Sage Monarch
Author: Divine Dreamwalker
Date: 2021-11-16T07:35:57+00:00

Chapter 1: Befuddled by Love

Energy is the essence of all life.

Energy arts are the means by which to cultivate the essence of life.

Reaching the peak of cultivation brings a host of fantastic and amazing abilities.

Energy arts experts could break walls with their hands, hear sounds as quiet as the footsteps of an ant, walk on water, breathe fire, become impervious to all sorts of weapons, fuse their energy with the clouds, sustain themselves by absorbing energy instead of eating food, and even track enemies by locking down onto their souls….

Rich-Lush Continent. Yanhaven.

It was a populous and affluent place; despite it being nighttime, streams of horses and carriages could be seen on the streets, and the city was bathed with bright lamplight.

It was midsummer, and dark clouds filled the night sky. The muffled rumble of thunder could be heard in the distance, and from the dense humidity in the air, it seemed rain would begin to fall soon.

In a relatively remote corner of the city, the ground suddenly shuddered, and then a hole exploded into being.

A young man leaped out of the hole, as agile as a cat. He appeared to be about seventeen or eighteen years of age, was dressed head to toe in black clothing, and was carrying an exquisitely crafted box.

This young man was Yang Qi who, like many others, cultivated energy arts.

He was a young master from the aristocratic Yang Clan of Yanhaven. He was also relatively famous within the city as a powerful master of energy arts. He wasn't very old, and wasn’t necessarily tall and well-built. But from his every move and action, it was obvious the mysterious energy flowing through him was ready to erupt out at any moment.

As he stood there at the edge of the hole, he circulated his energy, and intense rumbling sounds could be heard, shocking to the extreme.

“I guess it won’t be long before I reach the fifth phase of energy arts, the Energy Eruption level. Then I’ll be able to cast my true energy outside of my body. That will make me a real expert! My progress will be incredible!”

He glanced back at the towering city wall, looking very pleased at having circumvented it the way he did. Then he blurred into motion, disappearing like a black panther into the dark forest surrounding the city.

Yang Qi had long since cultivated his energy arts to the fourth phase, the Energy Refinement level.

On the Rich-Lush Continent, experts who cultivated energy arts divided them into nine phases.

First was Energy Growth, in which one built up energy in the body.

Second was Energy Circulation, in which one sent vital energy flowing through one’s meridian channels.

Third was Energy Convergence, when the vital energy was gathered in a central location, the sea of energy.

Fourth was Energy Refinement, in which the gathered vital energy was refined and purified.

Fifth was Energy Eruption. In that phase, one could use energy arts externally to harm enemies.

The first four phases —Absorption, Circulation, Convergence, and Refinement— were all internal, and although they could be used to strengthen one's body, did little else. Upon reaching the fifth phase, Energy Eruption, one’s body was completely transformed, making it possible to unleash energy arts in combat.

Only upon reaching the Energy Eruption level, could one be considered to be a truly powerful expert.

Thus, the fifth phase was considered a major watershed point in the cultivation of energy arts.

In that level, it was possible to unleash the Hundred Paces Divine Fist, a technique that could inflict damage a hundred paces away, even to the point of shattering trees. Such battle prowess was so extraordinary that one person who wielded it could defeat a hundred who could not.

The sixth phase was called the Energy Weapon level, in which one could use energy to form corporeal weapons.

The seventh level was the Energy Manifestation level. In that phase, energy arts could be used to summon ferocious beasts, or wings that could send one flying through the sky.

The eighth phase, Energy Incarnation, led to an ability called Mind Incarnation, in which the practitioner could create a defensive energy barrier of nearly impenetrable strength.

The ninth phase was called the Master of Energy level. Unfortunately, Yang Qi was very unlikely to ever become such a grandmaster of energy arts.

According to the rumors, experts in the Master of Energy level could eventually seize life from the heavens, and thus reach the Lifeseizing level. Lifeseizers essentially experienced a rebirth, and would acquire a lifespan multiple times longer than ordinary energy arts practitioners. Yang Qi had never even seen a person like that.

**

After running through the forest for a short time, Yang Qi caught sight of a young woman in an azure garment, standing there proudly, her back to him.

“Lan’er!” he called out. “I got the Latent Dragon Pill! It wasn’t easy, but thanks to my connections in the city, I managed to get into the city magistrate’s mansion, break into his treasure-house, and steal the pill!”

Looking excitedly at the young woman, he held out the crafted box he had been carrying this entire time.

The young woman turned, revealing a spectacularly beautiful face.

“So, Yang Qi, you finally succeeded.” Reaching out with fingers as beautiful as ivory, she said, “Hand it over so I can take a look.”

“Alright.” Without the slightest hesitation, Yang Qi handed the box to the young woman.

She took it, then opened it to reveal a fiery-red medicinal pill. A medicinal aroma immediately filled the area, and the pill itself seemed to flicker as if with flames, casting red light onto the young woman’s face, making her look even more attractive than before.

“Okay, Lan’er,” Yang Qi said. “I got you the Latent Dragon Pill. Now we can run off together like you promised, right? Come on, let’s get going.”

“I'm sorry, Yang Qi,” she said, tucking the box away into her garment. Looking at him coldly, she continued, “I have an important matter to attend to, so I won’t be running off with you. In fact, don't ever bring up the subject again.”

Her words struck him like a lightning bolt falling from blue skies.

Staggering backward a few paces, his face draining of blood, he said, “Lan’er, I put myself in great danger for you! I stole a Latent Dragon Pill from the city magistrate’s mansion, all because you said we would run off together. Now you’re changing your mind? Why? Why would you do something like this?”

Suddenly, a voice sounded out, “How about I explain?" A moment later, a figure emerged from the darkness of the forest. He was a handsome young man, tall and strapping, clad in a suit of armor. From the way he looked down his nose at Yang Qi, it was obvious how much of an arrogant and haughty person he was.

“Do you really think that Lan’er, a stunning princess of Yundale-by-the-Sea, would care about a little punk from the Yang Clan? Your clan might be important in Yanhaven, but let me tell you this: Not even the princes of Yanhaven would think of trying to pursue Lan’er. She used you! Understand, you naive fool? You know the saying about the ugly toad lusting after the swan? That's you!”

“Is all this true, Lan’er?” Yang Qi asked, his face ashen, but still holding onto whatever faint scraps of hope still existed in his heart.

However, the next thing Lan’er said crushed that hope out of existence.

Face incomparably cold, she said, “It's true, Yang Qi. I used you to get the Latent Dragon Pill. That having been said, I don't want to hurt you, so why don’t you just leave.”

“You….” Yang Qi was trembling, and his hands and feet were already as cold as ice. “How could you be like this, Lan’er? Go? Where am I supposed to go to? I stole a Latent Dragon Pill! I can’t go back home, and the guards from Yanhaven are probably already chasing after me. How about you at least give the Latent Dragon Pill back to me, and we call it even?”

The young man in the armor laughed coldly. “Give it back to you? Quit dreaming, punk. Who in their right mind would spit their meat out after taking a bite? Beat it. If you even think about stirring up trouble, I’ll make you regret it….”

“You….” Without any warning, Yang Qi suddenly exploded into action. As powerful as a tiger, and as lithe as a snake, he lunged at the armored young man, his hands swinging through the air with axe-like viciousness.

“Corpse-Chomping White Tiger!” he shouted, immediately resorting to a deadly energy art move unique to the Yang Clan. At its highest level, this energy art could be used to summon an enormous white tiger, fiendish to the extreme and strong enough to reduce any enemy to nothing more than a corpse. Of course, Yang Qi was far from being able to use it in that way.

“Looking to die?” the armored young man said, his eyes flickering with scorn.

Whoosh!

A transparent wave of energy shot out from his hand, slamming into Yang Qi. Before he could even fully execute his Corpse-Chomping White Tiger, he was slammed into the ground, where he vomited up a mouthful of blood.

Eyes shining with shock, he looked up and said, “You’re in the fifth phase of energy arts, the Energy Eruption level….”

“That’s right,” the armored young man replied. “To me, you’re like nothing more than an ant. “Corpse-Chomping White Tiger is a deadly move, but when you use it, you look like a kid play-fighting with his friends.”

Yang Qi struggled to his feet. Eyes flickering with hatred, he said, “Who are you…?”

“I'm Song Haishan, Lan’er’s older cousin. Only a few days ago, she was accepted to be an advanced disciple in the number one organization in Rich-Lush Continent, the Demi-Immortal Institute. Do you know how important that makes her? You really think you have any hope of getting close to her? Wait… did you ask who I was because you think you’re going to come after me for revenge? Hm. As the saying goes, if you cut the grass but not the root, it will grow again when the spring breeze blows. I guess letting you go free isn't really an option.”

Even as the words were leaving his mouth, Song Haishan’s energy began to build up inside of him.

“So,” Yang Qi growled, “you’re the one they call the best of the best in Yundale-by-the-Sea. Well, I'm still going to kill you. And as for you, Yun Hailan, you lied to me, and I swear that one day, I'm going to pay you back for that.”

“Seems leaving you alive is definitely the wrong thing to do….” Song Haishan growled, preparing to take action.

“Enough, cousin,” Yun Hailan said, reaching out to block his path. Then she looked in the direction of Yanhaven. “The guards are already on their way. There’s no reason to kill him. Come on, let’s go….” With that, she vanished into the night, leaving behind a single sentence. “After I'm a disciple at the Demi-Immortal Institute, Yang Qi, I’ll make this up to you.”

Song Haishan looked at Yang Qi with a sneer. “Hmph. Looks like you get to live a bit longer, punk. Lan’er doesn’t want you dead because she doesn’t want your blood on her hands. Fine. But the city magistrate of Yanhaven isn’t going to let you off the hook. So you won’t be alive for much longer regardless.”

Chuckling in sinister fashion, he turned to follow Yun Hailan.

“Yun Hailan….” Yang Qi murmured. Spitting out some blood, he looked in the direction into which she and Song Haishan had just vanished, fully aware that they were far superior to him in terms of energy arts.

Suddenly, he thought back to everything that had led up to this point. In the course of helping with the clan business, he had encountered Yun Hailan, whom he had fallen for at first sight. She treated him with tenderness and compassion for a time, whereupon she asked for his help to get the Latent Dragon Pill. He had pondered the matter for some time before making his decision. And now, here he was.

As he stood there, he circulated his energy arts and tried to decide what to do. He knew that the city guards of Yanhaven were coming for him. He had brought humiliation to his clan, and would surely be severely punished if he were caught.

As he was trying to recover, he suddenly heard voices. And then, only a moment later, several figures appeared in front of him.

One of them was a man wearing a suit of cold-forged iron armor that weighed no less than a hundred pounds, making him look like a vicious beast. As soon as Yang Qi saw that armored man, his heart sank into despair.

He was Luo Hun, one of the special guards from the city magistrate’s mansion, a brutal and fierce man whose cultivation had long since surpassed the Energy Eruption level.

“Hand over the Latent Dragon Pill you stole, Yang Qi. If you do, I’ll spare your life….”

Luo Hun’s eyes glittered like an animal’s, not a human’s, and his cold-forged iron armor radiated a powerful killing aura. Not waiting for a response, he stepped forward and struck Yang Qi’s dantian region with a palm strike, aiming directly at his sea of energy.

Yet again, blood sprayed out of Yang Qi’s mouth as the energy arts he had cultivated from the age of five to eighteen were crippled.

“You… crippled my energy arts…?” A look of complete despair overtook his face. With the sea of energy in his dantian region destroyed, it would be impossible for him to converge energy. Henceforth, he would be doomed to be nothing more than an ordinary person.

“You had the audacity to steal a Latent Dragon Pill,” Luo Hun said coldly. “Crippling your energy arts is actually letting you off a bit lightly. Because you’re a young master of the Yang Clan, and also for the sake of your aunt, I won’t put you to death immediately. Men, tie him up against that tree. I'm going back to the city to report to the magistrate and get new orders. Stay here and preserve the scene of the crime. I’ll have some people from the Yang Clan come out to take a look at the situation.”

“Yes sir,” replied the other special guards. Without any hesitation, they tied Yang Qi up against a nearby tree, and then began to patrol the area.

As for Luo Hun, it didn't matter that he was wearing a suit of cold-forged iron armor that weighed over a hundred pounds. He sped into motion like a bird taking flight, heading directly back toward Yanhaven.

Around then, numerous bolts of lightning began to crackle in the dark sky above. The rain that had been brewing all this time seemed to have reached a boiling point, and began to fall, joined by the lightning, which looked like silver snakes lashing at the ground.

“This rain is really heavy,” said one of the guards, looking up nervously. “And what’s with all the lightning?”

Suddenly, a bolt of lightning smashed into a distant tree, causing it to burst into flame despite the heavy rain. The sight of so much lightning falling within the rain was truly a frightening sight.

Looking completely frightened, another guard said, “This lightning really seems strange. I’ve never seen anything like it. I've heard that not even people in the Master of Energy level can survive being struck by heavenly lightning like this. If we stay in this forest, we’re going to get killed! Let’s get out of here!”

“What about this little punk?”

“Don’t worry, his martial arts have been crippled. Besides, he's all tied up. How could he possibly escape? Flying?”

Shivering in fear, the guards turned and fled.

However, even as they made their way out of the trees, a brilliantly shining bolt of lightning fell into the forest and smashed into the tree upon which Yang Qi had been bound.

Instantly, Yang Qi’s entire body filled with glittering electricity. Then, the smell of burning flesh filled the air.

Chapter 2: Profiting from a Disaster

Yang Qi couldn’t have been more demoralized.

With a single palm strike, Luo Hun crippled his sea of energy, destroying his energy arts and ensuring that his cultivation base had no hope of ever progressing.

And who could ever have guessed that he would then have the misfortune of being struck by lightning?

As the mighty lightning bolt slammed into the tree, and then him, his eyes felt like they were going to explode, forcing him to close them.

‘Am I going to die?’ he thought. ‘Well, I guess that would be good. Then I wouldn’t have to endure being a laughingstock the rest of my life.’

As the lightning entered his body, he felt unprecedented pain and heat, as though millions upon millions of blades were slicing into his flesh and bones.

However, he didn’t die. The power of the lightning ripped through his muscles, his skeleton, and his meridians, eventually causing a vortex to spring up in his dantian region.

As a result, his destroyed sea of energy suddenly underwent strange and bizarre transformations. The spiraling electricity began to assume a shape, until it looked like a violent, berserk mammoth, almost dragon-like in its ferocity.

If anyone had been able to witness what was happening inside of him, they would have seen what looked like an enormous mammoth made of lightning, trumpeting like mad.

The lightning did not dissipate; it coursed down through the tree into Yang Qi, causing the tree to burst into flame.

Eventually, Yang Qi saw a tiny golden person in the lightning, who flew directly into his forehead. After that, his mind felt like it was bulging on the verge of exploding, whereupon he passed out.

The guards, who were out of the forest by this time, were all visibly taken aback. They were close enough to have clearly seen the lightning striking the tree and catching it on fire. And they could even see Yang Qi slumped down into the mud, seemingly dead.

“What do we do now?” said one of the guards.

“Him getting struck by lightning doesn’t have anything to do with us,” said another.

“You go back to the city to report the matter to the exalted Luo Hun. The kid committed an unforgivable crime, but he does come from a rich and powerful clan, after all. If he dies like this and the matter isn't handled properly, it could cause big problems in Yanhaven.”

One of the other guards immediately turned to run back to the city.

However, before he could take more than a few steps, he saw a hulking figure up ahead, clad in metal armor.

Breaking out in a cold sweat, the guard flopped down into the mud. “Luo Hun, sir!”

“Struck dead by lightning…?” Luo Hun muttered, his eyes flashing like an animal’s as he walked up to Yang Qi. Reaching out with his hand, he sent a stream of energy into Yang Qi, only to find nothing unusual. His meridians and sea of energy were still destroyed, and his body was charred and blackened. “He was injured by the lightning strike, and his meridians and sea of energy are completely destroyed. But he’s alive.”

“Really?”

Even as Luo Hun inspected Yang Qi, a handful of men strode up, clad in luxuriously-tailored garments. They were important people from Yanhaven, one of which had long white hair, and seemed to be a steward from one of the clans in the city. After examining Yang Qi, he said, “Well, now we don’t have to bring this punk back for questioning. And we certainly don’t have to execute him. Send him back to the Yang Clan, and while you’re at it, send them this message from the city magistrate: because a Yang Clan delinquent stole a Latent Dragon Pill, the Yang Clan will provide full compensation, even if they have to sell every last belonging.”

“Yes sir!” The guards grabbed Yang Qi and began to drag him back to Yanhaven.

The night passed quickly, and soon, it was a bright, sunny day.

The violent storm the night before had destroyed a lot of crops and livestock, and the mighty Yan River outside of the city had flooded. But now, the rain was passed, and the temperature was already rising.

The Yang Clan, one of the most rich and powerful clans in Yanhaven, was completely abuzz. Servants scurried back and forth, the special guards were on high alert, and the servant girls, handmaidens, and older female servants were whispering amongst themselves in every corner of the clan.

A sharp-tongued old woman was currently in the middle of giving a vivid account of what had occurred, and although she tried to keep her voice down, it was impossible for her to hide her gloating smirk.

“Something major is going down for our Yang Clan, did you hear? Last night, Clan Lord Yang Zhan’s son Yang Qi stole a treasure from the city magistrate. He got beat up half to death, had his energy arts crippled, and was bound to a tree. Then he got struck by lightning! After they brought him back, he lay in bed all night, struggling to breathe. He could die at any moment….”

Next to speak was one of the more faithful servants to the clan. “That’s right. And the city magistrate issued an ultimatum. The Yang Clan has three days to pay back the price of the stolen treasure, which means that the clan is going to go almost completely bankrupt….”

Many of the young servant girls were completely bowled over by that news. “The clan’s going to go bankrupt? How will we ever recover?”

“What about the other rich and powerful clans? Chen, Wang, Hong, and Li? They’ve never liked our Yang Clan, and will definitely jump at the chance to hit us while we’re down.”

“Yeah, the Yang Clan is in big trouble this time. That silkpants Yang Qi didn’t think at all about what he was doing, and ended up causing a huge disaster. Heh heh. His father Yang Zhan is the clan lord, but I bet his position isn’t going to be very stable after this.”

“Someone who works for the city magistrate told me that Yang Qi did it for a girl. That’s why he stole the treasure.”

“Bah! Silkpants like him are the most wicked scoundrels of all. They always cause problems!” One of the servants even went so far as to say, “It’s good thing his energy arts were crippled. Without any martial arts, he’ll be completely useless.”

Some of the servants were gloating in Yang Qi’s misfortune, others worried about the future of the clan, and some even cursed Yang Qi.

Meanwhile, in a courtyard in the middle of the clan, which was nested in a maze of corridors and verandas, a tall, well-built man in brocaded clothing stood listening to a report about the situation.

A doctor was currently speaking. “Lord, Young Master Yang Qi has been stabilized. But he suffered burns across almost his entire body. His meridians were destroyed and his sea of energy shattered. His martial arts were completely crippled! He’s going to be handicapped for the rest of his life!”

"Crippled his martial arts?” Yang Zhan said. “Destroyed his sea of energy…?”

BANG!

A massive palm strike smashed a nearby table into bits.

Splinters whistled through the air like wailing ghosts, many of them embedding into the ground nearby.

“The Yang Clan can compensate for a lost Latent Dragon Pill,” Yang Zhan continued, fuming. “But why did they have to cripple my son’s energy arts? Even cutting his arm off would have been better. With a limb lost, but his energy arts intact, he could still become a top expert. With crippled energy arts, he’ll never be able to converge energy.”

Also present was the clan steward. “Lord, what's done is done. There’s nothing we can do about it now. The critical matter at hand is that the city magistrate has demanded compensation for the Latent Dragon Pill. I'm afraid the chief elders won’t just stand by while the clan goes bankrupt. Someone is definitely going to take advantage of this situation to try to seize power….”

Yang Zhan snorted coldly. “Remember why I was able to seize the position of clan lord to begin with? It wasn’t by plotting, scheming and building alliances. It was because my energy arts and cultivation base were unmatchable. And that’s how things will remain. Let’s see if any of them are strong enough to take me out. Notify the chief elders that we’re going to have a clan forum in three days. We’ll talk things out with the subsidiary branches and figure out what to do. The city magistrate has given us enough time to raise the necessary money.”

“Yes, sir,” the steward said, nodding. He turned to leave, then stopped and asked, “What about Young Master Yang Qi? Considering the trouble he's caused, the chief elders definitely won't let him off the hook.”

“His martial arts were crippled and he was struck by lightning!” Yang Zhan said angrily. “Not even the city magistrate is interested in him. What are the chief elders going to do? Have him executed? If anybody dares to suggest laying a hand on my son, I won’t take the matter lying down. Another thing: I'm going to write a letter that I want delivered to Yang Qi’s aunt in the Demi-Immortal Institute.”

The steward's eyes brightened. “Right! How could I have forgotten that we have the Young Lady on our side?”

The Young Lady he referred to was Yang Zhan’s adoptive sister, and thus Yang Qi’s aunt. She was a member of the number one most domineering organization on the Rich-Lush Continent, the Demi-Immortal Institute, which gave her a very different identity than in the past. She had been away from the Yang Clan for ten years, and was spectacularly talented. After all, she had been tutored in cultivation by one of the elders of the Demi-Immortal Institute since she was very young.

“Divine Doctor Cao, how badly is Qi’er hurt?” Yang Zhan asked. “Is there any medicine that can wake him up? Your medical expertise is spoken of everywhere in Yanhaven. You must know of a way to treat his injuries.”

“I've applied a topical ointment,” the doctor replied, “and used my energy arts to perform a medical massage. He should be back on his feet in a few days. His organs weren’t damaged, just his meridians and sea of energy. Of course, he won't be able to practice cultivation after this.”

“Give ten energy convergence pills to Divine Doctor Cao as a reward,” Yang Zhan said, waving his hand. “When Qi’er wakes up, I’ll call for you again, doctor.”

Energy convergence pills were treated as currency in all of the shops and markets in the Rich-Lush Continent. They could also be used during the cultivation of energy arts to gather true energy, nourish the meridians, and expand the sea of energy.

“Yes sir….” the old steward said, leading the doctor away.

Yang Zhan remained behind. Clenching his hands into fists, he murmured, “Qi’er, your mother left so early. And now we're facing some major bad luck. I’ll do everything I can think of to restore your sea of energy, and make sure you can practice cultivation again. In the world we live in, it’s not an option to be so weak….”

In another location deep within the Yang Clan, Yang Qi was awake and laying there quietly in bed.

The room was adorned with red velvet furnishings and expensive, ancient paintings. There was even a copper incense burner decorated with turtles and cranes, burning a very expensive type of incense. The level of wealth on display was staggering.

It was hot outside, but a cool breeze drifted by the room, its source being the large, mist-covered pond there. Trees next to the pond provided shade, and there were also numerous blocks of ice which had been placed in the area to provide further cooling. Next to the door was a young servant girl about eleven or twelve years old, whose head continued to bob up and down as she fought the urge to sleep.

Yang Qi was no longer in pain. As he laid there, he attempted to ascertain what the lightning strike had done to him. When he closed his eyes, he could see what appeared to be a fist-sized mammoth made of lightning, resting in his sea of energy. Virtually any outside stimuli would cause the mammoth to suddenly shrink down until it was a tiny dot, which was a good thing, because any powerful experts who examined him would notice nothing unusual.

Yang Qi could sense that the lightning mammoth contained massive destructive power, power so great that, if he could somehow release it in an attack, it would probably destroy the entire mansion he was in.

He had been struck by lightning, but hadn’t died; instead, the electricity entered him and took the shape of a mammoth and an imp. No matter how Yang Qi considered the situation, he couldn’t come up with any explanation of what was going on.

At one point, Yang Qi circulated his energy, and the golden imp appeared in his forehead.

The imp then spoke into his mind, in a stentorian voice that no one else could hear.

“Fail to succeed, break to found. Unparalleled under heaven….”

Chapter 3: Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth

“Fail to succeed, break to found. Unparalleled under heaven….”

The golden imp in Yang Qi’s forehead continued to repeat the same words over and over. As it did, Yang Qi did his best to communicate with it, but got no response other than those same words.

The imp had come to him through the lightning, almost like some sort of god or spirit, filling him with a sensation of indescribable grandness and mystery.

It was like having a nearly invincible and all-powerful master always there with him.

In the past, he had personally seen the city magistrate of Yanhaven, who had cultivated his energy arts all the way to the ninth phase, the Master of Energy level. The city magistrate was a man of incredible influence and authority, and yet the power Yang Qi sensed from the golden imp far surpassed that.

As he attempted to make a connection with the imp, a stream of textual symbols suddenly poured out of it, accompanied by physical images. They poured directly into Yang Qi’s sea of consciousness, revealing themselves as an energy art technique.

Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth

“Use energy to summon the god, which then becomes a mammoth; one’s every act and movement will have the power of a megamammoth; formed from eight hundred forty million particles, which are the home of that power; if all the particles are awakened, one can become like a godmammoth, overturning seas and rivers, dragging stars down from the sky, devouring moons and suns, all with a single thought….”

To have the text suddenly pouring into his mind was so startling to Yang Qi that he nearly leaped to his feet.

“What technique is this? It’s on a completely different level than the energy arts our Yang Clan cultivate. It must be millions of times beyond ours….”

The truth was that the energy arts practiced by the Yang Clan were actually considered quite advanced. Yang Qi’s father Yang Zhan had already reached the eighth phase, the Energy Incarnation level,  and was considered one of the top masters in Yanhaven, with only the city magistrate himself being far above him.

‘Godmammoths?’ Yang Qi thought. ‘Godmammoths…. According to the rumors, there is another land mass far to the west of the Rich-Lush Continent, with a very hot climate. Supposedly, they worship elephants and mammoths as gods. I’ve even heard stories that there’s another location in the west with an endless hell that people use godmammoths to suppress and crush. Perhaps this Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth is some superb technique from the west.’

The truth was that Yang Qi was not some hedonistic silkpants. He was actually one of the most elite young ones of his generation. His cultivation base had once been fairly good, to the point where he was on the edge of the Energy Eruption level, nearly able to utilize the Hundred Paces Divine Fist. Sadly, his judgement had become clouded by love, and thanks to being deceived by Yun Hailan, he ended up in his current state.

Generally speaking, though, he was intelligent and quite well-informed.

As such, he could immediately tell that the technique the golden imp had imparted to him was extraordinary. Most energy arts involved circulating and converging energy within the meridians. However, this Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth was different. It viewed the body as being composed of eight hundred forty million tiny particles, each one of which was a sleeping megamammoth. When all of that power was awoken and combined, it would be enough to tear stars out of the sky.

‘Hell-Crushing Godmammoth,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘Apparently, godmammoths are so powerful they can crush a never-ending hell. What exact level of power is that? I guess I profited from that disaster of mine. I acquired a remarkable ability that has the potential to push me far beyond my previous level. It really is a case of fail to succeed, break to found. Unparalleled under heaven….’

Without any further hesitation, he began to practice cultivation according to the methods of the technique.

As he did, countless strands of vital energy began to circulate throughout his body, which caused the lightning mammoth in his dantian region to stir in excitement. Vital energy began to stream out of it, causing it to slowly shrink. Meanwhile, that energy entered Yang Qi’s fleshly body and began to transform it.

As Yang Qi sat there with his eyes closed, he could sense his body changing, and could hear something like creaking and cracking sounds. All of his damaged meridians were slowly being repaired, as was his sea of energy. In fact, as the process continued, they grew stronger than before.

Ordinarily, the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth was an apex-level technique that was incredibly difficult to cultivate. Even unusually intelligent people with superb innate talents would be unable to succeed with it unless they had some outside enlightenment. However, because of being struck by lightning, Yang Qi actually had a lightning mammoth inside of him, and every time he circulated his energy, some of it would be absorbed into him. Because of that, his cultivation speed was far faster than that of an ordinary person. A day of cultivation for him was like ten years of hard work for others.

As time went on, Yang Qi could sense the power building up inside of him, and his energy arts being restored. As he advance by leaps and bounds, his active mind was spun with theories about why all of this was happening.

“People say that some top experts will provoke reactions from the heavens during the course of their cultivation. Sometimes, lightning will even strike them. Could it be that some consummate expert was struck by lightning, transformed into a golden imp, and then later fell with lightning onto me, taking up residence in my forehead? Is the lightning mammoth a representation of his vital energy and energy arts?”

The imp apparently existed in a state between something physical and something formed from vital energy. It was almost like a spirit or god, and was something that Yang Qi couldn’t take control of. After imparting the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth to him, it remained silent and unmoving, almost as if it were in a state of rest and recovery.

He tried several more times to communicate with it, but even after multiple attempts, got no response.

Yang Qi then decided to focus completely on mastering the new energy art he had been given, and on absorbing the lightning mammoth.

The power of the lightning mammoth was terrifying, and in fact, Yang Qi had no idea what his cultivation base would be like if he absorbed it all.

At some point during Yang Qi’s meditation, the servant girl outside woke up and looked over at him in surprise.

“Young Master, are you awake?”

Yesterday, he had been half-dead and gasping for breath. But now, in spite of the fact that he was still wrapped in all sorts of bandages, he seemed to be in high spirits and full of energy.

“What's wrong, Little Yan?” Yang Qi said calmly. “Don’t worry, I’m not dead yet!”

“Young Master, your father ordered that you were to go see him as soon as you were awake.” Little Yan was only twelve, and was as fair and charming of a girl as could be imagined. She had served Yang Qi for a long time, and had always viewed him as a good person. After all, he never bullied her like most young masters would their servants. He was also one of the elite young ones in Yanhaven. But now, he had suffered a major calamity, and had brought the clan to the brink of bankruptcy. And he himself was now a cripple.

“Alright, I’ll go see father.” Yang Qi rose to his feet to find that the pain which had previously wracked him was now mostly gone. Instead, he felt like he was thrumming with power. However, he still tried to make himself look so weak that he could barely stand.

“Young Master,” Little Yan said, sounding worried, “I heard that your energy arts are gone…. If you’re feeling weak, why don’t you—”

“Don’t worry, Little Yan. When did I ever allow people to just bully me? The people who hurt me will be punished, and the clan will be revitalized….”

Little Yan nodded vigorously. “Alright, I believe you, Young Master.”

As Yang Qi made his way through the labyrinthine corridors of the Yang Clan, he could hear what people were whispering about him. Most of them cursed him for being a hedonistic silkpants who had undermined his own clan.

He wasn’t bothered by such talk. If his martial arts truly had been wiped out, and he had no hope of recovery, he would definitely have sunk into despair. But now that he could cultivate the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, he had hope of restoring his martial arts. Better, his progress would come with incredible speed, and he would be even more powerful than before.

Now, he had hope and anticipation. Filled with thoughts of cultivating the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth to the very peak, he could walk with head held high, assured that he would be able to clear his name and restore the glory and honor of the clan.

After arriving at the official hall of business, he saw his father standing there as tall and straight as a mountain.

He immediately dropped to his knees. “I've been an unfilial son, Father, and have brought great trouble to the clan. Please, do not go lightly in my punishment….”

When Yang Zhan saw that his son was in high spirits, and didn’t seem dejected at all, a smile broke out on his face.  “What are you doing here so soon? You've already recovered from your injuries? I already know the story behind the Latent Dragon Pill. You stole it for Yun Hailan, princess of Yundale-by-the-Sea, didn’t you? She’s been in a cultivation bottleneck for a while now, and wanted that pill to help her achieve a breakthrough, all in the hopes of becoming a disciple of the Demi-Immortal Institute. I can't blame you for that, son. What youngster doesn’t do something stupid for love at some point? In fact, I hope this will help you to grow up a bit. In any case, I’ll help you deal with the fallout, and no matter what happens, I’ll do my best to help you recover properly. Your mother left when you were young, and your cultivation success up to this point has been a result of your own hard work. You might have caused a disaster because of love, but no matter how many people threaten to hurt or kill you because of it, I understand what you did.”

Feeling warmth in his heart, Yang Qi said, “Father, you just watch, I'm going to make you proud eventually. And I’ll definitely restore the glory of the clan.”

Yang Zhan nodded. “Very well. Your eldest brother and second brother have been notified of what happened, and are hurrying back to see you. I've also sent a letter to your aunt to explain. She’s been away for ten years, but she’ll definitely do everything she can to help us get through the coming crisis. Don’t worry about any of it. You focus on recovering, and after everything has blown over, I’ll help you restore your sea of energy.”

Yang Qi rose to his feet, stepped back a few paces, and then clasped hands.

‘Father would be happy to know about my major cultivation base progress,’ he thought. ‘But I can’t reveal the matter of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. If word leaked, it would definitely lead to a bloodbath, and would harm father's position in the clan.’

Yang Qi was no idiot, and was definitely not a typical silkpants. Although he had acted with impulsive, youthful foolishness because of Yun Hailan, he had learned his lesson. The incident had already caused his heart to turn colder, and had propelled him to a new level of maturity and calmness.

Later that night, the sky was absolutely clear, revealing the brilliant moon above.

Yang Qi was alone at the top of a low-lying mountain, quietly practicing cultivation. Slipping from stance to stance, he was going through the moves that made up the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.

His movements were smooth and fluid, like the flowing waters of a river, and caused occasional rumbling sounds to echo out. His muscles were as taut as iron, and beneath the light of the moon, his aura was like soft jade. There didn’t seem to be any indication at all that he had been struck by lightning.

In fact, if one looked closely, his aura seemed like an enraged, fearless mammoth.

BOOM!

As he practiced his strikes and kicks, the explosive sounds of his blows filled the air.

Wind swirled around him, rising up into the air until a vortex spun in the area, with him at the center.

“Hundred Paces Divine Fist!” he growled. His energy arts surged, projecting force out of him and causing an enormous, bowl-thick tree about a hundred paces away to snap in half, sending leaves flying about in all directions.

“Unleash the energy arts externally with explosive force. The Hundred Paces Divine Fist can snap trees and smash boulders….” As of this moment, Yang Qi knew beyond doubt that he had reached the higher level he had sought after for so long.

Chapter 4: Energy Eruption Level

“I can’t believe I broke through to the next level so quickly. I'm in the fifth phase of energy arts! The Energy Eruption level!”

He struck out with his fist, and a hundred paces away, another tree snapped in half. Afterward, Yang Qi looked down with wide eyes at his hand, and sensed that his vital energy had reached the point of being able to disregard all favors or humiliations.

Only one day and one night had passed, and he had transformed as surely as if he had been transported from hell to heaven. First he stole the Latent Dragon Pill, then he was betrayed by Yun Hailan. Next, his martial arts were crippled, and he was struck by lightning.

Later, he found that being struck by lightning had been extremely fortuitous; he had acquired the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, and had his cultivation base bolstered by the vital energy of the lightning mammoth inside him. And now, he had broken through to the Energy Eruption level.

Even better, he was certain that the overall level of his energy arts actually surpassed the Energy Eruption level.

Most experts could unleash their energy externally to some degree after reaching the Energy Eruption level. But most could do little more than cause a tree to sway back and forth with a ranged fist strike. Damaging or destroying a tree was a completely different matter.

It was only common to be able to unleash the Hundred Paces Divine Fist after reaching the peak of the Energy Eruption level, or perhaps after entering the Energy Weapon level. In any case, a profound cultivation base was required to release such devastating force.

Yang Qi could also tell that his physical body was stronger than the day before. He really had experienced a complete transformation both inside and out. He took another step forward, and unleashed his energy arts to crush a boulder with a kick. This was the true power that came with energy arts.

“The people who mocked and laughed at me could never have guessed that I would only remain a cripple for a day. Not only did I reach the highest level of enlightenment, I made dramatic progress! At the clan forum in three days, there will definitely be some attempts to force my father to abdicate. Instead, I’ll make sure he comes out stronger than ever!”

Of course, Yang Qi knew that despite having reached the Energy Eruption level and becoming a powerful expert, he didn’t count for much when compared to the other major experts in Yanhaven. For example, there was Luo Hun, the very man who had crippled him. He was already in the seventh phase of energy arts, the Energy Manifestation level, in which energy arts could manifest in physical form and allow one to fly through the air or swim through the water. A single fist strike from a person like that was like the attack of a dragon or a tiger.

‘I need to conceal the true level of my strength,’Yang Qi thought. ‘And I can’t reveal the truth about the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, nor any of its stances or moves. I’ll just use the energy art forms and stances of the Yang Clan. If anyone asks how I recovered so quickly, I’ll just say that it was thanks to my aunt.’

Having reached this point in his train of thought, Yang Qi suddenly found himself thinking about his aunt, whom he hadn’t seen in ten years. Back then, when she still wore her hair in twin braids, she had taught him how to read and write.

Even though he called her aunt, she wasn’t surnamed Yang; she was an orphan his grandfather had taken in. The only reason he called her aunt was that she was about three years older than him. For all intents and purposes, she was really his sister.

He had essentially grown up with his aunt, until one day when he was almost ten. That was when an eccentric expert traveling through Yanhaven had taken her away. Only later did he learn that the eccentric in question was an elder from the Demi-Immortal Institute, which was the top organization in the Rich-Lush Continent.

Back when she first arrived at the Demi-Immortal Institute, she had occasionally written him letters. However, he hadn’t heard from her for the past five or six years. Even still, everyone in Yanhaven knew that she was someone very important in the Yang Clan.

After all, the Demi-Immortal Institute was a major player in the Rich-Lush Continent, and was second only to the dominant power in all the lands, the Sage Ancestor Dynasty.

The Sage Ancestor Dynasty was essentially a feudal government. There was no true centralized state power, but instead, a host of vassal states. Separate locations held local jurisdiction, and had independent law, but on a yearly basis would send tribute to the Sage Ancestor Dynasty, and would dispatch representatives to offer worship.

Yanhaven was only one of many tiny vassal states. The city magistrate there held ultimate sway over the area, and made all the decisions, which meant that the aristocratic clans in the city had no choice but to submit to him. As for all of the nearby towns, villages, marketplaces, and counties, they also fell under the jurisdiction of Yanhaven.

In some ways Yanhaven could actually be considered a nation of sorts, a State of Yan, although on a very small scale.

Compared to the Demi-Immortal Institute, Yanhaven was quite insignificant. One was like a rabbit, the other, a tiger.

In the final analysis, the only reason that Yang Qi hadn’t been immediately executed for stealing the Latent Dragon Pill was his aunt, who was backed by the Demi-Immortal Institute. The city magistrate was simply too leery of offending her.

**

Golden Toad Eats the Moon

Fierce Tiger Leaps Over the Stream

Shatter the Heart, Crush the Lungs

Corpse-Chomping White Tiger

Yang Qi went through all of the forms of the energy arts he knew, until he was little more than a blur. As he did, his energy flowed inside of him faster and faster, and the lightning mammoth in his sea of energy continued to bolster his vital energy.

As for the essence of his life force, it grew more and more robust.

He continued with his practice, and his physical body grew stronger and more resilient.

Thanks to the transformation provided by the lightning strike, he was growing in unbelievable ways.

Over and over again, he released fist strikes that destroyed trees and rocks dozens of meters away.

Top experts in the fifth phase, the Energy Eruption level, could destroy things at such distance, but normally could not release strike after strike after strike. The drainage on vital energy was simply too significant.

But Yang Qi was different. He cultivated the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, a remarkable ability that could devastate devil-gods and devil-ghosts from hell. Not only was it a source of immense strength, it also provided incredible resilience.

The lightning mammoth, which was apparently formed from the quintessence of a powerful expert, was merging into Yang Qi, pushing his cultivation base to incredible heights.

If he fully assimilated it, then he would have enough vital energy to completely surpass any other ordinary person’s ability with the Hundred Paces Divine Fist. While they might be capable of ten strikes in a row, he could easily reach a hundred, or perhaps even a thousand.

The difference between those two levels was obvious.

And yet, Yang Qi still wasn’t happy. He wanted to be stronger, to reach the sixth phase, the seventh phase, the eighth phase, and eventually, the ninth phase, the Master of Energy level. He wanted to crush the city magistrate of Yanhaven, and make the Yang Clan the number one power in the area.

In the past, such goals would not have been reasonable, but now, they were within the realm of possibility.

The roaring trumpet of a megamammoth suddenly erupted inside of Yang Qi as he unleashed the ultimate level of fist strike possible for him. Afterward, he reined in his energy, which collected behind him to form the shadowy image of a megamammoth that then exploded, sending out a rushing wind that caused the leaves to rustle left and right on the low-lying mountain.

Yang Qi sat back down, closed his eyes, and sank into meditation. The power of the lightning mammoth flowed through him, and he began to use the cultivation techniques of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. First, he focused his thoughts on the eight hundred forty million tiny particles that made up his body, and the embryonic megamammoths inside of them, which could eventually give birth to a true godmammoth.

Godmammoths had heads like mountains, and trunks so many hundreds of millions of kilometers long that they could encompass stars.

Godmammoths’ feet could trample hells, and transform the devil-gods and devil-ghosts they contained into dust.

Such images, such thoughts, had been transferred into Yang Qi by the golden imp, a fundamental aspect of the cultivation of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.

As he slowly went about his cultivation, a popping sound could suddenly be heard from one of those tiny particles. Then, a chaotic, primeval aura, something beastly and ancient, began to spread out through him.

In that instant, flocks of birds suddenly shot up into the air from the numerous surrounding trees.

Moments ago, the surrounding forest had been alive with the calls of all sorts of bugs and insects, but when the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth’s aura suddenly awoke, it was as though all those bugs suddenly felt massive pressure weighing down on them, and went as still as death as a result.

Godmammoths were indeed divine spirits that had long existed in the west. They were filled with boundless power, enough to crush hells, and had murderous auras so intense that, with a single trumpet, they could cause all sorts of wild beasts to cower in fear. Even dragons and tigers would bow in allegiance to them.

As of this moment, Yang Qi had awoken one particle, and could use only a tiny scrap of the power of the godmammoths.

Currently, when Yang Qi used the full extent of his energy arts, he could unleash strength equivalent to a single ancient megamammoth.

But if he awoke all of the eight hundred forty million particles, then he would be able to unleash the hell-crushing power of the legendary godmammoths.

Yang Qi had just taken his first step on the path of that unmatchable and remarkable ability.

After taking that first step, he was convinced that this was an amazing ability that could lead to the highest heights and deepest depths. Of course, without the help of the lightning mammoth inside of him, he wouldn’t have been able to make such amazing progress, not in one day, and not in ten years.

Now, Yang Qi was almost like an ancient megamammoth in human form, with terrifying, deadly power inside of him, ready to be unleashed at any moment.

Rising slowly to his feet, Yang Qi retracted his aura, as well as the chaotic, primeval, and beastly aura.

Afterward, the petrified bugs and birds in the area calmed back down and returned to their previous activities.

The night was dark, but Yang Qi’s eyes glittered brightly, illuminating all of the details of the forest around him, even down to the feathers on the birds.

His hearing had now become so acute that he could even hear the ants a hundred paces away.

This was being able to hear sounds as quiet as the footsteps of an ant.

His ears were ten times as sensitive as before; the latent potential within him was truly being released.

“Eight hundred forty million tiny particles? If one of them makes me this strong, then how strong would I be if they were all awake? Also, considering that I'm advancing this quickly because of the lightning mammoth being inside of me, then after I absorb it, how will I continue to progress with the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth?”

Although he was very pleased with having become so strong, he also was a bit terrified of his new abilities. And he almost couldn’t imagine how anyone could cultivate this technique to completion.

It was almost like a cultivation path designed, not for humans, but for gods and spirits.

Only entities like that could possibly complete it.

Yang Qi had always been one of the elite young ones in the area, and had been somewhat arrogant as a result. Although he was very intelligent, it was his complete overconfidence that had led to him being tripped up by love, and betrayed by Yun Hailan. He had foolishly believed that stealing a Latent Dragon Pill would convince her to run off with him. Now that he thought about it, he had been a real fool. Thankfully, his father had forgiven him.

And now that he had begun to cultivate the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, he suddenly had true humility within his heart.

In the past, he had believed that he could cultivate any technique he wanted, and succeed. But with this ability, he suddenly felt very, very tiny.

Bit by bit, eighteen-year-old Yang Qi was starting to grow up.

Chapter 5: Yang Clan Forum

For three nights in a row, Yang Qi would slip out unnoticed to cultivate his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. During the daytime, he would pretend to convalesce, doing nothing to reveal his true state. As far as everyone could tell, he was a cripple, unable to recover from his injuries.

Fundamentally speaking, people who had their energy arts crippled would never be able to recover.

If he had done so suddenly, and even advanced by leaps and bounds with no explanation, it would definitely arouse suspicion. If experts from the city magistrate’s mansion began asking questions, and his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth were discovered, it could lead to the complete eradication of the entire Yang Clan.

The more Yang Qi cultivated this technique, the more he realized how profound and shocking it was.

He definitely needed to reach a much higher level of power before revealing anything about it.

During his three nights of cultivation, he grew stronger and stronger, as did his cultivation base. Virtually every move he made was capable of rending apart rocks and even metal. Although he still hadn’t unlocked a second particle, and with it the power of a second ancient megamammoth, he had already far surpassed ordinary masters of the fifth phase.

In fact, even if an entire group of fifth phase masters joined forces to fight him, he would cut them all down.

And the terrifying nature of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth was only beginning to be revealed.

As soon as Yang Qi reined in the technique and hid it, his meridians would wither up, and his vital energy would vanish, leaving his sea of energy completely empty.

Of course, the truth was that it was hidden within that single particle that he had awakened.

In some ways, his body was currently like the depths of hell, pitch black in a way that made it impossible for outsiders to gauge the level of his cultivation base. Anyone who examined him would think him to be nothing more than a cripple.

It was the power of the godmammoths, and the profundity of hell.

Considering how his cultivation was progressing, it wouldn’t be long before he reached the sixth phase, the Energy Weapon level. At that point, he would be able to use energy to form corporeal weapons, to use forces like sword energy to pierce powerful armor.

The Energy Weapon level far surpassed the fifth phase, and could unleash devastating force that was on a completely different level. Some experts who reached the fifth phase would be stuck there for their entire life, and would never enter the Energy Weapon level. Others who did reach that level would end up spending a decade or even longer before being able to form weapons with energy.

As for Yang Qi, despite being one of the elites of his generation, not even he was very familiar with how powerful Energy Weapon experts were.

During his three nights of cultivation, he made more attempts to establish communication with the golden imp in his forehead. However, the imp remained completely motionless, and didn’t respond at all.

Although the imp definitely existed inside of him, it almost seemed to exist in a different time and place, and would communicate with him only on its own terms.

“What's the deal with this thing? It's living in my forehead, and even gave me the matchless Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. Is it alive? Why is it ignoring me? Am I just too weak to communicate with it?” Questions piled upon questions in Yang Qi’s heart and mind.

In the end, there was nothing he could do about the fact that the imp was ignoring him.

Eventually, he gave up, and sat there in his room contemplating the profound mysteries of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.

**

On the morning after his third night of cultivation, the sun slowly began to rise.

The eight gates of Yanhaven opened, whereupon a caravan of horse carts began to thread through the city toward the Yang Clan mansion, which immediately aroused the attention of the cityfolk.

“What’s going on? Why are all those caravans heading toward the Yang Clan? Who are they?”

“Ah, you must not have heard. Those are the subsidiary branches of the Yang Clan. Look, do you see that caravan? That’s the Yang Clan branch from Zhaoluforth, led by Yang Zhen, the younger cousin of Yang Zhan. And see that caravan with the white tiger banners? That’s the Yang Clan branch from Baishiville, led by Yang Shi…”

“Something big happened three days ago in the Yang Clan. Yang Qi, the son of Clan Lord Yang Zhan, stole a valuable treasure from the city magistrate’s mansion. His martial arts ended up being crippled, and the city magistrate demanded the Yang Clan pay for the stolen treasure. That single treasure is as valuable as a whole city, so the Yang Clan obviously can’t afford to pay for it. They’re having a forum now to try to figure out what to do.”

“Pay for it? Can the Yang Clan’s chief elders actually figure out a way to do that? What a humiliation for them. Forget about the compensation! The Yang Clan is definitely going to be on the decline after this.”

“Why did Yang Zhan have to beget such an unfilial son…?”

The metal wheels of horse carts clattered across the stone roads of the city as they headed toward the Yang Clan.

The caravan with the white tiger banners was the first to come to a stop in front of the main gate of the Yang Clan mansion.

Then, the curtain of one of the carts parted as a middle-aged man stepped out, clad in richly embroidered leather, and a long cloak embroidered with golden thread. Although the sun was already hot in the sky, he radiated a chill that caused everything within a hundred paces of him to turn very cold.

This person cultivated energy arts based on frigid coldness, and had already reached a very high level with them.

He was the leader of the Yang Clan branch from Baishiville, Yang Shi.

Even as Yang Shi stepped out into the open, a few more carts came to a stop outside the gate, whereupon a young man and a young woman stepped out, who were his children. They were both considered young elites in the clan; in addition to their sharply glittering eyes, they had profoundly advanced cultivation bases.

“Father,” the young man said, “this is the opportunity we’ve been waiting for. Hmph. Yang Zhan has been leading the clan for ten years already. How could he possibly have the face to try to keep his position now?”

“That’s right, Father,” the young woman said.

Yang Shi waved his hand to forestall any further comments from his children. “We’ve arrived. We can talk more about it inside.”

As they all stood there in front of the mansion, they faced six enormous stone guardian lions, which seemed to stare at them with flashing eyes.

At that point, a voice floated out from another caravan, which had just arrived. “So, Yang Shi, you also have your eyes set on the leadership of the clan.”

A middle-aged man appeared, clad in a suit of armor that appeared to be crafted from jade and adorned with strips of silk. It was in fact nephrite, and was so strong that it could deflect all types of weapons, and even defend against energy art attacks.

This was Yang Zhen, who led the Yang Clan in Zhaoluforth.

“Unless Yang Zhan is deposed,” Yang Shi said, “all other talk is pointless.” He flicked his finger, causing a glittering, crystalline light to shoot out, smashing into the stone ground and leaving behind a host of ice-filled holes.

Yang Zhen in his nephrite armor definitely seemed impressed by Yang Shi’s frigid ice energy art. Waving his hand, he sent a blast of warm air out, melting the ice on the ground.

“Impressive. How advanced is your frigid ice energy art by now? Seventh phase? Eighth phase? Regardless, you can’t let your guard down. Yang Zhan’s cultivation base has long since reached the eighth phase. He can definitely use the Mind Incarnation ability!”

At this point, another caravan arrived, and a scholarly-looking man stepped out into the open holding a folding fan. “Why are the two of you talking things out already? Come on, let's go inside. Don’t give the city folk any more reason to deride us.”

The Yang Clan was definitely a rich and powerful clan, and the large square outside of their mansion was large enough to hold thousands of people. The green limestone slabs were scrubbed by the servants every day, leaving them shining and spotless.

“Yang Xu!” said Yang Shi, turning to face the man who spoke. From the look of things, he wasn’t quite ready to let things drop.

Yang Xu snapped open his fan. “Yang Zhan’s useless son has caused a big disaster for our clan! Not only are we a laughingstock, we’re in great danger. Before worrying about outside aggression, we need to settle our internal affairs! What's the point of fighting amongst ourselves? First let’s give Yang Zhan a chance to explain things.”

“Fine, let’s go,” Yang Shi said, his face softening a tiny bit. Without any further ado, they entered the Yang Clan mansion.

As more and more of the Yang Clan subsidiary branches arrived, powerful experts began to gather in the main courtyard in the mansion. There were even chief elders who normally spent their time traveling and practicing cultivation afar who had hurried back to the clan because of the situation, although they didn’t show their faces in public.

This clan forum would be attended by all of the clan’s most powerful leaders.

Meanwhile, in a certain room in the depths of the mansion, Yang Qi sat cross-legged, meditating. Suddenly, the servant girl Little Yan hurried in. “Young Master, this is bad! Experts from all the subsidiary branches are gathering in the main courtyard to discuss the clan's situation with Lord Yang Zhan. He sent me to tell you to head the courtyard immediately!”

“They're all here already?” Yang Qi said, slowly rising to his feet. “It's time to see how this thing is really going to play out.”

“Be careful, Young Master,” Little Yan said.

Yang Qi nodded, and once again made his way through the mansion to the meeting hall, where the other clan members had been led once the entire group assembled.

There were already about thirty adults gathered there, Yang Zhan included. Also present were a host of the clan’s elite young ones, nearly a hundred of them, standing behind the older ones.

Thankfully, the hall was actually large enough to fit hundreds, and therefore, didn’t feel crowded at all.

Despite the large number of people present, there was no din of excitement; the atmosphere was so tense that it was almost foggy.

As soon as Yang Qi stepped inside, well over a hundred pairs of burning eyes swiveled to lock onto him. Some of those eyes belonged to experts with such powerful energy arts that they could literally kill people by looking at them.

However, in response, the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth that was hidden deep inside of Yang Qi stirred, and negated the effects of all the gazes within him.

Godmammoths could crush hells, and hells contained all sorts of devils and ghosts, as well as the pressure they could unleash. Although Yang Qi had only awoken a tiny portion of the power within him, it was still more than enough for this situation.

At that point, Yang Zhan let out a cold harrumph, a sound backed by his energy arts, which completely dispelled the power of the gazes in the room.

Apparently completely unfazed by it all, Yang Qi walked over to stand next to his father.

Next, Yang Zhan spoke, his voice booming to fill the hall. “My son’s martial arts have been crippled, and yet the lot of you still gang up on him like that? Don’t tell me you want him dead?”

Chapter 6: Tit for Tat

When Yang Qi saw that projected shield of energy arts, and sensed the unfathomable level of his father’s cultivation base, he couldn’t help but marvel.

“Father’s energy arts and cultivation base are far beyond my own.”

His father truly did live up to his reputation of being a top master of the eighth phase, the Energy Incarnation level.

Although Yang Qi had already cultivated his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth to the point of entering the fifth phase, Energy Eruption, compared to someone in the eighth phase, he was like the earth being compared to the heavens.

Each one of the nine phases of energy arts was worlds apart from the phases beneath or above it. And that was especially true of the final five phases: each one of which could increase one’s battle prowess by ten times!

“Although, as long as I keep absorbing the lightning mammoth, then eventually I won't be any different from father. Then I can face all problems head on. I can restore glory to the clan and handle my own crises!”

Keeping his aura reined in, he stood next to his father and looked out at the clan.

He had his father’s protection, but that didn’t mean he couldn’t sense the scorn and hatred in the eyes of the other clan members.

All of the important leaders had come to this forum.

The Zhaoluforth branch, the Baishiville branch…. Hundreds of years ago, the Yang Clan had existed only in Yanhaven. Later, the clan began to spread, opening up operations in numerous cities, which would ensure that a major disaster in one area wouldn’t lead to the fall of the entire clan.

As time passed, the clan had grown larger and larger, but the entire time, rulership remained within Yanhaven. The clan lord was always based in Yanhaven, and he had the authority to appoint or dismiss personnel in the branches. Furthermore, the subsidiary branches were required to offer a thirty percent tithe to the main branch on a yearly basis.

The clan lord was like the emperor, and the branches were like his feudal vassals.

Of course, the clan lord answered to the chief elders, who were the oldest members of the clan. However, they were mostly concerned with their personal cultivation, and were usually out tending to their own affairs. They would only return on important occasions, and left power and authority in the hands of the clan lord.

All the branches wanted to win the favor of the council of chief elders, and thus attain the position of clan lord.

Right now, Yang Qi’s actions had caused a huge disaster that was forcing the clan to sustain severe losses. Therefore, all of the subsidiary branches had come. In fact, some of them had already petitioned the council of chief elders to strip Yang Zhan of the position of clan lord and give it to someone else.

As for Yang Qi, his experience of being betrayed had forced him to grow up a bit, and he knew full well what was at stake.

If his own family fell from grace, who knew what fate would be in store for himself?

When Yang Shi saw Yang Zhan protecting Yang Qi, he laughed uproariously. “You're still protecting that dirty little swine of yours, eh Yang Zhan?”

As Yang Shi sat there in his chair, the coldness around him caused snowflakes to appear and flutter in the air around him.

In fact, it made the entire hall cold.

The weaker individuals present were already shivering, and some of the younger ones were forced to actively draw upon their energy arts to drive away the cold.

At the same time, excitement lit their faces, as they knew that a great show was about to play out in front of them. Yang Shi from Baishiville was the first to start putting pressure on Yang Zhan.

And of course, the first thing he did was use Yang Qi’s unfilial actions as the basis for his accusation.

“If my son is no better than an animal,” Yang Zhan said coolly, “does that mean you’re calling me a beast too? Do you really need to make such oblique accusations?”

Yang Shi let out a cold harrumph. He rose to his feet, frigid energy swirling around him as he said, “The Yang Clan has been saddled with a debt of stupefying proportions. And your son is responsible for the losses! Even if he were chopped into tiny bits he couldn’t atone for such heinous crimes. Therefore, you had better provide a good explanation. And that’s not to mention that your parenting techniques are clearly useless, meaning that you also bear responsibility for the debt. You should tender your resignation immediately to the council of chief elders, and allow us to select a new clan lord!”

Yang Zhan remained in place, as unmoving as a boulder. “Oh? You want to select a new clan lord? So that's what this is all about. The position of clan lord isn’t one that can be filled by just any old person. Don’t tell me you want to be the new lord, Yang Shi? Could you even handle the responsibility?”

“Yang Zhan!” Yang Shi barked. Then, he waved his hands out in front of him, causing all of the frigid energy in the area to form together into a crystalline spear, covered with complex patterns. Instantly, the power of the spear caused the blistering summer day to turn as cold as winter.

Without any hesitation, Yang Shi threw the spear, sending it spiralling through the air toward Yang Zhan.

Pupils constricting, Yang Zhan said, “True Heat Wave.”

At the same time, he waved his hand out in front of him, causing a blast of hot air to shoot toward the crystalline spear, which melted in the course of only a few short moments.

Next a cracking sound could be heard as the tiles beneath Yang Shi’s feet began to break into pieces.

This was what happened when masters in the eighth phase of energy arts contended with each other.

All it took was one move for it to be clear who was in the winning position, and who was in the losing position. Clearly, Yang Zhan had the upper hand; Yang Shi was just not ready to take him on.

“So, Yang Shi, your energy arts have already reached the eighth phase, the Energy Incarnation level. You can finally perform a Mind Incarnation. Unfortunately, that alone is not enough to take the position of clan lord away from me. You’re still too weak.”

Yang Qi stood there behind his father, fascinated by what he was seeing. His father was definitely a true master. His energy arts were so profound he could casually turn what was cold into what was hot. He was essentially impervious to all sorts of weapons.

Flicking his golden cloak, Yang Shi said, “I have more moves than that, Yang Zhan! Let’s keep going and see who comes out on top!”

With that, he took a step forward, his desire to do battle surging.

“Enough, enough,” Yang Xu said in a loud voice. “This is supposed to be a clan forum, not a duel. Even if you beat him, Yang Shi, that wouldn’t make you clan lord. The council of chief elders would have to hold a clan election meeting. That’s the only way for anyone to officially become the new clan lord.” With that, Yang Xu waved his fan twice, sending out a majestic breeze that cleared the tension from the air and restored peace.

This was his Positive Yang Energy Art, something that was pure and harmonious in all ways.

“So what are you suggesting be done, Yang Xu?” Yang Zhan asked, remaining seated on his clan lord’s throne. “If you think you're going to lay a hand on my son, you might as well just not say anything. His martial arts have been crippled, and his sea of energy destroyed. Not only that, he was struck by lightning. God himself has doled out enough punishment. The fact that he wasn’t killed by the lightning shows that his crimes have been absolved, and that God has forgiven him.”

Although Yang Xu looked like a scholar, when he spoke, it was with words as venomous as a snake. “Your son might be crippled, but that doesn’t take the death penalty off the table. Before coming here today, I already discussed this matter with my clan brothers, and have prepared a few demands. First: we will not pay a single coin of the money to compensate for the Latent Dragon Pill. Your son committed the crime, and therefore, the clan itself will not bear responsibility. You're on your own when it comes to providing that compensation. Second: You will step down as clan lord because of this incident. Third: You must hand over your son to us immediately to be punished.”

Yang Xu’s broad smile did nothing to conceal his sinister intentions.

Yang Qi was starting to get very nervous. If the clan wouldn’t pay for the Latent Dragon Pill, and forced the debt onto his father’s shoulders, it was terrifying to consider what it would do to them.

In terms of clan seniority and ranking, Yang Xu was his fourth uncle, but at the moment, he clearly wanted him dead.

“Those are your three demands?” Yang Zhan said, smiling coldly. “Well, let me respond. First: although my son acted alone, he’s still a member of our clan. The clan is responsible for protecting him, even if it means a fight, and that includes all of you. Second: I will not step down as clan lord. Third: I won’t hand my son over to you.

“I refuse to comply with any of your demands. I'm the clan lord, and if any of you defy my orders, it will be considered a major crime!”

Yang Shi, Yang Zhen, Yang Xu, and many of the other top experts in the clan were visibly taken aback. One by one they began to speak.

“Yang Zhan, you….”

“Your son screwed up, and you want us to pay for it? Do you really think that because you run the clan, you can do whatever you want, defy all laws and principles, even of the heavens? What do you want, to fracture the clan?”

“You’re being too protective of your son, Yang Zhan.”

Eventually, one older man who had held his tongue up to this point said, “Since your son’s martial arts were crippled, we can let the matter of his punishment drop. But you definitely have to provide the compensation on your own. And regarding the matter of the position of clan lord, that is indeed out of our power. However, we’ve already submitted a petition to the council of chief elders, and it won’t be long before we hear back from them. So why don’t we just wait patiently until they reply?”

This particular old man actually outranked Yang Zhan, being his third uncle. He also ran an entire nearby city. However, he wasn’t one of the chief elders. The chief elders were all ancient, most of them being more than a hundred years of age and in the ninth phase of energy arts. Being in the Master of Energy level, but running short on longevity, they were all holed up in secluded meditation, hoping to break out of the ninth phase and into the tenth phase, the Lifeseizing level.

Moments ago, Yang Zhan had seemed to be unwilling to back down. But as the clan lord, he had no desire to see the clan fractured. And he also knew that asking the clan to pay for the Latent Dragon Pill wasn’t really appropriate.

“For your sake, Third Uncle, I’ll back down,” he said to the old man. “I’ll pay for the Latent Dragon Pill, and I’ll also wait for a response from the chief elders before commenting on the position of clan lord. If they don't want me to serve in that position, then fine. But I'm definitely going to do everything I can to help my son recover.”

“Why don’t we make an agreement right here and now?” Yang Xu said, waving his fan. “Yang Zhan, your son Yang Qi really let down the clan, but you have two other sons who supposedly have excellent cultivation bases. Although they are working on their cultivation outside of the clan, they will surely come back for this meeting. Why don’t we have a little competition between the younger ones, to see who is really the best among them all? The council of chief elders will surely give the winner a reward. After all, it will only be a handful of years before the clan lord of the next generation needs to be selected.”

“Fine,” Yang Zhan said, nodding. “A competition among the younger ones would be appropriate. Hui’er and Xiong’er are both on their way back, and neither one of them are crippled.”

It was in that exact moment that the sound of footsteps could be heard as the clan steward hurried over. From the blood which spattered his robe, it was obvious that something big had just occurred.

All of a sudden, Yang Qi had a very bad feeling.

Something momentous had occurred!

‘What’s wrong?’ he thought.

“Lord….” the steward said, looking around at the crowd.

At this point, someone chuckled darkly and said, “What? What happened? Not a good time to speak up? Scared? Come on, we’re all members of the Yang Clan.”

Clearly, all of them assumed that something more had gone wrong for Yang Zhan.

“Speak, steward,” Yang Zhan said, his voice serious.

Sounding very grim, the steward said, “Lord, the first young master and second young master were ambushed on their way here. They’re both seriously injured….”

Chapter 7: A Bolt from the Blue

The steward’s words hit like a bolt from the blue. It wasn’t just Yang Qi who was completely taken by surprise, Yang Zhan as well as numerous other experts were so shocked they went pale in the face.

“Where are they now?” Yang Zhan asked, his voice trembling as he rose to his feet.

“The first young master and second young master sent a message asking for help. I led several experts to their location and saved them. However, their assailants vanished without a trace. I brought both young masters back, but….” At this point, the steward trailed off.

“But what?” said a paled Yang Zhan.

Clearly struggling to find the right words, the steward went on to explain further. “Well… both of them suffered serious internal injuries. Their meridians were damaged, and they were poisoned. Even if they recover, their energy arts will have suffered a serious setback.”

“What…?!” Yang Zhan blurted, staggering backward, seemingly aging by ten years as he did.

As for Yang Qi, his hands clenched tightly into fists, and his killing intent was already rising. “Steward,” he said calmly, stepping forward. “Bring eldest brother and second brother here. Father’s energy arts are profound; perhaps he’ll be able to drive out the poison and treat their injuries.”

“Yes, Third Young Master.” The steward waved his hand, and immediately, a commotion could be heard outside as several special guards brought in two stretchers. There, spattered with blood, were two young men, one about twenty-five years old, the other about twenty. Their faces were ashen, and they both pulsed with a toxic aura. Palm prints could be seen on various locations on their body where they had been struck by some master of energy arts. Clearly, they both had broken bones and severely damaged meridians.

Even if they recovered, their energy arts would suffer a serious blow.

Rushing forward, Yang Qi said, “Eldest Brother! Second Brother!”

Unfortunately, the injured young men were both unconscious, and didn’t respond in any way.

Yang Qi had matured a lot lately, so although he was angered by what he was seeing, he still kept his cool. “Who did this to them? Who hurt my eldest brother and second brother?”

However, it was in that moment that Yang Zhan finally took action. Waving his hand, he summoned a white stream of true energy that split into two, then formed two humanoid shapes that looked exactly like him!

The two figures moved like lightning, fusing into the bodies of Yang Qi’s eldest and second brothers. Moments later, popping and cracking sounds could be heard as toxic energy was expelled from within them, and their meridians were repaired.

“Humanoid True Energy!” someone exclaimed. The other experts of the Yang Clan were clearly shocked at what Yang Zhan was doing. “I can’t believe he can use Humanoid True Energy. He can take his energy and project it into a human-like shape! Only people in the Master of Energy level can do that.”

“The ninth phase of energy arts! The Master of Energy level! That’s when your true energy can take a physical shape with a bit of intelligence. I can’t believe Yang Zhan has reached this level! Although his Humanoid True Energy manifestations don’t have true intelligence, they’re still extraordinary. Yang Zhan is definitely on the cusp of reaching the Master of Energy level.”

“He’s so strong….”

Yang Qi looked on thoughtfully. “So, father can actually shape his true energy into humanoid form.” Yang Qi was deeply shaken.

Unfortunately, as the two manifestations of Humanoid True Energy entered his eldest and second brothers, and managed to restore their meridians and force out the toxins, it did little good, as the poison regenerated almost immediately.

It was clearly the type of poison that could not simply be driven away.

“Shadowblight!” Yang Xu said, shivering as if from cold.

“Shadowblight….” others whispered.

This was a consummate poison from a unique organization, and although it wouldn’t necessarily kill whoever was afflicted by it, it would follow them like a shadow for the rest of their life, impossible to dispel, and a source of never-ending pain.

“So, it’s shadowblight,” someone else murmured, “which means that it’s impossible to dispel. Supposedly, it's a consummate poison from the House of Shadowblight in the west. Not even someone in the Master of Energy level would be able to do anything about it. According to the rumors I've heard, only an expert in the Lifeseizing level could deal with it.”

One of the young ones in the room suddenly said, “It seems these two are also cripples now, just like Yang Qi. They’ll never progress in energy art cultivation ever again. Yang Zhan just said that his other two sons aren’t crippled. Then, in the blink of an eye, that’s exactly what they became. Heh! Three useless cripples!”

Although he didn’t say the words very loudly, they were still incredibly biting.

When it rains, it pours. Everyone could tell that Yang Zhan was finished. After the council of chief elders learned of what had happened, how could they possibly allow him to continue to serve as the clan lord? With all of his heirs being crippled, how could he be entrusted with managing the affairs of the clan?

To be the clan lord, a man had to be powerful on a personal level, with incredible energy arts and cultivation base, but also had to have strong children. Because of that, when a new genius arose in the younger generation of a clan, his father would often also experience a rise in status.

Before, Yang Zhan had three sons who were all considered young elites in the clan. His oldest son reached the Energy Eruption level when he was only twenty-two. His second son was currently twenty, and was on the verge of stepping into the fourth phase, the Energy Refinement level. And his third son was even more of a talent, reaching the Energy Eruption level when he was only eighteen, although that was not yet public knowledge.

But now, his third son Yang Qi had committed a grave crime, had his martial arts crippled, and had led the clan into a catastrophe. Worse, his first and second sons had been struck with shadowblight, ensuring that they would live a life of torment. All of his sons were now crippled.

Of course, to see Yang Zhan experience such misfortune would make some people very happy. After all, when a clan lord fell, it would open the door of opportunity for many others.

Yang Qi’s ears were so sensitive that he could hear the footsteps of ants, so despite the fact that the young man who had spoken had kept his voice down, Yang Qi had obviously heard him.

“Who?” he said loudly. “Who just said the word cripple? Step forward immediately!”

The speaker was none other than the young man standing behind Yang Shi, who was his son Yang Feng.

He was twenty-six years old, with energy arts in the Energy Eruption level. He had reached that level when he was twenty-four, so after two years of cultivation, his foundation was very strong.

In the past, he had been somewhat leery of Yang Qi, whom had been close to reaching the same level as him before he was even twenty.

But now, his response to Yang Qi’s rebuke was nothing but a cold laugh. Looking over with scorn and arrogance, he said, “What. You heard me! Are you trying to tell me you three aren’t cripples? Your two brothers are poisoned, and will live lives of endless pain. And your sea of energy is destroyed. Crippled? You’re worse than a cripple. You’re a useless humiliation to our clan!”

“Oh really?” Yang Qi replied coolly. “You think I'm useless, Yang Feng? Alright. Let’s have a little competition, right here. Let’s see which one of us is really useless.”

Beckoning for him to back off, Yang Zhan said, “Qi’er, now’s not the time to try and show off. Stand down.”

“Brother Yang Zhan,” Yang Shi said, rising to his feet. “There’s no need for you, the clan lord, to interfere in the squabbles of the younger generation. Despite the crimes your son has committed, he still wants to run his mouth? What the hell makes him think he has the right to do that?”

“Father, I know what I'm doing,” Yang Qi said, his eyes flashing.

When Yang Zhan looked at his eyes, his own expression flickered with surprise, as though he had sensed something.

“What kind of a competition did you have in mind?” Yang Feng said. “Your martial arts are gone, so I could kill you with a single flick of my finger. Although, even if you hadn’t lost your martial arts, you still wouldn’t be a match for me.” He suddenly clapped his hands together. “Well, if you really have a death wish, then I’ll accommodate. Considering there are so many witnesses present, no one could accuse me of taking the initiative to try to fight you.”

“That’s right, Yang Feng,” said another of the young talents. “Just hit him and see what happens. Yang Qi’s probably hallucinating and thinks he hasn't lost his energy arts.”

“Beat some sense into him!” someone else said. “Help him see the truth.”

“Yang Qi was pretty amazing in the past,” added another young one. “After all, he did reach the Energy Refinement level when he was only eighteen. But now he's a cripple, and still dares to brag. If you don’t teach his stubborn ass a lesson now, then he’ll probably end up getting killed by someone else….”

All of the young clan members in the hall began to laugh loudly.

“It shouldn’t take long to see which of us is courting death, right?” Yang Qi said, clasping his hands behind his back casually, making him look very unlike a person suffering from crippled martial arts. “Those of you who laughed the loudest, why don't you come at me together? Aren't we supposed to have a big competition amongst us anyway? Why not do it now? Then we’ll see which of you dares to laugh.”

“What shameless boasting!” Yang Feng said through narrowed eyes. Suddenly, he thrummed with frigid energy; splaying his fingers, he summoned a web of it that immediately filled the air over Yang Qi’s head.

“Frigid Net of Heaven!”

This was an energy art of the Yang Clan, one of many that were related to frigid ice. After trapping the opponent in the icy net, frigid energy would assault their meridians, and quickly freeze them.

Even as that net of energy spread out, Yang Qi made his move.

His muscles flexed, and then erupted with power like that of an ancient beast. A fiendish aura roiled out, causing everyone present to suddenly feel as if they were looking at some sort of devil escaped from a primeval hell.

RUMBLE!

Yang Qi moved so quickly that he seemed to vanish, and in the blink of an eye, was right in front of Yang Feng, toward whom he unleashed a fist strike.

When his foot touched down, it was like the stomp of an enormous mammoth, crushing the ground and causing the entire hall around them to shake. Even the pillars supporting the roof creaked, and dust began to drift down from the rafters above.

Yang Qi’s fist strike was almost like a bomb exploding, powerful to the extreme.

Yang Feng’s face fell, and he tried to call upon his frigid ice energy art to defend himself, throwing his arms out and shouting, “Flowing River of Iron Fetters!”

However, even as the words left his mouth, the fist slammed into him, sending him flying through the air, a streak that flew out of the hall, his arms broken and blood spraying out of his mouth.

When he slammed into the stone slabs outside, he tumbled head over heels, suffering more injuries. When he finally came to a stop, he looked up at Yang Qi for a moment, then collapsed into unconsciousness, unable to even say, ‘You….’

Yang Qi had only used a single fist strike. But he was in the fifth phase, the Energy Eruption level, and thus, that single fist strike had hit Yang Feng with nearly deadly force. Even if Yang Feng had been fighting someone in the sixth phase, he would not have been so badly hurt, and would likely have been able to sustain three blows.

“What?!” Yang Shi blurted, gripping the arms of his chair so tightly that it shattered. Casting a glare at Yang Qi, he rushed over and picked Yang Feng up, pouring some true energy into him to begin the healing process.

Everyone stood there, blank looks on their faces. How could they ever have guessed that someone with crippled martial arts and a destroyed sea of energy could possibly be so strong?

Chapter 8: Displaying Prowess to the Full

At long last, some of the color returned to Yang Zhan’s face.

“Qi’er!” he said, his eyes lighting up with delight. “Your martial arts aren't crippled after all?”

Never could he possibly have imagined that in what seemed to be a moment of ultimate despair, things would suddenly turn completely around.

“Father,” Yang Qi said respectfully, “my sea of energy was indeed destroyed. However, because of being struck by lightning, I experienced some sort of transformation. My meridians and sea of energy recovered, and I actually got stronger. In fact, I advanced so dramatically that I’m already in the Energy Eruption level.”

Considering that his eldest and second brother had both been seriously injured and even poisoned, Yang Qi’s worries of the moment had disappeared. Actually, his fist strike from moments ago hadn’t even been filled with the true force of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. He had only used Yang Clan martial arts, techniques that only clan members would have access to.

If he had actually used the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, then Yang Feng would have been shredded to pieces.

Smiling, Yang Zhan said, “Qi’er, Yang Feng has been in the Energy Eruption level for a long time now. The fact that you could so easily defeat him after just achieving your breakthrough indicates that there is more to your newfound powers than you’ve let on.”

“You’re right, Father. The lightning tempered my body, giving my fist strikes incredible force, force that actually surpasses that of ordinary experts in the Energy Eruption level.” Yang Qi was well aware that the best thing he could do to help his father right now was not reveal the truth about what had happened to him. “In fact, I think I could even crush experts in the sixth phase, the Energy Weapon level.”

For a long moment, Yang Zhan roared with laughter. Then he breathed a long sigh of relief and said, “The heavens have stepped in to rescue my bloodline! I’ll definitely figure out a way to cure your eldest and second brothers from the shadowblight.”

At this point, Yang Shi looked up from the broken body of his son, glared at Yang Qi, and said, “Very clever, you little swine! I can’t believe you would use such ruthless methods against a member of your own clan!”

Yang Qi looked around at the gathered clan members. “Ladies and gentlemen, you all saw what happened; he was the one to make the first move. He can only blame himself for his lack of skill. And wasn’t it only moments ago that all of you urged him to teach me a lesson? Except, the person to be taught a lesson turned out to be him. He dug his own grave, right? What’s wrong with that, Yang Shi? What, you’re gonna try to avenge him now?”

“You!” Yang Shi spat, clearly enraged. However, considering his status in the clan, it wouldn’t be appropriate to make a move on Yang Qi. Besides, Yang Zhan was off to the side glaring at him menacingly, and the Humanoid True Energy that he had used a moment ago meant that his cultivation base was very close to the Master of Energy level, which struck even more fear into Yang Shi’s heart.

Suddenly, one of Yang Qi’s other uncles rose to his feet. “Yang Shi is your uncle, you little punk. Is that how you talk to your elders? And what makes you think you have the right to injure your cousin?”

Currently, there were over thirty experts in the hall who were considered uncles to Yang Qi because of their seniority in the clan. Yang Shi, Yang Zhen, and Yang Xu were the three most powerful among them, their energy arts all being in the eighth phase.

Most of the rest were in the sixth or seventh phases, with a few being as low as the fifth. Even still, they were all top experts. In the Rich-Lush Continent, anyone with fifth phase energy arts were considered extremely powerful, the type of individuals who could single-handedly defeat a hundred ordinary enemies.

In fact, according to the customs of the Yang Clan, anyone in the fifth phase or above could conduct affairs outside of the clan, and even settle down elsewhere to work on their own endeavors.

As for this uncle who had just rebuked Yang Qi, his name was Yang Kui. He had a cultivation base in the sixth phase, allowing him to form weapons from energy, and was considered one of the top experts within the clan. He had long since taken charge of the interests of the Yang Clan in Redleaf City in the east.

“What’s that supposed to mean? It was a fair match. Was I supposed to hold back or something? Besides, there’s no way I'm going to walk on eggshells around people who are trying to usurp my father as the clan lord. I’m not being unreasonable, am I, Uncle Yang Kui? And why did you suddenly stand up? Don’t tell me you want to fight me too? Well, that’s fine. I'm more than happy to swap pointers. Hopefully you can last for a few more moves than Yang Feng.”

The casual way that Yang Qi spoke caused Yang Kui’s face to turn bright red.

“You!” he blurted, walking right out into the middle of the hall. “Fine. Since you asked for it, I’ll teach you a lesson you won’t forget, you disrespectful brat!”

“Please, do as you wish!” Yang Qi said, standing there straight and tall, apparently waiting for Yang Kui to attack him.

As for Yang Zhan, his eyebrows twitched as though he wanted to say something, but he held his tongue and waited to see how things would play out. He wanted to see what surprises this supposedly “unfilial” son of his had up his sleeve.

“Can Yang Qi really defeat an expert in the Energy Weapon level?”

The crowd was now looking on with bated breath.

“How is he doing all of this? Sixth phase experts are ten times stronger than people in the fifth phase. Even ten fifth-phase fighters working together wouldn’t be able to take down someone in the sixth phase. Is Yang Qi looking to get killed?”

“I can’t believe something like this happened. Yang Qi obviously had his martial arts crippled, but then received an unexpected blessing in the form of a lightning strike, causing his energy arts to significantly advance. I have to say, though, he's acting a bit too arrogantly. He's actually challenging someone in a higher phase than himself.”

By now, most of the higher-level experts were whispering amongst themselves about the scene playing out, and the younger talented individuals were all staring at him with glittering eyes.

Of course, in terms of seniority, Yang Zhan was the highest-ranking member present.

Among the younger generation, Yang Qi and his brothers were actually somewhere in the middle. After all, over the past several years, quite a few geniuses had risen up in the subsidiary branches of the clan.

Glaring aggressively, Yang Kui looked at Yang Zhan and said, “Your son wants to fight me, Yang Zhan. What do you say?”

“It won't hurt for you to give him some advice about energy arts and cultivation base,” Yang Zhan casually said.

“Fine. No holds barred! If I hurt him, I don’t want to hear any complaints from you!” Yang Kui clenched his hands into fists and drew upon his energy arts. Then, he made a chopping motion with both hands, causing energy to surge out and take the form of two long sabers. After hefting them for a moment, he lunged at Yang Qi, slashing the sabers in his direction.

“Insane Devil Energy Sabers!”

Yang Kui cultivated the Insane Devil Energy Art unique to the Yang Clan, an aggressive and violent technique that used energy to create devilish sabers of frightening appearance, whose crazed aura would strike fear into the hearts of anyone with a lower cultivation base.

However, Yang Qi seemed completely calm.

With a single step, he evaded the blow. Then, he twisted like a wriggling snake, as smoothly as a fish swimming through water. It was none other than one of the most orthodox martial techniques of the Yang Clan, the One Hundred Transformations of the Fish-Dragon.

The Yang Clan had many unique martial techniques, all of them profound and mysterious. And when such techniques were cultivated to the pinnacle, they could turn the foul and rotten into the rare and ethereal.

Besides, with Yang Qi’s Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth to power the Yang Clan martial techniques, it pushed them to the ultimate level of perfection. As a result, he completely evaded any danger. He had been one of the young elites of the clan to begin with, and definitely not a hedonistic silkpants. With his advanced cultivation base, and the several days of cultivation he had just experienced, he had matured, not just in his personality, but also in his martial abilities.

“Hmph!”

When Yang Kui saw that Yang Qi easily evaded his Insane Devil Energy Sabers, he shifted tactics. He splayed his fingers, causing five streams of energy to flow out that looked like flying swords, so sharp that they could slice iron as easily as mud. In fact, if such blades hit a human, they would likely cut that person in half.

Everyone in the audience could tell that Yang Qi was now in a very bad position. This was Yang Kui’s Five Blooming Plum Blossoms, a trump card technique in which all five fingers summoned an energy weapon. It involved a heavy drainage of true energy, but was also so mysterious that it was nearly impossible to evade.

“Hundred Paces Divine Fist!” Yang Qi shouted, leaping backward, and simultaneously unleashing dozens of fist strikes. As he did, spiraling energy waves shot out to slam into the five energy swords.

Normally speaking, there was a massive gap between the fifth phase of Energy Eruption and the sixth phase of Energy Weapon. They were as different as the sky above and the mud down below. However, even a fierce tiger can be brought down by a pack of wolves. Yang Qi moved with incredible speed, utilizing his Hundred Paces Divine Fists over and over again. Spiraling energy smashed into the flying swords, until finally, they shattered into pieces.

They had been completely defeated by the Hundred Paces Divine Fists.

“What? How could he unleash so many Hundred Paces Divine Fists in such a short time? People in the Energy Eruption level can’t draw so deeply on their true energy for such a protracted time!”

When Yang Shi, Yang Zhen, and Yang Xu saw what was happening, their eyes nearly popped out of their skulls. Yang Qi was violating some of the most common understandings of cultivation. His reserves of true energy seemed completely unreal.

Although his true energy reserves obviously weren’t on the same level as Yang Kui, who was in the Energy Weapon level, they were still far beyond what they should have been. For someone like Yang Qi to utilize dozens of Hundred Paces Divine Fist enabled him to simply overwhelm the energy weapons which had been arrayed against him.

Essentially, using so many Hundred Paces Divine Fists made Yang Qi, who was only in the fifth phase, at least ten times more powerful than average.

‘What powerful true energy!’ Yang Kui thought, shaking physically as he looked at the remaining fist strikes closing in on him. Without any hesitation, he quickly summoned an energy shield.

Bam. Bam. Bam. Bam. Bam! Bam!!!

A torrent of fist strikes slammed into the energy shield, causing it to ripple and distort, and also emanate a droning buzz.

And Yang Qi didn’t stop. In the shortest amount of time, he unleashed more than a hundred fist strikes.

Each and every one sent energy streaming out, making it look like a river of motion around him. A raging aura filled the meeting hall, making everyone feel as though they were in the presence of some primeval beast.

At this point, the trembling audience couldn’t hold back from making various exclamations of shock. Yang Qi’s use of over a hundred fist strikes was simply too incredible.

“This guy… he’s a freak! He’s not even human! Even if he had a massive store of true energy, how could his meridians sustain this flow in the Energy Eruption level? Isn’t he afraid of his meridians being damaged?”

“His meridians must not be human! He just unleashed over a hundred fist strikes! Not even demonlings can do that sort of thing!”

“What kind of meridians does he have? And how can his sea of energy sustain this? Unless his body is made of iron, there’s no way he can keep this up, right? Does getting struck by lightning really make you this strong?”

Despite having witnessed what was happening with their own eyes, everyone was still partially convinced that they were seeing things.

Over and over, Yang Kui was shoved backward through the hall.

He couldn’t even collect himself enough to fight back. He could only pour more true energy into his shield to protect himself. With each moment that ticked by, his true energy was draining away faster and faster.

As he continued to power his energy shield, Yang Kui thought, “Is this brat some kind of monster? Such power in the Energy Eruption level! Shouldn’t he be dead? He’s fighting as fiercely as a dragon or tiger! I'm in the sixth phase, but not even my energy arts are a match for him. If this keeps going, I'm going to run out of energy and suffer defeat.”

However, Yang Kui was a veteran of over a hundred duels, so there was no way he would suffer defeat so easily.

“Insane Devil Detonation!” he shouted.

Pouring even more energy into his shield, he caused it to grow larger and larger, until it was a pulsing sphere. Finally, it exploded, completely wiping out any remaining fist strikes from Yang Qi.

Shaken, Yang Qi staggered backward as the blast from the Insane Devil Detonation shoved him across the battlefield. At this point, there was no way for him to unleash any more Hundred Paces Divine Fists.

“Stand down, you little punk!” Yang Kui growled, flying toward him like a bird. As he sailed through the air, he curled his fingers into hooks, making him look like a mighty eagle about to slash a decrepit wolf into pieces.

Chapter 9: Shocking Everyone Present

Yang Qi remained completely calm in the face of Yang Kui’s flying eagle attack.

Waves of energy battered against him, but he stood as still as a reef in the ocean, completely unmoving. Then, just before the attack hit, he twisted to the side, slipping out of the way like a fish, and causing the eagle attack to hit nothing but air.

Energy surged in all directions, and Yang Kui’s aura pulsed with power. He currently occupied the high ground, so yet again, he curled his hands into eagle claws and then slashed them at Yang Qi. Clearly, he would not give up until catching him.

From the perspective of the onlookers, Yang Kui looked like a mighty eagle, soaring through the air, slashing down over and over again with unimaginable force.

In contrast, Yang Qi was like a fish, slipping amongst the waves of energy, facing danger over and over again, and yet always managing to evade it. As this process continued, Yang Kui’s true energy drained away with every moment that passed.

This wasn’t a case of the eagle lacking in might, but rather, the fish being too evasive.

“How can this brat be so agile? How much of this can his fleshly body handle? How could he possibly push the One Hundred Transformations of the Fish-Dragon to such limits?”

Of course, everyone in the audience was equally stunned.

The Hundred Transformations of the Fish-Dragon that Yang Qi was using was actually a first-class technique of the Yang Clan, the type that only top masters would study. Normally speaking, even people in the sixth or seventh phases wouldn’t be able to do what he was doing; it was simply too much of a strain on the body. In one moment he would seem as tough as iron, in another, as flexible as a bowstring, and after that, he would be as soft as cotton.

“Good. Great. Excellent….” Yang Zhan murmured, his eyes shining with delight. By this point, his other two sons had regained consciousness, and although they were still afflicted with shadowblight, the sight of Yang Qi fighting Yang Kui made it impossible for them to conceal the shock they felt.

“Father, wasn’t third brother’s sea of energy destroyed?” the eldest brother managed to say.

“Something marvelous happened to your third brother,” Yang Zhan said. “Something marvelous and extremely important. The heavens have spared our bloodline. Just when everything seemed on the verge of falling apart, hope appeared. Your third brother might have come across some miracle, but the difference between the fifth and sixth phases is enormous. What if…?” Yang Zhan’s eyes suddenly flashed as if with fire. “It doesn’t matter. Your third brother’s aura is deep, and his true energy seems to have no bounds. Yang Kui is doing little more than flailing about; the battle will end soon. Attacking like this is a huge drain on true energy. At the worst, it will end in a draw.”

If Yang Zhan could analyze the fight in such a way, then Yang Kui could do so even more accurately. He had hoped to teach Yang Qi a lesson with his Insane Devil Energy Art, but only ended up unable to touch him, over and over again. And as the saying goes, if you ride a tiger, it's hard to get off. As his true energy reserves ran lower and lower, the danger he faced increased.

For someone in the sixth phase to be defeated by someone in the fifth would be a huge loss of face. If that happened, he would never again be able to hold his head high in public.

“DIE!” he shouted. Biting his tongue, he spat out some blood, which shot toward the top of his head like a flying arrow. There, he catalyzed it with his energy arts, causing it to explode, creating a blood mist that completely surrounded him, and caused the whole area to smell like blood.

Within that blood mist, his powers of attack were significantly enhanced. Without a pause, he splayed his five fingers out, causing his fingernails to grow out into what looked like iron scythes, each of them a meter long, which he then slashed toward the ground.

“Righteous Bloodshed Energy Art!” he shouted.

The experts of the Yang Clan all rose to their feet. “Yang Kui has actually been forced to use his Righteous Bloodshed Energy Art! That damages the meridians and burns one’s sea of energy, damaging the cultivation base. Nobody would use that unless there was no other option at hand.”

“A fifth phase fighter has forced a sixth phase fighter into this position? Of all the geniuses I've seen in my life, I've never seen any of them who could do this.”

“Yang Zhan has turned a disaster into a blessing. When the council of chief elders finds out that he has a son like this, they’re going to shower him with even more approval.” The opinions of many of the neutral clan members were now being swayed.

“Things are definitely going to end soon. Now that the Righteous Bloodshed Energy Art is in play, that brat Yang Qi is definitely finished.”

By this point, Yang Shi’s eyes were sparkling with killing intent. Considering how outstanding Yang Qi was, he knew that if he wasn't killed now, then he would continue to advance, and become more and more of a problem.

However, in the moment that the killing intent appeared, Yang Zhan glanced over at him, eyes flashing, and he knew that he couldn’t act.

“Stand down, Yang Qi!” Yang Kui shouted angrily shooting down toward the ground, the five iron scythes that were his fingernails completely locking down Yang Qi’s avenues of retreat. As of this point, if Yang Qi wanted to keep fighting, it would be very risky.

‘Time to go for broke!’ Yang Qi thought. It wasn’t a time to worry about every little detail. It was a life-or-death moment, and therefore he drew deeply upon his energy arts, and reached out to the lightning mammoth inside of him. Clenching his hands into fists, he punched out at the eagle-claw-scythes.

Crack! Rattle!

The lightning mammoth erupted with power, sending a mighty stream of electricity to cover Yang Qi inside and out.

The flow of electricity instantly dispersed Yang Kui’s Righteous Bloodshed Energy Art, smashing into him and sending him flying back into one of the supporting columns in the hall, where he then slumped down onto the ground, muttering in pain.

Then, the electricity slowly faded away from Yang Qi.

The entire hall was blanketed by deep silence, and the eyes of everyone present flickered with astonishment.

What is the greatest mistake one can make? Forgetting that if someone is strong enough, they can make up for any deficiency. That is a truth that can never be changed.

“An energy art that contains lightning? Our Yang Clan has never had any energy arts like that, have we? Of all the countless sects and clans, only a very few have the ability to absorb the quintessence of lightning and turn it into true energy. How did Yang Qi do this? Could it really be true that he underwent a major transformation because of that lightning strike?”

After a very long moment passed, people began to recover and react. Yang Xu leaped into the air, flying over to Yang Kui to help him to his feet. After checking his injuries, he found that they were minor. However, his true energy had been drained so severely that it would likely be ten days or even half a month before he recovered.

Everyone was now eyeing the freakish Yang Qi as he stood there stock still, eyes closed as he examined himself internally. The lightning mammoth was still active, sending a stream of life essence energy out into his meridians and bones. As that happened, the second particle within him began to stir as if it might awaken.

To his inner view, it was like his body consisted of those eight hundred forty million particles, scattered throughout a vast universe. They were like stars, each one of which contained a megamammoth in embryonic form, waiting to gain consciousness.

“Good! Once that second particle awakens, my true energy will become doubly powerful, like that of two ancient megamammoths. That major transformation will let me step into the sixth phase, the Energy Weapon level. Then everyone will be really shocked.”

Everyone was already in a state of complete astonishment because of the events of this day. One could only imagine what the reactions would be like when he reached the sixth phase.

In most situations it would take twenty or more years of painstaking cultivation to push one’s energy arts from the fifth phase to the sixth. And Yang Qi would likely do it in only a few days? To most people, it would seem completely impossible.

This fight, this true energy conflict, had allowed him to absorb more of the lightning mammoth, which was the only reason why he could possibly make such shocking progress.

At this point, a young man strode out of the crowd, faced Yang Qi, and clapped in applause. “Cousin Yang Qi, the fact that you, with a fifth phase cultivation base, managed to defeat an expert in the sixth phase, is completely spectacular. To call you a genius is not an exaggeration in any sense of the word. It’s been a long time since I've been in a fight myself, and seeing your performance makes me itch to have a go. What do you say we exchange some pointers?”

Yang Qi looked over at the young man and recognized him as one of the top geniuses in the clan, Yang Honglie.

“Well, if it isn’t Cousin Honglie,” he said. “If anyone in our generation deserves to be called a genius, it’s you! You stepped into the sixth phase long ago, and I bet you’re getting close to the seventh phase. If I remember correctly, you're over ten years older than me, right?”

Yang Honglie was indeed well over ten years older than Yang Qi, and had stepped into the Energy Eruption level when he was only fifteen years old. Now, several years later, he was still making rapid progress, and was closing in on the seventh phase, the Energy Manifestation level. In that level, one could give true energy a corporeal form, which was nothing to look down upon.

Based on his progress up to this point, Yang Honglie was likely going to reach the eighth phase, the Energy Incarnation level, before he was even thirty. At that point, he could unleash the energy art of Mind Incarnation.

Anyone in the Rich-Lush Continent who could reach the eighth phase before the age of thirty was considered to be a true genius.

At the moment, Yang Qi knew that he wasn’t a match for someone in the seventh phase. His sudden defeat of the sixth phase Yang Kui had been completely unexpected, and had been possible because of the power of the lightning mammoth, and the way it manifested lightning as true energy. Furthermore, Yang Kui wasn’t even ranked highly among sixth phase experts.

And the seventh phase was absolutely and completely different from the sixth.

And yet, with the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, Yang Qi was fairly certain that it wouldn’t be long before he could defeat Yang Honglie and become the number one expert of his generation in the clan.

“Qi’er, come over here,” Yang Zhan said. “You’ve brought a lot of honor to your father by what you've done today.” Sending out some glowing energy, he pulled Yang Qi back to his side. “Don’t push yourself. Cousin Honglie is over ten years older than you, with very profound cultivation base and energy arts. You have to admit that.”

“What?!” one of the other young elites said. “Weren’t you just running your mouth, Yang Qi? You defeated Yang Kui of the elder generation, but now you’re too scared to fight one of your own peers?”

Another young man stepped forward and added, “Yeah, that’s right! What happened to all your showboating from moments ago?”

“It’s only reasonable for the young ones to interact and learn from each other,” said a grim-faced old man.

All of them knew that Yang Qi had just secured a reputation as a consummate genius. However, the fact that he was now in the limelight only prompted them to try to cut him down a notch.

“Yang Qi, isn’t Honglie more than ten years older than you? Maybe you should wait ten years before you try to take him on. Of course, he’ll still be ten years older than you then, so maybe that excuse isn’t a very good one to rely on.”

Everyone started laughing.

“Ten years?” Yang Qi said, his voice cold. “Nah. How about three months? Yang Honglie, I hereby challenge you to a competition during our Yang Clan’s autumn hunt in the Blackcorpse Mountains, three months from now. Why don’t we see which of us will come out on top there?”

Chapter 10: Duel in Three Months

Yang Qi’s proposal of a duel in three months once again shocked everyone to the core.

Eyes sparkling, Yang Honglie said, “Is this some kind of joke, Yang Qi?”

He simply couldn’t believe that Yang Qi’s cultivation base could possibly catch up to his own. It seemed like a completely preposterous notion.

Even if some consummate master came along and tried to impart his energy arts into Yang Qi, it still wouldn’t be possible. If things were that easy, then people wouldn’t need to actually practice cultivation to make progress.

“No joke,” Yang Qi replied with decisiveness that could sever nails and chop iron. “In the presence of all of these members of the older generation, we can both promise to compete in the hunt three months from now. Regardless of who wins or loses, we can at least have a good time of it. What do you say? Do you dare to accept?”

Yang Honglie laughed uproariously in response. “Cousin, you really think too much of yourself. But since you want to come looking for trouble, how could I refuse you?”

And thus, in the presence of all the members of the older generation, the two of them agreed to settle things in three months during the autumn hunt.

The Yang Clan’s autumn hunt was modeled after the Sage Ancestor Dynasty’s imperial hunts. All of the top experts in the clan would gather to hunt demons and devils, to practice martial arts, and to promote the overall strength of the clan.

The truth was that in the Rich-Lush Continent, martial prowess was the most important thing of all. All of the rich and powerful clans wanted to see whose cultivation base and energy arts were the most powerful. The strongest would become famous, would have much power and authority… as well as other benefits.

Whenever it came time for the autumn hunt, the young ones in the clan would arrange for various competitions and contests to see who was the most outstanding of all.

When Yang Zhan saw what was happening, he blinked, then transmitted a message to Yang Qi using his energy arts. “Qi’er, are you sure about this?”

Sending his response with his own energy arts, Yang Qi said, “Don’t worry, Father. I'm absolutely confident.”

Yang Zhan nodded and replied, “Very well. After this forum is over, you and I will have a chat to plan for the future. We also need to figure out how to save your two brothers.”

With that, he raked his gaze across the crowd and said, “Gentlemen, I invited you here today to talk about important clan matters. And now, we have a final answer to the three main questions. First: I, Yang Zhan, will provide the compensation for the Latent Dragon Pill. Second: My son benefited greatly from his disaster, and his energy arts advanced significantly. Not only is he not a cripple, he has proven himself to be a genius. Do any of you dare to talk about punishing him now? Third: As far as the issue of who will serve as clan lord, we will wait for word to come down from the council of chief elders.”

Even as the words left his mouth, the cry of an eagle could be heard from above. A moment later, a golden bird appeared, as large as a horse, bathed in radiant sunlight as it flew toward them. It almost looked like it was made from pure gold as it landed in the courtyard in a gust of wind.

“The clan's golden eagle!” a few people murmured.

All of the experts of the older generation rose to their feet. After all, this golden eagle had a very extraordinary background, and was the mount used by the ancient chief elders.

Powerful energy fluctuations rolled out as an old man dismounted. He had white hair, and a long white beard, and appeared to be in his late nineties.

“Great Uncle!” Yang Zhan said, saluting formally.

This old man was Yang Zhougong, and although he wasn’t in the ninth phase, only the eighth, with a cultivation base the same as Yang Zhan’s, he represented the council of chief elders, and was thus given the utmost respect.

“I heard your son caused a big disaster,” he said, “so I'm here on behalf of the council of chief elders to address the issue.” Patting his golden eagle, he looked at Yang Zhan, his eyebrows dancing up and down. “Yang Zhan, your cultivation base continues to advance spectacularly. In all likelihood, you’ll reach the ninth phase within eight to ten years, whereupon you will be a true grandmaster of energy arts.”

“Great Uncle, my son might have caused a big disaster, but he grew because of it, and even acquired great good fortune.”

When further explanation was provided, Yang Zhougong was visibly shocked. He looked over at Yang Qi’s defeated foes, Yang Feng and Yang Kui, and then turned his attention to Yang Qi himself.

Whoosh!

Reaching out, he sent out a stream of blue true energy, which took the shape of a hand that grabbed at Yang Qi.

Yang Qi didn’t even have time to react. The hand instantly reached him, whereupon Yang Zhougong’s boundless energy arts entered his meridians.

Yang Qi had no visible reaction. After all, he had already made sure that his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth was well-hidden, as deep as if they were in the pits of hell. And the lightning mammoth had vanished without a trace, making it impossible for Yang Zhougong to see it.

“Very tough body,” Yang Zhougong murmured. “Durable. Thrumming life force. Less like a human and more like a primeval beast….”

“Great Uncle,” Yang Zhan explained, “Qi’er was struck by lightning, and it made him like this. His meridians were actually refined by the process.”

In the end, Yang Zhougong couldn’t find any evidence to provide any other explanation. All he knew was that Yang Qi had spectacular potential. “Even experts in the Lifeseizing level would find it difficult to escape with their lives after being struck by lightning like that. And he benefited from it. Simply miraculous.”

Releasing Yang Qi, Yang Zhougong looked around at the crowd. “Yang Zhan will continue to serve as the clan lord. The clan will be facing some tough times, so we all need to stick together. No infighting will be permitted. This is simply a matter of paying back some money. As long as we all remain standing in the end, we’ll be able to make a comeback eventually. Yang Zhan, take good care of your son. In the future, he’ll be sure to serve the clan well.”

“Yes sir,” everyone said, bowing their heads. When the chief elders spoke, even top masters would have no choice but to rein in their ambitions.

Everyone realized that Yang Qi was now a major force to be reckoned with. He had fought for the honor of his father, and only a father with a spectacular son could hope to hold on to the title of clan lord.

Whoosh!

Yang Zhougong leaped back up onto his golden eagle, then flew off into the air. He left just as quickly as he had arrived.

And thus, the internal crisis within the clan was put to rest.

As for Yang Shi, he let out a cold snort. “I’ll be taking my leave now. See you in three months, at the autumn hunt.”

Flicking his sleeve, he led his subordinates away.

One by one, the experts from the other subsidiary branches also took their leave.

Two hours later, the Yang Clan mansion was quiet, and the only people left behind in the meeting hall were Yang Zhan, Yang Qi, his two poisoned brothers and the steward.

“Qi’er,” Yang Zhan said, “I never could have imagined that your catastrophe would turn into a blessing.” At this point, his eyes flickered with cold light. “However, your brothers were hit with shadowblight. It seems to me someone was targeting me specifically, in concert with the disaster you incited. We have to uncover the truth of who was behind it.”

“You’re right,” Yang Qi replied. “We have to get revenge, and we must also heal eldest brother and second brother.” Kneeling down, he sent his powerful energy arts to work inside his brothers, and soon confirmed that the poison could not be driven away. As the energy and blood flowed through them, the poison joined it, becoming a part of the body itself, and its metabolism.

The shadowblight was almost like sweat that simply couldn’t be removed from the body.

Yang Qi’s eldest brother sighed when he felt Yang Qi’s true energy enter him. “Third Brother, your true energy is different from father’s. It feels much more pleasant.”

“Really?” Yang Qi said, surprised. Inside, he thought, ‘I wonder if my Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth could be uniquely useful in combating the shadowblight. My true energy isn't particularly strong, so it’s possible the effects are limited. But if I worked hard at cultivation….’

At this point, Yang Zhan said, “Qi’er, there does seem to be something strange with your true energy. You’ve been tempered by lightning, and have transformed in certain ways. Starting today, I'm going to teach you one of the most profound techniques of the Yang Clan, the Invincible King’s Fist. Since you swore an oath to defeat Yang Honglie in three months, you need to make sure to follow through on your word to fight him.”

“Invincible King’s Fist…?” Yang Qi murmured, shaken. He had heard of this technique, and knew it was one of the most powerful in the clan. In fact, it was nearly a royal-class energy art.

Energy arts were generally divided into classes, those being: third-class, second-class, first-class, royal-class, imperial-class, saintly-class, heavenly-class, and godly-class.

The Invincible King’s Fist was a cultivation technique that existed right between the first-class and royal-class level.

For the most part, a first-class energy art cultivation technique could support an aristocratic clan for hundreds of years, perhaps even thousands.

Royal-class energy arts were enough to found royal dynasties.

As for imperial-class, saintly-class, and heavenly-class energy arts, they were the things of legend.

When it came to the godly-class energy arts, as the name implied, they were the type that ordinary humans couldn’t even cultivate. They were the techniques of spirits and gods.

Yang Qi was fairly certain that his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth was at the very least a heavenly-class energy art. And he was even convinced that it might be godly-class. After all, it was simply too profound. Each of the eight hundred forty million tiny particles within him had the power of an ancient megamammoth, and when they combined would equal the power of a godmammoth. That was indeed the power of a god or spirit, something that surpassed humankind.

If word leaked that a godly-class energy art had appeared in the lands, it could lead to a major catastrophe, and therefore, Yang Qi kept the truth hidden from his father.

The more people who knew the truth, the more danger there would be. This was the type of thing that could lead to entire clans being exterminated. Yang Qi knew that before he told his father, he had to make sure that he was strong enough to protect the clan as a whole.

After a moment of silence, the steward said, “Lord, if you plan to pass on a technique to the third young master, then I’ll go out to stand guard.” Bowing, he left.

“Qi’er, watch closely. This is the first stance of the Invincible King’s Fist. It's called: Triumph in Every Battle….”

Fiery streams of energy shot out of Yang Zhan. In the blink of an eye, the true energy behind him took the form of six long arms that resembled those of crabs or spiders.

The powerful arms of true energy thrummed with muscle and power as they moved into a magical sealing mark. At the same time, Yang Zhan’s aura surged. All in all, Yang Qi was left completely shocked by what he was seeing.

“The ultimate expression of the Invincible King’s Fist is a three-headed six-armed image. At the moment, I can only summon the six arms. I haven’t yet succeeded with the three heads. By the time I do, I’ll be in the ninth phase, the Master of Energy level. Watch closely. There are six moves in total. Triumph in Every Battle, Victory in Every Fight, No Stronghold Too Powerful, Defy All Laws and Principles, Eternally Undefeated and All Phenomena Bend to the Master.”

The six arms behind him began to move in shocking fashion as he went through the forms, right there in the hall, unleashing attacks that even affected the gardens and lakes surrounding the area.

At one point, the lake reacted as though it had been hit with a falling star, causing water to explode in all directions, filling the entire Yang Clan mansion with mist.

“Such incredible power!” Yang Qi murmured, his face pale from shock. Although this attack couldn't be considered world-rattling, it was enough to dry out a lake or topple a low-lying mountain.

Chapter 11: Invincible King&#039;s Fist

After revealing the might of the Invincible King’s Fist, Yang Zhan looked a bit pale. Clearly, it was something he could only do once, not multiple times in a row.

After finishing the demonstration, he explained all of the details of the technique to Yang Qi, including the hand gestures the arms made, the cultivation method, how to circulate his true energy properly, and the relevant details regarding his meridians. Only after confirming that Yang Qi was completely familiar with all of it did he finally move on to another topic.

“Time is very limited, Qi’er. You have to make use of every moment to train. I’ll work on finding out who is targeting the Yang Clan, and I’ll also try to come up with a way to expel the poison from your brothers.”

At that point, he called the steward back in. “Lord, what orders do you have?”

“Bring out everything from the treasure storehouses. Do a complete inventory of all business endeavors, and then sell the businesses. Take everything over to the city magistrate’s mansion and work to make sure the entire debt of the Latent Dragon Pill is paid off.”

Upon hearing this, Yang Qi’s face turned ashen, and he clenched his hands into fists.

He was a member of the direct bloodline of the Yang Clan, a bloodline that was incredibly wealthy. And now, he was responsible for losing the entire family fortune. Silk, farms, medicinal ingredient shops, spirit stone stores, armories, jewels…. It was all being handed over to the city magistrate’s mansion to compensate for the Latent Dragon Pill.

Yang Qi was very well aware of what a Latent Dragon Pill could do. It was a first-class medicinal pill that was supposedly refined from the blood of dragons. After consuming it, one’s blood would gain traces of dragon power, which would increase both physical strength and lifespan.

The city magistrate had originally possessed two. One of them he had used to break into the Master of Energy level, and the other he had kept locked up in a private chamber. Yang Qi had somehow bribed the guards to gain access to the chamber, stolen the pill, and then given it to Yun Hailan. Of course, his attempt to win her over was a complete failure, as she betrayed him.

Just one of those medicinal pills was enough to clean out the entire direct bloodline of the Yang Clan. Unfortunately, it wouldn’t be long before servants, guards, and other members of the clan wouldn’t have a way to get food.

After all, the Yang Clan mansion was staffed by well over a thousand people.

“It's not a big deal, son,” Yang Zhan said, clasping Yang Qi’s shoulder. “As long as we’re alive, all of the money we lose can be earned back. Strength is the most important thing. We’ll pay for that Latent Dragon Pill, then figure out how to make the money back later.”

Yang Qi nodded and left, but the entire time, he was thinking one thing. ‘I'm going to get that Latent Dragon Pill back!’

About ten streets down from the Yang Clan, there was another sprawling complex with a huge sign above the main gate that read “Chen Mansion”.

This was another of the rich and powerful clans in Yanhaven, the Chen Clan.

In the Chen Clan’s meeting hall, four clan lords were in the middle of a conference. They were the lords from the Wang, Chen, Liu, and Li Clans.

Lord Chen wore a voluminous gown, and had profound energy arts. Even as he sat there, he was surrounded by concentric rings of energy, which were the manifestation of his unique Three Rings Energy Art, a first-class technique.

“Lords, are you aware of the situation with the Yang Clan?” he said calmly.

“Of course,” replied Lord Wang, tapping the arm of his chair. “And I’m fairly certain of what the final outcome will be. The experts from the Yang Clan's subsidiary branches will try to force Yang Zhan to abdicate. Did you see that golden eagle earlier? That means their council of chief elders already intervened to arbitrate. As for what exact decision was made, it’s hard to say. The subsidiary clans already left Yanhaven, making it a bit hard to gather more information.

“The Yang Clan is the highest ranked among all the aristocratic clans, and Yang Zhan’s cultivation base is higher than ours. That much is without question. However, his third son’s martial arts have been crippled. And his two other sons were seen being carried in from outside of the city; apparently, they were poisoned. And according to my informants, the Yang Clan’s steward has been gathering inventory and selling businesses, and is in contact with the city magistrate’s mansion. If the Yang Clan compensates for what was stolen, I'm afraid they’re going to be completely cleaned out.”

“The Yang Clan is clearly on the decline,” said Lord Liu. “Considering we all have various scores to settle with them, why don’t we join forces and strike them while they’re down! The only down side is that Yang Zhan isn’t hurt. If he was hit with shadowblight too, it would have been perfect.”

Lord Chen chuckled in sinister fashion. “Hmph! He’ll get poisoned sooner or later.”

In response to his words, the other clan lords shivered.

“Don’t tell me….”

“Yes,” Lord Chen said. “The Chen Clan has formed an alliance with the House of Shadowblight.” Rising to his feet, he clapped his hands. In response, several masked, black-clothed figures appeared. From the coldness that surrounded them, it was obvious that they cultivated yin-based energy arts.

“This is the emissary from the House of Shadowblight, Arhat Hyperblight. His energy arts and cultivation base have reached the peak of the eighth phase, giving him command of Mind Incarnation. He's on the very cusp of being in the Master of Energy level.”

The other clan lords exchanged glances and eventually rose awkwardly to their feet.

Arhat Hyperblight chuckled in dark fashion, causing goosebumps to rise up on everyone present.

“There are a few reasons we have targeted the Yang Clan,” he said. “First is the mighty Yang Zhan. At some point in the past, he used an airmastery plant, which makes him the perfect vessel to create a flying blightmaster puppet. Second is the mysterious martial technique of the Yang Clan, the Invincible King’s Fist. Third, and most importantly, is that the House of Shadowblight wants to get to Yang Susu, who is Yang Zhan’s adoptive sister, and who is also a disciple of the Demi-Immortal Institute. We can’t get into the Demi-Immortal Institute, but if the Yang Clan is put into danger, she will definitely come to their aid. After all, she has long since adopted the surname Yang for herself….”

With that, Arhat Hyperblight again chuckled in sinister fashion.

‘This… is turning into a struggle between two massively domineering sects…?’ That was what all of the other clan lords were thinking as they exchanged vaguely awkward glances.

In the Rich-Lush Continent, there were many rich and powerful clans, but they generally existed on a lower level than the city magistrates, who in turn existed on a lower level than the enormous sects. Only the Sage Ancestor Dynasty was powerful enough to rival the sects.

“Fellow lords,” said Lord Chen, “we’re going to make sure that this time, the Yang Clan falls for all time! After we deal with Yang Zhan, the subsidiary branches will be much easier to handle. As for their council of chief elders, the experts of the House of Shadowblight will take care of them! The Chen Clan and the House of Shadowblight are going to provide many benefits to all of your clans.

“And now, let us begin discussing the particulars of how we will make our move.”

And thus, the conspiracy began to take shape.

**

A few days had passed since the Yang Clan forum. People in Yanhaven had taken note that the steward was clearing out the businesses and handing over the wealth of the clan to the city magistrate. Before long, everyone knew that the Yang Clan’s direct bloodline was going bankrupt. It was also public knowledge that Yang Qi was crippled, and his two brothers had been poisoned.

Everyone was talking about how the Yang Clan was on the decline.

In the Yang Clan mansion, many of the handmaidens, servants, and guards were getting very nervous. As for Yang Zhan, in addition to clearing out the clan’s wealth, he also sent people to investigate the circumstances of his sons’ poisoning, and to search for antidotal medicine.

Yang Qi watched it all happening, and was unable to help. All he could do was remain in seclusion practicing cultivation. Only if he could break into a higher level could he possibly help his clan and family.

**

It was a clear night, with a river of stars stretching overhead, glittering in mysterious fashion.

Outside of Yanhaven, in a mountain range that few people visited, Yang Qi could be seen running at top speed as he went about training. Energy swirled around him as he tore through the air, causing rumbling sounds to echo around him.

He was now capable of covering vast distances in travel, roughly 500 kilometers during the day, and 400 at night. Furthermore, he was advancing in both physical strength and his energy arts.

Over the past few days, it was on a daily basis that he would travel into the wild mountains a few hundred kilometers outside of Yanhaven. There, he would cultivate his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. After all, the aura of the awakening of a megamammoth was so strong that any top experts who were nearby would notice it.

After about five or six days of cultivation, his true energy was pulsing, seemingly on the verge of pushing toward a breakthrough.

After running for a while, he reached a valley within the mountains.

It was roughly bottle gourd-shaped, and was very mysterious. There were no beasts, no snakes, no sounds of any kind, the reason being that the aura of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth was so fiendish that animals couldn’t deal with it. Not even the fiercest of beasts would dare to move once they sensed it.

“This place will do,” Yang Qi murmured. Planting his feet like those of a mammoth, and twisting his arms like one’s trunks, he let out a shout that resonated through the valley, even causing minor rockslides.

“Hell-Crushing Godmammoth! Megamammoth, awaken!”

He pushed his energy arts to their limits, causing the lightning mammoth to send electricity coursing through him, filling all parts of his body.

CRACK!

It was like the sound of a cocoon breaking open, and a butterfly emerging.

A majestic aura erupted from the top of his head, spreading out with wildness in all directions. Behind him, it was just possible to see two ancient megamammoths, wild and filled with madness, ready to trample anything in their path.

A second particle was now awake.

Yang Qi now had the power of two ancient megamammoths.

Ancient megamammoths were far removed from modern-day elephants. With an effortless tug of the trunk, they could uproot massive trees. They were about three to four times the size of elephants, with pelts of thick fur that were impervious to all sorts of weapons. Their skin was like copper, and their bones like iron, and some of them could even manipulate the vital energy of heaven and earth to produce energy arts similar to those created by humans. Because of all those things, they completely dominated all of the devilish beasts of ancient times.

According to the legends, megamammoths were actually descendants of the godmammoths.

For a young man like Yang Qi to be able to unleash the power of two ancient megamammoths was almost too terrifying to comprehend.

Energy erupted from all of his pores, accompanied by a piercing sound like a steam whistle, or the buzz of countless bees. Yang Qi crossed his arms, causing the previously invisible true energy to begin to take visible shape.

It collected in his palms, then poured out of his body and rapidly became corporeal.

Within moments, it had taken the shape of a chaotic, primeval spear.

This was the sixth phase of energy arts, the Energy Weapon level.

Take energy, and form it into a weapon!

Chapter 12: Sixth Phase of Energy Arts

The long spear pulsed with a hellish aura; apparently its origin was the unique true energy flow provided by the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.

Infernal Deity Spear!

The sixth phase of energy arts was the Energy Weapon level, in which one’s energy could be formed into a weapon. Such weapons were not randomly created; they were governed by complex rules and mechanics. They were made from different types of true energy, and then summoned through the various acupoints in the human body, in conformity with whatever energy arts were unique to that practitioner.

If the weapons were randomly created, they would obviously not be very powerful, and would be easy to defeat in combat.

As for Yang Qi’s Infernal Deity Spear, it was primitive in construction, and almost looked like it was made from stone. It pulsed with a hellish aura, and had a blood-red tip that would cause anyone who looked at it to feel as though their soul might be pulled into hell if they kept looking.

With this spear in hand, Yang Qi felt like he was actually a god of hell.

“Infernal Deity Spear!” he shouted, stabbing out with the spear. Instantly, the power of megamammoths rose up within him, causing vortexes to spring up inside his body. These were not ordinary vortexes, but instead, hell vortexes.

Once these vortexes sprang into action, explosive energy erupted out.

With that, he threw the Infernal Deity Spear, which streaked through the air, flying several hundred paces before stabbing into the side of a mountain. The mountain was like soft tofu to the spear, which emitted massive rumblings as it hewed out a massive cave so deep that it was difficult to see the end.

“Such might! This spear is so fast and powerful that if I used it to fight Yang Shi and his frigid ice energy art, I wouldn’t have any trouble at all defeating him. And he’s in the eighth phase!”

Yang Qi peered into the smoky cave that had been hewn out, and suddenly had a much better understanding of the might of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. Whether it was the method of forming true energy, or the raw strength, it was definitely beyond the compare of other energy arts.

Back when Yang Shi had used his frigid ice energy art to summon a blue spear, its might wasn’t even close to the Infernal Deity Spear.

And he was in the eighth phase, while Yang Qi was merely in the sixth.

Reaching down, Yang Qi picked up a stone off the ground, then drew on the hell vortexes to throw it. Instantly, it burst into flames and slammed into a nearby boulder, causing it to explode.

“Awesome! Normally, you have to cultivate to the peak of the seventh phase before you can pierce rocks and cause explosions. Just how strong is this energy art of mine? Unfortunately, I still have a lot of progress to make. I can’t extend and retract my true energy, so I still had to personally throw that rock.”

In the sixth phase, one could form weapons, but couldn't control them from a distance.

However, in the seventh phase, it was possible to extend true energy to wield weapons from a distance.

As for retracting the true energy, that was very useful in combat because it could help conserve strength. As was to be expected, the seventh phase was roughly ten times as powerful as the sixth in terms of battle prowess.

In fact, that was the reason why Yang Honglie felt so confident in being able to lord it over Yang Qi. Technically speaking, Yang Qi’s lower level of energy arts mastery meant that he shouldn’t be a match for Yang Honglie.

But now, thanks to the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, he was already confident that he could take on Yang Honglie. And that was especially true considering he had his Infernal Deity Spear, which could move with such speed that no one could possibly evade it.

This spear was not an ordinary weapon. When it was unleashed in an attack, screams like those from hell would echo out, as though millions upon millions of ghosts and devils were howling. Anyone who heard that would be shocked to the core, and would be unable to evade the attack, which in some ways was both mental and physical.

The truth was that even if some other genius somehow acquired the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, that person wouldn’t be able to form the Infernal Deity Spear.

The reason Yang Qi could was because of the lightning mammoth, the possible product of some powerful expert’s cultivation and true energy.

Speaking of which, Yang Qi was still curious as to why the golden imp in his forehead had remained completely unmoving up to this point. The quintessence it had left behind was empowering to a shocking degree, allowing Yang Qi to surpass ordinary people in many ways.

As his true energy surged, Yang Qi felt more relaxed and comfortable than ever, and finally threw his head back and let loose a long cry. It had only been a few days, and he already reached the sixth phase, the Energy Weapon level. Such an accomplishment was the type rarely seen in the Rich-Lush Continent.

“Invincible King’s Fist!” he shouted, unleashing the quasi-royal-class martial technique as best he could. As his energy flowed, his fists became like mountains, moving with rapid speed this way and that. The air was ripped apart, and the dirt was cleaved as though by an axe.

The Infernal Deity Spear was something that he couldn’t use lightly; if anyone saw it, it would surely lead to a major catastrophe. However, he could use the Invincible King’s Fist any time he wanted, making the quasi-royal-class something that could not be looked down on.

In his recent days of cultivation, he had already practiced all of the stances and forms of his new fist technique until he had them down perfectly. Although he couldn’t yet summon the six-armed image of true energy like his father, he could still unleash attacks so explosive they could hew crevices into mountains. At this point, he could easily tear anyone in the sixth phase to shreds.

Soon, it was about midnight, and the valley was starting to get very cold. At that point, Yang Qi took a break from cultivation. Leaping up into the trees, he began to travel out of the mountains, more nimble than a monkey.

Seventh phase experts could surpass this. They could flit along the tops of the trees themselves, and some could even use special methods to form true energy wings, thus making it possible to actually glide through the air. With those techniques, traveling 1,500 kilometers in a day wouldn’t even be a problem.

When it came to wings, if he cultivated the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth all the way to the seventh phase, then he could form Fiend-Devil Wings, which were far superior to true energy wings.

Unfortunately, the Yang Clan did not possess any technique that could be used to form wings out of true energy, which was a weakness of theirs.

Such true energy wing techniques were considered very rare, and were usually tightly kept secrets in the organizations that possessed them.

‘Yun Hailan. Song Haishan…. You two betrayed me, clean and simple. And I'm going to pay you back one of these days. Unfortunately, that time is not right now. But wait until my cultivation base gets stronger. Once I fully absorb that lightning mammoth, then I’ll pay you back in like kind.’

Yang Qi knew that restoring his clan’s honor and glory, helping his father, and saving his brothers were the most important things. But the greatest thorn in his side was still how Yun Hailan had betrayed him.

If he didn't avenge that wrong, then he didn’t deserve to be called a person.

Before long, Yang Qi was out of the mountains and heading back toward Yanhaven.

In the hundreds of kilometers surrounding the city were all sorts of garrisons, villages and towns, scattered about as numerous as the stars in the sky. They were connected by a complex web of roads, the biggest of which were wide enough for a dozen or so horse carts to travel abreast. Each and every road was paved with limestone slabs, and were very well maintained.

In the Rich-Lush Continent, almost everyone could practice cultivation, even the common people. Therefore, creating fabulous buildings and roads was no difficulty for them.

Of course, most ordinary citizens could only cultivate third-class energy arts, and most of them never progressed past the fourth phase, the Energy Refinement level.

However, that was still no small feat. People in the fourth phase were still strong enough to carry a hundred pounds while running at full speed. It was strong men such as they who repaired roads, built buildings, dug ditches, and quarried rocks from mountains. That was why the Rich-Lush Continent was filled with amazing buildings, well-maintained roads, and other rich goods.

It was for that very reason that the name of the continent itself had the word ‘rich’ in it.

Occasionally, a commoner would manage to hoard enough Energy Convergence Pills to make a cultivation breakthrough and enter the Energy Eruption level. Such people would immediately be recruited by the rich and powerful clans, or by the nobility, and would serve as special guards. As they became a part of whatever organization they joined, they would eventually gain access to higher-level energy arts.

Suddenly, something caught Yang Qi’s ear. ‘What’s that? Are there people fighting on the banks of the Yan River over there?’

Yanhaven was built next to the mist-covered Yan River, which was very convenient for many reasons.

The river itself was dozens of kilometers wide, and both of its banks featured sprawling beaches filled with reedy patches of vegetation, boulders, and the like. The beautiful terrain features actually made those beaches the perfect location to remain concealed, and many high-level energy artists would make their home there.

As Yang Qi was making his way past one such beachy area, he suddenly sensed energy fluctuations, and heard the sounds of fighting. Stopping in place, he looked ahead to find a young woman besieged by more than ten black-garbed men.

The black-garbed men were all experts in the fifth phase, the Energy Eruption level. One of them was particularly tall and impressive, and had an energy projection behind him that looked like a vicious ghost face. From the true energy fluctuations rolling off of him, it seemed that his energy arts were related to poison.

He was obviously their leader, and the fact that he could form true energy into a ghost face indicated that he was a bit more advanced than Yang Qi, and was in the seventh phase, the Energy Manifestation level.

‘Are those the energy arts of the House of Shadowblight?’ Yang Qi was quite a perceptive person, and almost immediately could sense that this Ghost Face Energy Art was somehow related to the poison his two brothers had been struck with. Possibly, these black-garbed men were enemies bent on harming the Yang Clan.

As for the young woman they were fighting, she was clad in white garments, and wielded a green sword. Every sweep of her weapon sent streams of sword energy out that would form into immortal cranes, which would then attack the ghost face.

WHOOSH!

A rain of crossbow bolts suddenly erupted from the other black-garbed men, each of them as thick and long as a spear.

“Are those Army-Felling Crossbows?” Yang Qi murmured, shocked. Army-Felling Crossbows were particularly lethal, and could tear right through true energy, even when it was formed into a shield.

For example, the energy shield that Yang Kui had summoned, although it could be said to be impervious to all sorts of weapons, would actually be useless against Army-Felling Crossbows.

Within moments, the air was full of razor-sharp bolts, heading like a cloud of locusts toward the white-robed woman.

The young woman already had her back to the river, leaving her no route of escape. But then… A huge pair of true energy wings suddenly sprouted out of her back, each of them fully nine meters long. With a single beat of those wings, she launched high into the sky, looking almost like an immortal crane as she completely avoided the crossbow bolts.

‘Is that what I think it is? Wings of the White Crane? That’s a first-class energy art used by people from the city magistrate’s mansion, isn’t it? She's from the city magistrate’s mansion!’ Shocked, Yang Qi began to run forward.

Chapter 13: Fist Versus Bell

Wings of the White Crane was a first-class energy art. It wasn’t brutally violent like the Invincible King’s Fist, but it did provide marvelous abilities of flight. Although it couldn’t enable the practitioner to fly to the highest heavens like an actual white crane, it did make heights of a hundred meters attainable, and could be used to glide for a dozen or so kilometers.

Thus, it was an energy art that was no more or less incredible than the Invincible King’s Fist. Because of how it could be used to escape from enemies or travel long distances, it was incredibly useful.

And in Yanhaven, the only people who could use this type of energy art were those from the city magistrate’s mansion.

The rich and powerful clans in Yanhaven had techniques that imparted vicious battle prowess, but none could fly like the people from the city magistrate’s mansion.

Even more specific than that, Wings of the White Crane was a secret technique that was only passed down through the bloodline of the city magistrate. As such, it was obvious who this white-robed woman was.

After evading the crossbow bolts, she looked back down, then pointed her sword at the ground. As she poured true energy into the sword, it began to tremble as destructive power built up in it.

Then, she shouted, “One Sword to Freeze Nineteen Prefectures!”

Instantly, blinding sword light began to fall downward, covering the entire beach with sword projections.

“Mesh of Heaven, Net of Earth. Destroy!”

Because of the immense power of the sword light, the granular sand on the beach was instantly transformed into powder.

It only took a single glance for Yang Qi to realize that this sword was an outstanding divine weapon. Anything that could amplify one’s energy arts in this way was definitely something very precious.

After all, divine weapons like this could easily be used to gain the upper hand on an enemy.

The leader of the black-garbed men obviously reached the same conclusion as Yang Qi. Throwing his arms out, he summoned what first appeared to be an elliptical canopy above them. As it took shape, it became clear that it was a huge bell, which took only a moment to cover him and his men.

“Golden Bell Rampart!”

The sword light slammed into the golden bell, causing flames to spark, and giving birth to numerous sharp clanging sounds that rolled out across the waters of the river.

Over a hundred sword projections slammed into the bell, and yet, were unable to break through it. Soon, the white-robed woman was clearly running low on true energy, causing her wings to begin to fade. Clearly, they would vanish within moments!

After all, not everybody could draw on their energy arts for such a long period of time as Yang Qi.

“This is our chance!” the leader of the black-garbed men said. Reversing the flow of his energy, he sent the bell flying upward, simultaneously transforming it into an enormous hammer.

BOOM!

The hammer struck the white-robed woman, knocking her out of the air. As she slammed into the sand, blood sprayed out of her mouth, and her true energy shivered in instability. By this point, Yang Qi could see her face, and was struck by her beauty.

Slowly walking toward the fallen young woman, the leader of the black-garbed men said, “How’d you like that? Hurt? You just reached the seventh phase, the Energy Manifestation level. But you haven’t stabilized your place there. I've been in the Energy Manifestation level for more than a decade. Do you really think that sword of yours could overcome me?”

The young woman looked up at him. “I can’t believe that the House of Shadowblight is here plotting against Yanhaven! Are you people tired of living or something?”

The leader smiled viciously. “Hmph. To the House of Shadowblight, Yanhaven is nothing. We’re going to annex one city after another, and eventually, overthrow the entire Sage Ancestor Dynasty! Then we will be the imperial force that rules the Rich-Lush Continent!

“Considering that you have those Wings of the White Crane, I guess it's safe to assume you’re the daughter of City Magistrate Yan Gufeng. If I kidnap you, he’ll definitely pay a handsome sum of energy convergence pills to get you back!”

Laughter erupted among the other black-garbed men.

“Boss,” one of them said, “why not let us have a bit of fun with her first? We could use some of our House of Shadowblight’s Lovemaking Powder. Give her some of that, and instead of fighting to get away from us, she’ll be fighting to get under us!” More raucous laughter filled the air, crushing any and all hope the young woman had held of getting out of the situation.

“Die!” she suddenly shouted, running her finger along the edge of her blade to send out a mass of sword light. As fast as lightning, it split into hundreds of separate streams that stabbed into the black-garbed man who had just spoken.

As he screamed and flopped backward onto the ground, the other black-garbed men scattered, shocked that the young woman could unleash such a devastating attack.

“Dammit,” the leader growled, looking around at his men. Then, he smiled and looked back at the young woman. “A very nasty little sword trick you have there. But now that you’ve used it, your true energy is in even worse of a state than before, so I don’t have to worry about you fighting like a cornered beast. Think you can kill anyone else? Go ahead and try!”

In response to his challenge, a host of whooshing sounds filled the air, and then another of his subordinates was transformed into a bloody pincushion. Unable to even cry out in shock, he toppled down onto the sand.

However, this time it wasn’t just the black-garbed men who were shocked, it was also the young woman in white, as she had not unleashed the attack!

Moments later, several blazing rocks shot through the air toward the leader. Rocks like this could easily pierce an iron shield, as they were propelled by Yang Qi’s hell vortexes.

“Spiraling energy pellets!?” the leader growled. Eyes flashing, he drew upon his energy arts, sending a host of his own rocks flying out to intercept Yang Qi’s. As they did, a string of booms filled the air.

Utterly discomfited, the leader said, “Who’s out there? Whoever dares to ambush me? You’d better step out into the open right now!”

“It’s me,” Yang Qi said, strolling out of the reeds, his powerful aura surging with such terrifying strength that the leader of the black-garbed men immediately backed up a few paces. “I can’t believe you’re actually trying to kill the daughter of the city magistrate right out in the open. You people really have some gall.”

“Who are you, you little punk?” the leader asked with a snarl. “Do you really think you can kill my men without the House of Shadowblight coming for revenge?”

Yang Qi laughed loudly. “Revenge? If I kill you, how will they ever know? You’ve roamed the jianghu for years now. Haven’t you heard of killing witnesses to prevent secrets from getting out?”

His words caused the young woman’s anxiety to suddenly be replaced by inner laughter.

‘I like this guy,’ she thought. At the same time, she pulled a pill box out of her garment, broke it open, and consumed the pill inside, hoping to restore some of her true energy.

“Kill me?” the leader said. “Apparently you don’t know the meaning of the word death.” He blurred into motion, like a serpent striking at its prey, and within a moment had already closed the several-hundred-meter distance between himself and Yang Qi.

“Watch out!” the young woman called. “They have powerful poison arts that—”

Before she could even finish her words, Yang Qi saw an enormous ghost face formed of true energy lunging toward him.

It was a fearsome sight, and something that couldn’t be taken lightly.

“Invincible King’s Fist!” he shouted, drawing upon all of the true energy he could muster as he slipped into the six forms of the technique. Triumph in Every Battle. Victory in Every Fight…. It took only a brief moment for him to complete the forms, whereupon his true energy exploded out in a massive blast onto the ghost face.

Instantly, the ghost face shattered into bits.

Yang Qi could sense his true energy diminishing rapidly, but in the end, his energy arts were just too vigorous. The power of two ancient megamammoths was enough to crush mountains, and therefore, after taking only one additional step forward, his true energy was back to full strength. Without hesitation, he launched another Invincible King’s Fist at the black-garbed leader.

“What energy arts do you cultivate, brat?” the leader spat. He had just wasted a significant amount of true energy when fighting the white-robed woman, only to once again have it drained in an interchange. ‘He’s only in the sixth phase,’ he thought. ‘How come it feels like he’s drawing on the power of some primeval beast? Each of his moves is like some enormous animal trampling across the battlefield.’

Stabilizing his true energy, he prepared to unleash another killing move. However, before he could, Yang Qi’s Invincible King’s Fist rocketed toward him again with devastating momentum.

“Golden Bell Rampart!”

The leader of the black-garbed men once again called on the same defensive energy art from before, summoning a huge golden bell. When Yang Qi’s fist strike hit it, the Invincible King’s Fist collapsed.

“Let’s see how many fists you can block!” Yang Qi said, obviously not willing to give the man any breathing room. Using the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth to back his Invincible King’s Fist, his hand was like a hammer smashing over and over again into the bell. In only a short breath of time, he drew upon his true energy to unleash over a hundred fist strikes.

Boom. BOOM. BOOM!

Gonging sounds could be heard as the bell was struck, causing visible sound waves to roll out in all directions. As for the leader of the black-garbed men, he staggered backward over and over, blood beginning to ooze out of his mouth thanks to the damage to his internal organs.

Pouring more energy into the golden bell, the leader said, “Listen, punk, you—”

“Die!” Yang Qi interrupted with a shout, unleashing a torrent of fist strikes that were like enormous axes that could cleave mountains. It was an impressive sight as he drew fully on his energy arts, his steel-like muscles bulging as he attacked with frightening tenacity.

He went through the six forms of the Invincible King’s Fist in an endless cycle, pushing his momentum to the absolute peak, to the point where no one could see him; they could only see the massive waves of energy battering at the bell.

He was like some sort of primeval, divine titan, smashing at mountains with an enormous sledgehammer.

‘Is he… even human?’ the white-robed woman thought, looking on with wide eyes. ‘How could his energy arts have reached such an explosive level?’

At this point in the fight, the leader of the black-garbed men was in a very, very bad situation. He couldn’t even fight back. All he could do was go all out to fuel his golden bell, aware that if it were to break, he would be reduced to a pile of blood and gore.

It seemed to him that he wouldn't be safe from this kid even if he were locked up inside of an iron chamber. The brat was only in the sixth phase, and yet, seemed mightier than ten sixth phase experts all working together.

“Listen punk!” he said angrily, “do you really think that—”

“Shut the hell up!” Yang Qi shouted, yet again interrupting. Meanwhile, he could now sense that the third particle within him was beginning to awake. A cracking sound could be heard within him, and suddenly, the lightning mammoth stirred with excitement. Moments later, he had the power of three ancient megamammoths at his disposal.

Yet again, his strength soared to epic heights.

BOOM!

The golden bell shattered, and Yang Qi rushed forward with vicious abandon, charging across the battlefield like a megamammoth. As he did, one fist after another slammed into the leader of the black-garbed men.

The young woman looked on in shock as the man was thrown into the air, blood spraying out of his eyes, ears, nose, and mouth, and his chest caved in. Then, he flopped onto the ground like a burlap sack.

Chapter 14: Daughter of the City Magistrate

The leader of the black-garbed men had been virtually beaten into a pulp. After laying on the sand for a moment, he struggled to look up at Yang Qi and said, “Y-you’re… quite the exp… expert, ya punk…. Who are you?”

BAM!

Yang Qi’s only response was to end his life with a final fist strike.

“Excellent striking technique, Young Lord,” the young woman in white said. “And excellent energy arts. Your cultivation base is in the sixth phase, and yet, you easily dispatched an expert in the seventh phase. Geniuses like you are rare to say the least. Many thanks for saving me. Young Lord, may I ask to know your honored surname and distinguished given name? As for me, I am the daughter of Yanhaven’s city magistrate, Yan Feixia.”

“I'm Yang Qi.”

His first expectation was to see her face light up with shock upon hearing his name. After all, he was fairly famous in Yanhaven right now, and was said to be a useless, hedonistic silkpants who had brought ruin to his clan. However, it was to his surprise that Yan Feixia didn’t react at all.

“Ah, a young master of the Yang Clan,” she said coolly. “Well, I must truly offer my thanks for your assistance tonight.”

Surprised by the reaction, Yang Qi said, “Young Lady Yan, have you only just returned to Yanhaven?”

“Indeed. I've been away working on my cultivation for about ten years. This is my first time returning, and I couldn’t have been more surprised to be ambushed by experts from the House of Shadowblight. In fact, I need to get back to the city right away to report the matter and try to get an explanation.” Stepping forward, she began to examine the bodies of the black-garbed men. When she got to the mangled corpse of the leader, it was to Yang Qi’s surprise that she reached into his garments and pulled out what appeared to be a tiny copper bell.

It was covered with complex designs, and if one looked closely, it would be obvious that although it looked like copper, it was actually made of some other type of metal.

“I was wondering why his Golden Bell Rampart was so strong. As it turns out, he had this little treasure, a bell made of refined gold from beyond the heavens, forged by a Master of Energy. This would serve to provide a significant boost to his energy arts, and obviously increased the strength of his Golden Bell Rampart by several times.”

She examined the bell closely for a moment, as though to commit every aspect of it to memory, and then tossed it over to Yang Qi.

“You’re giving it to me?” Yang Qi asked, surprised. Looking down at the complex designs that covered its surface, he noticed that there were also lines of extremely tiny text, which revealed the cultivation technique of the Golden Bell Rampart itself.

Surprisingly, it was a first-class energy art. It could be used to form a bell-shaped defense canopy made of true energy that would deflect all sorts of attacks. Even toxic energy would be useless against it.

“Well, it’s your battle trophy, after all,” Yan Feixia said with a soft laugh. “You did the hard work, so it’s not my place to take all the spoils. That’s a first-class cultivation technique, you know, so if you master it, it will advance your energy arts by a step or two. First-class energy arts are not easy to come by; if you sold that at auction, you would probably make a few hundred thousand energy convergence pills.”

“A few hundred thousand…?” Yang Qi replied. He licked his lips. “That’s a fortune!”

“It is. Things like that are worth a lot.” At that point, Yan Feixia looked down at the leader and prodded him with her sword. “He has some other treasures on him as well. It would be a big waste not to take them.”

“Well, he’s covered with poisons,” Yang Qi said, “and I don’t have the ability to use telekinesis yet. Miss Yan, why don’t you search him for treasure, then we can split what we find?”

“That works,” she replied straightforwardly. Waving her hand, she sent a stream of true energy out, which transformed into a life-like hand that quickly descended to search the corpse. The process only took a moment, and produced a snuff bottle, a few pieces of paper, and what appeared to be a leather bound book.

“This snuff bottle contains an antidote that nullifies most poisons used by the House of Shadowblight. These papers are bank notes from the Sage Ancestor Dynasty, which can be exchanged for energy convergence pills. And this book… well, well. It’s made from human flesh. And it contains the poison arts cultivated by the House of Shadowblight.”

Yan Feixia had clearly seen many things in her life, and was privy to many secrets that ordinary people would be unaware of. Yang Qi couldn’t help but marvel at what people from important clans and sects were capable of.

Although Yang Qi himself was considered one of the young elites in Yanhaven, he was still like a frog in a well when compared to someone like this.

“Antidote….” he murmured, eyes glittering. “My eldest brother and second brother were both poisoned by shadowblight, so that antidote would be very helpful. As for the banknotes, why don't we split them evenly? And then you keep the poison art manual? What do you say, Miss Yan?”

“Alright,” she replied with no ceremony. Handing him half of the bank notes, she said, “I don’t really need the poison manual to be honest, but I can probably hand it in to my sect in exchange for some rewards. Well, it’s getting late, and I need to get back home. Instead of inviting you over for a visit, I’ll head over to the Yang Clan in a few days to thank you properly.”

“You’re too kind,” Yang Qi said. “That having been said, Miss Yan, I’d prefer for you to not mention this incident to anyone. Just tell people that you handled the men from the House of Shadowblight.”

“Oh, I understand,” she replied. “If word got out about this it could be bad for the Yang Clan.” Waving her hand, she sent a stream of energy out that ignited the corpses of the ambushers. Within moments, they had all burned away into nothing but ash.

“An inferno energy art!?” Yang Qi’s eyes widened. “Miss Yan, I would never have been able to guess that, considering you used metal-type sword techniques before, you would also be a master of fire-type techniques. Can those two different types of energy arts really work well together?”

Normally speaking, people would cultivate a technique related to only one specific element. Mixing elements in cultivation could be very dangerous.

Yan Feixia smiled coolly. “It's a secret legacy technique from my sect that allows people to simultaneously cultivate two types of energy arts.” She didn’t seem inclined to offer any further explanation, which was entirely reasonable. Sects and organizations often had secrets that weren’t intended to be spread.

Although Yang Qi cultivated the energy arts of the Yang Clan, after being crippled, he had begun to power them with the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.

That new technique was as profound as the depths of hell, and had the ability to remain completely concealed.

In any case, Yang Qi wasn’t particularly interested in the Golden Bell Rampart. After all, if he could reach the seventh phase, the Energy Manifestation level, then the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth would provide its own special defensive technique, the Infernal Deity Aegis. In combination with the Fiend-Devil Wings, that would give him defensive capabilities that far surpassed the Golden Bell Rampart.

From that it could be seen that the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth was one of those legendary techniques that was unrivaled in the world.

In terms of the full manifestation of the Infernal Deity Aegis, it was a black spheroid of true energy. Eventually, in the Master of Energy level, it would become so strong that it would provide protection even in the depths of a volcano.

That was a level of defense that almost surpassed that which was human.

In fact, even the city magistrate of Yanhaven, who did have a Master of Energy cultivation base, as well as remarkable defensive techniques, would be transformed into ash if he jumped into a volcano.

‘It seems that every advancement of my cultivation base and energy arts will lead to hundredfold improvements in strength,’ Yang Qi thought, his heart pulsing with anticipation. ‘Can I really take them all the way to the seventh phase?’

Even having just stepped into the sixth phase, his fight with the black-garbed leader had caused a third particle to awaken within him, giving him the power of three ancient megamammoths.

“I’ll take my leave now, Young Master Yang. In a few days, I’ll come again to express my thanks.” With that, Yan Feixia called upon her energy arts to once again summon a pair of white wings. Leaping up a few meters into the air, she flapped her wings and flew off into the starlight, looking very much like a spectacular white crane.

Yang Qi looked down at his spoils. After looking over the bank notes, he realized that they were worth well over a hundred thousand energy convergence pills. That much wealth was equivalent to roughly three months of revenue for the Yang Clan.

Considering that his direct bloodline was now completely bankrupt, that many energy convergence pills would definitely be extremely helpful.

And then there was the golden bell, and the technique that was written on it, which was also an extremely valuable treasure. That was also worth hundreds of thousands of energy convergence pills, and although it wouldn’t alleviate the crisis, it would at least replenish the bloodline’s losses to some degree.

With that, Yang Qi sped off. When he reached the city walls, he scaled them as lithely as a leopard. The only thing the city guards detected was a slight breeze caused by his passing.

**

Back at the Yang Clan mansion, he found his way to a certain private chamber, then knocked on the door.

A moment later, Yang Zhan’s resounding voice could be heard from inside. “Qi’er, are you back from your training? Come in.”

Then, the door to the chamber, which was roughly a third of a meter thick, slowly opened. Yang Qi hurried inside to find his father and two brothers all sitting there cross-legged. His father had two hands outstretched, with a palm placed on each of his brothers’ backs as he worked to drive the poison out of them.

Unfortunately, from the complexion of his brothers’ faces, it was obvious that the toxic energy was not easy to dispel.

As soon as Yang Zhan saw Yang Qi, his gaze entered him like a burning fire. “Qi’er, your cultivation base has advanced again, hasn’t it?”

“Yes, Father. I finally broke through into the Energy Weapon level! At this point, I should be able to defeat Yang Honglie without any problem.”

“Don’t get cocky,” his father replied seriously. “Yang Honglie is in the seventh phase, and you can’t underestimate him. Generally speaking, sixth phase energy arts practitioners aren’t capable of defeating the seventh phase ones.”

“I know, Father,” Yang Qi said, nodding.

“Third Brother,” his eldest brother said, forcing a smile onto his face, “you really came out on top of your catastrophe! It’s too bad I've been crippled. Father just can’t get this damned toxic energy out of me.”

“Don’t worry,” Yang Zhan said. “Worst case scenario, I’ll beg one of the ninth phase chief elders to help.”

Yang Qi’s eldest brother shook his head. “Father, the chief elders are all running out of longevity, and have to focus all of their efforts on trying to seize life from the heavens. How could they possibly spare effort to focus on us when they're so worried about trying to extend their own lifespans?”

The chief elders had already reached the point of avoiding all fighting for the purpose of conserving true energy, so obviously, they wouldn't waste it unless absolutely necessary.

“There’s no need to worry, Eldest Brother,” Yang Qi said. Without further ado, he pulled the antidote out of his garment.

Chapter 15: Detoxification

“What’s that?” Yang Zhan said, heart beginning to pound as he looked at the antidote. “Don’t tell me it’s really…?” Because of his advanced energy arts, his senses were particularly acute, and a single whiff of the aroma of the antidote was enough for him to confirm that it could treat his sons. “Where did you get that?”

“It’s definitely an antidote of some sort,” Yang Qi said. “Whether it can cure eldest brother and second brother, I'm not sure. We’ll just have to try it out. As for how I got it, it was from a seventh phase expert from the House of Shadowblight that I killed….” He tossed the antidote to his father. “I also got some bank notes that should help the clan’s financial situation.”

With that, he went on to offer a description of the fight with the men of the House of Shadowblight, and how he'd saved Yan Feixia.

“Great! Excellent! You’ve done a lot to alleviate the grudge between our bloodline and the city magistrate’s mansion! I've heard of this Yan Feixia. She’s Yan Gufeng’s favorite daughter, and from the time she was young has trained at the True Dragon Institute. Now that she’s back, she’ll definitely have a very high standing in the Yan Clan.”

As Yang Zhan spoke, he took the bank notes and copper bell that Yang Qi offered him, and continued to speak. “Golden Bell Rampart is a first-class energy art. If an ordinary person got it and mastered it, he could found a new clan. Altogether, this is about six or seven hundred thousand energy convergence pills’ worth of wealth. That’s almost a year of profit for the Yang Clan! This will definitely alleviate some of the crisis.”

“Father, what about the antidote?”

Of course, that was what Yang Qi was most concerned about.

Yang Zhan sent some energy into the snuff bottle, as well as some of the toxic energy he had extracted earlier. When he saw that the antidote completely dispelled the toxic energy, he said, “It can definitely help your brothers drive the toxic energy out….”

Whoosh!

Not hesitating any further, he drew upon his energy arts to transform the antidote into two streams of smoke that pierced into his sons’ bodies, causing them to tremble visibly.

Upon seeing that, Yang Qi sent some of his true energy into his brothers, hoping to assist them in building back up their vital energy. After all, the serious nature of their poisoning meant that their vital energy had been severely damaged and reduced.

Face covered with a look of shock, his eldest brother said, “Third Brother, your energy arts are so powerful!”

Based on the level of his own energy arts, he could tell that his third brother’s energy flowed through his meridians like a massive river. Although the energy it contained was not as pure and refined as their father’s, it was the type that could cause virtually all living beings to bow in submission.

A short time later, the toxic energy was completely removed, and his true energy was thrumming with vitality. Rising to his feet, he said, “Recovered at last!”

“Same here,” the second brother said, similarly leaping up, his true energy surging. In fact, there was also a popping sound as his energy arts unexpectedly broke through into the fifth phase, the Energy Eruption level. “Third Brother, thanks to you, I just broke through! Getting struck by lightning was really a blessing in disguise for you. With energy arts like yours, you’re a true blessing to our Yang Clan!”

“Eldest Brother, Second Brother, not only have you recovered, you've also made progress! In the future, no one will dare to underestimate the direct bloodline of the Yang Clan! We might still be facing a financial crisis, but as long as we’re alive, we can make a comeback.”

“That’s right, Third Brother. From here on out, let’s all work as hard as we can to help father get us back on track financially….” The three brothers reached out with their right hands and clasped each other by the wrists, formalizing their resolve.

Yang Zhan gazed at his sons with a broad, pleased smile. Regardless, after a moment, a serious expression once again took over his face. “Boys, I’ve uncovered the truth of who has been opposing us. The House of Shadowblight has formed an alliance with another of the aristocratic clans of Yanhaven, the Chen Clan. In the past, they never had what it took to make a move against us. But they saw the incident with Qi’er as an opportunity to hatch a plot.”

Yang Qi’s eldest brother, Yang Yunchong, said, “Father, there’s something I've been wondering about. Our Yang Clan is clearly the strongest clan in Yanhaven, and although it’s common for there to be friction between the big clans, it doesn’t seem to me that we've reached the point where open conflict is appropriate. Are they really not worried about us fighting back?”

Yang Qi had also considered this issue.

After a moment of thought, Yang Zhan said, “It's because of your aunt. It’s been years since she joined the top organization in the Rich-Lush Continent, the Demi-Immortal Institute. She has a good reputation there, and is considered to be a genius when it comes to energy arts. Because of how important the institute views her, she’s become a valuable target for certain parties. Of course, they can’t make a move on her in the Demi-Immortal Institute itself, and therefore, they’re targeting the clan. Obviously, they hoped that she would be informed, and then rush back here to help, only to fall into their trap.”

‘So that’s what's going on….’ the three brothers all thought, their eyes flickering with understanding.

Yang Qi suddenly thought back to the young girl he remembered, and how she would often feed him when he was a child.

‘If you don’t eat your dinner, Yang Qi, I'm going to spank you!’ He could see her pigtails swaying back and forth as she blew on his soup spoon, worried that the hot liquid might burn him.

‘No! I don’t want to eat dinner!’ he would pout, stomping his feet. ‘I want to play!’

Those were the type of memories he had of his aunt.

Now, ten years had passed, and he didn’t even know what she looked like, or how advanced her cultivation base was.

“So what do we do now, father?” asked the second brother, whose name was Yang Hualong.

“We wait patiently and watch how the situation develops. In the meantime, we do our best to get the clan businesses back in operation. I’ll leave that to the two of you. As for me, I’ll focus fully on cultivation, and trying to break through to the ninth phase. Qi’er, you also focus on your cultivation, but take some time to go for a visit to the city magistrate’s mansion. The fact that you saved Yan Feixia means that our relationship with them has changed.”

“Yes, sir!” the three brothers shouted, their hearts brimming with excitement regarding the future of the clan.

After a moment of silence, Yang Zhan could see Yang Qi’s guilt written on his face, and said, “Don’t blame yourself for what's happened, Qi’er. Although your reckless action of stealing that Latent Dragon Pill led to a whole series of unfortunate events, some good also came of it. For one thing, we lured our enemies out of the shadows. Without that development, our clan, and your aunt as well, would have been in great danger, and yet completely unaware of it.”

“Alright….” Yang Qi said, his negative feelings fading a bit. “However, I’ll never forget the fact that Princess Yun Hailan of Yundale-by-the-Sea tricked me into stealing that pill, thus leading our clan into great harm. One day I will definitely get revenge for that. In fact, I also suspect that Yun Hailan has it out for my aunt. That’s probably why she targeted me to begin with, which would indicate that she’s in league with the House of Shadowblight….. Oh, right. I forgot to mention that when I was beaten by Song Haishan, he said that Yun Hailan was going to join the Demi-Immortal Institute.”

Yang Zhan was an experienced and insightful man, so after hearing this new information from Yang Qi, said, “That’s a distinct possibility. If that’s the case, then I’d say it's highly likely your aunt has an enemy within the Demi-Immortal Institute itself, plotting against her.”

“Father,” Yang Qi said, “if you can advance your cultivation to the Master of Energy level, then couldn’t you join the Demi-Immortal Institute as well, and offer some support to aunt?”

Yang Zhan shook his head. Waving his hand dismissively, he said, “In the Rich-Lush Continent, the Master of Energy level is so high that such individuals can command entire cities. Armies even. They are subjects of universal esteem, and some are even appointed as nobility by the Sage Ancestor Dynasty. However, in the Demi-Immortal Institute, they aren’t as special. The only way to be looked up to there is to break out of the Energy Arts level, and seize life from the heavens. Boys, you three catch up with each other. I'm going into seclusion to try to achieve my breakthrough.”

“Farewell, father!”

Yang Zhan gave the bank notes and the copper bell to Yang Yunchong, and then the three brothers left.

Yang Yunchong and Yang Hualong would be responsible for getting clan affairs back in order, leaving Yang Qi free to focus on cultivation. After all, he had only three months until the autumn hunt, which was his deadline to surpass Yang Honglie.

Although the direct bloodline had experienced a financial catastrophe, with the wealth Yang Qi had acquired, they were now at least capable of making a comeback.

**

Late that night, in the city magistrate’s mansion, a middle-aged man sat in a certain room, a look of delight on his face. This man’s energy surged even stronger than Yang Zhan’s, and behind him was a burning sphere of energy from within which stepped numerous humanoid figures that almost looked like gods or spirits.

This man was in the Master of Energy level, making him a grandmaster of energy arts.

He could use Humanoid True Energy at will to create incarnations and clones, could attack with lightning-like speed, could track enemies by following their souls, and could fuse with heaven and earth.

This man ruled all of the countless smaller cities and towns in the Yanhaven region, making him a leader to millions and millions of individuals. His name: Yan Gufeng.

Just like the characters in his name, he really did look like a lonely mountain peak, rising high into the azure sky, extraordinary in all aspects.

When a voice echoed into his ears, an excited, fatherly smile broke out on his face.

“Daddy, I'm back.”

“Is that you, Xia’er?” Drawing on his energy arts, he waved his hand, and the door to the chamber opened. “Hurry inside and let me have a look at you. You’ve been gone for ten years! How has your cultivation progressed at the True Dragon Institute?”

Yan Feixia hurried in, dropped to her knees before her father, and kowtowed respectfully. “Father, it's so good to see that you’re in good health.”

“There’s no need for all that bowing….” All of a sudden, a flash of anger appeared on Yan Gufeng’s face. “What’s wrong? Have you been in a fight recently? Were you accosted on the way here?”

Rising to her feet, Yan Feixia said, “Yes, Father. I was ambushed by people from the House of Shadowblight. They set up a trap by the Yan River.”

With that, she offered a few more details.

A cracking sound could be heard as the crystal goblet Yan Gufeng had been holding shattered into dust. “How dare the House of Shadowblight attempt to harm my daughter! And what gall they have to operate within the vicinity of Yanhaven. Do they really think the Yan Clan is powerless to retaliate?”

“Father, the House of Shadowblight is a huge organization, and they operate in the shadows. They’re one of the most powerful poison sects in the west. You can’t underestimate them, Father, nor do anything rash. I’ll report this matter to the True Dragon Institute after I return. By the way, Father, I had help dealing with the men of the House of Shadowblight. A friend who casually slaughtered all of their experts.”

Looking surprised, Yan Gufeng said, “You had help? Who was it?”

Chapter 16: Profoundly Shocking

“Thankfully some noble and qualified young hero was around to kill the villains from the House of Shadowblight!” Yan Gufeng said. “Who was he? Do I know him? I definitely need to offer my profound thanks to whoever he is. Which clan did he come from? Or was he someone from the senior generation?”

“I believe you do know him, Father. He’s a prodigy from the Yang Clan. Despite being only in the sixth phase of energy arts, he’s by no means inferior to experts in the seventh phase. If he were a member of the True Dragon Institute, he would be considered a top-rate genius.” Yan Feixia had nothing but praise for Yang Qi. After all, she had personally witnessed his grand performance; not only had he vanquished the Golden Bell Rampart, he had easily dispatched the leader of the black-garbed men. As such, she had a glowing impression of him.

In fact, never before had she encountered someone like him among her peers.

Yang Qi hadn’t even practiced cultivation to the peak of his current level, and yet possessed the power to cow countless devils and gods.

In response to his daughter’s words, Yan Gufeng’s expression flickered. “A prodigy from the Yang Clan? Who, exactly?”

“Yang Qi,” she replied.

His face fell, and he nearly lost control over his energy arts. “What? Yang Qi? Are you sure it was him? Impossible! His energy arts were crippled by Luo Hun! And then he was struck by lightning! How could he possibly have been the one to help you?”

“I hadn't heard about that,” said Yan Feixia, clearly surprised. “Father, why did Luo Hun cripple his energy arts?”

Yan Gufeng let out a cold snort, and his eyes flashed with killing intent. “That little punk stole my Latent Dragon Pill. As you know, it was years ago that I traveled far and wide in my quest to acquire the two Latent Dragon Pills that were all that remained of the legacy of Daoist Master Latent Dragon. By consuming one of the pills, I was able to reach the Master of Energy level. I’d planned to give the other one to you, and was merely waiting for you to return to visit. It would definitely have boosted both your energy arts and your place in the True Dragon Institute. But then that brat came along and stole it! I was so angry I wanted to just kill him. The only reason I didn’t was because of Yang Susu and her place at the Demi-Immortal Institute.”

“Father, I only just met Yang Qi, but he seemed like quite the heroic individual. Why would he steal your Latent Dragon Pill? Could it all have been some misunderstanding? Besides, didn’t you keep the Latent Dragon Pill guarded in a secret chamber? How could he even have stolen it to begin with?”

“Someone in the know gave him information about the chamber itself!” Yan Gufeng said angrily. “And he used a host of other methods to get inside. I investigated things later on, and as it turns out, that siren Yun Hailan from Yundale-by-the-Sea seduced him. When she realized that the city magistrate’s mansion had a lot of dealings with the Yang Clan, she pulled him into her scheme. In the end, the little punk just turned out to be a complete and utter fool.”

Yan Feixia frowned. “But how could his energy arts have recovered? And how did he end up being so powerful?”

After a moment of silence, Yan Gufeng waved his arm to send a blast of energy out of his chamber, which caused quite the stir within the mansion, and said, “Men, enter!”

Moments later, numerous figures came hurrying in, all of them wearing fancy, embroidered garments. Dropping to their knees, they joined their voices together to offer greetings.

“Our respects, Lord, Miss!”

Considering that Yan Gufeng presided over armies of followers, it was easy for him to summon top masters to do work like this. “Supposedly that brat from the Yang Clan got his energy arts back. Go investigate the matter immediately!”

The masters all kowtowed and then vanished. About an hour later, they returned and assembled outside of his chamber. However, the one to actually enter and report was the hulking brute of a man, Luo Hun. Dropping to his knees, he said, “City Magistrate, it seems that the young miss heard correctly. That punk Yang Qi actually benefited from being struck by lightning. I'm not sure what exactly changed or transformed about him, but I confirmed that his true energy is stronger than ever. Despite only being in the fifth phase, he made a big splash at the Yang Clan forum, and actually defeated Yang Kui of the senior generation, who’s in the sixth phase. He performed so outstandingly that even one of their chief elders praised him.”

Yan Gufeng was indeed a powerful person, with deep access to intelligence resources. Many of the rich and powerful clans in the city had no idea what had occurred in the Yang Clan forum, and yet, in one short hour, his men uncovered all of the details.

“Struck by lightning? Experienced some transformation? How did that kid get so lucky?” A thoughtful expression could be seen on Yan Gufeng’s face as he pondered the situation. “He broke through from the fourth phase into the fifth, and is now all the way into the sixth. Daughter, are you sure his energy arts are in the sixth phase?”

“Absolutely. Otherwise, how could he have defeated an expert from the House of Shadowblight who is in the seventh?” With that, Yan Feixia went on to provide a detailed recounting of the fight.

Yan Gufeng listened with increasing shock. “You're telling me that Yang Qi, who is only in the sixth phase, actually defeated an expert in the seventh phase, who was using the Golden Bell Rampart? And his opponent was boosting his own energy arts with a magical item? This is extraordinary!”

Considering how advanced his cultivation base was, he was very familiar with the differences between various cultivation levels. Fundamentally speaking, it was almost impossible for someone in the sixth phase to fight someone in the seventh. Only the most spectacular of geniuses could do something like that. And that was without even taking into consideration that the enemy had been using the Golden Bell Rampart.

That made things even more astounding.

‘What secrets does this kid have?’ Yan Gufeng thought. ‘It can’t be as simple as having been struck by lightning….’

When Yan Feixia saw how angry her father looked, she couldn’t help but say, “Father, it doesn’t really matter. He saved my life, and I’ll never be able to forget that. He was tricked into stealing the Latent Dragon Pill, wasn’t he? And didn’t the Yang Clan provide compensation already?”

“Fine,” Yan Gufeng said, his tone softer than before. “I won’t look into the matter any further. Originally I was going to make sure the Yang Clan was wiped out from Yanhaven, but now…. Luo Hun.”

“Sir?” Luo Hun said. “What orders do you have?”

“Carry out another investigation, this time, into the House of Shadowblight. Find out how strong they are, and what exactly they want in this area. What gave them the guts to come to Yanhaven and threaten my daughter?

“Daughter, spend the next few days in rest. Go see your brothers and sisters, and give them some tips regarding the energy arts of the True Dragon Institute. If any of them qualify, perhaps you could take them back with you to study.”

The True Dragon Institute was one of the largest institutions in the Rich-Lush Continent. Although they hadn’t been around as long as the Demi-Immortal Institute, they were at least comparable. Most people considered them to be in the top five, placing them far beyond the House of Shadowblight in terms of power.

“Very well, Father,” Yan Feixia said. After all, she had wasted a lot of true energy in her fight with the black-garbed men, and was feeling particularly exhausted.

After his daughter left, Yan Gufeng sat back down in his throne and thought about the situation for a bit more. Eventually, a smile touched his lips. ‘So, a new freak has appeared in the Yang Clan. That brat actually benefited from his catastrophe, and experienced a body tempering because of the lightning strike. I've heard of things like this happening before…. The Yang Clan has always been a big threat. If this kid continues to advance like this, then within ten years, we’ll have another Master of Energy to worry about. And Yang Zhan is already on the verge of reaching it as well. Pretty soon, my position as city magistrate will be difficult to defend. It’s not uncommon for the aristocratic clans to rise up in rebellion, kill the city magistrate, and take over the city.’

The cities in the Rich-Lush Continent were mostly self-governing, and were like city-states. Although they offered tribute to the Sage Ancestor Dynasty, that was where the relationship ended.

As for the aristocratic clans within the cities, they were like vassals underneath the city magistrate’s mansion. And many of them were more than happy to revolt and kill the person they served.

In fact, such events were so common that virtually all city magistrates had to be on guard against the possibility. Most of the time, the Sage Ancestor Dynasty wouldn’t pay any attention to such things, as long as their yearly tributes always came in.

Besides, the Sage Ancestor Dynasty was on the decline, ensuring that the hundreds upon hundreds of nations in the Rich-Lush Continent were always at odds. The number of groups who could be considered rebellious were too many to count.

Case in point: the numerous locations in the hundreds of kilometers surrounding Yanhaven that the Yan Clan controlled. Such places had a different name for the area they lived in. They called it the State of Yan. And in the grand scheme of things, Yanhaven was only a third-rate city, albeit within the top of that group. That having been said, considering the wealth they had access to, it was possible that they could gain even more honor and glory.

Slapping his hand on the table, Yan Gufeng said, “Luo Hun, spread word that in half a month, I want to invite all of the elite young ones from Yanhaven to a banquet. Make sure it’s common knowledge that my daughter Yan Feixia has returned from the True Dragon Institute for a visit, and that this is a welcoming feast. And if my daughter takes a liking to any of those who attend, I could very well pick him as a son-in-law….”

Luo Hun understood immediately. “Excellent idea, City Magistrate. First of all, this will give us a good idea of what aristocratic clans have been up to lately, and what level their top disciples have reached. Second, if we can use the other clans to kill Yang Qi and sow discord among them, then it will serve to consolidate your power.”

“That's right, Luo Hun,” Yan Gufeng said coldly. “You’re as clever as always. Also, keep your eyes on Yang Zhan. He’s always been a talented individual, and I know he used an airmastery plant in the past. If he reaches the Master of Energy level, he’ll be a major threat to the Yan Clan. Furthermore, we need to consolidate power over all the clans in Yanhaven. If we do that, and also get the support of the True Dragon Institute, then we really can proclaim ourselves the State of Yan.”

Luo Hun shivered. “Proclaim ourselves the State of Yan? You mean declare independence from the Sage Ancestor Dynasty?”

“Exactly. If Yanhaven can become an independent nation, and then begins to absorb other cities, we will only continue to grow stronger and stronger. In the years to come, it would not be entirely impossible to unite the entire Rich-Lush Continent under our banner. I’ve already reached the peak of the Master of Energy level. If the right good fortune comes along, and I break into the Lifeseizing level, then I’ll increase my longevity. I could theoretically rule for hundreds of years! Perhaps thousands! That has been the dream of all the leaders of the Yan Clan, going all the way back to our founding ancestor. Much of this will depend on your help, Luo Hun!”

“Yes sir,” Luo Hun said, ducking his head in deference.

Chapter 17: A Dream of a Thousand Years

Never could Luo Hun have imagined that the city magistrate he served would have such high ambitions. His dream actually stretched a thousand years into the future, and involved unifying the Rich-Lush Continent under his own rulership.

It was especially surprising considering that Yanhaven only counted as a small city in the sprawling continent. Although it held sway over a population of millions, there were other cities whose citizens numbered in the tens of millions. And there were even some with populations over a hundred million. Therefore, Yanhaven was nothing special, and if it declared itself a nation, could easily be wiped out by other, more powerful forces. Considering that, it almost didn’t seem worth mentioning the possibility of seizing rulership of the entire continent.

The thousands of cities in the Rich-Lush Continent were essentially independent vassals, and unifying them would be a very, very difficult task. Not even experts in the Lifeseizing level would think about trying to do so. After all, the Sage Ancestor Dynasty had as many powerful experts working for them as the sky had clouds, and not even they had ever tried to create a centralized state power. Although they did have an emperor who ruled at the highest tier of the feudal government, the truth was that he was really just another city magistrate. All that the imperial dynasty could do was preside over a loose collection of vassal states.

That having been said, if Yan Gufeng could actually reach the Lifeseizing level, gain the support of the True Dragon Institute, then slowly but surely conquer and absorb the other powers surrounding Yanhaven, such as Baishiville, Yundale-by-the-Sea, Zhaoluforth, and so on, then he could theoretically become a second-tier power. Although that wouldn’t be the same as fulfilling his thousand-year dream, it would definitely be incredibly glorious.

Much of his plan had to do with the True Dragon Institute, which was an exceedingly powerful organization.

In the Rich-Lush Continent, the first-tier powers were referred to as institutes. Beneath them were various sects, factions, religions, and so forth, which were second-tier powers. Such second-tier organizations often had impressive names, but were far below the first-tier powers in terms of overall strength.

Without deep reserve powers, and a host of powerful experts to establish and propagate civilization and culture, an organization couldn’t be referred to as an institute.

The word institute itself contained profound meaning, and was in fact holy in nature. All other organizations, whether they were called sects, parties, factions, religions, associations, or even dynasties, were often powerful, but in some ways could be considered unorthodox. None of them were holy and orthodox like the institutes were.

The Demi-Immortal Institute, the True Dragon Institute, and a handful of other institutes were like shining beacons of light in the Rich-Lush Continent, organizations that everyone looked up to as being holy lands of sorts.

Compared to them, Yanhaven was like an ant.

Luo Hun’s blood was surging at the thoughts which had just been awakened within him. “I definitely must live up to my own skill and abilities. If I do, perhaps I could be a part of a new royal dynasty, and establish a reputation that will be remembered for countless years to come. Are the kings and nobles really innately superior to people like me? I've heard rumors that there are already other cities that are calling themselves nations. If that's true, then why can’t Yanhaven be called the State of Yan?”

**

At the Yang Clan mansion, Yang Qi was very pleased with how his cultivation had progressed over the past several days. During the day, he would spend his time in seclusion, and at night, he would head into the mountains outside the city, where he would practice his martial arts. His internal energy was growing more powerful every day, and he was gaining a deeper understanding of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. From what he could tell, he was getting closer and closer to waking up the fourth particle inside him.

When that happened, he would have the power of four megamammoths, and would definitely be superior to someone in the seventh phase.

In fact, his energy arts were already reaching the point of breaking into the seventh phase.

It only took about three days for news to spread through the Yang Clan mansion that Yang Yunchong and Yang Hualong had recovered. The two elder brothers had already begun to put the clan’s business back in order, and even better, they managed to sell the copper bell on the gray market for five hundred thousand energy convergence pills. The Yang Clan’s direct bloodline was beginning to make its comeback already.

The clan was no longer listless and weakening, instead it was thrumming with activity because of the endless possibilities for the future that had been opened up.

Yang Qi’s second brother, Yang Hualong, had broken through to the fifth phase, the Energy Eruption level. All of the guards and servants were shocked, and were finally filled with a bit of hope for the future.

**

Exhale…. Inhale….

Yang Qi was sitting just outside the corridor of his private quarters, looking out at his pond as he performed breathing exercises. Every time he exhaled, the waters of the pond would part.

And when he inhaled, the surface of the pond would swirl up into the air like a tornado, and then splash down again like rain.

Clearly, Yang Qi’s energy art cultivation had reached an incredibly high level. Because of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, they resembled the way a mammoth could suck water up into its trunk. According to the legends, when godmammoths raised their trunks up to the sky and inhaled, they could pull the stars down from the sky. After all, mammoths were the perfect representation of limitless power.

As he breathed, the power of the lightning mammoth in his dantian region continued to flow through his meridians before returning to his sea of energy. During the journey, bits of the lightning mammoth’s quintessence would be absorbed into him, making him tougher and physically stronger.

With his eyes closed, he could sense that there was something like a membrane beneath his skin, transparent and crystalline, and ten times more powerful and durable than his actual skin. It was like the skin of a megamammoth, so tough that blades couldn't pierce it. Even energy art attacks that hit him would have difficulty piercing through that membrane.

Streaming across the surface of the membrane were magical symbols that were clearly not the product of human hands. They were like the writing of devils or gods, wriggling and squirming in a way that made it impossible to deduce their meaning.

With that membrane in place, Yang Qi’s physical body was more flexible, agile, and tough than before, to a level that was hard to even calculate. Without even using energy arts, he could run as quickly as a leopard, strike with force that surpassed a bear, leap as nimbly as a monkey, and flit about as effortlessly as a bird. At this point, he was so terrifyingly powerful that not even his father or Yang Shi, experts in the eighth phase, would be able to contend with him in terms of physical strength.

“Third Brother! Third Brother…!”

When Yang Qi heard one of his brothers calling out to him, he slowly reined in all of his energy arts and rose to his feet. Even as the surface of the pond went calm, his second brother Yang Hualong hurried in. “Big news, Third Brother! In twelve days, the city magistrate’s mansion is holding a banquet, and all of the unmarried young elites thirty years of age or under from the top clans are invited. That includes you, Third Brother. From what I heard, Yan Feixia is back from the True Dragon Institute to visit her parents, and the city magistrate is throwing this banquet to try to find a young genius to be her husband. Luckily for you, you saved Miss Yan Feixia back by the river, so she must have a good impression of you. Considering all the progress you’ve made, if you can butter her up a bit more before the banquet, maybe you’ll end up as the future son-in-law of the city magistrate!”

“Really? A banquet?” Yang Qi took the invitation card from Yang Hualong and looked down at it with a bit of a frown. “I just stole a Latent Dragon Pill, and very nearly lost all of my energy arts, and now the city magistrate is inviting me to a banquet? Maybe I did save his daughter, but he’s a wily old fox through and through. There must be more to the story. The safest thing would be to skip it, but of course, that would be pretty insulting to him.”

“You're right, Third Brother. As you know, the Yang Clan used to be the richest and most powerful clan in all of Yanhaven. Eventually, we were surpassed by the Yan Clan, which has pushed Yanhaven to the point of being able to call it the State of Yan. The Yan Clan is the lord, and the rest of the clans are the government officials. However, if the officials all join forces, they can kill the lord. Once our Yang Clan gets strong enough again, the Yan Clan will definitely fear us.”

Yang Hualong was no simpleton either; he had a lot of experience in life, and always analyzed matters in a thorough and logical way.

“That’s true,” Yang Qi said, putting the invitation card away. “I guess I’ll just have to play things by ear.”

Yang Qi’s eldest brother, Yang Yunchong, was already married, and even had children. Therefore, he didn't get an invitation. And Yang Hualong was engaged, so he naturally wouldn’t attend either. The only one to be going would be Yang Qi.

“There’s another bit of news I need to tell you, Third Brother,” Yang Hualong said. “Three days ago, word came in from Yundale-by-the-Sea. The city magistrate there made an official proclamation announcing the founding of the State of Yun. It won't be long before they start swallowing up the other powers around them…. Oh, I heard another rumor as well. Supposedly Yun Hailan and Song Haishan were both accepted into the Demi-Immortal Institute. That will also bolster the power of the State of Yun.” Each piece of news that Yang Hualong revealed was like a bolt of lightning.

“What?” Yang Qi said, shocked. “They founded a new nation? They’ve definitely got some guts. Don’t tell me they’re going to renounce allegiance to the Sage Ancestor Dynasty?”

“You probably haven’t heard about this, Third Brother, but the truth is that there are many powers throughout the Rich-Lush Continent who are declaring themselves to be sovereign nations. Although they still pay lip service to being vassals of the Sage Ancestor Dynasty, and continue to offer tribute, the dynasty is only growing weaker and weaker. And the Sage Ancestor Dynasty can’t really do anything about it. Who knows? Maybe one day Yanhaven will become the State of Yan. The glimmer of sabers and swords can be seen everywhere, and the dragons and snakes are beginning to struggle with each other. Kings are rising up! Which of them wouldn't want to unite the continent and establish a thousand-year legacy? Among the emperors and his vassals, not a single benevolent individual can be found.”

Yang Qi had grown up quite a bit, and to be discussing matters of politics and war with his brother made him feel like one of the heroes of old. “All the powers under heaven are experiencing drastic transformations. It's going to be difficult for the Yang Clan to pick the correct course. Considering the continent as a whole, we’re like country bumpkins. Rich country bumpkins, but still country bumpkins. If any of the big powers really wanted to wipe us out, they could do so as easily as stomping on a chicken egg.”

Yang Hualong sighed deeply. “Power is the foundation of everything. Speaking of which, I really need to improve my own cultivation.”

“Twelve days….” Yang Qi said. “I have twelve days to get a lot stronger. I think I need to come out of seclusion and go do some real-world training. Take care, Second Brother. Make sure to keep the clan in order while I'm gone.”

With that, Yang Qi blurred into motion.

“So fast!” Yang Hualong said, startled. “How did you get so strong so quickly? And where are you going?”

“To the Blackcorpse Mountains,” Yang Qi said, “to hunt some demonlings and devillings.” With that, he vanished without a trace.

“What? The Blackcorpse Mountains? That place is very dangerous. We don't even venture very far into those mountains during our autumn hunt. And you’re going in alone…?” Yang Hualong shook his head.

The Blackcorpse Mountains was where the Yan River started, and was a very inhospitable environment. They were filled with bizarre demonlings and devillings that had existed there since primeval times. Many such creatures had innate energy arts, and could do things like shoot fire, breathe smoke, or freeze things around them. And many of them operated in packs.

However, their pelts were extremely valuable, and thus, experts would often hunt them.

In fact, the Yang Clan’s autumn hunt was a big way the clan made money. However, people usually entered the mountains in teams, not alone. The dangers simply outweighed the potential profits to a huge degree.

Chapter 18: Blackcorpse Mountains

The next day….

It was noon, and the sun blazed overhead. The buzz of cicadas and other animals somehow made the heat even more oppressive.

The mighty Yan River flowed out from these mountains, which were pitch black and profound to the extreme. All of the sinister-looking mountain peaks were covered with enormous, black trees, making it impossible to see the sun from down below. The roars of the beasts which occasionally echoed out were enough to strike terror into the hearts of any humans who heard them.

Despite the heat, a sinister wind swept through the mountains, wailing in a way that would cause goosebumps to prickle the necks of anyone it touched.

At the actual source of the Yan River, it was possible to see aquatic monsters lurking within the surging water, their scales glittering and claws flashing. A fiendish aura filled the area, making it obvious that danger lurked everywhere, the type that could bring death even to those who cultivated profound energy arts.

At the moment, Yang Qi stood at the entrance of the Blackcorpse Mountains, marveling at the danger he sensed.

“Ahh. So these are the Blackcorpse Mountains!”

His first impression was that they were incredible, and clearly the work of ghosts or gods.

The mountains were more than a thousand kilometers away from Yanhaven, and the road between them was fraught with inhospitable territory and other dangers that normally meant the journey would take half a month. But with Yang Qi’s incredible cultivation base and energy arts, he could make the journey in about a day.

Sitting down cross-legged, he rested for a bit before pulling a bag out of the fold of his garment that was filled with energy convergence pills. They were sparkling and translucent, with an emerald-green surface and medicinal energy swirling inside.

Energy convergence pills had been invented ages ago by a holy expert. Originally, they were simply intended to strengthen the body, improve the meridians and solidify longevity. Eating one such pill would make a person so full they wouldn’t need to eat for an entire day.

In terms of the ingredients, they varied, and contained everything from the quintessence of the sun and moon to the spirit energy of heaven and earth. Eventually, they became a form of currency, replacing the previous system of gold and silver.

They could be used to purchase all sorts of things, from weapons to armor, from silk to servants.

They also had another common function. When going into remote areas to practice cultivation, such as Yang Qi was doing in the Blackcorpse Mountains, they made it unnecessary to bring bulky food rations.

After consuming a few energy convergence pills, Yang Qi circulated his energy. Cracking sounds erupted from his muscles, tendons, bones, and joints as the energy swirled into the area around him, flattening nearby plants and vegetation.

“I have ten days until I have to go to that banquet. I wonder if Yan Gufeng really plans to make a move on me; regardless, I have to promote the glory of the clan. And I have to be ready to fight Yun Hailan and Song Haishan one day, to cleanse myself of the humiliation they caused me…. Ten days. I have ten days to break into the seventh phase of energy arts.”

Whoosh!

Without any further hesitation, he activated his defensive energy arts and leaped into the trees, quickly becoming a blur that headed deep into the mountains.

His hope was to get to the Energy Manifestation level as quickly as possible, which would increase his battle prowess by another tenfold. He would also be able to use energy to form corporeal objects, thus giving him access to energy arts such as the Fiend-Devil Wings and the Infernal Deity Aegis. At that point, even people in the eighth phase would have trouble dealing with him.

Once he had his Fiend-Devil Wings, he would be able to glide through the air as though he were flying, which would make it much more difficult for enemies to fight him. That much was evident from what he had seen of Yan Feixia and her Wings of the White Crane, which had enabled her to easily dodge out of the way of the crossbow bolts the enemy had loosed.

And his Fiend-Devil Wings would definitely make him far more agile than the Wings of the White Crane would. Because of how vastly extraordinary the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth was, not even Yang Qi was exactly sure of how powerful he would be.

And if he added the Infernal Deity Aegis into the mix to defend himself, it would make him almost impossible to beat.

That was not even mentioning the fact that when he reached the Energy Manifestation level he would also be capable of telekinesis and other feats. At that point, every inch of his body would be like a weapon, which would make his fighting style much more diverse and varied.

The deep forest was densely packed with towering trees, most of them dozens of meters tall. As for the forest floor, it was covered by a mat of fallen leaves. And as Yang Qi got deeper and deeper in, he could sense the auras of powerful devillings lurking about.

Even if he was able to move along on the treetops, he wouldn't be safe.

After traveling for a bit, he stopped on a tree branch to catch his breath. As he did, he suddenly sensed a pungent aroma from behind him, and could feel something like a breeze on the back of his neck.

Turning, he saw an enormous viper, thicker than his own waist, its mouth wide as it glared at him. From the liquid dripping from its enormous fangs, it was obvious that this snake was poisonous.

“Well, hello,” Yang Qi said, leaping out of the way of the striking snake to land on another nearby tree.

From the way the vicious viper’s ghastly pale scales glittered, it was clear they were impervious to all sorts of weapons. Furthermore, there was a trace of intelligence in the viper’s eyes as it looked over at Yang Qi, opened its mouth, and spat out a burst of energy.

The head-sized bullet of toxic energy shot toward Yang Qi as fast as an arrow, causing the air to hum around it.

Shockingly, the viper was using a bizarre energy art that contained hypertoxic poison. This huge snake was an intelligent demonling, whose energy arts put it at roughly the fifth phase.

Because devillings usually grew to enormous sizes, they would develop all sorts of unique energy arts. In terms of variety, their energy arts surpassed humans, and would usually contain memories from ancient ancestors.

According to the legends, generations and generations in the past, the entire continent had been ruled by demons and devils, who kept humans as slaves. Those demons and devils had been so shockingly powerful that they could level mountains and fill in seas, and were supposedly the original inventors of energy arts.

Eventually, saints and holy ones arose among humans, who then drove away the demons and devils, and paved the way for the modern era.

However, many of the wild beasts in the mountains could still trace their bloodlines back to primeval times, and even had ancient memories of that era. Naturally, they could cultivate all sorts of energy arts.

Apparently, this huge viper was a demonling who had some of those ancient memories.

“You beast!” Yang Qi shouted, throwing his hand out in front of him, sending an energy wave out that completely destroyed the toxic energy.

The giant snake's shock was clearly visible in its eyes, as it realized that this opponent actually surpassed its own abilities. It instantly coiled up and tried to make a break for the forest floor. Shockingly, it was quite intelligent, probably at the level of an eight- or nine-year-old child.

And yet, even as it attempted to flee, a spear made of true energy stabbed directly through it, killing it and pinning it to the tree in the blink of an eye.

Normally speaking, this snake’s massive life force would ensure that, even if it were pinned to a tree, it wouldn't die. But the Infernal Deity Spear was too strong, and instantly killed it. The spear didn't rely on poisons like the snake. Instead, it contained the boundless will of hell, a force that would destroy the souls of any living beings it struck, including the enormous viper.

After a moment, the true energy that made up the Infernal Deity Spear faded away, and the enormous viper dropped down onto the leafy ground. Yang Qi hopped down next to it; drawing on his true energy, he summoned a sharp blade and then began to skin it.

Moments later, he had the entire viper's pelt.

Next, he dug into its innards until he found its gallbladder, which contained a faintly-glimmering blue crystalline shape that resembled a gem. It was none other than a demon core.

When demonlings reached the fifth phase of energy arts, they would naturally form a demon core, which would contain the quintessence of their cultivation base and energy arts.

On the black market, demon cores could be exchanged for energy convergence pills, depending on the level of the core itself.

That was another reason why people would often enter the mountains to hunt beasts; selling demon cores could be very profitable. It was the same with the Yang Clan’s autumn hunt, which was a competition of sorts for the younger ones; whoever got the most demon cores would be rewarded by the clan.

The autumn hunt would usually bring in demon cores worth more than a million energy convergence pills, and also served the function of providing important training for the young ones, as well as an assessment of their strength.

As far as Yang Qi was concerned, getting some demon cores wouldn't be very difficult at all. The clan was bankrupt now, and therefore, hunting demonlings would be a great way to help reverse that situation. Normally speaking, it would take a whole group of young clan members working very hard to take out a huge viper like this. But when Yang Qi went all out with his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, he was able to kill it in one hit.

It almost seemed like it was a technique specifically designed to be the bane of demonlings.

It also made Yang Qi capable of hunting demonlings even more quickly than experts in the Master of Energy level.

After killing the viper and harvesting its demon core, he once again activated his defensive energy arts, and then blurred into motion into the trees.

Thanks to his heightened sense of hearing, he was able to hear all sorts of noises around him in the forest.

Suddenly, his nose twitched. “Hm, seems that there’s a group of silverback devilwolves not too far off. Smells like blood too.”

Hopping down out of a tree, he sped toward a glade up ahead, until he caught sight of about a dozen wolves with sleek, silver fur, tearing some corpses into pieces.

Unexpectedly, the corpses were human, and many of them had armor on. There were also weapons scattered in the area.

Apparently, these were adventurers similar to Yang Qi, but who had fallen victim to the silverback devilwolves.

These beasts were even more dangerous than the huge viper Yang Qi had just fought. They traveled in packs, had a rigid ranking system, and could move like the wind. Upon reaching maturity, all such wolves would develop energy arts of a terrifying nature, making them impervious to most weapons.

Anyone who encountered a pack of silverback devilwolves was in for a tragedy; it was worse than offending an entire aristocratic clan.

Furthermore, these wolves had nearly human-level intelligence.

Supposedly, some of them actually descended from a famous Demon Sage of ancient times, and still contained some of his memories in their blood.

Almost as soon as Yang Qi arrived on the scene, all of the devilwolves stopped feasting on the corpses, and turned to look at him.

Chapter 19: Hunting Demonlings

The silverback devilwolves weren’t startled at all by the sudden presence of a human. One of them, a particularly large male, extended his paw in Yang Qi’s direction and then beckoned at him, as though saying, ‘Bring it on, you little punk!’

The scorn and bald-faced ridicule in his eyes were clear.

It was a very strange scene.

Not many people in the world could understand what it would be like to have a wolf look at you with scorn, and tell you to attack it. This wolf had long since become fully sentient, and was as intelligent as a human. The only thing it lacked was the ability to speak.

As for Yang Qi, he remained completely calm in response to what was happening.

After all, there were demonlings in the Blackcorpse Mountains who were even more intelligent than these wolves, and some of the old ones were at the Master of Energy level.

He remembered his father telling him a story back when he was young, about how the clan had once been chasing a golden rhino in their hunt in the Blackcorpse Mountains, and ended up going deeper into the forest than they expected. That was when they suddenly ran into a powerful divine ape whose cultivation base was well into the Master of Energy level. The ape even managed to injure one of the chief elders in the resulting fray. Thankfully, the creature wasn’t murderous in nature, otherwise the entire Yang Clan might have suffered a fatal blow.

“You beasts!” Yang Qi suddenly shouted.

As would be expected, the leader of the devilwolf pack understood, and was enraged. He threw his head back and roared, then swiped his paw out, causing a ball of intensely hot energy to appear. As it flew through the air, it swelled in size, transforming into a wind weapon.

“The power of gale force winds…?” Yang Qi instantly realized that the devilwolf cultivated a formidable energy art, and was in the sixth phase, enabling it to create weapons from energy. More weapons appeared in the air; axes, sabers, swords, hooks, spears, tridents…. Most people who faced an array of weapons like this would be transformed into corpses.

In the deep forest, one could kill an enemy without anyone ever knowing; therefore, Yang Qi wasn’t worried about the possibility of his secrets being revealed, and had no qualms about using his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.

Looking at the incoming wind weapons, he coldly chuckled, then shoved his hand out, causing a divine shield to shoot out in front of him, completely crushing all of the weapons.

Then, the energy continued onward, slamming into the wolves, causing them to wail in fear and pain, and prostrate themselves on the ground. Apparently, the hell-crushing power of a godmammoth was particularly effective in dominating wild demons and devils.

BAM!

In a blur of motion, Yang Qi jumped toward the leader of the pack and struck him with his right hand. The wolf instantly flew off to the side and slammed into a tree, dissolving into a mass of blood and gore.

The other silverback devilwolves were instantly thrown into chaos, but had no time to react before a hail of fist strikes instantly killed them.

Normally speaking, wolves had very strong heads and backs, and needed to be struck in the belly to do any damage. But Yang Qi didn’t need to worry about that. After all, one of the stances of his Invincible King’s Fist technique was No Stronghold Too Powerful.

It only took about five breaths of time before all of the devilwolves were transformed into corpses.

The head of each wolf, upon being broken open, revealed a thumb-sized silver pellet, which was none other than a demon core, pulsing with true energy. As of this moment, Yang Qi now had thirteen demon cores. Silverback devilwolves were rather unique, and on the black market, their demon cores were considered hard currency.

Top experts could use them to forge divine weapons, or embed them in suits of armor. Some people would even harvest the true energy from inside of them.

Of course, before absorbing the true energy from the demon cores, they would have to be purified. By skipping that step, one would run the serious risk of experiencing cultivation deviation.

“What a pity. Their pelts are pretty valuable, but I don't have any way to transport them.” It really was a pity; silverback devilwolf pelts could be sold for at least a hundred or so energy convergence pills.

In addition to the wolf corpses, there were also the human corpses that the wolves had been feeding on. There were four, all of them mangled nearly to the point of being unrecognizable. However, it was still possible to tell that three were male and one was female, all of them young. Presumably, these were young lords and a lady from some rich and powerful clan, sent here on training.

After checking the corpses, Yang Qi found some weapons and armor, as well as a bag containing a few dozen demon cores. Clearly, this group had successfully hunted down quite a few demonlings before meeting their end. They also had some banknotes on them.

Yang Qi took all of the demon cores, as well as the banknotes, which were worth about ten thousand energy convergence pills altogether.

Unfortunately, all of the actual energy convergence pills they had possessed had been consumed by the devilwolves.

Demonlings couldn’t concoct medicinal pills; they could only practice instinctual cultivation. As such, it was easy to imagine how much they coveted energy convergence pills.

“I suppose I should give you a proper burial,” Yang Qi murmured. With that, he carved out a pit, arranged the four corpses inside, and then buried them.

Having accomplished these things, he stood, and then shot into motion again, his feet blurring as he raced through the trees. After traveling some distance, he found a good spot to sit down cross-legged and do a bit of cultivation. Adjusting his energy arts, he did what was necessary to keep himself in top condition.

Technically, he was still on the edges of the Blackcorpse Mountains. In their depths, danger increased; demonlings like the silverback devilwolves were more common there, and there were also things like the eighth phase golden rhinos, which were even more powerful.

Golden rhinos were strange creatures, and their demon cores were particularly valuable, selling for hundreds of thousands of energy convergence pills.

As Yang Qi rested, he contemplated how he was going about his cultivation, and came to a conclusion. “This type of killing isn’t enough to draw out my potential. And it’s not helping me absorb the lightning mammoth. It seems I need to put myself in greater danger. The more dangerous the situation, the faster I’ll get to the seventh phase.”

With that, he headed deeper into the mountains, hoping to encounter larger groups of demonlings, and thus advance more quickly toward his breakthrough.

In the blink of an eye, three days passed.

Throughout that time, Yang Qi worked his way deeper and deeper into the Blackcorpse Mountains. In fact, he even reached areas that the Yang Clan had never traveled to during their hunts.

He encountered countless groups of demonlings: blood boars, giant bees, flying tigers, vampire bats, shadow mastiffs, devil-hunting spiders, man-eating ants, and more. Many of them were equivalent to humans in the seventh phase of energy arts, and yet Yang Qi killed them all.

On a few occasions, he found himself in great danger.

For example, the time he fought a massive colony of man-eating ants, each of which was the size of a human fist. They were fierce to the extreme, and would kill and eat anything in their path. Thankfully, Yang Qi was strong enough to fight through them and escape with his life.

He remained on guard at all times, and ate energy convergence pills when he got hungry. When he was thirsty, he would drink spring water, and would sleep with one eye open, ready to fight for his life at a moment's notice.

Thankfully, his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth was particularly effective in this situation. The lightning mammoth continued to deliver him the quintessence of its life force, enabling him to push far past normal human limits. On some occasions when his energy arts reached the limit, power would suddenly erupt within him, like floodwaters breaking through a dam, and he would experience profound transformations.

Soon, the signs of an imminent breakthrough grew more apparent.

One day, rain began to fall, rapidly turning into a downpour that soaked everything in the area. The intense heat vanished, to be replaced by water, thunder, and lightning.

Silver snakes danced in the sky, lightning that would occasionally smash into the mountains below. Yang Qi was seated cross-legged on a tree, circulating his energy in a way that caused the falling rain to be flung off to the side, and keeping himself completely dry.

The sound of the thunder was like music to his ears, and as his thoughts roamed, he slowly became one with creation. It was as though he had fused with the lightning, with the thunder, and with the wind.

As the lightning crashed, it soon became possible to see sparks of electricity entering him, fusing with the membrane under his skin, and inciting his life force.

Ever since he had been struck by lightning, he had found that practicing cultivation in stormy weather was particularly enjoyable.

Gradually, electricity reached his forehead, and the golden imp that resided there.

Suddenly, Yang Qi realized that the golden imp was absorbing the lightning, making him seem almost alive.

“Senior? Senior…?” Yet again he tried to communicate with the imp, but was ignored. Suddenly, the lightning above ceased, and the golden imp went completely still.

In fact, he almost couldn’t sense its existence.

After a bit of time passed, the storm continued, making the forest a world of water. Water pooled into lakes, and dripped off of the trees, to the point where Yang Qi could see fish everywhere, eating the insects in the area.

There were also devillings crouching in hiding, concealing themselves from the fury of nature.

As Yang Qi waited for the rain to stop, he continued with his cultivation. In his left hand was a demon core about the size of a longan fruit, which came from a seventh phase devil-hunting spider that he had killed the night before.

Devil-hunting spiders were chaotic, primeval creatures who naturally developed energy arts as they grew larger. Eventually, they would become big enough to eat humans, or shoot silk up into the air to snag massive flying birds.

Normally speaking, the most elite young members of the rich and powerful clans would have to team up to handle a devil-hunting spider. Even top experts in the eighth phase, like Yang Shi, would have trouble dealing with one. After all, their silk was particularly powerful.

But when that devil-hunting spider was ambushed by Yang Qi, his Infernal Deity Spear ensured that it didn’t even know what hit it.

After he got back to the clan, he would be able to sell its demon core on the black market for at least three hundred thousand energy convergence pills.

Chapter 20: Battling a White Ape

“It's too bad I haven’t found any demonlings in the eighth phase, they’re the only ones that are worth a million energy convergence pills.”

Sighing, Yang Qi put away the devil-hunting spider core. ‘The more demonlings I fight, the more I can help my clan. And that’s not even mentioning the training on my side. My cultivation base is already in the Energy Weapon level, high enough that I don’t need to worry about seventh phase experts. Only eighth phase opponents would cause me problems. That having been said, if I ran into a big group of eighth phase demonlings, I might end up dead.”

At the moment, he wasn’t afraid of fighting demonlings one on one. But big groups of them? That was a different story. For example, the devil-hunting spider he had fought was in the seventh phase, and he had been fine. But if he had been facing seventeen or eighteen at a time, he would have had no other option than to turn and run.

After all, devil-hunting spiders could shoot their silk high into the air, and even pull mighty eagles to the ground.

“No use worrying about it. I’ll just head deeper into the mountains. If I can find an eighth phase demonling worth a million, it would relieve a lot of the pressure on eldest brother and second brother as they try to restore the bloodline’s assets.”

Gritting his teeth, he headed further into the forest.

Meanwhile, it continued to rain, and occasional muffled booms of thunder rang out, shaking the mountains. Occasionally, lightning would strike portions of the mountains, unleashing flash floods. At this point, Yang Qi was far off the beaten path in the Blackcorpse Mountains. Only experts in the Master of Energy level would ever dare to venture this deep.

ROAR!

Suddenly, the sound of some enormous beast echoed out from the direction of a nearby flooded area.

“What’s that? Sounds pretty strong.” The sound waves caused by the roar left Yang Qi’s ears ringing.

Leaping into motion, he drew on his energy arts, flying a hundred paces in a single motion. Being careful to avoid the rushing floodwaters, he proceeded along until he reached a cliff with a huge waterfall. The sound of the water crashing onto the rocks below was like the marching of a huge army of horses and men.

Surprisingly, Yang Qi immediately caught sight of a demonling at the bottom of the waterfall, seemingly bathing.

In truth, the creature… was practicing martial arts forms.

And it was the source of the roar he had heard moments ago.

It was an enormous ape, as tall as three humans put together, with white fur and green eyes. It looked almost like some sort of evil ghost, standing there on a boulder beneath the waterfall, striking out, sending water spraying everywhere with each blow.

Considering that the waterfall was three hundred meters tall, it could only be imagined how powerful the force of the falling water was at the bottom. It was probably enough to destroy low-lying mountains, and yet, the energy which flew out of the palms of this white-furred ape was more than a match for it.

ROAR!

Almost as soon as Yang Qi caught sight of the beast, it twitched as though it had sensed something. Then it looked over its shoulder, its eyes locking down directly onto Yang Qi’s hiding place.

It was almost as though nothing could possibly hide from it.

Instantly, Yang Qi felt some mysterious force locking down onto his soul; even if he fled for a thousand kilometers, he knew that he wouldn't be able to shake this white ape.

‘Thousand Kilometer Soul Locking? Shit! This white ape is no joke. His energy arts and cultivation base have reached the point of perfection. In terms of his general level, he’s probably beyond father, and even further beyond him in energy arts. I'm definitely not a match for him! I wonder if he's in the Master of Energy level?’

Not willing to test out his theory, he turned to leave.

He knew that he could not handle this creature, and in fact, not even his own father could do so. An opponent with Thousand Kilometer Soul Locking was just too powerful. It was a technique that could be used only after one’s energy arts reached the pinnacle, and made one extremely sensitive to energy fluctuations, to the point where one could lock one's senses onto an enemy, and track them for hundreds upon hundreds of kilometers.

Only experts in the ninth phase, or possibly the peak of the eighth phase, could use such an ability. And that level was far beyond Yang Qi. Maybe if he was already in the seventh phase, he might have taken the risk. But in the sixth phase, he was absolutely certain that he would end up dead.

Even more relevant was that this wasn’t a human. It was a massive ape, so enormous that his true energy was probably three or four times as abundant as that of an average expert of the same level.

Unfortunately, although Yang Qi wanted to leave, the ape didn't seem inclined to let him.

With a roar, the beast struck out with his palm, sending a stream of energy into the waters of the lake around him. Instantly, the water and energy turned into a twisting dragon that lunged toward Yang Qi, mouth gaping. In the shortest of moments, it was right on top of Yang Qi, who was three thousand meters away.

“Not good!”

Yang Qi immediately burst into motion like a stone flung by a catapult.

An instant later, the water dragon’s ‘mouth’ snapped down onto the tree he had been standing on, shattering it into splinters.

Yang Qi could tell that if that ‘mouth’ had hit him, it would have ripped him to shreds.

“One attack went three thousand paces?” he thought, shaken. “Incredible energy arts!”

The so-called Hundred Paces Divine Fist got its name because it was an ability used to project destructive energy to a distance of a hundred paces. However, after a hundred paces, the true energy would simply fade away.

Based on Yang Qi’s current energy arts and cultivation base, he could actually strike things five hundred paces away, which was farther than most bows could shoot. However, three thousand paces was simply too enormous of a distance to even contemplate. This white ape was definitely that far away, and yet had attacked with energy arts in terrifying fashion.

“Hmm?” The white ape was clearly shocked that Yang Qi managed to dodge his blow. However, all he did was smile viciously, revealing a host of ghastly fangs. At the same time, the white fur on his face floated about, untouched by the water.

Then, he launched himself into the air, flying out of the waterfall, a pair of golden wings appearing on his back that made him look like a huge roc. These wings were far larger than the Wings of the White Crane, and clearly more powerful.

“Roc energy arts?”

Almost before Yang Qi could even react, the white ape was descending on him, his fists lashing out to unleash shocking levels of energy.

Suddenly, the air around Yang Qi swirled into a vortex, locking him into place as surely as fetters, making him like a tiny rowboat in the face of a massive, inescapable tidal wave.

Death and destruction were about to hit him head-on.

Worse, he knew that his own energy arts were like nothing compared to the ape’s. In fact, if this ape appeared back in Yanhaven, only City Magistrate Yan Gufeng would be his match.

“DIE!” Yang Qi shouted, his battle spirit surging. He knew that the only option he had right now was to put everything on the line and fight. Muscles rippling, he drew on the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, causing an aura like that of a devilish god to erupt out, something so monstrous it would strike fear into the hearts of even demons and ghosts.

His Infernal Deity Spear materialized in his hand, which he stabbed directly toward the white ape’s throat.

The white ape was visibly shocked; he could clearly sense the destructive nature of the Infernal Deity Spear, which contained true energy that immediately weighed down on his soul.

Instantly, a flood of water erupted from his hand, forming into an enormous cudgel which he thrust out toward the Infernal Deity Spear.

When the two weapons collided, the force shoved Yang Qi backward and dispelled his spear. At the same time, the power of the enormous cudgel entered his meridians and pierced into his sea of energy, seriously injuring him and causing cracking sounds to echo out inside of his body.

“Lightning mammoth!” he shouted in his mind. Instantly, the power of the lightning mammoth swept through him, repairing the damage to his meridians.

Because of the incredible pressure he was under, it was in that very moment that, at long last, the fourth particle within him awoke, yet again advancing his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. In the blink of an eye, his limbs and bones all pulsed with the blessing of the power of four ancient megamammoths.

“Spear!” he shouted. Yet again, the Infernal Deity Spear appeared. Simultaneously, his sea of energy began to churn as hell vortexes sprang into being to power the spear. Without any hesitation, he thrust the spear out, causing it to blur with devilish speed toward the white ape’s chest.

Never could the white ape have guessed that his opponent would achieve a breakthrough right in the middle of their fight, and experience a massive increase in his energy arts. And yet, he still had no intentions of letting Yang Qi go. Yang Qi was too valuable to him; the energy arts the ape cultivated required that he absorb the true energy of people just like this.

And his understanding of cultivation far surpassed that of ordinary humans.

His floodwater cudgel suddenly twisted like storm winds, once again slamming into the Infernal Deity Spear. The attack was blocked, and yet, an aura like that of devils from hell still poured into the white ape’s soul, destabilizing his true energy.

Yang Qi seized the opportunity to attack again, summoning a dozen Infernal Deity Spears to create an array that he sent shooting toward the white ape.

Simultaneously, he flitted into the air like a bird, unleashing six moves from the Invincible King’s Fist, each of them targeting a vital area on the huge ape's body.

ROAR!

Apparently, this ape had never experienced humiliation like this. Snarling ferociously, he lifted his cudgel and unleashed his energy arts, summoning an endless mass of floodwaters to create something like a wall, formed of numerous smaller layers. The Infernal Deity Spears pierced into the wall, destroying one layer after another, and causing the entire wall to tremble. But it was a wall that combined both hard and soft elements, and thus, despite the power of the spears, they eventually faded away, having failed to destroy it.

“Mountain!” the ape howled. Energy surging, it sent masses of floodwaters swirling into the air to form a mountain that then shot toward Yang Qi.

It was a mountain so enormous that Yang Qi had no hope of dodging out of the way of the attack.

“Fine,” Yang Qi said. “Let’s see what else you can do.” Unfazed, he threw his hands wide, drawing on the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, throwing his palms out to meet the incoming mountain.

Chapter 21: Seventh Phase Breakthrough

As Yang Qi threw his palms out, he unleashed two rumbling attacks whose sounds rivaled the very waterfall they were fighting nearby.

When they hit the mountain, it shattered, becoming like a heavenly net covering everything below it.

Tendrils of water then snaked through the air, wrapping around Yang Qi’s limbs. Clearly, this white ape’s energy arts really had reached the point of perfection, as revealed by his Mind Incarnation abilities.

Each of the projected water tendrils was covered with serrated barbs that allowed them to latch onto a target with tenacious force and drag it about. They were essentially endless ropes covered with razor-sharp teeth!

It was the type of force that could tear through any defensive energy arts that got in its way.

At the moment, Yang Qi was surrounded by water, which was slashing at him and trying to rip him apart. There was so much water that he couldn’t even see where the white ape was, and could sense his defensive true energy trembling wildly.

Furthermore, the white ape wasn’t going all out; he wanted to capture Yang Qi and extract his energy. He didn’t want him dead.

Anyone else in this situation would already have been torn to pieces. Luckily, Yang Qi was Yang Qi.

“Hell-crushing godmammoths can crush mountains and level seas! They can scare all demons and devils into submission!”

In this moment of extreme crisis, Yang Qi slipped into a deeper state of existence. The quintessence of the lightning mammoth flowed through him with greater speed than ever, replenishing his true energy and stimulating the particles that represented the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, prodding them away from their state of slumber.

The white ape was on the outside, fueling the streams of water with his energy arts, confused as to why Yang Qi wasn’t weakening, but instead, seemed to be getting more powerful. This ape had never been in a situation like this, in which a human in the Energy Weapon level could stand up to his eighth phase Energy Incarnation abilities. And that was especially the case considering that he was a demonling at the peak of his level.

Just when the ape was about to pour more power into his attack, Yang Qi’s true energy ran out, and a shocking aura erupted within him.

Thanks to the incredible pressure, he had just absorbed another full portion of the lightning mammoth, causing a fifth particle within him to wake up, unleashing the power of a fifth ancient megamammoth.

All of a sudden, Yang Qi himself seemed like an awakening megamammoth from ancient times. He shivered as energy flows erupted all around him, exploding with power as they destroyed the water that surrounded him.

Because the true energy now flowing through him was simply too forceful, his meridians began to crystallize. At the same time, the flows of true energy began to atomize, becoming liquid inside of him, transforming into something viscous within his sea of energy, something ten times as powerful as before.

In fact, Yang Qi could actually close his eyes and peer into that true energy liquid in his sea of energy and see creatures appearing and disappearing, beings like cranes, tigers, dragons and also, megamammoths….

In this moment of grave crisis, he achieved his breakthrough, rising into the seventh phase of energy arts, the Energy Manifestation level.

When entering this level, one’s true energy would change on a fundamental level. The most obvious change was how it became liquid, making it of a far higher quality than the state it had existed in before.

It was a watershed that most experts spent twenty or thirty years trying to pass, and in fact, many didn’t.

With every higher level one reached with one's energy arts, it was like stepping into a new world. As for the seventh phase, in any aristocratic clan in the Rich-Lush Continent, people of that level were treated with utmost respect.

Telekinesis. Flying through the air. Converging energy into corporeal form…. There were all sorts of abilities that only came when one broke through into the Energy Manifestation level.

And now, thanks to the violent pressure provided by this white ape, Yang Qi broke through into that level that he had dreamed of day and night.

Because of that, his true energy dramatically rose by ten times. With a casual swipe of his hand, he destroyed the water around him, transforming it into nothing more than countless water droplets. Then, in shocking fashion, he seemed to completely defy gravity as he remained hovering in place in midair.

SWISH!

Suddenly, two magnificent wings spread out behind him.

They were completely formed from true energy, and were as pitch black as the depths of the universe. At the same time, they were covered with innumerable mysterious magical symbols, as well as images of powerful devils. They surged with a fiendish aura, which caused everything within a hundred paces to suddenly be cast into utter darkness, as though hell itself were being pulled into the world of men.

These wings were sinister, but at the same time majestic and unsurpassably mysterious.

Compared to the Roc Wings or the Wings of the White Crane, they were far more powerful. In fact, when facing the pressure of the Fiend-Devil Wings, the white ape’s Roc Wings instantly began to dissipate.

As the Fiend-Devil Wings slowly flapped back and forth, Yang Qi hovered in the air, looking every bit like a devilish god. And when his cold gaze latched onto the white ape, the ape felt as though it were being stabbed to the core.

ROAR!

The ape bared its fangs and roared in ferocious fashion; clearly, it was not any more fearful of Yang Qi than it had been before his breakthrough. Reaching out, it yet again summoned its enormous water cudgel, as large as a tree.

“Infernal Deity Spear!” Yang Qi growled, standing his ground. When the long, devilish spear appeared in his hand, it was longer and bigger than before, and pulsed with black mist. When he stabbed out with it, the wails of hellish ghosts and deities could be heard, and all of the floodwaters in the area turned dark. At the same time, the black mist streaming off of the spear transformed into what appeared to be a being from hell itself, clad in a long black robe, an infernal deity the likes of which governed matters of both life and death.

The Infernal Deity Spear stabbed toward the floodwater cudgel, and before the two could even make contact, the cudgel seemed to shrink back in fear, and then collapse into pieces.

“Thrust of the Infernal Deity!” Yang Qi shouted. His Fiend-Devil Wings flapped, and he hefted his Infernal Deity Spear as he stabbed it toward the white ape's chest.

Howling, the ape yet again summoned a wall of water, formed of many layers. However, this time, that wall did little good. The Infernal Deity Spear destroyed it like a hot knife slicing through butter. In the blink of an eye, the spear was right in front of the ape.

SHUNK!

White hair was stained crimson as the spear stabbed into the ape, and blood sprayed out like a geyser. Then, the will of that infernal deity from hell immediately latched onto the ape's soul.

ROOAAAAAAR!!!

Never in ten thousand years could the white ape have guessed that the opponent who moments ago had been a fish in a barrel would suddenly turn the tables and actually harm him. Enraged, he employed an evasive move to leap out of range of the spear, then turned and fled into the waterfall.

“Hmm?” Yang Qi murmured, shocked that the white ape apparently had some sort of tunnel dug into the mountain behind the waterfall.

This enormous ape was definitely no joke. He had profound energy arts, had constructed a lair, and had even reached the level of Thousand Kilometer Soul Locking. Yang Qi knew that if he didn't end him now, and the ape came after him later for revenge, it could end up being the end of the Yang Clan.

And if he broke through to the ninth phase, the Master of Energy level, he would be even more terrifying.

To top it all off, the white ape had been the one to start the fight, hoping to capture Yang Qi. And after wounding him, Yang Qi could see the hatred in his eyes, and knew that leaving it to fester could have horrifying results.

In both his guts and his brain, Yang Qi knew that he had to face this danger head-on, and try to kill the white ape. That would be the only way to ensure there were no future repercussions.

After all, this white ape was more intelligent than the average human, and would not let a defeat and a humiliation like this go unavenged.

“Infernal Deity Aegis!” Yang Qi said, causing energy to swirl out and surround him with an iron-clad vortex that was almost like a shell. Protected in this fashion, not even water could touch him from outside.

This defense mechanism would not only negate most attacks that were sent his way, it even had the potential to send out backlash attacks in response.

This was essentially the most powerful type of protection there was.

Compared to the Infernal Deity Aegis, the Golden Bell Rampart he had faced in the past was as weak as a piece of paper.

With that, Yang Qi slipped like a fish through the waterfall and into the tunnel beyond.

His foot touched solid ground, which was slippery stone. The tunnel was large, as tall as five or six people, and definitely spacious enough for the white ape. Apparently, it had been carved right into the mountain itself, and was almost like the entrance to some sort of palace, right behind the waterfall.

Painted on the walls were various images of apes and monkeys, some of them sitting in meditation, others practicing sword techniques or training with staffs. There were even glowing meridian diagrams with instructions for various energy art techniques. Shockingly, all sorts of martial techniques for apes and monkeys were stored here.

On the ground were some splatters of blood, the evidence of the white ape’s passage.

As of this moment, Yang Qi was both skilled and confident. He had pushed his cultivation to the seventh phase and had his Fiend-Devil Wings, his Infernal Deity Aegis, and the power of five ancient megamammoths. Add in the fact that the white ape was now at a serious disadvantage, and Yang Qi didn’t hesitate at all to follow the trail of blood deeper into the tunnel.

Before long, his eyes glittered as he entered a large chamber, within which stood the white ape, an enormous golden cudgel with complex floral patterns in his hands. Just looking at it, it was impossible to tell how heavy it was.

This chamber was large enough to hold a thousand people, and was filled with stone bookcases, which were packed with books, papers, bamboo slips, antique items, leather-bound scrolls, metal and stone plaques, as well as weapons of all sorts.

Even odder was that, on the south side of the chamber, next to a burning fire, was a huge pill furnace.

From the look of it, this white ape knew how to concoct medicinal pills.

Not too far from the pill furnace, there was a long, seven-string zither. This place actually looked more like the mansion grotto of a scholar who had achieved his dao, not the home of a demonling.

The white ape currently stood in the middle of the mansion grotto. His wound had already stopped bleeding, although his fur was still matted with blood. He seemed to be in high spirits, his true energy surging, his eyes shining with a ferocious glint. As soon as he saw Yang Qi, he spoke to him in a voice that resembled a human’s.

“I can’t believe you actually chased me in here, you little punk. Sadly for you, there won’t be any escaping.”

“I can leave any time I want.” Yang Qi said, apparently not impressed at all by the ape. Smiling, he continued, “But will you promise not to come after me for revenge?”

“No human has ever pushed me into a corner like this before, you brat. So no. I'm going to exterminate your entire clan! I'm going to eat your family! That's the only way to wipe out this humiliation!” With that said, the white ape let out a furious roar.

Chapter 22: A Goldmine

“Well I guess that means only one of us is going to leave this place alive,” Yang Qi said, his killing intent beginning to boil. He gripped the Infernal Deity Spear so hard that it trembled, casting projections of itself in all directions, almost like a peacock spreading its feathers.

As of this moment, his energy arts did not seem inferior to the white ape’s in any way. Not hesitating for a moment, he stabbed out with the spear, whereupon the wails of ghosts and gods could be heard. The projected image of the infernal deity also appeared, and the entire stone chamber was cast into the darkness of hell.

When the white ape saw all of that, he didn’t dare to hold back. Swiping his golden cudgel through the air, he unleashed a swarm of deadly attacks.

It was impossible to say exactly what material his cudgel was made from, but it was clearly perfectly suited to his energy arts, making the white ape even more formidable. It even burst into flames as it swung through the air, causing heat waves to ripple out everywhere.

When the spear and the cudgel hit each other, a sonorous sound echoed out like that of a bell. As a result, the white ape staggered backward three paces, and Yang Qi felt his true energy fading a bit.

However, Yang Qi was resilient, and his true energy majestic; considering that he had the power of five ancient megamammoths, which was enough to level the mansion grotto around them, it took only a moment for him to recover.

Gripping his spear, he stabbed out again.

Crackling sounds could be heard as electricity danced on the surface of the Infernal Deity Spear; it hit the golden cudgel again, and sparks rained out everywhere.

ZZZZZZAAAAAP!!!

Metal was the perfect conduit for electricity, and therefore, electricity surged into the cudgel and then the white ape, causing the smell of charred flesh to fill the air. Some of the white ape’s fur even caught fire because of it.

With this move, even this demonling with his profound energy arts was put at a disadvantage.

“Lightning energy arts….” he murmured, looking a bit flustered.

Experts who could control lightning with their energy arts were completely terrifying. After all, lightning was a violent natural force, and if it wasn’t controlled properly, could easily destroy anyone who tried to use it.

But when Yang Qi was struck by it, he sowed destiny with the lightning mammoth that entered him. And whenever he pushed his energy arts to the limit, the lightning inside of him would subdue all other arts.

As for the white ape’s golden cudgel, it was made from some type of metal, and could easily conduct electricity. Therefore, it only took one attack to seriously injured the white ape, damaging his meridians to the point where he could only draw upon half of his normal energy level.

Yang Qi was growing fiercer by the moment, and his energy arts were being unleashed more and more quickly. His Infernal Deity Spear attacked like a lightning bolt, causing the entire chamber to be lit up with the glow of electricity.

It was now a critical moment for the white ape, and his reaction was to go all out. Taking a deep breath, he suddenly began to grow larger, until he was double his previous size. At the same time, he extended his golden cudgel; shockingly, a long metal spike emerged from the end, which he stabbed toward Yang Qi.

That golden cudgel was incredibly heavy; backed by the strength of the white ape, it was enough to reduce most humans to a bloody paste.

Yang Qi’s heart trembled. Drawing on all the power he could muster, he poured it into the Infernal Deity Aegis, causing energy to swirl ten paces in every direction, creating an impenetrable barrier.

BAM! KABAM!

One explosion after another rang out as the golden cudgel smashed into the barrier of energy, destroying layer after layer until it was right in front of Yang Qi.

Only then did Yang Qi actually make a move. He drew on all the power of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, causing five ancient megamammoths to appear behind him, trumpeting viciously. At the same time, the divine power of the megamammoth converged in his hands, which he thrust out toward the cudgel in the form of a palm strike.

The momentum of the cudgel was halted, and the cudgel itself actually bent under the force. On the other end, blood began to ooze out between the ape’s thumb and forefinger. Then, a moment later, the ape was flung backward, smashing into the wall and sending rock debris out in all directions.

Although the white ape was mighty, he didn't compare at all to the power of five ancient megamammoths.

Yang Qi himself had transformed on a bodily level, from his skin down to his tendons and bones. His fleshly body was no longer as simply constructed as the average human body; once he activated his energy arts, ordinary weapons would not be able to harm him, and although he didn’t compare in size to the ape, was basically just as tough as him.

After being hurled into the wall, the ape slumped to the ground and then struggled to rise to his feet. However, there was no way Yang Qi would let him do that. Without any hesitation, he launched the Infernal Deity Spear at the ape’s chest.

This ape was a ferocious demonling, and therefore, in this moment of crisis, he suddenly unleashed an explosive display of energy arts. Opening his mouth, he spat out a stream of blazing fire that blocked the spear, instantly dissipating it.

However, that was when Yang Qi reached out and grabbed the golden cudgel, which the ape had dropped earlier. Walking forward, he lifted it up with both hands and used a martial technique of his own, Devastating Mountain-Crushing.

RUMMMBLE!

He could now tell that the cudgel weighed thousands of kilograms, and as he swung it through the air toward the ape, it caused a massive wind to blast out.

The ape itself actually had difficulty using the cudgel sometimes because of its massive weight, but as for Yang Qi, he didn’t seem to have any problems at all. The power of five megamammoths combined could move buildings, let alone a cudgel.

“Damnation!” the ape cursed under his breath. “Have to put everything on the line!” There was no way the white ape could avoid the cudgel, so he thrust his palms out to try to block it directly. However, Yang Qi kept hitting him over and over again with all the ferocity he was capable of. He was like a windmill, sending strike after strike bashing into the ape.

Bam. Bam. Bam. Bam! Bam!! BAM!!!

He struck out ten times, thoroughly shaking the white ape’s defensive true energy until the final strike crushed it.

The ape was struck directly in the torso, breaking his bones, snapping his tendons, and destroying his five viscera. He couldn’t even let out a howl or roar. Glaring at Yang Qi, he slumped down onto the ground and died.

“Finally,” Yang Qi said. He tossed the huge cudgel to the side, where it smashed into the stone ground of the chamber. Then he walked forward to check the ape, ensuring that he was completely dead, his spiritual souls gone and his physical souls dissipated.

Then he struck out with another palm, breaking open the ape’s corpse. There, in his dantian region, was a fist-sized demon core that Yang Qi scooped out.

It was scintillating and gorgeous, and it was possible to see something like magical symbols inside of it. It also contained the true energy formed by the white ape’s essence-blood, built up over a lifetime.

“Incredible…. A demon core on the very cusp of the ninth phase. This thing must be worth a million or even more. I wonder what other good stuff this ape has in his mansion grotto.” With that, he began to search the cave, starting with the pill furnace.

It was made from some sort of remarkable stone that was as smooth as jade, and blue in color. When he touched it, it felt like ice, as though it contained boundless frigid energy. It was obviously very valuable, but considering there was no way for him to take it away, he would have to return another time for it.

In addition to that, Yang Qi happened to notice that the color of the ground off to the side was strange. Circulating his energy, he struck the stone and shattered it, revealing a secret compartment, which contained a jade box. Opening the box, he saw glittering, golden light coming from a medicinal pill. In addition, there was a scroll that contained, not some secret energy art or cultivation method, but rather, information about the medicinal pill. Presumably, the ape had stolen it from somewhere.

“Nine Transformations Pill Sutra?” he murmured. That was the title on the scroll. As for the text, it contained the medicinal plant ratios required to concoct what was called a Golden Nine Transformations Pill, as well as complex variations to produce different versions.

The effects of the pill were also explained. “Use energy to connect with heaven and earth, and be reborn a master. Those whose energy arts reach the peak of the eighth phase, but cannot break through to the Master of Energy level, can use this medicinal pill to achieve their desired breakthrough.”

‘Awesome!’ Yang Qi thought, delighted. ‘Father is already nearing the peak of the eighth phase. If he has trouble breaking through to the Master of Energy level, then he can use this Golden Nine Transformations Pill to be reborn a master. As for me, I have my Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, so I shouldn't have any problems with my breakthrough.’

Yan Gufeng was the only ninth phase expert at the moment, and he controlled the whole city. But if Yang Zhan broke through, then everything could change. Who knew whether Yang Zhan himself might be able to take over.

Yang Qi was already very pleased. Thankfully, the white ape hadn’t consumed the pill, otherwise he would have been much more difficult to deal with.

Putting away the Golden Nine Transformations Pill, Yang Qi continued to search the chamber, flipping through various scrolls which had clearly been stolen from human institutes and organizations.

Unfortunately, such things weren’t particularly valuable.

Eventually, he found the white ape’s treasure store, which contained a box of banknotes worth roughly five million energy convergence pills.

It made sense for demonlings and devillings to hoard wealth, as they required energy convergence pills if they wanted their own cultivation to advance rapidly.

Actually, one of the main reasons that humans rose to power to begin with was because of how popular energy convergence pills turned out to be. Years in the past, when humans could only eat food, they were very weak. At that time, it was almost impossible to practice cultivation to the Energy Eruption level.

The fact that this white ape was so rich indicated that it had killed a lot of humans. After all, if humans could kill demonling and devillings, they could do the same back.

‘How many people did that ape kill to get five million energy convergence pills worth of banknotes?’ Although he was shocked by the thought, he was also very pleased with all the wealth. It would definitely get the clan's businesses going again, and the idea of making a comeback would now be more than just wishful thinking.

After looking around and seeing nothing more of value, Yang Qi hefted the golden cudgel over his shoulder and then flew out of the mansion grotto.

Considering he didn't know what material the cudgel was made from, he decided that he should take it home with him.

He was now in the seventh phase, the Energy Manifestation level, and could glide along with his Fiend-Devil Wings. With that boost, he could travel ten times as quickly as before.

WHOOSH!

With the flap of his wings, he began to make his way out of the Blackcorpse Mountains.

By this point, the rain had stopped, and it was night, which made everything seem even more frightening. However, during the night, it was also easier to travel stealthily. Flying around in the forest in broad daylight would probably have attracted the wrong kind of attention.

Chapter 23: Going Home

Yang Qi’s training in the Blackcorpse Mountains had turned out to be very profitable, as he acquired demon cores worth millions. In the white ape’s mansion grotto, he acquired fully five million energy convergence pills' worth of banknotes, as well as the Golden Nine Transformations Pill, which was probably worth ten million.

Although it still wasn't enough to make up for the Latent Dragon Pill, it would still do much to help the clan recover.

Even better, his cultivation base had advanced after awakening the fifth particle within him. With the power of five ancient megamammoths, he had pushed his cultivation to the seventh phase of energy arts, the Energy Manifestation level. Combined with his remarkable Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, it meant that he could easily crush experts in the eighth phase.

The white ape’s cultivation base had already reached the peak of the eighth phase; considering that he was a demonling, that made him much stronger than a human, and the fact that Yang Qi had bested him indicated that it would be much easier to defeat humans.

For example, if he ran into Yang Shi right now, he could easily win. And there wasn't even a need to mention the number one young genius of the clan, Yang Honglie.

‘Hmph. If Yun Hailan and Song Haishan were in Yundale-by-the-Sea instead of the Demi-Immortal Institute, I would sneak in to kill the both of them. It’d serve them right.’

The stronger he got, the angrier he felt about how he had been betrayed by Yun Hailan. Unfortunately, the fact that she was in the Demi-Immortal Institute made her impossible to touch.

The Demi-Immortal Institute was the number one institution in the continent, with more experts than the sky had clouds. They even had people higher than the Master of Energy level, which was the Lifeseizing level. With people like that around Yun Hailan, Yang Qi knew that even if he were stronger than he already was, he would still be courting death to try to lay a hand on her.

The best thing to do now was focus on cultivation, get stronger, restore the glory of the Yang Clan, and slowly develop a plan about how to get revenge.

The political situation in the continent was tenuous and unstable. Numerous vassals were declaring themselves to be nations, and it seemed likely that open conflicts would soon break out. If the Yang Clan remained weak in a situation like that, it was highly possible they could end up being wiped out of existence.

As Yang Qi’s Fiend-Devil Wings carried him closer and closer to Yanhaven, a gust of demonic wind swept through the mansion grotto back in the Blackcorpse Mountains, and a new ape appeared, an ape even more enormous than the white ape.

This ape's fur was the color of gold.

His energy arts and cultivation base were so advanced that he could travel about on gusts of winds; clearly, he was powerful to a profound degree. From the look of it, he was an elder family member of the white ape, with arms so thick and long that they nearly touched the ground even when he was standing on two legs.

The claws on his fingers were more than a foot long, and could reduce rock to dust.

When the golden-furred ape saw the white ape laying dead on the ground, he let out a miserable cry. “Little White! Oh, who killed you, Little White….? I’ll find your killer and wipe out his entire clan, I swear it. He even stole your demon core!”

Even as he wept, he inhaled deeply, which enabled him to detect a certain aroma on the white ape….

Bursting with ferocity, the golden-furred ape exploded out of the waterfall. From the look of it, his energy arts were already in the ninth phase, the Master of Energy level….

**

A shadow slid through the darkness of night, entering Yanhaven as stealthily as a ghost, to arrive moments later in the Yang Clan mansion.

It was none other than Yang Qi.

Little Yan was dozing outside of his room when he arrived.

“Young Master, you’re back!” she said. Then she noticed the huge cudgel he was carrying, and the dilapidated state of his clothing. Leaping to her feet excitedly, she said, “I’ll get a bath ready for you, and a set of clothing. I can comb your hair too!”

Yang Qi waved his hand dismissively, “Nah, I’m clean enough. I’ll change clothes real quickly and then go see eldest brother and second brother. You just keep sleeping.”

With that, he went to his room, changed into a fine, brocaded garment and then headed over to the main hall. Upon arriving, he found Yang Yunchong going through accounting books with some of the clan's accountants. When the accountants saw Yang Qi entering the hall, they all rose to their feet to offer greetings.

Yang Qi looked at them expressionlessly, aware that they were all secretly cursing him for shoving the clan into bankruptcy. The only reason they were restraining themselves was his cultivation base breakthrough, and the fact that he had defeated Yang Kui in combat.

After all, strength was the most important thing in the world, even more so than wealth. If someone was strong enough, then wealth was easy to obtain.

‘If they knew I was already in the seventh phase, and that I just killed an eighth phase demonling, they'd be so scared they’d drop down and worship me.’ Waving his hand dismissively, he said, “You’re all dismissed for the moment. I have some business to discuss with my eldest brother.”

“You're dismissed,” Yang Yunchong echoed.

The accountants all left, closing the door behind them.

“Third Brother, I heard that you went alone into the Blackcorpse Mountains to work on your cultivation. I have to admit I was worried, but at the same time, I'm surprised to see you back so soon. What happened?” At that point, his eyes widened a bit. “Your energy arts advanced again?”

Thump!

Yang Qi’s bag landed onto the table, and demon cores immediately began to spill out of it.

Yang Yunchong’s eyes widened further. “Are these… all from demonlings you killed? How many did you take out? Is this a devil-hunting spider core? It’s… it’s so big! How did you do this?”

Then he saw the fist-sized demon core from the white ape.

Yang Qi gestured at it. “That’s from a white ape I killed. He was in the peak of the eighth phase. I also got these banknotes from his lair.”

He placed the five million energy convergence pills' worth of banknotes onto the table.

Yang Yunchong’s eyes couldn't have been wider, and he was actually trembling physically. “Third Brother, you…? You single-handedly killed a white ape at the peak of the eighth phase?”

Yang Qi nodded. “Yup. I'm already in the seventh phase myself.” Sitting down, he took a drink of tea. “Eldest Brother, why don’t you call second brother, and then we can all go see father? I acquired something else that should help him break through to the Master of Energy level.”

“Really?” Yang Yunchong was completely blown away by this point. Leaping to his feet, he anxiously said, “Alright, let’s call second brother. Hurry!”

Soon, Yang Hualong got the message, and was just as shocked as his eldest brother. And before long, all three brothers were heading toward Yang Zhan’s private chamber.

Yang Qi walked up to the closed door and knocked firmly, using his energy arts to make sure the sound penetrated the thick, iron door. As soon as his skin made contact with the door, he could sense a powerful energy flow inside the room.

RUMMMBLE!

The iron door opened, and Yang Zhan stopped performing his energy arts forms. Eyes sparkling with delight, he looked at Yang Qi and said, “Qi’er, did you just send your energy into the door? That’s the sign of the Energy Manifestation level. Energy flowing like water, entering sealed locations! Did you break through?”

“Yes, Father. I broke through. Not even ten Yang Honglies working together could kill me now. In fact, I could even defeat Yang Shi if I had to. Father, look at what I got on my trip to the Blackcorpse Mountains!”

With that, he pulled out the box with the Golden Nine Transformations Pill in it. When he opened the lid, light erupted out, along with a refreshing medicinal aroma tinged with the fragrance of orchid and musk.

“A Golden Nine Transformations Pill?” Yang Zhan said, his eyes glittering. “How did you get it?”

“From a white ape I killed.” With that, he went on to provide a detailed account of his fight with the white ape, although he left out some of the details of his use of the Fiend-Devil Wings and his Infernal Deity Spear. He simply said that his experience of being struck by lightning helped him to achieve victory.

Yang Zhan looked at the Golden Nine Transformations Pill for a moment, then shook his head. “That pill is yours to use. I don't need it.”

“Father, I’ve already thought this through,” Yang Qi said. And indeed he had. He had even thought of the specific words to express his stance. “Because of how I was tempered by the lightning, my cultivation is proceeding with astonishing quickness. In the short time since the incident, I've already progressed from the fourth phase all the way to the seventh. That’s three entire levels. And I can tell that my momentum will keep going. What I need to do right now is stabilize my cultivation base. Father, you're in a different position, and can break through to the Master of Energy level right away. Once you do that, the Yang Clan will be in a very different position. New nations are springing up left and right, and the continent is likely to descend into war soon. We need the Yang Clan to be as strong as possible; that’s the only way to keep safe.”

After a moment of silence, Yang Zhan said, “Very well, Qi’er. Since you’ve clearly put a lot of thought into the subject, I won’t continue to refuse your offer.” With that, he reached out and took the pill.

At this point, Yang Qi took out the Nine Transformations Pill Sutra. “Father, this book has the instructions for how to use the pill.”

Yang Zhan took the book, sat down cross-legged, and followed the instructions, sending out a stream of true energy to wrap around the pill. As soon as he did, the pill began to glow brightly.

The light spread, until Yang Zhan himself was glowing brightly, making him look pure and holy to the extreme.

Golden Nine Transformations Pills were not consumed like most medicinal pills. If someone tried to eat them the normal way, the pill would burn one’s digestive system. Perhaps the white ape had only recently acquired the pill, and had intended to temper his true energy to a certain degree before using it, only to have then encountered Yang Qi.

It remained to be seen whether Yang Zhan would be able to use the pill to actually achieve the breakthrough or not.

As the Golden Nine Transformations Pill began to shrink, sucked away by the true energy, Yang Zhan glittered with bright, multicolored light. He almost looked like a golden Buddha statue.

“I’ll need three days to absorb the medicine,” Yang Zhan said. “I need to remain in complete seclusion during that time. Even if the heavens begin to fall, don't let anyone disturb me.”

“Yes, Father,” the three brothers said. Aware of how important the situation was, they left, returning to the main hall to continue discussing business. The first task at hand was to sell the treasures Yang Qi had acquired and use the funds to further clan interests.

“Third Brother, you have to go to the city magistrate’s mansion in a few days for that banquet. Be completely on guard when you do. As for what we’re going to do with this six or seven million energy convergence pills' worth of wealth, I think the best thing to do is….”

Yang Yunchong was actually very adept at business matters.

Earlier, the Yang Clan’s wealth had been stripped in one fell swoop. And as the saying goes, not even the cleverest housewife can cook good food without rice. Thankfully, Yang Qi had just brought a massive amount of wealth, which completely changed the situation.

‘Seven million energy convergence pills is a lot, but it’s still nothing compared to what I lost the clan. Ai….’ The truth was that Yang Qi had never paid much attention to how much wealth the clan had accumulated, and actually had no idea how much money had been lost because of him. All he knew was that the clan had suffered a severe blow.

He had nearly caused their end.

‘I have to earn more money. Only if I can fully restore the clan to its former glory will I be content. But, as far as I can tell, the only way to do that is hunt demonlings. I guess the next time I’ll have to go deeper into the mountains, and take on even riskier prey.’

Chapter 24: Attending the Banquet

Yang Qi rested for a few days after returning from the Blackcorpse Mountains. Before long, it was time to attend the banquet at the city magistrate’s mansion.

City Magistrate Yan Gufeng had invited all of the unmarried, elite young ones from the rich and powerful clans to assess their potential as a future son-in-law.

The Yan Clan was massive, and ruled everything within five hundred kilometers of the city, making them the leader of at least a million citizens. Anyone who married into a clan like that would become wealthy beyond imagination. Even more relevant was the fact that Yan Feixia was studying at the True Dragon Institute, another powerful connection which could ensure that her husband’s path of cultivation in life went smoothly and without hitch.

The news had begun to spread half a month before, and had caused a windstorm of excitement among the elite young ones in Yanhaven. All of them had been preparing as best they could to win the favor of the beautiful Yan Feixia, and hopefully win her hand in marriage.

Yang Qi wasn't particularly interested in that. After being betrayed by Yun Hailan, who happened to be the beloved daughter of the city magistrate of Yundale-by-the-Sea, he had grown wary of women. Right now, his main focus in life was to pursue his cultivation, get stronger, restore his clan to glory, and get revenge on Yun Hailan and Song Haishan….

However, the Yan Clan had sent him an official invitation card, so there was no way he could refuse to go. If the Yang Clan wanted to survive in Yanhaven, then they absolutely could not afford to offend the Yan Clan in any way.

Yang Qi truly rested the days before going to the banquet. He didn't go into secluded meditation to work on cultivation. Instead, he spent time analyzing his experiences fighting demonlings in the Blackcorpse Mountains, especially his climactic battle with the white ape. Such deep analysis furthered his understanding of energy arts significantly.

The Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth had many marvelous aspects, such as the three great abilities of the Infernal Deity Spear, the Infernal Deity Aegis and the Fiend-Devil Wings. He was now very familiar with all three, and when he used them, it was truly like seeing an ancient godmammoth in action, trumpeting with its powerful trunk, pulling moons and stars down out of the sky. But when he hid them, they vanished as if into the depths of hell, where they rested in utter darkness. Not even a Master of Energy would be able to detect them.

In addition to all that, he continued to cultivate and practice the six forms of the Invincible King’s Fist. It was in this fashion that he went about preparing for the banquet.

All of the elite young ones would have a chance to compete amongst each other in energy arts at the banquet.

After all, in the Rich-Lush Continent, people respected strength. It didn’t matter if it was in the clan, the government or anywhere else, formal gatherings almost always involved martial arts competitions. In fact, it was even a custom for children during New Year's. Whoever performed the best would receive rewards from the clan, and enormous glory.

In many clans, the positions of the parents in the clan would often depend not just on their own energy arts, but also whether their children were talented in cultivation as well.

Obviously, Yang Qi couldn’t use his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth during this gathering, only his clan’s energy arts. However, considering how incredibly powerful he already was, he was like a wild beast in human form, making even casual moves on his part very deadly.

In fact, he had recently worked a bit on the Golden Bell Rampart, and could easily form an enormous golden bell if he wanted, to a degree that far surpassed the black-robed man from the House of Shadowblight.

Due to his breakthrough, he had gained a much deeper understanding of cultivation. His advancement had been so rapid that, at the moment, not even someone in the Energy Incarnation level would be able to defeat him. Only someone in the ninth phase, the Master of Energy level, would have a chance at crushing him. Of course, considering he had his Fiend-Devil Wings now, if someone like that did come after him, he would still have the option to try to flee.

In only a few weeks, his martial arts had gone from being crippled to the point where he could at least begin to rival someone in the Master of Energy level. It was almost like a dream.

However, in his heart, he had not forgotten that it was all because of the golden imp that resided in his forehead.

That golden imp never moved, but seemed to be in the process of recovering, and could very well wake up one day. Thankfully, Yang Qi was patient. Whenever he worked with his energy arts, he would always take the time to try to communicate with the imp.

Unfortunately, after imparting the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth to him, it had never responded.

**

Sunrise.

Yang Qi woke up, bathed and groomed himself, put on a fresh set of clothes, and then headed in the direction of the city magistrate’s mansion, invitation card in hand.

Virtually every part of the enormous Yanhaven buzzed with excited activity. Elite young ones from all of the aristocratic clans were dressed in their finest, heading to the city magistrate’s mansion with servants in tow.

Yang Qi didn’t bother bringing anyone. Nor did he take a horse cart or carriage. Instead, he strolled casually through the city toward the mansion.

The mansion was enormous, taking up well over ten thousand hectares within the city. A tributary of the Yan River formed a moat around it, and within its gurgling blue waters, it was just possible to see the shadows of machinery of war.

Simply put, only an insane person would think of trying to storm the city magistrate's mansion.

In addition to the moat, there were towering walls dozens of meters high, majestic and awe-inspiring, with a forest of battlements covering them. Soldiers and officers with profound energy arts patrolled the walls, and their watchful eyes would spot even birds who flew nearby.

There was also a veritable army of enormous projectile weapons with multiple barrels on the walls, which were armor-piercing flame ballistas which could shoot thousands of flaming crossbow bolts. In the face of fire from such ballistas, not even experts in the Master of Energy level could escape with their lives.

This entire mansion was a place of crouching tigers and hidden dragons, of concealed threats that would make it virtually impossible for any force to attack it.

When Yang Qi arrived and saw all of the defenses in place, he slowly shook his head. After all, he knew about a secret tunnel that led from the outside all the way to the depths of the mansion.

That information had been given to him by Yun Hailan, back when he had been sure that the two of them were meant for each other, and would run away together. Nowadays, his fantasies of only a few weeks before seemed pathetically childish.

By now, the city magistrate’s mansion surely knew about that secret tunnel, which meant that he couldn’t simply go in and out of the mansion as he pleased.

By the time he arrived, there were already young ones from various clans gathering at the main entrance of the mansion. There were sedan chairs pulling up, servants yelling, armored guards surveying the scene, and a host of other things going on.

And almost immediately, Yang Qi could sense numerous gazes locking onto him.

At the moment, his mind was clear, like a pool of deep water reflecting the starlight. He could feel every single one of those gazes, and without even turning in their direction, could ‘see’ who was looking at him.

It was a unique ability that came to those with very high energy arts.

Top experts were essentially impossible to ambush. As soon as anyone even looked at them, they would sense it.

Back in the Blackcorpse Mountains, that white ape had done that very thing, and had then used Thousand Kilometer Soul Locking on him.

Of course, Yang Qi was not at the level in which he could use the soul locking technique; until he reached the eighth phase, it wouldn’t do any good to even try to cultivate it.

“See that, guys? That’s the lousy Yang Qi from the Yang Clan. I can't believe he has the guts to show up at the city magistrate’s mansion!”

“Weren’t his martial arts crippled?”

“I heard he recovered. It’s probably because of some sort of miraculous spirit medicine his aunt sent him to heal his meridians. She practices cultivation at the Demi-Immortal Institute. Although, I heard another rumor that he got struck by lightning, and experienced some strange transformations afterward. Supposedly his martial abilities all returned. I don’t know if that’s true or not, though.”

“Bah! You really think he would recover from being struck by lightning? It was definitely some spirit medicine sent from his aunt. In any case, after what happened, he’s got to be on the outs with the city magistrate. I can’t believe he dared to come today. Don’t tell me he’s like the ugly toad who lusted after the beautiful swan!”

“That guy? He doesn’t look like he’s recovered to me. If he thinks he can win the heart of Miss Yan Feixia, then he’s a complete moron.”

Yang Qi heard every single word that people were saying, but all it provoked was a slight smile. Back when he had been little more than a weakling, if he had heard people saying things like that he would have been incensed. But right now, he didn’t really take it to heart. After all, he was on a higher level than these people now.

All of a sudden, a young man with a folding fan called out in a loud voice. “Well, what have we here? If it isn't Yang Qi! I heard your martial arts were crippled, and then recovered. Come come. Let me take a look at you! You’re here alone? No servants? Seems the Yang Clan really is completely bankrupt. Well, don't worry. You can come over to the Chen Clan and sell yourself into slavery. That way you’ll at least have enough to eat.”

This was one of the young elites from the Chen Clan, Chen Qing. His cultivation base was more or less the same level as Yang Qi’s had been not too long ago, and he was about the same age. From the look of it, he had recently made an energy arts breakthrough.

He waved his fan gently, and a whirlwind sprang up, causing all of the dirt and pebbles within a hundred paces to turn into a tornado that bore down on Yang Qi.

This was Strength of the Tornado, and Chen Qing was clearly using it in the hopes of cutting Yang Qi down a few notches right off the bat.

Tornado energy arts were a consummate skill of the Chen Clan, and were capable of sweeping objects as large as millstones into their winds. They were definitely nothing to look down on. For a while, Chen Qing had been in the Energy Refinement level, but now he had broken through into Energy Eruption. The fact that he was at this banquet indicated that his clan was grooming him for future glory.

Considering that the Yang Clan and the Chen Clan had never really gotten along, a fact that was public knowledge, it was no surprise to anyone to see events playing out this way.

The human-sized tornado was upon Yang Qi in the blink of an eye, and the rubble inside of it made a loud buzzing noise. Anyone who got hit by that tornado would surely end up pock-faced and disfigured afterward.

Everyone looked on, chuckling at Yang Qi.

In response, Yang Qi reached out casually, sending some true energy exploding out which immediately crushed the tornado into complete silence.

Then he waved his hand again.

BANG!

A palm of true energy sailed out, roughly the size of a water jug, that moved as fast as a meteor toward Chen Qing.

BAMMMM!!

Before Chen Qing could react, it slammed into him, shredding to pieces his fan, clothing, jade pendants, and even the armor he had under his clothing. Buck naked, he tumbled backward through the air.

Along with him flew his sedan chair, as well as the eight guards he had with him. None of them could escape, and were soon coughing up masses of blood.

Chapter 25: Dealing with the Chen Clan

With a simple swipe of his hand, Yang Qi sent Chen Qing and his retinue flying. Chen Qing, one of the elite young ones of the Chen Clan, an outstanding and respected individual, had been easily vanquished. Even his sedan chair was destroyed.

Yang Qi remained standing in place, where he dusted his shoulders off and said, “How dare you talk smack to me, you trash. The Chen Clan calls scum like you a young elite? You seem completely useless to me.”

In this moment, Yang Qi was the epitome of strength and dominance.

The Yang Clan had been in sore straits for days now. Because of their weakened state, many other forces in Yanhaven had done everything they could to hit them when they were still down. As a result, the work of Yang Yunchong and Yang Hualong had been made much more difficult.

Therefore, Yang Qi had intentionally showed overbearing dominance and strength as soon as he could, in order to make sure everyone in Yanhaven knew that the Yang Clan still had life left in them, and were a force to be reckoned with.

He was fully confident that word of what had happened today would spread throughout the city like wildfire. The Yang Clan’s business affairs would also be affected positively because of it.

As would be expected, everyone else in the area was shocked.

“Defeated? Chen Qing was actually beaten by a single move? Was that even a full move, or just half a move? How could Yang Qi’s true energy be so strong? What level of cultivation base does he actually have? The ability to injure people from a distance comes only after reaching the fifth phase.”

“Yeah, I wasn’t able to see the level of his cultivation base either. All he did was wave his hand, and then something like a palm flew out. And look what happened to Chen Qing and his retinue. The Chen Clan isn’t going to just let this slide. They didn’t just send Chen Qing here today, right?”

“Well, I say we just do like the famous saying. Sit on the mountaintop and watch the tigers fight, then reap the spoils when they tire out. It seems Yang Qi didn't just recover, he actually made some progress with his martial arts.”

Although all of the young elites present were shocked, they continued to watch with serious expressions on their faces. They could now tell that Yang Qi was a formidable opponent, and knew they could benefit by closely watching his conflict with the Chen Clan.

As some of the Chen Clan servants were trying to help Chen Qing to his feet, other experts from the clan were turning furious gazes onto Yang Qi.

A moment later, a young man of about twenty-five years of age strode out into the open, causing everyone in the area to feel their breath stifled because of his mere presence.

“What’s going on here?” he said, sounding openly aggressive. “What gall you have, Yang Qi! This is a gathering organized by the city magistrate’s mansion! How dare you cause trouble by fighting so ruthlessly here! That’s an insult to the dignity of the city magistrate, and is definitely worthy of punishment!”

This young man was even more famous than Chen Qing.

“That’s their number one elite, Chen Miejin. Supposedly, he's been in love with the martial arts since he was a child, and has long since been declared a genius in terms of his potential and talents. From what I've heard, he never got married, and has no children. Supposedly, he swore not to marry until he got to the Master of Energy level. Considering that he's already in the seventh phase of energy arts, he’s pretty much on the same level as Yang Honglie from the Yang Clan.”

Chen Miejin seemed like a mighty mountain or a deep well, his words incisive, and his demeanor the type that brooked no challenges.

As he spoke, he wore a slight smile, and yet his eyes flickered with killing intent, and his tone was openly aggressive. That was especially true considering how he tried to use the city magistrate as a threat.

“Intentionally causing trouble?” Yang Qi said calmly. “This Chen Qing tried to harm me with his energy arts, and all I did was fight back. If anyone is causing trouble, it's your clan.”

Chen Miejin’s smile faded, to be replaced by icy coldness. At the same time, his energy began to surge. “Young Chen Qing did nothing but offer you a greeting. Then you went crazy and hurt him with a sneak attack! However, we’re here at the city magistrate’s mansion for a banquet. Why don't we wait until we're in City Magistrate Yan’s presence before we offer each other fighting tips? Just kowtow and give our Chen Clan a gift of apology, say, a thousand energy convergence pills. Then I’ll forgive you.”

When the young elites present heard that, they immediately began to talk amongst themselves.

“Oh boy! He wants him to kowtow in apology and offer a thousand energy convergence pills. This is going to cause a big grudge between the Yang Clan and the Chen Clan! Everybody knows that the Yang Clan has gone completely broke. They don’t even have enough energy convergence pills to pay their servants and guards.”

“That’s right. The other day I saw some rice and meat shipments going to the Yang Clan. Everybody knows that food like that is for poor people. Rich clans like us subsist on energy convergence pills. If they can’t afford energy convergence pills, they’re definitely done for. Pretty soon, even their servants are going to abandon them. After all, the main reason people work for the rich clans is to get energy convergence pills.”

“The Chen Clan is being really insulting and aggressive toward them. But then again, the Yang Clan is really in a bad position now, making it the perfect time to kick them while they’re down.”

“What do you say?” Chen Miejin said, clasping his hands behind his back. Although he looked very calm, his eyes burned with killing intent. “If you don’t kowtow in apology, then I’ll just cripple your energy arts for the second time in your life. Then we can see if that aunt of yours at the Demi-Immortal Institute will have more spirit medicine to help you out with.”

“Cripple my energy arts?” Yang Qi laughed. “Sure. Why don't you give it a shot? In fact, not just you. Why don’t you ask your clan lord Chen Dalei to try as well? Except that he’ll fail.”

Clan Lord Chen Dalei was in the peak of the Energy Incarnation level, and was incredibly famous. He had held his position as clan lord for roughly thirty years now. However, what Yang Qi had just said was indeed true. After defeating the white ape in battle, his cultivation base had reached the point where only those in the Master of Energy level were a threat to him.

Of course, everyone else took his words to be the ravings of a lunatic. Even if he were more of an elite than he was, there was no way he could take on someone so powerful. He was just blatantly insulting the clan lord, as well as all of the other Chen Clan experts present.

Words like his were enough to cause a major conflict to break out between the Chen and Yang Clans.

Everyone from the Chen Clan immediately broke out into loud cursing and swearing.

“Dammit!”

“Cripple him! Kill him! He's obviously tired of living!”

“What humiliation! How dare he insult our clan lord like that! Nobody alive could take such disrespect standing. We should have expected this from the Yang Clan. Yang Zhan’s an animal, and so is his son.”

“Hmm?” Yang Qi’s eyes glittered, and thunderous cracking sounds could be heard from his tendons and bones. Sweeping his gaze across the people from the Chen Clan, he said, “Who was it? Who was talking nonsense just now? Who insulted my father? Step forward immediately and get on your knees. Otherwise I’ll turn you into a clan of corpses. Are the young ones in the Chen Clan all tired of living?”

“You!” Chen Miejin blurted, almost incapable of speaking. Face turning even more sinister and icy, he said, “Since you clearly want to die, Yang Qi, I’ll accommodate you! Dragon-Tiger Tornado!”

Instantly, a tornado sprang up behind him, filled with images of wind tigers and dragons. Seemingly surging with the power of those beasts, he chopped his hand out in front of him.

Whizz!

In the blink of an eye, a wave of energy was right in front of Yang Qi.

Stretched behind it was shattered air and broken ground, as if some enormous hammer were tearing through the area. If such energy smashed into a human, it would likely rip them to pieces.

A moment later, it hit, and yet did not rip Yang Qi into pieces, or even crush his bones. Instead, it seemed to hit some sort of bell, causing a sonorous boom to echo out. As for Yang Qi, he didn't even move.

“Golden Bell Rampart?” Chen Miejin blurted in shock.

Before he could do anything else, Yang Qi was right in front of him, moving so quickly that Chen Miejin had no way to even react.

Chen Miejin’s defensive true energy shattered, and blood sprayed out of his mouth as he was flung backward. Even as Yang Qi’s Golden Bell Rampart faded away, he placed his foot right on top of Chen Miejin’s abdomen, where his dantian region and sea of energy lay.

“How could this be happening? I'm in the seventh phase….” Chen Miejin struggled to free himself, but it did no good. Yang Qi’s foot was like that of a mammoth’s, and made it impossible for him to move.

“What’s so special about the seventh phase?” Yang Qi said coldly. “Like I said, Clan Lord Chen Dalei wouldn’t be able to hurt me, let alone you. You Chen Clan people insulted me first. Didn't you want to cripple my energy arts? Well, I’ll return the favor. I’ll destroy your sea of energy and make sure you live the rest of your life as a commoner.”

And then, as everyone looked on, he lifted his foot up as if he were preparing to smash it down onto Chen Miejin.

If he really did that, he would cripple Chen Miejin’s martial arts forever.

“Stay your hand!” someone shouted in a powerful voice. A moment later, a burly figure appeared, clad in a suit of armor. He looked like a devil-ghost of battle, and was none other than the sergeant major of the city magistrate’s guard, Luo Hun.

It was Luo Hun who had crippled Yang Qi’s sea of energy, and were it not for the bolt of lightning, Yang Qi would have been forced to live his life as a commoner, completely disgraced.

Luo Hun’s energy arts and cultivation base were among the highest in Yanhaven; he was even stronger than some of the clan lords. He also had a nickname: the Armored Devil-Ghost.

The reason for that was, no matter what season it was, spring, autumn, winter, or summer, he always wore his cold-forged iron armor. He would take it off when bathing, but other than that, never, not even when he slept. Apparently, he cultivated some sort of remarkable ability that made him as ferocious as a devil-ghost.

Yang Qi had noticed earlier that he was watching the conflict with him and the Chen Clan.

But only in the most critical of moments did he finally intervene.

However, in response to Luo Hun’s words, Yang Qi chuckled coldly, and stomped his foot down. Apparently, he wanted Luo Hun to simply look on as he crippled Chen Miejin’s sea of energy, unable to do anything to stop it from happening.

“What nerve you have!” Luo Hun shouted, his face falling at the realization that Yang Qi was going to ignore his command. At that point, Luo Hun’s sword-like eyebrows shot up, and his eyes turned as cold as ice. Anyone who crossed paths with that gaze would be immediately compelled to move out of the way lest they suffer agonizing pain. It was an ability that came with the Energy Incarnation level, Gaze Barrage.

He also let out a powerful roar, causing a screaming wind to rush out, like a beast backed by floodwaters as it closed in rapidly on Yang Qi.

Chapter 26: Who Dares Block My Path?

Luo Hun had been coldly looking on for the entire time.

He had long since been informed that Yang Qi's energy arts had recovered, but could never have guessed that he would be so strong he could vanquish Chen Miejin in the blink of an eye.

And considering that Yang Qi was about to cripple Chen Miejin, he had no choice but to intervene.

Nobody could possibly have anticipated that Yang Qi would simply ignore his command, and continue with his attack. It was an outright provocation to Luo Hun, something he couldn’t just ignore.

And so, he resorted to a ruthless move.

Energy surged as he unleashed a thunderously powerful attack from hundreds of paces away.

The explosive true energy became a huge vortex, bearing down on Yang Qi and threatening to drag him inside of it.

“Whale Consumes the Sea!”

Just barely visible within the massive vortex was an enormous whale, its mouth gaping as though to swallow up an entire sea.

This move was part of the martial ability that had earned Luo Hun his fame, his Furious Whale Energy Art. It was a boundlessly powerful technique that would summon the projection of an enormous whale, something so majestic that no opponent could possibly stand up to it.

This move was so strong that eighth phase experts would have trouble dealing with it, so there was little need to even mention people in the seventh phase.

And yet, Yang Qi didn’t even move a muscle in response.

Suddenly, six long arms of true energy sprang into being behind him, each of them fully nine meters long, crab-like in appearance, and domineering to the extreme, pulsing with the aura of a king.

Rumbling sounds echoed out as the Invincible King’s Fist slammed into the mouth of the enormous whale.

BAM!

Unexpectedly, the whale actually was incapable of consuming Yang Qi’s true energy, and was shattered to pieces by the six arms.

A shockwave of true energy raged outward in all directions, causing screaming winds to batter at the people in the area, who had no choice other than to step backward pace by pace.

“You dare to try to stop me?” Yang Qi growled as the winds battered at him. “When I want to cripple someone, I cripple them, no matter what anyone else tells me to do. The Chen Clan colluded with the House of Shadowblight to harm my eldest brother and second brother. And therefore, I’ll cripple one of their young ones! Eye for an eye, tooth for a tooth!”

As his words continued to float through the air, he mercilessly stomped down with his foot, sending a blast of energy directly into Chen Miejin’s dantian region and sea of energy.

Chen Miejin screamed, energy streaming out of him as he deflated almost like a balloon, blood oozing out of his eyes, ears, nose, and mouth.

“You… you really destroyed my sea of energy!?” he cried. “I'm gonna kill you….”

To him, the despair of having his sea of energy destroyed was worse than being killed.

After all, in the Rich-Lush Continent, people who could not practice martial arts or cultivation were looked down upon in all regards. And to be treated with such coldness was definitely worse than death in many ways.

Chen Miejin was widely regarded as a genius in the Chen Clan, and had been the top contender to become the next clan lord. But now he was a cripple, more useless than the lowest-ranked servant.

“Kill me?” Yang Qi said, pulling his foot back. “You can’t cultivate energy arts now, and will soon be the subject of endless scorn and ridicule. And I’ll be there to watch it all happen.

“And then there’s the rest of you….” He turned to look at some of the other elite young ones and servants from the Chen Clan. “Weren’t you just cursing the Yang Clan too? I think I should probably cripple all of your energy arts.”

With that, he jabbed his finger in their direction one by one.

Whoosh. Whoosh. Whoosh…!

With each jab of his finger, a spiral of energy shot out, almost like a bullet, slamming into the abdomens of each individual he targeted.

Instantly, the entire group who had cursed him sagged visibly as their seas of energy were destroyed, and their martial arts crippled.

These people had called Yang Zhan and Yang Qi animals, which was something he couldn’t possibly ignore. Therefore, he put them in the position of being alive, and yet yearning for death.

For Yang Qi to use such vicious tactics indicated that the Yang and Chen Clans would soon be going to war. And yet, he wasn’t too worried about that. The Chen Clan had no experts in the Master of Energy level, so even if they sent more people to try to fight him, he could stop them.

Furthermore, his father was in the middle of advancing to the Master of Energy level.

To top it all off, clues had come in recently indicating that the situation with his eldest brother and second brother was all because of the Chen Clan working together with the House of Shadowblight.

“You beast!” Luo Hun shouted, flying toward him and simultaneously summoning numerous bursts of energy that he locked down onto Yang Qi’s position, as if he planned to launch an attack at any moment. Never in his wildest dreams could he have guessed that Yang Qi would be strong enough to dispel his Furious Whale Energy Art.

His blood was surging through his veins, and his desire to do battle pulsed. He almost couldn’t hold back from starting a big fight with the cocky Yang Qi right then and there, taking his head as a way of warning others not to follow his bad example.

Others might fear the Yang Clan, but he didn’t. Furthermore, he knew that City Magistrate Yan Gufeng viewed the Yang Clan as being a thorn in his side, and planned to eliminate them eventually.

At this point, a vicious thought rose up within Luo Hun. ‘Perfect. This little punk Yang Qi actually crippled people right at the front gate of the city magistrate’s mansion. It’s the perfect excuse to simply kill him.’

However, that was when he heard someone speaking. It was none other than Yang Qi, who had compressed his voice into a line that went directly into his ears.

“I bet you’re thinking of trying to kill me, aren’t you Luo Hun? But do you really have what it takes to beat me? If you want to fight, we can find the time. But not now; I want to give Miss Yan Feixia a bit of face. Don’t worry. You crippled my martial arts not too long ago, and I'm going to get my revenge sooner or later.”

“It only took you less than two weeks to rise all the way to the seventh phase?” Luo Hun replied. “In that case, there’s no need to wait until later. I'm going to arrest and execute you this very day!”

As far as Luo Hun was concerned, if Yang Qi was allowed to continue to grow and advance, then it was impossible to say how powerful he would be in half a year. Just now, a completely unexpected event occurred: his whale was defeated.

That attack was something that only an eighth phase expert with remarkable skill and ability could have defeated. And yet, he was still confident that, if he paid the price, he could still cut Yang Qi down.

“Alright, Luo Hun. Bring it on. Let’s see if the Armored Devil-Ghost can live up to his reputation!”

Energy surged to the heavens as the two of them faced off and prepared to fight.

“Am I seeing things? Did Yang Qi just challenge Armored Devil-Ghost Luo Hun to a fight? Is he looking to get killed? Luo Hun is more terrifying than most clan lords!”

“Did you see that? Yang Qi just neutralized one of Luo Hun’s attacks! That’s something that only clan lords could do! He’s only eighteen years old, and yet has energy arts that profound?”

“His martial arts were crippled! Even if he recovered, he shouldn’t be able to do things this incredible, should he? Maybe he was possessed by some consummate master!”

“The Chen Clan suffered severe losses just now! Their prodigy Chen Miejin was crippled, along with several other young ones. The quintessence of their younger generation has been severely damaged! However, if the Yang Clan really goes to war with the Chen Clan, then they’re definitely going to make them pay the price in blood. Yanhaven is going to have one less aristocratic clan pretty soon!”

The people from the other clans were shocked, but at the same time, were interested to see how things would play out. On the other hand, they were all coming to realize that Yang Qi was definitively stealing the limelight.

Not a single one of these elite young ones could possibly fight him.

They all viewed Armored Devil-Ghost Luo Hun as being on the same level as a clan lord, and therefore, this was a fight they could not participate in.

Luo Hun stared at Yang Qi for about three breaths of time, then growled, “Alright, punk, if you get killed, you can only blame your own arrogance.”

His suit of armor began to tremble, causing metallic rumbling sounds to echo out. Then, a sea suddenly sprang into being behind him.

It was composed of pure true energy, and was so realistic that it had waves on its surface, and even contained the call of sea birds. In the middle of that sea, a spray of water shot into the air as a huge whale broke the surface.

Anyone present who closed their eyes and listened to what was happening would think that they really were standing at the shore of a sea.

This manifestation was none other than the mysterious and enigmatic Mind Incarnation ability, which made it abundantly clear that Luo Hun was at the peak of the eighth phase, the Energy Incarnation level.

“I’ve long since cultivated a fragmented scripture, the Sea Emperor Sutra. Remember the name Furious Whale Energy Art. It will be a great honor for you to be killed and buried by this technique!”

And thus, Luo Hun prepared to unleash a completely extraordinary technique.

In response, Yang Qi simply looked at him calmly. After all, he had once faced the attack of a mighty white ape. Although Luo Hun’s energy arts might be exquisite, in terms of true energy, he didn’t even come close to that beast. And Yang Qi was currently so powerful that if he used his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth to the fullest, he could easily destroy the man’s heart and blood vessels.

However, no matter what happened, he still wasn’t willing to reveal his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth to anyone.

Without using it, it would be hard to kill Luo Hun. And even if he did kill him, he would then have to face the wrath of Yan Gufeng, who was a Master of Energy.

‘Hmph. Either way, he’s trying to kill me, so I can’t just look on wide-eyed. He started this thing, so I'm going to end it. By killing him! If Yan Gufeng wants a war with the Yang Clan, then we’ll give him war! If father and I fight him together, there’s no reason to fear Yan Gufeng. And who knows, I might end up absorbing more of the power of the lightning mammoth during the fight, and awaken the sixth particle within me, or even the seventh. With even more megamammoth power, I would be so strong that I wouldn’t need to fear a Master of Energy!”

By this point, Yang Qi was definitely ready to kill.

After cultivating the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, he had accepted the life force characteristics of godmammoths, making him bold and fierce, the type of individual that could crush hells.

Elephants were powerful and mighty leaders; even fierce tigers, the kings of almost all other types of beasts, would run in fear from them. If elephants were like that, then it was even less necessary to mention godmammoths, who could crush hells.

Just as they began fighting, and right before things got serious, a beam of sword energy suddenly shot forth, separating them. And then a young woman appeared, who was none other than Yan Feixia.

“What are you doing?” she said. “Fighting?”

Fearful of injuring her, Luo Hun pulled all of his energy back into himself. “Miss, what are you doing here?”

Expression frosty, Yan Feixia said, “I heard something was going on at the main gate and hurried over to see. Why are you fighting with Prince Yang Qi? Are you really trying to kill him?”

Chapter 27: Hostility from the City Magistrate

‘What a pity,’ Yang Qi thought. Now that Yan Feixia was here, he knew that nothing would come of the fight with Luo Hun.

Although, that was also a good thing. If he killed Luo Hun, it would arouse the wrath of the city magistrate, and might force the Yang Clan to go to war with the Yan Clan.

And it went without saying that the Yang Clan wasn’t truly ready for something like that. The city magistrate, and the Yan Clan itself, had spent generation upon generation building their power, and the Yang Clan wasn’t even close to being able to assemble a force to reckon with them. Yang Zhan’s bloodline was just not in the position to win a victory against the Yan Clan.

Yang Qi immediately began to come up with other plans. ‘Just wait until I advance my cultivation base a bit more. When I'm in the Energy Incarnation level, there will be nothing to worry about. I’ll definitely be able to destroy any opponent, even a Master of Energy. For now, the best thing is to keep things civil with the Yan Clan. Considering I saved Yan Feixia, the city magistrate probably won’t do anything against the Yang Clan for the time being.’

Ever since he started cultivating the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, he had started thinking things through more clearly, and being more flexible.

“Miss, allow me to explain,” Luo Hun began, bowing his head. “Yang Qi mortally crippled a young one from another aristocratic clan. It’s a stain on the reputation of Yanhaven as a whole, and therefore, I took it upon myself to teach him a lesson.”

Yan Feixia remained silent in thought for a moment, then said, “Very well. The matter is over now. You’re dismissed, Luo Hun. This is an issue between the Chen and Yang Clans, so there’s no need for the city magistrate’s mansion to get involved. Understand?”

“Yes, Miss,” Luo Hun said. He instantly understood what she was thinking. If the Yang and Chen Clans fought amongst themselves, they would grow weaker, which would make the Yan Clan’s control over Yanhaven grow even stronger.

‘Well, she's definitely a disciple of the esteemed True Dragon Institute,’ Yang Qi thought, nodding in admiration. Going forward, he would definitely not make the mistake of underestimating Yan Feixia.

Although he had saved her life, clan interests superseded that, both for the Yan Clan and the Yang Clan. It was only normal that she would do everything she could to further the interests of her family. Clearly, disciples of the venerable True Dragon Institute were not the type to be taken lightly.

Obviously, the fact that Yang Qi had crippled some of the elite young ones of the Chen Clan would quickly be reported back, and most likely, open conflict would erupt between the two clans on this very day.

“Very well, everyone,” Yan Feixia said. “The fact that conflict has erupted on the day of our banquet seems to indicate the city magistrate’s mansion is not being a good host. Please, let’s go in.” Waving her hand, she said, “Luo Hun, escort these Chen Clan members back to their headquarters.”

“Yes, ma’am.” Luo Hun gave a meaningful look to Yang Qi, eyes flickering with a bloodthirsty light as he licked his lips. Then he led a group of city guards over to escort the people from the Chen Clan away.

All of the other elite young ones entered the mansion.

Yan Feixia waited for Yang Qi, and then began to walk by his side, “Brother Yang, your cultivation base continues to advance without letup. Congratulations!”

Although she didn’t show it, she was actually very surprised by what had played out. Although it had been remarkable that the sixth phase Yang Qi had defeated the seventh phase black-garbed man, the fact that he then went on to stand up to the eighth phase Luo Hun further went to show how much he had advanced. It seemed likely to her that someone in the Lifeseizing level must be giving him help.

In response to her congratulations, Yang Qi waved his hand dismissively. “Oh, it’s nothing special. What's so amazing about an occasional breakthrough? Miss Yan, did you ever uncover the truth about who was behind the incident with the House of Shadowblight? As it turns out, some members of my Yang Clan were also set upon by them. Apparently, they’re in league with the Chen Clan, which makes me wonder if they plan to remove the Yan Clan from a leadership position in Yanhaven.”

“The House of Shadowblight? In league with the Chen Clan? Are you sure about that?” Yan Feixia’s eyes glittered for a moment, then went back to normal. Nodding, she continued, “Well, I’ll definitely report the matter to my father for further investigation. After all, he oversees matters in Yanhaven, not me. I’ll be returning to the True Dragon Institute soon to continue my studies.”

‘This Yan Feixia is no simple girl,’ Yang Qi thought, a faint smile playing out on his face. Even if the Chen Clan was working with the House of Shadowblight, the Yan Clan and the city magistrate’s mansion probably wouldn't do anything about it. They would wait until the Chen and Yang Clans fought it out. When the smoke cleared, the Yan Clan would be perfectly justified in picking up the pieces and absorbing the wealth and manpower of both clans.

Right now, many city magistrates throughout the Rich-Lush Continent were trying to establish their own nations. For example, Yundale-by-the-Sea, which had become the State of Yun. Obviously, Yang Qi wondered whether Yan Gufeng had similar plans. If Yanhaven became the State of Yan, then the Yan Clan would be its royal house.

Smiling, he put aside the matter of the Chen Clan.

The talented young ones from the other aristocratic clans noticed that Yang Qi and Yan Feixia were chatting like old friends. That, coupled with the show of might he had just put on, further reinforced the fact that they were likely going to play supporting roles during the banquet, and little more. Not only did it cause them to sigh inwardly, but considering how ambitious most of them were, it caused their jealousy of Yang Qi to grow stronger.

A short time later, they arrived at the banquet hall, which was already buzzing with activity. Beautiful women were everywhere performing songs and dances, and exquisite delicacies were being served.

The ultimate ruler of Yanhaven, Yan Gufeng, sat tall and straight at the front of the chamber, looking like an emperor inspecting his court officials as the elite young ones entered.

Whoever his gaze touched, no matter how much of an arrogant genius they were, would be forced to bow their head meekly.

Seeing such reactions caused Yan Gufeng to nod in satisfaction. But then he caught sight of Yang Qi, and his sharp gaze stabbed into him in an attempt to analyze how his true energy flowed.

Shivering, Yang Qi looked up, and met Yan Gufeng’s gaze.

In the blink of an eye, it felt as though the brilliance of the sun and the moon were coursing painfully through his meridians, causing immense pressure to weigh down on him, both psychological and from energy arts.

“Concealed by hell, as cryptic as the Yellow Springs….” he murmured to himself.

The Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth instantly went to work, ensuring that all Yan Gufeng saw inside of Yang Qi was a blank emptiness. He had absolutely no way of locking down onto the true energy flowing inside him.

“Hmph!”

Yang Qi suddenly heard an explosive snort in his head, causing his mind to tremble. It was Yan Gufeng, and the outright hostility in the sound could not have been more obvious.

Yang Qi could tell that his show of strength outside the gate had provoked a rancorous response from Yan Gufeng.

However, he pretended not to notice, and simply let Yan Gufeng stare at him. He even plastered a carefree smile onto his face.

A moment passed, and then Yan Gufeng looked away. Looking around at all the elite young ones, he waved his hand in grand fashion. “Greetings, everyone.”

“Greetings, exalted City Magistrate….” they responded in unison.

All of the young ones could sense the power rippling off of him, the power of ninth phase energy arts, that of a Master of Energy.

Every word and action on his part could influence the hearts and minds of others, and the mere wave of his hand made it clear that he was a leader of men, an expert who had practiced cultivation to the pinnacle of the Energy Arts level.

‘The Master of Energy level is incredible,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘But after that is the Lifeseizing level. I wonder how terrifying that is? Supposedly there are even higher levels past Lifeseizing. I wonder what they're like?’ In that moment in which he had experienced Yan Gufeng’s gaze, and felt his hostility, he had also been able to sense how profound his energy arts and cultivation base were.

Yang Qi could defeat eighth phase experts in battle. But as for the ninth phase, the Master of Energy level, their profundity was as deep as the sea. They were on a completely different level than the eighth phase.

They were the true grandmasters of energy arts.

“This banquet is being thrown so that I can personally assess the prodigies of Yanhaven. There’s no reason for any of you to hold back in the competition to come.” As Yan Gufeng looked out at the crowd, his eyes once again turned to Yang Qi. By this point, there was no way he didn't realize how outstanding Yang Qi was, and that none of the other elite young ones were a match for him.

Earlier, he had been looking forward to the martial arts competition. But now, all of that interest had faded away.

“Feixia, I have some matters to attend to. You preside over the banquet.” With that, Yan Gufeng stood and walked out.

The assembled elites all rose to their feet. “Take care, City Magistrate.”

Each and every one of them was feeling very blank inside. Before the banquet even began, Yang Qi stole all the thunder. There could be no more depressing thing in life than to be relegated to a supporting role.

Some of the more dispirited elites only sat around for a few minutes before saying farewell to Yan Feixia and leaving.

Yang Qi sat there, watching coldly.

Yan Feixia didn’t have much of a reaction either. After one young elite after another left, the mood in the banquet hall was less than cheerful.

At one point, Yan Feixia suddenly raised her drinking vessel to Yang Qi in a toast. “Brother Yang Qi, it looks like you really stole the spotlight. By leaving, all of the other young elites in Yanhaven are all admitting that they can’t fight you. Before long, you’ll definitely be known as the top prodigy in Yanhaven.”

“Yanhaven's a tiny place,” he replied, “so that’s not saying much. I'm just a frog in a well who has never seen the wider world. Miss Yan, you study at the True Dragon Institute, one of the top places of learning in all of the Rich-Lush Continent. What types of geniuses have you seen there? Perhaps you could help me to understand the world a bit better.”

Yang Qi was rejecting her flattery, but at the same time, probing for information.

“Hm. Well, there are some geniuses of your level at the True Dragon Institute. After all, we produce spectacular individuals, the type who can dominate the world and everyone in it. If you have a chance, Brother Yang Qi, you should go there and see if they have a spot for you.”

It was impossible for Yan Feixia to cover up the pride she felt regarding the True Dragon Institute, which was typical among the students from there.

Just when Yang Qi was about to ask some more questions about the place, an old man rushed in, who was none other than the Yang Clan’s steward.

“Third Young Master, something bad has happened. The Chen Clan has put together an army of experts and are heading toward the Yang Clan mansion this very moment. First Young Master and Second Young Master aren't going to be able to hold them off. Your father is in a critical juncture of cultivation. You need to go back to coordinate the defense!”

“What?” Yang Qi said, rising to his feet. “The Chen Clan made their move already? They sure take clan affairs seriously.” Clasping hands toward Yan Feixia, he said, “There’s a situation with my clan, so I’m afraid I can't accompany you any longer. I’ll take my leave now.”

“Good luck, Brother Yang,” Yan Feixia said, a faint smile playing out across her face.

SWISH!

Yang Qi vanished.

Chapter 28: Open Clan Fighting

“Such speed,” Yan Feixia murmured as Yang Qi vanished without a trace. A moment later, a sonic boom could be heard off in the distance as he raced back toward his clan, towing the clan steward along with him. She was also in the seventh phase, with a deep understanding of energy. Even more importantly, she was a disciple of the True Dragon Institute, placing her far beyond just about everyone else in Yanhaven. And yet, Yang Qi’s incredible speed defied even her understanding of energy arts.

As far as she knew, it wasn’t possible for someone in the same level as herself to have such powerful energy, including the top geniuses in the True Dragon Institute.

‘No wonder father showed such hostility toward him today. For a genius like that to rise up in another clan is a big threat to the Yan Clan. But then again, I owe Yang Qi for saving my life. If he and father end up as enemies, it's going to put me in a really bad position.’

Sighing, she continued to preside over the young ones who remained at the banquet.

Unfortunately, as soon as Yang Qi left, the rest of the young elites in attendance rapidly bid farewell. The fact that the Yang and Chen clans were going to war meant that great changes would be coming to Yanhaven. And who wanted to be stuck in a banquet when things like that were happening? They wanted to watch the fireworks!

Before long, the hall was completely empty.

Mood sinking, Yan Feixia headed toward the depths of the mansion to find her father and update him about the situation.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi had a firm grip on the clan steward as he raced back to the mansion. He was a blur that passed through dozens of streets and intersections, before eventually arriving outside of the clan.

Even from a distance, he could sense wildly murderous auras coming from the square outside the mansion, which was a sprawling location that could house thousands of people.

Troops were arrayed throughout the square, all of them clad in armor. Most of them were in the fourth phase, although the captains of some of the squads were in the fifth phase.

Altogether, there were over a thousand men present.

Some wielded bows or crossbows, others had spears or pikes. From the look of it, this small army was preparing to march on the Yang Clan mansion and slaughter everyone inside.

There was no doubt as to who these people were; they were the private army of the Chen Clan, a formidable fighting force.

Virtually all of the rich clans in the Rich-Lush Continent kept private armies like this. Many had armies that numbered in the thousands, and some even had forces tens of thousands strong.

Such armies protected the clan, and in times of chaos, could be used for campaigning purposes.

The Chen Clan had obviously deployed their private army to the main gate of the Yang Clan, and if the Yang Clan didn’t play their cards exactly right, they would be invaded and wiped off the map.

Of course, it wasn’t as if the Yang Clan made an easy target. Bugle horns could be heard sounding out inside the mansion, whereupon the main gate opened, and the Yang Clan’s own private army emerged. They were also armed with bows and crossbows, as well as enormous tower shields. They made a particularly impressive sight.

The Yang Clan’s army was by no means small; they also had over a thousand men, broad-shouldered as bears and as tough-looking as lions.

The sight of them caused the Chen Clan fighters to frown.

It had only been a short time since the Latent Dragon Pill incident, and everyone had heard about it. And many people had noticed that the Yang Clan had been purchasing large quantities of grain, meat, and other foods which were considered low-quality.

In the Rich-Lush Continent, such foodstuffs were the thing of poor folk; rich and powerful clans used energy convergence pills for nourishment.

If the Yang Clan kept feeding their army things like grain and meat, then their fighting ability would quickly decline, and many of the discouraged soldiers would likely begin to defect.

Aware of this fact, the Chen Clan decided to make their move.

However, it was to their surprise that the Yang Clan’s army didn’t seem weak at all. In fact, they actually looked stronger than they had in the past. They didn't look like they had been eating grain and meat at all.

Of course, the truth was that the wealth Yang Qi had brought back had helped the clan to get through their moment of crisis.

Many of the Chen Clan’s energy arts experts were mixed within the soldiers. Shockingly, one of them was the clan lord himself, Chen Dalei, who stood there, energy swirling, and rage pulsing.

On the other side, leading the Yang Clan’s army, were the two brothers Yang Yunchong and Yang Hualong, whose faces were somberly paled as they faced the experts from the Chen Clan.

Yang Zhan was still in seclusion, and the two brothers were clearly facing a very tough situation.

“Yang Yunchong, Yang Hualong,” Chen Dalei said in a thunderous voice. “What are you two kids doing here? Tell Yang Zhan to get out here right now. I want to ask him why his son crippled so many people from my clan!” His voice was so loud that many of the roof tiles in the Yang Clan mansion cracked and crumbled.

“Clan Lord Chen, please, there’s no need to get so angry,” Yang Yunchong said. “As the old saying goes, harmony is the most prized possession…. We're still unsure of exactly what happened, and why. Is there really a need to mobilize troops and sow chaos in Yanhaven?”

“Impudence! What gives you the right to talk to a clan lord like that? Enough stalling, you dirty little swine. I've heard enough. Yang Zhan is in seclusion, trying to break into the Master of Energy level. And if he succeeds, the first thing he’ll do is exterminate our Chen Clan. Why wait around when I could take the initiative?”

A particularly tall and strapping elder from the Chen Clan stepped forward. “That’s right!” he said loudly. “Chen Dalei, we have the backing of the House of Shadowblight. What do we have to be afraid of? Don’t tell me the Yang Clan is going to make a comeback using their subsidiary branches?”

Also mixed within the Chen Clan forces were a few inconspicuous black-robed men, who had vicious-looking eyes. It was at this moment that one of them spoke in a devilish voice that tugged at the psyches of everyone who heard him.

“Some of the subsidiary branches will be quite happy to see the direct bloodline of the Yang Clan wiped out. Furthermore, our House of Shadowblight has long since decided that we need a representative in Yanhaven. After the Yang Clan is gone, we will exterminate the Yan Clan, and then Yanhaven can become the State of Chen!”

Clan Lord Chen Dalei’s expression flickered dramatically. He had been hesitating earlier, but the words of the black-robed man had caused him to make up his mind. “Excellent. First let’s kill these two dirty swine. There is no reconciling the grudge between our two clans. Men, the time has come! Attack!”

Instantly, the thousand-men army from the Chen Clan cocked crossbows and pulled back bowstrings. Twang. Twang. Twang! The air filled with a locust-swarm of arrows heading directly toward the Yang Clan’s army.

“Shield wall!” Yang Yunchong shouted, his eyes bloodshot. “Now, now, NOW!”

Yang Hualong’s eyes were equally bloodshot. Both brothers circulated their energy and joined the soldiers in thrusting their shields out to meet the hail of arrows.

Thudding sounds echoed out as arrows slammed into the metal shields, denting and bending them in numerous locations.

“You two little swine!” Chen Dalei shouted. Whoosh. Whoosh…! Suddenly, two spears materialized in front of him, which began to rotate rapidly as they shot toward Yang Yunchong and Yang Hualong.

Wham! Bam!

The two spears slammed into the brothers’ tower shields, unleashing a massive explosion of energy that sent the two brothers staggering backward.

A few of the soldiers in the Yang Clan’s private army were experts in the sixth phase, who immediately rushed forward to assist them, throwing out palm strikes to halt the momentum of the spears.

“Maybe you can survive the first volley. But you won't survive fifteen!”

One of the Chen Clan's elders, a man named Chen Dalong, suddenly summoned a shining blade of light, which rapidly grew to a length of nine meters long. Then, it twisted and turned until it was a circular blade.

“Balefire Chakram!”

The Balefire Chakram was a ranged weapon attack that could be used to kill one’s opponent from a distance. And now it was flying toward Yang Yunchong and Yang Hualong.

However, that was when an angered shout echoed out from a nearby street corner. “Have a death wish?!”

A blur appeared, a person who was moving so quickly it was impossible to see his features. However, any arrows that hit his defensive energy arts were immediately cast to the side.

Not even the most powerful of projectile weapons seemed capable of hurting him in the least bit.

It was Yang Qi!

As he charged toward the scene, his energy arrived even before he did. An enormous palm appeared, which was none other than his True Energy Megahand. Without the slightest pause, he shot toward the Balefire Chakram with meteoric speed.

In the moment of contact, the Balefire Chakram shattered like an empty chicken egg.

“Who dares to make trouble at the main gate of my clan?”

Yang Qi raced onto the battlefield, leaving behind whistling sounds and a trail of broken bolts and arrows.

“Dirty swine!” Chen Dalei said through gritted teeth. “You've shown up just in time to watch your Yang Clan be exterminated.”

Yang Qi snorted coldly. “Your Chen Clan worked with the House of Shadowblight to poison my eldest brother and second brother! Crippling a few people from your clan is fair and reasonable retribution!”

Some of the Chen Clan elders were in the seventh phase of energy arts. There were even a few in the eighth phase; clearly, they had no intention of leaving this fight unless their opponents were wiped out.

Even back when the Yang Clan had been at the height of power, it would have been difficult to deal with a force like this.

“You,” Yang Qi said, singling out someone in the crowd. “And you, in the black clothes. Are you from the Chen Clan? Or from the House of Shadowblight?”

“Good guess, brat. We're from the House of Shadowblight. Drop to your knees and beg for your life, and we might spare you. Otherwise we’ll turn everyone in your clan into blightzombies and blightpuppets. You’ll all become the walking dead! I've had my eye on your father Yang Zhan, you know. He would make a great puppet. You’re not going to escape, I can tell you that. Bwahahahahaha!”

The other black-garbed men from the House of Shadowblight joined in, mocking the Yang Clan in grating voices.

“Henceforth, there will be no Yang Clan in Yanhaven!”

“Hey, Yang Clan scum. Do you really dare to resist the House of Shadowblight? Give us what we want, even if it's your heads and your lives. If you fight back, we’ll make you live a life worse than death.”

Wild, arrogant laughter rang out from the mouths of the black-garbed men.

“Fine,” Yang Qi said grimly. He had heard enough. “Neither the Chen Clan nor the House of Shadowblight have any right to exist in this world any longer.” Without any warning, streams of true energy shot out of him, piercing through the air like flashing swords.

At the same time, all of the broken arrows and bolts on the battlefield suddenly floated up into the air and began to spiral into a flower-like shape. Then, ghost-like wailing could be heard as the arrows and bolts began to burn, sending a pungent smell out across the battlefield.

Hell Vortexes!

Secretly drawing on the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, Yang Qi sent the countless burning arrows and crossbow bolts shooting back toward the Chen Clan's army.

As that happened, he charged forward at top speed. Unexpectedly, he was taking on an army of elite enemies, all by himself.

Chapter 29: Defeating the Chen Clan

Yang Qi was in the mood to kill someone, and had no plans to hold back when dealing with the Chen Clan.

They were obviously working with the House of Shadowblight against the Yang Clan, which meant that the two clans had reached the point where they were as opposite as fire and water. There was no need for any pretense of cordiality.

The moment Yang Qi appeared, he drew up on his energy arts to send arrows and crossbow bolts flying out like a horde of locusts.

Of course, he secretly drew on true energy strengthened by his hell vortexes. Having just stepped into the seventh phase, if he propelled even a tiny pebble with the power of his hell vortexes, it could crush a mountain. Therefore, it was almost unnecessary to mention what a host of bolts and arrows could do when backed by the strength of five ancient megamammoths.

Pop! Smack!

Arrows peppered the shields and armor of the Chen Clan soldiers, and even with just the first volley, roughly fifty soldiers fell.

One of the captains in the Chen Clan army, a man in the sixth phase, tried to block an arrow with a palm strike. Unfortunately, the arrow pierced into his hand and shot up into his arm, shattering the bones, and unleashing such explosive energy that his meridians twisted painfully.

Shocked, the man let out an agonized shriek.

After all, that arrow had been backed by strength from hell, true energy bolstered by a devilish will. It almost seemed powerful enough to destroy one’s soul and sea of consciousness.

“The monster….” Chen Dalei growled. The other experts of the Chen Clan looked around at the screaming victims toppling to the ground, and their eyes turned bloodshot.

Each and every soldier in this army had been painstakingly trained and given countless energy convergence pills. Each one who died was a huge loss, and reduced the clan army’s usefulness as a threat to others. And just now, nearly fifty soldiers had been killed in one shot. The clan experts’ hearts virtually dripped with blood at the sight of it.

“Attack!”

“Kill that little punk!”

“Gentlemen from the House of Shadowblight, attack! Use your poison arts! That kid must be killed!”

“Kill everyone in the Yang Clan! Don’t even let the chickens or dogs escape with their lives.”

“Kill them all! Even the animals!”

RUMMMBLE!

Led by the top experts in the Chen Clan, the army surged toward Yang Qi. In the very front was one of the elders, Chen Dahong, who was in the seventh phase. He wielded a ghostheaded greatsaber whose edge glistened with what was obviously hyper-toxic poison. Every swipe of that saber would release blasts of blade energy that was toxic to the extreme.

“Ghost Toxin Saber Art!” Chen Dahong shouted as he closed in on Yang Qi. Eyes flashing ferociously, he swept his saber out in front of him. The glow of the blade light combined with the reflection of the burning sun in the sky stabbed painfully into Yang Qi’s eyes.

That was a function of the Ghost Toxin Saber Art, which not only contained poison, but also used reflected light to harm the opponent’s vision, and even induce hallucinations. At least, until the blade took off that person’s head.

“Ghost-Built Barricade!”

The blade light rapidly circled around, cutting off all paths of escape for Yang Qi.

Yang Qi didn't seem to care at all about the blade light. Reaching out, he grabbed the ghostheaded greatsaber, which was about as tough as tofu as far as he was concerned.

“Die!” he growled. Tightening his grip, he bent the saber completely in half.

POP!

The power imparted through that simple act caused a massive plume of blood to spray out of Chen Dahong’s mouth, accompanied by the sound of numerous bones in his body snapping.

Yang Qi took another step forward, simultaneously unleashing a palm strike.

It was actually one of the stances within the Invincible King’s Fist, Triumph in Every Battle, which gave his palm the ferocity of a tiger’s paw or a dragon’s claw. His muscles rippled, and his true energy surged mightily. He was like a bubbling crucible in the depths of hell, filled with lava, terrifying to the extreme.

There was simply no way for Chen Dahong to dodge. The palm connected with his chest, and an agonized shriek escaped his lips. Everyone watching saw what looked like a giant palm made from true energy, smashing into him, crushing him into a pulp. He was dead!

“Dahong!” Chen Dalei shouted. Then, he, Chen Dalong, the more than ten seventh phase experts, as well as numerous eighth phase masters, all joined forces, pooling their energy together in an attack, creating something like a massive mountain. It was so terrifying that pebbles and rubble from the ground began to float up into the air and spin around it like a vortex.

Some of the limestone floor tiles even shattered and joined the vortex.

Yang Qi faced the conglomeration of energy without even moving an inch.

“Bring it on,” he said. “All of you. Every single expert your Chen Clan has. Let’s see how powerful you people really are.” His own energy arts were fully activated, causing a devilish, ghostly aura to spring up around him, almost like a black waterfall. As a result, anything that got within ten paces of him dissolved into dust, including sabers, swords, spears, pikes, and arrows.

This was the power of five ancient megamammoths, converged together in one spot.

The combined attacks of all of the top experts of the Chen Clan were dispelled, vanished without a trace. Chen Dalei, as well as other eighth phase experts, all backed up several steps in shock.

“How is this even possible?”

“A combined attack by all of us should cause problems even for a Master of Energy. How could he possibly just block that mountain of energy?”

“Is he human? Even his father Yang Zhan would have been forced to flee from an attack like that, much less a hedonistic silkpants like him. There’s no way his energy arts and cultivation base can be that incredible.”

“We must be missing something here. He has to have some sort of defensive magical item.”

The experts from the House of Shadowblight were also completely shocked. The fact that Yang Qi was so ferocious completely defied all of their expectations.

“Hundred Poisons Energy Art!” shouted one of the House of Shadowblight experts. A blur of motion appeared, a streak of afterimages that was none other than Humanoid True Energy. This was the same thing that Yang Zhan had done fairly recently, an expression of Mind Incarnation that indicated this man was at the very peak of the eighth phase, and was already able to unleash certain abilities of the ninth.

The “incarnation” aspect of the name came from the fact that actual incarnations would appear.

This particular Humanoid True Energy was so full of toxic energy that it would probably have been more appropriately called Humanoid Toxic Energy. As soon as it encountered a living opponent, it would explode, exterminating everything within a thousand paces, down to the grass and the roots. It would even defile the dirt with a corrosive miasma. This was one of the most unique and deadly techniques from the House of Shadowblight.

“Let’s see how you block that, you dirty little swine!” The House of Shadowblight expert was clearly hoping to catch Yang Qi off guard with this sneak attack. The Humanoid True Energy bore down on him so quickly that before he could do anything, it hit his defensive true energy, then exploded in heaven-shaking, earth-shattering fashion, hewing out a massive crater in the ground.

The experts from the Chen Clan stopped in place, looking at the crater, and the toxic smoke that filled it. “Is he finally dead?”

“Third brother!” shouted Yang Yunchong and Yang Hualong.

“See, you dirty swine? Toxic Detonation is an energy art unique to the House of Shadowblight, and is something you clearly are incapable of dealing with.” The experts from the House of Shadowblight all began to laugh loudly.

That was when a voice spoke out from the crater.

“Really? Seems to me that your House of Shadowblight energy arts are actually a bit weak!”

Even as Yang Qi’s words echoed out, a blast of air swept the toxic energy out of the crater, even faster than the arrows and crossbow bolts he had shot out earlier.

“Not good!” shouted one of the House of Shadowblight experts. “Quick, hold your breaths!”

However, his cry came too late, as the toxic energy swept through the army, to be inhaled by more than a hundred soldiers. Miserable screams then erupted as they frothed at the mouth and clutched at their chests.

Some of the top experts from the Chen Clan had already activated their defensive true energy, and were thus protected from the toxic energy.

Flustered and exasperated, Chen Dalei shouted, “How could this be happening? Experts from the House of Shadowblight, do something!”

Everything was going completely wrong. The Chen Clan had come here with great fanfare, accompanied by the House of Shadowblight, all under the assumption that they would be able to wipe out the Yang Clan. They had even assumed that they would come out on top if Yang Zhan appeared. How could they ever have imagined that Yang Qi alone would not only stop them in their tracks, but would also kill so many of their soldiers?

“You’re all going to die here today,” Yang Qi said coldly, striding forward across the battlefield. “Nobody can save you.”

So far, he had killed well over fifty soldiers, poisoned more than a hundred, and had crushed Chen Dahong into a bloody pulp. It was a chilling performance that would cause people to shiver even on the hottest day.

“Stop right there!” one of the experts from the House of Shadowblight said. “Do you know how powerful the House of Shadowblight is? We—”

WHOOSH!

Before he could even finish speaking, Yang Qi blurred into motion, trampling the limestone floor slabs like a herd of megamammoths. Experts from the Chen Clan lunged to block his path, but before any of them could get closer than ten paces, they were sent flying backward by his defensive true energy.

As for the expert from the House of Shadowblight, all he saw was a finger appear right in front of him, that then went on to stab him in the forehead.

POP!

His entire head exploded!

The leader of the group from the House of Shadowblight, the one who had just unleashed the Humanoid True Energy, was shocked to the core. “Arhat Greenblight! Y-y-you… you actually killed Arhat Greenblight? Do you have any idea of the consequences you will suffer?”

Yang Qi slowly turned to look at him. “Don’t worry, you’ll be dying next.”

Six arms of true energy sprang into being behind him, performing a complex set of hand signs that caused massive waves of energy to shoot out toward the House of Shadowblight leader.

In response, the leader stamped his foot, causing his true energy to surge, spilling out to form a suit of scale armor.

“Mind Incarnation! Hundred Poisons Battle Armor!”

Each of the scales was as dark as night, and the suit in general had vicious-looking spikes everywhere. This level of defense clearly surpassed the Golden Bell Rampart that the leader of the other group from the House of Shadowblight had used.

Not only did the Hundred Poisons Battle Armor protect against all sorts of weapons, it also pulsed with true energy filled with a hundred poisons, making it particularly deadly when used in combat.

“Bring it on, swine!” the leader shouted.

However, before he could even make a move, Yang Qi accelerated to a speed ten times faster than before. Then, he summoned shadowy palms of true energy to mask his true killing move, which was a spear that came from the underworld. Instantly, that spear stabbed into the Hundred Poisons Battle Armor, and pierced into the heart of the leader from the House of Shadowblight.

Crackling sounds could be heard as the armor sloughed off, and the flame of the man’s life force vanished, sucked away by the Infernal Deity Spear.

“How is this possible…? I'm… actually dying?”

The leader looked down at the spear stuck into his chest, an expression of disbelief on his face as a devilish will exterminated his soul. Then he toppled over onto his back.

“Go to hell,” Yang Qi growled. Dispelling the Infernal Deity Spear, he stomped down onto the man’s head, crushing it.

Chapter 30: One Man Tries to Kill a Thousand

“Our leader is dead?”

“His energy arts were at the peak of the eighth phase! How could he be dead? Only a Master of Energy could possibly kill him!”

“Don’t tell me that punk is a Master of Energy? How is that even possible? He’s only eighteen. It's so rare for people to reach the Master of Energy level by eighteen that they’re only seen once every thousand years.”

“Go! Get out of here! We have to report this matter to the elders. With a body as powerful as his, they’ll definitely send some experts to kill him and turn him into a blightpuppet.”

Whoosh. Whoosh. Whoosh!

The House of Shadowblight experts began to flee, using their energy arts to fly into the air at top speed.

All of them knew that they were no match for this eighteen-year-old.

“Where do you think you’re going?” Yang Qi said, his voice echoing with thunderous fury. All of the enemy soldiers within three hundred paces of him were struck by the sound of his voice, and collapsed into unconsciousness.

As for their weapons, which had been summoned with energy arts, they were grabbed by Yang Qi and sent streaking high into the air. At a certain point, they turned and shot downward, stabbing directly into the backs of the fleeing experts from the House of Shadowblight.

Aaaiiiieee!Aaaiiiieee!Aaaiiiieee!Aaaiiiieee!

Screams ripped through the air as the House of Shadowblight people were shoved down out of the air. Not only were they killed, they were also pinned to the ground by the various weapons, and their dying howls were enough to chill one down to the bones.

At that point, Yang Qi pulled his foot out of the remains of their leader. Sending out a pulse of true energy, he removed the blood from his foot, as well as his clothing, leaving him free of any evidence of the killing he had just done.

Turning, he looked at the experts from the Chen Clan, a slight smile on his face. “Chen Dalei. Chen Dalong. Did you really think you could team up with the House of Shadowblight and wipe out the Yang Clan? What a joke! How about this: beg for your lives, acknowledge allegiance to the Yang Clan, and become our slaves. Do that, and the Chen Clan might not get exterminated today. Otherwise, we’ll wipe you out of existence, down to your chickens and dogs.”

Chen Dalong spat onto the ground in contempt. “Don’t you see how many people we have? You think we’re afraid of you? Listen, kid, the Chen Clan has deep roots in this city, and today, your clan is going to be exterminated.”

Although his words came out sounding fairly impressive, his heart was pounding in anxiety. Yang Qi had just killed all the experts from the House of Shadowblight, and was obviously impervious to all sorts of weapons. And it still wasn't clear whether the Chen Clan could even hurt him.

In fact, all of the experts from the Chen Clan were on the verge of going crazy, and felt like screaming hysterically. The level of Yang Qi’s energy arts completely surpassed anything they could have anticipated. It was akin to encountering a beggar in the street only to find that he was an emperor in disguise.

Who could have guessed that an eighteen-year-old would kill all of the experts who had been dispatched by the House of Shadowblight, and single-handedly hold off an army of a thousand? If word got out, it wouldn’t just be a shock to Yanhaven, it would cause a windstorm of astonishment in the Rich-Lush Continent as a whole.

Yang Qi was definitely the kind of spectacular genius that only came along once every thousand years.

“Don’t be so cocky, you little brat,” Chen Dalei said sharply. Then he continued in a tone that seemed to resonate with reason and insight. “Let me ask you a question. How much true energy did you waste just now? I bet you look impressive on the outside, but are all dried up on the inside. There’s no way you have any true energy left.”

Other Chen Clan experts chimed in.

“Yeah, that’s right. He must be completely drained of true energy! Let’s attack him before he fills back up. We can definitely kill him!”

“Considering how many people he killed from the House of Shadowblight, they’ll definitely view the Yang Clan as a mortal enemy from now on. Even if he survives today, they’ll definitely track him down and kill him eventually.”

“Kill him! He's definitely empty. We have to get him before he recharges!”

One particular expert in the Chen Clan, Chen Dazhen, simply couldn’t hold back any longer. Hefting his spear, he sprang into motion, flying forward a hundred paces in a single move, aiming his spear directly at Yang Qi’s chest.

“Hundred Flowers Bloom!”

True energy erupted from the tip of the spear, taking the form of what appeared to be a hundred flowers, all in the process of blooming. This was a move from the Chen Clan’s Hundred Flowers Spear Art, each move of which was like the dawn of spring, and was so miraculous it was hard to put into words.

“You morons think my true energy has run out?” Yang Qi said. “And you come at me with trash moves like that? I could kill scum like you a hundred times over without even starting to run low on true energy. I was honestly giving you a chance to get out of this with your lives. But since you seem set on dying, I’ll accommodate you!”

RUMMMBLE!

Another massive blast of energy erupted out of him as he simply reached out and grabbed the spearhead, instantly dispelling all of the projections that had existed around it moments ago.

“How could this be happening?” Chen Dazhen blurted as he fell out of the sky, trying in vain to wrench his spear out of Yang Qi’s hand.

In response, Yang Qi twisted his wrist, shattering the spear into countless fragments. As the splinters shot out, tearing into Chen Dazhen, he attempted to fall back, but before he could, a blur of motion rushed in his direction.

It almost looked like a megamammoth stomping down onto the ground, and instantly filled Chen Dazhen with a mass of intense vibrations. The blur passed through his body, through his bones, flesh, blood, and meridians, causing ripping sounds to fill his mind until his consciousness went black, and he toppled over, dead.

Even someone made of iron who was attacked by the power of five ancient megamammoths would be flattened, let alone someone whose body was made of flesh and blood.

Chen Dalei had finally come to realize that Yang Qi was like some unrivaled devil from ancient times, someone they simply couldn't stand up to. Not only did he have seemingly endless reserves of true energy, every move he unleashed was as barbaric and savage as a beast's.

In fact, Chen Dalei even wondered if Yang Qi was human, or if he had been possessed by some primeval creature.

“Run!” someone shouted. “Get out of here!”

“He’s not human! He’s a demon! We have to team up with the other clans in Yanhaven to slaughter him!” Everyone in the Chen Clan realized that they needed to flee.

“Retreat!” Chen Dalei called out coldly. Immediately, the soldiers formed into ranks, and the Chen Clan experts stepped forward, pooling their power to attack Yang Qi and give their army time to retreat.

“You think you’re going to leave?” Yang Qi said, charging forward like a tiger or a dragon. One leap took him dozens of meters forward, and at the same time, his true energy spread out for hundreds of paces around him, creating a whirlwind of slaughter.

The flick of his finger sent out a spiraling bullet of energy which pierced into the armor of one of the soldiers, killing him instantly.

A palm strike from the Invincible King’s Fist destroyed the meridians and blood vessels of ten soldiers.

“Net of Heaven!”

He threw out his hand, fingers splayed, sending true energy flying out like spider webs, creating a huge net that cut off all avenues of escape for the Chen Clan.

Chen Dalei wanted to retreat, but with that net in place, was completely stuck. Waving his hand, he sent a beam of sword energy slashing into the net, hoping to cut it open. However, the sword energy was as effective on the net as a knife was to water.

“Freakish hellion!” That was what all of the Chen Clan elders were thinking.

To them, he wasn't even human, but rather, some sort of monster. At the moment, they couldn’t think of any other explanation for his current cultivation level other than that he had been possessed by a thousand-year-old demon.

It was in that moment that a burst of raucous laughter split the air, piercing so high into the sky that the clouds seemingly trembled.

Fuse one’s energy with the clouds!

It was the sign of someone becoming a Master of Energy.

In the ninth phase, one became a grandmaster of energy arts, and in the moment it happened, one would fuse one’s energy with the clouds, a sign of connecting with heaven and earth. Shockingly, someone was becoming a Master of Energy in this exact moment.

Yang Qi kept his energy flowing, powering the enormous web, keeping the experts of the Chen Clan and their army completely trapped. He was well aware that this phenomenon had appeared because his father had reached the Master of Energy level. Henceforth, it would be difficult for anyone to prevent the Yang Clan from advancing to new heights.

A rushing wind filled the air, and a voice spoke. “Qi’er, you’re truly a delight. However, don’t slaughter everyone. Keep some of them captive.”

It was none other than Yang Zhan.

Even as his voice rang out, a figure appeared high above, striding forward without any sign of energy wings behind him.

Masters of Energy could speed through the sky without using wings!

That was the strength of the ninth phase!

RUMMMBLE!

The sight of Yang Zhan struck despair into the hearts of the Chen Clan experts. If they couldn’t even deal with Yang Qi, then how could they possibly fight back against both him and Yang Zhan, who was now a Master of Energy?

“On your knees, Chen Dalei!”

Taking advantage of the lull caused by the shock of the moment, Yang Qi leapt forward and chopped his hand toward Chen Dalei.

Chen Dalei managed to defend himself, unleashing the energy arts of the Chen Clan to throw up a defensive barrier. Unfortunately for him, Yang Qi’s attack completely slashed through that wall.

“Corpse-Chomping White Tiger!”

The head of a white tiger appeared, its maw gaping as it lunged forward. Chen Dalei was completely incapable of dodging, and after the tiger latched its jaws onto him, his true energy was instantly under the control of Yang Qi.

The name of the move Corpse-Chomping White Tiger came because its ultimate function was to capture the opponent. Once the tiger chomped down onto the enemy, that person would become like a corpse, unable to move or do anything.

And that was exactly the state that Chen Dalei was in now.

He had led the clan for twenty years, but today, had been captured by someone from the younger generation of the Yang Clan. Anyone who learned of the news would be sure to sigh emotionally.

The other rich and powerful clans in Yanhaven were well aware of the conflict between the Chen and Yang Clans, and many of them had sent people to observe what happened, and hoped that both clans would come out bloodied and bruised.

Unexpectedly, the Chen Clan was completely routed, trounced by Yang Qi in a spectacular and almost unbelievable way.

In the past, people had taken Yang Qi to be a mere silkpants, someone who had brought his clan to ruin. But now, their image of him completely changed.

Now, he was simply overwhelmingly powerful.

In the shortest amounts of time, a silkpants had become an unrivaled, powerful expert. It seemed like a dream to many, and most people were unsure of what to make of it. They could only look at Yang Qi holding Chen Dalei in his grip, and wondered if they were looking at a human, or rather, at some sort of demon or devil.

Keeping Chen Dalei firmly in his grip, Yang Qi shouted in a thunderous voice, “Your clan lord is captured! Surrender immediately!”

Chapter 31: Pillaging

The sound of Yang Qi’s shout shook the Chen Clan soldiers’ minds, making it impossible for them to resist his order.

Thunk. Thunk. Thunk.

The remaining six or seven hundred soldiers dropped their weapons and began to strip off their armor. Prostrating on the ground, they cried, “Spare us! Oh, exalted members of the Yang Clan, spare us! We’re just hired soldiers, that's all.”

“Spare us, please! We’ll even join the Yang Clan!”

One of the fifth phase captains kowtowed over and over again, saying, “I have powerful kung fu! I’ve already broken into the Energy Eruption level. I’ll work for the Yang Clan! Just spare my life.”

Reaching the fifth phase of energy arts was no small accomplishment, and was something any clan would respect.

Yang Zhan snorted coldly and then spoke in a voice that filled the entire square.  “Fine. You’ll get your chance. Yunchong! Hualong! Have our men arrest everyone who surrendered. The talented and loyal ones may join us. The obstinate resistors shall be either crippled or executed. The mediocre ones can leave behind their armor and weapons and return to civilian life.”

No one dared resist his orders. Such was the might of a Master of Energy.

Yang Yunchong and Yang Hualong immediately took charge of the Chen Clan forces, first identifying their leaders, and then starting to deal with the soldiers.

One particularly fierce soldier among the Chen Clan forces, who was apparently a member of one of their subsidiary branches, tried to resist. When Yang Qi saw that, he flicked his finger, sending a spiraling bullet of energy directly into the man’s heart, killing him instantly. After that, the rest of the soldiers were very cooperative.

Before long, the hired soldiers were all in custody and taken away into the Yang Clan mansion. The only people left behind were the actual members of the Chen Clan, who were now surrounded by Yang Zhan, Yang Qi, as well as countless soldiers and other experts from the Yang clan.

At this point, one of the Chen Clan elders spoke out in a loud voice, “Our Chen Clan has subsidiary branches on the outside, as well as a council of chief elders. They’re definitely not going to let this matter stand. You listen well, Yang Zhan. If you harm our clan lord, then you’ll have a full-scale war on your hands.”

“Bullcrap!” Yang Zhan shot back. “You’re not going to back down until you’re in a coffin, are you?!”

Suddenly, a dozen or so manifestations of Humanoid True Energy flashed into being, and then pounced on the Chen Clan elders.

The elders fought back with their energy arts, but couldn't stop the humanoids from entering their bodies and crushing both their meridians and seas of energy.

Within moments, their energy arts were crippled.

Faces ashen, they flopped to the ground.

Yang Qi was inwardly shaken.

He could see how powerful a Master of Energy cultivation base really was. Obviously, his father already surpassed him in terms of power, to the point where his own energy arts didn’t even compare.

‘So, this is a Master of Energy? After cultivating all the way to the ninth phase, one’s true energy capacity, techniques, and strength will all undergo incredible transformations. The peak of the eighth phase isn’t even close to being comparable to the Master of Energy level. I could kill someone in the peak of the eighth phase, but if I want to deal with a Master of Energy, I would need to make even more progress.’

After killing so many experts from the Chen Clan, it was a foregone conclusion that Yan Gufeng would be shocked, and would not be very happy with the Yang Clan. When the time came for conflict with the Yan Clan, Yang Qi knew that if they weren’t stronger, they would suffer the same fate as the Chen Clan, and be crushed out of existence.

After crippling the energy arts of all the Chen Clan elders, Yang Zhan said, “Qi’er, you take our army over to the Chen Clan and pillage their headquarters! I want the Chen Clan completely expunged from Yanhaven!”

“Yes, father,” Yang Qi said. Grabbing Chen Dalei by the arm, he continued, “Well, I guess you’ll be coming with me. You definitely know where all the treasure is hidden. Men, come with me. Let’s go!”

In response, the soldiers sprang into action, heading directly toward the Chen Clan. Even some of the clan servants came along. The Chen Clan elders were all crippled now, so it would be a big waste to leave their clan’s wealth untouched.

As Yang Qi led the army through the streets, he dragged Chen Dalei along with him and shouted, “Listen up, clans of Yanhaven. This is a personal matter between the Yang Clan and the Chen Clan. If anybody interferes, if any clan tries to take advantage of the situation, I’ll slaughter you without mercy!”

The peddlers on the streets, as well as the ordinary citizens, scrambled to get out of the way. However, there were some individuals within the restaurants along the way who stepped out curiously to see the Yang Clan’s army passing by.

“Conflicts between clans really are bloody affairs. I wonder how many heads will be lost today.” That was what most of them were thinking.

In one particular nine-story restaurant, the events were being discussed by a group of noteworthy individuals.

This restaurant was the Four Seas Bistro, a well-known location in Yanhaven.

It was operated by the Four Seas Consortium, which wasn’t based in Yanhaven itself. Actually, they had branches in thousands and thousands of cities throughout the lands. They specialized in selling food and alcohol that replenished one's energy and blood, and could aid in energy arts recovery. They also sold uniquely flavored spirit medicines and demonling meat. Unfortunately, they charged exorbitant prices to cover the costs of their extravagant services, and thus were only patronized by very rich individuals.

At one particular table, three young men and two young women were seated. The young men were handsome and nonchalant, and the young women, as beautiful as flowers. Clearly, this particularly eye-catching group of people were by no means ordinary.

In fact, certain unsavory characters seemed to be keeping an eye on the young women, as if they harbored illicit designs on them. However, anyone with a bit of insight would realize that they were not to be trifled with; they obviously belonged to some large sect or organization.

Spread out on their table were the finest foods and wines. There were fillets of dragonpool greenspring demonling fish, deepsea four-clawed floodwyrm limbs, all sorts of alcohols fermented from magical mushrooms, as well as king of ginseng soup…. It was a meal that definitely cost no less than five or six thousand energy convergence pills, which was equivalent to a year’s income for an ordinary clan.

One of the young men downed a glass of magical mushroom wine, savored the flavor for a moment, and then said, “I almost can’t believe this is happening, Junior Sister. Yanhaven’s Yang Clan has wiped out the Chen Clan, and is going to pillage their headquarters. It’s too bad we missed the fight. If we had known it was coming, we could have gone to watch.”

“Did you see the heavenly phenomenon, Elder Brother?” one of the young women said. “That was fuse one’s energy with the clouds, which means that some expert reached the Master of Energy level. And look at that little punk Yang Qi, the one leading the Yang Clan troops to pillage the Chen Clan. He seems pretty powerful.”

A look of scorn could be seen on another of the young men’s face. “Hmph! What a frog in a well. Doesn’t know the height of the heavens and the breadth of the earth. I could kill a whole group of people like him without even trying. This fight between the Yang and Chen Clans is nothing more than a fight between a bunch of country bumpkins. It's not even worth looking at. This inspection tour we’ve been sent on to the eighty-one southern cities has been a real bore. Turns out they’re all dying to found their own nations. It seems the Sage Ancestor Dynasty is getting weaker and weaker. War is coming, that’s for sure.”

The other young woman nodded. “That means our House of Spring and Autumn has a good opportunity coming our way. Whenever royal dynasties enter periods of unrest, the vassals rise up and heroes abound. It's the perfect chance for a sect revolution as well! We aren’t one of the four great institutes, but if war comes, we might have a chance to overthrow one and take their place.”

One of the young men said, “We should get a piece of the action here in Yanhaven. We might be out in the middle of nowhere, but the Chen Clan is still rich. Even old boats can still be scavenged. They definitely have some treasures hidden away. Let’s hurry over before that punk from the Yang Clan gets there. That’ll cut him down a notch or two. What do you say?”

“Sure, why not. The Chen Clan will probably have something worth taking. What’s the harm in lining our own pockets a bit? With some more wealth, we can grease the wheels a bit easier when we get back to our sect.”

“Alright, let’s do it. Boss, bring the check!”

With that, they paid their bill with banknotes and then left the restaurant.

“What do we do if Yang Qi gets there before us?”

“Simple. If he dares to resist the House of Spring and Autumn, we kill him! If this crappy Yang Clan tries to take us out, they’ll find that it's about as effective as throwing an egg at a rock.”

**

Yang Qi was already at the entrance of the Chen Clan.

Their mansion headquarters was vast and sprawling, well-fortified, with iron-bound gates in front. By now, the remaining experts of the Chen Clan had already learned of the big defeat, and had closed the main gate. Archers lined the battlements with arrows nocked, and messenger pigeons were flying this way and that, carrying news of the situation to numerous other locations.

Just like the Yang Clan, the Chen Clan had many subsidiary branches, as well as chief elders practicing cultivation in a secret location. Now that the main branch was on the brink of being wiped out, it was only natural that they would send out calls for help.

Of course, there was no way Yang Qi would give them that chance. Lifting up Chen Dalei, he announced, “Listen up, Chen Clan. I have your clan lord right here. If you don't surrender immediately, I’ll kill him, break down the gate, and slaughter everyone you have inside, even the chickens and dogs.”

“Ha!” came an angry voice from inside. “There’s no way you can wipe out the Chen Clan. We’ve already notified the chief elders. They’ll be here in a matter of days, and will cleanse your Yang Clan with fresh blood!”

“Pig-headed fools!” Yang Qi growled. He reached out with his hand and made a grasping gesture, which resulted in an enormous stone guardian lion, as tall as four people, to suddenly rise into the air.

RUMMMBLE!

That stone lion weighed no less than five thousand pounds, and yet, it soared through the air like a comet before smashing a hole into the wall of the clan mansion. No defenses could stand up to something like that.

“Attack!” Yang Qi shouted. Keeping his grip on Chen Dalei, he charged forward, leading all of the experts and soldiers forward in attack. As for the ten or so sixth phase experts in the Chen Clan, they were all cut down with impunity.

As for the several hundred soldiers present, and the servants, they didn’t put up any fight whatsoever, nor did the screaming women and children.

The entire affair lasted for less time than it takes an incense stick to burn.

“Lock this place down tight,” Yang Qi said to his experts. “Don’t let anyone in or out. Tie everyone up and start pillaging this place!”

Chapter 32: Spoils of War

At a single word from Yang Qi, the Yang Clan’s soldiers and servants, more than a thousand people in total, swiftly and decisively began to search the entire mansion. First, they rounded up all the soldiers, servants, womenfolk and children, and held them in the central square at crossbow-point. If they tried to do anything, they could be put to death instantly.

Next, they began to pull out all the treasure and wealth present in the clan.

Any rich and powerful clan would have storehouses full of demon cores, demonling pelts, medicinal pills, jewels, metals and ores. Many such things weren’t in raw form but had been crafted into various luxury objects such as jewelry or furniture.

When Yang Qi saw the demon cores and medicinal pills piling up, he nodded in satisfaction. The level of wealth here was enough to completely replenish what the Yang Clan had lost.

When Chen Dalei saw his clan being cleared out, he couldn’t take it any longer and coughed up a huge mouthful of blood.

“Don't start coughing up blood now, Chen Dalei! I know that you have secret treasure stores.” Yang Qi chuckled. “Hurry up and spit out the details. If you do, I might spare your life.”

“Yang Qi, you villain! I’ll die before I say anything. I’ll never submit to a little bastard like you!” Chen Dalei didn’t seem willing to back down in the least bit.

“Not gonna talk!? Very stubborn I see. Fine, I guess I’ll just cripple your energy arts and ask someone else. I doubt everyone will be as tight-lipped as you.” Eyes flashing with sinister light, Yang Qi drew on his energy and prepared to strike Chen Dalei in the stomach.

“Don’t!” Chen Dalei shrieked, his eyes radiating terror. “Don’t cripple my martial arts! I’ll tell you where the treasure stores are. There’s a painting in my room that has all the secret tunnels painted on it in code.”

When it came to clan wealth versus personal strength, Chen Dalei knew which choice to make. In a world where respect was earned through strength, as long as you were strong, you could always get up in the world. But no amount of wealth could protect you if you weren’t strong enough. Considering the situation, Chen Dalei's best option was to buy time until the chief elders arrived. Handing over a bit of wealth to stay alive until then would definitely be worth it. After all, the Yang Clan had already earned their face and taken the treasure. Besides, the Chen Clan's chief elders were not the type to be trifled with, and the Yang Clan elders might not necessarily want to end up in a fight to the death.

In response, Yang Qi said, “Yang Lei, get over here!”

One of the soldiers stepped forward, a man in the sixth phase. He was a bastard son of the clan, but was talented in cultivation, and had thus risen to a leadership rank in the army. In the past, Yang Lei had disdained Yang Qi, but now, it was exactly the opposite. Dropping to his knee respectfully, he said, “Yes, Third Young Master?”

“Head to the clan lord’s room and search it thoroughly.”

Before long, Yang Lei found the painting in the room, which depicted all the secret tunnels leading to the treasure stores.

“Plunder all those storerooms!” Yang Qi ordered. Instantly, hundreds of soldiers began to make their way into the depths of the Chen Clan mansion, scouring one hidden room after another. The gold, jade, and other valuable objects they found nearly caused them to cough up vital energy.

At one point, Yang Lei hurried over and said, “Third Young Master, there’s one particularly large chamber in this direction.”

“Alright, let’s go search it.” Yang Qi headed deep into the Chen Clan mansion through a large tunnel. All sorts of precious jewels and pearls could be seen on the ground, but close examination revealed that many of them were booby-trapped with vicious snares and pitfalls. Pits, arrows, cages, darts… there almost seemed no end.

Thankfully, the map they had found included the information about the traps, making it as easy for them to traverse the tunnel as if they were walking down a simple path.

“Third Young Master, there's a treasure storehouse at the end of this tunnel. We already opened the door, but haven’t taken any of the treasure. We wanted to make sure you had a chance to take inventory first. There are also three granaries filled with energy convergence pills that you should inspect. At the very least, there are around ten million energy convergence pills.” Yang Lei seemed to be bubbling with excitement at how the Yang Clan was finally on the path to glory again.

Yang Qi simply strode down the tunnel casually. Even if traps sprung, he had the power of five ancient megamammoths, putting him at almost the level of a Master of Energy. Therefore, a few puny traps were of little concern to him.

At the end of the tunnel, there was a metal door fully three inches thick, beyond which was a room of sparkling pearls and jewels.

There were also plenty of ingredients needed to make luxury items, as well as demon cores, all of them of the highest quality. In one location was a stash of medicinal pills, stored in a box crafted of cold jade, designed for replenishing energy and blood, and also increasing intelligence and latent talents.

The most common type of medicinal pill were energy convergence pills, which were often used like food among people who cultivated energy arts. However, there were also various miraculous pills with unique qualities.

For example, there was the Golden Nine Transformations Pill that Yang Qi had acquired in the past.

Like many other things, medicinal pills were classed according to their quality.

Yang Qi had seen low, mid, and high-grade pills, but never anything beyond that. He had only heard of such things. Even the Golden Nine Transformations Pill he had acquired was only high-grade, although that meant it was very difficult to produce.

Energy convergence pills, of which there were many types, were low-grade.

Everything in this treasure storehouse was mid-grade or high-grade, which went to show the spectacular reserves the Chen Clan had built up. There were demon cores from both seventh and eighth phase demonlings, each of which was worth hundreds of thousands or even millions.

“What’s that?” Yang Qi said, looking toward the center of the storehouse, where there was a statue of some sort of deity, with all sorts of spirits prostrating to it. It was none other than the founding ancestor of the Chen Clan, upon whose chest hung a mirror carved from jade. Its lustrous surface was carved with lightning, clouds, dragons and tigers, all of which were very lifelike and made it seem like it was a window into another world.

Yang Qi took the mirror and then forced Chen Dalei to explain what it was.

“Chiliocosm Mirror! It’s our Chiliocosm Mirror!”

After all, Yang Qi had Chen Dalei thoroughly under control, and could make him live a life worse than death if he wanted to. When Chen Dalei saw that precious treasure being ripped off of the statue of his clan’s most revered founding ancestor, he shook physically, and yet could do absolutely nothing in response.

“What does it do?”

“It’s a precious treasure that has been handed down from generation to generation in the Chen Clan. You can use it to reveal the weaknesses of any sort of martial discipline. Just look into it, practice your forms, and the mirror will correct the mistakes….”

“Well, that could be useful. Correct the flaws in one's martial disciplines…?”

Yang Qi put the mirror away. Although he was fairly sure Chen Dalei was hiding more information, he didn't feel like squabbling at the moment.

“Clear this place out!”

“Aaaiiiieee!”

Even as the words left his mouth, he heard an agonized shriek from upstairs. It was faint, but his ears were remarkably sensitive, and he could tell that it came from one of his clan's soldiers.

‘What happened?’

Instantly, he became a streak of motion that headed back to the tunnel.

As soon as he reached the door, he saw a dozen or so soldiers whose tendons had been severed and were now laying on the ground, unable to move. The perpetrator was a group of five young people, specifically, three men and two women. One of the young men held a long sword in his hand, that he was currently pointing at the heart of one of the captains among the soldiers.

“Listen, scum. Get your third young master out here. I have some questions for him.”

One of the young women detected Yang Qi’s arrival, and quickly said, “He’s already here, Elder Brother.”

Five pairs of eyes immediately came to rest on Yang Qi.

The young man with the sword lifted his chin and stared coldly at Yang Qi, the way that an emperor would one of his lowly subjects.

“You’re Yang Qi?” he asked. “Here to plunder the Chen Clan?”

Yang Qi looked them up and down but couldn’t tell who they were or where they were from. “Yeah, I'm Yang Qi. Who are you people? And why have you hurt my men?”

The young man let out a harrumph. “These scum, these people who are lower than slaves, dared to block my path. The fact that I didn't kill them is actually giving a lot of face to your clan. We're disciples from the House of Spring and Autumn.” The young man swept his sword through the air, causing droplets of blood to fly off of it. “We’re just passing through Yanhaven, and are a bit short on funds. Since you’re plundering this clan, we decided to come ask for some spare change. How about this: give us all of the Chen Clan’s valuable treasures, and we’ll write you a receipt. If you have any problems in the future, you can just contact the House of Spring and Autumn and say we sent you. This little bit of wealth can establish you a connection to the House of Spring and Autumn, and if you ask around, everyone knows that we take care of our friends.”

‘House of Spring and Autumn?’ Yang Qi thought. He knew that they were a big, domineering sect in the Rich-Lush Continent. Although they weren’t powerful enough to be called an institute, they were by no means weak. They were even more powerful than the House of Shadowblight, so much so that the Yang Clan couldn’t even compare to them. In fact, all the clans of Yanhaven put together would still be meaningless to them.

Not even ten Yanhavens could equal the House of Spring and Autumn.

In response to Yang Qi’s silence, the young people laughed.

Then, one of the young men noticed the Chiliocosm Mirror Yang Qi held, and was shaken inwardly.

“Is that mirror made from Nine Heavens godjade?” he asked. “What’s a treasure like that doing here? Hand it over.”

“What? Nine Heavens godjade?”

“Something from the Nine Heavens?”

“Some divine jade that fell from the heavens? How could something like that be here?” All five of these young people were shaken to the core by what they were seeing.

“Alright, brat,” the young man with the sword said. “Hand over that mirror as tribute to us, this instant.”

“You wouldn’t even be able to use that thing,” another of the young men added, “and what's more, it will definitely bring trouble your way. Divine objects like that belong in the hands of people like us, from mighty sects like the House of Spring and Autumn. You don’t have the character or quality to deserve to touch it.”

“Exactly,” one of the young women said, shaking her head. “You would never be able to use divine jade. Hand it over to us right now. And give us the rest of the Chen Clan’s wealth as well. From now on, your Yang Clan can be considered servants of the House of Spring and Autumn. Don’t worry, we’ll take care of you going forward.”

Flicking his hand impatiently, one of the young men said, “What are you waiting for, punk? We’ve already promised to let your clan be our servants. This is probably the best thing that will ever happen to you in your entire life. Hand over that treasure and then kowtow to us in thanks! Oh, your father just became a Master of Energy, right? Call him over to offer us thanks as well.”

As far as these people from the House of Spring and Autumn were concerned, the people of the Yang Clan were little more than nouveau riche country folk, people that they could frighten easily into submission.

“Really? Kowtow in thanks?” Yang Qi suddenly seemed to stand even more straight and tall than before. “You House of Spring and Autumn disciples are pretty aggressive, aren’t you? Fine. Prepare to go to hell.”

His words were spoken so coldly that, despite the burning sun overhead, it felt like the dead of winter in the Chen Clan mansion. Everyone could feel the killing intent swirling around them.

“What?”

The disciples from the House of Spring and Autumn almost couldn’t believe their ears. As for the young man with the sword, he said, “What did you just say? I dare you to repeat it!”

However, Yang Qi didn’t say a single word. He responded with action.

RUMBLE!

A fist strike roared like the wind directly toward the young man's throat.

Chapter 33: Disciples of the House of Spring and Autumn

All five of these disciples from the House of Spring and Autumn had profound energy arts. Yang Qi’s initial guess was that they were all in the eighth phase, and were capable of using Mind Incarnation. In that case, they were roughly equivalent to a clan lord from one of the rich and powerful clans in Yanhaven.

However, considering they were from the majestic House of Spring and Autumn, that meant that even if their cultivation base was on the same level of a clan lord, they would definitely be much more dangerous.

It was similar to Yang Qi who, despite being in the seventh phase, could still overcome nearly a dozen eighth phase experts. Only a Master of Energy would have a chance of beating him in a fight.

As for these five, because they were backed by a mighty sect, they felt that they could essentially do whatever they wanted. But there was no way Yang Qi would accept that. He had come here to seize the wealth of the Chen Clan, and conscript all of their people into servitude. He didn’t care how impressive their sect was; if he had to, he would kill these five disciples to keep what was his.

When the young man with the sword felt the gust of air that preceded the fist strike, and realized that Yang Qi was actually attacking him, his heart surged with murderous anger. “Nouveau riche yokel! How dare you insult the House of Spring and Autumn like this! Maybe you wiped out the Chen Clan today, but tomorrow, it's going to be your turn!”

His sword began to dance like a snake, sending sword light swirling into the air, along with cracking sounds like water freezing into ice and then breaking. Frost even began to spread out on the ground in the area.

Autumn Frost Blankets the Earth!

This was a royal-class energy art from the House of Spring and Autumn, called Four Seasons Swordplay, which could draw upon the power of spring, summer, autumn, and winter to wither all living things. When it was used in a fight, it was as though the power of nature itself was at play, like the most primeval elements of heaven and earth being used as a martial art.

The blast of air caused by the fist strike was instantly dispelled by the snake-like sword light, which then went on to strike toward the pit of Yang Qi’s stomach.

‘The martial disciplines of the House of Spring and Autumn are extraordinary!’ he thought, shocked. To him, it felt like the transition of autumn into winter was something that existed on a higher level than his Invincible King’s Fist. And truth be told, it was only royal-class energy arts that could evoke meteorological or astronomical phenomena.

In the blink of an eye, his fist struck the shining sword light.

The sword pierced his skin, but was rebuffed by the membrane that existed beneath it.

And yet, for some reason, sword energy still entered his meridians, filled with a sensation of autumn frost or winter snow.

The young man who wielded the sword saw all of this happen, watching as a layer of frost immediately covered Yang Qi, and frigid energy began to build up like clouds over his head. Moments later, snowflakes began to pour down, until Yang Qi looked almost like an ice sculpture.

“Elder Brother,” one of the young women said, “you've taken the two forms of the Four Seasons Swordplay all the way to the point of ultimate perfection! You have autumn and winter completely mastered. If you can unleash the rain of spring and the lightning of summer, then you’ll be able to step into the Master of Energy level. If you use a royal-class energy art to become a Master of Energy, you’ll be exponentially more powerful than any nouveau riche, country bumpkin Master of Energy.”

“That’s right,” another of the disciples added. “In all of Yanhaven, there are only two Masters of Energy. One is Yan Gufeng, and yet, his cultivation base is so-so at best. The other is Yang Zhan, and he’s even worse. A real moron.”

“Kill Yang Zhan’s son, and then we’ll go take him out. How dare they insult the House of Spring and Autumn like this? How could they possibly have the gall to behave so disgracefully? Considering the Yang Clan has a son like this, they definitely deserve to be exterminated.”

The arrogance of these five disciples was clear for all to see.

‘This Four Seasons Swordplay is pretty incredible,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘Thankfully, I’ve tempered my body by absorbing the lightning mammoth.’ He wasn’t uncomfortable at all being covered by ice, and in fact, he could have neutralized the sword energy from the very beginning. At the last moment, he had changed his mind, and allowed the sword energy to enter his meridians, in order to stimulate the life force quintessence of the lightning mammoth.

When that happened, it only took a single breath of time for the quintessence to completely neutralize the sword energy.

At the same time, the particles within him stirred as two of the embryonic mammoths began to wake up and unleash their power.

The bones in Yang Qi’s body instantly began to grow stronger, and the membrane beneath his skin became thicker. Every bit of muscle in him suddenly surged with barbaric ferocity, making him seem like a volcano that was just about to erupt.

As his energy and blood flowed through him, it sounded almost like the bubbling of a crucible somewhere in the depths of hell.

Supposedly, the crucibles of hell were able to melt anything in existence, even gods and spirits. Thus, when one cultivated the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth to the highest level, a tiny crucible could be produced within oneself, a crucible that could melt and refine anything.

It was known as the Hellfire Crucible. And eventually, it would give him the ability to consume a Golden Nine Transformations Pill, or possibly even directly consume a demon core.

However, Yang Qi was not quite at that level yet. At the moment, the only thing he could do was produce the bubbling sound of the Hellfire Crucible within his energy and blood flow. However, that was still considerable.

The additional power of two ancient megamammoths made Yang Qi stronger by a dramatic degree.

A massive flow of energy erupted out of him, shattering the ice and melting the snow.

He took a step forward, then reached out with his hand, his fingers curled into a claw.

That motion instantly destroyed the sword that had been stabbed into his palm, exploding it and sending shrapnel flying out in numerous directions.

The young man who had just attacked him was caught completely off guard, and the force of the blow sent him stumbling backward, blood spraying out of his mouth.

“You….” he growled, eyes turning bloodshot. Unsure of what was happening, he quickly tried to use his energy arts to counterattack. However, before he could, Yang Qi took another step forward and let loose another punch.

This punch was not a mere probe like the other had been. He left no room for his opponent to evade, and as his fist shot forward, he could hear the hissing that sounded like a crucible from hell as it melted the gods and spirits from the highest of the heavens.

His opponent had no way to fight back, and could only watch as the fist rapidly approached. Then, it slammed into his head, vaporizing it and turning him into a headless corpse that toppled down onto the ground.

Moments ago, that sword-wielding young man had been the picture of arrogance, but only three breaths of time later, his sword was destroyed, and he was killed where he stood. His four companions couldn’t even react.

And in fact, Yang Qi had no intention of letting them react. He was like a divine dragon embodied, his feet as destructive as a megamammoth’s, and his arms as sprightly as an eagle's wings. Without any hesitation, he unleashed his true energy, locking down everything within a hundred paces; there was no way he was going to allow these four disciples to escape.

If even one of them survived, and reported the matter to the leadership of their sect, the consequences would be unimaginable.

In the blink of an eye, Yang Qi struck each of the young men with a fist, caving in their chests. Blood erupted from their mouths, along with chunks of internal organs, as they flopped onto the ground twitching.

True energy wrapped around the hands and feet of the two young women, and rendered them incapable of moving. Then, Yang Qi flicked his finger, sending deadly strikes into their dantian regions, destroying their seas of energy. Instantly, they flopped to the ground, leaking energy like a pierced balloon would leak air.

And thus, five experts from the House of Spring and Autumn were either killed or crippled.

“You crippled our martial arts….” one of the women said. Even in the face of death, they simply couldn’t believe what had happened. They had always been proud and insufferable, and the subject of immense respect wherever they went. And yet, in this random place in the middle of nowhere, they had encountered the ultimate misfortune.

The disgrace and humiliation they felt was beyond compare.

“Men, form ranks immediately!” Yang Qi said loudly, causing all the soldiers in the area to immediately fall into place. “Wrap these five people up and get them out of here. Make sure nobody sees them. Don’t breathe a word of what just happened, and in fact, just forget it ever occurred! If word gets out, we’ll all be executed!”

The soldiers present were all loyal, and Yang Qi was fairly certain that he could trust them to keep the matter secret.

And yet, he was still worried. He had potentially offended both the House of Shadowblight and the House of Spring and Autumn. The Yan Clan was now eyeing them like a tiger would its prey, and the chief elders of the Chen Clan were likely on the way to exact vengeance. The Yang Clan was definitely in a very precarious situation.

Although the clan was seemingly basking in glory, the coming days would be fraught with danger, and if they didn’t play their cards exactly right, they could end up just like the Chen Clan, plundered and killed.

Chest after chest of treasure left the Chen Clan, as well as a stream of servants and clan members. The other big clans in the city all stayed in their mansions, completely on guard. At the same time, they sent reports to the city magistrate’s mansion.

Armed conflict between clans was not unheard-of, but situations in which an entire clan was destroyed and pillaged were relatively rare.

Yang Qi oversaw everything. The wealth and prisoners were quickly transported to the Yang Clan, as well as the five disciples from the House of Spring and Autumn. After everything was done, Yang Qi met with his father and brothers.

On the ground in front of them were the bodies of the three young men and the unconscious young women with the destroyed seas of energy.

“The House of Spring and Autumn….” Yang Zhan murmured. Considering he had just reached the Master of Energy level, it should have been a time of rejoicing. But the sight of these disciples caused him to frown as he paced back and forth. “If word gets out about this, then all ten branches of the Yang Clan would definitely be exterminated. In fact, Yanhaven itself would probably be razed to the ground. The House of Spring and Autumn is not a sect to trifle with. Some people are even starting to call them the Spring and Autumn Institute.”

“Father,” Yang Qi said coldly, “I already gave strict instructions to all the witnesses not to breathe a word of it. Furthermore, I left these two young women alive. Not only can we possibly get some inside information about their sect, but also, we might even get some energy arts that could strengthen our Yang Clan.”

“Yes. We can’t take back what's done, so there’s no use wasting time with regrets.” Yang Zhan’s eyes turned as sharp as swords. “Besides, your aunt is a member of the Demi-Immortal Institute. Worst case scenario, we call upon that connection to forestall disaster.”

Chapter 34: Four Seasons Swordplay

Yang Qi nodded. “In that case, I’ll wake them up and make them spill the secrets of their royal-class Four Seasons Swordplay.”

As the ancient saying went, when soldiers come, send a general to stop them; when flood waters come, use earth to block them. The ball was already in motion, and it wouldn’t do any good to sit around worrying about what bad things could possibly happen. Instead, energy could best be spent deciding how to react.

And at the moment, the most important thing was becoming stronger as a clan.

The Four Seasons Swordplay was an authentic royal-class energy art that outclassed even the Invincible King’s Fist. If Yang Zhan could master it, his Master of Energy cultivation base would become even more stable.

Besides, the only way to reach the Lifeseizing level was to use a royal-class energy art such as this. Without one, he would end up being stuck in the ninth phase for the rest of his life, unable to seize life from the heavens.

As for Yang Qi, he wasn't particularly interested in the technique. He was too wrapped up in the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, and had no time for distractions. He had just awakened the power of two more ancient megamammoths, which made him even stronger than his father. Unfortunately, he was still only in the seventh phase, and needed more enlightenment to progress beyond it.

In Energy Manifestation, one could take energy and give it a shape, turning it into things like dragons, tigers, boulders, enormous hands, etc. However, if he could reach the eighth phase, and perform Mind Incarnation, then he could bring forth Humanoid True Energy and use Thousand Kilometer Soul Locking, techniques of a much higher level than he was capable of right now.

Those abilities involved transformations of one’s true energy and soul, and required intensely difficult training.

Yang Qi wasn’t overly anxious about it.

The life force quintessence of the lightning mammoth was still there inside of him, which enabled his cultivation base to advance by leaps and bounds. Of course, he knew that once that life force quintessence was gone, his progress with the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, as well as his cultivation base, would slow down, and he would advance like an ordinary person would.

But that was something to worry about in the future.

Taking advantage of his present circumstances was the best thing to do.

Tapping each of the young women with his foot, he sent some true energy into them, opening their meridians and waking them up.

As soon as she opened her eyes, one of the young women said, “You Yang Clan dogs!” As she struggled to her feet, she glared at Yang Zhan, Yang Qi, and his brothers and went on to curse them with full vehemence. “How dare you! You think that crippling our martial arts will solve all your problems? Keep dreaming if you think that’s true! The House of Spring and Autumn has Lifeseizers who can help restore our seas of energy.”

‘What? People in the Lifeseizing level can restore destroyed seas of energy?’ Although Yang Qi was surprised, he knew that he had these two young women under his complete control, and that they had no way to fight back.

Instead of saying anything in response, he waved his hand, sending a stream of true energy into the three corpses of the young men. Before long, he had a stack of banknotes, some medicinal pills, and several pieces of paper in his hand.

Unfortunately, the papers did not contain the Four Seasons Swordplay itself, but rather, notes about it that the young men had written during the course of their studies. It was all very random, almost like journal entries.

“Talk,” Yang Qi said. “Tell me how to cultivate the Four Seasons Swordplay. Otherwise I’ll just kill you.” As for the banknotes, they were worth about three million energy convergence pills, a considerable sum.

There were also some demon cores of similar value to those from the white ape.

All in all, it was quite a fortune.

The events at the Chen Clan had completely reversed any financial misfortunes of the Yang Clan, and in fact, they were now much richer than before, although they still couldn’t compete with the city magistrate. However, they now had plenty of funds to expand their forces and interests.

“Forget it!” the other young woman said disdainfully. “The Four Seasons Swordplay is a transcendent energy art from the House of Spring and Autumn. How dare a bunch of nouveau riche country bumpkins even think of trying to use it!”

“Alright, enough,” Yang Zhan said. “Qi’er, your energy arts are profound, but not sufficient for the task at hand. Now that I'm a Master of Energy, I've gained a bit of enlightenment about matters pertaining to souls and communication with them. Let me see if I can force an answer out of them.” Two manifestations of Humanoid True Energy suddenly appeared, then lunged forward and entered the two young women.

Within moments, the young women’s eyes glazed over as Yang Zhan utilized an energy arts hypnosis technique.

“Now, let me ask you again. How do you cultivate the Four Seasons Swordplay? There’s no rush. Take your time. Start with the mnemonic.”

“Okay.” Speaking in very mechanical fashion, the young women went on to repeat the mnemonic. “Four Seasons Swordplay. Spring, summer, autumn, winter. Spring rains touch the mind and heart. Summer lightning strikes with violence. Autumn frosts blanket the earth. Winter snow fills the sky. Utilize the transformations of the four seasons to stimulate the yin and the yang in the meridians. Take vital energy and convert it into spirit seeds. Converge them in the sea of energy. Wait for the signs of spring to appear, and for all living things to blossom. The spirit seed will then grow….”

Yang Qi, Yang Zhan, Yang Yunchong and Yang Hualong listened with rapt attention as the cultivation mnemonic was spoken in full detail.

That was especially true of Yang Zhan, who was a true connoisseur of cultivation techniques. As he listened to the mnemonic of a royal-class energy art, his true energy surged, and his face began to flicker with an expression of enlightenment.

As for Yang Qi, he also benefited from the information, which made him even more confident in being able to reach the eighth phase.

**

In the city magistrate’s mansion.…

Yan Gufeng was anxiously discussing matters with his subordinates.

A big conflict had just erupted between two major clans, and as the city magistrate, he couldn’t just sit idly by; he was responsible for trying to intervene and resolve differences.

And right now, he was waiting for the fighting to break out, and casualties to be inflicted….

A vicious expression was slowly overtaking his face.

“Magistrate,” Luo Hun said, “the Chen and Yang Clans have presumably begun to fight by now. How about I go check on the situation, then report back?” Yan Gufeng nodded instantly, and Luo Hun left.

A moment later, another guard stepped in, and from the energy fluctuations on him, it was obvious that he was no less powerful than Luo Hun. As it turned out, the city magistrate’s mansion actually had eight experts on the same level as the Armored Devil-Ghost.

“Magistrate, I’ve already put our soldiers on high alert. All it will take is one word, and we can go arrest the experts from the two clans in question.”

“Remain combat ready, and wait for my orders,” Yan Gufeng said.

“Sir, yes sir!” the guard said, then left.

At this point, Yan Gufeng looked over at an old man sitting off to the side. “Mr. Sun, do you think we should just take out both clans? The Chen Clan is in league with the House of Shadowblight, and is a major threat to our clan. And then there’s Yang Qi from the Yang Clan; we don’t know how he did it, but his cultivation base has grown so powerful than he can defeat Luo Hun. If we don’t cut the weeds and eliminate the roots, then it could cause serious problems for my thousand-year-plan.”

The mysterious old man was clearly one of Yan Gufeng’s close advisors. He looked like an erudite thinker, and his eyes fairly glittered with schemes and conspiracies.

And the fact that Yan Gufeng addressed him as Mr. Sun showed that he had a very high standing. It was actually impossible to even see the level of his cultivation base.

“I've been watching that Yang Qi kid,” Mr. Sun said, fanning himself with a goose feather fan. “He really did benefit in miraculous fashion from that lightning strike, which caused his martial arts to advance by leaps and bounds. You’re right. He’s very dangerous, and has almost limitless potential. If you can’t use him, then the best thing would be to nip things in the bud and kill him now. City Magistrate, do you think it might be possible to recruit him?”

Yan Gufeng shook his head. “No. Impossible. He stole my Latent Dragon Pill, and obviously is holding a grudge over how his martial arts were crippled. Besides, as the saying goes, two tigers cannot live on one mountain. If things go as planned, and we found the State of Yan, then the Yang Clan will be our feudal vassals, and would be required to kowtow to us. How could he possibly go along with that? Besides, Yang Zhan is very ambitious. He would never agree to such an arrangement.”

“That’s true,” Mr. Sun said, lazily fanning himself. “The Yang Clan definitely won't submit. Very well, you have the authority to do what you wish. If you can’t recruit them, then the only thing left to do is kill them.”

“I can kill that punk kid right now.” Yan Gufeng kneaded the bridge of his nose. Apparently, he had made a decision. “A year from now, it will probably be impossible. And that’s not to mention that Yang Zhan might become a Master of Energy.”

Mr. Sun laughed loudly. “You don’t need to worry about that, City Magistrate. Sir, you know very well how difficult it is to reach the Master of Energy level. It involves an interconversion between true energy and one's soul. There’s no way Yang Zhan will achieve that breakthrough anytime soon.”

“By now, the Yang and Chen Clans must be in the ultimate heat of battle. Considering the Chen Clan has experts from the House of Shadowblight on their side, they probably have the upper hand.” As he spoke, Yan Gufeng continued to fiddle with a large thumb-ring on his right hand.

That ring was a valuable treasure that could store true energy. It had a name: Bloodbody Thumb-ring. The implication of the name was that the ring was similar to a person’s body.

Even Masters of Energy had limited reserves of true energy. When they fought, that true energy would be drained away. However, with a Bloodbody Thumb-ring, one could store up true energy to use when fighting. Essentially, it could make an energy artist much stronger in a fight.

With that thumb-ring, Yan Gufeng could actually take on two Masters of Energy at one time in a fight. In other words, no single Master of Energy could possibly be a match for him.

It was an invaluable item that people from the most powerful organizations would covet, even individuals from the institutes. It was probably worth more than all of Yanhaven as a whole.

“Something bad’s happened!”

In that very moment, a soldier rushed in and dropped to his knees, followed by Luo Hun, whose expression was grave.

“What’s going on?” Yan Gufeng asked. He then smacked the table. “Don’t tell me the fight between the Yang and Chen Clans is already over?”

“It's not just over, it ended in a rout!” Luo Hun said. “That punk Yang Qi single-handedly captured Chen Dalei, and defeated all the experts of the Chen Clan, along with their entire army. He killed more than ten experts from the House of Shadowblight, all of them in the eighth phase. Even worse, Yang Zhan reached the Master of Energy level in the middle of the fight. The Yang Clan army already marched on the Chen Clan mansion and started to clear it out.”

“What did you just say?!” Yan Gufeng said, half-convinced he was hearing things. Trembling, he continued, “That punk Yang Qi single-handedly wiped out all the experts from the Chen Clan and the House of Shadowblight? Was he really possessed by a thousand-year-old demon?”

That was the only explanation Yan Gufeng could come up with for what was happening.

Chapter 35: Chiliocosm Mirror

“You heard me, sir,” Luo Hun said. “I'm afraid the Yang Clan moved too quickly, and the Chen Clan simply couldn’t stand up to them. They’ve been completely wiped out. Even we couldn’t have taken out the combination of the Chen Clan and the House of Shadowblight so quickly. This Yang Qi is on the same level as a Master of Energy. If I fought him right now, I would definitely meet defeat.”

Luo Hun could only sigh at the fact that the kid whose martial arts he had crippled only a few weeks ago was now on the level of a grandmaster.

It was almost like a dream. Or a nightmare.

“Yang Zhan is now a Master of Energy, and his son is essentially on the same level….” Yan Gufeng was so shaken that he almost wanted to go out that very instant and raze the Yang Clan to the ground.

The main thing holding him back was that he knew that if he attacked the Yang Clan without an ironclad reason, the other rich and powerful clans in the city would rise to their defense. Yanhaven was heading toward chaos, and that was not to mention that other cities in the area were eyeing them covetously, and could theoretically attack them at any time.

Also holding Yan Gufeng back was Yang Zhan’s cultivation base, and the fact that Yang Qi seemed to have been possessed by a thousand-year-old demon. Even if the Yan Clan mobilized all of their forces to try to take them out, they would probably lose eighty percent of their men to achieve victory. And a victory like that was anything but a victory.

Yan Gufeng was struggling to contain his rage, and at the same time, was overwhelmed with regret. If he had known things would end up like this, he would have killed Yang Qi days ago. “What do you think we should do, Mr. Sun?”

“We’re in a moment of extreme crisis,” Mr. Sun said, rising to his feet. “City Magistrate, you can’t go to war with the Yang Clan right now. Maybe you could wipe them out, but Yang Qi and Yang Zhan would likely escape, and that could cause major problems in the future. But if you don’t wipe them out, then sooner or later, Yanhaven is going to end up being called Yanghaven. And in that case, you can forget about your thousand-year-dream. Very well. I’ll head immediately to my Master’s school and find an expert to help. City Magistrate, you absolutely must not do anything rash in the next few days. The Chen Clan will definitely send people to try to deal with the Yang Clan. And the House of Shadowblight won’t let this go either. The more problems they cause for the Yang Clan, the better your chances of winning in the end.”

“Well said,” replied Yan Gufeng. “Alright, I won’t mobilize a single man from my clan. And I’ll send messages to all the Yan Clan experts outside the city to return immediately! Originally I didn’t want to get the clan’s council of chief elders involved, but at the moment, it seems I have no other choice.”

“In that case, I’ll take my leave. My next task is to convince Master to send someone to help you achieve your thousand-year-dream.” Mr. Sun vanished in a streak of light.

Yan Gufeng stared off in the direction of the Yang Clan, his murderous aura caused the images of sabers, blades, spears, axes, and other weapons to appear in the air behind him. There were even devil-ghost designs and patterns.

Before long, numerous orders were being sent out from the city magistrate’s mansion.

Meanwhile, back in the Yang Clan mansion, the two young women from the House of Spring and Autumn had already divulged all the details of the Four Seasons Swordplay. There were all sorts of stances and forms, as well as complex descriptions of how to send energy flowing through one’s meridians. There were many things to consider, even ways of training the soul. On top of all that, one needed to perform special breathing exercises to absorb the quintessence of spring, summer, autumn, and winter. It was a massive amount of information that left the four men of the Yang Clan with heads spinning.

After making sure he had all the information memorized, Yang Zhan once again immobilized the two young women.

“Father, what do we do with them now?” Yang Yunchong said, immediately touching on the most important issue at hand. “If we leave them alive, it could lead to a major disaster.”

Apparently, he thought it might be best to kill them.

“Imprison them for now,” Yang Qi said. “It wouldn’t be appropriate to just kill them. Besides, they might be able to give us more information about the House of Spring and Autumn. And with their martial arts crippled, they won't be able to cause many problems.”

“Alright, Third Brother,” Yang Yunchong said with a nod. “You’ve clearly thought things through.”

At the moment, everything seemed to revolve around Yang Qi. Even Yang Zhan seemed to be under the impression that his son would soon surpass him in all ways.

Yang Zhan took the two women to the clan dungeon, then returned. Eyes glittering, he said, “Qi’er, what exactly happened to you when you got struck by lightning? There’s no way that a bit of body tempering could have gotten you to your current level.”

Yang Qi took a long moment before answering. “It’s a bit too embarrassing to talk about, Father. I’ll explain eventually. But I have a lot of secrets, and I don’t want to put the clan in harm’s way. I hope you can understand.”

“If that’s the case, I won’t push you any further. But if you've been possessed by a thousand-year-old demon, then your rapid cultivation advancement could end with you losing your mind and becoming a demon. You wouldn’t even be human at that point.”

Such things had actually happened in the Rich-Lush Continent before; when people were possessed, the end result was always tragic. And right now, anyone who had seen what was happening with Yang Qi would suspect that he had been possessed. However, Yang Zhan could see that Yang Qi still had all of his faculties, and didn’t have the slightest bit of demon energy on him. In those respects, it didn’t seem at all like he had been possessed.

Suddenly, Yang Qi had an idea. “Father, what if you start secretly spreading rumors that I've been possessed by an old demon? That might do a lot to prevent people from finding out the truth.”

“So that they don’t realize how powerful you really are?” Yang Zhan mused. “Make them let their guard down?” He nodded. “I have an even better idea. I’ll make a big deal about buying some medicinal pills designed to suppress evil demons. Then, let others start spreading rumors.”

“Perfect,” Yang Qi said. “Another upside is that people who have it out for me will be more inclined to wait until the supposed demon tries to take control of me before they make a move. Little do they know that the longer they wait, the higher my cultivation base will get. Once I reach the eighth phase, not even a Master of Energy will be a threat to me.”

“Father,” Yang Yunchong said, “we need to get ready. It will only be a few more days before the Chen Clan’s council of chief elders arrives, as well as their subsidiary branches. Perhaps you should send a message to our own council of chief elders and ask them to take control of the situation.”

“There’s no need,” Yang Qi said. “The chief elders are working hard at their cultivation, so we shouldn’t disturb them. We should be able to handle the coming difficulties. The strongest of the Chen Clan chief elders is a mere Masters of Energy. I’ll intercept them on their way to the city, kill a few and slow them down. That will solve our biggest problem.”

“You can do that?” Yang Zhan exclaimed. “Excellent. Kill as many experts from the Chen Clan as you can, outside of the city where nobody will know what happened. By now, the Yan Clan must have been informed that we exterminated the Chen Clan, and are probably thinking of making a move, but holding back for fear of causing problems for themselves. I know exactly what kind of person Yan Gufeng is. He’s probably recruiting some top experts to help deal with us, and is waiting until the fight with the Chen Clan resumes again. If we can neutralize the threat of the Chen Clan experts before they get here, the Yan Clan will get confused, and we’ll definitely be able to secure a victory.”

“Father, allow me to help third brother with this,” Yang Yunchong said.

Yang Qi waved his hand dismissively. “There’s no need. Father, you stay here in the mansion. It's the safest place to be right now. I’ll go ambush the Chen Clan experts. Not only will that push my cultivation higher, it will also make sure that our Yang Clan is in the safest position possible. With a Master of Energy on guard, who would dare to launch a sudden attack? Even Yan Gufeng would hesitate before attacking us on our home ground.”

Yang Zhan sighed. “You’re absolutely right. What an incredible son! Can you see all of this, Greensura? Before long, your son is going to surpass me.”

The Greensura was Yang Qi’s mother, who had left soon after he was born.

She hadn’t died, but rather, had supposedly left to work on her cultivation. She was a strange woman who remained married to Yang Zhan for only a year, gave birth to Yang Qi, and then vanished.

Yang Yunchong and Yang Hualong were actually Yang Qi’s half-brothers, whose mother was a previous wife of Yang Zhan. Despite being half-brothers, they were all very close with each other, and there was never any friction between them.

After hearing his mother’s name, Yang Qi said nervously, “Father, what exactly happened with mother? Where is she now? I've never even seen her. When I was young, you always said that when my cultivation base was high enough, you would tell me. Now I'm almost a Master of Energy. Don’t you think the time has come?”

Yang Qi had always wondered about his mother, who had been a mystery to him ever since he was young.

“Your mother….” A look of pain could be seen on Yang Zhan’s face. “She’s wrapped up in a monumental secret. The truth is that we were fated to only be together for a single year, and during that time, I never pressed her for information. I didn’t want to be privy to any secrets that might bring disaster to our clan. That said, your mother is a very important person. How about this: When you break out of the Energy Arts level and into the Lifeseizing level, I’ll tell you everything I know.”

“Okay….” Yang Qi said. Sighing, he continued, “If you’re that reluctant to talk about it, it must be something pretty important. I’ll work as hard as I can to push my cultivation base higher.”

“Father,” Yang Yunchong said, “aren’t you setting the mark a bit too high? In the Rich-Lush Continent, Masters of Energy aren’t uncommon, but we almost never see Lifeseizers.”

Yang Zhan smiled wryly. “That’s because to Lifeseizers, the rest of us are like bugs, even Masters of Energy. And there are some things in life that can be dangerous for bugs to know about.”

Yang Qi nodded. “Alright, father. Well, I'm going to head out to take care of the Chen Clan experts.” With that, he turned to leave.

“Hold on,” Yang Zhan said. “You still have some time on your hands. Before you leave, why don’t we try out the Chiliocosm Mirror.”

Yang Qi took out the Chiliocosm Mirror he had acquired at the Chen Clan, which the House of Spring and Autumn disciples had said was made from Nine Heavens godjade. Yang Qi still had no idea exactly what the mirror did.

Waving his hand, he sent the mirror flying over to Yang Zhan, who grabbed it. Of course, considering Yang Zhan had been at odds with the Chen Clan for years, it was only natural that he knew exactly what this terrifying object could do.

“What an incredible mirror,” he murmured. Rubbing its surface, he sent a bit of true energy into it.

When he did, transformations of the seasons appeared, such as the spring rain, summer lightning, autumn frost, and winter snow. There was also a male figure practicing sword forms.

Obviously, this was the Four Seasons Swordplay, and the man, Yang Zhan.

As Yang Zhan stood there, it almost seemed like he had sunk into a trance, with his soul having been pulled into the mirror to practice the Four Seasons Swordplay.

After some time passed, his eyes flickered, and he retracted his true energy. Instantly, the images within the mirror vanished.

“Incredible. Send some true energy into the mirror, and you can practice artificial cultivation inside. You can try out all sorts of energy circulation techniques, and not worry about experiencing cultivation deviation.”

Chapter 36: Ambush

Yang Qi was gradually coming to understand what the Chiliocosm Mirror could do.

One could send true energy into the mirror, and then cultivate an energy art in illusory form. Although it was only an illusion, it could still provide extremely valuable experience.

When cultivating energy arts in reality, one always ran the risk of circulating one’s energy incorrectly, and experiencing cultivation deviation. And if an energy spasm occurred, one could theoretically explode.

To be able to practice cultivation in the illusory world of the mirror was much safer. One could become thoroughly familiar with how to properly circulate one's energy through the meridians before engaging in real-life training.

Even better, the Chiliocosm Mirror would conform to each individual’s current state, and would help correct errors in one’s martial discipline.

There were also other functions to the mirror that he had yet to uncover.

“This mirror is incredible, Father. You take it.” Yang Qi knew that the sooner his father mastered the Four Seasons Swordplay, the better, and this mirror could be of great help in that regard.

Now that Yang Zhan was in the Master of Energy level, he was much closer to reaching the highest level of enlightenment. Once he broke through the final shackle holding him in the Energy Arts level, he would reach the Lifeseizing level. To do so would require, not only a major accumulation of resources, but also a royal-class energy art. Before, it would have been impossible for him. But if he could use the Chiliocosm Mirror to truly understand the transformations of spring, summer, autumn, and winter, and thus learn the Four Seasons Swordplay, then he really would have the hope of reaching the Lifeseizing level.

“Okay. With the Chiliocosm Mirror, I can increase my cultivation base to the point of being able to fight with Yan Gufeng. He's definitely planning to unify the territory controlled by Yanhaven and then officially declare it to be the State of Yan. And the Yang Clan will be his biggest obstacle in doing that. In the end, Qi’er, all of our hopes rest on you.”

“Father, I won’t let any harm come to the clan. Don't worry. I'm completely confident in being able to ambush the chief elders from the Chen Clan. I’ll be back safely before you know it.” With that, he turned and sprang into motion, vanishing in the blink of an eye.

Yang Yunchong sighed deeply. “Third brother’s cultivation base keeps getting higher and higher. It just keeps getting likelier and likelier that he’ll reach the Lifeseizing level. What will it be like if the Yang Clan actually has a Lifeseizer? How glorious would that be?”

Yang Zhan nodded. “Lifeseizers can live four or five hundred years, and are strong enough to lead enormous clans to the heights of glory. However, I'm still worried about Qi’er’s safety. What if his incredible progress now means that he’ll end up running into a major cultivation obstacle in the future?”

Yang Hualong took a more lighthearted perspective. “In any case, third brother is thousands of times stronger than he was in the past, and that's a blessing for our clan. Even if his progress stalls eventually, he’ll still count as a consummate expert.”

“You have a good point,” Yang Zhan said. Flicking his sleeve, he continued, “Very well, the two of you focus hard on your cultivation. No slacking off! All three of us can work on unlocking the quintessence of the Four Seasons Swordplay. Royal-class energy arts such as this cannot be taken lightly.”

There was no question that, with this new technique, Yang Yunchong and Yang Hualong would also achieve meteoric progress.

A day passed, and the other clans in Yanhaven were still completely focused on the previous clan warfare.

There was no royal or imperial law governing the Rich-Lush Continent as a whole. Local law was enforced by the city magistrate, and as for the rich and powerful clans, they enforced their own rules.

When two such clans went to war, then as long as the city magistrate didn’t interfere, then the most powerful clan would come out on top, and the weaker one would be the loser.

**

It was night, and Yanhaven was quiet. In many of the aristocratic clans, discussions were raging regarding the figurative storm that would likely hit the city soon.

“The Yang Clan won! The Chen Clan’s centuries-old foundation was destroyed!”

“You're right. But the weird thing is that the city magistrate didn’t do anything. He just let them fight it out. You would expect him to take advantage of the situation to take out both of the clans in question.”

“Well, you know the old saying, right? Don’t shoot the rat; you might break the vases. The Yan Clan was probably worried about innocent city dwellers getting caught in the crossfire. I guess he didn’t expect Yang Zhan to actually become a Master of Energy.”

“Master of Energy! I can’t believe we have two Masters of Energy in Yanhaven now. If they fight, it's going to be like a contest between giants.”

“The only thing we can do is wait and see what happens. If things get dicey, we might have to leave the city and return after the catastrophe passes.”

“I used to think that Yang Qi was just a silkpants. Who could have ever predicted that he would become as powerful as a grandmaster of energy arts? He single-handedly wiped out the entire Chen Clan. I heard that he might have been possessed by an old demon. Yang Zhan is even collecting spirit medicines that are used to neutralize demon energy. I guess he plans to use his Master of Energy cultivation base to subjugate whatever evil spirit took over his son.”

“Ah, no wonder! And here I thought that Yang Qi had come across some good fortune that fueled his progress. But it makes much more sense that he was possessed. Well, eventually the little punk will probably lose his mind to that spirit, and turn into a murderous devil. And if he becomes a monster, then there’s no way his existence will be tolerated.”

Everyone knew that even though the Chen Clan’s direct bloodline had been wiped out, they still had their council of chief elders, as well as subsidiary clans, all of whom would be coming soon to make a stand against the Yang Clan.

The reserve powers of the rich and powerful clans were nothing to be taken lightly. For one thing, they all had venerable Masters of Energy who normally spent their time in seclusion. Such people wouldn’t often make public appearances, but when critical moments arrived for the clans, they would.

**

Somewhere outside of Yanhaven was a place in the mountains where the road became cramped and narrow.

Suddenly, a pair of majestic black wings flapped, and a figure appeared, speeding along the road. The resulting blast of wind caused all sorts of birds to fly up out of the surrounding shrubbery. Crows, owls, and other birds all cried out in shock and terror.

Yang Qi came to a stop, floating there in the air above the road, his Fiend-Devil Wings keeping him aloft. He looked almost like a devil from hell, with black energy swirling around him, a long spear held in his hand.

The dark of night was the perfect time for an ambush.

Because he was alone on this attempt to assassinate the chief elders of the Chen Clan, he could use the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth to his heart’s content.

For now, his cultivation base was solidly in the seventh phase, the Energy Manifestation level. However, because he could use the strength of seven ancient megamammoths, as long as he continued to work on his cultivation, it wouldn’t be long before he reached the eighth phase, the Energy Incarnation level.

This particular path was remote and not oft-traveled, surrounded by numerous mountains, and far removed from even the smallest hamlets or villages. On this particular moonless night, the wind wailed through the valleys, making the entire place seem particularly sinister.

Yang Qi alighted onto the road, where he stood unmoving, staring down the road as if he were waiting for something or someone.

After all, the Chen Clan forces had to pass through this area to get to Yanhaven.

The Chen and Yang Clan’s had been at odds for many years, and had long since compiled detailed intelligence reports about each other. In fact, both sides knew exactly where the council of chief elders of the other was located.

As for the Chen Clan’s council of chief elders, they normally holed up on a place called Mount Green.

This path which connected Mount Green to Yanhaven was a treacherous one that even Masters of Energy would tread with utmost caution.

After all, not everyone was like Yang Qi, with Fiend-Devil Wings that made it easy for him to fly for hundreds of kilometers without resting.

Most Masters of Energy could fly, but could only do so for a few dozen kilometers before having to drop to the ground and proceed on foot for a time.

It was even possible for bad landings to result in deaths.

For that reason, the experts of the Chen Clan were saving energy, and being safer, by not flying. It was the same with the Yang Clan chief elders; the chief elder who had visited the clan some time back had been flying on a golden eagle.

Yang Qi stood there patiently, keeping his true energy reined in. Eventually, he sat down cross-legged and began to perform breathing exercises. As the lightning mammoth stirred within him, feeding the quintessence of its life force in an eighth particle within him, he could feel another ancient megamammoth struggling to wake up.

Without that lightning mammoth, Yang Qi would have been forced to use his own true energy and quintessence to wake up the particles, which would have been much more difficult.

Considering how weak he was to begin with, he wouldn’t even have been able to awaken a single particle by now.

The quintessence of Yang Qi’s life force was like a drop of dew, whereas the lightning mammoth’s was like a flowing river.

As for the particles, they were like deep, empty wells.

If he tried to fill in those wells one drop of water at a time, it would have been impossible. That was why most people never made much progress cultivating the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. Those who did advanced through the cultivation levels much more slowly.

From this it could be seen how difficult the technique was. How could a god-like cultivation method such as that be useful to humans?

In fact, Yang Qi was starting to get extremely nervous about what would happen when the lightning mammoth’s quintessence ran out. How would he further his cultivation? Could he progress on his own? Or would he have to steal life force quintessence from somewhere? But how?

Of course, based on what he knew of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, he understood that after a certain point, his true energy would transform. He would create a Hellfire Crucible inside himself that would be capable of melting and refining anything. Presumably, he could consume external life force quintessence of others to replenish his own, in the form of demon cores, golden medicinal pills, and the like.

Perhaps that was the way to get the quintessence he needed.

The more deeply he sank into cultivating this technique, the more he understood about gods and spirits, and the more he comprehended the nature of hell. In fact, his entire world view was changing.

In his meditations, he had come to the realization that the Rich-Lush Continent was like a speck of dust in a larger world. It was essentially a tiny village, whereas heaven and earth at large were boundless and unfathomable, just waiting for him to explore and understand it, and even… to dominate it.

As his true energy flowed, the eighth particle inside of him wriggled like a chrysalis on the verge of breaking open.

It was at this point that he heard something like the sound of hoofbeats, coming from some distance down the path. It sounded like dozens of them. After a few breaths of time passed, he realized that the sound did not come from ordinary horses.

Rising to his feet, he looked at a dozen riders heading in his direction. Their mounts were horse-like, but twice the size of ordinary horses, and covered in scales.

They were flood stallions, the legendary hybrid offspring of horses and floodwyrms. Not only were they incredibly powerful, but also extremely expensive, with a single one being worth hundreds of thousands of energy convergence pills.

The experts of the Chen Clan had arrived.

Chapter 37: Fighting a Master of Energy

Flood stallions were incredibly fast, and could tear through mountainous terrain as though they were a flat plain.

They could even run on water, meaning that enormous lakes and rivers were not obstacles for them. Generally speaking, only incredibly rich people, government officials, and aristocratic clans could afford them.

The rider leading the group was an old man who, at a certain point along the path, raised his hand, causing an energy field to spring up that forced the entire group of flood stallions to stop in place.

That old man was the leader of the Chen Clan’s chief elders, and had an incredibly profound cultivation base. Tugging on the reins of his flood stallion, he looked over at Yang Qi, his gaze as fierce as a tiger's. His eyes even glowed in the darkness of the night.

Yang Qi could sense the man’s gaze locking down onto his soul; if he tried to flee now, the man would be able to track him down wherever he went.

He had obviously comprehended the Thousand Kilometer Soul Locking technique.

There was also some devilish power contained in his eyes, something that battered at Yang Qi’s soul, making him want to fall asleep. Obviously, the old man was capable of hypnosis as well, which was an energy art that far surpassed the eighth phase.

He was in the ninth phase, making him a Master of Energy.

This was the only member of the Chen Clan’s older generation who was a Master of Energy, the venerable Chen Tianxiong.

He had been famous for sixty years already, and was also known as the Hundred-Armed Demonoid. The implication of his nickname was that his energy arts resembled those of a demon. He was inhumanly fast, and could unleash a hundred attacks in the blink of an eye, enough to destroy anyone he targeted.

He had been in seclusion for years now as he attempted to break through into the Lifeseizing level. Masters of Energy could usually live for one hundred fifty to two hundred years, and Chen Tianxiong was already more than a hundred. He was already starting to run out of time. His body was beginning to wear down, and his quintessence was running out. Unless he achieved a breakthrough, the only thing that existed at the end of his path was death.

But now, the Chen Clan had been wiped out and plundered, giving him no choice other than to go deal with the Yang Clan.

As soon as the Hundred-Armed Demonoid Chen Tianxiong assessed Yang Qi’s cultivation base, he could see that he was in the seventh phase. “Who are you? How dare you try to block my path, you seventh phase whelp.”

A Master of Energy was two levels higher than someone in the Energy Manifestation level, with true energy levels so high that one was like the heaven and the other, the earth. Although Yang Qi’s true energy was vigorous, in terms of level, he just didn’t match up. He couldn’t even form Humanoid True Energy, let alone think about performing Thousand Kilometer Soul Locking.

“You’re the Hundred-Armed Demonoid?” Yang Qi said loudly. “Chen Tianxiong? The only patriarch in the Chen Clan to have reached the Master of Energy level?”

“Who are you, punk?” one of the eighth phase chief elders barked.

“I'm Yang Qi,” he said, looking particularly impressive as he stood there calmly. “Here to execute the Chen Clan’s chief elders. Forget about the Yang Clan in Yanhaven. You’re all going to meet your end here in these remote mountains.”

“Hahahahaha!”

Raucous laughter erupted from the dozens of people present, who included both the chief elders as well as clan lords from subsidiary branches. Their laughter was laced with killing intent; after all, these people were the top figures in their clan.

“Elder Tianxiong,” said one of the chief elders, “allow me to dispatch this little punk.” Without another word, he flew off his flood stallion, his hand already clenched into a fist as he shot toward Yang Qi, as fast as a bullet. He looked like a fierce tiger, his fist thrumming with furious energy, surrounded by a vortex of true energy that could crush metal or stone.

This was a profound energy art from the Chen Clan: Devastation of the Rolling Stone.

And this particular chief elder was Chen Tianhua, who was an uncle of Chen Dalei. He was at the peak of the eighth phase, the type of person who virtually no one could defend against. Throughout the course of his life, he had torn dozens of opponents to shreds with his bare hands, and when he used Mind Incarnation to power his Devastation of the Rolling Stone, it could melt metal.

In fact, there were even stories about how he had once clenched his hand down onto some iron until it ran like liquid onto the ground.

However, Yang Qi hardly paid him any attention at all. He simply waved his hand out in casual and even weak fashion. When Chen Tianhua saw that, his expression twisted with vicious ferocity. “You think your true energy can stop me, you brat? I guess the expression a mantis trying to stop a war chariot was invented for you.”

RUMMMBLE!

How could he ever have guessed that, even as the words left his mouth, Yang Qi’s palm movement completely changed. A trumpeting sound like that of a dracomammoth could be heard, thrumming with energy that could dominate everything for thousands of kilometers in every direction. At the same time, seven ancient megamammoths appeared, ready to trample everything in their path.

“Not good!” Chen Tianxiong blurted. Without any hesitation, he flew over to help.

Unfortunately, he was too late.

Chen Tianhua was completely incapable of standing up to the attack; his true energy was smashed aside, and a palm hit his chest, which caved in, causing blood to spurt out everywhere.

Plop!

His corpse landed onto the ground, a mass of gore and blood that had been a living person only moments ago.

That was when Chen Tianxiong arrived. Reaching out, he grabbed Chen Tianhua’s corpse and poured true energy into it in the hopes of saving him. Unfortunately, he was completely dead and beyond any help.

Yang Qi clasped his hands behind his back, making himself look like a true grandmaster. “Don’t bother. He overestimated himself. He tried to compete with me using true energy, which meant he was just looking to get killed, don’t you agree?”

The truth was that he actually looked forward to fighting a Master of Energy; a deadly battle like that would likely lead to another breakthrough for him.

The Yang Clan was facing troubling times, so the higher his cultivation base got, the better.

Furthermore, once he reached the Lifeseizing level, his father would tell him the secrets pertaining to his mother.

“You’re really a vicious one, aren’t you, boy? Ruthless to the core.” Chen Tianxiong’s white eyebrows twitched as he looked over at Yang Qi, killing intent swirling in his eyes.

He could tell that this young man would not be easy to deal with, and that it would take everything he had to come out on top.

“Not really,” Yang Qi replied. “But our two clans are at odds, and the only way to resolve the situation is for one of us to be wiped out. You people actually colluded with the House of Shadowblight to harm my two brothers. That in itself doomed you to be plundered and exterminated.”

“Oh, really?” Chen Tianxiong began to stride forward. “You've been possessed by a freakish hellion, haven’t you boy? You might have gained incredible power, but the only thing you’ll get in the end is calamity. Well, that's fine. I’ll kill you now, and destroy whatever hellion is inside of you. Afterward, I’ll go kill Yang Zhan too.”

“Bring it on. A fight with a Master of Energy is just what I need to achieve my next breakthrough.”

Yang Qi swept his hands out in front of him, drawing deeply on his energy arts. As he did, his blood and true energy flowed in unison, causing the bubbling sound of the Hellfire Crucible to once again echo out, a sound that would cause anyone who heard it to instantly think about the fires of hell.

“What kung fu is this?”

That was what all the Chen Clan experts were thinking as they looked on, their faces draining of color.

“Prepare yourselves to end this kid’s life,” Chen Tianxiong said loudly. “Surround him, and on my command, we all attack with full force. Turn him into a pool of blood!”

The Chen Clan experts all dismounted and spread out to surround Yang Qi.

At the moment, the survival of their entire clan was at stake, so there was no way they would follow the normal customs of the jianghu, and fight him one by one.

Even as they took their positions, Chen Tianxiong attacked, splaying his fingers as he unleashed pulses of true energy that seemed powerful enough to crush mountains. This was a consummate energy art known as Landslide Devastation.

However, Yang Qi simply sidestepped the attack, then released numerous palm strikes, drawing fully on the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. The power of seven ancient megamammoths drove his true energy with such force that the ground in the area was scraped away, and boulders shattered.

In the blink of an eye, the two of them had exchanged seven blows.

Each one was powerful enough to shake heaven and earth, and destroyed much of the surrounding terrain features. Moments later, Chen Tianxiong’s face was flushed bright red as he stood there on a pile of rubble.

Yang Qi dropped down to the ground, his true energy surging with even more ferocity than his opponent's.

Unexpectedly, those seven interchanges were not enough to determine victory or defeat between the two of them.

“You have some impressive true energy, Chen Tianxiong,” Yang Qi said. “A hundred years of hard work gave you what it takes to stand on equal ground with me. Sadly, you’re getting old, and your body is already starting to decay. Can your meridians really take all of this?” Clearly, he wasn’t afraid at all of the fact that his opponent had a hundred years of experience. He was still confident in being able to take him out.

“I might be getting old, but I can still kill you easily.” Chen Tianxiong’s white hair began to float up, and heatwaves began to roll off of him. He was now preparing to use the true might of a ninth phase Master of Energy as, all of a sudden, a gust of wind shot out, and his true energy took physical shape in front of him in the form of a person.

That person was transparent, with facial features that looked exactly like Chen Tianxiong. It was a clone made by the Humanoid True Energy ability.

This manifestation actually had meridians inside of it, and a sea of energy that was clearly visible because of its transparent state.

It almost looked alive, and also intelligent. This was a much more profound version of Humanoid True Energy than what Yang Zhan had utilized.

As soon as it took form, it seemed to form a connection to the vital energy of heaven and earth. Black clouds formed high in the sky, as well as other meteorological and astronomical phenomena.

“Fleshly body transformation! Form energy into gods and spirits, seize life from the heavens! I became a Master of Energy sixty years ago, you little punk. I have a complete understanding of the Lifeseizing level, and energy arts so profound that there's no way a shallow whelp like yourself could possibly compare to me. Pay attention…. I'm going to show you what people call Energy Gods and Energy Souls!”

In response to Chen Tianxiong’s confident words, his Humanoid True Energy sprang into motion. At the same time, a gale-force wind erupted, filled with mists and clouds. Shockingly, within those winds and clouds appeared the images of dragons and tigers.

Because the Humanoid True Energy was not constrained by the shackles of a physical body, every move it made was fierce beyond compare. In fact, it was actually three to four times more powerful than Chen Tianxiong himself was. It unleashed a palm strike, sending out fire hot enough to scorch the heavens.

“Astral Flame!”

The fire instantly took the shape of numerous blades, connected together like a net that then descended toward Yang Qi.

Yang Qi let out a shout, causing black energy to erupt out of him, which became his Infernal Deity Aegis, a swirling defense that blocked the intense flames.

“Infernal Deity Spear!”

The long spear appeared in his hand, and the aura of devils from hell erupted. Above Yang Qi’s head, black energy transformed into devil horns, vicious to the extreme. At the same time, a godmammoth appeared behind him, ready to trample hell beneath its feet.

Then, the Infernal Deity Spear became a streak of dark light as it shot forth.

It was a move that contained infinite variations, and could destroy any true energy that it encountered. Even the hardest metals or the thickest walls would be pierced through by it.

“Godsnake Silk Hands!” Chen Tianxiong shouted from his position behind his Humanoid True Energy. In response, the manifestation twisted its hand into a new form, causing true energy to erupt out. Even as it shot through the air, it became strands of silk that wrapped around the Infernal Deity Spear.

Chapter 38: Eighth Phase

Godsnake Silk Hands was a first-class energy art from the Chen Clan. It took true energy and turned it into strands of silk that then formed spirit snakes, which could be used to bind an opponent in place. It was a martial discipline that could theoretically be used to constrain all types of true energy.

Any onlookers would see what appeared to be numerous strands of white silk streaming through the air like dancing snakes as they wrapped around Yang Qi.

This was the true power of Chen Tianxiong, a ninth phase Master of Energy.

He had his Humanoid True Energy out in front protecting him, using its infinite variations like a demon or devil.

This was the power of the Hundred-Armed Demonoid.

The way he used true energy was really like demons, devils, ghosts, or monsters, and would make it virtually impossible for anyone to beat him in a fight.

Yang Qi suddenly felt as though his Infernal Deity Spear had finally met its match. As the true energy wrapped around the spear, it suddenly felt like it weighed tens upon tens of thousands of pounds, causing his arms to ache with pain just from holding it. In fact, it seemed like it might be wrenched from his grasp at any moment.

Yang Qi had hit a snag, but he wasn’t afraid yet. Without any hesitation, he drew on the power of seven ancient megamammoths, and threw it into the spear.

Suddenly, the chanting of devil-ghosts echoed out from within it, sounds that seemed to originate in hell itself.

The cries were piercing, confusing, fiendish, and seemed to be thrumming with murderous intentions. They were filled with an incomparable desire to do battle, as though they were being voiced by an army of tens of thousands of soldiers.

Snap! The silken snakes suddenly vanished as the spear erupted in raging black flames. The Infernal Deity Spear had reached a new peak, a point where it produced fire.

ZZZAAAAAP!!! HISSSSSSS!!

In the face of these flames, the true energy of the Hundred-Armed Demonoid Chen Tianxiong was instantly vanquished.

In the shortest of moments, his Humanoid True Energy shrank down to half of its previous size.

“What energy art is that? That’s not a royal-class art, is it? It surpasses royal-class! Don’t tell me it’s imperial-class!?” Chen Tianxiong was shocked, but at the same time, suddenly seemed to be filled with greed. “Don’t you know, brat? When you have something nice, there will always be someone willing to take it from you! If word got out about this energy art of yours, everyone under heaven would be trying to kill you! Listen up, experts of the Chen Clan! It’s time for the Devil-Imprisoning Formation! Trap this kid and force him to tell us how to cultivate this energy art of his!”

Not even Masters of Energy like Chen Tianxiong could avoid the temptation of an imperial-class energy art, and would do anything possible to get it.

By now, he could tell that Yang Qi was not someone who could be defeated easily, and that if the battle continued, it could end up as a bloodbath. Furthermore, the fact that this kid possibly had an imperial-class energy art made him extremely valuable.

In response to Chen Tianxiong's words, the council of chief elders nearly went crazy.

“What? An energy art higher than the royal-class? How is that even possible? Only the institutes have such techniques!”

“Imperial-class energy arts are the type that can throw the lands into war! If word got out, it could shake the whole Rich-Lush Continent.”

“How did this punk get so lucky? How did he get an imperial-class energy art?”

“If it’s really an imperial-class energy art, then it makes sense that the direct bloodline of the Chen Clan got wiped out so easily. Even among the great institutes, those energy arts are tightly-kept secrets.”

“If our Chen Clan got our hands on this kid’s energy art, then with a few decades of hard work, we could be one of the top clans in the Rich-Lush Continent! Nobody could possibly be able to defy us. We might even be able to found a new imperial dynasty.”

“Trap this kid! We can’t let him die. Chief Elder Tianxiong can use his hypnosis arts to drag out the secrets of that imperial-class energy art.”

In the Rich-Lush Continent, energy arts were divided into third-class, second-class, first-class, royal-class, imperial-class, saintly-class, heavenly-class, and godly-class.

Most rich and powerful clans would have first-class techniques, whereas only large sects and organizations would have royal-class arts. Therefore, it could be imagined how heaven-shaking and earth-shattering an imperial-class art would be. Anyone who acquired such a technique would experience instant success in any endeavor, and would have almost no problem reaching the Lifeseizing level.

The Hundred-Armed Demonoid Chen Tianxiong was a Master of Energy, and had much experience in life. Sixty years ago, he was already a famous legend in the jianghu. Therefore, if he assessed Yang Qi’s energy arts as being in the imperial-class level, how could he possibly be mistaken?

Shouting, the more than twenty chief elders all unleashed the full power of their energy arts.

The Chen Clan’s council of chief elders was a powerful group; the requirement to join it was to be an expert in the eighth phase.

And even the weakest of them had been in that level for sixty years at the least.

All of them could perform Mind Incarnation, and they unleashed it to full effect to create an enormous projection of the eight trigrams. As the image rotated high in the air, true energy radiated out and caused all of the mountains in the area to tremble.

Cracking sounds rang out as trees snapped in two, and many boulders were reduced to dust.

This Devil-Imprisoning Formation required all the top experts in the clan to pool their true energy, and was normally used to constrain some of the most powerful demons and devils that existed in the world.

Twenty top experts, including one who was a Master of Energy: that was a force to be reckoned with.

Normally speaking, even someone in the seventh phase who got trapped in this formation would be killed for sure. It was simply too strong to fight back against.

Unfortunately, Yang Qi was something of a freak. And the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth was not some trifling imperial-class energy art. It was a godly-class energy art, which was so far beyond the imperial-class that the two couldn’t even compare. It was the type of energy art that would normally be cultivated by gods, not humans.

Even more relevant was that he had the life-force quintessence of some mysterious member of the senior generation.

As such, he could deal with even more force than was present already, if he had to. He was not the type of person who could be handled by relying on common sense.

As soon as the massive pressure of the Devil-Imprisoning Formation began to crush down on him, an expression appeared on his face, not that of terror, but rather, excitement.

A sound like the trumpet of hundreds of thousands of megamammoths could be heard as the lightning mammoth inside of him roared into action. One vortex after another sprang up around him, all of them radiating the aura of hell, to the point where the entire area smelled like lava.

One of the chief elders, an old woman named Chen Tianzhen, glared viciously at Yang Qi and unleashed a massive stream of toxic energy.

This was no energy art from the Chen Clan, but rather, a technique from the House of Shadowblight.

Another of the chief elders also snarled, sending out a mountain of energy that seemed strong enough to divert rivers and drain seas. The true energy took the shape of a huge hammer that could crush boulders into rocks as surely as if it were some sort of primeval spirit.

As the attacks slammed into the pitch black Infernal Deity Aegis, the shield rippled and distorted, as one defensive layer after another shattered. The wastage of true energy was massive to say the least, and even though Yang Qi cultivated a godly-class energy art, he was not a god. He was only in the seventh phase, and was facing more than twenty experts in the eighth phase, as well as one in the ninth phase. Even if he was a god, he would still be in a tough spot.

In fact, by this point, he was already gasping for breath.

“Crush him again!” one of the chief elders shouted, smiling viciously. They almost had an imperial-class energy art in their hands, like a gift from the heavens, and thus it was only natural that, in their excitement, they would act like ferocious beasts.

‘I'm the incarnation of a godmammoth!’ Yang Qi thought. ‘I can crush the stars, and inhale the sun and moon! I can crush hell, and transform into a crucible! I can dominate all infernal deities!’ Roaring with the effort, Yang Qi fought back against the pressure, causing the latent potential of his life force to once again surge. As the attack slammed into him, it bashed through his meridians toward his sea of energy and bore down on the lightning mammoth.

In response, the lightning mammoth quintessence poured out of it, coursing into the eighth particle within Yang Qi.

With that quintessence, Yang Qi had almost no limits. Any attack that hit him would only serve to incite that life force, and help him to advance further in his cultivation. It was also the main reason he dared to fight against a whole group of powerful experts.

Even Yang Zhan or Yan Gufeng would have had no choice but to flee in the face of so many opponents. But they were exactly what Yang Qi needed for his training. Only by walking the most deadly course could he achieve the breakthrough he needed.

Suddenly, as more life force was put into the particle, it woke up.

And it caused a chain reaction, opening up the ninth particle as well.

Shockingly, the process still continued. A third particle in a row woke up. The power of three additional megamammoths began to course through his meridians. When added to the previous seven, that was a total of ten megamammoths.

Yet again, Yang Qi’s body was remolded. As the energy flowed through his blood, he closed his eyes and inspected himself. Because of how his blood was becoming one with the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, it was no longer pure red; already, it was possible to see glimmers of gold in it. Gold was a sign of nobility, grace, dignity, might, royalty, and even… immortality.

When people normally practiced cultivation, they could transform their body to some degree, but not this dramatically. Only by gaining enlightenment of the good fortune of heaven and earth could they seize life from the heavens and thus become a Lifeseizer expert. At that point, they could use energy arts to refine and transform their body.

Without doing that, growing physically stronger was only somewhat effective.

For example, even Masters of Energy like Yang Zhan and Yan Gufeng were only ordinary in terms of fleshly body.

But now, Yang Qi was once again defying the norms. And if someone in the Lifeseizing level could actually come to see what was happening, they would see transformations of a completely extraordinary nature.

After all, only by having an incredibly powerful fleshly body could one contain such unusual amounts of true energy.

With the power of ten megamammoths, Yang Qi had surpassed the Master of Energy level, and was now beyond the compare of even Yan Gufeng. As the energy flowed through him, sounds erupted out like that of rushing water, crumbling earth, raging fire, and booming thunder. His blood ignited, and his true energy surged. As he transformed, he seized good fortune from heaven and earth, and began to understand the mysterious operations of the sun and moon.

The level of his energy arts increased, his true energy grew more crystalline, and a chain reaction swept through his entire body, causing his true energy to become one with his soul and his mind.

Mind Incarnation.

Chapter 39: Killing a Master of Energy

The Mind Incarnation ability of the eighth phase of energy arts was profound to say the least.

Simply put, one could send one’s thoughts into one’s true energy, and do the opposite as well. That could lead to all sorts of abilities, such as the True Energy Megahand, which could perform strikes, jabs, claws, and other motions.

The eighth phase was one of a complete increase in raw power. At that point, the True Energy Megahand was almost like one’s own hand, so much so that it could be used to detect an enemy's temperature, heartbeat, stamina and even how they circulated their true energy.

In the eighth phase, it also became possible to send one’s true energy out to examine one's surroundings.

By simply closing the eyes, one could use true energy to examine the surrounding area as if it were a painting.

When one reached the Energy Incarnation level, it didn’t matter if one was blinded, lost one’s ears, or suffered any number of other mutilations. After all, true energy could be used as a substitute for one's own eyes, ears, mouth or nose.

That was actually the meaning of the term Mind Incarnation.

It was the ability to send one’s mind outside of the body.

It was also one of the reasons why the eighth phase was so mysterious, and so much more powerful than the seventh.

At the moment, Yang Qi was using his vast reserves of true energy to break through the shackles that bound him to his previous level. As he entered the eighth phase, the whole world seemed to open up to him, and he was suddenly filled with power that could shake the heavens and topple the earth.

“Infernal Deity Aegis!” he roared. A black shield of true energy swept up around him, blocking the incoming attacks, and even sending backlash strikes to the attackers.

POP!

The toxic energy bullet launched by the old woman became an arrow that pierced directly into the pit of her stomach, causing a plume of black blood to shoot out. In the blink of an eye, all of her skin turned black from the poison, and then she dropped to the ground, dead, killed by her own weapon, her eyes still flickering with ferocious greed for that ‘imperial-class’ energy art.

“Many thanks for attacking me!” Yang Qi announced loudly. “It pushed me through another breakthrough. Now it will be even easier to kill the lot of you. Imagine, all the chief elders of the Chen Clan, buried in the deep mountains.”

WHOOSH!

He looked like a devilish god as he burst into action, as lithe as a dragon as he unleashed a fist strike onto the nearest chief elder. Before the elder could react, his tendons were snapped and his bones crushed. His skull caved in, and all of his blood was shoved out of his body by his true energy, spraying out of his mouth in its entirety as he flopped onto the ground, a dried-up corpse.

“Triumph in Every Battle.”

Yang Qi didn’t stop with killing one person. Without pausing, he continued with more forms from the Invincible King’s Fist, attacking the next two chief elders.

Cracking sounds rang out as the two chief elders’ arms were turned into mangled gore, and true energy raced through them toward their dantian. Sadly for them, their seas of energy simply couldn’t withstand the force.

Their bellies exploded, and both died.

In the blink of an eye, three people had been cut down.

“Dammit! How could this be happening? How could he have broken through so quickly?” Chen Tianxiong was completely overwhelmed by both grief and terror. Eyes bloodshot, he shouted, “Retreat! Get out of here! I’ll hold him off!”

With that, Chen Tianxiong began to walk forward, using a powerful footwork technique in which his steps created an outline of the Big Dipper constellation. At the same time, his Humanoid True Energy exploded, becoming seven enormous stars that hovered above his head. With those stars in place, it almost seemed like he had the power to connect with the actual stars in the sky.

“Seven Stars Above, Unleashed and Unstoppable.”

Chen Tianxiong’s hands flowed from one form to another, causing the seven stars of true energy to spring rapidly through the air. At the same time, he began to float up into the air, his clothes rippling as he went through the seven forms of the technique. Unexpectedly, he also had a quasi-royal-class energy art like the Invincible King’s Fist.

He was unleashing an attack that contained the accumulated power of one hundred years of cultivation. It was nothing to be taken lightly; the power of the seven stars was more than enough to slaughter devils and cut down demons.

Yang Qi slapped his palms together and then pulled them apart, activating his defensive energy arts; crackling sounds could be heard as lightning swirled around him. Then, he took three bold and decisive steps forward, clenching his hands into fists as he said, “Suppressing Hell!”

Suddenly, the image of a crucible appeared above his head. It was like a furnace, and also like a cauldron, yet was neither of those. It was filled with boiling lava, and emanated the screams of divine beings, as though disgraced gods were being melted inside of it.

This was a sign of a further increase in the godly-class energy art that was the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.

The first upgrade in the technique was the Infernal Deity Spear.

The second was the Fiend-Devil Wings.

The third was the Infernal Deity Aegis.

And the fourth was the Hellfire Crucible, which could melt anything and everything. According to the ancient legends, it had been created for punishing fallen and disgraced gods. With the complete crucible, Yang Qi could easily consume demon cores raw.

However, what he had now was only a slight fraction of the true Hellfire Crucible. As for how much cultivation it would take to reach the full form, he had no idea.

And yet, even adding even a fraction of the power of the Hellfire Crucible to a fist strike would be enough to defeat just about any opponent.

In the blink of an eye, the Seven Unstoppable Stars smashed into the Hellfire Crucible, and the resulting shock wave was like the roar of some enormous spirit, creating a cyclone dozens of meters high and marvelous to behold.

As for Yang Qi, he strode forward through the cyclone, completely unharmed. In contrast, Chen Tianxiong was dragged out of the air, his body covered with so much blood that he looked bright red.

“You little punk….” he growled, still unable to believe that Yang Qi was this strong. “You’ve definitely been possessed by a demon! And that’s not an imperial-class energy art. Not even imperial-class energy arts could release this kind of power. This technique isn’t meant for humans, it’s meant for gods!”

“You know too much,” Yang Qi said coldly. Coming to a stop above Chen Tianxiong, he reached down and grabbed him by the neck. Lifting him up into the air, he shouted, “Nobody move, or I’ll kill your highest ranking chief elder.”

Chen Tianxiong’s energy was in chaos. His meridians were nearly destroyed, and his sea of energy was in horrible shape. Considering how old he was, the damage he had suffered had pushed him to the brink of complete collapse. He was no longer as young as Yang Zhan or Yan Gufeng, and thus, Yang Qi was able to capture him with ease.

“Get out of here, all of you!” Chen Tianxiong barked. He knew that he was about to die, but was still concerned about his clan. “This brat isn’t human! He stole the power of a god! Mortals can’t do that without being punished in the end!”

The other chief elders were completely terror-struck by the sight of a Master of Energy having been defeated so easily. And considering that he had just ordered them to flee, they didn’t hesitate to do just that.

“You think I'm going to let you get away?” Yang Qi said. Twisting his wrist, he broke Chen Tianxiong’s neck. Then, black energy swirled as two wings sprouted out of his back. Now that he had increased another level, he could move ten times as quickly as before.

His Fiend-Devil Wings were now dozens of meters wide, and cast everything around them into darkness. Furthermore, the slightest flap of the wings could propel Yang Qi dozens of kilometers.

Thus, it didn’t matter how quickly the Chen Clan’s chief elders fled, or in which direction. They couldn’t escape the death which came at them from above.

One of the chief elders was already five kilometers away. But when Yang Qi appeared above him and threw his Infernal Deity Spear, the elder was pinned to the ground, dead.

Another chief elder managed to leap onto a flood stallion, but then Yang Qi’s True Energy Megahand grabbed him, pulled him three hundred meters up into the air, sealed his cultivation base, and then dropped him to his death.

In this moment, Yang Qi truly seemed like an infernal deity risen from the depths of hell. He was a sinister wind that could cut down millions of expert fighters if it wanted to.

Screams rang out in the desolate mountains on that moonless night. Over twenty chief elders of the Chen Clan were killed, as well as the leaders of the subsidiary branches.

And Yang Qi did it all on his own.

Not even Yan Gufeng and Yang Zhan working together could have accomplished such a thing. With the power of ten ancient megamammoths, the eighth phase Yang Qi was already more powerful than two Masters of Energy put together.

After the screams all died out, Yang Qi retracted his Fiend-Devil Wings and floated down to the ground. As for the flood stallions, they all dropped down to him as if in worship, completely cowed into subservience by his aura.

In the ancient myths, godmammoths were the lords of all beasts, demons, and devils. They were like the living incarnation of the power of all gods, that could crush and subdue anything that got in their path. The aura of godmammoths even surpassed that of dragons. Therefore, the flood stallions could do nothing other than obey any order Yang Qi gave.

Yang Qi collected the corpses together and searched them for valuables, thus acquiring about fifty million energy convergence pills’ worth of banknotes. He also found some divine weapons and medicinal pills.

The wealth carried by this council of chief elders was essentially the quintessence of the Chen Clan.

With these additional funds, Yang Qi had finally brought in enough money to pay for the losses incurred by the Latent Dragon Pill.

‘Ashes to ashes, dust to dust. You have only yourself to blame for picking a fight with the Yang Clan. You colluded with the House of Shadowblight to harm my brothers, and therefore, it’s only proper that I send you to the depths of hell. Hopefully in your next life, you’ll remember not to provoke those who should be left unprovoked.’

Yang Qi dug a deep pit into which he dropped all the corpses. Then he slapped his palms together, sending a stream of black fire into the pit, which quickly turned the corpses into ash.

The Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth had infinite variations, and high-temperature flame was just one aspect of it. It could also unleash freezing cold, or the sharpness of the sharpest metal….

That was one of the mysterious aspects of the technique, and one of the reasons it surpassed anything and everything.

Yang Qi watched until the flames burned out. As of now, no one would ever be certain of the whereabouts of the Chen Clan’s chief elders. That clan was no longer a factor in Yanhaven, and even their subsidiary branches were completely doomed.

Once again unleashing his true energy, he summoned his Fiend-Devil Wings. Sending out a blast of swirling wind, he picked up the twenty-eight flood stallions, and then disappeared into the darkness of the night, looking like the very picture of a demon king.

Chapter 40: Preparing a Diversion

Twenty-eight flood stallions, each one worth tens of thousands of energy convergence pills. There was no way Yang Qi would simply leave them behind.

Ordinary Masters of Energy weren’t capable of sustained flight for more than several dozen kilometers, much less use true energy to carry a team of flood stallions.

But Yang Qi had seemingly limitless strength, and boundless true energy, so to him, carrying a group of beasts like this wasn’t a problem at all.

Back in the Yang Clan mansion, Yang Yunchong and Yang Hualong were pacing back and forth, while Yang Zhan calmly sat off to the side.

“Father, why isn’t third brother back yet? Did his ambush fail? One of the Chen Clan’s chief elders is the Hundred-Armed Demonoid Chen Tianxiong, a Master of Energy. Is it possible that third brother met defeat?”

“That's right, the Chen Clan’s council of chief elders is not much weaker than our own. They’re all top masters. That’s at least twenty-three people in the eighth phase. Even a god or immortal who attacked a group like that might end up dead.”

Clearly, Yang Qi’s brothers were both very anxious.

Yang Zhan also seemed a bit restless as he sat there. “You’re right. Even Yan Gufeng and I working together would probably lose if we took on the Chen Clan’s entire council of chief elders. And Qi’er is only a single person, no matter how powerful he is.”

“What should we do, Father?”

“Stay calm,” Yang Zhan replied, waving his hand dismissively. “Ever since the incident with the pill, and getting struck by lightning, Qi’er has grown up a lot. He plans things out before acting, so he definitely wouldn’t do something stupid and leap to his own death. I think he wants to use this as an opportunity to temper himself. Let’s just wait. If he isn't back by dawn, then I’ll go look for him personally.”

Thump!

In the same moment that the words left his mouth, a gust of wind swept over them from above, and they heard a sound like something falling onto the ground. Then, they heard a bray like that of horses. Finally, someone appeared in the darkness, leading a group of enormous creatures.

“Who goes there?”

“Father, it's me,” Yang Qi said, walking over.

“Qi’er, you’re back!” Yang Zhan said, leaping to his feet. Then, he saw the more than twenty flood stallions, and his jaw dropped. “Are those… flood stallions? You have so many….”

“These flood stallions used to belong to the Chen Clan’s council of chief elders. I killed all of them, as well as some of their subsidiary clan lords, and took their mounts. I also got some banknotes….” Yang Qi plopped a big stack of banknotes onto the table, along with the weapons and medicinal pills he had taken.

Yang Zhan let out a long sigh of satisfaction. Sitting back down, he said, “With a son like this, what else could a man ask for?”

As for Yang Yunchong and Yang Hualong, they almost felt like they were looking at a stranger. After all, hadn’t Yang Zhan just said that not even he and Yan Gufeng could handle the Chen Clan's council of chief elders? And yet Yang Qi had killed them all?

It was like an ordinary citizen suddenly declaring himself to be a rebel, then breaking into the imperial fortress and killing the emperor.

Yang Yunchong was actually at a loss for words, and could only stammer, “Third Brother, is this real…?”

Yang Qi nodded. “It’s real, Eldest Brother. I killed them all. The Chen Clan is done for. They’ll never be strong enough to threaten the Yang Clan, ever again.”

Yang Hualong was similarly taken aback. “Are you saying… that not even a Master of Energy is a threat to you?”

“Indeed. I can take out Masters of Energy now. And thanks to the fight, I've unlocked more of my potential, and reached the eighth phase.” The calm way that Yang Qi answered the question immediately served to calm the hearts of his brothers and father.

Only at that point were his brothers finally able to accept what was happening. And yet, they still weren’t exactly sure how to react. Originally, they had assumed that Yang Qi would try to kill one or two of the Chen Clan’s chief elders, to throw them into chaos and delay their arrival in Yanhaven.

Never could they have guessed that Yang Qi would actually wipe them all out.

“Well, that puts an end to the matter,” Yang Zhan said, his eyes once again flashing like those of a fierce tiger. “None of us must ever breathe a word about the fact that Qi’er wiped out the Chen Clan’s entire council of chief elders. Qi’er, I'm going to make an announcement that you’ve fallen ill, and are bedridden. As the saying goes, the tallest tree attracts the most wind. If word got out about what you’ve done, the big sects and organizations would start investigating, and that could lead to a big disaster for us.”

Yang Yunchong and Yang Hualong both shivered.

“I agree, Father,” Yang Qi said. “However, what about me fighting Chen Dalei? Word of that is bound to spread, and there could be consequences.”

“He was only in the eighth phase, not the ninth,” Yang Zhan replied calmly. “The difference between the two is like the difference between heaven and earth. Therefore, it’s not a very big deal. Besides, I’ve been spreading word that you were possessed by a demon, but that during your fight with Chen Dalei, it was killed. I’ll also make sure people hear that the reason you’re bedridden is because of that very demon, and the injuries you sustained in the fight. If you stay out of sight in the clan mansion for a while, then eventually, all of it will blow over.”

“You’re right, Father.” It was a good time for Yang Qi to rest, and to stabilize his cultivation base. After all, his progress recently had all been thanks to the life force from the lightning mammoth. He had actually neglected his own personal cultivation.

For the rest of the night, father and sons discussed their plans and strategies, before finally dispersing to get some rest.

Nothing eventful happened in the following days. Yang Qi made no public appearances, which lent much credibility to the rumors that he had fallen ill. He spent his time meditating on his energy arts, and pondering the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. He also continued to absorb the lightning mammoth’s life force.

After all of the advancement Yang Qi had made, the lightning mammoth had shrunk down significantly, and he could tell that it wouldn't be long before it was gone.

Based on his guesses, he was fairly certain that there was enough left to push him past the ninth phase, and actually reach the Lifeseizing level.

Days passed in which Yanhaven remained very quiet.

The aristocratic clans in the city, and even the city magistrate’s mansion, were all waiting for an army of Chen Clan experts to come and fight things out with the Yang Clan. However, such events never materialized. It was as if the Chen Clan had simply vanished.

Everyone found it to be quite odd.

Eventually, word spread that Yang Qi had been possessed by an old demon. Supposedly, the demon had been eradicated, but the result was that Yang Qi fell seriously ill, and had regressed in his energy arts.

Not too long ago, everyone had worried that a spectacular genius had risen up in the Yang Clan. But now everyone believed it was all because of a demon, and thus breathed sighs of relief.

People who were possessed would often develop monstrous personality traits, and eventually transform into actual monsters that few people could ever fight. However, if the demon in question were expelled, then the previously possessed victim would become very weak.

A new genius was something everyone would talk about. But someone who was possessed, then cured and left incredibly weak, would be fated to be a laughingstock.

After an entire month passed, Yan Gufeng was starting to get extremely nervous.

He had already recruited numerous experts, who were all waiting in the city magistrate’s mansion, ready to spring to action as soon as the Chen and Yang Clans began to fight. Unfortunately, no such fighting broke out. The Chen Clan had been plundered, and their mansion occupied by Yang Clan experts. In fact, they had even removed the sign from above the main gate, and replaced it with their own.

Yan Gufeng smacked the table. “Luo Hun, go find out what’s going on.”

“City Magistrate, I've already run the investigation. The Chen Clan’s subsidiary clan lords were mobilized, along with their chief elders. But they never showed up here, and they never returned to their clans. They went missing.”

“Missing? The Chen Clan's council of chief elders has plenty of eighth phase experts, as well as the Hundred-Armed Demonoid Chen Tianxiong, a Master of Energy. How could they all have gone missing? Don’t tell me they’re dead?” Yan Gufeng simply refused to believe that something like that could have happened. “Perhaps they’re still preparing. Maybe they want to kill all of the experts in the Yang Clan, all in one shot.”

Luo Hun nodded. “City Magistrate, it’s definitely impossible that they were all killed. The only realistic explanation is that they're not confident in being able to take on the Yang Clan, so they went out to find allies.”

“Fine. What about that brat Yang Qi? Was he really possessed? If the demon was driven out, shouldn’t he be extremely weak?”

“I’d say there’s an eighty to ninety percent chance the rumors are true,” Luo Hun replied. “I’ve had people watching the Yang Clan mansion day and night, and Yang Qi hasn’t stepped outside at all over the past month. It seems he’s simply too weak. Like I said from the beginning, the only explanation for his unusual behavior is a demon. If he wasn’t possessed, then how could he possibly have become so strong that he could defeat me?”

“That demon must have been at the Master of Energy level, but bereft of a fleshly body. What a pity. If we could have captured that brat and then extracted the demon, it would have made a medicinal ingredient no inferior to a Latent Dragon Pill.” Yan Gufeng licked his lips.

“So, what do we do now?” Luo Hun said. “Do you want to make a move on Yang Zhan?”

“There’s no rush,” Yan Gufeng replied with the wave of his hand. “If the Chen Clan’s council of chief elders is working on some big plan, let them have at it. Meanwhile, we wait patiently and see how the situation develops.”

Even as the two of them discussed the matter, Yan Feixia’s voice suddenly reached their ears.

“Father….”

“What’s wrong, Xia’er?” Yan Gufeng said, rising to his feet.

“Father, I just received a message from the True Dragon Institute. I have to go back. The sexagenary Inter-Institutional Martial Arts Competition is going to be starting soon, and my master wants me to work on my cultivation ahead of time.”

“Well, hurry back then,” Yan Gufeng said. “This competition is a big deal, and your performance will have a big influence on your future.” Yan Gufeng knew well that the competition between the True Dragon Institute, the Demi-Immortal Institute, and the other two big institutions was nothing to take lightly, and was actually much more important than anything that could happen in Yanhaven.

To the big institutes, Yanhaven was like an ant.

“Take care, father,” Yan Feixia said. As she turned, a pair of white crane wings sprouted out of her back, and she vanished.

Chapter 41: Three Months Later

After Yan Feixia’s departure, things remained calm and quiet in Yanhaven.

Three months passed by in a flash, and summer was giving way to autumn. The bleak fall wind swept through dried-out trees, sending leaves swirling through the air as the migratory birds made their way south.

Farmers throughout the lands were harvesting their crops of medicinal herbs to sell to the rich and powerful clans.

In the Rich-Lush Continent, the common people didn’t focus on growing rice or wheat. They grew the spirit plants necessary to create energy convergence pills. Every year when autumn came, the harvest season, new batches of energy convergence pills would be created. Of course, the common people couldn’t concoct the medicinal pills, only grow the ingredients.

There were even some aristocratic clans who were incapable of making the pills.

Only the largest organizations in the lands, including the institutes and the Sage Ancestor Dynasty itself, were capable of such a feat.

However, the clans still participated in the trade, which was very profitable.

Yang Qi had been holed up working on his cultivation for three months.

During that time, he had become thoroughly familiar with the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, and had also remolded his body into something completely new.

He was now far stronger than any Master of Energy, and the membrane beneath his skin had become so tough that it was impervious to all sorts of weapons. In fact, few energy arts attacks would be able to pierce it.

He had also taken plenty of time to train with the various abilities that came with his godly technique, including the Infernal Deity Spear, Infernal Deity Aegis, and Fiend-Devil Wings.

Of those three, the Infernal Deity Spear was the most powerful in terms of attack power. The Fiend-Devil Wings provided speed, and the Infernal Deity Aegis gave him powerful defensive capabilities.

With all three of those abilities combined, he had incomparable strength in battle.

The next thing he needed to do was successfully cultivate his Hellfire Crucible to completion.

This technique was actually one of his most powerful assets, and would allow him to melt, refine, or consume just about anything. He could take life force quintessence from other beings, as well as the sun and moon, the vital energy of heaven and earth, the power of the stars, and use the Hellfire Crucible to add it to his own life force.

If he could create that crucible, then it wouldn’t matter if he lost the benefit of the lightning mammoth.

Inhale, exhale….

Yang Qi currently hovered cross-legged in the air, with absolutely nothing supporting him. He floated on true energy, and could do so for more than two hours without gasping or turning red in the face. That was how incredibly advanced his energy arts were.

If a ninth phase Master of Energy could see what he was doing, that person would likely pass out from shock.

At the same time, Yang Qi could send his true energy into the floor of his meditation chamber, and then expand it out to literally see everything around him as if with the naked eye.

Snakes, insects, rodents, and other small creatures were all going into hibernation, and provided a remarkable subterranean scene.

Yang Qi could even see the tangled waterways beneath Yanhaven, as well as all sorts of secret tunnels and passageways.

Although Yang Zhan could similarly send his true energy into the ground, it could only reach a few dozen meters down, and perhaps a few thousand meters in each direction.

But Yang Qi was different. His true energy could cover the entire Yang Clan mansion, and even further. Everything within four or five blocks of the mansion could be covered by his field of vision. Any powerful expert that even got close would be detected by him, which meant that unless someone dropped down from the sky, they wouldn’t be able to launch a surprise attack.

This was none other than the legendary Cosmic Surveillance.

Most top masters of energy arts had this ability, but none of them came close to Yang Qi’s version.

“Go,” Yang Qi said, flicking his finger. In response, a gossamer strand of true energy flew out, shot into the pond water, and wrapped around a large, ten-pound fish.

The fish, extremely powerful and green, struggled mightily as it was dragged out of the water. However, it was unable to free itself from the fetters of true energy.

This was Silk Rain of the Spring Silkworm from the Four Seasons Swordplay. When backed by Yang Qi’s cultivation base, it couldn’t be broken by the sharpest magical weapons, much less some big green fish. After practicing by grabbing the fish, Yang Qi let it drop back down into the waters of the pond.

There was a splash of water, and then the fish flapped its tail and disappeared.

Next, Yang Qi tried something a bit different. With the flick of a finger, he sent a thread of true energy up into the clouds, where it wrapped around a wild goose and dragged it out of the sky.

He grabbed the animal, who was so terrified it stuck its head beneath its wing.

“There, there,” Yang Qi said with a smile. “Head back to your buddies. I'm not going to hurt you.” He sent some true energy into the goose to stimulate its blood flow, then planted a tiny seed of energy into it. The goose immediately looked up in delight, then let loose a honk of gratitude.

With that, Yang Qi lifted the goose up, which flapped its wings and shot like an arrow back up into the clouds.

The goose had received quite the bit of good fortune; going forward, it would now be able to practice natural cultivation.

Letting the creature go was an act of mercy on Yang Qi’s part, mercy which came from the heart.

The Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth came with baleful energy like that of a devil from hell, and therefore, anyone who practiced it needed to consciously cultivate mercy. Yang Qi’s recent meditations had gradually revealed this fact to him. Not only had his cultivation base improved, his understanding of heaven and earth had as well. He had also developed a sense of empathy for other living beings. For example, he did his absolute best to not even harm the bugs that crawled around on the ground.

Of course, if he faced a dangerous enemy, he wouldn’t hold back at all. And as a representation of a godmammoth or an infernal deity, he would punish the wicked and promote righteousness.

As had been written: All living beings are fundamentally good; those who choose evil, should be punished with evil.He who slays endless evildoers is a monster, but with mercy, can become a living Buddha.

Taking a final breath, he floated down and landed on the ground, then stretched out his muscles, which caused a muffled rumble of thunder to echo inside him. As of this point, his true energy was so domineering that mere exhalation of breath on his part could send an eighth phase expert tumbling backward through the air.

And yet, he still didn’t have the spark he needed to propel himself into the Master of Energy level.

Even the rarest geniuses, people who had enlightened masters to help them, would still need fifty years of hard work or more to become a Master of Energy.

Yang Zhan had taken more than forty years himself, and that was only because of the airmastery plant he had consumed as a youth, and the Golden Nine Transformations Pill that Yang Qi had given him.

As for Yan Gufeng, he only succeeded because of the Latent Dragon Pill.

‘I'm not that far from the ninth phase. Although these past few months of hard work didn't awaken another ancient megamammoth, I’ve almost completely mastered the Four Seasons Swordplay. I wonder how my father and brothers are doing.’ He had not progressed past the level of ten megamammoths. However, his understanding of energy had reached a much higher level than before.

Suddenly, a servant girl rushed in and said, “Third Young Master, your father and brothers are waiting for you in the meeting hall. There’s an important matter to discuss.”

“What important matter?” Yang Qi replied. “Oh, I almost forgot. Summer’s over, so it's time for the clan’s autumn hunt. And I'm supposed to compete in martial arts with Yang Honglie! Although, at this point, I could kill that little punk with a single breath. Three months ago he was in the seventh phase, so even if he got some sort of miraculous medicinal pill, he couldn’t be any higher than the eighth.”

With that, Yang Qi hurried over to the meeting hall.

As the servant girl had said, his father and brothers were waiting for him.

In the months since he had seen them last, his eldest brother had reached the seventh phase, and his second brother, the sixth. The vital energy that had come from medicinal pills they acquired from the Chen Clan and their council of chief elders was equivalent to ten or twenty years of bitter cultivation.

Yang Zhan was in high spirits, and his eyes glittered from the enlightenment he had recently gained of the four seasons. From that, Yang Qi could tell that his father had used the Chiliocosm Mirror to full effect, and had succeeded in cultivating a royal-class energy art.

After all, the Invincible King’s Fist, which had once been the top energy art in the clan, had only been quasi-royal-class, and thus couldn’t compare at all to the Four Seasons Swordplay.

Smiling, Yang Qi said, “Congratulations, Father. I can see that you’ve become even more powerful. I guess you wanted to discuss the autumn hunt?”

“It looks like you’ve improved as well, Qi’er,” Yang Zhan replied. “I’m definitely not a match for you. Now, our direct bloodline can clearly hold our head high during the autumn hunt. The time has come to cow the subsidiary bloodlines, and unite the clan. If we all work together, we can definitely seize control of Yanhaven.” Yang Zhan clearly had some lofty ambitions.

Yang Qi thought for a moment, and then said, “Father, as long as the Yan Clan doesn’t try to take us out, we should be able to live our days in peace. What’s the point of taking control of Yanhaven?”

“You're technically right. But my sources have indicated that Yan Gufeng recently recruited a team of highly skilled fighters. Before long, he’s definitely going to make a move on us.” Yang Zhan shook his head. “In the Rich-Lush Continent, many city magistrates want to found their own nations. Before long, the world is going to descend into chaos. If Yan Gufeng doesn’t do something, then surrounding cities will eventually invade Yanhaven. He knows that there needs to be one major power here, not two.”

Yang Qi didn’t have anything to say in response. He was well aware that there were powerful forces in the area surrounding Yanhaven, such as Yundale-by-the-Sea, which was now the State of Yun. Already, such powerful forces were beginning to swallow up their neighbors, and that meant that an invasion of Yanhaven was only a matter of time.

“Well, enough of that. I just got a message from our council of chief elders. The clan forces are gathering in preparation to enter the Blackcorpse Mountains. The time has come for us to participate in the autumn hunt.”

“Father,” Yang Qi said, “the city magistrate could make a move on us at any time. What happens if he launches a sneak attack while we’re away?”

Yang Zhan shook his head. “He won't. With all of us away, it wouldn’t benefit him. Yan Gufeng wouldn’t do something so stupid. He’ll wait until he’s confident he can take us all out in one fell swoop.”

Chapter 42: The Clan&#039;s Autumn Hunt

As he thought about it, Yang Qi realized that it really didn’t make sense for the Yan Clan to make their move when everyone was out on the autumn hunt.

Besides, Yang Zhan was a Master of Energy now. And considering that Yang Qi was in the eighth phase, he could use Thousand Kilometer Soul Locking. Therefore, it would be a simple thing to leave a scrap of true energy behind in the clan, to provide an instant notification if anything happened.

And with his Fiend-Devil Wings, Yang Qi could return very quickly if necessary.

After considering all of those things, he nodded in agreement.

With that, father and brothers headed toward the Blackcorpse Mountains.

As they sped along, Yang Qi realized that his brothers didn’t have enough true energy to get even close to the speeds he was capable of. “Eldest Brother, Second Brother, let me give you a hand.”

With that, he sent some of his own true energy into them.

Instantly, their clothing billowed as they accelerated rapidly.

“Third Brother, your true energy is so powerful!” Yang Yunchong exclaimed. He had been working on his cultivation with his father recently, and had also used the Chiliocosm Mirror. Thanks to that, and some amazing medicinal pills they had acquired from the Chen Clan, he had sped through what normally would take twenty years of cultivation to achieve, and reached the seventh phase, the Energy Manifestation level.

Of course, compared to Yang Qi, his true energy was like a firefly compared to the full moon.

Thus, the four clansmen flew along, following the Yan River toward the mountains. In a very short period of time, they were fifty kilometers away.

To Yang Qi, though, that was still a bit slow. Looking around to confirm that there was no one else present, he turned to Yang Zhan and said, “Father, I know how to fly. How about we speed things up a bit?”

“What?” Yang Zhan said, shocked. “You can summon true energy wings?”

Then, he watched as a pair of black wings sprouted out of Yang Qi’s back, dozens of meters wide. The slightest flap of those wings sent the Yan River water churning, and the creatures within swimming away in terror.

All of a sudden, Yang Qi looked majestic to the extreme, like some deity from the most ancient times. The mere sight of him caused Yang Zhan’s breath to stick in his throat.

“What type of energy art is that?” Yang Zhan blurted, shivering. “That’s not first-class, is it? Royal-class? No, wait… don’t tell me that it's a legendary imperial-class energy art? Qi’er, what good fortune did you come across? If word of those wings got out, I'm afraid the Yang Clan would face complete and utter extermination.”

“Don’t worry, Father. I won’t let anyone see this.” With that, he flapped his wings, and in the blink of an eye, they were dozens upon dozens of kilometers away.

In the shortest of moments, they were nearing the source of the Yan River, the Blackcorpse Mountains.

Numerous waterfalls, springs, and other bodies of water in those mountains eventually met and became the mighty Yan River.

At a certain point, Yang Qi retracted his wings and pulled in his true energy. Then, he and his father and brothers sped through the mountains on foot for about an hour, until they reached a certain valley.

By the time they arrived, there was already a sizable group gathered there.

All the experts of the Yang Clan were present, from the young to the old.

Roughly thirty were white-haired and older, and that group all sat cross-legged in meditation. As they went about their breathing exercises, the fluctuations that rolled out confirmed that they had profound cultivation bases.

They were none other than the Yang Clan’s council of chief elders.

The enormous golden eagle was present, as was Yang Zhougong, who had appeared during the clan forum.

However, Yang Zhougong’s cultivation base was not the most powerful among the chief elders. Although he was at the peak of the eighth phase, there were two others who were Masters of Energy.

One of them was tall and well-built, with such a full head of white hair that he looked like a lion. He was the most powerful expert in the Yang Clan, and was even mightier than Chen Tianxiong had been. He had reached the Master of Energy level seventy years before, and was supposedly at its peak, constantly attempting to break into the Lifeseizing level.

His name was Yang Xingshi.

He was a beast of a man, and although he was old, his skin had no age spots, but instead, was as smooth and lustrous as jade.

Sitting off to the side was a female Master of Energy, an old woman who was just as tall as Yang Xingshi. She wore green garments, and resting next to her on the ground was a dragon-headed walking stick forged from metal.

She was known as Dowager Yan.

She was a matriarch of the Yang Clan who had already lived more than one-hundred and fifty years. People had long since forgotten her full name, and thus took to calling her Dowager Yan.

Yang Xingshi and Dowager Yan were the two strongest individuals in the Yang Clan.

Also present in the valley were Yang Zhen, Yang Shi, and Yang Xu, as well as other leaders from smaller subsidiary branches. And of course, the elite young ones were all there, including Yang Honglie.

Surprisingly, Yang Honglie was now in the eighth phase; his eyes flickered with violet light, and he was surrounded by a medicinal aroma. Even more noteworthy was that there was also a slight, violet hue to his face, apparently the manifestation of violet energy inside him.

He had obviously used a powerful medicinal pill recently, and had not yet fully absorbed it.

Suddenly, Yang Qi heard his father projecting his voice into his ear using true energy. “Qi’er, it looks like Yang Honglie used a medicinal pill that contained violet energy. I'd say it’s highly likely he used a legendary Violet Sunrise Pill. Consuming that pill is equivalent to practicing cultivation for a full sixty-year-cycle. I would never have guessed that he would encounter good fortune like that.”

“Don’t worry father,” Yang Qi replied with a cool smile. “Even if he did use a pill like that, he wouldn’t be a match for me.”

“I know, I'm not worried.” And that was the truth. After all, considering his son’s strength surpassed his own, what was there to be scared about?

Yang Zhan’s entrance into the valley immediately attracted the attention of the council of chief elders.

“Yang Zhan?” Yang Xingshi said by way of greeting. “So, you actually reached the Master of Energy level?”

Dowager Yan also turned her gaze onto Yang Zhan.

Considering that both of them were Masters of Energy, it was no surprise that they could detect the aura of another Master of Energy.

Experts in the ninth phase of energy arts were impressive figures, to say the least.

“What? Yang Zhan is a Master of Energy?” Yang Zhen, Yang Shi, Yang Xu, and the experts from the other subsidiary branches were all visibly shocked.

Yang Zhan offered a respectful salute to the two most powerful members of the clan. “That’s right. Great Uncle, Dowager Yan, I'm now in the Master of Energy level.”

“Considering your cultivation base, it should have taken you another thirty or forty years,” Yang Xingshi said. “What medicinal pill did you use?”

“You’re very perceptive, Great Uncle. I used a Golden Nine Transformations Pill.”

“A Golden Nine Transformations Pill….” Dowager Yan said, clearly surprised. “That pill provides a significant boost to both energy and blood, and also increases longevity.”

Yang Xingshi rose to his feet, looking very much like a mighty lion in human form. Glaring over at Yang Qi, he said, “Yang Zhan, according to the rumors, some major events occurred recently. Your prodigal son apparently shoved the direct bloodline into complete bankruptcy. Is that right? I also heard that your other two sons were poisoned, although it looks like they’ve recovered.”

“Great Uncle, your information isn’t completely accurate,” Yang Zhan replied. “The direct bloodline is actually stronger than it’s ever been. We exterminated our rivals, the Chen Clan, and have doubled the level of our previous wealth. We're also in the middle of recruiting a large army. It won’t be long before we have it out with the Yan Clan over control of Yanhaven.”

Yang Shi suddenly burst out into laughter. “Could you blow your own horn any louder, Yang Zhan? The Chen Clan is one of the most powerful clans in Yanhaven, and their council of chief elders has a Master of Energy, Chen Tianxiong, the Hundred-Armed Demonoid. You’re trying to tell me that he would just sit on his thumbs while you exterminated his clan?” Yang Shi had actually heard rumors about the conflict with the Chen Clan. However, because the direct bloodline had such a poor relationship with the subsidiary branches, Yang Zhan hadn’t even bothered to notify them of the latest developments. Therefore, Yang Shi believed the rumors to be mere exaggerations.

“There were plenty of eyewitnesses in Yanhaven,” Yang Zhan said coolly, “so what's the point of jabbering about it? Besides, it happened three months ago. You must have heard the news by now.”

“So it’s true?” Dowager Yan said.

“I would never joke about something so important. That said, the Chen Clan’s council of chief elders never showed up. They went missing three months ago, and we’re still waiting for them to make their counter strike.” Obviously, Yang Zhan wouldn’t go to the extent of telling everyone that his son had killed the Chen Clan’s entire council of chief elders.

Although, no one would have believed him if he had.

Eyes flashing, Yang Xingshi said, “Yang Zhan, you’ve done well with these two sons of yours. One is in the seventh phase, and the other, the sixth. I heard that your third son was crippled, but then got struck by lightning, and recovered. He even beat Yang Kui in a fight, is that correct? Don’t you find that to be a bit odd? Has he been possessed by an old demon? Things like that have happened in these lands. However, when freakish hellions like that suddenly have a massive increase in their energy arts, they always end up turning into monsters.”

As he spoke, he looked at Yang Qi with eyes that seemed capable of piercing into the soul itself.

Of course, Yang Qi had long since concealed the nature of his cultivation base. Anyone who looked at him would take him to be an ordinary person.

“He’s definitely been possessed by a demon,” said Yang Shi. The fact that his son Yang Feng had been defeated by Yang Qi caused hatred for him to seep down into his very bones. “Great Uncle, you should cripple his energy arts again. Now that he's been taken over by a demon, he’ll definitely turn into a monster sooner or later.”

“How dare you, Yang Shi!” Yang Zhan said loudly. “If you dare to touch my son, I’ll take your life!” With that, he unleashed some of the fluctuations of his cultivation base, causing Yang Shi’s face to turn pale.

However, Yang Shi still managed to laugh coldly and say, “Oh really? Don’t tell me you’re feeling guilty, Yang Zhan? Sadly, no matter how remorseful you feel, you can’t cover up the truth. Your son bankrupted the clan, and was then possessed by a demon. Did you really think he's some sort of energy arts genius? If he was a genius, why did he go steal a Latent Dragon Pill from the city magistrate of Yanhaven, and then drag the clan into ruin? And now you’ve gone and wiped out the direct bloodline of the Chen Clan. Their council of chief elders is definitely going to come for revenge, and that’s going to lead to an even worse catastrophe. Do you realize what you've done?”

Yang Zhan was about to say something when Yang Qi stepped forward. “Father, there’s no need to respond. Yang Shi, you say I've been possessed. But what evidence do you have to prove it? I'm no hellion. You can tell just by examining my true energy. If you want, you and I could have a little contest to see the truth.”

“You’ve really got some guts to say something like that, you cretin!” Yang Shi shouted. “Have a contest with you? Are you hallucinating? Have you forgotten your rank in the clan? Or the level of your cultivation base? Yang Zhan, you’ve raised a son that doesn’t understand how seniority works. Great Uncle, considering the ravings of this brat, I'd say it’s obvious that he's been possessed by a demon.”

Chapter 43: A Slap on the Face

What type of person was this Yang Shi?

He was considered one of the most powerful experts in the Yang Clan, a man who had long since reached the eighth phase, and could perform Mind Incarnation. He was someone that numerous younger ones looked up to. Three months before, Yang Qi had been in the fifth phase of energy arts, the Energy Eruption level. How could he possibly have reached the point of being able to fight Yang Shi? It was simply not possible.

Even most of the chief elders seemed to think that Yang Qi was being too arrogant and conceited.

“Quiet, Yang Qi, your superiors are talking,” Yang Zhougong said. “Don’t you know how to follow clan rules?”

“Clan rules?” Yang Qi replied, his tone of voice just barely hovering on the edge of being disrespectful. “This Yang Shi has repeatedly plotted against my father, the clan lord. He even said that I've been possessed by a demon. If I don’t speak up in my own defense, I might end up crippled again. Don't tell me it's against clan rules to defend oneself against slander?”

“What nerve you have!” Yang Xingshi said, his gaze turning as cold as ice. “We can easily check to see if you've been possessed! Yang Zhougong is ranked higher than your own grandfather! What gives you the right to be so disrespectful?”

“Because there’s a thing in the world called logic!” Yang Qi turned to look at Yang Xingshi. As of this moment, Yang Qi looked very domineering; considering how strong he was, his confidence was understandable. Sounding completely unruffled, he continued, “I'm just speaking logically. Can you point out anything I said that was disrespectful?”

His calm tone of voice only stoked the fury of Yang Shi and those who sided with him.

“You dirty little swine!” he shouted. “I can’t believe you’re actually being disrespectful to Great Uncle! Is this how Yang Zhan raises his sons?”

In that very moment, Yang Honglie stepped forward. Facing Yang Xingshi, he said, “Patriarch, it was only three months ago that Yang Qi and I agreed to have a martial arts match during the autumn hunt. And now here he is being disrespectful to you seniors. However, there’s no need for any of you to do anything. I can teach him the lesson he deserves.”

With that, he turned toward Yang Qi and began to circulate his energy, causing violet-gold light to swirl around him.

Immediately, the experts of the Yang Clan began to discuss the matter.

“No wonder Yang Honglie is considered the top genius in the clan. Look how quickly he reached the eighth phase! I wouldn’t be surprised if he becomes a Master of Energy even more quickly than Yang Zhan did.”

“This is what I'm talking about. Have Yang Honglie teach that brat a lesson.”

“Yang Qi is just too arrogant. Not only did he bring catastrophe to the clan, he even dared to insult the members of the older generation. I guess he thinks Yang Zhan will protect him now that he's a Master of Energy. Considering both Yang Qi and Yang Honglie are in the younger generation, Yang Zhan has no legitimate reason to interfere.”

“Remember how Yang Honglie found that rare manual out in the mountains once? It was the Violet Sunrise Divine Art, a royal-class energy art! Now that he used the Violet Sunrise Pill, he's taken another step toward reaching the highest level of enlightenment.”

“That brat Yang Qi has no hope of coming out on top.”

As far as these experts were concerned, Yang Honglie was the top genius in the clan, and even more relevant, had a royal-class energy art.

For many years, the Yang Clan had never possessed any royal-class energy arts, which were the only way to practice cultivation past the Master of Energy level and into the Lifeseizing level.

“Yang Qi, the time has come for me to teach you a lesson,” Yang Honglie said. “Not only will I punish you for your disrespect for the senior generation, I’ll also drive the demon out of you. Strength should come from personal accomplishments, not because of the help of a demon. That path will only lead to you becoming a monster.”

“Oh, really?” Yang Qi replied. “Alright, make your move. I’ll give you three chances.”

“Three chances?” Yang Honglie burst out laughing, as if he had just heard the funniest joke in the world. “Who do you think you are? How about instead, I give you three chances?”

Yang Xu and many of the other experts in the clan were shaking their heads, convinced that Yang Qi had been possessed, and that he was being exceedingly arrogant.

“Bring it on!” Yang Qi said, beckoning at Yang Honglie with his finger.

Yang Honglie’s eyes flashed with killing intent, and violet light erupted from his forehead. Waving with his finger, he turned the light into sword energy, and then sent it shooting toward the pit of Yang Qi’s stomach. Unexpectedly, he was using a deadly move!

He had transformed violet energy into sword energy, which cause the air to fill with sword projections, all bearing down onto Yang Qi.

“Violet Energy from the East!”

A moment later, the violet sword energy slammed into the ground about three paces behind Yang Qi. It had completely missed him, and no one saw how he evaded it.

“Eee?” Yang Xingshi murmured, his eyebrows shooting up.

“That was your first chance,” Yang Qi said calmly. “You have two more, Yang Honglie. Better make the best of them.”

“This is absurd! DIE!” Face twisting into a ferocious expression, Yang Honglie lunged forward, his forearms forming a cross in front of him as he summoned a projection of the word for DIE — 杀.

It was a powerful energy art that surged with violent energy so explosive it blasted a crater open into the ground.

However, Yang Qi was not in the crater.

“Second chance.” Yang Qi said. This time, he was standing right behind Yang Honglie.

Without even thinking, Yang Honglie spun around, curled his fingers into claws.

“Heart-Piercing Strike!” At the same time, he poured true energy into his fingernails, causing them to transform into meters-long blades that shot directly toward Yang Qi’s heart.

Sadly for Yang Honglie, though, Yang Qi merely stepped out of the way.

The Heart-Piercing Strike didn’t strike anything except air.

“Third chance. Now it's my turn. Better watch out, Yang Honglie.”

“You punk!” Yang Honglie shouted. “Fine, I'm gonna show you a real royal-class energy art. Violet Sunrise Divine Art!” He lunged backward, sending several streams of violet light out, which swirled together into the shape of an enormous dragon. “Rise of the Violet Dragon!”

Everyone looking on was shocked.

“Rise of the Violet Dragon? I can’t believe he's using that move. It's so powerful.”

“Look, it's ripping crevices open in the ground.”

Sure enough, crevices were opening up in the ground as the violet dragon behind Yang Honglie continued to power up.

“Rise of the Violet Dragon?” Yang Qi said. “Alright. So can I go now? That’s your most powerful move, right?”

Even as the words left his mouth, he swept his hand out in a slapping motion.

Then, as everyone looked on, an enormous hand materialized in the air, which then smacked Yang Honglie across the side of the face.

Whack!

“Aaaiiiieee!”

He let out a bloodcurdling scream as his violet dragon was shattered, and his violet energy was completely vanquished. He was thrown off of his feet, blood spraying out of his mouth as he then slammed onto the ground, his face already swelling up.

The move he had been using was strong enough to tear the ground open, and yet Yang Qi simply slapped him and knocked him onto the ground.

“Useless piece of trash.” Yang Qi said, shaking his head and clasping his hands behind his back. “Can’t even stand up to a single slap from me. Top genius in the clan? Consumed a Violet Sunrise Pill? It would have been better to not waste that pill!”

“You….” Yang Honglie grated. Still not quite convinced that he had been beaten, he tried to struggle to his feet. However, trying to circulate his energy through his meridians filled him with agonizing pain.

Thankfully for him, Yang Qi had actually held back, and had not used a deadly move. He wanted to hurt Yang Honglie, not kill him. Otherwise, he would have been ripped to pieces.

He was doing his best to show mercy, and refrain from killing as much as possible.

“Three months of rest and you’ll be fine. You’re a member of the Yang Clan, after all, so I didn’t cripple you.”

‘I hate you….’ Yang Honglie thought. However, the pain and humiliation were so intense, that at that point, he simply passed out.

“Freakish hellion!” Yang Shi shouted. “How dare you harm a child of the Yang Clan! Thousand-Kilometer Glaciating!”

Yang Shi immediately resorted to his frigid ice energy art, causing frost to spring up everywhere. Worse, he was attacking from behind Yang Qi.

It was a completely unexpected move, something that Yang Shi had clearly been planning to do from the beginning. Like the strike of an assassin, it was vicious and ruthless. Not even Yang Zhan could react in time.

This was Yang Shi’s most powerful move, Thousand-Kilometer Glaciating. By accusing Yang Qi of being a freakish hellion, he could later use the excuse that he was ridding the world of a demon or devil, not a true child of the Yang Clan.

“Qi’er!” Yang Zhan shouted, but he was too late to interfere.

Neither could the clan lords of the subsidiary branches do anything, nor the chief elders.

RUMMMBLE!

However, when the Thousand-Kilometer Glaciating hit, it didn't hurt Yang Qi at all. In fact, the energy simply shattered as surely as if it had encountered a warm spring breeze.

And then Yang Qi made his move.

Another slap.

The enormous hand of true energy sprang into being, then moved with lightning-like speed, instantly connecting with Yang Shi’s face.

The suit of ice armor he had been wearing collapsed into pieces, and he toppled head over heels off to the side. Most of his teeth flew out of his mouth before he slammed into a boulder and then slowly slumped down onto the ground.

WHOOSH!

Before Yang Shi could do anything else, Yang Qi flew through the air toward him, and then placed his foot onto his dantian region.

“You asked for it, Yang Shi. As a member of the senior generation, I honestly can't believe that you would attack me from behind like that. Are you even human?” Looking down at Yang Shi’s now toothless mouth, he said, “You’re just like Yang Honglie. A useless piece of trash.”

“Yang Qi… how did you….” Yang Shi was pinned to the ground by Yang Qi’s foot, unable to move. It was a complete humiliation. And he simply couldn’t understand how Yang Qi could be so strong. A single slap had knocked him out of the fight. And it didn’t seem like Yang Qi had even used an energy art. He had already reached the point of being able to turn ordinary actions and moves into nearly magical abilities.

“Can't figure out what's going on? You thought that because you’re in the eighth phase, you could crush me? Well, I don’t need help from anyone to crush you, not even my father. Want to usurp my father and take his place? I guess I should cripple your energy arts, that way the clan will be peaceful and stable going forward.”

With that, Yang Qi drew on his true energy and prepared to send it into Yang Shi’s sea of energy.

“Stay your hand!” someone shouted. It was like the roar of a lion, filled with boundless majesty, a sound that shook everyone so deeply that they went stiff from fear.

This was the Lion’s Roar, unleashed by the highest-ranking patriarch of the Yang Clan, Yang Xingshi, a move so powerful it could shake the soul.

Anyone with weaker energy arts than the person who unleashed that shout would have no choice but to comply with the orders they heard.

Chapter 44: The Chief Elders, Astonished

Yang Xingshi’s shout had absolutely no effect whatsoever on Yang Qi.

As soon as the sound waves entered his mind, the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth neutralized them. Despite that, Yang Qi still stopped moving, and did not cripple Yang Shi's energy arts.

He first wanted to hear what Yang Xingshi had to say.

After all, Yang Qi was still a member of the Yang Clan, and Yang Xingshi was the most powerful of the clan’s chief elders. He ranked higher than even Yang Qi’s grandfather, and therefore, it was proper to give him a bit of face.

Keeping his foot pushed down onto Yang Shi’s torso, he respectfully said, “Did you have something you wanted to say, Patriarch?”

Yang Xingshi looked at Yang Qi’s foot resting on Yang Shi’s torso, and frowned. “What were you planning to do, cripple him and then discuss the matter? He's still your uncle, you know. Is that how you treat an uncle? He attacked you from behind, but isn’t he still your senior? And you didn’t get hurt. Crippling his energy arts would be a bit excessive.”

“I didn't get hurt? That’s because I’m stronger than him. Way stronger. If I weren’t, then I would be dead right now, wouldn’t I? Would you have spoken up for me then like you’re speaking up for him right now?” There was no way Yang Qi was going to let Yang Shi off the hook. Therefore, he unleashed a biting retort onto Yang Xingshi.

At this point, the scholarly-looking Yang Xu stepped forward. Pointing his fan at Yang Qi, he angrily said, “You dirty little swine! How dare you talk back to Great Uncle like that? You're nothing but a disgrace and a rebel. In the end, you didn’t get hurt. And Yang Shi is one of the leaders in our clan, far above you in terms of seniority. Even if he did end up killing you, his punishment would come from the council of chief elders, not someone in the junior generation. What gives you the right to talk about crippling him?”

“That’s right,” Yang Zhen added. “If clan rules were violated by Yang Shi, then the council of chief elders should make the decision about what to do. It would be the same if something happened to your father; they would make the decisions for the clan in that scenario. Right now, Great Uncle is the leader of the council of chief elders, and he has the power to make all rulings and decisions. He just ordered you to release Yang Shi. Are you really going to defy him? Are you really going to go against the clan?”

One of the other chief elders frowned and said, “Yang Shi suspected you of being possessed by a demon. That’s why he attacked you. He was essentially trying to rid the world of devils. That’s not a crime, that's a contribution to society!”

“What’s that supposed to mean, Yang Wangxi?!” Yang Zhan said. “Are you saying my son is a demon?”

Yang Zhan was the clan lord, and was now a Master of Energy too. As such, his position was incredibly high. In the past, he had been forced to always concede to the council of chief elders, but now he was powerful enough to argue with them if he wanted.

As for Yang Wangxi, he was an eccentric old man in the peak of the eighth phase, who came from Yang Shi’s side of the clan. He also had it out for Yang Qi.

Yang Wangxi slowly rose to his feet. “What’s this, Yang Zhan? Do you truly dare to defy the orders of the chief elders? Don't think that just because you're a Master of Energy, you can do whatever you want. Your son is strong enough to defeat an eighth phase expert, and you're trying to get us to believe he did it on his own? He's obviously been possessed by some freakish hellion! Furthermore, why didn’t you do anything when he tried to cripple Yang Shi? You’re simply allowing him to become a monster and harm the Yang Clan?”

Turning his attention to Yang Qi, Yang Wangxi went on to say, “Back away from Yang Shi, you dirty little swine. Get on your knees and allow us to extract the demon from you and cripple your energy arts. If you don’t let us expel the monstrosity within, then don't blame us for putting you to death.”

“That’s right,” Yang Xu said. “As long as that demon is in him, he's going to keep causing disasters.”

All of a sudden, Yang Zhen made a proposal that fairly boiled with malice. “Great Uncle, considering you’ve already reached the peak of the Master of Energy level, you could probably use the hellion inside of him to create a medicinal pill that would help you break through to the Lifeseizing level.”

Yang Xingshi frowned in thought.

He had been about to point out that Yang Qi didn’t have any demon inside of him, but now he was starting to wonder if perhaps he did.

At this point, Yang Qi suddenly burst out laughing. Eyes flashing, he looked over at Yang Wangxi and said, “Don’t think that just because you’re a chief elder I'm scared to make a move on you. I’ve had enough of your nonsense. You claim I’m a freakish hellion? Fine. Say what you want. But if you think I'm just going to sit around and let you cripple me, you can forget it.”

RUMMMBLE!

Yang Qi thrust his palm out, spreading his fingers wide, causing his true energy to swirl out into the form of a net that shot in Yang Wangxi’s direction.

Shockingly, he was actually attacking one of the chief elders!

The audience immediately erupted into shouting.

“How dare you, swine!”

“You’re attacking a chief elder?!”

“Have a death wish?!”

Yang Xingshi took action immediately. Roaring like a lion, he summoned a massive vortex behind him, from within which emerged an enormous white lion made of true energy. Then, he struck out at Yang Qi.

“On the ground immediately, boy!”

“I think not,” Yang Qi replied calmly. With the wave of his hand, he sent some true energy out, creating something like a bolt of lightning.

It was the Four Seasons Swordplay, shooting through the air like a thunderbolt.

BAM!

The two blasts of true energy collided, and a massive explosion rocked the valley. The white lion shattered into bits, and Yang Xingshi staggered backward by about ten paces, crushing the stone floor of the valley with every step he took.

Yang Qi, on the other hand, didn’t even move. He simply stood there calmly, his foot still on Yang Shi.

It was immediately obvious who was more powerful than whom.

“Get over here, Yang Wangxi,” Yang Qi growled, continuing to propel the attack he had unleashed earlier toward Yang Wangxi.

Yang Wangxi’s eyes were bloodshot as he tried desperately to fight back. But Yang Qi’s command of Silk Rain of the Spring Silkworm was beyond perfection, and could be used to capture even the most powerful beasts of ancient times. How could Yang Wangxi possibly do anything to break it?

In the blink of an eye, he was wrapped up, and was dragged over to Yang Qi like a captive bug.

“What?”

“Not even Great Uncle can get the upper hand?!”

“How is that even possible? Is Yang Qi human? How can he be fighting Great Uncle?”

Moments before, several of the chief elders had been preparing to join forces to attack Yang Qi. But after what had just occurred, they were now too frightened to follow through. Yang Xingshi, the top expert in the Yang Clan, the bold and powerful fighter known as the Lion King, the man who had been famous for a hundred years, and was at the peak of the Master of Energy level, had actually been shoved backward across the battlefield by one of Yang Qi’s palm strikes.

What did that imply?

That Yang Qi was actually a Lifeseizer?

After all, only people in the Lifeseizing level should be able to do what he had just done.

Everyone who had just been about to jump into the fight suddenly began to edge backward and rein in their energy. Some people were even so shocked that they contemplated fleeing.

“Nobody move!” Yang Zhan shouted. Turning to Yang Xingshi, he said, “Great Uncle, my boy offended you. Please, I hope you can forgive him.” His words immediately served to defuse some of the tension which had built up moments ago.

It took Yang Xingshi a moment to bring his energy under control. After all, he hadn’t held back at all during the interchange with Yang Qi. And the feeling he got after the impact was definitely not that of someone from the younger generation. It had felt like exchanging blows with an enormous, demonic creature from ancient times.

He had also felt a sensation of impending death.

In that instant, he had the heart-pounding realization that this young man definitely had the capacity to kill him.

Suppressing his shock and anger, he said, “Excellent. Stupendous!” Staring at Yang Qi, he continued, “Boy, that demon inside of you is incredible. Why don’t you allow it to come out and introduce itself?”

“There really isn’t any demon inside of me,” Yang Qi said. “But if there was, I definitely wouldn’t let it out so that you could try to take control of it. Besides, perhaps I can accept being insulted by everyone in the clan, but a demon couldn’t. It would kill Yang Shi, and then do whatever else it wanted regardless of what you said.”

“Great Uncle,” Yang Zhan said, “I can guarantee that Qi’er has no demon inside of him. His strength is all due to his own hard work and good fortune.”

“Impossible!” Yang Xu shouted. “If there’s no demon inside him, then how come he's so fiendish and murderous? Great Uncle, if we can’t drive this freakish hellion away, then call one of the great sects to exorcize whatever demon or devil haunts him!”

“Have a death wish?!” Yang Qi growled, his anger spiking. Things had reached the point where Yang Qi was done holding back.

RUMBLE!

Energy erupted out of him as he waved his palm out in another attack. As for Yang Xu, he had no time to even react before he was slapped off of his feet.

Next, Yang Qi said, “And I've had enough of your mockery and ridicule, Yang Zhen! On the ground, immediately!” He let loose another slap, which Yang Zhen couldn’t dodge. Even as he was knocked off his feet, he screamed, “Monster! You're a monster!”

“I'm sick of all four of you!” Ignoring their curses, Yang Qi sent out Silk Rain of the Spring Silkworm, binding up Yang Xu, Yang Shi, Yang Zhen, and Yang Wangxi. For good measure, he added Yang Honglie in as well.

That group of five included a youngster, some clan lords, and a chief elder, and now they were hanging in mid-air, trussed up like chickens.

At this point, the unconscious Yang Honglie finally woke up, and looked around to a sight so shocking that he immediately coughed up blood.

“Top genius in the clan, Yang Honglie? That’s a joke if I've ever heard one.” Yang Qi shook his head. “Well, that’s fine. I’ll just leave you hanging there until you’re capable of acting sensibly. And as for you three, Yang Xu, Yang Shi and Yang Zhen, I want you to swear oaths that you’ll acknowledge allegiance to my father. From here on out, you need to be completely loyal to the clan. Do that, and I’ll let you go. The alternative is that I cripple your energy arts. And now you know that I can follow through with that threat if I feel like it.”

Crack!

All of a sudden, the dirt beneath Yang Qi’s feet erupted as a spike broke the surface of the ground right between his legs.

It was impossible to see who had launched the attack, but it was vicious to the extreme.

“How impudent!” Yang Qi yelled. Stomping down, he destroyed the spike, and sent a blast of energy through the ground toward its source. A moment later, Dowager Yan coughed up blood and staggered backward.

Chapter 45: Vanquishing All Five

Dowager Yan, another Master of Energy, had also launched a sneak attack on Yang Qi.

She had used her Deep Earth Energy Art, which allowed her to fuse her true energy into the ground itself, then give it a shape such as a spike, which could kill the enemy before they knew what hit them.

Unfortunately for her, Yang Qi's senses were too acute.

He had sensed the energy vibrations beneath his feet, and had stomped the spike out of existence, simultaneously shoving the true energy back toward its source in a backlash attack.

Three months ago, he had been able to kill all of the chief elders from the Chen Clan, including the Hundred-Armed Demonoid Chen Tianxiong. So what was he capable of now, three months later? During that entire three months, he had focused wholeheartedly on cultivation. His understanding of energy was at the very peak, and his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth had reached the point of perfection. He was so strong that not even a hundred demons could hurt him.

One move.

One simple move had completely defeated Dowager Yan, and even injured her.

After coughing up a mouthful of blood, she clutched her hands at her chest, as though her heart might explode at any moment.

“Why the sneak attack, Dowager Yan?” Yang Qi said, his voice laced with anger. “I didn’t kill Yang Shi and the others. Nor did I cripple anyone. I merely asked that they swear loyalty to the clan lord, thus strengthening our clan. Is there really a need for such ruthless tactics on your part?”

Yang Qi wasn’t bothering at all to be polite.

After all, Dowager Yan’s attack had been merciless; were it not for Yang Qi’s powerful defensive energy arts, he would definitely have been killed. From that, it could be seen how dead set Dowager Yan was on killing him.

And there was no way Yang Qi would be polite to someone who wanted him dead, even if that person was a senior member of the clan.

At this point, Yang Zhougong stepped in front of Yang Qi. Glaring at him, he said, “What do you think you’re going to do, Yang Qi? Don’t tell me you think you’re going to kill Dowager Yan?”

“No, I’m not going to kill her,” Yang Qi replied coldly. “But I can tell you this. If I find out anyone else is harboring malicious intentions, I'm going to run out of patience. I don't want to do anything to harm the clan. I want to restore us to glory. Father has already become a Master of Energy, and is also the clan lord. What’s so wrong about asking everyone to follow his orders?”

“Fine. What do you want, Yang Qi?” Yang Xingshi said. “What are the rules here?”

By this point, the astute Yang Xingshi could sense that Yang Qi really hadn’t been possessed. If he were, then considering the level of his cultivation base, he could have crippled or killed everyone present. Instead, he captured a few people; he had fought with propriety and restraint.

“Simple,” Yang Qi said, with a decisiveness that could sever nails and chop iron. “Our clan must remain united, with my father as its heart. Yang Xu, Yang Shi, and Yang Zhen must all give him their allegiance, and swear an oath to that effect in front of the clan shrine. Henceforth, they must focus all of their thoughts and efforts on supporting the clan as a whole, on defending it from external threats, and on upholding its honor and glory. If they do that, I’ll let them go. If not, I’ll cripple their energy arts immediately!”

“That’s it?” Yang Xingshi and the other chief elders exchanged glances, and then began to transmit a conversation amongst themselves.

A bit of time passed, then Yang Xingshi said, “If you really have no demon inside you, Yang Qi, that means you’re a consummate prodigy the likes of which only appears once every thousand years in the Rich-Lush Continent. However, in the past, your aptitudes could only be considered average. Therefore, we chief elders would be remiss not to ask some questions. How about this: can you tell us exactly what happened? Convince us to back you, and we will. We’ll even agree to let you be the next clan lord.”

Yang Zhougong nodded. “Exactly, Yang Qi. You definitely have to tell us what good fortune you came across. If it’s some consummate technique, then you have to offer it to the clan as a whole. You keep saying that you’re part of our clan, so why don’t you show it by action? Sharing with the clan is the proper thing to do.”

Yang Zhan let out a cold harrumph. “Yang Honglie acquired the royal-class energy art Violet Sunrise Divine Art, and a Violet Sunrise Pill that can provide sixty years of longevity. Why didn’t he hand those over to the clan? Well, whatever. Qi’er, you make the decision.”

“Okay, Father. The good fortune I encountered was extraordinary, to say the least. It involves a mysterious secret the likes of which could lead to the destruction of our clan if word got out. Therefore, now is not the time to reveal it publicly.”

“So, you’re saying you’re not going to tell us?” Dowager Yan said venomously. “That just proves you do have a demon inside you. Your mother was a freakish hellion, and—”

“Shut your mouth!” Yang Zhan shouted.

“What did you just say?” Yang Qi growled. Considering what Dowager Yan had just said, and how his father had reacted, numerous puzzle pieces suddenly clicked together in his mind.

He had been wondering about his mother for a long time, but Yang Zhan had always been very tight-lipped. But now, he was starting to understand some of the situation.

If information about his mother was involved, Yang Qi didn’t care at all about clan rules. Enraged, he sent true energy exploding out of him in the shape of an enormous clawed hand, like that of an eagle or a tiger.

“Tell me what you mean!” he said loudly.

“How impudent!” Yang Xingshi bellowed. Then, he and all of the other chief elders attacked at the same time.

Their energy arts joined together like a river, a host of deadly weapons and creatures that bore down murderously on Yang Qi.

“Be destroyed!” Yang Qi shouted, so loudly that even the clouds above were disturbed by the sound waves. Then, he swept his hands through the air in a ripping motion, causing innumerable images of palms to shoot out toward the river of energy arts.

Bam. Bam. Bam. Bam! Bam!!!

All of the chief elders were shoved backward, their faces draining of blood. Even Yang Xingshi staggered back more than twenty paces until his progress was halted by a tree. As of this moment, he had lost all face.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi took a step forward and made a grasping motion, causing Dowager Yan to be grabbed up as easily as a baby chick by an eagle. “Spit it out. Who was my mother? Or should I just cripple you? You think your little council of chief elders is a match for me? By the way, do you want to know why the Chen Clan’s council of chief elders never showed up? Because I killed them all.”

Yang Qi wanted to purge the clan of all opposition, and establish his might beyond the shadow of any doubt.

He was done with being vague.

“What?”

Thump.

Several of the younger clan members dropped to their knees. Others were so struck with terror that they couldn’t even react. Yang Qi had single-handedly defeated more than twenty experts from a council of chief elders?

Yang Xu, Yang Shi, and Yang Zhen did not shout or yell. They were struck mute from fear.

As for Dowager Yan, her expression was that of complete dread; she had originally assumed that if the council of chief elders all attacked together, they could defeat him. But instead, it was to her utter disbelief that not even that level of force did anything.

Yang Qi’s words were simply too astonishing. If he took out the Chen Clan’s council of chief elders, that meant that he had also killed the Hundred-Armed Demonoid Chen Tianxiong.

That meant that his cultivation base was already at the legendary Lifeseizing level.

“Talk,” Yang Qi said, not giving her any more time to deal with her shock.

“Your mother was a daemon!” Dowager Yan blurted. “You were born with the blood of daemons in you. Yang Zhan somehow stumbled into the holy land of the Demonfolk, the Hanging Mountain! That’s where he met that daemon and got that airmastery plant. If it weren’t for that, there's no way he would have become a Master of Energy so quickly!”

“My mother was a daemon?” Yang Qi shouted. “Are you feeling suicidal, Dowager Yan? Don’t think for a minute that I won’t kill you.”

“Enough, Qi’er!” Yang Zhan said, his tone somewhat bitter. “Let her go. She’s telling the truth. I’d hoped to keep the details from you until your cultivation base was higher, but we’ve passed that point now. I might as well just lay things bare. Your mother is a very important person. She’s a princess of the Demonfolk from the Hanging Mountain.”

“What?” Hand quivering, Yang Qi let go of Dowager Yan, allowing her to drop to the ground. “What's the Hanging Mountain?”

“It’s not in the Rich-Lush Continent. It’s part of another world.” Yang Zhan shook his head. “When your cultivation has reached a higher level, you’ll understand.”

“Another world?” Yang Qi was shocked, but considering how deeply focused he had been on cultivating the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, he was privy to some secrets that others were not. He knew that the Rich-Lush Continent was like a drop in the ocean compared to how many other places existed.

The very existence of his godly-class energy art itself pointed to the fact that there was a world of gods, and also a world of hell. And if the Rich-Lush Continent was tiny and insignificant, then Yanhaven was even more so.

Yang Zhan nodded. “Qi’er, when your cultivation base is high enough, you can go to the Hanging Mountain yourself. And considering that you are already much stronger than a Master of Energy, I'd say that that day isn’t too far off.”

‘The Hanging Mountain, huh?’ Yang Qi made sure to imprint the name deep in his heart.

A long moment passed in which no one spoke.

Then, Yang Qi said, “Enough is enough. Yang Xu, Yang Shi, Yang Zhen. And all of you chief elders, including you Yang Wangxi. I'm giving you one more chance to declare allegiance to my father. If you refuse, then you know what will come next.”

“I'm willing to swear allegiance,” Yang Zhen said bitterly. He was now convinced that he wasn’t a match for Yang Qi, and that if Yang Qi wanted, he could actually exterminate everyone in the clan.

“Very well then. You’re free to go.” Yang Qi waved his hand, allowing Yang Zhen to drop to the ground. Face completely expressionless, he said, “Now get on your knees and kowtow to my father. From here on out, you need to treat him the way that ministers of old would treat the emperor.”

Imperial etiquette was different from clan etiquette. In an imperial dynasty, even close relatives had to kowtow to the emperor.

Yang Zhan frowned for a moment, but then accepted the idea. After all, centralizing power would serve the interests of the clan as a whole.

“What? Not going to follow along, Yang Shi? Yang Xu? And what about you, Yang Wangxi? You might be a chief elder, but you still need to respect the clan. From now on, the position of clan lord surpasses your own. My father is like the emperor, with complete power over life and death, even that of the council of chief elders. Without rules, nothing good can be accomplished. The rules of an imperial dynasty are perfectly suited to our clan. If we’re not unified, if we allow for internal power struggles, how can we succeed in anything? Cities everywhere are struggling to found nations, and sooner or later, our Yang Clan might do the same.”

Chapter 46: I Make the Rules

“What? You want us to kowtow to Yang Zhan from here on out? Treat him with imperial etiquette? We’ve never had any rules like that before!”

The chief elders were all flabbergasted by Yang Qi’s demands.

After all, they ranked higher than Yang Zhan according to clan seniority. They were like patriarchs, or even higher, enigmatic figures who spent their time in cultivation. If they had to follow imperial etiquette, that would make them like government officials who had to show utmost respect to Yang Zhan. Not only would they have to kowtow to him, but he would also hold their lives in his hands. How could they possibly accept an arrangement like that?

“I make the rules from now on,” Yang Qi said coldly. “Refuse to comply, and have your martial arts crippled. Besides, this new arrangement will be good for the clan. Before, we were as unstable as a plate of sand. Everyone was constantly scheming and plotting to get ahead. Eventually, it would have led to the clan falling apart.”

Yang Qi knew that he couldn't back down when dealing with this group of old-timers.

If he did, things wouldn’t end well.

However, simply slaughtering them wasn’t an option. On the other hand, he had to be sure that they wouldn’t spread word of what had happened on this day. If that happened, then Yang Xu’s threat could become a reality, and some of the major sects could intervene. And Yang Qi would have a hard time coming out on top if people like that came after him. Besides, there was still the matter of him killing those disciples from the House of Spring and Autumn.

Furthermore, he didn't want his father dragged into the situation.

And that was not to mention the House of Shadowblight.

If he didn’t get this group to capitulate, they would become like termites eating away at the foundation of the clan, leading to inevitable disaster.

And thus, Yang Qi drew on all of the strength he could possibly muster to deal with the situation. As for Yang Zhan, he looked on as his son revealed how he had surpassed everyone in the clan, and nodded in satisfaction. ‘Can you see this, Greensura? Your son has become so powerful. He's growing up. Perhaps he hasn’t reached the point of being worthy among you Demonfolk, but his potential knows no bounds. He's not even twenty, and can already defeat any Master of Energy. One of these days, he's definitely going to come looking for you.’

“Yang Qi!” Yang Shi shouted furiously. “You've obviously become a freakish hellion, the vile spawn of a monster! If you’ve got what it takes, just kill everyone in the clan! None of us are going to follow your orders. You just wait. Eventually we’ll get someone to come kill you, you demon!”

“If that’s what you want, then fine.” Yang Qi could tell that Yang Shi’s animosity ran too deep, and not only would he never submit, but would definitely cause problems later. A burst of true energy suddenly erupted from Yang Qi.

Crack! Snap!

Yang Shi grunted as all his meridians exploded, and his sea of energy cracked open. Instantly, all of the frigid true energy he had inside him erupted into his body, freezing him in the blink of an eye.

Immediately, the other members of the Yang Clan began to whisper among themselves.

“Yang Shi is dead? He killed him!”

“Yang Qi caused a backlash of true energy that turned him into ice!”

“How cruel…. It seems nobody can do anything about Yang Qi now.”

“What do we do? If we fight back, he’ll kill us all. His cultivation base is so powerful that not even the chief elders can deal with him.”

Suddenly, one of the members of the younger generation stepped forward, dropped to his knees, and kowtowed to Yang Zhan.

“Clan Lord, I'm willing to comply with the new clan rules.”

This young man was one of the elite young ones in the clan. He was twenty years old, with fifth phase energy arts, and was named Yang Yang.

“Good. Very good.” Yang Qi said, nodding in approval. “Thank you for your good intentions, Yang Yang. You clearly have the interests of the clan at heart. So, you’re in the fifth phase, well on your way to the Energy Weapon level. Excellent. As a reward, I will help you advance your cultivation base a bit. That way, we can work together for the glory of the clan, our heads held high.”

Yang Qi placed his palm on the top of Yang Yang’s head, who shivered in response. He suddenly felt as though he were being burned with fire that cleansed the impurities in his body. It was as if his flesh, blood, and meridians were being bound with steel reinforcements, making them terrifyingly sturdy.

At the same time, Yang Qi sent some of his true energy into Yang Yang’s sea of energy, bolstering it, strengthening it. In that short moment, Yang Yang experienced the same benefit he would have by working hard at his cultivation for twenty or thirty years.

As soon as Yang Qi’s palm left his head, Yang Yang leapt to his feet and waved his finger, causing a stream of sword energy to fly out, carving a deep crevice in the ground.

Yang Yang burst out in exuberant laughter. “I’ve reached the sixth phase! I can form energy into weapons! That’s years of hard work, dispensed within a moment!”

In response to this development, everyone looked over at Yang Qi with complete astonishment.

Normally speaking, using one’s own vital energy to help further another’s cultivation was extremely harmful, and potentially even deadly. And yet Yang Qi had done just that in very casual fashion. It hadn’t even seemed to take any effort on his part; he'd done it as easily as spitting onto the ground.

“I'm willing to follow the new clan rules!”

“I submit, too.”

One by one, other young elites rushed out to kowtow to Yang Zhan, treating him the very same way that an emperor would be treated.

This was real power.

They were angry and unwilling, but the threat of Yang Qi, and the prospect of improving their cultivation bases, ensured that in the end, they agreed to the change in rules.

Personal interest would often trump all else. Energy arts and cultivation base lasted for a lifetime, and were the source of all possible honor, glory, and position. For those things, anyone could deal with a difficult situation. Many people would do anything to acquire wealth, and that was even more the case with energy arts and cultivation base.

“Very good,” Yang Qi said, pouring true energy into all of the young ones who had just stepped forward.

All of them immediately broke out of the fourth phase and into the fifth. That, of course, was a watershed. Reaching the Energy Eruption level meant that they could release their true energy outside of their body to use in a fight.

Everyone present was completely shaken.

Next, higher ranking members of the clan stepped forward to kneel and kowtow.

Yang Qi did not bless them with true energy; that was something he reserved for the young elites. The crafty, powerful older ones were not worth wasting vital energy on. And using the carrot and stick approach was often the best way to deal with a large group of people.

Up to this point, the chief elders still had not taken action. But now, they exchanged awkward glances.

The expressions on the faces of Yang Xingshi and Dowager Yan were extremely unsightly; to them, kowtowing to Yang Zhan was a fate worse than death.

In the end, Yang Zhan didn't want to push things too far. “Very well, the council of chief elders doesn’t need to kowtow. An ordinary salute will do.”

His words eased tensions a bit. Yang Zhougong nodded and then gave him a salute. “I'm willing to follow the new clan rules.”

He couldn’t help but look over at the frozen corpse of Yang Shi, whose energy arts had been at the same level as his own. And yet, Yang Qi had killed him as easily as slaughtering a chicken, leaving Yang Zhougong with the feeling that he had just barely escaped a similar fate.

After him, more chief elders expressed their willingness to follow the new rules.

Yang Qi looked on, very pleased with how he had forced everyone to submit by pure strength alone. Nothing compared to strength; not wealth, not position, not influence. Only by being strong could one be truly invincible.

In the end, it was only Yang Xingshi and Dowager Yan who still had not submitted. Because they were Masters of Energy, they simply couldn’t bring themselves to salute Yang Zhan as a superior.

Up to this point, they had been the true leaders of the clan; how could they so easily submit to a new leader? How could the ultimate figures in any organization suddenly agree to work for someone else?

“What,” Yang Qi said in a voice as cold as ice. “Yang Xingshi, Dowager Yan, don’t tell me you're not willing to accept a rule that can further the glory of the clan? You’re not willing to be a good example for everyone?”

Earlier, he had addressed Yang Xingshi as a patriarch, but now, he didn't show him any politeness. By now, he realized that politeness wouldn’t do any good. Strength was the only way he could force these people to submit.

And he was also willing to kill if he had to, to protect his father’s authority.

“You….” Yang Xingshi very nearly had an energy spasm in response to Yang Qi’s words. And there was nothing he could say by means of retort, especially considering the icy killing intent within Yang Qi’s eyes.

‘This kid is terrifying. He's only in the eighth phase, but he can already dominate Masters of Energy. If he reaches the ninth phase, does that mean he’ll be able to defeat invincible Lifeseizers?’ Finally, Yang Xingshi looked away from Yang Qi and saluted Yang Zhan.

“I, Yang Xingshi, offer greetings to you, Clan Lord.”

This was the first time he had submitted to another person in such a way.

“What about you, Dowager Yan?” Yang Qi said, his voice cool. Of course, everyone realized that since she was the only one left, if Yang Qi wanted to, he could kill her with impunity.

It was in this manner that true might and majesty were established.

“I’ll respect the clan rules,” Dowager Yan said, and then forced out a salute. The truth was that she was absolutely terrified of Yang Qi; when he had grabbed her moments ago, she had been powerless to fight back or flee.

“Well, that's good,” Yang Qi said. Then, he clapped his hands together once and smiled, dispelling some of the somber mood. “See, that wasn't so hard, was it? The corruption in the clan has been removed, and we've turned over a new leaf. On this day, the Yang Clan is born anew. We've centralized our power and established a new level of authority for the clan lord. By the way, Yang Xingshi and Dowager Yan, don’t harbor any ill thoughts. Soon I’ll be a Master of Energy, and then you’ll know what true power is. After all, you two still have hope of reaching the Lifeseizing level.”

His words seemed to wake Yang Xingshi and Dowager Yan up from a dream.

Dowager Yan’s face softened a bit; no amount of words or tokens of respect were more important than the marvelous Lifeseizing level. They were approaching the end of their longevity, and only had about twenty or thirty years before their energy and blood ran dry, and they died.

Therefore, they would kowtow to Yang Zhan ten thousand times, and even call him ‘daddy’ if it meant they could seize life from the heavens. Respect was almost like nothing compared to life and power.

Yang Zhan couldn't have been more pleased with how Yang Qi handled everything. As a father, there were few things that made him happier than seeing his son succeed.

“Father, shouldn’t we start the hunt? All we're waiting for is the word from you.”

“Right,” Yang Zhan said. Waving his hand solemnly, he said, “Let the autumn hunt begin!”

Chapter 47: Uniting the Clan

In response to Yang Zhan’s order, all the experts of the Yang Clan, chief elders included, looked over at Yang Qi.

The autumn hunt was a dangerous affair, and although it was possible to come out of it with great gains, it was also possible for clan members to die at the hands of the demonlings they encountered.

However, with an unrivaled expert like Yang Qi with them, they likely didn’t need to fear the demonlings as much.

Not even these beasts could survive in a fight against someone like him.

Yang Zhan knew that his son had numerous remarkable abilities at his disposal, and therefore he said, “Qi'er, how about we go into the deepest parts of the Blackcorpse Mountains to hunt for demonlings?”

“That’s fine,” Yang Qi replied. After all, he could benefit greatly from having a stockpile of demon cores when he finally finished his Hellfire Crucible, and could directly absorb them.

Demon cores were essentially collections of life force quintessence and energy arts, but in order for humans to benefit from them, they needed to be refined. Normally, they would put them into medicinal pills, or insert them into weapons, although some of the large sects and institutes would purchase demon cores, and then use secret methods to draw out their power.

In some respects, demon cores were viewed as a hard currency similar to energy convergence pills. And thus, everyone sought to kill demonlings and take them to earn profit. Locations which traded in demon cores could be found just about everywhere.

“Yang Yang. And you, Yang Tong….” Yang Qi picked out about a dozen of the elite young ones, all of whom had just made breakthroughs into the fifth phase. “Now that we’ve established some new clan rules, we need to set up some law enforcement methods. Why don’t you act as our new law enforcement team? If anyone refuses to comply with the newly established rules, then punish them with impunity. Imprisonment, beating, and execution are all accepted forms of punishment. Without rules, nothing good can be accomplished. As for me, I will act as the chief elder in charge of law enforcement.”

When the experts of the Yang Clan heard his words, their hearts went cold.

“Also, Eldest Brother and Second Brother, why don’t the two of you head the Ministry of Rites and Etiquette and the Ministry of Finance and Property respectively. That way you two can oversee all of the ceremonial rites and financial aspects of the clan.” All of this was another big blow to Yang Xingshi and Dowager Yan. Yang Qi technically had low seniority in the clan, and yet was obviously the most influential person in it. With such power at his disposal, and with the cold corpse of Yang Shi still laying there off to the side, who would dare to speak a single word of defiance?

“If any member of the clan violates any rules, or breaches etiquette, you two can decide how to punish them, and then report the matter to father. Of course, you will have the law enforcement team at your disposal to enforce the verdict. Furthermore, all wealth, troops, and other valuables that have been accumulated in the subsidiary branches will be returned to the clan headquarters. Father, I hope that you can come up with a plan for how to do that.”

The Yang Clan had more than a dozen subsidiary branches, each of which was like a small clan unto itself. Such clans would all have at least a hundred clan members, plus soldiers and servants. Anyone who gathered all of the wealth of so many clans together would have ultimate power over the lives of over ten thousand people.

After all, the people who had come to the autumn hunt were only the elite members of the branches, and numbered around two hundred people.

Yang Qi had just established a law enforcement team, as well as the Ministry of Rites and Etiquette and the Ministry of Finance and Property. Clearly, he was not pulling any punches. There was no question that he was putting all of the power of the clan into the hands of the clan lord.

As for Yang Zhan, he looked on in amazement at how decisively his son was taking matters into his own hands. He definitely didn’t seem like an eighteen-year-old.

Looking around, Yang Qi could see that many of the elites of the clan were looking very discouraged, and even outraged, although none of them dared to speak up. Obviously, they thought that he was already abusing his power.

After all, he had just declared his intention to seize all of the wealth in the clan. The fact that they weren’t rioting was actually admirable.

“Let it be known,” he said, “that the Ministry of Rites and Etiquette and the Ministry of Finance and Property have not been established to punish the clan.

“Those ministries are actually a gift to all members of the clan. Any clan member under thirty has a great opportunity during the autumn hunt. Whoever brings back the most demon cores will be given a month of cultivation time using the clan’s Chiliocosm Mirror, and will also receive an influx of true energy from me.”

Yang Qi’s words immediately caused an uproar.

“What? Chiliocosm Mirror? Isn’t that a legendary treasure from the Chen Clan?” Even Yang Xingshi was bowled over. Many of the chief elders were visibly excited; with cultivation bases like theirs, they had a much deeper understanding of life than the young ones, and knew exactly how amazing the Chiliocosm Mirror was. It could completely remove the very real chance of experiencing dangerous cultivation deviation.

One of the reasons that the cultivation of energy arts was such a slow process was that extreme caution had to be exercised. The slightest energy spasm could end a person’s life, and therefore, detailed study of a new technique was required before one could begin to cultivate it. Sometimes that process took ten years. Only when one was absolutely familiar and comfortable with a technique could the true cultivation and training begin.

Some cruel individuals would force others to practice a form of cultivation and watch to see if they experienced cultivation deviation. However, that was a dao of devils that was prohibited in the Rich-Lush Continent.

Anyone who was found to be performing human experiments would be condemned by both the Sage Ancestor Dynasty and the four institutes.

“Yes, the Chiliocosm Mirror. I have it right here.” Yang Zhan pulled out the mirror, which had been crafted from Nine Heavens godjade. The mere sight of that mirror caused all eyes present to widen.

One of the chief elders even gasped. “If I’d had that mirror years ago, my cultivation would have progressed much more smoothly.”

By this point, everyone was rolling up their sleeves in anticipation of beginning the hunt. The chance to cultivate with the Chiliocosm Mirror was just too enticing.

“Very well, let’s head into the mountains.”

With that, the group of roughly two hundred Yang Clan experts broke up into teams and began to head into the depths of the Blackcorpse Mountains, dashing through the trees with more agility than a troupe of monkeys.

Whatever demonlings they encountered, they killed; it was like an armageddon had been unleashed on the mountains.

As for Yang Qi, he floated up into the air and watched the clan members spreading out into the forest. He didn’t participate in the fighting, but rather, oversaw from a high vantage point. That way, if any of the young clan members encountered a particularly fierce demonling, he could interfere with a blast of sword energy.

After that happened a few dozen times, the Yang Clan experts were coming to view him as some sort of god or spirit.

At one point, Dowager Yan sat down on a tree to rest, having just dispatched a seventh phase demonling with her dragon-headed walking stick. Looking up at Yang Qi floating in the air high above the forest, she couldn’t help but sigh. “What do you think Yang Xingshi? Is there really no way to deal with that little punk Yang Qi?”

Masters of Energy could normally speed through the air as though flying.

But to do what Yang Qi was so calmly doing, to hover indefinitely, was simply unheard of. His true energy was clearly at least ten times abundant as theirs, or maybe even a hundred times.

Even more shocking, Yang Qi could use his true energy to attack enemies ten thousand paces away.

Currently, a group of young clan members on the front lines had encountered a particularly fierce demonling, an enormous boar that was several times larger than an ordinary ox. It was completely covered in fire, and could even breathe flame.

“Not good!” someone shouted. “That’s an eighth phase demonling, a redflame fireboar!”

Redflame fireboars were a rare type of demonling that normally lived in lava pits in the depths of the earth. Because they naturally absorbed the quintessence of fire that existed in their habitat, they were perfect for people who cultivated fire-type true energy.

After receiving some nasty burns, the young clan members began to retreat. One of them was nearly killed by a sea of flames.

At that point, Yang Qi, who was fully one hundred thousand paces away, flicked his finger, sending a stream of sword energy shooting out. In the blink of an eye, it reached the beast and wrapped it up until it couldn’t move.

“What?” Yang Xingshi blurted, his eyes nearly popping out of his skull.

Off to the side, Dowager Yan felt like she was about to have a heart attack.

“Dowager Yan, how far can you shoot your true energy?” he asked.

Sounding dazed, she replied, “If I go all out, I could maybe shoot it eight thousand paces. After that, it becomes so weak it couldn’t hurt a fly, and eventually just fades away.”

When it came to the range of true energy, most people could achieve a range of a hundred paces. Top experts could possibly reach a thousand, and true Masters of Energy could unleash it even further.

But Yang Qi had just killed an eighth phase demonling that was a hundred thousand paces away. Not even a top expert like Yang Xingshi could even dream of doing something like that.

“And he’s only in the eighth phase.” Yang Xingshi seemed both pleased and angered at the same time. “He’s going to be in the ninth phase soon. How powerful will he be then?”

“You’re right, he’s only eighth phase….” Dowager Yan shivered. “He’s going to be completely terrifying when he's a Master of Energy.”

“At the moment, he's already invincible within the Energy Arts level. After he breaks through, I'm afraid not even a Lifeseizer could stop him. Is that a good thing, or a bad thing?”

At this point, Dowager Yan resorted to projecting her voice by means of a special energy art. “He restructured the clan and demoted the council of chief elders. He’s got some ruthless ambitions…. He's a daemon just like his mother. He's definitely going to bring disaster to the clan.”

All of a sudden, a voice spoke into her ears, rumbling like thunder, accompanied by a flow of true energy that caused her to cough up a mouthful of blood.

“Hmph. Ruthless ambitions? Bring disaster to the clan?” High up in the air, Yang Qi was looking down at her. “Dowager Yan, I know you still haven’t accepted your fate. But don't forget that I'm watching you. I'm watching every little move you make. And your life is in my hands.”

Yang Qi had actually heard the words she had transmitted to Yang Xingshi, and then used his own energy arts to transmit a booming message into their ears. None of the other clan members heard his words. Only Yang Xingshi and Dowager Yan, and both of them were shaken to the core.

“The clan hunt is a grand occasion, so I'm not going to do anything to you now. But if you disturb the unity of the clan, then when the hunt is over, I’ll have the law enforcement team arrest you!”

Chapter 48: Aunt Susu

The sight of Dowager Yan coughing up blood because of Yang Qi’s energy art transmission was a complete shock to Yang Xingshi. At long last he was truly starting to realize that he was on the losing side; having been a patriarch of the Yang Clan for more than a hundred years, he could see how truly powerful Yang Qi was.

“That was a private conversation, Yang Qi! Don’t kill her!”

“I’ll kill her if I have to. Do you submit, Dowager Yan? Answer the question.”

“I submit! I submit!” Dowager Yan couldn’t have been more terrified. She knew that if she refused to back down, she would end up dead. “I’ll respect the clan rules from now on.”

Yang Qi let out a cold harrumph. “Well, that’s good. Let’s hope you keep your word. Everything I'm doing is for the benefit of our clan. If I notice any errant behavior on your part, or if I find out that you’ve leaked information about me to the big sects, then I won’t be as nice as I was today. It won’t be long now before all of the vassal states in the Rich-Lush Continent rise up, and war engulfs the lands. If the Yang Clan isn’t truly united when that happens, we’ll get wiped out.”

“Yes, of course….” Yang Xingshi said, nodding repeatedly. As of this point he was completely cowed by Yang Qi’s strength.

As Yang Qi’s voice faded away, Dowager Yan and Yang Xingshi looked up at him drifting through the sky above, and felt completely powerless.

As for Yang Zhan, he was aware of what had just occurred, but didn’t interfere.

The truth was that, as a Master of Energy, Yang Zhan could easily crush anyone in the clan except for Yang Xingshi and Dowager Yan. Those two had been Masters of Energy for many years, and had considerable influence. If they really wanted to try to overthrow him, the result would be a complete bloodbath.

Obviously, Yang Qi’s seemingly villainous behavior was all for the good of his father.

The clan’s autumn hunt proceeded without a hitch. Yang Qi was always there to interfere if the demonlings that appeared were too vicious, which left a deep impression on the hearts of all clan members.

Before, many of them had truly believed that Yang Qi was possessed by a demon, but now it didn’t seem likely. Possessed individuals would act with crazed insanity, but Yang Qi was cool, reasonable, and in complete control.

As the hunt proceeded, Yang Qi slowly solidified his position as the top genius and number one expert in the clan.

It lasted for three days, and the more than two hundred elite clan members completely dominated everything that got in their path in the Blackcorpse Mountains. Innumerable demonlings lost their lives, and a vast quantity of demon cores were harvested.

At one point, a thirty-year-old young man respectfully approached Yang Qi and said, “Elder Brother Qi, the forest gets particularly dense up ahead, in the true depths of the Blackcorpse Mountains. That’s where the corpse clans lurk, the supposed location of a spectacular battle in ancient times. Eventually, the corpses absorbed enough of the baleful energy of heaven and earth to become demon-spirits. The cores of these corpses are even more precious than normal demon cores. Why don’t we take the hunt there?”

As a matter of fact, many of the younger ones wanted to go into the ultimate depths of the mountains.

Yang Qi was currently standing on a cliff, looking into the pitch-black depths of the mountains, where black energy pulsed in such a fashion that it seemed like he was looking at a graveyard.

That graveyard of black mountains stretched out as far as the eye could see, leading to the true depths of the Blackcorpse Mountains.

As for that war in ancient times, it was impossible to say how many corpses it resulted in. From what Yang Qi could see, those mountains were filled with flickers of motion that seemed to be zombies. There were also numerous auras that even he felt were dangerous to the extreme.

He shook his head.

“Let’s not,” he said. “We’ve already killed enough demonlings to get millions upon millions of energy convergence pills. And the battle experience has been incredible. The battlefield in the depths of the Blackcorpse Mountains is just too mysterious and dangerous. I'm fairly certain there are thousand-year-old corpse kings there; one of those things could wipe out our entire clan if we tangled with it.”

The legendary, terrifying thousand-year-old corpse king was a demonic creature that was even more powerful than a Master of Energy.

Not even Yang Qi was confident in being able to defeat a being like that. He knew that he could crush anyone in the Energy Arts level, but when it came to entities higher than that, he wasn't sure.

The difference between a Lifeseizer and a Master of Energy was like the difference between the clouds and the mud beneath them.

Suddenly, a dazzling beam of light appeared, piercing through the night sky toward Yang Zhan.

With it came pulses of sword energy, and in fact, Yang Qi could even see a sword within the light.

“Watch out, Father!” he shouted, preparing to leap forward to intercept the sword.

“It's fine, Qi’er. That's your aunt's flying sword transmission art. Simply miraculous….” Leaping into motion, Yang Zhan reached out toward the descending sword, attached to which was a letter.

As soon as he plucked the letter off the sword, the sword apparently detected it. Spinning in place, it erupted with sparks and then shot off into the night.

“Flying sword transmission art? Legendary!”

Many of the other elites in the clan recognized what was happening.

Actually, one of the main reasons Yang Zhan had been able to secure the position of clan lord was because of Yang Qi’s aunt, Yang Susu, who was now a member of the Demi-Immortal Institute.

Clearly, this flying sword transmission art was her handiwork. Although Yang Qi was not capable of such a feat, he could tell that the most powerful aspect of it was the sword itself. It was a powerful, divine weapon that had already developed a spirit. In fact, if one considered it to be a demon, it would be a sword demon.

‘I wonder how Aunt Susu’s studies are going at the Demi-Immortal Institute.’ Yang Qi thought back again to the little girl who had fed him his meals when he was a child.

Many of the chief elders who didn't approve of Yang Zhan noticed the arrival of the sword, and looked on reticently.

After all, although they all recognized Yang Qi as being incredibly powerful, not even he could compare to Yang Susu.

And that was because Yang Susu was backed by the top institute in the lands. The Demi-Immortal Institute was a legendary holy place in the Rich-Lush Continent. When people talked about it, they would often refer to it as ‘that colossal monster of an organization’.

Yang Zhan looked at the message for a moment, and then his eyes lit up. “Good news, Qi’er. It's indeed a message from your aunt. She secured a spot for you at the Demi-Immortal Institute! She wants you to head over there to study.” With that, he handed the message over to Yang Qi.

“What?” Yang Qi said, taking the message, the handwriting of which was definitely his aunt’s. Apparently, she had performed some meritorious service for the institute, and was allowed to select her own reward. She had asked for approval to allow a young one from her clan to become a member, and her request had been granted.

All that was required was to personally take the message and report in to the institute.

It was both a great honor and an opportunity. Even Yang Xingshi or Dowager Yan felt jealous. On the other hand, all of their previous dissatisfaction with Yang Qi was now gone. He was going to be joining the Demi-Immortal Institute, which meant that no one had any hope of fighting him. And no excuse about ‘exorcising demons or devils’ would help.

The message from Yang Susu also contained some information about the House of Shadowblight.

She had used her position in the Demi-Immortal Institute to issue a warning to them, instructing that they leave the Yang Clan alone. That had put an end to the matter; the House of Shadowblight was simply too afraid of the Demi-Immortal Institute to do anything out in the open.

It also explained why the House of Shadowblight had been so silent in the past several months.

‘The Demi-Immortal Institute?’ Yang Qi thought, his heart already pounding with anticipation.

Although he had assumed a leadership role within the clan, that just made him a big fish in a very, very small pond. In contrast, the Demi-Immortal Institute was like an ocean, and was truly a place one could be proud to dominate.

Considering it was the number one institute in all the lands, one could only imagine what crouching tigers and hidden dragons could be found there, and what knowledge was there waiting to be acquired.

Yang Qi knew that although his cultivation of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth gave him extraordinary power, if he remained in isolation in this backwater part of the world, he could end up having major problems later. Therefore, having contact with other experts in the world at large would be very beneficial.

The Demi-Immortal Institute didn’t just have Lifeseizers, they had people even higher than that. In fact, Yang Qi wasn't sure what to call the level after Lifeseizing.

Another factor to consider was that if he joined the Demi-Immortal Institute, then the Yang Clan’s position would become even more stable.

That much could be seen from how Yang Susu’s position had helped him survive the disaster of the Latent Dragon Pill incident.

All of a sudden, a name that was branded into his heart and mind suddenly reared its head.

“Yun Hailan is in the Demi-Immortal Institute.”

Her deception had nearly resulted in his death, and he knew that she was a deadly, venomous foe. Now, the fact that she was in the Demi-Immortal Institute didn’t matter as much. Considering he would soon be in the same place, it would make it much easier to exact the revenge he sought.

She had very nearly brought about the destruction of his entire clan.

If it weren’t for that lightning strike, Yang Qi would currently be a cripple, and Yang Zhan would not be the clan lord. His entire immediate family would have suffered heaps of humiliation.

Pushing these thoughts to the back of his mind, he said, “Well, Father, why don’t we head home? Let’s get clan affairs in order, including all the ceremonial rites and financial aspects. Once all of the top experts have been moved to the main headquarters, and everything is in order, I’ll report in to the Demi-Immortal Institute.”

“Very well,” Yang Zhan said. Raising his voice, he called out, “Members of the Yang Clan, the time has come to go home. We have important matters to discuss in Yanhaven.”

The clan members regrouped, organized their loot, and then began to head back.

Before, people had given respect to Yang Qi because of his profound energy arts, but now, they did so because he was a student of the Demi-Immortal Institute. His future prospects were now boundless.

To the country bumpkins that the Yang Clan were, even an insignificant freshman student from the Demi-Immortal Institute was a top expert.

All the clans in Yanhaven were bumpkins, and the Yang Clan were nouveau riche among bumpkins.

Two days later, all of the experts of the Yang Clan were in Yanhaven, gathered in the meeting hall of the clan headquarters.

This forum was a much more solemn and important one than the previous one.

Yang Qi oversaw the affair, and Yang Zhan issued order after order. No one refused to comply. After all the orders were given, the forum ended, and the clan experts went out to gather all the wealth and manpower in the clan to be returned to Yang Zhan’s control.

Some of the chief elders even agreed to take up residence in the mansion in Yanhaven.

After the forum was over and everyone went about their tasks, the mansion quieted down.

“Father,” Yang Qi said, “the time has come for me to report in to the Demi-Immortal Institute. However, I'm still worried that Yang Xingshi and Dowager Yan might cause problems after I leave. We need to make sure you’re strong enough to keep them in line. I’ll help you, Father. Let's push your power to the next level.”

Chapter 49: Passing Energy to Father

To hunt tigers, one must have the help of a brother. To fight wars, one must have the help of an army of fathers and sons.

Yang Qi was very familiar with that old adage.

If he just left for the Demi-Immortal Institute, and didn’t leave someone powerful behind to keep charge, chaos would ensue. Therefore, he would pass some of his energy to his father, and also improve his brothers’ cultivation bases. Only in that way could he rest at ease in his studies, and pursue his revenge on Yun Hailan.

At the moment, he had no idea how she and Song Haishan were progressing in their cultivation. However, he was confident that they weren’t a match for him. Their only advantage was their backing, and the fact that she had presumably consumed the Latent Dragon Pill, and advanced by leaps and bounds.

The mere thought of his potential revenge on Yun Hailan caused Yang Qi’s heart to itch with the desire to get to the Demi-Immortal Institute as quickly as possible.

He also couldn’t wait to see the look on her face when she found out how powerful he was. And Song Haishan’s reaction would surely be similar.

‘Song Haishan. Yun Hailan. I'm going to make the both of you wish you could be dead.’

In a private chamber in the Yang Clan, Yang Qi, Yang Zhan, Yang Hualong and Yang Yunchong sat in the east, west, south and north corners of the room.

“Third Brother,” Yang Yunchong said, “won't it adversely affect you to transmit your energy to us? You’re at the peak of the eighth phase, just on the verge of becoming a Master of Energy. If it's going to harm you to do this, then don’t.”

Yang Qi shook his head. “It's fine. My life force is quite vigorous. Even if I give up some true energy, I can get it back soon enough. What I'm going to do this time is use an exceptionally powerful divine ability to cleanse you and strengthen your meridians and seas of energy. You should become ten times tougher than before, allowing your cultivation base to advance rapidly. In the future, you shouldn’t get stuck in any bottlenecks, either. Father, your cultivation base is the highest, and you have the best control over your true energy. I’ll start with you.”

“Okay.” Yang Zhan knew that Yang Qi had many mysterious and unfathomable aspects. Although he didn't know exactly what he planned to do, he was curious about what ability he would use to strengthen his meridians and improve his sea of energy.

“Infernal Deity Boneflame: Hellfire Crucible!”

Rising to his feet, Yang Qi pulsed with boundless true energy as power equivalent to ten ancient megamammoths erupted out of him.

The chamber they were in seemed to separate from the world around them. And Yang Qi was like the god of that realm, his black hair whipping about as his true energy took the shape of an illusory crucible, as well as other hellish images.

The howling of depraved, fallen gods soon echoed out from the crucible.

He still couldn’t use the full power of the Hellfire Crucible, and wouldn’t be able to even in the Master of Energy level. However, even the illusory version could give birth to true energy flames that could temper the physical body.

With the flick of a finger, he sent out a tongue of flame that contained infinite variations, which then took the shape of a magical pendant that entered Yang Zhan’s forehead.

Yang Zhan watched the process, his eyes flickering with fear; sometimes he felt like this son of his wasn’t even human, but rather some sort of demon or devil. Whatever he was, he was some higher form of life, perhaps even a god, something that didn’t originate from this world.

‘What technique is this?’ he thought. ‘It definitely surpasses even imperial-class energy arts! When I was in the Hanging Mountain, I saw some of the Demonfolk patriarchs who cultivated imperial-class arts, and I even encountered some entities who possessed saintly-class arts. Although they were stronger than Qi’er is now, he surpasses them in terms of how astonishing he is….’

It would almost have been impossible for Yang Zhan to be more shocked than he was. However, he was still very happy for his son.

Whizz!

As the flame entered him, he felt his meridians ignite. As a Master of Energy, he had a profound understanding of energy, and thus cooperated with the flow of the flame, allowing it to pass through all of his meridians.

As that happened, impurities within him that he hadn’t even been aware of were burned away. Pulses of black smoke began to rise up from the top of his head, and noxious filth began to ooze out of his pores.

As his blood pumped through his veins, it began to take on an aura like that of a god-spirit, and his meridians grew stronger. His skin grew tougher, his bones and tendons stronger. Every part of his body grew more closely connected, and if he closed his eyes and cast his senses inwardly, everything seemed to be glowing.

He could even hear his marrow bubbling.

Eventually, Yang Qi’s true energy reached his father’s sea of energy. When it did, Yang Qi saw something very unusual.

“Huh? What's that?”

It was a green medicinal energy that looked almost like a plant.

It had nine leaves, each of which had a different shape. One was circular, another was elliptical, and so on. Some even had serrated edges. Just like the nine sons of the dragon, each one was unique.

The plant was simply floating there, and resisted any attempts to be absorbed by Yang Zhan’s sea of energy.

“Father, is this the airmastery plant you consumed in the past?” Yang Qi asked, shocked.

“That’s right.” Yang Zhan smiled wryly. “Airmastery plants are a divine herb from the distant past, with incredible medicinal properties. Mortals who consumed them would be able to float up into the air. Even though I consumed it years ago, the medicinal energy still exists in the depths of my sea of energy. Even after becoming a Master of Energy, I'm not able to completely absorb it.”

“Oh? It's that strong? Well, let’s see if I can help you absorb it….” Growling, Yang Qi sent his true energy out in even more explosive fashion, drawing on the full power of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.

Instantly, the airmastery plant sent back a surge of overwhelming force. However, when it encountered Yang Qi’s energy, it dissolved, causing a powerful medicinal energy to begin to ooze out of Yang Zhan. As it did, it took heaps of noxious filth with it.

At long last, the airmastery plant which he had been unable to absorb even after decades, was melting away.

It was a divine herb from the distant past that most ordinary people wouldn’t be able to absorb even after a lifetime of trying. Without Yang Qi’s help, it probably would have remained inside of Yang Zhan until he died, after which it would have absorbed his corpse for nutrients.

But now, it was becoming a source of power for him.

The airmastery plant dissolved, turning into true energy that filled Yang Zhan with a sensation of lightness and airiness, making him feel almost like an immortal. In fact, if he drew upon that power, he would be able to float up into the air.

It truly was the power to master the qualities of air.

The power of the plant flowed through him, becoming a part of his own true energy, and instantly pushing his cultivation forward by leaps and bounds. Because of the true energy of the airmastery plant, Yang Zhan’s own true energy capacity increased by four or five times.

Thankfully, Yang Qi had helped remold his meridians, otherwise his energy would likely have exploded.

“Very well,” Yang Qi said with a smile, retracting his energy. He could sense that after absorbing the airmastery plant, his father had benefited so significantly that not even Yang Xingshi and Dowager Yan working together would be a match for him.

He was now quicker and more agile, and as fast as a ghost. He would be able to dispatch enemies within the blink of an eye, and should be stronger than even top experts in the same cultivation level as himself.

Yang Zhan was now in the very peak of the Master of Energy level, with a longer lifespan than before; he was at the very peak of life.

Yang Zhan couldn’t help but laugh heartily. “I'm afraid not even Yan Gufeng could fight me. He might have that strange thumb-ring of his that stores true energy, but he still couldn’t match up to me.”

Not only was Yang Zhan’s true energy vigorous to the extreme, in terms of quality, it surpassed any ordinary Master of Energy.

“Okay, Father, keep working on your Four Seasons Swordplay. You have to work on getting enlightenment to reach the Lifeseizing level. If you can seize boundless life from the heavens, then you can truly live forever. And now I’ll give some true energy to you, Eldest Brother and Second Brother.”

Reaching out, he placed a palm onto the back of both Yang Yunchong and Yang Hualong. Instantly, their meridians began to improve as Yang Qi imparted the infinite variations of his own energy to them.

The two brothers shivered, and their muscles and bones spasmed, causing rumbling sounds within them that resembled steel bands slamming against each other.

Thanks to the boundless true energy improving their cultivation bases, Yang Hualong suddenly achieved another breakthrough, and stepped into the seventh phase, the Energy Manifestation level.

As for Yang Yunchong, he pushed his way to the peak of the seventh phase, right on the brink of a breakthrough to the eighth.

The two brothers were now as powerful as many of the lords of the subsidiary branches.

Seven days and seven nights went by.

Father and sons remained in seclusion the entire time as Yang Qi explained various martial practices to them. As they were tempered and purified, their might increased, and they gained the dignity of gods.

As for Yang Qi, the constant flow of energy pushed an eleventh particle within him closer to awakening, inching him even closer to the Master of Energy level.

On the morning of the eighth day, the process was over. Yang Zhan had completely transformed, and was now more powerful and dignified than ever.

Yang Yunchong and Yang Hualong had also improved significantly, and had made major improvements with their Four Seasons Swordplay. They could perform Silk Rain of the Spring Silkworm and had incredible control over their sword energy.

Yang Qi was now confident in being able to leave. Unless a Lifeseizer suddenly showed up, the clan would be safe.

And thankfully, no such expert would deign to cast eyes on the countryside city of Yanhaven with its population of bumpkins.

Chapter 50: Yun Zhonglong

During the seven days that had passed, the troops and wealth of the subsidiary branches had already been consolidated by the chief elders. After all the details were handled, Yang Zhan called a formal meeting with them, along with Yang Qi and his brothers.

One goal was to see how sincere the chief elders were in their support of Yang Zhan as clan lord.

It was a frosty autumn morning, and the ground was already white with ice, with scattered leaves blowing here and there that the clan servants were working hard to clear.

All of the servants in the mansion seemed to be ruddy-faced and in high spirits.

Because of the energy convergence pills they received as salary, all of them had strong cultivation foundations. Already, the clan was rebuilding its strength and power.

As soon as the more than twenty chief elders caught sight of Yang Zhan, they were deeply shaken. Each and every one of them could sense how much more powerful he was than before.

That was especially true of Yang Xingshi and Dowager Yan.

Being Masters of Energy, both of them were certain of what had occurred.

Yang Zhan’s face fairly shone, and his eyes sparkled like the starry sky. It seemed like the wave of his hand would be sufficient to allow him to fly into the air and leave the world they resided in.

He was as sturdy and intimidating as Mount Tai, but at the same time, seemed as light as air, and capable of moving at such speed that he could vanish and reappear anywhere in the blink of an eye.

Shooting to his feet, Yang Xingshi said, “Yang Zhan? Did you fully absorb that airmastery plant that was in you?”

“Yes. I finally did, with Qi’er’s help.” Yang Zhan couldn’t hold back from laughing heartily. He almost seemed like a king now, and it immediately caused them all to bow their heads in deference. Even Dowager Yan felt like she was suffocating just by looking at him.

As of this moment, she realized that she was a match for neither Yang Qi nor Yang Zhan.

“My cultivation base and energy arts are now four or five times beyond what they were in the past,” Yang Zhan continued, “and the true energy of the airmastery plant now flows through me.” Smiling, he suddenly moved with such incredible speed that no one saw anything more than a blur. A moment later, he was back in his seat. However, everyone could now see that his palm print had been embedded into a huge tree several thousand paces away.

In a mere breath of time, he had moved a huge distance, and returned. What level of speed was that? And it was not an energy art, it was just the speed he was currently capable of.

In terms of his fleshly body, he was now past the Master of Energy level, all thanks to the airmastery plant. It was the same with his lifespan.

Most Masters of Energy would die of natural causes after two hundred years or so, but he could definitely live for much longer.

“Four or five times…?” Yang Xingshi murmured, swallowing hard and not daring to say anything further. He now fully realized that he couldn’t defeat Yang Zhan even if he teamed up with Dowager Yan.

Of course, thanks to the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, Yang Qi was actually ten times beyond Yang Zhan in those regards.

Many of the chief elders simply bowed their heads even more deeply. The son was invincible, and the father had advanced by leaps and bounds. The senior members of the Yang Clan were now pushed into a corner, and could do absolutely nothing about it.

Given some time, Yang Zhan’s control over the clan would definitely be like that of an emperor.

At this point, Yang Qi rose to his feet. “Father. Eldest Brother. Second Brother. Now that clan affairs are in order, the time has come for me to go to the Demi-Immortal Institute. Please, be careful of the city magistrate.”

“I’ll find some time to go put him in his place,” Yang Zhan said. “After doing so, I’ll make sure all the clans in Yanhaven know how powerful we are, and that they have no choice but to submit to our oversight.”

Yang Qi nodded. “Well then, I’ll take my leave.”

“Why don't you take something with you to help you in your studies? How about the Chiliocosm Mirror?”

“There’s no need,” Yang Qi replied with the shake of his head. “The technique I cultivate won't benefit from it.” He had actually attempted to cultivate the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth with the Chiliocosm Mirror, but for some reason, the mirror didn’t work with it. Apparently, the technique was simply too powerful for the magical elements of the mirror to handle.

“Farewell, Father.”

“Have a safe journey. Keep track of the map and don’t get lost. You’ll have to cross nearly a third of the continent to get to the Demi-Immortal Institute, a journey of tens upon tens of thousands of kilometers, through hundreds of cities. Make sure to bring plenty of energy convergence pills. And when you get to the institute, don't show off. Keep your true powers hidden.”

At that point, Yang Qi flew into motion, flitting away like a bird into the clouds.

That was something that Masters of Energy normally couldn’t do. For example, although Yang Zhan could now float in the air, that didn’t mean he could fly into the clouds like a bird.

‘With an outstanding person like that in our clan, I wonder what will happen when he reaches the Demi-Immortal Institute. Will he bring even more glory to us?’ That was what all of the chief elders were thinking. After all, no matter how shocking of a person Yang Qi was in Yanhaven, the experts in the mighty institute were as numerous as the clouds in the sky.

Therefore, it was hard to predict how Yang Qi would rank, or how he would progress.

Hopefully, he would reach the Lifeseizing level; if he did, all of the chief elders would benefit from that glory.

Yang Zhan now had two family members in the Demi-Immortal Institute, and a powerful cultivation base of his own. His power as the clan lord would only continue to grow more stable.

“Clan Lord! Bad news just came in!”

Suddenly, one of the clan's top experts rushed in and knelt in front of Yang Zhan. This was one of the individuals who had been sent to collect wealth from one of the subsidiary branches.

“What happened?” Yang Zhan said, his expression flickering. “What’s got you so flustered?”

“The State of Yun has started expanding. War broke out between them and Zhaoluforth, and therefore, we weren’t able to get in to access our wealth and troops. According to the news we came across, the experts from the State of Yun have already put the city magistrate of Zhaoluforth to death, and captured the city. Worse, our subsidiary branch there has already become part of the State of Yun!”

“What? Yundale-by-the-Sea wasn’t like this before, was it? They wiped out Zhaoluforth? The city magistrate there was a Master of Energy! The number of top experts under his command was like the clouds in the sky. And they had plenty of connections to big sects, like the House of Jade Dew. I can’t believe that they were defeated, just like that!”

Yang Zhan wasn’t the only one to react with shock. The more than twenty chief elders were also completely taken aback.

Yang Xingshi was so surprised that he rose to his feet. “Yundale-by-the-Sea is its own nation now,” he said, “the State of Yun. And former City Magistrate Yun Zhonglong is now calling himself a king. The Great King of Yun.”

“Yes,” Yang Zhan replied, “but who could have guessed that they would become so aggressive so quickly? How did they get so many soldiers and expert fighters? Did Yun Zhonglong actually join the battle himself, and kill Zhaoluforth’s city magistrate on his own?”

“No, Clan Lord. The State of Yun has a mysterious expert working for them, a masked figure who uses the energy arts of the Sea King. Supposedly, he's not even human, but rather, one of the people of the sea! In the battle for Zhaoluforth, there were quite a few experts present who wore very strange armor, people who are rumored to be Seafolk.”

Yang Zhan’s expression flickered dramatically in response to the news. “Yundale-by-the-Sea is in league with the Seafolk? Not good.”

The beings who populated the sea were usually called Seafolk. They built cities on the seafloor, and in most ways were like other humans. However, they breathed with gills instead of lungs, which made it as difficult for them to go on land as it was for ordinary humans to enter the depths of the water. When it came to affairs on the land, they normally minded their own business. But now, they had joined a war with dwellers of the land, which was very suspicious.

Of course, one of the four big institutes in the Rich-Lush Continent was the Sea God Institute, which was just as famous as the Demi-Immortal and True Dragon Institutes.

Yundale-by-the-Sea was actually a coastal city, and was the home of Princess Yun Hailan, who was the daughter of Yun Zhonglong.

Yun Zhonglong was something of a legend. He had reached the Master of Energy level long ago, and had married a Seafolk princess. His wife had eventually given birth to Yun Hailan as well as several doughty sons.

And now, they had gone to war to expand their territory, and were joined by warriors from the Seafolk. If that war reached Yanhaven, then the Yang Clan could be facing a big disaster.

“Clan Lord,” one of the chief elders said, “Zhaoluforth has already fallen, and the flames of war are heading in our direction. We need to be prepared for when it comes.” This chief elder had bossed Yang Zhan around in the past, but as of now, he was treating him with the newfound respect.

Suddenly, everything clicked for Yang Zhan. ‘Well done, Yundale-by-the-Sea. Yun Zhonglong's daughter seduced Qi’er and tricked him into stealing that Latent Dragon Pill. As it turns out, they were planning to make a move on Yanhaven all along. Supposedly, that Latent Dragon Pill was concocted using the blood of a dragon. When an ordinary person uses it, it increases their life force and strength, and completely transforms their body. It also imparts some of the blood of a dragon into whoever consumes it. However, it would be different for someone who has the blood of a sea god in them. A person like that would have a rapid advancement in energy arts. Yun Hailan has the blood of a sea god in her, and if it's incited, the results will be astonishing.’

“Muster our soldiers immediately!” Yang Xingshi shouted. “And—” Suddenly, he stopped talking. Apparently remembering his standing in the clan, he looked at Yang Zhan and said, “Clan Lord, what do we do now?”

Yang Zhan looked back at him with a glint of praise in his eyes. Strangely, Yang Xingshi didn’t seem offended at all by that.

“Muster the experts. And have all of the subsidiary branches retreat to Yanhaven. Thankfully, we exterminated the Chen Clan, which gives us an extra mansion in town. It should be large enough to hold the influx of people coming.”

In response to Yang Zhan’s orders, everyone in the clan headquarters burst into action.

Chapter 51: Young Man in Blue

WHOOSH!

A figure descended from above, a young man, seemingly seventeen or eighteen years old. It was none other than Yang Qi. After flying for several hundred kilometers out of Yanhaven territory, he dropped to the ground to proceed toward the Demi-Immortal Institute on foot.

There were roads and paths crisscrossing the land in all directions, as well as villages, cities, and rivers. The terrain featured both vast plains and sprawling mountain ranges.

Yang Qi had a map in his robe that he would occasionally check before continuing on his way.

The path to the Demi-Immortal Institute was a long one, and even with the incredible speed he was capable of, was not the type that could be made in only a day or two. This was the longest journey Yang Qi had ever taken in his entire life.

It was all very novel to him. After all, the furthest away he had ever been from home was the Blackcorpse Mountains. He had heard many stories of the world beyond, but had never experienced it for himself.

He took a deep breath of the crisp, autumn air, and looked around in satisfaction.

Suddenly, he sensed an intense sensation of murder coming from the road ahead. Looking off into the distance, he saw an army in the midst of carrying out slaughter. Numerous hamlets in the area were burning, and many locals were being cut down mercilessly as the soldiers marched toward the nearest town.

He was currently in a remote area in the territory controlled by Redleaf City. Both sides of the roads featured enormous trees with red leaves, although, considering winter was coming, the trees were nearly bare.

The soldiers marching on the town wore white armor decorated with a blue sea motif, which enabled Yang Qi to identify them as an army from Yundale-by-the-Sea.

All cities in the lands had unique sigils, which made their forces easy to identify on the battlefield. Because Yang Qi had been close with Yun Hailan, he was familiar with the sigil and armor of her state.

“The State of Yun has fought all the way to here? Doesn’t that mean they’ll invade Yanhaven soon?”

Obviously, the supreme leader of the State of Yun, Yun Zhonglong, had lofty ambitions. He had formed an alliance with the Seafolk, and was also connected to the Sea God Institute.

Many of the soldiers laughed lasciviously as they stripped the clothing from local women and tossed them onto their horses, taking time to grope them as they did.

The women screamed and wailed, but unfortunately, the soldiers were simply too vicious, and completely impervious to such cries for mercy. In fact, Yang Qi even saw one soldier cruelly cut the tongue out of one woman who had been cursing them particularly loudly.

“Worse than animals!” Yang Qi growled, striding forward.

The soldiers immediately took notice of him.

“Stop right there!” one of them barked, pointing his saber at Yang Qi. “Who are you?” The saber glittered with bright light that almost seemed alive. From the look of it, he could send his true energy flying through the air to kill people a hundred paces away from him.

That, of course, meant that he was in the sixth phase of energy arts, the Energy Weapon level. This was the leader of these soldiers, a man vicious to the core, whose aura seemed tinged with the screams of numerous souls, which was the only surviving remnant of the people he had slaughtered in cold blood.

In fact, this was the very same man who had just cut the woman's tongue out.

“Who am I?” Yang Qi replied. “I'm the guy who’s going to kill the whole lot of you.”

At that point, the leader of the soldiers chuckled and waved his saber through the air, sending a stream of blade light in Yang Qi’s direction. In response, Yang Qi flicked his finger, destroying the blade light and decapitating the leader, all in one move.

“Ambush!” shouted the soldiers further back. Drawing weapons, they rushed forward to surround Yang Qi.

These soldiers had mediocre energy arts, most of them being in the third or fourth phase. They couldn’t use their true energy outside of their bodies, and yet, they were still experienced fighters who had killed many opponents in their careers. Furthermore, they were skilled at fighting from a distance using bows and pikes.

It only took moments for dozens of pikes to be stabbing through the air with enough power to impale an ox.

The greatbows the soldiers used shot iron shafts that could pierce armor from a hundred paces.

Normally speaking, even someone in the seventh or eighth phase would have been forced to take a group like this seriously. Unfortunately for the soldiers, they were dealing with Yang Qi.

As he walked forward, he sent a blast of energy out that instantly caused all of the pikes and arrows to suddenly stop in place, unmoving.

Then…. Whoosh. Whoosh. Whoosh! They turned and shot backward, flying with ten times the speed they originally had, making it impossible to dodge them. The soldiers didn't even have time to scream before they were dead.

In the blink of an eye, Yang Qi had just killed roughly forty elite enemy soldiers.

However, their cries of ‘ambush’ had been loud enough to travel quite a distance.

Thus, it was no surprise that a screaming whistling sound suddenly erupted from the nearby town.

Because of the sound wave, the surrounding buildings trembled, and many roof tiles cracked and fell to the ground. Clearly, this was evidence of some powerful expert.

Swish!

A figure blurred into motion from atop the town’s defensive walls. He was clad in a blue robe, and had two sea-blue wings at his back, fully nine meters wide. The mere flap of those wings caused tornadoes to spring up in the area; unexpectedly, this was a first-class energy art, something that most people couldn’t possibly stand against.

“Master of Energy!” Yang Qi murmured.

Normally speaking, people in the ninth phase were city magistrates, therefore, it was strange to see one here amongst the forces of Yundale-by-the-Sea. He moved with incredible speed, flying off of the city wall, provoking cheers from the soldiers beneath.

Yang Qi simply stood there, waiting to see who he was dealing with.

As far as he remembered, Yundale-by-the-Sea only had one Master of Energy, that being Yun Zhonglong himself.

Moments later, the blue-robed Master of Energy appeared in front of Yang Qi. Surprisingly, he was a young man, probably not even thirty years of age.

‘A Master of Energy who isn’t even thirty?’ Yang Qi thought. ‘He has to be more than the typical genius. If such a young Master of Energy appeared in Yanhaven, the news would spread for thousands of kilometers.’

“Did you kill these soldiers?” the young man asked, looking around coldly at the dead bodies. He didn’t seem to have any emotional reaction at all, which actually served to make him seem even more chilling.

“I did,” Yang Qi replied without the slightest quaver to his voice. “And who are you? I don’t remember Yundale-by-the-Sea having a second Master of Energy.”

“Yundale-by-the-Sea?” The young man in blue clasped his hands behind his back. Looking down his nose at Yang Qi, he continued, “I'm from the Sea God Institute. An ignoramus like you doesn’t need to know my name. Since you killed these soldiers, I’ll kill you. In fact, I think I’ll torture you to death, which will be quite an honor for you, considering that I never kill worthless nobodies. So tell me your name. That way you can be more than worthless.”

‘Sea God Institute?’ Yang Qi was shaken; obviously, he knew that the Sea God Institute was a colossal monster of an organization.

However, the young man’s words caused a grim expression to appear on his face. “These soldiers were murdering, raping and looting. I’d say they hardly qualify to be human. Your Sea God Institute is orthodox and righteous. Don’t tell me the soldiers had your approval to do all those things?”

“Quite the blowhard, aren’t we?” the young man said. Apparently, he had lost his patience, and didn't think Yang Qi was even worth listening to. “Fine. If you don't want to tell me your name, then I’ll take you captive and force it out of you. I know over a hundred different torture arts for you to enjoy. In the end, you’ll be screaming your name to me.”

RUMMMBLE!

The young man thrust his palm out, causing a wave of energy to surge forth. At the same time, a sound like a crashing sea could be heard as his true energy transformed into the image of destructive sea water. Within that sea water was a gigantic floodwyrm with vicious-looking claws.

“Boundless Ocean!” the young man growled, sending out an attack that could level mountains.

To Yang Qi, it almost seemed like the sky had been replaced by a blue sea, surrounding him and crushing down with incredible force. In fact, the ground beneath his feet began to crack; this was a move that far surpassed anything he had faced from Yang Xingshi or Dowager Yan.

The truth was that Dowager Yan and Yang Xingshi were little more than countryside peasants. Although they were Masters of Energy, this young man in blue came from the Sea God Institute, one of the most colossal organizations in the lands. In terms of his true energy abilities, and his techniques, he existed on a completely different level.

In fact, this Boundless Ocean was a royal-class energy art!

And yet, Yang Qi didn’t even flinch. Even as the true energy surged toward him, he made his move, unleashing a single punch.

It seemed like nothing more than an ordinary fist strike, and yet, it was also like an ancient beast or god. Black energy swept out from beneath his feet, almost like the aura of hell. He was now the incarnation of an ancient godmammoth, an ancient god-spirit who could suppress millions upon millions of worlds. It almost was as if the word ‘power’ had been specially created just to describe him.

The Boundless Ocean was completely vanquished, and then Yang Qi’s fist landed onto the young man.

An expression of disbelief appeared on his face; this was only one fist strike! One! And yet, he was flung backward, booming sounds echoing out in his body as his meridians were destroyed.

Chapter 52: Sea God Institute

One fist strike.

One simple fist strike.

That was all it took for Yang Qi to destroy the meridians and sea of energy of a Master of Energy from the Sea God Institute.

Afterward, the blue-robed man flopped onto the ground, where he lay gurgling, a look of complete incredulity on his face. Never in his wildest imaginations could he have guessed that a nobody like this would unleash power like that of a devil-god.

After all, the attack he had just unleashed should have been enough to crush even a Lifeseizer.

“How could you be so strong?!” Despite his current condition, the young man in blue seemed just as wildly arrogant as before. Struggling to his feet, he continued, “I'm from the Sea God Institute! I'm famous there, and all the professors told me that I would be a match for any Lifeseizers I encountered. How could I possibly have been defeated by a nobody like you? Just who are you? Talk to me, punk! What's your name? You just wait till I get back to the Sea God Institute. Things aren’t going to turn out the same when we have a rematch!”

Yang Qi chuckled. “Where do you think you are, back home at that institute of yours? You think you can make a comeback after being beaten like this? We’re in the jianghu, the home of danger and viciousness. You seriously think I'm going to just tell you my name and let you go, so that you can return to the Sea God Institute and get some more powerful people to get revenge for you? Well, I can tell you, that’s not going to happen.”

He was by no means boasting. With the flick of a finger, he sent a stream of true energy directly into the young man’s forehead.

The young man screamed, then flopped back onto the ground, dead.

A moment later, Yang Qi flew up into the air, sending out countless threads from Silk Rain of the Spring Silkworm. In the blink of an eye, all of the soldiers from Yundale-by-the-Sea who had remained alive in the area were killed.

Obviously, there was no way that he would leave any of the enemy soldiers alive.

If they returned and informed the Sea God Institute of what he had done, the Yang Clan would be wiped off the map.

Even more pertinent, considering the troops from Yundale-by-the-Sea were pillaging and murdering everything in their path, killing them would ease a bit of the pressure on Yanhaven. And it would also give the common people a better shot at escaping the turmoil.

Several hundred fierce soldiers were all simultaneously struck by the sword energy of Silk Rain of the Spring Silkworm.

The Four Seasons Swordplay was a royal-class energy art, and thus it was no surprise that a single move from it could kill so many people that quickly.

If the other aspects of the technique were unleashed, the summer lightning, autumn frost, and winter snow, it would be even more formidable. At the moment, Yang Qi was stuck in the eighth phase, but when he reached the ninth, and became a Master of Energy, then even many top experts in the House of Spring and Autumn would blush with shame upon watching him use their Four Seasons Swordplay.

In one fell swoop, Yang Qi wiped out all the enemy troops, leaving the ground littered with corpses of soldiers from Yundale-by-the-Sea. There were also a handful of individuals wearing blue armor that identified them as Seafolk.

“Yundale-by-the-Sea is working with the Seafolk? So that’s why a student from the Sea God Institute was here.” After considering the matter for a moment, Yang Qi looked over at the blue-robed young man he had killed. Stepping over, he began to search him. Considering his identity, Yang Qi was fairly certain that he would be carrying a lot of riches. And since Yang Qi was about to enter the Demi-Immortal Institute, having some extra funds on hand would surely be useful.

Unfortunately, he was wrong. After searching the young man quite thoroughly, he didn't find anything on him. No banknotes. No energy convergence pills. No weapons. No energy art manuals. Nothing.

Apparently, he was completely penniless.

‘Impossible! How could a student from the Sea God Institute be completely broke? He doesn’t have anything on him? Not even some weapons?’

He even searched the body with true energy, and yet, couldn't find anything.

Eventually, his gaze came to rest on the finger of the corpse, and a thumb-ring of blue jade.

It looked completely ordinary in nature, like a common piece of jewelry. However, there was something about it that piqued Yang Qi’s interest, so he sent a stream of true energy into it.

After all, once one entered the eighth phase, one’s true energy would be able to pierce large objects and see what was inside of them.

However, when he sent his true energy into the blue jade thumb-ring, it was like dropping a pebble into the ocean.

He couldn’t sense anything inside the ring, but could tell that it was as large as an ocean. Obviously, this was no ordinary item.

Although this blue-robed young man had not possessed any weapons or magical items, his thumb-ring was definitely extraordinary.

Yang Qi took the ring and then leaped into the sky like a bird, vanishing in the blink of an eye.

The sooner he got away from this place, the better.

After all, the death of a student from the Sea God Institute would be no small matter. Soon, people would be coming to investigate, and if he stuck around, he would surely be suspected of being involved.

Sure enough, only a few hours after Yang Qi left, as evening began to fall, an autumn wind swept across the lands, stirring the leaves that had already begun to cover the corpses.

Suddenly, the thunderous sound of galloping warhorses could be heard, and the acrid odor of some sort of beast filled the air, as though an army of demonlings were approaching.

Before long, torchlight could be seen, illuminating the road.

Then, an army of horses appeared, tall and strong, mighty to the extreme. Unexpectedly, these were all flood stallions! Thousands and thousands of them.

It had only been by a fluke that the Yang Clan managed to get twenty-eight flood stallions, and yet here, there were thousands. If a force like this attacked a city, its walls would collapse instantly. No fortification would be able to resist a force like this, and in fact, any defending soldiers who saw it coming would collapse mentally before the fight began.

The ground trembled under the hooves of these furious creatures, whose passage caused the trees to tremble so violently, that many split apart and even crashed to the ground.

Furthermore, the wind that sprang up because of them instantly blew away all the leaves that had piled up, revealing the corpses on the ground.

When the corpse of the blue-robed young man was revealed, one of the riders, a burly, middle-aged man, leaped off of his horse in shock. Rumbling sounds could be heard as his true energy was unleashed, propelling him through the air toward the corpse, which he lifted up into his arms.

Unsure of his current state, he tried to pour true energy into the young man in the hopes of reviving him, but sadly, he was already dead.

Looking like the picture of astonishment, the man said, “How could you be dead, Gu Che? How? You were a top student at the Sea God Institute, with energy arts invincible to anyone under the Lifeseizing level. Even if you were attacked by a Master of Energy, you should have been able to escape. How could you have died? And who killed you? How is the State of Yun going to explain this to the Sea God Institute!?”

A soldier stepped forward. “Supreme Leader,” he said, “we must get to the bottom of this immediately. We need to find out who killed Gu Che, and then report the matter to the sergeant major of the Seafolk, and of course the Sea God Institute.”

As it turned out, the burly man who was now holding Gu Che’s corpse was none other than the supreme leader of the State of Yun, Yun Zhonglong, who was also the father of Yun Hailan.

“Look at the wounds,” Yun Zhonglong said. “See how fine they are? It’s almost like he was hit by silk threads, or raindrops. There’s also a lingering sensation of the life that blooms during spring….” He suddenly shivered. “Gu Che was killed by the Four Seasons Swordplay from the House of Spring and Autumn. It must have been a Lifeseizer. But what would such an expert from the House of Spring and Autumn be doing here?”

“Supreme Leader, we've already counted up the corpses. There are a few hundred of our men here, all of them killed by sword energy that pierced through them like silk threads. It looks like they were all killed at the same time. Only someone with profound energy arts could do something like that!”

“Huh? Didn't Gu Che have the Heart of the Sea thumb-ring? How could it be gone? Don’t tell me someone robbed him?” At this point, Yun Zhonglong was bristling with anger. After all, he knew how valuable that thumb-ring was; it was more important than Gu Che himself.

An eighth phase expert off to the side said, “Supreme Leader, there’s no need to be anxious. Everyone’s dead, so it makes sense that his valuables were taken.”

“You don’t understand. Gu Che’s most valuable possession was the Heart of the Sea. Supposedly, it is crafted from godly jade, and contains a minor plane that can be used to store large amounts of items. People like us can’t even conceive of how valuable that ring was. Gu Che borrowed it from the Sea God Institute, and now it’s lost! His death probably isn’t very important; there are plenty of exceptional students there. But for that precious treasure to have been lost is no joking matter! It could likely cause a war between the House of Spring and Autumn and the Sea God Institute!”

Looking exceptionally grave, Yun Zhonglong said, “Let’s go. We’ll head back to the capital. For now, our expansion stops here. Pour all of our resources into uncovering the truth of Gu Che’s death. Afterward, we’ll return to our border expansion initiative.”

“Yes, Supreme Leader. Considering we've already absorbed several dozen cities, and now control lands with a population of millions upon millions, we should be able to clear the matter up. And that’s especially true since we can assign so many aristocratic clans to the case.”

With that, the horses and men turned and prepared to leave.

“Supreme Leader, Gu Che’s death doesn't really matter. He was only a Master of Energy, and his clan isn’t very influential among the Seafolk. Besides, considering that Young Miss Yun Hailan got that Latent Dragon Pill, and awoke the blood of the Sea God inside her, she has already far surpassed Gu Che.”

“You’re right. Lan’er is in the Demi-Immortal Institute now, and a certain member of the senior generation has already taken a liking to her. From now on, her cultivation will advance with breathtaking speed.”

Chapter 53: Heart of the Sea

The next day, the autumn wind was as desolate as ever as Yang Qi made his way to the east, far, far from Redleaf City. Along the way, he saw the turmoil and chaos of war. Many city magistrates were founding nations and mustering troops to campaign across the lands. War had broken out, and the common people were the ones to suffer.

The vassal cities were like a pack of dragons with no leader, and no quarter was being given in the fights which were breaking out everywhere.

Yang Qi traveled for three days and three nights, during which time he saw over a hundred battles. Pillaging and looting were present everywhere.

Yanhaven was located in a relatively remote region that had not truly been touched by the flames of war. After all, the Rich-Lush Continent was a massive land, with huge cities everywhere. Some of them were ten times larger than Yanhaven, with so many energy arts experts that they were difficult to number.

On more than one occasion, Yang Qi sensed Masters of Energy fusing their energy with the clouds.

Instead of flying, he traveled mostly on foot; resorting to his Fiend-Devil Wings only when he found himself in extreme danger.

After all, experts abounded, and he was no longer in Yanhaven. If someone discovered who he was and what he could do, it could lead to complications.

Yang Qi had already made a decision not to use the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth when he got to the Demi-Immortal Institute, at least not unless it was absolutely necessary. Considering how many experts would be around, it would be a problem if people started picking up on the clues about him.

A godly-class energy art. What did that imply? It implied a connection to god-spirits in heaven, something that even the Demi-Immortal Institute would covet.

Right now, Yang Qi had the power of ten ancient megamammoths, which meant that even the most random energy arts move he used would be backed with endless power, and made him virtually omnipotent.

Once he broke through to the Master of Energy level, and truly began to cultivate his Hellfire Crucible, he would be able to melt and refine all sorts of true energy. Then, whatever energy art, martial art, or consummate discipline he encountered could be easily acquired and mastered.

Most people could only cultivate a handful of energy arts before running the risk of encountering a conflict between two of them, and damaging or destroying their meridians.

Yang Qi tucked such thoughts away and focused on the road; it would still be another two months before he would arrive at the Demi-Immortal Institute.

Thankfully, it was not a boring journey. There was plenty of scenery, including important historical sites. When he had moments to spare, he would take the time to study the blue thumb-ring.

Continued examination only went to confirm that it was a very peculiar object. No matter how he tried to send his true energy into it, the energy would disappear as surely as a rock thrown into the ocean. It seemed boundless and never-ending inside, as though it weren’t jade, but rather, something from another world.

As time passed, he fiddled with the ring and tried different ways of getting his true energy into it, but it was all to no avail.

However, he was becoming increasingly convinced that it was a valuable treasure, and that it was simply a case of him not yet being able to unlock its secrets.

Perhaps if he could become a Master of Energy, the resulting transformations to his true energy would be enough to crack the secret of the ring.

“What is this thing anyway? And how come I can't get into it with my true energy?”

In terms of his cultivation base, he could tell that he had already reached the ultimate peak of the eighth phase. His soul was already connecting to his true energy, and from the resulting fluctuations, he was sure that he was on the very verge of rising to the ninth phase.

As he traveled, he made sure to continue working on cultivating his true energy, as well as the various martial disciplines he had at his disposal. By now, he had pushed his three public-facing techniques to the point of perfection.

Of those three, the Invincible King’s Fist and the Golden Bell Rampart could both be considered hard and unyielding, whereas the Four Seasons Swordplay was all-encompassing and utilitarian.

Yang Qi could tell that because of those three energy arts, the true energy that flowed through his meridians was somewhat heterogeneous. And if he continued to focus on cultivating those arts, he might eventually lose control of them.

It was only because he also cultivated the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth that his meridians and sea of energy could endure to this point.

Having all sorts of energy arts at one’s disposal wasn’t necessarily a good thing; purity was often the best route.

It was for that reason that, after acquiring the Four Seasons Swordplay, Yang Zhan had flushed the true energy of the Invincible King’s Fist out of him. Then, he had focused fully on the new technique. By maintaining purity of energy, he could ensure that even if he did experience some problem it wouldn’t lead to a true energy spasm.

For similar reasons, Yang Qi was working hard to make progress with his Hellfire Crucible. If he could melt and refine all sorts of true energy, then he could use any techniques he acquired, and any type of energy art. Hard and unyielding. Soft and feminine. Frigid cold. Scorching hot….

“The Demi-Immortal Institute…. I wonder what it’s like. I can’t wait to find out. I'm on my way, Aunt. And I'm coming for you, Yun Hailan and Song Haishan!”

Yang Qi’s eyes shone with an incisive luster.

Considering his miraculous abilities, and the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, he was confident that he could earn a name for himself in the Demi-Immortal Institute, and accomplish amazing things.

At dawn, he emerged from an inn in a large city. Having paid for his accommodations, he blurred into motion, vanishing without a trace.

He was now holding nothing back in terms of speed.

A month later, after a multitude of experiences on the road, he reached the Demi-Immortal Institute, which was located in the most flourishing part of the Sage Ancestor Plains, right in the middle of the Rich-Lush Continent.

Stretching out on either side of the road were endless expanses of land. Nine rivers snaked through those plains, creating a complex pattern that surrounded an enormous city.

That city was the most bustling place in the Rich-Lush Continent, the imperial capital, Sage Ancestor City.

This was the home of the Sage Ancestor Dynasty, which commanded veneration from thousands upon thousands of vassal states.

Opposite of Sage Ancestor City was a collection of ancient, majestic buildings that stretched out for hundreds of kilometers in all directions. The buildings fairly radiated the sensation of learning and culture, a righteous and noble aura that filled the area.

This enormous collection of buildings was none other than a fountainhead for civilization.

The Demi-Immortal Institute!

‘How majestic!’ Yang Qi thought when he first caught sight of the institute and city. He was literally a country bumpkin catching sight of the biggest forces in the lands, and couldn’t hold back from craning his neck to look this way and that. All roads in the Sage Ancestor Dynasty led here, and as they neared, the traffic on them never ceased, no matter the time of day. Even at nighttime, the entire area would be brightly lit with fires and lamps.

It was quite a contrast to the turmoil and chaos of war that Yang Qi had seen on his way here.

With both Sage Ancestor City and the Demi-Immortal Institute being located here, there was enough military power to keep the peace for tens of thousands of kilometers in all directions.

Yang Qi made sure to hide his energy arts deep inside himself, making him seem like an ordinary person. Then, he entered Sage Ancestor City, where he found an inn to stay the night. The following morning, he headed over to the entrance of the Demi-Immortal Institute.

It was like an enormous temple, with countless towering structures here and there, so expansive that it was impossible to take in with a single glance. At the same time, it was so austere and impressive that no one would ever think to try to enter it unlawfully.

Of course, Yang Qi went directly to the hall set aside for receiving new students.

Outside was a square constructed of sparkling and translucent white stone slabs, so large it could fit hundreds of thousands of people.

As for the building that housed the entrance hall, it was so tall that one could easily get a crick in the neck from trying to glimpse its top. It was adorned with gold and jade to the point where it seemed completely holy and dignified.

Quite a few individuals could be seen kneeling in various locations in the square. There were young ones, middle-aged people, and even the elderly. Some were rich, some were poor.

This was the entrance to the grand Demi-Immortal Institute.

Yang Qi had asked around in the city the night before, and knew that people came every day to the main entrance, hoping to get accepted to study there.

Some were so devoted that they would remain kneeling for nine days and nine nights.

It was even said that people would occasionally drop dead from waiting there for too long.

This was the most prestigious educational establishment in all the lands, and therefore, being a part of it gave one incredible social standing. Yang Qi could even see some experts in the eighth phase, kneeling there quietly.

When Yang Qi simply showed up and started walking toward the entrance, many of those kneeling in the square noticed, and began to comment amongst themselves.

“That guy’s got a lot of guts. Does he think he’s just going to walk into the Demi-Immortal Institute?”

“He’s not going to get in. People who try to enter the Demi-Immortal Institute uninvited get killed instantly.”

“Is he out of his mind?”

“Calm down. Lots of crazy people try to get into the Demi-Immortal Institute in the hopes of getting famous. It was only a few days ago that a few youngsters came along and challenged the experts here. In the end, they were all beaten with a single palm strike. See the freshman students at the gate? They all have extremely profound energy arts.”

As Yang Qi got closer, someone suddenly yelled out in a voice that shook the surroundings. “Stop right there! You can’t just walk right into the Demi-Immortal Institute. If you want to join, kneel outside like everyone else, and wait for good fortune to come.”

A young man wearing the uniform of the institute walked out, looking very imperious as he glared at Yang Qi. Apparently, he didn’t think anyone out here was worthy to even talk to him.

In fact, he was acting exactly like the blue-robed young man from the Sea God Institute.

That was how the people from the institutes often acted, as though they existed on a higher level than anyone else. In the Rich-Lush Continent, there were a lot of organizations like the House of Spring and Autumn who weren’t called institutes. They were considered to be of a lower level, and were in some ways dissident groups, as opposed to the institutes, who were the orthodox practitioners of energy arts.

Only the four institutes truly represented culture, civilization, and great daos.

Standing in front of the long corridor that led into the institute itself were these students, who kept watch as surely as if they expected an imminent invasion.

Yang Qi knew that even though these were the lowest-ranked students, the freshmen, they would still be treated with utmost honor and respect wherever they went.

Acting neither servile nor overbearing, Yang Qi said, “I have a letter here instructing me to report in.”

With that, he took out the letter from his aunt, Yang Susu.

Printed on the outside of the letter in ancient script was the word Demi-Immortal. Anyone who looked at it would be able to tell at a glance that the letter came from the institute itself.

When the freshman caught sight of the letter, a solemn expression overtook his face. Not even opening it, he nodded and said, “Wait here for a moment while I report the matter to my superiors.”

Chapter 54: Entering the Institute

Some time passed, and then the freshman student returned, letter in hand.

“You’re Yang Qi, right? Come with me. For the most part, you already have your place as a student here. However, you still need to do a test to check your energy arts and cultivation base.”

“Okay.” All of a sudden, it felt like a great weight had been lifted from his shoulders. This entire time, he had worried that there might be some holdup because of internal matters in the institute. But now, everything seemed to be going smoothly. And considering the level of his cultivation base, he shouldn’t have any problem fitting in.

Thus, he followed the freshman student into the entrance.

This was merely a building set aside to accept new students into the Demi-Immortal Institute; it had dozens of floors, and was constructed with bricks of white jade. Everything was carved with exquisite texts and images depicting various martial disciplines, sword stances, aphorisms and proverbs. It simply pulsed with a sensation of knowledge and power.

Yang Qi went through various hallways that twisted and turned through the building, and climbed higher and higher, until they were on the eighteenth floor. Eventually, they reached a room filled with wooden bookcases, all of which were apparently crafted from expensive sandalwood.

In the middle of the hall was a middle-aged man, standing there reading a book. From this high vantage point, the scenery was beautiful, with a clear view of the plains and the rivers beyond the institute.

A tremor passed through Yang Qi as he sensed that this man was a Master of Energy. His true energy was mighty to the extreme; he was clearly many times more powerful than Yang Zhan with the airmastery plant.

Up to now, Yang Qi had always assumed that the most powerful experts in the Master of Energy level would only be a bit stronger than his father.

But now he could see that he had truly been a frog in a well, his eyes obscured by a single leaf.

If one split the Master of Energy phase up into three overall levels, then Yang Zhan and people like him would be at the lowest level.

It didn’t take Yang Qi long to reconcile himself to this fact, though. After all, the world was a large place, and if a freakish hellion like himself could rise up, why couldn’t other freakish hellions exist in other places?

This was the Demi-Immortal Institute, the number one most domineering organization in all the lands; it only made sense for it to abound with remarkable things.

The freshman student immediately bowed to the middle-aged man and then said, “Sect Uncle Chu, I've brought a new student here with an introduction letter.”

“Very well. You wait outside.”

The man waved his hand, sending the book in his hand flying off to a nearby shelf.

“So, young man, your name is Yang Qi. Is that right?”

“Yes.”

Yang Qi was doing his best to keep his cultivation base completely under cover, leaving only the true energy of the Invincible King’s Fist flowing through him. Everything else was hidden away in his sea of energy, and would appear as little more than a speck of nothing to anyone who looked at it.

That was a function of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. It could take true energy and turn it into a speck of nothing, then turn that speck into a megamammoth, all in the blink of an eye.

“You’re in the eighth phase. Not bad. And you just turned eighteen? If you can become a Master of Energy before twenty, your aptitude will be considered toward the top. Of course, Yanhaven is a small place. Presumably something miraculous happened to you?”

The man looked at Yang Qi with shining eyes, and was instantly able to tell ‘everything about him’.

“Wow, Professor Chu, you have sharp eyes. Yes, I was struck by lightning a while back, which made my meridians stronger, and advanced my cultivation significantly.”

“Oh? Struck by lightning, but didn’t die?” With another wave of his hand, he sent a stream of true energy into Yang Qi’s meridians.

Yang Qi plastered a look of surprise onto his face. However, he had already disguised his meridians to reveal only about ten percent of their full level.

The man’s true energy was as nimble as a fish, and almost seemed intelligent as it went through him. After coursing through his meridians a few times, it came to rest at his sea of energy for a bit before leaving.

“Strong meridians,” the man said. “And a good fleshly body. What energy arts and martial disciplines did you study? Why don’t you do a little demonstration?”

“Yes sir,” Yang Qi said. He quickly went through the forms of the Invincible King’s Fist, summoning the six arms of true energy to accompany him. Each move he did was better than the last; overall, it was a very impressive performance.

The man instantly recognized what he was looking at. “The Invincible King’s Fist. It’s too bad you haven’t been cultivating the full discipline. That’s a royal-class energy art with nine forms, but you only have six of them. I would guess that our Demi-Immortal Institute’s Scripture Pavilion probably has the full set. You just need to perform some meritorious service for the institute and you’ll be able to get your hands on it. Very well, that’s enough. You can go get your uniform now. You’re a freshman student, so from here on out, you will only go up in the world. Understand?”

“Freshman student?” Yang Qi replied, a bit stunned. He had originally assumed that he would come in with a higher rank.

“What. Not happy?” Apparently, the man could tell what Yang Qi was thinking. “Everyone here starts out as a freshman student. The only way to rise in the ranks is to perform meritorious service, get stronger, and learn more. Now go. The Elder Brother outside will take you to the place where you can clean up and change into your uniform. You’ll also be assigned a residence. Leave a record of your name at the admissions desk, and remember that you could be called in for assessment at any time.”

“Yes sir,” Yang Qi replied. Originally, he had assumed that he would be able to see his aunt right away, and possibly even Yun Hailan or Song Haishan. But now, he was coming to realize that in the Demi-Immortal Institute, rank and status were extremely important.

He needed to spend some time getting used to all the new rules and situations. Right now, he was too much in the dark.

At the moment, he didn’t even dare to cast his true energy out to get a sense of his surroundings. There were just too many powerful auras, and if they caught on to him, they would definitely try to figure out who he was.

Back outside, the freshman student he had met earlier was waiting there, looking a bit bored. Upon seeing him emerge, he said, “Well, Junior Brother, congratulations on becoming a member of the Demi-Immortal Institute. From here on out, you’re one of the top dogs in the Rich-Lush Continent!”

“Thanks so much!” Yang Qi replied. “I hope you’ll look out for me, Elder Brother. Might I ask your honored surname and distinguished given name? And please accept a little gift to establish our friendship.”

Smiling, he handed him a banknote worth one hundred thousand energy convergence pills.

That was no small number.

The freshman student nodded knowingly. “Of course, I'm happy to help out, Junior Brother. My name’s Li He. Pleasure to meet you. Alright, come with me, we need to get your uniform and identity plaque. Then you’ll officially be a student of our institute.”

With that, Li He led him down into the institute itself. Majestic pavilions and kiosks could be seen everywhere. Compared to this, the city magistrate’s mansion in Yanhaven was like an ant colony.

As he walked along, Yang Qi almost felt like he was in paradise. At one point, he said, “Since I only just arrived, Elder Brother Li, I don’t really understand how the sect works. Could you give me a quick rundown so that I don’t make any mistakes right off the bat?”

“Ah, that's easy. We're the lowest ranked students in the Demi-Immortal Institute: the freshmen. Above us are the outer campus students, and then the inner campus students. After that are the elite students, and then the conclave students. Anyone who goes past the conclave student level is called a holy neophyte.” The envy in Li He’s voice was clear. “Ai. Those people are legends. I've been in the Demi-Immortal Institute for eight years, and I’ve never even seen one of them.”

“What?” Yang Qi said, shocked. “You’ve been here for eight years and still haven’t been promoted? Is it really that hard to get into the Outer Campus?”

“It’s indeed hard,” Li He said bitterly. “Very hard…. Unless you’re a genius who constantly advances by leaps and bounds, you have to do it the slow way. According to the rules of the institution, you have to have performed plenty of meritorious services, and cultivated your energy arts all the way to the ninth phase. Then, if you pass the test, you can become an outer campus student.”

“What?” Yang Qi said, stunned. “Only Masters of Energy can join the Outer Campus? What about the inner campus students? How strong are they?”

“Most of the inner campus students are Masters of Energy, too. However, they’re all the best of the best. For example, that professor who just gave you the test is one. As for the elite students, they're all past the Master of Energy level, and are Lifeseizers.”

Considering the gift Yang Qi had given him, Li He was giving a very detailed explanation of everything.

“Junior Brother, if you want to rise through the ranks, you either need to hand in a lot of merit points, or advance your cultivation dramatically. If you can pass the Master of Energy level, and seize life from heaven, the institute will promote you to elite student level. It’s sort of a shortcut, and in fact, the easiest way to get promoted.” Li He chuckled bitterly. “I'm still in the eighth phase, and unable to become a Master of Energy. Most of the freshman students are like me, stuck in the seventh or eighth phases.”

“I guess that's to be expected from the Demi-Immortal Institute….” Yang Qi shook his head. Back in Yanhaven, people in the seventh or eighth phase were clan lords. Here, they were freshmen. ‘At least I’ll finally be able to get a look at a Lifeseizer. I wonder how strong they are?’

Before long, Li He and Yang Qi arrived at a room, inside of which was a bed, a desk, and various other necessities of life. It was actually very spacious.

“This is your room. Over there is your uniform. Put that on, and you’re an official student of the Demi-Immortal Institute. As for your daily tasks, you’ll be informed of that later. Whatever you do, don’t ever offend any of the important people among the freshman students. If you do, you’ll have a very hard time getting along.” With that, Li He waited outside for Yang Qi to get changed.

The uniform consisted of an exquisite white robe made of snow silk, which would keep one warm in the winter and cool in the summer. Back in Yanhaven, a robe like this would have been considered a treasure.

There was also a jade pendant which was carved with the words: Demi-Immortal.

Upon stepping out of his room, Yang Qi smoothed his robes, looked at Li He, and said, “By the way, Elder Brother Li, do you know a girl around here named Yun Hailan?”

Chapter 55: Yun Hailan&#039;s Whereabouts

Yun Hailan’s whereabouts were one of his top priorities now that he was at the Demi-Immortal Institute, and he had already started trying to track her down.

This institute was a massive place, with too many buildings to even count, and countless secrets. Finding a single person was like fishing a needle from the sea.

“Yun Hailan?” Li He shook his head, apparently unfamiliar with the name. But then, after a moment passed, his eyes lit up. “Wait, I have heard of someone with that name. A girl, right? She joined the institute a few months ago. But she’s not a freshman student; one of the higher-level students took an interest in her, so she’s already in the College of Elite Students.”

“What? She got straight into the College of Elite Students?”

The College of Elite Students was the highest college within the Demi-Immortal Institute, and every member was a Lifeseizer.

There was no way Yun Hailan was already in the Lifeseizing level, so how could she have joined the College of Elite Students? Back when Yang Qi had first met her, she was only in the sixth phase.

Of course, he was also aware that she was a shrewd schemer, and had kept much of her true powers secret.

But there was no way she had been in the Lifeseizing level, that was for sure.

“I think it might have something to do with an agreement between the Demi-Immortal Institute and the Sea God Institute.” Li He shook his head. “According to the rumors, there’s something very special about that girl's bloodline. She’s an important person, you know? Somebody we freshman students can’t even hope to emulate.”

A grim expression had overtaken Yang Qi’s face. ‘I could never have guessed that Yun Hailan would immediately join the College of Elite Students….’

Yun Hailan was now in a position of some reckoning. After all, Yang Qi was currently strong enough to win in a fight against ten Masters of Energy, but it would be suicide for him to cause problems for someone in that college level.

Considering the current level of his cultivation base, he definitely was not confident in being able to take on a Lifeseizer.

“Alright, Junior Brother. From now on, you’re an official freshman student of the Demi-Immortal Institute. Why don't I introduce you to some of your new Elder and Junior Brothers? We’ll be cultivating and working together pretty much every day, after all.”

With that, Li He took Yang Qi to meet some of the other freshman students. Along the way, he reminded him not to go wandering around the institute. It was a big and complicated organization, and freshman students had to stay in their place and not cause any problems. Generally speaking, they attended to daily chores, cultivated, studied, and did whatever the Masters of Energy told them to do.

Occasionally, they would be able to travel outside of the institute on missions to earn merit points, which was how they could eventually get promoted.

From what Yang Qi could tell, merit points were the most important thing in the Demi-Immortal Institute.

They were earned by performing important services, and a record of them was kept on-hand in the institute. For example, a student could hunt demonlings for demon cores, then turn them in at the institute in exchange for merit points. Some insanely rich people even handed in energy convergence pills just to buy them.

With merit points, one could go to the Scripture Pavilion to study matchless martial disciplines and energy arts, or acquire help from a top expert to refine one’s true energy and fleshly body. And it was also possible to buy treasured items, or have powerful techniques directly imparted into one’s mind by the institute.

From all of this it could be seen how important merit points were.

Before long, Yang Qi was settled in the Demi-Immortal Institute, and life turned into a rather boring routine. Other than guard duty and various chores, he worked on cultivation in his room, or attended lectures in which Masters of Energy would talk about cultivation. None of it was very exciting.

Freshman students were the lowest of the low, and only had access to the most fundamental energy arts and martial disciplines of the Demi-Immortal Institute.

That said, Yang Qi was fine with it all. Being able to peacefully work on his cultivation meant that his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth was becoming more refined by the day. He was growing stronger and his breathing exercises were more profound; by now, he could easily absorb the quintessence of the sun and moon, as well as the spirit energy of heaven and earth.

A month passed in which nothing of note occurred.

Even his mind and soul grew stronger; he almost felt like he truly was a godmammoth, capable of plucking stars and moons out of the sky.

Currently, he sat cross-legged in his room, his true energy surging through his meridians.

Just barely visible in his dantian region was a convergence of true energy that bubbled like lava. If anyone had been there to observe, they would have seen golden light flickering beneath his skin, almost as if he wasn’t made up of flesh and blood anymore, but rather, gold.

Gold was everlasting, and right now, an everlasting aura filled him.

Before, the membrane beneath his skin had been transparent, but now it had turned golden.

Suddenly, he opened his eyes and mouth, and spat out a burst of true energy, which wrapped around a sheathed sword that was hanging on the wall. The sword flew out of the sheath and whizzed through the air toward him. Grabbing it out of the air, he brandished it in front of him, causing pulses of frigid energy to roll out in all directions.

This was a treasured sword forged here in the Demi-Immortal Institute, made from uncommon metals, and it was so sharp that it could slice through iron as easily as mud.

Without any hesitation, Yang Qi ran the blade through the palm of his hand.

And yet, not a single mark could be seen on his skin.

Not even that incredibly sharp sword could harm him.

And he hadn’t even fused his true energy with his fleshly body at this point.

Snap!

He flicked his finger, causing the sword to shatter into pieces.

“Infernal Deity Boneflame: Scorching Hellfire.”

Intense true energy poured out of his palm, so hot that the ground in the area began to melt. As the energy entered the destroyed fragments of the sword, it turned them into liquid iron.

Upon cultivating the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth to the pinnacle, one’s true energy changed. It could be like a freezing hell, a burning hell, a hell of blades, or a hell of sludge.

It could freeze a mighty river solid, or evaporate it into nothing.

Yang Qi was currently working on this particular energy art in the hopes of taking the broken pieces of various equipment and weapons, refining them, and then gaining a better understanding of how they worked. The end goal was to further his understanding of the jade thumb-ring he had acquired.

His intuition was telling him that it was some sort of treasured item.

After sending his true energy into the fragments of the sword, he quickly deduced that it had been constructed from an amalgamation of at least thirty types of metals, all of them fused perfectly to create an incredibly sharp blade.

Yang Qi was by no means a grandmaster of equipment forging, and therefore, couldn’t specifically identify how the various metals had been knitted together. However, he could tell that there were imperfections that made the sword less than perfect.

With the wave of a hand, he caused his true energy to extrude the impurities, which became a small pile of sludge on the ground.

As the moments ticked by, the liquid iron slowly began to shape back together into a sword, this one smaller, only about seven inches long. In fact, it was more of a dagger. Reaching out, Yang Qi grabbed it. From the intense glitter that emanated off of it, it was clearly nothing ordinary.

A single swipe of the dagger could slice through the stone floor as easily as tofu. In fact, Yang Qi could tell that this dagger could definitely pierce through numerous types of defensive true energy.

“This thing is definitely worth some money. I wonder how much I could sell it for.” With that, he carefully put the dagger away and then took out the blue jade thumb-ring.

As the ring hung in front of him, supported by his true energy, he exhaled some more true energy, which took the form of a crucible, right beneath the ring. Instantly, flames sprang up as if to roast the item into nothing.

This time, Yang Qi wasn’t holding anything back.

Whoosh!

When the flames touched the ring, water vapor began to pour out it, filling the entire room with the aroma of the sea. It was even possible to hear the crashing of waves. As the water vapor continued to pour out, it gradually began to take the form of a humanoid entity.

It had the torso of a human and the body of a snake, and held a trident in its hand. It was ferocious to the extreme, and as soon as it appeared, it looked menacingly in Yang Qi’s direction.

In the blink of an eye, Yang Qi felt like he was in another location, in the depths of the sea, with massive waves all around him. As for the snake-like entity in front of him, it was like a god of the sea, with its glittering trident pointed directly at his heart.

In fact, he had never even been in the presence of something this powerful.

This was power that surpassed the Master of Energy level. It was true energy left behind in the ring by some consummate master, given a form that could slaughter anything it encountered.

‘Not good!’

Yang Qi reacted quickly, drawing on the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth to summon his Infernal Deity Spear, complete with its infinite variations. Without any hesitation, he thrust the spear out to meet the trident.

“Crush Hells, Subdue Devil-Gods!”

Yang Qi made an impressive sight, stabbing out with a spear that was like a mountain, causing black true energy to fill the area.

“Boundless Ocean,” the snake creature hissed. Instantly, a huge vortex like an ocean sprang up around the trident, complete with massive waves that bore down on Yang Qi.

Two expert fighters were clashing, causing the furniture in the room to shatter into pieces.

They fought back and forth for a short moment, whereupon Yang Qi unleashed an explosive attack. The Infernal Deity Spear pierced through the air, destroying the trident before stabbing into the snake creature.

The creature was not real; it was merely a manifestation of Humanoid True Energy, left behind by some powerful expert. Gurgling sounds erupted from its mouth as the spear stabbed into it. And yet, the creature simply lunged forward, allowing the spear to pass through it.

At the same time, Yang Qi felt some powerful will entering him.

Unexpectedly, the snake creature was trying to take control of his mind and soul.

This thing was far more powerful than a Master of Energy, that was clear. Apparently, it even had the ability to possess him.

However, as soon as it entered him, the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth erupted out, and a hell-crushing aura flowed through his meridians. In response, the creature shrieked, “What energy art is that? Dammit! That’s the aura of a godly-class energy art….”

Even as the voice echoed out, it started to fade away, as strange transformations began to occur to it.

Chapter 56: Thumb-Ring of Holding

As the Humanoid True Energy entered Yang Qi, it began to transform. It wanted to take control of his soul, to possess him, and normally speaking, not even a Master of Energy would have been able to resist. Sadly for it, Yang Qi cultivated a godly-class energy art that was designed to crush hells.

Cracking, crunching sounds could be heard as the creature entered Yang Qi’s dantian region to be absorbed by the lightning mammoth.

Normally speaking, if such powerful true energy entered a person, it would need to be expelled immediately lest it harm the meridians, or defile one's own true energy.

But with the quintessence of lightning that had come along with the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, Yang Qi could easily absorb it into his sea of energy.

Closing his eyes, he observed the energy settling into place in his dantian region, where it slowly transformed into a blue monster, the same snake-creature from before. However, it now seemed bereft of any ability to act or think of its own accord.

“Good!” Yang Qi murmured, prodding at it with his thoughts.

Unexpectedly, he found that he could manipulate it as easily as one of his own limbs.

At this point, he looked back at the jade thumb-ring which had been hovering there in the air this entire time. Without any further hesitation, he sent the strange stream of true energy directly into the ring.

Buzzzzzz….

The ring, which had not so much as trembled the entire time he had possessed it, suddenly began to shake violently.

At the same time, scintillating blue light shot out of it, which took the shape of a human-sized door, covered with blue ripples like waves.

Yang Qi’s eyes went wide with disbelief. “What's this?” He sent some true energy inside, and immediately realized that this door was a passageway to a small, self-contained dimension, roughly sixty square meters and as tall as seven or eight people.

As for the walls, ceiling, and floor, they all appeared to be made of rippling water.

There were a variety of objects stacked up here and there, the most eye-catching of which was an altar surrounded by bottles and bottles of energy convergence pills. The medicinal strength they exuded sent powerful fluctuations rolling out to fill the small dimension.

“A spell formation!” Yang Qi murmured, shocked. According to the rumors, some top masters became so powerful that they could send out true energy that would never fade away. Instead, it would perpetually absorb the spirit energy of heaven and earth. It was a level that far surpassed Master of Energy.

And this altar was exactly that type of object.

However, what was most intriguing of all wasn’t the altar, but instead, a weapon that lay on top of it.

It was a trident that was apparently made of black gold, its surface covered with numerous complex designs. It was inlaid into the altar itself, which was absorbing the energy from the energy convergence pills, and using a powerful spell formation to imbue it into the trident.

It was almost as if this weapon were a person, absorbing spirit energy.

“A spirit weapon?” Yang Qi was aware that some weapons would develop a spirit and personality. After being refined with true energy to a certain degree, they would be able to absorb the spirit energy of heaven and earth, and do amazing things such as fly through the air.

Most powerful weapons could improve the wielder’s true energy, but weapons with spirits and personalities were different. They could attack enemies on their own, and if they became strong enough, were often referred to as demons.

And in truth, such weapons had become demons, although they were referred to as spirit weapons. They were very rare, and in fact, Yang Qi had only ever seen one in his entire life, the flying sword that his aunt Yang Susu had used to transmit messages.

He had even entertained the hope that if he continued to refine that sword of his, it would eventually become a spirit weapon. Unfortunately, he didn’t know much about equipment forging; having been in the Demi-Immortal Institute for only a month, there was no way he would have studied such things.

And yet, this trident here was most definitely a spirit weapon in the making. It was impossible to say how many energy convergence pills it had absorbed, but after examining it with his true energy, Yang Qi could see that it already had a system of meridian channels forming in it.

“This thing is amazing! If it truly becomes a spirit weapon, it will be incredibly powerful.” Yang Qi was completely delighted. “Plus, this thumb-ring actually has its own dimension! Amazing! It must be some sort of legendary treasure. From now on, I can hunt way more demonlings than before. However many demon cores I harvest, I can keep them all in here.”

At long last he realized that this ring was a legendary holding device.

How many objects could be stored in a sixty-square-meter area as tall as seven or eight people? From now on, he wouldn’t need to carry important objects on his person anymore.

“No wonder that blue-robed youth wasn’t carrying anything. He actually had a thumb-ring of holding!” With that, he went on to take a complete inventory of everything in the ring. In addition to the altar and trident, he found some sets of clothing and medicinal pills. Unfortunately, he didn’t find any martial arts manuals.

There were also numerous banknotes worth more than thirty million energy convergence pills, which was a fortune.

“It’s too bad that thirty million energy convergence pills are only worth three merit points in the institute. Virtually useless….” In the Demi-Immortal Institute, merit points were precious. Even a single one was worth ten million energy convergence pills.

Generally speaking, it wouldn’t be worth it for anyone to buy merit points with energy convergence pills. They had set things up that way specifically to discourage students from doing so.

Yang Qi retracted his true energy, and the door vanished.

Reaching out, he grabbed the ring, which was when he noticed that he could now see writing on its surface: Heart of the Sea.

It was a legendary object from the depths of the sea, forged from a holy object that gave it the ability to hew out its own dimension.

Feeling very pleased with himself, Yang Qi put the ring away and looked around at the wreckage in his room. Taking a breath, he sent out numerous strands of Silk Rain of the Spring Silkworm, and before long, the room was back in order.

Thump thump. Thump-thump-thump….

It was at this point that Yang Qi realized someone was knocking on his door.

Sending some true energy through the door, he saw Li He along with his group of other freshman students.

When he opened the door, they all rushed in. “Yang Qi, we have a good opportunity on our hands. The institute issued a mission for freshman students that’s worth a lot of merit points.”

“What mission?” Yang Qi asked, starting to get a bit excited. After being in the Demi-Immortal Institute for a whole month, he hadn’t accomplished anything of note. If he could get some merit points, though, it would make life a lot easier.

One of the freshman students was named Hua Yinhu.

“An army of brigands has risen up in the northwest plains,” he said. “They've been burning and pillaging everywhere, causing a lot of grief for the common people. What’s worse, many of the common people who were killed had their blood sucked out of them. It seems that the brigands are probably cultivating some evil energy art. The institute wants students to investigate, so a lot of outer campus and even inner campus students are heading to the northwest. Luckily, there are also slots available for freshman students who want to join. All we have to do is kill some of the vampire brigands and bring their blood demon cores back here to get merit points.”

“Kill vampire brigands? That’s all we have to do to get merit points?” Yang Qi was surprised. “That's a pretty hefty reward, isn’t it?”

“Yeah, so a lot of students are planning on going. However, the fact that the reward is so high indicates that the vampire brigands are definitely not easy to deal with. That’s why we need to join forces.”

In addition to Li He, Hua Yinhu, and Yang Qi, there were two other students present, making them a team of five.

“Alright, let’s do it!” Li He said excitedly. “Hey, Yang Qi, I heard that some people from the College of Elite Students might be participating in the mission. You never know, you might run into that Yun Hailan you’ve been looking for.”

“Oh, really?” Yang Qi replied, an enigmatic smile playing out on his face, his pupils glittering.

Hua Yinhu thought for a moment and said, “Yun Hailan? She’s way more important than any of us freshmen. I heard she’s some sort of genius. I'm pretty sure that only two months ago she defeated an inner campus student who was in the ninth phase. Somebody like that must have some impressive backers. She's not the type that we could ever tangle with. We could only hope that one day we would have the chance to kiss up to her.”

‘What? She defeated a Master of Energy? How could she be advancing so quickly?’ Yang Qi frowned, but recovered his composure quickly. This was the Demi-Immortal Institute; studying here was ten times more beneficial than being on the outside, perhaps even a hundred. Many students who had the right circumstances could easily get stronger in a short period of time.

After all, this was a holy land in the Rich-Lush Continent, a place whose legacy stretched back more than ten thousand years.

And Yun Hailan had joined it as an elite student, a position vastly above that of the freshmen.

Perhaps she was being groomed by a Lifeseizer.

However, Yang Qi was convinced that, no matter how strong she was, and no matter how proud, he would be able to crush her.

‘You betrayed me, Yun Hailan. You used me to get that Latent Dragon Pill and then joined the Demi-Immortal Institute. I bet you never could have guessed that I would end up stronger than you. Unless you’re already in the Lifeseizing level, I can definitely crush you. I can't wait to see the expression on your face in that moment. Will you still look as arrogant as you did back when you were toying with me?’

Although the thought got Yang Qi’s heart pounding, he didn’t let it show on his face.

“What,” Li He said teasingly. “Who is Yun Hailan to you anyway? A sweetheart of yours?”

“No,” Yang Qi replied coolly. “But I know her. And she owes me.”

Chapter 57: Vampire Brigands

A biting wind swept across the lands, carrying with it a gritty sand that coated any passing travelers. These were the northwestern plains. It was now midwinter, and yet, no snow had fallen. It was a dry place, filled with yellow earth and bare hills. Occasionally, dried leaves would flutter drearily off barren trees, accompanied by the desolate caws of crows and ravens.

Li He cleared his throat and then spit; before the spittle could even reach the ground, it was frozen.

“The weather here is horrific,” he said. “Sand everywhere. Your spit even freezes as soon as it leaves your mouth. Without strong energy arts, you’d probably freeze if you stayed out in the open. How do people survive the winters here?”

One of the other freshman students opened his mouth to reply, only to have it filled with sand, causing him to devolve into a fit of coughing and cursing.

Yang Qi was there in the team of five.

They had accepted the mission to eliminate vampire brigands, all in the hopes of earning some merit points.

There were other groups who had accepted the mission as well, but were acting on their own. That was how it usually went in the Demi-Immortal Institute; small groups would form, and if things went well with them, they might eventually form official organizations.

Licking his lips enviously, Hua Yinhu looked over and said, “Yang Qi, how can you be taking this so casually? Your true energy must be way more powerful than ours!”

Yang Qi was actually surrounded by a shimmering barrier of energy, which kept the sand and wind away from him. He was the only one among the group who was completely clean, unlike the others, who were covered with sand.

The truth was that they could all create similar barriers if they wanted to.

After all, they were all in the eighth phase, and could perform Mind Incarnation. However, none of them were willing to casually waste their true energy in the way that Yang Qi did.

When they first arrived in the northwestern plains, and saw Yang Qi doing so, they had assumed it was because of his inexperience. After all, conserving true energy was one of the most important things to do on missions. One didn’t want to run low of it in a crucial moment.

To waste true energy on keeping warm and sand-free seemed like suicide.

However, Yang Qi’s energy fluctuations didn’t seem to be weakening at all. His face was not flush from the effort, and was not even close to gasping. He seemed to be taking it all completely in stride.

None of them had ever encountered anyone with such boundless energy reserves.

One of the other students, He Jili, seemed very intrigued.

“Hey, Yang Qi,” he said. “We’ve seen you working on your cultivation, but haven’t seen you fight yet. What are your energy arts and cultivation base like? We're all curious. Want to exchange some pointers? Warm up a bit?”

He Jili was in the eighth phase, and had an impressive background; he was born to a noble family from the Sage Ancestor Dynasty, which was far richer than the country bumpkin Yang Clan. They even had Lifeseizers there. Despite that, he had still been sent to study in the Demi-Immortal Institute.

“Hey, did you notice that?” Yang Qi said. “Forget exchanging pointers. I smell blood. Come on, let’s go check it out!” He suddenly burst into motion, sending sand flying out everywhere as he shot off in a certain direction.

“Blood? How come I don't smell anything?”

The other four students shook their heads, but followed along.

They sped along for a few dozen kilometers before arriving at a desert bazaar. What they saw instantly caused their jaws to drop.

It was a huge market city, and everyone in it was dead. There were corpses everywhere, and the entire place was splattered with blood. There were men, women, the old, and the young. Even babies. All of them had been drained of blood, leaving them as nothing more than desiccated corpses. Furthermore, everything of value had been taken away.

Expressions of horror could be seen on the twisted corpses, as though their final moments had been filled with unimaginable pain.

There were already wolves present, gnawing at the corpses. The sound of crunching bones made the entire scene seem like hell itself.

Yang Qi very nearly gasped at the sight.

After looking around, he noticed that the nearby corpse of a particularly burly man had a wound on his neck that looked like a bite mark. Shockingly, these people had been bitten on the neck, and then had their blood sucked out of them.

The winter wind swept through the bazaar, and it sounded like the wailing of ghosts and the moaning of gods; it was enough to cause one's heart to twitch.

Some of the wolves howled, and then, noticing that there were living humans present, rushed toward the freshman students. However, Hua Yinhu quickly killed them.

“What cruel vampirism!” he said. “I wonder what energy art they were using. It's forbidden to cultivate vampiric arts; they can lead to rapid cultivation advancement, ten times the speed of ordinary people. But anyone found to be practicing such things would be killed instantly. Who would have ever thought that vampire brigands would rise up in the northwestern plains? If we don’t drive them out immediately, who knows how much damage they’ll incur?”

He shook his head. As the son of a marquis from the Sage Ancestor Dynasty, he knew much more about the world than the rest of the students. Kneeling down, he reached out to touch the blood that filled the hoof marks leading off into the distance.

“These people have only been dead for a few hours. Thanks to the temperature, a lot of evidence has been left behind. Looks to me like there were a few thousand brigands. They swept through the bazaar and killed everyone in roughly the time it takes an incense stick to burn. If we follow these tracks, we should be able to catch up to them.”

‘This Hua Yinhu knows what he's doing,’ Yang Qi thought. Although he knew himself to be extremely powerful, it was obvious that it was going to take a lot of work to catch up to the other experienced students when it came to things like investigation and reconnoitering. He knew how to fight, but when it came to non-combat skills, the best thing to do for the moment was to keep quiet and learn from those who knew what they were doing.

“Since we have their trail, let’s track down these vampire brigands and slaughter them all!” Filled with righteous indignation, the students immediately focused on ridding the world of devils and demons like the brigands.

Yang Qi was in full agreement. These vampires were dangerous, and the world wouldn’t be safe until they were all dead.

Hua Yinhu took the lead, and the rest of the group followed him as he began to track the hoof prints off into the distance.

The northwest was gloomy at this time. Occasionally, they would pass hills or other terrain features where common people had set up residence. Sadly, all such structures had been destroyed.

Thousands of years ago, the northwest had been a prosperous place, but eventually, it had been taken over by desert sands, and descended into ruin. As the group continued on, they saw evidence of the civilizations that had existed in this place many years ago.

When they were a few hundred kilometers away from the bazaar, evening began to fall, and the sky turned dark. Thankfully, everyone in the group was an energy art expert, and could easily see in low light. From the thick clouds that choked the sky, it seemed likely snow would begin to fall soon.

At one point, Hua Yinhu stopped and pointed out in front of him. “Look, up ahead! The ruins of an ancient city. Be careful everyone. I’d say it’s highly likely the vampire brigands have taken up residence in those ruins.”

The winter wind howled across battlements which had watched thousands of years pass by.

The team of five sped forward until they were at the city gates. At that point, they realized that there was absolutely no signs of passage, neither of humans nor horses.

“Did we lose them?” Hua Yinhu murmured.

“It's fine,” Li He said. “These brigands move about like the wind. Look, it’s getting late. Why don’t we find a place in these ruins to make camp? We can come up with a new plan tomorrow. Besides, it looks like it’s going to snow, and we don’t want to get stuck out in the open if that happens.”

Everyone exchanged glances, and could see that they all agreed.

Not even people in the eighth phase would want to get stuck in a freezing storm that lasted the night. If spit turned into ice during the day, it could be imagined how cold the night would be.

And thus, the group of five entered the city gate.

The whimpering of the wind was even more ghostly inside the city, almost as though they had passed through the gates of hell. The shops that lined the streets were so old that their signage had long since rotted away into nothing.

“Let’s look for a place that—” Before Li He could finish his sentence, a creaking sound filled the air as the city gates closed behind them of their own accord.

Other than Yang Qi, everyone was shocked. Spinning, Li He said, “Who’s there!?”

Suddenly, they all had the feeling that they had walked into a trap.

Cawing like that of a crow or raven suddenly echoed out on the street, a sound that resembled that of fiendish ghosts who stalked the night. Whispering sounds could also be heard, although it was impossible to determine where exactly they came from.

“Watch out!” Hua Yinhu barked. “There’s something strange about this city. Everybody stand back-to-back!”

Even as the words left his mouth, a shadowy figure appeared behind Hua Yinhu, the color of blood, with sharp fangs and claws. At the same time, a ghostly wind blew across them that caused their hackles to rise.

A claw slashed through the air, pulsing with blood-colored energy as it made contact with Hua Yinhu’s defensive true energy.

An aroma of blood inundated the group that was so strong they nearly collapsed into unconsciousness.

Startled, Hua Yinhu let out a shout, but didn’t have time to react before the blood-colored claw was almost right on him.

“Die!” Yang Qi growled as he attacked like lightning. Instantly, a wave of true energy shot out from him and struck the blood-colored figure.

The thing screamed, then flew away, disappearing into the city.

As it turned out, it was Humanoid True Energy, dispatched by a Master of Energy.

“Who’s out there?!” Hua Yinhu shouted. “Vampire brigands? Your end is nigh! We’re students from the Demi-Immortal Institute! Get out into the open, you freakish hellions! It’s time for you to die!”

At the same time, however, he projected his voice to everyone else in the group. “We're in trouble. We fell into their trap. Who would have thought that they had a Master of Energy on their side?”

Chapter 58: Chu Tiange

A ninth phase expert, a Master of Energy, had ambushed their team of five.

As for the seemingly blood-soaked figure, it was Humanoid True Energy that had slipped in as quietly as a ghost, and disappeared just as suddenly.

Normally speaking, if five freshman students in the eighth phase were attacked by someone in the ninth phase, they would be wiped out. Sadly for their attacker, though, the freakish Yang Qi was there to fight back.

Suddenly, an eerie voice echoed out in the distance. “Who would have guessed that there would be an expert hidden amongst the freshman students of the Demi-Immortal Institute?”

Along with the voice, a demonic wind swept through the desolate ruins that reeked of blood. The stench was so unbearable that the group nearly vomited.

“That’s a blood-toxin energy art!” Hua Yinhu said, struggling to pull a medicinal pill out of his garment. “Get your antidote pills ready!” After consuming the pill, some color returned to his pale face, and wisps of blood-colored toxic energy seeped out of him.

“You take one, Brother Yang,” Li He said, digging out some pills. Clearly, everyone else in the group was experienced enough to have come prepared for something like this.

“There’s no need,” Yang Qi said. “That blood-toxin has no way to get into me.” Sure enough, the true energy flowing through his body prevented any tainted blood energy from entering him.

In fact, he even sent his true energy out for a few dozen paces in every direction, clearing it of any poison, and negating the demonic wind.

Seeing what was happening, the other four students edged closer to him.

They were no fools, and could immediately tell what was going on. Yang Qi was obviously far more powerful than them, and was finally revealing the levels of strength that he had previously kept concealed.

“How could I have guessed that you were keeping your true strength so deeply hidden!?” He Jili said, rubbing his hands together eagerly. “Don’t tell me you’re already in the ninth phase! I guess I really would have embarrassed myself if I really got you to fight earlier, huh?”

“I'm not a Master of Energy,” Yang Qi said with a smile. Shaking his head, he continued, “But don’t worry, I could fight one if I really had to. I’ll take care of you from here on out.”

Of course, if he drew upon the true power of his cultivation base, he could easily flush out and kill whatever Master of Energy was hiding in the ruins. But that would be a bit too dramatic.

And right now, he could only use his Invincible King’s Fist and Golden Bell Rampart.

The Four Seasons Swordplay wasn’t an option; it was a consummate discipline of the House of Spring and Autumn, so if word got out, he might not be afraid of the consequences, but he had to think of his father and brothers.

Even still, with his level of true energy, he could use his two techniques to defeat a Master of Energy fairly easily.

Suddenly, sinister laughter echoed out around them. “Pretty confident in yourself, huh, you little brat. You think you’re strong enough to escape me? What a joke! You brats don’t know the height of the heavens and the breadth of the earth! You think you can come here and rid the world of devils and demons? Although, considering that you’re all in the eighth phase and can perform Mind Incarnation, that means your blood will be much more rich and nourishing than that of mortals. I guess I’ll just have to suck you all dry.”

Yang Qi snorted coldly. “Enough grandstanding. Show your face.”

With that, he stamped his foot onto the stone ground, using his true energy to grab ahold of a large chunk of stone, which he then sent shooting toward the top of a nearby wall.

A gasp of surprise suddenly echoed out, and then a blood-colored streak of light blurred forth, slamming into the rock and shattering it.

As the dust settled, a middle-aged man appeared on the wall, clad in a blood-red robe.

His face was as pale as death, and twisted into a ferocious expression. Two fangs were just barely visible, which were clearly used for the purpose of sucking blood. He pulsed with demon energy, making him seem almost like a demon, and thanks to whatever energy art he cultivated, he was surrounded by blood-colored light.

The man strode off the wall, stepping onto the air as though it were solid ground.

As he approached, more brigands appeared on the walls, hundreds of them, all with profound energy arts. Even the weakest among them was in the fifth phase, and with a mere glance, Yang Qi identified at least ten who were eighth phase experts. Each and every one of them radiated the stench of blood, and were fiendish to the extreme.

As they looked down at Yang Qi and his companions, they seemed like hungry wolves eyeing helpless sheep.

“We’re done for!” Li He murmured. He and the others all had ashen faces, and felt despair gripping their hearts.

“We still have a chance to get out of here,” Hua Yinhu said. “If we send out a distress call, any students within fifty kilometers will come to help.” With that, he pulled out a small firework pellet. He would only have one chance to shoot that pellet high into the air and alert the nearby students. Without any hesitation, he threw it as high as he could.

Pop!

A holy light exploded above them, which gradually took the shape of the word: Demi-Immortal.

Anyone within dozens of kilometers would be able to see it clearly.

“That’s not going to do you any good,” the leader of the brigands said. “We’ve locked this place down tight. There isn’t a living soul within fifty kilometers. If you think other students from your institute are going to come help you, you’re a complete fool.”

The leader truly didn’t seem to care at all about their distress signal.

Eyeing Yang Qi, he said, “I want this brat’s blood. The rest of you share the others.”

“Yes sir!” the other brigands replied, and then began to chuckle menacingly.

“What do we do?!” Hua Yinhu said. He and the others looked over at Yang Qi, whom they had already come to view as their leader.

The fact that so many of these brigands were energy arts experts, all ready to attack, seemed to indicate that escape was an impossibility.

Yang Qi frowned. ‘It seems that the only way to kill these brigands is to use my true strength. If I do that, it could lead to problems later on. But then again, impressing these four right now might be a good thing. As long as they keep my secret, it shouldn’t be a problem.’

His frown vanished, and he prepared for the slaughter to begin.

“Kill them!” the leader shouted, his Master of Energy cultivation base surging to life.

The fight was just about to begin, and yet, that was when a whistling sound suddenly filled the air.

It started out at a great distance, but within moments, was only a few kilometers away. By that point, it sounded like rumbling thunder that caused the ruins around them to tremble physically.

Everyone present looked around in shock.

Even Yang Qi was visibly surprised.

Based on what he was hearing, this was a level of true energy that surpassed anyone he had ever met before. It was at least ten times more powerful than the Master of Energy level, perhaps even a hundred times. It was far beyond anything ordinary.

Shivering, he thought, ‘Don’t tell me… it’s a Lifeseizer…?’

He had just been preparing to unleash his true level of power, but now, he reined in his true energy, and decided to just wait patiently and watch how the situation developed.

The whistling sound suddenly ended, as quickly as it had begun.

At the same time, a figure appeared on a nearby section of the city wall.

It was a young man dressed in simple hemp garments that made him look like an ascetic monk. However, he had a sword strapped to his back, and was so dignified and imposing, with such powerful energy, that anyone who saw him would be inclined to drop to their knees to offer worship.

From his position on the wall, he looked over the scene, and anyone his gaze touched felt like their soul was being struck by a lightning bolt.

Looking at the leader of the brigands, he said, “You freakish hellions! How dare you ambush Demi-Immortal Institute students!”

“Who are you?!” the vampire brigand leader shrieked. Obviously, he recognized how powerful this young man was.

“Chu Tiange from the Demi-Immortal Institute. Remember my name after I kill you. After all, we wouldn’t want moronic ghosts in hell, would we?”

Even as Chu Tiange spoke, sword light spread out from the sword on his back, almost like a bright sun that illuminated all of the city walls.

Before the vampire brigands could even react, countless streams of sword energy stabbed through them, provoking blood-curdling screams.

“A Lifeseizer!?” the leader shrieked. He spun in place, and a pair of blood-colored wings sprouted from his back as he prepared to flee.

However, before he could, the sun-like sword light covered every possible path available to him.

Moments ago, the ancient city had been like a ghost city in the depths of night, sinister to the extreme. But now, intense, sun-like sword light filled it, dispelling any ghostly energy, and filling the place with warmth.

Only shocking types of energy arts could provoke such an astrological phenomenon with only one move.

“A cosmic sunflare leaves thousands shocked. A blow against evil that cannot be blocked. A Demi-Immortal elite who cannot be stopped! Only Chu can sing a song of the heavens!”

As Chu Tiange chanted his poetry, his sword energy swept out dramatically. A moment later, the vampire brigand leader screamed, and was cut down, completely unable to fight back.

Then, a blood-colored demon core flew out of him.

Chu Tiange had used a single move to kill hundreds of brigands, and also cut down a Master of Energy.

To him, it had been as easy as brushing some dust off of his shoulder.

After the sword light died down, Hua Yinhu bowed his head and said, “My respects, Elder Brother Tiange.”

Li He and the others followed suit.

“No problem,” Chu Tiange said, looking them over. His gaze came to rest on Yang Qi. “You’re the ones who released the distress signal?”

“Yes.”

“It's dangerous for freshman students like yourselves to try to take out vampire brigands of this level. I've already investigated the matter thoroughly; these brigands are the work of one of the demon kings of the seventy-two grottos, which is subordinate to the Hanging Mountain. Specifically, they came from the Blood Demon Grotto. Their entire purpose here is to sow chaos and wreak havoc.” Looking back up into the sky, Chu Tiange said, “They’re beyond you, so just leave.”

It was at that point that a howl like that of a lion suddenly reached their ears, and several shadowy figures appeared.

Shockingly, they were colossal monsters, creatures with the heads of lions and the bodies of birds. Yang Qi recognized them. They were demonlings called griffons, an ancient breed that some institutes raised as mounts.

The griffons swooped in and landed on the city wall, whereupon a few people hopped off, all of them students from the Demi-Immortal Institute. And none of them were freshmen. Laughing, they looked at the scene spread out in front of them.

“You’re so awesome, Elder Brother Tiange. You killed all of the brigands before our griffons could even catch up.”

Suddenly, Yang Qi’s eyes flashed with cold light, and his gaze became a stare that locked onto one particular young woman, dressed in blue clothing.

It was her!

Yun Hailan!

Chapter 59: Another Encounter with Yun Hailan

Yang Qi felt the blood rushing to his head, and could even hear grinding sounds as he gritted his teeth. His hands were clenched so tightly into fists that blue veins bulged out on his wrists and forearms.

This was his first time laying eyes on her after her betrayal.

The events had occurred more than half a year ago, and yet, her face had remained imprinted in his heart and mind the entire time. In fact, he couldn’t even count how many times he could see her staring at him contemptuously as he fell asleep at night, or when he went about cultivation. She was beautiful, but at the same time, despicable. Many times during the clan warfare he had participated in, when he saw the mangled, screaming, blood-soaked enemies, he had daydreamed of seeing her in such a state one day.

Now they were in each other's presence again, and the hatred was nearly overwhelming him. However, he knew that he couldn’t actually attempt to take revenge right now; he just wasn’t strong enough. Not by a long shot.

After all, he was also in the presence of a Lifeseizer, Chu Tiange.

The sword technique Chu Tiange had just used was so powerful it could encompass an entire city, and had been able to kill scores of vampire brigands with almost no effort. Yang Qi could tell that he was not a match for that.

This was his first time witnessing the might of a Lifeseizer.

Before, he had assumed that they were simply a bit more powerful than Masters of Energy; but now, he could tell that the disparity was the exact opposite of small.

In fact, the mysterious sun-like sword energy that Chu Tiange had unleashed had even seemed to contain the spirit energy of heaven and earth, and could lock down the sky and the land in all directions.

That was what happened when one could absorb the spirit energy of heaven and earth.

Yang Qi knew that eventually, when a person was powerful enough, he could absorb both the spirit energy of heaven and earth, as well as the quintessence of the sun and moon. Because of that, it wasn't necessary to only use energy convergence pills.

After all, medicinal plants and vegetation could absorb such energies. By taking such ingredients and using them to make medicines, one could then acquire that energy to bolster one's own true energy.

Only by reaching the Lifeseizing level could one ‘seize energy’ by forcibly taking it from heaven and earth.

Energy was life. Life was energy.

As some people said: without energy, life will end.

There were countless types of spirit energy within heaven and earth, and innumerable quintessences. However, experts in the Energy Arts level couldn’t absorb them. It was something only Lifeseizers could do.

And that was why that level was such a major step up.

‘My cultivation base is in the eighth phase, and I have the power of ten ancient megamammoths, but I still would die if I fought a Lifeseizer. If I could achieve another breakthrough, and become a Master of Energy, I would be able to use the Hellfire Crucible, and then I might have a chance…. Wow, Yun Hailan is so powerful! She's not a Lifeseizer, but it looks like she’s already a Master of Energy! Well, I guess that’s what comes from consuming a Latent Dragon Pill.’

Yun Hailan’s aura was so powerful that Yang Qi was almost certain he could see the image of an enormous blue ocean made of true energy behind her, within which dragons swam. Apparently, that was the power of true dragons.

Her exquisite blue clothing made her look like an immortal that had just stepped out of the ocean. She seemed free of all mortal impurities, and even prettier than she had in the past. Virtually any man who saw her would want to worship her.

At the moment, she wasn’t looking around at the others present, but rather, was focusing her attention on Chu Tiange.

“Elder Brother Chu, your Cosmic Sunflare Sword technique has reached the point of absolute perfection. I think it won’t be long before you reach Secondary Lifeseizing. At that point, you’ll be twice as powerful as you are now!”

Yun Hailan’s voice was so soothing and natural that everyone who heard her speaking would instinctively relax. With the exception of Yang Qi. To him, it was the sound of profoundly sinister schemes and plots.

Chu Tiange shook his head. “Not necessarily. The Lifeseizing level is broken up into nine stages, each one of which involves seizing life from the heavens and significantly increasing one’s own life force. But the spirit energy of heaven and earth will fight back, and many people who have lost control during that process end up being ripped to shreds. Secondary Lifeseizing is no joke, and can’t be rushed into.”

At this point, he smiled warmly, making him seem completely different from the man who had just slaughtered countless enemies. “But you’re different, Junior Sister. You have the blood of a sea god in you. As a descendant of a god-spirit, you can progress much more rapidly than me. In fact, many of the professors in the institute think that you’re more of a genius than me. I expect it won’t be long before you become a Lifeseizer as well.”

“Thank you for your kind words, Elder Brother,” Yun Hailan replied, looking like the picture of elegance. “Well, having killed all of these vampire brigands, I'm sure you’ll receive a hefty reward of merit points.”

“I don't care about the merit points, Junior Sister. If you could use the demon cores, they’re yours.”

He waved his hand, and numerous blood-colored demon cores flew up from the corpses and into a sack which he offered her.

“Well, many thanks to you, Elder Brother.” She waved her hands, and a young man stepped forward to take the bag for her.

That young man was none other than Song Haishan, clad in a suit of white armor. Unexpectedly, during the short half-year he had been in the Demi-Immortal Institute, he had already raised his cultivation base to the Master of Energy level as well. Normally speaking, that would take an ordinary individual an entire sixty-year cycle to accomplish.

Hopping back onto his griffon, Song Haishan glanced cursorily at Yang Qi and his companions and said, “You freshman students came to try to kill vampire brigands? How reckless! These vampires are the work of the Blood Demon Grotto, a subsidiary organization of the Hanging Mountain. They all cultivate using blood demon energy, and are experts at sucking the blood out of living beings. You’re no match for them, so get back to the institute immediately. That way we won't be troubled by having to save you again.”

The only people who could use griffons were either outer or inner campus students, which meant that they were beyond the compare of mere freshman students.

Hua Yinhu had long since come to the conclusion that they needed to leave. Grabbing Yang Qi, he said, “Come on, let’s get out of here.”

It was only at that point that Yun Hailan finally looked over at them. When her gaze came to rest on Yang Qi, a strange expression appeared on her face, including a hint of disbelief.

Song Haishan noticed her strange expression, and followed the line of her gaze to Yang Qi, whereupon his eyes lit with surprise. Then, he sneered viciously and said, “Yang Qi! It’s you! You joined the Demi-Immortal Institute?”

“That’s right,” Yang Qi replied in a sonorous voice that everyone present could hear. “I'm a student now too. Surprised, Song Haishan? After being crippled, I experienced a complete recovery.”

From the way he spoke, it was also obvious that he held Song Haishan in complete contempt.

Keeping his voice calm, he looked over at Yun Hailan and said, “It's been half a year since we saw each other last, Yun Hailan. Congratulations on the progress you’ve made, I guess that Latent Dragon Pill worked out well for you.”

Yun Hailan had already recovered her composure, and it was now impossible to tell what she was thinking or feeling. Smiling faintly, she said, “You’re in the eighth phase, Yang Qi. Seems you must have encountered some good fortune of your own. Well, it’s good to see you again. Who would have thought that you would also end up in the number one educational establishment in all the lands? Focus well on your studies, and be a good student. Don’t try to show off. Eventually you can go back to Yanhaven, get married, and live out the rest of your days in peace.”

There were volumes of meaning contained within her words; she was reminding him that he was lucky to be alive, and at the same time, warning him to know his place.

“Live out the rest of my days in peace?” Yang Qi replied, smiling. “If I can break through to the Lifeseizing level, and increase my longevity, maybe I could eventually live forever. Then, I could enjoy all the wonderful aspects of life for all time. There are a lot of things I want to do, and I'm definitely not going to stop until I reach the ultimate pinnacle. However, listen well, Yun Hailan. Relying on treacherous schemes won’t get you to the top. True strength comes from the heart!”

“What gall!” Song Haishan shouted, leaping off his griffon and then flying down from the city wall. Striding toward Yang Qi, he said, “Who the hell do you think you are? You’re nothing more than a measly freshman student! How dare you talk to Hailan that way! She's an elite student!”

“What,” Yang Qi replied, standing his ground, killing intent swirling in his heart. “You think you’re going to teach me a lesson or something, Song Haishan?”

“Teach you a lesson?” At that point Song Haishan laughed loudly. “You think you’re worthy of me? Let me tell you, Yang Qi, you’ve been nothing more than a bug to me from day one. Things haven’t changed. You’re nobody. You think because you got some good fortune and reached the eighth phase that you suddenly have the right to be a boorish philistine? Some people are born geniuses, and some people are born trash. And you’re the latter: Trash! You’ll never change that. I guess that’s something barbarians like you will never understand!”

Seeing how things were developing, and worrying that Yang Qi would come out the worst of it, Li He leaned over and whispered, “Brother Yang Qi, let me handle this. This Song Haishan is at the very least an outer campus student. He completely outranks us. Whatever grudges you held in the past, you should just let them go.”

Then, he stepped forward and addressed Song Haishan. “Elder Brother Song, it seems that my Brother Yang Qi has a beef with you. But we’re all Demi-Immortal Institute students now. As the saying goes, it's best to turn weapons of war into gifts of jade and silk. What do you say? Why don’t you give us some face and—”

Smack!

Before he could finish speaking, Song Haishan stepped forward as quickly as lightning and slapped him across the side of the face, causing blood and teeth to spray out of his mouth as he was knocked to the ground.

Then, Song Haishan spat on him. “Give you some face? Who the hell are you? You’re nothing but a measly freshman student. How dare someone like you talk about face to me! You think I owe you face?”

Not even Yang Qi could have guessed that Song Haishan would actually strike Li He.

He could have intervened, but was not blind to the fact that Chu Tiange was staring at him closely, forcing him to expend almost all his effort on concealing the evidence of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, and revealing only his Invincible King’s Fist and Golden Bell Rampart.

However, the sight of Li He laying there on the ground caused his killing intent to begin to burn.

Stepping forward, Yang Qi helped him to his feet and then sent some true energy into him. A moment later, the swelling on his face was gone.

As for his missing teeth, they would grow back eventually.

After all, energy arts masters were far beyond ordinary people, and could circulate their energy in a way that would mend bones and cause broken teeth to grow back.

“Many thanks, Brother Yang,” Li He said with a wry smile. “I really made a fool of myself, didn’t I?”

“Don’t worry, Brother Li. I’ll help you pay back that slap with plenty of interest.” Yang Qi’s voice then turned as cold as ice. “Nobody hits a brother of mine. He broke some of your teeth? I’ll break every bone in his body!”

Chapter 60: Paying Back Humiliation

“Pay it back? With what?” Song Haishan looked on coldly as Yang Qi helped Li He up, and then healed him with true energy. Secure in the knowledge that he had powerful backers, he was certain he was in absolute control of the situation.

“I'm an outer campus student, so I have full authority to provide instruction to freshmen. This little punk failed to study something he should have studied: Respect! Who does he think he is, asking that I give him face? And then there’s you, Yang Qi. I'm offended by your tone of voice, and normally speaking, would cripple you for it. However, considering that you're part of the Demi-Immortal Institute now, I’ll give you a chance to turn over a new leaf. Get on your knees and give me three sets of three kowtows. Then, I might let you off the hook. What do you say?”

The expression on Song Haishan’s face was as vicious as a cat’s when looking at a mouse.

Obviously, he was just having some fun, and everyone present could tell that even if Yang Qi did kowtow to him, he still wouldn’t let the matter drop.

As for Yun Hailan, she simply looked on, seemingly engrossed with what was happening.

Chu Tiange, on the other hand, was a powerful Lifeseizer. He remained on the city wall, hands clasped behind his back, his robe rippling in the wind. It was at this point that snowflakes began to drift down from above.

“It’s snowing,” Yang Qi said, reaching out to let a snowflake land on his finger. “It's too bad there’s an annoying dog barking in my ear, ruining the scene.”

When Li He heard his words, his jaw dropped. Hua Yinhu and He Jili shivered and turned to look at him, their eyes written with terror, completely incapable of comprehending why Yang Qi would say something like that.

“What did you just say?” At first, Song Haishan wasn't sure he had heard clearly. However, after a moment passed, his face turned purple, and he looked like he might explode at any moment.

“What are you, deaf?” Yang Qi shouted, his words echoing like thunder. “Well, Song Haishan, are you? I said you’re an annoying dog!”

“Are you looking to die!?” Unable to hold back any longer, Song Haishan burst into motion, curling his fingers into dragon’s claws, along with his true energy surging out to form clouds around him. As he moved forward, his claw-like hands stretched out from within the clouds, as if searching for prey.

Seeking Claw of the Cloud Dragon!

The true energy claw attack was so powerful that the stone beneath Song Haishan’s feet shattered. He was obviously holding nothing back, and the killing intent in his move made it clear that he wanted Yang Qi dead.

However, Yang Qi didn’t even pay attention to the claw attack. Clenching his hand into a fist, he unleashed the Invincible King’s Fist, causing six crab-like arms to appear behind him.

His true energy was as powerful as a ten-thousand-ton boulder, and as it catapulted forth, it hit Song Haishan’s true energy and crushed it into nothing.

The onlookers saw Yang Qi’s six arms of true energy form together into something like a sphere, which then rolled forth and smashed into Song Haishan, completely destroying all of his defensive true energy.

Song Haishan screamed as he was sent flying backward, his clothing in tatters. When he finally rolled to a stop, he tried to struggle to his feet, but failed.

“Defeated…?” Li He blurted.

Yang Qi’s friends weren’t the only ones who were surprised. All of the outer campus students on the griffons were completely taken aback. After all, Song Haishan was a Master of Energy, and Yang Qi was only in the eighth phase. Generally speaking, they existed on completely different levels, and no one would ever think that the fight would have gone this way.

Yun Hailan was also visibly shocked.

“What’s this?” Chu Tiange murmured, also surprised.

“You….” Song Haishan simply couldn’t believe that he had been defeated, and still wanted to try to kill Yang Qi.

But before he could move, Yang Qi was right next to him. Squatting down, he patted his cheek and said, “You think that just because you’re a Master of Energy, you can handle me? You see, what you don’t know is that I’ve already absorbed an airmastery plant. I have the same level of inner force as a Master of Energy….”

Of course, Yang Qi mentioned an airmastery plant as a way of concealing the truth about his cultivation base.

When he helped Yang Zhan absorb the airmastery plant inside him, he had acquired some of the plant’s aura, and therefore, had a deep understanding of it. Furthermore, the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth could easily imitate the true energy of the plant, in a way that no other person could detect.

Unless Chu Tiange actually sent some true energy into Yang Qi, he wouldn’t be able to pick up on any clues.

“Hailan, kill this brat!” Song Haishan screamed, hardly able to stand the humiliation.

Whack!

Yang Qi slapped Song Haishan squarely on the side of the face.

Another scream escaped Song Haishan’s lips, as well as a mouthful of blood and teeth.

“Like I said, if you insult a brother of mine, I’ll pay the insult back ten times over. Now, prepare to have your energy arts crippled. That’ll get rid of your little superiority complex.”

With that, he gathered his true energy together in preparation to cripple Song Haishan.

“Enough!” Chu Tiange said. Although he was far away on the city wall, he waved his hand, sending a stream of true energy out that took the form of an army of horses and soldiers. In the face of that, Yang Qi had no choice but to back away.

‘Incredible!’ Yang Qi thought, fully aware that he couldn’t fight back against that energy unless he relied on his true powers. But if he did that, it would attract the suspicions of Chu Tiange, which he couldn’t have right now.

While he backed away, the true energy picked up Song Haishan and pulled him back to the city wall. There, Chu Tiange grabbed him and sent some true energy into him.

Song Haishan immediately began to tremble as his blood heated, causing him to inflate almost like a balloon.

“Behold the spirit energy of heaven and earth!” Chu Tiange said. As everyone looked on, streams of green light fell from the sky, entering Song Haishan and repairing his teeth instantly.

‘So, Lifeseizers can even do that?’ Yang Qi licked his lips in near disbelief.

Although he hadn’t been able to kill Song Haishan, humiliating him did ease some of the inner tension. Of course, he cared a lot more about Yun Hailan. Song Haishan was nothing more than a henchman of hers.

Tossing Song Haishan back onto his griffon, Chu Tiange turned to Yun Hailan and said, “Very well, he's all healed up. Junior Sister Hailan, do you have some sort of grudge with that brat? He has some impressive true energy, and considering he used an airmastery plant, if he becomes a Master of Energy, he’ll be even more powerful. A word from you, and I can resolve the matter immediately, although you would owe me a favor. What do you say?”

Chu Tiange’s words immediately caused the atmosphere to become very tense.

From the way he spoke, he didn’t even think Yang Qi was worth looking at, and if he wanted to, could take him out instantly.

“Elder Brother Tiange,” Hua Yinhu blurted, “Sir, you're a Lifeseizer! Why do you have to make things so difficult for us?”

Chu Tiange ignored him, keeping his gaze fixed on Yun Hailan.

Yun Hailan looked at Yang Qi for a long moment, then sighed. “Forget it. His aunt is Yang Susu. Besides, airmastery plants aren’t anything special. Let’s go, Elder Brother Tiange. There are still plenty of vampire brigands left to kill.”

Chu Tiange’s eyes suddenly glittered with intense light. “He’s Yang Susu’s nephew? Well, isn’t that interesting. But you know, Yang Susu isn’t really that extraordinary. As I said, a single word from you, and I’ll end all of this frustration for good.”

“Many thanks, Elder Brother, but let’s go.” Yun Hailan hopped back onto her griffon, which spread its wings and then launched up into the air. Looking back down, she said, “Yang Qi, it would be best for you to know your place. Leave the Demi-Immortal Institute. If you don’t, you’ll regret it sooner or later.”

“Thanks for your concern,” Yang Qi replied. “Although, you should be more worried about yourself.”

Chu Tiange gave Yang Qi a long look, then blurred into motion, becoming a series of afterimages that shot off into the distance.

And thus, a heaven-shaking, earth-shattering event came to conclusion.

When Li He and the others were finally alone, they all breathed long sighs of relief, although they were all still taut with nervousness.

As for Yang Qi, he closed his eyes and sat down cross-legged, almost as if he were working on his cultivation.

After some time passed, Hua Yinhu found an area nearby where some trees had begun to grow in the ruins of the city. Within those trees was a ramshackle hut, where he quickly set up a fire. Hurrying back to Yang Qi, he said, “Why don't we spend the night here? There’s nothing dangerous in the area now. With all the brigands slaughtered, and Chu Tiange nearby, there definitely won’t be any more incidents.”

“Lifeseizers are incredible,” Yang Qi said, opening his eyes. “You four warm up by the fire. I'm going to work on my cultivation in this snowstorm. After seeing Chu Tiange in action, I’ve gained some enlightenment, and want to push toward my next breakthrough.”

“Alright. In that case, we won't disturb you.”

With that, everyone went to sit by the fire, although they kept an eye on Yang Qi.

The snowfall grew heavier and heavier, and before long, the ground was pure white.

Yang Qi had already summoned a protective barrier to keep the snow away.

‘Yun Hailan, it won't do you any good to hide behind Chu Tiange. I can defeat him.’ His true energy surged through him like lava ready to erupt from a volcano.

Meanwhile, the lightning mammoth was already active inside him.

Slowly but surely, the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth was causing something like a crucible to form within his sea of energy.

The Hellfire Crucible actually contained the lightning mammoth, and was slowly melting it, extracting its life force quintessence.

Whizz!

Another particle woke up inside Yang Qi, filling him with the power of an eleventh ancient megamammoth.

Chapter 61: Master of Energy Level

‘Hell-Crushing Godmammoth; return of the king of hell….’

As the eleventh particle within Yang Qi woke up, his mind and heart were filled with the fundamental meaning of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, saturating his true energy to an even further degree.

The liquid-like true energy within him was now crystallizing, and snowflake-like magical symbols were swirling within his sea of energy. Each of those symbols, which were expressions of true energy, contained different properties, and yet, they all seemed to be stretching out toward the heavens.

Even his soul seemed to be encompassed by his true energy.

The energy poured from his meridians, flowing toward his sea of energy, making it feel as though all parts of his body were linked together.

‘This is what it feels like to be a Master of Energy!’ he thought, filled with excitement at the prospect of an imminent breakthrough.

Upon reaching the ninth phase, it was true that all parts of the body became linked together. The true energy that was produced by the meridians not only became stronger, it formed river-like streams that flowed into the sea of energy.

In this level, one became vastly stronger than an ordinary person, and could last for much longer in a fight.

Because of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, Yang Qi was already a hundred times stronger than an ordinary person, and was very familiar with the Master of Energy level.

After all, he had helped to unleash the medicinal effects of the airmastery plant in his father.

Therefore, the transformations which were occurring now were by no means strange.

As soon as he felt the various parts of his body linking up, he guided the newly-created magical symbols into the shape of the Hellfire Crucible.

It was only an embryonic version, not fully formed. He would need to cultivate further to unleash its true power, but if he did, it would be easy to fight Chu Tiange.

After all, the legendary Hellfire Crucible had originally been used to melt and refine disgraced gods.

Even its embryonic form served to purify any type of true energy within him.

For example, the true energy of the Invincible King’s Fist, the Golden Bell Rampart, the Four Seasons Swordplay, or even the scrap of sea god energy. All of them became purer upon passing through the Hellfire Crucible, and would not conflict with each other.

As a result, he could use virtually any type of energy art that he wanted.

At the moment, snow choked the sky and covered the lands, making all existence a mass of whiteness.

Hua Yinhu looked out at Yang Qi sitting there in his defensive barrier and said, “I wonder what exactly Brother Yang Qi’s cultivating, he’s been out there in the snow for a long time. If I tried to sit out there all night, I'm afraid my true energy would run out.”

“He’s so strong that he can already defeat Masters of Energy,” Li He said. “He’s got so much true energy I don’t think it would ever run out. However, he picked a fight with Song Haishan, an outer campus student. That’s only going to cause more and more problems down the line.”

“What are you scared of?” said Liang Dong, another of the students. “As long as he's strong enough, those stuck-up bullies won’t dare to provoke him.”

The team of freshmen consisted of five students in total: Yang Qi, Li He, He Jili, Hua Yinhu and Liang Dong.

Liang Dong was the most mysterious. He had been in the institute for the longest, and yet, nobody knew anything about him. However, it was obvious that he wasn’t a nobody.

As he picked up another piece of firewood and tossed it into the fire, he heard a strange noise coming from outside. At the same time, he smelled something that made him think of lava from hell, causing him to sneeze.

“What’s going on? Is there a volcano in the area?” Shocked, he rose to his feet. “Look! Brother Yang Qi is experiencing a transformation! Do you sense that power?!”

Everyone else stood up and looked over nervously at Yang Qi.

The barrier which surrounded Yang Qi was getting bigger. And it was no longer transparent; instead, it was as red as fire or even lava, and just as hot, causing all of the snow in the area to evaporate and rise up like steam.

Even the ground began to grow soft, and then melt and bubble.

All coldness in the area was driven away, to be replaced by incredible heat.

In fact, all the snow that had built up within the ancient city around them was turning into steam.

“Hot! So hot!” Li He and the others were all having trouble enduring.

RUMMMBLE!

Moments later, it got so hot that the shack they were in burst into flames.

“Quick, get out of here!”

Drawing on their energy arts, the four students flew up to stand on the city wall.

In that position, the heat was less intense, and they also had a better view of Yang Qi’s position, although the bright red barrier that surrounded him made it impossible to actually see him.

It was as if he were in the middle of a sea of lava and flame that was transforming the entire city around him into a massive conflagration.

RUMMMBLE!

Suddenly, the lava barrier exploded, sending a column of flame high into the sky, piercing directly into the dark clouds.

If it weren’t for the fact that there was a snowstorm, the flame would have been visible for hundreds of kilometers in all directions.

“Fuse one’s energy with the clouds,” Hua Yinhu said. “The Master of Energy level….”

“This power is incredible!” Li He exclaimed. “Yang Qi was keeping his true strength concealed earlier. With this level of strength, I bet he could easily stand up to a move from Elder Brother Chu Tiange’s Cosmic Sunflare Sword technique.”

“Just how strong is Brother Yang Qi? And what energy art does he cultivate?”

Even as the students discussed the matter amongst themselves, the column of flame shrank back down, and the heat faded away. Yang Qi was then revealed, his clothing not burned in the least bit, and the ground beneath his feet already starting to cool and solidify.

Considering how cold it was, the ground soon began to ice over, and snow once again began to cover everything. Because of the rapid change in temperature, however, the city began to crack and crumble as surely as a porcelain vessel that had been dropped.

After all, the heat which had just been emanating off of Yang Qi had been like that of the sun.

‘I'm finally a Master of Energy!’ Yang Qi thought, calming his aura. Already, he could sense that the flow of true energy within him was much more stable.

Furthermore, because his true energy had transformed, the life force quintessence of the lightning mammoth inside him had caused the eleventh through fifteenth particles to awaken.

As of now, the lightning mammoth’s life force quintessence had been reduced so much that only a small amount was left.

Based on what Yang Qi could calculate, he was fairly certain that it would only get him to the point of twenty ancient megamammoths. When that happened, his cultivation would not proceed as smoothly as it had up to this point. He would need to find his own way to accumulate life force quintessence.

Thankfully, the Hellfire Crucible would help him to refine all sorts of true energy.

With the power he had now, that of fifteen ancient megamammoths, he could easily destroy all sorts of enormous beasts from primeval times.

Suddenly, a stream of true energy erupted out of Yang Qi, which assumed a humanoid shape. It actually looked exactly like Yang Qi himself, down to the finest detail. Only a powerful energy arts master who looked at it closely would be able to tell that it wasn't him.

‘Go!’ Yang Qi ordered via his thoughts. In response, his Humanoid True Energy burst into motion toward the nearby city wall.

BOOOOOOOM!

A huge explosion resulted, causing a large portion of the wall to crumble into nothing.

That city wall was very sturdy, and was dozens of meters thick. It had stood strong for many years, and was impervious to even gunfire weapons.

And yet, Yang Qi’s Humanoid True Energy crushed it, sending chunks of rocks flying out everywhere.

No ordinary person could possibly unleash power like that.

“He’s… a Master of Energy?”

Li He and the others were all shocked to the core as they dodged out of the way of the rocks which rained down after the explosion.

“The Sage Ancestor Dynasty’s Hundred Grandmasters Spell Formation can break through city walls as easily as a hammer crushing an ice cube,” Hua Yinhu murmured. “This is the same level of power!”

That formation was enormous, and required a hundred Masters of Energy to pool their power together to attack the walls of a besieged city. No matter how powerful a city wall was, it wouldn’t be able to stand up to that level of power.

And yet, Yang Qi’s Humanoid True Energy had unleashed exactly the same level of strength. How could one person be as powerful as a group of a hundred Masters of Energy?

“You might be a Lifeseizer, Chu Tiange, but now that I'm a Master of Energy, I can definitely take you on!” Yang Qi was confident that with his Humanoid True Energy combined with his Infernal Deity Spear, Infernal Deity Aegis, and Fiend-Devil Wings, he could definitely fight Chu Tiange and his Cosmic Sunflare Sword technique.

Maybe he wouldn’t be able to defeat him, but neither would he lose.

‘Today was my first time seeing a Lifeseizer in action. I wonder when I’ll actually be able to fight one.’ Yang Qi snorted coldly. ‘One day, Yun Hailan, I'm going to strip you of every bit of arrogance that exists within you. You will definitely come to realize that you made a monumental mistake.' At this point, his eyes softened. 'But my most important goal is still my dear mother. I will kill anyone who blocks my path to the Hanging Mountain to find her.’

Chapter 62: Secrets of the Hanging Mountain

BAM!

The head of a vampire brigand flew off his shoulders, his fangs shattered. At the same time, a blood-colored demon core flew out of him.

That particular brigand had been a sixth phase energy arts expert.

Far from the city was a band of thousands of vampire brigands who had just returned from pillaging a village. As soon as Yang Qi, Li He, He Jili, Hua Yinhu and Liang Dong found them, they set upon them with no mercy.

It was the day after Yang Qi had become a Master of Energy.

Now he really was a ninth phase expert, and had the power of fifteen ancient megamammoths at his command. His true energy was now powerful enough that his attacks could damage mountains.

Instead of returning to the Demi-Immortal Institute, they continued to hunt vampire brigands in the northwestern plains.

After all, every brigand they killed meant more merit points in the end.

And with Yang Qi in the mix, the vampire brigands had no hope of fighting back.

The northwest was rife with numerous bands of brigands; the one that Chu Tiange had killed the night before was only one of many.

After his breakthrough, Yang Qi had rested for the night. Then, at dawn, he led the hunt. It had taken some work, but they eventually found a village several dozen kilometers out of the city that some brigands had sacked. From there, it had been an easy task to track the vampires down.

“Get over here! Snatch the Dragon; Sway the Crane!” True energy poured out of Hua Yinhu’s hand, smashing into a seventh phase vampire brigand, and then extracting the blood demon core from him.

Soon, the group of five had a ninth phase brigand surrounded, the leader of the band.

Despite being a Master of Energy, he wasn’t as strong as the brigand leader from the city before; apparently, he had just achieved his breakthrough. Looking around at his dead subordinates, he backed away, trying to use his true energy to defend himself against Yang Qi.

Yang Qi wasn’t in a hurry to kill him; instead, he wanted information. “Talk, you hellion. How many vampire brigands are in the northwest? Who’s your top leader? Is he a Lifeseizer?”

The brigand burst out into raucous laughter. “Just kill me!” he growled. “The exalted Wuxue will avenge my death! You just wait! We’re subordinates of the Hanging Mountain! We were created by one of the demon kings of the seventy-two grottos, the Blood Demon Grotto!”

This was not Yang Qi’s first time hearing of matters such as this.

The first time had been back in the Blackcorpse Mountains, when his father revealed some of the truth of his mother to him.

That was when he came to know that his mother was actually an important person in the Hanging Mountain. She was not a human, but rather, one of the Demonfolk. And supposedly, the Hanging Mountain was actually another world.

And he had also heard of the demon kings of the seventy-two grottos before.

If even the lowest ranked among those grottos, the Blood Demon Grotto, could casually produce a huge force like this, it begged the question of what else the Hanging Mountain was capable of.

As Yang Qi tried to decide what to say next, a violent burst of energy suddenly rose up inside of the brigand leader, causing him to explode into a haze of blood.

Yang Qi leapt backward, waving his hand to summon a huge barrier to contain the explosion.

Within the barrier, blood splashed about everywhere.

“That was Grand Bloodshade Disintegration!” Li He blurted. ‘It’s used to kill oneself along with the enemy. When unleashed by a Master of Energy, the levels of deadly power are incredible. And yet, it couldn’t even break through that barrier Brother Yang Qi threw up? Just how strong is he?’

The longer this group of four was around Yang Qi, the more mysterious he seemed to them.

Yang Qi looked at the pearl-like demon core from the leader. “This is a high-quality core. We should be able to get quite a few merit points from this.”

“You’re right, Brother Yang,” Li He said. “That demon core is probably worth three merit points. It usually takes dozens or even hundreds of ordinary cores to get even a single merit point. And according to sect rules, only demon cores from the eighth phase and up can be exchanged. Do you want to rest for a bit? Or just keep on hunting? According to what we all just heard, the ultimate leader of these vampire brigands is someone they called the exalted Wuxue. He must be a Lifeseizer, otherwise Chu Tiange wouldn’t be involved.”

“Sure. By the way, I'm the newcomer here, so I don't know much about the Hanging Mountain. Considering how long you guys have been around, do you know anything about it?”

Up to this point, Liang Dong hadn’t said much. But apparently, he knew a lot about Demonfolk, as he provided the explanation. “According to the legends, it's a divine mountain created in primeval times by one of the Demonfolk’s invincible Great Sages. Supposedly, it exists beyond the heavens. The patriarchs of the Demonfolk live there, and the other Demonfolk who do live in the Rich-Lush Continent heed their commands, and view the place as a holy land. By that I mean the seventy-two demon kings and thirty-six devil lords, who lead a total of one hundred and eight major forces. As for those major forces, they are broken up into too many smaller factions to even count. The institutes of our land have tried to establish formal relations with the Hanging Mountain, but have never succeeded.”

None of it seemed very real to Yang Qi. “So the Hanging Mountain is basically mythological?”

It all seemed so vague and unreal that it made the idea of seeking out his mother seem like nothing but a fantasy.

“For all intents and purposes, yes.” At this point, Liang Dong shifted the topic of conversation. “Yang Qi, when you defeated Song Haishan yesterday, your true energy was incomparably mighty. Did you really use the power of an airmastery plant? I’ve heard that airmastery plants come from the Hanging Mountain.”

Yang Qi smiled. “Someone in my clan got one for me. And I was also struck by lightning, which helped me to absorb it.”

“You really got lucky, Brother Yang,” Li He said. “Well, now that you’re a Master of Energy, we can kill more of these vampire brigands and get even more merit points. If we can become outer campus students, then we can finally cultivate some of the institute’s best techniques. I’ve been wanting to become a Master of Energy for as long as I can remember.”

“Don’t even worry about it,” Yang Qi said, clasping Li He on the shoulder. “When my energy arts are strong enough, I’ll do everything I can to help you.”

“You’re a real brother,” Li He said, smiling. “If you ever need help with anything, you just come looking for me. Although, considering how profound your cultivation base is, I doubt I’ll ever be of much help.”

“You never know,” Yang Qi said. “I heard you’re actually from a powerful group in the Sage Ancestor Dynasty, is that right? Nobility or something? My clan is from a remote place called Yanhaven. War is coming their way, and I’m not sure if they’re strong enough to survive. Maybe you can help me move my clan closer to the Sage Ancestor Dynasty itself?”

“I’ll do everything I can to help.” Looking a bit nervous, he continued, “But don’t forget, although my clan is powerful, I rank really low. My words don’t carry much weight.”

Yang Qi chuckled. “Just wait until you’re a Master of Energy. Then your words will carry weight. And I'm not asking you to do anything right away. I’ll only need help if they reach the point where they can’t take care of themselves. Right now, they’re in a golden age of sorts, high-spirited and full of mettle. Here.” He sent a tiny seed of true energy into Li He’s sea of energy. “Absorb that true energy seed, and it might help you become a Master of Energy more quickly.”

The other three students looked on enviously, but refrained from saying anything. After all, it was no easy task to do what Yang Qi was doing.

Yang Qi looked over and could tell what they were thinking. “What, you three brothers also want some true energy?”

“Brother Yang Qi, your energy arts are profound. Any help you could provide would be amazing, and we would be eternally grateful. From now on, matters of the Yang Clan will be our responsibility. We’ll share both honor and disgrace with you.”

“Excellent. Considering everything we've been through, we’re all brothers now. Listen, I know it’s not the custom, but how about I help you increase your cultivation bases? The time has come for you to make a name for yourselves in the institute! Who says freshman students are useless? In fact, why don't we formalize our friendship and form a campus society?”

In the Demi-Immortal Institute, it was common for students to form campus societies, which could eventually turn into major forces.

Although the official rules stated that the students of the institute were supposed to be united, the truth was that relationship networks were both complicated and very important. Anyone who wanted to succeed needed to be in a campus society. After all, that was one of the best ways to get access to precious cultivation resources.

“Agreed!” Liang Dong said. “Let’s form our own society. And you have to be our leader, Brother Yang Qi. Right now, the most powerful society in our institute is the Crown Prince Society. Some of the other powerful societies are the Divine Ability Society, the Truth and Reason Society, the Five Lightnings Society, the Moonfire Society and the Gentlemen’s Society. We’ll start from the very bottom and work our way up. And eventually, we’ll rock the world and do amazing things.”

“Oh? I didn’t know there were so many groups in the institute.” Although he had been in the Demi-Immortal Institute for a while now, he was still very low-ranking, and hadn’t spent much time with others.

“Yeah, Chu Tiange is from the Crown Prince Society, that's why he’s so overbearing. Even some of the professors are scared of him.”

“I heard that the leader of the Crown Prince Society, the mysterious and enigmatic Crown Prince, is actually a holy neophyte within the institution.”

“They’re so strong! Think about it, you have to be a Lifeseizer to become an elite student, and above them are the conclave students. Can you even imagine what a holy neophyte is like?”

“Alright, but what should we call ourselves?” Yang Qi said, turning his eyes up in thought.

“You know, there’s a maxim in the Demi-Immortal Institute. It says ‘sage inside, monarch outside’. Powerful experts are sages, almighty beings are monarchs. Cultivate the morality of a sage on the inside, and the might of a monarch on the outside! If you're strong, you can protect the common people and the nation, and can earn the devotion of countless people. Be wise and sagacious. Appoint the best and brightest to serve you, and cater to their abilities. If you do these things, you will earn the sincere respect and admiration of the masses. Why don’t we call ourselves the Sage Monarch Society?”

“Sage inside, monarch outside….” Yang Qi murmured, thinking about the profound nature of the words. After a moment, he smiled. “Alright. The five of us are the Sage Monarch Society. Let’s hope that we can make a name for ourselves! I accept the nomination to be the first leader, and all of you will be the first council of chief elders!”

Chapter 63: The Sage Monarch Society

Who could ever have guessed that the very Sage Monarch Society which would eventually shake the Demi-Immortal Institute to the core would be founded by five freshman students in this fashion?

In truth, the puny little group was only the seed of a society. Compared to the membership and power of the numerous other societies in the institute, they were almost like children playing house. However, Yang Qi was convinced that things would only improve from this point on.

Although Li He, He Jili, Hua Yinhu and Liang Dong were only in the eighth phase, they all had impressive backgrounds. If they could rise within the ranks of the institute, and improve their cultivation bases, then their influence in their clans would grow, and that would benefit Yang Qi.

Most people who got into the Demi-Immortal Institute came from powerful clans, so the more people he could get as allies, the better he would be able to protect his own clan.

“Alright, let’s swear a blood oath to be brothers, and form our society!”

They all got on their knees and swore to the heavens: “The five of us are brothers. Sages inside, monarchs outside. Share in glory, share in loss. Let any traitors be punished by heaven and earth, and abandoned by mortals and gods alike!”

Having uttered their oath, they exchanged glances and then burst out in laughter.

Yang Qi was feeling wonderful. Now that they were all brothers, if his secret was revealed to them, he was more confident that word wouldn’t spread.

“Alright, sit down. I’m going to use my energy arts to transform you completely. Before long, all of you will be Masters of Energy!”

With that, Yang Qi used his true energy to mark out places for them to sit, placing his friends in the east, south, west, and north positions, and himself in the center.

Then, he threw his hands out, causing a true energy barrier to spring up around them. Simultaneously, four arms sprouted out from his back.

Now that he was a Master of Energy, the arms that came with the Invincible King’s Fist were extremely shocking in nature.

Five fingers sprouted out from the end of each arm, which then came to rest on the heads of his four friends. Almost instantly, scalding true energy began to pour through their meridians and into their muscles. The four of them gritted their teeth as the impurities within them were slowly extruded.

“So much heterogeneous true energy!” Li He was delighted to see the energy being forced out of him, and the reversal of the damage that had been done to his meridians because of the various energy arts he practiced.

Yang Qi’s cultivation base had also once contained such heterogeneous true energy.

The truth was that one of the main reasons people had trouble rising to higher cultivation levels was because of the discord created by different techniques, which caused the true energy to become impure.

Unfortunately, only cultivating a single technique wasn’t an option, as it would leave one too weak to contend with enemies in a fight.

All in all, cultivation required finding a good balance.

Now that Li He and the others were having the true energy conflicts within them smoothed out, they could tell that it would be easier to reach the ninth phase.

One of the main reasons their studies in the Demi-Immortal Institute had been going so slowly was because of the heterogeneous true energy they had built up.

All four of them exhaled, their true energy flowing through them as hot as magma.

It was no waste for Yang Qi to be using his true energy to purify them. After all, as it flowed inside of their bodies, he was able to discern certain secret aspects to the techniques they cultivated, which was of great benefit to himself.

Flames swirled out from Yang Qi’s true energy arms and into specific acupuncture points, piercing deep into their veins to find necrotic blood.

Before long, steam began to rise up from the heads of the four students as the noxious, acrid blood was cleansed and made pure.

This was a water-type energy art, and considering that it was snowing, water-type energy arts were particularly easy to use.

All of a sudden, a whistling sound could be heard as a stream of vital energy shot up from Liang Dong and reached toward the sky. Fuse one’s energy with the clouds! Liang Dong was the first among the group to become a Master of Energy.

He was the most mysterious of the group of five, and kept many secrets. But now, Yang Qi realized that he had a type of spirit herb inside him, similar to an airmastery plant. However, while the airmastery plant contained an energy related to lightness and agility, this plant was hard and unyielding, and as hot as fire.

“At long last my flamesun vine is completely refined!” Liang Dong exclaimed excitedly. “I’ve finally mastered flamesun true energy! Many thanks, Brother Yang!”

“Good job,” Yang Qi said, nodding. With that, he pulled his energy back in. Although his other three friends were not yet Masters of Energy, it wouldn’t be long before they broke through the bottlenecks that were holding them back.

Rising to his feet excitedly, Li He said, “Alright, let’s go track down some more vampire brigands. We can break through during the fighting.”

With that, the five of them blurred into motion, disappearing into the snow, eager to get back to action.

Meanwhile, on a mountain some distance away, a griffon was crouching in the snow. On its back was Song Haishan, who was in a foul mood. In fact, he was so angry that he felt like committing suicide.

“Dammit! I'm gonna kill you, Yang Qi!”

Waving his hand angrily, he sent out a burst of true energy in the form of a sphere, which smashed into the snowy ground and exploded.

Yun Hailan was off to the side.

“Alright, Song Haishan,” she said, her voice as cold as ice. “Calm down. Aren’t you done venting? You don’t want to interrupt Elder Brother Chu Tiange’s studies of that astrological phenomenon.”

In response, Song Haishan quickly reined in his true energy.

“I refuse to accept this, Hailan! That punk is nothing but trash. So what if you used him back in the day? And now he’s making a name for himself? I'm never going to forget how he humiliated me. I’ll get my revenge one day! I’ll wipe out his entire clan! I’ll make sure he understands the consequences of offending me!”

“Making a name for himself? I doubt it.” Yun Hailan sat down cross-legged, using her true energy to create a canopy over herself, not to block the snow, but to collect it.

As she did, the snow began to transform into magical symbols made of water vapor, which then shrank down into dots that entered her body.

Apparently, she was absorbing the quintessence of the snow itself.

“Yang Zhan probably saved Yang Qi using his airmastery plant, that’s all. If Yang Qi absorbed that airmastery plant, it means that his cultivation base is the same as four or five Masters of Energy put together. It’s only natural that you're not a match for him. However, not even a hundred Masters of Energy could be a match for a single Lifeseizer. You just focus on your cultivation. The rewards from the institute for this mission might be enough to awaken the blood of a sea god within you, and possibly even reach the Lifeseizing level. If you let the incident from yesterday erode your confidence, then you’ll be worse trash than Yang Qi.”

Throughout the entire conversation, Yun Hailan’s voice didn't seem to contain even a hint of emotion.

“I'm gonna rip that little swine’s head off and hang it on a tree right next to his father’s,” Song Haishan growled furiously. “Hailan, you had a Lifeseizer to help you further your cultivation. Plus, the blood of a sea god within you is very strong. Probably a hundred times stronger than in me, or maybe even a thousand. You definitely have a shot at becoming a Lifeseizer soon, but it's going to be a lot harder for me.”

“Don’t worry. Once I'm in the Lifeseizing level, my standing among the Seafolk will rise rapidly. I’ll get you some medicinal pills that have the blood of a sea god in them. That should help you out.” With that, she waved her hand dismissively. “Come on, sit down and start cultivating. If Yang Qi attacks you again, then I’m going to stop treating him special because of how he gave me the Latent Dragon Pill. I’ll take him out myself if I have to. If he tries to strut around relying on the quintessence of an airmastery plant, he’s nothing more than a big joke.”

Not too far away on the peak of the mountain was Chu Tiange, who was using a feng shui compass formed of true energy to study an astrological phenomenon. “Let me remind you again, Junior Sister Hailan. If you don’t mind owing me a favor, I can go cut that brat down right now.”

“Many thanks, Elder Brother. The reason I want to leave Yang Qi alone is more than just his connection to Yang Susu. He did steal a Latent Dragon Pill for me, and we were friends. And I also swore an oath not to kill him. However, if he insists on being bull-headed, and continues to talk of revenge, then our friendship will be over for good. That will be the day he dies.” Apparently, Yun Hailan felt that she had everything under control. “Yang Qi is a nobody, and isn’t worth even thinking about. The most important thing right now is what you're working on, Elder Brother Chu Tiange. Have you been able to divine the location of the leader of the vampire brigands, Jing Wuxue? If you want me to owe you a favor, Elder Brother Chu Tiange, then why don’t you kill Jing Wuxue and give me his blood demon core?”

“Alright. Done deal!”

Chu Tiange rubbed his hands together and eyed Yun Hailan’s voluptuous curves. “But favors to me aren't always easy to pay back. When the time comes, and I ask for something, will you agree to give it?”

Yun Hailan chuckled. “As long as the favor matches the debt, I won’t hold anything back. That said, the Crown Prince personally told me that everyone in the Crown Prince Society is supposed to take care of me. The whole reason I entered the College of Elite Students as a Master of Energy was because of him. Elder Brother Chu Tiange, aren’t you worried that he might find out about the thoughts running through your head right now?”

The Crown Prince was a legendary figure within the Demi-Immortal Institute.

He was a holy neophyte, an incredibly high position. Furthermore, his cultivation base was profound to the extreme. In fact, even Lifeseizers looked up to him, and were unsure of his exact cultivation level.

His Crown Prince Society was the most powerful organization within the Demi-Immortal Institute, and had as many experts as members as the sky had clouds.

Even an insufferably arrogant person like Chu Tiange would shudder in fear at the mentioning of his name.

After all, he was a member of the Crown Prince Society, and knew full well how terrifying the Crown Prince was.

Somehow, Yun Hailan had encountered the Crown Prince when she first joined the Demi-Immortal Institute half a year ago, and apparently, he had taken a liking to her; a single word from him allowed her to enter the College of Elite Students. And he had even used his own true energy to increase her cultivation.

Chapter 64: Dragonpearl

A long moment passed in which Chu Tiange apparently put some thought into the matter of the Crown Prince. Then, he shifted the topic of conversation. “Junior Sister Hailan, presumably you want to use Jing Wuxue’s blood demon core to force a breakthrough into the Lifeseizing level, right? Don’t forget, he’s a Lifeseizer. Even if I managed to kill him, you wouldn’t be able to absorb his demon core any time soon. It would burn your five yin organs, and throw your meridians and sea of energy into chaos.”

Yun Hailan smiled. “Oh, I have a plan, Elder Brother Tiange. Don’t you worry. Take a look at what I have here, and you’ll understand why I have no reason to fear a blood demon core.”

Even as her energy arts continued to transform the quintessence of the snow into magical symbols that entered her body, she rose to her feet and extended her hand, within which rested a pearl.

It glittered so brightly that it was difficult to look at, and was clearly filled with immense power.

The holy, silvery light which shone off of it rose high into the sky, driving the snow away from it.

Just barely visible within that silver light was what appeared to be a divine dragon, swirling about and roaring. All of a sudden, it felt as if there really were a dragon present, making it almost impossible to breathe.

Song Haishan immediately began to back away, his eyes wide with disbelief; clearly, he had no idea that Yun Hailan possessed such an item as this.

This was a legendary treasure!

“A dragonpearl!?” Chu Tiange blurted in shock. He immediately circulated his true energy as if he were about to attack her and steal it. But then, he thought of the Crown Prince, and settled his energy. Letting loose a low whistle, he said, “I can’t believe you have a dragonpearl. They’re so rare that I'm not sure if even the institute has any. Where did you get it, Junior Sister?”

“I found it on a sightseeing trip at the ocean,” Yun Hailan said casually. “Dragonpearls contain the will of a divine dragon, and can suppress all types of wretch-devils. Fortunately for me, I also acquired a Latent Dragon Pill in the past, giving me some of the blood of a divine dragon. With such blood, I can link myself to the pearl, making it the perfect treasure for me. After I get Jing Wuxue’s blood demon core and use the dragonpearl to suppress it, I can then use it as an ingredient to use to create an out-of-body incarnation of myself, a second nascent divinity if you will. In any case, I don’t plan to absorb it. What do you think, Elder Brother Chu Tiange? Truth be told, the moment the Crown Prince met me, he saw my dragonpearl, which was why he took an interest in me. In fact, he was the one who taught me how to make the second nascent divinity to begin with.”

“The Crown Prince taught you how to make a second nascent divinity?” Chu Tiange said, clearly shaken. “No wonder. That’s a secret legacy energy art of the Demi-Immortal Institute; not even I know how to do it.”

He then looked deeply at Yun Hailan. “That’s a royal-class energy art that would normally cost over ten thousand merit points to acquire from the institute. It's also forbidden to pass it on to another person. If they found out, they would cripple the energy arts of whoever did it…. but the Crown Prince is an exception. The normal rules don't apply to him, and no one would dare to accuse him of a crime. You’re extremely lucky to have attracted his attention, Junior Sister Hailan. Very well. I’ll help you to kill Jing Wuxue. I just hope that when you have a chance, you can put in a good word for me to the Crown Prince.”

“That goes without saying. By the way, the Crown Prince mentioned that he would personally help me to break into the Lifeseizing level.” Seeing that she had thoroughly cowed Chu Tiange, Yun Hailan smiled faintly. As she did, the dragonpearl sank down into the milky white skin of her palm.

Apparently, the dragonpearl wasn't corporeal, but rather, existed in spirit form, which allowed her to store it in her sea of energy.

All of a sudden, Song Haishan began to laugh loudly. “I never could have guessed that you would have a treasure like that, Hailan. No wonder you despise Yang Qi so much, that little punk. That airmastery plant doesn't even count for one one-thousandth of a dragonpearl.”

“Quiet!” Yun Hailan barked. “Focus on your cultivation, and on figuring out how to kill Yang Qi! You know what? Maybe you should get your own revenge on him. The whole reason he could come back for revenge is that you beat him up to begin with, giving him the drive to advance his cultivation. You could learn a thing or two from him.”

“Alright,” Song Haishan said meekly. He was her older cousin, so technically, he should be the one to rebuke her if he felt like it. But right now, he couldn’t even talk back to her. He knew how devious and cunning she was, and considering her connection to the Crown Prince, she was the type of person who no one could afford to offend.

There were a few other students on the mountain peak who had been in the middle of feeding their griffons, and had overheard the conversation between Yun Hailan and Chu Tiange. Now, their eyes shone with both fear and veneration of her.

After all, anyone who was closely connected to the Crown Prince was in a position of incredible glory.

“Eee?” Chu Tiange said. He waved his hand, sending out some true energy to create a map, which floated in the air in front of him. There on the map was a blood-colored light, blinking brightly. “Got it! Blood demon aura, coming from the northwest. There’s a large group of vampire brigands there and Jing Wuxue is definitely with them. Come on, let’s go!”

Some of the students made as if to mount their griffons.

However, Chu Tiange waved his hand. “The blood demon encampment is going to be very dangerous. Even though the lot of you are all Masters of Energy, you're still too weak. The last thing I need is for you to be getting in my way. Got it?”

“Yes sir!” the students said, including Song Haishan. After all, when someone as powerful as Chu Tiange gave orders, who would dare to talk back?

“Junior Sister Hailan, you might as well dispense with riding a griffon. I know how much power you have at your disposal. If you use the might of that dragonpearl, your true energy will essentially never run out.” Suddenly, a beam of sword light appeared beneath Chu Tiange’s feet, which wrapped around him, and then shot off into the snowy sky.

Yun Hailan smiled faintly, sending a stream of draconic true energy out, which swirled around her and lifted her up into the clouds. A moment later, she was gone.

Song Haishan stared mutely at the spot she had just occupied. It was as if he was seeing his younger cousin for the first time.

‘My cousin played you like a musical instrument, Yang Qi. You really thought that the two of you were meant to be? How could a good-for-nothing yokel like you even dream of being with her?’

Growling, he unleashed a fist strike at the snowy ground, carving out a sizable crater.

“Alright, everyone. Let’s go kill some vampire brigands and get some merit points.”

“Whatever you say, Brother Haishan.”

Considering that Song Haishan’s cousin was so closely connected to the Crown Prince, it was no wonder that they treated him with such respect. Although his humiliating defeat at the hands of Yang Qi ensured that they actually despised him, they didn’t dare to let that show.

“Brother Haishan,” one of the students said, “there’s no need to feel discouraged. That punk Yang Qi is only a freshman student, and can’t compare at all to people like us. We're like the heavens, and he’s like the earth. Once we get back to the institute, we can call in some favors. Trust me, there are plenty of ways we can drive him to an early grave.”

“Many thanks to all of you.” Song Haishan said, his eyes glittering with sinister light.

With that, the entire group vanished into the snow.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi and his four friends were resting in a majestic villa they had come across, which was nearly buried in the snow by this point.

The various servants, maidservants, handmaidens and soldiers were all waiting on them hand and foot.

Outside of the manor were piles of vampire brigand corpses, which were slowly disappearing under the snow.

By chance, Yang Qi and his friends had come across the place right when it was being attacked. They intervened, slaughtered the brigands, and saved everyone.

Without them, everyone inside would have become desiccated corpses.

One old man present was in the seventh phase of energy arts. When he realized that this group of five was from the Demi-Immortal Institute, he set out a lavish banquet for them.

“Villa Lord, why don't you move?” Yang Qi asked. “The northwest is overrun with vampire brigands. If you stick around, you’ll end up getting killed sooner or later.”

The villa lord looked like he wanted to cry, but had no tears to shed. “Move? To where? We would be complete strangers wherever we went. And besides, how do you move such a large group of people? All my wealth is tied to this land, and the spirit herbs that grow in the nearby mountains. Without that, I would have nothing. Sir, I'd be willing to part with half of everything I own if you would be willing to help protect us.”

“We’re students from the Demi-Immortal Institute!” Li He said. “We fight for justice, so slaughtering wretch-devils is part of our tradition. We don’t need any rewards. Besides, our entire purpose in coming up here is to clear out the vampire brigands, not for a reward from you locals.”

“Many thanks, many thanks! You Demi-Immortal Institute students truly live up to your reputation of being wise and sagely!”

“Villa Lord, do you happen to know of any other vampire brigands operating in the area? We’d love to clear out the entire area.”

At this point, a young man who was apparently the villa lord’s son approached. “Oh, holy ones, according to local rumor, the ancient city of Krorän is located about fifteen hundred kilometers away from here. It was once the most prosperous city in the northwest, and supposedly, was about to make a big comeback. But then, the vampire brigands came along and slaughtered the entire city. That’s their main encampment. If that main group were to be wiped out, the vampire brigands wouldn’t be a threat anymore.”

‘The ancient city of Krorän?’ Yang Qi had heard the name before, and remembered that it was reputed to be the capital of the richest nation in the northwest plains.

“In that case, there’s no time to lose,” Liang Dong said. “Let’s go scout it out.”

“Hold on a moment,” Hua Yinhu said. “That city is where the Lifeseizer Jing Wuxue should be. He’s the top expert among the subordinates of King Blood Demon, and we’re definitely not a match for him in an open fight. Besides, Chu Tiange is definitely going to try to kill him. Maybe we can kill some of the other brigands in the area, but there’s no way we can take on Jing Wuxue.”

Chapter 65: The Ancient City of Kroran

‘Jing Wuxue. A Lifeseizer.’ This was not Yang Qi’s first time hearing the name.

Back when he was in the eighth phase, he came to find that he was definitely not a match for the terrifying Chu Tiange. But now, he was in the ninth phase, with the power of fifteen ancient megamammoths, and most of the life force quintessence of the lightning mammoth gone.

It was hard to say exactly how powerful his three best assets were, the Infernal Deity Spear, Infernal Deity Aegis and Fiend-Devil Wings. The only way to find out for sure was to find some top expert to compare with.

However, he could defeat other Masters of Energy with hardly any effort at all. Only Lifeseizers, who were generally a hundred times more powerful than Masters of Energy, could provide him with the experience he needed. And that was also the best way to absorb the last bits of the lightning mammoth.

At the moment, his true energy was surging mightily, as if urging him to find someone challenging to fight.

“Let’s go. If we leave now, we can reach Krorän in less than a day. Considering it's morning now, we should be able to get there by nightfall. The darkness of a snowy night is perfect to clear out demons and devils.”

Yang Qi rose to his feet, and his four friends joined.

Before leaving, they changed clothing, donning white clothing and cloaks that were made from snowbear fur. Not only were they very warm, but they would also provide a large measure of camouflage, which would make it much easier to ambush the vampire brigands.

Snowbear fur was so warm that it would even allow mortals to survive in the bitter night cold.

Of course, these outfits were gifted to them by the villa lord.

Because Yang Qi and his friends were Demi-Immortal Institute students with profound energy arts, they hadn’t brought changes of clothing with them. But with these snowbear cloaks, they would be able to conserve true energy.

Thus clad, they vanished into the night in blurs of white, leaving not even a footprint behind as they sped through the snow.

They followed their maps until roughly nightfall, at which point they detected the odor of blood in the cold around them.

Yang Qi stopped in his tracks and reached out, letting a snowflake land on his finger. Unexpectedly, the snowflake had a bit of red on it, which was none other than blood-colored true energy.

‘What powerful demonic energy. How much human blood must have been consumed to cause the snowflakes to smell like it?’ Obviously, someone had cultivated their blood energy arts to the point where they could fuse their energy with the clouds. Thus, the snowflakes were stained red with blood.

Without a doubt, some freakish hellion was in the area.

“Krorän is right up ahead,” Li He said.

Sure enough, they soon caught sight of a magnificent metropolis, surrounded by smaller cities that served as guard stations. All of the buildings and structures were in very bad shape, as though some chaotic battle had been fought there.

There were massive stone columns and pillars, and domed temples that gave a glimpse into the city’s past glory.

This was the legendary city of Krorän, which in its golden era had housed millions upon millions of residents. Now, there weren’t any living beings at all, only vampire brigands.

Yang Qi and his friends dropped to the ground and crawled to the top of a nearby hill, which gave them a good vantage point of the city, as well as the various vampire brigands that were on patrol.

The blood-red garments they wore made them particularly eye-catching in the brilliant white snow.

They moved with incredible agility, and because their body structures were based on frigid yin qualities, were also completely unaffected by the frigid cold. According to the rumors, after cultivating blood demon energy arts, and consuming enough blood, a person could become a blood demon. In addition to spectacular power, it would bring a ferocious change in personality, and would force that person to live by consuming human blood.

“So many brigands!”

Yang Qi’s eyes were like blades as he examined the scene. In the smaller guard cities, there were tens of thousands of patrolling vampire brigands, including ones from the fifth to the ninth phase.

As for Krorän itself, it contained well over a thousand major structures, a testament to how rich the city had once been.

There were more vampire brigands patrolling the outskirts of the city, so there was little need to mention what it would be like in its depths.

“What do we do now?” Liang Dong said, making sure to keep his energy concealed. He knew full well what the deadly consequences would be if he didn’t. “According to the rumors, blood demon energy arts are quite miraculous. Supposedly, they originate with the Devil Sutra of the Blood Emperor, an imperial-class energy art. The Blood Demon Grotto cultivates a subsidiary version which is only royal-class, but it still leads to incredible cultivation progress. After consuming enough blood, one can reach Energy Eruption in only two or three months, and the Energy Weapon level in only a year….”

“That fast?” Yang Qi exclaimed. To the country bumpkins of Yanhaven, an energy artist who reached the Energy Eruption level in ten years was considered gifted.

“Yeah,” Hua Yinhu replied. “All you have to do is drink a lot of blood, which makes it a very attractive option to many. According to the legends, there was an ancient devil king who saw humankind flourishing, and created the Devil Sutra of the Blood Emperor in an attempt to seduce them to the dao of devils. And it worked. Some people will go crazy for power. Not me though.”

“In the past,” Li He added, “there were even some students in the institute who resorted to cultivating the dao of devils in the hopes of gaining more power. But that’s been strictly forbidden for a long time now.”

When Yang Qi used the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth to summon his Infernal Deity Spear and Fiend-Devil Wings, it definitely resembled an energy art from the dao of devils. If the Demi-Immortal Institute found out about that, it would lead to problems.

Of course, the truth was that the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth was the most orthodox energy art amongst gods and spirits. It was upright and majestic, something used by the legions of gods in heaven to crush hell. However, because of how it was touched by the aura of hell, there were certain aspects of it that seemed fiendish and devil-like.

Part of that was due to the fact that Yang Qi’s level was simply too low. For example, his Fiend-Devil Wings would eventually transform, becoming Angel Wings. And they would experience even further transformations later. At that point, the mere snap of his fingers would allow him to travel through all sorts of planes and dimensions.

As he hid in the snow, Yang Qi analyzed his energy arts.

He still itched to communicate with the golden imp that resided in his forehead, but unfortunately, it remained as still as if it were asleep.

That was currently the biggest mystery of all to him.

His godly technique came from that golden imp. But who exactly was the imp?

“You know,” Yang Qi said, “the institute sent a lot of people out here to hunt vampire brigands. If Krorän is the focal point, it's safe to assume we’ll run into some other students here. And considering how the brigands have been terrorizing all of the northwest, there’s no way that the other institutes didn't send people.”

“That’s right. How could that have slipped my mind?” Li He said. “There are over a million freshman students in the Demi-Immortal Institute, as well as plenty in the Outer and Inner Campuses. And that’s not to mention the elite students. There must be a lot of us in the Krorän area. I guess we’ll just have to play things by ear.”

Almost as if in response to what had just been said, he suddenly heard a whistling sound nearby.

Moments later, they saw figures speeding through the snow.

Apparently, the vampire brigands also detected the noise. Howling, they drew their blades and bows. Some of them even manned cannons on the city walls.

When such massive cannons were used, they could kill even a Master of Energy.

“They’re from our institute!” Li He exclaimed. “Look, Yang Qi. They’re from the Gentlemen’s Society; they usually wear white headbands and green clothing.”

With that, he rose to his feet fearlessly, looking almost like a snowbear.

Sure enough, there were several hundred students coming from the east, all of them dressed in green clothing, with white headbands, and swords in their hands. They were marching in tight formation, connecting their true energy to defend themselves. There were thirty-six students out in front who were Masters of Energy, leading the charge as they cut down any vampire brigands that got in their way.

BOOOOOOOM!

One of the cannons on the wall suddenly heaved backward as it launched an enormous projectile toward the students from the Gentlemen’s Society.

In response, they shouted, unleashing their energy to form a huge protective shield that stopped the projectile in mid-flight and sent it flying backward to smash into the city wall. Instantly, dozens of vampire brigands were wiped out.

Next, several hundred students joined their voices together to shout, “Thunder Fist!”

At the same time, they all unleashed precisely timed fist strikes.

A massive wave of energy rolled out, smashing into the city gate. The huge, seemingly impregnable metal gate was shredded to pieces as surely as if it had been made of paper.

Yang Qi watched as the hundreds of students from the Gentlemen’s Society destroyed a city gate that weighed a hundred thousand pounds. Then, they unleashed energy arts with deadly force, cutting down the vampire brigands who were on guard.

“Incredible,” Yang Qi murmured. “This Gentlemen’s Society is so strong!”

“Brother Yang Qi,” Li He said, “this is just one squad from the Gentlemen’s Society. They have tens of thousands of members overall; they’re the second most powerful society next to the Crown Prince Society after all. I think even the Crown Prince fears their leader.”

“Only one of their squads is this powerful?” Yang Qi’s blood was already pumping with excitement. “Come on, let's join the fight.”

Chapter 66: Red Fur

“Hold on!” Li He said. Yang Qi was obviously very pumped up, and wanted to wade into the fighting just like the members of the Gentlemen’s Society. However, Li He had another idea. “These vampire brigands have more experts than the sky has clouds,” he continued. “Look, the students from the Gentlemen’s Society aren't actually able to get very far into the city. Why don’t the four of us stay out here and pick off stragglers? As for you, Brother Yang Qi, your cultivation base is the highest, so you can sneak into the city and try to find the brigands’ treasure stores. Our Sage Monarch Society has just been founded, and we’re completely broke. We’ll need to get some major funds to attract new recruits.”

Yang Qi immediately realized that Li He was right. If he could find the treasure stores in Krorän, it could theoretically be far more valuable than killing the brigands themselves.

After all, the vampire brigands had been terrorizing the northwest for some time now, so they definitely had a lot of wealth built up.

Besides, they had also pillaged Krorän itself. Altogether, that was an amount of wealth that was probably worth more than a thousand Yanhavens put together.

Best of all, Yang Qi had a way to take massive amounts of wealth away with him.

‘Definitely a good idea. I can finally make good use of this thumb-ring of holding.’ Looking at Li He, he said, “Okay. You four stick close to the Gentlemen’s Society, and pick off any stragglers. If the situation changes, adjust accordingly. I’ll sneak into Krorän and see if they actually have some powerful experts inside. If not, I’ll send you a message to join me. Otherwise, I’ll search for their treasure stores alone.”

Of course, his four friends had no idea that he had a thumb-ring of holding.

However, they did know that even if he only took away a bit of the treasure the vampire brigands had built up, it would definitely be worth it.

They all knew what was going on.

There was no way they could get rich right here, not with the experts from the Gentlemen’s Society present.

In this situation, finding a hoard of treasure would be much better than trying to stack up merit points.

Based on how things were going, it was obvious that of the five members of the Sage Monarch Society, Li He was the most knowledgeable.

Of course, Yang Qi was quite intelligent, but he was only eighteen, making him the youngest. Even though the incident with Yun Hailan had been life-changing, he still lacked experience compared to the others.

After a bit more discussion, Yang Qi blurred into motion, heading deep into Krorän.

In fact, he moved so quickly with his energy arts that not even a Master of Energy would have been able to track him visually.

His friends were all stunned.

‘So fast!’

In the shortest of moments, he was thousands of paces away, where he easily scaled the city wall, which was hundreds of meters tall. Before the vampire brigands atop the wall could react, they were killed, and their demon cores harvested.

Meanwhile, whistling sounds could be heard from numerous directions as more students from the Demi-Immortal Institute arrived to besiege the city. Chaotic fighting was breaking out everywhere as vampire brigands rushed to defend themselves.

At this point, Hua Yinhu gave voice to the question that they had all been pondering.

“Liang Dong, now that you’re a Master of Energy, you’re much more perceptive than before. Can you tell what level Brother Yang Qi’s cultivation base is at?”

Liang Dong pursed his lips for a moment. “Presumably you all had a chance to sense his true energy when he improved our cultivation bases. Well, even after becoming a Master of Energy, I'd say I'm not even one percent as powerful as him. And when he struck Song Haishan, I think he only used about ten percent of his full strength.”

“So strong….” they gasped. “Doesn’t that mean he’s as strong as a Lifeseizer? After all, upon first achieving a breakthrough, Lifeseizers are a hundred times as powerful as a Master of Energy.”

“Well, if Brother Yang is really that strong, then our little Sage Monarch Society might actually have a chance to get big. We’re all sour at having been stuck as freshman students for nearly a decade, right? The only way to earn a name is to rely on someone important and powerful, but nobody like that has ever paid any attention to us. But Brother Yang Qi is definitely on the way to becoming such a person.” It was Li He who provided the final analysis. “Our clans are just as powerful as those of students from the Outer or Inner Campuses. Or even the elite students. It's just that our cultivation bases were too low, and we have no sway in our clans. If we stick with Brother Yang Qi, our cultivation bases are definitely going to continue rising.

“Come on, let’s focus on killing the stragglers out here. With Krorän under siege, the brigands are going to retreat sooner or later. Let’s earn some merit points while we can.”

Whoosshhhh!

Yang Qi sped through the towering buildings of Krorän, making his way through the broad streets as he headed deeper toward the city center.

Of course, there were plenty of vampire brigands in the streets, rushing toward the city walls, filling the air with demon energy and the smell of blood.

The ground was stained with blood, and desiccated corpses could still be seen within the buildings.

As of this point, the ancient city of Krorän was nothing more than a ghost town.

In the stories, this place had once been the capital of the thriving Krorän Nation, home to millions upon millions of people. But now, even the remnants of that once powerful country had been completely exterminated by the vampire brigands, turned into fuel for their demonic energy arts.

Of course, the city was large enough that they couldn’t occupy every corner of it.

Therefore, it was easy for Yang Qi to stay out of sight. Up to this point, no one had noticed him. And besides, he could move more than ten thousand paces in the blink of an eye. Almost as soon as he appeared in a given location, he would be gone. Even top energy arts masters would see nothing more than a blur.

Krorän had many towering buildings in it, some built from stone, others from hardened clay; all of them were very sturdy. There were even imposing towers made from metal.

At a certain point, Yang Qi resorted to his Four Seasons Swordplay to make it even more difficult for prying eyes to catch sight of him.

He had long since come to understand the royal-class energy art, and considering that it was a snowy day, it was the perfect time to use the winter snow fills the sky aspect. He sent his true energy out, fusing it with the snow, creating an energy field filled with snowflakes. Now, anyone who looked at him would see nothing more than a mass of swirling snow.

The Four Seasons Swordplay itself had an ability to mask one’s aura by fusing with the surrounding nature.

Not even a Master of Energy would be able to sense him as he sped like a blast of snowy wind into the depths of the ancient city.

As he got further in, he saw fewer vampire brigands, and yet, each one he saw was more powerful than the last. He also noticed that in some of the most sumptuous mansions, blood pools had been set up, which were all manned by vampire brigand leaders, all of them fiendish Masters of Energy.

And yet, not a single one noticed Yang Qi.

WHOOSH!

He quietly landed on the roof of a nine-story building that had clearly been a restaurant in the past. It was spectacularly constructed, complete with iron columns inlaid with gold leaf. Sadly, most of it had been spattered with blood. Right in the middle, a pool had been dug out which was filled with blood.

Next to the blood pool was one of the brigand leaders, currently in the middle of a session of cultivation. Countless magical symbols could be seen forming within the blood that then floated into his body.

This particular vampire brigand had bright red hair, and spiky, blood-red fur covering the rest of his body. He didn't even look human.

He was a Master of Energy, but was ten times more powerful than the average expert of that level. In fact, he was so strong that his aura was difficult to detect.

Clearly, this person was one of the core leaders of the vampire brigands.

As soon as the blast of snowy wind that was Yang Qi alighted onto the building, the red-furred expert’s eyes opened.

“Who’s there!” he barked in a voice laced with killing intent.

Even as the words left his mouth, a blood-colored whip appeared in his hands, formed of true energy.

“Bloodshadow Godwhip!” he growled. It was a high-level blood-type energy art which summoned a whip that resembled a blood dragon. Almost as soon as the whip appeared in the open, he lashed out with it, causing a sound like weeping apes and monkeys to fill the air.

Unfortunately for the red-furred expert, Yang Qi waved his hand, placing an energy barrier around the entire building, ensuring that no sound would escape.

Normally speaking, it would take ten Masters of Energy working together to seal down a building this large, but Yang Qi could do it all on his own. As of this moment, the red-furred vampire was now completely isolated.

Pop!

The whip landed, but couldn’t penetrate Yang Qi’s defensive true energy.

“Who goes there? An expert from the Demi-Immortal Institute?”

Blood-colored true energy swirled around him as he floated up into the air toward the roof, which was when he finally caught sight of Yang Qi in his snowbear outfit.

“A full body of red fur?” Yang Qi said coolly. “Looks like you’ve cultivated your blood demon energy arts to the pinnacle. You must know all the secrets in Krorän, right? Now’s your chance to live. Tell me where the treasure stores are located.”

Chapter 67: The Brigands&#039; Treasure Stores

The ancient city of Krorän was a huge place, filled with too many buildings to count. How could anyone ever find treasure storehouses in a place like that?

And Yang Qi couldn’t use his true energy to check, not with a Lifeseizer somewhere in the city.

Therefore, his plan was to capture an important person among the vampire brigands and force the information out of him. Then, he would loot the treasure and pack as much of it as possible into his thumb-ring of holding.

Yun Hailan and Chu Tiange were definitely planning to try to take out the Lifeseizer, and therefore, he would seize the opportunity to take the treasure before they could get to it. That would surely infuriate them.

“And who are you?” the red-furred vampire brigand growled.

Because of how much hair covered his face, it was impossible to read his expression, but from his tone of voice, he was obviously a cruel and sinister individual.

“It doesn’t matter who I am,” Yang Qi replied. “Tell me where the treasure storehouses are.”

The red-furred vampire burst out laughing. “The treasure has already been sent to the Blood Demon Grotto. If you want it, go look for it there.”

Suddenly, a mysterious, blood-colored shadow appeared behind Yang Qi, which transformed into a huge hand, reaching toward him aggressively.

BANG!

Yang Qi’s true energy smashed the Humanoid True Energy into bits, completely destroying it.

“So, seems you want me to force it out of you. I wanted to be nice, but I guess I’ll do it the hard way. You must really think I'm an idiot. Considering the size of the army here, and how much wealth it would take to sustain it, there’s no way you sent all the treasure away.”

Seemingly not in the least bit frightened, Yang Qi thrust his hand out.

As his hand moved forward, the Infernal Deity Spear formed in it, making him look like a god of death preparing to take the life of a mortal.

“Bloodshadow Godshield!” The red-furred vampire’s energy swirled out to create a tower shield decorated with a blood-colored ghost head that spat flames out of its mouth.

Unfortunately for the vampire, when the Infernal Deity Spear stabbed into the shield, the shield shattered into pieces. Then, enormous arms of true energy sprouted from Yang Qi's back, which reached forward and pinned the vampire to the ground.

All it took was one move for him to capture his opponent.

Of course, the vampire’s red fur was naturally poisonous, and could kill anyone who touched it. But Yang Qi was using true energy arms, ensuring that he wasn’t hurt at all.

“Ready to talk?” He sent a burst of true energy into the vampire, just a touch of the destructive power of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, which began to wreak havoc on the vampire’s meridians.

The vampire screamed as its red hair shriveled away, revealing a middle-aged man with an ashen face.

Yang Qi had used his true energy to force all of the man’s blood demon energy arts into his sea of energy, and was now exerting so much pressure that it was obvious he intended to cripple him.

“I’ll talk!” the vampire shrieked. “I’ll talk! There’s a secret passageway thirty meters below the imperial palace, right in the middle of the city. That's where the treasure is. Everything we pillaged in the northwest is there.”

With that, Yang Qi went on to get more information, such as the layout of the city, where the top experts were located, and what other dangerous things lay about.

After the time it takes an incense stick to burn, he had extracted all the information he needed.

Crunch!

With that, he ended the vampire’s life and took his blood demon core.

It was a beautiful thing, covered with countless swirling magical symbols that were the color of blood. This core contained the incredibly strong and pure blood demon true energy. Unfortunately, it couldn’t be used for cultivation purposes by humans. Anyone who tried would find that they suddenly needed to consume blood on a daily basis lest they experience terrible pain worse than death.

In some ways, cultivating blood demon energy arts was like being addicted to a powerful drug. It was only because of how one could progress in cultivation ten times faster than normal that people were often seduced by it.

“One blood demon core is worth at least five merit points.” After examining it closely, Yang Qi put it into his thumb-ring, which he was currently wearing openly.

“Infernal Deity Aegis!”

Rumbling sounds echoed out as his true energy flowed out, creating a dark, golden suit of armor that covered him from head to toe.

The true energy armor looked like it was forged from black gold, and was ferocious in appearance. It had numerous razor-sharp spikes on the back, and two curved horns on the helmet that resembled those of dragons. The gauntlets were spiked as well; each one had nine finger-length spikes, a nod to nine being the ultimate number.

This was a new state his Infernal Deity Aegis could assume now that he was a Master of Energy, the Infernal Deity Plate Armor.

Right now, he could descend into the magma of an active volcano and not be hurt at all. No type of ordinary true energy could possibly hurt him either.

This was another reason he was confident that he could take Chu Tiange on in a fight.

Not even his Cosmic Sunflare Sword could pierce the Infernal Deity Plate Armor.

Another good reason to wear his Infernal Deity Plate Armor was that the helmet made it impossible to see who he was. No one would recognize that he was Yang Qi.

“I can’t wait to run into Chu Tiange. And you too, Yun Hailan. Don’t think that because you have him to back you up you can do whatever you want. I'm going to kill him right in front of you. And then you’ll realize that all your arrogance is worthless when it comes to me.”

Thus, clad in Infernal Deity Plate Armor, Yang Qi yet again blurred into motion, speeding through the buildings of the city as a gust of snowy wind that not even top experts would realize was a person.

Before long, he was in the city center, where he saw the imperial palace, a mighty and grand structure that was ten times as large as Yanhaven. Even the roof tiles were covered with gold leaf, and as for the floor, it was paved with gold bricks.

Although gold was no longer used as currency in the world, it was still recognized as being extremely valuable, so to be able to use so much of it for mere decoration went to show how rich the imperial household of Krorän had been.

As Yang Qi neared the palace, he could sense that there was some extremely powerful entity lurking there.

It was like an enormous beast from ancient times, filled with such vast power that its mere breathing would affect the weather around it. He could also just barely make out a pillar of blood-colored true energy shooting up to connect to the sky.

That was definitely something that only a Lifeseizer could do.

“I’ll worry about him later. First things first: the secret passageway and the treasure.”

He dropped to the ground at the edge of the imperial palace. Thanks to it being night, and him being surrounded by the ‘winter snow’ true energy of the Four Seasons Swordplay, no one noticed him.

Furthermore, the sounds of fighting from further out toward the city’s edge were distracting, making it even easier for him to proceed along undetected.

After landing, he found himself at the edge of a frozen moat.

It was fully a thousand paces across, but the ice was as thick as a person was tall.

During the course of the interrogation moments before, he had learned that there was a subterranean pipe linking the moat to areas beneath the palace. The palace actually had many passageways beneath it, a virtual labyrinth that had been used to store the wealth that Krorän had built up over the past hundreds and even thousands of years. And the vampire brigands had only added further to that accumulation of riches.

Although the labyrinth was rife with traps and snares, Yang Qi’s energy arts were so advanced that he didn’t need to worry about them.

Crunch!

He quickly sent a blast of true energy out to pierce a hole in the ice, and then jumped in, sinking down to the bottom of the moat.

It was very dark there, but Yang Qi could still make out fish swimming about to and fro. Considering he was capable of Mind Incarnation, it was easy for him to see in circumstances in which there was no light.

He swept the area with his true energy, and quickly had a complete picture of it in his mind.

Of course, the moat was deep enough that the freezing temperature and the water pressure at the bottom was significant; most top energy arts masters would have difficulty staying there for too long. But Yang Qi had no problems.

The area was free of any sort of silt or sludge; even the moat was made from glittering gold that was kept clean by the flow of the water.

After proceeding along for some distance, he suddenly chopped his hand out, carving a hole into the moat floor that revealed a large metal door. Clearly, it was made from some sort of metal that didn’t rust, and upon opening it, revealed a passageway.

Yang Qi allowed the flowing water to suck him into the doorway.

Cruuuunch!

As soon as he entered the door, he heard a loud grating crunch. Scanning the area with true energy, he realized that the door had an enormous grinder built into it that activated once water flowed past it; if anyone tried to enter, the door would slice them to pieces.

However, it didn’t matter how sharp it was, it couldn’t damage his Infernal Deity Plate Armor.

Looking at the meter-long blades with their hundreds of razor-sharp teeth, he murmured, “Good thing I'm a Master of Energy, otherwise I would have been dead.”

After destroying the trap, he stepped out of the water and into the secret passageway; thanks to the ingenious construction of the trap, the water was actually channeled back out into the moat.

“Alright. Secret passage: found.”

Yang Qi knew that he was heading into a dangerous area; the closer he got to the treasure, the more traps there would be.

As he proceeded along, he found too many to count, including needles, poison, bladed wheels and flamethrowers. And yet, not a single one could do anything to hurt him.

Chapter 68: The Brigands&#039; Treasure Stores (2)

BAM!

A massive chunk of iron the size of an ox dropped onto Yang Qi.

And yet, the mere wave of his hand shattered it into pieces. Next, thousands of holes opened up in the wall, unleashing a barrage of arrows, each and every one of which was covered with magical symbols that gave them defensive true energy.

Regardless, Yang Qi’s true energy turned them into dust.

Moments later, countless razor-sharp blades shot up from the floor, and yet, instead of stabbing through his feet, they were destroyed by his armor.

Not a single one of the traps could hurt him.

Occasionally, iron doors would block his path, but even the thickest one was easy for him to blast through.

As long as he relied on the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, he was like the king of the labyrinth.

Of even more note, he could tell that the Lifeseizer up above was not using true energy to watch the labyrinth, but instead, had it focused elsewhere.

BOOOOOOOM!

After blasting through an iron door that weighed hundreds of thousands of pounds, he found a spray of poison heading toward him that his armor easily deflected.

In fact, when the poison landed back onto the ruined iron door, it sizzled and began to melt.

Yang Qi stepped through the remnants of the door, and found himself in an enormous chamber, filled with case after case of energy convergence pills.

From the look of things, there were at least a hundred million pills there.

‘So many energy convergence pills! It's too bad my thumb-ring can’t fit them all. The dimension inside is too small.’ Suddenly, his eyes lit up. ‘Wait a second. Wasn’t that trident inside the ring absorbing the energy around it? Why don’t I just pull it out and let it absorb the energy convergence pills here? Then, I can move on to another storehouse.’

Without any hesitation, he sent some true energy into the ring, grabbed the trident, and then pulled it out.

Instantly, the weapon began to vibrate in his hand.

Waving the trident through the air, he broke open one of the nearby cases, causing all the energy convergence pills inside to spill out. Then, he crushed the pills with his own true energy, transforming them into a medicinal mist that began to flow toward the trident.

The greedy trident instantly absorbed all the energy.

‘This thing is going to turn into a daemon pretty soon….’

He could see the numerous meridian passageways forming inside the trident, gradually spreading out to fill its entire structure as it got more energy convergence pills.

If it eventually became a true spirit weapon, it would be even stronger than a Master of Energy.

“Humanoid True Energy!”

The summoned humanoid wielded the trident to smash more boxes and absorb the energy convergence pills therein.

At long last, it was truly being given a chance to eat its fill.

“I wonder how it will transform if it absorbs all of the energy convergence pills here?” Filled with anticipation, he sped onward to look for more treasure storerooms, leaving the trident behind to do its work.

And he did find them. In one chamber after another were heaps upon heaps of energy convergence pills. He went through over a hundred such rooms, where he also found an assortment of mostly mid-grade medicinal pills.

None of that was particularly enticing to him. Eventually, he reached a sprawling chamber where the floor, walls, and ceiling turned into white jade, inset with gold designs and rare crystals. Amidst the kiosks and pavilions that filled the area, mist swirled, and the ground pulsed with true energy.

That was when he caught sight of an enormous bottle gourd made of crystal, fully half as tall as an ordinary human. Filling the gourd were numerous golden medicinal pills, exactly the same type that he had discovered in the mansion grotto of that white ape back in the Blackcorpse Mountains.

“Oh wow! Golden Nine Transformations Pills!” These pills could be used to break through to the Master of Energy level, and were incredibly valuable.

From what he could tell, there were several hundred such pills there.

Delighted, he sucked the gourd directly into his thumb-ring.

‘If I give Golden Nine Transformations Pills to Li He, Hua Yinhu, and He Jili, they’ll all be able to reach the Master of Energy level. And then there’s eldest brother and second brother. They could use them too…. I wonder what other treasures are around here.’

After looking around, he found a jade box filled with emerald green medicinal pills. Although he wasn't sure what they were made of, from the medicinal fluctuations coming off of them, he could tell they were high-grade pills that were in no way inferior to Golden Nine Transformations Pills.

He put the jade box into his thumb-ring, and then continued on to find dozens of other types of pills.

He was gaining so much on this adventure that he was feeling a bit numb.

Considering that a single Golden Nine Transformations Pill was worth millions of energy convergence pills, and that he had numerous other pills of equal or higher value, how much wealth did he have?

After more searching, he acquired even more medicinal pills, as well as demon cores, all of them from demonlings in the Master of Energy level.

In one location, he found a place where numerous demon cores cast scintillating light into the room.

Surprisingly, the demon cores were actually part of a mural.

It depicted a sage-like individual, with a shaved head and a monk’s vestment, riding an enormous black tiger. The image itself radiated the aura of some ancient beast, something that would shock one to the core.

As for the sage, concentric halos floated at his back, radiating light that reached the furthest corner of the chamber.

There were at least ten thousand demon cores that made up the images of the halos, all of them at the Master of Energy level.

In order to create this mural, someone had to kill more than ten thousand high-level demonlings.

And yet, there was something else that was even more shocking to Yang Qi. The sage had a pearl in his hand, which he was about to feed to the tiger he was riding.

That pearl was so bright and lustrous that Yang Qi could tell it was the demon core from a demonling in the Lifeseizing level.

‘My god! Someone killed a Lifeseizing level demonling, took its demon core, and then used it to make a mural? It also seems to be imbued with true energy…. Wait. This is a spell formation! This mural is actually a magical item? Too bad it's so big….’

Waving his hand, he sent some true energy into the mural, which to his surprise, came right off the wall.

The mural was almost like a rug, roughly five inches thick, and crafted, not from paper, but from what appeared to be the hide of some beast. The material used to paint the mural itself was apparently made from the powder of ground-up demon cores.

Yang Qi had no idea what this magical item did, but he decided to take it anyway, and sent it into his thumb-ring.

However, the instant it entered the ring, a voice suddenly echoed out from within it. “What audacious thief dares to steal my Sage-Devil Painting!? It took two hundred years of hard work to complete!”

As the voice spoke, a stream of true energy rushed down from above, piercing through the ceiling to strike at Yang Qi.

It was force like that of a mountain, hundreds of times beyond the Master of Energy level.

“Lifeseizer!”

Not only was Yang Qi not afraid of this true energy attack, but he was actually a bit excited. Now, he knew that the Sage-Devil Painting was obviously the most valuable treasure here.

“Hell-Crushing Godmammoth: Hellfire Crucible!”

Boundless true energy rushed out to block the attack, transforming into the illusory image of a crucible.

BOOOOOOOM!

A huge shock wave rolled out, destroying almost the entire room around him.

Yang Qi’s energy and blood were cast into chaos, and his sea of energy felt completely unstable.

However, the attack stimulated the life force quintessence of the lightning mammoth, turning the pain into a relaxing, calm feeling.

“Trident!” he shouted, summoning his Humanoid True Energy back to him, along with the trident, which had absorbed who-knew-how-many energy convergence pills.

‘Alright, I got plenty of treasure. I think this is enough. Time to go fight that Lifeseizer! I wonder how I’ll do. If I can get the power of twenty ancient megamammoths, I’ll finally be able to form my Hellfire Crucible….’

With that, he simply shot straight upward, blasting through earth and stone until he found himself in a palace hall.

This was the grand hall of Krorän’s imperial palace, which now looked like hell on earth, as numerous pits had been hewn out, and were filled with blood and corpses.

The entire room reeked of gore.

However, what was most shocking wasn’t the blood pools, but rather, a huge sphere of blood-red true energy that was in the middle of battling a sun-like convergence of sword light.

Every clash between the two of them destroyed parts of the surrounding palace.

No Master of Energy would dare to join a fight like this.

These were two Lifeseizers going all out in battle. As for the sun-like sword light, Yang Qi recognized it immediately; it was Chu Tiange’s Cosmic Sunflare Sword technique.

While Yang Qi had been down below looting treasure, Chu Tiange had come to Krorän and found the ultimate leader of the hundreds of thousands of vampire brigands, the Lifeseizer Jing Wuxue.

‘Where’s Yun Hailan?’ Yang Qi thought, looking around. ‘Didn’t she come?’

A moment later, he noticed a young woman in a blue garment, standing atop a high tower nearby.

Chapter 69: Battling a Lifeseizer

Yun Hailan’s blue garment seemed too thin for the coldness around her. As she stood there on the tall building, she looked impressive, and at the same time, dainty and lonely.

Virtually any man who saw her would feel his heart stirring, and would instinctively offer her both worship and love.

But Yang Qi just chuckled coldly in his heart.

‘So, you’re here in Krorän too, eh Yun Hailan?’ He was surrounded by the swirling snow of the Four Seasons Swordplay, and was clad in his Infernal Deity Plate Armor, making him look like a devilghost yama king.

No one who saw him could possibly recognize him.

However, he was still a bit nervous. Considering how close he had been with Yun Hailan, and how intelligent she was, he still worried that she might somehow be able to identify him.

He was fully aware of the extent of her treachery and shrewdness; she was profoundly dangerous.

‘Hmph! Even if she does suspect it’s me, what good will that do her? Where would she get proof? Besides, a battle of wits and strength is exactly what I want. You’re going to see exactly how powerful I am, Yun Hailan. You think you’re a powerful Master of Energy? Wait till you see me! In fact, I hope you suspect it's me. That would be a wonderful blow to your self-confidence.”

Mind spinning with ideas and plans, he burst into motion, radiating killing intent. As he moved, he unleashed a powerful attack with his right hand, releasing true energy that almost looked like lightning, which headed straight toward Yun Hailan.

This was the summer lightning from the Four Seasons Swordplay.

According to the rumors, that element was the most powerful aspect of the sword technique. Upon cultivating it to the fullest, it was possible to create lightning in the palm of one’s hand. It was like the power of gods among men, like the wrath of a lightning deity that could slaughter all types of wretch-devils.

Although Yang Qi hadn’t cultivated the technique to that level, his true energy was completely magnificent. As the various streams of true energy interacted, they created a rumbling sound like that of thunder, causing many of the buildings in the city to shake physically.

He was attacking like a thunderbolt, ready to kill his target!

He was actually very curious to see how Yun Hailan would deal with this attack.

Even if she blocked it, he had more moves lined up and ready to go. And his plan was actually to capture her, take her somewhere private, and then reveal his identity. That would be the ultimate humiliation for her.

When it came to matters of revenge, it was important to be able to hold one’s head high in the presence of ridiculers.

BOOOOOOOM!

Yun Hailan almost instantly sensed the ghastly killing intent bearing down on her, and it caused her face to fill with shock and disbelief.

Looking over, she saw the swirling mass of snow heading in her direction, and could sense a terrifying aura in it, as well as rumbling like that of thunder. Although she was taken aback, a moment later, she recovered her composure. And yet, she didn’t prepare to fight back; she was waiting to see what this person in the snowy wind would do.

She was the type of person who could keep calm even under extreme circumstances.

Yang Qi was not surprised by this. Maintaining complete focus, he continued with the attack, his aura growing unbelievably intense with every moment that passed.

He planned to use this one attack to cleanse the humiliation of the past, and restore his dignity. Because of that, he would not allow himself to be intimidated by Yun Hailan’s calmness.

It was in that exact moment, right before he was about to strike Yun Hailan, that a thunderous voice filled the air.

“Freakish hellion!”

A blazing sun suddenly appeared right in front of Yun Hailan, to aid in her defense.

The Cosmic Sunflare Sword!

Whizz!

Sun-like sword light smashed into Yang Qi’s summer lightning sword technique, causing a huge shock wave to ripple out in all directions, destroying much of the surroundings, and even causing gold to transform into ash.

The intense heat of the Cosmic Sunflare Sword then began to melt the ground.

Surprisingly, Chu Tiange had interfered to block Yang Qi’s attack on Yun Hailan.

During the entire time, Yun Hailan hadn’t even moved. Apparently, she had predicted that Chu Tiange would step in to help. This girl was absolutely unbelievable when it came to plots and schemes.

The blazing, sun-like sword light gradually faded away, revealing Chu Tiange, standing there on the building next to Yun Hailan. On another building, the blood energy also faded, revealing a middle-aged man in a blood-red cloak. Although he had no weapons in his hand, and not a single scrap of the aura of a vampire brigand, Yang Qi knew exactly who he was. He was the leader of the vampires here in Krorän, the Lifeseizer Jing Wuxue.

Yun Hailan and Chu Tiange were on one building.

Jing Wuxue was on another.

And Yang Qi was hovering in the air off to the side, still surrounded by swirling snow.

All three parties eyed each other.

“Who are you?” Jing Wuxue said to Yang Qi. “Were you the one who stole my Sage Devil Painting from my subterranean chamber? That was the Four Seasons Swordplay, just now, wasn’t it. Are you from the House of Spring and Autumn?”

“That's right,” Yang Qi replied, keeping his voice high pitched. “I have your Sage Devil Painting, allowing me to unleash my true power. It won't be long before the House of Spring and Autumn changes its name to the Spring and Autumn Institute, so consider this painting a gift of congratulations for that.”

“Do you have a death wish?” Jing Wuxue growled.

“Friend,” Yun Hailan said, “are you really from the House of Spring and Autumn? You're not working with this monster from the Blood Demon Grotto, are you? Why did you attack me just now? I haven’t done anything to offend you.”

“If I feel like attacking somebody, I attack them,” Yang Qi replied coldly. “What's that got to do with you?” It was obvious that Yun Hailan was already probing for information, but he didn’t care.

“Aren’t you aware that doing such a thing could harm relations between the House of Spring and Autumn and the Demi-Immortal Institute? Or could it be that it's all an act? True, the Four Seasons Swordplay is a consummate discipline from the House of Spring and Autumn. But there are plenty of experts who have gotten their hands on it through underhanded methods. Tell me who you really are! And why are you trying to stir up trouble between the Demi-Immortal Institute and the House of Spring and Autumn?”

“You really know how to run your mouth,” Yang Qi said, his killing intent surging. With that, he unleashed Silk Rain of the Spring Silkworm, causing masses of silk strands to fly toward Yun Hailan, accompanied by a blast of spring wind. Instantly, the bitter cold in the city turned a bit warmer, as though spring were coming.

On the outskirts of Krorän, some of the students from the Gentlemen’s Society looked up, and could sense the feeling of spring.

“What’s that? A spring wind?”

“What incredible energy arts. Has another Lifeseizer appeared?”

When Chu Tiange saw the incoming Silk Rain of the Spring Silkworm and its masses of silk strands capable of piercing metal armor, his eyes glittered brightly with killing intent.

“Evil creature!” Activating his defensive true energy, he drew his sword from his back and ran his finger along the flat of the blade. Ten burning suns of sword energy appeared, enigmatic to the extreme as they shot toward the Silk Rain of the Spring Silkworm. One by one, the strands of silk snapped; with one move, Chu Tiange completely vanquished Yang Qi’s energy art.

That brief interchange was all Chu Tiange needed to tell that Yang Qi wasn’t in the Lifeseizing level.

“So, you’re not actually in the Lifeseizing level. You used some spirit medicine to power up, or perhaps you cultivate some strange devil technique. Either way, I'm warning you. No matter how strong a Master of Energy might be, they can never be a match for a Lifeseizer.”

After all, breaking through to the Lifeseizing level involved a drastic transformation of true energy. Starting at that level, attacks would contain the spirit energy of heaven and earth.

Yang Qi was strong, but no matter how much power he drew on, his moves could not combine with heaven and earth.

Now that Chu Tiange had a better idea of Yang Qi’s level, he looked at him with a sneer.

“You seem to think you’re pretty powerful, you little punk. But it turns out you're nothing but trash. You're no Lifeseizer. For that arrogance, you will die!” Brandishing his sword, he said, “Ten Suns Ascend to Heaven; Guide You to an Early Death!”

Ten blazing suns of sword energy shot toward Yang Qi, sharp and hot to the extreme, an energy art that was virtually beyond mortal comprehension.

“Be broken!” Yang Qi said, clearly not the least bit frightened. Suddenly, the Infernal Deity Spear appeared in his hand, with its infinite variations. Without a moment’s pause, he leaped toward the ten suns.

Laughing coldly, Chu Tiange yelled, “Fool! Cosmic Sunflare; Meridian Immolation!”

The ten burning suns suddenly exploded, sending light shooting into the Infernal Deity Spear, and through it toward Yang Qi.

‘Now’s my chance!’

Spinning through the air, Yang Qi intentionally sucked all of the burning, golden fire into him.

His Infernal Deity Plate Armor could have protected him from the attack. But he wanted to absorb the sword light of the Cosmic Sunflare Sword. The attack of a powerful Lifeseizer was nothing to take lightly, but he needed something to stimulate the lightning mammoth.

Yang Qi was essentially using the sword light of the Cosmic Sunflare Sword and converting it into a power-up for himself. It was almost like having someone in the Lifeseizing level intentionally helping him improve his cultivation base.

Intense golden fire streamed through him, so hot and painful that it felt like his meridians were being destroyed. But Yang Qi was like an ancient, wild beast. Taking a breath, he sent the burning sword energy into his sea of energy, and toward the lightning mammoth.

Instantly, the lightning mammoth’s life force quintessence went to work, and after three breaths of time passed, all of the sword light had been converted, and his meridians grew stronger.

Multiple particles within him were waking up.

One ancient megamammoth after another was making him grow stronger and stronger.

Chapter 70: The Power of Twenty Megamammoths

Five particles within Yang Qi all opened up.

That meant that he now had the power of twenty ancient megamammoths coursing through him, more strength than many people in the Lifeseizing level.

At the very least, he definitely surpassed Chu Tiange.

However, it was a transformation that used all of the life force quintessence he had at his disposal. From now on, his cultivation would progress at a much slower pace.

Regardless, his rapid progress meant that he was now closer than ever to the Lifeseizing level.

Cracking sounds rang out within him as massive amounts of true energy began to gather in his sea of energy, glowing like magma.

And in the middle of it all was something that looked almost like a crucible.

His Hellfire Crucible was growing rapidly, and was already beginning to gain control of his sea of energy.

At the same time, his senses and consciousness were growing much more acute.

In fact, because of that, he now realized that there was something profoundly terrifying in Yun Hailan’s sea of energy, something beastly, like that of a god amongst animals.

‘What’s hiding in Yun Hailan? It's so terrifying! She’s even more mysterious than I realized. What I knew about her before was just a drop of water in the ocean…. It doesn’t matter though. I have to kill her. Not even Chu Tiange can stop me!’

As he floated there in midair, Yang Qi flexed his muscles, causing thunderous cracking noises to echo out into the air. The different forces of energy inside him cause a force field to spring up around him, making the air ripple, and sending out powerful fluctuations.

Moments ago, Jing Wuxue had been preparing to launch an attack from his position atop the building. However, when he realized Yang Qi was powering up, and that there was a force field rippling around him, he began to back up. ‘What a massive aura! What is that? My Blood Emperor devil energy seems like it wants to explode out of me to offer obeisance! This guy’s true energy seems like that of an otherworldly devil-god that can dominate all creation, and force all types of demon-devils to heed its commands. What energy art is it? Don’t tell me it’s a fabled imperial-class energy art! I cultivate the Devil Sutra of the Blood Emperor, which was once an imperial-class art. Unfortunately, my version is far removed from the original, and is only royal-class.’

At this point, he decided that the best thing would be to wait patiently and watch how the situation developed.

Laughing loudly, he said, “I don’t want to get involved in a conflict between the House of Spring and Autumn and the Demi-Immortal Institute. Chu Tiange, you fight it out with this guy first, and then we can continue our duel.”

With that, he flew up into the air to avoid the fluctuations of Yang Qi’s power-up.

“Horrid monster!” Chu Tiange cursed. Moments ago, when he realized that Yang Qi wasn’t in the Lifeseizing level, he had unleashed Ten Suns Ascend to Heaven, a consummate move that he had assumed would be instantly fatal.

However, his true energy hadn’t even been able to damage his opponent's body, and had been completely useless. In fact, his opponent then went on to unleash shocking energy.

In the blink of an eye, Yang Qi’s force field had covered almost the entire imperial palace. At that point, he dispelled the swirling snow around him, ceasing to use the Four Seasons Swordplay and instead fully drawing on the invincible Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.

The aura caused Chu Tiange’s face to turn very serious. Now, he could see a black-armored figure, tall, with long horns on his head, and vicious spikes protruding from his back. All of a sudden, he had the feeling that he might not be able to win this fight.

‘What happened? What technique is this? It’s actually intimidating me on the level of my soul? I cultivate the Cosmic Sunflare Sword technique, the key to which is to treat the world like a brightly shining sun. There is nothing more domineering than the burning sun shining down on the lands below! How could I possibly be intimidated by something like this? Ah, whatever. I’ll just kill him. That should solve the problem. It will probably be a big help to my cultivation too.’

Chu Tiange was a consummate expert, an elite student of the Demi-Immortal Institute. Therefore, he simply blurred into motion, a streak of afterimages that smashed through the force field and headed straight toward Yang Qi, sword outstretched.

That sword seemed as unstoppable as if it were being wielded by a god.

Bam!

Yang Qi’s Infernal Deity Spear shot forth with supernatural speed and focus, heading directly toward the tip of the sword.

“Leaping Flames; Burning Sun!” Chu Tiange said, a vicious smile playing out on his face. Keeping his grip on his sword with one hand, he stretched his other hand out in a palm, within which was a burning, sun-like flame. Suddenly, an enormous flame giant leaped out from the flames, radiating such intense heat that all the coldness in the area vanished, and the stone ground even began to melt.

WHAM!

The palm struck the Infernal Deity Spear with such intense heat that the spear’s true energy ignited. In the blink of an eye, Yang Qi’s spear transformed into nothing but fire.

Back on the building, Yun Hailan watched with icy calm, apparently not worried about the possibility of Jing Wuxue attacking her while Chu Tiange and Yang Qi fought.

“Listen punk, my Cosmic Sunflare Sword is designed to ignite true energy. Enjoy it while you can!”

“I’d rather not. Frigid Ice Hell.” Yang Qi’s echoing voice was so cold it seemed capable of freezing everything for tens of thousands of miles. As it swept out, the flames in the area were extinguished one after another.

Swish!

The Infernal Deity Spear swept directly toward Chu Tiange’s throat.

Chu Tiange shot backward, a look of shock on his face as he switched sword stances. Suddenly, his sword erupted into flames which took the shape of a fire dragon.

“Fire Dragon Belches Pearls!”

He was pushing his Cosmic Sunflare Sword technique to the limits of its capabilities. His fire dragon sword clashed with the Infernal Deity Spear over a hundred times, until the sword began to hum. Then, he sent a fist-sized fireball out, which exploded right in front of Yang Qi.

BOOOOOOOM!

The entire area instantly transformed into a sea of flames.

However, Yang Qi was completely unaffected. The true energy of his spear was like that of the Frigid Ice Hell, and as he swept it out in front of him, a wind rose up that sucked the fire completely away.

As the sea of flames vanished, his spear suddenly extended in length. It was like a pillar that could support the heavens, or an infernal deity from the distant past. It was something capable of slaughtering devils or demons or ghosts from the deepest hells. Suddenly, a godmammoth appeared behind him, its trunk capable of absorbing stars and moons, its four limbs ready to crush hells.

“The boundless netherworld is filled with dancing devil-gods. Summon the dismal souls into the pitch black of hell….”

As his true energy swirled, a sound filled the air like a song from the Nine Serenities underworld, summoning countless souls to it.

All of a sudden, it almost seemed like the world had been turned into hell itself.

The Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth almost seemed to open the gates of hell itself, unleashing millions and millions of devil-gods, all of them thirsting to control the universe and eradicate the world of man.

“Die!” Yang Qi said, thrusting his spear out in the direction of Chu Tiange.

With him dead, Yun Hailan would have no one to protect her any longer!

“The sunlight bathes all things, sweeping through the universe! The brightness of the boundless blazing sun can ignite heaven and earth! DIIIIIIIEEEEEEEE!” Chu Tiange’s sword exploded, transforming into innumerable fragments that began to glow as bright as suns. At the same time, his energy surged upward, like a pillar of fire rising into the sky; behind him, a golden-yellow god-spirit appeared, shining brightly, a massive sword held in its hand.

It was as if Chu Tiange had actually summoned the god-spirit who resided in the sun!

“Humanoid True Energy, Lifeseizing Nascent Divinity. The quintessence of the sun, an invincible out-of-body incarnation that can slaughter everything in its path. As long-lived as heaven and earth!” Letting out a shout, Chu Tiange attacked again, his movement mirrored by the flame god-spirit, which slashed its sword toward the Infernal Deity Spear.

Two divine weapons battered against each other more than a hundred times, until swirling black smoke filled the area. Finally, Chu Tiange shouted, “You just wait, you freakish hellion! I’ll get you eventually!”

WHOOSH!

Suddenly, he transformed into a column of fire that shot up to Yun Hailan, grabbed her, and then vanished.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi tumbled out of the sky, landing hard on the ground, his true energy in chaos, his meridians twisting and distorting. He was injured, but deep down, was actually very happy. He had fought a Lifeseizer, and even forced him to retreat. Although he hadn’t been able to kill him, he had injured him significantly.

And he had confirmed that he himself was as strong as a Lifeseizer.

If he actually broke through to the Lifeseizing level, he would definitely be able to cut down Chu Tiange with ease.

At long last, Jing Wuxue saw the chance he had been waiting for. Dropping down to the ground, he pulled out a long, blood-colored whip and said, “Hand over my Sage Devil Painting, brat, and I’ll let you live!”

This Bloodshadow Godwhip caused the reek of blood to fill the area; it was at least a hundred times more powerful than the version used by the red-furred vampire Yang Qi had fought earlier.

“That’s pretty presumptuous of you, Jing Wuxue," Yang Qi replied. "I’ll take a rain check on sharing fighting tips with you. Just wait till I make another breakthrough. Then, you’ll be dead.” Jing Wuxue lashed out with his whip, but Yang Qi’s spear shattered it. After that, Yang Qi leaped into the air, two enormous wings sprouting out of his back. With a gust of wind, he burst into motion, vanishing as sure as a divine crane flying into the highest heavens.

Jing Wuxue was inclined to give chase; obviously, his opponent's true energy must have been significantly drained after his fight with Chu Tiange. Now would be the perfect time to try to kill him. But Yang Qi was capable of such speed that Jing Wuxue knew he could do nothing more than eat the dust he left behind in his tracks.

‘What are those wings?’ he thought, shocked. ‘And what energy art is that? I'm not even close to being that fast….’

Chapter 71: Everyone Levels Up

Fierce fighting raged throughout the ancient city of Krorän.

An army of students from the Demi-Immortal Institute had breached the city walls, and were cutting down countless vampire brigands.

In numerous locations, it was possible to see people fusing their energy with the clouds as they reached the ninth phase and became Masters of Energy.

As for the vampires, they were meeting defeat left and right.

The forces from the Demi-Immortal Institute were simply too numerous. Furthermore, as a whole, they were not fighting chaotically; they were organized into ranks and teams, all of whom worked together, joining their true energy, making it as easy for them to kill the vampires as it would be to chop melons.

After all, the vampire brigands were essentially an unruly mob; how could they possibly deal with the best of the best from the Demi-Immortal Institute, the top organization in the lands, whose mere freshman students were in the eighth phase, and whose inner campus students were ninth phase experts?

Amongst the vampire brigands, Masters of Energy were rather rare.

“More and more students from our institute are arriving by the moment. Look guys! That’s the Five Lightnings Society, and the Divine Ability Society…. Everybody’s showing up. I wonder how Yang Qi is doing.”

Li He and the others had just finished killing their one hundredth vampire, and were now taking a rest.

“I dunno,” Liang Dong replied. “I saw some powerful energy fluctuations coming from the city center just now. I wonder if Chu Tiange is fighting with Jing Wuxue. Hua Yinhu, He Jili, Li He. How long is it going to take you to reach the Master of Energy level?”

“My energy is pulsing,” Li He replied. “I'd say that after this fight is over, and we get back to the institute, I should have enough merit points to buy the spirit pills I need to achieve my breakthrough. Then we can all become outer campus students, and start recruiting people to join us. We can really start to make a name for ourselves.”

“There are tons of societies, though,” Hua Yinhu said, sighing. “Standing out from the crowd will be easier said than done. The struggles within the institute can be even more fierce and deadly than those in the Sage Ancestor Dynasty as a whole. There, certain rules have to be followed, so enemies usually don’t actually kill each other. But if you make the slightest mistake in the institute, you can end up dead. The Crown Prince Society, Divine Ability Society, Five Lightnings Society and Gentlemen’s Society… they don't ever show mercy.”

“We’re fine. Just keep a low profile and don’t let anyone on to what we're doing. As long as we don’t make a big fuss, no one will know. After all, there are just too many students in the institute for people to keep an eye on everyone.”

As they discussed the matter, they suddenly heard a voice behind them. “It wouldn’t be good to reveal ourselves now. Just keep improving yourselves, and do your best to bring in talented people to join us naturally. Once I reach the Lifeseizing level, we can officially announce the founding of the Sage Monarch Society.”

“Brother Yang Qi!”

Everyone turned to see Yang Qi standing there with two huge bottle gourds in his hands, both of which radiated a strong medicinal aroma.

Then, he produced three medicinal pills that shone with golden light. The group recognized them immediately. “Golden Nine Transformations Pills?!”

“That’s right. I wasn’t able to bring much loot from the treasure-houses with me, so I tried to choose only the best things. This gourd is full of them, plus some sort of violet pill that I'm unfamiliar with. You guys take a look. In any case, one Golden Nine Transformations Pill should be all the three of you need to become Masters of Energy.”

Next, Yang Qi pulled out a violet-gold pill the size of a longan fruit.

“Violet-Golden Meridian-Strengthening Pill!” Li He exclaimed. “Those are even more valuable than Golden Nine Transformations Pills. They're made by combining ten-thousand-year-old violet-gold with thousand-year-old violet magical mushrooms, plus a whole bunch of other spirit medicines. It takes fully twenty years of concocting time to finish them. Even one of those pills is as valuable as an entire city! Eat it, and you can strengthen your foundation and consolidate your vitality. It will add a bit of preheaven essence into your sea of energy, which if you cultivate, will significantly improve the state of your meridians. That's why they're called Violet-Golden Meridian-Strengthening Pills. If you sold them at market, they would fetch an astronomical price. Brother Yang Qi, it looks to me like there must be hundreds of pills in that bottle gourd. We're rich! Terrifyingly rich!”

“You got that right,” Yang Qi said. Of course, he didn’t reveal that in his thumb-ring of holding, he had dozens upon dozens of collections of other pills just like those.

Unfortunately, he didn’t quite know what all the pills were. They were obviously beyond the level that mere Demi-Immortal Institute freshman students would know about.

“Let’s find a quiet place where I can help you use the Golden Nine Transformations Pills, and then the Violet-Golden Meridian-Strengthening Pills. Let’s strengthen your meridians, and get you into the Master of Energy level. Then we can all become outer campus students.”

With that, he handed out the pills. As for Liang Dong, he was already a Master of Energy, but Yang Qi gave him a pill anyway as a reward.

Taking one last look at the flames of war flickering within Krorän, they turned and left. Eventually, they found a distant mountain valley that was perfect for their needs. Sitting down cross-legged, they circulated their true energy and then consumed the pills.

The process took six hours. By that point, it was day again, and had stopped snowing, ensuring that bright sunlight filled the lands.

Yang Qi opened his eyes, to be followed moments later by Li He, He Jili and finally, Hua Yinhu. Energy soared into the sky from the latter three, accompanied by intense rumbling sounds. Nearby snow fowl, snow rabbits, snow foxes, snow apes, as well as powerful demonlings, all recognized the Master of Energy auras, and fled.

They were now all Masters of Energy, and not ordinary ones by any means.

“Excellent,” He Jili said. “We can hold our heads high now as Masters of Energy, and our positions in our clans will now improve significantly.”

All three of them had eyes brimming with tears of excitement. They came from powerful and important clans, but up to this point, their cultivation bases had been insufficient. But now that they were Masters of Energy, they would become outer campus students of the Demi-Immortal Institute, and would have completely different positions within their clans, with access to many more resources than before.

And of course, they all knew that it was because of their good brother Yang Qi. Without him, it would likely have taken another ten years for them to get their breakthrough.

And how many decades did one have to work with in life?

“Brother Yang,” Hua Yinhu said, “we won’t waste time with words of thanks. You’re the leader of the Sage Monarch Society, so we’ll climb mountains of daggers and swim through seas of flames to follow your orders, and not even bat an eye while doing so. Our place in our clans will be different now, so if you need help for your own clan, just say the word. Once I join the outer campus, I’ll send word back to my family. Soon, I’ll be able to call upon ten Masters of Energy to help me with whatever I need.”

“What? They’ll send you ten Masters of Energy?” Although Yang Qi was shocked, he quickly smoothed out his face. “Well, let’s get out of this land of ice and snow. Once we're back at the institute, we can turn in our blood demon cores for merit points, and then get those promotions to outer campus student.”

Continuing to chat, they sped away through the snow.

Yang Qi was in a wonderful mood.

But in sharp contrast was Chu Tiange, who was in another part of the northwest, fuming with anger.

‘Who would have thought that that punk would mess up my plan to kill Jing Wuxue….’

Currently, he was sending sword energy out as if to connect with the winter sun itself. Gradually, the sunlight gathered together and then descended as golden rays into him.

Earlier, his sword had exploded, and now he was forming it back together.

His Cosmic Sunflare Sword was similar to the Infernal Deity Spear in that it was a manifestation of the technique he cultivated. It collected the quintessence of the sun and the spirit energy of the cosmos to fuse with true energy and create a divine weapon.

Off to the side, Yun Hailan said, “There’s no need to be so angry, Elder Brother. Although, I was hoping you would kill him and reveal his identity. What energy art does he cultivate? It seems to surpass the royal-class, so I'd say that, at the very least, it's an imperial-class art. There was something very familiar about him. With enough time in his presence, I could probably deduce his identity.”

“What? He seemed familiar to you?” Chu Tiange looked over his shoulder at her. “Don’t tell me he’s some expert from the Sea God Institute.”

“I have no idea,” she said thoughtfully. “However, it won’t be too long before the truth comes to light. Whoever he was, he seemed to have something against me. After all, he attacked me first, and with killing intent. Seems he hates me and wants me dead. And since he failed, he’ll surely try again.”

“Well, he's terrifying, I can tell you that,” Chu Tiange replied. “He’s definitely not a Lifeseizer, and yet, is as powerful as one. If word got out about that, it would cause a huge stir.” He smiled viciously. “However, considering he picked a fight with me, he’s signed his own death warrant. You’re right, Hailan. His incredible strength must come from whatever energy art he cultivates, probably an imperial-class. In fact, it could even be a fabled saintly-class art.”

“Saintly-class energy art?!” Yun Hailan was visibly shocked.

“That’s right. An energy art that can surpass the mortal and enter the saintly, a consummate discipline passed down from a Great Sage of ancient times. If I could get my hands on it….”

“Well, that shouldn’t be hard,” Yun Hailan said, her eyes flashing. “He wants to kill me, so he’ll show up again eventually. How about this, Elder Brother Tiange: You find some top experts and then set up an inescapable trap to capture him and force him to reveal the details of that energy art. This is the perfect opportunity for us. If it works, then we might have a chance to surpass the mortal and enter the saintly.”

Chapter 72: Returning to the Institute

The more Chu Tiange thought about the plan Yun Hailan had just come up with, the more excited he got.

If he could get that person’s cultivation technique, then before long, he would be just as powerful as the conclave students in the institute.

Although elite students were like nobility, to truly be first-class, one needed to become a conclave student, or even better, a holy neophyte.

Those were positions of true power, in which one could have access to all the resources in the institute, including the ability to gain thousands of years of longevity, and essentially never die.

Chu Tiange couldn’t help but be envious of such people. If he could somehow get the secret to an imperial-class energy art, then he could rise to higher levels within mere decades.

And if it was a saintly-class art, the results would come even more quickly. He would definitely advance by leaps and bounds, and would be viewed as a genius.

That would be glory far beyond anything an elite student could even imagine.

Of course, Yun Hailan was thinking similar thoughts.

‘Just who exactly is he? Not even Chu Tiange realized he was there. He burst out from under the ground, which is where most of the treasure storehouses were. He must have really struck it rich there, plus he also got Jing Wuxue’s Sage Devil Painting…. Clearly, he hates me with a passion. Wait, don’t tell me he’s….’ All of a sudden, her thoughts came to focus on one particular person.

Finally, though, she shook her head. ‘Impossible. I played that puny silkpants like a violin. There’s no way he could have energy arts or a cultivation base like that, right? Besides, when he trounced Song Haishan, he was clearly in the eighth phase and the man from last night was a Master of Energy. The difference between the two is almost too vast to quantify. It seems I need to achieve my next breakthrough as quickly as possible. After I get back, I’ll go into seclusion and try to reach the Lifeseizing level….'

“Let’s go, Elder Brother,” she said. “Considering Jing Wuxue escaped with his life, I guess I don't owe you any favors after all. I wonder who will end up taking him out. The Gentlemen’s Society is here, perhaps they’ll do it. Jing Wuxue isn’t superhuman; he’ll definitely meet his end eventually.”

“I couldn’t care less,” Chu Tiange said, looking more than a bit irritated.

Suddenly, his expression flickered, and he looked over to see several beams of light approaching from the horizon. Considering how vigorous they were, it was obvious these newcomers weren’t Masters of Energy, but rather Lifeseizers.

“More Lifeseizers?” he murmured, shocked. However, his expression quickly calmed as he realized that the newcomers were students from the Demi-Immortal Institute.

Whoosh. Whoosh. Whoosh…!

The beams of light approached, and soon three individuals touched down near them. All of them were elite students just like Chu Tiange.

Two were male, and one was female.

“Long Tai, Ying Ling, Luo Tian,” he said by way of greeting. “Experts from the Gentlemen’s Society, the Divine Ability Society, and the Five Lightnings Society. What are you doing working together?”

“Infighting is best avoided when dealing with enemies of the institute,” the young woman said. Looking Yun Hailan up and down, she said, “Are you the genius they say has sea god blood in your veins? Yun Hailan?”

“Yes, ma’am, that’s me.” Yun Hailan bowed formally. “Is there some matter you wish to discuss with me, Elder Sister, Elder Brothers?”

The three elite students exchanged glances, and then the young woman said, “Not really. We’re just following orders. Here, this is for you.”

With that, she tossed a fist-sized, blood-colored demon core over to Yun Hailan.

The odor of blood that the core emanated was shocking to the extreme.

“A Lifeseizer blood demon core!?” Chu Tiange blurted. “Don’t tell me….”

“Yes. The three of us ambushed Jing Wuxue, killed him, and extracted his blood demon core. As for why we're giving it to Junior Sister Yun Hailan, you don’t need to waste time trying to guess. The Crown Prince ordered it. Although we're not members of the Crown Prince Society, we respect him to the ultimate degree, so it’s only natural that we would follow his orders. Junior Sister Yun Hailan, if you happen to see the Crown Prince again, we hope you can put in a good word for us. We would be eternally grateful.”

Yun Hailan put the blood demon core away. Expression not changing in the slightest, she said, “Of course I will. Many thanks to you, Elder Sister and Elder Brothers.”

Chu Tiange could not have been more shocked by what was happening.

He had assumed that the mysterious and enigmatic Crown Prince had only shown a passing interest in Yun Hailan. But now, it was obvious their relationship went beyond that. Apparently, the Crown Prince had personally spread word that whoever killed Jing Wuxue in the siege of Krorän was to deliver his blood demon core to Yun Hailan. Clearly, his interest in her was beyond passing.

‘Who exactly is this Yun Hailan? Why is he interested in her?’ Chu Tiange quickly suppressed his feelings. Although he was somewhat of a prodigy when it came to skill and strategy, he was like the earth, and the Crown Prince was the heavens. If he said one wrong thing, he would definitely end up crushed into nothing.

“Why don’t you let us escort you back to the institute, Junior Sister?” one of the other elite students said. “If something bad happened to you, the Crown Prince would be furious.”

“Thanks for the trouble,” Yun Hailan replied, remaining as calm and cool as ever as she flew up into the air to join them. “Oh, by the way, could you three possibly do me a favor?”

“Name it,” replied Long Tai.

“There’s a certain freshman student named Yang Qi. He’s Yang Susu’s nephew, and just joined the Demi-Immortal Institute. Could you find out what he does on a daily basis? If so, I’ll definitely put in a good word for you with the Crown Prince.”

“A freshman student?” The three elite students exchanged glances, then broke out into smiles. “No problem. Let us handle it. You’ll soon know every aspect of his schedule, even his bedtime. We can get all that information through our eyes and ears in the Demi-Immortal Institute.”

“Very well, let's be off then,” Yun Hailan said. “I need to get into secluded meditation as soon as possible to break into the Lifeseizing level.”

Feeling very pleased with herself, she flew away with the group.

Normally, Masters of Energy weren’t capable of long-term sustained flight, but with the mysterious power of the dragonpearl she possessed, she was nearly on the same level as a Lifeseizer in that regard.

**

After a day and a night of travel, Yang Qi was out of the snowy northwest, and back in the Demi-Immortal Institute.

Although he had failed to kill Jing Wuxue, the society he and his friends had created profited significantly.

Besides, killing Jing Wuxue would have brought too much attention. If word leaked, how could he explain how a mere freshman student had killed a Lifeseizer? How could something like that even be possible? It would definitely bring too much attention.

Instead, he had secretly acquired plenty of valuable loot, while his team had acquired a good collection of demon cores, and also become Masters of Energy.

As soon as they arrived, they took inventory, and found that they had killed twenty-three vampire brigand in the Master of Energy level. In terms of seventh and eighth phase brigands, they had hundreds.

If they turned all of that in, they would each get hundreds of merit points.

And merit points were the only way to become outer campus students.

Outer campus students had completely different lives than freshmen students. They could go anywhere they wanted in the institute, and also had access to the Scripture Pavilion, where there were plenty of martial disciplines, ancient records, and the like. Furthermore, they would have the chance to learn directly from Lifeseizers.

After resting up a bit, the group of five headed to an ancient stone temple deep in the institute.

The name of the stone palace was written in huge letters above the entrance: Hall of Feats and Virtue.

This was the location where students could turn in valuable objects in exchange for merit points. Many years ago, the merit point system in the Demi-Immortal Institute had been called the feat and virtue system. However, later, when other institutes rose up, people began to criticize the Demi-Immortal Institute for using terms that were too pretentious and dramatic. Therefore, it was changed to the merit point system.

And yet, they had not altered the name of the palace hall itself.

Yang Qi looked at the name of the palace, and couldn’t help but feel that the words feat and virtue seemed particularly appropriate. It was as if they represented law and order, and thus, respect.

Inside the hall, an old man sat on duty. He held a scroll in his hands, which he was currently studying, and considering that his aura surpassed that of a Master of Energy, he was obviously a Lifeseizer.

Li He stepped forward, bowed respectfully, and said, “Professor, we're here to turn in the blood demon cores from our mission earlier.”

“Oh?” the old man said. He looked up. “Very well, hand them over. Freshman students, eh? Seems you all just became Masters of Energy. Presumably you want to be promoted to the Outer Campus, correct?”

“You’re right, Professor. That’s exactly why we're here.”

With that, they all began to hand over the blood demon cores they had acquired.

When the old man saw how many Master of Energy demon cores they had, his eyebrows rose. “You actually killed this many vampire brigands? Seems you five have some skill. This many demon cores are worth about six hundred merit points. You can split it between yourselves.”

With that, the old man waved his hand, and a jade plaque flew out which Yang Qi reached out and grabbed. Inside were roughly six hundred shining dots that indicated how many merit points were inside.

Chapter 73: Outer Campus Students

‘Being an outer campus student is completely different from being a freshman student,’ Yang Qi mused. ‘Look at these accommodations. A soaring tower with a view of endless clouds and bodies of water. Simply wonderful.’

The building he was in was fully thirty-six stories tall, each story thirty meters from top to bottom. It was truly an imposing structure.

This was where the outer campus students lived. The rooms were far larger than those of the freshman students, and currently, Yang Qi was sitting next to a window, looking at the beautiful winter scenery outside.

After paying his merit points and taking a test provided by the school to prove that he was a Master of Energy, he got his promotion. He was now an outer campus student with his own spectacular accommodations, a virtual mansion grotto.

His four friends had similar rooms, and were currently there organizing their things.

The windows were made of pure crystal, with an inlaid screen that protected against the coldest of winds, but let in all of the light.

His accommodations were roughly six thousand square meters, and contained everything he could possibly need. It had a pill furnace, the requisite flame to power it, a bed made of jade, and all sorts of other things that were required for cultivating energy arts.

The walls were made of some unknown gold-like metal, and were decorated with millions of complex decorative patterns that actually formed a spell formation.

That formation could absorb the quintessence of the sun and moon, and the spirit energy of heaven and earth, which made practicing cultivation twice as productive.

This was the most important aspect to the accommodations, and was a special remuneration from the sect to outer campus students.

The Demi-Immortal Institute had millions of freshman students, but when it came to the outer campus students, there was one-tenth that number. And of course, there were even fewer inner campus students.

Being promoted from freshman student to the Outer Campus was a major upgrade.

Freshman students were assigned all sorts of random tasks and jobs. Some of them even were sent to mines outside of the school to do hard labor. But not outer campus students. Not only did they not have to work, they were actually paid to do nothing.

A perfect example was the formation of spirit convergence that was built into the accommodations.

Such formations could only be set up by powerful Lifeseizers, and those who practiced cultivation in one would receive constant tempering from the formation itself. The spirit energy of heaven and earth would continuously enter their pores to strengthen their meridians and replenish their sea of energy. All-in-all, it made cultivation vastly more effective.

Back when he lived in Yanhaven, Yang Qi couldn’t even have imagined that such things existed.

Compared to the Demi-Immortal Institute, Yanhaven was essentially a slum.

It wasn’t a case of people there rarely using spell formations for cultivation; no, it was a situation of no one having ever seen a spell formation before.

In fact, Yang Qi was shocked to discover that when he left his room, he could sense that the air outside was heterogeneous and full of filth. In contrast, the air in his room was pure and refreshing. It made him feel like he was an immortal of sorts, and caused his true energy to flow even faster through his body.

Yang Qi also spent time memorizing the decorative designs that made up the spell formation. That way, when he reached the Lifeseizing level, he could theoretically return to the Yang Clan and set up a similar formation. That would ensure that his father and brothers would be able to advance in their cultivation much more quickly.

A spell formation like that could help people reach the fifth phase of energy arts in only a few years, as opposed to the dozens of years it would normally take.

Suddenly, Yang Qi heard someone knocking at the door. Waving his hand, he opened it.

“Brother Yang Qi, can you believe these formations of spirit convergence?!”

Li He and the others entered, looking completely proud and elated.

Yang Qi beckoned for them to enter. “I heard that inner campus students have formations of vital convergence that are supposed to accelerate your cultivation even more. I wonder what they’re like. Well, I guess we have to start saving up more merit points so that we can become inner campus students.”

As of now, he truly was the leader of their little team, and they respected his word over all else.

“We’ll need to perform a lot of meritorious service to become inner campus students,” Li He said. “Instead of saving up merit points, why don’t we focus on cultivation? If Brother Yang Qi can reach the Lifeseizing level, then he’ll become an elite student without having to pay a single merit point. Only the students who have absolutely no hope of reaching the Lifeseizing level will actually spend the merit points to get a promotion.”

“That's right,” Liang Dong said. “Once you reach the Lifeseizing level, you become very important to the institute. Brother Yang, it's all thanks to you that we're Masters of Energy. Considering we’re finally outer campus students, I think it's time for us to go home and visit our fathers. At long last we’ll officially get higher positions there, and access to greater resources. Before leaving, we wanted to check with you to see if you had any instructions for us while we’re gone. For example, what about the situation with your clan? As far as I'm concerned, the Yang Clan is family now, and your father is my father. I swear that we will live together and die together, and share both glory and misfortune.”

“Actually, I just did some checking, Brother Yang,” Hua Yinhu said. “The fifty-thousand kilometer area that contains Yanhaven is fully engulfed in the flames of war. The main threat is the Seafolk, and to tell you the truth, the Yang Clan is in grave danger.”

“Really?” Yang Qi said. “Do you have any suggestion about what to do, Brothers? I know my clan is weak. If the Seafolk attack them, what should they do?” He was fairly certain that Li He would have a good idea in this regard.

“You don't even need to worry about it,” Li He said, sounding very matter-of-fact. “The four of us already talked the matter over. It will only take us a day to get back home. Once there, we can take advantage of our new positions to have some Masters of Energy sent to Yanhaven. It should only take three days. They should be able to keep the Yang Clan safe in the future. And if any significant trouble comes along, they can help the clan fall back. Considering we have our respective clans’ power at our disposal, your situation should be very easy to handle. The only caveat, Brother Yang Qi, is that you need to give our men something they can use to prove they’re allies.”

“Very well,” Yang Qi said, delighted. “I’ll entrust the matter of my clan to you. Here are ten Golden Nine Transformations Pills and ten Violet-Golden Meridian-Strengthening Pills. Send those along to give to my father and my brothers. Whatever’s left over can be distributed to loyal members of the clan.”

“Of course. Well, I’d say it will be about a month before we return with some good news, although who knows, it could be ten days.”

After discussing some more of the finer details, the group split up.

Once alone again, Yang Qi nodded in satisfaction. After their mission to deal with the vampire brigands, and the alliance they had formed, he had finally come up with a good way to help his clan.

Now, the main thing he had to do was focus on his cultivation, and hopefully break through to the Lifeseizing level.

Sitting down cross-legged in the middle of his room, he began to perform breathing exercises. Almost immediately, his true energy began to flow, and his meridians grew stronger. His bones and muscles were cleansed, and his sea of energy erupted like a volcano, causing rumbling sounds to fill his body.

Although massive levels of power were being unleashed, there was no longer any lightning mammoth in his sea of energy, and thus, he had no way to produce life force quintessence.

With that, he immersed himself in the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, causing his room to vanish from his senses. Instead, he saw eight hundred forty million star-like particles, almost like a galaxy that resembled a godmammoth. Unfortunately, those countless stars also pulsed with an aura of death, with the exception of twenty that shone brightly. Those were the twenty ancient megamammoths that he had already woken up.

Compared to that entire godmammoth galaxy, twenty stars were almost like nothing.

Yang Qi knew that if he actually woke up all eight hundred forty million particles, he would be just as powerful as a god-spirit. In fact, he himself would be a god.

‘Life force quintessence. Wake up that twenty-first particle!’

Clearing his thoughts, he sent his true energy thrumming through his body in an attempt to create life force quintessence.

Unfortunately, what he was capable of creating didn’t even cause the particle to stir, much less wake up.

His cultivation was proceeding completely differently than before. He was really stuck in a bottleneck.

He sighed. ‘With that lightning mammoth gone, my cultivation is going to slow down by a hundred or even a thousand percent. Godly-class energy arts are definitely not easy to cultivate. If I want to awaken another particle, I really need to break out of the Energy Arts level and reach the point of being able to seize life and vital energy from the heavens. At my current rate, it's going to take twenty years to wake up that twenty-first particle.’

Twenty years would definitely not do.

However, he had an idea of what to do. There was always the Hellfire Crucible in his sea of energy. At some point, he would be able to use it to refine and melt all types of true energy, and thus directly consume demon cores. He would become like a massive furnace that could melt even stone.

With that, he activated his thumb-ring, summoning a rippling blue door that led to a room filled with shelves of medicinal pills.

And of course, there was the completely eye-catching Sage Devil Painting, made up of thousands and thousands of Master of Energy demon cores, as well as that single Lifeseizing level demon core. The spell formation they created emanated a completely holy aura.

‘With the medicinal pills I have stockpiled here, my cultivation should speed up a bit. Unfortunately, I don’t know what most of these pills are for, so I can't really use them. And there’s no one in the institute that I can fully trust….’

All of a sudden his eyes lit up. ‘Wait, what about Aunt Susu? Now that I'm an outer campus student, I can go see her any time I want.’

Chapter 74: Giant Guards

There had been many important tasks at hand, including his personal cultivation and the mission to go hunt vampire brigands in the northwest. Because of all of that, the matter of his aunt Yang Susu had skipped his mind.

But now, here he was, an outer campus student with a more impressive cultivation base than ever. He had the freedom to come and go within the institute as he pleased, unlike when he had been a freshman student and had been subject to many rules about where to go and what to do.

Now, he could go seek out Yang Susu.

Besides, he was interested in getting a better look at the institute. It covered hundreds and hundreds of kilometers, and was filled with pavilions, kiosks, towers, pagodas, and temples. It was a multi-level maze of structures that hid so many secrets it was impossible to even guess how many there were.

Hopefully, a bit of a tour might net more information about Yun Hailan.

Considering the bottleneck he was in, there was no way he would be able to awaken that twenty-first particle any time soon.

The more one cultivated the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, the harder it got, especially considering that the life force quintessence requirement grew with each particle that awoke. In other words, each one was more difficult to wake up than the previous. That was one reason why godly-class energy arts were usually only cultivated by gods, not humans.

Making sure that his thumb-ring was well concealed, Yang Qi walked out of his room, hopping directly from the thirty-sixth floor all the way down to the ground.

Every floor of the tower was a different room or ‘mansion grotto’. Each one belonged to a different outer campus student. However, Yang Qi didn't know any of them and actually wasn’t very interested in getting too close.

At the bottom of the building was a well-manicured park filled with towering trees, flowing streams, and little pavilions. It was a lovely place, with teams of freshman students visible cleaning up, or trimming and fertilizing the plants.

Yang Qi had done such work himself in past months, but now, he was exempt from such chores.

As he walked along, the freshman students noticed his clothing, and the large ‘Demi-Immortal’ word stitched on the front in bright red. The envy in their eyes was impossible to mask.

Freshman students had no such marking on their garments. Theirs were pure white, which indicated that they were persons without any academic title or official rank.

Yang Qi noticed the envious gazes, and sighed. There was nothing he could do about how the Demi-Immortal Institute was so strictly organized by rank and title. It was hard to even imagine what the freshman students would think of him if he reached the Lifeseizing level and became an elite student.

He strolled out of the garden, and then began to walk through the various paths that made up the institute, passing buildings, pagodas, walls, and other scenery. Before long, he was at an area filled with majestic temples.

It was a glorious sight. At the tops of the temples were glowing halos that would fill the area with light even during nighttime.

And all of them were augmented by spell formations.

This place was a restricted area, the College of Elite Students.

Only elite students and Lifeseizers could enter, with the exception of lower-ranking students who had authentication tokens.

If any other person tried to enter unlawfully, they would be killed without question.

As he neared the place, and sensed the glory of the temples’ spell formations touching him, he felt blessed. His true energy seemed to grow stronger, and he felt more agile and free. It was almost as if he were being cleansed.

“What incredible spell formations,” he murmured.

The spell formations in the College of Elite Students were far more powerful than formations of spirit convergence. No wonder Yun Hailan and Song Haishan had experienced such rapid progress with their cultivation.

Now that Yang Qi had been in the Demi-Immortal Institute for several months, there were certain things he understood that had been a mystery at first.

Outer campus students had their formations of spirit convergence, and inner campus students had formations of vital convergence. Each such upgrade led to faster and more efficient cultivation.

As for the College of Elite Students, they had energy formations of the dao of monarchs. Such formations allowed the user to constantly absorb the spirit energy of heaven and earth, and the quintessence of the sun and moon. Even more importantly, they allowed one to develop the energy of the dao of monarchs.

Practicing cultivation there led to speed ten times superior to even a formation of vital convergence.

Yun Hailan had almost immediately been admitted into the College of Elite Students, and had been able to cultivate with an energy formation of the dao of monarchs. Thus, her progress was almost unimaginable.

As he thought about the matter, he stood there basking in the glory of the temples, and the feeling of his true energy being stimulated. It was hard to imagine what it would be like if he could actually go inside.

Suddenly, a thunderous shout emerged from one of the outer chambers bordering the temples. “Stop right there!”

The profound killing intent he sensed caused him to stop in place immediately.

From what he could tell, if he took another step forward, he would be attacked with deadly abandon.

Looking over at the outer chambers, he saw several towering men emerge, fully twice as tall as an ordinary person. They wore full suits of steel armor, and wielded dual-crescent-bladed halberds. As for their auras, they were so wild that they seemed like titans emerged from the wilds of yore.

Furthermore, they were clearly Masters of Energy.

These were giants tasked with guarding the entrance to the College of Elite Students. People with the blood of ancient giant-spirits possessed boundless power, and were the perfect guards.

They were by no means simpletons, and their meridians were ten times as powerful as ordinary humans. A single one who was a Master of Energy could easily defeat ten ordinary ninth phase experts.

They were often tasked with guarding important locations in the Demi-Immortal Institute, and their orders were simple: first give a warning to any trespassers, and if the warning was ignored, execute them.

Given the current level of Yang Qi’s cultivation base, he didn’t fear Lifeseizers, let alone some giant guards. That said, he also wasn't looking for trouble.

Clasping hands respectfully, he said, “Greetings, guards. I've come to the College of Elite Students to see my aunt, Yang Susu. Would you mind notifying her I’m here?”

The leader of the giants looked Yang Qi up and down, his eyes glinting with what seemed like greed. “Notify her? Sorry, we're busy. Come back tomorrow.”

“Oh?” At this point, Yang Qi realized that these greedy giant guards made a practice of soliciting bribes from students.

Not in the mood to bicker, and fairly brimming with wealth, he waved his hand and sent a banknote worth a million energy convergence pills flying over to him. “Please, take this. I hope that you can be a bit flexible here.”

“Oh?” The giant leader grabbed the banknote, looked at it, then put it away. However, he didn’t seem to have any intention of letting Yang Qi pass. “Listen, punk. We have a hundred guards here. You really think one banknote is enough? What are we supposed to do, cut it up into pieces? One banknote like this is only enough for one of us. Give me some more treasures, enough for a hundred of my brothers, and then maybe I’ll let you pass.”

“What?” As of this moment, Yang Qi realized what was going on. These giants were specifically making things hard for him! Frowning, he said, “This is ridiculous. All I want is for you to notify someone of my presence. Do you people do this all the time? Aren’t you worried that you’ll get in trouble if the higher-ups find out about this?”

The giants all burst out into raucous laughter. “Get in trouble? We stand guard here, and the unwritten rule is that we can use our position to earn a bit of extra money. How dare you, an outer campus student, provoke us giants! You really don’t know what’s good for you, do you? Screw the hell off!”

A massive hand waved through the air, sending a massive tornado spinning toward Yang Qi.

Tornadoes were wind-type energy arts, and the type of thing that could uproot massive trees and send them flying through the air. Obviously, it could hurl a human like Yang Qi far off into the distance.

Yang Qi’s eyes suddenly turned as cold as ice, and even began to flicker with killing intent. “Have a death wish, you bunch of watchdogs? Who told you to cause problems for me?”

As the tornado bore down on him, he unleashed some energy, dissipating it instantly.

Then, he made a snatching gesture, causing all of the energy within ten thousand paces to rush toward him.

Suddenly, the dozen or so giants felt their true energy surging out of control; it almost seemed like it might burst out of their bodies and flow toward Yang Qi’s palm.

Both shocked and enraged, they scrambled to gain control of their energy.

However, that was when Yang Qi opened his hand, causing all the energy flows to vanish.

As a result, all of the true energy they had been struggling to pull back suddenly rushed back and slammed into their seas of energy.

It was almost like Yang Qi had personally struck them.

POP!

Blood sprayed out of the giants’ mouths, even their leader.

‘How could a student from the outer campus be so strong?’ the leader thought, shocked.

Making another grasping motion, Yang Qi pulled the leader toward him through the air, then forced him onto his knees. “I know someone put you up to this, giant-spirit. Someone told you to cause problems for me, right? But I don’t feel like bickering with you. Now you see that I'm virtually as strong as a Lifeseizer, right? Once I achieve my next breakthrough, I could easily cause problems for you. I could make your life very hard.”

True energy swirled out, grabbed the banknote, and pulled it back to Yang Qi. “I gave you a banknote to give you some face. But if you don’t want face, then don’t blame me for taking it back. Now go notify Yang Susu that I'm here, immediately. Furthermore, I'm going to plant a seed of true energy in your sea of energy, so if you disobey, I can cripple you instantly.”

Chapter 75: Aunt Susu

Yang Qi quickly sent out a projection of Humanoid True Energy that entered the giant leader's sea of energy.

Shivering, the leader looked at Yang Qi and said, “You’re… you’re so vicious….”

“There’s nothing vicious about it. You treated me like an enemy, so I’m treating you like the dog you are. Go and pass my message along. And don’t piss me off; you can’t afford to. Besides, I'm fairly certain I know who sent you to cause trouble for me. It was Yun Hailan, wasn’t it? Well, you can tell her something for me. One of these days, I'm going to pay her back with full interest. And whatever schemes or plots she hatches to deal with me will be nothing more than jokes. No matter how smart she thinks she is, she’s no better than a chicken or dog.”

With that, he waved his hand dismissively.

He wasn’t afraid of causing a scene like this in the institute. After all, conflicts often erupted between students and giants, and as long as no one got killed, the institute would turn a blind eye to it.

Besides, he had just shown them that he was close to the Lifeseizing level, and had also indicated that he would achieve a breakthrough soon.

Once that happened, and he was an elite student, these guards would either have to suck up to him or suffer the consequences. Elite students were far above and beyond ordinary people.

Otherwise, they wouldn’t deserve to be called elite.

The leader of the giants could see the killing intent in Yang Qi’s eyes, and therefore, didn’t dare to say another word. He vanished in a figurative wisp of smoke, clearly terrified of provoking even more hatred.

As for the other giants, they simply prostrated to Yang Qi and remained there unmoving.

Before long, the leader of the guards came back, followed by a young man of approximately twenty-five years of age. He had an imposing bearing, and a very fair face. Looking Yang Qi up and down, he said, “You’re Yang Susu’s nephew? She's been in seclusion cultivating a very important energy art, and cannot be disturbed. However, she told me ahead of time to entertain you if you came. Come, follow me.”

This bossy fellow had an aura that far surpassed the Master of Energy level. One glance would reveal to anyone that he was a Lifeseizer.

Truth be told, other than people like Yun Hailan, everyone in the College of Elite Students was a Lifeseizer.

The Demi-Immortal Institute was the top power in all the Rich-Lush Continent, with as many experts as the sky had clouds. It wasn’t a rare thing at all to see Lifeseizers there.

It was only after arriving that Yang Qi found out his aunt had long since reached the Lifeseizing level, and was in the College of Elite Students.

‘Who is this guy? A friend of Aunt Susu?’

Now that he was finally able to visit Aunt Susu, he had assumed that she would come out to meet him. Never could he have guessed that some bossy man would be the one to escort him in. A bit displeased, and also wary, he followed the man inside.

When the man realized that Yang Qi was walking right next to him, he frowned and stopped in place. Looking very irritated, he raised his voice and said, “The College of Elite Students is filled with all sorts of spell formations and illusory regions. Unless you're a Lifeseizer, it can be a very dangerous place. Considering how weak you are, you’d better stay behind me. No wandering off, and no causing any trouble, you hear?”

“I’ll be fine,” Yang Qi replied calmly. “Those spell formations and illusory regions won’t hurt Lifeseizers, so they probably won't affect me either. If anything happens, I’ll take full responsibility.”

“What?” Eyes widening, the man glared at Yang Qi for a long moment. However, Yang Qi didn’t react at all, provoking a sinister smile. “Well then, just be careful.”

WHOOSH!

Suddenly, he blurred into motion, vanishing without a trace.

This area was a maze of corridors and doors that twisted and turned this way and that. The temples were very tall, and covered with murals that featured strange magical symbols and spell formations. Anyone who took a wrong step could find themselves falling into a bottomless pit or worse.

As for the elite student, he was so irritated by what Yang Qi had said that, in his hostility, he simply abandoned him in the hopes that he would get hurt or worse.

After only five breaths of time passed, he had gone through nearly a hundred different corridors, and was deep within the temple area.

At that point, he stopped, flicked his sleeve and gave a cold harrumph. “That reckless idiot is a mere outer campus student! How dare he act so arrogantly? I’ll just leave him back there to do some soul searching. That will save me some effort keeping him in check in the future.”

“Oh, really? These corridors don't seem very dangerous. So what if there are a few illusory regions or true energy barriers? With a high enough cultivation base, dealing with those things isn’t any problem at all.”

The elite student spun to find Yang Qi standing right behind him, looking completely calm. In fact, he was even examining one of the murals on the wall.

“You—!” After that, the man was at such a loss for words that he just made some gurgling sounds.

“Very well, Elder Brother,” Yang Qi replied coolly. “Continue on. I haven't seen my Aunt Susu for ten years now.”

The young man snorted, and looked like he might actually launch an attack to try to assess Yang Qi’s energy arts. After all, he was a powerful Lifeseizer and made it a practice of acting arrogant and bossy around other students. In fact, he viewed them like slaves or servants. To have lost so much face in front of Yang Qi was almost unbearable.

However, after a long moment of consideration, he got his anger into check and continued onward.

As the moments crept by, they went through numerous corridors and past countless temples. Eventually, they came to a stop in front of one in particular. The young man knocked on the door nine times in a row, and the sounds which echoed out from within seemed to come from another world.

CREAK!

The door slowly opened, revealing nothing but darkness, with a spiral staircase ascending up into parts unknown.

“Alright, your aunt is in secluded meditation here. She knows you've come.” Snorting coldly, the young man pointed into the darkness.

“Oh, really?” Yang Qi had already sent his true energy into this particular temple, and got the distinct sensation that it was a very dangerous place. He could even sense the aura of some sort of sealed devil-god.

This was definitely not his Aunt Susu’s secluded meditation chamber. It was obviously a trap!

Licking his lips, Yang Qi gestured at the door and said, “Well, Elder Brother, why don’t you come in with me?”

The young man’s eyes bulged as though he might lose his temper, but then he calmed himself. Smiling viciously, he said, “I have another matter to attend to. You go in on your own.”

“Don’t tell me there’s something dangerous in there?” Yang Qi asked, clasping his hands behind his back. He had no idea why this young man seemed to have it out for him. However, considering that the guards outside had given him a hard time, and now one of the elite students seemed to be targeting him, it definitely meant that someone higher up had issued orders.

‘Could it be Yun Hailan?’ he thought. ‘But she's only a Master of Energy, and doesn’t have much clout in the institute. How could she be issuing orders to a Lifeseizer? Don’t tell me that she has connections to the leadership of the institute. I’ll have to ask Aunt Susu.’

“Cut the crap, you brat. Get in there!”

WHIZZZ!

The young man thrust his palm out, sending masses of true energy raging out to create a powerful energy field covered with palm projections. It was almost like a mountain of palms surging toward Yang Qi.

“You’re right, punk! This isn’t Yang Susu’s secluded meditation chamber. This is the College of Elite Students’ Devil Suppression Cave! We have all sorts of vicious devil-banes here, so get in and enjoy yourself. How dare an outer campus student talk back to me so many times! If I didn’t punish you, my dignity would hit rock bottom! Oh, I might as well tell you that someone put a reward on your head! And I'm collecting it! After you get eaten by some devil-ghost, remember that the person who killed you was me, Ouyang Hu!”

Yang Qi had been waiting for this Ouyang Hu to attack him, and therefore, simply eyed the incoming mountain of true energy and prepared to make a move.

However, it was at that point that a streak of sword light shot through the palaces, radiating a massive gravitational force, and surrounded by a huge energy field. In the blink of an eye, it completely shattered the mountain of true energy.

Then, the sword light transformed into a vortex that consumed the fragmented energy clusters.

“You’ve really got some guts, Ouyang Hu! How dare you harm a family member of mine!” The voice belonged to a woman, and although it was as melodious as a flowing stream, it was also as sharp as a sword.

“Yang Susu!” Ouyang Hu blurted, shivering and backing up as if to flee the scene.

Even as he turned, a woman appeared at the end of the corridor. Waving her hand, she sucked the sword light back into her palm. She was tall and slender, with long legs that made her as graceful and lithe as an immortal crane. Her garb consisted of an aqua-green waistcoat, and her flowing black hair was bound with fiery-red gauze. The contrast between the green and the red was like the contrast between fire and water, or between yin and yang. She looked both calm and profound, like starlight reflected on the waters of a deep well.

Clearly, her cultivation base was on a far higher level than this Ouyang Hu’s.

Calming down a bit, Ouyang Hu, seemingly very confident in his position, said, “This doesn’t have anything to do with you, Yang Susu. Your nephew offended someone who the Crown Prince has taken a liking to, and I'm following her orders. I'm just showing respect to the Crown Prince. Don’t tell me that you’re going to defy him?”

Chapter 76: Profound Energy Arts

Yang Qi recognized this young woman at first sight.

‘Aunt Susu is finally here.’

He couldn’t suppress the excitement that sparked deep in his heart. Although she looked completely different from the way she had in the past, she still reminded him of that little girl who had helped him eat his meals as a child. She seemed extraordinary beyond belief, but there was still something about her that was exactly the same as before.

Looking Ouyang Hu square in the eye, she said, “Someone the Crown Prince took a liking to? You mean that Yun Hailan? Am I supposed to be impressed? Who cares if she's using her connections to try to intimidate people? That doesn’t change the fact that you plotted against my family. Well, I don’t need your life. Just be on your way, and leave behind one of your arms as you go.”

“What?” Ouyang Hu blurted, his face falling. “How dare you, Yang Susu! We're both in the College of Elite Students! Would you really attack me so viciously? Aren’t you afraid of the institute punishing you? If not, then just go ahead, attack me. I’ll make sure you understand what regret really is!”

“Cut the crap. Off with your arm!” Suddenly, Yang Susu drew her sword and then unleashed an eerie beam of sword energy that bore down mercilessly toward his right shoulder. There was no doubt about whether or not she intended to sever his arm.

Snarling with teeth bared, Ouyang Hu thrust out his right hand, which swirled with true energy until it looked like a tiger claw. This was a move from his Beast King Energy Art, Tiger Roars at the Heavens.

More true energy rippled out as images of tigers, leopards, jackals, wolves, snakes, vultures, eagles and bears sprang into being behind him.

He was using this one palm strike to try to deal with the incoming sword energy.

However, Yang Susu’s sword energy contained infinite variations. As it sped forward, a field of ice and a field of fire sprang up in front of it, the ice energy cold enough to seal everything within five hundred kilometers, and the fire hot enough to ignite anything.

The two energy fields merged into each other like yin and yang.

This was the ultimate expression of this sword technique of Yang Susu’s, a fire and ice taiji symbol.

“The immaterial universe beheads ghosts. Yin and yang expel gods. Supreme ultimate truth! Alright, Ouyang Hu, why don’t you try out the new technique I just finished cultivating, the Ghost-Beheading God-Expelling Godsword!”

Whizz!

Sword energy sliced through the air with seemingly boundless sharpness.

The fire and ice taiji symbol smashed into the Beast King Energy Art, and Ouyang Hu immediately staggered backward, blood spraying out of his mouth.

Although Ouyang Hu was also a Lifeseizer, he had only recently achieved his breakthrough, and had not yet fully stabilized his true energy. In fact, he was roughly at the same level as Chu Tiange, from what Yang Qi could tell.

And yet, as the saying goes, a centipede does not stop wriggling even after being stomped on. Despite having his Beast King Energy Art vanquished by Yang Susu, Ouyang Hu wasn’t ready to give up. Suddenly, Humanoid True Energy sprang out from him and sped directly toward Yang Qi.

It was a very strange manifestation; it was fully nine meters tall, covered with fur, with a head that resembled a tiger. It was apparently some sort of beast god, and it didn't hesitate at all to rush toward Yang Qi in terrifying fashion.

Smiling viciously, Ouyang Hu said, “Stop right there, Yang Susu! If you make another move, I’ll kill your nephew! This Humanoid True Energy is straight from my Beast King Energy Art. True Incarnation of the Tiger King!”

“How dare you!” Yang Susu said, preparing to change the direction of her sword energy to try to save Yang Qi. However, that was when she heard Yang Qi sigh.

“Don’t worry about me, Aunt Susu. You handle this Ouyang Hu. I can take care of his puny Humanoid True Energy on my own.”

Even as the words left his mouth, he reached out with his hands, causing an energy field to spring out that looked like a whirlpool of stars. “Invincible King’s Fist. Six stances combined.”

The tiger-headed Humanoid True Energy was sucked into the whirlpool, then let out an agonized shriek as it was torn to pieces. The resulting scraps of true energy were then absorbed into Yang Qi’s meridians, and sent to the embryonic Hellfire Crucible in his sea of energy.

Usually, heterogeneous true energy would act like poison if someone absorbed it. In fact, the first thing a normal person would try to do would be to expel it lest it inflict dangerous harm.

But now that Yang Qi was a Master of Energy, and had fully absorbed the life force quintessence of the lightning mammoth, he had his embryonic Hellfire Crucible. Already, it could melt and refine heterogeneous true energy, and turn it into true energy that he could use.

Therefore, he had nothing to fear at the moment. Thus was the power of a godly-class energy art.

Yang Susu had been worried about Yang Qi. And yet, to her utter surprise, it only took one sweep of his hand to vanquish the Humanoid True Energy of a beast king.

She was a veteran of numerous battles, and had been in many tight spots in her life. Therefore, it was easy for her to make quick decisions. Sword energy flared, and blood-red light shone. An agonized shriek rang out of Ouyang Hu as his right arm was cleanly severed off!

The blood-soaked Ouyang Hu couldn’t prevent the intense pain from showing on his face. However, he had profound energy arts, and quickly staunched the flow of blood. Grabbing his severed arm with his other hand, he turned and fled, leaving behind the following words: “I won’t rest until you’re dead, Yang Susu! And you’d better watch out for that nephew of yours. I'm not going to let this rest!”

Lifeseizers were powerful to the extreme. Even having an arm chopped off wouldn’t be a big hindrance. In fact, even with all four limbs chopped off, a Lifeseizer could still use their true energy to move as quickly as lightning. They could usually recover from the gravest of situations. The only way to truly put an end to one would be to sever their head, destroy their sea of energy, or perhaps detonate all of their meridians.

“What a piece of trash,” Yang Susu said, shaking her head. “Well, severing his arm and damaging his meridians will make it almost impossible for him to make any progress for the time being.” Turning her attention to Yang Qi, her eyes flickered with delight. “Qi’er, I didn’t realize you’ve grown up so much. I got your father’s message, and I'm up to date on everything that happened, including the incident with Yun Hailan and the Latent Dragon Pill. I know your martial arts were crippled, and that you got struck by lightning, leading to spectacular advancement. But I'd assumed your energy arts were the same as they were before. How could I have guessed that they would have advanced to this level?”

Yang Qi nodded. “Aunt Susu—”

Before he could continue, she waved her hand to cut him off. “This isn’t the place to talk. Let’s head back to my mansion grotto.”

A stream of sword light appeared which wrapped around Yang Qi and then sent him flying through the air faster than the speed of sound. A moment later, he was standing in a temple.

It was located in the middle of a massive lake, and featured massive walls inset with all sorts of gems and demon cores.

Both Yang Qi and Yang Susu were on the top floor of the temple, giving them a view of countless other lakes and temples stretching out in all directions.

“Qi’er, these temples in the College of Elite Students are set aside for students as mansion grottos.” Yang Susu pointed out at the scenery beyond. “See the lakes? That's not ordinary water. They’re fed by subterranean spirit springs, the waters of which are like the quintessence of the lands around us. The temples are actually constructed with spirit stone bricks that provide spectacular benefits for cultivation. And at the top of each temple is an energy formation of the dao of monarchs. These palaces are also considered to be mansion grottos. If anyone attempts to invade, I can draw upon the spirit energy in the lake water to activate a death formation that could easily kill four or five Lifeseizers. No one would dare have the gall to disturb us here.”

Leading Yang Qi inside the temple, she continued, “Qi’er, why don’t you stay here in my temple for a while? Your cultivation will progress ten times faster here. I’ll also be able to assess your cultivation base better, and determine exactly when you’ll be able to reach the Lifeseizing level. Considering how easily you dealt with Ouyang Hu’s energy arts, I suspect there is a lot more to your cultivation base than meets the eye.”

Already, Yang Qi could sense the boundless spirit energy of heaven and earth, filled with the power of the dao of monarchs, pouring into his acupoints. It felt wonderful.

However, he shook his head. “Aunt Susu, these temples are designed for use by one person. I don't want my own cultivation to influence yours negatively. Besides, my cultivation has been moving along quickly enough. At the moment, I’d prefer to stay at my current level and temper myself a bit. Purify my true energy a bit.”

“Oh?” Yang Susu’s eyes glittered. “So, your understanding of cultivation has reached this level already? Not bad. Not bad at all! Just what is the level of your cultivation base, Qi’er? Do you mind giving me a little demonstration? Your father sent word a few days ago about how you reformed the clan, and even subjugated Yang Xingshi and Dowager Yan. You must have some spectacular moves to have pulled that off. You know, I’ve been meaning to take a trip home for a while now, but have been so busy that I couldn’t buy the time.”

“You want to see my cultivation base, Aunt Susu?” Yang Qi smiled. The truth was that he was immensely proud of how strong he was, and didn't feel any need to hide things from his aunt. “No problem. However, you have to promise to keep it a secret. If word got out, it could shake the entire institute.”

“Shake the entire institute?” Yang Susu exclaimed, visibly taken aback. Then she chuckled. “You couldn't possibly shake the entire Demi-Immortal Institute. There are millions upon millions of students here. It's not uncommon for someone to come across some spectacular good fortune, and it’s normal to keep some moves secret. But the accomplishments of any single student can’t be considered more than a drop of water in the ocean.”

“Are you sure about that? Alright, Aunt Susu. Look closely….”

Yang Qi threw his head back and shouted at the top of his lungs, causing true energy to erupt behind him. The temple trembled as though it were being shaken by countless hells. It was as if godly beasts and devilish kings were climbing up out of the ground, and even more awe-inspiring, a huge portal opened behind him, like the gates of hell, from which countless devil-gods and ghost hands extended.

“What?” Yang Susu blurted, her expression flickering. Suddenly, sword light burst out from her palm to create a sword net above Yang Qi.

“Boundless Megaplexus Sword Net! Fetter heaven and shackle earth!” Apparently, she was drawing upon her most consummate discipline. “Qi’er, this is my deadliest move. This net of swords creates a megaplexus with eighty-one layers. If you can break free, it means you're as strong as a Lifeseizer!”

“What’s so hard about that?” Yang Qi made a ripping motion with his hands. “Be broken!”

Chapter 77: Medicinal Pill Explanation

Metallic black gold spread out to cover Yang Qi’s arms, densely packed magical symbols that looked like vicious devil-gods from hell.

As the armor covered him, the net descended, and pinging sounds rang out as the armor was scratched and damaged.

Back in the ancient city of Krorän, it was during his fight with Chu Tiange that his Infernal Deity Aegis had taken on the form of the Infernal Deity Plate Armor, which not even the Cosmic Sunflare Sword technique could pierce.

But Krorän was the past. Yang Qi’s cultivation base had advanced, and he was just on the verge of being able to seize life from the heavens. His Hellfire Crucible had reached its embryonic stage, and with his Infernal Deity Plate Armor, no divine weapons of any sort could hurt him.

Besides, with the power of twenty ancient megamammoths, he could crush anything that stood in his path.

He let loose a roar which shook everything in the area, and then he took a step forward, reaching out and ripping Yang Susu’s sword net apart layer by layer. The resulting destroyed sword energy then flew back to her, taking the shape of a long sword in her hand.

Whizz!

It only took a moment for him to reach the last layer, and crush it into ash.

With that, he retracted his true energy, returning him to his original form.

Shivering, Yang Susu reined in her sword energy, and then looked at her nephew with disbelieving eyes. “You're… you’re not in the Lifeseizing level, but your cultivation base is strong enough to stand up to Lifeseizers. It’s a miracle! You’re a genius! You must be one of the most extraordinary people in the institute. Just what good fortune did you come across, Qi’er? What was that energy art?”

“Aunt Susu, the energy art I cultivate is too extraordinary to speak aloud. If word got out, it could lead to calamity for the Demi-Immortal Institute itself.” He shook his head. “As for the details, let’s wait until I manage to reach the Lifeseizing level. At that point, I think I’ll be strong enough to provide a full explanation. For now, all you need to know is that I'm strong enough to trounce Lifeseizers.”

“That’s wonderful….” Although her eyes flickered with delight, they soon turned serious. “The fact that you, a Master of Energy, can do such things is actually completely shocking. Qi’er, I'm confident in saying that the technique you just used is an imperial-class energy art at the very minimum. You’re right, if people found out, it could lead to a major disaster. I’ll definitely keep your secret.”

“Thank you, Aunt Susu. By the way, how are things going for you here in the institute? Yun Hailan is here too, and she’s gained the favor of the Crown Prince. And who exactly is this Crown Prince character? Is he really that powerful? If Yun Hailan keeps using her connection to him to plot against me, I'm afraid I might be in some actual danger.”

“The Crown Prince….” A look of vigilance appeared in Yang Susu’s eyes. After a moment of silence, she sighed and said, “He's extraordinary, that’s for sure. He’s definitely broken out of the Lifeseizing level already, meaning that he’s currently in the Legendary level. Nobody really knows anything about his cultivation base, though. He's a holy neophyte; but that said, I don’t think you need to worry. His ambitions are too lofty for him to be concerned about you. That Yun Hailan is definitely just using his name to advance her own causes. Qi’er, you need to break through to the Lifeseizing level as quickly as possible. Doing that will relieve a lot of pressure.”

“It shouldn’t be long before I can do just that….” he murmured. Suddenly, his eyes glittered. “Aunt Susu, although I came across some good fortune, my fundamental understanding of cultivation as a whole is still relatively shallow. Would you mind explaining what this Legendary level that you mentioned is? That’s the level beyond the Lifeseizing level, right?”

“Of course I can explain,” she replied. Sitting down cross-legged, she said, “The so-called Lifeseizing level involves seizing life from the heavens, and surpassing the limitations of one’s own fleshly body. The goal is to be able to extend your lifespan. You seize life nine times within the level, and every time you do, you gain longevity. Of course, each time you seize life, it's more difficult than the time before. And every time involves a tribulation of vital energy. A few years ago, I achieved Primary Lifeseizing, and now I’m preparing for Secondary Lifeseizing. If I succeed, I’ll add five or six hundred years to my lifespan. If you reach Nonary Lifeseizing, then your longevity will increase to three thousand years. After you seize life nine times, your true energy transforms completely, allowing it to connect to the substructure of the world itself. Truth be told, I don't know how many sub-levels exist within the Legendary level, but I do know that even a higher level exists beyond it. You hear about it in stories from ancient times, about the great gods of antiquity. Supposedly, it's the Great Sage level….”

With that, Yang Susu went on to give many more details about cultivation. She talked about spell formation theory, true energy usage, meridian classification, as well as all the different types of spirit energy that existed in heaven and earth, and the nature of the quintessence of the sun and moon.

She had studied in the Demi-Immortal Institute for more than ten years, had received the approval of one of the grand elders, and before all that, had received a very thorough education. As such, her understanding of things vastly surpassed that of Yang Qi, who was still little more than a countryside yokel.

Many questions and conundrums he had encountered were explained, thanks to her.

Yang Qi felt like he was experiencing major enlightenment.

Tackling a situation with foreknowledge is always the best strategy. Now, Yang Qi’s efforts to break into the Lifeseizing level would go even more smoothly.

At a certain point, something she said caused him to remember an important thing.

With a slight grin on his face, he put his thumb-ring onto his palm and held it out.

Yang Susu immediately stopped talking for a moment, then said, “Qi’er, what's that?”

“Watch, Aunt Susu. You’ll see. This is another big secret of mine.” He sent some true energy into the ring, which caused the blue door to open, revealing the dimension inside the item.

“A thumb-ring of holding!?” Yang Susu said, visibly shocked. “That’s a treasure among treasures! Where did you get it?”

“I killed a Master of Energy from the Sea God Institute while traveling here. He had it on him. It took me a while, but I figured out how to use it on my own. What do you think?”

“You absolutely, positively must not let anyone know you have that. If word got out… yes, it would be a disaster for sure.” Yang Susu had been shocked over and over again by Yang Qi on this day. “Heart of the Sea holding items do indeed come from the Sea God Institute. The power of the world itself is used to forge them, which means that even Lifeseizers would have trouble to break into them.”

“I definitely won’t tell anyone about it, Aunt Susu. Except you of course.” Reaching into the dimension with some true energy, he pulled out a crystal box filled with medicinal pills. “Oh, I also got these from a leader of the vampire brigands in the ancient city of Krorän. Unfortunately, I have no idea what they do. Can you take a look?”

“Oh?”

Yang Susu took the crystal box and opened it to see rows of emerald-green medicinal pills. Eyes widening, she said, “These are Emerald Dew Rejuvenation Lozenges! They're made from an elixir extracted from thousand-year-old fine jade, which is then mixed with over three hundred types of spirit medicines. Then, they have to sit in a pill furnace for at least ten years. Just one pill is equivalent to over a hundred pounds of thousand-year-old fine jade. It’s impossible to even say how many man-hours went into making these. I can’t believe you have so many!”

“How do you use them?” Yang Qi asked.

“Seep them in fine liquor to extract the true energy. Drink it, and it will be naturally absorbed into your meridians and bones. It will extrude all sorts of impurities from you, and make you much stronger. It's like the quintessence of jade itself, and can significantly forestall the physical signs of aging. There are plenty of people who would fight tooth and nail to get pills like this.”

Although people with profound energy arts could live for hundreds of years, that didn’t stop the effects of aging. For example, even if Yang Susu lived for four hundred years, she would start to look old starting at around fifty or sixty. And once that happened, she could never go back. To people who prized their good looks, that was a horrifying thought.

Emerald Dew Rejuvenation Lozenges contained the quintessence of thousand-year-old fine jade, which could prevent the signs of aging and ensure that a person always appeared to be twenty or so. If such pills were held up in public, countless female students in the Demi-Immortal Institute would go crazy to get them.

“They sound amazing. Here, Aunt Susu, take a box. Either use them yourself, or give them out as gifts to strengthen your relationships.”

Yang Susu nodded eagerly. “You little brat! I guess it's a good thing I always fed you the most delicious food when you were a kid. Do you remember how you always used to try to grab my things? You even broke quite a few of my treasures.”

Yang Qi laughed. “Well, I guess the time has come to pay you back.”

Years ago, Yang Susu had taken Yang Qi with her everywhere she went, and it was really impossible to count how many of her trinkets he had stolen or broken. Back then, they had gotten into fights on many occasions, and Yang Susu had often been forced to teach him a lesson or two.

Now, more than ten years later, such memories caused warmth to rise up in both of their hearts.

From what Yang Qi could tell, his Aunt Susu hadn’t really changed that much, and he trusted and loved her just as much as he ever had.

“Aunt Susu, I'm just on the verge of breaking through to the Lifeseizing level. Unfortunately, I'm lacking in life force quintessence. Do you think any of these pills could help out?” With that, he pulled out some more medicinal pills and laid them on the ground between them.

“What a fortune….” she said with a slight gasp. “If you sold all of those for money, you would be richer than most of the elite students. Alright, let me see. Medicinal pills to improve life force quintessence….”

At a certain point, she picked up a gray medicinal pill and held it out. “This is a Marrow-Quickening Soul-Strengthening Pill. These pills are pretty amazing. They’re made from the fossils of demonlings from the most ancient times. It takes multiple Masters of Energy years of working together to make even just one such pill. This would suit your needs perfectly.

“There’s also this Dragon-Tiger Body-Rejuvenating Ointment. It will also increase your life force quintessence. It’s made from the gallbladders of pythons that are at least a hundred years old, combined with the crushed bones of fierce tigers. Oh, and here’s a Bearsnake Pill and a Blood-Energy Body-Eruption Pill…. They’re all very rare.”

Yang Susu pointed out numerous different types of spirit medicines, describing what they did and how to use them, as well as any possible negative side effects. When Yang Qi realized how much she knew about all these things, he really felt ignorant.

He had acquired the ultimate collection of spirit medicines, all of them extremely valuable. After memorizing all of the information, he was fairly certain that he would be able to achieve his breakthrough soon.

“Oh, there’s one more treasure I have….” he said, pulling out the Sage Devil Painting.

As soon as the painting was out in the open, Yang Susu shot to her feet. “That’s….”

Chapter 78: Sage Devil

“That’s a Sage Devil Painting!” Yang Susu said, her eyes wide. The painting was the size of a large rug, and contained thousands upon thousands of Master of Energy demon cores, as well as one that was from a Lifeseizer demonling.

“Aunt Susu, my cultivation level is too low to be able to use all of this spell formation. Do you think you could operate it?”

“The Sage Devil Painting is an immensely powerful magical item. It tells the story of an ancient Great Sage who fell from grace and became a devil. Throughout history, there were many experts from the dao of devils who sought to create an object like this, but only a cold-blooded murderer could do it. To succeed, one would have to kill countless humans and then use innumerable innocent souls to craft the design itself. Qi’er, look at the canvas of the painting. That’s not demonling hide; it's stitched together from patches of human skin.”

“Human skin….” Yang Qi murmured, shivering. Sending his true energy into the thick canvas, he realized that there must be thousands upon thousands of unique pieces of skin inside.

“Yes, human skin. And two particular types. One is human skin from someone born in a yin year, yin month, yin day, and yin hour, and then became a devil. The other is human skin from someone born in a yang year, yang month, yang day, and yang hour, who became a sage. See? The Master of Energy demon cores all contain the bitter aura of vengeful souls. This is really some high-level devilish sorcery.”

With that, Yang Susu sent some true energy into the Sage Devil Painting, whereupon all of the more than ten thousand Master of Energy demon cores suddenly began to shift and glitter, revealing distorted, bizarre human faces within them. Then, the entire painting began to transform, right in front of their eyes.

Vicious scales rippled out to cover the benevolent sage, who also grew a long tail. At the same time, bone spikes jutted out from his back.

In the blink of an eye, the sage transformed into a fiendish monster who seemed ready to send the tiger it was riding leaping out into the open.

To Yang Qi's shock, the Sage Devil Painting then floated up into the air, pulsing with so much killing energy that it seemed capable of slaughtering anyone it encountered.

This painting seemed so powerful that Yang Qi was certain that Jing Wuxue could have used it to kill him effortlessly.

But then, why would the man keep it in a treasure-house instead of carrying it on his person? For one thing, the painting was designed to be placed on a wall. The only reason Yang Qi had thought to take it was because he knew he could put it in his ring of holding.

“This Sage Devil Painting actually isn't complete,” Yang Susu said. “There is one last thing that needs to be done before finishing it, and Jing Wuxue was probably waiting for his secondary Lifeseizing before doing so. No wonder he led all of those vampire brigands on their campaign of devastation in the northwest. Supposedly it was to cultivate their blood demon energy arts; but the truth is that they were killing people to make this Sage Devil Painting. In only a few short years, the vampire brigands wiped out nearly all living beings within five hundred kilometers of Krorän. They didn’t leave anyone alive. And it was all for this painting…. I can’t believe you actually stole it, Qi’er.

“Look at those Master of Energy demon cores. They have at least a thousand vengeful souls in them. If you activated all of them at the same time, everything for dozens of kilometers, maybe even hundreds, would become a land of haunted ghosts and opened gates of hell. All the lands would be cast into darkness, and anyone caught in the trap would be killed by the sage-devil. Even a Lifeseizer would be in big trouble. However, the painting still isn't complete. And the final step doesn’t require souls, but rather, a massive influx of true energy.”

“So what does that mean? Aunt Susu, if you can break through to secondary Lifeseizing, do you think you could complete this treasure?” Yang Qi clicked his tongue. “If you become more powerful, your place within the academy will become even more stable. How about this. Why don’t I give you the painting?”

“Give it to me?” Yang Susu said, clearly surprised. “It’s a rare precious treasure from the dao of devils, probably the only of its kind. Jing Wuxue risked universal condemnation to make it, and sacrificed countless lives to do so. If I had that painting, I could definitely complete it. But my goal wouldn’t be the painting itself, but rather, to use it as a basis to succeed with one of the Demi-Immortal Institute’s most supreme energy arts, that of creating a second nascent divinity. The Sage Devil Painting has the fundamental qualities of both sages and devils. If a sage can become a devil, then I can turn a devil into a sage. With the help of my master, I might even be able to achieve multiple lifeseizings.”

“This thing is that powerful?” Yang Qi said. “Well, then, take it Aunt Susu. Use it to make your second nascent divinity. If you power up enough, maybe you can become a conclave student. That will be a major improvement in your standing. As for my own cultivation base, treasures like this won’t help it much. I just need lots of life force quintessence.”

Although he could use it as a magical item if he reached the Lifeseizing level, the truth was that once he was in that level, his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth would be able to destroy anything in his path.

Things were different for his Aunt Susu, who would benefit much more, especially in terms of her standing in the institute.

“It’s settled, Aunt Susu. The Sage Devil Painting is yours. Get the help you need from your master to make your second nascent divinity and break through to your secondary Lifeseizing. Also, take any of these medicinal pills that could be of help. As for me, I’ll go back and work as hard as I can to break through to the Lifeseizing level.”

Rising to his feet, he then added, “There’s no time to lose. It’s just too bad I didn’t do so already, otherwise I could use my unique true energy to help you.”

Because of what had occurred with Yun Hailan, he found it impossible to truly trust women. But his Aunt Susu was an exception. They had essentially grown up together, and there was unique emotional connection between the two. When it came to familial love, blood was thicker than water.

“That sounds good to me, Qi’er. Just wait until I have my second nascent divinity, and achieve my next breakthrough. Once I'm a conclave student, no one will ever dare to even think of harming you.” Waving her finger, she sent a stream of true energy to wrap the painting up.

With that, they continued to catch up on old times until night fell.

At that point, under the cover of darkness, the two of them flew out of the College of Elite Students.

Yang Susu headed to see her master, and Yang Qi went back to the Outer Campus.

In reality, it didn't matter how close two students were, it wasn’t permitted for outer or inner campus students to stay long-term in the College of Elite Students. If the matter were reported, it could lead to severe punishments. After all, if all elite students helped their family out in such a way, how could order be maintained?

Earlier, Yang Susu had implied that he should stay in her temple to work on his cultivation. Although she could probably rely on her master’s influence to make something like that work, he knew that Yun Hailan would be taking advantage of every possible opportunity to make a move against him. She was a merciless, venomous schemer, of that he was certain.

Besides, once she became a Lifeseizer herself, she might go after Yang Susu.

The best thing to do right now was make sure that his aunt grew more powerful as quickly as possible, so that Yun Hailan didn’t turn out to be a problem.

The Sage Devil Painting was a magical item that essentially shouldn’t even exist. It required killing nearly one hundred million people to produce, as well as thousands upon thousands of Master of Energy demonlings, plus a Lifeseizer.

However, it was possible that because of the unique qualities of the treasure, Yang Susu could transform proverbial devils into sages, and thus gain access to incredible power.

Yang Qi took advantage of the darkness of night to slip back into his residence. Now, he realized how inferior his formation of spirit convergence was to an energy formation of the dao of monarchs. Of course, it was still better than practicing cultivation on some random mountain in the middle of nowhere.

Taking some medicinal pills out of his thumb-ring of holding, he identified which ones were ideal for life force quintessence, and began to consume them one by one.

As the pills dissolved, they would be refined by his true energy, and would become medicinal energy that would flow into the embryonic Hellfire Crucible.

One by one, the power of those medicinal pills flowed into the lava-like true energy in the crucible, where they became life force quintessence, which would then continue on into his meridians. Slowly but surely, the twenty-first particle within him was beginning to wake up.

These were all rare medicinal pills, each one of which could provide the benefits of dozens of years of hard cultivation to ordinary individuals. However, because Yang Qi cultivated a godly-class energy art, his body surpassed those of ordinary individuals by hundreds or thousands of times. To him, such pills provided the benefits of ten days of cultivation, or at best, two weeks.

Thankfully, he had plundered a huge stockpile of them from the treasure stores in Krorän. As such, the medicinal strength flowing through him was significant.

As the life force quintessence flowed through him, the twenty-first particle began to twitch and wriggle, almost as if an ancient megamammoth were struggling to breathe. It was obviously just on the verge of waking up.

The true energy surging through him caused rippling, golden halos to spring up around him. They surged out, then shrank back down, gradually transforming into the shape of a door behind him.

The inside of the door was the color of black gold; black represented the devil-gods of hell and gold represented respect and nobility.

Together, they made black gold, the color that represented the supreme leaders of hell.

When the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth was cultivated to the ultimate degree, it could summon a gate to the netherworld.

Supposedly, that made it possible to communicate directly with hell itself, and to draw upon the immense power of ancient devil-gods. It was even theoretically possible to summon the heroic souls of such beings, and use them to crush any and all resistance.

Of course, Yang Qi was very far away from that level.

Right now, he needed to become a Lifeseizer, and eventually, reach the Legendary level, the same as the Crown Prince.

Chapter 79: Breaking into the Lifeseizing Level

After consuming massive amounts of medicinal pills, Yang Qi finally reached the point where life force quintessence was coursing through him, pouring into that twenty-first particle, which began to wriggle and twitch.

By now, he had a very deep understanding of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.

The further along one proceeded in cultivating it, the harder it became. Every step was like breaking through a massive obstacle. In fact, without all of the spirit medicines he had access to, he couldn’t make this progress in even a hundred years of cultivation.

However, he still wasn't willing to abandon an energy art that was meant for gods and spirits. How could he?

He was developing power that could look down condescendingly on all heaven and earth; despite being a mortal, he was already developing the heart of a god. One reason powerful experts could be called powerful was because of their heart. However expansive their hearts were, that was how expansive their prospects could be.

Now, by sending the spirit energy of numerous medicinal pills into the Hellfire Crucible, he was preparing to make his break through into the Lifeseizing level.

“Seize life from the heavens! Godmammoths are invincible; they can pluck stars and snatch moons, their energy can consume even blazing suns.” True energy gathered around him and then shot upward, only to be grabbed by the energy formation, and sent back into him.

Crick! Crack!

True energy settled down around him, no longer in the visage of a suit of armor, but rather, as scales, all of them a deep golden color, and rippling as if they were flowing magma. There were also countless sparks of electricity flowing around him constantly; having been struck with a fatal bolt of lightning, his meridians and true energy contained its power within them.

Scales of true energy settled around him, covering him; in the blink of an eye, it wasn’t even possible to see Yang Qi. The only thing in the room was a towering megamammoth.

This megamammoth looked nothing like an elephant; it was massive, with a trunk so powerful it seemed capable of sucking all the air out of the room in the shortest moment.

As for Yang Qi, he sat cross-legged inside of the true energy megamammoth, which was so big it took up almost the entire room.

“Seize life from heaven? Seize life from heaven…. Focus on becoming stronger. Communicate with the spirit energy of heaven and earth, and the quintessence of the sun and moon. Seize life. Transform the self….”

It was a process, not just of reaching the highest level of enlightenment, but of pushing beyond that. Gradually, he realized that the air around him was actually heterogeneous and impure. It was filled with elements that could help all living things to grow, could help plants to blossom, and could help humans to transcend to higher levels. It was an energy, marvelous and strange, something that couldn’t be forcibly taken into the body.

It was the spirit energy of heaven and earth.

In the Lifeseizing level, humans rose to the level of being able to take that energy, bring it into their bodies, and use it to create life force essence, to replenish personal true energy, to transform the fleshly body, to acquire greater strength, to add lifespan, and to purify the mind.

One of the most fundamental changes was that, with the swipe of a hand, a Lifeseizer could create a resonance with the spirit energy of heaven and earth, and use it to attack enemies, or create astrological phenomena.

For example, Yang Qi cultivated the Four Seasons Swordplay, so if he reached the Lifeseizing level, he could truly use the sword energy of winter snow to cause actual snow storms.

If he could continue to seize life, and reach Quinary Lifeseizing, or even better, Septenary or Octonary, then he could do terrifying things within a range of fifty kilometers to five hundred. Wind, rain, snow, lightning; all such things were in the realm of possibility.

“Azure dragon. White tiger. Vermilion bird. Black turtle….”

Yang Qi’s true energy megamammoth trumpeted loudly, and as it did, more manifestations of divine animals appeared, all of them bowing in subservience.

Godmammoths were gods to the legions of gods, and were created to be leaders of all creation. In the endless sea of worlds, planes, and hells, they were the only divine beasts capable of forcing anything and everything to submit.

Yang Qi’s eyes snapped open, and he threw his head back and howled.

True energy streamed out of his pores, as his Hellfire Crucible transformed the medicinal energy within him into life force quintessence.

Inhale. Exhale….

As he performed his breathing exercises, true energy saturated the room, eventually bursting up to connect to the clouds, which churned and seethed until they were a vortex.

As of this moment, Yang Qi was like a butterfly in a cocoon, just waiting to emerge into the world.

But then, all of a sudden….

The medicinal energy in his Hellfire Crucible faded away. He was out of medicinal pills.

He needed even more life force quintessence than he had already generated.

Without enough spirit medicines, the twenty-first particle could do nothing but sink down into silence.

“Ai….” Sighing, he reined in his true energy.

The megamammoth vanished, and the golden color which made him look like some sort of god from heaven slowly sank back down inside him.

Although it wasn't visible to the naked eye now, Yang Qi could tell that the color of the multi-layered membrane beneath his skin had changed. And now, it had complex designs on it that seemed to be a spell formation.

Once he did step into the Lifeseizing level, he would be a living spell formation of sorts, one with all creation, and virtually invincible.

“I failed to break into the Lifeseizing level. But at least I benefited in some ways. And I did progress a bit.” Now that his true energy was back inside of him, and was already starting to build up again, he could tell that his meridians were all thicker and stronger. The true energy flowed through them like massive, roiling rivers.

Compared to his meridians, those of ordinary people would be like little more than streams. Within his various acupoints, his true energy seethed like magma ready to erupt from a volcano and destroy the world.

Yang Qi had failed to reach the Lifeseizing level, and the only reason was that he lacked enough life force quintessence.

Without that lightning mammoth to help him, his cultivation would now be far more difficult. It was a good thing he had mentally prepared for this outcome.

“I need to think of some other way to get the medicinal pills I need.” Rising to his feet, he checked his thumb-ring and confirmed that he had less than half of the medicinal pills left.

That definitely wasn't enough to build up the life force quintessence he needed.

Every time one type of medicinal pill was consumed, the second such pill that was consumed would be only half as effective. Therefore, Yang Qi planned to give the rest of his pill stockpile to his brothers and father.

Another month went by, during which Yang Qi stayed in his room and practiced cultivation in peace and quiet. Thanks to the pointers given by Yang Susu, many of his areas of confusion had been cleared up. Now, his routine cultivation went about smoothly and with no difficulty. In fact, he was reaching the point where he felt that he could probably create energy arts of his own.

His Four Seasons Swordplay were now at the ultimate peak, and he could use them without even thinking. He could bring about the transformations of spring, summer, autumn, and winter at will, although not to the level of a Lifeseizer.

And thanks to his constant work at cultivation, every square inch of his flesh and blood was filled with true energy.

His blood was now a deep golden color, and when he cast his senses inward, he could sense how powerful it was. It flowed like mercury through his blood vessels.

At long last, the freezing temperatures were fading away, and the lands were warming up. It was almost time for the lunar New Year.

Yang Qi circulated his true energy and then flicked his finger, causing a drop of blood to emerge from its tip, which then dropped down to the ground. When it landed, it didn't splash, but instead, remained there, a deep golden pearl, flickering and glittering like metal.

His blood had already reached a level that even most Lifeseizers would have a hard time comprehending. It was almost as if he wasn’t even human. When one's blood became golden, and as heavy as mercury, it indicated that one's energy arts and cultivation base had reached the point of completely transforming.

If one drop of blood was that heavy, then it was difficult to imagine how sturdy Yang Qi’s flesh and blood were as a whole. He was more tough and durable than even some massive beasts from ancient times.

“Wow, I've been in seclusion for a month already. I wonder if Li He and the others have returned. I should go ask how things are going in my clan.”

Waving his hand, he pulled the dark golden drop of blood back into his body.

Considering how much medicinal energy now existed in his blood, each drop was precious. In fact, if some master pill concocter got a drop of his blood, they would be able to produce a consummate spirit medicine.

With that, Yang Qi sent his true energy out of his room and into the rest of the tower.

It was at that point that he realized Li He and the others were already back.

Without any hesitation, he summoned them, and they immediately flew over to his room.

“Brother Yang, we've been back for ten days. Why were you in secluded meditation for so long? You were cultivating for an entire month?” When they entered, it was clear that they were in very high spirits.

“Did your trips home go well? How is your clan standing now? And how is my clan doing?” At a single glance, Yang Qi could tell that all four of them had advanced significantly, and were already far beyond the level they had been at when first becoming Masters of Energy.

Obviously, they had benefited greatly from their trips home.

“Between the four of us, we managed to muster over thirty Masters of Energy, and a hundred eighth phase experts. With their help, your father has already driven the previous city magistrate out, and taken control of Yanhaven.”

“What?” Yang Qi exclaimed. “They actually took over Yanhaven? Did my father send any messages?”

“Of course, Brother Yang Qi. Check this out.”

With that, Li He handed over a sealed letter.

Yang Qi took it and immediately tore it open. At first glance, he could tell that it was his father’s handwriting.

Chapter 80: Life Force Springwater

The letter from Yang Zhan went into detail regarding everything that had happened in Yanhaven over the past several months.

It said that for unknown reasons, the previously overbearing State of Yun had retreated. Then, more than thirty Masters of Energy had arrived from four aristocratic clans, as well as hundreds of eighth phase experts. Because of that, it had been easy to capture Yan Gufeng and seize the city magistrate’s mansion.

All of the other clans in Yanhaven had immediately acknowledged allegiance to the Yang Clan, and had agreed to serve as counselors.

The letter went on to say that Yang Zhan intended to found a nation, and that he was interested in Yang Qi’s opinion on what to call it.

Furthermore, Yang Zhan’s cultivation base had significantly improved, thanks to the medicinal pills Yang Qi had sent him. And because of the Golden Nine Transformations Pills, his eldest and second brothers had both reached the Master of Energy level.

There were other messages that were more vaguely written. First, the clan was growing both in numbers and in power.

Second, Yang Zhan reminded Yang Qi that it was important to make a name for himself in the Demi-Immortal Institute; that was the clan's best chance to remain stable and avoid disasters.

Third, Yang Zhan yet again mentioned Yang Qi’s mother, and that he should try to get as much information about the Hanging Mountain as he could.

‘Wonderful,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘Truly wonderful! The clan is finally reaching new heights of glory!’

The message from Yang Zhan also explained that, after capturing Yan Gufeng, he realized that he had powerful backers, and thus, agreed to his pleas to be freed. He even let him take all of his counselors and guards with him. Of course, he had confiscated all of the Yan Clan’s wealth.

‘Who would have thought that Yan Gufeng would eventually flee Yanhaven? However, considering that Father let him go, I wonder if that means he’ll try to come back for revenge one day.’

Yang Qi was fairly certain that problems were on the horizon; there was no way that Yan Gufeng would let the matter drop.

That said, Yan Gufeng’s daughter Yan Feixia was a student at the True Dragon Institute, so killing him would still have resulted in major repercussions. At least this way there was still a possibility to resolve things later on.

‘For now, I probably don’t need to go home. I should focus on reaching the Lifeseizing level first. Once that happens, word will spread far and wide that the Yang Clan has a Lifeseizer on their side, which will make us untouchable.’ His hands clenched into fists. ‘Mother, I'm definitely going to get to the Hanging Mountain one day, and finally ask you why you disappeared and never returned.’

He really was itching to get into the Lifeseizing level.

At this point, Yang Qi finally put the letter away. Sighing, he said, “So, my clan is finally in a stable situation. Now I can really focus on building my power base here in the Demi-Immortal Institute. Looks like the four of you have improved recently!”

“Of course,” Li He replied excitedly. “Our positions in our clans improved dramatically, and we have access to greater resources than before. In fact, one of the Lifeseizer chief elders from my clan personally blessed me and expanded my sea of energy. My clan wants me to continue progressing and eventually reach the Lifeseizing level myself. If I can become an elite student in the Demi-Immortal Institute, my clan will have a huge advantage in the Sage Ancestor Dynasty.”

“Brother Yang Qi,” Liang Dong said, “you're the leader of our Sage Monarch Society. Do you think you have a shot at reaching the Lifeseizing level? I know you’re already capable of dominating Lifeseizers in combat, but it seems you’re currently stuck. Is it because of the energy art you cultivate? If you know what you need to achieve another breakthrough, just say the word, and we brothers will figure out a way to help you.”

“Yeah, that’s right,” Hua Yinhu added. “We have access to a lot of clan resources now. Perhaps whatever item you lack is something that we can help you get.” After all, if Yang Qi could reach the Lifeseizing level, it would be a big benefit to all of them.

Eyes glittering, Yang Qi said, “Well, what I really need are spirit medicines that increase life force quintessence. With enough pills like that, I could rise to the next level. Can you guys think of a solution to the problem?”

“Spirit pills that increase life force quintessence?” The four friends exchanged glances, and none of them seemed very confident. “Medicines like the Golden Nine Transformations Pill and the Violet-Golden Meridian-Strengthening Pill are extremely rare and valuable. Even if you found a place to buy them in bulk… our clans would probably go bankrupt trying to do so.”

“I see….” Yang Qi said, his eyes turning slightly downcast.

After a moment of thought, Li He’s eyes brightened, and he said, “But that doesn’t mean we have no other options. What if we went on missions for the institute?”

“What do you mean?” Yang Qi asked.

“I remember seeing a mission that involved going into one of the most dangerous locations in the Rich-Lush Continent, the Heavencorpse Dimension. There are fragments of holy relics there that belong to the Demi-Immortal Institute by right. If you collect enough fragments, you can get a hefty reward. Besides, there’s a type of spirit water there called life force springwater. According to the rumors, a single drop of it contains a huge amount of life force quintessence, far more than any golden pill or spirit medicine. A few decades ago, some students went there and found some. Afterward, all of them rose to the Lifeseizing level almost immediately. With that water, advancing your cultivation is like turning over your hand. In fact, Lifeseizers can use it to achieve multiple lifeseizings! Even the Crown Prince used it. That’s how he broke out of Nonary Lifeseizing into the level beyond.”

‘Life force springwater?’ Just the name alone made it sound like some sort of heaven-shaking, earth-shattering spirit medicine. ‘The Heavencorpse Dimension must be a place full of incredible dangers.’

All of a sudden, he found himself thinking about the Blackcorpse Mountains.

Deep in those mountains was a land of endless tombs, filled with countless zombies. According to the rumors, there were thousand-year-old corpse kings there, making it one of the top danger zones in the Rich-Lush Continent. Little did he know that the Heavencorpse Dimension was even more extraordinary.

“I'm not very good when it comes to the geography of the Rich-Lush Continent. What kind of place is this Heavencorpse Dimension?”

Yang Qi had only been in the Demi-Immortal Institute for a short time, and was fairly ignorant when it came to core studies such as medicine, pill concocting, astronomy, geography, history, and the like. Back in Yanhaven, he had spent all his time on energy arts and cultivation, and had never paid much attention to other random things.

Only by attending numerous classes in the institute could one gain an abundance of knowledge.

“The Heavencorpse Dimension is one of the top danger zones in the Rich-Lush Continent. A jeopardous place to say the least. It is surrounded by the Blackcorpse Mountains, Fiendcorpse Mountains, Primalcorpse Mountains, Dragoncorpse Mountains, Direcorpse Mountains, and the Devilcorpse Mountains. Only by passing through such locations can you actually reach the Heavencorpse Dimension, which is filled with such intense corpse auras that time and space are distorted. It’s almost like a different world, a place filled with endless corpses. The energy from there actually seeps out into the graveyard mountains in the Rich-Lush Continent. Such locations are where numerous ancient battles were fought, and are the home of ancient corpses, corpse kings, devil-banes, demon-ghosts and the like. Those mountains are filled with numerous tombs and graves that contain precious treasures such as divine weapons. It's relatively common for students to travel there to look for treasure.”

Li He and the others were obviously very well-versed in this field of knowledge.

“So, that's how it is,” Yang Qi said, nodding. “Yanhaven is near the Blackcorpse Mountains, but I had no idea they’re actually an entrance to the Heavencorpse Dimension.”

“The Fiendcorpse Mountains are to the east of the institute,” Hua Yinhu said. “They also lead to the Heavencorpse Dimension. Low-level students often go there to hunt demon-ghosts and zombies. I also heard that every sixty-year-cycle or so, a devil king will rise up and lead a horde of zombies into human lands to try to make more zombies. For that reason, the institute is always on guard for that possibility. Of course, freshman students aren’t allowed in. But now that we're outer campus students, we can go in to hunt zombies and turn in their zombie cores for merit points.”

“Alright, let’s do it.” Yang Qi was intrigued by this life force springwater, and very much wanted to see it for himself. He also wanted to know what kind of place the Heavencorpse Dimension was.

This was his first time hearing that there were other dimensions connected to the Rich-Lush Continent.

But then again, when his father told him that his mother came from the Hanging Mountain, and he had asked where it was, his father had said it was a different world. Perhaps the Hanging Mountain was another such dimension.

He couldn't even imagine what kind of power was required to create passageways to such places.

'If I can find that life force springwater, then it would probably help my father and brothers reach the Lifeseizing level too.' With that, the five friends discussed their plans in more detail.

After making all the preparations, they left the institute and headed east.

Spring was unfolding, and the lands were warming up. In many places, the snow had already melted, and the rays of the sun were calling the blooming plants up from the soil.

Yang Qi and his friends flew along at top speed until it was dark. Around that time, they saw mountains looming ahead, stretching from east to south, and radiating profoundly baleful energy.

“Art of Radiance and Light!” Hua Yinhu said, waving his finger. In response, a ball of energy shot out that radiated intense light, and drove away the mists that had begun to build around them.

Already, Yang Qi could sense that the massive mountains up ahead were filled with rot, and numerous corpse auras. There was also something toxic there that pricked at the nose.

Of course, toxins like that couldn’t affect him anyway.

“Here we are!” Hua Yinhu said. “The Fiendcorpse Mountains. Let’s go!”

However, even as his words rang out, a whistling sound reached their ears, as though someone were flying at top speed through the air.

WOOOOSH!

A powerful aura settled down onto them.

“Lifeseizer!” Yang Qi said. Now visible was a group of a few dozen students from the Demi-Immortal Institute. Apparently, they were also planning to travel through the Fiendcorpse Mountains to the Heavencorpse Dimension.

They had four Lifeseizers with them, and three of them wore the green robes and white headbands of the Gentlemen’s Society. As for the other, it was none other than Chu Tiange!

Chapter 81: Another Encounter with Chu Tiange

In the face of four Lifeseizers, and numerous other Masters of Energy, Yang Qi and his friends subconsciously backed up.

Unfortunately, Chu Tiange had extremely sharp eyes and immediately noticed Yang Qi.

“So, it’s you,” he said. Yang Qi had made a strong impression on him when he defeated Song Haishan. Later, he had promised Yun Hailan that, if she agreed to owe him a favor, he would kill him for her. Of course, she had other plans and had refused his offer.

Interest piqued, Chu Tiange landed on the ground and looked over at Yang Qi.

Of course, he had no idea that Yang Qi was the same person who had interfered with his duel with Jing Wuxue. If he did know, he would likely vomit blood.

That day had been snow-packed, and Yang Qi had used his Four Seasons Swordplay to cloak himself with a snowstorm, plus he had his Infernal Deity Plate Armor. No one could possibly have pierced that disguise. Besides, he had pulsed with the baleful energy of a devil-god from hell. Because of all that, Chu Tiange didn’t even suspect that his mysterious opponent was a student from the Demi-Immortal Institute.

One of the elite students looked at Yang Qi and his group and said, “What’s going on, Chu Tiange? You know this guy? He’s just an outer campus student. Come on, let’s go. We need to find that ripple in space in the Fiendcorpse Mountains that leads to the Heavencorpse Dimension. The zombie horde will be rising up soon, which is nothing to take lightly.”

Eyeing Yang Qi’s friends, Chu Tiange said, “These four are nothing more than bugs.” Smiling enigmatically, he looked at Yang Qi and continued. “But don’t underestimate this one. Back when he was in the eighth phase, he defeated a Master of Energy. Furthermore, Yun Hailan hates him to death. She’s very influential in the College of Elite Students, and is being mentored by the Crown Prince. It won't be long before she's a Lifeseizer as well. According to the rumors, the Crown Prince gave her three drops of life force springwater.”

“Salutations, Elder Brother Tiange, ladies and gentlemen,” Hua Yinhu said. “We dare not interfere with whatever important tasks you have at hand.”

With that, he and the group turned to leave.

“Hold it right there!” Chu Tiange said, his voice grim.

Heart pounding, Yang Qi stopped in place. He was very familiar with Chu Tiange, and didn't have a good impression of him at all. And now, it seemed like he might be trying to pick a fight.

Before Yang Qi could do anything more than think briefly about the situation, Chu Tiange said, “Yang Qi, you defeated the ninth phase Song Haishan when you were only in the eighth phase. Now, you’re a Master of Energy, so presumably, you’re even more powerful than before. I heard it had something to do with an airmastery plant, is that correct? Instead of leaving everything up to rumor, why don't you just show us if you really have some potential? If you do, well, you never know. These three here are experts from the Gentlemen’s Society. They might be interested in recruiting you.”

“Oh?” the leader of the Gentlemen’s Society students said, his eyes flashing with interest. “So, you used an airmastery plant? And you defeated a ninth phase expert when you were only in the eighth phase? That seems to indicate you have potential. How about this: give us a demonstration of your energy arts, and if we're impressed we’ll give you an official test. If you pass, and you can prove your loyalties, you can join the Gentlemen’s Society.”

‘A test? Prove my loyalties? Join their society?’

It took only a moment for Yang Qi to realize what Chu Tiange was up to.

In the Demi-Immortal Institute, the Gentlemen’s Society was second in place only to the Crown Prince Society. Joining them would definitely bring benefits. However, they would obviously have very stringent requirements to join, and it would definitely involve indoctrination into their society. Yang Qi wasn’t interested in being held back in that way.

Besides, they would also force him to take a very brutal test, and Chu Tiange hoped that he would be killed during the process. Chu Tiange wasn’t from the Gentlemen’s Society, but his words still carried a lot of weight. And obviously, he was indicating to the leaders that they should allow the so-called test to take place in the Fiendcorpse Mountains.

If Yang Qi refused to join, it would be an open insult to the Gentlemen’s Society. And if he did that, who knew if he would make it back to the institute alive.

Chu Tiange was killing two birds with one stone. He had spoken only a few words, and yet forced Yang Qi into a very difficult position.

Furthermore, from the sinister glint in Chu Tiange’s eyes, it was obvious to everyone what his true goal was.

“Come on, Yang Qi,” Chu Tiange said coolly. “Let’s see if you have enough potential to join them. What do you say? Do you know how many students in the institute are dying to get into the Gentlemen’s Society?”

Chuckling coldly in his heart, Yang Qi said, “Sorry, I'm not interested in joining the Gentlemen’s Society. I’m used to my freedom and independence.”

Almost immediately, the atmosphere grew tense.

One of the inner campus students in the other group stepped forward. “You've really got a lot of guts, don't you, punk? We're giving you face and you’re refusing to take it? Do you know how powerful these three Elder Brothers of ours are? They’re Lifeseizers! Elite students! They stoop to honoring you, and you throw it back in their face?”

The three Lifeseizers from the Gentlemen’s Society all looked visibly irritated. One of them, a middle-aged man, stepped forward and said, “Fine. We won’t force you. If you want to refuse a favor from us, so be it. Come on, everyone, let’s go. There’s no need to waste time on a nobody like this.”

The three Lifeseizers flew up into the air, letting out cold snorts that slammed into Yang Qi and his friends, sending them stumbling backwards before losing their feet and thumping down onto their rear ends. Yang Qi’s face turned ashen, and his four friends all coughed up blood.

Of course, Yang Qi’s reaction was an act, but not his friends’. They had been deeply shaken by the sound wave.

“You’re on your own now, punk,” Chu Tiange said. “I gave you a chance and you threw it away. Pretty soon, you’ll know how stupid that was of you.” With that, he flew deeper into the pitch black Fiendcorpse Mountains.

After a long moment passed, Yang Qi crawled to his feet, his eyes flashing with killing intent. Waving his finger, he sent four streams of soothing true energy into his four friends, healing them.

Li He shook his head, his expression the picture of bitterness. “Yang Qi, that Chu Tiange is a real son of a bitch. Thanks to him running his mouth, we’ve offended the Gentlemen’s Society. That’s going to make things difficult going forward.”

“Don’t worry,” Yang Qi replied. “Chu Tiange is going to eat his own words sooner or later.” With that, he sent some vibrations out to clean all of the mud and filth off of his clothing.

This close to the Fiendcorpse Mountains, the ground was rife with toxins and pollution, and smelled like rotting fish. In fact, the sludge almost seemed like decaying flesh, and provoked the urge to vomit. There were even occasional bones sticking out of the mud, the remains of people who died there at some indeterminable time in the past. It was only recently that Yang Qi had learned about the occasional zombie hordes that would sweep out of the mountains and invade the world of the living, hoping to feast on their flesh, produce more zombies, and strengthen the corpse energy in the mountains.

Based on his experiences in the Blackcorpse Mountains, he knew that many mountain peaks were, in fact, the tombs of illustrious individuals from the past, places filled with treasures of all sorts.

Of course, also buried out in these mountains were students from the Demi-Immortal Institute who had ventured into the wrong place and never left.

“Wavelight shield!”

After regaining their composure, the group of five activated their defensive shields, which manifested as semi-transparent, egg-like barriers around them. It was a common art from the institute which used true energy to defend against all sorts of vile entities.

As they proceeded along, the toxic energy, corpse energy and baleful energy all grew stronger.

It was almost a surprise that trees could grow in this place. Of course, they were completely strange and bizarre, with no leaves, and a color that resembled bone. It was almost like they were actually made from bones.

“Bone trees are native to the Fiendcorpse Mountains,” Hua Yinhu explained. “Be careful of them, and definitely don’t get too close. They can shoot out bone spikes that pierce most types of defensive true energy. Many students have died because of them.”

Even as the words left his mouth, one of the nearby trees suddenly shot out dozens of spear-like bone spikes that swirled through the air at top speed.

At the same time, skeletal hands suddenly reached up from within the sludge, grabbing Yang Qi’s ankles and trying to drag him down into the mud.

BAM!

Yang Qi unleashed his energy arts, shattering the bone spikes. Then, he stomped his foot down, destroying the skeletal hands. Floating up into the air, he unleashed a palm strike that smashed into the bone tree and wrenched it out of the ground.

From the resulting hole in the ground belched black smoke; apparently, it was a passage leading to parts unknown.

“Why don’t you all head over to that mountain?” Yang Qi suggested, pointing off into the distance. “From there, you can get a better idea of what's going on. I’m pretty sure there was some mysterious power controlling that bone tree, and that it was coming from underground. Perhaps it’s a corpse king? I'm going to head down and check it out, see if there’s any treasure.”

“Alright, Brother Yang. We understand.”

After a quick discussion to all get on the same page, Yang Qi flew into the dark tunnel. Meanwhile, his friends headed off toward the mountain he had indicated.

Whizz!

The moment Yang Qi entered the tunnel, he could sense a sinister wind that immediately raised his hackles. The tunnel went down and down, bending, twisting, and turning like a maze. It really did seem like the passageway to a tomb.

Eventually, the rotting smell faded away, and the walls turned into stone. Apparently, these were the catacombs of some ancient and forgotten empire, which had since been buried by the sands of time.

Chapter 82: An Enormous Tomb

Crack!

As Yang Qi sped through the catacombs, he accidentally stepped on a bone.

Although his surroundings were pitch black, with his energy arts, he could see as clearly as if it were day.

As he went along, the tunnels grew wider and taller, and before long, he began running into skeletons walking around here and there. It was hard to say what these skeletons had been in life. However, the bones that made them up were as tough as iron, and they still possessed the energy arts they had in life. Because of the baleful energy in the catacombs, these spirits of the dead were now skeleton warriors.

One thing was certain; they were the result of human sacrifices. Complex black carvings covered their bones, apparently the product of an energy art designed to automatically absorb baleful energy.

Only Lifeseizers who followed the dao of devils could possibly create spell formations like that.

That seemed to indicate without question that a Lifeseizer was lurking somewhere in this sprawling catacomb complex. Perhaps it was even one of the rumored thousand-year-old corpse kings.

Yang Qi knew that the Fiendcorpse Mountains were massive, and that the catacombs beneath them were a sprawling maze. Even powerful Lifeseizers who entered them would have their true energy slowly corroded by the baleful energy. Under those circumstances, if they actually met that thousand-year-old corpse king, they would be killed beyond the shadow of a doubt.

But Yang Qi was different. Because he relied on true energy that surpassed the Lifeseizing level, he could venture into the depths of the catacombs with ease. Furthermore, his Hellfire Crucible could actually refine baleful energy and corpse energy and change it into something useful.

As he passed along, all of the baleful energy and corpse energy within several dozen paces of him would begin to bubble and boil, causing a smell like that of sulfur to fill the air. At the same time, the stone walls began to sag as if they might turn into lava at any moment.

With each intersection that Yang Qi passed through, he saw more and more skeletons. Soon, he saw some that had bits of skin or hair still attached to them; a few even had ghostly flames flickering in the black pits that were their eyes. Unexpectedly, those were corpses who were using true energy to become demon-devils.

One skeleton appeared, splattered with blood. As soon as it saw Yang Qi, it clenched its hands into fists, which then burst into intense, toxic flames, the manifestation of some sort of toxic flame energy art.

Even more surprising, this corpse’s cultivation base was in the eighth phase.

However, this toxic flame energy art was useless against Yang Qi, and didn’t affect him at all. A moment later, the blood-drenched skeleton’s head exploded into bits, and a demon core flew out of the thing.

With the stomp of his foot, Yang Qi then crushed the rest of the skeleton into dust.

By this point, he had already passed through over a hundred intersections, and was deep underground. As the army of skeletons grew more numerous, he saw scattered zombies, as well as ancient corpses.

All of a sudden, a powerful aura locked down onto him.

Then, blade light flashed, and a zombie lurched out at him from a connecting corridor. This zombie wore a full suit of armor that was so ancient it was impossible to tell what type it was. However, it was clearly the armor of a general. Furthermore, the zombie wielded a massive, triple-spiked greatsaber, fully as long as a person was tall. The zombie was strapping and well-built, with pulsing true energy, and remnants of some consummate energy art. Howling, it slashed its saber out, backed by the power of the ninth phase.

The Fiendcorpse Mountains were essentially a huge burial complex where some grandmaster of the dao of devils had bestowed intelligence to the ancient corpses.

In life, they had been Masters of Energy. But after dying, they were transformed into corpse-demons with one-track minds. Now, they could advance in their cultivation even faster than before, and because they were zombies, were even tougher than in life.

The ancient corpse shouted in an incomprehensible tongue as it sent its blade flying toward Yang Qi.

In response, Yang Qi waved his hand casually, shattering the greatsaber. Then, he flicked his finger, sending out Silk Rain of the Spring Silkworm. Numerous strands of sword energy pierced into the head of the ancient corpse, ripping a jade pellet out of its mouth.

The pellet, roughly the size of a longan fruit, was covered with veins, making it look very much like an eyeball.

Yang Qi could sense an immense true energy in the jade, something akin to the entire sea of energy inside a Master of Energy. This was definitely a rare piece of spirit jade designed to hoard true energy.

Yang Qi remembered hearing that Yan Gufeng had possessed a thumb-ring that had a similar function, which was considered priceless. Although it didn’t quite measure up to the Heart of the Sea ring that he possessed, it was still something that students in the Demi-Immortal Institute would drool over.

Apparently, the jade eyeball in the mouth of the corpse general was what had prevented it from rotting away into nothing. Without it, the ancient corpse toppled over and exploded, taking out several nearby zombies with it.

“What a treasure. I don't really need something like this, but perhaps father could. Having a device that stores true energy can make you much more powerful in battle. Combine that with his airmastery plant, and he could probably come out alive in a fight with a Lifeseizer.”

Putting the eyeball away, Yang Qi eagerly continued on his way.

Whenever he encountered skeletons, zombies, or even corpse-demons with energy arts, he destroyed them and harvested their demon cores.

He found other ancient corpses with funerary objects, all of which he collected.

Unfortunately, he didn't find any other extremely precious treasures like the eyeball. Everything was ordinary in nature.

Despite fighting constantly, his true energy wasn’t draining away.

At one point, he suddenly heard a shrill cry from further ahead in the catacombs.

In response, the nearby zombies and skeletons retreated in other directions, vacating the area.

‘What’s that? It was so loud.’ Eyes flickering, he continued through intersection after intersection, heading deeper and deeper until he found himself at the entrance of a tomb.

It was very large, fully thirty meters tall, with walls covered in carvings of dragons, phoenixes and the like. The floor was engraved with images of mountains and rivers, and the ceiling was inlaid with pearls designed to look like heavenly bodies.

Right in the middle of the tomb was an enormous coffin, atop which lay a giant.

The coffin itself was crafted from bronze, and featured carvings of vicious beasts from primeval times.

One look at this tomb and coffin made it obvious that the person interred here had been very important.

Yang Qi stepped into the tomb, and instantly, the gigantic corpse flew off of the coffin. He was male, with a golden face, his body festooned with jewelry of gold and jade. He wielded a pitch-black scepter forged from unknown materials, capped with an enormous gem that was as bright red as the quintessence of fire itself, and pulsed with such power that Yang Qi felt like it contained a small sun inside.

‘What kind of jewel is that?’ he thought, shocked. From what he could tell, this jewel was probably of higher quality than the jade eyeball.

It was with profoundly evil eyes that this ancient corpse stared at Yang Qi, his aura rippling out with such power that it seemed capable of causing numerous Masters of Energy to collapse into unconsciousness.

This was a thousand-year-old corpse king in the Lifeseizing level!

And yet, Yang Qi wasn’t fazed in the least.

“A student from the Demi-Immortal Institute?” the corpse said in a grating voice. “A puny Master of Energy from the Outer Campus, here in the Fiendcorpse Mountains? How dare you come here! I am King Huaiyin, and this is my tomb. I guess you must be looking to die, right?!” In life, this ancient corpse had apparently been a king of some sort. “Well, since you're here, I’ll make you into a corpse slave of mine. Go to hell!”

King Huaiyin’s scepter erupted with a violent aura as he waved it through the air, causing a beam of burning red light to shoot out from the gem at its top.

Considering this was a thousand-year-old corpse king, and Lifeseizer, Yang Qi didn’t dare to react slowly. And since he was in the depths of a catacomb, he wasn’t worried about people seeing him. Without hesitation, he drew on the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, summoning his Infernal Deity Spear, Fiend-Devil Wings, and Infernal Deity Plate Armor.

Black armor rippled out over him, a long spear appeared in his hand, and massive wings flapped, causing a gale-force wind to pop up.

When the spear encountered the burning red light, it ate it up.

And then, innumerable spear projections appeared, bearing down on King Huaiyin. Yang Qi was attacking like a thunderstorm, hoping to destroy this Lifeseizer as quickly as possible.

No Lifeseizer would have been able to escape, especially considering that as a Master of Energy, Yang Qi now understood more about the spirit energy of heaven and earth than most Lifeseizers did.

Right now, he hoped to use this corpse king to prove to himself how strong he was, to temper himself, and to gain more enlightenment of heaven and earth, all in the hopes of achieving his next breakthrough as quickly as possible.

Besides, if he could get the demon core of a Lifeseizer to study, that would be of immense help.

The ferocious Infernal Deity Spear stabbed through the air, piercing the defensive true energy of the thousand-year-old corpse king, and stabbing into his raiment of gold and jade.

However, that was when intense light shone out from the gold and jade garment, and a sound like a booming bell could be heard. The spear was blocked! Unexpectedly, the garment itself was a precious treasure that the Infernal Deity Spear couldn’t stab through.

Of course, it was mostly because of Yang Qi’s low level, not the strength of the corpse king.

Chapter 83: Thousand-Year-Old Corpse King

In the sprawling catacombs beneath the Fiendcorpse Mountains, Yang Qi found a thousand-year-old corpse king, King Huaiyin, and attacked him immediately.

If the leadership back in the Demi-Immortal Institute learned of the matter, they would have been shocked. After all, the Fiendcorpse Mountains’ catacombs were nothing short of a labyrinth. Even Lifeseizers who ended up trapped by an army of zombies there might end up running out of true energy and dying. And even if they managed to wipe out all the skeletons and zombies, only to be faced with a thousand-year-old corpse king, then the result would be the same.

And yet, the freakish Yang Qi had mowed down everything in his path down to this point, and was still brimming with true energy.

Bam!

The two opponents slammed into each other and then backed away.

Eyes flickering with vile light, King Huaiyin glared at Yang Qi and said, “What kung fu is that? You’re no ordinary Master of Energy. You’re actually as strong as a Lifeseizer! Who are you? Don’t tell me a true consummate genius has risen up in the Demi-Immortal Institute.”

Yang Qi snorted coldly and eyed the garment of gold and jade worn by King Huaiyin. It was so tough it could actually block his Infernal Deity Spear, which meant that it was no ordinary treasure. It was obviously incredibly valuable.

Not waiting for any response, King Huaiyin continued, “Well, you might be a genius, but you're going to perish here anyway. By now, you’re an arrow that's reached the end of its flight. Well, am I right? You wasted a lot of true energy dealing with the army of skeletons and zombies on the way here, so how are you feeling now?” A horrifying smile spread out across his face, revealing two razor-sharp fangs. “I'm going to enjoy draining your life force. After I suck you dry, I’ll turn you into a zombie general under my command. Don’t worry, you’ll soon find that being a zombie isn't as bad as you might think.”

“Is that so?” Yang Qi’s grip tightened on his Infernal Deity Spear, which vibrated, causing densely packed magical symbols to appear on its surface. Then, an aura appeared like that belonging to devil-gods from the deepest depths of hell. Clearly, Yang Qi was ready to fight to his heart’s content.

Not once since he acquired his new energy art did he ever have a chance to do that. But now, with no one around to observe him, and with a thousand-year-old corpse king standing right in front of him, that was exactly what he was going to do.

“Time for you to die!” he shouted audaciously. Suddenly, his Infernal Deity Spear became ten times as solid as before, revealing countless dark golden designs that pulsed as though liquid flowed within them.

Shockingly, that liquid was actually blood; Yang Qi’s blood!

By combining his blood with the true energy in the weapon, it was no longer a manifestation of the Energy Weapon level. Instead, it was a real weapon, the type that would belong to a devil-god who ruled over the netherworld, and be used to execute disgraced gods.

As his spear pierced through the air, pulsing with the mysterious and boundless power of ghost-gods, it almost seemed as if it existed, not in this world, but in some other world or dimension.

The wails of ancient ghost-gods filled the air as, in the blink of an eye, the spear stabbed toward King Huaiyin’s throat.

King Huaiyin had a layer of defensive corpse energy, but in the face of this spear, it crumbled as surely as tofu or paper.

“Return of the Ghost-God!” King Huaiyin blurted. His scepter then appeared as if by magic right in front of his throat, the enormous gemstone atop it flaring with light as bright as the sun's.

Bam!

When the two divine weapons slammed into each other, Yang Qi didn’t even react. In contrast, King Huaiyin staggered backward, completely unable to rebuff the power of twenty ancient megamammoths.

As of this moment, he didn’t hesitate to call upon the grand spell formation that filled the entire tomb.

“Let the earth bring forth mountains and rivers. Let the vault above provide the heavenly bodies. Mountain-River-Heavenly-Body Grand Formation, activate!”

Dots of light blazed into being above, starlight that came from the pearls that were laid out like heavenly bodies. Below, the images of the mountains and rivers came to life, causing dirt and water to rise up. All of it turned into a deadly power which shot toward Yang Qi.

King Huaiyin had set up this spell formation countless years in the past, and now that it was activated, all of its power was bearing down on Yang Qi, force that even Lifeseizers from the Demi-Immortal Institute wouldn’t dare to tangle with. In fact, even people who were stronger than King Huaiyin, but who got caught by this formation, would surely be killed.

And yet, that only caused Yang Qi's battle spirit to burn brighter.

His blood surged with the spirit of godmammoths, the overlords of the ancient devil-gods. As of this moment, he was actually filled with a strange excitement.

According to the myths and fairy tales, godmammoths never ceased their war with the devil-gods of the hell planes. In primeval times, they slaughtered countless devil emperors, devil kings and devil dictators. They pulsed with power that even the legion of gods in heaven trembled at.

WHIZZZ!

Explosive true energy rushed out that resembled lava from hell, transforming everything around Yang Qi into burning liquid. And within the bubbling lava, the Hellfire Crucible appeared. Although it was only in its embryonic form, it could still melt the aura of fallen gods, and shake the hearts of billions and billions of devil-gods.

As of this moment, Yang Qi was like the true sovereign lord of hell.

The grand spell formation immediately began to fall apart, causing the ground to crack and the pearls overhead to begin to explode.

Yang Qi was like a godmammoth with a trunk so powerful it could pluck stars and snatch moons, even absorb suns.

As the godmammoth took shape, it crushed everything around it in the tomb.

Bam. Bam. Bam. Bam! Bam!!

The walls exploded, and all remnants of the spell formation were obliterated, and the pearls were transformed into dust.

“What devil art is that? That’s not a royal-class devil art. Don’t tell me it’s a fabled imperial-class art? Or even a saintly-class art? How could you possibly be this strong? You’re specifically targeting my type of true energy!”

In the face of a godmammoth, this thousand-year-old corpse king could do nothing but gasp for breath. His grand spell formation was destroyed before he even had a chance to do anything.

This godmammoth was like the bane of his existence, and in fact, the bane of existence for all demons, devils, ghosts, and monsters.

Just about anything possible could be found in hell, and godmammoths could dominate anything and everything, so it was only natural that they could be considered the bane of existence to devil-gods. And the source of this thousand-year-old corpse king’s devil arts and true energy was none other than the legion of devils in hell. Therefore, he didn’t count for much more than an ant.

However, even as the spell formation fell apart, Yang Qi frowned as he saw a demon core suddenly flying up from the rubble, surrounded by flaming true energy. Before he could do anything, it turned into a beam of corpse light that shot directly toward him in an attack.

“Heavencorpse Assault. Destroy the Cosmos!” growled King Huaiyin as intense corpse energy sped rapidly toward Yang Qi’s chest.

Yang Qi’s Infernal Deity Plate Armor was already fully powered up by his blood, making it the sturdiest defense possible.

Therefore, when the corpse energy hit him, it was the same as hitting an immovable mountain.

WHAM!

Yang Qi’s spear couldn’t pierce the gold and jade garment, but the backlash force from the failed corpse energy attack did.

“Aaaiiiieee!” King Huaiyin let out an agonized shriek as he stumbled backward and then fell into the bronze coffin.

Of course, there was no way Yang Qi was going to let matters end there. True energy exploded out as he unleashed a palm strike, completely destroying the coffin, revealing King Huaiyin, battered and damaged, black corpse blood oozing out of him everywhere. He seemed barely capable of keeping his body in one piece.

“You….” he murmured, shivering, completely shocked that a Master of Energy could do something like this.

“I bet you never would have thought I would end up putting you to death. Although, I do have to thank you for the service you’ve provided. I finally got to fight to my heart’s content, and at the same time, confirmed how strong I really am. I'd say it won’t be very long now before I reach the Lifeseizing level. Well, time to say goodbye.”

Leaping up into the air, he struck downward, smashing King Huaiyin’s head into bits, and destroying the rest of his body. At that point, a bone demon core shot out, roughly the size of a fist. Unexpectedly, the core had seven apertures on it, almost as if it were on the verge of gaining intelligence. Yang Qi could sense massive quantities of true energy stored inside it.

This was the demon core of a thousand-year-old corpse king, and was valuable beyond imagination.

However, even better was the gold and jade garment, and the scepter, which were definitely treasures in their own right.

After searching the rubble of the tomb, he found a few other things of value which he put into his thumb-ring of holding. He even took the remains of King Huaiyin.

With that, he donned the garment, and gripped the scepter, blurring into motion as he left the tomb.

Back outside, Li He and the others were on top of a mountain, fighting against the skeletons and rotting zombies that climbed up out of the mud. They had already killed several hundred.

“Brother Yang Qi won’t be in any real danger down there, right?”

“Don’t worry. We all know what he’s capable of.”

Suddenly, the ground off in the distance exploded, sending sludge flying everywhere as Yang Qi flew up into the open. With the wave of his hand, he sent a flood of flames flying out over the sludge. Instantly, all of the zombies and skeletons near him were transformed into ash.

Chapter 84: Chu Tiange Appears Again

“You’re really back already, Brother Yang Qi?”

Li He and the others excitedly unleashed their energy arts onto the remaining skeletons and zombies, and then harvested the demon cores from them.

Although the quality of the cores was very low, at least something was better than nothing.

“Yeah, I'm back.” Beckoning, he continued, “Guys, look at this stuff.”

They hurried over, whereupon Yang Qi showed them the gold and jade garment, the scepter, and the remains of King Huaiyin. After examining them closely, Liang Dong couldn’t help but exclaim, “That’s a thousand-year-old corpse king! And that gold and jade garment is a suit of preheaven armor.”

“And that scepter has a sun gem in it!” Hua Yinhu said loudly.

“I can’t believe it’s a sun gem!” Li He exclaimed.

“A suit of preheaven armor? A sun gem?” Since Yang Qi wasn’t familiar with them, he needed an explanation.

“Brother Yang Qi,” Liang Dong said, “as you know, there are all sorts of fields of study taught at our institute. For example, magical items, pill concocting, spirit medicine, equipment forging, crafting, astronomy, geography and more. We recommend you take the time to attend some classes as soon as you can. Being able to identify items like this will be of great help to your cultivation. This preheaven armor is made from something called preheaven goldjade, which is essentially impenetrable, and yet as soft as cotton. It also prevents dead bodies from decomposing. Any corpse buried in this will naturally absorb the spirit energy of heaven and earth, and eventually transform into a vicious zombie. However, unlike other zombies, it will retain its memories of its past life. As for that sun gem, it’s even more miraculous. It contains the quintessence of scorching heat. It actually started out as a fireball descended from the sun itself, which eventually turned into a gemstone. The power it contains can be used for all sorts of things. And anyone who cultivates fire-type energy arts, and got a sun gem, would be able to advance by leaps and bounds.”

“Brother Yang Qi, don’t tell me you found a thousand-year-old corpse king in that tomb, and then defeated him? How did you possibly beat a Lifeseizer?”

“Nah, I just got lucky. I happened to come across a thousand-year-old corpse king practicing cultivation. By chance, he experienced cultivation deviation, and very nearly exploded. I attacked him right then and managed to kill him.” Yang Qi made up a bit of a story. If word got out that he had casually killed countless zombies and skeletons, and then slaughtered a thousand-year-old corpse king, it would become increasingly difficult for him to hide the truth about himself.

It made more sense to slowly make a name for himself in the school, rather than do something to shock all creation. Although he was on the same team as these other four, that didn’t mean that it was wise to reveal secrets about his cultivation technique.

“You really did get lucky. You just happened to run into a thousand-year-old corpse king who then experienced cultivation deviation….” The entire group was taken aback, and yet, they believed him. It seemed obvious that it was impossible for him to have single-handedly charged into the depths of the tombs and killed a thousand-year-old corpse king.

“You know,” Li He said, “I’d say it’s highly likely this thousand-year-old corpse king was actually King Huaiyin. He was a ruler of old who was buried in a geomantic tomb. Later, he became a zombie, and wreaked havoc on the world for hundreds of years. Eventually, he came to rest deep in the Fiendcorpse Mountains. Throughout the years, plenty of students from the Demi-Immortal Institute have tried to fight their way to him, and even some of the Lifeseizer elite students. But he always eluded them. If word got out about this, it wouldn’t be good. If people found out we have a sun gem and a suit of preheaven armor, even elite students would get greedy, and would demand we hand them over. And if we didn't, it could cause some deadly grudges.”

“That's right,” Hua Yinhu said. “This preheaven armor and this sun gem should be considered precious treasures of the Sage Monarch Society. Especially that sun gem. If Chu Tiange found out about it, it would probably mean doom for all of us. He cultivates the Cosmic Sunflare Sword, which gathers the quintessence of the sun and the will of the cosmos to create a divine sword that can slaughter anything within five hundred kilometers. If he got this sun gem, he could instantly add a hundred or even two hundred years of cultivation to his technique. He would instantly go through multiple lifeseizings, and would probably become a conclave student. I bet he would even take the risk to violate the rules of the institute and kill us just to get it.”

It was at this point that a voice suddenly drifted into their ears. “You’re right. In fact, you couldn’t be more right. If I didn't kill you to take something amazing like that, then I wouldn’t be Chu Tiange.”

Yang Qi, Li He, Liang Dong and Hua Yinhu all looked visibly shocked as they turned to find Chu Tiange floating in the air nearby, his energy already weighing down on the mountain.

Yang Qi’s four friends suddenly went pale in the face, and their knees began to tremble as they stared at Chu Tiange. Already, they had sinking feelings about what was to come.

As the saying goes, an innocent man with treasure in hand is courting disaster. Now that Chu Tiange knew they had a sun gem and a suit of preheaven armor, there was no way he would simply let them go.

Only Yang Qi was as calm as could be, as if he was privy to some secret that no one else could guess at. Rising to his feet, he looked over coldly at Chu Tiange.

Chu Tiange looked back at him as if he were already dead. Then his eyes dropped to the sun gem, and they burned with passion. “A sun gem, something I have yearned for even in my dreams. And today, I’ll finally get one. With that gemstone, I can push my Cosmic Sunflare Sword to the ultimate peak. I will be like an emperor of the sun, a tyrant of the cosmos. But there’s one point in which you are incorrect. It won’t just let me bypass one or two hundred years of cultivation and become a conclave student. No, it will likely allow me to become a holy neophyte.”

“Ch-Chu Tiange,” Li He stammered, “er, Elder Brother Tiange, what are you planning to do?”

“What am I planning to do? You really don’t know?” As he talked, Chu Tiange began to stroll in their direction. “Thankfully, I'm quite the clever individual. I knew there was something fishy about you, so I secretly had some Humanoid True Energy follow you. Who would have guessed that the brat Yang Qi would sneak underground and find King Huaiyin in the middle of cultivation deviation, then end up with a sun gem and a suit of preheaven armor? That’s some bullshit luck if you ask me. Well, it seems that today is the day that Chu Tiange will finally rise to prominence.”

“Please, let us go, Elder Brother Tiange,” Liang Dong said. “Take the sun gem and the suit of preheaven armor as a gift. We won’t tell anyone what happened.”

Chu Tiange chuckled coldly. “Let you go? How naive of you. The only people who won’t spread rumors are dead people. All the others are liars. It doesn’t matter whether or not you would tell people about the armor or the gem. You’re dead. We're in the depths of the murky Fiendcorpse Mountains, a treacherous place of danger. It's the perfect place to get rid of a few witnesses.”

“Aren’t you afraid the institute will punish you?” Hua Yinhu said, clearly grasping at straws. “You might be an elite student, but that doesn’t mean you can just defile the Inner Campus. Murdering outer campus students is a major crime. The institute won’t let you off the hook.”

“What do you mean? I didn’t kill you. It was King Huaiyin.” Tapping his fingertips rhythmically, he said, “Of course, I fought a fierce battle trying to rescue you. Sadly, I wasn’t able to pull it off. It was only after you were killed that I managed to defeat King Huaiyin, and avenge your deaths.”

Chu Tiange had thought everything through, and Yang Qi’s four friends could already feel his killing intent.

There was no hope for them. They were all Masters of Energy, but he was a Lifeseizer, and he could crush them as easily as crushing an egg on a boulder.

A hundred Masters of Energy working together might be able to take on an ordinary Lifeseizer. But Chu Tiange was no ordinary Lifeseizer. He was an elite student from the Demi-Immortal Institute, a person capable of completely dominating other ordinary Lifeseizers.

Truth be told, outside of the Demi-Immortal Institute, and in the Rich-Lush Continent as a whole, he was considered second to none. When compared to people in the same cultivation level, students from the Demi-Immortal Institute were always considered the best of the best.

With his Cosmic Sunflare Sword, he could be considered a fiendish killer among the elite students.

“Time to go for broke!”

“Yang Qi, we have to put everything on the line. Let’s get out of here. Your cultivation base is the highest. We’ll buy time for you while you flee.”

“Brother Yang Qi, you have to get out of here. Report this matter to the institute. Tell them we were murdered by Chu Tiange! Tell our clans! They’ll avenge us.”

“We’re not going to let this drop, Chu Tiange!”

“Take care, brother! Get out of here!”

Shouting at the tops of their lungs, Li He, Hua Yinhu, He Jili and Liang Dong unleashed their true energy and charged toward Chu Tiange. Their goal: buy time for Yang Qi to escape.

Sword light glimmered behind Chu Tiange's back as he prepared to attack Yang Qi’s four friends.

“Gimps,” he said, chuckling. “Haven’t you heard the expression a mantis trying to stop a war chariot?”

However, that was when Yang Qi took a step forward.

Suddenly, powerful streams of true energy wrapped around his friends, pulling them back to his side.

Their eyes went wide as they looked around, trying to figure out what happened.

As for Chu Tiange, his pupils constricted as he looked over at Yang Qi.

“You four are really willing to sacrifice yourselves so that I can escape?” Yang Qi said. “You four… are truly brothers. Live together. Die together. From now on, you are like blood brothers to me, the same as my eldest brother and second brother. That’s how I’ll treat you. And therefore, I'm not going to hide things from you any longer. Brothers, watch as I cut down this Chu Tiange. Anyone who insults a brother of mine will die! And that means you, Chu Tiange!”

At that point, the true energy which had neutralized their attacks and pulled them back swirled around them into a defensive shield.

The four of them were gradually regaining their senses, and now looked over at Yang Qi.

“To tell the truth, I’ve been lying to you, although the reason is that if word leaked, it could have devastating consequences. I didn’t kill King Huaiyin when he was experiencing cultivation deviation. I just killed him. Plain and simple.” Shifting his attention back to Chu Tiange, he said, “I bet you never guessed at the truth, did you, Chu Tiange? Well now you know, although, it doesn’t matter. Because you won’t live past this day!”

Chapter 85: Fierce Combat

All of a sudden, Yang Qi was no longer a puny outer campus student. He was now a powerful expert whose energy could shake the heavens and topple the earth. As of this moment, it was hard to tell whether he was human, or a ghost-god.

As for his friends, they felt like they were dreaming.

And although Chu Tiange’s eyes were wide open, he still couldn’t believe what he was seeing.

Yang Qi might have defeated Song Haishan, but he was still a nobody, little stronger than an ant, a person who could be defeated without even thinking about it.

That was why Chu Tiange had so casually offered to get rid of him for Yun Hailan, in exchange for a favor.

But considering what Yang Qi’s aura was like now, and the fact that he had so easily neutralized the power of his four friends’ cultivation base, it was obvious that he was no pushover.

Yang Qi had revealed his true strength, and clearly had no intention of letting Chu Tiange get away alive. It was a kill or be killed situation, and there were no other options.

“You can only blame yourself for seeking death, Chu Tiange. You wanted to kill me, so I have no other options than to take your life first. Enough chit-chat. Let’s go!”

Whizz!

A blue ring appeared on Yang Qi’s thumb, which flashed with glittering light. Instantly, a rippling blue gate appeared, out of which swirled a cloud-like stream of true energy that wrapped up Yang Qi’s four friends, the gold and jade garment, and the sun gem, and pulled them all inside.

Mainly, he was concerned that the shock waves caused by the fighting might hurt his friends.

And he was dead set on making sure Chu Tiange didn’t leave the Fiendcorpse Mountains alive.

If he lived, there would be no end to the trouble he would cause.

And once he died, Yun Hailan would lose a powerful backer, which would make her much easier to deal with in the future.

Killing the thousand-year-old corpse King Huaiyin had only been his warm up routine. He was done playing games. Chu Tiange had delivered himself up just in time for Yang Qi to truly fight to his heart’s content.

As soon as Yang Qi used his thumb-ring, Chu Tiange realized exactly what it was. Startled, he said, “That’s a Heart of the Sea thumb-ring of holding! A consummate treasure which can store vast quantities of items inside of it….”

Then he suddenly let loose a long string of laughter that caused the mists of the Fiendcorpse Mountains to ripple and churn. “I underestimated you, Yang Qi. It turns out you’ve been keeping a lot of secrets. No wonder Yun Hailan takes you so seriously. And here I thought she was just concerned with giving face to Yang Susu. I would never have guessed that you're so shrewd. Sadly, you have too many valuable things to just let you go free. Before, I’d planned to just cripple you, but now, I guess I really will have to kill you.”

“You think you have what it takes to kill me? What a joke!” As Yang Qi’s power levels continued to climb, black energy swirled around him, and in the blink of an eye, he was covered with a suit of dark golden armor.

“What’s this?” Chu Tiange had been just about to attack, hoping to strike Yang Qi down before he could finish getting ready to fight. But the sight of this dark golden armor was so shocking that he stopped in his tracks. “Is that….”

“Yes, it is,” Yang Qi replied. “You’ve seen this armor before, because I'm the same person who fought you back in the ancient city of Krorän. And I also took the Sage Devil Painting, as well as plenty of treasure that the vampire brigands had hoarded up. By the way, I already gave that Sage Devil Painting to my aunt Yang Susu, which she’ll use to cultivate an out-of-body incarnation, a second nascent divinity. That will get her to Secondary Lifeseizing or possibly even Tertiary Lifeseizing. Either way, she’ll be well on her way to becoming a conclave student. What, did you really think I would let you take advantage of me that easily? You’ll never become a conclave student, Chu Tiange. You won’t live that long. Don’t tell me you’re so stupid that you think that you’re a match for me?”

Yang Qi had just openly described Chu Tiange’s worst defeat ever up to this point in his life.

Not only had his attempts to fight back been completely useless, he had also hurt himself in the process.

Afterward, he had spent months wondering who that armored man had been, in the hopes of tracking him down and taking back the face which had been lost. Unfortunately, he had never been able to turn up even a single clue.

And now, he found that the person he had been looking for was the same one he had always taken to be trash. It was easy to imagine how displeased, irritated, and impotent he felt.

“DIE!” he shouted. Sun-like radiance erupted from his hand, streams of sword energy that rapidly became his Cosmic Sunflare Sword. One sweep of that sword turned everything for ten thousand paces in all directions into a world of swords. No, a cosmos of swords!

“So, punk, you’re that monster with the dark golden armor, and you’ve been hiding in the Demi-Immortal Institute this entire time. What exactly is your plan? You’re obviously a devil, which means that Yang Susu must also be a monstress. Fine. I guess I need to take you into custody and bring you back to the institute for questioning. You and Yang Susu will both be imprisoned, and will suffer a grisly end. You just wait!” Chu Tiange exhaled sharply, sending streams of sound waves out to combine with the sword energy of the formation he had created.

“Cosmic Blast; Aeonic Invincibility!”

SWISH!

Millions of streams of sword energy swept toward Yang Qi with seemingly invincible strength.

At this point, the Infernal Deity Spear appeared in Yang Qi’s hand, with vein-like streams of dark golden blood that looked like they came straight from the underworld. The spear began to thrum, emanating a sound like a symphony from hell, describing the death of sovereign gods.

Yang Qi leapt into motion like an eagle taking to flight, easily dodging the sword energy.

All of a sudden, Chu Tiange had the distinct sensation that his life wasn’t under his own control.

Instead, it felt like Yang Qi was preparing to end it, a sensation that any Lifeseizer would find completely inauspicious and even terrifying.

“Repulsive!” Chu Tiange shouted. Slashing out with his Cosmic Sunflare Sword, he said, “Sword Shakes all Creation; Engulf the True Origin.”

Intense, sun-like true energy filled the entire mountain, driving away the mist, and even shoving away the sludge on the ground, revealing stones and graves of all sorts.

His sword energy spread out to create a fan of swords, which sent a gust of razor-sharp sword wind toward Yang Qi.

“Hell-Crushing Godmammoth!” Yang Qi barked. His spear vibrated, causing millions of spear projections to spring up in all directions, which linked together to make the outline of a door that emanated the aura of hell. It was almost like the gates of hell!

The radiating light from the fan of swords was then sucked into the gates of hell and neutralized, crushed into nothing more than dust.

All of the sword energy of the attack, was sucked through his spear into his sea of energy, and the Hellfire Crucible therein.

The more Yang Qi fought, the stronger he got, and the more impressive his Infernal Deity Spear became. It was now surrounded by a massive vortex of dark golden energy, like the power of hell itself, which was capable of absorbing the enemy’s true energy and turning it into Yang Qi’s.

The fact that his Hellfire Crucible could do such a thing, to use the enemy’s energy against them, made him virtually impossible to defeat.

Although the crucible wasn't actually complete, it was more than enough to deal with Chu Tiange.

He had actually been in the position to defeat Chu Tiange back in Krorän. Now, months had passed, and although he hadn’t yet reached the Lifeseizing level, his understanding of his current level far surpassed that of before. When it came to energy, life force, meridians, and cultivation, he was more knowledgeable than ever.

And the dark golden god blood that coursed through his veins made his Infernal Deity Spear, Infernal Deity Plate Armor, and Fiend-Devil Wings anything but simple manifestations of energy. They were almost completely corporeal, and corporeal objects were on a completely different level than illusory objects.

Whoosh!

His spear tore through all of the defensive sword energy, ignoring the burning power of the sun to stab directly toward Chu Tiange’s forehead.

Shaken, Chu Tiange shouted, “How dare you, brat!”

Spinning his Cosmic Sunflare Sword until it became a blur, he said, “Mighty Heaven Sword Wheel, Illuminate all Creation!”

His Cosmic Sunflare Sword flew up into the air, creating a burning red sun that cast red light down onto everything below; a burning stream of sword energy fully eighteen meters wide descending to smash viciously into the Infernal Deity Spear.

Snap!

Yang Qi and Chu Tiange shot away from each other. Chu Tiange couldn’t maintain his position in the air, and landed on the ground, where he staggered backward.

In contrast, Yang Qi remained airborne, his dark golden Infernal Deity Plate Armor suddenly covered with pulsing flows of god blood that added power to both it and the spear.

As of this moment, his Infernal Deity Spear, Infernal Deity Plate Armor and Fiend-Devil Wings all looked completely corporeal. The wingspan of his Fiend-Devil Wings was nearly three hundred meters now, and the wings themselves were also dark golden. The wild wind caused by their flapping uprooted numerous bone trees, and sent nearby skeletons and zombies flying away as surely as if they were leaves.

At the sight of those wings, Chu Tiange instantly knew that if he didn’t flee, he would be killed.

Yang Qi was so fast and brutal that even a Secondary Lifeseizer would be terrified in his presence.

A thousand thoughts ran through Chu Tiange’s mind, and yet, he still couldn’t think of a way to kill or capture Yang Qi.

“Just who are you?” he growled.

Chapter 86: Killing Chu Tiange (1)

In this fight between Yang Qi and Chu Tiange, only one person would come out alive at the end. The other would be dead.

Both of them knew that holding back wasn’t an option.

Chu Tiange wanted Yang Qi’s sun gem, his gold and jade garment, and his Heart of the Sea thumb-ring of holding. And Yang Qi needed Chu Tiange dead, lest he unleash a host of other complications.

One was an elite student and powerful expert in the Lifeseizing level.

The other cultivated the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, and was backed by the power of twenty ancient megamammoths. This was like a battle between two spectacular giants.

The fact that Yang Qi continued to batter him with this Infernal Deity Spear caused Chu Tiange’s killing intent to rise to ferocious heights.

“Cosmic Rotation; Rattle Heaven and Earth!”

His Cosmic Sunflare Sword began to vibrate, causing a humming sound to fill the air, along with resplendent sword light. It seemed as if the sword itself were transforming into a burning flame spirit.

Countless burning flames of sword energy swirled together, hot enough to melt metal, to the point where the stones and boulders in the Fiendcorpse Mountains began to liquefy. Even the numerous subterranean tunnels began to fill with lava. This technique was different from Yang Qi’s Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, and yet, was clearly its rival in this situation.

Yang Qi’s technique was a godly-class energy art, whereas the Cosmic Sunflare Sword technique was merely a royal-class art. However, the cultivation level disparity between the two was nothing to disregard.

After all, Chu Tiange’s cultivation was a hundred times more powerful than Yang Qi’s.

He had pushed his technique to the point of near perfection, allowing him to guide the quintessence of the great sun above, and use burning, righteous sword energy to wipe out wretch-devils of all sorts.

This was a true battle to the death.

A vicious expression filled Chu Tiange’s face as he unleashed a move that could shake the lands and rock the mountains. His energy sword slashed through the air like a fire dragon, slamming into the Infernal Deity Spear with astonishing power.

“Little punk! Get ready to die!” he shouted. “I never could have imagined that you would be this strong. Just what energy art is that? It's definitely not royal-class. In fact, I bet it’s beyond imperial-class. Its saintly-class, isn’t it? Yun Hailan thought she could lure that mysterious armored figure out into the open and kill him. Who would have thought that he was actually you, someone she views as being trash. Well, you pulled a fast one on me. But once I get that energy art of yours, I’ll be able to surpass the Crown Prince! Ha! He used his Son of Heaven’s Godfist, an imperial-class energy art, to reach the Legendary level. If I could get a saintly-class energy art, then I could go beyond the Legendary level! I could reach the Great Sage level!”

“Great Sage level? Might as well keep dreaming!” Yang Qi had long since learned that after the Lifeseizing level was the Legendary level. But now, thanks to Chu Tiange, he realized that beyond that was the Great Sage level. Of course, he had no idea what heaven-shaking, earth-shattering powers came at that level.

As he faced Chu Tiange’s attack, his blood boiled, pumping like liquid gold to power his Fiend-Devil Wings, Infernal Deity Plate Armor and Infernal Deity Spear.

During the course of the fighting, he had continuously absorbed elements of the Cosmic Sunflare Sword into his sea of energy, where he used it to solidify his embryonic Hellfire Crucible.

In fact, if he closed his eyes and focused on his dantian region, he could see the crucible formed of dark golden blood, covered with ancient designs, and the script of ancient gods.

Each magical symbol was like a sharp blade that echoed with the screams of fallen, disgraced gods.

Every time the Infernal Deity Spear clashed with the Cosmic Sunflare Sword, it would absorb some of it. And before long, something like the blood of a sun god existed in the embryonic Hellfire Crucible.

The point of the Cosmic Sunflare Sword was to gather the burning quintessence of the sun and mold it into a nascent divinity. At its highest level, the practitioner would become one with the sun, and would become a virtual incarnation of the Sun God, allowing him to walk about within the mortal world.

It was a consummate discipline invented by a miraculous individual in ancient times.

But now, Yang Qi’s aura of hell was drawing that Sun God into his Hellfire Crucible, and using his power to improve it.

As the crucible took form, his Infernal Deity Spear grew more corporeal!

Bam!

The spear once again slammed into the Cosmic Sunflare Sword, and his sea of energy churned like lava, or a volcano on the verge of erupting.

By now, Chu Tiange realized that no matter what sword technique he used, his attacks could not pierce Yang Qi’s Infernal Deity Plate Armor, and worse, Yang Qi’s true energy was growing fiercer and fiercer. Shaken, he glared at Yang Qi with even more killing intent than before.

After all, as Yang Qi got stronger and stronger, it only revealed how powerful his energy art was. And Chu Tiange couldn’t stop thinking about what it would be like to acquire it. And that thought filled him with excitement.

“Time to call it a day,” Chu Tiange murmured. “Dragonization!” His energy surged like the ocean, causing true energy flames to erupt behind his head, making it look like a shining sun hanging behind him.

“Behold a flame god from the distant reaches. Fire Dragon of the Great Sun; Nascent Divinity Quintessence. True spirit of mine, emerge! Slay this wretch-devil for me!”

The halo of burning light behind him looked almost like a divine dragon made of shining true energy. It reared its enormous head, its red eyes blazing, a sun sigil on its forehead, its draconic whiskers swirling about it, its horns as sharp as iron, its scales burning as if with fire.

“Yang Qi, you brat, I didn't want to use this move, but sadly, you’ve given me no choice. You should feel proud that you've made me try out this secret magic that I have worked so hard to cultivate. I forged this fire dragon with the quintessence of my soul, and you will be destroyed by its might!”

Chu Tiange’s voice was as cold as a cruel god’s, with no compassion whatsoever for mortal men.

As for the fire dragon, it swirled out from the halo behind him, becoming a streak of flame that shot toward Yang Qi.

Yang Qi felt massive pressure weighing down on him, almost as if a real divine dragon from the sun were approaching him. Even the power of twenty megamammoths could do nothing but retreat in the face of such power.

This was Chu Tiange’s ultimate trump card, his most deadly secret magic. Obviously, he would only use something like this if he had no other choice. He hadn’t even resorted to using it back in their fight in Krorän.

“DIE!” Yang Qi howled, his Fiend-Devil Wings flitting to propel him toward the fire dragon.

And yet, how could he have anticipated that, in that very moment, the fire dragon's power would spread out, locking down the air in the entire area, holding him in place as surely as if with iron fetters. Then, it began to crush down on him as if to destroy him.

Not even his Fiend-Devil Wings were capable of moving him!

This shocking level of power was nothing to look down upon.

“Infernal Deity Spear!”

Yang Qi poured all of the strength he could muster into the Infernal Deity Spear, causing it to glow brightly with an aura of death, piercing through the fetter-like energy bonds holding him in place, and heading directly toward the Fire Dragon of the Great Sun.

The dragon, dozens of meters long, and lithe as a snake, reached out with its dragon claws and grabbed onto the Infernal Deity Spear as if to crush it out of existence.

“Nascent Divinity Quintessence; Fire Dragon Armageddon! Let the burning sun fall to immolate gods and massacre immortals!”

WHIZZZ!

Chu Tiange was pouring all of his energy into the fire dragon, holding nothing back in his effort to kill Yang Qi and then extract his energy arts from him.

Snap! Crack!

Under the destructive power of the fire dragon, the Infernal Deity Spear first trembled, then shattered, sending dark golden fragments flying out in all directions.

Then, the fire dragon of true energy pierced Yang Qi’s Infernal Deity Plate Armor and stabbed into his body.

BOOOOOOOM! The dragon burned into his meridians, coursing toward his sea of energy with heat as intense as the sun. It seemed that, within moments, he would turn into an entity of pure flame.

“Time to die!” Chu Tiange said. “Even if you were stronger than you are, you would still burn to death! The nascent divinity fire dragon expression of my Cosmic Sunflare Sword technique is strong enough to melt rocks! It will extract your memories from your soul, and tell me all the details of that secret magic of yours.” With that, he erupted into maniacal laughter and took a step forward toward Yang Qi.

However, before he could do anything more than that, the flames that had engulfed Yang Qi winked out.

WHIZZZ!

A thrumming boom could be heard as an enormous crucible appeared behind Yang Qi, seemingly corporeal in every aspect. And inside of that crucible was a fire dragon, struggling desperately to escape.

In this moment of crisis, Yang Qi finished his Hellfire Crucible, and threw Chu Tiange’s fire dragon into it, that nascent divinity quintessence that he had worked so bitterly hard to cultivate.

As of this moment, Yang Qi radiated an aura that seemed to contain the power to dominate gods.

And it was only emphasized by the screams of the fire dragon behind him.

“Alright, Chu Tiange. Now it's your turn to face death!”

Yang Qi took a step forward.

Chapter 87: Killing Chu Tiange (2)

“What’s that?” Chu Tiange blurted, the shock visible in his eyes. Never could he have guessed that his Fire Dragon of the Great Sun would end up trapped in a true energy crucible, where it would be slowly melted out of existence.

Losing that dragon was equivalent to permanently losing half of his true energy, something that could only be replenished by returning to the Demi-Immortal Institute and practicing long-term cultivation with all sorts of precious materials of heaven and earth.

And if he continued to waste any more time in this fight, it would essentially be throwing his life away.

Shaking, he waved his hands, causing two wings of swords to spring out from his back, dozens of meters wide, and wreathed in flames.

Yang Qi chuckled. “That's not going to do anything. Hellfire Crucible, drag him in!”

Dark golden blood flowed across the surface of the crucible, which suddenly shifted, locking onto Chu Tiange as he hovered there in midair.

POP!

A stream of lava-like true energy swirled out of the crucible, flowed up into the air, and grabbed Chu Tiange, ripping his wings off in the process.

“What energy art is that? It's so brutal!”

At this point, Chu Tiange finally realized he didn’t have the upper hand, and as he looked over at the enormous Hellfire Crucible, his face flickered with astonishment.

“Yang Qi, how could you, a Master of Energy, actually be a threat to a Lifeseizer!?”

“Since you're about to die, Chu Tiange, I guess I’ll tell you. My energy art is called the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. And no, you were wrong. It’s not imperial-class. It’s not saintly-class. It’s not even heavenly-class. It’s a godly-class energy art! Only gods and mythological experts could possibly cultivate something like this!”

Yang Qi’s words battered Chu Tiange’s brain, smashing his self-confidence into absolutely nothing.

Every step Yang Qi took toward him seemed like that of a god in heaven, someone capable of plucking stars and snatching moons. This was the power of twenty ancient megamammoths.

“Impossible! Godly-class energy art!? The arts cultivated by gods exist only in heaven among god-spirits! You can’t even use them in the world of men. They’re impossible to cultivate! Who the hell are you anyway? A nobody! A lowlife piece of trash! How could you possibly be cultivating something like that!? There isn’t even a single godly-class energy art in the entire Demi-Immortal Institute.”

Wracked with astonishment, Chu Tiange simply couldn’t believe what was happening. He began to hack at the fetters holding him in place, hoping to somehow flee and spread word of what was happening, to ensure Yang Qi’s death.

“Infernal Deity Spear!”

Dark golden true energy turned into a spear fully thirty meters long and as thick as a column.

The Infernal Deity Spear was back!

A hell vortex sprang into being around the spear as it shot ruthlessly toward Chu Tiange.

Chu Tiange was simply incapable of dealing with the attack; blood sprayed out of his mouth, along with a terrifying scream, as his defensive true energy was destroyed, and he fell out of the sky onto the scorched earth below.

His true energy was in such chaos that it couldn’t even take humanoid form.

Striding forward, Yang Qi wrapped Chu Tiange up in more true energy bonds, making it impossible for him to even move. “Fortune favors the mighty, Chu Tiange. Is there anything you can say to that?”

“I’ve lost? Defeated by a Master of Energy? I refuse to accept this!” Chu Tiange’s hair was in disarray, and he was soaked with blood, his meridians damaged almost beyond repair.

He was now like an arrow that had reached the end of its flight, and was completely and utterly incapable of standing up to Yang Qi.

Even worse, Yang Qi’s Hellfire Crucible was simply unstoppable.

“I'm Chu Tiange, a heavenly genius! At age five I could already sense the true energy flowing through my meridians! By age eight, my meridians were fully opened! By nine, I was in the Energy Eruption level, and could use the Hundred Paces Divine Fist to kill people and leave behind no evidence! How could this be happening?” Chu Tiange glared up at Yang Qi. “Don’t think you can just kill me and get away scot-free. I'm an elite student of the Demi-Immortal Institute. If I die, it will cause a huge stir, and you’ll get found out eventually. The world is a big place, but not even you’ll be able to hide from them forever. I'm warning you, Yang Qi. You'd better think this through! And don't forget that you’ll drag Yang Susu into it.”

Yang Qi burst out laughing. “All that monologuing and you still won’t admit defeat? Do you really think that I'm too scared to kill you? What happened to all your big talk? What happened to all your confidence? You're a Lifeseizer! I'm just a puny Master of Energy. How could I possibly kill you?”

“You deserve to die ten thousand times over, Yang Qi, you criminal!” Chu Tiange spat, suddenly feeling a bit self-righteous.

He simply couldn’t accept this humiliation at the hands of Yang Qi. He was a Lifeseizer, and Yang Qi was a Master of Energy. That was like the difference between a nobleman and a slave! But now, the slave was about to crush the nobleman beneath his feet. And Chu Tiange knew that the only reason he wasn't dead already was that Yang Qi had more vicious humiliation planned.

“Inverse Sun-Moon Assassination!”

All of a sudden, his seemingly spent frame shone with intense light, and he lunged toward Yang Qi.

It was a last-ditch, suicidal attempt to somehow cut down his enemy.

Unfortunately, Yang Qi had been prepared for something like that, and immediately responded by summoning his Hellfire Crucible.

All of the light Chu Tiange had summoned vanished, and he flopped to the ground again. This time, he really was completely spent, without any more true energy to work with.

“You—!” he growled, glaring at Yang Qi. “I refuse to accept this. How come I can’t kill you?!”

“Time to die.” This time, Yang Qi didn’t mince words. Stepping forward, he thrust his palm out at the defiant Chu Tiange, absolutely shredding his heart, meridians, and sea of energy to pieces.

Chunks of internal organs erupted from his mouth, and he flopped back, dead.

He had been an elite genius student from the Demi-Immortal Institute, who had dominated everything in his path for his entire lifetime. But now he was dead.

Dead at the hands of Yang Qi.

Glancing down at Chu Tiange’s corpse, Yang Qi said, “I have to thank you, Chu Tiange. Your Fire Dragon of the Great Sun, the quintessence of a lifetime of cultivation, has already been imprisoned in my Hellfire Crucible. Now I’ll slowly refine it into true energy and life force quintessence. Then, I’ll make another attempt at reaching the Lifeseizing level!” Already, he could sense the life that was Chu Tiange slowly fading away into nothing.

Supposedly, upon reaching a certain extremely high level of cultivation, a powerful expert could see fading life auras, and manipulate them so that the dying person was temporarily spared.

But there was no one present to do such a thing for Chu Tiange, and thus, his death came quickly and cleanly.

Yang Qi pulled the Hellfire Crucible back into his sea of energy, and then summoned the rippling blue door of his thumb-ring of holding.

Instantly, Li He, He Jili, Hua Yinhu and Liang Dong all leaped out into the open, and the first thing they saw was Chu Tiange’s corpse, causing looks of shock to overtake their faces.

A very long moment passed, and finally, Li He managed to choke out, “Is that… the corpse of Chu Tiange? He’s dead?”

“Yes,” Yang Qi replied. “Chu Tiange’s dead. I just killed him.”

Chapter 88: Aftermath

‘Is that really the corpse of Chu Tiange? The famous energy arts master who cultivated the Cosmic Sunflare Sword technique? Killed by Yang Qi?’

That was what everyone was thinking. They almost could not believe what they were seeing. Then, they noticed something else. There, in the mangled remains of Chu Tiange, was a tiny little sword, glittering brightly.

Li He recognized immediately what it was. Shaken, he sent out a stream of energy to pull the tiny sword into his hand.

“An animadestiny sword manifestation!”

It was only about three inches long, and seemingly made of either metal or jade, and yet, was clearly neither of those. In fact, it almost seemed to burn with an inner fire, indicating how incredibly powerful it was.

“That’s the true energy quintessence of Chu Tiange’s Cosmic Sunflare sword,” Liang Dong said. “An animadestiny sword manifestation of his own creation. We could use this little sword to acquire Chu Tiange’s sword technique!”

“Great!” Yang Qi said. “Why don’t the four of you share it, one part each?”

With that, he flicked his finger, causing the animadestiny sword manifestation to shatter into four parts, each of which became a stream of sword light that poured into his four friends.

Sword energy flowed through them like fire, causing their true energy to thrum as they gained enlightenment of the fundamental nature of the Cosmic Sunflare Sword technique.

Now, each of them had part of the technique, and if they joined forces, could unleash it in full to much the same effect as Chu Tiange.

Yang Qi didn’t need the animadestiny sword manifestation himself; it was better used divided among his friends, who could use it to fight a Lifeseizer.

“This sword technique can shake heaven and earth to the point where ghosts and gods weep….”

It took some time, but the four of them managed to absorb all of the sword energy, whereupon their eyes snapped open.

“It’s too bad we don’t have the full technique,” Li He said with a sigh. “We need to get enough merit points to buy it from the Scripture Pavilion back at the institute. Then, we’ll really advance by leaps and bounds.”

The future cultivation path of these four was now clear: they would work on the Cosmic Sunflare Sword, a royal-class technique that was considered top-rate even among Lifeseizers.

Cultivating it would save the four of them years of hard cultivation, and would also give them a much better chance of reaching the Lifeseizing level.

As for Yang Qi, once he cultivated the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth to the proper level, he could extract memories and thoughts from the soul of someone he had killed.

Devil-ghosts in hell were adept at controlling the souls of humans, and considering that he cultivated the boundless power to crush hells, it was only natural that he would have an ability like this. Unfortunately, he wasn’t quite powerful enough to do it yet.

“You’re exactly right,” Yang Qi said. “With enough merit points, we can acquire the secret cultivation method to the Cosmic Sunflare Sword technique. Before long, the four of you will have surpassed Chu Tiange.”

In response, his four friends’ eyes went wide with disbelief. They simply couldn’t understand why Yang Qi would say such a thing so confidently.

At that point, Yang Qi smiled and pulled out the sun gem.

“Allow me to explain. The Cosmic Sunflare Sword is focused on absorbing the quintessence of the burning sun to form a great sun sword soul. Using this sun gem will save you years and years of cultivation. Furthermore, we can turn in this gold and jade garment to the institute to get a huge sum of merit points. It should be more than enough to get the full Cosmic Sunflare Sword technique.”

Gradually, Li He was coming to realize that Yang Qi just wanted to maximize their profits in every way possible.

“Alright, the matter's settled,” Yang Qi said. “Let’s get back to the institute. If there are any repercussions because of Chu Tiange’s death, we wait until things calm down. Then we can turn in the gold and jade garment and King Huaiyin’s demon core for even more merit points.”

After discussing the particulars, the group of five left the Fiendcorpse Mountains and headed back to the Demi-Immortal Institute.

The mountains weren’t very far away, so it wasn’t long before they were back in their rooms, working on their cultivation.

As outer campus students, cultivation went a lot more smoothly than back when they were freshman students. Although their formations of spirit convergence were nowhere close to being as effective as formations of vital convergence, or energy formations of the dao of monarchs, they still benefited greatly.

As for Yang Qi, now that he had his Hellfire Crucible completed, and the Fire Dragon of the Great Sun trapped inside, he could slowly melt it away and transform it into the life force quintessence that he needed.

Because of that, he wouldn’t need the help of any sort of magical treasure to make his breakthrough into the Lifeseizing level.

As for the gold and jade garment, Li He and the others were working on a plan to turn it in for merit points without attracting suspicion.

Gradually, an entire month passed by. No one realized that Chu Tiange had been killed; it was common for elite students to come and go unpredictably. For one of them to stay out of the institute for even several months was nothing out of the ordinary.

It would only be during the annual Elite Student Convention that his absence would be noted, or perhaps the inter-institute martial arts competition. At that point, an investigation would likely begin.

Unfortunately, by that time, it would be incredibly difficult to dig up any relevant clues.

In the end, Li He and the others sold the gold and jade garment to a powerful clan in exchange for a host of less valuable treasures. Then they turned the treasures in to the institute for merit points, which they subsequently used to get the full Cosmic Sunflare Sword technique.

At that point, they went to work full bore on their cultivation, of course using the sun gem to speed the process along.

By adding the quintessence of the sun into their sword energy, their meridians improved dramatically, and they quickly reached the ultimate peak of the Master of Energy level.

By now, they were able to unleash a level of power equivalent to half of Chu Tiange’s Cosmic Sunflare Sword.

Back when Chu Tiange had been cultivating it, he had no sun gem, and therefore, went a lot slower.

During the month that went by, the bitter cold that had gripped the lands began to fade away as spring approached, and life once again began to flourish.

Colorful flowers and medicinal plants were blooming everywhere in the Demi-Immortal Institute. As the pollen drifted through the air, those who breathed it in would suddenly feel much more relaxed and nourished.

On one spring evening, Yang Qi opened the window before sitting down cross-legged to meditate. The only thing that remained of the dragon in his Hellfire Crucible was a stream of golden light that was now flickering on the verge of fading away. The dark golden blood that coursed through his veins now contained some of the quintessence of the sun, making it even more scintillating and powerful.

As life force quintessence poured into the twenty-first particle within him, it slowly edged toward waking up.

Yang Qi breathed steadily, and a vortex appeared near his window, which drew in the life force aura that existed in the Demi-Immortal Institute. Pollen and petals alike formed a resplendent stream that slowly flowed into him.

Furthermore, a glittering demon core rested on the ground in front of him, which also pulsed with life force.

After crushing it, he put it into his mouth and swallowed it.

The true energy inside of the demon core immediately flowed into his sea of energy, and the Hellfire Crucible, which converted it to the true energy quintessence that it had once been!

He was directly consuming a demon core!

If a Lifeseizer could see what he was doing, their face would light up with shock, and they would likely assume that they were looking at a devil-god.

Chapter 89: Consuming a Demon Core

Not even powerful Lifeseizers could directly consume demon cores.

After all, demonlings were filled with demon energy. When heterogeneous true energy such as that came into contact with one’s own true energy, it would be like fire and water. The violent reaction could crush one's bones and transform one's flesh into ash.

Some Lifeseizers dissolve demon cores with true energy and then use them to bolster whatever weapons or items they used in their cultivation. Others would use pill furnaces to refine them into spirit medicines.

To directly consume them like Yang Qi was simply unheard-of.

However, Yang Qi had the outrageous power of the Hellfire Crucible, which could easily convert heterogeneous true energy into something he could use.

It was something that would make him almost invincible to opponents of his own level.

In fact, that was one reason why he had been so confident in challenging Chu Tiange to a fight to the death.

He fed one demon core after another into the Hellfire Crucible, melting them into something that was useful to his cultivation.

‘Reverse the quintessence, cultivate the re-refined!’

In fact, he was converging the true energy inside of him into quintessence vitality.

Most energy artists changed life force quintessence into true energy. But Yang Qi was doing the opposite. He was taking massive amounts of true energy and changing it into life force quintessence.

And then, he poured all of that life force quintessence into the twenty-first particle within him.

After being bombarded in such fashion, the twenty-first particle reached the point of being unable to remain asleep. As it woke, the aura of an ancient megamammoth began to course through Yang Qi.

It felt like being bathed in true energy. At the same time, a lava-like energy field sprang up around him, locking down his room and even forcing the formation of spirit convergence to stop functioning.

WHOOSH!

Yang Qi suddenly flew out of the window, moving with incredible speed and simultaneously reining in all of his true energy fluctuations.

Outside, he took advantage of the darkness of night to unfurl his Fiend-Devil Wings and then blur into motion, vanishing without a trace.

Now was the moment in which he would break through to the Lifeseizing level.

However, he didn't want to make a scene in his room in the Demi-Immortal Institute, lest the powerful experts there catch on to his secrets.

He flew through the air as fast as lightning, traveling for a full two hours before dropping to the ground and proceeding along on foot. Eventually, he found himself in a remote, unnamed coastal region roughly five thousand kilometers away from the institute.

He could see the waves of the sea pounding the shore, and there was even water vapor in the air. Up above, a bright moon shone down on the lands below.

‘This should work. The boundless, uninhabited ocean is the perfect place to break through to the Lifeseizing level.’

With that, he flew out over the ocean until he found a rather desolate reef, void of vegetation, and just barely above the surface of the water.

It was almost questionable whether the reef could survive the onslaught of the waves for much longer, and yet Yang Qi didn't seem bothered by that at all.

Looking up at the moon, he took a deep breath, circulated his energy, and let out a long piercing cry. Out here, he could be as loud as he wanted.

RUMBLE!

That particle within him erupted, sending out a flow of energy that calmed all of the ocean water within ten thousand paces.

Furthermore, the intense heat of the true energy caused steam to rise up as the water evaporated.

Nothing seemed capable of standing in the way of this energy flow.

The twenty-first particle was awake, and the power of that ancient megamammoth thrummed in his muscles, blood vessels, bones, and meridians, all of which seemed as tough as metal.

He was no longer human, nor of the Demonfolk. Instead, he was now becoming more like a god.

There was no demon energy inside of him, only the energy of a god-spirit.

Human energy was warm and active. Demon energy was strange and powerful. Devil energy was cruel and vicious. But the energy of gods was holy and noble, surpassing anything and everything else.

Now that Yang Qi had the power of twenty-one ancient megamammoths, it was time for him to break through. His thoughts and his mind were now far more powerful than before.

In fact, he could sense millions upon millions of nodes of vital energy in the air around him, things which were not visible to the naked eye.

By absorbing that vital energy, and combining its power with the particles inside of him, he could seize life from the heavens, and advance his cultivation. In the Lifeseizing level, one seized the minuscule quintessences of the vital energy of heaven and earth, then infused it into one’s fleshly body to bolster its life force.

As Yang Qi sent his thoughts out into heaven and earth, he felt like his mind and even his soul were being torn apart by vital energy.

Seizing life from the heavens was no simple matter! When reversing the ordinary course of one's life, it was only natural that there would be some opposition from heaven and earth. After all, it involved inserting one’s mind into the vital energy of heaven and earth, which would do its best to destroy the intruder.

And that was exactly what was happening right now with Yang Qi.

Unfortunately, it would be ten times more difficult for Yang Qi to achieve his breakthrough than it would be for ordinary energy artists. Perhaps even a hundred times. The resistance from the vital energy of heaven and earth would be even more severe. In fact, at the moment, Yang Qi was like a helpless child in the middle of a violent storm, with a tornado looming over him.

Boundless streams of vital energy swirled around the reef, pouring into him, causing him to tremble as his skin stretched on the verge of ripping apart.

Soon, glittering, dark golden blood began to ooze out all over him.

‘Crap!’ he thought, as he realized the level of danger he was in.

Throwing his head back, he let loose another long cry. ‘Don’t tell me that I actually don’t have what it takes to reach the Lifeseizing level? Am I lacking life force quintessence? Will I be unable to seize life from heaven? Fine. I guess now is the time to see how terrifying godly-class energy arts really are!’

Suddenly, an enormous demon core appeared from within his thumb-ring, pulsing with corpse energy, and a most sinister life force quintessence. This was none other than the demon core of King Huaiyin, a thousand-year-old corpse king.

Within that demon core was the cultivation base quintessence of a Lifeseizer.

And now that he was trying to reach the Lifeseizing level himself, Yang Qi decided to consume it.

Crack!

He crushed the demon core, causing corpse energy to belch out. As it streamed into his sea of energy, and the Hellfire Crucible, the intense heat caused the corpse energy to be transformed into pure life force quintessence.

The full power of the demon core was now at work within him.

The cracks which had been spreading out on Yang Qi’s skin healed, and his blood began to pump vigorously. Even his bones began to shine a dark golden color.

As of this moment, Yang Qi looked like a god descending from heaven. Waving his hand, he caused a whirlpool to spring up in the seawater, which rapidly became something like a tornado, linking to the clouds above.

“Let summer lightning fall!”

Rumbling could be heard within the clouds, and the flash of lightning was visible as rain began to fall.

Within moments, the entire area around Yang Qi had turned into a massive storm.

This was the ability to manipulate meteorological phenomena: transforming water into clouds, transforming clouds into rain.

“Seize life from the heavens!” Yang Qi roared. As his thoughts grew more focused and powerful, the various streams of vital energy began to separate into distinct kinds: gentle, soft, filled with life force, mighty, deathly, desolate… and even some that seemed like sword energy. There were millions upon millions of types of vital energy, and sometimes it was difficult to tell the difference between them.

Some of the gentle vital energy entered him, and at the same time, some of the desolate, deathly vital energy was expelled.

Yang Qi began to float up into the air, the heat radiating off of him being so intense that the reef below him began to melt, sending rivulets of molten liquid into the ocean and causing steam to billow up, and even killing some of the nearby sea creatures.

It was as if energy from hell itself were filling the area.

Yang Qi began to spin, causing the burning energy to rotate, and sending even more steam rising up into the sky.

Strange transformations were already beginning to occur within him, down to his bones and organs. The membrane beneath his skin was turning cutaneous. At the same time, a holy and magnificent aura began to swirl around him, and his heart began to pound.

Thump-thump. Thump-thump! Thump-thump!!!

His energy pulse and his heartbeat formed a resonance that rumbled with thunderous intensity.

His heartbeat was like a heavenly drum, and his energy pulse was like furious thunder!

All of it indicated that the very substructure of his life force was changing.

At the same time, mysterious streams of life force began to emerge from the air and enter him, heading straight toward the sleeping particles.

Instantly, a twenty-second particle woke up, then a twenty-third, a twenty-fourth… all the way to the twenty-ninth.

His energy was now as tough as iron, and at the same time, as soft as water.

This was the Lifeseizing level!

The sea water around him crashed and exploded as the power of twenty-nine ancient megamammoths pushed him the final distance.

He was finally in the Lifeseizing level!

Chapter 90: Lifeseizing Level

Yang Qi had finally reached the Lifeseizing level.

He could now detect the complex varieties of vital energy that existed in heaven and earth, as well as the dangerous transformations they were capable of. The countless energy vortexes he sensed were capable of reducing the strongest metals into ash.

Immense power coursed through him.

He took a breath, and could see streams of moonlight becoming refreshing vital energy that flowed into him and became part of his life force quintessence.

At the same time, he could tell that he was breathing in a certain spirit energy that cleansed the impurities within him.

He was now capable of maintaining complete purity of body, both within and without.

He could also tell that he could now subsist without any need to eat ordinary food. The only nourishment he needed was the spirit energy of heaven and earth, and the quintessence of the sun and moon.

Lifeseizers had no need to rely on things that ordinary humans needed.

They could gather energy to seize life.

Energy was life. Life was energy.

Seizing the spirit energy of heaven and earth to sustain oneself was one of the marvelous aspects of the Lifeseizing level. At this level of cultivation, if Yang Qi found himself trapped in some deadly location with no food or water, he could last for dozens of years, perhaps even over a hundred, without dying.

All he needed was spirit energy of heaven and earth.

The moment he reached the Lifeseizing level, his true energy underwent heaven-shaking, earth-toppling transformations, and could now probe and absorb the countless mysterious elements within the vital energy around him.

He was even able to grasp at a simplistic understanding of space-time.

Of course, space-time was actually a very ancient word, and Lifeseizers couldn't possibly have a full understanding of it, much less be able to control it.

For instance, although Yang Qi’s Heart of the Sea thumb-ring had a tiny dimension inside of it, that was not a full expression of space-time. Space-time implied fluctuations in time itself.

Yang Qi was now a Lifeseizer, and although he had an increased understanding, he could not yet manipulate the power of space-time to forge items like the Heart of the Sea thumb-ring. He needed to advance much further in his cultivation to accomplish that.

“Moonlight quintessence!”

He let loose a long cry, and the boundless moonlight that hung over the surface of the water swirled around him as rippling halos.

His control over the power of moonlight had reached an incredible level.

“Drain rivers and dry up seas! Crystal palace!”

He shoved his hands down toward the water, solidifying it instantly. Strangely, there was no frigid energy, because this was not an ice-based energy art. Instead, he was using immense power to reconstruct the water into crystal.

RUUUUMBLE!

Then, he lifted his hands up, causing the crystalline water to rise, taking the shape of an enormous palace. Although it looked like water, it was as tough as metal; in fact, during the process of forming, it emitted creaking and crunching sounds like that of metal scraping against metal.

It was fully a thousand paces from end to end, and came complete with tables, chairs, beds, and other furniture, all of it formed from beautiful, crystallized water.

It was a true masterpiece, created entirely by use of true energy.

Only Yang Qi could do something like this after having just entered the Lifeseizing level.

Not even Chu Tiange would have been capable of compressing water into crystal; the true energy wastage would have been too severe.

And to create a palace with such a method would normally have been impossible even for ten Lifeseizers working together.

And even if they somehow succeeded, they definitely wouldn’t be able to maintain the structure for more than about ten breaths of time.

But Yang Qi seemed completely at ease creating and maintaining this enormous palace, and from the look of it, could do so for hours. In fact, he wasn’t even done with his work. A moment later, numerous crystalline trees began to rise up on the palace grounds.

Even more spectacular, the water also formed crystalline tigers, elephants, and people, who looked startlingly lifelike as they moved about within the palace.

This was a level that surpassed Chu Tiange in every imaginable sense.

Yang Qi experienced unprecedented difficulty in reaching the Lifeseizing level, but now that he had succeeded, he counted as one of the most powerful Primary Lifeseizers possible.

In fact, if he went all out, he would most likely have no problem dealing with Tertiary or Quaternary Lifeseizers.

Nonary was the highest possible level for Lifeseizers. Each process of seizing life was difficult to the extreme. However, success brought increased longevity each time. Nonary Lifeseizers could easily live for three thousand years, giving them plenty of time to pursue their next breakthrough and reach the Legendary level.

Chu Tiange had only been a Primary Lifeseizer. Had he been a Secondary Lifeseizer, he would have been so strong that he could have easily trounced Yang Qi.

But now that Yang Qi was also in the Lifeseizing level, it would be a simple thing for him to destroy Secondary or Tertiary Lifeseizers.

That was how powerful a godly-class energy art was. The techniques employed by gods were not to be taken lightly. Cultivating such techniques was dangerous, but successfully breaking into a higher level with them was like being blessed by the gods, chosen as their representative to the masses below.

“A crystalline palace, a heavenly abode. Unfortunately, it’s not permanent. If my true energy were strong enough, and I could turn the entire ocean into a crystalline palace, that would truly be the power of gods. But I'm not quite there yet.”

Sighing, he retracted his true energy, and instantly, the crystalline palace, trees, tigers, floodwyrms, immortal cranes, elephants, and people all collapsed, yet again becoming water that splashed back down into the ocean below. The entrancing scene ended as surely as if it had been a dream.

The palace had been created by Yang Qi’s true energy, so as soon as that energy left it, it was only natural that it would collapse.

Even still, what he had done was something that most experts on the Rich-Lush Continent could not.

Thankfully, Yang Qi wasn’t an inherently arrogant person, and knew his place in the world. The Demi-Immortal Institute was filled with countless experts of all sorts. And there was also the Crown Prince, who had long since reached the Legendary level. It was impossible for Yang Qi to even guess how powerful that made him.

This small accomplishment of his own was nothing worth bragging about.

‘So,’ he thought, ‘should I go apply to become an elite student now?’

With that, he settled down cross-legged on the surface of the water, which crystallized around him. Seventh phase experts could walk on water, so there was little need to mention the power of Lifeseizers.

If he became an elite student, that would earn him a much higher status, and access to even better resources.

However, he was worried that it would also be risky; he still didn’t want anyone knowing about his godly-class energy art.

Becoming an elite student would definitely put him in the spotlight, and would prompt many top experts in the institute to look into him. Unfortunately, he wasn't completely confident in being able to keep his secrets under such scrutiny.

Although the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth could hide itself, Yang Qi was getting so powerful that he worried high-level experts might be able to detect the boundless power in his soul.

‘Maybe I should just forget about it. I can’t reveal the true extent of my powers, so perhaps the best thing would be to wait until I can fully seal my own true energy before revealing that I'm a Lifeseizer. Like the old saying goes, the tallest tree in the forest will be battered by the strongest winds. Besides, Yun Hailan is backed by the Crown Prince. Attracting his attention would definitely be a mistake.’

Eventually, Yang Qi rose to his feet.

As he rose through the cultivation levels, he knew that his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth would only get stronger and stronger. Eventually, it would surely come with an ability to fully seal his powerful life force and true energy.

All of a sudden, he felt the urge to check on the golden imp in his forehead.

That was when he realized that, at long last, his increase in cultivation level had apparently prompted a change in the imp.

After all, his soul, mind, and senses had all been improved by ten times. As of this moment, he could make out the golden imp’s facial features, and could see that its body was covered with complex designs.

It was wearing a radiant suit of armor that seemed suitable for fighting gods. Although the imp seemed very, very small, it was actually indescribably powerful.

As for the designs on the armor, they were lines of script that formed the description of some sort of technique.

Unfortunately, Yang Qi couldn’t read them. However, he was fairly certain that they described the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.

Back when he had been struck by lightning, the imp entered his forehead and imparted the technique to him. However, it wasn’t complete. He only knew the cultivation aspects pertaining to what came before the Lifeseizing level.

But now that he was a Lifeseizer, he would need to practice the cultivation described on the golden imp.

Unfortunately, he couldn’t make out the text clearly enough to read it. To do that, he would have to improve his cultivation base.

After examining the text, he found one part that he could make out relatively clearly. The words were written in ancient, flowing characters that were difficult to read, but not impossible. They read: Devil-God Seal.

In addition to that, there was another technique called the Hell Portal.

By summoning a Hell Portal, he could call out to the powerful devil-gods in hell, and perhaps even use their power to crush his enemy.

Chapter 91: Devil-God Seal

At this level, the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth had four major capabilities.

First, the Infernal Deity Spear.

Second, the Fiend-Devil Wings.

Third, the Infernal Deity Aegis and its next form the Plate Armor.

Fourth, the Hellfire Crucible.

The Infernal Deity Spear was the strongest offensive weapon, and the Fiend-Devil Wings provided incredible speed. The Infernal Deity Plate Armor was incredible in terms of defense, and the Hellfire Crucible provided major help in cultivation.

The next ability was the Devil-God Seal, which provided perfect powers of concealment.

After that was the Hell Portal, a powerful tool of summoning.

Yang Qi had no idea what came after the Hell Portal, but he did know he would have to wait until the Legendary level to find out.

Now that his Hellfire Crucible was complete, he could start working on the Devil-God Seal. Although the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth was inherently capable of concealing his energy arts and blood quintessence deep in his sea of energy, if someone probed him deeply enough, they would still be able to find them.

Now that he was in the Lifeseizing level, he was so strong that such things were actually impossible to cover up.

Thankfully, he now had the Devil-God Seal, which would resolve all those issues.

After memorizing the mnemonic, he circulated his true energy, which emerged and became like black snowflakes swirling around him.

Eventually, the black snowflakes transformed, becoming dark golden, resplendent in every aspect as they burrowed into the depths of his body.

Then, his physical body began to shrink down.

The scintillating dark golden blood within him once again turned red, and his bones began to turn soft. Even his muscles began to weaken. All of the strength left him, like the receding tide.

Next, the true energy snowflakes sealed all the power in his blood, bones and meridians, pulling it into a fist-sized sphere of true energy in his sea of energy. It shrank rapidly until it was the size of a sesame seed, completely undetectable by any outside force.

His overall true energy was now at only ten percent of its normal level, with all of his power having been sealed.

Right now, he seemed like an ordinary person who had just become a Lifeseizer, nowhere near the level of people like Chu Tiange.

That said, his sealed true energy could be released at any time, allowing him to use his true strength whenever he wanted. This was unlike other sealing magics which would usually take time to unravel.

It was not uncommon for people to use sealing marks to hide their true energy. However, it was always a dangerous process, and difficult to undo. And that was not to mention how tragic it would be to be killed before being able to draw on one's full strength.

The Devil-God Seal had no such weaknesses. A mere thought on Yang Qi’s part would give him access to all of his energy arts, and all of the massive power that entailed.

To an outsider, though, his aura seemed somewhat weak. That said, even though he seemed weak, that still made him vastly mightier than any Master of Energy.

After doing a bit more work to make sure as much true energy as possible was sealed away, Yang Qi flew into the air and headed back toward the Demi-Immortal Institute.

The moon had already set, and the night had passed. Soon, the first rays of sunlight began to stretch out over the waters of the ocean.

Then the sun rose, and a new day began.

Yang Qi made it back around noontime, and the institute was alive with activity. Some students were hard at work practicing cultivation, some were going out to hunt demonlings, some were sparring, some were attending classes, some were in the gardens, drinking and enjoying the scenery, and some couples were enjoying each other’s company.

Spring had come, and life in the place reflected that.

Immortal cranes and fenixes soared in the air, as well as multicolored peacocks and griffons belonging to higher-level students.

The sight of the griffons made Yang Qi realize that, as an outer campus student, he could spend some merit points to get one of his own if he wanted.

Of course, it didn't make much sense to do so. It took a lot of expensive medicinal pills to care for griffons, and besides, no griffon could possibly match the speeds he was capable of with his Fiend-Devil Wings.

Now that he was in the Lifeseizing level, his cultivation base was even more powerful than before. And his status would only continue to increase; when he became an elite student, he would have access to even better materials.

After finding a certain tower, Yang Qi stealthily made his way to a certain room.

There, Li He, He Jili, Liang Dong and Hua Yinhu were working together on the Cosmic Sunflare Sword technique.

By joining their true energy, they could unleash the Thousand-Ton Sword Net, which they were currently using to wrap up the sun gem and extract the quintessence of the sun from inside it. That process saved them months and months of difficult cultivation, perhaps even more than a year.

This technique from the Cosmic Sunflare Sword, which not even Chu Tiange could use, was now a simple cultivation tool for them.

The sun gem continued to slowly shrink as the four of them focused completely on their cultivation.

Unexpectedly, Liang Dong already had a sun-like manifestation of sword energy behind him that seemed equivalent to the one Chu Tiange had used. He had the highest cultivation base of the group of four, and was the most naturally talented in cultivation.

Truth be told, Liang Dong really was a genius, as was evidenced by him being the first to actually become a Master of Energy.

When Yang Qi entered the room and took in the scene, he waved his finger, sending out a bitingly cold stream of true energy to the sun gem.

In response, the sun gem erupted with power, sending four beams of bright red light into the tops of his four friends’ heads. As the light streamed into them, the sun gem quickly shrank down into nothing.

A sound like metallic bells filled the room, accompanied by a blast of heat as tiny swords appeared in front of each of the group of four. The swords glittered brilliantly, and radiated a profound cosmic aura.

These were the animadestiny sword manifestations of the Cosmic Sunflare Sword.

These manifestations were already about seventy to eighty percent as powerful as Chu Tiange's. After all, they had absorbed Chu Tiange’s preheaven sword manifestation, as well as the sun gem.

As of now, they could definitely tangle with a Primary Lifeseizer and come out alive on the other end.

And if they joined forces to create a sword formation, then they could easily fight on the same level as someone like Chu Tiange.

Liang Dong was the first one to open his eyes. First he looked at Yang Qi, then at the spot the sun gem had occupied moments before, and when he realized what had happened, looked visibly shocked. “Brother Yang Qi, you’re back! Your aura….”

“Yep. I reached the Lifeseizing level last night.” Although Yang Qi’s words were spoken casually, their import was anything but.

His other three friends retracted their true energy and rose to their feet, looking stunned.

“Really?”

“You reached the Lifeseizing level?”

“Such incredible progress.”

Instead of replying with words, he simply let loose a ripple of energy that calmed their hearts.

After a moment, Li He hesitantly asked, “Brother Yang Qi, how come your aura doesn’t seem very strong?”

“Because I’ve sealed about ninety-nine percent of my animadestiny quintessence. If I didn’t, it would be too terrifying. Even still, I could still crush an ordinary Primary Lifeseizer.”

“You sealed ninety-nine percent of it?” Hua Yinhu clicked his tongue in amazement. “How terrifying would you actually be if you unleashed it all?” He was pleased to say the least. After all, the stronger Yang Qi became, the more it would benefit the group, and the more likely the rest of them would rise to the Lifeseizing level.

The Cosmic Sunflare Sword technique was the type that could conquer the cosmos. It was incredibly powerful and dangerous, and could only be cultivated by individuals with very strong meridians.

The four of them had been blessed by Yang Qi, their bodies remolded and their meridians made much tougher than before. Therefore, cultivating an aggressive sword technique like this was very appropriate for them.

Although they wouldn’t necessarily achieve a breakthrough any faster because of it, they still had a high likelihood of succeeding. It wasn’t like their situation before when they seemed to have no hope of ever becoming Lifeseizers.

“Yang Qi,” Li He said, “why don’t you head over to the Academy of Sage Studies and apply to be an elite student? All you have to do is pass a test to prove you’re in the Lifeseizing level, and then you would rise to a much higher level than before. Nothing could get in your way after that. Furthermore, your clan would also have a much more stable position.”

“That’s right,” He Jili added. Having been in the institute for about eight years, he was very familiar with how much respect was given to elite students. “Brother Yang Qi, if you were an elite student, and your involvement in Chu Tiange’s death were to be revealed, the worst thing that would happen is you would be punished. After all, he was trying to kill us. It was self-defense!”

“I was thinking the same thing,” Yang Qi replied. “Come on, let’s go.” After all, he had his Devil-God Seal now, so he was confident that no one would be able to reveal his secrets. With that, he took out a jade pellet and tossed it to Liang Dong. “I got that from a zombie general I killed in the Fiendcorpse Mountains. It’s designed to hold true energy, and can thus provide a major power boost. Liang Dong, at the moment, you're the strongest, and have the best shot at reaching the Lifeseizing level. Make good use of that pellet.”

“This is made from Kṣitigarbha sagejade!” Liang Dong blurted.

“What’s that?” Yang Qi asked.

“There are nine different types of legendary jade in the Rich-Lush Continent,” Li He said. “For example, Nine Heavens godjade, Kṣitigarbha sagejade, Star River monarchjade, and so on…. Each type is precious and filled with unique power. Kṣitigarbha sagejade is perfect for hoarding purposes for example, and can even contain life force. It’s incredibly expensive, and normally speaking, something that not even Lifeseizers would have. For a Master of Energy to acquire one would make them vastly more powerful.”

Chapter 92: Academy of Sage Studies

None of the others in the group felt the least bit of jealousy when Yang Qi gave the Kṣitigarbha sagejade to Liang Dong.

All of them knew that Liang Dong was particularly talented in cultivation, and if he could reach the Lifeseizing level as well, and also become an elite student, the benefits to all of them would be astounding.

With two elite students in their group, how powerful would they be?

Obviously, Yang Qi also realized how talented Liang Dong was, and hoped to help him as much as possible.

‘Kṣitigarbha sagejade. Nine Heavens godjade…. That’s right. I remember that the Chen Clan’s Chiliocosm Mirror was made from Nine Heavens godjade. It seems I just don’t know enough about treasured items. I really need to take some classes here to learn about all the different types of precious materials of heaven and earth.’

There were all sorts of courses available in the Demi-Immortal Institute: cultivation, meridian theory, vital energy classification, pill concocting, equipment forging… even classes about demonlings and devillings.

In fact, elite students could attend courses regarding alternate dimensions.

Of course, classes weren’t free for the low-level students; they cost merit points to attend.

Sadly, Yang Qi was completely ignorant when it came to all those subjects…. He knew he needed to change that. He couldn’t just rely on the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, he needed to brush up on deeper fields of learning. Only by gaining a better understanding of heaven and earth could he perform all the necessary lifeseizings to eventually become a Legendary.

“Come on, let’s go,” Liang Dong said. “The most important thing right now is to register Brother Yang Qi as an elite student at the Academy of Sage Studies.”

He put the jade pellet away, although he did send a bit of true energy into it, and simultaneously worked with his Cosmic Sunflare Sword technique.

With that, the entire group headed to a location deep in the institute, to a structure that resembled an ancient castle.

This was the Academy of Sage Studies.

Whenever some talented genius broke through to the Lifeseizing level they would come here to take an exam and then become an elite student.

When it came to the freshman students, outer campus students, and inner campus students, they were like ants, streaming here and there and everywhere. However, elite students were not as common, and were viewed like treasures.

In fact, they were so important that they would receive special protection from the institute.

When it became clear where Yang Qi and his friends were going, it attracted quite a bit of attention.

However, Yang Qi kept his energy under control, so that no one could tell he was a Lifeseizer. Therefore, most people in the area assumed they had just come to look around.

“Why are there so many people at the Academy of Sage Studies today? Don’t tell me someone recently became a Lifeseizer. Are we going to have a new elite student soon?” As they got closer, Yang Qi could hear the conversations of students around him, and started to get the feeling something strange was going on.

It was the same with Li He, as he realized that there seemed to be a lot of students gathering in the area.

“I've been here before to watch someone become an elite student,” he said, “but it's never this crowded. I wonder if some important person is applying for a promotion. Brother Yang Qi, considering that we’re the only ones who know about you, there’s no way everyone else is here on your account.”

“Yeah, this is weird. Well, let’s go ask around and see what's going on.”

Yang Qi walked over to a female student in an emerald-green robe and said, “Hey there, Elder Sister. Do you mind if I ask what’s going on? Why is it so crowded? Is something important happening?”

This particular female student was a Master of Energy, and was a fairly well-known inner campus student. She was also quite pretty. Looking over at Yang Qi, she said, “You’re an outer campus student? Don’t tell me you haven’t heard the news? One of the top female students here is getting promoted, the genius Junior Sis— er, wait. Now that she’s going to be an elite student, I guess I need to call her Elder Sister. Elder Sister Yun Hailan. Only a month ago, she reached the Lifeseizing level. And then she defeated some other Lifeseizers who were much more experienced than her. I’d say that at the moment, she’s the most talented female student in the past twenty years.”

‘What? Yun Hailan already reached the Lifeseizing level, and is being promoted to elite student today?’ Killing intent immediately began to pulse in Yang Qi’s heart. ‘That girl is a deadly schemer. She’ll do anything she can to get what she wants. And now she’s becoming an elite student. She must have someone helping her, that’s the only explanation.’

The fact that Yun Hailan was in the Lifeseizing level was not good news. Already, Yang Qi’s blood was pumping, and he had to resist the urge to go give her a piece of his mind. What right did she have to simply manipulate any man she wanted, and then crush him beneath her feet before moving on as if nothing happened?

Killing Chu Tiange had eased some of his fury, but deep in his heart, Yang Qi could never let go of his hatred of Yun Hailan.

The only way would be to crush her once and for all.

When the female student saw Yang Qi standing there silently, she said, “You know, there haven’t been any genius male students in two decades. First there was Yang Susu, and now there’s Yun Hailan. Two genius women. One of these days the women are going to completely surpass the men….” With that, she gave a cold smirk and walked off.

“Brother Yang Qi, your archenemy Yun Hailan is getting promoted too? I guess it's just destiny that the two of you meet again.” Li He knew about how much Yang Qi hated Yun Hailan, how she had tricked him into stealing a Latent Dragon Pill for her and then left him to his death. If something like that happened to Li He, he knew that he would react just like Yang Qi.

Therefore, Li He and the others were all just as angry as he was.

“She thinks she’s some sort of genius,” Yang Qi said, “but she’s only advancing because of the help of the Crown Prince. One of these days, I’ll make sure she understands how sadly lacking she really is. Come on, let’s get in there. I want to become an elite student and really stick it to Yun Hailan.”

With that, he headed into the crowd that had assembled out front the Academy of Sage Studies. Everyone was craning their necks in the hopes of seeing what was happening inside. However, a group of students from the Crown Prince Society had cordoned off the area, and weren’t letting anyone in.

That said, it was still possible to see the ceremony being carried out inside, presided over by members of the senior generation with very profound cultivation bases.

Other elite students, Lifeseizers all, were present to act as witnesses and provide moral support.

Yun Hailan wore a sapphire-blue garment, and was very well made-up. She had a somber expression on her face that made her look something like a goddess. The female students were all staring at her in admiration.

In fact, Yang Qi could tell that many of the female students considered her to be a leader of sorts among them.

It hadn’t taken her long to really entrench herself in the institute.

As for the male students, they obviously respected her, but at the same time, dreamed of courting her. Of course, they couldn’t. The only thing they might hope to do was serve as escorts for her, and perhaps win a smile.

The way that some of these students virtually worshipped Yun Hailan caused Yang Qi to frown; dealing with her was getting more and more complicated.

“Can you guys see? That’s Elder Sister Yun Hailan. She's a legend already! She joined the Demi-Immortal Institute less than a year ago, and is already a Lifeseizer! She's already surpassed many of the elite students….”

“Yeah, I know. Supposedly she has the blood of a sea god in her. She's got divine protection!”

“She's definitely going to be the champion of us female students.”

“She’s spectacular. Even if she just smiled at me, it would make my day.”

Everyone seemed completely entranced with her, and that included certain members of the crowd who were from aristocratic clans in the Sage Ancestor Dynasty, or geniuses in their own right.

It was a group of Masters of Energy who maintained the cordoned-off area, preventing anyone from entering the Academy of Sage Studies. Each and every one was a member of the Crown Prince Society, with swords strapped at their backs, and all sorts of jade ornaments and jewelry. Although they looked excited, the arrogance in their eyes was clear; they viewed themselves as being above everyone else present.

Everyone who was in the Crown Prince Society developed something like an air of nobility.

After all, they represented power, authority, and ultimate respect.

According to the rumors, their leader, the Crown Prince, cultivated a rare energy art called the Son of Heaven’s Godfist. Upon cultivating that art to completion, one would truly become like a son of heaven, an emperor descended from on high. It was a fist strike that was so powerful that everyone who faced it was like a court official facing the emperor.

The dao of monarchs was one of being unparalleled under heaven.

The dao of the son of heaven was that of winning wars without deploying troops.

Yang Qi had heard stories about the Crown Prince, but had never seen him. However, based on how the Crown Prince Society students acted, he was fairly certain he knew what the Crown Prince himself was like.

“Stop right there!” said one of the Crown Prince Society students maintaining the cordon. Looking coldly at Yang Qi, he continued, “Students here to watch the ceremony have to stay behind the cordon. If you try to break past, don’t blame us for cutting you down!”

“I'm also here for promotion to elite student,” Yang Qi replied icily. “Besides, who gave you the power and authority to seal the Academy of Sage Studies?”

“What? Here for promotion to elite student? You’re in the Lifeseizing level?”

Shocked, other members of the Crown Prince Society looked over.

One of them narrowed his eyes and said, “You're in the Lifeseizing level? Doesn’t look like it to me!” Without any warning, he let loose a fist strike.

The people from the Crown Prince Society really were overbearing.

Chapter 93: How Impudent!

This member of the Crown Prince Society didn’t mince words. It was with unbridled aggressiveness that he immediately resorted to a physical attack.

“Army-Shattering Fist!”

A freezing blast of fist-wind roiled out, heading straight toward Yang Qi’s head. Even a massive boulder which found itself in the path of this fist attack would be blasted into dust. Furthermore, the fist-wind rotated in a way that was designed to completely obliterate the enemy’s defensive true energy.

This member of the Crown Prince Society clearly looked down on Yang Qi so much that he wasn’t even worried if he got killed.

After all, the Crown Prince Society was extremely powerful in the Demi-Immortal Institute.

“Resorting right to rule-breaking!?” Killing intent burning, Yang Qi unleashed a palm strike; true energy swirled out to form a huge hand, glittering and golden, which seemed to pulse with the aura of a king.

The fist-wind struck the enormous true energy palm, and shattered, whereupon the golden palm continued onward, smashing into the Crown Prince Society student, who staggered backward and coughed up blood.

The other nearby members of the Crown Prince Society were so incensed that they clearly wanted to kill Yang Qi and chop his corpse up into a million pieces.

“Such impudence! How dare you strike a member of the Crown Prince Society? You’re dead!”

Energy art fluctuations immediately filled the area.

More than ten Masters of Energy unleashed deadly attacks, causing sword energy, blade nimbuses, fist strikes, and more to descend like rain.

The explosion of energy actually made it difficult to see clearly.

The other students in the area backed up, all of them wondering who this Yang Qi character was, and why he had dared to arouse the ire of the powerful Crown Prince Society.

“Triumph in Every Battle!Victory in Every Fight!”

It was with casual calm that Yang Qi summoned six true energy arms. Even more shocking, two additional heads sprouted on his shoulders, one of them extremely vicious-looking, the other the picture of calm.

In the blink of an eye, he had literally turned into a three-headed six-armed entity.

This was the full manifestation of the Invincible King’s Fist.

His six arms flowed through numerous stances as he lunged forward, seemingly capable of ripping the ground up and destroying it.

“Aaaiiiieee!”

“Aaaiiiieee!”

“Aaaiiiieee….”

Numerous screams erupted as the students from the Crown Prince Society were sent flying backward, slamming into the stairs leading into the Academy of Sage Studies. As they did, the sounds of breaking bones rang out for all to hear.

They had all been vanquished in only one interchange with Yang Qi.

“Lifeseizing level!?” someone shrieked, a woman. “He's actually a Lifeseizer….”

It was none other than the arrogant young woman in the green garment that Yang Qi had spoken to moments ago. The shock on her face was apparent; how could she ever have guessed that the outer campus student she had just derided was actually a powerful Lifeseizer?

“Lifeseizer!? He's really in the Lifeseizing level…?”

As word spread, more and more students looked over at Yang Qi, their eyes shining with the realization that he was a Lifeseizer.

“An outer campus student actually reached the Lifeseizing level? That’s incredible! I'm a Master of Energy myself, but even I don’t know how many years it will take for me to do the same thing!”

“When you achieve meteoric progress, then you can hold your head high!”

“Well, even though he made his breakthrough, he pushed things a bit too far. How is he going to deal with the Crown Prince Society now that he's offended them? Seems he doesn’t understand the concept of death. They are definitely not going to let him off the hook.”

“Not necessarily. It depends on what society he joins. All the powerful organizations are interested in recruiting new Lifeseizers. If he has a problem with the Crown Prince Society, he could always join the Gentlemen’s Society. They would probably protect him.”

“You know, you’re right.”

Even as the members of the Crown Prince Society lay there in shock, Yang Qi strode past them into the main hall of the Academy of Sage Studies.

By this point, the commotion from outside had been noticed by the elite students inside, and they all looked over.

Almost instantly, Yang Qi felt something like the rays of a thousand burning suns locking onto him.

Everyone inside the hall was a top expert, and their combined gazes were so powerful that they could vanquish any Master of Energy.

However, Yang Qi merely squared his shoulders and continued walking.

In fact, his gaze locked onto the key figure of the ceremony, Yun Hailan.

She, of course, looked back at him, and instantly realized who he was. And considering his energy fluctuations, she could tell that he had recently reached the Lifeseizing level.

Chuckling coldly, he said, “I bet you never would have guessed that I would reach the Lifeseizing level, eh Yun Hailan? How long will it take you to learn that schemes and plots don’t always work? Connive and finagle to your heart’s content. I'm still going to leave you choking dust when I pass you.”

‘He actually reached the Lifeseizing level…?’ Although she was visibly shocked, she quickly wiped it from her face.

“I must offer my sincerest congratulations,” she said coolly. “Your cultivation is progressing along quite quickly. I guess I misjudged you in the past. You might be a Lifeseizer now, but don't forget that the higher you rise, the farther you can fall. To be honest, such a high cultivation base doesn’t fit you. If you want to live your days in peace, return to Yanhaven and go into seclusion. Live like an ordinary person.”

“Sorry to disappoint you, but not only will I not live like an ordinary person, I'm going to become the type of famed individual who shakes the entire world.” As of this moment, Yang Qi was hard-pressed not to just attack Yun Hailan and kill her right here.

He had only just entered the Lifeseizing level, and she had reached it some time ago, which left her feeling a bit confident. However, Yun Hailan had no idea how truly powerful he was.

‘Just you wait,’ he thought. ‘After I'm an elite student, there will definitely be some time when we meet alone, just the two of us. Then I’ll show you how strong I actually am.’ Yang Qi’s hand trembled with effort as he calmed his true energy, forcing himself to stop thinking about attacking her.

Although the conversation between Yang Qi and Yun Hailan didn’t appear to be over, that didn't stop a certain man from stepping forward and saying, “Who is this guy, Yun Hailan? I can’t believe that he actually interrupted a ceremony being carried out by the Crown Prince Society!”

He was tall and slender, with sword-like eyebrows and a complexion as sparkling as jade. A single glance at him, and one would take him to be a very powerful individual. Furthermore, his narrow, wolf-like eyes made him seem like a very unreasonable and intolerant person. At the same time, he was the type of person who could handle ‘troublesome’ situations.

“And you are…?” Yang Qi said. He could tell from this man’s aura that he was no less powerful than Chu Tiange. Obviously, he was also a Lifeseizer, an elite student and a member of the Crown Prince Society.

“You don’t need to know who I am,” the man said imperiously. “I’ll give you three breaths of time, and two options: One. Apologize to Yun Hailan and then get your ass out of here. Two. Get killed by me. Your choice. And when I say get your ass out of here, I mean on your hands and knees. If you try walking, then I’ll break your ankles.”

Another of the Crown Prince Society students waved his hand dismissively. “Don't get carried away, Gu Fenxian. This student is in the Lifeseizing level, so give him a bit of face. Besides, it's not too late for him to just step outside.

“Listen, brat. Just step out and wait for our ceremony to finish. Then come back and get your promotion. Afterward, you can join our Crown Prince Society. We can take care of everything in one shot.”

“Did you hear that?” Gu Fenxian said. “Get your ass out of here!”

Waving his sleeve, he sent a blast of air out that transformed into a tornado which bore down on Yang Qi.

WHIZZZ!

Yang Qi’s energy arts rumbled like a bell when Gu Fenxian’s tornado hit him. Then, the tornado simply collapsed into pieces.

“You want me to get my ass out of here? You people really talk big, you know that?” Yang Qi was getting very irritated with how arrogant and bossy this Crown Prince Society was. Shoving his finger in the direction of this Gu Fenxian, he said, “If you have what it takes, why don’t you make me? Except that you can’t.”

There were also some elders in the hall, transcendent-looking old men with high positions in the institute, who were tasked with overseeing the promotion of elite students. However, they didn’t react at all upon seeing Yang Qi arguing with the Crown Prince Society. In fact, it was even possible to see slight smiles on their faces, as if they were interested in seeing who would come out on top.

“How impudent!” Gu Fenxian blurted, incensed both by Yang Qi’s words as well as his sharp tone. With that, he threw his arms wide, causing intense heat to ripple off of him, which transformed into flame horses, flame crows, flame rats, flame tigers, flame snakes, and more….

Fire filled the air and then shot directly toward Yang Qi.

Yang Qi didn’t even look at the flames. He unleashed his true energy, causing numerous energy vortexes to spring up around him, which easily sucked in all of the flame manifestations, destroying them and sending sparks showering down everywhere.

Tiny pits and holes opened up on the ground where the sparks landed, which attested to how powerful the flames had been.

“Flame qilin!” Gu Fenxian growled. Scorching hot true energy shot out from his eyes, which rapidly took the shape of a large qilin. Stamping its hooves, it began to race toward Yang Qi, breathing fire as it did. It also emanated an energy field that was so wide it instantly enveloped Yang Qi.

Everyone present could see that the heat within that energy field was so intense that the ground was melting.

However, none of the onlookers felt any of that heat, which showed how exquisitely Gu Fenxian was able to control his energy art.

There were some people who would unleash incredible energy arts, but would injure innocent bystanders. People like that seemed amazing, but were actually not in control, and were wasting their true energy.

Obviously, Gu Fenxian’s energy arts had reached the highest level of perfection.

And yet, despite being in the midst of that intense fire, Yang Qi didn't seem worried at all. He was like the ultimate manifestation of the old adage true gold fears no fire. Reaching out, he splayed his fingers, then tightened them into a fist, causing a vortex to spring up around it. It was the Invincible King’s Fist again, this time, all of its stances combined into one.

BOOOOOOOM!

He punched the flame qilin hard on the head, provoking a miserable scream from it as it collapsed into pieces.

Thump, thump, thump….

Gu Fenxian staggered backwards, his face draining of blood.

Chapter 94: Ceremony

Yang Qi defeated Gu Fenxian with a single fist strike, then stared him down and jokingly said, “A piece of trash like you wants me to get my ass out of here?”

Gu Fenxian was from the Crown Prince Society, but that didn't scare Yang Qi.

Now that he was in the Lifeseizing level, he could use his Hellfire Crucible to directly consume demon cores, which meant that his cultivation base would continue to advance by leaps and bounds.

Given some time, he would eventually seize life again and again, and would thus gain enlightenment of the Hell Portal. With that, he would have even less reason to fear the legendary Crown Prince.

The Hell Portal would allow him to summon countless kinds of devil-gods, the type who had the capacity to turn the world of men into a living hell. Of course, summoning creatures like that was inherently dangerous in certain ways.

Gu Fenxian almost couldn’t believe that he had met defeat. “You! I'm gonna kill you!”

He was the insufferably arrogant type, and the fact that he had just been defeated by someone who just reached the Lifeseizing level was a complete humiliation. That in itself ensured that he now viewed Yang Qi as a mortal enemy.

“Painting of Immortal Immolation!” he howled. Flame rippled up behind him, quickly turning into the image of a painting. It depicted all sorts of god-immortals, all of them transcendent beings, who were wreathed in flames, agonized expressions covering their faces as they were immolated into nothing.

Face twisting viciously, Gu Fenxian said, “I can’t believe you shoved me backward a few steps, brat. Humiliation like that can never be wiped away. Henceforth, you have no reason to stay alive! I’ll put you in so much agony you’ll wish you could die! Except, I won’t let you! You’re going to be the first person to experience my imperial-class energy art, the Five Volumes of Immortal Immolation!”

From the way his energy was building up, it seemed he was preparing to go all out.

“The Five Volumes of Immortal Immolation! That's an imperial-class energy art! It’s a consummate discipline from the Gu Clan, not from the Demi-Immortal Institute.”

“The Gu Clan is one of the top ten richest clans in the Rich-Lush Continent. According to the rumors, they used to have a Great Sage. Even the Sage Ancestor Dynasty pays them a lot of respect. The Five Volumes of Immortal Immolation are so powerful that, if used together, they can be used to immolate immortals. However, after years of chaos in their clan, four of the five volumes were lost. Now they only have one of them. Even still, it’s incredibly powerful.”

“Who is this guy anyway? From his clothes, it seems he’s an outer campus student. I can’t believe his cultivation base is so profound. He actually defeated Gu Fenxian?”

“Gu Fenxian is being a bit careless. Considering he’s using his Painting of Immortal Immolation, there’s no way this other student will be able to defend himself.”

“Well, that guy is a Lifeseizer, so there’s no way the elders will let him get killed. They’ll interfere. Every Lifeseizer who loses their life is a blow to the quintessence of the institute.”

Already, many of the students were taking note of Yang Qi.

As for Yun Hailan, her expression was cold, almost as if she could see deep into Yang Qi and understand the truth of why he had advanced so quickly.

Before, she had taken him to be little more than a talented commoner who would never go very far no matter how hard he worked. How could she have ever guessed that he would actually reach the Lifeseizing level? He was standing out as conspicuously brilliant, which made him a major threat to her.

As for Gu Fenxian, she knew full well that he was one of the top talents in the Crown Prince Society. He had reached the Lifeseizing level ten years ago, and was already a Secondary Lifeseizer. Despite that, Yang Qi had defeated him, and forced him to use his Five Volumes of Immortal Immolation, a consummate energy art. It was no trivial matter, and Yun Hailan knew that things couldn’t go on this way.

“This has to stop,” she said coolly. It was difficult to tell whether she meant Yang Qi, or herself.

Even as Gu Fenxian prepared to unleash his Painting of Immortal Immolation, one of the elders from the Academy of Sage Studies waved his finger, causing a razor-sharp sword to appear.

“Enough!”

RIIIIP!

The Painting of Immortal Immolation collapsed, and the resulting true energy returned to Gu Fenxian, defeated by only one move from this old man.

The mere sight of it left Yang Qi shaken.

“Elder War-Soldier!”

“Elder War-Soldier, sir, did you have something you wanted to say?”

Shocked that an elder had interfered, Gu Fenxian’s fellows all began to urge him to calm down.

“Gu Fenxian, now that Elder War-Soldier has intervened, you’d better not use any more energy arts. Considering this punk barged into the Academy of Sage Studies, Elder War-Soldier probably wants to punish him. There’s no more need for the Crown Prince Society to step in.”

Obviously, this elder had a very high standing in the Demi-Immortal Institute, to the point where Lifeseizers from the Crown Prince Society wouldn't dare to defy him.

‘That was some incredible sword energy,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘I wonder how many times he’s seized life from heaven. If he went all out to attack me, would I be able to defend myself?’

Although Yang Qi’s energy arts were strong, he was still relatively inexperienced, and thus had no way to assess Elder War-Soldier’s level in detail.

“Silence!” Elder War-Soldier said. Looking around at the students from the Crown Prince Society, he continued, “Calm down, all of you. Today's formalities end here.” Then he looked at Yang Qi. “What’s your name?”

“Elder War-Soldier, I am Yang Qi,” he said respectfully. “I just reached the Lifeseizing level, and came to take the test and apply to be an elite student.”

“I see. Well, you definitely have the power of a Lifeseizer. That was the Invincible King’s Fist, correct? You’ve got some talent in you to be able to use an incomplete version of the technique to unleash the power you just did. What do the rest of you think?” Elder War-Soldier turned to look at the other elders.

One of those elders rose to his feet. “You’re absolutely right, Elder War-Soldier. I was watching this kid closely just now, and he definitely has a Lifeseizer cultivation base. No one can call that into question. However, according to our rules, we still need to administer the test.

“Elder War-Hero. Elder War-Power. Elder War-Gallant. Why don’t the four of us inspect the boy’s sea of energy?”

The other elders nodded and rose to their feet.

WHIZZZ!

Gentle energy streamed out of their hands, heading directly toward Yang Qi.

He did nothing to resist, and in fact, dissipated his defensive true energy and allowed their power to enter his meridians. He knew that passing this test was the only way that the Demi-Immortal Institute would permit him to officially become an elite student, and thus join the upper echelons.

Now was the moment of truth: would the Devil-God Seal work?

There were five grand elders present. The highest ranking among them was Elder War-Soldier, and after him were Elder War-Glory, Elder War-Hero, Elder War-Power and Elder War-Gallant.

These five elders ran the Academy of Sage Studies, and were in fact vice-administrators in the institute. Most major decisions were made by them. As for the head administrator himself, Elder War-Sage, he spent most of his time in seclusion, seeking enlightenment. He hadn’t even been seen in the last hundred years.

These five elders sent their power coursing into Yang Qi’s meridians, all the way into his sea of energy, where they could see the true energy of both the Invincible King’s Fist and the Golden Bell Rampart. As for the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, it was tightly sealed up, as well as the Four Seasons Swordplay, making it impossible for them to even notice.

After closely examining the true energy, the five streams of energy did another inspection of Yang Qi’s meridians before moving on to his head, as well as his acupoints.

Finally, the energy settled in his forehead.

Of course, Yang Qi was immediately concerned that the five elders might notice the golden imp.

But after a moment passed, his fears were proved unfounded, as the elders noticed nothing unusual.

It was almost as if the imp weren’t real, and existed in an illusory world, to appear only when it wished.

“Very well,” Elder War-Soldier said. The five elders retracted their true energy. “You pass, Yang Qi. You have no heterogeneous true energy in you, only energy from traditional consummate disciplines and first-class energy arts. To have practiced cultivation to this level shows how talented you are. We all agree that you should be promoted to elite student.”

“Awesome!” Outside, Li He and the others heard the exchange inside, and couldn’t help but cry out in excitement. There was no going back now; Yang Qi was an elite student, and nothing could change that.

“Any student who becomes a Lifeseizer, and also passes the test to prove no connection to deadly devil arts or forbidden techniques, can become an elite student,” Elder War-Soldier explained. “Let the promotion ceremony for Yun Hailan and Yang Qi be held in unison. Men!”

“Sir!” shouted a handful of giants, who strode forward and knelt in front of Elder War-Soldier. “Go fetch two sets of elite student uniforms from the storerooms, plus identity medallions.”

“Yes sir!” Moments later, the giants came hurrying back with the uniforms and identity medallions. Yang Qi tossed the uniform on, which instantly made him look more dignified than before.

“And now, offer three sets of three kowtows to the successive generations of patriarchs of the Demi-Immortal Institute and the Academy of Sage Studies.”

Yang Qi looked deeper into the Academy of Sage Studies and saw portraits of more than ten individuals. Each of them looked like transcendent beings, like rising suns, gods, or immortals. They looked ready to spring into action at any moment, and yet completely at ease. At the same time, they were austere, like emperors or saints.

Clearly, these were portraits of the generations of powerful individuals who had led the institute throughout the years.

The last portrait featured the current chancellor of the institute, a young man in yellow garments, with a scroll in one hand and a sword sheathed at his side. He was clearly extraordinary, and yet his eyes seemed touched by sorrow, as though he was worried about the difficulties faced by the common people. He wasn’t looking at the scroll in his hand, but rather, at the heavens above, as if he longed to bring peace to all creation.

Chapter 95: Becoming an Elite Student

Yang Qi looked away from the picture of the chancellor and shifted his gaze to Yun Hailan. Although her face was expressionless, he knew that her heart abounded with all sorts of sinister schemes and plots.

Yang Qi’s cultivation base had reached a profound level in which he was fairly certain he could sense danger. And right now, he knew that Yun Hailan was already completely fed up with him. There was no doubt in his mind that she was already contemplating ways to get rid of him.

Originally, this should have been a very important day for her, a day in which she could bask in her glory, and be cheered by the students from the Crown Prince Society. And yet, her triumphant rise to the elite student level had been completely ruined by Yang Qi.

If it had been some random person who accidentally interfered, it wouldn’t have been as big of a deal. But Yang Qi was someone she had personally toyed with in the past.

‘I don’t care how you plot against me. Like the old saying goes: When soldiers come, send a general to stop them. When flood waters come, use earth to block them. I’ll adopt whatever measures are appropriate to the situation. In the end, it will all come down to who is stronger.’ He chuckled coldly in his heart. ‘Chu Tiange is dead, and when the time comes, I’ll make my move, and make sure you end up just like him.’

“Three sets of three kowtows! Bow to the patriarchs!”

Both Yun Hailan and Yang Qi quickly dropped to their knees and offered three sets of three kowtows. After that, they lit incense, and went about the various other formalities.

The audience looked on in complete and utter silence.

This was a formal session of obeisance to the patriarchs, and anyone who dared to disturb the peace would be immediately imprisoned. Although the students from the Crown Prince Society were extremely displeased with Yang Qi, there was no way they would dare to violate the institute's rules to do anything about it right now.

After the kowtows and other formalities were finished, the five elders nodded. Bells rang out twice, drifting far and wide in the institute, announcing that two students had been promoted.

“The ceremony is concluded!” Elder War-Soldier said. “You are now officially elite students of the institute. You will be given your own temple in which to practice your cultivation. You are also free to recruit followers and establish your own societies, all for the sake of serving the institute and promoting peace in heaven and earth. Remember, our institute is devoted to bringing peace, prosperity, and health to the common people. Any time an opportunity presents itself to further that cause, you are expected to drop what you're doing and help. If you do, the institute will take good care of you. All students of the Demi-Immortal Institute have a responsibility to rid the world of devils and demons, to punish those who abuse power, and keep the commoners safe.”

“Yes sir!” Yang Qi replied, struck by the righteous and orthodox nature of the words. The Demi-Immortal Institute was devoted to morality and ethics, as well as peace. It was intended to be a just and righteous organization, the likes other smaller sects and groups couldn’t possibly match up to.

Now that the ceremony was over, Yun Hailan gave a final glance to the five elders and said, “If we're done, I’ll take my leave.”

As she turned away, she looked at Yang Qi, cold laughter in her eyes that seemed to say: Let’s wait and see what happens in the end!

Yang Qi looked back at her, and his unsaid words were just as clear. I’ll be waiting.

Their gazes were only locked for a moment before they parted, and Yun Hailan left, escorted like a celebrity by the members of the Crown Prince Society. Li He and the others hurried over to Yang Qi, who people now looked at very differently than before. The envy and jealousy in their eyes were clear. And the attitude of the young woman in the green garment had completely changed. Walking over awkwardly, she said, “Elder Brother Yang Qi, I know I offended you just now. I hope you’re a believer in the adage a great man does not remember a petty person’s trespasses.”

“Oh?” Yang Qi looked over at her and was suddenly acutely aware of his change in status. “Don't worry about it, I’m not going to cause problems for you. Carry on.”

“Many thanks, Elder Brother, many thanks,” she said happily, before hurrying away.

Nearly bursting with excitement, Li He said, “Yang Qi, now you can go to the College of Elite Students, where you’ll have an energy formation of the dao of monarchs. Your cultivation is going to progress even more quickly than before. And you can also learn about the various daos of spell formations. Soon, you’ll be able to set up grand spell formations of your own.”

“It goes without saying that I’ll figure out how to set up energy formations for you,” Yang Qi replied. “We need to get your cultivation bases stronger as quickly as possible. The sooner you reach the Lifeseizing level the better. I've offended the Crown Prince Society and Yun Hailan, and now I've dragged you all into it. I'm going to do everything I can to make sure all of you stay safe.” Yang Qi knew that Yun Hailan would definitely harm his friends if she felt it would advance her purposes, and in fact, he was also fairly certain it wouldn’t be long before she made a move on the Yang Clan in Yanhaven.

Although the Yang Clan controlled Yanhaven now, they weren’t much when compared to the powerful Yun Hailan and the Crown Prince society. As for what exactly to do about the situation, he needed to put more thought into it.

Right now, the most important task at hand was to get his four brothers into the Lifeseizing level. With them as elite students, and with the backing of their clans, they would be extremely influential, and would be of vital importance in protecting Yanhaven.

“Li He, use your powers within your clan to send word to Yanhaven. Let them know I've reached the Lifeseizing level and am now an elite student.”

“Sure thing!” Li He said. He could already tell what Yang Qi was thinking. Although Yanhaven was currently impregnable to most of its current enemies, there were plenty of powerful individuals who could still cause trouble for them. At the very most, the Yang Clan was experiencing a temporary respite from danger.

“Come on,” Yang Qi said with the wave of his hand. “I’ll take you into the College of Elite Students to look around.”

In the blink of an eye, ten days passed.

The incident between Yang Qi and the Crown Prince Society was the talk of the institute. Everyone assumed that the Crown Prince Society would start causing problems for Yang Qi, and yet, before long, the waves died down, and nothing happened. However, people in the know were aware that it was only the calm before the storm.

Yang Qi now had a castle-like temple in the College of Elite Students, just like Yang Susu. It was his own official permanent residence, complete with an energy formation of the dao of monarchs.

During the ten days that passed, he focused heavily on cultivation, both on coming to a deeper understanding of his abilities as a Lifeseizer, and also on his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.

Every few days, he would go help Li He and the others fortify their spell formations to further their cultivation. He also spent time attending classes in the institute. The elders and professors spoke on a variety of topics such as astronomy, geography, medicinal pills, vital energy, morality, history, meridians, acupoints, magical treasures, equipment forging, and more.

Being an elite student came with a lot of privileges, such as being able to attend class for free. Freshman students, outer campus students, and even inner campus students all had to spend merit points to do so.

Elite students were also provided with an abundance of resources.

For example, his temple came complete with giant servants who came in regularly to tidy and clean the place. Not only was he able to live like a prince, he was also able to focus more fully on cultivation.

Because of all that, he simply focused on getting stronger, and waiting for Yun Hailan and the Crown Prince Society to make their move.

At the same time, he kept an ear out for news about his Aunt Susu.

After acquiring the Sage Devil Painting, she had sought out her master, and then went into a session of secluded cultivation, with her goal being to achieve Secondary or perhaps even Tertiary Lifeseizing. However, after months with no news, Yang Qi was starting to get nervous about the situation.

Yang Qi was now no less powerful than Yang Susu, and in fact, he had surpassed her. That meant that he could definitely be of help to her, except for the fact that he had no idea where she was.

Meanwhile, far, far away from the Demi-Immortal Institute in Yanhaven, Yang Zhan was contemplating how to manage clan affairs, and push the clan to further glory. Now that Yanhaven belonged to the Yang Clan, he was the new city magistrate.

The Yang Clan had occupied the city magistrate’s mansion that had once belonged to Yan Gufeng, and had earned the allegiance of the millions of residents of the city, as well as the support of the other rich and powerful clans.

Yang Zhan was at the peak of the Master of Energy level, and Yang Yunchong and Yang Hualong were now both Masters of Energy.

Yang Qi had acquired all sorts of miraculous medicinal pills from the vampire brigands, such as the Golden Nine Transformations Pills. All of them were astronomically valuable, but he had sent them to his father and brothers, which had pushed their cultivation forward rapidly.

They were now the top figures in the Yang Clan.

Yang Zhan had the power of his airmastery plant, the Four Seasons Swordplay, and the Chiliocosm Mirror. With all of that, it seemed very likely that he would reach the Lifeseizing level soon. He wasn’t just the top expert in the Yang Clan, he was the most powerful individual in Yanhaven.

Not even four or five Masters of Energy working together would be a match for him.

Deep in the city magistrate’s mansion, in a large meeting hall, he was currently holding an important meeting.

Present were the clan lords from countless clans that existed within the five-hundred-kilometer jurisdiction of Yanhaven.

The Chen Clan had been exterminated, and the Yan Clan had been driven out. But there were still the Xu Clan, Wang Clan, Kang Clan, Chuan Clan, and more, dozens of rich and powerful clans.

“Greetings, gentlemen!” Yang Zhan said, causing profound silence to fall over the hall. No one knew how Yang Zhan had pulled it off, but he had acquired the assistance of thirty Masters of Energy, and hundreds of eighth phase experts. It was with that force that he had defeated the Yan Clan and became the new city magistrate. The spectacular battle which had been fought was still vivid in the minds of everyone present.

Yan Gufeng had been in the possession of an incredible thumb-ring that doubled his reserve of true energy, and yet despite that, had still been defeated by Yang Zhan.

That moment ensured that Yang Zhan would henceforth be the most respected person in the city.

Looking around at the assembled clan lords, Yang Zhan nodded and said, “We are in a bit of a strange situation. The time has come for all the aristocratic clans in Yanhaven to unite and work together. We can no longer be constantly bickering and at odds. Therefore, I have decided to establish a formal royal court. I will be the king, and you aristocratic clans will be appointed as vassals and government ministers. We need to discuss exactly how to administer affairs in the five-hundred-kilometer region surrounding Yanhaven. Gentlemen, do any of you have any good suggestions?”

His words broke the silence like a boulder dropping onto the surface of a placid lake.

“Impossible,” one of the clan lords said, rising to his feet. “City Magistrate Yang, you want our clans to be government ministers? You think we’ll just give you life-or-death power over us?”

Chapter 96: Uniting Yanhaven

It was no surprise that the aristocratic clans would be unhappy about Yang Zhan calling himself a king and appointing them all as vassals and ministers.

By doing that, they would be acknowledging that the Yang Clan was superior to them, and could even execute them if they wanted.

Furthermore, the clans’ military forces would be under the control of the Yang Clan. And the new royal court would control all of the clans’ income, provisions, weapons, medicinal pills, and the like. They would also appoint and dispatch officials to oversee the lands.

In the past, the clans controlled their own territory, and could do whatever they wanted therein. At that time, they were like emperors unto their own. But now, they were being told to be part of a royal court.

The Sage Ancestor Dynasty had little real power, and was also on the decline. City magistrates throughout the Rich-Lush Continent, as well as the various powerful clans, were all independent. Some were declaring their cities to be nations, and setting up their own governments.

And at long last, that was happening here in Yanhaven with the Yang Clan.

The Yan Clan had also attempted such a thing, but had been defeated and driven away.

Now the other clans were being asked to participate in the Yang Clan’s arrangement of military and civil officialdom. Without such a formal hierarchy, there would be little point to ‘establishing’ a nation. Unless the clans agreed to follow governmental decrees, chaos would ensue.

If other powerful forces invaded at that time, the aristocratic clans would be a major weakness.

But, with the clans serving as officials and ministers, with law in place, and with a standing army ready to fight, then it would be a very different story. The newly founded State of Yang would immediately be ten times as powerful as before.

Unfortunately, founding a new nation was no easy task, and the powerful clans would not give in easily.

When Yang Zhan saw that the clan lords were offering such staunch resistance, he sighed inwardly. He had known all along that something like this would happen. After all, if Yan Gufeng had been the one to make an announcement like this, he would have fought back just as fiercely.

“City Magistrate Yang,” one of the clan lords said passionately, “it’s my duty to follow you as a city magistrate. But do you really think you can just declare yourself king over all of us and confiscate our belongings and property? You might as well just execute us all! We absolutely do not agree. This crosses the line! The aristocratic clans will pay you tribute, but will not become your state officials. There is absolutely, positively no way we will give you the power of life or death over us.”

“That’s right, City Magistrate Yang. Your son might be a student at the Demi-Immortal Institute, but our Bai Clan has the backing of the House of the White Dragon. If you push things too far, you’ll be signing your own death warrant!”

“Exactly. If you want to found your own nation, that means you’re our enemy! Besides, what makes you think the Yang Clan can even hold on to the position of city magistrate?!”

“Hmph! Back when the Yan Clan was planning this sort of thing, we didn't do anything. And we also didn't do anything when your Yang Clan routed the Yan Clan. But don’t think that we’ll let you just run amok!”

“No matter what happens, we're not going to let the Yang Clan gain any more power. Found a nation? Really?”

The clan lords were all talking at the same time, and their opposition only seemed to grow stronger by the moment.

In fact, some of the individuals present, chief elders who were Masters of Energy, began to secretly circulate their energy in preparation to attack.

Yang Yunchong and Yang Hualong were both starting to sweat a bit at the sight of it all.

Back when they had fought the Yan Clan, they had more than thirty Masters of Energy on their side, plus over a hundred eighth phase experts. Afterward, the State of Yun had stopped expanding territory, and all those experts had returned home. If all of these aristocratic clans joined forces against them now, there was no way they could fight back.

“Well, what are you going to do?” Yang Zhan said coolly. “Don’t tell me you want to maintain the status quo. If we do, and someone invades us, we’ll all end up dead. Even our ancestral shrines will be destroyed.”

One of the chief elders rose to his feet and said, “If there’s an invasion, we can join forces to fight back. But founding a nation means stripping us of our power, and we’d rather die than let that happen. We refuse to accept such an arrangement.”

As the arguing in the hall grew more heated, a whooshing sound could be heard outside the city magistrate’s mansion.

Shocked, the clan lords and chief elders rushed out to see a host of men dressed in black garments, with black masks on their faces.

These men were all Masters of Energy, and from the way they looked at the clan lords and chief elders, they clearly viewed them as nothing more than country yokels.

These were experts from the Sage Ancestor Dynasty’s Capital City, a place that Yanhaven couldn’t even compare to.

Despite that, when they finally caught sight of Yang Zhan, the respect in their eyes was clear for all to see.

One of the black-garbed men tore the mask off his face, stepped forward, and said, “City Magistrate Yang, please, allow me to offer greetings.”

Yang Zhan recognized this man. He was one of the Masters of Energy who had been sent to help deal with the Yan Clan and the State of Yun, an expert from the Hua Clan.

“Well,” he said, “if it isn’t the Goldstone Soulcatcher, Mr. Hua Gang.”

The Hua Clan was a very domineering force back in Capital City, and Yang Qi’s sworn brother Hua Yinhu was a young lord from that very clan. As for this Hua Gang, he was a mere servant from that clan. Despite his status, he was a Master of Energy!

“Why exactly have you come today, Mr. Hua Gang?” Yang Zhan asked, clearly a bit surprised.

“Why, to offer my congratulations, of course, City Magistrate Yang.” With that, he bowed formally at the waist, accompanied by all the other Masters of Energy who had come with him.

Stunned, Yang Zhan said, “P-please, none of that! How could I accept such treatment as this?” He was truly confused as to why these people from Capital City would be acting with such courtesy.

Hua Gang rushed forward to prevent Yang Zhan from bowing in return.

“It’s only natural for a father to derive glory from the accomplishments of his son,” he said. “Last month, your son Yang Qi reached the Lifeseizing level, making him one of the top experts in the land. Furthermore, the Demi-Immortal Institute recognized his accomplishment, tested him, and deemed him fit to become an elite student. Young Lord Hua Yinhu from our Hua Clan is the sworn brother of Yang Qi, and he asked us to come bring the news.”

“What?” Yang Zhan said, so excited that his knees began to tremble. “What did you just say? Qi’er reached the Lifeseizing level and became an elite student?!”

Although he had long since known that Yang Qi had come across some sort of miraculous fortune, and had surpassed him in cultivation, this good news was so shocking that he couldn’t hide his delight.

As for the chief elders and clan lords present, they felt like they were being struck by lightning.

‘What? Lifeseizer? Elite student…?’ That was what everyone was thinking. Perhaps they didn't know what it meant to be an elite student in the Demi-Immortal Institute, but they definitely knew what the Lifeseizing level was. As far as they were concerned, Lifeseizers were invincible gods, the type of individuals they couldn’t possibly move against. Lifeseizers could destroy cities and exterminate entire armies.

“It’s absolutely true,” Hua Gang continued. “It won’t be long before the Sage Ancestor Dynasty hears of the matter, and issues an official proclamation about the matter. In any case, our clans were notified early, and came here to deliver the news.” Gesturing at the men behind him, he continued, “Our group represents the Hua, Li, He, and Liang Clans. Not only have we brought letters of congratulations, we also have a few meager gifts. Brother Yang Zhan, please, do accept them. Oh, another thing. The clan lords of our respective clans told us to follow any orders you might give us now that we're here.”

“That’s right,” said another of the black-garbed men. “Young Lord Yang Qi has provided help to the young lords of our own clans, and hopes to propel them all to the Lifeseizing level. If the matter is a success, then all of our clans will owe the Yang Clan a big debt. Therefore, we will do everything we can to make sure your clan is the most domineering force in these parts.”

“Heaven is showering the Yang Clan with blessings….” Yang Zhan murmured.

At this point, Clan Lord Wang stepped forward, dropped to one knee, and saluted Yang Zhan formally. “The Wang Clan is absolutely behind your effort to found a nation.”

‘Dammit, Clan Lord Wang sure reacted quickly. Who could have predicted that?’ That was what the other dissenting clan lords and chief elders were all thinking. At this point, all of them knew that if they didn’t submit to Yang Zhan, it would mean disaster for them, and were cursing Clan Lord Wang for seizing the spotlight. Without hesitation, they all began to rush forward and kneel.

Moments ago, they had been vehemently opposing Yang Zhan, but now they were acting as meekly as sheep.

That was the result of the news of Yang Qi reaching the Lifeseizing level.

After all, a single Lifeseizer could destroy their clans as easily as blowing away some dust.

Some Masters of Energy would work for a hundred years without successfully being able to reach that level.

“Very well, gentlemen,” Yang Zhan said. “Since all of you are willing to acknowledge me as your king, I accept. And considering you're all here, let’s discuss the important matters of establishing the civil and military officialdom, army structure, finances, land ownership and the like.”

Another month went by as summer approached and the lands began to heat up. Yang Qi stood atop the roof of his temple, enjoying the warm breeze. In his hands was a letter from his father, detailing events in Yanhaven over the past month. Yang Zhan had declared himself king, and had unified the aristocratic clans under his leadership.

Everything for five hundred kilometers surrounding Yanhaven was now controlled by him, including all of the various cities, towns, villages and hamlets.

According to the letter, Yang Zhan planned to formally declare the founding of a nation in a few months, and was interested in Yang Qi’s opinion about what to name it.

The end of the letter contained something else very important, secret matters regarding Yang Qi’s mother that Yang Zhan had long promised to reveal.

Qi’er, as you know, your mother comes from the holy land of the Demonfolk, the Hanging Mountain, which is a divine location beyond the heavens. Your mother is no ordinary person there. She is a holy daughter of the Demonfolk, and truth be told, I don’t even know her true name. I only know her nickname, Greensura. Supposedly, she was connected to me by destiny. I’ll never forget the words she spoke the day we left. ‘The day you become the ruler of the Rich-Lush Continent is the day we will meet again’. For years, I assumed we would never see each other again. But with a son like you, perhaps there’s hope….

Chapter 97: Energy Formation Drill

Yang Qi looked down at the hand-written letter from his father. Heart pounding, he murmured, “My mother's nickname is Greensura?”

Most shocking of all was the last line that mentioned being the ruler of the entire Rich-Lush Continent. A host of feelings rose up in Yang Qi’s heart. Only an extraordinary person could possibly rule the entire Rich-Lush Continent. Right now, that ruler was the emperor of the Sage Ancestor Dynasty.

Although the dynasty was on the decline, there was still an emperor who had occupied the throne for more than a thousand years already. Although he rarely made public appearances, and left most affairs of state to the imperial princes to handle, the dynasty was still widely respected and feared.

The emperor’s cultivation base was mysterious and unfathomable, although, it was known that it had already been a thousand years since he became a Legendary.

Considering how much time had passed since then, it was impossible to say his current level. Perhaps he had gone beyond the Legendary level, and had surpassed the mortal and entered the saintly. For all anyone knew, he was in the Great Sage level or even higher.

Considering how much Yang Qi had progressed in cultivation, he already knew that after the Lifeseizing level was the Legendary level. Although he wasn’t sure how many sub-levels were in that level, he did know that progressing through them was incredibly difficult.

Beyond Legendaries were the Great Sages, invincible individuals who were essentially saints, and were powerful beyond imagination. In the distant past, when the Demonfolk ran rampant, some of their most powerful experts reached the Great Sage level and left the world to roam space-time.

As for what lay beyond it, Yang Qi wasn't sure.

In any case, if someone wanted to become the ruler of the entire Rich-Lush Continent, they would definitely have to wipe out the Sage Ancestor Dynasty and execute its emperor.

And that meant that such an individual would definitely need to be as strong as one of those Great Sages from the distant past.

‘Who exactly is my mother? She must be very important if the prerequisite to see her is to be the ruler of this entire continent. How did she end up involved with father? In terms of status, the two of them are about as different as heaven and earth! Well, once my cultivation base is high enough, I’ll go to the Hanging Mountain and ask her myself.’ Filled with more questions than answers, Yang Qi waved his hand, causing the letter to burst into flames.

Because of the important secrets it contained, Yang Zhan had specifically directed him to dispose of it after reading it.

Calming himself, Yang Qi looked out at the beautiful scenery which surrounded his temple, as well as the abundant spirit energy. In the middle of the temple was the energy formation of the dao of monarchs, which he found to be particularly intriguing.

It was a formation created out of pure energy, designed to temper the physical body, strengthen the cultivation base, improve the meridians, and build up the energy of the dao of monarchs.

Remaining in the formation for long periods of time could even affect one’s personality and thoughts, causing one to think like a monarch. It could make one’s thoughts more clear, one’s vision more expansive, and could help a person to become a better leader.

Thus were the marvelous abilities of an energy formation of the dao of monarchs.

Unfortunately, ordinary Lifeseizers would be incapable of putting such a formation together. Besides, they required massive amounts of resources and true energy to construct.

Despite two months of intensive study, Yang Qi only had a vague understanding of how they were made.

He had attended many classes regarding spell formations, and thus knew much more about them than he had in the past. For example, he knew that many energy arts could be used in conjunction with spell formations. That included the Four Seasons Swordplay, which he could now use in a way that was ten times as powerful as the art normally was.

In the two months since he had become an elite student, Yang Qi had progressed rapidly.

He knew ten times as much as he had in the past, perhaps even a hundred.

And of course, his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth was growing even more refined. In fact, he was fairly certain that he would soon have enough life force quintessence built up to achieve Secondary Lifeseizing.

When working on his cultivation in the energy formation of the dao of monarchs, he could sense subterranean spirit lodes. When it came to the so-called spirit energy of heaven and earth, heaven had the free-flowing spirit energy, and the earth had spirit lodes. Usually, locations with spirit lodes were the best place to practice cultivation, build mansion grottos, and circulate energy.

And of course, the Demi-Immortal Institute in general was built in the best location possible. It was located in the very middle of the Rich-Lush Continent, on top of an enormous spirit lode. And it was that very energy that Yang Qi could sense below him.

On a few occasions, he had attempted to tap into it, but it was too powerful, and eventually, he was forced to give up.

After all, that was why the College of Elite Students had energy formations of the dao of monarchs to begin with. Unfortunately, he wasn’t allowed to bring his four friends in to use the formation. If he did, and it were found out, he would be severely punished.

Therefore, he was doing his research into spell formations in the hope of setting up small-scale versions for them on the outside. If they had energy formations of the dao of monarchs, they would definitely advance much more rapidly, and would soon be able to reach the Lifeseizing level themselves.

‘The true essence of the dao of monarchs, encapsulated eternally in a spell formation.’

After studying the spell formation for a bit longer, he suddenly produced a handful of white demon cores from his thumb-ring. Crushing them, he took the resulting white energy flow and sent it swirling into a very specific pattern.

He did not seal the energy, but let it continue to flow. At its current level, it was almost like the power of a dozen Lifeseizers all working together, causing powerful winds to scream through Yang Qi’s temple.

Wham! Bam!

Just like that, a small version of an energy formation of the dao of monarchs took shape, the result of Yang Qi’s two months of research into spell formations.

Spell formations could be used at any time. In fact, some spell formation masters could create spell formation cycles that could be placed into the internal organs, muscles, and bones, to make themselves far stronger than ordinary.

Furthermore, demon cores were often used in formation deployment.

The cores he had just used came from demonlings in the Master of Energy level, which he had acquired from the treasure stores of the vampire brigands.

Almost immediately, the small spell formation began to absorb the local energy of the dao of monarchs.

Besides, Yang Qi could sense that it was also drawing upon the vital energy from the subterranean energy lodes.

‘Most Lifeseizers cannot control the vital energy in the subterranean spirit lodes. In fact, their true energy would be completely destroyed by it. But with my Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, I have unique control over the ground beneath my feet. Now, I can actually connect to the subterranean spirit lodes. This technique makes me like the lord of earth!’

As he drew upon the quintessence of his energy arts, true energy gathered above his head in the shape of a godmammoth, whose trunk then slammed into the ground and immediately connected to the spirit lode beneath. If other top experts in the institute could see what was happening, they would be completely shocked. As for the spirit energy that flowed up, it was almost pure white, indicating how incredibly strong it was.

“The lord of the earth!”

The words actually echoed out from the true energy godmammoth itself.

The lord of hell would naturally be the lord of the earth.

The pure-white subterranean spirit energy flowed into the energy formation of the dao of monarchs, causing the smaller formation Yang Qi had created to grow larger, until it actually contained the entire true energy godmammoth.

‘For now, I can store the formation in my thumb-ring.’

The dimension inside his thumb-ring was definitely big enough to contain the formation, and once inside, it wouldn’t dissipate. In contrast, if he left it in his room and didn’t watch over it constantly, it would gradually fade away. And making another one would be quite troublesome.

Even inside the ring, it still continued to absorb the subterranean vital energy and convert it into the energy of the dao of monarchs.

‘If I leave it in there for too long, it might develop a spirit of its own. I'd better get it to Li He and the others as soon as possible.’

Deactivating the larger spell formation in his room, he blurred into motion, heading out of the College of Elite Students and toward the Outer Campus.

Meanwhile, in another location in the College of Elite Students, someone watched as Yang Qi left.

The observer was none other than Gu Fenxian, who Yang Qi recently humiliated.

He was with several other elite students, all of them members of the Crown Prince Society. Considering the shifty glints in their eyes, it seemed they were hatching some scheme or another.

“We’ve been secretly watching Yang Qi for almost two months now, Gu Fenxian,” one of the students said. “Have you seen anything suspicious? I have this feeling that he’s actually a lot stronger than he’s letting on. He's definitely talented, so it wouldn’t be a bad thing to accept him into our Crown Prince Society. However, considering how many invitations he’s turned down from us over the past months, it seems he’s the ambitious type who doesn’t want to acknowledge allegiance to anyone. If he's going to cause problems for us in the future, the best thing would be to get rid of him now. The Crown Prince himself has taken a liking to Yun Hailan, and she hates Yang Qi to death. Why don't we just finish things now?”

“Get rid of him?” Gu Fenxian growled. “I doubt we could assassinate him. He's an elite student now, and the higher-ups in the institute are no fools. They would definitely suspect us right away. And the punishment for killing fellow students is severe. Even if the Crown Prince interfered, I’d bet they'd still cripple our martial arts. And that would be a fate worse than death.”

“Well, there’s no rush,” another student said. Eyes flickering with sinister light, he continued, “We’ll figure out something eventually. Students die all the time. There’s no way the institute investigates all of the deaths in detail, right? Why don’t we get someone else to do the dirty work? For example, the inter-institute martial arts competition is coming up. What if we got a student from one of the other institutes to do it for us?!”

“Good point. The Crown Prince Society has been in operation for years, and we have agents in all the other institutes. We should be able to arrange something like that easily….”

And thus, their discussion continued….

Chapter 98: Summoned by an Energy Crane

As soon as Yang Qi was out in the open, he could sense that numerous hostile gazes had locked onto him. ‘Must be the Crown Prince Society. They’re the only ones who have a beef with me.’

Furthermore, one of the gazes seemed to burn with fire that could immolate immortals.

Clearly, Gu Fenxian was not willing to let matters drop, and wanted revenge.

He came from an aristocratic clan, and was inherently petty and arrogant. His clan had once possessed an imperial-class energy art, and had produced many Legendaries. In fact, the founder of the clan had been a Great Sage. Because of that, Gu Fenxian had always felt superior, and was used to people acquiescing to him in all situations.

How could he not seek vengeance for the defeat he had suffered at the Academy of Sage Studies?

Yang Qi had no doubts in his mind that he would, and thus, was fully on guard.

For the entire two months that he had been an elite student, he had been waiting for the Crown Prince Society to do something against him, and it was for that reason that he hadn’t left the Demi-Immortal Institute. Instead, he focused on study and on spell formations. That way, when the time came to clash with the Crown Prince Society, he would be ready to show them how strong he truly was.

Now that he was in the College of Elite Students, he would eventually be able to reveal the true level of his energy arts and cultivation base.

It was a long-standing tradition in the institute to leave elite students alone. They were expected to harbor secrets, and not even the professors and elders in the institute were allowed to investigate such matters.

In fact, the longer one remained an elite student, the more secrets they were expected to keep.

Yang Qi was currently expecting to wait four or five years and do his best to stabilize his position. At that point, he wouldn’t need to hold back as much.

‘Hmph! If you didn’t have the Crown Prince Society to back you up, Yun Hailan, I would have already given you what you deserve. One of these days, my Sage Monarch Society will surpass the Crown Prince Society. Then you’ll see that all the power you’ve worked to accumulate is nothing more than a joke! And no matter how much you beg and plead, I won’t give you any second chances. No hope!’

As Yang Qi made his way to the Outer Campus, he kept his senses focused on whether or not he was being followed.

Given the level of his energy arts and cultivation base, he could tell if hostile gazes were locked onto him. Even if the people watching him remained in hiding, he would still detect their gazes.

After all, Gu Fenxian and his friends were no match for him in terms of energy arts. They were all Lifeseizers, but Yang Qi was dozens of times more powerful than them. Therefore, it was only natural that he would be able to detect them watching him.

However, Gu Fenxian was under the impression that Yang Qi had no idea about being surveilled. Little did he know that, not only was Yang Qi aware of his actions, he could also sense exactly where Gu Fenxian was, and also could hear what he was saying.

After confirming that he had lost them, Yang Qi entered the room where Li He and the others were working on their cultivation.

During the two months which had passed, all four of them had made significant progress.

They had all sorts of relevant resources stacked up around the room, such as spirit medicines, pill furnaces, and the like. These weren’t things provided by the institute, but rather, treasured items given them by their clans.

All four of them had taken time to return to their clans for assessment by their clan seniors. Considering their progress, their clans now had deep hope that they would reach the Lifeseizing level.

Unless the leadership in their clans were complete fools, they would definitely do everything they could to support such rising stars.

Of course, Yang Qi realized that news of him reaching the Lifeseizing level and becoming an elite student had been spread to his friends’ clans, and that they had sent expressions of goodwill to his father.

In fact, in his letter, his father had asked him to offer thanks to Li He and the others.

As of this point, they were all mutually benefiting from their various relationships.

That was one reason why Yang Qi had worked so hard to research energy formations of the dao of monarchs. If his friends could advance a bit further in their cultivation, it would make their alliance even stronger. If their group consisted of five elite students, then they might not be able to rival the Crown Prince Society, the Gentlemen’s Society, or the Divine Ability Society, but at least those societies would hesitate before causing trouble for them.

As soon as he entered the room, his friends’ eyes went wide at the obvious progress he had made.

“How has your cultivation gone in the past two months, Yang Qi?” Li He said.

“I finished creating an energy formation of the dao of monarchs. It's right here in my Heart of the Sea thumb-ring. Let’s set it up here, and the four of you can try it out. Let’s see how similar it is to the ones in the College of Elite Students. Afterwards, I'm hoping you can help me get it to Yanhaven so that my father and brothers can use it, and possibly some of the young talented ones in the clan.”

With that, Yang Qi waved his finger, pulling the spell formation out into the room.

Pure white spirit energy flowed through the air, looking almost like milk. Instantly, the spirit energy began to pour into his four friends.

Within that energy was the energy of the dao of monarchs, which purified their minds and hearts.

“It’s really an energy formation of the dao of monarchs!” Liang Dong exclaimed. “How did you make it, Yang Qi? Lots of students have tried to do this, but none of them ever succeeded. You need pure subterranean spirit energy to do so, and that stuff is wild and powerful. Not even Quaternary Lifeseizers would be able to extract it. But you did?”

The only explanation Yang Qi offered was a mysterious smile. Because of the way the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth let him control matters of the earth, he could do things that many top masters could not.

“That’s not important,” he said. “Come on, start with your cultivation. I’ll help out. Who knows, we might even be able to get Liang Dong into the Lifeseizing level right now.”

“Let’s do it!” They all sat down cross-legged and got to work.

Yang Qi sat in the middle, his hands flowing through the air as he sent streams of true energy into the milky-white spirit energy. Drawing out the true essence of the dao of monarchs, he turned the spirit energy into what looked like snakes that began to pour into his friends’ body.

Instantly, their bodies began to transform, all the way down to their bones. Their blood began to turn as white as the spiritual energy itself, and the power of their Cosmic Sunflare Sword began to build.

By this point, the four of them had abandoned the use of true energy to practice cultivation, and instead focused purely on the Cosmic Sunflare Sword. As such, whenever they used their sword energy, it pulsed with the sensation of the cosmos, and the heat of a flaring sun.

Cultivating this sword technique was very taxing on the body. Sword energy was inherently sharp, and would damage the meridians upon passing through them.

But now, with the help of Yang Qi’s energy formation of the dao of monarchs, and the milky white spirit energy that was coursing through their blood, their bodies were being remolded. Now, the sword energy of the Cosmic Sunflare Sword could move through them much more smoothly and quickly.

In its ultimate form, sword energy could rage to the heights of the sky, destroy vital energy, and use ability to seize life from the heavens.

As for Yang Qi, he had used raw power to vanquish the vital energy and seize life.

But ability was different from raw power. Ability was about sharpness and accuracy, and the skill to slice apart anything and everything. Raw power was just the ability to crush or destroy.

Ability was like an assassin, and raw power was like an emperor.

In the modern world, few people used raw power to try to seize life. After all, raw power was something that belonged to the devils of the distant past, and the legion of gods in heaven. It was almost profane for humans to attempt to use it.

Therefore, few people would ever do what Yang Qi did. Generally speaking, ability was the orthodox method among humans.

The entire group of four was completely focused on their cultivation. Although they didn't compare much at all to the other powerful organizations in the Demi-Immortal Institute, one day, they would be able to unleash their true power.

Before, the four of them would never have even been able to dream of using an energy formation of the dao of monarchs, and thus, would never have reached the Lifeseizing level.

Yang Qi was definitely a major outlier. He had overcome many dangerous situations, killed Chu Tiange, completed his Hellfire Crucible, and built up significant reserves before heading out onto the ocean to reach the Lifeseizing level.

For others, things could never go so smoothly.

For example, Yun Hailan only succeeded because she had attracted the attention of the legendary Crown Prince, who had bestowed her with Life Force Springwater.

WHOOSH!

Even as they worked on their cultivation, they all sensed something odd. Sure enough, it was possible to see a radiant light hovering outside of the window, which looked like a paper crane made of pure energy.

It was exquisite, and very lifelike, and seemed to be honed in on Yang Qi’s aura.

At the same time, Yang Qi could sense Yang Susu’s aura on it.

‘Aunt Susu is out of seclusion? She’s using that energy crane to let me know?’ He waved his hand, causing the window to open, and simultaneously sent out a manifestation of Humanoid True Energy to take control of the spell formation. Then, he leapt up and flew out the window.

Instantly, the energy crane flew some distance away, then turned and looked at him, as if waiting for him to follow.

Without any hesitation, he flew after the creature, passing through numerous buildings toward the depths of the institute.

**

Hundreds of kilometers inside the Demi-Immortal Institute, there were no temples and pagodas. Instead, there were mountains, wreathed with mist and covered with flowers and vegetation.

The mountains stretched out in all directions, too many of them to count, almost like the scales on a dragon.

This was a very significant part of the institute, the Heaven Lode Mountains. According to the legends, this had once been a so-called dragon lode in the Rich-Lush Continent. In primeval times it had been very mysterious, and also, very famous. Later, it came to be occupied by the Demi-Immortal Institute.

The highest level members lived here, including conclave students and holy neophytes.

“Is this where Aunt Susu has been working on her cultivation? It seems her master must be a very important person.” Yang Qi flew through the mountains, not daring to stray off the path led by the crane. Obviously, it was a dangerous location, filled with deadly spell formations and other things that could kill him instantly.

Chapter 99: Sun Moon Institute

The chirping and twittering of birds drifted about in the mountainous forests.

Beautiful flowers abounded, like brightly brocaded cloth. It all looked like a profoundly beautiful painting.

The colorful birds flitted about, and butterflies fluttered here and there. Some of the butterflies were enormous, and Yang Qi even spotted one that was the size of a human. As it flew through the air, pollen swirled off its wings, making it look almost unreal.

“That butterfly is a demon-spirit, a type of devilling with a Master of Energy cultivation base!”

The butterfly noticed Yang Qi, and flapped its wings, sending a stream of true energy toward him. However, as soon as it sensed his Lifeseizer aura, it retracted the energy, turned, and drifted away in the opposite direction.

Yang Qi smiled faintly. After all, these mountains were part of the Demi-Immortal Institute, and the devillings here wouldn’t randomly go around hurting people. Most of them were raised as pets by the experts who lived here.

Eventually, he found himself following the energy crane up a path lined with countless flowers.

Considering how complex the twists and turns were, Yang Qi got the feeling it was a spell formation, and that if he wasn’t following the crane, he would have been snared by it.

They were making their way toward the top of one particular mountain in the Heaven Lode Mountains, one that was completely covered with bright flowers.

From the look of it, those flowers would remain in bloom all year, no matter the weather. After all, this mountain was covered by a warm flow of energy from top to bottom. With it in place, the mountain would remain as warm as spring throughout the year.

As for the dirt, it was made up of millions of years’ worth of fallen flower petals, and thus, was both fragrant and inherently medicinal in quality.

Yang Qi took in the sights as he proceeded along, marveling at how impressive it was. Whoever had made this mountain clearly had energy arts that surpassed his in every way.

‘Don’t tell me this is really where Aunt Susu has been practicing cultivation. Did her master make this mountain? That energy crane definitely had Aunt Susu’s aura on it.’

He followed the crane for more than two hours as it led him higher and higher up the mountain, until the mists were so thick that sometimes it was difficult to see anything beyond ten paces.

Yang Qi actually had no idea where he was, and didn’t dare to fly up into the air to try to find out; he knew that he had to stick close to the crane.

All of a sudden, his eyes lit up as they emerged from the mists into bright sunshine. At this point, Yang Qi could tell that he was about halfway up the mountain, at an enormous stone platform.

It was almost like a public square, large enough to fit hundreds of thousands of people. At the far end was a mansion grotto, almost like a palace. However, it wasn't constructed on the surface of the mountain, but rather, carved directly into it.

The ground of the platform was sparkling and translucent, like porcelain, its surface filled with innumerable complex floral designs. With a single glance, it was obvious that it had been crafted with powerful energy arts.

Yang Qi couldn’t help but wonder what level of power it would take to create a palace like this out of a mountain.

There were quite a few people present, although they weren’t students from the Demi-Immortal Institute. The first thing that jumped out to Yang Qi was that their garments were embroidered with shining moons and blazing suns, as well as writing in an ancient script. Surprisingly, these were students from another of the ancient institutes in the Rich-Lush Continent, the Sun Moon Institute.

Furthermore, all of them were male.

Apparently, they had come to pay a formal visit. Even more noteworthy, they were all dignified and imposing, without a single one of them being a weakling. These were all elite students.

There were four institutes of learning in the Rich-Lush Continent: the Demi-Immortal Institute, True Dragon Institute, Sun Moon Institute and Sea God Institute.

Yan Gufeng’s daughter, Yan Feixia, was a student at the True Dragon Institute. Gu Che, who Yang Qi had killed, was from the Sea God Institute. But he had never met anyone from the Sun Moon Institute.

Some of the students caught sight of him walking up the path, and one of them shouted, “Stop right there!”

Whoosh. Whoosh.

Two of them burst into motion, flying over to block Yang Qi’s path.

“Who are you?” one of them said coldly. “This is Manyflowers Peak! Our Elder Brother is here on business, so don’t take a single step forward. Trespassing is not permitted!”

Yang Qi was not amused at all. This was Demi-Immortal Institute territory, and yet students from the Sun Moon Institute were trying to order him around? After looking the two students over, he frowned and said, “This is the Demi-Immortal Institute, and you're from another institute. You’ve got a lot of guts to go around blocking my path.”

“How impudent!” the second student growled. “What’s your name, criminal!? Tell me immediately so I can report you to the Demi-Immortal Institute elders. They’ll definitely punish you. Our Elder Brother is here to propose to Holy Daughter Manyflowers’ apprentice, Yang Susu! This could affect relations between our institutes at the highest level! How dare an insignificant runt like you cause a commotion at a time like this?”

Yang Qi’s heart thumped, and a grim expression overtook his face. “Propose? As in marriage?” Although he wasn’t sure why, rage was already burning inside of him. “Some punk from the Sun Moon Institute wants to propose to my Aunt Susu? What surprises me most is that he thinks he's worthy to do so!”

His words were so biting that the students from the Sun Moon Institute initially couldn’t believe what they were hearing, and didn’t know how to respond.

“What? What did you just say?”

“What gall!” another of the students shouted in fury. “Prepare to die!”

Suddenly, a fireball appeared in his hand, pulsing with destructive power that could put an end to anything and everything. And as the fireball rotated, it slowly began to morph into the shape of a saber.

However, Yang Qi didn't care what shape it took. Waving his finger, he sent a stream of sword energy out from the Cosmic Sunflare Sword, which he could now use openly.

However, this was no ordinary Cosmic Sunflare Sword. He had combined the technique with the Four Seasons Swordplay, and had added in elements based on his own enlightenment. The result, refined with his Hellfire Crucible, was a type of sword technique that no one could possibly recognize.

Essentially, it was a consummate discipline created by Yang Qi himself.

This sword technique contained the burning true energy of the Cosmic Sunflare Sword, as well as the numerous variations of spring, summer, autumn, and winter that came with the Four Seasons Swordplay. Life sprouted, lightning crashed, frost spread, and snow filled the sky.

Swish!

The other student's energy arts were quickly vanquished, and he was sent flying more than a thousand paces backward. There, he landed hard onto his back, having lost all face.

“Dammit!”

“I can’t believe he used such a vicious move!”

“What sword technique was that? How could it be so profound?”

“He actually attacked us? Surround him and kill him! He's an elite student here! This is open provocation! How dare he insult the dignity of the Sun Moon Institute?”

Instantly, several of the Sun Moon Institute students flew over and surrounded Yang Qi. Others flew over to help up their comrade who had just been defeated, sending true energy into him to heal his wounds.

Of the seven students facing Yang Qi, all were Lifeseizers, elite students of the Sun Moon Institute. As they stood in formation around him, swords bared, they seemed on the verge of unleashing a deadly attack.

Yang Qi stood there looking coldly at them; considering that he was in the Demi-Immortal Institute, he wasn’t afraid at all. Even if deadly fighting did break out, he clearly occupied the moral high ground.

When the other students saw the killing intent flickering in his eyes, they suddenly got the sensation they were facing some primeval beast.

At this point, a melodious voice rang out from within the palace. “Stay your hand! What do you people think you’re doing?”

Then, Yang Susu herself appeared.

The power radiating off of her was clear; Yang Qi could tell that she had advanced significantly since their previous meeting. Her true energy seemed three or four times stronger, and her life force seemed to have transformed into something completely different than before.

Clearly, she had used the Sage Devil Painting to reach Secondary Lifeseizing.

When she saw Yang Qi, her eyes flickered with delight, and she said, “Qi’er? What’s going on? Why are you arguing with the Sun Moon Institute students? I heard that you reached the Lifeseizing level two months ago and became an elite student. Unfortunately, I couldn’t emerge from seclusion, and had no way to congratulate you. I just came out of meditation two days ago, and sent that energy crane to notify you.”

“Aunt Susu, what's going on with these Sun Moon Institute students? They said an Elder Brother of theirs came to propose to you? And then they dared to block my path? This is the Demi-Immortal Institute, not the Sun Moon Institute. For them to treat an elite student like myself this way is an insult to our institute! Besides, who is this Elder Brother they’re talking about? Mind if I say hello to him? Is he superhuman or something? How dare he look down on the Demi-Immortal Institute so blatantly!”

“Qi’er….” Yang Susu could never have guessed that Yang Qi would say things like this, and leave the Sun Moon Institute students with no room to back down. Looking at Yang Qi, she was about to speak when, all of a sudden, a voice thundered out from the palace.

“Susu, is this the genius nephew you talked about? If he keeps acting this domineering, he's going to get himself killed. I can’t believe he picked a fight with our institute! How dare a puny elite student cause friction between our two institutes. Well, since he wants to say hello, then I’ll just drag him inside!”

WHIZZZ!

All of a sudden, a flow of energy erupted out, becoming a huge hand that began to drop toward Yang Qi.

Chapter 100: Wrecking the Proposal

Someone important was making a move!

The booming voice combined with the massive hand made Yang Qi feel like he was suffocating.

At play was an energy art that surpassed the level of any Lifeseizer he had ever encountered.

This person had clearly achieved multiple lifeseizings, and was on a similar level as the elders at the Academy of Sage Studies.

It was no wonder this person was so arrogant.

Despite that, Yang Qi didn’t show an ounce of fear. Laughing coldly, he said, “Go in and say hello? You think you qualify to be honored like that? Who are you trying to impress, anyway? My ass? If you want to propose to my Aunt Susu, you have to get past me first. If you can’t, then kindly screw the hell off.”

With that, Yang Qi stamped his foot onto the ground.

RUMBLE!

Countless streams of true energy erupted from his foot, which merged together above him into an enormous, ever-growing sphere.

“How utterly useless,” the voice said, booming even louder than before. Suddenly, an enormous pagoda of true energy appeared in the palm of the True Energy Megahand. It was nine stories tall, and pulsed with an aura that seemed capable of crushing any and all demon-devils.

Yang Susu recognized the technique immediately. “That’s the Profound Yellow Pagoda from the Great Emperor Energy Art! Longxuan Ye, if you dare to harm my nephew, then you and I are going to have a serious problem!”

“Don’t worry, Susu. I just need to teach this over-arrogant nephew of yours a bit of a lesson. If he goes around with his nose stuck in the air like this, he's going to lose his life eventually.” However, the true energy at play didn’t change at all, and in fact, the pagoda grew larger and larger, making it seems as though a great emperor were descending, causing the entire square to tremble and shake.

“Aunt Susu, this guy sure talks big. I'm afraid I have no choice but to destroy this supposed Profound Yellow Pagoda.” Yang Qi simply stood there looking like some sort of god as his sphere of true energy exploded, becoming millions upon millions of streams of sword energy that shot toward the pagoda.

“Eee?” the voice said, clearly shocked. “Not bad. Your sword technique has reached the point of perfection. Unfortunately, it’s still not enough to overcome me. This pagoda is powered by a great emperor!”

RUMBLE!

The massive pagoda descended, smashing into Yang Qi’s sword energy, causing it to shatter into countless fragments.

With every moment that passed, the pagoda grew larger and larger. It was now several meters tall, seemed just on the verge of completely crushing Yang Qi

Furthermore, it was now just barely possible to see what appeared to be some sort of god within it, formed from true energy, like a great emperor from the distant past, ready to guide the pagoda in crushing a host of wretch-devils. Boundless, majestic power caused a heavenly thrumming sound to fill the area.

Anyone could tell that this was a completely invincible attack.

After all, this was the legendary Great Emperor Energy Art, which was imperial-class. The Profound Yellow Pagoda was an aspect of the technique just like the Infernal Deity Spear was an aspect of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.

A sound like a massive, booming bell filled the square as Yang Qi looked up at the pagoda. Even the wind had been completely stilled.

There was no way that Yang Qi could evade this blow.

“Don’t worry about your nephew, Yang Susu. I won’t kill him. I’ll lock him in the Profound Yellow Pagoda for three days and three nights. Once he acknowledges how powerful I am, I’ll take him back to the Sun Moon Institute to offer a formal apology. After that, I’ll let him go. Very well, come back inside so we can continue to discuss the marriage proposal.”

Even as he spoke, the pagoda descended completely onto Yang Qi.

However, that was when something completely unexpected happened.

From within the yellow pagoda of true energy, Yang Qi’s voice emerged. “You’re Longxuan Ye, right? You think you’re going to imprison me for three days and three nights? Are you shitting me? Be destroyed!”

KABOOOOM!

Cracks spread out over the surface of the Profound Yellow Pagoda, and then Yang Qi burst out from inside, surging with so much power that no one could possibly do anything against him.

He had completely destroyed the pagoda!

The chaotic energy that was unleashed raged like tornadoes, slamming into some of the off-guard Sun Moon Institute students, provoking agonized shrieks as their skin was flayed from their bodies.

They were powerful Lifeseizers, but the conflict between Yang Qi and Longxuan Ye was beyond shocking. Furthermore, just when they had assumed everything was over, a massive shock wave roiled out, completely destroying their defensive true energy.

“What?” an angry voice growled. “You destroyed my pagoda?” At that point, a yellow blur of light shot out from the palace.

At long last, Longxuan Ye was appearing in person.

He wore garments as yellow as the moon, embroidered with five-clawed dragons, making him look like the picture of an imperial prince.

Not only did he thrum with extraordinary power, he actually looked like a great emperor from the heavens.

Completely ignoring Longxuan Ye, Yang Susu looked with delight at Yang Qi and said, “Qi’er? When did you get so strong?”

She knew that Longxuan Ye was well-known in the Sun Moon Institute for being extremely powerful. He was already at Tertiary Lifeseizing, and with his Great Emperor Energy Art, could easily kill other Lifeseizers of a similar level as himself. Considering that Yang Qi had just completely vanquished the Profound Yellow Pagoda, didn’t that indicate that he was at the same level as a Tertiary Lifeseizer?

‘My god, what good fortune did Qi’er encounter?’

Of course, Yang Susu had been aware that, even as a Master of Energy, Yang Qi had been able to tangle with Lifeseizers. But this was even more shocking than that. After all, the gap between Primary and Secondary Lifeseizers was massive, much less Tertiary.

“Not bad,” Longxuan Ye said, looking up at Yang Qi. “Not bad at all. I've never met a Primary Lifeseizer who can vanquish my Great Emperor Energy Art. That said, I'm tired of your showboating. I only used thirty percent of my true energy just now.”

“You think it would have made a difference if you used a hundred percent?” Yang Qi said coldly. “If you’ve got what it takes, why don’t we have a real competition?”

“Don’t do anything rash, Qi’er,” Yang Susu said.

“We can have a competition!” Longxuan Ye said, his expression tinged with killing intent. “As long as you don’t regret the outcome! However, not today. When the time comes for conflict between our two institutes, then you'd better not back down from the fight! Come on, everyone. Let’s go!”

With that, he flicked his sleeve and left with the other Sun Moon Institute students.

Having completely failed to deal with Yang Qi, he had lost so much face that he had no other choice but to leave. Furthermore, there was no way he could actually kill Yang Qi while on the grounds of the Demi-Immortal Institute.

After Longxuan Ye and the other students were gone, Yang Susu breathed a sigh of relief.

“What was that all about, Aunt Susu?” Yang Qi asked.

She shrugged. “I met Longxuan Ye once when I was out hunting demonlings. We joined forces for a while at the time, and afterward, he wouldn’t stop pestering me. Recently, he came to ask my master for my hand in marriage. Thankfully, I was in secluded meditation at the time, and didn’t have time to see him. But he stuck around all the way until now. Thankfully, you showed up and saved me a lot of hassle.”

“Next time I run into a guy like that, I’ll kill him,” Yang Qi growled. “By the way, did you finish with the Sage Devil Painting? Did you reach Secondary Lifeseizing?”

“I did, after gaining enlightenment of sages and devils! In fact, I'm just on the verge of Tertiary. Once I reach Tertiary Lifeseizing, then according to the rules of the institute, I can apply to be a conclave student. Actually, that Longxuan Ye just recently reached Tertiary Lifeseizing, which is why he came to propose marriage. Qi’er, you're simply terrifying! How could you possibly be strong enough to defeat someone like him?”

“If I go all out, then I could definitely defeat a Tertiary Lifeseizer. But please keep that a secret, Aunt Susu. It wouldn’t be good if word got out.”

“Of course. Eventually, when you’re strong enough, you’ll be able to use your energy arts publicly. By the way, you really need to find a master that you can rely on. That will make your position much more stable. My master is Holy Daughter Manyflowers, a grand elder in the institute. She should be coming out of secluded meditation very soon. Once she is, I’ll ask for her to introduce you to some potential masters. Considering your amazing energy arts and cultivation base, I’d imagine that countless elders would be willing to accept you.”

“Oh?” The idea of having a powerful expert as a master was quite intriguing, and would definitely bode well for the future.

At this point, Yang Susu led him into Manyflowers Palace, of which she was the current sole occupant. There was no one else on the entire mountain other than her and the various devillings.

Being a grand elder, Holy Daughter Manyflowers had a similar rank as War-Soldier and his brethren. Years ago, Yang Qi had been furious that someone had taken his Aunt Susu away from him. Later, his anger had cooled, and he had begun to grow curious to see what that person was like.

As it turned out, she valued silence, which was why she spent her time on a lonely mountain.

In fact, if she hadn’t been in seclusion, she would personally have driven away Longxuan Ye and the other students.

And the reason Longxuan Ye was so quick to make an escape was that he feared what might happen if she appeared.

Chapter 101: Holy Daughter Manyflowers

Atop Manyflowers Peak, two streams of sword energy slashed back and forth.

One was like a dragon, surrounded by the mysterious transformations of spring, summer, autumn, and winter. The four seasons. Occasionally, the sword energy would fall like rain, other times it would become like snowflakes, and other times it would crackle like lightning and thunder.

The other stream of energy was like the blossoming of countless flowers. There were peonies, hibiscuses, roses, lilies, orchids, and more…. The swirl of innumerable flower petals was filled with a profoundly threatening true energy.

The first stream of sword energy belonged to Yang Qi, and the second, his aunt, Yang Susu.

He was using the combined Cosmic Sunflare Sword and Four Seasons Swordplay, both of them royal-class energy arts refined and transformed by his Hellfire Crucible.

Of course, top experts would still be able to identify the various elements making it up.

But right now, he wasn’t worried about that. After all, given his current level, he could actually purchase the Four Seasons Swordplay from the institute if he wanted to.

Of course, he hadn’t, but considering it was freely available, and he was an elite student, no one would be suspicious about him using it.

Furthermore, the institute allowed elite students to harbor personal secrets.

Bam!

The streams of sword energy collided, then separated. Shocked, Yang Susu said, “Qi’er, your energy arts really are incredible. You’re only in Primary Lifeseizing, but you can dominate Secondary Lifeseizers, and even hold your own against Tertiary.”

“This is nothing, Aunt Susu. When the time is right, I’ll show you how truly powerful I am.” Right now, the two of them were alone on Manyflowers Peak, and had no need to fear prying eyes.

“Considering your talents, I think that even some Legendaries might be interested in taking you as an apprentice. Once my master is out of meditation, I’ll ask her to help in that regard. Oh, right. I heard the Yang Clan took over Yanhaven. How are things going there?”

“Father has already established a nation, with himself as the king. Right now, he’s trying to decide what to call the nation. Oh, Aunt Susu, considering how long you’ve been at the Demi-Immortal Institute, do you know anything about the Hanging Mountain?”

Yang Susu’s expression flickered. “The Hanging Mountain? What exactly do you want to know? It's a forbidden location.”

In the hopes of learning more about where the place actually was, Yang Qi had attended quite a few classes on astronomy and geography. Unfortunately, he hadn’t heard a single mention of it, and he wasn’t sure who to go ask about it.

After a moment of thought, he looked at Yang Susu with a very serious expression and said, “You know about my mother, right?”

“Your mother?” She thought for a moment. “Back when we used to play as youngsters, I don't remember seeing her even once. I'm pretty sure she left as soon as you were born. I was too young at that time to be privy to such matters. Then I came here to the Demi-Immortal Institute, and didn’t have much to do with family affairs. Why? Don’t tell me your mother has something to do with the Hanging Mountain?”

“She does. Father told me that she has a very impressive background. Apparently, she's a holy daughter there.”

“What? A holy daughter from the Hanging Mountain? How is that even possible? You know what kind of place the Hanging Mountain is, right? It’s a holy land to the Demonfolk, a place with numerous Great Sages. And do you know what their holy daughters are? They’re the best of the best among the Demonfolk! Compared to that place, the Yang Clan is less significant than a bunch of ants. If your mother is a holy daughter there, why would she possibly have been in a relationship with your father? That would be like someone from heaven getting together with someone from the earth. The disparity is just too immense.”

“I know,” Yang Qi replied, a bitter smile on his face. “That's why I want to get more information. Even if I have to go to the Hanging Mountain itself to find out the truth, I will. Apparently, my mother told my father that they would reunite when he became the ruler of the entire continent.”

“The ruler of the entire Rich-Lush Continent? Yeah right. Do you know how many powerful forces there are here? There are the four institutes, the Sage Ancestor Dynasty, numerous other powerful sects and organizations, the Seafolk, demon-devils of all sorts…. And they’re all interested in gaining dominance. In fact, there isn’t even a true ruler of the continent. The Sage Ancestor Dynasty claims the position of emperor, but it's really in name only. None of the four institutes really have to answer to anyone.”

“What about the Hanging Mountain, though?” Yang Qi said. As far as he was concerned that was the most important topic at hand. “What kind of place is it?”

“The Hanging Mountain is… transcendent. It's not a location anywhere on our continent; it exists in another part of space-time. The Rich-Lush Continent is of only minimal importance to them. That said, the Rich-Lush Continent does have the demon kings of the seventy-two grottos, who are subordinates of the Hanging Mountain. Each and every demon king is already a Legendary…. And that's only one tiny fraction of the forces at the command of the Hanging Mountain. They also have a presence in other continents. Well, since you already know about the Hanging Mountain, I’ll tell you everything I know about it. You see, in the most ancient times, our Rich-Lush Continent wasn’t a continent at all. It was called Rich Prefecture, and was only one part of the massive Yore-Wilds Continent. It all stretches back to the God-Devil Apocalypse, which destroyed lands near and far. During the destruction, the Rich-Lush Continent broke away from the Yore-Wilds Continent, making a new continent of its own. Of course, it wasn’t the only one. It was also during that great war of primeval times, when space-time was in chaos, that the Hanging Mountain created a new world. So, does that give you an idea of how incredible it is?”

“So, that’s how it is,” Yang Qi muttered, nodding. He looked up into the sky, and thought about how his mother was out there somewhere, far, far away.

It all seemed like a fairy tale, in which his mother, an immortal, somehow got involved with a mortal, his father. Now more than ever, he yearned to reunite with her.

As far as he was concerned, the Hanging Mountain was essentially heaven.

Right now, he was only in the Lifeseizing level, but as he continued to practice cultivation, he would add more and more lifespan to his longevity. As such, he wasn’t in a hurry.

During the brief lull in the conversation, the sound of a tolling bell suddenly rang out from the cloud-wreathed top of the mountain. Then, a wave of true energy rolled out to cover the mountain, causing countless demonlings to look up in delight. Massive butterflies flew up into the air, almost as if to welcome the arrival of an important figure.

“Master is out of seclusion,” Yang Susu said. Dragging Yang Qi with her, she dropped to her knees to kowtow.

Yang Qi surreptitiously sent out a stream of true energy to observe what was happening, and saw an enormous energy projection of a woman in the clouds above.

She was dozens of meters tall, almost like a god from heaven. However, moments later, the projection vanished without a trace.

Then, an energy field shot down toward the palace, whereupon a young woman appeared, clad in a many-flowered garment. She was actually very young, seemingly only fifteen or sixteen years old. However, there was awe-inspiring dignity to her that, coupled with the powerful energy field that surrounded her, was sufficient to instantly scatter Yang Qi’s true energy.

‘So strong!’ he thought. ‘I'm definitely not a match for her. Even if I used all of my true energy at once, I couldn’t hold my own against her. What level is she? Nonary Lifeseizing?’

At this point, Yang Susu leaned over and whispered, “My master is a Nonary Lifeseizer, and she came to understand her path toward the Legendary level twenty years ago. Of all the grand elders in the institute, she’s the most likely to become a Legendary. And believe it or not, she's not very old. She's famous at forty, not like the other old fogeys in the institute who are hundreds of years old.”

Looking at Yang Qi, Holy Daughter Manyflowers frowned and said, “Susu, why is there a man here on Manyflowers Peak?”

A stream of true energy suddenly swept over Yang Qi, making him feel almost like he was naked, completely incapable of harboring any secrets. Thankfully, he had already mastered his Devil-God Seal, making it impossible for Holy Daughter Manyflowers to perceive his true marvelous qualities.

Rising to her feet, Yang Susu smiled and said, “Master, this is my nephew from the Yang Clan. He’s a real genius! He reached the Lifeseizing level at only nineteen years of age. He’s already an elite student here at the Demi-Immortal Institute, and I was hoping you could introduce him to a good master.”

Clearly, Yang Susu had a very warm, close relationship with her master.

“Oh? A Lifeseizer at only nineteen?!” Visibly taken aback, she looked Yang Qi up and down. “Not many elite students are only nineteen. You know, there’s an unwritten rule in the Rich-Lush Continent that anyone who becomes a Lifeseizer before twenty is a genius. Seems we have a genius on our hands here!”

Similarly rising to his feet, Yang Qi respectfully said, “Please, you’re being too generous, Grand Elder. I wouldn’t dare accept praise like that.”

Even though he was an elite student, there were still protocols in the way he should address Holy Daughter Manyflowers.

“Master, that Longxuan Ye from the Sun Moon Institute came again. He just broke through to Tertiary Lifeseizing, and wanted to ask for my hand in marriage. Thankfully, Qi’er drove him off. Could you possibly get in touch with the Sun Moon Institute about it? I really want him to stop harassing me.”

“How impudent!” Holy Daughter Manyflowers said, her expression turning grim. “That Longxuan Ye is impossibly dense! No apprentice of mine is going to get married! I require devotion to energy arts, not distraction because of love! Wait, what did you just say? Your nephew drove away a Tertiary Lifeseizer? How is that even possible?” Looking over at Yang Qi, she said, “Your name is Yang Qi, right? As an elite student, you’re already worthy of the attention of an elder like me. But how did you possibly defeat Longxuan Ye, a Tertiary Lifeseizer, when you yourself are only in the Primary Lifeseizing level?”

Chapter 102: Minorcosm World

Upon seeing that Yang Qi was hesitating, Yang Susu said, “Qi’er, you can trust my master. If you need to say something, just say it. Besides, whatever good fortune you came across can’t be that amazing. You might have reached the Lifeseizing level at nineteen, but my master did even better than that. She did it at age fifteen. She was at Nonary Lifeseizing at twenty-four, and now, she’s working on the dao of the Legendary level.”

Yang Qi was shocked to hear Holy Daughter Manyflowers’ background. Obviously, she was favored by the heavens. A Lifeseizer at fifteen? How was such progress even possible? It was hard for him to even wrap his mind around. After all, in the countryside Yanhaven, something like that was literally impossible.

As for reaching Nonary Lifeseizing by twenty-four, that was even more unimaginable.

She was obviously far more powerful than he was. Of course, that didn’t mean that he was willing to tell the truth about his godly-class energy art. If word got out about that, people in the Demi-Immortal Institute would likely faint from shock.

Besides, if he had been born with that technique, then he probably would have reached the Lifeseizing level as an infant. And how could Holy Daughter Manyflowers possibly compare to that?

“Grand Elder, the truth is that I was struck by lightning. It strengthened my meridians and expanded my sea of energy. My true energy is far more vigorous than an ordinary person in the same level as me, and my fleshly body is about ten times as powerful. It was for those reasons that I was able to smash Longxuan Ye.” At this point, he relaxed his Devil-God Seal a bit to reveal some of the faint golden color of his blood.

“Oh really? Struck by lightning? And you got that strong?” With that, she sent some true energy into Yang Qi, and immediately noticed the golden blood, his abnormally large meridians, and his sea of energy, which was roughly ten times as expansive as it should be. “Well, it seems you’re telling the truth. Although, a lot of people get struck by lightning, but don’t benefit in this way. There must be more to the story. Having some lightning elements to your energy arts will help, but not to the extent you’ve shown.”

Despite her suspicions, the Devil-God Seal ensured that she wasn't able to see anything that Yang Qi didn't want her to.

“During the lightning strike, I noticed a beam of light enter me that I'm fairly certain was Humanoid True Energy.”

Truth be told, the golden imp in his forehead only seemed to become active when it wanted to, and he still had no idea what exactly it was. Revealing a bit of the truth to Holy Daughter Manyflowers would be worth it if she could shed some light on the subject.

“Some Humanoid True Energy entered your body?” Holy Daughter Manyflowers was visibly shocked. “Ah, now I understand. Some powerful expert must have been going through an energy arts tribulation, and during the process, was killed by a lightning strike. In the last moments, he managed to save some of his life force quintessence, which was absorbed by that lightning. When it went on to strike you, the quintessence was passed on to you. Things like this don’t happen often, but aren’t unheard-of. The Lifeseizing level, Legendary level, and even the Great Sage level all involve tribulations. If you don't pass them successfully, your souls will disperse, and your life force quintessence will scatter. If another person can acquire that life force, then they can advance by leaps and bounds. It seems you really got lucky!”

At long last, Yang Qi understood what had happened.

Apparently, the lightning mammoth that had come to rest inside of him was pure life force quintessence. As for the golden imp, it was likely a fragment of the soul of some powerful expert, which had contained parts of a cultivation technique.

However, that didn’t answer the question of what type of person had been cultivating the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth to begin with.

After all, Yang Qi had never even heard whispers of godly-class energy arts existing in the Rich-Lush Continent.

In fact, not even heavenly-class arts were seen, and even saintly-class arts were little more than the thing of stories. For all intents and purposes, imperial-class energy arts were the most heaven-shaking, earth-shattering things in existence.

For example, Gu Fenxian’s Five Volumes of Immortal Immolation were called imperial-class, but were actually incomplete. At best, they could probably count as royal-class.

“Not bad at all,” Holy Daughter Manyflowers said. “Not only did you encounter some good fortune, but you're also naturally talented. However, the next thing you have to worry about is the Lifeseizing level, in which you will be treading a thin line between life and death. As I'm sure you know, the Lifeseizing level features enormous tribulations. Sometimes the vital energy of heaven and earth takes the shape of terrifying monsters who try to wrest control of your body, causing you to turn into a depraved, murderous monster yourself.

“It will all come down to your hard work, wisdom, temperament and perseverance. If you break through all of the obstacles, you’ll eventually reach the Legendary level.”

By this point, Yang Qi could tell that he had earned Holy Daughter Manyflowers’ approval. “I understand, Grand Elder. I definitely won't slack off in my cultivation.”

By now, he could actually release the full level of his strength, and as long as he didn’t actually reveal the true form of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, no one would suspect that he had a godly-class energy art.

Most likely, not even the founders of the Demi-Immortal Institute had ever seen such an art.

“Very well. Considering that Susu has asked me to find a master for you, and that you’re talented enough for some of the old-timers to take an interest, I’ll take you to see some of them. As for whether or not they end up taking you in, that will depend on you.”

With that, she waved her hand, causing millions upon millions of flower petals from throughout the mountain to swirl together into the shape of an enormous lotus throne. Yang Qi and Yang Susu joined Holy Daughter Manyflowers on the throne, which then began to fly through the mountains.

Yang Qi couldn’t help but nod in admiration at how perfectly she controlled her energy arts.

In fact, he couldn’t even sense any energy fluctuations from it, as though it existed in perfect harmony with nature, its true energy one with heaven and earth. Even the flower petals seemed to thrum with intelligence, and move of their own accord.

As the lotus throne sped through the clouds and mountains, Yang Qi looked over the edge at the scenery. There were simply too many mountain peaks to count, some of them sharp, jagged, and sinister looking. Others were covered with massive trees, and looked ancient to the extreme. Others featured flowing streams and waterfalls, making them look very elegant. Some rose so high they seemed to connect with the sky itself.

According to the rules of the institute, it was only after performing five lifeseizings that one could take up residence in the Heaven Lode Mountains. This was where most conclave students practiced their cultivation.

“This mountainous area is actually just the periphery of the Demi-Immortal Institute,” Holy Daughter Manyflowers explained. “Deep in the Heaven Lode Mountains, there is a unique dimension set up by the founders, a place called the Minorcosm World. It is the true core of the institute. Only people in the Legendary level can go there, for example, my own master. Susu, you’ve been here for ten years, and yet, I’ve never had a chance to take you there. Well, keep your eyes open. This could be of great benefit to your cultivation.”

Eventually, Holy Daughter Manyflowers waved her hands, causing the mist and clouds up ahead to part. Then, the lotus throne flew higher and higher until it rose over a crest of mountains, revealing a sea of clouds.

The mere sight of it caused Yang Qi’s eyes to widen.

There, in the middle of all the clouds, was a massive stone gate. It was fully three thousand meters tall, and dozens of kilometers wide, and stood completely alone among the sea of clouds.

Compared to that gate, Yang Qi felt like he was an ant, or even smaller, like a grain of sand.

“This door leads to the Minorcosm World. Come on, let’s go.” Holy Daughter Manyflowers didn't seem impressed at all by the gate as she led them onto the sea of clouds. “This stone gate is called the Mysterygate of Heaven and Earth, an incomparably powerful magical item that controls the destiny of the Demi-Immortal Institute, and also contains a unique world inside….”

The gate was closed tight, giving Yang Qi a perfect view of the complex designs that covered its surface. Although he couldn't tell what it was constructed of, it was obviously some sort of divine stone that pulsed with the power of heaven and earth.

The designs were so profound that Yang Qi could tell they contained mysteries within mysteries.

Furthermore, the clouds beneath his feet thrummed with a powerful energy that would be too much for a Master of Energy to fly over safely. Only Lifeseizers could possibly do so, and even that, with much difficulty.

The slightest misstep would obviously lead to one's bones being crushed to dust.

Because of the effects of the ancient stone gate, whatever dangerous powers in the sea of clouds were negated, and they were transformed into a solid form, almost like white jade.

Each step they took across the clouds caused muffled rumbling to echo out.

From what Yang Qi could tell, there was no way his sword energy could possibly penetrate those clouds.

Never before in his life had he seen something like this.

Guarding the gate was a legion of giants, each of them dozens of meters tall, with razor-sharp weapons in hand. All of them had Lifeseizing cultivation bases, and were clearly the most elite troops of the Demi-Immortal Institute.

At the very bottom of the enormous stone gate was a little door that was also tightly sealed. Obviously, that was the most commonly used entrance. The entire gate itself would only be opened on extremely important occasions.

When the leader of the giants caught sight of them, he stepped forward with a slight smile on his face. Then, he dropped to one knee, showing just how much his position in the institute differed from Holy Daughter Manyflowers.

“Well, if it isn’t Holy Daughter Manyflowers. What brings you here today? Visiting friends in the Minorcosm World? You’re nearly in the Legendary level, aren’t you? Fairly soon, you’ll be able to come here at will to practice cultivation.”

Chapter 103: Enemies Meet

“Very well, open the door,” Holy Daughter Manyflowers said with the wave of her hand.

“Yes, ma’am!” Not daring to defy her orders, the giant pulled out a huge silver key which he inserted into the small door.

However, it was in that very moment that a bright beam of light appeared off in the distance. After landing on the sea of clouds, a blur of motion could be seen heading toward them, and an old man became visible, broad-shouldered as a bear and as tough-looking as a lion, with flowing white hair. In that respect, he almost looked like Yang Xingshi. However, his aura was so far beyond Yang Xingshi’s that they could hardly compare to each other.

Clearly, this man had performed multiple lifeseizings.

At the very least, he was someone who Yang Qi couldn’t possibly contend with.

However, Yang Qi hardly noticed the old man. Instead, his gaze was drawn to the individual following him, a spectacularly beautiful young woman wearing blue garments.

Yun Hailan.

As fate would have it, the two rivals were facing off again.

It was just like the old saying, it is always on a narrow, cramped road that enemies meet.

That was exactly what Yang Qi was thinking as he laid eyes on her.

She noticed him at the same time, and when their eyes met, the proverbial sparks were already flying.

When Holy Daughter Manyflowers saw the old man, her expression flickered, and she said, “Grand Elder Godhawk, why might you be bringing this student to the Minorcosm World?”

Grand Elder Godhawk stopped and looked over at her. “She’s spectacularly talented, that’s why. I was entrusted with the task of bringing her here for the old ones to inspect. Hopefully one of them will take her as an apprentice. You’ve made significant progress in your cultivation, Holy Daughter Manyflowers. When will you be breaking through to the Legendary level? I’m very curious about that.”

Considering the sharp tone both of them were using, it was obvious there was some friction between them.

Snorting coldly, Holy Daughter Manyflowers said, “I’ll reach the Legendary level before you, Grand Elder Godhawk. You’ve been stuck in Nonary Lifeseizing for a hundred years already. I doubt you’ll achieve that next breakthrough at all in this life.”

Grand Elder Godhawk burst out laughing. “Unfortunately, you have that all wrong, Holy Daughter Manyflowers. I've secured aid from the Crown Prince himself. He gave me a bottle gourd of life force springwater which has stirred my waning life force. In two days, I’ll reverse my aging and re-form my physical body. As of now, there’s no question at all whether or not I’ll reach the Legendary level. As it turns out, you’re the slow one. Why don’t you just wait until you’re old and doddering like I am now? Then maybe you’ll succeed.”

“Life force springwater?!” Holy Daughter Manyflowers said, shocked. “I can’t believe the Crown Prince gave you something so valuable! What did you agree to do for him?”

“Convince one of the old-timers to take this girl as an apprentice. I'm friends with them from years ago, you know. Besides, now that I'm a dharmic guard in the Crown Prince Society, it’s only natural that the Crown Prince would help me out a bit.”

“So,” Holy Daughter Manyflowers said disdainfully, “a grand elder has stooped to the level of licking the Crown Prince Society’s dirty boots? Students join the Crown Prince Society, for their own personal interest. We elders aren’t supposed to participate in those sorts of things.”

“People do what they have to to get ahead in the world,” Grand Elder Godhawk replied, “and in the Demi-Immortal Institute too. The Crown Prince is a celestial genius, and favored by the heavens. He’ll only continue to bask in greater and greater glory. Before long, our institute’s current chancellor will rise to a higher level, and when that happens, the Crown Prince will definitely succeed him. What's so wrong with helping him out?”

Holy Daughter Manyflowers chuckled sarcastically. “Quite the show-off the Crown Prince is. Thinks he’s going to become the next chancellor, just like that?”

“Enough jibber-jabber,” Grand Elder Godhawk said, flicking his sleeve. “I have appointments to keep.”

At this point, Yun Hailan took a step forward and said, “Come over here, Yang Qi. I have something I want to say to you in private.”

With that, she walked off to the side.

Heart thumping, Yang Qi looked over at Yang Susu, who nodded. Gritting his teeth, he walked over until he was about nine meters away from Yun Hailan. “It’s always on a narrow, cramped road that enemies meet. Isn’t that right, Yun Hailan? We met at the Academy of Sage Studies, and yet again in the heart of the Demi-Immortal Institute, right in front of the Minorcosm World. Whatever it is you want to say, spit it out.”

“It’s always on a narrow, cramped road that enemies meet?” Yun Hailan brushed her hair behind her ear. She had a musky smell that resembled orchids, something that would drive most men mad, and only seemed to grow more and more mysterious as time went by. Perhaps it was because of the blood of the sea god in her veins, but she only seemed to get more beautiful and more divine. Perhaps that was how she attracted the attention of the fabled Crown Prince.

“As you know, Yang Qi,” she said quietly, “I’ve earned the favor of the Crown Prince, and he’s completely focused on helping me advance my cultivation. The Crown Prince Society is the top society in existence. It holds sway, not just over the institute, but over the Rich-Lush Continent as a whole. It doesn’t matter what sort of good fortune you came across, to the Crown Prince, you’re still like the mantis trying to stop a war chariot.”

“Yeah? So what? You think that because you’re sucking up to someone powerful that I'm afraid of you? If you really believe that after what you did to me I’ll give up on trying to get revenge, well… you couldn’t be more wrong.”

“I’m telling you this for your own good, Yang Qi,” she replied airily. “I’ve already cut you some slack, you know. Both you and Yanhaven. Let me tell you, I know everything there is to know about your old home. Your father plans to establish his own nation, except, it's a farce; it’ll never happen.”

How could Yang Qi not pick up on the threat in her words? “I dare you to do something to my clan! Believe me, if you do, I’ll kill you!”

“Kill me? You think that you and your paltry energy arts are enough to take me on? Oh. You beat Gu Fenxian, so you think you can beat me, is that right? Listen well, Yang Qi. My energy arts and cultivation base are beyond your comprehension.” She seemed both utterly arrogant, and supremely self-confident. “I don’t care if your aunt is a Secondary Lifeseizer. Not even she’s a match for me. If I felt like it, I could nip things in the bud right now and kill both of you.”

“Go ahead and try!” Yang Qi said calmly. Although he was completely furious, he managed to hide it and keep a cool head. After everything he had been through, he had mastered that ability quite well. “I know you’ve worked yourself up in the world, Yun Hailan. But in the end, the only things that matter are personal power and strength. Schemes and plans will only get you so far.”

“Well said,” she replied in an icy voice. “Personal strength and power are the only way to get ahead. And that’s why I used you like the chump you are. That’s all you are, a measly, useless patsy. And now that you aren’t useful to me anymore, I'm done with you.” Having said her piece, her voice warmed up again as she continued, “Come on, Yang Qi. You shouldn’t take all of this so seriously. It was just a Latent Dragon Pill after all, right? I can make it up to you many times over in the future. All you have to do is join me. Become one of my subordinates. Wouldn’t that be the best of both worlds? Not only would the Crown Prince Society leave you alone, but your father would be safe and sound in Yanhaven. Or at the very least, your clan won’t be wiped off the map.”

“Threatening me will only make me despise you more, Yun Hailan,” he said, his voice as sharp as a blade. “You should feel lucky I was such a fool back when we first met. You want me dead and my clan exterminated? Alright. Let's see you try.”

At this point, Yun Hailan’s voice turned hard again. “Since you insist on being pig-headed, don’t blame me for what happens. Are you hoping that gang of scoundrels you’ve put together can help you? What are their names again? Oh right. Li He. Liang Dong. Hua Yinhu. He Jili. You think their clans can protect you? That's a joke if I've ever heard one. Even the lowliest member of the Crown Prince Society has better clan backing than those four. For example, Gu Fenxian. The Gu Clan has the blood of an ancient Great Sage, and when they stomp their feet, the entire Rich-Lush Continent trembles. If they go on the warpath, those small fries you call your friends will be crushed like porcelain. The only reason they haven’t already is because I told them not to. I wanted to give you a chance to come to your senses and acknowledge allegiance to me. But since you’re set on being obstinate, don’t blame me for changing my mind.”

“You touch one of my brothers, and I’ll kill your whole clan,” Yang Qi said, his voice trembling with killing intent. “If you even insult them, I’ll cut you down!”

“You have a choice to make. Live. Or die. Acknowledge allegiance to me. Or watch everyone you know be exterminated. Ah, Yang Qi. You really have no idea what I'm capable of. Holy Daughter Manyflowers brought you here to get a master, right? Well, unless you acknowledge allegiance, I’ll make sure you never get a master.”

Yang Qi spat in contempt. “What, do you run the Demi-Immortal Institute or something? You’re with the trashy Crown Prince Society so you think you can just do whatever you want? There’s nothing in the entire world that works as simply as that.”

“Frog in a well,” Yun Hailan said. With that, she turned to Grand Elder Godhawk. “Grand Elder, let’s go in.”

“Very well.” Laughing loudly, Grand Elder Godhawk blurred into motion and headed into the door.

Holy Daughter Manyflowers snorted coldly and followed.

As for Yang Qi, he was sure based on the conversation that Yun Hailan was preparing to truly bare her teeth. Not only would he need to be careful going forward, so would all of his friends.

‘I need to think of a way to kill her, just like I killed Chu Tiange. Otherwise, I’ll never be able to get a good night's rest.’

Whizz!

Mind buzzing with deadly thoughts, he entered the Minorcosm World. However, as soon as he was inside, his mind went completely still.

The first thing he saw was blinding light, which gradually dissolved into a scene of shimmering beams of brightness falling from above. There wasn't even a speck of darkness in this place. Everything was filled with light bright enough to shock one to the core.

‘What is that light? Can it…. help temper the mind and heart?’

Based on what he could tell, the light was ten or even a hundred times more effective than an energy formation of the dao of monarchs.

Chapter 104: Patriarchs Wind and Cloud

The ground beneath their feet was as smooth as glass, and seemed to be filled with a marvelous true energy. In fact, as they walked along it, it chimed as surely as gold or jade.

“Susu, the Divinity-Piercing Immortal Light here in the Minorcosm World can pierce into your nascent divinity and drive impure thoughts or desires out. When practicing cultivation here, you can do so without any fear of developing inner devils, a year of cultivation here is worth a hundred outside.”

With that, Holy Daughter Manyflowers extended her hand into a flow of nine-colored energy that was rife with a feeling of immortals.

“The Minorcosm World also has something called Nine-Yang Immortal Energy, which comes from an alternate dimension, and is composed of nine types of pure yang vital energy. It can significantly bolster your true energy, improve your flesh and blood, and cleanse your sea of energy. Cultivating with it over a long period of time can be extremely beneficial.”

Clearly, the nine-colored energy flow swirling through Holy Daughter Manyflowers’ fingers was the very Nine-Yang Immortal Energy she was talking about.

Yang Qi looked around at the abundance of energy flows, and then took in a deep breath to absorb some of the Nine-Yang Immortal Energy. It flowed through him, reaching his sea of energy, except, nothing happened.

“What’s going on?” he murmured, confused.

Glancing coolly at Yang Qi, Holy Daughter Manyflowers said, “Nine-Yang Immortal Energy is nothing to be taken lightly. Our Demi-Immortal Institute sends top professors into numerous alternate dimensions to harvest it. After all, it’s a type of vital energy that doesn't even exist in our current heaven and earth. And only Legendaries can actually absorb it and make it part of their own true energy. Part of the reason for that is it requires a basic understanding of space-time to do so. If anyone could use it, then would it be special to begin with? Besides, students aren’t usually allowed in here to begin with.”

“Not allowed in?” Yang Qi murmured. Oh so carefully, he loosened his Devil-God Seal, allowing a tiny version of his Hellfire Crucible to appear in his sea of energy.

Considering he couldn’t absorb the Nine-Yang Immortal Energy into his true energy, it was already about to vanish from his sea of energy. However, by drawing on some of the power of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, he quickly shoved it into his crucible.

It was almost as if the immortal energy could sense the danger it was in, and tried to shove its way out, blasting back and forth against the inside of the Hellfire Crucible.

‘It's so strong! But my Hellfire Crucible is the lord of the netherworld. It uses the power of a legion of gods to melt and refine all sorts of divine beings!’

Without further hesitation, he unleashed more of the power of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, focusing it all on the Hellfire Crucible.

Closing his eyes, he looked into the Hellfire Crucible, and saw the image of a god. Unexpectedly, it had an elephantine head, the body of a human, and massive limbs. It was clad in a suit of armor, and was so powerful that it was actually holding a mountain above its shoulders, a mountain of gods so large that it seemed to fill the heavens.

This was a godmammoth.

In the ancient myths, a godmammoth was responsible for shouldering the mountain of the legion of gods. Not only did that godmammoth give the gods the glory of being able to oversee the heavens, but it crushed countless devils beneath its feet. Essentially, it supported the heavens and crushed the earth.

Now that Yang Qi was in the Lifeseizing level, his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth had reached a new level, and within the Hellfire Crucible existed a godmammoth with an elephantine head and a human body.

The godmammoth opened its mouth and breathed in, sucking in the Nine-Yang Immortal Energy. A moment later, it exhaled through its trunk, producing a blast of lava-like true flame, laced with hissing Nine-Yang Immortal Energy.

The remaining Nine-Yang Immortal Energy couldn’t withstand the heat, and broke apart, creating nine small dragons that began to fly back and forth in the Hellfire Crucible.

Each of those dragons was an energy flow of a different color.

Nine colors. Nine dragons.

Red. Green. Cyan. Blue. Purple. White. Black. Orange. Gold. The nine dragons swirled within his true energy, seemingly on the verge of merging into it, and thus, his body.

Crick! Crack!

A resonance sprang up with the thirtieth particle inside of him, which seemed just on the verge of absorbing the nine dragons.

The fact that the nine dragons formed a resonance with one of the particles indicated that it was possible for him to transform Nine-Yang Immortal Energy into life force quintessence.

As of now, he had twenty-nine particles awake within him, which put him at somewhat of a bottleneck. If he broke past thirty particles, he would enter Secondary Lifeseizing.

Each of the nine lifeseizings required different levels of power, a fact which was even more pronounced with Yang Qi. Normally speaking, cultivating a godly-class energy art like his was incredibly difficult.

In recent days, he had been working very hard at his cultivation. Sadly, even with the energy formation of the dao of monarchs, he had made almost no progress.

And yet, here in the Minorcosm World, he could absorb and use Nine-Yang Immortal Energy, an energy flow from an alternate dimension which ran contrary to the essences and magical laws of the world in which he lived. Normally speaking, it would be impossible to use it for cultivation before becoming a Legendary.

And yet, with his godly-class energy art, Yang Qi could refine it into nine colored dragons that burst with life force quintessence. It was a matter that no one could have ever predicted.

‘This is incredible! Who could ever have thought that I would be able to use this energy from the Minorcosm World? If I could cultivate here long term, I would be virtually invincible. Secondary and even Tertiary Lifeseizing would be just around the corner….’ Heart pounding with excitement, he sent the nine colored dragons directly into the thirtieth particle, which instantly woke up.

The powerful Nine-Yang Immortal Energy blasted right into the bottleneck, but could not break through it.

As that happened, Yang Qi looked out of the corner of his eye at Holy Daughter Manyflowers and Yang Susu.

However, neither of them seemed to be paying attention to him.

Therefore, he secretly continued to pull Nine-Yang Immortal Energy into his Hellfire Crucible, which went much more smoothly each time he did it. Furthermore, refining it into nine dragons was easier.

More and more of the dragons appeared in the Hellfire Crucible with every moment that passed.

Instead of sending them into the particles in his body, though, he decided to save them up to use all at once. With enough power, he could definitely break through to Secondary Lifeseizing.

A few dozen breaths’ worth of time passed, after which he had over a hundred tiny dragons in the Hellfire Crucible. By this point, the godmammoth could refine the Nine-Yang Immortal Energy with complete ease.

All of a sudden, Yang Qi realized that dragons were actually very much like mammoths, causing an expression to pop into his mind. The power of dracomammoths!

‘Work harder!’ he shouted inwardly. ‘The more of this energy I absorb, the more life force quintessence I’ll have to work with. And then, when the time finally comes to go all out, it will be even more effective. I doubt even Yun Hailan could fathom that the Minorcosm World would be so beneficial to me. Holding back in this moment will prevent any of the top experts from figuring out what I'm doing. After I'm able to leave, I can easily reach Secondary Lifeseizing. And if I'm in here long enough, I can definitely get enough to reach Tertiary Lifeseizing, and possibly even Quaternary. How strong will I be then?’

At the moment, his main focus was trying to absorb as much of the energy as he possibly could.

“I'm going to take you to see two old-timers, Yang Qi,” Holy Daughter Manyflowers said. “Collectively, they’re called the Patriarchs Wind and Cloud. They're both Legendaries, and have a very high rank in the Demi-Immortal Institute. For a while now, it's been public knowledge that they’re looking for an apprentice to pass on their legacy to. I have the feeling that codger Godhawk is taking Yun Hailan to see them. So, you’d better not lose face for me. Make sure you become their apprentice.”

“Yes ma’am,” Yang Qi replied. Although he was immersed in the process of absorbing the Nine-Yang Immortal Energy, he was still paying attention to everything around him.

‘Who exactly are these Patriarchs Wind and Cloud?’ he thought. ‘Legendaries, huh? Well, I'm intrigued. I've never seen Legendaries before.’

“Up ahead is their Wind and Cloud Pagoda,” Holy Daughter Manyflowers said. “Remember, be respectful.”

In front of them was an enormous pagoda made from wood. It had nine levels, and was surrounded by a network of mountains, rivers, and the like. It was very beautiful.

At the highest level of the pagoda were two middle-aged men playing Go. One of them wore white robes that drifted around him like clouds. The other wore gray garments that fluttered like the wind. Strangely, their auras were impossible to sense, making them seem almost like two ordinary people who knew nothing about energy arts.

‘These are Legendaries?’ Yang Qi wondered.

Standing right next to the two middle-aged men were Yun Hailan and Grand Elder Godhawk.

As Yang Qi arrived with Holy Daughter Manyflowers and Yang Susu, Yun Hailan looked down at them and smiled sarcastically.

Looking up, Holy Daughter Manyflowers said, “Holy Daughter Manyflowers is here to offer formal greetings, Patriarchs Wind and Cloud.”

“So, it's Holy Daughter Manyflowers,” said the man in white, his gaze shooting out toward the group below.

Those were eyes that could see all secrets; thankfully, Yang Qi already had his Devil-God Seal activated.

The gaze swept over him, then left, whereupon the white-robed patriarch said, “If you’re here to try to get us to accept an apprentice, just save your breath. We Patriarchs Wind and Cloud have already accepted a fine new apprentice, and don't need a second.”

Yun Hailan’s eyes glittered as she looked down at Yang Qi, the derision in them growing stronger by the moment.

Chapter 105: Ramifications of Accepting an Apprentice

“What?” Holy Daughter Manyflowers said with a frown. “Patriarchs Wind and Cloud, are you sure you don’t want to think about the matter a bit longer?”

Grand Elder Godhawk burst out laughing in response. “That brat you brought along with you is no genius, Holy Daughter Manyflowers. Did you really think that Patriarchs Wind and Cloud would take him seriously? What a joke!” Considering that Grand Elder Godhawk had never gotten along with Holy Daughter Manyflowers, it was no surprise that he took advantage of the moment to ridicule her.

“You!” Holy Daughter Manyflowers shot back, her eyes afire. “Godhawk, you old codger, is it really true that a dignified grand elder like yourself has turned into a Crown Prince Society brownnoser?”

“That's enough,” said the gray-robed Patriarch Wind. “There will be no quarreling here in Wind and Cloud Pagoda. I don't want our game of Go disturbed, understand? Holy Daughter Manyflowers, that brat of yours is clearly a far cry from being Yun Hailan’s equal. The two of us can see that as clear as day.”

“Exactly!” Grand Elder Godhawk added with a mocking smile. “I guess you’re only capable of finding middle-of-the-road people, Holy Daughter Manyflowers. For example, your apprentice Yang Susu, who hasn't even passed Secondary Lifeseizing after ten years. If she was an actual genius, she would have achieved seven or eight lifeseizings already.”

“My apprentice is no way deficient!” Holy Daughter Manyflowers said coldly. “Maybe you think this Yun Hailan is some sort of genius, but she can’t compare to even a hair on my apprentice’s head!”

SMACK!

Shooting to his feet, Patriarch Wind threw his game piece onto the board, scattering the other pieces. “Dammit! I said not to disturb our game, didn't I? I had a great strategy prepared, only to have it ruined by you brats!”

Silence reigned. Grand Elder Godhawk and Holy Daughter Manyflowers were both visibly taken aback by the fury of Patriarch Wind.

“Master, there’s no need for you to be so angry,” Yun Hailan said. “Grand Elder Manyflowers simply meant that you have poor judgment. She thinks that the apprentice you personally selected isn’t as good as her own apprentice. Actually, I’m a bit curious to see if she’s right. Is your apprentice better? Or is hers? I failed to bring gifts to offer upon becoming your apprentice, so allow me to earn some face for you. What do you say?”

“Very well, my apprentice. Do as you wish.”

Patriarch Wind sat down, looking a bit calmer than before.

‘This Yun Hailan really knows how to stir things up,’ Yang Qi thought, a cold smile slowly spreading out on his face. Unfortunately, with so many other top experts here, it wouldn’t be appropriate for him to speak up. Obviously, Patriarchs Wind and Cloud were both catering to Yun Hailan for the sake of the enigmatic Crown Prince. If it weren’t for that, there was no way she could have earned their favor and been accepted as an apprentice so quickly.

In all likelihood, the Crown Prince had contacted Patriarchs Wind and Cloud ahead of time to arrange things. That would also explain why Yun Hailan had been so confident before entering the Minorcosm.

“Master, why not allow Grand Elder Holy Daughter Manyflowers’ apprentice Yang Susu and I to exchange a few fighting tips? Then we can truly assess the level of her cultivation base. Unless I'm mistaken, Yang Susu is already a Secondary Lifeseizer. I, on the other hand, only just reached the Lifeseizing level. Primary and Secondary Lifeseizers are so different you can hardly even discuss them at the same time. Even still, I'm very interested to see if her energy arts are better, or mine.” Up to this point, she had spoken in a very cool tone, but all of a sudden, her wording turned sharp. “Yang Susu, I hereby challenge you to a duel, right here in Wind and Cloud Pagoda. Do you accept? Or not?”

“Fine! I accept.” Yang Susu chuckled coldly. “You used despicable methods to deceive my Qi’er, which resulted in his martial arts being crippled. I think today is the perfect opportunity to teach you a little lesson. In the future, you should avoid using plots and schemes to try to win glory.”

At this point, Yang Qi’s eyes flickered and he said, “Aunt Susu, why don’t you let me accept the challenge for you? I’d prefer to solve my issues on my own.”

Yang Qi was getting a very strange feeling from Yun Hailan, and was certain that she had some powerful hidden assets that were giving her the confidence to handle Yang Susu. He couldn’t quite tell the level of her cultivation base, but he knew that she was far too adept at keeping secrets, and hiding her strength. Although he didn't want to reveal the full extent of his power right now, he also didn't want to see Yang Susu in danger.

“Stand down, Susu,” Holy Daughter Manyflowers said.

“Yes, Master.”

“The Inter-Institutional Martial Arts Competition is just around the corner. Defeat her in a fair contest there, in front of all eyes. That’s the way to earn praise.”

Unexpectedly, Holy Daughter Manyflowers was actually preventing her apprentice from accepting the duel.

Apparently, Yun Hailan hadn’t anticipated that Holy Daughter Manyflowers would reject the offer to duel, and wasn’t willing to let the matter drop. “If you're strong enough, what’s there to be afraid of? I'm ready to compete whenever and wherever.”

“She's right, Holy Daughter Manyflowers,” Patriarch Wind said coldly. “You just said your apprentice is stronger than my new apprentice. You brought this whole thing up, and now you’re backing down?”

Patriarch Cloud let out a loud, impolite snort. “You, a little girl who isn’t even a Legendary, brings two babies still wet behind the ears to disturb affairs at Wind and Cloud Pagoda? She even ruined our game of Go. Just leave, Holy Daughter Manyflowers. Come back when you're a Legendary.”

“You have your apprentice, Patriarchs Wind and Cloud. But it won’t be long before the martial arts competition comes, and I’ll show just how bad your judgment is. And this young man who I was going to recommend to you will definitely surpass that apprentice of yours.” Holy Daughter Manyflowers’ words seemed to be filled with gunpowder. “Legendary? I’ll definitely break through soon. And when that happens, I’ll challenge the both of you, and we’ll see who has a better understanding of magical law.”

“Oh? Big talk, Holy Daughter Manyflowers. Not even a Legendary, and yet still you dare to call our sense of judgment into question? Are you conceited, or just arrogant? Compete with us? Do you know how many years we've been Legendaries?”

“It doesn’t matter. Just wait until the competition. Everything will be made clear then.” Turning to Yang Susu and Yang Qi, she said, “Let’s go. We’re leaving this Minorcosm World, but it won't be long before I'm back. Permanently.”

Flicking her sleeve, she left Wind and Cloud Pagoda, followed by Yang Qi and Yang Susu.

Yun Hailan watched her go, her eyes flickering with disappointment.

“See? See!?” Grand Elder Godhawk said, clearly trying to add fuel to the fire. “Patriarchs, that Holy Daughter Manyflowers is wildly arrogant, wouldn’t you say? I can’t believe she dared to treat you with such disrespect. She definitely deserves a harsh punishment.”

“She’s simply too haughty,” Patriarch Wind said. “However, she did reach Nonary Lifeseizing before forty, and is already about to break through to the Legendary Level. She’s definitely talented. That attitude of hers came from the fact that we stripped her of a bit of face by not accepting that young man as a disciple.” He chuckled coldly. “If we were out of the institute, we would teach her a bit of a lesson. But since we’re in the Minorcosm World, we’ll just let it slide. If we did something here, and the other old-timers noticed, they would accuse us of bullying.

“Very well, Yun Hailan. Now that you’re our apprentice, we’ll do everything we can to help you progress. And when the time comes for the Inter-Institutional Martial Arts Competition, you can drag Yang Susu down from her little pedestal. Maybe you can even teach Holy Daughter Manyflowers a lesson. Understand?”

“Actually,” Patriarch Cloud added, “this Holy Daughter Manyflowers is quite shrewd. It seems to me she could tell that you used life force springwater on your dragonpearl to transform it into the nascent divinity of a divine dragon. With that, you have the power to dry up rivers and drain seas. She wasn’t actually convinced her own apprentice could handle you, and thus backed down.”

“Patriarchs, the two of you are profoundly insightful,” Yun Hailan said, her eyes glittering.

“Well, enough of that nonsense. The time has come to pass on one of our energy arts to you, and then bolster your cultivation base. In two hours, you can leave. According to the institute’s rules, you can come to the Minorcosm World every seven days for two hours. Only Legendaries can stay in for longer than that. Anyone else will be forcibly ejected by the magical laws here. After you leave, could you please tell the Crown Prince we already attended to the matter we promised to handle? And we hope that he will follow through with what he agreed to do.”

“Of course,” Yun Hailan said, smiling. “The Crown Prince is currently in another area of space-time working on his cultivation. Apparently, he's collected the remains of an ancient god-devil for the purpose of creating a magical item. I'm sure that he’ll live up to his end of the agreement as soon as he returns.”

“By the way, what was that young man’s name?” Grand Elder Godhawk said. “You seem wary of him. His cultivation base appears to be fairly advanced, although not as much as yours.”

“His name is Yang Qi,” Yun Hailan said coldly. “When I first met him, he was nothing more than a fool. However, he got lucky and stumbled across some good fortune. I can handle him alone. There’s no need for you to trouble yourself, Grand Elder, or you, Masters.”

“Of course,” Patriarch Wind said. “Considering our status, it wouldn’t be appropriate to do anything to someone of the younger generation. You young ones can handle such matters on your own. Now, sit there cross-legged.”

**

As soon as they were away from Wind and Cloud Pagoda, Yang Susu said, “Master, why did you prevent me from having a match with Yun Hailan?”

“Yun Hailan has incredible power brewing in her. Something wild, from times of yore. It's almost as if a primeval divine dragon has been resurrected inside of her. I'm afraid she’s acquired the legacy of a divine dragon, as well as either a dragonpearl or a dragon egg. If that's the case, then you’re no match for her. Considering how conniving she is, and how strong, you need to be careful of her in the future.”

Continuing to absorb Nine-Yang Immortal Energy as they went along, Yang Qi said, “Aunt Susu, I'm going to kill that Yun Hailan one day. Don’t worry. And as far as getting a master is concerned, it’s not a big deal. Masters can be a crutch, and I’d prefer to do things on my own.”

By this point, he had so many colorful dragons in his Hellfire Crucible that it was almost completely full.

Chapter 106: Secondary Lifeseizing

Although he had failed to find a master, the Nine-Yang Immortal Energy that Yang Qi had acquired in the Minorcosm World was far more valuable.

On the one hand, he was trying to absorb as much of it as he could. On the other hand, he was thinking about a way to get back into the Minorcosm World as soon as possible.

At the moment, the only way to get in would be to be taken by Holy Daughter Manyflowers.

That said, the amount that he currently had stored up in his Hellfire Crucible was more than enough for the time being. By this point, thousands of colorful dragons were swirling about there. In fact, he was fairly certain that he would be able to generate enough life force quintessence to reach Secondary Lifeseizing and perhaps even push past that. The first thing he would do upon leaving the Minorcosm World was find a quiet, secluded place to achieve his breakthrough.

He definitely couldn’t let anyone find out about it, not even Yang Susu or Holy Daughter Manyflowers.

As for how powerful he would be in Secondary Lifeseizing, not even he was sure. All he did know was that it was a level that could shake heaven and earth, and leave both ghosts and gods perplexed.

All Holy Daughter Manyflowers knew was that he had benefited from the life force quintessence of some powerful expert who had failed to pass a tribulation. Never could she imagine that he had the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, a godly-class energy art.

If she found out, it was impossible to say what might happen.

“Okay, Susu,” Holy Daughter Manyflowers said, her voice trembling with determination, “the time has come for you to cultivate a top-notch energy art alongside me. You must surpass Yun Hailan, and win some face for me in the big competition. And you need to make sure Patriarchs Wind and Cloud lose as much face as possible!”

‘Master really is set on reaching the Legendary level right away,’ Yang Susu thought, shaken. She had never seen Holy Daughter Manyflowers acting so seriously before.

“As for you, Yang Qi, when you have the time, come to Manyflowers Peak so that I can help you with your cultivation base. At the moment, you’re definitely not strong enough to deal with Yun Hailan. She already has the aura of an ancient divine dragon. Combine that with Patriarchs Wind and Cloud helping to improve her cultivation base, and I'm afraid that over the next few days, she’ll only continue to get stronger and stronger.”

Yang Qi nodded. “Many thanks, Grand Elder.”

With that, the three of them left the Minorcosm World.

Upon returning to Manyflowers Peak, both Holy Daughter Manyflowers and Yang Susu prepared to go into seclusion.

The time had come for farewells.

“Be careful, Qi’er!” Yang Susu said, clearly concerned for his safety. “Yun Hailan has really made a name for herself. She's working with the Crown Prince Society, and now she has the support of Patriarchs Wind and Cloud, two Legendaries. She’s in her element now, and will only become more difficult to deal with as time goes by.”

Yang Qi nodded. “I know what you mean. However, her arrogance will only last for so long.”

He was well aware that Yun Hailan was making a name for herself, and seemingly overcoming all obstacles. Considering she was getting help from the Crown Prince, it wouldn’t be long before the upper echelons of leadership in the Demi-Immortal Institute would also throw their support behind her. Then she would be even more capable of stirring up trouble.

Yang Qi was definitely not the simpleton he had been in the past. ‘Considering the Crown Prince built up an organization like the Crown Prince Society, there’s no way he’s an idiot. He wouldn’t be so childish as to be taken in by Yun Hailan’s good looks. There must be other secrets to her.’

After leaving Manyflowers Peak, mist sprang up around the mountain, locking it down tight, and making it impossible for him to go back.

Clearly, Yang Susu and her master were now officially in secluded meditation.

The trip to the Minorcosm had had a profound effect on the two of them. Now, they were both determined to achieve another breakthrough.

With that, Yang Qi left the Heaven Lode Mountains. His trip to the Minorcosm World had really opened his eyes. Now he realized how much of a countryside hick he had been in the past. Back then, he didn’t even realize that places like the Minorcosm World existed, an alternate dimension floating in a sea of clouds.

Gaining understanding about such things would definitely be a big help to his cultivation.

‘I need to get away from the Demi-Immortal Institute and find some remote location to reach Secondary Lifeseizing!’ He sped along a few hundred kilometers until the Demi-Immortal Institute was far behind him. At that point, he shot up into the clouds and unfurled his Fiend-Devil Wings. As he did, black energy swirled around him, turning the clouds as dark as night.

Now that he didn't need to worry about prying eyes, he shot higher up into the air.

Eventually, he was above the sea of clouds, and the higher he got, the more powerful the heavenly winds grew. Soon, he was hundreds of thousands of meters in the air, and the vortexes of air grew larger and larger. Normally speaking, vortexes like this would rip people to shreds.

And in fact, if Yang Qi hadn’t used his true energy to protect himself, that is exactly what would have happened to him.

Even a mountain made of metal would have been destroyed.

WHIZZZ!

He sped through the heavenly winds, pushing himself as hard as he could, hoping to push past his limits and break through to Secondary Lifeseizing. The energy flows up here were created by nature itself, and the heavenly wind was something that no eyes could pierce.

Even most Lifeseizers couldn’t go much past the sea of clouds without expending significant effort, and wasting a lot of true energy. And if heavenly wind touched them, forcing frigid cold into their meridians, their true energy flow would be hindered, and they would freeze up and fall to their death.

It was a truly dangerous activity.

And yet, Yang Qi only continued to fly higher and higher. Frigid energy poured into him, hoping to freeze his meridians solid; ice even began to build up on his skin.

But Yang Qi cultivated the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, which meant that he could send the true flame of hell through his body. As powerful as magma, it easily destroyed the frigid energy from the heavenly winds.

‘Now I understand why the ancients had a different version of the expression it’s lonely at the top. They would say one can’t win against the cold when in high places. It really is freezing up here, but I need to challenge myself. Yun Hailan has a powerful expert helping her, and has it easy wherever she goes. But I want to push the limits. I want to be a true man!’

He was really feeling very heroic in this moment.

In fact, he was so high that he had left the light and was out in the darkness. Wild energy streams surrounded him, almost like tempests from hell. Vortexes were everywhere, the smallest of them hundreds of kilometers across, the largest, hundreds of thousands. The levels of power were so intense that he was being flung about like a rag doll.

By this point, his Fiend-Devil Wings had shrunk down to only a few meters across, and were shedding sparks as they were eaten away by the winds.

However, he remained unruffled.

Eventually managing to stabilize himself, he looked inside of himself and began to release the thousands of dragons.

One after another, they began to pour into the next particle.

WHIZZZ!

Thirty-one particles. Thirty-two. Thirty-three. One by one they opened up like blooming flowers, filling Yang Qi with the power of more ancient megamammoths. It was like a herd of the beasts that returned from primeval times, the rulers of the ancient beasts.

An aura like the wild lands of yore began to pulsate off him.

One by one, the particles awoke and bolstered his true energy.

Two hours later, the little dragons had all been converted into life force quintessence, and then used to add to the true energy of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.

No one alive would ever accept the fact that a Lifeseizer had remained within the heavenly winds for that long.

Not even the old-timers back in the Demi-Immortal Institute would have believed it. That was what happened when Yang Qi unleashed the true potential which he normally kept hidden.

If Patriarchs Wind and Cloud could see Yang Qi right now, they would definitely wish they could take back the words they had most recently spoken.

Ten explosive booms echoed out as forty true energy manifestations of megamammoths appeared behind Yang Qi. The megamammoths trumpeted, causing a massive energy to explode out in all directions.

Shockingly, Yang Qi had awoken ten particles all at the same time. The Nine-Yang Immortal Energy had pushed him from thirty all the way to forty, which went to show how powerful that fabled energy was.

Not even Holy Daughter Manyflowers could absorb that type of energy, but Yang Qi could, and could use it to incredible effect.

‘Return to me!’

The forty megamammoths instantly sank back down into Yang Qi.

Yang Qi was experiencing a major transformation, as dramatic as a cicada shedding its carapace, or a python its skin. Glittering droplets of metallic blood oozed out of his pores, making it look like he had golden skin.

This was one of the marvelous things that happened during Secondary Lifeseizing. Inner-Outer Transposition.

RUMBLE!

As the process went on, Yang Qi’s true energy grew more powerful, until it seemed to incite opposition from the vital energy of heaven and earth. Soon, rumbling sounds like that of thunder began to fill the air.

Crish. Crash…. A massive bolt of lightning smashed into Yang Qi, causing his own true energy to destabilize.

‘So, this is the tribulation of the Lifeseizing level?’ Yang Qi could sense that the vital energy of heaven and earth was definitely resisting him. ‘Well, lightning is already an integral part of me and my true energy. A bit of puny lightning isn’t going to hurt me. In fact, it might help me temper my body. Bring it on!’

Opening his meridians, he allowed the lightning to course through him, tempering his true energy as it did.

Most people feared lightning more than scorpions, but with Yang Qi, it was the exact opposite.

‘Secondary Lifeseizing!’

Vortexes and tornadoes spun around him, but could do nothing to prevent the spirit energy of heaven and earth from pouring into his body and becoming life force quintessence.

He was changing on the most fundamental of levels.

It was now the critical moment of Secondary Lifeseizing; if he succeeded, he would make a major advancement.

Chapter 107: Physical Transformation

Yang Qi was facing the most critical moment of his Secondary Lifeseizing tribulation.

The storm around him was building in intensity, sending massive lightning bolts at him which he simply absorbed into his true energy. Toward the end, the lightning took the form of swords, sabers, hammers, and all sorts of other weapons which bore down on him with reckless abandon.

As for Yang Qi, the constant influx of lightning energy was almost intoxicating.

Slowly but surely, symbols of lightning began to form around him, the images of gods and devils, of angels and ghosts.

In the middle of those angels and devil-ghosts was a god of heaven with an elephantine head and a human body, which seemed capable of propping up all the heavens as it crushed hell beneath its feet. This was the invincible might of the godmammoth.

Yang Qi’s true energy was now so boundless that it was like an ocean capable of fighting back against heaven and earth. The tribulation that had come with Secondary Lifeseizing wasn’t a problem for him at all, and in fact, benefited his true energy, and made him even stronger than before.

The golden layer on his skin slowly retreated, leaving behind a powerful aura, as well as sparkling and translucent skin. It seemed flawless in every aspect, almost as if it were carved from the purest crystal.

As of now, the blood inside him wasn’t dark gold anymore. Instead, it was like platinum. And instead of having a hellish aura, he now seemed like he came from the holy legion of gods in heaven.

WHOOSH!

His widespread wings were no longer pitch black. Instead, they pulsed with a holy aura, and were now laced with streaks of white.

His Fiend-Devil Wings were progressing toward becoming Angel Wings.

The Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth was not an inherently evil energy art. It was a mythical technique that had existed for so long that it had become tainted with bits of evil.

However, as progress was made within the technique, those evil aspects would be cleansed and expelled by holiness.

The most obvious evidence of that change was how the Fiend-Devil Wings were becoming Angel Wings. Furthermore, the Infernal Deity Spear would also change color, and would become pure and holy, like a sage, infused with energy of the dao of monarchs.

‘Infernal Deity Spear!’

The flick of his hand summoned the spear, which was not dark golden anymore. It was also laced with platinum. Now, anyone who looked at the spear wouldn’t think of it as the result of some evil technique, but rather, something orthodox and righteous.

Of course, it would take more time to truly expel the evil, or at least, purify and absorb it.

Only a small portion had been cleansed at this point. When his Fiend-Devil Wings truly became Angel Wings, they would be scintillating platinum. And to do that, he would need to seize life multiple times, and reach the Legendary level.

‘Physical transformation, and subjugation of evil. Use the power of hell to bolster heaven!’ Yang Qi’s mind was filled with the mental dharma of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, and his meridians were growing even more powerful.

Countless bolts of lightning entered him, along with boundless vital energy of heaven and earth.

The wind screamed high in the air where he was, a massive storm of vital energy that he forcibly grabbed and shoved into his meridians.

His meridians were now twice as large as they had been, and also twice as tough. And his sea of energy really was like a massive sea, overflowing with turbulent true energy.

Although the vital energy this high in the sky couldn’t compare to Nine-Yang Immortal Energy, it was still useful, and incredibly abundant.

As it poured into his meridians and went to his sea of energy, it became a mist, which was crushed into a liquid that then became a solid substance.

Then, that solid substance was crushed into tiny, nearly invisible bits, which then were absorbed into the existing particles within him.

With that vital energy, the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth was once again awakening.

BOOM!

The forty-first particle within him sent the true energy of a megamammoth pouring through him.

‘Awaken! The power of a megamammoth can prop up the heavens! And its legs can crush the countless hosts of devils in hell. I have accepted your legacy! I am supreme in all creation!’

Yang Qi felt as though he could dry up rivers and drain seas, or pluck stars and snatch moons.

Bam. Bam. Bam. Bam. Bam. Bam! Bam!! BAM!!!

Eight booms resonated as more megamammoths woke up. In the blink of an eye, he went to a total of forty-nine awakened particles. He was right on the verge of reaching fifty.

With the power of so many ancient megamammoths coursing through him, Yang Qi didn't feel like himself. He felt like a god in embryonic form.

His meridians continued to change, growing larger and tougher. When he closed his eyes and looked inside, he saw that his meridians were now platinum, holy to the extreme, within which flowed platinum true energy, energy that seemed to be on the verge of merging with his blood.

According to legend, in the highest levels of cultivation, the practitioner would become one with energy. The practitioner would be energy, and the energy would be the practitioner. That person would then be able to transform at any time, becoming an embodiment of pure energy. It was essentially a state of undying.

Of course, not even Legendaries could do that.

And yet, Yang Qi could tell that he was gradually heading in that direction. If people such as Patriarchs Wind and Cloud back in the Demi-Immortal Institute could see what was happening to him, they would be shocked to death.

He was truly transforming on all levels.

With that, he burst out laughing. At the same time, the violent energy flows around him were swept away, leaving him hovering in the air like a god or devil.

“Trident!” he said. Suddenly, the rippling blue door leading into his thumb-ring opened, and the divine weapon therein flew out. That trident was the weapon that had long since been on the verge of becoming a spirit weapon.

What were spirit weapons? They were weapons that developed their own spirit. They were essentially daemons with powerful energy arts. Most weapons never became daemons. But once they did, and once they developed their own spirit, they could not easily be vanquished by even the most powerful energy artists.

A spirit weapon was essentially like an expert in the Lifeseizing level.

As for the trident, it had been forged with cold, ten-thousand-year-old iron from the bottom of the ocean, bolstered by seasoul crystals and the quintessence-blood and souls of countless sea demonlings. It was named Trident of the Sea God, and had been infused with medicinal pills for decades, all for the purpose of turning it into a spirit weapon.

Yang Qi had learned of the matters pertaining to the trident after attending classes in the institute.

During his time at the Demi-Immortal Institute, he had not only transformed from an ignorant youth into something of a man of learning, he had also learned a bit about equipment forging.

“The dao of equipment forging involves manipulating the soul of steel. Clear the meridians, cast the spirit. Alright, trident. Now that I'm a Secondary Lifeseizer, I’ll help you form your soul and become a spirit weapon!”

WHIZZZ!

The Infernal Deity Spear suddenly flew out into the open.

As true energy poured from the spear into the trident, numerous cracking sounds rang out, as though something inside the trident was opening up.

In the end, a huge boom rang out, and the trident began to shine with dazzling light, and pulse with the vital energy of heaven and earth.

It was also possible to see, in the very depths of the trident, something like a blue soul.

The trident rose into the air, emanating true energy fluctuations that were equivalent to a Primary Lifeseizer.

“Not a bad weapon. Of course, considering I have my Infernal Deity Spear, I have no need of such a thing. I’ll give it to one of my brothers. If Yun Hailan makes a move against them or one of their clans, they will need all the help they can get.”

Although his Fiend-Devil Wings were not Angel Wings, they were laced with platinum, and were now even more powerful than before.

He flapped the wings, not only propelling himself downward, but also sending out a blast of heat.

The friction between that heat and the storm around him caused flames to erupt everywhere, making him look like a phoenix speeding down from the sky.

That fire moved so fast that the sound of its passage didn't arrive until the fire was more than fifty kilometers away, a truly terrifying level of speed.

In fact, it was speed the likes of which meant Yang Qi could kill some Lifeseizers by simply running into them, and not even unleashing an attack.

Now that he was fully in Secondary Lifeseizing, he was so powerful that if he ran into Longxuan Ye again, he could kill him without a second thought.

In fact, he could easily hold his own against Quaternary or even Quinary Lifeseizers.

WHOOSH!

By this point, he was back among the sea of clouds, and before long, landed on the ground. It was summer; the air was hot and parched, and the lands were dry, cracked, and covered with dust.

Smiling, he circulated his true energy, then turned into a blur that headed back to the Demi-Immortal Institute, leaving behind only a curl of smoke.

By the time he arrived, it was night. He didn’t go to the College of Elite Students, but instead, to the location where Li He and the others were in secluded meditation.

He had left behind some Humanoid True Energy to help them operate the energy formation of the dao of monarchs, but had no idea how their cultivation had progressed since he left.

As it turned out, the one who benefited the most was Liang Dong, who was rapidly approaching the Lifeseizing level.

Chapter 108: Preventative Measures

Yang Qi’s energy formation of the dao of monarchs had been constantly active this entire time.

Whizz!

Liang Dong’s aura was rapidly transforming, making him like the fish that wished to leap through the dragon gate and become a dragon itself.

“Lifeseizing level! Vital energy conversion, scorching heat immolates the body, shed the flesh and exchange the bones!” Liang Dong let loose a long howl as the true energy surged through his meridians, and the vital energy of heaven and earth coursed into him.

Shockingly, flames erupted from his eyes, ears, nose, and mouth, the manifestation of a tribulation of true flame energy arts. As it turned out, his energy arts were so intensely hot that he lost control of them upon entering the Lifeseizing level, and was bursting into flame himself.

The truth was that because of all the help from Yang Qi, Liang Dong’s true energy had long since reached the point of being able to enter the Lifeseizing level. However, he had been hesitating because of his flame-type energy arts; he knew that if he forced a breakthrough, he might burn out and become nothing more than ash.

Every year there were people in the Demi-Immortal Institute who burst into flames and died when trying to reach the Lifeseizing level.

But then, massive amounts of water vapor erupted from Yang Qi’s trident, subjugating the flames. Water was the ultimate core of the Sea God Institute's energy arts, just as scorching heat was the ultimate core of the Cosmic Sunflare Sword.

In the blink of an eye, fire and water juxtaposed, and the true flame that had engulfed Liang Dong transformed into a sweet dew of quintessence vitality.

His power levels rose, and deep in his sea of energy, a massive sword began to take shape, causing intense rumbling sounds to fill him.

At long last, Liang Dong had reached the Lifeseizing level.

And his version of the Cosmic Sunflare Sword technique vastly surpassed that of Chu Tiange’s.

After all, Chu Tiange’s version had never even come close to reaching its full potential. But Liang Dong had used the power of a sun gem. Furthermore, with the help provided by the spirit weapon that was the trident, his battle prowess was now at a shocking level.

Another hour passed, and Liang Dong reined in his true energy, his eyes sparkling. As of this moment, he didn’t care at all what it had taken to reach this point.

He was now a Lifeseizer!

“Congratulations!” Li He said, his voice filled with admiration and not the slightest bit of jealousy. “Another of us brothers has reached the Lifeseizing level….”

Shaking his head to clear it, Liang Dong said, “I got there a bit sooner than the rest of you, that’s all. Now I understand the situation. We’re cultivating the Cosmic Sunflare Sword, the intense heat of which makes the ascension to the Lifeseizing level incredibly dangerous. If you force the breakthrough without some soft and feminine treasure to help out, there’s a ninety-nine percent chance you’ll burn yourself to death.”

“That’s right,” Yang Qi said. “With that kind of treasure, you can all succeed. It won’t be long now before you’re all Lifeseizers. Although we won’t necessarily be the most domineering force in the institute, we can at least be strong enough to keep each other safe.” It was only after participating in Liang Dong’s breakthrough that Yang Qi realized the dangerous flaw in the Cosmic Sunflare Sword.

Apparently, Liang Dong could now sense that there was something unusual about Yang Qi. “Brother, your aura is so beyond me that I can’t even assess it.”

“Oh, I just reached Secondary Lifeseizing,” Yang Qi explained.

“Secondary Lifeseizing?! Already? It's only been a couple months since you first reached the Lifeseizing level. If word spread, people would pass out from shock.” Li He, He Jili and Hua Yinhu were so astonished that their eyes nearly popped out of their skulls.

Yang Qi chuckled. “Well, you guys have known for a long time how strong I really am, right? Remember how shocked you were when I killed Chu Tiange?” At this point, his expression turned serious. “Right now, you need to get as strong as you can, as quickly as you can. Don’t delay in becoming Lifeseizers! I’ll try to find soft and feminine treasures for all of you within the month, and then I’ll personally help you with the breakthrough. We’ll all become elite students!”

“What happened, Brother? What’s the rush?” His friends could tell that something was amiss, leading them to feel somewhat nervous.

“Yun Hailan is now the apprentice of Patriarchs Wind and Cloud, and as you know she’s allied with the Crown Prince Society. In order to try to clip my wings, she’s threatened to do something to your clans, and to mine….” Not wanting to hide anything from his brothers, he told them everything that had played out with Holy Daughter Manyflowers, the Minorcosm, and Patriarchs Wind and Cloud.

After hearing the whole story, all of his friends sat there in mute shock.

A long moment passed, whereupon Liang Dong took a deep breath and said, “Minorcosm World? Patriarchs Wind and Cloud? They’re Legendaries…. That’s way, way beyond our level. We can’t possibly deal with people like that. If they wanted to kill us, it would be as easy as stepping on an ant.”

“Not necessarily!” Yang Qi said, his eyes glittering. “Anybody who wants to try to kill me will have to pay the price in blood. And if anyone tries to hurt my friends, I’ll kill them even if I die in the process.” Because of his cultivation of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, he was starting to pick up some of the boundlessly domineering characteristics of the technique.

“Hold on a second….” Li He said. “If I remember correctly, Patriarchs Wind and Cloud are old professors. They won’t do anything to students like us. But the fact that the Crown Prince Society has it out for us is really a bit scary. All members of that society have impressive backgrounds, and it wouldn’t be impossible for their clans to do something to ours. Our top priority should be to get stronger. We’re all Masters of Energy, and are members of the younger generation. If we become Lifeseizers, and elite students, then everything would be different. At that point, people would definitely think twice before doing something to us. That said, to a colossal monster of an organization like the Crown Prince Society, we would still be nobodies.”

“All of this is because of the grudge between me and Yun Hailan,” Yang Qi said. “I'm sorry for having dragged you into it, Brothers.”

“Brother, you absolutely, positively must not think that way. We’re brothers for life. We live together and die together, we share honor and disgrace alike. There’s no need to say anything beyond that. We’ll overcome these difficulties together, and that’s that. On the upside, the martial arts competition is coming up. If we perform well, the institute will take us more seriously, and it will be harder for our enemies to make a move against us.”

“Fine, the matter’s settled!” Yang Qi said. “Now we need to figure out where to get something to neutralize the Cosmic Sunflare Sword. What kind of water-type treasure can deal with the fire of that technique? Whatever it is, I’ll get it so that you can all reach the Lifeseizing level.”

“I know!” Li He said. “I know the perfect treasure to deal with the Cosmic Sunflare Sword!”

“What is it?”

“You've heard of the demon kings of the seventy-two grottos, right? Well, one of those grottos is the Black Floodwyrm Grotto, which is led by King Black Floodwyrm himself. The Cosmic Sunflare Sword technique is a consummate discipline from our institute that focuses on intensely hot true energy. The perfect item to counteract that heat would be black floodwyrm demon cores from the Black Sea. The black floodwyrms from there are particularly fierce and violent. Whenever they come ashore, they cause devastation wherever they go. However, at nighttime, they absorb moonlight and store it in their demon core, where they refine and purify it. If you used that refined moonlight with the Cosmic Sunflare Sword, then it would be the perfect combination of sun and moon. Unfortunately, King Black Floodwyrm is indeed one of the demon kings of the seventy-two grottos, and his grotto ranks higher than the Blood Demon Grotto. If anyone from the orthodox institutions enter his territory, the black floodwyrms kill them on sight. It’s a very dangerous place. Even worse, our Cosmic Sunflare Sword technique came from both Chu Tiange’s animadestiny sword manifestation, as well as that sun gem. It would take demon cores from Lifeseizing level black floodwyrm to neutralize its heat. That would make the hunt even more dangerous.”

“He’s right,” Liang Dong said. “Black floodwyrm demon cores are the perfect counterpoint to fire-type techniques. Lots of top experts in the Demi-Immortal Institute use them. However, not many people actually go to the Black Sea to hunt them.”

“The demon kings of the seventy-two grottos?” Yang Qi's heart suddenly started pounding. “I’ve heard of them. They’re subsidiaries of the Hanging Mountain, aren’t they?”

“Yeah! That's exactly right.”

“In that case, I need to take a trip to the Black Sea. There’s no time to lose. I’ll leave now. Give me a map!”

Chapter 109: Black Floodwyrm Grotto

Whoosh. Whoosh. Whoosh!

A figure blurred across the lands at top speed.

It was Yang Qi, flying over roads, rivers, mountains, forests, lakes, and other terrain features. He passed along like a specter, moving so quickly that no one could even see him, his energy arts at such a high level that he was like a god-immortal.

He wanted to reach the Black Sea as quickly as possible, all in the hopes of getting Hua Yinhu, He Jili, and Li He into the Lifeseizing level immediately. His plan was to hunt for black floodwyrms that were in the Lifeseizing level, and harvest their demon cores. And of course, he was operating alone.

At the same time, Liang Dong would go apply to be an elite student, which would also significantly increase the sway of their group as a whole.

Furthermore, the fact that the Black Floodwyrm Grotto was run by one of the seventy-two demon kings subordinate to the Hanging Mountain had Yang Qi’s heart pounding with anticipation. Hopefully, this trip would also net him some clues about that mystical mountain, and how to get there.

The subject of his mother, and by extent the Hanging Mountain, occupied his thoughts day and night, and he couldn’t stop thinking about traveling there.

Even his desire to get revenge on Yun Hailan counted for almost nothing compared to that.

This trip to the Black Floodwyrm Grotto would not only help him in his fight with Yun Hailan, but it could also get him information about his mother. How could he possibly pass up an opportunity like that?

He knew that it would be a very dangerous place, but wasn’t very worried. He was a Secondary Lifeseizer who could kill Quaternary Lifeseizers, and maybe even Quinary. And by engaging in brutal fights, he would likely become even stronger. The time had come for tempering.

Besides, perhaps if he consumed some of the demon cores, he could even reach Tertiary Lifeseizing.

At that point, even the brownnoser Yun Hailan would have a hard time catching up to him.

Why wouldn’t he want to kill three birds with one stone?

His actual approach to the Black Floodwyrm Grotto was made, not by flying through the air, but rather, on foot. Trying to follow the twists and turns in the road to the Black Sea from up above would be too difficult.

He kept to the ground, and constantly referenced his detailed map of the Rich-Lush Continent. The map revealed all the various locations of profound danger, and also the forbidden regions. It was a map produced by the Demi-Immortal Institute itself, and was far beyond ordinary maps available in the Rich-Lush Continent.

Just by studying the map, it was possible to learn a lot about the continent. In fact, Yang Qi was thinking of sending a copy of the map back to Yanhaven. A better understanding of geography would definitely help his father when it came time to move troops.

“A desert,” Yang Qi murmured, looking at the seemingly endless sand dunes which stretched out in front of him. This desolate desert was tens upon tens of thousands of kilometers wide, and filled with dunes and sand mountains. All sorts of cactuses could be seen, some, mighty trees that stretched for dozens of meters up into the sky, others, spherical and roughly the size of an ordinary house.

Yang Qi scanned the area up ahead with true energy, and could sense a bit of demon energy from demonlings. There were snakes, scorpions, centipedes, poisonous insects, and even foxes and wolves, all of them demonlings who were adapted to desert life.

However, he had no interests in the little demonlings, and didn’t want to waste time. Without any hesitation, he headed into the scorching desert, following the map toward his target destination.

Surprisingly, the Black Sea was not located out on the open ocean, but rather, in the middle of a desert.

According to the stories, it was fed by numerous subterranean rivers and channels of spirit energy, making it a holy land for the demon-devils and demonlings that lived in the surrounding desert.

As for the desert, it was called the Northern Frontier Desert, and was known as a boundless danger zone devoid of any human population. It contained only demonlings, and countless bizarre terrain features.

About five hundred kilometers into the desert, a tornado-filled sandstorm suddenly sprang up, so powerful that the blasts of sand caused sparks to fly off of Yang Qi’s defensive true energy.

Even though the grains of sand were tiny, when they were propelled by the wind en masse, they could pierce even steel. Luckily, Yang Qi’s defensive arts and equipment were far beyond that level, and weren’t damaged at all.

It was now obvious why people didn't live here. Even some of the toughest demonlings would burrow deep into the sand when the tornadoes came, sometimes going as far as the subterranean rivers.

WHOOSH!

Yang Qi waved his hand, sending out a blast of true energy that completely destroyed a massive tornado that was in his path.

Having sent his true energy so far ahead of him, he realized that there was a source of water up ahead.

“The Black Sea,” he murmured, and then began to follow that sensation of water.

He flew along for hundreds upon hundreds of kilometers until eventually the sandstorms died down, and a sea became visible up ahead.

It was pitch black, even the waves, and covered in mists that made it impossible to see very far along its surface. It was so large that Yang Qi couldn’t see the ends of it.

For a huge sea to be located in the middle of a vast desert went to show how spectacular the works of nature could be.

‘This is the location of the Black Floodwyrm Grotto. The demon kings of the seventy-two grottos in the Rich-Lush Continent are all subordinate to the Hanging Mountain. I hope that I can unearth some more secrets here, maybe information about where exactly my mother is. I know her nickname is Greensura, but what is her real name…?’

As he stood there on the shore of the sea, he kept his true energy reined in, making him seem like nothing more than an ordinary person.

As the water lapped against the shore, he knelt down and scooped some up in his hand. Immediately, he could sense a frigid energy that seemed to be thousands of years old.

Unexpectedly, this water was freezing, and yet hadn’t turned to ice.

Furthermore, the darkness of the water made it seem like ink; clearly, this sea was different from ordinary seas.

‘This water has frigid yin energy of a black, baleful nature.’ Yang Qi was gradually becoming more knowledgeable in the ways of the world, and recognized this as a variation of the more common type of subterranean baleful energy.

Black, baleful yin energy could be extremely harmful to humans, but for some water-type demonlings with frigid yin aspects, it was profoundly beneficial.

Obviously, lurking in the depths of this sea were demonlings of incredible power and ferocity.

Yang Qi looked out thoughtfully at the Black Sea, the water slowly draining through his fingertips. The most important thing to do right now was find the actual location of the Black Floodwyrm Grotto.

According to what his friends had told him, he knew that King Black Floodwyrm of Black Floodwyrm Grotto was an actual black floodwyrm. However, one of the Great Sages from the Hanging Mountain had magically transformed him, changing his floodwyrm body into that of a human. He was a powerful Legendary, and someone that Yang Qi currently couldn’t hope to match up with.

King Black Floodwyrm was vicious to the extreme, and the yearly raids he led resulted in countless lost lives among humans. Even the top experts in the institutes weren’t sure what to do about him.

Although there were Legendaries in the institutes, King Black Floodwyrm was backed by the Hanging Mountain, an organization so massive that ordinary people didn't even know how large it actually was.

If Yang Qi caught the attention of someone like him, he would have a hard time making it out alive.

After all, he had no techniques of invisibility.

Such arts did exist though. For example, there was the Shape-Altering Art and the Form-Concealing Technique. Such abilities used one’s true energy to create a field of distortion around oneself that essentially made one invisible. There were even some that could perfectly hide one's true energy.

But Yang Qi had only been in the institute for a short time, and had never had the free time to study such things.

Thankfully, the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth innately enabled him to conceal his aura.

Waving his hand, he summoned his suit of armor.

The Infernal Deity Plate Armor appeared, and this time, it was even sturdier than before. In fact, it was so strong that he could swim through lava for three days and three nights without being hurt.

Thus equipped, he leapt into the water, diving down to begin his hunt for black floodwyrms. He was like a deadly assassin, his aura concealed, his black Infernal Deity Plate Armor the perfect color to match the Black Sea around him.

As he swam along, he sent out his true energy, filling an area dozens of kilometers around him and enabling him to see everything as clear as day.

There were many creatures around him: strange fish with vicious fangs who absorbed the black, baleful yin energy around them and used it to fuel their powerful water-type energy arts. Down here, the weak were prey to the strong, and not a single creature was docile in any way.

Yang Qi saw a pitch-black, nine-meter-long fish battling with a water snake. Water surged around them, until the black fish spat out a mouthful of sword light, killing the snake, which it then swallowed whole. Then it sent out energy fluctuations that caused the surrounding demonling fish to tremble in fear.

That fish was as powerful as someone in the eighth phase, similar to the white ape Yang Qi had fought in his early days in the Blackcorpse Mountains.

Of course, creatures of that level were of no interest to him now. He needed black floodwyrms who were in the Lifeseizing level.

With three such demon cores, he would have accomplished his mission, and would be able to leave whenever he wanted.

Chapter 110: Encountering a Black Floodwyrm

‘This Black Sea is really deep.’

On the sea floor, it was common to see vents spewing black liquid, which was none other than the water from the subterranean rivers that fed the sea. The armored Yang Qi sank deeper and deeper into the black waters, encountering more demonlings as he did.

At one point he saw a five-colored sea snake with a Master of Energy cultivation base. It had created a mansion grotto for itself in the reefs below the surface of the water, and was currently lounging there absorbing the baleful energy around it. There were numerous demonlings in the area that it had obviously subjugated and forced to serve it.

The sea snake was as wide as a water bucket, and dozens of meters long. It had clearly guided the growth of the reef around it, ensuring that it was a perfect defensive structure within which to practice cultivation.

In fact, the reef was so large that it was almost like a city, similar to the kinds built on the surface by humans.

Demonfolk were innately intelligent, and were born with legacy techniques from ancient Great Sages of the Demonfolk. Obviously, their cultivation went very different than humans’.

In fact, Yang Qi even noticed that the snake was intelligent enough to have directed some demonlings to grow black, magical mushrooms in the fertile waters of the sea, and also ginseng and other medicinal plants that could be used to make energy convergence pills. Some demonlings were intelligent enough to concoct pills to use in their cultivation, much the same way humans did.

The truth was that the Demonfolk in primeval times had many paths of cultivation, and in the beginning, humans had simply imitated them.

As for this sea snake, the projected image of a human rested on its head, formed from true energy, his skin five-colored just as the snake’s.

It was Humanoid True Energy, and in the position where a human’s heart would have been, it had a five-colored demon core, the size of a fist. It was hard to say how many years of cultivation it would take to develop a demon core that size.

The snake immediately sensed the fluctuations indicating Yang Qi’s presence, and looked over in his direction.

“Who’s there?”

Without waiting for a response, the snake suddenly shot through the water at incredible speed, heading directly toward Yang Qi as if to consume him.

A Master of Energy who was in this situation would likely have been taken out by this demonling before even being able to react.

However, Yang Qi waved his hand, sending out streams of sword energy into the water, creating a massive sword net that surrounded the sea snake.

“Spare me, oh Greater Demon! I beg of you!”

The sea snake didn’t fight back at all; it could tell immediately that it was dealing with a Lifeseizer. Of course, it didn’t speak with words. However, the fluctuations which rolled out of it would be understandable to anyone with a high enough cultivation base.

Actually, even people in the eighth phase were already capable of fusing with their own soul to a certain level. With a little effort, and enough time, they could understand just about any spoken language.

And that power only got greater in the Master of Energy level.

Therefore, it wasn’t even necessary to mention Lifeseizers. They could easily use their true energy to communicate with others on the soul level, without even using spoken words.

“Spare you? Tell me where the Black Floodwyrm Grotto is! And where can I find black floodwyrms in the Lifeseizing level?”

Considering that Yang Qi was completely unfamiliar with the Black Sea, he didn’t want to waste time blindly searching. It would be much more efficient to find some locals to get information from.

“You’re looking for Black Floodwyrm Grotto, oh Greater Demon?” The five-colored snake shivered inwardly. “It’s far, far away in the east of the Black Sea. There’s a deep gully there where they’ve built a massive city. That's where all the top black floodwyrm experts are.”

“Oh really?” With that, Yang Qi tightened the net, slicing the snake to pieces, causing blood to swirl out and fill the area.

The demonlings in the Black Sea were vicious to the core, and frequently came out of the sea itself to hunt and eat humans. Therefore, there was no way Yang Qi would let one in the Master of Energy level go free.

Reaching out, he took the fist-sized demon core, looked at it, and then crushed it with his true energy.

Moments later, his Hellfire Crucible appeared above his head. He placed the demon core inside, and the bubbling lava immediately began to melt it. Only ten breaths of time later, it was a stream of true energy that flowed through his meridians to his sea of energy, and then into one of the particles inside him.

By this point, his Hellfire Crucible was strong enough that it could melt demon cores almost immediately, and convert them to life force quintessence.

It was something most people would find unimaginable.

There weren’t even any imperial- or saintly-class energy arts that could do such a thing.

Whack. Whack. Whack! Whack!! WHACK!!!

The wave of his hand sent a burst of energy toward the other demonlings in the area, causing them to explode, and dragging all of their demon cores into his Hellfire Crucible.

Clearing this part of the sea floor had netted him over a hundred cores. Yang Qi let out a long sigh. This was definitely much better than sitting around meditating to further his cultivation, although it wasn't quite as amazing as using Nine-Yang Immortal Energy.

Unfortunately, he currently had no valid reason to go to the Minorcosm World. Even someone like Holy Daughter Manyflowers could only remain there for a short time without violating sect rules.

To him, it seemed like a huge waste that Yun Hailan was allowed inside. Although, she couldn’t absorb Nine-Yang Immortal Energy, so perhaps it didn't matter.

Yang Qi could tell that it wouldn’t even take a month of working with Nine-Yang Immortal Energy for him to blow past Tertiary Lifeseizing and possibly go all the way to Quinary.

Unfortunately, it was currently nothing more than a fantasy.

'Ah, whatever. Since I can't get into the Minorcosm World, I’ll just hunt demonlings here in the Black Sea. Demon cores are better than nothing. Hopefully I can find some that are in the Lifeseizing level, which will at least be closer to the effectiveness of Nine-Yang Immortal Energy.' With that, he headed toward the eastern part of the Black Sea.

In that direction, the cities grew more numerous, as did the demonlings.

A few hundred kilometers in, he ran into a pack of sea spiders in the middle of hunting some other demonlings. They were as large as horses, and were all in the Master of Energy level.

As soon as they saw him, they lunged toward him, sending out silk-like streams of true energy in the form of a net that cut off all avenues of escape.

“Welcome!” Yang Qi said. Suddenly, the Infernal Deity Spear appeared, sending out streams of lava-like true flame that destroyed all of the silk strands.

CRACK!

The spear stabbed through one of the sea spiders, and the intensely hot true energy caused it to explode. As for its demon core, he pulled it into the Heart of the Sea.

SWOOOOSH!

He shot forward, easily dispatching the rest of the nine sea spiders, and then harvesting their demon cores.

As he proceeded along, he was like a god of death ridding the world of devils and demons. He cut down every demonling in his path. Sea lions, walruses, sea centipedes, sea scorpions, sea wolves. Not a single sea demonling could stand up to the Infernal Deity Spear.

Two hours later, he had killed over a hundred demonlings in the Master of Energy level, and had their demon cores in his thumb-ring.

After finding a rather remote valley, he sat down cross-legged and pulled out the cores. After melting them in his Hellfire Crucible to remove the demon energy, he sent the resulting life force quintessence into his body.

By this point, he could tell that the fiftieth particle within him was starting to stir.

However, he wouldn’t be able to wake it in this fashion. After all, Yang Susu had used the Sage Devil Painting to reach Secondary Lifeseizing, and that had contained ten thousand demon cores in the Master of Energy level, and one that was from a Lifeseizer. He would need a massive amount of force to breakthrough. Using a few hundred Master of Energy demon cores would be like throwing a cup of water on a burning cart of firewood.

That said, this experience was giving him a much better practical understanding of the Hellfire Crucible.

Rising to his feet, he once again shot through the depths of the sea, a god of death, a bodhisattva of killing.

Eventually, he ran into a nest of black snakes in a valley. Almost instantly, vortexes sprang up around the entrance of their nest, sending out shocking energy fluctuations.

Then, from within the depths of the valley, a black floodwyrm appeared.

It had long horns, vicious claws, and scales that glittered in a way that vastly surpassed any snakes.

He had finally found one. Unfortunately, it was not at the Lifeseizing level, although it was close, making it worth dozens of Master of Energy demonlings.

Demonlings were different from people, and generally had much stronger true energy.

‘I'm finally getting close to Black Floodwyrm Grotto.’

After spotting the black floodwyrm, he looked into the depths of the valley, and realized that further in, there were even more powerful auras to be sensed. And he could just barely make out what appeared to be an underwater city.

It was the palace of the black floodwyrms.

The Black Floodwyrm Grotto, home to one of the seventy-two demon kings.

Chapter 111: Exceptional Strike

The black floodwyrm shot forth, and Yang Qi didn't waste time speaking.

He blurred into motion, and before the black floodwyrm could react, its body shattered into countless pieces. Before any of the blood could even flow out, a huge burst of true energy shoved it down into the sea floor, burying it.

Everything was over, just like that. It was almost as if the mighty black floodwyrm hadn’t even appeared to begin with.

At the same time, a perfectly spherical demon core appeared in Yang Qi’s hand. It was mighty, but not particularly sturdy. In contrast, it was very soft and pliable, almost like an internal organ of some sort. However, it pulsed with profoundly vigorous life force, almost as if there were an infant inside of it, about to be born.

Supposedly, when some daemons reach a high level of cultivation, they could break out of the cycle of reincarnation, and create an infant inside of their demon core. Eventually, they could then abandon their daemon body and become a perfect human.

This black floodwyrm had not quite reached that level, but its core did thump with life force, almost like a heartbeat, indicating that it was very close to forming that infant.

‘Lunar Corona, Cosmic Sunflare.’

It was with no warning whatsoever that Yang Qi unleashed the sword energy of the Cosmic Sunflare Sword technique, causing the water around him to bubble and boil.

The flaming sword energy hit the demon core, and the opposing forces of water and fire caused a taiji symbol to appear, as a perfect balance between the sun and moon was unleashed.

Black floodwyrms loved to consume moonlight, which was, of course, the quintessence of the moon above. In contrast, the Cosmic Sunflare Sword ate up the vital energy of the burning sun, providing the perfect complement.

Yang Qi threw the core into his Hellfire Crucible, and it instantly began to melt.

Eyes flickering, he looked off into the distance.

‘Is this place a black floodwyrm nest or something? That’s definitely the Black Floodwyrm Grotto over there. Supposedly, it's even higher ranked than the Blood Demon Grotto. It's definitely a very dangerous place, that's for sure.’

For most experts, even Lifeseizers, it would be a big waste of true energy to try to stay hidden in the depths of the icy Black Sea. Obviously, humans couldn’t breathe underwater; they would need to use true energy to move about. Because of that limitation, most Masters of Energy would only be able to stay underwater for a short time.

Lifeseizers could last for longer, but of course, if they ended up fighting with demonlings, would have to waste true energy even more. Occasionally, Lifeseizers would enter the Black Sea to help rid the world of devils and demons. But in most instances, they wouldn’t even be able to get close to the Black Floodwyrm Grotto. They would end up getting involved in fighting the various demonlings on the way, run out of true energy, and then be forced to flee. Either that, or be killed.

But Yang Qi was a terrifying exception to the norm. He wasn’t even close to running low on true energy. After all, he could consume the demon cores of the creatures he killed. As such, his true energy was surging, and he was actually in a better position than someone of the Seafolk would be here.

With his pitch black Infernal Deity Plate Armor, Yang Qi was like a devil-ghost from hell.

As for his Infernal Deity Spear, the platinum magical symbols that glittered on its surface made it seem like it was a glorious blessing from the legion of gods.

Furthermore, the helmet of the Infernal Deity Plate Armor had true energy eyes that made it possible for Yang Qi to see everything with utter clarity. He could even see the meridians inside his enemies, and the true energy flowing through them.

And he could also see all of the underwater terrain features. There were gullies, mountains, and further into the immense valley, a sprawling plain. And right in the middle of that plain was a collection of temples, crystalline palaces, and the like, which was the Black Floodwyrm Grotto itself.

He could sense countless auras within the mountains, and the way they caused his hackles to rise led him to the conclusion that if he charged blindly ahead, he would be killed.

‘What I need to do now is perfect the dao of the quick strike. There are definitely black floodwyrms practicing cultivation in caves. If I catch a few by surprise, and kill them quietly, I shouldn’t attract any attention.’ After a short moment of planning, he headed down into one of the gullies, and then in the direction of the palace complex up ahead.

Eventually, he caught sight of a black floodwyrm in the depths of the gully laying there completely motionless. However, its true energy was focused on its head, in humanoid form, holding a rotating pearl in its hands.

That pearl was much larger than the demon core Yang Qi had taken from the black floodwyrm earlier, and was clearly of much higher quality. Shockingly, this floodwyrm was in the Lifeseizing level! And it was completely focused on its cultivation.

‘Good… very good.’ Yang Qi’s heart immediately started pounding. After all, Lifeseizing demon cores were exactly what he needed to make sure that Li He, Hua Yinhu, and He Jili achieved their breakthroughs.

'Killing a Lifeseizer will be different. I know that I can win, but there’s no guarantee it won’t manage to send out a cry for help. If that happens, and experts from the Black Floodwyrm Grotto come, I’ll be in big trouble!' He wanted to make his move, but was still hesitating.

If he attacked, he needed to accomplish the kill quickly and cleanly.

Even the weakest Lifeseizer who was facing a deadly attack would call upon all of their power to reach a peak state of defense. And at the very least, they would use their power to send out a cry for help.

To kill a Lifeseizer so quickly that they didn't know what hit them was very, very difficult.

If he were back on land, Yang Qi would have been more confident, but right now, he was in the depths of the Black Sea, and knew that any fluctuations which rolled out through the water could easily attract the attention of nearby experts.

From what he could tell, his best bet would be to strike like lightning, then wait to see if anyone noticed. If they did, he would attempt to flee as quickly as possible.

What he was doing right now would be exactly the same as if some deadly monster snuck into the Demi-Immortal Institute and tried to assassinate an elite student. It was easy to imagine how things would turn out if the deed were noticed.

‘Ah, whatever. I'm here, so I might as well prepare a killing blow. If it doesn’t work the first time, I’ll follow up with another attack.’

Dropping down, he concealed himself in one of the many reefs on the seafloor.

His mind filled with thoughts of the dao of the quick strike, he focused on his sea of energy, and the power of forty-nine ancient megamammoths that rested there, waiting to be unleashed….

This was something new to him; the desire to do battle inside of him was growing so strong that his killing intent threatened to leak out into the open. Keeping a tight grip on it, he continued to build up power.

Beneath his suit of true energy armor, he was sweating profusely.

He absolutely had to pull this off like an assassination.

To make matters worse, black floodwyrms had abundant life force, perhaps ten times more than humans. That would make it even more difficult to kill them quickly. This assassination attempt of Yang Qi’s was nothing short of heaven-defying. After all, if he succeeded here, then who in the world could be his match?

‘The boundless dao of the quick strike is about killing in one blow. Put complete focus into the attack, do something rarely seen, strike with utter mercilessness…. This is the perfect opportunity to temper my willpower and determination.’

As of this moment, his heart was pounding, and a thousand thoughts were running through his mind.

‘Maybe this isn’t a good idea after all. If my strike misses, and the experts from the Black Floodwyrm Grotto show up, I probably wouldn’t be able to escape them. It wasn’t easy to get to the level I’m currently at. And I still have plenty of time to cultivate the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. As the saying goes, a wise man foresees the danger and avoids it.

‘That's right, if I ended up getting killed, what would father do? And what about the clan? And my brothers?’ Yang Qi almost felt like there were two voices inside of him arguing about what to do.

With each second that passed by, it seemed backing down might be the best thing to do.

After all, he didn't need to put himself in danger to further his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. He could just kill lower-level demonlings and use their cores to advance his cultivation base.

At that point, he very nearly abandoned his idea of attempting a quick strike on this floodwyrm. The crystalline palace complex up ahead just seemed too dangerous. And he knew that, however dangerous it seemed now, the true danger could erupt like a volcano at any moment.

‘No!’ he said to himself, forcing away the thoughts of giving up. ‘Ever since my life changed, my cultivation base has advanced steadily, without any major setbacks. I need some difficulty. I need some training. I'm going to go into that cave and kill that floodwyrm. I’ll either succeed, or die trying! Only by pushing myself harder can I rest at ease in my heart. Attack! No giving up! Otherwise, how could I hope to prop up heaven and earth as the successor of the godmammoths, and crush the devilish gods beneath my feet! If I backed down, my heart would be faulty, and how could I possibly continue with cultivation? I'm not weak. I know in my heart that I'm a powerful expert! Only by walking the path between life and death can I free myself from the shackles of doubt!’

In that moment, he made his decision.

Self-confidence blossomed inside of him as his own will fused with the raging spirit of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. All of a sudden, he felt something like a wave of approval from the golden imp in his forehead. It was as if the technique was personally approving of his soul.

As of this moment, his willpower was stronger than ever. Never before had he thrummed with such a powerful desire to fight.

Maintaining complete and utter silence, he shot forward with his spear.

There was no sound. There were no energy fluctuations. He blurred into motion, piercing through the water almost as if he existed in a different world.

He moved so quickly that it defied any and all description.

And then, his spear stabbed into the black floodwyrm.

In the blink of an eye, the Humanoid True Energy atop the floodwyrm’s head vanished. It died before it knew what hit it!

Yang Qi had succeeded!

Chapter 112: More Assassinations

An exceptionally quick strike. An exceptional assassination.

All it took was one spear strike from Yang Qi to end the life of the black floodwyrm. It was as if the Infernal Deity Spear had truly awoken an infernal deity who was the sovereign of death, to take away the souls of the living.

Yang Qi looked down at the enormous corpse, and felt confidence and pride rising up in his heart.

As he had been preparing for the blow, conflict had erupted within him, essentially, an inner devil. Had he shrunk back, it would definitely have caused problems for his progress later on.

How could a coward possibly control the hard and unyielding Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth? It took bravery and ferocity to suppress hells, and only someone with the heart of an invincible expert could possibly frighten and control devil-gods. Even the slightest step backward could turn one into a coward.

But Yang Qi was no coward. He had successfully passed a major milestone in his cultivation.

And he had reaped quite a reward.

After building up his power, he unleashed an exceptionally quick strike, pushing his life force to the pinnacle, and also developing deep confidence.

His aura was transforming on a fundamental level; apparently, the true energy of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth had acknowledged allegiance to him, and approved of him.

In the past, his true energy had been unyielding, and able to explode out at any time. That also made it difficult to control. But now things were different. For example, he could now use the Four Seasons Swordplay in either a hard or a soft fashion.

He was now like finely tempered steel.

‘Not a bad demon core. Unfortunately, this is only a floodwyrm, not a dragon. I wonder how strong dragons are?’ He looked down at the demon core, which looked like a translucent moon, shimmering with soft light, illuminating the dark waters around him.

Everything around him was very quiet, without the slightest energy fluctuation.

At the moment that the black floodwyrm had died, he had pulled the heterogeneous true energy and life force of the massive beast into his Hellfire Crucible, which immediately began to bubble.

Sitting down cross-legged, he proceeded to take the heterogeneous true energy and convert it into the quintessence he needed.

Normally speaking, the death of a black floodwyrm would have led to an explosion of true energy that would send fluctuations out for quite a distance.

But with his Hellfire Crucible, he was able to absorb it instantly.

The true energy became like a black dragon which swirled through his meridians, circulating three times before it collapsed and was absorbed.

All of a sudden, Yang Qi felt like his blood had something akin to the power of dragons in it, something that was also fused into his muscles and bones. It was like the power to soar to the highest heavens, or sink to the bottom of the deepest seas.

He could even absorb what air existed in the water through his skin.

As of this point, he didn’t need to use true energy to survive and breathe underwater. He was almost like one of the Seafolk.

Thus was the benefit of a human absorbing the true energy of a black floodwyrm.

After some more time passed, Yang Qi rose to his feet, feeling very energetic. Not only was he completely recovered, but his true energy and cultivation base were at a new peak.

The strike from moments ago was really one of the most ultimate strikes he had ever unleashed.

‘I don’t care how strong you are, Yun Hailan. This strike of mine will cut you down before you can react. You just wait.’ In fact, he was confident that very few elite students in the Demi-Immortal Institute could defend against it.

Right now, he was only a Secondary Lifeseizer, and yet, if he struck quickly enough, could definitely kill or injure even a Senary Lifeseizer who had achieved six lifeseizings.

‘I need to find more black floodwyrms!’

With that, he became a dark shadow that was one with the waters of the Black Sea. Prowling through the various mountains and gullies, he was like a world-class assassin. All he had to do was build up his energy, then unleash it in that stunning strike, and he could end the life of any enemy.

An hour later, he was getting very close to the crystalline palace. At one point, in one particularly deep gully, he came across two enormous floodwyrms that were both in the Lifeseizing level.

Killing one such floodwyrm unnoticed could be done, but he couldn't quite manage two with complete confidence. It was simply impossible, and therefore, he passed them up.

Slowly but surely, he proceeded along, killing anything that he came across.

Thanks to his recent enlightenment, he could now use both soft and hard aspects of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, making it even easier for him to escape notice. Similarly, his Infernal Deity Plate Armor could be softened, allowing him to slip through the water completely undetected.

Before long, he found another rather old black floodwyrm working on cultivation in an underwater river. Apparently, it was at a critical juncture, and was just about to reach Secondary Lifeseizing.

Shockingly, the black floodwyrm was covered by multiple layers of yin-fire.

It was practicing yin-fire body refinement to improve its true energy, and then make its breakthrough to Secondary Lifeseizing.

‘Heaven is really helping me!’

Yang Qi slipped into the river and began to build up his energy to unleash a devastating attack.

There was little suspense in it all.

The black floodwyrm collapsed immediately when hit, and even as its true energy exploded out, it was sucked in by the Hellfire Crucible.

Another moon-like demon core floated into Yang Qi’s palm.

It was a level of energy that far surpassed anything he had acquired from the other black floodwyrms up to this point, and he almost couldn’t take it.

However, he had been prepared for that, and immediately set to work wresting control and fusing it into his body and blood.

Soon, the heterogeneous true energy was filling him with more power and energy than ever. He could actually see how, within his platinum blood, there were images that resembled dragons.

‘So, every time I kill one of these black floodwyrms and absorb its demon core, I get some of its heterogeneous true energy. It’s actually quite beneficial. I guess since I can’t cultivate in the Minorcosm World right now, I’ll just advance by ridding the world of devils and demons.’

Sending some true energy sweeping out, he collected the floodwyrm’s tendons, skin, bones, and horns into his thumb-ring. Such materials could be used to create armor and weapons, which meant that he could turn them in to the institute in return for a healthy sum of merit points.

Obviously, he wouldn’t just abandon them.

‘It's too bad my brothers back at the institute can’t benefit from these demon cores the way I can. Maybe I should turn them in for merit points to purchase the help of a Legendary for them.’

These black floodwyrms were essentially treasures embodied for the Lifeseizing level.

And with his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, Yang Qi could essentially take all of those treasures at will. Blurring into motion again, he continued on his way.

His aura was so close to that of the Black Sea’s at this point, that no creatures present would notice him any more than people on the land would notice a faint breeze.

With two Lifeseizing black floodwyrms having fallen under his hand, Yang Qi was now stronger and more deadly than ever.

WHIZZZ!

Another black floodwyrm was killed before it knew what was happening.

Snap!

An old black floodwyrm in one of the underwater rivers was killed, and vanished before even a drop of its blood could seep out. Yang Qi’s true energy seemed completely inexhaustible.

He now had complete control over his true energy, and could make it freezing cold or burning hot at will. Being able to turn mountains into lava was something that ordinary Lifeseizers weren’t capable of.

One by one, he slaughtered Lifeseizing black floodwyrms, all without being noticed.

He was like a god of death in the dark waters, the king of hell out to collect what was his. Only after killing five powerful black floodwyrms in a row did he need to stop for a moment to catch his breath.

Even he was somewhat taken aback at how completely heaven-defying this trip was turning out to be. After all, what would happen if a deadly monster snuck into the Demi-Immortal Institute and killed five elite students like this? Top experts would definitely be dispatched to track that monster to the ends of the earth to kill it.

If King Black Floodwyrm ever found out he was the one responsible, wouldn’t the same happen to him?

All of a sudden, he experienced a sense of impending disaster.

‘What if I somehow shift the blame to Yun Hailan? After all, she has the blood of the Sea God in her. She could get around just as easily as me here. That would be perfect!’ Having made up his mind, he looked over at the crystalline Black Floodwyrm Grotto, which was nearer than ever. If only he could go there and uncover some secrets about the Hanging Mountain.

However, considering that there was a Legendary level demon king there, it would be too dangerous.

Even as he tried to decide what to do, explosive ripples surged through the water around him.

‘What a commotion,’ he thought. ‘Has someone else entered the Black Sea to kill demon-devils?’

Chapter 113: The Devils in Chaos

Yang Qi had killed five black floodwyrms that were in the Lifeseizing level, acquiring five demon cores. That was definitely enough to help his three brothers reach the Lifeseizing level.

As for the two extra, he tossed them into his Hellfire Crucible.

Ignoring the energy fluctuations he had just noticed, he focused on absorbing the power of the cores.

Each of them was roughly the size of a human head, and glowed with the light of the moon, plus an image that looked like a black floodwyrm consuming the moon. The power in those cores was enough to level a small city.

But right now, the quintessence within the cores was converted by the Hellfire Crucible, and turned into power for Yang Qi, fusing into his Cosmic Sunflare Sword technique and the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. As it did, the fiftieth particle within him woke up, giving him access to the power of fifty ancient megamammoths. And that meant that he could now enter Tertiary Lifeseizing.

However, after absorbing the two black floodwyrm demon cores, he realized that he was in a bottleneck, which meant that he still needed some more time. Stilling his cultivation base, he rose to his feet, and looked up toward the surface, which was the source of the fluctuations he had detected.

The fluctuations even woke up some of the powerful entities that lurked in the various sea gullies.

Yang Qi watched as more than a hundred black floodwyrms in the Lifeseizing level emerged from the depths of the underwater rivers, unleashing demon energy that flowed toward the source of the fluctuations.

At the same time, the enormous, crystalline palace in the center of the plane, the Black Floodwyrm Grotto, began to pulse with light. Apparently, some huge spell formation was being activated.

‘What a pity!’ Yang Qi thought, shaking his head at the scene. ‘I just can’t proceed any further.’ It would be madness for him to try to enter the Black Floodwyrm Grotto now. ‘I wonder what expert has arrived. Is someone really going to try to attack the Black Floodwyrm Grotto? Is this person really not afraid of King Black Floodwyrm? I should sneak away and get back to the surface to see what's going on. In the water, the black floodwyrms have the advantage, but up above, it’ll be the other way around.’

Taking advantage of the chaos, he slipped away and then headed up toward the surface.

As soon as he burst out of the water, he unfurled his wings and then flew higher up into the sky. Looking out at the water, he saw massive waves surging back and forth. Various energy arts which were being unleashed caused massive pillars of water to shoot hundreds of meters up into the air before raining back down.

Apparently, some huge fight between two major experts was playing out under the water.

Right now, he wasn’t afraid at all. Now that he was out of the Black Sea, all it would take would be the flap of his Fiend-Devil Wings to escape any enemy who tried to attack him.

He could essentially come and go as he pleased.

Suddenly, a huge bubble of water formed, then exploded, revealing a young man in blue clothing, holding a long harpoon in his hand. It was not an energy weapon, but rather corporeal, and surged with spirit energy that indicated it was actually a spirit weapon.

It was far more powerful than the trident Yang Qi had finished forging, and the blue-garbed young man was even more powerful than his weapon. Suddenly, his true energy surged out to create a blue suit of armor, as well as a pair of spectacular wings.

Furthermore, the pulsing true energy fluctuations which rolled off of him made it seem like he was capable of controlling all water flows under heaven.

Whether it was clouds or rain, or even the mist in the Black Sea, this young man could manipulate them all.

His aura surpassed that of even the Tertiary Lifeseizer Longxuan Ye that Yang Qi had encountered on Manyflowers Peak. From the look of it, he had already performed five lifeseizings.

No wonder he was confident enough to enter the Black Sea and take on the black floodwyrms.

‘I wonder where this guy is from. He uses water-type energy arts, that’s for sure.’ Even as Yang Qi examined him, the blue-garbed young man turned to face nine black floodwyrms.

Leading them was one floodwyrm whose armor-like scales glistened with bright light. It had five claws, and swirling horns that made it almost look like a black dragon. Standing atop its head was a boy in a black tunic and trousers, holding a dual-crescent-bladed halberd.

That boy was not a manifestation of Humanoid True Energy, but rather, a nascent divinity created by the black floodwyrm’s soul, making him much more powerful.

‘This black floodwyrm leader is incredible!’ In fact, Yang Qi could tell that he was no weaker than the young man in blue.

“You really think you can just waltz into the Black Floodwyrm Grotto, punk?” the floodwyrm said. “Do you know how powerful the demon kings of the seventy-two grottos are? You cultivate Tsunami of the Sea King, right? That’s a consummate technique from the Sea God Institute, which makes you like a king of the sea. Unfortunately for you, I'm one of the top cultivation geniuses from the Black Floodwyrm Grotto. I'm going to capture you, extract your soul, and then rip all your techniques out of it.”

“Dream on, you freakish hellion!” The blue-garbed young man spun and then shot off into the distance.

As for the nine black floodwyrms, they immediately gave chase.

Before long, they were nearing the edge of the sea, where the sandy desert once again began.

Yang Qi then watched as the entire group entered the desert.

The entire time, he kept focused on the depths of the Black Sea, curious to see whether or not the Legendary King Black Floodwyrm would appear. However, he never sensed any Legendary aura.

He had met Legendaries before, namely, Patriarchs Wind and Cloud, and could thus identify such auras. And if he had sensed anything like that, he would have fled at top speed. However, for whatever reason, King Floodwyrm never appeared. Perhaps he was away, or perhaps he was focused on cultivation and was ignoring the activities of the younger generation.

The Black Sea was located right in the middle of the Northern Frontier Desert, and was surrounded by endless dunes, mountains of sand, and violent storms.

At a certain point, the blue-robed young man landed on one of the dunes.

Moments later, the black floodwyrms arrived, black mist swirling around them. As for the incarnation of the leader, he looked coldly at the young man and said, “You think that you can weaken us by luring us out into the desert? Don’t forget that you also cultivate water-type energy arts. You’ll be limited here just as we are.”

“So what? I’ve achieved multiple lifeseizings. Out here, I can unleash the full potential of my power. Who exactly are you? Tell me your name so I can report it to my superiors after I kill you.”

“Jiao Wufeng,” the leader said coldly. “What about you?”

“I'm Jun Tianchou, conclave student from the Sea God Institute.” Although this Jun Tianchou spoke in very domineering fashion, he was actually so good-looking that he bordered on pretty.

Jiao Wufeng let loose a long laugh. “So, seems I'm going to be performing a big service for the exalted King Black Floodwyrm. He’d love to offer a conclave student to the emissary from the Hanging Mountain. And I’ll earn a hefty reward.”

Eyes flickering, Jun Tianchou said, “An emissary from the Hanging Mountain is in the Black Floodwyrm Grotto? There, right now, with King Floodwyrm? How come I didn't sense any such aura?”

Jiao Wufeng chuckled. “Trying to squeeze some information out of me? Well, I guess it won't hurt. You’re dead anyway. The exalted Black King Floodwyrm most certainly is entertaining the emissary from the Hanging Mountain. They’re in the depths of the subterranean rivers, inspecting the Dragonizing Grand Spell Formation. You know, I’d bet money that you're here on a mission for the Sea God Institute, trying to find information about the emissary. Sadly for you, the only thing you’ll find is an early grave.”

“Well then, Jiao Wufeng. You're one of the top experts among the Demonfolk, right? Go ahead and make your move.”

Instead, Jiao Wufeng snorted coldly and turned to look out into the desert sands. “You’ve been following us for a while, punk. Are you a friend of this Jun Tianchou? There’s no need to skulk around out there. I noticed you quite a while ago.”

A bit surprised, Yang Qi stepped out into the open. Considering he was only a Secondary Lifeseizer, he didn't seem like much at all compared to the Quinary Lifeseizers Jun Tianchou and Jiao Wufeng.

Of course, he was also intentionally masking his true level of strength.

Eyes flashing, Jun Tianchou said, “Brother, I can tell from your garments that you’re from the Demi-Immortal Institute. Why don’t you come fight by my side? I’ll watch your back. We’re both from prestigious, orthodox institutes, so we can’t let each other get hurt by these hellions.”

Yang Qi was actually a bit surprised at the kindness he sensed in Jun Tianchou’s words. Thanks to his dealings with people like Yun Hailan and Gu Che, he actually had a relatively poor impression of students from the Sea God Institute, and hadn’t expected this Jun Tianchou to immediately offer to protect him.

As a Quinary Lifeseizer, he truly did qualify to protect someone in Secondary Lifeseizing.

Already, Yang Qi liked this Jun Tianchou.

“Brother Jun, you're right. I'm from the Demi-Immortal Institute, and I came here to slaughter hellions from the Black Floodwyrm Grotto.” Blurring into motion, he flew over and stood at Jun Tianchou’s side.

“Excellent energy arts!” Jun Tianchou said, nodding in admiration. “You stay behind me. These beasts are nothing to take lightly. The nine of them have a spell formation prepared called the Nine Dragons Fatal Strike Array. Even I would be in big trouble if I got stuck in it. Seems you’re in Secondary Lifeseizing, right? Be careful. If something goes wrong, you won't be able to escape. Even in the desert, these nine will be able to catch up with you if you fled.”

Chapter 114: Killing a Quinary Lifeseizer

Jiao Wufeng burst out laughing. “A puny Secondary Lifeseizer? What are you going to do? Well, you two are students from the Demi-Immortal and Sea God Institutes, with access to the best techniques possible. You know what? I want those techniques.”

At this point, one of the black floodwyrms said, “Don't waste your breath on these two little punks, Boss Wufeng. Let’s just attack with our Nine Dragons Fatal Strike Array. There’s no way they can escape that.”

“You’re right. Set up the formation.”

RUMMMBLE!

Jiao Wufeng looked down as the other eight black floodwyrms opened their mouths and spat out blasts of true energy, which converged into the shape of numerous flags, all of them embroidered with images of dancing devils.

The true energy flags slammed down into the sand, locking down a roughly five-square-kilometer area. All areas of escape were thus completely sealed off.

“Watch out, Brother!” Jun Tianchou said. “The Nine Dragons Fatal Strike Array is virtually impenetrable.”

However, even as the words left his mouth, Yang Qi took action.

SWISH!

Energy began to swirl around him, distorting the air, until he simply vanished.

Shocked, Jun Tianchou murmured, “What’s going on?”

A moment later, he caught sight of a spear that seemed to belong to a ghost-god from the netherworld, stabbing directly into Jiao Wufeng.

Jiao Wufeng had been surrounded by a defensive energy field that was seemingly as impregnable as iron. But this attack of Yang Qi was like the epitome of death, and crushed through his defenses as easily as a hammer crushing an ice cube.

Whoosh!

The energy field collapsed, and at the same time, the image of an entity with an elephantine head and a human body appeared, its trunk capable of absorbing even the stars in the sky.

With a single inhalation, that entity absorbed all of the energy which had just been shattered.

Yang Qi had just killed five black floodwyrms in the Lifeseizing level, all with a single shot.

And from the way he attacked now, it was clear that he was very familiar with that method. It didn’t matter that Jiao Wufeng was a Quinary Lifeseizer. That spear strike was something he could never have dreamed existed. And how could he ever have guessed that a mere Secondary Lifeseizer could attack with such force that his defensive energy field would be destroyed instantly?

It was the type of strike that could cause ghost-gods from hell to weep, and could cast judgement on disgraced gods from heaven.

The moment the defensive energy field was destroyed, the Infernal Deity Spear stabbed into the black floodwyrm at Jiao Wufeng’s feet, causing it to explode into a cloud of blood and gore.

Then the spear angled up, heading directly toward the nascent divinity that was Jiao Wufeng himself.

That nascent divinity was the embryonic form of Jiao Wufeng’s future humanoid form, and it also contained his demon core. Accompanied by an agonized shriek, that huge, moon-like demon core burst out into the open, where it then began to speed off in the hopes of making an escape.

Silvery light spread out in all directions, making it seem very much like an actual moon, and turning the entire world around them pure silver.

This demon core was far, far larger than any of the others Yang Qi had collected so far.

In comparison, those other demon cores were like clumps of dirt, and this one was like an enormous jewel.

This was a Quinary Lifeseizing level demon core!

The fact that Yang Qi could slaughter a Quinary Lifeseizer in a single shot would leave many powerful experts in the world completely stunned.

“Dammit! I can’t believe you’re so strong, you bastard! You tricked me!” It was the voice of Jiao Wufeng. Unexpectedly, he actually wasn’t dead.

Yang Qi’s attack had been so devastatingly powerful that it was impossible to defend against. It was the type that could instantly eradicate any black floodwyrms who were Primary or Secondary Lifeseizers.

But Jiao Wufeng was too powerful to be killed by a single blow. It could only seriously injure him. He was the type of expert who could survive even after being chopped to pieces. His true energy could always form back into a humanoid shape and flee. He could even abandon his fleshly body if he wanted to, and go possess another.

BAM!

Shockingly, the force released by the destruction of the nascent divinity sent out such powerful reverberations that the Infernal Deity Spear was shaken.

Then, the nascent divinity and the demon core fused into the shattered remnants of the black floodwyrm body, which began to restore itself.

Jiao Wufeng's true form was that enormous black floodwyrm; he just liked to maintain human form whenever it was convenient. This was actually a weakness among many high-level Demonfolk. Demonfolk experts believed that maintaining human form would earn them respect.

And in fact, the individuals who were most respected among the Demonfolk were humans.

Unfortunately, Jiao Wufeng’s nascent divinity had been damaged, and his black floodwyrm body almost completely destroyed. Right now, he had no other choice than to practice cultivation to heal himself before he could think about fighting back.

“Brother Jun, let’s go!” Yang Qi said, “If we wipe out Jiao Wufeng, then the other hellions will be easy to take down!” Armor rippled out to cover his body, and his Fiend-Devil Wings sprouted behind him. The Infernal Deity Spear formed again in his hand, only this time, bigger and longer.

Now, it seemed mighty enough to pierce moons.

Furthermore, a tiny black hole sprang into being on the spearhead, which sucked in all light in the area.

Yet again, another massive attack surged forth, backed by the spectacular power of a megamammoth.

One spear strike. Only one, single spear strike.

Jiao Wufeng struck out with his floodwyrm claw, unleashing a variety of martial disciplines unique to demonlings. However, no amount of complex variations could evade Yang Qi’s spear.

Another agonized shriek rang out as the spear stabbed through his claw. Then Jiao Wufeng said, “Time to go for broke! Devilish Floodwyrm Breaks Gods! Slaughter Immortals and Kill Devils! Nine Cleavings of the Dragon King!”

Massive amounts of energy erupted from this terrifying, devilish floodwyrm, a Quinary Lifeseizer. He even burned his own life force to unleash a technique created by whatever black dragon was his immortal ancestor: The Nine Cleavings of the Dragon King.

“First Cleaving: Sever Rivers! Second Cleaving: Part Seas! Third Cleaving: Carve Mountains! Fourth Cleaving: Shatter Stars! Fifth Cleaving: Collapse Voids! Sixth Cleaving: Eradicate Immortals! Seventh Cleaving: Pulverize Heaven and Earth! Eighth Cleaving: Fracture the Universe! Ninth Cleaving: Create a Great Dao!”

In the shortest of moments, Jiao Wufeng suddenly transformed into nine projections, which then swirled together to create a massive axe of true energy. The axe then reared back and slashed toward the incoming Yang Qi, seemingly carrying with it the force to destroy anything and everything.

“Die!” Yang Qi bellowed, fully aware of the power of the axe, and yet not the slightest bit afraid.

‘Tertiary Lifeseizing! Upgrade to invincibility!’ He knew that this was Jiao Wufeng’s final move. Therefore, he went all out, and held absolutely nothing back. Instantly, the vital energy of heaven and earth in the area erupted into motion. Countless tiny vortexes sprang up, which quickly took recognizable forms. There were devil-ghosts, wild beasts, flames, lightning bolts, giant-spirits, and more. It was as if the gates of hell had been opened allowing all types of demons, devils, ghosts, and monsters out, as well as other tribulations such as fire and flame.

Instantly, the entire area was filled with all-destructive power.

By going all out, Yang Qi had pushed himself to the level of Tertiary Lifeseizing.

And of course, heaven and earth would fight back. Thus, countless tribulations of vital energy formed to fight him.

Of course, such tribulations also affected Jiao Wufeng.

Because of the eruption of all the vital energy, the enormous axe formed by his Nine Cleavings of the Dragon King was shattered into bits.

As for his enormous floodwyrm body, it began to collapse.

It all happened in the shortest of moments.

‘How could this be happening? What a devastating attack! How could a Secondary Lifeseizer do something like this? Is he even human?’ Jun Tianchou had been so bowled over by what was happening that he only now began to recover his composure.

Just when he was about to remind Yang Qi to be careful of the Nine Cleavings of the Dragon King, he saw Tertiary Lifeseizing Tribulation suddenly spring up around him.

‘I need to get rid of those other eight floodwyrms!’ Jun Tianchou was a conclave student of the Sea God Institute, which meant that he ranked higher than an elite student. His cultivation base was one of profound mystery, and when he took to action, it caused waves of energy to roll out that formed into the image of a sea king.

It was hard to say exactly what type of entity it was, but as soon as it appeared, Jun Tianchou burst into action.

A Primary Lifeseizer black floodwyrm exploded instantly. After all, Jun Tianchou was a Quinary Lifeseizer, so opponents like this were far, far beneath him.

At that point, Jun Tianchou slashed out with his harpoon, killing another of the black floodwyrms.

They had no chance to form their Nine Dragons Fatal Strike Array. As soon as their leader was injured by Yang Qi, they were as united as a plate of shifting sand.

ROAR!

Despite the countless vital energy tribulations, Yang Qi wasn’t weakening at all. Instead, he was growing fiercer. Platinum light surrounded him, filled with holiness, making him seem like a host of gods from numerous heavens, come to offer blessings of all sorts.

Wherever that platinum light shone, the vital energy tribulations vanished.

As for his Infernal Deity Spear, it grew larger and more powerful, until it was a holy object. Then, with a single strike, he stabbed Jiao Wufeng through.

Aaaiiiieee!

Blood sprayed out everywhere as Jiao Wufeng turned to flee. He knew that this was an enemy he couldn't defeat, and that if he didn’t escape, he would end up being buried here.

But now, Yang Qi was a Tertiary Lifeseizer, faster and even more powerful than he had been moments before. Jiao Wufeng entered the sea of clouds, vanishing from sight as surely as if he had traveled to an alternate dimension.

And yet, only a moment later, Yang Qi appeared in front of him, a three-hundred-meter-long spear held in his hand. With a single thrust, he speared Jiao Wufeng, sending him downward to be impaled in the ground.

“This….” Jun Tianchou was completely and utterly flabbergasted.

Chapter 115: Another Brother

In this bitter fight to the end, Yang Qi stabbed Jiao Wufeng through, killing him before he even slammed into the ground.

The spear pierced into his mouth and came out of his floodwyrm tail, turning him into a meat kabob.

It would be difficult for most people to conceive how a Quinary Lifeseizer could possibly be killed by someone in the Tertiary Lifeseizing level. And yet, there was no denying the bloody scene which had played out.

As for the surviving black floodwyrms, they were astonished to the core.

Now that their leader had been crushed right in front of them, they knew that they were hopelessly outmatched. And thus, Jun Tianchou, conclave student from the Sea God Institute, cut them down one by one.

His harpoon moved like the wind, stabbing through the floodwyrms with ease. Within mere moments, they fell from the sky, massive amounts of true energy erupting out of them.

With the wave of his hand, Jun Tianchou summoned a blue jade bottle gourd, which began to suck in all of the true energy. Actually, that bottle gourd looked very similar to the Heart of the Sea thumb-ring.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi dropped down, his Infernal Deity Spear having sucked all of Jiao Wufeng’s true energy into his Hellfire Crucible to be refined.

Normally speaking, he wouldn’t be able to do anything with that true energy, and it would have dissipated. But now, he was a Tertiary Lifeseizer.

Because of that, his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth had undergone massive changes. For example, the lava in his Hellfire Crucible had become a different color. It was now platinum, with holy flames dancing on its surface, which was none other than sagefire.

There were still many mysterious aspects to the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth that Yang Qi wasn’t familiar with. However, as his cultivation base grew, such things would be revealed, and would provide him with immense benefit.

That was one of the unequaled elements of the godly-class energy art.

If godly-class energy arts were the same as ordinary energy arts, then why were they techniques that were usually cultivated by gods?

Common people and gods were simply not on the same level. One existed in the highest heavens, the other wallowed on the face of the earth.

Yang Qi extended his hand, causing silvery light to radiate out from Jiao Wufeng’s demon core. It almost looked like a real moon, and it contained a massive life force aura that seemed like it was just on the verge of breaking out to form a living being.

Demon cores from demonlings in the Quinary Lifeseizing level were considered precious treasures in the Demi-Immortal Institute, and were only accessible to conclave students.

For the moment, he couldn’t refine it. He could only use his Hellfire Crucible to slowly chip away at it, and gradually extract its life force quintessence.

Even still, now that he was a Tertiary Lifeseizer, every move he made thrummed with power, making him seem so invincibly domineering that even Jun Tianchou couldn’t help but admire him.

“Brother, you’re nothing less than a peerless talent! Since when did a person like you rise up in the Demi-Immortal Institute?”

“Ah, who cares about the Demi-Immortal Institute and the Sea God Institute? We're all individuals, right? It was a pleasure to work with you to cut down these hellions, Brother. There’s nothing more gratifying than punishing evildoers. And what’s more important than making good friends? By joining forces to rid the world of devils and demons, we can bring out the best in each other. You know, since we’ve already started calling each other Brother, why not make it official and become sworn siblings?” Yang Qi was in a wonderful mood, not only because of reaching Tertiary Lifeseizing, but also because of how good of a person Jun Tianchou seemed to be.

Otherwise, why else would he have offered to protect him so quickly earlier?

“Become sworn siblings?” Jun Tianchou’s eyes glittered. Seemingly infected by Yang Qi’s mood, and also impressed by what he had just seen, he replied, “Great idea. We obviously hit it off right from the start. Let’s do it right here. We can offer the corpses of the floodwyrms to heaven as a sacrifice to seal our oath.”

“That sounds perfect.”

Yang Qi was of the opinion that making new friends was always a good thing. Waving his hand, he sent out three streams of sword energy down into the ground to act in the stead of incense sticks.

Jun Tianchou smiled, using his energy arts to pile the black floodwyrms up onto a nearby dune to act as their sacrificial offering.

With that, the two of them dropped to their knees.

“I, Yang Qi…”

“I, Jun Tianchou…”

With that, they joined their voices together. “… hereby offer this sacrifice to heaven to become sworn siblings. Henceforth, we shall share honor and disgrace, and join forces to fight any enemy. If either of us betrays the other, may we be put to death at the edge of a sword.”

With that, they kowtowed eight times. Afterward, they rose to their feet, looked at each other, and burst out in contented laughter.

It was all a bit unbelievable.

The two of them hardly knew each other, but had fought side by side, and thus decided to take each other as sworn siblings. In any case, they were both so advanced in cultivation that it wasn't a big deal to take on a new sworn sibling if that person was a kindred spirit.

Yang Qi couldn’t help but click his tongue in amazement. After taking down Jiao Wufeng, he had been caught up in the moment, and casually suggested to Jun Tianchou that they become sworn siblings. Who would have thought that he would agree? Now he had a brother in the Sea God Institute.

Inwardly, Jun Tianchou let out a soft sigh. After all, he was a conclave student from the Sea God Institute, a mighty individual whom scores of other students called Elder Brother. Even students from other institutes would show him the utmost respect. However, he was a shrewd individual; based on what had just played out, he was sure that Yang Qi was a spectacular genius. It didn’t matter that he was from another institute; he had limitless potential, and if he kept on his current path, would likely end up in the higher echelons of the Demi-Immortal Institute. Having a sworn brother like that would be of great benefit down the line.

Normally speaking, a person with such potential would have been wary of strangers, but instead, had directly suggested they become brothers. That indicated that either he wasn’t interested in gaining power in his institute, or, he was the type of person who did whatever he wanted, regardless of what others thought.

Either way, his personality appealed to Jun Tianchou.

“Brother, I'm a conclave student in the Sea God Institute. Considering my high position, if people from the Demi-Immortal Institute found out that you and I are now sworn brothers, well, it could be dangerous for you.”

Yang Qi chuckled. “That doesn’t matter. I'm just at the Demi-Immortal Institute temporarily, working on my cultivation. I'm not interested in pursuing power. Institutes are temporary. Brothers are for life. So, Brother, what do you plan to do with these black floodwyrms?”

“Well, they’re treasures, so I’ll take them away with me.” His eyes hardened. “You know, the corpse of Jiao Wufeng is full of things that can make great ingredients for magical treasures. If I handed his corpse in to the Sea God Institute, the reward would be a hefty sum of merit points. Listen, Brother, I have an idea. Although I killed the black floodwyrms, and you killed Jiao Wufeng, you obviously don’t have a hoarding item. On the other hand, I have this Heart of the Sea bottle gourd which can contain all the corpses. So how about I take the corpses, and you take the demon cores. What do you say?”

Yang Qi nodded. “Great idea. I’m in your debt now, Brother. I was hoping to get some demon cores just like these to help some of my brothers back home to cultivate the Cosmic Sunflare Sword technique. If you're sure, then I’ll take them.” Inside, he was thinking that this new brother of his really was a good person. After all, even though the corpses were valuable, the demon cores were definitely more precious. And yet, he made it sound like it was the opposite, to make the matter more acceptable in terms of face.

“Alright then. You take these eight demon cores.” Jun Tianchou waved his hand and tossed them over. Each and every one was from a Lifeseizing level floodwyrm. “The Cosmic Sunflare Sword and black floodwyrm demon cores complement each other like fire and water. Your friends will definitely reach a much higher level.”

Yang Qi put the demon cores away, then watched as Jun Tianchou sucked the corpses into his blue bottle gourd.

From what he could tell, the bottle gourd could definitely hold a lot more than his thumb-ring.

“I guess it's a good thing King Floodwyrm is entertaining the emissary from the Hanging Mountain in the depths of the sea. If he had been there in Black Floodwyrm Grotto, things might have turned out very different.” With that, Jun Tianchou looked off into the distance. “We shouldn’t stick around here for much longer. Let’s go.”

With that, they flew into the air. After flying along for about two hours, they landed onto a rather beautiful mountain that jutted up from the desert sands.

“By the way, Brother,” Yang Qi said, “have you heard any rumors in the Sea God Institute about a girl named Yun Hailan?”

“Yun Hailan? Hm. One of us Seafolk who has the blood of a sea god in her?” His eyes flickered. “Didn’t she end up studying at the Demi-Immortal Institute?”

“That’s right. She’s made quite the name for herself already. She’s in the Lifeseizing level, and even more noteworthy, has earned the favor of the leader of the Crown Prince Society. She also took Patriarchs Wind and Cloud as masters.”

“Earned the favor of the Crown Prince?” Jun Tianchou’s expression flickered. Apparently, he knew who the Crown Prince was.

Yang Qi could sense that Jun Tianchou didn’t seem to have very positive feelings about the Crown Prince. “Wait. Are you telling me that even conclave disciples in the Sea God Institute have to worry about the Crown Prince?”

“When it comes to the four institutes in the Rich-Lush Continent, geniuses abound. However, when it comes to the Crown Prince from the Demi-Immortal Institute, he’s a star among stars. No one in the younger generation can even come close to being his match. That said, Brother, I’d say you have even greater potential than me. If you end up finding the right good fortune, you might end up as a rival of the Crown Prince.”

“Who is this guy anyway?” Yang Qi asked. “I haven’t been in the Demi-Immortal Institute for very long, so I don't know much about him.”

“I heard that he’s a god from heaven descended into the mortal world. He’s not even human. He’s literally heavenly. Furthermore, people say that his mother had a dream of a falling star, which was when she came to be pregnant. Even stranger, his mother was a virgin.”

“What? She dreamed of a falling star and got pregnant?” Yang Qi couldn’t have been more shocked. “According to the stories of the distant past, that’s how many Great Sages were born.”

Chapter 116: A God from Heaven Descended into the Mortal World

In the distant past, there were many Great Sages who were fatherless. In some stories, the mothers became pregnant after dreaming of god-spirits in heaven, or by treading in the footsteps of giants. Others became pregnant after dreaming of falling stars.

Such stories were accepted history, and the children that had been born to those mothers were all spectacular geniuses who were favored by heaven and earth. Their rise in cultivation never stopped, and they eventually became Great Sages.

Each and every one was a god from heaven descended into the mortal world.

Now, it was said that the Crown Prince was born to a mother who had dreamed of falling stars, and that it was the touch of spirit energy that led to her giving birth to a son. In other words, it seemed the Crown Prince was also a god from heaven descended into the mortal world.

That was no minor identity.

And clearly, he was destined to reach the Great Sage level.

‘No wonder the Demi-Immortal Institute cares so much about him,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘I wonder if I’ll ever have a chance to see him in person one day. I may be a Tertiary Lifeseizer who can kill Quinary Lifeseizers, but the Crown Prince is a Legendary. That’s far beyond my current level.’

“By the way, Brother, what’s the deal with that emissary from the Hanging Mountain?”

“The Hanging Mountain holds sway over large numbers of Demonfolk who live in the Rich-Lush Continent. It looks like they’re getting ready for some sort of operation here. There have been some dramatic developments recently, and I suspect there is some ancient secret at play. That’s why the ancient Demonfolk sent an ambassador from their alternate dimension, to hatch plans with the demon kings of the seventy-two grottos and the devil lords of the thirty-six caves. In fact, that’s why I came out here, in the hopes of getting some information about what they’re planning.

“The Hanging Mountain is a force to be reckoned with, and is the natural enemy of orthodox groups like our four institutes. It's very likely that war will break out with them eventually. Brother, you never know when that might happen, so you need to focus hard on getting stronger and improving your cultivation base. Alright, I have some important matters to attend to, so I think the time has come to part. I look forward to seeing your performance in the upcoming Inter-Institutional Martial Arts Competition.”

“Alright, I’ll take my leave. I need to get these demon cores back to the Demi-Immortal Institute as quickly as possible, and help my other brothers to reach the Lifeseizing level.” With that, Yang Qi clasped hands respectfully.

Jun Tianchou returned the gesture. “Take care, Brother. I hope we have more chances in the future to stand shoulder to shoulder and rid the world of devils and demons. Oh, one more thing. Here’s a spirit talisman I personally created. It’s called Four Corners of the Earth. If you’re ever in trouble, inscribe it with a message and then rip the paper; I’ll be notified, and come to your aid as quickly as I can. I forged it with my own heart-blood, so no matter how far away I am, I’ll remain connected to it on a spiritual level.” With that, Jun Tianchou handed a sea-blue paper talisman to Yang Qi. Then, he flew up into the sea of clouds like a divine dragon, where he vanished.

The profundity of his energy arts was simply shocking.

Yang Qi put away the Four Corners of the Earth talisman and then flew into the air to head back to the Demi-Immortal Institute.

Up in the sea of clouds, Jun Tianchou stopped for a moment and looked back at Yang Qi speeding off into the distance. Eyes flickering with complex thoughts, he murmured, ‘Who would have thought that I, Jun Tianchou, would take on a sworn sibling like him. Yang Qi…. He’s only a Tertiary Lifeseizer, but he managed to kill Jiao Wufeng, a Quinary Lifeseizer…. Another genius is rising up in the Demi-Immortal Institute. However, he doesn’t care about power and position. He just wants to enjoy life. One of these days, I have the feeling he's going to do some amazing things.’

Sighing, he turned and vanished in a blur.

The next day….

Back in the Demi-Immortal Institute,

Yang Qi, Hua Yinhu, He Jili, Liang Dong, and Li He were all together again.

Liang Dong was wearing the garments of an elite student; he was now truly one of the top figures in the sect.

Everyone was shocked to see Yang Qi back so quickly, and when they saw the black floodwyrm demon cores he had, they were overjoyed.

In total, he had acquired fourteen such demon cores, five from the floodwyrms he had hunted down and killed, and nine from the other group. Of course, one core was more than enough for Hua Yinhu, He Jili, and Li He. They couldn’t even use more of them if they wanted. They just needed enough to keep the Cosmic Sunflare Sword in check, to correct the imbalance of yin and yang.

Yang Qi put the others into his Hellfire Crucible to convert into life force quintessence, including the one from Jiao Wufeng.

He was now in Tertiary Lifeseizing, and it was getting harder and harder to make progress. Relying on the vital energy he could build up just wasn’t sufficient. To reach Quaternary Lifeseizing, he would have to consume many, many more demon cores, or possibly spirit medicines.

After helping his three brothers achieve their breakthroughs, he would go into secluded meditation for a time to absorb all of the demon cores.

It was almost impossible for him to comprehend how much life force existed in the demon core of a Quinary black floodwyrm. The benefits of fully absorbing it would be tremendous.

“Alright, are you guys ready?” he asked, anticipation visible on his face as he looked at Li He, Hua Yinhu, and He Jili.

“Ready,” Hua Yinhu said. “We've been waiting for this moment for a long, long time.” He looked down at the black floodwyrm demon core in his hands, and the dazzling light which radiated off of it.

“Good.” Yang Qi reached out and flicked his fingers three times in quick succession, causing the three demon cores to explode, sending watery-like light spreading out in all directions.

“Alright, activate your Cosmic Sunflare Sword techniques. I’ll help you subdue the heterogeneous true energy.”

Immediately, the three of them unleashed scorching hot sword energy.

Their goal was to use the complementary aspects of fire and water, but that was a difficult thing to pull off. Thankfully, they had Yang Qi there to help them.

Soon, their animadestiny sword manifestations had absorbed the silvery moonlight, and their auras were calming down.

Immense levels of life force erupted from their sword manifestations, filling their bodies. The three of them were experiencing dramatic transformations as animadestiny true energy raged through them.

Vital energy swirled into powerful vortexes. However, it wasn’t enough.

“Use these energy convergence pills!” Liang Dong said. Waving his hand, he opened one of the boxes he had prepared, sending out thousands upon thousands of energy convergence pills, as well as certain mid-grade spirit medicines designed to replenish vital energy.

As the pills exploded, they became streams of vital energy pouring into the three friends.

Massive amounts of vital energy were needed to break into the Lifeseizing level, and considering that the three of them were making their attempts all at once, that meant that even more was required than usual. Thankfully, they had prepared well in advance.

Yang Qi wasn't sitting on his laurels.

Three huge arms sprang out behind him, which reached out to pour true energy into his friends. At his current level, the true energy he was wasting counted for almost nothing.

Bam! Bang! Boom!

Three sounds like explosions could be heard as all three of his friends broke through to the Lifeseizing level, causing heaven-shaking, earth-toppling transformations to their meridians, and causing their seas of energy to grow much larger. Their blood became more concentrated, and their skin also began to transform.

Yang Qi looked them over, then sent out more true energy, making slight adjustments here and there to help them overcome certain difficult stages of the transformation.

Before long, the three opened their eyes and reined in their auras. As of this moment, they had finally reached that oft-dreamt-of level, Lifeseizing.

“Alright,” Liang Dong said, clapping his hands together. “Now we're all Lifeseizers. Who would dare to look down on us now? Hua Yinhu, He Jili, Li He, why don’t you let the elders in your clan know. I’d love to see the expressions on their faces when they find out.”

“Yeah, exactly….” Li He said blankly, looking down at his hands, hardly able to believe what he had accomplished. “I've been dreaming my whole life about reaching the Lifeseizing level. If it wasn’t for you, Brother Yang Qi, I wouldn’t have succeeded even with another fifty years of cultivation. Only half a year ago, I was in the eighth phase.”

“Congratulations, my Brothers,” Yang Qi said. “We did it together. Why don’t the three of you go to the Academy of Sage Studies to get your promotions? It’ll be quite the scene for all three of you to go at once. Now, anybody who has it out for you will know that they can't afford to provoke you. As for me, I need to go into secluded meditation to fully absorb the items I acquired from the black floodwyrms.”

“Alright, we’ll head off to take care of our things,” Li He said. “You're the backbone of our band of brothers, so the stronger you are, the stronger we are. First things first, we get our promotions to elite students. Then we notify our clans. When the Sage Ancestor Dynasty finds out that we’ve become elite students, they’ll definitely give rewards to our clans. With the protection of the dynasty, other clans wouldn’t dare to cause problems for our clans.”

With that, the four of them left to the Academy of Sage Studies.

As for Yang Qi, he headed back to his lakeside temple in the College of Elite Students.

After inspecting himself internally, he ran through his techniques and made various adjustments. He had defeated his inner devils, gained enlightenment of the dao of the quick strike, and produced further transformations in his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.

**

“Hey, guys, see that? Yang Qi's four friends just left.”

In another corner of the Demi-Immortal Institute, several inner campus students were spying on the group. Of course, they were members of the Crown Prince Society.

“They've been holed up for the past two days working on cultivation. Hmph! I can’t believe they think they can break through to the Lifeseizing level just like that. Since when did it become that easy? Back when Liang Dong broke into Lifeseizing, it caused a big stir. Elder Brother Gu Fenxian originally wanted us to cause trouble for the Liang Clan, but now that the Sage Ancestor Dynasty has formally rewarded them, it won't be so easy.”

“Elder Brother Gu Fenxian is following the orders of Elder Sister Yun Hailan. She’s in the good graces of the Crown Prince himself, and even took Patriarchs Wind and Cloud as masters. Let’s just keep doing what we’re told. If we can make her happy, it will only result in good for us.”

“She’s so far above us that it won’t be easy to gain her favor. However, her cousin Song Haishan is a different story. Considering his status, the female students are all throwing themselves at him. And he was defeated by Yang Qi in the past, so he hates his guts. If he could defeat Yang Qi, then he would be very, very pleased.”

“Come on, we need to follow them. He made a point of emphasizing that we should let him know of any developments.”

“I heard that Yun Hailan got help for Song Haishan, from the leaders of the Crown Prince Society. He was in seclusion for two months, and just came out last week as a Lifeseizer.”

“That's right, he became an elite student only three days ago.”

“Hey, look. Are those four heading to the Academy of Sage Studies? Don't tell me…?”

All of a sudden, the group of students from the Crown Prince Society felt very uneasy.

Chapter 117: The Fury of Song Haishan

The students from the Crown Prince Society were completely shocked.

It was plain as day that Li He, Hua Yinhu, He Jili, and Liang Dong were all heading toward the Academy of Sage Studies. Of course, Liang Dong was already an elite student, so he had no particular reason to return there. And the other three were only inner campus students, so why would they be going there?

There was only one explanation, as unlikely as it seemed, and that was that all of them had reached the Lifeseizing level, and were about to become elite students.

“Q-q-quick… follow them. We have to find out what’s going on.” After only a moment of hesitation, the entire group raced after them.

The scene of the four students heading toward the Academy of Sage Studies, followed by a scrambling group from the Crown Prince Society, immediately attracted a lot of attention.

When they arrived, Elder War-Soldier looked at them in surprise. “What? All three of you reached the Lifeseizing level? Present your techniques for inspection.”

Whoosh!

A blast of air rushed through the Academy of Sage Studies as a burning mass of sun-like sword energy rose up.

Shocked, Elder War-Soldier said, “What a pure version of the Cosmic Sunflare Sword technique! The only way to do that would be to use a sun gem combined with moonlight from black floodwyrm demon cores; the complementary aspects of fire and water combined! With sword energy like that to wield in a fight, the three of you will be the best of the best among Lifeseizers. Your future prospects are going to be incredible.”

“You guessed correctly, Elder. With the help of our clans, we got a sun gem and some moonlight from black floodwyrm demon cores. That enabled us to cultivate the Cosmic Sunflare Sword to the next level, and break through to Lifeseizing.”

“Good. Great!”

The other elders in the Academy of Sage Studies all let out exclamations of praise.

“Your meridians are much stronger than those of average elite students!” Elder War-Soldier continued. “And your seas of energy are far larger. All of you could be considered long-time, hardworking students here at the Demi-Immortal Institute. As of this moment, we elders of the Academy of Sage Studies confirm that you are in the Lifeseizing level, and may be promoted to the level of elite students. Men! Bring out the elite student garments, as well as the identity medallions. And arrange for personal residences in the College of Elite Students.”

The events which were playing out were a complete shock to the members of the Crown Prince Society.

The student who was in charge of the eavesdropping group was a ninth phase inner campus student. After a long, long moment passed, he managed to regain his composure and say, “Let’s leave. We have to tell our superiors about what’s happened. This is big.”

“Let’s go….”

All of the students flew off.

Soon, word began to spread about the three new Lifeseizers.

“They’re all fast friends of Yang Qi, and now they all achieved breakthroughs at the same time! They’ve definitely got potential. Whatever society manages to recruit them will instantly be a lot stronger. Elite students are very important to the institute.”

“That's right. Now that they’re all elite students, they're a force to be reckoned with. Although they can’t exactly do anything they want, they’re definitely the type of people that no one will dare to offend now.”

“I have to go tell the higher-ups in my Five Lightnings Society. We need to recruit Yang Qi and his friends as quickly as possible, and especially Yang Qi. Seems he’s a real genius.”

“Yun Hailan from the Crown Prince Society has a grudge with him, right? I wonder what that’s all about.”

“That’s old news. I heard that she betrayed him a while back.”

“Shh! Keep your voice down. Yun Hailan is a hotshot in the institute nowadays. She gained the Crown Prince’s approval, and even became the apprentice of Patriarchs Wind and Cloud. If you talk about her, and people from the Crown Prince Society overhear, you’re going to be in deep trouble.”

“Come on, let’s get out of here….”

Whispering amongst themselves, the students slowly left.

Meanwhile, behind the buildings that made up the Demi-Immortal Institute, in the Heaven Lode Mountains, a group of elite students had gathered on a certain mountain peak to discuss matters.

One of them was the very same Gu Fenxian that Yang Qi had defeated some time ago. Also present was Song Haishan, who was clad in a spectacular suit of leather armor that made him look like a heroic warrior. However, his expression was grim, and his eyes flickered with burning hatred, making him seem more like a hungry wolf lurking on the side of the road.

There were other top experts present, both Secondary and Tertiary Lifeseizers. There was even a Quaternary Lifeseizer.

Song Haishan was now a Lifeseizer as well, and from his energy fluctuations, it seemed that he cultivated some unusual, rare technique.

The leader of the group was a young man named Jiang Fan.

He was obviously the highest-ranking person present, with a Quaternary Lifeseizing cultivation base.

That said, the mountain peak they currently occupied didn’t belong to him, but rather, to some other member of their society who had already reached Quinary Lifeseizing, and become a conclave student. However, he was out of the institute on business, and had left his mountain available for members of the society to use.

Normally speaking, a group of students like this could not come to the Heaven Lode Mountains without a conclave student to lead them. But being members of the Crown Prince Society, things were different for them.

Snorting coldly, Jiang Fan said, “Where did Chu Tiange get off to? It's been months, and he’s still not back. As a member of the Crown Prince Society, he’s supposed to help with important activities. Does he want to get expelled or something?”

“Elder Brother Jiang,” Gu Fenxian replied, “I heard that Chu Tiange joined some students from the Gentlemen’s Society on a mission into the Fiendcorpse Mountains. Ever since then, no one has seen him. The students from the Gentlemen’s Society all returned, just not him. I’d say there’s a high likelihood he’s actually dead.”

“If he’s dead, good,” one of the Secondary Lifeseizers said. “He was an arrogant prick anyway. I can't believe he teamed up with people from another society. But if he's really dead, the members of the Gentlemen’s Society are going to be investigated by the institute.”

“Look,” Song Haishan said, “If Chu Tiange isn't back in time for the Inter-Institutional Martial Arts Competition, then it means something bad happened to him, and the institute will look into it. For now, it doesn’t matter. Let’s talk about that disaster Yang Qi.”

“Yang Qi is a Lifeseizer already,” Jiang Fan said, “with a very profound cultivation base. Not even Junior Brother Gu Fenxian was a match for him. If he refuses to join us, and even goes so far as to oppose us, we might as well crush him right now. Hailan has the support of the Crown Prince, so for all intents and purposes, her desires should be treated like his. First, we’ll try to get him to acknowledge allegiance. If he refuses, then he ‘disappears’.”

Gu Fenxian didn't seem very happy about Jiang Fan’s analysis. Snorting coldly, he said, “I was just careless that day, Elder Brother Jiang. If I had used my Painting of Immortal Immolation, he would definitely be dead now.”

“Come on, Elder Brother Gu,” one of the other experts said. “This Yang Qi isn’t that easy of an opponent to deal with. Besides, he has the backing of Yang Susu and Holy Daughter Manyflowers. Both of them could be real problems.”

“Who cares about those two?” Song Haishan said. “My cousin took the Patriarchs Wind and Cloud as masters. With the patriarchs and the Crown Prince on our side, if Holy Daughter Manyflowers and Yang Susu try to make a move against us, they’re dead.” He was obviously trying to sound tough; his defeat at the hands of Yang Qi had been a big humiliation, and he dreamed constantly about getting revenge.

When everything began between the two of them, Yang Qi had been little more than an ant. Now, he was becoming famous, and had a higher position in the Demi-Immortal Institute than Song Haishan himself. Considering all that, how could he possibly just sit around doing nothing?

“Fine,” Gu Fenxian said, his voice echoing with hatred, “if you don’t want to go after Yang Qi right now, why don't we do something about those little accomplices of his? What are their names? Li He? Hua Yinhu…? Kill them all! Or at least cripple them. Better yet, we strike at their clans, and thus force them to acknowledge allegiance to us. One at a time, we can take out everyone Yang Qi cares about.”

At this point, the group on the mountain peak heard a voice from down below. “This is bad. Real bad….”

Jiang Fan waved his hand, causing a stream of true energy to descend to the foot of the mountain, wrap around a group of Crown Prince Society students, and pull them to the peak.

“Bad news, Elder Brother Jiang,” said one of the crestfallen students who had been watching Yang Qi’s friends.

“What happened?” Jiang Fan asked his expression flickering. “Spit it out!”

“We just watched with our own eyes as Hua Yinhu, He Jili, and Li He all went to the Academy of Sage Studies. The grand elders there commended them and promoted them to the elite student level. They’re all in the Lifeseizing level! The Academy of Sage Studies already sent an official message to the Sage Ancestor Dynasty requesting that they reward their clans….”

“What?” Song Haishan blurted, shooting to his feet. Stepping forward, he grabbed the student who had just spoken. “Stop jabbering, I can barely understand what you're saying!”

The student he had grabbed looked back, anger flashing in his eyes. Actually, most students in the Crown Prince Society felt that Song Haishan was simply taking advantage of his cousin’s status. As far as they were concerned, he really was trash.

Of course, none of them would dare to say that out loud.

PLOP!

Song Haishan tossed the student to the side. Expression the picture of vicious fury, he said, “Dammit! Damn these friends of Yang Qi. How could they have become elite students? I risked my life to do the same! I cultivated day and night in the Devil-Suppression Tower, where I constantly fought devil-ghosts to temper myself! I'm gonna kill you, Yang Qi!”

“Calm down, Song Haishan,” Jiang Fan said. “Things have changed, so forget about the previous plan. They’re elite students now, and will receive rewards from the Sage Ancestor Dynasty. If we did something to them now, it would be like slapping the ruling dynasty in the face. The institute would never let something like that happen.”

“So what? We just let it all drop?” Song Haishan’s eyes were completely bloodshot. “Yang Qi must die! That’s what my cousin wants. We have to think of a way to deal with him.”

“Well, that’s simple. Since we can't do anything to his friends, we’ll just have to take him out directly!” Jiang Fan chuckled coldly. “Before, Hua Yinhu and those others were just freshman students. It was only after they met Yang Qi that they suddenly became Lifeseizers in only a half a year or so. That's definitely the work of Yang Qi. He has secrets, that's for sure. Alright, I’ll handle it myself tomorrow. I’ll go to the College of Elite Students to call him out, and then we’ll see what tricks he has up his sleeves.”

Chapter 118: Crush Him in Person

“Alright, fine,” Song Haishan said, calming down a bit. “Elder Brother Jiang Fan, even if you're the one to crush Yang Qi and not me, it will still sate my anger.” He knew exactly what kind of person Jiang Fan was, an enigmatic Quaternary Lifeseizer, someone who was actually on the very verge of becoming a Quinary Lifeseizer.

If a person like that wanted to do something to Yang Qi, then even if Yang Qi were stronger than he already was, he would still end up getting crushed.

The mere thought that he was going to experience a humiliation caused Song Haishan’s heart to pound with glee.

“Considering my status,” Jiang Fan said. “I would normally never deign to do anything to Yang Qi personally. But since he's helped all his friends become Lifeseizers, then it's obvious he's harboring some spectacular secret. There’s no way that people could reach the Lifeseizing level so quickly under ordinary circumstances. If I can extract whatever secret he has, and then use it for the benefit of the Crown Prince Society, that would be ideal.

“Alright, everyone. Let’s continue our previous session of cultivation. We also need to discuss whatever cultivation problems and enlightenment you all have encountered recently. Tomorrow, we’ll call Yang Qi out and get some answers to our questions.”

“Yes sir, Elder Brother Jiang,” Gu Fenxian said. “We could all use some cultivation tips from you. Hopefully I can achieve a breakthrough and personally vent my anger on Yang Qi.”

Jiang Fan closed his eyes. “I said, get back to cultivation.”

**

Yang Qi sat cross-legged in his lake-side temple in the College of Elite Students, holding nothing back as he circulated his true energy.

Hovering above him in the air was his Hellfire Crucible, which was now the color of platinum, holy and glorious. Platinum sagefire burned inside of it, a flame capable of melting anything and everything.

Originally, the flames had been like intensely hot lava. But it had changed, transforming from devil energy into something pure and holy. This was not fire from hell, but rather sagefire, something magnificent and pure.

Furthermore, Yang Qi’s own blood had also transformed, becoming the color of platinum.

‘Hellfire Crucible, melt these demon cores!’

The demon core of the Quinary Lifeseizer Jiao Wufeng currently floated in the crucible, slowly being eaten away. Yang Qi had already refined the other cores, turning them into life force quintessence that he fed into the next particle within him.

At the moment, he already had the power of more than fifty ancient megamammoths at his disposal.

Awakening the fifty-first had pushed him to Tertiary Lifeseizing. He had been baptized by the vital energy of heaven and earth, causing even more particles to awaken. Then he had killed Jiao Wufeng, and taken both his true energy and his demon core.

As of this moment, when he closed his eyes, he could see fifty-five particles awake inside his sea of energy. His rise to Tertiary Lifeseizing had involved five entire particles waking up.

‘Fifty-five megamammoths. That’s not enough to dry up rivers and drain seas, but it’s enough to topple a low-lying mountain.’ He truly did feel like he was strong enough to rip up a mountain by the roots. ‘Megamammoths can rip up mountains! Refine this demon core!’

Waving his hands, he sent numerous streams of true energy into his Hellfire Crucible, causing it to vibrate so intensely that the air around him rippled and distorted.

Even some of the metal accoutrements on his clothing began to melt.

‘Flame restraint….’ He reined in his energy, focusing the heat in the depths of the crucible, causing the demon core to burn, but causing the rest of the air in the room to begin to cool.

Now that he had conquered his inner devils, gained enlightenment of the dao of the quick strike, and fused the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth with his soul, it was almost as if he could do anything he set out to accomplish. He could pierce all hardness, and infiltrate all softness. He really was at one with the vital energy of heaven and earth.

Crunch!

As the demon core burned, tiny text markings became visible on its surface, although Yang Qi couldn’t quite make them out clearly.

He knew that the text was the cultivation technique that Jiao Wufeng had practiced, which was branded onto his soul. However, it was now damaged, making it impossible for Yang Qi to unlock its secrets.

Of course, he didn’t really care about some random technique of the Demonfolk anyway.

‘I originally thought it would take about ten days to refine the core, maybe even half a month. But it turned out to go much more quickly. I guess defeating my inner devil and mastering that quick strike really did help a lot. In the end, cultivation is really about besting oneself.’

Thrusting out both of his hands, he shattered the demon core into a powder that glowed as brightly as the moon. Instantly, the powder began to burn in his platinum sagefire.

One after another, various particles within him trembled and began to awaken.

Pop. Pop. Pop. Pop! Pop!!

The power of a demon core from a Quinary Lifeseizer was so incredible that it caused five particles to wake up. He now had the power of sixty ancient megamammoths.

Putting away his Hellfire Crucible, he closed his eyes to see if he actually had enough power and enlightenment to dredge up more enlightenment regarding Tertiary Lifeseizing. Who knew, perhaps he might even be able to reach Quaternary Lifeseizing?

As he sat there, the sun set, and the moon rose.

He absorbed the vital energy of the energy formation of the dao of monarchs without cease, using it to expunge the impurities from within him.

A day went by, and he was still completely absorbed in the intoxication of seeking enlightenment of his cultivation level. He was learning about his own life, the vital energy of heaven and earth, and the mysteries of the void and the universe. He was so engrossed that he lost all track of the world around him.

It was a state of cultivation that could only be happened across, not sought out.

Some of it was because of the mysteries of his godly-class energy art, and some of it was because of the fact that he had defeated his inner devil and strengthened his spirit.

As of this moment, his spirit was connected to the vital energy of heaven and earth, making him at one with the world. Now, he felt like he could control the clouds and wind, perhaps even cause it to rain, all without any true energy at all. According to the rumors, authentic holy ones could control magic with a single word. As sovereigns of heaven and earth, their mere thoughts surpassed energy arts, and could command all sorts of natural forces.

Of course, he was still light years away from such a level.

All of a sudden, Yang Qi sensed powerful vital energy fluctuations outside of his castle.

Pulling in his energy and focusing his thoughts, he rose to his feet. Heading outside, he saw a group of people floating in the air outside of his temple. There were six of them, and among their number were Gu Fenxian and Song Haishan.

However, the leader was a young man with a profound cultivation base, wearing white clothing. He kept his hands clasped behind his back, and didn’t seem to be carrying a weapon at all. However, the way he looked down his nose made him seem like a general who existed above everyone else on the earth.

“I'm Jiang Fan from the Crown Prince Society,” he said by way of introduction. “You’re Yang Qi, right? Come with me. I have something to discuss with you.”

“Why should I go with you?” Yang Qi replied. “Whatever you have to say, why not just say it here?”

“Come on, Yang Qi, behave yourself,” Gu Fenxian said grimly. “Give us some face and just come along. If you insist on being stubborn, then you can’t blame me for exterminating those four brothers of yours.”

Song Haishan didn’t say anything, as if he were waiting for something to happen.

“What exactly do you people want?” Yang Qi said. It was obvious they were up to no good, but he was confident in himself, and wanted to see what shenanigans they would try to pull off.

“Oh nothing,” Jiang Fan replied. “We just want to chat. But if you refuse, then fine, we’ll leave. I just hope you aren’t digging your own grave. Why lead your friends and your clan into ruin? I’d prefer to follow the rules of the institute and not do that to you.”

“Fine,” Yang Qi said with a nod. “If you agree not to cause any problem for my friends or my clan, then I’ll come with you for a chat.”

Jiang Fan turned and flew off, and Yang Qi followed close behind.

Before long, they were out of the institute, and in a sprawling plain a few thousand kilometers away. It was already midsummer, and the flowers were in full bloom. Combined with the endless green grass, it was a beautiful sight. There were even flowing rivers with occasional leaping fish in them.

Jiang Fan touched down onto the ground, and Yang Qi followed suit.

Meanwhile, the other members of the Crown Prince Society all landed, keeping Yang Qi surrounded.

“Well, what do you people want?” Yang Qi asked. “Didn’t you want to chat? Don't tell me this is some sort of ambush?”

“Chat? Ha!” Song Haishan spat on the ground. “The only reason we came out of the Demi-Immortal Institute is so that the elders wouldn't get in the way. Making a move there would be difficult, but that’s not the case out here. Now shut up and listen. You think you qualify to ‘chat’ with us, you country yokel!?”

“Enough,” Jiang Fan said, waving his hand to stop Song Haishan from saying anything further. Looking at Yang Qi, he said, “Tell me what special technique or treasure you have. You got all four of your friends into the Lifeseizing level with almost no effort. They said it was with the help of their clans, and they might be able to trick everyone else into believing them, but not me. It’s pretty impressive that you could push four people into breakthroughs like that. Hand over the treasure, or explain whatever method it is that you used. Then, you can join the Crown Prince Society. If you agree to work for us, we’ll let you off the hook, and even ignore your friends. What do you say?”

“Elder Brother Jiang,” Song Haishan said grimly, “my cousin wants this guy crippled at the very least.”

“I'm the one in charge here,” Jiang Fan said, clasping his hands behind his back. Eyes flashing at Yang Qi, he continued, “You’re out of options here, so do as I say. If you don't, then I’ll take you into custody and get the information out of you the hard way. And when that happens, trust me, you’ll regret your decision. I'm giving you an out here. Why don’t you take it?”

“Aren’t you worried about breaking the rules of the institute?” Yang Qi said.

“Rules?” Jiang Fan chuckled. “Rules are made by people. And people are what make laws meaningful. In the Demi-Immortal Institute, the Crown Prince Society makes the rules. We are the law.”

Chapter 119: As Useless as Chickens or Dogs

“On your knees immediately, Yang Qi!” Song Haishan shouted. “And explain your secrets right this instant! Otherwise, you’ll regret it. Today, you’re going to wish you were dead. Our Crown Prince Society is the most powerful organization in the whole continent, not just the Demi-Immortal Institute! We even have agents in the other institutes. If you offend us, then even if you run to the ends of the earth, you’ll still end up dead. With death on the line, you have no options.”

“You’re nothing more than a dog, Song Haishan,” Yang Qi said, waving his fingers at him dismissively, “and yet you dare to rave like that in my face? I already beat you once, and you’re still out for revenge. Well, that’s never going to happen. Not in this life, anyway. Your cousin Yun Hailan tricked me once, but that was a one-time thing. So forget any thoughts of trying to do anything to me.”

“What did you just say?” Song Haishan growled, his eyes bulging. Suddenly, he waved his hand, causing a blade to appear, which was none other than an energy weapon.

It was a long, blood-stained saber that appeared to be the manifestation of an energy art that combined both righteous and wicked aspects.

It also thrummed with a royal aura; it was definitely a royal-class energy art.

“Ghost-Slaughtering Saber Art!” Song Haishan said, grinning viciously. “On this day, Yang Qi, you will get a taste of the consummate energy art that I have so painstakingly cultivated over the past few months in the Devil-Suppression Tower. I spent days and nights with devil-ghosts until I mastered this energy art and stepped into Lifeseizing. Now, I’ll sacrifice you to my blade and—”

“Slow down,” Jiang Fan interrupted. “Listen, Yang Qi. Don’t be so stubborn. I'm giving you a chance here. Join the Crown Prince Society and hand over your secrets to atone for your crimes. If you push things too far, then I won't be able to do anything to save you. Presumably you're aware of the kind of punishments we inflict on criminals like you. You’ll end up begging to die, only to be refused. As long as I don't kill you, the Demi-Immortal Institute will turn a blind eye to it. Don’t think the institute will save you. For thousands of years, it's been that way. As long as no one dies, they don’t care. At the most, I might end up locked up for a few decades, that's all.”

What Jiang Fan said was true; the rules of the institute would not help Yang Qi in his current situation.

And the Crown Prince Society exercised incredible authority there.

Any non-affiliated students who ended up in a conflict with the Crown Prince Society would find that their own life or death wasn't in their own hands.

Of course, Yang Qi knew all that, and yet, was still confident in his situation. Looking coldly at Jiang Fan, he said, “Your name is Jiang Fan, right? You've done well in your cultivation it seems. You’ve been studying in the Demi-Immortal Institute for quite a few years, so I'm sure you’ve had plenty of chances to study the writings of the wise and holy men of the past. From generation to generation, the learned men of our institute have taught us to rid the world of devils and demons, console the common people, and bring peace to the lands. And yet here you are bullying fellow students, and using your power and position to try to steal from others. Considering that, what makes you different from the typical freakish hellion?”

“Shut your mouth!” Jiang Fan shouted, his face turning scarlet. With that, he let out a howl of rage that caused the clouds above to churn and collapse. “Who the hell do you think you are? I can’t believe you're trying to lecture me!” The killing intent that filled his voice was clear. “Gu Fenxian, grab him! I'm going to personally soulsearch him and make sure he knows the true meaning of the word pain! By the time I'm done, he’ll be mentally defective!”

“Yes sir, Elder Brother Jiang!” Gu Fenxian strode forward, glaring menacingly at Yang Qi. “I'm not sure why you would go and say something like that. Crazy maybe? Or maybe you think someone’s going to come help you. I guess you're still under the impression the rules of the institute will keep you safe. In that case, I won’t waste my breath any further. Time for you to see my immortal-immolating energy arts, the Painting of Immortal Immolation!”

Suddenly, a painting made of true energy sprang into being behind him.

It was much larger than the last time it had appeared outside the Academy of Sage Studies, and caused everything in the area to tremble. The power to immolate immortals swirled out of the painting and surrounded Gu Fenxian.

“Just die, will you?!” he said, waving his hand. Instantly, the Painting of Immortal Immolation swept forth and wrapped up Yang Qi.

However, in the same moment that Gu Fenxian made his move, so did Yang Qi.

His finger swept out like a sword, slicing through the air, and sending a boundless stream of sword energy out.

It was sword energy like that belonging to the most consummate swordsman, a strike that could destroy even the most ancient mountains.

In the blink of an eye, the Painting of Immortal Immolation was completely ripped to shreds.

Before Gu Fenxian could react, his defensive true energy was shattered, and the sword energy entered his meridians. Instantly, he saw nothing but stars, and he began to cough up mouthful after mouthful of blood.

Next, an enormous arm of true energy appeared, the type that could pluck stars and snatch moons. Before he could react, it grabbed him by the neck and dragged him over to Yang Qi.

Before anyone could do a single thing, Gu Fenxian was captured by Yang Qi, so casually that it seemed to take no effort on his part.

As the true energy in the area died down, everyone looked over to see Gu Fenxian hanging in the air next to Yang Qi, as helpless as a baby chicken.

Behind Yang Qi were six enormous arms of true energy.

“You!” Gu Fenxian gurgled. He looked around at the arms of true energy, and then the humiliation in his heart grew so intense that he simply passed out.

However, even as he lost consciousness, Yang Qi sent some true energy into him, waking him back up. “Wake up, Gu Fenxian. Now that I've got you, you won’t escape even if you tried to kill yourself. What do you think? You said you’d make me wish I were dead, but now, it looks like you’ll be the one begging to die.”

“Yang Qi….” Gu Fenxian growled. He almost felt like he was going crazy. “I'm a young lord of the Gu Clan, one of its top talents! How dare you humiliate me! You're making an enemy of my entire clan! Do you know what that means?”

Before Yang Qi could reply, Jiang Fan said, “Let Gu Fenxian go.” The shock in his eyes was visible. “I seriously could never have guessed that you would be this strong. You actually beat Gu Fenxian with a single move. So that’s why you’ve been acting so arrogant, huh. But do you really think that such paltry strength gives you the right to be arrogant to the Crown Prince Society as a whole? Fine. I guess I’ll have to personally take you down a notch!”

As he spoke, his true energy began to roil, and a violent aura spread out from him.

As it did, the entire plain went completely silent, and a massive energy field spread out, with Jiang Fan being at the center.

“Back up, everyone! Elder Brother Jiang Fan is about to make a move. There’s no way Yang Qi can fight back against this. Elder Brother Jiang Fan cultivates the Starry River Zodiac Cyclone Art! Once he unleashes it, the fluctuations will reach a distance of fifty kilometers! It will even break through mountains!”

“I can’t believe this little punk forced Elder Brother Jiang Fan to personally make a move! You hardly ever see him in action!”

“Isn’t Elder Brother Jiang Fan worried about hurting Gu Fenxian? I'd say there's a high likelihood Gu Fenxian won’t get out of this unharmed.”

“Nah. Elder Brother Jiang Fan knows his stuff. Besides, if Gu Fenxian gets killed, the blame will all be on Yang Qi.”

“That’s true. Yang Qi is going to need to keep Gu Fenxian safe. If he gets hurt or killed, the institute will definitely punish him.”

Instantly, the other students from the Crown Prince Society began to back up.

Song Haishan joined them, all the while thinking, ‘How did this animal Yang Qi get so strong? Not even my painstaking cultivation has pushed me to the point of being able to deal with him? He can’t be left alive! Thankfully, Jiang Fan has made a move. If he can capture him, then I’ll have my chance to kill him eventually.’

The hatred and killing intent in his heart had reached such a high level that he had to hold back from lunging forward and cutting Yang Qi down where he stood.

Jiang Fan looked like a devil-god hovering in midair. “Bring it on, Yang Qi! Let me see how strong this energy art of yours is, and—”

“You really talk a lot of crap,” Yang Qi said, eyes flickering. Suddenly, he attacked, moving with such incredible speed that no one present could track him with their eyes.

He was like a ghost-god emerged from the netherworld, spear in hand.

One strike destroyed Jiang Fan’s energy field, and then instantly absorbed all of the true energy.

And then, Yang Qi was in front of him.

Before Jiang Fan even realized what was happening, Yang Qi’s palm smashed into his chest.

BOOOOM!

He was a powerful Quaternary Lifeseizer, the famous Elder Brother Jiang Fan. And yet a single palm strike sent him flying down to slam into the grass below.

Thump.

Yang Qi dropped out of the air and landed on top of him, stomping onto his face with his foot.

Jiang Fan was still too stunned to react, and was shoved down into the dirt, temporarily unable to even breathe.

“Like I said, you really talk a lot of crap, Jiang Fan. It bored me so much I decided to just shut you up. Well, you wanted to see how strong I am. What do you think?” Yang Qi reined in all of his true energy, making himself look like nothing more than an ordinary person with no energy arts. And yet, that only made him seem even more terrifying than before.

Gu Fenxian plopped onto the ground some distance away, trembling violently, hardly able to accept what he was seeing. The seemingly heavenly Elder Brother Jiang Fan had been defeated with a single move, and hadn’t even been able to fight back. Not even his energy field had been able to stand up to Yang Qi. It was simply unbelievable.

“Impossible!” one of the other students shrieked.

They had all been preparing to watch Jiang Fan crush Yang Qi, only to see Yang Qi defeat him with a single move, and then stomp him down into the dirt below. It was a level of strength that they simply couldn’t comprehend.

Only one move, and Jiang Fan was completely and utterly defeated. How strong was this Yang Qi?

As for Song Haishan, his thoughts were in such chaos that he felt numb.

‘Not good! I have to get out of here!’

That was the only thing he could think of at the moment. However, just as he turned to leave, a blast of true energy smacked him to the ground, and then an arm of true energy pinned him down, leaving him in the same position as Jiang Fan and Gu Fenxian.

“Song Haishan, you’re such a weakling that I could kill you a hundred times over with the mere flick of a finger.” Pointing around at the other students, he said, “Nobody's allowed to leave. Anybody who tries will be buried here.”

Chapter 120: Blood Tribute

In the briefest of moments, everything turned around.

Moments ago, the domineering members of the Crown Prince Society had Yang Qi surrounded, and were preparing to attack with full force. But then, Gu Fenxian ended up being captured, Jiang Fan was stomped into the ground, and Song Haishan was crushed.

The Crown Prince Society’s battle formation was completely routed.

As for those members who had been about to flee, when they heard Yang Qi’s words, they froze in place, not daring to move. Even worse, Yang Qi unleashed a deadly manifestation of Humanoid True Energy, which instantly locked down onto all of their auras.

Instantly, they could tell that this Humanoid True Energy was something they couldn’t possibly hope to fight against.

However, one of the students present was apparently unconvinced.

“I'm leaving, and nobody’s gonna get in my way!” he said, flying up into the air. A moment later, the Humanoid True Energy appeared above him, smashed its hand down, and knocked him out of the sky, nearly killing him.

The man was a Tertiary Lifeseizer, and yet, he was slammed into the ground with seemingly no effort by the Humanoid True Energy.

Yang Qi had killed Jiao Wufeng, a powerful Quinary Lifeseizer, and had then absorbed his demon core and used it to gain access to the power of sixty ancient megamammoths. Not even the Quaternary Lifeseizer Jiang Fan was a match, let alone this weaker student.

“A bunch of useless dogs and chickens,” Yang Qi growled. “You really want to keep pushing my buttons?” Looking around at the cowering students, Yang Qi suddenly realized that he had the entire situation completely under control.

This was power.

This was respect.

In the world he lived in, respect came only with enough power.

Nodding in satisfaction, he moved his foot off of Jiang Fan. Jiang Fan struggled to extricate himself from the soil, looking completely different than he had moments ago. As of now, he was bedraggled and covered with dirt, making him seem more like a beggar than a powerful Lifeseizer.

“What energy art was that?” he said, still hardly able to believe that he had been beaten. “My Starry River Zodiac Cyclone Art is widely known for having incredibly powerful true energy! Even a Quinary Lifeseizer shouldn’t be able to defeat it so easily. Who exactly are you? A lowborn commoner like you shouldn’t be so strong! You must have been parasitized by a hellion or a monster. I'm going to report this to the institute, and demand you be investigated!”

“Still struggling with delusions of grandeur?” Yang Qi said, once again planting his foot on Jiang Fan’s chest. “Don’t you understand the situation you’re in?” Then he sent some true energy into Jiang Fan’s meridians, causing him to scream from the pain, making him sound like a pig going to the slaughter. “Whether you believe it or not, I’ll cripple your energy arts if I have to. Then your entire life of cultivation will have been a complete waste.”

It was only at this point that an expression of fear overtook Jiang Fan’s face. “Alright, I believe you. Let’s talk this through. We're from the Crown Prince Society, aren’t you afraid of the Crown Prince?”

“The Crown Prince? Me afraid of him? Isn’t he the one looking to cause trouble for me? I don’t have any grudge with your Crown Prince Society. You’ve brought this upon yourselves. Actually, I think I should probably be a bit more vicious!” Yang Qi looked down at Jiang Fan, his eyes glinting with sinister light.

“Okay!” Jiang Fan blurted. “I promise not to cause any more trouble for you! This is all our fault! Let’s just pretend none of it ever happened.”

“You can’t let him off the hook, Elder Brother Jiang Fan!” Song Haishan suddenly shrieked. “I refuse to believe that he’ll actually cripple your energy arts! Isn’t he afraid that the institute will punish him? Hurting fellow disciples is a big crime!”

BAM!

Yang Qi waved his hand, sending a blast of energy to smack Song Haishan right across the side of the face, sending blood and teeth flying. “You don't have the right to participate in this conversation, Song Haishan. After I'm finished dealing with Jiang Fan, it’ll be your turn. You think I wouldn’t dare to cripple him? All of this was started by you people, and the institute will take that into consideration. For me, it's simply self-defense. Besides, the institute knows that I'm a genius with a high cultivation base. You really think they would just get rid of someone like that? As for the Crown Prince Society, all I have to do is join one of the other societies, and then you won't be able to do anything about me. Your Crown Prince isn't going to commit a heinous crime by murdering me in the middle of the institute, is he?”

Yang Qi waved his hand, sending out a stream of true energy.

C-C-CRACK!

Popping like that of fireworks echoed out inside of Jiang Fan as one of his meridians was destroyed.

Jiang Fan’s eyes went slack as he realized that Yang Qi really was preparing to cripple his energy arts. And being a cripple like that would be worse than being dead.

Before that could happen, he suddenly shouted, “Fine, Yang Qi! What do I have to do to get you to let me go?”

Meridians could be healed by the use of spirit medicines and special healing techniques. But once one’s sea of energy was destroyed, there would be no hope of recovery.

“Oh?” Yang Qi said, holding his energy in place. “You want me to let you go? That can be done.”

“What do you want?” Jiang Fan said, his heart suddenly burning with hope. “We can swear oaths to abandon any thoughts of revenge. We can keep the events of today completely secret.”

“I don't trust a word that comes out of your mouth,” Yang Qi replied. “The only way to resolve this situation is for you to provide me with a blood tribute.”

“Blood tribute?” Jiang Fan said, stunned.

“That’s right. A blood tribute.” Yang Qi’s eyes glittered. “The choice is up to you. One option is to have your energy arts crippled by me. I'm not a kindhearted person, and considering how far things have gone here, it’s only natural that I’d want to cut the weeds and eliminate the roots. Why wouldn’t I just kill all of you to make sure there were no witnesses? Good thing for you I don’t go around killing people left and right. However, I can’t just let you go, right? You need to do something to earn my trust. You need to get your hands dirty.”

“Just tell us what you want us to do, alright?” Jiang Fan said, his heart already beginning to sink.

“Kill Song Haishan!” Yang Qi shouted. “And Gu Fenxian too! All of you! Cut them down. Do it together, and do it quickly. That is the blood tribute I demand. Personally kill the two of them, and then I’ll believe you won’t spread word of what happened today. Then, all of you can leave.”

“W-what?” Jiang Fan said, so astonished he could hardly speak. Never in his wildest imaginings could he have guessed that Yang Qi would be so vicious! He was proving true the old saying, all great men are ruthless. The blood tribute he required was that the other students personally kill Song Haishan and Gu Fenxian. If they did something like that, they would never be able to take it back.

At this point, a Secondary Lifeseizer named Huang Hong shouted, “Yang Qi, you cruel villain! I can’t believe you would demand a blood tribute like that. If we killed Gu Fenxian and Song Haishan, we would be doomed! Not only would we be responsible for covering up the truth, you could threaten to reveal the secret at any time! There’s no way we’ll agree to something like that! I’ll never agree to kill someone. If you’ve got what it takes, just go ahead and violate institute rules to cripple me! There’s no way you’d dare to do it! If you've got the guts, then just—”

“What did you just say?” Yang Qi interrupted, his voice as cold as ice. “I dare you to repeat it!” Then he began to walk toward Huang Hong.

Huang Hong clearly wasn't willing to back down. Staring snidely at Yang Qi, he said, “Ah, come on, Yang Qi. That same act? I'm not buying it anymore. You're completely screwed here, and yet you’re still struggling to escape? You think that talking tough will scare us? You think we’ll really give in and give you your blood tribute? I’ll tell you what, if you forced us to do something like that, neither the Crown Prince Society nor the institute itself would let you off the hook. Maybe you could escape somehow, but not your family, friends, and brothers. And what about your aunt, Yang Susu? She would be punished too. And thus, I refuse to believe that you’ll do anything.”

“That’s exactly right!” Song Haishan shouted. “I also refuse to believe. Even if you had three heads, six arms, and eighty-one lives, there’s no way you would dare to hurt us. Don’t fall for his bluff, everyone. Just wait and see what he actually dares to do!”

“How heinous of you, Yang Qi!” Gu Fenxian said. The mere mention of the ‘blood tribute’ had caused flames of fury to dance in his eyes. “You actually want the other members of the Crown Prince Society to put us to death? I don't care how things turn out today, I can guarantee that my Gu Clan is going to wipe the Yang Clan off the map!”

Clearly, there was no way his hatred of Yang Qi could ever be eliminated.

“Well, are you going to do it Yang Qi? If you've got what it takes, then start with me!” Huang Hong laughed loudly. “I know you cultivate some sort of devil technique, and are hiding your true strength. But institute rules still apply here. If you do anything to us, your friends are going to get dragged into it. Think it through, man! We're giving you a chance right now to reveal your secrets, and—”

Snap!

Suddenly, a spear stabbed into his chest.

He looked down in shock, then looked back up the length of the spear to see Yang Qi holding it. Expression flickering with both incredulity and pain, he said, “Y-you… you killed me…?”

“You were working harder than anyone to piss me off. Who else would I kill?”

Yang Qi rotated the Infernal Deity Spear, causing a burst of true energy to surge into Huang Hong.

Suddenly, Huang Hong exploded into bits, and all of the true energy inside of him was sucked into the spear.

Huang Hong, Secondary Lifeseizer and elite student, was completely wiped out of existence by Yang Qi’s Infernal Deity Spear.

He hadn’t even been able to fight back.

Everyone looked on in mute shock. The only thing that remained of Huang Hong was an echoing scream of anguish, and even that faded away. Not a single shred of evidence was left behind to indicate that Huang Hong had ever existed.

As of this moment, everyone present realized how vicious and merciless Yang Qi could be.

As for Song Haishan and Gu Fenxian, moments ago they had been yelling angrily, but now, they simply looked on with ashen faces.

“Since you refused to give me a blood tribute, I decided to give one to you.” Brandishing the Infernal Deity Spear, he said, “You think I'm worried about how this will play out? Sorry, but I’m not. When it comes to killing people, I don't hesitate. To me, nothing is taboo.”

Chapter 121: You Think I Won&#039;t?

With one vicious spear strike, Yang Qi slaughtered Huang Hong, leaving the other members of the Crown Prince Society completely flabbergasted. Not a single one of them had actually believed that Yang Qi would so wantonly kill one of them. His absolute lack of restraint was monstrous; clearly, he wasn’t exaggerating when he said that nothing was taboo to him.

Who was this Huang Hong?

A Secondary Lifeseizer, best of the best among elite students. His death would definitely cause a stir in the institute. After all, not even rival societies would dare to actually kill someone like that, for fear of reprisal from the institute itself. And yet here Yang Qi had gone and committed an enormous crime, killing Huang Hong with a devastating spear strike. What type of ferocity did it take to pull off something like that?

As of this moment, no one present dared to harbor illusions that Yang Qi wouldn’t follow through with his threats.

The truth was that Yang Qi was simply putting everything on the line. After all, he had already killed Chu Tiange. So he had little to lose from killing someone else to make a point.

If he didn’t thoroughly terrify all of the Crown Prince Society students present, the consequences would be too horrible to contemplate. Considering he had basically no options, he decided he might as well go all in. In the past, he would never have done something like this. In fact, no ordinary person would.

But after his experience in the Black Floodwyrm Grotto, he had defeated his inner devil, gained enlightenment of the dao of the quick strike, and become much more resolute. He was slowly becoming more aggressive, and at the same time, ambitious and ruthless. When the time came to make a kill, he would do it without hesitation.

“Don't kill me….” Jiang Fan said, deeply shaken by having seen Huang Hong killed right in front of him. He held no doubts about Yang Qi; he had essentially given them a blood tribute, a message written in blood that said: if I can kill Huang Hong, I can kill you too.

The penalty for killing one person would be death. And it was the same penalty for killing many. Why would he not just kill everyone?

Everyone present realized this basic truth.

The other students began to drop to their knees. They knew they were beaten, and that a massive catastrophe loomed over their heads. And none of them were foolish enough to goad Yang Qi any further.

“I gave you your chance already, Jiang Fan. Do as you please.” Yang Qi put away his Infernal Deity Spear and clasped his hands behind his back. “Your options are, one: give me my blood tribute, or two: die. Considering I just killed Huang Hong right in front of you, you’re likely intelligent enough to realize that I can’t just let you leave scot-free.”

“Ah, whatever,” Jiang Fan said, letting loose a long sigh. Crawling to his feet, and ignoring the dirt and mud that caked him, he decisively said, “Alright everyone. If you want to live, then we have no choice but to kill them.”

The other students exchanged glances, then looked over at Song Haishan and Gu Fenxian.

So terrified his face was completely ashen, Song Haishan said, “Elder Brother Jiang Fan, you can’t do this.” Then he looked over at Yang Qi. “Are you really going through with this, Yang Qi? Aren’t you afraid my cousin will come after you for revenge?”

“Yun Hailan? I'm going to kill her too, eventually. It’s just too bad that she can’t witness your horrific demise. Nor will you be able to see hers.”

“You’ll pay for this, Yang Qi!” Gu Fenxian shouted. “The institute will find out what you’ve done. And the same goes for you, Jiang Fan! Aren’t you worried about what happens when the glorious Crown Prince finds out? He’ll sever your tendons and skin you alive!”

Clearly, Gu Fenxian was not willing to back down, and in this respect, he made Song Haishan look like a true weakling.

After all, Gu Fenxian came from one of the great clans of the land.

Sadly for him, Yang Qi would not let him go simply because he was strong-willed. In fact, such strong-willed people were exactly the type who would never stop trying to get revenge. Whether it was for his clan or friends, Yang Qi couldn't let him live now. He wasn’t that softhearted.

“Are you going to do it, Jiang Fan?” Yang Qi suddenly barked. “Are you going to kill them?”

Shivering, Jiang Fan looked at Song Haishan and Gu Fenxian, and said, “I'm sorry, Junior Brothers. The Crown Prince is powerful, but he's not here to save us right now. Distant water won't put out a fire close at hand. I'm powerless to save even myself, and you both saw what happened to Huang Hong. Not even his bones are left behind. If we don't kill the two of you, we’ll all end up dead. We really have no choice but to sacrifice you for the greater good.”

Heart pounding, he said, “Kill them!”

Shouting at the tops of their lungs, he and the other students attacked.

Sword light shone, and true energy surged. Song Haishan and Gu Fenxian let out agonized shrieks as they were surrounded and reduced to pools of blood and gore.

In the blink of an eye, they were dead.

As they died, Yang Qi could sense two streams of grievous rancor shooting toward him.

In response, he snorted coldly and activated the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, destroying the rancorous energy.

As for Jiang Fan, he looked down at the blood and gore, then turned to face Yang Qi. “Are you going to let us go now? We killed them just like you asked. Now our hands are stained with the blood of fellow students. If the truth is revealed, the consequences will be horrific. We can’t divulge any of today’s secrets, to anyone.”

Yang Qi nodded, finally confident that he could rest at ease. “You did well. Now all of our secrets are tied together. That said, the deaths of Huang Hong, Song Haishan, and Gu Fenxian is still a major issue. You'd better think of a way to cover it up. Otherwise, we’ll all come under investigation.”

“It’s going to be somewhat troublesome, but we from the Crown Prince Society can handle it. It's only natural that we have certain methods for covering up things like this. Considering we're involved now, there’s no way we’ll take it lightly.” Jiang Fan looked around at the rest of the group. “Alright, everyone. We’re all in the same boat now. Understand?”

Everyone nodded and said, “We understand, Elder Brother Jiang Fan.”

Considering these people managed to survive down to this point, it was obvious they were no fools. They understood the situation they were in, and knew that there was essentially only one course of action.

“Very well then,” Yang Qi said with a smile. “We’re all in this together now. Don’t worry. I’ll keep my end of the bargain.” Suddenly, he stomped his foot, causing vital energy to spring out and fill everything for five kilometers. Then, his own true energy surged out, becoming a variety of shapes that shot forth and entered the bodies of everyone present.

“I’ll even help you out a bit. The true energy I just gave you is extremely powerful. It will remain inside of you permanently until you need it, whereupon it will assume the same form as this spear of mine, which you can use to pierce anything in your path.” The truth was that the true energy he had just imparted to them contained a bit of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. “You see, I'm actually much, much stronger than you can possibly imagine. Only two days ago, I went to Black Floodwyrm Grotto and killed the Quinary Lifeseizer Jiao Wufeng, as well as a few dozen other black floodwyrms in the Lifeseizing level. Although your Crown Prince is stronger than me now, it won’t be long before I catch up.”

Everyone was completely taken aback.

“I can even rip the ground apart,” Yang Qi said, stomping his foot down. In response, the entire plain quaked violently, and massive crevices opened up.

Jiang Fan staggered so wildly that he almost fell to the ground before staring around at the crevices which had opened up. As far as he could tell, this was something that only conclave students should be able to do.

‘That’s the power of Septenary Lifeseizing!’

The mere stomp of Yang Qi’s foot had leveled most of the area; it was a complete shock to everyone present.

“Alright, let’s discuss how exactly you plan to cover everything up. By the way, in order to make sure all of this remains a secret, we’ll need to keep in touch. If you feel that true energy inside of you stirring, you’ll know that I want to get in touch with you, and that you should arrange to come secretly meet me. Understand?”

Everyone present shivered as they realized that, with Yang Qi having imbued them with true energy, they were completely under his control.

And there was nothing they could do about it.

In fact, for all intents and purposes, they were his agents in the Crown Prince Society now.

Sighing, Jiang Fan stepped forward and said, “Elder Brother Yang Qi, this is what we can do….”

With that, he explained his plan to cover over the deaths of Huang Hong, Song Haishan, and Gu Fenxian.

After discussing some of the details, Yang Qi nodded. Although these people were no match for him in terms of cultivation base, they were clearly masters at schemes and plots.

Eventually, it was evening, and the bright moon cast silver light over the sprawling plains. By this point, the plans were ironclad, so Yang Qi rose to his feet and sighed. “Well, I’ll head back to the institute now. You’ll return in ten days, with news that Huang Hong, Song Haishan, and Gu Fenxian were killed when you were ambushed by powerful demonoids. Meanwhile, the rest of you escaped with serious injuries.”

“That’s the best we can do,” Jiang Fan said, also rising to his feet, mixed emotions playing out on his face.

Yang Qi spread his arms, and two wings of true energy spread out behind him. Then, a blast of sand and wind swept out as he vanished.

As soon as he was gone, the Crown Prince Society students tried to expel his true energy from within them. Unfortunately, it was stuck like glue, and couldn’t be budged.

Before long, the moon hung high, and Jiang Fan smacked his hand on the ground, causing a cloud of dust to rise up. “That’s some powerful true energy. There’s simply no way to expel it.”

“Elder Brother Jiang Fan,” one of the crestfallen students said, “we're basically criminals now. What do we do? Don’t tell me we're going to have to follow Yang Qi’s orders for the rest of our life? I don’t think I’ve ever met someone as vicious and merciless as him.”

“There’s nothing we can do now. We underestimated him. He’s ambitious, ruthless, and just seems to grow stronger by the day. It won’t be long before he's invincible to anyone under the Legendary level. And unless something drastic happens, he’ll probably catch up to the Crown Prince within four or five years. For now, the only thing we can do is keep ourselves alive.” Jiang Fan gritted his teeth from the frustration. “If it wasn’t for that ignoramus Song Haishan, we wouldn’t be in this predicament. Damn him and damn that Yun Hailan!”

Chapter 122: Going Home

A potentially devastating storm had been averted by Yang Qi’s ruthlessness.

Even he realized that in the world he lived in, sometimes the only way to stay alive was to be merciless. If your enemies noticed that you were weak, they would immediately take advantage of that, and you would end up dead.

Just as he had discussed with Jiang Fan and the others, they would return ten days later, and spread the story that they had stumbled onto a lair of fiend-devils, which resulted in Huang Hong, Song Haishan, and Gu Fenxian all being killed.

Yang Qi was confident that they wouldn’t leave any loose ends, and wondered what unlucky group of demon-devils would end up paying the price.

At this point, it didn’t matter as far as he was concerned. Considering he would be cultivating in the institute when the event played out, the matter shouldn’t be connected to him in any way.

It was with the utmost stealth that he returned to the Demi-Immortal Institute. Back in his castle, he looked at the energy formation of the dao of monarchs and thought, ‘I wonder how Yun Hailan will react when she comes out of seclusion to find that Song Haishan is dead. She’ll probably suspect me right off the bat, the shrewd schemer. As far as she’s concerned, losing Song Haishan just means losing another tool. She won’t care. All she cares about is her own interests. She doesn't have an ounce of pity in her body.’

Yang Qi was very well aware of what type of person Yun Hailan was.

‘Yun Hailan is getting stronger by the day. Although I've likely surpassed her by now, she has the backing of the Crown Prince. In other words, if I want to kill her, I'm going to have to deal with him. And my cultivation base isn’t even close to being high enough to do that. I need to get much, much stronger. I need to seize life over and over again. I need one breakthrough after another. Only then will I be able to defeat the Crown Prince.’

Considering the dramatic events he had just participated in, it was hard to calm down at first.

But eventually, he managed to focus. ‘Father should be ready to step into the Lifeseizing level. I need to find some time to head back and help him with his cultivation. The same with eldest brother and second brother. And I also need to come up with a specific plan of how to get stronger myself. It seems to me the only option I have at the moment is to kill demonlings and consume their demon cores with the help of my Hellfire Crucible.’

Opening up his Heart of the Sea thumb-ring, he allowed the pure subterranean spirit energy to enter it, and by extension, the energy formation of the dao of monarchs that he had created.

He had already decided to take the formation back home to his clan for them to use. His main goal was to make sure his father reached the Lifeseizing level.

Furthermore, he had also decided to enter the Blackcorpse Mountains to further his cultivation.

The tombs in the depths of those mountains contained numerous thousand-year-old corpse kings, and also a passage to an alternate dimension. And there were plenty of demonlings around, thus, demon cores to consume. Besides, clearing out some of the demonlings would ensure that the rustic lifestyle of the common people of Yanhaven could remain peaceful.

Now that he thought about it, it might be worth it to take a trip to Yundale-by-the-Sea.

Yun Hailan had already threatened his clan, right? Eye for an eye, tooth for a tooth. It only made sense for him to threaten her clan in return.

He worked on his cultivation for three days and three nights, simultaneously using the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth to force as much subterranean vital energy into the Heart of the Sea ring as he could. He was now a Tertiary Lifeseizer, giving him much greater control of vital energy than before, to the point where he felt like he could use Mind Incarnation on the spell formation.

During his three days of meditation, his level of enlightenment of his energy arts grew more profound. He was now completely confident in being able to harness the power of Tertiary Lifeseizing.

Next step: Quaternary Lifeseizing.

Thanks to the demon core of Jiao Wufeng, his physical body was now so tough that it was almost unimaginable. Every drop of his blood was platinum in color, and the flames of his Hellfire Crucible were all magnificent sagefire.

By now, he didn’t resemble a human at all, but rather, a god.

It took no effort at all to use his five most powerful states of true energy: the Infernal Deity Spear, Infernal Deity Plate Armor, Fiend-Devil Wings, Hellfire Crucible, and Devil-God Seal. Combined with Mind Incarnation, there was nothing that could get in his way.

Thanks to his newfound strength, Yang Qi was feeling more confident than ever.

He knew that when the time came for the big martial arts competition, he would definitely be able to dominate the opposition, and be the ultimate rising star.

One night, he slipped out to meet with his four brothers. Over the past several days, they had remained safe and secure in the College of Elite Students, waiting for him to return.

When they heard that he planned to go home, they were all very happy for him. Of course, all of them were also extremely pleased with their own situations. They now had very different statuses within their sects, and in fact, all four were in the running to succeed as the next clan lord.

Their clans had also been bestowed rewards from the Sage Ancestor Dynasty, ensuring that they were experiencing new golden ages.

“Brother,” Li He said, “make sure you take care of matters back home, and ensure that all the matters pertaining to your clan are settled. Before long, the martial arts competition will be here, and there will be plenty of incredible rewards up for grabs. The senior members of the sect will be watching to see who rises to the top, and will likely take new apprentices. Hopefully all of us can put on a good showing. If we could gain the good graces of a Legendary, not even the Crown Prince would dare to make a move against us.”

Yang Qi nodded. “Alright, Brothers, I'm leaving. I’ll be back as soon as I can.” With the flap of his wings, he flew into the clouds and vanished into the night.

When Yang Qi made his initial journey from Yanhaven to the Demi-Immortal Institute, it took more than a month. Since then, his cultivation base had climbed so high that it was now like the sky compared to the dirt.

His Fiend-Devil Wings could now propel him a hundred times faster than before.

He was like a shooting star speeding through the sea of clouds, moving five hundred kilometers in the shortest of times. Tertiary Lifeseizers were immensely powerful individuals, and in terms of true energy, he was actually more on the level of a Septenary Lifeseizer. The speed he was capable of was truly terrifying.

In the beginning, the friction caused by his true energy against the wind caused him to be surrounded by thunderous rumblings, and even flames.

But now, he could fly completely soundlessly, little more than a black streak moving through the air. It was almost like he was traveling in an alternate dimension.

His energy was completely focused inwardly, without a scrap leaking out in waste.

Eventually, he dropped down from the sea of clouds to fly through a mountain range. However, his mere passage caused the mountains to crumble.

‘What power!’

Not even he had been aware that his Fiend-Devil Wings could do such a thing.

And yet, he was used to the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth defying imagination. He couldn’t help but wonder what it would be like at its highest level. Of one thing he was fairly certain: once his Fiend-Devil Wings truly became Angel Wings, he would be able to pierce the void and travel among alternate dimensions.

Unfortunately, he wasn't at that level yet.

Besides, when it came to the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, there were things that surpassed the Angel Wings. He just needed to wait until he was strong enough to find out what they were.

He flew for about half the night, until the sun began to rise. Eventually, he slowed down a bit, until he saw Yanhaven up ahead.

It was a bustling place; although the sky wasn’t yet bright, the city gates were already open, with people, horses, and carts streaming in and out of them. Whether it was visiting merchants and businessmen, or the locals, people here were clearly very hardworking.

It was also possible to see that heavy construction was going on outside of the city limits. Earth was being moved, and stones carved out of quarries.

As for the heart of the city, the city magistrate’s mansion, it was alive with bright light, as though great tasks were underway. There were plenty of guards and maids, and everyone went about their work in very orderly fashion. It really did look like a small royal dynasty.

Yang Qi landed, sending out a blast of swirling wind into the main square of the city magistrate’s mansion.

Instantly, numerous guards burst into motion, nocking arrows and drawing blades, ready to start fighting at any moment.

Yang Qi actually caught sight of several familiar faces, various sons of the Yang Clan.

Looking at one of the guards racing toward him, Yang Qi said, “Yang Yong, come over here. It's me! I'm back!”

“What? Prince? It’s the prince!” Shocked, the man dropped to his knees to kowtow. “Everybody, stay your hand! The prince is back!”

Yang Yong was one of the elite young ones of the clan that he had promoted long ago. Back then, he had been a bit bitter at how things were going, but eventually had become an important person, and was actually fiercely loyal to Yang Qi.

“What? It’s Young Lord Qi?” Many of the guards were stunned. By now, Yang Qi was something of a fabled individual, almost a myth. Last summer, he turned everything upside down. He roused the Yang Clan, exterminated the Chen Clan, entered the Demi-Immortal Institute, became an elite student, rose to the Lifeseizing level, and received rewards by the dictate of an imperial edict from the Sage Ancestor Dynasty. He had even made friends with four powerful clans from Capital City, who had sent experts to help drive out the Yan Clan, and win Yanhaven for the Yang Clan.

It was all somewhat miraculous.

He was essentially the backbone of the entire clan, and also its leader in spirit.

All of the guards dropped to their knees.

At that point, a powerful whistling sound erupted from the royal palace in the heart of the mansion, as Yang Zhan flew out. Face filled with excitement, he said, “Qi’er! You're back!”

“Greetings, my dear Father!” he replied, rushing forward to meet his father.

Chapter 123: Yang Zhan, Lifeseizer

“You’re finally back, Qi’er!”

The sight of his son caused all sorts of feelings to well up in Yang Zhan’s heart. Yang Qi was famous now, and was making his way in the world, bringing honor to the clan ancestors, and even earning rewards from the Sage Ancestor Dynasty.

The Yang Clan was now the number one clan amongst all the cities for thousands of kilometers in all directions.

And all of the aristocratic clans had bent the knee, and had provided military forces to serve the Yang Clan. As of now, the clan was the ruler of the entire area, and Yang Zhan was the king.

The only thing that was lacking was a proper name for the nation that Yanhaven had become.

“Third Brother!”

Even as Yang Qi was offering formal greetings to his father, Yang Yunchong and Yang Hualong rushed out.

“Eldest Brother. Second Brother.” Laughing happily, he hurried forward and embraced his brothers.

Waving his hand at the nearby soldiers, Yang Zhan said, “Cancel the night curfew; we’ll have three days of feasting to welcome my son home. Arrange for fireworks, and distribute medicinal pills to the mortals young and old. And summon the civil and military officials to the royal palace for a banquet.”

“You really don’t need to go to all that trouble, Father.” Yang Qi couldn’t help but feel that it was going a bit overboard to have official banquets, and a virtual festival for the commoners.

“It’s no trouble,” Yang Yunchong said. “Third Brother, you might not be aware, but although all the clans of Yanhaven have officially capitulated, there are still people plotting against us. Some are even working with outside sects to foment rebellion. In fact, we’ve received intelligence reports that people from the House of Shadowblight and the House of Spring and Autumn have been seen on the borders, presumably preparing to make a move on the city. Father is hoping to use your return to scare the clans into submission, and increase our prestige and reputation. In fact, it might be a good idea to demonstrate your energy arts at the banquet. That would probably be particularly effective.”

“Ah, so that’s how it is,” Yang Qi said. Clearly, his family had thought these matters through.

“Your assistance is much appreciated, Qi’er,” Yang Zhan said. Leading them all toward the royal palace, he issued a few more orders to a nearby guard, a man who happened to be in the eighth phase. “Summon the chief elders. Tell them we’re going to have an important meeting.”

“Yes, Your Majesty,” the guard replied.

“Father, your energy arts have peaked, and I suspect you’re having some difficulty reaching the Lifeseizing level. Thankfully, you’ve absolutely mastered the Four Seasons Swordplay, as have I. Why don't I help you reach Lifeseizing? As a Lifeseizer, you shouldn’t have any problem keeping Yanhaven under control.”

They continued to discuss the matter as they made their way through the palace.

Yang Qi could see that everything was strictly organized. There were guards and maids everywhere, and he even caught sight of some court eunuchs. The palace complex was enormous, and filled with countless winding corridors. There were overhanging eaves, and imposing columns and crossbeams, everything carved with dragons and phoenixes, giving the place a profoundly royal feeling.

Of course, it had all been left behind by the previous city magistrate, Yan Gufeng, who had also been a profoundly ambitious individual. He had hoped to establish a dynasty that would last for a thousand years, so he had naturally turned his palace into a place fit for royals. Sadly, he never managed to take full control of the city, and had eventually been driven away. Even his treasures stores had been seized, including the impressive collection of medicinal pills therein.

The court eunuchs were also left behind by him.

As he looked around at the situation in the mansion, Yang Qi took time to assess his father and brothers’ cultivation bases.

Yang Zhan was at the peak of the Master of Energy level; the power of his airmastery plant had been fully assimilated. He seemed like he could float into the air like an immortal, all with the simple wave of a hand. Both of his brothers were Masters of Energy as well, and with their Four Seasons Swordplay, were far beyond any ordinary Master of Energy.

However, it would take longer before they could hope to reach the Lifeseizing level. They would need some fabled item such as life force springwater to achieve their breakthrough.

Soon, Yang Clan elders of various rankings had assembled, along with the clan lords of the subsidiary branches. Yang Xingshi was there, as was Dowager Yan.

They were still the highest-ranking chief elders, and yet, the first thing they did was offer respectful salutations to Yang Zhan.

“My respects, Your Majesty,” they both said. The meeting hall was large enough to fit thousands, so the several hundred clan members had plenty of room to situate themselves. As everyone offered deep bows of respect to Yang Zhan, they cast glances at Yang Qi.

“Rise and find your seats,” Yang Zhan said, sounding every bit a king.

After everyone was seated, he continued, “Today is a wonderful day, as my son Yang Qi has returned from the Demi-Immortal Institute. Qi’er, have you brought any gifts for the clan?”

“Yes, father,” he replied coolly, fully aware that this particular clan forum was being held in order to intimidate everyone present. “During the course of my studies at the Demi-Immortal Institute, I’ve reached the Lifeseizing level. I've also learned much of spell formations. In fact, I can set up a spell formation here to help members of the clan progress much more quickly in their cultivation. Ladies and gentlemen, please hold back any questions or comments until I’ve provided a bit of a demonstration.”

At this point, the rippling blue light of his thumb-ring could be seen as a huge spell formation appeared right in front of Yang Zhan’s throne.

Everyone could sense the rippling power of the energy formation of the dao of monarchs. As for Yang Zhan, he leaned forward, an intoxicated expression on his face as his true energy surged within him.

“Father,” Yang Qi said loudly, “go through your energy arts forms. Pull your true energy back into your sea of energy. I’m going to help you break through to the Lifeseizing level right here and now!”

Without any hesitation, Yang Zhan called upon his Four Seasons Swordplay. The energy of spring, summer, autumn, and winter surged in the area, and yet, was held in place by the formation.

Everyone watched as the energy shifted back and forth between spring rain, summer lightning, autumn frost, and winter snow.

Maintaining complete focus, Yang Qi called upon the sword energy of the Four Seasons Swordplay that existed in his own sea of energy, and sent it into the formation. The energy quickly entered Yang Zhan’s meridians, causing true energy to forcibly push his life force substructure to a higher level. After all, Yang Qi’s cultivation base was already in Tertiary Lifeseizing, and his true energy was as strong as a Septenary Lifeseizer. With his help, Yang Zhan was shaving dozens of years off of his cultivation, perhaps even as much as a hundred.

In some ways, a single strand of Yang Qi’s sword energy was more than some people could accumulate in a lifetime of cultivation.

Yang Zhan now seemed like a deadly, unsheathed sword! At the same time, his life force quintessence was being bolstered by the energy formation of the dao of monarchs.

Before long, his energy reserves reached their limit, and then blew past them.

Sword energy shot upward, breaking through the ceiling.

However, Yang Qi reacted quickly, splaying his fingers as he summoned an energy field that restrained the sword energy and forced it back into Yang Zhan.

Yang Zhan’s life force substructure was transforming dramatically, and the flow of vital energy streaming into him caused everyone in the hall to stagger in place.

Yang Qi sucked the spell formation back into his thumb-ring, revealing Yang Zhan standing there, eyes closed.

“Congratulations on reaching the Lifeseizing level, Father,” Yang Qi said. “The Yang Clan is now assured of standing strong for a thousand years.”

‘I almost can't believe I'm a Lifeseizer!’ Yang Zhan looked down at his hands, which glowed with bright light. ‘Such power! I'm so far removed from before that it defies description! No wonder a Master of Energy could never beat a Lifeseizer in a fight. One is like a tiny mouse, the other is like a mighty eagle.’

All members of the clan were shocked, and immediately broke out into discussion.

“He really reached Lifeseizing!?”

“That aura is incredible.”

“The clan lord broke through? And it was Yang Qi who helped him? How strong does that make Yang Qi…?”

As for Dowager Yan and Yang Xingshi, they looked on with barely-concealed envy. They too wished to reach the Lifeseizing level, and yet, were stuck at the peak of the Master of Energy level. Although they both had decades of longevity left, which meant that they could live far longer than ordinary people, the more time that crept by, the less likely it was that they would break through.

But now, they had hope.

Without any hesitation, they rose to their feet and walked over to Yang Qi.

He watched them, his gaze sharp and powerful.

Plop!

They dropped to their knees in front of him.

“Young Lord Qi,” Yang Xingshi said, “we two chief elders have treated you poorly. Not even death could make up for our crimes, but still, we hope that you’ll let bygones be bygones. Sir, would you possibly be inclined to allow us to cultivate using this energy formation of the dao of monarchs? We will swear to follow the clan lord with complete loyalty, and completely abandon any duplicitous thoughts.”

Yang Qi looked them over. “I came back to set up this energy formation here in the clan, to extract subterranean spirit energy for use in cultivation. Hopefully, it can become the core of our clan’s cultivation. In fact, anyone who performs meritorious service can use it. Rise, you two. As long as you cooperate with my father, and perform heroic contributions, then you will be rewarded.”

Yang Qi knew that these two most powerful of the chief elders had always harbored misgivings. Generally speaking, it would be more beneficial to allow the young prodigies in the clan to use the formation to become Masters of Energy.

After all, not even members of the Outer or Inner Campus back at the institute had access to formations like this.

And if Yang Xingshi and Dowager Yan broke through to the Lifeseizing level, it could theoretically be opening a can of worms. However, as long as they were truly loyal, then it was worth considering.

Chapter 124: Official Banquet

The sun shone bright in the sky, and Yanhaven buzzed with activity.

Local officials went up and down the streets, knocking on doors to deliver colorful lanterns, beautiful decorations, and fireworks to the common people. All households received gifts of medicinal pills.

Many visitors to the city still didn’t know what was going on.

In one particular restaurant was a group of people who were clearly wandering heroes of the martial world, feasting to their hearts’ content. When they noticed all the activity in the city, one of them said, “Hey shopkeep. What's going on here in Yanhaven? It’s not New Year or any other festival. What’s the buzz all about?”

“Ah, you must not have heard.” the shopkeeper replied. “The Yang Clan’s Third Young Master has returned from the Demi-Immortal Institute. He’s a god-like Lifeseizer, an elite student who has received rewards from the Sage Ancestor Dynasty! It’s only natural that the Yang Clan would want the whole city decorated with lanterns and colored banners. In fact, there’s going to be a banquet this evening for all of the big clans— er, no, for all the government officials.”

It was still a big change to have the clans be called government officials, and the shopkeeper had to correct his wording in mid-sentence.

One of the wandering jianghu heroes, a man with a thick beard, looked at the shopkeeper with flashing eyes and said, “With a Third Young Master like that, the Yang Clan is obviously a top-level power!”

This hero’s energy arts were profound; although he carried no weapon, he had thick, gnarled fingers, and a barbaric air that made it obvious he could rip wild beasts to pieces.

“That’s exactly right,” another of the wandering heroes said, a burly, middle-aged man. “Out here in the countryside, Lifeseizers are gods. But things are different back home. That said, elite students from the Demi-Immortal Institute are not to be looked down upon. Our House of Spring and Autumn can't even compare to them.”

This man carried no weapon either, only a scroll tucked into his belt, making him look something like a scholar. The laws of Yanhaven were very strict; anyone who wanted to carry a weapon had to register their name with the authorities to be able to enter the city.

Such rules had many of the heroes of the jianghu a bit frustrated.

Most jianghu wanderers were in the fourth phase of the Energy Arts level, or perhaps the fifth, and did odd jobs for a living. Obviously, people like that couldn’t defy the Yang Clan’s armed forces. After all, the army was populated by top masters.

“Calm down,” said another of the jianghu wanderers, a young man. “We’re not here to fight Yang Qi, just get information. Those disciples who went missing were last seen in Yanhaven, and it seems likely they fell victim to the Yang Clan. Now that Yang Qi has returned, it’s the perfect opportunity for Lord Lie to come and question him personally. It would be courting death for the measly Yang Clan to hurt someone from the House of Spring and Autumn. And as for the Demi-Immortal Institute, well, you know the old saying: distant water won't put out a fire close at hand.”

The people in this group were disciples from the House of Spring and Autumn. They were actually all Masters of Energy who had simply disguised themselves as jianghu wanderers.

Rising to his feet, one of the group said, “Very well. Send a message to notify Lord Lie that the Yang Clan is having a formal banquet tonight, and that Yang Qi will be in attendance.”

Moments later, a sparrowhawk shot up into the air and flew off into the distance, a tiny message attached to its right leg.

Meanwhile, some distance away from the city was a forested region that was as still as death. Countless birds and animals could be seen littering the ground, their bodies pitch black from whatever poison it was that had killed them.

Deep within that forest was an area of swirling mist in which even the plants and vegetation were dead.

Not even the vipers could handle the poison, and had burrowed deep into the ground to escape it. Unfortunately, not even that could save them. The poisonous mist seeped into the earth, killing everything, and transforming the area into a rotten swamp.

Unexpectedly, there were people within that misty area.

They were expert fighters who wore black clothing, and who were clearly unafraid of the deadly energy around them. In fact, they were the source of it.

“Did you hear that?” one of the men said. “Yang Qi is back from the Demi-Immortal Institute. Now is the perfect opportunity to make a move. The only reason we didn’t dare to do anything to the Yang Clan was that he was holed up in the Demi-Immortal Institute. If we wiped out his clan when he was away, he would never let the matter drop until he got revenge.”

“Our House of Shadowblight lost too many men here in Yanhaven,” another of the men said, “killed by the Yang Clan. A puny city magistrate dared to contend with us? What a joke. Let’s wipe them out completely. If we don't, the dignity of our house will be forever stained.”

“But as a student of the Demi-Immortal Institute, if we kill Yang Qi, won’t there be repercussions? What do we do about that?”

“Hmph! It's not like the Demi-Immortal Institute holds sway over the entire continent, right? Our House of Shadowblight originally comes from the Western Continent. The Demi-Immortal Institute only holds sway in the Rich-Lush Continent. Besides, we’re like shadows. We strike in the dark, and then vanish without a trace. Even if they wanted to retaliate, they wouldn't know where to find us.”

“In that case, let’s just wipe out the entire Yang Clan.”

“That's not a bad idea. Although, our orders were to kill Yang Qi in front of all the other clans of Yanhaven. If we strike fear into their hearts, and show them that we don’t even care about students from the Demi-Immortal Institute, then they’ll definitely acknowledge allegiance to us. We want to control Yanhaven, not leave it an empty shell.”

“Our leader has really thought things through. Well, doing everything in one shot will be sure to stamp out the source of trouble. Alright, I’ll send a message to the leader informing him of the situation. Tonight, the Yang Clan gets exterminated. It’s a night of rejoicing for them, but as the saying goes, great joy begets sorrow! Soon, the game will begin.”

Plots were afoot now that Yang Qi had returned home.

In the numerous clans that had been forced to serve as vassals, a variety of attitudes could be found. However, not a single clan could refuse to attend the banquet.

Hours ticked by as evening approached. Soon, lanterns were being lit city-wide, and fireworks were going off.

All the commoners in the city felt prosperous and content.

Meanwhile, a stream of carts and carriages were making their way to the royal palace, the various powerful and noble clans coming to attend the banquet, and see this ‘god’ of the Yang Clan, Yang Qi.

Many of the energy artists present had never even seen a Lifeseizer before.

The main square of the palace was jammed with tables, all of them laden with food and wine. Music filled the air, and dances were being performed. Yang Zhan looked out at all of his government officials, and sighed in satisfaction.

It was still fresh in the minds of everyone present how the Yang Clan had recently been in a very difficult predicament.

But now, they were a force to be reckoned with. Although they still didn't count for much when compared to the Rich-Lush Continent as a whole, they did rule over hundreds and hundreds of kilometers of land. And likely, that arrangement would continue for generations to come.

Yang Qi sat next to Yang Zhan as the various clans came to offer greetings. A deep and sophisticated expression could be seen on his face; he was nothing like the ‘clan-wrecker’ he had been in the past.

In barely a year, the clan-wrecker had become a god.

‘So this is Yang Qi. His aura is incredible! So profound. It’s like his every move and action corresponds to the heavenly dao.’ Even the chief elders of the various clans were shocked.

When everyone was present and seated, Yang Zhan stood and addressed the crowd in a booming voice. “Ladies and gentleman, my son is back from the Demi-Immortal Institute, and in the hopes that all of you can share in my joy and satisfaction, I'm throwing this banquet. Please, eat and drink to your heart’s content.”

“Congratulations, Your Majesty!” the ministers all responded in unison.

By now, the chief elders of the Yang Clan truly felt respect and reverence for Yang Qi. As for all the younger clan members, they were even more passionate in their support for him.

However, it was right in this moment of jubilant exultation that an ear-piercing string of laughter swept through the royal palace.

Shocked, everyone looked around to see what was happening.

Whoosh. Whoosh. Whoosh…!

Suddenly, several shadowy figures descended from above, almost like meteorites. When they slammed into the ground in the middle of the banquet, an energy field shot out, destroying numerous banquet tables, and forcing countless guests to leap backward to safety.

The entire banquet was immediately thrown into chaos.

“An ambush!” one of the Yang Clan guards shouted, rushing forward.

“You bunch of chickens and dogs. How dare a country bumpkin declare himself king here! You throwing an imitation royal banquet is like a bunch of monkeys dressing up as people. Completely unacceptable.”

There were seven people present, led by a man in golden clothing that looked almost like raging flames. From the disdainful look in his eyes, he was like a mighty imperial minister come to the countryside, where he encountered a bunch of peasants.

“Stay your hand,” Yang Qi barked. Immediately, the Yang Clan guards stopped moving. With that, he rose to his feet and stepped forward.

Smiling coldly, he said, “Who are you people? This is a day of celebration for the Yang Clan. What gives you the right to come uninvited and ruin the festivities?”

“You’re Yang Qi?” the young man said imperiously. “Newly promoted elite student from the Demi-Immortal Institute? Even if you are, I don't care. I'm Lord Lie from the House of Spring and Autumn. I've come to Yanhaven to investigate the disappearance of some fellow disciples. They were last seen here, and after some investigation, I've come to the conclusion that the Yang Clan was involved. It’s on the authority of the elders of the House of Spring and Autumn that I have come today to condemn the Yang Clan for their misdeeds, and arrest the perpetrators. Thankfully, you’re here today, so please, come with me.”

Chapter 125: Spring and Autumn; Shadowblight

These people were from the House of Spring and Autumn.

Yang Qi clearly remembered that day back when he had wiped out the Chen Clan, and some disciples from the House of Spring and Autumn showed up and arrogantly demanded that he hand over the Chiliocosm Mirror. They had even gone so far as to talk of the Yang Clan becoming their servants.

In his rage, he had killed some of them, and crippled the others.

As for the crippled ones, they had been kept prisoner in the Yang Clan ever since.

It had been a well-kept secret, and yet, here the House of Spring and Autumn was, come to get answers.

Apparently, they wanted to take both Yang Zhan and Yang Qi into custody, and take them back to the House of Spring and Autumn for questioning. Of course, Yang Qi would never agree to something like that. The House of Spring and Autumn was a powerful organization, but now that he had the backing of the Demi-Immortal Institute, he wasn’t afraid of them. The Demi-Immortal Institute was the most holy of locations in the continent, and had been for tens of thousands of years.

Looking at Lord Lie in his golden clothing, he smiled coldly and said. “House of Spring and Autumn? What's so special about you people? I'm from the Demi-Immortal Institute. Does your House of Spring and Autumn really have the gall to cause trouble for us? You really think I’m going to go with you for questioning? Who do you think you are?”

“What gall!” one of the other disciples shouted. “How dare you talk to Lord Lie like that! Do you know who he is!?”

“It doesn’t matter who you are,” Yang Qi said coldly. “If you come as a friend, then you’re welcome to sit and have a drink with me. Don't accuse me of being impolite; after all, you’re the ones who showed up and started causing trouble. As far as I'm concerned, the House of Spring and Autumn doesn’t count for anything. You don’t really think of yourselves as the Spring and Autumn Institute, do you?”

“Have a death wish?!” Lord Lie growled, taking a step forward, his killing intent surging.

However, before he could do anything else, a whistling sound filled the air, as though a group of people were approaching. Considering that, Lord Lie stopped in his tracks.

As he did, several shadowy forms dropped out of the sky.

Along with them came a medicinal aroma that, when inhaled, caused the muscles to go slack. It was no medicine, it was toxic energy!

“Hello there, Zhang Lie. Who would have thought that the fame of the House of Spring and Autumn would be insufficient to strike fear into the hearts of these yokels.” A man appeared, wearing black garb and a black headband. He also had green eyes that made him seem something other than human.

“Well, if it isn’t Blightking Skulkdevil from the House of Shadowblight. What, have you also come for the Yang Clan? I heard they killed quite a few of your people recently. This Third Young Master of the Yang Clan is a student at the Demi-Immortal Institute now. Does your House of Shadowblight really dare to make a move against him?” As it turned out, this Lord Lie was surnamed Zhang. And the words he spoke were sharp and biting to say the least.

Green eyes glittering, the House of Shadowblight elder continued, “When the House of Shadowblight takes action, even the dogs and chickens get wiped out. You’re right, I am Blightking Skulkdevil. I've dominated the jianghu for a hundred years, and have killed scores of top experts. As for this little brat, I’ve taken a liking to him, and plan to turn him into a blightpuppet. Care to lend a hand?”

The surrounding banquet guests immediately devolved into a panic.

“I've heard of this guy!” someone cried out. “He’s a Lifeseizer from the west, who’s killed other Lifeseizers with his poison!”

“What? A Lifeseizer blightking?!” The guests began to huddle together in fear.

Yang Qi looked over and noticed that the person who had just called out was a chief elder from the Wang Clan. Obviously, the Wang Clan was in cahoots with the House of Shadowblight.

After all, in remote places like Yanhaven, even the top experts from the richest clans would usually only have heard of local Masters of Energy. It didn’t make sense for them to have heard of Lifeseizers from distant places. Obviously, this chief elder from the Wang Clan was intentionally sowing discord, and hoped to sway the masses to rebel against the Yang Clan.

“You’re exactly right,” said Blightking Skulkdevil. “I'm a Lifeseizer, and also an elder from the House of Shadowblight. We’ve come here today to put an end to the Yang Clan. Any who wish to join us will live. Think the matter through carefully. If you help exterminate the Yang Clan, your clan might be picked by the House of Shadowblight to become the true kings of Yanhaven.”

“Slow down, Blightking Skulkdevil,” Zhang Lie said with a broad smile. “I think part of Yanhaven should go to the House of Spring and Autumn.”

“Fine. Let’s wipe out the Yang Clan, then split the city 50/50. What do you say? This puny Yang Clan is of little interest to us. But that Lifeseizer brat, the one who dared to kill people from the House of Shadowblight, well, he deserves a horrific death. It’s hard to believe there are people out there who think they can bully the House of Shadowblight.”

By this point, Yang Zhan had had enough. Summoning a powerful energy field, he stepped forward and said, “You people are pushing things way too far. Our Yang Clan is not the type that can be intimidated so easily.”

When the members of the noble clans sensed Yang Zhan’s aura, they were shocked.

“Yang Zhan reached the Lifeseizing level?”

“When did that happen? He’s so strong! That’s fully a hundred times the power of a Master of Energy, or even more!”

“Yang Qi studied at the Demi-Immortal Institute, so it's no surprise that he's a Lifeseizer. But when did Yang Zhan reach the Lifeseizing level? Don’t tell me the Yang Clan acquired some blessing from the heavens?”

Zhang Lie and Blightking Skulkdevil were similarly astonished. However, a moment later, Blightking Skulkdevil laughed and said, “Excellent! Two Lifeseizers! It seems heaven is truly on my side. Soon I’ll have two blightpuppets!”

“Worldwide Blightstorm!” Black true energy surged out behind him to create an enormous, blade-wielding devil-ghost. “Sadly for the two of you, I'm stronger than both of you put together. You see, I've long since reached Secondary Lifeseizing! As Primary Lifeseizers, you’re far too weak. Prepare to meet your death, Yang Zhan!”

As the terrifying devil-ghost lunged forward, the entire square seemed to grow darker.

Yang Zhan looked on ashen-faced; never could he have guessed that Blightking Skulkdevil would be this strong. Clearly, he would have to go all out to try to deal with him. However, before he could do anything, Yang Qi took action.

He chopped his hand through the air, sending a scintillating, sun-like beam of sword light straight toward the devil-ghost. The burning flames of that true energy instantly vanquished the toxic energy.

Then, Yang Qi took a casual step forward, placing him directly in front of Blightking Skulkdevil, where he waved his hand out in front of him. To everyone watching, it seemed like the most nonchalant of movements. However, to Blightking Skulkdevil, it seemed faster than lightning.

Face draining of blood, and hair standing on end, he shoved out his own palm and shouted, “Blightstorm Energy Art!”

Instantly, an enormous, pitch-black palm shot out in front of him.

When the two palm strikes collided, Blightking Skulkdevil shuddered, and blood began to ooze out of his eyes, ears, nose, and mouth. Then, he heard Yang Qi speaking into his ear. “You might be a Secondary Lifeseizer, but sadly for you, I'm a Tertiary Lifeseizer. Therefore, you’ll be the one to die today.”

The sword energy of the Cosmic Sunflare Sword pierced Blightking Skulkdevil full of holes, then continued on, stabbing into the other experts from the House of Shadowblight, causing them to burst into flames. Instantly the entire hall filled with bloodcurdling screams.

Obviously, there was no way Yang Qi could allow such people to live. Even their corpses would be laced with countless toxins; burning them into ash was the only safe option.

As for the onlookers, their faces were as pale as death.

“What? He killed Blightking Skulkdevil, a Secondary Lifeseizer, with only one move?”

Zhang Lie was just as astonished, but it was without hesitation that he said, “Come on men, let’s go.”

Then he flew up into the air. He was a shrewd individual, and knew that of the thirty-six stratagems of war, retreat was often the best option.

“You’ve come all this way, I’d be remiss to not entertain you. Why leave now?” Yang Qi waved his hand, causing an enormous vortex to appear that immediately sucked in all of the true energy in the area. As a result, all of the House of Spring and Autumn disciples who had just leaped into the air to fly away, were dragged back down to the ground.

Then, Yang Qi walked up to Zhang Lie, reached out, and sealed his meridians, making it impossible for him to access his own true energy. As soon as his energy touched the other disciples from the House of Spring and Autumn, they immediately passed out.

As easy as blowing some dust off his shoulder, he captured everyone.

“So, what were you saying just now, Zhang Lie?” Yang Qi said. “Something about the puny House of Spring and Autumn wanting to take on the Demi-Immortal Institute? How about this. Instead of killing you today, I’ll just take you prisoner. Then, you can arrange for an elder from the House of Spring and Autumn to come in half a month and pay a ransom to set you free.”

The truth was that Yang Qi had no desire at all to kill Zhang Lie. After all, a grudge with the House of Spring and Autumn wouldn’t be very easy to resolve, and although they weren’t on the level as the four institutes, they were still a powerful force in the lands.

Killing Zhang Lie would make him a mortal enemy of the House of Spring and Autumn, and would be a source of never-ending problems for the Yang Clan. Simply imprisoning him and asking an elder to come discuss the matter was a much better option. Besides, Yang Qi was currently capable of handling even Quaternary Lifeseizers, so an elder from the House of Spring and Autumn shouldn’t pose any real problem for him.

And although the House of Spring and Autumn might have a Legendary on hand, they wouldn't send such a person to handle a minor task like this.

Legendaries did not take part in the mundane aspects of society. From what Yang Qi knew, for them to send a conclave student would be rather exaggerated.

With enough of a show of strength, and with the name of the Demi-Immortal Institute on his side, Yang Qi was confident in being able to resolve the situation.

On the other hand, the House of Shadowblight was a different matter. They were like wretch-devils with no sense of justice. Whoever they sent against him, he would simply kill them.

And thus, after only a few breaths of time passed, a catastrophe was completely averted.

As for all of the banquet attendees, they were totally bowled over. The House of Spring and Autumn and the House of Shadowblight had each sent a Lifeseizer to exterminate the Yang Clan. But Yang Qi handled them with ease, killing one and capturing the other.

The clans had witnessed a truly domineering display, and as of this moment, they suddenly felt like they were looking at a Great Sage from the distant past.

At this point, the livid Yang Zhan raised his voice and said, “Guards, heed my command! Arrest everyone from the Wang Clan!”

It was plain as day that the Wang Clan had been colluding with the House of Shadowblight. And the time had come to clean house.

Chapter 126: Entering the Blackcorpse Mountains

It was a sleepless night for Yanhaven.

A major purge played out as countless armored soldiers and energy arts masters descended ruthlessly on the Wang Clan, apprehending everyone in their headquarters, and then pillaging it. Screams and howls echoed through the city as the other rich, aristocratic clans waited, trembling, for the night to pass.

Never for all eternity would they be able to forget the sight of Yang Qi slaying the mighty Blightking Skulkdevil, a top expert from the House of Shadowblight, who ended up as nothing more than ash drifting in the wind.

As for the experts from the House of Spring and Autumn, they had been captured and imprisoned.

In the past, they had feared the name of the Demi-Immortal Institute, but not necessarily Yang Qi himself. Now they were terrified by him, a feeling which was already turning into veneration.

Yang Zhan had just declared himself king, and was not in a very stable position. Although many of the aristocratic clans had agreed to act as ministers in his government, the truth was that many of them were up to mischief, and were wrangling over financial and military matters.

But now, all of them understood how truly powerful Yang Qi had become, and they knew that struggling against the Yang Clan was futile.

In a study in the royal palace, Yang Zhan nodded as he listened to a report regarding the wealth which had been confiscated from the Wang Clan. He couldn’t have been in a better mood. Not only had a major catastrophe been averted, but he was now a Lifeseizer, and had taken a major step to consolidating his royal power in Yanhaven. From now on, the Yang Clan would be as famous and glorious as the sun in the noon sky. Even some of the most powerful organizations in the land would hesitate before thinking of invading their territory.

If they played their cards right, it wouldn’t be impossible to establish a thousand-year legacy.

“Father,” Yang Qi said, “I'm going to head into the Blackcorpse Mountains for some more training. You help eldest brother and second brother with their cultivation. Once I find the right spirit medicine, I’ll help them to reach the Lifeseizing level as well. One of these days, I’ll be strong enough to go to the Hanging Mountain to look for mother.”

“Very well, Qi’er. It’s still hard to believe that you’ve become so strong. However, the Demi-Immortal Institute is full of hidden dragons and crouching tigers. You’d do best to keep the true level of your power a secret.”

“I’ll keep that in mind, Father. By the way, I’ve finished setting up the energy formation of the dao of monarchs in a secret chamber beneath the palace. Considering that eldest brother and second brother already have the Four Seasons Swordplay deeply rooted within them, all they need to do is work on their cultivation in that formation, and they’ll definitely advance by leaps and bounds. Also, I suggest you promote some of the younger, loyal clan members, and give the chief elders less attention. It's easier to foster devotion amongst the younger generation. You know the old saying, right? Whoever provides milk is your mother. The loyalties of the elders are definitely just a matter of convenience for them.”

“Don’t worry, Third Brother,” Yang Yunchong said. “We’ll handle all of the clan affairs properly. The chief elders have long since become useless. We’ll definitely focus our efforts on the energetic young ones. As for the older ones, as long as they don’t betray us, we’ll let them live out their days in peace.”

“Good,” Yang Qi replied, his eyes glittering. “Once I've fully established a power base in the Demi-Immortal Institute, I’ll arrange for your children to go there to study.”

By this point, both of his brothers were married and had children.

Now, he was the only one who was single.

Considering that he was nineteen, tradition dictated that he should be married already. But Yang Zhan knew that his son had a long road ahead of him, and plenty of longevity to work with. Therefore, such matters could wait until later.

“Be careful in the Blackcorpse Mountains, Qi’er.”

“Don’t worry.” With that, Yang Qi rose to his feet, simultaneously summoning a manifestation of Humanoid True Energy. It looked exactly like him in every way, so lifelike that it even had body heat.

Yang Qi’s true energy had reached such a high level that his Humanoid True Energy was almost like an out-of-body incarnation, a second nascent divinity.

“I’ll leave behind this Humanoid True Energy to wait for the elder from the House of Spring and Autumn. Hopefully we can resolve the issues with them once and for all. Once that elder arrives, I’ll hurry back from the Blackcorpse Mountains. It should only take a few breaths worth of time.”

Of course, considering that Yang Zhan himself was now a Lifeseizer, the reputation of the Yang Clan itself would be enough to resolve many sticky situations.

Having made all of the necessary arrangements, Yang Qi flew up into the air and vanished.

Yang Zhan watched his mysterious, powerful son leaving, and then sighed. “Greensura, can you see all of this? Your son only continues to grow more and more powerful. Soon, he’ll be the rival of Great Sages. He’ll definitely come to look for you in the Hanging Mountain one day.”

**

Yundale-by-the-Sea was located on the bluffs overlooking the ocean. It was a flourishing city that had already come to be called the State of Yun. Troops patrolled the streets, and a steady flow of merchants came and went among the countless docks.

This city was many, many times larger than Yanhaven, and the ruler of it all was Yun Hailan’s father, Yun Zhonglong.

He was currently sitting in a study in his mansion, opposite of a middle-aged man who was none other than Yan Gufeng. After being driven out of Yanhaven, he had shifted his loyalties to Yundale-by-the-Sea, or more properly, the State of Yun.

“I'm very pleased to have you on our side now, Yan Gufeng.” Both of these men were Masters of Energy, and city magistrates as well.

“After being driven out by the Yang Clan, I became little more than a stray dog. I'm very grateful for how you’ve treated me, Supreme Leader.” Although Yan Gufeng kept his expression placid, it was impossible to conceal the raging enmity in his eyes. “My daughter is studying at the True Dragon Institute, and was recently promoted. Furthermore, she’s in the good graces of one of the top experts there. Sooner or later, she’ll get revenge for me. She definitely won’t let the Yang Clan get away with this.”

“Getting revenge will be easier said than done,” Yun Zhonglong said with a faint smile. “I heard that Yang Qi joined the Demi-Immortal Institute, and that he's already reached the Lifeseizing level. That makes him an elite student there. With every day that passes, he seems to be getting more powerful.”

“I heard that too. Your daughter is in the Demi-Immortal Institute as well, and has the backing of a very powerful person. She's also an elite student, correct? From what I understand, it was for the purpose of awakening the blood of the sea god in her that she had Yang Qi steal that Latent Dragon Pill. I think you owe me some help here, Supreme Leader. Yang Qi hates your daughter, and will definitely try to get revenge eventually. Both you and I have grudges with the Yang Clan that can only be ended in death. You understand all of this, right?”

Yun Zhonglong nodded. “Of course I understand.”

At this point, a light tapping could be heard on the door.

“Come in,” Yun Zhonglong said.

One of Yun Zhonglong’s agents entered and kneeled. Voice trembling, he said, “Supreme Leader, I have some bad news. I just received a report about something that happened in Yanhaven yesterday. Yang Qi returned home to visit his family, and both the House of Spring and Autumn and the House of Shadowblight showed up. In the end, Yang Qi completely decimated Blightking Skulkdevil from the House of Shadowblight, a Secondary Lifeseizer. He reduced him to nothing more than ashes….”

“What?” Yun Zhonglong grabbed the report and read every word. After reaching the end, he sagged into his chair, seemingly having aged by an entire decade. “Yang Zhan’s a Lifeseizer now too….”

“This is big news,” Yan Gufeng said. “Supreme Leader, may I read the report as well?”

“Take a look,” Yun Zhonglong replied, handing the report to him.

Yan Gufeng read it, and his face fell. Hands trembling, he said, “Is Yang Qi a god from heaven descended into the mortal world? How could he be this strong? What did he learn at the Demi-Immortal Institute? No. Wait. This doesn’t have anything to do with the institute, does it? It must be that lightning strike! My subordinate Luo Hun crippled his energy arts, and then he was struck by lightning. That’s when everything changed.”

After a long moment passed, Yun Zhonglong took a deep breath and said, “Quick, send a message to my daughter and tell her what’s happened! There’s something very mysterious about this Yang Qi. My daughter surely has connections at the Demi-Immortal Institute that can help.” Looking back at Yan Gufeng, he continued, “The time has come to take a trip out to the sea. We need to talk to one of the Seafolk kings.”

Meanwhile, in the Heaven Lode Mountains, high above the sea of clouds, Yun Hailan had just emerged from the Minorcosm World. The first thing she noticed was an eagle flying toward her; she reached out, and it landed on her arm, allowing her to take the message from its leg.

‘A letter from home?’ The eagle flew away, and she opened the message. ‘Yang Qi went home. How did he get so powerful? He helped his father to reach the Lifeseizing level? How did he do it? Didn’t I tell Song Haishan and the Crown Prince Society to keep an eye on him? Why didn’t they tell me about this?’

Without any hesitation, she flew down from the clouds and left the Heaven Lode Mountains. Back in the main part of the institute, she was greeted by some of the high-ranking members of the Crown Prince Society. Considering that she had the favor of the Crown Prince, and also had Patriarchs Wind and Cloud as her masters, everyone was quick to fawn over her.

“Where are Jiang Fan and Song Haishan?” she asked coldly. “Bring them to me.”

“Elder Brother Jiang Fan went to stir up trouble with Yang Qi. However, it seems Yang Qi knew what was coming, and went into hiding. Later, Jiang Fan sent a message indicating that he and Song Haishan went out on a mission. They haven’t reported back yet.”

The fact that Song Haishan and Gu Fenxian were dead was still a big secret. Jiang Fan and the others were still away from the sect, and were planning to wait until their return before reporting the deaths.

However, Yun Hailan was clever enough to be suspicious about the situation.

“The Crown Prince Society has secret ways to transmit messages, right? Send word to them to return immediately. We have something very important to discuss.”

After she entered her room, the members of the Crown Prince Society exchanged glances and then shook their heads.

“This girl is advancing like crazy. What level is she now, anyway? Do we really need to contact Elder Brother Jiang Fan?”

Chapter 127: Getting Stronger

BAM!

A golden rhinoceros with an enormous, razor-sharp horn charged directly toward Yang Qi.

A moment later, he had a golden demon core in his hand. Golden rhinos were demonlings that consumed metal, ensuring that their bones, blood, and muscle were all metallic in nature.

Their bodies made excellent ingredients for concocting metal-type spirit medicines, and their demon cores were perfect for insetting into spirit weapons.

With the wave of his hand, he sent the golden rhino demon core into his Heart of the Sea thumb-ring.

Currently, he stood at the top of a towering mountain, looking off into the distance, where black clouds swirled, and zombies stalked. He was now very close to the deepest parts of the Blackcorpse Mountains. His main goal in this venture was to see if there really was an alternate dimension in the Blackcorpse Mountains, that fabled Heavencorpse Dimension.

After all, there was a dimensional passageway in the Fiendcorpse Mountains near the Demi-Immortal Institute.

The Blackcorpse Mountains also contained corpse energy from the Heavencorpse Dimension, so it should contain such a passageway.

And he wanted to track down the fabled life force springwater from that dimension.

The only way to make significant progress with his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth was that springwater. Without it, he might as well give up on any thoughts of achieving a breakthrough.

‘It will only be a few more days before Yun Hailan learns about Song Haishan’s death. Too bad I can’t be there to see the expression on her face. Well, her agents in Yanhaven will definitely send word to her about what I did, so she’ll know I’m not in the institute.’ Such thoughts about the Demi-Immortal Institute continued to occupy his mind as he sped through the mountains.

Swish!

Corrosive, hypertoxic corpse energy battered his face, and the screams of zombies reached his ears. Soon, he reached a valley packed with zombies, skeletons, and even some zombified demonlings.

He waved his hand, sending out a burning blast of true energy that transformed all of them into ash and streams of corpse energy.

Every few thousand years, the Blackcorpse Mountains would explode into activity. Corpse energy would abound, and any living beings it touched, whether they be humans or demonlings, would turn into zombies, which would attempt to eat any living beings they encountered.

Therefore, the more that Yang Qi killed, the less potential for disaster the mountains would pose.

Given the level of his true energy, he was virtually invincible, and therefore, any zombies or skeletons that he encountered were instantly destroyed. He was like an emissary from hell.

Meanwhile, in the depths of his sea of energy, in his Hellfire Crucible, a bundle of toxic energy that resembled a devil-ghost was currently howling in rage.

It was none other than the energy Yang Qi had absorbed from Blightking Skulkdevil, which contained the man’s life force quintessence. Yang Qi was currently using his platinum sagefire to break down the toxic energy, and extract the true energy from it.

The Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth abounded with the aura of hell.

What kind of a place was hell? It was a place where all sorts of devil-gods lurked, a place of profound evil. Even the most vicious of devil-gods could seek refuge in the depths of hell, which in itself was like an enormous crucible.

As such, it was only natural that Yang Qi could harbor some heterogeneous true energy.

By using the toxic energy to destroy the corpses and skeletons, he was thus fighting fire with fire, and at the same time, acquiring the purest form of life force quintessence possible.

By now, his energy arts were at the ultimate peak, right on the verge of reaching Quaternary Lifeseizing.

At the same time, he was hoping to find some thousand-year-old corpse king lairs; building up more life force quintessence would only help him get more prepared for his breakthrough.

And the further he got into the Blackcorpse Mountains, the more corpses and skeletons there were.

At the same time, the entities he encountered were getting stronger and stronger. Seventh phase, eighth phase, and ninth phase enemies appeared. There were even some old corpses who had been top experts for hundreds of years before their deaths.

Yang Qi also saw some who had once been famous experts in the Yanhaven area years in the past.

After all, Masters of Energy could live well over a hundred years, and if the corpse energy from the Blackcorpse Mountains reached them in their graves, they would become zombies, dig their way out, and enter the mountains to serve the corpse kings there. It was virtually impossible to say how many times such things had occurred over the years.

As such, it could well be imagined how powerful of a force lurked in the Blackcorpse Mountains.

In fact, there were far more zombies there than in the Fiendcorpse Mountains.

One reason for that was that the Fiendcorpse Mountains were a popular destination for students from the Demi-Immortal Institute to go for training and experience. In contrast, the Blackcorpse Mountains were located in the remote countryside. No one would go there for training, and thus, the forces of evil were free to grow stronger and stronger.

Yang Qi was able to slaughter demons to his heart’s content here, and the demon cores flowed into his Hellfire Crucible almost without cease.

Such demon cores would be instantly melted by the platinum sagefire, and would quickly become pure life force quintessence.

AAOOWWW!

AAAAOOOWWWW!

All of a sudden, a tomb-like mountain trembled, and a massive column of corpse aura shot into the air. In response, the nearby skeletons and corpses all prostrated in allegiance.

A thousand-year-old corpse king had appeared.

Yang Qi had been ridding the world of devils and demons with such eagerness that he had attracted the attention of one of the location’s top experts. This corpse king was actually golden, with golden wings, making it uncertain if he was a human or a devil.

As the golden corpse king appeared, a gale force wind blew out, filled with streaks of gold.

It was metal-type true energy, powerful to the extreme, the type that could pierce through just about anything.

“Divine Yaksha Starmetal Aurora!” he growled. The energy art fluctuations coming off him were gloomy and cold, and constituted a deadly attack. “It's been years since someone dared to cause trouble this deep in the Blackcorpse Mountains. You’ve bitten off more than you can chew, brat.”

“So, a corpse that cultivates the dao of yakshas.” Yaksha energy arts were considered evil, and after cultivating them, they would cause the fleshly body to grow physical wings, transforming the practitioner into an actual flying yaksha.

In the Demi-Immortal Institute, it was a forbidden devil art.

After all, only non-humans could cultivate it.

As the glowing light approached, Yang Qi unleashed an energy field that caused everything to tremble so violently that mountains began to crumble, and the lands began to crack.

As for the fluctuations of the starmetal aurora, they shattered.

“I control hell, and represent all the infernal deities there. Therefore, I call upon the magical laws of hell to strip you of your power!” It was as if the words Yang Qi had spoken came from the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth itself; the vital energy of heaven and earth fluctuated wildly, completely inundating the flying corpse king.

The corpse king was overwhelmed, and could instantly sense that he was about to be wiped out of existence.

As he fell out of the sky, his body collapsing, he shrieked, “Who are you? How can you control the laws of magic? What devil art is that? It contains the power of hell, the bane of all demon-devils. Are you human or a devil?”

Eyes flashing, Yang Qi killed him.

After extracting his demon core, which was enormous, he tossed it into the platinum sagefire to begin melting it.

Platinum sagefire was like a blessing from the legion of gods and could purify all sorts of demonic, devilish, and wretch energies. And it was the exact reason why Yang Qi had been so eager to enter the depths of the Blackcorpse Mountains, and beyond them, the Heavencorpse Dimension.

The Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth was the bane of all types of demon-devils, and thus, it was no surprise it could easily be used to crush them.

After killing the golden corpse king, Yang Qi continued onward unhindered.

RUMMMBLE!

Suddenly, a mountaintop exploded, sending massive boulders flying out in all directions, as well as clouds of dust. Revealed inside was a tomb, the depths of which contained a bronze coffin.

Inside the coffin, eyes opened up, and they shone with astonishment at the fact that the mountain had just been destroyed above it.

It was a level of power that clearly surpassed the Primary Lifeseizing level.

And yet, even as the eyes opened, a hand appeared above the coffin, grabbed the thousand-year-old corpse by the throat, and dragged him out into the open.

This corpse had recently gorged himself on human blood, and was in the middle of a session of cultivation. But now, he found himself in the grip of a young man. Baring his fangs instinctively, he lunged toward Yang Qi's hand to suck his blood out.

However, when his fangs touched Yang Qi’s skin, they shattered, and then his entire body exploded. A moment later, Yang Qi had another demon core, this one, blood-red.

It looked very similar to the blood demon cores from the vampires he had killed some time ago.

This was a vampiric corpse king, extremely powerful, who usually slept in the day and went out at night to hunt. It had long been a major threat to the regions surrounding the Blackcorpse Mountains, but now, Yang Qi had put an end to his reign of terror.

And of course, he had benefited in the process.

The time had come to clean house in the Blackcorpse Mountains, and put an end to as many thousand-year-old corpse kings as possible.

Chapter 128: Devil-Ghost Spirit Body

As Yang Qi slaughtered his way further and further into the mountains, countless zombies and skeletons met their end at his hands.

He broke open innumerable tombs, slaughtering virtual armies of zombies and corpse kings. Normally speaking, the terrifyingly powerful thousand-year-old corpse kings would lurk in the mountains, waiting for the right moment to launch a wave of slaughter on innocent humans.

But this time, Yang Qi was forestalling all of that.

KABAAAMMM!

Another mountaintop exploded as Yang Qi unleashed a torrent of destructive true energy.

He had long since hoped to find a chance to see exactly how destructive he could be, and this was the perfect opportunity. At long last, he was able to push his energy arts to the limit to see what they were capable of.

Back when he had been a Master of Energy, his Invincible King’s Fist had been capable of causing the waters of a lake to rise into the air. But now, he was thousands upon thousands of times stronger than that.

Now, he could easily crush mountain peaks.

He was like an unbeatable god of battle, bringing disaster with him wherever he went. Mountains crumbled. Platinum sagefire burned away every scrap of filth.

He had long since contemplated clearing out these mountains in order to make Yanhaven a safer place, and now, he was actually rooting out the thousand-year-old corpse kings and ending them, one by one.

In one short day, he slaughtered six of them. As for the number of zombies and skeletons he ended, it was literally impossible to count. He was a merciless meat grinder that no demon-devil could possibly stand up to.

He now had over a hundred zombie demon cores of the Master of Energy level in his thumb-ring, and hundreds of eighth phase versions. Those were demon cores that were essentially useless to him at this point, but would act as a mountain of wealth to his clan.

Because of the platinum sagefire that constantly surrounded him, he was like a shining light within the darkness of the mountains around him.

‘Dear lord, six thousand-year-old corpse kings in a single day? All of them Lifeseizers? If something happened to provoke all of them to attack at one time, there’s no way Yanhaven would have survived. Actually, I’m going too slowly. I need to kill more, and faster.’

Speeding up, he sent platinum sagefire out, creating a massive sphere hundreds of meters wide, which then exploded, causing a rain of fire to fall.

It was something that came naturally with the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth; in places where evil energy abounded, the platinum sagefire would erupt to cleanse it.

Most corpse kings spent their time sleeping, and absorbing the baleful, subterranean energy they needed to cultivate their nefarious arts. Only occasionally would they go out to hunt spirit creatures or humans to suck dry of blood. After all, if they killed humans too brazenly, it could attract the attention of the powerful orthodox organizations.

A good example was the vampire brigand force from the Blood Demon Grotto. They had long since been completely and utterly routed.

Yang Qi watched as the rain of platinum sagefire descended, then sighed as he realized that there was no corpse king in this area. However, it was still worth it; as long as there weren’t any corpse kings to lead armies of zombies to attack Yanhaven, his father would be able to handle the situation.

Deeper and deeper he went into the mountains….

As he did, he felt his energy building, pushing him closer and closer to breaking through into Quaternary Lifeseizing.

All of a sudden, a host of voices reached his ears, like a throng of vengeful souls all crying out at the same time.

“Give me my life back… give me my life back…!”

It was accompanied by the most wretched of energies. Even the air itself seemed to turn evil. Looking off into the distance, he could see something like a black haze, which was the source of the howling. Just barely visible within the churning haze were vicious ghost faces.

He was now nearing the ultimate depths of the Blackcorpse Mountains, a place of such profound evil that few people ever came here. Even a Master of Energy who reached this location would find his defensive true energy destroyed, and would become a zombie within minutes.

The wretch energy here was so profound it caused the air to distort.

‘So, I was right about the Blackcorpse Mountains!’ To his delight, the distortions ahead made it clear that there really was a dimensional passageway, leading to the fabled Heavencorpse Dimension. That was where he would be able to find life force springwater.

With that, he drew all of his magical power back inside of him.

Cracking sounds rang out as a platinum suit of holy armor spread out to cover his body, burning with flames that could destroy any wretch energy that came near. It was none other than his Infernal Deity Plate Armor. In the past, it had been dark gold. But each time he seized life, he grew stronger, and his armor changed. Slowly, it was becoming the holy color of platinum to reflect the glory of the legion of gods in heaven.

Deeper and deeper he went into the mountains….

Every step he took required more and more effort as the wretch energy and wild distortions grew stronger. Even other ordinary Lifeseizers would have difficulty resisting the energy, and would have eventually been forced to retreat.

But Yang Qi was different.

Godmammoths drew upon the ultimate powers of the legion of gods to suppress hell. This mere wretch energy was like nothing.

“Be destroyed!” His Infernal Deity Spear stabbed out, driving away the wretch energy as he shot forward.

The weeping of ghosts and the wailing of gods that he heard around him truly made it seem like he was descending into hell.

By now, it was impossible to tell what was east, south, west or north. Directions were meaningless. However, thanks to his true energy, he could sense the source of the wretch energy, and could slowly make his way toward the passage that led out of the Blackcorpse Mountains and into the Heavencorpse Dimension.

He wasn't particularly familiar with alternate dimensions, other than the Minorcosm World that existed above the sea of clouds.

However, as long as the portal that he sought remained open, he was confident in being able to find it.

“Give me my life back!”

Suddenly, a deadly surge of wretch energy headed toward Yang Qi, only to be blocked by a blast of platinum sagefire.

A devil-ghost had appeared just behind him in the wretch energy, a hulking, pitch-black thing with vicious claws. It actually looked like it was made completely of smoke, as opposed to having a corporeal body.

“Devil-ghost spirit body!” Yang Qi realized instantly that this was a type of devil-ghost that had a spirit body as opposed to a physical one. Such beings were difficult to exterminate; after all, ordinary energy arts couldn’t hurt spirit bodies.

Only noble, righteous energy filled with intense heat could do anything against vicious and deadly devil-ghosts like this.

Because of the extremely intense wretch energy in the Blackcorpse Mountains, some beings that died would leave behind souls that would then become contaminated, and transform into devil-ghosts!

As for this particular devil-ghost, it was far beyond the level of the thousand-year-old corpse kings he had fought up to this point. It was even more powerful than Blightking Skulkdevil had been, and was approaching the level of Jiang Fan.

Its sneak attack having failed, it transformed into a black cloud that then took the shape of a huge ghost claw.

“Netherworld Ghostclaw!” it screeched.

Dark green flames surrounded the ghost claw as it shot through the air, creating a vacuum, and emanating sounds like metal scraping against metal.

This was a claw that could drag its victim so far into the netherworld that it would never be reincarnated.

Such was the power of the Netherworld Ghostclaw, a truly sinister and vicious energy art.

In response, Yang Qi spun in place and threw his spear out, sending it speeding forth like an arrow, like a raging god from ancient times, like a burning sun!

Whoosshhhh!

The ghost claw was pierced by the spear, and the devil-ghost screamed in frustration.

“Ghostsoul Possession!” Soul fluctuations erupted from the creature, becoming a sickly green energy flow that somehow bypassed Yang Qi’s armor and entered his body in the blink of an eye. Clearly, this devil-ghost was trying to possess him. Coldness gripped him as the thing’s will tried to take control of the true energy in his meridians, and his mind and soul came under attack.

‘All rivers run to the sea. True energy: return!’ Chuckling coldly, he pulled all of his true energy back into his sea of energy, dragging the devil-ghost with it.

RUMMMBLE!

As soon as the ghost broke into his sea of energy, the Hellfire Crucible appeared, and the ghost was thrown in. Sizzling sounds then rang out, accompanied by bloodcurdling screams.

As a spirit body, the devil-ghost was essentially an expression of life force energy, very similar to heterogeneous true energy.

For most people, having an influx of heterogeneous true energy would lead to cultivation deviation, and likely, a physical explosion of the body itself. And if a devil-ghost entered a person, he or she would eventually become a monster.

Sadly for this devil-ghost, the Hellfire Crucible was the bane of all spirit bodies!

Chapter 129: Devil Horde Defilement

‘What a powerful devil-ghost.’

The devil-ghost had countless ways to try to escape the Hellfire Crucible, but none of them did any good. Slowly but surely, the platinum sagefire ate away at the vengeful spirit, and transformed the wretch energy that made it up into pure life force quintessence, which poured into the next of Yang Qi’s particles.

This devil-ghost’s spirit body was the equivalent of a Quaternary Lifeseizer.

Whatever this thing had been in life, if it had turned into a zombie upon death, it might not have been a big deal, because that would have been little more than a fleshly body.

But instead, it turned into a devil-ghost, which was a different matter. Its soul had not dispersed, which only happened with incredibly mighty beings. It had obviously been very powerful before dying.

Yang Qi exhaled slowly, looking at the rippling wretch energy around him. The devil-ghost had tried to possess him, but he had turned the tables and benefited greatly. In fact, the benefit was no less than from the Nine-Yang Immortal Energy he had absorbed from the Minorcosm World.

‘So, it seems these devil-ghosts look for flesh and blood bodies to possess or parasitize. Maybe I should just open myself up to them, sort of like the old saying invite the wolf into one’s house. Then, once they’re inside, I can trap them in my Hellfire Crucible. I can benefit from these devil-ghosts just like I benefited from the Nine-Yang Immortal Energy. In fact, with enough of them, I could probably reach Quaternary Lifeseizing, or even Quinary! At that point, the only people in the Demi-Immortal Institute who could possibly cause me problems would be the Legendaries.’

With that, he prepared to proceed forward through the twisting wretch energy toward what he knew was the entrance to the Heavencorpse Dimension.

But then, just before moving onward, he stopped. ‘I need to get stronger before I go into this strange aspect of space-time. Otherwise, how could I be confident in being able to defend myself?

With that, he pulled in his true energy and concealed it in his dantian region. He also extinguished his sagefire, leaving behind only a very weak bit of defensive energy. Then, he intentionally stimulated his blood flow, and sent strong pulses of energy out in all directions.

Almost immediately, the wail of multiple ghosts could be heard. It was almost like he had just tossed blood into shark-infested waters, as rippling balls of ghostfire appeared in all directions.

Some of them were fist-sized, and were obviously very weak devil-ghosts.

But one was as large as a mountain, a massive conflagration of flame that was roughly on the same level as Jiao Wufeng in terms of strength.

A devil-ghost that was, at the very least, as powerful as a Quinary Lifeseizer!

“What a lovely fleshly body! What strong blood energy! If I could have that shell for my own use, I could reach a much higher level of cultivation.” All of a sudden, the mountain-like mass of ghostfire began to pulse with soul fluctuations as it took on a devilish appearance. This creature seemed powerful enough to cause the stars to fall from the skies, and force all other ghosts to prostrate in worship.

The devilish image seemed to blot out all other creation as it loomed over Yang Qi.

Crack! Rattle!

As the devilish image closed in, the true energy around Yang Qi shattered, and the thing entered his body.

“Undying Devil Soul!”

Incredible levels of power seized Yang Qi’s fleshly body, and wrested control of his meridians.

It was almost impossible to fathom how powerful this devil-ghost was; it was clearly stronger than Jiao Wufeng. In fact, it seemed to Yang Qi that it had likely seized life six times.

Almost as soon as the devil-ghost entered him, he felt his soul trembling on the verge of being expelled from his body. Even his blood seemed to freeze because of the icy true energy of the devil-ghost.

‘Did I bite off more than I can chew?’ he thought. The danger posed by this devil-ghost was almost beyond comprehension. However, he wouldn’t simply give up and resign himself to eternal damnation.

“I am like an infernal deity! I crush devils beneath my feet, and issue orders to ghosts of all kinds!” As he spoke, his voice thrummed with true energy, and his Hellfire Crucible appeared.

The devil-ghost cackled evilly. “So, brat, this was all a trick. Inviting the wolf in your house in the hopes of subduing me? Sadly for you, your schemes will do no good. I cultivate the Undying Devil Soul! No type of burning true energy can hurt me. What sect are you from? Reaching the Lifeseizing level is no small feat. Sadly, I'm going to take over your body and suppress your soul for all time.”

‘Undying Devil Soul?’ Yang Qi thought, shocked. He had actually heard of this type of energy art back in the Demi-Immortal Institute. It was something commonly cultivated among devil-ghosts with spirit bodies.

In ancient times, there were many things that devil-ghosts feared, such as fire, sunlight, blood energy, wild beasts, and burning true energy. Eventually, a spectacular genius arose among devil-ghosts, a being who came to be called Ghost Emperor Yama. He was the one who eventually created an energy art of the dao of ghosts, the Undying Devil Soul. Any devil-ghost who cultivated it would no longer fear burning fire or golden blood energy.

In fact, even devil-ghosts who had just come to exist, but cultivated that technique, could go out into broad daylight at any time. Eventually, numerous Great Sages of the distant past joined forces to vanquish Ghost Emperor Yama, and his technique was lost in the sands of time.

And yet, here that very technique was, back in the world and being wielded by an enormous devil-ghost.

‘Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, as unmovable as a mountain….’ In that moment, certain skills and abilities he had worked so hard at became incredibly relevant. He had defeated his inner devil, gained enlightenment of the quick strike, and gained supreme confidence. Although this devil-ghost had entered his body with the Undying Devil Soul, he had already reached a state in which he felt neither joy nor sorrow nor fear.

Even as the devil-ghost entered his dantian region, a god appeared, with an elephantine head and a human body. A godmammoth!

Furthermore, it was just barely possible to see that, right behind the godmammoth was a Hell Portal.

“What’s that? A godmammoth?” The devil-ghost simply couldn’t believe what it was seeing.

How could it possibly believe that it would encounter an energy art of the gods inside of this human? Although Ghost Emperor Yama had been a Great Sage, compared to the countless devils which existed in hell, he counted for little.

The Great Sages of the distant past were little more than saints who dominated the world of men. They were like nothing when compared to the inimitable legion of gods that existed on their mysterious plane of existence.

All devil-ghosts feared the godmammoths that were the creation of the legion of gods. Such entities existed in both mythologies and the devil-ghosts’ inherited memories.

“That's right. A godmammoth that can crush hells. The greatest level of strength from the legion of gods in heaven. You cultivate the Undying Devil Soul, a puny technique created by Ghost Emperor Yama? You’re delusional if you think something like that can compare to my godly-class energy art.” Instantly, platinum sagefire sprang up everywhere.

All of a sudden, the huge devil-ghost shrieked, “Devils and ghosts of all types! Come immediately and help me consume this human’s fleshly body!”

Instantly, numerous devil-ghosts in the area began to rush over.

Emerald green ghostfire flickered within the surrounding wretch energy as thousands of wretch-devils attempted to enter Yang Qi’s body.

Yang Qi felt immense pressure weighing down on him, the likes of which he had never felt before.

He really was inviting the wolf into his house.

Years in the past, the fabled Great Sages would often be besieged by hosts of devils and monsters when they achieved their dao.

In this moment, Yang Qi was receiving the same treatment. Although, these were not monsters from beyond the heavens, and Yang Qi was also not at the level of a Great Sage.

It was a battle to the death, and only one side would come out alive.

Countless ghosts poured into him, filling his meridians, racing to his dantian region, occupying his acupoints, invading his five viscera and six bowels, even occupying his brain….

In the blink of an eye, Yang Qi was completely overtaken by devil-ghosts.

There were millions of them, and they made his body like a living hell as they began to use their cultivation techniques to snatch at his energy, blood, and life force. Even a top expert like Holy Daughter Manyflowers would be helpless in a situation like this.

Only a Legendary could possibly do something to fight back.

However, the fact that a horde of ghosts was turning him into hell itself actually conformed quite nicely to the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. The aura of countless devil-ghosts swirled through his meridians, trying to transform his true energy into something completely evil. And that was when something deep within Yang Qi suddenly woke up.

“Trying to defile me with a horde of devils? Well, I’ll just execute them all!”

He threw his head back and roared as pop pop pop pop… one after another, numerous particles within him released their power. Instantly, he was engulfed in platinum sagefire.

Unexpectedly, he was breaking through into Quaternary Lifeseizing!

Some of the smaller devil-ghosts burst into flames and became life force quintessence, which further fueled the power of Yang Qi’s true energy.

In the shortest of moments, Yang Qi’s power exploded in intensity, and a river of platinum sagefire streamed through him, wiping out any devil-ghost it touched.

The horde of ghosts that had just entered his body was now the fuel he needed to become a Quaternary Lifeseizer. He might as well have been sitting comfortably in the Minorcosm World, with Nine-Yang Immortal Energy flowing into him.

“No! I have to get out of here! I can’t be exterminated!”

Screaming and howling, the devil-ghosts tried to flee, but unfortunately, they soon found that Yang Qi’s skin was locked down, sealed, making it impossible for them to escape.

Devil-God Seal!

He was going to absorb each and every one of these devil-ghosts!

The largest of the devil-ghosts, the one with the Undying Devil Soul, was there in his sea of energy, struggling uselessly against the godmammoth. All it took was a single inhalation through that massive trunk, and the devil-ghost was sucked into the Hellfire Crucible.

The lid slammed down with a boom.

Chapter 130: Quaternary Lifeseizing

“No! I can’t be exterminated like this! Undying Devil Soul! Ghost Emperor Yama!”

The devil-ghost was going all out in its attempt to break free from the Hellfire Crucible.

The aura of the Undying Devil Soul erupted out, like the weeping of a ghost-god, fighting against the power of the platinum sagefire.

The fiendish devil-ghost was putting everything on the line.

Unfortunately, Yang Qi didn’t budge. The power of millions of melting devil-ghosts poured into the particles in his body, awakening a sixty-first, sixty-second, and sixty-third….

One ancient megamammoth after another was waking up.

Thanks to the unstoppable platinum sagefire, he was being blessed by the power of millions of ghosts, and the blood of millions of devils.

As he stepped into Quaternary Lifeseizing, the vital energy of heaven and earth stirred, and began to flow into him. The wretch energy was blasted away as expressions of thunder, lightning, earth, water, fire and wind attacked him.

He was too strong, like an enormous mountain, impossible to shake. He almost seemed like a Great Sage descending on the world in the flesh.

“Undying Devil Soul? Be destroyed!”

His hands flashed with magical sealing marks, each one powerful, righteous, and divine. The power that erupted out was like that of an azure dragon floating through the heavens, a white tiger creeping along the ground, a vermilion bird being born in a volcano, or a black turtle lurking in the depths of the ocean.

The wretch energy in the area was swept away in explosive fashion, clearing the area for ten kilometers in every direction.

Slowly but surely, the platinum sagefire began to take the shape of a palace, complete with trees of fire, holy beasts and other divine scenery.

Shockingly, it was also at that moment that Yang Qi suddenly received a message from the golden imp that resided in his forehead. A name suddenly came to exist in his heart.

God Legion Paradise!

It was another special ability of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.

‘So, that’s how it is. After the Infernal Deity Spear, Fiend-Devil Wings, Infernal Deity Plate Armor, Hellfire Crucible, and the Hell Portal, is the God Legion Paradise…. The Hell Portal can break through to alternate dimensions, connecting directly to the planes of hell to summon devil-gods. As for the God Legion Paradise, it is a land of utmost purity, which can never be broken, and will exist for all eternity.’

In order to master the God Legion Paradise, he needed to understand the magic of space-time. If he did, he could transform his true energy into a pure land, a paradise that would exist eternally, and could never be invaded.

Of course, just like the Hell Portal, the God Legion Paradise was something that would develop later in his cultivation of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, not now.

Most likely, he would need to become a Legendary before he could understand the profound secrets of alternate dimensions, and use them in cultivation.

If he could use the Hell Portal and the God Legion Paradise as a Lifeseizer, then he would definitely be able to kill Legendaries. And that would make him a genius among geniuses, even when taking into consideration all the experts who had existed throughout history.

After all, only stories from the ancient past told of Lifeseizers who killed Legendaries. In fact, such stories were essentially mythological, and there was no way to prove whether they were true or false. In any case, such a person had never existed in the Rich-Lush Continent.

As such, it would seem to most people that it was highly unlikely Yang Qi could ever reach such a level. After all, he was human, not a god, nor a god from heaven descended into the mortal world, reincarnated into a human body.

“I refuse to accept this!” the powerful devil-ghost shrieked, making another attempt to break free.

Netherworldly sounds bubbled up from the Hellfire Crucible, which was actually beginning to show signs of cracking.

“You’ll accept it whether you want to or not!” Yang Qi shouted.

As of this moment, his energy arts broke through to an even higher level.

Millions upon millions of devils had been transformed into vital energy for his use, and the largest of the devil-ghosts was now stuck in his Hellfire Crucible. As it screamed, it melted away into pure vital energy, which bolstered Yang Qi’s true energy, making it stronger and stronger.

One particle after another awoke.

Sixty-nine. Seventy. Seventy-one….

Even Yang Qi was shocked at how much he was benefiting. As of this moment, he possessed the power of seventy-one ancient megamammoths, which was enough to drain lakes and reverse the flow of rivers.

‘Quaternary Lifeseizing!’

Rising to his feet, he looked around, and found that all of the wretch energy had retreated, and there was no aura of any sort of devil-ghost. He had cleansed the vital energy of the Blackcorpse Mountains; now, there was no sign of any sort of horde of zombies. Yanhaven was safe.

‘Unfortunately, not even being a Quaternary Lifeseizer will be enough to deal with the Crown Prince. I need to progress more. Become stronger. Maybe when I’m at Septenary Lifeseizing I could defeat a Legendary. I guess the time has come to enter the Heavencorpse Dimension and look for life force springwater. Or maybe I can find some more devil-ghosts.’

Now that he realized how beneficial devil-ghosts were, he actually found them to be somewhat charming, and was hoping he could find some even more powerful versions to lure into a trap.

‘I can sense the twisting and distortion of another dimension up ahead.’

Already, the area was starting to fill up with more wretch energy, and he could sense its source.

Obviously, it was the passageway to the Heavencorpse Dimension.

Now that he was even stronger than before, finding the object of his search was even easier.

A moment later, the wretch energy and distortions suddenly grew much more intense.

WHIZZZ! Dimensional fluctuations suddenly erupted out with biting ferocity. His platinum-colored Infernal Deity Plate Armor sprang up in response; after all, this deadly flow of energy could definitely cut down even powerful Lifeseizers.

Within the depths of the wretch energy flow, Yang Qi could see something like an enormous eye, flickering in and out of existence. It was this eye that was the source of all of the wretch energy in the Blackcorpse Mountains.

‘Deathly Devil-Eye!’ Yang Qi murmured in shock.

Even he was aware that, if someone cultivated devil arts to a certain level, they could create Deathly Devil-Eyes. They were the ultimate expression of the dao of death, and any being they gazed upon would most certainly die. Only fabled monsters in the Great Sage level could possibly create them.

And now, there was a Deathly Devil-Eye right in front of him, belching devil energy, placing him right on the verge of meeting a tragic end.

He didn't dare to do anything rash, so he simply observed it for a bit. That was when he realized that it wasn’t a true devil-eye, but rather, a passageway that resembled an eye.

It had obviously been created to look like a Deathly Devil-Eye, but was really a passageway to an alternate dimension, that being, the Heavencorpse Dimension.

Unfortunately, he wasn’t sure it was safe to actually enter it. After all, he didn’t fully understand alternate dimensions and their entryways and exits. If he went in, it was entirely possible he would never be able to get out. He wasn’t a Legendary yet, and therefore, lacked the requisite understanding of the magical laws of space-time.

After a moment of thought, the platinum sagefire around him rippled and transformed into a humanoid shape that strode forward and entered the passageway.

It was Humanoid True Energy, branded with Thousand Kilometer Soul Locking. If that Humanoid True Energy could enter the dimension and then return safely, then it would indicate that he could do the same.

Besides, he could also assess what was on the other side at the same time.

His Humanoid True Energy vanished into the passageway, then reappeared in a world of endless gloom, filled with devil energy and devilish wills.

WHOOSH!

He directed his Humanoid True Energy to return, which it did instantly. At that point, a serious expression appeared on his face.

The view of that dark and gloomy world was a sharp contrast to the bright and sunny Minorcosm World.

Not only could he not see into the true depths of the place, but he could sense a powerful devilish will standing guard where the passageway opened up.

Clearly, there was some sort of fiend-devil waiting there.

This place seemed even more dangerous than Black Floodwyrm Grotto.

“Alright, fine. I just need to go in with a plan. Let’s see exactly what sort of hidden dragons and crouching tigers are in this place. There’s no way that a mere passageway to another dimension is going to be guarded by a Legendary, right? Even the guards at the Minorcosm World were just giants in the Lifeseizing level.” He sat down for a few minutes to think and plan. It took some time, but he eventually came up with a plan that he was confident in.

With that, he stepped forward and vanished into the so-called Deathly Devil-Eye. He felt a tremor pass through him, and then he felt solid ground beneath his feet.

He was in another world, a place filled with sinister auras and intense wretch energy. He saw vast plains stretching out in all directions, a wasteland filled with boulders, dirt, and swamps. However, instead of dark soil, everything was the color of blood. The water of the swamps was blood itself, and there were bones visible within them.

Occasionally, a bubble would rise to the surface of the blood, which would then pop, letting loose green flames that were none other than ghostfire.

Occasionally, the ghostfire would take the shape of a humanoid face, which would then turn into a full devil-ghost. Shockingly, monsters were being born here left and right.

Chapter 131: Heavencorpse Dimension

‘So, these blood swamps are where monsters are born. This alternate dimension is so mysterious! I definitely can’t go too deep inside. I’ll just stay near the entrance and look for clues about life force springwater. It’s too bad information about this place is strictly controlled back at the institute. You can't even get it with a lot of merit points.’

He looked out at the swamps and the monsters being born from within the popping bubbles. Then he stared out into the misty distance, and wondered what lay within the true depths of this place.

The Heavencorpse Dimension was quite famous as being a place of incredible danger.

The Demi-Immortal Institute had thoroughly investigated it, but its secrets were tied together with the life force springwater itself, and were kept under tight control.

Whoosh. Whoosh. Whoosh…!

Almost as soon as Yang Qi emerged from the dimensional passageway, numerous devil-ghosts in the area apparently could sense his blood, and were drawn to him like moths to the flame.

‘Hell Vortex. Sagefire Crucible!’

Yang Qi didn’t hold back at all, summoning a vortex of true energy that sucked the devil-ghosts up and converted them into life force quintessence. Sadly, these devil-ghosts were so weak that they did him little good in terms of pushing him toward a breakthrough. He needed devil-ghosts in the Lifeseizing level, with spirit bodies. Only they would help him press toward a higher level of enlightenment.

As he began to travel through the blood swamps, he eradicated any devil-ghosts he found, and absorbed them.

Considering he cultivated the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, this Heavencorpse Dimension was better for him than his energy formation of the dao of monarchs or Nine-Yang Immortal Energy.

As for his sea of energy, considering that he was pulling in tens of thousands of devil-ghosts into it, it truly was becoming like hell.

The ever-burning platinum sagefire was really hell for ghosts, causing them to scream and howl as they struggled in vain to escape.

His sagefire even caused the blood of the nearby swamps to congeal and dry up.

After a bit of time wreaking havoc on the lesser enemies, he suddenly heard a cry of rage as an enormous devil-ghost reared its head off in the distance.

It had a spirit body, but not the type made of emerald green flame. Instead, the fire which made it up was as red as blood. In the blink of an eye, the gigantic thing shrank down until it resembled a man with parchment-like skin. Glaring at Yang Qi, he said, “Where are you from, cultivator? You’ve got some real guts to invade the Heavencorpse Dimension and slaughter devil-ghosts. Aren’t you worried about being captured and sacrificed?”

Yang Qi eyed the blood-colored devil-ghost and said, “And you are…?”

“King Bloodcorpse Devil of the Heavencorpse Kingdom,” the creature replied. He looked at Yang Qi closely, then glanced at the so-called Deathly Devil-Eye off in the distance. “I've been bored out of my mind guarding the Deathly Devil-Eye to the Blackcorpse Mountains for the past several hundred years. Who would have thought that someone would come in this way? Usually people come from the Fiendcorpse Mountains, which borders the Demi-Immortal Institute. The monsters over there get more than their fair share of fresh blood and succulent flesh. It seems I've struck it lucky today.”

From the way this King Bloodcorpse Devil looked at him, it seemed he was getting ready for a feast.

Suddenly, he attacked, summoning a long, blood-colored whip that he struck at Yang Qi with. This was a blood demon energy art that Yang Qi had seen before, the Bloodshadow Godwhip.

Blood-type energy arts all came from the imperial-class canon, the Devil Sutra of the Blood Emperor. The experts from the vampire brigands had used the Bloodshadow Godwhip, although their version was not very powerful. In contrast, this King Bloodcorpse Devil was using a version that was very powerful. The blood-colored whip was like a crimson dragon surrounded by a raging sea of blood.

Obviously, this opponent was far more powerful than the devil-ghost from earlier. He was likely as strong as a Septenary Lifeseizer from the Demi-Immortal Institute, one of the powerful conclave students.

It made sense; only an extremely powerful guard would be stationed here to prevent experts from entering the Heavencorpse Dimension.

“Be destroyed!” Yang Qi growled, stabbing out with his flaming spear. At the same time, he used White Corona Pierces the Sun to attack King Bloodcorpse Devil’s head.

However, King Bloodcorpse Devil was no easy foe; he was deceptively agile, and incredibly powerful, making him difficult to hit.

“Blood Drenches the Human World!” he said, shocked at Yang Qi’s performance. After all, he was only a Quaternary Lifeseizer, which was like nothing compared to the Septenary Lifeseizing level.

No matter what blood-type energy art King Bloodcorpse Devil used, it seemed that Yang Qi’s platinum spear could vanquish it with ease.

That spear slaughtered everything that got in its way, cutting down all forms of evil, and easily dispelling King Bloodcorpse Devil’s true energy.

Suddenly, a fiendish beam of blood-colored light shot out from King Bloodcorpse Devil’s forehead, rising into the sky, where it then exploded. The surrounding blood swamps began to boil and rise up, creating a huge blood sphere that surrounded Yang Qi.

“Nine Blood Gods; Boundless Blood Sea!” King Bloodcorpse Devil suddenly split into nine separate versions of himself that sped to nine specific locations throughout the blood sphere. Unleashing various hand signs, they caused the blood sphere to then burst into flames.

It was a massive spell formation that drew upon the power of the blood swamps in the area to trap a person, and also strengthen the one controlling the formation.

Yang Qi could already sense massive pressure weighing down on him.

‘It’s a good thing I took the time to power up before entering. If I had come here as a Tertiary Lifeseizer, this blood formation would have been very, very difficult to deal with.’

The towering blood flames which bore down on him were already pushing his sagefire to the limits. Obviously, he had to be very careful, otherwise he would end up dead and buried in this place.

Of course, what he was doing was actually terrifying to the extreme.

If word got out to the Demi-Immortal Institute, it would cause a massive uproar.

The Heavencorpse Dimension was a restricted area as far as the Demi-Immortal Institute was concerned, and was generally entered only by teams of conclave students.

Not even elite students were allowed to go in. It was simply too dangerous for them. As for conclave students, they were experts in the use of various battle formations, and thus qualified to kill the devils and demons in this place, and take the precious materials of heaven and earth that existed here.

And yet, despite that, here was Yang Qi, an elite student, fighting King Bloodcorpse Devil. It was simply miraculous.

If this King Bloodcorpse Devil somehow escaped into the Rich-Lush Continent, it would be a disaster of monumental proportions. Legendaries would have been dispatched to defeat him.

And yet, Yang Qi was fighting him all on his own.

If the chancellor of the institute learned of the matter, he would definitely launch an investigation. But Yang Qi was still keeping a low profile. He had no desire to become famous, but rather, preferred to do amazing things in secret.

There he hovered in the midst of dazzling blood flames, keeping his power restrained, like a dragon that had slept too long and become a loach. He was waiting. Building up his energy to unleash a devastating attack in the manner of the dao of the quick strike.

Laughing maniacally, King Bloodcorpse Devil said, “Alright, punk. I have to admit that you’re strong. You actually forced me to use my Blood Drenches the Human World. The blood hellfire in that formation will really bring out the flavor in your bones. All I have to do now is wait for you to finish melting.”

With that, King Bloodcorpse Devil pushed the formation even harder, trying to defeat Yang Qi as quickly as possible.

‘Now’s my chance!’

In the blink of an eye, Yang Qi unleashed the energy he had been holding back, causing him to erupt with platinum, holy light.

Sagefire flames danced around him, not elegantly, but with vicious ferocity.

WHIZZZ!

A white stream of light shot toward the blood flames, slicing the nine projections of King Bloodcorpse Devil in half.

“What energy art is that?” he blurted, stunned and terrified. That platinum sagefire seemed to be just on the verge of slashing into his spirit body, causing his soul to pulse with intense pain.

“Blood-Devil Dispellation! Manifold Vital Energy!”

His projections returned together, flickering with blood-colored light as they fought back against the platinum sagefire.

However, there was no way Yang Qi would just let him seize the initiative. Blurring into motion, he appeared suddenly above King Bloodcorpse Devil, where he unleashed the power of seventy-two ancient megamammoths. His true energy formed into the Hellfire Crucible, which dropped down, alive with inescapable sagefire.

“You want to use blood flames to kill me? Unfortunately for you, I'm not afraid of devil arts. The energy art I cultivate is the bane of all wretch-devils. And now, I’ll give you a chance to see what it’s really like. It comes from heaven, and represents the glory of the legion of gods, with sagefire that can purify anything and everything!”

He held nothing back as he waved his hand to summon blazing sagefire, which swept out to cover an area even larger than the blood flame spell formation.

King Bloodcorpse Devil was caught up in the middle of it, and before he could even unleash his next attack, sizzling sounds could be heard as his blood-type energy art was vanquished by the attack. It was almost like a rat facing a cat, with no hope whatsoever of coming out on top.

“How can you possibly be so strong?” King Bloodcorpse Devil shouted in rage. “You’re only a Quaternary Lifeseizer! I'm King Bloodcorpse Devil! I've been famous for hundreds of years! My name alone is enough to cause the Rich-Lush Continent to tremble in fear! Who exactly are you?!”

Chapter 132: Conclave Students

“It doesn’t matter who I am. You just need to know that I'm the bane of your existence. You monsters are all hoping for a chance to plague humanity and commit the most horrific of crimes. So I’m going to cut down as many of you as I can.”

Yang Qi’s fingers interlocked in an incantation sign, at which point his platinum sagefire churned, revealing azure dragons, white tigers, vermilion birds, black turtles, qilins, shimmering palaces, flame trees, silver grass, all of which seemed to thrum with the power of the God Legion Paradise.

Of course, it wasn’t the true pure land of the God Legion Paradise, but rather, a mere expression of it.

However, it made his sagefire more intense, and as it burned King Bloodcorpse Devil, Yang Qi could sense himself benefiting.

His true energy coursed through him like a river, causing the fire to immolate the surrounding wretch energy. Any nearby corpses were transformed into ash, the blood of the swamps turned dry, and the ground began to melt into lava. Everything truly was being purified.

This part of the Heavencorpse Dimension, true kingdom of devil-ghosts, was temporarily becoming a paradise.

A paradise that belonged to Yang Qi.

Trembling with the effort, King Bloodcorpse Devil made yet another attempt to break free.

“The Blood Emperor Cometh! I Rule the Cosmos!” A figure appeared wearing a blood-colored robe, with a blood-red crown on his head. Simultaneously, a raging sea of blood sprang up around him.

Yang Qi could tell that the fighting had come to a climax. King Bloodcorpse Devil was using the ultimate energy arts of the Devil Sutra of the Blood Emperor, summoning a blood emperor from the netherworld for a final explosive attack.

“Blood Detonation! Lightning of Blood!”

Masses of blood formed into a lightning bolt that slammed into the platinum sagefire and the Hellfire Crucible. Simultaneously, the blood emperor waved his hand, causing a blood-colored light to stream out, filled with the curses of ghosts and the wails of gods.

“Sagefire Mirror!” Yang Qi barked, causing a mirror to form in front of him, formed of pure platinum fire. As for the blood-colored light, it slammed into the mirror, and then bounced right back.

It was yet another facet of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.

Now that he was in Quaternary Lifeseizing, Yang Qi was even more familiar with the infinite variations of the technique.

Although the Lightning of Blood shook the platinum sagefire, it couldn’t break through the Hellfire Crucible.

With Yang Qi keeping the crucible closed tight, it didn't matter what King Bloodcorpse Devil did, he was incapable of shaking Yang Qi’s true energy, or his confidence.

The process continued for eight hours, until King Bloodcorpse Devil’s true energy finally began to run out, and he began to weaken visibly. He was now like a fish on the chopping block, just waiting for the end to come.

In a moment like this, Yang Qi had no intention of holding back.

“Hellfire Crucible!” he shouted. “Melt blood to dispel devils! Exterminate all vicious fiends! Establish a pure paradise! With an empty hell, the legion of gods can never be vindicated!”

WHIZZZ!

Power poured into the Hellfire Crucible, and King Bloodcorpse Devil screamed as he slowly melted into a glob of blood and vital energy.

Magical symbols flitted throughout the glob, which seemed to exist between a state of liquid and solid.

‘Wow. That’s going to make some powerful life force quintessence. In fact, I think it might enable me to seize life a fifth time! King Bloodcorpse Devil definitely deserved to be a devil king in the alternate dimension that was the Heavencorpse Dimension.’

There were many danger zones in the Rich-Lush Continent, various alternate dimensions, some small, some large. Many contained vast treasures. There were some that contained no entryways or exits, and could only be discovered by Legendaries. Those that could be traversed to by lower-level energy artists contained permanent entryways which were almost always guarded by powerful monsters and fiends.

The Heavencorpse Dimension was among the latter.

Most experts focused on killing the monsters first before they looked for treasure. After all, spirit bodies were in and of themselves treasures, and could be converted into medicinal pills or magical items.

King Bloodcorpse Devil was as powerful as a Septenary Lifeseizer, and yet, had not been able to hold out against Yang Qi.

After all, Yang Qi cultivated a technique that was a bane to all sorts of evil and wretched energy arts. If Yang Qi had been facing a practitioner of orthodox energy arts, someone in Septenary Lifeseizing, at best he would have been able to fight to the death in bitter fashion, with only a slight hope of coming out on top, or even escaping. But when fighting wretch-devils such as this, he was actually much stronger.

In the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, the ‘hell-crushing’ aspect said it all.

‘Now, into my sea of energy you go.’ Of course, King Bloodcorpse Devil was still struggling, just like the old saying a centipede does not stop wriggling even after being stomped on. Just as Yang Qi was preparing to toss him into the Hellfire Crucible, a bright beam of light shot up from deeper in the Heavencorpse Dimension.

Then, a powerful rumbling like thunder could be heard, followed by a lightning-like streak of light.

It was sword energy!

Sword energy that crackled like thunder!

It was massive, and cut through the sky like a white dragon as it headed directly toward Yang Qi.

‘What’s that? Such intense sword energy! I’ve never encountered anything this strong before.’ Fully aware that he couldn't fight something like this, he shot down, spiraling through the air to slam into the ground and dig deep under the surface.

The earth was a quagmire of bloody swamps, so as soon as he entered it, the powerful wretch energy began to eat away at him.

However, he wasn't afraid. Like a loach, he burrowed downward and then vanished without a trace.

When the massive beam of lightning-like sword energy hit the ground, the blood in the swamps evaporated, and the soil quaked as the wretch energy therein was eradicated.

A massive shock wave rolled out, and by the time the dust settled, the only thing left behind was a huge crater. Although the soil was still blood-red, not a single moving being could be seen in the area.

A single sword attack had decimated the entire region.

It was the type of sword energy that could destroy mountains and divert rivers, like an expression of rage from a heavenly being.

Obviously, it had not originated from some ordinary energy artist, but rather, some transcendent expert.

After the rumble of thunder faded away, a white-garbed individual appeared in the air above the crater. He had long eyebrows that extended all the way to his temples, and a sword in his hand. However, the sword immediately dissolved into energy that he pulled back into his body. His skin was as fair as jade, and he had a silver sigil on his forehead that looked almost like a lightning bolt.

This was a human, not a devil-ghost, and his sword energy had been pure and orthodox, the type designed to conquer the wretched. Even the sound of it would be enough to shake most wretch-devils.

‘Whoever that was, did he burrow into the ground? Was he human, or a devil?’ The man in white looked down at the crater, and then over at the Deathly Devil-Eye passageway. ‘That way leads to the Blackcorpse Mountains, an area packed with devil-ghosts. There’s no way someone came in through that passage. The area surrounding the Blackcorpse Mountains is barren countryside, with no big sects or organizations there. So how did this guy get in here?’

Swooosh!

Even as he muttered these things to himself, another man approached, accompanied by a woman, both of them moving so quickly that they left behind a string of afterimages behind them.

These were clearly people favored by the heavens, consummate experts.

Of course, that was to be expected; only the best of the best would come to the Heavencorpse Dimension.

“Elder Brother Lei,” the young woman said, “your Grand Thunderclap Swordplay has really reached the pinnacle. Even from five hundred kilometers away, you were able to raze this entire area to the ground. Although, why exactly did you unleash it with no warning, and then vanish?”

“I could sense some vital energy fluctuations from this area that indicated a fight was going on.” The man who had unleashed the thunderclap sword energy was Lei Tao. Looking around, he said, “Unfortunately, whoever it was, they escaped, making it impossible to determine if they were depraved or righteous.”

“You're saying there’s someone else here in the Heavencorpse Kingdom?” the other man said. “This place belongs to our Demi-Immortal Institute, and only conclave students can come here to work on their cultivation and slay wretch-devils. That’s a well-known fact, so there’s no way people from another organization would come here, lest they arouse the wrath of our institute. Considering that, I would venture to say that you detected the fluctuations of a fight between monsters. After seeing your sword technique, Elder Brother Lei, there’s no way they’ll show their faces now. And if it was a righteous individual, he wouldn’t have burrowed into the ground. The ground here is a toxic sludge of decaying flesh that only devil-ghosts can tolerate.

“Elder Brother Lei, our mission has taken us from the Fiendcorpse Mountains all the way to here, looking for life force springwater for the Crown Prince. Come on, let’s continue the search. If we don’t hurry, our mission will be a failure, and the Crown Prince won’t be happy.”

“By the way, Elder Brother Lei,” the woman added, “do you have any idea why the Crown Prince was so adamant about us finding some life force springwater? Considering the level of his cultivation base, it's not like he needs it.”

“It must be for that woman,” the man said. “What's her name again? Yun Hailan? Ever since she showed up, the Crown Prince has been showing her a lot of favor, and helping her this way and that. I wonder if the rumors that have been going around are true…. Well, we’ve all been following the Crown Prince for a long time. I doubt he would fall for some random hussy. He’s a god from heaven, and is pursuing the heavenly dao. He exists outside of the law, and will soon break into the Great Sage level. How could he possibly get distracted by a woman?”

At this point, Lei Tao's eyes snapped open. “It's not like we can figure out what the Crown Prince is thinking, so what’s the point in random speculation? There’s definitely a purpose behind all this, something that plays into his master plan. Besides, Yun Hailan is no ordinary woman. In addition to the blood of the sea god that runs in her veins, she also has some of the aura of a dragon. I can attest to that personally. The aura of a dragon god is inside of her, and I felt it calling to me. There’s definitely something special about her, so it's obvious that the Crown Prince is grooming her for a specific reason.”

“The aura of a dragon god?” the woman said. “No wonder the Crown Prince asked Patriarchs Wind and Cloud to take her as an apprentice. I've heard that her energy arts have been advancing by leaps and bounds.”

“Having someone like this suddenly join our ranks puts a lot of pressure on us,” the other man said. “We need to keep working hard on our cultivation and break into the Legendary level as soon as possible.”

With that the group flew off into the distance.

Chapter 133: Grand Thunderclap Swordplay

Once Yang Qi was alone again, he emerged from the blood swamps and flew up into the air, his eyes flashing. ‘So, it really was someone from the Demi-Immortal Institute.’

Just as he had remembered, top experts from the institute would come to the Heavencorpse Dimension to hunt demon-devils and collect demon cores.

Based on how strong those three were, he was fairly certain that they were rarely seen conclave students.

Most conclave students were Quinary Lifeseizers or higher. They were precious assets to the institute, the expert students who were on their way to reaching the Legendary level. The treatment they received vastly surpassed that given to elite students; for instance, they could acquire personal mountain peaks within the Heaven Lode Mountains.

Conclave students essentially had the same standing as institute elders.

They were second only to holy neophytes, the Legendary students who were like sovereign lords in the institute. As for the holy neophytes, the Crown Prince was the most powerful among them.

Originally, Yang Qi’s goals in the Heavencorpse Dimension had been to further his cultivation, and look for life force springwater. He had not intended to travel very deeply inside, lest he end up getting lost. But now that he realized that these three conclave students were members of the Crown Prince Society, he suddenly felt a streak of boldness rising up within him.

It was compounded by the fact that they were apparently here to find life force springwater for Yun Hailan.

‘Ah, Yun Hailan. It turns out you need life force springwater too. Well, I guess I’ll have to make sure your supply is cut off!’ With that, he blurred into motion.

Occasionally he would speed along on foot, and sometimes he would become a streak of red, concealed within the blood swamps. The entire time, he followed the aura of the Grand Thunderclap Swordplay.

Of course, King Bloodcorpse Devil was already in his sea of energy, being slowly eaten away by the Hellfire Crucible.

Yang Qi completely covered his own aura, and instead released a bit of blood-type energy from King Bloodcorpse Devil. By mixing that with some heterogeneous true energy, it became like devil energy, which made it very easy for him to keep hidden. As he proceeded along, he could sense other sources of devil energy, some of them hundreds of meters beneath the surface of the swamp, others, even further down. Although such entities could sense him, they simply let him pass.

Meanwhile, inside of him, the blood-type energy was slowly being converted into life force quintessence, which he stored in his meridians and acupoints.

Clearly, he was starting to build up momentum in the hopes of breaking through to Quinary Lifeseizing.

How much vital energy did a Septenary Lifeseizer like King Bloodcorpse Devil have? Enough that Yang Qi felt one particle after another waking up inside him.

Even as he flew along, he went from seventy-two particles to seventy-three. Seventy-four. Seventy-five. Eighty. Eventually, the process slowed down, leaving him with the power of eighty-one ancient megamammoths.

Taking out King Bloodcorpse Devil had been a big win for him.

After reaching Quinary Lifeseizing, one would experience a transformation on the substructure level. For example, true energy would take hold in one’s acupoints and begin to form objects similar to the demon cores found in demon-devils.

Among those who practiced energy arts, such objects were referred to as internal pellets.

Yang Qi’s godly-class energy art was no different in this regard. As his true energy came to rest in his acupoints, they began to form internal pellets. His internal pellets were quite miraculous; each and every one of them flickered with dazzling, platinum sagefire.

At the moment, it seemed like he was undergoing some sort of baptism.

As for Quinary Lifeseizing, there were even more marvelous aspects to that level. However, at the moment, he wasn’t quite ready to try to break through.

The Energy Arts level had nine phases, the fifth of which was the Energy Eruption phase, in which one could unleash one's true energy outside of the body. As for the Lifeseizing level, it was broken up into the nine lifeseizings, and similarly, the fifth was a watershed. Upon reaching Quinary Lifeseizing, one’s life force would change dramatically, and thus, Quinary Lifeseizers were viewed as the ultimate core of any institute. Such individuals truly understood energy arts on a deep level, and could live for many, many years. Their prospects were virtually limitless.

‘I probably shouldn’t try to break through to Quinary Lifeseizing right here and now. I need to get used to my current level first. Trying to achieve breakthroughs too early can lead to instability. I’ll just wait until I have plenty of life force springwater to use. With that, and a strong foundation, I can have a solid path to lead toward the Legendary Level. Either way, there’s no way I'm going to lose to the Crown Prince or Yun Hailan.’

With that, he made his decision. No matter how difficult it might be, he would screw over these three conclave students from the Crown Prince Society.

And he would do it in a way that none of them realized who was actually responsible.

The deeper one got into the Heavencorpse Dimension, the more powerful the corpse energy, sordid energy, and wretch energy became. In fact, in many places, the air distorted so much that only monsters could possibly fly through it.

Eventually, Yang Qi finally caught sight of the group of two men and one woman. Lei Tao was in the middle of using his Grand Thunderclap Swordplay.

Stretched out in front of them were numerous pitch-black mountains rising up out of plains and swamps of blood. The mountains were so imposing that Yang Qi immediately felt his heart sink, and had to circulate his true energy to suppress his disappointment. Obviously, they were beyond him.

As for the group of three, they were well-prepared; they all pulled out various magical items, causing the air to distort around them for a moment as they began to move. Then, they suddenly vanished without a trace.

Yang Qi proceeded forward a bit, but could soon sense that within those mountains lurked demon-devils that could definitely destroy him. The only reason the other three had been able to enter were those magical items that lent them the power of invisibility.

“I guess the only thing I can do now is wait for them to come out.”

Wrapping himself up with true energy, he sank down into the sordid, stinking, bloody sludge, where he lay in wait, not moving a muscle.

Back when he mastered the dao of the quick strike, he had also learned how to be extremely patient.

By this point, his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth had combined perfectly with the wretch energy around him, making his aura exactly the same as the Heavencorpse Dimension in general.

As of this moment, he was like a combination of a god and a devil.

It was also right then that he suddenly gained a deeper understanding of his technique. As he did, his true energy made cracking sounds as it solidified even more, and the platinum sagefire became slightly more transparent.

As he remained immersed in enlightenment of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, the air rippled at the edges of the mountain range, and three figures appeared. Of course, one of them was the white-garbed Lei Tao, who currently had a rather large bottle gourd slung over his shoulder. From the way he carried it, it was obviously extremely heavy.

Instantly, Yang Qi detected the aura of life force.

‘Life force springwater! They actually got their hands on some. But how? Don’t tell me it's just because of those invisibility treasures they have. Well, I guess it doesn’t matter. I’ll relieve them of it either way.’ The mere sight of that gourd of water caused Yang Qi’s mind to start spinning with ideas.

As the group of three flew out of the mountains, it became evident that Lei Tao was actually running low on true energy, and needed to rest. “That place was so dangerous! The only reason we were able to get out with this bottle gourd is the Space-Piercing Divine Talisman that the Crown Prince painstakingly created for us. Otherwise, we would have awoken the monster sealed in the depths of the mountain.”

“Elder Brother, are the rumors true? Have the Yama Mountains really been hiding Ghost Emperor Yama for tens of thousands of years? His apprentice, Baron Heavencorpse, is the true sovereign lord of the entire Heavencorpse Kingdom.”

“That’s right,” Lei Tao said. “Ghost Emperor Yama is indeed sealed in these mountains. Great Sages of the distant past used life force springwater to suppress him. That water is like poison to zombies and those who cultivate the dao of devils. Supposedly, if they even get a whiff of the odor of the water, they’ll be killed instantly. Alright, let’s build our true energy back up and then leave this place. It won't be as easy to get our hands on life force springwater next time. Ghost Emperor Yama gets closer and closer to waking up with every day that passes. One of these days, he’ll break free, and that will definitely be a big catastrophe.”

“I heard people saying that the Crown Prince actually went into the Yama Mountains and talked with Ghost Emperor Yama,” the female student said. “Supposedly, he carried a message from the chancellor of the Demi-Immortal Institute, requesting the Ghost Emperor Yama remain in place after waking up, lest he be killed for good.”

“It’s impossible to be certain about such things,” Lei Tao said. “Who knows what that old devil is thinking. You can never trust demon-devils; they always go back on their word. Come on, we really need to get out of here.”

Having rested for a bit, Lei Tao was preparing to call upon some of his sword energy, but before he could….

Swish!

Holy, platinum light erupted out, making Lei Tao feel as though some chaotic, primeval beast were lunging toward him with deadly intentions.

In the blink of an eye, he saw a platinum sea threatening to completely overwhelm him, as well as a long, platinum spear stabbing toward him.

However, Lei Tao was no amateur. Considering the danger, he dropped his bottle gourd and threw his hands wide, causing the boom of thunder to ring out as he summoned his Grand Thunderclap sword. “Thunderclap Devastation!”

As his sword energy spread out, it formed the image of an enormous temple behind him.

The sword energy slammed into the spear, and Lei Tao staggered backward, his true energy almost completely drained.

The platinum spear vanished, to be replaced by a figure wearing a suit of platinum armor. It was hard to say whether he was a human or a devil. However, he moved so quickly that he was able to grab the bottle gourd of life force springwater, which vanished before any of them could do anything.

Then, he spun and dove back down into the bloody sludge, disappearing like a loach into the mud.

Chapter 134: Three Birds, One Spear...

“Stop right there!”

Yang Qi had relied on the skills he had mastered when gaining enlightenment of the dao of the quick strike. He struck a massive blow that shoved Lei Tao backward, and forced him to use his Grand Thunderclap Swordplay to defend himself. Then, he took that opportunity to snatch the bottle gourd of life force springwater.

Of course, he immediately threw the bottle into his Heart of the Sea thumb-ring.

After all, the thing was as heavy as a mountain, and could possibly have crushed him to death. Also, the powerful life force aura it emitted would have made it very simple to track him down. And it went without saying that he had no interest in sticking around to have a big fight with Lei Tao. If he had started a fight, and killed them, it could cause a catastrophe for him in the institute. And if he fought them but didn't kill them, it would have been much easier for them to deduce his identity.

After all, it would lead to profound irritation on their part if they didn’t accomplish the mission the Crown Prince had assigned them.

That bottle gourd full of life force springwater could provoke heaven-shaking, earth-toppling transformations in Yang Qi. In fact, he didn’t even need to open it to sense the powerful life force aura inside of it prodding at the particles within him, pushing them toward waking up.

This holy water was like the source of any and all life.

“Have a death wish?!” Lei Tao shouted, seemingly about to explode from frustration and anger at the sight of his life force springwater being stolen right in front of his own nose. Not only was it a big personal loss, it also meant that he couldn't accomplish the Crown Prince’s mission, which would lose him a lot of face in the Crown Prince Society.

This was fury. Uncontrollable rage.

In fact, nothing like this had ever happened to him before.

“Transformation of the Thunderclap. Bring a myriad of lightning bolts to life to slay all opponents!” Sword light erupted out, accompanied by the rumble of thunder. Ten thousand fiery lightning bolts smashed into the bloody sludge, followed by Lei Tao himself. From how much effort he was putting into this, it seemed he would chase Yang Qi to the ends of the earth if he had to.

Almost as soon as Yang Qi burrowed into the sludge, a powerful lightning bolt slammed into the ground behind him, blasting away the nefarious energy and rapidly spreading out to form an impassable barrier.

Bam!

His spear slammed into the sword light, and the resulting shock wave sent bloody sludge spraying high into the air.

Then, Yang Qi burst out into the open.

Lei Tao shot out behind him, sword energy swirling around him, which caused thunderous rumbling sounds to echo out.

Each beam of sword energy that he unleashed was like a thunderbolt that could crush any sort of weapon or armor that got in its path.

At first, Lei Tao just stared at Yang Qi in his platinum armor. At the same time, his two teammates spread out to form a triangular formation around Yang Qi.

“Hey there, friend,” Lei Tao said, glaring at him viciously. “We’re conclave students from the Demi-Immortal Institute. I'm Lei Tao, and these are my fellow students Qu Ling and Qin Hui. People call us Heaven, Earth, and Man, the Three Heroes. As a top expert yourself, you must have heard of us before. And you surely realize what will happen if you steal food from the tiger's mouth. Now, I’ll give you one chance to give that life force springwater back to me. If you do, we can forget that this little incident ever happened.”

From the look in Lei Tao’s eyes, it seemed he was ready to unleash a full-power attack if Yang Qi so much as twitched.

Yang Qi had never heard of any of these people before, and had definitely never heard of “Heaven, Earth, and Man, the Three Heroes”. However, that was because he had only been a member of the institute for a short time. If Li He or his other friends were here, they would be trembling in astonishment.

They were fabled individuals among the students in the institute, and had been through countless adventures to reach their current level.

If they hadn’t, then they wouldn’t have earned their unique moniker.

“Elder Brother Lei, why waste words on this fool?” Qu Ling said. She clearly had the most violent temper of them all. In fact, it looked like she had already decided to launch an attack. “We have him surrounded. Let’s just use our Heaven, Earth, and Man combined attack. Kill him and reduce him to dust. At least then we’ll see why he thinks he qualifies to steal things from us.”

“Jabber all you want,” Yang Qi said, keeping his voice low and gravelly so that they wouldn’t be able to identify him. “I'm not giving it back. You want a fight? Fine, let’s fight. Let’s see if Heaven, Earth, and Man, the so-called Three Heroes are worth leaving alive.”

With that, he brandished his spear, its tip pointing skyward, and the length of the spear flickering with partially-translucent platinum fire.

Considering that these three had cornered him, it seemed that he would have no choice other than to fight.

However, thanks to his recent progress, he wasn’t the least bit afraid.

“A real ingrate, huh,” Lei Tao said. “Fine, don't blame me when you end up dead.” With that he swung his sword out in front of him; as it turned out, he had been using the short dialogue as a way to buy time and build up some energy.

“Lightning Tramples all Creation!” Having built up enough energy, he unleashed a deadly attack. The swipe of his sword caused thunderclouds to fill the sky, and a fiery rain of lightning to descend. It was almost as if he were in control of all of the power of heaven and earth.

Unfortunately for him, Yang Qi was even stronger. As he sprang into motion, a sound like the trumpeting of megamammoths erupted out, and he stabbed forward with his spear. Countless spear projections appeared, accompanied by the energy of hell itself, all of which shot forward to meet the lightning sword strike.

The two weapons collided with a huge boom.

“Wrath of the Lightning God!” Lei Tao shouted, his voice thrumming with such power that it could render lesser beasts unconscious or even dead from the mere vibrations.

This sword stance was even more powerful than the last; lightning swirled around him, gathering atop his head in the form of a strange being with the head of a bird and the body of a human, surrounded by snake-like bolts of lightning. It was a god of lightning who held a drum cradled in one arm that it began to beat.

Boom. Boom. Boom. Boom! Boom!! BOOM!!!

With each bang of the drum, the lightning grew brighter and brighter, until everyone present felt their hearts beating to the same rhythm.

Sword light shot out furiously to surround Yang Qi, moving so quickly that it was completely impossible to dodge.

And yet, Yang Qi had no intention of dodging it. Instead, he would meet it head on with his spear.

As he stabbed out, the trumpeting of megamammoths could be heard, and a whole herd of them appeared behind him, causing the ground to tremble. This was the ultimate level of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth that he was capable of unleashing, the power of eighty-one megamammoths, all combined together.

As for his Infernal Deity Spear, it was now able to project some of the God Legion Paradise, making it seem partially real and partially illusory.

There was now little suspense as to what would happen when the Infernal Deity Spear hit the Grand Thunderclap Sword.

CRASH! An overwhelmingly loud boom echoed out as the sword shattered into pieces, and the god of thunder behind it collapsed.

Lei Tao was clearly in the inferior position when dealing with power levels like this.

The Grand Thunderclap Swordplay was a royal-class energy art, and the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth was godly-class. How could the two even be compared to each other?

Lei Tao staggered backward, his face completely falling. However, as he fell back, Qu Ling and Qin Hui took action. Qu Ling attacked with a deadly Qimen Wheel. As soon as that wheel spun forth, tens of thousands of moons and suns appeared to surround Yang Qi.

“Wind Forest Volcano!”

This was another deadly, top-rate energy art.

As for Qin Hui, he narrowed his eyes and pulled out a razor-sharp pike. “Driftflame Meteor!”

The two of them picked up exactly where Lei Tao had left off. Clearly, they didn't want to give Yang Qi any breathing room, and were dead set on defeating him.

They joined forces in a way that they hoped would wear out the enemy. After all, it didn’t matter if someone was even an Octonary or Nonary Lifeseizer, once they ran out of true energy, they would be in big trouble.

Unfortunately for them, they didn’t understand Yang Qi.

He just looked coldly at the incoming attacks and said, “Perfect.”

He stabbed his spear out again, unwavering and filled with power that far surpassed that of his two opponents.

“Power of Heaven and Earth!” he growled. As he did, it seemed as if all of the power of heaven and earth in the area were sucked into the spear, making it resplendent to the highest degree.

It was as if he were in control of all creation.

True energy rumbled as the power of the lands seemed prepared to overturn anything in its path. It was a level of power that would weigh on the soul, making it seem like Yang Qi was the sovereign lord of all heaven and earth.

This was the power of a godly-class energy art.

What was a god? All-knowing. All-capable. Omnipotent. Eternal. That was a god.

When a god cultivated an energy art, of course it would reflect the spirit of the gods.

When a god said the world should be bathed in light, then all creation would fill with brightness. When a god said that the world should be destroyed, it would descend into ruin. The world was created by gods, as were all the living beings that inhabited it, and thus, it only made sense that godly-class energy arts would be so spectacular.

Although Yang Qi hadn’t truly become like a sovereign lord of all heaven and earth, he was already starting to surpass mortal humans, and become something separate from the world around him.

RUMMMBLE!

His attack immediately formed a resonance with heaven and earth, causing the clouds to spin in the sky as the wheel of blades was defeated. Qu Ling’s face went pale, and she staggered backward a few steps before coughing up a mouthful of blood.

Yang Qi didn't follow through with the attack. Spinning, he faced Qin Hui’s Driftflame Meteor.

Yet again, his spear completely dominated the competition. Qin Hui was a famous conclave student, and yet he was completely vanquished by Yang Qi’s true energy. In fact, his eyes shone with terror. Even in his wildest dreams, he would never have imagined that someone could possibly be this strong, or have true energy like this.

“You three are too weak. Demi-Immortal Institute? Crown Prince Society? I think only your Crown Prince could possibly qualify to fight me. Clearly, you don’t.” Yang Qi’s spear vanished, and then he disappeared.

And his three opponents had no desire to give chase.

Chapter 135: Ghost Emperor Yama

“What do we do?” Lei Tao, Qin Hui, and Qu Ling exchanged awkward glances. Although they wanted to chase after Yang Qi, they weren’t a match for him in terms of true energy.

“He has very powerful true energy, but for some reason, I have the feeling his cultivation level isn’t very high. He must be some sort of freak.” A long moment passed, after which Lei Tao sighed. Eyes flashing, he said, “We lost. But we’ll be able to track this guy down eventually. It seems to me he stole our life force springwater because of the Crown Prince. We need to report the matter as soon as we get back.”

“Qu Ling, did you get a recording of everything that happened?”

“Yes, Elder Brother Lei,” Qu Ling replied. “I got it all. My light refraction mirror captured the entire fight, and everything that was said.” She pulled out a mirror and sent some true energy into it, causing it to project a recording of everything which had just played out.

“Alright. With hard evidence to back us up, the honorable Crown Prince won’t blame us for what happened. It’s not like we lost that springwater on purpose. That guy was a real freak, but I’m sure the Crown Prince can track him down and kill him, for the honor of our Crown Prince Society.”

“Come on, let’s head back. Considering we already used that divine talisman, there’s no way we can go back into the Yama Mountains to get more life force springwater.”

After some more discussion, the disheartened conclave students left.

After they were gone, Yang Qi emerged from his subterranean hiding place. ‘A light refraction mirror?’

He hadn't fled earlier. After all, sometimes the best hiding place was in the most dangerous location. With his aura concealed, the three conclave students hadn’t noticed him at all.

The fact that they had a light refraction mirror was troubling. And it meant that he could never use any of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth in the Demi-Immortal Institute, lest his secrets be revealed.

Unfortunately, not being able to use the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth would make him much weaker.

“Well, there’s nothing that can be done about it! Right now, I need to absorb this life force springwater and use it to reach a higher level. At that point, all of my energy arts will be even easier to use, and also more powerful. I’ll be able to dominate just about every fight even with just the Cosmic Sunflare Sword.” With his Devil-God Seal and its infinite variations, it would be easy to keep his aura sealed so tight that not even a Legendary would be able to see the truth behind it.

His godly-class energy art would definitely be safe.

He turned to look at the Yama Mountains and briefly considered going in, before shaking his head. If he could get his hands on even more life force springwater, then it would only be a matter of years before the Yang Clan was one of the top clans in the Rich-Lush Continent. However, he knew that getting too greedy could lead to catastrophe.

If the fabled Ghost Emperor Yama really was trapped in those mountains, an entity on the same level as an ancient Great Sage, then rashly going in would definitely be courting death.

‘I think it's time to leave. With the life force springwater I already have, I can definitely help eldest brother and second brother to reach the Lifeseizing level. And whatever I have left, I can give to my sworn brothers back in the institute.’

With that, he flew up into the air, and yet, even as he did, he realized that black clouds were filling up the sky, making everything around him so dark that he had no way to figure out which direction the exit was.

‘What happened? What’s going on?’

Circulating his true energy, he sent a pillar of platinum sagefire shooting high into the sky in an attempt to dispel the clouds. Unfortunately, they were as tough as iron, and wouldn't burn. Then, he realized that there were fluctuations rolling through the air around him that seemed to contain the natural might of heaven and earth. Apparently, it was some sort of teleportation magic that was currently preparing to take him to another location.

It was a level of power that, unless he was mistaken, surpassed even what Patriarchs Wind and Cloud were capable of.

Yang Qi was now a Quaternary Lifeseizer, and had studied in the Demi-Immortal Institute for long enough to have a much better understanding of the world. He was no longer the ignorant simpleton he had been in the past. Based on what he was sensing, he knew that it was a power he couldn’t fight against, and therefore, it would be a waste to use his true energy to try to resist it.

Soon, the black clouds were gone, and he found himself standing in an ancient, savage palace hall.

In the middle of the hall was a pond filled with gurgling springwater that emanated a boundless aura of life force. In fact, it was so intense that it filled the entire place with swirling mist.

A single breath of that misty air caused his own life force to flourish, and the particles within him to surge as if in anticipation. The life force quintessence building up in him in this short time seemed to be at almost the same level as that of the lightning mammoth of the past.

It was to Yang Qi’s shock that he realized that this pond in the middle of this savage palace must be the source of life force springwater. Furthermore, didn't that mean that he was in the depths of the Yama Mountains? But how had he come here? Did someone use a powerful divine ability or energy art to bring him?

Not daring to move, he circulated his energy arts and waited patiently to see how things would develop.

Suddenly, a sound echoed out from within the life force springwater pond, like steel scraping against steel, as if some consummate devil-ghost were chained up within.

Heart pounding, Yang Qi thought, ‘Don’t tell me that the infamous Ghost Emperor Yama really is locked up inside the life force springwater.’

Suddenly, the grating sound stopped. Then, the water in the pond exploded upward, revealing a throne, atop which sat a middle-aged man who was dark gold in color.

He held a scepter in his hand, and had an aura that could only be described as raging to the heavens. He seemed so strong that a single breath of his could send Yang Qi flying through the air. In fact, it seemed to Yang Qi like even his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth would be powerless to do anything to this man.

There was no question about it; this person had definitely used some energy art of teleportation to bring Yang Qi into the depths of these mountains.

After a moment of observation, Yang Qi could tell that neither the man nor the throne were real. They were actually projections of true energy.

Forcing himself to calm down, he saluted the man and respectfully said, “Senior, are you Ghost Emperor Yama? Why have you summoned me here to the Yama Mountains? Is there some way that I can be of aid to you?”

Instead of answering the question, the man asked one of his own. "What's your name?"

"Senior, I'm Yang Qi."

“Yang Qi…?” the dark gold man said. A moment passed, and then he nodded. “Yes, I am the same Ghost Emperor Yama who was sealed here tens of thousands of years ago. What you are looking at now is a projection of true energy; my true body is in the depths of the life force spring, shackled with locks forged from Quake-Dawn godsteel. I saw everything that happened just now between you and those three students from the Demi-Immortal Institute. I'm very curious about who you are, so I expended some effort to teleport you here and see what type of energy arts you cultivate.”

“Senior, how could a person as lofty as you be interested in the energy arts I cultivate?” Yang Qi was starting to feel very nervous. He didn’t dare to loosen his Devil-God Seal in the presence of this projection of Ghost Emperor Yama, after all, this man was no member of the senior generation. He was a monster who wouldn’t hesitate for a moment to kill Yang Qi if he felt like it. Perhaps he would even soulsearch him to get his techniques.

“Your aura is weak, but that is because your cultivation level is low. But I can tell that your substructure is mighty. Your technique surpasses royal-class, imperial-class, and even saintly-class.” Suddenly, Ghost Emperor Yama’s voice turned as cold as ice. “Tell me what energy art you practice! Imperial-class arts don’t interest me, and I wouldn’t waste my time bringing you here because of a saintly-class art. This place is the source of all life force springwater. Why not work on your cultivation here. You can stay for as long as you like, and I’ll even lend you a helping hand. You’re only in Quaternary Lifeseizing, but with my help, you could easily reach the Legendary level. All you have to do is tell me what technique you cultivate.”

Suddenly, everything clicked. ‘So, this monster really is interested in my technique.’

Normally speaking, even Legendaries would assume that he cultivated some amazing imperial-class energy art. But this ten-thousand-year-old Ghost Emperor Yama was very discerning, and could tell that his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth was nothing to be taken lightly.

And if Ghost Emperor Yama got his hands on the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, it would spell disaster for the Rich-Lush Continent.

If he led an army of zombies and devil-ghosts into the lands of the living, billions of innocent people would die.

Monsters were monsters, and regardless of anything else, Yang Qi was a student from a righteous sect. His job was to rid the world of devils and demons, not help one of them to invade his home.

Unfortunately, there was no way he could actually fight Ghost Emperor Yama, at least not with strength. He could only use guile.

“If you want my technique, Senior, then I will gladly give it to you. Unfortunately, it's incomplete, and I need to reach a higher level before I can unleash the full version. Senior, it’s my dream to reach the Legendary level and do just that. If you could help me, then I would be eternally grateful.”

He was testing out this Ghost Emperor Yama a bit. If the monster really could help him to reach the Legendary level, then his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth really would be more powerful, and he might be able to get out of this situation.

Worst case scenario, perhaps he could buy some time to come up with a better plan.

After all, this was the most dangerous situation he had ever been in. It was even worse than when he had been crippled. It was so bad that his heart nearly hurt from the pressure he was under.

Chapter 136: The Imp Acts

“Boy, there’s a time for schemes and cleverness,” Ghost Emperor Yama said placidly. “But don’t get greedy. Becoming a Legendary is no simple feat.” His gaze was so piercing that it seemed capable of seeing through to all of Yang Qi’s secrets. “In the grand scheme of energy arts cultivation, the Lifeseizing level isn’t something particularly amazing. However, it is a time to set a solid foundation, which can deeply affect your future path. If you don’t seize enough life from the heavens, and end up with an unstable foundation, no amount of hard work later on will help. Some Nonary Lifeseizers take a thousand years to break into the Legendary level, and others even two thousand. For those who have a weak foundation, the process could even take as long as five thousand years.”

“You're absolutely right, Senior,” Yang Qi said. He actually had no idea what point Ghost Emperor Yama was trying to make, and was simply trying to play along.

“That energy art of yours seems deficient. Presumably it’s connected to some secret legacy of the distant past, so it’s only natural that it would be incomplete in certain areas. How about I help you solve those problems? With my help, you probably can reach the Legendary level even sooner.”

With that, he beckoned for Yang Qi to approach him.

Yang Qi could tell that this Ghost Emperor Yama was a crafty individual. Obviously, he had no intention of providing any so-called help, but rather, was hoping to trick Yang Qi into revealing his technique.

After getting it, he would most likely just kill Yang Qi.

“Most types of cultivation require personal exploration,” Yang Qi said. “Besides, when I acquired this technique, I swore an oath not to spread it. Therefore, I won’t bother you with asking for help, Senior.”

“Come on, boy. You don’t really think that I would try to steal your technique, do you?” It seemed that Ghost Emperor Yama could tell what Yang Qi was thinking. “I dominated all creation tens of thousands of years ago, and have my own ancient and mysterious technique. It’s just that I can see how much potential you have, and realize how much I can help you to grow. What I was doing just now was testing you to see how respectful you are. Sadly for you, you lost a good opportunity. If you had acted deferential, and given me your technique, I would have helped you reach the Legendary level right away. I might have even taken you as an apprentice, and let you join me as I conquer the world. Unfortunately, your lack of sincerity has lost you some good fortune. I was looking for a successor! Understand?”

“Aiya!” Yang Qi said with a gasp. “I really did lose out on some good fortune. Well, since you don't want me as your successor, Senior, I guess I’ll just have to leave empty-handed. You, the great Ghost Emperor Yama, definitely won’t cause any problems for a nobody like me, right? Well, I guess I’ll take my leave now.”

“Take your leave? To where? These are the Yama Mountains. Everything in the area is locked down with the power of yamas. Not even a Legendary could break free, let alone you.”

“Oh. Well, would you mind teleporting me out? I'd be eternally grateful.”

“Think this through, boy. I’m going to give you another chance. Take me as your master, and I’ll help you with your technique. All you have to do is pass three different tests. What do you say?”

Yang Qi shook his head. “No, that’s okay. Really. I'm not destined for such things, and wouldn’t want to disappoint you, Senior. Besides, this technique of mine is missing too much information. Although it looks hard and unyielding, I constantly run the risk of cultivation deviation. If that happened, I would lose my memories, and my soul would disperse. Then I would be left with absolutely nothing.”

There was quite a bit of hidden meaning to Yang Qi’s words. What he was really saying was: Don’t push me too far, Ghost Emperor Yama. I’d rather kill myself than give you my technique. And if my soul and memories disappear, then not even soulsearching me would do any good.

He had hit the nail on the head. Actually, the whole reason Ghost Emperor Yama was talking with Yang Qi instead of just killing him, was that the slightest mistake could result in exactly what Yang Qi had just mentioned.

In response to his words, Ghost Emperor Yama burst out in laughter. After all, he was so old that he had seen just about everything, and actually found Yang Qi to be somewhat amusing. “You’re pretty clever, you little punk. You remind me of another clever brat I met recently, although he's much, much stronger than you. He was able to force his way into the Yama Mountains, and you weren’t.”

“Are you talking about the Crown Prince?” Yang Qi asked.

“Exactly. He’s the new genius from the Demi-Immortal Institute. Well, anyway, what’s your decision? Your technique is obviously profoundly harmful to devil-ghosts like myself. Thankfully for you, I need something like that to dispel the nefarious energy around me, purify my own technique, and thus escape from the confines of this life force springwater. Who knows, maybe I could even absorb all the water. Listen, let’s make a deal. You help me get free, and I’ll give you a huge reward.”

“What if I don’t agree?” Yang Qi said.

“Don’t agree? Well. You can die.” A vicious smile played out on Ghost Emperor Yama’s face. “You’re in the Yama Mountains now. You think you can just waltz your way out of here? The truth is that you're trapped. If you agree to help me, I’ll help you. If you refuse to cooperate, I’ll have to kill you, and wait for the next person to come along.”

‘Devil-ghosts are devil-ghosts,’ Yang Qi reminded himself. ‘You can’t trust them, no matter what.’

“To tell you the truth,” Ghost Emperor Yama continued, “although my true self is bound by Quake-Dawn godsteel, I could still send out enough true energy to kill a Legendary, much less an ant like you. But I can tell you’re smart. You know the old saying, right? Hesitate to shoot the rat for fear of breaking the vases. If I destroyed your soul and memories, then you’re right, not even a soulsearch would help me get your technique. Come. Tell me of your technique. I'm more knowledgeable than anyone else in this continent, so I can tell that it’s not saintly-class. It’s heavenly-class, isn’t it?”

“I don’t know,” Yang Qi replied simply.

At this point, he truly had stopped thinking about matters of his own life or death. This was an infinitely powerful wretch-devil that he was dealing with, a devil emperor in the Great Sage level. If he got his hands on a godly-class energy art, then he would definitely cause a rain of blood and death to soak the Rich-Lush Continent, the likes of which Yang Qi could scarcely imagine.

“Listen, brat, you’re really pushing your luck here. Tens of thousands of years ago, I would never even look at an ant like you. I'm making an exception today by giving you a chance to become my apprentice. And yet you refuse? Do you have a death wish or something? If so, then I can make your wish come true!”

Apparently, Ghost Emperor Yama was starting to get angry.

Considering how powerful he was, it was little wonder. He had asked a tiny nobody for a technique, only to have that nobody refuse him. Of course he would become enraged!

All of a sudden, he lifted his hand off his throne, sending an enormous, dark gold palm flying through the air. “Hand of the Yama!”

WHIZZZ!

The entire savage palace filled with rumbling sounds as the enormous palm stretched out, filling the air around Yang Qi and giving him no room to escape.

Yang Qi was instantly immobilized, unable to even draw on his true energy.

“You think that I would just let you destroy your own memories and soul? Never! I'm Ghost Emperor Yama, and I can make you live a life in which you beg for death only to be refused!”

Yang Qi wasn't even close to being a match for Ghost Emperor Yama; he was simply too far below him.

Perhaps if he was a Legendary, with a deeper understanding of magical law, he might have qualified to fight back. But he wasn’t.

‘Hell-crushing godmammoths can overawe all wretch-devils!’

Under the immense pressure, Yang Qi’s unyielding spirit kicked in. His true energy began to bubble in his dantian region, and then pour out into his body like the rising tide.

Unfortunately, the dark gold Ghost Emperor Yama reached out and placed a finger onto Yang Qi’s forehead. Voice filled with rage, he said, “Heavenly Reincarnation Art! Ten Lives Transmigration! Your name is Yang Qi, right? Well, let’s see what happens if your soul slips into eternal bewilderment. With my Heavenly Reincarnation Art, I can take everything you know from within the cycle of reincarnation, and make you speak it out loud.”

At that moment, Yang Qi felt an evil, powerful, and irresistible force pouring into his forehead.

Ghost Emperor Yama was so strong that he could force Yang Qi’s soul into the cycle of reincarnation, destroying any control he had over himself. It was a boundless devil art that experts even more powerful than Yang Qi couldn't defend against.

In fact, it contained magical laws of both space and time.

As the evil true energy entered Yang Qi’s acupoints, Ghost Emperor Yama spoke in the cruelest of voices. “When you cultivate to the Legendary level, your acupoints will become expressions of space. The acupoint in your forehead is called the ancestral aperture, which contains the ultimate expression of your soul. All I have to do is take control of that, and I’ll know exactly what technique you cultivate!”

It was in this very moment that Yang Qi realized the golden imp which resided in his ancestral aperture had noticed the devil energy.

Then, Ghost Emperor Yama noticed the golden imp. “What?” he blurted. “What do you have hiding in your forehead? What is that thing? A golden imp? Don’t tell me you cultivate some nascent divinity technique? Well, I’ll just dig this thing out!”

The evil energy grew stronger, pouring into Yang Qi’s forehead and wrapping around the golden imp as if to tear it out of him.

But…

As soon as the devil energy touched the golden imp, everything changed! Golden streams of light suddenly poured out of nowhere, shattering the air; it was as though some mighty, mysterious entity were suddenly taking form.

It was impossible to see whether the tiny golden person inside of Yang Qi’s forehead was male or female. However, the imp’s eyes had definitely opened. Godly might erupted out, causing the previously pitch-black Yama Mountains to suddenly shine with golden light, and tremble violently. It was almost as if some wretch-devil had blasphemed a god-spirit, who had then come to inflict divine punishment.

Chapter 137: God Legion Seal

Godly might towered to the heavens! Godly will spread like the deepest sea!

The golden imp in Yang Qi’s forehead that had remained motionless and unmoving for so long suddenly sent its might out into the world, and it was so overwhelming that all of the Yama Mountains were encompassed.

The golden imp was awake, and was like a heavenly god out to punish blaspheming fiend-devils.

“What is that thing?!” Ghost Emperor Yama repeated, shocked by how his true energy was being completely routed. Even his Heavenly Reincarnation Art had been completely vanquished. From what he could tell, this golden imp was completely terrifying in nature, something that didn’t even belong on the earth. It was more like a mysterious god from heaven.

If Yang Qi was as vastly separated from Ghost Emperor Yama as heaven from earth, then the exact same disparity existed between Ghost Emperor Yama and the golden imp. To the imp, Ghost Emperor Yama was like a bug.

He was a vulgar devil-ghost meeting the sovereign lord of all living beings.

At least, that was what Ghost Emperor Yama felt in this moment.

“How could you have something like that in your forehead? Who are you?! Ten Lives Seal!” Face written with terror, Ghost Emperor Yama performed numerous double-handed incantation gestures, summoning a heavenly seal that poured into Yang Qi’s forehead to try to stop the golden imp.

Unfortunately for him, that sealing mark only caused the golden imp to react with even greater might.

The imp flew out of Yang Qi, and in the blink of an eye, the sealing mark was destroyed.

Then, the imp spoke.

It wasn’t the language of humans; every single word was grand, pure, holy, and mighty. This was the language of some magnificent civilization, that much was clear.

Somehow, Yang Qi understood the words being spoken.

“Blaspheme the one marked by the God Legion Seal? Receive punishment from the legion of gods!”

The golden imp reached out with a hand so powerful that it seemed capable of ripping up the Yama Mountains by their roots. The entire palace began to tremble, and the life force springwater went still as the hand wrapped around the dark gold incarnation of Ghost Emperor Yama, as well as his throne, and shattered them.

The golden imp seemed completely invincible, and capable of crushing anything in its path like twigs. Tens of thousands of years ago, Ghost Emperor Yama had dominated the world, and yet this imp crushed his clone as easily as a clay figurine.

Gurgle. Splash.

The sound of metal chains could once again be heard as the life force springwater began to sink down. Soon, Yang Qi could see down into the depths, where an enormous, chained devil-ghost knelt on the ground. It was fully three thousand meters tall, with pitch black scales, and fiendish energy that would kill even a Lifeseizer who got too close to it.

That was Ghost Emperor Yama’s true body; he was no human, he was a devil-god.

He looked up at the golden imp, his massive eyes gleaming with shock and terror. “Godtongue! That was Godtongue, the most ancient dialect in existence! Your energy art isn’t heavenly-class. It’s godly-class, isn’t it?! Dear lord! Why has a godly-class energy art appeared in a lowly place like the Rich-Lush Continent? Compared to all the other worlds out there, the Rich-Lush Continent is so weak! Wait. You’re no god-spirit! You’re just an expert in the Godmyth level, bound by a godseal, aren’t you? Leave this place immediately!”

Roar!

Ghost Emperor Yama seemed to have pulled himself together. Massive amounts of devil-god energy began to bless him, augmenting him with the sensation that he could shake the heavens and topple the earth.

“Reverse the flow of life force. Draw deeply on the lifespan. Remove this god-spirit! Spatial teleportation!”

His roar caused everything in the area to tremble from the powerful fluctuations.

As for Yang Qi, he still wasn’t capable of moving, and was relying fully on the golden imp in his forehead, who now continued to speak in Godtongue.

The words came more and more quickly, and caused golden light to converge into a single point, which suddenly pierced through the air with deadly speed toward Ghost Emperor Yama’s forehead.

A hoarse scream rang out, and a huge hole opened up in his forehead as his true body suffered a grievous blow. However, at the same time, he managed to send out a sphere of destructive energy, which headed directly toward Yang Qi.

That ball of energy was clearly powerful enough to destroy a Legendary, much less someone as weak as Yang Qi.

However, that was when the golden imp flew back into the recesses of Yang Qi’s forehead. Golden light shot forth, and the sphere was destroyed.

Even as blood poured down the face of Ghost Emperor Yama’s true body, he threw his hands wide, and bent space-time.

“Devilhorde Greater Teleportation!”

Yang Qi felt the space-time around him cracking and shattering, and then felt himself leaving the palace.

He blinked, and then he wasn’t in the Yama Mountains anymore, but rather, back out in the desolate blood swamps.

Off in the distance, the location where the mountains had once existed now seemed completely empty.

“What’s going on here?” he murmured. Putting his hands to his temples, he cast his senses inward toward the golden imp. However, the imp was back in its usual position, and was completely motionless.

It was almost like everything that had just happened was a dream.

However, Yang Qi knew that it was no dream. Ghost Emperor Yama saw him steal the life force springwater from Heaven, Earth, and Man, the Three Heroes, and had then teleported him into the Yama Mountains in the hopes of getting his energy art. Thankfully, the golden imp who resided in his forehead ended up attacking the ghost emperor.

And in the moment before Ghost Emperor Yama was completely defeated, he teleported Yang Qi out, resolving the situation.

‘Senior? Senior…?’

Yet again, his attempts to communicate were fruitless. The golden imp didn’t even move, much less speak in Godtongue, or any other language for that matter.

After a while, Yang Qi simply gave up. ‘Maybe my cultivation base just isn’t high enough. Well, I won’t worry about it for now. I just escaped from almost certain calamity. From now on, I can’t go into dangerous situations like that so casually. After all, I have more people to worry about than just myself. What would Father do if I died, or my sworn brothers?’

Yang Qi wasn’t necessarily afraid of calamity, but he did have a lot of people to take care of.

After some more thought, he decided that he shouldn’t stay in the Heavencorpse Dimension for any longer than necessary.

It took some searching, but he found the Deathly Devil-Eye passageway back to the Blackcorpse Mountains. Before long, he was back in the outside world.

Thanks to the slaughter he had carried out on his way to the dimension, there were no zombies to be seen, and no thousand-year-old corpse kings. He had killed just about everything.

The wretch energy was also much less intense than before. Yang Qi couldn’t help but nod in satisfaction at the deed he had accomplished.

With that, he burst into motion, heading back toward Yanhaven at top speed.

He couldn’t wait to get back.

Already, several days had passed, and he had no idea whether or not the representative from the House of Spring and Autumn had arrived. After all, he had been unable to connect with his Humanoid True Energy while in the Heavencorpse Dimension.

Thankfully, the connection reestablished soon after he emerged, and he found that the situation in Yanhaven was calm and peaceful. No one from the House of Spring and Autumn had come yet.

Before long, he landed in Yanhaven.

**

Meanwhile, deep in the Heavencorpse Dimension, the Yama Mountains that had vanished moments ago slowly reappeared.

Deep inside those mountains, in the palace, the life force springwater was building back up again, although, thanks to the blood of Ghost Emperor Yama, it was now pitch black.

‘Dammit. Why did I have to run into someone like that? I can’t believe he actually had a God Legion Seal in his forehead. A fabled sealing mark belonging to the legion of gods. What is something like that doing on an ordinary person from the Rich-Lush Continent? Tens of thousands of years ago, I, Ghost Emperor Yama, was completely invincible! If that expert from the Quake-Dawn Continent hadn’t come and locked me up with Quake-Dawn godsteel, who could ever have been my match? And yet, godseals are never seen even on the Quake-Dawn Continent!’

Ghost Emperor Yama had been very seriously injured.

He was a virtually invincible devil-god, and yet even he couldn’t hold back from howling in pain. He almost couldn’t believe what had just happened, and completely regretted teleporting Yang Qi into his palace.

‘A godly-class energy art! I can’t believe something like that has shown up in this continent! This place was only a tiny part of the Yore-Wilds Continent before the entire thing broke apart. And now, a godly-class energy art has appeared. Don’t tell me the mysterious, unparalleled, paragonic gods in their alternate dimension actually want to restore the Yore-Wilds Continent?’

Soon, Ghost Emperor Yama managed to stop the bleeding and close up his wound. Continuing to try to comfort himself, he thought, ‘Or, perhaps there are problems amongst the gods in heaven! Either way, considering that a godly-class energy art has appeared here, the Rich-Lush Continent is in for a major storm of events. And what about that Crown Prince fellow who came before? There’s an incredible aura inside of him as well. I wonder where he's from. I have to get rid of this Quake-Dawn godsteel!’

**

Back in Yanhaven, in a particularly spacious den, Yang Qi had reunited with Yang Zhan, Yang Yunchong, and Yang Hualong.

The energy formation of the dao of monarchs was fully activated, providing cultivation results that were ten to a hundred times as effective as elsewhere.

Yang Yunchong and Yang Hualong had not yet reached the Lifeseizing level, but they were very close. Both of them had called upon the Four Seasons Swordplay to summon four spheres of sword light, which corresponded to spring, summer, autumn and winter.

By now, they could use their sword energy to kill an enemy ten thousand paces away, making them even stronger than Masters of Energy like Yang Xingshi or Dowager Yan.

“Qi’er, how was your trip into the Blackcorpse Mountains?” Yang Zhan asked. “No one from the House of Spring and Autumn has shown up, but I have the feeling it won’t be long. In fact, I was just about to send you a message asking you to come back.”

“Forget about my adventures, Father. Look at what I acquired. With this, eldest brother and second brother should both be able to reach the Lifeseizing level.” With that, Yang Qi took out the enormous bottle gourd filled with life force springwater. It was so incredibly heavy that the ground cracked and shattered beneath it, and the walls and columns around them creaked ominously.

After all, one drop of life force springwater was dozens of times heavier than a drop of ordinary water.

Chapter 138: Young Lord from the House of Spring and Autumn

‘Life force springwater is an amazing thing,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘And considering what happened in the Yama Mountains, it's going to be a lot harder for the Crown Prince to get any more of it to help Yun Hailan.’

Yang Qi used true energy to handle the huge bottle gourd, so as to avoid allowing the immensely heavy life force springwater from breaking it.

After all, the gourd was not a magical item, but a mundane object forged from metal. Using true energy, he carefully opened it, and pulled out a single drop of the scintillating liquid.

Taking a step forward, he looked closely at the water. Even just this single drop weighed dozens of kilograms.

If a person consumed it directly, the water would dissolve them from the inside out. However, it was possible to use true energy to refine it into life force, which could then be sent into the meridians.

“Eldest Brother. Second Brother. Circulate your energy and relax your muscles.”

Yang Yunchong and Yang Hualong were already ready.

Waving his finger, Yang Qi used true energy to pull out another drop. Then, he waved his finger again, causing them to transform into two shimmering, swirling expressions of energy that thrummed with life force.

Without any hesitation, he sent that energy into his two brothers.

Yang Yunchong was the first to let out a hoarse bellow as his muscles bulged, making him look like he was about to explode. After all, a drop of life force springwater was all it took to force a person’s life force to the ultimate limit. Watering a tree with a drop of the stuff would cause a sapling to grow into a mighty tree in only a few days. It was truly terrifying.

Of course, no one would go to the ridiculous extent of watering trees with life force springwater. Not even the rarest of spirit herbs needed treatment like that.

“Brothers,” Yang Qi said, “the quintessence of the four seasons are connected to the twenty-four solar terms, and their corresponding twenty-four acupoints. Your bodies are heaven and earth, the sovereign lords of all astrological phenomena. Understand this enigmatic truth, and you can seize life from the heavens!”

With that, he poured his own true energy into his brothers to help them.

With the life force springwater replenishing them, they were given the same benefit that would come from a hundred years of bitter cultivation. As the moments ticked by, their true energy climbed higher and higher toward the Lifeseizing level.

Powerful rumbling sounds echoed out as the vital energy of heaven and earth formed vortexes around Yang Yunchong and Yang Hualong, causing them to experience a baptism of sorts as they broke out of the ninth phase and into Lifeseizing.

‘Amazing!’ Yang Qi thought. ‘This life force springwater is truly incredible. No wonder that useless Song Haishan actually made it to the Lifeseizing level. Too bad I killed him, making it all pointless.’ Although Yang Qi was still pleased that he had managed to get his revenge on Song Haishan, he wouldn’t be able to rest at ease until he exacted revenge on Yun Hailan.

‘All four of us, Lifeseizers!’ Yang Zhan thought, filled with pride and excitement. In all his life, he had never even seen a Lifeseizer. For generations, Yanhaven had been ruled by puny Masters of Energy. But now, he and his sons were all Lifeseizers. It was almost impossible to even comprehend the glory that represented. Their clan was now comparable to some of the most powerful organizations in existence. ‘If word spread, even our staunchest opponents would pray to the gods for mercy.’

At this point, Yang Qi retracted his true energy. Eyes sparkling, he said, “Okay, brothers. Your energy arts are now solidly in the Lifeseizing level. As long as you continue to focus on your cultivation, you will continue to progress, and at the same time, be able to care for Yanhaven and the Yang Clan for generations to come. Our direct bloodline is completely stable. The next thing to focus on is grooming the younger generation. Incidentally, how have things been going with the chief elders?”

“They want access to the energy formation of the dao of monarchs to further their cultivation,” Yang Zhan answered. “Unfortunately, none of them have performed any particularly meritorious service. In fact, I assigned some younger ones to spy on Yang Xingshi and Dowager Yan, to see whether they were truly on our side, or whether they were interested in sowing discord in the clan. If they’ve truly repented, and can prove their loyalty by doing good for the clan, I might give them the opportunity they seek. If not, well….”

His eyes glittered with killing intent.

“That does seem like the best thing to do,” Yang Qi said. “The chief elders used to be completely high and mighty, so it’s only natural that they would chafe under your leadership. Give them some assignments and see how they perform. Only the loyal ones should be given a chance.”

“Third Brother,” Yang Yunchong said, “not only have your energy arts and cultivation base improved in the Demi-Immortal Institute, but also, you’ve come to understand how to run a clan and a nation. After you went into the Blackcorpse Mountains, father founded the Yang Clan College, and appointed the chief elders as the faculty. Tests are being administered in the various counties subsidiary to Yanhaven, and the best and brightest young ones will be brought here to study. The top performers will eventually become government officials, allowing the nation to thrive on the backs of loyal, aristocratic clans.”

Yang Qi nodded. “Excellent plan. I just wonder if the chief elders will do their best to teach the younger ones.”

“If they don’t,” Yang Zhan said, “then for the good of the clan I might just have to institute the death penalty. Although, enticing rewards will also be on the table.”

“Sounds good, Father. By the way, do you have a vessel I could use to separate out some of this life force springwater for the three of you to use later on in your cultivation? Remember, you mustn’t allow anyone to know about this water. If word leaked, the consequences would be too horrible to contemplate.” Yang Qi gave about one fifth of the life force springwater to his father.

Yang Zhan accepted it with trembling hands. After all, if only one drop of that water had been enough to push two of his sons into the Lifeseizing level, then it could only be imagined how much an entire bottle gourd was worth. Perhaps it would lead to an entire clan of experts! And who knew how far it could push Yang Zhan’s cultivation base?

“And if you use it on the loyal young ones, don’t directly give it to them. Water it down first, otherwise, they won’t be able to absorb it.” With that, he put the bottle-gourd away, and went on to discuss other important clan matters with his father and brothers.

Sometime later, a deafening rumbling sound could be heard from outside, and a massive beam of sword energy descended on the clan. Apparently, some consummate expert was arriving. Heart thumping, Yang Qi flew out to the main square in front of the city magistrate’s mansion, to find a group of people landing.

All of them were Lifeseizers.

For countless generations, the tiny Yanhaven had never been graced by the presence of even a single Lifeseizer, and yet now, they were showing up left and right.

This group was made up of five people. Four were elderly, with bold, powerful demeanors and haughty eyes. Obviously, they were grand elders from a major organization. And yet, most eye-catching of all in this group was a young man who the four elders flanked. He appeared to be seventeen or eighteen years old, younger than Yang Qi. He wore light blue clothing, and even as his feet touched the ground, his eyes locked onto Yang Qi.

“Are you Yang Qi from the Demi-Immortal Institute?” he asked. “The one who imprisoned Zhang Lie from the House of Spring and Autumn?”

“That's right. I'm Yang Qi, elite student from the Demi-Immortal Institute.” He examined the group for a moment, then continued, “You must be from the House of Spring and Autumn. Welcome, guests. Please, come in and sit down.”

“There’s no need. We’re here for punitive purposes, so you can cut the courteous act. I can’t believe that a measly elite student like you would dare to haggle with the House of Spring and Autumn. Let’s see how tough you really are!”

Even as the words left his mouth, the young man attacked Yang Qi.

He arrived in a blur, striking out with lightning-like speed, causing swirling snow to fill the air. Unsurprisingly, he was using the Four Seasons Swordplay, and with a degree of skill that far surpassed Yang Qi’s ability with the technique.

Moments ago, they had been surrounded by the heat of summer, but this one move caused clouds to fill the air and a snowstorm to cover Yanhaven.

Even more surprising was that he was using a palm strike.

This young man’s energy arts were profound to say the least. The House of Spring and Autumn had sent a Quinary Lifeseizer to Yanhaven to deal with Yang Qi, indicating that they intended to crush him.

“Cosmic Sunflare,” Yang Qi said with a faint smile. A beam of scorching hot sword energy exploded from his palm, which surged forward to meet the young man’s attack.

At the same time, the image of an enormous sword shot up into the sky, tearing open the cloud cover and allowing a golden stream of sunlight to fall down.

The combination of the brilliant sunlight and Yang Qi’s Cosmic Sunflare Sword was virtually unstoppable, and caused scorching flames to completely surround him.

In the blink of an eye, the young man was surrounded by fiery, raging sword energy.

“You’ve cultivated the Cosmic Sunflare Sword to this level…?” the young man said, clearly shocked. Never could he have guessed that Yang Qi would have such an incredible technique at his disposal. “You’re really only an elite student? You seem more like a conclave student!”

“Watch out, Young Lord!”

The four old men lunged forward, unleashing their own Four Seasons Swordplay to intercept Yang Qi’s invincible sword energy, causing innumerable strands of silk to fill the air.

"Silk Rain of the Spring Silkworm!" they shouted.

Yang Qi smiled and casually said, “Sunflare Illuminates the Nine Prefectures.”

A burning mass of red sword energy appeared behind him, sending bright light out to fill the entire square, and causing the temperature to rise so high that the Silk Rain of the Spring Silkworm was instantly vanquished.

“Stay your hand!” the young man barked.

Yang Qi had never been interested in getting in a fight with the House of Spring and Autumn, so as soon as the young man spoke, he reined in his energy arts and said, “Young Lord, did you have something you wanted to say?”

The young lord hesitated for a moment, then said, “I see now that you are indeed strong enough to make demands of the House of Spring and Autumn. How about this: We’ll pay whatever ransom you demand to get back Zhang Lie and the other elders.”

From the straightforward manner in which he spoke, it was obvious he had been put in his place by Yang Qi.

Chapter 139: Converting Enemies to Friends

Yang Qi could tell what this young lord wanted to do. Considering that he had no way of handling Yang Qi, he wanted to turn weapons of war into gifts of jade and silk. That was why he cut to the chase and clearly stated his demands, in the hopes of avoiding any further embarrassment.

Yang Qi’s enigmatic energy arts had something to do with it. It didn't matter that this young lord was a Quinary Lifeseizer, the burning sun Yang Qi had summoned was simply too much for him. And if Yang Qi had been some ordinary person, perhaps threatening him with the reputation of the House of Spring and Autumn would have been effective. But he was a student from the Demi-Immortal Institute, so that made things different.

The Demi-Immortal Institute was the number one institute in all of the Rich-Lush Continent, an organization the House of Spring and Autumn couldn’t even compare to.

Considering all of that, this young lord really had no choice but to back down.

“Fine,” Yang Qi said. He wasn't interested in throwing his weight around too much. In fact, he was hoping to smooth the situation out. “If that's what you want, Young Lord, then the Yang Clan would be happy to comply. When people show me even an inch of respect, I pay them back with a hundred times that. We’ll return Zhang Lie and the elders who came with him. Furthermore, we don’t ask for a single bit of compensation from the House of Spring and Autumn.”

“Really?” the young lord said, his eyes brightening. He had assumed that the Yang Clan would demand an exorbitant payment from them to resolve things. For things to play out like this was quite refreshing.

All of a sudden, he realized that he liked this Yang Qi.

“Brother Yang Qi, since you’re being so magnanimous, then let’s just consider the matter between the House of Spring and Autumn and the Yang Clan as having been completely resolved. By the way, Brother Yang, there’s no need for you to address me as Young Lord. I’m just one of many of my father’s relatively useless sons. Please, call me Lu Wangxian.”

Yang Qi nodded, then turned to look at his father and brothers behind him. “Eldest Brother, Second Brother, bring out that Zhang Lie.”

“Yes, Third Brother.” Yang Yunchong and Yang Hualong hurried off.

‘Wait, they’re all Lifeseizers…?’ Lu Wangxian thought, eyes widening a bit. ‘The insignificant Yang Clan from Yanhaven has three Lifeseizers? Talk about big fish in a little pond. Actually, they’re more like big sharks in a little pond….’

Lu Wangxian’s impression of this place was changing by the moment. Earlier, he had assumed the people here were just nouveau riche bumpkins, but as it turned out, they were actually a first-tier aristocratic clan.

After all, people respected power in these lands. With three Lifeseizers in the clan, and the enigmatic Yang Qi, who not even a Quinary Lifeseizer could deal with, it was clear that the Yang Clan would definitely be around for hundreds of years to come.

It didn’t take long for Yang Yunchong and Yang Hualong to return with Zhang Lie, and the other elders he had come with. All of them had their meridians tightly sealed. Yang Qi waved his hands, and popping sounds could be heard as they were freed.

“Ninth Young Lord!” Zhang Lie blurted. Rushing over, he dropped to his knees and saluted Lu Wangxian. Then, he glared over at Yang Qi and the others from the Yang Clan, and said, “This puny Yang Clan dared to trifle with our House of Spring and Autumn. They should be sentenced to death! Young Lord, please, carry out the punishment immediately! Otherwise, we’ll lose a lot of face in—”

“Shut your mouth!” Lu Wangxian shouted. “You good-for-nothing fools are the ones who lost face for the House of Spring and Autumn. I can’t believe you dared to come cause trouble here. I just sparred with Brother Yang, and believe me, if he wanted the lot of you dead, he could have done it with the snap of a finger. In fact, you apologize to him immediately!”

“But, Ninth Young Lord, the Yang Clan is definitely involved with the disappearance of some of our disciples!”

“The entire reason I came here today was to resolve this issue,” Lu Wangxian said, his face completely expressionless. “It's a matter that involves both the Demi-Immortal Institute and the House of Spring and Autumn, and therefore, you don’t qualify to offer your opinion. I’m in charge here, understand?”

“Yes, Ninth Young Lord.” Zhang Lie said, shivering. He was familiar with how Lu Wangxian operated, and knew that the more expressionless he was, the more dangerous he became.

“Brother Lu, you’re a guest,” Yang Qi said. “Unfortunately, I don't have much in the way of entertainment here. Why don’t we head into my study, and we can talk about the disappearance of those disciples of yours. I can provide a full explanation.”

“Many thanks, Brother Yang. Truth be told, my father did send me here to handle that very issue. If I don’t take care of things to his satisfaction, I won't be able to show my face in his presence. And my brothers and sisters would definitely take advantage of the situation to my detriment. Brother Yang Qi, you have no idea the type of things that go on in my family.” With that, the two of them went inside, along with the four elders who ranked high enough that they qualified to attend the meeting. Zhang Lie and the others were left outside.

Along the way, Yang Qi contemplated what to do next. ‘Although this Lu Wangxian makes a show of complaining about the situation, the truth is that he really wants to find out what happened to those disciples. He’s a young lord from an important sect, but he still has to deal with a lot of competition and infighting. It sounds worse than being an imperial prince. If he doesn’t handle his tasks well, he’ll come under attack. And if he gets a bad reputation, that would be very difficult to come back from.’

After sitting down, Lu Wangxian said, “Brother Yang Qi, could it be that some useless disciples from the House of Spring and Autumn ended up offending the Yang Clan?”

“That’s exactly right,” Yang Qi said. To the surprise of everyone from the House of Spring and Autumn, he had no intention of hiding the truth. “Some time ago, a few disciples from your house tried to wipe out the Yang Clan….”

With that, he went on to give a detailed account of how he had been pillaging the Chen Clan when he came across the Chiliocosm Mirror, and how some disciples from the House of Spring and Autumn suddenly showed up, demanded the mirror, and then attacked him. He told the entire story, including how he had killed some of the disciples, and crippled the others. “And that’s what happened, Brother Lu. So, what do you think? Did I do the right thing? We had no beef with each other, and yet those disciples demanded that we be their slaves! There’s no way I could allow my clan to just sit around like a fish on the chopping block.”

As Lu Wangxian listened to the story, anger began to burn in his eyes. “So, that’s how things played out? Undisciplined and immoral! I almost can’t believe that disciples from the House of Spring and Autumn would act in such a way. Elders, what do you think? Are disciples from our sect really this arrogant nowadays?”

“Ninth Young Lord, sir,” one of the elders said, his expression grave, “this kind of thing happens with all large sects. It’s really unavoidable. Even righteous and upright organizations like the Demi-Immortal Institute will have some bad apples, people who use their power to bully and rob others. That said, such matters should be handled internally. If word got out that outsiders were disciplining our disciples, we would come across as being weak. Reputation is everything when it comes to big sects like ours. Ninth Young Lord, please consider carefully how you handle this.”

One of the other elders noticed that Yang Qi’s expression was turning grimmer by the moment, so he quickly said, “Of course, the Yang Clan did nothing wrong. You’re really in a tough situation Ninth Young Lord. Yang Qi, please, cut us some slack here. We aren’t going to blame you, but on the other hand, the Ninth Young Lord has to go back and make a report about the situation. I'm sure we can come to an agreement. After all, our Ninth Young Lord wants to be friends with the Yang Clan.”

Yang Qi’s expression softened. “I understand. This matter could affect the reputation of the House of Spring and Autumn as a whole. Although our Yang Clan was by no means in the wrong, in the interests of righteousness, we couldn’t sit back and do nothing. Brother Lu, how about I offer some compensation?”

“Oh?” Lu Wangxian said, taken aback. “Brother Yang, you're being so magnanimous today that I feel moved to tears. In any case, I have an idea of what to do. Why don’t I just go back and say that the missing disciples were set upon by wild beasts and killed, and that it had nothing to do with the Yang Clan?”

About this time, the voices of two young women reached their ears. “Get your hands off me! Let me go! Your puny Yang Clan dared to kill disciples from the House of Spring and Autumn, and then you crippled our energy arts! Your whole clan is going to be exterminated because of this!”

The door opened, and the two young women were shoved in, the very disciples that Yang Qi had crippled. When they realized who was in the room, they were at first stunned, but then began to cry out in loud voices. “Ninth Young Lord! You have to get revenge for us! Exterminate the Yang Clan! It was this guy right here who killed our Elder Brothers! He cut them down!”

Snorting coldly, Lu Wangxian snapped his fingers to interrupt the young woman, who didn’t dare to say another word.

“Brother Yang, the crimes of these stubborn, moronic disciples are really unforgivable.”

With no warning whatsoever, Yang Qi reached out, revealing a drop of scintillating liquid floating above his palm. Along with it came a powerful aura that instantly enlivened everyone present.

The eyes of both Lu Wangxian and the elders went as wide as saucers.

“Is that…? Life force springwater? Is that really the fabled life force springwater?”

“That’s exactly what it is,” Yang Qi replied. “Thanks to some meritorious service I performed for the Demi-Immortal Institute, I was rewarded with this drop of life force springwater. It’s only a drop, but it should be more than enough to propel someone into the Lifeseizing level. Perhaps this compensation will be enough to make up for the trouble the House of Spring and Autumn has endured.”

“This….” It took a moment, but Lu Wangxian managed to calm himself. “You call an amazing gift like that ‘compensation’? I can’t accept it. Your virtue knows no bounds, Brother Yang Qi. You have my deepest respect.”

Snap! Crack!

Lu Wangxian’s fingers blurred, and two screams rang out. Then, the two young women from the House of Spring and Autumn toppled backward onto the ground, dead, gaping holes in their chests.

Yang Qi looked on, eyes flashing, fully aware of Lu Wangxian’s stance in the matter.

“Not even death can wipe out the crimes of those two disciples. Undisciplined and immoral robbers is what they were. Elders, considering that they flagrantly violated clan rules, shouldn’t they have been sentenced to death?” Lu Wangxian looked over at the elders.

“Yes,” one of them said, nodding.

“Brother Yang Qi, I think matters have been resolved satisfactorily for both of us. I’ll return and provide my father with a full report. And I’ll even suggest that the House of Spring and Autumn enter a formal alliance with the Yang Clan.” With that, he rose to his feet. “By the way, the House of Shadowblight has been eyeing your clan recently. If you need our help to deal with them, just say the word.”

“There’s no need for that,” Yang Qi said, his tone turning cold. “The House of Shadowblight is a vile organization that deserves to be wiped off the map! I’ll kill those dogs myself! Unless they send a Legendary, they won’t be able to deal with me!”

As Yang Qi spoke, his aura grew more and more powerful, forcing Lu Wangxian and the four elders to back up a few paces, terror flickering in their eyes as they realized how strong Yang Qi was.

‘My god,’ one of the elders thought, ‘his true energy is so strong! He’s as powerful as an Octonary or Nonary Lifeseizer! Is he just a genius? Or is he actually like the Great Sages of the distant past, a god from heaven descended into the mortal world?’

“Very impressive, Brother Yang Qi,” Lu Wangxian said with a forced laugh. “Now I know that you were actually holding back earlier; I'm not even close to being a match for you.”

“Mercy is a virtue after all,” Yang Qi said, smiling. “Listen, Brother Lu. We became friends at first sight, so for the sake of the future alliance between the Yang Clan and the House of Spring and Autumn, why don’t we become sworn brothers, right here and now?”

Chapter 140: All Men Are Brothers

“Become sworn brothers?”

At first, he was stunned, but soon, his eyes flickered with delight. Considering that Yang Qi had just demonstrated a bit of his true power, Lu Wangxian knew that he was a pure monster within the Lifeseizing level. Besides, who wouldn’t want to have a friend in the Demi-Immortal Institute, or even better than that, a sworn brother.

“Okay,” he said. “You’re right. We became friends at first sight, so let’s do it. As sworn brothers, we’ll live and die together, and share in victory and defeat alike.”

“Perfect! Eldest Brother. Second Brother. Deputy Sect Leader Lu Wangxian and I are going to become sworn brothers right here and now. Fetch some incense!”

“Of course!” Yang Hualong and Yang Yunchong hurried about making all the arrangements.

As for the elders, they exchanged glances, but did little more than that. After all, an arrangement like this would be beneficial to them. Considering the level of Yang Qi’s cultivation base, he was obviously going to be an important person in the Demi-Immortal Institute. For their Ninth Young Lord to have a sworn brother like that would make it a bit easier for him to deal with his struggles in the House of Spring and Autumn.

Sworn brothers were different from friends. Friends were simply strangers that one encountered by chance, and ended up having dealings with, but sworn brothers were bound together by a formal ceremony. They swore to live and die together, and to share both glory and dishonor.

After the incense was prepared, Yang Qi and Lu Wangxian dropped to their knees, joined voices and said, “On this day, we, Lu Wangxian and Yang Qi, hereby swear to become brothers. We will share life and death, glory and dishonor. Although we were not born on the same day, we hope to die together on the same day. If either of us betrays the other, let heaven destroy him and the earth eradicate him, and let him be spurned by mortals and gods alike.”

With that, they kowtowed eight times, formalizing the arrangement.

Afterward, they burst into delighted laughter. Yang Qi clasped Lu Wangxian on the shoulder and said, “Very well, Brother. Henceforth, the Yang Clan and the House of Spring and Autumn advance together and retreat together. If you ever need any help with anything, I’ll be there for you. Any problem you have will be a problem for me too.”

Lu Wangxian clasped hands formally. “Excellent. From now on, anything that matters to the Yang Clan matters to me too. Your father is my father.”

Yang Zhan cleared his throat. “Oh, I couldn't possibly accept that honor!”

Yang Qi smiled. “Very well, my brother. Take care of that drop of life force springwater. Once your father finds out about it, he’ll definitely admit that you handled matters perfectly.”

“Yeah. Getting this life force springwater will count as a major meritorious service. However, becoming your sworn brother is even more important. By the way, the Inter-Institutional Martial Arts Competition is coming. Plenty of people from other big sects will be there to observe. I hope you perform well, Brother. Considering what you’re capable of now, I bet you’ll sweep the competition.”

“I hope so too,” Yang Qi said. Waving his hand, he used his Devil-God Seal to summon a small piece of true energy that resembled jade. Handing it to Lu Wangxian, he said, “Brother, this is an animadestiny true energy seal. If necessary, just crush it to send a message to me; I’ll come to aid you as quickly as possible.”

Jun Tianchou, Yang Qi’s sworn brother from the Sea God Institute, had used a similar technique to create his Four Corners of the Earth talisman.

Lu Wangxian nodded. “Many thanks, Brother. Well, the time has come to say farewell. Take this divine talisman from the House of Spring and Autumn. You can use it to find me if you ever need help.” With that, he handed over a jade talisman.

“Farewell, Brother. Until we meet again.”

Lu Wangxian left in a blast of air, taking with him the elders, the bodies of the disciples he had killed, and Zhang Lie. In the blink of an eye, they were all gone.

Not only had Yang Qi resolved a big grudge, he ended up gaining the Ninth Young Lord of the House of Spring and Autumn as a sworn brother.

“You’ve grown up so much, Qi’er,” Yang Zhan said. Clasping his son on the shoulder, he continued, “For a minute there I thought you were going to be bullheaded and offend the House of Spring and Autumn. It might not have affected you, since you can always go back to the Demi-Immortal Institute, but it could have caused some big problems for us here in Yanhaven. Instead, you turned everything into a big blessing. Having sworn brothers in life can make everything go much more smoothly. You’ve done something truly incredible, Son.”

“I wouldn't say it's incredible, Father. Save that for when my cultivation reaches the point that I can go to the Hanging Mountain and find Mother. That would be incredible.”  At this point, Yang Qi’s voice turned serious and decisive. “Father, I benefited greatly from my trip into the Blackcorpse Mountains, and now I need to spend some time in seclusion. Afterward, I’ll head back to the Demi-Immortal Institute. It won’t be long before the big martial arts tournament is here, and I need to do well. If I can attract the attention of the institute, it will provide an even further measure of safety. The House of Shadowblight definitely won’t dare to do anything to our clan in that situation.”

“I’ll follow your lead,” Yang Zhan said with a smile.

**

Sometime later, Yang Qi was back in the middle of the energy formation of the dao of monarchs, preparing to work with the life force springwater. Using his true energy like a hand, he carefully placed an egg-sized collection of the water into his Hellfire Crucible.

Snap!

His true energy immediately began to thrum, and his platinum sagefire grew even purer, to the point where it was nearly transparent. Henceforth, it would be called Cleansing Flame of the Heavenly World.

It was now so hot that even a tiny bit of it would be enough to melt the hardest steel.

As the egg-sized conglomeration of life force springwater entered him, Yang Qi instantly sensed multiple particles within him beginning to wake, almost as though an entire herd of megamammoths were rising up.

Just as he had hoped, the life force springwater was far, far more effective than ordinary life force quintessence.

‘Quinary Lifeseizing! Awaken, particles! If I become a Quinary Lifeseizer, then I’ll be promoted to conclave student in the institute. Although that will make me more important, there will be down sides. The higher I rise, the more likely I’ll come into direct conflict with the Crown Prince Society. Right now, I'm not strong enough to be a threat. But once I'm a conclave student, things could be different. In the end, I have to get stronger. If I can become a Legendary, then I can really make a big scene at the competition. But can I actually reach it in time?

‘Unfortunately, I have no way to guarantee that the golden imp will always jump out to protect me. If I could be sure, then I wouldn’t have to worry about the Crown Prince at all. It only took one move for it to crush Ghost Emperor Yama, a Great Sage. Oh right. What was it that Ghost Emperor Yama said about the golden imp? Something about a God Legion Seal? What’s that? And what was that Quake-Dawn Continent he talked about? And why did he say that the Rich-Lush Continent is lowly and weak? It looks like I have some research to do after I get back to the institute.’

As he went about his cultivation, he reviewed his encounter with Ghost Emperor Yama, and thought about the many things he had learned.

Unfortunately, he had no idea what the God Legion Seal or the Quake-Dawn Continent were. All he did know was that the golden imp would take action if it encountered a powerful wretch-devil who was trying to harm him. Sadly, he had no idea how to communicate with it, let alone control it. Until he did, the only thing he could truly rely on was his own true energy.

‘I have to break through to Quinary Lifeseizing!’

Focusing his thoughts, he opened his eyes, and the eighty-one particles that he had already awakened erupted with boundless energy.

A god-spirit appeared above his head, an expression of Humanoid True Energy with an elephantine head and a human body. In the blink of an eye, it shot out of the room and high into the sky, above the sea of clouds, until it was amongst the boundless, deadly winds.

As the winds bore down, it lifted its trunk, inhaling the vital energy so quickly that the winds immediately surrounding it vanished.

Flame lightning, intense winds, and bane-devils then appeared, and rushed toward the figure.

This creature with the elephantine head and human body was an expression of the nascent divinity that existed in Yang Qi’s soul. Now, the vital energy of the tribulation that came with Quinary Lifeseizing didn’t pause for a moment before attacking it.

However, the tribulation couldn’t do a single thing to that Humanoid True Energy. It attacked for eight hours straight, and yet couldn’t harm it at all. Instead, the true energy was tempered until it looked like porcelain, like the workmanship of some heavenly grandmaster craftsman.

It was a porcelain god-spirit with an elephantine head and a human body, standing tall and straight, surrounded by swirling flows of energy.

Eventually, the tribulation faded away.

The true energy sank back down, and entered Yang Qi again.

As it did, numerous particles within him awoke, and true energy took root on the various acupoints throughout his body, making him stronger and tougher than ever before.

Not even using true energy, he unleashed a fist strike, and punched a hole in the ground as easily as if it were soft tofu.

That was pure fleshly body power.

And the ground in this secret room was made of pure steel, the type that the most powerful weapons couldn't even scratch, metal that was as thick as several people standing on each other's shoulders.

‘I'm finally in Quinary Lifeseizing. Now, I have numerous true energy vestiges within my body, all of which can store true energy. My true energy reserves will now be even deeper than before.’ The true energy vestiges that were inside of him now were linked to him inextricably, and were basically a part of his body on a fundamental level.

They existed in his acupoints, almost like new seas of energy unto their own. Furthermore, they could defend themselves; if someone broke past the practitioner’s defensive true energy and attacked them internally, the true energy vestiges would instantly fight back.

That was one of the main benefits of true energy vestiges.

‘Alright, the time has come to return to the Demi-Immortal Institute.’ Putting the bottle gourd of life force springwater back into his thumb-ring, he rose to his feet. However, in that very moment, his Four Corners of the Earth talisman suddenly trembled.

Chapter 141: Jun Tianchou Requests Help

Inside Yang Qi’s Heart of the Sea thumb-ring was the Four Corners of the Earth talisman, which had been given to him by Jun Tianchou, a conclave student from the Sea God Institute. The two of them had become sworn siblings, and had agreed to use the talisman as a way to keep in touch. Even if they were hundreds of kilometers apart, that talisman could be used to transmit a message.

Originally, Jun Tianchou had told Yang Qi to use the talisman to ask for help if necessary.

But now, it seemed that Jun Tianchou was the one in trouble, and he was reversing the function of the talisman to reach out to his sworn brother.

With the wave of a hand, Yang Qi summoned the Four Corners of the Earth talisman out into the open.

As soon as he did, Jun Tianchou’s voice was transmitted to him: “Brother Yang Qi, come to the East Sea, to Fiend-Devil Island. Myself and a few others are trapped in a spell formation set up by the fiend-devils….”

As soon as the message was transmitted, the Four Corners of the Earth talisman exploded, transforming into nothing but water vapor.

‘East Sea? Fiend-Devil Island?’ Yang Qi had never heard of the place, so he quickly pulled out a map of the Rich-Lush Continent that he had acquired back in the Demi-Immortal Institute, which included the oceans.

The East Sea was a huge place, with countless dangerous locations, island nations, and minor continents. There were all sorts of powerful organizations there, and numerous islands where powerful experts had founded sects on top of the spirit lodes in the sea springs that existed on them.

There were also space-time rifts that led to minor planes similar to the Heavencorpse Dimension.

According to the stories, in ancient times, the fiend-devils in hell used a powerful energy art to tear a hole through the void, opening up a unique area in space where fiend-devils could be birthed. That place eventually came to be called Fiend-Devil Island.

Later, the island came to be used for cultivation purposes by the Sea God Institute, similar to the way the Heavencorpse Dimension was used by the Demi-Immortal Institute. Occasionally, students from other organizations would also be invited to go there to hunt fiend-devils.

Apparently, Jun Tianchou had run into a dangerous situation there, and Yang Qi didn't have time to sit around thinking about the matter. His only choice was to get to Fiend-Devil Island as quickly as possible. When it came to helping a sworn brother, Yang Qi wouldn’t hesitate to go through hell or high water.

Thankfully, he had a map, and thus, had a general idea of how to get there.

“Father, Eldest Brother, Second Brother: a sworn brother of mine is in great danger. I have to go save him. I’ll leave Yanhaven in your hands, just contact me if you need any help. Here’s a collection of antidotal medicinal pills that I acquired when I killed Blightking Skulkdevil and the other elders from the House of Shadowblight. If any people from there come to cause problems, these pills should be a big help.”

With that, he shot like lightning up into the sea of clouds, where he vanished without a trace.

Beyond the view of any outsiders, he unfurled his Fiend-Devil Wings. Instead of being pitch black like they had in the past, they now glowed with holy light, making him look almost like an angel. As the nefarious energy was expunged from them, they were slowly transforming into Angel Wings.

Furthermore, the speeds they were capable of only continued to increase.

When he had returned home from the Demi-Immortal Institute, he had been in Tertiary Lifeseizing. Back then, he could move so quickly that he was little more than a white streak of light in the sky. And if he hit a mountain peak along the way, he could slice it clean through.

In the Blackcorpse Mountains, he had consumed numerous devil-ghosts, propelling him to Quaternary Lifeseizing. And with the help of the life force springwater, he had seized life a fifth time.

Now, he was a Quinary Lifeseizer. Alive within him were ninety-nine particles, giving him the strength of ninety-nine ancient megamammoths.

Ancient megamammoths were not like mammoths that existed in modern times. Their trunks could uproot mountains, and they could easily crush tigers, panthers, and all sorts of devillings. In ancient times, they were the epitome of power. They could even drain streams and then shoot the water into the air to become rainstorms.

The idea of the power of nearly a hundred such creatures lurking within Yang Qi’s flesh and blood was simply terrifying.

WHOOOOOSH!

He sped through the sea of clouds, holding nothing back, glittering with light as golden as the sun itself. It was as if he could draw upon the power of gods that existed in nature, making him one with all creation, to the point where he didn't even emit energy fluctuations.

It didn’t take any effort for him to fly nowadays, it came completely naturally. In fact, he had to keep his true energy under strict control so that he didn’t damage his surroundings.

It was relatively easy for energy artists to acquire power, but to control that power was another matter. Smashing a boulder was a simple thing, but using that power to thread a needle would be incredibly difficult.

Back when he went from the Master of Energy level into the Lifeseizing level, he had flown out to the South Sea near the Demi-Immortal Institute. But this time, he was going to the East Sea, which was much farther away.

After flying for barely half a day, he could sense the humidity changing, and could smell the sea air. Reining in his energy arts, he came to a stop and looked out at the endless smattering of islands that covered the emerald waters.

He pulled out his map, then flew around a bit to confirm his exact location. At the moment, he was on the very edge of the East Sea, whereas Fiend-Devil Island was much further out in the depths of the water.

Thankfully, the map was very detailed, otherwise, he might have spent valuable time wandering.

It was already evening, and the moon was rising, casting dazzling light onto the countless islands. It was an extremely beautiful scene, but Yang Qi was too worried about his sworn brother to spend any time admiring it. As a lovely sea wind swept over him, he headed in the direction of Fiend-Devil Island.

Night deepened, and the temperature dropped. At the same time, he sensed wretch energy up ahead, something brutal and soaked with blood. It was so strong that it even disturbed the water. It almost seemed like there were an infinitude of demonlings, slaughtering each other, constantly shedding blood in their attempt to struggle for superiority.

‘That’s definitely Fiend-Devil Island, straight ahead.’ The source of that boundless wretch energy was a massive land mass that was only now becoming visible. It wasn’t actually an island, more like a continent. However, its inhabitants weren’t humans, but rather, fiend-devils from another plane. They were the descendants of whatever powerful fiend-devils had created the continent in ancient times, and lived so far from the mainland that it was impossible for most of them to reach it even by flight. Therefore, they existed by raiding and devouring whatever sea creatures they could come across in their area.

As he neared, Yang Qi could see fiend-devils of all sorts. Most of them were only about half as tall as an average person, with ugly, vicious faces. They had clawed wings on their back, which looked like smaller versions of his own Fiend-Devil Wings.

Any demonlings they encountered in the water around them, they would fall upon and slash to pieces. Even these lesser fiend-devils had energy arts that allowed them to spit fire from their mouth, fire that smelled like the sulfur of hell.

Further inland, past the lesser fiend-devils, were enormous greater fiend-devils. They were often twice or three times as large as an average human, with enormous wings and profound energy arts. They were as powerful as Lifeseizers, and vicious to the extreme.

As soon as Yang Qi arrived, he attracted the attention of numerous nearby fiend-devils.

RUMMMBLE!

Almost like locusts, the lesser fiend-devils filled the sky as they charged toward him, sulfuric fire spewing out of their mouths, claws extended to slash him to shreds.

There were so many of the things that they looked like an army of ants. Even most Lifeseizers would turn and flee in the face of such a vicious horde of ravenous fiend-devils, lest they be destroyed in a matter of moments.

But Yang Qi wasn’t impressed. “Screw the hell off!”

He sent out a wave of energy, causing all of the lesser fiend-devils within a thousand paces to explode, after which their demon cores shattered, becoming vital energy that shot into his Hellfire Crucible.

He had no time to waste on lesser fiend-devils, and thus, he became a white streak that shot through the air, destroying any of the things that got close. Even some of the greater fiend-devils attempted to get in his way, but he simply destroyed them and took their demon cores.

After his experience in the Heavencorpse Dimension, he was fairly certain that Jun Tianchou must have gone deep into the island, and whatever alternate dimension existed there. Therefore, these lesser and greater fiend-devils were of little consequence. His main goal was to reach the location with the strongest wretch energy.

As he flew further inland, he saw more and more spatial rifts, from which emerged numerous fiend-devils.

‘Where is he? The Four Corners of the Earth talisman already exploded, so I have no way of contacting him. According to the information on the map, Fiend-Devil Island has numerous spatial rifts that lead to different alternate dimensions. All of them are controlled by different fiend-devils. This is going to be like fishing a needle from the sea! What a waste of time. Well, I guess I can’t worry about that now. I have to find him as quickly as possible!’

After some time passed, he made no headway, and finally, resorted to shouting at the top of his lungs, “Brother Tianchou! It's me, Yang Qi! Where are you?!”

RUMBLE!

His voice echoed out like the shock wave from a massive boulder slamming into the ground. As it spread out, countless lesser and greater fiend-devils looked around in shock, and many of them simply exploded.

Chapter 142: Fiend-Devil Viscounts

Yang Qi yelled as loud as he possibly could, bolstering his voice with true energy.

Not only did the sound waves shred numerous fiend-devils to pieces, they passed through the entryways to the various dimensional spaces.

His true energy was so powerful that these sound waves were almost Humanoid True Energy, making them audible to individuals within the alternate dimensions.

When he got no initial response, he shouted out again, and then again. Countless fiend-devils rushed toward him, but none could reach him, and soon, they simply went into hiding.

Although fiend-devils generally didn't fear death, they were like wild animals in that, upon encountering something even more vicious than themselves, would slink away to save their lives.

After shouting several times in a row, he got a faint response from one of the entryways to another spatial dimension. “Brother Yang, we’re over here….”

‘That’s definitely Brother Jun Tianchou!’ Heart pounding with anxiety, he shot toward that very passageway, and entered it.

He soon found himself in a location very similar to the Heavencorpse Dimension. Looking around, he saw endless decaying swamplands, and black streams and rivers that stank so badly he had to suppress the urge to vomit. However, those black waters were rife with lesser fiend-devils, as though that liquid were like mother’s milk to them.

There were also many of the things flying about in the air.

Yang Qi ignored them and focused on what appeared to be a mountain off in the distance. Just barely visible at the top of the mountain were several enormous, devilish figures. They sat on the perimeter of a hexagrammic spell formation, in the middle of which was a shimmering black-gold canopy. Inside that canopy, he saw a familiar face: Jun Tianchou.

There were other experts trapped alongside him.

Obviously, Jun Tianchou had brought some friends with him to Fiend-Devil Island to rid the world of devils and demons. However, they had encountered some particularly powerful monsters who trapped them in a deadly spell formation.

Having no other options, Jun Tianchou ended up contacting Yang Qi for help.

There were five peaks on the mountain ahead, and the enormous devilish figures there were clearly different from the lesser and greater fiend-devils he had encountered up to this point. For some reason, they seemed more powerful and noble than the others.

Back in the Demi-Immortal Institute, Yang Qi had studied some of the detailed information about various monsters. Right now, he did his best to recall that information.

‘Because of the influence of the power of hell, fiend-devils have a very strict social structure. They are monsters that are born out of thin air, and are classified as lesser, greater, and noble fiend-devils. As for the fiend-devil nobility, they are broken up into barons, viscounts, counts, marquises, dukes, and princes. Their classification corresponds to their energy arts level. Greater fiend-devils are equivalent to Primary Lifeseizers. Fiend-devil barons include Secondary, Tertiary, and Quaternary Lifeseizers. Fiend-devil viscounts are Quinary and higher. Fiend-devil counts are Legendaries. Above them are the marquises, dukes, and princes. I wonder what level those things up there are.’

There were many types of monsters, including zombies, devil-ghosts with their spirit bodies, fiend-devils, bane-devils, blood-devils, heaven-devils, god-devils and many more.

Of all of those, fiend-devils were considered to have the purest bloodlines, as well as the strictest social order. They were very similar to humans in how they ran their society.

All of the various dimensions which connected to Fiend-Devil Island were run by different fiend-devils. There were no other types of monsters.

From what he could tell, the beasts on the mountain were far past the Quinary Lifeseizing level. Furthermore, he didn't sense any Legendary aura. That meant that the group contained Septenary, Octonary, and apparently at least one Nonary Lifeseizer, whose energy fluctuations were roughly on the same level as Holy Daughter Manyflowers.

Yang Qi was currently in Quinary Lifeseizing, and if he went absolutely all out, could probably hold his own against a Nonary expert. However, defeating such an opponent probably wouldn’t be possible.

Nonary Lifeseizers were on the border of becoming Legendaries, and had profound understandings of the mysteries of heaven and earth, and the magical laws that existed therein.

Even with the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, Yang Qi still felt nervous about fighting someone on that level.

These five fiend-devils, the weakest of which was a Septenary Lifeseizer, maintained their perches on the five mountain peaks, trapping the humans between them.

As Yang Qi continued to observe the situation, he realized that the monsters weren’t there in their true form, but rather, as Humanoid True Energy. Their true forms were likely hiding somewhere nearby, although he couldn’t tell where.

The crafty fiend-devils had set things up so that launching an ambush would be very difficult.

‘What do I do?’ Yang Qi thought. He knew that he didn’t have time to spare, and thus, his mind raced as he tried to come up with an idea.

RUMMMBLE!

The black-gold, egg-like shield trembled and shrank down a bit. From what Yang Qi could tell, it was some sort of energy art that would definitely be very dangerous to break through.

‘My top priority is keeping my brother safe. Killing those monsters isn’t as important. The best option would be to break into that spell formation and join forces with my brother. With me there to help, he’ll be less likely to get hurt. And maybe we could buy time until more help arrives.’

Having made his decision, he circulated his true energy and became a white streak of light that shot directly toward the black-gold shield. He was now fully drawing upon his dao of the quick strike to try to breach the spell formation and rescue Jun Tianchou.

However, even as he neared, a vortex suddenly appeared on the black-gold shield, which sucked him in before he could react.

As soon as Yang Qi was inside, the five fiend-devil viscounts began to transmit a conversation with devilish sense.

“Viscount Kui, it looks like another righteous individual has been sucked into our devil formation. Although, I must say, this fellow looks particularly strong.”

“Only a Legendary could hope to break free from our Preheaven Devil Formation. Everyone else will become fodder for our sacrifice.”

Another powerful stream of devilish sense rumbled, “The more Lifeseizer humans we get, the better. For years these righteous humans have been invading Fiend-Devil Island to slaughter us. Now, the debt of blood will be paid in blood!”

“That's right, these humans are all from big sects. They’re the best of the best from the institutes in the land. Killing them will certainly ease some of our angst.”

“But what if the institutes get angry and attack us en masse?”

“Ah, what are you scared of? There are countless dimensional spaces on Fiend-Devil Island. Some are even controlled by exalted counts and dukes. Although they currently sleep, if the humans attack us en masse, we’ll definitely end up slaughtering them. Humans won’t dare to interfere in the affairs of god-devils.”

The fiend-devils continued to confer amongst each other with devil sense.

‘What a powerful spell formation,’ Yang Qi thought. The black-gold true energy that crushed down on him caused his defensive true energy to creak ominously. Thankfully, his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth was the bane of wretch energy, and therefore, he wasn’t very adversely affected.

Now that he was inside the spell formation itself, he saw something else, a shimmering light that looked like a cauldron, which was protecting all of the people inside. Then he glanced over at Jun Tianchou, and could see that his face was ashen, and his true energy was running dangerously low.

“Everyone, this is my sworn brother that I mentioned,” Jun Tianchou said. “Brother, come over. We’ll open the Flameking Cauldron for a moment to let you in.” The cauldron flared with light, and the black-gold devil energy was momentarily dispelled.

Yang Qi allowed the light to grab him and pull him into the cauldron, whereupon the pressure he had felt moments ago vanished.

“You came so quickly, Brother,” Jun Tianchou said, rushing forward to greet Yang Qi.

The glowing cauldron was the size of a small house, and was protecting everything inside it from the boundless devil light outside.

“Yeah. As soon as I got your message, I rushed over here without even stopping to rest.” At this point, Yang Qi finally looked around at the others in the cauldron, and his eyes immediately flickered with shock.

There were fourteen people present, and all of them were higher than Quinary Lifeseizing. One of them was even an Octonary Lifeseizer, that one being the person operating the Flameking Cauldron.

There were men and women, and they all wore different styles of clothing, but from their haughty expressions, it was obvious they all came from large organizations. One of the experts was a young woman in Septenary Lifeseizing, who wore the long robes of the Sun Moon Institute. She was particularly beautiful, and wore dazzling, silver earrings that were decorated with phoenixes.

Shockingly, all of these people were conclave students.

And all of them were now sizing up Yang Qi.

At this point, the young woman from the Sun-Moon Institute snorted coldly and said, “Come on, Jun Tianchou, you really think this guy is going to save us? A Quinary Lifeseizer? You’ve basically just doomed him to die. This Preheaven Devil Formation is manned by five fiend-devil viscounts. Only a Legendary could possibly break it.”

Clearly, this young woman was disappointed by the low level of Yang Qi’s cultivation base.

“My brother isn’t an ordinary person,” Jun Tianchou said. “Not long ago, when he was only in Secondary Lifeseizing, he actually killed Jiao Wufeng with a single move.” Looking at Yang Qi with no small level of disbelief, he continued, “Brother, you reached Quinary Lifeseizing already? How are you progressing so fast?”

Yang Qi nodded. “I encountered some good fortune, that’s all.”

The young woman with the earrings looked at Yang Qi, her eyes flickering with surprise. “You killed Jiao Wufeng when you were in Secondary Lifeseizing? How is that even possible? If that’s the case, why don't you send some true energy into the Flameking Cauldron and see how long you can keep it going?

“Elder Brother Flame Clearspring, why don’t you hand over the cauldron to Jun Tianchou’s sworn brother for a moment, and see how strong he really is?”

Chapter 143: Doing It Alone

More than ten experts, most of them conclave students from top organizations, were looking at Yang Qi.

They had already been stuck in the Preheaven Devil Formation for several days by now, and no attempts to break free had succeeded; they were forced to pool their true energy to power the magical item that was the Flameking Cauldron.

The protective shield generated by that cauldron was the only thing keeping them safe from harm.

After days of strenuous effort, they were all like oil lamps on the verge of flickering out. They were almost completely out of medicinal pills to replenish their true energy, and although they were all skeptical about what Yang Qi could do, at least he offered them a tiny scrap of hope.

The beautiful young woman from the Sun Moon Institute wanted Yang Qi to take over the effort of running the Flameking Cauldron for a moment to let everyone else rest and recuperate.

“Sure,” Yang Qi said. “All of you are friends of my brother Jun Tianchou, so that means you’re friends of Yang Qi. We're going to get out of this together, I guarantee it.”

“Oh really,” Flame Clearspring replied. “Fine, send your true energy into the cauldron. And cut it with the bragging. For all you know, we’ll end up having to take care of you. This Preheaven Devil Formation is easy to get into; in fact, it will suck you in whether you want to enter or not. As for getting out, well, that's a different matter altogether. It contains magical laws from the dao of devils, so unless you’re a Legendary, you have little hope of breaking free.”

He wasn’t from one of the four great institutes. However, he was from an organization that was nearly as strong as one. He was a conclave student from the Tabernacle of Flame, and held the rank of deputy pontifex. He was in the Octonary Lifeseizing level, and his enlightenment of the good fortune of heaven and earth was the only reason he had been able to keep the Preheaven Devil Formation at bay for so long.

As far as he was concerned, Yang Qi was no one special, and that was reflected in his tone of voice.

Everyone present was a spectacular hero, far beyond the Quinary Lifeseizer Yang Qi, and thus, none of them were particularly convinced that he would really be able to help them.

Yang Qi wasn't upset by the chilly reception, and realized that the best thing to do in the situation was simply prove himself.

“Cosmic Sunflare,” he said, taking a step forward and looking up at the Flameking Cauldron. With that, he summoned a crimson burst of sword energy as thick as a bucket.

The sword energy emanated deafening rumbling sounds as it shot out, and everyone present could sense that it contained dangerous levels of heat.

When the energy touched the Flameking Cauldron, a projection of Yang Qi appeared inside of it. He looked like a sun god, shining with boundless sunlight that spread out and began to burn the black-gold light of the spell formation around them.

“Such strong true energy!” the girl with the phoenix earrings exclaimed, her eyes glittering with delight. “The Cosmic Sunflare Sword contains fire-type true energy that’s the perfect fuel for the Flameking Cauldron! There’s no way a Quinary Lifeseizer can unleash energy like that! In fact, not even ten Quinary Lifeseizers put together could match up to it!”

Now that Yang Qi was in Quinary Lifeseizing, all of his acupoints contained true energy vestiges that could store true energy. He also had the power of ninety-nine ancient megamammoths. And his Cosmic Sunflare Sword technique transformed in nature along with them. As of now, it was like he could truly communicate with the sun, and control the sun god that existed inside of it.

The flare of that sun could fill the cosmos!

Considering that he didn’t feel safe using the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth in front of so many strangers, his best alternative was to use a sword technique from another sect. And obviously, the Cosmic Sunflare Sword was the best choice.

He had already imparted all of the true energy from the Four Seasons Swordplay that he had built up to his father and brothers, for use in their cultivation.

However, he had also fused the meaning of that sword technique into the Cosmic Sunflare Sword technique. Now, it was a combination of hard and soft, with elements of both fire and water mixed together. The mere sight of it was profoundly shocking to all onlookers.

‘How could his true energy be so strong?’ Flame Clearspring marveled. After all, he had the highest cultivation base among everyone present. Eventually, this deputy pontifex of the Tabernacle of Flame would become a Legendary. But now, he was only an Octonary Lifeseizer. And yet, from what he could tell, Yang Qi was just as strong as he was. How could that be?

Jun Tianchou laughed heartily. “Sure enough, Brother, you didn't let me down. I knew you could pull off a miracle. Come come, let me introduce everyone. This is Elder Sister Hua Fengfeng from the Sun Moon Institute. Her father is Hua Tianxiong, a Legendary grand elder. And this is Elder Brother Flame Clearspring, a deputy pontifex from the Tabernacle of Flame. Over here is another conclave student from the Sea God Institute….”

Not including Jun Tianchou and Yang Qi, there were thirteen people present, and as it turned out, not all of them were conclave students. Some were deputy leaders of their sects or clans. In any case, none of them could be considered common people.

As the saying went, birds of a feather flock together. It only made sense that as a conclave student from the Sea God Institute, Jun Tianchou would go on missions with people who had a similar standing as himself.

One of the experts nodded and said, “Brother Yang, I could never have guessed that your true energy would be so impressive. That said, we’re still stuck in here. Even your true energy will eventually run out, and then we’ll fall prey to those monsters out there.”

“I’m fine for now,” Yang Qi said. With that, he made some adjustments to his energy flow, causing the Flameking Cauldron to shine with even brighter light than before.

As everyone bathed in the radiant light, they felt their true energy being replenished rapidly.

That happened because of the aura of the life force springwater that now existed within Yang Qi’s true energy. When Flame Clearspring and Hua Fengfeng sensed what was happening, their eyes glittered with thankfulness.

“Brother Yang,” Flame Clearspring said, “we can't help but feel ashamed to have you sacrificing yourself like this on our behalf. Considering the strong life force aura in your true energy, could it be possible that you acquired that most fabled of precious treasures from the Demi-Immortal Institute, the life force springwater? That seems to be the perfect explanation for this.”

“You're exactly right. I did get a bit of it.” Yang Qi knew that many of the conclave students back in the Demi-Immortal Institute had used life force springwater, mostly thanks to the Crown Prince, so there would be little point in hiding the truth.

“Brother Yang,” Hua Fengfeng said, “don’t draw too deeply on your true energy. Save as much as you can. We need to figure out a way to get out of this spell formation, or at least, last for long enough to be rescued.”

“How long have you been stuck so far?”

“Seven days and nights,” replied a young man named Zhao Wuhun. “All of us have tried to contact the chief elders of our sects, but haven’t received any responses from them. Those few people who did get our messages and came to help were all Lifeseizers, and are now stuck here as well. No Legendaries have come.”

Zhao Wuhun was a conclave student from the House of Martial Saints, which was a powerful organization similar to the House of Spring and Autumn, and ranked just below the four institutes.

“Only Lifeseizers received your messages?” Yang Qi said, expression tightening. “The Legendaries don’t even know the situation? This is bad. My guess is that it’s all part of these fiend-devils’ plan. Our top priority right now should be to escape. If too much time passes, and we really run out of true energy, we’ll definitely be in a bad situation.”

“We’re all well aware of that, Brother Yang,” said a young man in green. “But we really have no options. The Preheaven Devil Formation has the power to bend space. And the eye of the formation is packed with gravitational force, so no matter how you try to break free, you end up getting dragged back in. If you don’t believe us, Brother Yang, just try to make a break for it with the Flameking Cauldron, and see how far you can get.”

Yang Qi looked down at the black-gold devil energy that made up the formation, and could see a large eye staring back up at them.

It was deathly white, and terrifying to even look at. That was the eye of the spell formation, which was actually located deep beneath the surface of the ground.

As a test, he sent some true energy out of the formation, only to find that a huge gravitational force sprang up from the devil-eye and pulled it back.

“A Deathly Devil-Eye?” he said, shocked.

“No, not a Deathly Devil-Eye,” Flame Clearspring said, shaking his head. “Deathly Devil-Eyes are objects from the dao of ghosts and corpses. This is a Preheaven Devil-Eye from the dao of fiend-devils. Obviously, a Preheaven Devil Formation would need one to operate. The devil-eye uses the wretch energy of fiend-devils to bend space-time, and right now, we're completely under its control. If we got sucked into the eye itself, well, then we would be done for.”

“As for those five fiend-devil viscounts,” said another of the experts, a student from the True Dragon Institute, “their true bodies are in the Preheaven Devil-Eye itself. The versions we can see are just projections. One of those viscounts is a Nonary Lifeseizer, which makes that devil-eye even stronger than normal. Their whole goal here is to wear us down until we get sucked into the eye, which will obviously lead to a fate worse than death.”

As of now, there were students from the True Dragon, Sun-Moon, Sea God, and Demi-Immortal Institutes present. All four institutes were represented.

After some thought, Yang Qi said, “It seems the best plan of attack would be to send someone into the Preheaven Devil-Eye to attack those five fiend-devils. If we could disrupt their control over the eye, then everyone else would have a chance to escape.”

Flame Clearspring shook his head. “In the end, that wouldn’t work even if we teamed up. Only a Legendary could stand up to the wretch energy fluctuations in the devil-eye. Anyone under that level would be killed.”

“I’ll go,” Yang Qi said. “I’ll buy you the time you need to escape.”

“What?” everyone exclaimed in shock.

“Brother,” Jun Tianchou said in a serious tone, “are you crazy? Going down there alone would be suicide.”

Chapter 144: Saving Everyone

Jun Tianchou grabbed Yang Qi by the shoulder in the hopes of stopping what he took to be a completely crazy impulse. “That's crazy, Brother. The viscount fiend-devils in that Preheaven Devil-Eye could only be handled by a Legendary. If you go down there, you’re dead for sure. Even if we all joined forces, it would be hopeless. The best thing to do is hold out for as long as possible, and hope that a Legendary comes to save us.”

Everyone else present threw in similar bits of advice.

“Brother Yang,” Flame Clearspring said, “we know you’re trying to do the right thing here, but you’d be like an egg thrown against a boulder. The entities down there are too terrifying to even imagine. Besides, the Preheaven Devil-Eye has the power to distort space-time itself.”

Flame Clearspring already liked Yang Qi a lot, and took him to be a heroic individual who valued friendship and righteousness. After all, in response to a call for help from his sworn brother, he had dropped everything and raced over to Fiend-Devil Island to try to save him. Then, he had completely disregarded any potential dangers by offering to enter the Preheaven Devil-Eye to save everyone else. It was a show of absolute sincerity and heroism.

In fact, it wasn’t just Flame Clearspring who felt this way. Everyone present was starting to really like Yang Qi.

It was a rare thing for someone to take the initiative to help friends in such a way. That was especially true among Lifeseizers, who viewed life as extremely precious.

“Come on, Brother Yang,” Hua Fengfeng said. “There’s no need to bring up crazy talk like that. Besides, if you ended up stuck in the Preheaven Devil-Eye in an attempt to save us, how could we rest our hearts at ease? And how would we explain the situation to the Demi-Immortal Institute?”

“That’s right,” someone else said. “You already put yourself in great danger coming in here to try to help. Now you want to just throw your life away? No way!”

“Alright,” Yang Qi said, sighing as his energy rippled. “I came here to save my sworn brother, and now, I have all of the rest of you as friends. So let me explain. I actually cultivate an energy art that’s specifically designed to deal with fiend-devils. If I go in there, it will definitely be dangerous, but it won’t be suicide. I’ll actually have a good shot of eking out a win. Besides, these fiend-devils’ plan is clear; they want us to try to delay things, and as a result, get completely worn out. For all we know, there may be a fiend-devil count on the way from deeper in Fiend-Devil Island. If a being like that showed up, we would definitely be doomed. The best thing to do is try to get out of here as quickly as possible. All of you need to get off of Fiend-Devil Island immediately, and then wait for me to join you.”

Before any of them could even reply, Yang Qi’s true energy thrummed, causing everything around them to tremble violently.

Swish!

He became a blur that shot through the bright light cast by the Flameking Cauldron, and headed directly toward the gravitational force, causing him to be sucked directly into the Preheaven Devil-Eye.

“Brother!” Flame Clearspring cried, but he was too late to stop Yang Qi.

“This….”

Everyone present was completely taken by surprise that Yang Qi was actually going through with his plan without even discussing matters with them. The spirit of loyalty and self-sacrifice on display was incredible, and it prompted numerous spirited reactions.

“Come on, everyone. Let’s go fight those fiend-devils to the death!”

“Yeah! If Yang Qi can pursue justice with no second thoughts, then how can we be soft!?”

“Everybody calm down!” Jun Tianchou shouted. “My brother went down there in an attempt to save us. We need to think about the situation clearly. If we go in there now, wouldn’t it be a betrayal of his goodwill? But if we could escape and send word to the elders of our various organizations, maybe someone else will come along who can save him.”

At this point, Zhao Wuhun from the House of Martial Saints said, “Are you really Yang Qi’s sworn brother, Jun Tianchou? He’s down there risking his life, and you’re actually talking about how scared you are of dying?”

“It's precisely because I'm Yang Qi’s brother that I'm suggesting this!” Jun Tianchou shot back. “I have faith that he can hold on long enough for us to get out of here and get help. If Yang Qi dies in that Preheaven Devil-Eye, then I swear to end my own life! All of you can bear witness to this oath!”

“He’s right,” Flame Clearspring said. “Everybody just calm down. If we rush in bull-headed, we’re going to turn this into a worse disaster than it already is. Everyone, focus all of your true energy into the Flameking Cauldron, and get ready to break out.”

“If we get out of this devil formation,” Hua Fengfeng added, “Then we can save Brother Yang. We need to stand united on this.”

“It looks like the Preheaven Devil-Eye is starting to stir!” another expert said. “It’s gonna blow! The gravitational force is weakening!”

In that moment, Yang Qi’s voice echoed out from within the Preheaven Devil-Eye. “Brother Tianchou! I'm fine where I am. Now is the perfect time for you to escape.”

When everyone heard his words, their hearts began to pound with excitement, and their eyes welled up with tears. For people like them, there was little worse in the world than to be almost completely out of true energy in a situation like this. To top it off, Yang Qi disregarded his own safety to try to save them. It was impossible for them to not be moved.

Some people were still considering trying to join him.

However, that was when Flame Clearspring shouted, “Let’s go! NOW!”

Focusing his true energy, he attacked the black-gold devil light with full force.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi was already in the midst of deadly combat. As soon as he entered the Preheaven Devil-Eye, he caught sight of several distortions in space-time, within which were the five towering fiend-devils. They were all different. One had armor plating and looked like a crab. Another had a sheep’s head on a human body. The other three had the heads of wolves and the bodies of humans.

All of them had terrifying auras, auras that vastly surpassed those of the projections he had seen outside.

And yet, before anything could happen, his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth flared to life, and his Infernal Deity Spear appeared, burning with Cleansing Flame of the Heavenly World. Instantly, the wretch energy in the area was suppressed.

“Greetings, fiend-devils. Ready to go back to hell!?” With that, he lunged forward, stabbing his spear out in an attack. Instantly, five projections of energy shot out, each one capable of snuffing out all forms of life, and sending fiend-devils to the depths of hell.

Even more impressive, the spear also projected the image of a shadowy figure in black clothing and a wide conical cap, which was none other than an infernal deity from hell, whose task was to collect the souls of the dead.

“What a mighty energy art!” one of the fiend-devils blurted. Howling in rage, the five of them unleashed more streams of wretch energy, causing everything within the Preheaven Devil-Eye to twist and distort.

Five pulses of devil energy smashed into the five spear projections.

However, Yang Qi’s attack was strong enough to weaken the gravitational force being exerted, and thus gave Flame Clearspring and everyone else the chance they needed to break free.

Howling, one of the huge fiend-devils appeared behind Yang Qi. It was the one with the sheep's head and human’s body; it had a pitch-black carapace and carried a massive hammer that it used to strike at Yang Qi with a devastating, killing blow.

This was a fiend-devil viscount, in the Octonary Lifeseizing level, born and raised in a fiend-devil space-time. Its energy arts were wicked to the extreme, and every move was designed to kill. As for its hammer, it was not a manifestation of true energy, but rather, an actual weapon forged by devilish hands, designed to increase the wicked power of fiend-devil energy arts.

The hammer was larger than Yang Qi himself, and cast a dark shadow over him as it descended, just on the verge of turning him into a bloody paste.

Unexpectedly, he didn’t dodge the strike. As the hammer descended, a shining figure with an elephantine head and a human body appeared behind him. It almost looked like a porcelain statue wreathed in Cleansing Flame of the Heavenly World. Without any hesitation, it thrust its hands up to meet the enormous hammer.

Bam!

The two hands and the weapon collided, and the hammer was sent recoiling in the opposite direction, two hand prints embedded on its surface. As for the sheep-headed fiend-devil, it staggered backward as its carapace exploded, causing red blood to spurt out everywhere.

At the same time, terror appeared in its evil, triangular eyes.

“Prepare to die!” Yang Qi seemed one with the Infernal Deity Spear as he blurred into motion, almost teleporting through space-time to appear right in front of the sheep-headed fiend-devil.

Then, he stabbed his spear directly into its heart.

Blood sprayed out like a fountain, and the fiend-devil howled in heaven-shaking, earth-shattering fashion as it realized that its true energy was leaking out rapidly. The Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth was attacking it on a foundational level, destroying it piece by piece.

However, in that moment, another of the enormous fiend-devils howled and leapt into motion. Tendrils of wretch energy shot out, some of them wrapping around the sheep-headed fiend-devil like tentacles, and some of them speeding straight toward Yang Qi’s heart.

This was the most powerful expert of the group of fiend-devil viscounts, who commanded an almost supernatural level of power. It was similar to Holy Daughter Manyflowers, being at the peak of Nonary Lifeseizing, and just on the verge of becoming a Legendary.

A devil claw descended, surrounding Yang Qi, its wretch energy threatening to pierce through his armor and devilize him.

In fact, Yang Qi’s Infernal Deity Plate Armor was already beginning to transform, changing into scales, which was the first sign of devilization.

Powerful fiend-devils all had the ability to devilize humans, which involved turning them into a fiend-devil.

And considering this crab-like fiend-devil viscount was in Nonary Lifeseizing, it meant that not even someone in Quinary Lifeseizing would be able to resist its devilization.

‘What an incredible wretch-devil energy art!’ Yang Qi quickly pulled back his Infernal Deity Spear, then stabbed it toward the crab-like fiend-devil. As he did, over a thousand spear projections appeared.

“Quite a strong human!” the fiend-devil said. Strangely, it sounded excited. “You’ll make the perfect sacrifice for our Preheaven Devil Formation. I might even be able to use you to break into the Legendary level! We set this whole trap up for that very purpose, and you’re delivering yourself up willingly!?”

WHOOOOOSH!

The crab-like fiend-devil threw its sheep-headed comrade off to the side, then stood there facing Yang Qi in a ready stance.

Chapter 145: Fighting Devils

The enormous crab-like fiend-devil had eight claws, each of them sharp enough to slice mountains in half. He also had a disgusting human face, with triangular eyes that glittered with light that could pierce deep into one’s heart and mind.

Anyone who looked into such eyes would experience the terrifying sensation of their soul being tugged at.

That was the power that fiend-devil viscounts had at their command, especially one at the Nonary level.

One by one, the other fiend-devils surrounded Yang Qi. Considering how much taller they were than him, they stared down at him the same way that wolves would stare down at a bunny.

Besides the fiend-devil close to being a Legendary, the sheep-headed fiend-devil was at the Octonary level, and the other three were just below it, in the Septenary level. Each and every one of them was savage, ruthless, malicious, evil and cruel.

As for the energy field they generated in their formation of five, it was strong enough to literally crush anyone in Quinary Lifeseizing or lower out of existence. However, it was nothing particularly threatening to Yang Qi.

The sheep-headed fiend-devil that he had stabbed was already fully healed thanks to the help provided by the crab-like fiend-devil.

Were it not for that outside assistance, he wouldn’t have escaped from the Infernal Deity Spear with his life.

And without the powerful nefarious energy in the Preheaven Devil-Eye, there was no way he would have recovered so quickly.

Despite not having managed to take the thing’s life, Yang Qi had put on an impressive enough showing to shock all of the fiend-devils present. He was a mere Quinary Lifeseizer student, and yet had charged into the Preheaven Devil-Eye and stabbed a fiend-devil viscount through the heart. They could hardly imagine what that implied regarding his cultivation base.

Considering he was surrounded by five fiend-devils, Yang Qi wasn’t going to hold anything back. Drawing on all of the power he could muster, he brandished his spear; the wails of ghosts and howls of gods rang out, and the Cleansing Flame of the Heavenly World raged around him.

“Fiend-devils from hell, you should be on your knees in front of me, trembling at the sight of my spear. I represent the legion of gods who dominate hell. I am the sovereign lord who reigns supreme over all wretched entities of the underworld….”

With that, he unleashed five more spear attacks. As he did, the image of a god appeared behind him, porcelain in color, with an elephantine head and a human body. It stretched out its hands and splayed its five fingers wide, causing all of the wretch energy in the area to sweep toward the Hellfire Crucible inside Yang Qi.

In fact, the five fiend-devils realized to their terror they had lost control over the wretch energy of their own Preheaven Devil-Eye.

WHOOOOOOOOSH!

Five spear projections sped directly toward the hearts of the five fiend-devils, who already felt their wretch energy being pulled away from them. Thanks to this spear, their devil arts were acting like government officials in the presence of the emperor. There was virtually nothing they could do to fight back.

This was the typical reaction of evil techniques to the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.

Whether it was fiend-devils, devil-ghosts, or zombies, as long as they carried the characteristics of hell, the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth was the bane of their existence.

Roar!

The crab-like fiend-devil howled as its eight arms shot forward and formed an ancient sealing mark. Instantly, a burst of energy fluctuations shot out.

“Grand Palms of the Wretch-Emperor!”

Eight enormous palms appeared, wicked, dripping with blood, and bursting with so much energy that everything in the area distorted.

Those eight hands quickly vanquished the five spear projections.

And yet, Yang Qi didn’t seem fazed at all. He slipped from stance to stance using his spear, stabbing at the palm projections in quick succession, destroying one after another.

Suddenly, the crab-like fiend-devil grinned in sinister fashion and began to shrink down in size until he was as tall as an ordinary person. However, that only seemed to concentrate his power and make it more potent. Furthermore, it also summoned a manifestation of Humanoid True Energy, a wretched emperor dressed in black clothing, bursting with the most evil of auras.

Yang Qi recognized this energy art as being a secret legacy of fiend-devils, Wretch-Emperor Energy. If that power fully coalesced in the wretch energy of the Preheaven Devil-Eye, then it would likely make the battle too difficult for Yang Qi.

Quickly summoning his Fiend-Devil Wings, he circulated his true energy and before the wretched emperor could fully form, resorted to the dao of the quick strike.

RUUUUMBLE!

He vanished, moving so quickly that he appeared right in front of the fiend-devil, where he thrust out his spear with the power of ninety-nine ancient megamammoths to back it.

‘Strike like a thunderstorm!’

This quick strike really was like a thunderstorm, like a manifestation of the rage of the heavens.

Instantly, the wretched emperor that the crab-like fiend-devil had been summoning was stabbed through, making it impossible for it to fully form.

In response, the crab-like fiend-devil spun in place and fled. Yang Qi’s quick strike was like the rage of a god from heaven, and despite being in the Nonary Lifeseizing level, he knew that if he kept fighting, he would end up dead.

Before anything else could happen, Yang Qi vanished again, then reappeared in front of a wolf-headed fiend-devil.

These creatures were weaklings as far as Yang Qi was concerned. Back when he was in Quaternary Lifeseizing, he had consumed a devil-ghost who was an even stronger Septenary Lifeseizer. Considering how much stronger he was now, he could easily kill them with a single strike from his spear.

Whack. Whack. Whack!

Three explosions rang out as the three wolf-headed fiend-devils exploded, and their demon cores flew into Yang Qi’s Hellfire Crucible.

Then, blue light shone out as he put their bodies into his Heart of the Sea thumb-ring. After all, their corpses were full of treasured parts that could be used to forge magical items, or handed in to the institute for a hefty reward of merit points.

With that, he turned and began to fly away. He had no desire to try to track down the crab-like fiend-devil. After all, he wasn’t completely certain that he would actually be able to beat it in a fight. More pertinent, the Preheaven Devil-Eye had already lost much of its gravitational force.

Also, he could sense that the Flameking Cauldron was gone, which indicated that the other students had managed to escape the devil formation.

**

Meanwhile, outside of Fiend-Devil Island, Flame Clearspring, Hua Fengfeng, Jun Tianchou, and the others all hovered in the air, looking back at the island and the lesser fiend-devils that flew about on it. Thanks to the help Yang Qi had provided in weakening the Preheaven Devil Formation, they had finally managed to break out and escape. It was impossible to say how many lesser fiend-devils they killed as they did.

“I wonder how Brother Yang is doing. It was difficult enough to escape, let alone pay attention to what was happening in the Preheaven Devil-Eye. That thing is nothing to take lightly. I hope he’s alright.”

“Flame Clearspring. Jun Tianchou. Quickly notify the elders at your institutes. Tell them to send help immediately. We absolutely, positively must not let anything happen to Brother Yang.”

“We need to call for the Legendary elders. I’ll send a message immediately with my command medallion.” One of the conclave students pulled out a very valuable command medallion and prepared to send the urgent message.

But just as the student was about to send the message, a whistling sound reached their ears, and a blur could be seen. Then, a voice echoed out. “Brother Tianchou, there’s no need to send any messages. I broke free. Let’s get out of here.”

“It's Brother Yang Qi!”

“Brother Yang….”

“Brother Yang didn’t die? He succeeded! He's a genius favored by the heavens! A role model for a generation!”

“So strong!”

Everyone rushed over and surrounded Yang Qi, and could sense from the intensity of his true energy fluctuations that he had just fought a heaven-shaking, earth-shattering battle.

“It’s not the time and place to talk. Let’s put some distance between us and Fiend-Devil Island. Once we find a safe place, we can talk a bit.” With that, the group flew along for a few tens of thousands of kilometers over the sea until they found an island covered with blossoming peach trees.

They were now so far away from Fiend-Devil Island that they couldn’t sense even a scrap of wretch energy. Even the demonlings in the nearby sea were docile and peaceful.

As they landed, the entire group immediately began to offer more praise. “Brother Yang Qi, I almost can’t believe that you escaped from the Preheaven Devil-Eye! Without you, we would have been killed by those viscounts.”

Yang Qi smiled. “Ah, you’re definitely exaggerating. Besides, I just happened to get lucky, and don’t need to fear devil energy. As friends of Brother Tianchou, you’re friends of mine. And I'm the type of person who will go through hell and high water for my friends.”

Suddenly, Zhao Wuhun from the House of Martial Saints said, “Listen, everyone. We barely escaped certain disaster thanks to the help of Brother Yang Qi. I suggest that we all become sworn siblings right here and now. Henceforth, we will live and die together, and share glory and misfortune alike. What do you say?”

He was a hot-blooded fellow, the same one who had suggested that they all join Yang Qi in a fight to the death with the fiend-devils.

“Fine! Great idea!” said Flame Clearspring, the strongest of them all. Eyes sparkling, he looked over at Yang Qi with an expression of admiration. As far as he was concerned, it was a great idea to become a sworn sibling of someone who would face danger for his friends, and whose heroism and sense of justice towered to the heavens.

Chapter 146: Sworn Siblings from All Corners

‘More sworn siblings?’ Yang Qi thought, somewhat taken aback. The thought hadn’t even occurred to him, and that was definitely not why he had saved them. But after thinking about it for a moment, he remembered that all of these people were like royalty in their various organizations. Some were even conclave students from the big institutes.

If they all became sworn siblings, then they would definitely make a powerful force if situations of life or death came around.

Although he wasn’t the type to rely on help all the time, having more sworn siblings wouldn't be a bad thing.

“Alright,” Yang Qi said with a nod. “Considering we were all in a deadly situation just now, I'd say becoming sworn siblings makes perfect sense. And we’re all from righteous, orthodox organizations. Here, in this very forest of peach trees, let’s become the closest of friends. It doesn’t matter which of us is male or female. We will be brothers and sisters. In fact, I’ll be the first to swear the oath.”

With that, he dropped to his knees.

Everyone else followed suit, their hearts pounding. Kneeling together in a circle, they used the soil itself to stand in for incense.

“I, Yang Qi….”

“I, Flame Clearspring….”

“I, Jun Tianchou….”

“I, Hua Fengfeng….”

Everyone spoke their names, and then, they joined their voices together.

“Today, on this island of peach blossoms, we swear to become brothers and sisters. Our surnames might be different, but we shall live and die together, and shall share honor and disgrace. We shall be bound together in spirit and action, shall rid the world of devils and demons, and shall face all difficulty together. As brothers and sisters, we won’t hesitate to go through hell and high water for each other. Let any betrayers be exterminated by heaven and executed by the earth.”

Afterward, they brushed the dust off their clothes, rose to their feet, and turned to embrace each other.

Cultivators of energy arts felt a special connection to heaven, and had a healthy fear and respect for its will. Now, they had sworn a formal oath to heaven to become sworn siblings, and thus, it was only natural that they immediately felt more closely connected to each other.

There were exactly fifteen people present.

Other than Yang Qi and Jun Tianchou, there were thirteen members of various institutes, aristocratic clans, or other powerful organizations. All of them were Quinary Lifeseizers or higher, and most were conclave disciples. They were a force who could shake the heavens and topple the earth in the Rich-Lush Continent.

And now, Yang Qi considered them all as brothers and sisters.

Flame Clearspring was a deputy pontifex from the Tabernacle of Flame.

Hua Fengfeng was a conclave student from the Sun Moon Institute, a Septenary Lifeseizer who could rebuke even the elements of nature. In addition to being extremely beautiful, she was a valiant and formidable fighter as well. There were two other female conclave students from the Sun Moon Institute, friends of Hua Fengfeng. They were blood sisters, and were named Ji Xiaoman and Ji Xiaorong.

Those three were the only women in the group.

Then there was Zhao Wuhun, a Septenary Lifeseizer and conclave student from the House of Martial Saints. His master was a Legendary from that same organization, making him very famous.

Next was Meng Qingshan, a Senary Lifeseizer and young lord from the famous Meng Clan. The Meng Clan had a history that stretched back to the distant past, and once had a Great Sage as one of their members, much like the Gu Clan had. However, Meng Qingshan actually had a much higher position in his clan than Gu Fenxian had.

Next were Soaring Cloudheaven, Soaring Cloudwyrm, and Soaring Cloudgrit, who were all Quinary Lifeseizers. They were blood brothers from the House of Soaring Clouds, an organization similar to the House of Spring and Autumn or the House of Martial Saints.

Next was Yuan Tiankong, a conclave student from the Sea God Institute, a Quinary Lifeseizer and Elder Brother to Jun Tianchou.

After him was Sun Qian, Quinary Lifeseizer and conclave student from the True Dragon Institute.

Then there was Li Zhengdao, conclave student from the True Dragon Institute, and Elder Brother of Sun Qian. He was also a Quinary Lifeseizer.

Finally was Su Ximing, who was actually not a disciple or child of any organization or clan. He had come across good fortune of his own, and silently practiced cultivation to the point of being a Quinary Lifeseizer. He was a friend of Jun Tianchou, and was actually preparing to found a sect of his own. It had all started when he came across the first half of an imperial-class energy art, the Eight Polarities Divine Anthology.

One by one, Yang Qi met all of his new brothers and sisters, and learned a bit about them. All of them knew that he was from the Demi-Immortal Institute, and they were already in awe of his energy arts. In fact, Flame Clearspring could tell that despite being an Octonary Lifeseizer, if he got in a real fight with Yang Qi, he would come out the loser.

For a Quinary Lifeseizer to be able to defeat someone in Octonary Lifeseizing was a rarity that only happened once every thousand years.

“Brother,” Flame Clearspring said, “who could ever have guessed that a genius like you would rise up in the Demi-Immortal Institute? When the Inter-Institutional Martial Arts Competition arrives, I'm certain you’ll sweep your opponents and take first place. The Tabernacle of Flame has been invited to observe, so I’ll definitely be watching your performance.”

In response, Yang Qi shook his head. “I'm not interested in fame. I just want to practice my cultivation in peace and quiet. In fact, I don't want to make much of a scene until I'm a Legendary. Before then, I'm worried I might get killed if my true strength is revealed.”

“Killed?” Hua Fengfeng said, clearly surprised. “Does someone have a grudge with you, Little Bro Qi? If so, how strong are they? Don't tell me that you have a beef with a Legendary.”

Yang Qi smiled. “It's a personal matter of mine that I’d rather not trouble you all with.” With that, he waved his hand, causing a manifestation of Humanoid True Energy to appear, which broke apart and reformed into a handful of paper talismans. “Brothers and Sisters, my Humanoid True Energy contains some of my heart-blood. If you ever encounter any trouble, crush the talisman, and I’ll sense it. And after that, ten thousand mountains and rivers couldn’t block my path to come help.”

With that, he sent the paper talismans flying out to everyone present.

Snatching a talisman, Flame Clearspring said, “Yang Qi, if you have that attitude, then you’re not treating us as true brothers and sisters. You just braved the depths of a Preheaven Devil-Eye to save us. If you’re facing some trouble, how could we possibly sit idly by? In fact, even if it were a Legendary, we still wouldn’t need to fear. After all, every single one of us is backed by a major power, right? Truth be told, with all fifteen of us working together, we could shake the entire continent! Who out there would we possibly be afraid of?”

Flame Clearspring was the son of the pontifex of the Tabernacle of Flame, who was a famous Legendary, so it was little wonder he was so confident.

Yang Qi sighed. “Well, to tell you the truth, it’s the Crown Prince Society. Have you heard of them?”

“Crown Prince Society?” Faces fell, and some gasps were even heard. “Brother Yang, don’t tell me that your enemy is the leader of the Crown Prince Society, the famous Crown Prince himself? I’ve heard he's a god from heaven descended into the mortal world, born after his mother dreamed of a fallen star. He's definitely not someone to take lightly.”

“Well, I'm not specifically referring to him. Here's the whole story….” With that, Yang Qi went on to explain how Yun Hailan betrayed him, joined the Demi-Immortal Institute, attracted the attention of the Crown Prince, and finally took Patriarchs Wind and Cloud as masters. “If I can reach the Legendary level, then I would be able to fight with people like the Crown Prince if I had to.”

“You’re right,” Jun Tianchou said. “That is a bit of a problem. The truth is that although all of us are outstanding individuals from the most powerful organizations in the Rich-Lush Continent, the Crown Prince ranks even higher than us. A mere wave of his hand could cause a storm of chaos to grip the lands. However, even if he were more powerful than he already is, if you make a move on him, Brother, we’ll all join you!”

“That’s right,” said Sun Qian from the True Dragon Institute. “I'm not afraid of anything in heaven or earth!” But then he shook his head. “That said, the Crown Prince Society really is powerful. They’ve even started meddling in affairs in our True Dragon Institute. In fact, some of the students there have joined the society. And with the blessing of the society, the leaders of the so-called branch there have advanced by leaps and bounds in their cultivation. Everyone knows how ambitious the Crown Prince is. He wants to single-handedly control all of the students in all four of the institutes. But it's not like we’ll let him do that without a fight, right?”

“You’re right, Brother Sun Qian,” Yang Qi asked. “By the way, is there a young woman at your institute named Yan Feixia? She’s probably a freshman student. I'm just curious how she's been doing.”

“Freshman student? I usually don’t pay attention to people who rank so low.” After all, the difference between a conclave student like Sun Qian and a freshman student was like the difference between heaven and earth. “Although, now that I think about it, the name Yan Feixia does sound familiar. I'm pretty sure one of the Legendary elders took a liking to her and accepted her as a consecrated apprentice. She must have a pretty impressive background. Why? Are you close with her?”

“Close with her? To some degree, yes. I saved her life once. But on the other hand, she’s somewhat of an enemy. My clan drove her clan out of the city we both come from.” He went on to provide a bit more explanation, then said, “The reason I bring it up is not because I want her dead. If that were the case, I wouldn’t have saved her life. I’m just interested to know if she’d be willing to turn weapons of war into gifts of jade and silk as the saying goes. In fact, that’s one of the reason why we simply drove her Yan Clan away, instead of wiping them out.”

Sun Qian nodded. “I understand what you mean, Brother. If I get the chance, I’ll explain the situation to her. It’s always better to end rivalries than foster grudges. We’re students of the four institutes now. We shouldn’t let clan squabbling interfere with more important things.”

At this point, Hua Fengfeng said, “Little Bro Qi, there are always a multitude of issues to deal with in life, and little time to do so. We’re all brothers and sisters now, so we’ll have plenty of time in the future to take care of any important matters. For now, it’s time for us all to return home. The big martial arts tournament is coming, and we all look forward to seeing you stomp the competition.”

Yang Qi nodded. “Very well. I look forward to reuniting with all of you there. It won't be long now.” Yang Qi was anxious to get back to the Demi-Immortal Institute and make good use of the life force springwater. If he could rise by another level or two, then if he ended up facing a Legendary, he would at least be able to defend himself.

“I’ll take my leave now, Brother.”

“If you have the time, come visit us. We’ll definitely entertain you well.”

Everyone said their goodbyes. After all, the fourteen others in the group had been stuck in the Preheaven Devil Formation for seven days and seven nights. They needed time to replenish their true energy, and then reflect on the experience. That was the only way to benefit from the incident, and even make some progress because of it.

Flame Clearspring was the first to fly into the air and then speed away, and everyone else followed suit.

Chapter 147: Sword Training

Thus ended a spectacular battle, and a daring rescue.

Then, on an island of peach blossoms in the middle of the East Sea, fifteen people swore oaths to live and die together. Yang Qi was quite pleased with how it all turned out. Now he had sworn siblings from all corners of the lands. Having lots of good friends would always prove to be an advantage. And he would be reuniting with those friends sooner rather than later, at the big martial arts competition between the four institutes.

The fact that experts from all sorts of orthodox organizations would be invited to be spectators at the competition meant that it was a grand occasion involving the entire continent.

The Sage Ancestor Dynasty, which officially ruled over all the lands, would send representatives to oversee the occasion. Sometimes, the emperor himself would come to demonstrate his energy arts as a way of underscoring his majesty and might.

It was also an occasion in which the big institutes could show off their top geniuses.

Furthermore, it was a way for the institutes to identify their top talents, the individuals who would lead the future growth of their respective organizations.

Even more important, if the True Dragon, Sun-Moon, and Sea God Institutes could bring more genius experts to the competition than the Demi-Immortal Institute, it was entirely possible that the Demi-Immortal Institute would no longer be known as the number one institute in the lands.

That was something that the leadership of the Demi-Immortal Institute, the elders, grand elders, prime elders and prime paragon elders couldn't possibly stand for.

Yang Qi had long since noticed the somewhat tense atmosphere in the institute recently. And many experts had gone into seclusion to work on their cultivation, including his Aunt Susu, and even Holy Daughter Manyflowers.

‘Right. I really need to get some life force springwater to Aunt Susu. She’ll really advance by leaps and bounds then. When Holy Daughter Manyflowers comes out of seclusion and sees me, she’s definitely going to be blown away.’

Unless Holy Daughter Manyflowers managed to reach the Legendary level, she would currently be at the same power level as Yang Qi. And if he went all out, he could probably best her. Of course, if she had become a Legendary, there would be no competition between them.

Unfortunately for her, there was no way Yang Qi would give her life force springwater to help her with a breakthrough. For one thing, it provided life force, not the vital energy that was necessary to reach the Legendary level. Even more pertinent, if word spread about the matter, and the people from the Crown Prince Society found out, they would instantly know that he was responsible for robbing them, which could prove troublesome.

Although Holy Daughter Manyflowers was powerful, she wasn’t powerful enough to protect him from the Crown Prince.

According to the stories, the Crown Prince wasn't just a Legendary, he was a top expert among Legendaries. He was even more powerful than Patriarchs Wind and Cloud. Otherwise, those patriarchs wouldn’t have treated Holy Daughter Manyflowers so insultingly during their last meeting.

Yang Qi watched all of his new sworn siblings leaving. Eventually, he was alone on the island of peach blossoms, and yet, he didn’t leave. Instead, he decided to enjoy the lovely scenery for a bit.

Although this island had no name, the peach trees that covered it were not ordinary. They bloomed with spectacular colors, and emanated a strong medicinal aroma. They were also enormous, with dark green trunks that resembled jadeite.

Yang Qi sent out a stream of sword energy to slice a branch off one of the trees, whereupon an extremely fragrant, emerald-green sap flowed out. Clearly, these trees were very high-quality spirit plants.

Furthermore, after looking around the island more closely, it was obvious that the trees weren’t growing here naturally, they were being tended by human hands.

Upon arriving, neither Yang Qi nor any of his friends had seen any traces of habitation, nor had they seen any mansion grotto where someone might be in seclusion. That wasn’t necessarily unusual. Islands dotted the sea like stars in the sky or Go pieces on a Go board, whereas human beings were few and far between. Considering that there were underwater spirit meridians everywhere, it wasn’t unusual for energy arts masters to use islands like personal farms to raise spirit plants.

As such, it was likely that whoever tended these trees would eventually come back.

According to what Jun Tianchou had told Yang Qi, the numerous beautiful holy lands that existed in the region surrounding Fiend-Devil Island had long since been abandoned. Energy arts masters just didn’t want to deal with the constant threat of the fiend-devils.

Apparently, that was exactly what this island was.

Flying up into the air, Yang Qi looked around and confirmed that the island was only about five kilometers from end to end, and roughly crescent-shaped. Furthermore, from the various birds that flew about amongst the trees, it seemed unlikely that there were any dangerous devillings present.

Yang Qi sent his true energy out into the air, slowly covering the entire island. As he assessed its layout, he realized that there was some sort of spirit spring in the very middle of the island, emitting a steady stream of spirit energy.

‘No wonder. Without that spirit spring, it seems unlikely that all these trees would be growing here. The sap from the trees would help in energy arts cultivation even more than energy convergence pills. However, to a Lifeseizer, it would be relatively useless.’

Before going back to the Demi-Immortal Institute, Yang Qi wanted to do a bit of practice with his Cosmic Sunflare Sword technique and Invincible King’s Fist, and this deserted island seemed like the perfect place to do so.

Obviously, he couldn’t use his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth in the middle of the big competition, with numerous experts all looking on. Even trying to use it in disguise would be too risky with so many extremely knowledgeable individuals present.  Even the most righteous and sanctimonious energy artists would transform into worse fiends than Ghost Emperor Yama if they thought they could get their hands on a godly-class energy art. And the result would be his own death.

Despite all that, though, he didn’t want to just blindly press on without any greater strategy. Therefore, his plan was to take the true energy of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth and convert it into sword energy that could be used by his Cosmic Sunflare Sword. That would turn the sword technique into something that surpassed anything which had ever been seen, either in the past or the present.

With a sword technique like that, he would be like a shining sun high in the sky, capable of defeating any genius who tried to fight him.

With that, he made his way to the spirit spring in the middle of the island. Because of the spirit energy it emitted, everything surrounding it was completely pure and clean.

The mouth of the spring was like a little pond that stretched down to depths unknown. In fact, it was actually impossible to see its bottom, as though the spring descended into the very depths of the ocean.

Yang Qi sat down next to it and sent out a field of energy that would make him invisible to any people or demonlings who were observing from outside.

‘I need to thoroughly understand the Cosmic Sunflare Sword, and then combine it with my own true energy.’ Although the Cosmic Sunflare Sword was a royal-class energy art, it actually existed on the very cusp of imperial-class. The person who originally invented it used it to dominate all creation, to raze mountains to the ground and evaporate entire seas. Its sword energy was formed by the quintessence of the burning sun, and was capable of emitting heat like that of ten suns combined.

He had acquired the full and complete technique from the Demi-Immortal Institute some time ago, but had never spent the time to study it thoroughly.

The sun burned high in the sky, and as he began to work with the technique, a smaller sun appeared above his head. Two suns shone with brilliant radiance, causing the entire island of peach trees to be covered with golden light.

From a distance, the island almost looked like it was on fire.

‘Sword Energy Convergence!’ As he continued to work with the technique, the sword energy of the Cosmic Sunflare Sword became a swirling, golden vortex as the sunlight was sucked into it. The quintessence of the burning sun in the sky created numerous shafts of bright light, true flame that writhed like fiery serpents.

‘Sensing the Star God!’ Yang Qi’s sword energy vortex was like a black hole, dragging all of the light in the area into it, and causing the devillings nearby to sink down to the depths of the ocean in fear.

Eventually, the gravitational force began to drag the energy from the spirit spring into it, combining it with the aggressive, masculine energy therein.

As of this moment, Yang Qi had pushed his Cosmic Sunflare Sword to the level of Sensing the Star God.

That indicated that his version of the technique had reached the level intended by its original creator. He could actually sense the star god that existed in the huge sun overhead, and could call on its power by communicating to it with his nascent divinity. Even in the pitch black of night, his sword energy could summon burning true flame of the sun that would dispel all darkness.

By cultivating it to the proper level, one could literally turn night into day. In fact, experts of the past had used that ability to create areas around them that didn't see night for months at a time.

Obviously, that was something that came with the Legendary level, as it involved mysterious transformations of the magical laws of space.

Once Yang Qi succeeded with Sensing the Star God, he felt his true energy flowing into the sword energy vortex, and reaching an indescribable state.

A boom rang out as the sword energy shot upward, causing everything for fifty kilometers to tremble, heading into the sea of clouds and then beyond.

Yang Qi could sense that, far out into the void, there was a sphere of fire, burning endlessly, majestic beyond the compare of any human. It was a thing of god-spirits, something created by the legion of gods. It was the sun! The sun!

The sun was something that surpassed Legendaries or Great Sages. In fact, compared to that massive entity, a Great Sage would be like nothing more than an ant.

With his thoughts cast into the sword energy, Yang Qi could feel the enormous burning sun, and could sense the intense heat branding itself onto his soul.

Finally, the sword energy returned to him, causing endless sparks to rain down on the island of peach trees.

It was a heavenly sign that his energy art had stirred the true flame of the sun itself.

In that moment, something deep in the island reacted to the sword energy, and stirred. Suddenly, the spirit spring turned intensely cold.

Chapter 148: Island of Unusual Fate

Having reached the level of Sensing the Star God, Yang Qi could draw out the true flame of the sun itself, and use it to forge sword energy.

As his cultivation base grew more and more refined, his sword technique could become godlike, and even use true flame to create a cosmic flame palace. His blood could slowly become golden like the sun, until eventually, he could call himself the offspring of the sun.

Of course, his blood had already been purified to the point where it was like the color of porcelain. It was the blood of a god from heaven, which surpassed the blood of the sun. Therefore, he didn’t need to use scorching hot true energy to transform his blood.

In fact, with the blood of the legion of gods, he could push his Cosmic Sunflare Sword technique to an even greater level of power, until it was also like something created by gods.

Doing that would be far more effective than improving it with a sun gem.

According to myth and legend, it was the legion of gods who had created the sun to begin with. After all, they were the sovereign lords of all, and had created everything.

Even as the fiery rain descended on the island of peach trees, incomparably frigid energy erupted from the spirit spring, becoming crystalline layers of ice that rose up to block the path of the sparks.

Considering how much frigid energy blanketed the island, it seemed like there must be something lurking in its depths that had been provoked into action.

Each spark within that fiery rain was hot enough to melt metal and pierce rock, and if it had actually landed onto the island, it would have been turned into slag, and all of the trees would have been destroyed.

That was one reason why Yang Qi had avoided carrying out this session of cultivation at the Demi-Immortal Institute.

If he had, it would have definitely been noticed, and worse, would probably have thrown the institute into chaos. And of course, people would have begun to investigate the reason for it all.

In contrast, he was free to do what he wished on this remote island. After all, with his life force springwater and abundance of vital energy, he wasn’t worried about any problems cropping up. Furthermore, it seemed as though he actually ended up encountering even further good fortune.

As the frigid energy spewed out of the spring, it became like clouds of ice that blocked the intensely hot rain of sparks.

Cracking sounds rang out as the sparks hit the ice clouds. Not a single spark made it through; they were vanquished by the clouds, which slowly began to turn into dense mist.

At that point, Yang Qi waved his hand, causing the deluge of sparks to swirl together to form a fiery sword several dozen meters long, which he used to slash the ice clouds to bits.

Then, he sucked the sword energy into his dantian region, where it condensed down into a flame spark, floating amidst his true energy.

The most typical representation of Sensing the Star God was the ability to make a flame spark that represented the sun. Although it was miniscule, and constantly flickered as though it might be extinguished, it was actually formed from the true flame of the sun, and was itself like the soul of the sun.

“Disperse this mist!” He then unleashed his sword energy, causing golden, burning light to emerge, which transformed into fire flowers, fire trees, fire crows, fire birds, fire horses, fire qilins, fire dragons, fire humanoids, fire phoenixes, fire palaces and the like.

The fire then spread out through the island, dispelling the mists, and allowing the brilliant sunlight to shine down on it again.

Miraculously, none of the peach trees were burned, and in fact, they seemed to bloom even more spectacularly than before. Yang Qi’s sword energy had truly reached the point of perfection; it was as if it had its own soul which governed its actions, and prevented it from blindly destroying everything in its path.

With the ice clouds and the mists driven away, the island almost seemed to be reborn. No more frigid energy pulsed out of the spirit stream, only spirit energy, which spread out to nourish the trees.

‘There’s something very strange about this spring!’ Yang Qi looked into its depths, but could see nothing, so he finally sent out a stream of true energy to investigate.

Down, down the true energy went, finding no bottom.

Eventually, the water grew so cold that his true energy began to freeze up. And as he descended further and further down, the space widened.

At the mouth, the spring was only the size of a bowl, but down here, thousands of meters from the surface, it was already kilometers wide. In fact, it was wider than the island above, but did not contain sea water.

The water here was not like the sea water in the ocean. Sea water was salty, but this one was sweet and aromatic, and could liven the senses.

At a depth of roughly twelve thousand meters, the level of coldness was shocking, and Yang Qi’s true energy was so frozen up that it could hardly move. Shaking his head, he bolstered his true energy directly with the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, allowing it to break through the ice like a boulder crushing a drinking glass. Soon, he was thirty-thousand meters down.

There, he saw successive layers of ice so solid that it couldn’t possibly break or melt by any ordinary means. It was as hard as steel, and pulsed with such frigid energy that it could freeze virtually all other types of true energy. If it wasn’t for his godly-class energy art, there was simply no way Yang Qi could sink his true energy to this depth.

Not even Nonary Lifeseizers like Holy Daughter Manyflowers could do so.

The layers of ice seemed endless, and as still as death, without any living things anywhere. Yang Qi’s stream of true energy swept this way and that, which required a massive drainage of energy with every breath of time that passed. Thankfully, he had such boundless reserves that he could easily sustain such wastage.

‘Why would there be a kingdom of ice at the bottom of a spirit spring? There must be something hiding in here. Otherwise, why would so much frigid energy have shot up to counter the rain of sparks?’ As his true energy ‘eyes’ roved about, he suddenly realized that in the depths of the frozen waters was a baleful, fiendish energy that suddenly rose up as if to attack him.

‘There it is!’ Some distance away in the depths of the ice was an enormous ice dragon.

It was hundreds of meters long, and it seemed capable of moving through the layers of ice with no effort at all. It was a deep azure blue, and almost looked like a statue of jade or stone, pulsing with boundless frigid energy.

‘An ice dragon? A real dragon?’

Real live dragons were nothing to be taken lightly. For the most part, they only existed in mythological stories of the distant past. Even Legendaries would immediately retreat in the face of such a beast.

The most powerful creatures in modern times were floodwyrms, not dragons, the two of which were different on a substructural level.

Shockingly, in the depths of this spirit spring, far beneath the island of peach trees, was a kingdom of ice, within which lurked an actual ice dragon.

‘Hold on. No, it's not a true dragon, it's a sword! A divine sword!’ Although Yang Qi’s true energy seemed like it was about to be defeated, it was at that moment that, as he sat above on the island next to the mouth of the spring, he said, “Hell-crushing godmammoths can sweep away heavenly bodies, and inhale suns and moons!”

All of the true energy within him shot toward the spring, causing the stream of true energy which descended down to transform into something like the trunk of a mammoth.

The image of a godlike being appeared above him, with an elephantine head and a human body, whose trunk seemed capable of absorbing any and all treasure which might exist in the depths of the spring.

As for the dragon, Yang Qi could see through to its true form, which was a long sword roughly a meter long, dark green in color, almost as if it were forged from jade. Its aura was no less powerful than the crab-like fiend-devil he had fought recently. As for the ice dragon, it was merely the manifestation of the frigid energy that emanated from the sword itself.

It was a divine sword that already had its own spirit; apparently, it was lurking in the depths of this spring as it grew stronger. It was almost like some consummate demon-devil hiding away practicing personal cultivation.

‘What an incredible sword….’ Yang Qi thought. ‘Amazing. I've never seen a sword such as this before. I wonder what mighty expert left it here, sealed in this spring, feeding on the layers of ancient ice, never to be seen in the outside world? I have to get it! If I combined it with my Cosmic Sunflare Sword technique, the complementary aspects of fire and ice would make it so powerful that I could dominate the world of energy artists.’

Yang Qi immediately started to get excited.

However, it was a very powerful sword, located in a mysterious kingdom of ice. Even a Legendary would probably have trouble subduing it. All Yang Qi could do at the moment was use his true energy to struggle with the sword, hopefully subdue it, and then reel it out from the depths. Obviously, he couldn’t enter the depths of the spring with his fleshly body.

And that would significantly limit the strength he could use.

Obviously, this wasn’t a naturally occurring phenomenon. Some almighty expert must have left the sword there, someone who was likely a Legendary.

The massive trunk of true energy that Yang Qi controlled stretched into the depths of the mysterious kingdom of ice, and then headed directly toward the ice dragon.

As for the dragon, it looked over disdainfully and then attacked the true energy trunk.

Chapter 149: Subduing the Divine Sword

The sword, manifested as an ice dragon, slashed out with its claws, sending crystalline streams of frigid energy out to wrap like fetters around Yang Qi’s true energy trunk.

‘True energy reversal.’ The trunk swished, shattering the fetters.

‘Nascent divinity incarnation.’ Yang Qi poured more true energy into the depths of the spring, creating a Humanoid True Energy manifestation with an elephantine head and a human body.

Personally controlling the manifestation, Yang Qi sent it to attack the ice dragon with the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.

By this point, the massive wastage of true energy had Yang Qi down to half of his total reserves.

After all, the divine projection with the elephantine head and a human body required massive support to be able to unleash the true battle prowess that Yang Qi was capable of. Otherwise, it would be smashed by the ice dragon in the shortest of moments.

‘Life force springwater!’ A drop of life force springwater flew out of his thumb-ring, entering his mouth and instantly dissolving into true energy, replenishing and invigorating him.

The fact that he had to resort to life force springwater was very telling. Clearly, other than him, no one but a Legendary could possibly try to subdue this divine sword.

As the battle raged in the icy depths of the spring, a long spear suddenly appeared in the hand of the godmammoth, a spear that burned with Cleansing Flame of the Heavenly World.

The Infernal Deity spear had appeared, accompanied by the wail of ghosts and the howl of gods. It was like a scene from hell itself.

POP!

The spear stabbed into the ice dragon, and pierced all the way to the dark green body of the sword itself.

The sword seemed to pulse with fury, and sent more frigid energy sweeping out into the darkness around it.

Pinging sounds rang out as the ice dragon sword and the Infernal Deity Spear clashed back and forth dozens of times. With life force springwater at his disposal, Yang Qi’s true energy was virtually limitless. In no other circumstance would he be forced to do this. In fact, even when he was fighting five fiend-devil viscounts in the Preheaven Devil-Eye, he hadn’t been even close to running out of true energy.

From that it could be imagined how much he would benefit if he managed to subdue and take this divine sword.

In fact, he was willing to throw caution to the wind to do so.

The true energy that flowed out of him looked like crystal or porcelain, and as it smashed into the ice layers of the stream, it fueled the epic battle.

The godmammoth projection grew more and more corporeal, and unleashed such heaven-shaking, earth-toppling power that the ice around it began to melt and turn into steam.

‘The power from hell and the power from the legion of gods. The sovereign lord of everything, glorious and mighty….’ The Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth was operating at its current limit, causing beautiful scriptural texts praising the legion of gods to swirl here and there, like the singing of angels.

“A freezing to time immemorial….” All of a sudden, a faintly discernible groan echoed out, like the chant of some mysterious ghost-god. Because of the incredible pressure weighing down on the sword, the ice dragon was beginning to fade away. But then, a mountain-toppling, sea-draining blast of frigid energy erupted from the sword, freezing everything, and locking the godmammoth in place.

The godmammoth’s true energy began to build, and then it struck out with its fist, shattering the layers of ice. Then it lashed out with the Infernal Deity Spear, the ultimate expression of the quintessence of Yang Qi’s martial arts. Each strike of that spear was like the blow of an infernal deity out collecting souls, the Cleansing Flame of the Heavenly World burning bright as it fought against the frigid energy in the spring.

The divine sword didn't seem to care. In fact, it began to vibrate, causing humming sounds to echo out as a frigid tide suddenly rose up from the depths of the spring. It was pitch black, and so cold that the godmammoth’s true energy began to crack and break apart, and the Cleansing Flame of the Heavenly World on the Infernal Deity Spear began to die down.

“Apex cold wave?” Yang Qi murmured, stunned. He knew that the purest, intense type of cold waves originated in the depths of the earth, and that they were called apex cold waves. During a lunar corona, in the deepest part of the night, frigid energy would seep into the lands, causing everything to freeze. It was a frigid yin energy, the ultimate expression of cold, something that not even powerful Lifeseizers could handle.

Supposedly, when some Lifeseizers reached a certain level, they would incite an apex cold wave, a tribulation of sorts that had the potential to turn them into a zombie in the blink of an eye.

Yang Qi recalled a certain lecture given by an elder in the institute, talking about geographical theory. The elder had taken the class to observe a captive Octonary Lifeseizer, a conclave student who had succumbed to an apex cold wave and been transformed into a zombie. The sight of his freezing bone spurs had caused everyone in the class to shiver with fear.

Shockingly, this ice dragon sword had summoned an apex cold wave, something that even godly power would be forced to take seriously.

‘Well, yin can beget yang. I’ll use this apex cold wave to further improve my Cosmic Sunflare Sword technique!’ It took focus, but Yang Qi managed to control the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth and simultaneously unleash his Cosmic Sunflare Sword.

“Treat the sword as a god. Treat the god as heaven. Oh great sun, release your burning energy….” As Yang Qi murmured the mnemonic of the Cosmic Sunflare Sword, the flame spark in his sea of energy flared to life, connecting to the sun above and causing a golden stream of light to descend, which became a dazzling burst of incisive sword energy.

With the wave of a finger, Yang Qi sent that sword energy down into the spring. In the depths of the mysterious kingdom of ice, it took human shape, a swordsman with a long, golden robe, who resembled Yang Qi in every aspect, with shining halos rotating behind him. That swordsman merged with the godmammoth to fight the ice dragon sword and the apex cold wave.

It was none other than Yang Qi’s sword energy nascent divinity of the sun.

Unfortunately, the combination was too weak. As the apex cold wave rolled up, it seemed that the combination would soon be destroyed.

Taking a deep breath, Yang Qi once again summoned true flame from the sun itself, then sent it down into the nascent divinity, empowering it further.

Tempering a fire-type sword energy in the middle of a cold wave was actually the best way to improve it. Yin can beget yang, and the juxtaposition of heaven and earth created the perfect, endless cycle.

Naturally, Yang Qi understood that principle.

By now, the sky was beginning to grow dark, and the power of the sun waned as it set. That in turn made the battle he was fighting more difficult. And yet, overcoming difficulty was often the best way to provide tempering.

As Yang Qi sat there at the edge of the spring, sending out a flow of constant true energy, golden light shone above his head, and flames surrounded him, making him look like some sort of burning god.

Soon, the sun dropped below the horizon, and the moon rose. Instantly, soft moonlight filled the world, the manifestation of yin power.

In the blink of an eye, it became ten times more difficult for Yang Qi to work with his Cosmic Sunflare Sword technique.

However, he didn’t even think of giving up. Doubling his focus, he reached out to the already-set sun, working hard to grasp onto the thin thread of sunlight that moments ago had been as thick as a bucket.

POP!

In the depths of the spring, the Cosmic Sunflare Sword’s nascent divinity was frozen by the apex cold wave, and then shattered. As it dispersed, Yang Qi was grievously injured, and his face turned pale white. Another drop of life force springwater flew into his mouth, which he used to heal his wounds and restore his true energy to its limit. The golden strands of light that had been as thin as gossamer threads were now as thick as chopsticks, and as they flowed into the depths of the spring, they once again took the shape of the Cosmic Sunflare Sword’s nascent divinity.

Then, the entire cycle repeated. Again. And again.

Yang Qi lost track of how many times the nascent divinity was destroyed. However, he could sense that the sword energy was changing, forming a deeper connection with the sun.

Soon, he entered a state in which the only thing that existed in his mind was a rising sun that could dispel all evil and darkness. He felt completely radiant and righteous, as though his mind and soul were being baptized, and his sword technique were being propelled to new heights.

He had entered a state of enlightenment in which, despite the fact that the sun had set, he could still call upon its aggressive, masculine power.

Soon, it reached the dead of night, when the cold wave was at its most powerful state. And yet, the true flame of the sun that burned above him only continued to grow stronger, sending out streams of light as thick as an arm.

The night passed, and the nascent divinity in the spring was defeated countless times. Soon, the sun rose, sending yang energy out into the lands. In the blink of an eye, Yang Qi’s Cosmic Sunflare Sword technique was ten times as powerful as it had been a moment before. Back in the depths of the spring, it easily began to fight back against the apex cold wave.

And thus, Yang Qi continuously sent out true energy to fight the ice dragon sword. Three days and three nights passed, during which time he ran out of true energy over and over again, but replenished it with life force springwater. His true energy was being thoroughly tempered, and he was also developing incredible patience. Even the true energy vestiges in his acupoints were becoming more refined.

He was experiencing benefits and enlightenment that would normally only come with ten years of cultivation.

Unfortunately for the ice dragon sword, it didn’t have the reserves Yang Qi had, and after three days and three nights, it was beginning to tire. Finally, it mustered its energy for one final attack.

“Ice-Soul. Ice-Soul!”

Chapter 150: Ice-Soul God-Sword

Swish!

The ice sword’s final attack slashed through the air toward what was now two Cosmic Sunflare Sword nascent divinities. To the ice sword, the might of the godmammoth was so intense that it was almost impossible to bear.

However, because of the increasing levels of power emanating from the two nascent divinities, the sword could also tell that, because of the apex cold wave, its enemy, the human up above on ground level, had succeeded in tempering his own sword energy.

Although it was both confused and enraged, it couldn’t help but wonder who exactly this person was. How could his true energy be so strong? He hadn’t run low on energy even after three days and three nights of continuous effort, something only Legendaries should be able to do.

As the vibrations of the final sword technique rolled out, the apex cold wave seemed to surge to life again within the layers of ice. Then, a voice could be heard, a voice which seemed to come from the awakening of an ancient soul.

“Ice-soul of antiquity….”

As the soul awoke within the sword energy, countless soul-like apparitions appeared within the layers of ice, which then rushed toward Yang Qi’s two streams of sword energy, where they then exploded.

Boom. Boom. Boom! Boom!! Boom!!!

Explosions rippled out through the depths of the spring, and frigid energy erupted out into the air above, spreading out to obscure the sun. The entire island of peach blossoms was covered with an icy cloud, after which, snow began to fall.

This was the ultimate expression of frigid yin energy.

Yang Qi didn’t seem affected by it at all, though. In fact, he simply poured more true energy into the depths of the spring.

“Scorching hot godmammoth; eliminate these soul apparitions!”

The two manifestations of Humanoid True Energy grew larger and larger, until they glowed with godly light as they fought back against the incoming attack. Meanwhile, the godmammoth wrapped its trunk around the weakened ice dragon sword, and then began to drag it upward.

Before long, more frigid energy rippled out of the spring as a dark green sword appeared, which was slowly pulled up like a fish on a hook.

Yang Qi reached out, grabbed the sword and waved it through the air. Flames surged, creating fiery clouds that filled the sky, driving away the ice clouds, and evaporating all of the snowflakes. Within moments, it was a clear day again.

‘What an incredible divine sword!’ As he held the sword, pulses of frigid energy surged through his meridians toward his dantian region. At the same time, layers of frost began to build up on his skin. An ordinary Lifeseizer who experienced something like this would be frozen and turned into a zombie. But all Yang Qi had to do was shiver, and the frost shattered and turned into steam.

The scorching hot true energy of the Cosmic Sunflare Sword then entered the ice sword, subduing the frigid energy, and causing complex, golden designs to appear on its surface.

Furthermore, characters written in ancient-style script became visible, which read: Ice-Soul God-Sword.

Clearly, this was the sword’s name.

It was impossible to determine what material it was made from, but clearly, the power of a lunar corona had been part of its forging. When its frigid energy encountered the scorching hot energy of the Cosmic Sunflare Sword technique, the two were originally completely incompatible. However, with the help of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, the two of them were combined into the supreme, ultimate balance of yin and yang.

The three days and three nights of battle had caused the fundamental nature of the Ice-Soul God-Sword to emerge. And as Yang Qi poured more true energy into the sword, he slowly but surely subjugated it.

It was a powerful sword, on the same level as a Nonary Lifeseizer, and covered with complex patterns that were none other than the manifestation of internal meridians. Clearly, this sword had its own sea of energy, although, at the moment, it was completely empty.

After completely suppressing it, Yang Qi flicked his finger, sending a drop of life force springwater into the Ice-Soul God-Sword. Instantly, the sword began to shine, and at the same time, emit such powerful frigid energy that the island and even the surrounding water began to freeze over. Of course, Yang Qi could already control the sword in its entirety, even including such effects.

Without any hesitation, he swept the sword through the air toward the sea water.

Swish!

A blast of frigid energy erupted out, and when it hit the water, it created a pathway of ice dozens of kilometers long.

‘Such incredible power!’ Yang Qi waved his hand, and the Ice-Soul God-Sword swept nimbly through the air, becoming an ice dragon surrounded by powerful frigid energy.

‘Awesome! However, now I need to temper the sword even more, to make sure that it perfectly coordinates with the Cosmic Sunflare Sword technique.’ He waved his finger, and a fire dragon appeared, which swirled out to meet the ice dragon. The two of them intertwined, making an S shape in the middle, and a circle without. Ice and fire together created a perfect taiji symbol.

With that, he went about refining his sword technique.

The Ice-Soul God-Sword was powerful enough to temper the Cosmic Sunflare Sword technique, and vice versa. The combination of yin and yang together allowed his sword technique to advance by leaps and bounds.

With the combination of these two, it seemed highly likely he could dominate the Inter-Institutional Martial Arts Competition. After all, he wouldn’t need to fear anyone under the Legendary level.

And he would have no need to conceal the fact that he had acquired the Ice-Soul God-Sword and used it to his advantage.

As he grew more familiar with the combination, it became easier and easier to control the sword. After all, although it had a spirit of its own, it hadn’t reached the point of being able to take human form. And thanks to the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, he was able to take what did exist of its spirit and make it a part of his own soul. As of now, the sword was like an extension of himself, and he could completely control its frigid energy.

The sword had been originally forged from some jade-like stone, refined numerous times, and had then experienced cold waves for countless years. It was almost impossible to quantify how much Yang Qi would benefit from it.

For instance, the fact that it had its own sea of energy made it almost like a Nonary Lifeseizer at his side, protecting him.

As he continued to refine the sword and train with it, the sun rose and fell, and the tide came in and out. Meanwhile, the flame spark within his dantian region began to shine more brightly, until it was ten times as powerful as before. Instead of a spark, it was more like a lamp. Furthermore, within the light that shone out from it could be seen all sorts of flame palaces, flame pagodas, and even flame immortals.

There were few people in Yang Qi’s cultivation level who had ever pushed the Cosmic Sunflare Sword technique to this level. Perhaps none.

After another three days and three nights passed, Yang Qi was pleased with his level of control over the new sword technique. Furthermore, he was so stabilized within Quinary Lifeseizing that he was fairly certain it wouldn’t be much longer before he reached Senary Lifeseizing.

His five most powerful abilities, the Fiend-Devil Wings, Infernal Deity Spear, Infernal Deity Plate Armor, Hellfire Crucible and Devil-God Seal were now easier than ever to use. Even more noteworthy, he could use his Devil-God Seal to almost instantly mask his energy, blood, and true energy vestiges, sucking them into a tiny, imperceptible particle in his dantian region.

When he did that, he would seem like nothing more than a brand new Lifeseizer, weak and powerless. Not even people like the Patriarchs Wind and Cloud would be able to see through the illusion.

Godly-class energy arts truly came into their own during Quinary Lifeseizing, and began to develop aspects that ordinary humans couldn’t comprehend. After all, most Legendaries cultivated imperial-class energy arts, with only a few having saintly- or heavenly-class arts.

Truth be told, no one in the Rich-Lush Continent currently had a heavenly-class energy art, much less a godly-class art. Even the chancellor of the Demi-Immortal Institute only had a saintly-class art, namely the Demi-Immortal Sage Magic.

In total, Yang Qi had just spent six days and six nights on the island. The first half had been spent fighting the Ice-Soul God-Sword, and the last half had been devoted to training with the new sword energy, and working on his cultivation.

However, for all he knew, those six days and six nights might as well have been sixty years. He lost track of the passage of day and night and focused completely on his work, using life force springwater to replenish himself whenever necessary. Although he remained at the level of ninety-nine ancient megamammoths, his command of his current powers significantly improved, and he gained incredible insight into the vital energy of heaven and earth, the great sun out in the void, and how fire and ice were like yin and yang.

As the dawn sun warmed Yang Qi’s face, he bathed in the spring water, changed into a fresh set of clothing, and then prepared to return to the institute.

Now that the Ice-Soul God-Sword had been removed from the spring, its waters were slowly drying up. Apparently, without the sword, the spring was little more than ordinary in nature. Likely, it would only take a few dozen years for any remaining spirit energy inside to vanish completely.

‘It’s too bad. I guess these peach trees will probably wither up as well.’ Yang Qi sighed.

Without the precious treasure of the Ice-Soul God-Sword, this island would soon lose all of its miraculous qualities.

Just when he was about to leave, he suddenly heard some loud whooshing noises from off in the distance; a powerful energy arts expert was coming. And not just one. Soon, he saw a whole group heading over, all of them with powerful cultivation bases.

‘Who are these people? And why are they coming to this island?’

Acting quickly, he activated his defensive true energy, and then slowly sank into the waters surrounding the island. He also sent some true energy into the island itself so that he could observe what happened there.

Powerful winds buffeted the island, and the ground trembled. Some of the trees were even uprooting, causing green sap to stain the ground.

First to land was an old man in white garments, who emanated a powerful frigid energy. He seemed righteous, but not righteous, evil, but not evil. Even more telling, he landed right in the middle of the island, in front of the mouth of the spring.

Moments later, seven other powerful individuals landed behind him, clad in armor. From the feathers which adorned their heads, it was obvious that they were not from a righteous organization. They were obviously from one of the strange nations that existed on the ocean surface.

The old man walked up to the spring, looked in, then shouted, “What?! Someone looted my spirit spring!? The spirit energy is gone, and the Ice-Soul God-Sword was taken away?!”

Chapter 151: Shroud-Heaven Alliance

“Who did it?!” the old man howled. “Who dared to take my Ice-Soul God-Sword? That sword was locked in countless layers of ice. Only a Legendary could possibly reach it. Wait. Don’t tell me some expert Legendary found out about the sword and stole it! How could that be possible, though? There aren’t any Legendaries around here.”

The man seemed to be on the verge of going crazy as he sent out true energy to cover the island with frigid cold. Instantly, the peach trees all began to wither up, and the island transformed from a place of beauty into one of chaos and disorder.

“Calm down, Patriarch Frost-Drake,” said one of the men behind him, a burly Lifeseizer in black armor. “Perhaps the spirit energy just transformed naturally, and the Ice-Soul God-Sword is still down there. Let's join forces and bolster you with our true energy. Then you can just reach down and try to fish the sword out from the spring. As you know, Young Master Shroud-Heaven from the Hanging Mountain has come down to gather energy arts experts of all sorts into the Shroud-Heaven Alliance. We East Sea cultivators are relying on you to subjugate the Ice-Soul God-Sword and then reach the Legendary level. If you do, we can become one of the most important members of the Shroud-Heaven Alliance, and hopefully, gain the favor of the Hanging Mountain.”

‘Shroud-Heaven Alliance? The Hanging Mountain?’ Yang Qi thought as he eavesdropped via true energy. Of course, he was hidden so expertly that not even the white-robed Patriarch Frost-Drake noticed him.

And thanks to what he had already overheard, he was fairly certain he knew what was going on.

Out in the sea, there were many experts of various levels who had never established their own sects, or if they had, were too inconsequential to consider important. People such as that were often referred to as rogue cultivators.

If they ever joined forces, they would be considered quite powerful.

Apparently, someone named Young Master Shroud-Heaven was trying to unite all of the rogue cultivators from the four seas and form them into some sort of alliance.

And this Patriarch Frost-Drake was the leader of one of many smaller groups who were hoping to find the Ice-Soul God-Sword, fuse with it to become a Legendary, and then become a powerful force within the Shroud-Heaven Alliance.

Yang Qi could tell that he cultivated frost-type energy arts that perfectly corresponded with the Ice-Soul God-Sword. If he acquired that sword, he would definitely advance by leaps and bounds, and would have a strong chance of reaching the Legendary level.

Normally speaking, the Cosmic Sunflare Sword that Yang Qi cultivated would be as compatible with the Ice-Soul God-Sword as oil was with water. After all, despite having certain elements of yin and yang that were complementary, the oppositional aspects were far more powerful.

Thankfully, he had his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth and its Hellfire Crucible to forcibly combine them.

‘The Hanging Mountain, huh,’ he thought, heart pounding. ‘I need to keep listening and see if I can get any information about my mother.’ Right now, his two main ambitions in life were to crush Yun Hailan beneath his feet, and to get to the Hanging Mountain to find his mother.

In response to his subordinate's words, Patriarch Frost-Drake calmed down a bit.

“A thousand years ago,” he said, “the Legendary Guru Ice-Soul himself practiced cultivation on this island, right by this apex cold wave spring. Thirty thousand meters beneath the mouth of the spring was a mysterious kingdom of ice, which was exactly where Guru Ice-Soul used his understanding of the magical laws of the void to seal the Ice-Soul God-Sword. There, he refined it day and night in his attempt to transform it into a Legendary-level weapon. Unfortunately, Guru Ice-Soul eventually experienced cultivation deviation, and went missing. Presumably, he died. As for the weapon, it remained sealed here ever since. I learned of the matter well over a hundred years ago, and ever since, have been trying to think of a way to drag that sword out into the open. Sadly, I never succeeded. However, now that the Shroud-Heaven Alliance has been formed, I need to try again. Hopefully, if we combine all of our energy arts to create a spell formation, we can suppress the cold wave and drag up the sword. If we succeed, then all of the spirit medicines, treasures, and wealth that I have accumulated back on Frost-Drake Island will be yours for the taking.”

“Of course,” said one of the accompanying Lifeseizers. “You’re the backbone of our group, Patriarch, so we’ll do whatever you say.”

Including Patriarch Frost-Drake, there were a total of eight people present.

And the group of them held nothing back as they joined forces next to the spring to set up a huge spell formation. The group of them roared at the tops of their lungs as manifestations of Humanoid True Energy took shape above all their heads, which then combined into a sphere of energy that shot into Patriarch Frost-Drake.

He shivered, then unleashed a stream of frigid true energy that shot into the depths of the spring.

Before long, his face fell, overtaken by a look of first disappointment, then despair.

“You animal! You bastard! I worked myself to the bone for that Ice-Soul God-Sword! I planned for a hundred years! I sacrificed everything. And it was all in vain. Why? If I ever find out who dared to take that sword, I’ll kill him. I’ll wipe him off the face of the earth!”

His true energy surged with such power that the other seven individuals coughed up blood and suffered vital energy injuries.

‘So, someone did take it.’ The entire group exchanged awkward glances as Patriarch Frost-Drake howled in fury.

“Come on,” one of them said. “Let’s get out of here and give the patriarch a chance to calm down.”

Worried that the crazed patriarch might vent his anger on them in deadly fashion, the others nodded in response to the suggestion. As they flew up into the air, one of them called out, “Patriarch Frost-Drake, take some time to clear your head. Who knows, maybe some miracle will happen, and everything will turn out fine. Well, we don't want to disturb you any further, sir, so we’ll take our leave.”

Without any hesitation, the entire group fled.

Meanwhile, Patriarch Frost-Drake’s eyes were completely bloodshot, and he looked like he was about to go crazy and kill everyone in sight. However, inside, he was still in possession of his faculties. Waves of frigid true energy rolled out from him, covering the area, freezing the sea for dozens of kilometers in every direction, and turning the island into a virtual iceberg.

Crick. Crack!

All of a sudden, cracks appeared on the surface of the frozen water.

“Who’s there!?” Patriarch Frost-Drake blurted, spinning as he looked around. Although he had been venting a bit, his energy arts and cultivation base were roughly on the same level as Holy Daughter Manyflowers’, so how could he not sense the energy fluctuations from moments ago?

A projection of Humanoid True Energy appeared on the island, which caused the ice to crumble around it as it walked forward, and the frigid energy to melt. It was like a spring breeze surrounded it, its aura warm, its facial features that of Yang Qi.

“Who are you…?” Patriarch Frost-Drake asked. Although he could sense that this person’s cultivation level wasn’t necessarily very high, his energy arts were profound, and he was definitely not the type of person to look down upon.

“Is this the sword you were looking for, Patriarch Frost-Drake?”

Yang Qi reached out, and a dark green sword shot out and began to swirl around him.

“The Ice-Soul God-Sword!” Patriarch Frost-Drake’s eyes suddenly glittered with hope. Apparently, it was a person who was weaker than him who had acquired the sword, which meant that perhaps things weren’t as bad as he thought. Clearing his throat, he said, “So, you little punk, you were the one who dared to take the Ice-Soul God-Sword.”

Yang Qi nodded. “That's right. It was me. It was a real shock to find a sword like this in what seemed like a quiet, ordinary island.”

Licking his lips, Patriarch Frost-Drake said, “Well, in that case, brat, I order you to give me that sword. If you don't, I’ll have to kill you.”

Already, he was circulating his true energy as if in preparation for an attack. Now that the sword he desired was in sight, there was no way he would just let it go. It represented all of his hopes to reach the Legendary level, and was just too important.

“You want to kill me?” Yang Qi said. He laughed. “Think this through for a second, Frost-Drake. Considering that I subjugated this sword, don’t you think I could do the same to you? Are you really planning to attack me? Listen. Take some advice from me. After all the work you went through to reach Nonary Lifeseizing, don’t do something stupid. The reason I'm confronting you right here and now is that I want information about the Shroud-Heaven Alliance. Tell me its background. And where does this Young Master Shroud-Heaven stand in relation to the Hanging Mountain as a whole? Tell me everything you know about the Shroud-Heaven Alliance and the Hanging Mountain.”

Seemingly very confident, Patriarch Frost-Drake said, “Are you crazy, brat? You must be from some aristocratic clan, right? Or maybe from a big sect? Presumably you have some treasure that let you control the Ice-Soul God-Sword. There’s no other explanation for how you managed to pull it up from that mysterious kingdom of ice thirty-thousand meters down. You think you can threaten me? What a joke! I’ll give you two choices. One: give me the sword. Two: die. I’ll let you pick between life and death.”

Eyes turning icy, Yang Qi said, “You fool. You think that because it looks like I have a Quinary Lifeseizing cultivation base you can beat me? Well, I guess I have no choice but to force you to tell me about the Shroud-Heaven Alliance.”

With that, he waved his hand.

SWISHHH!

The Cosmic Sunflare Sword technique swirled out, shining brightly, joined by the Ice-Soul God-Sword. They combined, like two dancing dragons, forming the fire and ice taiji symbol which shot toward Patriarch Frost-Drake in deadly fashion.

As it turned out, Yang Qi was very eager to use this fire and ice taiji symbol on Patriarch Frost-Drake, to see exactly how effective it would be.

There could be no better test subject for it than a Nonary Lifeseizer.

Besides, if he captured him, he could probably get plenty of information about the Shroud-Heaven Alliance, a group that Yang Qi had never heard of before. After all, if Nonary Lifeseizers were itching to join it, then it must be powerful.

As soon as the fire and ice taiji symbol appeared, an incredible aura spread out over the island, filling the area with the ultimate expressions of both yin and yang. Everything twisted and distorted in dangerous and painful fashion.

Patriarch Frost-Drake felt himself being wrung into a fried dough twist, causing his meridians and sea of energy to twinge with pain.

Chapter 152: Sword Dao from the Distant Past

Although Patriarch Frost-Drake was initially shocked by Yang Qi’s sword, after a moment, a vicious grin spread out across his face, “Quite a powerful technique, ugly as it is! I can't believe you actually combined a fire-type sword art, the Cosmic Sunflare Sword, with the Ice-Soul God-Sword! The power of that fire and ice taiji symbol is incredible. Sadly, cultivation levels are still cultivation levels. You’re in Quinary Lifeseizing, placing you so far beneath me you couldn’t ever hope to reach my level.

“Furthermore, that abomination of a sword technique you've created is simply appalling to behold. Watch and learn. I’ll show you what a real sword technique is supposed to look like. I practiced my cultivation without any special sword to use. I used pure technique! That’s my path to the Legendary level. Presumably, you have no idea that in the East Sea, Frost-Drake is known as being so skilled with the sword that he can freeze the entire world with a single attack!”

POP!

Even as the fire and ice taiji symbol descended on Patriarch Frost-Drake, he drew a sword. Although it was impossible to tell exactly what type of material it was made from, it was clearly some sort of cold steel. Etched on its surface were designs that looked like snowflakes, as well as two words: Haughty Snow.

This was no energy weapon, it was an actual sword.

“It took me two sixty-year-cycles and an entire batch of snowflake steel to forge my Haughty Snow Sword. And now, boy, I’ll draw your blood with it!”

As soon as that sword was out in the open, snowflakes filled the sky, and oppressive sword energy weighed down. From the way Patriarch Frost-Drake stood there in the snow, he looked like a consummate swordsman, the type of proud, lonely individual who would search his entire life for a worthy opponent.

Sword light flashed, and the fire and ice taiji symbol was vanquished.

Neither the Cosmic Sunflare Sword nor the Ice-Soul God-Sword were a match for Patriarch Frost-Drake. Next, he attacked, using his Haughty Snow Sword to reveal the countless variations of his sword art. As the snow fell, he hacked, chopped, sliced, crushed, stabbed, and spun. He used dozens of techniques, each one filled with immense power and speed. The Ice-Soul God-Sword was clearly not inferior to the Haughty Snow Sword, and yet, also seemed incapable of dealing with it.

It didn't take long for Yang Qi to realize that Patriarch Frost-Drake fully deserved the reputation he had mentioned. He was obviously the best of the best when it came to skill with the sword.

However, that meant that he was the perfect opponent to help Yang Qi improve his own sword skills. Without any hesitation, he released two more streams of sword energy.

“Your middling sword skills are like child’s play,” Patriarch Frost-Drake said, his eyes flashing with vicious light. “Take this move. Freezing Night!”

His sword technique transformed; the Haughty Snow Sword suddenly stopped moving, and a true energy vortex sprang up around it. The flowing energy caused the light to distort, casting the entire island into pitch black night. Then, Patriarch Frost-Drake vanished into the darkness.

No light was present at all; even the burning fire of Yang Qi’s Cosmic Sunflare Sword was incapable of shining, let alone other types of energy.

This move from Patriarch Frost-Drake’s sword technique, Freezing Night, seized good fortune from heaven and earth to bend light, and make people lose their senses. Not even mystical sixth senses could do anything against it.

Of course, this was not a technique invented by Patriarch Frost-Drake himself. His technique was actually a sword art from the distant past, created by some spectacular Great Sage.

Yang Qi could tell that he was in great danger, and quickly pulled his two streams of sword energy back into him to form a defensive barrier. He didn’t resort to the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, as he was mostly interested in improving his sword technique, and wanted to see exactly what Patriarch Frost-Drake was capable of.

Even as he retracted his sword energy, a burst of coldness stabbed through his shield, vanquishing the Cosmic Sunflare Sword and passing through his skin into his meridians.

“Flying Stars!” Patriarch Frost-Drake said in a cold voice.

Bam!

Yang Qi swept his Ice-Soul God-Sword out, hoping to find the Haughty Snow Sword. After all, the Haughty Snow Sword seemed to appear and disappear randomly. Suddenly, just when the Ice-Soul God-Sword was just on the verge of reaching it, it vanished, and everything turned bright and sunny again.

Yang Qi stood there, his clothing in tatters, his shoulder bleeding from where the Haughty Snow Sword had struck it. Obviously, his own sword technique had just come out on the losing end, and had been unable to block Patriarch Frost-Drake’s sword, which could shake heaven and earth to the point where ghosts and gods wept.

Some distance away, Patriarch Frost-Drake stood there, looking at the blood dripping off of his sword. Smiling, he said, “Ever heard of the expression jack of all trades, master of none? That’s exactly what your sword technique is. Not even getting the Ice-Soul God-Sword will help you.”

In reality, Yang Qi’s blood was pure and nearly transparent, like porcelain sagefire. But because of the Devil-God Seal, it appeared to be bright red, just like any ordinary Lifeseizer.

“What sword technique is that?” Yang Qi replied coolly. “It definitely wasn’t invented by you. You might be a Nonary Lifeseizer, but you couldn’t possibly come up with moves like that. Come on, at least tell me the names of the stances. It's obviously some sort of ancient sword art.”

“You have sharp eyes, brat,” Patriarch Frost-Drake said, his eyes glittering. “This sword technique is from the remnants of a sword manual I came across, something invented in the distant past. It has seven moves: Freezing Night, Flying Stars, Rustling Wind, Broken Moon, Shocking Clouds, Ravage Law, Ravish Heaven. The only moves I used so far are Freezing Night and Flying Stars, and already, you’re wounded. And that's because I was holding back. So, what do you think? You won't last long with my sword energy inside of you. Let me tell you, once my sword energy enters an opponent, it’s impossible to drive away. Unless I personally help, you’ll die sooner rather than later. Eventually, it will detonate your sea of energy, so unless you drop to your knees and respectfully hand over the Ice-Soul God-Sword, you’re dead.”

“It’s a nice sword technique,” Yang Qi said, ignoring the threats. A solemn expression on his face, he held his sword up and saluted Patriarch Frost-Drake. “Regardless of whether in terms of energy arts or sword technique, you are my superior. Your sword is marvelous and worthy of respect, and I can only offer my thanks for the fighting tips you’ve provided. Please show me the rest of your moves. Don’t hold anything back. And if you end up getting killed, don't worry, I’ll leave your corpse intact.”

“What?” Patriarch Frost-Drake blurted, visibly shocked. “Aren’t you having problems because of my sword energy?” Looking over, he realized that the area where Yang Qi’s skin had been sliced up was completely healed, and there was no sign of blood. His skin looked just as lustrous as before, and in fact, seemed to thrum with even more energy than before, like the rising tide crashing against the seashore.

“Please, go on with the rest of your moves,” Yang Qi said, holding his sword out and looking very solemn. At the moment, he seemed like he was one with his sword, and vice versa. He was simply waiting there calmly for Patriarch Frost-Drake to make a move, which made him seem even more intimidating than if he had launched an attack.

All of a sudden, Patriarch Frost-Drake felt himself trembling.

Yang Qi seemed to have transformed into a different person, reaching a higher level in terms of both sword energy, sword will and sword stance. It was as if being stabbed had transformed him from a simpleton into a consummate genius.

“Freezing Night, Flying Stars, Rustling Wind, Broken Moon, Shocking Clouds….”

Patriarch Frost-Drake had a bad feeling, and therefore, flew up into the air and held nothing back, attacking with five moves in quick succession, each one of them designed to kill his opponent. In the blink of an eye, the island was smashed, boulders transformed into dust, and the ground razed flat.

After experiencing these five sword moves, the former island of peach blossoms would soon vanish into the East Sea and become a thing of the past.

Yang Qi had already merged his thinking and mind with his sword, and was thus unconscious of the boundary between himself and his weapon. In that moment, his Cosmic Sunflare Sword and Ice-Soul God-Sword truly fused, becoming a single sword, the mixture of yin and yang, the ultimate expression of the power of the origin of the universe.

Clanging sounds rang out as his sword countered the twisting power of Freezing Night. Whatever moves Patriarch Frost-Drake made, it seemed like Yang Qi was capable of locating his Haughty Snow Sword and meeting it head-on.

Yang Qi could now directly sense the mysterious aspects of the sword technique, and thus, was easily able to vanquish Freezing Night and Flying Stars.

When Rustling Wind came, the sword energy became like rain falling in the wind. Before Yang Qi could even detect where it was coming from, the sword light was suddenly right at his throat.

As for Broken Moon, it seemed to Yang Qi like some consummate swordsman flying through the sky and splitting the full moon in half.

Finally was the last move, Shocking Clouds.

He suddenly found himself in the midst of a sea of clouds, filled with millions upon millions of crashing waves.

Facing these moves seemed to incite his potential even further, pushing him to another peak. The Cosmic Sunflare Sword technique and the Ice-Soul God-Sword were like twin dragons coursing through the sky, launching forth countless streams of sword energy.

Bam!

Finally, Yang Qi and Patriarch Frost-Drake separated, flying away from each other to land on either end of the island, placing them several kilometers apart.

The island was now filled with countless crisscrossing ravines, into which the sea water flowed. The spring had been destroyed as well, releasing massive amounts of frigid energy into the area.

More wounds could be seen on Yang Qi, including on his neck, forehead, and abdomen. Those three came from Rustling Wind, Broken Moon, and Shocking Clouds.

However, none of the three wounds seemed particularly serious.

By now, Patriarch Frost-Drake was too shocked to speak. That was especially true when he saw Yang Qi’s wounds healing up in front of his own eyes. Within a few breaths of time, they were completely gone.

Patriarch Frost-Drake was very familiar with his own sword technique, and knew how deadly all of the moves were. In fact, the blow he had landed on Yang Qi’s throat should have been powerful enough to cleanly cut off the top of a mountain.

And yet, it was like a mere scratch to him.

As for Broken Moon and Shocking Clouds, they were profoundly formidable, but inflicted only temporary wounds.

“Alright,” Yang Qi said, “you have two more moves, right? Ravage Law and Ravish Heaven? Let’s see them.”

Chapter 153: Capturing Frost-Drake

In this battle of profound sword techniques, Yang Qi benefited significantly.

There was no doubt that Patriarch Frost-Drake was a first-class swordsman, and an elite amongst Nonary Lifeseizers. He had a sword technique from the distant past, and although it was impossible to tell how long the man had immersed himself in its study, one thing was for certain: each stance within the set of sword techniques was different, and contained varied meanings. However, in the end, they were all designed as killing moves.

The five consummate stances, Freezing Night, Flying Stars, Broken Moon, Rustling Wind and Shocking Clouds had sliced Yang Qi full of holes, and were it not for the fact that the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth made him virtually impervious to all sorts of weapons, he would have died several times over already.

From that alone Yang Qi could tell how profound Patriarch Frost-Drake’s sword technique was, and that it was the type of thing which would require much time to master.

Only a year ago, Yang Qi had been one of the ‘young elites’ in Yanhaven, a brat who was little more than a frog in a well.

For someone to advance in such spectacular fashion in such a short time was something that was rarely seen, even in ancient times. Sword techniques, martial arts stances, and enlightenment were all things that required time and training. Slacking in even one area would lead to major deficiencies. And the fact that Patriarch Frost-Drake had lived for hundreds of years indicated that he had likely worked with this sword technique for about the same length of time.

When a young punk fought an old man with hundreds of years of practice under his belt, it was only natural that the latter would have the clear advantage.

Yang Qi was well aware of that, and yet, wasn’t ready to acknowledge defeat. Instead, he was excited, and wanted to fight even harder in the hopes of improving his own technique. And he even hoped to come out on top in the end.

Of course, so far, Patriarch Frost-Drake had only unleashed five stances from his ancient sword dao. He still had two more, those being Ravage Law and Ravish Heaven. Together, they formed the ancient saying to ravage law and ravish heaven, which implied defying all sorts of laws and principles. Those two moves were completely different from the previous five, and were obviously designed to be the mightiest of them all, the most ultimate type of kung fu. Trump cards.

Yang Qi very much wanted to see them, but unfortunately, Patriarch Frost-Drake hadn’t resorted to them yet.

Patriarch Frost-Drake could sense what Yang Qi was up to. He knew that this opponent was inferior to him in terms of sword technique, but at the same time, was impossible to defeat. It was like fighting some sort of devil or giant.

Even worse, the more fiercely Patriarch Frost-Drake fought, the more this young opponent seemed to improve. It made him feel like he had taken on the role of a teacher. In fact, he was already contemplating how to escape the situation.

However, he still couldn’t resign himself to the fact that Yang Qi had the Ice-Soul God-Sword. That sword was simply too enticing to him, considering that it was his ticket to reaching the Legendary level.

The Lifeseizing level was essentially about building up enough reserves to seize life over and over. It was only Legendaries who truly began to receive the benefits of energy arts cultivation, and could connect with heaven and earth.

The nine phases of the Energy Arts level were about reaching out to make contact with vital energy. The nine levels of Lifeseizing were about remolding the fleshly body and building a solid foundation to step into the Legendary level. With enough longevity to work with, Legendaries would easily be able to work on gaining enlightenment of magical laws and their transformations. The gap between a Nonary Lifeseizer and a Legendary was even greater than that between a Master of Energy and a Lifeseizer.

Patriarch Frost-Drake had been a Nonary Lifeseizer for many years, and had never been able to make that final push into the next level. Now that he finally had the chance, he wouldn’t let it go easily.

Looking at Yang Qi, he gritted his teeth and said, “Alright, punk. Since you want to die, I’ll accommodate you. The last two moves, Ravage Law and Ravish Heaven, are so lethal that they’ll kill you before you even shed any blood. And if they do draw blood, it will mean catastrophe for the entire world, an armageddon involving rivers of gore and millions of corpses. From the time I mastered these two moves until now, I haven’t used them to kill a single living being. But now, I’ll use them on you, even if it means I end up bedeviled.”

“Wow,” Yang Qi said. Although he had assumed the moves were deadly, the fact that they could lead to bedevilment made them even more interesting than before. After all, other people might fear bedevilment, but not Yang Qi.

The Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth was designed to slaughter devils and monsters, and crush hells. So why would he possibly fear bedevilment?

“Time to die! Ravage Law!”

It was with bloodshot eyes that Patriarch Frost-Drake swept his sword out, his aura instantly transforming into something like an unfathomable ghost-god from the netherworld.

The sky grew dark, and the light of the sun and moon were obscured as the wailing of a ghost-god filled the air. As for the Haughty Snow Sword, it suddenly seemed stained with an aura that resembled both ghosts and gods, but at the same time, neither of those. It was a ghost-god aura that towered to the limits of heaven, that despised celestial might, and that repudiated magical law.

Ravage Law!

Then, Patriarch Frost-Drake suddenly vanished, in much the same way that Yang Qi had when mastering the inimitable dao of the quick strike. Patriarch Frost-Drake’s one move destroyed countless natural and magical laws, and demanded that a life be taken. It struck Yang Qi’s mind so harshly that he couldn’t think, and could only stand there waiting to be slaughtered.

One sword move destroyed natural law, ravaged magical law, and attacked the heart and mind. It was simply beyond compare. Although Yang Qi’s mastery of the dao of the quick strike was on par with this in some ways, there were miraculous elements to this sword technique that far surpassed it. After all, this was a technique created by a Great Sage of the distant past, based on enlightenment that Yang Qi’s deathblow art couldn’t possibly match up to.

Use one sword technique to destroy a myriad of laws. It was truly ravaging law!

In the blink of an eye, the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth stirred, and Yang Qi came to his senses. Without even thinking about it, he swept the Ice-Soul God-Sword out in front of him to meet Patriarch Frost-Drake’s sword. At the same time, his aura surged, and his Infernal Deity Plate Armor swept out to cover every part of him.

When the Haughty Snow Sword met the Ice-Soul God-Sword, their auras exploded in a tempest of sword projections. In the blink of an eye, the Ice-Soul God-Sword was shoved out of the way, and the Haughty Snow Sword was stabbing toward the Infernal Deity Plate Armor.

However, Yang Qi’s armor was already the color of porcelain, and no matter how sharp Patriarch Frost-Drake’s sword was, all it could do was scratch its surface.

“Ravish Heaven!”

Wicked light shone in Patriarch Frost-Drake’s eyes, making it seem like he had been possessed by a host of devil-gods, and that he was ready to challenge the legion of gods to battle. Brilliant light shone off of his Haughty Snow Sword, sword energy in the form of numerous enormous stars that first rose high into the sky, then fell to converge on the tip of his sword.

One sword strike to pierce the heavens. Ravage Law, Ravish Heaven. Defy all laws and principles!

Patriarch Frost-Drake was confident that his sword will was able to conquer every obstacle, and therefore, it didn’t matter how powerful Yang Qi’s armor was, or how abundant his true energy was, it wouldn’t be able to stop this attack.

This one sword move was as strong as a storm of falling stars.

This one sword move could exterminate all forms of life.

The tip of that sword contained power that seemed capable of absorbing the heart and mind, and sucking away Yang Qi’s entire body. Any attempt to dodge, evade, or fight back would be laughable. The only option was to meet it head on.

Pop!

Sword light shone brightly as the Haughty Snow Sword finally pierced the Infernal Deity Plate Armor and prepared to enter Yang Qi’s body and take away all of his life force.

Patriarch Frost-Drake’s eyes immediately began to glitter with the light of success.

But then, his Haughty Snow Sword suddenly stopped moving.

The moment that the Infernal Deity Plate Armor was pierced, it suddenly shone with brilliant light, and then came alive. Cracking sounds rang out as it suddenly sent a massive backlash attack into the sword, which began to vibrate loudly. Then, cracks appeared on its surface, which widened, glowing, until the sword shattered.

Countless bits of sword shrapnel exploded out, flying through the air in all directions.

In the end, it never pierced completely through the Infernal Deity Plate Armor, and was in fact destroyed by it.

Then, the backlash swept into Patriarch Frost-Drake’s meridians, forcing him to cough up a mouthful of blood. Disbelief filled his eyes; how could his Haughty Snow Sword, and the deadly Ravage Law, Ravish Heaven move, be unable to pierce this person’s defensive true energy? Only a Legendary should be able to do something like that. Even a Nonary Lifeseizer who faced an attack like that should have been killed.

However, what happened next was even more unimaginable.

A hand reached out, pulsing with an energy field that could control everything. Before he could even react, it latched onto his throat, sending a stream of true energy toward his dantian region.

Only then did he realize how powerful Yang Qi’s true energy really was; it was beyond the level of ordinary humans.

Trembling, Patriarch Frost-Drake said, “You… are you even human? A human couldn’t possibly have true energy this powerful. Human bodies can’t take it. In fact, you're stronger than some primeval devillings! Who are you? You're definitely not from this continent. Don’t tell me you’re from the Quake-Dawn Continent?!”

“Quake-Dawn Continent?” Yang Qi shook his head. “No, I'm from the Rich-Lush Continent. Alright, Patriarch Frost-Drake, now do you mind telling me about the Shroud-Heaven Alliance? Who is Young Master Shroud-Heaven?”

Even as he spoke, he used his true energy to search Patriarch Frost-Drake thoroughly, revealing a small sword manual, as well as a tiny medicinal pill bottle that was no larger than a snuff bottle, which contained some very small green-colored beans.

Despite their small size, they were clearly very powerful, and a single sniff of their aroma confirmed that they were some sort of treasure that surpassed high-grade medicine. Designed to replenish blood and energy, and to improve the nascent divinity, they were obviously not the type of pill that ordinary individuals could concoct.

As for the sword manual, it was extremely ancient, and not even made from paper, but rather, leather of some sort. A single glance at it, and it was obvious it was some sort of mysterious, powerful technique. In fact, the cover had no name, and the inside contained only seven pages. Each page featured one of the moves that Patriarch Frost-Drake had just used, described in densely-packed text accompanied by tiny illustrations. In fact, the information was so tiny that ordinary individuals wouldn’t even be able to read it; only top experts like Yang Qi would have the requisite eyesight to make out the details.

The illustrations were the size of a grain of rice, and the words, a million times smaller.

Considering all that, it was difficult to determine how much information the book actually contained. Upon pouring some true energy into the book, Yang Qi felt like his soul was being drawn into the text, where he found a burial mound made of swords. In the middle of the burial mound was a proud, heaven-defying individual training with a sword, perfecting a technique to slaughter great daos, to destroy the shackles of heaven, and to bring an end to innumerable natural laws.

Thankfully, Yang Qi had very strong willpower, and was able to pull his mind out of the book, which he then tossed into his thumb-ring.

Chapter 154: Behind-the-Scenes Information

As of this moment, fear gripped the heart of Patriarch Frost-Drake. No longer did he harbor any thoughts of taking the Ice-Soul God-Sword. After all, he knew that his life was in the hands of his opponent. “Just who are you? How are you so strong? Why do you want information about the Shroud-Heaven Alliance?”

“I'm the one asking the questions here,” Yang Qi replied coldly. “Tell me what I want to know.” Keeping his grip tight on Patriarch Frost-Drake’s neck, he added, “Otherwise I’ll detonate your sea of energy. And you know what will happen if I do that.”

“Y-yes, yes, of course….” Patriarch Frost-Drake stammered. “The Shroud-Heaven Alliance is a coalition personally put together by Young Master Shroud-Heaven. There are already hundreds of smaller organizations throughout the seas who have joined up. The alliance headquarters is on Heavenly Demon Island in the middle of the Sea of Chaos. People say that Young Master Shroud-Heaven is actually the son of the immensely powerful Great Sage Shroud-Heaven from the Hanging Mountain. The Young Master is a Legendary, and he came here with the specific purpose of forming an alliance of forces to bring great transformations to all heaven and earth. He's going to change the entire Rich-Lush Continent! Oh, and he's also come for revenge.”

“Revenge?” Yang Qi asked. “Revenge against whom?”

Patriarch Frost-Drake didn’t hesitate at all to answer, almost as if he were worried he might be speaking too slowly, and that Yang Qi would impatiently kill him as a result. “Supposedly, this isn’t the first time Young Master Shroud-Heaven came here. Years ago, on his first trip, he encountered the Crown Prince from the Demi-Immortal Institute. When they fought, the Young Master lost, and was forced to flee back to the Hanging Mountain.”

‘The Crown Prince again?’ Yang Qi thought. ‘Well, if this Young Master Shroud-Heaven is against the Crown Prince, then that's a good thing for me. Then again, he’s a demon-devil. Different races think differently, so it's not like I can just become friends with him right off the bat.’

Knowing that his life was on the line, and not wanting to hold anything back, Patriarch Frost-Drake continued, “The Crown Prince Society is huge, and has connections to many of the major organizations in the lands. That’s why Young Master Shroud-Heaven is forming a coalition, to have enough people to fight the Crown Prince Society if necessary. During the Inter-Institutional Martial Arts Competition, Young Master Shroud-Heaven will make his move, formally challenge the Crown Prince, and kill him. That will earn him a reputation that will last for all time.”

“Hm, I see,” Yang Qi said. “Excellent. By the way, what were those medicinal pills I just took off of you? They don’t seem like something that a Lifeseizer could concoct.”

“Those were a gift from Young Master Shroud-Heaven. They’re called Nascent Divinity Pills, and their base ingredient is a divine medicine from beyond the heavens. You’ll never find pills like that in the Rich-Lush Continent. Our continent is just too low-level.”

“I see,” Yang Qi said. Now that he had the answers to his questions, he needed to think about what they implied.

As for Patriarch Frost-Drake, he said, “Please, spare my life. It hasn’t been easy to practice cultivation down to this point. I don’t want to die! I can be your servant! I’ll work myself to the bone for you!”

“I would feel a bit uncomfortable having a servant as powerful as you,” Yang Qi said with a chuckle. “But I'm not going to kill you. Of course, I can’t just let you go. I'm going to take away your sword energy so that you can’t perform any more evil. The Shroud-Heaven Alliance was founded by one of the Demonfolk, so there’s no way they’re up to any good. From here on out, you’re going to be my eyes and ears there. If you do a good job, eventually, I’ll unseal your sword energy.”

With that, he sent a powerful stream of true energy into Patriarch Frost-Drake.

Patriarch Frost-Drake shrieked as seven tiny swords of true energy appeared in his dantian region, which represented his seven killing moves of Freezing Night, Flying Stars, Rustling Wind, Broken Moon, Shocking Clouds, Ravage Law and Ravish Heaven. That was all of the sword energy that he had painstakingly cultivated over the years.

Yang Qi wanted to master those same seven sword moves, and if he had to practice them the normal way, who knew how long it would take him to do so. But if he simply extracted the sword energy, then he could master them in only a few days.

Most people couldn’t do such a thing; the heterogeneous true energy conflicts would be too severe. But with the Hellfire Crucible, it would be an easy thing for Yang Qi.

Without any hesitation, he extracted the seven tiny swords from within Patriarch Frost-Drake, who then sagged as limply as a deflated balloon. Although he was still a Nonary Lifeseizer, it would be hard to find another Nonary Lifeseizer weaker than him. In fact, it would probably be easy for a peak Octonary Lifeseizer to defeat him in battle.

Yang Qi had raked the firewood from beneath the kettle, and there was no way that Patriarch Frost-Drake could prevent animosity from flashing in his eyes as a result.

“What. You hate me to death now? That’s fine. I'm also going to place a sealing mark in you so that you can contact me if necessary. At the same time, if you harbor any thoughts of crossing me, you’ll be done for good.” With that, he sent some of the true energy of the Devil-God Seal into Patriarch Frost-Drake.

He was already in complete despair. Even after circulating his own true energy through his body, he had no idea where that sealing mark was. And yet, he could sense that Yang Qi truly did have ultimate control over him.

From now on, it would be impossible for him to work against Yang Qi. He could only do what he said, and hope that Yang Qi somehow ended up getting himself killed.

With that, Yang Qi flew up into the air, and right before he disappeared into the sea of clouds, said, “Take care of yourself, Patriarch Frost-Drake.”

Patriarch Frost-Drake slumped down onto the ground of the island that he had just nearly destroyed with his sword energy. As of this moment, he was crestfallen, and almost felt like drowning himself in the water to commit suicide.

However, after some time passed, he decided that killing himself probably wasn’t the best thing to do. Flying into the air, he headed off into the distance.

And thus, Yang Qi managed to place a pawn into the Shroud-Heaven Alliance.

That pawn would surely be useful in the future, especially when conflict broke out between the Crown Prince Society and the Shroud-Heaven Alliance. It was just like the old adage, when the sandpiper and the clam fight, the fisherman benefits.

Feeling very pleased with how everything turned out, Yang Qi headed back in the direction of the Demi-Immortal Institute.

Thanks to the way things had played out, he could now openly show power that was much closer to his true level.

The combination of the Cosmic Sunflare Sword with the Ice-Soul God-Sword, and the other seven techniques he had acquired, would enable him to dominate and likely kill anyone in the Lifeseizing level, even a Nonary Lifeseizer.

He could now destroy anyone in his cultivation level without relying on the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, which meant that putting all the other students in the Demi-Immortal Institute in their place would be no difficult task.

Of course, the Demi-Immortal Institute was a mysterious, unfathomable place, and there were plenty of experts among the conclave students, some of them probably more powerful than the rogue cultivator Patriarch Frost-Drake. Therefore, he couldn’t let his guard down. But in his current state, he was confident that he would still be able to surpass any of them.

As he flew back, he took the seven streams of sword energy that he had taken from Patriarch Frost-Drake and refined them in his Hellfire Crucible. Soon, they became parts of his own sword technique.

Now, he truly was a master of the sword, just the same as any other swordsman who had spent a hundred or more years immersed in the study of the weapon.

It didn’t take long for him to leave the East Sea and reach the Demi-Immortal Institute. He didn’t make a big scene, but instead, returned to his quarters and sent a message to Li He, He Jili, Hua Yinhu and Liang Dong. All four of his sworn brothers were Lifeseizers now, and were elite students. The entire time since being promoted, they had stayed in the College of Elite Students, making it impossible for Yun Hailan or the Crown Prince Society to do anything against them. After all, killing was prohibited there.

It was for that very reason that, not too long ago, Jiang Fan, Gu Fenxian, and the others had taken Yang Qi out of the College of Elite Students before trying to do anything to him. Otherwise, they would have been punished.

As soon as he sent his message, his four friends arrived at his temple, all of them very excited.

“Brother, have you heard?” Li He said. “Something big happened! Song Haishan and Gu Fenxian are dead! They went out with another elite student named Jiang Fan, and got ambushed and killed by some demon-devils. There was already an investigation, and Jiang Fan and some other members of the Crown Prince Society were punished because of the matter. Of course, for us, it’s a great thing.”

Yang Qi nodded. “You're right, that is a good thing for us. I guess they dug their own grave.” Of course, he didn’t say anything about his involvement in the matter. If they knew, and then the matter came to light, they couldn’t deny being involved. And the fewer people who knew about the truth, the better. After all, if they got captured by the wrong person, it was possible that soulsearching energy arts could be used to extract the truth from them.

Sounding very authoritative, Hua Yinhu said, “It seems the institute knows about Chu Tiange’s death as well. The Hall of Corrections assigned several elders to investigate. They already interrogated everyone from the Gentlemen’s Society who was present that day. Thankfully, they all told the same story. After entering the Fiendcorpse Mountains, they parted ways from Chu Tiange, and never saw him again. I guess no one brought up the encounter with us, because the elders never came to ask any questions. It seems we’re really in the clear now.”

Yang Qi nodded. “Alright. For now, let’s keep our heads down and focus on our cultivation. On my trip back home, I came across some treasure that should be of help to all of you. And I also found some good fortune of my own that will help during the martial arts competition. It will be the perfect opportunity to make a name for ourselves.”

With that, he prepared to take out some life force springwater.

But then, he stopped moving and said, “What Elder Brother has come for a visit?”

Something like a gentle breeze could be heard from outside, accompanied by a voice. “We’re from the Gentlemen’s Society. Junior Brother Yang, please come out for a quick conversation.”

Chapter 155: Join Us

Before Yang Qi could give the life force springwater to his brothers, people from the Gentlemen’s Society came for a visit. Therefore, he and his four friends flew up to the top of his temple.

There, three people were waiting for him.

Two were women and one was a man, and from the auras they emanated, they weren’t elite students. They were conclave students!

Furthermore, their garments were embroidered with platinum characters that read: Demi-Immortal.

That was further proof that they were conclave students. Being in the Conclave was a holy position that countless students in the Demi-Immortal Institute could only dream of. It was a position of true power.

Li He and the others were visibly shocked, and quickly bowed their head respectfully. “Our respects, Elder Brother, Elder Sisters.”

Conclave students were treated with utmost importance by the institute, and were given plenty of resources in the hopes that they would become Legendaries. Legendaries were the true powers within the institute, and students who were in that level were called holy neophytes.

Most other students in the institute would feel incredibly pressured when facing conclave students. But Yang Qi wasn’t very impressed at all. Back home, he had killed Senary and Septenary devil-ghosts, and had even faced the invincible Ghost Emperor Yama. He also had numerous sworn siblings, with whom he had faced fiend-devil viscounts. Afterward, he had subdued the Ice-Soul God-Sword, captured the Nonary Lifeseizer Patriarch Frost-Drake, and then turned him into a pawn in the Shroud-Heaven Alliance.

Considering he had done all that, he wouldn’t be intimidated by anyone less than a Legendary.

Looking at the three conclave students calmly, he said, “What matter does the Gentlemen’s Society have to discuss with me?”

“How dare you speak so disrespectfully to us!” one of the female students said coldly. She had almond-shaped eyes set in a very attractive face. She also carried a long green sword in her hand, the sheath of which was clearly made from the pelt of some unknown devilling, and was inset with numerous gems. From the true energy fluctuations emanating from that sword, it was obviously incredibly sharp, and if its sword energy were released, it would be shocking to the core. “You lot just reached the Lifeseizing level and became elite students. Who do you think you are? You can act tough in front of freshman students, or students from the Outer or Inner Campus, but what gives you the gall to talk like that to us?”

Apparently, this young woman had already decided that Yang Qi deserved some punishment, as a stream of sword energy suddenly shot out from the hilt of her sword, moving like a snake to wrap around Yang Qi. Apparently, her plan was to cut off Yang Qi’s hair as a warning.

The rules for conclave students within the College of Elite Students were strict; they were not to resort to violence. However, as long as they didn’t kill or severely injure one of the elite students, they could usually do as they wished.

Without even taking time to think, Yang Qi reached out and clamped two fingers down onto the snake-like stream of sword light. In response, the light twisted and distorted, and yet, could not free itself.

Then, flames burst out of his fingers, igniting the sword energy and transforming it into dust.

“Elder Sister from the Gentlemen’s Society, I'm afraid you still need to work on your sword energy. It’s not quite strong enough to hurt me. Look, I'm a bit busy with my cultivation at the moment. If you have something you want to say, spit it out. Otherwise, I’ll head back in and you can see yourselves out.”

The young woman’s eyes flashed in shock. Apparently, she couldn’t quite believe that Yang Qi had actually dispelled her sword energy. Although she had only sent out a tiny bit of it, she was at the peak of Quinary Lifeseizing, whereas Yang Qi had only just become a Lifeseizer.

The Gentlemen’s Society had done their research into Yang Qi. They knew that he had only broken through a few months ago, so clearly, it should have been impossible for him to stand up to a Quinary Lifeseizer.

Throughout the hundreds upon hundreds of thousands of years that the institute had existed, there had occasionally been geniuses who could do such things. For instance, the Crown Prince. And there were certain members of the senior generation who had been like that when they were young. However, according to the information that the Gentlemen’s Society had gathered, Yang Qi hadn't shown any signs of being like that.

The elders in the Academy of Sage Studies had only given him ordinary marks.

But now, things seemed different.

“You think I underestimated you? That bit of sword energy was just to check your cultivation base. Now I’ll use my full strength. Let’s see how you do this time!” The young woman reached down to draw her sword, but before she could, the male student reached over to stop her.

“Slow down, Junior Sister Tao. This is the College of Elite Students. We can’t start a fight here. Furthermore, the Crown Prince Society has eyes on us everywhere. Don’t give them an excuse to make a move against us. If word spread of us behaving poorly, it could damage the reputation of the Gentlemen’s Society as a whole.”

Turning his attention to Yang Qi, the man continued, “I'm Yuan Kun. We've come here today to invite you to join the Gentleman’s Society, that’s all. There’s no need for the hostility.”

“Yuan Kun the Flying War-King?” Li He blurted, a shiver passing through him. Eyes shining with disbelief, he said, “You’re the genius who, sixty years ago, traveled to the northeast with nothing but his halberd to execute the seven evil cultivators known as the Seven Scourges of the Sea of Trees?”

Yuan Kun nodded. “Yes, that was me.”

“Brother Yang,” Li He said, “the Seven Scourges of the Sea of Trees were evil villains who took over the northeastern jungle sixty years ago. They practiced a wicked energy art in which they killed people to collect their souls. They committed every crime imaginable. Eventually, they reached Quinary Lifeseizing, and formed evil true energy vestiges. Even worse, they acquired the remnants of some sort of ancient, villainous encyclopedia called the Sutra of Myriad Evils.

“In the end, they were all cut down in a single fight by this very man standing in front of you. He became an overnight sensation! And that was when he was an elite student, not a conclave student like he is right now.”

Yang Qi nodded. “I see. In other words, when he was only a Quaternary Lifeseizer, he cut down seven Quinary Lifeseizer experts. He didn’t just beat one enemy of a higher level, but seven at once.” It was obvious that this was an impressive individual.

Of course, it went without saying that students of the Demi-Immortal Institute, regardless of who they were, were not ordinary.

Clearly pleased with how impressed everyone seemed, Yuan Kun said, “It seems to me that you’re hiding the truth about how strong you are, Yang Qi. Back when you became an elite student, you defeated Gu Fenxian. Given, he didn’t use his Painting of Immortal Immolation, but still, that was no small feat. Obviously, the five of you have come across some good fortune, otherwise you wouldn’t have gone from being freshman students to elite students in less than a year. Considering how strong you are, it would be a real shame if you didn't join a powerful organization. Besides, the Crown Prince Society clearly isn’t happy with you, and there’s no way that you can stand up to them. Why not join the Gentlemen’s Society? We can keep you safe.”

“Many thanks,” Yang Qi said, his voice cold. “We appreciate your good intentions. But I have a rule in life: I don’t take orders from anyone. If I joined the Gentlemen’s Society, I would definitely be saddled with a lot of annoying responsibilities. I’d rather practice cultivation in peace and quiet, with my freedom and independence intact. Thanks for the offer, but no. Now, will that be all?”

“What?” blurted the female student with the almond-shaped eyes. Never could she have guessed that Yang Qi would refuse their offer just like that, and not even give them any face. “Elder Brother Yuan personally came here to try to recruit you and you're just going to refuse? Do you know who Elder Brother Yuan is? And do you know who you people are?”

“None of that is important,” Yang Qi replied. “We’re all just students in the Demi-Immortal Institute. The rules of the institute don’t mandate that students join a society. Furthermore, the rules imply that we shouldn’t form cliques for personal interest.”

Yuan Kun was no ordinary individual. He was considered impressive even within the Gentlemen’s Society, in which he had a very high rank. The fact that he had been sent here to recruit these five students went to show how much the Gentlemen’s Society wanted their additional strength.

After all, five elite students were nothing to look down on.

Normally speaking, outer and inner campus students of promise were recruited into the societies when they were Masters of Energy.

For five Lifeseizers to have never joined a society was rare indeed, and made them prize prospects.

Even more puzzling was that this group of five had a problem with the Crown Prince Society. It made perfect sense for them to join the Gentlemen’s Society for their own safety. And yet, their ringleader Yang Qi refused the offer.

Yuan Kun felt like he had just been slapped hard in the face, and there was no way he would start begging after that. If word got out that he had, he would definitely become a laughing stock.

However, he still had to make one last effort. Livid, he said, “I know you five worked hard to reach the Lifeseizing level, so I'm going to give you a bit more time to think. Are you going to join the Gentlemen’s Society, or not?”

“We’re not joining the Gentlemen’s Society under any circumstances,” Yang Qi replied with decisiveness that could sever nails and chop iron. “Now, I’ll have to ask you to leave. We need to start cultivating in preparation for the Inter-Institutional Martial Arts Competition.”

“Fine!” Yuan Kun barked, his face green from rage. “So be it! You’ve got some real nerve, you people. I can’t believe you actually refused an important person like me. Tired of living? Is that what it is? You think you’re going to join the martial arts competition? You won't last until then! You’ll be dead before it ever comes around. Understand?”

By this point, Yuan Kun was resorting to outright threats.

Yang Qi looked back at him coldly. “What. We’ll die if we don't join the Gentlemen’s Society? Alright. Let’s wait and see how you people arrange for my death. I guess you’re even scarier than the Crown Prince Society.”

At this point, the young woman with the almond eyes said, “This is your last chance. Join the Gentlemen’s Society, and offer whatever good fortune you’ve come across as a gift to us. If you don’t, things won’t end well for you. Maybe you won’t get killed, but you’ll definitely regret being alive.”

“I look forward to seeing how you pull that off.” Eyes flashing, Yang Qi turned back into his temple, followed by his sworn brothers. As he did, an energy field sprang up, preventing the three from the Gentlemen’s Society from entering.

“Elder Brother,” the other young woman said, “let’s just break through this spell formation and drag them out. Then we’ll see if they dare to refuse again.”

“Hold on,” Yuan Kun said, smiling grimly. “We have plenty of time, and there will be other opportunities to get them to submit. It won’t be long before those five are crawling on their knees to us, begging to join us and handing over their good fortune. It's unusual for them to have reached the Lifeseizing level so quickly. The best outcome would be for them to join us so that we can get our hands on their secrets. And if they don't join us… they’ll be the ones to experience utter humiliation!”

Chapter 156: Power Rising Everywhere

“Brother,” He Jili said, “you really wouldn’t back down to those experts from the Gentlemen’s Society. That Yuan Kun is anything but a nice guy, you know. Back when he killed the Seven Scourges of the Sea of Trees, he got their incomplete version of the Sutra of Myriad Evils, which contains all sorts of evil energy arts cultivation techniques from the dao of devils. Although he handed the scripture over to the institute, he definitely took a look at it first.”

“That’s right,” Hua Yinhu added. “What are we supposed to do if we’re enemies of both the Crown Prince Society and the Gentlemen’s Society?”

“Yang Qi did the right thing,” Li He said. “If we joined them, it would cause no end of trouble.”

“No end of trouble?” Liang Dong said. “What do you mean?”

“A year ago we were freshman students. And now, we’ve blazed ahead to our current position. It's obvious that we must have come across some sort of good fortune, and nothing trivial at that. If we joined the Gentlemen’s Society, they would definitely require an explanation. And then what? It’s not like they’re going to keep all our secrets for us. Word would get around eventually.” Li He looked at Yang Qi. “That’s what you were thinking, right Brother?”

“Exactly,” Yang Qi said with a grim smile. “They aren’t a bunch of humanitarians. They’re fierce and domineering, just like the Crown Prince Society. None of these organizations got where they are by following the rules; they definitely did their fair share of cheating and robbing on their way to power. I’d rather just refuse them outright than make things complicated by joining them. In any case, their leadership isn’t going to do anything outrageous against us as long as we’re in the institute.”

“Fair enough,” said Liang Dong. “But back to the topic at hand. The Gentlemen’s Society just lost a lot of face, and they’re not going to let it drop. If word spread, they would become a laughingstock amongst the sea of students, and it would make their future recruitment efforts much more difficult. I guarantee you they're going to retaliate, so we have to be careful.”

Yang Qi nodded. “I know. But it doesn’t matter. I can guess what those petty fools are thinking. They’ll wait until we leave the institute, then surround us and humiliate us to no end. Or, they might try to do something to our clans to force us to acknowledge allegiance to them. Either way, we can deal with any of that. From now, until the martial arts competition, we’ll keep our heads down in the College of Elite Students, and focus on cultivation. After all, I already got my hands on something to help you achieve another breakthrough.”

Even as the words left his mouth, he waved his hand, causing four streams of light to fly out and enter his brothers’ seas of energy.

All of them could feel their life force quintessence surging within them as a result.

“Brother, what spirit medicine was that!? It's so strong!”

“Don’t worry about the details. Absorb it, and you should be able to reach Secondary or possibly even Tertiary Lifeseizing. The stronger you are, the more importantly the institute will view you, which means that anyone who made a move against us would risk offending the elders.” Next, Yang Qi went on to explain certain matters of sword enlightenment. Long after night fell, he left, and surreptitiously made his way toward the Heaven Lode Mountains to see Holy Daughter Manyflowers and Yang Susu.

He didn't give the seven powerful sword stances to his brothers. After all, they couldn't cultivate them now even if they wanted; it would simply have been a waste of time and energy. It would be much better for them to work on perfecting their Cosmic Sunflare Sword technique. Later, when they reached Quinary Lifeseizing, they could form true energy vestiges.

Freezing Night. Flying Stars. Rustling Wind…. The ultimate meaning of the seven deadly moves was profound to say the least. At long last, Yang Qi didn’t need to rely on the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth to fight a Nonary Lifeseizer.

But right now, he was anxious to see how his Aunt Susu and Holy Daughter Manyflowers were doing. He moved with incredible speed along the same path as before, passing through the numerous castles, temples, and campuses of the institute until he was in the seemingly endless mountains that were the Heaven Lode Mountains.

Almost immediately, he could sense the milky quintessence energy flowing through the meridians and springs beneath his feet. Magical power surged, pushing the subterranean true energy into the mountains, which then flowed into Yang Qi, providing both a pleasing sensation, and also, a significant boost to his own true energy.

Based on what he could sense, it was almost like a sea existed beneath the Heaven Lode Mountains, milky white true energy and subterranean quintessence. It was as if this place were the mother of all creation.

However, that milky sea had been sealed down tight so that none of it leaked outside.

Comparing the Heaven Lode Mountains to the spring he had encountered on the island of peach blossoms was like comparing a mighty beast to a tiny worm.

It made sense, considering that the Demi-Immortal Institute was the number one power in the Rich-Lush Continent.

‘No wonder conclave students reside in mountains. From there, they can connect to the milky, subterranean sea, and use that energy to further their cultivation. Although cultivating in such a fashion might seem slower than using an energy formation of the dao of monarchs, it will actually lead to much quicker progress. Unfortunately, you have to be a Quinary Lifeseizer to take up residence here. If it weren’t for the special control the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth has over the land, I wouldn't be able to absorb any of it.’

He licked his lips as he looked out at all of the mountains, each and every one had a spring connecting to the quintessence below.

Some of the springs were larger, and some were smaller, depending on the resonance between them and the milky, subterranean quintessence and spirit energy. Off in the distance were some mountains that were particularly mighty and impressive. Likely, those belonged to important conclave students, Nonary Lifeseizers who would likely become Legendaries sooner or later.

Yang Qi looked around here and there as he made his way through the Heaven Lode Mountains toward Manyflowers Peak.

The last time he had been here, his cultivation base had been so low that the experience was completely different. Now, he realized that the mountains almost looked like they had been painted in place, creating a huge image that almost looked like a meridian map of the human body.

And as for that milky sea of spirit energy, it was like that body’s sea of energy in its dantian region.

The Heaven Lode Mountains were like a huge giant, laying there silently, slowly practicing cultivation, just waiting for the day in which it would wake up and dominate all the lands.

Just looking at the mountains, Yang Qi could grasp at slightly better enlightenment of various martial disciplines.

‘Don’t tell me that there are martial truths hidden within the Heaven Lode Mountains themselves? Does understanding the mountains and the way the energy and water flows through them lead to profound insights into martial arts?’ Although Yang Qi was shocked, he didn’t have the extended time that would be required to seek enlightenment right now.

Even as he pondered the subject, he suddenly realized that a huge burst of true energy was rising up beneath him, a heaven-defying ripple that rose up into a massive, terrifying wave, the type that might result if a mountain or a star were violently thrown into the ocean.

Considering that Yang Qi’s true energy was already connected to the milky, subterranean quintessence, he instantly sensed that, off in the distance, a huge gravitational force had appeared on one of the mountain peaks. It was currently absorbing the quintessence madly, forming something like a huge tornado, or a black hole that was sucking in massive amounts of quintessence.

Wind raged through the mountains, to the shock of many experts in the area, who Yang Qi saw flying up into the air and looking toward the same mountain he was.

Despite it being some distance away, Yang Qi suddenly realized that what he was looking at was actually Manyflowers Peak!

A heaven-shaking, earth-shattering event was playing out there.

‘Crap! How could this be happening? Considering the energy forces at play, does it mean that some powerful expert is at Manyflowers Peak right now? Is someone trying to capture Holy Daughter Manyflowers and Aunt Susu?’

Even as Yang Qi was preparing to fly over to the mountain, some of the other experts who had flown up into the air began to comment in loud voices.

“Earthlode activity? Vital energy eruption? Astrological phenomena? Is someone becoming a Legendary? Holy Daughter Manyflowers must have succeeded. She’s finally going to reach the Legendary level!”

‘What? Holy Daughter Manyflowers is stepping into the Legendary level?’ Yang Qi had never witnessed something like this before, but considering everything, he was confident that he knew what was going on, and was delighted. ‘She’s going to become a Legendary, and Aunt Susu is her only apprentice. From now on, nobody will dare to look down on either of them ever again. Holy Daughter Manyflowers is incredible! Not even forty and already a Legendary? Back in Yanhaven, people who reached the seventh phase by forty were considered the best of the best.’

Yang Qi remained in place, looking over at Manyflowers Peak. Vital energy of heaven and earth swirled madly everywhere, and as it did, monsters appeared, deadly beings from beyond the heavens.

Yang Qi knew exactly what these were: heaven-devils. ‘When becoming a Legendary, heaven and earth are shaken to the core, and the monsters react with envy. That’s when heaven-devils appear!’

Their hope was to interfere with Holy Daughter Manyflowers and make sure she didn't become a Legendary.

The heaven-devils were bizarre in appearance; some had tentacles like an octopus, others were like shapeless specters. There were many that took humanoid shape, with green skin and long fangs.

Lightning gathered in the sky, terrifying to the extreme, so powerful that even Yang Qi felt his hair standing on end. Shockingly, the lightning bolts also began to take human shape.

Yang Qi even saw a palace, which began to descend in crushing fashion toward Manyflowers Peak, as if to level it into dust. The energy emanating off it seemed like that of tens of thousands of Legendaries all self-detonating at the same time.

Tribulations of all sorts appeared, expressions of earth, water, fire, wind, and endless baleful energy. The air shattered as everything within dozens of kilometers became a massive Legendary tribulation.

When one reached the Legendary level, one was no longer human, but rather, close to being an immortal. That was when one came to understand magical laws, and thus, would be the subject of jealousy on the part of heaven and earth. This was a tribulation a hundred times as severe as that from the Lifeseizing level. The only way to succeed was to defeat the monsters and subjugate the tribulation, with the alternative being permanent death.

Chapter 157: Becoming a Legendary

Holy Daughter Manyflowers was becoming a Legendary, and in many ways, it was an eye-opening experience for Yang Qi.

Strange signs appeared, subterranean quintessence erupted, and lightning gathered. Yang Qi had never seen so much lightning before; it was filled with celestial winds and the roars of dragons and tigers, heavenly palaces, heaven-devils and earth-fiends, and more.

In fact, countless stars above seemed to emit destructive starlight, as if to rip Manyflowers Peak out of the ground and crush it into ash.

Yang Qi got the feeling that if he were in that tribulation, he wouldn’t make it out alive.

All prospective Legendaries had to pass this massive tribulation to reach the next level.

‘Crap,’ he thought. ‘Aunt Susu is on Manyflowers Peak too, which means that she might get killed if Holy Daughter Manyflowers doesn’t pass the tribulation. Well, I guess the only thing I can do is prepare to charge in there and rescue her if things go bad.’

Meanwhile, the surrounding experts were discussing the goings-on.

“Her Legendary Tribulation is profound to say the least. Having a cultivation base that strong shows that this girl is really a genius. She reached Nonary Lifeseizing twenty years ago, and now she’s doing this? I wonder if she’ll succeed. If so, our institute will have another Legendary.”

“It’s hard to say. That tribulation is nothing to take lightly. Look, there’s a heavenly palace in the lightning! The rulers of heaven aren’t happy at all!”

“Her apprentice Yang Susu is there with her. You know, I’ve always wondered about that. Yang Susu doesn't seem particularly talented. Why would Holy Daughter Manyflowers pick her as an apprentice? Was it really worth it?”

“Supposedly, Yang Susu has a unique background. She’s been here at the institute for ten years, but only has a middling cultivation base as far as I’m concerned. Well, you can’t compare her to Holy Daughter Manyflowers or the Crown Prince. In any case, she’s no weakling. I heard that she hasn’t opened her apertures, but if she does, she’ll be extraordinary beyond belief.”

“Opened her apertures? What does that mean?”

“Even I'm not really sure. It has something to do with a physique-type from the distant past.”

“Look, the heavenly tribulation is growing more intense. Incredible! Her apprentice Yang Susu is actually fighting by her side. Is Holy Daughter Manyflowers crazy? She’s actually using the power of the tribulation to temper her apprentice! Wait, don’t tell me she’s using the tribulation to help her open her apertures?”

More and more people were gathering to watch the events playing out at Manyflowers Peak, including elders, conclave students, and even some elite students who happened to be around at the time. Mixtures of both envy and fear could be seen on the faces of those present.

On the one hand, some people envied the fact that Holy Daughter Manyflowers was becoming a Legendary, and on the other hand, some people feared the power of the tribulation.

Yang Qi could sense two auras in the tribulation, one strong, one weak. Obviously, the weaker one belonged to Yang Susu.

To his surprise, he realized that Holy Daughter Manyflowers was actually guiding some of the tribulation power into Yang Susu.

‘What heaven-defying secret magic is that? Can Aunt Susu take it?’ He had just overheard people talking about Yang Susu having some sort of special physique, and that if she ‘opened her apertures’, she would make astounding progress.

The fact of the matter was that Yang Susu was only a bit over twenty, and had just started to make a name for herself. She was already a Secondary Lifeseizer, and because of that, was considered something of a prodigy. And yet now they were saying she would become vastly stronger if she opened her apertures?

WHIZZZ!

The lightning above swirled together to form a huge bell, which descended to encompass the entirety of Manyflowers Peak.

Many people were now letting out exclamations of shock.

“I can’t believe she provoked tribulation lightning like that!”

“That’s the Universal Polarity Godbell! Its appearance indicates that the person in question cannot be permitted in this heaven and earth, and has aroused the rage of both the legion of gods, and heaven and earth! What is that kind of tribulation lightning doing here? Our Demi-Immortal Institute is a righteous, orthodox organization. From what I've heard, this type of tribulation would only appear for the most evil wretch-devils in the distant past.”

“That phenomenon is incredible. About a hundred years ago, I was in the deep mountains when I saw an incredibly powerful wretch-devil facing a tribulation like this. He set up countless grand spell formations, and even performed blood sacrifices. And yet, the bell came and reduced him to ash. Don’t tell me that Holy Daughter Manyflowers cultivates some sort of devil art?”

“How is that even possible? If she cultivated a devil art, the elders would have found out about it a long time ago. I’d guess it's because her strength is literally heaven-defying. She’s forcing the tribulation to help her apprentice, which is inciting even more tribulation to come. She's really got some guts, I’ll give you that. Isn’t she afraid of dying? Not only does she have to worry about passing the tribulation herself, but she also has to take care of her apprentice.”

“She’s killing two birds with one stone. I heard that last time she went to the Minorcosm World, she got in an argument with Patriarchs Wind and Cloud, who said that her apprentice doesn’t match up to their new apprentice, Yun Hailan. Maybe that's why she decided to go and defy heaven to this degree.”

“She’s going to get herself killed.”

WHIZZZ!

All of a sudden, the bell that had covered Manyflowers Peak began to vibrate, as though something inside were banging against it with incredible force.

Ninety-nine times, the bell trembled, cracks spreading out on its surface until, finally, it exploded into countless fragments that became a vortex swirling around the area.

“Void Severing!” It was Holy Daughter Manyflowers’ voice, accompanied by a projection of Humanoid True Energy. As it floated above the mountain like a goddess, it hefted a sword and then slashed it upward, causing a bizarre black rift to open up in the air. The resulting imbalance with heaven and earth instantly caused the heaven-devils, lightning, and other tribulations to be sucked inside.

In the blink of an eye, the heavenly tribulation vanished.

At the same time, a voice spoke out that would incite any lesser person who heard it to drop to their knees in worship.

“Success! This is the Legendary level!” With that, Holy Daughter Manyflowers’ energy projection sank down and merged back into her.

The experts in the area were all muttering amongst themselves. “I can’t believe she broke through. She actually destroyed the Universal Polarity Godbell! Come on, let’s go pay her a formal visit to offer congratulations. Her status in the Demi-Immortal Institute will be completely different from now on. I wonder if her apprentice opened those apertures?”

Soon, a stream of experts was heading toward Manyflowers Peak.

Yang Qi also flew over.

By the time he arrived, the place was already buzzing with activity. Experts of all types had come: old, young, men, women. After all, the rise of a new Legendary was no small event.

When Yang Qi touched down, he saw that, in the palace halfway up Manyflowers Peak, there were two prayer mats, upon which knelt Holy Daughter Manyflowers and Yang Susu.

Yang Susu shone with brilliant light, making her look like a living treasure. She had concentric halos floating behind her, and she emanated the fluctuations of a Tertiary Lifeseizing cultivation base. Even more marvelous, her blood seemed to contain seven colors, making her look more like a god from heaven than a human. However, there was some power within her concealing some aspects of her true strength.

“A Seven Apertures Sprite Body!” one of the experts exclaimed. “That’s a Seven Apertures Sprite Body! According to the legends, it exists only in the blood of an ancient race of sage-like beings from the distant past. It's a saintly body-type of the Spritefolk. No wonder Holy Daughter Manyflowers was always so devoted to that apprentice of hers! Who would have thought that she actually had that type of holy body?”

Yang Qi looked over to a nearby expert, a conclave student who was a Quinary Lifeseizer.

“What's a Seven Apertures Sprite Body?” he asked.

“The Spritefolk were a people from the distant past who had boundless potential in cultivation,” the student explained. “Later, as heaven and earth transformed, they disappeared. However, some people still have their blood in them, and every once in a while, a person like that will awaken their bloodline and become a top expert because of it. Who would have thought that Yang Susu would have Spritefolk blood in her? Now that she's opened her apertures, it will definitely attract the attention of the leaders in the Minorcosm World. I wouldn’t be surprised if the chancellor himself shows up. Reaching the heavens in a single bound. That’s what she’s done.”

‘I can’t believe Aunt Susu has powers like that!’ Yang Qi thought. All he remembered was that his grandfather had raised his Aunt Susu for a time before she was taken away by Holy Daughter Manyflowers. To think that she possessed the holy body of an ancient race of people, the Spritefolk.

At this point, Holy Daughter Manyflowers said, “Ladies and gentlemen, reaching the Legendary level was very draining. I'm afraid I’m not up to entertaining all of you. If you don't mind, I’d like to be alone for a time to recover. After I report to the leaders in the Minorcosm World, I’ll make sure to take time to visit all of you.”

“Rest well, Holy Daughter Manyflowers. We just wanted to offer our congratulations. We’ll come again on a more appropriate occasion to offer gifts.”

It was with such words that everyone took their leave, until only Yang Qi remained behind.

Looking at him, Holy Daughter Manyflowers waved her hand, causing dense mists to spring up and cover the mountain. “So, you’re back. How strong are you now?”

Silence reigned. Yang Qi could sense the immense magical power within Holy Daughter Manyflowers, and knew that not even his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth would be a match for her now. Her true energy had transformed significantly, to the point where it was now connected with the natural and magical laws around them.

That was the Legendary level.

Yang Qi was already very wary of people like this. After all, he could handle Nonary Lifeseizers, but Legendaries were a totally different story.

And yet, it turned out that Holy Daughter Manyflowers was actually more shocked than Yang Qi was right now. The last time they had met, he had been strong, but only in an ordinary way. Now, he was completely different. He seemed like a sword sharp enough to rip the sky apart and slash the earth to pieces. His sword techniques had obviously reached the point where ghost-gods could hardly fathom them.

“Did you start studying a new sword technique?” she asked. “And is that the aura of a divine sword I sense on you? Let me see it.”

“Yes,” Yang Qi replied. With the wave of his hand, he summoned the Ice-Soul God-Sword, which became a streak of green as it flew toward Holy Daughter Manyflowers.

Reaching out, she grabbed it. Upon running her finger down the length of the blade, and reading the characters inscribed there, she said, “What?! The Ice-Soul God-Sword!?”

Chapter 158: Seven Apertures Sprite Body

“This was the signature sword of Guru Ice-Soul, years ago,” Holy Daughter Manyflowers continued. “He forged it from Perennial frigidjade, and imbued it with the quintessence of an ice soul to give it a spirit of its own. It was tempered for an entire sixty-year-cycle in flame lightning, and when its full power is unleashed, it can freeze everything for hundreds of kilometers, and can even divert rivers. This is not the kind of thing that can be easily subjugated. How did you get it? And how did you get it to submit? Even a Legendary would have a hard time with it. And a Nonary Lifeseizer would definitely fail.”

“This sword and I are kindred spirits of a sort,” Yang Qi replied. “I encountered it by chance out in the East Sea. There was an old man out there named, what was it? Oh right. Patriarch Frost-Drake. He was fighting to pull the sword up from a spring on an island of peach blossoms. The two of them were seriously hurt in the struggle, and I swooped in at the end to take the sword.” Yang Qi told his tale very smoothly, leaving no holes whatsoever in his story.

“Oh? Patriarch Frost-Drake?” Holy Daughter Manyflowers nodded. “I've heard of him. He reached Nonary Lifeseizing quite some time ago. He acquired some snowflake godsteel, which he used to forge his Haughty Snow Sword. And supposedly, he acquired an old manual describing seven sword stances from the ancient Ravaging Dual Sword Sect.”

Holy Daughter Manyflowers didn’t have any reason to doubt Yang Qi. After all, it made sense that he might be able to snatch the Ice-Soul God-Sword after it experienced a protracted battle with Patriarch Frost-Drake that left both of them injured.

If she had been told that it was Yang Qi himself who dragged the Ice-Soul God-Sword out of the depths of a frozen kingdom, and then went on to defeat Patriarch Frost-Drake, there was no way she would have believed it. After all, only a Legendary should be able to do things like that.

“Lucky. So lucky,” she said with a sigh of admiration. “Although, don’t forget that the Cosmic Sunflare Sword and the Ice-Soul God-Sword are completely incompatible. Be careful.”

“Don't worry about that, Senior,” Yang Qi said. “I already gained enlightenment of yin and yang, and of the dao of water and fire. I even used the frigid energy of the Ice-Soul God-Sword to temper the burning flame of the Cosmic Sunflare Sword.”

“Oh?” Holy Daughter Manyflowers said, looking a bit surprised. “Do you mind doing a little demonstration?”

Yang Qi nodded and flicked his finger, sending out a spark of flame that transformed into a sword of fire, which then fused with the ice sword.

The two bursts of sword energy were like yin and yang, making a taiji symbol that rotated without cease.

He didn’t use any specific sword stances or techniques; he just revealed his profound understanding of the dao of the sword. After taking the sword energy that Patriarch Frost-Drake had worked for a hundred years to build up, and after seeking enlightenment for so many days on the island of peach blossoms, he now seemed like a grandmaster of the sword.

“Not bad,” Holy Daughter Manyflowers said, “Not bad at all. You understand the transformations of yin and yang, and the dao of the opposed sword energies of water and fire. Unfortunately, the Cosmic Sunflare Sword is actually a set of techniques, whereas the Ice-Soul God-Sword isn't a technique at all. How about I teach you the Moonset Hyperlunar Sword technique? It was created by a member of the senior generation to be a counterpoint to the Cosmic Sunflare Sword technique. That would be the perfect combination to use with the Ice-Soul God-Sword.”

“Many thanks, Senior. I really need to work hard on my sword technique. With the big martial arts competition coming up, I definitely have to win honor for the institute.”

“You’ll have a chance of making a scene with the Ice-Soul God-Sword.” Looking him up and down, she asked, “What level is your cultivation base now anyway?”

“Er, I've actually been in Quinary Lifeseizing for a while now, but I’ve been hiding it. The tallest tree attracts the most wind, right? Not only is the Crown Prince Society plotting against me, but I also offended the Gentlemen’s Society. So I've been trying to keep my head down.”

“Quinary Lifeseizing? You’re progressing very rapidly.” Holy Daughter Manyflowers was slowly coming to the realization that she was dealing with a real genius in Yang Qi. “Well, do as you wish. Incidentally, Susu has opened her apertures, and released the godpower of the Seven Apertures Sprite Body. The upper echelons will definitely take note of that, and spend extra resources to guide her. I'll be taking a trip to the Minorcosm World tomorrow to report the matter. Hmph! Just wait until those Patriarchs Wind and Cloud see how amazing my apprentice is!”

At this point, Yang Susu looked over at Yang Qi.

“Qi’er,” she said by way of greeting. She then took a breath, and the vital energy of heaven and earth thrummed in resonance. She rose to her feet, and the seven-colored glow inside of her radiated out into the open; clearly, her true energy was now far beyond that of any conclave student.

“I'm in Tertiary Lifeseizing already?” she blurted. “And my true energy is ten times beyond what it was before?”

“That’s right,” Holy Daughter Manyflowers responded. “You’ve fully activated your holy body, but that's only the first step. From here on out, your cultivation will proceed even more quickly than before. I realized back when you were a child that you had the blood of the Spritefolk in you. Unfortunately, your cultivation base wasn’t high enough to open your apertures at that time. Thankfully, I was able to use my rise to the Legendary level to awaken the latent potential in your blood. No one will possibly dare to underestimate us now.”

“But Master, what is a Seven Apertures Sprite Body?” Yang Susu asked.

“It is a type of physique among the Spritefolk. They were a holy people from the distant past, who supposedly had the blood of the gods in them. If you can awaken their power, it will be enough to move mountains and fill in seas. In antiquity, there were eight other types of godly bloodlines, and the Spritefolk were only one of them. Another example is the Seafolk, who have the blood of sea gods, although it's very out of the ordinary. Yun Hailan is one of the rare few who have it.” Turning to Yang Qi, she said, “Do you understand now, Yang Qi? Yun Hailan is no one to take lightly. It would be very difficult for you to beat her in a fight.”

“Yes,” Yang Qi said, nodding. ‘But if I used the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, not even ten Yun Hailans could kill me. But I probably wouldn’t be a match for her just using the Ice-Soul God-Sword. Besides, she also has the Crown Prince backing her.’

“Yang Qi,” Holy Daughter Manyflowers said, “are you thinking that your cultivation base is actually high enough to take on Yun Hailan? You might be almost invincible now with your Ice-Soul God-Sword, but she has the backing of the Crown Prince, and he’s far, far more powerful than the Ice-Soul God-Sword. He has countless treasures of unimaginable power, so many that he wouldn’t think twice about giving one or two to Yun Hailan as a gift. Beyond all that, Yun Hailan doesn’t just have the blood of a sea god in her, she also has the blood of a divine dragon. That gives her the power of a dragon in the sea.”

“The power of a dragon in the sea?” Yang Qi was actually chuckling inwardly, but outwardly, put on a look of confusion. “Senior, perhaps I really do need some more assistance from you.”

“Well, you’re not my apprentice, but you are Susu’s nephew, so in some ways, I'm obliged to help you.” Holy Daughter Manyflowers waved her hand, causing projected images of people to fill the hall. Some practiced sword techniques, some performed breathing exercises, some sat in meditation, some simply remained in place motionless…. All were working on the Moonset Hyperlunar Sword technique, which was soft and feminine, graceful and lonely in nature.

After giving Yang Qi plenty of time to memorize them all, she said, “This is the quintessence of the sword technique. You and Susu work on your cultivation here while I go for a trip to the Minorcosm World.” With that, she vanished.

The projections disappeared along with her, leaving behind only Yang Qi and Yang Susu.

Yang Qi closed his eyes to contemplate the new sword technique. Sometime later, he opened them. “Incredible! It's actually the perfect complement to the Cosmic Sunflare Sword technique. Cultivating this will be of great benefit to me.”

“Qi’er,” Yang Susu said, “your cultivation base is advancing by leaps and bounds! What good fortune did you come across?” By now, Yang Susu was convinced that there was much more to his cultivation base than he was letting on. After all, they had grown up together, and therefore, she could read him much better than others could.

“Let’s talk about that later,” Yang Qi said. “Aunt Susu. I have something amazing that should push your cultivation base even higher.” With the wave of his hand, Yang Qi produced the huge bottle gourd, which filled the hall with a powerful aura of life force.

“Life force springwater?” Yang Susu said. “Isn’t that what the Crown Prince Society uses? How did you get your hands on it?”

“I’ll explain everything later, Aunt Susu. For now, let me help you push your cultivation base to a higher level. With your Seven Apertures Sprite Body, you could probably make use of a big portion of life force quintessence.” He clenched his hand into a fist, causing water to fly out of the gourd and into Yang Susu.

A moment later, the seven-colored glow inside of her was even stronger than before.

Meanwhile, some distance away, Yun Hailan stood atop a mountain peak, clad in a blue garment, looking through the mist and clouds toward Manyflowers Peak. A seemingly bottomless cliff stretched out below her, and her delicate garment fluttered in the breeze.

In this moment, there was something quite odd about the way she carried herself.

“What’s wrong, Junior Sister Hailan? Are you feeling pressured?” Behind her stood a man with a warm smile on his face. He seemed graceful and refined, and looked more like a scholar than an energy artist.

And yet, standing behind him in deference were a host of experts from the Crown Prince Society.

The conclave student who had lost the life force springwater was there, the Septenary Lifeseizer Lei Tao, who cultivated the Grand Thunderclap Swordplay.

“Many thanks, Elder Brother Xie Feng,” Yun Hailan said coolly. “No, I'm not under any pressure. Yang Susu might have opened her apertures and activated the supposed Seven Apertures Sprite Body, but I could strangle her while she slept if I felt like it.”

The scholarly young man was none other than the Nonary Lifeseizer Xie Feng, who was just on the verge of becoming a Legendary, and was considered the leader of the conclave students in the Crown Prince Society.

The Crown Prince put a lot of trust in him, both to lead the society, and to accomplish all sorts of important tasks.

Whenever people outside of the institute talked about Xie Feng the Heaven-Toppler, they would shiver in fear. Once, he single-handedly waged war on eighteen sects, all because they had spoken ill of the Crown Prince.

And on one occasion, he killed a general from the Sage Ancestor Dynasty for saying that the Crown Prince didn’t deserve his name. The man had claimed that only the actual crown prince from the dynasty could legitimately be called that. In the end, Xie Feng killed him, and the Sage Ancestor Dynasty didn't do anything about it.

Although he looked gentle and civilized, when he struck, he never showed any mercy, and never left any loose ends.

“Holy Daughter Manyflowers is a Legendary,” he murmured, “and so will I be, soon.”

Chapter 159: Martial Arts Competition

The people gathered on that high mountain were the best of the best, the conclave students, the core power of the Crown Prince Society.

In the Demi-Immortal Institute, the student body was divided into freshman students, outer campus students, inner campus students, elite students, conclave students, and finally, holy neophytes. To become a conclave student, one needed to be a Quinary Lifeseizer. As for the holy neophytes, they were even rarer. After all, the number of people in the Rich-Lush Continent who could become Legendaries was few and far between.

Because of that, the fundamental situation was the same in all the big institutes; the Lifeseizers in the Quinary level or higher, the conclave students, were considered extremely prestigious, and most capable of living up to their potential.

And Yun Hailan was now brushing shoulders with just such individuals, not just because of her having found favor with the Crown Prince, but also because of her own skill and ability.

“Holy Daughter Manyflowers is a genius,” Yun Hailan said. “From what I’ve heard, she reached Nonary Lifeseizing when she was around twenty or so. Now, less than twenty years later, she broke through all the requisite shackles to become a Legendary. And yet, I will still surpass her. I’ll reach the Legendary level ten years before she did.”

Yun Hailan was currently twenty, so if she could do as she claimed, and become a Legendary at the age of thirty, it would be shocking to the extreme.

Perhaps most people would take her claims to be mere boasting, but she was absolutely confident. After all, few people knew that the might of gods and dragons lurked inside of her. Of the people present, only Xie Feng had an inkling of the secrets she kept.

And yet, despite being a Nonary Lifeseizer, not even he was able to see the truth about her level, which was quite surprising to him.

‘The Crown Prince has taken a liking to her,’ he thought, ‘which in and of itself indicates there’s something incredible in her blood. Plus, she took Patriarchs Wind and Cloud as her masters. And she just spent two days practicing cultivation here in the Minorcosm World. I wonder what level she’s reached. From what I heard, the Crown Prince is in some dangerous location cultivating a powerful energy art, the Son of Heaven’s Godfist. Even still, he transported a powerful treasure to her, something that makes her unreadable even to me.

‘I know she has the blood of a sea god, that’s without doubt. But why does she also seem to have true dragon blood in her as well? The power of ‘a dragon in the sea’ is nothing to look down on. The treasures the Crown Prince has access to are godly to say the least. If he gave her something truly powerful, doesn’t it mean she’ll take first place in the martial arts competition?’

All of a sudden, Yun Hailan turned around, looked at Xie Feng, and said, “Elder Brother Xie, what do you think about the upcoming martial arts competition? The whole point of the competition is to watch the Nonary Lifeseizers from the various institutes fight it out, right? The holy neophytes won’t take part. And since you’re the best of the best in the Crown Prince Society, sir, does that mean you’ll be able to dominate the rest of the competitors?”

“Dominate the rest of the competitors? Well, that’s easier said than done.” Xie Feng smiled. Although he made a show of being humble, he was actually very confident in himself. “In all four of the institutes, elite students are as common as sand on the seashore. There are plenty of Nonary Lifeseizers, some of whom have been in that level for hundreds of years, and are right on the verge of becoming Legendaries. I’ll do my best, but there’s no telling what will happen. Junior Sister, I know you’re quite the ambitious type, and would love to make a name for yourself. There are some amazing rewards available during the Inter-Institutional Martial Arts Competition. From what I heard, whoever takes first place will receive a magical item from the distant past.”

“Oh? And what might that be, Elder Brother Xie Feng?”

Xie Feng’s eyes glittered as he replied, “I'm not sure. I heard that the chancellors of the four institutes had a meeting about the subject, and ended up making a bet. One of the chancellors lost the bet, although I'm not sure who. In any case, that chancellor is the one who provided the grand prize. One thing's for sure: it's definitely a precious treasure. And I'm going to be the one taking the prize and reaching the Legendary level. As for anyone who gets in my way, they’ll end up dead!”

When he said the word dead, everyone present shivered, with the exception of Yun Hailan, who stood there by the cliff, looking like the picture of eternal purity in her blue gown. As the wind blew past, she said, “In that case, I guess I should offer my congratulations now, Elder Brother Xie Feng. Oh, by the way. The death of my cousin Song Haishan needs to be thoroughly investigated. There’s something extremely peculiar about the whole situation.”

One of the other leaders of the Crown Prince Society said, “Peculiar? What do you mean? According to Jiang Fan, they were ambushed by monsters. There doesn’t seem much more to it than that. There are students every year who get killed by monsters. It's just the will of heaven, and you know you can’t defy that.”

“In that case, I’ll just have to look into the matter myself. You’d better hope I don’t find any new evidence. Otherwise, you’ll have a hard time explaining things to the Crown Prince.”

Before anyone could say anything else, Yun Hailan suddenly exploded, becoming countless blue streaks of lightning-like light that vanished into thin air.

“What incredible true energy,” Xie Feng said, visibly moved. “That's Flight of the Thunderbolt Diffusion, one of the most powerful escape magics of Patriarchs Wind and Cloud. I can’t believe she can use something so incredible.”

“Elder Brother,” one of the conclave students said, “this Yun Hailan is no one to take lightly. The Crown Prince is holding nothing back to help her progress, and she’s already strong enough to dominate Quinary Lifeseizers. I'd say there’s a high likelihood she's actually much stronger than that. And I bet she’s actually going to try to take first place in the competition. You know, only true geniuses can challenge people multiple levels higher than them. In antiquity, there were supposedly some Lifeseizers who could defeat Legendaries, but they were the children of gods. Although no such beings exist nowadays, there are still people who are close.”

‘I’m aware of all that,’ Xie Feng thought. ‘I'm not sure what the Crown Prince has in mind, but if he wants her to take first place, I won’t interfere. Of course, in the interests of fairness, I'm sure the Crown Prince would compensate me for that.’

“In any case,” he continued out loud, “the most important thing right now isn’t Yun Hailan, it’s the Shroud-Heaven Alliance that was recently formed. The Crown Prince’s old defeated foe Young Master Shroud-Heaven is back. Apparently, he’s mastered an invincible devil art unique to the Demonfolk. In fact, that's why the Crown Prince went to a distant danger zone to cultivate that extremely deadly energy art of his; to kill Young Master Shroud-Heaven. That technique is so amazing that not even the fabled Great Sage Shroud-Heaven himself will be able to resurrect his son after his nascent divinity is killed.

“Let’s keep track of all the movements of this alliance. That’s our most important task right now. By the way, considering the matter is connected to the Hanging Mountain, you all need to be very careful. Most organizations in the lands fear the Demi-Immortal Institute enough that they wouldn't dare to do anything to us. But the Hanging Mountain harbors no such fear. It’s been quite some time that they’ve been eyeing the Rich-Lush Continent like a tiger eyeing prey.

“Mobilize all our spies and agents. Make sure we know everything about the Shroud-Heaven Alliance!”

Whoosh. Whoosh. Whoosh…. Blasts of wind swirled out as the students blurred into motion.

Meanwhile, Yun Hailan hovered high above the sea of clouds, looking down at the conclave students vanishing into the night. Shaking her head, she murmured to herself, ‘Everyone in the Crown Prince Society thinks that all my success is because of the Crown Prince. Little do they know that, as far as I'm concerned, the Crown Prince is no different from that Yang Qi. They’re all pawns. I’ll never let any man use me…. The Crown Prince Society people treat me politely, but in their bones, they hate me. Eventually, they’ll all be forced to kneel in front of me.’

Expression flickering, she turned to look in the direction of Manyflowers Peak. ‘Yang Qi…. I have to admit that I underestimated you. You were once nothing more than a country bumpkin brat, but you’ve changed. You really stand out from the crowd now. It's almost hard to believe how vicious and merciless you’ve become. If only you would bow your head and swear loyalty to me, I could use you to accomplish incredible things here in the Demi-Immortal Institute. I need to find a good opportunity to force you to submit….’

Suddenly, her eyes flickered with shining light. ‘I know that you were involved in the deaths of Song Haishan and Gu Fenxian. And I can’t help but admire how perfectly you covered it all up. But I know you. You’re an amateur, so you definitely left some evidence somewhere. Once I find it, I’ll push you into a life-or-death situation in which you have no choice but to agree to become my slave.’

**

Back in the grand hall on Manyflowers Peak, Yang Qi continued to send a flow of life force springwater into Yang Susu, who was glowing with dazzling light. Unexpectedly, there were seven specific locations within her that were absorbing the life force and, as a result, transforming into seas of true energy.

‘What? Seven seas of energy?’ Yang Qi was shocked at what his acute senses were telling him. There was no doubt about it; they were not acupoints or meridians, they were seas of energy.

Seas of energy and acupoints were very different. Seas of energy converted life force quintessence, and also balanced the blood and energy in the body. In Quinary Lifeseizing, one formed true energy vestiges, but all they did was store true energy that was built up during breathing exercises. Eventually, it would be turned into animadestiny true energy, which could then flow out into the acupoints.

In contrast, seas of energy were like furnaces. They were a core element of the body that simply couldn’t be substituted or replaced.

And yet, now Yang Susu had seven swirling vortexes inside of her that were becoming seas of energy. Those seas of energy could absorb power from outside the body, and transform it into true energy.

In other words, when Yang Susu took a single breath, she would be absorbing seven times the normal amount of spirit energy. Obviously, she could also circulate her energy at a much higher speed than ordinary people.

Furthermore, Yang Qi could also sense that those seven seas of energy were larger than normal. If he closed his eyes, shutting Yang Susu’s physical form from his senses, he could see the seven massive vortexes, spinning endlessly as they sucked in vital energy.

The seven seas of energy also served to organize, sort, and distribute the absorbed vital energy in a perfect way, and used it to cleanse the fleshly body.

Those seas of energy, each one a furnace, were nearly as marvelous as his Hellfire Crucible.

Chapter 160: Seven Seas of Energy

For seven seas of energy to have formed inside Yang Susu was something completely unprecedented.

From that, Yang Qi was starting to understand how terrifying the Seven Apertures Sprite Body was. Yang Susu now had seven furnaces that could refine vital energy, and although the function wasn’t quite as marvelous as his Hellfire Crucible, it was still astonishing.

“Spritefolk Godfurnace….” Yang Susu murmured. Massive amounts of vital energy surged within her seven seas of energy, gradually transforming into true energy expressions that resembled pill furnaces. Each breath she took was now like the breathing of dozens of Lifeseizers, and the milky vital energy quintessence from beneath the ground seemed almost incapable of keeping up with it.

Yang Susu had experienced such a fundamental transformation that, instead of being human, she was now more like a god, immortal, or sage.

Now, it seemed as if she possessed some incredibly unusual energy art.

“Aunt Susu, what energy art are you cultivating?” Yang Qi asked. He was very curious about what marvelously enigmatic technique she was working on, which was clearly something that ordinary humans would never possess.

Eyes mostly blank, Yang Susu replied, “It’s something I was enlightened about after opening my apertures. A mental dharma of the Spritefolk. It seems to be something buried deep in my blood.”

“Oh?” Yang Qi replied, thoroughly taken aback. Some demonlings could awaken cultivation techniques that were buried in their memories or souls, but who would have thought that a similar thing would happen with Yang Susu and her Seven Apertures Sprite Body? Even stranger, it seemed that it all happened because of the forming of those seven seas of energy.

There happened to be a spring built into this hall of Manyflowers Palace which contained a milky-white flow of energy that was none other than the quintessence of the earth.

Also in the depths of that spring was an enormous spell formation, something that far surpassed an energy formation of the dao of monarchs. This was an energy formation of the imperial heaven, something that only Quinary Lifeseizers or higher could make use of.

However, not even the quintessence provided by that energy formation could possibly have been enough for Yang Susu. It was only thanks to the life force springwater that Yang Qi had provided that she was able to grasp this new mental dharma.

Before long, densely packed lightning bolts could be seen taking shape above her, as well as monsters, bane-devils, baleful energy and the like. Flames covered her.

Tribulation had come!

She was breaking into Quaternary Lifeseizing, and so Yang Qi prepared to stand guard.

And yet, even as the tribulation formed, her seven seas of energy erupted to life, sending energy out to form a huge vortex that easily sucked in the lightning, monsters, and other aspects of the tribulation.

Just like that, the tribulation vanished.

Yang Susu’s cultivation base was advancing by leaps and bounds.

Even as Yang Qi breathed a sigh of relief, all of a sudden, the vital energy of heaven and earth fluctuated, and even more powerful monsters began to take shape, burning with ghostfire, their faces vicious to the extreme.

Another tribulation was starting!

‘Another one? Is this the tribulation of Quinary Lifeseizing?’ To his shock, Yang Qi realized that, right after reaching Quaternary Lifeseizing, the incredible power of the life force springwater was providing life force quintessence that was the equivalent of over a hundred years of bitter cultivation. Unexpectedly, that was provoking Quinary Lifeseizing tribulation.

Massive amounts of intense lightning began to fall, and in the blink of an eye, the entire hall was filled with baleful energy, devil-ghosts, lightning, earth, water, fire, wind and vital energy as sharp as a blade. Even Yang Qi was in danger because of it.

But then, a burst of sword energy swirled out to protect him, preventing any of the ill effects from affecting him.

Yang Qi looked into the nearly-empty bottle gourd, quickly absorbed all of the remaining life force springwater, then sent the resulting true energy out into his limbs and bones.

His life force springwater was completely used up. Back on the island of peach blossoms, he had used a significant amount to subjugate the Ice-Soul God-Sword, and drag it up from the mysterious kingdom of ice. He had then given some to his sworn brothers. And just moments ago, he had also provided a large amount to Yang Susu. Taking the last amount had yet again caused his cultivation base to rise. At the same time, the life force springwater instantly fueled a new level of enlightenment of the sword energy of the Moonset Hyperlunar Sword that Holy Daughter Manyflowers had given him.

“Ice-Soul God-Sword; Moonset Hyperlunar Sword technique!”

All it took was a thought on Yang Qi’s part for the martial technique to be fully employed. Two streams of sword energy shot out, one like yin, one like yang, which swirled around him like supple dragons. Together they formed a shield, half of which was ice, the other fire, a barrier that was impenetrable, and that could conquer every obstacle.

“Yin-Yang Tower Shield!”

The countless variations of Yang Qi’s sword technique could quickly shift back and forth from a defensive shield to a sword formation. As it turned out, he was using Yang Susu’s Quinary Lifeseizing tribulation to hone his sword technique.

It took an entire day for the tribulation to fade away. When it was all over, Yang Susu had transformed on a fundamental level. She opened her eyes, and saw Yang Qi working with numerous streams of sword energy, which were combined into a magnificent tableau. However, at the same time, the vital energy of heaven and earth vibrated as another tribulation began.

It was Senary Lifeseizing tribulation!

One spectacular event after another was taking place on Manyflowers Peak. First was Legendary tribulation, and then, Yang Susu experienced tribulations of Quaternary and Quinary Lifeseizing. And to top it all off, Yang Qi was now preparing to face Senary Lifeseizing tribulation.

After all, he was already at the peak of Quinary Lifeseizing, and was now working on combining the yin and yang aspects of his sword technique, backed by a sizeable amount of life force springwater.

Suddenly, the hundredth particle within him erupted, and the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth was stirred.

‘What? Another tribulation?’ Yang Susu was simply stunned by what she was seeing.

Around that time, a graceful woman appeared at the entrance of the hall, who was none other than Holy Daughter Manyflowers.

“Master!” Yang Susu blurted loudly.

Holy Daughter Manyflowers looked at the tribulation brewing, and her eyes sparkled with strange light. ‘He’s challenging Senary Lifeseizing tribulation? His cultivation base is even more amazing than I realized. He definitely has some profound secret that he’s hiding. Well, it doesn’t have anything to do with me.’

“Susu, come with me. The chancellor wants to see you!”

“What? The chancellor?” Yang Susu replied, clearly surprised.

“That's right. The most powerful person in the Demi-Immortal Institute: the chancellor.” Holy Daughter Manyflowers seemed to be in too much of a hurry to worry about Yang Qi. Sending out a stream of true energy, she wrapped up Yang Susu and said, “Everyone in the Minorcosm World knows about you activating your Seven Apertures Sprite Body. The chancellor himself wants to help train you now! There’s no time to lose. Let’s go!”

“But what about Qi’er?”

“He’ll be fine. Manyflowers Peak is locked down tight, so no one could possibly interfere. And letting him gain enlightenment of his cultivation base on his own will be better for him anyway.” Even as the words left her mouth, Holy Daughter Manyflowers sped away with Yang Susu.

With them gone, Yang Qi could breathe a sigh of relief, and could actually call upon all of his true levels of power. Writhing silver snakes burrowed into his blood vessels, and devil energy erupted from the ground. Heaven-devils descended, and devilish projections appeared that tried to drag him down into the depths.

Completely unfazed, Yang Qi shouted as he summoned his Hellfire Crucible. As it erupted with gravitational force, it began to transform on a fundamental level. A pitch black doorway seemed to rise up from inside, which slowly opened, reaching out with force to drag all of the tribulation manifestations toward it like a river.

And yet, even more tribulation manifestations appeared everywhere, with shapeless monsters that lunged viciously at Yang Qi.

These monsters were like inner devils, and yet, had corporeal shape. The more powerful someone became, the more their inner power could affect the material world, and even the vital energy of heaven and earth.

The sheer number involved would be completely exhausting to virtually anyone who faced them.

Manyflowers Peak was now like a hive of devils, and if Yang Qi made one wrong move, he himself would transform into one of them, after which the full might of the Demi-Immortal Institute would be harnessed to destroy him.

And yet, he simply remained in place, a cold smile on his face as the monsters besieged him. Circulating his energy, he fought, his thoughts transforming constantly as he grew more used to this state, to this way of using martial arts, energy arts, vital energy, and the like.

Seven days and seven nights passed. By that point, all of the monsters which had appeared on Manyflowers Peak had been smashed into nothing but dust.

As for Yang Qi, he was calm in an unheard-of way as heaven-shaking, earth-toppling transformations occurred within him. One after another, particles began to awaken. One hundred and one. One hundred and two. On and on it went until a total of one hundred and eight particles were awake.

He was now fully in Senary Lifeseizing.

As for his sword technique, it only continued to rise along with him. He had his Cosmic Sunflare Sword technique, Moonset Hyperlunar Sword technique, and the seven moves he had learned from Patriarch Frost-Drake. Thanks to Holy Daughter Manyflowers, he now knew that those seven moves were from an ancient organization called the Ravaging Dual Sword Sect.

Unfortunately, that sect had long since been destroyed.

In the distant past, great sects had flourished, and there had been far more than four prominent ones. That was back when the Rich-Lush Continent was just a tiny speck in the Yore-Wilds Continent.

The Ravaging Dual Sword Sect had been more powerful than all of the four great institutes combined, and yet, had not been able to survive the destructive nature of the passage of time.

‘Now that I'm in Senary Lifeseizing, my sword technique is complete. I don't even need to use the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth to defeat any Lifeseizer in the Rich-Lush Continent. I only need to fear Legendaries, with their ability to manipulate magical laws. Now, I can leave and get ready for the martial arts competition.’

Feeling wonderful, he flew into the air off of Manyflowers Peak.

Even as he looked out at the beautiful sunlight streaming down over the mountains, a voice reached his ears. “Yang Qi, there’s something I want to talk with you about.”

“Hmm?” To Yang Qi’s shock, that voice belonged to Yun Hailan.

Chapter 161: Treachery

Yang Qi’s initial thought was that it must be about the deaths of Song Haishan and Gu Fenxian. However, he was still confident that Jiang Fan and the others wouldn’t reveal the truth even if they were beaten to death.

And if the institute had come to suspect him in the matter, they would have sent investigators to talk to him. But they hadn’t. Yun Hailan had come alone.

‘This Yun Hailan is full of craft and cunning. What scam is she trying to run on me now? Let’s see just how strong she actually is. If the right opportunity presents itself, I could….’ His eyes were already flashing with killing intent. If he did get an opportunity to make a move against her, he definitely wouldn’t show any mercy. He had once been in love with her, but now, he didn’t feel an ounce of pleasure when he heard her voice.

It was very telling that he heard her voice before seeing even a flicker of motion to reveal where she was. Her voice projection energy arts were clearly at a very high level. Apparently, she had been watching him, waiting until he emerged from seclusion to send a message.

Smiling coldly, Yang Qi replied, “What schemes and intrigues are you up to now, Yun Hailan?”

“Schemes and intrigues? I admit that I underestimated you before, Yang Qi. But I just want to talk. You were careless in something, are you aware of that?”

“What do you mean?” Although Yang Qi kept his voice even, his heart was starting to pound a bit. It seemed to him that Yun Hailan really did suspect that he was involved in the deaths of Song Haishan and Gu Fenxian. And if the truth got out, it would have severe ramifications. At the very best, he would likely be exiled from the Demi-Immortal Institute.

Considering how crafty he knew Yun Hailan to be, there was no way he would trust anything she said.

“What do I mean?” she said coolly. “Follow my voice to me. I want to talk with you in person.”

“I’m already getting tired of this charade. You deceived me back when we first met, but things are different now. Fine. Scheme away and let’s see what happens.”

With that, he flew high into the sky, piercing through the sea of clouds. Leaving the Demi-Immortal Institute, he eventually reached a wide-open plain of verdant grass.

There was even a little stream off to the side. When Yang Qi realized where he was, his heart skipped a beat; this was the exact location where he had killed Huang Hong, one of Jiang Fan’s lackeys.

Standing next to the stream was a beautiful, curvaceous young woman in blue, looking down at the silver fish dancing in the water.

At first sight, he recognized Yun Hailan.

As he landed next to the stream, his energy arts caused the water to stop flowing, and even froze the fish in place.

“Impressive,” she said, turning to look at him. She was stunning, like a goddess, with her long hair slowly fluttering in the breeze, and a fragrant aroma surrounding her that was intoxicating to say the least.

Yang Qi’s eyes narrowed as he tried to figure out what trap was about to be sprung. “Whatever you want to say, Yun Hailan, say it. You’re an elite student. I'm an elite student. You looked down on me in the past, but now, you have no hope of surpassing me.”

“I really did misjudge you, Yang Qi. How many times have you seized life so far?” She looked him up and down, her eyes sparkling. “I know that you didn’t achieve this with some airmastery plant. You acquired greater good fortune, didn’t you? There’s no other way you could have advanced so rapidly. You’ve helped Li He and your other friends to reach the Lifeseizing level, and I even heard that your father Yang Zhan broke through as well. And imagine my surprise when I caught wind of rumors you felled Blightking Skulkdevil from the House of Shadowblight with a single blow. You’re a Secondary Lifeseizer, aren’t you? Tell me the truth. What good fortune did you come across? How did you get so strong?”

“Why should I tell you?” Yang Qi replied with a chuckle. All of a sudden, he felt very pleased with how things were going. “Who are you to me? What makes you think you have the right to know my secrets?”

Yun Hailan shook her head. Softening her voice, she said, “Looks like you’re really holding on to that grudge, aren’t you? I can tell how much you hate me. Maybe too much for this to be resolved. Are you really sure there’s no way we can get past our misunderstandings?”

From the look of it, she really did want to make things right with him.

“The enmity between us cannot be resolved,” he said firmly. “Not until one of us is dead. I guess you could say that, to me, you’re already dead. Incidentally, it’s fairly obvious you don’t really want to ‘put the grudge behind us’. I’ve gotten stronger, so you want to use me. Unfortunately, you won't be able to pull the wool over my eyes twice.”

“It's your hatred of me that has fueled your efforts at retaliation, isn’t it? You were the one who killed Song Haishan. Am I right?” Although she spoke in a soft tone, her words struck him just as powerfully as a bolt of lightning.

“What do you want me to say? Yeah, I'm glad Song Haishan’s dead. And it's too bad I couldn’t kill him with my own hands.” There was nothing untruthful about what Yang Qi had just said. After all, he hadn’t personally killed Song Haishan. “Whatever freakish hellion killed him sure did me a favor, I suppose.”

“That ‘freakish hellion’ was you, Yang Qi,” Yun Hailan said, her voice suddenly turning quite sharp. “You’re like an open book to me, you know. I understand you too deeply. You're decisive, and once you choose to do something, you don’t hesitate. That’s exactly why you were willing to throw your clan away to steal that Latent Dragon Pill for me. Right? I’ve already investigated the matter thoroughly, and I know that Song Haishan, Huang Hong, and Gu Fenxian all died on this plain, and—”

“That’s sheer nonsense,” Yang Qi interrupted. “I honestly can’t believe you would stoop so low in your attempt to hurt me. Of course, I know that you’re a despicable villainess. I mean, I nearly died getting that Latent Dragon Pill for you, and even betrayed my clan in the process. Don’t you feel even the least bit guilty for all that? And now, having failed to manipulate me a second time, you want to frame me for a crime? Do you really think I wouldn’t kill you?”

“Don’t waste words trying to deny the truth,” Yun Hailan said, glaring at him. “I know exactly what happened. It started with Jiang Fan and his friends coming to talk with you, right?”

Face remaining completely expressionless, Yang Qi said. “So what if they did? And so what if they didn’t?”

He really was curious to see where Yun Hailan was taking all of this.

“Somehow, they convinced you to come out here. Then, for some strange reason, they decided to go out hunting monsters, and ended up falling into a trap. Meanwhile, you had returned to the institute, almost as if you were hiding. To me, it’s obvious what happened. You killed Huang Hong, Song Haishan, and Gu Fenxian, right here on this plain. Then, you somehow blackmailed Jiang Fan and the others into going out on a supposed hunt for wretch-devils, all as a pretense to explain how those three were killed. That's what happened, isn’t it?”

The entire time, Yun Hailan stared deeply into Yang Qi’s eyes hoping to get more proof of her theory.

‘This woman is incredible! I can’t believe she figured out almost every detail! I knew all along that she was smart, but I never realized she’s this much of a genius.’ More than ever, Yang Qi felt his heart burning with the desire to kill her.

However, he held back. Obviously, the fact that she was stating these things so outright indicated that she wasn’t worried about him attacking her. In fact, maybe she was just waiting for him to try to kill her. Then she would spring her trap, and he would end up dead.

Keeping a firm grip on his killing intent, he said, “It's a good thing you were never appointed to law enforcement duties in the institute, Yun Hailan. Considering how you casually make up baseless theories, slander innocent people, and make accusations without any evidence, it's hard to say how many poor students would have been executed thanks to you. If the only reason you asked me out here today is to blabber this nonsense, then I think we’re done. Just wait until the martial arts competition, then we’ll see if you’re strong enough to justify running your mouth like this.”

Yun Hailan suddenly chuckled. “Calm down, Yang Qi. The reason I wanted to talk with you is to tell you that all of this coincides with my plans. I can tell from the look in your eyes that you did it. And honestly, I'm impressed. If you had been like this back when we first met, things would have turned out very differently. How about this: join me. If you do, I’ll make sure no word leaks about what you’ve done.”

Yang Qi immediately burst out into loud laughter.

“What are you laughing for?” Yun Hailan said, her expression turning cold.

“I'm laughing at the fact that you're delusional. You think I'm going to start working for you? You think you can use some random bits of speculation as a threat? Even if the entire Rich-Lush Continent was destroyed, and all heaven and earth collapsed, I would never, ever do a single thing for you. The only thing I'm going to do is kill you! I’ll take every chance I can get to do it. And when you finally end up dying, there won’t be any need for an investigation. Everyone will know that it was me. If you have proof to back up your claims, go give it to the institute. Otherwise, leave me alone.”

At long last, Yun Hailan realized that Yang Qi’s hatred for her went deeper than the four seas, and that any efforts to control him would be futile. Not even exterminating his clan would do anything to stop him from coming after her.

All of a sudden, she felt a spark of fear in her heart. ‘His hatred for me is too intense. He’s definitely too dangerous to leave alive. And any thoughts of controlling him are infantile jokes. How could I have missed this before?’

“In that case, Yang Qi, don’t blame me for turning a blind eye to our past affections.” Without warning, Yun Hailan vanished, to be replaced by a conglomeration of vital energy and seawater, which then splashed down onto the grass. The only thing that remained behind were a few echoing words. “I’ll find the proof I need. And then you’ll be dead!”

Yang Qi looked down at the soaked ground, shocked that he hadn’t noticed that the Yun Hailan he had been speaking to wasn’t her true body. Obviously, she had been using some powerful magical item to form a seawater clone of sorts, something that not even a top expert like him could identify.

Chapter 162: The Competition Begins

The fact that Yun Hailan came in the form of seawater seemed to indicate that she had been worried Yang Qi might attack her.

And yet, he had been completely unable to tell that he wasn’t dealing with a real person. It was a marvelous technique, and obviously not something that she was inherently capable of. It was definitely the work of some unexpectedly spectacular magical item.

Yang Qi remembered Holy Daughter Manyflowers saying that the Crown Prince was actually far more powerful than the Guru Ice-Soul of the past. Furthermore, he had magical items that were more powerful than the Ice-Soul God-Sword. If Yun Hailan had access to something like that in the martial arts competition, she would have a strong chance of taking first place.

Thankfully, Yang Qi had an early chance to witness the power of whatever item she had.

The fact that he hadn’t realized he was dealing with an imposter indicated that Lifeseizers were incapable of piercing her disguise. Only Legendaries could do so. If she was now capable of taking any form she wanted, it meant that her scheming capabilities had been pushed to an even higher level.

‘Let her scheme and plot to her heart’s content. Once I'm a Legendary, I’ll be able to overpower countless techniques and magics. Then her tricks will be completely useless.’ Yang Qi’s eyes glittered as he swore to himself that he would crush both the Crown Prince and the Crown Prince Society into dust. When he destroyed Yun Hailan’s god-protector right in front of her, she would sink into despair. Then he would kill her, and vengeance would be served.

Blurring into motion, he flew up into the air.

After he left, the water on the ground formed back into Yun Hailan, who wore a vigilant expression as she looked in the direction he had left in.

When she was sure that his aura was completely gone, she floated up into the air and then transformed into a mist, which sped through the air toward a mountain peak some distance away. There, her true body awaited, standing on the peak with a sphere of bright blue light floating above her head, which rotated slowly without cease. The mist instantly joined the sphere, which was not true energy, but rather, a magical item whose surface began to flicker with countless blurry images. Apparently, those images were a recording of everything which had just played out, which she could keep as evidence.

‘The Thousand Illusions World….’ she murmured to herself. ‘This Pearl of the Thousand Illusions World is definitely a god item. Not only does it have an enormous holding dimension inside, it also has the power to create powerful illusions out of nothing. I'm honestly surprised the Crown Prince would loan this to me with such little hesitation. Even a Legendary would do anything to get something like it. There’s no way he’s just being generous. The pearl is just too powerful, and too difficult to control…. I need to head back to the Sea God Institute before the competition begins. The leaders there should be able to help me refine it a bit. That way I can use it without any qualms. I'm becoming important in both the Demi-Immortal Institute and the Sea God Institute. Everything is going according to plan.

‘Although, Yang Qi’s cultivation base is getting so high that I can’t even assess it.’ Thinking back to her interchange from moments ago, she chuckled coldly. ‘You’ve grown up a lot, Yang Qi. You didn't slip up at all in what you said. However, our little conversation only went to further convince me that you were the one who killed Song Haishan and Gu Fenxian. Well, that will only make things easier to handle. Although I have no proof now, I’ll find some eventually. And once the Crown Prince returns, and I ask him to look into the situation, he’ll definitely force Jiang Fan to tell the truth. I refuse to believe that Jiang Fan will play dumb to the Crown Prince.’

A moment passed, and she smiled. ‘Yang Qi. Ah, Yang Qi. Once I have proof that you killed fellow disciples, all of that arrogance of yours will vanish. Thanks to your impulsiveness, your friends and family are all going to meet catastrophe. You act tough now, but when that day comes, you’ll definitely kneel in front of me and beg for mercy. Don’t worry. I won’t kill you. You’ll make a fine lapdog, and a fine knife to stick into my enemies’ backs.’

With that, she flew into the air and headed toward the shore, and the Sea God Institute.

The sun rose, and the sun set. Life went on. Three months passed, and summer left the lands. Fall took over the lands, and the plants and vegetation rustled as autumn wind spread coldness everywhere.

Of course, the Demi-Immortal Institute was still a warm and thriving place. Freshman students, outer and inner campus students, elite and conclave students, were all filled with excitement. It was time for the big competition.

The Inter-Institutional Martial Arts Competition only came around once every several decades, and the institutes rotated hosting duties. This time, the competition was being hosted by the Demi-Immortal Institute, the oldest and largest of the institutes. Of course, they had long since begun to attend to the tiniest details related to their hosting duties.

**

Yang Qi opened his eyes one morning and walked to the balcony of his castle-like temple. The institute was abuzz, with students hurrying about everywhere. Streaks of light could be seen in the air as visitors arrived and headed to their arranged guest quarters.

There were also elders assigned to escort guests through the institute.

Yang Qi could even sense certain intense energy fluctuations coming from people he couldn’t see, which were presumably the Legendaries.

‘Legendaries….’ he thought. ‘I wonder if I’ll be able to catch a glimpse of the fabled chancellors of the institutes. They’re Great Sages, right? And it’s also possible that the emperor of the Sage Ancestor Dynasty will be in attendance.’

The atmosphere in the institute was already causing Yang Qi’s heart to swell with ambition, to the point where he felt like throwing his head back and letting loose a whoop of excitement.

Ever since his interchange with Yun Hailan, he had remained in secluded cultivation. Three months had passed, but he had not yet reached Septenary Lifeseizing. That said, his cultivation base had reached an unimaginable level of stability and strength.

And he had long since used his Hellfire Crucible to fully refine the Ice-Soul God-Sword. It was now an expression of sword energy which resided peacefully in his sea of energy.

His sword technique had reached the ultimate peak. With the Cosmic Sunflare Sword technique, Moonset Hyperlunar Sword technique, and Ravaging Dual Sword technique combined with his powerful true energy, he was now so strong that a single sweep of his sword energy would be enough to vanquish Patriarch Frost-Drake.

By now, he was roughly ten times as strong as he had been back on the island of peach blossoms.

In addition to that, his Devil-God Seal was even more stable and strong.

His Infernal Deity Spear, Infernal Deity Plate Armor, Fiend-Devil Wings, and Hellfire Crucible were all operating at a higher level too. If he used the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, he could directly channel the power of the earth. Unfortunately, he still could not use the Portal to Hell to reach out to alternate dimensions and summon devil-gods to fight for him, much less use the God Legion Paradise.

However, he was definitely much stronger and much more enlightened than he had been three months ago. And he also had the sensation that he was getting close to the point of communicating with the golden imp in his forehead.

Ghost Emperor Yama had called the golden imp the ‘God Legion Seal’, and had implied that it was simply some sort of sealing magic. However, Yang Qi knew that the golden imp was definitely tied to his own life force, and that the God Legion Seal was not sealing him. It was sealing some other extremely mighty life force.

He was well aware of how mighty the golden imp was; back when Ghost Emperor Yama had been trying to kill him, the golden imp unleashed its raging power, and had stabbed the ghost emperor through with a single attack. Were it not for Ghost Emperor Yama’s quick retreat, he would likely have ended up being killed.

Power like that definitely surpassed the highest level of leadership in the four institutes. After all, it had taken an alliance of Great Sages to suppress Ghost Emperor Yama in the distant past. If he broke free now, he would essentially be invincible.

And yet, the golden imp had easily defeated him, showing exactly how disparate their cultivation levels were.

Every time Yang Qi worked with his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, he could feel the golden imp stirring. That was especially true when he used the Devil-God Seal. It was almost as if the golden imp was helping him to conceal his energy.

‘If the day ever comes when I can actually control the power of the golden imp, I’ll be able to crush the Crown Prince with ease. However, whatever entity is sealed by the God Legion Seal will definitely not be easy to control. I’ll have to be very strong. Right now, I can rely on sword technique alone to defeat Nonary Lifeseizers. If I used the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, I wonder if I could tangle with a Legendary.’ Yang Qi had yet to see a Legendary fighting, and was now itching for the opportunity.

He hadn’t had a chance to go see Yang Susu and Holy Daughter Manyflowers, otherwise, he could have asked some advice from them.

Li He and the others flew over, and when they saw the look in his eyes, the seemingly abstruse connection to heaven and earth, they realized that his cultivation must have reached an even higher level.

“You finally came out of seclusion, Brother!”

Yang Qi looked them over, and said, “Looks like all of you have improved as well.”

All of them were now in Secondary Lifeseizing, except for Liang Dong, who was a Tertiary Lifeseizer. Clearly, they had benefited a lot from the life force springwater. Thanks to Yang Qi, they had saved dozens of years of cultivation.

All of a sudden, bugle calls filled the air, followed by the boom of war drums. The clouds trembled, and the autumn wind went still. Everyone felt their blood pumping hard in their veins.

Li He’s expression turned stern and awe-inspiring. “The Heaven Dragon War Drum! It’s starting. Let’s go!”

Chapter 163: Heroes Gather

Quite a few students were talking loudly about the Heaven Dragon War Drum, which only served to further enliven the crowd. Immediately, everyone began to rush toward the Central Battle Arena, which was only used for important events, or for meetings for the entire institute. It was a huge place, constructed from unknown materials by some Legendary of the past. No matter what type of fighting went on inside, the arena itself would never suffer any type of damage.

Yang Qi had been studying at the institute for quite some time now, but had only heard of the Central Battle Arena, and had never been inside.

Now, he followed the tide of people to the center of the institute, where the war drum was being beaten. There, in the midst of numerous ancient temples and castles, an enormous pillar of light rose up, then slowly collapsed, revealing a huge arena, complete with a fighting platform and grandstands extensive enough to accommodate millions of spectators.

Soon, crowds were pouring into the arena from the east, south, west, and north.

Yang Qi had never seen so many people gathered together in one place. The highest levels of the grandstands were sealed, making it impossible to see who occupied them. However, from the auras emanating out of them, it was obvious that powerful experts were seated there.

Those seating areas were clearly reserved for the Legendaries.

It was easy to identify the students who made up the sea of people. Those from the True Dragon Institute wore clothing embroidered with golden, five-clawed divine dragons. Students from the Sun Moon Institute had sun and moon sigils on their garments. The Demi-Immortal Institute students had the word ‘demi-immortal’ on their robes, and the people from the Sea God Institute all wore blue garments that seemed to ripple like water.

There were other random outfits that identified experts from other organizations.

Many powerful groups throughout the lands had been invited to attend the competition, and were allowed to send both leaders and lower-ranking disciples to observe and learn.

There were so many people present that anyone who was in the crowd would have to struggle to avoid being overwhelmed at it all.

There were just too many people! In fact, the entire city of Yanhaven would count for almost nothing compared to this crowd. If you described Yanhaven as a goldfish, then this crowd would be a whale shark.

Suddenly, a voice message was transmitted to Yang Qi via his identity medallion.

Elite students of the Demi-Immortal Institute: the time has come to gather in the appointed spot. Follow orders and refrain from wandering about!

His elite student’s identity medallion was made from the finest of jade, and was carved with a delicate cloud motif that would be impossible to counterfeit. In addition to the message which had just been transmitted by the institute elders, there was also an energy path to follow.

Yang Qi began to follow the path through the crowd as he looked for the appointed meeting place.

Before long, he found the location where the elite students were beginning to gather.

They were all maintaining taciturn silence as they sat there, attempting to build up their final accumulation of power for use in the coming fighting.

After all, this was a major competition, to be taken very seriously. It was the perfect place to establish one’s reputation, and acquire immense rewards from one’s institute.

Ladies and gentlemen, you are the elite students of the Demi-Immortal Institute. Before long, you will be fighting students of similar rank from the other institutes. It is an occasion in which you have the chance to win unprecedented glory. The rewards are substantial. Defeat a single opponent, and you will earn a thousand merit points. Defeat two opponents, get two thousand. Three opponents is worth four thousand. Four opponents is worth eight thousand. And so on. Any elite student who can defeat a conclave student from another institute will win an even more unimaginable sum of merit points!

The eyes of the elite students were already glowing with incredible brightness at the exciting thought of winning so many merit points.

After all, merit points were the key to everything in the Demi-Immortal Institute.

You could even spend merit points to have the chancellor of the institute, a Great Sage, personally improve your cultivation base. Of course, it would cost an incredible amount of points to purchase a benefit like that. Generally speaking, not even the holy neophytes could afford it.

‘Awesome!’ Yang Qi thought. ‘I never thought the institute would be willing to give out so many merit points!’

Up to now, he had never needed to worry much about merit points. After all, his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth didn’t require the usual cultivation resources. And the resources he did need were not the type that could be simply bought with merit points.

Besides, if he absolutely needed to, he could simply hunt demon-devils and then directly consume their demon cores. And if he handed in the monsters he had killed, those which were equivalent to Nonary Lifeseizers, it would have caused a huge stir in the institute, and would have attracted unwanted attention.

But now, he had a chance to win some merit points in a completely above-board fashion.

Ding dong. Ding dong….

The war drums faded, and bells tolled, the sound of which seemed to calm the hearts of everyone who heard them. In the resulting quiet, Yang Qi looked around to see that most people in the crowd of spectators were using their energy arts to conceal their true appearance.

He had hoped to confirm whether or not any of his other sworn siblings were present, but now, it was impossible to do so. Nor could he simply fly into the air to look around for them; the air was locked down to prevent people from flying around casually.

All he could do now was wait for the fighting to begin.

Of course, the specific instructions would be revealed soon enough.

At this point, four voices joined together to ring out over the crowd. “Ladies and gentlemen of the four great institutes: Demi-Immortal, True Dragon, Sun Moon, Sea God. Let our great martial arts competition begin….”

There was an overwhelming sensation of power in those voices that made them seem erudite, majestic, and righteous. In fact, the power of the voices weighed down in a way that made them seem as if they belonged to saints.

‘The chancellors of the four institutes!’ Yang Qi craned his neck in the direction of the source of the voices, but all he could see were indistinguishable figures high in the clouds.

That said, the power in those voices was definitely no less than that of Ghost Emperor Yama.

It was only natural that the chancellors wouldn’t allow people to see their faces. They were saint-like figures who looked down on all creation, whose cultivation bases surpassed the Legendary level. They were Great Sages!

As soon as they declared the competition to have begun, countless pillars of light rose up throughout the arena. There were tens upon tens of thousands of smaller fighting platforms, enough for numerous fights to take place at the same time.

Of course, if all of the countless students from the various institutes fought, it would take more than a hundred years to go through them all.

“Brother Yang,” Li He said, sounding both anxious and excited, “the rewards available in this competition are incredible. We really need to do our best. And if you get the opportunity, let’s hope you can defeat a conclave student! Then we’d really strike it rich.”

This was his first time participating in a big martial arts competition like this, just like Yang Qi.

“Yeah. Just make sure to keep a clear head.” At this point Yang Qi looked around again. ‘Where’s Aunt Susu? She’s an elite student, so she should be here somewhere, right? Unless she’s already become a conclave student….’

Unfortunately, Yang Susu was nowhere in sight. He wasn’t worried though. Considering she had activated her Seven Apertures Sprite Body, it was likely the institute had given her special attention. After all, she had been called to meet the chancellor himself. It was hard to say what spectacular good fortune she might have acquired since then.

“I wonder if the Crown Prince will show up,” Hua Yinhu said. “He’s a holy neophyte, so he wouldn’t participate in the fighting. But I heard that toward the end of competitions like this, the holy neophytes will sometimes exchange fighting tips with each other.”

Yang Qi scanned the highest seating areas, where the most powerful auras were, but unfortunately, couldn’t make out any details. However, he could sense that the Legendaries were transmitting messages amongst themselves.

Because Yang Qi was only an elite student, he didn't qualify to fight with the conclave students at first. He could only do so if he stood out in the fighting and defeated all of his elite student opponents.

If he did that, and then succeeded in defeating a conclave student, he would acquire a huge reward.

Silence settled over the arena, after which, streams of energy emerged from the students’ identity medallions, directing them into the arena itself, and to the specific platforms where they would fight.

As soon as Yang Qi stepped onto his assigned platform, everything looked different. Instead of the view of numerous smaller fighting platforms around him, he saw only a huge, open space.

Opposite him, the air rippled, and a man became visible, wearing the garments of the Sun Moon Institute. Obviously, this was his opponent for the first round.

He seemed to be about thirty years old, with an aloof expression. Pointing at Yang Qi with his sword, he said, “I'm Wang Yujue from the Sun Moon Institute! Forfeit the match immediately. Otherwise, I’ll show you the true meaning of the word pain.”

Chapter 164: A Hot Knife Through Butter

‘Quite the grandstander,’ Yang Qi thought. The way this Wang Yujue thrust his sword out and demanded that he forfeit the match was relatively intimidating. The man actually seemed to bristle with killing intent, and if Yang Qi had been a weaker or more timid person, it might have led to him making mistakes and eventually losing the match.

It was a classic fighting tactic. Showing open derision of an opponent could theoretically unnerve them, interrupting their true energy flow, and disrupting their thoughts.

But Yang Qi was different. True confidence stems from superb skill.

Although this Wang Yujue was a Secondary Lifeseizer with incredible sword energy, Yang Qi could tell that the man was far below him.

In fact, he didn’t even bother to respond to him. Taking a step forward, he waved his finger, sending out a stream of boundless sword energy that shattered his opponent's sword.

Before Wang Yujue could even finish his opening monologue, he was sent flying. A moment later, he slammed into the ground, blood spraying out of his mouth, his meridians severely damaged.

Then Yang Qi waved his finger again, ripping Wang Yujue’s identity medallion off of him, and then slicing it to bits.

At that point, he heard a voice speaking. “First round victory goes to Yang Qi from the Demi-Immortal Institute.”

The primary way to determine victory and defeat in this competition was to destroy your opponent’s identity medallion.

When that happened, the unique properties of the Central Battle Arena would detect what had occurred, and announce the winner. Of course, anyone who feared being injured could always throw their identity medallion down to forfeit the match.

After defeating Wang Yujue and smashing his identity medallion, Yang Qi felt a stream of energy wrap him up and drag him back to his original position.

Back at his seat, he looked around to find himself the only person sitting in the area for elite students. Apparently, everyone else was locked in fierce combat.

It was a rare thing for people to be able to end a fight in one move, but considering that Yang Qi could already defeat Nonary Lifeseizers, other students were clearly not at his level.

And thus, he sat there, somewhat aloof, not bothering to pay attention to anything or anyone else.

Before long, more elite students began to emerge from the arena, some of them having been defeated, others puffed up with pride from achieving victory.

Yang Qi's eyes glittered when he caught sight of Li He, Liang Dong, He Jili and Hua Yinhu, all of them in high spirits, clearly having achieved victories in round one. When they saw Yang Qi, they sat down next to him.

“This is incredible,” Li He said. “We can use the Cosmic Sunflare Sword technique to the limits of its capabilities.”

“It looks like you four have some foreign true energy in your meridians. Here, let me help you expel it.” Yang Qi quickly sent some of his own true energy into them, healing their wounds and helping them recover from the fighting.

“Winning one round in the competition doesn’t mean much,” Yang Qi pointed out. “This is a good opportunity for training for the four of you, so don’t get cocky.”

“We know,” Li He said, nodding. “We’ll be careful.” After all, the competition could also be very dangerous; the slightest slip-up could lead to life-threatening situations.

Not every aspect of the fighting could be controlled, and it wasn't impossible for competitors to lose their lives. If a student were accidentally killed, the institute wouldn't investigate the matter very closely. But that wouldn’t stop people from trying to get revenge. Because of that, most competitors would show mercy, and wouldn’t deliver killing blows unless it was absolutely necessary. Of course, if two people with a grudge happened to meet each other, it would often turn into a battle to the death.

For example, if Yang Qi and Yun Hailan ended up fighting each other, there was no way he would hold back. He would do everything he could to kill her, and then worry about the consequences later. As far as he was concerned, a match with her would be the perfect opportunity to put her to death!

‘I'm just waiting for that day to come, Yun Hailan. Nobody can interfere with these matches. Not the Crown Prince, not anybody! If you're dead set on taking first place, then that means we’ll run into each other sooner or later. And that will be the day you die. I don't care what magical treasure he gave you, it won’t be able to save your life from me!’

Anticipation surged within him.

Before long, the first round of the competition was over. Various emotions could be seen among the throngs of competitors, including grief, joy, fear, pain, anxiety, and confidence….

The Central Battle Arena was like a boiling pot of emotion.

As for Yang Qi, he forced himself to be calm.

Meanwhile, in the highest level of the grandstands, behind the glowing shields that blocked sight from below, a very interesting conversation was playing out.

Yang Qi couldn't see the people up there, but they could most certainly see him, and could also see every aspect of the fight which he had just ended.

Seated together were a group of very powerful people, including the Legendary elders of the Demi-Immortal Institute.

Patriarchs Wind and Cloud. The Seven Preheaven Masters. The Three Pure Yang Elders…. These were top experts who were rarely seen out in the open, but who were now gathered together in very rare fashion.

Also present were many of the holy neophytes, who wore solemn, fixed expressions.

Of course, there were also Legendaries from other organizations as well. There were sect leaders and paragons of all sorts, all of them Legendaries of immense power who had been specifically invited to observe the proceedings.  Although the four institutes were the most powerful orthodox organizations, there were other ancient and powerful groups in the lands, such as the House of Spring and Autumn, the Tabernacle of Flame, and others.

The chancellors of the four institutes were not present. They had projected their voices from some other distant location.

“Report ready!” four voices called out in unison. At the same time, four individuals materialized, holy neophytes who had been selected to oversee the competition and keep track of the standings.

“The statistics for round one are in,” one of the holy neophytes said. “In the total standings, the Demi-Immortal Institute took first place, the Sea God Institute second place, the True Dragon Institute third place, and in fourth, the Sun Moon Institute.”

Patriarchs Wind and Cloud, the Seven Preheaven Masters and the other grand elders from the Demi-Immortal Institute all broke out into chuckling.

“Looks like the Demi-Immortal Institute will retain the number one position among the institutes.”

“Oh really?” one of the Sun Moon Institute elders said, a man who had a halo floating behind his head that made him seem like a god from heaven. “This competition isn’t about numbers. It’s about who produces the most consummate genius. A true genius can easily vanquish tens upon tens of thousands of other elite students. Our institute has several geniuses present who will topple every student who gets in their way, even the ones from the Demi-Immortal Institute. We’re definitely going to sweep the top ten.”

“Well, that’s impossible,” said one of the Seven Preheaven Masters. “The geniuses from the Demi-Immortal Institute are superior in every way.”

“What’s the point in talking about it?” shot back one of the Legendary grand elders from the Sea God Institute. “We’ll know soon enough who the top geniuses are. I'm sure you all remember Yun He, the outer campus student from our Sea God Institute who performed so remarkably in the last competition. He was only a Master of Energy, but he cut down everyone who faced him. He even defeated numerous elite students, as well as a conclave student. This time, he’s at the peak of the Lifeseizing level, so he’ll definitely be the one to take first place.”

When it came to matters of seniority between the four institutes themselves, a lot of it came down to which students performed better. When a student shone, it reflected on their entire institute.

“Well, let’s just wait to see whose genius rises to the top! Issue the orders to commence rounds two and three.”

Soon, more bells were tolling, and more fierce fighting began to play out.

Yang Qi followed the tug of his identity medallion to enter the arena, and the dimension in which he would fight his second opponent.

This time, his opponent was even younger than he was. He appeared to be fourteen or fifteen, with bright, intelligent eyes that fairly shone with experience.

“I'm Qiao Yihang from the True Dragon Institute. Do you mind sharing some fighting tips with me?”

In the blink of an eye, the young man erupted with incredible power, like the true energy of a divine dragon. A dancing dragon appeared behind him, and as it coiled up, it seemed to thrum with the might of gods.

‘A True Dragon Institute technique. Coiling Dragon Grand Energy Art?’ Yang Qi’s eyes flashed as he looked at this profound energy art, which to his eyes seemed like a swirling, fluctuating mass of vital energy, twisting in and out of various transformations….

This was an ability he had gained after pushing the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth to a certain level. Given the right circumstances, he could easily see through to all of the unique variations of an energy art. Eventually, he could even use that ability to copy other energy arts.

When Yang Qi just stood there unmoving, his opponent smiled coldly, then blurred into motion. An instant later, he was actually behind Yang Qi, where he shouted “Probing Claw of the True Dragon!”

However, before anything else could happen, Yang Qi’s sword energy erupted, stabbing out like a black lightning bolt, completely destroying this Qiao Yihang’s true energy.

Then, a cracking sound could be heard, which was none other than his identity medallion breaking.

Even as the young man seemed just about to lunge forward for another attack, Yang Qi coolly said, “You lose. Enough. I don't want to hurt you.”

Shocked, Qiao Yihang looked down at his broken medallion, and then shrieked, “How? How did I lose? You destroyed my identity medallion with only one sword strike? With a cultivation base like that, how could you be an elite student? Your energy arts must be strong enough to kill a Quinary Lifeseizer! How could you be so much stronger than me?”

“You know the old saying. However strong you are, there’s always someone out there stronger than you.” With that, Yang Qi exited the fighting dimension.

Already, there were elite students who had noticed what happened, and were in an uproar.

“What? Seriously? Defeated in the second round?”

“Qiao Yihang once descended into the Myriad Dragon Cistern, where he was baptized in Myriad Dragons Divine Blood. His energy arts are incredible, the type rarely seen in the world. How could he have been defeated in the second round?”

Chapter 165: Revealing Ability

In quite a few circles, Yang Qi’s defeat of Qiao Yihang from the True Dragon Institute caused a major commotion.

Qiao Yihang was a relatively famous person, and was widely regarded to be a genius. He had benefited from marvelous good fortune in his life, and eventually had entered the mysterious Myriad Dragon Cistern of the True Dragon Institute. Instead of dying inside, which was the usual outcome, he acquired the blessing of Myriad Dragons Divine Blood. From then on, his energy arts had advanced rapidly, and his true energy had quickly surpassed that of ordinary individuals.

Although he had just entered the Lifeseizing level, he had already defeated several conclave students in combat.

He was definitely a rising star.

The True Dragon Institute had put a lot of hope in him, and yet, he was defeated in the second round. And not just defeated. Completely and utterly decimated. One sword strike destroyed his identity medallion, and if Yang Qi hadn’t shown mercy, he would have been killed.

“What? Qiao Yihang lost?”

To the Legendary elders on the observation deck, it was a huge shock. And that was especially true when it came to the various elders from the True Dragon Institute. Looks of complete disbelief covered their faces.

“What happened?” one of the Demi-Immortal Institute elders asked quietly. Neither he nor any of the other elders were quite sure what was going on. After demanding explanations, reports came in. “An elite student named Yang Qi easily defeated Qiao Yihang. This stone contains a recording of the event.”

Soon, the elders from the Demi-Immortal Institute were able to personally watch the scene in which Qiao Yihang lost.

Yang Qi calmly unleashed his sword stroke, and destroyed Qiao Yihang’s identity medallion before he could even react. The casual nature of the victory left the elders shocked.

‘I can’t believe it’s that brat.’ The Patriarchs Wind and Cloud were particularly taken aback. It hadn't been long since Holy Daughter Manyflowers brought Yang Qi to them in the hopes that they would take him as an apprentice. Instead, they had defied her by accepting Yun Hailan instead.

Of course, Holy Daughter Manyflowers was also present in the group. Chuckling, she said, “What, pray tell, are you thinking, Patriarchs Wind and Cloud? Could it be that you realize you made a mistake? I offered him to you as an apprentice, and not only did you ignore my advice, you also insulted me. Now that Yang Qi is basking in glory, are you having second thoughts?”

The derision in her eyes couldn’t have been clearer. Now that she was a Legendary, she was on equal footing with Patriarchs Wind and Cloud. Back when they outranked her, she might not have spoken so sharply, but right now, she was simply too pleased with Yang Qi’s performance.

After all, he was already earning her some face.

Patriarch Wind snorted. “So what. Presumably you infused him with your Moonset Hyperlunar Sword, right? Now his sword technique is a combination of that and the Cosmic Sunflare Sword. By the way, that apprentice of yours got lucky. After activating her Seven Apertures Sprite Body, she was taken in by the chancellor, and thus won't participate in the competition. If she did, then our apprentice Yun Hailan would definitely mop the floor with her.”

Holy Daughter Manyflowers chuckled coldly. “All I did was teach Yang Qi the Moonset Hyperlunar Sword technique. I didn’t infuse him with anything. He encountered good fortune of his own, the Ice-Soul God-Sword left behind by Guru Ice-Soul.”

“What? The Ice-Soul God-Sword?” Patriarchs Wind and Cloud looked more closely, and sure enough, saw a faint blue figure within Yang Qi’s animadestiny true energy. However, the figure disappeared after he finished his blow, making it impossible to see its true form.

“I can’t believe he cultivated the Ice-Soul God-Sword to that level,” Patriarch Cloud said. “He fused it with his own internal sword energy? He became one with the Ice-Soul God-Sword? Should have known the brat would do something like this. How dare he hide his true strength all this time and refuse to help our institute!”

“What was that? Our institute has a new genius, and you’re not happy? Could it be that you’re jealous? Could it be you wish you’d accepted him as an apprentice?” Holy Daughter Manyflowers simply couldn’t hold back from rubbing salt into the wounds of Patriarchs Wind and Cloud. How could she not after the vicious things they’d said in their previous meeting?

At this point, another of the elders from the Demi-Immortal Institute spoke up. “He’s still nothing. So what if he won because of a divine sword? There are plenty of hidden dragons and crouching tigers in the competition. He might think he’ll sweep the competition with a single magical treasure, but in the end, someone will come along and cut him down to size.”

This old man wore a jade-colored robe, and was one of the Three Pure Yang Elders, Master Jade-Yang.

Holy Daughter Manyflowers’ eyes flashed. After all, Master Jade-Yang’s nephew was a conclave student and a member of the Crown Prince Society. He was a powerful Nonary Lifeseizer, roughly as prestigious as Xie Feng.

Obviously, Master Jade-Yang was on good terms with both the Crown Prince and Patriarchs Wind and Cloud, and thus, was coming to their aid.

“So, Master Jade-Yang, you think that Yang Qi will meet defeat?” Holy Daughter Manyflowers asked.

“Of course,” he replied. “He might last for another ten rounds or so, but once he starts facing conclave students, he’ll definitely end up losing.”

“Oh? Well, if that’s what you think, why don’t we have a little wager? I bet that Yang Qi will end up in the top three!” Holy Daughter Manyflowers’ words caused a small-scale uproar among the surrounding elders.

Snorting disdainfully, Patriarch Wind said, “What? Are you addled in the brain, Holy Daughter Manyflowers? The four institutes are filled with crouching tigers and hidden dragons. Experts emerge constantly, and in fact, there are several Nonary Lifeseizers who are right on the verge of becoming Legendaries. People like that could probably hold their own against full Legendaries. You think that because Yang Qi got his hands on some Ice-Soul God-Sword, he could trounce people like that? What a joke!”

Master Jade-Yang shook his head, and the other elders also began to rebuke Holy Daughter Manyflowers.

“He’s nothing but a paltry elite student. Maybe he's hiding some of his true strength, but he's still a nobody. How dare you compare him to the cream of the crop of the four institutes? There are plenty of near-Legendaries, and that’s not even to mention the full Legendaries who he couldn’t even touch. He definitely won’t get into the finals.”

The elders from the True Dragon, Sun Moon, and Sea God Institutes were also turning their noses up at her.

“This Holy Daughter Manyflowers is really an arrogant grandstander. She thinks that because she’s a Legendary now she can play to the gallery with ridiculous claptrap?”

“Just ignore her. Look. All the important people from the Demi-Immortal Institute are denouncing her.”

“Hmph!” Holy Daughter Manyflowers looked around, then snapped her finger, causing a burst of power to surge out through the observation deck they all occupied. Then, to the shock of everyone present, a fist-sized flower appeared in her hand.

The presence of that flower instantly caused the entire area to fall into shades of white and gray.

Immense power rolled out from the flower, which was pure gold in color, almost as if it were made from metal. And yet, the color seemed soft and warm, to the point where anyone who looked at it would feel like they were about to transcend to a higher level of existence.

And in the middle of the petals of the flower, it looked like there was an entire world in embryonic form.

Patriarchs Wind and Cloud instantly shot to their feet.

“That’s a fabled pāraka godflower!” Patriarch Wind said. “How did you get one? Long ago, such flowers would be watered with the blood of gods, and after blooming, would contain the power of a god-spirit.”

“You're right,” Holy Daughter Manyflowers said, “this is a pāraka godflower. I acquired it some time ago when I happened upon some immense good fortune. If I put this up as the stakes, would you take up my wager? I’m serious when I say that Yang Qi will get into the top three.”

Before anyone else could react, one of the Legendary elders from the Sea God Institute said, “Fine! I’ll take your bet!”

With that, he pulled out a powerful magical treasure to put up as stakes.

“We’ll take the bet too,” Patriarch Cloud said, expression flickering with greed. “We’ll put up our Wind and Cloud Flag….”

“I'm in too….” other elders said. All of them seemed determined to get their hands on Holy Daughter Manyflowers’ pāraka godflower.

“Wonderful. Well, considering how many witnesses there are, I'm sure none of you will back out if you lose.” With that, Holy Daughter Manyflowers turned her attention back to the fighting below.

Of course, Yang Qi had no idea what was happening because of his performance. He was focused fully on the competition.

POP!

Ji Haifeng, a student from the Sun Moon Institute, was defeated by a single, bloody sword strike.

Bam!

Dong Yuting, a Quaternary Lifeseizer from the Sea God Institute was struck so badly by a single sword blow that she immediately forfeited the match.

Next was Cheng Yiche from the Demi-Immortal Institute, also a Quaternary Lifeseizer, and a member of the Gentlemen’s Society. As soon as he saw that his opponent was Yang Qi, he launched into a speech demanding that he forfeit, and reminded him that the Gentlemen’s Society would never forgive him for how he had insulted them. Yang Qi nearly destroyed his meridians with a sword strike, leaving him lying on the fighting platform moaning.

Round after round went by, until it was well into the night. And yet, the competition continued to rage in the Central Battle Arena. As time went by, more and more students found themselves out of the competition.

Yang Qi watched many miraculous events play out. There were even Masters of Energy from among the inner campus students who were so mighty that they managed to defeat Lifeseizers. There were some who managed to last until they started facing the conclave students.

Such individuals were able to earn particular glory for themselves.

Of course, it was only natural for things like this to happen. Yang Qi actually saw quite a few near-Legendaries defeat their opponents with such speed that no one could see what happened.

Through the course of the night, his four sworn brothers were eventually eliminated. However, they earned plenty of merit points, and were clearly recognized as being above average. Not only was it great training, but they also earned glory for their clans.

As for Yang Qi, not a single opponent could last for more than one move against him.

“Report ready! Yang Qi has reached conclave student opponents. He just fought a Senary Lifeseizer and knocked him unconscious with a single sword slash!”

Of course, thanks to Holy Daughter Manyflowers’ performance from before, plenty of elders from the four institutes were watching Yang Qi closely.

An unsightly expression could be seen on the faces of Patriarchs Wind and Cloud. During the night of fighting, Yang Qi had defeated dozens of opponents, and every single one fell after a single blow.

His sword was crushing the opposition as easily as dried weeds, making him seem invincible.

Chapter 166: You Can&#039;t Block One Sword Strike

“What incredible sword technique from Yang Qi. At first, it wasn’t obvious, but the further along he gets, the more obvious it is how amazing he is. It doesn’t matter who he fights, he defeats them with a single move. In fact, he hasn’t even resorted to a second move yet.”

The elders from the four institutes, and the leaders from the other sects present, watched Yang Qi’s performance with increasing levels of shock. All of them had to admit that he was a genius, and that his skill in the dao of the sword had reached the ultimate pinnacle. It was impenetrable in terms of defense, and could find the weaknesses in any opponent.

“Look, his opponent in the next round is Flying War-King Yuan Kun. This Yuan Kun is a top genius from the Demi-Immortal Institute. Isn’t he the one who slaughtered the Seven Scourges of the Sea of Trees, and acquired the Sutra of Myriad Evils?”

“Flying War-King Yuan Kun is an Octonary Lifeseizer. He's really good.”

“He might be the one to finally stop Yang Qi. Let’s hope Yang Qi doesn’t progress past this round.”

Everyone was discussing Yang Qi, from the Legendary elders of the four institutes to the representatives from the other powerful organizations. By now, a whole day and night of competition had passed, countless students had been eliminated, and there had even been some serious injuries and deaths.

The remaining competitors were almost all conclave students with remarkable skills. Thanks to the various good fortune they had come across through the years, they were all the type who could challenge opponents of a higher cultivation level than themselves.

**

At one point, Yang Qi realized that Yun Hailan was still in the competition.

She had progressed easily through the various rounds, using an ability in which she would split apart into numerous projections, which would form a mysterious spell formation. Anyone who got caught in that spell formation would quickly forfeit the match.

This competition was very unforgiving; a single defeat, and you were eliminated. Thus, it went without saying that Yun Hailan was also undefeated.

‘Sooner or later I’ll be up against her. I can't wait….’ The longer he lasted in the competition, the more likely it was that he would fight Yun Hailan. And if he had the chance, he would definitely strike her down with his sword.

Even as he contemplated the matter, another round began.

After leaping up into the arena, he found himself up against a familiar face, Flying War-King Yuan Kun. Three months before, Yuan Kun had pressured him to join the Gentlemen’s Society, and now, here they were up against each other in the competition.

When Yuan Kun saw Yang Qi, he snorted coldly, and a vicious expression appeared on his face that he simply couldn’t hide. “Well, if it isn’t you, Yang Qi. Yet again you fall into my hands. I gave you face by offering to let you join the Gentlemen’s Society, and all you did was come up with a thousand and one excuses. Well, how do you feel about that now? According to the old saying, the guilty can never escape justice from heaven. Am I right?”

“The guilty can never escape justice from heaven?” Yang Qi laughed. “So, you broke out of Octonary Lifeseizing, huh Yuan Kun? Seems you really made some progress in the past three months. Not bad. Not bad at all.”

“Cut the crap.” Yuan Kun growled. “Look, you little punk. I'm going to give you one more chance. If you join the Gentlemen’s Society, I’ll let you off the hook today. But if you don't, you won’t get out of this fight unscathed. At best, I’ll cripple your energy arts. You won’t be able to use true energy again for the rest of your life.”

“You really talk big,” Yang Qi replied coolly.

“It’s more than talk,” Yuan Kun replied, bristling with killing intent. “I'm guessing you don’t know how I got the name Flying War-King, do you? You know, if I kill you here in the competition, nobody will care a bit. So I'm going to count to three. If I get to three and you haven’t agreed to join the Gentlemen’s Society, I’ll turn you into a corpse!”

Before Yang Qi could even reply, he started counting.

“One! Two! Three!”

As soon as he said ‘three’, Yang Qi suddenly spoke up. “One sword strike!”

“What?” Yuan Kun said, clearly unsure of what Yang Qi meant. Expression darkening, he said, “What did you just say?”

Yang Qi suddenly seemed to be standing even taller and straighter than before. “I said ‘one sword strike’. That’s all it will take for me to beat you. And that sword strike is going to be a warning, Yuan Kun. Don’t ever talk about me joining the Gentlemen’s Society again. I'm not the type of person you can afford to provoke.”

“You're a real egomaniac, aren’t you, brat!” Yuan Kun said, his voice burning with rage. “Flying War Formation. Shatter the Void!”

All of a sudden, he seemed like a devil-god, with an aura like a mountain or a sea, the type that could crush all types of beasts and subdue all monsters. With his energy art, he seemed like a king, stronger than any other Nonary Lifeseizer, far beyond the level of someone like Patriarch Frost-Drake.

After all, Patriarch Frost-Drake was a rogue wanderer, whereas Flying War-King Yuan Kun was a consummate genius. Back when he was a Quaternary Lifeseizer, he killed the Seven Scourges of the Sea of Trees, who were top experts in their own right. He could challenge an opponent of a higher cultivation level than himself, but that wasn’t all. He could challenge multiple opponents.

And right now, he was stronger than he had ever been.

As he attacked, his rage could blot out the sun and the moon, and cause the lands to be ravaged by a tempest of fury.

However, before he could finish powering up, Yang Qi attacked.

He didn’t move. He vanished, to be replaced by a beam of sword light, magnificent, awesome, pure, and righteous.

It was powerful, sharp, and direct, like a god who represented the law of the heavens, mighty to the extreme, shapeless, and yet more real than could be imagined.

It was a sword that could destroy all plots and schemes, and all types of killing intent. It was like a spring breeze blowing across the lands, melting all the ice it encountered. It was like a saint enlightening the world, educating the masses, like a swift and decisive emperor.

This sword seemed to touch on the dao of sages. Just like the saying went: sage inside, monarch outside.

The sword light glittered with dazzling glory as it shot forth like a meteor, breathtakingly resplendent.

It seemed like only a moment passed, but at the same time, ten thousand years.

WHAM!

A blood-red slice appeared on Yuan Kun’s face. Then his clothes were ripped to shreds, and more streaks of blood appeared on his throat, chest, abdomen, and other places.

His true energy was thrown into complete chaos, and more than half of the hair was shorn off of him. Moments ago he had been heroic and handsome, but now he looked like a sad joke.

And finally, his identity medallion exploded.

“I told you I would teach you a lesson with a single sword strike. And you’d better not think of getting into mischief by harming my sworn brothers. If you touch them or my clan, Yuan Kun, I’ll take your life. And there won’t be a thing you can do to stop me.”

And without saying another word, Yang Qi left the fighting platform.

Of course, the onlookers were completely blown away. His one, spectacular sword strike had just vanquished a mighty Nonary Lifeseizer.

“Could I handle a sword move like that?”

“That sword strike was incredible. The sword will, sword energy, sword momentum, sword stance…. He’s in an enigmatic level that the host of gods in the heavens might bestow upon a saint to enlighten the masses. How pure and righteous! Invincible! Nothing could stand up to it!”

“One move. That’s all it took to defeat Flying War-King Yuan Kun. And Yuan Kun is a top genius!”

“Years ago, Yuan Kun slaughtered the Seven Scourges of the Sea of Trees, and performed all sorts of other feats. I can’t believe he was defeated so easily. Is it because Yang Qi is strong, or because Yuan Kun has grown soft?”

“Yuan Kun hasn’t grown soft. Yang Qi is just too strong.”

Meanwhile, everyone from the Crown Prince Society was seemingly stuck in the moment in which Yang Qi had unleashed his sword strike.

Xie Feng’s eyes glittered as he looked over at Yun Hailan. “Pretty impressive. That one sword move was incredible. His mind is fused with his sword, and he’s become one with creation. A sovereign lord of a myriad of techniques like him could destroy all types of true energy. I'd say he has what it takes to sweep the competition and win first place.”

“Oh really?” Yun Hailan said, staring at Yang Qi. As of this point, she was truly shocked. Never could she have guessed that Yang Qi would actually have reached this level. She had assumed that he would be roughly as strong as a Quinary or Senary Lifeseizer, but now, it seemed more like he was closing in on the Legendary level. Even Nonary Lifeseizers would have to take him seriously.

‘Just what fortune did this brat come across anyway? A year ago he was trash, but now he’s so strong.’ Yun Hailan had been very familiar with Yang Qi and his personality, but now, it was almost like she didn't know him. After the incident with the Latent Dragon Pill, he had advanced by leaps and bounds, forcing other elite geniuses to do nothing but eat his dust as he passed them by.

She very, very much wanted to know what good fortune he had come across to allow that.

The top experts from the institutes were all shocked, including the Legendaries up in the observation room.

“What a sword move! Such incredible power and momentum. That’s not something that Lifeseizers should be able to do.”

“That move is proof enough that he should be able to defeat any Nonary Lifeseizer. This wager has suddenly become very serious.”

Patriarchs Wind and Cloud had profoundly uneasy looks on their faces. How could they have ever guessed that Yang Qi would put on such a spectacular show? His sword seemed almost invincible, like that of a grandmaster of the dao of the sword, who had been training for hundreds of years.

The pontifex of the Tabernacle of Flame was a powerful expert whose robe looked like living flame. He himself seemed like an incarnation of fire as he sat there on his throne. “That’s Yang Qi? The same one Flame Clearspring took as a sworn brother? My son did say that he was strong! Simply spectacular!”

This man was just as strong as many of the Legendary elders. Obviously, only a person like that would be the leader of such a powerful church. As he looked down at Yang Qi, he nodded in satisfaction.

In addition to him was another man who looked like a heroic scholar, with a jade crown on his head.

“My son made a good choice in this sworn brother. Yanhaven is a small place, how could it have produced someone like this?” This scholar, who seemed as unmovable as a mountain, was none other than the houselord of the House of Spring and Autumn.

He was another powerful expert who led an organization that came close to rivaling one of the four institutes.

The pontifex’s son Flame Clearspring, and the son of the houselord, Lu Wangxian, were both sworn siblings of Yang Qi.

Chapter 167: Finals

The time had come for the final matches.

For the most part, the competitors were all conclave students.

These were people from the four institutes who were favored by the heavens, consummate geniuses who had come across some level of good fortune. Each and every one was famous in some way.

Because there were so few people left in the competition, the matches were subjects of much scrutiny.

As such, Yang Qi’s impressive sword technique stood out, and many people who had never heard of him began to pay more attention.

In the past, he had always managed to avoid attention, but now he was shining like a blazing star.

Many of the upright and honest elders from the Demi-Immortal Institute were nodding in admiration. After all, it was a blessing for a genius to rise up in the institute.

Also seated on the observation deck with the top experts was a middle-aged man clad in a black robe that had four dragon designs embroidered on it, one on the chest, two on the shoulders, and one on the back. He also wore a headdress styled like a dragon. He was surrounded by armored men, and didn’t look like someone from the four institutes or any of the other organizations. Instead, he looked like someone from the imperial court.

“Go look into Yanhaven. What has the Yang Clan been up to recently?”

“Yes, Prince Wei,” one of the armored men replied. After using some unknown means to send and receive a message, he said, “The Yang Clan has established a nation in Yanhaven. However, they continue to offer servitude to the Sage Ancestor Dynasty, and have been officially recognized as a royal dynasty.”

Another of the armored men leaned over and whispered. “Prince Wei, when you consider the Rich-Lush Continent as a whole, Yanhaven is nothing but a town of country yokels. They’re hardly worth mentioning. But considering they’ve produced a person like Yang Qi, the Sage Ancestor Dynasty has to get involved. Furthermore, he has a grudge with the so-called Crown Prince Society of the Demi-Immortal Institute, which makes it even more worth it to take an interest in him.”

“You're right,” Prince Wei responded quietly. “This Crown Prince has shamelessly taken to calling himself that without any authority. Where does that leave the true crown prince of the Sage Ancestor Dynasty? He obviously has vicious ambitions, and probably wants to unite the entire continent under his control. He's definitely an enemy of our dynasty. If he calls himself Crown Prince now, then soon enough, he’ll be calling himself the Son of Heaven. Notify the Office of Military and Political Affairs, and ask them if we can make some more official appointments in Yanhaven. We need to do something to get Yang Qi on our side, and helping his clan is probably the best place to start.”

“Yes.”

“Yang Qi. Ah, Yang Qi. How far will you get in the competition today? Are you really going to live up to Holy Daughter Manyflowers’ hopes, and reach the top three?” He shook his head. “Somehow, I doubt that.”

After all, as the competition went on, and the fighting was amongst the most powerful Lifeseizers, each and every one of whom was a prodigy of freakish ability.

Prince Wei knew that there were some near-Legendaries who were prodigies in every sense of the word, and that no matter how much he wanted Yang Qi to perform well, he was probably incapable of matching up to them.

There were also holy neophytes on the observation deck, and they were also looking down thoughtfully at Yang Qi. They were powerful experts, and included people like the leader of the Gentlemen’s Society, the Divine Ability Society, the Five Lightnings Society, and others. Although none of them were as mighty as the Crown Prince, they were still extremely powerful, and led societies that vied with the Crown Prince Society.

When Yang Qi returned to his seat, Li He and the others laughed exuberantly.  “Awesome, Brother! You slashed Flying War-King Yuan Kun right out of the competition. He’ll definitely think twice about doing anything to us in the future. The people from the Gentlemen’s Society were eyeing us like fierce tigers before, and seemed like they might pounce on us at any moment. But now the tigers have their tails between their legs! Starting today, everybody's going to know that we aren’t the type who can just be pushed around!”

All four of them were pleased as punch that Yang Qi was finally making a big scene.

Before, there had been quite a few societies in the institute who had been hoping to forcibly recruit their group of five.

But now, with Yang Qi having put on such an impressive show of sword technique, it was obvious that anyone who thought they could force him to submit was little more than a fool. He was obviously a Legendary in the making.

In any case, one thing was for sure; Yang Qi was already a very well-known figure, so keeping out of the limelight now would be virtually impossible.

“That’s right,” Yang Qi said coolly. “However, the fighting is only going to get harder. Everyone left is a Nonary Lifeseizer. Prodigies like that aren’t the kind I can beat with a single sword strike.”

“I know, Brother. But I still have faith that you can take first place! You’ll definitely be crowned the champion.”

“If you take first place, the reward will be incredible. I heard it's a top-rate magical treasure.”

“The rewards in the competition are always amazing. From what I’ve heard, the Crown Prince took first place five competitions ago. That was when he won the heaven-shaking, earth-shattering Pearl of the Thousand Illusions World.”

“Pearl of the Thousand Illusions World?” Yang Qi said with a frown. “What type of treasure is that?”

“According to the rumors,” Li He said, “it can create an incredibly realistic illusory region, filled with massive amounts of true energy, an alternate dimension that constantly absorbs vital energy from around it. With that pearl, you can create millions upon millions of clone incarnations. It also serves as a holding device to contain all sorts of material objects.”

“It's most important ability is how it connects with other alternate dimensions,” Liang Dong said. “Lifeseizers can only absorb vital energy from the Rich-Lush Continent, but Legendaries are different. They can travel through the various space-time manifestations of the universe to acquire higher levels of power, energies that far surpass the spirit energy of heaven and earth. With the Pearl of the Thousand Illusions World, you can absorb the energies from alternate dimensions and use them to strengthen your body. It’s almost like having a Legendary at your side to help you with your breathing exercises, and assisting you to absorb huge amounts of vital energy. It leads to cultivation speeds thousands or tens of thousands of times faster than most other top experts. That pearl is one of the reasons why the Crown Prince advanced so quickly in his cultivation, and became one of the top experts in the continent.”

‘I couldn’t tell that Yun Hailan was talking to me via incarnation last time we met,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘Don’t tell me that she has that Pearl of the Thousand Illusions World? How did she end up with a treasure like that? Has the Crown Prince gone mad? Has he fallen for her just like I did back in the day?’

There were no answers to such questions.

It didn’t seem to make sense that Yun Hailan would be able to get her claws into the Crown Prince. But based on all the evidence, it seemed like that she did indeed possess the Pearl of the Thousand Illusions World.

Which led to the question of what exactly the Crown Prince was up to.

It almost seemed like the two of them were married, and that he was holding nothing back in his efforts to aid her. From what Yang Qi could tell, the Crown Prince Society as a whole was unhappy with the arrangement, but the Crown Prince was suppressing any such discontent.

Yang Qi had never seen a treasure which could absorb power from alternate dimensions, but he did know that energies existed that far surpassed the spirit energy of heaven and earth. For example, there was Nine-Yang Immortal Energy.

The tiny bit of that energy that he had acquired from the Minorcosm World had been enough to push him into rapid advancement, similar to life force springwater.

Ding. Dong….

Even as he contemplated the matter, the sound of bells once again reached his ears.

Another round of fighting was about to begin.

Yang Qi leaped up into the arena, the subject of countless gazes. As of now, the number of competitors in the Central Battle Arena had been reduced significantly.

Furthermore, the prizes that were up for grabs were significantly greater than before.

Yang Qi didn’t even know how many merit points he had won so far. All he knew was that in barely a day, he had earned more than was normally possible in hundreds of years.

The first battle had been worth one thousand merit points, the second, two thousand. The third was four thousand and the fourth was eight thousand…. It went on like that, and in the end, Yang Qi really couldn’t calculate what he had won.

Standing in front of him was a young woman.

Her expression was cold, and she carried no weapons in her hands. She didn't radiate shocking energy but instead, just stood there calmly.

However, he sensed that there was something inside of her that could connect with the power of the heavens, something that could enrage the heavenly deities and destroy all creation.

She was a Nonary Lifeseizer, and from the clothing she wore, she was obviously from the Sea God Institute. They rippled like the waves of the sea, and even seemed to emanate the sound of the tide battering the seashore.

“Ao Yiyue.” She said only her name.

“Yang Qi.” He knew that this expert from the Sea God Institute was not someone he could take lightly. She was far more powerful than Patriarch Frost-Drake, and surely had powerful magical treasures of unbelievable quality.

“You’re new, aren’t you?” she said. “Fighting to this point is no small feat.”

Yang Qi laughed. “I plan to keep fighting even longer. Do you have any advice about that, Elder Sister Yiyue?”

She shook her head. “Sorry. Your progress stops here.”

“You sure about that?” With the wave of his palm, he summoned sword energy that took the shape of a fire and ice taiji symbol.

Ao Yiyue didn’t even seem to react. It was almost as if she didn’t have any true energy at all, and was a common person who didn’t cultivate energy arts.

“No offense!” Yang Qi said, sending his sword energy down into Ao Yiyue. Nothing blocked the sword energy at all, and surprisingly, Ao Yiyue was cleaved in half!

However, it was instantly obvious that the two halves weren’t real. They were merely projections which twisted and distorted, then faded away into nothing.

This time, Yang Qi most definitely did not defeat his opponent with a single sword strike.

WHIZZZ!

Before he could even finish delivering the blow, Ao Yiyue appeared behind him, a slight smile on her face. “It's over, Junior Brother. You’re not quite up to snuff.”

The entire field of battle began to tremble as powerful vibrations rolled out. It was as if they were suddenly fighting in the middle of the ocean, as flows of energy wrapped around Yang Qi, making it impossible for him to move.

Then, an enormous hand appeared above him, which reached down to grab him.

Chapter 168: Finals (2)

Ao Yiyue bucked the trend. She dodged Yang Qi’s sword technique, then unleashed an enormous palm attack that was a consummate discipline from the Sea God Institute.

The Sea-Quelling Megapalm.

It was said that, once mastered, it could be used to quash the most powerful hurricanes, and also the most powerful devils.

To cultivate it, the practitioner was required to remain inside of a hurricane, and absorb its power for days and nights on end. Eventually, that person’s true energy would connect with the sea itself, and conversely, the sea’s power would connect to the person. That was the way to unleash this uncharacteristically powerful palm attack.

Upon being unleashed, it was like a hurricane, able to crush anything in its path.

How could Yang Qi have guessed that Ao Yiyue, who seemed like such a dainty young woman, would attack with power like this? The sight of her Sea-Quelling Megapalm descending from above made him feel like an entire sea was about to crash down onto him.

“Rustling Wind!”

There was no time to think. Yang Qi immediately resorted to his top sword technique, the seven moves from the Ravaging Dual Sword Sect. His sword stabbed into the wind, making him one with nature as the storm of vital energy from the Sea-Quelling Megapalm surrounded him. And yet, no matter how powerful the palm was, it couldn’t touch him.

Clanging sounds could be heard as the sword and the palm clashed, along with intense flashes of light. The two fighters were competing on terms of true energy, fleshly body, and even their animadestiny willpower.

“Sea-Calming Finger.”

The palm vanished, to be replaced by a single, dazzling finger that almost looked like a massive needle capable of forcing calm into the wildest of seas.

Yang Qi’s sword energy was shattered, forcing the Ice-Soul God-Sword out into the open. It was dark green, like jadeite, and exquisitely beautiful, pulsing with frigid energy that turned everything around it into a mysterious kingdom of ice.

Bam!

Ao Yiyue’s sea-calming power smashed into Yang Qi’s divine sword.

“Give up!” she said. “Your Ice-Soul God-Sword is amazing, but your cultivation base isn’t strong enough to wield it properly.”

“Sorry to disappoint.” Yang Qi spun his sword, causing it to spiral toward Ao Yiyue’s finger attack, using a technique so marvelous that it surpassed nature itself.

It was none other than Ravage Law.

In this technique the ‘law’ referred to none other than magical law.

This aspect of the Ravaging Dual Sword Sect’s technique was designed to vanquish all sorts of magical and natural laws, to revert cosmic nature, and to control anything and everything with the sword. It was an ultimate technique that could defy all laws and principles, even those of the heavens.

Although Yang Qi wasn’t yet a Legendary, and thus had not reached the level of being able to use one sword technique to destroy myriad laws, he was still able to evade all types of true energy attacks.

Quite a few spectators noticed what was happening, and couldn’t help but let out exclamations of admiration. “Excellent sword technique!”

Even some of the Legendary experts said the same thing.

Patriarchs Wind and Cloud had very dark expressions on their faces, as did other experts who had made wagers with Holy Daughter Manyflowers. By now, they were coming to realize that Yang Qi was the type of freak who couldn’t be judged by ordinary means.

And yet, even as Yang Qi vanquished Ao Yiyue’s Sea-Calming Finger, he unleashed another spectacular move.

“Alright, Elder Sister. Get ready for my next move! Ravish Heaven!”

After Ravage Law was Ravish Heaven!

The purpose of this sword technique from the Ravaging Dual Sword Sect was to destroy all laws, then rebuke and destroy heaven itself. In this technique, the swordsman was the ultimate figure in all existence.

That ancient sect was a larger organization than any of the four institutes. Unfortunately, when the Yore-Wilds Continent was destroyed, it vanished into the sands of time, leaving behind only this sword technique, of which only a few moves could still be considered invincible.

A sword to ravish heaven.

As everyone watched, Yang Qi’s sword seemed to suck in all the light in the area, blotting out heaven and earth, sun and moon alike.

The sun and moon were created to give light to the lands, and nourish all living beings. But his sword technique snatched that light, which was a challenge to heaven itself, and a threat to all living things.

Sword energy abounded, causing swords to appear everywhere and nowhere.

Yang Qi vanished, leaving in his stead only a sword manifestation that shot toward Ao Yiyue with deadly force. It was as if the sword had consumed Yang Qi, and had been bedeviled, completely leaving his control.

The wail of ghost-gods filled the air, and boundless baleful energy filled the area. It was even possible to see the projected images of devil-ghosts.

It was as if this sword move was a technique from antiquity, like a sword devil from the Ravaging Dual Sword Sect, resurrected and leading an army of devils to heaven to challenge the legion of gods.

Ao Yiyue’s face fell and she backed up.

“Seven Forms of the Sea God!” she cried, true energy erupting out. “Sea-Quelling form, Sea-Calming form, Sea-Leveling form, Sea-Pacifying form, Sea-Disturbing form, Sea-Parting form, Sea-Ravagingform!”

The seven moves caused seven seas to appear around her, nearly obscuring her. Obviously, any attack against her would need to get past these seven seas first.

In some strange ways, they were actually reminiscent of Yang Susu’s seven seas of energy.

However, Yang Qi’s sword only seemed to grow more powerful as it met the seven resisting seas, and in that moment, he seemed to suddenly gain deeper enlightenment into the profound secrets of the Ravaging Dual Sword Sect.

As a result, his Ravish Heaven sword stance grew even more enigmatic.

WHAAAAAM! The seven seas were all vanquished, and the tip of the sword was suddenly closing in on Ao Yiyue’s throat.

In that instant, a heavenly shield sprang up to oppose the sword, composed of seventy-two streams of water.

It was the manifestation of a magical treasure called the Mysticwater Heavenshield, created by extracting mystic waters for ten thousand years, and forming them into seventy-two spell formations of virtually impenetrable strength. Any energy art used on the Mysticwater Heavenshield would be almost instantly absorbed.

Therefore, Yang Qi’s sword deflated like a balloon upon contacting it, causing true energy to spill out without cease.

“You’ve lost, Junior Brother Yang Qi. However, you forced me to sacrifice my Mysticwater Heavenshield, and of that, you should be proud.”

“You’re wrong again.” Yang Qi’s sword energy vanished, and he backed up. Then his own true energy replaced the sword energy from moments ago, making him even more powerful, like a god from heaven descended into the mortal world. Then, he unleashed the full set of seven sword moves.

“Freezing Night. Flying Stars. Rustling Wind. Broken Moon. Shocking Clouds. Ravage Law. Ravish Heaven!”

In the blink of an eye, the seven manifestations of the technique swirled together, shrinking down and combining.

Pop!

The Mysticwater Heavenshield was pierced, and Yang Qi’s sword stabbed toward Ao Yiyue. True energy surged, and a wave of light erupted out, accompanied by a loud cracking sound.

Yang Qi retracted his energy and stepped back, looking completely calm and leisurely. “You’ve lost, Elder Sister. I smashed your identity medallion.”

The cracking sound from moments ago was her identity medallion breaking.

A moment passed in which Ao Yiyue recovered her composure. Then, she said, “Nice sword technique. Yang Qi, was it? I'm going to remember you, Junior Brother. I lost, but at the same time, I learned. If I ever make it to the Legendary level, it will definitely be because of this battle. One day, I’ll come looking for you again.”

With that, she leaped off the fighting platform.

Yang Qi’s defeat of Ao Yiyue led to another commotion. After all, she was from an imperial clan of the sea. She was also a top expert in the Sea God Institute, and a famed Nonary Lifeseizer.

She was considered one of the most likely candidates in the Sea God Institute to reach the Legendary level, and yet, had been defeated by an elite student.

Of course, everyone knew that it was no fluke. The seven sword moves Yang Qi had used were each deadly to an unimaginable level. All of them contained the invincible sword will of the ancient Ravaging Dual Sword Sect, which could pierce even heaven itself.

It was a sword technique that could lead to the highest levels of fame.

Up on the observation deck, Prince Wei from the Sage Ancestor Dynasty smiled enigmatically. ‘Interesting. Things just keep getting more and more interesting. He defeated Ao Yiyue! Seems this Yang Qi is going to make it into the top ten. The fighting is only going to get more intense, and the experts more skilled. How far will he actually get?’

Holy Daughter Manyflowers was also looking at Yang Qi. ‘Yang Qi. Nephew of my apprentice. He's really giving me a lot of face. However, I can also tell that those seven spectacular moves of his were just a cover. He still hasn’t used his most powerful techniques. When he does, it will shake heaven and earth. Come on, Yang Qi. Do it. Shock everyone!’

She had assessed matters perfectly. After all, she was the type of rare genius who only came along every thousand years. She became a Legendary at forty, which, considering her total longevity, made her like an infant.

In fact, she actually looked younger than Yang Susu, as if she were little more than a teenager.

Of course, no one would dare to underestimate her, especially now that she was a Legendary.

She had long since come to realize that Yang Qi’s true strength came from another source. Although she wasn’t sure exactly what it was, her sixth sense was telling her that it was something monumental.

Li He and the others were left speechless by Yang Qi’s victory over Ao Yiyue. From their perspective, this sworn brother of theirs was just performing one miracle after another.

Another round started, and there were only ten competitors left.

These ten were the absolute top experts from among the countless students of the four institutes. And one of them was Yang Qi.

It was a complete miracle, and as a result, everyone was watching this dark horse of the competition, and wondering how far he would go.

His next opponent: Xie Feng!

He was a leader among the conclave students in the Crown Prince Society, and a top contender for first place in the competition. He had defeated countless experts so far, including geniuses from the Sun Moon, Sea God, and True Dragon Institutes.

His nickname? The Heaven-Toppler.

Chapter 169: Finals (3)

Xie Feng looked Yang Qi up and down and then said, “So, you’re Yang Qi?”

“That’s right, I'm Yang Qi.” Yang Qi knew who Xie Feng was in the Crown Prince Society. He was very powerful, and answered directly to the Crown Prince himself. Considering that, there was no way that Yang Qi would go easy on him, and in fact, already felt the itch to use deadly fighting methods.

The members of the Crown Prince Society were bad apples one and all.

Clasping his hands behind him, Xie Feng said, “It’s really a pity. Why does someone with energy arts as good as yours insist on opposing the Crown Prince and his society?”

“I’ve never opposed the Crown Prince Society,” Yang Qi replied. “Yun Hailan betrayed me, and I want her dead. She nearly got everyone in my clan killed, and that's an enmity that must be avenged. The truth is that your Crown Prince Society has been helping Yun Hailan to put pressure on me. What. I'm just supposed to let you walk all over me?”

“That's right. When the Crown Prince Society puts pressure on someone, the proper response is to let yourself get walked over. Anyone who fights back gets killed. Soon, the Crown Prince will be the Son of Heaven, and his will shall become an extension of the will of heaven. As for the Crown Prince Society, we’re loyal to him, not to supposed justice expected by society at large.” Xie Feng’s speech was nothing short of fear-inspiring, and he did nothing to conceal the arrogant and despotic goals of the Crown Prince Society.

“Oh really?” Yang Qi said, his expression turning grim. “Well then, I guess I’ll be fighting your society to the bitter end.”

“Not necessarily. You still have a choice: join us. I know that reaching this level of cultivation isn’t easy, so as long as you become one of us, and cast aside your desire for revenge against Yun Hailan, then I guarantee your troubles will be at an end. Of course, if you insist on being stubborn, then your days are numbered. In fact, I’ll make sure you understand this very day what it means to defy the might of heaven.”

Yang Qi laughed. “Defy the might of heaven? So you put yourself on the same level as heaven itself? Considering how small the Rich-Lush Continent is, how come your little Crown Prince hasn’t taken it over already? Compared to the Quake-Dawn Continent, he might as well be a shrimp larva.”

Considering that Yang Qi now had come to realize how small the Rich-Lush Continent was, he also knew that for the Crown Prince to declare himself like heaven showed him to be nothing more than a frog in a well.

At that point, Xie Feng decided to stop mincing words. Obviously, Yang Qi could not be won over, and therefore, needed to be shown the error of his ways.

“Pig-headed fool!”

He flipped his hand over, causing the vital energy in the area to shatter as a heaven-toppling hand print appeared above Yang Qi. It was like a black hole of vital energy that sucked madly at everything around it, even tugging at the true energy in Yang Qi’s dantian region.

Xie Feng was called the Heaven-Toppler because every move he made was powerful enough to topple heaven and shake the earth.

His true energy was abundant to an inconceivable degree. If it weren’t, he wouldn’t have reached a leadership position in the Crown Prince Society.

Furthermore, he had all sorts of consummate skills and abilities at his disposal.

‘Black hole of vital energy? Cute. Except that my Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth can prevent any true energy loss….’ Snorting coldly in his heart, Yang Qi proceeded to make his move.

The truth was that he had held back a bit when fighting Ao Yiyue. He had not fully drawn on his own staggering reserves of true energy, and had instead relied mostly on the sword technique itself. He had also drawn on the true energy of the Ice-Soul God-Sword and made it seem like his own.

However, the truth was that his most powerful energy art, the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, had remained hidden in his sea of energy.

There was no way he could reveal the truth. He couldn’t use the Infernal Deity Spear, Infernal Deity Plate Armor, or Hellfire Crucible. However, he could secretly draw upon the true energy of the technique to make his sword more powerful.

“One sword to exterminate natural law. Two swords to pierce the heavens. Three swords to fracture time and space. Four swords to slaughter the universe….” As he unleashed his sword technique, he pulled true energy from his dantian region and sent it into the Ice-Soul God-Sword, causing it to shine brilliantly.

“If you think my fight with Ao Yiyue showed my true strength, Xie Feng, then you’ve made a big mistake. Do you really think I'm that weak? Do you really think I’ve been relying on the strength of the Ice-Soul God-Sword? Let me tell you, this sword is nothing more than a slave to me!”

Yang Qi knew he couldn’t hold back against a person like Xie Feng, and therefore, he powered his sword energy with the true energy of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. Thankfully, not even Legendaries would be able to see the truth unless they sent their own true energy into his dantian region.

SWOOOOSH!

Four streams of heaven-shaking, earth-shattering sword energy shot forth, destroying Xie Feng’s true energy.

“Treacherous villain!” Never in his wildest dreams could Xie Feng have guessed that Yang Qi would actually be this strong. He had assumed that Yang Qi had already pushed himself to the limit, only to realize that what he had witnessed up to this point was only the tip of the iceberg.

“Lord Brahma's Gauntlets!”

All of a sudden, two light-golden gloves appeared on Xie Feng’s hands, exceptionally precious objects covered with complex designs. As a result, he was covered with a golden glow, and even his skin shone with a faint golden color.

It was like he was surrounded by golden clouds as he shoved his hands out in front of him, causing two enormous palm projections to appear. Intense rumbling sounds echoed out with mountain-toppling, sea-draining force as the palms filled the fighting arena and bore down on Yang Qi.

“Mahābrahman Buddhist Palm!” blurted one of the elders in the observation dimension. “This Xie Feng actually cultivates the Mahābrahman Buddhist Palm! It's a consummate discipline that supposedly originated from an ancient Buddhist sect. Each palm contains the power to move mountains and fill in seas. As for Lord Brahma's Gauntlets, they’re a spectacular magical treasure that contains the ancient power of Buddha! Used together, they allow Xie Feng to become one with Buddha, and unleash the mighty power of a god!”

“The ancient Buddhist sects have long since vanished into the sands of history. But Yang Qi is so strong, and has such immense reserves of secret power, that he’s actually forced Xie Feng to use both Lord Brahma's Gauntlets and the Mahābrahman Buddhist Palm.”

“That’s right. There’s definitely some incredible power in Yang Qi’s sea of energy. That’s how he's fueling that sword technique of his. But where did this power come from? How much true energy does he have?”

“This is no ordinary kid.”

The elders watching Yang Qi’s match were completely and utterly astonished.

“I've never used these gauntlets, Yang Qi. You’re the first person I've ever unleashed them on! Normally speaking, only Legendaries deserve to see them. Once Lord Brahma's Gauntlets are out in the open, they must drink the blood of the opponent. Therefore, your blood will be used to consecrate them!”

Xie Feng was actually furious that a nobody like Yang Qi had forced him to use the magical treasure he had kept secret for so long. It was really a huge loss of face for him.

A humiliation.

And the only way to cleanse that humiliation was with blood.

He was like a huge dragon, surging with power, surrounded by roiling winds that caused the air to distort. As he attacked, numerous golden deities appeared around him, dharmic guards in plate armor that were only the size of a finger. As they chanted Buddhist scriptures, they truly made Xie Feng seem like a king of the gods.

He released palm strike after palm strike, which descended on Yang Qi, filled with innumerable deities in plate armor, almost like a mountain of force.

In the face of the mighty attack, Yang Qi simply remained calm and poured true energy into his Ice-Soul God-Sword in preparation to make his move.

“To meet your myriad of divine palm strikes, Xie Feng, I’ll use one sword move. Then you’ll be able to see what true godpower is like.”

Suddenly, Yang Qi’s sword erupted with destructive power as the blade transformed, seemingly becoming a host of ghost-gods from the netherworld, infernal deities tasked with reaping the lives of humans.

The Ice-Soul God-Sword had transformed into a sword crafted to harvest souls.

The truth was that Yang Qi had inserted the Infernal Deity Spear into his sword technique. He couldn’t use the spear openly, but over the past three months, had perfected the technique to use aspects of it with his sword.

The spear technique used with the Infernal Deity Spear was something beyond the compare of the Ravaging Dual Sword Sect’s technique. After all, the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth was a godly-class energy art. Even the Ravaging Dual Sword Sect’s most secret manuals were only saintly-class.

With his incredible perseverance and willpower, and by reaching out to the God Legion Seal and the golden imp, Yang Qi managed to fuse his spear technique with his sword technique. Although it wasn’t perfect, it was enough to deal with anyone under the Legendary level.

A moment later, the Mahābrahman Buddhist Palm and the Ice-Soul God-Sword slammed into each other.

Dark clouds spread out, which caused the golden deities to shiver in fear, and then explode.

It was as if Yang Qi was an infernal deity, and that every sweep of his Ice-Soul God-Sword was enough to cause all souls in the area to tremble.

His sword technique was now an expression of soul-harvesting beings from the depths of hell, and was nothing like the skills found in the mortal world.

Pop!

His sword slashed through the air more quickly than the eye could track as it headed toward Xie Feng’s forehead. Shocked, Xie Feng immediately backed up and threw his palms up to protect his head.

“What sword technique is that?” he asked.

“The type that can kill you,” Yang Qi replied. He seemed to be striding forward casually, and yet was moving with incredible speed. As his sword sliced through the air, a song of death began to drift about. “The Nightfall Symphony…. Anyone who hears this song, even the legion of gods, will experience the fall of night.”

As Yang Qi unleashed this ultimate sword technique, he suddenly felt as though he could communicate with the golden imp, and was gaining new enlightenment as a result. As his sword technique continued to transform, it slashed into Lord Brahma's Gauntlets, and beyond, into Xie Feng’s hands.

Chapter 170: First Place

Xie Feng’s scream instantly attracted a lot of attention.

Blood sprayed out of the stumps of his wrists as his hands were cut clean off by Yang Qi’s sword, and his gauntlets tumbled to the ground, soaked in blood.

Xie Feng’s momentum ended, completely and utterly.

His scream sounded like that of a wild beast, and he completely lost control of his true energy. His eyes were now completely bloodshot and filled with terror.

Fights between top experts usually came down to a single moment. And Xie Feng could never have known that Yang Qi would use an improvised infernal deity sword technique, and accompany it with the Nightfall Symphony.

In fact, not even Yang Qi had been aware of what would happen. By combining the spear technique with his sword, he received the Nightfall Symphony from the golden imp, and immediately used it to sever his opponent's hands.

“I'm gonna kill you!” Xie Feng shouted. He still had some energy arts to rely on, and therefore, it was just as the old saying went: a centipede does not stop wriggling even after being stomped on.

“Piece of trash.” Yang Qi sneered, flicking his sword toward Xie Feng’s throat. Xie Feng felt his blood run cold as he realized that he couldn’t make another move without being killed.

He swallowed hard as the tip of the sword slowly pierced into the skin of his throat, causing a bead of blood to run down toward his chest. A single stir of Yang Qi’s true energy, and Xie Feng would be dead.

POP!

Yang Qi stirred his true energy, and yet, didn’t stab Xie Feng through the throat. Instead, he destroyed his identity medallion. “I'm not going to kill you, Xie Feng. Screw the hell off, and take your hands with you. I'm sure you can find the right spirit medicine to reattach them.”

“I'm going to get revenge for this, Yang Qi!” Xie Feng said, his expression incomparably malicious.

“I’ll be waiting,” Yang Qi replied calmly. “I could have killed you today, and it’ll be the same tomorrow too. Considering how badly I damaged your vital energy, there’s no way you’ll reach the Legendary level any time soon. Soon enough, I’ll seize life again, and leave you in the dust. Once I’m a Legendary, your Crown Prince Society won’t be able to do anything about me. Nor will your Crown Prince.”

“You just wait!” Xie Feng spat. Then he turned and left, taking his hands, and his shame, with him.

Yet again, exclamations of praise and shock could be heard.

A broad smile could be seen on Holy Daughter Manyflowers’ face. “What an incredible fight! If he wins the next round, he’ll be in the top three.”

Meanwhile, fierce fighting played out as the rest of the battles between the top ten contenders played out.

The next round would have only five finalists, and would feature two fights, with one competitor sitting out. And thus, the top three would be selected.

After that, the top three would draw lots to determine the order of the fight for the final prize.

Patriarchs Wind and Cloud looked completely ashen-faced, as did many of the other experts who had wagered on the outcome of Yang Qi’s progress. None of them could possibly have imagined that he would actually beat Xie Feng. There was no more spectacular dark horse in the competition than him.

Thanks to the wagers with Holy Daughter Manyflowers, many of them would be losing precious treasures, and thus, a large contingent was dearly hoping that Yang Qi would be defeated in the next round.

Bells tolled, and Yang Qi once again entered the fighting arena.

Of the five people present, one was Yun Hailan!

The other three were students from the Sea God Institute, True Dragon Institute, and Sun Moon Institute respectively. The Sun Moon Institute student was a young woman who looked over at Yang Qi and nodded. From the look of it, she had a good impression of him.

There was something familiar about this young woman, so Yang Qi said, “Elder Sister, might I ask for your honored surname and distinguished given name?”

“You’re Hua Fengfeng’s sworn brother, right?” she replied. “I'm her older sister Hua Piaomiao. My sister told me all about you. She said you’re supremely honorable and righteous, and that you put your life on the line to save your sworn brother, by fighting devils. You actually charged right into a Preheaven Devil-Eye.”

“Yang Qi!” Yun Hailan interjected. “You really have worked up a pack of rogues as friends.”

“Calm down, Yun Hailan,” he replied. “I don't care what happens today, you won’t be escaping the tip of my sword! I got to where I am by relying on my own cultivation base, so I can’t help but feel a bit disgusted having you here. After all, the only thing you know how to do is manipulate men. Women who toy with men are virtually the same as prostitutes. After all, both of them can reach incredible heights of power in society. Don’t tell me that God really doesn’t care about this sort of thing?”

“Hmph!” Yun Hailan’s eyes blazed with intense killing intent. Even if she had greater self-restraint than she did, she wouldn’t have been able to ignore Yang Qi’s jab. “If you’re looking to die, I can accommodate you.”

RUUUUUMBLE!

Suddenly, massive force weighed down on the area as one of the Legendary grand elders of the Demi-Immortal Institute appeared, a jade tray in hand, upon which rested five jade markers. “The five of you will draw lots to determine who fights next. There is one blank marker. Whichever of you is lucky enough to draw it will sit out the next round.”

“Yes sir!” The five students nodded. This method for competitions was an old tradition, and thus, none of them found it strange. As for Yang Qi, he stepped forward, drew a marker, and found that his next opponent was Hua Piaomiao. Unfortunately, he hadn’t struck it lucky.

Hua Piaomiao was Hua Fengfeng’s sister, but now she was his opponent. How was he supposed to fight her considering that?

“Looks like you’re a lot luckier than me, Yang Qi,” Yun Hailan said snidely. In her hand was a blank marker. She would sit out the round and advance directly into the top three.

In the blink of an eye, the arena was split into two fighting zones.

On one side, Yang Qi would fight Hua Piaomiao, and on the other, the students from the True Dragon and Sea God Institutes would compete.

As Hua Piaomiao took her place, she looked at Yang Qi with a faint smile and said, “I don’t think there’s any need for us to fight, Yang Qi. You want to kill Yun Hailan, right? How about I give you the chance you’re looking for? I’ll simply step out of the competition.”

“What?!” Yang Qi said. Shaking his head, he continued, “No, you can’t do that.”

“Why not? You saved Hua Fengfeng, so the Hua Clan owes you. If you have the time, why not come to the Sun Moon Institute for a visit? I hope you end up taking first place, and pull off a miracle. Besides, I know that I can’t defeat you. Your sword technique is beyond the comprehension of even ghosts and gods.”

Before he could say anything else, she pulled out her identity medallion and crushed it. “Good luck.”

Then, she flew off of the fighting platform.

“What’s going on?! Why’d she just give up?” This caused an even bigger commotion than Yang Qi’s previous victories. This time, he didn’t even fight.

Furthermore, it indicated that he was now in the top three.

Patriarchs Wind and Cloud, as well as the other Legendary grand elders who had placed wagers howled in rage, as if they planned to interfere. After all, they had all just suffered disastrous losses.

“What,” Holy Daughter Manyflowers said with a chuckle. “Don’t tell me you’re going to resort to rule-breaking? In this competition, just like those in the past, any competitor can admit defeat. You think everyone should fight to the death or something?”

Those were indeed the rules of the competition. And there was nothing anyone could say to argue with her.

“Patriarchs Wind and Cloud, hand over your Wind and Cloud Flag,” she said, extending her hand toward them. “I heard that you forged it with hundreds of years’ worth of heart-blood, plus dragon-king goldsilk. You even had to refine it with water, fire, wind, and lightning. Well, it will make a great defensive item for Yang Susu when she comes out of seclusion. And you over there, hand over that Wild-Calming Pearl….”

Although many a glare was cast in her direction, there was nothing any of the other grand elders could do to try to wriggle out of their agreement, and thus, one treasure after another changed hands. The sight of so many treasures caused Holy Daughter Manyflowers’ impression of Yang Qi to improve more and more. But at the same time, so did her curiosity over what mysterious power he had access to.

Soon enough, the other battle came to an end, and the student from the Sea God Institute prevailed over his opponent from the True Dragon Institute.

The victor was a young man with a snow-white complexion, making him look almost sickly. However, he fought with incredible speed, using a trident that he could wield with incredible dexterity. Each blow he struck contained massive power, and occasionally, it was possible to glimpse the image of a huge whale within the blur of his movements.

Similar to the way that Yang Qi had awoken ancient megamammoths, this young man could call upon the power of leviathans. Of course, despite being formidable, it couldn’t compare to the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.

Considering how long he had been watching the fighting in the competition, Yang Qi knew that this young man’s name was Yun He. He was the very same student who, in the previous competition, had defeated several elite students when he himself was only a Master of Energy. Because of that, he was widely regarded as a genius.

Supposedly, he could draw upon the power of a primeval leviathan, which allowed him to virtually dominate the sea. He was a genius like Holy Daughter Manyflowers, a person who was rumored to be the next Legendary in his institute.

There were now three competitors left: Yang Qi, Yun Hailan, and Yun He.

Next, the Legendary elder had Yang Qi and Yun He draw lots.

Whoever got the blank marker would sit out, and the other would fight Yun Hailan. The winner of that match would then fight the person who had just sat out.

As for Yun Hailan, considering she had sat out the last round, according to the long-standing rules, she had to fight now.

The lots were drawn, and Yang Qi picked the blank marker. He would sit out while Yun He and Yun Hailan fought.

As of this moment, he was only one round of fighting away from taking first place.

‘Unless you forfeit this round, Yun Hailan, I'm going to kill you.’ Of Yang Qi’s two great ambitions, one was very close to becoming a reality: killing Yun Hailan.

“Junior Sister,” Yun He said, “I know that you really want to take first place, so I’ll accommodate your desire, and help the Crown Prince out at the same time. Although the prize for first place is a very rare magical treasure, I’d much rather provide a helping hand. Besides, the Crown Prince will reward me, and likely, help me reach the Legendary level.”

Unexpectedly, Yun He broke his medallion, backing out of the fight with Yun Hailan.

Now, only Yang Qi and Yun Hailan were left in the competition.

‘Good!’ Yang Qi thought, his excitement building. His biggest fear had been that Yun Hailan would forfeit. Never could he have imagined that Yun He would be the one to do so.

As Yun He walked past Yang Qi to leave the fighting platform, he leaned over and whispered, “You’d better forfeit, punk. Otherwise you’ll die a miserable death….”

Chapter 171: First Place (2)

“The Crown Prince already arranged for Yun Hailan to win this thing,” Yun He continued. “Anyone who interferes will become his enemy, and he has power in all four of the institutes. Think things through carefully Yang Qi….”

With that, Yun He was gone.

However, his words rang loud and clear in Yang Qi’s mind.

It was now abundantly clear that the Crown Prince was someone not to be trifled with. In the past, Yang Qi had heard that he had influence in the other institutes, but had always assumed it was minimal. After all, the institutes wouldn't allow outsiders to hold sway over their students, would they?

As it turned out, he had been wrong. Clearly, experts from all the institutes feared him, and would heed his commands.

Even this expert among experts, Yun He, held the Crown Prince in high esteem.

That was a level of power that couldn’t be described as ordinary in any way.

In fact, Yang Qi even wondered if the four institutes were collectively grooming the Crown Prince to be their future leader. It seemed unlikely. After all, despite the fact that all four institutes claimed to be righteous and orthodox organizations, they still differed from each other as much as water differed from fire.

Regardless, one thing was for sure: the Crown Prince was powerful beyond imagination.

Could it be that he was intentionally setting Yun Hailan up as the winner in order to establish even more might and authority?

That also seemed a likely possibility.

And yet, all it did was make Yang Qi even more intent on cutting her down in front of all of these spectators. He would not shrink back, not even if the Crown Prince himself showed up in person to try to stop him. He had made up his mind, and nothing would change it. It was like the old saying: If a human blocks my path, I’ll kill him. If a Buddha blocks my path, I’ll kill him too.

Using divine sense to transmit a message into Yun He’s mind, Yang Qi said, ‘You’re complete trash, Yun He. You call yourself a top expert, but it turns out you’re just a bootlicker. And you try to unnerve me? Well, just wait until I win first place. Then I’ll come kill you.’

‘I’ll be waiting,’ Yun He replied. ‘If you’re alive in the end, I’ll be the one killing you.’

‘Screw you.’ As of this moment, Yang Qi knew that he had another enemy in the world.

After all, Yun He was from the Sea God Institute, and shared a surname with Yun Hailan. For all he knew, the two might be related. Maybe they were both jackals from the same lair.

Now, Yang Qi and Yun Hailan were the only ones left in the arena. As they faced off, one boiled with killing intent, and the other stood confident in her well-thought-out plans. As for the latter, it was possible to tell from the arrogant glint in her eyes that she felt she was in perfect control.

“Yun He’s just looking out for your best interests, Yang Qi,” she said. “Walk away. I know it wasn’t easy for you to reach this part of the competition. If you offend the Crown Prince, you’ll meet a tragic end today.”

“Can you do anything other than rely on men to help you, Yun Hailan? By the way, I'm going to make you eat your words. The one to be meeting a tragic end will be you.”

Yun Hailan chuckled. “What's that supposed to mean? You really think you’re going to kill me? Aren’t you worried that I’ve figured out your little secret?”

Looking completely unruffled, Yang Qi replied, “Yeah right. Nothing you know or say could possibly change my mind. I'm going to kill you today, no matter what. So stop wasting your breath. Go ahead and show me whatever it is that pushed you from a puny Energy Arts level nobody to your current level.”

“You’re gonna regret this, Yang Qi! I've given you plenty of chances, but sadly, you’ve been blinded by your desire for revenge, and have lost all sense of reason. Whatever good fortune you’ve come across, you think it’s made you invincible. Sadly, there are plenty of people in the world who have acquired good fortune many times better than yours. And now you’re letting your desire for revenge make you an enemy of the Crown Prince.”

“Enough!” Yang Qi said. He was in no mood to hear Yun Hailan monologuing, and thus, he attacked, waving his hand to send a beam of razor-sharp sword energy flying straight toward her throat.

It was a completely vicious move, cold and merciless to the extreme.

His sword was like wind, lightning, and light. It was a spring rain falling in the dead of night to enter one's dreams. Anyone who faced it would immediately feel like they were facing death itself.

A serious expression overtook Yun Hailan’s face a moment before she transformed into a blur of mist that the sword passed through.

Then, the entire field of battle filled with projected images of her.

Yang Qi suddenly felt like he was surrounded by countless copies of Yun Hailan, each of them as real as real could be, with boundless true energy ready to be unleashed in deadly attack form.

RUUUUUMBLE!

The projections of Yun Hailan clenched their right hands into fists, causing vortexes to spring up behind each and every one of them. Violet energy swirled as an imperial figure appeared. It was almost as if she were communicating with higher heavens, and drawing upon vital energy that contained their might. As the energy descended, it created a rain of vital energy.

Real drops could be seen, not of water, but rather, the vital energy of heaven and earth.

All of them glowed with violet energy that belonged, not to humans, but rather, the Son of Heaven.

“Son of Heaven’s Godfist!”

Unexpectedly, Yun Hailan was using that most all-encompassing and deadly of energy arts, the Son of Heaven’s Godfist, an imperial-class energy art.

It was a fist strike that could overwhelm the world itself, and normally speaking, Yun Hailan’s true energy wouldn’t be enough to sustain it. However, she possessed an item that seemed to be constantly replenishing her reserves.

It was obviously some invincible magical treasure, and most likely, was none other than the Pearl of the Thousand Illusions World.

Yang Qi could sense immense pressure from the Son of Heaven’s Godfist, so mighty that it instantly destroyed his sword energy.

However, sword light quickly swirled around him, creating a defensive barrier that the fist couldn’t penetrate.

The Legendary grand elders in the observation dimension were already discussing how things were playing out. Whoever won this fight would have access to an extremely powerful and mysterious treasure.

“This Yun Hailan is strong. She’s actually forced Yang Qi into a bit of a corner.”

“It’s not that Yun Hailan is particularly strong,” another of the Legendaries said. “It’s the Crown Prince’s Pearl of the Thousand Illusions World. Although, you can’t underestimate her. She has the blood of a sea god in her, as well as the blood of a dragon god. That gives her the power of a dragon in the sea. Patriarchs Wind and Cloud, when you took this girl as an apprentice, you must have shed plenty of blood, sweat, and tears to help her.”

“That’s right,” Patriarch Wind said proudly. “With our Eight Trigrams Wind and Cloud Furnace, we used the true energy of wind and clouds to purify her for a total of forty-nine days. We strengthened her meridians, and even bolstered them with some Eight Trigrams Preheaven Godseals. Thanks to that, her strength has reached an unimaginable level. Of course, the Crown Prince has done even more amazing things. Despite being in another area of space-time, he sent his power to her and created a small-scale world inside of her sea of energy.” Turning to Holy Daughter Manyflowers, he said, “Do you think Yang Qi can stand up to all of that? The Crown Prince is powerful enough to seize good fortune from heaven and earth.”

Holy Daughter Manyflowers snorted coldly. “I'd say that Yang Qi can beat her easily.”

“Oh really?” Patriarch Cloud said. “We just lost quite a bet with you, Holy Daughter Manyflowers. Do you dare to make another wager?”

“Sure. What’s the bet?” Holy Daughter Manyflowers didn’t seem fazed at all by his words. “How about I put up everything I just won as stakes. What could you put up to match that?”

“We’ll put up Vast Heavens Sage Energy!” He pulled out a bottle gourd which he tilted back and forth, causing it to emit a gurgling sound that seemed to indicate the thing was full of liquid. At the same time, the sound was filled with indescribable power, causing the expressions of everyone present to flicker dramatically.

“What?!” one of the Legendaries exclaimed. “Is that really Vast Heavens Sage Energy?” Other Legendaries also rose to their feet in shock.

“It is!” someone said. “According to the rumors, it comes from the vast heavens void, and is a true energy that is rightly called sage energy. Both Legendaries and Great Sages can benefit greatly from it.”

“Yes,” Patriarch Wind said. “It is indeed Vast Heavens Sage Energy, a much higher-level energy than Nine-Yang Immortal Energy. The mighty Crown Prince used his magical power to scour countless voids until he found the proper space-time to extract it from. Then, he provided it to us as a gift. What do you say, Holy Daughter Manyflowers?”

“Fine. If you’re offering a gourd of Vast Heavens Sage Energy, I won’t make any show of refusing the bet. You’re on.” With that she held out her hand, revealing a ring. “All of the treasures I just won are in this ring of holding.”

“Fine! Let’s see how this fight turns out!”

Both Patriarchs Wind and Cloud were gnashing their teeth from the frustration of losing earlier.

Meanwhile, Yun Hailan and Yang Qi were fighting back and forth below, their true energy exploding in terrifying fashion. Yun Hailan’s Son of Heaven’s Godfist only seemed to grow mightier each time she unleashed it, provoking astrological phenomena and causing vital energy to fall like rain.

At the same time, Yang Qi’s sword slashed back and forth, finding every flaw in her fist technique.

From the look of things, Yang Qi was actually on the defensive. Of course, if Yun Hailan ran out of true energy, Yang Qi would likely be able to turn the tables. But unfortunately, the Legendaries present could all tell that she wouldn’t be running out of true energy any time soon. She obviously had a way to connect to some alternate dimension, and draw vital energy from it. As long as heaven and earth existed, she would never run out of energy, and in fact, would likely get stronger as the fight drew out.

“Admit defeat, Yang Qi! My Son of Heaven’s Godfist will only get stronger as I fight. Nobody could beat it. Don’t tell me you think you can defy the heavens?”

Yun Hailan herself wasn’t even visible, only the countless projections of her that filled the area and unleashed fist strikes without cease were seen.

Yang Qi moved about constantly, seeking to find the weaknesses in her attack. Then, at long last, he realized where she was actually standing.

“Enough with your blathering!”

His sword lashed out, and the Nightfall Symphony began.

Chapter 172: First Place (3)

The most difficult aspect of the fight with Yun Hailan was finding her true body.

There were so many projections of her that the task was truly challenging.

She had the Pearl of the Thousand Illusions World, which made her much stronger than normal, and capable of casting out millions upon millions of incarnations. And each of those incarnations was roughly as strong as her true body, and so realistic it was almost impossible to tell which was real and which were clones.

However, regardless of the fact that the clones were not ‘real’, the attacks they unleashed were.

Each fist strike contained unimaginable power; the Son of Heaven’s Godfist was being unleashed without restraint. This was a true imperial-class energy art, and a complete one at that, not like the fragmentary Painting of Immortal Immolation of Gu Fenxian.

That godfist was like a sovereign lord of all creation, giving Yun Hailan incredibly destructive power. And of course, it was all magnified considering how many of her incarnations were attacking Yang Qi simultaneously.

With the exception of the Crown Prince himself, this was a strength that no Nonary Lifeseizer could possibly stand up to.

However, as the fighting played out, Yang Qi quickly realized that Yun Hailan was not herself a Nonary Lifeseizer. Just like him, she was in Senary Lifeseizing.

The main difference was that her cultivation base wasn't stable. She had obviously been assisted by some powerful expert who shoved their cultivation base to a higher level with force. It was a sharp contrast with Yang Qi, who had forged ahead with hard work and personal enlightenment.

Because of that, the execution of her forms had flaws, causing vital energy leakage that Yang Qi was able to detect.

Without any hesitation, he unleashed the quintessence of his Infernal Deity Spear technique into his sword moves. It was the Nightfall Symphony!

According to the ancient myths and legends, the godmammoths who suppressed hells subjugated numerous infernal deities and evil gods of hell. When such evil gods congregated, they could join forces to perform the Nightfall Symphony. And when it sounded loud and clear, even the legion of gods in heaven would find their glory fading. Night would fall, and hell would visit the world of men.

It was because of the Nightfall Symphony that the ancient legion of gods had pooled their own power to create the godmammoths, and thus crush the infernal deities. It was only in that way that the Nightfall Symphony could be rendered powerless.

However, as the godmammoths suppressed hell, they were stained by the aura of the infernal deities, and thus, the Infernal Deity Spear of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, when it reached a high level, could perform the Nightfall Symphony.

And right now, Yang Qi’s sword technique also contained that deadly symphony.

As his sword stabbed forth, the Son of Heaven’s Godfist was suddenly tainted by the darkness of nightfall, and began to crack apart.

One projection after another was cleaved by the sword, and collapsed into mist.

‘The mighty Son of Heaven leads an empire, and his rage can subdue millions of commoners. And yet, even he will eventually be forgotten in the sands of time. Nothing can completely escape death in the end. To humans, it is nothing but fair. Even the legion of gods who created countless worlds, as well as the sun, moon, and space-time itself, will eventually reach a time when night falls on them….’

It was thoughts such as these that ran through Yang Qi’s mind as his sword energy vanquished the Son of Heaven’s Godfist.

Bam. Bang. BANG!

Projections exploded left and right, until there was only one version of Yun Hailan left. The real one.

She looked a bit pale in the face; never could she have guessed that Yang Qi’s single sword form would be so spectacular. In the face of his sword, even her imperial-class energy art seemed completely useless.

Now that he had forced her out into the open, he didn’t hesitate for the slightest moment, or have any thoughts of mercy. From the perspective of the onlookers, it was as if night were falling on the arena, with the beautiful setting sun giving way to ultimate darkness.

“DIE!”

Yang Qi’s sword energy swirled around and around, forming a black vortex that looked like it came from the depths of hell.

Yun Hailan instantly lost control of her true energy, which was now being slowly dragged into the vortex. Now, it was obvious how much Yang Qi’s hard work and training made him completely different from her.

He had never received assistance from anyone. His journey of cultivation had involved hunting and killing monsters, refining demon cores, and defeating enemies on his own, one after another.

Yun Hailan was very different. Her cultivation had progressed without any hitches. She was blessed by Patriarchs Wind and Cloud, as well as the Crown Prince. She had been given plenty of life force springwater, as well as medicinal pills, all without having to work to get them. Unlike Yang Qi, she had not developed the tenacious instinct to stay alive even in drastic circumstances.

When facing an opponent like him, she would end up dead if she made the slightest wrong move.

Besides, Yang Qi’s sword move, backed by the Nightfall Symphony and his godly-class energy art, was so powerful that even the Crown Prince’s technique was like a drop in the ocean compared to it.

Swish!

The sword closed in on Yun Hailan’s throat, and she could do nothing but stare at it getting closer and closer.

From the look of things, she was just about to be stabbed through. She fell back, hoping to elude the sword, but sadly for her, it was like an infernal deity that she simply couldn’t shake.

It was like the old proverb: When a yama king wants someone dead by the third watch, who would dare let them live until the fifth?

And of course, yama kings were infernal deities. They were just two different words for the same thing.

“Go to hell, Yun Hailan. Literally!” Yang Qi was unleashing such a massive amount of sword energy that it seemed no one could possibly stop it. It was enough energy to destroy a nation, or bring down heaven.

He was going all out!

The true meaning of the sword, its arrogance, its cleanliness, its haughtiness, its respect… were all integrated into a single attack.

Who could escape from something like that? Definitely not Yun Hailan.

In fact, a drop of blood had already appeared on her throat. Then, it turned into a line, which wrapped around her neck, after which her head flew off of her body. And yet, she was still smiling, almost as if she didn’t believe she had just been decapitated.

“Very fast swordwork, Yang Qi,” she said. “That technique of yours is incredible.”

BOOM!

Suddenly, her head exploded, and the rest of her body disappeared without a trace. Unexpectedly, it had been another projection!

It was not her true form!

In her place appeared a blue pearl, which hovered there in the air. As for the identity medallion she had been wearing, it was shattered.

‘What? She wasn’t actually here? She sent an incarnation to compete? An out-of-body incarnation? A second divinity! She used that pearl to create a second nascent divinity?’ Obviously, the pearl floating in the air was that most precious of treasures, the Pearl of the Thousand Illusions World.

Thanks to Yun Hailan’s scheming, Yang Qi had become all worked up over nothing. He had believed all along that he would kill her in the competition, only to find out that she sent an incarnation in her stead.

“Clever,” he growled. “Very clever.” Although he smashed her identity medallion, and thus took first place, it didn't bring him any joy.

His true desire had not been fulfilled in any way.

‘Yun Hailan! You might have escaped death at my hands, but your Pearl of the Thousand Illusions World is right here for the taking!’ He took a step forward and reached out to grab the pearl. No matter what happened, there was no way he would return it to her. In fact, he would melt it with his Hellfire Crucible at the earliest possible moment.

Using his true energy to draw on the Invincible King’s Fist, he used the hand of a king to reach out toward the treasure.

But then, all of a sudden, a voice spoke from within the pearl, cold and full of dignity, like that of an invincible, unmatchable emperor, a sovereign who ruled both heaven and hell.

“What gall!”

RUMBLE. RUMBLE! RUUUUMBLE!

In response, numerous exclamations rang out.

“The Crown Prince!”

“That’s the Crown Prince talking!”

“The Crown Prince is here.”

It was a voice that numerous students from all four of the great institutes instantly recognized. All of the experts who were members of the Crown Prince Society instantly rose to their feet and offered respectful salutes.

Without question, it was the voice of the Crown Prince.

He was a mysterious figure who few people ever managed to catch a glimpse of, and yet, he was now making an appearance.

“What? The Crown Prince is here?” Holy Daughter Manyflowers shot to her feet. She had long since forgotten the wager with Patriarchs Wind and Cloud. Of course, she had definitely won the bet; although Yang Qi didn’t end up killing Yun Hailan, he had clearly destroyed her identity medallion and won the competition.

“The Crown Prince? That’s the Crown Prince’s voice?” All of the Legendary grand elders were now completely focused on the fighting arena. Generally speaking, no one should have been allowed to enter the scene. After all, Yang Qi’s victory meant that the competition was over. He had won.

But now, the Crown Prince had arrived, completely changing the situation. Even the grand elder presiding over the formalities was completely taken aback, and wasn't sure whether he should interfere or not. After all, the Crown Prince was a mighty and respected individual.

WHIZZZ!

The hand Yang Qi had sent out to grab the Pearl of the Thousand Illusions World was destroyed.

The backlash attack from the pearl then forced him to stagger backward, drawing on all of his defensive sword techniques to prevent himself from getting killed.

‘Such power! Is the Crown Prince really going to show his face?’ Yang Qi sent the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth flowing into all of his acupoints to defend against the encroaching power. Although it ended up being neutralized, he couldn’t help but think, ‘I can’t believe that backlash was enough to have completely destroyed me.’

As he stared at the pearl, it suddenly erupted with pure vital energy, from within which a figure emerged.

He looked like the emperor of heaven, a god in human form.

He was a son of the highest heaven, filled with heavenly might.

The Crown Prince had arrived.

Chapter 173: A Moment of Great Danger

The Crown Prince had come, emerging from a chaotic aspect of space-time, using such incredible power that he seemed like a heavenly god stepping out of primeval times.

The hearts of many of the spectators began to pound, some with excitement, some with fervor, and some with anxiety. After all, this was a person of legendary fame, the Crown Prince.

He was the founder of the Crown Prince Society, and had power and connections everywhere in the world. Many people would feel suffocated just at the mention of his name. Supposedly, he was already at the peak of the Legendary level, and was just on the verge of becoming a Great Sage. He was the type of individual that ordinary persons couldn’t compare to, and in fact, the current chancellor of the Demi-Immortal Institute, and even many of the prime elders, all knew that he would succeed as the next chancellor.

Soon, he would control the entire institute.

Yang Qi felt so much pressure weighing down on him that he had to suppress the urge to drop flat onto the ground. If it weren’t for the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, and his connection to the golden imp, he would already be coughing up blood.

This was true power, and he was so shaken by it that he had no choice but to back up, until he was at the very edge of the fighting arena. Only there could he pull himself together and stand his ground.

The Crown Prince looked like a young man of about twenty years of age. However, there was something extraordinary about him. He had angular features, and stood as tall and straight as a god from heaven, his hands clasped behind his back. His eyes were captivating, and overall, he looked like a spear ready to stab the heavens through and through.

He was the type of individual who could prop up the sky with his hands, and had an aura that would urge anyone affected by it to drop to the ground in worship.

If it weren’t for Yang Qi’s unusual willpower, he would definitely be doing that very thing.

‘So strong. Too strong! Like a king of gods from primeval times! I have to reach the Legendary level, and succeed with both the Portal to Hell and the God Legion Paradise. Only then might I be able to fight him. Right now, I definitely can’t.’ Yang Qi already felt his mind weakening, and his body bending on the verge of dropping down into prostration.

The Pearl of the Thousand Illusions World looked like little more than a toy as the Crown Prince grabbed it. Then he spoke again in that sonorous voice. “What incredible gall you have. I can’t believe you actually dared to touch the Pearl of the Thousand Illusions World. What makes you think you deserve to do that? Answer me!”

Under the battering of the voice, Yang Qi thought, ‘Not even the legion of gods could suppress me. I have the power to suppress hell and control the netherworld. I command the forces of death….’

The Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth surged out from his sea of energy, accompanied by cracking sounds from his bones because of the immense weight crushing down upon him.

However, he still managed to force himself to stand tall and stare back at the Crown Prince.

“I defeated every opponent I faced in this competition. I'm the victor, and I have the right to plunder my defeated foes. I beat Yun Hailan, so why shouldn’t I be able to take her pearl?”

As his voice echoed out across the arena, many onlookers reacted with visible shock. ‘I can’t believe he’s actually talking back to the Crown Prince. Incredible! This guy is really gutsy!’

Even the Legendary grand elders were completely shocked by what they were seeing. After all, the Crown Prince was a peak Legendary. Even some Legendaries would be frightened in his presence, and wouldn't dare to speak out of turn. And yet Yang Qi didn’t hesitate to do just that. Clearly, he was either completely reckless, or didn't fear death at all.

As for Holy Daughter Manyflowers, she was already preparing to step out and defend Yang Qi if the Crown Prince attacked him.

Yang Qi had won the competition, and was to be acknowledged by the institute as a true genius. However, if the Crown Prince attacked him, nobody would come to his defense, unless it happened to be the chancellor himself.

And nobody knew where the chancellor stood on the subject.

“Oh?” the Crown Prince said, visibly surprised. How could he have guessed that Yang Qi would talk back to him? Causing more power to fill the area, he said, “Not bad. You’re actually able to stand up to my might for a time. Interesting. What sort of miracle have you come across? That sword technique you used against Yun Hailan just now must be some secret legacy from the distant past, right? Well, I founded the Crown Prince Society, and I have followers everywhere under heaven. What makes you think you qualify to squabble about Demi-Immortal Institute rules with me? I make the rules!”

There was no way Yang Qi was going to let himself be intimidated by the Crown Prince. “The Demi-Immortal Institute has prime elders, prime paragon elders, and the chancellor himself. Considering you’re not the chancellor, how could you possibly say that you make the rules? You call yourself Crown Prince, but the truth is that the Sage Ancestor Dynasty still rules over the Rich-Lush Continent. The emperor still lives, and his son is the real crown prince! With no true status, why do you call yourself Crown Prince?!”

The Crown Prince was Yun Hailan’s biggest backer, so if he let himself be crushed by him, it was the same as being crushed by Yun Hailan.

Up in the observation deck, Prince Wei rose to his feet. ‘Well said! In front of all these people, he actually dares to give voice to the true sentiments of the Sage Ancestor Dynasty. He must be protected. If he isn’t, then who would dare to declare loyalty to the dynasty in the future?’

“No true status?” The Crown Prince’s gaze seemed so sharp that it could pierce all barriers, and thus see deep into Yang Qi, despite whatever true energy defenses he had.

In fact, Yang Qi could tell that if it weren’t for the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth protecting him, he would have burst into flames already.

“If you feel like dying, so be it,” the Crown Prince said. “But why drag your family into it? Why hurt your brothers, sisters, family and friends? I'm feeling generous today, and considering that you did win the competition, I’ll give you one chance to live: cripple your own energy arts. If you do, I’ll let all your friends and family off the hook. But if you refuse, they will all die. And it won’t be peacefully, understand? Don’t push me.”

The Crown Prince was being completely overbearing. In fact, he was acting like an emperor who had the authority over the lives and deaths of everyone around him, and who could exterminate entire clans at a whim.

He expected Yang Qi to cripple his own martial arts just like that?

For someone of Yang Qi’s level to have their martial arts crippled was a fate worse than death, and for the Crown Prince to try to force the champion of the competition to do it right now made just about everyone in attendance feel a twinge of pity. However, they knew that it was all because Yang Qi had ruined the Crown Prince’s plans, which was a big blow to his reputation.

It was no surprise that, considering he had rushed over so quickly, he would immediately begin to throw his weight around.

The grand elders could theoretically have stepped forward to interfere, but none of them wanted to offend the Crown Prince either, not even those from the other three institutes.

“Drag my friends and family into it?” Suddenly, he looked out into the crowd, raised his voice, and said, “Are there any sworn brothers and sisters of mine out there who would be willing to stand with me against this supercilious Crown Prince? Is there anyone out there willing to face life and death with me?”

His voice was so loud that it boomed throughout the entire arena, and immediately cause a stir in the crowd.

“What does he think he’s doing?”

“He has friends and sworn siblings? Well, even if he does, there’s no way any of them would dare to defy the Crown Prince.”

The Legendary grand elders were all watching closely to see what would happen.

“Brother, we’ll face life and death with you!” Li He, Liang Dong, He Jili and Hua Yinhu all rose to their feet and flew down to stand next to Yang Qi on the fighting platform!

“Oh, you four,” the Crown Prince said scornfully. Considering his level of power and authority, he wouldn't be fazed even if there were more people facing him. “Now we have a whole gang of useless dogs. You're all sworn brothers?”

Of course, the onlookers were quite taken aback.

“Are they all suicidal? Who do they think they are to stand up to the Crown Prince?”

“Their clans are only middling at best. Aren’t they worried about being wiped out?”

All of a sudden, a volcanic blast of fire erupted from the audience and flew down toward Yang Qi.

“Brother, I’ll face life and death with you!”

This aura was incredibly mighty, being that of a Nonary Lifeseizer!

It was Flame Clearspring, son of the pontifex of the Tabernacle of Flame. Back when he became Yang Qi’s sworn brother on the island of peach blossoms, he had been an Octonary Lifeseizer. But now, three months later, he had advanced by leaps and bounds, all for the purpose of attending this competition.

“That’s the son of the pontifex of the Tabernacle of Flame! When did he become a sworn brother of Yang Qi?” Many faces flickered with astonishment. After all, Flame Clearspring might not be much on his own, but he was backed by the Tabernacle of Flame, which was no small organization, and could only be outranked by the likes of the four institutes.

“Another suicidal fool?” the Crown Prince said coolly. “Any more out there?”

“Me!” Lu Wangxian stood up from his place amongst the forces of the House of Spring and Autumn, then flew down to stand by Yang Qi.

“And me!” Hua Fengfeng also flew down.

“I’m here for you, Brother!” Jun Tianchou didn't hesitate to fly forth from the forces of the Sea God Institute.

Next, everyone who had become a sworn sibling of Yang Qi on the island of peach blossoms flew out to stand with him. Zhao Wuhun from the House of Martial Saints. The three brothers from the Soaring Clan of the House of Soaring Clouds. Soaring Cloudheaven, Soaring Cloudwyrm, and Soaring Cloudgrit.

Meng Qingshan. Yuan Tiankong. Sun Qian. Li Zhengdao. Su Ximing. Ji Xiaoman. Ji Xiaorong.

“Brother,” Jun Tianchou said, “it was with supreme honor and righteousness that you came to our rescue on Fiend-Devil Island. How could we just stand by and watch the Crown Prince trying to intimidate you? We already said that if we didn’t live and die together, we would be exterminated by heaven and executed by the earth!”

“That's right!” Flame Clearspring added. “Perhaps we weren’t born on the same day, but all of us will die on the same day! Even if you were facing a horde of primeval devils, we wouldn’t hesitate to fight with you!”

Laughing heartily, Su Ximing said, “I might be just a rogue cultivator, but when I swear brotherhood, it’s for life!”

“Little Bro Qi,” Hua Fengfeng said, “it’s not common for a woman to become sworn siblings with a man, but I’ll never forget my oath.”

“Same with us!” Ji Xiaoman and Ji Xiaorong said in unison.

Next up were the three brothers from the Soaring Clan. “Our clan has no Great Sages, but anyone who tries to kill a sworn brother of ours will have to do so over our dead bodies!”

“True siblings one and all!” Yang Qi said. Taking a step forward, he unleashed an aura as deep as the sea to resist the Crown Prince.

“We live together and we die together!” Flame Clearspring shouted. “Anyone who bullies a brother of ours will have to fight us to the bitter end!”

“Live together, die together! Fight until rivers of blood flow! He who insults our brother will die!”

The shouts of Yang Qi’s sworn siblings were so loud that the arena trembled!

Chapter 174: Supreme Honor and Righteousness

“True siblings, one and all!” Yang Qi’s heart swelled with gratitude to see all of his sworn siblings coming to stand with him and face death. “With brothers and sisters like this, I, Yang Qi, have gained the blessing of three lifetimes, and could die nine times without regret.”

Everyone present in the arena could hear his words as clear as day.

This was heroism that towered to the sky, and caused the blood to pump with passion.

In fact, the members of the Crown Prince Society in the arena had all fallen silent. They were regarded as the most powerful society in all the lands, with more experts than the sky had clouds, and therefore, Yang Qi and his sworn siblings were like nothing compared to them. However, not a single member could so much as chuckle at what they were seeing. All of them could sense the hot-blooded heroism on display, a strength that could conquer every obstacle. Furthermore, the term ‘sworn sibling’ contained profound meaning.

The Crown Prince Society had a huge membership, strict rules, and a complex seniority system. However, there was always intense competition between members, and definitely no sense of brotherhood which would prompt a given member to stand with another member the way that Yang Qi’s sworn siblings were standing with him. If a member was facing death like this, others would look down on him as being weak. They were fine teaming up to defeat enemies, but if anyone too powerful came along, they would scatter.

Right here and now, nineteen Lifeseizers were taking a stand against the Crown Prince. In fact, the members of the Crown Prince Society almost couldn’t believe it. It struck fear into their hearts, not because they suddenly felt themselves weak, but rather, they realized they lacked cohesion. There was no passionate sense of brotherhood among any of them.

After all, the Crown Prince was someone who could dominate even ten Legendaries fighting together. To many people, he was literally invincible, and also the most important person in existence. It was even said that he would eventually unite the Rich-Lush Continent and become the Son of Heaven.

‘How come Yang Qi has so many sworn siblings?’ That was what virtually all of the Legendary grand elders were thinking.

“That’s… that’s Flame Clearspring!” one of the elders said. “The son of the pontifex of the Tabernacle of Flame! He’s willing to live and die with Yang Qi? He’s standing with him against the Crown Prince?”

“And look at that! Isn’t that the ninth son of the houselord of the House of Spring and Autumn?”

“Those three are from the Soaring Clan. In the distant past, they had a Great Sage. How could the pride of the Soaring Clan be sworn brothers with Yang Qi?”

“That’s nothing. Look. She’s Hua Fengfeng. Her father is Hua Tianxiong from the Sun Moon Institute. I’ve heard that he's the Junior Brother of the chancellor there. He's already reached the ninth Legendary transformation, making him a Never-Dying Legendary. There’s a definite possibility that he’ll end up becoming a Great Sage.”

“Ah, no wonder Hua Piaomiao forfeited her match against Yang Qi earlier.”

“Did you notice that Meng Qingshan and Zhao Wuhun are there? They’re both from a big organization. The House of Martial Saints is no less impressive than the House of Spring and Autumn or the Tabernacle of Flame!”

“And then there’s Ji Xiaoman and Ji Xiaorong. Their father and mother are Legendary grand elders from the Sun Moon Institute!”

“Look, Jun Tianchou and Li Zhengdao from the Sea God Institute are there too. This is incredible.”

Although the people surrounding Yang Qi were only Lifeseizers, they all had impressive backgrounds. Probably the most impressive was Hua Fengfeng’s father, who was in the ninth Legendary transformation, and seemed likely to become a Great Sage. Although he wasn’t as famous as the Crown Prince, he was still an enigmatic and widely respected figure.

Together, Yang Qi’s sworn siblings were a very impressive collection of people, and many people in the audience were wondering how a country bumpkin from Yanhaven could possibly gain such support.

All of a sudden, the Crown Prince looked at Yang Qi and his sworn siblings with a gaze that caused the fighting arena to twist and distort.

“You think your little gang has what it takes to stand up to me?” he said. “Are you all suicidal?”

Yang Qi could sense powerful vibrations that seemed to indicate he and his friends were about to be extracted to another location.

‘Nightfall Symphony!’ Sword energy erupted, causing a defensive canopy of nightfall to surround him and his sworn siblings.

However, the powerful gaze quickly ate through the sword technique and then pierced into Yang Qi. As for his sworn siblings, they simply couldn’t react in time. This gaze of the Crown Prince was so powerful that, if he wanted to, he could use it alone to wipe them out of existence.

“You think that getting the help of your so-called sworn siblings qualifies you to defy me? I think not.”

By means of his gaze alone, the Crown Prince then lifted Yang Qi up into the air. “Since you refuse to cripple yourself, I’ll step in and do it for you. And your friends won’t be able to do a thing about it.”

Crack! Snap!

Intense fluctuations rolled out that caused his meridians to tremble violently, his sea of energy to dry up, and the true energy vestiges in his acupoints to rattle on the verge of exploding.

The Crown Prince seemed just as strong as Ghost Emperor Yama, to the point where Yang Qi simply couldn’t stand up to him.

‘Time to go for broke!’ With that, Yang Qi prepared to call upon the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. His plan? To loosen the Devil-God Seal, and use his Infernal Deity Plate Armor, Infernal Deity Spear and Hellfire Crucible. In this life-or-death moment, there was no way that he could hold back.

But then, in that very moment before he took action, the God Legion Seal in his forehead stirred.

Boundless power erupted from his forehead, moving with indescribable speed as it destroyed the power of the Crown Prince’s gaze and then shot into Yang Qi’s sea of energy.

Yang Qi felt immense power building up in him, and at the same time, heard a faint voice speaking to him. “Who can possibly harm he who has been blessed by the legion of gods, and inscribed with the God Legion Seal…?”

Rumble! BOOOOOOOM!

The area around Yang Qi exploded, sending out a shockwave of energy. Moments ago, the Crown Prince’s gaze had been surrounding Yang Qi almost like a sphere, but then, that sphere exploded, and Yang Qi dropped to the ground.

“Brother, are you alright?” his sworn siblings asked as they clustered around him.

“Crown Prince,” Flame Clearspring said, “if you want to hurt our brother, you’ll have to walk over our corpses to do so!”

“I'm fine,” Yang Qi said, his true energy surging. The golden imp in his forehead had neutralized the Crown Prince’s gaze, and then bolstered Yang Qi’s true energy. His Hellfire Crucible was now bubbling with so much power than he knew that he could break into Septenary Lifeseizing at any moment.

“What’s this?” the Crown Prince murmured, taking a step forward. Never could he have guessed that his gaze would be neutralized in such a miraculous fashion. He had assumed that he would simply cripple this Yang Qi and be done with the matter, only to find that his intended victim actually had access to some mysterious power.

“It’s time to go all out, isn’t it?” Zhao Wuhun said, his gaze sharpening. “Brothers and sisters, we might not be able to win this fight, but there’s no way we can just stand here and be humiliated. Anyone who insults our brother shall die. Either him, or us!”

“Attack!”

“Kill whoever insults our brother!”

All of Yang Qi’s sworn siblings drew their weapons and called upon their most powerful techniques. An enormous flaming phoenix formed from true energy appeared behind Hua Fengfeng. It was the color of blood, and it was singing a song of incredible beauty and power.

“Opus of the Phoenix! She's burning her life force to gain power!” someone blurted.

The Crown Prince took another step forward. “You think that because you have impressive backgrounds I won’t cut you people down? No one in heaven or earth would dare to defy the Crown Prince!”

All of a sudden, a vertical eye opened up on his forehead.

“The Rage Eye!” someone said.

“Not good!” another echoed.

In accompaniment with the two voices, two powerful auras flared to life. Meanwhile, a beam of dazzling light shot out of the Crown Prince’s third eye, furious, burning light that shot forth toward Yang Qi and his sworn siblings.

Shockingly, the Crown Prince was ignoring the powerful backers of this group, and was actually attempting to burn them all alive.

Considering how intensely hot the light was, Yang Qi knew that it was a very bad situation, and immediately stepped forward to try to block it from harming his friends.

However, that was when two blurs arrived, figures who thrust their hands out to meet the incoming attack.

“Thousand Autumns!”

“Sagefire!”

Both figures were tall and muscular, and pulsed with incredible auras. One looked like a middle-aged Confucian scholar, and the other was wreathed in flame-like robes. As for the scholar, his true energy transformed into a tome that pulsed with an aura of civilization and culture, which blocked part of the incoming flame attack.

The man in the robe of flames unleashed a beam of sagefire, to literally fight fire with fire.

Their combined true energy smashed into the Rage Eye attack, causing deafening rumbling sounds to echo out, and shaking the arena so violently that many students feared it would collapse beneath their feet.

“These are children, Crown Prince,” the Confucian scholar said. “Why are you using your Rage Eye? Are you really trying to kill them all?”

“That's right, Crown Prince,” the man in the flame robes said. “Squabbling with them is unbefitting of your status.”

“Houselord Spring-Autumn. Pontifex Flame.” The Crown Prince's Rage Eye closed, vanishing as though it had never existed to begin with. “You interfered because your sons are present, correct? But this Yang Qi broke rules that I instituted. How can I maintain any face without killing him? Don’t tell me that the House of Spring and Autumn and the Tabernacle of Flame are really going to defy me?”

“What's that supposed to mean?” House Lord Spring-Autumn said. “Are you really dead set on causing problems for my son? I watched the entire competition, and didn’t see Yang Qi break a single rule. He even took first place. You're a holy neophyte of the Demi-Immortal Institute. If you picked the first place winner ahead of time, and then fixed the competition, doesn’t that mean you’ve blasphemed against the four great institutes?!”

Chapter 175: Matchlessly Rude and Unreasonable

Houselord Spring-Autumn simply could not stand being pushed around this much, and so offered a biting retort.

After all, in the end, it was still true that the Crown Prince was a holy neophyte, whereas Houselord Spring-Autumn ran a major organization. For him to be rebuked by the Crown Prince was simply too excessive.

Even worse, the Crown Prince was acting beyond arrogant. He had obviously manipulated the martial arts competition to ensure that Yun Hailan took first place. Thankfully, a dark horse came out of nowhere, that being Yang Qi.

Unfortunately, the Crown Prince was now trying to cripple that dark horse. And to top it all off, he was actually threatening to kill Houselord Spring-Autumn’s son. As the leader of a major organization, if he let himself get pushed around like that, it would cause the reputation of the House of Spring and Autumn to plummet.

Besides, the Crown Prince had used his deadly Rage Eye, a fabled energy art that could converge the rage of heaven and earth, and then transform it into a burning attack that even a hundred Lifeseizers couldn’t defend against.

“That’s right, Crown Prince,” said Pontifex Flame. “Yang Qi didn’t break any rules, and he even took first place. Why exactly have you inserted yourself into the situation? Could it be you’re trying to cover up the truth? Are you the real power behind the four institutes?”

The Crown Prince looked back at Pontifex Flame and Houselord Spring-Autumn and said, “What. What do you think you’re going to do? What makes you think I need to explain myself to a couple of heretical sects like you? You really think you can protect your children from me? How about I just expunge your two organizations from the Rich-Lush Continent outright?!”

The Crown Prince was being matchlessly rude and unreasonable. These were the leaders of two major organizations, so either he was crazy, or absolutely certain that he was invincible to them.

“What? Heretical sects?” Both Houselord Spring-Autumn and Pontifex Flame were clearly enraged by the Crown Prince’s words. One of the most taboo things to do in their presence was to call their respective organizations heretical.

After all, in the Rich-Lush Continent, only the most orthodox and civilized groups could hope to be called an institute. The institutes were orthodox. Any other group, whether it was called a sect, church, cult, or anything else… was considered unorthodox. And heretical could be considered a synonym of unorthodox. Such organizations were considered unqualified to acquire the approval of heaven and earth.

The House of Spring and Autumn had long yearned to be called an institute, but no matter how powerful an organization was, that was impossible unless they produced a Great Sage.

Only if a cultivator could break out of the Legendary level and become a Great Sage, prove that he or she did not cultivate devil techniques or engage in mass slaughter, could they then go on to found an organization that could be called an institute.

Although the House of Spring and Autumn had many Legendaries, they had never produced a Great Sage, despite the fact that they had existed for thousands of years. It was a major sore point for them.

Now, the Crown Prince was virtually slapping them in the face by openly calling them a heretical sect. And if they simply took that insult without fighting back, how could they possibly qualify to be sect leaders?

“You’re saying the House of Spring and Autumn is a heretical sect?” Houselord Spring-Autumn said angrily. “Well, then I'd like to see how you, a representative of an orthodox sect, will perform against someone like me.”

The Crown Prince laughed loudly, but his eyes flashed with such mercilessness that he seemed capable of reducing every living being in the area to ashes. “Very well, come on. Both of you. You two aren’t a match for me on your own, and even together you’re little more than dogs. I’ll kill you and then enslave your heretical House of Spring and Autumn and Tabernacle of Flame.”

When the people from the numerous other organizations heard those words, many faces lit up with shock. Some people rose to their feet as if to take action, while others just looked on, eyes burning with hatred, and yet too scared to do anything.

All of a sudden, some random member of the Crown Prince Society rose to his feet and shouted, “The Crown Prince is without rival!”

As his voice rang out, it stirred other members of the Crown Prince Society to similarly stand and cry out.

At this point, Holy Daughter Manyflowers rose to her feet. “Fellow grand elders, if we let this go on, our Demi-Immortal Institute is going to end up a laughingstock. We’re the hosts here, after all, and Houselord Spring-Autumn and Pontifex Flame are both guests. It’s downright outrageous to humiliate them like this.”

“Holy Daughter Manyflowers,” Patriarch Wind said, “these heretical sects are intentionally stirring up trouble. Just let the Crown Prince put them in their place. These sects, cults, churches and whatnot all need to be taught a lesson. After all, we don't want a fifth institute springing up.”

“Everyone here knows who is really stirring up trouble,” she shot back. “There’s no need for prevarication from you.”

“What’s so wrong with the Crown Prince punishing a rule-breaker?” Patriarch Cloud said. “And what are you getting so worked up for? If you’re so set on getting in the Crown Prince’s way, why don’t you go down there yourself? Maybe he’ll actually end up teaching you a lesson.” Both Patriarchs Wind and Cloud were being so sarcastic that it couldn’t have been more obvious that they were staunch members of the Crown Prince Society.

Master Jade-Yang, one of the Three Pure Yang Elders, said, “Patriarchs Wind and Cloud are right. The chancellor himself has been grooming the Crown Prince as his successor. Let him show off his power a bit. It will only serve to reinforce the authority of the Demi-Immortal Institute.”

One of the Legendary Seven Preheaven Masters added, “That’s right. These other organizations are so arrogant they consider everyone else beneath them. How dare they interfere with internal matters of our institute. Let the Crown Prince cut them down a notch or two. In fact, maybe they should just be wiped out of existence. They’re nothing more than heretical sects anyway.”

Obviously, those two were on the Crown Prince’s side too.

At this point, Prince Wei suddenly spoke, his voice as cold as ice. “Ladies and gentlemen, even your four institutes have to accept the authority of the Sage Ancestor Dynasty in the Rich-Lush Continent. As such, we will govern over this matter. A genius champion was already declared, only to have the Crown Prince suddenly show up and try to cripple him. Then, numerous elders of the Demi-Immortal Institute mocked and ridiculed the champion. What a disappointment to see behavior like this. I'm sure the many experts and elders present from all over the lands are gasping in shock at how the Demi-Immortal Institute teaches its students.”

Before anyone could react, he flew down to the arena floor, just in time to prevent Houselord Spring-Autumn and Pontifex Flame from attacking the Crown Prince.

“Crown Prince, a champion has already been declared. Are you really willing to violate the rules laid out by the four institutes, in the direct presence of all these witnesses? You’re going to just kill the champion and declare a new winner?” Considering that the Sage Ancestor Dynasty hated the Crown Prince to the bones, it was little surprise that Prince Wei was doing this. If he had the chance, he would love to actually fight him.

“Prince Wei?” The Crown Prince looked at him. “This is a matter pertaining to the four institutes, and not a single member from any of them has seen fit to interfere. And yet you, an outsider, dare to do just that? What's the meaning of this?”

“The Sage Ancestor Dynasty has the authority to oversee the four institutes. After all, each institute was appointed directly by the dynasty. Besides, naming yourself Crown Prince is truly disgraceful.”

“Disgraceful?” The Crown Prince laughed loudly. “The Sage Ancestor Dynasty is going to be exterminated eventually anyway. No dynasty lasts forever. Just wait until I'm a Great Sage. Then I’ll challenge the emperor himself, and wipe out your sham of a dynasty.”

The arrogant, overbearing nature of his words was wild to the extreme.

“What gall!” Prince Wei blurted angrily.

“Cut the crap!” the Crown Prince replied. Looking around, he said, “Alright, I want to know exactly how many people are opposed to me. Step forward. All of you!”  His voice was like a storm wind battering at the Central Battle Arena. “Who dares to defy me!? Reveal yourself. We’re going to settle this right here, right now.”

In the observation deck, the Legendary grand elders from the True Dragon, Sun Moon, and Sea God Institutes frowned. None of them were happy at all that the Crown Prince had essentially infiltrated their institutes to recruit students for the Crown Prince Society. Although they had tolerated that behavior, now they found that he had rigged the martial arts competition, and then went so far as to demand that everyone who opposed him step forward to be ‘settled’.

One of the Legendary grand elders from the Sun Moon Institute shot to his feet. “This is outrageous! This Crown Prince from the Demi-Immortal Institute isn't showing any consideration to any of the other three institutes. I'm Hua Fengfeng’s uncle, and if you try to hurt her, then the Sun Moon Institute will declare war on the Demi-Immortal Institute!”

“Oh? Declare war?” Patriarch Cloud said mockingly. “Are you serious, Hua Chicheng? You think the Sun Moon Institute is the top dog or something? What a joke. Besides, even if you did declare war, the Crown Prince is going to be a Great Sage soon. Do you think his behavior today is just a random accident? He’s just establishing his authority. After all, he knows that he’s just on the verge of breaking out of the ninth Legendary transformation.”

The other Legendary grand elders all reacted with open shock.

“He’s going to break out of the Never-Dying Transformation and become a Great Sage? Incredible! Once he does that, he’ll basically be the most powerful person in the Rich-Lush Continent!”

“I wonder what the chancellors of the four institutes think about him being so strong. Although none of the chancellors attended the competition, they were surely watching the fighting. How come none of them have interfered so far?”

“There must be a reason why the Crown Prince is acting so arrogantly. He must be absolutely certain that he’s going to reach the Great Sage level. Incredible. Truly incredible. I have to say, I've started to look at the Crown Prince in a different light already. Great Sages are supposed to be rude and unreasonable, right? After all, they are the type of people who can found institutes.”

Chapter 176: Utter Chaos

It was a scene of utter chaos.

Houselord Spring-Autumn, Pontifex Flame, Prince Wei and Hua Chicheng from the Sun Moon Institute, had all come to the aid of Yang Qi and his sworn siblings, and were standing up to the Crown Prince.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi’s true energy had reacted to the Crown Prince’s attacking gaze in a way that had pushed him to the point of reaching Septenary Lifeseizing.

Multiple particles within him had woken up.

Instead of one hundred and eight, he now had one hundred and twenty-eight, in other words, the power of that many ancient megamammoths.

However, he still had to pass Septenary Lifeseizing tribulation, melt the rest of the residual power in his Hellfire Crucible, and then stabilize it with his Devil-God Seal.

Therefore, he simply watched as the current scene played out.

After all, top experts had interceded, and therefore, Yang Qi didn’t need to take the lead any longer. That said, he was extremely disappointed with the Demi-Immortal Institute. The Crown Prince was acting extremely rude and domineering, and yet, not a single Legendary grand elder was doing anything about it.

None of them were making any attempt to keep matters fair and just.

From that it could be seen exactly what position the Crown Prince occupied in the institute. He was at the top of the food chain, with everyone else beneath him. Apparently, the only person who outranked him was the chancellor, meaning that no one else would dare to defy his will.

Obviously, it didn’t matter that Yang Qi had come out victorious in the competition. Going forward, it would be very difficult for him to maintain a good standing in the Demi-Immortal Institute.

He knew that he was in a very precarious situation.

The Crown Prince was the type of person who would seek revenge over the smallest grievance, and was also the type who would cut the weeds and eliminate the roots, and target the friends and family of any enemy. However, it wouldn’t be easy for him to simply kill Yang Qi’s entire alliance of sworn siblings.

At the moment, he seemed so dead-set on killing Yang Qi that it wouldn't matter if even more people tried to stop him, he would still press forward.

Despite the fact that he had four major experts standing protectively in front of him, Yang Qi still felt fear. After all, the Crown Prince seemed like a fierce tiger looking at four prancing bunnies.

“So, this is how it's going to be,” the Crown Prince said. “I’ll just have to put an end to the entire lot of you. Let’s see if there’s anyone out there who will help you. The brat youngsters don't qualify to fight with me, but you old codgers are fairly strong. You know, I just finished making a magical treasure, and your souls and blood would make a great offering to it.”

Suddenly, a dual-crescent-bladed halberd appeared in his hand, red and gold, with decorations on the curved blades that resembled fierce ghosts and countless devil-gods. From the look of it, this was a weapon that came from the depths of the netherworld.

The four powerful experts facing the Crown Prince immediately erupted into a rage.

“A Purgatory Godhalberd!?”

“You actually forged that weapon?!”

“Of all the demon and devil weapons of the ancient past, I can’t believe you dared to forge that!”

“Aren’t you worried about being punished by the orthodox sects? Who could have guessed that you would forge a weapon of the ancient dao of hell?”

The Crown Prince hefted the halberd, making him look like a fierce devil-god. “Punished by the orthodox sects? I decide what’s orthodox and what’s not. I'm favored by the heavens. In any case, weapons cannot be considered inherently good or evil. It all comes down to the person wielding them. Right?”

Suddenly, he slashed the halberd through the air, causing scintillating blade light to shoot out. The sky flashed, and darkness spread everywhere, accompanied by a sinister, howling wind, and coldness that pierced down to the bones.

Shockingly, he was directly attacking Houselord Spring-Autumn, Pontifex Flame, Hua Chicheng and Prince Wei.

Various weapons appeared as the four experts defended themselves with weapons of their own, causing powerful fluctuations to roll out. Hua Chicheng also waved his hand, wrapping up Yang Qi and his sworn siblings and throwing them out of the arena floor.

This was a battle of the Legendary level, and not the type that Lifeseizers could participate in.

Even as Yang Qi and his fellows were ejected from the fighting floor, the Crown Prince lifted his halberd over his head and then slashed it down, shattering the air as it went.

Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang!

Four weapons exploded, becoming streams of blood-colored light that hit the four experts, sending them staggering backwards, covered with wounds.

Houselord Spring-Autumn had nearly been chopped in half at the waist. Pontifex Flame had a wicked, bleeding wound on his head. Hua Chicheng’s shoulder had been punched clean through. And Prince Wei’s left leg was so viciously cut that the bone was visible.

One move had defeated all four experts! The Crown Prince was as vicious as a tiger!

“Other than a Great Sage, nobody in this world could possibly be a match for me,” he said, flicking the blood off his halberd. “Houselord Spring-Autumn, Pontifex Flame, Prince Wei, Hua Chicheng. Even if more Legendaries than you joined forces, you still wouldn’t be able to fight me. How dare you act so brazenly in my presence! You three, I’ll give you one chance to get on your knees and join the Crown Prince Society. The House of Spring and Autumn and the Tabernacle of Flame will become subsidiary branches of my society, and all of your wealth and property will belong to me. You can do that, or you can die.”

“You!” Houselord Spring-Autumn shouted, putting pressure on the wound at his side to prevent the blood from flowing out. “I can’t believe the Demi-Immortal Institute allows such vicious behavior!”

“Enough!” All of the grand elders from the Sun Moon Institute stood up. “This is out of hand. Does the Demi-Immortal Institute really want to resort to open conflict with the Sun Moon Institute?”

Patriarchs Wind and Cloud both shot to their feet, clearly inspired by the Crown Prince’s show of strength.

“Open conflict?” Patriarch Wind said. “Fine. Let’s see who’s scared of whom.”

“The Crown Prince just defeated all four of them with one move,” Patriarch Cloud added. “And you people think you could do better?”

The Seven Preheaven Masters, the Three Pure Yang Elders, and all of the other grand elders of the Demi-Immortal Institute rose to their feet and looked down at the Crown Prince. In the end, he was just too strong. Even if they threw in a dissenting opinion, there was no way the Crown Prince would listen to them. For all intents and purposes, the chancellor and the prime paragon elders were the only ones who could keep him in check.

At the very least, there were no experts present who could deal with him.

“This is getting out of hand. Quick, send messages to the chancellors!” Many experts began to do just that.

Meanwhile, the Legendary grand elders from the True Dragon Institute and Sea God Institute also stood. “This competition is held by the four institutes, together. It stands to reason that Yang Qi should be the champion. He defeated every opponent, all the way until the Crown Prince came and caused a scene. However, considering how things have turned out, it seems the four chancellors need to weigh in on the matter.”

Some of them, ones who were particularly interested in justice and righteousness, began to call out to the Crown Prince. “Crown Prince, stay your hand. This matter needs to be resolved by the chancellors.”

“Oh?” The Crown Prince looked back up at them. Not giving any face at all, he said, “Why should I stay my hand? The chancellors are all busy working on their cultivation, and don’t have time to waste on trivial matters like this. I hold power over life and death here, so I’ll be making the decisions for them. Anyone who gets in my way will die. ”

His gaze shifted to Yang Qi. “This little brat Yang Qi is a dead man. In a moment, I’ll expel him from this institute and turn him into a roaming ghost that anyone can punish. The champion of this competition is, of course, Yun Hailan. As for the precious treasure that is the prize, the Gate of the Great Void, it belongs to her.”

Instantly, a buzz of shocked coversation rose up

“What? The grand prize is the Gate of the Great Void?”

“I've heard of that treasure! It has an even more impressive origin than the Pearl of the Thousand Illusions World. The chancellors really picked an incredible prize for the winner. Ah! No wonder the Crown Prince went to such great lengths to do all this. A Legendary couldn’t make a treasure like that, only someone in the Great Sage level.”

“Well, Yang Qi might be the champion, but it seems the prize belongs to the Crown Prince. He definitely won’t let it go to any potential rivals, especially Yang Qi.”

“Maybe. I mean, Yang Qi really came out of nowhere to prove himself a genius student. If the chancellor of the Demi-Immortal Institute is looking at the bigger picture, there’s no way he would let someone like that get killed so early in his development, right? If he did, then how could the institute produce any other geniuses in the future? Wouldn’t they be too frightened to show their faces?”

“The Crown Prince is just too strong. He could reach the Great Sage level at any moment. Once he does, the chancellors will have to openly cater to him. You never know, maybe they’ll just sacrifice Yang Qi to make things easier later.”

It was a completely chaotic situation. The Crown Prince wasn't giving face to anyone, and was establishing himself as an ultimate figure of authority. If nobody stopped him now, then it seemed likely his society would hold sway over the entire continent.

‘This is the arrogance that comes with power. The ability to just ignore the rules.’ Yang Qi looked coldly at the Crown Prince, aware that things had reached the point where the man was absolutely set on killing him, and killing anyone who tried to stop him. Not even two sect leaders and a prince were an exception.

All he could do now was regret the fact that he had progressed too slowly up to this point.

In the past, he had often imagined what it would be like to face off against him. He had come up with many plans of what to do, and had visualized many possible outcomes. Most of them had involved using the rules of the institute against the man. After all, he had assumed that those same rules would restrict the Crown Prince, and prevent him from doing anything too extreme.

However, he now realized the huge mistake he had made. The Crown Prince was even willing to kill grand elders from other institutes!

He didn’t care about rules at all, and would even break them in grandiose fashion.

Chapter 177: A Sudden Development

“This Yang Qi is a dead man. Even if he somehow lives through the day, he won't last in the Demi-Immortal Institute long-term.”

“Yeah. In all fairness, he’s a genius. He’s only in Senary Lifeseizing, but he actually defeated a Nonary Lifeseizer and took first place. Sadly for him, a champion was already arranged ahead of time. Now that he's pissed off the Crown Prince, he’s going to be killed beyond the shadow of a doubt.”

“Not even Houselord Spring-Autumn, Pontifex Flame, Prince Wei and Hua Chicheng working together could beat him.”

“Although, Yang Qi does have quite a group of sworn siblings who are ready to fight to the death with him. It’s hard to believe the Crown Prince is actually willing to go against such a big group. If I had sworn brothers like that, I could die without regret.”

“I heard that Yang Qi treats his sworn siblings like true family. Not too long ago, Jun Tianchou called for help when he got stuck in a Preheaven Devil Formation on Fiend-Devil Island. Yang Qi showed up and charged right into the devil-eye to save him and the others there. That was when they all became sworn siblings.”

“Yeah. Now that is what it means to be supremely honorable and righteous. It’s just too bad he had the misfortune of crossing paths with the Crown Prince.”

“I know. But come on, there’s no way the Demi-Immortal Institute is going to let the Crown Prince just kill a genius like that, right?”

As the countless experts present discussed the matter amongst themselves, Yang Qi stared at the Crown Prince, his heart swelling with the desire to become stronger. Although he currently had a Senary Lifeseizing cultivation base, that was too weak. He wouldn’t be able to last for even a single move against the Crown Prince.

‘If I was a Legendary,’ he thought, ‘I could use my Hell Portal, or perhaps the God Legion Paradise. Then I could fight the Crown Prince, or at the very least, not be pushed into a corner like this.’ Right now, he wished more than ever that he could surpass the ordinary limits of strength and power. That way, he could protect himself, his friends and his family. That way, he could live by the maxim: Leave me alone, and I’ll leave you alone. Mess with me, I’ll wipe you and your people out of existence! Then he would be free and unfettered to climb to the highest heights.

Unfortunately, the Crown Prince was strong enough that he could disregard the rules, which was threatening to ruin all of Yang Qi’s plans. He was so strong that, while millions of people were watching, he flagrantly broke the rules and even attempted to kill the champion of the competition. The grand elders who hoped to keep order were now shivering like cicadas in winter, and were waiting for the chancellors to step in.

The mood was now one of chaos and anxiety.

As for Yang Qi and his friends, they could only watch as the scene unfolded.

They had already steeled their hearts to fight back against the Crown Prince, no matter how hopeless the situation seemed.

Pointing his halberd at the grand elders, the Crown Prince said, “Still trying to stop me? Don’t tell me I'm really going to have to wipe you all out?”

These were grand elders from all four of the institutes, people who normally spent their time focusing on cultivation, not on external matters. Today, they had been tasked with maintaining order as the competition identified the top genius in all the institutes.

“Crown Prince,” one of the grand elders said, “you’re really going a bit overboard. This competition is a tradition among our four institutes, and the point of it is to identify the top geniuses. It’s really inappropriate for you to try to kill one of the top competitors, much less fix the outcome. Let’s just call it a day, and turn hostility into friendship.”

“Turn hostility into friendship?” The Crown Prince laughed coldly. “Only a pig would be stupid enough to ignore my commands. What do you think you’re going to do? Back down NOW. You don't qualify to speak to me, and I don’t feel like killing you today.”

Swish!

He stabbed his halberd out, causing a beam of energy to fly out toward the grand elder who had just spoken, shoving him backward. Face draining of blood, the man staggered to a stop and didn’t dare to speak again.

“No more jibber-jabber,” the Crown Prince said coldly. “If anyone else says a single thing, I’ll kill them!”

Everyone else who had been preparing to offer words of advice closed their mouths.

He wasn't giving face to anyone, and nobody present was strong enough to fight him. They could only keep their mouths shut.

“Houselord Spring-Autumn, Pontifex Flame, Prince Wei, Hua Chicheng, I'm going to ask you one more time. Do you acknowledge allegiance to me? Or not. If you don’t, then in a moment or two, the four of you will be corpses.”

Their faces fell, and they prepared to join forces in one last-ditch effort to fight back.

However, that was when a mighty voice drifted down from above.

“Stay your hand, Crown Prince.” A majestic will filled the area, like that of a sage bringing enlightenment to the masses of mortals. It was like a spring breeze from the depths of the universe, the work of an ancient saint, an aura that was on par with what Yang Qi had felt from Ghost Emperor Yama.

It was the chancellor of the Demi-Immortal Institute, a powerful figure who had long since practiced cultivation all the way to the Great Sage level.

“What’s going on, chancellor?” the Crown Prince asked, his eyes flashing. “Why should I stay my hand?”

“We have rules in the institutes,” the voice replied warmly, “and the point of this competition is to identify geniuses. What need is there for you to interfere, considering the level of your cultivation base? It won't be long before you are in the Great Sage level, like a saint from the distant past. As such, you should develop the inner qualities to help bring enlightenment to the masses. That includes being tolerant and free from vulgarity. When you become a Great Sage, you will need to be like the wise and holy saints who have risen up throughout the years in the Demi-Immortal Institute. You will qualify to leave the Rich-Lush Continent and travel to larger and more expansive lands. At that point, you will be the new chancellor, and you will understand that all students of the institute are like children. Their glory will be your glory, and their losses will be your losses. When you are one with the institute, you will understand why it is necessary to be completely tolerant, and at the same time, to avoid the squabbling of societies and factions.”

The onlookers were completely shocked.

“What? Is he…? He is! The chancellor of the Demi-Immortal Institute is formally declaring that the Crown Prince will be the next chancellor when he reaches the Great Sage level.”

“He's actually making the promise in front of all these people?”

“It seems the chancellor is giving the Crown Prince something to calm him down. Considering how powerful he is, not even the chancellor can criticize him. He can only treat him with care and caution.”

There was now no doubt about who the next chancellor of the Demi-Immortal Institute would be: the Crown Prince. And from what the chancellor had said, it seemed to be no doubt whatsoever about whether or not he would become a Great Sage.

Apparently, the Crown Prince actually respected the chancellor to a degree, because his tone of voice softened as he said, “Chancellor, are you saying you want me to free these people who just openly insulted me?”

He didn’t seem very willing to comply.

“There there, Crown Prince,” the chancellor replied. He almost sounded like he was speaking to a child. “Your true opponent is the son of Great Sage Shroud-Heaven. Defeat him, and it will be a great service to the continent as a whole. Stop worrying about minor squabbles in the institute.”

Almost as soon as the chancellor finished speaking, another voice could be heard, echoing from beyond the horizon. “Crown Prince, the time has come to settle our grudge. I will get revenge today, and you will die a miserable death. Then everyone in the Rich-Lush Continent will know that I am the ultimate genius!”

The voice abounded with devil energy, and was boundlessly sinister. It pierced through the air so effectively that everyone who heard it felt their hair standing on end.

“Young Master Shroud-Heaven!” The Crown Prince’s gaze suddenly seem to pierce through the sky to a distant location. Voice turning sharp, he said, “I defeated you before, and now you’ve returned to be beaten again? Fine. First I’ll kill you, then I’ll return and take care of these little bastards!”

He slashed the air with his halberd, ripping an opening that erupted with space-time ripples that distorted everything around it. It was a tempest that would normally shred Legendaries to pieces, and yet, posed no problems for him. Without any hesitation, he stepped into the rift.

Meanwhile, high above the fighting platform was a pillar whose top was covered with a red cloth. As the Crown Prince stepped into the rift, the red cloth fell to pieces, revealing a seven-inch-tall treasure in the form of a gate. It was bronze, and covered with countless complex designs and patterns.

This was the prize for the competition, the Gate of the Great Void.

Under the eyes of everyone present, the Crown Prince reached out and drew on his magic to pull the gate into his hand.

“Chancellor, I refuse to acknowledge this brat as the champion, so I'm taking the prize with me. As for all other matters, I leave them in your hands!”

It was to the shock of everyone present that the Crown Prince simply took the prize for himself! He really did view everyone else as worthless. After all, despite the promise that the chancellor had given him, there was no way he would leave completely empty-handed considering how much face he had lost.

And thus, a major incident ended, albeit with little fanfare, and not a particularly satisfying conclusion.

For the moment, the Crown Prince would not be killing Yang Qi or anyone else, although, in the future, it was entirely likely the conflict would resume.

The Crown Prince had acted rudely and arrogantly, but the chancellor managed to calm him down.

That said, he still managed to wreck the competition by taking the prize that should have gone to the champion.

He was ferocious, domineering, and insufferably arrogant, and had just left a profound impression on everyone from the four institutes.

That was the Crown Prince.

Someone so powerful that only the chancellor could possibly keep him in check.

Yang Qi watched him go, livid. Then he closed his eyes and murmured to himself, ‘You can break the rules all you want, Crown Prince. One day I’ll get strong enough to stomp you beneath my feet!’

He had scraped through this crisis by the skin of his teeth. He had lost the prize, and there was no way that the institute would fork over a second prize as valuable as the Gate of the Great Void. In fact, considering the threat of the Crown Prince, they might not give anything at all.

Of course, Yang Qi didn’t really need powerful magical treasures anyway. His energy arts were his most important asset.

Therefore, he yet again swore that he would do anything and everything to reach the Legendary level. When that happened, his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth would transform further. He could use his Hell Portal to summon the powers of hell, and would also have access to the God Legion Paradise. Then he would be able to stand up to the Crown Prince, or at least not be demolished by him.

‘I need to be strong enough to resist the Crown Prince after he reaches the Great Sage level. If I don’t, and he becomes the chancellor of the Demi-Immortal Institute, then I'm afraid I wouldn’t be safe anywhere in the entire Rich-Lush Continent.’

Time was limited, and therefore, he couldn't wait around. Besides, thanks to the Crown Prince’s support, Yun Hailan would only continue to get more and more arrogant, and would cause more and more problems for him.

Even as he stood there pondering the situation, the chancellor’s voice suddenly reached his ears. “Yang Qi, come see me in the Minorcosm World!”

Yang Qi was a bit taken aback. He had assumed the chancellor would just ignore him. Instead, he was being summoned for a personal audience.

“Yes, sir!” Flying up into the air, he looked down and said, “Brothers and sisters, I offer my profound thanks for your willingness to fight to the death with me. I won't let you down in the future.”

His nineteen sworn brothers and sisters all nodded.

“There’s no need for that, Brother Yang,” Jun Tianchou said. “Go. The chancellor wants to see you, presumably to offer some compensation. You did win the competition after all.”

Chapter 178: The Chancellor

And thus, the martial arts competition ended.

The Crown Prince had caused a huge scene, and essentially turned the entire thing into a farce. In fact, quite a few people now wondered what the point of the entire thing was. Of course, there were many top experts who had been completely shocked by the Crown Prince’s strength. Soon, he would be the chancellor of his institute, and would be the most powerful person in the Rich-Lush Continent.

The Demi-Immortal Institute was the number one organization in all the lands, to the point where not even the Sage Ancestor Dynasty could really compare to them. And now, it seemed obvious that it had all the other three institutes in check as well.

As long as the other three chancellors didn’t intercede, there was no one in any of their institutes who could do anything about the Crown Prince.

As for the members of the Crown Prince Society, they were all feeling very high and mighty as they looked down at Yang Qi and those who stood with him. Even if they were stronger than they were, or there were more complicated rules, or more geniuses to provide backup, what did it matter when the Crown Prince was calling the shots?

“The Crown Prince is so incredible. He just broke the rules, plain and simple! Now that’s power. That’s majesty! Not a single person from any of the four institutes could do anything to stop him. He even took the prize away from the champion.”

“That’s right. It's a real honor for us to be members of the Crown Prince Society.”

“After this, I bet plenty of people from the other societies will be wanting to join us.”

“The Crown Prince calmed down and took the Gate of the Great Void, but there’s no way he's going to let that Yang Qi off the hook. He’ll die sooner or later. Not even meeting with the chancellor will do him any good. After all, the chancellor will be retiring soon and travelling to parts unknown.”

“Yang Qi must have a death wish. Why would a genius like him refuse to join the Crown Prince Society and even defy the Crown Prince? The fact that he opposes us just shows that he doesn’t know the difference between life and death.”

There was quite a buzz among the students.

“Hey, do you wanna make a bet about how he’ll die?”

“Sure. I say that he won’t live longer than a month. He and everyone connected to him will be dead by then.”

“Exactly. When the Crown Prince wants someone dead, they die. That’s how it's always been. He won’t leave someone alive who could be a future threat. Although, right now he’s off fighting Young Master Shroud-Heaven. I wonder if he’ll be able to handle him. I heard that the young master’s father is a Great Sage from the ancient divine mountain of the Demonfolk.”

“Ah, stop worrying. Come on, the Crown Prince is someone that even Great Sages fear. And you think he needs to worry about a Great Sage’s son? Not likely. The martial arts competition is put on by the four institutes, with the backing of the Sage Ancestor Dynasty. And yet he threw the whole thing into chaos. Besides, the emperor didn't show up either, and that goes to show a lot, considering he's a Great Sage too.”

“According to the rumors, the Crown Prince is a god from heaven descended into the mortal world. He's not even human! It’s only natural that he would be incredibly talented. I wonder if he’ll actually break past the Great Sage level to whatever is beyond.”

“The Great Sage level is the highest level described in the Demi-Immortal Institute’s secret records. Is there really a more powerful level after that?”

“I heard there is, although I’m not sure what it’s called or what it’s like. They say that the founder of the Demi-Immortal Institute was actually in that level, and that he eventually left for another heaven and earth.”

As for the students from the other societies, such as the Gentlemen’s Society and the Divine Ability Society, they all stood there ashen-faced. Although they all had known that the Crown Prince was powerful, the show he had put on today was completely unprecedented.

If the Crown Prince Society went on to act as arrogantly as he had today, how would the other societies survive?

Yun Hailan hovered high above the sea of clouds, watching as Yang Qi entered the Minorcosm World. Despite the chaos that had played out moments ago, she was smiling coldly.

‘Yang Qi might have been invited to a meeting with the chancellor, but he's only delaying his inevitable death.’

In one hand, she held the Pearl of the Thousand Illusions World, and in the other, a tiny bronze gate that flickered with glittering light. That gate emanated the power of an alternate dimension which significantly bolstered her true energy.

‘The Gate of the Great Void. Incredible. With this, I can harvest Great Void True Energy from an alternate dimension, an energy that not even a Legendary could easily acquire. With the gate and the pearl, I can definitely reach the Legendary level soon. Yang Qi, you brat peasant, you simplistic oaf, I bet you still want to get some treasure as a reward, don’t you?’

Obviously, the Crown Prince had delivered the Gate of the Great Void to Yun Hailan before going on his way.

With those two items, it would be easier than ever for her to advance her cultivation base. In fact, not even she was certain how far they would push her.

The Pearl of the Thousand Illusions World allowed her to converge her power into countless clones. As for the Gate of the Great Void, it could open the way to alternate dimensions, and allow the user to escape dangerous situations.

Originally, the Crown Prince had arranged for her to win the competition so that she could get that magical treasure. And even after Yang Qi won, he still managed to take it and give it to her.

“Considering you’ve refused to serve me, Yang Qi, I very much look forward to seeing how you meet your end. And the same with your clan.”

Then, she vanished without a trace.

**

The giants guarding the entrance to the Minorcosm World didn’t block his way; obviously, they had been given orders to let him pass.

Normally speaking, students who were summoned to meet with the chancellor would have bright prospects for the future, and would thus be fawned over by the giants. But when they saw Yang Qi, they looked at him stony-faced and didn’t even offer a conversational greeting. Clearly, they were aware of what had played out at the competition.

Yang Qi had offended the Crown Prince, and therefore, would die sooner or later. And no one would dare to kiss up to someone like that.

Yang Qi didn’t care about their attitude. He entered the Minorcosm World, to be instantly assailed by Nine-Yang Immortal Energy. However, he didn’t absorb any of it. He was to meet with the chancellor, and had no way of knowing if the man would be able to tell. If the secret of his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth were revealed because of that, the consequences would be too horrible to contemplate.

He proceeded through the Minorcosm World flying forward until he caught sight of a man standing on a mountain far above.

He looked like a middle-aged scholar, elegant, simple and refined, almost like a divine being, with an aura that seemed to be at one with the boundless and infinite void.

“My respects, Chancellor,” Yang Qi said, respectfully clasping hands in greeting.

“Come,” the chancellor said. Waving his arm, he sent a gentle breeze down, which wrapped around Yang Qi and pulled him up to the top of the mountain. Now, Yang Qi had a closer view, and realized how handsome the chancellor was. He had long, flowing eyebrows, and an expression that seemed to mourn the difficulties of the common people. There was no evidence that he practiced energy arts cultivation, and yet, his eyes shone with the desire to bring justice and morality to all creation.

Yang Qi said nothing, but instead, waited for the chancellor to speak.

Although they were now face to face, he wasn’t sure what the chancellor was thinking, and couldn’t read his expression at all.

He really did seem like a sage, and Yang Qi felt like nothing standing in front of him. And yet, it didn’t seem as if the chancellor were peering into his heart and mind.

‘If he can see the imp in my forehead, I’m done for, and it won’t matter how careful I try to be. I'm fairly certain the golden imp is more powerful than a Great Sage though.’ Suddenly, he felt completely calm.

A moment passed, and the chancellor spoke again, and the question he asked was somewhat surprising.

“Aren’t you upset at having lost the Gate of the Great Void? Considering you’re the champion of the competition, it should have gone to you. It is a magical treasure from the distant past, a magical space-time treasure that enables the user to escape any dangerous situation. With a treasure like that, not even a Legendary would be able to hurt you.”

“It doesn’t belong to me,” Yang Qi replied coolly, “so I don’t have any right to make decisions about it. Whatever arrangements the institute makes, I’ll abide by them.” Although it was a pity he had lost the Gate of the Great Void, he had his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, which was a far more valuable treasure. As long as he could continue to advance his cultivation base, the technique would only continue to grow stronger and stronger.

“That's true,” the chancellor said. “What do you think of the Crown Prince?”

Yang Qi’s eyes flickered. Obviously, the chancellor knew what he thought about the subject. “With enough power, any rule can be broken.”

“Rules can be broken with power?” The chancellor’s eyes glittered, but his expression was still impossible to read. “Very funny. The Crown Prince broke the rules, but it was within the larger scope of what is acceptable. He’s in the position to win immense glory, not only for the Demi-Immortal Institute, but for the Rich-Lush Continent as a whole. There's no one in his generation who surpasses him, and he's actually prevented a lot of fighting and conflicts in the younger generation! Before long, he'll break into the Great Sage level and become the next chancellor of the Demi-Immortal Institute. And he won’t stop there. It’s very likely that he will lead our institute to even greater heights. As for you, you haven’t even reached the Legendary level yet. The difference between the two of you is almost too vast to describe. However, you're both children of the institute. As far as I'm concerned, the squabbles of the societies, and even the martial arts competition, are inconsequential matters. Only Great Sages surpass the importance of the institute, and become relevant to the continent itself, and perhaps, other continents. Considering what you’ve done for the Demi-Immortal Institute so far, and what you might do in the future, not even ten thousand of you put together could be as important as the Crown Prince. Do you feel dissatisfied about that?”

“I'm inferior, but not dissatisfied,” Yang Qi said.

“Feeling dissatisfied is the normal reaction. I somehow doubt that you truly feel that way.” The chancellor shook his head. “In all fairness, if I were you, I would definitely be dissatisfied. In fact, I would swear an oath to improve my energy arts and bide my time until I could get revenge. That’s the normal thing to do.”

“You’re very perceptive, Chancellor.” Yang Qi bowed his head as his eyes flickered with sharp light.

“The Rich-Lush Continent isn’t a place of fairness and justice. Even back in primeval times, during the era of the Yore-Wilds Continent, the weak were the prey of the strong. In all the billions of aspects of space-time, in all the billions of planes, there was no such thing as justice. The strong ruled, and the weak were like ants.

“However, heaven is merciful, and provided hope. That was how energy arts came to be. With energy arts, the weak can become strong, if they have ambition and perseverance, plus the right opportunities. You’re all children, but in the end, I can only protect the strongest of you. After all, only if our institute remains the strongest in the land can it prevent the children as a whole from being bullied and swallowed up by greater powers. Perhaps some of the children will be eliminated in the process, or even sacrificed…. Alas. I yearn for mercy, and desire to save all living beings. Heaven and earth are merciless, and view living beings as things to be discarded!My feelings are what cause me to age. The ruthlessness of heaven and earth ensure that they exist for all eternity.It is what it is. It is what it is. Understand me or curse me. I must speak the truth!”

“Yes, sir!” Yang Qi didn't want to be around the chancellor for any longer than necessary. And he understood what the man was saying. To him, all the students in the institute were children, but he didn't care if they fought or died. He didn't even care about their societies. As long as he could find the strongest among them, he would help that student to grow into a powerful individual who could carry on the legacy of the institute.

“Very well. My time is limited. The reason I called you here today is that the competition you won is a tradition thousands of years old, in which a genius will make a name for himself. Unfortunately for you, the Crown Prince got involved, and turned the whole thing into a joke. It stands to reason that I would compensate you, except that you’ve incurred the wrath of the Crown Prince. I can protect you temporarily, but given how strong you are now, or rather, how weak, you’ll never be a match for him. And it won’t be long before he simply kills you.

“In the west of the Rich-Lush Continent is a place called the Heavendawn Quarry. In primeval times, it was a mine operated by Demonfolk. Nowadays, it serves as a prison to a powerful monster. Go there, slay the monster, and take its treasure. That will be your reward.

“Of course, the monster is at the Legendary level. Whether you’re able to kill it or not will depend on your own skills and abilities. Incidentally, when the Crown Prince becomes a Great Sage, I’ll retire and travel to another continent. At that time, he’ll essentially be in charge of all the lands! You’re on your own now. Good luck!”

Chapter 179: Ancient Mine

Yang Qi had assumed the chancellor called him to the Minorcosm World to offer some reward or another. Instead, he had shared his opinion about the Crown Prince, offered no reward, and instead, assigned him a dangerous mission.

The west? An ancient mine? A monster, and a Legendary at that?

And he was to kill this monster and steal a treasure, in a place originally created by Demonfolk of the distant past? That was like snatching food from the tiger’s mouth. It would definitely be profoundly dangerous.

According to the rumors, the Demonfolk of the distant past practiced cultivation using a certain type of spirit stone that contained particularly powerful spirit energy. And humans who used such spirit stones would achieve incredibly rapid progress. Unfortunately, the Heavendawn Quarry had long since dried up, and people had learned to either eat physical food to gain strength, or use medicinal plants to make energy convergence pills.

Cultivation in modern times went much more slowly than in the past.

The powerful divine abilities and energy arts of the primeval world were all available because of the spirit stones, and the vital energy they produced.

Of course, there were still scattered pockets of spirit stones that remained deep in the mine. However, such areas were usually occupied by freakish hellions, ensuring that only Legendaries would dare to go there.

Why exactly was the chancellor sending him there? In the hopes that he would get killed? Or was it a form of training?

Yang Qi literally had no idea what the chancellor might be thinking. The man was like a bottomless abyss that was impossible to assess.

“Yes sir, Chancellor. I shall abide by your orders.” He didn’t argue. He knew that it was not his place to do so, and that he had to simply listen to what the man said.

“Here’s a map of the Heavendawn Quarry, which includes the location where the monster is imprisoned.” The chancellor waved his hand, causing a map to emerge from thin air, formed from crystalline manifestations of the power of space.

“Take care,” the chancellor said, fading into thin air. Soon, Yang Qi was completely alone.

He looked down at the map, which was as thin as a cicada's wing, and filled with detailed information of a mountain range in the west. It almost looked like a small world unto itself.

The power to manipulate space went far beyond his own capabilities. People like the Crown Prince and the chancellor could use it to simply step through space itself. Yang Qi couldn’t help but be a bit jealous.

However, it wouldn't do any good to worry about that right now.

Snorting coldly in his heart, he thought, ‘It seems now is the time to throw caution to the wind. The Crown Prince isn't going to let me off the hook, so there’s no need to sit around worrying. If I stick my neck out, he’ll try to kill me, and if I do the opposite, the result will be the same.’

Now that he was alone, Yang Qi decided to do some breathing exercises, to absorb some of the Nine-Yang Immortal Energy in the Minorcosm World.

He completely opened his body and mind.

Cracking sounds filled the air as the explosive vital energy of heaven and earth rushed toward him as Septenary Lifeseizing tribulation began.

The attacking gaze of the Crown Prince had become true energy that pushed him to the brink of a breakthrough, and considering he was currently alone, he decided that now was the perfect time to finish the process.

He was soon surrounded by a maelstrom of soil, water, fire, wind and even lightning. Numerous monsters appeared within the vital energy, all of whom tried to burrow into Yang Qi’s body.

Unfortunately for them, he was too strong. With minimal effort, he sent out boundless sword light, destroying the monsters and vanquishing the vital energy. As for the lightning, it coursed through his bloodstream, creating dazzling vein-like designs.

More particles within him stirred. In the blink of an eye, more than ten awoke, bringing him to the total power of over one hundred forty ancient megamammoths.

And his power continued to climb.

He took a deep breath, inhaling masses of Nine-Yang Immortal Energy. It was like a river flowing into him, pouring into his Hellfire Crucible and transforming into life force quintessence.

The Minorcosm World was huge, almost like its own heaven and earth. And the location where the chancellor had summoned Yang Qi to was very remote. Therefore, no one noticed any disturbance to the vital energy of the place.

Furthermore, only a Legendary would have noticed what he was doing with the Nine-Yang Immortal Energy. Therefore, this was an amazing opportunity to acquire the life force quintessence he needed.

He was consuming the energy like a voracious gobblewock, not holding back in any way as he sucked it in. A short time later, his Hellfire Crucible was completely full.

And yet, he still wasn’t pleased, and decided to go all out.

Crick. Crack…. The Nine-Yang Immortal Energy in the crucible began to crystalize, and transform into gemstones. Each beautiful stone had nine colors, and would cause any human who looked at it to feel like an immortal who had abandoned the vulgar mortal world.

He was now almost completely filled with crystallized nine-yang energy, even in his meridians.

It was almost impossible to say how much of the stuff he had absorbed.

WHOOSH!

All of a sudden, a massive energy fluctuation hit him and shoved him out of the Minorcosm World and into the sea of clouds above.

Only then did he stop absorbing the Nine-Yang Immortal Energy.

Non-Legendary students who stayed in the Minorcosm World for too long would be automatically ejected.

However, Yang Qi had still benefited greatly. The yang energy built up in his meridians and Hellfire Crucible was equivalent to an entire bottle gourd of life force springwater.

After absorbing it fully, he would definitely be able to reach Octonary Lifeseizing.

For now, he was a Septenary Lifeseizer with one hundred and fifty awakened particles within him, making him vastly stronger than before. He was very pleased with the results. Unfortunately, he knew that the Crown Prince was now eyeing him like a tiger watching its prey, and that his current level of power was still like nothing compared to him.

The Legendary level.

He had to reach the Legendary level.

He knew that there were nine transformations within the Legendary level, each one of which led to heightened senses and awareness. Unfortunately, just reaching the level wouldn’t be enough. Although the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth would improve, making it more difficult for the Crown Prince to kill him, unless he was able to communicate better with the enigmatic golden imp, he would need to be stronger.

‘Should I go to this Heavendawn Quarry? I guess there’s no reason not to. I wonder what the Legendary level monster is like.’ Map in hand, he began to fly through the sea of clouds.

Evening had fallen, and the hubbub because of the events of the martial arts competition had died down. The visitors to the institute had left, and the entire place was relatively quiet.

However, when he reached Manyflowers Peak, he found that his sworn siblings were waiting for him.

Holy Daughter Manyflowers was also there. As a Legendary, she had a position in the Minorcosm World, but considering that this was a special occasion, had come to talk with him. “Yang Qi! You’re back! What did the chancellor have to say to you? Did he give you any sort of reward?”

“He gave me this map. He said that there’s a monster imprisoned in the Heavendawn Quarry, and that I'm supposed to kill it. It has a magical treasure that's supposedly my reward.”

With that, he pulled out the map.

“Bullcrap!” Holy Daughter Manyflowers said. “The Heavendawn Quarry is a very dangerous place. Not even I would venture too deeply inside of it. That's the reward the chancellor gave you? It seems more like a death sentence to me. Does the Demi-Immortal Institute really belong to the Crown Prince now? After the scene he caused, the chancellor actually gave him the institute to calm him down! You can't go to that mine, Yang Qi. You’ll end up dead and buried there.”

“She’s right, Brother,” Jun Tianchou said, sounding worried. “The Heavendawn Quarry is a ruined mine of antiquity. There are countless freakish hellions who occupy the place. According to the rumors, a Great Sage sealed some enormous devil there. All of the sects and organizations in the Rich-Lush Continent consider it a forbidden region. Only Legendaries ever go there, and plenty have never come back out alive. You definitely must not go. You’ll die for sure.”

“Little Bro Qi, it seems to me you’re not safe in the Demi-Immortal Institute any longer,” Hua Fengfeng said. “Why not come to the Sun Moon Institute? My father is the Junior Brother of the chancellor, and the most likely expert to become a Great Sage. Once he succeeds, he’ll definitely be able to protect you from the Crown Prince.”

“Yeah, Brother,” Meng Qingshan said. He sighed. “Even I thought your chancellor would give you some sort of reward. He placated the Crown Prince, so it only makes sense that he would try to placate you. But the only thing he gave you was a dangerous mission? It seems obvious to me that he’s on the side of the Crown Prince. Ai…. If you stick around the Demi-Immortal Institute, you’ll be dead for sure.”

Yang Qi shook his head. “No. I can’t leave the Demi-Immortal Institute. At least not yet. If I scurried off with my tail between my legs now, how could I ever hold my head high in public? Besides, I would be a laughingstock to Yun Hailan and the Crown Prince, and I just can’t let that happen. If I abandoned the institute, he could just declare me a traitor, which would make it less of an issue for him to kill me. I have to become a Legendary, or maybe even a Great Sage. Only then would he have to think twice about trying to kill me, not like now, when he can basically do it without even trying. My importance to the institute compared to his is like the difference between heaven and earth. He has performed all sorts of services, and provided an enormous amount of life force springwater to various students to aid in their progress. With the Hanging Mountain and other continents harboring designs on the Rich-Lush Continent, he's the only one who can answer the challenge of the geniuses from other continents. For example, he already beat Young Master Shroud-Heaven once, and now he's fighting him again. I need to prove to the institute that I'm stronger than him. I need to prove to the institute that I'm important! If I do that, perhaps the chancellor's opinion of me will change.

“It's not necessarily true that he gave me this mission in an attempt to kill me. If he were that superficial, he wouldn't have become the chancellor. He must have other reasons. Perhaps it's a test, a challenge to see if I can accomplish important missions. True geniuses, people like the Crown Prince, should be able to fight Legendaries even when they’re only a Lifeseizer! If I finish this mission, at least it’ll mean I have the potential to tangle with the Crown Prince. And in that case, the chancellor will be interested in seeing me progress. If I fail the mission, he won’t care at all. In the end, I have to rely on myself to screw over the Crown Prince. And considering how haughty he is, as long as I'm still alive, he won’t do anything to my friends and family. He would never stoop so low.”

Chapter 180: Turning in Merit Points

Hua Fengfeng still wasn't done trying to convince Yang Qi not to go. “Little Bro Qi, maybe the chancellor is testing you, but you still need to think this through carefully. The Heavendawn Quarry is an extremely dangerous place. Even Legendaries get killed there. If you go, it’s highly likely that you’ll end up dead. Then what?”

“I’ll be fine. You know how the saying goes. You can’t catch tiger cubs without entering the tiger’s lair. Of all the things I fear in the world, monsters are at the bottom of the list. In fact, even if I didn’t have the mission from the chancellor, I would still go there to push myself toward becoming a Legendary. If I'm going to tangle with the Crown Prince, I need to temper myself. After he deals with Young Master Shroud-Heaven, he’ll come for me. I just hope that the young master can keep him occupied for long enough.”

This was Yang Qi’s final decision.

“If you’re dead set on doing it, Brother, let us go with you,” Zhao Wuhun said. “The more people there, the safer it will be.”

“No, we have to consider the bigger picture. Brothers and sisters, I have to request that you head back home to your sects and clans. Otherwise, the Crown Prince could theoretically take us all out at once. If I somehow get killed, at least the rest of you can lay low for a while before trying to avenge my death. And without you, who would take care of my clan?”

“Whatever happens, we’ll take care of your family,” Li Zhengdao said. Shaking his head, he continued, “Besides, you’re right, the Crown Prince is too arrogant to come after us or your family before killing you. If he did, and word got out, he would lose too much face. The best thing for you to do right now is keep safe and stay alive. Before, I assumed the rules of the institutes would keep the Crown Prince in check, but after that competition, it's obvious that he can do whatever he wants. It's really frightening. After we get back, we can discuss matters with our sects and clans. Perhaps the best thing to do is form an alliance with the Sage Ancestor Dynasty. After all, they're the only ones who will dare to defy the Crown Prince.”

“Many thanks, brothers and sisters,” Yang Qi said. “Well, since things are settled, I’ll head off now. There’s no time to lose. And you all do the same.”

With that, he prepared to leave.

“Slow down.” Holy Daughter Manyflowers said. “Yang Qi, although you didn’t end up winning the Gate of the Great Void, you still earned a huge amount of merit points. Why not go to the Hall of Feats and Virtue and see what you can purchase? The more prepared you are before heading to the Heavendawn Quarry, the better.”

Yang Qi had completely forgotten about the merit points, of which he had earned so much that he eventually lost track. After all, he had won over a hundred matches during the competition. He now had so many merit points that even most Legendaries in the institute would be shocked by the amount.

Having such wealth sitting around would be a waste when it could essentially be converted into real-world assets.

Of course, at the moment, Yang Qi didn’t really have a big need for magical treasures or weapons. Improving his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth and advancing his cultivation would be much more effective.

However, according to the rumors, you could get just about anything possible with merit points, and Yang Qi was indeed curious about what might be available.

“Brother,” Jun Tianchou said, “you go make whatever preparations are appropriate. For now, the rest of us will leave. Contact us if you need anything. We all have various ways of keeping in touch. After I get back to the Sea God Institute, I’ll use all my connections to try to build an alliance against the Crown Prince. I refuse to believe that he controls the entire Rich-Lush Continent.”

“That’s right,” Hua Fengfeng said. “The Crown Prince pissed a lot of people off today. He essentially slapped the four institutes directly in the face. I definitely need to check in with my father, and get him to do something about it.”

Her father was in the ninth Legendary transformation, making him a Never-Dying Legendary. He was one of the few people who was on a similar level as the Crown Prince. Of course, the Crown Prince was rumored to be a god from heaven descended into the mortal world, whose mother gave birth to him after dreaming of the stars. Obviously, he was much more famous than Hua Fengfeng’s father.

“Go, Brothers and Sisters,” Yang Qi said, his eyes glittering. At the moment, he looked like a world-class assassin getting ready to go out and fight for his life. “Don’t waste time sitting around here.”

With that, his sworn siblings flew up into the air and headed off in various directions.

Of course, Li He and the others couldn’t leave the Demi-Immortal Institute. As the saying went, when a monk joins the temple, he can’t leave. They had to stick with Yang Qi and face the wrath of the Crown Prince with him.

“Come on, I’ll take you to the Hall of Feats and Virtue,” Holy Daughter Manyflowers said. Smiling coldly, she continued, “Word is already spreading far and wide about you, Yang Qi. Presumably, there will be people at the Hall of Feats and Virtue who will cause trouble in the hopes of getting on the Crown Prince’s good side. Brownnosers like that, like those Patriarchs Wind and Cloud, are going to do their best to see you dead. Remember, they fear you so much now that, if they make a move, it will be with deadly force.”

“Oh really? The Patriarchs Wind and Cloud?!” Yang Qi’s killing intent began to bubble. “If the Crown Prince can’t do anything about me right now, then what are those two old farts going to do? Just wait until I'm a Legendary too. The first thing I’ll do is kill both of them!”

The sight of the intense killing intent flickering in Yang Qi’s eyes caused Holy Daughter Manyflowers’ heart to turn cold. She knew that Yang Qi was no simple individual, and that he had immense hidden power at his disposal. However, as a mere Legendary, she couldn’t see deeply enough to uncover the truth. And she wouldn’t be so bold as to ask.

“Let’s go,” she said, heading down the mountain and toward the sprawling temple complexes that made up the institute.

Yang Qi and everyone else followed, and before long, they were nearing a large hall. It was an immense and imposing structure, which was adorned with a sign that read: Hall of Feats and Virtue.

The square outside of the building could fit hundreds of thousands of people if necessary, and the doors leading into it all emanated powerful auras. Clearly, there were plenty of magical treasures stored inside the building, as well as countless types of spirit medicine.

There were many students present, all of them here to exchange their merit points.

Anyone who saw Yang Qi and his group would immediately avoid him like the plague, not daring to even be seen near him. Not even people from the Crown Prince Society dared to cause problems for him, not after his performance in the competition.

Besides, most people assumed that, considering Yang Qi had defied the Crown Prince, he was a walking dead man. What was the point in provoking someone who had nothing to lose?

Therefore, any Crown Prince Society people who saw him quickly got out of his way.

Soon, they were in the Hall of Feats and Virtue.

Deep inside, several powerful elders sat on duty. One of them was a Legendary, who looked over at the group who had just walked in, eyes flashing as if with fire. “It's been a while, Holy Daughter Manyflowers. Congratulations on your breakthrough to the Legendary level. Are you here to purchase something in particular?”

“I've brought someone with me to do just that.” Giving the grand elder a level look, she continued, “Grand Elder Feat-Virtue, I'm sure you’re aware that Yang Qi is the champion of the martial arts competition. Although he suffered persecution at the hands of the Crown Prince, he was still summoned to a meeting with the chancellor, and was subsequently assigned a dangerous mission. He’s here to spend the merit points he earned on magical treasures and medicinal pills. Don’t make things hard for him, otherwise I’ll report the matter to the chancellor.”

Grand Elder Feat-Virtue flashed a broad smile. “Oh, come come. I would never do such a thing. I’ve presided over the Hall of Feats and Virtue for years now, always with complete fairness and honesty. As long as you've accumulated enough feats and virtue, you can get any magical treasures or medicinal pills you’d like. So, what will it be? Why don’t you hand me your identity medallion, young man?”

Yang Qi nodded. Waving his hand, he sent his identity medallion flying over to Grand Elder Feat-Virtue. After checking it, the man's expression flickered with shock at how many merit points were inside.

Considering how much Yang Qi had built up during his successive victories, it was a number that was rarely seen.

“Do you have any precious treasures that can pierce through space?” Holy Daughter Manyflowers asked, hoping to immediately identify the best item for Yang Qi. “Nothing so powerful as the Gate of the Great Void. What about Space-Piercing Divine Talismans? They’re nearly as good. Yang Qi will be on a very dangerous mission, so having a talisman like that to make a quick escape when necessary would be very beneficial.”

With a talisman like that, Yang Qi would be able to flee from even a Legendary.

“What? Space-Piercing Divine Talisman?” Grand Elder Feat-Virtue’s eyes glittered, and his smile twisted into something a bit more sly than before. “I'm sorry to say that we just recently ran out. If you want to wait for us to restock, that’s fine. We should have some in about two or three years.”

“That’s an outright lie, isn’t it Grand Elder Feat-Virtue!?” Holy Daughter Manyflowers said angrily. “You’re completely out of Space-Piercing Divine Talismans?”

“We’re really out,” Grand Elder Feat-Virtue replied with a cryptic smile. “Whether or not you believe me is your choice. What. Don’t tell me you want to go in and check our stock? You wouldn’t dare! That would be quite the crime. According to the rules of the institute, anyone who causes trouble in the Hall of Feats and Virtue, even a holy neophyte or a Legendary grand elder like yourself, will be imprisoned for a minimum of a thousand years.”

“Forget it then,” Yang Qi cut in. “If you’re out of Space-Piercing Divine Talismans, I’ll go with something else.” It was obvious that Grand Elder Feat-Virtue was doing this on purpose, and Yang Qi didn’t feel like wasting time.

“Oh? What would you like? Unfortunately, we’re out of most of the supreme-grade spirit pills as well. The best magical treasures are out of stock as well.” At this point, he wasn’t even hiding the fact that he was making things hard for Yang Qi.

“Anything which can increase life force quintessence?” Yang Qi asked.

“Well, as a matter of fact, we do,” Grand Elder Feat-Virtue said, his cheek twitching. “Life force springwater would be the best thing for that, but we’re out of stock. Luckily, we do have some godstones. To be specific, Euphoria Godstones. Even one is worth as much as your entire collection of merit points.”

“Are you insane?!” Holy Daughter Manyflowers snapped. “Euphoria Godstones have massive amounts of wretch energy, as well as the power of space. It's said they were created with wretch energy from the Hell of Euphoria, making them useless even to Legendaries. What’s he supposed to do with something like that? They would pollute his mind! In fact, stories tell of people in the distant past who tried to tap into the power of Euphoria Godstones and ended up experiencing cultivation deviation and turning into monsters.”

Grand Elder Feat-Virtue snorted coldly. “You just don’t know what's good for you, do you? Euphoria Godstones contain incredible power that far surpasses that of life force springwater. Although they’re hard to work with, they're still considered priceless treasures. Do you want one, or not? If not, then you can just leave and come back in two or three years.”

“You!” Holy Daughter Manyflowers shouted.

“It's fine,” Yang Qi said. “If all you have are Euphoria Godstones, then I’ll take one.”

Chapter 181: Euphoria Godstone

When Holy Daughter Manyflowers saw that Yang Qi was about to spend all his merit points on a Euphoria Godstone, she immediately got very nervous.

“Why do you want a Euphoria Godstone, Yang Qi? They’re tainted by the baleful energy of the Hell of Euphoria, making them sordid to the extreme! Not even pure yang energy could cleanse them. They’re useless! Not even good as a doorstop.”

Grand Elder Feat-Virtue snorted coldly. “He said he wants one, Holy Daughter Manyflowers, so what are you interfering for? Euphoria Godstones are artifacts from the ancient past, and contain incredible power. Ordinary individuals would never even be able to get their hands on one. Thankfully, our Demi-Immortal Institute actually fought the forces of the Hell of Euphoria long ago, which was the only way we managed to get a batch of them. They were originally used as cultivation resources by the most powerful devil-gods of ancient times, and are so powerful that not even a Legendary could refine them. They’re true treasures.”

Grand Elder Feat-Virtue seemed worried Yang Qi might change his mind, so he waved his hand, causing a large, glittering door to open up out of nowhere, into which he threw Yang Qi’s identity medallion.

A moment later, intense, wretch energy wafted out from the door.

Then, Yang Qi watched as Grand Elder Feat-Virtue carefully pulled out a stone.

It was roughly the size of a fist, and was sealed with paper talismans that abounded with righteous energy, and were so powerful that it was impossible to tell what type of person had created them. At the very least, it had to be a Legendary.

In fact, the powerful nature of the talismans’ aura seemed to indicate that it wasn’t a single person who had sealed the stone, but rather, a group of experts working together. That was the only way that the wretch energy of the stone had been contained.

Deep within the Euphoria Godstone was what appeared to be tiny, wriggling masses of flesh and blood. It was as if this stone had once existed in the depths of hell in ancient times, as part of the body of some vicious monster.

Yang Qi could also sense that the wretch energy was laced with abundant life force, as though a devil embryo lurked within the stone. Of course, ordinary individuals could never absorb that life force; if they did, they would transform into a wretch-devil or some other being. They might even end up being possessed, and transformed into a monster.

“This is the largest and most powerful of the Euphoria Godstones in our collection. It’s said that this stone was soaked with the blood of a devil-god from hell. In ancient times, the top experts of the Demi-Immortal Institute led a campaign in an alternate dimension, which was where they acquired it. Nine teams of nine Legendary grand elders worked together to seal it. It’s only because of your sizeable collection of merit points that I’ll let you have it.”

A sinister smile spread out on Grand Elder Feat-Virtue's face. “I'm really giving you some preferential treatment here. Oh, by the way, the wretch energy in the stone has been slowly eating away at the seal. Be careful. Otherwise you might end up turning into a monster.” Suddenly, he burst out laughing, and at the same time, tossed the stone and the identity medallion back to Yang Qi.

As of this moment, Yang Qi had spent all of his merit points on what appeared to be a useless rock.

“You're pushing things too far, Grand Elder Feat-Virtue!” Holy Daughter Manyflowers said, clearly incensed. In fact, it seemed like she might actually be ready to start a fight.

“What. You might be a genius, Holy Daughter Manyflowers, a Legendary at forty and whatnot. But I’m not scared of you. If you keep stirring up trouble, I’ll have no choice but to put you in your place! There’s no place in the Hall of Feats and Virtue for your histrionics! You might be able to beat me in a fight in a hundred years, but right now, you’re no match for me. Back down before you lose all face.”

“Fine! You wanna see what I can do?” Eyes flashing, she prepared to attack. “Holy Daughter Manyflowers isn’t afraid of anybody!”

“Senior, forget about it,” Yang Qi said. “He’s just abiding by the wishes of the Crown Prince, and he’s too powerful. Let’s go. If we cause problems here, the Crown Prince Society will be able to use it against us later. We need to save our strength for when it really matters. And besides, nothing we do here will help us. Obviously, the Crown Prince controls the Hall of Feats and Virtue.”

“Fine,” Holy Daughter Manyflowers said, inwardly moved by how calm and collected Yang Qi was acting. “But I'm not going to just let the matter drop. I’ll report the matter to the chancellor. After all, he hasn’t retired yet, and the Crown Prince hasn’t taken over his position!”

With that, she turned and stalked out of the Hall of Feats and Virtue.

Turning to Li He and the others, Yang Qi said, “Brothers, let's go. Don't waste your merit points here.” Yang Qi knew that because of how everything was playing out, his sworn brothers were going to have a hard time in the coming days. Only if he managed to defeat the Crown Prince would they have hope of getting a fair shake.

“Let’s go!” With that, they all strode proudly out of the Hall of Feats and Virtue, not bothering to even glance over their shoulders as they did.

Grand Elder Feat-Virtue watched them leave. Chuckling coldly, he said, ‘Useless dogs. They still think they can defy the Crown Prince? Nothing but insufferable arrogance. The entire Demi-Immortal Institute is going to belong to him eventually. Once he finishes killing that monster Young Master Shroud-Heaven, Yang Qi and his buddies are dead.’

At some unknown point, someone new had arrived at the Hall of Feats and Virtue.

“I’m impressed,” said the person. He held a fancy folding fan, and looked like a prince from the mortal world. However, his aura was that of an individual who could fight against heaven itself.

“Master Wind Gentleman!?” Grand Elder Feat-Virtue said, visibly surprised. “The leader of the Gentlemen’s Society?!”

This man was indeed the leader of the second-largest society in the Demi-Immortal Institute, the Gentlemen’s Society. He was a holy neophyte, and someone of incredible renown. Other than the Crown Prince himself, there were few people who could match him. His father had been an influential member of the council of prime elders for years and years.

Yang Qi had been raised backward both economically and culturally, but Master Wind Gentleman was the opposite. He had grown up with substantial behind-the-scenes support.

The prime elders were Never-Dying Legendaries, all of whom hoped to eventually achieve breakthroughs to become Great Sages.

If the Crown Prince ultimately failed to achieve his own breakthrough, he would eventually be held in check by them.

“Impressive work, Grand Elder Feat-Virtue,” Master Wind Gentleman said, fanning himself. “You got him to spend all of his merit points on a measly Euphoria Godstone. Quite the profit margin.”

Without any warning, Master Wind Gentleman locked down the entire Hall of Feats and Virtue, making it impossible for anyone to enter.

“What’s that supposed to mean, Master Wind Gentleman? Euphoria Godstones were rare and marvelous even in primeval times.”

“Right, right, right. Rare and marvelous in primeval times. Except that nobody can actually use them. They’re essentially devil embryos. Furthermore, a group of Legendaries spent a huge amount of time and effort to seal the wretch energy of the thing. It’s too horrible to contemplate what would happen if it were to be unsealed.” Master Wind Gentleman calmly fanned himself as he continued to provide a very detailed analysis. Clearly, he had been listening to everything that just played out. “You got rid of a hot potato, and also did something for the Crown Prince. Killed two birds with one stone, right? Whatever miracle that country bumpkin Yang Qi came across, there’s no way he understands how terrifying a Euphoria Godstone is. Like I said, very impressive.”

“What are you getting at, Master Wind Gentleman? Are you going to interfere in the matter? Yang Qi was the one who said he wanted the Euphoria Godstone. And so what if I'm helping out the Crown Prince. Are you going to defy him?”

“The Crown Prince? You think he can do anything to me? Until the day he becomes a Great Sage, he’s no threat.” All of a sudden, Master Wind Gentleman unleashed an aura that caused Grand Elder Feat-Virtue to shiver. After all, Grand Elder Feat-Virtue was no match for him.

“What are you doing?” he said. “This is the Hall of Feats and Virtue! You’re not allowed to cause trouble here.”

“If the Crown Prince can cause trouble, why can’t I?” Master Wind Gentleman smiled. “He broke all the rules during the martial arts competition, and even went so far as to steal the main prize. The rest of us holy neophytes are not very happy with his flagrant violations. People either need to respect the rules, or be crushed by them. Let me tell you something. The Gentlemen’s Society, the Divine Ability Society, and the Five Lightnings Society have thirty holy neophytes between us. And we’ve been in touch with the holy neophytes from the other institutes. We’ll be having a meeting soon to decide what to do about the Crown Prince. He’s simply too ambitious, and if we let him get any stronger, I'm afraid all of us will be assimilated by the Crown Prince Society. And thus, I've come here today to give you a friendly ultimatum. Please, come with me. Join our meeting of holy neophytes. Or, you can simply sit around and wait to be killed!”

“What?” Grand Elder Feat-Virtue suddenly found himself between a rock and a hard place. “Er, um, but Yang Qi—”

“The Crown Prince is watching him like a hawk. Therefore, we can use him as bait. He’s going to die one way or another. The only question is whether it will be sooner or later.”

Unsure of how to extricate himself from the situation, Grand Elder Feat-Virtue said, “Er, I need to think about this a bit and—”

“Think about it? Sorry, but that’s not possible. I want your answer within the time it takes an incense stick to burn. And I’ll wait right here for it. Either come with me to the meeting, or become the enemy of everyone else who attends. And if that happens, we’ll do everything in our power to see you dead.”

Master Wind Gentleman waved his hand, causing a stick of incense to appear.

**

Around the time that Master Wind-Gentleman was talking with Grand Elder Feat-Virtue, Yang Qi and his four sworn brothers were outside of the Demi-Immortal Institute and in the distant mountains.

“Brother, what did you bring us out here for?” Li He asked.

Yang Qi burst out laughing. “That dolt Grand Elder Feat-Virtue actually gave me the Euphoria Godstone. To me, it’s more valuable than the Gate of the Great Void! Ah, Crown Prince, you’ve made a grave mistake here. You actually gave me access to energy that truly originated in hell, to the blood of a devil-god, and to a true expression of the Hell of Euphoria.”

With that, he pulled out the Euphoria Godstone, which began to pulse with a devil will that stained the sky black.

Chapter 182: Devil Embryo

Regardless of the era, the kingdom, or the continent, myths and stories of hell existed everywhere. No person actually knew what hell looked like, and yet, it was widely accepted that it consisted of many levels, each of which was filled with millions and millions of fiend-devils and devil-gods.

No energy artists, not even the students in the Demi-Immortal Institute with their ancient historical records, knew exactly how many levels existed in hell.

In fact, the most powerful person to have ever existed in the Demi-Immortal Institute, its founder, didn’t even have access to that information. It was known only to the legion of gods in heaven.

However, the ancient records of the Demi-Immortal Institute did speak of an alternate dimension of devil-gods, who, long ago in primeval times, had invaded one of the continents above them, bringing it to catastrophe. It was none other than the fabled God-Devil Apocalypse.

The continent in question was the Yore-Wilds continent. At the time, the Rich-Lush Continent was a tiny part of that ancient continent, as insignificant as a drop of water in the ocean. As for the Quake-Dawn Continent that Ghost Emperor Yama had spoken of, it was another part of the former Yore-Wilds Continent. However, it was much larger than the Rich-Lush Continent, and had much more abundant resources. The living beings from there were unbelievably powerful.

The God-Devil Apocalypse started when certain Great Sages of the time, who had been traveling in a mysterious and ancient alternate dimension, found what they thought was a sealed magical treasure. By combining their secret magics, and by spending an inordinate amount of time, they managed to break the seal.

Unfortunately, that seal had been protecting, not a treasure, but rather, a passageway. And as soon as it was opened, disaster arrived in the form of hordes of fiend-devils, devil-gods, and ghost-gods, who erupted onto the continent and brought with them a reign of terror and a rain of blood.

Because of the war between the ancient cultivators and the devil-gods, the Yore-Wilds Continent was shattered, and transformed into countless smaller continents and locations. And the powerful groups that had once filled those lands became countless smaller organizations.

The sealed dimension which the monsters came from was called the Hell of Euphoria. And the devil-gods which had poured forth from it called themselves the Generals of Euphoria.

Each one of those devil-gods was strong enough to prop up mountains and seas, and to destroy the mightiest of rivers. Some of them could rip entire continents to shreds.

During the course of the war, the people of the lands came to realize that the Hell of Euphoria wasn’t the only hell. There were many others, such as the Hell of Never-Ending and the Hell of Mud Tilling…. All of them were ancient, boundless places that existed in the depths of space-time, far away in the universe from the Yore-Wilds Continent.

Such myths were recorded in the ancient records of the Demi-Immortal Institute, and considering how long Yang Qi had been a student there, he had read through many of them.

Unfortunately, now that he was in direct conflict with the Crown Prince, it was doubtful that he would have much time for reading and study. The Crown Prince Society was simply too large and powerful.

As for the Euphoria Godstone that Yang Qi now possessed, it was an artifact from that ancient time, created in the Hell of Euphoria itself, and filled with profound wretch energy. Because it had been present in the endless and bitter fighting of the war, it was also imbued with much information about the devil-gods of hell. And thus, Yang Qi, who cultivated the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, could understand and benefit from that information.

In the Hell of Euphoria, devil-gods used Euphoria Godstones as part of their cultivation. The stones contained an evil and fiendish life force quintessence that was impossible to control, and was thus unsuitable for usage in cultivation by human cultivators.

But Yang Qi was different. He absolutely could use this stone.

The Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth was the most powerful technique created in the distant past by the legion of gods. It was designed to subdue the millions upon millions of hells that existed, as well as the countless powerful gods that existed throughout space-time. Not only did Yang Qi have the power to control the wretch energy of the Hell of Euphoria, he also had the ability to refine it for his own use.

In fact, it would be possible for him to use the stone to grasp the ultimate core of the Hell of Euphoria. And if he did, and was able to break through any intervening obstacles, then he would theoretically be able to form his Hell Portal even before he reached the Legendary level.

The wretch energy of the Euphoria Godstone was incomprehensibly powerful, and the sealing mark on it was already loosened, and could break at any moment. Once it did, it would erupt with incredible devil energy, enough to cause a huge disaster in the Rich-Lush Continent in general.

Even Grand Elder Feat-Virtue was somewhat nervous about that fact, and had only given the stone to Yang Qi to help the Crown Prince. In the end, the Euphoria Godstone was far, far more important to Yang Qi than the Gate of the Great Void could ever have been, and as such, he was very pleased.

“What are you so happy about, Brother?” Li He asked, confused.

Eyes shining with vicious light, Yang Qi said, “That Grand Elder Feat-Virtue has no idea what kind of technique I cultivate. He thought that giving me this stone would be damaging to me, but the truth is that it will be extremely helpful. Anyway, there’s no need to waste words. I'm going to set up a spell formation in this valley, after which I’ll absorb the Euphoria Godstone.”

“What?” Liang Dong said, visibly shocked, “Brother, can you really absorb it? That thing is extremely dangerous! It was sealed by Legendary power, and if you open it, we could all be devilized! Grand Elder Feat-Virtue definitely gave it to you with ill intentions.”

“It's fine. Trust me. If I succeed, it will benefit all of us, as I’ll be much more capable of standing up to the Crown Prince. All I’ll need to do is reach the Legendary level, and then he’ll have a much tougher time dealing with me.”

“Alright, brother, we trust you!” Hua Yinhu said. “We’ll set up the spell formation according to the feng shui of the terrain here.”

With Yang Qi’s help, his four sworn brothers were all either Tertiary or Quaternary Lifeseizers, and were adept at creating spell formations. They knew how to draw out the spirit energy from the surrounding terrain, and call upon the true flame of the sun, moon, and stars. They could even use the magnetic powers of the earth to create magical treasures, and to refine their nascent divinities.

“No, there’s no need,” Yang Qi said. “I’ll set up the spell formation. I need the four of you to stand guard and keep the true energy flowing. If anything happens, don't move. I absorbed enough Nine-Yang Immortal Energy from the Minorcosm World that I can create a spell formation here that can never be broken.”

“Oh?” Hua Yinhu said. “If that’s the case, Brother, why not go back to Yanhaven and make the formation there? Wouldn’t it be a big help to your clan?”

Yang Qi shook his head. “I've thought about it, and although that would be somewhat helpful, I think it would be too dangerous. If for some reason I fail in my effort, everything for thousands of kilometers will be filled with hordes of monsters. A force like that would turn Yanhaven into a sea of blood, and that’s just too much of a risk.”

“In that case, never mind.”

Li He and the others looked at the Euphoria Godstone in Yang Qi’s hands, and felt goosebumps prickling their skin.

Even people with stronger energy arts than they would feel terrified when looking at a Euphoria Godstone. In fact, people who weren’t Lifeseizers who looked at one would be so overwhelmed by the evil that they would vomit and then pass out. Not even Masters of Energy would be an exception.

“Nine-Yang Immortal Energy; Nine-Yang World!”

Yang Qi exhaled a stream of colorful Nine-Yang Immortal Energy, which made a shield that encompassed the entire valley. Then, he built a Nine-Yang Immortal Energy palace, surrounded by a city, and filled with people. In the blink of an eye, the place looked like a world of god-immortals.

Li He, He Jili, Hua Yinhu and Liang Dong sat within the Nine-Yang Immortal Energy, and marveled at the comfort they felt. It was almost like being able to practice cultivation in the Minorcosm World itself. Although they couldn't actually absorb the Nine-Yang Immortal Energy through breathing exercises, its mere presence created a resonance with their flesh and blood, and caused profound transformations therein.

Next, Yang Qi sat down in his world of energy and sent the true energy of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth into the Euphoria Godstone. Instantly, an image of his Hellfire Crucible appeared above his head, transparent and filled with the Cleansing Flame of the Heavenly World, which caused the surrounding Nine-Yang Immortal Energy to twist and distort madly.

It was enough power that it could have burned a Nonary Lifeseizer alive; it was the most pure and ultimate expression of vital energy.

Yang Qi was now a Septenary Lifeseizer. And back in the competition, when he had only been a Senary Lifeseizer, he had dominated Nonary Lifeseizer geniuses, and that was without even using the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.

With his current level of power, he could slaughter any Nonary Lifeseizer he encountered.

In fact, he would probably be able to cut down some Legendaries as well.

However, his goal was to keep rising, to reach Octonary or possibly even Nonary Lifeseizing. Before, that would have been nothing more than lunatic ravings, even if he had been able to practice cultivation long-term in the Minorcosm World. But now, with this Euphoria Godstone, everything was different. There was nothing else he could have acquired that would be more beneficial to the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.

‘Let’s open this seal and take a look. How evil are you, little Euphoria Godstone? You were sealed by a team of Legendaries, so will the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth be enough to suppress you?’ Without any further hesitation, he threw the stone into the Hellfire Crucible.

The flames of the crucible surged, burning away at the sealing talismans.

The nefarious energy of the stone had been eating away at the talismans already, weakening them. As such, the Cleansing Flame of the Heavenly World couldn’t have been more destructive.

Booms rang out as one sealing talisman after another was destroyed, and the true energy of Legendaries erupted out. Yang Qi inhaled, absorbing the energy and allowing it to flow through him, pushing his own energy to heaven-shaking, earth-toppling levels. All of a sudden, he felt strong enough to lift mountains on his shoulders.

He almost wondered if he was going to transform into an enormous god with an elephantine head and a human body, and a true energy trunk that could lift mountains.

There were a total of eighty-one seals on the Euphoria Godstone, and when the last of them shattered, the devil embryo that was the stone seemed to be on the verge of exploding.

A piercing scream erupted out, filling the air around the Hellfire Crucible. Then the godstone began to twitch and wriggle, almost as if the life force quintessence inside of it was about to give birth to a real devil.

Chapter 183: Hell Portal

As soon as the Euphoria Godstone was unsealed, it began to pulse like a devil embryo, almost like a living thing, not a simple rock. However, Yang Qi had been prepared for something like this. He knew it was a godstone from antiquity, something stained with the blood quintessence of a god-devil. Some such creatures were so incredibly powerful that a single drop of their blood, combined with enough vital energy, could fuel a complete rebirth.

Considering how long this thing had been resting sealed, it was no surprise this was happening.

Throughout history, it was not unheard-of for Euphoria Godstones that had been sealed by Legendaries to eventually be freed because of the corrosive nefarious energy.

The devil embryos inside, which had been slowly absorbing Legendary true energy for years on end, would be very difficult to control or reseal. They could shake the heavens and topple the earth, and bring destruction to the world of men. It was for this exact reason that Grand Elder Feat-Virtue had felt that he was killing two birds with one stone. Not only was he getting rid of the volatile Euphoria Godstone, he was also striking a deadly blow at Yang Qi.

Of course, it was the exact opposite. It was a big help to Yang Qi.

Right now, the devil embryo was undergoing rapid, constant transformations. Black energy swirled everywhere, destroying the Nine-Yang Immortal Energy, accompanied by a shrill cry that seemed capable of extracting the souls from humans. Apparently, some wretch-god or similar creature was on the verge of appearing.

In fact, it even spoke to Yang Qi. “Exercise faith in me, and acquire endless euphoria. Spurn me, and acquire endless pain….”

Apparently, the devil embryo contained the incomplete will of some wretch-god of ancient times, whose devilish will would attempt to force anyone it encountered to acknowledge allegiance.

It was a mighty entity, much more powerful than any Nonary Lifeseizer, and even stronger than many Legendary grand elders. The wretch energy it contained was strong enough to be the bane of any righteous technique, and even worse, when this wretch-god actually emerged from the god stone, it would open a mysterious passageway within the stone itself, a link to the Hell of Euphoria from which enormous amounts of wretch energy would belch forth.

Generally speaking, Euphoria Godstones weren’t connected to the power of space-time; they only contained a wretched and fiendish life force quintessence. However, the quintessence-blood in this stone did contain the power of space, which was further influenced by the magical laws that were part of the sealing marks. The long-term influence of that combination ensured that the wretch-god would indeed have some command over the godly power of space-time.

Just like the Gate of the Great Void or the Pearl of the Thousand Illusions World, it could break through powerful shackles to reach an alternate space-time from which it could extract the vital energy and power of the universe itself.

As Yang Qi watched the wretch-god taking shape and becoming more powerful, he immediately took action.

“You will acknowledge allegiance to me, wretch-god!” he said. Obviously, if he let the thing get any more powerful, and truly break free, it would not only affect him, it would affect the Rich-Lush Continent as a whole. And he would be powerless to stop it.

His Infernal Deity Plate Armor spread out, the color of porcelain, burning with bright fire that made him look like a god from heaven, capable of purifying anything he encountered. His Infernal Deity Spear appeared in his hand, a glorious weapon designed by the legion of gods to cast judgement on the fiend-devils of hell, and to subjugate all forms of wretch energy. His Fiend-Devil Wings spread out behind him, burning with the Cleansing Flame of the Heavenly World. And his Hellfire Crucible focused all of his power to attack the wretch-god.

“Nightfall Symphony!” he said, thrusting his spear out with all of the enlightenment he had gained regarding the technique to use it. Night fell, encompassing the wretch-god, and at the same time, the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, which was the bane of wretch energy, caused the creature to collapse into smoke, and start fading away.

“No!” it screamed defiantly in the voice of ancient devils. Reaching out with vicious claws, it tried to grab the Infernal Deity Spear.

Whoosshhhh!

The spear stabbed through its claws, and the Cleansing Flame of the Heavenly World raged, burning away the wretch energy, cleansing the fiendishness. The Hellfire Crucible grew larger, causing the Euphoria Godstone to hiss, and the flesh and blood sealed within it to slowly collapse into green smoke.

The wretch-god embryo was being damaged on the level of its essence, and was beginning to fade into nothing.

But then, the Euphoria Godstone suddenly twitched, causing spatial cracks to appear around it, from which poured wretch energy of an immensely powerful nature.

“Have faith in me, gain endless euphoria….” its voice echoed. Its eyes were fixed on Yang Qi as it fought to control his heart and mind, drawing upon the devil arts of wretch-gods to suppress him. Suddenly, some sort of weapon appeared in its hand, a blood-red sickle with a long haft, an energy weapon that seemed designed to harvest souls.

It was a god weapon from hell, apparently related to the Infernal Deity Spear in some way. Not bothering with any true energy, the wretch-god hefted the sickle and then slashed it toward Yang Qi’s neck, hoping to remove his head and take his soul.

Unfortunately, Yang Qi’s soul was the bane of hell. The Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth was already a fundamental part of him; he was the godmammoth, and the godmammoth was him. Not only could he stand up to this powerful wretch-god, he would come out on top, and learn more about the true meaning of hell from the experience.

“Nightfall Symphony!”

As his spear slashed through the air, musical notes drifted about, filling the air with music that could shake the mind and heart.

However, even as the wretch-god’s sickle was eaten away at by the Nightfall Symphony, it began to emanate a baleful, grievous tune of its own.

“Soul-Quelling Sonata!”

It was a wretched, ancient song designed to drag the souls of humans into the Hell of Nine Serenities.

Two hellish weapons were clashing, causing enormous booming sounds to echo out everywhere.

This wretch-god was incredibly powerful.

It was stronger than an ordinary Legendary, while Yang Qi himself was still only a Septenary Lifeseizer. Although he was invincible to all other Lifeseizers, and on top of that, cultivated a godly-class energy art, he was still having trouble handling this wretch-god.

Luckily, the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth was a bane to creatures like this; every stab of his spear sucked away some of the wretch-god’s wretch energy, and weakened the Euphoria Godstone. As that happened and the sealing mark of blood was weakened further, massive amounts of life force quintessence rushed out.

The Nine-Yang Immortal Energy that made up the spell formation around Yang Qi writhed and churned as the battle raged on. As time passed, Yang Qi grew stronger; each attack he made seemed capable of destroying anything wretched and evil, until eventually, it was impossible to see him. He was surrounded by mysterious true energy that looked like an enormous god with an elephantine head and a human body, whose massive trunk inhaled all of the wretch-god’s wretch energy, and turned it into nourishment.

The longer Yang Qi fought, the stronger he got.

And the wretch-god grew weaker and weaker, albeit, more and more fierce.

“Give me your soul!” it growled in Helltongue. Its blood-red sickle slashed back and forth through the air, following a deadly path of prescribed motion that closed in around Yang Qi.

‘The perfect opportunity!’ he thought. He suddenly vanished, and the sickle slashed through nothing but air. When he reappeared, he was atop the wretch-god's head, seated cross-legged in the form of a godmammoth.

The wretch-god let out a bloodcurdling scream as it was sucked back into the Hellfire Crucible, which erupted with massive flames. The Euphoria Godstone completely broke open, causing black-gold energy to spill out. At the same time, the power of space spilled out of the stone, combined with wretched, evil energy that filled Yang Qi.

‘Hell Portal, form!’

Without even taking time to think about it, he drew upon the true meaning of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth to cultivate the technique of the Hell Portal. Behind him, a gateway appeared, complete with a swirling vortex of death, evil, and destruction….

This portal really did lead to hell. To the Hell of Euphoria!

The Hell Portal required the power of space to operate, which was normally the thing of Legendaries. Yang Qi was no Legendary, so he shouldn’t have been able to gain enlightenment of the portal. But with the Euphoria Godstone, complete with the blood of an ancient devil-god, blood that contained the power of space, and the aura of the Hell of Euphoria, Yang Qi succeeded. He had personally made contact with a most wretched and evil place!

The Euphoria Godstone was now melting away.

The wretch-god was also fading away into the Hellfire Crucible, becoming the building blocks for the Hell Portal. Yang Qi felt himself trembling along with the surrounding area as masses of wretch energy exploded from the Hell Portal, which was filled with the wretched, powerful life force quintessence of hell.

Just like the Pearl of the Thousand Illusions World or the Gate of the Great Void, the Hell Portal could be used to harvest true energy from alternate dimensions, the type that vastly surpassed the spirit energy of heaven and earth. In this case, Yang Qi was able to harvest the true energy of the Hell of Euphoria.

To ordinary cultivators, and even to demon-devils, this type of energy would be fatal. But to Yang Qi, it was essentially life force quintessence.

The things that lived in hell had to deal with the most horrid environment, which was why only those with powerful life force could exist there.

Chapter 184: Reaching the Peak

“Whew!”

Yang Qi exhaled slowly, then took a deep breath, sucking all of the Nine-Yang Immortal Energy in the valley back into himself, mingling it with the evil life force quintessence that was belching from the Hell Portal. The combination was like yin and yang; when the righteous and the wretched combined, it led to profound transformations.

One particle after another woke up within him, to the point where even Yang Qi was startled at the quantity. There were dozens, pushing him to the point of having the terrifying power of two hundred ancient megamammoths.

He felt like he was about to burst, and yet, it only served to strengthen his fleshly body; his skin, blood vessels, sea of energy, meridians, five viscera and six bowels, all became even stronger than before.

RUUUUMBLE!

Cracks spread out on the ground as baleful energy surged up, taking the form of various monsters that instantly besieged him. Heaven-devils descended from above, and the wail of ghosts and scream of gods could be heard everywhere. Fire dragons and flame serpents rose up, all of them dead set on killing Yang Qi.

It was a tribulation of vital energy.

Pop!

Lightning appeared, forming a heavenly blade that slashed down at Yang Qi with the force to split mountains and divert rivers.

This grand tribulation of heaven and earth was none other than Liberating Weapon Tribulation.

According to the rumors, when vital energy became strong enough, it would unleash a tribulation, which no ordinary cultivator could possibly come out of alive.

The ‘weapon’ aspect referred to how the vital energy of heaven and earth would transform into weapons that could slash through anything and everything.

The ‘liberating’ aspect referred to the target being freed from mortal constraints. In other words: death. Cultivators who faced Liberating Weapon Tribulation had reached such heights that they could avoid facing death.

Bam!

The heavenly blade landed onto Yang Qi, and yet, did not slash him to bits.

Next, a spear appeared which stabbed toward his head in vicious fashion.

“Be broken!”

A white beam of light shot out of the top of Yang Qi’s head, which smashed the spear to bits. Next, countless flying swords appeared out of thin air, which swirled together into a sword formation.

He clenched his hand into a fist and punched out, shattering the sword energy.

However, the resulting fragments swirled about with such vigor that heaven and earth seemed to have become a world of swords, or even, a universe of swords. Because of Yang Qi’s familiarity with sword techniques, the Liberating Weapon Tribulation had become a tribulation of swords. Unfortunately, even if the vital energy had been stronger, against Yang Qi, it could do little more than be destroyed.

In the end, he threw his head back and roared, opening the Hell Portal as wide as he could, causing a gravitational force to spring up that sucked in all of the energy weapons.

RUUUUMBLE!RUUUUUUUUMBLE!

Soon, a stream of sword energy was pouring toward the Hell Portal, almost like a river. As it was shattered into bits, it then tumbled into the Hellfire Crucible.

‘Life force quintessence!’ Yang Qi sent a fist strike out, which slammed into his four sworn brothers, awakening them from the trances they had slipped into. When they looked around at all the shocking things happening, it was almost as if their own souls were fighting with the forces of hell, tempering and strengthening them.

The Euphoria Godstone had been refined into the Hell Portal, belching out the true energy of the Hell of Euphoria that Yang Qi then went on to transform into incredible power to benefit his sworn brothers.

It was no small matter; all four of them were now being pushed rapidly toward Quinary Lifeseizing, and thus the position of conclave students.

The stronger they got, the more seriously people would take them. Although their standing in the Demi-Immortal Institute was now tenuous, if they ever joined the forces of the Sage Ancestor Dynasty, they would be highly respected right off the bat.

The process continued for a day and a night. It was impossible to say how much of the vital energy of heaven and earth was channeled into them. However, it was obvious that Yang Qi’s Octonary Lifeseizing tribulation was actually more powerful than Holy Daughter Manyflowers’ Legendary tribulation. And yet, all it did was give him more fuel for his Hell Portal.

With his Hell Portal, he could communicate with that mysterious Hell of Euphoria that existed in some unknown aspect of space-time, and even use the vital energy from there in offensive fashion. Furthermore, the Hell Portal could be used for other purposes; it could pierce through space-time to connect to other locations.

Unfortunately, Yang Qi wasn't strong enough to use it in such a way. Right now, it was not the full and complete version of the Hell Portal.

The next day, the vital energy tribulation faded away. Yang Qi retracted the Hell Portal, and smiled. For some reason, he seemed a bit taller, and thrummed with an indescribable aura, as though he had been further blessed by the legion of gods.

His four sworn brothers sat in meditation, their energy arts advancing rapidly. They had benefited greatly, therefore, it would take them time to fully assimilate everything.

After collecting himself, Yang Qi projected his voice into the minds of his sworn brothers. “Brothers, I'm heading to the Heavendawn Quarry now. You stay here and work on your cultivation. I've used my energy arts to remold your physical bodies. You're no longer mortals, but rather, are progressing toward the level of god-spirits. Your life force might not be a perfect match with those of true god-devils from hell, but you are at least strong enough to survive in any hostile environment.”

Flying into the air, Yang Qi vanished into the clouds, completely confident that his sworn brothers would progress well in their cultivation.

He headed west, moving so quickly that it almost seemed like teleportation. With the power of his Hell Portal, he couldn't quite pierce through space, but he could move much more quickly than before.

Infernal Deity Spear. Infernal Deity Plate Armor. Fiend-Devil Wings. Hellfire Crucible. Hell Portal. With those five abilities, and the power of two hundred ancient megamammoths, his attacks could devastate the land, air, rivers and seas.

He was now an Octonary Lifeseizer, and so much more powerful than he had been during the martial arts competition that it was difficult to quantify. At the very least, he could fight against low-level Legendaries, and thus, this mission to the Heavendawn Quarry seemed less intimidating. Perhaps he would be able to get his hands on that magical treasure after all.

In all fairness, despite the fact that he wasn’t able to decipher the purpose of this mission given him by the chancellor, he felt confident that he wasn’t being plotted against. Why would a Great Sage, someone with a cultivation base so vastly beyond his own, resort to such tactics? It seemed more likely that the dangerous mission was really a test.

Although it would likely be a very dangerous test, it wouldn’t be impossible to succeed. If the chancellor was trying to see how he compared to the Crown Prince, then perhaps that meant it would be possible to gain his support.

If worst came to worst and he simply abandoned the mission, the chancellor would probably just ignore him.

Therefore, it made sense to at least go to the Heavendawn Quarry and look around. If he succeeded, the reward would surely be on the same level as the Gate of the Great Void.

Besides, the mine was also occupied by all sorts of demon-devils. If he could kill some of them, and use their demon cores to get more life force quintessence, it would also advance his cultivation. The sooner he got to Nonary Lifeseizing, and beyond it, the Legendary level, the better.

Time was of the essence.

He needed to achieve that next major breakthrough before the Crown Prince tried to kill him.

**

The Heavendawn Quarry was a huge mining district in the west, although it no longer was used to produce spirit stones. That said, there were still lingering veins of spirit energy in its depths, as well as the occasional pocket of spirit stones. Thus, it was the perfect location for demon-devils to further their cultivation.

The Rich-Lush Continent was a huge place, filled with a multitude of rivers and mountains. Despite how fast Yang Qi could move, it still took him about a day to reach the location of the mine.

It was actually so near the sea that he could see the water off in the distance. It was a place filled with countless towering mountains, and was riddled with all sorts of caves, tunnels, boulders, gullies, and the like.

In the very depths of the mine was a passageway to an alternate dimension, something like an ancient teleportation portal, although its exact location was unknown. There were also countless streams of demon energy wafting to and fro, as well as gigantic hellions lurking in the shadows.

From the levels of power that he could sense, Yang Qi was fairly certain that there were Legendary-level monsters here.

That didn't frighten him, though. After all, he had tangled with the Crown Prince. Therefore, fighting some Legendary hellions would be good training.

The nine transformations of the Legendary level all involved great changes. It wasn't as simple as the Lifeseizing level. No, each transformation involved gaining enlightenment of various magical laws of heaven and earth. None of that was to be taken lightly.

Unfortunately, Yang Qi was not well-versed in what those various transformations were, as such matters were kept secret by the institute.

Chapter 185: Arriving at the Ancient Quarry

The Heavendawn Quarry was a massive place that was impossible to take in with a single glance.

The mining district stretched through numerous mountain ranges that were filled with demon energy. There were also plenty of tunnels and caves that led into the depths of the mine, where magical treasures glittered, and spirit energy abounded. There were also all sorts of stones and gems, as well as locations where the quintessence of the sun and moon had built up over the years.

Yang Qi currently flew in the air over the mountains, and despite the thick cloud cover, could easily see everything down below. He wore his Infernal Deity Plate Armor, the helmet of which featured two glowing eyes that could pierce through to the brightest heights and the darkest depths.

In fact, if Yang Qi practiced cultivation to an extremely high level, the eyes of the godmammoth could supposedly pierce through time itself. It could gaze into the depths of hell, into the most ancient past, into the chiliocosm itself. Eyes like that could make out the tiniest of details, and were essentially all-seeing.

Yang Qi’s eyes weren’t that sharp yet, but they were at least able to pierce through cloud layers and masses of demon energy.

As he looked down at the terrain below, he would consult the map the chancellor had given him, which clearly depicted the winding rivers and complex mountains and valleys.

His destination was none other than the area where the monster was supposedly sealed.

‘I wonder how strong this monster is. And what type of magical treasure was used to seal it. How difficult is this test going to be? The chancellor is a profound schemer, and unfortunately, I have no idea what he’s thinking. Well, I guess I’ll just have to take my chances.’ He did his best to keep his aura reined in. Although the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth had some fiendish elements, it was actually the perfect amalgam of the righteous and the evil.

Considering the Heavendawn Quarry was the territory of powerful demons, if someone who cultivated a righteous technique entered it, they would be like a bright torch on a moonless night. They would immediately attract the wrong kind of attention, and be attacked by hordes of evil creatures.

Given the level of Yang Qi’s cultivation base, he wasn't particularly worried about being attacked, but at the same time, it might make his mission more difficult to accomplish. Furthermore, it could cause complications in regard to getting on the good side of the chancellor, and standing up to the Crown Prince.

Keeping his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth hidden, he slipped down into the mine.

As he moved along, he sensed many powerful demon-devils, and yet, none of them noticed him. Some of that had to do with the Hell Portal.

When he fully completed the portal, he would be able to step through it as a means to pierce through space. After all, if he hid himself in the Nine Serenities or Yellow Springs underworld, not even the legion of gods would be able to see him.

However, he was still perfecting it, and as such, wasn’t able to use it to completely conceal himself, or to travel through space. However, he could draw on his power to create illusory effects around him that were even more profound than those of certain energy arts of invisibility.

At the moment, his energy flow conformed exactly to that of a boulder. Thanks to the Hell Portal, anyone who looked at him would have no way to distinguish him from one of the numerous rocks that filled the area.

Only the most powerful of entities, the type who were at one with nature in every aspect, would possibly be able to pick up on the signs.

Even among Legendaries, such individuals were rare.

In the Demi-Immortal Institute, there were many royal-class energy arts that could be used to cast illusions, or confuse the eyes of others. Such energy arts of invisibility were often what mortals took to be magic. However, such techniques paled in comparison to the Hell Portal’s abilities.

Although energy arts of invisibility were quite useful, Yang Qi had never studied them. With the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, why should he?

“The geography here conforms exactly to the azure dragon, white tiger, vermillion bird, black turtle and flying snake. The five phases are all perfectly represented. It's the perfect location for either a consummate hellion or a genius human.”

The massive Heavendawn Quarry had extremely favorable feng shui, to the point where it almost seemed crafted by human hands.

Of course, in ancient times, it had actually been created by Great Sages of the Demonfolk, which was why the feng shui was so spectacular.

Even as he proceeded along stealthily, pulses of demon-devil energy suddenly battered his face, along with the reek of blood. Moments later, he caught sight of a lake of blood up ahead.

It was thousands of kilometers from end to end, and covered with rolling waves. There was even a blood mist which covered its surface and the surrounding areas.

There, in the middle of the lake, was a stone statue of a blood demon, standing guard over the area.

‘So here we are at Blood Demon Grotto.’ He suddenly thought back to when he had been hunting vampire brigands, and how similar their auras were to what he was sensing now.

Of course, he had been to the Black Floodwyrm Grotto in the Black Sea. And now here he was in front of another grotto. Of course, King Blood Demon wasn’t anywhere close to being as strong as King Black Floodwyrm. The Blood Demon Grotto ranked very low among the seventy-two grottos, which led Yang Qi to feel very curious about what its king was actually like. If he was only in the first transformation of the Legendary level, he wouldn’t be too tough of an opponent. And his demon core would be very useful, as it would have Legendary magical laws in it. That would make Yang Qi’s progress toward Nonary Lifeseizing even smoother.

Heart swelling with ambition, and under a lot of pressure because of the Crown Prince, he decided that now was the time to hunt for Legendary level opponents.

Two years ago, he had been a country bumpkin brat, a so-called elite young one of his clan. Now he was a powerful Lifeseizer, which in the past had been the thing of myth and legend to him. Back then, he had never even heard of the Legendary level. But now, only two short years later, he was closing in on that very level. It was almost unbelievable.

All of a sudden, a group of demon-devils flew out of Blood Demon Grotto, all of them pulsing with powerful auras.

They had blood-red wings that were so powerful that their flapping caused blood-colored tornadoes to spring up as they passed. Unexpectedly, these were Lifeseizers, some of the most powerful experts associated with the Blood Demon Grotto.

“Hmph! We sent Jing Wuxue out to kill some people and finish the Sage Devil Painting, and he couldn’t even do that. Instead he got himself killed by some punks from the Demi-Immortal Institute. Thanks to him, King Blood Demon ended up getting punished by Young Master Shroud-Heaven. It's completely outrageous!”

“Jing Wuxue was nothing but trash,” another of the blood demons said. “Forget about him. He couldn’t do anything right, so it's better that he's dead. By the way, did you hear that the Crown Prince showed up at the four institutes’ martial arts competition? Young Master Shroud-Heaven directly challenged him to a duel in the hopes of killing him. I wonder how the fight is going. Don’t tell me that the young master is really planning to use the Nine-Heavens Ten-Earths Demon-Devil-Horde World-Ending Grand Spell Formation here to kill him?”

Yang Qi had been preparing to leave and work on the chancellor’s mission, then return later to fight the Blood Demon Grotto forces. But after hearing what these blood demons were talking about, he suddenly shrank back into his concealed position.

Right now, he would look like little more than part of the blood mist in the area, and would be impossible for these Lifeseizers to spot.

The Crown Prince. Young Master Shroud-Heaven. And now this Nine-Heavens Ten-Earths Demon-Devil-Horde World-Ending Grand Spell Formation? How could such terms not prick his ears?

“He is,” a female blood demon said. “A Great Sage of the Demonfolk left some Demon Sage power in the depths of the Heavendawn Quarry. However, it's fused with the baleful earthly powers, making it very difficult to tap into. That doesn't stop it from influencing the terrain in the mining region as a whole, though. Otherwise, the righteous sects would have tried long ago to take this place over. Why do you think it’s so easy for us Demonfolk to remain here undisturbed?”

This female blood demon was clad in thin strips of red silk, and was so incredibly alluring that most human men would instantly be entranced by her. Furthermore, from the way she carried herself, she was clearly the leader of the group.

“Why haven’t the people from the Shroud-Heaven Alliance come yet?” she said, looking off into the distance. “If they don’t hurry, they’ll be too late. Considering they don’t have any demon-devil aura, I wonder if the formation’s Demon Sage energy will harm them.”

“It won’t,” said another of the blood demons. Chuckling coldly, he continued, “Young Master Shroud-Heaven prepared for that. He imparted some demonic cultivation arts to the cultivators from the Shroud-Heaven Alliance. Not only does it make them stronger, but it transforms their life force, slowly turning them into Demonfolk. That technique was recently created by Great Sage Shroud-Heaven, with the specific purpose of transforming everyone in the Rich-Lush Continent into powerful Demonfolk. In fact, he intends to spread it to other continents as well.”

“Before long, none of the continents will have humans any longer, only Demonfolk.”

“Well, who knows what will happen in the end. It’s not like the four institutes are just going to let a technique like that spread. They’ll definitely make it illegal and try to kill anyone who cultivates it.”

“Who do you think is going to come out on top this time, the Crown Prince, or Young Master Shroud-Heaven?”

“How should I know?” the female blood demon said. “That Crown Prince is a terrifying person. He’s a god from heaven descended into the mortal world, you know. His mother dreamed of falling stars, which was how he was born. He’ll definitely become a Great Sage eventually. On the other hand, Young Master Shroud-Heaven is dead set on revenge. He actually begged for help from numerous Great Sages from the Hanging Mountain, all to open the Sura Portal. By training in the Hell of Suras, one can acquire an iron heart, and incredible battle prowess. Who knows, maybe he's a match for the Crown Prince now. They’re currently fighting somewhere deep in the void. Young Master Shroud-Heaven is just waiting for the spell formation to be complete. Once it is, he’ll lure the Crown Prince back here and kill him!”

“What? The Hell of Suras? According to the stories, that's one of the most ancient hells, a place of endless fighting and battle. How could Young Master Shroud-Heaven treat himself with such cruelty?”

Chapter 186: Deadly Spell Formation

Young Master Shroud-Heaven was working with numerous demon-devils, plus his so-called Shroud-Heaven Alliance, to activate a massive spell formation in the Heavendawn Quarry, and use it to kill the Crown Prince.

Yang Qi had learned that, plus many other interesting tidbits. For example, he now knew that the Hanging Mountain had opened a passageway to the Hell of Suras, to give Young Master Shroud-Heaven a place to further his cultivation and prepare for the fight.

Among the innumerable different hells, the Hell of Suras was known as a fierce and terrifying place. It ranked far higher than the Hell of Euphoria, the Hell of Never-Ending, or other such places. According to many ancient records, the Hell of Suras was a place of evil fiends and devils. Far in the past, suras and fiend-devils were the strongest fighters of all, and were often appointed as leaders of the armies of hell. They were the ones who led the fight against the gods of heaven.

The devil-ghost inhabitants of a hell like that were not the type that ordinary humans could fight.

In fact, if the Great Sages of the past had accidentally connected to the Hell of Suras instead of the Hell of Euphoria, the Yore-Wilds Continent would likely have been destroyed.

That was where Young Master Shroud-Heaven had supposedly trained, and yet, Yang Qi had the feeling it was only a rumor. Thanks to his cultivation of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, he innately understood certain things about hell, and could open a portal, not to the Hell of Suras, but to an aspect of space-time that had been influenced by it, where the fiend-devils were mighty to the extreme.

After all, even a Great Sage who entered the Hell of Suras would be ripped to pieces and consumed within a matter of moments.

Therefore, even getting close to the Hell of Suras, and training with the entities who had been influenced by it, would be a major affair. The Hell of Suras was known as a place of battle, and the worlds that existed in the space-time around it were so filled with a will of battle that the entities there were all demonized, and looked just like suras and fiend-devils.

Yang Qi knew of such matters, and also realized that the Rich-Lush Continent was a small place, essentially a tiny chunk of the Yore-Wilds Continent of the past. And even the Yore-Wilds Continent had been little more than a drop in the ocean of the universe at large.

The ultimate size of the universe was something Yang Qi couldn’t even begin to wrap his mind around.

And as for the heaven that the legion of gods inhabited, he had no idea where it was, and in fact, couldn’t even speculate about it. After all, in the Demi-Immortal Institute, even conclave students could only cultivate royal-class energy arts. Imperial-class energy arts were as rare as phoenix feathers or qilin horns, and when it came to saintly- or heavenly-class, they were unheard-of.

At the moment, Yang Qi lay in hiding and continued to eavesdrop on the blood demons.

All of a sudden, a whistling scream could be heard from far off in the distance. Then, a massive beam of sword light became visible, piercing through the sea of clouds toward Blood Demon Grotto. The terrifying sword energy was so powerful that the entire lake of blood was whipped up into a fury.

The blood demons present all began to back away, looks of terror on their faces.

Then, the sword light faded away, revealing a group of people led by a man in a white robe, who stood there ramrod straight, pulsing with an intense sword energy that was far more powerful than the Patriarch Frost-Drake that Yang Qi had encountered in the past.

This man was a Legendary.

“Swordguru Flying-Cloud!” one of the female blood demons exclaimed.

“Correct. I'm Swordguru Flying-Cloud, leader of the Hall of the Flying-Cloud Sword Dao.” Swordguru Flying-Cloud seemed to emanate the sharpness of a sword, to the point where the surrounding blood-colored mists were collapsing because of his mere presence. “I'm also one of the eighteen leaders of the Shroud-Heaven Alliance. Now, where is King Blood Demon? Young Master Shroud-Heaven has ordered me to work with him to activate this section of the Nine-Heavens Ten-Earths Demon-Devil-Horde World-Ending Grand Spell Formation. Then, we merely need to wait for the Crown Prince of the Demi-Immortal Institute to fall into the trap. Other leaders of the Shroud-Heaven Alliance are already taking their places in other locations of the Heavendawn Quarry, waiting to do the same with other fiend-devil viscounts.”

Not waiting for a response, Swordguru Flying-Cloud spoke in a voice that stabbed like a sword into the depths of the blood-colored lake. “King Blood Demon, show your face!”

BOOOOOOOM!

A massive wave of blood rolled out as a Legendary figure appeared, clad in a blood-colored robe, who emanated shocking levels of power. He was a blood demon, but he looked like a human in every aspect. Furthermore, there was a massive, blood-red canopy that floated over his head, swirling nonstop like some sort of crimson lotus flower.

This was one of the demon kings of the seventy-two grottos, King Blood Demon, an expert powerful enough to stain the sea of clouds red as if with blood.

“You’re just in time, Swordguru Flying-Cloud,” King Blood Demon said, his bright red eyes flickering. “I've been waiting for a while now. There’s no time to lose. We need to carry out the task assigned by Young Master Shroud-Heaven as quickly as possible. Send your men to those mountain peaks over there. All of them are nodes in the spell formation that need to be maintained. Looks like you brought just enough people.”

“Of course I did,” Swordguru Flying-Cloud replied. “Young Master Shroud-Heaven has been setting up this trap for who knows how long. It’s only natural that I would come fully prepared. Very well, let’s begin.”

As the orders were passed down, whooshing sounds could be heard as people began flying toward the various caves on the tops of the nearby mountain peaks.

Swordguru Flying-Cloud and King Blood Demon took positions in the middle of the blood lake, where they sent out streams of true energy to take control of the spirit lodes in the area.

**

Keeping out of sight, Yang Qi crept closer to one of the mountains.

After all, the cave in that mountain was occupied by someone he recognized: Patriarch Frost-Drake.

**

“Dammit,” Patriarch Frost-Drake grumbled. “If that brat hadn’t taken my Ice-Soul God-Sword, then I'd be a Legendary by now, I wouldn’t be any weaker than that Swordguru Flying-Cloud. Unfortunately, I'm little more than an ordinary henchman now.”

After making his way into the dark depths of the tunnel, Patriarch Frost-Drake found an area filled with complex decorations depicting horrific scenes of torment from hell.

In the center of it all was a column decorated with totemic markings, images of extremely realistic devil-gods that belched out demon energy and emitted soundless screams.

Looking leerily at the devil-god totems, Patriarch Frost-Drake sat down. “I wonder if Young Master Shroud-Heaven is actually going to kill that fabled Crown Prince. The Crown Prince is supposed to be a god from heaven descended into the mortal world. He’s definitely nobody to take lightly. Hmm. This column has the souls of numerous devil-gods imprisoned in it. Once the spell formation is activated, I need to feed it with my own blood. It’s going to be damaging, but supposedly, we’ll get compensated after the fact. Of course, we won’t get any compensation at all if Young Master Shroud-Heaven doesn't win.”

Gritting his teeth, Patriarch Frost-Drake muttered half to himself, “Damnation! If I ever run into that little punk again, I'm definitely going to use the power of Young Master Shroud-Heaven to chop him to pieces!”

“Oh really? I'm right here. Chop away.” Sealing the entire cave, Yang Qi stepped out into the open.

“It’s you…! Y-y-you….”

Patriarch Frost-Drake leaped to his feet and dashed toward the entrance of the cave in the hopes of calling for help.

Of course, it was a doomed effort. Yang Qi had been prepared for just that. Waving his hand, he summoned a True Energy Megahand that forced Patriarch Frost-Drake to the ground.

He was now like a squashed toad, incapable of rising to his feet.

“I put you in your place back then, Patriarch Frost-Drake, and I'm hundreds of times stronger now. I could kill you with the snap of a finger. You're like a ball of dough, just waiting to be squished whichever way I want. Understand? Fight back, I’ll kill you and disperse both your spiritual and physical souls.”

“I won’t! I wouldn’t dare!” Patriarch Frost-Drake groveled, knocking his head onto the ground as he kowtowed.

“Very well, that’s much better.” With that, he dissipated the True Energy Megahand, allowing Patriarch Frost-Drake to rise to his feet. Of course, Patriarch Frost-Drake didn’t dare to talk back, although he couldn’t help but wonder why he was being plagued by this fiend again.

“Tell me what’s going on here,” Yang Qi said. “You people are trying to kill the Crown Prince?”

Patriarch Frost-Drake didn’t dare to hide anything. “That’s right. Young Master Shroud-Heaven has mobilized everyone from the Shroud-Heaven Alliance. They’re here in the Heavendawn Quarry, ready to power an ancient spell formation that can kill the Crown Prince.”

Yang Qi’s eyes flashed. “How come I wasn’t aware that there was a spell formation like that here?”

“It was a secret known only by the Demonfolk from the Hanging Mountain,” Patriarch Frost-Drake replied. “Even I just found out about it. Apparently, Great Sages of the Demonfolk hid a spell formation of immense power in the Heavendawn Quarry, long ago. Young Master Shroud-Heaven called on everyone to help, including the demon kings of the seventy-two grottos, and the fiend-devil viscounts from Fiend-Devil Island. He even got a fiend-devil count to help.”

Fiend-devil viscounts were all Quinary Lifeseizers or higher, and the counts were Legendaries. That much Yang Qi had personally learned on Fiend-Devil Island.

“Oh really? Presumably, you have a map of the formation, correct? I'm curious to see how exactly it works.” Yang Qi reached out his hand expectantly.

“Of course I do. Young Master Shroud-Heaven distributed these to everyone in the alliance, and we’ve been training with it for days. Here, take a look.” With that, Patriarch Frost-Drake used his true energy to summon a huge map, complete with mountains, valleys, tunnels, and the like. After examining it for only a moment, Yang Qi noticed something strange.

“What's that?” In the very middle of the map was what appeared to be a wide-open plain, in the middle of which was a sphere that resembled a fear-inspiring eye.

“The very middle of the spell formation is called the Sura Devil-Eye.”

“What?” Yang Qi was immediately struck with immense shock as he realized that he recognized the location from his own map. It was the same place where the monster he sought was sealed. Now, he couldn’t help but feel even more confused about what the chancellor was up to.

Chapter 187: Sura Devil-Eye

‘What exactly is going on here? Why is the monster that the chancellor sent me after located in the eye of the Heavendawn Quarry’s enormous spell formation? Sura Devil-Eye? Don’t tell me… that Young Master Shroud-Heaven plans to kill the Crown Prince in the eye itself?’

Not only was Yang Qi shocked, he was starting to think that there must be some deeper, more important reason the chancellor had sent him here. It was obviously no mere test.

The chancellor’s motives seemed impossible to discern. However, after a moment of thinking, an idea occurred to Yang Qi.

‘Hold on. I need to think about this carefully….’

He reviewed all of the information he had so far, but couldn't come up with any further theories. And that feeling of ignorance was profoundly unsettling.

‘Young Master Shroud-Heaven invited the demon kings of the seventy-two grottos, a host of fiend-devils, and numerous experts from the Shroud-Heaven Alliance, all to operate this ancient, deadly spell formation. And the purpose is to put an end to the Crown Prince. It seems a foregone conclusion that the Crown Prince is going to end up getting killed. But the chancellor is no simpleton. He must be privy to some secret or another, and thus sent me to try to damage or destroy the spell formation eye. Does he want me to save the Crown Prince? The Crown Prince is my enemy, and the chancellor knows it. Why would he send me here to save my enemy?

‘Back during the competition, he tried to kill me and my sworn brothers, and even went so far as to steal the Gate of the Great Void. He’s stated outright that he will destroy me or die in the attempt. The first thing he’ll do after taking care of Young Master Shroud-Heaven will be to come after me. There’s no doubt about any of that. So why would the chancellor send me to help him? It seems to me he’s on the Crown Prince’s side. Although, considering the level of his cultivation base, that’s not necessarily the case….’

As Yang Qi stood there wrapped up in his thoughts, Patriarch Frost-Drake remained silent, not daring to say a word.

Yang Qi tried to put himself in the chancellor’s shoes, and figure out what he was thinking. After a moment, another idea struck him. ‘That must be it. I’d say it’s highly likely that the chancellor wants me to resolve my differences with the Crown Prince. If I go into the Sura Devil-Eye, and accomplish my mission, it will weaken the devil-eye, and make it impossible for Young Master Shroud-Heaven to trap the Crown Prince. That, in turn, will allow the Crown Prince to defeat Young Master Shroud-Heaven, ostensibly with my help. Afterward, the chancellor will point out that fact to the Crown Prince, and say that, given how I helped out, he should let old matters drop. The chancellor is trying to kill two birds with one stone. Very clever and shrewd. This chancellor is definitely on another level than me. I guess that’s what you would expect from a Great Sage.’

If Yang Qi damaged the devil-eye and weakened the spell formation, it would be a big help to the Crown Prince, and perhaps the chancellor could convince him that letting Yang Qi live was the best thing for the institute. And the chancellor didn't tell Yang Qi the complete truth because he hoped he would unwittingly accomplish his mission and aid the Crown Prince.

When all was said and done, a big grudge would have been resolved.

Yang Qi couldn’t help but admire the chancellor’s skill in scheming. It was with seemingly casual ease that he set everything in place to fix a major problem.

Sadly, Yang Qi quickly saw through his plans.

‘If I did it,’ he thought, his expression turning grim, ‘it would definitely be a big service to the Crown Prince, and would probably resolve the deadly crisis….’

He suddenly shot to his feet and began pacing back and forth in the cave, startling Patriarch Frost-Drake, who scrambled backward and nearly fell down in the process.

‘You made a big mistake, Chancellor,’ Yang Qi thought as he stomped back and forth. ‘You misjudged me. There’s no way I’ll stoop to helping the Crown Prince. He refused to show me mercy, and as a true man, there’s no way I’ll stand for such bullying. Even if he let me off the hook, I won’t do the same for him. Turn hostility into friendship? Never! I’ll fight him as long as I have blood pumping in my veins.’

Yang Qi had made his decision, and would not play the chancellor’s game. He would not live in humiliation.

He would fight!

He would do battle with the Crown Prince down to the bitter end, and wouldn’t let a single chance to kill the man pass by. And in fact, he was now facing an extremely rare opportunity to do just that.

Sitting down cross-legged, he thought, ‘Forget the chancellor’s mission. I'm going to bury the Crown Prince in this place. Should I wait patiently and watch how the situation develops? Or do something else? No, the chancellor is too tricky. There must be more to his plan regarding that monster. And I bet he even took into consideration that I might just stay on the sidelines and refrain from interfering. I need to get into the Sura Devil-Eye and see how the chancellor has set things up, and what traps he might have laid. Whatever he wants me to do, I’ll do the opposite. I’ll make sure his plan fails, and that the Crown Prince gets killed this very day!’

No matter how he thought about it, the best idea seemed to be to go into the Sura Devil-Eye and place himself right in the middle of the action. That would be the best way to wreck the chancellor’s plan and see the Crown Prince dead.

With that, he reached out and gently slapped Patriarch Frost-Drake’s torso, sending a stream of true energy into him. “Alright, Patriarch Frost-Drake, listen well. I've put some true energy inside of you, and if you screw up, it will explode. You wait here for me. I’ll return shortly with a task for you.”

With that, he blurred into motion, vanishing in the blink of an eye.

Using the Hell Portal to mask his cultivation base, he made his way through the wretch energy into the depths of the mine. The deeper he got, the more often he encountered raw spirit stones that seemed to bubble with immense power.

However, he ignored them, and kept his course set on the Sura Devil-Eye.

In the middle of the Heavendawn Quarry was an enormous mine shaft that had supposedly been hewn out by greater demons of the past, in their attempt to mine godstones. Later, the mine went dry, and the greater demons and giant-devils sacrificed various living creatures to the deities they worshipped in the hope of contacting the Hell of Suras for help.

Eventually, that location became the Sura Devil-Eye, the center of a spell formation fueled by the power of ancient Demonfolk Great Sages. Nowadays, it was a place of such profound evil that not even members of the Demonfolk would enter it lightly, for fear of meeting terrible catastrophe.

And now, Yang Qi was preparing to head directly in and see what was inside.

This Sura Devil-Eye was far, far more powerful than a Deathly Devil-Eye or Preheaven Devil-Eye.

Soon, he was able to catch sight of the location itself. It seemed to pulse with an intense feeling of war, a murderous, devilish will that made the entire place seem like a battlefield, rife with blood, slaughter, and massive armies of monsters. This was a place without even a shred of mercy, only endless fighting.

The will of battle here would cause even Quaternary Lifeseizers to be devilized. In fact, even Nonary Lifeseizers who stayed long enough would be eaten away by the sura energy, and transformed into monsters.

From that it could be seen how terrifying of a place the chancellor had dispatched Yang Qi to for this mission.

Thankfully, Yang Qi had his Hell Portal, Hellfire Crucible, and the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. The sura power which emanated from the Sura Devil-Eye was one of the highest levels of power in hell, but that only meant it was the perfect fuel for the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, and could even be used to push his Hell Portal to a higher level.

Fiend-devils would be terrified of that energy, but to Yang Qi, it was just as beneficial as Nine-Yang Immortal Energy.

As he flew down into the mine shaft that was the Sura Devil-Eye, a hair-raisingly terrifying sensation swept over him. The mine shaft really did seem like an enormous eye, in the depths of which was some profoundly evil entity, something that could defile heaven as easily as blowing some dust off the ground.

As for the raging sura power, as soon as it touched Yang Qi, his Hellfire Crucible, Infernal Deity Plate Armor, Infernal Deity Spear and Fiend-Devil Wings all seemed to thrum with excitement.

He immediately began to absorb it, and as a result, could feel that the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth was pleased. At the same time, his cultivation base, martial arts instincts, and fighting stances were all being thoroughly refined. It was almost as if some grandmaster of martial arts were imparting all of his secrets and experiences to him.

What were suras? Of all the entities in all the hells, they were the most adept at waging war. They lived to fight, and their martial arts experience gave them unprecedented advantages. An ordinary person who encountered the power of the suras would instantly be ten times better at martial arts, perhaps even a hundred or a thousand times better. Unfortunately, they would also turn into a bloodthirsty monster.

But not Yang Qi.

As he absorbed the sura power, he could see the Hell of Suras, and could see countless suras locked in combat. Every stance they unleashed could shake heaven and earth, and their command of the magical laws of heaven and earth, and of the ways of combat, were simply unmatchable.

Suddenly, Yang Qi received enlightenment about the nature of combat.

This was war!

Crick. Crack!

The true energy of his Infernal Deity Spear changed as numerous magical symbols appeared on it. It also thrummed with the Nightfall Symphony.

Supposedly, when the Infernal Deity Spear unleashed the Nightfall Symphony on the world, ordinary living creatures would be killed instantly, and their souls extracted.

The symphony was composed of many musical notes, but before, Yang Qi only had enlightenment of a few of them, not the complete score. Now, with the sura power, the entire piece was playing out in his mind, causing the nature of his martial arts to grow far more powerful.

WHOOSH!

Reveling in the sensation, he descended further into the Sura Devil-Eye. As he did, the sura power grew stronger, and the benefits to him more profound. In fact, he had the feeling that he might reach Nonary Lifeseizing here.

Chapter 188: Sealed Asura

It was exactly as Yang Qi had anticipated.

The sura power only grew stronger the farther down he went into the Sura Devil-Eye. It was black, tinged with dark violet, and it clumped up like blood, until it looked almost crystalline in nature.

That power was like the sharpest glittering diamond, able to cut anything in its path. Even the most powerful magical treasures or defensive empyrean energies would be stabbed through by it. And once it entered the body of a person, they would be quickly devilized, transformed into a half-sura, a ferocious monster of the most evil nature.

However, when that sura power entered Yang Qi’s acupoints and meridians, it was subjugated by the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, and began to form something that looked like the image of a tiny person.

This was not a true energy vestige.

After reaching Quinary Lifeseizing, one strengthened the flesh and blood, until true energy vestiges appeared in it. By fueling those vestiges with more true energy, one’s life force and body structure would become vastly stronger, and one’s sea of energy would become more vast.

Later, during Senary, Septenary, and Octonary Lifeseizing, the true energy vestiges would become so strong that they eventually became nascent embryos, and eventually, nascent divinities. That was the point when one would break through to Nonary Lifeseizing.

Nonary Lifeseizers were sometimes called another name: Acupoint Divinities. The meaning behind the name was the fact that their true energy became like nascent divinities, crystalized into their acupoints, where they were forced to undergo drastic transformations.

In the end, when the true energy and nascent divinities were ready, the Lifeseizer could attempt to break through to the Legendary level.

In the Legendary level, all of those divinities would combine into one, becoming immense power that would reside in the sea of energy. Then the power would erupt, and the body would transform. It would be cleansed by the vital energy of heaven and earth, and the practitioner would be one with all creation, and become a Legendary.

Of course, if they failed in the attempt, they would be crushed into dust.

Yang Qi had been present on Manyflowers Peak when Holy Daughter Manyflowers experienced her Legendary tribulation, and had seen the countless bolts of lightning form a huge bell which surrounded the mountain. Its tolling nearly reduced the mountain to rubble, except that Holy Daughter Manyflowers was an exceptional talent, and had successfully passed the tribulation.

Now, thanks to the stimulation provided by the sura power, Yang Qi’s true energy vestiges were transforming, becoming tiny people formed of true energy, which were none other than true energy nascent divinities. As of this moment, he had already begun to break through to Nonary Lifeseizing.

Even more noteworthy was that the true energy nascent divinities in his acupoints were different from the ordinary type.

Most Lifeseizers had true energy nascent divinities that looked like miniature transcendent beings. In contrast, Yang Qi’s nascent divinities seemed enormous, and completely vicious-looking. They were armored, and pulsed with devil energy. They also carried weapons, including wolf-fang swords, sawtooth sabers, bone canes, sickles, spears, funerary staffs, nooses, hooks, and even more. They were ferocious to the extreme, making it seem like an army of evil ghosts from hell were occupying his body.

They were ghostly suras, and even more shocking than their mere existence was the fact that they were in the middle of performing all sorts of profound martial arts, techniques Yang Qi had acquired by mere contact with the sura power. If an expert from an evil sect could peer into Yang Qi with divine will, he would see profound truths relating to the martial arts of such sects. Even just a smattering of the moves on display here would be enough to accomplish all sorts of ambitious and ruthless goals.

For all intents and purposes, the tiny suras in Yang Qi’s acupoints were a treasure house of martial disciplines.

Furthermore, as he continued to absorb the sura power, the techniques grew more and more complete. Soon, the tiny suras inside him were like gods of martial arts and war, fiend-devils who could slaughter anything and everything in their path.

‘Incredible! This sura power is even better than the Nine-Yang Immortal Energy. This is the true energy of hell, perfect for the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.’ As he descended into the Sura Devil-Eye, it got easier and easier to use his Hell Portal.

Eventually, he dispensed with the Hellfire Crucible and the Hell Portal, and simply absorbed the energy directly, which seemed even more effective.

As he did, it almost sounded like iron fetters were being loosened in his mind.

Sura power poured into him with mountain-like force, and yet, he was a fish in water. He even closed his eyes as he continued downward into the Sura Devil-Eye.

Eventually, his foot touched onto solid ground. Opening his eyes, he saw an enormous spell formation, which was rife with the stench of blood. In the middle of it was a palace filled with steel chains. Apparently, those chains were some sort of godsteel designed to constrain devil-ghosts. In fact, they were very much like the Quake-Dawn godsteel that bound the imprisoned Ghost Emperor Yama.

It was pitch dark inside the palace, but Yang Qi could still see clearly. There, amidst all the steel chains, was some sort of hulking devil-ghost. He was fully three hundred meters tall, with a boney, violet exoskeleton.

He pulsed with a will of battle, and raw sura power that rolled off him in waves.

Apparently, the sura power in the Sura Devil-Eye came from this creature. In other words, everything Yang Qi had benefited from up to this point was merely excess energy from this beast.

‘Is this a fiend-devil from the Hell of Suras? A fabled asura!?’ Although Yang Qi was shocked, from what he could tell, this devil-ghost was not as strong as Ghost Emperor Yama in terms of cultivation level, but his life force substructure was apparently far stronger.

After all, Ghost Emperor Yama was from the Rich-Lush Continent, and although he was a Great Sage, was inherently weak. In contrast, this asura, who was only at the Legendary level, originally came from the Hell of Suras, and thus was inherently more powerful.

In fact, it seemed to Yang Qi that if he were freed, he would be able to take on the Crown Prince.

He was an entity that, given Yang Qi’s current cultivation base, he couldn’t kill even if he tried. Besides, as one of the most powerful types of devil-gods from hell, this asura’s life force was so powerful that, if he were to be killed in combat, he would be reborn almost instantly.

Numerous paper talismans could be seen at the asura’s feet, an ancient spell formation which pulsed with demon energy. Obviously, it was the work of whatever Great Sage of the Demonfolk had sealed this asura here.

As he studied the formation, Yang Qi could sense that one part of it was different from the others. In a far corner of the formation, there was a character written in blood. It read ‘Demi-Immortal’. It looked ancient, and it was impossible to say who exactly had written it, but to Yang Qi it seemed very much like the work of someone from the Demi-Immortal Institute.

It seemed highly likely that it had been written by the chancellor. After all, he had mentioned that he found a monster in the Heavendawn Quarry when he was young, and that he had sealed the creature.

However, the truth was obvious; the asura had been sealed by the ancient Demonfolk Great Sages, not by the chancellor. The chancellor had only added a sealing mark that could be utilized in some moment of great danger.

‘That must be what’s going on!’ Yang Qi thought. Instead of entering the hall, he took the time to study the spell formation in more detail. Every part of it, including the area with the ‘Demi-Immortal’ character on it, seemed to be jumping up and down with life. It almost seemed alive.

Yang Qi was no expert with spell formations, and didn’t understand their most enigmatic secrets. However, based on what he did understand, he could reach certain conclusions.

‘It seems extremely likely that Young Master Shroud-Heaven knows there’s an asura sealed here, an asura no weaker than the Crown Prince. Therefore, he hopes to use his Nine-Heavens Ten-Earths Demon-Devil-Horde World-Ending Grand Spell Formation to trap the Crown Prince, then unleash this asura on him. Of course, he couldn’t possibly control the asura after releasing it. Perhaps he hopes to assimilate him?’

Yang Qi thought about the situation a bit more. ‘The chancellor wanted me to come here and kill a monster. Obviously, this thing is the monster. And supposedly, my reward is here too? But where? I don’t see anything particularly special. That ‘Demi-Immortal’ character isn’t the treasure, that’s for sure. Don’t tell me he wants me to actually enter the hall? This mission is crazy. There’s no way I can actually kill that thing. Maybe if I was a Legendary, I could take on an asura. But right now, there’s no possible way. Perhaps the chancellor left behind some object or weapon that would make the job possible.’

After more consideration, he realized that, as the saying went, you can’t catch tiger cubs without entering the tiger’s lair. It seemed the only option was to enter the hall, no matter how dangerous it seemed.

As he neared the malignant asura, his cultivation base benefited more and more. If only he could melt that thing in his Hellfire Crucible, he would be able to reach the Legendary level, and perhaps achieve multiple transformations within it. Then he could definitely dominate the Crown Prince.

However, that didn’t seem like a realistic plan. Even if the asura willingly entered the Hellfire Crucible, Yang Qi would probably still die as a result. Not even ten of himself put together was strong enough for that right now.

After a bit more thought, he activated his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth and stepped into the hall.

As he did, the clink of chains could be heard as the asura apparently sensed what was happening, and opened his eyes.

The entire hall burst into flames fueled by sura power, causing a wave of heat to envelop Yang Qi.

Chapter 189: A Chat

Sura power became sura flames, far more powerful than anything up to this point. In fact, the invincible fire took the shape of devil-ghosts and demonlings, vicious things that could vanquish all types of energy arts and vital power.

Compared to this type of fire, the flames of the Cosmic Sunflare Sword were like nothing. In fact, no energy arts could really compare to it. When it burned souls to death, they would become the suras and devils that would later appear within the flame to augment its power.

When sura flames killed a person, that person’s soul became part of the fire.

As the flames slammed into Yang Qi, the true energy of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth hissed and sparked, and he felt like his bones were weakening.

It almost seemed like he was going to be absorbed and eaten up by the fire.

‘The hell-crushing godmammoths could subdue suras as well.’

There was no time to sit around worrying about what was happening. Yang Qi immediately called upon his strongest technique, summoning the Hell Portal, which began to suck in the flames and convert them into power that he could use.

Instantly, the amount of sura power he could benefit from reached new heights.

He was using the life force of this asura to refine his own energy arts and cultivation base. He was now an Octonary Lifeseizer, but his true energy vestiges had transformed into nascent divinities, something from Nonary Lifeseizing. All he had to do was push his cultivation a bit more, and he could fully break through, and be right on the cusp of reaching the Legendary level.

Of course, stepping from Nonary Lifeseizing into the Legendary level was a massively difficult undertaking.

It would be difficult to say how many Nonary Lifeseizers throughout history failed to become Legendaries, and reached the ends of their incredible lifespans, whereupon they returned to the dust.

However, Yang Qi was confident that he would succeed.

As the sura flames poured into him, his true energy nascent divinities grew stronger, and their martial arts forms more clear and profound. After all, their martial arts were legacies of this ancient asura.

Any asura could be considered a grandmaster of martial disciplines. Every form and stance they knew had been practiced millions of times, and were the type that few could stand against.

Now that Yang Qi was in this asura’s hall, he wasn’t thinking about the sealing marks, but rather, was working on his cultivation. If he could reach Nonary Lifeseizing, he would be at the peak of his current level, and so close to the Legendary level that his battle prowess would be vastly superior to before.

However, it was at this point that the sound of clinking chains once again rang out, and an enormous head stooped down to look at him. It was hideous to the extreme, with green skin, long fangs, white hair, and red eyes. All in all, it looked far more terrifying than even a ten-thousand-year-old corpse king.

The asura had finally detected Yang Qi’s aura, and was now looking into what type of person could possibly be here absorbing his sura flame.

A powerful will filled the hall as the asura said, “I can’t believe you can absorb my sura flame. Who exactly are you? Don’t tell me you’re one of the Devilfolk too? Wait, is that the godpower of the sura people that I sense on you? The Hell of Suras exists far, far away from this damnable continent. Who would ever have thought I would encounter one of my people here?”

Yang Qi immediately backed up and looked at the enormous asura staring at him curiously.

“That's right,” he said, “I do have sura power in me, and the blood of the sura people. I’m not scared of you.” It was outright rubbish, except the last sentence. He knew the asura was sealed, and thus incapable of doing anything to him. In fact, he wasn’t even worried if the asura saw through his deception. His main goal was to see what he could get from the thing.

“So, you are one of my people!” The asura shook his head briefly, causing the sura flames to leap into the air. “Did you come here to free me? If you do, I’ll bless you to no end. In fact, I can even give you the correct method to cultivate with sura power. It seems your current energy arts actually have a lot of flaws! You might be able to absorb my power now, but eventually, the baleful energy within it will transform you into a monster.”

“Oh?” Yang Qi’s mind was racing as he tried to decide what to do next. Obviously, the asura was just toying with him. Any expert would be able to tell that Yang Qi’s energy arts were incredibly powerful. And this crafty, ancient asura was no exception. Furthermore, Yang Qi couldn’t help but wonder if the talk of flaws was some sort of trap.

Instead of contradicting the asura, he acted like he was afraid. “Really? I'm actually a disciple from a famous orthodox sect. I just happened to come across this spectacular technique that lets me absorb any type of evil energy in the world. The reason I told you I have the blood of suras in me is that I was worried you might kill me.”

The asura burst out into laughter, and the flames in the hall surged with even more heat and light. “I am Akkhongž, a general among the sura people. Why would I kill a child like you? That’s what you are to me, you know. A child. Even without the blood of suras in you, you don’t need to worry. Look, I’ve been alone in here for a long time, so just being able to chat with you is actually wonderful. Why don’t you demonstrate your energy arts for me? I can help you improve them a bit! As you probably know, the sura people are the ultimate masters of martial arts. We can spot flaws in any technique we see.”

“Is that so?” Yang Qi could already tell that, just like Ghost Emperor Yama, this asura was after his technique. “Well, I’m sorry to say that, when I got the technique, I swore an oath not to share it with anyone.”

“Oh, I see. That's fine. Just wait until you absorb enough of the sura power and start feeling uncomfortable. At that point you’ll probably understand the flaws on your own. By the way, what's the situation outside? And how did you end up in this Sura Devil-Eye?” The asura was clearly hoping to give Yang Qi enough rope to hang himself, and was thus pretending that he didn’t care about the technique.

“I’m from the Demi-Immortal Institute. Our chancellor told me that there was some sort of monster sealed in this place. Considering that my technique is the bane of wretch energy, he sent me here to try to take that monster’s magical treasure, and also kill it.” Yang Qi hoped that by simply telling the truth, he might get some more insight into what the chancellor’s true plan was.

For one thing, he had no idea what the chancellor’s ‘Demi-Immortal’ sealing mark did. Messing with it in ignorance might only further the chancellor’s plan, and save the Crown Prince from disaster. In contrast, this asura likely knew all about the chancellor, and might end up shedding some light on the matter.

“So, it was that contemptible parasite!” The asura suddenly seethed with killing intent so boundless that it forced Yang Qi back a few steps. “He’s a treacherous schemer to the core, and impossible to read. He stole from me, and stole secrets of the ancient Great Sages of the Demonfolk. Despite being trapped here, I managed to figure out what those Great Sages had hidden here. Unfortunately, he conned me, and took my Heavendawn Treatise. Then he strengthened the sealing marks, making it even more impossible for me to escape. In any case, it's wonderful that you’re here. After all, he left behind a heaven-shaking, earth-shattering magical treasure called the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, which is linked to the demon formation here. Once that demon formation is activated, the Grand Emperor's Pagoda can control a large portion of it.”

Yang Qi nodded. “On my way in, I noticed quite a few Demonfolk outside trying to take control of the spell formation. Seems that wouldn’t be good for you, would it?”

“No, it wouldn’t. Those Demonfolk are trying to use the formation to melt me and make me an out-of-body incarnation for one of their leaders. Unfortunately, their efforts are all in vain. The Grand Emperor's Pagoda forms the nucleus of the spell formation, and is controlled by someone else. If they pour enough power into it, the Grand Emperor's Pagoda will fly away of its own accord, right into the hands of that despicable chancellor of yours. Of course, it's not like I’m completely powerless here. I realized long ago what was happening, and managed to secretly send some of my own power in to the pagoda, which will make it less responsive. Unfortunately, it’s a miraculous treasure from the distant past that not even I can refine for my own use. However, if you're really from the Demi-Immortal Institute, then maybe you could be of some aid. If you can help me take control of the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, I’ll become invincible! I’ll definitely break through to the Great Sage level, and become a greater asura!”

Yang Qi plastered a begrudging look onto his face. “Uh… what type of magical treasure is this Grand Emperor's Pagoda? It’s strong enough to get you into the Great Sage level?”

“What. Don’t want to help? You think the Grand Emperor's Pagoda belongs to you or something? You're wrong. Let me tell you, that despicable chancellor of yours tricked you. Even if you got the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, you wouldn’t be able to use it. Your cultivation base is definitely too low. The pagoda was created in antiquity; it’s a weapon forged by an actual grand emperor! It has too many functions to list out, but one of the most noteworthy is providing power for breakthroughs. The whole reason your chancellor left the pagoda hidden here was so that it could absorb me, convert me into raw power, and give it to someone to break through to the Great Sage level. There’s simply no way that damn chancellor meant for the Grand Emperor's Pagoda to go to you. Most likely, it’s intended for his apprentice, that expert in the ninth Legendary transformation.”

In that moment, Yang Qi’s eyes lit up with understanding. ‘The Crown Prince!’

The chancellor had talked of killing a monster and taking a treasure. But it was all a sham. A trick. He had left the Grand Emperor's Pagoda hidden here for the Crown Prince.

Apparently, he realized that the fight between the Crown Prince and Young Master Shroud-Heaven would end in this enormous demon formation. However, once the Crown Prince was in the formation, and just when his opponent thought that he was doomed, the Grand Emperor's Pagoda would fly out, and use the refined power of the asura to push the Crown Prince into the Great Sage level. Then he could kill Young Master Shroud-Heaven and all the other wretch-devils. The Demi-Immortal Institute would then be the subject of even more acclaim, and would strengthen its grip on the continent as a whole.

As for Yang Qi, he was little more than a pawn to the chancellor, and his mission was a farce. At best, the chancellor might try to convince the Crown Prince that because he was a Great Sage, he should spare him.

However, there was no way Yang Qi would let things play out that way.

Chapter 190: No Way

Yang Qi could not possibly allow the Crown Prince to reach the Great Sage level, not if he had a way to prevent it. Even if the Crown Prince somehow spared him in the moment, Yun Hailan wouldn’t let him off easily. And Yang Qi was not the type who could accept a life of humiliation.

The chancellor wanted him to just wait here until the fight between the Crown Prince and Young Master Shroud-Heaven reached the point where the Grand Emperor's Pagoda would fly out. After the Crown Prince became a Great Sage, Yang Qi’s supposed ‘service’ would be enough that the Crown Prince would pardon him.

Everything made sense now.

The chancellor wasn’t giving Yang Qi any reward at all. He was simply going through the motions, and trying to arrange things so that the Crown Prince wouldn’t cause problems for him.

‘There’s no way I’ll let that happen. The Crown Prince will not become a Great Sage, and I will not live a life of humiliation!’ He clenched his hands into fists. ‘In the eyes of the chancellor, I'm nowhere near as important as the Crown Prince. Well, that's not surprising. Compared to someone who’s on the very verge of becoming a Great Sage, I'm basically an ant. And the Crown Prince is also supposed to succeed the chancellor. Well, I'm going to give them all a bit of a shock! That Grand Emperor's Pagoda is going to be mine. And I'm going to take this asura’s power and blood quintessence for my own!’

Yang Qi’s eyes flashed as his aura surged. Sura flames leapt up around him as he tried to push toward Nonary Lifeseizing, and face the tribulation that came with it.

Once he did that, he would snatch the Grand Emperor's Pagoda and use it to vanquish the asura.

After all, the chancellor had said that he was to kill the monster and take its treasure. That was supposed to be his compensation for the Gate of the Great Void. In the end, there would be nothing the chancellor could find fault with.

In fact, what would be even better would be if he could kill the Crown Prince at the same time. Then he wouldn’t have anyone to fear.

By now, Yang Qi’s main enemy in the Rich-Lush Continent wasn’t Yun Hailan, it was the Crown Prince. Even if Yun Hailan encountered better fortune than she already had, she wouldn’t be a threat to him. Only the Crown Prince was strong enough for that.

Of course, accomplishing what he wanted to do would be easier said than done.

The chancellor’s plan seemed like a perfect one, and of course, considering the difference between Yang Qi’s cultivation base and the Crown Prince’s, directly fighting him wasn’t a possibility.

‘But there’s one thing the chancellor couldn’t have taken into consideration. And that’s my God Legion Seal!’

In Yang Qi’s plan, the God Legion Seal and the golden imp were his greatest assets. That sealing mark had nearly killed Ghost Emperor Yama, so it could definitely wreck the chancellor’s plan with the Grand Emperor's Pagoda.

The only downside was that Yang Qi couldn’t directly control it. Therefore, factoring it into his plans would require meticulous forethought.

‘Ah, my dear chancellor. Win or lose, it all ends here. I refuse to believe that I'm fundamentally weaker than the Crown Prince. I’ll show you. I have far more potential than him, and I might not be interested in becoming the next chancellor, but I definitely won’t let the Crown Prince have the position.’ As he absorbed more sura flame and used it to push himself toward his breakthrough, he waited, keeping some attention focused outside to detect when the Crown Prince and Young Master Shroud-Heaven began fighting.

When top experts fought, it could often go on for a long time, even months. In fact, in the distant past, there were Great Sages who engaged in duels that lasted for many years.

And according to the legends, the wars between the legion of gods and the fiend-devils had lasted for tens upon tens of thousands of years.

“You’re absorbing that sura flame pretty quickly,” the asura said. “Heading for a breakthrough, I suppose? Well, it won't be long before you find out the truth about those flaws I mentioned.” By this point, it seemed the asura realized Yang Qi wasn’t the type of person to be easily fooled. However, he still was needling him about his cultivation, trying to find an opening.

“Oh, right,” Yang Qi said. “Senior, you probably know quite a bit about cultivation. What are the nine Legendary transformations about? Mind explaining a bit? I'm really close to the Legendary level right now, but there are still many things I don’t understand. I never learned much back in the Demi-Immortal Institute because I spent most of my time working on my own cultivation. If you give me some good tips, then maybe I can show you a bit of my technique.”

“Hmm….” The asura thought about it for a moment, and apparently decided that answering a few cultivation questions shouldn’t be a problem.

“Well, if you want to know,” he said confidently, “I guess I can help out a bit. Since you’re on the verge of reaching the Legendary level already, you could probably benefit from my own steady rise through that level. In fact, when the people on the outside activate the spell formation, you could probably benefit from the power surges, and even use them to temper your physical body.”

“I’d love to hear your advice, Senior. And if you can help me temper my physical body when they activate the spell formation, I would definitely be in your debt.”

“Very well, listen up. The Lifeseizing level is all about building up resources. There isn't anything particularly mystical about the nine seizings of life. You just have to have enough willpower and natural talent. However, in the Legendary level, you have to connect with magical law. Once you’re in Nonary Lifeseizing, the requirements to break through to Legendary are as follows: a full sea of energy, strong bones and tendons, adequate acupoints, unhindered meridians and a sharp mind. When the moment comes, combine all of the true energy nascent divinities in your acupoints into one. After it’s done, they will explode, sending power coursing through your body, turning it into a mass of primal-chaos. In that moment, stick voraciously to life, and remold both your meridians and your sea of energy. At the same time, refashion your body into something uniquely your own. Of course, the more superior the technique you cultivate, the more powerful your life force will burn when you reach the Legendary level, and the more prospects you’ll have for the future.”

“Oh really?” Yang Qi was actually surprised. He had never heard that one's technique could affect one’s breakthrough into the Legendary level. Apparently, entering the Legendary level with a mere royal-class energy art would make one almost useless as a Legendary. An imperial-class energy art would be a bit better, as it would aid in remolding the meridians and sea of energy.

Of course, Yang Qi knew that when he finally did achieve that next breakthrough, the golden imp would impart a new technique to him. Most likely, it would be a marvelous ability used for remolding the body in the form of a godmammoth.

He very much looked forward to that moment.

“If you have flaws in your technique,” the asura continued, “then the moment of remolding will be extremely dangerous. Of course, the sura people have a special technique for just that. I wouldn’t mind explaining it to you, although I'm not sure if it would conflict with your current technique. You’d definitely need to show me your current technique ahead of time, otherwise I wouldn’t feel comfortable explaining mine to you.” The asura clearly was not giving up on its attempts to get his technique.

Yang Qi nodded vigorously. “Oh, right, right. But first, Senior, do you mind explaining the important aspects of the various transformations of the Legendary level?”

“Very well. The first is called the Blood-Form Transformation, in which you remold your meridians, sea of energy, blood, flesh and bones. In this transformation, the ‘blood’ refers to your literal blood, and the ‘form’ refers to your physical form. It's a fundamental transformation of incredible power. It essentially forms the basis of everything after that, much like the base of a thirty-thousand meter pagoda will ensure how stable it is.” In his desire to get Yang Qi’s technique, the asura was actually holding nothing back in his explanation.

“The second transformation is known as the Spirit-Soul Transformation, in which you strengthen your mind and cultivate your divine will. In that transformation, a single thought of yours can cause the wind to blow and the clouds to stir. By sending your divine will into heaven and earth, you can become one with nature, and understand magical laws.

“Third is the Space-Void Transformation. After pushing the first two transformations to the limit, and ensuring that both your soul and your physical form are at the ultimate peak, you can begin to seek enlightenment of the magical laws that govern the operation of space and the void. You can create small-scale spatial dimensions, albeit unstable ones. You will also be able to travel through space, at least to some extent. Of course, your understanding of magical laws at this point will be superficial at best. If you really want to be able to travel the depths of the void, you’ll need to become a Great Sage.”

The asura almost sounded like a professor teaching a class in college. He had plentiful stores of knowledge, and was using it like a torch in the night, dispelling much of the confusion Yang Qi had felt before.

‘Now I get it,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘If I want to make the God Legion Paradise, I need to reach the third transformation of the Legendary level, the Space-Void Transformation. The God Legion Paradise is a unique dimension, and thus, I need to have a basic understanding of magical law to use it.’

Clearing his throat, he said, “I wonder what the fourth transformation is…?”

“It’s called the Five-Phases Transformation, in which you collect the elements of the five phases, and gain enlightenment of the five convergences. When you understand the principles of mutual augmentation and suppression, you can mix the power of the five phases into your attacks. It all depends on enlightenment of the five phases. For example, fire can negate water, water can give birth to wood, and so on. It's all very profound.

“The fifth transformation is none other than the Yin-Yang Transformation, in which you use the yin and yang energies that exist in heaven and earth and combine them with the energy of the five phases. By understanding the profundity of yin and yang, you can fully master this step of cultivation.”

Yang Qi listened with rapt attention to this detailed information. As it turned out, the Legendary level was essentially split up into three subsections. No wonder the Crown Prince had been able to easily defeat Houselord Spring-Autumn, Pontifex Flame, Prince Wei and Elder Hua from the Sun Moon Institute. The truth was that he could have killed them if he wanted.

“What about the sixth transformation?”

“The sixth transformation is the Personal-Domain Transformation! By using yin and yang, the five phases, the power of the void and space, and a remolded body, one can create a personal domain, a place in which you will be almost completely invincible.”

Chapter 191: The Nine Legendary Transformations

At long last, Yang Qi was starting to get an idea of what cultivation was like in the Legendary level. ‘First, the Blood-Form Transformation. Second, the Spirit-Soul Transformation. After that, the Space-Void Transformation, Five-Phases Transformation, Yin-Yang Transformation and Personal-Domain Transformation. They’re all connected. Each transformation is more miraculous than the one before. And in the Personal-Domain Transformation, you can create an incredible domain. In my case, it will be the God Legion Paradise. And here I thought it would come with the Space-Void Transformation. Seems I was wrong.’

“Hm. What about the seventh and eighth transformation?” Of course, he had heard that the ninth transformation was the Never-Dying Transformation, although he wasn’t sure the exact implication of the name.

“The seventh is the Ghost-God Transformation. In that transformation, you take the empyrean and baleful energies of heaven and earth and use them to create a ghost-god. Think about it. During the Lifeseizing level, didn’t the empyrean-baleful power of heaven and earth create ghost-gods to interfere with your breakthroughs? Those ghost-gods are manifestations of empyrean-baleful energy. Because of that, the Ghost-God Transformation is sometimes referred to as the Empyrean-Baleful Transformation. If you succeed in it, you’ll have access to incredible power, for example that of ghost-god possession. In any case, you can use the power of empyrean-baleful energy.

“The eighth transformation is called the Astral-Star Transformation, in which you use your energy arts to connect with the power of the stars out in the universe. Doing so, you create a small-scale universe of your own, that connects you with the universe at large. As a result, you will be able to draw powers from the void that vastly surpass your own. The largest objects in the universe are stars, any one of which can illuminate vast swaths of the void. The power of the stars is the most mysterious in the universe, and for energy artists to be able to draw on such power gives them the strength to move mountains and fill in seas. It’s virtually limitless.

“Last is the Never-Dying Transformation, the level I am currently in. By uniting one’s flesh, blood, and soul, adding in the empyrean-baleful energy, and drawing on the light of the stars, one’s body becomes incapable of dying. If you’re killed, your body will form back together, even if it was chopped up into millions of pieces. Of course, it draws heavily on your essence. Regardless, you won’t be able to die naturally, and will be very, very difficult to kill. Of course, if you venture out into the void, it would definitely be possible for you to meet your end if you run into a spatial tempest. Even in the Never-Dying Transformation, you’d do your best to avoid trying to get from continent to continent on your own. After all, spatial tempests are no joke. Once you leave the Never-Dying Transformation, and surpass the mortal and enter the saintly, then you will no longer be considered human. You will be a Great Sage, a person who can traverse the void and unlock the deepest of secrets.”

At long last, Yang Qi had a fairly thorough understanding of the nine Legendary transformations.

Each transformation was full of profound mysteries, and was vastly more powerful than the transformation before it. For example, not even four or five Blood-Form Legendaries could possibly win over a Spirit-Soul Legendary.

Of course, techniques were a major factor. Once Yang Qi became a Blood-Form Legendary, not even ten opponents in the same level would be a match for him.

Blood-Form Transformation. Spirit-Soul Transformation. Space-Void Transformation. Five-Phases Transformation. Yin-Yang Transformation. Personal-Domain Transformation. Ghost-God Transformation. Astral-Star Transformation. Never-Dying Transformation. Nine transformations that all connected. This was a great dao of cultivation.

Yang Qi committed everything to memory.

One day, he would be a Legendary, and would reach the point of being able to directly handle the Crown Prince. It would be a far cry from now, in which the Crown Prince could kill him as easy as blowing some dust off of his shoulder, and then go on to slaughter all of his friends and family.

With the lecture over, Yang Qi sat there absorbing the sura flame and simultaneously mulling over what he had just learned. Slowly but surely, the fire was being converted into life force quintessence, which was pushing more particles in him toward the point of waking up.

Although he currently possessed the power of two hundred ancient megamammoths, his power was only continuing to grow.

He was also becoming more familiar with the fundamental nature of the martial arts of this asura.

‘I wonder how strong I would be if I let this asura transmit some of his energy arts to me. He would definitely try to turn me into a puppet if I did. Although, the golden imp would fight back. Unfortunately, I still can’t control that power. And if something went wrong, and it didn’t fight back, then I would have let myself get killed for nothing.’

After thinking about the matter for a bit longer, he said, “Many thanks for your help, Senior. I very much appreciate it. You know, I thought from the beginning that getting sent here by the chancellor would be a good thing. But based on what you’ve told me, that’s a pipe dream. The chancellor just wants to help the Crown Prince!”

In order to buy some time, Yang Qi had decided to reveal a few secrets of his own.

“What Crown Prince?” the asura asked.

Yang Qi went on to explain the details of who the Crown Prince was, and even went so far as to touch on the enmity between them. He explained the situation at the martial arts tournament, how the Crown Prince had stolen the Gate of the Great Void, and how the chancellor had offered Yang Qi this mission to make up for it. It took quite a while to tell the whole story, and during the entire time, he was absorbing the sura flame. Slowly but surely, the projection of an asura was forming in his Hellfire Crucible.

“Crown Prince, huh?” the asura said, sounding quite excited. “He’s a god from heaven descended into the mortal world? If I could consume him, and use his quintessence-blood and vital energy as a sacrifice to the king of suras, I would definitely get a blessing that would push me into the Great Sage level. I can't believe his fight with Young Master Shroud-Heaven all hinges on me. I'm definitely not going to let him succeed. You! Help me out and I’ll make it worth your while! I’ll definitely kill that Crown Prince. In fact, I can even show you my secret sura magic and help you reach the Legendary level, right now!”

“Hold on!” Yang Qi said. “Senior, you can’t underestimate the chancellor. His plan with the Grand Emperor's Pagoda can’t be so easy to see through. How about this: let me examine the pagoda first. After all, I’ve been a member of the Demi-Immortal Institute for quite a while, so I might be able to identify something that could help you deal with it.”

“You want to see the Grand Emperor's Pagoda? Alright, sure. Look.” The asura exhaled sharply, causing something like a ripple of water to spread out through the hall. Then the ripples faded, revealing a pagoda.

It seemed both large and small, and there was something about it that made Yang Qi think about an emperor. It was bronze, but covered with a green patina. There were also images carved in its surface, depicting an ancient emperor going on an inspection tour of his lands. He rode an imperial chariot decorated with nine dragons, and was attended by all sorts of military and civil ministers. There were also Demonfolk, as well as humans, beasts, monsters, and the like, all of them offering allegiance.

The pagoda’s aura was the type that could suppress the auras of all types of ghosts and gods in heaven and earth, so there was no need for Yang Qi to inspect it. He could instantly sense that it was far more powerful than the Gate of the Great Void. This was a true treasure, something that a Great Sage had once spent blood, sweat, and tears to create. Anyone who had it would gain incredible power. Even Yun Hailan’s Pearl of the Thousand Illusions World and Gate of the Great Void put together wouldn’t be more than a tenth as powerful. With it, an Octonary Lifeseizer could kill a Legendary without question.

“What a treasure. Amazing.” Yang Qi sighed in admiration. “Although, the chancellor is a Great Sage, and a profound schemer. He definitely left a nascent divinity sealing mark in it. It definitely won’t be easy to take control of it, Senior.”

“I know. Even after years of trying, I can’t wrest control of it. However, I did manage to drain much of its vital energy, and I’m fairly certain of where the sealing mark is located. With your help, and by taking advantage of the people on the outside, I should be able to succeed. You’re a student of the Demi-Immortal Institute, sent here by your chancellor on a supposed mission to take the Grand Emperor's Pagoda. Although the chancellor lied to you, the pagoda definitely won’t harm you. Just wait until the spell formation is activated. The pagoda will fly out to attack me, and will use the power of the ancient Demonfolk Great Sages to try to refine me. When that happens, I’ll use an energy art I have that can secretly get you into the pagoda in my stead. As for me, I’ll attack it from the outside, and borrow the power of the Demon Sage formation to destroy the sealing mark inside. At that point, the pagoda will be masterless. Alright, I've said everything that needs to be said. Show me your energy art, and I’ll tell you what flaws exist in it.”

“I'd still rather break into Nonary Lifeseizing first, and get a bit closer to the Legendary level,” Yang Qi said. “I still don’t feel any ill effects from the sura flames. Actually, they seem great. My power continues to grow by the moment.”

It seemed obvious to Yang Qi that the asura wanted to use him to get to the Grand Emperor's Pagoda. Once he did, the creature would turn on him. Therefore, there was no way he was going to explain his energy art.

In response to Yang Qi’s words, the asura trembled as if he was about to attack and kill him. However, he quickly got himself under control and smiled.

“However you want to do it is fine. I’ll save you if you end up experiencing cultivation deviation. If you want, just keep working on your cultivation here until the fighting starts out there in the Heavendawn Quarry.”

“Many thanks, Senior.” Yang Qi smiled grimly in his heart. Life force quintessence was building up in him, and crystallizing in his Hellfire Crucible. Slowly but surely, an image was forming in his Hell Portal that looked exactly like the asura in front of him.

The Hell Portal could create almost perfect duplicates of any sort of devil-god from hell. As he continued to absorb more of the sura flame, and understand more about the animadestiny aura of the asura, he was able to prepare to deliver a deadly blow.

Although he might not be able to kill him, it would at least be an effective blow.

Chapter 192: Nonary Lifeseizing

More and more sura flame was building up inside of Yang Qi, and within his various acupoints, the martial arts of the various sura devils grew more refined. Their weapons were nearly blurs as they executed one deadly move after another, and called upon the most deadly battle techniques of the sura people.

And Yang Qi took it all in without hesitation.

All of a sudden, sixty particles within him erupted, releasing the power of sixty ancient megamammoths. As the energy spread out, his Hell Portal, Hellfire Crucible, Infernal Deity Spear, Infernal Deity Plate Armor and Fiend-Devil Wings all grew stronger, and absorbed even more sura flame.

As of this moment, he now had the power of two hundred sixty megamammoths.

His blood was the color of porcelain, untainted by the slightest speck of impurity. It was like the pure light of the stars and the moon, as boundless as the azure sky, as magnificent as the blazing sun.

The asura’s explanation of the nine Legendary transformations had been profoundly enlightening, to the point where achieving Nonary Lifeseizing actually seemed like a simple matter.

He had long since built up enough energy to do so, but had just lacked the mental factors and enlightenment. But now, his path of cultivation had been made even more clear and open, and the moment of a breakthrough had arrived.

Nonary Lifeseizing!

For many energy arts cultivators, that level was the ultimate peak. In the Demi-Immortal Institute, conclave students of that level were the top experts, even higher than Yang Qi’s current rank of elite student.

“Bane-devils and ghost-gods, emerge!” Yang Qi shouted amidst the flames. Instantly, a gale force wind filled the Sura Devil-Eye as the empyrean-baleful energy transformed into a host of monsters. Also visible were numerous bolts of lightning, accompanied by the crackle of thunder. Yet again, Yang Qi was facing Lifeseizing tribulation.

And this would be no scant tribulation. Normally speaking, considering he was in the Sura Devil-Eye, and in the presence of a mighty asura, most ghost-gods wouldn’t dare to appear.

However, Yang Qi was simply too powerful. Not only did the ghost-gods come, but they came in seemingly endless waves. Suddenly, a monster burst out of the ground, muscles bulging as he charged toward Yang Qi like a moving mountain.

‘A flawless god-devil? A devil-ghost formed from pure subterranean baleful energy?’ The asura simply looked on as Yang Qi faced his Nonary Lifeseizing tribulation. After all, the asura was tightly shackled, and couldn’t have interfered even if he wanted to.

BOOM!

Yang Qi attacked, blasting the flawless god-devil into bits before it could even reach him. Next, an armored heaven-god appeared in the sky above him, wielding a dual-crescent-bladed halberd which it slashed down toward him with the force to sunder mountains.

However, Yang Qi simply dodged to the side and struck out with such massive force that the heaven-god shattered.

The empyrean energy from heaven would attack in the fashion of god-spirits, whereas the subterranean baleful energy would become vicious monsters.

As the asura looked on, a vertical eye slowly opened up on its forehead. ‘These monsters aren't very strong. They’re almost like toy dolls. Just wait until you reach the seventh Ghost-God Transformation, when the empyrean-baleful energy creates devil-gods that can shake lands and rock mountains. Then you’ll really understand what terror is. Back when I reached the Ghost-God Transformation, it was pure torture.’

More monsters poured forth, attempting to overwhelm Yang Qi.

RUMBLE!RUUUUMBLE!

Suddenly, a mass of lightning appeared above him. However, instead of consisting of zigzagged lightning bolts, it was composed of spherical masses that looked like pellet-sized meteors.

Instantly, the lightning-meteors began to fall like rain. Although they weren’t very big, when they slammed into Yang Qi, they caused deafening booms to fill the enormous hall. Soon, he was surrounded by a sea of lightning. If there weren’t an asura here, it was likely that the entire place would have been destroyed already.

‘Quite an impressive tribulation. That’s… Deadly Star Lightning. He’s provoked Deadly Star Lightning in the Lifeseizing level? Who is this guy? And what technique does he cultivate? It's definitely nothing to look down on. Normally speaking, Deadly Star Lightning only appears in Legendary tribulations.’ The asura was actually quite shocked by what he was seeing.

However, even as the Deadly Star Lightning exploded around Yang Qi, it was sucked into him and absorbed by his true energy. In the end, it didn't harm him in the least, neither his meridians nor his cultivation base.

It fell for roughly twelve hours straight, during which time Yang Qi didn't even experience discomfort. Instead, he was filled with heaven-shaking, earth-toppling power. Eventually, the tribulation was sending lightning dragons, lightning snakes, lightning tigers, lightning apes, and all sorts of other beasts at him, creatures from the ancient wilds of yore. However, none of it was effective against Yang Qi.

Just as he felt certain that the tribulation was about to end, a thunderous boom descended from above, like the toll of some enormous bell.

‘Universal Polarity Godbell!?’

Never could Yang Qi have guessed that in the moment he was about to overcome the lightning tribulation, this would happen. He very clearly remembered Holy Daughter Manyflowers’ Legendary tribulation, and how the Universal Polarity Godbell covered all of Manyflowers Peak for an entire day and night before she destroyed it.

Now, he was receiving the same treatment as her, except not as part of Legendary tribulation, but as part of Nonary Lifeseizing tribulation. But why?

As soon as the Universal Polarity Godbell appeared, Yang Qi knew that it was not the time to be distracted. The tribulation had just become very real.

The asura was similarly shocked, and even looked a bit worried. ‘This little punk is a bit crafty, but he's an important pawn to me. He’s the only way I can escape from here, get the Grand Emperor's Pagoda and become a Great Sage. He’ll die eventually, but he can’t die right now! I’ll send him to hell only when he’s not useful anymore!’

If Yang Qi ended up being killed in the tribulation, neither his bones nor his soul would remain behind, and the asura would end up completely empty-handed.

Unfortunately for him, the only thing he could do right now was wait to see how things played out.

Yang Qi was now inside the Universal Polarity Godbell, surrounded by pure darkness interlaced with flashing lightning. It was suffocating as the booming of the bell smashed into his very soul and mind, trying to destroy him, trying to crush him to bits. Soon, humanoid lightning appeared, and palaces made of electricity, even weapons….

The massive assault almost immediately drained away a significant portion of his true energy.

If a normal Nonary Lifeseizer encountered tribulation like this, they would be crushed out of existence, even some of the top geniuses. But for Yang Qi, it was nothing to worry about.

He took a deep breath, causing true energy to bubble up in his sea of energy. Instantly, Cleansing Flame of the Heavenly World surged out to combat the Universal Polarity Godbell. As the immense power of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth fought back against the tribulation, the bell began to spin in dizzying fashion.

However, Yang Qi simply sat down, breathing steadily as he calmed his spirit and energy.

As time passed, he felt himself growing stronger, and could fairly sense the frustration of the Universal Polarity Godbell. The power of the bell waned and waned, until finally, in its moment of ultimate weakness, Yang Qi attacked.

BOOOM!

It was a shocking fist strike so powerful that it could shake heaven and earth. The Universal Polarity Godbell shattered, and all of the true energy that made it up immediately rushed into Yang Qi and became part of him. Instantly, his own true energy seemed to burst with life, filling him with a very strange sensation.

In fact, he almost felt like he could cast aside his physical form and exist as pure true energy.

Of course, it was only a fleeting feeling. If he did that now, he would actually die. True energy inhabited the human body like liquid would fill a bottle. If the bottle were to be smashed, the liquid would splash to the ground and evaporate.

However, what that feeling of his did prove was that he was now utterly and thoroughly in Nonary Lifeseizing, truly only a step away from the Legendary level.

The tribulation was over.

Of course, reaching the next level would be much, much more difficult than his previous success at going from the Energy Arts level to the Lifeseizing level. And considering he didn't know exactly how to go about achieving that breakthrough, he would need to take his time.

“So, brat, you reached Nonary Lifeseizing,” the asura said, sounding a bit less haughty than before. “Not bad. Not bad at all! That was an incredible tribulation! As a Lifeseizer, you provoked the Universal Polarity Godbell. Even among the sura people, that’s a rare thing. I wonder what will happen when you try to break through to the Legendary level. Will you topple heaven and destroy the earth?”

“Any instructions for me, Senior?” Yang Qi asked calmly.

“I just sensed immense demon-devil power from outside. It seems to me that Young Master Shroud-Heaven and the Crown Prince should be here shortly. And those demon-devils outside have gone all out to activate the Demon Sage spell formation and reach out to the Grand Emperor's Pagoda. I think—”

RUMBLE!

Even as he spoke, everything began to shake violently.

Chapter 193: A Fierce Battle Between Two Heroes

The ground shook, causing cracks to open up everywhere, giving Yang Qi the sensation that the land beneath his feet was about to collapse. It felt like some immense power were stirring beneath his feet, causing demon energy to leak up from the ground, power that could surpass the sky, the seas, and even the stars. This truly seemed like the power of an ancient Great Sage of the Demonfolk.

The Legendary level had its nine transformations, and the Great Sage level had something similar.

As for whatever Great Sage had set up this spell formation, that individual seemed far more powerful than the Great Sages of modern times.

At the moment, there were only five individuals in the Rich-Lush Continent who were in the Great Sage level, namely, the chancellors of the four institutes, and the emperor of the Sage Ancestor Dynasty.

Of course, it was possible that there were other Great Sages who remained in hiding. And there was also the possibility that some who were native to the Rich-Lush Continent were traveling in other locations.

‘The Demon Sage spell formation is activating!’ Yang Qi thought. He was ready to enact his plan; he had reached Nonary Lifeseizing, and felt strong enough to take on and possibly even kill a low-level Legendary. In fact, it would probably be appropriate to refer to him as an actual Legendary.

The moment he had been waiting for was near.

Heart pounding, he pondered what it would be like if he could actually acquire the Grand Emperor's Pagoda and prevent the Crown Prince from reaching the Great Sage level. Hopefully, it would end with both the Crown Prince and Young Master Shroud-Heaven exhausted and severely injured.

And the best outcome for Yang Qi would be for him to simply escape with the pagoda.

As long as the Crown Prince didn't become a Great Sage, he would take it to be a victory. And if he did acquire the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, a precious treasure related to space itself, then he would finally have a way to protect his friends and family, to take them from this continent and make sure the Crown Prince could never hurt them.

Although, he would only do that as a last resort.

“Alright brat, it's finally starting. I can sense some vibrations from the Grand Emperor's Pagoda already. Just as I suspected, that despicable chancellor of yours never fully cleansed the Grand Emperor's Pagoda. There is still a noble spirit of antiquity inside that he never fully melted away. That’s why he left the thing hidden in here; he hoped to borrow the power of the spell formation to refine it. After the noble spirit of antiquity is gone, he’ll finally be able to control it. Of course, we’re not going to let him succeed.”

The chained asura let out a whoop of excitement.

“Is that so…?” Yang Qi was now more certain than ever that the chancellor had numerous backup plans in place. He wouldn’t just rely on one simplistic strategy. “Senior, are you sure the chancellor can’t directly wrest control of the Grand Emperor's Pagoda?”

“Enough with the questions, brat. I've already explained enough to you over the past few days. My patience has run thin. Hurry up and teach me that energy art of yours, otherwise I’ll make you wish you could die!” The asura was done with words, and in the blink of an eye, his power filled the entire hall.

Creak!

All of the doors to the hall suddenly shut of their own accord!

Pretending to be shocked, Yang Qi said, “Senior! You—”

“Enough with the games, brat. You’re a crafty one, I’ll give you that. You knew I had it out for you from the beginning, and that’s the only reason you treated me with that false civility of yours. Look, you're a Nonary Lifeseizer now. Hurry up and teach me the mnemonic for the technique. I’ll give you this one last chance.” The asura looked at him viciously, straining at its chains, which groaned as though they might snap at any moment.

Yang Qi suddenly burst out laughing. “Nice try, asura. You're locked tight by those chains. What are you going to do to me? One of the reasons I dragged out the conversation with you was to do a little test. Perhaps if you could free yourself, you could kill me. Sadly for you, the only thing you can do right now is use sura power to summon sura flame. Except, I love sura flame! So even if you attack me with it, the only thing you’ll do is make me stronger.”

“Ignoramus!” the asura roared. “You think that just because I'm chained up I can’t do anything to you?” He suddenly let out a roar that caused a massive wind to spring up, filled with numerous weapons of the sura people. Space-time rippled everywhere, even the very location where Yang Qi stood.

“Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth!” Yang Qi shouted. Armor instantly spread out over his body, like porcelain, covered with inscriptions of the legion of gods. It didn't seem hellish in the least bit, but rather, like something from the heavenly halls.

Instantly, the distortions around him were negated.

“Greater Teleportation!” the asura growled. The distortions around Yang Qi suddenly sprang back up with even more intensity than before, causing him to sink down into the ground.

In the blink of an eye, he saw an enormous bronze pagoda, covered with inscriptions of ancient text. This was definitely not a treasure from the modern age, but rather, something from the distant past.

This was the Grand Emperor's Pagoda.

“Get in there!” the asura shouted, unleashing power that actually succeeded in shoving Yang Qi into the pagoda.

Once inside, he immediately realized that he was trapped. Everything around him was bronze, except for a transparent window, beyond which was grotesque and monstrous scenery. He was now located in the dimension that existed inside of the Grand Emperor's Pagoda.

At this point, he heard the asura speaking to him from beyond that window. “Don’t worry, brat. You’ve been trapped inside of the Grand Emperor's Pagoda by me. Soon enough, I’ll refine you into a suitable substitute for my own body. And now, let's see how things are progressing outside.”

Suddenly, the view outside the window shifted to the Heavendawn Quarry.

It looked different now. Towering demon energy raged everywhere, and the auras of powerful fiend-devils surged. Burning demon light rose high into the sky, illuminating all heaven and earth.

There were countless daemons in the mine, enough to strike fear into the heart of anyone. There were even dozens of Legendary-level entities, lurking at various spell formation nodes. Meanwhile, out over the sea, in a pocket dimension somewhere, deafening booms rang out without cease.

Clearly, powerful entities were out there fighting a deadly battle.

Yang Qi could actually see the faint image of two people locked in combat, fighting back and forth with shocking stances and forms.

BOOM!

Suddenly, all heaven and earth trembled as two figures shot out from the dimension, one of them being the Crown Prince. There was no way Yang Qi would forget what he looked like, this arch enemy of his who had proudly declared his intention to kill all of Yang Qi’s friends and family.

The other of the two figures looked like a young man. He wielded a long spear, a seemingly ancient weapon of copper, and was clad in a voluminous blood-red cloak embroidered with countless gigantic beasts. They looked extremely lifelike, as if they had just emerged from the jungles of yore, complete with profoundly ancient auras.

The Crown Prince was fighting with the same dual-crescent-bladed halberd he had before. The energy which swirled around him seemed to form millions of wild dragons, whose energy caused the seawater in all directions to evaporate into steam. Within moments, the muddy seafloor was revealed. Every sweep of his halberd would pierce through the evil aura of his opponent, and would cause the light of the sun and the stars to shine brightly.

Normally speaking, the presence of the blazing sun would cause the glory of the stars to diminish. But this halberd caused starlight to stream down like a waterfall from the highest heavens.

Soon, the sea around him was like a sea of stars, shining with resplendent glory.

Although Yang Qi hated the Crown Prince to his very core, even he had to admit that it was a glorious scene. The Crown Prince looked like a powerful hero, so much stronger than himself that he was obviously impossible to fight.

As for the young man with the spear and the blood-red cloak, he seemed a perfect match for the Crown Prince. Evil clouds surrounded his spear, obscuring the starlight. At the same time, dimensional cracks spread out behind him, which revealed demonic eyes that shot demon light to attack the Crown Prince.

“The Heavendawn Quarry? So, Young Master Shroud-Heaven, you actually set up a spell formation for me here. All of these days of fighting were a setup to lead me here? Who do you think I am? You think a flimsy plot like this would work on me? Sadly for you, I've beaten you at your own game. The Heavendawn Quarry is going to be where I kill you and all your demon-devil subordinates! And I’ll also destroy this spell formation! Henceforth, demon energy will not exist in this heaven and earth!”

The Crown Prince didn’t seem worried at all by the carefully-laid trap. It was almost as if he had already planned for it. Even as the power of the spell formation caused the space around him to shrink in on itself, trapping him, he looked around with casual abandon, like an emperor looking at his own territory.

And within moments, an expression of anticipation appeared on his face.

“You’re strong, Crown Prince,” Young Master Shroud-Heaven said. “You’re a god from heaven descended into the mortal world, born of a mother who dreamed of falling stars. You’re destined to eventually become a Great Sage. But that’s why I have to kill you. Your mere existence pains me, and now, I will avenge my previous defeat. This Nine-Heavens Ten-Earths Demon-Devil-Horde World-Ending Grand Spell Formation is being powered by the demon kings of the seventy-two grottos, and by powerful fiend-devil viscounts. This place is going to be your grave!”

“Oh really?” the Crown Prince said, his smile widening. “Even I’ve lost track of how many powerful entities I've killed. So isn’t it fitting that I reach the Great Sage level in the middle of a heaven-shaking, earth-shattering battle? Prepare for death, all of you!”

Chapter 194: Massive Fight

‘Finally these two have come for their big showdown.’ Through the window, it was possible for Yang Qi to see the Crown Prince and Young Master Shroud-Heaven, both of them Never-Dying Legendaries, ninth transformation experts who were vastly more powerful than himself.

Each and every move of theirs could defeat the most ancient and profound of techniques. One wielded a dual-crescent-bladed halberd, the other, a holy spear of the Demonfolk. The intense heat caused by their conflict caused the nearby seawater to evaporate, filling the sky with dense mist. The entire area seemed rife with primal chaos, and the vital energy of heaven and earth was thrown into complete pandemonium.

The Legendary level was the level of magical law.

Right now, these two peak Legendaries were using that power to fight with such dominance that it seemed possible for them to overturn heaven and destroy the earth, and even cause the stars and moon to sink into oblivion.

Yang Qi was so entranced that he almost forgot that he was in such a dangerous situation in the Grand Emperor's Pagoda.

He was stuck in a place that had no exits. The powers of the Grand Emperor's Pagoda were enigmatic and mysterious, almost as if it were something that came from another world.

Bam!

Yang Qi struck the wall of the pagoda with his palm. However, despite the fact that he could unleash power to crush mountains, he wasn’t even able to produce a mark on it.

‘What is this thing made from?’ Shocked, he tried out the Infernal Deity Spear, but the effects were the same. The Grand Emperor's Pagoda was seemingly impervious to anything and everything.

In fact, as soon as the spear touched the wall, the spear itself actually emitted cracking sounds, and then collapsed into fragments.

‘This is simply….’ Yang Qi actually was at a loss for words. It seemed that any thoughts of escaping the pagoda were a fantasy.

Right now, the only option was to wait to see what happened, and react accordingly.

And he still had his plan.

There were plenty of powerful enemies to deal with. Young Master Shroud-Heaven. The Crown Prince. The fiend-devils. And of course the asura, who was also a Never-Dying Legendary. Yang Qi was almost like an ant compared to all of these powerful entities, and to most people, it would seem like a sure death sentence for him.

However, he had his trump cards: the golden imp and the God Legion Seal. If he pulled everything off according to plan, the benefits would be staggering.

RUMBLE!

Even as he tested out the situation with the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, he heard a huge commotion outside. The ground beneath his feet lurched, and he sensed a massive power pouring into the Grand Emperor's Pagoda. The pagoda was being activated, causing his own soul to feel like it was being tugged at.

‘The Demon Sage formation is finally at work!’

Yang Qi knew that the chancellor owned the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, but was not the person who forged it. It had been created by a Great Sage of antiquity, and contained a noble spirit of the distant past. The chancellor had left it here in the hopes that the noble spirit would be purged, thus giving him ultimate control of it. Once the huge spell formation outside was activated, the noble spirit would be snuffed out, the asura would be sucked into the pagoda, and the Crown Prince could use it to reach the Great Sage level.

If Yang Qi wanted to get the pagoda, he needed to do two things. First, he needed to destroy the noble spirit and the nascent divinity sealing mark the chancellor had placed on the pagoda. Second, he needed to ensure that the asura was dead.

Yang Qi had thought the matter through extensively, and was certain that in terms of the first aspect, he probably didn’t need to do anything. The chancellor’s plan would have already factored in the need to destroy the sealing mark and the noble spirit, and relinquish control of the pagoda so that the Crown Prince could use it.

In terms of the second thing, he knew that the asura was hoping for Yang Qi to die in his stead. However, the God Legion Seal and the golden imp would surely defend him.

The asura was strong, but not as strong as Ghost Emperor Yama, who the golden imp had easily crushed to the point of nearly destroying him.

Because of these various factors, Yang Qi was confident that he could snatch the pagoda, and benefit from all the scheming going on between the chancellor, the Crown Prince, the asura, and Young Master Shroud-Heaven.

The chancellor was extremely crafty, but the golden imp was the deal-breaker.

‘For now, I simply bide my time, and see if the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth will be enough to refine the pagoda for my use. If the aggressive method doesn't work, I’ll go with the passive.’ Ignoring what was happening outside, he sat down cross-legged.

The Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth was a godly-class energy art, so it was entirely possible that he could use it to wipe out the spirit seal within this magical treasure, and replace it with his own.

He had taken control of the Ice-Soul God-Sword in a similar way.

The wailing of ghosts and weeping of gods could be heard as the Nightfall Symphony suddenly erupted into the open.

Gradually, the music of the symphony began to soak into the pagoda.

Unfortunately, the power of the pagoda was like a mountain or sea, making it impossible for his true energy to truly enter it.

Yang Qi didn’t care. Instead, he drew more deeply upon his true energy, sending it out with more and more force, until it was like the ocean tide smashing against a seaside rock.

No matter how strong that rock was, as the waves continued to batter it, it would eventually be eaten away and destroyed.

As he continued with his work, the power of the Demon Sage formation built, and streams of Demon Sage energy poured into the pagoda. Thanks to that, the situation in the pagoda changed, and finally, Yang Qi’s true energy managed to find a small corner where it could take hold.

If he wanted to control the entire pagoda, then obviously, he needed to start with a tiny corner.

Now, he just needed to wait for the right opportunity.

Now that his true energy was connected to the pagoda, he could sense two powerful entities inside, each occupying half of it.

One of them seemed profoundly ancient, as though it had existed for millions and millions of years.

The other was as boundless as a mountain or river, like a sage who could provide enlightenment to the masses under heaven. That second aura seemed somewhat familiar, and Yang Qi was fairly certain it belonged to the chancellor of the Demi-Immortal Institute.

Pushing his true energy further into the pagoda, he eventually reached an enormous dimension at the top.

Within that dimension was a noble, armor-clad spirit, standing opposite a young, scholarly man. That scholar looked like a young version of the chancellor, his sleeves fluttering in the wind, his eyes shining as if with the mysteries of the cosmos. His aura seemed as deep as the sea, and as profound as the sun, as if he were the type of person who could influence millions of mortal nations.

‘So, the chancellor and that ancient spirit are facing off. I wonder what’s going to happen next. Are they going to destroy each other? And will the asura interfere?’

As Yang Qi adjusted his plans based on what he was seeing, he kept his true energy pouring into the pagoda in the hopes of getting more information that he could use to his advantage.

The power of the Demon Sage formation continued to build, almost as though it were trying to take control of the Grand Emperor’s Pagoda. In fact, it was possible to sense Young Master Shroud-Heaven’s aura within that power; clearly, he was personally influencing the formation.

Considering that, there was no way that he wasn’t paying attention to what was happening in the Sura Devil-Eye.

‘He must already know about the Grand Emperor's Pagoda….’

All of a sudden raucous laughter erupted from the asura. “I’ve been waiting for this day a long time. Finally, I’ll be free, and finally, I’ll become a Great Sage! I've never felt more alive! Once I'm a Great Sage, I’ll turn the Rich-Lush Continent into my own version of the Hell of Suras. I’ll open a portal to hell, and free all of my fellow devil-gods! Finally, I will have my fill of blood, souls, and lives!”

RUUUUMBLE!

Intense fire erupted from the steel chains, causing hissing sounds to echo out as his skin was burned. However, he didn’t seem to be worried at all. The activation of the spell formation might be melting him, but he knew that it also meant that this was his perfect chance to finally escape, and to turn Yang Qi into a substitute for himself.

“Foolish brat. Why do you think I let you use so much of my sura flame? You’ve been infected with a sura aura, so once I switch places with you, you’ll stand in for me to become the target of the formation! Sura Phantom!”

WHIZZZ!

An enormous sura suddenly appeared behind Yang Qi.

Yang Qi looked over his shoulder. “Switch places with me? Stand in for you? You've got to be kidding me!” Calling upon the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, he summoned the Cleansing Flame of the Heavenly World, which instantly began to eat away at the phantom sura.

“What's going on? My sura power is being neutralized by his energy art?! And my life force quintessence is being destroyed!? What energy art is that? It’s the bane of all fiends and devils!”

Never could the asura have guessed that all of his plans and efforts would be for nothing. All of them were useless on Yang Qi.

In other words, he would be unable to switch places with Yang Qi, and thus, would become a sacrificial offering to the spell formation.

Suddenly, terror welled up within him.

“No! You’re not going to escape me, brat! You’re mine! Divine Dao of Suras; Dao of Six Paths; Never-ending Rotation; Devil-Sense Cometh!”

His sura aura raged, not in the form of flame, but in the form of a viscous liquid like melted gold, which poured into the pagoda, toward Yang Qi.

Chapter 195: Spell Formation, Activated

The asura used the moment that the spell formation began to activate to go all out against Yang Qi.

He forced the blood out of his own body and sent it into the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, hoping to use it to kill Yang Qi.

No longer was the asura resorting to trickery and deception. He was directly attacking, holding nothing back in his attempt to seize Yang Qi’s body and soul. After all of the observation, he was confident that he knew exactly how strong Yang Qi was, and how to deal with him.

“I know you inside and out, brat. You might have some strange energy arts, but you’re not really very strong. In fact, you’re sadly weak. At first, I assumed that treacherous chancellor of yours must have sent you here with some sort of secret item or technique. But it seems that’s not the case. If he had, I would have noticed it already. So, brat, the time has come for you to die!”

Masses of blood formed together into a clone of the asura, who stood menacingly above Yang Qi in the Grand Emperor's Pagoda.

The only thing Yang Qi had that could fight back was the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.

Of course, the asura wasn’t able to fight with all of his power. His true body was still locked up in steel chains, bound by magical law, making it possible for him to only use about one percent of his actual strength.

If he were able to use all of his power, Yang Qi would have had no choice but to just accept death. In fact, even that one percent of power was enough to make Yang Qi feel like all of Mount Tai was weighing down onto him, threatening to crush him to death.

Therefore, all he could do was wait until the spell formation fully activated.

Meanwhile, outside….

In the Heavendawn Quarry, the hordes of demon-devils had caused the region of the mine to be filled with masses of demon and devil energy. The sun, moon, and stars were obscured, making the sky pitch black.

The Crown Prince was in the middle of it all, fighting fiercely with Young Master Shroud-Heaven. The surrounding mountains cracked and crumbled as the demon-devils operated the spell formation, and streams of empyrean-baleful energy became monsters that shot toward the Crown Prince in deadly attacks.

However, there was something about the Crown Prince that made him seem almost like an emperor. In fact, the image of a shadowy emperor could be seen behind him, something powerful enough to cause the universe to tremble.

Any demon or devil energy that got close to him was instantly vanquished. That shadowy emperor almost seemed to have stepped out of the ancient past, and was an entity who was completely at one with the Rich-Lush Continent.

“Grand Emperor Rich-Lush!” Young Master Shroud-Heaven said, his face falling. “I can’t believe that you acquired the legacy of the first emperor of these lands, Grand Emperor Rich-Lush!”

“That’s exactly right!” the Crown Prince said, brandishing his halberd, causing stars, suns, moons, mountains, and rivers to swirl around him. “I did acquire his legacy! And let me tell you something else. He was the ultimate monarch of the Rich-Lush Continent. After all, the continent still bears his name. The essence power of these lands come from him, and with that on my side, not even a Great Sage could kill me! When I reach the Great Sage level, everyone will have to bow to my wishes, even the four institutes. You might have set up your Nine-Heavens Ten-Earths Demon-Devil-Horde World-Ending Grand Spell Formation down in the Heavendawn Quarry, but I don't care. I’m going to show you what it truly means to be the ruler of this continent! It means shaping the place to your wishes!”

RUMBLE!

The aura of a grand emperor grew stronger on the Crown Prince, until the essence power of the lands began to tremble. It was as if he were the true sovereign lord of the continent, and that all of the vital energy of heaven and earth was willing to bow to him in allegiance.

According to the rumors, the first sovereign lord of the continent was Grand Emperor Rich-Lush. After the Yore-Wilds Continent was destroyed, he was the emperor who united the lands.

Back at that time, the place didn't even have a proper name.

But after Grand Emperor Rich-Lush rose to power, it came to be called the Rich-Lush Continent. Eventually, he left to parts unknown, and the dynasty he had founded fell into decline. Other dynasties rose and fell, until modern times when the Sage Ancestor Dynasty held sway.

However, there was no denying that only under the rulership of Grand Emperor Rich-Lush had the continent been truly united. Back then, his words had been law, and he had controlled everything from the founding of sects to the shape of the land itself. Back in his days, the four institutes had been places of learning operated by the Confucian scholars and intellectuals attached to the imperial court. They had been tasked with finding talented individuals to serve the government.

It was nothing like the modern state of affairs. Nowadays, the imperial dynasty could hardly stand up to the four institutes and the other powerful organizations. Imperial orders were hardly effective outside of Capital City, and many people throughout the lands were declaring themselves kings and founding nations.

WHIZZZ!

Almost as soon as the aura of a grand emperor appeared on the Crown Prince, Yang Qi could sense the Grand Emperor's Pagoda trembling, as if it might fly out into the open at any moment.

“Dammit!” the asura shouted. “How did that Crown Prince get the legacy of Grand Emperor Rich-Lush? The emperor built this pagoda, and now it’s trying to find its rightful owner. No! I can’t let that happen!”

‘What? Grand Emperor Rich-Lush?’ Yang Qi thought, shocked.

He had read his history, and knew that Grand Emperor Rich-Lush was the first ruler of the continent. He was the most preeminent of the ancient Great Sages, and had apparently even broken past that level to whatever mysterious higher level existed beyond.

Right now, Great Sages were the ultimate figures in the Rich-Lush Continent, but there was definitely a higher level. However, other than Grand Emperor Rich-Lush, no one had ever reached it.

The fact that the Grand Emperor's Pagoda had been created by him went to show how mighty it was.

Now Yang Qi realized why the chancellor had intended for the pagoda to go to the Crown Prince. It made perfect sense for him to use an item like that to achieve a breakthrough. It would obviously bring out the best of him in terms of his cultivation.

In fact, it now seemed a foregone conclusion that the Crown Prince would become a Great Sage.

Perhaps he would even become like Grand Emperor Rich-Lush himself, and unite the continent under his rule. Perhaps the Demi-Immortal Institute would come to serve him as a branch of the government, with the other three institutes as subsidiaries.

However, there was no way Yang Qi would just let that happen.

“Hurry!” Young Master Shroud-Heaven shouted. “Nine-Heavens Ten-Earths! Demon-Devil-Horde! World-Ending Grand Spell Formation!”

He quickly pushed the spell formation to greater heights. Instantly, the summoned monsters in the Heavendawn Quarry vanished, replaced by a demon-devil aura from the primeval Yore-Wilds. At the same time, the earth cracked and split, allowing mud to flow up into what at first looked like a mountain. However, when combined with the demonic energy, it took the shape of a gigantic demon-god that stood behind Young Master Shroud-Heaven the same as the shadowy emperor stood behind the Crown Prince.

“The ancient Great Sages of the Demonfolk were the true sovereign lords of the Rich-Lush Continent!” Young Master Shroud-Heaven shouted. “Back in the days of the Yore-Wilds, Grand Emperor Rich-Lush was nothing! Once I kill that asura, I’ll be in the Great Sage level! I trained for months in the Hell of Suras, Crown Prince, and experienced pain you can't even imagine. And all that pain has led to this moment, in which I kill you!”

“Yes, Young Master Shroud-Heaven!”

“Your days are coming to an end, Crown Prince!”

“Kill the Crown Prince!”

The angry shouts of the countless demon-devils became like a massive vortex, filling the area. Meanwhile, flames danced in the depths of the Heavendawn Quarry, in what looked like an eruption of subterranean fire.

The huge subterranean palace collapsed into rubble and a massive axe flew forth, splitting the asura’s head into two, causing white brain matter to splatter about.

Even as the asura screamed, a divine lamp appeared beneath him that sent flames up to burn him alive.

At the same time, masses of divine weapons and magical treasures formed from vital energy appeared in the area, which was none other than the power of the spell formation. The demon-devils above were all working together to exterminate the asura.

Of course, the asura had been fated to die all along, but now it had hope in the form of Yang Qi.

“Sura Rebirth Magic! Sura nirvana, boundless battle spirit! Oh god of suras, mysterious god among gods, ruler of hell, bless me with your power….” The asura was now resorting to a powerful magical enchantment. His body collapsed, and his aura vanished, causing his flesh and blood to rush into the Grand Emperor's Pagoda.

Instead of being absorbed by the pagoda, his flesh and blood began to take the shape of a body again, right in the location where Yang Qi was hiding.

“Scared, brat? It's time to get exterminated! All of your energy arts will soon be mine!”

It was as if the asura had been completely reborn, and now had Yang Qi completely in his control. A wicked smile covered his face as he reached out to grab Yang Qi, easily crushing his defensive true energy.

The power of this asura was not something that Yang Qi qualified to fight against.

However, Yang Qi wasn’t flustered at all. He quickly called upon his Devil-God Seal, converging all of his attention, all of his true energy, all of his blood into his forehead. It was almost as if he were ready to cast aside his fleshly body.

Of course, the asura sensed that.

“That won’t do you any good. No matter where you try to hide, I can get to you!” With that, the power of the asura flowed into Yang Qi’s forehead.

And that was when it encountered the golden imp.

Chapter 196: Taking the Pagoda

The asura was using Sura Rebirth Magic, drawing on all its power to appear inside the Grand Emperor's Pagoda and try to take over Yang Qi’s body for its own use. Then, he would use Yang Qi’s energy arts to kill him for good.

His rebirth magic was only a temporary respite from disaster. After all, the power of the Demon Sage spell formation would soon exterminate him even inside the Grand Emperor's Pagoda. He needed to parasitize Yang Qi as quickly as possible, so that he could use Yang Qi’s life force to stand in for his own.

Therefore, when he saw Yang Qi suck his soul, his true energy, and his life force into one specific location in his forehead, he didn’t even pause before going after him.

Unfortunately for him, what he actually encountered was the golden imp. The God Legion Seal.

The instant the power of the asura touched it, boundless golden light shone out from the golden imp. Apparently, it was only in moments that Yang Qi truly couldn't fight back that the imp would do anything.

Its mighty power filled the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, causing even that supreme aura of a grand emperor to become the opposite of glorious. At the summit of the pagoda were two powerful forces, one being the nascent divinity sealing mark of the chancellor, the other being the noble spirit of the pagoda itself. Both of those forces were backed by the power of a Great Sage, and were powerful enough to exterminate anything in existence. However, when compared to the shining light of the God Legion Seal, they were like nothing.

In fact, their auras even began to shrink down.

Yang Qi could sense shock from the chancellor’s energy projection; he obviously couldn’t understand how such a powerful new force had come to appear in the pagoda.

The God Legion Seal surpassed the projection’s understanding. That seal was not equivalent to a Great Sage, it was a power far beyond that. It came from the legion of gods, to whom Great Sages were like ants.

In front of the legion of gods, even Grand Emperor Rich-Lush would be forced to act with the utmost humility and respect.

The asura immediately screamed in terror. “What is that? It’s… it’s melting me!”

Beneath the golden light, the asura's flesh and blood began to drip away.

The asura was even weaker than Ghost Emperor Yama; before the God Legion Seal could even do anything specific, he was dying. And thanks to that weakened state, he was quickly sucked into the depths of the pagoda, including his flesh, blood, quintessence, magical laws, and everything else that made him up.

Yang Qi looked on. Unfortunately, there was nothing he could do to prevent the Grand Emperor's Pagoda from taking the asura away.

However, he also knew that the pagoda would automatically transform the asura into power that he could use to temper himself, or bless his friends and family. Of course, he first had to acquire the pagoda for himself.

Even as the asura was destroyed by the light from the golden imp, the noble spirit of the Grand Emperor's Pagoda spoke, his voice quivering with rage. “Who dares to challenge the authority of the Grand Emperor?”

In coordination with his words, a massive power erupted out, taking the form of a bronze axe that slashed toward the golden imp.

That bronze axe was mighty to a divine level, the kind of thing that could cleave mountains and divert rivers, even destroy the sky. It was virtually invincible.

It was actually a warding magic that was built into the Grand Emperor's Pagoda.

The noble spirit of the pagoda could control all aspects of its defense. Anyone who wanted to take control of the pagoda would have to deal with the attacks of that spirit, who would stop at nothing to repel all invaders.

Even the chancellor of the Demi-Immortal Institute had been incapable of fully taking control of it; the most he had been able to do was put a sealing mark in place that was capable of standing toe to toe with the noble spirit.

As the axe slashed toward the golden imp, the imp waved its finger. When that tiny finger hit the tip of the axe, the gigantic weapon shattered.

Then, the imp spoke in a voice that only a member of the legion of gods could speak in. “Whoever defies the majesty of the legion of gods shall die!”

WHIZZZ!

It waved its finger again, and massive power surged forth, locking down all of the pagoda’s warding magics. This magical treasure, created by the Great Sage Grand Emperor Rich-Lush, was rendered completely defenseless by a single wave of the finger of the golden imp that was the God Legion Seal.

The pagoda’s noble spirit was too stunned to even react.

Then, the golden imp waved another finger. “You have been found guilty by the legion of gods!”

The noble spirit immediately burst into flames, screaming as it faded away into nothing. This noble spirit, an entity which had existed for countless tens upon tens of thousands of years, was easily destroyed by the golden imp.

Now, the only other powerful entity in the pagoda was the projection cast by the chancellor’s sealing mark.

Earlier, he had been facing off with the noble spirit, but with that spirit dead, the chancellor was free to seize control of the pagoda. And he didn’t waste any time in trying to do just that.

But then, the golden imp said, “Any who blaspheme against the legion of gods shall die!”

It waved its finger again.

RUMBLE!

Before it could react, the chancellor’s sealing mark exploded into nothing.

Now, the Grand Emperor's Pagoda was completely filled with the golden light from the imp. The chancellor’s sealing magic had tried to seize control, but had offended the legion of gods, and was wiped out of existence.

Every last bit of Grand Emperor Rich-Lush’s aura had been expunged from the pagoda.

And all the scraps of the asura’s flesh and blood had been absorbed for use as fuel.

With all threats having been eliminated, the golden imp once again settled into immobility within Yang Qi’s forehead.

Yang Qi was now regaining his composure, and found that he was actually connected to the pagoda on the level of his soul. Rising to his feet, he saw all the doors within the pagoda open, allowing him to reach the highest level, where the chancellor and the noble spirit had been earlier.

Within that hall was an enormous spell formation chart, covered with countless paper talismans, each of which was one of the various warding magics that protected the pagoda. It almost looked like a map of the starry sky.

All a person had to do was send some true energy into that chart, and they would be able to control every aspect of the pagoda. And that was exactly what Yang Qi did.

As of this moment, he was the owner of the Grand Emperor's Pagoda. He could control its movement, and could even allow people to enter it and use the immense stores of vital energy therein to practice cultivation.

Even if Grand Emperor Rich-Lush, the original owner of the pagoda, showed up and tried to take control of it, he would fail. With the God Legion Seal in place, no one would ever dare to try to do so. After all, that would constitute an offense to the legion of gods.

And even someone like Grand Emperor Rich-Lush who offended the gods would end up dying.

‘With this pagoda under my control, the chancellor’s plan will definitely fail!’ Yang Qi was now confident that there was no way the Crown Prince would easily become a Great Sage.

Hand resting on the spell formation chart, he thought, ‘I should just let Young Master Shroud-Heaven and the Crown Prince fight to the bitter end. Hopefully they both get seriously injured. Right now, I need to get out of here.’

In that same moment, the Nine-Heavens Ten-Earths Demon-Devil-Horde World-Ending Grand Spell Formation surged with heaven-shaking, earth-toppling power.

Even as the spell formation sent the power of a Demon Sage into the pagoda to destroy it, Yang Qi used his true energy to activate one of the pagoda’s functions. In the blink of an eye, it pierced into the air and vanished.

The enormous spell formation had previously had the entire area locked down, which would have prevented anyone from leaving. Even a Great Sage would have been forced to expend a huge amount of energy to do so.

But the power of the God Legion Seal still lingered in the Grand Emperor's Pagoda. And the spirit of the huge spell formation could sense that, and was terrified.

Not even hordes of demons or devils would dare to profane the legion of gods. The gods were simply too powerful.

In the moment that the Grand Emperor's Pagoda vanished, something happened in the Demi-Immortal Institute, specifically, in the Minorcosm World. Within a mysterious aspect of space-time there, a man opened his eyes, and they shone with intense light. He was none other than the chancellor. “What was that power? I couldn’t even fight it. Not even the founder of the Demi-Immortal Institute could have stood up to it. It made me feel like a mortal. Heaven and earth, the stars, mountains and rivers, the boundless void… compared to that power, they are like the things of mortals. So terrifying…. Don’t tell me that was connected to Yang Qi? Impossible. With power like that, he could have killed the Crown Prince in the blink of an eye. Not even everyone in the Rich-Lush Continent working together could stand up to power like that. The Grand Emperor's Pagoda was taken over, and then it vanished. The Crown Prince is going to have a rough time getting out of that spell formation….”

Chapter 197: The Crown Prince in Danger

The chancellor’s gaze pierced from within the Minorcosm World all the way to the Heavendawn Quarry near the western ocean.

The mine was completely locked down, and bursting with demon energy. The chancellor was profoundly insightful, but it didn’t take much observation on his part to realize that the Nine-Heavens Ten-Earths Demon-Devil-Horde World-Ending Grand Spell Formation was too powerful for ordinary people to fight against. Even a Great Sage who ended up caught in it would be in trouble. For the Crown Prince to be stuck in it meant that he was in incredible danger.

Furthermore, Young Master Shroud-Heaven’s cultivation base was no weaker than his. The Crown Prince might have the legacy of Grand Emperor Rich-Lush, and have supreme control over the vital energy of the lands, but the spell formation was a game-changer.

The chancellor’s plan had been for the Crown Prince to use the Grand Emperor's Pagoda to push all the way into the Great Sage level. Then, he could have killed any enemy in his path. But in a surprise twist, the noble spirit, the asura, and even the chancellor’s nascent divinity sealing mark had been wiped out.

And now, the chancellor had no way to even know where the pagoda was.

After all, despite having come into possession of it, he had not forged it, had never completely taken it for his own, and could not control it.

‘My plan has failed…. So, will the Rich-Lush Continent experience a major catastrophe now? Apparently so. Did this really happen because of Yang Qi? If he has the pagoda, how do I figure out who’s backing him? If his backer is this powerful, probing for information could bring disaster to the Demi-Immortal Institute. For now, I’ll just watch from the shadows. The Crown Prince won’t die. In fact, this could be good training for him. Perhaps forcing him to wait a bit before reaching the Great Sage level won’t be such a bad thing. And if I intervened right now, there’s no way Great Sage Shroud-Heaven would simply stand by and do nothing….’

Sure enough, he could sense that another powerful entity was watching this duel between two members of the younger generation. Both of the contenders had powerful backers; one was supported by the Hanging Mountain, the other, the Demi-Immortal Institute.

If the chancellor made a move now, Great Sage Shroud-Heaven would do the same. And a fight between two Great Sages could have a profoundly negative effect on the continent as a whole.

Since both Great Sages were tacitly agreeing to refrain from interfering, the only thing to be done was to wait and see how things would play out between the Crown Prince and Young Master Shroud-Heaven.

“Don’t let me down….” the chancellor murmured. Then, he closed his eyes.

Back in the Nine-Heavens Ten-Earths Demon-Devil-Horde World-Ending Grand Spell Formation, the battle raged on between the Crown Prince and Young Master Shroud-Heaven. One had the projection of Grand Emperor Rich-Lush, and the other had a consummate demon-god. Both were at the peak of their power, and every time their spear and halberd made contact, massive shock waves exploded out, destroying various areas of the Heavendawn Quarry.

Then, right in the middle of the fighting, the sura power which had been pulsing in the Sura Devil-Eye vanished. Both the Crown Prince and Young Master Shroud-Heaven looked down with visible shock.

‘What?!’ Young Master Shroud-Heaven thought. ‘Thanks to all my work setting up this trap, I knew about the Grand Emperor's Pagoda and the asura. I was planning to use that power to kill him and achieve my goals. How could the pagoda and the asura both have vanished? Is this the Crown Prince’s doing?’

The Crown Prince was similarly stunned. ‘The chancellor snuck the pagoda into there for the purpose of me using it during this fight. With the power of the Demon Sage formation he diverted to that location, the pagoda should have absorbed the asura and vanquished the noble spirit. Then I could have used the power of Grand Emperor Rich-Lush’s legacy to absorb the treasure. How could it have vanished? Did Great Sage Shroud-Heaven do this? Have I fallen into a real trap this time?’

Although Young Master Shroud-Heaven had experienced somewhat of a setback because of the disappearance of the pagoda, the Crown Prince had it worse off. As long as he didn't get the pagoda, Young Master Shroud-Heaven still had the advantage in the fight, thanks to his overall control of the spell formation. And it would be very difficult for the Crown Prince to escape.

‘The Crown Prince is definitely not the one who caused the Grand Emperor's Pagoda to vanish!’ Young Master Shroud-Heaven thought. Obviously, if the Crown Prince had been the one to take it, he would have instantly become more powerful. Instead, he was looking around nervously, seemingly seeking an opening to escape from the spell formation.

In that moment, Young Master Shroud-Heaven realized that the Crown Prince’s plan had been foiled, and that he wanted to flee.

Chuckling, he said, “Your plan failed, didn’t it Crown Prince? My father knew all along about your chancellor’s scheme with the Grand Emperor's Pagoda. You two thought that hiding it here would be your ticket to defeating me? Well, that pagoda is now buried in the depths of my Demon Sage formation. And soon, you will be too!”

He then looked on eagerly to see how the Crown Prince would respond to his threats.

“Even if you do have the Grand Emperor's Pagoda now, it won’t do you any good,” the Crown Prince replied. “I'm invincible! Not just in the Rich-Lush Continent, but also in the universe at large!” As he stood there proudly, he looked like a god of battle, a warrior who could never possibly be beaten in battle. “The Grand Emperor's Pagoda is a mere material possession. Not having it is actually better. I will use my own strength to connect with heaven and break all shackles! The Great Sage level is only the starting point for me! I will defy heaven!”

RUMBLE!

His dual-crescent-bladed halberd pierced through the air toward Young Master Shroud-Heaven.

“Son of Heaven’s Godfist; Son of Heaven’s Horoscopy. The Son of Heaven controls the cosmos, and will unite all the lands!”

Young Master Shroud-Heaven was caught off guard, and staggered backward under the force of the attack.

Clearly, he was shocked that the Crown Prince had actually been hiding his true strength. However, at least he had confirmed that the Crown Prince didn't have the Grand Emperor's Pagoda. Feeling a bit more confident, he calmed his heart and smiled in vicious fashion.

“You will die this day, Crown Prince. You think some idle threats will help you beat me? What a joke! Heaven-Demon Spear Art! Heaven-Demon Descends!”

As Young Master Shroud-Heaven went through the initial forms of what was obviously a consummate spear technique, a vortex sprang up around the tip of the weapon. At the same time, a long, sharp horn sprouted from his head.

“Ghost-God Transformation. Astral-Star Transformation. Never-Dying Transformation! Come forth, Heaven-Demon Domain!”

RUMBLE!

Massive amounts of true energy exploded out of him to create a personal domain, which was none other than the Heaven-Demon Domain. Countless daemons appeared within it, and the demon energy which surged out caused Young Master Shroud-Heaven to look like the picture of a demon-god.

The sixth Legendary transformation was when one could create a domain, a unique dimension in which one could be virtually invincible. Normally speaking, an enemy would have to spend ten times as much effort to make any successful attack on an enemy protected in that way.

Furthermore, Young Master Shroud-Heaven’s domain benefited from the Demon Sage formation, and was even stronger than normal. Within a few breaths of time, it negated all of the Crown Prince’s attacks.

“Heaven-Demon Domain? I’ll break that too!” The Crown Prince strode forward, sweeping his halberd through the air, using a mysterious technique that caused numerous streams of light to slash through the air, slamming into the domain, and instantly damaging it visibly.

“The Son of Heaven wields a halberd to wage war in the four corners of the earth!” It almost seemed as if this halberd technique of the Crown Prince was enough to defeat and even kill Young Master Shroud-Heaven.

“Feeling suicidal, Crown Prince? Sura Secret Magic! Grand Asura Undying Technique! Demon Dao. Devil Dao. Demon and Devil Combined!”

Blood-colored light surged into the sky, making Young Master Shroud-Heaven even more intimidating than before.

“You're stuck in my spell formation, Crown Prince, and there’s no way you’ll escape!” Meanwhile, some distance away, deep in the sea of clouds, the Grand Emperor's Pagoda floated there, Yang Qi still inside. The pagoda's aura was now masked, and it was invisible. Now, Yang Qi realized that the inside was a dimension very much like his thumb-ring of holding.

There were even areas that were so profound and mysterious that he couldn’t reach them.

Furthermore, he now knew that he actually couldn’t control all of the marvelous aspects of the pagoda. He simply didn’t have enough true energy. Even just using it to escape the spell formation had wasted more than half of his reserves.

Back in the location of the fight between the Crown Prince and Young Master Shroud-Heaven, the thick clouds that covered the area made it impossible for outsiders to observe the battle. However, Yang Qi could use the powers of the pagoda to pierce that barrier and observe, although it did involve further drainage of energy.

Normally speaking, not even ten Nonary Lifeseizers combined would be able to control the Grand Emperor's Pagoda like this. Even Legendaries in the second transformation would have difficulty doing so.

The fact that Yang Qi could control it now was remarkable to say the least.

Chapter 198: Seriously Hurt and Running

Yang Qi was feeling particularly pleased, more so than ever.

The first reason was because the Crown Prince was now trapped in the Nine-Heavens Ten-Earths Demon-Devil-Horde World-Ending Grand Spell Formation. The second was because he now had the Grand Emperor’s Pagoda. Not even the chancellor could take that treasure away from him now. It was really a wonderful feeling.

That said, he was still riveted by the show of force the Crown Prince was putting on.

Even surrounded by hordes of demons and devils, he continued to fight on as if he didn’t know the meaning of the word exhaustion. Every attack of his was strong enough to level mountains, making it obvious to Yang Qi that not even a hundred of himself combined could possibly be a match, not even if all hundred versions had a Grand Emperor’s Pagoda.

After all, the pagoda was a magical treasure that required true energy to control. And right now, Yang Qi could only do so for a short moment.

He hadn’t yet fully grasped the quintessence of the pagoda, and needed more time studying it to gain more enlightenment. In its depths, the quintessence-blood and vital energy of a Never-Dying asura still waited to be converted into power by the pagoda. Once that power was tapped into and released, it could sustain the cultivation of countless energy artists.

Yang Qi wasn’t sure exactly how to do that yet, but it was only a matter of time before he figured it out.

For now, he could use it to pierce through the air, and harvest some of the power of the universe. In that respect, it made the Pearl of the Thousand Illusions World and the Gate of the Great Void seem like little more than toys. In antiquity, those two items had been glorious treasures among treasures. However, the versions that Yun Hailan had were so far removed from the original versions that they were virtually counterfeits, and were so weak it was pathetic.

In contrast, the Grand Emperor's Pagoda had actually been created by Grand Emperor Rich-Lush himself. Therefore, when it was used in the Rich-Lush Continent, it would provide profound benefits. In the future, Yang Qi could allow his sworn siblings and family to practice their cultivation in it, and thus absorb the spirit energy of the continent much more quickly than normal.

If the pagoda were to be placed in Yanhaven, the city would essentially become invulnerable to all attacks. Not even Legendaries would be a threat to it.

Even more important, if Yang Qi reached the Legendary level, the powers of the pagoda that he could unleash would be even more pronounced, and he could slaughter even more powerful opponents.

Now that the Crown Prince had the legacy of Grand Emperor Rich-Lush, he would be virtually invincible in the Rich-Lush Continent. However, the pagoda would definitely be an equalizer. After all, it would provide similar blessings from the essence of the continent itself.

Streams of power flowed through Yang Qi with every breath he took.

As a Nonary Lifeseizer, he could inherently absorb the vital energy of heaven and earth much more quickly to replenish his true energy. Furthermore, his godly-class energy art only continued to grow more powerful as he increased in cultivation level. In fact, if he performed breathing exercises in a given area, he could absorb so much spirit energy that it would make it impossible for any other cultivators within hundreds of kilometers of him to practice their own cultivation. Even the plants in that area would find it impossible to grow.

It didn’t take long for him to restore his true energy levels to normal.

Then, he flew out of the pagoda and into the sea of clouds. As he did, the Grand Emperor's Pagoda shrank down until it was the size of a grain of rice, and then flew into his sea of energy, and the Hellfire Crucible. There, Yang Qi would be able to study it more closely and learn more of its functions.

It took a huge amount of true energy to send the pagoda flying about. Furthermore, because the magical laws of space were volatile, and the pagoda was somewhat unwieldy, there was always the risk that spatial tempests could snatch it and throw it into another aspect of space-time, never to return. If that happened, it would be a big disaster.

Thankfully, the pagoda had the miraculous ability to change sizes. It could become so miniscule it was almost impossible to see, or as large and imposing as a mountain. It was also capable of holding almost anything.

As Yang Qi hovered cross-legged in the clouds, getting familiar with the pagoda, the sounds of explosive battle could still be heard in the Heavendawn Quarry. At one point, Yang Qi sent some true energy over to observe the fighting, and saw that although the Crown Prince was still holding his own, he was slowly being pushed toward the Sura Devil-Eye.

That devil-eye was the center of the enormous Demon Sage formation, and it exerted a gravitational force that would pull nearby enemies toward it, where it would crush and melt them.

If nothing happened to stop the process, the Crown Prince would eventually be dragged into the same location the asura had been in, where he would be bound up and slowly melted, refined for Young Master Shroud-Heaven to use to break into the Great Sage level.

With each moment that ticked by, Yang Qi’s mood improved; he very much wanted to see the Crown Prince dead.

Young Master Shroud-Heaven might be a demon-devil, but the Crown Prince was the epitome of arrogance and egotism. He was also completely unreasonable, and would kill anyone he wanted. In some respects, he was more of a demon-devil than actual demon-devils. Therefore, if he won this fight, it was a foregone conclusion that he would carry out a reign of terror in the Rich-Lush Continent.

As such, Yang Qi was completely focused on the battle, and would remain so until he saw what fate the Crown Prince met.

At a certain point in the fighting, mad cackling erupted from Young Master Shroud-Heaven, and his monster subordinates all started to go crazy.

In fact, the subordinates were now openly taunting the Crown Prince.

“You’ll end up buried here today, Crown Prince! This spell formation was created by a Great Sage of the Demonfolk in ancient times. The only path available to you now leads to death!”

“Hey Crown Prince, how come you’re always so arrogant? Now look at you! You’re like a stray dog! Why don’t you just kowtow to our Young Master Shroud-Heaven? If you don't, you’ll definitely die here today.”

“That's right. Drop to your knees, Crown Prince. Kowtow! And you know what, you should probably change your name. Instead of Crown Prince, you should be the Clown Prince!”

“Clown Prince? No, that’s too nice. How about he change his name to Crown Twit? Or Crown Bitch? Or wait, how about Crown Dipshit?”

“Just call him Clown Slave and make him grovel in front of us every day.”

For a proud and arrogant person like the Crown Prince to hear such insults pushed him into nearly indescribable levels of rage.

“You hellions think you can get me to slip up by pissing me off? I think not.” Suddenly, he seemed to grow completely calm as a huge domain sprang up around him, completely negating any of the attacks against him.

“Demi-Immortal Sage Magic! Saintly-class energy art! Holy Sage Domain!”

Not only did the domain protect him from attacks, it caused his power levels to rise. Blood energy surged within him, emerging from the top of his head to form a bloody mist filled with dragons, tigers, birds, and turtles.

Eyes blazing with killing intent, he looked at Young Master Shroud-Heaven and said, “You think I can’t handle you? As far as I'm concerned, this little spell formation of yours is nothing more than a joke. I didn’t want to resort to my domain, as my Demi-Immortal Sage Magic isn’t yet complete, but since you give me no choice, I guess I’ll do just that.”

“Demi-Immortal Sage Magic!?” Young Master Shroud-Heaven said, shocked. “I can’t believe the chancellor of your institute actually gave that energy art to you. That’s the most secret technique of the chancellors, which is supposed to be available only to them! Why did he give it to you? Nine Ultimate Paragons! Demon Sage Extermination!”

Without any further hesitation, Young Master Shroud-Heaven drew on his trump card to attack the Crown Prince.

RUMBLE!

All of a sudden, immense power surged out of the Sura Devil-Eye.

Young Master Shroud-Heaven blurred into motion, taking up a position within the devil-eye itself. Even as the ground shook violently, numerous freakish monsters in the mine district began to rush toward him and gather in his vicinity.

Ten breaths of time passed, and then he shot back out of the Sura Devil-Eye.

Shockingly, he now looked completely different from before. He was taller and burlier, and shone brightly, as though his skin were now bronze. It was as if he were the most ultimate and perfect incarnation of the Demonfolk.

It was almost as if he had been possessed by some Demonfolk Great Sage from the distant past. Even his aura had transformed, and his eyes were now blank, and seemingly filled with the primal-chaos of the universe itself.

“Your Demi-Immortal Sage Magic might be powerful, Crown Prince, but you won’t escape death! I've become one with this Demon Sage spell formation. With this power, I can kill gods! Prepare to die!”

He thrust out his spear, causing numerous projections to spring up around him, gigantic daemons from ancient times. It was almost as if the souls of demons were waking up, ripping apart space-time as they attacked.

It was a consummate, deadly spear move that could seemingly slay gods.

The Crown Prince simply stood there, his dual-crescent-bladed halberd trembling as he built up his power. In the last possible moment, he slashed his weapon out, leaving behind a trail of dazzling light.

The arc of his weapon seemed to conform to a great dao, like a meteor streaking through the night, causing light and warmth to spread through the universe. This was also a consummate move.

Looking at it, Yang Qi felt as though he could sense its ability to control life itself.

‘Not good!’ he thought, shocked at the power that the Crown Prince was capable of unleashing. However, he was a mere spectator now, and could do nothing to interfere or influence the fight.

The bright beam of light from the Crown Prince slammed into the spear, and an explosion of blinding radiance resulted. Young Master Shroud-Heaven was sliced clean in half by the halberd, and yet, his spear stabbed directly into the Crown Prince’s head.

The Crown Prince’s vital energy immediately began to drain out, and yet, he had created the opening he needed. Even as the light continued to spread out, he vanished without a trace.

Yang Qi gritted his teeth in frustration. ‘He escaped! Injured, but alive!’

Chapter 199: Calling Out to Sworn Siblings

‘They both got hurt, and the Crown Prince actually escaped. It seems he’s in really bad shape. I wonder if he’ll pull through. What should I do? If he really gets away, it could cause big problems in the future.’

Yang Qi had half a mind to try to track down the Crown Prince and take advantage of his weak state to kill him.

However, as soon as he sent his true energy out to look for clues, a spatial tempest erupted out, destroying any traces of the Crown Prince’s passage. There was now no way for anyone to know where he went.

Apparently, whatever spatial dimension he had traveled through to escape had been destroyed after his passage.

Considering there was no way to track the Crown Prince, Yang Qi prepared to just leave. However, that was when the voice of Young Master Shroud-Heaven erupted out.

“After him! Track him down! My deadly spear strike definitely hit him, infecting him with the true energy of an ancient Demon Sage. Even a Great Sage would need years to cleanse himself. He’s definitely hiding somewhere to recover. Search the highest heavens and the deepest hells, and drag him out!”

The fact that Young Master Shroud-Heaven could issue such orders even after having been cut in half went to show that his injuries weren’t as severe as they seemed.

“Young Master Shroud-Heaven, don’t exacerbate your injuries!”

“I'm fine! The Crown Prince is hurt even worse than I am. I stabbed his head and injured his sea of consciousness. All he did was hurt my torso. A Never-Dying cultivation base can always be healed. That last halberd strike could have killed me, but thankfully he was stuck in the formation. That weapon of his definitely conforms to the dao of heaven, and the essence of demi-immortals! He can’t be allowed to heal up! If he does, he’ll definitely end up improving his cultivation base, and then he’ll be unstoppable.” Young Master Shroud-Heaven actually sounded extremely nervous.

In response to his orders, a black cloud of demon-devils erupted from the Heavendawn Quarry and scattered in all directions to look for clues.

At that point, Yang Qi stealthily made his way off.

Based on what he had heard from Young Master Shroud-Heaven himself, the Crown Prince would need years to recover, and would most likely require the help of the chancellor himself. However many years the Crown Prince took licking his wounds, those would be years Yang Qi could use to improve his own cultivation.

‘A few years….’ he thought, clenching his hands into fists. ‘That’s not much, but it should be enough to reach the Legendary level. Stepping from the Lifeseizing level to the Legendary level is a change from quantitative to qualitative. Once I succeed, my Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth will transform to even more invincible heights.’

Although rising to the Legendary level would be harder for him than the average person, if he succeeded, the results would be terrifying.

‘What next? Where should I go? Back to the Demi-Immortal Institute?’ He had benefited greatly in the Heavendawn Quarry by acquiring the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, and reaching Nonary Lifeseizing. However, time was very limited, and he needed to get a lot stronger before the Crown Prince returned from recovery.

It seemed the best thing to do would be to return to the Demi-Immortal Institute, improve his cultivation base, and learn more about the pagoda. At the moment, he only knew about ten percent of its secrets. If he could unlock all of those secrets, he could definitely kill any Legendary he came across.

Another task he needed to focus on was reviewing the fight he had witnessed, especially the various moves the Crown Prince had used.

His final attack with his halberd had pierced through the air and consumed magical laws. It had fairly thrummed with the might of heaven, and seemed capable of destroying any life it touched. It was a level that Yang Qi could hardly comprehend.

It seemed like evidence of a breakthrough, as though being trapped in the huge spell formation had actually provided the Crown Prince with some level of enlightenment.

Without the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, there was no way the Crown Prince would easily reach the Great Sage level. However, if he did eventually gain all the enlightenment he needed, then after he healed, he would be completely terrifying, and would be the type of person other Great Sages simply couldn’t contend with.

Yang Qi had already learned quite a bit from just watching him fight with that halberd. By adding certain elements from it into the dao of the quick strike, and the Nightfall Symphony, those techniques could become even more profound.

As he flew closer to the Demi-Immortal Institute, something suddenly occurred to him, and he stopped in place.

‘I probably shouldn’t go to the institute now,’ he thought. ‘Grand Elder Feat-Virtue would surely cause trouble for me. And Patriarchs Wind and Cloud were openly working for the Crown Prince Society, and would certainly do their best to oppose me too.

There was no way he would be able to focus on cultivation that way. Besides, he didn’t feel that he could truly trust any of the elders in the institute.

Right now, the only people he had faith in were his sworn siblings.

‘I should probably take my brothers to Yanhaven, and let them work on their cultivation in the Grand Emperor's Pagoda. If we remain united, we can face any obstacle.’ The more he thought about it, the more it seemed like a good idea to have his sworn siblings further their cultivation in the treasure. Back when he had faced off with the Crown Prince, they had taken their stand with him, and had been willing to fight to the death at his side. If he couldn’t trust them, then who could he trust?

The Crown Prince was so strong that even most Legendaries could do nothing more than shake in their boots in his presence. And yet, his sworn siblings hadn’t hesitated to join him. That was true comradeship.

Yang Qi valued friendship deeply, and would never forget the kindness that had been shown to him by his sworn siblings.

The Grand Emperor's Pagoda currently contained the flesh, blood, and vital energy of a Never-Dying Legendary asura, so there was no doubt that his sworn siblings could benefit from cultivating there.

His decision was made.

Pulling out various messaging talismans from his Heart of the Sea thumb-ring, he sent messages to everyone to meet him at Yanhaven.

A moment later, he received replies. Most agreed, but not all. For example, Flame Clearspring said that his father, Pontifex Flame, demanded that he stay at the Tabernacle of Flame. Apparently, his father had completely acquiesced to the tyrannical Crown Prince.

‘I don’t think Pontifex Flame understands the situation fully. Perhaps I should go pay a visit and explain things. He would never have given me the time of day before, but now that I'm strong enough to stand up to Legendaries, he should at least listen to me.’ Frowning, Yang Qi headed south toward the Tabernacle of Flame.

**

The south was a scorching place, the perfect location for the fiery Tabernacle of Flame. The weather was never cold, and there were deserts everywhere. No matter what season it was, the sun always burned hot in the sky, scorching the lands and causing the air to twist and distort.

The Tabernacle of Flame was a very large organization, and Yang Qi knew exactly where the headquarters was located. It sat on the enormous Mountain of Flames, in the middle of a sprawling desert that was so hot and dry it could kill people who spent too much time in it. This mountain actually resembled a raging fire, as it was made from a type of red stone called flamejade. Anyone who cultivated fire-type energy arts here would feel like they were in heaven.

It was incredibly hot there, and yet there were still natural springs filled with icy-cold water. That water was like liquid jade made for immortals, and even one drop of it would quench all thirst. It was a wonderful elixir for people who practiced cultivation.

Because of those factors, all disciples of the Tabernacle of Flame dreamed of practicing their cultivation there.

At the top of the Mountain of Flames, in a sprawling, castle-like temple, Pontifex Flame was in the middle of giving some advice to his son, Flame Clearspring.

“Clearspring, from now on, you can’t have any dealings with that Yang Qi.” He almost looked nervous as he sat there on his throne. “The Crown Prince is just too strong! Besides, he’s destined to be the next chancellor of the Demi-Immortal Institute, and that will make him the most powerful person in the continent! Yang Qi will definitely end up getting killed by him. If you continue to claim to be Yang Qi’s sworn brother, the entire Tabernacle of Flame is going to be dragged into ruin.”

“Father,” Flame Clearspring replied forcefully, “I swore to be Yang Qi’s brother for life! We’re going to live and die together, and if either of us betray our oath, we’ll be exterminated by heaven and executed by the earth! We swore oaths together! The Crown Prince might want him dead, but I’ll fight to the death to defend him!”

At this point, a burly fellow who had been standing next to Pontifex Flame took a step forward. “Clearspring, your emotions are clouding your judgement. I know that Yang Qi is your sworn brother, but I'm your brother too, your blood brother! If you drag the Tabernacle of Flame into this feud with the Crown Prince, then all of your friends and family will be dead. Then what? Brother, you really need to think this through clearly.”

This man was Flame Midheaven, Pontifex Flame's oldest son. He had just recently broken through to the Legendary level, and was the official successor of his father the pontifex.

From this it was possible to see the vast difference between the Tabernacle of Flame and the Demi-Immortal Institute.

The Legendary level was the prerequisite for the successor of the Tabernacle of Flame, whereas the Demi-Immortal Institute required a Great Sage.

“Brother, I think you’re missing the point. Even if I broke ties with Brother Yang Qi, the Crown Prince isn’t just going to let us off the hook. He’s merciless and sinister, and seeks revenge over the smallest grievance. The only thing we can do now is stand together! Form an alliance with the other organizations, and maybe even the Sage Ancestor Dynasty. That’s the only way to stay alive!”

“Nonsense,” Pontifex Flame said. “You think some sort of alliance can do anything to someone as powerful as the Crown Prince? If we go up against him, our church will be nothing more than cannon fodder. How about this: sever ties with Yang Qi, and I’ll send a messenger to the leadership of the Crown Prince Society, telling them that we want to turn weapons of war into gifts of jade and silk. We’ll even send some gifts to whoever has the Crown Prince's ear.”

“Father,” Flame Midheaven said, “if there’s one person who has the Crown Prince’s ear, it's Yun Hailan. And I've already thought of the perfect gift to give her.”

Chapter 200: Astonishing the Tabernacle of Flame

“What?!” Flame Clearspring said. “You want to give a gift to Yun Hailan and ask her to put in a good word with the Crown Prince? Are you kidding me? She’s my sworn brother’s biggest adversary! All of us hate her guts. Sucking up to her would be siding with the enemy!”

“Clearspring,” Pontifex Flame said, “you’re really acting muddle-headed. If she's the only one who has the Crown Prince’s ear, what else are we supposed to do? Do you really want to bring about the destruction of our church? The Flame Clan has been building up this organization for thousands of years. Do you realize that, back in the martial arts competition, not a single of the Great Sages did anything about the Crown Prince breaking the rules? Don’t you understand what that means? His rise to power has only just begun. Besides, everyone says he’s a god from heaven descended into the mortal world. He’s an invincible force who is destined to become a Great Sage. In fact, he might even progress beyond the Great Sage level. And he's also the future chancellor of the Demi-Immortal Institute. What is Yang Qi in comparison? In fact, I would bet money that Yang Qi is in a really bad situation in his institute right now. Maybe he won the competition and got a lot of merit points, but I doubt they’ll let him buy anything noteworthy with them.”

Nodding, Flame Midheaven said, “That’s exactly right. Father’s powers of insight are nearly supernatural, Clearspring. According to my eyes and ears, Yang Qi used his merit point to buy some rock from the Hell of Euphoria, something completely useless to him. In fact, it’s probably a disaster in the waiting. Don’t be hopelessly obstinate, Brother. I understand that Yang Qi saved your life, but don’t allow him to bring our entire church to ruin, and everyone in it!”

“I can’t believe this!” Flame Clearspring said, his hands clenching into fists. “I should just go kill that Yun Hailan right now. Put an end to her mischief once and for all!”

“What gall!” Pontifex Flame shouted. “What are you thinking?! You’re going to kill Yun Hailan? What then, just invite the Crown Prince to come over here and slaughter us all? Besides, how do you know you have what it takes to kill her? You don’t know how strong she really is. Remember, she has the Pearl of the Thousand Illusions World and also the Gate of the Great Void. With those two treasures, she’ll be able to advance her cultivation with incredible speed. If she's a Nonary Lifeseizer already, she’s probably the strongest Lifeseizer in existence.” By this point, Pontifex Flame seemed to have become really worked up. “Flame Midheaven!”

“Yes, father?”

“Escort your unfilial brother to the dungeon. Once Yun Hailan has promised to put in a good word for us with the Crown Prince, maybe we can let him out into the open. I simply won’t let him drag our clan and our church into destruction.”

It was in that very moment that some disciples hurried into the hall. “Pontifex, Yang Qi from the Demi-Immortal Institute has come to pay respects.”

“What? Yang Qi is here in our territory? Tell him I won't see him!” With a dismissive wave, Pontifex Flame sent the disciple back out.

“Father!” Flame Clearspring shouted.

“Enough of this. Midheaven, escort your brother to the dungeon.” Pontifex Flame sighed as Flame Midheaven walked over and placed his hand on his brother's shoulder. “Truth be told, you have to admire Yang Qi. But in the end, he's not strong enough. Back when I clashed with the Crown Prince, I’d assumed he would at least hold back a bit. But he's passed that point. He’s not afraid of anything, and will hold back at nothing to achieve his goals. He’ll break whatever rules he wants, and even exterminate our Tabernacle of Flame.”

“Father,” Flame Midheaven said, “this is for the betterment of our clan, and for all of the disciples of our church. Clearspring will understand it all eventually.”

However, it was in that very moment that a voice rang out that shook all of the Mountain of Flames, and caused many of the springs to erupt with freezing, liquid jade.

“Uncle Flame, I'm the sworn brother of your son, Clearspring. Why are you keeping me at such a distance? Could it be for fear of the Crown Prince? Did you know that he just had a huge fight with Young Master Shroud-Heaven, and suffered a head injury from a Demon Sage spell formation? He was hurt so badly that it will take years to recover, which means it will be a long time before he can even try to take me on. By the time that happens, he’ll find I'm not so easy to deal with.”

When Pontifex Flame realized that it was Yang Qi’s voice, he was visibly taken aback. ‘Such incredible true energy!’

Of course, what was even more shocking was the news about the fight between Young Master Shroud-Heaven and the Crown Prince. If the Crown Prince was going to be stuck in recovery for years, many new possibilities were now on the table.

He and Flame Midheaven exchanged a glance, and then he said, “My most esteemed nephew, I was grievously injured in my fight with the Crown Prince, and am currently convalescing. I shouldn’t really see any visitors, but considering the news you’ve brought, please come in for a short audience.”

With the wave of his hand, he sent out a beam of red light that transformed into a bridge of fire.

Almost immediately, a pulse of true energy surged from that bridge, making it seem like some enormous beast from primeval times were walking toward the hall.

As the ground trembled beneath the pontifex's feet, he looked over to see Yang Qi entering.

“Brother!” Yang Qi said. Laughing heartily, he strode over and clasped Flame Clearspring on the shoulder.

Flame Clearspring returned the gesture. Laughing, he said, “What have you been up to, Brother? Is what you said about the Crown Prince really true? Brother, you’re so strong! Your true energy is far beyond where it was during the competition. Have you increased another level? Wait. Are you a Nonary Lifeseizer? It’s only been a few days! Back in the competition you were in Senary Lifeseizing!”

“What?” Pontifex Flame blurted in shock. Staring fixedly at Yang Qi, he said, “You really are a Nonary Lifeseizer. There’s no mistaking it. Your true energy is incredible, and you’re connected with the vital energy of heaven and earth. You look like an expert who’s practiced cultivation for hundreds of years! A miracle! This is nothing short of a miracle! Normally speaking, each seizing of life after Senary requires hundreds of years of bitter cultivation. Furthermore, you need deep understanding and enlightenment. You shouldn’t have been able to achieve three successive lifeseizings without the direct help of a Great Sage. But that would result in instability, and you’re clearly anything but unstable.”

“You flatter me, Uncle,” Yang Qi said, bowing slightly at the waist. “Uncle, I understand that, out of fear of the Crown Prince, you forbade my sworn brother Flame Clearspring from seeing me. To be honest, it was a sensible decision. The Crown Prince is not the type of person you can afford to offend. Of that, I am completely aware. However, he is now in seclusion, and he won't come out for several years. It’s impossible to say how things will change between now and then.”

“Are you saying that when the time comes, you’ll be able to fight the Crown Prince?” Flame Midheaven asked, his tone as cold as ice. “Come on, the Crown Prince is a Never-Dying Legendary, right on the verge of being a Great Sage, and you're only in Nonary Lifeseizing. The nine phases of the Energy Arts level are for mortals, and the nine seizings of life in the Lifeseizing level are about building a foundation. For all intents and purposes, Yang Qi, you’ve only begun your path of cultivation. Back in ancient times, only Legendaries were considered true energy warriors. Anyone below that was considered a mere mortal. As a mortal, how can you possibly stand up to the Crown Prince? Do you know how much energy and resources it will take you, not just to reach the Legendary level, but to reach the ninth transformation? Every transformation is a hundred times more difficult than practicing cultivation from the very beginning all the way to Nonary Lifeseizing.”

Turning to look at Flame Midheaven, Yang Qi said, “Is that so? Well, perhaps you’d like a little demonstration to show you why I'm so confident. You’re a Blood-Form Legendary, correct? The first transformation. According to you, I'm just a mortal. Why don’t we see if you can handle one palm strike from me?”

“A single palm strike? Are you insane?! I know you won the Inter-Institutional Martial Arts Competition, but none of the competitors were Legendaries. I'm getting the sense you have no idea how terrifying the Legendary level is. Alright, fine. I guess now is as good a time as any for you to learn.”

Flame Midheaven extended his hand, splaying his fingers as flames erupted from them, filling the entire hall with heat powerful enough to melt metal. Five columns of flame shot out, like fire dragons, heading straight toward Yang Qi with terrifying speed.

This fire was actually created by the means of numerous tiny paper talismans, giving it intense heat that vastly surpassed ordinary true flame.

Even one strand of such flame that hit an ordinary Lifeseizer would reduce that person to ash. Most noteworthy of all, Flame Midheaven was using a killing move, a signature ability of the Tabernacle of Flame, the Five Dragons Godflame Massacre.

The dragons intertwined, becoming like a sea of lava that bore down on Yang Qi with incredible speed.

Yang Qi hardly even looked at the incoming attack. He extended his palm and then swept it in a downward motion. It almost looked like he was performing calligraphy, except that it sent a graceful arc of light shooting out in front of him.

As soon as that light hit the true flame, the flame collapsed into a multitude of sparks, and the flame talismans that had powered them all went dim.

And then, the light proceeded onward, seemingly not weakened at all by the contact with the fire dragons. Distorting the air as it went, it shot directly toward Flame Midheaven.

Flame Midheaven was powerless to avoid the blast. His armor was shattered, and his clothes nearly ripped to shreds, revealing his bronze-colored skin beneath. Blood sprayed out of his mouth as he tumbled backward out of the hall like a kite with its string cut.

“Midheaven!” Pontifex Flame cried, lunging forward to grab his son. Pouring true energy into him, he found that he had only been superficially wounded, and in fact, much of the impurities in his blood had been forced out.

Eyes sparkling, he turned to look at Yang Qi and said, “You, a Lifeseizer, actually defeated a Legendary?! People like you only come around once every few thousand years! What move was that? With one sweep of your hand, you connected with the dao of heaven?! That’s something that is normally capable only for Legendaries. It should be impossible for you. And your true energy transformed according to the trajectory of your strike.”

Yang Qi smiled. “Oh, that was something I picked up when watching the fight between the Crown Prince and Young Master Shroud-Heaven. Now are you confident in how strong I am, Pontifex?”

Chapter 201: Cultivating Together

With one blow, Yang Qi defeated a Blood-Form Legendary.

He earned his respect, and opened up Pontifex Flame’s eyes, forcing him to acknowledge Yang Qi as a true consummate expert. Of course, considering that he had recently won the Inter-Institutional Martial Arts Competition, there were no shortage of people who already thought of him as an expert.

Normally speaking, the champion of the competition would receive endless glory, and would be groomed by their institute, but he was an exception. Because of the way the Crown Prince blithely broke the rules, Yang Qi got no special treatment, and in fact, was brutally suppressed.

But to many, that didn’t change the fact that he was a top expert with an incredible cultivation base.

And now, he defeated a Legendary while only being a Lifeseizer, leaving Pontifex Flame feeling like he was experiencing a heart attack.

It begged the question of what a person like him would be like if he reached the Legendary level.

Flame Midheaven was ashen-faced and visibly embarrassed. Glaring at Yang Qi, he tried to figure out how he had lost, but couldn’t. This was not just a loss, it was complete and utter defeat. He had never even been given a chance to fight back. He was a Legendary, and according to the ancient way of looking at things, that made him an energy warrior. In contrast, Yang Qi was a mortal.

How could an energy warrior be defeated by a mortal? It seemed impossible.

Of course, Flame Midheaven had only recently made his breakthrough, and was only in the first transformation. But there was still a massive gap between the two of them. His meridians, sea of energy, flesh, blood, and bones had all been formed anew, using the Tabernacle of Flame’s most secret of techniques, the True Scripture of the Flame Emperor.

His bones were now made of flamejade steel, and were visible through his skin, like a combination of jade and fire. They were now ten times tougher than even flying swords. His blood was like magma, so hot that a single drop of it could evaporate all of the water in a huge pond, and cook all the fish to death.

Furthermore, his physique was simply beyond the compare of the Lifeseizing level. By way of comparison, the body of a Blood-Form Legendary was like that of a strapping bodybuilder, while a Nonary Lifeseizer was like a toddler who had only just learned to walk.

And yet, Yang Qi had just proved himself to be far stronger than Flame Midheaven. It seemed unbelievable, and yet he had no choice but to swallow his frustration and believe.

Yang Qi could sense the rancor in Flame Midheaven, and realized how much face he had just lost. Before anything else could happen, he said, “You think that was a fluke, Brother Flame Midheaven? Fine. Take a look at my aura.”

RUMBLE!

Immense true energy erupted out of him, shaking and transforming the audience hall so profoundly that everyone suddenly felt like they were in the presence of a fierce beast of battle from the primeval Yore-Wilds. The aura which pulsed out without stop was so shocking that Pontifex Flame’s face drained of blood.

As for Flame Midheaven, he edged backward, now fully convinced that there was no way he could beat Yang Qi in a fight.

“Very well, rein in your true energy,” Pontifex Flame said with a wry smile. “It seems to me you’re about as strong as someone in the second transformation, a Spirit-Soul Legendary. And you didn’t even use your full level of power, did you? There's something stronger in you, some substructural power that leaves even me feeling shaken to the core.”

Yang Qi smiled. “That’s quite perceptive of you, Uncle. You’re right. That wasn’t my full level of power. I actually have an incomparable magical treasure that makes me virtually invincible. Of course, it takes a lot of true energy to use, so I wouldn't do so lightly.”

Pontifex Flame’s interest was piqued. “Oh? What kind of magical treasure is it? Mind giving me a look? Don’t tell me it’s stronger than the Gate of the Great Void. The prize for the tournament was an imitation of the original Gate of the Great Void, but even that is nothing to look down on. It’s really too bad the Crown Prince took it.”

Yang Qi snorted coldly. “That fake Gate of the Great Void is nothing. If you’re interested, Uncle, I’ll show you right now. Come forth, Grand Emperor's Pagoda!”

Instantly, a power ten times stronger than Yang Qi’s true energy from moments ago filled the entire hall. Visibly shocked, Pontifex Flame rose to his feet, waving his hand to send sheets of flame out that sealed the entire hall.

There, right in front of them, was a bronze pagoda of ancient design. It was mighty, intimidating, and so grand that all of the vital energy on the Mountain of Flames bent in its direction as if in worship. Not even the warding magics protecting the mountain were useful in suppressing it.

“The Grand Emperor’s Pagoda!? Is that really the fabled Grand Emperor's Pagoda?! The pagoda made by the first emperor of the Rich-Lush Dynasty, Grand Emperor Rich-Lush? It's a source of unlimited power! It can even command the vital energy and essence of heaven and earth on this continent! How did you end up with it?”

Before Yang Qi could even reply, his eyes flickered with understanding. “Oh, right. I remember hearing that the chancellor of the Demi-Immortal Institute somehow acquired it. Don’t tell me that he gave it to you as compensation for the Crown Prince taking the Gate of the Great Void? Compensation like that… it’s simply unimaginable. Does the chancellor really care that much about you? If so, does that mean that the Crown Prince—”

‘You think the chancellor gave this to me as compensation?’ Yang Qi thought, chuckling coldly in his heart. However, he didn’t say anything. The chancellor had meant for the Grand Emperor's Pagoda to go to the Crown Prince, but obviously, Yang Qi couldn’t tell the truth to Pontifex Flame. It would be much better for people to assume that the chancellor was supporting him. After all, backing like that would make it a lot more plausible that he could fight the Crown Prince.

Thanks to the God Legion Seal, he had completely wrecked the chancellor’s plans, to the point where the shocked chancellor would never reveal the truth publicly.

“Exactly,” Yang Qi said. “The chancellor gave me this treasure as compensation, and in the hopes that I could use it to keep the Crown Prince in check. Uncle, you would do best to quash any thoughts of trying to improve your relationship with the Crown Prince Society. The Crown Prince doesn’t believe in turning weapons of war into gifts of jade and silk. He’ll definitely take the first chance he can get to kill all of us. I'm completely confident that I can prepare to fight it out with him in a few years.”

“The Grand Emperor's Pagoda….” Pontifex Flame’s eyes flickered with a bit of envy. Of course, he wouldn’t dare to think of trying to snatch the treasure, not considering that he believed the chancellor had given it as a reward to Yang Qi.

“Brother, that’s a huge upgrade for you!” Flame Clearspring said. “I've heard stories of the Grand Emperor's Pagoda. With it, your true energy would be so powerful you could easily kill Legendaries. And using it for cultivation could provide tremendous benefits.”

“You’re right. That's why I came to the Tabernacle of Flame today. I'm calling all of my sworn siblings over to work on their cultivation in the Grand Emperor's Pagoda. In fact, I have the remains of a Never-Dying asura in the pagoda as well. I used the power of the pagoda to cleanse its evil, and now its magical laws and life force quintessence can be used for purposes of cultivation! With that, I'd bet that all of my sworn siblings can reach the Legendary level within only a few years. Hmph! Even if the Crown Prince does become a Great Sage, there’s no way he’ll be killing my sworn siblings.”

“What did you just say?” Pontifex Flame said. “An asura in the Never-Dying Transformation?” He and Flame Midheaven exchanged a glance. Pontifex Flame was already in the third transformation, and had sustained a blow from the Crown Prince. He knew exactly how powerful the ninth transformation was; it had left him completely incapable of even fighting back.

Seeing that he had won the pontifex over, Yang Qi didn’t feel like wasting any more time. “Well, the time has come for Flame Clearspring and I to leave. Once we’re back in Yanhaven, we can start working with the Grand Emperor's Pagoda and the remains of that asura.”

“My dear nephew, why not stay a while?” Pontifex Flame said quickly. “I haven’t even served you any food or wine yet.”

“No, it's fine. Besides, I didn’t bring any proper gifts of introduction for you, Uncle. There’s no time to lose. Although we have a few years to work with, it's still a race against time. Farewell! When I’m strong enough to fight the Crown Prince, the Tabernacle of Flame will benefit as well.”

Swish!

Wrapping up Flame Clearspring with some true energy, he entered the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, which then vibrated and vanished into thin air. Not even Pontifex Flame was able to deduce how it departed.

“The Grand Emperor's Pagoda is truly miraculous,” Pontifex Flame said, looking at the spot the item had occupied only a moment before. “With that pagoda, it would be difficult for any Legendary to kill Yang Qi. I guess your brother is going to benefit quite a bit in the coming period of time. It’s really surprising that the chancellor cares for Yang Qi this much. Giving him that treasure ensures that he won't be killed by the Crown Prince, at least not now.”

Finally shaking free from his reverie, Flame Midheaven clenched his hands into fists and said, “If Yang Qi is this strong right now, how strong do you think he’ll be when he's a Legendary?”

“Midheaven, those are people you simply can't contend with. Both Yang Qi and the Crown Prince are gods from heaven descended into the mortal world. Don’t let yourself feel jealous, it’s just fate.”

“But what do we do now, Father? Should I send word for my people to hold off on giving those gifts to Yun Hailan?”

“No, send the gifts. There’s no harm in it, and we can afford it. In fact, double the value of the gifts! In the end, Clearspring is a sworn brother of Yang Qi, and although Yang Qi will likely never do anything to the Tabernacle of Flame, the Crown Prince will. We need to have as much insurance as possible. Ai….”

“We need to be prepared on all fronts,” Flame Midheaven said, his fists clenching even harder. “What a pity. I wish I were stronger. The Tabernacle of Flame still hasn’t produced a Great Sage. If we had, we would be the Flame Institute by now.”

Chapter 202: Five Years

In Yundale-by-the-Sea, endless waves lapped against the shore, and leaves rustled in the autumn wind, making the scenery even more unique and beautiful.

Yundale-by-the-Sea, also known as the State of Yun, seemed to grow larger by the day. Metal battleships filled the harbor and patrolled the surrounding sea, and all of the docks buzzed with activity. The entire city was like a well-oiled machine of war.

The recently founded state had been fully mobilized, with all its powers focused on the upcoming campaign to subjugate the Rich-Lush Continent.

In a certain study somewhere in the city, Yun Hailan was toying with the statue of a gate, which was none other than the Gate of the Great Void.

Also present was her father, Yun Zhonglong, as well as other important figures of the Yun Clan.

Nowadays, Yun Hailan was more important than her father, and acted every bit like an empress. Yun Zhonglong seemed to be in high spirits. His aura was different now; no longer was he a puny Master of Energy. He had finally reached the Lifeseizing level.

“Lan’er, another organization has sent gifts. The lord of Wavesand Isle has sent five thousand-year-old tiger-shark pearls, and five thousand kilos of ten-thousand-year-old cold steel from the seafloor. There are also a few other assorted treasures. The emissary is currently in the audience hall, do you want to go see him?”

“Lord Wavesand is a mere Tertiary Lifeseizer,” Yun Hailan said airily. “He would hardly count for anything back in the Demi-Immortal Institute. Wouldn’t it be a loss of face for me to deal with someone like him? Ever since the Crown Prince put Yang Qi in his place back in the Inter-Institutional Martial Arts Competition, people have been giving me gifts left and right. It would be far too exhausting to go accept them personally, wouldn’t you say? From now on, just record the names of the people who deliver gifts, and then send them on their way.”

“Yes, of course,” one of the men present said. “Cousin, your progress has been amazing. Soon, the Crown Prince will be the chancellor of the Demi-Immortal Institute, and you’ll be the madam chancellor.”

This man was Song Haiguo from the Song Clan, the older brother of Song Haishan. Yundale-by-the-Sea had two main clans: first the Yun Clan and second the Song Clan.

“Madam chancellor?” A look of ridicule appeared on Yun Hailan’s face. “There's no man in the world who can control me. Not even the Crown Prince. Don’t bring that matter up again, Song Haiguo. Otherwise you’ll end up like Song Haishan.”

“Y-yes, of course, Cousin!” Song Haiguo stammered, beads of sweat popping out on his forehead. Dropping to his knees, he kowtowed over and over, all the time saying, “Please forgive me, Cousin. Please! I understand the error of my ways.”

“On your feet,” Yun Hailan said with the arrogant wave of a finger.

Next to speak was Song Zuting, the clan lord of the Song Clan. “Niece, what happened to my son? Have you uncovered the truth yet? Was he killed by some monster, or was it really Yang Qi?”

“I'm certain it was Yang Qi!” she replied, a cold smile playing out on her face. “He's really grown up. The Crown Prince is going to have to deal with him personally; if he doesn’t, then within four or five years, Yang Qi will probably outmatch him. Of course, I don’t have any hard evidence right now, but wait a few more days. When the Crown Prince gets back from fighting Young Master Shroud-Heaven, I’ll explain the whole thing. And he’ll definitely be able to drag the truth out of Jiang Fan and his friends. At that point, nobody in the Demi-Immortal Institute will be able to stop us from wiping Yanhaven off the map!”

With that, she slapped her hand down onto the table, and the map that lay there. Right under her palm was Yanhaven, making it seem almost like she had reduced the city to rubble.

“Cousin, your cultivation base is so profound, why don’t you just go to Yanhaven right now and put Yang Zhan in his place? Force Yang Qi to commit suicide, or at least enslave him, and destroy his home. You have the Gate of the Great Void, you’re definitely strong enough to take him on, right?” The next person to speak was another member of the Song Clan, Song Haitu.

Yun Hailan snorted coldly. “I could exterminate the Yang Clan as easily as turning over my hand, but now is not the time. That Yang Qi has acquired quite a bit of good fortune, and I'm not completely confident in being able to end him once and for all. Besides, he has a lot of sworn siblings, and if they came for revenge, it would be no small matter. The best thing to do is wait for the Crown Prince, and have him wipe them all out. For now, I'm going to focus on breaking through to the Legendary level. As all of you know, Yang Qi’s aunt Yang Susu awoke her Seven Apertures Sprite Body, and is now in the Minorcosm World of the Demi-Immortal Institute, an alternate dimension that will push her cultivation ahead much faster. She cannot be underestimated.”

“You've really thought things through thoroughly, as usual, Cousin,” Song Haiguo said, doing nothing to hide his obsequiousness. “I guess that old codger Yang Zhan is going to live for a bit longer. That said, he really has put Yanhaven in order. They have an educational establishment already, and all the clans have acknowledged him as king. Furthermore, they’re getting more and more Lifeseizers. Before long, they’ll have as many masters as the sky had clouds. Here in the State of Yun, you’ve managed to push our supreme leader into the Lifeseizing level, but we can’t match up to Yanhaven at the moment. Cousin, do you have any spirit medicines that could push our cultivation to a higher level?”

“The Crown Prince arranged for me to be given a huge batch of life force springwater that I had planned to use for that exact purpose. However, the experts from the Crown Prince Society who went to get it were ambushed by some top master, and had the life force springwater stolen. My guess is that they made the whole story up and kept the water for themselves. However, as my energy arts and cultivation base climb higher and higher, so does my level of power and authority in the Crown Prince Society. Eventually, I’ll purge the organization and get rid of anyone who isn't loyal to me.”

“The Crown Prince will allow that?” Yun Zhonglong said, sounding a bit worried.

“Don’t worry. He already explained that after he reaches the Great Sage level and becomes the chancellor of the Demi-Immortal Institute, he won’t need to stay in the Rich-Lush Continent anymore. He’ll find someone to succeed him, and leave as quickly as possible. According to the rules of the Demi-Immortal Institute, a chancellor has to find a replacement before leaving, and he intends that replacement to be me.” She chuckled coldly. “Unless something unexpected happens, you’re looking at the true future chancellor of the Demi-Immortal Institute!”

Shocked gasps could be heard in the room. After all, the position of chancellor of the Demi-Immortal Institute was the most powerful in all the lands.

“No wonder the Crown Prince is treating you so well,” Yun Zhonglong said, his face flushing with excitement. If his daughter was to be the most powerful person in the continent, then obviously, his clan would become mighty enough to shake the whole world.

All of a sudden, a soldier rushed into the room. “Young Lady,” he said, “a high-ranking member of the Crown Prince Society just arrived to discuss an urgent matter. His name is Xie Feng.”

“Send him in immediately,” Yun Hailan said. ‘Xie Feng is one of the top conclave students in the Crown Prince Society. He lost to Yang Qi, then indicated to me that he wished to have my support. Something really important must have happened for him to rush over and seek an audience like this.’

A moment later, Xie Feng was standing there in the study. Ignoring the shocked onlookers, he said, “Junior Sister Hailan. Something really bad just happened! The Crown Prince and Young Master Shroud-Heaven just fought a huge duel. That hellion Young Master Shroud-Heaven brought in the demon kings of the seventy-two grottos, as well as fiend-devil counts from an alternate dimension. They activated a huge spell formation in the Heavendawn Quarry that drew upon the power of an ancient Demon Sage to injure the Crown Prince. He’s hiding somewhere out in space-time, recovering. He just sent a message to the leaders of the Crown Prince Society, ordering us to come back for a big meeting. He’s going to be in seclusion for five years in that alternate dimension, with his first goal being to fully recover from his injuries, the second being to reach the Great Sage level. When he returns, he’ll unite the continent under his leadership, become the chancellor of the Demi-Immortal Institute, and achieve glory that Grand Emperor Rich-Lush only dreamed of. Junior Sister, you need to come back with me right away. The Crown Prince has ordered that, with him gone, you’re the provisional leader of the Crown Prince Society.”

“What?” Yun Hailan said, shooting to her feet. “Provisional leader? But without the Crown Prince around, the society is like a host of ambitious dragons. How am I supposed to maintain control?”

“Junior Sister, I'm afraid it’s probably a test from the Crown Prince. You need to become a Legendary as quickly as possible. After all, there are plenty of chief elders and conclave students in the society who are already Legendaries. Your cultivation base is definitely too low to keep them in check right now. But with the Gate of the Great Void that the Crown Prince gave you, you should be able to break through soon. Junior Sister, don’t tell me you're not confident…?”

Shaking her head, she said, “There’s something else I'm worried about, and that’s Yang Qi. How strong will he get if we let five years pass? If you don’t kill the tiger, you’ll get bitten sooner or later.”

“Yang Qi doesn’t matter. We’re basically in control of the Demi-Immortal Institute already, so he won't be able to do anything there for now. And in five years, when the Crown Prince is a Great Sage, nobody will be able to stand in his way. How far could Yang Qi possibly progress in that short a time? He’s only in Senary Lifeseizing, right? At the very most, he might become a Legendary in five years. And even that would be completely heaven-defying. Besides, the Crown Prince already passed down orders to make a move on Yang Qi. We just need a bit of time to prepare, then we’ll send a whole host of Legendaries against him and kill him in one fell swoop. The Crown Prince has recruited quite a few Legendaries from the outside, just for that purpose.”

Sounding more than a little excited, Yun Hailan said, “Alright, let’s head back. I need to meet with the leaders of the society and accept the mantle of authority! I’ll get the Crown Prince Society in order long before the Crown Prince returns. Gentlemen’s Society? Divine Ability Society? Five Lightnings Society? They’ll all be wiped out!”

Yun Hailan was under the impression that this was her moment to shine.

With that, she and Xie Feng flew into the air and vanished.

Meanwhile, a few thousand kilometers away from Yundale-by-the-Sea, experts were gathering in Yanhaven. It took about three days, but all of Yang Qi’s sworn siblings arrived to begin cultivating in the Grand Emperor's Pagoda.

Chapter 203: Gathered Under One Roof

“So Brother, this is the Grand Emperor's Pagoda?”

“Miraculous! My strength is like nothing compared to this thing. How does it rank among magical treasures? I’d guess sagely-grade at the very least.”

“Brother, are we going to work on our cultivation right here? Supposedly, Grand Emperor Rich-Lush created this pagoda so that when you practice cultivation in it, it gathers the vital energy of heaven and earth at an insanely rapid speed. It can draw energy from tens of thousands of kilometers of land, including the subterranean spirit energy. With that much energy gathered in Yanhaven, it will become a holy land for cultivation. Even ordinary people will benefit, with their physical bodies growing stronger just by breathing the air.”

“Amazing. A treasure through and through. And you say the quintessence-blood and vital energy of a Never-Dying asura is in there? Even performing breathing exercises for ten years in there wouldn’t dry up all that energy.”

“I heard that the Crown Prince Society just called a big meeting. Something happened to him, and he’s going into seclusion for five years. Young Master Shroud-Heaven has people out trying to track him down, so he didn’t return to the Demi-Immortal Institute.”

“Why would he avoid the institute, though?”

“Well, that’s simple. He’s too proud, and doesn’t want people saying that he needed the Demi-Immortal Institute to protect him from the Hanging Mountain.”

“I wonder if he’ll actually recover in five years, or if it will take longer.”

“Yeah, that's what I was thinking. Think of what can we accomplish in five years or more! Although, he’s a crafty character. Maybe he said five years to lull us into complacency, and he’ll really come out after three years. That must be his plan.”

An enormous bronze pagoda loomed in the main square in Yanhaven, so heavy that the ground sank down beneath it. At the same time, countless streams of true energy connected the pagoda to the earth and everything around it.

Yang Qi’s nineteen sworn siblings were all there gathered in front of the pagoda, along with Yang Zhan, Yang Yunchong and Yang Hualong.

The pagoda reached all the way up into the sea of clouds, where it absorbed the spirit energy of heaven and earth, as well as the quintessence of the burning sun. The shimmering streams of energy that flowed toward the pagoda seemed like astrological phenomena.

Yang Zhan couldn’t help but mutter exclamations of praise and excitement. Never before had he seen a magical treasure like this, and the thought that it belonged to his son was completely astonishing.

A year ago, the Lifeseizing level had seemed like a mere myth to him. But now, even the level above it, the Legendary level, was as real as could be. In fact, his son was now a Nonary Lifeseizer, just on the verge of becoming a Legendary. Yang Zhan knew that the only people who could possibly threaten Yang Qi now would be experts in the Great Sage level.

Hua Fengfeng, Jun Tianchou, Meng Qingshan, Li Zhengdao…. All of Yang Qi’s sworn siblings were gasping in praise.

Yang Qi focused on the operation of the pagoda, but at the same time, digested the news he was getting. The Crown Prince hadn’t returned to the Demi-Immortal Institute, but had instead gone to some unknown location to hide from the forces of the Hanging Mountain. Most likely, it was all connected to the fact that he never got the Grand Emperor's Pagoda. It seemed that the way things had played out caused some distrust for the chancellor to rise up in the Crown Prince's heart.

And thus, he had avoided the Demi-Immortal Institute.

Yang Qi knew how insufferably proud the Crown Prince was, and therefore, it was highly likely that he hated the chancellor now.

And that could only be good for Yang Qi.

‘Ah, Crown Prince, you have no way of knowing how shocked you’ll be when you come out of seclusion. Who knows? Maybe I’ll end up as the next chancellor instead of you.’ Yang Qi had long since come to have grand ambitions of his own. He was no longer the nobody he had once been. He had even begun to contemplate what it would be like to be the chancellor.

With a godly-class energy art that had the immense power to suppress hells, plus the God Legion Seal, why would he possibly be afraid of butting heads with people like the chancellor?

Compared to the hells that existed, places such as the Demi-Immortal Institute, and even the Rich-Lush Continent as a whole, were like nothing. They had been mere specks on the Yore-Wilds Continent of the distant past, tiny drops of water in the ocean that was the universe.

“Brothers and sisters, let’s begin this session of cultivation. Please, enter the Grand Emperor's Pagoda. Join forces, and use your energy arts to power the spell formation therein.”

“Will do!”

“Brother, if you need us to do anything for you, just say the word.”

Li He, Liang Dong, He Jili, and Hua Yinhu spent most of their time at their clans nowadays, not in the Demi-Immortal Institute. However, Yang Qi had also called them to work on their cultivation in the Grand Emperor's Pagoda. Everyone present was in high spirits, and looked forward to the possibility of reaching a higher level.

When Hua Fengfeng entered the pagoda, she looked around at the enormous dimension around her, every inch of which looked like ancient bronze. Powerful auras buffeted her face, like ancient vital power of the most pure and unadulterated nature. Instantly, her true energy began to flow inside of her with more vigor than before.

“Our main goal is for all of us to become Legendaries before the Crown Prince comes out of seclusion!” she said. “In the past, that would have been a pipe dream, but with this treasure, and the flesh and blood of a Never-Dying asura, it’s more than just a fleeting wish. In fact, we might eventually be able to use the spatial powers of the pagoda to search for treasures in dangerous places. We could even look in alternate dimensions. And the fighting that will go on with that search would be great training.”

There was also the faint sensation of magical law that only top Lifeseizers were able to detect. That should be because of the asura.

Yang Qi led everyone to the highest level of the pagoda, which had a dimension that was ridiculously large. It was hundreds or perhaps thousands of kilometers from end to end, everything bronze and covered with ancient magical symbols. They almost seemed alive, pulsing with ancient energy, like script that modern-day individuals could never carve out.

However, what was most shocking to everyone was not the bronze surroundings with the magical symbols, but rather, a huge, wriggling mass of flesh and blood that hovered in the air above them. It abounded with wretch energy, and upon closer examination, was obviously the corpse of some powerful, wretched devil.

As it wriggled, something like an enormous eye suddenly opened up, a devil-eye. Then another, and another, until thousands such eyes were open, all of them radiating terrifying power.

“That's the flesh and blood of the asura,” Yang Qi said. “He’s been tightly bound, and is actually only half-dead. However, he will never be able to free himself. Please, sit. Find the magical symbols which form the shape of eyes, which are the nodes of the spell formation. They’re called Rich-Lush Eyes. Pour your true energy into them, and we can begin to refine the flesh and blood of the asura.”

As everyone looked on, the magical symbols on the ground swirled into the shapes of eyes. Somehow, they seemed warm and inviting, nothing like the wicked devil-eyes of the asura. As they sat down in their places, they felt a refreshing sensation, as though their minds were being purified.

In many types of energy arts, eyes were considered the most ultimate symbol of respect. After all, eyes revealed one's thoughts, and were a window into the soul. They could express evil, righteousness, and emotion.

Sura Devil-Eyes represented battle and slaughter. Deathly Devil-Eyes represented an end of life. Preheaven Devil-Eyes represented cruelty. As for Rich-Lush Eyes, they represented rich resources and lush harvests, the things of pure joy.

As Hua Fengfeng sat down on one of the Rich-Lush Eyes, she said, “That asura reached the Never-Dying Transformation, and yet the Grand Emperor's Pagoda can still keep him locked down. Simply miraculous. How did you do all this, Little Bro Qi?”

She couldn’t help but shiver a bit as she asked the question. After all, if that flesh and blood were unsealed, it would be able to raze everything within five thousand kilometers. Everything down to the grass and roots would be destroyed, and rivers of blood would run everywhere.

After all, in the ancient mythologies, the Hell of Suras surpassed the Hell of Euphoria.

And back when the Hell of Euphoria invaded the Yore-Wilds Continent, the lands were shattered, and many Great Sages were killed. Later, it came to be known as the God Devil Apocalypse. However, if it had been the Hell of Suras that invaded, the Yore-Wilds Continent would have been wiped out of existence.

In modern times, asuras were mythological creatures, so to be in the presence of one now, even one that had been killed, caused dread to seep into the hearts of everyone present.

Yang Qi laughed. “I took advantage of the fighting between the Crown Prince and Young Master Shroud-Heaven. Don’t worry, this asura is mostly dead, and his mind is gone. The wriggling is just instinctual movement. Besides, I cultivate a technique specifically designed to destroy evil. Combined with the power of the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, there’s no way any of the lingering wretch energy will infect you. I've already done a few tests, and benefited spectacularly. Go ahead and begin your cultivation.”

“Alright, then, let’s begin!” Yang Zhan looked at the lump of asura flesh, heart beating with fear. Not daring to act rashly, he looked at the Rich-Lush Eye, then placed his hand onto it and sent out some true energy.

WHIZZZ!

The bronze magical symbols glittered, and the wriggling lump of flesh and blood suddenly came to be covered with numerous vortexes, which started extracting the vital energy.

RUMBLE!

After ten breaths of time passed, life force quintessence and vital power shot out from the Rich-Lush Eye and into Yang Zhan. Suddenly, he shot to his feet, trembling physically. Shockingly, scales began to pop up on his skin, almost as if he were being devilized. There was even a horn of true energy that sprang out of his forehead. From the look of it, he was being transformed on a fundamental level.

The sura battle spirit which he had just made contact with was trying to transform him into a sura.

“Uncle!” shouted some of Yang Qi’s sworn siblings. Rising to their feet, they prepared to interfere and help.

“Don't do anything!” Yang Qi said quickly. “Father is now in combat with a sura battle spirit. It’s not wretch energy. Defeating that will of battle will have a purifying effect. Success will provide significant advancement in martial arts. Although it's not quite the same as training personally in the Hell of Suras, it's about as close as you can get.”

Even as he spoke, Yang Zhan continued to tremble violently. However, a moment later, the scales began to fade away, and the horn disappeared. He returned to his previous condition, although he was flushed and dripping with sweat. “What a powerful battle spirit. I can already tell that my essence has improved by double! I'm almost ready for Secondary Lifeseizing!”

Chapter 204: Physique of the Sovereign Lord

Yang Zhan was extremely pleased, but at the same time, profoundly calm. His battle spirit pulsed because of his martial arts reaching a higher level, and even his aura was multiple times stronger than before.

Defeating the battle spirit of the asura had been like fighting a hundred fierce battles, and had been profoundly beneficial to both his true energy and his martial arts.

Yang Qi nodded. “Yes, Father. You absorbed just the right amount of vital energy. Any more, and you would have been devilized, and turned into a maniacal warrior. Of course, I could have purged the evil from you if that happened. Now it should only take a few months for you to form true energy vestiges and reach Quinary Lifeseizing.”

“What?” Yang Zhan said, shocked. “Quinary Lifeseizing? True energy vestiges? Impossible. It usually takes a hundred years or more to achieve each successive breakthrough in the Lifeseizing level. How could I do it in a few months when other people spend hundreds of years at it?”

“Because of the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, and the flesh and blood of that asura. Not even the four institutes have access to resources like these.”

“Exactly,” said Lu Wangxian. “How could anyone possibly refine the flesh and blood of an entity in the Never-Dying Transformation? And who else could use the Grand Emperor's Pagoda? My father was hesitant to allow me to have dealings with you, Brother Yang. But when he heard that the chancellor gave you the Grand Emperor's Pagoda as a reward, he changed his mind.”

Just like Pontifex Flame, Houselord Spring-Autumn was deeply afraid of the Crown Prince.

But the news about the Grand Emperor's Pagoda prompted a change of heart. He decided to just wait and see what happened. In addition to allowing his son to have dealings with Yang Qi, he also sent gifts to Yun Hailan.

There was no other option than to try to play it safe with both sides.

Of course, Yang Qi understood the situation, and wasn't opposed to it. Obviously, it didn’t make sense at this point for them to risk their lives on his behalf.

“Very well, everyone. Let’s continue to work on our cultivation. Make sure to absorb the vital energy slowly and carefully.” Yang Qi settled down cross-legged, placed his palms onto the ground in front of him, and sent his true energy into the Rich-Lush Eye.

RUUUUUUMBLE!

A force shot out that was ten times as powerful as that of everyone else combined. Instantly, the huge conglomeration of flesh and blood pulsed more violently than ever, sending streams of dragon-like blood-energy high into the sky, where it was caught and filtered by the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, then sent through the Rich-Lush Eye into Yang Qi.

Yang Qi could immediately sense that this sura godpower was dozens and dozens of times as powerful as the sura flames he had dealt with in the past.

In response, numerous particles inside of him stirred. In one shot, forty awoke, providing megamammoth true energy that seemed capable of flattening mountains.

Thankfully, this was all happening in the Grand Emperor's Pagoda. If such a thing occurred on the outside, the levels of true energy that were raging in the area would level Yanhaven, and kill too many people to count.

But inside the pagoda, the Rich-Lush Eye controlled the force, sending out waves of opposing power to soften or block it.

In fact, not a bit of true energy leaked away, allowing Yang Qi to use it all for his cultivation.

With every wave of the incoming energy, Yang Qi felt his own true energy crystallizing, causing major transformations to his bones, flesh, and blood.

Adding the power of forty megamammoths to the previous two hundred and sixty, he had now reached a total of three hundred of those ancient beasts. How shocking, considering that the trunk of only a single megamammoth was strong enough to drain a stream, then shoot the water into the air to create a rainstorm that filled a fifty kilometer area. The power of three hundred such creatures was definitely on par with a Legendary.

In fact, ordinary Legendaries such as Flame Midheaven would be only a third as powerful as Yang Qi.

RUUUUUUMBLE!

As power coursed through Yang Qi, he sent more of his true energy into the bronze magical symbols that made up the Rich-Lush Eye. As a result, the spell formation went into full activation, along with the warding magics. At the same time, the flesh and blood up above sent out more dragon-like streams of blood-colored true energy into Yang Qi.

And thus, Yang Qi’s energy continued to grow stronger, flowing through his veins, arteries, meridians, dantian region and even his bones.

All of a sudden, it felt like more particles were about to wake up.

His flesh, blood, and bones were transforming every moment, and even his acupoints were shifting, along with the nascent divinities that existed within them. Everything about him was experiencing a heaven-shaking, earth-toppling change.

It was an unprecedentedly sudden and intense burst of power. Even more shocking, the golden imp in his ancestral aperture was also waking up.

With no warning whatsoever, it overflowed with boundless golden light, causing a mass of written text to appear, which was none other than a new technique.

‘What’s this…?’

As of this moment, Yang Qi felt like his mind was an endless mass of darkness, in the middle of which was a cluster of dazzling light. Closer examination revealed that it was a plethora of worlds, which was none other than the heavenly halls, the home of the legion of gods.

Below, in the dark, infinite void, were countless planes, so many that they were like the sands of the sea. And they pulsed with devil energy that seemed to indicate that they were the hells that were the home of the horde of devils.

Radiance and light defined the legion of gods in heaven.

Darkness and gloom defined the horde of devils in hell.

Gods and devils were eternal entities within the universe, and the conflicts and wars between them never ended. Endless space-time. Endless planes. And all of them trembled as though they were in the middle of evolving.

All of a sudden, a majestic power erupted from the depth of the radiance and light of the heavenly halls. That light met the darkness, and as it did, the power began to take a physical form.

Even when the figure was just forming, and was impossible to see clearly, it was obvious that it had an elephantine head and a human body.

As the light and shadows swirled together, massive power pulsed. After what seemed like the passage of millions and millions of years, the figure became a god-spirit, which stepped forth, causing all heaven and earth to devolve into primal-chaos, and keeping the masses of darkness trapped beneath its feet.

Soon, the chaos of the darkness began to recede, and the radiance and light of the legion of gods rose to superiority.

All of a sudden, Yang Qi realized what was happening. ‘That’s the body of a godmammoth. This is a body-tempering magic….’

As he watched, he received enlightenment from the golden imp, a technique mnemonic regarding a method to improve one's physical body. This was the orthodox technique he could use to progress toward the Legendary level, something that was an absolute necessity to achieve success.

Upon reaching the Legendary level, one’s body would literally explode, and the acupoints, meridians, and even the sea of energy would transform into primal-chaos. Then, using one’s technique, that primal-chaos could be molded back into a body. For example, if one cultivated the Cosmic Sunflare Sword to the ultimate limit, then when one reached the first Legendary transformation, the Blood-Form Transformation, one would acquire a Sunflare Sword Body.

But the technique the golden imp was giving him now was so far beyond the Sunflare Sword Body that it was impossible to even quantify.

In the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, the godmammoth body type gifted from the legion of gods was called the Physique of the Sovereign Lord, named after the ultimate ruler of all living things, who was often simply referred to as the Lord.

The legion of gods used their own power and quintessence to create the godmammoths to suppress hell, and subjugate the horde of devils. Because of that, radiance and light came to hold supreme within the universe. As for the Physique of the Sovereign Lord, it was incredibly mighty. Right now, Yang Qi was only receiving a tiny fraction of what he would in the Legendary level. Even still, the enlightenment he was receiving of its mysteries was enough to transform his meridians, and give him the initial aspects of the Physique of the Sovereign Lord. A moment later, transformations spread to his blood, which Yang Qi could sense was changing on a substructural level. Tiny specks of life force came to appear in it, like tiny people, devils, gods, ghosts, immortals, bodhisattvas, kings, and emperors. This was the grandest aura and power in existence.

As the tiny entities propagated, they organized themselves in accord with some predetermined, perfect order.

Yang Qi’s bones, joints, and marrow all thrummed as they connected with each other, and as his blood flowed, it seemed alive with magical symbols.

Whizz!

At that point, a vertical slit appeared on Yang Qi’s forehead, something like an eye. It was like an eye of the heavens, abstruse, mighty, and filled with the power of stars and planes, capable of bringing life or destruction.

Compared to this, the Crown Prince’s Rage Eye was almost like nothing.

This was a unique eye associated with the Physique of the Sovereign Lord, and it was called the Lord's Eye.

When a godmammoth opened its Lord's Eye, the most powerful devil-gods in the depths of hell wouldn’t dare to make a single move. It represented the past, present, and future of the world, and the most powerful ruler there was. It was the power of the Lord.

When the Lord said something existed, it would never be destroyed.

When the Lord said something should vanish, it would disappear forever.

When the Lord took control, he controlled the entire universe.

This eye was a gift from the Lord himself, presented by the legion of gods to the godmammoths, to use to defeat the darkness, to see through all planes and hells, and to defeat all devil-gods.

Of course, despite having formed the Lord's Eye, Yang Qi couldn’t release its full power. That would come when he was a Legendary.

When that happened, his Physique of the Sovereign Lord would fully solidify, and would make him almost indestructible.

Chapter 205: Spirit Rain

‘This is really the perfect body type. Powerful. Invulnerable.’ Yang Qi reined in his true energy. At the moment, he wasn’t sure how much time had passed. However, his introduction to the Physique of the Sovereign Lord ensured that he now had a solid foundation for the Legendary level.

When his meridians exploded during the first Legendary transformation, he could use this technique to shape it back together. The Blood-Form Transformation was no simple level; it was a state close to that of a god-spirit, in which one could use raw power alone, with no energy arts, to level mountains and divert rivers.

The Physique of the Sovereign Lord was superior to the body types of any devil-god.

In fact, in its ultimate form, the Physique of the Sovereign Lord could absorb any attack and turn it into power. Unfortunately, Yang Qi wasn't even close to that level yet. He would definitely need to be a Great Sage, or perhaps even higher.

Energy Arts. Lifeseizing. Legendary. Great Sage.

Those were the four levels of cultivation practiced in the Rich-Lush Continent. As for what existed beyond that, Yang Qi had no idea. In fact, he didn’t even know what subcategories the Great Sage level was broken up into.

Of one thing he was certain; the conflict he had witnessed between radiance and light, and darkness and gloom, the battle between the legion of gods and the horde of devils, had made Great Sages seem like weaklings. From that alone he could tell that there were definitely higher levels. Of course, now was not the time to worry about such things. After all, in ancient times, his current cultivation base wasn’t even high enough for him to be designated an energy warrior.

‘It’s too bad the Heavendawn Quarry doesn’t have any more ancient spirit stones. It would be a lot more efficient to cultivate with them than with medicinal pills. And if I had spirit stones like that, I could raise plenty of young ones in the clan to the Lifeseizing level in probably only a few years. That would make my father’s dynasty strong for many years to come.’

Although the Grand Emperor's Pagoda was currently bolstered by the vital energy of the asura, which was even stronger than ancient spirit stones, he had long since decided that he would not allow young ones of the Yang Clan to cultivate within.

The Grand Emperor's Pagoda was only for his immediate family and sworn siblings.

The asura’s blood and flesh could provide enough vital energy to push dozens of Nonary Lifeseizers into the Legendary level. But to Yang Qi, it still wasn’t sufficient.

His godly-class energy art required massive amounts of vital energy, so much so that it surpassed what even a hundred ordinary Legendaries would require.

And in the Legendary level, one began to explore the magical laws of heaven and earth, which was something very different from the Energy Arts and Lifeseizing levels. Those two levels were about the most general fundamentals. After all, in ancient times, people like that were still considered mortals.

Up to now, Yang Qi had been able to take advantage of all sorts of random situations to advance his cultivation, but the Legendary level was different. The vital energy requirements were stupefying to say the least. When the time came, he would not be waking up one megamammoth here and there. They would come in batches of hundreds, thousands, and even tens of thousands.

After all, in order to completely cultivate the technique, he had to wake up the power of eight hundred forty million ancient megamammoths.

If he did it one at a time, how long would it take?

With eight hundred forty million megamammoths backing him, he could traverse the void, suppress wretch-devils, and gain enlightenment of the dao of the Sovereign Lord.

Right now, he only had three hundred, which would make him absolutely invincible within Nonary Lifeseizing. However, compared to the ultimate potential of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, it was puny to the extreme.

After clearing his head, Yang Qi realized that about two weeks had passed. Everyone else in the Grand Emperor’s Pagoda remained in place on their respective Rich-Lush Eyes, fighting the battle spirit of the asura, tempering themselves, and reaching new enlightenment by means of life and death struggle.

RUMBLE!

All of a sudden, a boundless column of vital energy shot up into the heights of the Grand Emperor's Pagoda. Lightning swirled around Yang Zhan, as well as masses of empyrean-baleful energy. It was none other than Secondary Lifeseizer tribulation.

‘Half a month has gone by, and father has reached Secondary Lifeseizing. It seems reaching Quinary Lifeseizing in the next few months won't be very hard for him at all. And the rest of my sworn siblings should be able to reach Nonary Lifeseizing.’ He waved his finger, causing vital energy to erupt out, and an eye to open on his forehead. Within it were the mysteries of the universe, the majesty of the starry sky, and the endless life and death of the infinitude of planes and worlds.

Yet again, the Lord's Eye appeared, as Yang Qi tried to gain control of its power.

All of a sudden, a voice spoke to Yang Qi from within the depths of that eye. It spoke a language no living person knew, and yet every person could understand, Godtongue. It was the language of the legion of gods, a tongue which no one would need to study to comprehend.

“The Lord’s Eye exists eternally in the world. The eye of the Lord is like the eye of heaven.”

For all eternity, the legion of gods existed on a level that mortals could hardly understand. However, it was possible, and in fact necessary, for mortals to comprehend their will. If they didn’t, and they forsook the legion of gods, they would become depraved outcasts.

“The eye of the Lord brings light to all places,” the voice continued. “It leaves no hiding place for that which is wretched and evil. The eye of the Lord casts glory upon the universe. It cannot be resisted, and any entity which stares into it profanes the glory of the legion of gods, and blasphemes against the Lord. Any such individual shall perish!”

The sonorous speech caused vibrations to ripple through the air into the depths of the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, and into the conglomeration of flesh. Instantly, the flesh and blood began to melt, and the ear-piercing scream of a devil-ghost could be heard, filled with agony. As of this moment, Yang Qi didn’t need the Grand Emperor's Pagoda to filter the power; he directly began to absorb the asura’s remains.

Pop. Pop. Pop. Pop! POP! POP!!!

Numerous particles within him were waking up, and the power of dozens of ancient megamammoths began to course through him.

Meanwhile, the pulsing vital energy in the pagoda in general continued without cease, to be absorbed by everyone sitting on the Rich-Lush Eyes.

Again, tribulation began to rise up.

It started with Yang Qi’s eldest and second brothers, in the form of Secondary Lifeseizing tribulation. Before long, it spread to many of his other sworn siblings. Flame Clearspring was currently in Nonary Lifeseizing, and although no tribulation appeared for him, flames engulfed him as he began to work on a powerful body transformation.

Blood oozed out of his pores, which then began to take the form of magical symbols.

Crick! Crack! Fire serpents writhed like whips, flagellating him without end, forcing his body to transform.

“Flame symbols formed from blood. The body of a grand ruler! Tyrannical Form of the Flame Emperor!”

Flame Clearspring roared as his body transformed into something stronger and larger than before. An aura like that belonging to his older brother Flame Midheaven sprang into being, and flames raged around him.

“I finally succeeded with the Tyrannical Form of the Flame Emperor! I'm now much further along the path to becoming a Legendary!”

Nodding, Yang Qi returned his focus to his own cultivation.

Days passed, and the more than twenty individuals in the Grand Emperor's Pagoda continued to experience breakthroughs. At the same time, the pagoda gathered the vital energy of heaven and earth around it.

As a result, it was causing fundamental changes to Yanhaven itself.

On the first day the pagoda appeared, the common people didn’t notice anything unusual. However, on the second day, a warm, gentle breeze filled the city. Of course, it was already deep in autumn, and frosts had already begun to appear throughout the lands, but the dozens of kilometers surrounding Yanhaven seemed like they were still in spring. As people inhaled the spring breeze, they found that numerous ailments they had suffered from vanished.

On the third day, a spring rain began to fall on the city and its surrounds. As it turned out, it wasn't a rain of water, but rather, a rain of spirit energy. A spirit rain.

As it soaked into the ground, life flourished. Plants sprouted and climbed high, and the people benefited greatly as well.

The rain fell harder and harder, until the city magistrate’s mansion was the epicenter of a huge downpour. And yet, this was not a rain of water, and thus, no pools of water built up.

The soldiers and guards in the royal palace, and the members of the Yang Clan, would often stare up into the falling rain, or step out to let it soak them.

“It’s spirit energy of heaven and earth! I can't believe it's become so dense that it's falling to the earth as a spirit rain!” There were even chief elders who leaped out as if they were crazed to try to benefit from it.

As they absorbed the rain, they circulated their energy arts, cleansing themselves, and extruding impurities from their meridians.

Ten days later, Yang Xingshi, Dowager Yan, and others similar to them in level trembled, their blood energy surging as they began to rise to the Lifeseizing level.

These were people who had been stuck as Masters of Energy for years, unable to reach the Lifeseizing level. However, because the Grand Emperor's Pagoda was in the middle of Yanhaven, spirit energy from the sky, the land, and even certain ruined dimensions flowed in, allowing them to experience a baptism on the deepest level.

Yanhaven was now like an enormous spell formation, filled with so much spirit rain that it was almost on the verge of crystallizing.

The residents of Yanhaven stretched their hands up to the sky, embracing the warm, soft energy that then coursed through them to purify their meridians.

As weeks passed, countless people in Yanhaven experienced energy arts breakthroughs. Many of the common people even broke through to the Energy Eruption phase.

From a distance, it looked like Yanhaven was surrounded by a transparent bowl.

As the spirit rain built up, it began to turn viscous, allowing the residents of Yanhaven to fully bathe in its glory.

The royal mansion was the epicenter, where the spirit energy of heaven and earth fell so heavily that the structure began to crystallize.

Chapter 206: Six Months

Time passed, one day after another.

Everyone in Yanhaven remained immersed in the spirit rain.

The city was becoming like a city of crystal, and everyone inside stopped their daily activities of life and focused fully on cultivation. In the past, most people could only cultivate with the help of energy convergence pills, making it a very slow process. But now, this nearly liquid spirit energy of heaven and earth provided benefits that vastly surpassed those pills.

Everyone was able to make incredibly rapid progress.

Because of the transformations that were constantly at work, Yanhaven was truly becoming a holy land of cultivation.

Of course, no outsiders dared to intrude into the territory controlled by Yanhaven. The Grand Emperor's Pagoda was extremely mighty, and kept the entire area locked down with incredible power.

Those who benefited the most were nearest the pagoda. That was especially true of the guards in the immediate vicinity. By now, they were motionless, so imbued with spirit energy that they almost looked like crystalline statues of ice.

The spirit energy flowing through them made them feel wonderful, and as they breathed, their meridians were cleansed, and their true energy flowed like never before.

Many of the expert energy artists among the guards, and even among the ordinary children of the Yang Clan, were already pushing into the Master of Energy level.

Days passed, and the process continued.

Because of the crystallization of the spirit energy, the areas near the pagoda were almost like a convergence of ancient spirit stones.

Thus was the power of the Grand Emperor's Pagoda.

It was the top treasure created by Grand Emperor Rich-Lush, connected to the essence of the land, capable of creating the ultimate convergence of spirit energy. Even Legendaries would be able to benefit greatly because of its presence.

One month. Two months. Three months….

Soon, autumn gave way to winter, and snow began to fill heaven and earth.

However, the power of the Grand Emperor's Pagoda only seemed to increase, surrounding the area of Yanhaven with what looked like a rippling shield. Those who stood outside of that rippling distortion would not be able to see anything happening inside.

Of course, it soon attracted the attention of top experts in the lands. However, not even the strongest energy artists among them were able to observe what was actually happening in Yanhaven.

Yanhaven was a remote place to begin with, where Lifeseizers were little more than fables. And compared to the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, Lifeseizers were like ants.

‘What? Something's happening over in Yanhaven? There's a distortion field surrounding the area? How is that even possible?’

One of the first experts to get the news was Supreme Leader Yun Zhonglong in the State of Yun. At first, he didn’t believe the news, but when he flew up into the sea of clouds and looked over in the direction of Yanhaven, he saw the rippling distortion that seemed to indicate another dimension existed beyond it.

He tried to send his true energy into the distorted area of space-time, but was rebuffed, and ended up coughing up blood from the damage it inflicted on him.

Terrified, he flew back into the State of Yun.

‘What exactly is going on?’ Smacking his hand down onto his desk, he shouted, “It must be some sort of magical treasure. Men, go to the Demi-Immortal Institute and notify my daughter Yun Hailan!”

Similar reactions occurred among the experts of the House of Shadowblight.

A few dozen men in black garments stood on a towering peak in the Blackcorpse Mountains, surrounded by swirling toxic energy. All of them were Lifeseizers, and were obviously from the House of Shadowblight.

“What exactly is happening? Why is Yanhaven surrounded by a rippling distortion? Don’t tell me it’s a Legendary that just reached the third transformation, the Space-Void Transformation? Impossible. Yanhaven is a poor place with no major organizations. Lifeseizers are rare there, let alone Legendary patriarchs. What do you think, Blightking Crimsondevil?”

One of the black-garbed men was a Lifeseizer with a head of flowing red hair.

He was an extraordinarily powerful blightking, a Quinary Lifeseizer with true energy vestiges. When he unleashed his true energy, all of the devillings in the Blackcorpse Mountains would prostrate in fear.

Blightking Crimsondevil snorted coldly. “It doesn’t matter. The chief elders of the House of Shadowblight gave explicit orders to reduce Yanhaven to rubble and kill Yang Qi. Considering he killed Blightking Skulkdevil, how could our House of Shadowblight maintain any level of dignity with him alive?”

“Kill him!”

“We’ll raze Yanhaven to the ground with poisons and toxins. We won't even let the chickens or dogs survive!”

“Yes, but given the current situation, I'm afraid we can’t do anything. We need reinforcements. Come on, let’s head back and report to the chief elders.”

“Yes. Let’s go. We’ll keep our eye on Yanhaven, and strike when the moment is right. Like the saying goes, it's easy to dodge an open spear, but hard to ward off a hidden arrow. I refuse to believe that he’ll be able to defend against us forever.” One of the blightkings flew up, and the flap of his wings caused toxic energy to spread out that killed numerous devillings in the area.

That was the power of hyper-toxic poison, which could corrode true energy and transform it into toxic energy.

More than a dozen experts from the House of Shadowblight who were present all vanished into the night.

Eventually, spring returned. It was the third lunar month, making it about six months since Yang Qi and the others had gone into their session of meditation. Life had come to a halt in Yanhaven as all of the people immersed themselves in the nearly liquid spirit energy of heaven and earth. The spirit energy imbued everything, from the city walls, to the buildings, to even mundane sabers, which slowly began to transform into divine weapons.

On one particular day when the sun shone high in the sky, Yanhaven trembled, and all of the spirit energy was sucked into the Grand Emperor's Pagoda. At the same time, the barrier which had sealed Yanhaven dissolved.

Slowly, everyone began to emerge from their trance-like dreams, and began to look around in surprise.

Of course, in their hearts, they already knew what had transpired. They had not been frozen into ice over the past six months, but rather, had been in an extended session of cultivation.

Many Masters of Energy had risen up among the government officials and aristocratic clans. As for the common people, there were a large number who were in the sixth, seventh, or even eighth phase.

The children of the Yang Clan had benefited even more greatly, as virtually all of them were Masters of Energy now. And all of the chief elders were now in the Lifeseizing level. The palace had been filled with so much spirit energy of heaven and earth that it became almost like an ancient spirit stone mine; any of them who didn’t reach the Lifeseizing level would have become laughingstocks.

Even some of the common animals in Yanhaven benefited, and quite a few had begun to develop demon cores.

Now, all of the remaining energy was sucked into the Grand Emperor's Pagoda.

RUUUUMBLE!

The pagoda began to shrink, and then Yang Qi flew out, followed by his family and sworn siblings.

Yang Zhan let out a stream of contented laughter. Then, he spoke in a booming voice that filled the entire city. “I finally reached Quinary Lifeseizing! I have true energy vestiges! It only took six months!”

“Quinary Lifeseizing! Our king is a Quinary Lifeseizer!”

“On your knees, everyone! Offer congratulations to His Majesty!”

Many of the members of the aristocratic clans, and even the common people, had been completely wrapped up in the joy of their own benefits. However, when they heard the voices of certain government ministers, they dropped to their knees to kowtow.

“Ministers,” Yang Zhan said. “Immediately carry out a census to check the cultivation bases of the populace. We’ll meet tomorrow to report matters and discuss the future.”

It was obviously of utmost importance to see how the city as a whole had benefited. As could well be imagined, if the forces of the city were mustered, they would be a huge army that could sweep through any nation that got in their path.

And of course, Yang Zhan knew that Yang Qi now had nothing to fear even from Legendaries.

Contented laughter rang out as Yang Qi landed on the ground in the royal palace. As he did, his sworn siblings touched down around him. If the common people who were near the Grand Emperor's Pagoda had benefited, how did the rest of the people inside fare?

“Brothers and sisters!” Jun Tianchou said excitedly. “I'm actually in Nonary Lifeseizing. I'm a Nonary Lifeseizer! I'm ten times stronger than before, in only six months!”

“I'm also in Nonary Lifeseizing!” Hua Fengfeng said coolly. “Although, it's going to take a lot of power and enlightenment to reach the Legendary level.”

“I'm a Nonary Lifeseizer too,” Meng Qingshan said. He wasn’t the only one. Soaring Cloudwyrm and his brothers were all looking down at their hands in amazement.

“I'm a bit behind,” Li He said, shaking his head. “Only Octonary Lifeseizing. I guess it makes sense considering the rest of you are the top members of the institutes, and the pillars of your clans.”

In a short six months, the fight with the will of the asura, and the vital energy they had absorbed, benefited them the same as ten years of ordinary cultivation.

Li He, Liang Dong, Hua Yinhu and He Jili were all in Octonary Lifeseizing.

Yang Zhan was in Quinary, whereas Yang Yunchong and Yang Hualong were in Quaternary. Everyone else was in Nonary Lifeseizing. After all, Yang Qi’s sworn siblings all had much more stable foundations than Yang Zhan. They were either conclave students, or experts from clans that had once birthed Great Sages.

Back when Yang Qi had taken them as sworn siblings, most of them had been in Quinary Lifeseizing or a bit higher.

As for Yang Qi, he was still a Nonary Lifeseizer. However, in terms of strength, he surpassed a hundred Nonary Lifeseizers put together. And he now had access to the power of five hundred ancient megamammoths.

If he wanted to, he could casually rip a Blood-Form Legendary to pieces. Next on his path: the Legendary level.

Chapter 207: Repairing the Roof before the Storm

“Such is the power of the Grand Emperor's Pagoda,” Yang Qi said coolly. However, as he looked around at his sworn siblings, he couldn’t help but shake his head in disappointment. As it turned out, not a single one of them had become a Legendary. It was actually somewhat of a letdown.

He had hoped that at least one of them would achieve it. However, the Legendary level was fundamentally different from the Lifeseizing level. Lifeseizers were respected by all, but Legendaries were treated like patriarchs.

Flame Clearspring had always been the strongest among them all, a Nonary Lifeseizer. Although he had succeeded with his Tyrannical Form of the Flame Emperor, and had improved his true energy, he was still not quite ready to break through to the next level. It wouldn’t have helped even if Yang Qi directly used his own energy arts to assist.

If Flame Clearspring had succeeded, it would have been a big encouragement to the group. Unfortunately, it wasn’t possible to rely just on raw power to achieve that breakthrough. Something else was required, something special.

“Brother Yang Qi, why didn’t you reach the Legendary level?” Flame Clearspring asked. “I failed because of some flaws in my animadestiny. However, now that I’ve fixed them, it should only take a bit of enlightenment to succeed. But you're far, far stronger than me. You even defeated my eldest brother already. We’re all waiting for you to take the next step.”

“It will be hundreds or even thousands of times harder for me to reach the Legendary level than the rest of you,” Yang Qi said with the shake of his head. “However, when I succeed, the transformations will be completely dramatic. I cultivate a very unique technique, a divine ability that comes from the ancient void. To achieve the next breakthrough, I have to completely and utterly control the Grand Emperor's Pagoda. At the moment, I can only control it with difficulty. For example, I’ll eventually be able to use the pagoda to pierce through space and reach alternate dimensions. And according to the ancient records in the Demi-Immortal Institute, some of the alternate dimensions near the Rich-Lush Continent have Nine-Yang Immortal Energy, Clear Heaven True Energy, Great Void True Energy, Thousand Illusions Immortal Energy, and other fundamental powers of the universe.”

“You’re right,” Hua Fengfeng said. “Not even all of us working together could unleash the full powers of the pagoda. And working on our cultivation in it now wouldn’t be of much help. We need even more resources to break through our current bottlenecks.”

“All of us have reached bottlenecks that require deadly combat to surpass,” Flame Clearspring said. “That’s our only hope of becoming Legendaries. To reach that level, my brother entered the Realm of the Flame Emperor, deep in the Mountain of Flames. I'm not sure what secrets he came across there, but he gained enlightenment of the Legendary level, and succeeded in his breakthrough. I guess the next thing for me to do will be to follow his footsteps and seek similar enlightenment.”

“I see,” Yang Qi said. “Well, Brother, you should hurry on your way.”

“I need to leave as well,” Hua Fengfeng said. “Now that I'm in Nonary Lifeseizing, I need to request a Legendary level technique from the institute. The Sun Moon Institute always focuses a lot of attention on grooming Nonary Lifeseizers. They have a technique just for them.”

‘It’s true,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘If you don’t have the right body-tempering technique, you won’t have any idea how to achieve the breakthrough to the Legendary level.’ Clearly, his sworn siblings needed to return to their various organizations to acquire the secret methods they needed to become Legendaries. Flame Clearspring’s Tyrannical Form of the Flame Emperor was a Legendary technique, but he still needed to return to his organization for further training.

“Alright, brothers and sisters. We part ways here, and meet again as Legendaries.”

“Very well,” Flame Clearspring said, “let’s all exchange talismans so that we can meet up again as quickly as possible when necessary.” Everyone reached out to put their hands on top of each other’s, and then threw their hands up over their heads.

“Sworn siblings for as long as we live! Together forever, be it in life or death.”

“Together forever, be it in life or death!” Yang Qi said solemnly along with everyone else. “Sworn siblings for as long as we live!”

Whoooooooosh….

Everyone flew up into the air and then vanished.

Life began to return to normal in Yanhaven. Yang Qi knew that when his sworn siblings returned to their homes, it would cause a big stir. The fact that they had all reached Nonary Lifeseizing so quickly would cause a commotion in the Rich-Lush Continent at large.

Nonary Lifeseizers were Legendaries in the making, and were of utmost importance to any organization.

One of his sworn brothers, Su Ximing, had become a powerful rogue cultivator after acquiring the Eight Polarities Divine Anthology, an amazing imperial-class energy art. However, he had long since joined the Sun Moon Institute, and taken Hua Fengfeng’s father, Hua Tianxiong, as his master. Therefore, he also went to the Sun Moon Institute to work on his next breakthrough.

Looking at Yang Zhan, Yang Qi said, “Father, your recent breakthrough is going to cause a huge stir in Yanhaven. As for me, I'm going to prepare the roof before the storm, so to speak. It’s time to put the top enemies of Yanhaven to death. During that session of cultivation, I sensed some toxic energy in the area, which was likely from experts of the House of Shadowblight. The time has come to root out those wretch-devils once and for all, and cleanse the earth of their poison.”

“Excellent idea, Qi’er. You’ve really grown up, you know. It's only been two years. Two short years. Once you’re a Legendary, I’ll truly be able to rest at ease. And you’ll finally be able to go to the Hanging Mountain to look for your mother.” Yang Zhan looked at his son for a very long moment, and his eyes seemed to turn particularly solemn. “Son, I think the time has come to tell you the truth about your past.”

All of a sudden, Yang Qi had a very strange feeling. “Truth about my past? What do you mean?”

“Qi’er, the truth is that you’re not my son.”

“What?!” Yang Qi said, trembling. Although his emotions were instantly riled, the fact that he cultivated a godly-class energy art gave him unique self-control, and he quickly calmed his heart. “What’s that supposed to mean, Father? Tell me the whole story!”

“Considering the level of your cultivation base, you've likely learned a bit about the Hanging Mountain already, correct?” Hardly able to contain the bitterness in his voice, Yang Zhan said, “It's a holy land to the Demonfolk, not any place connected to the Rich-Lush Continent. They rule over countless demon-devils, and your mother Greensura is a holy daughter among them. I suppose you've wondered why someone like her would end up married to a bum like me.”

“Hold on,” Yang Qi blurted, “as far as I’m concerned, you—”

“Calm down. Just let me finish explaining.” Eyes going a bit blank as he thought back to the past, Yang Zhan said, “I was young when your mother fell from the sky, spattered with blood. I thought she was an immortal goddess descending into the mortal world, so of course, the first thing I did was help her. Later, she told me that, because of matters of destiny, she had to marry me, and live an ordinary life. Some time passed in which I did my best to care for her. The entire time, I thought of her as an immortal, and didn’t dare to do anything to sully her honor. Eventually, she bore a son. You.”

Yang Qi felt like he could hardly speak. “Are you saying… that I'm not your son?”

“Correct.” Yang Zhan sighed. “You are not my son. You are the offspring of Greensura and some other man. One thing I do know is that, because of you, she barely escaped the Hanging Mountain with her life. Later, after you were born, she left this place, and returned home. I must have sounded like a complete fool to her when I asked if she would come back. That's when she said that if I ever ruled the entire continent, I might have the chance to see her again. Ai. You've grown up, Qi’er, and you’re stronger than I could ever have possibly imagined. That’s why you deserve to know the truth about your past. I hope that after you become a Legendary, you can go to the Hanging Mountain and find your mother. Then maybe you can learn even more about yourself.”

Without any warning, Yang Qi dropped to his knees in front of Yang Zhan.

“Qi’er, what are you doing?” Yang Zhan said, visibly taken aback.

Yang Qi smacked his head into the ground as he kowtowed. “You raised me, in just the right way. I have only one father, sir. You. Yang Zhan. I don’t care about anything else, and I don't care what happens later on. You're my father. You’re right, I’ve grown up now, so I'm going to keep you safe, and the Yang Clan as well. That’s my responsibility. I’ll take care of everyone, because I'm part of this clan too, no matter my background!”

Yang Zhan quickly pulled him to his feet, his eyes glistening with tears. “Son, I couldn’t be more proud of you. Right now, my final important goal in life is to reunite with your mother.”

“I'm going to make that happen, Father.” Although Yang Qi’s mind and heart were in chaos, he knew that now was not the time to sit around talking. Time was of the essence. “For now, you take care of matters here in the clan. I’ll clear out the surroundings of the city. I’ll also use the pagoda to set up a spell formation to protect the area, with the main hub being the royal city. Once it’s in place, not even a Legendary would be able to break through in any short time. At the very least, I would have time to come back.”

Yang Qi shot up into the air, followed by the Grand Emperor's Pagoda. Soon, streams of energy shot out from the pagoda, burying themselves deep into the earth around the city. Numerous true energy shields sprang up, which then faded away as enormous magical symbols appeared around the palace. Each of those symbols extended into Yang Zhan’s personal study.

There, they converged together into a Rich-Lush Eye that could control the entire formation. Yang Qi had used the power of five hundred megamammoths, along with the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, to create a powerful defensive mechanism for the city.

The Superlative Defense.

With almost no effort, Yang Zhan could activate the formation to protect the city. On top of that, thanks to the six months of inundation by the vital energy of heaven and earth, the entire city was strengthened on a fundamental level.

After three days and three nights, Yang Qi had finished preparing the defenses of Yanhaven, down to the most remote corners of the city.

His sealing marks were everywhere.

He had even used occasional drops of his own blood. If any crisis ever rose up in Yanhaven, those drops of blood could converge, creating a clone of himself that could fight back against any enemies.

One drop of Flame Midheaven’s blood was enough to evaporate a huge lake. But Yang Qi already had the Physique of the Sovereign Lord, and was far, far stronger than Flame Midheaven. The blood he had left behind was so strong that it could likely kill even invading deities or bodhisattvas.

When Yang Qi was pleased with the setup, he vanished, to reappear in a private chamber in the royal palace, where he extracted a wriggling mass of flesh and blood from the Grand Emperor's Pagoda.

A fragment of the remains of the Never-Dying asura.

That flesh and blood was even more powerful than Yang Qi’s, and right now, he slapped it with his palm to imbed a sealing mark into it. Then, he used the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth to suppress it.

After putting it in place in the spell formation, it meant that if Yang Zhan needed, he could summon a minor replica of an asura, which would be like a nightmare to any invader of Yanhaven.

As of this moment, Yang Qi was confident that his clan was safe. He had repaired the roof before the storm.

Chapter 208: The Myriad Consortium

Thanks to Yang Qi’s preparations, Yanhaven was now like a city blessed with divine protection.

After all, being a Nonary Lifeseizer who was on the very cusp of reaching the Legendary level gave him a solid understanding of spell formations.

It helped that, back in the Heavendawn Quarry, he had been able to observe the operation of the Nine-Heavens Ten-Earths Demon-Devil-Horde World-Ending Grand Spell Formation, which had been extremely beneficial.

And the past six months of practicing cultivation in the formation inside the Grand Emperor's Pagoda had been even more helpful.

In his early days as a country bumpkin, he had known nothing about spell formations, but his progress in the past years had been considerable.

It was the same with pill concocting, weapon forging, and the like; he now had foundational understandings of them all. Although he couldn’t be called a grandmaster of any of them, not in any sense of the word, at least he wasn’t groping around in the dark.

It helped that he had sworn siblings who had been raised in powerful institutes. All of them were geniuses with plenty of formal training. In fact, during the course of their six months of intensive cultivation in the pagoda, many of them had given him tips, such as information about the dao of spell formations.

That, coupled with his increasing level of control over the energy, ensured that the spell formation protecting Yanhaven was quite formidable.

After the preparations he had made, deadly traps and illusory regions could spring up anywhere and everywhere, especially in the depths of the royal palace, where the flesh and blood of the asura ensured that not even Legendaries could easily survive.

Yanhaven was now virtually invulnerable to attack.

Having accomplished these things, Yang Qi headed west.

Not only did he seek to reach the Legendary level, he also hoped to get rid of some troublesome enemies.

The first on the list was the House of Shadowblight.

The House of Shadowblight originally came from the west, and not from the Rich-Lush Continent. Their true origins were in the Western Continent, and specifically, the Blight Legion Church.

It was a mysterious organization, adept at using poisons and toxins. In fact, whenever their unique toxic energy arts were discussed, people would go pale in the face from fear. For Yanhaven and the Yang Clan, they were an enemy that could never be fully guarded against.

The only way to ensure safety would be to completely destroy their organization, to cut the weeds and eliminate the roots.

And that was exactly what Yang Qi intended to do. The House of Shadowblight definitely had Legendaries, but Yang Qi was already capable of destroying Blood-Form and Spirit-Soul Legendaries.

Space-Void Legendaries were capable of piercing through space and the void, which made it possible for them to easily avoid mundane attacks. Normally speaking, only others in the third transformation would be able to fight against them.

However, Yang Qi wasn’t worried at all about tangling with one, the reason being, the Grand Emperor's Pagoda. It was a magical treasure that gave him the ability to flit through the void, and make attacks that he normally couldn’t. With that, he could definitely tangle with a Space-Void Legendary, if not actually kill one.

The Grand Emperor's Pagoda inherently contained all of the magical laws pertinent to the Legendary level. With enough true energy for operational purposes, it could even decimate Great Sages.

Unfortunately, Yang Qi would need far more power at his disposal. Only with the strength of sixty thousand ancient megamammoths could he control the pagoda to that level.

The truth was that the pagoda was actually intended for use by a Great Sage. After all, back when it was used by Grand Emperor Rich-Lush to subjugate the lands, even Great Sages of the Demonfolk would flee in terror because of it. Of course, his work of founding the Rich-Lush Dynasty had been a success because of the alliance of other Great Sages who worked with him.

After making all the pertinent preparations, Yang Qi flew up above the sea of clouds and then vanished without a trace. Things had changed for him. Now more than ever, he wanted to know the true story of his past.

He was still digesting the shocking news that he was not the true son of Yang Zhan. He was the offspring of his mother, Greensura, and another man. His mother was a holy daughter of the Hanging Mountain, the ancient holy land of the Demonfolk. That seemed to indicate that his father was probably a similarly important person.

However, he had no feelings for this mysterious, supposed father. As far as he was concerned, no one could ever measure up to Yang Zhan. Yang Zhan had always been and always would be his true father, and he could hardly care less about his biological father.

The Rich-Lush Continent was a vast place, and even at his current level, and his ability to fly with incredible speed, he still couldn’t cross it quickly. He didn’t use the Grand Emperor's Pagoda to head west, but rather, relied on his Fiend-Devil Wings.

According to the rumors, if one crossed the West Sea, one would eventually reach another continent. It was the Western Continent, which was almost a completely different world from the Rich-Lush Continent.

Yang Qi knew there were other continents, for example, the Quake-Dawn Continent. Unfortunately, he had no idea where any such continents were. Perhaps they existed in other aspects of space-time. After all, during the fabled God-Devil Apocalypse, the Yore-Wilds Continent had been shattered, with different parts sailing out into other areas of space.

As for the western regions of the Rich-Lush Continent, there were millions upon millions of cities and nations there. There was something unique about this area. Although it was technically part of the Rich-Lush Continent, throughout the years, its culture had been affected by the Western Continent.

People said that that continent was much larger than the Rich-Lush Continent, and that cultivation was much more common there. There was even talk about how the Western Continent wanted to invade the Rich-Lush Continent. There had to be some truth to that, because millions of years in the past, battleships from the Western Continent had indeed crossed the ocean and waged war on the people of the Rich-Lush Continent.

And that was exactly how the House of Shadowblight started.

Based on information provided by his sworn siblings, Yang Qi had pieced together something of a picture of the House of Shadowblight. His goal? To locate their headquarters, attack it, and raze it to the ground.

Eventually, an enormous city rose up in the distance, hundreds of times the size of Yanhaven. Landing on the ground, he approached on foot.

This enormous city was named Mongoltar.

It had as many expert energy artists as the sky had clouds, to the point where the gate guards were all Masters of Energy. When Yang Qi prepared to enter the city, one of the guards looked over at him and barked, “The entry tax is a hundred energy convergence pills!”

Yang Qi paid the tax and entered the city. It was roughly the same size as the Sage Ancestor Dynasty’s Capital City, and was filled with towering buildings and bustling with people. It was even possible to see Lifeseizers here and there, all of them high and mighty.

‘There’s a business group based in Mongoltar called the Myriad Consortium,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘Supposedly, they deal in all sorts of precious items, and also, information. They’re a very powerful force in the continent, and apparently, they also fund the Crown Prince Society. The House of Shadowblight supposedly has a branch here too. This place is really a nest of dragons and serpents.’

Yang Qi strolled through the city, thinking back to everything he had learned about the place.

At one point, he suddenly came across one particular street that was paved with white jade. It was as pure and clean as the halls of heaven, and was lined with towering buildings. An archway entrance towered over the entrance of the street, where a group of expert energy artists would inspect anyone who wished to enter.

For the most part, ordinary citizens were not allowed in.

After a moment of looking on from a distance, Yang Qi realized that only Lifeseizers were being permitted to pass.

Looking up at the archway, he saw the words Myriad Consortium inscribed in bold calligraphy.

‘So, this place is where the Myriad Consortium is headquartered.’ Nodding to himself, he circulated his energy, causing his facial features to shift, and making him look slightly hunched. In the blink of an eye, he was an elderly cultivator. After all, Yang Qi was fairly famous nowadays. Word had long since spread of how he had stood up to the Crown Prince, and therefore, disguising himself with the abilities of his godly-class energy art seemed like the smart thing to do.

As he approached the archway, one of the guards reached out to block his path.

“What,” Yang Qi said, snorting coldly. Unleashing some of his powerful true energy, he said, “I'm here to do business with the Myriad Consortium. What’s the meaning of this?” The Lifeseizing aura he unleashed caused the guard to fall back a few paces, his eyes flickering with fear.

In his hand was a jade identification plaque that suddenly began to shine with dazzling white light. The guard looked down at the plaque and thought, ‘Such incredible true energy! He's a Nonary Lifeseizer!’

“Senior, please, you’re welcome to enter,” he said. “If there’s anything specific you're looking to buy, please let me know, and I can point you in the right direction.”

“I want to buy information,” Yang Qi replied in a cold tone. With that, he handed the man a demon core.

The guard’s expression flickered. “A fiend-devil demon core in the Lifeseizing level?! Many thanks, Senior. Many thanks for your generosity!” This man had only recently reached the Lifeseizing level, which was when he became a captain of the guard at the entrance to the Myriad Consortium. It was a relatively high position, and therefore, Yang Qi decided to whet his appetite with a little gift, in the hopes of getting more insights into the Myriad Consortium.

“Little Yu,” the captain said, “you take over for me. I'm going to take this Senior in to talk business.” With that, he led Yang Qi in through the archway. Before long, they were in a meeting hall, where the captain served some tea and then said, “I’ll go get some of the leaders of the consortium, Senior. Please wait here for just a moment.”

Without any further ado, he left. Before long, a burly man entered, who sized Yang Qi up, and vice versa. Yang Qi instantly identified him as a Quinary Lifeseizer.

“What can I help you with, Senior?” the man asked courteously, clearly nervous because of Yang Qi’s cultivation. “I am a vice-president in the Myriad Consortium branch here in Mongoltar. We do business throughout the lands, in hundreds of thousands of cities. As long as you can pay the price, we can provide the goods you need. Don't worry, Senior, we have an excellent reputation, and we live up to it.”

“Oh really?” Yang Qi said. Without any hesitation, he placed three enormous demon cores onto the table, each of them as dark as night. They looked like devil-eyes, and flickered with abundant wretch energy.

“Demon cores from fiend-devil viscounts?!” the man blurted in shock. “Senior, don’t tell me you want to sell them!?”

“Yes, I want information,” Yang Qi replied. “Where is the headquarters of the House of Shadowblight?”

Chapter 209: Buying Information

In somewhat shocking fashion, Yang Qi just directly asked for information about the headquarters of the House of Shadowblight.

In response, the eyes of the Myriad Consortium vice-president glittered brightly.

“Senior, you want to buy information about the House of Shadowblight? Don’t tell me that they offended you somehow?”

“Not per se,” Yang Qi replied coolly. “They’re heretical wretch-devils. Anybody has the right to punish them. Considering the Myriad Consortium is a group of honest and upright businessmen, you would surely be eager to help rid the world of devils and demons. Am I right? These three demon cores are precious treasures from Quinary Lifeseizing fiend-devils. Considering how much vital energy is stored in them, it would be hard to find a better treasure to insert into a spell formation. This should cover the cost of some information about some wretch-devil heretics.”

“Demon cores like this are definitely very valuable, but details regarding the headquarters of the House of Shadowblight, well…. that’s no inconsequential information. I need to check with my superiors to see if I'm allowed to directly sell top secret information like that. If you don’t mind, I’ll go put in a request, and at the same time, have these three demon cores evaluated.”

“That's fine. I’ll wait here for an update.” Yang Qi closed his eyes and sat there calmly.

The vice president made his way out with the captain. Once they were out of earshot, he asked, “Where did this guy come from?”

“I don't know,” the captain replied. “But my identification plaque said he has a Nonary Lifeseizing aura, so I didn’t dare press him for information. What do we do now? The House of Shadowblight is an important customer. They spend huge amounts of wealth on intelligence reports from us. And now someone wants information about them?”

The two men walked down the street to another towering building, which was protected by numerous spell formations and warding spells. Entering, they made their way to a tea room which was constructed entirely of translucent porcelain, and was so high up in the building that it offered a spectacular view of the entire city.

Sitting at a table in the room were two men, one middle-aged, one elderly, having a discussion as they sipped fine tea.

Upon hearing the knock on the door, the middle-aged man said, “Enter!”

“Greetings, President,” the vice-president said with utmost respect. “I wasn't aware that you were entertaining a customer, my apologies.”

“It's fine. This is Blightking Blisscarnage from the House of Shadowblight, one of our top customers. He’s come in person to discuss an enormous business deal.”

“That’s right,” said the old man, who was none other than Blightking Blisscarnage. Although he was stooped from age, he radiated immense strength and power. Clearly, he was a Nonary Lifeseizer, just on the verge of becoming a Legendary. “We’re about to receive a big shipment of treasure from the Western Continent. There are even some precious spirit stones from ancient times which are tens of thousands of times as effective as energy convergence pills. We hope to trade them for more intelligence reports from your Myriad Consortium.”

‘Spirit stones?!’ the vice president thought, shocked. “President, I have a customer who wants to buy some top-secret information, and I need your authorization to—”

“There’s no need to keep secrets from present company,” the president said. “Go ahead and speak freely.”

“You see….” he looked hesitantly at Blightking Blisscarnage, then continued, “well, it’s like this….” With that, he went on to explain the whole situation. He even pulled out the three demon cores. “Considering the matter involves one of our most important clients, the House of Shadowblight, I know that I can’t make the decision on my own.”

Blightking Blisscarnage suddenly cackled loudly. “I can’t believe someone is trying to make a move on the House of Shadowblight. I'm very curious what monstrous force of evil might be plotting against us.”

“Please wait a moment, Blightking Blisscarnage,” the president said. “Remember, you can’t do anything within the headquarters of the Myriad Consortium itself. Our rules are clear about that. We’re completely and utterly on your side in this, of course, but we need to maintain the appearance of propriety.” Chuckling, he looked down at the three demon cores. “Not bad…. They could really boost the power of any devil item they were used to augment. And if they were added to a devil formation, they could unleash incredible power. Blightking Blisscarnage, please, take them as an expression of good faith.”

With that, the three demon cores flashed through the air into Blightking Blisscarnage’s hand.

The old man was visibly surprised, but then he laughed loudly. “Yet again you prove to be a perfect business partner. So now what? You’re going to take his money and leave him out to dry?”

“Leave him out to dry? Of course not. He wants information about the House of Shadowblight, so I’ll give it to him. He's obviously some hothead looking to get killed. Your house should have plenty of ways to handle him, right?” The president was clearly not worried about the matter at all. “Vice-President, go tell him that we accept his offer, and that we’ll carry out a full investigation. He can come back in three days for the report.”

“Yes, sir!” With that, the vice-president and the captain left.

Chuckling, the president then said, “Although, who knows what will happen in those three days….”

Blightking Blisscarnage laughed uproariously. “How cunning, you wily old fox. Don’t worry, I won’t forget this gesture. And I’ll definitely report it to the houselord. It will help out significantly when it comes time to ink the next deal. By the way, I heard that your largest shareholder, the Crown Prince Society, is growing more powerful by the day. Presumably you need a lot of resources to feed their growth. I’d expect this latest deal of ours to help out in that regard. And in five years, when the Crown Prince comes out of seclusion as an invincible Great Sage, your company will definitely experience a meteoric rise.”

“That’s right,” the president said, nodding. “Of course, we have other shareholders besides the Crown Prince Society, and all of them are very much looking forward to this upcoming business deal. After all, everyone knows that the House of Shadowblight is backed by the massive Blight Legion Church. In the Western Continent, they’re on a similar level as our four institutes.”

“Yes, I truly hope this collaboration goes without a hitch.” Eyes flashing with cold light, Blightking Blisscarnage rose to his feet. “It seems the House of Shadowblight will soon have another Nonary Lifeseizer blightpuppet. We’ll definitely go all out to take him down. In fact, perhaps our Legendary leader will personally lead the team. Three days? That should be more than enough time.” With that, he vanished into thin air.

**

Back in the waiting room, Yang Qi listened to the vice-president’s explanation, and then said, “So, you’re taking my payment, but I need to wait three days for the information?”

“That's right. During the following three days, the consortium will hold nothing back to get information about the House of Shadowblight experts, including their defenses, spell formations, resources, etcetera. All of it will be in the report. It's up to you whether or not to accept. That's just how we do business.” The vice-president was really laying it on as thick as he could.

Yang Qi nodded. “Alright, if that's how it works, then I’ll be back in three days.”

“Very well. Take care, Senior.” The vice-president held out his hand, indicating that Yang Qi should leave. After he was gone, he smiled viciously. ‘Doesn’t know what's good for him. Within three days, you’ll be a blightpuppet.’

As Yang Qi left Mongoltar, the sky began to grow dark. Eventually, he found a mountain a few hundred kilometers away, where he sat down and looked back at the glittering lights of the city, a cold smile playing out on his face. ‘Three days? Is that how much time you need to warn the House of Shadowblight? Otherwise, why wouldn’t you offer me accommodations? Seems this Myriad Consortium is up to no good. And to think the Crown Prince Society is their biggest shareholder.”

Yang Qi had learned of such matters a while back from his sworn siblings. However, the main thing he lacked was the location of the House of Shadowblight itself. And finding it on his own would be like fishing a needle from the sea.

But now, he was definitely closing in on his objective.

With that, he began to perform some breathing exercises beneath the glittering starlight. From what he had heard, upon reaching the eighth Legendary transformation, the Astral-Star Transformation, it was possible to absorb the boundless power of the stars. And it would even be possible to create a starry magnetic field, which would instantly transform everything in a five hundred kilometer radius into a sea of stars. Of course, Yang Qi was far from that level.

Time passed…

At one point near the end of the three-day period of waiting, ten shadowy figures suddenly appeared in the air around the mountain that Yang Qi occupied. They were surrounded by black, hypertoxic energy, that, in the blink of an eye, transformed into a powder-like substance that rained down on the mountain. As it did, all of the animals and plants nearby died, and even the rocks began to melt.

One of the shadowy figures touched down on the ground and looked over at Yang Qi, who seemed unaffected by the toxic energy. Chuckling, he said, “Listen up, moron. I'm Blightczar Skyfiend, ninth vice-houselord of the House of Shadowblight. Are you the one who asked the Myriad Consortium for information about our headquarters?”

“That’s right. I did.”

Another old man appeared. “I'm Blightking Blisscarnage, thirty-second vice-houselord. Hurry up and tell us who you're working for, moron. Otherwise you’ll end up in such horrific pain that you’ll only be able to yearn for death.”

“You're all they sent?” Yang Qi said, opening his eyes and looking around. The hypertoxic true energy that filled the area was kept at bay by his own energy arts, and couldn’t touch him. As he examined the people who were speaking to him, he realized that most were Octonary or Nonary Lifeseizers. The strongest was the so-called Blightczar Skyfiend, who was a Legendary. Normally speaking, someone who found themselves surrounded by a group like this would be terrified.

One of the other blightkings, an Octonary, stepped forward, glared at Yang Qi, and said, “You’re a Nonary Lifeseizer? You must be a famous person. Who are you? Spit it out! Why are you asking for information about our organization? We’re not a group you can afford to offend.”

“So, the Myriad Consortium told you about me?” Yang Qi said, rising to his feet.

“You're a real imbecile, you know that?” Blightczar Skyfiend said. “The Myriad Consortium is the biggest business partner of the House of Shadowblight. In fact, they even do business with the Blight Legion Church. And here you come along, some moronic hothead who thinks he’s just going to stroll right into our headquarters? What a joke! Surrender immediately, and tell us who sent you.”

“I’ll capture him, Ninth Vice-Houselord,” Blightking Blisscarnage said, chuckling coldly. Descending toward Yang Qi, he waved his hand, pulling out a snake-like weapon. “Guess what, moron? My Magic Viper Cane is missing a soul. Yours! And now—”

Before he could finish speaking, Yang Qi vanished, reappeared right behind him, and ripped his head off.

Chapter 210: Taking More Heads

“Aaaiiiieee!”

A heaven-shaking, earth-shattering scream erupted from Blightking Blisscarnage as his head left his body, and intense pain struck deep into his sea of consciousness.

“My head! My body!”

Without any hesitation, he drew on all of his energy arts in an attempt to break free. Not even removing the head of a Nonary Lifeseizer would kill them, much less prevent them from speaking. After all, such people could normally live two or three thousand years.

“Still trying to fight back?” Yang Qi said. Gripping Blightking Blisscarnage’s head, he sent a burst of true energy into his body, causing it to transform into nothing but ash. At the same time, three demon cores flew out of his corpse and into Yang Qi’s hand.

“The Myriad Consortium actually gave these to you people? What a pity that I leave true energy seals on everything that I own. And a person like you couldn’t discover and remove it. First things first. Take care of you people. Then I’ll head back and wipe out the Myriad Consortium.” With that, he turned to face Blightczar Skyfiend and the other experts from the House of Shadowblight.

‘What just happened?’ Blightczar Skyfiend thought, his heart starting to pound as he stared at Yang Qi. Never in his wildest dreams could he have guessed that, with almost no effort, Yang Qi would rip Blightking Blisscarnage’s head off, and then destroy his body.

It happened too fast. After all, even if Blightczar Skyfiend had tried to kill Blightking Blisscarnage, it would have taken at least four or five moves.

In fact, if Blightczar Skyfiend hadn’t seen it with his own eyes, he might not have believed it.

“Kill him! Surround him with the toxic formation. Don’t let him escape!” Suddenly, true energy swirled out to form a devil-ghost behind Blightczar Skyfiend, bursting with wretch energy, and clad in a suit of armor. It had three heads and six arms, green skin and long fangs, a long, poisoned spear, and a mouthful of venom.

Then, Blightczar Skyfiend thrust his palm out, causing an enormous palm to appear, whose mere presence sent cracks snaking out through the mountain below.

“Blight Legion Megapalm!”

This heaven-rending, earth-crushing palm seemed powerful enough to transform any area into a world of toxins and poison.

At the same time, the other experts from the House of Shadowblight scattered, producing magical treasures in the form of flags, each of which was embroidered with the sigil of some venomous creature. There were centipedes, scorpions, vipers, venomous dragons, wasps, and more. As they waved their flags, they transformed into thousands of streams of black energy, which interlocked to form a toxic web that locked down the whole mountain.

Instantly, viscous, toxic ooze began to bubble up everywhere.

This was a spell formation unique to the House of Shadowblight, the Bloodmelting Grand Spell Formation. Normally speaking, anyone caught within it would be melted into nothing but blood.

However, even as the enormous spell formation took shape, Yang Qi dodged Blightczar Skyfiend’s attack, and then made a ripping gesture with both hands.

In unison with the motion of his hands, two gigantic hands of true energy appeared, almost as if some powerful emperor from ancient times had arrived to inflict punishment on the guilty.

Pop. Pop. Pop! POP!!!

The countless streams of toxic energy from the flags were ripped to shreds, and the House of Shadowblight experts who had created the formation all began to cough up blood.

“What level of power is this?” one of the Octonary Lifeseizers blurted in terror.

Before he could do anything else, an eye opened up on Yang Qi’s forehead, and a sonorous voice could be heard speaking Godtongue.

“You have forsaken the light of the Lord, degenerates!”

The Lord's Eye sent blinding, purifying light spilling out. This was light that surpassed even the most mysterious legion of gods, glorious light that represented the will of the Lord.

Godly might filled it, as though it was an expression of ultimate judgement, punishment carried out by the legion of gods. In the blink of an eye, the eye pierced through the Octonary Lifeseizers.

Each and every one burst into flames, becoming screaming human torches that briefly illuminated the sky before transforming into nothing but ash.

‘What’s happening?’ That is what the other experts from the House of Shadowblight were thinking as they contemplated how to flee. However, the Lord's Eye would not permit them to do so. Next, that sonorous voice rang out in their very souls.

“The Lord’s judgement is omnipresent. If you sink into evil, then your punishment will come….”

The rest of the experts’ souls ignited, turning them into writhing torches that quickly burned away into ash.

In only ten breaths of time, more than ten Lifeseizers from the House of Shadowblight had perished.

Now, the only one left was the Legendary.

“Your turn, Blightczar Skyfiend,” Yang Qi said. “I knew this fishing expedition of mine would hook some fish, but I could never have guessed that one of them would be a Legendary. Tell me where your headquarters is. What cultivation base does the houselord have? You’re the ninth vice-houselord? What are the other eight like?”

“Y-you….” Blightczar Skyfiend was literally at a loss for words, and wondered if he was dreaming. He was a Legendary, and yet had never seen anything like this. A spell formation ripped to shreds? Enemies burned to death in an instant? And this was only a Lifeseizer, not a Legendary.

“I’m a Legendary, and you're a puny Lifeseizer! I don’t care what special technique you cultivate, you can’t bridge the gap between levels! Get ready to die! Skyfiend Blightpalm. First stance. Hook the Soul. Snatch the Life!”

Howling, he thrust two palms out at Yang Qi with mountain-toppling, sea-draining force.

Yang Qi merely stood in place, a cold gleam in his eye as he drew upon his true energy to create a defensive barrier. A moment later, a huge boom rang out as the attack was rebuffed.

“Second stance. Break the Legs, Sever the Arms!

“Third stance. Mountain of Corpses, Sea of blood!

“Fourth Stance. Defeat the Armies, Slaughter the Hordes!

“Fifth stance. Descent of the Toxic God!”

Blightczar Skyfiend looked like a tornado as he fueled his top martial disciplines with all of the true energy he could muster. Toxic energy filled the area as his attacks slammed into Yang Qi’s defensive true energy. However, Yang Qi was like a reef in the tide, hovering there in the air, unmovable no matter what was thrown against him.

It was only after Blightczar Skyfiend unleashed his ultimate stance that Yang Qi finally made his move, reaching his hand out through his true energy shield.

What did his hand look like?

It was only flesh and blood, but it looked perfect in every aspect. The finest jade in the world couldn’t compare to it, not even the Nine Heavens godjade that the Chiliocosm Mirror was made from. Considering how he glowed with holy light, he didn’t even look human, an effect which was made even more prominent by the holy thrum which surrounded him.

Virtually anyone who saw him in this state would feel the urge to drop down and worship him.

It was a hand that seemed to be filled with compassion for the living things in the world, the type that might tousle the hair of a child. But at the same time, it looked like the most powerful Sovereign Lord of the legion of gods, someone who could shower all creation with blessings.

This hand was the hand of the Lord, come to punish the wicked and bring both destruction and rebirth to the world.

Blightczar Skyfiend’s eyes went wide as, before he could even see what was happening, all of his moves were vanquished.

RUMBLE!

The hand latched onto his head, and his true energy was sealed tight in his dantian region.

Then he found himself hanging in the air, held aloft by Yang Qi.

It almost felt like his head was a watermelon that Yang Qi could squash at any moment.

“Talk. Where is the House of Shadowblight’s headquarters? Where? Tell me now!” Although he spoke in a warm tone, his words seemed like a death sentence to Blightczar Skyfiend.

Lips trembling, he said, “Who are you?”

“Yang Qi.” At this point he allowed his features to return to their true form. “You've heard of me, right? You know who I am.”

“You’re the champion of the Inter-Institutional Martial Arts Competition! The genius, Yang Qi! B-but… but how can you fight a Legendary like me? What energy art do you cultivate? You were only in Senary Lifeseizing during that competition, but now you’re a Nonary Lifeseizer?”

“You don't qualify to be asking the questions here. Tell me what I want to know.”

Calming down a bit, Blightczar Skyfiend said, “If I tell you, will you let me go?”

Swish!

One of his arms was severed, and blood sprayed everywhere.

“My god, the pain!” he screamed.

“If you don't want to tell me, fine. The Myriad Consortium will. Last chance. Are you going to talk?”

“Wait! Hold on!” Blightczar Skyfiend shouted, sweat dripping down his face. Of course, he was only trying to buy time.

RUMBLE!

Suddenly, his other arm burst into flames, causing hissing and popping sounds to fill the air as his flesh and blood were burned away. He couldn’t hold back from twitching as he watched the arm slowly transforming into ash.

Without reaching the Never-Dying Transformation, it wouldn’t be possible to recover those arms, which meant that from now on, he would be an armless cripple.

Furthermore, considering that he was already a Blood-Form Legendary, it meant that he had remolded his body, and couldn’t accept grafted body parts from other individuals. Such things would be rejected by his own body, and would wither away almost immediately.

“I’ll talk! I’ll talk!!!” he shrieked. Not daring to try to buy time any longer, he said, “The headquarters of the House of Shadowblight is on a mobile island out in the western sea! It’s never in the same place, and it's surrounded by mirages that make it impossible to spot with the naked eye. But I have a spirit talisman that you can use to locate it.”

Chapter 211: Wiping Out the Myriad Consortium

The burning sun shone so hot above that it seemed capable of melting metal.

And yet, the streets of Mongoltar were as busy as ever, filled with many top energy arts experts. On the street occupied by the Myriad Consortium, business boomed as usual.

The guards at the gate were in the middle of a conversation. “Captain, remember that Nonary Lifeseizer who stopped by three days ago? I wonder if he’ll be back today. He was pretty generous. Three Lifeseizing fiend-devil demon cores? I wonder what sort of deal he wants to work out with our Myriad Consortium.”

The captain snorted. “He won’t be back, I guarantee it.” After all, he knew what was going on behind the scenes. Smiling coldly, he said, “Look, you need to forget about the whole thing. Asking questions will only get us in trouble. From now on, just pretend you never saw that guy.”

“Yes! Yes, of course….” the other guards replied, averting their gazes from the captain.

The captain nodded in satisfaction. “Excellent. I like that you can obey orders. The first rule in the Myriad Consortium is to follow orders no matter what.”

Suddenly, one of the guards shouted, “C-cap… captain!”

“What?! What’s with the shouting?” Even as the shocked captain prepared to slap the guard across the side of the face, the man blurted, “Sir, look! Isn’t that the guy from three days ago?”

The captain swiveled to find Yang Qi striding toward him, wearing the same disguise as three days before.

“Th-this… th-this, this is….” The captain was at a complete loss of words.

“Remember me?” Yang Qi said coolly. “I'm back for my information. Hurry up and lead the way.”

“J-just… just wait a moment….” The captain was flustered, but had a lot of experience in life, so he quickly composed himself. “Sir, just hold on a bit and I’ll inform the vice-president that you’re here.”

“No, there’s no need for that. I’ll go find him myself.” With that, Yang Qi made as if to walk through the gate.

“Hey, you can’t go in there!” the captain shouted. “I have to report the matter to— oomph!”

Suddenly, he looked down and realized that a spear of true energy had been plunged into his chest, and blood was spilling out like a waterfall. “You killed me…?”

“Block my path? Guess you're not interested in living!” Yang Qi twisted the Infernal Deity Spear, and the captain exploded.

Instantly, this part of Mongoltar erupted into a huge commotion. People immediately began to gather in the area, even Lifeseizers.

“He killed him!”

“Who is this guy!? He’s killing people! Wasn’t that a captain from the Myriad Consortium?! What does he think he’s doing? Quick, spread word!”

“Not even Legendaries are allowed to randomly kill people in Mongoltar! Isn't he afraid of being executed?”

“It must be a revenge killing.”

“What, does he think he's going to fight the entire Myriad Consortium?”

“The Myriad Consortium is so powerful it’s terrifying. There’s no way he's a match for them.”

“Let’s just wait and see what happens….”

The other guards reacted very quickly.

“An ambush!” they shouted, drawing swords and sabers.

Meanwhile, a group of Lifeseizers flew out from the interior of the Myriad Consortium, all of whom took up positions to block Yang Qi’s path.

One of them, a Tertiary Lifeseizer, shouted, “Drop your weapon and surrender. Killing people in the Myriad Consortium is an unforgivable crime!”

Raising his voice, Yang Qi said, “Three days ago I paid a deposit to your Myriad Consortium, for information about the House of Shadowblight. Instead, you people sold me out. The House of Shadowblight even sent people to kill me. Anyone care to explain the situation?” He spoke so loudly that all of the onlookers could hear him clearly.

“What? The Myriad Consortium betrayed him?”

“That’s very bad form. If they do business like that, how could anyone trust them?” More and more people were gathering to watch the scene, and many of them were already cursing the Myriad Consortium.

“Bullcrap!” another of the Lifeseizers said. “How dare you insult us in that way? Do you have any proof that we took your deposit and then sold you out to the House of Shadowblight? Do you have a witness? Or some physical evidence? Bring it out immediately! I didn’t think so. Come on, let’s arrest this guy and figure out what type of heretical wretch-devil he is. I can’t believe he actually came here to slander our Myriad Consortium.”

“Evidence?” Yang Qi said. “This isn’t about evidence, it's about justice. I'm here for one reason: to wipe you out one and all. After today, there will be no Myriad Consortium in the Rich-Lush Continent!” Smiling darkly, he lunged forward with his spear, stabbing with such speed that it was almost blinding.

SNICK!

The Lifeseizer who had demanded evidence died in an explosion of blood.

Then, Yang Qi’s spear was a blur as it took the heads off all the other Lifeseizers. Blood erupted from their necks, shooting like bright red rainbows, high into the air.

“Stay your hand!” someone shouted from some distance away. Then, two powerful auras descended as the vice-president and president arrived.

The vice-president looked at Yang Qi, and then down at the bodies of the Lifeseizers. Eyes turning bloodshot, he said, “You fiend-devil!”

“Vice-President,” Yang Qi replied calmly. “Three days ago, did you or did you not betray me to the House of Shadowblight? Did you or did you not have them send people to kill me? Who's the fiend-devil here, huh?”

“What did you just say? I don’t know what you're talking about. I've never even seen you before! Ladies and gentlemen, this fiend-devil came to the Myriad Consortium for the purposes of murder! That’s an unforgivable crime that should provoke universal hate from all of you! If we don't condemn this, Mongoltar will become a lawless land of bloodshed!”

“It doesn’t matter what you say,” Yang Qi said, hefting his spear. “Death has come. First for you, then the rest of the Myriad Consortium!”

“Freakish hellion!” Suddenly, something like a clap of thunder caused all of Mongoltar to tremble, and a figure appeared above the street that housed the Myriad Consortium.

An energy field sprang out which caused the entire street to ice up, and forced the crowd to back up, hearts pounding with fear. At this point, one of the Lifeseizers present said, “Legendary! A Legendary patriarch is here! It’s the ruler of Mongoltar, Patriarch Mongolbeast!”

Permanent residents of Mongoltar all recognized this person, who had ruled over this sprawling city for a thousand years.

As soon as Patriarch Mongolbeast appeared, the street went deathly silent. The only thing that could be heard was the clink of armor as soldiers rushed to gather in the area. At the same time, multi-colored pillars of light climbed into the air in different areas of the city, evidence of a grand spell formation being activated.

If Yang Qi could set up a spell formation in Yanhaven, then it was little wonder that the ancient, famous city of Mongoltar would have similar defense.

“What’s going on here?” Patriarch Mongolbeast said, his voice thrumming with awe-inspiring power. “Tell me immediately why you slaughtered these people!”

“City Magistrate,” Yang Qi replied, “I came to do business with the Myriad Consortium, and they betrayed me. They sent the House of Shadowblight to kill me, and now I'm back to seek justice.”

“Bah!” the vice-president said. “I don’t even know this man. I've never seen him before.”

“City Magistrate, please,” the president said, “you must enforce your own laws here. Killing in Mongoltar is a capital offense!” Looking over calmly at Yang Qi, he continued, “This man is besmirching your dignity, Sir. That in itself is an unpardonable offense. Furthermore, he mercilessly slaughtered many experts of the Myriad Consortium. If you don’t put him to death, the common people will be up in arms.”

“You're right,” Patriarch Mongolbeast said. Looking sharply at Yang Qi, he said, “I don't care what your reasons are, or where you’re from. The punishment for killing people in Mongoltar is death. Even if the Myriad Consortium did betray you and cover up the truth, the proper reaction would be to come to the city magistrate’s mansion and file a court petition for redress, after which, you could follow through with all subsequent legal formalities. I take the lead in presiding over justice in this city, and I've forbidden vigilante justice. Without rules, chaos will result. I make all the decisions here, and therefore, I'm going to give you two choices. One: surrender to be sentenced by me. Two: be executed. Choose.”

With that, Patriarch Mongolbeast clasped his hands behind his back and waited for a response from Yang Qi.

The city’s warding magics had already been activated, making it impossible for anyone to leave the area. Furthermore, with the warding magics at his disposal, Patriarch Mongolbeast was confident that not even a Legendary of the same level as himself would be a match for him.

A moment passed, and then he said, “I’ll give you three breaths of time. One—”

Whoosh!

Yang Qi’s only response was to lunge forward with his spear.

In response, strange colors flashed in the sky, and the entire city suddenly filled with the glow of nightfall. At the same time, a strange music drifted out, like a symphony performed by the legion of gods during the end of days.

Patriarch Mongolbeast’s expression flickered, and then a cold smile filled his face as he reached out toward the incoming spear.

However, when the hand made contact with the spear, it was powerless to stop it. In fact, the spear immediately stabbed into the hand, and then through the defensive true energy that protected his body. Within the shortest of moments, it proceeded to his throat, and then out the top of his head.

Yang Qi flicked the spear, and Patriarch Mongolbeast’s head flew off of his shoulders, his eyes still flickering with the utmost disbelief.

The head flew up into the sky, trailing drops of blood.

Yang Qi then twisted the spear, and the patriarch’s body exploded, causing blood and gore to rain down on the street below.

As the severed head began to float down, Yang Qi looked at it and said, “You think you’re the law? I was giving you face by providing an honest explanation. Drag things out, and it’s just asking to be killed. Even if you’re a Legendary, I’ll cut you down without hesitation if I need to!”

With that, he stabbed his spear out, sending it piercing into Patriarch Mongolbeast’s forehead.

Patriarch Mongolbeast was a Blood-Form Legendary, and thus, even if his fleshly body were to be killed, his soul would survive. But now, he couldn’t help but blurt, “You… you killed me?”

“Enough with your blabbering, moron.” Yang Qi twisted his spear a final time, and the head exploded, causing the entire city to tremble.

Patriarch Mongolbeast, a powerful Legendary, had been killed with virtually no effort, and so quickly that no one could even react.

Eyes tranquil, Yang Qi said, “President. Vice-President. Who are you going to call to help you out now?”

Chapter 212: Exterminating Them All

No one in Mongoltar would ever be able to forget the events of this day.

Someone they had thought to be like a deva from heaven, a powerful ruler who could never be defeated, the Legendary Patriarch Mongolbeast who had lorded it over them for a thousand years, was decapitated by a single spear move, and then completely destroyed.

It all happened within the space of a few breaths of time.

It was almost like a nightmare, a horrible dream that they were incapable of waking up from.

The vice-president and president of Mongoltar’s branch of the Myriad Consortium were rooted in place, their hands and feet turning as cold as ice.

Even still, no one present dared to trust what they were seeing with their own eyes.

Suddenly, Yang Qi stabbed his spear into the ground and sent out his true energy through it, causing the city walls to shatter, and the warding magics protecting the city to collapse. The multi-colored pillars of light fell apart, indicating that Mongoltar was now completely defenseless.

“What was that guy’s name?” he said loudly. “Patriarch Mongolbeast? What a reckless, suicidal moron. How dare an ant like him try to show off in front of me.” As his words echoed out into the hearts and minds of the onlookers, they began to awaken from their reveries.

“My god!” blurted a nearby Quinary Lifeseizer. “Patriarch Mongolbeast was a Legendary! The Mongol Clan has ruled over Mongoltar for generation after generation. I can’t believe he was killed with one spear move. Is that guy a god, or a devil? Is he human, or a ghost?”

“Patriarch Mongolbeast is dead. He’s really dead! Mongoltar’s warding magics are destroyed. Come on, let’s get out of here! This guy’s going to slaughter everyone!”

“What do we do? What do we do?!”

Panic started spreading through the streets like an epidemic.

“Ladies and gentlemen!” Yang Qi said. “For every debt, there is a debtor. I came here today for the Myriad Consortium. Your city magistrate Mongolbeast tried to stop me, and died because of it. When it comes to people who protect criminals, not even death can wipe away their crimes. However, I don’t kill innocent people. Every person who I kill is a person who deserved to die. There’s no need for any of you to panic.”

There was something calming in his voice that quickly quelled the panic that had begun to spread through the city.

The blood of Patriarch Mongolbeast soaked the street that housed the Myriad Consortium, and considering that he was a Legendary with supremely powerful flesh and blood, already, the weeping of ghosts and wailing of gods drifted about, as though a vengeful soul were present that wished to return to life.

Henceforth, even if this street were to be razed to the ground and rebuilt, the area would always be haunted.

Not that Yang Qi cared. Looking at the vice-president and president, he said, “Well, give me your explanation. Why have you been working with wretch-devils? Why did you plot against me with the House of Shadowblight? Why did you not respect the rules of business?”

Backing up, the vice-president said, “Just who are you? You're a Nonary Lifeseizer, but you can kill a Legendary? How? Maybe you can kill Patriarch Mongolbeast, but you should be aware that the Myriad Consortium is backed by the Crown Prince Society! And we’re friends with plenty of other patriarchs, all of them Never-Dying Legendaries, invincible entities who are just on the verge of becoming Great Sages. If you offend people like that, you’ll be signing your own death sente—”

Before he could finish speaking, he screamed, and his head flew off of his shoulders. The pain he felt pierced all the way to the bottom of his sea of consciousness, and yet, before he could do anything else, a burst of true energy turned him into dust.

“Well, he was a real chatterbox,” Yang Qi said coolly.

“Wait!” shouted the president. Terrified at the prospect of dying, he went on to reveal everything he knew. “Don’t kill me. I admit it! We were behind everything. The Myriad Consortium has been working on a big business deal with the House of Shadowblight. We’re planning to purchase a shipment of spirit stones from the Western Continent. Spirit stones don’t exist in the Rich-Lush Continent nowadays. If we make this deal happen, it will be extremely profitable. That’s why we told the House of Shadowblight about you.”

Many looks of shock could be seen on the faces of the onlookers.

“So, that’s what happened. They really are in league with wretch-devils. And they even arranged to have one of their own customers killed. This Myriad Consortium disgusts me.”

“They had one of their own customers killed so that they could turn a profit? Betrayal like that is disgraceful. No one’s ever going to do business with the Myriad Consortium again!”

“This is absurd! I can’t believe the Myriad Consortium would do something like this. If that member of the Senior generation wasn’t an energy arts expert, then he would be dead now! Not only would justice have never been served, injustice would have reigned supreme!”

“Detestable! Come on, let’s spread word of this everywhere. Before long, the Myriad Consortium will be done for. They might do business everywhere in the Rich-Lush Continent, but they can’t stop rumors from spreading.”

After hearing the talk, Yang Qi nodded in satisfaction; his main goal had been accomplished. The Myriad Consortium took orders from the Crown Prince Society, so if he could damage their reputation enough, it would cause harm to the business interests of the Crown Prince Society.

“You….” Upon hearing the talk around him, the president’s face turned ashen. ‘Wait,’ he thought. ‘As long as I stay alive long enough, I can escape and report the matter to my superiors. They’ll definitely be able to come up with a plan. In fact, they can probably just capture him and force him to say that it’s all a sham. That should solve everything. After all, if word really does spread, and the Myriad Consortium finds out it’s my fault, I’ll be severely punished.’

“Am I free to leave now, Senior?” the president asked.

“Free to leave?”

Snap!

Yang Qi’s spear stabbed into the man’s chest, then twisted, causing him to explode.

“Only your blood can wash away your impertinence.”

Waving his hand, Yang Qi then said, “Grand Emperor's Pagoda!”

RUUUUMBLE! Boundless energy rose up into the air, where an enormous pagoda appeared, large enough to cover everything in sight.

Everyone in the city was so deeply shaken that they immediately passed out, even the fleeing members of the Mongol Clan.

Mongolbeast was the patriarch, but beneath him were numerous sons, grandsons and the like. They were a huge clan who had tyrannized Mongoltar and the area surrounding it for years on end. But when the tree topples, the monkeys scatter, and upon hearing that their patriarch had been killed, everyone in the clan immediately took to flight.

But now, all of those people simply collapsed onto the ground, unconscious.

Then, Yang Qi’s true energy swept through the entire city, locating the subterranean treasure stores. Medicinal pills. Swords. Divine weapons. Powerful items. Even spirit stones.

Drawing on the power of the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, he took them all.

Crevices opened up in the ground of Mongoltar, and treasures of the Myriad Consortium and the Mongol Clan flew up into the air, one after another, even demon cores, all of them to be sucked into the Grand Emperor's Pagoda.

The Grand Emperor's Pagoda was nothing like the Heart of the Sea thumb-ring. It was huge inside, and actually consisted of multiple separate dimensions. It was large enough to contain mountains and rivers, so a small treasure hoard was like nothing to it.

Of course, this ‘small’ treasure hoard would be nothing less than gargantuan in Yanhaven. After all, part of it came from a Legendary Patriarch who had led an aristocratic clan for a thousand years. And the other came from one of the richest business groups in the lands.

It was impossible to even quantify the level of resources involved. If it were given to the Yang Clan, they would be able to produce countless experts within a very short time.

Yang Qi glanced over the wealth, and shook his head. He had no intention of organizing it all; he would just give it to his father to fund the clan.

But first, he needed to wipe out the House of Shadowblight’s headquarters.

Most likely, they would have hundreds or even thousands of times the treasure from Mongoltar. After all, as Yang Qi now knew, they were essentially a minor outpost of the Blight Legion Church, who had access to unimaginable resources.

WHOOSH!

Having looted Mongoltar, Yang Qi flew up into the sky and disappeared. Before long, the populace woke up, and exchanged awkward glances at the sight of the chaos of the city.

“Mongoltar is in ruins!”

“What do we do? Who’s in charge of this place now?”

“Regardless of who takes charge now, Patriarch Mongolbeast is dead, and the Mongol Clan is destroyed. They always relied on their patriarch to carry out their evil deeds. They bullied men and women alike, and killed too many rivals to count. Now, it's time to settle accounts! Kill everyone from the Mongol Clan! At long last they’ll understand what revenge really is!”

“An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth!”

Already, Mongoltar was descending into pandemonium. And the Mongol Clan was done for.

Enormous aristocratic clans like that often bullied the populace, men and women alike. When such grievances piled upon grievances, it only meant that when the leader of that clan died, the rest of the clan would receive full payback for their previous actions.

Off in the distance, Yang Qi looked back to see what was happening, and realized that he needed to work hard to make sure something like that never happened with the Yang Clan. In that moment, he decided to enact a new rule when he got back: any member of the Yang Clan who hurt innocent people would be put to death without mercy.

That would be the best way to prevent disaster from striking the clan one day.

After all, no matter how strong the clan was, there would always be stronger people out there, and that meant that death was a constant threat.

With that, Yang Qi sent his thoughts into the Grand Emperor’s Pagoda, “Listen up, Blightczar Skyfiend. I really hope you weren’t lying to me about that mobile island. You saw what I just did. I didn’t even need the Grand Emperor's Pagoda to kill Patriarch Mongolbeast. He didn't last for one move against me.”

“Yes, of course….” came the reply. It was none other than the Legendary Blightczar Skyfiend. Yang Qi hadn’t killed him, but rather, taken him prisoner to learn more about the House of Shadowblight.

Chapter 213: The House of Shadowblight&#039;s Moving Island

The headquarters of the House of Shadowblight was located on a moving island somewhere out in the West Sea. He had extracted that information from Blightczar Skyfiend earlier, but there were still details he lacked. For example, what experts would be stationed on the island?

Blightczar Skyfiend was the ninth vice-houselord, and a Blood-Form Legendary. That alone seemed to indicate that the other vice-houselord would also be Legendaries, and likely, stronger than Skyfiend.

And that was not even to mention the houselord himself.

Considering Yang Qi had no idea the level of the houselord’s cultivation, that was the person he feared the most. Right now, he could single-handedly defeat a Blood-Form Legendary, and perhaps a Spirit-Soul Legendary. However, on his own, he couldn’t kill a Space-Void Legendary. It was only by using the Grand Emperor's Pagoda that he could take on a Space-Void Legendary.

But what if the houselord was a Five-Phases Legendary in the fourth transformation?

Such Legendaries could casually manipulate the five phases, achieve incredible speed, and understood the principles of mutual augmentation and suppression that came with metal, wood, water, fire and earth. They could even create enormous spell formations with complete ease. It was an enigmatic level that led to tenfold and even hundredfold levels of power. A person like that would be no easy opponent to fight, and Yang Qi wasn’t sure if he could do so even with the Grand Emperor's Pagoda.

And if there were multiple Legendaries and the houselord, then not only might he fail to exterminate their organization, he might end up getting killed.

The only surefire way of guaranteeing victory would be to become a Legendary himself.

At that level, he would have an initial understanding of magical law, which would give him a much higher level of control over the Grand Emperor's Pagoda. In that case, he could definitely take on a Five-Phases Legendary, and possibly even a Yin-Yang Legendary.

Unfortunately, he wasn’t quite ready to step into the Legendary level. He was already at the peak of his current level, but achieving the next breakthrough was no simple task. He needed the right good fortune, and if he didn't get it, would have no hope of succeeding.

“Ready to talk, Blightczar Skyfiend? How strong is everyone in the House of Shadowblight? What’s the houselord’s cultivation base like?”

“We have thirty-six vice-houselords, and I rank ninth. Everyone in the top ten is a blightczar and a Legendary. The top three are all Spirit-Soul Legendaries, people who can easily manipulate the power of their quintessence to rip apart mountains. The houselord, Blightczar Manyshadows, is in the fourth transformation. As a Five-Phases Legendary, he’s protected by the power of the five phases, which can be used to create all sorts of spell formations. That makes it virtually impossible to attack him. Furthermore, the island is filled with numerous blightpuppets, enough to blot out the sky and cover the earth.”

‘So, he really is a Five-Phases Legendary,’ Yang Qi thought. It was shocking news. If the House of Shadowblight fully mobilized its forces and attacked Yanhaven, the city would definitely be wiped out. If he had to, he could theoretically suck his clan into the Grand Emperor's Pagoda and escape, except, he would never betray the rest of the people in the city like that.

The houselord of the House of Shadowblight was Blightczar Manyshadows, a Five-Phases Legendary with profound energy arts, surrounded by the five phases, which could protect him better than any suit of armor. Even a sneak attack wouldn't work on him.

In the face of a person like that, Yang Qi would have no choice but to simply flee. And that was not to mention the other Legendaries on the island. Right now, it seemed like eliminating the House of Shadowblight wasn’t just a heaven-defying task, it was actually an impossible one.

And yet, the more impossible it seemed, the less Yang Qi was willing to abandon the idea. The House of Shadowblight had long since become a mortal enemy of his, and if he didn't end things soon, the ultimate consequences would be too horrible to contemplate.

After thinking about the matter a bit more, he settled down cross-legged onto the water below. ‘I should probably find the island and hide on it. After getting the lay of the land, I can identify the House of Shadowblight’s weaknesses. Maybe I can catch the houselord when he's alone. If I build up enough power, and land a surprise attack, I could probably wound him enough that I would have time to wipe out the rest of them.’

RUMBLE!

Drawing upon his true energy, he summoned the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, and at the same time, began to sink down toward the seafloor, where no one would be able to sense him or guess at what he was doing. His goal was to practice cultivation for a time to build up energy, so he sat down on a Rich-Lush Eye and summoned his Hellfire Crucible. Within the crucible were numerous strands of true energy that swirled together into the shape of a screaming old man. It was none other than Patriarch Mongolbeast.

He was a Legendary, so there was no way that Yang Qi would let his true energy reserves go to waste. After killing him, he sucked him into the Hellfire Crucible for later use.

“Get over here, Blightczar Skyfiend!”

Neither would Yang Qi let Blightczar Skyfiend off the hook. Making a grasping gesture, he sent a strong wind through the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, summoning the sealed Blightczar Skyfiend.

“No! Don’t kill me! If you kill me, you’ll die a horrible death!” It seemed Blightczar Skyfiend finally realized that he was reaching the end of the line. “I’ll be your slave, Yang Qi! Think of what you could accomplish with a Legendary as a slave!”

Yang Qi snorted coldly. “I don’t want or need an evil slave, especially one adept with poisons. It would only be a matter of time before you went behind my back to poison everyone I knew. Your death will fuel my Lord's Eye, and improve the power of my Grand Emperor's Pagoda, and also my quick strike. If I can injure Blightczar Manyshadows badly enough, it will make him a lot easier to kill.”

With the wave of his hand, he transformed Blightczar Skyfiend into a haze of blood, which sent another wave of powerful true energy surging into the Hellfire Crucible.

As of this moment, he now had true energy from two Legendaries to work with, which contained magical laws.

After refining them a bit, he opened his Lord's Eye, and used it to absorb the true energy.

As a result, the Lord's Eye suddenly turned bloodshot, as though it were about to erupt with fury. The anger of the Lord could bring an end to the world, and carry out the most destructive judgement.

Next, he sent out more true energy to scour the far corners of the Grand Emperor's Pagoda. Soon, he located the conglomeration of the asura’s flesh and blood.

Despite the six month session of cultivation, there was still plenty of it left. In fact, it was impossible to say when exactly it would run out. Considering that the original plan had been for the Crown Prince to use that asura to reach the Great Sage level, it was possible to tell how much power there was in it.

Right now, Yang Qi couldn't absorb anything more from it, as his current cultivation base level couldn’t accept it. If he tried to, it would merely leak away.

However, he was not using that power to put into his sea of energy, but rather, his Lord's Eye. By converging as much energy as possible into the eye, he hoped to be able to use it to unleash a quick strike onto the houselord of the House of Shadowblight, backed by the additional power of the Grand Emperor's Pagoda. Hopefully, the result would be a serious injury.

After several days and nights of absorbing the power, the Lord's Eye was completely bloodshot, filled with killing intent and ready to unleash incredible force whenever he wished.

‘Fusion of the Grand Emperor!’ Even as Yang Qi rose to his feet, the Grand Emperor's Pagoda shrank down to the size of a dust mote, which then entered the Lord's Eye.

The Lord’s Eye closed tight; the next time he opened it, it would unleash heaven-destroying, earth-extinguishing power.

Yang Qi rose from the water and then began to fly through the air for a moment before vanishing into a parallel dimension. It was a high-level concealment technique that only a Space-Void Legendary would possibly be able to see through.

Of course, it was fueled, not by Yang Qi’s power, but by the Grand Emperor's Pagoda.

Before long, dense mists began to rise up around him, making it impossible to see anything clearly. He had been prepared for this, and began to follow a prescribed route through the mist. After two hours passed, a large island rose up in front of him. In fact, it was so large that it was almost like a continent.

Despite its huge size, it looked like a ship of sorts, covered with all sorts of temple-like structures that were set aside for cultivation.

On the western side was a harbor that numerous metallic battleships sailed in and out of, merchant vessels shuttling goods to and from the Western Continent. Many of the ships from the Western Continent bore slaves that the people from the House of Shadowblight would inject venom into, transforming them into walking corpses, tireless puppets that did all the manual labor on the island. As for the sides of the island, they were bolstered with metals mined from the ocean floor, making the entire thing nearly impregnable. High above in the air was a shimmering shield of poison that would make it impossible for most outsiders to invade the place. Of course, that barrier was no obstacle to Yang Qi.

This was none other than the House of Shadowblight’s headquarters.

Looking down, Yang Qi could see that the bottom of the island had machines designed to propel the place in any direction. It really was an enormous ship.

‘The soil of this island is actually metal that can survive the ravages of ten thousand years. It’s basically a gigantic battleship.’ Yang Qi couldn’t help but marvel.

After studying the place for a few hours, he suddenly noticed something.  ‘Eh? What’s that?’

High above in the air, a powerful stream of sword energy was descending.

Looking closely, Yang Qi was surprised to see several members of the Crown Prince Society. One of them was a man who thrummed with the energy of the Grand Thunderclap Swordplay. He was none other than Lei Tao, and also present was Xie Feng.

The leader of the group was a holy neophyte, a Legendary student in the Demi-Immortal Institute, a member of the Crown Prince Society who ranked second only to the Crown Prince. Yang Qi had never seen him before, but from the way he carried himself, it was obvious that he was a supremely powerful individual.

‘What is a holy neophyte from the Crown Prince Society doing here at the House of Shadowblight? Don’t tell me it’s because of me wiping out the Myriad Consortium in Mongoltar?’

Chapter 214: Holy Neophyte

The first to speak was none other than Lei Tao. “Elder Brother Huang Hou, why are we meeting with the House of Shadowblight this time? Is it because of the incident back in Mongoltar? Who do you think picked a fight with our agents in the Myriad Consortium branch there? Whoever it was, it's hard to believe he actually killed City Magistrate Mongolbeast.”

The holy neophyte was named Huang Hou, and he radiated an aura that seemed reminiscent of the Yore-Wilds of old. Clearly, he cultivated some sort of energy art from primeval times, and had a very profound cultivation base. Yang Qi could sense something incisively powerful on him that made him seem even stronger than Patriarch Mongolbeast. In fact, it seemed highly likely that he was either in the second or third Legendary transformation.

“This business deal is very important to the Crown Prince Society,” Huang Hou replied coldly. “There’s a huge shipment of spirit stones coming from the Western Continent that we can use to forge the Superheaven Altar for the Crown Prince. That will be of immense help to him in his recovery, as well as his ascension to the Great Sage level. The Crown Prince said he would need five years to recover, but if we seal this deal, and get those spirit stones, we can make the altar, and help him to recover in only one year. Then he can make his comeback, and slaughter each and every one of his enemies.”

Xie Feng chuckled bitterly. “What? Really? Only a year? All of the other societies are joining forces to oppose us. The Gentlemen’s Society, the Divine Ability Society, the Five Lightnings Society, and even societies from other institutes. Considering that, and the disaster with the Myriad Consortium, we’re not exactly in a good place right now.”

“Even if things get worse off,” Lei Tao said, “even if we go broke doing it, we have to forge that Superheaven Altar. Then, only a year later, all of our enemies will be dead!”

“Elder Brother Huang Hou, what do you think of Yun Hailan?” Xie Feng said. “As her cultivation base rises, she’s earning the loyalty of more and more students. Now she’s a Nonary Lifeseizer, with the support of quite a few of the Legendary elders, such as the Patriarchs Wind and Cloud, the Seven Preheaven Masters, and the Three Pure Yang Elders. And she's using every trick in the book to try to become a Legendary herself. Should we worry about her trying to seize power?”

“None of that matters,” Huang Hou replied. “Do you really think a single conclave student who isn’t even a Legendary could possibly take over the Crown Prince Society? What do you think we holy neophytes are for? Besides, the Crown Prince has appointed her as his successor. Before long, we’ll be taking orders from her, so it would be stupid to butt heads with her now.”

“So, you believe those rumors too, Elder Brother Huang Hou?” one of the other conclave students said. He sounded somewhat angry. “Did the Crown Prince really appoint her as a successor? Is he actually grooming her for the position? He’s going to be the next chancellor of the Demi-Immortal Institute, which means our society will definitely need a new leader. But there are so many loyal holy neophytes who have performed all sorts of services. Why shouldn’t you be the next leader, Elder Brother Huang Hou? Why does it have to be Yun Hailan?”

“Shut your mouth!” Huang Hou replied icily. “There’s no way people like us can guess what the Crown Prince is thinking. Our job is to follow orders. What do you think you’re going to do, lead a revolution or something? Stay in line, and you’ll reap the rewards. Remember, the Crown Prince is a god from heaven descended into the mortal world.”

“Yes sir!”

At this point, Lei Tao changed the subject. “By the way, according to my contacts, it’s highly likely that the person who slaughtered the Myriad Consortium in Mongoltar was actually Yang Qi!”

“What evidence do you have?” Huang Hou said, his eyes flashing. “How could someone like him have done that? Back in the martial arts competition, he was only in Senary Lifeseizing. You think he could kill a Legendary? Doubt he reached the Legendary level already.”

“Elder Brother Huang Hou,” Xie Feng said, “don’t forget that after the competition, he was summoned to a meeting with the chancellor. And then he went to the Heavendawn Quarry. It was in that very time period that the hellion Young Master Shroud-Heaven used his spell formation to entrap the Crown Prince. The chancellor had arranged for the Crown Prince to get the Grand Emperor's Pagoda and use it to kill Young Master Shroud-Heaven, but the treasure vanished. I'd say it’s highly likely that the chancellor ended up helping Yang Qi to get the Grand Emperor's Pagoda!”

“What?” Huang Hou said, clearly shocked. “Why would the chancellor do something like that? I've been so focused on cultivation recently that I hadn’t heard anything about this.”

“It’s just speculation on my part,” Xie Feng said with a wry smile. “But there’s been a lot of talk to that effect in the institute. Besides, I also heard that over by the Blackcorpse Mountains, Yanhaven was locked down tight for the past six months. No one was able to get even a peek of what was going on in the city. Only an unparalleled magical treasure could do something like that. To top it all off, there are whispers in other organizations that Yang Qi did get the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, and that he invited all of his sworn siblings to use it to help their cultivation.”

“What?” Huang Hou said angrily. “So the chancellor did give the Grand Emperor's Pagoda to Yang Qi! That’s ridiculous! He’s grooming the Crown Prince to be his own successor! And the Crown Prince acquired the legacy of Grand Emperor Rich-Lush! He’s the rightful owner of the Grand Emperor’s Pagoda. What is the chancellor thinking? And why didn’t the Crown Prince confront him about the situation?”

Xie Feng shrugged. “I don’t know. You’d have to ask the Crown Prince about that. But I think that’s one reason why the Crown Prince didn’t return to the Demi-Immortal Institute to rest and heal; he doesn’t trust the chancellor anymore. Originally, the Demi-Immortal Institute would have been the perfect place to avoid Young Master Shroud-Heaven. But now…. Not even the chancellor can be trusted.”

“The chancellor is trying to play both sides, but I’d say he’s pushing things too far.”

Around this time, a string of laughter interrupted the students from the Crown Prince Society as a stream of dragon-like black energy erupted from the depths of the island. Within the energy were a handful of figures wearing bronze masks carved with sinister faces, and elaborate, luxurious clothing that identified them as leaders of some sort.

“Welcome, guests from the Crown Prince Society. Please, forgive us for not coming out earlier to meet you.”

“No offense taken,” Huang Hou said. “Vice-Houselords, let’s head in to begin the discussion. I'm here on orders of the Crown Prince himself, to discuss the spirit stone shipment from the Western Continent.”

“Recent events have been unfavorable for both of our organizations,” one of the vice-houselords said. “We definitely need to get to the bottom of the matter. Someone wiped out the Myriad Consortium branch in Mongoltar, and also killed our ninth and thirty-second vice-houselords.”

“I’m fairly certain I know who did it,” Huang Hou said. “However, we still need to discuss how to get rid of him. Come, let’s get down to business.”

“After you, sir!”

“After you!”

The group of people then disappeared into one of the large temple halls on the enormous island.

Yang Qi had just seen everything that was happening, and had used the powers of the Grand Emperor's Pagoda to eavesdrop on the conversation, although he hadn’t been able to make out every word. Unfortunately, he wasn’t in the Rich-Lush Continent any longer, so the powers of the pagoda were not as profound.

Snorting coldly, he thought, ‘If I was in the Rich-Lush Continent, I would have full access to the powers of the pagoda, and would have heard every word they spoke. Thankfully, my Physique of the Sovereign Lord is growing more powerful. New divine abilities, sharper eyes, sharper hearing….’

The news he had just received was of utmost importance.

The Crown Prince was buying a whole shipment of spirit stones from the Western Continent, which would be used to forge a Superheaven Altar. Although Yang Qi had never heard of such a thing, it seemed that it would help the Crown Prince to recover within a year, and also reach the Great Sage level.

Yang Qi had to stop that from happening. If he didn’t, he and everyone else he cared about would end up dead.

Unfortunately, the House of Shadowblight’s moving island was under tight lockdown. Furthermore, there were numerous powerful auras there, which he couldn't deal with unless he was a Legendary.

‘Spirit stones. Spirit stones….’

All of a sudden, a glimmering, violet stone appeared in Yang Qi’s hand, which swirled with spirit energy and power. It was a low-grade spirit stone he had taken from the treasure stores in Mongoltar, and compared to it, energy convergence pills were like trash from the gutter.

He actually had thousands of stones like this in his collection now.

If an ordinary energy artist used spirit stones like this in cultivation, the spirit power and spirit energy would be profoundly beneficial to that person’s meridians and sea of energy.

Even a tiny fragment of a spirit stone contained such incredible spirit power that it could propel an ordinary person into the fifth phase of the Energy Arts level, Energy Eruption, with almost no work at all. They could simply sleep with the stone in hand, and their cultivation base would rise.

Ten spirit stones could push someone into the sixth or seventh phase, and those were only low-grade spirit stones.

One could only imagine the progress that could be made with higher level stones, such as mid-, high-, supreme-, royal-, imperial-, sovereign-, or sagely-grade spirit stones.

Right now, all Yang Qi had were low-grade spirit stones, and he actually had no idea what mid-grade spirit stones looked like.

From what he had read back in the Demi-Immortal Institute, the smallest mid-grade stone contained dozens of times more spirit energy than the low-grade versions.

‘No wonder they need spirit stones to make their Superheaven Altar. And no wonder the ancient energy warriors were so strong. They used spirit stones for their cultivation, which would make it a lot easier to break through the levels and reach Lifeseizing, or possibly even the Legendary level. If I could get some high-grade spirit stones, or better yet supreme-grade, I would definitely be able to reach the Legendary level. Or what if I could get some royal-grade ones…?’

Suddenly, Yang Qi’s eyes glittered as he came up with a new idea.

‘I need to steal some spirit stones!’ It was obvious that, because of the deal between the Crown Prince Society and the House of Shadowblight, there was a huge shipment of spirit stones on the way from the Blight Legion Church in the Western Continent.

Stealing that shipment would not only wreck the Crown Prince’s plans, it would also enable him to reach the Legendary level, and slaughter the House of Shadowblight with ease.

‘That’s exactly what I need to do.’ His earlier check with true energy had confirmed that there was no huge stockpile of spirit stones on the moving island. Obviously, the shipment was still on the way.

With the power of the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, he would have sensed their fluctuations, even if they were stored in a holding item.

Chapter 215: Stealing Spirit Stones

Yang Qi felt a lot better now that his decision was made.

There could be no better plan in the current situation than to sneak in and sever their supply chain. In vicious fashion, he would rake the firewood from beneath the kettle.

With that, he blurred into motion, leaving the region of mirage that surrounded the island, and heading west.

Far, far away, on the other side of the boundless sea, was the Western Continent. Yang Qi had never been there before. However, he could sense that this continent was actually not located in the same dimension as the Rich-Lush Continent. Instead, it was connected by a tenuous passageway similar to the passageway between the Fiendcorpse Mountains and the Heavencorpse Dimension.

Following his senses, he flew for a day and a night. He took his time, simultaneously using his thoughts to study the fluctuations on the surface of the water, and observing the paths of the metal trade ships that were ferrying goods back and forth between the two continents.

After all, although the Western Continent sold all sorts of goods on the Rich-Lush Continent, the reverse also occurred. Yundale-by-the-Sea survived by sea trade, and was much richer than Yanhaven, as well as much more militaristic.

If Yang Qi truly wanted Yanhaven to prosper, the best thing would be to relocate it to a suitable harbor, and start trading demon cores for spirit stones.

Supposedly, the Western Continent had plenty of spirit stones, but few demonlings. In contrast, the Rich-Lush Continent had many sparsely-populated areas where demonlings thrived.

Demon cores were obviously rare in the Western Continent, and they had many useful functions. They could be used in spell formations, inset into weapons, and more. Although spirit stones were extremely useful for personal cultivation, they were far less effective than demon cores when added to weapons.

As Yang Qi proceeded along, he saw fewer and fewer ships. And the people manning what ships he did see were very powerful. The waves grew fiercer, and the sea demonlings all traveled in large packs. In fact, he even noticed a pack of demonlings who were in the Lifeseizing level, far down in the depths of the water. Occasionally, such demonlings would attack the ships, and even eat the people on them, or the spirit stones that were the cargo.

In these parts, the ships were all extremely large, and guarded by powerful energy arts experts, some of them Legendaries.

Eventually, Yang Qi saw what appeared to be an enormous barrier rising up from the sea off in the distance. It was none other than a barrier between dimensions.

This was the end of the sea, a fact which he could also tell from how his Grand Emperor's Pagoda was vibrating. The other side of the barrier was where the Western Continent existed, although it wasn’t visible with the naked eye. Of course, Yang Qi didn’t have ordinary eyes. He could see through the barrier, across the boundless sea on the other side, to the enormous continent.

Ordinary people who came here would think they had just reached the end of reality. After all, one could not proceed past this point.

Yang Qi initially hesitated. Should he try to break through the dimensional barrier, and head to the Western Continent?

After some thought, he decided not to. The Grand Emperor's Pagoda would be too weak, and he wouldn’t be at one with heaven and earth. Besides, the Western Continent had as many experts as the sky had clouds, and now wasn’t the time to alert the enemy to his existence.

RUMBLE!

Thankfully, he didn’t have to wait long. Soon, spirit energy fluctuations rolled out from the dimensional barrier, and an opening appeared, from which emerged an enormous bronze ship.

Its design was ancient in nature, and it looked powerful enough to crush mountains. The waves in this area of the sea were so large that they would capsize any smaller vessel, but this bronze vessel floated along as smoothly as if there were no waves at all.

At the stern of the ship was an enormous banner embroidered with the character “Blight”.

There was also a stifling spirit stone energy in the ship that caused Yang Qi to instinctively shiver.

There was no question about it: this ship belonged to the House of Shadowblight, and contained the shipment of spirit stones.

The spirit stones were actually locked away tight, and if it weren’t for his Grand Emperor's Pagoda, he wouldn’t have been able to sense their fluctuations.

‘Heaven’s on my side in this!’ he thought. However, he kept his Lord's Eye closed. Instead, he used his godly-class energy art to connect with the vital energy of heaven and earth, allowing him to identify several powerful auras on the ship. One of them contained traces of the magical laws of space, indicating that it was someone in the third Legendary transformation, a Space-Void Legendary.

That made sense, as only a Space-Void Legendary would be able to breach the dimensional barrier.

Of course, that was only because the Western Continent and the Rich-Lush Continent were very close to each other, and the dimensional barrier was essentially a single membrane separating the two. The fabled Quake-Dawn Continent was so far away that it would have too many separation membranes to count. And the spatial tempests that could strike within them would be strong enough to kill even Never-Dying Legendaries.

Only Great Sages could possibly brave such dangers, and travel the void to look for other planes. Of course, they could only take care of themselves in such a situation, not bring others. Only those powerful experts who existed beyond the Great Sage level could be considered the true overlords of space-time.

Yang Qi snorted coldly. ‘I can kill a Space-Void Legendary. I have a move ready for just that purpose! A ten-thousand sword attack!’

Even as the bronze ship began to cut through the waves, Yang Qi drew upon his sword technique. The Cosmic Sunflare Sword and the Ice-Soul God-Sword swirled out, creating countless streams of sword light, a shining sword formation that filled the sky with explosive vibrations.

RUMBLE!

The sword formation instantly shot downward toward the bronze vessel in a powerful attack.

“Ambush! It's an ambush!”

Streams of true energy shot up from the bronze ship toward the formation. However, Yang Qi’s sword technique was the type that ordinary Legendaries couldn’t even fight back against. Instantly, screams rang out as the sword energy pierced the defensive shields and stabbed numerous holes into the ship.

The bronze hull of the ship was instantly melted by the Cosmic Sunflare Sword, and any water in the area was frozen solid by the Ice-Soul God-Sword.

“Where’d this freakish hellion come from!?” someone shouted, his voice filled with powerful fluctuations that eradicated the fire and shattered the ice.

Even the damage to the hull started healing up.

Under the power being unleashed, the bronze ship was as moldable as clay.

‘He's the one I'm after!’ Yang Qi thought. He became a series of afterimages as he shot down toward the ship. Ignoring the crew of black-garbed experts from the House of Shadowblight, he summoned his Infernal Deity Spear, punched a hole in the deck, and dropped down inside of it.

Soon, he was in the depths of the ship, where he saw a wizened old man sitting cross-legged in the middle of a spell formation, protecting a bag of spirit stones. Those spirit stones were the source of the fluctuations he had detected on the outside.

The old man was in the third Legendary transformation, and as soon as he saw Yang Qi approaching, countless spatial distortions appeared around him. Because of that, any ordinary person would be incapable of even reaching his true form. They would instead be sucked into an impassable maze.

That was the power of a peak Space-Void Legendary.

As for the bag, it was obviously a powerful holding item with an immense capacity and powerful defenses. It was only because of the Grand Emperor's Pagoda that Yang Qi had even sensed the spirit fluctuations to begin with.

Rising to his feet with a wicked smile, the man said, “Who are you? I'm Blightczar Manyrivers from the Blight Legion Church!”

Not waiting for a response, the man reached out with his hand, bending space so that Yang Qi suddenly felt like he was upside down.

“Flip Heaven, Invert Earth!”

Although the old man looked physically weak, he commanded terrifying power. Instantly, spatial fluctuations erupted out, causing everything to seemingly flip upside down. Clearly, a Blood-Form Legendary or a Spirit-Soul Legendary would be powerless to fight back against a move like this.

This was the terrifying power that came with enlightenment of space itself. The power of magical law could crush any and all true energy.

However, that was when Yang Qi opened his Lord's Eye.

The cry of ghosts and wailing of gods drifted out, accompanied by a holy hymn. Streams of sacred light shot forth, solidifying the space in the area. All of a sudden, Yang Qi looked like a god, like the Sovereign Lord of everything, come to the mortal world to bless all creation.

Blightczar Manyrivers could never have guessed that something like this would happen. In fact, because of the light of the Lord's Eye, his eyes felt like they were on fire.

“Blight Legion Void!” he roared. Massive spatial fluctuations rolled out from his palms to try to extinguish the flames.

BOOM!

The Grand Emperor's Pagoda appeared and slammed down onto him. As boundless spell formations activated in the pagoda, the light of the Lord's Eye slammed into Blightczar Manyrivers. “What is this thing? The Grand Emperor’s Pagoda!?”

Chapter 216: Spirit Stones In Hand

Yang Qi attacked so swiftly and decisively that it almost defied comprehension.

First, he locked onto the ship and hit it with a spectacular sword strike that sent it listing visibly to the side. Next, he identified the location of the Space-Void Legendary who was in command.

Then, he attacked with his Infernal Deity Spear, and opened his Lord's Eye, unleashing a dangerous attack that instantly inflicted a serious injury on Blightczar Manyrivers.

Although Blightczar Manyrivers wanted to continue the fight, unfortunately for him, Yang Qi trapped him with his Grand Emperor's Pagoda, leaving him completely locked down and incapable of moving.

‘Go time!’ Yang Qi thought. The instant Blightczar Manyrivers was locked down, he lunged forward and grabbed the bag. Then he flew back up into the air and looked down at the listing ship, which seemed just on the verge of sinking down into the water. Finally, he sent out a stream of true energy that activated a massive gravitational force from the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, which grabbed the entire bronze ship and sucked it inside.

If he wanted to establish Yanhaven as a trading hub, he could theoretically do it via the Yan River, which eventually reached the ocean. And this ship might be of help in that regard.

It was a bronze ship, far larger and more powerful than ordinary steel ships, and would definitely give Yanhaven an advantage in controlling the nearby waterways.

Thankfully, the interior of the pagoda was enormous, and it had no difficulty taking in the ship. Of course, the very brief fight had severely drained Yang Qi’s true energy, so he dropped down into the water below and then headed off in a random direction.

The power of the Grand Emperor’s Pagoda had already killed the lower-level members of the House of Shadowblight, and as for Blightczar Manyrivers, he was now a mere prisoner. And in order to prevent any other experts from causing problems, Yang Qi left the scene of the crime as quickly as possible.

Not counting anything else, the bag of spirit stones he had acquired were a windfall, and would definitely help him reach the Legendary level. Once he succeeded, the House of Shadowblight would be doomed, and even Blightczar Manyshadows, the houselord, would end up dead.

The Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth would definitely provide amazing transformations once he was a Legendary. Not only would his Physique of the Sovereign Lord improve, his meridians, sea of energy, and fundamental structure would be completely reborn, and he would truly become like a god-spirit.

At that point, his true energy would truly begin to turn into godpower.

Unfortunately, it was an endeavor which would require a stupefying level of resources.

**

It took only a short moment for Yang Qi to be far, far away in the depths of the sea.

Down by the sea floor, he saw all sorts of underwater terrain, including enormous mountains and impossibly deep trenches, even volcanoes that fueled the enormous waves on the surface.

And there were hordes of demonlings, including fish, mammals, floodwyrms, snakes, and the like. It seemed like each demonling he encountered was stronger than the last. Some of the sea demons had even built cities, with powerful patriarchs standing guard over them.

Yang Qi avoided such locations, and searched around until he found a nameless, abandoned trench.

Staying in a place like this would make it difficult for anyone from the House of Shadowblight to track him down, not without carrying out an enormous search that would involve tangling with Demonfolk.

Even a Legendary would have to deal with true energy wastage in a protracted, underwater battle like that.

Thankfully, Yang Qi was on a completely different level thanks to the Grand Emperor's Pagoda.

The location he picked had once been a thriving, underwater city, with an enormous castle in the middle. Now, it was nothing more than crumbling ruins.

That said, the castle had been built with many factors in mind, including the five phases, eight trigrams, seven stars, and six directions. It was a miraculous place that perfectly conformed to the dao of heaven, and even still contained some defunct spell formations.

It was clearly an ancient city that had once existed above the surface of the water, but had been sunk in some cataclysmic disaster.

Similar cities could be found in numerous locations in the vicinity of the Rich-Lush Continent.

There were scattered demonlings who had built nests here, which he easily slaughtered. Finding an appropriate location, he used the Grand Emperor's Pagoda to create a bubble of air, then sat down cross-legged and checked on the bound and sealed Blightczar Manyrivers.

The man was both enraged and terrified; after all, he was completely incapable of accessing his true energy right now.

“Who are you? I can’t believe you have a magical treasure like the Grand Emperor's Pagoda! Why have you targeted the Blight Legion Church?”

Yang Qi ignored him. The man was severely injured, and his days were already numbered. Instead, he pulled out the bag of spirit stones to check on their value and type.

His arm actually stung from the effort of breaking open the bag, which had been protected by powerful warding magics. In the end, he had to resort to using his Lord’s Eye, which revealed that it was indeed a spatial magical treasure, and could contain far more items than his Heart of the Sea thumb-ring.

Instantly, an immense force of spirit energy erupted out, leaving him feeling suffocated. Inside of the bag were mountains of spirit stones, all of them dazzlingly bright.

He quickly emptied the spirit stones into the Grand Emperor's Pagoda so that their aura wouldn’t attract nearby demon-devils.

They were roughly walnut-sized, and had been very precisely cut, which made sense considering they were used as currency in the Western Continent, and were all kept a certain size, with a certain amount of spirit energy. During their creation, they would be labeled, each of them with a single character written in the script of the Western Continent. In terms of the possible grades, they were: low, mid, high, supreme, royal, imperial, sovereign, sagely, heavenly, and godly.

Of course, the rarity increased as the grade increased, with supreme-grade and royal-grade being relatively rare.

A single supreme-grade spirit stone would have so much spirit energy in it that an ordinary person could use it to quickly ascend all the way to the Master of Energy level.

Reaching into one of the mountainous piles of spirit stones, Yang Qi randomly grabbed one, pulled it out, and saw the character ‘supreme’ on it. A few more attempts produced the same result.

Apparently, most of the spirit stones in this collection were at least supreme-grade. He couldn’t find a single low-, mid-, or high-grade.

‘I'm rich! I'm really rich!’

Looking around, he counted forty-nine mountainous piles of spirit stones, which emitted so much spirit energy that he could hardly breathe.

Reaching out, he grabbed a golden-colored spirit stone that pulsed with such intense spirit energy it seemed it might float up into the air at any moment. Instantly, a pleasant sensation spread through him. Looking down, he saw that it was a royal-grade spirit stone.

After some more checking, he realized that about ninety percent of the stones were supreme-grade, but there were quite a few royal-grade mixed in as well.

‘Awesome. These spirit stones should definitely be enough to get me to the Legendary level. I guess I have the House of Shadowblight to thank. Although, are there really enough spirit stones here to build that Superheaven Altar the Crown Prince needs?’ Suddenly speaking out loud, he said, “Blightczar Manyrivers! This is only the first shipment of several, isn’t it!?”

“Who are you, hellion!?” Blightczar Manyrivers spat back.

“I'm an enemy of the Crown Prince, and an enemy of the House of Shadowblight. I can’t believe that useless Crown Prince actually colluded with you heterodox wretch-devils. He's from an orthodox sect! Well, just wait until I'm a Legendary. He’ll get what's coming to him then.”

Glancing at the spirit stone again, he summoned his Hellfire Crucible.

Cleansing Flame of the Heavenly World raged as the crucible appeared. Then, a burning wind sprang up that dragged all of the spirit stones into it.

Crack. Crunch…. The spirit stones shattered, releasing immense spirit power into Yang Qi’s meridians, and beyond, to his sea of energy, where it began to build up, and at the same time, transform his aura.

‘Ignite true energy, break into Legendary!’

He was using the power of the spirit stones to ignite his true energy, and push himself to the absolute peak. Then, he would explode, and his meridians, sea of energy, flesh, and blood would transform into primal-chaos. Sure enough, stepping into the Legendary level was extremely dangerous, and the slightest mistake could lead to being absolutely destroyed.

The flesh and blood of the asura that he had could provide immense power. However, it could only bolster the true energy, not ignite it. Spirit stones were completely pure, as they grew directly out of the quintessence of heaven and earth. Thus, they were the perfect item to ignite true energy.

That was one reason why Yang Qi was so confident that they would help push him into the Legendary level.

Perhaps there weren’t enough spirit stones here to create the so-called Superheaven Altar, but there were enough for Yang Qi’s needs. Win or lose, it would all be determined here. Once he transformed the substructure of his own life force, and then returned to the Demi-Immortal Institute, it would cause a huge stir.

“What?!” Blightczar Manyrivers shrieked. “You’re actually trying to reach the Legendary level right now!? My god! You’re not even a Legendary and you’re already strong enough to defeat me? What will you be like after you break through? What energy art do you cultivate? How could you be so strong?!”

Yang Qi ignored him, and focused instead on the task at hand. Obviously, all of this would be for naught if he ended up killing himself.

“God-spirits of heaven and earth; Physique of the Sovereign Lord; Dao of all living things; First in all creation.” Yang Qi was fully immersed in reciting the mnemonic. “Monarch among monarchs. Dao among daos. Sage among sages. God among gods….”

RUMBLE!

The power of the spirit stones created such intense friction with his true energy, that a chain reaction occurred almost immediately. Within his acupoints, the true energy nascent divinities exploded, sending raging, destructive force through him.

As the raging flames erupted from his acupoints, the sea water in the area began to fill with lightning bolts.

The flow of electricity was like that of a dragon, which all of the demonlings in the area scrambled to avoid. One unlucky demonling in the Lifeseizing level was too slow, and was hit by the lightning, which instantly transformed it into cinder.

Chapter 217: Tackling Legendary

Yang Qi was finally trying to break into the Legendary level.

He was using massive amounts of spirit stones to ignite his true energy, and then attempting to turn it into an explosion. If the explosion succeeded, he would be halfway to the Legendary level. Considering he cultivated a godly-class energy art, if he molded his blood into a new form, it would be nothing less than good fortune from heaven and earth.

At the moment, his true energy was burning, but had not yet reached the point of exploding.

Considering all of the aspects of Yang Qi’s cultivation and level, triggering that true energy explosion was no easy task. Massive amounts of spirit energy were required to start the chain reaction. Furthermore, there would be tribulation as well.

Lightning bolts were already piercing into the water in the area, making the entire location a deadly danger zone devoid of any life.

From what Yang Qi could guess, his tribulation would probably be equivalent to dozens of ordinary tribulations. Maybe even upwards of a hundred. Holy Daughter Manyflowers’ tribulation had been impressive, but would pale into insignificance compared to Yang Qi’s. And the Universal Polarity Godbell would seem like a child’s toy compared to the challenges he would face.

As the moments passed, the lightning began to take the shape of war gods, humanoid expressions of electricity.

The lightning also became magical treasures. There was a lamp which burned brightly enough to destroy mountains, a spear that seemed capable of piercing through any obstacle, and a pagoda that looked more imposing than the Grand Emperor's Pagoda.

High above was an enormous heavenly palace made of lightning, like a dwelling place for god-spirits. It thrummed with the power of natural law, and seemed dead set on slaughtering Yang Qi. After all, trying to become a Legendary was an act of challenging the natural laws of heaven and earth, so it was only natural that they would respond with deadly force. Yang Qi was aware of that, and had benefited greatly from observing Holy Daughter Manyflowers’ tribulation. Furthermore, his six months of cultivation in the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, and the work he did there managing the operation of the spell formation, gave him a bit more dao enlightenment.

All sorts of information and thoughts were swirling in his head.

The sea water had long since been expelled from the ancient city around him. Everything was empty except for the bizarre manifestations of lightning.

Blightczar Manyrivers was blown away by what he was seeing, and was gripped by paralyzing fear.  “Aeonic Tribulation Lamp!? Lightning God Tribulation Spear?! Lightning Symmetry Pagoda!? And is that… a Heavenly Lightning Retribution Palace?!

“Why? Why would tribulation like this appear? Who is this guy? This is not ordinary Legendary tribulation by any means. I can’t believe the vital energy of heaven and earth would create something so challenging. Stuff like this only happens in ancient myths and fables. It’s terrifying! Wait, if he succeeds, he’ll be strong enough to wipe out the House of Shadowblight! I have to get out of here! I have to break free from this Grand Emperor's Pagoda. River of Myriad Blights! Break me free!”

Hypertoxic rivers flowed out from Blightczar Manyrivers, and yet, they couldn’t even scratch the Grand Emperor's Pagoda.

It was at this point that some of the lightning entered the pagoda, slamming into Blightczar Manyrivers, provoking a hoarse scream, and leaving him smoking.

“Alright, then,” Yang Qi said. “If so much tribulation wants me, then so be it. I'm like no one else in this world. I cultivate a godly-class energy art, making me unique under heaven! Bring it on! I'm reaching the Legendary level today, so this tribulation can ratchet it up even more if it wants. I want that explosion!”

RUUUUMBLE!

Outside of the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, he had no defenses to rely on. The area he occupied deep on the seafloor was like a focal point for the lightning, all of which was racing directly toward him.

It was like a rainstorm pounding onto him.

“Hellfire Crucible!”

True energy took the shape of a crucible behind him, along with an enormous vortex that forced the lightning to flow toward it like rivers, and then be melted.

BOOM!

The enormous lamp bore down on him, burning so brightly it was nearly blinding. Destroying his defensive true energy, it entered his meridians.

“Feels great!” he laughed. “Come on. You've got to have something stronger than that. I need my true energy to explode!”

He was literally opening himself up to the lightning.

WHOOSH!

The huge spear stabbed into him, then vanished into his meridians, where it began to slash about with devastating force.

Next was the palace and the pagoda, which blasted their way into his acupoints and meridians.

All of a sudden, the lightning formed into a painting that featured endless stretches of interlocking rivers and mountains, the passage of ages, the cycle of the sun and moon. And it swept directly toward Yang Qi.

“My god!” murmured Blightczar Manyrivers. "Is that the fabled Immortal-Slayer’s Painting? According to what I've heard, it should only show up when stepping into the Great Sage level. Why would it be in this tribulation? Wait, did he just say he cultivates a godly-class energy art?!” He was injured and out of energy, but could see everything that was happening, and it left him feeling completely stunned. The images playing out in front of him were like pictures from ancient energy arts histories, and were things that surpassed what humans should experience.

The term “godly-class energy art” was still ringing in his mind like thunder, and left him feeling like he was completely bereft of his senses.

After all, he cultivated a mere imperial-class energy art, and yet it was the most powerful and enigmatic ability in the entire House of Shadowblight.

“With an enemy like this, it seems the House of Shadowblight’s days are numbered. What is a godly-class energy art doing in a place like this? They don’t exist even in the Western Continent, or the fabled Quake-Dawn Continent. Back in the days of the Yore-Wilds, at the height of the God-Devil Apocalypse, it was only Infernal King Euphoria from the Hell of Euphoria who actually used a godly-class art….”

After thinking about that ancient myth, Blightczar Manyrivers was certain that he must be seeing things.

Whoosh!

The enormous Immortal-Slayer’s Painting wrapped around Yang Qi, and he began to collapse. His true energy exploded, eviscerating his five viscera and six bowels, his meridians and sea of energy, his bones and marrow. Everything about him was shredded into dust.

Normally speaking, it would mean that he was utterly and thoroughly dead.

However, his soul still existed, and his quintessence and power could survive the destruction of his body. In some respects, Yang Qi was unparalleled under heaven in this regard.

Throughout history, many Nonary Lifeseizers would fail to keep their soul intact when their true energy exploded.

After all, when the fleshly body died, it would take incredible strength to maintain one's willpower and soul, then draw upon unparalleled energy arts to reform one’s life force into a new body.

Some people who survived the explosion in soul form would then be unable to form a new body.

But Yang Qi could. He had prepared well for this moment, and with the help of the spirit stones he had taken, and his godly-class energy art, he immediately began to form a new body.

“The Lord is the father of the legion of gods, and the master of all living beings. The mighty Lord created the world by bringing radiance and light to the darkness. He created time, karma, reincarnation, judgement, as well as the halls of heaven and the depths of hell…. The Lord created everything, and also said that anything which could be reborn would never be destroyed. The time has come for… rebirth! Physique of the Sovereign Lord!”

Cracking sounds were heard as his meridians, vital energy and sea of energy began to form into something like an embryo.

At the same time, it seemed as though the vital energy of heaven and earth could sense what was happening, that something incredibly powerful was coming into existence. Instantly, the natural laws of heaven and earth surged with power, and five enormous mountains of lightning appeared. They were like mountains belonging to ancient gods, five peaks that represented destruction, chaos, blasphemy, evil, and fanaticism.

“Five Hellish Lightning Mountains? What are those things doing here?!” Blightczar Manyrivers was almost numb to what was happening. The things he were seeing were spoken of only in myths, making him feel like he was living in an epic poem from the distant past.

In fact, he was actually happy that he was in the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, not on the outside, otherwise he would likely be dead already.

The Five Hellish Lightning Mountains descended onto Yang Qi’s newly reforming body, entered it, then exploded. From a distance, Yang Qi almost looked like a leather bag that had been emptied out. His blood, bones, and organs were all gone as he attempted this nirvanic rebirth.

“Perfect timing!”

The additional explosion pushed his Hellfire Crucible to the limit. It consumed the five lightning mountains, converting it into true energy for Yang Qi to use.

“Physique of the Sovereign Lord; Nirvanic Rebirth!” He began to inflate almost like a balloon. Streams of holy light suddenly appeared, which shot into him, revealing that he now had pure white bones that were inscribed with text and poems by the legion of gods, praising their Lord.

Chapter 218: Mastering the Legendary

Yang Qi’s newly reformed bones were etched with magical symbols praising the Lord of the gods, symbols that seemed to have the power to pierce through everything, and absorb universal power.

As his bones formed, he could sense his marrow multiplying within them. It was like drop after drop of the purest of liquids, all of them tiny magical symbols that were akin to the particles of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.

As his bones linked together, they formed a skeleton, not that of a human, but something more graceful than that. It was a more perfect design in which the positions of the five viscera and six bowels were arranged within the bones to become something like a spell formation. It was the Physique of the Sovereign Lord, a source of boundless power, something that could absorb any blow, and could draw upon universal power.

As his bones formed, the lightning outside grew more intense.

His organs continued to grow, including his heart, lungs, stomach, and so on, and all of them surpassed anything human. They were pure and translucent, free of any impurities, almost like they weren’t internal organs, but rather crystalline forms of incredible power.

There were other organs growing inside of him that he was unfamiliar with. His eyes took shape, and his pupils spun in an endless cycle. As for his heart, it burned like fire as it sent power to all parts of his body.

Bright streams of light erupted from him as his five viscera and six bowels were completed, and his acupoints, flesh, and skin began to form. There were too many acupoints to count, and combined with his skin and flesh, were like crystal. He glittered with light that seemed to thrum with life force, and his blood flowed through his veins with such force that it seemed capable of crushing stars.

As every aspect of him formed anew, he slowly stood up, tall and straight. Much of him had changed; now he was beautiful and bewitching in the most holy of senses, to the point where women and men alike would be drawn to him, but at the same time, not dare to meet his gaze.

The paths of his meridians had changed. Most humans had eight extraordinary meridians, twelve regular meridians, and a sea of energy. But not Yang Qi. Not any longer. The eight hundred forty million particles which made him up had created new meridians that conformed to the workings of heaven. They were at one with the void, which would allow Yang Qi to, with a single inhalation, absorb the energies of enormous, unknown worlds. It was universal power, something that surpassed Great Void True Energy, Clear Heaven True Energy, Nine-Yang Immortal Energy and the like. It was the pure power of the universe itself, channeled into Yang Qi via a connection to some unknown world.

Within the universe, there were more worlds and spaces than the eternal sands of the seas. There were high-level worlds and low-level worlds. As for the high-level worlds, they had pure sorts of power, and were inhabited by powerful entities. The low-level worlds, however, were powered by the spirit energy of heaven and earth, the inferior quality of which caused the entities from those places to be extremely weak.

Of course, the Rich-Lush Continent was one of those low-level worlds that had weak vital energy.

As the universal power poured into Yang Qi, the burning spirit stones around him continued to fuel his perfect remolding. His aura grew stronger, and the lightning began to fade away, clearly incapable of harming him in any way. In fact, the lightning had actually helped his efforts.

At a certain point, he shivered, and the Lord's Eye opened up on his forehead, which shone with light radiant enough to create and destroy billions of planes of existence. Time seemed to accelerate. Soon, countless gods and spirits appeared, and images could be seen of the godmammoths’ war with the forces of hell, with the omniscient, omnipotent Lord watching over it all.

When the Lord's Eye was complete, it sent a shock wave out that vaporized all of the lightning. Then, true energy swirled out to form a holy garment on Yang Qi’s shoulders. No longer would he don the Infernal Deity Plate Armor, but instead, the armor-like robe of the legion of gods. It was voluminous and flowing, and yet, true energy swirled through it, powering spell formations that made it far stronger and mightier than his old armor.

As for his Fiend-Devil Wings, they had now fully transformed into Angel Wings.

The wings fluttered, and a massive tempest spread out on the seafloor, destroying the ancient city that had existed around Yang Qi moments ago.

“The supreme and ultimate Lord has called on the blessings of the legion of gods to gift you with enormous power. I am to lead all living beings along the path of radiance and light….” A choir sang around him as his power and aura surged to the ultimate level. He was a Legendary now!

The Physique of the Sovereign Lord was complete, and he had transformed on a substructural level, with even his blood taking a new form.

This was the first of the Legendary transformations, the Blood-Form Transformation.

Technically, because he had never officially risen to the level of conclave student in the Demi-Immortal Institute, he was currently still an elite student. But if he went back, he could become a holy neophyte.

For a student to become a holy neophyte was a huge matter. In the distant past, people who reached the Legendary level were known as energy warriors, and many people considered that level the true identifying mark of a cultivator.

Now, Yang Qi was an energy warrior who could aspire to one day join the legion of gods.

“The Legendary level… So this is the power of a Legendary! And I haven’t even opened any more particles to advance the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth! Fine. How about I start with five hundred of them!” Five hundred rumbling booms rang out inside of him, as the true energy of five hundred ancient megamammoths coursed through him. He had already possessed the power of five hundred before his breakthrough, which meant that he was now blessed with the power of a thousand. When he struck out with his fist, he could easily crush mountains or divert the course of rivers.

As he retracted the true energy of the megamammoths, Blightczar Manyrivers cried out from within the Grand Emperor's Pagoda.

“Spare me! Spare my life! I can see how powerful you are. Just let me live! I can help you kill Blightczar Manyshadows! He’s my Elder Brother, and one of the top leaders of the Blight Legion Church. He’s in the fourth transformation, a Five-Phases Legendary. Killing him won’t be easy, but with me there to help, you could do it.”

“Oh?” Yang Qi waved his hand, causing the Grand Emperor’s Pagoda to fly over into his palm. Looking down at the man, he smiled. Now that he had made major progress with the Physique of the Sovereign Lord, and was a Blood-Form Legendary, he could control many spell formations in the pagoda that had been restricted to him before. Not only was it more powerful, it had more functions, and could remain hidden from sight more easily.

Given his current level of power, it seemed to him that if he used the Grand Emperor's Pagoda to launch a sneak attack on Blightczar Manyshadows, the man probably wouldn't be able to defend against it.

The Legendary level was completely different from the Lifeseizing level. He now conformed to the dao of heaven, and could use magical laws. Any magical treasure that he laid hands on could be transformed on a fundamental level. He could change something rotten into something magical. And of course, the Grand Emperor's Pagoda was no exception.

Yang Qi’s true energy was now so vigorous that he was no different than ten ordinary Blood-Form Legendaries all put together. Furthermore, his energy contained holy godpower from the legion of gods. When he unleashed it, it would be pure and radiant, without any impurities at all. Even a scrap of that true energy could easily defeat multiple attackers.

“You know my secrets now, Blightczar Manyrivers. You know that I cultivate a godly-class energy art, and have the Grand Emperor's Pagoda. Soon, I’ll reach the second transformation, and then the third. Killing you would be as easy as turning over my hand.”

“Yes, yes, yes. Of course.” Blightczar Manyrivers’ voice was literally quavering. “I’ll stick with you forever. I'm in the third transformation, a Space-Void Legendary. I’ll do whatever you tell me. After all, you still can’t pierce through space without using the power of the pagoda. Look, how about this? Hide the Grand Emperor's Pagoda inside of me. I’ll get close to Blightczar Manyshadows, and then you can jump out and kill him. If you don’t do it that way, it will be difficult to get close to him.”

Yang Qi thought about it for a moment, then nodded. It seemed like a good idea. It would be difficult to get into the presence of Blightczar Manyshadows, and therefore, using Blightczar Manyrivers would definitely save time. Furthermore, catching the enemy unawares meant that his chances of success would improve. After killing Blightczar Manyshadows, he would wipe out the rest of the House of Shadowblight, and thus ensure the ongoing safety of the Yang Clan.

“Alright, I’ll let you off the hook for now. Let’s see how good a job you do. If you perform poorly, I’ll just kill you. But if you do well, maybe I’ll have more jobs for you in the future.”

The reason he had killed Blightczar Skyfiend earlier was that he had no way to keep him in check. But now that he was a Legendary, things were different. With the Grand Emperor's Pagoda in combination with Mind Incarnation, he could do all sorts of things to keep Blightczar Manyrivers in line.

With the help of a blightczar, he would be even more powerful than before. Besides, the House of Shadowblight was backed by the Blight Legion Church. Although the latter had no official presence in the Rich-Lush Continent, they would have plenty of ways to cause trouble. With Blightczar Manyrivers there to give him information, he would be in a much better position.

Despite the fact that Yang Qi was technically two levels below him, Blightczar Manyrivers didn’t hesitate for a moment to immediately start acting the toady. “I’ll help you however you need. Besides, with a godly-class energy art, your future prospects are limitless. I’ll follow you forever, sir!”

Chapter 219: Brazen Assassination

“Fine then. I’ll put the Grand Emperor's Pagoda inside of you. If you even so much as twitch in the wrong way, I’ll detonate it and kill you.” After entering the pagoda, he caused it to shrink down until it was as small as a tiny particle, which then floated into Blightczar Manyrivers’ forehead.

The man shivered, well aware that he was now completely under Yang Qi’s control.

With the Grand Emperor's Pagoda in his head, if it exploded, his soul would be wiped out, and he would truly lose his life. Even without the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, he knew that he wasn’t a match for Yang Qi. He was a Space-Void Legendary, but he couldn’t actually perform greater teleportations, and therefore, a fight with Yang Qi that dragged on for long enough would eventually end with him losing.

Sighing, he flew up out of the water and then headed toward the House of Shadowblight’s moving island.

Somewhere on that tiny continent, there was an ancient temple, decorated with spectacular gold and jade, with floors made of sparkling crystal that seemed untainted by even a speck of dust. There were beautiful women present, clad in nearly see-through garments; obviously, the master of this place wallowed in all sorts of vices and luxuries.

The holy neophyte Huang Hou from the Crown Prince Society was present, as were Lei Tao and Xie Feng, and the group of them were carrying on a discussion with a young man. The young man sat on a throne, flanked by two beautiful, flirtatious women who were currently massaging his neck and shoulders. The mere sight of it would be enough to induce matchless jealously on the part of most men.

There was something vile about this young man. His eyes shone with malice and ferocity, and he also seemed to thrum with the power of the five phases. In fact, he was surrounded by successive layers of spell formations which would make it impossible for anyone to ambush him. Obviously, he was a Five-Phases Legendary.

From Huang Hou’s perspective, the man almost seemed to be shifting back and forth constantly between different layers of space. It was impossible to lock down on his position even with divine will, which meant that attacking him was virtually impossible.

This was obviously the most powerful person in the House of Shadowblight, the houselord.

“Blightczar Manyshadows,” Huang Hou said, “this deal between our two organizations is going to involve us paying you a huge sum. We’re going to give you all of the demon cores we’ve stockpiled in exchange for spirit stones. In fact, the Crown Prince even went so far as to travel to the kingdom of the fiend-devils and kill a count. You know how valuable the demon core of an Astral-Star fiend-devil is. In addition to that, we have about three hundred other demon cores from various Legendary levels. And when it comes to Lifeseizing demon cores, there are virtually too many to count.”

“I see,” Blightczar Manyshadows said, licking his lips, his fiendish aura pulsing. He almost couldn’t hold back from simply attacking these three students when they mentioned a demon core from an Astral-Star Legendary. However, he was simply too fearful of the Crown Prince, who was essentially the most powerful person in the world other than the Great Sages. “Don't tell me the Crown Prince doesn’t have anything better than that. What about a demon core from a Never-Dying Legendary?”

“He has that too,” Huang Hou replied. “But we need to see if you can provide something of equal value. The Crown Prince is currently in the kingdom of the fiend-devils, hunting down a group of them that are in that very level.”

Shocked, Blightczar Manyshadows said, “The Crown Prince is a Never-Dying Legendary. Are you telling me he can kill multiple opponents that are all in the same level as himself?”

“What, does that surprise you?” Lei Tao said. “The Crown Prince wouldn’t run from a fight even if he encountered a Great Sage. Think about it. He fought Young Master Shroud-Heaven, the demon kings of the seventy-two grottos, numerous fiend-devil viscounts, and even a Demon Sage spell formation. It took all of that just to hurt him.” From his tone of voice, it was obvious how proud he was. After all, everyone in the Crown Prince Society truly believed the Crown Prince to be invincible.

“Of course. Well, the first shipment of spirit stones will be arriving shortly.”

“There was one other thing we needed to discuss,” Huang Hou said, “that being the incident in Mongoltar. Even many of your House of Shadowblight experts were killed there, and we know who did it.”

“Oh? Who was it?” Blightczar Manyshadows said, his eyes flickering with killing intent.

“Yang Qi.”

“Yang Qi? Isn’t he the one who took first place in your Inter-Institutional Martial Arts Competition, but was then crushed by the Crown Prince? What a loss of face that was!” Suddenly, Blightczar Manyshadows seemed to hesitate. “Is he really that strong? All of our Legendaries there were killed. By him?”

“He has the Grand Emperor's Pagoda!” Huang Hou said coldly. “Houselord, I'm sure that you’ve heard of the powers of that treasure, correct?”

Blightczar Manyshadows’ eyes now began to glitter with greed.  “He has the Grand Emperor’s Pagoda? The same magical treasure forged in the distant past by Grand Emperor Rich-Lush, which can harness the essence of the continent itself? Doesn’t that make him invincible?”

“That’s why we would like to suggest we join forces to kill Yang Qi and wipe out his clan. We’ll need to strike like lightning. Unfortunately, Yang Qi is a member of the Demi-Immortal Institute, the same as we are. If we personally kill him, we’ll be denounced. And that's why we need your help.”

“Killing Yang Qi will be a trivial matter,” Blightczar Manyshadows said. “And if you’re saying he has the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, I’ll do it myself. What’s in it for us? Don’t tell me you’ll just let us keep it?”

“Unfortunately not. To be perfectly honest, Houselord, the Crown Prince acquired the legacy of Grand Emperor Rich-Lush, and thus, absolutely requires the Grand Emperor's Pagoda. However, he is willing to compensate you handsomely for it, namely, with three Never-Dying demon cores. In addition, when he becomes a Great Sage, he will personally impart a powerful ability to you that will ensure that your standing in the Blight Legion Church will rise significantly.”

Blightczar Manyshadows shot to his feet. “Are you serious? The Crown Prince will help me that much?”

“The Crown Prince never, ever goes back on his word. He’s a god from heaven descended into the mortal world, the future Son of Heaven! Have you ever heard any stories of him not living up to his promises? No. As long as you get the Grand Emperor's Pagoda for him, he’ll help you reach the seventh transformation, and become a Ghost-God Legendary!”

“Alright! It’s a deal. You're right, the Crown Prince always follows through on his promises. I'm confident he’ll do the same with me. How about this: let's first conclude the deal at hand. Then I’ll head over to Yanhaven, kill that brat, and take the Grand Emperor's Pagoda. In fact, you can join me if you’d like.”

“Of course I’ll join you,” Huang Hou said. “I’ll even help you handle him. As long as you make sure to spread word that it was all the doing of the House of Shadowblight, we’ll be fine. We just want to have evidence to ‘prove’ that you were responsible. As you probably know, Yang Qi has a lot of sworn siblings from big sects and organizations. If all of them came for the Crown Prince Society at the wrong time, it would be troublesome.”

“I understand. The Grand Emperor's Pagoda will be yours!” Chuckling viciously, Blightczar Manyshadows then said, “You know, isn't there someone else from the Yang Clan who's important? Right. Yang Susu, with her Seven Apertures Sprite Body. If I could use her as a cultivation vessel, it would really help out my techniques and constitution.”

“Well that goes without saying,” Lei Tao said. “If you’re interested in her, we can arrange for the proper opportunity. Next time she goes out of the institute for training, we’ll snatch her right up. Besides, once the Yang Clan is exterminated, she’ll have a permanent grudge with the Crown Prince Society, so we might as well handle everything up front.” He was making absolutely no attempt to hide how vicious and merciless he was.

“Let’s drink to this wonderful partnership of ours,” Blightczar Manyshadows said. “Men, bring some alcohol!”

Just when Blightczar Manyshadows was about to begin the festivities, a servant rushed in. “Sir, the exalted Blightczar Manyrivers just arrived. He's waiting at the main gate.”

“Oh? Junior Brother Manyrivers arrived ahead of schedule! Hurry up, bring him in! With him to help, we’ll be able to exterminate the Yang Clan even more quickly. He’s a Space-Void Legendary with particularly unique understanding of the dao of space. That should also make it easier to get to Yang Qi and deal with the Grand Emperor's Pagoda. Furthermore, Junior Brother was the one escorting the first spirit stone shipment here. That means our first deal can be sealed immediately.”

Even as he spoke, Blightczar Manyrivers entered the room, a leather sack held in his hand.

“Elder Brother!” he said, chuckling loudly. “We meet again! I have the spirit stones, but what’s this I heard about wiping out the Yang Clan? Mind telling me the full story?”

Without an ounce of suspicion, Blightczar Manyshadows said, “Hand over the spirit stones so we can finish the deal with these experts from the Crown Prince Society. Afterward, we have to wipe out a whole clan, kill a top genius, and take a beautiful woman. And we’re even going to get our hands on the Grand Emperor's Pagoda.”

“The Grand Emperor’s Pagoda!?” Blightczar Manyrivers said, visibly shocked. “Since when was that treasure at play?” At this point, he handed the leather bag over to Blightczar Manyshadows.

Blightczar Manyshadows would never have been so at ease with any other person, and would never have let anyone get so close to him.

But this was a familiar face, and therefore, he wasn’t on guard at all.

Chuckling, Blightczar Manyshadows grabbed the bag and prepared to go into more detail about the situation with Yang Qi and his clan. “The Grand Emperor's Pagoda is actually—”

However, it was in that very moment that a powerful aura suddenly erupted from Blightczar Manyrivers. Without any warning whatsoever, an enormous pagoda popped out of nowhere, and smashed down onto Blightczar Manyshadows’ head.

Crack! Snap!

The space around him shattered, and the power of the five phases exploded out, destroying everything in the hall.

And before anything else could happen, Blightczar Manyrivers unleashed a vicious attack onto Blightczar Manyshadows’ chest.

“Are you crazy, Manyrivers!?” Blightczar Manyshadows blurted, blood spilling out of his mouth as he tried to defend himself. But then, a long spear suddenly appeared behind him, held by Yang Qi.

Yang Qi opened his Lord's Eye, and blazing light swept out to cover Blightczar Manyshadows. “The Grand Emperor's Pagoda is right here, Manyshadows.”

Dazzling light filled the area, and the air filled with words of praise for the Lord. His glory, His light, His majesty, completely inundated the area.

Yang Qi was a Legendary, and with the Physique of the Sovereign Lord and the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, his Lord's Eye could strike at the very soul of the enemy.

In the blink of an eye, Blightczar Manyshadows turned into a human torch, and was just about to be sucked into the Grand Emperor's Pagoda.

Chapter 220: Terrifying Attack

“Well, if it isn’t you, brat! So, you used Blightczar Manyrivers to get close enough to assassinate me. Dammit, why didn’t I think to prepare for something like this!? Your plan to get close to me worked, I’ll give you that. But don't think for a second that you’ll actually kill me.” There was no denying that Yang Qi had destroyed Blightczar Manyshadows’ five phases defense, and stabbed him deeply with a spear, causing severe damage to his meridians.

“Ultimate Five Phases Transformation; Perfect Enlightenment of Heaven and Earth; the Sun and Moon, True Monarchs; Destroy all Confinements!”

All of a sudden, the mighty power of the five phases once again erupted around Blightczar Manyshadows, creating such a powerful energy flow that not even a Spirit-Soul Legendary would be able to break through it without dying in the process.

Unfortunately for him, Yang Qi had the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, which could defend him against spatial tempests. And Blightczar Manyrivers was a Space-Void Legendary who could himself similarly withstand deadly tempests. With the two of them working together, there was no way this move of Blightczar Manyshadows would possibly hurt them.

“Don’t blame me for this, Elder Brother. Yang Qi has me completely and utterly under his control. I'm unable to act of my own volition.” Blightczar Manyrivers was visibly frustrated, but had no choice other than to attack with full force. Each move he used was deadly in nature, and contained the corrosive power of rot, making it seem like a god of poisons had descended into the world of men.

The attacks came with such fury that Blightczar Manyshadows could barely breathe.

“Detonate!” Yang Qi said, twisting his spear and causing it to explode. His entire plan had been to blast away Blightczar Manyshadows’s defenses with his Lord's Eye, then stab him with the Infernal Deity Spear.

Normally speaking, just stabbing someone with a spear would be enough to kill them, even a Legendary. That was exactly what had occurred with Patriarch Mongolbeast.

And now, he was trying to do that to Blightczar Manyshadows.

Unfortunately, a massive expression of true energy suddenly erupted from within Blightczar Manyshadows and wrapped around the Infernal Deity Spear like a tight cord. As of this moment, Yang Qi couldn’t even pull his spear free, let alone detonate it an attack.

‘What an incredibly strong fleshly body! So, the Five-Phases Transformation pushes the vital energy of the five phases to the ultimate limit. This is far stronger than the Space-Void Transformation. Dealing with Blightczar Manyrivers was easy, but not this Blightczar Manyshadows.’ Although he was shocked, he quickly adapted, and dispersed his true energy, causing the Infernal Deity Spear to vanish.

“Sovereign Lord of Heaven and Earth; the Glory of the Lord; Judgement and Majesty!”

Swish!

Yang Qi flew up into the air and disappeared into the Grand Emperor's Pagoda. Up to this point, the pagoda had been suppressed by Blightczar Manyshadows’ five phases power. But now that Yang Qi was inside, he took control of the various spell formations, causing bright light to shine as the image of a grand emperor appeared.

Beneath his feet was a black turtle, and on either side was an azure dragon and a white tiger. Hovering above him in the air was a vermillion bird, and a flying snake was wrapped around his torso. As soon as he appeared, a mighty aura swept out that transformed the entire surrounding audience hall into ashes.

“Prepare to die!” the grand emperor said, and his voice was none other than Yang Qi's. “You want to exterminate my Yang Clan? How about instead I exterminate your House of Shadowblight? You won’t escape from this tribulation, Blightczar Manyshadows.” Then he roared, a sound so mighty that it could crush millions upon millions of mountains, cause seas to dry up, and rocks to melt.

“Blightgod Overturns Heaven!” Blightczar Manyshadows shouted back. Thanks to Yang Qi’s sneak attack, his vital energy had been harmed, along with his meridians and sea of energy. Even his soul was badly hurt, leaving him like a cornered animal ready to fight to the death. And in his desperate struggle to stay alive, he unleashed even more power than he thought was possible.

Flying to meet the incoming attack, he projected a message to Yang Qi with divine will. “You’re gonna die, you hear me?! I can’t believe you ambushed me! When I escape, I’ll heal up and then gather all the experts from the Blight Legion Church to wipe the Yang Clan off the map. You’ve got some guts, I have to admit that, but you're too reckless!”

A blightgod appeared behind him, pitch black and surrounded with roiling black energy. Bubbles of poison could be seen on his skin, which constantly popped and then reformed. All in all, he was a terrifying, vicious entity. If he exploded, it would send out a storm of poison that would exterminate all life within five hundred kilometers, even down to the grass and roots. In fact, the dirt itself would end up a toxic sludge.

However, Yang Qi in grand emperor form simply opened his third eye, causing the glory of the Lord to spill out. It contained boundless majesty, holy hymns, and inscriptions from the legion of gods. It was like an epic poetic saga as grand as the sea of stars itself.

In the blink of an eye, the toxic energy was vanquished and removed from existence.

At the same time, a voice spoke from within the light, using that most holy and boundless Godtongue.

“The Lord's Eye is the eye of heaven, and is filled with glory, blessing, eternity, and history…. No evil can escape it. Sinners, your evil will vanish in the face of the Lord’s light. Your soul will follow the brilliance of the Lord into the eternal kingdom of heaven, to drink of immortality….”

Anyone who heard that voice would feel their soul trembling and stifled. It was an instinctual thing, like the reverence mortals felt for heaven, or that spirits felt for the legion of gods.

WHIZZZ!

Blightczar Manyshadows’ blightgod shattered into nothing.

Still wearing the form of a grand emperor, Yang Qi strode forward and smashed his fist into Blightczar Manyshadows, causing him to cough up a massive mouthful of blood, and shoving him backward through the wreckage of the hall.

“DIE!” Blightczar Manyshadows drew on both true energy and life force quintessence itself, summoning an enormous, ancient dagger-axe.

“Ancient Blightlegion Dagger-Axe! Transform the world of humans into a sea of toxins! Destroy all living things! Destruction! I want destruction! Bring this world to ruin with me! Blightlegion Godslaying! Exterminate everything under heaven!”

Toxic energy filled the area as the ancient dagger-axe slashed through the air toward Yang Qi’s forehead.

Obviously, Blightczar Manyshadows realized that Yang Qi’s third eye, and the light it cast, was a terrifying threat that he had to eliminate. That was his last and only hope.

“Those who profane the light of the Lord shall perish!”

RUMBLE!

Just when it seemed like Yang Qi would be split in half by the Ancient Blightlegion Dagger-Axe, burning sagefire shot out from the Lord's Eye, becoming something almost like golden shackles made from magical law.

Clank!

The dagger-axe lurched to a stop three meters from Yang Qi’s forehead, and could move no farther. It was completely locked in place by pure golden chains.

“Be broken!” Yang Qi said, and the dagger-axe shattered into fragments. Sensing how weak Blightczar Manyshadows was, he continued, “The Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth scares hells into submission, and can exercise control over billions of planes of existence. Prepare to see my ultimate move, Blightczar Manyshadows. Then you will understand the true meaning of despair.”

Immensely powerful true energy erupted out as the image of the grand emperor shattered, to be replaced by a god-spirit that surpassed any grand emperor by billions of times. It was an entity who could trample the eternal sands of hell and support all the gods in the halls of heaven. It was a godmammoth!

It had an elephantine head, a human body, and a powerful trunk. Its fists were like suns or moons, and its feet could trample all existence.

Without even the slightest pause, the godmammoth struck out, landing a fist onto Blightczar Manyshadows.

Cracks spread out over the man’s body, and he let out a shocked scream. Blood began to spray out, and his eyes went slack as his true energy began to dissipate.

“You’re mine now!” It was a blow intended to be fatal, and as a result, Blightczar Manyshadows’ life force was already spilling out of him in dramatic fashion, and there was nothing he could do to stop it.

It was all thanks to the sneak attack. If Blightczar Manyshadows had been prepared, there was no way he would be in such a desperate situation right now.

The trunk of a godmammoth could inhale the power of the stars, so there was no way Blightczar Manyshadows could do anything about it. The trunk snaked out, grabbed him, and tossed him into the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, where he disappeared. From the perspective of any outsider, it would be impossible to determine whether he was alive or dead.

**

Moments before….

“Not good. It’s Yang Qi!”

As soon as the fight broke out, Huang Hou and his companions had flown out of the hall and used true energy shields to protect themselves. As such, they had no idea what was happening inside. Soon, the hall itself collapsed into rubble.

Then, they saw Yang Qi transform into what looked like a god-spirit, whose powerful trunk grabbed Blightczar Manyshadows and threw him into the Grand Emperor's Pagoda.

The final scream that echoed out across the battlefield proved that Yang Qi had won the fight.

‘Yang Qi ambushed Blightczar Manyshadows and won! Blightczar Manyshadows is dead!’ That was what all of the students from the Demi-Immortal Institute were thinking. After all, they weren’t fools, and they could easily piece together what had just played out.

The holy neophyte Huang Hou was quick to assess the situation and come to a decision. “Let’s get out of here! Yang Qi’s a Legendary, and he has the Grand Emperor's Pagoda! None of us are a match for him. Even worse, he has control of a Space-Void Legendary, Blightczar Manyrivers. There’s no way we can fight them.”

Unfortunately, a massive force settled down over the area, locking it down. Before they could do anything, Yang Qi appeared in front of them, and sent out his true energy to block their path.

“Where do you think you’re going? You think you can run off, just like that? You were just working out a deal with Blightczar Manyshadows to exterminate my Yang Clan. You were even going to go so far as to offer my Aunt Susu to these heretical wretch-devils.”

Huang Hou, Lei Tao, Qu Ling, Xie Feng, and the other students from the Crown Prince Society were all extremely famous. But in front of Yang Qi they seemed like little more than shivering chickens.

Chapter 221: You&#039;re Not Going Anywhere

“Yang Qi. It's really you…?”

Now that he was standing right in front of them, the entire group could see exactly who it was they were dealing with. Ignoring them, Yang Qi called out, “Blightczar Manyrivers. Go wipe out all of the rest of the evildoers from the House of Shadowblight.”

“Yes, Milord.”

It didn’t matter that Blightczar Manyrivers was one of the top leaders of the House of Shadowblight. He didn’t hesitate or show any mercy. Soon, screams rose up into the air from all areas.

There were other Legendaries in the House of Shadowblight, but apparently, none of them were present today. Therefore, it took Blightczar Manyrivers little effort to take the lives of the disciples present.

Of course, even if there had been Legendaries present, unless they were in the third transformation, they would have been little challenge to deal with.

Only at this point did Yang Qi turn his attention to the members of the Crown Prince Society.

“Is there anything you people have to say for yourselves?” Yang Qi said. “Now's your chance. If you wait any longer you’ll have to speak your final words in hell.”

“What? You’re going to kill us?” Lei Tao said angrily. “You’ve really got some gall, Yang Qi. We're students at the Demi-Immortal Institute too. Killing fellow students is a capital offense. Not even the chancellor could change that.”

“Oh really? Weren’t you just planning to kill me and my entire clan? Wouldn’t it be pretty stupid and dangerous of me to leave you alive? Tell me where the Crown Prince is hiding. I’ll pass the information to the Shroud-Heaven Alliance so that they can track him down and kill him.”

“You want to know where the Crown Prince is?” Lei Tao replied. “Keep dreaming! I'm completely loyal. I won't give you any information even if you kill me.”

“Enough, Lei Tao,” Huang Hou said. “Yang Qi, you need to look out for your own best interests here. He's right. Killing us would be a big mistake. You would become public enemy number one in the Rich-Lush Continent, and would heap humiliation onto the Demi-Immortal Institute. You must understand all of that, right?”

“What do you mean? You were all killed by the House of Shadowblight. Their houselord lured you here into a trap, and the whole lot of you ended up killing each other in the resulting fight. The House of Shadowblight has long since been working with the Hanging Mountain. They’re a patsy of Young Master Shroud-Heaven, so it’s little wonder they hoped to get information out of you regarding the Crown Prince’s hiding place. Everybody is talking about the situation, you know. If the Crown Prince perishes, then I’ll be the next leader of the holy neophytes. In other words, the Demi-Immortal Institute will be under my control. What do you think? Good plan?”

“Hellion!” Qu Ling said, her eyes flashing with rage. “You're a freakish hellion, that’s all! You’re not even human, you treacherous scum. Heaven will punish you for this!”

“Shut your mouth!” Yang Qi growled. “You wanted to kill my family, and you were colluding with heretical wretch-devils. Do you have any explanation at all for that?”

Huang Hou snorted coldly. “This is all meaningless. You really think you're a match for us, Yang Qi? Don’t kid yourself. Look, I'm a Space-Void Legendary, and I'm far stronger than that piece of trash Blightczar Manyrivers. I guess you don’t realize how powerful holy neophytes from the Demi-Immortal Institute are. I’ll tell you this: if I wanted to, I could just leave this place right here and now.”

“Leave right here and now?” Yang Qi chuckled coldly. “If you could, you would have already. Look, I'm done with this bullcrap. Tell me where the Crown Prince is. If you do, I’ll let you live and you can all go back to the Demi-Immortal Institute and live happily ever after. But if you refuse, I'm not going to go easy on you. I’ll bury you all on this island.”

The only reason Yang Qi hadn’t attacked with full force already was that he was hoping to get information about the Crown Prince.

If he could figure out where the Crown Prince was hiding, he really could inform the Shroud-Heaven Alliance, or even the Hanging Mountain. They would definitely pay a handsome sum for information like that.

If he could profit by getting someone to slay his enemy for him, it would really be killing two birds with one stone.

Yang Qi already hated everyone from the Crown Prince Society. And considering they had been hatching a vicious plan to wipe out his clan, that meant that they had crossed the bottom line.

At this point, Lei Tao couldn’t hold it in any longer and shouted, “Have a death wish?!”

Without any hesitation, he unleashed his Grand Thunderclap Swordplay. Even as his sword slashed toward Yang Qi, he said, “Elder Brother Huang Hou, get out of here! I’ll buy you some time. That way, even if he kills the rest of us, you can avenge our deaths. From now on, this guy is an enemy of our entire institute! This disgraceful traitor will be hunted down until he’s dead! He won't be able to hide anywhere in the world!”

Lightning flashed and thunder boomed as Lei Tao attacked in deadly fashion, sending a massive river of sword energy surging toward Yang Qi’s throat, filled with seemingly infinite variations.

“Go!” Lei Tao repeated. “Get out of here!”

However, before his sword energy could reach its target, Yang Qi’s true energy surged out, forming a long spear that moved with such incredible speed it was almost invisible. Lei Tao couldn’t even react; the spear slashed his head off his shoulders, sending it flying up into the air, where it burst into flames. “It was you who stole that life force springwa—”

Before he could finish speaking, his head exploded.

And then, his true energy was all absorbed by the Infernal Deity Spear.

Lei Tao, conclave student of the Demi-Immortal Institute, had perished. He had been cut down with absolute impunity by Yang Qi. Not even in Lei Tao’s most bizarre dreams could he have guessed that Yang Qi would actually kill him. In fact, that was why he had attacked him to begin with.

“That’s what trash like you gets for opposing me.” Yang Qi had killed Chu Tiange, Huang Hong, Gu Fenxian and Song Haishan, all of whom were students of the Demi-Immortal Institute. And he hadn’t felt the least bit sorry about any of their deaths. Now he was a Legendary, so considering that these people had all been conspiring to exterminate him and his clan, then he would make sure they all perished.

Even as Lei Tao’s blood continued to splatter onto the ground, Yang Qi said, “The rest of you really think you're going to buy time for your Elder Brother Huang Hou to escape?” Pointing his spear at Huang Hou, he said, “Talk. Where is the Crown Prince? I know you're loyal to him. But the only person in control of your life right now is you. If you don’t tell me what I want to know, you’ll never see the sun rise again in your life.”

Voice hoarse and trembling, Huang Hou said, “Y-you… you actually killed Lei Tao? What gall. I can’t believe you dared to kill a conclave student from the Demi-Imm—”

“I'm looking forward to killing a holy neophyte too, one who doesn’t understand what’s good for him. But hopefully, you won’t be that person.” The Nightfall Symphony began to thrum from Yang Qi’s spear, causing the air in the area to distort.

“Do you really think you’re going to get us to reveal the Crown Prince’s secrets?” Huang Hou’s eyes blazed with bright light. “I'd do anything for the Crown Prince. I won’t help you even if it means I have to die. Everyone, attack him!”

“Attack!” the other students shouted.

“Fine. If you people want to die, I’ll accommodate you. Worse than dogs or chickens! Everyone from the Crown Prince Society deserves to die!” Yang Qi suddenly vanished.

Bang. Bang. Bang. Bang! Bang!! BANG!!!

The students flanking Huang Hou exploded one after another, decimated by the Infernal Deity Spear, and their life force sucked away. Not even Xie Feng was an exception. He was the leader of the conclave students, and yet a massive red hole opened up in his forehead, and he was transformed into nothing but dust.

In the last moment before he died, he screamed, “You killed all of us!? The Demi-Immortal Institute will never let this stand….”

Huang Hou shouted in rage, but before he could do anything, the Grand Emperor's Pagoda appeared above him, its true energy enveloping him and making it impossible to do anything other than watch his comrades being cut down.

Before even three breaths of time passed, the conclave students of the Crown Prince Society were all dead. Some were Nonary Lifeseizers, some were Septenary. Normally, if even one such person died, it would cause a huge uproar. And yet, here a whole group of them fell at Yang Qi’s hands.

It could only be imagined how such news would rock the Rich-Lush Continent if it got out.

Yang Qi hadn’t given the matter a second thought. When necessary, he had no taboos, and would kill enemies like cutting down wheat. He didn’t care about the rules or the consequences, not any more than the Crown Prince himself.

He was now a Legendary with the Grand Emperor's Pagoda and the God Legion Seal. Although he couldn’t control the golden imp, it had saved his life on numerous occasions.

Therefore, if someone wanted to kill him and his clan, he would kill them without mercy.

“You just cut people down like a fiend-devil, Yang Qi! There’s no way you’ll be able to explain yourself out of the situation!” Unfortunately for Huang Hou, the terrifying power of the Grand Emperor's Pagoda was so incredible that he could do nothing to free himself. He was surrounded by spatial tempests, locking him securely in place. After all, the pagoda had been forged by Grand Emperor Rich-Lush, and not even someone in the third Legendary transformation could rival it.

“Considering how many I've already killed, do you think I’ll hesitate to do it again? You know, the chancellor of the Demi-Immortal Institute is loyal to the Crown Prince. Sadly, he didn't account for my God Legion Seal.” Yang Qi didn’t really care whether Huang Hou understood what he was talking about or not. “I stole the Grand Emperor's Pagoda to show him that I will always be better than the Crown Prince.”

Entering the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, he stood in front of Huang Hou. “Well, you were right. You really are a lot stronger than Blightczar Manyrivers. Unfortunately, that's still not enough for you to deal with me. I defeated Manyrivers before I was even a Legendary, so dealing with you now will be easier than ever. So, tell me where the Crown Prince is. Or you can just go to hell. Literally.”

With that, he pointed the Infernal Deity Spear at Huang Hou’s forehead.

Chapter 222: The Crown Prince&#039;s Whereabouts

“Hold on!” Huang Hou shouted, eyeing the Infernal Deity Spear. The truth was that he was actually very afraid of dying. It had been no easy task to reach the third Legendary transformation and become a holy neophyte. To die at this point would be a huge waste. And considering how ruthlessly Yang Qi had just killed a whole group of conclave students, Huang Hou knew that he wouldn’t hesitate to finish the job.

Now that he was staring death in the face, he finally gave in.

The Infernal Deity Spear hovered an inch in front of his forehead for a long moment, allowing the Nightfall Symphony to caress his ears, which in turn caused him to break out in a cold sweat.

“I’ll talk! I’ll tell you where the Crown Prince is. I'm a top leader in the Crown Prince Society, and I'm in charge of the mission to create the Superheaven Altar. So of course I know where he is. Just don’t kill me. I don’t want to die here! Let me go. I’ll tell you whatever you want to know. I won’t hold anything back.”

Yang Qi laughed. “Why weren’t you like this earlier? Acting macho didn’t really help you, did it? And it’s not like I'm your father or your grandfather. It would be a real waste for you to just throw your life away.” He retracted the Infernal Deity Spear, and wiped the smile from his face. Already, he knew that he had made more progress with his master plan, and was pushing the Crown Prince closer and closer to death. In fact, the Crown Prince might not even know what hit him when it happened.

As a Space-Void Legendary and a holy neophyte, Huang Hou was on a similar level as Patriarchs Wind and Cloud. He was one of the top leaders of the Crown Prince Society, perhaps even more important than Yun Hailan. It was only reasonable that he would know where the Crown Prince currently was.

That was one reason why Yang Qi had been so quick to kill Lei Tao and even Xie Feng. It was highly unlikely that any of them knew anything about the Crown Prince’s whereabouts.

“Alright, spit it out. Where is he? Remember, I've killed everyone else; there’s no one left who could reveal that you betrayed the Crown Prince.” There was something enticing about Yang Qi’s tone of voice, almost like a devil-ghost luring a human into the depths of darkness. “Besides, if the Crown Prince dies, you would have a chance to rise even higher within the Demi-Immortal Institute. Maybe you could become the next chancellor. Why waste your time with the Crown Prince and Yun Hailan? The stronger I get, the more you’ll benefit.”

Looking very serious, Huang Hou said, “If I tell you where he is, will you really let me go? You won't kill me to keep me quiet?”

Yang Qi laughed. “Of course I’ll let you go. You’re working for me from here on out. Besides, I need you to spread word about how everyone died here. They were killed by the House of Shadowblight and the Blight Legion Church. And of course, the Demi-Immortal Institute will send experts to wipe those two organizations out of existence, even their stronghold in the Western Continent. Remember, after you tell me where the Crown Prince is, there will be no going back. You’ll belong to me and me alone.”

Yang Qi was being particularly clear and logical in the hopes of calming Huang Hou down a bit.

“Fine,” Huang Hou said. “The Crown Prince is hiding in a fractured section of space-time, an area severely damaged during the ancient God-Devil Apocalypse. When the forces of hell fought the Yore-Wilds Continent, it opened up a land that came to be known as the Superheaven Badlands.”

Yang Qi’s initial reaction was one of suspicion. “The Superheaven Badlands? You’re not lying to me, are you? How come I've never heard of any place like that before?”

“I'm not lying!” Huang Hou said. “Really, I'm not! The Crown Prince is definitely in the depths of the Superheaven Badlands. Very few people know of the existence of that place, and it’s not even listed on maps in the Demi-Immortal Institute. I don’t know how the Crown Prince learned of it, but he gave me a space-time navigational chart. As long as you follow the path marked out on that chart, you can find the place. I've never been there, so I couldn’t claim to be able to lead the way. And since I'm only in the third Legendary transformation, there’s no way I could survive the spatial tempests along the way. The most I can do is create holes in space to perform minor teleportations here on the Rich-Lush Continent. Anyway, only someone in the sixth Legendary transformation, a Personal-Domain Legendary, could possibly reach the Superheaven Badlands alive.”

“A space-time navigational chart?” Yang Qi said.

Obviously, that was the most important part of this whole thing. If he could get it, then he could definitely trade it to the Shroud-Heaven Alliance or the Hanging Mountain. And he had a pawn in the Shroud-Heaven Alliance already, that being Patriarch Frost-Drake.

Who knew how valuable that chart would be to the Crown Prince’s enemies? In fact, he could probably demand something of equal value to the Grand Emperor's Pagoda.

Of course, he would have to be very careful when trying to make the deal. It would be as dangerous as asking a tiger for its skin.

“I have the chart right here,” Huang Hou said, pulling his garment aside to reveal a jade pendant hanging around his neck. Yang Qi used the Infernal Deity Spear to pluck the pendant off of him. Grabbing it, he sent some true energy inside, causing an arched door to appear. As it turned out, the pendant was a dimensional treasure.

After searching the dimension quickly, he found what looked like a map crafted from unknown materials.

It was a complex chart featuring numerous complicated, interconnecting passageways. There were no mountains or rivers, but instead, pathways through space, and various spatial nexuses. With this map, one could traverse the complexities of space-time itself. In one location in the middle of the map was an enormous area of darkness with one bright light in it. That was obviously where the Crown Prince was located.

Looking at the map, he shook his head. Even with the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, there was no way he could traverse space to reach that location. If he got lucky, the spatial tempests might blow him to some other stranger world. If he got unlucky, he would be ripped to pieces.

To reach the Superheaven Badlands, he would need to be in the third Legendary transformation, and use all of the powers of the Grand Emperor's Pagoda.

However, that wasn't something he was worried about.

Still not sure he could trust Huang Hou, he looked at him and said, “Another question. After you got all the spirit stones you needed, and actually built the Superheaven Altar, how would you get it to the Crown Prince?”

“It’s like this,” Huang Hou said, shivering at the knowledge that his own life depended on how well he explained things. “The Crown Prince sent word that we were supposed to acquire the spirit stones and take them to a magical altar that he had already begun to set up in the Demi-Immortal Institute. It’s branded with his nascent divinity, which would automatically use the spirit stones to complete the Superheaven Altar. At that point, the Crown Prince’s domain would fuse with the altar, and he would reach the Great Sage level.”

Yang Qi snorted coldly. “That’s it? Then what’s the point of this map?”

“No, you don’t understand. First of all, you have to know where the correct spatial nexuses are located in both the Rich-Lush Continent and the Superheaven Badlands. That part is required to reach out to the Crown Prince. At the same time, there is a part of the Superheaven Badlands which uses spirit stones to create a spatial roadmap of sorts, which can guide the power from the Demi-Immortal Institute to the Superheaven Badlands, and link it up. The nexus is located in a place deep in the Minorcosm World. You can even go check the place yourself. Look, I'm not lying to you. I’m selling out the Crown Prince, which means that I'm now an enemy of the Crown Prince Society. And the Crown Prince severely punishes traitors.”

“Alright. Everything you've said makes sense. And I doubt you could have made all that up on the spot. However, I still need to keep you locked up in the Grand Emperor's Pagoda for a time. After I make my deal with the Shroud-Heaven Alliance, I’ll let you out. You can explain the whole thing to them. And of course, I’ll split the profits with you.” Considering everything Yang Qi had experienced in life up to this point, there was no way that he would actually let Huang Hou go.

When the time came to deal with the Shroud-Heaven Alliance, he would have Huang Hou as a living witness to the information he was providing. Plus he would have the navigational chart. In fact, maybe he could even sell Huang Hou to them.

Around this time, the screams and sounds of fighting on the island had died down, and Blightczar Manyrivers returned. “I’ve killed everyone, Milord. No one was able to stand up to my poison arts. Unfortunately, the other vice-houselords are all away.”

“Fine. Well, I’ll just loot this place and leave it empty. That way returning here will do them no good.” Yang Qi then used one of the abilities of the Grand Emperor’s Pagoda, causing an enormous gravitational force to spring up that sucked all of the treasures on the island into it, including spirit stones, medicinal pills, magical items, spell formation materials and the like. Considering how wealthy the House of Shadowblight had been, it could only be imagined how much Yang Qi was profiting in this moment. There were even cases of royal-grade medicinal pills, and divine weapons of all sorts.  All of it would be of great help to the Yang Clan, and would mean they were close to being on the same level as a clan with a Great Sage.

‘With this wealth, the Yang Clan will be set for the next hundred years. We’ll be a powerful kingdom on the same level as the House of Spring and Autumn or the Tabernacle of Flame. And if I can become a Great Sage, the Yang Clan could even become an institute! The fifth in the continent.’ Sighing, he thought, ‘I guess it's time to head home. I’ll deliver all of these goods to the clan, and come up with a more fully fleshed-out plan of how to work with the Shroud-Heaven Alliance.’

It took about an hour for him to clear out all of the treasure stores. Then, he flew up off the deserted island and vanished into the night.

The House of Shadowblight had been exterminated.

Never again would an organization like theirs exist in the Rich-Lush Continent.

He also had Blightczar Manyrivers captive, a Space-Void Legendary. With his help to shore up the spell formations in Yanhaven, it would be even more secure.

Chapter 223: A Deal with the Shroud-Heaven Alliance

Yang Qi left the sprawling ocean and headed back toward Yanhaven, taking Blightczar Manyrivers and Huang Hou with him, two experts in the third Legendary transformation.

Yanhaven looked much the same as it always had, but its overall aura had changed. Adjustments had been made allowing it to conform to the five phases, the eight trigrams, and the yin and yang. And the Yan River which flowed past it was filled with so much spirit energy that it almost seemed like a sea.

Large-scale construction was underway all around the city, with buildings rising up everywhere. The entire populace was high-spirited and full of mettle, and their auras were so powerful that even ghosts and gods would be shocked by them.

The six months of complete still and quiet had been profoundly beneficial. And now, the benefits were coming into play.

The city was expanding, people were being trained, and forces were being recruited.

As of this point, the Yang Clan could be considered a mid-level aristocratic clan, not the small-scale force they had once been. Even without Yang Qi, the fact that the clan lord was a Quinary Lifeseizer was telling. After all, in the four institutes, Quinary Lifeseizers were conclave students.

Of course, Yang Qi was a Legendary, and clans that had Legendary patriarchs were considered top-tier.

Currently, he was now considered to be on the level of a patriarch, much like the position Patriarch Mongolbeast had in the Mongol Clan back in Mongoltar.

Although matters of ranking and seniority had to be maintained in the clan itself, meaning that Yang Qi couldn’t formally occupy the position of patriarch, as far as the rest of the world was concerned, strength and power were the most important things.

Currently, some of the chief elders had gathered in the royal palace to meet with Yang Zhan, along with some of the government officials from the other aristocratic clans. They looked excited, but at the same time nervous.

First to speak was Yang Xingshi. “Clan Lord, the cultivation bases of everyone in Yanhaven have improved recently. Unfortunately, we’re running dangerously low on energy convergence pills, and don’t know what to do about that. Clan Lord, please, can you make a decision?”

“I'm aware of the situation,” Yang Zhan replied. “We can’t rush things. The clan’s foundation is too weak at the moment. Although everyone experienced a cultivation base improvement, we don’t have the resources to keep up with the demand. My suggestion is that we send troops to take some of the coastal nations such as the State of Yun. Not only would we acquire more resources that way, we would also have the chance to benefit from overseas trading. That would definitely improve our financial situation. A big push to recruit troops will also help our construction efforts. In the end, though, taking one of those coastal cities is probably the best bet.”

“You've really thought things through, Your Highness.” The ministers all dropped to their knees in reverence. After all, they were all aware that Yang Zhan was a Quinary Lifeseizer, and his son was in the Nonary level, just about to become a Legendary. Many people in the clan had never even heard of the Legendary level before. However, they now knew that people such as that were essentially god-spirits from heaven, completely eminent and unapproachable.

RUMBLE!

At this point in the discussion, a wave of energy swept over the audience hall, and Yang Qi appeared.

Yang Zhan was the first to see him, and he immediately rose to his feet. “Qi’er, what are you doing back? Did something go wrong with your training?”

“Don’t worry, Father. My training went perfectly. I'm a Legendary now! Plus, I acquired incredible wealth.” Yang Qi looked around at everyone else in the hall, all of whom were prostrating as low as possible.

And when they heard the words he had just spoken, their minds reeled as if they had been smashed by a mountain, and they couldn’t help but break out into discussion.

“Legendary?! I can’t believe he's a Legendary!”

“I'm not even completely sure of how strong Legendaries are. But I do know that in the Demi-Immortal Institute, Legendaries are all holy neophytes. Their ranking system goes freshman, outer campus, inner campus, elite, conclave, holy neophyte. Even an outer campus student can call the wind and summon the rain. So what about the holy neophytes?”

“Terrifying!”

“The Yang Clan is flourishing. No one will dare to cross us now. Perhaps one day we’ll even have a Great Sage in our midst!”

“A Great Sage clan. They get written about in the histories, and remembered for all eternity!”

“Quit jabbering! We need to offer congratulations!”

Almost in unison, everyone kowtowed and said, “Congratulations, Young Lord. May you reign supreme for all eternity!”

“You're unparalleled under heaven, Young Lord! You’ll surely unite the continent under your rule!”

“Very well,” Yang Qi said, “let this royal court be adjourned for today. You’re all dismissed. I’ve already taken care of the financial problems of the clan. I’ll make all the arrangements tomorrow.” With that, he waved his hand dismissively.

The various ministers and officials left, looking very excited. Within moments, word of him being a Legendary would be spreading through Yanhaven like wildfire. Of course, there was no way he would reveal the information about what he had done to the House of Shadowblight, or the exact details of the wealth he had acquired.

That night, he held a long meeting with his father and brothers in which he provided a detailed account of how he had dealt with Blightczar Manyrivers and Huang Hou. Afterward, they created a special dimension in the depths of the royal palace where they stored all of the wealth from Mongoltar, the Myriad Consortium, and the House of Shadowblight.

Then, he called upon the powers of the Grand Emperor's Pagoda to force Huang Hou and Blightczar Manyrivers to help with the spell formations protecting Yanhaven. After all, back when he wiped out the House of Shadowblight’s moving island, he had acquired a large collection of materials useful for working with spell formations. At this point, the area for hundreds of kilometers surrounding Yanhaven was virtually impregnable.

Yang Qi had never been a top expert of spell formations, but now that he was a Legendary, his skill and ability had improved quite a bit. And there were many functions of the Grand Emperor's Pagoda that he could use with complete ease.

Yang Zhan now had a massive subterranean defensive spell formation at his disposal, countless flying swords and magical treasure in his storehouses, and numerous spirit stones in hand. It was almost like a dream.

Over the years, the Blight Legion Church had built up the House of Shadowblight as a sort of military encampment in the Rich-Lush Continent, and Yang Qi had benefited greatly because of that. He had even taken many blightpuppets, which were now being held in the Grand Emperor's Pagoda. And thanks to the spell formations around the city and in the Yan River, even Legendaries who attacked the area would be killed.

After three days, the work was done. At that point, Yang Zhan actually took some of the lower-quality items that Yang Qi had given him and distributed them to the populace. Such items might be relatively useless to him, but were considered spectacular treasures to the general population. After all, the Mongol Clan from Mongoltar had been even richer than the House of Shadowblight. Their wealth was enough to sustain the cultivation of the people of Yanhaven for a hundred years.

Now, Yanhaven had enough to support even ten times its current population.

With the spell formations set up and the resources distributed, the focus became building projects and the training of troops. The time was coming to invade the coastal areas, and the first target would naturally be the State of Yun and the Yun Clan.

Everyone in Yanhaven knew that Yang Qi had a big grudge with the Yun Clan. Yun Hailan was his archenemy, and thus, it was only natural that the people loyal to him wanted to put an end to them.

**

After his work was finished, Yang Qi took Blightczar Manyrivers and Huang Hou and headed toward the East Sea, which was the location of the Shroud-Heaven Alliance. He was no longer worried about running into any dangerous people. He could kill even Five-Phases Legendaries if he struck quickly enough, and if he went all out, could probably fight to a draw with someone in the fifth Legendary transformation.

And that wasn’t even taking into consideration the deadly God Legion Seal.

The endless azure sea was a beautiful sight. As Yang Qi flew along, the scattered islands he passed reminded him of that one particular island of peach blossoms, and the day he gained so many new sworn siblings. Thanks to the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, all of them were now Nonary Lifeseizers, and would likely become Legendaries soon.

Although, that actually caused him to feel a bit worried. He knew more than ever now that becoming a Legendary was no simple task, and that failure in that effort meant death. No one would survive having their bones crushed and their soul wiped out of existence.

If any of his sworn siblings were to die, the grief would stab him to his heart. However, there was nothing he could do to help. Breaking through to the Legendary level was a personal thing that others could not provide assistance for.

“If any of my brothers or sisters die, I will remember their names, and when I acquire the true cultivation base of a godmammoth, then perhaps the power of the Sovereign Lord will enable me to resurrect them.” Shaking his head, he shoved such thoughts away.

Eventually, he reached one particular deserted island. Landing, he waved his hand and sent a paper talisman flying out, which then vanished.

Before long, a stream of frigid energy approached, which was none other than Patriarch Frost-Drake. As soon as he looked at Yang Qi, an expression of shock overtook his face. “Your aura… you’re a Legendary?!”

“Yes, I reached the Legendary level,” Yang Qi said coolly.

Thump!

Patriarch Frost-Drake stumbled backward and fell into a sitting position, where he remained, panting in shock. “Back in the Heavendawn Quarry, after you entered that Sura Devil-Eye, Young Master Shroud-Heaven and the Crown Prince had a fierce fight. They both resorted to trump cards. And then the Grand Emperor's Pagoda appeared and flew off to who knows where. Were you responsible for that?”

“Yes. I have the Grand Emperor's Pagoda. And as a Legendary, I can unleash many of its terrifying abilities.”

Getting onto his knees, Patriarch Frost-Drake said, “I see. Milord, henceforth, I Frost-Drake, will serve you with complete and utter loyalty.”

Chapter 224: Hua Tianxiong

Patriarch Frost-Drake knew that things had long since reached the point where resisting Yang Qi was pointless. He was simply too weak for that.

He had lost the sword energy of the Ravaging Dual Sword Sect that he had spent decades upon decades cultivating, and was now stuck at Nonary Lifeseizing, with no hope of becoming a Legendary. Back when Yang Qi had been weaker, he had nursed thoughts of revenge. But now, with Yang Qi a Legendary, and in possession of the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, any such thoughts were long gone.

He now thoroughly acknowledged allegiance to Yang Qi, and had no thoughts of crossing him.

In fact, he actually hoped that after Yang Qi grew more powerful, he would offer cultivation help.

Clasping hands respectfully, he said, “Milord, may I ask why you called upon me today? Your humble servant will go through hell and high water to carry out any task you assign me.”

“I actually do have an important assignment for you. Who’s in charge of your Shroud-Heaven Alliance at the moment? Is Young Master Shroud-Heaven himself around?”

“What? You want to talk to the person in charge of the alliance?” Patriarch Frost-Drake was visibly taken aback. “Young Master Shroud-Heaven already headed back to the Hanging Mountain. He appointed Old Man Superdestruction to run the alliance in his absence, who started out as a deep-sea leviathan, and is strong enough to smash holes into the seafloor. He’s already in the fifth Legendary transformation, making him a Yin-Yang Legendary. In fact, he’s just on the verge of reaching the sixth transformation. Don’t tell me you want to arrange a meeting with him?”

“Yes, I do,” Yang Qi replied, nodding. “I have some business to discuss with him.”

“What sort of business? Milord, working with a person like Old Man Superdestruction would be very dangerous. He’ll kill you without blinking an eye. Young Master Shroud-Heaven gave him an imperial-class energy art, the Superdestruction Heart Sutra. The wretch energy that surrounds him is intense to say the least.”

“I want to make a deal with him that will benefit both of us,” Yang Qi continued, seemingly unfazed by what Patriarch Frost-Drake had just said. “If he’s only in the fifth transformation, then he's no threat to me. Just go tell this Old Man Superdestruction that I know where the Crown Prince is hiding. If your Young Master Shroud-Heaven wants to kill him, they need his location, right? Assuming your alliance is interested in information like that, they can come find me at the Sun Moon Institute.”

“What?” Patriarch Frost-Drake blurted in shock. “Milord, you know the secret hiding place of the Crown Prince? All of the demon-devils in the Shroud-Heaven Alliance are searching for that very location. In fact, Young Master Shroud-Heaven announced that whoever finds his hiding place will be given a hundred imperial-grade spirit stones and three sovereign-grade spirit stones!”

‘Imperial-grade spirit stones?’ Yang Qi thought. ‘Sovereign-grade spirit stones?’ The best spirit stones he had seen up to this point in his life were royal-grade. And he had used all of them when breaking into the Legendary level.

Imperial-grade spirit stones were a hundred times as effective as the royal-grade. They contained shocking levels of spirit energy, and could help just about anyone break into the Legendary level.

With spirit stones like that, it was no wonder Demonfolk like Young Master Shroud-Heaven could progress so quickly in their cultivation.

“Head back and pass the information along. If Young Master Shroud-Heaven is interested in making a deal, then I’ll reward you. Remember, I’ll be at the Sun Moon Institute.”

With that, he vanished into thin air.

His next destination was in the south: the Sun Moon Institute.

This possible deal with the Shroud-Heaven Alliance was of utmost importance, but it was definitely like asking a tiger for its skin. Even if they really wanted the information, they might not necessarily pay the price Yang Qi wanted. And thus, he needed to have someone to back him up.

The best protectors he had right now were his sworn brothers and sisters. Right now, Yang Qi was thinking of Hua Fengfeng’s father, who was a grand elder in the Sun Moon Institute, Hua Tianxiong. According to the rumors, he was in the ninth Legendary transformation, making him a Never-Dying Legendary.

Upon sending a message to Hua Fengfeng, she immediately replied and said that he should come to the Sun Moon Institute.

He was now capable of incredible speed, such that it hardly took any time at all to reach a sprawling plain in the south, which was almost entirely filled by a bustling city. In addition to numerous energy arts cultivators, there were also plenty of common people in the area.

High in the sky in the middle of the plain was a burning sun and a shining moon. And directly beneath them were a vast array of temples and institutes of learning. The burning sun and the bright moon were not real, but rather the products of an enormous spell formation.

This was the Sun Moon Institute.

“Welcome, Little Bro Qi!” Hua Fengfeng said. Of all of his sworn brothers and sisters, only Flame Clearspring was stronger than Hua Fengfeng.

“Did my message just now make sense?” Yang Qi asked.

“Yes. It’s a big matter. Who could have ever guessed that you would figure out where the Crown Prince was hiding? My father is in seclusion, but I sent him a message, and he wants to see you immediately.” All of a sudden, Hua Fengfeng’s phoenix-like eyes flickered with surprise. “Little Bro Qi, your aura! Did you reach the Legendary level?”

“I did,” Yang Qi replied with a nod. “I'm in the Blood-Form Transformation now. However, it won’t be long before I advance to the Spirit-Soul Transformation. My control over the Grand Emperor's Pagoda has reached the point of perfection. Not even someone in the fifth Legendary transformation could possibly kill me.”

If he could form his own personal domain, then even without the additional power of the Grand Emperor’s Pagoda, he wouldn’t need to worry about experts in the fifth transformation.

“You're already a Legendary. Amazing. Before, Father thought that you couldn’t possibly stand up to the Crown Prince. But now, I can only imagine how shocked he’ll be to see you.” All of a sudden Hua Fengfeng seemed to be in very high spirits. It was almost as if she were filled with pride because of being able to take her man to meet her father.

Yang Qi didn’t notice the change in her. He simply nodded as she led the way into the Sun Moon Institute.

The Sun Moon Institute was a very impressive place. The opposing and complementary powers of the sun and the moon created the perfect taiji energy flow whose mere presence could relax the spirit and improve longevity.

In Yang Qi’s opinion, the Demi-Immortal Institute felt ancient and old, whereas the Sun Moon Institute felt new and energetic.

‘I wonder what the True Dragon Institute is like?’ he thought.

Eventually, they were in the depths of the Sun Moon Institute, where an enormous gate rose up from within the endless mountains. In this regard, it was very similar to the layout of the Demi-Immortal Institute.

Thanks to the six months of cultivation in the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, Hua Fengfeng was now a Nonary Lifeseizer, and was close to becoming a Legendary. As such, she was more important than ever in the Sun Moon Institute, so much so that no one even stopped to ask her why she was bringing an outsider here.

“Little Bro Qi, this is one of the most important and mysterious locations in the Sun Moon Institute. It’s called the Minorbrilliance World, and is very similar to your Minorcosm World. Since you’re not a student of the Sun Moon Institute, you aren’t permitted to enter, so father will see you on a mountain outside of it.”

Although Yang Qi couldn’t enter the Minorbrilliance World, it was still telling that he was being allowed to come to the mountains where the conclave students resided.

Soon, they arrived at one particular mountain that resembled a scarlet phoenix flying toward the sun, or a vermillion bird nodding its head. This mountain could gather the spirit energy of heaven and earth, and the quintessence of the sun and moon. It was truly a perfect location in terms of feng shui.

This was obviously where Hua Fengfeng practiced her cultivation. However, there was currently a man standing on the peak of the mountain, clad in a radiant garment, his hands clasped behind his back. At first, he looked like a statue, but when he noticed Yang Qi and Hua Fengfeng approaching, he beckoned at them, which caused Yang Qi to feel as though the entire world was spinning.

A moment later, he landed on the mountain in front of the man.

“Little Bro Qi, this is my father,” Hua Fengfeng said.

“Greetings, Uncle,” Yang Qi said respectfully, offering a formal salute.

“Yang Qi?” The man’s radiant robe made him seem like a god from heaven. And yet, it was impossible for him to prevent the surprise from showing in his tone of voice. “You’re Yang Qi? And you’re already in the Legendary level?”

“I just got lucky,” Yang Qi replied, marveling at how this man seemed to glow like both the sun and the moon together. His aura didn't seem any weaker than the Crown Prince’s, to the point where he seemed like someone who could never die.

This, of course, was Hua Fengfeng’s father, Hua Tianxiong.

At the moment, Hua Tianxiong was profoundly shocked. He knew that his daughter had taken on a sworn brother who had a beef with the Crown Prince, and he had initially disapproved of it, but after hearing that Yang Qi had acquired the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, he began to change his mind. And now, having met Yang Qi in person, and finding out that he was a Legendary, he realized that everything was different from what he had assumed.

Legendaries were people with unlimited potential.

In the institutes, they were holy neophytes, and were the ones who the chancellors would groom to be their successors. It was only natural that Yang Qi becoming a Legendary meant that people would view him differently.

Hua Tianxiong himself was in the ninth Legendary transformation, far more powerful than Yang Qi. However, to him, anyone that was a Legendary was worth talking to with respect.

Chapter 225: Old Man Superdestruction

“Excellent. Now that you’re a Legendary, Yang Qi, your potential is limitless. As long as you manage to stay alive, you’ll definitely reach the peaks of glory.” Hua Tianxiong made no effort to keep the tone of praise out of his voice.

“Many thanks, Uncle, you truly flatter me,” Yang Qi replied humbly. “Really, it was just a fluke that I managed to reach the Legendary level.” He knew that he had earned Hua Tianxiong’s respect, and also the right to talk with him as an equal. Without that, there was no way he would agree to back Yang Qi up in the upcoming negotiations, not even if he was a sworn brother of Hua Fengfeng.

“You have the Grand Emperor's Pagoda?” Hua Tianxiong asked.

“Indeed, Uncle. Take a look.” A moment later, a bronze pagoda appeared on his palm, which he unhesitatingly handed to Hua Tianxiong.

He had no fear of Hua Tianxiong attempting to take the item. The man was a Never-Dying Legendary, and would be a powerful and important ally. Besides, Yang Qi had long since become one with the pagoda, and had created a special connection with it. In fact, it was likely his main path to becoming a Great Sage. Furthermore, the pagoda was also marked by the God Legion Seal. Not only did the God Legion Seal represent the legion of gods, it represented He who existed on an even higher level, the Lord.

Anyone who tried to forcibly unseal the pagoda and take it would feel the wrath of the God Legion Seal, which had decimated even Ghost Emperor Yama. Even if Hua Tianxiong were stronger than he already was, he was like nothing compared to the ghost emperor.

In fact, if the chancellor of the Demi-Immortal Institute tried to forcibly take the pagoda, it would be nothing but wishful thinking on his part. And even if Grand Emperor Rich-Lush himself tried to do so, he would fail. None of them qualified to challenge the legion of gods.

The horde of devils from hell were millions of times more powerful than Grand Emperor Rich-Lush, and even they would be crushed if they directly challenged the legion of gods.

“Oh?” Hua Tianxiong said. Not even he could have guessed that Yang Qi would simply take out the Grand Emperor's Pagoda and let him inspect it. Accepting it, he looked it over and sighed at the power he sensed in it. After a moment, he handed it back. “You know, considering our disparity in level, if I wanted to, I could just kill you, wipe your life force seal from the pagoda, and take it for my own. It could be of great use to me. Presumably, you understand how helpful it could be to any living being born in the Rich-Lush Continent.”

“Hua Fengfeng and I are sworn siblings,” Yang Qi replied calmly, “and we've promised to live and die together. Her father is just like my father.”

“Very well….” Hua Tianxiong was coming to find that he liked Yang Qi more and more. Obviously, he valued loyalty and friendship, and would pursue justice with no second thoughts to protect his sworn siblings.

Such rumors about Yang Qi had quickly spread after the incident with the Crown Prince. Everyone knew that he was totally devoted to his sworn siblings, and most people admired him deeply because of that quality.

“So, you’re sure you know where the Crown Prince is hiding? And you want to make a deal with the Shroud-Heaven Alliance? Presumably you want me to back you up, but have you considered that the Sun Moon Institute is a righteous, orthodox organization, and the Shroud-Heaven Alliance is full of heretical wretch-devils? If word spread, it could harm our reputation.”

“The Crown Prince is the most heretical wretch-devil there is,” Yang Qi replied. “You have no idea the extent of it, Uncle. What I'm trying to do is get the tiger and the wolf to kill each other. It would benefit all of us if the Shroud-Heaven Alliance and the Crown Prince fought to the death. After all, if he succeeds in becoming a Great Sage, it will be a disaster for the entire continent. Of that, Uncle, I'm sure you’re aware.”

“Yes, I know. Getting the tiger and the wolf to kill each other. Not a bad idea.” Hua Tianxiong was himself on the cusp of being a Great Sage, and knew exactly what type of person the Crown Prince was. He had actually expended many resources to determine his personality and moral standings. Therefore, he was actually a bit intrigued by Yang Qi’s idea.

“For now, consider me a behind-the-scenes supporter. Let’s see how your deal with the Shroud-Heaven Alliance goes. Of course, my support must be kept a strict secret. If word leaked, things could get dangerous for me in the Sun Moon Institute. For now, I’ll stay hidden. If Old Man Superdestruction or even Young Master Shroud-Heaven attacks you, then I’ll come to your support.”

Yang Qi nodded. “That sounds perfect.”

**

The sky was pitch black, and a harsh wind swept across the lands several hundred kilometers away from the Sun Moon Institute. In a certain valley in the mountains was an enormous waterfall that looked like something out of a painting. Yang Qi sat quietly in a cave behind the waterfall, protected by numerous warding magics.

A short time passed, and then his ears caught a strange, dreary noise that seemed to tug at his soul. Opening his eyes, he said, “Honored guest, why not step inside for a chat?”

A strange chuckle could be heard, and the air seemed to rip open as an old man stepped out.

He actually had Patriarch Frost-Drake held by the scruff of the neck, who he then tossed off to the side.

Glaring at Yang Qi malevolently, the old man said, “You’re Yang Qi? The one with the Grand Emperor's Pagoda?”

The man’s glittering eyes almost seemed capable of ripping one’s soul out of one’s body.

“Your soulsnatching devilwords and devil-eye won’t do anything to me,” Yang Qi said. “You must be Young Master Shroud-Heaven’s most trusted subordinate, Old Man Superdestruction.”

“That’s right, I'm Old Man Superdestruction. You want to make a deal with me? What do you want in exchange for the Crown Prince’s whereabouts? I know about your grudge with him, but how could a nobody like you figure out where he's hiding? It all sounds a bit suspicious.”

“Suspicious?” Yang Qi said. He waved his hand, and Huang Hou appeared.

“Do you recognize who this is? He’s one of the key leaders of the Crown Prince Society, Huang Hou, a Space-Void Legendary. He’s switched loyalties to me, and he knows all of the Crown Prince’s secrets.”

“What? Huang Hou?” Old Man Superdestruction stared at Huang Hou for a long moment. “He's a holy neophyte in the Demi-Immortal Institute, and a pillar of the Crown Prince Society. How did you win him over? Alright, punk. Give me Huang Hou and the Grand Emperor's Pagoda. If you do, I’ll spare your life.”

Before waiting for an answer, he lunged toward Yang Qi.

Instantly, all of the light in the area seemed to vanish, as if everything were being destroyed. This was an imperial-class energy art, the Superdestruction Heart Sutra.

Black scriptural text flowed out, becoming an enormous hand which closed in around Yang Qi, and the air began to twist and crack.

It was a palm attack filled with the transformations of yin and yang, and the five phases. It could crush all sorts of spell formations, and would easily vanquish anyone in the first or second Legendary transformation.

It moved as fast as a meteor, and yet before it could reach Yang Qi, an enormous pagoda appeared around him. On the surface of the bell was an asura equipped for battle, which roared and thrust its hands out to meet Old Man Superdestruction’s attack.

POP!

The Superdestruction Palm shattered.

Old Man Superdestruction looked at Yang Qi with an expression of disbelief, and Yang Qi looked back with an enigmatic smile. Yin-Yang Legendaries were powerful, but considering some of the people Yang Qi had killed recently, he had advanced by leaps and bounds. Furthermore, he had taken elements of Blightczar Manyshadows’ soul and magical laws and imbued them into the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, combining them with the flesh and blood of the asura.

Because of that, the Grand Emperor's Pagoda now had its own soul.

And with Blightczar Manyrivers and Huang Hou as slaves in the pagoda, bolstering all of its spell formations, the pagoda was far stronger than before.

Because of all that, Yang Qi easily negated Old Man Superdestruction’s attack.

On a nearby mountain, Hua Fengfeng stood with Hua Tianxiong. “Father, why didn’t you do something just now? Old Man Superdestruction is in the fifth Legendary transformation! What if something happened to my Little Bro Qi?”

“I’m testing Yang Qi’s cultivation base,” he replied, a look of surprise on his face. “Now I can see that he's even more mysterious than I realized. He’s so strong! The difference between the first Legendary transformation and the fifth far surpasses the difference between heaven and earth. Even with the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, he shouldn’t be able to fight back like that. It’s too bad I can’t fully assess Yang Qi’s cultivation base. Well, he definitely deserves to be the one opposing the Crown Prince. Let’s see how his negotiation with Old Man Superdestruction goes.”

Back in the cave, Yang Qi looked at the shocked Old Man Superdestruction and said, “You run the Shroud-Heaven Alliance, correct? I asked you here to negotiate a deal, and instead, you attacked me. I'm having a hard time believing you’ve come in good faith.”

“Very well,” Old Man Superdestruction said, his eyes flashing. “I admit you’re strong, so let’s get back to the main point. What do you want in exchange for information about the Crown Prince?”

Chapter 226: Demanding Spirit Stones

Old Man Superdestruction was finally convinced that Yang Qi was qualified to enter a discussion with him. And the fact that he had Huang Hou seemed to indicate that he really did have confidential information about the Crown Prince.

Huang Hou was a holy neophyte, the type of person who could call the wind and summon the rain in the outside world. At a single word from him, even a powerful clan could be pillaged or slaughtered. Even the most powerful aristocratic clans in the continent would do everything possible to avoid offending him, lest they be wiped out of existence.

He was so famous that the Shroud-Heaven Alliance had long since put out a bounty for his head. Old Man Superdestruction himself had come up with numerous plans to kill him, none of which had worked. And yet, here he was, acting almost like a lapdog to Yang Qi.

“Talk, Yang Qi,” Old Man Superdestruction said. “If you have hard evidence to point to the alternate dimension the Crown Prince is hiding in, then the Shroud-Heaven Alliance will give you whatever you want. Young Master Shroud-Heaven has already arranged a handsome reward for you.”

“Reward?” Yang Qi chuckled. “Whatever so-called reward he’s arranged, I don’t want it. Look, I’m not just planning to give you information about the Crown Prince, I have a map leading right to him. And I also know what he’s planning to do next. But in exchange, I want something specific. Treasure. And a lot of it!”

“You have a complete map? And you know what he’s planning to do next?” Old Man Superdestruction’s eyes flickered with shock. “Fine. Name your price.”

“A thousand spirit weapons. A hundred thousand royal-grade spirit stones. Ten thousand imperial-grade spirit stones. A thousand sovereign-grade spirit stones. Plus, at least five magical treasures equivalent to the Gate of the Great Void, things that can extract items from alternate dimensions.”

“What?!” Old Man Superdestruction said, his eyes burning with killing intent. “Feeling pretty greedy, are we? The Shroud-Heaven Alliance would go completely broke if we tried to pay you that much. I doubt your Demi-Immortal Institute has that much wealth on hand, and probably not even the Hanging Mountain.

“Are you really serious about this deal? A thousand spirit weapons? Do you know what a spirit weapon is? Even just one is equivalent to a Lifeseizer. It takes the spirit energy of heaven and earth, and the quintessence of the sun and moon to give a spirit consciousness to a weapon. You think they just grow here and there like bok choy, and that you can just grab them willy-nilly? And do you know anything about spirit stones? Apparently not. A royal-grade spirit stone could buy you a city! And that's not to mention imperial-grade or sovereign-grade. Ordinary cultivation can only be practiced with high-grade and supreme-grade! Who do you think you are? Even Young Master Shroud-Heaven himself wouldn’t be able to casually use royal-grade or imperial-grade spirit stones for cultivation. I doubt even Great Sages would have reserves that rich.”

“Look, calm down,” Yang Qi said coolly. “Maybe my asking price is a bit high, but do you know who the Crown Prince really is? Forget about the fact that he's supposed to be the next chancellor of the Demi-Immortal Institute, he's a god from heaven descended into the mortal world, someone who harbors an enormous secret. If your Young Master Shroud-Heaven managed to kill him, and use some sort of demon magic to refine him into an out-of-body incarnation, a second nascent divinity, then reaching the Great Sage level would be a simple thing for him. Furthermore, he would be more powerful than any other Great Sage of his level. You must be aware of how strong the Crown Prince is, and the terrifying level of power that exists within him.”

Old Man Superdestruction looked back at him wordlessly. He led the Shroud-Heaven Alliance, which had been created for the specific purpose of dealing with the Crown Prince. They knew more about him than anyone, and would pay anything to have him killed.

Unfortunately, the price Yang Qi had just asked for was simply outrageous.

“I know you and the Crown Prince are enemies,” Old Man Superdestruction said. “Killing him would benefit you as well. Why don’t we just join forces? You tell us where he is, and we can go there together to kill him. That way, we both win. What do you think? He has plenty of treasure of his own. If we're partners, we can just split it between the two of us. Considering the ancient artifacts he has access to, his treasure horde would be roughly the same value as the price you just mentioned.”

Yang Qi burst out laughing. “You think I'm an idiot? Working with you would be a case of asking a tiger for its skin. I'd rather have cash up front than possible access to hidden treasure. Although, you did hit the nail on the head. The Crown Prince does have a lot of treasure. Once you kill him, you’ll get all of it, and it will definitely surpass anything you paid me. I'm just asking you to make an early withdrawal, right? Look. Do we have a deal, or not? Or do you need to go get approval from Young Master Shroud-Heaven?”

“He doesn’t need to ‘get approval’. I make the decisions!”

RUMBLE!

In the blink of an eye, a god-spirit appeared from within the depths of boundless space, pulsing with never-ending demon and devil energy, a spear in his hand which he held outstretched toward the heavens. Behind him were millions upon millions of vengeful souls, which were the living things he had killed and transformed into ghost-gods and devil-spirits.

Young Master Shroud-Heaven had arrived.

Yang Qi had seen Young Master Shroud-Heaven before, and had not sensed anything particularly extraordinary from him. However, that was because all of Young Master Shroud-Heaven’s energy had been focused on the Crown Prince. This time, Yang Qi could most definitely sense the boundless pressure that radiated off of him.

Cracking sounds could be heard as the air around Yang Qi crumpled and was torn, and all of the warding magics he had set up with the Grand Emperor's Pagoda were instantly shattered. A tremor passed through Yang Qi, and his blood surged so violently that he nearly coughed up a mouthful of it. But then, the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth activated. Inside of him, the power of the Hell Portal and Hellfire Crucible neutralized all negative effects.

From an outsider’s perspective, it looked like he simply flew up in the air for a short moment before landing back down on the ground.

“Hmm?” A strange look flashed through Young Master Shroud-Heaven’s eyes. Clearly, it was a complete surprise to him that Yang Qi could stand up to his power. Of course, he was only here in clone form, but it was a clone he had crafted with utmost care, using the souls of numerous powerful demons. Logically speaking, the power of the clone should have been enough to leave Yang Qi seriously injured and coughing up blood. And yet, nothing of the sort had happened. He seemed as lively as a dragon or tiger, and didn’t seem to have been hurt in the least bit. It was actually somewhat terrifying.

“Get out here, Hua Tianxiong!” Young Master Shroud-Heaven said. “I know you’re over there spying on us, waiting to come help this punk at a moment’s notice. You’re his little shield, aren’t you? Is this what you call making a deal? Seems more like you’re trying to rip me off!”

A chuckle echoed out as Hua Tianxiong appeared in the cave. Looking over at Young Master Shroud-Heaven, he smiled and said, “You’re a Never-Dying Legendary, Young Master Shroud-Heaven. Ready to reach the Great Sage level the moment you find the right opportunity. Well, isn’t this the opportunity? Why aren’t you willing to split the profits a bit? Besides, this deal is between you and Yang Qi. I'm just here to act as mediator if necessary. If you want my help to kill the Crown Prince, I’d be happy to comply, assuming it’s worth it for me.”

“You think I need your help to kill the Crown Prince?” Young Master Shroud-Heaven said. “If so, you’re wrong. I'm going to kill him with my own hands. Besides, the Hanging Mountain has as many top experts as the sky has clouds, so if I did need help, I definitely wouldn’t come to you.”

“Maybe, maybe not,” Hua Tianxiong replied. “From what I've heard, you might have a lot of top experts on the Hanging Mountain, but the infighting between them is fierce. You Demonfolk are all vicious schemers who care only for self-interest. Unless you team up with a blood relative, you’re likely to end up getting stabbed in the back. But that’s not how I do things. I'm sure you’re aware of how old-timers like me conduct ourselves.” With that, he clasped his hands behind his back proudly.

“You’re right, we Demonfolk can’t even trust people on our own side. In fact, there are plenty of things I have to keep from my blood relatives, lest I end up dead. And I have to admit that you orthodox people do tend to be more trustworthy. In fact, I've done my homework about you, Hua Tianxiong. You’ve never betrayed anyone in your entire life. That said, you still need to talk some sense into this Yang Qi. His price is far too high.”

“Not in the least,” Yang Qi interjected. “If you kill the Crown Prince, you’ll have access to all his wealth, an amount that far surpasses anything I’ve asked for. Young Master Shroud-Heaven, aren’t you willing to pay that much to get to the Crown Prince?”

“Are you absolutely certain you know where he is?” Young Master Shroud-Heaven asked.

Yang Qi nodded. “Yes. Absolutely certain. In fact, you can have Huang Hou if you’d like, and get the information from him directly. Although, in that case I would have to up the price. In any case, the Crown Prince gave a map to Huang Hou, plus instructions for a very important task. If that task is completed, the Crown Prince will recover in a year, and come out as a Great Sage. If that happens, he’ll crush everyone, starting with you.”

“A year?” Young Master Shroud-Heaven said, visibly shocked. “Don’t tell me that he…. Oh, I understand. So, he wants to build that thing. He’s really putting everything on the line. Damnation! I can’t let him succeed, otherwise….” A long moment passed. “Fine. I agree to your price. But I want Huang Hou.”

“Then the price is doubled,” Yang Qi replied without the slightest hesitation. “He’s a student of the Demi-Immortal Institute, so giving him to you would be a big betrayal. That’s especially true considering you’ll probably kill him.”

“There’s no way I can double the price. It's going to be difficult for me to get everything you already asked for. Besides, what if your information is bad?”

“How about we compromise,” Hua Tianxiong cut in. “I’ll take Huang Hou. And I’ll also join you in your attempt to kill the Crown Prince. It’ll be the best of both worlds. You tell me whatever questions you want to ask Huang Hou, and I’ll make sure you get the answers.”

Young Master Shroud-Heaven’s eyes narrowed as he considered the offer. In the end, the Crown Prince’s whereabouts were just too important.

“Fine. Agreed. We meet back here in three days to finalize everything.”

Chapter 227: Striking it Rich

Three days later, with Hua Tianxiong there to keep things in line, Young Master Shroud-Heaven’s clone brought a dimensional sack to Yang Qi to complete their deal.

Both of them were on their best behavior. Young Master Shroud-Heaven didn’t try to pull any tricks, and Yang Qi provided a very thorough explanation of how the Crown Prince was hiding in the Superheaven Badlands. Both sides could sense that the other was being sincere. After a short discussion, Yang Qi gave the navigational chart to Young Master Shroud-Heaven, who handed over all of the treasures he had brought in the dimensional sack.

The process took the entire afternoon. After all was said and done, Yang Qi felt like he was dreaming. He had struck it fabulously rich. Overnight, he had acquired wealth to rival the richest clans in the lands.

In the Rich-Lush Continent, there were plenty of aristocratic clans, powerful families, and sects. Although the four institutes were considered the most influential, there were also the Sage Ancestor Dynasty, the House of Spring and Autumn, the Tabernacle of Flame, and other such organizations.

In the past, the Yang Clan hadn’t even been considered worth ranking, and even now, they were still considered only third-tier. But Yang Qi had just acquired wealth that would normally belong to only first-tier clans. It wouldn’t be long before the Yang Clan really could brush shoulders with the likes of the Tabernacle of Flame and House of Spring and Autumn.

That was especially true considering that the clan now had what was essentially a patriarch in the Legendary level, namely, Yang Qi.

A quick check of the dimensional bag confirmed that everything he had asked for was inside. Without any hesitation, he threw it all into the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, and activated the spell formations necessary to purge it of demon energy.

Even Hua Tianxiong was a bit jealous of the wealth, but his main concern at the moment was taking down the Crown Prince.

He even helped Yang Qi check to make sure there were no traps lurking in the treasure. Of course, considering how much Yang Qi valued his close relationships, Hua Tianxiong knew that Yang Qi’s newfound wealth would likely benefit his daughter Hua Fengfeng.

After acquiring the map, Young Master Shroud-Heaven looked very pleased. He and Hua Tianxiong made arrangements to meet back later to go kill the Crown Prince. Then, the group parted ways.

**

On an island out in the East Sea, Old Man Superdestruction and Young Master Shroud-Heaven’s clone stopped for a short discussion.

“Young Master, I did some checking, and to my surprise, I found that only two years ago, that brat Yang Qi was an absolute nobody. An ant. Then he suddenly started making crazy progress, and now he’s a Legendary. How do you go from being a mortal to being a Legendary in so short a time? Not even the Crown Prince progressed that quickly.”

“Very suspicious,” Young Master Shroud-Heaven said.

“Young Master, why did you give all that wealth to him? I almost can’t believe that you just handed over a full set of five phases magical treasures. The Skyspirit Lamp, Razorgold Dagger-Axe, Mulberry Shoot, Singularity Water, and Yellowdragon Sand. You forged those items personally to give as a gift to Great Sage Ultra-Heaven’s daughter, Princess Saddharma!”

Young Master Shroud-Heaven snorted coldly. “You think I'm just going to hand the stuff over and let him keep it? Those five phases magical treasures are a trap that not even Hua Tianxiong will be able to see. I used my Eighty-One Soul-Concealing Demon Sorceries to split a heaven-demon seed into five parts and infuse it into those treasures. Once Yang Qi begins to work with them, he’ll transform into a heaven-demon before he realizes what’s happening. Once he’s entranced, not even a Great Sage could save him. And that’s when I’ll have access to his biggest secrets, and also, the Grand Emperor's Pagoda.”

“But… but what if Yang Qi doesn’t try to use them?” Old Man Superdestruction said.

“He will,” Young Master Shroud-Heaven replied with a cold chuckle. “You see, when my father was working with the five phases, he discovered a set of spatial coordinates that form a sort of natural spell formation. Because of that, those five items contain particularly powerful five phases energy, energy that will be extremely beneficial to Yang Qi. He’ll definitely want to benefit from it, as it will lead to rapid cultivation advancement. In fact, it should push him toward the Five-Phases Transformation much more quickly. He won't be able to hold back from using those treasures. Then, after he becomes a heaven-demon, I’ll use my Heaven-Demon Body Possession Incantation to make him into a clone. I’ll take over his mind, and then use him to achieve even greater glory.”

Old Man Superdestruction slowly settled down into a cross-legged position as he listened.

Laughing loudly, Young Master Shroud-Heaven continued, “No one can escape from my control! Not the Crown Prince, not Yang Qi, and not Hua Tianxiong. He wants to kill the Crown Prince and split the profits? Maybe become a Great Sage? Yeah right. He's just going to end up as my puppet. Alright, you keep an eye on the Shroud-Heaven Alliance, and also have Yang Qi watched!” With that, Young Master Shroud-Heaven vanished.

Old Man Superdestruction also faded into nothing.

**

Back in the Sun Moon Institute, on Hua Fengfeng’s mountain, Yang Qi sat cross-legged, toying with a spirit stone.

Hua Fengfeng also held a spirit stone, roughly the size of a walnut. It seemed to radiate the aura of a sovereign, and even glittered with dazzling light. If one looked closely, they would see that inside of the spirit stone, there were magical symbols that took the form of heavenly winds, lightning storms, dragons, tigers, qilins, phoenixes, and other shapes.

Spirit stones were classified into low-, mid-, high-, supreme-, royal-, imperial-, sovereign-, sagely-, heavenly-, and godly-grade. To most people, sovereign-grade spirit stones were the thing of legend, and contained mysteries that would flummox even ghosts and gods.

The single sovereign-grade spirit stone that Hua Fengfeng held was more than enough to push her into the Legendary level. Now, the important thing to do was pass her tribulation. If she couldn’t do that, it wouldn’t matter how much vital energy she had to work with.

“Unfortunately, I'm not very confident in succeeding,” she said. Looking down at the spirit stone, she sighed, her phoenix-like eyes flickering with envy. “A sovereign-grade spirit stone. Not even holy neophytes here in the Sun Moon Institute could hope to use one for cultivation. In fact, I don’t even think my father could. Only the chancellor, when making his breakthrough into the Great Sage level.”

“It's a shocking level of wealth, that’s for sure,” Yang Qi said. “But it begs the question of why Young Master Shroud-Heaven is being so generous. My request really was a bit over the top.”

His eyes flickered with suspicion as he pulled out a flying sword, an item which was somewhat difficult to control, because of the powerful spirit it possessed. It was no weaker than a Lifeseizer. This was a spirit weapon!

And Yang Qi had extorted a thousand such items from Young Master Shroud-Heaven. Even the Demi-Immortal Institute as a whole would likely have only a few hundred in stock.

Yang Qi was quite suspicious of how Young Master Shroud-Heaven had just agreed to his outrageous demand. However, even after checking over all the items, he couldn’t find anything dangerous hidden within.

If he delivered these weapons into the hands of the Yang Clan, its disciples would be so well-armed that no one could stand in their way.

He could even use them to set up spell formations that could unleash a multitude of attacks to overwhelm enemies.

After taking inventory again, he focused on five particularly powerful items, magical treasures which were on the same level as the Gate of the Great Void.

Five god weapons.

The Skyspirit Lamp, Razorgold Dagger-Axe, Mulberry Shoot, Singularity Water, and Yellowdragon Sand.

The lamp burned with intense fire that was the same color as the sky. There were no impurities in it, and although Yang Qi couldn’t tell what type of fire it was, it was flawless in every way.

The long dagger-axe was extremely sharp, and radiated a metallic aura that made one feel like one's eyes were bleeding.

The plant shoot had green leaves that pulsed with life force. It seemed ancient, and also, the type of thing that could heal virtually all wounds, even regrow limbs. It had the inherent ability to absorb spirit energy, which was enhanced now that it was a magical treasure. Apparently, it was constantly absorbing the energy of a preheaven wood spirit from an alternate dimension. With a plant shoot like this, it would be possible to turn a desert into a forest.

The spring water virtually jumped up and down as if alive. One drop of it could transform into a white, dragon-like river. This was the ultimate form of water, its quintessence.

Finally was the yellowish sand, which was sentient, and could transform into an actual yellow dragon.

This set of five phases magical treasures was no less precious than the Gate of the Great Void. And if they were combined, they would create a full cycle of the five phases, and would greatly strengthen the cultivation base.

Yang Qi really had no idea why Young Master Shroud-Heaven would have given him something like this. Deep inside, he was convinced that it must be some sort of trap.

And yet, not even Hua Tianxiong had been able to identify anything suspicious about them. Hua Tianxiong was a Never-Dying Legendary just like Young Master Shroud-Heaven was, a level far beyond Yang Qi. If he said there were no problems with the five items, then there must not be.

But because of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, Yang Qi was still convinced that his suspicions were accurate.

He just needed to identify the clues.

All of a sudden, a huge crucible appeared behind him, into which he tossed all five of the treasures. Hopefully, he could refine them in the furnace, and perhaps even use the aura of hell from the Hellfire Crucible to purify them.

After reaching the Legendary level, his Infernal Deity Spear, Infernal Deity Plate Armor, Fiend-Devil Wings, Hellfire Crucible and Hell Portal had all changed. His Fiend-Devil Wings were now Angel Wings, and his Infernal Deity Plate Armor had become the God Legion Battle Robe. And his Hell Portal was slowly reaching out to connect with various spatial nexuses of hell.

Now, all he had to do was reach the third Legendary transformation, the Space-Void Transformation, and he would finally be able to open a passage to hell, and summon devil-gods through it.

Chapter 228: Five Phases Treasures

Yang Qi was currently in the first transformation, making him a Blood-Form Legendary. He was incredibly durable and strong, and could easily punch through mountains or destroy rivers.

However, to higher-level Legendaries, he was weak. And if he actually fought the Crown Prince, it would definitely end in his death.

In fact, even if he fought experts beneath the Crown Prince, such as Old Man Superdestruction, a Yin-Yang Legendary, he would have to focus solely on defense, or possibly escape. And that would be with the help of the Grand Emperor's Pagoda.

If he ended up fighting Huang Hou or Blightczar Manyrivers without the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, he would be powerless against them. After all, the attacks of Space-Void Legendaries could be made from alternate dimensions, and how could he defend against that?

Without a magical treasure that gave him the ability to defend against extra-dimensional attacks, it wouldn’t matter how strong he was, he would still die.

Right now, the most important task at hand was to reach the second transformation, and become a Spirit-Soul Legendary. By tempering his spirit and soul to the highest degree, and honing his psychic powers, he would be able to sense spatial coordinates, and eventually, when his fleshly body was strong enough, open rifts in space itself.

The first two transformations were about the fundamentals.

After the Blood-Form Transformation and the Spirit-Soul Transformation were complete, and the spirit and flesh became one, it would be possible to attack space itself with psychic tempests, and pierce between planes.

Ordinary Space-Void Legendaries could create minor ripples in space, small-scale spatial spell formations. Psychic and fleshly body power were inherently limited, and thus, enlightenment of the five phases and yin and yang were required. Then, one could create a personal domain, and truly be powerful enough to brave the dangers of inter-planar travel.

But Yang Qi was different.

With his godly-class energy art, he was on a higher level. Every time he increased in level, heaven-shaking, earth-toppling transformations would occur. For him, the Energy Arts level and Lifeseizing level were all about establishing a foundation. They counted for almost nothing, and in ancient times, such practitioners weren’t even qualified to be called energy warriors. However, everything was different in the Legendary level. The advancements he would make in that level would be very dramatic. For example, when he reached the second Legendary transformation, he wouldn’t need to use true energy or his fleshly body at all. He would be able to form psychic tempests that could level mountains in the blink of an eye.

By combining his soul and physical body, he could unleash truly incredible power, and then casually tear rifts into space itself, holes which he could then travel through. At that point, braving spatial tempests would be an easy thing to do.

Yang Qi’s Space-Void Transformation would be very different from the ordinary version. After all, connecting with hell was not something that could be done lightly.

And not even he had any idea of what he would be able to do with the Grand Emperor's Pagoda at that point.

But he was certain of one thing; reaching the next level would not be easy. Although he now had a huge collection of spirit stones of various grades, that would only help a bit. In the Legendary level, enlightenment was more important than raw power. Worse, breaking through the barriers of levels with a godly-class energy art was far more difficult, and involved numerous powerful bottlenecks.

Now, he was considering using these five phases treasures to try to break through his current bottleneck, and at the same time, figuring out exactly what Young Master Shroud-Heaven was up to.

Perhaps Hua Tianxiong couldn’t discern the truth, but with the God Legion Seal, Yang Qi was confident that he would be fine.

Within the Hellfire Crucible, the lamp, dagger-axe, shoot, sand, and water were all beginning to tremble.

As true energy poured into the treasures, Yang Qi’s keen senses passed over them. For one thing, he noticed that someone had used powerful magic to imprint each object with a spatial nexus, which allowed pure quintessence energy of the five phases to pour into them freely from another location.

The five phases quintessence energy from the Rich-Lush Continent was actually heterogeneous and impure. Practicing cultivation with it was not only very difficult, it was also a huge waste of time. However, it was often a necessary evil. For example, if someone cultivated a fire-type energy art, they would absolutely require the quintessence energy of the fire element. Sometimes, refining and purifying it would take dozens of years or even more than a hundred.

But these five phases spatial nexuses were drawing in incredibly pure versions of the five phases elements. Yang Qi was even able to sense that the spatial nexuses in the five objects led to five, enormous worlds.

They were unique planes of their own, each of which were the ultimate expressions of the metal element, wood element, water element, fire element and earth element.

Sadly, Yang Qi had not reached the Space-Void Transformation, much less the Personal-Domain Transformation. Therefore, he couldn’t possibly use the spatial coordinates to actually travel to those planes.

Instead of absorbing the items directly, or trying to extract the five phases quintessence energy, he was simply melting them in the Hellfire Crucible, and hoping that something would come of it.

However, even after three days and three nights, nothing special seemed to be happening. The five phases treasures looked exactly the same, and even glittered brightly within the flames.

Hua Fengfeng sat cross-legged off to the side, watching in amazement. What Yang Qi was doing was something that most Legendary elders couldn’t do.

Meanwhile, deep in the Sun Moon Institute’s Minorbrilliance World, a man and woman were watching a projection of Yang Qi sitting there with Hua Fengfeng. They were none other than Hua Tianxiong and his wife Yan Chenxing.

Yan Chenxing was Hua Fengfeng’s mother, and was also a powerful Never-Dying Legendary. Although she couldn’t compare to preeminent individuals like Hua Tianxiong and the Crown Prince, she was still very powerful, and also profoundly beautiful. Furthermore, she was a descendant of the Sun Moon Institute’s current head of academics, Yan Wuya.

“What do you think of him, my dear?” Hua Tianxiong said, a slight smile on his face. “Our high-and-mighty daughter actually found a genius of a man. Seems we can finally rest our hearts at ease.”

“This Yang Qi is barely twenty, and he's already a Legendary?” Yan Chenxing said. She sounded very pleased. “Extraordinary. Although, what type of energy art does he cultivate? I can’t tell. On the outside, he seems holy and pure, but on a substructural level, there seems to be pressure from hell. It’s actually provoking a reaction from my soul.”

Hua Tianxiong nodded in agreement. “That crucible is very unique. From what I can tell, its fire resembles something mentioned in the most ancient records, Cleansing Flame of the Heavenly World. However, I would have to do more research to confirm. What is he doing, exactly? Sacrificing those five phases treasures? It's been three days and three nights, and he still hasn't absorbed them. What’s going on?”

“Maybe he suspects they’ve been tampered with.”

Hua Tianxiong shook his head. “Impossible. I checked them thoroughly with our institute's Radiant Paradise God-Eye. They’re five phases treasures without a hint of demon energy. Although, he's a very meticulous kid. He doesn’t trust anybody when it comes to his own personal safety. I’d say he's the perfect person to keep Fengfeng safe. He’s definitely superior to all the other young elites that we considered in the past. He's even superior to the holy neophytes here in the Sun Moon Institute.”

“Very true! If the two of us fail to reach the Great Sage level, and fade away into nothing, then at least we’ve found the ideal husband to take care of Fengfeng. This world is as vicious and dangerous as a gale from the Nine Serenities underworld, but at least we have him to keep her safe. Ai!”

RUMBLE!

Even as Hua Fengfeng’s parents looked on sighing, an enormous gate appeared behind Yang Qi down on the mountain. Instantly, boundlessly evil devil energy erupted out into the open, and it was just barely possible to see countless devil-ghosts, spirit bodies, vengeful souls emerging from hell, screaming as they then shot toward the Hellfire Crucible.

Instantly, the flames there leapt higher.

The entities emerging from the gate were literally acting as fuel for the Hellfire Crucible, causing it to burn ten times as hot as before.

In his current level, Yang Qi was finally able to work more properly with the Hell Portal. He could now use it to summon devil-ghosts, spirit bodies, and vengeful souls from some of the nearest hellish locations.

Because he was not yet in the Space-Void Transformation, he could not summon physical entities, only spirit creatures. But they were still very powerful. In fact, if he was simply summoning them out into the open, then before long, everything for thousands of kilometers would transform into a kingdom of devil-ghosts. It would quickly transform into a place like the Blackcorpse or Fiendcorpse Mountains.

“What is he doing?” Hua Tianxiong murmured in shock. “Is that some sort of consummate devil art? Although it's not common to see summoning techniques, it is possible to break the limits of matter and space to bring living entities from other worlds.”

Yan Chenxing’s face drained of blood. “You’re right. That's a powerful devil art, a summoning technique. Look, there are even Lifeseizing-level devil-ghosts coming out of that portal. How could he possibly be summoning things like that?”

“He’s using those devil-ghosts as fuel for that crucible. I've never seen or even heard of such a thing.” Unsure of exactly what was happening, Hua Tianxiong continued to observe carefully.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi heard a voice speaking to him in Godtongue.

“The legion of gods uses devil-ghosts as sacrifices to the glory of the Lord. Burn them to provide radiance and heat….”

RUMBLE!

Immense heat surged from the Hellfire Crucible, which was now glowing with dazzling brightness. Divine light pulsed out, transforming into numerous angels with pure white wings, who then flew in a constant stream into the five phases treasures.

Then, a third eye appeared on Yang Qi’s forehead, casting such brilliance onto the treasures that it was impossible for anything to be hidden inside of them.

At that point, a green flicker could be seen in the depths of the treasures.

“A heaven-demon seed!” Hua Tianxiong blurted, his face falling.

Chapter 229: Heaven-Demon Seed

“Damnation! That Young Master Shroud-Heaven is truly a vile creature.” Hua Tianxiong was thunderstruck by the implications of what he was seeing.

He had personally inspected the five phases treasures, and hadn’t noticed anything amiss. And yet Yang Qi, after several days and nights of refinement work, actually identified the nefarious truth. There was actually a heaven-demon seed hidden in the treasures! How could Hua Tianxiong not be incensed?

Back on the mountain peak, Yang Qi was looking at the faint green glow inside of the melted five phases treasures. ‘Young Master Shroud-Heaven really is up to no good.’

Clearly, it was some sort of seed, and it seemed to fairly radiate a sensation of extreme age. It was actually covered with countless tiny spikes, all of which radiated intense demon energy. This thing had a will of its own, and could easily take over a person’s thoughts and even their soul.

It would then transform them into something different, something demonic. It was nothing to take lightly. Clearly, this was a trump card belonging to Young Master Shroud-Heaven. No wonder he had so casually handed over so much wealth to Yang Qi. He had hoped that once Yang Qi refined the five phases treasures for his own use, he would get it all back, and the Grand Emperor's Pagoda to boot.

‘Demonfolk really can't be trusted. What a complete scoundrel.’ Yang Qi examined the heaven-demon seed for a long moment. Then, instead of destroying it, he waved his hand, causing a sealing mark to settle onto it, before sucking it into his forehead.

Suddenly, two blurs could be seen as Hua Tianxiong and Yan Chenxing appeared in front of him.

“Yang Qi!” Hua Tianxiong said anxiously. “That’s a heaven-demon seed! Be very careful! Not even I noticed it before, which means it’s highly likely Great Sage Shroud-Heaven himself put it there. That seed can turn even the most consummate human geniuses into Demonfolk. There are explanations about these things in the ancient records of the Sun Moon Institute. Why did you absorb it? Hurry up and expel it! I can help you destroy it.”

“I’ll be fine,” Yang Qi said with a smile. “The immense power of the heaven-demon seed will actually be very helpful. It's connected to Young Master Shroud-Heaven's soul, so if I destroyed it, he would know, and that could have a negative effect on our plans. Let’s wait until he tries to make a move, and then he’ll reap what he’s sown. Besides, the seed will help me to keep track of Young Master Shroud-Heaven’s movements. And who knows, once the fighting breaks out, it might even provide some helpful information about the Crown Prince.”

“You’re really sure you can control it?” Hua Tianxiong asked doubtfully.

“Absolutely,” Yang Qi replied with a confident nod. “I cultivate an ancient energy art specifically designed to control demon-devils and the like, a secret technique passed down through the ages. It makes it virtually impossible for demon-devils to harm me.”

“So, that’s how it is.” Hua Tianxiong was feeling more and more pleased with Yang Qi. As far as he was concerned, Yang Qi was the type of prodigy who came along only once every ten thousand years. And as long as he had enough time to prepare, he seemed like the perfect candidate to stand up to the Crown Prince.

Yang Qi put away the five phases treasures, and then took the time to formally offer greetings. “Greetings, Uncle, exalted Aunt.”

“There’s no need for such formality,” Yan Chenxing said, in just the way a mother-in-law would talk to a son-in-law. Inside, she thought, ‘This young man is no simple individual. He has the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, and he also has acute senses that surpass those of ordinary people. He’s cautious, loyal, and righteous. He really would be the perfect husband for Fengfeng.’

All of a sudden, Yang Qi seemed to realize what was going on. “Uncle, you’ll be trying to break into the Great Sage level soon. From what I've heard, it's a very dangerous undertaking, with an eighty to ninety percent chance of mortal failure. When the time comes, I’ll lend you my Grand Emperor's Pagoda to help you with your breakthrough. Hua Fengfeng is my sworn sister, after all. I have some urgent matters to attend to at the Demi-Immortal Institute, so I’ll need to say farewell for now.”

Not waiting for a response, he rose to his feet and vanished.

“The little punk,” Yan Chenxing said, shaking her head. She looked over at Hua Tianxiong. “He’s very perceptive. That said, if he's not interested, we shouldn’t be pushy.”

Hua Fengfeng was quite bright, and had already picked up on what was happening. Face turning red from both anger and embarrassment, she said, “Father, Mother. What are you talking about?”

Hua Tianxiong smiled. “Fengfeng, this Yang Qi is clearly a natural-born genius. He’s cool-headed, meticulous, and takes time to plan things out. He's definitely going to accomplish great things. Think about it. You’re a proud girl, and you don't like any of the geniuses here in the Sun Moon Institute, so don’t let him get away.”

“Hpmh!” Feeling more angry and embarrassed by the second, Hua Fengfeng snorted coldly and looked away. Hua Tianxiong and Yan Chenxing exchanged a slight smile, then vanished without a trace.

**

High above the sea of clouds, Yang Qi looked down at the Sun Moon Institute, mixed emotions playing out on his face. It was hard to say exactly what he was thinking, but after a moment he shook his head to clear his thoughts.

‘Although I took the initial steps of breaking down the five phases treasures, I'm not in the position to fully absorb them. I need my fleshly body to be a lot stronger, and also need to reach the Spirit-Soul Transformation.’

After the three days and three nights of work with the five phases treasures, he was stronger than ever.

However, he still had not pushed the Blood-Form Transformation to the highest level it was capable of reaching with a godly-class energy art. He needed to push his fleshly body to greater heights before he could stimulate the psychic element.

The physical body and the mind were closely connected; even ordinary people who had very strong physical bodies would often have extremely strong minds. Conversely, weak people would often be weak mentally.

After the Blood-Form Transformation reached a peak level of power, one’s mental abilities would eventually be able to create a psychic tempest which could rip apart the void. That was the beginning of the Spirit-Soul Transformation.

Most ordinary people who had a fleshly body as strong as Yang Qi’s, or even one only a tenth as strong, would already have succeeded with their psychic tempest. However, Yang Qi was different. He needed more cultivation before he reached that point.

What he intended to do now was head back to the Demi-Immortal Institute so that he could officially become a holy neophyte. That change in status would be incredible; he would be so important that most grand elders would be helpless to do anything to him officially. In fact, holy neophytes technically outranked the elders, as they were the ones who could eventually reach the rank of chancellor.

Holy neophytes were among the most important people in the Demi-Immortal Institute, and as one, Yang Qi would finally be able to openly build the Sage Monarch Society into a force that could protect its members.

In his current state, he could travel hundreds or even thousands of kilometers in the briefest of moments, so it didn’t take him long to reach the Demi-Immortal Institute.

It was currently bustling, with people out and about everywhere. The outer and inner campus students were all going about their tasks with vigor, hoping to stand out among the crowd. Elite students were going out on missions, or returning from them, hoping to use their rewards to reach a higher level of enlightenment. The conclave students were busy at work trying to become Legendaries. After all, holy neophytes had true freedom and independence.

When Yang Qi landed, his immense aura immediately attracted attention.

“Is that Yang Qi? He was the champion of the Inter-Institutional Martial Arts Competition, but once the competition ended, he vanished without a trace. Now he's back?”

“Quick, go tell Yun Hailan and the leaders of the Crown Prince Society.”

“His aura is incredible. And look, he’s heading right for the Academy of Sage Studies. What do you think he’s doing?”

“There’s only one reason to go to the Academy of Sage Studies, and that’s to get a promotion. He’s still an elite student, right? But considering he reached Quinary Lifeseizing, I guess it means he’s going to apply to be a conclave student.”

Everyone was curious about why this person who had only recently been put in his place by the Crown Prince had unexpectedly returned to the institute.

Most people had assumed that he would leave and never come back. But now, here he was, in what seemed like an open provocation to the Crown Prince Society.

As soon as Yang Qi stepped into the Academy of Sage Studies, the elders there looked up in astonishment. War-Soldier and War-Sage both stepped forward to meet him.

Elder War-Sage, a Nonary Lifeseizer, and the leader of the Academy of Sage Studies, was actually quite afraid of Yang Qi. However, that didn't stop him from reaching out to block his path. “What are you doing here, Yang Qi? What do you want?”

“What am I doing here?” Yang Qi replied with a cool smile. Then he stamped his foot, causing an aura to envelop the hall that contained the power of magical law. Strange phenomena appeared in the sky above, and everyone felt as though heaven and earth were about to crack and shatter. It was definitely power that was different from the Lifeseizing level on a substructural level.

“He’s a Legendary….”

“That’s the power of the Legendary level. I can’t believe Yang Qi's a Legendary!”

The elders of the Academy of Sage Studies were all taken completely aback, and didn’t know what to say. The envy and jealousy in their eyes was clear. After all, Legendaries were all important people in the Demi-Immortal Institute. They were true energy warriors, the people who, in ancient times, were said to be able to walk the path of becoming an immortal.

“I'm here to apply to be a holy neophyte. I've reached the Legendary level, so I should qualify, right? Please, Elders, I await your evaluation.”

The elders were so stunned that it took them a long moment to recover their composure. Then, Elder War-Sage said, “This is no small matter, Yang Qi. Wait here. I’ll go inform my superiors in the Minorcosm World. We need more witnesses present to raise someone to holy neophyte, including the chancellor.”

“Fine. Do what you have to do. I’ll wait here.” Yang Qi remained standing in place quietly, as immovable as a mountain.

Instantly, an uproar swept through the institute.

It was usually a big deal when someone was promoted to elite student. And there was little need to mention new conclave students. Such people were the envy of millions of students. But for a Legendary to appear, a holy neophyte, well, that was something that was a true rarity.

Chapter 230: Deliberately Making Things Difficult

“What? Yang Qi reached the Legendary level? How is that even possible? Is it really that easy to become a Legendary? It’s only been a few months! How did he do it? So he's going to be a holy neophyte now?”

There were quite a few grand elders clustered around Yun Hailan in the Minorcosm World.

Patriarchs Wind and Cloud. The Seven Preheaven Masters. The Three Pure Yang Elders. Legendaries were incredibly powerful figures in the institute. In fact, at this point, the only grand elder who could possibly cause any trouble for Yang Qi was Grand Elder Feat-Virtue, the very same one who had sold the Euphoria Godstone to him. In his mind, he had really pulled a fast one on Yang Qi. Little did he know that the godstone actually turned out to be extremely beneficial, and the best foundation Yang Qi could have acquired to build on.

The thirteen Legendaries were powering a spell formation for Yun Hailan, a Thirteen Heavenly Gates Reincarnation Formation that was in the midst of thoroughly transforming her. There were two magical treasures floating above her, the Gate of the Great Void and the Pearl of the Thousand Illusions World, which were being used to form an out-of-body incarnation, a second nascent divinity.

Yun Hailan was now at the peak of the Nonary Lifeseizing level, just on the verge of becoming a Legendary.

However, breaking into the Legendary level was no simple task. She had been working day and night with the help of these grand elders, their true energy stimulating her blood flow, all in the hopes of achieving the next breakthrough. Unfortunately, she still wasn’t ready.

And now, she received the astonishing news that Yang Qi was a Legendary. It was such a shock that her true energy suddenly went wildly out of control, and she coughed up a mouthful of blood. It was a dangerous situation that could end in death if she didn’t regain control.

It took some struggle, but she stabilized herself and then looked over at the Crown Prince Society student who had brought the news, who was virtually soaked with sweat.

“Are you absolutely sure?”

“Yes,” he replied. “Yang Qi is at the Academy of Sage Studies right now, waiting for enough elders to show up. Even now, word is being sent summoning various grand elders. I took a look myself, and he’s definitely in the Legendary level. There’s no way that aura of his could be a counterfeit.”

“Damnation. How could this be happening?” Yun Hailan’s eyes glittered with raw malice.

It was at this point that the sound of bugles suddenly echoed out from the Academy of Sage Studies.

“The Sagely Might Bugles are sounding,” Patriarch Cloud said. “That means someone is being promoted to holy neophyte. Fellow Grand Elders, we need to get over there immediately to confirm what’s going on. We’re responsible for making sure new holy neophytes meet all the requirements. We can only accept loyalists, not monsters.”

“Regardless of anything, we have to stop Yang Qi from becoming a holy neophyte,” Yun Hailan said. “That’s what the Crown Prince ordered. Even if he really is a Legendary now, we absolutely, positively must stop him!”

“We hate Yang Qi as much as you do,” Patriarch Wind said. “He might want to become a holy neophyte, but that’s easier said than done. We have to crush him, and crush him hard. Force him onto the heretical path of wretch-devils, and make sure he can never recover. Wipe him out for all time!”

Patriarchs Wind and Cloud were completely stunned by this development, and knew that if Yang Qi became a holy neophyte, he wouldn’t just be on their level, he would surpass them.

“Very well, Grand Elders,” Yun Hailan said. “I’ll entrust the matter to you. Not everyone in the institute works for the Crown Prince, and some grand elders will likely welcome Yang Qi as a holy neophyte. After all, Legendaries are important assets to the institute as a whole.”

“Fear not,” Grand Elder Feat-Virtue said. “We’ve made great progress in winning people over to our side. Although, the leader of the Gentlemen’s Society, Master Wind Gentleman, has really been putting pressure on me lately. I hope the Crown Prince can offer some support in that regard.”

“We’re aware of that, and the Crown Prince has been informed,” Yun Hailan replied. “He’s very pleased with the loyalty you’ve shown. We’ve already sent Master Wind Gentleman a warning. The Crown Prince will be returning soon, and any who oppose him will be killed.”

“What?” Patriarch Cloud exclaimed. “The Crown Prince is returning this soon? I thought it was supposed to take five years.”

Yun Hailan rose to her feet. “That was false information that the Crown Prince intentionally spread to make them think he was injured worse than he really was. The truth is that everything is going according to his master plan. Soon, he’ll be a Great Sage. Grand Elders, please hurry over and take care of Yang Qi.”

“Of course,” Grand Elder Feat-Virtue said, chuckling viciously. “How dare this good-for-nothing punk try to become a holy neophyte! I'm definitely going to teach him a lesson he won’t ever forget.” He couldn’t stop thinking about the incident with the Euphoria Godstone, and how easy it had been to bully Yang Qi. Because of that, he wasn’t afraid of him at all.

Whoooosh…. The large group of grand elders flew into the air and headed toward the Academy of Sage Studies.

Yun Hailan remained behind, her expression a complex mixture of jealousy and hatred. ‘I underestimated you yet again, Yang Qi. I thought I was going to reach the Legendary level first, but then I hit this bottleneck. How did you do it so quickly? Well, it doesn’t matter. I’ll make sure you get what’s coming to you. Almost everyone in the Demi-Immortal Institute is loyal to the Crown Prince Society now. I’ve even got plenty of grand elders working for me. You, on the other hand, are all alone. How do you expect to accomplish anything like that? I think that, for the purposes of becoming a Legendary, I need to enact that plan.'

Suddenly, Yun Hailan began to murmur some sort of mysterious enchantment. A moment later, a voice pierced through the void, powerful and domineering to the extreme, almost like the voice of heaven itself.

“Yes?”

It was none other than the Crown Prince!

“Crown Prince, I want to start Operation Azure Heavens.”

“Are you sure, Hailan? Operation Azure Heavens is nothing to take lightly. Not even I would enact it unless absolutely necessary. You’ll only have one fleeting chance to gain enlightenment of the dao of the azure heavens, and have the seed of that heavenly scripture implanted in your heart. If you fail, you will return to the dust. Not even your soul will remain. You have the blood of a sea god, the blood of a divine dragon, and other mysterious powers. You're an important person in my long-term plan.”

“It's fine. When I succeed with Operation Azure Heavens, then it will help your plan immensely. Besides, Yang Qi is a Legendary now, and he's about to become a holy neophyte. If he succeeds, he’ll have immense power. Other than you, no one will be able to keep him in check. Therefore, I can't wait.”

“Oh? That brat became a Legendary?” The Crown Prince was clearly surprised. To him, it was as if an ant had crawled onto his foot in annoying fashion. “Well, once I'm out of seclusion I’ll kill him.”

“You won’t have to,” Yun Hailan said casually. “I’ll personally put an end to him. By the way, I heard that he acquired the Grand Emperor's Pagoda.”

“What? The Grand Emperor’s Pagoda?! I can’t believe a low-down scumbag like him got it.” A psychic tempest rolled out through the void, seemingly strong enough to shake the Minorcosm World to the core, and definitely powerful enough to destroy Nonary Lifeseizers.

“It’s true,” Yun Hailan said coolly. “The chancellor sent you to the Heavendawn Quarry to get the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, but Yang Qi, a measly Lifeseizer, somehow managed to snatch it. It was definitely the chancellor who helped him. He must be worried about you getting too powerful, and is trying to play both sides. By giving the Grand Emperor's Pagoda to Yang Qi, he ensured that you wouldn’t get the full legacy of Grand Emperor Rich-Lush.”

“I was already aware of that,” the Crown Prince said. “The moment I saw the Grand Emperor's Pagoda flying away, I knew that the chancellor was behind it. Well, in the end, I’ll make sure he realizes how stupid it was to try to play both sides. I'm the Crown Prince. I'm the Son of Heaven! I'm a god from heaven descended into the mortal world. All living things will acknowledge allegiance to me. Not just the Rich-Lush Continent. Not just the four institutes. All of the countless energy warriors from the most powerful continents will be reduced to ashes if they cross me. Anyone who resists me is a rebel against heaven! Understand, Yun Hailan?! Very well. I suppose I need to help you with Operation Azure Heavens. Come, join me here!”

RUMBLE!

A massive psychic tempest swept through the Minorcosm World and wrapped up Yun Hailan. Then, she vanished.

**

Meanwhile, many other grand elders in the Minorcosm World were reacting to the sound of the Sagely Might Bugles.

“What? Someone reached the Legendary level?”

Holy Daughter Manyflowers was in her part of the Minorcosm World, absorbing Nine-Yang Immortal Energy. However, as soon as she heard the bugles, she flew up into the air and looked off in the direction of the Academy of Sage Studies. When she saw Yang Qi standing there, thrumming with energy, she realized instantly that he was a Blood-Form Legendary. ‘I can’t believe he got to the Legendary level so fast. It's a miracle. However, there are definitely going to be people who cause trouble. I need to head over to provide support.’

‘So many grand elders.’ Yang Qi thought. Numerous grand elders were converging in the Academy of Sage Studies. Soon, he saw Patriarchs Wind and Cloud, the Seven Preheaven Masters, the Three Pure Yang Elders, Holy Daughter Manyflowers and Grand Elder Feat-Virtue. There were other experts whose names he didn’t know. Before long, the hall was relatively packed, and everyone was looking at him.

“I trust you’ve been well since we last met, Grand Elder Feat-Virtue?” Yang Qi said, his eyes flashing with killing intent. “By the way, thanks a lot for that Euphoria Godstone. That was what pushed me into the Legendary level. The life force quintessence it gave me was exactly what I needed.”

“You!” Grand Elder Feat-Virtue blurted. A moment ago he had been nearly dancing with joy, but now he had to fight not to cough up blood. “You actually used a wretch-devil stone to become a Legendary! Well, you're obviously a monster! A true heretical villain! You want to be a holy neophyte? No way! I suggest that he be locked up immediately, and have the wretch-devil energy purged from him by force!”

Chapter 231: You Qualify?

Grand Elder Feat-Virtue’s words echoed throughout the hall for everyone to hear clearly.

He was a very important person, a Legendary who ran the entire Hall of Feats and Virtue. When it came down to it, he controlled what treasures could be purchased with merit points. Considering he essentially controlled all of the most important supplies in the Demi-Immortal Institute, no one would ever think to defy him. Anyone who did would suddenly find themselves incapable of making any useful purchases.

He was a greedy, hateful man, notorious for his corruption. However, he had long since gained the support of the Crown Prince, and thus, no one could do a thing about him. After all, no one in the institute outranked the Crown Prince other than the chancellor. And for the most part, the chancellor didn’t pay attention to the daily affairs. The Crown Prince and the holy neophytes ran most things. In some ways, the chancellor was like a mortal emperor who sat back and watched his various sons vie for his inheritance.

To continue the comparison, that would make the grand elders like the civil and military officials.

And of course, the princes would always try to get the officials on their side. In this case, Grand Elder Feat-Virtue was clearly working for the Crown Prince. Now that Yang Qi had reached the Legendary level, he was like a brand new prince in an imperial court.

And thus, it was no surprise that Grand Elder Feat-Virtue was the first to leap out and try to put Yang Qi in his place. He absolutely could not allow Yang Qi to be a holy neophyte. Otherwise, things would immediately start going bad for him. Holy neophytes were very powerful people, so if Yang Qi teamed up with someone like Master Wind Gentleman, then it would definitely be troublesome.

“Yang Qi, you really think a hellion like you can become a holy neophyte?” Grand Elder Feat-Virtue shouted. “Everybody, let’s join forces to crush him. If we don’t, it will be a disaster for the Demi-Immortal Institute! He deserves to die!”

Not waiting for anyone to respond he attacked, splaying his fingers wide, which caused a stream of translucent true energy to swirl out and form the shape of a cage. Lightning began to crackle on its surface as it then descended toward Yang Qi.

“Ghost Exterminating God Art. Lightning Cage. Wipe out all wretch-devils!”

Grand Elder Feat-Virtue was clearly hoping to kill Yang Qi as quickly as possible, then discuss the matter afterward. Because of that, he instantly resorted to his most powerful magical treasure, the Lightning Cage.

He also called upon his most powerful technique, the Ghost Exterminating God Art, which was specifically designed for slaying wretch-devils and vengeful souls.

As the Lightning Cage descended, numerous onlookers let out exclamations of shock. No one had expected that Grand Elder Feat-Virtue would disregard all protocol and simply attack the new Legendary, Yang Qi.

It was the type of thing that rarely ever happened.

In the institutes, Legendaries were proud individuals that everyone respected. For a grand elder to ambush one as soon as they applied to be a holy neophyte seemed like an impossibility.

And yet, that was exactly what Grand Elder Feat-Virtue was doing. To him, it clearly didn’t matter that Yang Qi was a Legendary. At the moment, he technically wasn’t a holy neophyte, and therefore, it was the perfect time to end his life.

“Have a death wish?!” Yang Qi snarled.

Even as the Lightning Cage descended, a massive force of energy erupted from him. It was like a million volcanoes, accompanied by blinding light that filled the area. Everything began to tremble as though a god-devil from the distant past had suddenly stepped out into the open.

BOOOOM!

The Lightning Cage exploded.

As for Yang Qi, he stood in place, aura pulsing, eyes flashing, killing intent burning. And then, he reached out to grab Grand Elder Feat-Virtue.

“How could this be happening!?” Grand Elder Feat-Virtue’s magical treasure had been broken, and he was sent stumbling backward, coughing up blood.

Yang Qi had the Physique of the Sovereign Lord now, and therefore, as his hand pierced through the air, all the energy flows in the area were sucked toward him. Everyone in the area was feeling the same thing: terror. His hand seemed capable of snatching up souls, and as people looked at it, it was as if heaven and earth disappeared, leaving only that shocking hand.

It was a hand that seemed capable of seizing the cosmos itself, with Yang Qi being its sovereign lord.

“Not good! Dammit!” Patriarchs Wind and Cloud both leaped forward, sending attacks heading directly at Yang Qi’s hand.

BOOM!

Everyone in the Academy of Sage Studies was completely taken aback. Massive amounts of force were being unleashed as Patriarchs Wind and Cloud leaped to the defense of Grand Elder Feat-Virtue.

The two patriarchs were very strong. Patriarch Wind was in the third Legendary transformation, making him a Space-Void Legendary, whereas Patriarch Cloud was one level higher, being a Five-Phases Legendary, much the same as Blightczar Manyshadows.

Originally, they had hoped to teach Yang Qi a lesson, but now their focus was saving Grand Elder Feat-Virtue from him.

After pulling him to safety, they exchanged a glance, and both could see the shock in the other’s eyes.

Glaring back at Yang Qi, Patriarch Wind said, “Yang Qi, how dare you make such a vicious move on Grand Elder Feat-Virtue. You’ve really got some gall!”

“I can’t believe you’re so willing to disregard the rules of the Demi-Immortal Institute,” Patriarch Cloud added. “What kind of a wretch-devil are you? Are you really planning to betray the institute?”

The accusations being made by Patriarchs Wind and Cloud were truly serious.

However, in response, Yang Qi chuckled coldly and said, “That’s a damn funny joke! Everyone present can attest to the fact that Grand Elder Feat-Virtue was the one to attack me, and right in the middle of the Academy of Sage Studies at that. All I was doing was defending myself. What difference is there between people like you, who invert right and wrong, and actual wretch-devils?”

“How impudent!” Patriarch Wind shot back. “Who are you in our institute? And who is Grand Elder Feat-Virtue? Perhaps you forgot that you're nothing but a lowly elite student. You’re about as far beneath Grand Elder Feat-Virtue as earth is from heaven. If he wants to punish you for some reason, he has every right to do so. What, you think you’re a holy neophyte or something?”

“Exactly!” shouted Grand Elder Feat-Virtue. “I was just trying to see what type of wretch-devil energy you have on you. The Demi-Immortal Institute is righteous and orthodox, so there’s no way we can allow wretch-devils like you here. It’s my job to rid the world of devils and demons! But you, bedeviled as you are, simply attacked me, a grand elder! It’s unforgivable! Elders, join me in attacking him! Seven Preheaven Masters! Three Pure Yang Elders! Patriarchs Wind and Cloud! Let’s kill him!”

The elders to which he spoke were the staunchest supporters of the Crown Prince Society present.

As for the other grand elders present, they merely looked on with cold eyes, waiting to see what would happen.

Holy Daughter Manyflowers was the only one to stride over to stand next to Yang Qi. Glaring coldly, she said, “Have you gone crazy, Grand Elder Feat-Virtue? Yang Qi is here to become a holy neophyte. Why are you causing such a scene? Any institute in this continent would be overjoyed to have a new Legendary, but instead, you humiliate Yang Qi by calling him a wretch-devil, and then attack him? What’s going on here? I’ll tell you. The lot of you work for the Crown Prince Society, and you just have it out for Yang Qi personally. Do you care for the Demi-Immortal Institute at all? Or just the Crown Prince?”

At this point, one of the Seven Preheaven Masters stepped forward, Master Jadecrux.

“How impudent of you, Holy Daughter Manyflowers!” he said. “What level is your cultivation base? How dare you speak to us in such a way!” He had the most powerful and enigmatic cultivation base of the group, being in the fifth Legendary transformation. As a Yin-Yang Legendary, he was roughly on the same level as Old Man Superdestruction, and clearly outranked Holy Daughter Manyflowers. In fact, complete silence filled the hall in response to his words.

All of the grand elders were Legendaries, but at the moment, there were none in the sixth transformation. After all, Personal-Domain Legendaries such as that could travel into the depths of space-time to harvest empyrean-baleful energy. Using that energy to form their personal domain, they could then attempt to reach the seventh transformation, the Ghost-God Transformation.

There were countless different heavens and earths in the universe, and each one had a different version of the thirty-six types of empyrean energy and seventy-two types of baleful energy. By absorbing them, one could empower ghost-gods in one’s domain, and thus have access to incredible force.

All of the institute’s Personal-Domain Legendaries were currently in secluded cultivation sessions, and thus Master Jadecrux of the Seven Preheaven Masters had the most authority of anyone present.

There were some others who had the same level of cultivation base, but at the moment, they were just waiting to see how things played out. After all, the combined force of the Seven Preheaven Masters, the Three Pure Yang Elders, Patriarchs Wind and Cloud, and Grand Elder Feat-Virtue was formidable to say the least.

“What did you just say, Master Jadecrux?” Holy Daughter Manyflowers said, her anger burning.

“I said your cultivation base is too low, so shut up and back down immediately!” Master Jadecrux had lost some very valuable items to Holy Daughter Manyflowers during the martial arts competition, thanks to him betting against Yang Qi. As far as he was concerned, this was the perfect opportunity to vent a bit of anger. “If you refuse, then don’t blame me for accusing you of being a heretical wretch-devil too. I’ll smash you down and lock you up in Myriad Devils Hall and let the horde of devils there feast on your skin. You’re a Blood-Form Legendary and I'm a Yin-Yang Legendary. We’re so far apart from each other that I'm like the sky and you're like the mud. What. You think you’re going to help Yang Qi or something?”

Master Jadecrux was blatantly using his cultivation base to push Holy Daughter Manyflowers around.

“You!” she growled, seething with anger. “One of these days, Master Jadecrux, I’ll slaughter you. Personally!”

“Are you threatening me?” he replied, his expression darkening. “We’re both grand elders, and yet you're openly saying you're going to slaughter me? I guess if I don’t crush you now, you’ll end up like this Yang Qi, a heretical wretch-devil to the core.”

With that, he began to walk forward, his eyes flashing with sinister light as he prepared to capture and humiliate Holy Daughter Manyflowers.

After all, with the chancellor not present, and the threat of the Crown Prince to rely on, no one would possibly try to stop him.

“Stay your hand!” Yang Qi said.

“What,” Master Jadecrux said, looking over at him with cold eyes. “What do you think you're going to do, you little wretch-devil? Wicked Daughter Manyflowers has obviously experienced cultivation deviation. You think you’re going to protect her? Well, fine. Just kneel and admit you're a wretch-devil. Then I’ll lock you in Myriad Devils Hall with her to await interrogation. As long as you confess, you’ll be able to keep living, but if you don’t, I’ll beat you till your souls disperse.”

“You think you’re strong enough to do that?” Yang Qi said, seemingly without a care in the world.

“Clearly, nobody can criticize me for what I'm about to do,” Master Jadecrux said with a chuckle. “There’s nothing you could say to defend yourself at this point. You will not become a holy neophyte this day.”

“Oh? What if I kill you? Could I be a holy neophyte then? Do you really qualify to stand in my way?”

Swish!

A spear shot out, seemingly from the depths of hell, piercing through the air until it was right in front of Master Jadecrux’s throat.

Chapter 232: None of You Qualify

The Infernal Deity Spear had made its appearance.

With that spear in hand, Yang Qi’s true energy could strike terror into the hearts of ghosts and gods. It could lock down onto any soul it wanted, and charge forth like an unstoppable army.

It was a sudden, deadly attack. He had long since reached the point of wanting to kill this Master Jadecrux, and as of this moment, had decided that the time had come to do exactly that.

The Crown Prince could break whatever rules he wanted, and Yang Qi couldn’t.

But in this situation, he had been pushed too far, and thus decided to bet on the God Legion Seal to help him smash anyone who stood in his way. Even if the chancellor showed up and tried to stop him, hopefully, the seal would defeat him as easily as it had defeated Ghost Emperor Yama.

There was no way that the measly Demi-Immortal Institute could truly threaten he who carried the legacy of the legion of gods, and bore the glory of the Lord.

The aura of Yang Qi’s Physique of the Sovereign Lord had reached a peak level, and his life force flourished mightily. In this moment, if he didn’t break the rules, he would be admitting that he was weak. And the consequences would be too horrible to contemplate, thus, he had one option: kill anyone who got in his way.

The Infernal Deity Spear materialized out of nowhere, seemingly summoned from some distant land, to appear only an inch in front of Master Jadecrux’s throat.

Master Jadecrux was surrounded by the power of the five phases and the energy of yin and yang. However, all of that was shattered by the spear, which was already a mere moment away from stabbing into his fleshly body and ripping him apart.

As a Yin-Yang Legendary, Master Jadecrux was constantly surrounded by fragments of space and the void, as well as reflections of the five phases, and yin and yang. Anyone less than a Space-Void Legendary would find that their attacks could never actually reach him. Even if they got within an inch of him, the remaining distance would still be like a space filled with endless mountains and rivers.

But Yang Qi was drawing on the Grand Emperor's Pagoda’s power, causing his attack to distort space itself, and reach his opponent’s body.

Yang Qi had already killed experts in the fourth Legendary transformation, such as Blightczar Manyshadows. Unfortunately, he was still weak compared to experts in the fifth transformation.

When it came to people like that, such as Old Man Superdestruction, all he could do was scramble to avoid being hit. Winning would be a much, much more difficult task, if not completely impossible.

But after making his deal with Young Master Shroud-Heaven, he acquired a massive amount of wealth, including many spirit stones, items that most energy arts cultivators could only dream of. After his three days and nights of working with the five phases treasures, he had dramatically refined his true energy. He had also tossed the slaughtered Blightczar Manyshadows into his Hell Portal to become a devil-spirit. At the same time, he had continued access to the flesh and blood of the asura which still remained in his Grand Emperor’s Pagoda. Because of that, he now had something new: a spore-devil.

Spore-devils were a fundamental aspect of the Hell Portal. When summoning monsters with the portal, it was necessary to have some entity to act as the leader, and that was the function of the spore-devil. The stronger Yang Qi’s cultivation base grew, the stronger his spore-devil would become; it was the metric by which to measure the quality of summoned monsters. Any fiend-devil that was weaker than the spore-devil could become a target for summoning, whereas devil-gods that were stronger than it could not be touched.

Without the spore-devil, it could theoretically be possible to summon a devil-god who was too strong, which would lead to Yang Qi being killed. As for those entities which could be summoned, they would be sealed with a mark that would force them to follow Yang Qi’s commands.

Yang Qi’s spore-devil was much stronger than Blightczar Manyshadows. After all, he had fused the man’s devil-spirit with the flesh and blood of the asura, which had been in the Never-Dying Transformation.

If Yang Qi were stronger, it might have been possible for his spore-devil to summon entities in the ninth Legendary transformation.

But at the moment, his limit was the fifth transformation; he could summon Yin-Yang Legendaries, and control them with such finesse that they were almost like his own Humanoid True Energy.

That was the trump card he had kept tucked away in case he needed to fight Old Man Superdestruction.

And because of working with the five phases treasures, he had made even more progress, and pushed himself higher within the Legendary level. He could actually unleash a psychic tempest at any moment to jump into the second Legendary transformation.

And therefore, this spear attack was definitely enough to kill Master Jadecrux.

Suddenly, everyone present felt the Nightfall Symphony tugging at their hearts and souls. In that instant, it was as if everyone realized that Master Jadecrux was in the last moment of his life.

His eyes were somewhat blank because of the Nightfall Symphony, and yet, a moment later, they flashed with clarity. Bellowing, he leapt backward.

“Demi-Immortal Teleportation!” he shouted. It was the most powerful of movement techniques.

Unfortunately for him, the Infernal Deity Spear was locked onto his aura, and before he could actually do anything, the spear stabbed deep into his shoulder.

Blood sprayed out in all directions, and Master Jadecrux let out a mixture between an agonized shriek and an enraged roar. His true energy erupted out, its power so intense that the roof of the Academy of Sage Studies immediately began to melt. At the same time, he did everything he could to try to destroy the Infernal Deity Spear.

However, Yang Qi twisted the spear, simultaneously summoning the enormous Hell Portal. Instantly, streams of devil-ghosts poured out like a river, following the spear to pierce into Master Jadecrux.

In the blink of an eye, Master Jadecrux was being consumed by a myriad of devils. His meridians were instantly infused with boundless devil energy, and his sea of energy became like a kingdom of ghosts.

“Damn wretch-devils!” Master Jadecrux realized that his life force was like a candle flickering in the wind, and that if he wasn't careful, he would die here.

Without any hesitation, he used an unheard-of magic. “Demi-Immortal Secret Magic! Great Wheel of Yin and Yang! Detonate! Life Force Combustion!”

Massive amounts of life force power surged out of his flesh and blood, burning him as it destroyed the wretch-devils, and even the Infernal Deity Spear.

Smack! The flesh and bones around the spear also exploded, ripping his arm off of his body.

“Freakish hellion!”

“I can’t believe you blind-sided him!”

The rest of the Seven Preheaven Masters all lunged forward to attack Yang Qi. These seven had practiced cultivation for so long together that they could act as one. As long as they weren’t caught off guard, they could virtually share each other’s thoughts.

“Come forth, Grand Emperor's Pagoda!” Yang Qi shouted, causing an ancient bronze pagoda to pop into being overhead. As it spun, it absorbed all of the attacks which had just been unleashed, causing sonorous booms to echo out.

Yang Qi didn’t even have to move a muscle. The spell formations in the pagoda kept him completely protected.

“Damnation!”

The other six of the Seven Preheaven Masters grabbed their strongest member, and quickly sent their true energy into him to heal him. Unfortunately, the exploded flesh and blood was not something that could be restored in a short time.

Henceforth, Master Jadecrux would have only one arm. Because of his advanced state of cultivation, the only way to regrow it would be to become a Never-Dying Legendary. Not even trying to transplant a new arm would help; the discordant energy and blood would cause any such transplant to quickly wither away.

“You Seven Preheaven Masters want to stop me from becoming a holy neophyte? Sadly, none of you qualify! You people believe that justice isn’t important, only power. Well fine. I’ll show you what true power is.” With that, Yang Qi sucked the Grand Emperor's Pagoda back into his body, and stood there with his hands clasped behind his back. It was almost as if nothing had happened a moment ago.

“What? He won, just like that? Master Jadecrux lost an arm and looks a hundred years older than a moment before. He must have used a technique to burn his longevity! That’s the only way he was able to defend himself. How is that even possible? Yang Qi just reached the Legendary level, and Master Jadecrux is in the Yin-Yang Transformation!”

“They're as apart from each other as earth is from heaven. How could the fight have ended like this!?”

“The Grand Emperor's Pagoda? I wasn’t seeing things, was I? That magical treasure was the Grand Emperor's Pagoda! Grand Emperor Rich-Lush leveled mountains and changed the flow of rivers with that thing. It’s a magical treasure for Great Sages!”

“Strong. So strong! He’s only in the first Legendary transformation, but he can already beat someone in the fifth! That’s like the Crown Prince back in the day! Another person who can just break the rules. Another genius in the Demi-Immortal Institute….”

Everyone was discussing what had just played out. Whether the elite students, conclave students, or even the Legendary grand elders, they were all nearly mad with shock. However, they somehow managed to keep their cool.

By this point, a huge sea of people had surrounded the Academy of Sage Studies, and more were showing up every moment.

Of course, none other than Yang Qi dared to actually enter the place.

Holy Daughter Manyflowers almost felt like she didn’t know Yang Qi, and was eyeing him with a strange look. Never in her wildest dreams could she have guessed that he would reach this level, that he would become a maverick able to disregard all the rules, just like the Crown Prince.

As the moments ticked by, Master Jadecrux seemed to also regain his composure. He looked down at the stump of his arm, and then assessed the damage to his vital energy. Finally, he looked back up.

“How dare you hurt me!” he shouted, sounding like a wild beast. “You wretch-devil! Preheaven Masters, hear my command. Set up the grand spell formation and use our preheaven powers to slaughter this wretch-devil! Students of the Demi-Immortal Institute, I order you to all join us. Slaughter this beast, and you’ll be rewarded. Attack!”

As far as he was concerned, the only way to cleanse his humiliation was to use the surrounding sea of people to cut down Yang Qi right here and now.

“Seven Preheaven Masters?” Yang Qi said with a chuckle. “More like Seven Pieces of Trash. Alright. I'm ready to fight a big battle, and I'm ready to kill all of you! Prepare yourselves to go to hell.” As of this moment, Yang Qi really was ready to defy all laws and principles, just like the Crown Prince had. Without any hesitation, he summoned his Infernal Deity Spear, splitting it into seven pieces that shot toward his seven opponents.

In the blink of an eye, the Nightfall Symphony filled the Demi-Immortal Institute. Dead gods joined their voices into a choir that shook the spirits and souls of everyone who heard it.

Chapter 233: Strike First, Achieve Lethality

It was just like the old saying: Strike first, achieve lethality. Strike second, meet calamity. There was no way Yang Qi would give his enemies a chance to surround him and attack him all at once. It was obvious he couldn’t resolve this enmity with the Seven Preheaven Masters. Therefore, he had to fight fire with fire.

However vicious his enemies were, he would be more vicious!

Beat the enemy down. Kill them. That was Yang Qi’s style.

He who hesitates is lost.

He used his Infernal Deity Spear to fight seven opponents at the same time, and each attack became like an enormous god of death, ready to harvest any souls it encountered. In the blink of an eye, the Nightfall Symphony swept over all of the Seven Preheaven Masters.

Before they could fully recover from the shock of the initial clash, much less set up their formation, Yang Qi attacked.

Each spear was as powerful as a mountain, attacking from numerous angles, a firestorm of destruction that was unparalleled under heaven.

Yang Qi even threw in all of the power of the ancient megamammoths that he could muster, making the attacks more deadly in nature. The Grand Emperor's Pagoda appeared again, and the power of space poured out. At the same time, a vertical eye opened up on Yang Qi’s forehead.

As it did, destructive light exploded out.

The Lord's Eye had opened!

The glory of the Lord did not tolerate blasphemers, and His light shone upon all. The Lord existed above the legion of gods, and his representative on earth was Yang Qi.

BOOM!

The weakest among the seven, Master Kilocrux, was stabbed through, provoking a bloodcurdling scream that originated in his very soul.

Pop!

His body was torn open, sending blood and internal organs flying everywhere as he slammed into the ground, where he lay gasping for breath, his true energy leaking out rapidly from his destroyed sea of energy.

Now that blood had been spilled, Yang Qi only became more vicious, like a wolf or tiger. He was like the Sovereign Lord now, like the very entity who had created everything, who was a father to all living beings, the source of all life, and at the same time, someone who could destroy anything, exact punishment to cleanse any sin. He was like the maker of the world and the creator of space-time itself.

The Infernal Deity Spear was incisive enough to harvest any life with the greatest of ease.

Crack!

Another Legendary grand elder, Master Macrocrux, was stabbed through, leaving a gaping, bloody wound in his chest.

When Master Jadecrux saw what was happening, his guts twisted inside of him. “Wretch-devil! Beast! You’ll die for this! Hurry! Hurry and kill him, everyone! Cut him down!”

However, with the Grand Emperor's Pagoda to protect him, Yang Qi couldn’t be hit. Any true energy that was used on him ended up being sucked right into the pagoda.

The only way to avoid that was to simply parry his attacks, and not fight back.

Even as the words left Master Jadecrux’s mouth, one of his compatriots, Master Goldcrux, felt his meridians shattering, and his body being devoured by monsters.

“Another one down!”

“This Yang Qi… he's crazy.”

“Is he a god or something? Not even the Seven Preheaven Masters are a match for him!”

“Come on, let's get out of here. If we stick around here who knows what horrific thing might befall us.”

“Yeah, let’s go! This place is going to collapse. That Grand Emperor's Pagoda is probably going to destroy all the buildings in the area.”

Yang Qi was dealing with the Seven Preheaven Masters with his Infernal Deity Spear and Lord's Eye, making deadly moves that made it clear who the superior party was. As the buildings in the area collapsed one by one, subterranean spirit lodes erupted, sending spirit energy high into the air. And in turn, Yang Qi used the Grand Emperor's Pagoda to create a perfect connection to heaven and earth, to power each and every one of his moves to the ultimate degree.

“Kill him! He’s become a monster!”

“Slaughter him! Everyone, hurry up and attack! Kill him!”

Patriarchs Wind and Cloud, the Three Pure Yang Elders, and even Grand Elder Feat-Virtue simply couldn’t sit around waiting to see what happened. Casting aside any worries about the consequences, they lunged forward, joining forces to attack Yang Qi.

Yang Qi shot up into the air, shining brightly, the Grand Emperor's Pagoda rapidly increasing in size to block the attacks of all of his opponents.

“Since you’re throwing yourselves at me, I guess I’ll kill all of you! Everyone from the Crown Prince Society will die! Anyone who stands in my way will be killed!” Yang Qi’s true energy surged, almost as though primeval megamammoths had stepped out of the ancient past, causing everything to tremble violently. Something like the nefarious energy of hell filled the area, seemingly preparing to rip apart space-time and drag everyone down to the Nine Serenities underworld.

“What level of power is this?”

“What a powerful energy art. Is this Yang Qi’s true strength?”

“Who could be his equal? Quick, call the Personal-Domain Legendaries! Only someone with a domain could possibly keep him in check.”

“In the Rich-Lush Continent, the Grand Emperor's Pagoda is invincible! The only way to beat it would be to destroy the continent itself. But how did Yang Qi get the true energy needed to control it?”

Everyone was looking up into the sky at the fight taking place.

‘So strong. So domineering. Nothing can compare with this.’ Never could Holy Daughter Manyflowers have guessed that Yang Qi would dare to pick a fight with experts like this. Furthermore, every move he made knocked one of them out of the fight. Yang Qi was so strong that it was simply awe-inspiring.

‘Susu’s nephew is so strong! Well, in that case, I guess I should stop holding back!’  With that, Holy Daughter Manyflowers began to gather her power to unleash an attack.

However, in that moment a voice of utmost purity, grandeur, and majesty erupted out. It seemed to come from nowhere and everywhere, and instantly caused the scene to go still and quiet.

“Everyone, stay your hands!”

All residual energy flows, streams of light and heat, and any other such things were locked in place. Even the Grand Emperor's Pagoda temporarily ceased functioning.

In the last moment before Yang Qi lost the ability to generate thought, the following words occured to him: ‘He’s obstructing time.’

The power to interfere with time itself was something that only Great Sages commanded. They could meditate in a cave for what seemed like seven days, but was really thousands of years. At least, that was how Great Sages had been portrayed since the distant past.

This was definitely the chancellor.

However, in the very moment that Yang Qi’s thoughts were locked down, the golden imp that was the God Legion Seal sensed what was happening, and opened its eyes. Then, the ancient God Legion Seal began to echo in Yang Qi’s mind. “Time belongs to the legion of gods. Mortals who interfere with the domain of the gods are doomed to fall into the depths of hell….”

Crick. Crack….

Boundless power swirled around Yang Qi, who suddenly realized that he could move again. Looking at his surroundings, he saw that everything was completely still and unmoving.

The Seven Preheaven Masters hovered motionless in the air, as did Patriarchs Wind and Cloud. Other experts in the area stood there unmoving, including Holy Daughter Manyflowers. It all looked like a lovely painting, except devoid of color.

The only person who could move was Yang Qi.

“Yang Qi.” A shining figure appeared in front of him, like a saint arrived to provide enlightenment to all creation. It was none other than the chancellor of the Demi-Immortal Institute.

Of the sea of people in the area, he was the only person who could engage Yang Qi in a chat like this.

“Chancellor!” Yang Qi said. He offered no show of courtesy or respect. He simply said, “So, you finally decided to show up. What are you going to do? You arranged for the Crown Prince to get the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, but sadly for you, I'm a lot stronger than you realized. I have it now. Are you planning to take it back? Or at least… try?”

Of course, the Grand Emperor's Pagoda was marked by the God Legion Seal, so even if the chancellor tried to take it by force, it would do him no good. He would end up being killed.

Of that, Yang Qi was certain.

“You’re right that I intended the Grand Emperor's Pagoda to go to the Crown Prince. The way things turned out was quite a surprise.” This chancellor was a shining incarnation that was obviously not his true body. “You managed to take the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, so keep it. If I tried to take it, whatever mighty entity backs you would certainly interfere. Tell me, Yang Qi, who is your backer? Considering you can free yourself from my time obstruction ability, I’d say it’s a Great Sage at the least.”

“Sorry, Chancellor,” Yang Qi replied coolly. “Not even I'm sure about the limits of his power. Furthermore, I don’t trust you any more than the Crown Prince does. How do you want to resolve today’s situation? I injured quite a few Legendary grand elders, and you know full well who was in the right and who was in the wrong. What’s your decision?”

“Bold words.” The chancellor actually didn’t seem angry. “You know, there are only two types of people who would stand up to me. A psycho. Or a genius. Of course, your confidence comes from whatever entity backs you. In that respect, you’re similar to the Crown Prince. I was the same, years ago. To qualify to be the chancellor of the Demi-Immortal Institute, you have to be willing to defy all laws and principles, even those of heaven. You have to despise all powers and all rules. Of course, the prerequisite is that you also have to be strong enough to pull it off. Truth be told, considering your actions today, the rules of the institute state that I should quell you for all time.”

“Quell me for all time?” Yang Qi said. “Fine, Chancellor. Make your move.”

“No. I'm not going to do that. You're already strong enough to disregard the rules. Or rather, it's because you have that mysterious, powerful entity protecting you. If I tried to do something to you, that entity would make a move, and I would likely end up facing a catastrophe. Besides, I would never dare to blaspheme godly might. You know, back when you removed my sealing mark from the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, I could sense that you have access to boundless power that surpasses anything in the Rich-Lush Continent.”

Yang Qi didn’t say anything in response.

“In the end, Yang Qi, you have what it takes to undermine the rules. Whether or not that power actually belongs to you doesn’t matter, as long as you can direct it. I guess you could consider that another sort of rule.” The chancellor sighed. “Is it safe to assume that your true energy arts also come from that mysterious backer of yours?”

“Yes.” Yang Qi was finally starting to calm down a bit.

“As expected. Well, that's fine.” The chancellor nodded. “If you didn't have the power to undermine the rules, then I would have no choice but to kill you today. But since you do, then I guess the Demi-Immortal Institute has another potential successor.”

Chapter 234: Becoming a Holy Neophyte

Considering what the chancellor had just said, Yang Qi knew that the moment of danger had passed.

Not only would he be a holy neophyte, he would be standing shoulder to shoulder with the Crown Prince. In fact, the chancellor would consider him as a possible successor.

Of course, Yang Qi only half-trusted the man at best. He always worded things so vaguely that it was impossible to tell exactly what he was up to.

But there was one thing that was for sure. The God Legion Seal and its mysterious power ensured that the chancellor viewed Yang Qi as being of a similar level of power as himself. In fact, he feared him. And to forestall a major event that could shake the Demi-Immortal Institute as a whole, he was simply letting him do what he wanted.

Although it was impossible to tell what his long term plans were, Yang Qi was confident that his own immediate future in the Demi-Immortal Institute was secure, at least until the Crown Prince emerged from seclusion. And there was still the chance that Young Master Shroud-Heaven and Hua Tianxiong would succeed in their effort to kill him.

Unfortunately, Yang Qi had the sneaking suspicion that the assassination effort would fail.

There was some mysterious fate or destiny that the Crown Prince was part of, something that connected him with heaven itself, something that would make killing him very, very difficult.

‘That’s fine! If they fail, I’ll kill him myself. Besides, he blasphemed the legion of gods, and profaned the light of the Lord. It should be me who exacts punishment anyway.’ The boundless thinking of the godmammoths had already begun to overtake Yang Qi, to the point where he felt like he was an incarnation of the Sovereign Lord.

“Yang Qi,” the chancellor said.

“Yes?” Yang Qi replied, in a somewhat more respectful tone of voice than before. Considering that the chancellor was backing down, it was only appropriate to refrain from impudence.

Besides, he didn’t have complete control over the God Legion Seal. For all he knew, he could find himself in a dangerous situation, only to get no help from it. If that happened, he would end up dead. Right now, the best thing to do was quit while ahead.

“I’ll issue the decree right now naming you a holy neophyte, in front of all these witnesses.” The glowing incarnation of the chancellor waved his hand, causing the color to return to the world, and allowing everyone to move again.

“The chancellor’s here!”

“Did he come to put Yang Qi in his place?”

“Quiet down and listen to the chancellor.” Once again, silence filled the area, although this time it was the mere sight of the chancellor, and the sensation of his aura.

Eyes burning with rage, Master Jadecrux shouted, “Chancellor, you have to take charge here. This heretical wretch-devil Yang Qi started attacking the grand elders! Grab him and execute him! That's the only way to maintain the dignity and authority of the institute!”

Several of the Seven Preheaven Masters had been hit so badly by Yang Qi that they were lying motionless in pools of their own blood. They usually acted like high-and-mighty experts, but now, they had been thoroughly vanquished.

The fact that the Seven Preheaven Masters, Patriarchs Wind and Cloud, Three Pure Yang Elders and Grand Elder Feat-Virtue had all joined forces to try to kill Yang Qi left many of the bystanders completely shocked. To them, he seemed both mysterious and vicious, almost like the Crown Prince himself.

Some of them had been thinking about joining in on the attack, but now, such thoughts were gone.

A mere Blood-Form Legendary had just fought back against a whole host of top experts, making him less a person and more like a devil-god emerged from the distant past. Most telling of all, he had the Grand Emperor's Pagoda.

In the end, it was the chancellor who would have to make the final decision about what to do.

Grand Elder Feat-Virtue had been one of the very first to begin opposing Yang Qi. Now, he raised his voice and shrieked, “That’s right, Chancellor! This hellion Yang Qi is a complete wretch-devil. He was just using a devil art, rife with wretch energy. He’s not even human! You must kill him, immediately! Announce to everyone under heaven that his clan will be executed, and anyone close to him will be exterminated. Friends, family, everyone with even the slightest connection to him will be eradicated!”

Grand Elder Feat-Virtue was really trying to provoke a slaughter.

When he realized that Yang Qi was just staring at him menacingly, he continued to shout, “With the chancellor here, brat, your hysterics are over! Go ahead! Go crazy again and see what happens. Chancellor, his most powerful asset is a magical treasure, the Grand Emperor's Pagoda. If you take that away from him, we can handle the rest. The Grand Emperor's Pagoda belongs to the Crown Prince, so for this kid to have it is a travesty of heavenly proportion.”

“Everybody shut your mouths!” the chancellor said, immediately silencing the area. “I'm fully aware of everything about Yang Qi. You think you can just throw around some false charges and then kill him? Downright outrageous! If everyone went around acting like you, how could any talent ever arise in the institute?”

RUUUUMBLE! The chancellor's voice shook the entire area like thunder, leaving the crowd literally stunned. As of this moment, everyone knew that the chancellor was siding with Yang Qi.

Grand Elder Feat-Virtue was still not ready to give up.

“Chancellor!” he shouted. “You said with your own mouth that the Crown Prince was your successor.”

“That’s right, I said the Crown Prince will succeed me. But according to the rules of the Demi-Immortal Institute, until he is actually the chancellor, he is nothing more than that: a successor. And there can be other possible successors, all of whom will struggle for dominance. There’s no need for any more from you Grand Elder Feat-Virtue, got it?” Suddenly, the chancellor’s gaze turned sharp, striking into Grand Elder Feat-Virtue like a bolt of lightning. Obviously, there was nothing he could do to fight back, considering that the chancellor was a Great Sage.

Seeing that everyone was remaining silent, the chancellor said, “Hear my command.”

“Yes sir!” the grand elders all said, bowing formally. “We will abide by your edicts, Chancellor!”

“Promote Yang Qi to holy neophyte. Reward him with five thousand supreme-grade spirit stones, and grant him land in the Minorcosm World. Record the matter immediately, and follow through with all the rewards post haste. Understand?”

“Yes sir!”

“I’ll take the grand elders he injured with me, to treat them in the Soul Rejuvenation Cistern. Whether or not they recover will be up to their own luck and fortune.” The chancellor flicked his sleeve, and a whooshing sound could be heard as he vanished with the injured from the Seven Preheaven Masters.

Yang Qi floated back to the ground. Wherever he looked, people averted their gazes, clearly fearful of provoking this fiendish monster.

Everyone knew that Yang Qi had come out the victor in the conflict.

No one in the institute would ever dare to countermand the words of the chancellor. Not even the Crown Prince could do such a thing.

However, many people in the crowd were truly confused about why the chancellor was being so charitable. The only person who knew the truth was Yang Qi. The chancellor had outright said that as long has he was strong enough, he could break the rules. Without the God Legion Seal, it would be a very different story, and the chancellor would definitely have killed him.

“Let’s go!”

Patriarchs Wind and Cloud, Grand Elder Feat-Virtue, the remaining Seven Preheaven Masters, and the Three Pure Yang Elders all knew that they couldn’t remain in the Academy of Sage Studies.

Patriarchs Wind and Cloud had the highest energy arts of the group, and were the quickest to leave.

However, Grand Elder Feat-Virtue seemed to be taking his time. After flying up into the air, he turned to look at Yang Qi with a vicious expression. “You just wait, Yang Qi. Once the Crown Prince is back, you’re dead!”

“Yeah right. Get down here!”

Yang Qi suddenly made a grasping motion, unleashing an energy flow like a dragon. The energy wrapped around Grand Elder Feat-Virtue and dragged him back down to the ground.

“What are you doing, Yang Qi!?” he blurted in shock. All of a sudden, he felt restrictions falling into place all around him, making it impossible for him to flee.

“What am I doing?” Yang Qi said, walking toward him. “Killing you, of course. The enmity between us has not been resolved. I'm a holy neophyte now, and to put things plainly, I need to make a blood sacrifice to commemorate the occasion. You’re it. Thanks to you, everyone in the Demi-Immortal Institute will know not to cross me!”

“Yang Qi! You arrogant dog!” Up in the air, the remaining Seven Preheaven Masters, along with the Three Pure Yang Elders and Patriarchs Wind and Cloud all started cursing Yang Qi again. “The chancellor already resolved things, but you're still acting like a lunatic!? Don’t tell me you really think of the Demi-Immortal Institute as powerless? Aren’t you worried about everyone joining forces to kill you? Do you really want to piss off the chancellor and the grand elders of law enforcement?!”

“Trash, all of you,” Yang Qi said. His Infernal Deity Spear suddenly appeared in his hand. “The Crown Prince completely defied all the rules back in the Inter-Institutional Martial Arts Competition. You know why? Power. And do you know why the chancellor didn’t punish me, and in fact, promoted me to holy neophyte? You think it's because he likes me? No. It's because I have a backer that could trounce the chancellor in a second! With strength like that, I’m just like the Crown Prince. I can completely ignore the rules.”

“What? You have the backing of a Great Sage?” Patriarchs Wind and Cloud, the Seven Preheaven Masters, and the Three Pure Yang Elders were visibly taken aback by this news.

If it was true that Yang Qi had the backing of a Great Sage, he could easily ignore the rules, just like the Crown Prince.

“Impossible!” Patriarch Cloud said.

“If you don’t believe me, do as you see fit.” Ignoring the other grand elders, Yang Qi took another step toward the trembling Grand Elder Feat-Virtue. All of the people Grand Elder Feat-Virtue had hoped would help him were just looking on, and the result was that pure terror filled his eyes.

The matter had been concluded. Yang Qi was a holy neophyte. However, he was clearly not content with how things had turned out. Unexpectedly, he was going to kill Grand Elder Feat-Virtue in front of all the onlookers. It was an outrageous act that crossed the bottom line for many of the grand elders present.

As of this moment, Yang Qi had become a public enemy that everyone felt they had the right to punish.

But the fact that he was backed by a Great Sage, a person that not even the chancellor dared to defy, meant that the grand elders could do nothing more than look on with hearts pounding. After all, they were all like ants compared to a Great Sage.

Some people present had been planning to notify Personal-Domain Legendaries, in the hopes that they would come to crush Yang Qi.

But then they thought back to what had just occurred with the chancellor. Everyone knew how the chancellor did things, and his actions filled them with fear. The truth was obvious: Yang Qi was backed by someone nobody could afford to provoke.

Chapter 235: Killing Grand Elder Feat-Virtue

Because of his completely overbearing performance, Yang Qi was making a lot of new enemies.

However, the talk of him having a Great Sage as his backer caused everyone to bite their tongues. Instead of thinking that he was pushing things too far, they now feared him. Now, nobody would dare to pick a fight with him, and in fact, many people would probably start kissing up to him.

It was simply human nature to bully the weak and fear the strong.

“Y-you're… backed by a Great Sage?” Grand Elder Feat-Virtue stammered, his face turning green. He had previously assumed that Yang Qi was a nobody, a country bumpkin from the anthill that was Yanhaven. He couldn’t possibly have a powerful behind-the-scenes supporter, and was obviously the type of person who could be crushed easily.

But now, in the blink of an eye, the scraggy chicken had turned into a mighty phoenix.

With the backing of a Great Sage, Yang Qi could theoretically found a fifth institute in the Rich-Lush Continent.

“Yes, Grand Elder Feat-Virtue. Little did you know that the Euphoria Godstone you foisted onto me was actually a big help. The power of a Great Sage easily negated the wretch energy, and gave me access to the pure life force quintessence in the stone. That’s how I became a Legendary.”

By this point, Grand Elder Feat-Virtue was completely and utterly crestfallen. “You’re lying! You don’t have any Great Sage backer! It's a bluff! Elders, all of you, help me kill him! A defier of laws and principles like him has to die! He’s actually trying—”

Before he could finish speaking, a spear stabbed into his chest, and began to voraciously gobble up his life force. A moment later, his soul shattered, and his flesh and blood evaporated.

Raging fire engulfed his entire body.

An agonized shriek rang out, until there was nothing left of Grand Elder Feat-Virtue but drifting ash. Yang Qi had killed him right in front of everyone.

What kind of arrogance was this?! What kind of rulebreaking?! This surpassed the Crown Prince in every way. It was just like the ancient saying, submit to me and prosper, or oppose me and perish.

He had cut down a grand elder right in the middle of a huge crowd.

On the one hand, Legendaries were definitely top experts, people who had been referred to as energy warriors in ancient times. They understood magical law, and were considered important people in the institute, similar to patriarchs. They were like mythological figures to all other students, and were the subject of universal envy.

But now, a person like that had perished, killed by Yang Qi. Grand Elder Feat-Virtue, the very man who had presided for so long over the Hall of Feats and Virtue, a person of inimitable fame and majesty, was dead. Further, he was a person who had been personally helped by the Crown Prince.

Yang Qi snorted coldly. “This Grand Elder Feat-Virtue used his public office for personal gain. For years, cries of complaint have risen up regarding his criminal activities. Executing him was the only way to serve justice here in the institute. In fact, if anyone present was ever the victim of Grand Elder Feat-Virtue’s bullying, tell me now, and I’ll report the matter to the chancellor. And I guess we’ll be needing a new Grand Elder Feat-Virtue.”

Up in the air, Patriarchs Wind and Cloud, the Seven Preheaven Masters, and the Three Pure Yang Elders looked down at the ash that was all that remained of Grand Elder Feat-Virtue, and could still hear his dying scream.

Silence reigned.

Ignoring the crowd, Yang Qi looked at Holy Daughter Manyflowers. “As a holy neophyte, I act first and report later. I’ll be providing a statement to the chancellor shortly, in which I recommend that you take over the responsibility of running the Hall of Feats and Virtue.”

Not waiting for a response, he flew up and disappeared into the sea of clouds, where he headed toward the Minorcosm World.

The matter was concluded. And the death of Grand Elder Feat-Virtue was already causing a huge uproar in the institute. Yang Qi had broken the rules in flagrant fashion, and it would definitely cause criticism.

And yet, what he had done was very effective.

“What? Yang Qi treasonously killed Grand Elder Feat-Virtue, right in public? Don’t tell me the grand elders of law enforcement didn't show up!”

**

In a hidden aspect of space-time somewhere in the institute was Master Wind Gentleman from the Gentlemen’s Society. He was in the middle of his personal domain, which flickered with five radiant colors, reflecting the power of the five phases, and absorbed the violent power of the void for multiple kilometers in every direction.

The aspect of space-time he occupied was filled with violent spatial tempests that he traversed with utmost care.

It was really a dangerous location.

Master Wind Gentleman was in the sixth Legendary transformation, making him a Personal-Domain Legendary. When he practiced cultivation, he could absorb the empyrean and baleful energy of heaven and earth, which slowly but surely was pushing him toward the level of a Ghost-God Legendary.

There was another domain in this area, filled with lightning and thunder. Within that domain was someone who looked like a god of lightning, and who was conversing with Master Wind Gentleman.

He was the leader of the Five Lightnings Society, another extremely powerful holy neophyte called Unparalleled Lightning.

These two had received word of the recent events, and were currently in the middle of discussing them.

“Logically speaking,” Unparalleled Lightning said, “the chancellor should have killed him. Instead, he let him go, and even promoted him to holy neophyte. An entire day has passed, and no one from the law enforcement team has done anything. The chancellor must have told them to hold back. It seems Grand Elder Feat-Virtue died for nothing.”

“So what do you think?” Master Wind Gentleman said, a grave look on his face. “Does Yang Qi really have the backing of a Great Sage? But who? Could it be the chancellor of another institute? Or perhaps the emperor of the Sage Ancestor Dynasty?” Great Sages were not to be taken lightly. In fact, neither of these two had the backing of someone like that.

“I’d say there's an eighty to ninety percent chance he does. However, we still need to look into the matter more closely. Don’t forget, he has the Grand Emperor's Pagoda. It takes an unimaginable level of true energy to use that thing, and he can. He can definitely fight people above his current level. He decimated the Seven Preheaven Masters, and cut the Crown Prince Society down a notch, which benefits us.”

“It doesn’t matter how we thwart the Crown Prince Society now. Once the Crown Prince returns, they’ll be as insufferably arrogant as ever.” Master Wind Gentleman frowned. “He said he would be back in five years, but based on my information, I’d say it’ll be a year and a half at most. When that happens, he’ll wipe out everyone. We won’t stand a chance against him once he’s a Great Sage.”

“So what do we do? Don’t tell me we need to join forces with Yang Qi.”

“Let’s wait and see. Yang Qi is powerful, but it’s not like that Great Sage can keep watch over him constantly. And if the Crown Prince becomes a Great Sage, he might crush that backer, and kill Yang Qi. Let’s see how much Yang Qi progresses in his cultivation over the next few months. That said, we might as well start getting an idea of his attitude. Why don’t the two of us go offer formal congratulations to him for becoming a holy neophyte?”

“Sure. That sounds like a good idea.”

**

Deep in the Minorcosm World was an enormous palace which currently echoed with a thunderous roar.

“Damnation! Bloody damnation! I can’t believe he killed a Legendary grand elder! He’s treating the laws of the Demi-Immortal Institute like trash! If the Hall of Law Enforcement doesn’t do something, how could we expect anyone to listen to us in the future? How could the Demi-Immortal Institute continue to function?”

The plaque outside of this enormous temple had only two characters: Law Enforcement.

The grand elders from this place were fierce and terrifying, and could kill people like harvesting wheat. Anyone who heard their name, be they followers of evil, or students of righteousness, would be filled with incredible fear.

It was hard to say how many traitors to the Demi-Immortal Institute had been executed by them throughout the years.

But now, every member of the Hall of Law Enforcement was simmering in discontent. Moments ago, they had been given a message from the chancellor, specifically instructing them not to hold Yang Qi accountable for killing Grand Elder Feat-Virtue.

“The chancellor said that he’s backed by a Great Sage, and I’d say that whoever it is, there's a high likelihood he surpasses even the chancellor. Are you going to go punish someone like that? Are you just looking to get killed, or have the Demi-Immortal Institute overthrown?”

At this point, the message-bearer continued to speak. “Grand Elders of the Hall of Law Enforcement, I understand that you abhor wickedness, but now is not the time to let your emotions affect your decision-making. Wait patiently and see how the situation develops.”

“What about the rules, though?” someone asked.

“We have rules to inflict severe punishment on those who are not strong enough to break them. When the rules come into conflict with someone strong enough, the rules get shattered, and the old way is done away with. When that happens, it means the time has come for new rules. That’s just how life works. Grand Elders, you represent the old way. I've been sent here today to tell you that, until the Crown Prince emerges from seclusion and fights it out with Yang Qi, you are to ignore anything that Yang Qi does. If you don’t, you’ll probably end up dead. Understand?”

The owner of this mysterious voice was the person most trusted by the chancellor. Therefore, although everyone in the Hall of Law Enforcement virtually trembled with rage, there was nothing they could do.

The owner of the mysterious voice chuckled, then vanished without a trace. ‘Yang Qi. Ah, Yang Qi. Who are you exactly? I'm starting to get very curious.’

At that point, the Hall of Law Enforcement went silent. In the end, the threat of a Great Sage was enough to crush anything and everything.

**

Somewhere in the Minorcosm World, Yang Qi sat in the middle of an enormous mansion. Although it looked like it was made from jade and jewels, it was actually made from immortal energy. It was a location where he could rest completely at ease, or focus fully on cultivation, all without worrying about anyone disturbing him.

This dimensional mansion was the type that only holy neophytes could occupy.

At the moment, Holy Daughter Manyflowers was with him. “Yang Qi, do you really have the backing of a Great Sage? You should have quit while you were ahead today. Killing Grand Elder Feat-Virtue is going to arouse public anger.”

“Public anger? Don’t worry. What I did today won’t just arouse public anger, it’ll arouse fear too. I needed to show people that I'm absolutely confident in myself. Give it a few more days, and the other societies will be coming to offer expressions of goodwill.”

Chapter 236: Psychic Tempest

“You still haven’t answered my question, Yang Qi. Do you have a Great Sage backing you, or not?” Holy Daughter Manyflowers was obviously not willing to let the topic just drop. “If you do, then I’d say you’re safe. Not even the Crown Prince will be able to do anything to you. But if you don’t, and simply used some trick to make it seem like you do, you’re playing with fire.”

“It's a secret,” Yang Qi replied. Instead of offering any further explanation, he suddenly extended his hand, revealing a walnut-sized spirit stone that was somehow reminiscent of the Grand Emperor's Pagoda. It was a sovereign-grade spirit stone, something rarely seen in the world, as they were usually used for cultivation purposes by Great Sages.

Holy Daughter Manyflowers’ eyes went wide. “Is that…?”

“Yes. A sovereign-grade spirit stone. Don’t ask me where I got it. Take it, and your cultivation base will improve by leaps and bounds. Soon, you’ll be the new Grand Elder Feat-Virtue, and you’ll need a strong cultivation base to stay in power.”

“Okay,” she replied, taking the spirit stone. “From ancient times until now, sovereign-grade spirit stones have been considered the best of the best in the Rich-Lush Continent. There is literally no better type of spirit stone. I have a few deadly moves that I haven’t been able to cultivate because of lack of power, but now that won’t be a problem.”

“How is Aunt Susu doing?” Yang Qi suddenly asked.

“Susu? The chancellor took her to another aspect of space-time to be educated by some of the prime elders. Hopefully, she can fully awaken the potential of her Seven Apertures Sprite Body now. In that regard, they view her as being more important than the Crown Prince. Rest at ease. Even when the Crown Prince becomes the chancellor, he won't be able to defy the prime elders.”

“Alright,” Yang Qi said, nodding.

“Well then, I guess the time has come to part. Take care of yourself. I’m not going to forget this gift, Yang Qi. I’ll pay you back one day.”

Suddenly, she disappeared into a blurred shadow as she returned to her own mansion in the Minorcosm World.

In the end, only Legendaries were truly viewed as being important in the institutes. In fact, in case of emergency, the Minorcosm World could actually slip through the void and leave the entire Rich-Lush Continent, taking all the Legendaries with it to safety. Of course, that would only be done in an extreme emergency, as it would involve losing all of the lower-level students.

In any case, Yang Qi was now so important that the institute wouldn’t casually discard him. The only person who could directly harm him would be someone so powerful they could ignore the rules, just like him.

As of now, he was the only person in his sprawling mansion, and for some reason, he felt a bit lonely.

However, he shook his head to dispel such feelings, and began to consider matters at hand. At the moment, he had established himself as a prestigious individual in the institute. Unfortunately, it was all because of the God Legion Seal, which was not something he could absolutely rely on.

What would happen if the God Legion Seal didn’t work the next time he needed it to? The answer was simple: he would die.

For now, the best thing to do was stay in seclusion and push his cultivation higher as quickly as possible. At the absolute minimum, he needed to reach the third Legendary transformation.

Once he was a Space-Void Legendary, and understood spatial fluctuations, he would have access to even more spell formations in the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, and would definitely be able to deal with people in the sixth Legendary transformation. If he ran into someone like that now, he would definitely be in big trouble. Unless the God Legion Seal defended him, he would be forced to flee, and likely be seriously injured after that.

“Well, considering how many spirit stones I have, I’ll just focus completely on cultivation. If I can’t make cultivation progress, then I'm useless. I need to improve my physique, and master the psychic tempest. Then, with a stronger spirit and soul, I can reach the second transformation.” Waving his hand, he summoned a pile of royal-grade spirit stones.

Instantly, the wave of intense spirit energy caused images of humans, dragons, tigers, winds, clouds, palaces and more to take shape around him.

He used the spirit stones to set up a formation around him, which would allow him to converge the spirit energy in the area into a single node, a Rich-Lush Eye that was just like the ones in the Grand Emperor's Pagoda.

Although he had never been an expert of spell formations, he did have some experience. This particular formation was one of the more powerful ones from the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, and it was called the Rich-Lush God Formation. As for the "rich-lush” aspect, it referred to prosperity, abundance, blessing, and contentment.

It took ten thousand royal-grade spirit stones to set up the formation, but he was sure that it would be enough to push his cultivation base to a higher level.

Generally speaking, it would be rare for a Legendary to use a hundred royal-grade spirit stones in cultivation. Not even the corrupt Grand Elder Feat-Virtue would have been able to; at most, he would have used supreme-grade.

In fact, many Legendaries had to settle for mid-grade or high-grade spirit stones.

The fact that Yang Qi had just casually produced ten thousand royal-grade stones would cause most experts to faint from shock. Of course, his energy art required many, many times the power that others did.

It was a very pleasant sensation to be sitting in a spell formation powered by so many spirit stones; he almost felt like an immortal. In some situations, feelings like this could be dangerous. There was no shortage of individuals who had been ambushed while caught up in the intoxicating feeling of cultivation, and ended up dead. That was why it was always best to select a secure location for cultivation.

And there were few places more secure than the Minorcosm World.

‘Time to power up my physique. Five phases god items!’

The spirit energy flowed into Yang Qi, and as it entered his meridians, the friction between it and his true energy caused flames to spring up inside of him.

True flame ate at the five phases treasures, the Skyspirit Lamp, Razorgold Dagger-Axe, Mulberry Shoot, Singularity Water, and Yellowdragon Sand, turning them into molten liquid that flowed into the depths of his five viscera.

In the blink of an eye, the treasures became a part of him.

All of a sudden, Yang Qi felt as though his five viscera contained spatial coordinates which could connect to the same aspect of space where the five phases treasures had come from. Inhaling, he caused pure elemental quintessence energy of the five phases to stream into him. With that, his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth and Physique of the Sovereign Lord grew stronger.

“Must get stronger!” Without any hesitation, he drew fully on the energy of all of the royal-grade spirit stones. At the same time, he opened his Hell Portal and sent streams of devil-ghosts into his Hellfire Crucible. He also drew on the flesh of the asura in his Grand Emperor's Pagoda, which pushed him to even greater heights.

Bang! Bam!

Explosions rang out inside of him as vital energy swirled through his body like dragons. Considering the technique he cultivated, the combination of the two were like dracomammoths. He was the mammoth aspect, and the energy was the dragon aspect. He was one with the energy, and his blood, soul, and spirit were experiencing manifold transformations.

Yang Qi was gaining enlightenment of a very mysterious and enigmatic level.

Inside of him, one particle after another exploded. Moments before, he had the power of a thousand ancient megamammoths, but now, that same amount awoke within him.

This was what came with the Legendary level, that ancient realm of powerful energy warriors; with every breakthrough he made, his power skyrocketed.

The power of two thousand megamammoths made his fleshly body even stronger; as the flames purified him, the Physique of the Sovereign Lord became even more eternal.

Every inch of him glittered like crystal. His flesh and blood could be considered perfect in every way, as well as his bones. The five phases treasures in his five viscera continued to draw in the power of the five phases, creating an endless cycle, and fueling his transformations with the very power of the universe, power that was an aspect of the true Sovereign Lord.

Suddenly, the Lord's Eye opened, and within its pupil was a never-ending cycle of the destruction and creation of various worlds and planes of existence. It was almost like a dream.

By using the five phases treasures to connect with those five spatial nexuses, Yang Qi was able to use the power of the Lord to transform his own true energy into Sovereign Lord True Energy. Even a scrap of that type of true energy would vastly surpass that of any other cultivator in his level. After all, it was on the same level as universal power itself.

The Grand Emperor's Pagoda trembled as it sensed the power of the true Sovereign Lord. After all, its creator had used power such as this in the past, which indicated that it contained the potential to push the pagoda to even higher levels than before.

The power of the Sovereign Lord was changing Yang Qi on a fundamental level, and as it coursed through him, he opened his eyes, and a powerful psychic tempest could be seen in their depths.

As it swirled out into his mansion, cracks began to spread out on the walls, as if they might explode.

At long last, he was reaching the limits of the Blood-Form Transformation, and provoking a psychic tempest.

That, in turn, meant that he was getting very close to the Spirit-Soul Transformation.

In the Spirit-Soul Transformation, it was possible to use psychic tempests to begin to pierce through space itself, to see into its deepest depths. Afterward, when he perfectly combined his mind and body, he would reach the next level, the Space-Void Transformation.

Space was a very mysterious thing. No fleshly body could pierce through space on its own, no matter how tough it was. Only the power of psychic tempests could do that.

‘I've finally mastered the psychic tempest. Next is to truly reach the Spirit-Soul Transformation.’

Chapter 237: Inter-Society Alliance

Yang Qi was now filled with the power of two thousand ancient megamammoths. The Physique of the Sovereign Lord was beginning to metamorphose, and yet, he still had not yet reached the second Legendary transformation.

Although the psychic tempest enabled him to sense the variations of space around him, he could not enter them.

The Spirit-Soul Transformation was very powerful, and allowed one to insert one’s spirit and soul into space, and sense the slightest fluctuations therein.

Unfortunately, no matter how strong one's spirit and soul, and no matter how powerful the psychic tempest, it was only possible to sense space, not literally tear it or pierce through it. That ability only came with the third transformation, the Space-Void Transformation.

At the moment, Yang Qi’s psychic tempest could not fully permeate space, and therefore, he couldn’t yet reach the Spirit-Soul Transformation.

He didn’t mind. After all, it would only take a bit more cultivation to succeed.

Most people who used the same number of spirit stones would easily have been able to reach the eighth or ninth transformation. But for Yang Qi, the amount of energy provided was simply not enough. A godly-class energy art could consume massive amounts of spirit stones.

He reined in the psychic tempest, and cast his senses into his body to examine what transformations had occurred. For one thing, the power of the Sovereign Lord within him made his true energy vastly stronger than before.

If his previous true energy could be likened to water, then his current true energy was like mercury. They existed on two completely different levels.

Before, he would need to pour a sizeable portion of true energy into the Grand Emperor's Pagoda to get it to work. But now, it took a single exhalation for the spell formations to work like mad.

As of this moment, the might of the Grand Emperor's Pagoda had reached another level.

Inside the pagoda, Patriarch Frost-Drake and Blightczar Manyrivers could sense the changes, and were deeply shocked. In fact, they both dropped to their knees to kowtow.

“Milord, your powers are incredible!” Patriarch Frost-Drake said. “Your energy arts are strong enough to pluck stars and snatch moons, and even unite the continent under your control.” He no longer considered himself part of the Shroud-Heaven Alliance. He served Yang Qi, and remained in the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, where he would help power the spell formations.

Truth be told, Patriarch Frost-Drake wasn’t very important to Yang Qi anymore. Even Nonary Lifeseizers were like ants to him now.

On the other hand, Blightczar Manyrivers could be slightly more useful. He was in the third transformation, high enough that, without the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, Yang Qi would have a hard time beating him in a fight.

“You two focus on your cultivation,” Yang Qi said. “The stronger I get, the more it will benefit you.” Putting the Grand Emperor's Pagoda away, he pulled out an imperial-grade spirit stone, which emanated a powerful aura as he looked at it. The main question he had was how to use it to reach the Spirit-Soul Transformation.

After all, if the Grand Emperor's Pagoda was already so much stronger, then if he reached the Spirit-Soul Transformation, and gathered more Sovereign Lord True Energy, then how much more powerful would it be? He couldn’t wait to find out.

With that, he opened the door of his dimensional palace, allowing the Nine-Yang Immortal Energy from the Minorcosm World to pour inside. Harnessing the energy, he condensed it down until it was like an immortal serum. Then, he tightened his grip on the imperial-grade spirit stone, causing true flame to erupt out and ignite the serum. At the same time, the Hell Portal appeared behind him, which he used to summon powerful devil-spirits. That, combined with the power of the asura’s flesh and blood, yet again transformed into Sovereign Lord True Energy, one of the highest forms of power in the universe.

Of course, there were many sources of power in the universe, virtually an infinite number.

Nine-Yang Immortal Energy. Great Void True Energy. Clear Heaven True Energy. There were many types and kinds, some of higher level, some of lower. In ancient times, the term ‘universal power’ was used to rank a certain high level of energy. However, such practices had ended many years in the past.

As for Nine-Yang Immortal Energy, it was of only moderate use. Although it was better than nothing, compared to Sovereign Lord True Energy, it was actually like nothing.

Without the flesh and blood of a Never-Dying asura, it would not have been as easy for Yang Qi to bolster that energy. At the moment, he needed to just continue the process, push harder toward the transformation, and become a Spirit-Soul Legendary.

However, just as he was about to continue his session of cultivation….

“Not bad at all, Brother Yang Qi! You really can absorb that energy. If you keep it up, you’re going to suck this place dry of Nine-Yang Immortal Energy.”

“That’s right. Now that you’re a holy neophyte, Brother Yang Qi, we absolutely must come to offer our congratulations. Would it be possible to enter your mansion?”

“Who might the two of you be?” Yang Qi asked, maintaining full vigilance. Although he was in the Minorcosm World, he knew that dangers lurked everywhere, and that he couldn't be lax.

“Master Wind Gentleman.”

“Unparalleled Lightning.”

In accompaniment with the voices, two individuals appeared. And shockingly, they were so powerful that they could completely ignore the defenses of his mansion. Instead of waiting outside, they entered immediately.

“Master Wind Gentleman. Unparalleled Lightning. The leaders of the Gentlemen’s Society and the Five Lightnings Society, the two most powerful organizations in the institute next to the Crown Prince Society.” Yang Qi knew exactly what was going on here. These two individuals were far more powerful than Master Jadecrux, and were at the very least in the fifth Legendary transformation. Obviously, they could either produce their own personal domains, or had magical treasures that could produce the same effect. It was only natural that people like that could bypass the defense of his mansion.

Master Wind Gentleman looked Yang Qi up and down and then said, “You made quite the scene at the Academy of Sage Studies, Brother Yang Qi. You decimated the Seven Preheaven Masters, Patriarchs Wind and Cloud, and the Three Pure Yang Elders. And then you killed Grand Elder Feat-Virtue. Talk about a rule-breaker! You caused a storm the likes of which comes around only every few thousand years. You definitely put the Crown Prince Society in their place for the time being.”

Yang Qi smiled faintly. “I just got lucky and scared the chancellor. Considering my cultivation base, I probably should have ended up dead. I apologize for the crude accommodations here. I don't even have tea to serve. Please, I hope you don’t take offense.”

“It’s fine,” Unparalleled Lightning said. He was a tall, burly fellow who, even with his hands clasped behind his back, seemed like a mountain. He also seemed to be constantly surrounded by the muffled rumble of thunder.

“The reason we've come today is that we want to join forces with you to fight the Crown Prince. Now that you’re a holy neophyte, you qualify to start your own society if you wish. If you’re unfamiliar with all the particulars, we can help. After all, it would befit you to build a power base. There are always things that important people like the three of us can't do personally. Having minions to help out with minor tasks can be very beneficial.”

“Well, I actually founded my own society some time back. I just never announced it publicly. It's called the Sage Monarch Society. It’s based on that old adage you hear around the institute: sage inside, monarch outside.”

“Sage Monarch Society….” Unparalleled Lightning and Master Wind Gentleman exchanged a glance, then nodded.

“It’s a good name,” Master Wind Gentleman said. “Well then, let’s get to business. We need to decide what to do about the Crown Prince Society.”

Yang Qi had known all along why these two had come to visit, and so he didn't waste any time getting to the important matters. “As you know, the Crown Prince and I are mortal enemies, and there’s no way we’ll ever reconcile our differences. Once he comes out of seclusion, the first thing he's going to do is come looking for me. Unfortunately, I'm not a match for him right now, and not even the two of you are strong enough to take him on. Do either of you have any ideas about what to do?”

“We were going to ask you the same thing. The Crown Prince is a Never-Dying Legendary, but his power vastly surpasses that level. I think even some Great Sages would have a hard time killing him.” Master Wind Gentleman’s eyes narrowed thoughtfully. “Brother Yang Qi, we heard that you're backed by a Great Sage, someone that even the chancellor fears. Is there any way we could call on the help of this Senior? If he or she had any advice for us, we would take it.”

Yang Qi could immediately tell that Master Wind Gentleman was digging for information. After all, this supposed Great Sage was the reason everyone was scared of him; if it turned out he didn't actually have that backing, things would get very difficult. “I don’t think that's possible. I was provided help to get the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, but nothing more.”

“What?” Unparalleled Lightning said. “Helped you get the Grand Emperor's Pagoda? What do you mean, exactly?”

Yang Qi chuckled, then went on to give an account of the incident in the Heavendawn Quarry. He talked about how he killed the asura, wrecked the chancellor’s plan, and took the Grand Emperor's Pagoda. Of course, he left out the part about the God Legion Seal, and instead, said that the “nameless Senior” was the one who had helped him.

Overall, Master Wind Gentleman and Unparalleled Lightning believed most of his story.

“The chancellor really is being too partial. He’s too focused on helping the Crown Prince.” Master Wind Gentleman didn’t sound very pleased at all, and in fact, somewhat envious. “If the Grand Emperor's Pagoda had ended up in the Crown Prince’s hands like the chancellor intended, he would already be a Great Sage. And if that happened, we would be dead already. Not even our families would have been able to keep us safe.”

“That’s right,” Unparalleled Lightning said, a bead of cold sweat dripping down his temple. “He’s vicious and merciless to the core. Considering how much we’ve fought with him over the years, there’s no imagining how horrific our ends will be. We can only be glad that you got it instead.”

“Don’t be too quick to rejoice,” Yang Qi said, quickly taking back the initiative in the conversation. “From what I've heard, the Crown Prince won’t need five years to recover. The truth is that he’ll reach the Great Sage level within a year and a half. Then he’ll make his comeback. And that, my friends, is when we’ll die.”

“What? A year and a half?! But he was hurt so badly by Young Master Shroud-Heaven! He shouldn’t even be able to recover in that amount of time, let alone break through to the Great Sage level.” Unparalleled Lightning and Master Wind Gentleman were visibly shocked.

After all, a year and a half was definitely not enough time to make the needed preparations.

“You aren’t just being alarmist, are you Yang Qi?” Unparalleled Lightning said. “How come you have information like this that we haven’t even heard of? We're aware of the unusual activities of the Crown Prince Society recently, including their attempt to get spirit stones from the Western Continent, but that should just be to help the Crown Prince’s recovery.” Clearly, he was yet again probing for information.

Chapter 238: Being Used Again

Yang Qi could see that Unparalleled Lightning and Master Wind Gentleman didn’t believe him. Instead of wasting time with explanations, he waved his hand and said, “Alright, fine. Get out here, Blightczar Manyrivers!”

Instantly, a black blur of light appeared, resolving into the form of none other than Blightczar Manyrivers, who kowtowed and said, “Respects, milord.”

“Is this…?” Both Unparalleled Lightning and Master Wind Gentleman were clearly taken aback. However, before they could ask any questions, Blightczar Manyrivers launched into an explanation.

“I am your humble servant Blightczar Manyrivers, former vice-houselord of the House of Shadowblight, and grand elder of the Blight Legion Church. Milord Yang Qi exterminated the House of Shadowblight and took me captive. From then on, I have been his servant. The Crown Prince Society offered a huge collection of demon cores to the Blight Legion Church in exchange for masses of spirit stones. Apparently, they want to use them to create a massive object that can create passageways to other worlds, something that will help the Crown Prince break into the Great Sage level. All in all, it should take half a year to complete. Furthermore, there are members of the Crown Prince Society who have traveled to the Western Continent, to make contact with organizations there to further that plan.”

The ghost energy that filled Blightczar Manyrivers’ voice when he talked was spine-tingling to say the least.

“You have a Space-Void Legendary as your servant…?” Unparalleled Lightning murmured.

All of a sudden Yang Qi seemed even more mysterious. At the same time, Unparalleled Lightning and Master Wind Gentlemen found that they trusted him more and more. Considering their past dealings with the Crown Prince, this plan seemed exactly like something he would do.

Throughout his life, the Crown Prince had faced many powerful enemies, and had been seriously wounded many times. However, whenever that happened, he always came out the other end having advanced by leaps and bounds.

To many people, it was a sheer nightmare.

No one could take a setback and turn it into an advantage better than him.

“Well, what do you think?” Yang Qi said coolly. “Seems I do have a bit more information than you, don’t I? I'm willing to bet you don’t know where the Crown Prince is, do you? And obviously you don't know his full plan.”

“What. You know?” Master Wind Gentleman asked.

“I have a few clues. However, it’s a secret of such monumental gravity that I can’t speak of the details.” Of course, Yang Qi was simply dangling bait right in front of these two.

“I have to disagree with you, Brother Yang Qi,” Master Wind Gentleman said. “We're enemies of the Crown Prince too. Once he's back, all of us are going to be in a really bad situation. Enough with the secrets. Tell us where the Crown Prince is hiding. After all, if we strike first, we’ll have the advantage!”

“That’s right,” Unparalleled Lightning said, his eyes flashing with killing intent. “You know the old saying. All great men are ruthless. Let’s take the initiative!”

“No, I'm serious,” Yang Qi said, waving his hand dismissively. “If you made the slightest slip-up, and word got out, it would ruin the entire plan. The Crown Prince would simply move to a different location, and then we would never be able to get at him.”

“Very well, Yang Qi,” Master Wind Gentleman said. “You're no amateur, we can see that now. You know where the Crown Prince is hiding, and you’re not just going to give the information for free. What do you want? Name your price.”

“I don’t want much of anything. Just your support for Holy Daughter Manyflowers to be the new Grand Elder Feat-Virtue. That’s all.” Instead of trying to extract wealth or treasure from them, Yang Qi was trying to make use of their influence in the institute. He had caused a huge upheaval when he killed Grand Elder Feat-Virtue, and although he had not been officially punished, many people were unhappy with the situation. To them, he was a freak, a rebel and even a fiend-devil. Once the Crown Prince returned, there would be plenty of people asking him to kill Yang Qi.

As a result, installing Holy Daughter Manyflowers as the new Grand Elder Feat-Virtue was currently no easy task. But if Master Wind Gentleman and Unparalleled Lightning worked together to make it happen, it was definitely a possibility.

The two society leaders exchanged a glance, and then Master Wind Gentleman said, “We can definitely make that happen.”

The two of them had assumed Yang Qi would make outrageous demands, but instead, he asked for something relatively simple.

“Well in that case, let me tell you the details.” Yang Qi went on to explain that the Crown Prince was in the Superheaven Badlands, and that he wanted to make a Superheaven Altar. He explained some of how he had interfered with the plans, but went on to say that he doubted he had foiled them entirely. He even gave them the relevant spatial coordinates so that they could check the information on their own.

“The Superheaven Badlands.” Unparalleled Lightning and Master Wind Gentleman exchanged another glance, and they could both see the killing intent in the other’s eyes. A moment passed, and they rose to their feet.

“Starting today, the Sage Monarch Society, Gentlemen’s Society and Five Lightnings Society will formally enter a tripartite alliance,” said Master Wind Gentleman. “Henceforth, we will come to each other’s aid, and work together to fight the Crown Prince Society.”

“Incidentally, do you know where Yun Hailan is?” Yang Qi asked. “If you can help me determine her exact location, I’ll do everything I can to make sure she ends up dead.”

“Of course,” Master Wind Gentleman said. Chuckling, he continued, “But I have to say, Yang Qi, it’s a real shock to hear that you plan to harm a lovely young lady like her. Well, anyway, she returned before you did, and has been working hard to reach the Legendary level the entire time, albeit in vain. As far as I know, she's right here in the Minorcosm World.”

Yang Qi’s eyes fairly erupted with killing intent. “Oh really? Why can’t I sense her aura?”

“Maybe she fled,” Unparalleled Lightning said thoughtfully. “We definitely need to track her down.”

A moment passed.

“Well, if that’s all there is, I’ll see the two of you out,” Yang Qi said, preparing to escort them away.

Master Wind Gentleman and Unparalleled Lightning didn't see any need to stay around discussing matters. Instead, they would go check the Superheaven Badlands to see if the Crown Prince really was there, and if so, take advantage of his weakness to strike a mortal blow.

However, even as they prepared to leave, a mighty power descended onto Yang Qi’s dimensional mansion.

RUMBLE!

It was an edict from the chancellor himself.

Looks of shock played out on the faces of Unparalleled Lightning and Master Wind Gentleman as something like a paper talisman appeared in front of them. As it unfurled, brilliant light shone out, and a mighty voice spoke, “Holy Neophyte Yang Qi, killing Grand Elder Feat-Virtue was an unforgivable sin. However, he was corrupt and greedy, and throughout his years running the Hall of Feats and Virtue, many a complaint was levied against him. He was quite the criminal himself. Yang Qi, you will not be executed for your crime. Instead, your punishment will be to go on a very dangerous mission. Namely, Mission: Mend Heaven. If you fail, you will be imprisoned for a thousand years. If you succeed, your record will be expunged.”

The edict itself slowly floated down to land on Yang Qi’s palm. Keeping his voice calm, he said, “I accept the mission. Now, would the messenger please step forward.”

“You’ve got some nerve,” a voice responded. Even as the glowing light of the edict faded away, a masked young woman stepped out of thin air.

It was hard to say how strong or weak she was, as her aura was impossible to read.

However, upon seeing her, Unparalleled Lightning and Master Wind Gentleman shivered and then respectfully said, “Well met, Young Lady.”

Obviously, this masked young woman had a very high position within the Demi-Immortal Institute.

Not wasting any words, the young woman said, “Master Wind Gentleman. Unparalleled Lightning. Is it safe to assume you came to ally yourself with Yang Qi against the Crown Prince Society?”

Bowing at the waist, Master Wind Gentleman said, “Very perceptive, Young Lady. The Crown Prince is incomparably cruel and merciless. If we don’t resist him, the future will be very dark. It's self-defense, that's all. That said, this decree is very strange. I almost can't believe the chancellor wants Yang Qi to do something that dangerous. Mission: Mend Heaven? That’s one of the top three most important tasks in the institute. Not even we would seriously consider taking it on. Isn’t this just sending Yang Qi to his death?”

“What’s Mission: Mend Heaven?” Yang Qi asked.

Even Unparalleled Lightning felt struck with coldness at the thought of this mission. “Brother Yang, the mission is about repairing the damage to heaven. As I'm sure you’re aware, in the ancient past, the Hell of Euphoria invaded the Yore-Wilds Continent, bringing about the God-Devil Apocalypse.”

“Yes, I’ve heard of that,” Yang Qi replied, his expression flickering. “Don’t tell me that Mission: Mend Heaven is….”

“It is,” Master Wind Gentleman said, sighing. “Mission: Mend Heaven is about repairing the damage inflicted on the Rich-Lush Continent by the Hell of Euphoria. It’s an operation of unparalleled danger. In the middle of the Rich-Lush Continent is an aspect of space-time that was ripped open during the ancient God-Devil Apocalypse, and is extremely weak. In the ancient past, certain incomprehensibly powerful experts sealed that area, but over the years, the power of the Hell of Euphoria has eaten away at the sealing marks. In many places, they’ve almost been worn through. From generation to generation, the chancellors of our institute have made arrangements to have the sealing marks repaired. Unfortunately, no one has ever succeeded. Even the Crown Prince tried and failed a few years ago. Successfully accomplishing the mission would bring an immense amount of merit points.”

“The chancellor is sending you on this mission either to have you killed,” Unparalleled Lightning said, “or as part of some other cunning plan.”

“Very well, that's enough,” the masked young woman said, her tone harsh. “The two of you can see your way out. The chancellor is sending him on a dangerous mission as punishment for killing Grand Elder Feat-Virtue. It’s a crime that can't just be forgiven; dealing punishment is the only way to smooth over the issue. If Yang Qi accomplishes this mission, complaints will die down because of it. And if he doesn’t… well in that case, the chancellor isn't going to pull any punches.”

“I see. Well, we’ll take our leave now.” A slight smile appeared on the face of Master Wind Gentleman as he turned to Yang Qi. “With a Great Sage backing you, Yang Qi, it shouldn't be difficult to accomplish the mission. Smooth things over, and show the rest of the Demi-Immortal Institute how strong you are.”

With that, the two of them left.

To Yang Qi, it seemed obvious what the chancellor was doing. He was trying to force Yang Qi’s hand, and find out who this Great Sage backer was.

Repairing the damage to heaven was a task he simply couldn’t succeed at alone. In fact, to think that he would accomplish the mission single-handed was a joke. When word spread that he was being punished, it would calm down a lot of people in the institute. If he succeeded at repairing the damage, then he would become a hero that no one would be able to criticize. If he failed, it would prove he had no support from a Great Sage, at which time, the chancellor would finally make a move to deal with him.

Chapter 239: Mission: Mend Heaven

Of course, the chancellor wasted no time in spreading word, and the reactions were mixed. However, everyone felt that it was fair for him to punish Yang Qi for being so arrogant. Killing Grand Elder Feat-Virtue was a crime that couldn’t just be forgiven, so if the chancellor hadn’t punished him in some way, the discontent in the institute would have reached the point of being irresolvable.

It was true that the chancellor had never punished the Crown Prince for his breaking of the rules. But Yang Qi wasn’t the Crown Prince. Many people believed that the Crown Prince was so important that he was justified in breaking the rules. Not so with Yang Qi. He just wasn’t important enough.

Many of the grand elders in the Minorcosm World were discussing the matter.

“This was a smart move by the chancellor. He really deserves his position.”

“Mission: Mend Heaven is an extremely dangerous mission. Yang Qi stands a very high chance of dying, and has almost no chance of accomplishing it. That’s a pretty big punishment.”

“It’s unusual. Considering Yang Qi’s cultivation base, not even the Grand Emperor's Pagoda will be enough of a boost for him to succeed. Whenever we make an attempt at Mission: Mend Heaven, it’s with a group of experts, with the chancellor providing backup. Even then, people end up getting hurt or killed. How could one person possibly accomplish it?”

“It’s a stiff punishment. He’s killing two birds with one stone.”

“But what if Yang Qi actually succeeds? Won’t Grand Elder Feat-Virtue have died for nothing?”

“Succeed with Mission: Mend Heaven? If Yang Qi does, it means he really does have the backing of a Great Sage, and yes, Grand Elder Feat-Virtue will have died for nothing. It's a really smart move by the chancellor. Not only does he punish Yang Qi, but he also forces him to reveal if he has a Great Sage backer or not. If he doesn’t, his days are numbered. If he does, then fine, he shows that, not only did he qualify to kill Grand Elder Feat-Virtue, he also was in the position to repair the damage to heaven.”

“If you look at it that way, then the chancellor is really killing three birds with one stone. I wonder if we’ll see who Yang Qi’s backer really is.”

Key members of the Crown Prince Society had been planning to send word of Grand Elder Feat-Virtue to the Crown Prince. However, this latest news pacified them for the moment, and they decided to wait to see how things played out before making a decision.

Before, there had been open cries of complaint about Yang Qi’s actions, but now, everyone was quieting down.

Not even the Hall of Law Enforcement had anything negative to say. The grand elders there were simply chomping at the bit for Yang Qi to fail in his mission, so that they could swoop in and arrest him. Afterward, they would make him live a life worse than death.

**

Yang Qi and the masked young woman hovered high above the sea of clouds, looking down at the Demi-Immortal Institute.

“Look, Yang Qi, do you see all the devil-suppressing halls down in the institute? The reason for that is we’re located in the exact middle of the Rich-Lush Continent, where there are a large number of spatial rifts. Such rifts are easy for devil-ghosts to slip through, and thus, we need plenty of places to keep them prisoner when we catch them.”

As Yang Qi looked down, he identified many temples that were filled with pitch black devil energy, as well as the howls of devil-ghosts. He even sensed the auras of fiend-devil barons, viscounts, and counts.

The devil-suppressing halls were scattered about everywhere, and anyone who got close to them would be terrified by the powerful devil energy they contained. If any of those halls were breached, and the devil energy poured out, the entire institute would be invaded by devil-ghosts.

“Since you haven’t reached the Space-Void Transformation, you can’t see how, in the very depths of the institute, space-time is twisted and distorted. There are many areas there which were magically sealed by Great Sages of the past. On the other side is an immense aspect of distorted space-time filled with devil-ghosts. To describe them as numerous as the grains of sand in the sea would be an understatement. If those seals were ever breached, the Demi-Immortal Institute, and the Rich-Lush Continent as a whole, would be overwhelmed.”

“Are you saying that the magical seals are keeping the Hell of Euphoria out?” Yang Qi asked.

The masked young woman shook her head. “No. The Hell of Euphoria exists much further away. But the worlds and kingdoms beyond the magical seals have been affected by its devil energy, causing their inhabitants to turn into monsters.” She chuckled coldly. “If it was the Hell of Euphoria on the other side, the Rich-Lush Continent would long since have been razed to the ground, and would be inhabited by monsters. There are far, far more magical seals preventing the Hell of Euphoria from reaching us here, and many space-time barriers. Only someone in the Great Sage level could possibly reach that hell, and yet, if they did, would inevitably be turned into a fiend-devil.”

“The Hell of Euphoria, huh….” The truth was that Yang Qi would love to have a chance to visit a true hell. After all, the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth was specifically designed to deal with hells, and if he could cultivate in one, it would be very beneficial to his cultivation base.

Although, even being able to enter an aspect of space-time filled with devil-ghosts would help him to achieve significant progress. The chancellor was trying to sound him out, but in the end, was giving him a perfect opportunity for training.

And considering the progress he had been making recently, he knew that relying on his current methods to achieve a breakthrough didn't seem the best strategy.

“Very well, let’s go inside,” the masked young woman said. “I’ll point out any monsters, as well as the heavenly damage that needs to be repaired.”

“What?” Yang Qi blurted, completely caught off guard. “You’re coming with me? What’s going on here? Don’t tell me you’re coming to supervise me?”

“That’s exactly right. I’ll be supervising you to make sure you don’t try to escape.” She laughed. “As you well know, if you fail with Mission: Mend Heaven, you’ll be punished for killing Grand Elder Feat-Virtue. But if you succeed, then you’ll have equal standing with the Crown Prince.”

“If this mission is so dangerous, don’t you stand a chance of getting killed if you come with me?”

“Me? Get killed?” She laughed again. “You know, I'm more accomplished than the Crown Prince in many ways. Besides, if you really want to accomplish the mission, you’ll need help from me. There’s no way you could do it on your own. I’ll tell you how to kill the fiend-devils, and how to repair the damage.”

“Who exactly are you?” Yang Qi asked. He was very curious about this point. “Master Wind Gentleman and Unparalleled Lightning treated you with the utmost respect. They even called you Young Lady.”

“It’s no secret. All the important people in the Demi-Immortal Institute know who I am. I'm the chancellor’s daughter. You know, I'm actually very curious about you, Yang Qi. I looked into you, so I know that when you joined the institute about two years ago, you were only in the seventh or eighth phase of the Energy Arts level. Now you’re a Legendary. That’s speed that surpasses almost every genius in the history of the Demi-Immortal Institute. Not even the Crown Prince can come close. Therefore, I'm going to help you repair the damage to heaven, and at the same time, be looking to see what secrets you harbor.”

“The chancellor’s daughter? No wonder everyone shows you so much respect. Might I presume to ask how to address you, Young Lady?”

“Just call me Young Lady,” she replied, clearly not willing to divulge her true name. “Even the Crown Prince calls me that. No one is allowed to know my name, and that includes you.”

‘Quite the egomaniac,’ he thought. He tried again to assess her cultivation base, but had no luck. For all he knew, she could be weaker than him, or stronger. If he had to bet, he would say she was a Legendary, and a high-level one at that.

The fact that she was the daughter of the chancellor meant that she was destined to be powerful and respected.

“Alright, then. I’ll call you Young Lady. With the formalities out of the way, do you mind leading the way into this aspect of space-time?” He extended his hand invitingly.

“You can do it on your own with the Grand Emperor's Pagoda. It's more than capable of piercing through the void and defending against space-time tempests. My father had the Grand Emperor's Pagoda for a while, but sadly, I never had a chance to work with it. He subsequently arranged for the Crown Prince to get it, but things changed, and now it's yours.”

Hoping to probe for some information of his own, Yang Qi said, “Thanks to me, the Crown Prince doesn't fully trust the chancellor anymore.”

“He’s suspicious by nature,” she replied casually. “In that way, he's very much like a monarch. As long as people do what he wants, everything goes smoothly, but when someone goes against him, he reacts violently. He’s the epitome of the saying submit to me and prosper, or oppose me and perish. Of course, he's very important. It's highly likely that he was actually sent here from beyond heaven, by some incredibly powerful person from a higher plane of existence.”

“Higher plane?”

This was Yang Qi’s first time hearing the term.

“Planes are worlds. And our world is one of the lower planes, with living things that aren’t particularly powerful. Even in primeval times, when the Yore-Wilds Continent was whole, it only counted as an intermediate plane. There are many planes in the universe, and they’re usually ranked according to the level of the living beings they contain. As for the truly higher planes, they produce immensely powerful living things. The ancient records of our institute contain detailed information about that. Supposedly, some of the immortal-ranked planes have entities strong enough to be considered immortals, who can pluck stars and snatch moons. Above the immortal planes are the god legion planes, which are inhabited by the legion of gods. The gods are entities which can create worlds as easily as breathing. With the snap of a finger, such beings could create dozens of planes like the Rich-Lush Continent. Although, perhaps all of that is just myth. One thing is for sure, though: the Hell of Euphoria is a much more powerful plane than the Rich-Lush Continent.”

After finishing her explanation, the mysterious Young Lady waved her hand, causing a rift to open up in front of them, from which emerged the sound of wailing ghosts, screaming gods, and spatial tempests.

Chapter 240: All-Encompassing Devil Energy

This was Yang Qi’s first time directly piercing through space in this manner.

Up to this point, he had always used the Grand Emperor's Pagoda to do so. And it had always been within the Rich-Lush Continent itself; never had he dared to brave the spatial tempests that filled space-time.

The slightest mistake could lead to being sucked into one of the tempests, or losing one's way for all time. However, he was now strong enough to provoke a psychic tempest. And his true energy now counted as Sovereign Lord True Energy. Considering that, and the added protection of the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, he didn't need to fear spatial tempests.

Besides, he had the additional assistance of the Young Lady.

The mere wave of her hand opened the spatial rift; it seemed as easy for her as blowing some dust off her shoulder. Yang Qi couldn’t help but be shocked. She was obviously far beyond the level of Master Wind Gentleman or Unparalleled Lightning.

In fact, Yang Qi was now fairly certain that she was on the same level as Hua Tianxiong and Young Master Shroud-Heaven. Although her aura didn't seem particularly powerful, on a substructural level, she was terrifying. From what he could tell, she had access to some of the most powerful energy in the world.

It was similar to how, if a Great Sage looked at Yang Qi, that person would see true energy that appeared to be weak. And yet, because of the universal power in it, the substructure of that true energy was actually far purer than that of many Great Sages.

“After you,” the Young Lady said. “This is the first of the passageways. Take your time reaching the location of the sealing marks. Along the way, you’ll encounter powerful opponents, fiend-devils that I'm sure you can handle on your own.”

Looking completely unfazed, Yang Qi said, “I happen to love ridding the world of devils and demons. When facing me, even the strongest fiend-devils will be crushed into a bloody paste.” With that, the Grand Emperor's Pagoda appeared, and he entered the area of spatial tempests.

Instantly, the pressure increased by hundreds or thousands of times. Spatial tempests battered the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, like the attacks of tens of thousands of Space-Void Legendaries.

Yang Qi was like an ant being swept along by a flood, able to do nothing but hand his fate over to heaven.

And he had already lost track of the path leading back.

Presumably, the Young Lady had already closed the rift.

Yang Qi immediately activated certain spell formations in the Grand Emperor’s Pagoda, which caused radiant light to swirl out everywhere, and fight back against the spatial tempests. Within moments, he managed to stabilize himself.

Looking around, he saw the violent tempests raging everywhere, seemingly without end, so terrifying that it didn’t seem like even fiend-devils could survive them.

“What are you hesitating for?” the Young Lady said from behind him. “Some aspects of space-time have tempests, some don’t. They come and go at random. In that respect, it’s just like being out on the sea. We’re here when the tempests are at their peak, because that’s when the devil-ghosts are least active. But if we see any, they need to be exterminated. Understand?”

Yang Qi looked over his shoulder and saw her simply hovering there among the tempests. She wasn't using any magical treasure, nor any sort of defensive true energy. When the tempests hit her, she seemed to simply absorb them, as surely as a black hole. Yet again, Yang Qi wondered what level she was, and what technique she cultivated.

However, he said nothing. Instead, he circulated his true energy and began to work on the Physique of the Sovereign Lord. By setting up self-sustaining cycles of true energy, he could keep the Grand Emperor's Pagoda functioning for many days and nights without intervention.

“Follow me,” the Young Lady said as she began to make her way through the tempests.

He did, his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth stirring excitedly at the sensation of powerful devil-ghosts and fiend-devils up ahead.

RUMBLE!

Suddenly, something like a black river appeared off in the distance, causing everything to turn dark. The spatial tempests went still, and the passage of the river caused space-time to twist and distort. At the same time, a corrosive aura spread out, accompanied by the cries of fiend-devils and ghost-gods.

“A hell monsoon!” the Young Lady said, stopping in her tracks, astonishment visible on her face.

Yang Qi stopped behind her and looked over at the pitch-black river that could crush spatial tempests. This was a mighty power that was clearly not man-made; no, this was definitely godpower.

“What’s a hell monsoon?” Yang Qi asked.

“All hells are planes of immense power,” the Young Lady said in a somber tone of voice. “At any given time, billions of streams of evil power can be found streaming out to different aspects of space-time. Whenever such a stream of power reaches a certain peak level, it causes a hell monsoon. Countless hellish beings, including devil-ghosts, fiend-devils, ghost-gods, zombies, skeletons, and the like, will ride the monsoon to other parts of space-time. In other words, hell monsoons are the only way that they can get to different planes and aspects of space-time.”

Even fiend-devils in the Great Sage level had to exercise extreme caution when piercing through space-time, much less ordinary fiend-devils. However, if they were in a hell monsoon, then it would be much easier for them to reach planes with flesh and blood creatures. If they could reach such places, they would attempt to conquer them and make them hells of their own.

At the moment, the Rich-Lush Continent was under assault by this hell monsoon. And if the hell monsoon broke through the protective seals, all of the lands would be destroyed and turned into a hell of fiend-devils.

As the hell monsoon bore down on Yang Qi, the surrounding spatial tempests vanished, to be replaced by what appeared to be a viscous, noxious plane that reminded Yang Qi of the Heavencorpse Dimension.

It was an expression of the might of the hell monsoon; wherever a hell monsoon blew, the surroundings became the perfect environment for fiend-devils.

All of a sudden, millions of fiend-devils appeared within the monsoon, all of them viscounts. And all of them seemed dead set on ripping Yang Qi to shreds.

“Prepare to die!” they screamed.

Strangely, the fiend-devils didn’t seem to notice the Young Lady, despite the fact that she was obviously standing right next to Yang Qi.

She seemed to be an observer that they didn't care at all about.

“Yang Qi, don’t take these fiend-devils lightly. And they’ll only continue to get stronger. In addition to the Legendary counts, there will also be corpse emperors and corpse sovereigns. Focus on the fighting. I’ll give you tips as I see fit.”

“Why aren’t they going after you?” Yang Qi asked. “Can they even see you?”

She laughed. “I'm here to observe and offer suggestions, not directly help you. You’re the one who’s supposed to be repairing the damage to heaven, not me. I’m not going to come out in the open and help you fight.”

Roar!

The horde of fiend-devils was almost upon him, so there wasn’t any time for discussion.

“You fiend-devils can all die!” Yang Qi leaped into action. As he unleashed a fist strike, the Hell Portal appeared behind him, within which was a simmering cauldron. Instantly, gravitational force erupted out to grab the fiend-devils.

Those who didn’t react quickly enough were quickly sucked into the Hell Portal.

And when they landed into the crucible beyond, they let out bloodcurdling screams as they were transformed into ash. These fiend-devils were not spirits, they were living things with flesh and blood, carried by a hell monsoon to a plane of other living beings, where they hoped to gorge themselves on the inhabitants.

Sadly for them, they ran into Yang Qi, who was a crusher of hells.

Over a thousand fiend-devils vanished in the blink of an eye, burned up in the Hellfire Crucible. This part of the hell monsoon was ripped to shreds, and sucked into the Hell Portal, which might as well have been a black hole designed specifically to drag in things from hell.

All darkness and gloom from hell would be consumed and transformed into pure radiance and light.

In the blink of an eye, countless fiend-devils, zombies, devil-ghosts, spirit creatures, and skeletons were absorbed, and converted by the Hellfire Crucible into power for Yang Qi.

‘This is great. This hell monsoon is incredibly powerful, and provides me with pure energy from hell. It’s almost the same as that asura’s flesh and blood.’

Ignoring the Young Lady, he flew forward into the hell monsoon, destroying everything in his path. Thanks to the constant power being fed to him by the Hellfire Crucible, his Sovereign Lord True Energy began to rise rapidly.

In fact, it seemed likely that this slaughter could push him all the way to the Spirit-Soul Transformation.

These fiend-devils were simply too weak!

Chapter 241: Hell Monsoon

The masked Young Lady closely watched Yang Qi carrying out slaughter in the hell monsoon, and her eyes glittered.

‘This guy’s cultivation base really is designed to dominate fiend-devils. He can even neutralize a hell monsoon and turn it into burning fire to temper his true energy. Not even Great Sages can do things like that. One who got caught in a hell monsoon would need to be very careful to avoid being infected with wretch energy.’

She was an observer, and apparently, wasn’t even in the same world as Yang Qi, but rather, in another one. It was a special ability of hers that not even most Great Sages could duplicate, something born of her unique constitution. In this regard, she was similar to Yang Susu.

Yang Qi didn’t have time to spend observing her. He continued to charge deeper into the hell monsoon, where the devil-ghosts, zombies, and fiend-devils grew stronger and more powerful. As a result, his Hell Portal and Hellfire Crucible raged with increasing intensity, his true energy continued to be refined, and the scope of his psychic tempest increased.

The Grand Emperor's Pagoda was also in full operation. Combined with the effects of his two techniques, Yang Qi was like an executioner from hell, slaughtering fiend-devils like mad. Millions of them were ripped to shreds, causing a powerful aura of death to spread out.

Soon, the fiend-devils in the hell monsoon began to back away from him.

But then, a terrifying howl swept forth as the most enormous fiend-devil so far appeared, a leader of sorts, fierce and murderous, fully three hundred meters tall, burly, with massive wings.

This beast was in the third Legendary transformation, a fiend-devil count who was a Space-Void Legendary. He fairly radiated a sensation of nobility and power that would cause any human who encountered him to feel like they were suffocating. His entire three-hundred-meter frame was covered with armor, and it was impossible to say how much raging true energy existed inside him.

Whether it was true energy or physical strength, a fiend-devil like this would surpass any human of the same cultivation level by dozens of times. In other words, not even ten Blightczar Manyrivers would be a match for him.

Only the ancient megamammoths could possibly match up with fiend-devils in terms of physical constitution; a single megamammoth could suck a river into its trunk and then spray it up into the air to create a rainstorm. And the energy arts cultivated by the megamammoths were focused on brute strength. After all, they were the descendants of the godmammoths, so even the weakest of the megamammoths could slaughter fiend-devils with ease.

At the moment, Yang Qi had the power of multiple megamammoths, plus the Physique of the Sovereign Lord. On a substructural level, he was the equivalent of two thousand megamammoths, and therefore, he had what it took to crush this powerful fiend-devil.

As he faced the beast, his aura surged, and he summoned his Infernal Deity Spear. Burning with fire, the spear extended until it was three thousand meters long. The Nightfall Symphony rang out, causing the hell monsoon to tremble violently.

Eyeing Yang Qi, the fiend-devil spat out a string of words in the Helltongue, apparently some sort of spell or curse.

“Kurūkh karražk….”

Ghostly light sprang from his eyes, and misty winds swirled around him as he extended a blood-colored ghost saber made from true energy. Everything in the area was suddenly stained the same color, making it like a sea of blood. Without hesitating, the fiend-devil slashed the saber at Yang Qi.

Clash. Clang.

The Infernal Deity Spear and the blood-colored ghost saber slashed back and forth, causing killing energy to ripple out in all directions.

Yang Qi’s true energy flowed without cease, and flames wreathed the Infernal Deity Spear. At the same time, the image of a godmammoth appeared behind him, surrounded by stars that fell like rain.

Massive power smashed into the blood-colored ghost sabre, which quivered and then shattered.

Shocked, the fiend-devil count backed up a few paces.

Suddenly, an ancient voice spoke from Yang Qi’s forehead, using nothing other than Godtongue.

“You have blasphemed the legion of gods, fiend-devil, and you will be punished for it. Under the glory of the Lord, all fiends will be slaughtered, and the world will be bathed in radiance and light.”

His Lord's Eye opened, and a massive stream of light shot out, smacking into the huge fiend-devil with might that surpassed any divine weapon or god item. In fact, the fiend-devil’s armor was instantly pierced.

The burning light ignited the fiend-devil’s flesh and blood, and he was absolutely incapable of doing anything to stop it.

The beast screamed, and his devil energy raged as he tried to extinguish the fire. Unfortunately for him, it did no good. Even if he had far more devil energy than he did, he couldn’t fight those flames. In fact, it was actually like pouring oil onto fire. Soon, even the surrounding areas of the hell monsoon were burning.

Once again, the Hell Portal appeared, sucked in the burning fiend-devil count, and deposited him into the Hellfire Crucible. As the fiend-devil’s life force was turned into burning fire, Yang Qi became even more holy. His flesh and blood grew more refined, almost as if he had been refined by the striking of a thousand hammers.

‘He took out a Space-Void Legendary fiend-devil, just like that?’ thought the Young Lady. ‘Burned alive, and the thing couldn’t even defend himself? What type of fire is that? It’s designed to target devil energy.’

Without saying a single word, Yang Qi continued into the depths of the hell monsoon, fighting and killing everything in his path. Each slash of his spear was like a mountain crushing into the armies around it, slaying zombies, devil-ghosts, skeletons, fiend-devils, spirit creatures, and other hellish beasts.

Before long, the Infernal Deity Spear began to change color. The blood of the hellish fiend-devils which covered it provoked a transformation in which it shone with scintillating light. Angels appeared, flying in the air around the spear, singing holy hymns as a beautiful choir.

Massive flames burned away at the hell monsoon, as brilliant light pushed away the darkness, replacing hell with pure holiness.

‘I represent the legion of gods, and I spread radiance and light. I will drive darkness to the furthest reaches of the universe…. Where I stand, life is welcome, and the rot of hell will be forced to retreat…. The glory of the legion of gods, and the dignity of the Lord. I shall propagate both….’ As the slaughter continued, Yang Qi’s true energy grew stronger, until his meridians were virtually magical symbols written out in Godtongue. He felt like he was one with nature, and because of the cleansing quality of the quintessence energy of heaven and earth, he would never run out of energy. He was like a tool designed specifically to wage war on hell.

At the same time, the psychic tempest inside him grew more powerful, to the point where the vital energy in the area was beginning to transform.

Eventually, the Young Lady settled down cross-legged, hovering there in the void, eyes closed. When she finally opened her eyes, she murmured, “An entire day has passed.”

Later….

“Two days….”

Multiple days passed. At one point, the Young Lady opened her eyes and saw that Yang Qi had slaughtered just about every hellish being in sight. Time worked differently in the hell monsoon, but the Young Lady was able to sync this aspect of space-time with the Rich-Lush Continent. And thus, she knew that Yang Qi had been fighting nonstop for seven days and seven nights.

He was like a god of battle who could never tire.

‘Whether or not he has a Great Sage backer, his future prospects are limitless. Give him a few dozen years, a hundred at most, and he’ll be another Crown Prince. It’s too bad that two tigers can’t live on one mountain. The Crown Prince definitely won’t allow him to stay alive. Otherwise, it would only be a matter of time before Yang Qi surpassed him.’

Even as she considered the matter, she heard Yang Qi shout, “Second Legendary transformation. Spirit-Soul Transformation!”

Boundless flames wreathed him, and his true energy created the images of palaces, god-spirits, and war being waged. There were even scenes from hell.

A massive psychic tempest erupted, ripping the void around him to shreds, and putting an end to even more devil-ghosts in the hell monsoon.

Thanks to the seven days and nights of fierce fighting, Yang Qi had pushed his fleshly body to the limit, and had finally broken through to the second Legendary transformation.

As of this point, his spirit and soul were unimaginably powerful. Thanks to the psychic tempest, something like an infant had been created, which was none other than a manifestation of his soul, barely visible within the depths of his pupils.

Looking around, he suddenly realized that the many distortions in space-time around him resembled the holes worms might leave as they burrowed through the soil.

Wormholes.

That was the word that came to mind. Looking out through his psychic tempest, he saw numerous barriers which were obviously passageways to other worlds and planes. Some of them had no life, some of them teemed with it. Others abounded with evil.

The world had changed to him, on a substructural level.

It was as if the world had been two-dimensional to him before, but now, it was three-dimensional, and richly colorful. Everything was different.

Inside of the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, spirit stones burned brightly as his power rose higher and higher. However, in that moment, he suddenly saw what looked like a sea of lightning out in the void. Tribulation had come.

It spread out without cease, covering everything in the area, to the point where the Young Lady actually began to back away. “Sea Lightning Grand Tribulation?”

Chapter 242: Spirit-Soul Transformation

Yang Qi had been preparing and building up power, and now, thanks to this hell monsoon, he was finally making a breakthrough to another level.

Originally, he had assumed it would take several months of work to reach the Spirit-Soul Transformation, but as it turned out, seven days and nights of fighting pushed him to the level he needed. And it was all thanks to the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.

And now, a sea of lightning was forming overhead. Within it writhed dragons, snakes, and beasts of all kinds, bursting with killing intent, surrounded by the chanting of god-spirits.

This was only happening because of the unique nature of Yang Qi’s psychic tempest.

This tribulation lightning was many, many times fiercer and more powerful than anything Yang Qi had faced before. There were even lightning gods with axes and other weapons, ready to chop Yang Qi to pieces.

And yet, he just stood there in the midst of the lightning, not moving an inch. Behind him, an enormous godmammoth appeared, who simply inhaled all of the ‘water’ of the sea of lightning. As it did, it transformed into a lightning mammoth surrounded by a river of sparks and electricity.

Mysterious changes immediately began to occur to Yang Qi as he stepped into the Spirit-Soul Transformation. The Grand Emperor's Pagoda rotated above his head, sending out vibrations that caused the space around him to shatter like a mirror.

And because of how the godmammoth had absorbed the lightning, particles began to awaken in him like crazy. One thousand particles. Two thousand. Three thousand…. Before, he had two thousand, but now, he increased it by a full three thousand to five thousand. All of them were like megamammoths formed from true energy, like a bizarre scene from the most primeval times when the megamammoths ruled supreme.

In antiquity, there were hosts of demons that existed, and yet, the Mammothfolk were not considered to be part of the Demonfolk. They were the descendants of the godmammoths, and were thus holy and god-like. In fact, they were often raised by the god-spirits of the ancient world.

As for this new host of mammoths, they didn’t have a scrap of demon energy, but instead, were completely holy.

The Young Lady made sure to memorize every detail of what she was seeing so that she could report it to her father.

Yang Qi didn't care. He had reached the point where he was done keeping secrets. Perhaps people would be able to guess what type of energy art he cultivated because of things like this, but at the moment, it wouldn't become widespread knowledge. At the most, the chancellor would be in on the secret.

In any case, it was past the point where he could hide his true technique.

Back in the Lifeseizing level, he had been able to rely on his sword technique to fool people. But now that he was a Legendary, trying to rely on that technique would only get him killed.

The Cosmic Sunflare Sword, Moonset Hyperlunar Sword, and Ravaging Dual Sword technique were not the proper tools to use his true abilities. Although they could still be useful, compared to the Infernal Deity Spear, they were too weak.

With the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth and the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, he could crush anyone who got in his way.

And that was even more the case now that he had succeeded with the Spirit-Soul Transformation.

The power of five thousand ancient megamammoths was almost beyond comprehension; it was the type of power that could literally level mountains and drain seas.

Of course, he had only scratched the surface of his ultimate potential. Eventually, he would be strong enough that the Rich-Lush Continent was like a speck of dust to him, something he could simply toss into the sun to destroy it if he wanted.

That was power that surpassed even the Great Sage level.

“Congratulations, Yang Qi,” the Young Lady said. “You achieved another breakthrough. You're a Spirit-Soul Legendary now. Once you reach the third Legendary transformation, you’ll be able to truly use the powers of the Grand Emperor's Pagoda. You’ll be able to break through many types of godwardings, and create your own rich and lush kingdoms within the void. Furthermore, you’ll be able to cast the domain inherent to the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, the Rich-Lush Domain.”

“What?” Yang Qi asked, shocked. “When I'm a Space-Void Legendary I’ll be able to use the Grand Emperor's Pagoda to summon a personal domain?”

“Of course. What, you think that the fabled Grand Emperor Rich-Lush’s most powerful magical treasure is just a chunk of bronze? Your cultivation level is too low to unleash its full potential, that’s all. If I had it….” From her tone of voice, it seemed she thought that Yang Qi having the Grand Emperor's Pagoda was a big waste. “Well, let’s just say that the Crown Prince wouldn't be the number one figure in his generation. Nor would he be the next chancellor.”

‘So, that’s how it is,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘If I reach the Space-Void Transformation, I actually can use the pagoda’s domain, which is called the Rich-Lush Domain. Well, it won’t be as good as the God Legion Paradise, but I guess having at least one domain is better than nothing.’

The God Legion Paradise would come with the sixth Legendary transformation, a pure land of the legion of gods, a kingdom of light that could crush all other domains.

Unfortunately, it was impossible to say how many months or years it would take to reach that point. Right now, Yang Qi was in the second transformation. He had a powerful soul, and a fleshly body that was like the Sovereign Lord’s, but he still couldn’t pierce through the void on his own.

After looking around, Yang Qi said, “I've wiped out all the fiend-devils from this part of the hell monsoon. Let’s continue on.” As for the hell monsoon itself, it stretched through numerous aspects of space-time, and was not something that Yang Qi could stop.

Not even sun flares or spatial tempests could compare to hell monsoons.

Their power could eat away at the most powerful of magical sealings, and would inflict damage that could not easily be recovered from.

“Your luck is bad, Yang Qi,” the Young Lady said, shaking her head. “This hell monsoon couldn’t have come at a worse time. Thanks to it, the sealing mark is now even worse off than ever. It's going to be ten times as difficult to repair it as before. Hurry up and call on your Great Sage for help. Otherwise, you’ll never accomplish the mission, and my father will be forced to punish you for killing Grand Elder Feat-Virtue.”

Yang Qi chuckled coldly. “It's obvious that your father sent me on this mission to try to force me to reveal who my Great Sage backer is. And if I don’t have one, he’ll crush me, take the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, and give it to the Crown Prince.”

“Well, of course,” the Young Lady replied, not bothering to try to deny it. “We live in a world in which power and resources count for everything. Without them, you’re dead. If you’ve been stirring up trouble in the Demi-Immortal Institute without a Great Sage to back you, then you’ve been living on borrowed time. If you do have that backing, then your actions can be considered justified.”

Yang Qi shook his head sadly. “Ai…. Public morals are degenerating with every day that passes. People just aren’t like they used to be in the old days. The Demi-Immortal Institute is losing its right to provide enlightenment to the masses, and set the compass of morality. If I ever end up taking over the institute, I’ll definitely enact a plan of reform and inspiration.”

“Cut the crap. Go repair that seal. Now that you're a Spirit-Soul Legendary, you should be able to see the sealed area up ahead, and which parts are damaged.”

“Let me see….” Yang Qi opened his Lord's Eye, and instantly, the layers of mist that had surrounded him vanished, and he saw the endless spatial tempests and boundless devil energy. As for the devil energy, it came from howling fiend-devil counts, Legendary experts who seemed to be searching for targets. Yang Qi could also sense numerous locations off in the distance that seemed to be locked down with magic. There was also one particular area that currently surged with massive amounts of devil energy.

That final location was the origin of the hell monsoon, a place that had been sealed by ancient Great Sages. Unfortunately, the seal had been corroded through the years until it was possible for things like the hell monsoon to pass through it.

As he neared, the damaged areas became visible. Beyond the openings were other planes of existence, continents and small worlds that were filled with monsters, most of whom were focused on destroying the sealing marks to a further degree. To repair the damage, Yang Qi would have to get much closer, and thus, face more danger.

Most likely, those nests of devils would have monsters in the eighth or ninth Legendary transformation. No wonder the Crown Prince had failed to repair the sealing marks.

As Yang Qi assessed the situation, his expression flickered. It was obvious that he simply wasn’t strong enough to do what was being asked of him. Perhaps the God Legion Seal would be strong enough to destroy all the fiend-devils in question, except, he couldn't actively wield the God Legion Seal. All he could do was wade into the action, try to avoid being killed, and hope it activated.

However, that would be taking a huge risk, and Yang Qi didn't like taking unnecessary risks. He liked to be confident in the outcome of whatever he did.

What if he got into a deadly situation, and the God Legion Seal didn’t activate? What would he do? Just die?

Unfortunately, he didn't see any other options.

He simply had to brace himself, and advance.

Looking at the dense devil energy, he thought, ‘I’ll give it a shot. But I can’t do this kind of thing again. My hand is being forced, all thanks to the Crown Prince and the chancellor. However, I guess I can consider it training. Let’s see how far I can push the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.’

Chapter 243: Deadly Training

Now that Yang Qi was a Spirit-Soul Legendary, his psychic power could easily penetrate dimensional barriers to see what lay beyond. Because of that ability, he could tell that the monsters in this hell monsoon were extremely powerful.

Soon, he was closing in on the nearest damaged seal, which was surrounded by Legendary-level devil-ghosts. They were creatures with powerful flesh and blood and flourishing true energy. Even casual movements on their part could destroy mountains and rivers. They grasped the meaning of the five phases, and could bend yin and yang to their will. Some of them were even capable of crafting magical treasures, or using their devil energy to set up spell formations and magical sealing marks.

The mere sight of so many terrifying monsters would cause even the most powerful humans to shiver with fear.

However, the Young Lady didn't seem worried at all. Looking over, she said, “The real test begins here, Yang Qi.”

“You’re not really here, are you Young Lady? You’re a projection cast by some unparalleled magical treasure of some sort. That’s why the monsters haven’t shown any interest in you. Of course, that means you can’t attack them any more than they can attack you.”

“Very perceptive,” she replied. “You’re right. I'm using my Cosmic Mirror to project myself here. My true form is in the Minorcosm World. That said, if you think I can’t unleash attacks here, you’d be sadly mistaken.”

Waving her finger, she sent a stream of light out that slammed into a Lifeseizing fiend-devil off in the distance, reducing it to powder.

“But don't even think of asking for help.”

“I don’t need your help,” Yang Qi said with a sneer. “Let's see just how dangerous these fiend-devils actually are.”

Once again drawing on the power of the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, he shot forward, twisting and distorting space-time as he passed along. As he drew closer to his destination, he noticed that up ahead was a seemingly endless field of greyspace. That was where the actual sealing mark was. Now he just needed to fight his way close enough to it.

Before actually beginning the repair work, he would need to kill all the nearby enemies. Then, the Young Lady would tell him the specifics of how to do the repairing. Not wasting any time, he shot toward the greyspace.

As for the Young Lady, she remained behind. After all, there would be significant danger, and if she wasn’t careful, her projection could end up being destroyed.

Suddenly, from within the stormy darkness, the ancient voice of a fiend-devil rang out.

“Ah, another damned human has come to repair the seal! Well, I’ll just kill him! He's not a Great Sage, and yet came to repair the sealing mark? Is he looking to get killed? I’ve been camped out here for over a hundred years eating away at the seal. Once I break it, more hell monsoons can enter! And anyone who tries to stop me is going to be killed beyond the shadow of a doubt. Perhaps I’ll eat him! He does look quite plump and flavorful. And he’s a Legendary! Legendary meat is very nutritious. And scrumptious too….”

He was none other than a fierce zombie, dark gold in color, indicating that he was a ten-thousand-year-old corpse king. Shockingly, he pulsed with corpse energy that formed something like a kingdom of corpses around him.

It was a personal domain, indicating that this beast was at least in the sixth Legendary transformation.

By drawing on the power of hell monsoons to bolster himself, he would continuously improve his cultivation as time went by. Practicing cultivation in hell monsoons was the best way for many monsters like this to progress. To them, hell monsoons were as beneficial as spirit stones were to people.

Roar!

As the corpse king flew toward Yang Qi, claws extended, he sent underworldly power out, which became a corpse dragon. At the same time, he used the power of his personal domain to try to crush Yang Qi.

To Yang Qi, it looked like the world around him was collapsing, spinning and turning until it became a strange, new world. It was filled with toxic energy, and plenty of zombies. And it also had the power of the five phases and yin and yang, which instantly tried to crush him into powder.

Incredibly powerful magical laws rendered him almost completely immobile.

‘What power! So, this is what personal domains can do?’ This was his first time tangling with a Personal-Domain Legendary, and already, he could tell how much more powerful this was than the Yin-Yang Transformation.

If he hadn’t already reached the second Legendary transformation, this domain would definitely have crushed him. Thankfully, he now had what it took to fight back.

“Lord's Eye!” he said. The Grand Emperor's Pagoda appeared above his head and began to fight against the evil domain, and the light from the Lord's Eye burned away any corpse energy it touched.

To wretch-devils like this who possessed the aura of hell, Yang Qi was the worst enemy possible.

BOOOOM!

In the very moment that the corpse king enveloped Yang Qi with his domain, hoping to transform him into a zombie servant, that was when intense, burning flame shot out from inside the domain.

Yelping, he ‘vomited’ Yang Qi out of his domain, and then sucked the domain back in.

“Head of the Heaven-Devil Corpse!” Slapping the flames off himself, the corpse king unleashed an evil energy art, sending devil energy roiling out to create an enormous, mountain-like head which opened its mouth and lunged toward Yang Qi.

However, Yang Qi already had his Infernal Deity Spear ready. Swishing forth, it stabbed directly into the forehead of the incoming head.

More flames erupted from the spear, which instantly set the gigantic head ablaze, and then surged onward to threaten the corpse king.

Never could this zombie have guessed that this opponent would be so formidable. Howling, he summoned an enormous, freezing banner of true energy. The surface of the banner was embroidered with millions of zombies, and even just flourishing it caused the temperature to drop so rapidly that the flames began to die.

‘Heaven-Devil Banner?’ the Young Lady thought. The shock was visible on her face. ‘That ten-thousand-year-old corpse king knows energy arts from the Heaven-Devil Sutra? Supposedly, it’s a supreme energy art created by the ancient ancestor of the heaven-devils, the Mahābrahmā Nine Destructions. The original is a heavenly-class energy art, but as it passed down through the generations of monsters, it became saintly-class, then imperial-class, and finally royal-class. But this Heaven-Devil Banner seems to be imperial-class. If he finishes cultivating it, it will be powerful enough to blot out the sky and melt mountains and rivers.’

Eyes flashing with killing intent, the corpse king said, “I haven’t even used a trump card yet, brat! You have no idea what true power is. Prepare to die….”

With that, his psychic tempest erupted out, slamming into the Grand Emperor's Pagoda and provoking a sonorous boom.

The Heaven-Devil Banner extinguished the remaining flames, and prepared to sweep Yang Qi up into its depths. At the same time, it locked down all of the space-time in the area. This energy art was definitely no weaker than the Son of Heaven’s Godfist.

However, Yang Qi didn’t seem even a little bit nervous. He hefted his spear, and the Nightfall Symphony rose up. As the Heaven-Devil Banner descended, it was sliced as cleanly in half as a ribbon that landed on a razor-sharp blade.

“Hell Portal!” The portal opened up behind Yang Qi, something that the corpse king couldn’t possibly fight against. In the blink of an eye, the Heaven-Devil Banner was sucked inside and thrown into the Hellfire Crucible.

“What energy art is that?” The corpse king blurted, turning around in the hopes of fleeing into the depths of the hell, and possibly getting help from other monsters. Every single move he used was completely defeated by Yang Qi, who now seemed like an impossible opponent to fight.

Of course, how could Yang Qi possibly let a ten-thousand-year-old corpse king escape? His true energy erupted as he sped forward like a stone shooting from a catapult. At the same time, the Grand Emperor's Pagoda began to rotate as he then smashed into the corpse king.

An agonized shriek erupted from the corpse king as cracks appeared all over him, and he began to leak corpse energy.

“Rage of the Infernal Deity!” Yang Qi poured all of the true energy he could into this one deadly attack. As he did, an actual infernal deity appeared, howling with such rage that the corpse king was completely struck senseless.

This was an ultimate expression of the Infernal Deity Spear, a martial technique that could cause monsters from hell to experience unbelievable fear. Nothing could terrify hellish monsters as much as infernal deities could, not even Great Sages.

The fact that the corpse king had been struck senseless also indicated that he was about to be destroyed.

The spear stabbed into his chest, and then flames enveloped his meridians, true energy, demon core, flesh, blood, and even his magical laws.

Even as he remained pinned on the spear, he reached out as if to grab Yang Qi.

Unfortunately, as his claws reached Yang Qi's skin, bronze light flared up, making it impossible for him to do any damage. That was the Grand Emperor's Pagoda.

“No! I refuse to accept this!” From the evil hatred in the corpse king’s eyes as he stared at Yang Qi, it seemed as though he wanted to end this fight in mutual ruin. Most people would shiver in fear at the mere sight of a gaze like that.

But Yang Qi wasn't moved at all. Reaching out, he extracted the thing’s demon core through the top of its head.

BOOM!

The corpse king dissolved into ashes, and Yang Qi tossed the core into his Hellfire Crucible, where it erupted into flame.

Chapter 244: Completing the Spore-Devil

Yang Qi had acquired a demon core from a Personal-Domain corpse king, which, if it were to be inlaid into a spell formation, could actually replicate the corpse king’s Heaven-Devil Domain. And anyone who wasn’t in the Personal-Domain Transformation who got caught in a domain like that would be killed.

Unfortunately, Yang Qi could not do that, nor could he consume the core directly. It was just too powerful. Perhaps if he broke through to the Space-Void Transformation, then he could use it.

In any case, the fact that he could kill a Personal-Domain Legendary was quite gratifying. Part of it had to do with the fact that his energy art was specifically designed to deal with fiend-devils.

If he had been fighting a human cultivator in the same level, it would have been a different story. At best, he might have been able to fight to a draw.

Given his current cultivation base, squaring off with people like Master Wind Gentleman or Unparalleled Lightning just wouldn’t work. People like that cultivated righteous and orthodox energy arts, and thus, would not be adversely affected by the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. Once Yang Qi reached the third Legendary transformation, though, things would be a different story. At that point, he could use the Grand Emperor's Pagoda to crush countless powerful heroes.

‘A demon core like this is a rare thing. I guess I’ll save it in my Hellfire Crucible for the time being, and refine it later.’

At the moment, the Hellfire Crucible rested in his Hell Portal, constantly burning the flesh and blood of the monsters he killed. Its flames were incredibly powerful, and could handle all sorts of magical treasures, even spirit stones. They surpassed the types of fire that ordinary people cultivated, such as Five Phases True Flame, Burning Sun True Flame, and even Heavenly Body True Flame. Yang Qi had the radiant fire of the legion of gods, the Cleansing Flame of the Heavenly World.

He also had the Grand Emperor's Pagoda in the Hell Portal, where it rotated above the Hellfire Crucible. Inside the pagoda, the remains of the asura were now a sphere of wriggling blood. That was the most precious thing to Yang Qi. Sovereign-grade spirit stones, spirit weapons or magical treasures didn’t even come close to the flesh and blood of a Never-Dying asura. Not even the five phases treasures.

He had been working with that flesh and blood for a very long time, and yet had still not extracted the full potential of its power. After all, there was a devil core in those remains, which contained never-dying magical laws. Obviously, Yang Qi’s cultivation base would need to be higher before he could refine that core, or use it in a spell formation.

RUMBLE!

As soon as the corpse king’s body entered the Hellfire Crucible, the Cleansing Flame of the Heavenly World began to transform. The faces of god-spirits appeared in it, almost as if each tongue of flame were one. As the magical laws of the corpse king began to burn, all sorts of strange phenomena occurred.

Because Yang Qi’s cultivation base was too low to absorb the magical laws, the best thing he could do was to burn them and use them to improve the Cleansing Flame of the Heavenly World.

As the pure flames burned his own true energy, his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth continued to climb to new heights.

‘The legion of gods provides the spore-devil in the Hell Portal. Oh, master of countless devils, devil among devils, controller of hell, come forth!’

Yang Qi threw his hands wide, and a monster appeared within the Hellfire Crucible. Without hesitation, it absorbed the god-spirit flames, and even fused with the asura's flesh and blood, like a parasite would. Although the asura’s flesh and blood was something that seemed eternally indestructible, the Cleansing Flame of the Heavenly World had changed it.

Flesh and blood quintessence swirled around the new monster, until it was wrapped up like a chrysalis.

This monster was none other than the Hell Portal’s spore-devil.

Yang Qi was pushing himself to the limits, using all of the power of five thousand ancient megamammoths. He couldn’t surpass the limits of his own level, but this spore-devil could.

The spore-devil’s facial features resembled Yang Qi’s, except devilish in nature. His psychic elements were ensconced in the thing, making it very much like the out-of-body incarnations that certain cultivators created. It was like a second nascent divinity, and yet, was much more profound and enigmatic than ordinary second nascent divinities.

The spore-devil was the overseer of the Hell Portal, and using it to summon monsters vastly increased the possible pool of targets. Now, summoning monsters that were higher than Yang Qi’s level would be no problem. Although it was not an uncommon thing for energy artists to have out-of-body incarnations or second divinities that surpassed their own level, such entities ended up being autonomous to a certain degree. In contrast, the spore-devil was connected to Yang Qi on a deep level. If he died, it would vanish. In fact, with a mere thought on his part, he could destroy it.

“With a thought, the devil appears,” Yang Qi murmured in Godtongue, “and the pāramitā lily blooms….”

The spore-devil began to twitch and wriggle, transforming as the cleansing flames washed over it. Numerous magical laws stirred inside it as the unique changes affected its life force on the deepest level.

Thanks to the powerful Cleansing Flame of the Heavenly World, the magical laws and corpse energy of the ten-thousand-year-old corpse king were already burned away.

Before, the flame had not been strong enough to burn away the asura’s flesh and blood, but with the additional fuel of a monster in the sixth Legendary transformation, they could burn hotter than ever.

Before, he had been able to burn and absorb the will of battle and slaughter that existed in the asura, but now, he was taking the quintessence of its flesh and blood. In fact, he could now finally see the asura’s devil core deep in that mass of flesh and blood.

**

“DIE!” Yang Qi shouted, slaughtering his way deeper into the hell monsoon, and the ancient sealing mark on the planar greyspace.

As for the fiend-devils which sensed his onslaught, they rushed to attack him. “Inverse Devil-Spirit Attack!”

A fiend-devil count reached out, summoned a huge bow and arrow made of true energy. The bow was thousands of meters from tip to tip, and the enormous arrow swirled with a massive vortex of devil energy.

TWANG!

The arrow was drawn to the limit and then released, piercing through everything in its path as it shot toward Yang Qi. However, it was no challenge at all to the Infernal Deity Spear, which shattered it into fragments. Then, the spear transformed into something like a bolt of lightning that smashed into the fiend-devil count’s chest, reducing it to a bloody paste. Before anything else could happen, the Hell Portal opened, sucking in the thing's remains, including its demon core.

This fiend-devil was many transformations below the corpse king from earlier, and thus, was quickly eaten away by the Cleansing Flame of the Heavenly World.

Yang Qi wasn’t even paying attention to that aspect, and merely advanced to the next challenge.

This was a fight in which he must continue onward no matter what deadly obstacles faced him. In this session of training and fighting, he knew that he could achieve progress that would be considered impossible outside.

After all, who but he could use a Legendary fiend-devil as mere fuel for fire to improve his true energy? In the Rich-Lush Continent, even Great Sages like the chancellors of the four institutes couldn’t even comprehend such a thing.

When the Young Lady saw the fight with the bow-wielding fiend-devil, she couldn’t help but murmur, ‘Heaven-Devil God-Exterminating Greatbow?’

That bow might not have posed a threat to Yang Qi, but that was mostly because of the low level of the fiend-devil he had fought. Had it been wielded by a more powerful enemy, things would have been different.

According to certain stories, there was a leader of the fiend-devils who resided in the depths of hell, a being who possessed wisdom regarding all aspects of hell. He was the fabled creator of the Heaven-Devil God-Exterminating Greatbow energy art, which had been designed to attack and kill members of the legion of gods.

There was no way that the true and full manifestation of the technique would be in the hands of some low-level fiend-devil. Clearly, what had been used was a subsidiary version. Even still, it was nothing to scoff at.

By the time the Young Lady recognized what she was seeing, Yang Qi had killed the thing and was continuing to advance through the hell monsoon. At that point, mournful bugle sounds rang out, as some greater fiend-devils summoned an army to besiege Yang Qi.

Instantly, black streams of smoke began to gather.

Each and every soldier in the army was a fiend-devil viscount, and there were over ten thousand of them, Lifeseizers all, a massive force arranged in tightly disciplined ranks. There were dozens of officers among them, Legendary counts, some of them in the fourth or fifth transformation.

Shockingly, all of the fiend-devils had enormous bows and devilish arrows. In the blink of an eye…. a rain of arrows was bearing down on Yang Qi.

In fact, the arrows actually made a spell formation of seemingly invincible power, which locked down space-time and made it impossible for the target to flee.

Yang Qi knew that this was nothing to take lightly. Without any hesitation, he entered the Grand Emperor's Pagoda and activated its defenses. As it hovered there, the arrows began to slam into it.

One by one, the arrows shattered, and Yang Qi absorbed their energy to improve his own.

By the time the rain of arrows ended, his aura was the type that could shake the heavens and topple the earth.

Chapter 245: Completing the Spore-Devil (2)

The true energy of countless Heaven-Devil God-Exterminating Greatbows was blocked by the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, and then sucked inside to be refined in Yang Qi’s Hellfire Crucible. With every arrow that was vanquished, Yang Qi’s aura grew more powerful.

True energy fluctuations rolled out as a godmammoth appeared above Yang Qi, an enormous bow in its hand, over a thousand meters from end to end, seemingly constructed from the remains of countless fallen devils.

TWANG!

A thunderous boom could be heard as an arrow was launched. As it shot forth, it destroyed every fiend-devil it passed, crushing their bones, and extracting their demon cores. It was like a shooting star of dazzling glory that could not be stopped.

As rank upon rank of fiend-devil was mowed down, the Hell Portal opened wide to suck in their remains, to become more fuel.

The power of the spore-devil was growing constantly, and the Hell Portal grew larger with every moment that passed. By now, it didn't look like it was made from true energy, but rather, a corporeal object from ancient times, risen up from the depths of the netherworld.

At the same time, Yang Qi himself was being tempered. His soul was experiencing a major baptism, and his psychic tempest was growing stronger and stronger.

Pop!

He opened his eyes, and a fiend-devil count, one of the leaders, was crushed by his psychic tempest. How could a mere Spirit-Soul fiend-devil possibly be a match for him? He was like a wolf or a tiger unleashed on a flock of sheep, slaughtering fiend-devils left and right, giving rise to a haze of blood and a sea of gore. Some of the Lifeseizer fiend-devils never saw him before they were crushed and burned.

For some of the wretch-devils, Yang Qi merely had to look at them to ignite their wretch energy and turn them into humanoid torches.

He really was like the incarnation of an invincible executioner from hell.

Soon, even the counts were fleeing in terror. Whoosshhhh! Yang Qi’s spear impaled a Space-Void fiend-devil count, who could do nothing but struggle weakly as his blood gushed out.

Hundreds upon hundreds of fiend-devils died and became fuel for the Hellfire Crucible. As the flames burned, a glorious song echoed out, an epic saga recounting the glory of the hosts of gods.

Hours passed, and eventually, the entire army was vanquished.

BOOOOM!

The Hell Portal now seemed incredibly ancient, spattered with blood, and carved with the script of the legion of gods. The text described the vanquishing of evil, and recollections of the ancient civilization of the god-spirits.

The spore-devil was now complete, emerged from its chrysalis, almost like a second Yang Qi.

It had dragons and snakes at its feet, and held a long spear in its hand. It was also equipped with a bow and arrows, a shield, a sword, and a pitchfork. It had three heads and six arms, and as it stood there in the Hell Portal, it seemed both godly and devilish at the same time, with an aura that could force numerous fiend-devils to submit to its might.

At long last, Yang Qi had succeeded in creating his spore-devil, which could guard the entrances to hell, and summon armies.

In some ancient stories, the final representation of the spore-devil would have ten thousand heads and ten thousand arms. But right now, it only had three heads and six arms. In this initial stage, it could be considered weak, and yet, on a deep level, it still had the power to control numerous fiend-devils.

Yang Qi now brimmed with so much power, and his soul and fleshly body were so strong, that it seemed like he could easily pierce through the void and break through to the third Legendary transformation, the Space-Void Transformation.

However, he knew that the feeling was an illusion to some extent. He had just reached the second transformation, and thus, tearing space right now was nothing he could accomplish easily.

That said, the training he was experiencing surpassed imagination. For too long, he had been holed up in the Demi-Immortal Institute working on his cultivation. At the rate he had been going, it would have taken years to reach the level he needed to. The Crown Prince would definitely have come out of seclusion before that, and crushed him.

Perhaps the God Legion Seal would have saved him, but that power was not his own, and he knew that it was risky to rely on it alone. He needed to get power of his own, power that he could trust.

Suddenly, a voice echoed out that seemed capable of strangling all of the other fiend-devils he had seen so far.

“You have killed many fiend-devils, mortal. And now you've disturbed me. I will sacrifice your blood to my offspring!”

All existence trembled as this new fiend-devil appeared. Rivers swirled around it, formed from baleful energy and ghost-gods, pulsing with a power that could force all living things to acknowledge allegiance to it.

It was an ancient fiend-devil clad in a blood-red garment embroidered with the script of devil-ghosts. The thing wasn’t large, only about the size of an ordinary human, and it even looked like a middle-aged man. However, there was nothing human about his eyes, which were evil to the extreme. His large hands featured razor-sharp claws, and he radiated nothing but wickedness and the desire to conquer.

‘Seventh Legendary transformation!’ Yang Qi thought, his face falling. ‘A Ghost-God Legendary!’

That level was simply too high for him. Although he had just taken out a corpse king in the sixth transformation, the difference between the sixth and seventh transformations was like the difference between the sky and the land.

The Ghost-God Transformation was sometimes called the Empyrean-Baleful Transformation. During that transformation, one absorbed baleful earthly powers to create personal quintessence. In other words, one had the power of minor worlds, and with the flip of a hand, could raze entire lands flat.

Experts such as this were rare even in the four institutes.

So-called Ghost-God Legendaries used the strength of the ghosts and gods of heaven and earth to reach a terrifying level of power.

“You puny energy warrior! Considering history as a whole, humans only just realized how to refine energy. You think learning a bit about magical law makes you qualified to challenge me? You think you can repair this sealing mark? You’re just delivering yourself up to die!” It was almost as if the mere glance of this Ghost-God Legendary fiend-devil could force Yang Qi into cultivation deviation and then death.

Yang Qi didn’t mince words.

“DIE!” he shouted, lunging forward with his spear. He was like a divine dragon piercing through the hell monsoon, like a bolt of lightning slashing forth to kill this fiend-devil.

Bam!

In response, the fiend-devil reached out and grabbed the spear, stopping its path. No matter what Yang Qi did, there was no way he could budge the spear now.

All of a sudden, he felt like he had been sucked into some ancient heaven and earth, a place from which he could not free himself. Not even the might of the Grand Emperor's Pagoda could get him out.

“Detonate!” he shouted, and the Infernal Deity Spear exploded, wreathing the fiend-devil’s hands in flames, causing black smoke to erupt out.

The Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth was the bane of fiend-devils, and this one was no exception.

The pain caused the ancient wretch-devil’s rage to burn. Calling on all its true energy, it severed its own arm, then punched Yang Qi so hard that he was sent flying backward.

To Yang Qi, it felt like his entire body was shattering. Thankfully, he had gone in prepared, and had used the Grand Emperor's Pagoda to defend himself. Even still, the power that smashed into him was so intense that it took several breaths of time to neutralize it.

But then, only a moment later, another massive fist shot in his direction, seemingly powerful enough to shatter the most ancient of mountains.

There was no time for contemplation; Yang Qi dropped into the depths of the Grand Emperor's Pagoda.

Bam!

The ancient fiend-devil’s fist smashed into the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, causing fluctuations to roll out that twisted and distorted everything in the area.

Meanwhile, the fiend-devil’s energy surged out, causing an out-of-body incarnation to appear behind it, a devil-god that reached out to grab the pagoda.

“What treasure is this? I can’t believe it's strong enough to block me. Hm, it has the aura of an ancient Great Sage on it. With that sage's will, I could communicate with the stars in the universe, and reach the eighth Legendary transformation. I could become an Astral-Star Legendary!”

The fiend-devil’s out-of-body incarnation unleashed a torrent of devilfire from its mouth, enveloping the pagoda, attacking its warding magics, and even causing Yang Qi to burst into flames. Clearly, it wanted to take the pagoda for its own.

“Heaven-Devil Domain!”

Suddenly, an enormous personal domain sprang into being, covering the pagoda, and fueling the devilfire to refine it. A vertical eye appeared on the fiend-devil’s forehead, a Heaven-Devil Eye that could absorb the souls of any living creature it encountered.

Off in the distance, the Young Lady saw what was happening, and shook her head. ‘A Ghost-God Legendary fiend-devil. So strong. Yang Qi can fight the Personal-Domain Transformation, but not this. And I can’t help him. I need to wait and see what happens. Will this supposed Great Sage backer of his come and save him? If not… then he’ll die. What a pity. That said, I’ll at least have to take the Grand Emperor's Pagoda back. If I refine it for my own use, the Crown Prince might as well forget about getting it for himself.’

As was to be expected, the Young Lady was quite full of schemes.

However, little did she know that, there in the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, surrounded by devilfire, Yang Qi was actually quite excited.

“Both heaven and this fiend-devil are really helping me out!”

Chapter 246: Selfless Philanthropist

‘This fiend-devil is really reckless. Does he actually think he can just take the Grand Emperor's Pagoda from me? This pagoda has been marked by the God Legion Seal, so not even a Great Sage could take it away, not even Grand Emperor Rich-Lush himself. He thinks he's refining it with devilfire, but after being filtered by the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, that fire just helps me refine the flesh and blood of the asura.’

Of course, Yang Qi didn't take the thing to be stupid. Most likely, anyone in this fiend-devil’s position would try to do the same thing. How could any of them know how much of a freak Yang Qi was?

As the devilfire entered the dimension inside of the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, Yang Qi loosened the warding magics to make the path clearer. Soon, it was pouring into the Hellfire Crucible to help refine the asura.

“Hmm?” After some time passed, the fiend-devil was surprised to find that its devilfire was just disappearing into the pagoda. It thought for a moment, and then a vicious grin spread out across its face. “You’re too weak, brat. You think you can use this treasure to absorb devilfire? Maybe you can absorb a little, but too much, and you're dead. Let’s see what your true limits are! Heaven-Devil Rageflame! Eradicate the world!”

Instantly, his shadow shattered into a thousand separate entities which surrounded the pagoda and unleashed an intense type of devilfire. It was obviously dead set on killing Yang Qi and taking this treasure.

And yet, despite that, Yang Qi felt more comfortable than ever.

It was almost like having a top expert intentionally impart powerful energy arts to him to help with his cultivation.

Not even a loving father would be able to help his child this much.

In fact, Yang Qi now realized that this fiend-devil was actually a bit charming in certain ways.

‘Keep going! This is great. After all this time, maybe I can fully refine that asura’s flesh and blood. Oh, right! I can also use the power of the devilfire to refine the demon core of that corpse king.’ As the devilfire continued to erupt, the flames began to take the shape of heaven-devils. And it was all so beneficial that Yang Qi almost wanted to issue a call summoning more fiend-devils to add fuel to the fire.

The raging Heaven-Devil Rageflame that wrapped him up was helping his Physique of the Sovereign Lord, and as it coursed through his meridians, acupoints, and sea of energy, it filled him with more power, and pushed him closer to the Space-Void Transformation.

The third transformation was a watershed of sorts. Those who mastered it could leave the world they inhabited and travel to locations of profound danger.

Normally speaking, it should have taken him dozens of years to reach this point. Perhaps even a hundred. But now, this ‘selfless philanthropist’ of a fiend-devil was helping him to achieve incredible progress in a short time.

Soon, the corpse king’s demon core was out in the open, pulsing with the power of a domain. If Yang Qi absorbed it, he could make use of a temporary domain, the Zombie Kingdom. However, that would be of little use to him. It was like nothing compared to the God Legion Paradise that he would eventually be able to summon. That having been said, the demon core could be of some help to his spore-devil.

If the spore-devil absorbed it, it could unleash a domain of its own, which would make it possible for it to summon flesh and blood wretch devils from out in the void.

Right now, the only thing it could summon were devil-ghosts with spirit bodies. Flesh and blood creatures were an entirely different story.

But with a personal domain, the spore-devil could set up spatial spell formations of immense power.

The truth was that, in the Space-Void Transformation, the Hell Portal would transform, becoming a spatial spell formation that Yang Qi could use to connect to certain fiend-devil planes of existence.

Spell formations powered by domains were even stronger.

Now, not only could he summon fiend-devils in the Space-Void Transformation, but instead of being limited to drawing on targets nearby, he could summon them from afar. At the moment, he couldn’t truly reach into hell, but being able to connect to other planes was certainly a huge improvement.

‘Heaven-Devil Rageflame! Help me refine this demon core!’

With both his true energy and the Heaven-Devil Rageflame assaulting the demon core, it soon began to emit dazzling light.

Another moment passed, and it exploded, causing an enormous domain to spread out, filled with corpse energy, which took the shape of an enormous, writhing dragon.

Without any hesitation, Yang Qi tossed it into the Hellfire Crucible.

Then, he guided the Heaven-Devil Rageflame in as well, using the crucible to combine it with the domain.

RUMBLE!

The Hell Portal changed once again, becoming more corporeal, and its summoning function more powerful.

Meanwhile, off in the distance in the hell monsoon, other powerful fiend-devil counts had taken note of what was happening. In particular, there was a group who had arrived recently from a plane that bordered the Hell of Euphoria, and had been conscripted to besiege the sealing marks.

“That exalted Ghost-God Legendary appears to be refining a human. Is the human crazy? I can’t believe he would dare to come here and try to repair these sealing marks.”

“It doesn’t matter. That exalted superior is definitely going to get that treasure. We won’t get even the tiniest share.”

“It's a real pity. We just got here to the Yore-Wilds Continent to share in the slaughter, and to feast on endless blood. But in the end, we were tasked with destroying the sealing marks. It’s such hard work!”

“Uh, have you forgotten that there hasn’t been a Yore-Wilds Continent for a long time now? It was destroyed! We're outside of the Rich-Lush Continent, not the Yore-Wilds Continent. Hurry up and destroy these sealing marks. The sooner we do, the sooner we’ll have a nice continent to invade. The Rich-Lush Continent was once a tiny part of the Yore-Wilds Continent, but its small size belies its importance. The entire continent is a huge teleportation portal, a hub of sorts. Once you get there, there will be plenty of other continents to go to.”

“Hey, what do you say we jump to a place where we can see a fiend-devil prince?”

“Fiend-devil prince?” said one of the fiend-devil counts, a particularly powerful one in the third Legendary transformation. “Don’t tell me you’ve seen one before? I highly doubt it. They’re honorable beyond measure, and far more powerful than the Great Sage level. You know, I happen to have seen some of our fiend-devil dukes who are Great Sages.”

“I've never seen one either, but I've heard that in the ancient Hell of Euphoria, there are plenty of fiend-devil princes. There are even fiend-devil emperors, boundlessly respected god-devils from ancient times. They’re the type who can match up with true god-spirits.” This particular Blood-Form Legendary fiend-devil was referring to ancient mythology.

“It’s too bad we’re not from the Hell of Euphoria. We’ll never get the chance to see fabled entities like that.”

There were more than ten fiend-devils in this group, the most powerful being in the Space-Void Transformation, and the weakest being Quinary Lifeseizer viscounts. Even as they chatted in the midst of the hell monsoon, discussing this matter and that, a huge spatial gateway appeared in front of them. In the blink of an eye, it erupted with stifling power that caused their souls to go still.

It was none other than Yang Qi’s Hell Portal, which quickly whisked them into his Grand Emperor's Pagoda.

Before they could react, they were captured and tossed into a massive crucible, where they were burned alive, and their demon cores extracted.

Yang Qi was very pleased that his summoning had worked, and that he had easily been able to capture such beings.

Inside the Hell Portal, his spore-devil was already transforming from an entity with three heads and six arms, to one with four heads and eight arms. The process continued as the devilfire improved it, and the domain became stable. By that time, it had thirty-six heads and seventy-two arms.

It was now far, far more powerful than Yang Qi himself.

By now, the asura’s flesh and blood was dripping with bright red fluid, which dropped into the Hell Portal and transformed into spatial fragments.

As the spatial fragments were then burned by the Hellfire Crucible, they became part of Yang Qi’s true energy, and caused his Sovereign Lord True Energy to become even stronger.

That was his path to the third Legendary transformation, and becoming a Space-Void Legendary.

Chapter 247: Trying to Steal a Chicken....

‘How could this little punk be so tough? After all this refining work, nothing's happening?’ The fiend-devil had already drawn upon roughly fifty percent of its cultivation base to power its Heaven-Devil Rageflame, which now completely and utterly covered the Grand Emperor's Pagoda.

The bronze pagoda currently had magical symbols flowing across its surface, making it seem like it was weakening, and possibly even on the verge of melting.

But the truth was that there was no way the Grand Emperor's Pagoda could possibly be so weak. Its creator, Grand Emperor Rich-Lush, had been, at the minimum, a Great Sage, and possibly even beyond that level.

A magical treasure created by someone like that was the type of thing that could exist for all eternity.

Of course, the person actually controlling the pagoda was an important factor. After all, a knife in the hand of a child would not only be useless in terms of defense, it could actually hurt the child.

Therefore, this Ghost-God Legendary fiend-devil was still completely confident that it could kill Yang Qi and take the pagoda. But after three days and nights passed, it was starting to get impatient. Sending out a stream of true energy, it summoned a blood-colored river that was none other than quintessence-blood.

BOOOOM!

Bolstered by that blood, the Heaven-Devil Rageflame suddenly burned even more brightly than before. The wail of ghosts and weeping of gods could be heard as a wind kicked up that was filled with the aura of heaven-devils.

The flames were now so hot that they could destroy the void itself. In fact, that was exactly what was happening. The void in the area was melting into literal liquid, which was none other than primal-chaos vital energy.

Within the Heaven-Devil Rageflame, it was possible to see vicious skeletons, fiend-devils, and the like, dancing about madly.

Off in the distance, the Young Lady was visibly shocked by what she was seeing. ‘Heaven-Devil Rageflame fueled by a blood sacrifice. That’s the Fire Dance of the Heaven-Devil.’

She knew how powerful Heaven-Devil Rageflame was in general. And when a Ghost-God Legendary sacrificed its own blood to power it up, it would be even more terrifying.

Even other Ghost-God Legendaries who were trapped by the Fire Dance of the Heaven-Devil would find their own personal domain destroyed, after which the empyrean-baleful energy would eat them up and turn them into ashes. According to certain stories, the forebears of the heaven-devils would use this fire to kill Great Sages.

As the dance proceeded, the flames grew exponentially powerful. And then, moans of pain echoed out from inside the pagoda, as though Yang Qi were being immolated.

“Excellent,” the fiend-devil chuckled. “The brat is almost dead. I refuse to believe that he can hold out any longer against this power of mine.”

With that, he sent more of his blood into the flames.

Inside the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, Yang Qi was laughing up his sleeve. ‘This devil-ghost is a real fool. It’s just like the old saying about trying to steal a chicken only to end up losing the rice you used to lure it.’

It didn’t matter how strong the Heaven-Devil Rageflame got, it was no threat to him. In fact, the way it destroyed the space around it and transformed it into liquid was actually helping him acquire spatial power to improve his Physique of the Sovereign Lord.

Yang Qi felt like he was his own heaven and earth, and right now, every part of him was brimming with strength. Even his five viscera and six bowels were like unique spatial dimensions.

Before, his sea of energy had been essentially illusory, but with the new spatial power that was seeping into him, it was turning into something true and real.

It was the same with his meridians, which were like massive rivers flowing without cease.

Casting his senses inward, Yang Qi could see that various dimensional barriers were beginning to appear in his meridians, creating something almost like his thumb-ring of holding. The same sort of power was now appearing inside of him, and would allow him to create vast reserves of true energy.

Theoretically, if someone chopped Yang Qi up into pieces, they could actually use his bones as holding dimensions.

The benefits Yang Qi was receiving from the Heaven-Devil Rageflame were incredible to say the least.

He was now in a level that most cultivators could only dream of, in which his fleshly body could count as its own heaven and earth.

Some entities who developed such abilities could inhale mountains or oceans with a single breath. In fact, there were some beings who could absorb continents, or even entire planets.

Of course, that was something only god-spirits could accomplish.

Legendary energy warriors who reached the Space-Void Transformation would be able to refine their meridians and sea of energy with spatial power, to begin the process. When the process was complete, the sea of energy would be far more stable, and also capable of storing much more true energy than before.

Generally speaking, even Space-Void Legendaries would take upwards of three hundred years to reach that point. After all, it required much refinement of the sea of energy, the meridians, the flesh, blood, and bones. Some Legendaries spent a thousand years on the process.

One slight mistake, and the spatial power could stiffen one’s true energy and turn one into a zombie, or even a crystalline statue.

Thanks to the help of this selfless fiend-devil, Yang Qi was now receiving benefits that would normally require enlightenment of the Space-Void Transformation.

In the blink of an eye, his true energy reserves skyrocketed.

If you likened Yang Qi’s body to a small pond with a bit of true energy, then after his sea of energy became a dimension of its own, it was like a huge lake.

Of course, his ability to withstand massive force far surpassed any ordinary individual. Another person who was inundated with the same amount of true energy would already have been reduced to a bloody pulp.

Thanks to the Physique of the Sovereign Lord, every part of him was a spatial dimension.

Once that body type was completed, he could absorb entire hells, and contain billions upon billions of planes of existence. At that point, he would be eternal and everlasting.

‘Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, awaken further!’

A sovereign-grade spirit stone appeared in his hand, which exploded, sending spirit power coursing through him. Combined with the Heaven-Devil Rageflame and the asura’s flesh and blood, it fully provoked the Sovereign Lord True Energy and universal power within him.

In the blink of an eye, immense power poured into the particles within him.

Pop, pop, pop, pop, POP!

Another five thousand particles woke up, sending more true energy pouring into his sea of energy and meridians.

Despite how much true energy was being added, he didn’t fill up. Now that he had pushed his Physique of the Sovereign Lord to this point, his maximum reserve levels of true energy were far, far larger than before.

Before, the power of five thousand ancient megamammoths had been his limit; at that time, he couldn’t have added even the tiniest drop of power beyond that level.

But now, a quick assessment revealed that his maximum levels were ten times what they had been before.

At the moment, he only had the true energy of ten thousand megamammoths, but the upper limit was actually fifty thousand.

‘Darn it! I wish I understood the Space-Void Transformation….’ Although he was benefiting greatly, there were still aspects that were not ideal. ‘If I did, I could use my full level of true energy to combine my spirit, soul, flesh and blood. With that, I could break through to the Space-Void Transformation. At least I've improved my true energy levels. From here, it will take a few months or years to finally reach the point where I can break through.’

Although he was slightly disappointed, there was nothing he could do about it at the moment. He was continuing to grow stronger by the moment, and as long as this fiend-devil kept trying to refine him, the process would continue.

And he now had so much megamammoth power in him that he was definitely strong enough to fight experts in the sixth Legendary transformation.

Now, in order to achieve his next breakthrough, he needed to fill up with the true energy of fifty thousand megamammoths.

Of course, that would be no easy task. The higher one's cultivation level, the more difficult it became to build up true energy. After all, the magical laws of heaven and earth would resist such efforts. Cultivation was fundamentally a defiance of heaven, and the vital energy of heaven and earth would oppose individuals who tread that path.

While Yang Qi was reveling in his cultivation, the fiend-devil on the outside was getting very anxious. ‘What’s going on?’

He had already burned about ten percent of his quintessence-blood to fuel the Heaven-Devil Rageflame. And yet, it didn’t seem to be having any effect. Yang Qi’s aura seemed as stable inside the Grand Emperor's Pagoda as a rock in the middle of a fire.

‘Don’t tell me this brat has turned into a stone?’ The fiend-devil shook his head.

The Young Lady similarly shook her head, wondering why Yang Qi was simply doing nothing in the face of such grave danger. ‘What is this Yang Qi doing? Don’t tell me he fell asleep? He's been in this part of space-time for quite a while already. Being trapped like this isn’t something to be taken lightly.’

Chapter 248: Astral-Star Fiend-Devil

The Young Lady was here to see how Yang Qi went about repairing the sealing marks, and also in the hopes of getting information about his Great Sage backer. However, despite tangling with enemies over and over again, no Great Sage had appeared at all. At this point, she was starting to suspect that there was no such backer at all.

In another aspect of space-time, deep in the Minorcosm World, where the sun burned bright overhead, there was a mirror which converged the falling sunlight and sent it shooting out into the void.

Standing in front of the mirror was the Young Lady in her true form. Next to her was a saintly figure, who was none other than the chancellor of the Demi-Immortal Institute, her father.

His gaze was so powerful that it could pierce into the void on its own to watch Yang Qi dealing with the Ghost-God Transformation fiend-devil.

“My dear Father.”

“Guang’er, what do you think of Yang Qi after dealing with him for these past few days?” As he stood there with his hands clasped behind his back, it was completely impossible to read the expression on his face.

The Young Lady thought for a moment and then said, “I think there are two words that perfectly describe him, Father. Unlimited potential. I bet he even surpasses the Crown Prince. Unfortunately for him, he has a severe lack of time, and there’s no way the Crown Prince will give him any extra. If Yang Qi had a hundred years to work with, or better yet three hundred, he would definitely end up as a Great Sage, and someone who could rival the Crown Prince. It would bring immense glory to the Demi-Immortal Institute, you know.”

“Don’t be so modest, Guang’er,” the chancellor said. “It’s entirely likely that you could reach the Great Sage level before the Crown Prince does. Your body type is none other than the Nascent Divinity Starlight Body, which comes from one of the most respected of the ancient humans, the Starfolk. It's definitely comparable to the Seven Apertures Sprite Body, both of which were created by the ancient legion of gods. You are essentially a member of one of the holiest races in history.”

“Father, who exactly is the Crown Prince?” the Young Lady asked quizzically. “Or should I say, what is he? I've always had the feeling he’s some unique form of life, something extremely powerful. To me, he seems terrifying, all the way down to his substructure.”

“The Crown Prince isn’t human,” the chancellor said, tossing out a shocking piece of information in a completely casual fashion. “He’s someone from a much, much higher plane of existence. That's why he’s advanced through his cultivation so quickly. No ordinary human could possibly match speed like that. Some people say he’s a god from heaven descended into the mortal world, and for all intents and purposes, that’s true. There is something noble about his aura, something that surpasses all the various races of humans. Deep inside, he feels that he’s superior to everyone. To him, the Demi-Immortal Institute is merely a starting point, and in fact, the respect he shows me is just for show. Once he reaches the Great Sage level, it’s entirely possible he’ll undermine all the traditions of the institute.”

The Young Lady truly didn’t understand. “Then why are you helping him, Father? Why have you been protecting him all these years?”

“Because of a promise. A promise I made to his mother.” The chancellor closed his eyes for a long moment. “What they say is true: she dreamed of a falling star, and then gave birth to him. In other words, the Crown Prince has no blood relationship to her. However, she and I go way back. Because of that, I'm helping him, and even giving him the Demi-Immortal Institute. Besides, he’s the type of ruthless leader that can control an entire institute.”

“But what about Yang Qi? Isn’t all this a bit unfair to him?”

“His fate will depend on his own good fortune.” The chancellor looked at the distant Grand Emperor's Pagoda. Because of the glowing golden light which surrounded it, it was impossible for him to see exactly what Yang Qi was doing inside. “There’s some mysterious power in him that I can’t assess, and I very much want to see what it is. That’s the whole purpose of this little exercise. I spent years trying to defeat the noble spirit of the Grand Emperor's Pagoda that Grand Emperor Rich-Lush left behind years ago, all to no avail. Then, Yang Qi came along and defeated both the noble spirit and me in one fell swoop. That’s not the power of mortal humans. And it's not the power of Great Sages.”

“Wait. Don’t tell me he's stronger than a Great Sage!” Beads of cold sweat broke out on the face of the Young Lady. “Father, is that power of his really equivalent to the fabled Demi-Immortal level?”

“Yes. The Demi-Immortal level, the level after Great Sage. That’s what our institute was named after. For generation after generation, the chancellors of our institute have sought the glory of the Demi-Immortal level. And yet, throughout all the years, the only one to actually succeed was the original founder.” The chancellor shook his head. “Only in the Demi-Immortal level can one pursue the vestiges of the dao, and begin to form immortal life force. It’s actually a starting point. You know, in ancient times, Great Sages were still considered human. They were saints, the ultimate peak of humanity, and yet, they still had human life force. Only by surpassing that level, and becoming a Demi-Immortal, could one be considered an immortal. Back in the old days, Legendaries were mere energy warriors, people who were just beginning to understand energy arts and magical laws. As for Lifeseizers, they were ants, not even worth mentioning.”

“I know all that, Father. The Demi-Immortal level is the first step on the path to immortal ascension, but doesn’t that mean there are levels beyond it? What are they? The ancient legion of gods could create universal planes with casual abandon, and they could destroy suns, moons, and stars. What level is that? Even our institute's most ancient records, the ones which describe the Demi-Immortal Sage Magic, don’t have any information beyond the Demi-Immortal level.”

“I only know a smattering about such matters,” the chancellor said. “I’ve traveled to many places, and seen many relics of the past. From all of that, I've pieced together some clues to what lays beyond the Demi-Immortal level. After the nine stages in the Demi-Immortal level comes boundless demolishing. It's known as the Demolishing level. As for what comes after that, I'm not sure.”

“Demi-Immortal level and Demolishing level….” murmured the Young Lady, her eyes flickering with thirst for what was to come in the future. “Father, if Yang Qi really does have a Demi-Immortal backer, no one in the Rich-Lush Continent could possibly be a match for him. It would probably take someone from a higher plane like the Quake-Dawn Continent to handle him.”

“Let’s wait and see what happens. I'm also curious to see whether or not it’s a Demi-Immortal. If it is, then I’ll switch priorities back to Yang Qi. I’ll even give him a hundred years to try to crush the Crown Prince.” The chancellor almost sounded like he looked forward to that possibility.

“Father, the Crown Prince is going to be a Great Sage sooner rather than later. If you switch loyalties, will you really be able to deal with him? Although, perhaps I’m overthinking things. If Yang Qi has a Demi-Immortal backer, the Crown Prince will have trouble defending himself. After all, in ancient times, Demi-Immortals are essentially half-immortals who have already begun to connect with magical laws pertaining to the dao of heaven. At least, that is what the ancient stories say.”

The chancellor chuckled. “Guang’er, why do I get the sense that you approve of Yang Qi and disapprove of the Crown Prince? I realized a long time ago that whoever this Demi-Immortal backer is, he must have been restrained by certain magical laws, keeping him away on a distant plane of existence. Obviously, he can only give assistance in the form of a psychic projection. If someone in the Demi-Immortal level came to the Rich-Lush Continent in person, it would shatter the lands and destroy the fragment of the Yore-Wilds’ Heart that exists in the depths of the continent. Our lands simply couldn’t handle that level of power. In other words, the protection Yang Qi enjoys is limited, and it's still possible that the Crown Prince will become a Great Sage and kill him.”

“Oh look,” the Young Lady said. “Here comes another fiend-devil trying to refine Yang Qi. He definitely won't be able to defend himself this time. Seems we’re finally going to see the power of this backer of his.”

The two of them looked on with rapt attention.

Cackling laughter could be heard from the depths of the hell monsoon as another fiend-devil appeared, this one a sinister and emaciated female. Even her most casual movement caused the surrounding void to shatter. She was surrounded by the faint images of stars, all of them pulsing with evil auras that indicated she was far more powerful than the Ghost-God Transformation.

She was in the eighth Legendary transformation, making her an Astral-Star Legendary.

“Are you planning to fight me for this treasure, Wroggbâllazath?” the first fiend-devil said, trembling as if from either fear or rage.

“I’m here to help!” the old female fiend-devil said in a piercing, savage voice. “You’ve been trying to refine that pagoda for a while now, and still haven’t succeeded. Why don’t you let me help out, and then you can help me later on when I try to break through to the Great Sage level?”

“Fine, please do help out.” Of course, there was little the first fiend-devil could do. An Astral-Star Legendary could kill him with hardly any effort at all, leaving him no choice other than to bow his head in submission.

“I refuse to believe that if I help boost your Heaven-Devil Rageflame, that little brat will be able to take it. Starry Vilefire!” Eyes flashing with sinister light, she waved her hand, summoning an enormous, evil star formed from baleful energy, and wreathed with eternal, wicked fire. This was also an expression of Heaven-Devil Rageflame, except, far, far more powerful than what the other fiend-devil was capable of. It was Starry Vilefire, and it was capable of shaking heavenly bodies; in fact, it caused the Grand Emperor's Pagoda to begin to tremble.

Yang Qi was immediately shaken out of his previous reverie. Looking very serious, he thought, ‘Great, another fiend-devil. And this one is an Astral-Star Legendary. If my Physique of the Sovereign Lord hadn’t just acquired that dimensional ability, the mere vibrations would have destroyed me.’

Pouring true energy into the pagoda, he activated various warding magics that caused bronze light to emanate out from the pagoda and block the Heaven-Devil Rageflame.

“So, this brat can actually stand up to my power? Is he really only in the second Legendary transformation?” Shocked, the female fiend-devil poured more power into her attack.

‘They’re really holding nothing back to make me stronger!’

Yang Qi pulled out another sovereign-grade spirit stone, and drew on its power to wake up another five thousand megamammoths. Since another selfless philanthropist had arrived, he would not hold back out of courtesy.

Chapter 249: Thirty Thousand Ancient Megamammoths

“This is amazing. The Starry Vilefire is actually improving the dimensions in my sea of energy and meridians. I wonder if this will push me into the Space-Void Transformation sooner than expected. But how do I get the power of fifty thousand ancient megamammoths? In any case, I need to make as much progress as possible in this moment!”

Yang Qi drew on the Heaven-Devil Rageflame, Starry Vilefire, dimensional fragments, dimensional liquid, and even the dimensional primal chaos energy flowing inside him, causing his meridians and seas of energy to improve with every moment. In fact, there were even dimensional talismans appearing within him.

After being refined by the Sovereign Lord True Energy and the universal power, the dimensional talismans were as pure as lightning. They all looked different. Some were hexagonal, some were octagonal, some had saw-toothed edges, some were like beautiful paintings or scroll poetry.

Every possible thing that could exist in heaven and earth were represented by them.

These were Sovereign Lord Dimensional Talismans.

Whenever any cultivator reached the Space-Void Transformation, they would use spatial power to create such talismans. They were almost like drops of blood which would fuse with the body and make it sturdy and durable.

Blightczar Manyrivers was a Space-Void Legendary, but the talismans he had created were relatively weak, and were all tainted with toxic energy. As a result, the dimension in his sea of energy had been rather small, and could only contain a bit of true energy.

Of course, it was only proper to say “a bit” of true energy when comparing him to Yang Qi. Compared to ordinary people, he had a massive river of the stuff.

As of this moment, if Yang Qi had to fight Blightczar Manyrivers, he would find the man to be incredibly weak. In fact, he would be like a child’s doll that could be easily crushed underfoot.

Yang Qi had a physique that had been blessed by the legion of gods, making him able to crush virtually anyone. He was completely invincible to anyone in his current level, and could even fight and kill people three to four levels higher than him.

Thanks to the Starry Vilefire and Heaven-Devil Rageflame, the asura’s flesh and blood was sizzling and popping, releasing massive amounts of energy that, combined with the sovereign-grade spirit stone and the universal power of the Sovereign Lord, was causing even more particles to wake up.

A rapid series of explosions occurred, each of which involved, not a single particle waking up, but a thousand.

In the shortest of moments, five thousand particles woke up, pushing Yang Qi’s true energy to the level of fifteen thousand ancient megamammoths.

This was absolutely advancing by leaps and bounds. Yang Qi had changed down to his very substructure, and was now at least a hundred times stronger than he had been before entering the hell monsoon.

Back then, he had been in the first Legendary transformation. Now, he was in the second, the Spirit-Soul Transformation, with a physical body that was at the level of the third transformation or possibly even higher.

“The brat’s still not dead?” the female fiend-devil growled. She sent out more flame for a full two hours, but it didn't seem to affect the Grand Emperor's Pagoda at all. By this point, she was really starting to think that something strange was going on. With that, she let out a piercing cry, which was none other than a Heaven-Devil World-Incinerating Soundwave.

However, the sound wave didn’t seem to affect Yang Qi at all. He simply waved his fingers as though he were strumming a pipa, dissolving the sound waves and sending them into the asura’s flesh and blood.

The flesh and blood melted even more, becoming universal power that shot into the particles within Yang Qi, rapidly waking up another five thousand megamammoths.

And that only served to further stabilize the Grand Emperor's Pagoda.

By now, Yang Qi’s true energy had completely filled every nook and cranny of the pagoda, and all of the spell formations suitable for his level, including the ones that had been inaccessible to him before. One such formation was the Sky Wave Grand Formation, which could create resonances with many types of auras, and send them rolling out of the pagoda like waves.

Yang Qi didn’t activate any of the pagoda’s deadly formations. After all, with two ‘selfless’ fiend-devils pooling their power to help him, it was only serving to give him more megamammoth power.

And with the amount of royal-, imperial-, and sovereign-grade spirit stones he had on hand, he had all the energy he needed.

“Dammit! Why won’t this punk just die? Blood Sacrifice!”

The female fiend-devil had already wasted plenty of vital energy, and had lost a lot of face. Not hesitating for a moment, she ripped her pinky finger off and threw it toward the flames that surrounded the pagoda.

Thanks to the sacrifice, the Heaven-Devil Rageflame grew ten times as powerful, and the heaven-devils inside it danced with even more crazed abandon. Instantly, the attack on the Grand Emperor's Pagoda grew far more intense than before.

However, it only served to melt the asura’s flesh and blood more quickly, as well as the sovereign-grade spirit stone. As a result, the crystalline universal power flowed into him more quickly than ever.

In the briefest of moments, massive amounts of power awoke inside of Yang Qi, that of ten thousand megamammoths. Above Yang Qi’s head was an image that depicted the mammoths of yore, an entire herd of them, stampeding across a vast plain, trampling countless demon-devils beneath their feet.

Thirty thousand. The power of thirty thousand megamammoths was awake inside of Yang Qi, power that could shake stars and rip apart suns and moons. Inside the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, royal-, imperial-, and sovereign-grade spirit stones burned brightly to keep up.

When the last spirit stone burned into nothing, and all of the spirit power was in him, Yang Qi rose to his feet.

The power of thirty thousand megamammoths was enough that he was now on par with Ghost-God Legendaries.

‘Ah, what a pity,’ he thought. ‘I just didn’t have enough spirit stones. And here I thought that ripping off that much from Young Master Shroud-Heaven would be enough to get me to a much higher level. I guess my calculations were way off. I'm not even in the Space-Void Transformation! Going forward, my cultivation is going to be very difficult unless I can get more spirit stones. What am I supposed to do now?’

He needed the power of fifty thousand megamammoths, but unfortunately, only had enough spirit stones to reach thirty thousand.

He needed the raw spirit power in those stones, and not even defeating more fiend-devils would help.

In the blink of an eye, his cultivation had become ten times as difficult.

‘I guess I need to figure out a way to get more spirit stones. Very well, Sky Wave Grand Formation, activate!’

Now that he had finished powering up, he was using the Grand Emperor's Pagoda to finally strike back at the two fiend-devils who were trying to refine him.

A massively powerful sky wave rolled out from the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, instantly dispersing the Heaven-Devil Rageflame.

Then, it hit the two fiend-devils’ defensive true energy, and grating, explosive sounds rang out. Cracks spread out on the surface of their bodies, and their devil energy began to leak out, along with vast quantities of blood.

The male fiend-devil roared, his eyes shining with panic as he tried to back away.

Unfortunately, that was when something blurred out of the Grand Emperor’s Pagoda.

Even as the waves continued to roll out, the pagoda vanished, and Yang Qi appeared behind the male fiend-devil, Infernal Deity Spear in hand. Before the thing could react, he stabbed it, piercing directly through the fiend-devil’s personal domain.

Yang Qi had already reached such a vast level of power that personal domains were no longer impervious to him.

Furthermore, the fiend-devil had wasted so much blood over the past several days in its efforts to fuel its Heaven-Devil Rageflame that it was now too weak to fight back effectively.

The Grand Emperor's Pagoda was now inside of Yang Qi, but he could easily use its powers to defend himself or pierce defensive items. And with its spell formations combined with the Infernal Deity Spear, no wretch energy could stand in Yang Qi’s way.

This was the easiest kill Yang Qi had carried out since mastering the dao of the quick strike.

BOOOOM!

The fiend-devil exploded, and the Hell Portal popped into being, grabbing his demon core, as well as his flesh and blood.

Just like that, a greater fiend-devil in the Ghost-God Transformation perished.

He never even had a chance to scream.

“Father,” the Young Lady said, “did you see how strong Yang Qi's attack was just now? He must be dozens of times more powerful than before! His true energy, his fleshly body, and even the effects of the Grand Emperor's Pagoda have all experienced vast advancement. It’s like he was born anew! Has he already reached the Space-Void Transformation?”

Of course, being a Great Sage, the chancellor could see much more deeply into what was happening. And he was profoundly shaken.

“He hasn’t,” the chancellor said, his eyes glittering. “But he has spatial dimensions inside of him. Such strength! I've never seen anything as pure and powerful as this! It's universal power! He's only in the second Legendary transformation, but is already as strong as the seventh. What kind of metamorphosis did he experience? Not even the Crown Prince was like this back when he was in the same level.”

Chapter 250: Planar Pearl

The chancellor and the Young Lady had assumed that Yang Qi would die, beyond the shadow of a doubt. Or at least, that his backer would come to his aid. It should have been impossible for someone in the second transformation to defend against the combined assault of a Ghost-God Legendary and an Astral-Star Legendary.

Not even the Grand Emperor's Pagoda should have tipped the scales.

Therefore, the final result of the conflict left them with eyes wide. Not only did Yang Qi not die, he actually fought back, killing the Ghost-God Legendary with a spear strike, and using the Grand Emperor's Pagoda in the way that a saint from ancient times would. In fact, the chancellor actually suspected that if Yang Qi were just a bit stronger, he would be able to activate the sage formations that existed in the pagoda. Such formations had been put in place by Grand Emperor Rich-Lush, and could only be used by people in the Great Sage level.

Although Yang Qi had not activated such formations yet, what he was doing did cause the might of a Great Sage to spread out and destroy the personal domain of the Ghost-God Legendary.

After all this time, no mysterious backer had appeared, and Yang Qi had relied on his own might to come out on top of the conflict. The chancellor shook his head. “This Yang Qi has unbelievable potential. Sending him into the hell monsoon to repair the damage to heaven actually turned out to be the perfect training for him. In only a few days, he achieved a hundred years’ worth of bitter cultivation. By the way, where did he get all the spirit stones he must have needed?”

“That’s a good question, Father, I’m not sure. Considering all of this, do you think he can really accomplish the mission on his own? Should I tell him how to actually succeed?”

“Well, repairing the damage to heaven is actually a simple task. Find the Planar Pearl, and pour pure immortal dao power into it. That’s all that needs to be done to repair the sealing marks. After all, the fiend-devils’ method to corrode the seals is similarly simplistic. They simply pour evil power into the Planar Pearl to slowly eat away at it. I would do it myself if it weren’t for the fact Great Sages can’t get remotely close to the pearl. It won’t hurt to tell Yang Qi. Besides, his energy art seems designed to subjugate evil. There couldn’t possibly be a power that conforms more purely to the immortal dao. If he gets close enough to the Planar Pearl, it should be a simple thing for him to repair it.”

“If he tries to get close to the Planar Pearl,” the Young Lady said, “his backer will definitely show up. The amount of power required to repair the pearl would drain even a Great Sage. That’s the most difficult aspect to it all. And that’s not to mention that the thing is surrounded by countless fiend-devils, some of them in the ninth Legendary transformation. I wouldn’t be surprised if there are even Great Sage entities. Back when the Crown Prince tried to get close to the pearl, he had no choice but to retreat. I'd say that even if Yang Qi turns out to be stronger than he’s let on, he still won’t succeed. After he runs out of true energy, he’ll be surrounded by fiend-devils and killed.”

“Even I would suffer the same fate, much less Yang Qi,” the chancellor said with a dismissive wave of his hand. “The time has come for his final test. Go tell him the details of the repair work.”

“Yes, dear Father.”

Meanwhile, Yang Qi had just finished killing the Ghost-God fiend-devil. Feeling very pleased with himself, he turned to face the female Astral-Star fiend-devil, when a stream of spirit power entered his mind with a message, the result of a powerful energy art of the Young Lady’s.

“Yang Qi, did you happen to notice that, deep in the sealed area, there is a huge sphere surrounded by hordes of fiend-devils? That sphere is called the Planar Pearl, and must never be destroyed. Many Great Sages joined forces to make it, and they were even helped by someone from the cultivation level beyond them, the Demi-Immortal level. Get close enough to the pearl to send pure power of the immortal dao into it, and you can repair all the damage. Of course, to get close to the pearl, you’ll have to fight anything that gets in your path. And after you get there, you run the risk of being drained of energy, and then perishing. So consider the matter carefully. Do you think you can accomplish the mission?”

‘Planar Pearl, huh?’ Yang Qi turned to look off into the depths of the inky hell monsoon. Thankfully, the Lord's Eye could pierce through all sorts of devilish clouds, and therefore, he quickly identified the location the Young Lady had referred to. There, he saw an enormous, glowing pearl, dozens of kilometers in radius, inset into the greyspace of the plane, seemingly eternal in nature.

Black stains covered the surface of the pearl, evidence of the corrosive power of the fiend-devils. In fact, it was only about half as bright as it should be. If that pearl were to ever be destroyed, the sealing marks and the greyspace would shatter, and the hordes of fiend-devils from hell would invade the Rich-Lush Continent and destroy it.

‘Are these people serious? This is way too dangerous! I've already come under attack by seventh and eighth transformation fiend-devils. How am I supposed to keep going if things get worse? Do they expect me to just go and fight Never-Dying monsters? I'm definitely not a match for things like that right now. Even experts in the eighth transformation are difficult for me to handle. And the only reason I could handle the seventh transformation fiend-devil just now was that he had drained much of his quintessence-blood and true energy before I attacked him.’

At this point, Yang Qi had no hope whatsoever that he could accomplish the mission.

Sensing his hesitation, the chancellor looked at the Young Lady and said, “Tell Yang Qi that if he doesn't want to go forward with the mission, he doesn’t have to. He's proven how much potential he has, and I don’t want to see someone as strong as him perish. If he comes back now, I’ll simply imprison him for three hundred years to pay for killing Grand Elder Feat-Virtue. During that time, he’ll have plenty of opportunities for training and cultivation advancement.”

“Yes, Father.” Once again, the Young Lady cast her thoughts into Yang Qi’s mind. “Yang Qi, you've proven yourself. If you keep going, you’ll be killed beyond the shadow of a doubt. The chancellor has agreed to allow you to return, and be imprisoned for three hundred years. During that time, he’ll make sure the Crown Prince doesn’t kill you.”

“Three hundred years?” Yang Qi snorted coldly. “What good will that do? And if I'm in prison, what about my father, my clan, and my sworn brothers and sisters? You people want to see the power of my backer, right? Fine. I’ll show you.”

SWISH!

Hefting his spear, he shot toward the Astral-Star fiend-devil.

‘How did you possibly kill a Ghost-God Legendary?’ That was what the female fiend-devil was thinking. The sight of Yang Qi cutting down her compatriot had nearly caused her eyes to pop out of her head.

As Yang Qi bore down on her with his spear, she shouted and backed up. At the same time, clouds roiled out, and the power of the stars descended from above. A rippling field of power spread out as an enormous, evil star appeared above her, almost like a devil-eye.

Bam!

Without any hesitation, she reached out to meet Yang Qi’s Infernal Deity Spear.

The slashes of his spear were like the sweeping of a divine dragon’s tail. Massive power was unleashed as he drew deeply on his spatial sea of energy and meridians, and the universal power in his flesh and blood. Sky waves continued to roll out of the Grand Emperor’s Pagoda, filling the area, causing it to descend into nothing but primal-chaos.

Not even the attacks of this Astral-Star fiend devil could do anything to the power of those sky waves.

Although Yang Qi might not be capable of slaying a fiend-devil of this level, neither could the fiend-devil slay him.

Over the course of a few dozen breaths’ worth of time, the two of them fought back and forth for nearly a thousand moves. Yang Qi’s true energy was beginning to wane, and he wasn’t even close to killing his opponent. Not even three days and nights of fighting would put him in that position. Therefore, he finally opened his Lord's Eye.

Scintillating light shone out, completely piercing through the fiend-devil’s personal domain, and slamming into her with intense heat.

“You just wait, brat!” the fiend-devil shrieked, turning to flee.

Unexpectedly, a vicious fiend-devil in the eighth Legendary transformation was simply fleeing in the face of Yang Qi.

The Young Lady couldn’t keep the admiration out of her voice as she said, “Father, it doesn’t seem Yang Qi is going to agree with your suggestion.”

“Predictable,” the chancellor replied, sounding anything but perturbed. “He’s too strong-willed. It doesn’t matter what adversities he faces, he acts like he’s an important person. Well, let’s see if he can accomplish the mission. Can he really repair the Planar Pearl?”

“He's only a Spirit-Soul Legendary, and yet he’s able to fight the seventh and eighth transformation. And kill them at that! If word about this spread, the entire Rich-Lush Continent would be shocked.” The Young Lady sighed. “Even with my special physique, I couldn’t have done something like that at his level. Not even with the help of the Grand Emperor's Pagoda.”

“This must remain a tightly guarded secret,” the chancellor said. “Outsiders must never know.”

As his opponent fled, Yang Qi drew on the powers of the Grand Emperor's Pagoda. The area around him twisted and distorted, and then he vanished, becoming a blur that headed toward the Planar Pearl, and the hordes of fiend-devils that surrounded it.

Every development only served to pique the Young Lady’s interest more. “So, he’s using the power of the Grand Emperor's Pagoda to disguise himself and get closer to the pearl? I’m afraid that's not going to work. His level is just too low. Maybe if he were in the Personal-Domain Transformation, trying to hide that way would work. But right now, enemies in the eighth and ninth transformation will definitely be able to detect the spatial fluctuations.”

‘Heavenwave Cloaking.’ Using the spell formations of the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, Yang Qi got closer and closer to the Planar Pearl. As he did, he could sense its holy nature. Unfortunately, the evil power had stained it and eaten away at both it and the plane it was connected to.

‘Get close to the pearl, and use holy energy to negate the attacks of the fiend-devils.’

From what he could tell, if he could get close enough to the pearl, its radiance and light would actually protect him somewhat from the fiend-devils. After all, they clearly didn't want to get too close to it.

Onward he proceeded until he was only a few thousand kilometers away from the sealing marks and the greyspace. From what he could tell, he was completely hidden within the hell monsoon.

However, it was at that point that a massive surge of power erupted out, slamming into the Grand Emperor's Pagoda. This was something that compared to the Crown Prince, Young Master Shroud-Heaven or Hua Tianxiong. This was something eternally indestructible, something that could never die.

A Never-Dying greater fiend-devil was making a move.

Chapter 251: Breaking Through the Interceptors

Experts in the ninth Legendary transformations were said to be ‘never-dying’. Cut off an arm, and it would regrow. Cut off a head, and the same thing would happen. Even if you chopped one up into mincemeat, they would still be able to live again.

Their life force and powers of regeneration came because their spirit and soul were ensconced in the void, and were on the very cusp of the Great Sage level.

They were figures who had long since combined all the various aspects of the sun, the moon, the stars, heaven and earth, and all types of ghosts and gods. By using that combination as a furnace, they seized good fortune for their cultivation base, and survived countless tribulations.

The Crown Prince, Young Master Shroud-Heaven, and Hua Tianxiong were such individuals, and were beyond what Yang Qi could handle, even with the Grand Emperor's Pagoda. The final Never-Dying Transformation surpassed the other transformations on an exponential level. In fact, even if Yang Qi reached the third or fourth transformation, he would likely be useless against an opponent like that.

The only way he could possibly fight a Never-Dying Legendary was if he successfully formed his own personal domain, the God Legion Paradise, which was impenetrable to all magic, impervious to all evil, and blessed by the legion of gods.

Of course, even with that level of power, he would still not match up to the Crown Prince.

From what Yang Qi could tell, the Crown Prince surpassed the Never-Dying Transformation. He already had traces of a Great Sage aura, and as such, could actually be referred to as a Half Sage. He was already at the point that certain Great Sages would be incapable of killing him.

That was one of the reasons that no one had been able to keep him in check when he ran rampant.

If the chancellors of the four institutes had attacked him with deadly intent, but failed to kill him, the grudge that would have resulted would have been irreparable. After the Crown Prince recovered, he would definitely have razed the institutes to the ground.

After all, the chancellors all knew that the Crown Prince’s blood and spirit came from a higher plane.

BOOOOM!

Yang Qi’s mind was instantly destabilized, all by the mere presence of the Never-Dying Legendary that had suddenly appeared. And he could do nothing from stopping an enormous palm from flying out and hitting the Grand Emperor's Pagoda.

The hand was the color of bronze, and didn't look human at all; it was the hand of some ancient devil, backed by terrifying, hellish power. As soon as it touched the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, a massive burst of evil power immediately rushed into its depths.

The dimensions inside the pagoda were thrown into chaos, and Yang Qi was powerless to fight back. He was sent flying backward until he smacked into one of the walls, where he coughed up a mouthful of blood.

“Damnation!” he spat, trying to catch his breath. Thankfully, the power of the Sovereign Lord that existed in him helped him to recover rather quickly. Not only did he recover from any injuries, his own true energy was able to harness some of the Never-Dying power that had entered his body to strengthen him a bit.

“Grand Emperor's Pagoda, stabilize.”

Yang Qi quickly stabilized the pagoda, then looked out into the hell monsoon to find an enormous bronze giant there, a fiend-devil clad in bronze armor that was covered with channels of flowing lava. From the look of it, this creature could easily turn the entire world into a lava-filled hell.

‘Bronzeblaze fiend-devil!’ Yang Qi murmured, visibly taken aback. The burning aura of this fiend-devil reminded him of how his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth had been early on; it was like the pure aura of hell.

There was no question about it; this Never-Dying devil was truly from the depths of hell. It was not like the fiend-devils from earlier, who merely came from planes close to hell, and had been infected by wretch energy.

Those types of fiend-devils, and the true hell-born fiend-devils, were different on a substructural level. Because they came from different planes, hell-born fiend-devils could easily kill ten fiend-devils of a similar level who came from less powerful planes.

“Shake with fear, mortal!” the bronzeblaze fiend-devil said, using the purest form of Helltongue. “You should be trembling. To face me should be an honor for you.”

A bronze fist that no one could possibly evade struck out, laced with burning lava.

It slammed into the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, once again sending Yang Qi flying.

Next, the bronzeblaze fiend-devil went on to unleash a bevy of fist-strikes, making him seem like an untiring machine of combat. He wasn't even using any energy arts, just raw power. Over and over again, he smashed the Grand Emperor's Pagoda with power from hell that no one could possibly fight against.

As for Yang Qi, he was being battered back and forth in unprecedented fashion, to the point where his meridians and sea of energy seemed to be on the verge of collapsing.

Thanks to the progress he had made with the Physique of the Sovereign Lord, his flesh, blood, meridians, and sea of energy all had dimensional aspects, making it much easier for him to fight people above his level, but the attack he was suffering now simply defied any previous limits he had reached.

‘How could the horde of devils in hell possibly defeat me, someone blessed by the legion of gods? My heart and mind are that of the Sovereign Lord, the leader of the legion of gods. The Sovereign Lord brings radiance and light to the world, and drives away the darkness. Let his eternal kingdom come….’

A higher will within Yang Qi suddenly erupted out, a higher aura that originated with the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, something that wasn't willing to be cowed by monsters from hell.

What were hellborn monsters in the end? Bugs to be crushed beneath the feet of godmammoths!

Now, the inheritor of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth was being attacked by a low-grade monster from hell, and was struggling to survive. Because of such humiliation, it was in this moment that the true potential of his godly-class energy art was unleashed.

Yang Qi’s will was touched by the will of ancient godmammoths, and thus, he suddenly grew more powerful. In the blink of an eye, the hellish power was vanquished by the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, and Yang Qi’s meridians were healed.

Another thousand blows smashed into him, and yet Yang Qi didn’t move. He stood there tall and straight in the middle of the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, focusing all his energy on withstanding the onslaught.

Then, when the moment was right, he struck back. The Grand Emperor's Pagoda suddenly began to spin wildly, dodging the burning, bronze fist, and streaking forth to attack the bronzeblaze fiend-devil.

“Mortal! How despicable of you! How dare you evade me, much less fight back….” Enraged, the bronzeblaze fiend-devil smacked the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, sending it flying off into the distance.

‘This is my chance to escape, and also get closer to the Planar Pearl!’ Sending a burst of true energy into the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, Yang Qi activated a spell formation to provide a burst of speed. “Time Flows Like Water!”

The Grand Emperor's Pagoda became like a stream of flowing water that sped away from the bronzeblaze fiend-devil.

The fiend-devil howled in fury, apparently to notify other powerful experts who were in between himself and the Planar Pearl.

“Mortal!”

“You low-down scum!”

“Paltry ant!”

“Worm! How dare you approach such exalted hellish beings as us. Prepare to die!”

Numerous powerful auras locked down onto the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, fully ten Never-Dying fiend-devils.

Another huge bronze hand slammed into the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, causing it to tilt to the side. Then, a pitch-black, saw-toothed sword sliced deep into the pagoda itself, sending evil energy into it to destroy its spell formations.

“Aiieee! Save me, milord!”

Sadly, Blightczar Manyrivers was in the very location of the attack, and although he was a Space-Void Legendary, not even he could survive such force.

Before, Yang Qi had been able to protect him with the powers of the pagoda, but not any longer. In the blink of an eye, Blightczar Manyrivers perished.

Earlier, Yang Qi had hoped that if Blightczar Manyrivers served him loyally, he could entrust him with the defense of Yanhaven. A Legendary would have been a powerful protector for the city. Unfortunately, now he was dead.

As Blightczar Manyrivers slipped into death, he was joined by Patriarch Frost-Drake.

After all, he was only a Nonary Lifeseizer, and thus, wasn’t even close to Blightczar Manyrivers. Both of them died immediately, and didn’t even leave behind demon cores.

Also in the area of destruction were a thousand spirit weapons, which Yang Qi had acquired from Young Master Shroud-Heaven, and had hoped to distribute them to younger ones in his clan. Unfortunately, the destructive force which bore down on them was too much to handle.

‘Damnation! If I hadn’t been given Mission: Mend Heaven by the chancellor, I wouldn’t be in this situation! Just wait until I get the job done, then I’ll demand that the Demi-Immortal Institute pay me back!’

Holding nothing back in terms of true energy, he tried to dodge back and forth, avoiding the attacks and heading on toward the Planar Pearl. Unfortunately, the attacks were so powerful that the Grand Emperor's Pagoda’s trajectory was destabilized.

He was now facing no small danger. The spell formations of the Grand Emperor's Pagoda were on the verge of shattering, and if they did, there would be nothing to defend from outside attacks. In fact, the fiend-devils would be able to just enter the pagoda and attack Yang Qi physically. If they caught him, there was no doubt that they would skin him alive and turn him into a garment.

There was no time for thought or planning. Calling on his Hell Portal, he summoned masses of monsters, using them as fuel to cover the Grand Emperor's Pagoda with Cleansing Flame of the Heavenly World. He even ignited the demon core of the Ghost-God fiend-devil he had recently killed, and used it to power one of the Grand Emperor's Pagoda’s formations.

This formation was called the Disintegration Formation. By using powerful demon cores as fuel, it could cause the power of a grand emperor to erupt out in a mighty attack. In some ways, it was like the self-detonation of a powerful expert.

Right now, Yang Qi didn't hesitate to use his most powerful demon core to fuel that explosion.

As soon as the core entered the formation, the personal domain of a Ghost-God Legendary sprang up around the pagoda, and then exploded. The massive power immediately forced all of the enemies some distance away.

“Wow, mortal, you self-detonated?”

“No! He crushed the demon core of a Ghost-God Legendary!”

“This thing can force a demon core like that to detonate? What a spectacular treasure! I've seen a lot of Great Sage magical treasures, but I've never seen any as powerful as this.”

“Hurry! He’s heading toward the Planar Pearl. We have to stop him!”

Chapter 252: Left Behind by Sages

Yang Qi had gone so far as to sacrifice the demon core of a Ghost-God fiend-devil, so the explosion it created was almost the same level as the self-detonation of an actual Ghost-God Legendary.

Unfortunately, considering how many powerful greater fiend-devils he was facing, even a blast of that level didn’t count for very much. At the very most, it could open up a bit of space between the various streams of true energy.

And yet, that was all the opportunity Yang Qi needed.

Pouring the power of thirty thousand ancient megamammoths into the pagoda, he sent it hurtling onward, causing screaming sounds to echo out.

BAM!

A Never-Dying fiend-devil lunged in his path, only to be smashed aside as he continued onward toward the Planar Pearl.

“Amazing. This kid is incredible.” The chancellor shook his head. “So many fiend-devils, even a bronzeblaze fiend-devil from a hellish plane, and none of them can stop him. He’s vicious, merciless, and can make snap decisions. I have to say he surpasses even me. Forgetting everything else, he definitely has the temperament to dominate the Rich-Lush Continent. The tiny pond that is the Demi-Immortal Institute definitely can’t handle a big fish like him. If he stays alive, he might even have what it takes to subjugate higher planes of existence.”

More and more fiend-devils were rising up from within the hell monsoon, all of them besieging Yang Qi and the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, trying to stop them from getting close to the Planar Pearl. The Planar Pearl had been created in the days of the Yore-Wilds Continent, by the combined efforts of numerous Great Sages, and even a Demi-Immortal. It was a powerful seal that contained the might of radiance and light, as well as the pure energy of the immortal dao. It was designed to restrain wretch energy and prevent fiend-devils from approaching it. In fact, only by endlessly pouring wretch energy into it had they managed to corrode and restrain some of the radiance and light.

If Yang Qi could get close to the Planar Pearl, then it would make it much more difficult for the fiend-devils to do anything to him.

BOOOOM!

Even as numerous fiend-devils took action, it was possible to see that in the very depths of the hell monsoon, numerous gargantuan beasts were rising up.

They were mountainous in size and clad in armor, like terrifying dragons from primeval times. As they neared, they opened their mouths to belch toxic liquid, and lashed out with immensely long tongues to grab the Grand Emperor's Pagoda.

Caught off guard, Yang Qi could do nothing to prevent one of the tongues from wrapping around the pagoda, which was then dragged into the belly of the beast to be digested.

“Burst!” Yang Qi immediately poured some true energy into another of the pagoda’s formations, the Massive Energy Burst Formation. Numerous streams of air flowed together to make an enormous bubble, which grew larger and larger until the hellish beast exploded, sending flows of energy spattering out in all directions. At the same time, a demon core dropped into Yang Qi’s hand.

The beast had only been in the sixth Legendary transformation. Although it had a personal domain, it was nothing like the bronzeblaze fiend-devil Yang Qi had fought moments ago.

Unfortunately, the slight delay it had caused meant that Yang Qi’s pursuers were catching up.

The Grand Emperor's Pagoda was clearly in bad shape; it was hardly moving, and the glowing layers of spell formation shields were flickering out.

“The time has come,” the chancellor said, remaining riveted on what was happening. “That last blow destroyed most of the pagoda’s spell formations. Yang Qi’s cultivation base just isn’t high enough to power the pagoda for this long. Each one of those shield layers that goes out represents another destroyed spell formation.” Yang Qi seemed like an oil lamp on the verge of flickering out. Unless his powerful backer stepped in to protect him, it seemed a foregone conclusion that he would die.

At this point, the chancellor was preparing to step in to save him. After all, he didn’t want the Grand Emperor's Pagoda to fall into the hands of fiend-devils. Besides, Yang Qi was clearly a top talent, and for him to die would be a big waste.

‘This is the last stretch,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘I have to put everything on the line.’ He circulated his power and glanced at the numerous spatial spell formations that had stopped working. It was a moment of critical danger, and yet, the golden imp had not yet done anything to help him. It was almost as if the God Legion Seal didn’t care at all whether or not he lived or died.

Obviously, it would be foolish to continue to wait around until the Grand Emperor's Pagoda was destroyed. After all, if the God Legion Seal continued to remain inactive at that point, he would be dead.

It wasn't worth it to gamble.

Gritting his teeth, he thought, ‘What a pity I have to resort to this. Alright. Heaven-demon seed! Give me some power!’

All of a sudden, a green seed appeared in his forehead, which he activated to the fullest degree possible. Instantly, a mysterious, mighty power erupted from it, catalyzing his physical body, and instantly pushing his true energy to incredible heights. This was the raw power of a heaven-demon, which despite not being able to match up to Sovereign Lord True Energy, was simply too abundant to describe with words.

RUMBLE!

Power coursed through the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, and all of the weakened shields flared to life. The entire thing glowed more brightly than ever, and there were even some spell formations that had been inactive before, but were now ready for use.

That included some of the formations that would normally require a Great Sage to operate.

The more than two thousand spell formations in the pagoda caused brilliant light to spring up everywhere, neutralizing any incoming attacks. With that burst of strength, Yang Qi continued toward the Planar Pearl.

“Demon power?” the chancellor said, shocked. “How could he also have demon power? Unless I'm mistaken, that must be a heaven-demon seed created by Great Sage Shroud-Heaven. Those things are vile! Once unleashed, they give spectacular, godly power, and yet, transform one into Demonfolk on a substructural level. Once that thing takes hold, it will turn anyone into a greater demon. Where did he get it, and more importantly, why is he using it?”

“He has too many secrets, Father,” the Young Lady said, sighing. “Look, he's reached the Planar Pearl. Let’s see how he gets that power in check, and whether he pours true energy into the Planar Pearl. If he uses heaven-demon true energy, not only would he not repair the pearl, he would provoke a backlash from the will of the numerous Great Sages who created it. He would be reduced to ashes in the blink of an eye.”

“This is the moment of truth, and of ultimate danger. Once the Planar Pearl sucks him dry, the fiend-devils will descend on him.” It was almost as if the chancellor knew exactly how everything would play out. “Years ago when I sent the Crown Prince to try to repair the Planar Pearl, he also got to this point. But he didn’t dare to pour too much of his true energy into it. After the sacrifice became too dangerous, he had to turn and flee.”

‘Whew….’ As Yang Qi entered a new world of radiance and light, he found himself face to face with the enormous pearl, set into the greyspace of the plane itself. It pulsed with pure brightness, with the energy of the immortal dao, something that weakened the devil energy that filled the area, and instantly suppressed the heaven-demon energy on Yang Qi.

It didn't take long for all of that green energy to be shoved back into Yang Qi’s forehead, where it once again took the shape of a heaven-demon seed.

‘It actually worked! Using the heaven-demon seed in just the right moment actually saved my life. And then the power of the Planar Pearl suppressed it right back down into submission.’ The Grand Emperor's Pagoda shrank down to the size of a mote of dust, and then came to rest on the surface of the pearl. Few of the attacks being sent his way were capable of reaching him, giving him at least a bit of time to recover.

Originally, the heaven-demon seed that Young Master Shroud-Heaven had given him, hidden in the five phases treasures, should have entered him and been impossible to drive away. Once he tried to draw on its power, he would have fallen under its control, and eventually become a greater demon that Young Master Shroud-Heaven could have enslaved.

But now, Yang Qi had killed two birds with one stone. Not only had he used the power of the seed to escape the fiend-devils, he had used the power of the Planar Pearl to keep the seed in check.

It was the classic strategy of getting the tiger and the wolf to kill each other. Now he was right where he wanted to be: in front of the Planar Pearl. Unfortunately, that also meant that he was in an even more dangerous situation than before.

Now he needed to send his true energy into the pearl.

If he used too much true energy, he would perish, and yet, if he didn't go all out, he couldn’t accomplish the mission.

‘Regardless, I have to give it a shot. Perhaps the fundamental nature of my true energy will do something unexpected.’ First, he took a bit of time to recuperate, and used the power of radiance and light that shone off the Planar Pearl to heal his injuries. He also stabilized his true energy.

At the same time, the radiance and light that emanated from the pearl was constantly being imbued into the greyspace.

After less than two hours passed, Yang Qi was back to his top state. Because of how he had drawn relentlessly on his true energy during the fighting earlier, he had actually made a bit of progress. Unfortunately, he needed some more external power to reach the point of having the power of a total of fifty thousand ancient megamammoths. Once his soul and his blood were one, he would be able to tear rifts into the void, and become a Space-Void Legendary.

‘So, Planar Pearl, you protect the entire Rich-Lush Continent, and prevent fiend-devils from entering en masse. As a child of the Rich-Lush Continent, it’s my duty to protect my home. Forget about the Demi-Immortal Institute’s mission, I'm not going to let these fiend-devils invade.’

Peering into the pearl, he saw that it was made up of layer after layer, so many dimensions that they were impossible to count. And deep in its core was a shining bundle of radiance and light. Unfortunately, there was no way for him to enter that area.

The Planar Pearl was vastly more powerful than the Grand Emperor's Pagoda. After all, the pagoda had been created by Grand Emperor Rich-Lush, whereas the pearl had been crafted in the days of the Yore-Wilds, by a whole host of Great Sages.

The pearl was connected to the greyspace of the continent itself, and was completely one with the void. It was something similar to the sun or the moon, something so powerful that even after years of assault, and years of battery by hell monsoons, it was still intact. And Yang Qi’s task was to pour his own true energy into it to cleanse it, and restore it to its true luster.

WHIZZZ!

After a moment of thought, he drew on his Sovereign Lord True Energy and sent it into the pearl.

The true energy began to flow out of him like a river, instantly making him feel like he was emptying out.

Yang Qi’s true energy was so abundant that, normally speaking, he could draw on it fully for a whole month without any problems. That was something that not even people in the seventh or eighth Legendary transformation could match. But the Planar Pearl was something of an entirely different nature. It needed so much energy that, within a few breaths of time, Yang Qi realized that he didn’t have enough.

However, there was an upside. His energy was the purest type possible, something that was of the legion of gods. The radiance and light of the Sovereign Lord was something that far surpassed anything which the Planar Pearl could produce.

Therefore, the moment his energy entered the pearl, it vibrated, as though some profoundly ancient will were waking up inside of it….

Chapter 253: Immense Fortune

The vibrations of the Planar Pearl gave Yang Qi the sensation that his own true energy had become countless sparks, falling into the ocean and causing it to boil violently.

Countless expressions of will within the Planar Pearl could sense the power of Yang Qi’s true energy, and stirred into action. It was like numerous Great Sages awakening, thirsting, rejoicing, and even cheering.

Yang Qi could also sense a larger will lurking in the very depths of the pearl, and when it noticed his true energy, it was as if it had finally seen true radiance and light, as well as hope. And all of that came because of Yang Qi.

All of a sudden, he heard many voices speaking in his mind.

“The distant heavenly world has not forgotten the Yore-Wilds Continent. Finally, radiance and light descends. This is the true holy light of the heavenly world!”

“Yes. This is hope from the heavenly world. This pure aura is the stuff of legends, something paramount, that which exists atop the legion of gods. A god among gods is the Lord, but why has His glory and light appeared here?”

“Although this light is faint and weak, its substructure is powerful. Don’t tell me that the legion of gods has placed the son of the Lord on this plane?”

“There’s no way! To the legion of gods in heaven, our Yore-Wilds Continent is like a single grain of sand among all the seashores. Why would they care so much about us?”

“It doesn’t matter. We have been sleeping for tens of thousands of years, but now, light and radiance have come to drive away our slumber. We might have perished, but this is the legion of gods! One day, in the Kingdom of Triumph, we will be born again….”

“The brilliance of the legion of gods has aroused the will of the Planar Pearl itself…. Beneath that brilliance, we sages can gain enlightenment of the most profound aspect of the immortal dao, which is radiance and light.”

“For years the hell monsoons have battered our wills into the depths of despair. But now, radiance and light have arrived. We can finally rise up and be saved. With the resplendence of the legion of gods shining on us, we will never again despair.”

“Who could be pouring their true energy into the pearl? The Son of the God Legion? But he’s so weak! Considering he’s driven away our despair, we absolutely must help him to grow stronger! We must help the Son of the God Legion to advance!”

“That goes without saying. There is no limit to what the Son of the God Legion can achieve in the future.”

“We are awake, and will never despair again. The power of hell will never force us to become monsters. Henceforth, the plane will finally be stable….”

“Oh Son of the God Legion, we fallen sages of the Yore-Wilds Continent shall hereby bless you….”

A moment ago, his true energy had been so deeply drawn upon by the Planar Pearl that he was like an oil lamp on the verge of flickering out, unable to sustain the wastage, and just on the verge of disconnecting with the pearl.

Without enough true energy to remain in front of the pearl, the magical fluctuations of the pearl would then thrust him out into the hands of the fiend-devils.

If that were to happen to Yang Qi in his depleted state, he would definitely lose his life.

But now, his true energy had awoken the sage spirits within the pearl, and as their despair sloughed away, they drew upon the true reserves of the pearl to instead send power back into Yang Qi.

RUMBLE!

A pillar of sagelight shot forth, entering the Grand Emperor's Pagoda and filling it with dazzling splendor.

Yang Qi felt himself surrounded by the most holy of auras. Then, his true energy began to build back up, and his body started growing strong again. Without any effort on his part, the power of the radiance and light was converted by the Physique of the Sovereign Lord into Sovereign Lord True Energy and universal power.

Meanwhile, his meridians, sea of energy, flesh, and blood all grew stronger, and their dimensional aspects more profound. In other words, he could now contain even more true energy than he had in the past. Instead of his ultimate capacity being that of fifty thousand ancient megamammoths, he reached the level of sixty thousand. Then seventy thousand, eighty thousand, a hundred thousand….

‘It’s too bad though,’ he thought. ‘With a sea of energy and meridians like this, it’s going to take me years of work to build up enough true energy to reach the Space-Void Transformation.’ He could even sense dimensional spaces in his hair. If he filled them with true energy, they would be like divine weapons that could, on their own, kill a low-level Legendary.

If a single drop of his blood fell into the ocean, it would transform everything within five hundred kilometers of it into a holy land. It could even turn an entire massive river into a river of spirit energy.

‘Hurry up and finish! Convert to universal power. This expansion has got to stop. If it goes on any longer, it’s going to be impossible for me to tear rifts in space and reach the Space-Void Transformation. The more potential I have, the more space will resist me. How am I supposed to pierce it now?’

All he could do now was absorb the light, convert it to Sovereign Lord True Energy and universal power, and send it into the particles within him.

Ten thousand particles erupted to life.

In the blink of an eye, twenty thousand, an entire herd of megamammoths from the wilds of yore, stampeding wildly. Thirty thousand. Forty thousand. Fifty thousand. Sixty thousand…. Particles were erupting without cease.

And thus, the radiance and light poured forth endlessly as the will of the Great Sages in the Planar Pearl blessed Yang Qi in unprecedented fashion. At the same time, the light dissolved the sordid stains on the surface of the pearl, and even began to melt the hell monsoon in the area. Dazzling brightness spread out into the greyspace, healing the cracks and crevices, filling it with life force.

The nearby fiend-devils reacted with terrified shock.

“What’s going on?! The plane is recovering? The will of the sages is repairing the damage the hell monsoons have inflicted over tens of thousands of years! Those sages were supposed to sink into despair and slumber, and then be turned into devil-spirits. The Planar Pearl was supposed to turn dark and become a Hell Pearl. But now the sages are awake! They’re no longer in despair!”

“Quick! Run! The passage to hell is about to be locked down!”

“How could this be happening?”

“Agggghhhhh!” One of the bronzeblaze fiend-devils, a Never-Dying Legendary, got too close to the burning light of the awakening Planar Pearl, and was transformed into ash.

The will of the massive pearl was rejecting any fiend-devils who were too near.

The hundreds of billions of fiend-devils were scattering like frightened pigeons, fleeing into the depths of space. Any who were too weak or too close were instantly destroyed by the will of the plane itself.

“What!?” the chancellor shouted, having completely lost all sense of decorum because of his complete astonishment. “The will of the sages in the Planar Pearl have been battered by the hell monsoons for so many years that they long since began to sink into despair. Not even the combined might of the four chancellors could help them. There’s no way the true power of the Planar Pearl could have been called upon! There’s no way those sages could have been woken up. Once the sages descended into complete despair, the plane would eventually be overrun and turned into a hell. But somehow Yang Qi has managed to wake up the will of those sages? What power is this?! Not even a Great Sage should be able to do this! Where is the wielder of the power? I don't see anyone!”

“Father, what's going on?” the Young Lady said, trembling visibly. “Why is this happening? Those Great Sages should have eventually become devil-spirits. It was something no one could possibly stop. The only thing we could hope to do was buy time. But it seems like Yang Qi is truly restoring their radiance and light. How could he be doing this? The Crown Prince couldn't even do it. In fact, nothing he's ever done can compare to what Yang Qi is doing right now!”

“You're right!” the chancellor said excitedly. “The radiance and light of the entire plane is being restored. No longer will devil energy be able to interfere with it. The hell monsoon will no longer plague us. Starting today, the Rich-Lush Continent is going to be invulnerable to attack! The danger has finally passed! The four great institutes no longer need to worry about repairing the sealing marks. In some ways, Yang Qi has just become a hero to the entire Rich-Lush Continent. No one has ever performed a greater service than this. He can even compare to the holy spirits of the past. He’s saved all of us.”

“So what do we do with him now?”

“The service he has just performed is great enough to wipe out any sins or crimes. Already, people in the institute should be able to sense what has happened. The Minorcosm World is already back to its original state. It was damaged by many hell monsoons over the years, but now, all that damage is being healed.” The chancellor pointed in a certain direction. “Guang’er, look.”

Already, it was possible to see the evidence of the changes he referred to.

Radiance and light streamed through the Minorcosm World, causing it to grow bigger, and causing the Nine-Yang Immortal Energy therein to become so strong it took liquid form. All of the Legendary grand elders could tell what was happening, and even some ordinary students looked up into the sea of clouds to see an enormous stone gate, which was none other than the entrance to the Minorcosm World. As radiance and light streamed out from it, the Demi-Immortal Institute was bathed in vital energy, and all living creatures were baptized, experiencing an immediate advancement in energy arts.

“This….”

The grand elders from the Hall of Law Enforcement all shot to their feet. “The Minorcosm World is expanding, and the power of the hell monsoon is fading away. Someone is repairing heaven! Completely and utterly repairing it! Who woke up the will of the sages in the Planar Pearl? Who saved the world?”

“A few weeks ago the chancellor sent that detestable Yang Qi deep into space-time to repair the damage. Don’t tell me it was him! Is he the one who saved the world?”

“Impossible. What type of power would you need to do this? Not even the chancellors of the four institutes working together could have done it. There’s no power in the Rich-Lush Continent that could lift the wills of those sages from despair.”

Chapter 254: Hero

Everyone in the Demi-Immortal Institute was shocked.

The transformations which were occurring were spectacular to say the least. Boundless, never-ending vital energy poured into the Minorcosm World, as though heaven itself had been opened, and jade-like fluid were pouring out from it.

As the Minorcosm World expanded above the sea of clouds, numerous dimensions appeared, and previously desolate wormholes opened up. In fact, there were too many wormholes to count, leading in the direction of other planes, and allowing various types of high-level vital energy to pass through them. Nine-Yang Immortal Energy. Great Void True Energy. Clear Heaven True Energy. Numerous types of energy were rushing in.

When the Demi-Immortal Institute first built the Minorcosm World, it was unimaginably large, and had contained a host of wormholes leading to other planes, to harvest vital energy from them. However, over the years of being battered by hell monsoons, most of the space-time wormholes had closed up or rotted into disuse.

Back when the institute had been at its peak, the Minorcosm World hadn’t just contained Nine Yang Immortal Energy. It had contained fully three hundred different types of universal and planar powers.

Now, the hell monsoons had been vanquished, and the Planar Pearl was active. The wills of the Great Sages had been lifted up from despair, and in the process of their being illuminated by radiance and light, the greyspace of the Rich-Lush Continent was repaired. At the same time, many of the wormholes in the Demi-Immortal Institute were restored.

Almost instantly, the institute was bathed in the same glory it had been in the past. Back then, it had possessed the power to rise to heaven itself, and fully cultivate the potential of all its disciples.

“Something big is happening in the institute’s Minorcosm World!”

The leaders of the big societies all flew out into the open to see what was happening. Master Wind Gentleman. Unparalleled Lightning. Divine Ability Li. All of the top experts were shocked, and these were holy neophytes and grand elders.

“Someone is resealing the greyspace?” Master Wind Gentleman said, his eyes somewhat blank. “The wills of the ancient sages in the Planar Pearl have woken up? Who did it? Who saved the ancient holy spirits? Not even the chancellors could do that. Don’t tell me someone higher than the Great Sage level actually took action?”

“A few weeks ago the chancellor sent Yang Qi to repair the heavenly damage. Did he succeed? He must have convinced his Great Sage backer to help out.”

“Incredible. Simply incredible. So his backer finally made a move. And a heaven-shaking, earth-shattering move at that! Hahahahaha! It’s only getting worse for the Crown Prince. Once word of this gets out, everyone in the Crown Prince Society is going to be shaking in their boots!”

“That's exactly right. Yang Qi’s backer actually fixed the heavenly damage, and woke up the ancient spirits of the past. What cultivation base would that take? It must be higher than the Great Sage level. What could the Crown Prince do to rival that?”

Immediately, the buzz of discussion filled the air.

Some students were excited, and realized that the future was much brighter than before. After all, they would all be benefitting from what was happening.

The only ones who weren’t happy were the people from the Crown Prince Society. And those who were particularly close with the Crown Prince felt their hearts pounding, and could hardly breathe.

“Hurry, report this to the Crown Prince!” Patriarch Cloud shouted as he leaped to his feet. Both he and Patriarch Wind were visibly frightened.

“Yang Qi’s backer finally made a move,” Patriarch Wind said. “He accomplished a mission the four institutes couldn’t have accomplished even if they joined forces. It seems highly likely that Yang Qi’s backer… is a Demi-Immortal!”

Both Patriarchs Wind and Cloud seemed to sag listlessly at the realization of what was happening.

Master Jadecrux of the Seven Preheaven Masters was shaking physically. “This can’t be happening! How could it be? How could anyone do this…?”

The Three Pure Yang Elders all stood there with chattering teeth. “What about Yun Hailan? Where did she get off to?”

“Call all members of the Crown Prince Society together for a meeting. This is an absolutely critical juncture, a moment of life or death. If we don't act quickly, we’re all dead!”

Some people in the Demi-Immortal Institute were going completely crazy, and others were outright rejoicing.

Meanwhile, individuals in the other three institutes realized what was happening, as well as in the Sage Ancestor Dynasty.

Somewhere in that dynasty, a powerful will swept through the imperial court, which belonged to none other than the emperor. “What exactly is happening? Did someone actually awaken the wills of the Great Sages in the Planar Pearl? Quick, go check what’s happening in the Demi-Immortal Institute!”

Meanwhile, the Great Sage chancellors in the Sun Moon Institute, Sea God Institute and True Dragon Institute were issuing decrees regarding the Demi-Immortal Institute.

In the Sun Moon Institute, Hua Tianxiong opened his eyes, and the shock therein was visible. “Don’t tell me it was really Yang Qi’s backer? With someone so strong watching out for him, doesn’t that make him the most powerful person in all creation? At the very least, he’s invincible in the Rich-Lush Continent.”

He actually cared a lot for Yang Qi, and had become quite perturbed when he learned that the chancellor of the Demi-Immortal Institute had sent him on the mission to repair the damage to heaven.

Now, only days later, the vital energy of heaven and earth was stirring in unprecedented fashion, transforming the entire continent. That indicated that, not only had Yang Qi succeeded, he had become a savior and hero.

However, Hua Tianxiong was privy to many of the most ancient secrets. “Right now, the most important thing is to work with Young Master Shroud-Heaven to kill the Crown Prince. Even if Yang Qi does have a backer who surpasses the Great Sage level, that person can’t watch over everything that happens in the Rich-Lush Continent. He’ll be under the restriction of the Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragment.”

Rising to his feet, he vanished.

All of the Rich-Lush Continent was in upheaval.

All of the Great Sages could sense that dramatic transformations were occurring to the vital energy of heaven and earth. Meanwhile, outside of the Rich-Lush Continent, powerful organizations were also able to detect what was happening.

Far in the depths of the void was a powerful, holy mountain, rife with demon energy. It was pieced together from a number of continents and lands, and connected to countless other worlds via a multitude of space-time wormholes.

This was the holy land of the Demonfolk, the Hanging Mountain.

Suddenly, a voice rumbled out from within the mountain. “The Rich-Lush Continent’s Planar Pearl has been activated. A power greater than that of a Great Sage has lifted the ancient noble spirits from their despair….

“Go investigate. Hold nothing back to get information. Also, open the space-time wormhole to the Rich-Lush Continent. We can't afford to keep it closed any longer. The Rich-Lush Continent is the springboard to many locations, and also the home of the Yore-Wilds’ Heart of the past. That continent is the key to reaching higher planes. Without it, the resources needed to reach them is exorbitant. Not even Demi-Immortals can afford it.”

Screams of demon energy immediately began to swirl out from the Hanging Mountain, all of which belonged to powerful heaven-demons.

At the same time, on Yama Mountain in the Heavencorpse Kingdom, Ghost Emperor Yama was still restrained by the Quake-Dawn godsteel, and his eyes shone with terror. “There’s no mistaking it. That's the God Legion Seal. How terrifying! What level of power is it? The Demolishing level? Perhaps the Godmyth level? Or… maybe even the Deathless level. My strength isn’t even worth mentioning when compared to that. I'm like a speck of dust. And yet, how come it seems to me that the God Legion Seal is broken in some way? Shattered by some immense power. It’s only a fragment, not nearly as powerful or terrifying as it could be. If I could get it… then perhaps I could transcend! I could become a devil among devils, the Lord of hell….”

Ghost Emperor Yama trembled with the desire to free himself from his shackles, return to the world, and take the God Legion Seal.

Of course, Yang Qi didn’t realize any of that was happening. He could only sense his power rising as he was blessed by the host of sages in the Planar Pearl. He was being transformed on the most fundamental level, and with terrifying speed. Already, he had reached the level of two hundred thousand ancient megamammoths, and the process hadn’t stopped yet.

As for the amount of energy reserves he had, they were equivalent to one hundred fifty thousand megamammoths, which was indescribably higher than before.

Yang Qi actually didn't know exactly how strong he was; all he knew was that mad power was coursing through every inch of him.

Eventually, the light began to fade.

The transformation was complete. Every hair on Yang Qi’s body had enormous spatial dimensions in them, as did every inch of his flesh and blood. He was such a hive of dimensions that he himself resembled a greyspace of sorts.

His meridians and sea of energy were now many times stronger and larger, and as for his total limit of power, it was that of three hundred thousand megamammoths. However, only two hundred thousand of them were awake. In other words, he had to fully wake up the power of tens of thousands of megamammoths to reach the pinnacle of his potential.

“My god! Are these ancient sages toying with me?! How… how am I supposed to get that much energy? Where would I find that many spirit stones? Furthermore, even if I got that much energy, how am I supposed to pierce through the void with it?”

After all, the stronger one got, the more one would meet resistance from magical laws. Tearing openings into the void was difficult as it was, but doing so with the power of two hundred thousand megamammoths was approaching the power levels of the ninth Legendary transformation.

How could someone in the second transformation overcome obstacles intended for the ninth? Yang Qi’s scalp tingled at the thought of the backlash he would get when he tried to break through.

Chapter 255: Joy and Worry

The larger a piece of driftwood was, the more the water would resist it, and the harder it would be to push it beneath the surface of the water.

The more powerful a Legendary, the more space would resist him, and the harder it would be for him to pierce through it. Space was like water, and people were like driftwood.

As for Yang Qi, he was essentially a mountain-sized piece of driftwood, whereas ordinary people were the size of a fist. One could only imagine how difficult it would be to shove a mountain-sized chunk of driftwood under the surface of the water.

And thus, Yang Qi wished to cry, but had no tears to shed.

With his current true energy, and the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, not even Never-Dying fiend-devils were worth worrying about to him. But levels were levels. And despite how strong he was, he still was worried about how to reach the third Legendary transformation.

That said, if he achieved his breakthrough, it was impossible to say how profoundly he would understand space. Not even Great Sages would be able to wrap their minds around what he could. From ancient times until modern, no one had ever reached the same level Yang Qi had in the second Legendary transformation.

The power of two hundred thousand ancient megamammoths.

Now, even the tiniest bit of his true energy could power up the Grand Emperor's Pagoda to insane levels. As of this moment, it had over a thousand glowing shields, each one powered by a different grand spell formation. Those intended for use by Great Sages were profound, each one more powerful than the last. And because of the Sovereign Lord True Energy and universal power, it even looked different. Somehow, it was more majestic and awe-inspiring, like it had been back when it was created.

‘I did it all without any help from the God Legion Seal. Not that it was an easy process….’ Although he was still a bit worked up about everything which had occurred, in the end, the benefits outweighed the detriments.

At the very least, his ultimate power levels had increased. Even being a mere Spirit-Soul Legendary, he would now be able to dominate virtually the entire Demi-Immortal Institute.

The grand elders of law enforcement, and anyone else in the sixth, seventh, or eighth transformations were as impressive to him as dog crap. With the power of only thirty thousand megamammoths, he had been able to kill a fiend-devil in the seventh transformation. Now that he had two hundred thousand, what were his limits?

There were certain constraints inherent to the levels themselves. But in terms of raw power, he was at a level that no one could look down on.

Yang Qi couldn’t have been more pleased. Not even he could have guessed that he would only need his own true energy to succeed, and wouldn't need the help of the God Legion Seal. Of course, he was well aware that it was because of his godly-class energy art, Sovereign Lord True Energy, and universal power. That was what had awoken the sage spirits. And those sages were the ones who had actually repaired the plane’s greyspace.

Essentially, Yang Qi had been the spark, and the sages had been a sea of oil. Of course, the spark was still vitally important. Without it, the sages would never have woken up.

Yang Qi looked around at the fleeing fiend-devils, and put aside any thoughts of pursuing them. He flew off into the distance, and before long, encountered the projection of the Young Lady.

“Did I accomplish the mission well enough, Young Lady?” he asked. “I'd say I actually surpassed the requirements.”

“The chancellor wants to see you.” Her projection faded away, and the power of spatial teleportation grabbed onto Yang Qi and pulled him into the presence of the chancellor and the Young Lady.

The chancellor looked at him for a long moment and then said, “You did well, Yang Qi. Very well….”

After that, he stopped, almost as if he wasn’t sure what to say next.

“What,” Yang Qi said coolly. “Still planning to imprison me, Chancellor? I accomplished a mission no one else could accomplish, something that should outweigh killing Grand Elder Feat-Virtue a hundred times over. You know, I spent a lot of spirit stones on the mission. Any chance you could make up for some of that, Chancellor?”

The chancellor nodded. “What exactly do you want? It was a vital mission, and you’ve brought untold benefits to the Demi-Immortal Institute. From here on out, our institute will enter an era of boundless advancement. Over the next hundred years, geniuses are going to abound. Considering the services you’ve performed, I should probably give you the chancellorship of the entire institute. In fact, you would be a good leader for all four of the institutes.”

Yang Qi had saved the entire plane from a slow descent into darkness and despair.

“I need spirit stones. Lots of them. And the highest quality possible. Sovereign-grade, and at the very least, a thousand of them. Of course, sagely-grade spirit stones would do as well.” Yang Qi didn’t hesitate to say exactly what he wanted. After all, to achieve his next breakthrough, he needed a lot of high-quality spirit stones.

It was impossible to say how many years of ordinary cultivation it would take to fill in the power of a hundred thousand megamammoths. And with each day that passed, the threat of the Crown Prince emerging from seclusion became more relevant. Yang Qi needed to reach the Space-Void Transformation as quickly as possible, so that he could help Young Master Shroud-Heaven and Hua Tianxiong take out the Crown Prince.

And he absolutely could not allow the Crown Prince to become a Great Sage.

“What?!” the Young Lady blurted. “A thousand sovereign-grade spirit stones? Go steal them yourself! My own cultivation requires spirit stones, and even building up a supply of royal-grade is difficult. I hardly ever get to use sovereign-grade. In the Rich-Lush Continent, sovereign-grade spirit stone are extremely uncommon. And you think you're going to get a thousand?”

“What's that supposed to mean?” Yang Qi said, his voice as cool as ever. “Chancellor, are you saying that you're refusing to reward me?”

The chancellor shook his head sadly. “I really can’t give you that many spirit stones. The Demi-Immortal Institute doesn’t even have that many in stock. Spirit stones are not very common in the Rich-Lush Continent, not since the mines and quarries dried up in ancient times. However, considering how strong you are, it shouldn't be difficult for you to get some. Just go to the Western Continent. There are plenty of spirit stone mines there that are still in operation. Sometimes they even dig up immortal stones.”

“Immortal stones?”

Yang Qi knew that the highest grade of spirit stone was godly-grade, but he had never heard of any sort of immortal stone.

“Immortal stones come from high-energy ores. Considering your power levels, I would say that ordinary spirit stones probably won’t sate you. If you could get some immortal stones, you could easily achieve the breakthrough you seek. Without them, you won’t succeed, at least in any short amount of time. You're strong, but that will only make your next breakthrough even harder.”

Yang Qi nodded, his eyes glittering with intense light. “Oh? Well, in that case, I guess I’ll go check out the situation in the Western Continent.”

He had already guessed that if he asked for spirit stones from the Demi-Immortal Institute, the chancellor would say that he had none to give. Despite the amazing services he had performed, the stingy man wasn’t going to give him the slightest reward.

Most likely it had to do with the Crown Prince. After all, if Yang Qi got even stronger, he could obviously cause problems.

And intentionally or otherwise, the chancellor was always protecting the Crown Prince. Yang Qi had long since realized this, and at the moment, he chose not to point it out. There didn’t seem to be any reason to quibble about the matter now. The day would come in which Yang Qi would plainly demonstrate to the chancellor how weak the Crown Prince was, and how wrong he had been to support him.

“Very well then, Chancellor. I’ll take my leave now.” With that, he turned to leave.

“Go ahead,” the chancellor replied. Then he waved his hand, and he and the Young Lady vanished.

Yang Qi flew into the air, and soon, was high above the transforming Minorcosm World. ‘You're so worried about protecting the Crown Prince that you don’t even abide by the rules. Fine. Don’t blame me for doing what has to be done.’

With that, he also vanished.

In the depths of the Minorcosm World, the Young Lady was discussing matters with her father. “Father, why didn’t you give any reward at all to Yang Qi? He’s surely coming to resent you. What if that ends up harming the Demi-Immortal Institute? The service he just performed was incredible. Even sovereign-grade spirit stones wouldn’t have been enough of a reward. Are you worried that he might get so strong that he’ll cause problems for the Crown Prince?”

“I'm trying to find the proper balance. You can’t underestimate Yang Qi. He was just blessed by the host of saints in the Planar Pearl, and has reached a terrifying level of cultivation. If he becomes a Space-Void Legendary, with an understanding of the power of space, then he’ll be able to use the Grand Emperor's Pagoda with complete and utter ease. At the very least, he’ll be as strong as a Half Sage. In fact, he’s probably in the position to threaten the Crown Prince right now. Consider my actions a test. If Yang Qi can maintain a cool heart, free from hatred, then perhaps he's worth grooming. Sadly, it seems he’s already developing a grudge.”

“I’d develop a grudge if I were him.” The Young Lady shook her head. “It’s just not fair. If you’re this scared of him, why not take the Grand Emperor's Pagoda away?”

“I can’t. That pagoda is his now, and it has power that even I find terrifying. Besides, from what I can tell, Yang Qi’s backer is so strong that even if Grand Emperor Rich-Lush came back and tried to reclaim his pagoda, he would fail.”

The Young Lady shivered. “Are you really sure you can keep Yang Qi in line, Father?”

“Of course. His level is too low, and he doesn’t understand anything about magical law. My only fear is that if I made a move, his backer would show up. Then I’d be in trouble. Even if I were joined by all of the chancellors, and all of the prime elders from all four institutes, we would all die. The Rich-Lush Continent itself would probably be destroyed. I'm afraid Yang Qi is far more powerful than anyone in his generation. In the end, though, I promised the Crown Prince’s mother to safeguard him. I can’t go back on my word.”

The Young Lady frowned. “Father, we never even saw that backer of his. Does he even exist? You absolutely cannot afford to be mistaken in this regard.”

“I'm not mistaken. Based on what happened in the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, I'm absolutely sure. That said, what happened with the Planar Pearl was a surprise. Yang Qi actually accomplished the mission without the help of his backer.” At this point, the chancellor’s eyes shone brightly. “Having Yang Qi off in the Western Continent looking for immortal stones will put some of the pressure off of the Crown Prince.”

Chapter 256: Discussing Important Business

‘The reason the chancellor refused to give those spirit stones is that he knows if I reach the Space-Void Transformation, I’ll kill the Crown Prince.’

After leaving the Demi-Immortal Institute, Yang Qi headed toward the Sun Moon Institute.

In his heart, he was laughing coldly. He had just performed the greatest service imaginable, and yet the chancellor refused to reward him at all. At this point, he couldn’t be more disappointed with the Demi-Immortal Institute, and especially the chancellor. The man was outright protecting the Crown Prince, and although he surely had his reasons, he was the leader of an institute. His priorities should have been fairness and justice. But it was more clear than ever that they were not. As far as Yang Qi was concerned, the man didn’t deserve to be the chancellor.

Unfortunately, there was nothing he could do about the matter right now. In the world Yang Qi lived in, everything was about power and strength. The chancellor could act even more unfairly than he already was, but he was a Great Sage, and therefore, nobody could do anything about it.

Yang Qi had intimidated a lot of people, and yet, everyone was convinced that he had a backer who was stronger than a Great Sage. Only he knew the truth of the matter. Sometimes the God Legion Seal worked, other times it didn't. Despite all the danger he had faced in his last mission, it hadn’t helped him at all.

Clearly, he couldn’t just assume that the seal would save him from every dangerous situation.

‘That’s fine. For now, I’ll go talk to Hua Tianxiong and see if he has any ideas about how to get spirit stones. I absolutely have to reach the Space-Void Transformation as quickly as possible. If I do, I can help him make a move against the Crown Prince.’

With the power of three hundred thousand megamammoths fully activated, and the ability to pierce through the bindings of space, his cultivation base would be shocking beyond belief.

With the added power of the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, Yang Qi was confident that he, Young Master Shroud-Heaven, and Hua Tianxiong would be strong enough to slay the Crown Prince.

Some distance away from the Sun Moon Institute, he pulled out a paper talisman, burned it, and then landed on a nearby low-lying mountain. Although it wasn’t a particularly prominent mountain, the scenery in the area was beautiful. Magical mushrooms and mystical ginseng roots grew everywhere. Immortal peaches could be seen, and snow-white deer and apes frolicked here and there. All sorts of plants and flowers could be seen, and there were even gurgling spirit springs.

Almost as soon as Yang Qi touched down, an immense force weighed down on the area, and Hua Tianxiong arrived. After looking Yang Qi up and down, he said, “The development with the Planar Pearl… was that you?”

“Yes, all of it,” Yang Qi replied, not mincing any words.

“What?! Really? Considering what you've done, any crimes you committed in the past should be forgotten. So, I guess your backer is stronger than the Great Sage level. A Demi-Immortal, I assume?”

“I hope you can forgive me for not offering an explanation. It's complicated. And if word leaked about the truth, it would be very bad for me.”

“Of course you can’t reveal the secrets of an invincible Demi-Immortal.” Hua Tianxiong looked at Yang Qi for another long moment. “Your cultivation base…. It’s inciting pressure from the void, and the power of expulsion. Just how far have you progressed since we last met?”

Because Hua Tianxiong was a Never-Dying Legendary, to his eyes, the world looked different. Yang Qi was surrounded by the power of space, a power that seemed leery and even terrified of him. It was almost as if he were so strong that, before long, space itself would try to expel him.

Normally, this sort of thing would happen if a Demi-Immortal tried to enter the Rich-Lush Continent. Because the power of such an expert was too intense, the plane itself would immediately try to eject such a person. After all, that level of power would eventually destroy the continent as a whole.

Once experts reached a certain level, they would be forced to either ascend to higher planes, or risk destroying the plane they currently occupied.

And yet, the spatial power around Yang Qi was already preparing to confine, expel, or destroy him.

There was a favorable aspect to the situation: it was forcing him to temper himself. It would be similar to a mortal human who walked around with an enormous sandbag on their shoulders. After doing so for an extended time, all they had to do was throw the bag down to be vastly more limber than before.

Yang Qi would be similarly benefited once he could pierce through space.

“I acquired some good fortune,” Yang Qi explained. “When I was purifying the Planar Pearl, I was blessed by the will of the ancient sages. My body was remolded, and I grew much stronger. However, there’s a downside. That power has become something of a limitation, and I need spirit stones to negate the effects. A lot of spirit stones. That’s the only way to further my cultivation now. In fact, that’s why I've come, Uncle. Do you happen to know where I might be able to get a large amount of sovereign-grade spirit stones?”

“You need spirit stones for your cultivation?” Hua Tianxiong said, sounding a bit confused. “Well, that's simple. The Demi-Immortal Institute has plenty in their reserves. Considering you just saved the world, and also helped your institute to open up previously sealed space-time wormholes, your chancellor will definitely give you some spirit stones. I’d bet he’d even give you sagely-grade stones.”

“Hmph!” Although Yang Qi was still very angry about the subject, he managed to calmly explain the situation with the chancellor.

Snarling coldly, Hua Tianxiong said, “Damn that chancellor. Because of mere sentiment, he’s refusing to acknowledge your services. So what if he had something going on with the Crown Prince’s mother? Nobody knows for sure the extent of their relationship. However, it was shortly after she gave birth to the Crown Prince that people came from the Quake-Dawn Cathedral and took her away. That was when she asked the chancellor to watch over her son. And that is why he’s gone out of his way to help him over the years. And now, he's bending the law to help the Crown Prince and keep you down. Yang Qi, you should just leave the Demi-Immortal Institute. Join our Sun Moon Institute, and I’ll put in a good word with our chancellor. He’ll definitely do everything he can to protect you.”

Yang Qi shook his head. “There’s no need for that, Uncle. I will never forget the chancellor’s heartlessness. One day, I’ll make sure he realizes that protecting the Crown Prince was a huge mistake. Incidentally, this reminds me of another major problem. If we go to kill the Crown Prince, the chancellor isn’t just going to sit on his thumbs and let it happen, is he?”

Hua Tianxiong thought about the question for a moment. “It's possible he could step in and do something. However, myself, Young Master Shroud-Heaven and the Crown Prince are all Legendaries. The chancellor is a Great Sage, so if he interfered, it's likely other Great Sages would get involved. And nobody wants Great Sage Shroud-Heaven in the picture. You know, if you reached the Space-Void Transformation, you could probably join us in our attempt to kill the Crown Prince.”

“But where could I get all the spirit stones I need? The chancellor mentioned that the Western Continent has plenty, but I don't want to just go there without a plan. The spirit stone mines there are definitely going to be guarded by powerful organizations. It would be silly to get in so much trouble there that I can’t deal with the Crown Prince later.”

“Unfortunately, if you want spirit stones, the Western Continent is probably your best bet. Besides, a lot of organizations trade demon cores from the Rich-Lush Continent for spirit stones from the Western Continent.” He thought for a moment. “The Western Continent is a huge place with a lot of mines. If you really plan to go, I can give you a secret map from the Sun Moon Institute that shows all the major locations there.”

Yang Qi nodded. “I would very much appreciate that, Uncle. By the way, how is Fengfeng doing?”

“She's in seclusion right now, trying to reach the Legendary level. It’s a tense time. Reaching the Legendary level isn’t easy, and failure leads to death. I was initially opposed to her decision, but she wouldn’t back down, so here we are.”

Yang Qi’s heart pounded a bit at the news. Breaking into the Legendary level was a process that some described as going from being a mortal to an energy warrior. The death of failure involved the vital energy of heaven and earth crushing one into dust. And no interference from anyone could stop that.

Even if Yang Qi were a Great Sage, he wouldn't be able to provide any assistance. In the Lifeseizing level, it was possible to receive outside assistance to strengthen the meridians and build up true energy. But the Legendary level was about the understanding of magical laws, and therefore, was entirely a personal matter.

“Uncle, if you and Young Master Shroud-Heaven go to kill the Crown Prince, you have to be very careful. Young Master Shroud-Heaven is a profound schemer, and I’d say it's highly likely he has a plan to take you out as well.”

“Don’t worry, I was thinking the same thing. Considering he laced those five phases treasures with a heaven-demon seed, it seems a foregone conclusion he’ll try to take me out.” With that, Hua Tianxiong waved his hand, producing an ancient, bronze-encased book entitled Western Continent Atlas. It contained detailed maps of the Western Continent, as well as all sorts of records and information. It explained which organizations controlled which areas and which mines, and featured cities, mountains, temples, states, and just about everything one could imagine.

The Western Continent was much larger than the Rich-Lush Continent. The lands were fertile and prosperous, and the population was enormous. Even more shocking, the entire continent was unified under the rulership of one large imperial dynasty. It was nothing like the Sage Ancestor Dynasty, a sham of a dynasty that could best be described by the adage advertising mutton, selling dog meat.

“The Sky-Heaven Dynasty controls the entire Western Continent,” Hua Tianxiong explained. “They have the true power, and exercise jurisdiction over every single city that exists there. Even the sects there pay fealty to them. In fact, anyone who wants to start a sect has to submit a formal application, and go through all sorts of formalities. Furthermore, the churches in the Sky-Heaven Dynasty all worship a god-spirit named Amaranthine Greensura.”

“Amaranthine Greensura?” Yang Qi immediately thought of the fact that his mother was called Greensura.

“Amaranthine Greensura was the most powerful entity among the ancient Demonfolk, who unified all of the countless Demonfolk that existed in the Yore-Wilds Continent, and then went on to found the Hanging Mountain. The Sky-Heaven Dynasty of the Western Continent is something of a subsidiary of the Hanging Mountain, and everyone there exercises faith in the leaders of the Hanging Mountain. Throughout the years, the holy daughters of the Hanging Mountain have all been called Greensura, because Greensura is actually a surname. In one way or another, all such holy daughters have the blood of Amaranthine Greensura in them.”

‘So that’s how it is,’ Yang Qi thought, his heart beginning to pound. ‘The dynasty that rules the Western Continent is a subsidiary of the Hanging Mountain! I have to go there! This is the perfect chance to get in touch with the Hanging Mountain!’

Chapter 257: Western Continent

A strange, unique aspect of the Western Continent was that it lacked demonlings.

Back when the Sky-Heaven Dynasty was founded, an almighty member of the Demonfolk swept through the continent and took away all demonlings with potential for future growth. Later, the Sky-Heaven Dynasty instituted laws to strictly prohibit the slaughtering of demonlings. Instead, they were to be captured and offered as gifts to Amaranthine Greensura.

According to the intelligence reports of the Sun Moon Institute, all such captured demonlings ended up in the Hanging Mountain.

Over the millions upon millions of years which had passed since then, the population of demonlings in the Western Continent shrank and shrank to the point where they were essentially extinct. Any organizations who sought demon cores to augment spell formations or magical devices would need to surreptitiously acquire them from the Rich-Lush Continent.

Demon cores were about as precious in the Western Continent as spirit stones were in the Rich-Lush Continent.

Not even the elite students of the institutes in the Rich-Lush Continent had access to spirit stones for their cultivation. They had to rely directly on the powers of heaven and earth, which made their cultivation much more arduous.

Because of the vast network of subterranean mines, the people of the Western Continent had used spirit stones for cultivation for countless generations. As a result, there were more energy arts experts there. That was another reason why the Sky-Heaven Dynasty was so strong; they had plenty of Legendaries in their forces.

There had been many occasions in which the Western Continent sought to invade the Rich-Lush Continent. However, because the chancellors of the four institutes were always Great Sages, such efforts were extremely dangerous to say the least. Unless they could be absolutely confident in taking out all of the Great Sages, invading would be too risky.

Yang Qi took some time to study the Western Continent Atlas for a time. After he was finished, he left.

Thankfully, he had acquired quite a few demon cores in the hell monsoon. Furthermore, when the wills of the sages in the Planar Pearl had swept out and killed numerous fiend-devils, Yang Qi had been able to harvest the demon cores they left behind.

Right now, they were all stored in his Hellfire Crucible, the best being from a Ghost-God fiend-devil, that being one he had harvested in the moments after the restoration of the pearl.

Because of his improvement in cultivation base, he could now use his Hell Portal to summon flesh and blood fiend-devils. Although the highest ones he could summon were those in the fourth or fifth transformation, they would still be a perfect supply for the demon cores he would need to get spirit stones.

His psychic power was now stronger than ever, and when he unleashed his psychic tempest, he could access numerous nearby planes of a similar level to the one he occupied. That in turn made the summoning powers of his Hell Portal even more effective.

Even fiend-devil counts, Yin-Yang Legendaries, who were hiding in the depths of space, could be snatched up by him and turned into slaves.

In fact, the regions of space-time surrounding the Rich-Lush Continent were now virtually devoid of fiend-devils. But the Western Continent was a different story. Hell monsoons battered that continent as well, and that meant there were plenty of fiend-devils in the area for Yang Qi to summon.

In his dimensional sea of energy, massive amounts of true energy simmered, and in the middle of it all was the Hellfire Crucible, which burned with everlasting Cleansing Flame of the Heavenly World.

And his Lord's Eye was now powerful enough to pierce through a thousand planes. When he looked out, he could see countless spatial tempests and space-time wormholes, and at the same time, use his psychic power to lock down on whatever evil entities lurked in the darkness.

To him, wretch energy shone like brilliant stars in the dead of night.

Suddenly, he waved his hand, and the Hell Portal opened, connecting to another location in space-time. As it happened, that location was Fiend-Devil Island! Without any hesitation, he locked onto a Septenary Lifeseizer fiend-devil, who he then pulled toward him through the portal.

BOOM!

The fiend-devil immediately shattered into powder. Yang Qi didn't even bother speaking to the thing; he had simply been interested in testing out his summoning abilities.

His eyes could pierce through space-time, and thus, he could easily identify major convergences of wretch energy, locations with fiend-devils, zombies, devil-ghosts, skeletons, and the like. They were places like the Blackcorpse Mountains and the Fiendcorpse Mountains.

In fact, out in the depths of space-time, he saw a half-plane, connected to the Rich-Lush Continent by a wormhole, which was none other than the Heavencorpse Dimension. In the middle of that location, in a pitch-black mountain, was the aura of an immensely powerful fiend-devil.

There was no doubt about it: that was Ghost Emperor Yama, who was far more powerful than the chancellor of the Demi-Immortal Institute. Not even the chancellors of the four institutes combined could match Ghost Emperor Yama. Summoning a fiend-devil like him was currently beyond Yang Qi’s capabilities.

‘I wonder what type of demon core he would have.’ After some thought, Yang Qi blurred into motion, heading out over the ocean toward the Western Continent.

On what was essentially the horizon of the Rich-Lush Continent was a membrane, a dimensional barrier that only Space-Void Legendaries could possibly travel through. That was what led to the Western Continent.

On his own, Yang Qi could never pierce that dimensional barrier. However, he had the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, and therefore, when he reached the end of the sea, he drew upon its spell formations to do exactly that.

RUMBLE!

Just like that, he was in another land. At the same time, the Grand Emperor's Pagoda shivered as some immense force attempted to expel it. The local vital energy of heaven and earth forced its way into the depths of the spell formations, and immediately caused explosions and flashes of light.

‘What’s going on?’ The Grand Emperor's Pagoda was part of the Rich-Lush Continent, and differed from the Western Continent on a substructural level. Thus, the local vital energy instinctually wanted to expel or even exterminate it.

However, even as the vital energy rushed into the pagoda, the might of an emperor erupted from inside. In the blink of an eye, an actual emperor appeared out of thin air, holding a scepter, the tool he would use to expand his empire.

“The four corners of the earth are my domain; the four seas serve me as ministers….”

It was the voice of an emperor, sounding out from ancient times, and it immediately cowed the vital energy. Unexpectedly, this emperor was actually seeking to expand his territory! Even as the Grand Emperor's Pagoda subjugated the local vital energy, something new appeared in its depths. An embryo!

It was the embryo of an emperor that radiated boundless imperial might, indicating that Yang Qi had pushed the Grand Emperor's Pagoda into its second form.

The greatest thing an emperor could do was expand his empire throughout his life. And that was the exact point of the second form of the Grand Emperor's Pagoda; it was going to try to subjugate the Western Continent.

Yang Qi had the feeling that if he ventured far enough into these lands to acquire the continent’s heart, then make it part of the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, the pagoda would transform. It would become like an actual empire, constantly seeking to expand and add new blood into itself.

Yang Qi could sense that the Grand Emperor's Pagoda sought to do battle, to conquer a new land, to take over another plane of existence.

‘Emperor embryo….’ Yang Qi thought, looking into the depths of the pagoda. It looked like an actual human embryo, laying there deep inside the pagoda, pulsing with the desire to conquer. All of the vital energy that it encountered, it subdued, tempering and refining itself in the process.

With the emperor embryo in the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, Yang Qi felt even stronger than before, and capable of more marvelous feats.

‘So, where exactly am I?’ he thought, absorbing the pagoda into his body and looking around. He was currently in the sea of clouds near a certain coastal region. Thanks to all the clouds, there was no way anyone would be able to spot him.

Countless trade ships could be seen along the winding coast, some of them obviously captained by Space-Void Legendaries. Those would be the ones who could pass through the dimensional barrier to the Rich-Lush Continent.

Already, Yang Qi could detect the presence of spirit stones. Casting his gaze off into the distance, he saw areas of dense spirit energy, which were the spirit stone mines.

‘This is the coast of the Sea of Waves, the most prosperous area of trade in the Western Continent. However, it’s not the center of culture, nor is it a location of many spirit stone mines. The greatest spirit lodes are in the Sky-Heaven Plains; that’s where all the mines and cities are, and that’s where I'm most likely to find what I need. But first, I might as well head down to Silvermoon to get the lay of the land. The Western Continent is bound to be full of hidden dragons and crouching tigers, so I have to be on guard at all times.’

Thanks to his map, he knew a bit about the local cities.

His destination was a flourishing city called Silvermoon, a coastal trade hub, and a fairly large place.

In the Western Continent Atlas, Silvermoon was described as being a prosperous and influential city, ruled by a member of the imperial house, a Legendary known as Lady-Princess Silvermoon.

It didn't take long before Yang Qi found himself outside of the city.

The walls were massive, and were covered with a type of mithril that reflected the moonlight, and made even the dead of night as brilliant as midday.

Chapter 258: Silvermoon

Mithril was a very special type of metal. When forging weapons, adding only a drop or two of it could unleash the true potential and power of the weapon. It could even absorb the quintessence of the sun and moon to improve the quality of whatever weapon it was part of. Such weapons were all destined to become spirit weapons eventually.

In the Rich-Lush Continent, even a small portion of mithril could be exchanged for a hoard of energy convergence pills.

Some places even used mithril as currency instead of energy convergence pills. And yet here in this trade hub of the Western Continent, this city’s walls were actually plated with the stuff.

Even more telling, the mithril obviously contained spell formations that continuously absorbed external power. There were also spirit stones decorating the walls. Everything exuded a sensation of abundant riches, but at the same time, immense security. Clearly, no one would dare to cause trouble in a place like this, lest the spell formations be activated to deadly effect.

The people of the Western Continent were visibly different from those in the Rich-Lush Continent, exotic even. However, it was also possible to spot denizens of the Rich-Lush Continent coming and going from Silvermoon.

Trade abounded between the two continents, with demon cores and spirit stones changing hands without cease.

Therefore, Yang Qi in his Rich-Lush Continent clothing didn't attract much attention as he approached the city. People who saw him just assumed he was another trader that came to do business.

Roads and paths surrounded the countryside of Silvermoon like spider webs, making travel very convenient. There were fountains and channels of water on the sides of the road, even in the city itself, making the entire area seem like a painting.

Although it seemed like a place of business, Yang Qi could also sense traces of rancorous auras, the result of people being harmed or killed in the area.

This city was anything but a haven of security. On the surface it looked lively and happy, but underneath, danger and darkness lurked.

That said, Yang Qi knew that true confidence stems from superb skill, and therefore, he simply walked toward the city. Before he could get very close, he heard a voice speaking to him from a nearby merchant caravan.

“Hey there, friend. Wait up!”

It was the language of the Rich-Lush Continent!

Looking over his shoulder, he saw a group of a few dozen individuals walking along on foot. They had carts led by flood stallions, which were laden with boxes. The flags the merchant caravan flew were embroidered with the character ‘sage’, indicating that they hailed from the Sage Ancestor Dynasty.

The person who had called out to Yang Qi was the leader of the caravan, who he quickly identified as being a Nonary Lifeseizer.

“How can I help you?” Yang Qi said, waiting for them to catch up.

“You're from the Rich-Lush Continent, right?” the leader asked. “We're an imperial trading caravan from the Sage Ancestor Dynasty. You know, Silvermoon is a dangerous place. You probably shouldn’t go in alone.”

“What do you mean?” Yang Qi asked, frowning.

“A lot of big things have happened in the city recently. Some factions in the Western Continent have started targeting people from the Rich-Lush Continent, attacking us, robbing us, kidnapping us, even assassinating us. The locals in this region really don’t like us, and that's why I say that going in alone would be very dangerous for you. If you feel like it, you can join us. We can help keep you and your trade goods safe.”

“I appreciate that,” Yang Qi said, a bit moved. This imperial trading caravan seemed to really be concerned about him, and considering the level of his cultivation base, he would have been able to tell if they had ill intentions.

After joining the caravan, he continued to chat with the leader. He soon learned that, every year, the Sage Ancestor Dynasty would trade large amounts of demon cores for spirit stones. In addition to the actual merchants in the caravan, there were also guards and government officials, as well as energy arts experts in disguise.

All-in-all, Yang Qi had a fairly good impression of the Sage Ancestor Dynasty.

As they continued along their way, they came across a few other isolated Rich-Lush Continent cultivators, who also joined the group. Eventually, evening fell, and the torchlight in Silvermoon combined with the shining walls caused bright light to fill the area.

It was under these circumstances that the trade caravan entered the city.

At the city gate, they were stopped by the gate guards.

“The tax is based on the number of people in your group,” one of the guards said, his voice cold. “One mid-grade spirit stone per person. Two per horse. And three per box.”

“What?” the leader said, visibly surprised. Eyes flashing, he said, “Yesterday the tax was low-grade spirit stones. Now it’s mid-grade? That’s fully ten times higher! And look at the next gate over! They’re charging low-grade spirit stones, not mid-grade!”

“Orders just came down that anyone from the Rich-Lush Continent has to pay this tax to enter Silvermoon. If you don’t, then no business for you.” The guard was speaking the language of the Western Continent, clearly without a single thought or care as to whether the people listening could understand him. And from the look in his eye, it seemed like he would love to thrash them within an inch of their lives. Or even worse. “Well? Are you going to pay up? Or not? If not, then beat it. And never come back to Silvermoon again. Understand?”

Yang Qi couldn't speak or understand the language of the Western Continent. However, because of the psychic fluctuations in the man’s voice, he was able to identify the meaning of his words.

After reaching the Lifeseizing level, it was possible to use psychic fluctuations to understand most spoken languages.

“Ah, whatever. We’ll suck it up for now.” Shaking his head, the leader of the caravan collected the money from the members of the group and handed it to the guard. Turning to Yang Qi, he lowered his voice and explained, “Lady-Princess Silvermoon must have some bone to pick with us people from the Rich-Lush Continent right now. She belongs to a particularly radical faction within the Sky-Heaven Dynasty, a group that's always calling for an invasion of the Rich-Lush Continent.”

The walnut-sized spirit stones glowed with soft light. They had been perfectly cut, and contained no visible flaws. The regulations for how to cut spirit stones had been in place since ancient times, and was the reason they could be easily used as currency. Once someone tapped on the spirit power inside of them, they would transform into something unsuitable to use as money.

Snatching the stones, the guard looked over the group with bloodthirsty eyes and said, “That’s better. Seems you know what's good for you. It's a good thing you didn’t argue, otherwise I would have killed you. Your heads would have made for great warning decorations to put on the city walls.”

With that, Yang Qi and the rest of the caravan entered the city. As they made their way off, the guards chuckled. “What a bunch of fat sheep waiting to be slaughtered. Should we send people to kill them tonight?”

“Nah,” the captain of the guard said. “They’re from the Sage Ancestor Dynasty, so you never know whether or not they have Legendaries hiding in their ranks. Besides, there’s no open war between our Sky-Heaven Dynasty and the Sage Ancestor Dynasty. Let’s just wait until they start doing business. Then we can go fine them into bankruptcy!”

Thanks to the psychic fluctuations, Yang Qi heard his words.

As for the rest of the members of the caravan, they were already discussing matters amongst themselves.

“Completely disgusting. I can't believe they increased the tax like that. Seems we’re not going to be able to do business here much longer.”

“You're right. Well, things are getting better in the Rich-Lush Continent every day. Just yesterday I heard people saying that the heavenly damage was repaired, which means that no more monsters will be able to get in. Good times are coming for our lands, and the vital energy is stronger than ever. In fact, I bet that's why the Western Continent is clamping down on us.”

Almost immediately, a tone of excitement took over the conversations.

“I wonder who it was that repaired the damage to the heavens.”

“According to the rumors, it was a student from the Demi-Immortal Institute named Yang Qi.”

“How did he do it? Not even the chancellors of the four institutes were able to repair that damage.”

“I heard that he has a backer that’s stronger than a Great Sage.”

“Alright, enough talk,” the leader of the caravan said. “Considering the developments, let’s wrap up our business here and get out of Silvermoon as quickly as possible. Then we can meet up with the other caravans, and also send a report back to Prince Wei.”

‘This caravan reports to Prince Wei?’ Yang Qi thought, surprised. He remembered Prince Wei and had a fairly good impression of him. After all, back in the big martial arts competition, the man had stood up for him against the Crown Prince. And he had even been humiliated in the process.

As the caravan made its way down the broad streets of Silvermoon, the surrounding locals glared at them menacingly.

As far as the people from the Western Continent were concerned, the Rich-Lush Continent was full of barbarians. And the fact that they traded measly demon cores for valuable spirit stones made them profiteers as well, and essentially, deserving to die.

“These people all seem ruthless to the core,” Yang Qi commented quietly.

“They are,” the leader of the caravan replied. “They have the blood of the Demonfolk in them, probably more of it than human blood. You know, a lot of them are demons in human form, or mutants.”

“Sir,” someone called from further up the street, “we’re at Silvermoon’s Municipal Business Pavilion.”

Up ahead was an enormous structure plated entirely with mithril, and filled with all sorts of terrifying spell formations.

Surrounding it was an enormous grand hall that was used specifically for business.

Chapter 259: Let the Slaughter Begin

The Municipal Business Pavilion was the main place to do business in Silvermoon. It consisted of a host of temples, each of which was run by a different business, and focused on different goods and services.

Of course, the most profitable type of business involved trading demon cores with the Rich-Lush Continent.

As soon as Yang Qi entered the pavilion with the rest of the caravan, he saw that the place was already busy. Most of the people present were from the Rich-Lush Continent, who were exchanging their demon cores for spirit stones.

All of a sudden, a booming voice echoed out from further in the pavilion.

“One demon core from a ninth phase demonling for one low-grade spirit stone. That’s the price. Take it or leave it!”

Yang Qi looked over and saw an old man, a Lifeseizer, who had a bag full of demon cores and was negotiating with a seller of spirit stones from the Western Continent. The latter was the one who had just spoken, and he had a snide smile on his face.

“What?” the old man said angrily. “Yesterday a ninth phase demon core was worth a mid-grade spirit stone. How could the price have dropped so dramatically? And that’s on top of the mid-grade spirit stone tax I paid to get in the city! This is exploitation! What's going on here! I'm going to go file a complaint!”

“You old codger!”

SMACK!

The Western Continent merchant viciously slapped the old man across the side of the face, knocking him off of his feet. Then he set about trampling the old man. “Who the hell do you think you are? How dare you try to haggle with me? We set the prices, ya hear!?”

He stomped on the old man over and over again, making it impossible for him to get to his feet. Of course, it was worse considering the merchant was in Quinary Lifeseizing, and the old man was a level or two below him.

The old man screamed, but was unable to extricate himself.

“Dammit!” Just about everyone in the caravan with Yang Qi was bristling with rage, and a few stepped forward to interfere.

Before they could, the leader of the caravan held out his hand to block them. “Keep yourselves in check,” he said quietly. “We can’t cause problems in Silvermoon. If we do, they’ll have the perfect excuse to simply kill us. Let’s just get our business done and then get out of here.”

When the merchant saw that no one dared to interfere, he looked very pleased with himself. Grabbing the old man’s bag of demon cores, he raised his voice and said, “This man violated the rules of Silvermoon by causing a scene in the pavilion. Take him away and lock him up to await a verdict.”

“Yes sir!” the ruthless guards replied, hurrying forward to grab the old man.

Again, no one dared to do anything or speak up.

At this point, the arrogant merchant turned to the caravan and said, “You people are imperial traders from the Sage Ancestor Dynasty, right? Here for large-scale business? Come with me!”

“We’re not going to set up shop here like usual?” the leader asked timidly.

“Large-scale business goes on inside.” The merchant turned and began walking. “Follow me.” The man spoke as if he were issuing orders to servants. However, considering the circumstances, they had no choice but to just follow along with his arrangements. Yang Qi went along, looking around to study the spell formations as he did.

Before long, they were in an area behind the main section of temples.

It was a large square, in which three people sat sipping tea, their eyes glittering. They were Legendaries, natives to the Western Continent, and business administrators in the city. The one on the left was a burly, middle-aged man with swarthy skin and an imperious look.

“Sirs, the imperial traders are here,” said the merchant who had led them here.

“Excellent,” the swarthy man said. “Leave your trade goods here and be off.” With that, he waved his hand dismissively.

“And the spirit stones?” the leader of the caravan asked.

“Spirit stones?” another of the administrators said. “We’re running low on spirit stones, but things should be back to normal in two or three years. Go have the financial affairs officer write you an invoice, and come back then.”

“What?” the leader of the caravan blurted. “Are you serious? We came here to trade for goods, not invoices. If we have to wait three years I’d rather just take my merchandise with me.”

“What did you just say?” the swarthy administrator said. “We said to leave your goods here and then be on your way. Either that, or die!” The man’s wording left little room for negotiation.

“Hold on!” Yang Qi said suddenly. Easing his God-Devil Seal to let out a bit of his Legendary aura, he continued, “First of all, I'm not an imperial trader. Second of all, I have top-rate demon cores, the type that have to be sold individually. But I’ll only take spirit stones up front, not invoices.”

“Oh?” another of the administrators said. “So, you’re a Legendary. Alright, what type of demon cores do you have? I'm sure we can make a deal.”

Yang Qi extended his hand, revealing a glittering demon core that radiated the power of hell.

“Seventh Legendary transformation. A Ghost-God demon core.”

The administrators’ eyes immediately began to shine with greed. One of them said, “Hand that over for inspection. If it's real, we can give you spirit stones for it!”

“Alright,” Yang Qi said, tossing the demon core over. The administrator grabbed it and looked over it closely, whereupon his eyes narrowed. “What gall. This is stolen! It was only recently that a number of items were taken from Lady-Princess Silvermoon’s official residence. One of them was this very demon core. How dare you openly try to sell me— urgh!”

The man suddenly felt a twinge of pain, and looked down to find a spear imbedded into his chest, sucking away his true energy.

Hardly able to believe what he was seeing, he said, “You killed me? How… how dare you!”

“I kill trash like you whenever I feel like it. You Western Continent savages are all the same. Demonfolk one and all. Not even human!”

He twisted the spear, and the administrator exploded into a cloud of blood. Reaching out, Yang Qi took back his demon core.

At first, he had hoped to acquire spirit stones in the proper way, but clearly, these Western Continent savages hated people from the Rich-Lush Continent. Not only did they refuse to hand over the spirit stones, they actually intended to rob them and then kill them to cover up any evidence. Therefore, Yang Qi decided to simply go all in right from the start, and fight fire with fire. In fact, why not pillage all of Silvermoon? Then it would be obvious who was afraid of whom.

‘What? What's happening?’ That’s what everyone in the trade caravan was thinking. At the moment, they just didn’t understand how a powerful Legendary could have been killed so easily.

“An ambush!” the remaining two administrators shouted, activating the spell formations in the courtyard.

Every corner of Silvermoon had spell formations, crafted from mithril and inset with spirit stones. And whoever controlled a spell formation could become ten times as powerful as they actually were.

Unfortunately for these people, they were far too weak to be a match for Yang Qi.

Before they could do anything other than shout about an ambush, they were stabbed through the chest by the Infernal Deity Spear. Then they exploded, and their wealth fell into Yang Qi’s hands.

“You….” the caravan leader said. “You actually killed three high-ranking administrators? They’ll accuse us of treason! The Sky-Heaven Dynasty will put us on their most-wanted list. This could even lead to war between the two continents.”

“If it’s war they want, then it’s war they’ll get,” Yang Qi replied. “Don’t worry. I'm friends with Prince Wei, so I’ll take care of all of you. For now, I'm going to take on Silvermoon, and relieve the city of all its spirit stones.” The Grand Emperor's Pagoda appeared, and Yang Qi put everyone from the caravan inside.

“Y-y-you….” stammered the merchant who had led them into the courtyard. He slowly began to back up.

“You Western Continent hellions are all going to die.” With a glance, Yang Qi unleashed his psychic tempest, and the man exploded.

Then, Yang Qi absorbed the Grand Emperor's Pagoda back into his body, hefted his Infernal Deity Spear, and walked back toward the business pavilion.

BOOM!

The door leading into the pavilion exploded, and the guards looked over to see Yang Qi walking out. “Hey, who are you!? What are you doing?”

Yang Qi stabbed him and hoisted him up into the air, where he then exploded.

“Ambush! Ambush!”

Shouting guards began to rush over, but all Yang Qi did was look at them, and they burst into flames and transformed into ash.

“Dammit! Who dares to cause trouble in Silvermoon's Municipal Business Pavilion?” someone shouted. Suddenly, the entire pavilion trembled as a huge hand of true energy appeared and shot toward Yang Qi.

“Utterly useless,” Yang Qi muttered. In response to his words, the hand shattered. Then, he hurled his spear out into the air. Whack! A certain area of the air exploded, and an old man tumbled out, blood spraying everywhere.

“That was the guardian of the Municipal Business Pavilion, a Personal-Domain Legendary! He’s in charge of watching over all the spirit stones, and now, he's dead? Just like that?”

“Just who exactly are you? I can’t believe you’re causing trouble right here. Are you tired of living?”

“What? What just happened? What’s going on?”

“Such explosive vital energy of heaven and earth!”

The fluctuations immediately attracted the attention of many top experts in the area. Some of them were merchants and some were just city-dwellers, but all of them began to head toward the source of the commotion.

“Someone’s attacking the treasure stores and stealing the spirit stones!”

“That level of power is incredible.”

As it turned out, Yang Qi was already in the treasure stores of the pavilion, taking all of the spirit stones.

The storehouse was locked up tight, but all he did was smash his way in. Afterward, he found himself in a massive dimension filled with mountains of spirit stones.

Chapter 260: Crashing the Party

Silvermoon was a prosperous and affluent city that did so much business on a yearly basis it was almost impossible to quantify. Trade wasn’t just limited to demon cores. Treasures, weapons, and tools of all sorts changed hands on a daily basis.

Of course, the currency was spirit stones, just like it was everywhere else in the Western Continent.

As soon as Yang Qi entered the treasure storehouse, he saw an immense amount of wealth, more spirit stones than he had ever seen in his entire life. It was such a hoard that his eyes immediately went wide.

There were mountains of spirit stones of varying qualities, so much so that the entire area seemed to be filled with solid spirit energy. Of course, considering he was an intruder, countless warding magics immediately flared to life, sending numerous beams of deadly light flying in his direction.

“Be destroyed!” he shouted, launching his palm out in front of him. Instantly, the beams of light shattered, and the spell formations and warding magics in the area were destroyed.

All it took was a single move on his part.

He now had the power of two hundred thousand ancient megamammoths, making him roughly as strong as someone in the eighth Legendary transformation, an Astral-Star Legendary. In fact, in terms of raw strength, even an expert in the ninth Legendary transformation might have trouble dealing with him.

However, all other factors taken into consideration, he would still be killed in a fight like that.

Thankfully, he had his Grand Emperor's Pagoda, and the emperor embryo inside, which could unleash unimaginable force. In fact, in terms of what exact level of battle prowess he could achieve, the only way to find out would be to get in an actual fight.

‘So many spirit stones. Those are… royal-grade. And those. Imperial-grade….’

After destroying the spell formations, Yang Qi started clearing out the storehouse, including everything from low-grade spirit stones to imperial-grade. Unfortunately, there were no sovereign-grade stones present.

That point left him feeling a bit disappointed, considering that the spirit power they contained was the most suitable for his cultivation.

Even still, imperial-grade stones would also work.

As for the royal- and supreme-grade spirit stones, they were essentially useless to him other than as fuel for spell formations. They would be helpful to the Yang Clan, though. At the very least, Yang Zhan could use the royal-grade spirit stones to achieve another cultivation base breakthrough. After all, every single one of Young Master Shroud-Heaven’s spirit stones had been used in the incident with the Planar Pearl.

The might of the Grand Emperor's Pagoda spread out into the storehouse, grabbed all of the spirit stones, and sucked them inside. As for the imperial-grade stones, he sent them directly into the Hellfire Crucible to become power to work with the asura’s flesh and blood, as well as to bolster his Sovereign Lord True Energy and universal power.

Yang Qi also sent the corpse of the Personal-Domain Legendary guard he had killed into the crucible as well, after which a demon core popped out. A Personal-Domain demon core.

‘So, it turns out these Western Continent savages really do have the blood of the Demonfolk in them.’

Of course, the people of the Western Continent wanted to separate themselves from demon cores, therefore, they called them by a different name: internal pellets.

“What gall! Who is it that has dared to break the laws of Silvermoon, ransack the Municipal Business Pavilion, and plunder the treasure stores? Whoever it is, kill him! Attack!”

It was only at this point that the experts of Silvermoon finally arrived.

Silvermoon was a very large and important coastal trade city, and overseen by the Sky-Heaven Dynasty. Obviously, Yang Qi’s actions would not be ignored. As the experts converged on the business pavilion, numerous spell formations throughout the city were activating, locking down the entire area.

“Ambush! Ambush!” cried the soldiers.

“Citizens of Silvermoon, do not panic. Stay where you are and remain calm. Anyone who causes a scene will be killed immediately.”

Ding dong. Ding dong….

The tolling of bells could be heard, their source being a silver castle in the middle of the city, the highest tower of which was emblazoned with a crescent moon sigil. It was the city magistrate’s mansion.

Along with the tolling of bells, clouds spilled out of the tower to cover the city, almost like rivers of mercury flowing to and fro. The city walls and the streets were bathed in silver light, seeming to indicate that the city was under complete lockdown. In fact, the light caused everyone in the city to physically slow down as the true energy inside of them was influenced by the spell formations.

Silvermoon was clearly a very powerful city, far beyond a place like Mongoltar. And of course, Yanhaven was like nothing compared to it.

Back in the Rich-Lush Continent, only the Sage Ancestor Dynasty’s Capital City could possibly compare in terms of raw power and spell formations. As Yang Qi flew up into the air, he saw the mercurial clouds flowing out to cover the area.

The city itself covered an area of roughly fifty kilometers, and actually formed an enormous spell formation. The foundations of the city were made from mithril, refined gold, godjade, spirit stones and smaller spell formations. When the entire city was activated as a spell formation, it was essentially a huge weapon. A magical treasure.

‘What an amazing city!’ Yang Qi thought. ‘I wonder how many years it took to construct it. Considering all the mithril, it must have taken years and years. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a magical treasure as big as this.’

He could only sigh in admiration at the work that must have been involved.

As soon as he was out in the open, the spell formation and the mercurial clouds instantly caused him to slow down.

Then, several beams of deadly light slammed into him. At the same time, voices rang out which clearly belonged to ancient energy arts experts.

“Nine Yin Palm!”

“Fire Dragon Energy Art!”

“Devour Souls, Assault Heaven!”

“Invincible Lightning Blitz!”

“Unending Jadefall!”

Five unique imperial-class energy arts had been unleashed by five experts of Silvermoon, each energy art shocking to the extreme.

Down below, the people of the city reacted with shock.

“The Five War Gods of Silvermoon are in action? They’re the five strongest subordinates of Lady-Princess Silvermoon. Whoever has been causing trouble is going to be killed beyond the shadow of a doubt. How many times throughout the years have things like this happened? I think the last time was a few hundred years ago, before all the spell formations were complete. Nowadays, Silvermoon gets stronger with each day that passes!”

“Who is that? He doesn’t look like someone from the Western Continent. He’s from the Rich-Lush Continent!”

"Those damned Rich-Lush Continent bastards! I can’t believe one of them dared to cause trouble in Silvermoon. Kill him! Slaughter all of the barbarian bastards!”

“Kill them all and mount their heads on spikes on the wall!”

“Invade the Rich-Lush Continent! Kill everyone there! They should die down to the last one. How dare they extort spirit stones out of us with their demon cores. Kill them!”

Every single native in Silvermoon was angrily shouting the same sort of thing as they watched the fighting up above. And throughout the city, people from the Rich-Lush Continent were being seized.

‘These people from the Western Continent really hate us,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘People with the blood of the Demonfolk are clearly rotten to the core. Different from us on a fundamental level.’ The five energy arts attacks didn’t hurt him at all, and he quickly negated them.

Looking around calmly, he saw five figures blurring toward him from the city center. They came to a stop some distance away from him, keeping him surrounded.

These were top experts from Silvermoon, who were called the War Gods. Three of them were Personal-Domain Legendaries, and two were in the seventh transformation, making them invincible Ghost-God Legendaries.

All of them wore dazzling suits of armor, and had halos that made them seem like gods from heaven descended into the mortal world.

One of the War Gods stepped forward and said, “Who are you? You’re from the Rich-Lush Continent? Why are you causing trouble in Silvermoon? You can’t escape. With Silvermoon’s spell formations activated, no one can leave the city.”

“Yeah right!” Yang Qi suddenly vanished without a trace, then reappeared behind the War God, where he unleashed a palm strike.

Spinning, the War God smiled viciously. “I'm invincible in Silvermoon. And the spell formation gives me access to unlimited power. Prepare to die….” He immediately thrust out his own palm to meet Yang Qi’s.

Almost immediately, his vicious grin turned into an expression of terror. Then, everyone down below in the city watched as he began to inflate like a balloon, until he simply exploded.

He never even had a chance to scream before he perished.

After a moment, one of the Ghost-God Legendaries shouted, “Retreat! Hurry!”

Backing up, he summoned his personal domain, which looked like a rolling river and a huge mountain, and sent it rumbling toward Yang Qi.

Before it could arrive, Yang Qi vanished again.

Then, blood erupted into the air as the Ghost-God Legendary’s head flew off his shoulders, severed by Yang Qi’s spear.

Everyone in Silvermoon felt like they had descended into a nightmare.

“Tremble, all of you!” Yang Qi shouted. “You Western Continent people want to invade the Rich-Lush Continent? What a joke! Henceforth, any city here that dares to talk of harming my continent will be wiped off the map. And I'm going to start with Silvermoon. After today, there will be no Silvermoon in the Western Continent. Let it serve as a warning to all the other savages here!”

Without any warning, his spear transformed into millions upon millions of projections which shot toward the three remaining War Gods.

Not even their personal domains could protect them. All they could do was die.

Chapter 261: Lady-Princess Silvermoon

Before Yang Qi’s spear attacks could land on the three War Gods, a stream of immense power shot out from the depths of Silvermoon. Silver light flared as a moon appeared above the city, out of which stepped a woman.

“For killing my generals, mortal, you deserve to die….”

She radiated a field of power that immediately locked onto the trajectories of the three spear strikes, and neutralized them.

The three War Gods had been saved.

Yang Qi rested his spear at his side and looked over at the woman, who was obviously the magistrate of the city. She was a member of the imperial family of the Sky-Heaven Dynasty, Lady-Princess Silvermoon, widely regarded as a powerful expert of energy arts.

The power of the stars seemed to descend from the sky, blessing her, and giving her the most holy of auras. At the same time, there was something about her that made it seem like she could never die; from the fluctuations which rolled off of her, it was possible to tell that she was somewhere between the eighth and the ninth Legendary transformations.

“So, she's in the Eighth Legendary transformation, making her an Astral-Star Legendary. However, she’s being boosted by countless spell formations, making her no weaker than a Never-Dying Legendary.”

Yang Qi had killed entities of this level in his time in the hell monsoon. For example, the bronzeblaze fiend-devils. Therefore, he was relatively familiar with the auras involved.

Despite being only in the second transformation himself, he didn’t fear this level of power.

That said, the defensive mechanisms in Silvermoon were nothing to take lightly, and the spell formations were deadly to say the least. Worse, the vital energy of the Western Continent wanted to expel the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, making it much more difficult for him to use it. Obviously, he had to be much more careful than when he was in the Rich-Lush Continent.

“Who are you?” she asked, her expression frosty. “Rich-Lush Continent scum? Anyone who invades my precious Silvermoon will pay the price in the form of rivers of blood. Aren’t you afraid?”

The fact that two of her War Gods had been killed was infuriating. They were key subordinates of hers, similar to holy neophytes back in the Demi-Immortal Institute.

“The Rich-Lush Continent and the Western Continent have done business with each other for a long time,” Yang Qi said. “Both sides have benefited greatly. What gives you the right to unilaterally change the terms of business? Worse, you slander people, steal their demon cores, and even randomly arrest them. Why?”

“Listen, peasant. Everyone from the Rich-Lush Continent is scum, and should be slaves of the Western Continent. The fact that you use those despicable demon cores to take our precious spirit stones is a mockery. Your bloodlines are impure, and you’re all despicable, natural-born slaves. We people from the Western Continent have the purest of blood, and are destined to rule you. One of these days, the Rich-Lush Continent will bow to our leadership, and you mortals will tremble in fear!”

“Unless I'm misunderstanding the situation, you people are the ones with impure blood. You’re all part Demonfolk! You've been ruled by the Hanging Mountain for who knows how long. You’re not even human anymore. You’re half-human, half-demon freaks!”

Even as the words left his mouth, Yang Qi remembered that his mother was a holy daughter from the Hanging Mountain, and that he had probably been born with Demonfolk blood in him. Of course, his blood had transformed since then. With Sovereign Lord True Energy and universal power, it had become the thing of god-spirits. Actually, his blood surpassed that of the legion of gods. He had the aura of the Sovereign Lord!

“Half-human, half-demon freaks…?” Lady-Princess Silvermoon’s silver eyes burned as if with the light of the stars above. “Mortal, you have profaned the noble blood of the people of the Western Continent, and the dignity of the Sky-Heaven Dynasty. You won’t be the only one to die today. Everyone from the Rich-Lush Continent in Silvermoon will be executed!”

“How impudent!” Yang Qi growled. “Not interested in living? Alright. We’ll see who ends up dead.”

The Nightfall Symphony erupted as his spear sped forth, following a profound and mysterious trajectory as it shot toward Lady-Princess Silvermoon.

Apparently, she had just been waiting for him to attack.

“Heavenly Wolf Sage Magic!” she said. An enormous star appeared above her head, fiendish to the extreme, and pulsing with demonic power of the fiendish Heavenly Wolf star.

Clearly, Lady-Princess Silvermoon had taken the ancient Heavenly Wolf Star as her animadestiny star, and used it to cultivate a sage magic. Upon using that magic, she could draw on the fiendish power of that fabled star. It wasn’t something to do with demons or wretches, but rather, pure power of heaven and earth. Normally speaking, this level of fiendish power would instantly destroy the will of anyone it assaulted.

Suddenly, a scepter appeared in her hands, atop which could be seen a crescent moon. On the other end, at the bottom of the scepter, was an enormous heavenly wolf, howling to the moon.

It was her Heavenly Wolf Consumes the Moon Scepter.

It was actually a powerful divine weapon and magical treasure, which she could use in countless ways. For one thing, it contained a dimension filled with spell formations, which she drew upon now to cause concentric rings of light to spread out and block Yang Qi’s Infernal Deity Spear.

“Heavenly Wolf Devours the Moon!”

She twisted the scepter, and a massive stream of glittering starlight shot out, swirling around her, bolstering her until her true energy itself took the shape of an enormous, silver wolf, which lunged at Yang Qi.

Yang Qi didn’t even move. Behind him, his true energy took the form of an entity with an elephantine head and a human body. At the same time, ancient power descended, the glory of the Sovereign Lord, which easily crushed the silver light.

“Despicable heavenly wolf….” a voice said in Godtongue. The being with the elephantine head and a human body twitched its trunk, and the heavenly wolf shattered, becoming countless fragments of silver light.

Backed by the power of two hundred thousand megamammoths, Yang Qi took a step forward and stabbed out with his spear.

“I'm halfway into the Never-Dying level!” Lady-Princess Silvermoon said. “I'm one with the ancient city of Silvermoon. I'm connected to heaven and earth!” Eyes brimming with malice, she threw her hands over her head, using her scepter to summon numerous paper talismans. Some were hexagramic star charts, pentagramic star charts, others resembled the Nine Stars Pearl Necklaces….

At the same time, corresponding spell formations activated within Silvermoon, causing Lady-Princess Silvermoon’s power to spike instantly. In the blink of an eye, she reached her absolute peak state.

The silver heavenly wolf appeared again, along with a silver moon hanging high above her, looking almost like a sword preparing to chop down and execute judgement.

“Attack!”

Her scepter was now fully ten times as strong as it was before, and she didn’t hesitate to thrust it in front of her to meet Yang Qi’s spear.

When the two weapons met, it was like a comet slamming into the ground. Numerous streets in Silvermoon were ripped to shreds, and countless spell formations were destroyed.

The streets of the city were paved with mithril, and contained powerful defensive spell formations that not even Legendaries should have been able to harm, but Yang Qi’s attacks were like the footsteps of megamammoths, and the vibrations they caused were more than enough to destroy the tiles that covered the ground.

The Infernal Deity Spear was backed by the power of hell, and was so shockingly strong that the spell formations in the city were like nothing.

Each sweep of the spear would cast light filled with images of hell. The Hell of Euphoria, the Hell of Suras, the Hell of Never-Ending, the Hell of Mud Pits, the Hell of Frigid Ice, the Hell of Melting Iron….

The various hells superimposed and created a domineering, destructive power that could transform the living world into a burning underworld. Virtually all living beings who encountered power like this would have no other choice than to acknowledge allegiance to it.

This was Yang Qi’s first time since his recent major breakthrough to unleash the full extent of his power. Backing his spear technique with the power of two hundred thousand megamammoths, it radiated the glow of numerous hells, and although it was somewhat heavy and slow, it was immensely powerful. It brought with it darkness that could extinguish all nearby radiance and light, and create pure devilishness, the most divisive power in the universe.

BOOOOM!

The spear fairly thrummed with power as it slammed into the scepter.

Lady-Princess Silvermoon screamed as her weapon was wrenched from her hand. Backing away, her eyes shone with terror as she realized that she had been bested. There was no way she could stand up to an attack backed by the power of hell. Every swish of the Infernal Deity Spear made her feel like she was in hell itself, with her soul facing nothing but endless despair.

It was like she was fighting a god-spirit, someone who would tolerate no blasphemy, and would instantly cast offenders into hell to be tormented.

“You're mine,” Yang Qi said. Suddenly, the Grand Emperor's Pagoda appeared, and descended onto Lady-Princess Silvermoon, accompanied by thunderous rumbling sounds.

“He captured Lady-Princess Silvermoon!”

“It's the end of the world! What’s going on here? Run. RUN!”

“Dammit, how could this be happening? Lady-Princess Silvermoon is like a god! How could she have been captured? Not even the city’s spell formations could save her. What’s happening? Is this guy a Never-Dying Legendary? Or a Half Sage?”

“This is bad. We’re trapped! That damned Rich-Lush Continent scum has locked down the city!”

“Fight him to the death!”

A few of the braver experts in the city shot up into the air to try to fight Yang Qi.

And yet, before they could even reach him, they collapsed into ash.

At this point, Yang Qi pronounced judgment, his voice echoing out into the ears of all the locals in Silvermoon. “Silvermoon, I hereby sentence you to death.”

RUMBLE!

Chapter 262: Taking the City

Yang Qi dominated Lady-Princess Silvermoon, and used the Grand Emperor's Pagoda to completely overwhelm the vital energy of the city itself.

He wanted to refine the entire city, by placing the thing inside the Grand Emperor's Pagoda.

The remaining three War Gods were incapable of escaping, and were also sucked inside. Yang Qi didn't kill them. Instead, he would imprison them and save them for later use. It was the same with Lady-Princess Silvermoon, whom he could theoretically sell back to the Sky-Heaven Dynasty for a hefty ransom, as well as all of the citizens of the city.

Raging sagefire swept through every house, street, and corner of Silvermoon, subjugating all of the spell formations, and leaving Yang Qi’s mark on them.

Then, the fire continued into the foundations of the city, where countless precious materials of heaven and earth lurked. In the blink of an eye, that treasure was snatched up and pulled into Yang Qi’s pagoda. Some such treasures were protected by the powerful will of Lady-Princess Silvermoon, but Yang Qi didn't care. He simply destroyed such defenses and took what he wanted.

Meanwhile, he sent his own will into the core of the city magistrate’s mansion, where he discovered a private chamber constructed from spirit stones, which was none other than Lady-Princess Silvermoon’s lair.

‘Ah, finally, some sovereign-grade spirit stones.’

They were inset into a magical altar constructed in Lady-Princess Silvermoon’s chamber, thousands of them. There was also one particular spirit stone, the same size as the others, but filled with boundless amounts of radiance and spirit energy.

‘A sagely-grade spirit stone!’

Yang Qi couldn’t have been more delighted.

Countless individuals could only dream of seeing a spirit stone like this, which was something that Great Sages of past times would use in their cultivation. It contained a universal power that surpassed anything else in existence, and was far, far beyond the compare of sovereign-grade stones. They were precious beyond measure, to the point where modern-day Great Sages would fight to the death over them.

This was surely one of Lady-Princess Silvermoon’s most valuable treasures; furthermore, it seemed to be what she had intended to use to break into the ninth Legendary transformation.

After all, she was only half a step into that level, not a true Never-Dying Legendary. Otherwise, she would not have been so easily decimated by Yang Qi in their encounter.

‘I'm so lucky! If I can absorb the power in this altar, I’ll definitely have what it takes to reach a total of three hundred thousand megamammoths, and pierce the void. As a Space-Void Legendary, I’ll definitely be strong enough to kill the Crown Prince.’ As of this moment, Yang Qi knew that this trip to the Western Continent had been worth it. Although he had caused a huge scene, if he could reach the Space-Void Transformation, he should be able to find a suitable hiding place that could keep him safe even from Great Sages.

“Come here!”

With the wave of a hand, he ripped up the altar, plus all the other treasures and spirit stones, and tossed them into the Grand Emperor's Pagoda. In addition to the sovereign-grade spirit stones inset into the altar, there were also Astral-Star-level demon cores, and even a few from Never-Dying demonlings. They were formed into a Nine Stars Pearl Necklace, something that inherently resembled a constellation, and that could provide enlightenment in the dao of heaven.

This was obviously Lady-Princess Silvermoon’s top treasure.

RUUUUMBLE….

Suddenly, the Grand Emperor's Pagoda sent out boundless, godly might, causing a huge, fifty-kilometer black hole to spring into existence.

‘The power to move mountains and fill in seas,’ Yang Qi murmured to himself. Suddenly, a god-spirit with an elephantine head and a human body appeared, and the swish of its trunk caused all of Silvermoon to be surrounded with pulsing true energy.

The ground quaked as massive crevices opened up everywhere, and the cityfolk looked on in shock as Silvermoon began to rise up from the ground, lifted by some immense power.

What type of shocking godpower was this? It was definitely not the power of humans.

Slowly but surely, the city of mithril that was Silvermoon rose into the air, and was sucked into the Grand Emperor's Pagoda.

Even its foundations were ripped up and taken away. People looking on from a distance watched as the mithril city vanished, leaving behind nothing but a gaping crater.

An entire city, filled with incalculable wealth, one of the most important trade hubs in the Western Continent, had been literally taken away.

The culprit had not gone on a killing spree, or robbed the people of the city in general. He had simply used incomprehensible levels of power to simply take the place for his own. Everyone who saw it happen was gobsmacked. There were a few people who were so stunned they ended up falling into the crevices that had opened up in the ground, however, being energy artists, they were able to fly back out again.

After Silvermoon disappeared into the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, the pagoda shrank down, then shot into the sea of clouds, where it disappeared.

The city was gone, and everyone from the Rich-Lush Continent had been taken away with it as well. The only people left behind were the natives from the Western Continent.

“What an astonishing nightmare! Quick, send word to the Sky-Heaven Dynasty. This is huge! It could lead to a revolution!”

“Silvermoon vanished? What do we do? What do we do?! Are those damned barbarians from the Rich-Lush Continent actually starting an invasion? We have to get revenge!”

“Vengeance! From here on out, we have to kill anyone we see from the Rich-Lush Continent. It doesn’t matter if they're men or women, old or young!”

News immediately began to spread through the continent, prompting many people to fly over to see for themselves the spot that Silvermoon had once occupied.

Of course, the Sky-Heaven Dynasty ruled over the entire continent, and Silvermoon had been a location of important strategic value. The fact that someone had literally taken the city away was shocking to the extreme. It hardly took any time at all for all of the dynasty’s capital city to be shaken to the core.

The entire continent was abuzz.

However, the culprit, Yang Qi, was nowhere to be seen.

The truth was that he was somewhere else deeper in the Western Continent, far from the original location of the coastal Silvermoon. Right now, his main priority was to stay hidden and break through to the Space-Void Transformation. Afterward, perhaps he would sow some more chaos.

He had not come to these lands with the goal of causing such pandemonium. He had gone in good faith to trade demon cores for spirit stones, only to be bamboozled. Not only did they demand he hand over his goods in exchange for an IOU, they then tried to imprison him. That wasn’t trade, that was highway robbery. Therefore, he would treat them the same way they had treated him, and cause more problems than they could ever have guessed were possible.

Thankfully, he ended up benefiting more than he had ever thought he would. With Lady-Princess Silvermoon’s altar, something designed specifically to reach the Never-Dying Transformation, it was all worth it.

Thankfully, he could hide using his Devil-God Seal, which would make it easier to fish a needle from the sea than to find him. Obviously, returning to the Rich-Lush Continent right now wouldn’t be a good option, considering that it would be much easier for people to find him out in the open. And that would be dangerous.

Eventually, he found himself on a wide, desolate plain in the middle of the continent, where he entered an abandoned mine, the perfect place to secretly work on his cultivation.

There were many such mines in the Western Continent, places that had been mostly ignored ever since they ran dry. Occasionally, mortal citizens would enter such places in the hopes of finding precious metals or gems, but that was all.

Using the powers of the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, he burrowed deep into the earth, where he hewed out a small cave which he protected with various sealing marks.

After all, if he drew too deeply on the surrounding vital energy, it was highly likely that other energy arts experts would notice.

In one of the dimensions inside the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, a large group of people from the Rich-Lush Continent were huddled together in terror. These were the people that Yang Qi had collected from the vicinity of Silvermoon. There were no Legendaries in the group, only Lifeseizers. Generally speaking, Legendaries who came to the Western Continent would handle affairs on their own. They were considered very important individuals. Because of that, Lifeseizers generally had to stick together, for their own protection.

Among the group present was the imperial trading caravan.

After gathering his senses, the leader of the caravan looked around.

“Brother,” he cried out into the pagoda, “who exactly are you? And what are you doing?”

A whooshing sound could be heard, and Yang Qi appeared. “There’s no need for panic. I saved you all. If I hadn’t brought you here, the enraged locals would definitely have killed you. My name is Yang Qi, holy neophyte from the Demi-Immortal Institute. Presumably you’ve heard of me before?”

At first the leader of the caravan looked shocked, but then, his expression turned into one of delight. “Yang Qi? You're Yang Qi!? You’re the one who fixed the Planar Pearl and saved the entire Rich-Lush Continent?”

Chapter 263: Sagely-Grade Spirit Stone

Many powerful groups were aware of the recent developments in the Demi-Immortal Institute, and it was only natural that an imperial trading caravan would be no exception.

Even the most inferior of groups that came to do business in the Western Continent were people from rich and powerful clans. Other than such groups, who could possibly arrange for passage through the dimensional barrier?

People like that would obviously be informed about the situation in the Demi-Immortal Institute, and would also be privy to other rumors and clues that ordinary people might not. How could they not have heard of Yang Qi, who had won the Inter-Institutional Martial Arts Competition, and then defied the Crown Prince?

Of course, the fact that he had repaired the damage to heaven trumped everything else. To many people, he was the ultimate hero, a mysterious and enigmatic figure who existed far above ordinary people.

Even more telling, everyone was saying that he had succeeded in repairing heaven because he was backed by an all-powerful, mysterious figure, someone beyond the Great Sage level. Obviously, that person had to be in the Demi-Immortal level, someone strong enough to destroy the cosmos and eradicate all the lands.

In the beginning, a lot of people had believed that Yang Qi was overestimating himself to believe that he could defy the Crown Prince. To them, he had been like a moth challenging a raging fire. But after what had played out, most people had changed their minds. In fact, many members of the Crown Prince Society had even gone into hiding.

Many people now thought that the Crown Prince was the one in great danger.

Even if the Crown Prince reached the Great Sage level, he wouldn’t be able to fight against someone powerful enough to repair damage done to heaven.

Because of all those things, when the people present learned that they were dealing with Yang Qi, they started to get excited. He was like a hero from an epic poetic saga.

“You’re the holy neophyte Yang Qi?” the leader of the caravan said. “Sir, just how powerful are your energy arts? They seem terrifying. Back during the martial arts competition, weren’t you just a Lifeseizer? Now that I think about it, Lady-Princess Silvermoon is an Astral-Star Legendary, just on the verge of reaching the Never-Dying Transformation. With the power of Silvermoon at her disposal, she could easily crush Never-Dying Legendaries! But you not only defeated her, you took her city! Doesn’t that indicate that you could defeat a Never-Dying Legendary?”

Everyone in the Grand Emperor's Pagoda began to discuss the matter.

“What?”

“He was only recently in the Lifeseizing level, but now he can actually defeat someone in the Astral-Star Transformation? Those two levels are miles apart! One’s like an ant, the other’s like a dragon. For an ant to become a dragon almost overnight definitely requires the backing of someone stronger than a Great Sage. No one would believe any other explanation.”

“In other words, Yang Qi is already strong enough to beat the Crown Prince?”

“I’d say it’s eighty to ninety percent likely.”

From the awe in their eyes as they looked at Yang Qi, it was obvious they believed him to be a very important person. Two years ago, if Yang Qi had encountered any of these people, they would have been the important people to him.

“Brother Yang Qi,” the leader said, “I am your humble servant Sage Greatmaster, an imperial clansman of the Sage Ancestor Dynasty, the thirty-second son of Vice Prince Mightyplexus. I'm completely in your debt now, so once I'm back in Capital City, I’ll do everything I can to pay you back. In fact, I know that you have several sworn brothers in Capital City, people from very powerful clans, so I’ll definitely reach out to them to offer thanks.”

All true members of the Sage Ancestor Dynasty were surnamed Sage, a name that had been bestowed by the original emperor on his descendants, and a name that no one else in the continent was allowed to use. As it turned out, the leader of the trade caravan was an imperial clansman, which meant that he actually ranked quite highly. Considering that, it made sense for Yang Qi to make use of him.

“Ladies and gentlemen,” Yang Qi said loudly, “please get some rest here in the Grand Emperor's Pagoda. After I fully subdue Lady-Princess Silvermoon, and perfect a consummate energy art that I've been working on, I’ll make contact with Prince Wei and make sure you all get back to the Rich-Lush Continent.”

Sage Greatmaster nodded his head and said, “Of course, Brother Yang Qi, please go ahead to handle whatever business you have.”

Then he looked back at the rest of the people and said, “Calm down, everyone. We're safe here in the Grand Emperor's Pagoda. It’s a treasure forged by Grand Emperor Rich-Lush himself, and is powerful enough to control the entire plane we come from.”

In response, the crowd quieted, and watched as Yang Qi nodded and vanished from the place.

In another dimension in the pagoda, Yang Qi materialized, then looked up at a gigantic, silver city floating in the air, completely locked down with sealing marks. Underneath the city, four individuals were chained up and immobile. One of them was the powerful Lady-Princess Silvermoon, and the others were her three War Gods.

“Hello there, Lady-Princess Silvermoon,” he said, looking down at her. “So, how are you feeling now? You said people from the Rich-Lush Continent are all scum, and now here you are, captured and your city taken away. Anything you’d like to say?”

“You’re dead, scum! The Great Sages of the Sky-Heaven Dynasty will hunt you to the ends of the earth if they have to. Nobody can save you now.” She had regained her scepter, and still had a few talismans left, which were organized into the shape of a huge white lotus, ensuring that she was safe from any harm.

However, the spiderweb-like network of chains locking her in place made it so that she couldn’t do anything.

Her War God subordinates had no such protection, and thus, the chains stabbed into them and slowly drained their true energy. None of them were strong enough to actually fight back.

The white lotus protecting Lady-Princess Silvermoon wasn't something of her own creation, but rather, the work of a Great Sage. It was specifically designed to protect against all sorts of harmful magics, and was the only reason she was currently beyond harm.

“I'm dead?” Yang Qi laughed coldly. “Presumably you’ve heard that the Rich-Lush Continent’s heaven has been repaired, and the hell monsoons blocked. Wormholes created by ancient Great Sages have opened up, allowing all sorts of universal power to flow into the continent. In the following centuries, the continent will truly become rich and lush, and your Western Continent will count for nothing compared to it.”

“You!” Lady-Princess Silvermoon blurted. “Why are you bringing this up? Wait. Don’t tell me….”

“Yes. I'm the person who repaired heaven. And my backer isn't some Great Sage. You think that the Western Continent can do a thing to me? If you do, you’re delusional!”

BOOOOM!RUUUUMBLE!

His true energy erupted forth, smashing into the white lotus, which trembled violently, causing Lady-Princess Silvermoon’s face to turn ashen.

“You’re Yang Qi? The same person everyone is talking about, whose backer is an invincible Demi-Immortal expert?” Lady-Princess Silvermoon’s heart was already pounding with fear. After all, stories about Yang Qi had already begun to spread in the Western Continent, and as a high-ranking member of the ruling class, she knew more about the matter than most.

Obviously, the Western Continent had agents in the Rich-Lush Continent.

They knew all of the most important pieces of information, including that Yang Qi had the Grand Emperor's Pagoda.

Now that Lady-Princess Silvermoon was convinced of who Yang Qi was, she was even more scared, considering the rumors about his backer. Other than a Demi-Immortal, who could possibly have repaired the damage to heaven, stopped the hell monsoons, and saved the despairing sage spirits? A person like that was strong enough to actually destroy the Western Continent.

“What do you want? Even if you do have a Demi-Immortal backer, now that you’re here in the Western Continent, a person like that would still be subject to the magical laws here. He would be rejected by heaven and earth and….” Lady-Princess Silvermoon started out speaking with confidence, but slowly, her voice grew softer until she simply stopped talking.

“I'm not interested in hearing blabbering from you, Lady-Princess Silvermoon,” Yang Qi said. “I’ll give you two options. One: destroy those talismans and let me seal you. Work for me, and I’ll spare your life. Option two: die! I'd prefer you not force me to use the truly terrifying power I have access to.”

“You!” Although Lady-Princess Silvermoon’s face fell because of Yang Qi’s threats, in the end, it seemed she wasn’t afraid of dying. “This is a Sky-Heaven Godcharm, crafted by Grand Empress Sky-Heaven. Back when she fought with Grand Emperor Rich-Lush, neither of them could gain the upper hand. You really think you can get past something like that?”

Although the Western Continent was currently a subordinate to the Hanging Mountain, its founder, Grand Empress Sky-Heaven, had been full-blooded Demonfolk. In fact, she had ranked high in the Hanging Mountain.

Years ago, she had waged war with Grand Emperor Rich-Lush, until they finally reached a peace agreement. But now, both leaders were gone, moved on to higher planes of existence.

It was true that it would take a lot of effort for Yang Qi to unravel the Sky-Heaven Godcharm, which in turn meant that directly threatening Lady-Princess Silvermoon wasn’t really an option.

However, there was another factor that Lady-Princess Silvermoon hadn’t considered.

“You’re really not afraid of the power of my Demi-Immortal backer?” Yang Qi said, his eyes glittering. “Make no mistake, Lady-Princess Silvermoon, you have two things working in your advantage. One, you’re a woman. Two, you’re valuable. Any other person in your position would be dead already.”

“Hmph! You can use Demi-Immortal power? If so, let’s see it!” According to the old saying, a dead pig doesn't fear scalding water, and in this moment, neither did Lady-Princess Silvermoon fear any threats from Yang Qi.

“Fine! I’ll show you how strong I am! Altar, come forth!” He waved his hand, and Lady-Princess Silvermoon’s own altar flew out and landed on the ground, its sagely-grade spirit stone emanating the most holy of auras.

Chapter 264: Filling Up with True Energy

At the moment, there was nothing Yang Qi could do to Lady-Princess Silvermoon.

She had a godly talisman created by Grand Empress Sky-Heaven, which could not be used as a weapon, but was far too powerful for him to break through. Not even the Grand Emperor's Pagoda could reach her, making Yang Qi almost like the dog trying to bite the hedgehog.

But Yang Qi had an idea, that being to use the sagely-grade spirit stone on the altar to fill up his true energy.

His sea of energy had the capacity for the power of three hundred thousand ancient megamammoths, but at the moment, was capped at two hundred thousand. He needed a huge amount of power converted into Sovereign Lord True Energy and universal power, to fill his true energy to the point he needed.

And now, that was a simple task.

Besides, he had plenty of other marvelous treasures from Silvermoon to help.

If he succeeded, he wouldn’t just have a lot of true energy, he would be a Space-Void Legendary, which was nothing to take lightly.

Once he broke through, and could shatter the fetters of space and the void, he would definitely be strong enough to fight the Crown Prince, and most likely, kill him. After all, if he waited too long, the Crown Prince would become a Great Sage, and he would lose any advantage.

Even Never-Dying Legendaries were as vastly separated from Great Sages as heaven was from the earth.

In primeval times, Legendaries were known as energy warriors, but Great Sages were known as saints, the type of people who could save all humanity, and exorcise evil. They were looked up to by all creation.

Energy warriors were the servants, and saints were the generals.

“Lady-Princess Silvermoon, you created this altar to help you reach the ninth Legendary transformation, didn’t you?” The altar not only had a sagely-grade spirit stone, it had a Never-Dying demon core as part of the Nine Stars Pearl Necklace, as well as nine hundred and ninety-nine sovereign-grade spirit stones arranged into a spell formation.

The altar was pure white, almost as if it had been crafted from the bones of some powerful and holy creature. There was something mighty and godly about it, and something immensely powerful.

Yang Qi touched the altar, and even sent some true energy in to examine it. When he did, he suddenly found himself thinking of an enormous divine dragon with pure white scales, flying through the clouds, causing rain to fall.

‘It’s made from dragon bone!’

When Lady-Princess Silvermoon saw that Yang Qi had her altar, it looked like she might spit fire out of rage, or perhaps leap out and try to rip his throat open with her teeth.

“Dammit! I made that altar from the bones of a primeval white dragon, and the demon cores of nine powerful dragonlings! I spent blood, sweat, and tears to make it! Do you know how much it cost? You had better not—”

“You’re the one being pig-headed and stubborn. You refused to back down, and even demanded that I show you how strong I am.” Not interested in a debate, Yang Qi immediately began to draw upon the energy in the spirit stones.

Sagefire erupted out of him, wrapping around the altar, and causing the sovereign-grade spirit stones to start melting. Instantly, a massive amount of spirit power poured into the Hellfire Crucible.

At the same time, the remaining flesh and blood of the asura melted further, and all sorts of spirit energy, magical laws, and devil energy swirled together at his command.

The Hell Portal appeared behind him, as well as numerous devil-ghosts, zombies, and skeletons. It was the true power of a hell monsoon, and it was erupting with full force out of the enormous gate.

“What is that thing?” Lady-Princess Silvermoon murmured, her eyes wide with terror. To her shock, Yang Qi was summoning even fiend-devil counts in the third, fourth, and fifth Legendary transformations. There were even bronzeblaze fiend-devils.

Bronzeblaze fiend-devils were true denizens of hell, complete with bronze skin, and voices that could flay the skin off of living creatures. They could belch out true energy that was like lava, and could turn the world of living men into hell itself.

To people from the Western Continent, fiend-devils were terrifying, and the presence of one would be considered a major disaster.

For one thing, there was no such thing as a bronzeblaze fiend-devil in the Lifeseizing level. They were born as Legendaries, and considering how noble their bloodline was in hell, they were considered as beings from higher planes. They were a form of life that existed above Demonfolk or humans.

And yet, here Yang Qi had casually summoned one and was using it like nothing more than firewood.

The power of the summoned fiend-devils combined with that from the spirit stones and the asura’s flesh and blood. All of it bolstered Yang Qi’s true energy, creating an explosive mixture in the Hellfire Crucible. Transformations began to occur, a chain reaction that led to one explosion after another. Slowly but surely, Sovereign Lord True Energy was flowing through him.

Only after the massive conglomeration of different types of energy was refined by the Hellfire Crucible could the various qualitative and quantitative transformations occur which resulted in tiny bits of Sovereign Lord True Energy seeping out, and stimulating the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.

To Yang Qi’s delight, his Hell Portal could already sense the numerous aspects of space-time that existed in the void around the Western Continent. There were all sorts of devil energies to be drawn upon, be it from hordes of devils or from the powerful hell monsoons that battered the continent.

Lately, the Western Continent had been surrounded by far more fiend-devils than the Rich-Lush Continent, and most of them were bronzeblaze fiend-devils, which were the perfect fuel for Sovereign Lord True Energy.

After all, it was only the most hellish of auras that could be converted into the boundless radiance and light.

Within the Hellfire Crucible, radiance and light slowly mixed with darkness and gloom.

RUMBLE!

Somewhere in the space-time outside of the Western Continent was an enormous area that was like an air bubble, surrounded by a hell monsoon.

The depths of the bubble consisted of burning lava, and a continent filled with countless bronzeblaze fiend-devils. They thrived on hell monsoons, as well as combat. In fact, they constantly fought among both themselves, and the various Demonfolk who they would encounter occasionally in the void.

After all, the devils of hell and the Demonfolk were staunchly opposed to each other.

Suddenly, a portal opened up within that enormous bubble, and a gravitational force erupted out which began to drag the bronzeblaze fiend-devils into it. None of them were strong enough to fight back.

One of the fiend-devils, in the fifth Legendary transformation, thought to take the offensive. He rushed toward the portal to attack it, but unfortunately, that was when the image of an enormous pagoda appeared. The fiend-devil coughed up blood, and then a huge, holy hand appeared, grabbed him, and dragged him into the portal.

Roar!

Another fiend-devil tried to attack the Hell Portal, this one in the sixth Legendary transformation. Although the creature wasn't dragged into the portal, none of its attacks had the slightest effect.

Yang Qi wasn't capable of dealing with a fiend-devil in the sixth Legendary transformation, and therefore, he didn’t even try summoning one.

Thankfully, there were plenty of other targets near the Western Continent to pick from, and thus, his Sovereign Lord True Energy continued to build up.

The Hellfire Crucible was growing bigger and bigger as it absorbed more of the asura’s flesh and blood, and more spirit stones. Popping sounds rang out as sovereign-grade spirit stones exploded, and transformed into greenish spirit power.

As the explosions rang out, and power coursed through Yang Qi, the image of an ancient megamammoth appeared next to him, formed from true energy. Then another, and another. They radiated a primeval aura that seemed eternally unstoppable. The truth was that the true energy megamammoths actually looked exactly like real-life megamammoths from the past. It was almost as if they had actual flesh and blood bodies, as though they were something illusory that had become true and real.

True energy. True energy…. It was said that by using energy to create physical objects, it was possible to give rise to the true ego. That was why the word "true” was used in the term true energy.

When the god-spirits in heaven unleashed their true energy, they could create worlds that were true and real in every sense of the word.

Using true energy to create something true and real indicated that a person’s energy arts had reached an incredibly high level of enlightenment. The fact that the true energy megamammoth that Yang Qi had created contained a strong element of reality was quite shocking to say the least.

They were all engaged in different sorts of activities. Some were casually breathing in the spirit energy of heaven and earth. Others were sleeping, drinking water, or letting out trumpeting calls. As they congregated above Yang Qi, it was almost possible to see the environment in which they existed: the Yore-Wilds Continent of old. It was simply miraculous.

The extent of a godly-class energy art was on full display here.

“What energy art is that….?” Lady-Princess Silvermoon murmured, feeling stifled by the power, her face ashen. In fact, she was so shaken that she could hardly keep her talisman fueled with true energy.

Yang Qi couldn’t break her talisman yet, but she still felt the might of a god-spirit crushing down onto her will and soul. All of a sudden, her faith in her ability to hold out against Yang Qi shattered.

Another fifty thousand megamammoths awoke in Yang Qi. Thanks to his Sovereign Lord True Energy, he now had the terrifying power of two hundred and fifty thousand megamammoths. The final number of three hundred thousand was just around the corner.

And that meant that he was very close to becoming a Space-Void Legendary.

Chapter 265: Nine Stars Pearl Necklace

Bronzeblaze fiend-devils were summoned without cease from the hell monsoon, and as a result, Yang Qi grew stronger and stronger. Eventually, the Grand Emperor's Pagoda trembled violently as it came completely under his control.

Imperial might radiated out of the pagoda, indicating how impossible it would be for anyone else to forcibly take control of it. It was for that reason that the chancellor hadn’t even made such an attempt.

Another way to refer to a grand emperor would be ‘Son of Heaven’, and as of this moment, Yang Qi’s will surpassed that of heaven. He was like the father of a grand emperor, the one god, the most paramount sovereign in existence, a person who the most ancient of grand emperors would bow to in allegiance.

After all, when emperors offered sacrifices to heaven, they would usually begin by saying, “I, your humble servant, tasked with managing all creation…..”

Now that the Grand Emperor's Pagoda had offered complete allegiance to Yang Qi, it was only natural that the imperial mightiness therein would be sacrificed to him.

A sense of nobility and might filled him, combining with his personality and even his soul, making him an entity that any lesser being would instinctively feel shame just looking upon.

Sovereign-grade spirit stones melted like mad, until all nine hundred and ninety-nine of them vanished in wisps of smoke.

At that point, Yang Qi reached out toward the sagely-grade spirit stone.

WHIZZZ!

The instant he touched it, dazzling light shone out, and the nine Never-Dying demon cores that made the Nine Stars Pearl Necklace suddenly erupted with power. The entire bone altar seemed to come alive, pulsing with the most intense sagely light imaginable.

Then, a sonorous voice echoed out from the altar. “Who dares blaspheme against the might of dragons…?”

Along with the voice, an enormous white dragon appeared, its claws bared as it loomed over Yang Qi.

RUMBLE!

Never-Dying pressure weighed down as the dragon lunged at Yang Qi, unleashing a bevy of deadly draconic energy arts and magics.

Lady-Princess Silvermoon suddenly burst out with laughter. “Oh Yang Qi, I bet you never could have guessed that the sagely-grade spirit stone in my altar contained a Nine-Stars Demon-Dragon Supreme White Spell Formation. Anyone other than me who tries to take that spirit stone will activate the spell formation, which will summon a supreme white demon-dragon that can kill gods and devils!”

“Oh really? You mean this puny thing?! Is this all it can do? You really think I was caught off guard or something? Not really. This supreme white demon-dragon, this Nine Stars Pearl Necklace, and these nine demon cores, will all be perfect to upgrade my spore-devil! And the stronger my spore-devil gets, the stronger fiend-devils I can summon!”

Not nervous at all about the demon-dragon, Yang Qi stepped forward, sweeping his hands out in front of him, creating swirling expressions of light as he drew on the powers of the Grand Emperor's Pagoda. In the blink of an eye, he was surrounded by the image of a god-spirit with an elephantine head and a human body.

Without any hesitation, that god-spirit hefted the Infernal Deity Spear and then began fighting the demon-dragon.

The enormous dragon was backed by the power of a sagely-grade spirit stone, as well as the Nine Stars Pearl Necklace. Its fighting prowess surpassed Lady-Princess Silvermoon’s, but unfortunately, it wasn’t actually a Never-Dying Legendary. It had no soul, which was a big disadvantage.

Yang Qi had assumed all along that there was more to the altar than met the eye, which was why he had used the strategy of slowly reeling silk from the cocoon. He had taken his time to investigate the situation, and had first drained the nine hundred and ninety-nine sovereign-grade spirit stones, in the hopes of discerning what hidden dangers existed in the altar.

Thankfully, the supreme white demon-dragon that had appeared was the perfect fuel for the Hell Portal to strengthen his spore-devil.

At the moment, the spore-devil had the power of a Personal-Domain demon core and the Zombie Kingdom, making it quite formidable. But the demon-dragon and its Never-Dying demon core was something that Yang Qi should not have been able to work with, normally speaking.

However, the changes Lady-Princess Silvermoon had made to the sagely-grade spirit stone, and the fact that the demon-dragon was an entity similar to the spore-devil, made everything different.

It was almost like a shortcut tailor-made for Yang Qi. All he had to do was use his Sovereign Lord True Energy to combine the spore-devil and the dragon, transforming it into a hellish protector who would boost his power to even higher levels.

It would also serve as a backup plan for dealing with the Crown Prince. If he couldn’t reach the Space-Void Transformation, perhaps he could use the power of his spore-devil and the Hell Portal to trap the Crown Prince.

As the godmammoth and the demon-dragon fought back and forth, streams of energy swirled out from the Grand Emperor's Pagoda to wrap up the dragon.

And that was when Yang Qi opened the Lord’s Eye, causing brilliant light to spill out onto the dragon, which was instantly rendered powerless as a result.

“Hell Portal!” Even Yang Qi was surprised at the result. The spore-devil lunged forward, grabbed the demon-dragon, and gobbled it up. Then the spore-devil sank down into the flames of the Hellfire Crucible, to be surrounded by devilfire as he underwent a shocking transformation.

Time passed. The spore-devil twitched, and then leaped back out of the Hellfire Crucible. He was taller and more real than before, clad in a suit of resplendent armor, as well as a battle robe. He now had hundreds of heads and hundreds of arms, and carried countless magical devices. His skin was covered with devil-eyes, and he radiated the power of a psychic tempest.

Of particular note were nine devil-eyes on his chest that were larger than the others, and glittered with brilliant light. They were none other than the demon cores of the Nine Stars Pearl Necklace, each of them with the power of the ninth Legendary transformation. Such objects were considered rare, so only a person as powerful as Lady-Princess Silvermoon could possibly have collected so many.

As of this moment, those demon cores were the source of the spore-devil’s ultimate strength.

Almost immediately, the Hell Portal became more stable, and Yang Qi could sense that he could now summon fiend-devils in the seventh Legendary transformation.

Of course, he was still far from being able to truly connect to hell.

Supposedly, when the Hell Portal was used to directly connect to hell itself, it would be possible to summon suzerains of hell, the leaders of hellish forces who surpassed the Demi-Immortal level.

Although he had subdued the demon-dragon, his cultivation base was still too weak. If he could get a bit stronger, and fully unleash the potential of the Nine Stars Pearl Necklace, then he might be able to summon Astral-Star fiend-devils.

In any case, his spore-devil was now more powerful than ever.

And therefore, despite not having reached the Space-Void Transformation, he could still help Hua Tianxiong take on the Crown Prince.

After the process was over, the spore-devil spat out the sagely-grade spirit stone. Even after having been used to melt the demon-dragon and form a devil body for the spore-devil, the stone still glittered with bright light, and the aura of sages. Yang Qi couldn’t help but gasp in amazement.

If a sagely-grade spirit stone was this powerful, then what about heavenly-grade? Or godly-grade? And speaking of which, what did those fabled immortal stones look like?

After seeing everything that had just happened, Lady-Princess Silvermoon was visibly in despair. That was especially true considering how casually Yang Qi had dealt with the bronzeblaze fiend-devils.

‘A fiend-devil in the sixth Legendary transformation? Something like that would be a big threat to the Sky-Heaven Dynasty. A whole host of experts would need to join forces to defeat it! With a personal domain, it could summon armies and take over much of the continent. It would be a true war god! And this guy just uses them for fuel? Who is he?’ All of Lady-Princess Silvermoon’s hopes were now completely dashed.

Yang Qi ignored her as his true energy grew stronger and stronger. Seven days and nights passed, and explosions rang out over and over again. Eventually, the sagely-grade spirit stone had been reduced by half, whereupon Yang Qi gathered all of the energy in his body together.

It was at that point that he reached the level of three hundred thousand megamammoths.

His meridians, his sea of energy, his blood and even his hair were now real expressions of true energy, and his aura had something sagely about it.

Even the slightest, most casual movement on his part was filled with domineering and invincible might.

Unfortunately, when he tried to use his psychic powers and soul to pierce through the void, he suddenly found himself facing a backlash of spatial power.

Even as he stretched his hands out to try to tear a rift in space, countless transparent lightning bolts appeared, which slammed into him, causing his flesh and blood to vibrate, and his meridians to tremble.

“That’s… Space-Void Godlightning!” Lady-Princess Silvermoon blurted. “I can’t believe you’ve provoked Space-Void Godlightning! How strong must you be to do that? Your true energy is actually provoking a reaction like that? Ohhhh, I get it.” She let out a stream of laughter. “You’ve reached this level of cultivation, but can’t tear open rifts in space. You've really bitten off more than you can chew! You’ve gotten strong enough that the magical laws of heaven and earth have decided that you can't be permitted to exist!”

She was obviously quite happy at this development.

Despite Yang Qi’s immense strength, he couldn't pierce through space, and thus, she assumed he would end up permanently stuck in his current level. Heaven and magical law were envious of him, and had completely rejected him.

Frowning, Yang Qi sank into thought regarding the matter.

Chapter 266: Incapable

Yang Qi hardly noticed Lady-Princess Silvermoon’s words. With the power of three hundred thousand ancient megamammoths, his Sovereign Lord True Energy was stronger than ever, with even a tiny bit of it being a hundred times stronger than the true energy of an ordinary person. And that wasn’t to mention the powerful fiend-devils he could summon with the Hell Portal.

Considering the endless supply of fiend-devils he could use as fuel for the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, it seemed a foregone conclusion that he would be able to break the Sky-Heaven Godcharm.

Although the charm had been created by Grand Empress Sky-Heaven, what was more important was the person who was using it.

If the user didn’t have enough true energy to keep it active, then it would be completely useless. That was one reason why so many people would love to take the Grand Emperor's Pagoda from Yang Qi.

In fact, if it weren’t for the fact that the chancellor of the Demi-Immortal Institute feared Yang Qi’s so-called backer, he would probably have tried to do so already.

As for the reason why Yang Qi had frowned earlier, it was because he was coming to find that piercing through space really was difficult.

Space was like the ocean, while people were driftwood.

As for Yang Qi, he was like a piece of driftwood so enormous that it was almost impossible to push it under the water. Worse, trying to pierce through space resulted in the magical laws of space fighting back against him, even sending Space-Void Godlightning to try to punish him.

In fact, Yang Qi wasn’t sure if he was strong enough to succeed.

Furthermore, he had to worry about what would happen if the backlash were severe enough to affect the Grand Emperor's Pagoda. After all, there were a lot of people inside that he needed to keep safe.

From the look of things, he just wouldn’t be able to pierce through space right now.

‘First I’ll handle Lady-Princess Silvermoon, then I’ll worry about piercing through space. Besides, I need to pick the appropriate place for the attempt, and the Western Continent isn’t it. After all, if I succeeded, I would probably draw the attention of the Great Sages here.”

Besides, he had to succeed using only his own power. When that happened, and his soul and body truly combined, drastic transformations would occur.

The baptism by the magical laws of heaven and earth that he would undergo would provide incredible, unimaginable benefits. Besides, what would his true energy capacity rise to? Five hundred thousand megamammoths? Six hundred thousand? Seven hundred thousand? Perhaps even the terrifying level of one million was a possibility.

‘I wonder if I can get something from Lady-Princess Silvermoon to help me.’ After some thought, he turned and walked toward her.

“What do you think you’re going to do?!” she said, her voice quavering with fear.

“What am I going to do? Didn’t you say I could never break through your Sky-Heaven Godcharm? That you could just sit there like everything was hunky-dory? Well, I'm going to show you what I'm capable of when I want to break something.”

He splayed his five fingers, causing the Hellfire Crucible to appear above Lady-Princess Silvermoon.

With the flick of his hand, he turned it on its side, causing molten fire to pour out and splash onto the white lotus that was the Sky-Heaven Godcharm. Instantly, the sound of explosions rang out, and Lady-Princess Silvermoon’s eyes went wide.

However, the Sky-Heaven Godcharm was indeed crafted by a Great Sage. Not only did it not weaken under the attack, it actually seemed to grow stronger, causing white lotuses to bloom everywhere around it.

Within each of the lotuses stood an empress, surrounded by her host of ministers and officials as she prepared to conquer, not just the lands around her, but the sky itself.

She was none other than Grand Empress Sky-Heaven.

Also present within the white auras was a sensation of the blood of the Demonfolk. However, that blood was not the ordinary type, but rather, the type that came from a lofty and noble demon.

The reason for that was that Grand Empress Sky-Heaven was once a white lotus demon.

White lotuses were pure and holy, but they were still demons.

Yang Qi wasn’t surprised at all to find that his attempt to break through the Sky-Heaven Godcharm was being resisted. In fact, it was to be expected. Next, he sent black energy pouring out of the Hell Portal as he summoned numerous bronzeblaze fiend-devils, which he used as fuel to further intensify the fire pouring from the crucible.

One by one, the white lotuses began to melt.

And yet, however quickly they melted, new ones popped up to replace them.

Yang Qi hovered cross-legged in the air, using the opportunity to gain further enlightenment. After all, this attempt to break through the Sky-Heaven Godcharm involved his soul and thoughts being in direct contact with imperial might, and the will of a Great Sage.

It was a tempering through and through.

With every lotus that melted, he would experience a vision of the empress on it attacking him, using millions of martial techniques of the most deadly nature.

Of course, it was the will of the empress, assaulting him.

Any ordinary person who tried to break the Sky-Heaven Godcharm would be attacked by the imperial might, and even if they were in the eighth Legendary transformation, would be killed.

But Yang Qi’s willpower was stronger than average, and as it turned out, the attacks of this empress were actually like a baptism for his soul.

It was almost as if, there in his sea of consciousness, he was fighting Grand Empress Sky-Heaven, countering and dodging her every vicious move. If he made a mistake, then his soul would be damaged or even destroyed, and he would be dead.

The fighting went on for a long time until the empress finally shouted, “Sky-Heaven Triple Severing!”

Those three final moves involved using her hands as the sharpest of blades, like axes capable of cleaving mountains, of slicing the void apart, of cutting deep into the heart of an enemy and destroying their soul.

As for Lady-Princess Silvermoon, she could sense the imperial might growing weaker and weaker; after all, she was controlling the incarnation of Grand Empress Sky-Heaven.

“Think you can harm my soul? You’re delusional!” Within Yang Qi’s sea of consciousness in his forehead, countless streams of energy backed the Infernal Deity Spear to block the Sky-Heaven Triple Severing. When they made contact, his sea of consciousness trembled, and yet, remained firm. Sitting nearby was the golden imp, who seemed secure and content to remain completely motionless.

Millions upon millions of moves were exchanged as the fight continued.

As for Yang Qi’s martial path, it contained the fundamental nature of a powerful asura from the depths of hell. Grand Empress Sky-Heaven's martial path was mighty, but compared to the asuras from hell, it counted for little. In fact, the only reason she had the advantage was that she was a Great Sage, a person who could soon break through to the path of immortality by becoming a Demi-Immortal.

Furthermore, the Sky-Heaven Godcharm only contained a sliver of her will, which was like nothing compared to her true self. In contrast, Yang Qi was very much his true self, able to think and react in unpredictable ways.

As the fight proceeded, Yang Qi was getting used to her moves and actions.

And also her weaknesses.

‘There it is!’ Suddenly, his eyes widened as he saw the opening he had been looking for. Without any hesitation, he launched an explosive attack, and the might of the empress was destroyed.

Countless white lotuses began to fall down to the ground.

The will of Grand Empress Sky-Heaven had been completely vanquished.

BOOM!

Yang Qi reached out, smashing through the defensive barrier, and laid hands on the white lotus that was the Sky-Heaven Godcharm.

The charm itself was a five-petaled lotus, crafted from some unknown material, and covered with magical symbols written in the ancient demon script that had existed for countless years. It also contained pulsing imperial might.

The Sky-Heaven Godcharm was his.

Of course, he would need to study the item to identify how to use it properly.

“That’s it!” Lady-Princess Silvermoon shouted. “You’re dead!” Without any hesitation, she shot forth to fight Yang Qi. However, before she could barely move an inch, a terrifying hand appeared, latched onto her throat, and lifted her up into the air.

Yang Qi now had the power of three hundred thousand ancient megamammoths, a Hell Portal powered by the Nine Stars Pearl Necklace, and his Grand Emperor's Pagoda. With all that, he could defeat Lady-Princess Silvermoon with a single move.

With Yang Qi holding her by the throat, her face began to turn bright red, and she gurgled, “W-what… what are you doing?”

“What am I doing?” He quickly began to place sealing marks all over her, which was when he noticed that her sea of energy contained a vortex of stars that emanated a constant stream of power.

“So this is the sign of the Astral-Star Transformation?” He looked a bit closer. “The eighth Legendary transformation. Clearly nothing to take lightly. You can communicate with the universe, and draw upon the power of the countless stars that inhabit it. Unfortunately, Lady-Princess Silvermoon, you’re pathetically weak. I wonder what I’ll be like when I'm in the Astral-Star Transformation.”

“You beast!" she snarled, feeling completely overwhelmed with humiliation of having Yang Qi slap his hands on her body to seal her.

“Devil-God Seal!” Yang Qi had to admit that this Lady-Princess Silvermoon was smoking hot in every sense of the term. In fact, most men who had her in this position would be hard pressed to avoid doing something completely inappropriate. However, at the moment, Yang Qi was primarily interested in sealing her meridians to guarantee her compliance.

Once the power of the Devil-God Seal entered her, she truly lost any hope at all. She could instantly sense that Yang Qi had taken control of her true energy, which now contained some enigmatic and powerful will that was not her own.

He was even connected to her on the level of her soul. All he had to do was exercise a thought, and she would have no choice but to carry out the action.

When the process was complete, she collapsed to the ground.

“Get up!” Yang Qi said.

Gritting her teeth, she climbed to her feet. Although she didn’t have the slightest desire to do as he asked, his will tugged on her heart and soul like magic, making it impossible for her to disobey him.

“You serve me from now on….” he said, trying to decide how to teach her a lesson she wouldn't forget. However, it was in that exact moment that he sensed a boundless will sweeping across the lands above.

Chapter 267: The Will of Great Sages

“What’s that? The will of a Great Sage level is sweeping the lands? Presumably hunting for information about me?” Surprised, he sent his psychic tempest out to check on the situation.

Sure enough, a powerful will was at work, hunting high and low, near and far.

The level of power in question was far beyond that capable by mortals; it was clearly a manifestation of the Great Sage level.

This was no random, casual act, it was obviously a concerted effort to find Yang Qi.

Considering the scene he'd caused in the Western Continent, and the fact that he had literally taken Silvermoon, it was no surprise that a Great Sage had stepped in.

In the Rich-Lush Continent, there were five Great Sages, including the chancellors of the four institutes, and the emperor of the Sage Ancestor Dynasty.

In the Western Continent, there were more Great Sages than that. After all, the abundant spirit stones there made cultivation a lot easier.

In the Western Continent Atlas that Yang Qi had acquired at the Sun Moon Institute, it said that there were at least six Great Sages there. If they joined forces, they would be powerful enough to shake heaven and topple the earth.

The reason Yang Qi had immediately gone into hiding after taking Silvermoon was that he knew he would have no way to fight a Great Sage.

“Not good. Devil-God Seal!” He quickly shrank the Grand Emperor's Pagoda down to the size of a particle, and placed it inside of him.

At the same time, he used the Devil-God Seal to conceal his aura, to the point where it almost seemed like he didn’t exist.

Divine will swept through the lands, passing over Yang Qi before continuing on into the distance.

He didn’t move, much less loosen the Devil-God Seal. He just lay there quietly as if asleep.

Before long, another stream of divine will approached, searched the area, and then departed.

It happened six times, and every time, the will was stronger and different than before. In fact, Yang Qi was able to get a sense of how strong these Great Sages were, simply by undergoing their search.

By now, he knew quite a few secrets about cultivation. For example, the Great Sage level was broken up into nine ranks, each one of which was more terrifying than the one before it. Just like the Legendary level, each rank involved different magical laws, and different enlightenment of the mysteries of heaven and earth. All of it led toward the path of immortal ascension.

Great Sages gathered heaven motes, which would eventually be converted into immortal motes. Upon reaching the ultimate peak, they would become Demi-Immortals, and would tread the path of immortality.

According to some legends, many years in the past, the Demi-Immortal level had been called the Half-Immortal level.

As for the Great Sage level, the more heaven motes and immortal motes one built up, the stronger one would be.

From what Yang Qi could tell, those six streams of divine will actually did not measure up to the enigmatic chancellor of the Demi-Immortal Institute. The chancellor was a mysterious individual, and unexpectedly, he was actually stronger than any of the Great Sages from the Western Continent. Now it made sense why the Western Continent, who was backed by the Hanging Mountain, hadn’t invaded the Rich-Lush Continent.

Of course, even the weakest of these six expressions of divine will was far more powerful than Yang Qi. Unless he was aided by the God Legion Seal, he would die in a fight with one.

Therefore, he didn’t dare to do anything other than lay there quietly.

The aura of the Grand Emperor's Pagoda did not conform to the Western Continent, making it very easy to detect. Although it had inherent powers of concealment, Yang Qi’s cultivation base was still too weak to fully employ them. It wasn't a matter of lack of true energy, but rather, a simple result of cultivation base level. After three or four more breakthroughs, he wouldn’t have this problem anymore.

Once he was in the Personal-Domain Transformation, and could form the God Legion Paradise, then even low-level Great Sages would be forced to flee from him or die.

Therefore, he drew on what powers of the Grand Emperor's Pagoda that he could, and also his Devil-God Seal, to try to keep himself completely hidden. He became wreathed in primal-chaos, separate from the three realms and divorced from the five phases.

The combination of the Devil-God Seal with the Grand Emperor's Pagoda was virtually impenetrable, and was more than enough to hide Yang Qi from the divine will of a Great Sage.

Furthermore, because of the hordes of devil-ghosts that existed around and in the Western Continent, as well as the hell monsoons that battered it, his aura was even less likely to be noticed.

‘This is ridiculous,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘I need to get back to the Rich-Lush Continent as quickly as possible. I've done what I came here to do.’ Now that he had the spirit stones he had come for, the safest thing to do was go back home.

After all, there was a treaty between the two continents that prohibited Great Sages from entering one of the other continents. Without that agreement in place, it would be too easy for conflicts to break out, and war to erupt.

If Great Sages fought, it could wreak havoc on entire continents, and nobody wanted chaos like that.

Having made his decision, Yang Qi flew out of the abandoned mine, and blurred into motion toward the border region of the Western Continent. He kept close to the ground, and was careful not to release any of his aura. Obviously, he was in great danger, and if he revealed his location, he would likely end up buried there.

‘It's too bad I can’t get my hands on just a few more spirit stones,’ he thought. ‘And so much for my dream of finding some immortal stones.’ The only reason he might have stayed behind in the Western Continent was to break through to the Space-Void Transformation, by means of the fiend-devils that existed in the strange aspects of space-time around it.

Nowadays, using his Hell Portal in the Rich-Lush Continent wasn't very effective.

Although he wanted to stay behind, six Great Sages were combing the lands for him, tightening the net to the point where eventually they would locate him no matter how he hid. Clearly, sticking around the Western Continent to try to further his cultivation would be a mistake.

However, he still had time to get back home.

Thankfully, he hadn’t traveled very far into the depths of the continent, so it only took him a few hours to reach the shore, where he flew out over the ocean, and eventually found himself at the end of the world, where the dimensional barrier existed.

Once he passed the barrier, he would be in the Rich-Lush Continent, and would be safe from the enemy Great Sages, at least, as long as they weren’t interested in waging war.

‘Almost home,’ he thought. With that, he drew on the powers of the Grand Emperor's Pagoda to accelerate toward the barrier.

However, that was when something completely unexpected happened.

The previously flimsy barrier actually rebuffed the Grand Emperor's Pagoda. The instant Yang Qi hit it, the boundless might of a sage erupted out, pushing him backward toward the continent itself.

‘Crap!’ he thought, his heart sinking. Despite having thought the matter through from every angle he could consider, he didn’t realize that the Great Sages of the Western Continent could use their powers to strengthen the barrier to the Rich-Lush Continent.

And now that he had failed to pass through the barrier, his location had been revealed.

Instantly, the Great Sages turned their attention in his direction.

There was no time for thinking or planning. If he didn’t escape immediately, he would perish beyond the shadow of a doubt.

Glancing around, he realized that there were many locations in the greyspace of the Western Continent that had been corroded by hell monsoons. Beyond the greyspace, space-time was in chaos, and danger abounded. Furthermore, he had no idea what existed out there. For all he knew, if he went out, he would never find his way back.

But given the circumstances, he didn’t feel that he had any other choice.

RUMBLE!

Without any hesitation, he shot through the greyspace toward the masses of fiend-devils and fractured space-time that existed outside of it. As he did, a massive wave of power surged forth, smashing into the area he had just occupied, and causing masses of seawater to evaporate in the blink of an eye.

It was the power of a Great Sage.

The space-time in the area around Yang Qi shattered, and at the same time, countless fiend-devils were shredded to pieces, including their demon cores.

Yang Qi didn’t even need to look over his shoulder to know that there was an enormous hand reaching toward him, smashing everything in its path. He didn’t know whether it was illusory or real, but it was hundreds of kilometers from end to end, and filled with layer upon layer of glowing light. And in the palm of the hand, there was a bundle of radiance and light that was like a sun.

It was none other than a heaven mote.

When heaven motes were used, magical laws could easily be distorted.

If that hand reached him, he would be wiped out of existence. He was a mere Spirit-Soul Legendary, and was far, far too weak. Even the power of three hundred thousand ancient megamammoths was ant-like in comparison with a Great Sage.

“Open up!” he shouted, activating the summoning powers of his Hell Portal. Instantly, a river-like deluge of fiend-devils poured out behind him, causing a veritable army to spring up between him and that enormous hand.

Meanwhile, he shot toward the eternal and unknowable space-time beyond the Western Continent. He had no idea how he would ever get home, but at least he was escaping the Great Sages.

Unfortunately, it seemed as though his efforts were in vain.

The enormous hand didn’t slow down, much less stop moving. The tens upon tens of thousands of fiend-devils were wiped out of existence as though they were a mist being waved away, even those in the sixth Legendary transformation. And the hand kept moving.

Chapter 268: Frenzied Flight

It was a moment of profoundly deadly danger.

Yang Qi had fallen into the clutches of a Great Sage, and had no surefire way to escape.

The only thing he could do was put everything on the line, to flee like mad and hope that the chaotic power of space-time itself would somehow ensure his safety. After all, at least that way he would have a chance of surviving.

He was like a person who had been chased to the edge of a cliff, and in the face of certain death at the hands of his enemy, had chosen to jump.

However, the Great Sage apparently realized what he was planning to do, and was attempting to stop him.

Godly might emanated off the enormous hand, smashing its way through the devil-ghosts Yang Qi had summoned, transforming them into nothing more than dust. Then, the heaven mote in the hand unleashed a gravitational force that caused all of the space in the area to ripple and distort.

To Yang Qi, it looked as if the void around him were being crumpled up, making him like a bird in a cage, or a fish in a net, completely unable to escape.

The power of the heaven mote roared forth, destroying Yang Qi’s true energy and piercing deep into the Grand Emperor's Pagoda.

BOOOOM!

One of the dimensions inside the pagoda was outright destroyed, causing several of the pagoda's shields to shatter.

Yang Qi’s true energy trembled as the power of the heaven mote severely damaged his sea of energy and many of his meridians. He came very close to coughing up a mouthful of blood, but didn’t.

“Myriad Reversals; Rebirth of the Sovereign Lord.”

Suddenly, a new stream of true energy erupted from his sea of energy, like a raging fire, but at the same time, a sweet dew that healed all of his wounds. Sovereign Lord True Energy made him like a phoenix rising from the ashes, eternally indestructible, able to recover even after being hit by the heaven mote of a Great Sage.

As he recovered, he sped onward into space. As for the countless fiend-devils in the area, they had no idea what was happening, and thus, attacked him on sight.

But then, the Great Sage’s palm appeared again, unleashing more heaven motes that destroyed any fiend-devils they got near.

Spinning, Yang Qi used all the strength he could muster to summon an enormous spear, many kilometers in length. It was almost like a mountain, and it was none other than the Infernal Deity Spear. It was made from true energy, and bolstered by the power of the hell monsoon. In fact, it was so powerful, that it destroyed any nearby fiend-devils and sucked them into itself.

Yang Qi was about to unleash the most powerful attack he could muster using this spear.

Looking like a mighty heaven-god, he hefted the spear, and then hurled it out with all of his might toward the incoming hand. It was said that the infernal deities of hell could hurl their spears high into the sky, to destroy the planets that represented the legion of gods, and Yang Qi was attacking in that very same fashion right now.

The massive spear shot forth, and in the blink of an eye, it was bearing down on the enormous palm. Not even the heaven motes could stop it.

“Eee?” a voice echoed. Then, the Great Sage controlling the hand caused its index finger to curl up, and then flick Yang Qi’s Infernal Deity Spear.

BOOOOM!

Cracks spread out across the surface of the spear, and then it fell apart; the light from the legion of gods vanished, and the massive amount of true energy faded into nothing. At the same time, a shock wave rippled out into the surrounding space-time.

Yang Qi coughed up a huge mouthful of blood because of the injuries.

‘I have to get out of here!’ A sagely-grade spirit stone appeared in his hand, and he drained its power to heal himself. At the same time, he and the Grand Emperor's Pagoda continued to fly further away from the greyspace of the Western Continent.

“You’re not going anywhere!” echoed the voice of the Great Sage. “It doesn't matter that you're out in that distorted space-time, I can still make it impossible for you to escape.”

Rumbling sounds echoed out as the enormous hand shot out past the greyspace and toward Yang Qi.

By this point, Yang Qi was far from the Western Continent's greyspace, and was out in chaotic space-time, surrounded by a wild wind, and the howling of ghosts and the wailing of gods. The forces assailing him seemed no less than the attack of a Never-Dying Legendary, and the sight that met his eyes was impenetrable darkness.

Behind him was an enormous continent hanging in the middle of chaotic space-time, with a curved heaven and a flat earth. As for the transparent barrier that blocked the chaos around it, it was the continent’s greyspace, which was the heaven of the continent. Without such a protective membrane, meteorites, energy flows, chaotic fluctuations, and other destructive forces would smash it into oblivion.

At the moment, Yang Qi couldn’t see the Rich-Lush Continent, nor could he sense it with the Grand Emperor's Pagoda. Having left the greyspace of the Western Continent, he was lost, and had no idea how to get home. And the chaotic churning of space-time was backed by such power that any cultivator in this situation would count for almost nothing.

Of course, Yang Qi had not extricated himself from danger. The enormous hand was still closing in on him, surrounded by a host of glowing halos that suppressed the spatial tempests.

Only Great Sages qualified to leave a plane, to exit the greyspace of a continent and enter the chaos of space-time to travel to other continents or higher planes.

“Angel Wings!” Yang Qi barked. Considering the mortal danger, he needed to use every possible option to try to flee, and thus, true energy flowed out to create two massive wings.

They were dozens of kilometers wide, and each wing consisted of numerous subsidiary wings, thirty-six in total. They radiated holiness and light, and when they combined with the spatial powers of the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, it actually calmed the chaos of the surrounding space-time, and made Yang Qi feel as comfortable as a fish in water.

Not only did the surrounding chaos not affect the wings, it actually seemed to bolster them, giving them additional speed.

Yang Qi’s wings had long since been upgraded from Fiend-Devil Wings to Angel Wings. However, after acquiring the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, he hadn’t been afforded many occasions to use them. After all, the Grand Emperor's Pagoda allowed him to pierce through space before reaching the Space-Void Transformation, and that meant he could achieve speed that surpassed what he could with his wings.

Therefore, it was actually quite a surprise to him that his Angel Wings were this strong.

They could absorb the power of spatial tempests and convert it into something he could use. They made him like a sea bird in a storm, able to flit about with great ease.

In fact, it was to Yang Qi’s shock that the combination of the Grand Emperor's Pagoda’s spatial power, plus the Angel Wings, boosted him to ten times his previous speed.

The wings flapped, causing cyclonic winds to spiral out, and at the same time, sucking in more of the space-time chaos. As it swirled through Yang Qi’s meridians and sea of energy, it caused the Angel Wings to glow even more brightly.

In the depths of space-time, there were spatial tempests that even Great Sages would flee from. But now, Yang Qi wouldn’t need to fear them at all.

However, at the moment, he still needed to escape.

BOOOOM!

The Great Sage’s hand smashed down into nothing, but the resulting explosion caused the space-time for five hundred kilometers in every direction to evaporate and transform into a vacuum.

‘I can’t believe my Angel Wings can do this. It’s too bad I'm not a Space-Void Legendary; the wings would be even more powerful! I could move so quickly people could hardly see me!’ To his delight, it now seemed much more likely that he would be able to make his escape. How could he ever have guessed that, during the time he had gone without using the Angel Wings, they would improve this much?

A sensation of rage emanated out from the hand of the Great Sage, and was accompanied by a grim snarl from the greyspace of the Western Continent. Then, a mighty force erupted out, causing the hand to immediately grow to ten times its previous size. The power of the heaven motes shone with such brilliance that space-time rippled as surely as the sea would when a monstrous whale breached the surface.

“Heaven and Earth in my Palm….” an ancient voice said.

Then, Yang Qi saw the chaos around him suddenly transforming into a vast blue sky, at the end of which were five enormous pillars that represented the essence of the world.

‘Not good!’ he thought. Obviously, he had fallen into the hand of the Great Sage.

He flapped his wings, which propelled him forward to smash into the pillars.

“Angel Wings. Glory of the Lord….”

Drawing on his true energy, the power of spatial tempests, and a sagely-grade spirit stone, he shot up, smashing into the blue sky. In the blink of an eye, he was back out into space-time.

Chapter 269: Angel Wings Transformation

“Dammit!”

The hand of the Great Sage had summoned a blue sky and five pillars to prop it up. The goal had been to trap Yang Qi, and yet, with the help of his Angel Wings, he escaped. In his current state, not even spatial tempests could stop him.

In fact, those tempests were actually beneficial. The friction between their power and his own true energy created a tempering effect that made him tougher and more resilient.

He felt very close to being able to tear open space itself. As a result, becoming a Space-Void Legendary seemed much easier than before. Every moment he was in the chaos of space-time, his meridians and energy were influenced and honed by the void, and became more closely connected to it.

‘Come on, keep chasing me!’ he thought. ‘If things keep going on like this, I’ll hit the Space-Void Transformation, and then fleeing will be an easy task.’

In some ways, it was like a session of cultivation. The chase was helping him to understand space better, and as its power flowed through his meridians, bolstering his Angel Wings, his control of it grew more refined.

Without any hesitation, he headed deeper into space.

And the hand of the Great Sage followed.

The heaven motes in the hand flashed in rage. How could a nobody like this possibly escape from a Great Sage? And not just once, but multiple times in a row? How could any Great Sage maintain face after such a thing? And thus, whatever Great Sage was controlling that enormous hand continued to pour more and more power into it in the hopes of catching Yang Qi.

However, Yang Qi was perceptive and shrewd, and knew that he couldn’t delay even the slightest bit. Although he had no idea where he was or where he was going, he pressed forward with all the speed he could muster. Thankfully, his decisiveness ensured that his pursuer was a projected hand, and not the actual Great Sage behind it.

The difference between the two was monumental.

Of course, most Great Sages would never think to use their true body to deal with a Legendary; it would be too embarrassing to have to do something like that. Great Sages could project their true energy across incredible distances, and even use it to kill people.

But how could the Great Sage pursuing Yang Qi have ever guessed that the quarry would be so powerful? His Angel Wings could actually borrow power from the spatial tempests, making it much easier for him to move about.

By now, Yang Qi was so far out in space-time that it was too late for the Great Sage to go after him in person. Unfortunately, he didn’t have an actual destination to run to. And in the vast chaos of the spatial tempests, even a Great Sage would be like a drop of water in an ocean. One wrong turn could lead one to most deadly disaster.

Therefore, considering the Great Sage had Yang Qi locked down with his projected hand, there was no way he would give up the chase now.

Yang Qi could only continue to flee. The longer he dragged things out, and the further he ran, the more difficult it would be for the Great Sage to power his projection. Eventually, it would fade from existence, which was when Yang Qi would finally be safe.

In any case, at least he had hope.

However, at the moment, there were powerful fluctuations emanating from the enormous hand, the type that could pierce through space. From what Yang Qi could tell, that distant Great Sage back in the Western Continent was trying to set up a space-time wormhole connection between himself and the hand. Wormholes were fixed passages between two locations, even two worlds, something that could resist the dangerous spatial tempests. Therefore, if the Great Sage finished the process, it would take only a moment for him to show up in person to kill Yang Qi.

‘The Great Sage level is so strong! Too strong!’

As Yang Qi flew along at top speed, the Great Sage was searching for the proper spatial nexuses to use to create his wormhole. Of course, it was no simple task, as Yang Qi was now far, far away from the greyspace of the Western Continent.

‘Where is he going? Why doesn’t he stop to rest?’ The hand of the Great Sage seemed to be getting anxious. Suddenly, it vibrated, causing white lotuses to spill out everywhere.

“Grand Empress Sky-Heaven; Will of Blooming Flowers; White Lotuses Abound; Pure Land of Sages….”

Unexpectedly, the Great Sage was unleashing a land of sages to try to trap Yang Qi, a move that required expending a massive amount of true energy.

Once an expert reached the Great Sage level, his personal domain would become a land of sages. And it was even said that after the Great Sage level, the land of sages would become an immortal realm. And beyond immortal realms were the kingdoms of gods that belonged to members of the legion of gods.

Yang Qi didn’t even have a personal domain, and here a Great Sage was unleashing a sage domain. Fundamentally speaking, capturing Yang Qi in this way would be as easy as trapping a turtle in a jar.

And yet, as soon as the white lotuses began to rain down to create the land of sages, a talisman appeared in Yang Qi’s hand, which also resembled a white lotus. With it, he proceeded along through the land of sages as though it didn’t exist.

“A Sky-Heaven Godcharm? Created by Grand Empress Sky-Heaven herself, the White Lotus Immortal? So, you actually killed Lady-Princess Silvermoon and got her talisman? But how did you break its defenses?!”

The hand of the Great Sage seemed to radiate even more fury than before. Suddenly, the heaven motes in the palm formed into what looked like an eye, which instantly locked down onto Yang Qi.

“Pure Space Eye; Purify the Void!”

Shining light from the eye slammed into Yang Qi’s back, causing his Angel Wings to fold up.

‘Not good!’ Yang Qi could tell that the enraged Great Sage was holding nothing back to try to kill him. True energy swirled around him as an enormous figure appeared with an elephantine head and a human body, which subsequently lunged toward the hand.

As for the hand, it shot toward the godmammoth with full fury.

Letting loose an echoing trumpet, the godmammoth hefted its spear, and began to fight furiously with the hand.

“What powerful true energy. Sadly, your cultivation level is too low. Even still, how terrifying….” Clearly, this Great Sage was actually starting to fear Yang Qi. Despite his low cultivation level, he was capable of unleashing extremely dangerous attacks, which only led to the question of how powerful he would become in the future.

Even in the primeval past, it was unheard-of for Legendaries to kill Great Sages. At least, it was unheard in the Yore-Wilds Continent. Perhaps in higher planes of existence, it was more common.

But considering the level of power that was on display, this Great Sage had decided that Yang Qi absolutely had to die.

RUMBLE!

Suddenly, the enormous hand transformed into a mighty fist, which slammed into the godmammoth with such force that the godmammoth faded out of existence.

However, in the time it took for that small fight to play out, Yang Qi’s Angel Wings recovered, and he shot off into the distance.

“I will kill you today, no matter what it takes!” the Great Sage shouted. “Nobody can stop me!” The voice itself was powerful enough to cause anyone who heard it to cower in fear.

And yet, Yang Qi ignored it, and pushed himself forward even faster. Thankfully, he had just replenished himself with a sagely-grade spirit stone, which meant that he could maintain his current state for quite some time.

Yang Qi had never been in such a desperate situation before, nor had he ever been forced to waste true energy like this. But he was under too much pressure from this Great Sage, and if he held back, he would die.

Thankfully, with the sagely-grade spirit stone, Sovereign Lord True Energy, and his Angel Wings, it was almost like he was connected to magical law, making him the sovereign of space-time.

Within the power of the spatial tempests, streams of quintessence appeared, which began to form countless invisible talismans. As they clumped together, they unexpectedly transformed into tiny fay creatures the size of a finger. They were tempest fays, or spatial fays, legendary things that were supposedly the children of space itself. These fays were purely elemental constructs, and anyone who possessed them, and made them part of their true energy, would gain vastly superior control over space.

To Yang Qi’s shock, the countless spatial tempest fays began to gather in his Angel Wings, which caused the wings’ connection to the spatial tempests to grow even stronger.

The fays began to merge with his Sovereign Lord True Energy, and as they did, he felt his own soul being strengthened. All of a sudden, he was now capable of seeing what existed out in the inky darkness beyond.

His soul was stronger, and as it linked with his fleshly body and his true energy, he suddenly felt like he was on the verge of being able to pierce through space.

Chapter 270: Escaping Alive

Yang Qi was truly benefitting from his crisis. Thanks to the pursuit of this Great Sage, he was actually acquiring spatial tempest fays.

The finger-sized fays were purely elemental. Normally speaking, they would only come forth when a specific individual met certain requirements, including amassing the element of space to a very high degree. Even some people who had personal domains could never connect with space to that level. But Yang Qi could.

More and more spatial tempest fays attached to his Angel Wings, until they looked like a pure sea of the things. The fays chattered amongst themselves as they poured into Yang Qi’s blood and soul. With every moment that passed, he felt more and more like he could pierce through space.

He used to be a massive piece of driftwood, but with the help of the spatial tempest fays, he now felt like he was an iceberg sinking down into the water.

Suddenly, he was struck with enlightenment. ‘I can’t use massive force to pierce through space, then why not sink into it? Become a part of it?’

It was as if a new world had opened up to him.

Spatial power bubbled inside of him, and it felt as though both his soul and his fleshly body could completely transform at any moment. Before the chase with the Great Sage began, he hadn’t had any inclination that he could break through to the Space-Void Transformation, but right now, he felt completely enlightened.

Of course, now was not the place and time for a breakthrough. Breakthroughs didn’t happen instantly, and if he gave the Great Sage enough time to finish constructing a space-time wormhole, then the situation would get very bad, very quickly.

Even if he did reach the Space-Void Transformation, that still wouldn’t put him in a place to be able to defeat a Great Sage in a fight.

Instead, he continued to fly back and forth randomly, in order to make it harder for the Great Sage to establish the coordinates he needed.

“Divine Dragon Fills the Sky.”

He streaked through space with his Angel Wings, looking like a divine dragon, and making it very difficult to determine where exactly he would be next.

As time passed, Yang Qi’s efforts began to produce results, and the Great Sage grew weaker and weaker, until he was having trouble keeping up.

“Evil creature! I can’t believe you can produce spatial tempest fays. Too bad for you that you aren’t in the third Legendary transformation! Maybe if you broke through, you would have a chance. But I won’t give it to you. You’re dead!” The hand of this Great Sage seemed incapable of giving up, or perhaps its rage had caused it to lose its faculties.

All of a sudden, the Great Sage’s voice rang out.

“Puṇḍarīka!

“Maitreya!

“Vihārapāla!

“Ādittapariyāya!

“Mañjuśrī!

“The five of you lend me your true energy. We have to pierce through space to kill this brat!”

Unexpectedly, the Great Sage was calling out to five other Great Sages from the Western Continent to ask for help.

Almost immediately, Yang Qi could sense five expressions of will converging on the hand of the Great Sage.

‘Not good! If five Great Sages make a move together, I’ll never make it out of here alive.’ How could he ever have guessed that the Great Sages of the Western Continent would be so shameless as to team up to try to kill him?

“‘This evil creature must not be allowed to escape!” the Great Sage went on to say. “I can sense that he has some spectacular, high-level energy art. Perhaps it's even a heavenly-class energy art from primeval times, something that could help us break through to the Demi-Immortal level. Sages and immortals are vastly different. Breaking through with our measly saintly-class energy arts will be too difficult.”

In response to his words, the five expressions of will began to go all out to build up the power to pierce through space.

‘There’s no time!’ Yang Qi thought, well aware that he was only moments away from death. There was no way he could rely on the God Legion Seal. After all, it had remained silent when he went to repair the damage to heaven, and he had no way of knowing if it would respond to the attacks of these Great Sages. He couldn’t just stake his life on something that sometimes worked and sometimes didn’t.

The hand of the Great Sage began to radiate higher and higher levels of power, to the point where it was starting to affect the time and space around it.

Six enormous sage domains were beginning to take form.

Already, Yang Qi’s momentum was being affected.

As the moments ticked by, six streams of psychic power entered his mind, allowing him to see six mighty individuals, like six gods who could crush heaven and earth beneath their feet. And right now, they were trying to kill him.

However, in the very moment in which death seemed inevitable, a massive force bore down on the area, parting the space-time tempests. It was like an endless black river that had passed by countless continents, greyspaces and wormholes. It was like an interstellar tempest that had showered rage throughout countless star systems.

Yang Qi knew exactly what this black river was. It contained power that surpassed Great Sages and Demi-Immortals. This thing contained the power of hell.

It was a hell monsoon!

Yang Qi instantly realized that he had a perfect opportunity on his hands.

‘Heaven’s helping me! Heaven’s helping me!!’ Holding absolutely nothing back, he headed toward that black river.

However, the hand of the Great Sage didn’t seem to notice, and before it had even reached its peak state of power, it smashed toward Yang Qi.

Six massive bursts of energy propelled the hand as it shot through the void and into the monsoon.

By this point, Yang Qi himself was well inside the hell monsoon.

BOOOOM!

Instantly, devil energy erupted, and a host of fiend-devils surged forth to attack the hand.

There were plenty of powerful experts among this host of fiend-devils, which traveled with the hell monsoon to other planes, hoping to find kingdoms of flesh and blood creatures to invade.

There were even some Half Sage fiend-devils. And thus, the force blasting into this hand of a Great Sage was no small matter.

The Crown Prince was a Half Sage, a state in which heaven motes would already begin to form in the body, and he could already start to form a sage domain.

Beyond the mere levels involved, there were simply too many fiend-devils in the hell monsoon to count.

Almost immediately, the hand of the Great Sage was stained black by the monsoon; the Great Sages powering it were not like Yang Qi, and could experience nothing but death in a place like this.

“Dammit! Who would have thought a hell monsoon would show up!”

The hand destroyed countless fiend-devils as the enormous black river raged through the area.

Unfortunately, hell monsoons were enormous, and could encompass multiple planes. They contained the power of darkness and gloom, against which Great Sages counted as almost nothing. As for Yang Qi, he immediately hid himself. And thus, the hand of the Great Sage was slowly eaten away, and soon vanished.

**

Deep in the Western Continent, in an enormous imperial palace, six furious Great Sages were engaged in a discussion.

“Not even the six of us working together could catch a Legendary level energy warrior? He's an ant! If word got out about this we would lose all face!”

“That evil creature is too shrewd and scheming. We were careless to not have attacked in full force from the beginning. Once that hell monsoon came, it was impossible to keep track of him. Apparently, that brat is the same one who repaired the damage to heaven in the Rich-Lush Continent.”

“Should we go to the Rich-Lush Continent to kill him?”

“We can’t. If we did, the Great Sages there would notice us. According to the long-standing treaty, Great Sages aren’t supposed to go to the other continents. Besides, we probably couldn’t beat their five Great Sages in a fight.”

“How about we send some Half Sages to try to assassinate him!? Spare no cost! Maybe even try to capture his friends and family.”

“That's a good idea. Unfortunately, now that he's lost himself in space-time, it’s not likely that he’ll find a way back.”

“It would be great if the chancellor of the Demi-Immortal Institute left to track him down. That man is too strong for us to deal with.”

“Prepare to send out the orders….”

**

‘I finally shook them!’

A certain Astral-Star bronzeblaze fiend-devil in the hell monsoon actually emanated a bit of Yang Qi’s aura.

After entering the monsoon, Yang Qi had immediately gone into hiding. He had used his Devil-God Seal and Hell Portal to summon a bronzeblaze fiend-devil, and then shrunk the Grand Emperor's Pagoda down small enough to enter the thing's body and rest. The hell monsoon was filled with an enormous army of fiend-devils, zombies, devil-ghosts, skeletons, hellish beasts, devillings, hobgoblins and the like. However, bronzeblaze fiend-devils had the purest hellish blood, and were considered nobility and leaders.

In fact, Yang Qi had learned from the thing that it was leading an army via the hell monsoon to another plane.

This particular bronzeblaze fiend-devil was the subordinate of a Half Sage asura.

Chapter 271: Drift with the Waves, Go with the Flow

The majestic hell monsoon swept along, seemingly without end.

It was impossible to say how many devil-ghosts filled the thing, but they were organized, with generals, commanders, captains, squad leaders, and the like. They were truly an army seeking to invade another plane of existence.

The bronzeblaze fiend-devil that Yang Qi had possessed was one of the leaders, from a higher plane of hell. He commanded an enormous portion of the army that was composed of millions of devil-ghosts.

At the moment, Yang Qi knew that he couldn’t show his face within the hell monsoon. There were Half Sages here and there, and if he revealed himself, he would definitely be in great danger. As the saying went, not even a strong man can fight an entire pack of wolves. He could only wait until the fiend-devils reached another plane. Hopefully, he would be able to enter that plane, and then figure out a way to return home.

Unfortunately, he had no idea where he was, or how far away he was from home.

Hopefully the Grand Emperor's Pagoda would eventually help him to determine the exact location of the Rich-Lush Continent. Despite being very, very far away from home, he could still feel a faint connection to the place. Unfortunately, his cultivation level was too low right now to actually make the journey.

Thankfully, he was very close to the Space-Void Transformation. Once he found a peaceful and quiet place to make his breakthrough, he would have the power to break the fetters of space and the void.

The sagely-grade spirit stone he held in his hand was much smaller than earlier; his flight from the Great Sages had required him to drain much of its power.

‘Ai. The power levels I need right now are ridiculous. If a sagely-grade spirit stone can only get me to the Space-Void Transformation, how am I possibly going to reach the Five-Phases Transformation? Where am I going to get more sovereign- and sagely-grade stones? Don’t tell me I need to go back to the Western Continent again. That doesn’t seem like an option.’

As he sat there in the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, he focused his thoughts on the spatial tempest fays.

At the moment, spatial power lurked inside of him, ready to erupt at a moment's notice.

‘The chase earlier really did unlock a lot of my potential. Unfortunately, it also wasted a lot of time. I need to get home as quickly as possible, and kill the Crown Prince.’

Even just the days he had spent in the Western Continent were worrisome. After all, what would happen if Hua Tianxiong and Young Master Shroud-Heaven attacked the Crown Prince without him? Unless he could personally see the Crown Prince dead, he would never be able to rest at ease.

“You… you actually escaped from Great Sage Pure Emptiness?” the terrified Lady-Princess Silvermoon said. Back when she realized that Yang Qi was tangling with Great Sages, she had been absolutely convinced that Great Sage Pure Emptiness would capture or kill him, and thus, free her.

Instead, Yang Qi escaped to safety, leaving her in complete despair. If Great Sages couldn’t deal with Yang Qi, then who could? As of now, it seemed completely impossible for her to ever win her freedom.

As for the other individuals in the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, the fight between the Great Sages and Yang Qi had been so intense that many of them had collapsed into unconsciousness. Only now were they starting to recover.

Upon clearing his head, Sage Greatmaster said, “Brother Yang Qi, did you really escape? Those were Great Sages! And Great Sage Pure Emptiness, well, he’s completely famous in the Western Continent.”

“Great Sages?” Yang Qi replied coolly. “Ha. Not even they can kill me.”

If he could get these people back to the Rich-Lush Continent, then the stories they would tell would only bolster his reputation. He would become so renowned that not even the Crown Prince would be able to match up to him.

At this point, the bronzeblaze fiend-devil sent a mental message to Yang Qi. ‘Milord, the greyspace of the Quake-Dawn Continent is up ahead. That’s where the hell monsoon is headed. You need to be very careful, sir. The Quake-Dawn Continent has as many experts as the sky has clouds. And they carefully guard the gaps in their greyspace. Once our army arrives, it's going to be a massacre.’

After possessing this fiend-devil, Yang Qi had used the Devil-God Seal and the Hell Portal to thoroughly subjugate it. If he wanted to, he could extract its demon core with a single thought.

Of course, it was all thanks to the spore-devil, and the power of the Nine Stars Pearl Necklace. Otherwise, how could he possibly have subjugated an Astral-Star fiend-devil? It was just shy of being as strong as Hua Tianxiong or Young Master Shroud-Heaven.

‘What? The Quake-Dawn Continent? The hell monsoon is heading there?’ Yang Qi was so surprised that he was trembling.

He had heard of the Quake-Dawn Continent, and knew that it was an important place. It had even been a significant location back in the days of the Yore-Wilds Continent.

It was far larger than the Western Continent or the Rich-Lush Continent, and according to the ancient records, was a location with many powerful energy artists. It was considered a higher plane, while the Rich-Lush Continent was considered a lower plane. The two simply couldn’t be compared to each other.

Ghost Emperor Yama had been imprisoned by experts from that continent, and they had used Quake-Dawn godsteel; and even after all the time which had passed, had still not freed himself. How could Yang Qi have ever guessed that he would be carried by a hell monsoon to the Quake-Dawn Continent, that legendary higher plane of existence?

‘Well, that’s fine. Let’s see what this Quake-Dawn Continent is like. Maybe I can get some spirit stones, or even better, immortal stones. If the Western Continent has immortal stones, then the Quake-Dawn Continent definitely will too.’

Yang Qi simply continued on with the hell monsoon, recovering his energy and seeking cultivation enlightenment. He even secretly observed the powerful fiend-devils around him in the hopes of learning new things.

As he built up Sovereign Lord True Energy, he eventually reached his maximum level, and then began to store some of it in a spell formation in the Grand Emperor's Pagoda.

The pagoda could store many types of true energy in unique dimensions, to the point where Yang Qi could theoretically be able to fill himself all the way up from being empty. Such reserves would be very helpful when he tried to reach the Space-Void Transformation.

Eventually, the Sovereign Lord True Energy in the Grand Emperor's Pagoda was like a roiling ocean.

As the process went on, the sagely-grade spirit stone slowly shrank down and down until it finally vanished.

At that point, Yang Qi opened his Lord's Eye and looked off into the distance, where an enormous sphere could be seen.

It was a planet!

It was enormous, seemingly invincible, with a pulsing aura that would cause anyone who looked at it to tremble inwardly. And that was where the hell monsoon was heading.

The planet had countless clouds on its surface, and was surrounded by glowing light that was none other than its greyspace.

Shockingly, the Quake-Dawn Continent was actually a planet, not a continent with a curved heaven and flat earth.

This was Yang Qi’s first time seeing an intact, planetary world, and he couldn’t suppress the shock that filled his heart. After all, his homeland, the Rich-Lush Continent, was very different from this. It had a curved heaven and flat earth; its lands were like a plate, and its sky was like a bowl covering it over.

‘If a continent is spherical, what about the people on the bottom? Shouldn’t they fall off?’ Numerous questions such as this popped into his mind. However, he remembered reading ancient records that talked about spherical continents, where the spirit energy of heaven and earth flowed in a perfect cycle. Perhaps that had something to do with it. In any case, only places like this could truly be called worlds.

After thinking about it, Yang Qi realized that the Quake-Dawn Continent could probably be called Planet Quake-Dawn. Upon seeing the enormous place, he immediately thought of the maps he had seen of the Rich-Lush Continent.

Compared to this place, his continent was miniscule at best. On the planet that was the Quake-Dawn Continent, it was possible to see all sorts of different colors. That would be because of the various terrain features such as jungles, oceans, mountains, and the like.

As for the mottled lands, any one of them was actually bigger than the Rich-Lush Continent.

The Rich-Lush Continent was like a sesame seed, and the Quake-Dawn Continent was like a watermelon. It was almost impossible to imagine what things would be like there.

Yang Qi wasn’t even near the place, and he could already sense the power and vital energy. The pure energy of this place was called Quake-Dawn Spirit Energy, and it was of vastly higher quality than the vital energy in the Rich-Lush Continent.

It was more like Nine-Yang Immortal Energy, Clear Heaven True Energy or Great Void True Energy.

Considering that the inhabitants of this place could absorb true energy like that, as well as the spirit energy that filled the area, just how strong were they?

No wonder the top experts in his homeland always admired the Quake-Dawn Continent, and longed to go there.

It was the same feeling that people would experience who grew up in a tiny farming village, but dreamed of going to a big city.

As the hell monsoon neared, an aura surged out from the planet which caused the entire monsoon to tremble, revealing the fiend-devils inside.

The fiend-devils immediately began to call out in their language.

“Attack!”

“Conquer Quake-Dawn!”

En masse, they began to charge toward the continent.

Soon, Yang Qi caught sight of the forces of the Quake-Dawn Continent, armor-clad experts who were energy warriors and cultivators, all of them fighting with full force against the fiend-devils.

‘This has nothing to do with me,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘I just need to get into the Quake-Dawn Continent and break through to the Space-Void Transformation.’ With that, he left the fiend-devil he had possessed and used the Grand Emperor's Pagoda to fly toward the Quake-Dawn Continent, as small as a speck of dust.

As he grew closer, the lands, forests, and oceans grew larger and larger in his eyes. He was like a raindrop, falling ever downward.

WHOOSH!

Soon, he was passing through the defensive barriers that protected the continent. Although there were many experts under these skies, Yang Qi didn’t immediately sense the aura of any Great Sage.

And considering he had just escaped from Great Sages, there was no way the Legendaries in the area would notice him.

Before long, the speck of dust that was Yang Qi landed in a forest.

He had finally reached the fabled Quake-Dawn Continent.

Chapter 272: Quake-Dawn Continent

The forest which stretched out around Yang Qi had clearly existed since the most primeval of times. Of course, he didn’t dare to reveal his presence openly. He used the Devil-God Seal to completely conceal his aura. And then he used one of the spell formations in the Grand Emperor's Pagoda to further hide himself.

The spiritual energy that was already pouring into the pagoda left him feeling refreshed and invigorated.

Sage Greatmaster realized what was happening and excitedly said, “I can’t believe we’re in the Quake-Dawn Continent. I've dreamed of this for years. Brother Yang Qi, the spirit energy is incomparably powerful, and can lead to unprecedented cultivation advancement. The essence of the Quake-Dawn Continent surpasses that of the Rich-Lush Continent in every way imaginable. People born here are naturally stronger, and have better meridians that never get clogged up.”

“Oh really?” Yang Qi said. “Well in that case, I’ll open up the pagoda and allow the energy to flow in for you to use in your cultivation. However, don’t do anything to attract outside attention or reveal our presence. Maybe after I have the chance to look around and make sure we’re safe, I’ll release you into the open. And I’ll also start thinking of a way to get home.”

“Of course. We’ll do whatever you say, Brother Yang Qi.”

The Quake-Dawn Spirit Energy that filled this heaven and earth was particularly wonderful. Upon inhaling it, it would cleanse the fleshly body, and extrude impurities. It also contained some of the aura of the primeval Yore-Wilds Continent, which inherently enabled those who absorbed it to become stronger.

‘Oh boy, there are so many spirit plants here.’

There was a beautiful waterfall off in the distance which was surrounded by vibrant greenery, including numerous tufts of dragonwhisker herb, a type of spirit plant that was considered extinct on the Rich-Lush Continent. Even more shocking, the energy flows which emanated off the dragonwhisker herbs would take physical shape, becoming child-like entities with draconic horns on their heads, who would frolic and play in the pool beneath the waterfall.

For spirit plants to naturally create nascent divinities was an amazing thing. Again, it begged the question of how strong people from these lands could be.

After all, dragonwhisker herb could be used to develop dragon power, and transform a person on a fundamental level, including adding to their longevity.

In fact, a Master of Energy who consumed a medicinal pill made from it could almost immediately reach the Lifeseizing level. If something like that appeared in the Rich-Lush Continent, or even the Western Continent, people would fight viciously to get their hands on it.

However, after some thought, Yang Qi decided against trying to harvest it.

After all, the little dragon people who were playing in the water actually looked like living, breathing children. They clearly had thoughts, and were alive, and to harvest them for human consumption seemed wrong. Slaughtering fiend-devils to make the world a safer place was fine, but harming defenseless living beings was simply out of the question.

With that, Yang Qi began to explore the area, hoping to determine whether or not it was safe, and whether or not any powerful groups of humans were in the area. If not, he would set up a spell formation to help in his effort to reach the Space-Void Transformation.

If there were people, then he would wait a bit before deciding what to do next.

He even attempted to send a psychic tempest out to check the space-time in the area, only to find that it was particularly difficult. Apparently, it was because the space-time on the Quake-Dawn Continent was particularly stable.

This continent was more of a complete world than the Rich-Lush Continent, and therefore, it was little surprise that this was the case. Opening spatial rifts here would require a lot more energy, or in some cases, would simply be impossible.

Actually, Space-Void Legendaries from the Rich-Lush Continent would be incapable of opening rifts in space here. They would need to practice their cultivation for many years here, perhaps dozens or even a hundred, before they could become strong enough to do so.

Space in the Rich-Lush Continent was like a piece of paper that could be poked through with relative ease. In contrast, the space in this place was like a steel casing.

WHOOOOOSH….

Even as Yang Qi observed the world around him, a burst of devil energy descended from above, the aura of a bronzeblaze fiend-devil that seemed intent on burning the entire forest to the ground.

Obviously, it was a fiend-devil from the hell monsoon.

However, in hot pursuit of the fiend-devils were two powerful auras. Within moments, the pursuers were fighting the fiend-devils on a nearby mountain peak.

Yang Qi could see that the fiend-devil was in the sixth Legendary transformation, which meant that he could crush it with ease if he needed to. However, to many others of a similar level to him, even energy arts cultivators from the Quake-Dawn Continent, they were like things out of a nightmare.

The Quake-Dawn Continent was considered a higher plane, but whatever hell this thing came from was an even higher plane than that. Besides, bronzeblaze fiend-devils were inherently tougher than the average monster. If Yang Qi’s technique wasn’t specifically designed to deal with things like them, he wouldn’t have such an easy time.

The two energy artists fighting the fiend-devil were a man and a woman, both of them in the sixth Legendary transformation, with their personal domains unleashed to full effect to corner the fiend-devil.

The fiend-devil roared and unleashed a blaze of fire that turned into a spiralled spike that shot toward the man and the woman.

Shockingly, they directly blocked the attack. Back in the Rich-Lush Continent, three or four Personal-Domain Legendaries wouldn’t have been able to do such a thing. In fact, it would likely have taken a Ghost-God Legendary to fight a fiend-devil of this level.

Suddenly, the pair unleashed a consummate sword move.

“One Sword to Execute Ghost-Gods, Two Swords to Harmonize with Heaven and Earth….”

Each of them summoned an enormous, divine sword, the two of which merged together into a devastating attack.

The combined sword move slashed into the bronzeblaze fiend-devil’s personal domain, and then sliced the thing in two, instantly ending its life.

The gigantic beast fell out of the sky and landed into a river below, which began to steam violently as a result.

Even in death, a bronzeblaze fiend-devil was powerful enough to pollute the world around it with darkness and gloom.

However, the man and the woman were aware of this, and quickly sent down some true energy in the form of a huge net. Scooping up the corpse, they deposited it into a dimensional sack.

Afterward, they settled down onto the mountain peak to catch their breath.

As for Yang Qi, he crept forward stealthily, hoping to overhear some of their conversation, and maybe get some news in the process.

“Elder Brother Luo,” the young woman said, “these swords that master gave us really do eat up true energy. That combined move we just used drained me by about fifty percent. It’s powerful, but hard to control.” She sighed.

“Don’t worry about it for now,” Elder Brother Luo replied. “Once we break through to the seventh Legendary transformation, we’ll be able to control the swords more easily. At that point, we’ll be strong enough to travel anywhere in these lands. The body of this bronzeblaze fiend-devil is worth a lot. We can use its demon core, and even its body, as materials to create a powerful spell formation. And then we can sell it for a handsome profit.”

“Why do you think that hell monsoon targeted the Quake-Dawn Continent? The Quake-Dawn Cathedral knows of the matter, and called upon all of the three thousand daoist sects and hundred thousand smaller factions to defend against the invading fiend-devils.”

“I think it has something to do with one of the minor planes. Junior Sister, have you heard of the Rich-Lush Continent?”

“Rich-Lush Continent?” the young woman replied, her brow furrowing. “I think I've heard of it. It’s a really small plane right, or rather, half a plane? Like a tiny province here in the Quake-Dawn Continent. In fact, even a single one of the hundred thousand smaller factions probably has more territory than that entire plane. What could a teeny place like that have to do with these fiend-devils?”

“Seems there’s a few things you don’t know about, Junior Sister. Although the Rich-Lush Continent is indeed a half-plane, it’s actually a very important place. It’s like a springboard into space-time. In the ancient era, a group of Great Sages created a mysterious sealing mark there, and according to the stories I've heard, there’s even a fragment of the Yore-Wilds’ Heart there. Get that fragment, and you can learn secrets of the path to immortality, in other words, the Demi-Immortal level.” This Elder Brother Luo seemed to be very interested in showing off what he knew. “Furthermore, I also heard rumors of something that happened years ago, something few people know about. Did you know that the Holy Daughter of our most revered Quake-Dawn Cathedral actually traveled to the Rich-Lush Continent? The official word was that she went to look for the Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragment. However, according to what I heard, the real reason is that she was hit by a falling star from a higher plane. Later, she gave birth to a son, which was how a god from heaven descended into the mortal world.”

“What?” the young woman blurted. “Elder Brother Luo, how did you possibly learn about secrets like that? If people from the Quake-Dawn Cathedral found out, we’d most likely be killed.”

“Ah, it's not a big deal. You know the old saying, paper can’t be used to conceal a fire. The truth is going to come out eventually. The higher-ups are already whispering about it, so there’s no way the Quake-Dawn Cathedral can suppress the rumors now. In fact, one of the leaders of our Yayoi Association told me that the Holy Daughter is already back. Apparently, the overseers in the Quake-Dawn Cathedral didn’t believe her story of being magically impregnated, and even accused her of having an affair. They also sent three Great Sages to the Rich-Lush Continent to investigate the matter, and arrest the perpetrator. However, that was when the strangest thing happened.”

“Something strange happened? What exactly?”

“Those three Great Sages were killed by some mysterious individual! Even their souls were destroyed. It was a big shock to the Quake-Dawn Cathedral, and even some of their supreme chief elders came out of meditation because of it. However, in the end, no one could figure out what happened. And that's why the Quake-Dawn Cathedral is planning to send more people to the Rich-Lush Continent. In fact, our Yayoi Association is trying to decide whether or not to open a wormhole to the vicinity of the Rich-Lush Continent, to send some of our disciples there. The main reason is to find that fragment of the Yore-Wilds’ Heart, but the secondary reason is to see what this supposed son of the Holy Daughter is like, and to find out whether he’s really a god from heaven descended into the mortal world.”

Chapter 273: Secrets of the Crown Prince

The conversation between these two disciples from the so-called Yayoi Association had already provided Yang Qi with an abundance of new information. For one thing, he learned that the Holy Daughter of the Quake-Dawn Cathedral had given birth to a son who was said to be a god from heaven descended into the mortal world. Back in the Rich-Lush Continent, people said the exact same thing about the Crown Prince.

Then, he learned that three Great Sages had been sent to the Rich-Lush Continent to investigate, only to be killed by a mysterious figure from there. It seemed highly likely that the mysterious person in question was the chancellor of the Demi-Immortal Institute.

Yang Qi was well aware of how the man had always been a staunch protector of the Crown Prince. And he had learned from Hua Tianxiong that the chancellor had some sort of relationship with the Crown Prince’s mother. Of course, the Crown Prince was not the chancellor’s son, he really was some sort of “god from heaven descended into the mortal world”. There was no question about that. And now, it was clear that he was deeply connected to the Quake-Dawn Continent.

Yang Qi had also learned other information. For instance, the Quake-Dawn Continent had three thousand daoist sects, and a hundred thousand smaller factions. They had more cultivators than an ox had hairs, and even a mere province in these lands was larger than the Rich-Lush Continent.

But then they had mentioned this Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragment, and how the Rich-Lush Continent was some sort of springboard, a teleportation portal of some sort. In the end, it seemed that many people out there were interested in profiting from the Rich-Lush Continent.

And if the people from this Yayoi Association were going to open a space-time wormhole to the Rich-Lush Continent, then that might be his ticket home.

Other than that, he had no idea how he could possibly get back to the Rich-Lush Continent.

The Quake-Dawn Continent might be a nice place, but it wasn’t home. His family and sworn siblings were all back in the Rich-Lush Continent.

One day in the future, after he killed the Crown Prince and Yun Hailan, and made sure his friends and family were all safe, he planned to go to the Hanging Mountain to find his mother, and ask her about his origins. Perhaps at that time he would go on to travel to higher planes such as the Quake-Dawn Continent, to seek information about the secrets of the universe. But at the moment, he was itching to get back to where he came from.

“So, what do we do now, Elder Brother Luo? Head back up to hunt for more fiend-devils?”

“Exactly. There have to be more stragglers out there. The more we kill, the greater our reward will be, and the better we’ll be able to further our cultivation.”

At this point, the young woman looked around and realized where she was. “You know, Elder Brother, we’re in the Spirit Origin Mountains right now. There are a lot of rare spirit plants here, and I've even heard that there are subterranean spirit lodes filled with endless reserves of spirit power. Maybe we should search around for some things like that.”

“If you want to, sure. The Spirit Origin Mountains are in the territory of the Spirit Origin Association. They have a lot of subterranean energy, and great feng shui as well. Life abounds here, although, for some reason, the Spirit Origin Association has never started mining operations here. In any case, there are definitely some rich spirit lodes here.”

“Maybe it’s because if they started mining, it could cause spirit energy leakage. And if they mined all the spirit energy, the mountains would turn into a wasteland. From what I've heard, the Spirit Origin Association has been focusing on buying spirit stones and storing them to eventually produce an immortal realm here. I’d say it won’t be long before they actually put their plan into action in these mountains. You know, helping ourselves to their resources probably wouldn’t be appropriate.”

“I think you’re right. Come on, let’s go.” With that, the two of them flew up into the sky to start hunting for more fiend-devils. Considering they were both Personal-Domain Legendaries, they could go past the greyspace of the world they lived in, although they couldn’t stay outside for too long without risking death.

After hearing their words, Yang Qi looked down at the ground, a bit surprised. He had sensed that there was something special to these lands, and now he realized the situation was more complicated than he had realized. Apparently, he was in the territory of some powerful organization, and there were spirit lodes in the ground beneath him, which were perfect for cultivation.

Opening his Lord's Eye, he looked around more closely.

The mountains towered high into the sky, and looked like growling dragons, worshipping tigers, singing birds, and turtles carrying immortals. It truly looked like a pure land of immortals, and at the same time, a place of pristine natural beauty.

It was obvious that there were no human inhabitants, making Yang Qi wonder if the place were some sort of restricted area.

In fact, he didn’t even see any signs of this Spirit Origin Association. One would think that a daoist sect or religion in this place would be huge, at least the size of the Demi-Immortal Institute. The headquarters of such a place would surely be bustling with people, and yet, Yang Qi didn’t see anyone nearby.

It seemed likely that the Spirit Origin Association’s headquarters was hidden in another aspect of the void, in a place where people couldn’t detect its location. Worse, Yang Qi felt a lot of pressure here in the Quake-Dawn Continent, and could tell that he was not as strong as before.

Although his cultivation level was somewhat low, his fighting ability was particularly high. However, he still lacked enlightenment, especially when it came to celestial phenomena.

Looking down into the ground, he saw immense universal power simmering there in numerous spirit stone veins.

‘Seems like a good opportunity for me. I think I’ll slip into one of those spirit stone veins and work on my cultivation. Maybe I can reach the Space-Void Transformation.’ Although he knew this was the territory of the Spirit Origin Association, he didn't see anyone else present. And based on the conversation he had just heard, he was fairly certain this was an out-of-the-way place. If it weren’t, then why didn't anyone come out when a bronzeblaze fiend-devil showed up?

Although the subterranean spirit stone veins weren’t particularly high level, it would still be beneficial to work on his cultivation there.

However, there was always the possibility that he would be noticed by some expert. Setting up the proper spell formation would help, although, that was no promise of safety. After all, breakthroughs in the Legendary level could provoke reactions from magical law, and cause very noticeable things to happen in heaven and earth. And if some powerful expert came along who realized who and what Yang Qi was, he would definitely be in great danger.

Most of the time, when Legendary experts attempted breakthroughs, their master or sect would watch over them. Having a dharmic guard could protect against outsiders, but Yang Qi would be doing it completely alone, and would be particularly vulnerable. Unfortunately, there was little he could do about the situation. Obviously, he didn't trust the chancellor any more than the Crown Prince did, and therefore, wouldn’t risk attempting a breakthrough in the Demi-Immortal Institute.

‘Ah, whatever. I’ll just set up the spell formation and try to extract some of the spirit energy from underground. If a dangerous situation arrives, I can always use the formation to lock down the vital energy in the area and attempt the breakthrough later.’

He spent some time searching through the mountains until he found a suitable location, a lake with a spirit cave located atop a sizeable vein of spirit stones. There was a considerable energy buildup in the area, to the point where the fish swimming in the pond had large demon cores.

Yang Qi set up the spell formation, locking down everything for dozens of kilometers in every direction. Then he waved his hand, parting the waters of the lake and revealing the lake floor beneath. Sending out a stream of true energy, he hewed out a hole, and then sent the energy down into the ground. Eventually, he found the origin of the lake, after which, his true energy vibrated as it hit something solid.

Using his true energy like a fishing line, he dragged up a raw, uncut spirit stone.

It was fist-sized and irregularly shaped, but contained such power that it was obviously a royal-grade stone.

Clearly, he was above a vein of royal-grade spirit stone, which would be very useful to most Legendaries. To Yang Qi, it wasn’t particularly amazing, but something was better than nothing.

Besides, it seemed likely that a vein of imperial-grade spirit stone would have been highly guarded, not just sitting out in the open where anyone could take it.

‘This seems like as good a place as any. Besides, I have plenty of true energy reserves built up.’ With that, he placed some demon cores into the spell formation he had set up, then activated it with his true energy.

From a distance, the area would seem completely still and undisturbed.

However, it was now a location of hidden danger.

Also noteworthy was that after absorbing the spirit energy of the Quake-Dawn Continent, the emperor embryo in the Grand Emperor's Pagoda had grown, and had begun to twitch and move as though it might transform. It seemed like the Grand Emperor's Pagoda wanted to expand its territory yet again, and conquer this new continent it had encountered.

‘You want to wage war on the Quake-Dawn Continent?’ Yang Qi thought with a wry smile. ‘I don’t think that would be possible even if I were a Great Sage.’

Ignoring the pagoda, Yang Qi used his divine will to prepare his soul, then sat down cross-legged next to the lake. Combining his soul and body, he prepared to step to a higher level, and focused his thoughts.

Seemingly endless spatial power began to form around him, and more spatial tempest fays came into being, covering him, entering his blood, and eventually causing a black hole to spring into existence, which sucked in the vital energy in the area.

This was the beginning of the Space-Void Transformation, in which Yang Qi adjusted his soul and body to a precise level. Afterward, he would be able to unleash the technique to open rifts in space.

“The Void is Boundless, People are Boundless….” He began to mutter mnemonics from the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, causing the spatial tempest fays to scatter. However, the spell formation he had created suppressed them, and then, the space in the area began to rip and tear as white holes popped into existence.

White holes were the exact opposite of black holes.

The black hole he had created was gobbling up the vital energy in the area, but the white holes were an expression of tribulation, and spat out countless deadly attacks against him.

Already, his attempt to reach the Space-Void Transformation was meeting resistance.

BOOOOOOOM!

A tiny speck of divine lightning appeared, and then slammed into him with the force of a mountain. Heaven-shaking, earth-shattering rumbling sounds filled the area, and were it not for the spell formation he had created, would have echoed out for experts thousands of kilometers away to hear.

This was none other than Space-Void Godlightning, each tiny manifestation of which was capable of destroying mountains, diverting rivers, slaughtering armies, and drying up lakes and seas.

The fluctuations which were rolling out would actually destroy any personal domain they touched, and exterminate even a Personal-Domain Legendary. Any energy arts cultivator who saw what was happening would be terror-stricken.

Chapter 274: Reaching the Third Transformation

Before, Yang Qi hadn’t felt very confident at all in achieving his breakthrough into the third Legendary transformation. But after the incident when the Great Sages stimulated his potential, and he formed the elemental fays, things changed. Plus, with the true energy he had converted from the sagely-grade spirit stone, he was now more prepared than ever.

No longer did he face any fear-inspiring obstacles in reaching the Space-Void Transformation, but instead, brimmed with confidence.

Without the incident with the Great Sages, he would likely have been forced to practice cultivation for dozens of years, perhaps even a hundred, before reaching this point.

The spatial white holes hovered above him, belching out Space-Void Godlightning, each manifestation of which could destroy mountains or rivers, and even kill ghosts or gods.

It didn’t matter what type of personal domain was hit by that tribulation, it would be destroyed in an instant.

It was said that only Great Sages who spent long periods of time in the void could eventually form bolts of godlightning like this, which they would then bestow upon their apprentices.

Such apprentices would view such a thing as the most precious of treasures, something that they could use in a moment of desperation to kill an enemy.

And yet now, countless bolts of Space-Void Godlightning filled the area. It was really a very dangerous situation. In fact, even Ghost-God Legendaries or Astral-Star Legendaries would be injured by such lightning. But now, Yang Qi was facing hundreds of billions of bolts.

However, he didn’t seem fazed at all, and actually, each bolt that struck him provided new enlightenment into space, and magical law.

BOOOOM!

The Grand Emperor's Pagoda shook violently, much to the alarm of everyone inside.

Lady-Princess Silvermoon almost couldn’t believe what she was seeing, and wondered if she were hallucinating. “Space-Void Godlightning? And there’s so much of it! What’s going on? Has the lightning gotten weaker recently or something?”

Yang Qi wasn’t paying any attention to the reactions from the onlookers. He unleashed his true energy, causing the image of a godmammoth to appear, whose trunk rapidly sucked in all of the external true energy. Destructive power filled Yang Qi’s meridians, blood vessels, internal organs, and sea of energy, and instantly, his entire body was thrown into a state of primal-chaos.

However, he wasn’t worried at all, and simply went about reconstructing himself anew, expanding the dimensional aspects of his body.

The previous dimensions had been formed because of the technique that he cultivated. But this time, he was gaining spatial enlightenment, and being born again. Now, the dimension in his sea of energy bore his own personal mark, and his meridians were almost like space-time wormholes, twisting and writhing like blood dragons.

Soon, a huge vortex appeared in his sea of energy, which absorbed the spirit energy flowing into him and turned it into Sovereign Lord True Energy and universal power. The spirit energy kept erupting from the depths of the ground.

“Grand Emperor’s Pagoda!” Yang Qi suddenly opened one of the doors of the pagoda, causing a stream of liquid Sovereign Lord True Energy to pour from it into him, aiding in the reforming of his body.

Yet again, he was transforming on the most fundamental level.

Pop!

It was in that very moment that an enormous axe popped out of a white hole. It was fully three hundred meters from end to end, and was the type that could slaughter dragons and cause space to undulate around it. It was a primeval weapon formed from the very power of space, and without the slightest pause, it chopped down toward Yang Qi.

“World-Splitting Axe…” Lady-Princess Silvermoon breathed. “It's a tribulation that only forms when the fluctuations of space reach a peak level of intensity. What could possibly come after this?”

Yang Qi reached up and grabbed the blade of the World-Splitting Axe, instantly stopping its momentum. Then, he rotated his hand, and the axe exploded, letting out an energy blast that he absorbed without hesitation.

Next to emerge was a heavenly sword, like a flying immortal from beyond the heavens, which stabbed toward him, radiating dazzling light.

Bam!

He grabbed the sword between two fingers, and then twisted them, snapping the sword in half.

Next, the white holes began to send out even more weapons, such as sabers, lances, spears, truncheons, whips, and the like. They were all formed from the magical laws of space, and seemed capable of reducing anyone other than a Never-Dying Legendary to a corpse.

And yet, Yang Qi vanquished each and every one.

In the end, a mirror shot out, which hung there in the sky, shining with the power of millions of suns and moons. The air ignited into flame as the light shone down onto Yang Qi, making the entire area a sea of fire.

“Flame Mirror of the Void. This level of tribulation usually shows up when Great Sages form their sage domain.” Lady-Princess Silvermoon finally covered her eyes with her hands, overwhelmed with terror at the fact that, if the mirror killed Yang Qi, she would also die.

However, Yang Qi simply leaped into the air and leveled a fist strike at it.

After hitting it once, he struck again and again, causing cracks to spread out over the surface of the mirror. Flames covered him, and yet they didn't hurt him at all. In fact, they felt somewhat pleasant.

Finally, the Flame Mirror of the Void shattered, and Yang Qi absorbed all the fire, causing the porcelain aspects of his body to emit brilliant shafts of light, each of which contained images of primeval godmammoths.

‘Perfect….’

Thanks to this baptism of tribulation, Yang Qi could sense that his soul and his body were reaching an extremely high level.

Suddenly, he sprang into motion, following a prescribed route through the spell formation he had set up, moving faster and faster with each moment that passed.

As he moved, his Angel Wings appeared behind him. Instead of being dozens of kilometers wide, which they could be, they were shrunk down to only a few meters long. However, the speed and power they could generate was no less because of it.

Soon, he was a streak of blurred light that closed in on the white holes, and then struck them.

In order to destroy the white holes, he had to pierce through space; they fought back with the magical laws of space, so if he could destroy them, it would prove he was in the Space-Void Transformation.

BOOM!

He smashed into one of the white holes, which shrank down and began to tremble.

Yang Qi was a blur that smashed into countless white holes, all of which began to shrink down and tremble like they might explode at any moment.

However, that was when something completely unexpected happened.

Countless magical laws of space reacted, causing intense rumbling sounds to fill the area as all of the white holes converged on each other, transforming into an enormous door.

It was transparent, almost like it was made from crystal, and was fully three thousand meters tall, reaching high into the clouds. However, it was very stable, and Yang Qi’s subsequent fist strikes didn’t seem capable of doing anything against it.

It was none other than a Space Portal!

“When I reached the Space-Void Transformation,” Lady-Princess Silvermoon blurted, “the Space Portal was only as tall as me! His is… three thousand meters tall? How… how is that even possible? And I'm considered a top genius in the Western Continent!”

RUUUUMBLE!RUUUUMBLE!

Yang Qi continued to strike the portal over and over again, and eventually it began to tremble. However, it remained tightly closed.

This was the final obstacle thrown up by the magical laws of space.

If Yang Qi could open the door, he would be enlightened regarding the profound secrets of spatial magical law.

However, if he failed, it would mean he had reached the end of his life.

Although he was completely exhausted, he had plenty of true energy stored in the Grand Emperor's Pagoda to help him push forward.

“Godmammoths can open the way to hell. What is this puny Space Portal going to do!?” Bellowing from the effort, Yang Qi let loose a blur of fist strikes, causing booming sounds to echo out that were reminiscent of the stampeding of megamammoths.

The Space Portal was being beaten like a heavenly drum, and the fluctuations that rolled off of it caused any water it touched to evaporate.

Crack!

Yang Qi’s spell formation began to tremble, damaged by the Space Portal and already on the verge of breaking.

There was no time for him to try to shore it up. He had to open this portal and step into the Space-Void Transformation, otherwise, the portal would vanish, and he would be finished.

Every moment he had to strike at it was vitally important.

‘Let the infernal deities come forth from hell….’ The Infernal Deity Spear appeared in his hand, which he stabbed toward the portal. He also opened the Lord's Eye, sending dazzling light onto it, like a river of brightness that could overwhelm the mortal world.

BOOOOM!

The spell formation couldn't conceal the fluctuations any longer, and they began to leak out into the world around it, destroying much of the forest, and even toppling mountains.

At long last, the silence of the distant mountains had been broken, and nearby experts noticed that something unusual was happening….

Chapter 275: Experts Gather

‘Damnation. With the spell formation broken, nearby experts are definitely going to notice what's happening.’ Although Yang Qi was frustrated, there was nothing he could do about what had happened.

Taking a deep breath, he began to strike the portal even more quickly than before.

He used every imaginable martial discipline, and held nothing back in terms of true energy. As he did, signs of damage finally appeared on the surface of the Space Portal.

However, as the old saying went, a centipede does not stop wriggling even after being stomped on. From within the depths of the portal, spatial power seeped out in an attempt to repair the damage.

It even sent stifling pressure down onto Yang Qi.

It seemed to be fighting directly against his soul, to the point where, even if he opened the portal and survived, it would still do everything possible to hurt him.

Of course, that was only natural. When a Legendary tackled a higher level, they needed to go all out and never shrink back. If they succumbed to the backlash from magical law, they would either be injured so badly they could never achieve their breakthrough, or they would be killed, and their spiritual and physical souls would disperse.

WOOOOSH!

As Yang Qi intensified his efforts, shadowy figures could be seen flying into the area and looking down at the enormous Space Portal, all of them clad in yellow garments.

All of them picked places that were safe from the spatial fluctuations, and some even used magical treasures to summon true energy shields of protection. As they settled down onto mountain peaks in the area and saw what was happening, their expressions flickered dramatically.

“That Space Portal is huge!”

“Someone is gaining enlightenment of the third Legendary transformation!”

“Even when I broke into the sixth transformation, I didn’t provoke such a reaction from the magical laws of space.” The highest ranking member of this newly arrived group was a Personal-Domain Legendary, but even he was shocked by what he was seeing.

“When I broke into the Space-Void Transformation, my Space Portal was about as tall as myself, but even then, I wasn't able to open it. I had to use that Space Piercing Immortal Pill to do it.”

“What do we do?” another of the experts said. “These Spirit Origin Mountains are ours, but here’s some outsider experiencing tribulation as he tries to achieve a breakthrough. Should we capture him? Hand him over to the grand elders of law enforcement? Or should we just kill him on the spot?”

“Hold on,” the leader said. “It’s not like we can attack him now. You’re going to walk into the middle of that tribulation? With spatial tempests like that, not even my personal domain would protect me. Let’s wait until the Elder Brothers arrive, then we can decide what to do.”

Before long, more waves of power filled the mountains as additional forces arrived. The highest ranking person among them was a young man in a golden crown and robe, whose eyes radiated golden light. Although he held no weapon in his hand, his aura revealed him to be a Never-Dying Legendary.

Behind him were three other experts, one of them an Astral-Star Legendary, the other two in the Ghost-God Transformation. From the high and mighty way they carried themselves, it was obvious that they believed themselves to be superior to everyone present.

“What’s going on here?” asked the young man in gold.

“Elder Brother, someone is borrowing the power of our spirit lodes to achieve a breakthrough right here in Spirit Origin Association territory. Sir, look at that Space Portal. It’s huge! You can tell that this person doesn’t have a very high cultivation base, and yet look at how shocking the tribulation is. He must be someone important.”

“Space Portal….” The young man in gold licked his lips, and his gaze turned sharp. “It is big. I wonder how strong this guy will be if he breaks through. Even the successive patriarchs of our Spirit Origin Association never had Space Portals this large during their breakthroughs.”

“What are your orders, Elder Brother? What do we do?”

“It doesn’t matter what happens, we have to take him captive. He’s trying to break through in our territory, and is using our spirit lodes. That’s a big crime, something he can’t explain away no matter where he's from.” Deep within this young man’s eyes was a trace of jealousy and greed.

Any observant person would be able to tell that Yang Qi was not a person to be easily trifled with. However, that meant that he most likely had very valuable loot on him.

Although this young man in gold was an arrogant fellow, how could he not feel jealousy upon meeting someone stronger than him?

“Alright, we're going to take him captive right now,” the young man said. “Activate the spell formation, and I’ll personally break through the spatial tempests. He’s a mere Spirit-Soul Legendary, so I don't have anything to fear from him.”

Before anyone could do anything, Yang Qi’s voice echoed out from within the spatial tempests. “Ladies and gentlemen, please, hold on a moment! I can compensate you for the spirit energy I used for my breakthrough. Here, I got these demon cores from fiend-devils I killed out in the void. This should make up for your losses. After I achieve my breakthrough, I promise to owe your Spirit Origin Association a favor!”

With that, six demon cores flew out of the spatial tempests.

Several of the nearby experts reached out to grab the demon cores, which pulsed with burning auras. Strictly speaking, these were actually devil cores from the bronzeblaze fiend-devil’s Yang Qi had killed.

“Incredible!” one of the Ghost-God Legendaries said as he realized that it was a devil core from an Astral-Star bronzeblaze fiend-devil.

“Bronzeblaze fiend-devils have particularly strong life force!” one of the Ghost-God Legendaries said. “Even if we dispatched two or three experts of the same level, they still wouldn’t be able to kill a fiend-devil like that. And this guy says he killed them and took their devil cores? No way! In any case, these are definitely valuable enough to make up for the damage to the spirit lodes. Elder Brother, what do you think? This guy doesn’t bear us any ill will, and he even took the initiative to offer compensation. He also says that he’ll owe us a favor. I’d say that's enough to establish his sincerity. Wouldn’t it be a bit overbearing to attack him now?”

The young man in gold looked down at Yang Qi with bare killing intent. “Ah, what are you scared of? He’s just afraid of us! He's obviously the kind of person who likes to defy the law, and now he’s trying to buy time so that he can break open the Space Portal. Look, I don’t care what he said. We can’t let him succeed. Everybody, attack him now and make sure he fails!”

In the blink of an eye, an enormous, golden swordbreaker appeared in the young man’s hand, which shone with dazzling golden light. It emitted a drone that sounded like the rumbling of volcanoes, and emanated fluctuations that seemed capable of destroying the sky.

“Elder Brother!” one of the Astral-Star Legendaries said. “You’re going to use the Heaven-Dominating Golden Swordbreaker?! Are you trying to kill him? This is bad! What happens if he’s somebody important? There’s a hell monsoon out there, and countless experts of the Quake-Dawn Continent are outside fighting. What if this guy is a genius from some powerful sect who got wounded in the fighting? If we kill him, couldn’t it cause a big disaster?”

“It doesn’t matter. Whatever downsides there are to killing him, the upsides will outweigh them.” Burning killing intent erupted from the young man's eyes as he prepared to enter the spatial tempests and kill Yang Qi.

His golden swordbreaker was a powerful magical treasure from primeval times, something similar to the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, and thus, he felt completely confident in being able to come out on top.

Just as the young man was about to attack, a voice could be heard from off in the distance as more experts arrived.

“Stay your hand!” said a young man in a long blue robe, who emanated the fluctuations of the Never-Dying Transformation. “Jin Zhenyun! Stop causing trouble. He’s no enemy; he’s already made it clear he has good intentions. There’s no place for you to be so unforgiving here. Our Spirit Origin Association is one of the three thousand righteous and orthodox daoist sects. We don't do things like this. Besides, if word got out, it would be very damaging to our reputation.”

“This is my business, Lan Tianbo. What right do you have to interfere? Nobody can tell me what to do! Who do you think you are? A Half Sage? A Great Sage? Even if you were a Half Sage, you still wouldn't qualify to boss me around. I only give face to Great Sages!”

Flying forward to block Jin Zhenyun’s path to Yang Qi, Lan Tianbo said, “Regardless, taking advantage of someone in a moment of danger, especially one who has shown us good will, violates the spirit of the rules of our Spirit Origin Association!”

Both of them looked at each other and snorted coldly.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi's assault on the Space Portal grew more intense. Each of his blows was backed by the power of three hundred thousand ancient megamammoths, making him like the incarnation of a god-spirit, capable of shaking the starry sky and causing the sun and moon to tremble.

The power of the Space Portal was waning, and more cracks were spreading out over its surface. Everyone present could see that it was almost done for.

The power of the spatial tempests in the area swept back and forth, destroying the local terrain.

“Back up!” someone shouted. Many of the experts did just that. However, the low-ranking leader, the Personal-Domain Legendary, apparently wanted to use the power of his personal domain to try to advance. Unfortunately, he ended up being struck by a bolt of lightning, causing him to cough up blood.

Falling back, he pulled out a handful of medicinal pills, which he swallowed. “Not even my personal domain can deal with the fluctuations of that Space Portal. If he succeeds, how powerful will he be? He’s not human! He’s even stronger than a bronzeblaze fiend-devil! His substructure surpasses anything from the Quake-Dawn Continent. In fact, I don’t think higher planes like the Dragon-Snake Continent have people this strong.”

Everyone was completely surprised by what they were seeing.

It was in that moment that Jin Zhenyun hefted his Heaven-Dominating Golden Swordbreaker and dodged past Lan Tianbo. Golden light spilled out from the swordbreaker, parting the spatial tempests to allow him to blur toward Yang Qi. As he closed in, he sent his swordbreaker flying toward Yang Qi’s head with the force to shatter mountains.

“Die!”

Chapter 276: Breaking Open the Door

The Heaven-Dominating Golden Swordbreaker was so incredibly mighty that no tempest could possibly pose a problem for it. In fact, it seemed powerful enough to smash planets into bits. The entire area was now bathed in golden light as the Never-Dying Legendary Jin Zhenyun attacked with deadly force, drawing upon never-dying magical law to leave Yang Qi with no avenue of escape.

His jealousy and greed were pushing him into the depths of killing intent.

“Wait, don’t—” Lan Tianbo shouted. He was joined by other experts, and yet, all of them were too late. The Heaven-Dominating Golden Swordbreaker was a primeval precious treasure, and not even Half Sages could escape it once it was unleashed.

“Prepare to die, freakish hellion!” shrieked Jin Zhenyun.

Yang Qi was in the middle of attacking the Space Portal, and had no time to focus his concentration on anything else. If the blow landed, it seemed a foregone conclusion that he would be crushed to pieces.

And yet, when the Heaven-Dominating Golden Swordbreaker was only about nine meters from Yang Qi’s head, it was blocked by an enormous bronze pagoda. The swordbreaker hit it, and a sonorous boom echoed out.

“A primeval defensive treasure?” Jin Zhenyun blurted. Then, his expression turned even fiercer as he raised his Heaven-Dominating Golden Swordbreaker overhead and prepared to strike with even more unprecedented force.

“Heaven-Dominating Strike!” he shouted. Instantly, the swordbreaker began to glow with even more intense golden light than before, and he swung it down in what seemed like a completely unblockable move.

Snap!

The Heaven-Dominating Golden Swordbreaker smashed its way through the pagoda, and then closed in on Yang Qi’s head.

‘He's finished….’ That is what everyone was thinking. Now they could do nothing other than wait for Yang Qi to be reduced to a bloody pulp.

However, when the swordbreaker landed, it did not smash his head like a watermelon.

In fact, Yang Qi actually rose to his feet, his robe rippling around him.

He no longer wore the Infernal Deity Plate Armor, but instead, a corporeal manifestation of true energy that was a robe, the same robe that would be seen worn by the legion of gods.

As he stood there, a golden river of true energy poured into him from the swordbreaker, filling his meridians and sea of energy in an attempt to destroy him.

But then, a tremor passed through him, taking all of that energy and converging it in his fist. His next fist strike was powerful enough to shake the sky, to destroy suns and moons, to cause planets to fall, and to shatter the void.

The enormous Space Portal exploded into countless fragments. Shockingly, in the most critical moment, Yang Qi was able to redirect the power of the Heaven-Dominating Golden Swordbreaker, combine it with his own true energy, and use it to power the final blow that ended the Space Portal. He was finally in the Space-Void Transformation.

At the same time, the shattered fragments of the Space Portal were sucked into Yang Qi, where they became pure spatial power, the magical laws of space which had existed for aeons and aeons.

All of the remaining Sovereign Lord True Energy that he had stored in the Grand Emperor's Pagoda flowed into him, strengthening his meridians, his fleshly body, and his soul.

“You used me, you freakish hellion!” Jin Zhenyun growled, hefting his swordbreaker. Not pausing for a moment, he lashed out again at Yang Qi, a golden vortex swirling around his weapon as he attacked.

Yang Qi suddenly thrust his hand out in Jin Zhenyun’s direction, and space parted for him as easily as a curtain, causing a spatial energy flow to surge forth.

To the utter shock of the onlookers, he grabbed the Heaven-Dominating Golden Swordbreaker, completely stopping its motion. Jin Zhenyun struggled, and yet, could not budge the weapon.

BAM!

Yang Qi waved his hand, and the space in the area collapsed.

Jin Zhenyun let out a shout as he was thrown backward, his body shattering, golden blood spraying out of him to shower down onto the mountains below. Yang Qi had decisively taken away his Heaven-Dominating Golden Swordbreaker.

It only took one swipe of his hand to send the young man flying away, after which Yang Qi completely ignored him, and instead breathed deeply as he probed the new power coursing through him. Moments ago, he had destroyed the Space Portal and then absorbed the resulting rubble, which was very important to improve the dimensions inside himself.

Currently, his sea of energy and meridians had so much energy in them they were inflating like balloons. As for the dimensions inside them, they were also rapidly expanding. As his blood pumped through his veins, he grew stronger and stronger, making him look like a warrior sent by the legion of gods to subdue hell.

Sovereign Lord True Energy poured into him from the reserves he had built. At the same time, spirit energy gathered from the surrounding mountains, to the point where countless subterranean white dragons burst out into the open and were absorbed. There was even universal power streaming into him from beyond heaven.

In the moment that he made his breakthrough, his mind seemed to expand, and all of a sudden, he was deeply connected to space-time. The power of the void began to converge inside him, and in an instant, he could see with his naked eye countless glowing lights around him, which was none other than the power of the stars.

High above him in the sky, countless stars winked into being; as he absorbed the power, he provoked strange signs in heaven and earth.

“This… not even a Half Sage can handle the power of heaven and earth like this. Look at all the strange signs. Isn’t he worried that if he absorbs all that energy, he’ll explode? Each one is a different type of power!” The people from the Spirit Origin Association were all looking on in complete shock.

However, Yang Qi ignored them, and focused completely on his enlightenment. Inside of him, the godmammoth particles were waking up. Moments ago, he had been at the level of three hundred thousand. But now….

Three hundred ten thousand. Three hundred twenty thousand. Three hundred fifty. Three hundred seventy. Four hundred thousand….

The rippling energy fluctuations which rolled off of him seemed to contain an eternally burning glow, something that could subjugate any vital energy it touched.

In the end, he had six hundred thousand particles woken up within him, meaning his total true energy reserves had doubled. That was no small feat. After all, each particle of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth was harder than the previous one to awaken.

‘I feel like I'm strong enough to destroy continents, to rip openings in space, to break all fetters!’ The power coursing through Yang Qi made him feel like he was stronger by far than anyone of a similar level.

The slightest hand gesture on his part could send ripples of spatial power out.

Suddenly, an opening appeared in space, and a pitch-black spatial tempest poured out.

The true energy of the Hell Portal had changed dramatically, and the spore-devil now had a holy aura. The Nine Stars Pearl Necklace formed by the demon cores had melted, and combined with Sovereign Lord True Energy, to form something new, an enormous star that was now inset at the top of the door.

Now that Yang Qi was a Space-Void Legendary, all of his true energy manifestations were different. His Infernal Deity Spear, Hellfire Crucible, Devil-God Seal and Angel Wings had advanced by leaps and bounds.

SWISH!

His Angel Wings appeared behind him, glowing with holy light that could drive away all darkness and gloom. They were covered with bugles, drums, holy hymns, and musical notes from the halls of heaven. From what Yang Qi could tell, the slightest movement of those wings could pierce through space.

If he were attacked by that Great Sage’s hand now, he could escape as easily as blowing some dust off his shoulder.

Right now, the only thing that would be a danger to him would be a Great Sage appearing in person to attack him.

The third Legendary transformation was a watershed, a point in which one could finally gain deep enlightenment of heaven and earth.

Of course, it was only enlightenment.

To understand magical laws well enough to control or change them, one had to be in the Great Sage level, or possibly even the level beyond that, the Demi-Immortal level.

The magical laws of space involved innumerable daos. To truly enter the depths of the universe, Yang Qi would need more than the superficial enlightenment of the Space-Void Transformation.

Of course, considering the immense nature of the Space Portal he had broken open, Yang Qi had received enlightenment comparable to someone four or five levels above him.

His Infernal Deity Spear now burst with spatial powers, and could pierce through space-time to kill enemies.

He summoned the spear, then thrust it forward to pierce through space. It vanished, and then a moment later, a scream could be heard from high above as an Astral-Star bronzeblaze fiend-devil was stabbed to death, and fell down like a falling star. When it smashed into the mountains below, they melted into sulfurous lava.

‘Excellent. I now control the powers of space.’

Retracting his true energy, he looked around at the group of people from the Spirit Origin Association. At the same time, he hefted the Heaven-Dominating Golden Swordbreaker.

The swordbreaker had been forged from some unknown metal, and was covered with carved decorations of birds, flowers, and similar things. It was also as heavy as a mountain, to the point where most people in the third Legendary transformation wouldn’t even be able to lift it. From its aura, Yang Qi could tell that it was roughly on par with the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, which meant that whoever had forged it was a person similar to Grand Emperor Rich-Lush.

However, the explosive, mighty energy inside it, which seemed to thirst to slaughter the enemy, actually surpassed the pagoda.

Chapter 277: Heaven-Dominating Golden Swordbreaker

It was impossible to say who in history had named the swordbreaker, but it didn’t matter. It was enormously powerful, and thus, when it struck Yang Qi, he had had no choice other than to use the powers of redirection that were inherent to his godly-class energy art to send the force of the blow into the Space Portal.

If he had let it truly enter his body, he would have been done for.

Although the Grand Emperor's Pagoda might have been able to soften the blow, he still would have suffered massive damage to his meridians.

The swordbreaker was filled with the burning power of metal, like molten gold. Therefore, as its power flowed through it, it shone brilliantly, causing all heaven and earth to turn into a sea of gold.

‘What a wonderful treasure. I was just thinking that I don’t have any good weapon to fight the Crown Prince with, and this swordbreaker seems incredible. If I unleash its full potential, I think it would hurt even him. Maybe I could even blow his brains out with it.’ With that, he sent some of his own power into the swordbreaker to try to make it his own.

“Stay your hand!” someone suddenly shouted. “The Heaven-Dominating Golden Swordbreaker belongs to the Spirit Origin Association! It was forged by a Great Sage in the distant past, and is a signature weapon of our sect. Anyone who steals it will suffer the wrath of heaven!”

A powerful aura accompanied the voice, which belonged to a middle-aged man, clad in blood-stained armor. Considering how he reeked of fiend-devils, he must have just returned from the fierce fighting above.

Rushing forward, he picked up Jin Zhenyun and poured true energy into him to try to heal him. Looking up at Yang Qi, he said, “Why are you sowing discord in Spirit Origin Association territory? Hand over the Heaven-Dominating Golden Swordbreaker immediately, and come to our headquarters to beg for forgiveness. If you do, we might let you off the hook.”

Yang Qi recognized the man’s aura immediately. ‘Half Sage!’

Half Sages such as this man and the Crown Prince were halfway to becoming Great Sages. They were in the Never-Dying Transformation, but far more powerful than that level. A single motion on their part could burn the sky and evaporate the sea, and they were easily able to manipulate magical laws.

“I was fighting the fiend-devils up there and happened to fall into this area,” Yang Qi explained in a cool voice. “I subsequently borrowed some vital energy from your territory to achieve a breakthrough. Even after I provided handsome compensation, this fellow didn’t hesitate to try to kill me.”

“Elder Brother, this is what happened….” The other disciples in the area went on to provide an explanation to the Half Sage.

“What?” the man said, visibly taken aback. “You’re saying that he just reached the third Legendary transformation, and yet was still able to hurt Jin Zhenyun this badly? And he even forcibly took the Heaven-Dominating Golden Swordbreaker away?”

“That’s right, Elder Brother,” Lan Tianbo said. “We suspect that this guy has an important background. He might even be from a higher plane. We tried to get Jin Zhenyun to hold back, but he attacked him anyway.”

“Well if that’s how it played out, then I guess we should talk things over,” the man said. Looking back at Yang Qi, he said, “Listen friend, you need to return the Heaven-Dominating Golden Swordbreaker. It's a very valuable treasure, the kind that the Spirit Origin Association would stop at nothing to retrieve. Even the Great Sage prime elders would participate in the chase if you tried to take it. Besides, there’s no way you can take control of the weapon. It's protected by the will of a Great Sage that you could never possibly neutralize. If you try to forcibly take control of it, the backlash would be catastrophic for you.”

Yang Qi sucked the golden sea of light back into the swordbreaker. “So, is this how your Spirit Origin Association does things? You people nearly killed me, even after I offered plenty of compensation. Then, instead of offering an apology, you want to take back the swordbreaker I won fair and square?”

“How impudent!” Jin Zhenyun shouted. Suddenly, golden true energy swirled out of him, as if he were preparing to try to call the swordbreaker back to him.

Unfortunately for him, now that Yang Qi had the swordbreaker, it didn't even twitch.

“How dare you, hellion! Give back the Heaven-Dominating Golden Swordbreaker! Otherwise, you’re dead!” Jin Zhenyun’s eyes flashed like those of a wolf or tiger. Obviously, he just suffered a big humiliation at Yang Qi’s hands, and it was made worse by the open looks of derision on the faces of his fellow disciples.

He was a mighty Never-Dying Legendary, and Yang Qi was merely a Space-Void Legendary. They were fully six levels apart, and yet, Jin Zhenyun had been absolutely crushed. He hadn’t even been able to fight back. The entire fight had been like a joke.

Instead of responding to Jin Zhenyun, Yang Qi simply waited for the Half Sage to say something.

If the response was unsatisfactory, he would just leave. Considering the current level of his cultivation base, not even a Great Sage would be able to kill him, and in fact, might die in the process.

After all, Yang Qi merely needed to head out into the space-time tempests and find a hell monsoon.

The Half Sage thought about the situation for a moment, then said, “How about you just return the Heaven-Dominating Golden Swordbreaker, and we call things even? Then you can just be on your way.”

“I’ll remind you one last time that this Jin Zhenyun took advantage of a critical moment in my breakthrough to try to kill me. You’re asking me to just forget that?”

“Well, what do you expect? Our Spirit Origin Association is one of the three thousand great daoist sects of the Quake-Dawn Continent. Our history goes back to the Yore-Wilds of old! Can’t you give us a bit of face in this? What, you think we're going to apologize or something? Who do you think you are? A Great Sage? An overlord from ancient times? Wait, hold on. You’re just looking for an excuse to keep the swordbreaker, aren’t you?”

Yang Qi couldn’t help but burst out laughing. “Ladies and gentlemen from the Spirit Origin Association, I'm leaving, and I'm taking this swordbreaker with me. Take care, all of you. And don’t even think of trying to get this thing back. Farewell and good luck ever finding me again.”

WHOOSH!

With that, he flew up into the air.

“You’re not going anywhere!” the Half Sage said. Waving his hand, he caused the sound of a military march to explode, filling the area. At the same time, it was like an entire army appeared, a host of souls who rapidly formed into the shape of a cage.

“War-Dao Battle-Fist! Warrior Soul Body Refinement!”

The Half Sage ripped open space, then stepped through it to appear next to Yang Qi, where he unleashed a fist strike.

The energy of war and death swept forth, momentum that could slaughter gods and leave behind swaths of blood in its wake.

“Perfect timing!” Yang Qi said. He had been thinking about testing out his newfound strength against a powerful opponent. This man was a Half Sage, and the Crown Prince was a Half Sage. Therefore, a fight like this would give him a good idea of what a deadly fight with the Crown Prince would be like.

BOOOOM!

The Infernal Deity Spear appeared in Yang Qi’s hand, which he thrust out at an angle that perfectly conformed with the workings of heaven. Instantly, it pierced through the energy of war and death, and headed toward the Half Sage’s palm.

“I don’t care how strong your true energy is!” the Half Sage said. “Even if it were stronger than it is, it would still be too weak. Watch and learn what the true dao of heaven and earth is like! Recruit!”

The Half Sage waved his hand through the air to summon a character formed from true energy, which began to rumble toward the Infernal Deity Spear.

It was none other than the character for ‘recruit’, in the ancient script of immortals. Its mere presence forced the vital energy of heaven and earth in the area to become like a recruit in the army.

‘What energy art is this?’ Yang Qi’s spear instantly slowed down. However, it was a martial discipline with infinite variations, so he quickly shifted angle, causing everything in the area to tremble.

“Army!” the Half Sage said with a cold smile, summoning a true energy character that read ‘army’. Instantly, rifts opened up in the surrounding space, and deadly formations poured out like an army.

“You will fall this day, boy!” the Half Sage said, thrusting both of his hands forward, causing mountain-like projections of true energy to shoot forward. He had forced all vital energy in the area to become an army under his control, which he could use to trample anything that got in his way.

His energy arts and cultivation base were clearly just shy of being a Great Sage.

“Very bombastic!” Yang Qi said, sweeping his Infernal Deity Spear back and forth to slash at the streams of vital energy. Then, he threw his head back and shouted, causing countless white holes to suddenly appear around him. Space-Void Godlightning erupted out, a river of it, sweeping over the Half Sage before he could react.

“You can control Space-Void Godlightning?! Only Great Sages should be able to do that!” The Half Sage immediately defended himself, summoning a huge, brightly-shining halo. Then he splayed his five fingers to attack again, sending the ‘recruit’ and ‘army’ characters out, which combined instantly. “Sadly for you, I'm a Half Sage, and thus, this lightning can't do anything to me! Now, get over here!”

It was a powerful attack that the Half Sage clearly intended to rip Yang Qi to shreds with.

Yang Qi’s eyes widened, and his heart began to pound. Then, sagelight poured off him, and his Angel Wings unfurled.

In the blink of an eye, he vanished.

The Half Sage’s attack hit nothing but air, and a moment later, he realized that he couldn’t even lock down onto his opponent’s soul fluctuations.

“Not good!” Looking around, he forced the halo surrounding him to shrink, bolstering his defenses. However, it was in that moment that a spear suddenly appeared right behind him.

Crick. Crack! Pop!!!

The spear suddenly stabbed through the barrier and into his body.

“Power Field Distortion!” he shouted, shocked and angered that Yang Qi could possibly do something like this. Instantly, the defensive energy surrounding him transformed into a personal domain.

“Warfare Domain!”

In the blink of an eye, the man was surrounded by war banners, war drums, and a vast army….

Chapter 278: Battling a Half Sage

As the Half Sage unleashed his personal domain, Yang Qi thought, ‘Half Sages are extraordinary. It seems I need to do some more serious training if I'm going to try to kill someone like the Crown Prince. After all, our cultivation levels are just too far apart. Seven whole levels! Although my true energy reserves are immense, that doesn't make up for the level disparity.’

“Warfare Domain!” the Half Sage shouted. As the domain took shape, it was as if the dao of war overtook the area. Vital energy surged with incredible power, and he stood in the middle of it all, seemingly invincible.

Bam!

The Infernal Deity Spear stabbed partway into the Warfare Domain, but then stopped. It sent hellish energy into the domain to try to infect it, but all the Half Sage did was shrug his shoulders, and the energy dissipated.

This was his domain. This was his kingdom.

“So, what other tricks do you have up your sleeve?” he asked. With his personal domain fully powered, the aura of a Great Sage flickered in the area, which was what happened when Half Sages were just on the verge of forming sage motes.

Next, it was without any warning at all that he lunged toward Yang Qi.

Smiling, Yang Qi dodged to the side and slashed out with his Infernal Deity Spear, curious to see exactly how strong this Half Sage would be now that he had called on his personal domain.

“You have no domain! Are you crazy? Or do you just want to die?!”  The Half Sage’s fists turned into palms as he said, “Star-Plucking Moon-Snatching Palms!” Now, it seemed as if he were trying to capture Yang Qi, and it almost seemed like the light of fallen stars flickered around him.

Every attack that Yang Qi blocked caused sounds like metal grating on metal to echo out. Unexpectedly, the Infernal Deity Spear wasn’t actually capable of piercing those palms. This man’s fleshly body had reached an incredibly high level.

And yet, the weapon didn’t collapse. Yang Qi was in the Space-Void Transformation, and was strong enough to fight the personal domain of a Half Sage. It was something completely unheard-of, even in the Quake-Dawn Continent.

As for the Half Sage, the longer the fight dragged on, the more surprised he was. He had originally assumed that, considering the level of his cultivation base, all he would have to do was summon his Warfare Domain to capture Yang Qi. In contrast, his confidence was eroding as he realized that his opponent wasn’t even fighting at full force.

WHIZZ!

Yang Qi flitted back and forth like the wind, surrounded by streams of space that made it such that any ordinary person who looked at him would likely grow dizzy from the effort.

None of the Half Sage’s attacks could touch him, and he continued to stab his spear into the man’s domain, damaging it as surely as the stomp of an elephant’s foot.

Eventually, the Half Sage let out a bellow of rage and frustration.

The mere flap of Yang Qi’s Angel Wings could propel him through multiple layers of space, making it impossible for the Half Sage to lay hands on him. In fact, the man could only eat his dust as he tried to catch up.

Yang Qi could have merely made his escape, but instead, he decided to teach this Half Sage a lesson, and at the same time, assess the man’s cultivation base.

“You’re pushing things too far!” The Half Sage spun back and forth, and yet could see nothing more of Yang Qi than a blur out of the corner of his eyes. Finally, he forced himself to calm down, and shrank down his personal domain. Then, he unleashed a burst of true energy and said, “The guilty can never escape justice from heaven!”

His true energy became like countless strands of silk that shot out to fill the air around them.

At long last, this effort managed to lock onto Yang Qi’s location.

“Sky Sundering Slash!” Using his index and middle finger like a sword, he slashed downward.

From the look of things, the Half Sage was powering this attack with everything his cultivation base had to offer. It was his last move, a move designed to slash open the sky itself, to destroy mountains and rivers, to break open the void and wreck great daos.

It was at this point that a spinning pagoda appeared above Yang Qi’s head, whose every rotation was capable of nullifying the most deadly of attacks. At the same time, a domain appeared around it.

“Rich-Lush Domain!” Now that he was in the Space-Void Transformation, he could use his Sovereign Lord True Energy to employ the personal domain of the Grand Emperor's Pagoda. As it spread out, the domain glowed with a golden yellow color, the color of fertile crops and lush abundance. It was not metallic gold, but rather, the yellow of wheat and grain, that which represented a rich harvest, and abundant joy.

The Rich-Lush Domain surrounded Yang Qi, making him seem like a god of the most rich and fertile lands possible, a place lush with vegetation.

Yet again, the Grand Emperor's Pagoda revealed a higher level of power; now that Yang Qi had grown strong, this precious treasure from the distant past revealed one of its most powerful abilities.

The instant the Rich-Lush Domain surrounded Yang Qi with golden abundance, he began another bombardment on the Half Sage.

As a result, the man nearly coughed up another mouthful of blood, this time not from injury, but from fury. He simply couldn’t do anything to Yang Qi, a humiliation the likes of which had never occurred to him in battle.

With the domain and the swordbreaker, Yang Qi was simply too powerful. In fact, anyone who tried to enter into that domain would instantly be crushed.

After all, the Heaven-Dominating Golden Swordbreaker had been forged by some Great Sage who was likely no weaker than Grand Emperor Rich-Lush.

BOOOOM!

Suddenly, the golden light shining off the swordbreaker shot upward, almost as if it intended to break through the Rich-Lush Domain. As a result, flames burst up everywhere around Yang Qi.

“Hah!” the Half Sage laughed. “You think you can take control of the Heaven-Dominating Golden Swordbreaker, you hellion? That’s impossible. Look, it’s fighting back!”

Throwing caution to the wind, he lunged forward to strike at Yang Qi’s Rich-Lush Domain with a mighty fist strike.

In the blink of an eye, Yang Qi was threatened from both within and without the domain.

“Oh really? It’s not like this swordbreaker is actually a Great Sage. It was made by one, but I can tell that whoever forged it perished long ago. If his will refuses to acknowledge allegiance, then I’ll just have to purge it from the treasure!” Although the will of the swordbreaker was rude and domineering, Yang Qi was even ruder and more domineering. He could crush both heaven and hell alike, and represented both the legion of gods and the will of the Lord.

Gripping the swordbreaker tightly, he sent a stream of Sovereign Lord True Energy into it, suppressing the golden light and slowly eradicating the will inside the weapon.

At the same time, the Hellfire Crucible appeared behind him, as well as the Hell Portal. Fiend-devils poured out of the portal, entering the crucible, which roared to life with flames that further suppressed the will of the swordbreaker.

“What's that?” the Half Sage blurted at the sight of the Hell Portal. A river of fiend-devils flowed out of the depths of the ancient doorway, some of which burned with bronze light, like magma that could melt rocks.

“That’s a bronzeblaze fiend-devil in the eighth Legendary transformation! And that’s an asura!”

Asuras were far more terrifying than bronzeblaze fiend-devils. After all, a single asura was usually worth ten bronzeblaze fiend-devils of the same level. In hell, the asuras were considered the best warriors, and the masters of martial arts, entities who were the ultimate fighters.

The people of the Quake-Dawn Continent knew full well that if an asura in the eighth Legendary transformation arrived in their lands, it would mean utter catastrophe. Not even ten human experts in the same level, powering a spell formation, would be able to take it down easily. Only a minimum of two or three Never-Dying Legendaries could possibly join forces to kill one.

When asuras fought human cultivators, they could easily surpass the gaps between cultivation levels.

And yet now, one asura after another was becoming nothing more than sacrificial fuel for Yang Qi to take control of the Heaven-Dominating Golden Swordbreaker. Not even Great Sages would be capable of doing something like this.

As of this moment, the Half Sage’s scalp was tingling so hard it felt like it might explode at any moment.

He couldn’t help but wonder what type of person could summon asuras this powerful as mere fuel. Who was this person? The son of a suzerain from hell?

‘This feels great!’ Yang Qi thought. Every inch of his flesh and blood was vibrating from the process, and the burning aura of the asuras was propelling his Sovereign Lord True Energy to new heights.

Furthermore, using asuras as his fuel was able to bring forth the true radiance and light of the legion of gods. According to the legends, in the halls of heaven that belonged to the gods, there were some oil lamps that actually used the fat of asuras as the fuel.

Maybe the Heaven-Dominating Golden Swordbreaker was domineering, but how could it possibly be as domineering as sacrificial asura flames?

When the ancient sage spirits in the Planar Pearl had encountered Yang Qi’s Sovereign Lord True Energy, they had felt the blessing of the legion of gods, and had risen from the depths of despair.

As for the will of the Heaven-Dominating Golden Swordbreaker, it could do nothing but back down in the face of this assault. After all, Yang Qi’s Sovereign Lord True Energy was far, far stronger than it had been back when he set out to repair the damage to heaven.

Perhaps if the Great Sage who had forged the weapon was still alive, he would have failed. After all, that Great Sage would have sensed what was happening and interfered. But with that person having long since perished, Yang Qi was the superior entity.

Despite the onslaught, the will of that ancient Great Sage could not be fully exterminated.

And yet, Yang Qi was prepared for that.

All of a sudden, the heaven-demon seed emerged from his forehead and entered the swordbreaker.

WHIZZZ!

Emerald-green light shot out to wrap around the golden light of the swordbreaker, causing a green and gold taiji symbol to appear. The matter was concluded. Yang Qi waved his hand to seal them, and then sent his true energy into the swordbreaker again.

At this point, the swordbreaker was fully his. Gripping it tightly, he raised it into the air.

BOOM!

The swordbreaker slammed into the Half Sage’s personal domain.

Chapter 279: Vanquishing a Half Sage

Yang Qi had many tools at his disposal. By sacrificing some of the asuras, he could easily gain control of the Heaven-Dominating Golden Swordbreaker, and by using the heaven-demon seed, it was a simple task to draw out the powerful will of the Great Sage that existed within the weapon.

Because of that, he could freely wield the swordbreaker in any way he wanted.

Upon branding the thing with his soul, he could sense the immense power within it, as well as the sage motes inside. Sage motes came from the quintessence-blood of a Great Sage, and were forged with vital energy. With those sage motes, the golden, metallic power of the swordbreaker would never dissipate.

The slightest wave of the swordbreaker sent out a screaming golden sea, filled with reflections of golden sage motes. The saintly might on display could crush anything from the most ancient times to the most modern.

No person in existence could take command of the golden power in the swordbreaker as casually as Yang Qi, not considering he had a heaven-demon seed.

That seed had been created by Great Sage Shroud-Heaven, and thus contained some of his will, which was the perfect bane of the will of the sage in the swordbreaker. In fact, later on, Yang Qi would be able to borrow the power of that golden will to oppose the heaven-demon seed, and hopefully force Young Master Shroud-Heaven to reap what he himself had sown.

In the end, he was killing three birds with one stone.

Without any hesitation, Yang Qi smashed the Heaven-Dominating Golden Swordbreaker into the Half Sage’s domain.

As a result, the domain shivered, and then broke open! Before the Half Sage could do anything, the golden light slammed into him, causing rips and tears to spread out over his skin.

Screaming, he fell back.

And without hesitation, Yang Qi advanced and attacked him again!

BOOM!

Massive amounts of golden light shone forth, causing everything in the area to turn golden in color. Golden waves became a golden sea, and Yang Qi was a golden war god within that sea.

Then he raised the swordbreaker up, causing the golden sea beneath it to form into numerous golden mountains.

BOOOOM!

Every attack sent a golden mountain flying forth to smash into the Warfare Domain.

The Half Sage coughed up a mouthful of blood, unable to stand up to the battering of the swordbreaker, and the massive golden mountains it sent against him.

“I can’t believe you can actually summon the golden mountains of the Heaven-Dominating Golden Swordbreaker!” the Half Sage shouted. “Who exactly are you? How can you have such strong universal power?! And are you really going to make an enemy of the Spirit Origin Association?”

“I'm teaching you a lesson because, first: you can’t tell the difference between right and wrong!” Yang Qi smashed the swordbreaker into the personal domain again, causing the Half Sage to shake down to his bones.

“Second: you’re ruining the reputation of your sect!” The next blow onto the domain knocked the Half Sage to the ground, where he coughed up several mouthfuls of blood.

“Disciples of the Spirit Origin Association, heed my command! Activate your emergency talismans and summon the top experts to deal with this interloper! The Great Sage prime elders need to come out of seclusion and teach him a lesson!”

Even as the words left his mouth, he waved his hand, sending a stream of smoke up into the sky, which then exploded, creating a blood-drenched image of an individual being attacked viciously.

Yang Qi snorted coldly. “You don’t know what's good for you! I thought people from the Spirit Origin Association were reasonable, which is why I didn’t kill you. And now you want to summon a bunch of experts to gang up on me? You’re delusional!”

All of a sudden, Yang Qi’s Angel Wings unfurled again.

At this point, a host of voices could be heard from off in the distance.

“You think you can just run off!?”

“Freakish hellion!”

“Get back here, monster!”

“If we let you go, our Spirit Origin Association would become a laughingstock!”

There was even a fist attack which ripped through the air toward Yang Qi.

However, that was when Yang Qi vanished without a trace. Of the people present, none were completely sure which direction he had taken. He left no spatial fluctuations, almost as if he had teleported away. That was something that could only be achieved after reaching certain enlightenment regarding the magical laws of space.

“Not even my Super-Luminous Godfist could hit him? Just how fast is he?” Almost in the same instant that Yang Qi vanished, a young man appeared, clad in snow-white garments. He seemed profoundly graceful and at ease, perhaps even lazy. However, he was obviously much stronger than a Half Sage.

Even as he hovered there, seemingly examining the surrounding natural law of space, other powerful individuals arrived, including Never-Dying Legendaries and Half Sages.

After seeing the young man in white, the Half Sage who had just been beaten in battle flew up and said, “Elder Brother Nie! That guy beat me, but he was only in the third Legendary transformation.”

“I could sense as he fled that his cultivation level wasn't very high,” replied the young man in white. “However, he thrums with universal power. It seems to me that his true energy is at an unimaginably high level. He must be from a higher plane. According to the most up-to-date information we have here on the Quake-Dawn Continent, the universe is broken up into nine ranks. Our Quake-Dawn Continent is only second-rank, so I’d venture that this expert was from a third-rank plane, perhaps fourth or fifth at the most. However, I'm still confident that I could kill him.”

“Elder Brother Nie, did you just get a lock onto his aura?”

Everyone in the area clearly respected this Elder Brother Nie, all the way down to their bones. In some respects, it was similar to the way the people in the Demi-Immortal Institute treated the Crown Prince.

“That’s right. My Super-Luminous Godfist managed to acquire some of the vital energy he left behind as he fled. I can definitely track him down, and I won’t return without the Heaven-Dominating Golden Swordbreaker.” Waving his hand, he pulled Jin Zhenyun up to him from down below. “You piece of trash. Giving you the Heaven-Dominating Golden Swordbreaker was obviously casting pearls before swine. If your father weren’t a prime elder, I’d definitely execute you right here and now.”

Jin Zhenyun didn’t even dare to say anything in response.

“Screw off!” the white-garbed young man said, hurling Jin Zhenyun down to smash into the ground below. After that, he took a step forward and opened a spatial rift.

“Be careful, Elder Brother Nie!”

“I’ll be fine. As long as he’s not a Great Sage, I can capture him. And we all know he's only in the third Legendary transformation. If word got out about what just happened here, we would become a laughingstock. Besides, I’ve been wanting to fight someone from a higher plane. Maybe I’ll turn him into a second nascent divinity for myself. An out of body incarnation.”

Yawning lazily, the young man vanished.

**

‘This really feels great….’

With his Angel Wings, Yang Qi could move so quickly that not even a Great Sage could easily catch him.

And now that he had the combination of the Grand Emperor's Pagoda and the Heaven-Dominating Golden Swordbreaker, he was strong enough to actually force a Half Sage to cough up blood in a fight. The offensive powers of the swordbreaker surpassed that of Grand Emperor's Pagoda beyond question; even Great Sages would thirst to have such a weapon at their disposal. Back in the four institutes in the Rich-Lush Continent, it was something that could be the signature weapon of a chancellor.

However, what delighted Yang Qi the most was that he could now use the Grand Emperor's Pagoda to sense the general direction of the Rich-Lush Continent. In fact, with the correct spatial coordinates, it would be possible for him to just head there himself directly.

“Crown Prince! You just wait. I'm coming to kill you!” Yang Qi was feeling very pleased. With the Heaven-Dominating Golden Swordbreaker, he had actually surpassed his expectations upon reaching the Space-Void Transformation. Now, he was fairly certain that if he fought the Crown Prince as a Half Sage, he wouldn’t be defeated with a single glance.

Most shocking of all, only a year had passed. After only a year, he was powerful enough to contend with the Crown Prince. Although he might not be able to kill him, he was at least strong enough to fight him. And considering that the Crown Prince was still dealing with an injury, perhaps it would be possible to end him once and for all.

Besides, now that he was in the Space-Void Transformation, reaching the Five-Phases Transformation and Yin-Yang Transformation shouldn’t be very difficult at all. The Five-Phases Transformation was about absorbing the quintessence energy of the five phases from within the void itself, and using it to fill one’s sea of energy.

Thankfully, Yang Qi had benefited from Young Master Shroud-Heaven’s five phases treasures, the Skyspirit Lamp, Razorgold Dagger-Axe, Yellowdragon Sand, Singularity Water and Mulberry Shoot. Those treasures had spatial nexuses built into them that he could use to absorb five phases energy much more easily than before.

Now, all he needed were enough spirit stones, preferably, the sagely-grade variety.

After the Five-Phases Transformation was the Yin-Yang Transformation, and if he passed that, he would be in the Personal-Domain Transformation, at which time he would finally be able to utilize the God Legion Paradise.

At that point, as long as the Crown Prince wasn’t a Great Sage, he would definitely be able to kill him. In fact, maybe it would still be possible to take him out as a Great Sage.

After having gained some experience with different domains, Yang Qi now realized how terrifying the God Legion Paradise must be. It was a pure land belonging to the legion of gods, and therefore, once it came into being, it would be almost impossible to destroy. It would be able to absorb almost any attack, and convert it into power that he could use.

Eventually, he came to settle down onto a mountain peak far from the Spirit Origin Association, in a completely different part of the Quake-Dawn Continent.

‘With the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, and the spatial coordinates to the Rich-Lush Continent, I can head home any time I want. However, I’ll need plenty of power and spirit stones first.’

Unfortunately, he wasn’t familiar with the Quake-Dawn Continent, and had no idea where to go to trade demon cores for spirit stones. Perhaps the best thing would be to look around first….

Chapter 280: Vermillion Dragon City

No matter the circumstance, if you wanted a steady, consistent source of power, you could always rely on spirit stones.

Yang Qi had the spatial coordinates to return to the Rich-Lush Continent, but using them would require a huge amount of power, and thus, he needed spirit stones. Thankfully, spirit stones were abundant in the Quake-Dawn Continent.

And he had plenty of demon cores to trade for them. He could only hope that the situation wouldn't be like the Western Continent, where open contempt was shown for people from the Rich-Lush Continent.

Although the Western Continent was known for its spirit stone mines, when compared to the Quake-Dawn Continent, their reserves were paltry at best. At the moment, Yang Qi stood on the mountain peak, looking off into the distance, where a surging convergence of spirit energy seemed to indicate that a large number of people were gathered. Sending his psychic tempest into space-time, he soon caught sight of a sprawling city some tens of thousands of kilometers away. It was a city far larger than Silvermoon, and also more prosperous.

‘Looks like a trade center of sorts. I should go check it out.’

However, he had learned from his previous experiences, and instead of just waltzing into the city, he first sat down cross-legged and worked on changing his appearance. Considering his level, it was easy for him to use true energy to change his clothing and facial features. In fact, he could even change his body in general. Before long, he looked like a completely different person, even down to his temperament and mannerisms.

A person from the Quake-Dawn Continent and a person from the Rich-Lush Continent could change their facial features, general physique, and even their clothing to resemble someone from the other location. However, in terms of their temperament and mannerisms, the old saying still applied: in these lands and waters, people are unique. Because of that, it would be easy for people from one land to notice strangers from another.

However, the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth was so miraculous that it could even transform Yang Qi’s mannerisms and temperament.

After finishing with his work, he headed toward the city and blended into the crowd heading toward the gates.

Everyone that he saw was an energy arts cultivator. Even the commoners had cultivation bases in the eighth or ninth phase of the Energy Arts level. And Lifeseizers were everywhere. There were even quite a few Legendaries here and there.

In the Rich-Lush Continent and even the Western Continent, Legendaries were relatively rare, and even in big cities, people would crane their necks to catch a glimpse of them. Here in the Quake-Dawn Continent, they were considered like nobility, but at the same time, were not rare.

Even in the ancient era, Legendaries were called energy warriors, and were considered to have a high status. As such, it was no surprise that even the Legendaries in the Quake-Dawn Continent walked around with looks of haughty pride on their faces.

As he passed the moat that surrounded the city, Yang Qi looked down and caught the occasional flash of scales; apparently, there were dragon-snakes in the moat.

As for the city walls, they were carved with countless dragons and vermillion birds, which served as inspiration for the name of the city. The highest structure in the city had a plaque with three characters written on it, in the ancient Yore-Wilds script. Of course, the Rich-Lush Continent, the Western Continent, and the Quake-Dawn Continent had all once been a part of the primeval Yore-Wilds Continent. Because the script used back in the Yore-Wilds Continent was still used in the large continents that had once been part of it, Yang Qi had studied it in the Demi-Immortal Institute.

‘Vermillion Dragon City?’

Eventually, he reached the main gate of the city, where he paid a spirit stone tax before entering. At the moment, his stockpile consisted only of the low-, mid-, and high-grade variety that he had taken from Silvermoon.

After entering the city, he singled out a cultivator in Tertiary Lifeseizing.

“Hey there, Brother, do you happen to know where I can exchange demon cores for spirit stones?”

From the man’s getup, he seemed to be a freshman student from some sect, and he was carrying himself with utmost caution. In the Rich-Lush Continent, a Tertiary Lifeseizer would be an individual to be reckoned with almost anywhere he went, but in the Quake-Dawn Continent, he was a nobody.

“Y-you’re talking to me, Senior?” the cultivator stammered, immediately intimidated by Yang Qi’s powerful aura. Shivering, he continued, “The best place to do business in Vermillion Dragon City is in the Grand-Wilds Mansion. They buy and sell everything there. You could definitely trade demon cores for some really nice spirit stones. It’s in that direction.” He pointed.

“I see. Many thanks!” Tossing a few high-grade spirit stones over as a tip, Yang Qi turned and headed toward the Grand-Wilds Mansion.

Eventually, he reached the end of one particular street where an enormous structure rose up, emanating an aura like that of the ancient Yore-Wilds. There were actually countless storefronts and halls in the structure, as well as countless towers rising into the sky. And of course, people streamed in and out constantly as they did business.

Everything imaginable was being sold, from magical treasures, to building materials, weapons, medicinal pills, books and scrolls, and even bottle gourds filled with all varieties of true energy.

As for the demon core business, it seemed to be booming more than anything else.

Yang Qi even saw a few Legendaries selling fiend-devil cores to acquire royal- and imperial-grade spirit stones.

As he attempted to enter the location, a Lifeseizer pageboy reached out to block his path. “Sir, this is the demon core market here in the Grand-Wilds Mansion. Are you here to exchange demon cores?”

“That’s right,” Yang Qi said with a nod. “What are the rates?”

“Please come with me. I’ll take you to an official appraiser, who can determine the quality of the cores you want to trade, and set a fair price for you.” This pageboy spoke quite fluently, and kept his face completely expressionless. Clearly, he was extremely experienced in dealing with customers.

Without any further fanfare, he led Yang Qi to a certain sales counter, sitting behind which was an old man with a long white beard, and sharply glittering eyes. He was a Legendary, and in the fifth transformation. Considering that he understood the transformations of both the five phases and yin and yang, it was obvious that he qualified to understand the workings of vital energy.

To the old man, Yang Qi looked like nothing more than a Space-Void Legendary, and thus, he didn’t feel any need to be courteous.

“Alright boy,” he said, “hand over the demon cores you want assessed.”

Yang Qi pulled out a blood-red devil core, pulsing with so much battle spirit that the entire area suddenly seemed like a battlefield for suras. The old man shot to his feet.

“An asura devil core?!”

When others in the area heard the appraiser’s exclamation, they looked over with envious shock.

“What? An asura devil core? Who pulled out something like that? What level is it? Don’t tell me it’s Legendary?”

“Yeah right. Asuras are born as Legendaries. Even a baby asura is dozens of times stronger than a human Blood-Form Legendary. Devil cores like that are perfect to add to powerful weapons or deadly spell formations. In fact, you can even use them to create warrior nascent divinities.”

“What level is that devil core? Asura devil cores are virtually priceless!”

Rubbing his hands together, the appraiser said, “Let me see that, boy.”

Yang Qi flicked his hand, sending the devil core flying over in a streak of light. The old man caught it and began to study it, even pulling out a mirror and using reflected light to determine the core’s level.

Then, he pricked his finger and let a drop of blood drop onto the core.

RUMBLE!

Thunderous rumbling sounds echoed out as the blood evaporated and transformed into an asura war god, a being whose most casual attacks could shatter the void and summon masses of starlight.

“Eighth Legendary Transformation? This devil core is from an Astral-Star asura!” Looking very serious, the old man put the devil core down onto the counter. “Where did you get this devil core, boy?”

Yang Qi raised an eyebrow. “What. Does the Grand-Wilds Mansion require certificates of origin or something?”

“It’s not that,” the old man replied. “It just seems to me that you don’t have the cultivation base it would take to kill an Astral-Star asura. That said, you don’t have to reveal the information if you don’t want to. That's a rule here in the Grand-Wilds Mansion. In any case, this devil core is an amazing thing. How much do you want for it?”

“I thought you people specialized in appraising things like this,” Yang Qi said coolly. “What’s it worth?”

“You’re right, we do specialize in appraisals. But this core is too precious. We’re going to need to negotiate a price that you're happy with.” He licked his lips. “This isn’t the place for a discussion like this. Please, come upstairs with me.”

Under the glittering eyes of all present, the old man led Yang Qi up the stairs. There were looks of sadness, envy, and outright jealousy. There were even some experts who considered trying to snatch the core. In the end, though, none of them dared to cause problems in the Grand-Wilds Mansion.

After all, it was a powerful organization, with as many top experts as the sky has clouds. Anyone who caused trouble would end up dead. After all, it was common knowledge that the person who ruled over the entire mansion was a Great Sage.

Yang Qi followed the old appraiser upstairs, into a dimension that was larger than below, and very quiet and peaceful. Eventually, they reached a table, where Yang Qi sat down. The appraiser left, and the pageboy hurried over with a silver platter to put the demon core on.

Yang Qi remained expressionless, but inside he mused that he was actually starting to like this Grand-Wilds Mansion.

Soon, tea was served, as well as a variety of fruit and melons. Eventually, the old appraiser returned with a younger man.

Almost instantly, this newcomer’s aura caused everything in the area to tremble. He was a Half Sage, and from the way the old appraiser bowed and scraped in his presence, it was obvious he was very important. He was clearly in a leadership position in the Grand-Wilds Mansion.

Of course, Yang Qi had just beaten up a Half Sage, and therefore, wasn’t fazed at all. In fact, he didn’t even rise to his feet per protocol. Instead, he nodded slightly.

The fact that Yang Qi didn’t stand caused a flicker of displeasure to pass through the man’s eyes.

“I run the Vermillion Dragon branch of the Grand-Wilds Mansion,” he said. “You can call me Overseer Redwood.”

With that, he pulled a chair over and sat down. “Friend, do you mind telling me what organization you represent? Our Grand-Wilds Mansion has relationships with many powerful groups, and if you come from one of them, we can give you a much better deal.”

“I'm just a rogue cultivator,” Yang Qi replied. “I'm happy to do business with you without any special privileges. As long as the price is reasonable, I'm happy to part with quite a few devil cores.”

With that, he waved his hand, and another asura devil core popped out, this one radiating the power of the eighth Legendary transformation.

“What?” the appraiser blurted, visibly stunned.

Even the Half Sage Overseer Redwood had to suppress the urge to rise to his feet.

Chapter 281: Grand-Wilds Mansion

A very long moment passed before Overseer Redwood managed to regain his senses.

“Just who exactly are you?” he asked. “Astral-Star asuras are extremely rare, and come from beyond heaven. Normally speaking, they are sura commanders, or the direct subordinates of great generals. They’re monstrous killers who lead armies of fiend-devils into combat, and are so hard to kill that only Great Sages can fight them.”

“I'm just a rogue cultivator, that’s all.” A faint smile could be seen on Yang Qi’s face as he continued, “Look, if your Grand-Wilds Mansion can’t afford asura devil cores, then what about some bronzeblaze fiend-devil cores?”

He waved his hand, causing dozens of bronzeblaze fiend-devil cores to fall onto the table.

“Devil cores from bronzeblaze fiend-devils?!” the appraiser exclaimed. “Those are so high-quality that they might as well come from dragonlings. They’re priceless! Completely and utterly priceless!”

“Well, what do you think?” Yang Qi said. “I heard the Grand-Wilds Mansion had a good reputation, which is why I came here in the first place. But if you keep asking personal questions, I’ll just leave. ”

After a brief moment of thought, Overseer Redwood slapped his hand down decisively onto the table. “Very well. How many devil cores do you have? We’ll take all of them. What about this: we’ll give you thirty thousand imperial-grade spirit stones a piece for the bronzeblaze fiend-devil cores, and ten thousand sovereign-grade for the asura devil cores!”

“Ten thousand sovereign-grade spirit stones per core?” Yang Qi thought about it for a moment and decided that it seemed to be a reasonable price. Sovereign-grade spirit stones were extremely rare; the powerful magical altar he had encountered in Silvermoon had been constructed with only nine hundred and ninety-nine such spirit stones.

And most Legendaries would only work with royal or possibly even supreme-grade spirit stones. Imperial- and sovereign-grade stones were for the Great Sage level, or at the very least, Legendaries in the sixth transformation.

But considering the technique Yang Qi cultivated, his requirements were sovereign-grade at the minimum, and preferably, sagely-grade.

After maintaining silence for a moment, he said, “I really need sagely-grade spirit stones. Do you happen to have any on hand?”

“Sagely-grade spirit stones!?” the appraiser exclaimed loudly. “You’re not just ambitious, boy, you’re rapacious! Sagely-grade spirit stones are extremely rare! Even a single one could be considered a precious gem of heaven and earth. Asura devil cores are rare too, but they’re not worth sagely-grade spirit stones! Maybe if you had one in the ninth transformation, or a Half Sage version, then the Grand-Wilds Mansion would give you a sagely-grade spirit stone.”

“Oh? What if I have a lot of asura cores just like these ones?”

With another flourish, Yang Qi tossed out several dozen devil cores, all of them from Astral-Star asuras.

After all, when he had been taking control of the Heaven-Dominating Golden Swordbreaker, he had made use of the Hell Portal, and had summoned quite a few powerful asuras, during which time he had kept a handful of demon cores off to the side.

Then he waved his hand to summon a whole pile of bronzeblaze fiend-devil cores. As of this moment, the silver platter had forty asura cores and over three hundred cores from bronzeblaze fiend-devils. The devil energy they pulsed with seemed strong enough to rip the entire dimension they were in to shreds, except that Yang Qi was keeping it under control.

“So many devil cores!” Overseer Redwood said, trembling visibly. “That many cores are definitely worth a sagely-grade spirit stone. Unfortunately, they’re all eighth transformation cores. Don’t you have any from the ninth transformation, or possibly the Half Sage level? If so, we could strike the perfect deal.”

“Indeed I do, just not on me. If your Grand-Wilds Mansion wants them, why don’t we conclude this deal first, and then I’ll come back in a few days. By the way, I don’t just have devil cores. I have a living asura that I could give you, for the right price. Wouldn’t that be worth a lot more than just a simple devil core from the thing?”

This time, Overseer Redwood really couldn’t hold back from leaping to his feet. “You have an actual, living asura? If so, and it’s in the Never-Dying Transformation, then that will definitely earn you a sagely-grade spirit stone. And eight in the Astral-Star Transformation will earn you the same thing.”

One reason living asuras were so valuable was that they lived for battle, and would rather die than surrender. Asuras actually had a unique divine ability called Sura Disintegration, in which they could combine their life force and their sura karmaflame to self-destruct, and usually, take their enemy with them at the same time.

Even a Great Sage would have trouble capturing a Never-Dying asura alive.

In fact, most experts avoided asuras at all cost; one wrong move when facing one, and the result was usually death. From that it could be imagined how valuable a living, sealed asura would be. It would be like a treasure, including its flesh, blood, magical laws, life force, powers, and of course, its devil core.

“Fine then,” Yang Qi said. “Let’s make the agreement formal. And in the meantime, I want the sagely-grade spirit stone for these cores right here.”

“Wait here just a moment!” Overseer Redwood said. Scooping the cores into a bag, he left, then returned a short while later with a softly glowing spirit stone, which he handed to Yang Qi.

‘Wow, it really is a sagely-grade spirit stone!’ Yang Qi thought. Just being near the thing, he could sense the universal power in it. In fact, this was of even higher quality than the similar stone he had acquired from Lady-Princess Silvermoon. Apparently, the spirit stone mines in the Quake-Dawn Continent were far better than those in the Western Continent.

With this stone, he could significantly boost his true energy. Then, with enough five phases vital energy, he could push his cultivation base toward the Five-Phases Transformation.

Making that next step would ensure that he didn’t need to fear low-level Great Sages.

Putting the sagely-grade spirit stone away, Yang Qi rose to leave. However, before he could do more than that, Overseer Redwood said, “Hold on, friend.”

“What,” Yang Qi said, his expression flickering.

“Well, if you're really a rogue cultivator, then the Grand-Wilds Mansion has a mission you might be interested in. We’re hiring a large group of experts to travel to a low-level plane and look for an extremely valuable treasure. A fragment of the Yore-Wilds’ Heart. If you're interested, you could join the team. The payment will be substantial. Of course, I need to point out at the beginning that there’s a selection process you would need to pass first. If you do, then you could earn at least ten sagely-grade spirit stones.”

“So many!” Yang Qi replied. “Exactly what lower plane would we be going to? I would think that lower-level planes would be safer, and that big rewards would come with going to higher planes. Sounds pretty shady if you ask me.”

Overseer Redwood chuckled. “That’s funny, friend. Come on, the Grand-Wilds Mansion never does shady things. We’ve been in business for years, and our reputation is our biggest asset. It really is a lower-level plane. It's a place called the Rich-Lush Continent. Have you heard of it?”

“The Rich-Lush Continent?” Enormous waves of shock battered at Yang Qi’s heart. “I've never heard of it, no.”

“I see. Well, there’s a bit of a story behind this mission. You see, the Rich-Lush Continent is a lower-level plane, however, it's an extremely important spatial nexus. It’s like a springboard that leads to all sorts of extremely high planes, with an inactive teleportation portal from the ancient past, and even maps of the Yore-Wilds Continent. That said, its greyspace is protected by the will of Great Sages from the distant past. After years of being battered by hell monsoons, those sage spirits slowly sank into despair, and the greyspace began to break down.

“However, something changed recently. The spirits of the ancient sages woke up and repaired the greyspace, allowing the previously inactive space-time wormholes to once again be activated. In fact, there are wormholes here in the Quake-Dawn Continent that lead there, and many of the top organizations in the land are forming mercenary squads to go explore the place. Of course, the main goal will be to find the Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragment, and the ancient teleportation portals.

“As you know, traveling through space-time wormholes is extremely dangerous. Furthermore, the Rich-Lush Continent won’t allow extremely powerful experts to go there. If a Great Sage tried to go, he or she would be killed instantly.”

Yang Qi nodded. “I see. A Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragment, one of the most powerful artifacts from the distant past. Alright, considering how incredible the reward is, of course I’m willing to sign up. But how would I actually collect the reward? Would I get the ten sagely-grade spirit stones beforehand, or would I have to find the Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragment first?”

“A fragment of the Yore-Wilds’ Heart would be worth far more than ten sagely-grade spirit stones. In fact, forget sagely-grade. Even heavenly-, godly-, or the fabled immortal stones would be on the table. But that will come after the mission is complete. First, you need to pass the selection process set by the Grand-Wilds Mansion. If you prove that you're strong enough, you would be given an up-front payment of five sagely-grade spirit stones. Of course, don't forget that space-time wormholes often have greater fiend-devils in them. You’ll likely have to fight your way past them, and therefore, it's important to ensure beforehand that you can do so.”

“Yeah, I understand that part. Alright, when can I sign up?” From what Yang Qi could tell, it seemed like a pretty good opportunity.

Overseer Redwood held up three fingers on his right hand. “In three days. Didn’t you say you needed time to go get that living asura? We can handle the formalities when you return.”

“No problem. I’ll be back in three days.” With that, Yang Qi turned and blurred into motion, vanishing without a trace.

“Such incredible speed!” Overseer Redwood said, visibly surprised.

“Overseer,” the old appraiser said, “this guy has a mysterious background. I almost can’t believe he has so many demon cores. Should we follow him? Perhaps run an investigation to see who he is?”

“Are you retarded?!” Overseer Redwood shouted angrily. “How exactly are we supposed to investigate him? And how are we supposed to follow him? Not even I could see how he left so quickly. Who do you think you are?!”

“Er, what?” the old man said, looking crestfallen. “Not even you could lock onto his aura, sir? But he’s only a Space-Void Legendary!”

“Perhaps he's using some primeval treasure,” Overseer Redwood replied. “Or maybe he’s magically sealing his cultivation base, and is really some top expert. Just wait three days. If he proves himself and ends up joining our mercenary squad, we’ll probably be able to get a much better idea of who he is.”

By this point, Yang Qi was standing on some nameless mountain, far, far away from Vermillion Dragon City. ‘He wanted to lock onto my aura, but I caught him off guard.’

He looked down at the glittering, sagely-grade spirit stone in his hand. ‘Excellent. I’ll go out into the void and grab some fiend-devils, and hopefully a Never-Dying asura. With enough sagely-grade spirit stones, I should be able to reach the Personal-Domain Transformation with ease.'

Chapter 282: Capturing an Asura

The sagely-grade spirit stone glittered with dazzling light.

Once again, massive amounts of power poured into Yang Qi, combining with the five phases power in him, and the spatial tempest fays. After it was thoroughly mixed with his energy, blood, and psychic powers, he sent it all into the Hellfire Crucible to brew.

In the end, what came out was preheaven five phases power in the form of Sovereign Lord True Energy.

The Five-Phases Transformation was the fourth of the Legendary transformations.

At this point in his cultivation, his true energy was imbued with the power of the five phases. And thus, it could transform easily. Icy cold true energy could become scorching hot. Beyond that, it could become true energy of wood, earth, or metal. Being able to mix and match with the five phases was the foundation of forming a personal domain.

Virtually everything in creation was imbued with the elements of the five phases. And it was by adding the five phases into one’s true energy that it became ‘true and real’.

Without the elements of the five phases, true energy was not really true energy. The five phases and yin-yang transformations were about making one’s true energy more ‘true and real’.

Although Yang Qi’s Sovereign Lord True Energy was already extremely high-level, it did not have the five phases, and as for the yin-yang elements in it, they were impure. Ordinary Half Sages would never be able to see that, but to the eyes of a Great Sage, it would be obvious, and the flawed elements of the energy would be easy to exploit.

Therefore, Yang Qi very much wanted to succeed with both the Five-Phases Transformation and the Yin-Yang Transformation, preferably at the same time.

It wasn’t a process that could be rushed. Thankfully, absorbing the five phases treasures had given him five spatial nexuses that could pull in the mysterious elements of the five phases from other dimensions, which allowed him to advance his cultivation dozens of times more quickly than normal.

Most Legendaries who reached this level would need to spend hundreds of years, perhaps even more than a thousand, absorbing the quintessence energy of the five phases until it reached the appropriate level.

Once they had enough of that energy, they had to make sure it was absolutely pure in every sense of the word. The slightest impurity would make it highly counter-productive to use, and would take a huge amount of life essence vital energy to cleanse.

The most critical element involved was time, and there were no exceptions. Even the most powerful of Great Sages had to pass this point early on.

Circulating his true energy, Yang Qi took the five phases treasures that were in his five viscera and unleashed their power. At the same time, he drew on his Sovereign Lord True Energy to touch the five spatial nexuses. All of a sudden, he could sense the five worlds they connected to, each of them enormous spheres that were far larger than the Quake-Dawn Continent. One of them was bright red, like a burning sun. The others were green, blue, golden, and yellow, all of them corresponding to planes connected to the essence of the five phases. To lock down the spatial coordinates for such distant places in space-time was no easy task. Only a Great Sage who could struggle to acquire good fortune from creation, and be enlightened regarding heavenly workings, could do so.

However, thanks to the five phases treasures that had once belonged to Great Sage Shroud-Heaven, Yang Qi was able to accomplish what few others could accomplish.

All of a sudden, he burst into motion, tearing an opening in space and then appearing outside of the Quake-Dawn Continent.

After piercing through layer after layer of space, he caught sight of the boundless devil energy of the hell monsoon, where countless fiend-devils were arranged in an enormous spell formation that battered at the Quake-Dawn Continent.

Yang Qi couldn’t help but wonder why the Quake-Dawn Continent had come under such assault by the fiend-devils. The energy of hell that was on display was so intense it seemed like it might solidify.

In fact, he could even spot areas in the hell monsoon where the energy had taken the form of cities, palaces, buildings, forts, and the like. They were formed from energy, and yet, were no weaker than corporeal objects.

‘I need an asura,’ he thought, looking around. For now, he didn’t plan to use his Hell Portal.

At the moment, he was incapable of summoning Never-Dying asuras with the Hell Portal. The eighth Legendary transformation was his limit, and that was based on his cultivation level, not his strength.

However, he could definitely target an asura within the army itself.

Hopefully, he could find a Half Sage asura, and see if he had what it took to capture one. That would be his ticket to several sagely-grade spirit stones.

He unfurled his Angel Wings, then transformed them back into Fiend-Devil Wings. On a substructural level, they were just as strong as before, but with an evil and fiendish aura, it would make it a lot easier to traverse the hell monsoon.

At a certain point, he suddenly lashed out with his psychic tempest and Hell Portal, locking down onto an Astral-Star asura.

Then, he shrank the Grand Emperor's Pagoda down to the size of a speck of dust, and entered the thing's body.

He quickly possessed it and seized control of its will, then sent it into one of the enormous palace halls of devil energy.

Almost as soon as the asura entered the palace, another asura blocked his path.

“What are you doing here, Waabusžt!? The commander put you in charge of that million-strong army. You’re supposed to be training the bronzeblaze fiend-devils, amunling fiend-devils, and eastbrute fiend-devils in the use of spell formations!”

This particular asura was covered in scales, and was in the Never-Dying Transformation. To asuras who were weaker than him, he would seem inherently mighty and worthy of respect.

However, as for this Waabusžt, his eyes glittered with malicious light, and he lunged forward in attack, unleashing authentic energy arts from the martial disciplines of asuras.

“Have a death wish, Waabusžt?” the other asura shouted, his killing intent immediately boiling. After all, he was in a higher cultivation level. “Where’d you get the guts to attack a superior!?”

He splayed his fingers, revealing the webbing between them as he unleashed a massive palm strike. Immediately, rumbling sounds echoed out as he shredded Waabusžt to bits.

But then… RUMBLE! An enormous golden swordbreaker shot out toward the Never-Dying asura’s face.

Snap! Crack!

The asura was forced into a kneeling position, his true energy having been completely and utterly vanquished by the Heaven-Dominating Golden Swordbreaker. In fact, he himself had already turned a golden color.

The asura instantly realized that he had come into the presence of a powerful enemy, so he drew upon the self-destruction power that existed inside of him. Before it could be unleashed, though, Yang Qi slapped him with the Devil-God Seal, causing magical symbols to settle down all over the asura’s body.

When the asura’s true energy encountered the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, it was innately subdued, and forced into retreat.

A moment later, a huge cage appeared.

It was a spatial jail which dropped onto the asura, sealing him tightly, until he was like nothing more than a statue. Then, the cage transformed into a glittering sagepearl.

Just barely visible inside the pearl was the asura, sealed and immobile.

Only Sovereign Lord True Energy could possibly subdue an asura’s true energy like this.

Of course, it was also a huge drain. If it weren’t for the might of the Heaven-Dominating Golden Swordbreaker, it would likely have been too taxing.

After all, Yang Qi was still in the lowly third Legendary transformation.

The gaps between cultivation levels were still relevant, no matter how strong he was.

“Who’s out there? Who dares to cause trouble in my palace? A mortal?! A despicable bug?! Only your blood can cleanse this blasphemy! The glory of asuras is not something that mortals can sully casually!”

A stream of devil energy poured out of the depths of the palace as another asura leader appeared. This one was almost the same level as the one that had been sealed in the Heavendawn Quarry, a Half Sage!

Even ten human Half Sages who joined forces to fight this thing would end up getting slaughtered. Unfortunately for him, Yang Qi was the bane of such creatures.

“Tell me your name, despicable mortal! I am the mighty Marshal Agghedḑa of the asuras! I won’t kill a despicable mortal unless I know his name. So out with it! Lest I torture you for all eternity!”

Devil energy raged around the asura as it glared at Yang Qi, and it sent so much sura flame surging toward him that the palace in the area began to tremble on the verge of collapse.

“You think a sealing magic like that can trap me?” Yang Qi said. He laughed. “Well that’s a joke if I ever heard one! Get over here, asura!” He flapped his wings, tearing space open and allowing him to quickly exit the palace. Obviously, he wanted to fight the asura alone in the spatial tempests. If he could capture and seal this thing, then the sagely-grade spirit stones the Grand-Wilds Mansion would give him would definitely be enough for him to reach the sixth Legendary transformation.

With his Angel Wings, it was easy for him to reach a distant area in the blink of an eye. There, surrounded by countless black holes and wormholes, he turned to face the Half Sage asura.

RUMBLE!

The tempests in the area were swept away as Agghedḑa arrived with murderous intentions. Suddenly, a weapon appeared in his hands in the form of a flag, attached to a spear. The flag featured a bloody scene of battle, as well as numerous ancient magical symbols. It was clearly some sort of magical treasure.

“You think that running out here will give you better luck, despicable mortal?” He chuckled loudly, sweeping his flag out in front of him, and causing devil soil to build up around him. Shockingly, he was summoning aspects of the hell monsoon to form an asura domain.

“Heaven-Dominating Golden Swordbreaker!” Yang Qi shouted, funneling Sovereign Lord True Energy into the sword breaker, complete with preheaven five phases power. After being powered up in this fashion, the swordbreaker could smash mountains and drain seas, much less deal with the devil qi in the energy.

Golden waves filled the sky as a golden sea swept forth, as well as enormous mountains that radiated astonishing pressure.

BOOM!

The swordbreaker hit the flag, and the flag exploded!

Yang Qi had the power of six hundred thousand megamammoths, plus a swordbreaker backed by the will of an ancient Great Sage.

Chapter 283: Working with the Five Phases

Yang Qi’s Heaven-Dominating Golden Swordbreaker decimated the asura’s battle flag, and completely vanquished its devil energy.

It was as if the swordbreaker had been specifically forged to be the ultimate weapon for this sort of thing. However, it required a huge amount of true energy, so much that ordinary people would be quickly drained if they tried to use it.

No wonder the Never-Dying Legendary Jin Zhenyun had become winded so quickly, and had been unable to recover.

However, it was almost the perfect weapon for Yang Qi; there was no better type of true energy in existence than Sovereign Lord True Energy, energy which could overwhelm opponents of much higher levels of skill.

Every sweep of the swordbreaker contained nearly unstoppable force, the power of golden metal as expansive as a sea, like golden gods from ancient times, surrounded by glowing halos as they stomped barefoot over countless enemies, flanked by golden dragons that could topple mountains and destroy all enemies.

“Level Mountains; Drain Rivers!” Yang Qi struck out again, and the swordbreaker extended to a length of five hundred kilometers, like a pillar that could support the vault of heaven as it smashed toward the Half Sage Agghedḑa.

Shocked and enraged, Agghedḑa tried to fight back with the remains of his war flag, but it was already far too damaged.

BOOM!

The next blow from Yang Qi shook all creation, and caused the flag to completely explode. The wreckage of the flag rained down in the area as Yang Qi strode forward, his footsteps seemingly in unison with the dao of heaven.

Boom, boom…. Boom, boom….

They were like the crash of stampeding megamammoths from the ancient past, the likes of which no horde of demons or devils could possibly evade.

When six hundred thousand megamammoths all trumpeted at the same time, it could cause stars to fall from heaven. A group that large could suck up an ocean into their trunks, spray the water into the air, and cause a massive rainstorm.

Considering that was the level of power Yang Qi was using to wield the Heaven-Dominating Golden Swordbreaker, it was little wonder that his every blow caused the asura to gasp for breath.

Of even more to the despair of the asura was that whenever he struck Yang Qi’s true energy, his own energy would vanish as surely as the statue of an ox tossed into the sea.

All of a sudden, Agghedḑa threw his hands out in front of him, causing a waterfall of devil energy to erupt out, like a tempest, which ripped into the golden sea, replacing it with a myriad of devils. It was almost as if he were receiving a blessing of power from some other mysterious location.

“Heaven-Devil Soul-Devouring! Spirit-Soul Vortex! Myriad Devils Life Possession!”

Blasting through the defenses of the Heaven-Dominating Golden Swordbreaker, he landed a savage palm strike onto Yang Qi’s chest.

The quintessence of his martial path was the type that Yang Qi couldn’t even dream of matching. Furthermore, his deep understanding of space itself made his skill even more enigmatic, with his every move designed to kill.

BOOOOM!

When the palm hit Yang Qi’s chest, it sounded like a huge bell being struck. This was the type of force that would shatter a mountain made of iron.

Agghedḑa smiled cruelly and said, “Prepare to be destroyed, mortal. Weaklings like you have no choice but to be reduced to ashes by my Iron Fist.”

However, as the words left his mouth, his eyes suddenly widened as he realized that Yang Qi didn’t seem hurt at all. In fact, his true energy was bubbling even more vigorously than before.

Suddenly, a crucible popped into being around Yang Qi, holy and pure, covered with inscriptions written in the script of the legion of gods.

‘That’s… the Hellfire Crucible…?’ Apparently, Agghedḑa was reminded of the profoundly ancient legends among the asuras, stories which were actually imprinted into the memories and blood of devil-gods. ‘In the depths of the ancient hell, the lowest of the billions of planes, in the netherworld itself, there was a crucible that could be used to melt disgraced gods….’

“What are you!?” he blurted, backing up, realizing that he was vanquished. Even a fist strike backed by secret asura magic had done nothing to this opponent. What was the point of even trying to fight someone like that?

“Are you prepared to die, asura?” Yang Qi once again hefted the swordbreaker, and then attacked with violent force, causing a stream of golden light to descend.

The truth was that he was struggling to get his true energy to respond the way he wanted. Moments ago, it had only seemed like he had shrugged off the asura’s attack. In reality, the force had been devastating; if any opponent Half Sage other than an asura had hit him with that force, he would have been grievously injured.

Thankfully, the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth was the bane of asura true energy, and could negate it with the Hellfire Crucible.

If he had kept fighting with full strength, Yang Qi would have been in trouble. But when the asura saw the crucible taking form, he had become so filled with terror that he began to back away. His ancient, inborn memories told him what the crucible was, and thus, he instinctively attempted to flee from it. Asuras were gods of battle, with boundless life force that let them fight without ever stopping. However, the dread of the Hellfire Crucible that was built into them was something they couldn’t escape.

The Hellfire Crucible was a furnace of punishment and judgement.

Any fiend-devil would fear it, even those higher than the Demi-Immortal level. Even the suzerains of hell, who existed at the peak of life force, would tremble in terror in the face of the Hellfire Crucible.

As the asura backed up, Yang Qi circulated his true energy, neutralizing the foreign energy in his meridians. At the same time, the flames in the Hellfire Crucible roared to greater heights.

Yang Qi’s gamble had paid off. Lunging forward, he swept the swordbreaker out, not giving the asura any opportunities to escape.

“Where are you from, human?! You have the Hellfire Crucible, so it’s only a matter of time before the forces of hell come for you!” Agghedḑa spun as if he intended to literally run away. “This is important news! Enough to get me what I need to reach the Great Sage level! Then I can truly enter the Hell of Suras!”

Not even Half Sages could enter and exist in the Hell of Suras; they would be forced to stay in surrounding planes. The Hell of Suras was a plane in which weakness was simply not tolerated.

However, this news about the Hellfire Crucible would be like a bolt from the blue, and would likely be enough to ensure a high leadership role for any asura who brought it to light.

However, even as Agghedḑa tore open a rift in space, an enormous spear suddenly plunged into his chest.

Never in his wildest imaginings could he have guessed that the Infernal Deity Spear would appear here.

Immediately upon stabbing the asura, Yang Qi grabbed him by the head and used the Devil-God Seal on him.

The sealing mark hit him like a glob of ink, causing him to tremble violently, and his eyes to shine with vicious light. From the look of it, he wanted to fight back by attacking Yang Qi on a psychic level.

Clearly, he was underestimating Yang Qi’s magical seal. Mysterious magical symbols of true energy formed that the asura could not fight against, and at the same time, an infernal deity appeared behind Yang Qi.

“Souls Decry the Body; Fight without Cease; Live On and On; Suras Defy Death! Asuras only die in battle! Asuras refuse to be taken captive!” The asura was clearly preparing to self-destruct.

However, Yang Qi had been prepared for that, and quickly opened his Lord's Eye, sending burning flames to attack the asura’s will.

“The Lord… the Lord who exists above the legion of gods? This is the glory of the Lord!”

Yang Qi continued to slap sealing marks down onto the terrified asura, until he was as immobile as a statue. Then, that statue shrank down and came to rest on Yang Qi’s palm.

With that, he wiped the asura’s memories clean, so that there would be no record of himself in his mind.

Once he had full control of a fiend-devil, every aspect of it would be under his control.

Now that he had the Half Sage asura, he breathed a sigh of relief. He didn’t return to the army to fight more asuras, instead, he opened a spatial tempest and sat down cross-legged inside. All he wanted to do was rest for three days until it came time to make his deal with the Grand-Wilds Mansion.

The Grand-Wilds Mansion was the ticket to a quick return journey to the Rich-Lush Continent. Plus, he was interested to see what kind of experts would be a part of this supposed mercenary squad.

They would obviously be impressive folks, and they would surely be interested in pillaging and plundering the Rich-Lush Continent. People from higher planes often felt the desire and right to do such things.

In any case, at least Yang Qi could use the sagely-grade spirit stones for purposes other than traveling through space.

After all, getting back from the Quake-Dawn Continent wouldn't be as easy as coming, considering he had arrived via hell monsoon. It wasn't as if he could simply summon a hell monsoon to take him back.

As he sat cross-legged in the void, circulating his energy, he thought back to the fight he had just experienced, and at the same time, gathered five phases quintessence energy.

Before long, the preheaven five phases true energy had become five spheres within him, pulsing in his five viscera. Sending some Sovereign Lord True Energy caused them to become more true and real, and filled him with a sense of strange enlightenment.

Slowly but surely, the true energy transformed into burning flames, towering trees, sandy expanses, muddy silt, oceans, weapons, and other things.

WHIZZZ!

A huge river appeared, filled with writhing dragon-snakes. As it flowed, it became a sea of flames that towered to the sky, filled with fire dragons. Then life came to be in the fire, huge trees that instantly became verdant and lush, and completely realistic in every aspect.

Then, birds began to fly about within the forest, and the roar of beasts could be heard.

Yang Qi’s five phases true energy was so powerful that Lifeseizers wouldn’t be able to distinguish it from reality itself.

Chapter 284: Deal

Working with the five phases was no easy task; it was like using drops of water to eat through rock. It was often impossible to determine how much work would be needed to use five phases true energy and turn it into preheaven energy.

When it came to five phases quintessence energy absorbed from external sources, it didn’t matter how pure it was, there would still be impurities in it. Only by refining it with one’s energy and blood could it be converted into the preheaven five phases, which was its truly original form.

By polishing the five phases quintessence energy to higher degrees, it would increase one's future potential. Without that polishing, and with the postheaven impurities, it would be impossible to break through to the Five-Phases Transformation.

Thankfully, Yang Qi’s Hellfire Crucible was designed to melt even disgraced god-spirits, and therefore, it was as easy for him to polish the five phases quintessence energy as it was for a child to play house.

As the postheaven five phases quintessence energy entered him, he cleansed it with fire from the crucible, and transformed it into pure preheaven five phases quintessence energy. It was shining, brilliant, and pure, without any impurities of any sort.

Not even Great Sages could produce such pure five phases energy as this.

After combining it with the Sovereign Lord True Energy, it became even more true and real. The biggest change that resulted was that his Infernal Deity Spear now had golden designs on it, and looked even more ancient than before. It was also splattered with traces of blood, which was the blood of disgraced god-spirits in hell. Thanks to the five phases quintessence energy, the spear was no longer merely a pure expression of true energy. Instead, it was like an actual magical treasure from primeval times. Eventually, when Yang Qi reached the Great Sage level, the Infernal Deity Spear would actually surpass both the Grand Emperor's Pagoda and the Heaven-Dominating Golden Swordbreaker. It would truly be a magical treasure that could slaughter sages and exterminate immortals.

“Angel Wings….” Yang Qi murmured, and the Angel Wings unfurled behind him. They were fully fifty kilometers from end to end, and covered with endless spatial tempest fays. However, thanks to the transformations which were occurring, the fays were changing, becoming actual angels with wings and halos, which flew around the wings and sang the most holy of hymns and psalms.

The singing was so pure and distinct that it turned all the space around him into a holy kingdom of the gods.

The Angel Wings also flickered with five different colors, as though they were fire dragons, water dragons, earth dragons, metal dragons, and wood dragons. It was almost mythological, and in fact, in the depths of the Angel Wings, it was possible to see a vortex of stars, a conglomeration of radiance and light, and darkness and gloom. It was almost like a small-scale universe.

These wings were the type whose single flap could level cities and territories. They were like the wings of an ancient roc, which could skyrocket to the highest heavens with ease.

With these wings, Yang Qi wouldn’t have to expend any effort to prevent even someone in the eighth Legendary transformation from touching him. And if he found himself out among spatial tempests, then not even Great Sages could catch him.

That would be a huge advantage to him here in the Quake-Dawn Continent.

After all, now that he had taken the Heaven-Dominating Golden Swordbreaker, there was no way that the Spirit Origin Association would rest until they got it back.

His God Legion Battle Robe had also changed, and now floated in the air around him with the utmost ease. No longer did it surround him with shining halos. Instead, the cloth looked simple and pure. It actually looked like real cloth, spun from the pure quintessence energy of the five phases. His Hellfire Crucible was larger, and the Hell Portal and Devil-God Seal could now take more corporeal form, as if they were real magical treasures.

All of these items had been forged or created countless years in the past. Now that Yang Qi had mastered the five phases, they became exponentially more powerful in his hands. At the same time, the spatial dimensions throughout his body became more real and true than before, which made him think about a term he had read in some of the ancient records: to cultivate reality.

In the era of the primeval Yore-Wilds, if one cultivated energy arts to a very profound level, it was referred to as cultivating reality, and involved taking illusory vital energy and transforming it into physical things that were true and real. It could be used to create kingdoms for gods and spatial dimensions.

After three days and nights of cultivation, Yang Qi was filled with a sense of dignity as he realized that his energy arts had reached a much higher level. As he sat there, a sagely-grade spirit stone rotated above his head, providing constant power to purify the five phases quintessence energy.

Deep in the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, the flesh and blood of the asura was finally fully evaporated, sucked into Yang Qi, the magical laws of a Half Sage transformed into power for him.

Crack!

The sagely-grade spirit stone split open, and immensely powerful true energy spilled out, causing Yang Qi to ignite into flames. That in turn caused one particle after another within him to erupt with the power of ancient megamammoths.

In the shortest of moments, another fifty thousand megamammoths awoke, putting him at the level of six hundred and fifty thousand.

‘Sagely-grade spirit stones are definitely what I need!’

Looking down at the Quake-Dawn Continent, he could tell that three days had passed. Reigning in all of his energy arts, he ripped open another rift in space, stepped into it, and vanished.

After the time it takes an incense stick to burn, he appeared in Vermillion Dragon City, at the end of the long street, which was the location of the Grand-Wilds Mansion. Of course, there was someone waiting there to receive him, one of the appraisers.

“How very punctual of you,” the man said. “Come, the overseers are waiting!”

Yang Qi nodded and followed as he was led to one of the top floors of the Grand-Wilds Mansion, which was high above the level of the clouds.

Upon entering the reception room, he found himself facing five Half Sages. Overseer Redwood was among them, and they all began to size up Yang Qi as soon as they laid eyes on him.

“You kept your word, friend,” Overseer Redwood said. “Three days! Excellent. Now, allow me to introduce you to everyone present. This is Overseer Greenwood, Overseer Amberwood, Overseer Dragonwood, and Overseer Heavenwood. We oversee daily affairs in the Grand-Wilds Mansion, although we usually are stationed in different branches. We gathered here today in rare form for this very important occasion. Did you manage to bring that living asura with you? If so, why don't we finalize our deal?”

“I did,” Yang Qi said. “But first I’d like to see the sagely-grade spirit stones.”

Gong!

A silver platter appeared, upon which were ten sagely-grade spirit stones, each of them shining with dazzling light. If one closed one’s eyes and listened carefully, it was even possible to catch hints of ancient sages discussing profound truths. It was possible to benefit from these stones even by just keeping them in one’s presence. In fact, a Lifeseizer who had long-term access to one could reach the Legendary level without doing a thing.

“Great!” Yang Qi waved his hand, sending a crystalline object tumbling onto the table. Inside it was an asura, extremely lifelike and pulsing with baleful energy. It looked so intent on fighting that everyone else in the room instinctively edged away from it.

“A Never-Dying asura!”

“It’s actually been sealed alive. There’s no way anyone other than a Great Sage could do something like this.”

“But… only one? That’s only worth a single sagely-grade spirit stone.”

The overseers passed the sealed asura amongst themselves to examine it. All of them could tell that the seal keeping it in check was powerful, and that if they unraveled it, the asura would leap forth and cause a catastrophe.

“I have one more. Take a look and tell me what it's worth.” He waved his hand again, and the Half Sage asura appeared on his palm. Everyone in the room immediately leaped to their feet and circulated their energy arts to ward off the baleful energy that swirled out.

“A Half Sage asura marshal!” Overseer Greenwood blurted, reaching out excitedly.

“That’s no forgery. It's really a Half Sage!” The two most powerful of the overseers, Overseer Dragonwood and Overseer Heavenwood, exchanged a glance, and could see how shocked each other were.

“Yes, it's a Half Sage asura,” Yang Qi said. “If you want, I could loosen the seal for you to take a closer look.” Even as he spoke, the seal began to fade like melting frost.

ROAR!

A bellow echoed out as if from the depths of hell, causing the innards of everyone present to twist. Meanwhile, the asura began to claw at the sealing mark as if it intended to leap out into the open.

“No, don’t!” Overseer Redwood shouted. “We've seen enough. That’s a Half Sage asura marshal, alright. There’s no need for any further proof. If you let that thing out, I'm afraid that not even all of us working together could contain it. We’d need the help of a Great Sage for sure.”

“Very well then,” Yang Qi said. With that, he strengthened the seal until the asura looked like little more than a crystal statue. “How many spirit stones is a Half Sage asura worth?”

The group exchange glances. “Five. Is that enough? That’s really our limit. And that’s taking into consideration that you might join our mercenary squad.”

“Five?” Yang Qi thought about it and then nodded. “Fine. Including the Never-Dying asura, that’s a total of six. Hand ‘em over.”

Both sides seemed happy with the deal, and quickly exchanged the goods. As of now, Yang Qi was confident that he had the resources he needed to significantly further his cultivation.

“Friend, are you really only a Space-Void Legendary?” Overseer Heavenwood asked.

“What?” Yang Qi said, looking a bit displeased.

“I'm not asking you to reveal any of your secrets,” Overseer Heavenwood quickly added. “If you’re really in the third Legendary transformation, then you must cultivate some extremely profound technique. Either that, or there’s something fundamentally special about you. Perhaps you come from a higher plane in the universe. Of course, that means that achieving cultivation breakthroughs is harder for you. Normally speaking, Legendaries only need royal-grade spirit stones, but you need sagely-grade. It's really a very shocking thing. Presumably, you need five phases quintessence energy, and luckily for you, we have just that. In fact, we have a set of five phases spirits. Do you think you might be interested in another deal, friend?”

Chapter 285: Assessment

‘Five phases spirits? Those things are incredible….’ Yang Qi was frankly surprised that an amazing set of items like that would become available to him here. Right now, he had reached a point where he needed to plan out his path of cultivation in great detail. Although his cultivation generally went hundreds of times faster than most people, he was still fairly certain that it would take a year or even a year and a half for him to reach the fourth Legendary transformation.

Unfortunately, what he lacked most of right now was time.

He absolutely had to get back to the Rich-Lush Continent, and then head through the passageway to the Superheaven Badlands, and kill the Crown Prince.

If he could reach the Five-Phases Transformation sooner than expected, then he could be even more assured of victory. His hope was to make the trip to the Superheaven Badlands within ten days, or two weeks at the most. If he let too much time slip by, the consequences could be too horrible to contemplate.

Right now, acquiring a set of five phases spirits seemed like the best way to achieve an early breakthrough.

The so-called five phases spirits were pure living spirits birthed directly from the power of the five phases. They possessed preheaven godpower, and came in the form of things such as wood-based azure dragons, metal-based white tigers, fire-based vermilion birds, water-based black turtles and earth-based flying snakes.

Such things were rare in the Western Continent, let alone the Rich-Lush Continent. However, this was the Quake-Dawn Continent, and things were different here.

With a set of five phases spirits, Yang Qi was fairly certain that he could reach the next cultivation level within ten days to two weeks. If he became a Five-Phases Legendary, then the power of the Heaven-Dominating Golden Swordbreaker would also ascend, and the Grand Emperor's Pagoda would become mighty to a heaven-shaking, earth-toppling level.

He definitely couldn’t let an opportunity like this slip by.

“And how might I acquire this set of five phases spirits?” Yang Qi asked.

Overseer Heavenwood was the one to answer. “Five phases spirits are precious beyond compare, and can be used by cultivators of all levels. Overseer Redwood, why don’t you bring out what we have in stock?”

Overseer Redwood immediately pulled a case out of thin air, an object locked with incredibly powerful sealing marks and paper talismans.

As soon as the talismans were removed, a wave of pure five phases quintessence energy surged out.

Inside of the case were five dimensions, within which could be seen powerful spirits formed from five phases quintessence energy: an azure dragon, white tiger, vermillion bird, black turtle and flying snake.

The five spirit creatures drifted about, occasionally attempting to break free from their seals. On a substructural level, these things surpassed asuras, and the power they emanated would cause anyone who sensed it to tremble. After all, five phases spirits were, in their substructure, close to being god-spirits.

“A Great Sage from our Grand-Wilds Mansion encountered these spirits while traversing space-time,” Overseer Heavenwood said. “It was difficult to capture them, and took a huge expenditure of energy, but in the end, he succeeded. They’re worth more than a hundred sagely-grade spirit stones.”

“A hundred sagely-grade spirit stones?” Yang Qi was visibly stunned. That was an astronomical price that no one could possibly pay. However, to him, it just meant capturing some more asuras. “What if I gave you living, sealed asuras?”

“Are you telling me you have more?” Overseer Heavenwood said, looking skeptical.

“I would have to go out and capture some more. It would take a lot of time to get some Never-Dying asuras, but Astral-Star versions are much easier. I could get as many as you wanted.”

Yang Qi was very anxious to get his hands on those five phases spirits. Of course, he also knew that these people were doing this for their own benefit. They could tell that he was an extraordinary individual, and wanted to fill their own pockets because of it. Therefore, he decided to give them a bit of a surprise.

“Get out here, asura!”

RUMBLE!

A dimensional portal opened up which was none other than his Hell Portal in disguise. Of course, only a Great Sage could possibly tell that it was something other than an ordinary portal. However, the overseers were all Half Sages, so they simply looked at the portal, wondering what Yang Qi planned to do with it.

But then, a moment later, they began to back away as they saw an enormous asura emerging, radiating the power of the stars, and filled with wretch energy and battle spirit beyond comprehension. Although the overseers were all Half Sages who shouldn't need to fear an asura in the eighth Legendary transformation, the fact was that people from lower-level planes would instinctively fear asuras from higher-level planes. In fact, they would be terrified of them.

“That’s…!” Overseer Heavenwood was already on the verge of launching an attack.

However, that was when the asura kneeled in front of Yang Qi and said, “Milord!”

The eyes of the overseers nearly popped out of their skulls, and they were absolutely dumbstruck. Almost nothing could have surprised them more than to see a mighty asura step out and kneel respectfully in front of Yang Qi. After that, more asuras stepped out of the Hell Portal, dozens of them. Some were in the fifth Legendary transformation, as well as the sixth, seventh, and eighth.

Before an incense stick of time could pass, more than a hundred asuras stepped out and knelt, making Yang Qi seem like an invincible god of battle, or a suzerain of hell.

‘They can’t be real. They’re fake!’ That was what the five overseers were thinking as they backed away. After all, the asuras were all lower level than them, but if they joined together as an army, they would be unstoppable.

For one thing, if this entire group self-detonated, which asuras were known to do, then the overseers would be wiped out of existence.

At this point, Yang Qi said, “Overseers, I remember you mentioning that the space-time wormholes leading to the Rich-Lush Continent will be rife with fiend-devils. Well, sirs, I may not excel at much, but if there’s one thing I can do, its handle fiend-devils. You see, I happened to stumble across the chance to enter a formal agreement with hell, giving me innate control over fiend-devils. In fact, I can even summon them through the void. I'm going to guess that abilities such as this will make me useful to the Grand-Wilds Mansion.”

Yang Qi was casually stabbing right to the heart of the situation.

“Th-this… th-th-this is….” None of the overseers could do anything other than stammer meaninglessly.

After a long moment passed, Overseer Heavenwood managed to compose himself.  “Amazing… simply amazing. You can do this all on your own? You, a Space-Void Legendary, can control Astral-Star asuras? You’re definitely not from this continent, are you? Which higher plane are you from?”

“I'm not at liberty to say,” Yang Qi replied. “I'm a customer of the Grand-Wilds Mansion, and an important customer at that. I'm also key to whatever plans you have in store for the Rich-Lush Continent. Let's just leave it at that.”

Obviously, there was no way Yang Qi would reveal that he was actually from the lower-level Rich-Lush Continent. Instead, he tried to make himself as mysterious as possible.

“By the way,” he added, “if I reach the Five-Phases Transformation, then I’ll be able to summon, not just Astral-Star fiend-devils, but those in the Never-Dying level.”

That was the final nail in the coffin. Not only was it a warning to these people that they weren’t just dealing with him, they were dealing with a potential army of asuras. Second, it was an indication that he wasn’t just strong, he had the potential to be far stronger than he already was.

“Just wait a moment, sir,” Overseer Heavenwood said. “I need to confer with my superior, a Great Sage.”

With that, he opened a spatial rift and left.

Yang Qi simply closed his eyes to wait, curious as to whether the Grand-Wilds Mansion would actually send a Great Sage to discuss the matter with him.

The other overseers couldn’t help but marvel at how he kept his cool, and also began to wonder what powerful backers he might have.

After enough time passed to enjoy three cups of tea, immense rumbling sounds filled the air.

Then, sagely might erupted out from a spatial rift. A Great Sage had arrived!

He was an old man in a white robe, with halos floating behind his head, and he was followed closely behind by Overseer Heavenwood. As soon as the old man stepped into the room, the kneeling asuras trembled as though a great weight had come to rest on their shoulders. After all, this was a sage, a type of living being that surpassed humans and monsters alike.

As soon as Yang Qi laid eyes on the man, he realized what he was. ‘He’s a clone!’

He was actually very similar to the enormous hand that Great Sage Pure Emptiness had sent chasing after him. Immediately, Yang Qi felt a bit calmer; if this had been an actual Great Sage, he might have been worried, but since it was only a clone, he felt a lot more confident.

Nodding at Yang Qi, the sage clone said, “I'm Great Sage War-Wilds. Friend, might I ask which high-level plane you come from?”

Yang Qi rose to his feet courteously and replied, “Please forgive me for this, but I'm really unable to say. I'm just an ordinary customer hoping to get some five phases spirits. They’re very important to me at the moment. And I'm also interested in joining your mercenary squad. What’s involved in the assessment? I'm more than happy to participate, and also, pay whatever price you want for the five phases spirits.”

“You can have the five phases spirits,” Great Sage War-Wilds said.

Yang Qi had assumed this old man had come to cause problems, but instead, he agreed immediately.

“And there’s no need for you to undergo the assessment. Friend, you’re definitely strong enough to join our mercenary squad. In fact, we’d like to hire you as a guest elder. Just count the five phases spirits as the recruitment gift. How about that?”

“Great Sage,” Overseer Heavenwood interjected, “those five phases spirits are worth over a hundred sagely-grade spirit stones!”

“So?” Great Sage War-Wilds said, waving his hand dismissively. “Our friend here can summon fiend-devils, which means that, as long as he agrees to help us, the Grand-Wilds Mansion will never be short on stock ever again. Wouldn't you say that’s a fortune worth more than a couple five phases spirits?”

The eyes of the overseers began to glitter brightly.

“Well, friend, what do you think?” Great Sage War-Wilds even held out the case with the five phases spirits in it.

“It’s a deal!” Yang Qi said, not mincing words. He knew that being a guest elder of the Grand-Wilds Mansion would likely come with some annoying responsibilities. However, having a good relationship with a powerful organization could be a good thing. And most importantly, it would help him grow faster, stronger. And that would only make it easier to kill the Crown Prince.

Besides, there would definitely be all sorts of information to be had in the Grand-Wilds Mansion. For example, he might be able to get new details about the Hanging Mountain. After he dealt with the Crown Prince, he wanted to go looking for his mother, and find out the truth about his origins.

“Excellent! Straight talk from a straight person. I like it!” Great Sage War-Wilds handed the box of five phases spirits over, along with an identity medallion that had the words Guest Elder carved on one side, and the character Wilds on the other. It fairly radiated an aura of the Yore-Wilds.

“The Grand-Wilds Mansion is one of the most powerful organizations in the Quake-Dawn Continent,” Great Sage War-Wilds said. “And that is because we were established by the primeval Wilds God.”

Chapter 286: Captain

Having acquired the five phases spirits, Yang Qi’s mood lifted greatly.

At the moment, he wasn’t in a hurry to try to absorb them. Five phases spirits were nothing to take lightly; they contained massive power, and had many mysterious aspects that would make them very difficult to work with. The slightest mistake, and the spirit energy in them could vanish, and the beast itself could explode. If that happened, the destructive results could be catastrophic.

Furthermore, Yang Qi suspected that there were warding spells in the five phases spirits, left there so that the Great Sages of the Grand-Wilds Mansion could spy on him and his techniques.

He had experienced something similar when acquiring the five phases treasures from Young Master Shroud-Heaven, in the form of a heaven-demon seed. Whenever refining and absorbing things, one had to exercise extreme caution, lest one end up a puppet.

“Our Grand-Wilds Mansion has multiple Great Sages,” Great Sage War-Wilds continued. “Other than the Quake-Dawn Cathedral, there is no organization that can match up to us. The exalted Wilds God has long since left the Quake-Dawn Continent to travel to higher planes of existence. However, his might still resounds in these lands.” Clearly, he was trying to impress Yang Qi. “Therefore, friend, the position of guest elder in our organization is one of extreme importance. If you run into any trouble, simply state who you are, and even Great Sages will back down. The mere name of the Grand-Wilds Mansion should be more than enough to put any offenders in check.”

Yang Qi laughed to himself. ‘So seems I'm with the Grand-Wilds Mansion now.’

“Overseer Heavenwood, please take our new guest elder to the teleportation portal,” Great Sage War-Wilds said, “and beyond it, the mercenary squad rendezvous point. From there, they can travel through the space-time wormhole to the Rich-Lush Continent!”

“Yes sir!” Overseer Heavenwood said. Extending his hand and looking at Yang Qi, he said, “Please, come with me, Guest Elder.”

Waving his hand, Yang Qi sucked all of the asuras into his Hellfire Crucible. Then, he followed Overseer Heavenwood toward the teleportation portal.

After the two of them were gone, Overseer Redwood said, “Great Sage War-Wilds, this fellow has a very mysterious background, and is clearly backed by powerful forces. He’s only in the third Legendary transformation, but can subjugate extremely powerful fiend-devils. Not even the top geniuses from the Quake-Dawn Cathedral can do such things. Don’t you think it’s a bit inappropriate to randomly invite him to be a guest elder?”

The other overseers all chimed in with their opinions.

“Yeah, that’s what I was thinking. He’s very mysterious, and definitely harbors some secrets.”

“Should we run an investigation into his background?”

“What about those five phases spirits? They’re extremely valuable! And we just gave them to him as a gift? What if he gets so strong that we can’t control him? Great Sage, do you really want him to become an official elder in the Grand-Wilds Mansion?”

Great Sage War-Wilds waved his hand dismissively. “Of course he’s from a higher plane in the universe; he’s just down on his luck at the moment. Otherwise, he wouldn't be trying to get spirit stones from us. Besides, I left some of the power of the Wilds God in those five phases spirits. If he tries to absorb them, I’ll be privy to all his secrets, including his origin and techniques. In fact, that's the whole reason I gave them to him.”

The overseers were now grinning from ear to ear. “Oh, so that’s how it is. Very clever! Great Sage, don’t forget that we were the ones who discovered this fellow. If your superiors ask about the situation, we hope you can put in a good word for us.”

“Well that goes without saying,” Great Sage War-Wilds said with a faint smile. “Let’s see exactly how much we benefit from him. Besides, our mission to the Rich-Lush Continent isn’t just about the Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragment. The Quake-Dawn Cathedral sealed a powerful entity there quite some time ago, and we plan to free him. The mercenary squad is just the vanguard. In fact, we’ll be sending them right to where that evil being is located. If they free him, then it’s hard to say whether they’ll make it back alive or not.”

The overseers reacted with open shock.

“An entity sealed in the Rich-Lush Continent by the Quake-Dawn Cathedral? Wait. Do you mean Ghost Emperor Yama from the primeval past?!”

“The ancient records of our Grand-Wilds Mansion mention that the Wilds God used to have dealings with Ghost Emperor Yama.”

Great Sage War-Wilds laughed loudly. “That’s right, I’m talking about Ghost Emperor Yama. And you’re right, he and the Wilds God are actually friends. You see, the Quake-Dawn Cathedral had good reason to seal Ghost Emperor Yama. In their view, if our Wilds God got too strong, and had the help of an ally like him, the duo might have been too powerful for the church to deal with. So, in order to preserve their position of supremacy, they did what was necessary. Incidentally, the mercenary squad will have a third goal. Hopefully, they can find out what exactly happened with the Quake-Dawn Cathedral’s Holy Daughter. Did she have an affair with someone in the Rich-Lush Continent? Or was her pregnancy really a case of a god from heaven descending into the mortal world? Back in those days, Holy Daughter Quake-Dawn was virtually invincible, a top figure even among sages, so it seems unlikely that she would have been impregnated by a random falling star. If that was really what happened, that ‘star’ must have been incredibly powerful.”

“What a terrifying thought!” Overseer Dragonwood said. “Even back then, Holy Daughter Quake-Dawn was a top genius, and was supposedly on the verge of becoming a Demi-Immortal. For a falling star to strike her and result in that means that it had to have been sent by a paramount expert from a much higher plane. I can hardly wrap my mind around what type of person that would be.”

“Well, there’s no need to get carried away talking about it. Let’s wait until the cannon fodder mercenaries get to the Rich-Lush Continent, then decide what the best next step is.”

“That’s true. Some big developments have occurred in the Rich-Lush Continent recently, and a lot of the big organizations are sending people there. If our mercenary squad ends up running into other mercenaries, hopefully this new guest elder can shake things up a bit. Considering that he can summon fiend-devils, I doubt any other mercenary squad will be a match for ours.”

“Very well, all of you,” Great Sage War-Wilds said coolly. “Be ready to take action at any moment. Once the squad reaches the Rich-Lush Continent and ensures there isn’t any great danger, you can follow. Besides, I’ll be keeping an eye on them as well.”

With that, the clone faded away into nothing.

**

Yang Qi found himself in a mountain valley, surrounded by towering cliffs and waterfalls. It was a very impressive scene; clearly, this was no ordinary valley.

The spirit energy was abundant here, and the terrain was dangerously rugged.

In the middle of it all was a teleportation portal, which was powering down having just transported Overseer Heavenwood and Yang Qi.

“This is Rubble Valley,” Overseer Heavenwood explained, “the rendezvous point for the mercenaries. Look, there they are right now. They're all equipped with consummate skills and abilities, and hail from a variety of regions. Only the Grand-Wilds Mansion would possibly offer pay high enough to attract people like this. In a moment, I’ll issue the announcement appointing you as the captain of the squad.”

Yang Qi saw a rather large group of people scattered throughout the valley, men and women who were all in the middle of various forms of cultivation. Some hovered cross-legged in the air, others sat by the waterfalls. Some practiced sword forms on the nearby boulders, and one was even training in a dimensional pocket he had created, cultivating some sort of extremely powerful body technique.

All of them had extraordinary cultivation bases. The weakest was in the Never-Dying Transformation, and some were imperious-looking Half Sages. Not a single one was a direct employee of the Grand-Wilds Mansion.

Quite a few of them took note of the arrival of Yang Qi and Overseer Heavenwood. And when they noticed that Yang Qi was only a Space-Void Legendary, looks of disdain appeared on their faces. In fact, most of them simply looked away from him and focused on Overseer Heavenwood.

One of the mercenaries was a middle-aged man clad in a suit of pitch-black armor, a Half Sage. Clasping his hands behind his back, he stepped forward and said, “Say, Overseer Heavenwood, I came from a long way to join this mercenary squad of yours. I passed the assessment, so when exactly are we going to head to the Rich-Lush Continent? Has your space-time wormhole been activated yet?”

“You leave now,” Overseer Heavenwood replied. “Considering that all of you passed our assessment, you’re definitely elites among elites. And of course, you will be paid handsomely for your services. Incidentally, we’ve picked a captain to lead your squad, this young man right here.” He gestured at Yang Qi. “He’s a guest elder of the Grand-Wilds Mansion, and will be given complete authority to make decisions and give orders. All you have to do is find the Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragment, get news about the Holy Daughter of the Quake-Dawn Cathedral, and her son, and then our Wilds God will give you a personal audience. He’ll even impart some boundless techniques to you that will ensure that you achieve major cultivation breakthroughs.”

“What? He's our captain?” one of the mercenaries said.

“Yeah, are you kidding me?” said the man in the black armor. “Him? Did you people make a mistake or something? All I sense from him are spatial fluctuations, and a bit of five phases vital energy. Considering that he hasn’t fused the power of the five phases with the void, it means he’s only in the third Legendary transformation. How could he possibly measure up to us? I can’t believe you’re making him our captain! Are you people brain-dead or something?”

With that, he glared at Yang Qi.

WHIZZZ!

Spatial fluctuations erupted from his eyes, a powerful attack that came in the form of two beams of light. Shockingly he wasn’t holding anything back; he intended to kill Yang Qi.

This man was clearly a vicious person. The truth was that he was actually a notorious bandit who had no problems killing people left and right.

“The Delirium God-Eye!” another of the mercenaries said. “I can’t believe he’s using that. That Space-Void Legendary is dead for sure. So vicious! Pan Yong is a famous bandit who has killed too many experts to even count. All he did was take one look at this captain, and he decided to kill him.”

“Yeah, Pan Yong is also known as King Delirium, a famous outlaw who kills people without even thinking. He’s the kind of person who defies all laws and principles, even those of heaven. He's a Half Sage, which means that only Great Sages could possibly be a match for him. How could the Grand-Wilds Mansion possibly think that he or any of us would accept some punk kid as our captain?”

“I see what’s going on here. Well, if King Delirium thinks he’s going to be the captain, he’ll have to fight his way through me first. There’s no way he qualifies to give orders to me, Blademaster Thunderbolt!”

Powerful fluctuations began to roll out from all of the vicious and ambitious mercenaries in the squad.

“Delirium God-Eye?” Yang Qi said. “You think a technique like that qualifies to have the word ‘god’ in it?” As soon as the two rays of light hit Yang Qi, they vanished. Then, he blurred into motion, appeared right in front of King Delirium, and punched him in the chest.

BOOM!

King Delirium slammed into the ground, coughing up blood.

Chapter 287: Wormhole

The insufferably arrogant King Delirium had been struck down by a single blow. Now he lay amidst a heap of rubble, his face completely ashen as he coughed up blood.

The people in the crowd were having a hard time believing their eyes.

Yang Qi had moved too quickly for anyone to see clearly, and in fact, faster than many of them could think. Before anyone could react, his target was on the ground, seriously injured.

“Trash like you doesn’t deserve to challenge my dignity,” Yang Qi said, brushing his hands together as if to clean them of dust. “How dare you compare yourself to me. I'm the captain here. If anyone doesn’t like that, then they can join King Delirium in the dust.”

King Delirium was many levels higher than Yang Qi, and yet had ended up crushed. To the spectators, it was as shocking as having watched an ant felling an elephant.

“Bastard!” King Delirium spat as he crawled out from the rubble. His complexion was ashen, but his eyes were shining bright red. “How dare you hit me like that! Fine, I guess I’ll show you my top secret magic. Grand Delirium!”

Waving his hand through the air in front of him, he caused a string of mysterious symbols to appear, which formed into various hexagramic and heptagonic spell arrays, all of which emanated an aura of delirium.

“Come forth, Delirium Blade!”

WHIZZZ!

An aura that resembled that of tortured gods could be heard as a divine weapon appeared within the spell arrays. It was hard to say whether it was an actual magical treasure, or formed from true energy. However, it seemed to pulse with such an aura of delirium that anyone who looked at it would sense their vision blurring.

“That’s the Delirium Blade! From what I’ve heard, it’s an energy art created by Great Sage Delirium himself, and is one of the most powerful secret magics there is. That weapon can kill the most powerful experts, and at the same time, cause everyone within five hundred kilometers to turn into delirious beasts.”

“Considering King Delirium acquired the legacy of a Great Sage, and reached this level of cultivation, it's little wonder he’s furious. He’s definitely going to kill that guy.”

“Yeah, after being knocked down like that, it would be strange if he didn't get angry. It’s too much of a loss of face. Without killing that kid, he’ll never recover his dignity.”

“Prepare to die!” King Delirium shouted, swinging the Delirium Blade back and forth through the air as he strode forward. The vital energy in the area was sliced to pieces by the blade, which was so powerful that it was surrounded by the image of deliriously dancing devil-ghosts.

“Crazed Devil Chaos Blade! Grand Cleaving!”

A blade nimbus from King Delirium’s weapon surrounded Yang Qi, making it seem like King Delirium was just about to achieve his goal of killing him.

Everyone present looked on, eagerly awaiting Yang Qi’s response. After all, because no one had been able to clearly see what happened earlier, they assumed that Yang Qi had knocked down King Delirium by unexpectedly using some sort of magical treasure. Now that King Delirium was attacking with force that bordered on the level of a Great Sage, everyone was very curious to see if Yang Qi could hold up.

Bam!

Yang Qi reached out with his hand and stopped the blade’s motion. Not only did it not cut him, he actually forced it to a complete standstill. That blade was unimaginably sharp, and yet it couldn’t even cut Yang Qi’s skin.

“Look!” a female mercenary cried. “He actually used his bare hand to stop the Delirium Blade! How strong could his fleshly body be?”

“What?! His bare hand!? Are you sure?”

C-C-CRACK! The Delirium Blade shattered into countless fragments, which then became a virtual storm of vital energy.

Scarcely able to believe his eyes, King Delirium began to back away.

However, Yang Qi lunged toward him, reaching out with his hand, a move that caused a black hole to spring up that shattered King Delirium’s armor.

“Grand Delirium Detonation!” King Delirium shouted, drawing on even more explosive energy arts, causing his long black hair to whip about like enormous snakes. “Let’s see whose attack is the strongest. DIE!”

Not even bothering to see what the man would throw at him next, Yang Qi just stepped forward and unleashed another fist strike.

Even before Yang Qi’s fist reached King Delirium, Space-Void Godlightning appeared, slamming down onto the surrounding mountains, shattering the boulders into even more rubble. At the same time, thousands of black holes sprang into being, causing the trumpeting of ancient megamammoths to fill the air.

AAAAOOOWWWW!AAAAOOOWWWW!AAAAAAOOOOOWWWWWW!

Anyone who heard that sound would think they were hearing something from the primeval Yore-Wilds. It was a sound so powerful that it was suffocating by nature, and weighed down on the souls of all present.

BOOM!

Yang Qi’s fist was like an iron-clad expression of the wrath of the gods. It completely vanquished King Delirium’s energy flows, then hit his head, smashing it like a watermelon.

Roar! Before the man’s flesh and blood could pull back together, Yang Qi took a step forward and ripped the rest of him to pieces, then sent raging flame out that, to the utter shock of everyone present, burned him away into nothing. Cries of anguish echoed out at first, but then faded away.

Eventually, the only thing left was a bag, King Delirium’s dimensional sack, which was surely filled with all sorts of treasures, including spirit stones.

King Delirium had been a famous bandit, and thus, had unimaginable riches. Yang Qi could sense that there were sagely-grade spirit stones in the sack, and yet, he just tucked it away without looking at it. Feeling very pleased with himself, he looked around at the other mercenaries.

“Ladies and gentlemen, this Pan Yong refused to follow orders from me, so I was forced to execute him. Is there anyone else out there who doesn’t admit that I should be in charge? The Grand-Wilds Mansion appointed me as the captain of this squad. As a guest elder, I have ultimate say regarding what happens in the Rich-Lush Continent. If anyone disagrees with that, we can talk it over right here and now.”

“I'm on board!” someone said.

Yang Qi looked over to see a rather lazy-looking young man in white. He seemed the type of person who was too lazy to take anything seriously, and yet, emanated fluctuations that made him seem far more mysterious to Yang Qi than the so-called King Delirium had.

“You’re definitely stronger than average, friend,” the young man continued. “Considering you ripped King Delirium to shreds, I'd say you definitely deserve to be our captain. In this world, we respect strength above all else.”

“Friend, might I ask your honored surname and distinguished given name?” Yang Qi asked.

“Oh, you can just call me Chaoguang,” the young man said casually.

“I'm on board too,” said a burly man with long sideburns, and a thunderbolt longsaber. He was none other than the man who had called himself Blademaster Thunderbolt moments ago.

“I'm in as well, Captain.”

More and more voices joined in. After all, these people had come to earn money, not fight amongst themselves. Now that Yang Qi had proven how strong he was, they all approved of him.

“Fine. Let’s head to the Rich-Lush Continent.” Yang Qi had killed King Delirium for the very purpose of establishing his authority, and obviously, it had worked. He could only imagine how shocked the people at the Demi-Immortal Institute would be when he returned leading a group like this. He now commanded a group even more powerful than the Crown Prince Society.

In fact, if these mercenaries actually followed his orders, then not even the Chancellor could stand up to him. And what could the Crown Prince possibly count for? Nothing. These were top experts from the Quake-Dawn Continent, which was a higher plane of existence than the Rich-Lush Continent. Even in the Quake-Dawn Continent, these people would be considered an invincible force. After all, among the dozens of mercenaries, there were at least seven or eight Half Sages, with the rest being Never-Dying Legendaries.

As of this moment, Yang Qi could truly call the wind and summon the rain.

He could already imagine the looks of shock on the faces of the elders in the Demi-Immortal Institute when they saw him.

Of course, gaining the complete allegiance of a bunch of mercenaries wasn’t going to be easy. Yang Qi could only hope that the journey through the wormhole to the Rich-Lush Continent would provide some opportunities to make these people his true subordinates.

“Very well,” Overseer Heavenwood said. “Now that everything is settled, and you’ve agreed on your captain, the time has come to depart. Remember, you may run into other mercenary squads in the Rich-Lush Continent, so be prepared.” Of course, Overseer Heavenwood didn’t care at all that King Delirium had been killed. To him, everyone present, even Yang Qi, was little more than cannon fodder.

Hefting his saber, Blademaster Thunderbolt loudly said, “What about the wormhole? Why haven’t you opened it yet? I'm very curious about this lower plane that is the Rich-Lush Continent. I’ve never been to a place with a curved heaven and flat earth.”

“The wormhole is being opened even as we speak!” Overseer Heavenwood waved his finger toward the center of the valley, causing rumbling sounds to echo out from a formation of stalagmites which rose up from among the rubble. Within them was a spell formation, powered by spirit stones, which ripped open a hole in the void, causing a wormhole to appear.

Wormholes were like tunnels eaten into space by enormous, archaean worms. They twisted and turned through the spatial tempests, connecting different planes of existence. Unfortunately, they were often unstable, and as they were battered by spatial tempests, always ran the risk of collapsing.

However, that didn’t seem to bother the mercenaries. They all knew that wormholes were inherently unstable, and that anything could happen when traversing them. There was little to be done about it, and they were the only way to quickly travel between planes. Even Great Sages could exhaust themselves to death trying to get to other planes by traveling the long way.

After all, the spatial tempests outside of wormholes often contained spatial beasts and hobgoblins, as well as hell monsoons, naturally occurring spell formations, magnetic fields, heavenly tribulations, vital energy tempests, and other dangers.

Compared to all that, wormholes were definitely the safest way to travel.

After the wormhole was opened, Yang Qi took the lead. The time had come to return to the Rich-Lush Continent.

Chapter 288: Returning to Rich-Lush

To Yang Qi, being in the space-time wormhole felt like being inside the body of some archaean worm. The passageway moved constantly, making it difficult to keep one's bearings. Of course, the twitching movements inside wormholes were what facilitated the actual travel to other planes.

One thing was for certain: as soon as he entered the wormhole, he could tell that he wasn’t in the Quake-Dawn Continent anymore.

In ancient times, enormous worms would eat space itself, and their passage left behind sprawling passageways. Later, powerful individuals used divine abilities to imitate the way that those archaean worms burrowed through space, to create what in modern times were called wormholes.

Only individuals in the Great Sage level or higher could create wormholes. When it came to Great Sages, they could create wormholes that led to planes similar to the one they inhabited, or lower planes. But Demi-Immortals could create wormholes leading to higher-level planes.

Considering that the Quake-Dawn Continent was a mid-level plane, and the Rich-Lush Continent was a lower plane, traveling from one to the other via wormhole was fairly safe. At the very minimum, it was relatively certain that the wormhole wouldn’t collapse.

A collapsing wormhole would eject those inside of it into scattered locations in the void, where they could theoretically remain lost for all eternity. If they were lucky, they might be able to randomly encounter some plane of existence, but if not, they would eventually waste away into death.

That said, Yang Qi wasn’t really worried about that possibility. With his Angel Wings at their current level, and the help of the Grand Emperor's Pagoda to fix onto spatial coordinates, he could get to the Rich-Lush Continent from anywhere, albeit with extra time and effort.

The wormhole convulsed, moving the silent mercenaries along through it. They were all attempting to conserve energy, and were thus refraining from even speaking. They wanted to be completely ready to take action if necessary.

As for Yang Qi, he hovered along cross-legged, using his Sovereign Lord True Energy to probe the five phases spirits.

Right now, he didn’t dare to unseal them, because there was a high possibility they would flee. However, he could use his Sovereign Lord True Energy to at least check and see if they had something in them similar to the heaven-demon seed.

Before long, he came to be convinced that there was indeed something in them. It made sense; there was no way that the Grand-Wilds Mansion would simply give him something so incredibly powerful.

As he was going about his cultivation, the white-garbed young man named Chaoguang neared and said, “Captain, I was wondering what higher plane you might hail from.”

He seemed completely at ease, and not worried about a thing. While everyone else was conserving energy, he was wandering around and looking at things left and right. He actually didn't seem like a mercenary at all, but rather, more like a tourist.

On the surface, it seemed like he was striking up a conversation with Yang Qi out of sheer boredom. However, Yang Qi’s intuition was telling him that there was something very unusual about him, including some immense power that he was keeping well-hid.

“I'm afraid I’m not at liberty to talk about that,” Yang Qi said. “What are you wasting energy for? Look. Everyone else is working on their cultivation. What happens if a fight breaks out?”

“They can do whatever they want, and so can I. Life is a wonderful thing, so why waste it on boring things like cultivation? What would be the point of that?” He yawned. “Your cultivation base seems profound enough as it is. So why not just chat with me for a bit? Who knows, we might end up talking about matters of enlightenment.”

Continuing with his internal work, Yang Qi chatted casually. “I'm currently a Space-Void Legendary. My main goal is to build up five phases vital energy, convert it to the preheaven version, and then reach the Five-Phases Transformation. You’re a Half Sage, standing right on the verge of the Great Sage level. Considering how much more advanced you are than me, what could we possibly have to chat about?”

“Five-Phases Transformation? Oh, that’s a foundational transformation. It's heavily connected to the Yin-Yang Transformation, you know. Both of them are very important to the Legendary level.” With that, he began to chant some sort of song: “Five phases, yin and yang, double what you seek. The blazing sun and shining moon both orbit the spirit peak. A host of heavens, a hundred apertures, the gods attend court. Ever seeking enlightenment of death and life’s mystique….”

It was a profound song with many lyrics, and was very thought-provoking. As Yang Qi listened to it, his heart began to pound as he realized that it was giving him new ideas. Eventually, he was stirred to his very soul, as though this song contained profound truths about a great dao.

“What song is that?” he asked.

“It’s a song composed by some unknown expert who lived in the ancient Yore-Wilds Continent. It’s called Ballad of the Dao Testimonial. I go traveling a lot, and one time, I found it carved into a cliff. Every time you reach a cultivation bottleneck, sing that song, and before long, you’ll break through. It has over five hundred lines in total, each one seven characters long, and they all have profound meaning. However, if you think about them, and try to decipher their meaning, they can link you to a great dao. Captain, if you’re interested in learning the song, I can teach it to you.”

“No, that’s fine. It’s your secret technique, and a boundless daoist scripture. A gentleman doesn’t steal.” Although Chaoguang’s song had stirred Yang Qi on a deep level, he wasn’t particularly motivated to acquire it. His godly-class energy art was profoundly domineering, and at its core was hard and unyielding. After all, it was the foundation of the halls of heaven in which the legion of gods resided.

The Ballad of the Dao Testimonial was different. It was a method of leisure and freedom, like a divine dragon gliding through the highest heavens, filled with the profound mysteries of a great dao. If he actually used it, and mastered it, he was worried that it might have a negative effect on his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.

“You’re so polite, Captain!” Chaoguang said, chuckling. “But, why not share good things amongst each other? That way we can all benefit. Captain, whatever energy art you practice, it seems unusually profound. How about the two of us share some of our secrets with each other?”

Yang Qi didn’t feel like beating around the bush. “What’s the point of us comparing notes when we have different daos? You walk the path of ancient immortals, free and unfettered. But I walk a different path. Why would I go about undermining my own energy arts?”

Chaoguang flashed a wide smile. “Captain, it seems to me you have a weak will. A strong-willed person wouldn’t worry about being influenced in such a way.”

“Say what you want. But considering how much lower my cultivation level is than yours, it's only natural for me to be weak-willed by your standards. It’s something that I’ll improve slowly but surely, by becoming stronger and reaching a higher level.” Yang Qi wasn’t particularly pleased with how he had worded things. After all, he had essentially admitted to being weak-willed. Of course, the truth was that he was anything but weak-willed.

“Alright then, Captain,” Chaoguang said, looking at Yang Qi with flashing eyes. “Well, I won’t bother you any longer.”

“Fine. Go work on your cultivation. We’ll end up in a fight sooner or later, and you need to be at peak readiness.” With that, Yang Qi closed his eyes and ignored Chaoguang.

However, he was now fully on guard.

The few lines of the Ballad of the Dao Testimonial that he had heard were still echoing in his head, and he simply couldn’t drive them out.

As he attempted to continue working on his cultivation, he found that his thoughts were being affected, and that he was feeling more free and unfettered. Actually, it ran completely counter to the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, which was domineering, fierce, unyielding, and explosive, and pertained to the Sovereign Lord Himself.

All of a sudden, he realized that he felt sluggish, and that he couldn’t focus his thoughts.

‘Something’s wrong. It’s definitely that Ballad of the Dao Testimonial! Maybe it does conform to a great dao of ancient immortals, but it’s affecting my soul! This Chaoguang is no simple fellow, that’s for sure.’ Yang Qi’s eyes snapped open as a holy hymn suddenly resonated in his mind, a choir of countless voices all singing together. “The glory of the Lord, boundless and paramount; omniscient and omnipotent, the will of the Lord; only this is True, the Lord’s words….”

RUMBLE!

Immediately, the Ballad of the Dao Testimonial was driven out of his mind. In that moment, Yang Qi was the one and only Lord, He who existed above the legion of gods, the Sovereign Lord, the source of what was True in the world.

“I am the Truth, the one and only Truth. Because of Me, nothing else in the world is true and real.” Yang Qi took a deep breath. He had just been baptized by true energy, and was now more confident and strong-willed than ever. He was the Lord, and he was Truth. Compared to him, everything else was a heretical dao. Only he was true and real.

This was the domineering true energy of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. How could the glory of the Lord tolerate blasphemy? Not even great daos had the right to do that. The glory of the Lord did not need advice and tips from other sources. I am the Truth, and all other wills shall conform to me.

There was now no trace of the Ballad of the Dao Testimonial in him.

All of a sudden, he felt a keen desire to do battle, something that came from his very will. After all, had he succumbed to the Ballad of the Dao Testimonial, he would have fallen, and would have betrayed the glory of the Lord.

After all, he himself was the Lord.

When Yang Qi drove the Ballad of the Dao Testimonial out of him, Chaoguang shivered, and his face drained of blood. ‘His willpower is so strong,’ he thought. ‘It’s like he's the only thing in existence. It almost seems like the will of the legion of gods! My Ballad of the Dao Testimonial was left behind by an ancient immortal, and was transformed by me into an energy art. Once I sing it, it should infiltrate the soul of the listener, and brand them with a great dao. From then on, their dao should be under my control. It's an unfathomable and ancient song, a tune used to pass on a dao. It should even affect the mind of Great Sages. I could have passed on my dao to him… but he drove the Ballad of the Dao Testimonial away….’

All of a sudden, Chaoguang felt profoundly unsettled. Before he could do anything else, rumbling sounds filled the wormhole.

Several of the mercenaries rose to their feet.

“What? What’s going on? There’s fighting?”

“We've arrived at the Rich-Lush Continent! Look, there it is up ahead. It really does have a curved heaven and flat earth! It’s not spherical! So, this is what a lower plane looks like. Oh, look! It’s surrounded by fiend-devils! A whole cloud of them!”

Yang Qi rose excitedly to his feet and looked further into the wormhole. There, he saw a huge continent floating in space-time, with a curved heaven covering it over.

It was the Rich-Lush Continent.

‘I'm back….’ he thought, his excitement building.

Chapter 289: Giant Snake from the Hell of Nagas

The Rich-Lush Continent was within sight, and Yang Qi was nearly overwhelmed with excitement. His journey from the Western Continent to the Quake-Dawn Continent, and everything which had occurred subsequently, ate away a lot of time. Worse, he had no way of knowing what might have occurred while he was away.

He was now a Space-Void Legendary, and very close to being a Five-Phases Legendary. Although he couldn’t quite match up with a Great Sage, it shouldn’t be difficult for him to fight a Half Sage, and possibly even kill one.

He would surely cause quite a few double-takes back in the Demi-Immortal Institute.

“Crown Prince. Yun Hailan. Chancellor…. You people just wait until I get back. You’ll be trembling under the power of my energy arts.”

Reaching into his sleeve, he patted the Heaven-Dominating Golden Swordbreaker. When he used the swordbreaker, the might it unleashed was shocking, and at the same time, made his true energy more true and real. Backed by the quintessence energy of the five phases, it was a fiendish weapon that could dominate anything in creation.

RUMBLE!

In the very moment that Yang Qi actually caught sight of the Rich-Lush Continent, the entire wormhole shook as though it were being attacked. Its walls began to split open, and devil energy rushed in. Devil-ghosts and gigantic beasts appeared and began to attack anything in their path.

“So, we're finally meeting some resistance.”

All of the mercenaries unleashed their energy arts to fight the devil-ghosts. These people were world-class fighters from the Quake-Dawn Continent, so creatures like this could hardly put up a fight. Instantly, screams of death rang out, and none of them were from the mouths of the mercenaries.

“How could fiend-devils like this stand up to me, Blademaster Thunderbolt!?” A shining blade nimbus erupted from Blademaster Thunderbolt’s hand, which sliced a fiend-devil to pieces. A moment later, a devil core dropped in Blademaster Thunderbolt’s palm.

“This is so boring,” white-robed Chaoguang said lazily. “Why can’t there be any interesting fiend-devils?” Seemingly expending no effort at all, he waved his finger back and forth, cutting down fiend-devils as though he were harvesting wheat.

“How come there aren’t any asuras?” a female mercenary said, waving her shining chakram through the air, taking the heads off several bronzeblaze fiend-devils all at the same time.

“I thought we were going to end up in a real fight,” a middle-aged mercenary said. “What's with these weak fiend-devils? I'm actually quite disappointed.” He suddenly exhaled a massive blast of fire which burned all of the nearby fiend-devils to death.

HISSSSSSSSSSSSS!

Even as the mercenaries laughed and joked, a profoundly noxious stench suddenly swept through the wormhole. Many of the mercenaries suddenly felt their eyes drooping, and their heads nodding down toward their chests. Some of them simply passed out.

“Not good!” Chaoguang said, his face falling as he looked deeper into the passage ahead. “Something really strong is coming!”

Suddenly, an enormous snake appeared up ahead, slithering toward them, pulsing with a suffocating aura.

It had nine heads, and wings, and its eyes flickered with evil, aberration, corruption, lust, greed, bloodthirstiness, and a host of other evils.

The giant, nine-headed snake glared scornfully at the mercenaries, its psychic fluctuations causing the entire wormhole to tremble. “Listen up, mortals. I command armies back in the Hell of Nagas. Tremble! Shake with fear in my presence! For all of you are about to become lunch!”

“A giant snake from the Hell of Nagas!” Chaoguang growled.

“Everyone, form ranks!” Yang Qi said.

The rest of the mercenaries were shocked. “How could this be possible? How could a being from a higher plane of hell be right here?”

In the ancient Helltongue, nagas were actually called ‘dragons’. In fact, even in many other planes, giant snakes like this were commonly called ‘dragons of hell’ because of their noble blood. They were actually considered to be more highborn than asuras. It was little wonder considering the Hell of Nagas ranked higher than the Hell of Suras.

As for this giant snake, its aura was equivalent to a Half Sage. Furthermore, each of its nine heads contained separate psychic fluctuations, which meant that, for all intents and purposes, it was equivalent to nine Half Sages, collected together in one body.

Giant snakes like this were powerful in a depraved way, and specialized in devouring enemies. They were different from asuras in that any sort of lesser true energy that hit them would be instantly consumed.

Almost immediately, Blademaster Thunderbolt found himself trembling under the psychic power of the naga. Circulating his true energy, he lifted his thunderbolt longsaber over his head and then lunged forward in an attack.

Thunderous rumblings echoed out; this attack was definitely strong enough to chop Never-Dying Legendaries in two.

“Mortal!” the giant snake growled. One of its heads shot forth, eyes shining with blazing light, to meet the descending blade. Then, when the blade hit it, it simply absorbed all of the light of the attack.

“What low-level universal power! Is this really the true energy you mortals have?” That particular head opened its mouth and spat out a stream of toxic energy, which slammed into Blademaster Thunderbolt and sent him staggering backward.

Unfortunately, his defensive true energy was too weak, and immediately began to corrode. A moment later, it was gone, and Blademaster Thunderbolt screamed as the toxins began to eat away at his flesh.

Instead of leaping to his aid, all the other mercenaries began to back up, fearful of the deadly nature of the toxins.

The giant snake seemed to be playing with the group. Nine heads swaying back and forth, it said, “Stupid humans. Ants. There’s no way you can fight back against a noble being like myself.”

HISSSSSSSSSSSSS!

An enormous tongue shot out from one of its mouths, which began to swirl around Blademaster Thunderbolt to pull him back to be eaten.

But then, a hand appeared out of nowhere and grabbed him. Intense, holy light then washed through him, healing his corroded flesh and driving out the toxins.

“Captain!” Blademaster Thunderbolt blurted. He had been certain that he was about to die, only to be saved at the very last minute. Bowing his head in thanks, he said, “I, Blademaster Thunderbolt, owe you my life!”

“Mortal!” the giant snake roared, whipping all nine of its heads around to stare at Yang Qi. “How dare you snatch food out of my mouth. Very well, I guess I’ll eat you instead.”

“Despicable denizen of hell,” Yang Qi said, striding forward. He was completely impervious to the toxic energy, and in fact, it was being eaten up by his own true energy.

RUMBLE!

He unleashed an iron fist of immense power, simultaneously sending out a sea of true energy, like an interstellar deluge.

This giant snake could gobble up mountains if it wanted, so it simply bared its fangs and tried to bite Yang Qi’s fist.

BOOM!

When his fist made contact with the fangs, they shattered. As for the venom, not only did it not affect Yang Qi, it actually seemed afraid of him, and tried to flee. Unfortunately, his true energy treated the venom like water treated fire, instantly extinguishing it. At the same time, Yang Qi began to absorb the hellish energy of the naga snake.

“Impossible! You’re actually stronger than me, mortal!” The giant snake reared its nine heads in crazed fashion, causing large swaths of the wormhole to shatter from the force.

“No kidding, you oversized worm!” Yang Qi drew fully on the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, hammering the snake with blows that it couldn’t possibly avoid.

All of a sudden, the snake began to glow with devil light, and at the same time, shrink down as it consolidated its strength. Its wings flapped, and it flew up into the air, simultaneously transforming into a sinister-looking man in a long black robe. Above his head was a rippling magical symbol that looked like a twisted dragon-snake. That symbol was actually the written script of Helltongue, and meant ‘dragon’. This was none other than the human form of the giant snake.

“Prepare to die, mortal! Naga Hellfist!” Clenching his hand into a fist, he unleashed a pure expression of the martial path, something no inferior to an asura.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi strode forward to meet him, surrounded by holy hymns, unleashing a fist strike that could devastate all magics, and a palm strike that could capture all devils.

His left hand was a fist, and his right hand was a palm; the fist focused on a devastating attack, and the palm prepared to capture the enemy.

“Downfall of Myriad Hells!” he growled, unleashing one of the most invincible moves belonging to the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, something that the godmammoths could use to force countless hells to sink into oblivion.

Every step he took shattered the space beneath him into oblivion. At the same time, he glowed with powerful, radiant light that could evaporate any devil energy. In the blink of an eye, his foot smashed into the snake’s chest.

The man shrieked as he exploded, transforming into a haze of blood and gore that splattered everywhere in the wormhole.

However, a moment later, he formed back into the shape of a giant snake, and after that, a devilish wind.

“Expeditious Retreat of the Heaven-Devil!”

The devilish wind shot to the end of the wormhole and then vanished.

Yang Qi didn't give chase. He knew that the giant snake was incredibly powerful, and would be difficult to fully vanquish, whether that be by sealing it or killing it.

“Captain, that was incredible! You actually forced that giant snake into retreat. Without you here, I'm afraid our mercenary squad would have suffered a crushing defeat….”

“Amazing! If that giant snake got into the Quake-Dawn Continent, it would take dozens of Half Sages powering a grand spell formation to fight it!”

Chapter 290: Another Encounter with the Ghost Emperor

‘What a pity I couldn't catch it,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘Imagine the incredible power I could have unleashed if I managed to enslave it with the Devil-God Seal!’

Unfortunately, it would have been very difficult to succeed in that task, so letting it escape was definitely the best thing. After all, what would have happened if, after he captured it, the thing managed to break free?

It was just on the verge of becoming a hellish dragon, and devil-dragons like that were pure terror.

Only Great Sages could possibly deal with such entities, and at the moment, Yang Qi wasn’t that strong. He needed to reach the sixth Legendary transformation before he could be on the same level as a Great Sage.

‘I wonder when I’ll actually be able to use the God Legion Paradise.’ He shook his head. ‘If I were a Personal-Domain Legendary, would my God Legion Paradise be enough to capture that snake?’

Although he was actually a bit disappointed about how things had turned out, the mercenary squad was completely shaken, and everyone was looking reverently at Yang Qi, as though he were a deva from heaven.

Even the white-garbed Chaoguang was moved, although he managed to hide it. All of a sudden, he realized that he wasn't sure if he could take on Yang Qi in a fight.

“Alright, everyone, calm down,” Yang Qi said. “The wormhole took a lot of damage, but back in the Grand-Wilds Mansion, they're definitely catalyzing it with enough magical power to keep it stable. We just need to wait until we reach our destination.”

WHIZZZ!

The wormhole twitched, and the mercenaries were pushed into descent toward a spatial nexus.

“This is it!” Chaoguang yelled. “The Great Sage back on the other end is pushing us into the nexus. I wonder where we’ll end up in the Rich-Lush Continent. Make sure to stick together, everyone!”

As the wormhole seemed to spin around them, the mercenaries linked their true energy to each other; if they got separated, it would only make it more difficult to accomplish their mission.

An explosive force shoved them, and they descended into the spatial nexus, flying through the greyspace of the Rich-Lush Continent.

After Yang Qi repaired the greyspace, it became far more strong and stable. However, the wormholes which had existed since the primeval era were still in place, and the greyspace would allow them to pass through it.

Before long, everyone realized that the fluctuations of the wormhole were gone.

They were surrounded by darkness, and for some reason, it seemed like they were far, far underground. There was even a vile aura that made them feel like throwing up.

“Where are we?” one of the female mercenaries said. Drawing on her true energy, she caused a glowing orb of light to form above her head, which cast radiance out in all directions.

They found themselves in an ancient hall of some sort, apparently in the depths of a mountain. However, it was a strange mountain, completely imbued with wretch energy, as well as what seemed to be some sort of magnetic force.

In the middle of the hall was a pond filled with gurgling springwater that emanated a boundless aura of life force that posed a sharp contrast to the wickedness of the mountain around them.

Yang Qi immediately realized that the place seemed familiar.

Next, the sound of clanking chains could be heard from the depths of the pond, as though some diabolical monster were sealed inside of it.

“This is odd,” the female mercenary said. “Why would the Grand-Wilds Mansion send us here? This low-level plane really is weak. Too weak. I could create a spatial tempest without hardly even trying. And the magical law here is almost nonexistent. There’s definitely no way any top experts or powerful magical treasures could appear in a place like this. Eee? A pond? That’s a pretty strong aura of life force. Wait, is that life force springwater?”

She quickly flew over, reached out with her palm, and began to absorb the life force springwater.

‘Hold on…’ Yang Qi thought. ‘Life force springwater….?’ All of a sudden, everything clicked. “This is bad, get back here!”

They were in Yama Mountain in the Heavencorpse Kingdom.

Ghost Emperor Yama was imprisoned here, supposedly sealed by experts from the Quake-Dawn Continent. In fact, that was why Ghost Emperor Yama was bound by Quake-Dawn godsteel.

“This is Yama Mountain!” he shouted. “We have to get out of here!” Unfortunately, he was too late.

A pitch-black hand suddenly burst out of the pond and grabbed the female mercenary. She was a Never-Dying Legendary, and yet, the arm moved so quickly that not even she could track its movement.

WHOOSH!

Before she could react, she was dragged into the pond. Next, an agonized shriek rang out, which was then cut short as blood began to bubble up from the depths of the spring.

“Dammit, is there a devil-ghost in there? What is it?” Mercenaries left and right were shouting in anger and terror. Meanwhile, Blademaster Thunderbolt lunged forward and slashed at the pond with his saber, splitting it apart and revealing a pitch-black cave underneath.

“Stop!” Yang Qi shouted. “We have to go! This place is too dangerous. We’ve been tricked by the Grand-Wilds Mansion. Dammit! When I get back I'm gonna rip them to pieces!”

“Leave? Where are we supposed to go?”

Intense rumbling sounds could be heard, and the sky-obfuscating, land-enshrouding might of a sage filled the entire hall. At the same time, a devil-ghost appeared, wrapped up in chains that were so weak they seemed like they might crumble at any moment.

Yang Qi recognized him instantly; it was none other than the mighty Ghost Emperor Yama.

“A Great Sage devil-ghost!”

“It really is a devil-ghost in the Great Sage level!?”

“Why did they send us here? There’s a sealed Great Sage devil-ghost here? The Grand-Wilds Mansion has sent us to our death!”

“Damn you, Grand-Wilds Mansion! You're using us like cannon fodder!”

“Run! Get out of here!”

Despite the fact that everyone present was a top expert, they were all terrified. After all, the aura emanating off Ghost Emperor Yama was the type that none of them could fight against.

This was an invincible, gigantic devil from the ancient past, a consummate monster who could end worlds.

“Run?” Ghost Emperor Yama said with a chuckle. “To where?”

Instantly, the space in the area turned solid, making it impossible for anyone to leave. At the same time, the chains binding Ghost Emperor Yama crumbled into dust. At long last, he was free!

All of a sudden, Yang Qi’s heart sank into the deepest depths.

With Ghost Emperor Yama free, could the Rich-Lush Continent even defend against him? There was no doubt that once he was out in the open, he would instigate a reign of carnage and death.

‘Crap!’ Chaoguang thought. ‘Damn that Grand-Wilds Mansion!’

Now that Ghost Emperor Yama was free of his chains, his aura was growing stronger.

“So, Wilds God, after all these years, you still remember me.” Throwing his head back, he laughed maniacally. Even as the mercenaries dropped to their knees in terror, he continued, “You even sent me plenty of flesh and blood sacrifices. Wonderful. A host of magical laws from Half Sages and Never-Dying Legendaries will do a lot to help me build my power back up!”

Even as he spoke, he slowly shrank down from his gigantic form, until he looked like a vicious old man in a black robe.

Taking a step forward, he waved his hand, causing the life force springwater to rush together until it formed a pearl.

“Quake-Dawn Cathedral! The two of us cannot exist together. You sealed me here for far, far too long. I, the mighty Ghost Emperor Yama, locked up for tens of thousands of years. Tens of thousands of years!” He looked around. “You people are here from the Quake-Dawn Continent, right? Excellent. The fluctuations of the space-time wormhole from moments ago finally freed me of that Quake-Dawn godsteel. The spatial coordinates led right to my throne room, which, unluckily for you, means that you’re now going to be sacrificed to me. However, if any of you wish to live, and act as my servants, then start fighting. Whichever of you survives in the end can join me.”

The mercenaries all exchanged awkward glances. Would they really have to fight each other to the death?

When Yang Qi realized that some of the mercenaries looked like they might actually start fighting, he threw his hands out. “Hold on everyone, don’t move. Don’t let yourself be fooled by this devil-ghost.” Standing, he took a step forward. “Remember me, Ghost Emperor Yama?”

Moments ago, Ghost Emperor Yama had been reaching out to crush to death whoever had just spoken up. But then he got a good look at Yang Qi’s face, and suddenly staggered backward three full paces.

The mercenaries all looked on in complete disbelief. How could any of them have guessed that Yang Qi would be able to frighten a consummate fiend-devil like this?

“I never would have guessed that you would remember me, oh Ghost Emperor Yama,” Yang Qi said with a cool smile. The truth was that he wasn’t confident at all in what he was doing. The ghost emperor was enigmatic and impossible to predict, and although Yang Qi had his God Legion Seal, he had no idea of knowing whether it would help him.

If it didn’t, and Ghost Emperor Yama attacked him, he would be doomed.

“It’s you!?” Ghost Emperor Yama said, glaring at Yang Qi. “You came back!? Well, that’s good. I was just going to come looking for you. It’s just like the old saying, you little brat. You can wear out iron shoes in a fruitless search, then find what you're looking for without even trying. By the way, the stuff with the Planar Pearl, was that you?”

“Yes, it was,” Yang Qi said, sounding very confident in himself. “What I did with the Planar Pearl should be a good reminder of what I can do to you. I’ll give you one chance here, Ghost Emperor Yama. Acknowledge allegiance to me, and I won’t kill you. If I have to resort to that sealing mark of mine, you know that you’ll regret it!”

Chapter 291: Donning the Tiger Skin

(footnote explains the spoiler title)

Yang Qi knew that neither the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, the Heaven-Dominating Golden Swordbreaker, nor any of his other techniques would do him any good against Ghost Emperor Yama.

It was true that the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth was the most primeval of consummate techniques, representative of the might of the Lord.

If he ran into an ordinary Great Sage, he would at least have the chance to escape with his life. But Ghost Emperor Yama was no ordinary Great Sage. He was a devil king from primeval times, and it had taken an entire team of Great Sages to seal him back in the day. Just now, he had locked down the entire area without even trying, which was something that bordered on the power of immortals.

In the Great Sage level, each and every step was vastly more powerful than the previous, and there was absolutely no question that Ghost Emperor Yama was a high-level Great Sage. His command of countless magical laws insured that not even the chancellors of the great institutes could do anything to him.

Of course, the chancellor of the Demi-Immortal Institute was mysterious and hard to read, so there was no telling what would happen if he and Ghost Emperor Yama actually broke out into fighting. In any case, that didn’t matter. It wasn’t as if the chancellor would show up in this situation to save the day.

Besides, Yang Qi didn’t want help like that. No, he would make his own last-ditch effort to try to salvage the situation. He even went so far as to demand that Ghost Emperor Yama acknowledge allegiance to him and be his servant. After all, Ghost Emperor Yama was well aware of how powerful the God Legion Seal was, and knew that it could kill him.

“Feeling suicidal, brat?!” Ghost Emperor Yama yelled angrily. There was something particularly strange about how he focused his sinister eyes on Yang Qi’s forehead, as though he could see his deepest secrets.

Yang Qi snorted coldly and took another step forward. “Look, Ghost Emperor Yama, do I need to call on my God Legion Seal, or not? There’s someone else I'm anxious to kill in the Rich-Lush Continent, so either acknowledge allegiance to me, or be crushed. It's up to you.”

“You’re bluffing, punk. That God Legion Seal in your forehead is strong, but it's passive. You can’t use it like a weapon! Besides, it's broken. Incomplete. If it were whole, not even an immortal could do anything to you. But last time we clashed, it didn't kill me, which indicates that it isn’t fully powered. You know what, I think I’ll grab you, dig the seal out of your head, and absorb it. Then I’ll be the most powerful entity in the world!”

“Is that what you think?” Yang Qi shrugged. “Alright. Go ahead and try. Even if it isn’t complete, it's enough to destroy an ant-devil like you. Remember, last time we met, I was only in the Lifeseizing level. That's why I couldn’t control the seal directly. But now I'm a Legendary, so things are completely different.” Throwing caution to the wind, Yang Qi took a casual step forward, seemingly daring Ghost Emperor Yama to attack him.

As for all the mercenaries, the conversation which was playing out was so shocking that many of them nearly collapsed into unconsciousness as they shrank into the corners of the hall, trembling like baby chickens. In contrast, Chaoguang watched the situation with glittering eyes, seemingly more and more curious with Yang Qi.

Never could he have guessed that Yang Qi would be able to deal with a vicious fiend like Ghost Emperor Yama. After all, despite the lofty words Ghost Emperor Yama kept spewing, he wasn’t actually doing anything. In fact, he actually looked scared.

“You’re definitely bluffing!” Ghost Emperor Yama said, licking his lips with his blood-red tongue. “If you could actually use it like a weapon, you little punk, you already would have. You’re not going to talk your way out of this situation.” With that, he shook out his hand, causing devil energy to pulse out, almost as if he were loosening up to begin fighting.

“If you think I’m lying, fine.” Brushing his fingers through the air casually, Yang Qi said, “Go ahead and attack me. But I promise you, you’ll regret it for the rest of your life, however short it is.”

Instead, Ghost Emperor Yama stood there hesitantly, recalling the moment when the golden imp had appeared to him last time, and the horrific pain and injury that had resulted. The truth was that he did almost die back then. The might of the legion of gods had treated him like a rag doll, and the more he thought about it, the less he wanted to see that golden imp ever again.

Finally, he said, “I, Ghost Emperor Yama, am a top expert from the era of the Yore-Wilds! I've been sealed for tens of thousands of years, but now I'm free, and I'm going to dominate the world! Soon, the Rich-Lush Continent will be a sea of blood, and afterward, I'm going to slaughter everyone from the Quake-Dawn Cathedral!”

“Fine, go do what you have to do,” Yang Qi said. “But if there’s nothing else between the two of us, then I'm going to take my mercenaries and leave.”

“You think you're just going to walk out of here, punk?” A sinister smile broke out on to Ghost Emperor Yama. Shaking his head, he continued, “I'm not letting you out of my sight. I want to know the truth about you, and therefore, I'm coming with you. Let’s see how far you’ll actually take this bluff.”

Yang Qi smiled coldly. “You want to come with me? Alright. But I'm leaving Yama Mountain. You’re not going to stop me are you?” Waving his hand, he helped all the mercenaries to their feet. “Come on, everyone. We're leaving. There’s no way this Ghost Emperor Yama will use the warding magics of Yama Mountain to try to stop us. If even a speck of his devil energy touches us, he’s done for.”

Letting out a shout, he sent out numerous streams of true energy to attack the mountain itself, and break a passage open.

“Dirty little swine,” Ghost Emperor Yama growled, instinctively waving his hands to disable Yama Mountain’s warding magics, allowing Yang Qi to pass through them unharmed. Until he was absolutely sure of Yang Qi’s limits, he didn’t dare to do anything to provoke a reaction from the God Legion Seal.

Yang Qi and the mercenaries left Yama Mountain, to find themselves in the rotting swamps of the Heavencorpse Kingdom.

“Captain, are we really free?” one of the female mercenaries said, hardly able to believe what was happening.

“Yes,” Yang Qi replied coolly. “You see, Ghost Emperor Yama was once thoroughly vanquished by my mysterious backer.” Looking around at all the mercenaries, he continued, “We were deceived by the Grand-Wilds Mansion, recruited simply to be sacrifices to Ghost Emperor Yama. From here on out, all of you stick close to me. It's obvious that Ghost Emperor Yama won’t let any of us off the hook if he has the chance.”

“Yes, Captain!” the mercenaries all said. Clearly, all of them were completely and utterly devoted to Yang Qi now.

“Who would have thought that the Grand-Wilds Mansion would be so sinister,” Chaoguang said. “It seems to me that they really want to challenge the authority of the Quake-Dawn Cathedral. By unleashing Ghost Emperor Yama on the world, they’ve ensured that the church will suffer a huge catastrophe.”

“You’re exactly right, you ants! A big disaster is coming to the Quake-Dawn Cathedral, thanks to me!”

RUUUUUUUUMBLE!

Ghost Emperor Yama himself appeared. Reaching out with his hand, he caused Yama Mountain to shrink down, and sent out powerful fluctuations that shook the Heavencorpse Dimension so badly that the blood swamps began to simply dry up.

Within moments, Yama Mountain was a magical treasure sitting on the palm of his hand. The truth was that the mountain was just like the Grand Emperor's Pagoda or the Heaven-Dominating Golden Swordbreaker. It was a sage item, crafted by the blood, sweat, and tears of a Great Sage. Although Yang Qi couldn’t yet unleash the ultimate potential of the two sage items he currently had, Ghost Emperor Yama was different. He most certainly could draw on the full powers of Yama Mountain. After all, he had created it to begin with.

Putting the treasure away, he clasped his hands behind his back and, in the most sinister of voices, said, “Listen up, punk. Like I said, I'm coming with you. Wherever you go, I go. You can’t be on guard all the time, so if I find out that you can’t use the God Legion Seal, then you’re dead!”

From the way he was eyeing Yang Qi, it seemed he regarded him as a precious treasure that he didn’t want to lose sight of. In some ways, Yang Qi really was like a treasure. He had the God Legion Seal and a godly-class energy art, things that Ghost Emperor Yama could only dream of possessing.

“Fine,” Yang Qi said. “Do whatever you want. But let me remind you that the chancellor of the Demi-Immortal Institute is no weaker than you. A few years ago, the Quake-Dawn Cathedral sent some Great Sages to look into the son of their Holy Daughter, who is supposedly a god from heaven descended into the mortal world. Except, the chancellor killed them. If you come with me to the Demi-Immortal Institute, you’ll be in the middle of a whole bunch of enemies.”

Of course, Yang Qi was intentionally trying to intimidate Ghost Emperor Yama.

“The Quake-Dawn Cathedral!?” Ghost Emperor Yama's eyes flickered with hatred. “So, their Holy Daughter gave birth to a supposed god from heaven descended into the mortal world. A son, huh. Well, it must be true. There’s no way the Holy Daughter had an affair. Besides, I've seen that son of hers with my own eyes. He’s innately strong, and noble on a substructural level. He just hasn’t unleashed his true potential. Well, it doesn’t matter. He’s little more than a pawn in my clash with the Quake-Dawn Cathedral!”

Ghost Emperor Yama was obviously referring to the Crown Prince.

Yang Qi had known all along that the Crown Prince acquired life force springwater from Ghost Emperor Yama. That alone made it obvious that they had been working together. However, it was obvious that Ghost Emperor Yama was scheming against him, and viewed him as little more than lunch meat.

“Alright, let’s go,” Ghost Emperor Yama said. “I'm curious to see what this chancellor is like.”

“Fine. I guess it won't hurt to have some more muscle on my side. But if you get in a fight, don’t blame me for hitting you while you’re down.” With that Yang Qi summoned his Grand Emperor's Pagoda, causing a bit of purity to appear within the Heavencorpse Kingdom. “Everyone, come to the perimeter of my Grand Emperor's Pagoda.” Settling down cross-legged, he began to activate the pagoda’s defenses. “If you don’t mind, please lend me some power via the pagoda. I need to refine these five phases spirits to push myself into the Five-Phases Transformation.”

Yang Qi was itching to return to the Demi-Immortal Institute, or perhaps make contact with Hua Tianxiong to see about the situation with the Crown Prince. But now he had Ghost Emperor Yama shadowing him, which meant he was in constant danger. Because of that, he hoped to reach the Five-Phases Transformation as quickly as possible, and become even stronger.

As the mercenaries gathered around the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, they sent their true energy into it, causing the pagoda to shine with brilliant light.

“The Grand Emperor’s Pagoda,” Ghost Emperor Yama said. “After the Crown Prince got the legacy of Grand Emperor Rich-Lush, that pagoda was supposed to go to him. How did you get it?”

Chapter 292: Power of the Wilds God

Yang Qi wanted to reach the Five-Phases Transformation as quickly as possible, no matter how he had to go about doing it. And it seemed that Ghost Emperor Yama really was planning on following him around and watching his every move.

Therefore, it was with the protection of the Grand Emperor's Pagoda that he took out the case with the five phases spirits in it.

Ghost Emperor Yama clicked his tongue at how casually Yang Qi was just going about his cultivation. “So, five phases spirits! The Grand-Wilds Mansion must have given those to you, right? Not bad. Not bad at all. What a pity you can’t actually use them for cultivation.”

“Why’s that?” Yang Qi asked.

Ghost Emperor Yama snorted coldly. “I guess it won’t hurt to tell you. Although they have pure five phases power, and can push you into the Five-Phases Transformation, they also have the power of the Wilds God in them. If you use them for cultivation, that power will transform you into a wilds-slave. You’ll become a puppet of the Grand-Wilds Mansion!” Ghost Emperor Yama chuckled coldly. “I'd advise you not to send yourself to an early grave. After all, I don’t want my prey falling into the hands of another hunter.”

“That’s not really news. I expected them to do that.” Yang Qi had suspected something like this would be the case, but hadn’t been able to find any evidence. To hear the words right out of Ghost Emperor Yama’s mouth seemed to just confirm his earlier guesswork. The power of the Wilds God was supposedly quite mysterious.

After all, he was the ultimate leader of the Grand-Wilds Mansion, and most likely, was a high-level Great Sage, a person similar in power to Ghost Emperor Yama.

“Listen, brat. At least let me see some of your true technique. If you do, I’ll help you out. I’ll even expel the power of the Wilds God from those five phases spirits. What do you say?” His eyes glittered with sinister coldness, as well as something profoundly enigmatic. “I can even transform that power into something you could use to benefit your cultivation base. If I do all of that, then forget worrying about the Five-Phases Transformation; you’ll have no problem going all the way to the Personal-Domain Transformation.”

“Is that so?” Yang Qi said coolly. “Sounds like a pretty good deal. However, you already know that the energy art I cultivate is beyond value. It's something you would never find in the Quake-Dawn Continent, or even higher planes of the universe for that matter. It didn’t even exist in the Yore-Wilds Continent. I'm not going to give it to someone such as yourself, just like that. You think a breakthrough to the Personal-Domain Transformation is going to entice me? Sorry, but that's far too lame of an offer.”

“Oh? So you want to haggle?” Eyes glittering, Ghost Emperor Yama waved his hand to produce something that looked like a swirling seed of water.

“Back when the Quake-Dawn Cathedral imprisoned me, they used the power of life force springwater, which originates from this motherspring seed. It has immense life force power, so if I give it to you, and explain the technique to use it, you can essentially utilize the most powerful techniques from the Hell of Yamas. After absorbing it, you’ll achieve multiple breakthroughs. Furthermore, I can use it to channel true energy into you, and impart some of my personally-created heaven motes and sage motes! All of that should be able to help you with all your breakthroughs to the Half Sage level!”

When the rest of the people in the Grand Emperor's Pagoda heard the words of Ghost Emperor Yama, they nearly fainted from shock, and their eyes glimmered with open envy and jealousy.

Even the mysterious Chaoguang murmured to himself, ‘Sage motes? Heaven motes? Great Sages use their own life energy to create them as a way to conform to the nature of heaven. And he's just going to give them away as part of a deal? Doesn’t this Ghost Emperor Yama realize that once you lose a sage mote, your cultivation base will regress?’

‘I'm not interested in that stuff,’ Yang Qi thought. Obviously, he didn’t trust Ghost Emperor Yama at all. ‘Cultivation is about making progress one step at a time. And taking each step is predicated on stabilizing yourself first. If you try to make progress too quickly, you can end up in cultivation deviation, the consequences of which are too horrible to imagine.’ However, he also realized that there was a great opportunity here.

“Ghost Emperor Yama,” he said, “you’re saying that I can’t neutralize the Wilds God power within these five phases spirits, right? Well, I think I can. What do you say we have a little wager?”

Ghost Emperor Yama looked at Yang Qi quizzically. “Don’t forget I know exactly how strong the Wilds God is. He’s so powerful that not even a Great Sage could expel his energy after being infected with it. And you think you can neutralize it? Who do you think you are? A Space-Void Legendary? You think you’re going to directly fight the will of the Wilds God and come out on top?”

“Enough jibber-jabber, Ghost Emperor Yama. Do you dare to take the bet? Or not?”

It was possible to see a bit of killing intent in Ghost Emperor Yama’s eyes because of how Yang Qi was trying to force his hand. However, he was a devil king from primeval times, so how could he possibly be scared of a little bet?

“What do you want to put up as stakes?”

There was no way he would lose face in front of so many people by not taking a little risk.

“You put up the motherspring seed,” Yang Qi said. “If I neutralize the power of the Wilds God, I win, and you give me the seed.”

“What if you fail?” Ghost Emperor Yama said condescendingly. “What are you putting up?”

“I’ll give you part of the energy art I cultivate.” Yang Qi waved his hand, and the Infernal Deity Spear appeared, covered with the complex script of the legion of gods. As Yang Qi flourished it out in front of him, it sent powerful fluctuations out in all directions.

At this point Yang Qi began to communicate with Ghost Emperor Yama using psychic fluctuations, in order to keep the information out of the ears of the others present. “This is the Infernal Deity Spear, which the most powerful infernal deities of hell use to punish hell-born fiend-devils. The powers of the spear are manifold and enigmatic. With it, you would be able to dominate the horde of devils, and subjugate all creation!”

“What?” Ghost Emperor Yama said, his eyes immediately beginning to shine with envy. As far as he was concerned, that spear was the thing of dreams. “A spear meant for the lords of hell!? Back when I was young, I heard stories about the Infernal Deity Spear. I can’t believe you have it!”

Yang Qi laughed. “So. Are we on?”

“We’re on. Of course we’re on.” The Infernal Deity Spear and its cultivation technique were simply too incredible. There was now no way he wouldn’t take the bet. As far as he was concerned, for Yang Qi to have ultimate control of that energy art was a huge waste. If he could get it, he could definitely reach the Demi-Immortal level, and ascend to higher planes of existence. “There’s only one problem. How can I trust that you’ll follow through with your end of the deal?”

“I hereby swear on the legion of gods that I’ll honor the terms of the wager,” Yang Qi said. “If I don’t, it will be blasphemy against the glory of the gods, and I will fall from their grace for all eternity. You need to swear a serious oath as well, Ghost Emperor Yama. Even fiend-devils from hell can swear to the names of devil-gods. How about you swear an oath in the name of the leader of your Hell of Yamas?”

“Er….” It was no secret that such oaths could cause cultivation base problems later on if they were violated. In other words, one had to keep one’s word when using them.

After a moment, Yang Qi looked away. “Fine. You’re obviously not being sincere, so just forget about it.”

“Wait!” Ghost Emperor Yama said. “Fine. I hereby swear on the name of the leader of the Hell of Yamas. If I go back on my word, then I’ll be burned eternally in the crucibles of hell, and never be reincarnated!”

“Deal!” Yang Qi clapped his hands together, and the power of the Grand Emperor's Pagoda erupted out like the tides of the sea. It instantly wrapped up all of the mercenaries and pulled them into a hidden dimension inside. Not only would it imbue them with true energy while they waited, it ensured that Yang Qi and Ghost Emperor Yama now had a bit of privacy.

“Hellfire Crucible, I summon you!” Yang Qi bellowed in a voice like the trumpeting of megamammoths.

Instantly, the crucible appeared out of thin air right in front of Yang Qi. At the same time, the Hell Portal materialized behind him, and countless fiend-devils poured out of it to fuel the crucible.

There were giant snakes from the Hell of Nagas, including Astral-Star Legendaries, Ghost-God Legendaries, Personal-Domain Legendaries and Yin-Yang Legendaries…. The giant snakes all had the blood of hell dragons in them, meaning that when they were sacrificed by Yang Qi, it provided the power of dragons, which vastly surpassed that of asuras, and was far more suitable for his purposes.

Dragonfire appeared within the Hellfire Crucible, making the tongues of flame resemble actual dragons.

“Giant snakes from the Hell of Nagas?! How can you summon things like that?” Ghost Emperor Yama’s eyes were as wide as saucers, and yet, he didn’t dare violate his oath by interfering with Yang Qi. Besides, he also feared the power of the God Legion Seal.

All he could do was watch as the giant snakes were burned away, and the five phases spirits began to melt.

Booms rang out as the sealing marks on the spirits were broken open. Instantly, the five phases quintessence energy transformed into an azure dragon, white tiger, vermillion bird, black turtle and flying snake, which swirled about in the Hellfire Crucible. Each and every one of those spirits was as strong as a Half Sage, and yet, were completely and utterly held in check by the fires of the crucible.

“God legion power!” Yang Qi said, waving his finger. “The glory of the Lord will illuminate the universe!”

The Lord’s Eye appeared on his forehead, sending forth brightness that pierced directly into the five phases spirits. A moment later, something like a pearl appeared.

It was a pearl of power from some incredibly powerful being, something as miraculous as the heaven-demon seed. Almost immediately, it erupted with power from the Yore-Wilds of old, which infected the Hellfire Crucible. In the blink of an eye, the dragonfire developed scales, as if that powerful energy was about to change them into real-life beasts.

Immediately, Ghost Emperor Yama burst out into laughter. “The power of the Wilds God is nothing to take lightly. That Wilds God seed is sprouting, and unless you do something quickly, you're going to turn into a wilds-slave. Are you waiting for the God Legion Seal to help you? Well, I guess this means I have an opportunity on my hands. Since you insisted on making this stupid wager, then I'm going to enjoy every minute of the results. I’ll let the will of the Wilds God fight with you, and use that to determine your weaknesses. If the God Legion Seal comes out, I’ll definitely be able to gain an advantage.”

‘What a powerful energy,’ Yang Qi thought, shivering. It was true; the power of the Wilds God was mighty, to the point where it caused the flames to develop scales. In addition to that, it was making his true energy difficult to circulate.

At this point it was a case of, if you ride a tiger, it's hard to get off. If his true energy were fully vanquished, he would be finished, and the five phases spirits would explode.

Worse, he would come under the full assault of the power of the Wilds God.

Chapter 293: You Lose

The power of the Wilds God was mighty, and at the same time, felt like a vile poison that stuck to the bones and could not be expelled. No matter what he did, it seemed like escape was impossible.

He could only go all out.

Either the power would enslave him, or he would neutralize it.

It was a critical moment, and holding back wasn’t an option.

Rising to his feet, he expended every ounce of energy possible to summon fiend-devils from the void. By this point, the area outside the greyspace of the Rich-Lush Continent was virtually devoid of the things. The creatures popping out through the Hell Portal now were things like the giant snakes from the Hell of Nagas, or other bizarre entities.

Thanks to the influx of fuel, the fire burned even more brightly, and cracking sounds could be heard as the scales that covered the flames began to shatter.

The power of the Wilds God was actually retreating.

Snorting coldly, Ghost Emperor Yama said, “It's definitely miraculous that you can summon fiend-devils like that for fuel. Not even Great Sages should be able to do that. But if you think that’s enough to expel the power of the Wilds God, then you're more naive than I realized. His power can defeat anything and everything!”

“Oh really?” Yang Qi said, seemingly unfazed. In addition to fueling the flames, he began to absorb the five phases spirits.

“Azure dragon, white tiger, vermillion bird, black turtle, flying snake! Come here immediately.” Even as the words left his mouth, he opened the Lord's Eye again, which began to violently suck in the five phases power and use it to transform his true energy. The five phases spirits howled, but the Hellfire Crucible was too powerful for them. After all, it had been created to punish disgraced gods, and these preheaven five phases spirits had the same substructure as gods and spirits. In other words, the Hellfire Crucible was the perfect tool to destroy them.

As the five phases quintessence energy entered him, his own true energy grew stronger and stronger, and the Hell Portal grew more true and real, and thus more capable of summoning fiend-devils.

“Sagely-grade spirit stone!” Yang Qi shouted. Crushing the stone, he sent heaps of immense power into the Hellfire Crucible.

As of this point, the power of the Wilds God was in full retreat.

A moment passed, and then the power began to surge back, as though it had been absorbed by Yang Qi’s energy, and was now ready to use it to launch a counter attack. The stronger Yang Qi got, the more viciously the power of the Wilds God fought him. In fact, within the seed, it was possible to see numerous scaled creatures writhing about in fury.

They were beasts of the wilds, creatures with ancient wills that wanted to enslave Yang Qi.

“Heaven-demon seed! Golden will! Emerge!” Yang Qi waved his hand, and two beams of light shot out, one of them green, the other golden. They swirled through the air until they formed a golden-green taiji symbol, which smashed into the Wilds God power seed.

In the blink of an eye, the wills of three Great Sages were clashing.

The heaven-demon seed had the will of Great Sage Shroud-Heaven in it, a fierce entity from the Hanging Mountain. His name actually gave a clue into what he was like. ‘Shroud-Heaven’ was a reference to the saying use a single hand to enshroud heaven; how arrogant and powerful would someone have to be to despise the might of heaven itself?

The golden will Yang Qi referred to was the will of whatever Great Sage had forged the Heaven-Dominating Golden Swordbreaker. Whoever that person had been, he was definitely on the same level as Grand Emperor Rich-Lush.

Those two wills were now fighting the Wilds God seed, the power of which was treating those two opponents like Yang Qi’s own true energy.

The Wilds God seed was a domineering item which sought to transform anything and everything it encountered into wilds-slaves.

This was the opportunity Yang Qi had been looking for.

AAAAOOOWWWW!

The will of Great Sage Shroud-Heaven howled from within the heaven-demon seed. After all, that will could sense that it was being challenged, and considering the challenge came from other Great Sages, there was no way it could tolerate such an insult.

Suddenly, an emperor of the Demonfolk appeared, clad in a voluminous cloak, with a Crown of the Peaceful Heaven on his head.

From somewhere in the depths of the universe, boundless green light was filtered through the heaven-demon seed, shooting out to transform anything it touched into a heaven-demon!

In this respect, the heaven-demon seed and the Wilds God seed were almost exactly the same; as the power of the two Great Sages clashed, the resulting explosions caused the Grand Emperor's Pagoda to rock back and forth.

Meanwhile, a war god appeared, clad in a golden cloak that covered golden armor.

“I am the Golden King!”

Roar!

The shout of the Golden King seemed intent on turning everything around it into a golden kingdom.

‘Alright, it seems to be working. Now I can go about absorbing the five phases power.’ Under the shocked eyes of Ghost Emperor Yama, Yang Qi settled down quietly to begin working with the vital energy of the five phases spirits.

‘Where did he get the will of two Great Sages?!’ Ghost Emperor Yama thought, suddenly feeling a bit uneasy.

Yang Qi chopped his hand out in front of him, shattering the azure dragon. Then, a black hole appeared which completely absorbed the thing, and caused the true energy around him to transform into something like a primeval forest.

Next, he quickly shattered the vermillion bird, black turtle, white tiger and flying snake. As they were added into his true energy, he pulled out another sagely-grade spirit stone and crushed it, causing sagefire to rage around him.

The five phases spirits could compare to Half Sages, and if they combined their power, could tackle a Great Sage. Unfortunately, Yang Qi was like the bane of their existence, and could fight them with hardly any effort at all.

Now that the five phases power was fusing with Yang Qi’s true energy, a kingdom of metal came to exist inside of them, then kingdoms of fire, of water, and of sand.

Then, the cycle of the five phases was completed; fire could become water, water could become wood, wood could become earth, and earth could become fire.

The five phases could give birth to and transform into each other.

At the same time, immense power deep within him began to erupt.

In the blink of an eye, fifty thousand particles woke up. He was now at the level of seven hundred thousand ancient megamammoths.

‘There’s no way I'm going to stop here,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘I want the power of a million! I need to burn more sagely-grade spirit stones, and provoke the transformations of the five phases, and yin and yang.’

As the five phases quintessence energy fused more fully with his own true energy, the glow of the five phases began to form around him.

‘True energy, become five hells!’

Massive amounts of true energy began to transform into five unique hells, each of which was a kingdom focused on one of the five phases. This was an indicator that the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth had enough power to push the energy of the five phases to a perfect level.

These few short moments cut away the equivalent of a hundred years of bitter cultivation; most cultivators would require dozens upon dozens of years to push the power of the five phases to this level.

It was only at that point could someone truly reach the Five-Phases Transformation.

It was a profound transformation that was an absolute prerequisite to the Personal Domain Transformation. After all, without a full understanding of the five phases, as well as yin and yang, how could one possibly form a personal domain?

WHIZZZ!

Yang Qi’s arms trembled as cracks spread out in the space around him, and more five phases energy thrummed. Slowly but surely, five black holes were forming around him. More precisely, they were five colorful wormholes, each of which led to a different dimension associated with the five phases.

“You have the spatial coordinates to five phases dimensions?” Ghost Emperor Yama blurted in shock.

“Yup!” Yang Qi replied. “Watch and learn, Ghost Emperor Yama! I don’t need to use my God Legion Seal to subjugate the power of the Wilds God. And now, I’ll step into the Five-Phases Transformation!”

Immense levels of power poured in through the wormholes, entering Yang Qi to the point where heavenly tribulations were incited. Cracks spread out everywhere in the Heavencorpse Dimension, as lightning fell and tempests raged. Five phases flames raged, causing destructive power to completely inundate Yang Qi.

Soon, the entire Heavencorpse Dimension was a massive storm, which turned the blood swamps into ash, and caused numerous zombies to tremble in confusion. Although they wanted to flee, they were incapable, and in fact, they were sucked into the Hell Portal. Ghost Emperor Yama even saw some that were in the Legendary level, and yet were powerless to fight back.

The Heavencorpse Dimension was collapsing! A half-plane of profound evil and wickedness was being destroyed by Yang Qi’s heavenly tribulation.

‘What a pity! The Heavencorpse Dimension has existed for tens of thousands of years, and now it's being destroyed. The most powerful of zombie kingdoms is no more.’ Despite what was happening around him, Ghost Emperor Yama kept his attention fixed on Yang Qi, hoping to identify his weaknesses.

Meanwhile, the heavenly tribulation raged around Yang Qi; as he absorbed the evil power around him, everything was destroyed, making him like a destroyer of planes, a harbinger of the end of times.

And all the time, his energy arts grew more and more powerful; he wasn't worried at all about the heavenly tribulation.

In fact, the heavenly tribulation contained bugle cries from the legion of gods, protecting him as surely as the divine armor.

Seven hundred thousand ancient megamammoths. Eight hundred thousand…..

Nine hundred thousand…. Nine hundred and fifty thousand….

In the end, he had a million megamammoth particles. Each strike of Yang Qi’s fist would be like heavenly tribulation; his true energy could create minor planes that conformed to the cycle of the five phases.

The intensity of the heavenly tribulation around him grew, and yet, he only got stronger and stronger.

With one fist, he could seal gods and become immortal. His fist strikes were those of sages and monarchs!

In the blink of an eye, the heavenly tribulation ended, defeated by Yang Qi. As for Ghost Emperor Yama he looked on with open shock.

As of this moment, Yang Qi’s Hellfire Crucible was ten times larger and more powerful than before. It was now decorated with images of five hells, whose flames were far beyond anything they had been in the past.

Suddenly, the Hellfire Crucible tipped over, spilling out the heaven-demon seed, the Wilds God seed, and a golden seed, which Yang Qi absorbed into his body.

“You lose, Ghost Emperor Yama. I've reached the Five-Phases Transformation!”

Chapter 294: Flabbergasting News

It was with the utmost rapidity that Yang Qi broke through into the fourth Legendary transformation.

There were a total of nine transformations, and the first three were about piercing through space, which was a profoundly difficult task. The next three were also grouped together, and were about forming a personal domain. In some ways, the Five-Phases Transformation and the Yin-Yang Transformation were actually somewhat easier than the final Personal-Domain Transformation.

Therefore, considering that Yang Qi had plentiful spirit stones, achieving success in this situation was nothing remarkable.

Besides, he also had the golden seed, the heaven-demon seed, and the Wilds God seed, just waiting to be absorbed. From the look of things, he had completely succeeded, whereas Ghost Emperor Yama had lost miserably.

“You ruthless little punk!” Ghost Emperor Yama growled as he watched Yang Qi’s aura growing more powerful by the moment. In the blink of an eye, his true energy seemed twice as powerful as before, enough to operate the Grand Emperor's Pagoda at a much higher level.

This true energy was becoming more true and real, which was one of the benefits of five phases power. Now that Yang Qi was a Five-Phases Legendary, his cultivation could truly draw on its potential to use the various aspects of his true energy to summon half god items.

The Infernal Deity Spear was a half god item, as were his Angel Wings, Hellfire Crucible, God Legion Battle Robe and Devil-God Seal. They were all formed from true energy. However, if they could become real, then their effectiveness would advance by leaps and bounds.

Only the Hell Portal was different; it was still limited to being able to summon Astral-Star fiend devils.

The only way he could change that was to reach the Personal-Domain Transformation, and summon the God Legion Paradise. At that point, he could target Never-Dying fiend-devils, and possibly even Half Sages.

‘It won’t be long before I can reach the Yin-Yang Transformation, and then, break through to the Personal-Domain Transformation. At that point, I’ll be able to take on Great Sages if I go all out. I really need the God Legion Paradise before I can truly unleash my might.’

Even still, he was feeling quite pleased.

Looking over at Ghost Emperor Yama, he extended his hand, palm up.

“What are you doing?” Ghost Emperor Yama said.

“You owe me,” he said. “You might think that if you leave a sealing mark or warding magic on that motherspring seed, I’ll experience cultivation deviation later when using it. But that would be very shifty, wouldn’t you say? Besides, you saw what I'm capable of just now.”

“You’re good, I’ll give you that, punk!” His eyes narrowed hatefully for a long moment, before he decided that violating his oath wasn’t an option. Taking out the motherspring seed, he looked at Yang Qi. “Be careful with this thing, brat. It’s as heavy as an entire river. Ready?”

Yang Qi smiled and extended his hand further. Ghost Emperor Yama placed the seed onto it, whereupon the power of a million megamammoths shot forth to support it.

‘He's so strong!’ Ghost Emperor Yama thought.

Obviously, the power of a million megamammoths was more than enough to lift a river. In fact, it could handle small-scale oceans.

Yang Qi lifted the motherspring seed up and down a few times, and could already sense the powerful fluctuation inside. The life force energy it contained seemed to rival that of a Great Sage.

After all, it wasn’t a drop of life force springwater. It was the quintessence of the stuff, the motherspring itself, the source of all the power of such water. It had been enough to injure Ghost Emperor Yama years ago, albeit not kill him. In any case, it was obvious how beneficial it would be to Yang Qi if he absorbed it.

Inside, Ghost Emperor Yama’s heart was dripping with figurative blood. ‘Not only did the brat not reveal any weaknesses, he actually won my motherspring seed, which means he’s only going to get stronger. Sadly for him, it doesn’t matter how profound his techniques are, until he’s a Great Sage, he won’t be a match for me. I can kill him any time I want. If it weren't for that God Legion Seal, I could kill him ten times over.’

‘Alright,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘With this motherspring seed, I can become even stronger, and can reach the Yin-Yang Transformation even faster. In fact, the Personal-Domain Transformation shouldn’t be too far off. But right now, my top priority is to kill the Crown Prince as quickly as possible!’

With that, he sucked the Grand Emperor's Pagoda inside of him, and then left the Heavencorpse Dimension crumbling behind him.

The first thing he did on the outside was send a message to Hua Tianxiong via paper talisman. However, he got no reply. Instantly, he started to get worried. ‘Did he and Young Master Shroud-Heaven already go to the Superheaven Badlands to kill the Crown Prince? If that’s the case, I need to get back to the Demi-Immortal Institute to find out what the latest news is. Maybe that will also be my ticket to getting rid of this stalker Ghost Emperor Yama. He’s really terrifying, and I definitely won't be a match for him until I'm much stronger.’

The mere thought of Ghost Emperor Yama shadowing him wherever he went made him feel nervous. Besides, what if a fight did break out with the Crown Prince, and he interfered?

With such thoughts on his mind, he began flying in the direction of the Demi-Immortal Institute. Upon passing Capital City, he released everyone he had picked up in the Western Continent, including members of the imperial trading caravan, and other important people from big organizations. Most of them were Lifeseizers, which meant that, as a group, they were quite powerful.

Yang Qi told them to do their best to support his friends and family if they could find them.

Of course, the people who had been with him in the imperial trading caravan had long since come to view him as a deva from heaven. Considering he had escaped Great Sage Pure Emptiness, and then survived a huge adventure in the Quake-Dawn Continent, they all viewed him as being a nearly mythological figure.

As such, they would obviously comply with his wishes.

He didn't spend too much time interacting with them. Considering the current level of his cultivation base, allies like this weren’t particularly important. However, it never hurt to build relationships.

As for the mercenaries, they simply remained in the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, ready to follow his orders, and simultaneously benefiting from the cultivation they could practice there.

However, he did call out Lady-Princess Silvermoon to act as an attendant, which she was perfectly willing to do. Not that her being unwilling would have changed anything. And when she saw that he was with Ghost Emperor Yama, she broke out in a cold sweat.

After all, Ghost Emperor Yama had been famous in the ancient past; even people in the Western Continent had heard of him. The Great Sage experts from there all considered Yama Mountain in the Heavencorpse Dimension to be a dangerous, forbidden region that they would never dare to enter. The fact that an entity like that was following Yang Qi around with seeming meekness was terrifying to Lady-Princess Silvermoon, and further reinforced her decision to never cross him.

And thus, Yang Qi entered the Demi-Immortal Institute.

He had all his ducks in a row, and now, he needed information, and the latest news.

The moment he entered the institute, he realized that the place felt odd. Instead of the excited buzz he remembered from the past, the students walked around in silence.

Of course, Ghost Emperor Yama had his aura suppressed, and emitted no devil energy. He looked like nothing more than an odd old man, a person nobody would suspect of being a powerful expert. He almost looked like an attendant to Yang Qi.

After looking around, he clicked his tongue disapprovingly and leaned over to Yang Qi. “This institute of yours looks pretty impressive, but to me, it’s about as intimidating as a chicken or dog. I could destroy the entire place in a single breath. Lifeseizers? Legendaries? Minorcosm World? Nothing here could stand up to me.”

“Yes, yes, you're amazing. Now keep quiet.” The last thing Yang Qi needed was Ghost Emperor Yama making a scene.

Soon, students noticed Yang Qi, and they began to talk amongst themselves.

“Yang Qi’s back!”

“Really? He actually came back? I heard that he went to the Western Continent and crossed some Great Sages. So, he's really returned? That was pretty fast. I guess those Great Sages never caught him. That’s pretty surprising considering the ruckus he caused over there. He actually destroyed Silvermoon.”

“And here we all thought he had died in the Western Continent. Who could ever have guessed that he would actually come back?”

From the reactions of most of the students, it seemed they viewed Yang Qi as some sort of plague to be avoided at all costs.

It was actually surprising to him.

“Well, he won’t be around for much longer. I heard that the Crown Prince really powered up recently, wherever he's practicing his cultivation. He killed Young Master Shroud-Heaven as well as the Sun Moon Institute’s Hua Tianxiong. He's already broken through all the shackles to reach the Great Sage level, and he’ll be back within a few days.”

“Yeah, the Crown Prince is a Great Sage now. The people from the Gentlemen’s Society and Divine Ability Society have already gone into hiding. Master Wind Gentleman and Unparalleled Lightning officially dispersed their societies, and according to what I've heard, have acknowledged allegiance to the Crown Prince. Once the Crown Prince is back, he's going to kill everyone who ever opposed him! You know his attitude. Submit to me and prosper, or oppose me and perish.”

“Yeah, that's for sure! But I heard that Yang Qi is backed by someone stronger than a Great Sage.”

“We’ll see. Maybe he has a strong backer, but he’s incredibly weak.”

“It's going to be a fierce battle, you can bet on that.”

“Hey, look at that! See that woman walking behind Yang Qi? Is that Lady-Princess Silvermoon? She’s known to be a fiendish killer from the Sky-Heaven Dynasty in the Western Continent! He got her to work for him as a servant girl? And look, who’s that old man?”

“Look, it doesn’t matter. Yang Qi won't be around for more than a few days. Just sit back and enjoy the fireworks. By now, all of the elders in the institute have joined the Crown Prince Society. Even the prime elders in the Minorcosm World are preparing to receive the Crown Prince with full honors.”

The news Yang Qi was hearing battered at his mind like bolts of lightning. Never in his wildest dreams could he have guessed that in the few short months since he left for the Western Continent, all of these things would occur.

Young Master Shroud-Heaven had been killed!

Hua Tianxiong was dead!

The Crown Prince had become a Great Sage!

Could it all be true?

If it was, then it seemed everything was about to come crashing to an end. Originally, it was supposed to be five years before the Crown Prince returned as a Great Sage. Although it had seemed a foregone conclusion that he would come back sooner than that, less than a year was too soon. Now it seemed as though all of Yang Qi’s plans might be for nothing. He had come back with grand ambitions and endless confidence. But now, the situation looked grim.

Ghost Emperor Yama suddenly burst out into cackling laughter. “Your archenemy is now invincible, brat! He's a Great Sage! There’s no way that you're a match for him. Unless you get help from me. What do you say?”

Chapter 295: Difficult Questions

“Hey, get over here!” Yang Qi waved his hand, causing a raging wind to spring up and grab some nearby members of the Crown Prince Society who had noticed him and then averted their gazes.

They were all Lifeseizers, and included both elite and conclave students, indicating that they were both strong, and had high positions. However, compared to Yang Qi, they weren’t even ants.

At this point, the only person in the Demi-Immortal Institute who could do anything to Yang Qi would be the chancellor. Even if all the other students joined forces, they wouldn’t be able to fight him.

After all, he wasn’t worried about a large-scale battle.

If necessary, he could summon an army of fiend-devils from the void, including giant snakes from the Hell of Nagas.

Truth be told, even people from the Quake-Dawn Continent would have to form a team of dozens of Legendaries to fight a giant snake of the same level as them. So what need was there to even mention people from the Rich-Lush Continent?

“We're under attack!” screamed one of the conclave students. “Quick, report the matter to the elders and prime elders in the Minorcosm World! The Demi-Immortal Institute is under attack!”

“Like hell it is!”

SMACK! Yang Qi slapped the student across the side of the face, sending a bit of blood splattering onto the ground. “If you insist on talking crap, the next slap will kill you. Now tell me, what's the latest news about the Crown Prince?”

“The Crown Prince… he’s in the Great Sage level already, and he's coming back in a few days. You just wait, Yang Qi! Your days are definitely numbered! Everybody in the entire Demi-Immortal Institute works for the Crown Prince now. Besides, the Crown Prince is backed by an organization that you couldn’t possibly deal with. Your only hope to stay alive is to drop to your knees right now and beg for mercy. Come on. Do it!”

“Are you feeling suicidal or something?” Yang Qi said with a cold smile. “Well, considering you’re so loyal to the Crown Prince, I guess I’ll just cripple your energy arts.”

Suddenly, his true energy flared into activity with incomparable invincibility.

“Stay your hand!” someone shouted from off in the distance. A moment later, a group of Legendaries appeared. Of course, they all were staunch supporters of the Crown Prince Society, and also grand elders of the institute.

The Seven Preheaven Masters. The Three Pure Yang Elders. Patriarchs Wind and Cloud.

In addition to them, there were some other top experts in the seventh, eighth, and even ninth Legendary transformation. All of them had the word “Law” embroidered on their robes, indicating that they had the power to enforce the rules of the institute.

They were the grand elders of law enforcement, a group which everyone feared deeply.

The Hall of Law Enforcement was located deep in the Minorcosm World, and was tasked with punishing traitors and renegades. Any students who broke rules could be executed by them, a power they would not hesitate to draw upon. Because of that, every single grand elder from the Hall of Law Enforcement was at the very least a Personal-Domain Legendary.

That guaranteed that the Hall of Law Enforcement would be respected by all. After all, in the Rich-Lush Continent, Legendaries were virtually mythological figures.

“What gall!” Patriarch Wind said. “You just got back, Yang Qi, and you're already breaking the rules of the institute? I can’t believe you would go so far as to cripple the energy arts of a conclave student! Just who do you think you are? Conclave students are precious treasures to the institute! If one of them really did violate some important law, they should be handed over to the Hall of Law Enforcement for interrogation and sentencing. What authority do you have here? You think you can just go around punishing people? Put that student down immediately, admit your crimes to the grand elders of law enforcement, and await your own punishment. If you don't, we’ll toss you into the Devil Suppression Hall, to be tormented day and night.”

“Very funny!” Yang Qi said, keeping his grip on the conclave student. “I've performed some incredible services for the institute and the Rich-Lush Continent, Patriarch Wind. I repaired the damage to heaven. I saved the world! That puts me in a much higher position than you, and yet you think you can go hurling accusations and orders left and right? Completely disgraceful! Don’t tell me you want to end up like Grand Elder Feat-Virtue? And as for you, Seven Preheaven Masters and Three Pure Yang Elders, have you forgotten the lesson I taught you not too long ago?”

Back when Yang Qi applied to become a holy neophyte, it was this very group who had interfered.

In the end, Grand Elder Feat-Virtue ended up dead, and the Seven Preheaven Masters were seriously injured. In fact, a few of them had to be treated in the institute’s Soul Rejuvenation Cistern before they could recover. Because of that, the Seven Preheaven Masters hated Yang Qi down to their marrow, and wished they could just kill him.

Their leader, Master Jadecrux, was actually having trouble controlling his killing intent as he listened to Yang Qi speak. Although he knew he wasn’t a match for him, he couldn’t prevent a sinister smile from spreading out across his face at the thought that at least he had the upper hand. The Crown Prince was a Great Sage now, and was off in space-time dealing with some issues with the Hanging Mountain.

Soon, he would return as the ruler of everything under heaven, and would unite the Rich-Lush Continent under his control.

When that happened, Yang Qi would be dead.

“What gall!” Master Jadecrux said. “Seriously, you are simply too brazen! It doesn’t matter if you’re a holy neophyte, you can’t just go around killing and robbing people.” With that, he turned to a nearby Never-Dying Legendary and said, “Grand Elder Law-Chief, sir, as the highest-ranking member of the Hall of Law Enforcement, I hereby request that you handle this matter personally!”

This particular grand elder was called Law-Chief because of his position of oversight in the Hall of Law Enforcement. Normally, he didn’t make public appearances, but nonetheless, was considered one of the top figures in the institute. When he spoke, people listened and complied, even the holy neophytes. In fact, other than the chancellor himself, there was no one who out-ranked him.

He was a middle-aged man clad in a long robe, who carried no weapon in his hand, and yet caused everything to tremble because of his mere presence.

His gaze was so sharp that anyone it touched would immediately begin to tremble from fear, and would put any thoughts of violating the law far from mind.

“Put that student down, Yang Qi!” he said. “Your behavior is a clear violation of the rules of the institute. You know full well you’re not permitted to randomly pick fights on campus! True, your crimes, including the murder of Grand Elder Feat-Virtue, were wiped away when you repaired the damage to heaven. From that day forward, you had a clean slate. But now you’re committing more crimes? Sorry, but this is not acceptable.”

“What crime did I commit?” Yang Qi asked.

As the various grand elders were talking, Ghost Emperor Yama stood there quietly, watching. To him, it was like looking at a bunch of ants bickering with each other. Because of how he kept his energy sealed, few people were paying attention to him, and assumed he was a servant of some sort.

Lady-Princess Silvermoon was attracting a bit more attention, and yet, most people were intent on the dialogue playing out.

“First,” Grand Elder Law-Chief said coolly, sounding like a judge pronouncing a sentence, “you went to the Western Continent and killed a host of people. You even destroyed Silvermoon. In fact, I see Lady-Princess Silvermoon standing right there behind you. We grand elders ran a thorough investigation into the matter, and concluded that it was you who damaged the delicate relationship between the Western Continent and the Rich-Lush Continent. Because of you, all communication and travel between the two continents has ceased, which has resulted in severe financial losses on our part. Quite a few organizations have petitioned the Demi-Immortal Institute to punish you over the matter. In fact, all the prime elders have been called back to the institute to decide what to do about the matter.”

“Are you serious?” Yang Qi said, his eyes flashing with sinister coldness. “The Western Continent has long since started eyeing the Rich-Lush Continent like a tiger eyes its prey. By the time I showed up there, they were already tyrannizing our people! Raising prices. Robbing them outright. Don’t tell me you people didn’t know about all that!”

Ignoring Yang Qi’s explanation, Grand Elder Law-Chief continued, “Second! You kidnapped a holy neophyte of the institute, namely, Huang Hou. And you also colluded with Hua Tianxiong from the Sun Moon Institute to murder the Crown Prince. Thankfully, the Crown Prince managed to kill both him and Young Master Shroud-Heaven, and at the same time, rescue Huang Hou. It was Huang Hou who revealed how you also murdered numerous other conclave students at the House of Shadowblight. All of these are major crimes.”

Yang Qi snorted coldly. “Those people were all working with the House of Shadowblight, a heretical group of wretch-devils. Anybody would be justified in ridding our organization of people like that.”

Grand Elder Law-Chief was completely ignoring anything that Yang Qi said. “Third! When you joined the Demi-Immortal Institute, you killed fellow disciples, and forced other disciples to give you a ‘blood tribute’ by killing even more. Step forward, Jiang Fan.”

Immediately, Jiang Fan and his companions stepped out.

“It was him!” Jiang Fan announced loudly. “It was Yang Qi! He killed Chu Tiange and Huang Hong. Then he forced us to give him a ‘blood tribute’ by killing Song Haishan and Gu Fenxian! He’s evil to the core, a real monster! He definitely follows the dao of devils.”

Jiang Fan then went on to provide a detailed account of everything that happened that day, including how Yang Qi killed Huang Hong, and how he had forced them to kill Gu Fenxian and Song Haishan. At long last, Yun Hailan’s suspicions were confirmed as being true, right in front of everyone present.

“There’s plenty of evidence on hand to prove your guilt, Yang Qi. Do you really think you can talk yourself out of this? Do you really think you can convince all of these people that we’re slandering you? ” He sighed and shook his head. “Who would have thought that a vicious, bloodthirsty individual like you would somehow get into the Demi-Immortal Institute? You deranged beast! I can only grieve and lament that things turned out this way!”

“The evidence is beyond conclusive!” Patriarch Cloud said. “It doesn’t matter what he said, he’s obviously guilty. Men, take him into custody!”

Chapter 296: That&#039;s All the Evidence You Have?

After hearing Jiang Fan’s story, many in the crowd began to whisper among themselves about the fiendish monster that was Yang Qi.

“I never could have guessed that Yang Qi was this diabolical. Even back when he was a puny outer campus student, he actually dared to kill Chu Tiange! And then he arranged for Song Haishan and Gu Fenxian to be killed too.”

“That’s nothing. The key here is that he slaughtered a bunch of conclave students. And do you know who Elder Brother Huang Hou is? He’s an invincible Space-Void Legendary! Yang Qi actually kidnapped him and used him as a weapon against the Crown Prince.”

“Thankfully the Crown Prince is a blessed person, and managed to recover. If he hadn't, Yang Qi might have gotten away with all this.”

“He actually colluded with people from other institutes to murder our future chancellor! That’s definitely worthy of the death penalty.”

“Yeah, but I heard he’s backed by someone really powerful.”

“It doesn’t matter. The evidence is iron-clad! He’s dead!”

Technically speaking, Yang Qi had betrayed the institute. It was true that he could claim he was justified in his actions. After all, the Crown Prince really had been working with the House of Shadowblight. And Jiang Fan, Chu Tiange, and everyone else he had killed had been out to kill him as well, so in the end, it was really self-defense.

But the Hall of Law Enforcement was out in full force, chomping at the bit to denounce him. And Grand Elder Law-Chief wasn’t even listening to his explanations.

At this point, Ghost Emperor Yama chuckled and once again leaned over to Yang Qi. “Listen, brat, you’re in a sticky situation here. The whole institute has it out for you! Tell me how to use the Infernal Deity Spear, and I’ll save you. I’ll wipe out the entire Demi-Immortal Institute if you want.”

“Yeah right,” Yang Qi said. “They can’t do anything to me.”

“So, what do you have to say for yourself, Yang Qi?” Grand Elder Law-Chief said. “You’ve committed high crimes, too many to even list out. Trying to refute the accusations would be pointless. Henceforth, you will be known as the greatest traitor the Demi-Immortal Institute has ever seen.”

“That’s all the evidence you have?” Yang Qi said. Instead of offering more explanations, he simply looked at all of the grand elders and smiled coldly. “I'm afraid that’s not going to be enough to sentence me to death. Besides, your evidence….”

All of a sudden, he blurred into motion, causing everything in the area to vibrate.

In the blink of an eye, he was right in front of Jiang Fan and the other ‘witnesses’.

“What do you think you’re doing, Yang Qi?” Jiang Fan shouted.

“You think that because the sealing marks I put in you were neutralized, you can escape punishment? That’s a joke if I've ever heard one.”

Bam. Bam. Bam. Bam. Bam! BAM!

Before anyone could say anything else, massive force entered the bodies of Jiang Fan and the other ‘witnesses’ and detonated them. In the blink of an eye, they became clouds of bloody mist, with even their souls having been destroyed.

Yang Qi had ended their lives without even moving a muscle. Face expressionless, he said, “Evidence? How come I don’t see any? The witnesses just committed suicide! Apparently, they were too guilty about being forced to slander me. Plagued by their consciences, they simply ended their own lives.”

The speed with which Yang Qi had just cut them down was such that not even the Never-Dying Legendary grand elders could do anything to stop him. In fact, it would likely have been impossible for a Great Sage to do anything.

He had fully mastered the use of his Angel Wings, and was now in the Five-Phases Transformation. With the added benefit of his elemental fays, he could move so quickly that with a single move, he could probably destroy an entire city before anyone could stop him.

The initial reaction to what had just occurred was deathly silence. But after a moment passed, people began to regain their composure and exchanged awkward glances.

“What gall! Freakish hellion!” Grand Elder Law-Chief shouted. Immediately, he and the other grand elders spread out to surround Yang Qi.

“Are you outright rebelling, Yang Qi? Do you have any respect for the laws and rules?” one of the grand elders shouted. “You are simply throwing yourself into eternal damnation! Do you understand? This is an abyss you’ll never escape from!”

“Monster! Hellion! Kill him! He’s gone crazy!” Patriarchs Wind and Cloud, the Seven Preheaven Masters, and the Three Pure Yang Elders all drew their weapons and circulated their true energy, joining the ring to surround Yang Qi.

Taking a step forward, Grand Elder Law-Chief said, “You have only one choice here, Yang Qi. Drop to your knees and wait to be arrested. If you don't, you’re dead! The Demi-Immortal Institute has rules, you know! You’ve crossed the bottom line!”

“The Demi-Immortal Institute has a bottom line?” Without any warning, Yang Qi made a move.

BOOOOM!

He launched a fist strike that caused thousands of vortexes to spring up out of nowhere, which belched spatial tempests everywhere. Instantly, the space in the area was ripped to shreds, and all of the Legendary grand elders who had surrounded him were thrown violently to the ground.

Patriarchs Wind and Cloud were left coughing up blood.

As for the Seven Preheaven Masters and the Three Pure Yang Elders, they were like chickens who had been caught up by an exploding case of gunpowder. Their clothing was ripped to shreds, and they were splattered with blood. A single fist strike from Yang Qi had crushed all of these previously overbearing grand elders.

The grand elders from the Hall of Law Enforcement were in a similar state.

Even the most grandiose of their number, Grand Elder Law-Chief, looked like he had been struck by a volley of lightning, and coughed up three successive mouthfuls of blood. Thankfully, his energy arts were profound enough that he managed to stay hovering in the air instead of slamming into the ground.

However, what happened next was like a true nightmare to him.

A hand thrust forth and grabbed him by the neck, making him look very much like a bedraggled duck.

Yang Qi’s grip was so tight that he couldn’t even struggle. “Y-Yang Qi… you’re… so strong. How? Do you really dare to break the laws of the Demi-Immortal Institute?”

“Laws? Back in the Inter-Institutional Martial Arts Competition, the Crown Prince went crazy and even stole the prize, and you people just looked on. He even tried to kill me. Where were you then? Why didn’t you jump out and start talking about laws back there? You want to talk about laws? You think I'm an idiot?”

Yang Qi was actually completely calm and collected. He was now strong enough that he didn’t care at all about the Demi-Immortal Institute. Other than the mysterious chancellor, no one here could do anything to him. Besides, he still had the God Legion Seal and Ghost Emperor Yama. If he really had to, he could give the Infernal Deity Spear technique to Ghost Emperor Yama and have him raze the institute to the ground.

It was a bit annoying to have Ghost Emperor Yama shadowing him, but the upside was that he might turn out to be useful. Of course, he was like a double-edged blade that could cut both ways, and could be very dangerous if used incorrectly.

Off to the side, Ghost Emperor Yama chuckled and said, “Nice job, brat. Very vicious. I like it. You’re decisive, and not willing to let yourself get boxed in. You're already starting to behave like a big shot.”

“Think this through, Yang Qi!” Grand Elder Law-Chief managed to say. “The chancellor won’t let you get away with this. You’re flagrantly violating the rules!”

Yang Qi laughed out loud. “The Crown Prince can break the rules, and so can I! The time has come to put an end to your so-called Hall of Law Enforcement. Now that I'm back, we’re going to shuffle things up a bit here in the institute. You people have been bedeviled, and don't deserve to talk about laws and justice. In fact, I hereby sentence all of you to death. And I'm going to start with you, Grand Elder Law-Chief. Let’s see if the chancellor tries to step in.”

With that, Yang Qi prepared to send out a stream of true energy and kill Grand Elder Law-Chief.

He was an immensely important figure in the institute, but Yang Qi wanted him dead, and therefore, he would die.

If the chancellor tried to step in, then Yang Qi would go all out. He would cause rivers of blood to flow as he destroyed the institute.

“Stay your hand!”

All of a sudden, the sea of clouds opened up, and a pillar of light appeared, within which was the entrance to the Minorcosm World. Then, a beam of light shot out to create a golden bridge, and a group of experts strode out.

These were people who never appeared in public. They were Half Sages, all of them just as strong as the Crown Prince had been back before his breakthrough. From their auras, it seemed like they were just on the verge of becoming Great Sages.

These were none other than the prime elders!

They were like retired emperors, all of them so old that they would be considered a generation senior to the chancellor himself.

They were mysterious figures who wielded immense power in the institute, and resided in that most unique of dimensions in the institute, the Minorcosm World. No one in the world had access to resources better than them.

Generally speaking, they were all descendants of previous chancellors, and were strong enough to cause problems for the current chancellor if they wanted. According to rumors, some of the prime elders had actually reached the Great Sage level, although it was impossible for anyone to know whether that was true or not. Shockingly, the prime elders were actually being led by the chancellor himself.

Next to the chancellor was a burly man with chiseled features and a perfect physique, making him seem like a majestic mountain.

This man was a Great Sage.

He was obviously on the same level as the chancellor himself, and yet, his aura did not conform with that of the Demi-Immortal Institute.

No, he had the aura of the Quake-Dawn Continent!

Chapter 297: Someone from the Quake-Dawn Cathedral

Yang Qi was very familiar with the aura of the Quake-Dawn Continent, as well as the way people from there tended to dress. Considering he had just returned from that very location, he was even a bit familiar with their local customs.

As such, he immediately realized that this burly Great Sage standing next to the chancellor was from the Quake-Dawn Continent. The only question was what he was doing here.

That said, his presence was little surprise. After all, there were plenty of space-time wormholes leading from the Quake-Dawn Continent to the Rich-Lush Continent.

And considering all the dramatic things that had occurred in the Rich-Lush Continent recently, it was quickly becoming a destination for many top experts and organizations from the Quake-Dawn Continent.

Not only was there the Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragment to be had, but also, valuable information about the Crown Prince.

Yang Qi had long since become aware that the Crown Prince was actually the son of the Quake-Dawn Cathedral’s Holy Daughter, born after she dreamed of falling stars. Although it was an event from many years ago, it was for unknown reasons that the Quake-Dawn Cathedral had suddenly become interested in the Crown Prince again.

‘Could it be that this is why the Crown Prince reached the Great Sage level so suddenly? Did the Quake-Dawn Cathedral help him? It seems highly likely….’

The more Yang Qi thought about it, the more it seemed that it must be true. It would not only explain how the Crown Prince had achieved his breakthrough, but also how he had so easily killed Hua Tianxiong and Young Master Shroud-Heaven, which had wrecked all of Yang Qi’s plans.

It seemed very possible that it was because of this Great Sage from the Quake-Dawn Cathedral.

“He’s from the Quake-Dawn Cathedral!” growled Ghost Emperor Yama. Yang Qi turned to look at him and could see the hatred burning in his eyes.

Despite his anger, he didn’t do anything, opting instead to wait to see how the situation played out. Ghost Emperor Yama had been imprisoned tens of thousands of years ago by people from the Quake-Dawn Cathedral, and he hated them as deeply as the sea. There was nothing in the world that could resolve that enmity.

Yang Qi looked back at the chancellor, who was staring at him in open shock, his mouth open as if he were planning to speak.

But then the chancellor’s eyes shifted to Ghost Emperor Yama, and they narrowed slightly.

Before anything else could happen, one of the Half Sage prime elders shouted, “Yang Qi! What are you doing? Rebelling? You’re going to bring your friends and family to utter disaster, and that aunt of yours too. Yang Susu has a Seven Apertures Sprite Body, and we’ve been taking good care of her because of it. But how can we continue to help her if you act like this? In fact, we’ll be forced to punish her and deprive her cultivation resources permanently!”

“Are you threatening me?” Yang Qi said, his expression flickering.

“It’s not a threat, it’s a fact,” the prime elder said. “Thanks to you being bedeviled, your friends, your family, and also Yang Susu are all going to be put on trial. It doesn’t matter how skilled or strong you are, considering how you’ve defied the laws of the Demi-Immortal Institute, we have no choice but to put you to death.”

“Alright, prepare to die,” Yang Qi said.

“What did you just say?” the prime elder replied, shock flickering in his eyes.

“I said, prepare yourself to die!” The killing intent in his words couldn’t have been plainer. “One of the things I hate most in life is when people threaten my friends, my family, and my sworn siblings. Anyone who threatens me will die, along with everyone related to him!”

Yang Qi waved his hand, and spatial fluctuations rolled out, along with a beam of light that instantly reached the prime elder. Apparently, it was locked down onto his soul, making it completely impossible for him to evade it.

Now that Yang Qi was a Five-Phases Legendary, with the power of a million ancient megamammoths, he was definitely capable of killing Half Sages.

Face falling, the prime elder backed up, and spatial fluctuations rolled out as he called on his personal domain. However, his personal domain could not block the incoming light.

The prime elder was on the verge of being killed, and yet the chancellor wasn’t doing a thing. Instead, he seemed to be staring at Ghost Emperor Yama.

As for the Great Sage from the Quake-Dawn Cathedral, he seemed stunned at the levels of power Yang Qi was revealing. Suddenly, the man extended his index and middle fingers, clamping down onto the beam of light, which caused Yang Qi to tremble and stagger backward a few paces.

In the blink of an eye, the Great Sage ended Yang Qi’s attack, and even hurt him a bit.

Having just escaped with his life, the prime elder wiped the sweat from his brow and then shouted, “What gall! Perversely disgraceful! Chancellor, this situation has gone out of control! You have to exterminate him and everyone connected to him! If you don’t, how could we maintain the honor and dignity of the Demi-Immortal Institute?”

“Outrageous effrontery!” another prime elder said. “He’s a pure fiend-devil! If we don't kill him, the Demi-Immortal Institute won’t have any face left in the Rich-Lush Continent.”

“Kill him! Chancellor, just hurry up and kill him!”

All of the prime elders began to call out similar things.

“Everybody shut your mouths!” It wasn’t the chancellor who spoke, but rather, the Great Sage from the Quake-Dawn Continent. Taking a few steps forward, he looked at Yang Qi and said, “Release Grand Elder Law-Chief and do as I say.”

“Do as you say? Who are you?” Of course, Yang Qi didn’t release Grand Elder Law-Chief, and in fact, tightened his grip on his neck, causing the man to gurgle a bit.

“I'm Great Sage Quake-Cloud, from the most important organization in the Quake-Dawn Continent, the Quake-Dawn Cathedral. What energy art do you cultivate? Tell the truth, immediately. You’re obviously in the Five-Phases Transformation, and yet you can fight Half Sages. Even in the Quake-Dawn Continent, that would make you a rare genius. I’ll give you two choices. First: tell me the secrets of your energy arts, from beginning to end. If you do, I’ll ask the Demi-Immortal Institute to do me a favor and let you go. Second choice: be stubborn. In that case, I’ll take you captive and drill chains of Quake-Dawn godsteel into your spine. That way, you’ll undergo the burning torment of godsteel day and night for as long as I see fit. Oh. I’ll also take all of your friends and family captive as well, and do the same thing to them. Presumably, you’ve never experienced the torture of being stabbed with Quake-Dawn godsteel, so trust me when I say that it’s no joke.”

As the man spoke, Yang Qi realized that there was a very slight grating sound coming from behind him, which was apparently Ghost Emperor Yama grinding his teeth.

After all, he had been imprisoned with Quake-Dawn godsteel for tens of thousands of years, and had experienced the exact torment this man was referring to. And now, a Great Sage from the Quake-Dawn Cathedral was standing right in front of him, talking about Quake-Dawn godsteel. How could he not want to kill the man?

“Is that so?” Yang Qi said, looking completely cool and confident. “Well, now I'm interested to see how strong this Quake-Dawn godsteel actually is, and how much it hurts.”

“Imbecile!” the Great Sage shouted, killing intent flaring in his eyes. “Fine. I’ll show you exactly how much it hurts. Of course the ignorant seem fearless! Hmm. I think I’ll just use that servant of yours to show you. After I kill him, you’ll definitely acknowledge allegiance and reveal the secrets of your energy art!”

Clink. Clank.

All of a sudden, a chain appeared out of nowhere, which blurred, not toward Yang Qi, but toward Ghost Emperor Yama.

It was a classic case of killing a chicken to frighten the monkey. By cutting down one of Yang Qi’s companions, this man hoped to intimidate Yang Qi. And at the moment, Yang Qi had two companions. One was a woman, Lady-Princess Silvermoon. Considering that this Great Sage Quake-Cloud was relatively conceited, he wouldn’t attack a woman. Therefore, the only other natural choice was Ghost Emperor Yama.

At the moment, Ghost Emperor Yama looked like an old man in dark robes. At best, he could be said to be unsightly. To Great Sage Quake-Cloud, he seemed like the perfect ‘chicken’ to kill.

“Dammit!” Ghost Emperor Yama shouted. “You, a measly Great Sage, dare to insult me like this!? You all deserve to die! Everyone in the Demi-Immortal Institute and the Quake-Dawn Cathedral can just DIE! Rivers of blood are going to flow because of me! Great Sage Quake-Cloud? Bullshit! You’re only in the first step of the Great Sage level. How dare you call yourself an actual Great Sage!”

He had reached the point where he couldn’t hold back any longer. He was a majestic devil king, but had been suppressed for tens of thousands of years, all thanks to a whole group of Great Sages from the Quake-Dawn Cathedral. Great Sage Quake-Cloud had only recently reached the Great Sage level, and his cultivation base wasn't particularly strong. To Ghost Emperor Yama, a person like that might not be as low as an ant, but he definitely wasn’t anything impressive.

BOOOOM!

The ‘old man’ that was Ghost Emperor Yama exploded, and massive amounts of devil energy spilled out in all directions. In the blink of an eye, the Demi-Immortal Institute was covered with a devilish tempest, making it seem like the Hell of Yamas. Even the chancellor was shocked, and prepared to start fighting.

“Quake-Dawn godsteel? Be destroyed!”

SNAP!

Ghost Emperor Yama’s pitch-black, devilish hand latched onto the chain, then squeezed down, shattering it into ash. Next, he reached out, his enormous hand sailing toward Great Sage Quake-Cloud, shattering the air as it went, blotting out the sun and turning it into something devilish. Space-time bent under the power of the devil energy, as it came to be under the complete control of Ghost Emperor Yama.

“You’re… you’re a seventh step Great Sage!?”

Great Sage Quake-Cloud immediately turned to flee, and yet, he was too late. Ghost Emperor Yama’s devil hand reached him and—

POP!

The man’s head burst like a watermelon.

Chapter 298: Rage of the Ghost Emperor

All of a sudden, Great Sage Quake-Cloud was bathed in holy light, and his head grew back.

“Flesh and Blood Rebirth; Quake-Dawn God Magic!”

It was a powerful divine ability that only Great Sages could utilize. However, despite the fact that he had avoided death, Great Sage Quake-Cloud was completely terrified by what had just occurred, and lost all sense of courage. He had assumed that the sinister-looking old man with Yang Qi was a nobody. How could he ever have guessed that what he assumed was a bunny rabbit was actually a devil-dragon!?

After all, Ghost Emperor Yama had sealed his aura perfectly, making it seem that he was nothing more than a low-level Legendary. Although Legendaries were still looked up to, in the Demi-Immortal Institute, they weren’t particularly noteworthy.

Nobody could ever have guessed that he was really a devil king from primeval times, someone who was tens of thousands of years old. He was someone who could destroy anything and everything, who could reduce the world to rubble.

In fact, a casual move on his part had destroyed the head of a Great Sage.

His cultivation base was so profound that Great Sage Quake-Cloud was too weak to even fight back.

And yet, Great Sage Quake-Cloud was still a Great Sage from a higher plane.

After regrowing his head, he shouted in rage as he summoned a field of millions upon millions of layers of blinding light. Instantly, the land began to quake, and the sea of clouds overhead was torn to pieces.

Buildings in the Demi-Immortal Institute began to crack and crumble to the ground, and subterranean spell formations were destroyed. The effects rapidly spread for dozens of kilometers, and as the buildings collapsed, students fled out into the open, screaming in shock and confusion.

Shouting, the chancellor waved his sleeve, sending out a stream of pure vital energy right in between Great Sage Quake-Cloud and Ghost Emperor Yama, hoping to stop them from fighting. At the same time, he sucked all of the students of the institute into his sleeve.

His sleeve contained an entire cosmos, and every living thing in the area was pulled to safety inside of it. In the end, the chancellor still wanted to keep the Demi-Immortal Institute safe.

“Anybody who gets in my way is dead!” Ghost Emperor Yama was enraged, and was absolutely determined to kill Great Sage Quake-Cloud, no matter who tried to stop him.

Even as the chancellor swished his sleeve, Ghost Emperor Yama roared in fury, causing the air to split open, and filling the area with rumbling sounds. At the same time, a massive rift opened up above the sea of clouds, surrounded by a spider web of cracks and tears. Instantly, tribulation fire, tribulation water, and tribulation wind began to descend. As they did, they became primal-chaos that threatened to turn the entire area into a sea of tribulation.

Even the Minorcosm World up in the clouds was threatened, and seemed like it might explode.

The burning sun overhead turned black, and the sunlight became streams of black flame.

Even the sun and moon were being devilized.

Ghost Emperor Yama stood there like the ultimate devil in heaven and earth, ready to spread his kingdom to cover the lands.

“Yama Sage Domain; Sun-Moon Devilization! Wherever I step, the world of man becomes a land of devils….”

His sage domain easily negated the stream of vital energy from the chancellor.

“If you try to stop me from killing this despicable twit, then I’ll destroy the entire Demi-Immortal Institute!” Flames erupted from Ghost Emperor Yama’s eyes, shooting up to engulf the Minorcosm World.

“Cosmic Reversal!” The chancellor shot up into the air to block Ghost Emperor Yama’s fiery gaze, and then waved his sleeve again, sucking the massive Minorcosm World into it. At the same time, a host of stars appeared up above, which sent starlight streaming down through the sea of clouds with the power to demolish devils.

“Devil-Demolishing Legion of Stars? Complete crap! Watch and see what a ghost emperor can do! Devil-Completing Army of Stars!” BOOOOM! Innumerable streams of devil energy shot up to meet the starlight, and turn it completely black.

Meanwhile, the chancellor simply turned and left Ghost Emperor Yama’s sphere of influence, seemingly uninterested at all in fighting him. Some distance away, he waved his sleeve again, sending the students of the institute out, where they quickly formed ranks. After all, his sleeve could contain them all, but couldn’t necessarily keep them safe if he ended up in a protracted fight.

When he left the area of devil energy, Ghost Emperor Yama ignored him. Even he seemed to realize that the chancellor was profoundly mysterious, and was not someone to be casually trifled with. Turning, he once again faced Great Sage Quake-Cloud.

“You despicable beast. You insulted me, Ghost Emperor Yama, and the only way to pay for that is with your blood!"

His Yama Sage Domain quickly spread out to cover Great Sage Quake-Cloud, whose face fell dramatically. However, he still had backup techniques to try to protect himself.

“Sacrificial Instrumentation! Great God of Quake-Dawn, come to me!”

BOOOOM!

A space-time wormhole opened up, and the power of faith flowed forth. In the blink of an eye, an enormous god appeared behind Great Sage Quake-Cloud, a terrifying being who seemed capable of driving away all devil energy.

But all Ghost Emperor Yama did was walk forward, his eyes blazing with devilfire, the sky above him darkened by the black flames of the sun and moon. This was the might of a primeval devil king!

“The power of faith? Great God of Quake-Dawn? You think that will stop me? How very naive. Be destroyed!”

He then unleashed a fist strike that caused all heaven and earth to shake. In fact, it seemed capable of vanquishing the sea of stars itself.

The fist slammed into the Great God of Quake-Dawn, which immediately crumbled to pieces.

POP!

Great Sage Quake-Cloud coughed up a mouthful of blood as a gaping wound opened up on his torso, revealing his five viscera and six bowels, twitching and wriggling. “Time to go all out. Sage Domain; Kingdom of Clouds!”

White clouds spread out in all directions, which was none other than Great Sage Quake-Cloud's sage domain, filled with sage motes.

Shockingly, he was sacrificing his sage domain in an attempt to flee!

“You're delusional!” Ghost Emperor Yama said, taking another step forward. When his foot fell, black devil energy spread out from his foot and into the sea of clouds.

With the single stomp of his foot, he destroyed the massive sage domain. In fact, it shattered as easily as a chicken egg.

Great Sage Quake-Cloud flopped to the ground, and Ghost Emperor Yama walked over and began to trample him.

“I'm a Great Sage from the Quake-Dawn Cathedral!” the man screamed. “You can’t kill me! You’ll bring disaster on all these lands!”

“The reason I'm killing you is precisely because you’re a Great Sage from the Quake-Dawn Cathedral! You people are the ones who sealed me for tens of thousands of years!” Ghost Emperor Yama reached out and grabbed Great Sage Quake-Cloud’s head, causing it to burst into flames.

His screams could shake heaven and earth.

Off in the distance, the prime elders, grand elders, and numerous students of the institute were watching the scene play out.

All of them were trembling in fear; were it not for the chancellor’s timely interference before, all of them would be dead already. Either that, or devilized by Ghost Emperor Yama.

“Chancellor, that’s Ghost Emperor Yama! He’s supposed to be sealed in the Heavencorpse Kingdom! He's free! Ghost Emperor Yama is free!”

“That's right. He’s killing Great Sage Quake-Cloud!” one of the prime elders said. “We have to stop him! He's going to irreparably damage our relationship with the Quake-Dawn Cathedral. Chancellor, do something! Hurry!”

“I couldn’t stop him even if I tried,” the chancellor said coolly. “Ah, Yang Qi. Yet again I underestimated you. You actually brought Ghost Emperor Yama with you.”

The masked Young Lady was also in the group. “Father, what are we going to do?”

“Let the Crown Prince sort things out. With Ghost Emperor Yama on Yang Qi’s side, the prime elders can forget about punishing Yang Qi. The most important thing is to make sure Ghost Emperor Yama doesn’t go on a killing spree. If he does, it will be a major disaster. I’ll see if I can calm him down in a moment.”

One agonized scream after another erupted from Great Sage Quake-Cloud’s mouth.

The terrifying things that Ghost Emperor Yama was doing to him caused the people of the Demi-Immortal Institute to literally tremble in fear. A Great Sage was being killed right in front of their eyes.

Hardly any time had passed since Great Sage Quake-Cloud arrived in the Demi-Immortal Institute, at which time he had been treated with the utmost dignity and respect. But now, he was being burned alive.

Eventually the screams died away, and Great Sage Quake-Cloud’s soul faded away.

The only thing that remained was a cloud of motes in Ghost Emperor Yama’s hand. They looked almost like jade, and would feel completely pure and holy to anyone who touched them.

They were the ultimate manifestation of Great Sage Quake-Cloud’s cultivation base, his sage motes.

Ghost Emperor Yama had killed a first step Great Sage as easily as if he had been eating breakfast. As of this moment, he truly seemed like a consummate devil king.

“Get over here, Yang Qi!” he said.

Yang Qi had been watching from the sidelines, observing the fight between these two Great Sages.

Upon being beckoned at by Ghost Emperor Yama, he nodded, flew over, and said, “Congratulations on your revenge, Ghost Emperor Yama. The death of a Great Sage will surely be a heavy loss for the Quake-Dawn Cathedral.”

“Like hell it will,” Ghost Emperor Yama replied. “He was only a first step Great Sage. His death will sting for them, but he's not crucially important. Listen, punk. These sage motes are the full manifestation of his cultivation base. Give me the cultivation technique for the Infernal Deity Spear, and you can have them, and achieve meteoric progress!”

Chapter 299: Negotiation

Ghost Emperor Yama had killed a Great Sage, reducing him to nothing more than sage motes.

They contained Great Sage Quake-Cloud’s cultivation base, experience, energy arts, and even the quintessence of his life force. The benefits to acquiring all that could hardly be expressed in words.

For example, a top expert could refine the sage motes and use them to push a Legendary through multiple breakthroughs. It could lead to cultivation advancement that was ten thousand times as fast as ordinary.

And there was no doubt that Ghost Emperor Yama could do that for Yang Qi.

Of course, there was no way he would help Yang Qi for free. He wanted the Infernal Deity Spear technique, with which he could slaughter countless victims. And if he cultivated it into the form of a full divine ability, then he could break into the Demi-Immortal level.

Because of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, Yang Qi was already strong enough to fight people numerous levels higher than himself. Even experts in the seventh or eighth Legendary transformation were like nothing to him. But Ghost Emperor Yama was so far beyond that level that Yang Qi couldn’t even assess him. Furthermore, his overall understanding of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth was far from being complete.

If Ghost Emperor Yama got the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, he would be able to wield it to far greater effect than Yang Qi.

Yang Qi knew that, and therefore, unless the circumstances were dire beyond belief, he would never make a deal with Ghost Emperor Yama to give him part of the technique. As of this moment, the danger had passed; Great Sage Quake-Cloud was dead, and the chancellor of the Demi-Immortal Institute was definitely feeling the pressure of having Ghost Emperor Yama free in the world.

To some extent, it was a deadlock.

“Er. Hmm. Well, I need to think about it.” Yang Qi didn’t outright refuse Ghost Emperor Yama, and in fact, made it seem like he might actually consider taking the offer.

Ghost Emperor Yama snorted coldly. He obviously wasn’t very happy with Yang Qi’s stance, and yet, he was still afraid of the God Legion Seal. “Look, brat, you need to get stronger real fast. Danger is coming. I skimmed through Great Sage Quake-Cloud’s memories, and got a lot of news about the Quake-Dawn Cathedral, as well as that enemy of yours. What’s his name? Right. The Crown Prince. He’s already secured support from several important people in the Quake-Dawn Cathedral, who view him as a true genius, and plan to help him reach his full potential. In fact, he might even become the leader of the Quake-Dawn Cathedral one day. At the moment, he’s dealing with Great Sage Shroud-Heaven, who is not happy at all that his son was killed. Of course, now that the Crown Prince is a Great Sage himself, and has the support of the Quake-Dawn Cathedral, he’ll definitely come out on top. And once he returns, he’ll come for you. You’re strong, I’ll give you that. You can kill Never-Dying Legendaries and Half Sages and whatnot. But if you think you can kill a Great Sage, you might as well keep on dreaming.”

‘What!?’ Yang Qi thought, shocked. He had originally hoped that the news about the Crown Prince reaching the Great Sage level was incorrect. But considering what Ghost Emperor Yama had just said, it seemed it was true. With the Quake-Dawn Cathedral helping the Crown Prince, it was entirely within the realm of possibility that he could have become a Great Sage so quickly.

Before, Yang Qi had been confident that he could kill the Crown Prince, but now, that confidence was waning rapidly.

Of course, from an objective standpoint, Yang Qi himself was an aberration. Only a few years ago, he had been a punk in the fourth phase of the Energy Arts level. At that time, the Crown Prince had been a Half Sage for over a hundred years. It was a level gap that couldn’t be overcome casually.

If Yang Qi made the deal with Ghost Emperor Yama, and took the sage motes, then he could theoretically jump six or seven levels in one shot, and perhaps even become a Half Sage.

But to do that at the cost of handing over the cultivation method of the Infernal Deity Spear would be extremely risky. Besides, it wasn’t as if he trusted Ghost Emperor Yama. And accepting his help would involve willingly allowing him to send true energy into his own body.

Who knew what Ghost Emperor Yama might do in that situation? Yang Qi had no guarantee that the God Legion Seal would save him from every threat.

“What do you think, Yang Qi?” Ghost Emperor Yama said. “Consider my offer carefully!”

At this point, the chancellor of the Demi-Immortal Institute floated over.

“Ghost Emperor Yama!” he said by way of greeting. “So, you’re finally free. Who was it that saved you? Don't tell me it was Yang Qi?”

Ghost Emperor Yama looked over. “You're the chancellor of the Demi-Immortal Institute? Well, this is a surprise. You’re pretty young. You must be pretty amazing to have reached this level at your age. Yang Qi? No, he’s not strong enough to do something like that. The Wilds God from the Quake-Dawn Continent freed me, for the purpose of fighting the Quake-Dawn Cathedral! Look, I’ll be straight with you. Yang Qi is my prey, so nobody else is allowed to touch him. And right now we're doing a bit of negotiating.”

“Oh? Your prey?” The chancellor’s eyes flickered with surprise as he looked over at Yang Qi, who stood there looking confident, and not the least bit flustered. In fact, he didn’t look like ‘prey’ of any sort. He looked more like a young master, with Ghost Emperor Yama being a bodyguard arranged to look after him.

“Considering the level of your cultivation base,” the chancellor said, “it shouldn’t be difficult at all for you to deal with Yang Qi. Why haven’t you made a move on him?”

“Oh please, do you really need to ask?” Ghost Emperor Yama chuckled coldly. “I'm not going to do anything to him. If you want to, though, be my guest. What are you, a Demi-Immortal? Actually, no. Even if you were a Demi-Immortal, and had all of the other past chancellors of the Demi-Immortal Institute helping you, you still wouldn’t be able to do anything to him.”

“Is that so?” The chancellor looked at Yang Qi again, musing that all of his previous speculations were true. Whoever Yang Qi’s backer was, even Ghost Emperor Yama was terrified of him. “Yang Qi, why don’t you just tell us who your backer is? Ask him to send his will to our lands, and bring the most ultimate glory to the Demi-Immortal Institute?”

Ghost Emperor Yama looked at the chancellor as though he were a complete fool. “You want to know who his backer is? Your measly Demi-Immortal Institute doesn't qualify to know. Not even the entire Quake-Dawn Continent qualifies, or the leaders of the ancient Yore-Wilds Continent. He’s backed by the legion of gods, who exist in a plane so high you can’t comprehend how powerful it is. They’re stronger than the host of immortals.”

The God Legion Seal that existed in Yang Qi’s forehead was a fabled thing even in the era of the Yore-Wilds, and was something that only very occasionally would appear in one of the immortal-level planes. And the Yore-Wilds Continent was no immortal-level plane. In those primeval times, it was only considered a high-level plane, completely different from the immortal continents.

Unfortunately, few people in the Rich-Lush Continent were aware of the history of the countless ancient planes, and that included the god legion plane. Compared to the legion of gods, even Ghost Emperor Yama was like a speck of dust. The former leader of the Yore-Wilds Continent had been a Demi-Immortal expert, but even he would have been a speck of dust in front of the legion of gods.

Now, the chancellor of the Demi-Immortal Institute was casually asking Yang Qi to summon the legion of gods? It would be hard to ask for something crazier than that. Strangely, the chancellor responded to Ghost Emperor Yama’s words by simply smiling faintly, apparently under the impression that he was being made fun of. He was convinced that Yang Qi’s backer was stronger than a Great Sage, but there was no way he would believe that he was backed by the legion of gods.

The legion of gods were mythological, and no one even knew the name of the plane they resided in. Even ten of the ancient Yore-Wilds Continents put together would be destroyed if they tried to attack them. The legion of gods could create innumerable continents and living beings as easily as exhaling. How could Yang Qi possibly have backing like that? If he did, wouldn't the Crown Prince have been killed already?

All of a sudden, the Young Lady said, “Yang Qi, bringing Ghost Emperor Yama here to the Demi-Immortal Institute caused a huge disaster. Not only were countless buildings destroyed, but also, Ghost Emperor Yama killed Great Sage Quake-Cloud, damaging our relationship with the Quake-Dawn Cathedral. You’re a holy neophyte of our institute, and yet you've brought us nothing but catastrophe. How can we possibly stand proudly in front of all creation now?”

“Stand proudly? You people can’t even tell the difference between right and wrong. I couldn’t care less if the Demi-Immortal Institute were completely destroyed.” All onlookers reacted with visible shock to his insulting words. Everyone in the Demi-Immortal Institute was on the side of the Crown Prince, and for all intents and purposes, the chancellor was the Crown Prince’s father. “What do you think, Ghost Emperor Yama? Do I have what it takes to destroy the Demi-Immortal Institute?”

“Of course!” Ghost Emperor Yama replied. “Just call on the power of the legion of gods, and you could destroy it ten times over.” Ghost Emperor Yama’s words caused the Young Lady to blanch.

“What kind of talk is that, Yang Qi?” the Young Lady said angrily.

“The truth,” Yang Qi replied, without a hint of emotion on his face. “Anyone who pisses me off will end up dead. That’s how the Crown Prince acts, right? Well, me too. Enough with this chattering. If you don't shut your mouth, I’ll kill you too!”

“You!” she said. However, there was nothing else she could do other than tremble. Obviously, she was no match for Yang Qi.

Ghost Emperor Yama sighed with praise. “What character, Yang Qi. Amazing! It’s a real pity you don’t tread the dao of devils. You would have made a great devil king.”

Ignoring Ghost Emperor Yama, Yang Qi looked at the chancellor and said, “I didn't see Holy Daughter Manyflowers with the other grand elders just now. Why not? Where is she? And by the way, I’d appreciate it if you call my Aunt Susu out. I'm permanently leaving the Demi-Immortal Institute, and I'm taking her with me.”

The Demi-Immortal Institute was no longer a stable location to grow. Yang Qi felt no attachment to it, and no reason to stay. Originally, he had viewed the place as a good spot to practice his cultivation and grow stronger. But now, there was no place for him here. He had accomplished more good for the world than any of the chancellors of the institute ever had, and yet, had received no reward. Instead, the chancellor sent him on a fool’s errand in the Western Continent. Then, upon returning, he was ganged up on by the grand elders of law enforcement.

Considering all that, the time had come to leave, and start building a house of his own.

Chapter 300: Go Ahead and Fight

There were a lot of grand elders present, but not Holy Daughter Manyflowers, which gave Yang Qi a very sinking feeling. Back when he had left for the Western Continent, he had arranged for her to take over as the new Grand Elder Feat-Virtue. Unfortunately, he had noticed earlier that someone else was wearing the uniform of that position. It seemed highly likely that Holy Daughter Manyflowers was suffering because of Yang Qi, and that was something he couldn’t stand for.

As far as he was concerned, the Demi-Immortal Institute was full of ungrateful curs. Maybe they were the most powerful organization in the Rich-Lush Continent, but he had been to the Western Continent and the Quake-Dawn Continent, which had been a very eye-opening experience. At this point, he didn't care about the institute at all, and in fact, had decided that doing things on his own would be the best course of action.

He would build the Sage Monarch Society into a powerful organization of its own, one that could rule all heaven and earth.

Instantly, the chancellor’s gaze became sharp enough to slice open heaven, and pierce directly into Yang Qi’s heart.

“What? You want to formally leave the Demi-Immortal Institute?”

“That’s right. There’s no reason for me to stay around any longer. Let’s be straight: you're the chancellor, and yet not even you act in a fair and impartial way. Everything you do is to benefit the Crown Prince. Look, I'm not interested in fighting with you people, although I will kill the Crown Prince sooner or later.” Yang Qi emphasized all of his main points by jabbing his index finger in the chancellor’s direction.

Immediately, the grand elders began shouting with righteous indignation.

“What incredible gall!”

“How dare you!”

Ghost Emperor Yama glanced at them and then rolled his eyes. “Do you insects want to die? Ants clamoring. That's all you are. Don’t spoil my mood, you’ll regret it.”

In the blink of an eye, the prime elders became as quiet as mice.

Not the chancellor though. “As a holy neophyte, you know full well that your heart and soul belong to the institute. You live as a member of the Demi-Immortal Institute, and you’ll die as one. If you formally leave, you’ll become a rebel and a traitor, and no matter how long you live, we’ll go all out to kill you. And that includes me.

“In the entire history of our institute, never once has a holy neophyte done something like this. Each and every one would die to maintain the glory and honor of our organization. You could commit no worse crime. After all, if you left, and we didn't kill you, then our position in the Rich-Lush Continent would suffer horrendously, and we would become the ultimate laughingstock.”

“Oh?” Yang Qi didn’t seem frightened at all by the chancellor’s glare. Instead, he seemed to be glowing with holy light. “Compared to the glory of the legion of gods, the reputation of the Demi-Immortal Institute isn't even worth mentioning.”

“Come on, Yang Qi,” the Young Lady said angrily, “are you really trying to convince us that you represent the legion of gods? Only the Crown Prince is a god from heaven descended into the mortal world!”

Ignoring her, Yang Qi said, “How about this, Chancellor: if you want to kill me, go ahead and make your move. Then we can all see how far you’ll go to help the Crown Prince. I just took a trip to the Quake-Dawn Continent, and I learned a lot of behind-the-scenes information. For example, the Crown Prince is the son of the Holy Daughter of the Quake-Dawn Cathedral. And not even they know whether or not he’s really a god from heaven descended into the mortal world.

“In fact, I even heard rumors that their Holy Daughter had an affair with an important person from the Rich-Lush Continent, and that he’s the father. I'm pretty sure you’re the only person who matches that description, Chancellor. It's common knowledge around here that you had an intimate relationship with the Crown Prince’s mother. Could it be that the Crown Prince is actually your son, and that that’s why you’re protecting him?”

“You shut the hell up!” the chancellor shouted, his eyes bulging. “Enough, Yang Qi.”

“No, it’s not enough. I'm leaving the Demi-Immortal Institute, whether you like it or not. Now tell me where Holy Daughter Manyflowers is. And where’s my Aunt Susu? If you don’t hand them over immediately, people are going to start dying. A lot of them.” Yang Qi wasn’t making the slightest attempt to be polite. In fact, he was tearing the chancellor’s figurative face into shreds. “Listen up, Ghost Emperor Yama! If these people don’t hand over Holy Daughter Manyflowers and Yang Susu, then the two of us are going to take on the entire Demi-Immortal Institute. If you kill the chancellor, I’ll give you the Infernal Deity Spear. I swear it on the glory of the legion of gods.”

“Are you serious?” Ghost Emperor Yama said, his face lighting up.

“Of course I'm serious. I just swore it on the legion of gods. Do you really think that I, the representative of the gods, would betray their glory? I couldn’t do that anymore than you could betray the leader of the Hell of Yamas.” Yang Qi was throwing caution to the wind. If the Demi-Immortal Institute didn’t concede to his demands, he would make sure rivers of blood flowed. Ghost Emperor Yama could definitely deal with the chancellor, and Yang Qi could decimate the other leaders. After all, he had a whole squad of mercenaries to help him, and he could also summon an army of fiend-devils.

Other than the Crown Prince, the only fear-inspiring member of the Demi-Immortal Institute was the chancellor himself. It was just too bad the Crown Prince wasn't around as well.

“As long as you can kill the chancellor, Ghost Emperor Yama, or at least keep him occupied, then I can kill everyone else.” Yang Qi’s words couldn’t have been more shocking. He was being insulting to the extreme, and overbearing in a way that surpassed the Crown Prince. Throughout all the years which had passed, the Crown Prince had never dared to challenge the chancellor, and yet Yang Qi was actually threatening to have him killed by Ghost Emperor Yama.

It was a case of tit for tat. You treat me heartlessly? I’ll treat you without mercy!

And at the moment, Yang Qi had the ultimate advantage. All Ghost Emperor Yama had to do was keep the chancellor occupied for a bit, and the Demi-Immortal Institute would be no more.

“How dare you, Yang Qi!” the Young Lady shouted in fury, her body glowing with starlight as though she intended to make a move.

Unfortunately for her, Ghost Emperor Yama’s eyes had already locked onto the chancellor. “So, the new chancellor of the Demi-Immortal Institute is a brilliant talent who reached the Great Sage level quicker than most. Sadly, you’re just too young. Alright, get over here. Yang Qi swore to the legion of gods, and that means the two of us are going to fight. By the way, don't even think of trying to defend your subordinates at the same time. If I let that happen, I might as well stop calling myself a devil king!”

In the hopes of getting the Infernal Deity Spear, Ghost Emperor Yama was ready to go all out.

“Oh really?” Frowning, the chancellor looked over at Ghost Emperor Yama, fully aware that the situation was turning very grim. Yang Qi wasn’t willing to back down, and was acting more overbearing than it seemed possible.

The chancellor was essentially the most powerful person in the Rich-Lush Continent, and yet he was being forced into a corner by a Legendary, and a holy neophyte of his own institute at that. How could he possibly have any face left?

On the other hand, if he ended up fighting Ghost Emperor Yama, it was entirely likely that Yang Qi would massacre everyone else in the institute. And that wasn’t even bringing Yang Qi’s Demi-Immortal backer into the equation. For all intents and purposes, the chancellor was now in an impossible situation.

However, it was in that very moment that a sealed rift down below suddenly broke open.

“Stay your hand, Yang Qi! Stay your hand!”

Devil energy erupted out of it, along with Holy Daughter Manyflowers. Obviously, she had been imprisoned in some sort of subterranean devil-suppression hall, a punishment inflicted only on people who had committed terrible crimes.

As she emerged, the chains which had been binding her collapsed, and she rushed to stand in front of Yang Qi. “Stay your hand! Yang Qi, as soon as you left, the prime elders cooked up an excuse to imprison me. Thankfully, I benefited a lot in the hall of devil-suppression. The training was intense, but I advanced a lot. And Susu isn’t in the Rich-Lush Continent any longer, she left with two prime elders, Great Sages who returned from the void to take her on a search for information about the founder of the Demi-Immortal Institute, as well as the ancient Spritefolk. If you destroy the Demi-Immortal Institute, it could be really bad for Susu.”

“I’ll go find Aunt Susu myself,” Yang Qi said. “By the way, what crime were you charged with that got you imprisoned? The Demi-Immortal Institute doesn't handle things with fairness and impartiality, which frankly causes my hackles to rise from fury. What’s the point in you sticking around here? Why don’t you leave the Demi-Immortal Institute with me?”

She shook her head. “I can't. The institute has treated me well throughout the years, so I don’t have any right to leave it. Besides, you really shouldn’t be fighting them either. Why don't the both of you just back down?”

This time, it was Yang Qi’s turn to shake his head. “The Crown Prince is already a Great Sage. I have nowhere to back down to. My own life or death is on the line, so there’s no way I'm going to give face to anybody. In fact, I'm going to take it away.”

“You can’t!” Holy Daughter Manyflowers said.

“Moron!” Yang Qi said. Reaching out, he tapped her head, rendering her unconscious. Then he tossed her into the Grand Emperor's Pagoda. He cultivated the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, and bore the weight of the will of the gods. He did things in a domineering and overbearing fashion, just like the godmammoths of old. How could he possibly allow someone to just tell him what to do?

“However it happens, Chancellor, I'm leaving the Demi-Immortal Institute for good. If you try to stop me, rivers of blood will flow, and I’ll stack up mountains of corpses. I really do represent the legion of gods, and therefore, I'm not going to just sit back and let the Demi-Immortal Institute blaspheme their glory. I honestly don’t care whether you believe me or not. That’s my stance here, so do what you want. Are you really going to fight? Or will you let me go?”

The chancellor stood there, a host of emotions playing out on his face. Never in his wildest dreams could he have guessed that he would be pushed to this point. In the end, Ghost Emperor Yama was just too strong, and the chancellor was not confident that he could beat him in a fight.

A long moment passed, and the chancellor regained his composure.

“Fine,” he said coolly. “I understand the situation now. However, the truth is that you've committed no crime, so there’s no need for you to formally leave the Demi-Immortal Institute. How about this instead: you can fight it out with the Crown Prince when he gets back. I imagine it will be within about a hundred days. I’ll work things out with the other three institutes, and I’ll even arrange for the emperor himself to preside over the formalities. Whichever of you comes out alive in the end will be the new chancellor of the Demi-Immortal Institute. That’s the most fair and impartial way to handle the situation. You’re not a Great Sage, but perhaps you're strong enough to kill one. That in itself qualifies you to be the chancellor. Look, I'm done arguing here. Starting today, no grand elder, prime elder or any other person in the Demi-Immortal Institute will be allowed to interfere in matters pertaining to the Crown Prince and Yang Qi!”

It was in very casual fashion that the chancellor issued a shocking decree.

He was going to retire, and was letting the Crown Prince and Yang Qi fight each other to earn the right of succession. One of them would be the new chancellor!

Chapter 301: One Hundred Days

Everyone present was shocked to the core. Who could have ever guessed that the chancellor would actually suggest a compromise?

He was backing down, and even letting Yang Qi and the Crown Prince fight it out to become his successor. As such, Yang Qi didn’t need to formally leave the Demi-Immortal Institute.

It was absurd. Ridiculously, astonishingly absurd.

However, the crowd also realized that, to some extent, the chancellor’s decision made sense. Yang Qi was in a position of incredible power, and had the support of Ghost Emperor Yama. He could already kill Half Sages, and if he could defeat the Crown Prince, then it would prove that he was strong enough to take control of the institute.

The chancellor essentially had two choices. Let Yang Qi leave the institute, and make him an enemy. Or keep him, and potentially benefit the institute. Why wouldn’t he pick the latter?

Clicking his tongue, Ghost Emperor Yama said, “Very clever, little chancellor. Bravo on being able to let go of your position so easily. I can't help but admire you for that. Even in the days of the Yore-Wilds, it wasn’t common to see someone as young as you reach such heights of cultivation so quickly.” At this point, a sinister smile spread out across his face. “However, I don’t care what Yang Qi does, I'm going to fight you. I'm very curious to see how you fare under my Six-Daos Yama Godfist.”

He didn't mind helping Yang Qi for profit, but was definitely not willing to take orders from him. Therefore, he was not simply going to let the chancellor off the hook.

“Hold on, Ghost Emperor Yama,” Yang Qi said. Lowering his voice so the chancellor couldn’t hear, he continued, “Listen to my larger plan. I’ll give you a mnemonic you can use immediately, regardless of how things play out right now. Not the Infernal Deity Spear, but something perfect for fiend-devils, a sutra of enlightenment from a primeval infernal king.”

“Really?” Ghost Emperor Yama replied quietly, both surprise and greed flickering in his eyes. “Well, in that case, I’ll follow your lead. For now. However, if you don’t give me that sutra of enlightenment, then don’t blame me for killing you and everyone else in the Rich-Lush Continent.”

“Don’t worry. I always keep my word.” He looked back at the chancellor. “Don’t try to tempt me with the position of chancellor. I'm not interested. That said, I do want to fight the Crown Prince. You say that he's coming back in a hundred days? Well, regardless of where I am, he's going to come looking for me. And if I beat him, then I’ll take control of the Demi-Immortal Institute, change its name, and put an end to the old ways. Understand?”

“You can do whatever you want,” the chancellor said, seemingly without a care in the world. “If you beat the Crown Prince, then I’ll retire and hand over all authority to you. I have matters of my own to attend to, so you can deal with the Rich-Lush Continent after I'm gone.”

“Fine. So be it. I'm leaving; when the Crown Prince returns, he and I will fight to the death!” Without any further ado, Yang Qi shot up into the air in a beam of light, and disappeared. Everyone else remained behind, exchanging awkward glances.

“He’s crazy,” the Young Lady said, her voice trembling with rage. “Ridiculously arrogant. Father, he's a hundred times worse than the Crown Prince. The Crown Prince will break the rules, but he won’t go so far as to eliminate them. Just now, Yang Qi was talking about exterminating everyone in the institute. Disgraceful, rebellious behavior like that simply defies description.”

“When all of this is over, I’ll take you out into the void,” the chancellor said, “to look for the ancient people of the Starlight Body. We just need to wait for a hundred days to see who comes out on top, the Crown Prince, or Yang Qi.”

“Yang Qi is only a Legendary. How could he possibly beat the Crown Prince? Considering that the Crown Prince is a god from heaven descended into the mortal world, now that he’s a Great Sage, his blood will be even more active. Yang Qi won’t stand a chance against him.”

“That’s not necessarily true. Didn’t you notice that Yang Qi and Ghost Emperor Yama seemed to be working out some sort of deal? Considering what Yang Qi is capable of, the fact that he agreed to wait for a hundred days, it seems he’s confident in being able to win. Most likely, Ghost Emperor Yama is going to do something to increase Yang Qi’s cultivation base like crazy.”

All of a sudden, the chancellor’s eyes narrowed, as if he had just realized something.

Raising his voice, he said, “Ladies and gentlemen, we must reconstruct the Demi-Immortal Institute. Remove the rubble and relocate the students to new facilities.” He waved his sleeve, sending a host of giants flying out of it, who immediately set to work.

“Chancellor,” one of the prime elders said, “a mere clash between you and Ghost Emperor Yama destroyed virtually all of the structures in the institute. What would have happened if you truly fought each other?”

“The continent would have descended into ruin, and countless living beings would have been destroyed. And even if I won, I would have been the only survivor. We can never allow something like that to happen.”

“Chancellor,” another prime elder said, “are you really sure that we prime elders couldn’t have teamed up to take out Yang Qi? With you keeping Ghost Emperor Yama busy, and with so many of us Half Sages and Never-Dying Legendaries on our side, we definitely could have killed him.”

“Even teaming up against him would be courting death. He’s mastered all sorts of powerful energy arts, and can summon armies of fiend-devils from the void. With an army like that, he could take out the whole continent. As long as there are fiend-devils in hell, he would never run out of troops.” The chancellor shook his head. “Back when he repaired the damage to heaven, he summoned a Personal-Domain bronzeblaze fiend-devil. And he’s even stronger now than he was back then. Think about it. What if he summoned a bunch of asuras in the eighth or ninth transformation? How would you defend against something like that?”

“That’s impossible! Since when did a summoning magic like that even exist? In the ancient era of the Yore-Wilds, there were supposedly people who could summon immortal-spirits from the immortal planes. But such entities would always be the same level as the person who summoned them. Otherwise, how could they be controlled? Summoning fiend-devils of a higher level than yourself wouldn’t make any sense.”

“It doesn’t matter if you don't believe it. Perhaps Yang Qi can do it because he has the help of that mysterious backer. Enough. Discussing the matter won’t help. Going forward, nobody is allowed to provoke Yang Qi. In a hundred days, when matters between the Crown Prince and Great Sage Shroud-Heaven are settled, we can put this issue to rest once and for all. I’ll inform the other four Great Sages from our lands to attend, as well as the six Great Sages from the Western Continent.”

“We’ll follow your brilliant instructions as usual, Chancellor.”

Meanwhile, high above the sea of clouds, Ghost Emperor Yama flew alongside Yang Qi. “So, where’s this sutra of enlightenment, Yang Qi? Hand it over.”

“Hold on a moment,” Yang Qi said. “There’s one more thing I need you to do.”

Ghost Emperor Yama's expression flickered. “Are you kidding me? My patience has a limit, you know. Are you just messing around with me?”

“No, no, it's a simple thing. I need your help to get back the soul of a friend of mine, a member of the senior generation. He was a Never-Dying Legendary who was killed recently. If you promise to help me bring him back to life, I’ll give you a third of the mnemonic right now. Agreed.”

Ghost Emperor Yama thought for a moment and then said. “Alright, fine.”

“Good. Now listen carefully.”

In addition to the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, Yang Qi had a lot of other information about hell.

Back when he had been branded with the God Legion Seal, he not only acquired the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, but other bits of enlightenment, scriptures, and lower-level energy arts. Among them were primeval infernal king sutras.

“In the chaos of prehistory, the netherworld was dark; devil-banes abounded, and darkness intertwined with light; monarchs were born….” As Yang Qi spoke, enlightenment entered Ghost Emperor Yama’s mind, and he even saw the written script of the primeval infernal deities. His eyes went slack with astonishment, and streams of devil energy began to pulse inside of him. Apparently, he was receiving major revelations in terms of cultivation understanding.

“Amazing. It really is a sutra from primeval times, containing enlightenment from the depths of hell. Meditating on this is definitely my key to reaching a higher level. Unfortunately, it’s not the Infernal Deity Spear. That thing is the key to true enlightenment from the legion of gods. For that spear to be stuck with you is a real waste.”

He sighed, his eyes narrowing with pleasure. It almost looked like he was on drugs of some sort.

But then, only a moment later, Yang Qi stopped talking.

“What about the rest? Tell me the rest!” Eyes flashing with rage, he said, “Give me the rest of the sutra, Yang Qi. I was just reaching some major enlightenment! Why would you cut me off right then? Don't tell me you’re trying to force me into cultivation deviation?!”

Upon seeing Ghost Emperor Yama so flustered and exasperated, Yang Qi chuckled. Obviously, he had him hooked, and just needed to slowly reel him in. “That’s the first third of the sutra. If you want the rest, you need to help me bring my friend back to life. By the way, I have other sutras just like this one, all of them from hell. Let’s see. I have some from the Hell of Misery, the Hell of Never-Ending, the Hell of Mud Pits. Some really great stuff. They’re not techniques from the legion of gods, but I’d bet that you could use them to cultivate your way into the Demi-Immortal level.”

“Excellent….” Ghost Emperor Yama said, rubbing his hands together in delight. “Alright, where did this friend of yours get killed? As long as his corpse remains, or a discarnate soul, I can use some devil arts to bring him back to life. That's especially true considering he’s a Never-Dying Legendary. As long as he isn’t completely dead, we can restore his soul.”

“Alright then. We’re going to the Sun Moon Institute.”

Yang Qi had never believed that Hua Tianxiong had been fully killed by the Crown Prince. After all, the talisman he had given Yang Qi still flickered with a bit of light, indicating that there was still a chance to restore his soul.

Unfortunately, that was something Yang Qi couldn’t do on his own. He needed the terrifying power of a Great Sage to do that.

Chapter 302: Restoring a Soul

If there was any hope that Hua Tianxiong could be brought back to life, Yang Qi would do his best to make it happen. Having a powerful expert like Ghost Emperor Yama on his side was turning out to be very useful. Without him, dealing with the chancellor earlier wouldn’t have been so easy.

Right now, Yang Qi planned to save Hua Tianxiong, and then call all of his sworn siblings and clan relatives together. Then, he would do everything in his power to make sure everyone achieved major progress.

Furthermore, he wanted to know more about the unsuccessful attempt Hua Tianxiong and Young Master Shroud-Heaven had made on the Crown Prince’s life. For example, exactly how strong was the Crown Prince now? He absolutely needed to know that.

At the moment, Ghost Emperor Yama could hardly contain his excitement, and wanted nothing more than to bring Hua Tianxiong back to life so that he could get the rest of the scripture Yang Qi had just tantalized him with.

As time went by, Ghost Emperor Yama was becoming more and more convinced of how strong Yang Qi was. The fact that the chancellor of the Demi-Immortal Institute was so leery of making a move on him only seemed to confirm that tangling with the God Legion Seal was too dangerous.

Thanks to the tens of thousands of years he had been imprisoned, Ghost Emperor Yama was actually a very patient person. He knew that he had plenty of time to deal with Yang Qi, and that being short-sighted would be a mistake. The fact that Yang Qi had his God Legion Seal indicated that he was definitely no ordinary individual, and that he had mighty powers backing him. In fact, Ghost Emperor Yama was beginning to believe that Yang Qi was truly favored by the heavens, and that he had some unique destiny. Even he trembled at the thought of the legion of gods.

As such, he was beginning to abandon thoughts of somehow forcing Yang Qi’s godly-class energy art out of him. If Yang Qi truly was connected to the will of the gods, then harming him would mean blaspheming against the legion of gods.

Considering how high Ghost Emperor Yama's cultivation base was, he had something of an understanding of the will of heaven, and mysterious principles of the universe.

And because of that, he was fairly certain that the will of heaven had touched Yang Qi.

Yang Qi and Ghost Emperor Yama were both capable of incredible speed, and therefore, the Rich-Lush Continent actually felt like a small place to them. It didn’t take them long to reach the Sun Moon Institute which was similar to the Demi-Immortal Institute in that it was filled with pavilions, pagodas, ancient temples, and beautiful scenery.

Upon arriving at the main gate, Yang Qi raised his voice and said, “People of the Sun Moon Institute, it's me, Yang Qi. I’ve come to offer formal greetings and discuss an important matter.”

In response to his voice, the Sun Moon Institute began to glow with shining light, as streams of true energy rose into the sky that resembled golden, silver, and azure snakes. It was the manifestation of a spell formation, which, in the shortest of times, locked down the entire institute.

“What’s going on here?” Yang Qi said, frowning. Something seemed very strange.

At this point, a group of individuals appeared, wearing long robes decorated with suns and moons, with golden crowns on their heads. Unexpectedly, these were the holy neophytes of the Sun Moon Institute.

“Yang Qi,” one of them said, “you’re no longer welcome here in the Sun Moon Institute. There’s nothing for us to discuss with each other.”

“Open the spell formation,” Yang Qi said. “I’ve come to bring Uncle Hua Tianxiong back to life.”

At this point, a woman appeared, who was none other than Hua Tianxiong’s wife, Yan Chenxing.

“Just leave, Yang Qi,” she said, her face a mask of fury. “The Crown Prince is a Great Sage now. He has the support of the Quake-Dawn Cathedral, and the only thing left of Hua Tianxiong is a discarnate soul. Not even the chancellor of the Sun Moon Institute can save him. What do you think you’re going to do?”

One could only imagine the pain and anger she felt because of her husband being killed.

“All we need is his discarnate soul,” Yang Qi said. “You think that just because your chancellor can’t do anything about the situation, I can’t either? Ghost Emperor Yama, please break this spell formation. If we don’t bring Hua Tianxiong back to life, then I won’t be able to give you the rest of that sutra.”

Ghost Emperor Yama snorted coldly. “What am I, your coolie? Well, I guess that since a sutra from hell is on the line, I’ll just grin and bear it. This had better be worth it in the end.”

With that, he reached out with his pitch black hand.

RUUUUUMBLE!

His hand blotted out the sky, causing lightning to crash and pitch black rain to fall onto the glowing shield generated by the Sun Moon Institute’s spell formation.

“Be broken!” he shouted. The land for hundreds of kilometers in all directions quaked, and crevices opened up. At the same time, the spell formation began to break, causing the students of the institute, even the holy neophytes, to cry out in alarm.

“A Great Sage! That guy’s a Great Sage!”

“Stay your hand!”

Just before the spell formation crumbled, a glowing taiji symbol composed of the sun and the moon shot out toward Ghost Emperor Yama’s hand projection. Shockingly, another Great Sage was making a move. The chancellor of the Sun Moon Institute!

“What kind of bullshit energy art is that? You think that’s going to do something to me?” Ghost Emperor Yama changed the direction of his hand, grabbing the taiji symbol, and crushing it out of existence. “What are you hiding for? Get out here! Your institute was founded by Reverend Sun Moon, right? Seems he was really worthless!”

Ghost Emperor Yama let loose another punch, causing the air to tremble. A moment later, a tall, burly man tumbled out into the open. “You’re… you’re Ghost Emperor Yama! How did you get free? Everyone in the Sun Moon Institute, fall back immediately! This is a deadly devil king!”

“Calm down, Chancellor Sun Moon!” Yang Qi shouted. “Ghost Emperor Yama and I have an agreement. We're here to bring my Uncle Hua Tianxiong back to life!”

“That’s right!” Ghost Emperor Yama added. “Your puny Sun Moon Institute isn’t worth making a fuss over.” He kept his energy arts reined in, aware that if things got out of hand, Yang Qi might not hand over the sutra.

And he also knew that he currently wasn't strong enough to single-handedly get his revenge on the Quake-Dawn Cathedral. There were old-timers in the Quake-Dawn Cathedral who were strong enough that, if Ghost Emperor Yama tried to take them on, he would probably just end up being imprisoned again. Therefore, he needed Yang Qi’s godly-class energy art to become a Demi-Immortal, then truly destroy the church.

‘This little punk Yang Qi might not ever give me that godly-class energy art though. So how am I supposed to get my revenge? He definitely has the God Legion Seal on him, so I can’t force him to give it to me. I can’t challenge the legion of gods. Wait a second!’  All of a sudden, a new thought occurred to him. ‘Yang Qi has the God Legion Seal. And there are people in the Quake-Dawn Cathedral who support that brat they call the Crown Prince. So therefore, the Quake-Dawn Cathedral is definitely going to clash with Yang Qi at some point. And if those old codgers from the Quake-Dawn Cathedral provoke the legion of gods, then they’ll definitely end up dead! Even Demi-Immortals would end up dead if they went up against the God Legion Seal.’

The more he thought about it, the more Ghost Emperor Yama realized that it made a lot of sense to try to use Yang Qi to deal with the Quake-Dawn Cathedral. Having reached this point in his train of thought, a broad smile appeared on his face.

Considering that Ghost Emperor Yama had stopped attacking the spell formation, the people in the Sun Moon Institute were beginning to calm down. However, Chancellor Sun Moon was visibly taken aback that Yang Qi was working with Ghost Emperor Yama.

Even to Chancellor Sun Moon, Ghost Emperor Yama was a senior to his seniors’ seniors.

He had heard many stories of this primeval monster who was sealed in the Heavencorpse Dimension.

“Chancellor Sun Moon, it stands to reason that you have Uncle Hua Tianxiong’s discarnate soul,” Yang Qi said. “And I've brought Ghost Emperor Yama here to restore it. Please, let me in. It won’t be long before you get a message from the Demi-Immortal Institute about what’s happened. I'm going to have a duel with the Crown Prince in a hundred days. If I win, I’ll be the new chancellor of the Demi-Immortal Institute. You, the other two chancellors, and the emperor himself will be invited to bear witness.”

“What?” Yan Chenxing said. “You’re going to have a duel with the Crown Prince…? This….”

“He’s telling the truth,” Chancellor Sun Moon said. “I sensed some powerful fluctuations earlier, coming from the direction of the Demi-Immortal Institute. It felt like two Great Sages fighting. If you can really help restore Hua Tianxiong’s soul, then please, come with me.”

The students and elders of the Sun Moon Institute could never have guessed that something like this would happen. All of them were looking at Ghost Emperor Yama, their eyes shining with unprecedented awe.

To most people, he was a devil from primeval myths, a savage villain who struck fear into the hearts of anyone who heard his name.

Before, everyone had assumed that because the Crown Prince was a Great Sage, Yang Qi’s death was a foregone conclusion. But now, everything was changing. With Ghost Emperor Yama working for Yang Qi, who could possibly harm him?

Even as everyone discussed the matter, Chancellor Sun Moon led Yang Qi and Ghost Emperor Yama into a small dimension in the depths of the Sun Moon Institute.

Inside the dimension was a pagoda, and inside the pagoda was an altar, atop which rested a host of white flags, which were being used to contain Hua Tianxiong's discarnate soul.

In fact, in the middle of the fluttering flags were streams of will that occasionally formed together into Hua Tianxiong’s face. Unfortunately, they weren’t capable of maintaining a consistent form.

Also in the middle of the flags was a lamp which pulsed with Hua Tianxiong’s aura.

Chancellor Sun Moon sighed. “Legendaries in the Sun Moon Institute all have an altar lamp like this, which is connected to their soul. If such a person perishes, it will provide an opportunity to restore their soul. Unfortunately, Hua Tianxiong was killed very violently, and no matter how I’ve tried to use the soul-gathering flags, I haven’t been able to restore his soul. If the soul isn’t restored, then as time passes, it will slowly fade away into nothing.”

Chapter 303: Supreme Devil Might

Ghost Emperor Yama looked around and said, “Soul-gathering flags. A soul-restoring altar. An altar lamp. This is the Sun Moon Soul-Harvesting Grand Energy Art. Not bad. Not bad at all. Unfortunately for you, little chancellor, your cultivation base is just too low. Only high-level Great Sages could manipulate magical laws to make this work. That said, I'm curious as to why that brat chancellor from the Demi-Immortal Institute is so strong. He’s no weaker than me, and he has a very dangerous aura. I wonder if he got some sort of powerful legacy.”

It was obvious that Chancellor Demi-Immortal was far stronger than Chancellor Sun Moon. However, the former kept his true skill and power hidden. He might seem soft on the outside, but Ghost Emperor Yama actually feared him quite a bit. Otherwise, he wouldn’t have agreed to Yang Qi’s suggestions so quickly.

Chancellor Sun-Moon didn't seem offended that he had just been called weak. For one thing, Ghost Emperor Yama was so far above him, if word got out about what he said, it would be no loss of face. Furthermore, Hua Tianxiong’s life was on the line here, and they needed Ghost Emperor Yama’s help.

“Ghost Emperor Yama, you’re a member of the senior generation, with a profound cultivation base. Not even Reverend Sun Moon could match up to you, sir. You definitely have what it takes to operate the altar and call Hua Tianxiong’s soul back from the void.”

“Of course I do. We fiend-devils know a lot more about the workings of souls than you humans. In the Hell of Yamas, we have something called the Spirit-Assimilating Soul-Controlling Grand Energy Art, which is specifically designed for collecting souls. Once I'm finished with this, Yang Qi, you’d better not forget your promise to give me the Primeval Infernal Deity Sutra.”

“I won’t,” Yang Qi said. He could already sense that Ghost Emperor Yama was treating him a bit differently, He was being a bit more polite, and had stopped using pejoratives such as ‘brat’ and ‘punk’. Instead, he was addressing him with his full name.

One reason was that Ghost Emperor Yama hoped to get his help to deal with his arch-enemies in the Quake-Dawn Cathedral. The other was that he was worried that constantly calling him names like that could end up offending the legion of gods. Even hell-born fiend-devils who were more vicious than Ghost Emperor Yama feared the gods.

“Alright, let me get to work. Back up.” He waved his hand, sending devil energy roiling out. Instantly, the altar trembled, and Yang Qi and Chancellor Sun Moon felt themselves leaving the Rich-Lush Continent. In the blink of an eye, they were out in the starry sky.

There were countless glittering planets around them, which cast their soft, gentle light down onto the living beings below. They were like a shining river that streamed endlessly into the depths of the universe.

The planets existed, not in the void, but in outer space.

The void, and outer space, were two very different things.

Outer space described the distance between objects in the universe. The void was what connected such objects. Outer space was immeasurably large; even Great Sages who wanted to travel through it from planet to planet would require years and years of effort. In fact, the only way to truly do it was to fold space to perform teleportations.

As Yang Qi looked at the distant river of planets, he saw one particularly bright object which was none other than Planet Quake-Dawn. Also known as the Quake-Dawn Continent, it was not something that could normally be seen from the Rich-Lush Continent. If one simply traveled through outer space to try to reach it, it could take ten thousand years. And that was even using minor teleportations and spatial coordinates.

Most energy artists would never go into outer space. It was deathly, cold, and never-ending. Empty.

By way of analogy, outer space could be likened to the countless twisting ravines and valleys that would exist between two mountains, whereas the void was like a bridge connecting them. To get from one mountain to another could take days if one walked the land between them. However, if one walked the bridge connecting them, the trip could be made in the time it takes an incense stick to burn.

‘This devil-ghost is so strong! He actually teleported us into outer space.’ Chancellor Sun Moon couldn’t have been more shocked. At the same time, he realized that no amount of warding magics could ever be used to keep Ghost Emperor Yama at bay.

Ghost Emperor Yama looked out at the boundless river of planets, and extended both hands.

“The Step of the Planet God; the Position of Outer Space; the Transformation of the Giant Spirit; the Bridge of the Heavenly Connection; the Magic of Life and Death; the Arts of the Archaean Past; the Dignity of Double Nines; the King of the Vast Heaven….”

RUMBLE!

Never-ending devil energy swept through outer space, causing countless planets to tremble, making it seem like they might fall out of the sky.

Ghost Emperor Yama’s hand reached out and tore a rift into space, causing a huge stream of shining light to descend, which became countless memorial gateways. Instantly, the sound of wailing ghosts filled the area, along with a wind straight from the netherworld itself.

‘The Planet God step!’ Chancellor Sun Moon thought. ‘I wonder if I’ll ever reach that level myself?’

“Preheaven Planet God, Bathe Me in Radiance; Turn Planets into Gods, Open the Door to Hell; Return the Soul, Grant it Long Life!” As Ghost Emperor Yama unleashed one magic after another, the planets trembled, and Yang Qi and Chancellor Sun Moon felt like they were suffocating.

Ghost Emperor Yama threw his head back and howled; ripples spread through outer space, and the light intensified. The millions upon millions of distant planets seemed to form a web of light that settled onto him, transforming him into what looked like a god of planets.

Wham! Bam!

Stimulated by the power being drawn upon, the altar began to tremble, and the lamp began to shine ten times as brightly as before. Suddenly, the aura of Hua Tianxiong’s soul began to pulse. Soon, it was so strong that it affected some of the streams of light around it, causing the planets themselves to reflect Hua Tianxiong’s features.

What level of power was this? How strong was Ghost Emperor Yama? And to think that even a mighty being like him was afraid of the God Legion Seal.

Ghost Emperor Yama burst out into laughter. “With the power of ten thousand planets to search for this soul, I'm ninety-nine percent confident that I can succeed! Thankfully, we’re in time. If another ten days went by, perhaps two weeks at the most, the soul fragments would have disappeared, and not even a Demi-Immortal would have been able to find them.”

Ghost Emperor Yama stamped his foot, and countless streams of light shot out of him, racing out into the void like god-spirits.

Soon, the lamp began to burn more brightly as the light re-converged, each beam of it pulsing with Hua Tianxiong’s aura.

Six hours passed, and the aura of Hua Tianxiong’s soul grew stronger and stronger. Soon, a shadowy figure took form.

“Yang Qi, spatter some of your blood onto the altar lamp to stand in for your friend's body. Your blood has the aura of a god-spirit, and is filled with the glory of the legion of gods. It'll be very beneficial to use it as the husk for the soul. That way, he’ll be resurrected without any deficiencies. In fact, he’ll be able to advance by leaps and bounds, and can probably become a Great Sage.”

“Alright,” Yang Qi said. Waving his hand, he sent a stream of his own blood over to the altar lamp. It was pure and transparent, like porcelain, filled with magical symbols pertaining to the legion of gods. It was even possible to hear singing like that of a choir of angels.

‘That’s blood? Is it even human?’ Chancellor Sun Moon was completely shocked. ‘It's so strong! Not even the blood of a Half Sage could match that. This kid is already as strong as a Great Sage!’

‘God blood! The blood of gods!’ A very serious expression overtook Ghost Emperor Yama’s face. ‘It's too bad I can’t use it for my own purposes. The might of the gods is the natural bane of fiend-devils.’

As soon as Yang Qi’s blood hit the altar lamp, the lamp began to spin rapidly, causing a humanoid figure to take shape.

“Excellent. The rebirth is starting! With my help, and your god blood to make the body, the results are going to be extraordinary! You owe me for this, Yang Qi! Now, I’ll use my Multifold Heavenly Devil-Refining Grand Energy Art to fuse your friend’s body with his soul! Let the godly and the devilish combine!”

RUUUUUMBLE!

Ghost Emperor Yama sent a drop of his own blood into the altar lamp, which caused immediate transformations. Instantly, the forming body became corporeal.

Hua Tianxiong had a new body, and his soul was repaired.

His skin was like copper, and the blood that pumped through his veins was like porcelain. He was like half a god and half a devil, a god and devil combined, with shining light for his clothing. It was a fiery baptism of epic proportions.

“I’ve been resurrected! You chopped me into mincemeat, Crown Prince, and yet, I've come back. And I’m stronger than before. One of these days, I’ll have my revenge, and kill you!”

As Hua Tianxiong touched down onto the ground, the altar behind him shattered into dust. Everyone could tell that he was no longer a Never-Dying Legendary, but rather, a Half Sage. And not an ordinary Half Sage, but one of incredible power, just on the verge of reaching the Great Sage level.

“Yes, you’ve been resurrected, little bug,” Ghost Emperor Yama said without any pretense of courtesy. “Don’t get all arrogant, though. That Crown Prince of yours is originally from a higher plane, perhaps even an immortal plane. He's terrifying down to his core, and now that he’s a Great Sage, his memories from the immortal plane will likely return. Once they do, he’ll get even worse. He might even remember the various immortal skills necessary to make immortal motes! That's rare in low-level Great Sages, and would let him kill people higher than his level. You think you’re going to beat him? At the moment, I'd say it’s highly unlikely.”

“That’s enough, Ghost Emperor Yama,” Yang Qi said. “Uncle Tianxiong, now that you've been reborn, we need to talk about how to deal with the Crown Prince. You and Young Master Shroud-Heaven both ended up dying when you fought him. What exactly happened?”

Chapter 304: Progress

“A few months ago, when you went to the Western Continent, I assumed that I could get in touch with you using the talisman, to tell you when Young Master Shroud-Heaven and I planned to go to the Superheaven Badlands to kill the Crown Prince. But then….”

As they sat down to hear Hua Tianxiong’s story, Ghost Emperor Yama teleported them back to the Sun Moon Institute.

Ghost Emperor Yama was also interested in the Crown Prince. After all, he had hoped to use him as a pawn in the past, although that effort had failed.

It was now clear that the Crown Prince was actually from an immortal plane. However, to Ghost Emperor Yama, that still didn’t make him worthy of compare to Yang Qi. After all, the God Legion Seal far surpassed anything that could come from an immortal plane.

Back in the ancient era, it wasn’t unheard-of for immortals to descend to the Yore-Wilds Continent, which wasn’t an immortal plane itself, but was close to it. As such, Ghost Emperor Yama had heard a lot of stories of immortals, and had even seen some treasures left behind by them.

Demi-Immortals were called half-immortal. As for beings who surpassed that cultivation level, they were actual immortals.

Back in those days, Ghost Emperor Yama had looked up to immortals in the same way that modern-day individuals in the Energy Arts or Lifeseizing level would look up to Great Sages. Although Great Sages were something of a myth to most people, they were still real.

When it came to the gods, Ghost Emperor Yama had obviously never seen any of them. He had only read of them in books and scrolls left behind by immortals. Such books contained epic sagas and mythological stories that many people considered to be fictional. But Ghost Emperor Yama was a fiend-devil with the blood of hell in him, and on an instinctual level, he knew that the legion of gods was anything but fictional.

They just didn't exist in the world of men; they were in another, vastly distant location.

Because of all of that, Ghost Emperor Yama was fairly certain that Yang Qi was going to win in the fight with the Crown Prince. Of course, he was essentially the only person to hold that view. Everyone else in the Rich-Lush Continent believed that Yang Qi was no match for the Crown Prince.

“The Crown Prince really was in the Superheaven Badlands. However, he had set up something called the Azure Heavens Grand Spell Formation, an aspect of profoundly ancient military strategy called Operation Azure Heavens. Young Master Shroud-Heaven and I brought a host of top experts with us, but as soon as we encountered that spell formation, we were stuck. Shockingly, the Crown Prince was also in the formation, and he had transformed into an enormous embryo! Next to him was a woman holding a pearl, and off to the side was a huge altar built entirely from spirit stones. Some of them were even sagely-grade. It was in that moment that I realized all the stories of the Crown Prince gathering spirit stones to build an altar, well, it was a smoke screen. The truth was that he had long since finished constructing the Superheaven Altar.

“Young Master Shroud-Heaven and I fought to get free, but it was all in vain. The Crown Prince emerged from the embryo and killed Young Master Shroud-Heaven. Then he turned to me, and it seemed as though his will had fused with the azure heavens above. I fought as hard as I could to escape, but in the end, I was ripped to shreds. In the moment before I died, I saw that a vast and boundless world had come to exist above the Crown Prince’s head. It was massive, millions upon millions of times as large as the Rich-Lush Continent. In fact, it was larger than anything I’ve read about in the ancient records. Based on what I’ve learned in my studies, I would say that world was a plane even higher than the Yore-Wilds Continent.”

“An immortal plane!” Ghost Emperor Yama exclaimed. “The Azure Heavens Grand Spell Formation…. It seems this Crown Prince completely and utterly awakened his aura, and connected to the immortal plane he comes from. You know, there are countless planes in the universe, and while the lower-level ones are called continents, the higher-level ones are called planetary systems. And beyond that are even higher planes that are called heavens. Those heavens are the planes inhabited by immortals. For example, one of the heavens I've heard about is the Titan Emperor Heaven, which existed above the Yore-Wilds Continent. You see, the Yore-Wilds Continent, the Brute-Wilds Continent, the Waste-Wilds Continent and the Proto-Wilds Continent, these four continents, actually contain hundreds of millions of planets, all of which are administered by the immortal plane above them. As for which heaven the Crown Prince actually comes from, I have no idea.”

“Incredible,” Yang Qi murmured. He felt like a new world had just opened up to him.

The Rich-Lush Continent was really like a tiny pond, and he was like a fish swimming around in it. Actually, it wasn’t even a pond, more like a puddle.

After all, it had once been just a small part of the Yore-Wilds Continent. And the Yore-Wilds Continent, along with the three other major continents around it, contained hundreds of millions of planets, and was overseen by Titan Emperor Heaven.

From what Yang Qi could guess, the legion of gods must exist on a plane higher than the numerous heavens that existed.

‘I can hardly wrap my mind around how large it all is. No wonder you have to reach the Great Sage level before you can leave this place.’ From what he could tell, there was really no good reason to stay in the Rich-Lush Continent any longer.

“Hey Ghost Emperor Yama, how much do you know about the Hanging Mountain?” Yang Qi asked.

“The Hanging Mountain?” He frowned slightly. “It's a holy mountain created by immortals of the ancient Demonfolk. It’s also subsidiary to Titan Emperor Heaven. From what I've heard, the immortals from Titan Emperor Heaven are divided into factions, with the Humanfolk immortals opposing the Demonfolk immortals for control over the mortal world. Of course, when hell-born fiend-devils enter the picture, like those from the Hell of Euphoria, then all types of immortals in Titan Emperor Heaven will fight them, no matter what faction they come from.”

“I see. That explains why the Hell of Euphoria destroyed the Yore-Wilds Continent. Does the Hanging Mountain have powerful people in it still?”

“Of course. This brat just mentioned Young Master Shroud-Heaven, whose father is a minor figure in the Hanging Mountain. I would imagine that the Hanging Mountain takes orders directly from Titan Emperor Heaven nowadays. You see, it exists far out in the boundless void. It’s essentially an entire world, connected by wormholes to countless other Demonfolk continents. If I remember correctly, the patriarch who leads the Hanging Mountain should be on the verge of entering the Demolishing level.”

“The Demolishing level?” Yang Qi said. “Is that the level after Demi-Immortal?”

“Exactly. The nine steps of the Great Sage level all involve heaven-shaking, earth-toppling transformations. In the ninth step, you form immortal motes, which is how you break into the Demi-Immortal level. The Demi-Immortal level also has nine sub-levels. You have Lesser Demi-Immortals, Potent Demi-Immortals, Tyrant Demi-Immortals, et cetera. And after the Demi-Immortal is the Demolishing level. Once you reach that level, you're considered a true immortal.”

Feeling completely shaken by all the new information, Yang Qi asked, “What’s after the Demolishing level?”

“After the Demolishing level is the fabled Godmyth level. Although, I've never even heard of such an entity existing in our area of space-time, much less seen one. I'm sure there are higher levels after Godmyth, but I'm not sure of the details, and have no idea how to even practice such cultivation. If I ever become a Demi-Immortal, I’ll definitely try to make my way to an immortal plane and find a proper energy art to do so. Of course, if you gave me that energy art of yours, I wouldn’t have to worry about such things. How about this, Yang Qi: you give me that energy art, I’ll help you accomplish anything you want to accomplish. Kill gods. Slay devils. Whatever. In fact, we can start with the Crown Prince. What do you say?”

“I don’t think so,” Yang Qi replied. “What good would that do? I need to handle my own affairs. The Crown Prince is a stumbling block on my path of cultivation, and I need to kick him out of the way on my own. If I didn't do it myself, how could I proceed with my cultivation?”

Ghost Emperor Yama flashed a vicious smile. “Well fine then. But at least give me the full Primeval Infernal Deity Sutra.”

The truth was that Yang Qi wasn’t very worried about the ramifications of giving the Primeval Infernal Deity Sutra to Ghost Emperor Yama. It was a sutra after all, not an energy art, and definitely not the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. With a thought, he sent countless magical symbols flowing into Ghost Emperor Yama’s mind.

Ghost Emperor Yama accepted them, and soon, his devil energy surged with even more might than before. Immense transformations began to occur within him as his every inhalation and exhalation caused terrifying devil energy to sweep about.

Some time passed, and he opened his eyes, which shone with the glow of enlightenment. “It’s too bad I didn’t have this a long time ago. If I had, I probably wouldn’t have ended up imprisoned. It really does contain enlightenment from a primeval infernal deity. It might not be a cultivation technique on its own, but it’s already pushed me to a higher level, and helped me to have a much deeper understanding of hell.”

At this point, Yang Qi rose to his feet. “I need to head back to Yanhaven now, and call my sworn siblings together to discuss matters at hand. By the way, how has Hua Fengfeng fared in reaching the Legendary level?”

“There’s good news on that front,” Yan Chenxing said. “She suffered untold hardships in the Minorbrilliance World, but she finally broke through. Right now she’s in rest and recovery.”

“Well that’s good to hear,” Yang Qi said. After returning to the Rich-Lush Continent, he had only been hit with one bit of bad news after another, so this information was most welcome.

“Yang Qi,” Ghost Emperor Yama said, “there’s no way you’re going to increase your cultivation base in such a short time. And it's a real pity that you keep refusing to strike a deal with me. Remember, I still have those sage motes. They would definitely give you the strength you need to fight the Crown Prince. He's in contact with an immortal plane, which means he can get immortal energy. With that level of power, he should be able to decimate just about any other Great Sage. At the very minimum, he’ll be a lot stronger than that piece of trash Great Sage Quake-Cloud was. Think about it! You couldn't even kill Great Sage Quake-Cloud, could you?”

“We’ll talk about that later,” Yang Qi said. “All I need to do is advance by two levels. As long as I'm in the Personal-Domain Transformation, I should be fine.”

“Personal Domain Transformation?” Ghost Emperor Yama chuckled. “Considering your energy arts are a gift from the legion of gods, just how strong will your personal domain be?”

“Wait and see,” Yang Qi replied. “If you're anxious to find out, you could always help me. What do you say?”

“I will, if it’s worth it for me.” Suddenly, his voice turned grim. “Don’t forget that you’re my prey.”

All of a sudden Chancellor Sun Moon jumped into the conversation. “Yang Qi, what level is your energy art? Don’t tell me it’s….”

“Yep, it’s a godly-class energy art!” Ghost Emperor Yama said. “It’s something you wouldn’t even see in the Yore-Wilds Continent. Only immortal planes would have godly-class energy arts. And I can guarantee that, at the very least, it’s a paramount godly energy art. Not even a lesser godly energy art could compare to it.”

Chapter 305: There&#039;s a Way

“G-godly… godly-class energy art?” Chancellor Sun Moon stammered, his mind spinning. The top-secret art practiced in the Sun Moon Institute was the Grand Radiance Scripture, but it was only saintly-class. And not even he could gain complete enlightenment of it. Of course, even saintly-class arts could be divided into categories based on their quality, and the high-level type were rarely seen.

Beyond saintly-class were the heavenly-class arts, which were the thing of fables even in the Yore-Wilds Continent. They were supposedly descended from heaven itself, and only the most powerful individuals from the most powerful organizations would have them.

As for godly-class arts, they surpassed heavenly-class arts exponentially. They were the remnants of shattered universes and gods, and even a scrap of one, a tiny remnant, could cause entire immortal planes to go to war.

And now, Ghost Emperor Yama was casually saying that Yang Qi had a godly-class energy art? And not a low-level one, but rather, one of the most powerful types? How could Chancellor Sun Moon not be completely bowled over?

In fact, he actually didn’t believe it. It was simply too outlandish of a concept to accept. At the most, he could accept that Yang Qi cultivated a saintly- or heavenly-class art.

“I’ll just pretend I didn’t hear that,” he said. “If word got out, it could lead to the entire Rich-Lush Continent being destroyed. In fact, it could bring catastrophe to countless other planes in this part of space-time.”

Chancellor Sun Moon was exactly right. For example, the Hell of Euphoria had invaded the Yore-Wilds Continent for a lesser reason than a godly-class energy art.

If word got out that Yang Qi had a godly-class energy art, it could cause conflict the likes of which would make Great Sages seem like ants to be squashed left and right.

“Even I have difficulty understanding the deeper aspects of the Grand Radiance Scripture. Not even the top geniuses among Legendaries could do any better. And considering that godly-class energy arts are designed to be cultivated by god-spirits, there’s no way that a human could understand them.”

Ghost Emperor Yama’s eyes glittered. “You’re right. Even Great Sages have trouble with heavenly-class energy arts, much less godly-class. It stands to reason that Legendaries would be limited to imperial-class. But Yang Qi is different. He's marked with a seal from the legion of gods. It seems highly likely to me that the sealing mark is helping him to cultivate the technique.”

“You’re right,” Yang Qi said coolly. “The God Legion Seal does help me cultivate the technique. In fact, even if I give you the method to use the Infernal Deity Spear, you might not succeed.”

Ghost Emperor Yama snorted coldly. “Regardless, having the technique will be better than not having it. And how do you know I would fail? Even if I did, I would at least gain some significant enlightenment from the process, enough to reach the Demi-Immortal level.”

At this point, Chancellor Sun Moon’s face flickered dramatically. “Wait a second. Yang Qi, are you telling me that when you repaired the damage to heaven, you used the God Legion Seal, and didn’t actually have the help of a Demi-Immortal backer?”

“What’s with the shocked facial expression, boy? Not even a Demi-Immortal could do anything to Yang Qi’s God Legion Seal. In fact, a Demolisher who tangled with him would end up dead, and even Godmyths would have trouble. You’re really not very bright, are you? Why do you think I didn’t just kill Yang Qi a long time ago, absorb his soul, steal his memories, and take his energy art? Well, actually, I tried that. Thankfully, he left before the God Legion Seal could completely kill me. And why do you think that brat chancellor from the Demi-Immortal Institute never dared to do anything to Yang Qi? The God Legion Seal is mighty enough to destroy even top experts from the Yore-Wilds Continent or the Titan Emperor Heaven. Although, my guess is that the seal is actually incomplete. If it were whole, it would be even mightier. It could decimate countless heavens, and destroy myriad worlds. It could eradicate literally anything that refused to exercise faith in the legion of gods.”

“I guess you’re right,” Chancellor Sun Moon said, deeply shaken. In fact, when he looked over at Yang Qi, the fear in his eyes was as plain as day. How could he ever have guessed that Yang Qi would have something that could kill Ghost Emperor Yama instantly?

Considering that Ghost Emperor Yama had just restored Hua Tianxiong’s soul right in front of Chancellor Sun Moon’s eyes, it was obvious how powerful he was. The fact that someone like him could be cut down with impunity was a terrifying thought.

“Enough,” Yang Qi said. “No more talk about this. I have pressing matters at hand, especially improving my cultivation base. Chancellor Sun Moon, considering the good relationship I have with your Sun Moon Institute, is there any chance you can suggest a way for me to improve my cultivation base more quickly?”

Chancellor Sun Moon was a Great Sage, and the leader of an entire institute, so he would obviously have access to abundant resources, as well as numerous secret magics.

And his fate was now tied to Yang Qi’s. Considering that, and the situation with Hua Tianxiong, the Crown Prince would obviously not let his institute off the hook. Getting rid of the Crown Prince was the only way the Sun Moon Institute could guarantee its own safety.

“I do have some secret magics that can help you, as well as some medicinal pills.” With that, he waved his finger, sending a stream of true energy out to surround Yang Qi, apparently, to test his strength.

“Such incredible true energy. Such shocking power!” After examining Yang Qi, Chancellor Sun Moon was so astonished he couldn’t maintain his composure. “You’re only in the fourth Legendary transformation, but your true energy is stronger than a Half Sage’s. It’s actually on the border of the Great Sage level. If you had sage motes, you could definitely kill a Great Sage. This level of cultivation advancement, it’s… not just difficult… it’s virtually impossible! You’re so strong that I don’t think any of the secret magics I know would be useful for you. You're so unique that, not only have I never seen anything like this, I don’t think any of the chancellors throughout the history of the Sun Moon Institute ever did. In fact, you would be unique even in the Yore-Wilds Continent.”

Hua Tianxiong sighed admiringly. “Lifeseizers who could kill Legendaries were the stuff of fable even in the Yore-Wilds. Legendaries who could kill Great Sages, well, that just defies logic. People like that would be considered heaven-defying freaks.”

“So what you’re saying is that you can’t help me with my breakthrough.” Yang Qi only had a hundred days before he would be fighting the Crown Prince, which was not much time at all. He absolutely needed to reach the sixth Legendary transformation by then. Only with the God Legion Paradise would he be able to fight and kill a Great Sage. There was no guarantee that he could do it otherwise.

Even if a Great Sage helped him, reaching the Yin-Yang Transformation would be difficult in a hundred days, much less the Personal-Domain Transformation.

This transformation was an important watershed, and was ten times harder to reach than any level before it. Most times, energy artists would take a hundred years to reach it.

At this point, Ghost Emperor Yama chuckled. “Like I said, Yang Qi, all you have to do is give me the Infernal Deity Spear, and I’ll hand over the sage motes. They will definitely push your cultivation base much higher. What do you say? You could stand up to people with vastly higher cultivation bases than you.” Ghost Emperor Yama was taking every opportunity to try to force Yang Qi to give him what he wanted.

“How about more infernal king sutras?” Yang Qi said.

“Nope. Come on, those things would definitely be helpful, but you’re at a life-and-death crossroads. How could I not take advantage of the moment to get something even better? Either the Infernal Deity Spear, or nothing. If I have to, I’ll just sit around and watch the Crown Prince kill you!”

Ghost Emperor Yama was really digging his heels in.

Yang Qi smiled. “I'm not going to get killed by the Crown Prince any more than I would be killed by you.”

“Maybe, maybe not,” Ghost Emperor Yama replied lightly. “Who knows what unexpected things might occur.”

“Well, if that’s how you're going to be, then just forget about it.” Yang Qi rose to his feet. “I’ll go work on my cultivation my own way. I’ll figure out my own heaven-defying way to achieve progress!”

With that, he tore open a rift leading to Yanhaven.

Even as he stepped through, he smiled; he had just come up with a new idea to achieve the breakthrough he sought, and afterward, defeat the Crown Prince.

Ghost Emperor Yama followed him, and when he saw the smile on his face, couldn’t help but ask, “What are you planning to do, brat? I'm telling you, without my help, there’s no way that you're going to reach the Personal-Domain Transformation.”

“I don’t need your help. If you don’t believe me, then how about we have a little wager? I say that I’ll definitely be a Personal-Domain Legendary within a hundred days. In fact, I’ll probably be stronger. Dare to take me up?”

“Another bet?” Ghost Emperor Yama had already lost one wager with Yang Qi, which resulted in him losing the life force motherspring seed.

“You’re going to use the motherspring seed, aren’t you? Well, that’s not very realistic. You would need more than a thousand years to properly absorb it.” He shook his head. “Look, I've been following you around for a while, so I know most of your secret techniques. What else do you have that you could use? If you really had something that you could use to break through, you would have used it already.”

“Quit yapping and make your decision. Are we going to have a wager, or not?”

A moment passed.

“What do you want to bet?” Apparently, Ghost Emperor Yama was convinced that he was right.

“Simple. The sage motes and the Infernal Deity Spear. Agreed?”

“Agreed! I'm very curious to see how you plan to break through in less than a hundred days. What, you have a celestial treasure? The ability to defy the dao of heaven? The skill to reverse time? Even Great Sages like me can only slow down time temporarily, and in a small region. There’s no way you can pull off one of those situations where a thousand years passes in your meditation chamber with only a few days passing on the outside.”

“You’ll find out soon enough. However, let me point out right now that, no matter what I do, you’re absolutely not allowed to interfere. If you do, then I automatically win the bet.”

“Well, that’s a given. I would never stoop to interfering with your cultivation. Are you kidding me? I can’t believe you would even insinuate that I would do something like that. Am I some sort of despicable villain or something?”

Yang Qi had just recalled an important tidbit of information: he had been sent to the Rich-Lush Continent by the Grand-Wilds Mansion, with the purpose of finding the fragment of the Yore-Wilds’ Heart.

And he had a huge advantage when it came to searching for that item: the Grand Emperor's Pagoda!

Chapter 306: Yore-Wilds&#039; Heart

With the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, Yang Qi had unprecedented control over the vital energy of the Rich-Lush Continent.

Many forces from the Quake-Dawn Continent were interested in finding the Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragment, but Yang Qi had the best chance of all of them. After all, the pagoda was already tightly linked to the fragment.

The fragment had been sealed in the depths of the continent in ancient times, and not even Grand Emperor Rich-Lush himself had dared to try to extract it.

But Yang Qi was different. He had rescued the sage spirits in the Planar Pearl, who acknowledged him as a representative of the legion of gods. As of now, there was no way that they would oppose him. It was something he had forgotten due to the hectic nature of recent events. And of course, that was why he had been so confident in his suggestion of a wager with Ghost Emperor Yama.

If he could find the Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragment, and then combine its powers with the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, he would definitely have the power he needed to advance by leaps and bounds.

The fragment had been the ultimate core of the Yore-Wilds Continent in ancient times. It was like its literal heart, and abounded with the power of the five phases, and of yin and yang. With it, reaching the Yin-Yang Transformation would be a simple thing.

Of course, one of his initial fears had been what Ghost Emperor Yama would do when he found out the truth.

That was why he had initiated the wager, and demanded that Ghost Emperor Yama promise not to interfere. Otherwise, Ghost Emperor Yama could very well have seized the fragment ahead of him.

**

Yanhaven was now a flourishing city, far beyond anything it had been in the past. Countless boats made their way up and down the Yan River, kept in check by an enormous bronze vessel that patrolled the waters.

The innumerable estuaries that branched out from the river were also full of boats, and there were even numerous canals that had been built. It all formed a massive web of transportation that facilitated all sorts of business.

Yang Zhan had already followed through on his plan to take the coastal cities and establish ocean trade. Thanks to the spirit stones Yang Qi had provided for the city, and the spell formations they had been used to create, Yanhaven was now a holy land of cultivation. The Yang Clan had recruited many soldiers in recent days, and taken over quite a few nearby cities. The population grew constantly, with numerous smaller locations and clans swearing fealty to the Yang Clan.

There were even canals that stretched all the way to the seaside.

In the Rich-Lush Continent, it was possible to quickly accomplish great deeds by means of cultivation. And thanks to the Yang Clan, there were plenty of medicinal pills and spirit stones to go around in Yanhaven.

Thus, the construction work went about at a fever pitch.

No one would dare to cause problems. The Yang Clan had plenty of Lifeseizers now, plus Yang Qi himself, who was considered to be a Legendary patriarch.

As Yang Qi touched down in the square outside of the royal mansion, his aura spread out, causing countless guards, maids, and children of the clan to rush over and drop to their knees.

Laughing heartily, Yang Zhan rushed out, flanked by Yang Yunchong and Yang Hualong. Further back were the chief elders, who offered solemn greetings.

Yang Qi really was viewed like a mythical patriarch nowadays, and was venerated by everyone.

“Father, I've invited my sworn siblings to come here tonight to discuss an important matter. In a hundred days, I'm to duel with the Crown Prince. Beforehand, we need to make sure that Yanhaven is completely prepared.”

“Yeah, I heard the news from the Sage Ancestor Dynasty. The Crown Prince is a Great Sage! Did you return to the Demi-Immortal Institute already? If not, then you should stay away. They’re definitely not on your side anymore.” Yang Zhan and the Yang Clan were well connected to Capital City now, which meant that they were much more in tune with recent events.

“I did go back. And I forced Chancellor Demi-Immortal to give me a hundred days to prepare for a final fight with the Crown Prince. If I win, I’ll become the new chancellor. However, there are a lot of details to discuss. Why don’t we head to one of the studies?”

Later that night, a vortex of starlight suddenly appeared up above, and numerous individuals stepped out into a certain tower in the royal mansion. As they did, they laughed heartily and embraced Yang Qi.

“Brother!”

These were Yang Qi’s numerous sworn siblings. Flame Clearspring, Lu Wangxian, and many more. All of them had made significant cultivation advancement, especially Flame Clearspring, who had finally succeeded in becoming a Legendary.

Even Hua Fengfeng came. Her eyes were warm as she greeted him; she knew that he had brought her father back from death, and even helped him to advance his cultivation.

As the night wore on, more and more sworn siblings arrived, until they were all present.

“Yang Qi,” Flame Clearspring said, “you really threw your weight around at the Demi-Immortal Institute. Everyone is talking about how you forced the chancellor into a corner. Back when news spread that the Crown Prince was a Great Sage, everyone warned us to stay away from you. But not anymore. That's why we were able to assemble so quickly.”

“This must be Ghost Emperor Yama,” Hua Fengfeng said, looking at what appeared to be an old man standing with Yang Qi. “Everyone, offer greetings.” Clasping hands respectfully, she said, “Many thanks to you, Ghost Emperor Yama, sir, for bringing my father back to life.”

“There’s no need to be so respectful, girl. You’re from a righteous, orthodox sect, and I'm an old devil. We have wildly different daos. You're clever to give me face, though. Here, take this. I don't want people saying that I went around seeking flattery.” Ghost Emperor Yama seemed to be in a good mood. Flicking his finger, he sent a stream of pure spirit light into Hua Fengfeng, which began to purify her true energy. Soon, she began to radiate an aura like that of a lotus.

“That's some lotus seed true energy. It even contains some immortal energy. I came across it many years ago, before I was imprisoned. It should help you to think more clearly, and refine your true energy to make your cultivation proceed much more quickly.”

“Many thanks, Senior!” Hua Fengfeng said. Already, she could tell that her true energy had reached a higher level.

“Say, Ghost Emperor Yama,” Yang Qi said in a cold voice, “you’d better not be infecting my sworn siblings with some sort of devil art. You wouldn’t threaten them to get at me, would you?”

“Are you fucking kidding me!?” Ghost Emperor Yama shouted. “I'm trying to be nice and you accuse me of evil intent? Listen fool, I'm Ghost Emperor Yama, a mighty devil from the primeval times, a devil king! You think I'm going to use insects like this to threaten you?”

“Okay, okay,” Hua Fengfeng said. “Senior, my Little Bro Qi is always acting like this. Considering that you two are working together, there’s no reason to take things so seriously. He was just joking.”

“Calm down, Ghost Emperor Yama,” Yang Qi said. “I understand where you’re coming from. As long as I live through the next hundred days, I’ll give you some more of that infernal deity enlightenment. Alright?”

“Fine,” Ghost Emperor Yama said with a cold snort.

Nodding, Yang Qi waved his hand, and said, “Come out, everyone.” In response, the Grand Emperor's Pagoda trembled as his mercenary squad emerged, an entire group of Never-Dying Legendaries and Half Sages.

Yang Qi’s sworn siblings were completely stunned.

To them, Never-Dying Legendaries were the most powerful experts in the world, with Half Sages being even more shocking. And yet here, there were dozens of them, all following Yang Qi’s orders.

“Well met, Captain!” said Blademaster Thunderbolt. All of the mercenaries bowed at the waist, and simultaneously cast fearful glances at Ghost Emperor Yama. Although they feared Yang Qi, they definitely feared Ghost Emperor Yama even more.

Even the white-robed Chaoguang joined in. He knew that Yang Qi could essentially kill anyone who was under the Great Sage level, and therefore, had to be shown respect. Not even an army of Half Sages would do any good against him considering that he could summon fiend-devils.

“And now it's time for Silvermoon!” Instantly, the city emerged from within the Grand Emperor's Pagoda. It was enormous, hundreds of kilometers from end to end, and shining with splendorous silver light. As it hung there in the air, it was actually like a silver moon casting brilliant light onto Yanhaven and everything around it.

“Mercenaries,” Yang Qi said. “Please help me to refine Silvermoon, and then place it in the Blackcorpse Mountains as a sister city to Yanhaven. It will become a bastion of defense for the Yang Clan. Furthermore, please produce any precious materials or magical treasures you have that can be used to bolster it. I want it to become an impregnable fortress!”

“Yes, Captain!” the mercenaries all replied. With that, they flew up to begin the work refining Silvermoon. Some of them flew over to the Blackcorpse Mountains and began to level a section to make room for the new city.

After some time passed, Ghost Emperor Yama impatiently said, “What are you wasting time like this for, brat? Look, just give me some more hellish enlightenment, and I’ll help you to refine Silvermoon. Having those punks do it is like throwing a cup of water on a burning cart of firewood. I can make it so strong that not even a Great Sage could break into the city without a lot of hard work. In fact, I can connect it to the void so that it could make an easy escape in a dire situation.”

Yet again, Ghost Emperor Yama was taking advantage of the dire circumstances to try to benefit a bit.

“Deal!” Yang Qi said without hesitation.

Chapter 307: Sage Monarch City

As soon as Yang Qi said ‘deal’, Ghost Emperor Yama leapt into motion. The mercenaries made way without hesitation; all of them knew full well that he was a hundred times stronger than them if not more.

Back in the Quake-Dawn Continent, they were known as people who could call the wind and summon the rain, and could acquire top spots in any organization they applied to.

But compared to Ghost Emperor Yama, they were like toddlers.

Ghost Emperor Yama would be considered a high-level entity even where they came from. No one would dare to blithely irritate him, and in fact, he would be treated like an honored guest wherever he went.

“Alright Yang Qi, I'm going to use Myriad Stars Gravitational Energy Convergence Sage Magic to strengthen your city with the power of the stars. It’s going to be a sage domain and a heavenly paradise! In fact, it’s going to end up as a magical treasure. It might not match up to that Grand Emperor's Pagoda of yours, but it's going to be a top-rate mansion, that’s for sure. In fact, it will be no less amazing than the Minorcosm World or the Minorbrilliance World!”

Even as Ghost Emperor Yama bragged about what he was going to do, he waved his hand, and the stars above trembled. Meteors began to fall, and countless space-time wormholes sprang into being, from which he extracted metals from beyond heaven.

As Ghost Emperor Yama called upon countless foreign building materials to assist with the construction, Silvermoon continued to expand.

Meanwhile, Lady-Princess Silvermoon stood behind Yang Qi, trembling. Only she knew exactly how much time and effort had been spent to make this city of hers strong. And yet, in the hands of Ghost Emperor Yama, it was as malleable as dough.

‘Not even all six of the Great Sages from the Western Continent could match up to him. Chancellor Demi-Immortal’s cultivation base is so high that we’re not even sure how strong he is, and yet, he’s afraid of Ghost Emperor Yama too? No wonder our Sky-Heaven Dynasty has always been hesitant to invade the Rich-Lush Continent.’

HISSSS! ZZZZAP!

Starlight poured down until it was nearly liquid in form. As Silvermoon was blessed, star gods began to take form within it. There was Scorpio, Sagittarius, Pisces, Aries and more. Before long, Silvermoon was like a city of constellations.

RUUUUUMBLE!

Intense rumbling could be heard in Silvermoon as spatial tempests swept to and fro. Twisting wormholes stretched out into the void, allowing the spatial power to converge in the greyspace above, and draw upon the true energy of higher planes.

Ghost Emperor Yama called upon the astral deities, thrusting his hands out as he used matchless energy arts, causing everyone watching to feel dazed to the core. In fact, Yang Qi wasn’t even able to make out clearly everything that was happening.

Finally, he couldn’t hold back any longer, and opened the Lord's Eye. In that state, he finally saw the truth. Ghost Emperor Yama truly was drawing upon divine skill; every move he made could splice vital energy, separate the particles of nature, and even transform base elements into precious materials. This was skill that required a fundamental understanding of the structure of reality, and the transformations of matter.

Only the highest-level Great Sages could reach this stage.

In the hands of Ghost Emperor Yama, Silvermoon could become large or small, round or square, or whatever else he wanted. It was now filled with layer upon layer of starlight, filling even the dirt itself and turning it into fragrant, starry sand. Slowly but surely, the entire place was becoming purer and fresher.

It had only been about six months since Yanhaven had benefited from the spirit rain, giving it true spirit soil. It might be somewhat of an exaggeration, but people could probably eat the dirt itself to benefit their cultivation.

Now, that spirit soil was turning into starry sand, a substance filled with brilliant starlight down to its very substructure. It was like a holy medicine!

Someone in the Energy Arts level could take a handful of that sand and turn it into a medicinal item that could push them all the way into the Master of Energy, and possibly, the Lifeseizing level.

Ghost Emperor Yama was really showing off his skill, and holding nothing back as he did. That was how deeply he desired to acquire the hellish sutras that Yang Qi had access to.

When all of the soil had turned into starry sand, Ghost Emperor Yama changed tactics. Slowly but surely, the falling power of the stars grew more intense, until a silver river began to flow through the area. As of this moment, the Yan River was like a flow of stars.

The fish and other aquatic animals began to transform, becoming starryfish and starbeasts; as for the nearby Blackcorpse Mountains, the devil energy was being expunged from them, and they were turning into a pure land.

Yang Qi could do nothing other than admire this mighty display of power. Three days and nights passed, during which he remained cross-legged atop the Grand Emperor’s Pagoda, watching Ghost Emperor Yama go about his work. With the Lord's Eye, he could see everything that was happening, including the minute workings of true energy, as well as certain aspects of the dao of devils.

It wasn’t true cultivation, and yet, came close.

The observation helped his cultivation base to advance rapidly, and provided immense enlightenment. In fact, the changes were so profound that two seeds appeared within him, one related to yin and the other to yang. As of this moment, he was finally beginning to understand the dao of yin and yang.

He was pushing toward the Yin-Yang Transformation.

Throughout the ages, many Legendaries ended up stuck at this point, and were unable to undergo the full transformation. But now, during this brief period of three days and three nights, Yang Qi was able to benefit immensely thanks to Ghost Emperor Yama.

It was simply miraculous.

Of course, he hadn’t yet made the transformation. The next step was to fuse more external yin and yang energy with his own, to fill the seeds inside him and then unite them. When they became the ultimate manifestation, taiji, he could achieve his breakthrough.

Right now, he was only in the initial stages of enlightenment.

Without that enlightenment, it would be impossible to collect all of the yin and yang energy he needed, and he would be stuck in a dead end.

But now, he knew what he had to do.

In cultivation, there was one particularly terrifying concept. It wasn’t the thought of putting in seemingly endless years of monotonous work to achieve a breakthrough. No, the most terrifying thought was lacking a path to tread. If one didn’t have a path, then any effort they expended could be completely counterproductive. How terrifying it would be to work extremely hard, only to find oneself moving backward.

“Make me a city of kings!” Yang Qi murmured.

A castle-like city was forming in front of everyone’s eyes. It was ten times larger than anything before, and it hovered in midair with countless constellations engraved on its walls, which constantly absorbed the power of the stars.

Dimensional barriers surrounded it, making it impossible for even Legendaries to break their way in.

When all the work was done, Ghost Emperor Yama let the castle settle down in the Blackcorpse Mountains. Of course, those mountains had experienced a complete transformation, and were now like a land of stars. Even the trees had transformed, and the wild beasts; now, these lands contained startrees and starbeasts. The spirit energy here was so abundant that it was nothing other than a holy land for cultivation.

“Let it be called Sage Monarch City,” Yang Qi said. “Henceforth, the Sage Monarch Society is no longer a part of the Demi-Immortal Institute. Furthermore, we will now begin to openly recruit new members, and publicly establish our own philosophy. Soon, we will engulf all heaven and earth!” Looking at the mercenaries under his command, he said, “Starting today, you are the highest ranking members of the Sage Monarch Society. Understand?”

These mercenaries were top experts from the Quake-Dawn Continent, arrogant, cruel individuals who rarely took orders from anyone. But considering how mighty Yang Qi was, none of them dared to talk back to him. Instead, they just went along with his arrangements.

After all, he could slaughter them all with hardly any effort.

And thus, Yanhaven and Silvermoon were combined to become Sage Monarch City. And the land for hundreds of kilometers in all directions became a holy land of cultivation.

Ghost Emperor Yama had created something to rival the four institutes and the Sage Ancestor Dynasty.

In fact, it could be said that the lands now had five institutes. No one would dare to object if someone said that Ghost Emperor Yama had created the Sage Monarch Institute.

However, Yang Qi didn’t want to formally do such a thing now. He needed to kill the Crown Prince, and become the chancellor of the Demi-Immortal Institute. Then, he would change the name of the institute.

“The exalted Ghost Emperor Yama is going to stand guard here now, so everyone can go about your cultivation with a calm heart. Strengthen yourselves. I’m going to the west; I have a hundred days to advance by leaps and bounds, and then kill the Crown Prince!”

“I'm not going to sit around here like a guard dog, Yang Qi!” Ghost Emperor Yama said. “You’re my prey! I'm not letting you go free. Besides, you have another volume of hellish enlightenment to give me. Hand it over!”

“No problem,” Yang Qi said. Without any hesitation, he handed over another sutra. After all, he had plenty such information thanks to the golden imp, enough to keep Ghost Emperor Yama busy for a hundred years.

“Amazing!” Ghost Emperor Yama said, handling the sutra as if it were the most precious of treasures. “Incredible….” Looking up, he continued, “I don't care what happens, Yang Qi, I'm going to keep my eyes on you. Don’t even think of trying to escape. That said, it shouldn't be a problem for me to leave a clone here to make sure your friends and family can practice cultivation in safety. What exactly is your plan?”

Of course, he was very curious about Yang Qi, and wondered exactly how he thought he was going to win their bet.

“If you come with me, you have to promise again not to interfere, no matter what I do. Otherwise, the bet’s off.”

“Of course! What kind of a person do you think I am?! There’s no need to be deliberately mystifying. Come on, tell me!”

“Well, since you’ve promised, I guess there’s no harm in explaining. I'm going to go find a fragment of the Yore-Wilds’ Heart. Once I have that, I’ll put it in the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, and unleash incalculable power. With that, I’ll definitely have what it takes to reach the sixth Legendary transformation.” He smiled. “Well, what do you think?”

“A Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragment!?” Ghost Emperor Yama said, visibly taken aback. A moment later, he started laughing. “Not bad. Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragments have immense power in them. Unfortunately, you’ll never be able to access that power. It's a thousand times more difficult to work with than sage motes. Besides, that fragment is so heavy that not even multiple Great Sages working together could lift it. How are you going to take it? Even more relevant, that fragment has been sealed beneath the Rich-Lush Continent for a long time, locked in place by Great Sages of the past. How exactly do you think you're going to unseal it? Ha! I'm definitely going to win the bet!”

Chapter 308: Underneath the Continent

“Oh really?” Yang Qi wasn’t worried at all about Ghost Emperor Yama’s negative talk. With the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, he could already sense the existence of the Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragment. And his cultivation base was vastly higher than when he had left these lands. Not only was he more familiar with how to use the pagoda, he was also more connected to the essence of the Rich-Lush Continent.

He was now a Five-Phases Legendary, and even more relevant, the Grand Emperor’s Pagoda had absorbed the vital energy of both the Western Continent and the Quake-Dawn Continent, and then used it to form an emperor embryo. As such, upon his return to home, he found that he had all sorts of abilities that he hadn’t known about before.

To Yang Qi, it almost felt like the Grand Emperor's Pagoda was a continent unto itself now.

With it, he could tap into the will of ancient Great Sages, and as such, he was fully confident that he could get the Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragment.

RUUUUUMBLE!

Without any hesitation, he flew past the greyspace of the Rich-Lush Continent, to find himself hovering in the void beyond. From this vantage point, the continent had a curved heaven and flat earth. There was also boundless devil energy from a hell monsoon; however, the monsoon was completely blocked by the power of the greyspace, and couldn’t enter.

Only people born and raised in the Rich-Lush Continent could casually pass through the greyspace without being rejected. The only other way to enter would be by means of space-time wormholes.

Cradling the Rich-Lush Continent and its greyspace was a massive convergence of primal-chaos energy.

It was a permanent feature beneath the continent, and its existence was well-known among many people. Without that primal-chaos, the continent would have no stable foundation, and would actually just float about randomly in the void.

Unstable planes were terrifying things. After all, they could theoretically end up colliding with other continents, which would result in the destruction of both planes, and everything on them.

In other words, primal-chaos energy like this was very important to the overall safety of a continent.

From what Yang Qi could tell, the Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragment was actually located in the depths of that primal-chaos energy flow.

It was far larger than the continent itself, and contained layer upon layer of profound mysteries. In fact, the remains of Great Sages could be found therein. The place abounded with killing intent, and was rife with naturally-forming spell formations, even teleportation portals. It was a dangerous place, and those who explored it usually ended up either dead, or transported to unknown locations.

“Are you sure you want to go into that primal-chaos, Yang Qi?” Ghost Emperor Yama asked. Even he looked somewhat afraid. “The Rich-Lush Continent is a pretty small place, but it’s actually very important. That primal-chaos energy convergence was created by a very important person from the Yore-Wilds Continent, a primal-chaos elder-immortal. During the war, he fought an extremely powerful monster from the Hell of Euphoria, and suffered a grievous wound. A chunk of his flesh fell to this location, and gave birth to the energies of primal-chaos.

“Later, a group of Great Sages transformed the place into what you see now. This is one of the unique aspects of the Rich-Lush Continent, and one of the reasons why people often desire to visit. In fact, it’s why the old geezers from the Quake-Dawn Cathedral imprisoned me here. They wanted to use the primal-chaos vital energy to wear me down. Unfortunately for them, I actually used it to gain understanding of the great transformations of primal-chaos.”

“I’ll be fine,” Yang Qi said lightly. “I rely, not just on the will of the legion of gods, but on the will of the Lord who exists above them. This primal-chaos energy flow won't be able to do a thing to me.”

The primal-chaos energy convergence had been touched by the will of many Great Sages. However, he had rescued the sage spirits in the Planar Pearl, and had thus repaired the greyspace of the continent. Therefore, he had a unique connection to this heaven and earth, and by extension, the primal-chaos vital energy.

Of course, instead of revealing the truth to Ghost Emperor Yama, he tried to make himself seem more mysterious.

At this point, he flew into motion and entered the primal-chaos vital energy.

Almost immediately, he felt everything spinning, and then found himself within an entire world of primal-chaos. The dirt was made of the stuff, and contained the most ancient of auras. There were crumbling buildings, columns, statues, temples… and also corpses.

Within the primal-chaos energy convergence was another unique heaven and earth.

Even as Yang Qi began to search for signs leading to the Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragment, he suddenly detected the stench of blood. Looking off into the distance, he saw a ruined temple with some corpses in it, whose flowing blood contained traces of Legendary magical laws.

Walking over, he grabbed a flow of energy and looked at it more closely. “This is the aura of the Quake-Dawn Continent. So, some people from there were killed here? But who were they fighting? Others from the Quake-Dawn Continent?”

Ghost Emperor Yama examined the scene, and then checked some of the primal-chaos vital energy flows. Finally, he shook his head. “Since you fixed the greyspace of the continent, space-time wormholes have opened up all over the place. And the ruins in this place have a lot of treasure in them; it’s only natural for treasure hunters to show up and end up fighting each other.

“Seems to me there was a Great Sage treasure in this temple that was recently taken away. You know, there are even places deeper inside where Great Sages perished and left behind sage motes. Any of them would be considered precious. You think you’re going to find the Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragment here? Not even my divine will can see very far. This place is really dangerous.”

“It's fine,” Yang Qi replied. “In fact, I hope I can find some magical treasures that will help in my fight against the Crown Prince.” Taking a closer look at the corpses in the temple, he saw that they were all in the sixth Legendary transformation or higher.

Any treasures on them had been looted. In fact, they all had gaping holes in their torsos, which seemed to indicate that the true energy pellets inside of them, the objects similar to demon or devil cores, had been harvested.

Whoever had killed them was clearly a vicious individual.

“Before you go any further, Yang Qi, hear me out: whatever dangers you face in here, I can help you handle them. But only for a price. A big price. Understand?”

“We already have an agreement, right? I think the terms are more than fair.” With that, he headed further into the primal-chaos vital energy. There were no mountains or rivers, only ruins. Buildings, altars, temples, corpses. All of it lacked any life force whatsoever.

Ghost Emperor Yama used a consummate energy art to turn himself into something like a shadow that drifted along behind Yang Qi, invisible to any onlookers. He wasn’t interested in causing trouble for anything in this place. As long as he didn't get greedy, and didn’t disturb any of the spell formations, he wouldn’t be bothered.

RUUUUUMBLE!

“Die, brat!”

All of a sudden, a figure blurred out of one of the nearby ruins. He was clad in all black clothing, making him look like a world-class assassin. His sword was like a blur that moved faster than the speed of light as he closed in on Yang Qi.

Shockingly, this person was a Never-Dying Legendary.

However, Yang Qi didn’t even look in his direction. He thrust his palm out, destroying the sword light, and provoking a scream from the black-garbed man. In the blink of an eye, he was reduced to a mass of twitching blood and gore.

“Ignite!” the man screamed. Before anything else could happen, he burst into flames, and was reduced to ash. Thankfully, Yang Qi managed to grab his dimensional sack and magical treasures before they were burned up.

Ghost Emperor Yama didn't seem surprised at all that Yang Qi could kill a Never-Dying with a simple palm strike.

“He’s from the Quake-Dawn Cathedral, Yang Qi. However, he’s not just an ordinary member. He definitely is an assassin from their Hall of Ninjas.”

“Hall of Ninjas?”

“Yep. The Quake-Dawn Cathedral has a number of different halls. However, the hall that’s adept at assassination, concealment, infiltration and the like, the most dangerous hall, is the Hall of Ninjas. Their top leader is called the Ninja God, and he was one of the ones who imprisoned me. The old bastard. I wonder what cultivation level he's reached by now.”

“Ninja God? People who call themselves ‘god’ of their own volition blaspheme the glory of the true legion of gods.” Already, Yang Qi’s eyes flickered with killing intent.

Whooosh!

Even as Yang Qi spoke, he heard several people flying through the air, a large number of people in groups of between three to five.

He could even hear them talking. “Is that the weapon of a Great Sage? Did a sealing mark unravel somewhere?”

At the same time, the sensation of sagely might erupted out from somewhere in the distance, accompanied by intense rumbling sounds.

‘That’s a big group of people,’ Yang Qi thought. Piercing through the air toward the source of the fluctuations, he looked around to find numerous people heading the same direction. They all wore different outfits, and although some had the aura of the Quake-Dawn Continent on them, there were also the auras of other continents. Surprisingly, some even pulsed with demon energy.

‘So, repairing the Planar Pearl really did open up space-time wormholes, and now experts from all over are gathering. Presumably, they want the Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragment, as well as that ancient teleportation portal that leads to higher planes.’ Yang Qi shot through the primal-chaos with everyone else, closely followed by the invisible Ghost Emperor Yama, who wasn’t about to lose sight of his ‘prey’.

Before long, a ruined temple appeared up ahead, which was the location that all the experts were heading to. Already, they were landing outside and peering into the depths of the structure.

Inside was an altar that pulsed with intense spatial fluctuations. Shockingly, there was a hook-shaped weapon sealed there that emanated sagely might.

Chapter 309: The Depths of Primal-Chaos

“It’s a sage weapon! Who was it that broke open the seal?”

“It was someone from the Watson Association! They sensed the sagely might and started digging here. Sadly for them, they hit the temple's spell formation and ended up getting killed. Look, see that blood? That's all that’s left of them.”

“The Watson Association is a big daoist sect from the Quake-Dawn Continent. They have as many experts as the sky has clouds. And yet their entire group here got killed? How strong is that spell formation? Are you telling me we’re going to be forced to just sit here looking at that sage weapon, unable to take it away? Does anyone else have the guts to try to break the sealing mark?”

“Not me! After what happened to the people from the Watson Association, there’s no way I’ll do something that stupid.”

A whole host of experts stood outside of the temple, looking in at the sage weapon, shaking their heads. Not a single one of them dared to take a step forward, for fear of being attacked in deadly fashion.

A long moment passed, and eventually, someone couldn’t resist the temptation and lunged forward. Thrusting both hands out in a lightning attack, he tried to smash his way into the temple and pull the sage weapon out.

Sadly, as soon as his palms reached a certain point, the spell formation in the temple sent out a field of bright light to create a mirror world. The mirror world then reflected the lightning back onto the man who had unleashed it, except amplifying the power by millions of times.

In the blink of an eye, the man was overwhelmed by a sea of lightning, and completely destroyed. Nothing was left behind, neither bones nor ashes.

Everyone present was shocked to the core, and didn't dare to make any attempt at entering the temple.

“That sage weapon looks pretty strong,” Yang Qi said. “Not quite as good as my Heaven-Dominating Golden Swordbreaker or Grand Emperor's Pagoda, but clearly it was made by a powerful Great Sage. I don’t really need it, but father definitely could.”

Ghost Emperor Yama chuckled in derision. “That sage weapon is much weaker than your Grand Emperor's Pagoda. That said, a Lifeseizer could definitely use it to great effect, and maybe even a Legendary. But overall, nothing amazing. I could easily make five or ten weapons like that.”

“What step are you in within the Great Sage level?” Yang Qi asked.

Ghost Emperor Yama snorted coldly. Instead of answering the question, he said, “Grand Emperor Rich-Lush was tough, but not that tough. He was only in the eighth step of the Great Sage level, and could never reach the ninth. Understand the implication? The Grand Emperor's Pagoda is only as powerful as the eighth step. You have another sage weapon, don't you, something even more powerful, something forged by the famous Golden Sage from the era of the Yore-Wilds Continent? He was incomparably mighty, and his Heaven-Dominating Golden Swordbreaker simply couldn't be beaten.”

Surprised at how much Ghost Emperor Yama knew, Yang Qi said, “Yeah, I do have the Heaven-Dominating Golden Swordbreaker. I took it from some weakling. You haven't seen it in action yet, but just wait a bit, and you will.”

“So, you do have it!” Ghost Emperor Yama's eyes glittered. “Ah, what a pity. There’s no way you can actually call upon the golden true energy in that weapon. Otherwise, you would be really strong.”

“You think I care about that? The legion of gods has the power to create anything and everything. The true energy of the Wilds God himself is like nothing compared to their will. I already inserted my energy into the Heaven-Dominating Golden Swordbreaker, and not only can I unleash its ultimate power, I actually transformed it into something stronger than it was before.”

Even as Yang Qi and Ghost Emperor Yama were chatting, a sinister voice rang out into the area.

“Get out of the way, slackers!”

Suddenly, a group of black-garbed individuals appeared from within the primal-chaos energy flow. Looking over, Yang Qi saw that they were dressed exactly like the expert from the Hall of Ninjas that he had killed earlier.

As they approached, a cold, sinister aura spread out that caused all of the other experts present to back up slowly.

“Hmph. The people from the Quake-Dawn Cathedral really are domineering.”

“How else would you expect them to be? Keep it down, otherwise you're courting disaster. They kill people without blinking an eye. Everybody knows that the Hall of Ninjas is the most dangerous and terrifying hall within the Quake-Dawn Cathedral.”

“Our Feudal Association doesn't necessarily fear them! But they have numbers on their side, so let’s be careful. What a pity they’re going to end up getting that sage weapon.”

“Not necessarily. First they have to get through that sealing mark, which isn’t exactly something simple to do.”

Yang Qi backed up along with the crowd. Instead of trying to fight with this group, he decided to see how exactly they planned to open the seal.

“The lot of you surround this temple, and if anyone gets too close, kill them without hesitation!” As the leader gave orders, numerous black-garbed men flitted through the air to form a perimeter around the temple. Almost at the same time, something like a black cloud appeared, which shot toward the temple, carrying a group of high-level experts.

As the experts from the Hall of Ninjas attacked the temple, they summoned an enormous black cauldron, which settled down to cover the entire temple. Almost immediately, the spell formations in the temple fought back, causing many of the attackers to cough up blood.

But then, the cauldron began to rotate, emanating rumbling sounds that resembled the howl of divine dragons. Cracking sounds echoed out as the spell formation in the temple began to shatter.

“Ah, the Black Golden Dragon-Smelting Cauldron,” Ghost Emperor Yama said. “That’s a seventh step sage item from the Quake-Dawn Cathedral. It’s not as good as the Grand Emperor's Pagoda or the Heaven-Dominating Golden Swordbreaker, but it’s still pretty strong. It should be able to clear out the remains of the warding magics in that temple. If you’re planning to grab that treasure, Yang Qi, now's the time to make your move.”

Meanwhile, one of the experts from the Hall of Ninjas shouted, “Deactivate the cauldron! Take the treasure!”

The cauldron shrank down into the hand of the man who had been operating it, leaving behind spatial rifts that glowed with bright light.

‘It’s out in the open. Time to snatch it!’ That was what numerous experts in the area thought. Instantly, true energy surged as powerful Half Sages leaped forward, some in teams, some alone, all of them in the hopes of snatching the treasure.

“Are you asking to die, miscreants!?” shouted the expert who had been operating the cauldron, a Half Sage. Calling on the powers of the cauldron, he knocked away all of the other Half Sages, then sent out a stream of black light that suppressed the hook-shaped sage weapon.

Taking advantage of the moment of chaos, Yang Qi took a step forward to appear next to the sage weapon. Before anyone could do anything, he locked down space in the area, allowing him to reach out and grab the weapon.

Then, he turned to leave.

“Bastard!” shouted the expert from the Hall of Ninjas. Reaching out, he called on the powers of the Black Golden Dragon-Smelting Cauldron to send a wild stream of explosive true energy toward Yang Qi, true energy that resembled a black golden dragon.

“Surround him and kill him!” The experts from the Hall of Ninjas all lunged toward Yang Qi, unleashing consummate arts of assassination.

“Crush him! Use the cauldron to refine him! How dare he steal from the Hall of Ninjas! This is unforgivable!”

The massive cauldron began to descend with the power to crush heaven, causing crevices to open in the ground, and tearing open rifts in the air.

Acting on instinct, Yang Qi pulled out the Heaven-Dominating Golden Swordbreaker. Extending it to a length of three thousand meters, he swept it toward the dragon, and beyond, the cauldron. In response, a sonorous boom rang out, and the cauldron was sent flying backward to slam into the experts from the Hall of Ninjas.

Miserable screams echoed out as the mountain-like cauldron crushed dozens of them into bloody paste. Not even their souls managed to escape.

“Prepare to die!”

Four Half Sages flew forward to stop the path of the huge cauldron, then turn it back to face Yang Qi. At the same time, they all spit a mouthful of blood into the cauldron, which caused black golden light to shine up from inside.

It was black golden dragon water.

As it poured forth in waves, black dragons appeared inside, hundreds of them that all shot with deadly intent toward Yang Qi. They looked true and real in every aspect, and they didn’t hesitate to spread out to surround him.

However, Yang Qi didn’t shy away from them; instead, he hefted the Heaven-Dominating Golden Swordbreaker and then swung it out.

RUUUUUMBLE!

A massive golden mountain appeared, pulsing with suffocating power that instantly crushed the black dragons, transforming them into nothing more than black smoke.

Gong!

Then the swordbreaker hit the cauldron, which trembled so violently that the Half Sages all coughed up blood.

“Get out of here!” one of them shouted. “This guy is too strong. Retreat! Wait till the backup army arrives!”

“You think you can just leave?” Yang Qi said. Taking another step forward, he unleashed four more attacks with the swordbreaker, each of which followed prescribed pathways conforming to heaven and earth, until they landed directly onto the Half Sages’ heads.

Before any of them could recover from coughing up blood, they were dead.

“That sage item is mine!” Yang Qi announced. “Black Golden Dragon-Smelting Cauldron: get over here.” The cauldron flew over, and he used his true energy to suppress it and shrink it down to the size of his palm. Black shafts of light whipped back and forth from inside of it, almost like ten thousand dragons, quivering in rage.

‘Another sage weapon. And I can’t forget their magical treasure bags!’ With the wave of his hand, he scooped up the dimensional sacks of everyone he had just killed.

Then, he simply vanished into thin air.

“Who was that guy? He was so strong! He even killed those Half Sages and took their Black Golden Dragon-Smelting Cauldron. They were like tofu to him! What level of Great Sage was that guy?”

“Well he was a Great Sage, that’s for sure. Only a Great Sage could do something like that. Do you know what the Black Golden Dragon-Smelting Cauldron is? It's a sage weapon! Short of a Great Sage, only a bunch of Half Sages working together could use it.”

“Come on, let’s get out of here! Considering what just happened, it won't be long before a Great Sage from the Quake-Dawn Cathedral shows up.”

Chapter 310: Black Golden Dragon-Smelting Cauldron

Clicking his tongue, Ghost Emperor Yama said, “How very ruthless of you, Yang Qi. You left those people from the Hall of Ninjas either dead or running, and got their Black Golden Dragon-Smelting Cauldron to boot. The Quake-Dawn Cathedral just suffered a big loss, and they’re definitely going to do something about it. They’ll probably even send a Great Sage after you.”

Of course, the sight of Yang Qi cutting down people from the Quake-Dawn Cathedral actually caused Ghost Emperor Yama to nod inwardly in approval. Even still, he hadn’t joined in the attack.

He actually wanted Yang Qi to force the Quake-Dawn Cathedral’s hand, and get them to send some top experts out to try to kill him. Once Yang Qi was in the position of not being able to defend himself, then either the God Legion Seal would destroy the experts from the Quake-Dawn Cathedral, or Yang Qi would end up dead. Either way, Ghost Emperor Yama would benefit.

Just thinking about that got him excited.

Everything was going according to his master plan.

‘Ah, Crown Prince, I really have to thank you. If you weren’t working with the Quake-Dawn Cathedral, then how could I have recruited Yang Qi to help me deal with them? I hope both they and Yang Qi end up hurting or killing each other. Then I can get my hands on that God Legion Seal. Although… I have the feeling Yang Qi won’t end up getting killed that easily, not with the seal protecting him.’

Of course, Yang Qi was fully aware that Ghost Emperor Yama must have plots and schemes of his own, and was only using him. But in the end, he was doing the same, so he couldn't complain.

‘The Black Golden Dragon-Smelting Cauldron is a powerful sage weapon, the type of rare thing that a Great Sage spent blood, sweat, and tears to make. At the very least, I can use it to put on a bit of a show.’ All of a sudden, he thought about how the Crown Prince had snatched the Gate of the Great Void, and given it and the Pearl of the Thousand Illusions World to Yun Hailan. Both of them were sage weapons, but obviously of low level, most likely first and second step respectively. Neither of them were anywhere close to the level of the Black Golden Dragon-Smelting Cauldron, the Grand Emperor's Pagoda or the Heaven-Dominating Golden Swordbreaker.

“You know,” Ghost Emperor Yama said, “that hook weapon is called the Fierceblood Falx. It was forged tens of thousands of years ago by Great Sage Fierceblood, who was nothing more than an errand boy for a subordinate of one of the primal-chaos elder-immortals. Even still, he was pretty important. There used to be two of them, but I'm not sure where the other ended up. It would make a pretty good gift for one of your own followers.”

Ghost Emperor Yama seemed to know everything about treasures like this, which made sense considering that he was tens of thousands of years old, and had seen many more things in life than Yang Qi had.

“Of course, you need to refine that cauldron to make it your own. If you don't, it will realize it, and then you’ll be done for. It would be like keeping tribulation lightning as a pet. Now that I think about it, considering the level of your cultivation base, I don’t think you’re actually strong enough to handle the cauldron. Want some help? All you have to do is admit that you're going to lose our bet.”

Ghost Emperor Yama was taking advantage of every opportunity to try to get what he wanted. However, even as the words left his mouth, Yang Qi chuckled, and something spectacular happened.

A black dragon flew out from the palm-sized cauldron, which was then wrapped up by the heaven-demon seed, the yellow gold seed, and the Wilds God seed.

“You’re using the power of a heaven-demon and the Wilds God to suppress the will of the Great Sage in that cauldron?” Ghost Emperor Yama was receiving one shock after another, until he felt like biting his own tongue off from the astonishment.

“Yes, Captain Obvious,” Yang Qi said. “I took the Heaven-Dominating Golden Swordbreaker for my own, and those five phases spirits as well. Did you forget about that?”

A moment later, the cauldron was his.

With that, Yang Qi burst into motion, heading deeper into the primal-chaos. He knew that more and more people would be showing up here, including Great Sages. He needed to get the Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragment quickly, before someone else found it and ruined his plans. It was his main hope for defeating the Crown Prince.

Unfortunately, the world within the primal-chaos vital energy was huge, and consisted of multiple levels. The ruins therein were like a labyrinth with no end. It was impossible to tell where one was, and furthermore, it was too unstable to perform teleportations in.

As he traveled along, he saw experts of all sorts stuck within the primal-chaos, fighting powerful enemies, searching for clues, or dead in spell formations.

Some were howling in frustration because of being lost.

Some of the experts from the Quake-Dawn Continent were actually powerful Demonfolk, but unfortunately, they were just as lost as everyone else, and were wandering around like headless flies.

Unlike them, Yang Qi felt like a fish in water. The primal-chaos vital energy actually felt comfortable, as though it were connected to him personally. To some extent, it even acted like his eyes and ears. Because of that, it was an easy task to avoid the dangerous spell formations which existed here and there. He almost felt like he was walking around his own home. Therefore, he made his way through the labyrinth with ease, and didn’t set off a single trap.

Some of it had to do with how he had fixed the Planar Pearl and saved the sage spirits, and some of it was because of the functions of the Grand Emperor's Pagoda.

The primal-chaos vital energy was actually intelligent, and recognized that Yang Qi was a glorious representative of the legion of gods.

‘That aura belongs to multiple Great Sages!’

Yang Qi suddenly stopped in place and allowed the primal-chaos vital energy to surround him, making him fade from view. As of this moment, his aura was almost non-present, making him like a drifting ghost.

Then, he opened the Lord's Eye, and peered out to discover a shocking scene some distance away.

He saw nine Great Sages, all of them clad in battle robes as they stood there in the depths of the primal-chaos.

They stood around a well, which was pitch black, and seemed to descend for endless kilometers. In fact, it was so deep it was impossible to say what was at the bottom.

Each of the nine Great Sages held a fishing pole in hand, with the line stretching far down into the darkness.

“Nine Dragons Fishing Poles! Azure Yin God Hooks! Godworm Silk!” Ghost Emperor Yama was visibly taken aback. “Those are all priceless treasures. So, nine Great Sages are working together to make a Nine by Nine Azure Infernal Dragon-Hooking Spell Formation. They must be trying to pull the Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragment up from inside that well.”

“What? Nine by Nine Azure Infernal Dragon-Hooking Spell Formation?” Yang Qi asked.

“It’s a spell formation that ancient immortals would use to pierce through multiple planes all the way down to the Dragonsea Plane, to try to hook gigantic dragons. Once that formation is activated, it can hook just about everything. You know, those nine Great Sages would be like nothing to me, but you definitely couldn’t handle them.” He smiled craftily. “Although, if you’re interested, then you could just wait for them to pull up the Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragment, and then I could grab it for you. You’d have a hundred percent chance of getting it. Just hand over the Infernal Deity Spear first.”

“No, I'm fine,” Yang Qi replied casually. “I'm pretty confident in my own plan. The primal-chaos vital energy is telling me that those nine are almost completely drained of power. Furthermore, once they pull the Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragment into the open, it will attack them. That’s when I can swoop in and get it for myself.”

“Yeah right!” Ghost Emperor Yama said with a cold chuckle. “You really think you can pull it off that easily? Those Great Sages are top experts from the Quake-Dawn Cathedral. They’re not going to just ignore you if you try to do something like that. And even if they are drained, what if they team up against you? What will you do then?”

“Whatever. Just wait and see. Now’s not the time for me to explain. As long as you don’t do something to interfere, then I’ll get that heart fragment.”

“Fine. I’ll just sit back and watch. Other than using that God Legion Seal, I don’t see what you could possibly do.” With that, he crossed his arms and looked over at the well.

The area around them was quiet and peaceful. Thanks to the abundance of deadly spell formations, even Great Sages who wanted to get to this area would need to be very cautious, let alone weaker people.

And from what Yang Qi could tell, these nine Great Sage hadn’t taken the long way to get here; they had most certainly used teleportation formations or wormholes.

Twang! Twang!

A moment later, the nine Great Sage’s arms began to tremble, and their fishing line went taut and began to thrum.

Yang Qi watched as blue veins bulged out on their arms and hands, as they seemingly went all out to try to pull the lines up.

Then, blood seeped out of the pores of their hands, forming into shocking magical symbols that began to follow the fishing line down into the well.

“I'm impressed. Those Great Sages are actually sacrificing their own life force and longevity to try to hook the Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragment. That fragment is definitely not going to be easy to get.” Licking his lips, Ghost Emperor Yama waited to see what Yang Qi was going to do next.

Only moments later, a blood-red stream of energy shot up from the depths of the well, and a roar like that of a dragon could be heard. It was followed by the sound of earth, water, fire, and wind, as well as Yore-Wilds power that could shatter space itself. All of the Great Sages began to tremble and sweat, as though they might not be able to endure for much longer.

Even Ghost Emperor Yama felt like he was being weighed down.

In contrast, Yang Qi didn't seem affected at all. In fact, as the vibrations grew more intense, he seemed to be fusing with the void, as though the Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragment were causing him to enter some strange state of dao enlightenment.

The truth was that even the sight of the red beam of energy left him feeling very comfortable. It was almost like seeing a dear friend or family member. Although it would be as hot as lava to anyone else, to him, it was extremely beneficial. Pulses of the power of the Yore-Wilds began to race through him, and ancient megamammoths began to wake up left and right.

Chapter 311: Taking the Fragment

The Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragment had not emerged, and yet, blood-red vital energy was already erupting out into the open.

It was an ancient and wild energy, even the smallest bit of which could crush mountain peaks to bits. And anyone who tried to absorb it would find their meridians shattered, and would then drop dead.

Even the nine sages who were trying to reel in the fragment could barely breathe, and had unleashed their sage domains to protect themselves.

If the energy were allowed to spread out further and develop, it would transform into mountains, rivers, crystals, and perhaps even form an entire plane. It was preheaven energy and power that no person could absorb, with the exception of Yang Qi.

The holy power inside of him was already splicing that vital energy for personal use.

On the one hand, it was vital energy that contained everything and anything: yin and yang, the five phases, the wild and aeonic past, the universe and the chiliocosm, the sun, the moon, and all creation. It was everything mixed together. On the other hand, it was the purest energy possible, capable of transforming Yang Qi’s meridians, sea of energy, five viscera, six bowels and even his sea of consciousness, into numerous worlds of their own.

The Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth was transforming rapidly, and with every cycle, it absorbed massive amounts of the blood-red vital energy, which was essentially the blood of the ancient Yore-Wilds Continent.

Even more telling, the vital energy actually seemed connected to Yang Qi, and was entering him as though it was returning to its parent.

The reason for that, of course, was the God Legion Seal in his forehead. All planes of existence, and all vital energy, originated with the true words spoken by the legion of gods. The preheaven origin and substructure of the planes made all of them children of the legion of gods.

Furthermore, Yang Qi had rescued this plane from destruction, and the vital energy was aware of that.

As the energy coursed through him, explosive cracking sounds could be heard, and he began to tremble physically. Soon, true energy megamammoths inside of him began to rear up and trumpet loudly. Back when he reached the Five-Phases Transformation, he reached the level of one million megamammoths, and from then on out, they began to awaken in batches of ten thousand.

Ten thousand.

Twenty thousand….

In a very short time, a hundred thousand megamammoths awoke. As Yang Qi grew stronger, the yin yang seeds in his sea of energy grew more solid, and transformed into a palm-sized taiji symbol. Streams of black and white energy intertwined, and pulsed with the power of both yin and yang. As a result of this heightened level of yin yang and five phases power, his physical heart turned bright red, and countless images appeared on its surface, including mountains, rivers, endless stars, countless forests, and even more beautiful scenery. It was like the most wonderful aspects of the Yore-Wilds Continent.

As the true energy of the megamammoths poured through his blood vessels, the power of the Yore-Wilds built up within him.

‘Yang Qi’s cultivation base is advancing by leaps and bounds!’ Ghost Emperor Yama thought, visibly stunned by what was happening. ‘Not even I could absorb the Yore-Wilds power coming from that heart fragment, and he’s just sucking it in like crazy!? This is unbelievable. Although, I guess having the God Legion Seal in you means you can do unbelievable things.’ Peering into the depths of the well, he saw a writhing blood dragon that seemed like a ghost-god ready to fly out into the open and become an actual divine dragon.

All of a sudden, a resounding sound echoed out from the well, which resembled the tolling of bells from the netherworld.

Even the first bell toll caused Ghost Emperor Yama’s face to turn ashen. ‘That’s the Yore-Wilds’ Resonance! Incredible! It’s a preheaven musical note of immense and pure power. According to the rumors, when the Yore-Wilds’ Heart would beat, it would cause this sound to echo out and cow all wretch-devils and daemons in existence! Even a fragment of the heart would still be able to unleash it with unimaginable power.’

If Ghost Emperor Yama was shaken by the sound, there was little need to mention the Great Sages. The entire group was sent flying backward, coughing up blood like mad, and apparently, seriously injured.

“Hold on to your fishing poles!” shouted the strongest of the group. “The Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragment is almost out in the open.” All of the Great Sages pulled out handfuls of medicinal pills which they popped into their mouths and swallowed.

As their energy built back up, they tightened their grips on their fishing poles, and began to pull the line in with more vigor.

However, the Yore-Wilds’ Resonance continued to echo out louder and louder, causing them to cough up more blood; it seemed like they might not be able to hold on for much longer. Shaking his head, Ghost Emperor Yama used a consummate skill from the dao of devils to protect himself.

In contrast, Yang Qi didn’t seem negatively affected at all, and in fact, was benefiting from the sound. In addition, Ghost Emperor Yama could tell that all of the energy from the sound was rushing toward him like the rivers of the world would rush into the sea.

With every moment that passed, Yang Qi’s aura grew stronger, to the point where the yin and yang energies within him were like two enormous dragons floating behind him, one of them black, the other, white.

‘Black and white twin dragons! Grand yin and yang transformation!’ Ghost Emperor Yama was shaken to the core. ‘That’s an ancient sign spoken of only in stories! Only when someone is blessed by preheaven yin and yang will the image of a black and white dragon appear. Don’t tell me he’s so lucky as to have been blessed by preheaven yin and yang?’

At first, Ghost Emperor Yama looked anxious, then worried, but then, a moment later, calm, as though he had just realized something.

‘This feels wonderful!’ Yang Qi thought. ‘It seems I definitely made the right choice here. The Yore-Wilds’ Heart really is giving me access to a huge boost of power. This is just what I need to fight the Crown Prince.’ As of this moment, Yang Qi was fully confident that he could reach the sixth Legendary transformation and then fight the Crown Prince, that supposed ‘god from heaven descended into the mortal world’.

As he continued to absorb the power, he looked over at the well, where the Yore-Wilds’ Resonance had reached a peak level, and was battering the nine Great Sages to the point where it looked like they might die at any moment.

RUUUUUMBLE!

All of a sudden, a space-time wormhole sprang into being above the heads of the Great Sages, which then erupted with pitch black divine light.

The light instantly healed the sages, and filled them with energy, until they were as lively as dragons or tigers. Gripping their fishing poles, they pulled back with all their might, causing an enormous, glowing red object to emerge from the well.

In the blink of an eye, all of the primal-chaos vital energy in the area was stained bright red.

It was the Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragment!

Yang Qi’s heart began to pound with excitement.

‘The Ninja God!’ Ghost Emperor Yama thought, his eyes shining with hatred at the sight of the pitch black light shooting out from the wormhole. From the look of it, he wanted to rip that wormhole to shreds in a burst of fury.

He recognized the black light the moment he saw it; its origin was one of the same bastards who had imprisoned him years ago, the ultimate leader of the Hall of Ninjas, the renowned Ninja God, whose cultivation base put him only a hair away from being a Demi-Immortal.

However, he managed to keep himself in check. ‘The pressure from the Planar Pearl is only more effective against stronger people. There’s no way he can get into the Rich-Lush Continent. As for me, I was sealed in the Rich-Lush Continent for so long, that I’ve already fused with its vital energy. I might as well be a full-blown native. You really think you're going to get the Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragment?’

‘Now’s my chance!’ Yang Qi thought, looking at the heart fragment, and the dazzling red light it cast on everything around it. Even the wormhole that had just opened up was forced to shut, as all space in the area was locked down. Not even the Great Sages could easily move, and in fact, cracks began to spread out on their skin. It seemed that without the power of the Ninja God to support them, they would soon be crushed out of existence by the Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragment.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi, who wasn’t hurt at all by the power being unleashed, and actually enjoyed it, could now see something like bloodjade within the glowing light. It looked like part of an actual heart, covered with blood-red magical symbols, script carved by the legion of gods. From what he could tell, it was Godtongue, the same language he had first heard thanks to the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.

“Out-of-Body Godmammoth! Capture and Return!” Yang Qi reached out with his hand, and at the same time, an enormous godmammoth appeared behind him, with a trunk that could tear planets down out of the sky. In coordination with the movement of his hand, that trunk snaked out and wrapped around the Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragment.

Not even nine Great Sages working together could capture that fragment, and in fact, were just about to die from the effort. Even as they tried to focus the power of their cultivation bases to complete the effort, a ‘bandit’ showed up.

As soon as the trunk wrapped around the fragment, Yang Qi was covered with so much red light that it looked like he was dripping with blood.

Instantly, more particles within him woke up. In the blink of an eye, he had three hundred thousand more.

The will of the Lord touched the heart fragment, blessing it, making it feel like it was being embraced by a fatherly figure. Without any hesitation, it flew in Yang Qi’s direction.

“Grand Emperor’s Pagoda!”

As soon as the pagoda appeared, the heart fragment flew inside, filling it with bright red color. The Great Sages couldn’t do anything about it whatsoever. Once the true energy of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth entered that fragment, the weight which had once seemed like that of an entire continent disappeared, and the thing turned as light as a feather. The sight of it caused Ghost Emperor Yama’s jaw to drop.

‘He really is blessed by the legion of gods. The Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragment isn’t even heavy to him?’

“Hey!” he shouted. “What are you waiting for? Let’s get out of here!”

Yang Qi wasn’t paying attention to him. As soon as he had the Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragment, the primal-chaos vital energy wrapped him up, and then he vanished without a trace, as if he had been teleported away. Ghost Emperor Yama was left alone to face nine Great Sages.

“Who was that!?”

“Who stole our Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragment!?” It took a moment for the Great Sages to react, and when they did, it was with utter rage.

Chapter 312: Without a Hitch

The enraged Great Sages couldn't believe that anyone would have the audacity to just snatch the Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragment right from under their noses.

The fragment was immeasurably precious, and they had just worked themselves nearly to death to get it, damaging their meridians, sea of energy, sage motes, and even their longevity in the process.

Great Sages had immense lifespans, and could live tens of thousands of years. However, each of this group of nine had just lost about ten thousand years. If they had succeeded, the cultivation base advancement they would have made would have balanced out the loss. After all, the Quake-Dawn Cathedral would have rewarded them greatly. But in the end, it was a matter of trying to steal a chicken only to end up losing the rice you used to lure it. Worse, they would now suffer the wrath of the Quake-Dawn Cathedral upon returning.

“After him! Even if we have to chase him to the ends of the earth, we’re going to catch him and chop him to pieces!”

“Yeah! Hold nothing back. If we don't accomplish this mission, then we’ll be punished so badly upon returning that we’ll only wish we could die.”

“Kill him! Whoever steals from us will die and receive no burial! We’ll unleash carnage on the entire Rich-Lush Continent if we have to.”

“Who exactly did it? He grabbed it from us before we even noticed, and seemed extremely familiar with the primal-chaos vital energy spell formation. But how come that spell formation didn't stir when he arrived?”

“We have to cut him down. Where is he? How come we can’t sense his location, or the presence of the Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragment?”

“After him! He’s definitely out in the primal-chaos vital energy somewhere. Kill him!”

Yang Qi was actually hidden within the primal-chaos vital energy, and was able to watch as the Great Sages went mad. ‘Crazy fools,’ he thought. ‘Go ahead and start running around in the primal-chaos vital energy. There are plenty of spell formations in there for you to fall prey to.’

He was actually standing atop a beautifully designed spell formation, which, as it rotated, caused the space around him to twist and distort, and made it impossible to see him.

It was an ancient immortal formation, and it was thanks to it that he was completely safe.

As of now, the primal-chaos vital energy around him was actually protecting him.

It was almost as if this place were his own home. In fact, it was the perfect place to practice cultivation, to use the power of the Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragment to unleash the boundless potential within him.

A moment later, a shadow appeared near him, moving here and there as though searching for a path through the twisting and distorting layers of space. Slowly but surely, it got closer to Yang Qi.

It was none other than Ghost Emperor Yama. “This ancient immortal formation is strong, that's for sure. The only way I can follow you is by using my Roving Ghost Shadow Body Technique. It’s hard to believe that you can just enter the formation and use it so easily. There’s no way those nine dolts will be able to track you down here. This thing is frightening even to me.”

Yang Qi smiled. Considering he was in the middle of all this primal-chaos vital energy, and especially this formation, he wasn’t afraid at all of Ghost Emperor Yama. If a fight broke out, it was entirely likely that Ghost Emperor Yama would end up dead.

Furthermore, none of the formations in here were threatening at all to Yang Qi.

Sitting there cross-legged, he pulled out the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, which now had a burning collection of bright red light atop it, almost like a sun.

The sight of the Yore-Wilds Heart fragment struck fear into the heart of Ghost Emperor Yama, and when Yang Qi entered the pagoda, he stayed back.

“You’ve clearly lost this bet, Ghost Emperor Yama. I think you need to admit defeat and hand over those sage motes. I bet you never could have guessed that I would get the heart fragment so easily.”

“Not so fast,” Ghost Emperor Yama said stubbornly. “Maybe you have the Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragment, but there’s no way you can use it to reach the sixth Legendary transformation any time soon. Each breakthrough with a godly-class energy art is incredibly difficult. And that will apply especially to the Personal Domain Transformation. You think you can do it in less than a hundred days? I'd say that's impossible.”

“Alright, fine. Watch and learn.”

“I will.” Ghost Emperor Yama sat down cross-legged within the immortal formation, not daring to move too quickly lest he provoke some disaster.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi focused his thoughts on the heart fragment. At first nothing happened, but then, red color began to spread out on him, and the yin and yang energies within him began to circulate at high speed.

The twin dragons that made up the taiji symbol appeared again, and as they swirled about, they resembled both fish and dragons, both wind and clouds. In fact, they seemed capable of unleashing the most primal and paramount truths of heaven and earth.

It was a state that not even the top geniuses of ancient times could reach. Only immortals from the highest of planes could hope to experience what Yang Qi was currently experiencing.

Slowly but surely, the Grand Emperor's Pagoda was transforming, and in a much more dramatic fashion than Yang Qi. The pagoda had been crafted by Grand Emperor Rich-Lush with his own heart-blood. Back in those days, his main regret had been that he never managed to fuse it with the Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragment. By that time in history, the sage spirits in the Planar Pearl had already fallen into despair, and the Yore-Wilds’ Heart had been suffering from the same taint that infected the pearl. Furthermore, its immense weight made it virtually impossible to drag into the open, not even using powerful spell formations.

Although Grand Emperor Rich-Lush had been a powerful emperor, just on the verge of reaching the Demi-Immortal level, he actually couldn't compare to Yang Qi at all. After all, the noble spirits had not approved of him. But those same spirits recognized that Yang Qi had the aura of the legion of gods, and gave him approval, allowing him to succeed where no one else had.

Not even nine Great Sages working together had been able to suppress the power of the heart fragment, and that was even with the help of a divine ability from the Ninja God.

Now that the fragment was in the pagoda, the aura of the legion of gods was forcing the two of them to fuse.

As a result, the pagoda began to glow in unprecedented fashion, even more brightly than it ever had in the presence of Grand Emperor Rich-Lush. As its substructure changed, noble spirits suddenly began to appear in the various levels of the pagoda, countless ancient, godlike beings of immense power.

Yang Qi could even sense that, within the primal-chaos vital energy, multiple immortal formations were adhering to the pagoda, and helping the emperor embryo inside of it to grow.

The pagoda was growing far stronger than it ever had been when in the possession of Grand Emperor Rich-Lush. New warding magics appeared left and right, and it even gained a very elementary control over time.

‘So, the true power of the treasure is finally manifesting,’ Ghost Emperor Yama thought. ‘Grand Emperor Rich-Lush knew that it was incomplete, and hoped that whoever inherited it would eventually acquire the Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragment, and complete it. If I could get it, I would be able to use it the way it's truly meant to. I would instantly be many times more powerful than before. It's a real waste for Yang Qi to have it, considering he can't even use its full power. He has enough true energy, but his cultivation level is too low.’

As Yang Qi observed the transformations, he felt more particles stirring within him.

‘Perfect, with the power of the Yore-Wilds’ Heart, I can finally catalyze the life force motherspring seed, and transform my sea of energy into the true image of the Yore-Wilds. I just need more life force in my sea of energy!’

With every moment that passed, Yang Qi was gaining enlightenment of new cultivation methods. Furthermore, considering that he was already in the Five-Phases Transformation, and had great control over the spatial dimensions in his body, it was an easy thing to transfer the heart fragment there.

Howling, he opened the Lord’s Eye, causing brilliant light to shoot out and touch the fragment. In the blink of an eye, the will of that eye caused the heart to rise into the air and fly toward him.

The immense pressure radiating out from the fragment forced Ghost Emperor Yama to back up, and eventually duck into an alternate dimension to stay safe.

In contrast, Yang Qi was completely unfazed; opening his sea of energy, he deposited the heart fragment inside.

RUUUUUMBLE!

Instantly, brilliant red light began to shine out of every pore on Yang Qi’s body, making him look like a mighty god-spirit who could illuminate all heaven and earth.

‘Such incredible power!’ he thought. ‘It's too bad I can’t use it all. I can only tap into it temporarily. Even if I was a Great Sage, it would probably take me ten thousand years to fully drain this thing.’

As the bright red light flowed through him, he found that the spatial magical symbols in his flesh, blood, and meridians were growing stronger and more durable.

And then, he also placed the motherspring seed into his sea of energy.

He howled as the seed exploded, transforming his sea of energy into a massive conglomeration of life force that merged with the Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragment, and the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.

Soon, an image appeared within his sea of energy, an image that depicted the Yore-Wilds.

It was filled with life force and ancient forests. There were megamammoths, demonlings, dragon-snakes, qilins, phoenixes, rocs, and other creatures. As Yang Qi’s life force conformed to this image, his battle spirit skyrocketed, and the desire to control these Yore-Wilds filled him.

This was none other than the Yore-Wilds Battle Mural, which contained the Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragment, and was like a burning sun that dominated all the lands.

“Yore-Wilds Battle Mural; Invincibly Control the World. Life Force Fountainhead; Ancient and Eternal. This is power!” He shot to his feet as tens upon tens of thousands of particles exploded to life within him.

Chapter 313: Yin-Yang

Power surged inside of Yang Qi.

Before all of this started, he had the strength of a million megamammoths. But now he was absorbing the power of both the Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragment and the motherspring seed, and the particles inside of him were waking up like mad, seemingly without end, tens of thousands at a time. Each of them unleashed incomparable levels of true energy, fortifying his spatial dimensions and, in the shortest of moments, pushing him to the level of two million megamammoths. Thanks to the Yore-Wilds’ Heart, he had doubled his level of power.

Furthermore, the bright red light that shone off of the fragment contained massive amounts of preheaven yin yang power.

As a result, the yin yang seeds inside him began to fuse with the five phases power, and began to push him relentlessly toward the Yin-Yang Transformation.

If that happened, then he could finally begin seeking enlightenment of his personal domain, the God Legion Paradise.

At that point, he would be able to slaughter the Crown Prince and despise Great Sages.

“Yin-Yang Transformation, Five Phases Fusion, True Energy Cultivates Truth. Falsity is False, Truth is True, Borrow Falsity to Cultivate Truth. Gods are Tathāgatas….”

Yang Qi’s hands moved through the air to form complex signs, each of which caused the images of countless god-spirits to enter him.

They were none other than elemental fays which represented spatial tempests, the five phases, and yin and yang. As they entered Yang Qi, they expanded his meridians, widened his spatial dimensions, and improved his capacity to contain true energy.

With that, he broke past the level of two million megamammoths.

Two million three hundred thousand. Two million five hundred thousand. Two million eight hundred thousand….

The staggering and maddening increase of power yet again caused Ghost Emperor Yama’s jaw to drop.

‘He’s already stronger than a first step Great Sage. Only, his cultivation itself is different from a Great Sage. If it weren’t for the fact that he lacks sage motes, he could definitely take on Great Sages. Once sage motes are in the picture, anyone who lacks them will lose to him, no matter how strong they are.’

Ghost-Emperor Yama shook his head. Never before in his life had he ever seen someone like Yang Qi, who, in the mere fourth Legendary transformation, had true energy that could rival a Great Sage’s. In fact, if he actually became a Great Sage, didn’t that mean he could trample the nine heavens and ten earths, and topple the three thousand realms?

Things finally stopped with three million megamammoths, at which time his meridians pulsed with vital energy, true energy, and holy glory. As of this point, all of his energy reserves were absolutely full and couldn't absorb anything more.

The Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragment remained in his sea of energy, its brilliant red light restrained to some degree. Meanwhile, the Grand Emperor's Pagoda rotated above his head, emanating thousands of shafts of scintillating light.

It had actually benefited far more than Yang Qi just had.

‘I have the power of three million megamammoths now,’ he thought. ‘My yin yang power is at the ultimate peak, meaning that I'm just on the verge of reaching the Yin-Yang Transformation. I’ve already absorbed everything I can from the Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragment, and formed the Yore-Wilds Battle Mural in my sea of energy. Given some time, I can reach the highest level of enlightenment possible for my level. Unfortunately, there is still a tiny gap to cross!’

He was more than aware that he already had less than a hundred days to work with. Every day was important, and he needed to take advantage of every moment to achieve progress. That was the only way he could guarantee a victory over the Crown Prince.

When the time came for the decisive battle, he would show the Crown Prince and Yun Hailan who was stronger than whom. It was a moment he could hardly wait for.

After he killed the Crown Prince, he would kill Yun Hailan. Then, once he had no more enemies in the world, he could safely go to the Hanging Mountain to search for his mother. The main thing he would have to worry about at that point was the truth of his origins.

In any case, he knew that the Crown Prince and Yun Hailan would not be long-term enemies for him. They were merely obstacles on the larger path he walked, stones that he would kick aside to ensure smooth progress later on.

‘Since I'm running low on time, I’ll steal it from heaven. I need this breakthrough. The time has come for… Yin-Yang Transformation!’ Taking a breath, he drew upon the yin yang power inside of him, simultaneously splitting open the void to allow countless black and white dragons to emerge and burrow into him.

He was virtually full of yin yang power, and yet, he continued to absorb more and more. After a certain point, cracking sounds could be heard as fundamental aspects of himself began to break and then recombine.

His true energy weighed down on the yin yang power, transforming it on a fundamental level, causing the taiji symbol to explode, releasing massive amounts of vital energy.

RUUUUUMBLE!

Numerous wormholes opened up in the primal-chaos, which spat out masses of lightning; tribulation had come to suppress Yang Qi.

WHIZZZ!

A huge lightning bell appeared, which settled down on top of him and sent flame lightning smashing into him. However, he destroyed it with a single fist strike. Next, a lamp appeared within the lightning, which attacked him furiously. However, he blew it out with a single breath.

After that came sabers, swords, axes, hooks, dagger-axes, spears, and all sorts of other god weapons. Each one was the type that could shake all heaven and earth, and caused the area around Yang Qi to tremble violently. However, none of them hurt him, and none lasted for longer than a single counter-attack on his part.

Millions of weapons appeared, and he destroyed them all. Next, the wormholes combined, releasing even more immense power in the form of an armor-clad figure formed from lightning.

“I am the Myriad Tribulation God!” he roared as masses of tribulation clouds rolled out around him. Without any hesitation, he reached out toward Yang Qi.

Yang Qi didn't seem worried at all. Clenching his fist, he punched out with the power of three million megamammoths, creating a stream of power that ripped the tribulation god to pieces.

More tribulations descended. There was lightning that fell like meteors, yin yang fire, dragons, and more.

However, Yang Qi had countless fist strike techniques that ensure that he defeated everything without any trouble.

In the end, heaven couldn’t do anything to him. Slowly, the space-time wormholes faded away, and the remaining aspects of tribulation transformed into vestiges of yin yang energy that streamed into Yang Qi.

Suddenly, his true energy vibrated as though it might take corporeal form. In the blink of an eye, his aura surged out into the primal-chaos vital energy, causing projections of plants, animals, and humans to appear. They were so lifelike that they actually seemed real. Yin and yang had combined perfectly with the five phases, to the point where he seemed capable of creating humans.

Of course, they weren’t actual living beings. However, they were close enough that they contained some level of intelligence, and rudimentary spirit bodies, albeit no flesh and blood.

Not even Great Sages could create actual living beings; that was something that only immortals could do, or at the very least, Demi-Immortals.

Some people actually called the Demi-Immortal level by a different name: the Ascending Immortal level.

Regardless of that, Yang Qi knew what lay next. Now that he had reached the Yin-Yang Transformation, his next step was the Personal-Domain Transformation, and the God Legion Paradise.

But what exactly did he need to do? Receive help from the legion of gods? He wasn't actually sure, and in fact, had no idea if he could succeed within less than a hundred days. All he did know was that the effort would be incomparably difficult.

And yet, he wouldn't allow that to erode his confidence, something which stemmed from the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.

Upon seeing the blank look in Yang Qi's eyes, Ghost Emperor Yama chuckled. “What are you stopping for, Yang Qi? Scared to keep going? Or is it too hard for you? Now that you’re in the Yin-Yang Transformation, you're not sure you can achieve that next breakthrough? You need to build up power to make each breakthrough. Now that you’ve drained your reserves, you need to work for another three years or so before you can make your next attempt. Not even the Yore-Wilds’ Heart will help. That’s an external object, and won’t help you get enlightenment. Your mind is a blank, so filling up with more energy won’t help a bit. It’s a fundamental truth of cultivation that nobody can get around.”

“Hold on a second,” Yang Qi said. “I think I just need a few more days to come up with some inspiration, and get a bit more enlightenment of heaven and earth. All my previous enlightenment has given way to power. Come on, let’s go. There’s no point in sitting around here. If those Great Sages don't find me soon, they might start causing problems in the Rich-Lush Continent.”

Rising to his feet, he vanished into the primal-chaos vital energy.

Naturally, Ghost Emperor Yama followed him.

As Yang Qi left, he committed the details of the immortal formations in the area to memory. For now, it seemed like just about everything in existence was worthy of note and contemplation, and could theoretically lead to enlightenment. A cloud. Sweet dew on a plant. A stream of water. A fountain…. Who knew where enlightenment would come from?

Before long he was back in Yanhaven.

Ghost Emperor Yama joined him, still unconvinced that he would be able to achieve another breakthrough anytime soon.

After settling down on a raised platform in his audience chamber, Yang Qi reached out and tore open a rift into the space-time in front of him. A moment later, the mercenary squad appeared. Waving his hand, he pulled over the white-robed Chaoguang.

“Mind singing that Ballad of the Dao Testimonial for me again?”

Chapter 314: Ballad of the Dao Testimonial

The lazy, white-robed Chaoguang was both extremely strong, and profoundly mysterious. There was a strange power within him, to the point that his Ballad of the Dao Testimonial could actually tug at the hearts and minds of the most powerful of experts, pushing them into an empty state of enlightenment in which their dao would begin to conform to his.

Unfortunately for him, now that Yang Qi was a Yin-Yang Legendary, there was absolutely no way that Chaoguang could struggle against him. He was like a baby chicken in the face of a roc with a ninety-thousand-kilometer wingspan.

He struggled, causing shafts of divine light to emanate out from him, and yet he couldn’t even budge within Yang Qi’s grasp. In the blink of an eye, all of the shafts of light shattered.

Yang Qi ignored his struggling. After all, he just wanted him to sing his Ballad of the Dao Testimonial, and watch him practice his cultivation for enlightenment purposes.

“Listen, Chaoguang, I know that you come from some powerful organization. It’s obvious you’ve been plotting against me, but sadly, you’re only a Half Sage, so you’re not strong enough to do anything. Not even Great Sages qualify to scheme against me, so what makes you think you do? Tell me where you’re from. You work for me now, so if you just tell the truth, I’ll forgive everything from the past. I can tell you're a top genius, and are worthy of help. In fact, if you could become a Great Sage, you could be a big help to me.”

Chaoguang looked at Yang Qi, then shook his head in defeat. He knew he was too weak, and that if Yang Qi wanted to, he could force the truth out of him. It was obvious that Yang Qi’s cultivation base was nearly as strong as a Great Sage’s, which was far too powerful to fight against.

If he did, he would end up crushed into a pulp.

After a moment, he composed himself, then went on to speak in a somewhat arrogant tone, saying, “I'm from the Spirit Origin Association. My name is Nie Chaoguang.”

When some of the other mercenaries heard his words, they rose to their feet in shock.

“What?” Blademaster Thunderbolt said in shock. “You're Nie Chaoguang? From the Spirit Origin Association? The type of genius they say only appears once in ten thousand years?! According to the rumors, you acquired the legacy of the immortal Patriarch Chaoguang, and you're just on the verge of reaching the Great Sage level! Why did you join a mercenary squad working for the Grand-Wilds Mansion? The Spirit Origin Association is just as powerful as the Grand-Wilds Mansion is!”

“Because I was chasing him,” Nie Chaoguang said, pointing at Yang Qi, his eyes flashing with intense light. “He caused a big scene in our territory, and stole our Heaven-Dominating Golden Swordbreaker. I had no choice but to try to get it back! The damned silkpants son of one of our prime elders basically handed over the swordbreaker to him. You know, not even I could control that swordbreaker. It's really meant for Great Sages. I warned them over and over again not to give it to that brat, but they overruled me. And now look what happened!”

“So, that’s how it is,” Yang Qi said, thinking back to how he had been surrounded by the Spirit Origin Association people when he was trying to break open the Space Portal. After taking the Heaven-Dominating Golden Swordbreaker, he had simply left. Unbeknownst to him, this Nie Chaoguang had actually followed him. Considering everything, it was obvious that he couldn't let him go.

Yang Qi had offended the Quake-Dawn Cathedral and the Grand-Wilds Mansion, and on top of it all, the Spirit Origin Association. How could he possibly take them all on by himself?

Of course, he wasn't interested in the details of Nie Chaoguang’s organization, just his technique. “Where did your Ballad of the Dao Testimonial come from?”

“Honestly, I'm surprised that you can defend against it,” Nie Chaoguang replied. “In fact, you simply erased the sealing mark from your soul and sea of consciousness. I really admire you for that. I acquired the Ballad of the Dao Testimonial from an immortal stone I found. It was left behind by an ancient immortal, and surpasses even the Demi-Immortal level. When I sing the song, anyone who hears it will be touched by the dao will of the song. It will mark their soul, and force them into a state of enlightenment. Afterward, they will actually lose control of their soul, which will come under my control. Then, I’ll gain enlightenment of their techniques, cultivation base, and vital energy. And that, of course, will enable me to achieve meteoric advancement.”

“Hold on, Nie Chaoguang,” Ghost Emperor Yama blurted. “Doesn’t that mean you’re a missionary!?”

“A missionary?” For the briefest moment, Nie Chaoguang’s eyes flashed with panic before he managed to cover it up.

“Missionaries come along every once in a while,” Ghost Emperor Yama explained. “Usually they acquire the will of an immortal from a higher plane. Because they conform to the magical laws of the lower planes, they can travel to places the immortals cannot. After all, if an immortal goes too low, they can destroy the planes they enter, or suffer backlash attacks from the magical laws of the universe. However, some immortals who wish to reach a higher level, who wish to struggle with the legion of gods for the faith of people below, will defy heaven, and establish sects in the lower planes. By gathering followers from among the mortals, they can build the power of faith, which they can use to achieve breakthroughs to higher levels. Anyway, because such immortals cannot travel freely in the lower planes, they often appoint missionaries to help them.

“And you’re a missionary, aren’t you Nie Chaoguang? The will of an immortal from a higher plane looked upon you with favor, and is using you to gather believers in the lower planes. Eventually, you plan to establish your own sect, your own school of thought, and gather a flock of people to worship that immortal. Your Ballad of the Dao Testimonial is a way to gather power, a holy hymn of whatever church you wish to found. Few people can resist it, because it really does contain the profundity of heaven and earth. It is music created by an immortal who has gained enlightenment of all creation, and therefore, not even Great Sages can resist its temptation. Thankfully, I pursue the dao of hell; I use slaughter, destruction, darkness and gloom as my pillars. I instinctively reject the truths of immortal energy.”

‘I see,’ Yang Qi thought. As it turned out, Nie Chaoguang had been touched by immortal destiny, and was the representative of some incredibly powerful figure from an immortal plane.

“Well then, why don’t you sing the full song?” Yang Qi said. “I’d love to see what profound truths of heaven and earth it contains.”

“Are you crazy, Yang Qi?!” Ghost Emperor Yama exclaimed. “That Ballad of the Dao Testimonial contains the will of an immortal! Once it gets into you, it will only burrow deeper and deeper. Eventually, the song will connect you to the person singing it, and your soul will become theirs. You’ll be completely and utterly possessed, a true believer! It will be profoundly harmful to your cultivation.”

“I’m not worried about it,” Yang Qi replied. “Let’s see how strong this immortal’s will is. It’s like the saying goes: the valiant go into the mountains even though they know tigers lurk therein. My current state of enlightenment is lacking, and ordinary methods aren’t going to help. How else am I supposed to reach the sixth Legendary transformation in less than a hundred days? And how else am I going to win our little bet and defeat the Crown Prince?”

To achieve the breakthrough he needed, Yang Qi was willing to take some risks. As was written in the Art of War: Place someone on a field of death, and he will fight to live.

Ghost Emperor Yama shook his head. “Well, if that's your decision, I'm not going to get in your way. It’s going to be up to your own willpower. You bear the will of the legion of gods, so perhaps you can actually wrest control of the will of an immortal.”

“Very well,” Yang Qi said. “In that case, I'm going into seclusion. The rest of you, be on your way. Continue your work with Sage Monarch City. Ghost Emperor Yama, would you mind giving the Fierceblood Falx and Black Golden Dragon-Smelting Cauldron to my father?” Waving his hand, he sent the two sage weapons over to Ghost Emperor Yama.

Ghost Emperor Yama caught them and shook his head again. “A waste. A complete and utter waste. Your father is only in Quinary Lifeseizing, and you're giving him a sage weapon? I doubt he’ll even be able to use it.”

“Stop worrying all the time. I placed seeds of power in both weapons. Anyone who absorbs the seeds will acquire some power as a legacy from me. It should be more than enough to control the cauldron and the falx.”

“You know what, chatting with you is really boring,” Ghost Emperor Yama said. “Don't forget, if you screw up, I’ll go in, disperse the will of that immortal, and save you. But that will count as you losing our bet, and you’ll have no choice but to give me the cultivation method for the Infernal Deity Spear.” Of course, there was no way that Ghost Emperor Yama had forgotten about the bet.

“That goes without saying,” Yang Qi said. “For the time being, don't allow anyone to disturb me. If I fail because of something like that, then the bet’s off.”

“Don’t worry. Until the hundred-day-period is over, nobody will disturb you. Do you really think that I, Ghost Emperor Yama, earned my reputation for no reason?” With that, he turned to leave. “Good thing I have those infernal king sutras. With some extra enlightenment, I’ll be in an even better place to deal with the people from the Quake-Dawn Cathedral.”

After he was gone, Yang Qi could sense warding magics falling into place to cover everything for hundreds of kilometers. Clearly, not even a Great Sage would be able to break past Ghost Emperor Yama’s defensive measures very easily.

“It's time, Nie Chaoguang. Let’s see if I can fight back against the will of this immortal. You might think of yourself as the missionary of an immortal, but in the end, you’re a puppet. The only way to truly practice cultivation is with a will of your own.” He waved his hand. “Start singing the Ballad of the Dao Testimonial.”

“Alright,” Nie Chaoguang said. “The Dawn Breaks, the Dao of Time Immemorial; Immortal Motes are Refined, Dao Motes form the Web of Heaven….” One after another, the words entered Yang Qi’s sea of consciousness, like pearls dropping into water.

In the shortest of moments, Yang Qi was once again wrapped up in the dangerous state of enlightenment that came with the Ballad of the Dao Testimonial.

Time passed, one day after another.

A month.

Nothing much had changed in Sage Monarch City. Everyone was working hard on their cultivation, trying to achieve the next breakthrough.

However, strange things were happening in the sky above the Demi-Immortal Institute.

Crack!

The institute had been rebuilt, and looked even more glorious and beautiful than before. It abounded with spirit energy. It was currently dawn, but for some strange reason, the sunlight was as blue as a sapphire.

Many students looked up at the blue shafts of light, and grand elders from the Minorcosm World flew out to see what was happening.

RUUUUUMBLE!

Mountains shook as a blue space-time wormhole opened up, and a young woman stepped out: Yun Hailan.

Chapter 315: The Return of Yun Hailan

Several of the holy neophytes were already discussing the matter.

“Elder Sister Yun Hailan is back!”

“You’re right, she’s back. It must be because the Crown Prince is finally a Great Sage. Does that mean he’ll be coming back soon too?”

“The Crown Prince still doesn’t know about the agreement the chancellor made with Yang Qi. I wonder if he’ll just ignore it and go directly to attack Yang Qi.”

“It's hard to say for sure, but considering his personality, I’d say it’s likely. Either way, it's going to be a fierce fight.”

“Fierce fight? Are you serious? Yang Qi is definitely going to lose. The Crown Prince is a Great Sage, and Yang Qi is only a Legendary! From ancient times up to the present, that's been the most difficult of gaps to cross. Considering the level disparity, how could Yang Qi possibly fight the Crown Prince? The only outcome for him is death!”

“You don’t know that for sure. Remember, he has the backing of Ghost Emperor Yama. That devil is so invincible that not even the chancellor could handle him.”

“Hmph! Yeah, well the Crown Prince has the support of the Quake-Dawn Cathedral. They were the ones who imprisoned Ghost Emperor Yama to begin with.”

“Shouldn’t we go formally receive Yun Hailan? The chancellor ordered all students in the institute to maintain a neutral stance, and to stay away from both the Crown Prince and Yang Qi. From what I heard, Yang Qi is back in Yanhaven working on his cultivation. His sworn siblings are all with him, and even Holy Daughter Manyflowers.”

“Look, there are no two ways about it. The Crown Prince is going to kill Yang Qi. Since Yun Hailan is his main representative, if we don't treat her well, then she's going to hold it against us. Soon, the Crown Prince will be chancellor, but we all know that won’t last long. Once Yun Hailan succeeds him, what would we do? We wouldn't stay alive for long, that's for sure.”

“Come on, let’s go receive her. No matter the situation, we have to maintain a good relationship with her.”

Finally, they flew up into the sky to meet Yun Hailan.

“Congratulations on your safe return, Elder Sister Yun Hailan!”

Included among the group were Master Wind Gentleman, Unparalleled Lightning, and the leader of the Divine Ability Society…. In fact, all of the leaders of the various societies were there, famous experts who could call the wind and summon the rain in the institute. They were people who, with a single word, could cause millions of people to do this or that. Most people would tremble at the mention of their names. And yet, in the face of Yun Hailan, they acted like flunkies, despite the fact that she wasn't even a holy neophyte.

That didn’t matter. She was backed by the Crown Prince, and he was a Great Sage. Besides, her aura surpassed that of ordinary individuals. She was now a Legendary, and she had the power of the gods in her. In fact, she was so powerful that she seemed like someone from a high-level plane, not someone from the Rich-Lush Continent.

The holy neophytes were all shocked to the core.

“So, you all came?” Yun Hailan said as she floated down and looked around imperiously. “Well, I suppose you know about the Crown Prince becoming a Great Sage?”

“Yes,” Master Wind Gentleman said in an ingratiating tone. “Now that the Crown Prince is a Great Sage, we've abandoned all our previous misconceptions of glory. For example, I dissolved the Gentlemen’s Society, and have been humbly waiting for the Crown Prince to return. In this heaven and earth, only the Crown Prince Society exists. One society to rule all! May our Demi-Immortal Institute exist for all eternity!”

“So, you’ve adjusted your sails according to the direction of the wind? Well done, Master Wind Gentleman. You really live up to your reputation.” Her cool tone of voice caused Master Wind Gentleman to feel so depressed he felt like coughing up some blood. However, he had no choice but to accept her thinly-veiled criticism.

Bowing his head, he said, “You’re absolutely right, Elder Sister. From here on out, I’ll stand by the Crown Prince as his most staunch supporter. Whatever he asks me to do, I’ll do without question!”

Of course, inside he felt like he was about to explode.

“Feeling a bit resentful are we?” she said, apparently able to sense what he was thinking. “Circumstances often surpass people, and you just have to deal with it. Back when I joined the Demi-Immortal Institute, you were a big deal, but now, you’re bowing your head to me. That’s just your fate.”

“Yes, yes of course….”

Next, she went on to berate all of the holy neophytes in similar fashion.

After she was done, she continued, “I just returned from the Superheaven Badlands. What, pray tell, has happened to Yang Qi? Did he return from the Western Continent? What technique has he taken up? And what level is he? Perhaps I can go kill him to save the Crown Prince some effort.”

“Oh, no, you definitely shouldn’t do that,” Master Wind Gentleman said quickly. “Yang Qi can already destroy any Legendary. He’s basically invincible to anyone other than a Great Sage. He returned last month with Ghost Emperor Yama, who he freed from the Heavencorpse Dimension. The two of them made a big scene here, and forced the chancellor to intervene. Afterward, the chancellor sent down orders that, when the Crown Prince returns, he and Yang Qi would fight it out, and the winner would become the new chancellor. Yang Qi is currently in Yanhaven working on his cultivation. Considering a whole month has passed, it's hard to say what level he’s at now.”

“Yeah, that’s right!” Unparalleled Lightning said. “You need to be very careful of him. One of the Half Sage prime elders got in his way, and was defeated in a single move. Then Yang Qi told Ghost Emperor Yama to keep the chancellor occupied while he killed everyone else! In the end, even the chancellor had to admit that Yang Qi was strong enough to do that. Unless a Great Sage is there, he could kill anyone that got in his way. Even Half Sages would be like chickens or dogs to him.”

“Are you serious?” Yun Hailan said. Her eyes turned as cold as ice, and she fairly radiated a frigid aura. “Or is this supposed to be some sick joke? Yang Qi only became a Legendary recently, and he can already slaughter multiple Half Sages? You think he's a character out of a myth or something? And how could he possibly be able to order around Ghost Emperor Yama?”

“If you don’t believe us, Elder Sister Hailan, just look at this. Here’s a water-type energy art recording of the scene he caused. Please, check it out yourself.”

With that, one of the holy neophytes handed over a pearl.

Yun Hailan took it and crushed it, causing a puff of mist to spray out that showed Yang Qi’s arrival, and Ghost Emperor Yama killing Great Sage Quake-Cloud. Afterward, Yang Qi said, “As long as you can kill the chancellor, Ghost Emperor Yama, or at least keep him occupied, then I can kill everyone else.” His words stabbed into her ears like knives, and caused her face to completely drain of blood.

Soon, the mist fell away into nothing, and yet Yang Qi’s words continued to echo in her mind. He sounded even more crazed than the Crown Prince.

‘Such arrogance!’ she thought. However, after a moment passed, she regained her composure. Although she was still shocked, she didn’t let it show on her face. ‘I've begun Operation Azure Heavens, and having communicated with higher heavens, I've increased my power dramatically. But, how could I have guessed that Yang Qi would reach this level!? It seems only the Crown Prince is capable of dealing with him now.’

Keeping such thoughts to herself, she said, “He’s gone completely crazy. Seems to me he must have experienced cultivation deviation. Perhaps he's even under the control of Ghost Emperor Yama. If we don’t get rid of him, then the Demi-Immortal Institute will never see a peaceful day for the rest of its existence. He’ll probably destroy the Rich-Lush Continent as a whole. For the next few days, I’ll travel to the other great institutes to spread the orders of the Crown Prince. I’ll also negotiate with the other chancellors, and convince them to join the effort to wipe out the fiend-devil Yang Qi.”

Master Wind Gentleman nodded repeatedly. “That would definitely be for the best. You’ve obviously thought things through perfectly, Elder Sister.”

“By the way, Elder Sister,” Unparalleled Lightning said fawningly, “you’re currently only a conclave student. Now that you’re a Legendary, do you want to apply to be a holy neophyte? That would definitely earn you much more glory in the institute.”

Without even thinking about the question, Yun Hailan said, “It doesn’t matter. Holy neophyte. Not holy neophyte. What's the difference? Before long, the Crown Prince will be here, and Yang Qi will be dead. The Crown Prince will consolidate his power, and within a few years, he’ll leave the Rich-Lush Continent, and I’ll be the next chancellor. By the way, where’s Yang Susu? Did Yang Qi take her with him too?”

“No, she was taken by two prime elders out into space-time to look for the ancient Spritefolk. But Yang Qi did take Holy Daughter Manyflowers with him.”

“Fine, I understand. Very well, you’re all dismissed! By the way, tell the prime elders to come to me immediately. I have orders from the Crown Prince for them.”

“Yes ma’am.”

With that, she entered the Minorcosm World, and the holy neophytes exchanged awkward, embarrassed glances.

For all intents and purposes, Yun Hailan was already the chancellor of the Demi-Immortal Institute.

Once inside the Minorcosm World, she found herself received by a young woman in black garb and a mask.

Expression flickering, Yun Hailan said, “Well, if it isn’t the chancellor’s daughter, Young Lady Starlight. Is there some reason you’re blocking my path?”

“I saw everything that just happened. Quite impressive, I must say. It’s almost like you’ve already assumed the position of chancellor.” Young Lady Starlight didn’t do anything to hide the biting tone of her words.

“That's right. I’ll be running the Demi-Immortal Institute in a few years. What, you don't like that or something?” Yun Hailan spoke in a very unyielding voice. From the look of it, an altercation might break out at any moment.

“Maybe. Maybe not. Look, Yun Hailan. I know that you have the blood of both a sea god and a dragon god. You also have a special body type. It seems to me that the Crown Prince wants to use your blood to reach out to those two immortal planes, to carry out Operation Azure Heavens. You’re just a tool to him, that’s all.”

“You’re right. The Crown Prince is using me. But what makes you think I can’t do the same to him? I'm a lot stronger than you realize, and I’ve even been touched by immortal-spirits. My destiny is something that would be considered incredible even in ancient times, and I'm going to be a Great Sage soon. Do you really think you’re even close to being on my level? Maybe you are the chancellor’s daughter, but you’ve been stuck at your current level for years now. You actually can’t reach the Great Sage level, can you? You’re stuck where you are for the rest of your life, and will eventually die of old age. In sharp contrast to you, I have unlimited potential.”

Voice thrumming with rage, Young Lady Starlight said, “If that’s what you think, why don’t the two of us have a little contest? Then we can see which of us is actually stronger? What do you say?”

Chapter 316: Dragon World Godpower

“If that’s what you want, fine.” Yun Hailan didn’t seem to be the least bit intimidated by Young Lady Starlight. In fact, she was even willing to get in a fight with her right there in the Minorcosm World.

Instead of making a move, Young Lady Starlight stared intently at Yun Hailan and said, “What makes you think you’re on the same level as me? Unless I'm mistaken, your cultivation base is only in the third Legendary transformation. You’re not even as advanced as Yang Qi; he already reached the fourth transformation. In terms of strength, you’re far beneath me. I could kill you with my pinky finger.”

Yun Hailan’s face remained expressionless. “You can say whatever you want. That doesn’t make it true. If you want to know how strong I actually am, you’ll have to fight me. Not even Yang Qi could do anything to me. The only thing he has going for him is his backer. Besides, he’s bedeviled, so before long, he’s going to start acting like the monster he is. Everyone under heaven already despises him, so when the time comes, the Crown Prince will rid the world of devils and demons by killing him. He’ll also re-seal Ghost Emperor Yama, and thus, save the lives of everyone in the Rich-Lush Continent.”

Young Lady Starlight snorted coldly. “Yang Qi’s a villain, and the Crown Prince is worse of a villain. But you’re more ambitious than either of them. First, you used Yang Qi, now you’re using the Crown Prince. You know, if you keep asking tigers for their skin, the tigers will eventually eat you.”

“Yang Qi’s a dead tiger. I used him before, and now, I’ll use his hatred against him. It actually doesn't matter whether he wins, or the Crown Prince. Either way, I’ll come out on top as the fisherman usually does when the clam and the sandpiper quarrel. My position as the chancellor of the Demi-Immortal Institute is secure no matter what happens.”

“Maybe the Crown Prince will become the chancellor, but it won’t be as simple of a thing for you to succeed him. Mark my words, you might as well forget about it. In fact, I think I’ll teach you a lesson right now that you won’t soon forget!” Without any warning, Young Lady Starlight attacked, sending a streak of starlight directly toward Yun Hailan.

Of course, Young Lady Starlight was a Never-Dying Legendary, whereas Yun Hailan had only just recently reached the Legendary level. Operation Azure Heavens had enabled her to achieve several breakthroughs in a row, but she had eventually petered out at the third Legendary transformation. Although she could pierce through space, she was still vastly below Young Lady Starlight, and theoretically, should have been beaten in a single move.

However, even as Young Lady Starlight attacked, Yun Hailan simply stood there motionless, as though simply waiting to be killed.

Then, when the starlight blade was only about nine meters away from her, just when it seemed like she was about to die, a mysterious power erupted from within her.

RUUUUUMBLE!

An enormous blue dragon of true energy shot out of her, with claws like mountains, and might like that of a sage. In the blink of an eye, it formed a personal domain around Yun Hailan, like a vast blue sea that could drown the universe itself.

RIIIIP!

A dragon claw grabbed the sword of starlight, shattering it into powder. And then, the claw proceeded forward, tearing through Young Lady Starlight’s special Starlight Domain.

POP!

Young Lady Starlight coughed up a mouthful of blood and staggered backward. “That’s not your power, Yun Hailan! What is it?”

“Yang Qi has external power inside him, but that’s because he’s been possessed and taken over by a devil. I'm different. I have the power of dragons in me. A dragon seal. You haven’t offended me, you’ve offended a dragon! A primeval divine dragon! Maybe I could forgive you, but the dragon won’t. Get on your knees immediately.”

Yun Hailan strode forward, and didn't need to do a single thing to draw on the power within her. The enormous dragon swirled about in the Minorcosm World, disturbing winds and clouds alike, almost as if it were a Great Sage.

“That's enough!” a voice called. It was the chancellor, and as soon as he appeared in the open, the primeval dragon was shoved back into Yun Hailan. “You communicated with an immortal plane, a world of dragons, didn’t you? And the will of some ancient dragon picked you to be its representative. Am I right? You have the Dragon Might Seal, and anyone who attacks you, attacks it.”

Yun Hailan backed up a bit, but she still looked confident. “You grace us with your presence, Chancellor. Sorry for any impropriety; your daughter and I were simply giving each other some fighting tips. Sir, why might you have interfered?”

“I didn't interfere, you won,” the chancellor said. “The Dragon Might Seal is equivalent to a Great Sage. Furthermore, that dragon might has been bolstered by some other mysterious power, allowing you to create a boundless sea-based personal domain. It’s the power of a dragon in the sea, isn’t it? If I'm not mistaken, you also have the sealing mark of a sea king in you as well, also from an immortal plane. So, the Crown Prince wants to use your blood to carry out Operation Azure Heavens. With his help, you reached two higher planes, and acquired the approval of two ancient immortal-spirits. With their blessing in the form of the sealing marks, the two of you have become their representatives in this lower plane. You’re missionaries now, aren’t you? Well, that may be the ticket to a quick boost in power right now, but you’ll pay the price later on. You've lost your own will, and can easily be forced into disciplehood by immortals from those higher planes.”

“That’s none of your concern, chancellor. The Crown Prince already knows how to overcome any downsides. He’s already defied heaven by cultivating a secret magic called the Immortal-Slayer's Heart-Chant.”

“What? The Immortal-Slayer’s Heart-Chant?” The chancellor shivered. “That’s a mysterious secret magic from the most ancient of planes. It’s said to be completely heaven-defying, something the host of immortals used to fight against the legion of gods. It's self-destructive, and is designed to destroy great daos. Don’t tell me that such a technique actually exists in this heaven and earth?”

“It does. Of course, I can’t use it, Chancellor, so don’t even ask me to show it to you. After establishing communication with two immortal planes, the Crown Prince acquired the sealing mark, and then used the chant to excise the immortal motes from the sealing marks. Now, they contain only pure power, and aren’t dangerous to me at all. Of course, it's not my power, more like a special tool to use whenever I wish. I'm still working on advancing my own cultivation base.”

“So you and the Crown Prince plan to take out Yang Qi together?” the chancellor asked. “You’ve been a follower of the Crown Prince for a while now, but to what end? Why? Now that you’ve returned, you must have come as a representative of him to see me, correct?”

Eyes glittering, she said, “Correct. The Crown Prince is very dissatisfied with you. You sided with Yang Qi, and in the most critical moment of battle, you gave him the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, all for the sake of maintaining ‘balance’ in the Rich-Lush Continent. But the Crown Prince doesn't want balance. He wants to unite the continent under his rule.”

“Yang Qi did that on his own,” the chancellor replied. “It had nothing to do with favoritism on my part. Furthermore, he has the backing of someone similar to the two of you, making him a representative of an immortal-spirit from a higher plane. He also saved the entire continent, of which I'm sure you’re aware. The truth is that I have been chafing under his oppression. No matter how I tried to hold him back, he continued to achieve breakthrough after breakthrough. Considering all that, the Crown Prince thinks that I've acted unfairly? Well, in that case, you two can go handle him yourself. If it weren’t for my promise to his mother, I wouldn't have done what I did throughout the years. After everything, he acts like he never had any parent here.”

“The Crown Prince is a god from heaven descended into the mortal world,” Yun Hailan said. “He’s paramount, and above all. Of course he has no parents. In the end, it doesn't matter. For now, keep things going the way they are. After the Crown Prince kills Yang Qi, then you’ll hold a formal ceremony announcing to all creation that you’re handing over the position of chancellor to him.”

“You two really think you can kill Yang Qi?” the chancellor said, his brow furrowed. “If I were you, I’d suggest to the Crown Prince to be very careful.”

“He’ll be fine. He’s long since planned everything out. He knows that Yang Qi has backing from a higher plane. That’s why he enacted Operation Azure Heavens, to deal with that very circumstance. Once the Crown Prince uses the Immortal-Slayer's Heart-Chant, he can sever Yang Qi’s connection to that higher plane, at which time he will fully suffer the consequences of all his misdeeds. The Crown Prince will cut him down to size, until he’s like nothing more than a helpless child. At that point, we’ll see if Yang Qi qualifies to act arrogant and domineering.”

Yun Hailan visibly shivered with excitement as she visualized Yang Qi as weak and helpless as an infant.

“Fine then. Go and do as you wish.” The chancellor waved his sleeve, disappearing along with his daughter.

Yun Hailan smiled coldly.

**

“Father,” Young Lady Starlight said, “Yun Hailan has become puffed up with pride very quickly. And she’s ruthlessly ambitious. Why didn’t you punish her?”

“It doesn’t matter. Let the younger generation squabble and fight and scheme and plot. The Demi-Immortal Institute is going to have to go through a lot more chaos before things finally settle down.” Although the chancellor’s words were very telling, he actually had no idea how things were going to turn out.

**

‘Well, now that I've seen Chancellor Demi-Immortal,’ Yun Hailan thought, ‘I guess I’ll head to the Sea God Institute to see the chancellor there. That's where I started out before I was sent as a mole to this institute. Now, there’s no need for all the subterfuge. If the Sea God Institute insists on being stubborn, and refuses to comply with my instructions, then when the Crown Prince returns, he’ll just put them next on the list to wipe out after Yang Qi. They're not important anyway. They think the Crown Prince is an ordinary Great Sage? How could they ever have imagined how terrifying he would become? There’s no way Yang Qi will escape this time.’

Not bothering to meet with the prime elders after all, Yun Hailan blurred into motion toward the Sea God Institute.

**

Far away, the Superheaven Badlands hung in the midst of the chaos of space-time, surrounded by a seemingly endless tempest of demon energy. There was demon fire, demon-dragons, demon-gods, demon-devils, and more, all battering the location, as if to reduce it to rubble.

However, in the depths of the place, an energy stirred that was like that of a god-spirit, or a greater immortal, preventing the harsh winds from entering. And in the middle of it all, was an enormous cocoon formed of true energy, inside of which was the Crown Prince. Above his head were various spatial nexuses, out of which poured the energy of immortal-spirits.

Power from high-level planes coursed into him without cease.

Chapter 317: Immortal Plane

The Crown Prince was currently being besieged by endless demonfire, the result of all sorts of spell formations. And yet, he wasn’t being harmed in any way. In fact, it almost seemed like a tempering of sorts for him.

When the Crown Prince spoke, his voice echoed like thunder. “You should abandon any thoughts of capturing me, Great Sage Shroud-Heaven! I’ve already reached out to the immortal planes, and acquired the sealing marks of immortals. I've severed the psychic connection between you and me, and now I'm a Great Sage, making me completely invincible. Soon, I will unite the Rich-Lush Continent under my rule, and eventually, I’ll come to the Hanging Mountain and take your demon head off your shoulders.”

As he spoke, the images of immortal planes flickered in and out above his head.

He was able to communicate with them because of the so-called Operation Azure Heavens. Not only did it allow him to have access to boundless power, it also gave him incomplete immortal motes, which were gathering to himself to increase his strength even further.

Because of that, the demonfire in the area shrank away from him and didn't dare to touch him.

Soon, the power of the fire began to fade, and he emerged from the cocoon.

Looking out into the far distance, he could see the curved heaven and flat earth that was the Rich-Lush Continent and its greyspace. He could see the Planar Pearl at the very peak of the greyspace, and the primal chaos vital energy beneath the continent, as well as all the countless terrain features of the lands.

‘So, Yang Qi actually saved the plane. From that alone, it's obvious that he has a spectacular, almighty backer. Sadly for him, that backer can’t enter the continent in person. Most likely, his backer is just trying to turn him into a puppet.’ Cold light flickered in the Crown Prince’s eyes, as though he were making a calculation of some sort.

‘It doesn’t matter. The first thing I’ll do upon returning is kill Yang Qi, ferret out the truth of his backer, and take his power for my own.

‘Then, I’ll unite the Demi-Immortal, True Dragon, Sun Moon and Sea God Institutes under my authority. At that point, I’ll rule the world.’

With that, he waved his hand to extinguish the final remnants of the demonfire.

‘The most powerful institute in the Quake-Dawn Continent, the fabled Quake-Dawn Cathedral, will soon be mine as well. For now, I need them to keep the chancellors in check. Among all the Great Sages in the Rich-Lush Continent, Chancellor Demi-Immortal is the strongest, and also the most mysterious. I can’t believe he actually helped Yang Qi, and foiled my plans to get the Grand Emperor's Pagoda. Thanks to that, I was injured by that trashy Young Master Shroud-Heaven. What an utter humiliation.’

All the Crown Prince could think about was how to slash down anyone who stood in his way along the path to glory.

‘I’ve already awoken part of my true will. I am an almighty being from an immortal plane, something rare in all creation. Considering the being I represent, no one can possibly be a match for me. Even the Yore-Wilds Continent itself could be considered nothing in my eyes.’

Even his mere thoughts caused everything to shake, and the plane he occupied to sink downward.

**

Yang Qi was currently in the Rich-Lush Continent, cultivating with the help of the Ballad of the Dao Testimonial. Many days had passed, and the appointed time for the final duel approached. Everyone in the continent was waiting with bated breath.

Of course, Yang Qi had no idea exactly when the Crown Prince would actually return. Therefore, although he allowed himself to seek enlightenment with the Ballad of the Dao Testimonial, he still kept some attention focused outward. The process of working with the ballad felt like connecting with some immensely powerful spirit, and the more time that passed, the more that it seemed that the spirit represented the only truth in the world. That spirit being was the entity that had created the Ballad of the Dao Testimonial, a sovereign being who could lord it over heaven and earth, who could create natural law, and was virtually invincible.

Yang Qi felt like he absolutely had to exercise faith in that great dao, and become a true disciple.

At the same time, he managed to keep his own thoughts clear in his sea of consciousness. He knew that the Ballad of the Dao Testimonial was a tool being used by some immortal to try to gain faith and followers. If that immortal could convert an entire plane to its worshipers, and then help them to spread further out into the universe, it would be a path to immense power.

Any other person would already have succumbed. But not Yang Qi. He was using the Ballad of the Dao Testimonial to directly contend with the will of that immensely powerful immortal. By doing so, he could temper his own spirit, and hopefully, reach the next highest level of enlightenment.

The fluctuations of a great dao swept to and fro over him, and pulses of immortal energy emerged from the top of his head, to the point that they were visible to the naked eye. It was almost as if he were connecting to some unknown natural law, and that the immortal energy was connecting to his soul itself.

‘The valiant go into the mountains even though they know tigers lurk therein?’ Nie Chaoguang thought as he looked on coldly. ‘This guy is strong, but I can’t believe that he intentionally wanted to cultivate using the Ballad of the Dao Testimonial, all to provoke his soul and cultivation base, and achieve a breakthrough. Doesn't he know that it's playing with fire? The Ballad of the Dao Testimonial can be used to communicate with a mysterious immortal plane. Once he does that, the will of a mighty immortal will enter his sea of consciousness and brainwash him. He couldn't possibly fight back. Even Great Sages are like absolutely nothing compared to immortals, and this guy is only a wimpy Legendary.”

Of course, Nie Chaoguang didn’t dare to do anything tricky; he knew that Yang Qi’s energy field could crush him out of existence in the blink of an eye.

Anyone other than a Great Sage would be forced to bow and scrape to Yang Qi now.

However, Nie Chaoguang simply couldn’t wait to see the will of the immortal take over Yang Qi and force him to become a disciple. He would become the most powerful disciple Nie Chaoguang had come across so far, and in fact, he was fairly certain the immortal would reward him because of it.

That thought caused his eyes to glitter brightly.

**

Suddenly Yang Qi’s eyes snapped open, including the Lord's Eye, which sent a beam of light stabbing high into the sky, where a door suddenly appeared.

It was immense, the type that seemed could never be opened for all eternity. It was bronze, covered with spots of age and rust, and emanated the most ancient of auras. However, as soon as the light of the Lord's Eye touched it, the door cracked open.

Bam!

The platform Yang Qi sat on was reduced to rubble, and Yanhaven itself was affected, almost as if by an earthquake, which caused numerous buildings to sway back and forth.

“Be suppressed!”

Porcelain sagelight erupted out, a manifestation of Yang Qi’s mighty power that instantly quelled the vibrations shaking Yanhaven.

He had established a connection with the immortal plane.

‘The brat’s playing with fire,’ Ghost Emperor Yama thought, looking up into the space-time wormhole up above. In the depths of that door was a flickering light that was powerful enough to eradicate Great Sages. ‘Can he really communicate with a higher heaven using only his own will? And can he actually defeat the will of an immortal?’

It was obviously an impossibility for ordinary folk to do such a thing when dealing with the Ballad of the Dao Testimonial. Whatever immortal had created the song must have been shocked at the strength of Yang Qi’s soul, and then directly taken control of his will to make him into a disciple.

After all, a disciple like him would be more terrifyingly strong than any other disciple from the mortal realm.

‘This is the so-called will of an immortal?’ Yang Qi thought. ‘Are you kidding me? So, you think you can enslave me and turn me into your disciple? Guess what? I used the Ballad of the Dao Testimonial to draw you out for training purposes. You’re like a training dummy!’

The light from the Lord's Eye turned into a godly beam that carried Yang Qi’s will into the enormous bronze door.

RUUUUUMBLE!

A moment later, a mountain-crushing, sea-shattering sound erupted from the bronze door, like millions of explosions all occurring at the same time. Thankfully, Yang Qi had already thought to protect Yanhaven, otherwise it would have been wiped off the map, turned into either lava or ash.

The bronze door was actually a space-time wormhole leading to an immortal plane, and not even Ghost Emperor Yama could have entered it if he tried. It was sealed tightly by the magical laws of the plane it led to.

However, Yang Qi had offended the mighty immortal who had created the Ballad of the Dao Testimonial, and in that entity’s fury, it wanted to enter the world, enslave Yang Qi, and destroy everything else in his plane of existence.

To such an immortal, the people of lower planes like the Rich-Lush Continent were essentially bugs. And for a bug to use the Ballad of the Dao Testimonial to try to establish contact in this way was blasphemy.

It was a complete, utter humiliation, like a mighty emperor suddenly being slapped across the face by a beggar.

Without any warning, the space-time wormhole suddenly opened fully.

POP!

The bronze door turned into a meteor, shooting downward as fast as lightning, moving more quickly than anyone could comprehend. In the blink of an eye, it was on top of Yang Qi’s head, about to smash into him.

RIIIIP!

Suddenly, bronze light spread out to cover Yang Qi’s body. At the same time, his aura became different, as though he had been possessed by some ancient god-spirit.

‘That’s…!’ Ghost Emperor Yama’s eyes went wide. ‘A god from heaven descended into the mortal world! He’s been inhabited by some reincarnated being who will destroy any who blaspheme it. Either that, or he’s been transformed into a slave! Hold on. Now it makes sense. That must be what happened to the Crown Prince’s mother, the Holy Daughter of the Quake-Dawn Cathedral. She angered an immortal and then ended up pregnant as a result.’

Chapter 318: The Will of an Immortal

Immortal will had filled Yang Qi.

The magical laws of an ancient plane turned the bronze door into a meteor that shot down and entered his sea of consciousness to take him over. It was a very dangerous moment, as the slightest mistake on Yang Qi’s part would involve his soul perishing. He would be parasitized, and most likely turned into a slavish disciple of an entity from a higher plane.

Even Ghost Emperor Yama with his vastly higher cultivation base wouldn’t take such a dangerous risk.

Yang Qi was weaker than him by a hundred times over, so the fact that he was doing this was mind-boggling.

‘Good,’ Nie Chaoguang thought. ‘Excellent. He offended the immortal who created the Ballad of the Dao Testimonial. Anyone who could create a song like that is obviously a paragon entity in creation, making us bugs in comparison. And if you mess with beings from high-level planes, aren’t you courting death?’

He was excited, but also trepidatious, so he rose to leave the platform in the hopes of avoiding being hurt by what was to come.

However, even as he leaped into motion, Yang Qi waved his hand, leaving him stuck in midair.

“Stay,” Yang Qi said in a booming voice. “You’re the missionary of this great immortal, aren’t you? I want you to see how I fight this immortal will.”

A look of terror overtook Nie Chaoguang’s face. “How could this be happening? Didn’t the immortal’s will enter you?”

“Enter me? Just look and see. It’s not like I can’t fight back. My sovereign will can dominate anything and everything. My soul is eternally indestructible, and comes from the Sovereign Lord. I will not exercise faith in any living being. I am a Lord who exists above all. The legion of gods gives me glory, and I support the legion of gods.”

As he spoke, his voice grew louder and louder, and at the same time, he began to float up into the air above the platform. Then, he took a step forward, and cracks spread out in the air around his foot.

As he did, countless expressions of will streamed out to cover him, accompanied by a most ancient of voices: “Acknowledge allegiance to me! Acknowledge allegiance! I’ll give you an immortal destiny. You’ll have immeasurable power! You can help spread my glory to beings on countless other planes!”

“Screw the hell off!” Yang Qi said, his voice grimly cold, like the sovereign lord of anything and everything.

“Yang Qi,” the other voice said, “you have profaned my will, and you have blasphemed against my glory. Now, you will be forever shackled….” Clanking sounds could be heard as bronze chains began to wrap around him, sealing him, even piercing his flesh and blood to enter his bones, meridians and sea of energy.

The will of the immortal was putting on a show of great might.

RUUUUUMBLE!

Inside of Yang Qi’s sea of consciousness was an enormous, bronze entity, like a god, whose hand was reaching out to rip his soul apart. His bronze skin was covered with a dense network of complex designs, all of which pulsed with a sensation of ultimate power. This was the immortal whose will had created the Ballad of the Dao Testimonial, and his fists and feet could shatter worlds. His rage could cause stars to fall, and could fill the void with brilliance and glory.

Meanwhile, a representation of Yang Qi also appeared in the depths of his sea of consciousness. He was much smaller than the bronze giant, but he had an elephantine head and a human body.

He was a godmammoth, and he was much smaller than his opponent, but his substructure glistened with radiance, with his Angel Wings behind him. He looked like he had just stepped out of hell, but at the same time, abounded with holy glory and mightiness.

However, the radiance, glory, and mightiness were secondary to the aura of purity that spread out from him.

It was a pure energy that seemed separated from all other things, something that could create an eternal kingdom. It was a paradise that could contain all types of living beings. It was the aura of the God Legion Paradise.

According to the legends, the God Legion Paradise was the location of the ultimate radiance and light, and of utmost holiness. Back before the destruction of countless universes and creations, the legion of gods had created it to be a safe haven for all living beings. It was a never-ceasing temple to their glory.

Yang Qi had succeeded with the Five-Phases Transformation and the Yin-Yang Transformation, and had perfectly combined yin and yang with the five phases. He also had the Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragment, and plenty of true energy. The only thing he had lacked was enlightenment, and the proper stimulation. However, as the saying went, place someone on a field of death, and he will fight to live. And thus, he summoned the will of an ancient immortal to contend with.

The struggle finally stimulated his true energy in the proper way, and he knew that a key moment in the development of the God Legion Paradise had arrived. The next few moments in the fight would determine whether or not he could succeed. Could he defy heaven, and then use that heaven-defying will to defeat the immortal?

“Despicable worm!” the bronze immortal shouted inside his head. This was a contest of pure will, without energy arts, magical treasures or the like.

The bronze immortal unleashed a fist strike on Yang Qi’s godmammoth form, sending intense psychic fluctuations to fill his sea of consciousness like an explosion.

“Metadimensional Greyspace!” The godmammoth’s trunk swished about, causing a porcelain manifestation of radiance and light to spring up, which was none other than a multi-layered greyspace. Not only was his sea of consciousness repaired by it, but there were numerous metadimensions and alternate dimensions that sprang up to suck away the residual power.

“Not bad,” said the will of the bronze immortal. “Surprisingly, you've harnessed the power of metadimensional greyspace. So, you want to form a personal domain? Sadly, you won't succeed. You’re no match for me; your will is simply too weak. Prepare to be destroyed!”

The will of this bronze immortal could exterminate ancient powers and slaughter everything in existence. And as he struck out with his fist, he shattered layer after layer of the greyspace, and crushed the metadimensions into fragments. In the blink of an eye, Yang Qi’s sea of consciousness was thrown into a state of primal-chaos, focusing mostly on the godmammoth. And at the same time, immortal skills were unleashed in devastating fashion.

Bam!

Suddenly, the Infernal Deity Spear appeared in the hand of the godmammoth, and it thrummed with heaven motes as it struck the incoming fist.

Cricking and cracking sounds rang out as, in utterly shocking fashion, the godmammoth began to fall apart as surely as a destroyed roof tile. However, Yang Qi’s will remained strong. “This is my sea of consciousness, so as long as I'm not destroyed, my will remains eternal.”

The godmammoth formed back together and once again lunged forward to fight the bronze immortal.

The immortal seemed to be building momentum, as if he desired nothing more in the world than to thoroughly crush Yang Qi beneath his feet. “Despicable thing. Maybe this is your sea of consciousness, but I can still destroy it. You think you can heal it from my attacks? We're fighting on your home ground, which means that all the damage hurts you. Stop this senseless fighting. You’ve cultivated my Ballad of the Dao Testimonial, and thus, you are destined to serve me. As my disciple, you will spread faith of me throughout the lower planes.

“Dao-Cracking form!”

Even as the words left the immortal’s mouth, he threw his hands wide, and massive cracks spread out in all directions in Yang Qi’s sea of consciousness, until it seemed like it might shatter.

However, Yang Qi’s will surged, and his spear became a streak of light that stabbed into the bronze immortal’s hand.

“Dao-Severing form!”

The bronze immortal unleashed another fist strike, which caused the Infernal Deity Spear to bend like a bow, its golden designs snapping and shattering.

“Ying Yang; Five Phases. True Energy God Incarnation!” Yang Qi in godmammoth form focused his will, and even as the Infernal Deity Spear shattered, numerous spatial fluctuations began to roll off it, as though a paradise were about to appear.

As the battle continued, Yang Qi’s personal domain began to take shape further.

“Dao-Shattering form!”

The bronze immortal didn’t seem to be worried at how fiercely Yang Qi was fighting back. He launched another fist strike, which seemed capable of shattering great daos. A psychic tempest rolled out that seemed capable of destroying the universe, much less Yang Qi’s sea of consciousness.

POP!

Blood began to ooze out of Yang Qi’s physical eyes, ears, nose and mouth. Clearly, that last move had done some significant damage to his sea of consciousness.

Ghost Emperor Yama shook his head at the sight. ‘Not good. That crazy brat can’t hold out. Unfortunately, not even I can interfere. That immortal’s will is just too terrifying, and would wreak havoc even on me. Maybe I could expel it, but I would lose too much of my soul essence. Besides, he said I couldn’t interfere. I guess I’ll wait until he’s fully possessed, then save him. That will definitely count as me winning. Although, why hasn’t that God Legion Seal done anything? Don’t tell me that it's not working?’

All of a sudden, Ghost Emperor Yama’s eyes flickered with killing intent toward Yang Qi. If it weren’t for the God Legion Seal, he would have killed Yang Qi a long time ago, absorbed his soul, taken his memories, and crushed him like a bug.

Pop!

Just when it seemed like Yang Qi was about to lose, and even as blood poured out of him, porcelain sagelight suddenly surrounded him.

It instantly purified the blood, and transformed Yang Qi into something incomparably holy. As he hovered cross-legged in the air, dimensional representations of elemental fays appeared, in the form of magical symbols, holy light, angels, and the like. In something like an explosion of fireworks, they created palaces, mountains, rivers, and a starry sky. It was like a mural depicting a plane itself, and at the same time, an enormous personal domain.

In the middle of the domain was the huge bronze immortal, who was lashing about with fists and feet to destroy the palaces and other terrain features around him.

What was happening in Yang Qi’s sea of consciousness was now being projected outside of him by means of true energy.

“Yore-Wilds Battle Mural….” he murmured. Instantly, the fragmented images that made up the Yore-Wilds Battle Mural erupted from his dantian region, and entered the projection, making his personal domain stronger and mightier than before.

In that moment, the bronze immortal suddenly found it difficult to move.

Chapter 319: Godly Might of the Paradise

Yang Qi was throwing caution to the wind.

He desperately wanted to form his God Legion Paradise, to seemingly turn what was illusory into what was real. Therefore, he was converging true energy into the sea of consciousness in his forehead, in the hopes of forming his personal domain. The domain was the fusion of one’s psychic aspect with one's flesh and blood; when it formed, it contained one's soul and one’s will.

The personal domain was true energy and will combined, birthed of the sea of consciousness. With it, all one had to do was think of something, and it could be conjured in one’s personal domain.

It was the true manifestation of one’s heart and spirit.

As for this bronze immortal, he was so powerful that he was capable of directly damaging Yang Qi’s sea of consciousness. Each blow he struck was devastating, and Yang Qi had no way to deal with it in his current state. All he could do was go all out, and try to summon his personal domain, even though it wasn’t complete. After all, this situation was extremely dangerous, and if he failed, he would end up dead.

Keeping the fight going only in his sea of consciousness would not be as dangerous. In contrast, if he summoned his personal domain, it would involve both his soul and fleshly body.

If he lost the fight in his sea of consciousness, then his body would be taken over, and his soul sealed. However, that always left the possibility open that he could recover one day.

However, if he lost the fight with his personal domain, then his soul and his body would be destroyed, and he would never have a chance to recover.

But Yang Qi was ambitious.

When he did something, he didn't hold back. And thus, he was using the fight with the bronze immortal to try to force the completion of his personal domain, the God Legion Paradise.

Thankfully, he had an advantage in the Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragment.

The red light that shone from that fragment could devastate even the will of a Great Sage, and as it rose up in his half-formed personal domain, it was like a burning sun in the Yore-Wilds Battle Mural, shining down onto the Yore-Wilds of old. In the blink of an eye, it began to eat away at the bronze immortal.

It was almost as if, within the battle mural, Yang Qi was inside the sun, fighting the immortal, surrounding it with countless projected images of the Yore-Wilds.

The immortal destroyed one image after another, each blow of which caused some of Yang Qi’s true energy to disperse. The immortal shattered the images of the Yore-Wilds without hesitation, as if he wanted to make his own world in its stead.

“Grand Emperor’s Pagoda!”

Yang Qi’s true energy spread out to lock down the space around the pagoda, then used it to begin forming greyspace, which was the shell of his personal domain. Once it was complete, the framework for the domain would be finished.

With the Grand Emperor's Pagoda and the Heaven-Dominating Golden Swordbreaker, Yang Qi faced the bronze immortal and began to fight with more fury.

By this point, the bronze immortal was not an expression of will, but a real form, a clone made from vital energy and the quintessence of a martial path.

“Dao-Extermination form!”

RUUUUUMBLE!

The bronze immortal unleashed his most powerful move yet, spreading his arms wide and then crushing them together. Everything began to shrink down, and all the land beneath him transformed into dust, crushed by the power of space.

The light of the Grand Emperor's Pagoda faded, and the pagoda itself began to shake violently, as if it might collapse.

Yang Qi didn't seem afraid at all, and swung his swordbreaker with full force, causing a river of gold to sweep toward the bronze immortal.

“Dao-Opening form!”

The immortal stomped his foot onto the ground, causing crevices to open up, and a wild wind to sweep through Yang Qi’s forming domain. Raising his hands over his head, the immortal smashed them down, tearing open a huge rift, and causing magical laws to go into chaos. Waves of earth, water, fire and wind spread out, causing Yang Qi to cough up a mouthful of blood.

“Just die, will you?!” the immortal shouted. Spitting out a stream of vital energy, he shrank space, ensuring that no obstacles could interfere as he sent mountain-like force crushing down toward Yang Qi’s head.

Bam!

The Heaven-Dominating Golden Swordbreaker blocked the move, but instantly went dim, its golden power forced to retreat inside of it. Its spell formations and warding magics were so damaged that it obviously couldn't be used again any time soon.

‘Time to go for broke,’ Yang Qi thought. Shaking his head as his wounds began to heal, he yet again summoned his partial domain.

“This is all futile!” the bronze immortal shouted. “Give me control of your soul! Become my missionary! Spread faith of me through all creation, and I will bless you!”

Clenching his hand into a fist, he punched out.

“Dao-Corroboration form!”

The instant his fist made contact with Yang Qi’s true energy, it started a chain reaction.

Bam. Bam. Bam. Bam. Bam. Bam! Bam!! BAM!!!

The true energy began to explode, and his meridians, sea of energy, acupoints, five viscera and six bowels all began to detonate. His face drained of blood as he staggered backward. And yet, no matter how he retreated, how could he avoid the will of an immortal?

“Soul Appropriation!”

The bronze immortal turned into a shining field of light that swept forth to wrap up Yang Qi, until he was like a wriggling bronze cocoon.

“Crap, he lost!” Ghost Emperor Yama blurted, shooting to his feet and preparing to take action. “You’ve been beaten, punk! Admit it! Seems you finally need me to save you. However, why did the God Legion Seal fail to come to your rescue? Is it weak? Or did it leave you? Why exactly have you been boasting so much in front of me without it? Well, in that case, I won't save you. I’ll expel the will of that bronze immortal, and then finally absorb you like I’ve always wanted to!”

Devil energy suddenly raged around Ghost Emperor Yama. “Your sworn brothers and sisters, your friends and family, all of them will soon be my puppets! They’ll be an army of zombies for my use!”

Laughing maniacally, he reached out toward Yang Qi.

However, in the moment he laid hands on him, dazzling golden light suddenly erupted from the bronze cocoon, accompanied by the frenzied scream of the immortal. “What’s that!? That’s not the power of a human! Nor is it the power of an immortal! That's power from the legion of gods. Dear lord! How could your soul have something like that in it?!”

RUUUUUMBLE!

A stream of golden flame began to melt the bronze immortal into nothing; clearly, he had finally crossed a line he should not have crossed, and was suffering the wrath of the legion of gods.

Meanwhile, Ghost Emperor Yama’s hand was still touching Yang Qi.

Golden light stabbed through his hand, catching it on fire. He was a Great Sage, and had a powerful devil physique, and yet the golden light met no resistance. In fact, the flames raged so violently that, in the blink of an eye, his arm was transformed into ash. And the flames continued to spread!

“Not good! It's the legion of gods! I'm going to die! No. I can't die here! Why did I have to make a move on Yang Qi?”

Ghost Emperor Yama was going virtually crazy with regret at what he had done.

“Hellish Transmigration; Primeval Infernal Deity; Swap Life for Life; Ten Thousand Years of Longevity!” In that moment, he quickly called on a primeval secret magic, burning his own life force to gain access to immense power, which he used to craft a new version of himself. Even as the old version burned away into nothing, he switched places.

Then, he watched as his old body became nothing more than ash.

His face was ashen as he reveled in the sensation of having just escaped death. “The God Legion Seal. The God Legion Seal is still there…. Dear lord. I almost died. If I hadn’t acted quickly, and used that rebirth magic, I would have been destroyed! Dammit, my cultivation base and lifespan were both severely damaged!”

With every moment that passed, Ghost Emperor Yama felt more regret that he had made a move on Yang Qi.

He had tried to steal a chicken only to end up losing the rice he used to lure it.

Now, he could only stare as the bronze immortal and his bronze glory were absorbed by Yang Qi. Meanwhile, countless beams of sagelight and magical symbols spread out like rainbows around Yang Qi, turning the surrounding area into a holy land.

A glowing dimension was taking shape around him.

In the moment that Yang Qi exterminated the will of the bronze immortal, he gained significant enlightenment of numerous magical laws of space, as well as of yin, yang, and the five phases.

As he did, the enlightenment caused the space around him to burn with fire as it became purified.

This was the initial state of the Personal-Domain Transformation.

Something like a ray of sunlight shot out into his personal domain, turning it into an expression of the Yore-Wilds of old.

“To form one’s personal domain,” Ghost Emperor Yama murmured, “one needs a powerful magical treasure, core, or nascent divinity to exercise control over it. And he has the Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragment. With that as the focus of his domain, how strong will it be? Isn’t he afraid of the power levels? If the Yore-Wilds’ Heart fought back against him, wouldn’t it destroy his domain?”

After yet another grievous loss, Ghost Emperor Yama was finally convinced that he couldn’t do anything to Yang Qi.

The Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragment was now set into the greyspace of his personal domain. As Yang Qi’s true energy continued to form the geometric dimensional segments of the greyspace, they all thrummed with the power of the Yore-Wilds. With that power, he could fully realize his personal domain.

The fight and victory over the bronze immortal had given him plenty of enlightenment.

Now, he needed to use the techniques of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth to fuse the various dimensional aspects together, and then complete his domain. When that happened, he would fully step into the sixth Legendary transformation.

Now, he just needed a bit more time.

Chapter 320: Sixth Legendary Transformation

Just like that, the will of an immortal vanished, and Yang Qi incited the power of the God Legion Seal.

The truth was that, moments ago, when the will of the immortal wrapped him up, he actually had plenty of energy left to fight. However, he had intentionally enticed the will of the immortal into his forehead so that it would encounter the God Legion Seal.

There was no way the God Legion Seal would allow the will of an immortal to stir up trouble in its presence. In fact, the God Legion Seal hadn’t even fully activated; it had only stirred, sending out a bit of golden light into his sea of consciousness that was more than enough to vanquish the will of the immortal and seriously injure Ghost Emperor Yama.

Yang Qi closed his eyes and focused inwardly, and realized that somehow, the God Legion Seal seemed more powerful than before, and the golden imp seemed larger and more complete. As his cultivation base improved, it was as if golden light from somewhere out in the void was collecting into the golden imp.

Just as Ghost Emperor Yama had speculated, the God Legion Seal had actually been broken at some point in the past, and was resting within Yang Qi to recover and recuperate.

Once he reached a certain extremely high level in his cultivation, the seal would not only become complete, Yang Qi would also receive the full blessing of the legion of gods, and could give rise to countless planes of existence, breathe life or death into the universe, and illuminate anything and everything.

Deep within the seal were countless magical laws of the gods, to the point where not even Yang Qi knew the extent of their secrets.

He had the feeling that, eventually, the seal would become strong enough to leave him.

Therefore, he needed to work hard at his cultivation, and break through all obstacles that got in his way. One day, he wouldn’t have the God Legion Seal to rely on, and would be forced to face everything alone.

In any case, his current goal was to complete the God Legion Paradise.

And thus it took form, backed by his soul, true energy, will, psychic power, nascent divinity, and everything else that made up his essence.

One day passed. Ten days. A month.

Slowly but surely, his personal domain grew more and more complete. The beehive that was the greyspace of the domain looked almost like porcelain tiles, covered with magical inscriptions. Each line of text described the glory of the legion of gods, although not even Yang Qi was able to understand it all. It was a product of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, and the process of completion was mysterious to the extreme, the same way that the work of a master blacksmith would seem incomprehensible to an outsider when he forged a powerful sword.

At the same time, countless elemental fays appeared, their fluttering wings causing the greyspace to tremble as they imparted to it the power of space-time tempests. Also within the domain was the Hellfire Crucible, which burned with porcelain flame of intense heat.

“The Hell Portal uses the blood of devil-gods to forge the pure land of the legion of gods; the God Legion Paradise is built upon the corpses of the horde of devils; only by eradicating the hellish devils can anything be pure; eternal radiance and light will illuminate everything from the ancient to the future.”

Yang Qi was currently reciting a scripture as he sent the Hell Portal into the depths of the personal domain, and then began to summon fiend-devils.

“What’s that!?” Nie Chaoguang gasped, his eyes wide. To his shock, an enormous giant snake from the Hell of Nagas appeared, a Half Sage with nine heads, and a body that pulsed with immense power.

It was the exact same giant snake that had attacked them not too long ago in the space-time wormhole, and yet, Yang Qi was summoning it to act as simple fuel for his Hellfire Crucible.

After experiencing the Hellfire Crucible, the giant snake was reduced to a devil core, a dragonpearl that Yang Qi set into the greyspace of his domain.

Next were hellish fiend-devils, asuras, bronzeblaze fiend-devils, rageflame devils, six-armed silver-devils, eight-headed gold-devils, euphoric true-devils, bloodshadow ghost-devils… and more. Yang Qi summoned them with impunity and reduced them to corpses, which he then used to bolster the God Legion Paradise.

During the month which passed, it was impossible to say how many fiend-devils he used.

His Hell Portal had become almost completely real, like an ancient structure made of stone, infused with the five phases, and yin and yang. It was a true magical treasure, which he could use to summon extremely powerful fiend-devils even from distant planes.

Fiend-devils from hell, fiend-devils flying in the void, and even fiend-devils in hell monsoons could all be targeted. As long as they weren’t powerful Great Sages, he could grab them.

Even low-level Great Sage fiend-devils weren’t really frightening to him, and could be defeated with some fighting.

He summoned a glittering, golden devil, who existed in a state of liquid metal, similar to the powers of the golden swordbreaker. It was none other than a golden paleo-devil from the Hell of Melting Gold.

Zzzzzap!

Supposedly, the Heaven-Dominating Golden Swordbreaker had been forged by a Great Sage of the past, in the Hell of Melting Gold. Therefore, using the power of the golden swordbreaker in his domain, he drained the golden paleo-devil of all of its golden power.

Yang Qi snatched countless fiend-devils out in the void, each of them with their own powers and characteristics. Each and every hellish plane was similar to an immortal plane, and in fact, many of them were more powerful.

Unfortunately, because he wasn’t at the Great Sage level, he couldn’t reach the true depths of hell to summon the most powerful devil-gods.

As for the fiend-devils he was currently able to summon, they had pure bloodlines from hell, but were not actually born in hellish planes. Most were born in hell monsoons, and were, at best, infant devils.

True fiend-devils were so powerful that even Great Sages who faced them in hell would be nothing more than cannon fodder.

During the month that went by, Ghost Emperor Yama worked hard to heal his vital energy. Slowly but surely, his countenance turned less ashen. ‘With that God Legion Seal there, those people from the Quake-Dawn Cathedral are in for some trouble.’

Now, all he could do was wait until Yang Qi finished with his personal domain. Of course, he didn’t dare to interfere. This was the second time he had nearly died as a result of Yang Qi, and therefore, he feared the God Legion Seal more than ever. Never again would he take such a risk. And he had also resigned himself to losing Great Sage Quake-Cloud’s sage motes.

‘So, to finish his personal domain, he needs to use the corpses and souls of numerous fiend-devils. Well, that certainly conforms to the will of the legion of gods. A pure paradise can only be built upon destruction. With the Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragment as the source of power for his domain, it will be eternally stable. However, it will be hard to complete and then control. Although, I guess he’ll need something like that to deal with the Crown Prince. He’s got to reach the sixth Legendary transformation, or die trying. The Crown Prince is a Great Sage, which is just too much of a level discrepancy. Not even the strongest magical treasure would help him. However, if he pushes the Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragment for all its worth, he might have what it takes.

‘I guess I’ll just have to wait. It’s already been two months, so the Crown Prince should be back soon. It's going to be an epic fight, and it’s hard to say who will win in the end.’

As the fiend-devil corpses piled up, the pure paradise continued to take shape, with the Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragment as its source of power.

Of course, Yang Qi couldn’t actually draw on the full level of power within the heart fragment. If he could, then not even a Great Sage could be a match for him. After all, it had taken nine Great Sages working together to draw the heart fragment out into the open, and they had ended up coughing up masses of blood. From that it could be told how powerful the fragment was.

Within his domain, the heart shone like the glorious sun, making it extremely difficult to fully fuse with the greyspace.

‘It’s time to use my sagely-grade spirit stones. Ignite!’

With that, he threw forth all such spirit stones that he possessed, releasing an immense amount of power that he sent directly toward the Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragment.

In the blink of an eye, dozens of pulsing streams of light filled the domain, which shot toward the burning-red Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragment, and then caused its light to fuse the pure land around it.

Instantly, the God Legion Paradise, and the honeycomb-like greyspace that covered it, began to emanate the aura of the ancient gods. At the same time, it was almost possible to hear those gods quietly reciting ancient scriptures.

A moment later, an image of a host of gods could be seen within the God Legion Paradise.

At long last, the God Legion Seal had sent out an actual image of the legion of gods. Without a legion of gods, how could the domain be called the God Legion Paradise?

“Heaven and earth are indistinguishable, the sun and moon sink to the depths; the light of the legion of gods penetrates the void; paradise of reincarnation, eternal life and eternal lives!” Yang Qi catalyzed all of the blood quintessence within him, imbuing it into the pure land around him. As he did, in the middle of the domain, a godmammoth appeared, a spear in hand which it could use to stab to the depths of hell. A host of devils lay beneath its feet as it propped up the legion of gods on its back.

The power of the godmammoths could crush the void, could dominate ghosts and gods, and could rout all devil kings.

RUUUUUMBLE!

Intense explosions could be heard within the pure land, as vital energy rifts opened up, space-time wormholes that unleashed masses of tribulation water to drown the domain.

It was real water, as black as ink, and wherever it went, it turned the radiance and light into pure darkness. Any person who that water touched would be infected and corroded into nothing.

“Jambudvīpa Deluge!” Ghost Emperor Yama blurted in shock. “What is that doing here? That's a tribulation for the Great Sage level, when your cultivation reaches the level of understanding the magical laws of time. I was almost drowned by it. It’s the kind of tribulation that can destroy the world and drown the void. I even lost some sage motes to it. How could a Jambudvīpa Deluge be unleashed on him when he's merely working on his personal domain?”

Ghost Emperor Yama was absolutely correct. This was the fierce Jambudvīpa Deluge that normally assailed Great Sages.

In the stories, during the time of the ancient legion of gods, when it was time for the world to end, it would come in the form of the Jambudvīpa Deluge. It would roil forth from the lowest of planes, rising higher and higher until it could cover even the immortal planes. In fact, it was even possible for it to reach the halls of heaven, where the legion of gods resided.

Eventually, the world would become filled with nothing but waves of darkness, which would destroy everything.

In the following epoch, the water would recede, and the world could begin anew.

Chapter 321: Prologue to the Final Battle

Jambudvīpa Deluge had arrived, and the sight of it caused Nie Chaoguang’s pupils to dilate.

Back in the Spirit Origin Association in the Quake-Dawn Continent, he had seen top experts face Jambudvīpa Deluge during their tribulations.

It was a tribulation that could destroy sage motes, and in fact, Nie Chaoguang had even seen some of those top experts sink into it. It was a tribulation water that could dissolve the void and visit death by drowning up those who faced it.

The water would emerge from nowhere and fill up the domain of the person facing the tribulation. And a person could not simply abandon their domain any more than they could abandon their head. Not without dying. After all, the personal domain was an extension of a person’s mind and body.

And now, Jambudvīpa Deluge was filling Yang Qi’s personal domain, covering over the legion of gods, and turning everything pitch black.

“Everyone get back!” Ghost Emperor Yama warned. “If the Jambudvīpa Deluge breaks out into the open, then everything for hundreds of kilometers will be melted into nothing. Not even I could stop it. That water can melt sage motes! How did Yang Qi manage to piss off heaven this much? Is it because his magical laws are too strong? All he did was reach the sixth Legendary transformation! He should be facing tribulation lightning, but instead it's the Jambudvīpa Deluge that Great Sages usually face.”

Nie Chaoguang didn't hesitate to fly as far away as he could.

Meanwhile, Ghost Emperor Yama flew up into the air and looked down at Yang Qi’s personal domain, which now seemed like a mass of inky darkness. He couldn't see anything inside; the greyspace was being corroded, making it seem as fragile as an eggshell. From what he could tell, it would be only moments before the greyspace exploded, and Jambudvīpa Deluge water exploded out in all directions.

However, that was when Ghost Emperor Yama realized that Yang Qi was still there in the tribulation water. He hadn’t been melted, and in fact, was actually glowing with brilliant light. It was almost as if he were seeping himself in the water, absorbing its nutrients through his skin, and experiencing a baptism. It was like he was absorbing energy from heaven and all creation.

‘His flesh and blood already surpass that of a Great Sage. He’s so strong! Technically, I could beat him, but an ordinary Great Sage definitely couldn’t stand up to him.’ Ghost Emperor Yama could also see the red glow of the Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragment in the tribulation water. It seemed deeply connected to Yang Qi, as if it had become such a part of him that it was like an out-of-body incarnation, a second nascent divinity.

The mere sight of it was actually terrifying.

Yang Qi had thrown caution to the wind in his attempt to improve his cultivation base. After all, time was extremely limited for him. Two months had already passed, and after another month went by, the hundred-day period would be up, and the Crown Prince would return. When he did, he would wield the might of a Great Sage, and therefore, Yang Qi’s only hope for victory was to finish his God Legion Paradise.

Yang Qi was facing death by drowning in the Jambudvīpa Deluge, and yet, he was not dead. In fact, the power of his Physique of the Sovereign Lord was now fully on display as he suddenly began to absorb the tribulation water, and use it to temper himself.

His true energy was hard and unyielding, invincible and domineering, and now it was being imbued with the Jambudvīpa Deluge, which was only serving to improve it.

Jambudvīpa.

In the ancient Godtongue, it was another word for ‘all living beings’. The ‘world of Jambudvīpa’ was the ‘world of mortals’. In the eyes of the legion of gods, even immortals counted as being among ‘all living beings’.

And thus, the Jambudvīpa Deluge was a flood that would drown all living beings. Once it began, it would rise to the halls of heaven, after which, no living beings would exist.

Yang Qi’s true energy came from the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, making him completely hard and unyielding. His attacks could pierce anything and everything, and could kill the soul and fleshly body alike.

However, the Jambudvīpa Deluge contained the will of all living beings, and when it encountered his true energy, it imbued it with the ultimate core of life.

His true energy was like a sage, a monarch, an emperor, a sovereign….

All living beings existed within his true energy.

Waves of tribulation water lapped up against the greyspace with corrosive power, and yet, the Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragment repaired the greyspace without cease. Because of the process, the greyspace was strengthened, and soon, the tribulation water actually became part of it.

The legion of gods had created all life.

Without life, the glory of the legion of gods could not be upheld.

Because of the Jambudvīpa Deluge, Yang Qi now had what it took to support all life. In fact, he could bring forth life from his greyspace, whether that meant men or women, old or young, emperors or kings, generals or ministers. Mortal individuals of all sorts, and people from all planes, could now appear within his personal domain.

WHIZZZ!

A beam of holy light began to rise up.

The tribulation water began to sink, absorbed into Yang Qi himself; the ‘living beings’ of the Jambudvīpa had been converted into a host of gods.

“The legion of gods has been restored, the pure land has been completed; the God Legion Paradise, my preheaven personal domain….” Somehow, Yang Qi seemed taller than before, and as he was immersed in holy light, he truly looked like the Sovereign Lord.

The God Legion Paradise was finished.

An imposing aura weighed down on everything for hundreds of kilometers in every direction, filling everyone it touched with the impulse to drop to their knees in worship. In that moment, the golden imp in his forehead imparted a new fist technique to him.

It was called the Fist of the Halls of Heaven, and was another consummate martial discipline of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. He couldn’t use it in the sixth Legendary transformation; he would have to wait until the Great Sage level for that.

With this fist, he could somehow connect to the halls of heaven that the legion of gods inhabited. Power from the halls of heaven could be used to strike fear into the hearts of the horde of devils, and also, to eradicate worlds.

It could be considered invincible, and as such, a true godly-class energy art, something that vastly surpassed things like the Demi-Immortal Sage Magic from the Demi-Immortal Institute.

The Infernal Deity Spear. The God Legion Battle Robe. The Angel Wings. The Hellfire Crucible. The Hell Portal. The Devil-God Seal. The God Legion Paradise. All of them were manifestations of true energy.

And now, he had another true energy state, the Fist of the Halls of Heaven, a martial discipline that he could use when he finally pushed his cultivation to the Great Sage level.

Something else happened when he formed the God Legion Paradise; another two million particles within him woke up.

Five million.

He now had the strength of that many ancient megamammoths, which was simply terrifying to contemplate. When such power coursed through his veins and meridians, and then was unleashed into the open, it could shake heaven.

‘At long last, I have my God Legion Paradise…. I'm not sure exactly how strong I am, but I'm definitely strong enough to kill a Great Sage. Now that I'm a Personal-Domain Legendary, the next step will be the Ghost-God Transformation, in which I absorb the empyrean-baleful power of heaven and earth, and use it to refine my personal domain, and build up extraordinary ghost-god power.’

As Yang Qi looked up, he saw that his personal domain had absorbed all the clouds in the sky, leaving nothing behind but the shining moon.

He took a deep breath, he could sense the power of the bright moon entering him, creating a vortex that allowed a moon to rise in the God Legion Paradise.

At this point, Yang Qi turned to look at Ghost Emperor Yama. “I formed my God Legion Paradise, Ghost Emperor Yama. You lose. Hand over Great Sage Quake-Cloud’s sage motes.”

“Hmph!” Ghost Emperor Yama was not happy at all, but knew that he had to abide by the agreement. Taking the sage motes out, he tossed them over to Yang Qi.

They were filled with the power of a Great Sage, so he sent them into his God Legion Paradise to be refined for his own use. Now, he could use those sage motes to unleash even greater power with his attacks, which would make it even easier to defeat a Great Sage.

Yet again, his confidence in being able to handle the Crown Prince grew.

‘I'm waiting for you, Crown Prince, and I'm definitely going to kill you. Twenty days. That's all the time left. Hurry up. Death awaits!’

Looking back at Ghost Emperor Yama, he said, “So, back when that immortal was fighting me, you tried to take advantage of the situation to kill me, didn’t you?”

All of a sudden, Ghost Emperor Yama felt very flustered, but after a moment passed, he forced himself into a state of calm. Glaring at Yang Qi, he said, “That’s right. I said all along that you were my prey. If you had slipped up at all, I would have killed you, and taken everything away from you. What, did you really think I had decided to be your servant or something?”

“You’re going to be my servant sooner or later. And then you’ll do any little thing I say.” Yang Qi didn’t bother acting politely. It was obvious that Ghost Emperor Yama wouldn't be bothering him again. He had made a move twice, and suffered greatly, and as of this moment, it was even possible to see fear in his eyes. However, Yang Qi would not forget the disloyalty that existed in his core.

At this point, Yang Qi began to issue orders. “Gather everyone into Sage Monarch City, and lock the gates. We’ll practice cultivation day and night, and gather our power. When the fighting starts with the Crown Prince, the city needs to be ready to pierce through space at any moment. I wouldn’t put it past the Crown Prince to try something underhanded, and directly attack my family.”

Instantly, Sage Monarch City burst into activity.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi looked out into the void, aware that, win or lose, it would all end soon.

As the date for the showdown approached, all of the people of the Rich-Lush Continent, from the poor folks to the great sects to the aristocratic clans, were discussing the matter. It was the same in the Western Continent. The coming battle would be the focus of all eyes.

On one side was the leader of the Crown Prince Society, a preeminent and haughty individual, a supposed god from heaven descended into the mortal world, who had finally become a Great Sage.

On the other side was a representative of the common people. After stumbling across some good fortune, he advanced by leaps and bounds, and as a very young man, became a Legendary.

In the coming conflict, most people hoped that Yang Qi would win. After all, it was now common for people to tell the story of how, back when he was a Lifeseizer, he had defeated Legendaries. However, for a Legendary to defeat a Great Sage was another matter, and in fact, many believed it to be impossible.

Chapter 322: The Crown Prince Returns

“The Crown Prince is coming back.”

“There’s more than a week left before the hundred-day time limit is up. Pretty soon there's going to be a huge fight going down! The Crown Prince has a clear advantage, but he can’t lower his guard. After all, Yang Qi is backed by Ghost Emperor Yama.”

“Ghost Emperor Yama is a deadly monster, that's for sure. However, he’s inherently untrustworthy. Why would someone like him agree to work with Yang Qi? Isn’t it a case of Yang Qi asking a tiger for its skin?”

“Besides, after all these years, the Crown Prince’s true origins have come to light. Everyone’s saying that he's the son of the Holy Daughter of the Quake-Dawn Cathedral. He really is a god from heaven descended into the mortal world! The real question is whether he’s blood-related to the Quake-Dawn Cathedral, and how much they’ll actually support him.”

“Really? The Quake-Dawn Cathedral is a colossal monster of an organization! From what I've heard, the Quake-Dawn Continent is a higher plane that's thousands of times larger than our Rich-Lush Continent. They have access to purer power than we do, to the point where Ghost Emperor Yama probably isn't a match for the experts from there. In fact, I heard that they were the ones who originally imprisoned him.”

“Well, however it plays out, it’s going to happen soon. I wonder how Yang Qi has progressed in his cultivation recently.”

“A few days ago I snuck into Yanhaven, and you’ll never guess what I saw.”

“Huh? What did you see? Don’t tell me that you actually saw Yang Qi working on his cultivation!”

"I saw spatial powers moving Yanhaven into the Blackcorpse Mountains, where it began to glow with sagelight. Nowadays, it's a holy land of cultivation that no one can enter without permission. The territory controlled by Yanhaven stretches for thousands of kilometers. Furthermore, I got the feeling that the entire city could fly up into the sky at any moment, and pierce through space. It seems like the perfect location to achieve immortal ascension.”

“Hey, what about all the big-shots from the Demi-Immortal Institute? What are they up to?”

“Yun Hailan returned recently, and I heard that she earned the favor of an immortal from a high-level plane. She’s a lot stronger than before. In fact, with the blessing of that immortal, she can fight Never-Dying Legendaries and even Half Sages.”

“What a prodigy….”

A storm was brewing in the Rich-Lush Continent, and it was all due to the coming conflict between Yang Qi and the Crown Prince.

Even the Sage Ancestor Dynasty court was abuzz.

In Capital City, virtually everyone in the imperial palace was talking about the matter, including military officials, civil officials, princes, counts, dukes, marquises, feudal kings, and the like.

For nearly a thousand years, the emperor hadn’t held a formal morning court session, and yet even he made an appearance. Sitting there on his throne of nine dragons, he looked out at the court for a long moment.

“Advise me. Who should I support?” he said in a thunderous voice. “The Crown Prince is a Great Sage now, just like I am. I can already sense his aura, and his baleful energy; he’s backed by the Quake-Dawn Cathedral, and they have vicious ambitions. Unfortunately, he has the audacity to call himself the Crown Prince, and has killed generals of our Sage Ancestor Dynasty. He defies all laws and principles, even those of heaven. His rebellious intentions are well-known.”

At this point, the famous Prince Ba stepped forward, a Half Sage.

“Your Majesty, it makes sense for us to support Yang Qi,” he said. “Unfortunately, his cultivation base is too low, which means that the Crown Prince should be able to kill him with ease. Even before the Crown Prince was a Great Sage, he was insufferably arrogant. Now, he’ll be worse. Plus, he has the support of the Quake-Dawn Cathedral. How far do you think he’ll go when it comes to crushing his enemies? It’s difficult to determine what the chancellor of the Demi-Immortal Institute really thinks about it all. One thing is clear, though: he favors the Crown Prince. And we all know about his relationship with the Crown Prince’s mother. Considering all that, we definitely need to establish a solid base for ourselves. If we don't, we’ll give the Crown Prince an excuse to wipe us out for all time.”

“Hold on, Prince Ba!” Prince Wei interjected. “Are you saying that the Sage Ancestor Dynasty should side with the Crown Prince?! That’s completely inappropriate! The Crown Prince is ambitious, everyone knows that. Even if we side with him, he’ll still crush us beneath his feet, and humiliate us to no end. I think we should support Yang Qi, and fight to the death with the Crown Prince. Based on what I've heard, the chancellor of the Sun Moon Institute has publicly sided with Yang Qi.”

A duke stepped forward. “That's not appropriate either. Why not just withhold support from either? We can stand by while they fight it out. Who knows, they might kill each other.”

A flurry of conversation ensued.

“Kill each other? That would be great, but things never go so smoothly in life. The Crown Prince is a Great Sage, and he’s more powerful than ever. It doesn't matter how much stronger Yang Qi has become recently, he's definitely not a match for the Crown Prince.”

“Don't forget that Yang Qi has a Demi-Immortal level backer! How else could he have repaired the damage to heaven?”

“You’re right. However, the Quake-Dawn Cathedral probably has people just as strong as that. And the Crown Prince has surely learned of how Yang Qi repaired heaven.”

The members of the court continued to discuss the matter, and yet, couldn’t come to an agreement.

Eventually, the emperor cut in.

“Enough jabbering! I’ll take everything you’ve said into consideration.” Instantly, the court went silent.

However, that was when a voice rang out, seemingly from nowhere. “There’s no need for further consideration, Emperor. Support the Crown Prince. That’s your only option. Otherwise, you’ll only have one fate in store for you: death!”

Next, a sea-blue space-time wormhole opened up into the middle of the court, and three individuals stepped out.

In the lead was a young woman in a blue garment. She had a face as beautiful as if it had been carved from jade, and she emanated immortal energy, making it seem like she could easily travel between planes. In fact, not even Emperor Sage-Ancestor could lock down onto her aura.

Of course, she was none other than Yun Hailan.

Flanking her were two Great Sages, one of them clad in ocean-blue clothing, with an aura that caused everyone around him to feel like they were drowning.

“Chancellor Sea God!” blurted Emperor Sage-Ancestor, rising to his feet.

The other individual emanated the aura of a dragon, the type who could shred heaven to pieces and pierce through space.

“Chancellor True Dragon!”

Two chancellors had arrived.

Apparently, both the True Dragon Institute and the Sea God Institute had joined forces with Yun Hailan.

“Emperor Sage-Ancestor,” Chancellor Sea God said, nodding in greeting.

Chancellor True Dragon did the same, and then said, “We’re here because we openly support the Crown Prince in his effort to kill Yang Qi.”

“Support the Crown Prince? Kill Yang Qi?” Emperor Sage-Ancestor looked at them with shock. “You two…?”

“Yun Hailan has the sealing mark of the Sea King Plane on her,” Chancellor Sea God explained, “as well as that of the Dragon World Plane, both of which are immortal worlds. In other words, she has the power of both seas and dragons in her. And of course, that conforms to the power sources of both the True Dragon Institute and Sea God Institute. As such, Yun Hailan now acts as the spokesperson for both of our institutes.”

“Isn’t all this a bit sudden? It’s hard to believe.”

Emperor Sage-Ancestor could tell that Yun Hailan’s cultivation base was in the third Legendary transformation, but that she had other mysterious power lurking within her. In fact, even though he himself had sage motes, her substructure actually seemed stronger than his.

‘So, that’s what an immortal’s sealing mark does,’ he thought.

He immediately realized that although she wasn’t too strong for him to deal with directly, if he killed her, and made contact with the immortal sealing mark in her, he would likely suffer a backlash attack. And that would be very troublesome.

For all intents and purposes, she was safe from attack by Great Sages.

And as her cultivation base grew stronger and stronger, her connection to the two immortal planes would cause her power to grow exponentially.

Looking around at the court, Yun Hailan said, “Gentlemen, the Crown Prince will return today. So make your decision. If you don’t, the consequences will be too horrible to contemplate.”

Her words resounded like thunder into the minds of everyone present. Even Emperor Sage-Ancestor blanched.

“What?!” one of the princes shrieked, his heart pounding with terror. “The Crown Prince is coming back today? I thought there were still twenty days to go!?”

“Chancellor Demi-Immortal set the hundred-day time limit, not the Crown Prince. Considering how strong the Crown Prince is now, do you really think he needs to listen to the chancellor? In fact, abiding by the chancellor’s hundred-day time limit would actually be a big loss of face, don't you think?”

“He's returning today,” Chancellor True Dragon said coolly. “He’ll head to the Demi-Immortal Institute first, to meet with the Crown Prince Society. The True Dragon and Sea God Institutes, as well as some Great Sages from the Quake-Dawn Cathedral, will go there to meet him and offer formal greetings. We already have the spatial coordinates, and can travel there immediately. Will the imperial court be joining us? By the way, the Crown Prince has already said that anyone who doesn’t go to receive him will be executed. I'd say the safest course for the Sage Ancestor Dynasty is to go along.”

“The Great Sages from the Quake-Dawn Cathedral are already here?” Emperor Sage-Ancestor’s face fell again, and his heart twisted with indecision. He was an emperor, and a Great Sage, so he truly did not wish to bow before the Crown Prince. But everything was happening so quickly that he didn’t see any other options.

In the end, he sagged visibly. “Fine! I’ll bring all of my officials to offer greetings.”

“Congratulations on your decision, Your Majesty,” Yun Hailan said. She chuckled. “You couldn’t have chosen better. Come on, let’s go.”

Waving her hand, she used some sort of unfathomable power to create a space-time wormhole leading directly to the Demi-Immortal Institute.

Emperor Sage-Ancestor led his subordinate and officials to follow.

Soon, they found themselves in a land of rolling mountains which formed a huge spell formation.

In the middle of it all was an altar vastly larger than the one used by the Sage Ancestor Dynasty to offer sacrifices to heaven. In fact, it towered so much higher than the surrounding mountains that it made them look like ants.

As soon as Emperor Sage-Ancestor arrived, he caught sight of nine other Great Sages. They were located in various positions around the altar, and were using their energy arts to lock down onto precise spatial coordinates.

‘Nine Great Sages?!’ Emperor Sage-Ancestor thought, trembling inside. ‘This is the strength of the Quake-Dawn Cathedral. Nine of them? It’s… it’s unbelievable!’

“Your Majesty,” Yun Hailan said, “look, the Crown Prince is here.”

RUUUUUMBLE!

A massive force erupted out that was suffocating even to the Great Sages.

The Crown Prince had arrived.

Chapter 323: Incredible Decisiveness

The immense power on display caused everyone to tremble.

Deep within the spatial nexus in the middle of the altar, a beam of divine light appeared, revealing a tall, strapping figure. He seemed capable of propping up the sky, crushing the land and sea, and causing all living entities to prostrate in terror. Of course, he was the Crown Prince.

The emperor looked profoundly embarrassed. He was supposed to be the leader of all the lands, the emperor of a sprawling dynasty, a ruler who had held sway for thousands of years. And yet, in the face of the Crown Prince, he was weak.

As an emperor, he should have innately been able to consolidate the destinies of everyone who lived under his rule. It was no fiction. It was the result of the true power of will, and was something every citizen in the empire was aware of. As the years passed, the Sage Ancestor Dynasty would mysteriously gather that destiny, and imbue it into true imperial energy. After all, he was the ‘Son of Heaven’. It was nothing to be taken lightly.

It was a power that was on par with that of pure faith.

Unfortunately, the Crown Prince was now stronger than the grand destiny of the imperial dynasty. And it was hard to say exactly how that had come to be. Obviously, his strength came from a high-level plane in the universe, and was a power that was pure and boundless, as infinite as the starry sky itself.

WHIZZZ!

As the Crown Prince stepped out into the open, a pair of resplendent wings unfurled behind him, thousands of kilometers wide, translucent and seemingly formed from innumerable starry nexuses, a glorious silver river of stars.

“That….”

Chancellor True Dragon, Chancellor Sea God, Emperor Sage-Ancestor, and the nine other Great Sages were bowled over with shock.

“The fabled Wings of the Starry Sky!?” blurted one of the Great Sages from the Quake-Dawn Cathedral. “They can defend against interstellar tempests and gale storms, which are many times more powerful than spatial tempests! They’re made from the power of countless heavenly bodies! The Wings of the Starry Sky!”

The other Great Sages from the Quake-Dawn Cathedral began to chime in. “That’s exactly what they are. The Wings of the Starry Sky are an energy art passed down from numerous immortal planes, countless years in the past. To date, no one has ever succeeded in fully cultivating them. The secrets to do so were lost in the most primeval times. According to the rumors, once you have the Wings of the Starry Sky, you don’t need to teleport around through space. You can just fly from planet to planet with the true and real power of heavenly bodies. They’re even strong enough to cause a planet to tremble by their flapping.”

“So, this is the Crown Prince? How strong! Power like this is rare in heaven and earth.”

“No wonder our Quake-Dawn Cathedral supports him. He’s really a natural-born genius. What a pity we weren’t able to reel up the Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragment. If we had, I wonder what level of power he could have reached.”

The nine Great Sages exchanged awkward glances as they realized that their previous attitude of looking down on the Crown Prince had actually been completely incorrect. Although he technically ranked far below them, considering that he had the Wings of the Starry Sky, it was obvious that he was far beyond them in terms of fighting capability. Maybe his cultivation level was low, but his inherent strength and potential vastly surpassed their own.

After all, throughout the generations, not a single genius from the Quake-Dawn Cathedral had ever done anything like this.

Joining their voices together into a thunderous chorus, the high-ranking members of the Crown Prince Society all said, “We offer respectful greetings upon your return, Crown Prince!”

The call stirred the members of the other powerful sects and aristocratic clans who were present, and they too began to call out greetings. As the Crown Prince looked around at all of them, his gaze caused them to tremble as if they were freezing, and they were filled with the desire to acknowledge allegiance to him.

There were many clans present who had once given rise to Great Sages. There was the Gu Clan, the Wang Clan, the Sun Clan, the Zhao Clan, the Gang Clan, and others…. They all claimed to have the blood of Great Sages in them, and yet, every single one offered obeisance to the Crown Prince. Of course, all of this was thanks to Yun Hailan. In a very short period of time, she had managed to gather a large contingent of powerful organizations, which of course left Yang Qi very lacking in terms of support.

Thankfully, Yang Qi had anticipated such an outcome. He had already gathered all of his sworn siblings, and all of his allies, back in Sage Monarch City. There, they worked on their cultivation, safe from any harm.

Chancellor Sea God, Chancellor True Dragon, and Emperor Sage-Ancestor all watched what was happening, and it seemed completely unbelievable; the Crown Prince was actually far, far stronger than any of them had anticipated could be possible. It completely and utterly defied their imaginations.

As all of this happened, six more Great Sages appeared on a nearby mountain peak. They were the experts from the Western Continent. The stakes at hand in the coming fight were incredible, and thus, they had also come to see how things played out.

One of them was the very same Great Sage Pure Emptiness that Yang Qi had tangled with some time past. Also present was the reigning emperor of the Sky-Heaven Dynasty. When they saw the Crown Prince, they all shook in fear.

“The Wings of the Starry Sky?” Great Sage Pure Emptiness murmured. “Yes, those are the Wings of the Starry Sky! I've only heard of them in stories, and yet, here they are in the possession of the Crown Prince. No wonder he was able to escape the demonfire of Great Sage Shroud-Heaven!”

The Sky-Heaven Dynasty, and in fact, all of the Western Continent, was essentially a subsidiary of the Hanging Mountain. Some time ago, the Crown Prince had killed Young Master Shroud-Heaven, and yet, it seemed that he had finally worked things out with the Hanging Mountain.

Originally, the people of the Western Continent had considered themselves enemies of the Crown Prince, but after all was said and done, weapons of war had been turned into gifts of jade and silk.

The six Great Sages from the Western Continent hated Yang Qi deeply. He had caused a huge scene there, kidnapping Lady-Princess Silvermoon, and stealing her city. That itself was a humiliation, but it was made even worse by the fact that Great Sage Pure Emptiness had been completely incapable of apprehending the culprit.

Because of that, they truly hoped to see Yang Qi slaughtered by the Crown Prince.

Even better would be a situation in which they killed each other, or at least ended up mutually wounded. They wouldn’t hesitate at all to hit the Crown Prince when he was down, and possibly even kill him.

But now, all such hopes seemed completely unrealistic. They could already tell they weren’t a match for him. There was no way he and Yang Qi would kill each other. The outcome of the upcoming conflict was a foregone conclusion, with the only question being how Yang Qi would die.

“Excellent. It's wonderful that you all gathered here to welcome me,” the Crown Prince said. As of this moment, he looked every bit the emperor glancing down arrogantly at his congregated government officials. “You did quite well, Yun Hailan. It was not in vain that I helped you reach your current level.”

Yun Hailan nodded. Apparently worried that he might have forgotten about Yang Qi, the first thing she said was, “Crown Prince, now that you’re here, do you plan to go kill Yang Qi immediately? Or do you have other plans? Ghost Emperor Yama now supports him, sir. He's not an individual to take lightly, and I'm afraid he’ll be very difficult to deal with. Perhaps you’d like to take some time to come up with a proper plan.”

“I'm aware of the situation. The chancellor set a hundred-day period, correct?” He smiled coldly. “Considering I’ll be the chancellor soon, why should I listen to him? In this world, no one can bind me with their words. Ghost Emperor Yama? Yes, he's strong. But he and I are connected by destiny on many levels. Perhaps he's been following Yang Qi, but he clearly views him as prey, and wants his energy art. I'm very familiar with the ghost emperor; once the fighting starts, he’ll just stand by and watch. Today, my first order of business is to kill Yang Qi.

“Immediately. Post haste! Without any delays!!!

“Thankfully, all of you have already assembled, which means you can all watch and see how I’ll have him slaughtered. Soon that brat will learn about the height of the heavens and the breadth of the earth.”

“Oh, by the way, Crown Prince,” Yun Hailan said, “there are two individuals who aren’t present. The chancellors of the Demi-Immortal and Sun Moon Institute.”

Yun Hailan was obviously taking every opportunity possible to sow discord.

“Chancellor Demi-Immortal isn’t important. He’ll be retiring soon anyway, so let him do as he wishes. As for Chancellor Sun Moon, his refusal to come offer greetings is a sin of the most grievous nature, and therefore, he will be destroyed. In fact, I’ll kill him along with Yang Qi, and put an end to his institute as well. There’s no need for it anymore.”

There was no doubt that the Crown Prince was both haughty and domineering.

Because the chancellor of the Sun Moon Institute didn't come to greet him, he planned to exterminate him? It was a shocking thing considering that his institute had stood strong and tall in the Rich-Lush Continent for many years.

It was no joking matter. If the Crown Prince uttered such outlandish words in front of so many witnesses, but then didn’t follow through, it would be like slapping himself in the face.

The Crown Prince was the type of person who always followed through on his word, and therefore, it was obvious that the Sun Moon Institute was doomed.

“Could it be that you all think I'm being too domineering?” he said, looking around. “Well, I am. I now bear the will of the host of immortals, and can tolerate no blasphemy. Hua Tianxiong of the Sun Moon Institute took advantage of a moment in which I was practicing cultivation to join forces with Young Master Shroud-Heaven, and try to kill me. Sadly for him, he ended up dead. That enough is reason to put an end to the Sun Moon Institute. Hear me well. I will turn Chancellor Sun Moon’s head into a drinking glass, and will hang his corpse on a tree. Then all of you can see for yourself what happens to people who defy me.”

Turning, he looked at Emperor Sage-Ancestor. “Hello there, Emperor Sage-Ancestor. I must say, I’m surprised you came to offer greetings. But as the saying goes, a wise man submits to the circumstances. In doing so, you’ve spared the Sage Ancestor Dynasty from the fate of death.”

Emperor Sage-Ancestor’s subordinates, including the princes and ministers, all looked extremely embarrassed. However, not a single one dared to say anything in front of the Crown Prince. It was like the old adage, when the emperor wants silence, not even the horses will neigh.

Generally speaking, Emperor Sage-Ancestor could probably have tried to fight the Crown Prince, but considering the Crown Prince had nine Great Sages flanking him, even the emperor felt weak at the knees.

To the grief of the Sage Ancestor Dynasty, their emperor had no choice but to bow his head.

At this point, the Crown Prince shifted his attention to the six Great Sages on the mountain peak some distance away. “The six of you are from the Western Continent, correct? Great Sage Shroud-Heaven and I had a bet going, and I won. For now, the Hanging Mountain holds no grudge against me. You hate Yang Qi as much as I do, so why not join me? You can keep an eye on Ghost Emperor Yama while Yanhaven is being destroyed. If you do, I promise you that the Western Continent will benefit greatly.”

“As you wish, Crown Prince,” replied Great Sage Pure Emptiness. “As you probably know, Great Sage Shroud-Heaven doesn’t hold sway over the Western Continent. We are led by a different Great Sage, and thus, your problems with Shroud-Heaven don’t concern us. In fact, we would love to join your great alliance of Great Sages.”

“Good. Let’s head to Yanhaven. It looks like the people of the Sun Moon Institute have already gathered there, so I’ll just destroy them all at once. In this world, you either submit to me and prosper, or oppose me and perish.”

Chapter 324: Savage Compulsion

The Crown Prince didn’t care about the hundred-day time limit the chancellor had set.

The first thing he wanted to do now that he was back was kill Yang Qi.

He was the type of person who would defy all laws and principles, break any and all rules. He wouldn’t allow anyone to tell him what to do. If he wanted to thrash someone, he would thrash them. If he wanted to kill them, he would kill them. Anyone who he didn’t like would end up dead. He was aggressive and domineering no matter what he did.

He was the Crown Prince, and at his very core, he was wildly arrogant, and incredibly powerful. He was a leader who intended to conquer the world.

More than two months had already passed, which meant that there were well over twenty days until the deadline. But that didn’t matter.

Raising her voice, Yun Hailan said, “Yang Qi never qualified to make a move against the great Crown Prince. And yet, he has been bedeviled by Ghost Emperor Yama. Furthermore, he has apparently begun to cultivate devil arts, corrupting the sage spirits of the Planar Pearl, and giving the false impression that he saved the entire plane. The Crown Prince’s duty is to rid the world of devils and demons, and thus he will execute Yang Qi for the radical crimes he has committed. It has nothing to do with any supposed duel proclaimed by Chancellor Demi-Immortal.

“Duel? Does that weakling Yang Qi really qualify to duel with the Crown Prince? That’s a joke if I’ve ever heard one. He's a mere Legendary, and the Crown Prince is a Great Sage. From ancient times until now, has there ever been a Legendary who could fight a Great Sage?”

“That’s correct,” the Crown Prince said. “I have a duty to rid the world of devils and demons. And to talk of a duel is really ridiculous.” The Crown Prince clearly approved of Yun Hailan’s assessment. There was no way he would agree to a duel; duels implied a certain equality of position and strength. But the Crown Prince felt himself far above Yang Qi, and in fact, looked down on him in every sense of the word. His plan was simply to crush him like the ant he was.

And the way to do that was with an army.

“Let’s go, Crown Prince, Yanhaven awaits.” Yun Hailan simply couldn’t wait to see the look of terror on Yang Qi’s face before he died. “Oh, do you know about Sage Monarch City, in the Blackcorpse Mountains? After stealing Silvermoon from the Western Continent, he refined it, and then renamed it Sage Monarch City, implying that he is a Sage Monarch. Crown Prince, you really need to end him quickly.”

“Sage Monarch?” The Crown Prince chuckled coldly. “Yes, I heard of the supposed Sage Monarch Society that he founded, and that he started recruiting henchmen. Well, it’s an evil and heretical sect, and it's a good thing he never built it up very large.”

“Crown Prince, it's good that you’re going to kill Yang Qi in such impressive fashion,” said one of the Great Sages from the Quake-Dawn Cathedral. “Great Sage Quake-Cloud was killed by Ghost Emperor Yama, and Chancellor Demi-Immortal did nothing to stop it. He’s clearly prejudiced! Before long, the Quake-Dawn Cathedral is going to call him to account for his crimes. And although Ghost Emperor Yama was previously imprisoned and not killed, this time, he’ll have a hard time escaping what's coming to him.”

“Let’s go,” the Crown Prince said. “You people from the Quake-Dawn Cathedral can deal with Ghost Emperor Yama if necessary. It’s unforgivable that he killed Great Sage Quake-Cloud. However, I would suggest that you refrain from provoking him at first. Let me talk to him, and see if I can work out an arrangement. For the time being, he could be very helpful to my plans.”

“We’ll follow your every command, Crown Prince,” the nine Great Sages echoed. Obviously, none of them dared to say anything that might cause friction. Although the Crown Prince was only a first step Great Sage, he was obviously far stronger than that level. And he had a sealing mark from an immortal plane, which was an enigmatic and impossibly powerful object.

“Let’s go!” The Crown Prince swished his sleeve, and a massive wind kicked up. Space parted, and a passageway opened up to the Blackcorpse Mountains.

RUUUUMBLE!

**

Yang Qi was currently in Sage Monarch City, working on his cultivation. Off to the side was Ghost Emperor Yama, who was watching him closely.

All of a sudden, a beam of light descended into the spot between Sage Monarch City and Yanhaven, like the sun and the moon combined.

Ghost Emperor Yama quickly stepped forward to block the path of the light if it turned out to be an attack.

However, it was none other than Chancellor Sun Moon, and he had the Minorbrilliance World with him. Visible within it were numerous towering structures with individuals sitting on them, catalyzing the power of the dimension.

Chancellor Sun Moon was bringing literally everything with him.

“Hey there, little Sun Moon,” Ghost Emperor Yama said. “So, you’re bringing your whole institute here with you? The call to retreat was issued, but like they say, the monk can’t flee the monastery. When the monastery itself flees, though…” He clicked his tongue. “I guess that means something big is happening, right? What could it be?”

Looking flustered, Chancellor Sun Moon said, “Senior Ghost Emperor, something really bad has happened. The Crown Prince is back, and he’s gathered a host of heroes to his side. He wants to destroy the Sun Moon Institute, and then kill Yang Qi. I had no choice but to flee here. There’s no way I can fight the Crown Prince. Senior, we’re all relying on you now.”

“What? The Crown Prince is back already?” Ghost Emperor Yama’s eyes pierced through the air of the Rich-Lush Continent, after which he rose to his feet. Looking toward Yang Qi, he said, “The Crown Prince is coming, Yang Qi. He wants to have the duel early, and you’re no match for him. You’re going to die. Give me the cultivation technique for the Infernal Deity Spear, and I’ll deal with him for you! If you don't, then this place is going to be your grave!”

“This grudge is between me and the Crown Prince,” Yang Qi replied. “There’s no need for you to interfere, Ghost Emperor Yama. Even if you wanted to, I wouldn’t let you. Just watch and learn as I kill the Crown Prince.”

“Fine, be pig-headed. The Crown Prince isn't going to be pulling any punches. And he’s not going to fight fair, either. He’s definitely going to have the help of those nine Great Sages who were trying to reel in the Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragment. If they gang up on you, there’s no way you can handle them alone. Maybe you could escape, but what about everyone you’re supposed to be protecting?”

“Just wait until the Crown Prince is here and the fighting starts, Ghost Emperor Yama,” Yang Qi said with a decisiveness that could sever nails and chop iron. “Enough with your chattering.”

Ghost Emperor Yama snorted coldly, but didn’t say anything else. Flying into the air, he vanished.

Chancellor Sun Moon was completely shocked. “Yang Qi, you….”

“Get into Sage Monarch City, Chancellor Sun Moon,” Yang Qi said. “Stand watch there over everyone. Whoever the Crown Prince sends to fight me from his army, I’ll fight them. And whoever tries to kill me won’t be able to take five steps before collapsing into a pool of blood.”

Waving his hand, he sent power streaming out to carry Chancellor Sun Moon and everyone else from the Minorbrilliance World into Sage Monarch City.

Meanwhile, the Crown Prince was approaching with his followers.

As he did, a stream of black energy suddenly approached to block their path. A moment later it resolved into the form of Ghost Emperor Yama, who pulsed with boundless devil energy.

The Crown Prince stopped in front of him. “And so we meet again, Ghost Emperor Yama. I'm on my way to kill Yang Qi. Don’t tell me you’re going to block my way?”

“I'm not blocking your way; go kill Yang Qi if you want. You’ve reached your biggest goal so far, Crown Prince. You’re a Great Sage, and thus, you qualify to talk with me like an equal. However, before you go any further, I want to discuss our deal. I don’t care what happens to Yang Qi, I want that thing. And by the way, there’s no way I’ll continue to exist under the same sky as anyone from the Quake-Dawn Cathedral.”

“Ha!” one of the nine Great Sages said. “We've been keeping an eye on you for quite a while now, Ghost Emperor Yama. If you step out of line even the least bit, then we’ll kill you!”

Ghost Emperor Yama suddenly seemed to stand straighter and taller. “Is that so? Well, I'm actually very curious to see which of us will end up dead if we start fighting. Listen, Crown Prince. I'm a spectator, that’s it. So don’t worry. Slaughter whoever you like, I won’t interfere. Oh, by the way, you nine brats. Remember how you were fishing for the Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragment in the primal-chaos vital energy? Someone stole the fragment, right? Well, guess what? It was Yang Qi. Yang Qi has the Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragment. Have fun with that!” Without another word, he turned and vanished.

“What? Yang Qi got the Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragment?!”

“Dammit! He was the one who foiled our plan!”

“Kill him! We have to kill him!”

“We have to take back the Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragment!”

“Hold on a moment, Crown Prince. Please, allow us the first chance to kill Yang Qi. We absolutely must torment him, and revel in his screams for mercy!”

“Whatever,” the Crown Prince said. “Yang Qi doesn’t qualify to fight with me anyway. In fact, making a move on him would be disgraceful on my part.”

He frowned as he looked at the spot Ghost Emperor Yama had just occupied. It was obvious that he hadn’t left, but instead, was hiding in an alternate dimension, waiting to see how the fight with Yang Qi would go.

‘So, Ghost Emperor Yama, even you think that Yang Qi is capable of fighting me? Well, sorry, but he's not!’

The Crown Prince looked off toward the sprawling Blackcorpse Mountains, and could sense a holy aura rising up from them. And then there was Yanhaven, perched next to the Yan River, which seemed to serve as the perfect companion for Sage Monarch City. The mountains looked like a sleeping giant, and the river looked like the trunk of an enormous megamammoth.

Behind the Crown Prince, his various followers were discussing the developments.

“The big fight is about to start. I wonder what Yang Qi is doing right now. The Blackcorpse Mountains used to be barren and infertile, but look at them now. They’re like spirit mountains, a holy land of cultivation! And look at the highway between Yanhaven and Sage Monarch City, it's filled with spatial barriers and powerful spell formations. The vital energy of heaven and earth here is linked with the stars above! Can you feel the boundless killing intent?!”

“Yeah, only a Great Sage could do something like that. I wonder if it was actually Ghost Emperor Yama.”

“That’s possible. But Ghost Emperor Yama just said he wasn’t going to interfere. So why would the Crown Prince make a move against him? Wouldn’t that be too risky? It would be better to take out those two cities first, right? Do you think he’s really going to let those nine Great Sages act first?”

“We’ll find out soon enough. Hey, look. You can see the light of the sun and the moon there in Sage Monarch City. That’s the chancellor of the Sun Moon Institute! He must have heard that the Crown Prince wants to destroy his institute, and retreated here to be with Yang Qi.”

“It’s not like that will do him any good. Chancellor Sun Moon and the people from his institute are all dead. How could they possibly fight against the Crown Prince?”

Chancellor True Dragon, Emperor Sage-Ancestor, Chancellor Sea God, Yun Hailan, Master Wind Gentleman, Unparalleled Lightning, and the leaders of numerous powerful clans, were all waiting to see what would happen next.

Suddenly, the Crown Prince waved his hand.

As he did, countless streams of vital energy converged, heading toward Yanhaven and Sage Monarch City. Without even a word, he was attacking!

Chapter 325: The Slaughter Begins

The wave of the Crown Prince’s hand caused space to rip like the paper in a paper window. It provided virtually no resistance.

Everyone watching could see that, within the depths of space, there were thousands of streams of power rushing forth.

It included starlight, as silver as mercury, incomparably heavy, enough to tear the lands apart. There was a river of fire, of water, of blades, of lightning… all sorts of destructive elements descended onto Sage Monarch City and Yanhaven.

It was a chilling sight.

Who could possibly stand up to something like that? Not even ordinary Great Sages could do so. It seemed like something absolutely impossible to fight. That was how the domineering Crown Prince worked; he would unleash a mighty attack to destroy anything and everything that stood in his path.

“If I faced that attack, I couldn’t possibly survive!”

“It’s definitely strong. Even a hundred Half Sages working together would be sliced to bits by it.”

“Half Sages? Come on, even Great Sages would be powerless against it!”

Chancellor True Dragon, Chancellor Sea God and the Great Sages from the Western Continent were feeling even more nervous than ever as they realized that not even they could defend themselves against the Crown Prince.

‘Is he even human?’ Even the nine Great Sages from the Quake-Dawn Continent knew that they couldn’t defend against something like this.

Everyone looked on wide-eyed as the events played out. It was almost like they were watching an enormous steel hammer descending from high above, heading directly toward an egg. Obviously, there was no question about what would happen to the egg.

“Crown Prince, it seems that killing Yang Qi is actually going to be a bit too easy,” Yun Hailan said, looking a bit let down.

“Wrong. I'm not killing him. This attack is intended to destroy the spell formation and kill the chancellor of the Sun Moon Institute. I'm not even going to give him a chance to beg for his life. This attack will kill a Great Sage!” He sighed, increasing the power in the attack. “Killing a Great Sage like this will ensure that everyone knows how strong I am!”

It all suddenly made sense.

The Crown Prince’s goal was to single out Chancellor Sun Moon within Sage Monarch City, and kill him as an example. That would definitely impress upon everyone present how strong he was.

WHIZZZ!

Thousands of deadly rivers descended on Sage Monarch City and the area around it.

However, even as the massively destructive force descended, everyone suddenly felt as though the vital energy of heaven and earth in the area were trembling violently. It almost seemed like some primeval beast were awakening, some enormous god from ancient times.

Crack!

A hand big enough to blot out heaven suddenly rose up from Sage Monarch City, rising skyward in deadly fashion. It spread out like a canopy, meeting the thousands of destructive rivers, and completely blocking their power.

“I can’t believe that someone blocked the Crown Prince’s attack? Who was it?”

Sage Monarch City was most definitely not crushed like an egg, much to the shock of everyone present.

“Who did it? Was it Chancellor Sun Moon?”

“It didn't look like it. Besides, the Crown Prince’s attack actually called power from other higher planes in the universe. There’s no way that Chancellor Sun Moon could deal with that.”

“Look, it's Yang Qi!” one of the Great Sages shouted.

Beneath the enormous hand, Yang Qi slowly rose to his feet.

He wore the pure God Legion Battle Robe, which slowly fluttered in the breeze. He was mighty and powerful, but not overbearing. And yet, there was something about him that seemed capable of bearing the weight of all living beings under heaven.

He was awe-inspiring, but not ruthless. He was tolerant, not hurtful. He was a sage, a monarch, a person who could enlighten all living beings. He was a forerunner of good news and tidings, a representative of the legion of gods, an emissary to the mortal world. He was surrounded by a pure paradise, a holy land established by the legion of gods for living beings, the halls of heaven among men.

In the past, he had radiated a feeling of slaughter, decisiveness, peril, and threat. He had been like a sharp, unsheathed sword, just on the verge of killing someone. But now, the feeling of peril was not visible. Instead, he seemed dignified, moral, merciful, grandiose, responsible, and tolerant.

It made sense, considering that tolerance typified the principles of the legion of gods.

In that moment, everyone who had come to watch the fight suddenly felt a sensation of shame in their hearts. In the face of the representative of the legion of gods, what else could they feel other than humility and puniness? It was an instinctual sense of devotion that existed in humans, devils, demons, immortals, and all other living entities within the universe.

Hidden within the depths of the plane was Ghost Emperor Yama, who was watching closely as everything played out. And what was occurring left him completely shocked. ‘Not bad, brat. Not even I realized you had reached this level of cultivation.’

“Be broken!” Yang Qi said coolly. Exhaling softly, he caused the enormous hand of true energy to split apart, and belch out a mass of primal-chaos vital energy, which wrapped around the rivers of the Crown Prince's attack, and caused them to fade away.

Just like that, he negated the Crown Prince’s entire assault.

‘Incredible!’ Chancellor Sun Moon thought, his jaw dropping. From what he could tell, the Crown Prince had not held anything back in his attack just now, and in fact, the chancellor had not expected Yang Qi to intervene. Even more shocking, he negated the attack as easily as blowing some dust off his shoulder.

Floating up from the city, Yang Qi looked at the host of experts atop the sea of clouds nearby, and said, “So, you’re finally here, Crown Prince.”

From the look of it, just about every important person possible was present. The experts from all the top clans, the famous people from the Sea God and True Dragon Institutes, everyone was there behind the Crown Prince. It was almost as if Yang Qi were facing off against all of them.

Surprisingly, he didn't seem scared at all. The wind caressed him gently, and spatial energy flows swirled around him with the utmost ease, as if he were part of nature.

The Crown Prince looked just as arrogant as ever as he hovered much further above, looking down at Yang Qi. “So, you’ve finally stopped acting like a scared turtle. Who would have thought that a bug like you would be strong enough to resist me a bit? I should have killed you a long time ago. Well, last time I gave you a chance to survive, but this time, that won’t be happening.”

“You’ve never been in the position to kill me,” Yang Qi said. “Back in the martial arts competition, Young Master Shroud-Heaven was always there lurking in the background, ready to attack you. Later, you fought him, but ended up seriously injured. And now, after two years of rest and recovery in the Superheaven Badlands, you’re finally back in action. Well, does it make you happy to know that I'm the reason for all of it? Back in the Heavendawn Quarry, I was the one who took the Grand Emperor's Pagoda. I'm sure you remember the moment quite clearly. When it comes to our struggles, Crown Prince, you haven’t come out on top a single time, you pitiful creature!”

“Yang Qi,” Yun Hailan said, “you’re not going to escape this day. The Crown Prince has come for you, and he's going to rip you to pieces and crush your bones into powder. What are your last words? Say whatever you need to make yourself feel better….”

When Yang Qi replied, his voice was completely devoid of emotion. “You’re going to die today, do you know that, Yun Hailan?”

“What incredible gall!” Chancellor Sea God shouted, stepping forward to hover in front of Yun Hailan.

He was joined by Chancellor True Dragon, who said, “You’ve already stepped into the dao of devils, Yang Qi. You’re in league with Ghost Emperor Yama to destroy the peace and tranquility that exists in the Rich-Lush Continent. How dare you speak of killing Great Sages! Did you know that Yun Hailan has the sealing mark of the Sea King Plane and the Dragon World Plane!? For you to oppose her is to oppose the combined might of the Sea God Institute and the True Dragon Institute.”

“Two old fools who don’t know the difference between life and death,” Yang Qi said with the utmost discourtesy.

“Listen up, brat,” said one of the Great Sages from the Quake-Dawn Cathedral. “Hand over the Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragment immediately!”

“We know it was you who stole it from us,” another of them said. “Wrecking our plans is a capital offense! You’ve fallen into the dao of devils, and the only way to escape is to give us that Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragment, then publicly confess your sins and commit ritual suicide. If you do that, we might allow your Yang Clan to survive. If not, then we’ll exterminate your clan, your family, your friends, and everyone else connected to you, down to the tenth degree!”

“Don't waste your words on him,” said yet another of the nine Great Sages. “Crown Prince, we’ll take action now. After slaughtering him, we’ll hand over his head to you personally!”

This was no duel. This was strong-arming. The Crown Prince had brought nine Great Sages from the Quake-Dawn Cathedral to crush Yang Qi. He wasn't even giving Yang Qi a fair chance to fight him.

“Considering that everyone wants this monster dead, we’ll join you,” Chancellor Sea God said.

“That’s right,” added Chancellor True Dragon. “He’s clearly in the dao of devils now, and has threatened all of us in deranged fashion. Let’s cut him down together.”

Of course, the two of them were inwardly drooling over the possibility of getting their hands on the Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragment, or at least the Grand Emperor's Pagoda.

RUUUUMBLE!

Even before they took action, their auras began to weigh down on the area like mountains. Even a Great Sage of the same level as this group would be crushed by their combined power.

However, Yang Qi’s true energy erupted in full force, and something like a sun emerged from the top of his head, to cast light that originated in the most ancient of times. It was both glorious and strange, like the swirling of infinite flower petals, a cool, holy brilliance that was simultaneously strong to the ultimate degree. It was sagelight, and as it climbed into the sky, it seemed to connect Yang Qi to the mysterious halls of heaven.

“I guess I’ll bury you all here together!” he said. “I’ve been preparing for today for a long time.”

All of a sudden, the God Legion Paradise appeared, making Yang Qi seem awe-inspiring and righteous, completely inviolable.

He stamped his foot down, and the ground for dozens of kilometers in all directions sank down, making everyone in the area feel weightless.

Right in-between Yanhaven and Sage Monarch City, a gaping hole appeared in the ground.

Throwing his head back, Yang Qi shouted, “Primal-chaos paleo-energy; primeval immortal formations. Slaughter Immortals, Execute Devils; Bury Heavens in Death!”

In the shortest of moments, a massive column of primal-chaos paleo-energy rose up from the gaping hole, spreading out to surround everyone.

“Primal-chaos paleo-energy!? It is! It’s primal-chaos paleo-energy! There’s a mysterious energy flow that exists beneath the Rich-Lush Continent, and it contains immortal formations that can kill Great Sages!”

Immediately, screams rang out from the top experts as they realized what was happening.

Chapter 326: Yang Qi Kills a Great Sage

Still hidden somewhere in space-time, Ghost Emperor Yama shivered and looked at Yang Qi in utter shock. ‘What’s that? Sinking land? Primal-chaos paleo-energy? Immortal spell formations? He’s really been hiding things! I can’t believe he secretly linked to the primal-chaos paleo-energy in the deepest parts of the Rich-Lush Continent. He's using those immortal formations in concert with his personal domain? In a single breath of time, he’s completely changed everything.’

Primal-chaos paleo-energy was an ancient type of energy originally created by a primal-chaos elder-immortal during the era of the Yore-Wilds Continent. It was profound and mysterious to say the least, and was one of the main reasons the Rich-Lush Continent didn’t end up being tossed about by spatial tempests.

Throughout the years, many individuals had attempted to tap into this energy, as well as the immortal formations.

Even the original top expert of the lands, Grand Emperor Rich-Lush, had done so, using his Grand Emperor's Pagoda in the process. In the end, he failed. He couldn’t gain the approval of the sage spirits of the continent, nor could he acquire the Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragment.

Only Yang Qi, who bore the glory of the legion of gods, and had the approval of those ancient heroic spirits of the Great Sages, could access this most boundless secret magic. It all happened when he finally succeeded with the God Legion Paradise, and could absorb empyrean-baleful energy. And of the various types of empyrean-baleful energy that existed in the Rich-Lush Continent, primal-chaos paleo-energy was the most powerful.

After completing the God Legion Paradise, Yang Qi had worked day and night to connect to that energy, using the Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragment. He had also probed certain immortal formations, ones that could slaughter Great Sages.

Not even Great Sages in ancient times would have dared to go near those formations.

The truth was that, after reaching the sixth Legendary transformation, and acquiring the God Legion Paradise, Yang Qi was already strong enough to kill Great Sages with the Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragment, the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, and the Heaven-Dominating Golden Swordbreaker. But now, he had primal-chaos paleo-energy and immortal formations; it was now hard to say exactly how strong he was.

After gaining enlightenment, he sent his mind out to become one with that energy, which had led to even greater advancement. Then, using the power of five million megamammoths, he drew upon the power of the spell formations, whose power was like that of an army of Great Sages all working together. In fact, that power could spread out to cover thousands upon thousands of kilometers, and combined to become one massive primal-chaos spell formation.

The Crown Prince, Yun Hailan, the clan leaders, the people from the Sage Ancestor Dynasty, Sea God Institute, True Dragon Institute, as well as the nine Great Sages from the Quake-Dawn Cathedral and the six Great Sages from the Western Continent were all now trapped within that massive formation.

“What's going on here? How come there’s suddenly so much primal-chaos paleo-energy here? And how come I can’t tell its source?”

“This is the primal-chaos paleo-energy that holds the Rich-Lush Continent in place. It was left behind by an immortal in ancient times! It's nothing to take lightly. Don’t absorb it! If you do, you’ll explode. Even a scrap of it is as heavy as a mountain!”

“How? How can Yang Qi use energy like this? Not even the Great Sages from past generations could do this! Not even Grand Emperor Rich-Lush! And Yang Qi is only a Legendary! How is this possible?”

“Don’t forget, he actually saved the entire plane. No wonder he can do things like this. He definitely has what it takes to fight the Crown Prince.”

Countless lesser beings were already lost within the energy, unable to figure out how to escape it, or how to move about. Yang Qi had locked down everything for hundreds of kilometers, making it an immortal formation that could seal space and the void. Not even the Great Sages could do anything about it. This already surpassed anything that could be considered his power; this was the power of the Rich-Lush Continent as a whole.

RUUUUMBLE!

A pillar of sagelight rose up, illuminating all of the primal-chaos paleo-energy, and making Yang Qi stand out to everyone present. He looked holy to the extreme, surrounded by his paradisiac pure land. Meanwhile, the land within the spell formation began to rotate, and turn porcelain in color, as though it were untainted by even a speck of dust, and pure to the extreme.

Both Sage Monarch City and Yanhaven were within the bounds of that pure land.

And so were the elite cultivators from all of the lands.

Countless holy trees began to sprout and rise up, shining with radiance and light. Yang Qi had prepared well to meet the Crown Prince. This was his personal domain, his God Legion Paradise, fused with the primal-chaos paleo-energy, and one with the Rich-Lush Continent’s immortal formations.

It was a power that vastly surpassed that of a Great Sage, and as a result, the Great Sages present were trembling in fear.

“This is my personal domain, the God Legion Paradise,” Yang Qi said, looking at all the elite experts, including Yun Hailan and the Crown Prince. “It's been combined with primal-chaos paleo-energy. And behind me is Sage Monarch City, where my sworn brothers and sisters are, safe and sound. If you kill me, then you can get to them. But if you can’t, then I’ll kill you. Anyone who tries to harm a brother or sister of mine, will be killed. Chancellor Sea God. Chancellor True Dragon. Gentlemen from the Quake-Dawn Cathedral. Crown Prince. Yun Hailan. Observe my godly might. I am the legion of gods, and the legion of gods is me. I will rise to heaven, and spread the glory of the gods….”

BOOM!

Stepping forward within the fusion of the immortal formations and the God Legion Paradise, Yang Qi clenched his fists, and then attacked the entire group of enemies arrayed against him.

He was going up against them alone, in what seemed an act of complete madness, like a moth attacking a raging fire.

It was an awesome sight as he flew forth, his God Legion Battle Robe whipping about him like white clouds. His eyes flashed as if with lightning, and his hands were like raging thunder, ready to tear mountains asunder.

It was a sight which would leave most people at a loss for words. Yang Qi was single-handedly attacking an entire group of Great Sages, including the deva-like Crown Prince.

His grandeur and majesty were almost palpable, and his power seemed like the epitome of that which was virtuous and moral.

Those present who were not Great Sages immediately scattered in flight.

‘So fierce!’ Ghost Emperor Yama thought.

“Evil creature!” Chancellor Sea God shouted. He and Chancellor True Dragon were among the most powerful figures in the world, and thus, they led the charge to meet Yang Qi’s attack. Much of their clothing was ripped to shreds from the power of their fist strikes, and they even called upon their sage motes.

But!

When their fists struck the God Legion Paradise, the primal-chaos paleo-energy sent them flying backward.

At the same time, a mass of sage motes appeared behind Yang Qi.

“Sage motes!” Chancellor Sea God blurted. “Look, he has sage motes! He absorbed a Great Sage!”

His face went ashen from the shock, and his mind began to reel, as though he had seen something that couldn’t possibly exist.

Yang Qi had long since absorbed Great Sage Quake-Cloud’s sage motes and made them part of his own true energy. As of now, his true energy was no different from that of a Great Sage's. That was another reason why it had been so easy for him to harness the power of primal-chaos paleo-energy.

“Attack!” cried the Great Sages from the Quake-Dawn Cathedral as they attacked with a killing move. An immense net appeared, filled with dragon-like, tiger-like lightning, the type of thing that could destroy the stars.

“Dragon-Tiger Lightning God Grand Empyrean Energy!”

The dragon-tiger lightning web swept out like an ocean, something that could destroy countless devillings. In fact, anything that fell into that net would likely be destroyed.

Yang Qi clenched his fist, and sagelight converged upon it. In the blink of an eye, a host of holy halls appeared within the pure land around him, glowing with radiance and light. It was impossible to say what plane these halls originally came from, billions upon billions of years in the past. However, with the sage motes, and the sagelight they cast, it was now possible for these halls of heaven to appear in the human world.

The Fist of the Halls of Heaven.

Only a Great Sage who commanded the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth should be able to use it. However, Yang Qi had absorbed sage motes, and had a basic understanding of the boundless halls of heaven. Therefore, he could use this godly fist technique, which was originally designed to slaughter immortals and devils.

BOOM!

Sagelight roiled out to fill all creation, ripping the net of lightning to pieces. At the same time, the Great Sages from the Quake-Dawn Cathedral staggered backward, their faces turning as pale as death. To them, that fist strike from moments ago caused chills to run down their spines.

Yang Qi wasn’t willing to back down an inch. Within his pure land, countless godly trees of radiance and light sent eternal brilliance out, driving away all darkness, and causing even devil-gods in the depths of hell to sense the glory.

His eyes were like freezing stars, and his eyebrows were like sharp swords. And yet, he still seemed merciful and awe-inspiring, someone who others would naturally offer allegiance to. In fact, the countless experts present all realized that they admired him in their hearts.

He took another step forward, stepping through the remnants of the net to appear in front of the nine Great Sages. He glowed with the brilliance of the halls of heaven, to the point where everyone could only stare in open shock.

Yet again, he unleashed the Fist of the Halls of Heaven. And this time, a Great Sage fell.

The man threw his lightning-wreathed arms up to block, except, his bones creaked ominously, and then began to shatter. His flesh began to peel off of him like that of a rotten fruit, and even his sage motes began to explode. Then, he collapsed into a mass of blood and gore.

A Great Sage had been killed.

The other eight Great Sages from the Quake-Dawn Cathedral were enraged, and immediately began to ask for help.

“Kill him! Surround him! Crown Prince, you take the lead! Find an opening and kill him.”

Maybe Yang Qi did have shocking godly might, but there was no way he could stand up to so many people at one time.

As for Yun Hailan, she looked deathly pale, and her eyes shone with indescribable disbelief. Yang Qi had only been in action for a few breaths of time, and had defeated Chancellor Sea God and Chancellor True Dragon, and then killed one of the Great Sages from the Quake-Dawn Cathedral.

The idea of one person defeating three Great Sages so easily was almost impossible to reconcile. Who was this guy? Was he really a Legendary? From ancient times until now, throughout the history of countless planes, had there ever been a person as ferocious as this?

Chapter 327: Superlative Defense

All of the Great Sages attacked Yang Qi simultaneously.

The only one who held back was the Crown Prince himself. The group consisted of six Great Sages from the Western Continent, the eight Great Sages from the Quake-Dawn Cathedral, the chancellors of the Sea God and True Dragon Institutes, and Emperor Sage-Ancestor. Seventeen Great Sages were unleashing deadly attacks with the goal of cutting him down.

On the one hand, it was a breathtaking sight. On the other hand, it seemed impossible that anyone could survive something like this.

In Sage Monarch City, Chancellor Sun Moon felt completely crestfallen and without hope, and was sure that he was about to die. He knew that Yang Qi was much stronger than he had ever realized. Because he had the Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragment, he could activate the ancient formations in the primal-chaos beneath the continent. He had absorbed the sage motes of a powerful Great Sage, and also had the Grand Emperor's Pagoda and other similar treasures.

Despite all that, though, it seemed inevitable that he would die in the face of an attack like this.

The Great Sages in question were all of relatively low level, including the first, second, and third step. Perhaps someone like Ghost Emperor Yama could destroy seventeen such individuals with ease.

But Ghost Emperor Yama was so far beyond their level of power that he was almost in another world. Yang Qi was in quite a different position. He was in the sixth Legendary transformation, making him like little more than an ant.

To top it all off, the Crown Prince was holding back, and he was a person who was completely enigmatic and impossible to predict.

He had a serious expression on his face, which indicated that, at long last, he was taking Yang Qi seriously, and realized that he wasn't someone to be underestimated. No longer was he a mere ant that could be squished with relative ease. No, he was like a primeval wild beast!

And yet, the Crown Prince was still waiting to see exactly how strong he was. Now that he had provoked the enraged attack of seventeen Great Sages, it seemed likely that he would be dead within moments.

Truth be told, the total number was eighteen, but he had just reduced one of them to a bloody pulp. With him out of the count, it was seventeen Great Sages.

At this point, many of the terrified lower-level individuals who had come along with the Crown Prince began to discuss the events, keeping their voices low.

“This Yang Qi really does have access to some sort of invincible power! I can’t believe that he actually defeated three Great Sages in one shot! It’s really shocking.”

“What transformation is he in? Even in ancient times, it was unheard-of for a Legendary to be able to defeat a Great Sage.”

“Even the Crown Prince must be astonished by all this. Although, considering how many Great Sages are left, and that they’re all furious at Yang Qi, I doubt he’ll escape with his life. How could a Legendary possibly stand up to the combined attack of so many Great Sages? If that happened, word would probably spread to other planes of existence. Even in the era of the Yore-Wilds, something like this would be surprising to immortals, let alone sages.”

In that moment, time seemed to slow down, creating an image that would exist for all eternity in the minds of those present. Seventeen Great Sages were all joining forces to attack Yang Qi.

C-C-CRACK!

Seventeen flows of all-destructive energy parted the primal-chaos paleo-energy and bore down on Yang Qi’s soul.

Each attack was the manifestation of a sage domain, and all of them were different. Some were murderous in nature, while others were incisive, fierce, or imposing. All of them were attacks that were backed by the full force of the Great Sage that unleashed them, and were designed to destroy their target in every sense of the word.

Yang Qi would die beyond the shadow of a doubt.

That much seemed certain, both to the attackers, and the people in Sage Monarch City. Time started moving again.

RUMBLE!

Heaven and earth filled with darkness and gloom, as well as with primal-chaos vital energy. It was almost as if the sun had lost its ability to cast light.

At the same time, all of the sagelight emanating from Yang Qi swirled around him protectively.

Moments ago, the sagelight had been spread out in the form of the God Legion Paradise, bolstered by the primal-chaos spell formations, to make it even larger than before.

But now, it was as if heaven and earth were returning to their original state of primal-chaos, as he pulled in the God Legion Paradise.

“And thus I step onto the long road of battle….” Yang Qi murmured.

As the God Legion Paradise shrank down, something else appeared within the sagelight: a projection of the halls of heaven. The pure land around him now contained living people, the sky, the land, oceans, as well as the corpses of countless god-devils.

Yang Qi sighed, and a blood-red sun rose, which was none other than the core of the God Legion Paradise, the Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragment.

At this point, Yang Qi murmured, “God Legion Paradise: Superlative Defense!”

Instantly, the power of ten thousand galloping horses surged out. It was the rage of heavenly deities, like the falling of countless meteors to crush the lands beneath. Even a million volcanoes all erupting at the same time would pale in comparison. The God Legion Paradise shrank down to a size of only ten square meters. Then, the attacks of the seventeen Great Sages hit it with mind-boggling force, instantly causing crevices to open up in the ground of that pure land.

However, closer examination revealed that they were not, in fact, crevices. They were a turtle-shell-like pattern, like that of a divine turtle from the distant past. It was none other than the God Legion Paradise’s Superlative Defense.

To the complete shock of everyone present, the blazing attacks of the seventeen Great Sages entered the God Legion Paradise, only to be completely vanquished by the blood-red Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragment.

Within his domain, Yang Qi controlled everything, and could create an entire heaven and earth.

“What? Not even seventeen Great Sages can break into his personal domain?!”

“What exactly is going on here? Those are seventeen Great Sages! And they're all working together! Any opponent they attack should be killed instantly. How did this guy block them? Look, he’s not even hurt. Is he really a Legendary? Is he even human? He’s not an immortal, is he?”

Chancellor Sun Moon, as well as countless other members of the aristocratic clans, were numb from shock.

‘Superlative Defense!’ Ghost Emperor Yama thought, shivering from fear. ‘That must be the Superlative Defense from his godly-class energy art. If I had that, I wouldn’t have anything to fear from the Quake-Dawn Cathedral! I wouldn’t even need to worry about Demi-Immortals! It’s too bad that his God Legion Seal is so strong, otherwise I’d figure out a way to deal with him.’

According to certain legends, when the God Legion Paradise was complete, it would become impervious to attacks, and could even convert them into power. Normally speaking, the attacks of seventeen Great Sages should have been more than enough to destroy the God Legion Paradise. But with the Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragment, that was absolutely not the case.

The combination of those two was powerful to an unimaginable degree.

They could create a truly superlative defense.

“He has the Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragment in his personal domain!” shouted Chancellor Sea God. “There’s no way we can break through it! We're just not strong enough. Look! His domain is actually absorbing the force of our attack and turning it into more sage motes!”

“How could this be happening?” Chancellor True Dragon shouted. “What kind of a personal domain is that? Why is it so terrifying!?” He had the projection of a true dragon behind him, ready to unleash another deadly attack.

However, before he could, Yang Qi made a move.

Considering that these sages couldn't possibly break his Superlative Defense, there was no way he was going to let any of them go.

Sagelight flared, illuminating everything for thousands of kilometers in all directions. The projection of the halls of heaven floated above his head, and sage motes flitted about, which had all been created thanks to the seventeen Great Sages.

Clenching both hands into fists, he took a step forward, placing him directly in front of the chancellors from the Sea God and True Dragon Institute.

“Fist of the Halls of Heaven!”

Holy light shone out that could illuminate the universe, becoming a raging sea that completely swept over the two chancellors.

As they tumbled within the ‘sea water’, the powers of destruction inundated them, and within the blink of an eye, they realized they were in incredible danger.

Without hesitation, they called upon their most deadly techniques, drawing on sage motes to unleash a dragon-snake and a sea of light to fight back against Yang Qi.

Clank. Clang….

Their sage mote attacks hit the God Legion Paradise like a metal sword hitting a shield. Not only did they not hurt it, the God Legion Paradise actually absorbed the force of the attack.

As Yang Qi stood there on the porcelain land of the God Legion Paradise, with fists clenched, tall and straight, his domain spread out, locking the two chancellors in place.

Wham! Bam!

In a sight which no one would ever be able to forget, two enormous, glowing fists of light shot forth, hitting each chancellor in the chest. Sagelight poured into them, burning so hot that their blood quickly transformed into sagelight.

Their screams echoed about in the pure land, but could not leave it. Everyone looked on in silence as vicious expressions of pain and terror twisted their faces in terrifying fashion.

Pop!

Sagelight shot up, almost as if it wished to drag the stars down out of the sky. The primal-chaos paleo-energy in the area grew stronger, and the two chancellors began to glow so brightly that they soon turned into pure light. Then the light faded away, revealing that the ground of the God Legion Paradise now had two etchings, depicting both Chancellor Sea God and Chancellor True Dragon. They were now a permanent part of the porcelain-colored pure land.

Yang Qi stood there with his pure white God Legion Battle Robe fluttering about, looking down at the two portraits etched into the ground. Then, he began to speak, almost as if he were uttering an elegy to the two fallen chancellors. “Ashes to ashes, dust to dust. If the pure land is not pure, then purified it shall become….”

These two chancellors had led two of the most powerful organizations in the Rich-Lush Continent for thousands of years. And yet, now they had fallen, and were nothing more than etchings in the ground of the God Legion Paradise.

Yang Qi had killed them with complete ease.

Even among Great Sages, they were no slouches. Their names were nearly as prominent as that of Chancellor Demi-Immortal.

After a moment of shocked silence, the grand elders and prime elders of their two institutes let out wails of grief, almost as loudly as if their own mothers had perished.

Chapter 328: Total Annihilation

Two famous, hegemonic rulers, Chancellor Sea God and Chancellor True Dragon, died. Just like that. In the blink of an eye, they became two portraits, etchings that would exist for all eternity in the depths of the God Legion Paradise.

They were powerful overlords, but they did not die at the hands of some high-level Great Sage. No, they were killed by a mere Personal-Domain Legendary.

Perhaps it could even be said that they died unfairly, in very woeful fashion.

It only served to highlight how strong Yang Qi was, considering that he had completely and thoroughly annihilated them. Despite being attacked by a whole group of Great Sages, he had not suffered any setbacks whatsoever, and had launched a counter-strike of the most lethal nature.

Probably most terrifying of all was the fact that the God Legion Paradise’s Superlative Defense had ensured that the seventeen deadly attacks levied against him hadn’t even injured him.

The sage motes belonging to the two victims immediately began to disperse, but before they could, red light shot out from the Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragment, grabbing them and placing them behind Yang Qi, where they swirled about like bright red dragons.

With the sage motes of two chancellors, he could reach an even higher level of enlightenment, making him stronger and more terrifying. In the blink of an eye, his control over the primal-chaos paleo-energy improved. In fact, everyone present suddenly felt as if there were a primeval immortal-spirit nearby, an ancient god of the primal-chaos.

There was no doubt in anyone’s mind that after killing the two Great Sages and taking their sage motes, Yang Qi would be able to unleash the primal-chaos paleo-energy and the immortal formations to even greater effect. In fact, his control over the plane in general would have improved.

Ghost Emperor Yama was literally shivering. ‘He’s so incredibly fierce! He killed two Great Sages with one attack?! And he’s only in the sixth Legendary transformation. Nobody like this existed even in the Yore-Wilds Continent. In fact, I doubt the immortal planes have people like him! And he hasn’t even used the God Legion Seal yet. This power belongs to him and him alone. I wonder how terrifying he’ll be if he reaches the Great Sage level. I doubt even I could deal with him.’

Yang Qi still had to reach the Ghost-God Transformation, the Astral-Star Transformation, the Never-Dying Transformation, and eventually, the Half Sage level. Each of those breakthroughs would be shocking to an immense degree.

Ghost Emperor Yama couldn’t even wrap his mind around what Yang Qi would be like after all that.

After absorbing the sage motes, Yang Qi’s true energy was stupefyingly powerful. The holy light that glowed in the God Legion Paradise was brighter than ever, and it was even possible to hear holy hymns echoing about. At the same time, godmammoth particles within him began to wake up.

One hundred thousand.

Five hundred thousand.

One million.

Three million.

Five million!

In the shortest of moments, five million particles woke up, putting his total at the staggering level of ten million.

That put him far beyond the strength of an ordinary Great Sage.

The power of the two chancellors’ sage motes and true energy was so immense that it seemed as though the God Legion Paradise might not be able to handle it. However, Yang Qi had been prepared for such an outcome, and quickly drew on the Yore-Wilds’ Heart to neutralize the effects. As long as no one could destroy the heart fragment, then it would be able to absorb virtually any force, and convert it into power for Yang Qi.

That was one of the terrifying aspects of the God Legion Paradise, and was also the reason that, when it was being formed, it had incited the Jambudvīpa Deluge.

His true energy had essentially doubled, going from five million megamammoths to ten million. It was truly a wonderful gift that the two chancellors had given him.

All of these things happened in the blink of an eye. From the moment the seventeen Great Sages attacked, to when Yang Qi revealed his Superlative Defense, to the counter-attack and slaughter of the two chancellors, almost no time passed. And yet, to the onlookers, it was almost as if ten thousand years had gone by.

Within their minds was a clear image of Yang Qi, glowing with sagelight, destroying the chests of the two chancellors, and then absorbing them without the slightest hesitation.

“Well done, Yang Qi,” the Crown Prince said. “Well done! Apparently, I shall be the one to destroy you!” He couldn’t hold back any longer. He took a step forward, and was instantly surrounded by wind, lightning, dragons, tigers, black turtles, and the like. Hundreds of thousands of sword nimbuses appeared, manifestations of swords that could cleave apart all creation, and slash primal-chaos paleo-energy into pieces.

Crack! Snap!

It was with flourishing immortal will that he stepped into Yang Qi’s sagelight, and headed toward his God Legion Paradise.

“Immortal-Slayer's War-Halberd!” he shouted. Ripping open the void, he produced a dual-crescent-bladed halberd. It was not the weapon he had used to fight Young Master Shroud-Heaven, but something more powerful and mysterious, something that could sever mountains and rivers, and whose aura was like a heaven-immortal descending into the world, an immortal king arriving into the lands of mortals.

“Hear my commands, Great Sages,” he said. “I will personally execute this brutish bastard. Meanwhile, the lot of you break through the primal-chaos paleo-energy and into the city. Slaughter everyone, including his family, friends, sworn brothers and sisters, and everyone from the Sun Moon Institute.”

Considering that Yang Qi had just cut down the two chancellors, it was obvious that the Crown Prince had to do something immediately, lest he lose all face.

With that, he hefted his halberd, and the crescent-shaped blades shone with brilliant light, pulsing as though the weapon contained the vengeful souls of immortal-spirits. It was stained with the blood of the countless beings it had put an end to, including giant dragons, chymeras, gobblewocks and other divine beasts. It was impossible to say what the weapon was forged from, but it had sage motes, allowing it to erupt with brilliant sagelight, which the Crown Prince sent flying toward the God Legion Paradise. The instant it hit, the wail of ghosts and gods erupted out, and the fleeting images of immortal planes rose up behind Yang Qi.

The Crown Prince had finally made his move!

“Heaven-Dominating Golden Swordbreaker!” Yang Qi said. Face completely expressionless, he waved his hand to summon his enormous golden swordbreaker, which weighed as much as ten thousand golden mountains. “Ashes to ashes, dust to dust. Expand, God Legion Paradise. Everyone who wants to harm my friends and family shall die.”

The God Legion Paradise expanded outward rapidly, until it contained all of Sage Monarch City, as well as the Great Sages who had just made their move to attack it.

As for the images of Chancellor Sea God and Chancellor True Dragon, they also grew larger, and even more lifelike.

“The Crown Prince is going to kill Yang Qi!” shouted one of the Great Sages from the Quake-Dawn Cathedral. “The evil monster won’t be able to hold out much longer. Come on, let’s join forces to destroy his personal domain, and slaughter everyone he knows! The distraction to Yang Qi will be his undoing!”

KABAM!

The Heaven-Dominating Golden Swordbreaker made contact with the Immortal-Slayer's War-Halberd, and stopped it in its tracks. Meanwhile, an enormous, holy hand appeared behind Yang Qi, clasping a long, lightning-wreathed spear covered with the images of numerous hells. The Hells of Euphoria, Yamas, Suras, Nagas, Never-Ending, Mud Pits, Misery, and more.

The spear shot forth with unstoppable momentum, like an infernal deity out to collect souls. When night fell, the lives of human beings shone brightly, and although evening was a beautiful thing, when the primeval infernal deities arrived, their deadly spears could stab the sun out of existence.

POP!

The power of the spear overwhelmed the sun, and darkness and gloom enveloped the lands.

The Great Sage who had just spoken let out an anguished scream, and before he could even react, he was pinned to the ground by the Infernal Deity Spear.

As his blood flowed out onto the porcelain ground of the God Legion Paradise like a bright red river, his sage motes were quickly absorbed and purified.

Another Great Sage had fallen.

As of this moment, of the eighteen Great Sages who had come to face Yang Qi, one had been mortally wounded in the initial charge, and two, the chancellors, were dead. Now, another one had been killed. There were only fourteen Great Sages left.

“Dammit. He killed another one! Not even the Crown Prince’s halberd can keep him in check. Even while fighting the Crown Prince, he still managed to kill another one of the sages!”

Countless people were backing away in fear of Yang Qi, as they realized that he was a person who slaughtered Great Sages like they were stray dogs.

When the Infernal Deity Spear entered the world of men, the light of evening abounded, and a symphony of death filled the world.

Bam!

The Heaven-Dominating Golden Swordbreaker once again connected with the Immortal-Slayer's War-Halberd, making it more obvious than ever that neither of these combatants was weaker than the other.

All of a sudden, Yang Qi shouted, “Hell of Melting Gold! Give me your power!”

RIIIIP!

A space-time wormhole opened up above his head, out of which poured golden paleo-devils, which entered the Heaven-Dominating Golden Swordbreaker, and gave it even more astonishing levels of power.

The Crown Prince’s eyes were like twin blades that could slice apart heaven as he hefted his halberd. Then, he began to swing it out in front of him in a prescribed set of movements that conformed to the orbit of stars and the workings of heaven.

“Reincarnation of the Immortal-Slayer! The Dao of Heaven is Fickle!”

Chapter 329: Devouring Everything

The Crown Prince had brought eighteen Great Sages to kill Yang Qi and exterminate everyone he knew.

Instead, they had been stopped in their tracks. Actually, Yang Qi had even begun to kill them. No one could do a thing about his savagery.

In fact, if the Crown Prince hadn’t taken action, then all of the other Great Sages would likely have been wiped out already.

The six Great Sages from the Western Continent, and Emperor Sage-Ancestor, were filled with immense regret that they had joined the Crown Prince in this endeavor.

Unfortunately, if you ride a tiger, it's hard to get off, and that was exactly the position they were in now.

Countless streams of primal-chaos paleo-energy were rushing to Yang Qi’s God Legion Paradise, keeping the entire area completely locked down, and making it impossible for the Great Sages to escape.

“He’s locked down Sage Monarch City!” a Great Sage shouted, his voice trembling with terror. “He's not going to let us live!”

Fear was spreading like crazy, and it wasn’t just the Great Sages who were affected. The Crown Prince had brought many other elites from various clans and sects, and now, all of them were trembling like chickens.

Never could any of them have guessed that Yang Qi would be so ferocious and invincible.

Most of them were coming to the conclusion that killing him was nothing but wishful thinking. It was as if the more he fought, the stronger he got. He had made it impossible to escape Sage Monarch City, and not even the Crown Prince seemed capable of getting the upper hand in the fight.

At long last, it was possible to see fear in Yun Hailan’s eyes. She was terrified of Yang Qi, and simply couldn’t believe that his battle prowess was so incredibly shocking. He killed Great Sages, and then harvested their energy to become stronger. Even the Crown Prince, who she thought of as something like a deva from heaven, was actually incapable of tangling with him.

If she could have fled, she would have, but unfortunately, that wasn't possible.

In the depths of the God Legion Paradise, surrounded by boundless sagelight, was Yang Qi’s soul, and it was locked down onto her hard and fast. Perhaps others present might have been able to escape by certain means, but Yang Qi was too set on killing her.

A very serious expression covered the Crown Prince’s face as he slashed his halberd back and forth with increasingly violent vigor. Everything that was happening was vastly beyond anything he could have predicted. Not only was Yang Qi strong enough to stand up to him, his Superlative Defense made him impervious even to a whole group of Great Sages.

The Crown Prince had always viewed Yang Qi as little more than a bug, but now, he was proving to be like a gigantic dragon from primeval times.

If he had known things would end up like this, he would have done anything and everything he could to kill him back in the Inter-Institutional Martial Arts Competition. Unfortunately, he had not, which he now realized was one of the biggest mistakes he had ever made.

“Yang Qi, you despicable ant. Do you really think that you, a Personal-Domain Legendary, can defeat me, a Great Sage? I'm a god from heaven descended into the mortal world! I come from a higher plane of existence in the universe, making you like dirt beneath my feet! The Wrath of Heaven Chastises Gods!”

His Immortal-Slayer's War-Halberd swept back and forth, its crescent blades creating an enormous spell formation.

Instantly, a devastating aura descended onto the God Legion Paradise.

The Great Sages all stopped fighting and backed up as an enormous eye formed in the middle of the formation, which seemed to glow with the wrath of heaven.

“The Wrath of Heaven Chastises Gods!? That represents the full fury of the vault of heaven! The Crown Prince is drawing upon the wrath of heaven!”

“That’s a consummate art that was thought to be lost in the sands of time!”

“According to the rumors, this really is the manifestation of the rage of heaven!”

“He’s dead for sure!”

After drawing upon the wrath of heaven, the Crown Prince threw his halberd over his shoulder and leaped into the air, like a divine dragon flying in the sky, or a mighty whale breaching the surface of the ocean.

He was an ancient god whose steps could crush mountains, and whose power shocked all onlookers to the core.

Everything trembled violently, and the porcelain ground of the God Legion Paradise began to crack. Finally, the Crown Prince was baring his fangs.

And yet, Yang Qi stood there as tall and strong as a mountain. At the same time, three enormous arms of true energy sprouted out from him, each of them fully three hundred meters long. One held the Heaven-Dominating Golden Swordbreaker, the other the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, and the third, the Infernal Deity Spear.

Meanwhile, his two physical hands, empty, swept out in front of him, causing sagelight to erupt as the ancient halls of heaven appeared once again.

Yet again, it was the Fist of the Halls of Heaven!

His God Legion Battle Robe fluttered wildly, and his hair whipped about him as, instead of trying to avoid The Wrath of Heaven Chastises Gods, he leaped directly toward the eye that represented it.

And when the Fist of the Halls of Heaven smashed into the formation, the eye was ripped to shreds. The wrath of heaven had been vanquished!

“The legion of gods created the vault of heaven,” Yang Qi said. “And you dare to chastise them?”

Another attack having been completely neutralized, the Crown Prince shouted, “Immortal armor!”

The killing intent in his eyes raged even more intensely than before. Burning his quintessence energy like fire, he howled, causing a suit of armor to spread out over him. Obviously, this was a magical treasure, not an expression of true energy, and even more telling, it was inscribed with the written script of immortals.

“That’s immortal armor! It wasn’t created by a sage, but by an immortal!”

“Look, it has immortal motes on it!”

“At the very least, it was forged by a Demi-Immortal.”

“The Crown Prince actually has a suit of immortal armor!”

“That aura is so powerful! Those must be immortal motes left behind by some Demi-Immortal expert. With that armor on, the Crown Prince is like a tiger with wings! Now he’s really going to be able to fight! Come on, let’s join forces to distract Yang Qi. Keep him pinned down, and that way the Crown Prince will be able to make full use of his immortal armor.”

Howling with rage, the Great Sages formed ranks again and unleashed more dazzling attacks, as well as a variety of sage domains that began to compete with the God Legion Paradise.

“Superlative Defense!” Yang Qi yet again shrank the God Legion Paradise down to a small size to rebuff all of the incoming assaults.

Meanwhile, the Crown Prince’s suit of armor radiated boundless immortal power, the aura of a powerful Demi-Immortal.

Without any hesitation, he stamped his foot, and as a result, the primal-chaos vital energy spell formation started crumbling.

“Yang Qi, I have to admit that, despite being a mere Personal-Domain Legendary, your cultivation base makes you a worthy opponent. How else could you have put me in this position? Unfortunately, your momentum ends here! I am a majestic Great Sage! Immortal motes!”

Immortal motes appeared on the surface of his nameless suit of armor, which were vastly more powerful than sage motes; and right now, they swirled about dizzyingly, covering his face, hands, skin, and halberd.

He took a step forward, with his very stride conforming to the fury of heaven. As he proceeded forward, the land beneath him collapsed, and the vital energy was thrown into chaos. Then, his halberd slashed through the air to slam into the greyspace of the God Legion Paradise.

At this point, the Superlative Defense finally shattered, and the God Legion Paradise was left wide open.

“Attack!”

“Kill him! The primal-chaos paleo-energy is being held back!”

“His Superlative Defense is broken! He’s not invincible anymore.”

“Our only hope is to kill him!”

Brilliant light shone everywhere as the remaining Great Sages once again attacked Yang Qi with full force.

Thanks to the Crown Prince’s immortal armor and motes, Yang Qi was finally open to attack.

As for the Crown Prince, he was already in Yang Qi’s personal domain, and it was as quick as lightning that he unleashed another move, sending his halberd directly toward Yang Qi’s neck to remove his head.

As for the other Great Sages, they closed in on the core of his personal domain, where they saw absolutely nothing in terms of defenses. They hated Yang Qi down to their bones, especially the ones from the Western Continent, and therefore, they led the charge.

Yang Qi stood in the middle of the God Legion Paradise, his expression one of complete placidity, without a trace of fear. Then, he began to speak lightly in Godtongue, “Ashes to ashes, dust to dust. Tribulation to tribulation, flood to flood. Any who profane the paradise of the legion of gods will be punished!”

RUMBLE!

All of a sudden, water began to pour down from the greyspace of the personal domain, quickly forming a surging sea. It was pitch black water that could corrode bones and souls, that could eradicate all living beings, that could drown the host of immortals and even reach the halls of heaven and the legion of gods.

It was a Jambudvīpa Deluge!

An agonized shriek rang out as Great Sage Pure Emptiness, who was in the lead, bore the brunt of the Jambudvīpa Deluge. In the blink of an eye, his skin began to melt, and before he could do anything, his bones were revealed, which also began to dissolve.

A moment later, he was gone.

A Great Sage had vanished like nothing into the waters of the Jambudvīpa Deluge.

Water swept forth, filling the pure land of Yang Qi’s personal domain, to bear down on all the Great Sages who had been following Great Sage Pure Emptiness.

“It’s a Jambudvīpa Deluge! How could that be here, in this personal domain!? It can even melt Great Sages into nothing! Retreat! Retreat! We have to get out of his domain, otherwise we're all dead!”

The emperor of the Sky-Heaven Dynasty was hit with the flood water, and one of his sage items was destroyed. At the same time, his arm withered away into nothing, and numerous other wounds opened up on his body. Screaming, he put everything on the line to fall backward, and thus barely escaped with his life.

The rest of the Great Sages scattered like rats, screeching in fear.

The only one left behind was Pure Emptiness, although, technically speaking, there actually wasn’t anything of him left. His sage motes, his quintessence energy, his soul, his flesh and blood; all of them had been destroyed by the Jambudvīpa Deluge.

Meanwhile, the God Legion Paradise was already repairing itself, and the breach the Crown Prince had opened in its greyspace was closing up, leaving him trapped inside.

Thanks to the Crown Prince’s immortal armor, he was protected from the Jambudvīpa Deluge, which completely covered him. However, his eyes were now shining with both terror and fury.

As of this moment, the power of the tribulation was almost completely negating the power of his immortal armor.

“So, you can actually summon a Jambudvīpa Deluge! That’s not your own power, is it Yang Qi!?” Hefting his halberd, he tried to launch another attack, but the tribulation water made it impossible for him to keep focused on a target.

“What do you know about me and my power, Crown Prince?” Yang Qi replied. “Watch. I'm going to show you what true tribulation is like!” Throwing his arms wide, he said, “Ghosts and gods of heaven and earth, come to me! Ghost-God Transformation!”

Countless wormholes popped into being in the God Legion Paradise, and more Jambudvīpa Deluge water appeared.

Shockingly, Yang Qi was taking advantage of this moment to break through to the Ghost-God Transformation!

Chapter 330: Ghost-God Transformation

Yang Qi had just killed four Great Sages in a row, and then absorbed their sage motes into his God Legion Paradise, provoking dramatic transformations. After filling himself to the brim with true energy, he used the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth to push forward into the seventh Legendary transformation.

Each of the nine Legendary transformations were different. The sixth was particularly difficult, but once it was achieved, and the personal domain was formed, reaching the Ghost-God Transformation was relatively simple.

All one had to do was absorb different types of empyrean-baleful energy, and thus add the power of ghost-gods to one’s personal domain.

The primal-chaos paleo-energy of the Rich-Lush Continent was a type of empyrean-baleful energy that only Yang Qi could absorb.

The Crown Prince had his immortal armor, which contained, not sage motes, but immortal motes. The fact that he had broken into his God Legion Paradise made Yang Qi realize that, without taking some extraordinary action, it would be difficult to prevail over him in the fight.

And thus, he had made the snap decision to call upon the Jambudvīpa Deluge to try to reach the Ghost-God Transformation. Considering how many sage motes he had acquired, he probably had enough to go all the way to the Half Sage level, given enough time.

‘In the term “empyrean-baleful”, the empyrean relates to gods, and the baleful relates to ghosts! The power of multiple planes will converge in me, and boundless hells will become part of my pure land.’

Yang Qi was currently surrounded by the Jambudvīpa Deluge as he faced the Crown Prince. But then, he drew upon the explosive power of another type of tribulation. Beyond the waters of the Jambudvīpa Deluge, countless space-time wormholes began to belch endless flames.

They were as red as blood, and almost looked like blooming ‘queen of the night’ flowers. Those flowers only lived for a short, fleeting moment, and yet, these flames erupted out without cease.

“Fleeting Fire!”

The Crown Prince shrank back from the fire, his eyes flashing with vigilance as he tried to find a way to escape from the God Legion Paradise, and the blood-red Night Queen Flame.

The Night Queen Flame was a grand tribulation of heaven and earth just like the Jambudvīpa Deluge was. Both were rare, and when they appeared, it indicated that something very unusual was going on.

Despite the fact that the Crown Prince had his immortal armor, he still didn’t dare to make contact with them, and was already backing away in the hopes of escaping the God Legion Paradise as quickly as possible.

“Think you can just leave, Crown Prince?”

As the tribulation wreathed Yang Qi, it entered his meridians and acupoints, flickering with destructive power. And as a result, figures appeared within the depths of the God Legion Paradise, almost like ghosts and gods of heaven and earth.

Instead of weakening because of the tribulation, Yang Qi seemed to be growing stronger. In fact, his aura and his true energy were indeed becoming more powerful. And the greyspace of the God Legion Paradise moved and shifted as winged ghost-gods became visible in its interlocking segments.

“Fist of the Halls of Heaven!”

Yang Qi stepped forward, keeping the God Legion Paradise closed tight so that the Crown Prince had no avenue of escape, and aiming a fist strike directly at him.

Stopping in his tracks, the Crown Prince said, “Well, it seems I have no other choice but to bury you here! Jambudvīpa Deluge and Night Queen Flame are nothing special. I have immortal armor and immortal motes. No attack of yours could harm me!”

Then he thrust his halberd out, parting the water and flame as he shot directly toward Yang Qi’s heart.

Bam!

Yang Qi struck out with his other fist, and the halls of heaven appeared again. He was unleashing two fist strikes at the same time. Sagelight combined with the Jambudvīpa Deluge and the Night Queen Flame as Yang Qi directly struck out toward the Crown Prince’s halberd.

The immortal motes on the halberd had broken into the God Legion Paradise, and yet Yang Qi was using his fleshly body to strike it. It seemed like a very risky and dangerous move.

As the power of the two fist strikes combined, blood-red light and sagelight flared. Then, Yang Qi struck the halberd, and sparks showered out in all directions. At the same time, a tremor passed through the Crown Prince as his halberd was knocked back.

This was a first!

In terms of raw power, the Crown Prince was at a disadvantage.

He had his immortal armor, and yet, he couldn’t pierce Yang Qi’s defenses.

As for the Great Sages who had survived the fighting so far, their hearts sank at the realization of what they were seeing.

“Get ready to die!” Yang Qi shouted, unleashing another double fist strike. Each blow that he unleashed had the power to sunder the heavens and crush the earth, and utilized the energy of both the Jambudvīpa Deluge and the Night Queen Flame.

Suddenly, he opened his mouth and inhaled all the tribulation water and fire, which caused the God Legion Paradise to grow larger. There were even godly trees that began to sprout up from nowhere within it.

As for the sagelight inside him, it seemed to be growing more real by the moment.

In that moment, Yang Qi suddenly seemed to grow taller and stronger, superior to the Crown Prince in almost every aspect. He had entered the seventh transformation and was now a Ghost-God Legendary.

Less than a hundred days ago, he had been in the third transformation. But now, thanks to the pressure provided by the Crown Prince, he had changed on a fundamental level.

“Bring the halls of heaven to the mortal world!”

Without any hesitation, he unleashed another fist strike.

It was a blow that could crush mountains and scatter seas, and even caused divine signs to appear within the God Legion Paradise. There was a god riding a dragon, who wielded an axe that could cleave primal-chaos itself. There was a black-robed old man with a brush, who painted yin and yang, the taiji, and the eight trigrams. There was a five-colored goddess creating five phases spirit stones….

BOOM!

The fist struck the Crown Prince, and he staggered backward, and even the immortal motes on his armor seemed stunned.

For the first time, he was backing away from Yang Qi.

“The Crown Prince has been beaten into retreat!? Not even his immortal armor can stand up to Yang Qi? This… this is unbelievable.”

“Don’t tell me the Crown Prince is really going to lose this fight.”

“What are we supposed to do? The primal-chaos paleo-energy is so strong! There’s no way we can break free. Besides, that Jambudvīpa Deluge could hit us at any moment.”

The terrified Great Sages kept trying to break free of the God Legion Paradise, but were unable. Even worse, Yang Qi was now a Ghost-God Legendary, and was forcing the Crown Prince into retreat.

“Not even the Crown Prince can fight him! Yang Qi is beating everyone and slaughtering Great Sages. We're in extreme danger!”

None of the Great Sages dared to try to make another move against Yang Qi.

Swish!

It was in that moment that radiant starlight spread out behind the Crown Prince, forming into two wings.

Wings of the Starry Sky!

It was a consummate art from primeval times, which could summon interstellar tempests.

“What do you call your personal domain? Some sort of paradise? Hah! I’ll destroy every last inch of it!”

He flapped his Wings of the Starry Sky, and suddenly, a hail of falling stars descended on the God Legion Paradise, which was none other than a massive interstellar tempest.

“Heavenly bodies of the legion of heavens, lend me your glory! Pierce all heavens to exterminate this evil being!” The Crown Prince reached up as if to grab heaven itself. As he did, an immense, glorious network of constellations appeared, filled with a river of silver, and countless planets. In the blink of an eye, glorious starlight descended, smashing into the greyspace of the God Legion Paradise.

“Wings of the Starry Sky?” Almost on instinct alone, Yang Qi summoned his Angel Wings.

A moment later, dazzling sagelight shot up to meet the falling starlight, and destroyed it with utter impunity. Every scrap of the starlight that had entered the God Legion Paradise was vanquished.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi’s wings unfurled, instantly reaching a wingspan of tens of thousands of kilometers, piercing into the void and drawing upon all of the radiance and light of heaven and earth.

Metal elemental fay!

Earth elemental fay!

Fire elemental fay!

Water elemental fay!

Wood elemental fay!

Space elemental fay!

Light elemental fay!

Countless elemental fays transformed into angels, giving the Angel Wings stupefying power that could crush the Wings of the Starry Sky.

A dimensional barrier appeared high in the sky, covering the dazzling constellations, and severing the source of power for the Crown Prince’s wings. Instantly, the Wings of the Starry Sky began to turn dark.

“Six Daos Downfall!” Yang Qi struck out six times with the Fist of the Halls of Heaven, each blow of which slammed into the Crown Prince.

POP!

The Crown Prince staggered backward, and as he did, his wings crumbled into ash.

“He actually eclipsed the glory of the Wings of the Starry Sky!? What wings are those?”

“The Crown Prince’s wings were defeated!”

“What do we do now?!”

Heart pounding with anxiety, Yun Hailan shouted, “This is the moment of truth! Great Sages, attack now! Kill Yang Qi and rescue the Crown Prince!”

And yet, the Great Sages all remained in place, unmoving, waiting to see what would happen between the Crown Prince and Yang Qi.

“Die!” the Crown Prince shouted. Although his wings had been destroyed, and he was in a very bad position, he was still a valiant fighter. Hefting his halberd, he said, “The great dao of the Immortal-Slayer can destroy anything! In the immortal planes, the host of immortals massacred the gods!”

Cracks spread out over his body, which then began to emit dazzling shafts of light, revealing a spectacular image. It was a painting of numerous immortals fighting the legion of gods, creating a blood-soaked scene of battle leading all the way to heaven!

RUUUUMBLE!

Suddenly, a powerful will appeared on the scene, seemingly out of nowhere.

As it did, the Crown Prince began to grow larger, and his true energy surged with heaven-shaking, earth-toppling force. Immortal energy rippled out of him as he seemed to surpass the Great Sage level and transform into an actual immortal.

“Yang Qi, you’ve forced me to waste my quintessence-blood as a sacrifice, to draw an immortal-spirit into me. You have only yourself to blame for this, understand? You might have been able to escape before, but now, there is nowhere you can flee to!”

His eyes were like burning, immortal fire as all the potential within him was released. Apparently, he was reaching out to another plane to draw on the immense power of an immortal-spirit.

It was very similar to how Yang Qi had connected to the will of that bronze immortal, which had eventually been destroyed by his God Legion Seal. However, in this case, the Crown Prince actually controlled the will of that immortal-spirit, giving him access to incredible power.

“There’s no question what will happen now. Tremble! And be destroyed!”

As the Crown Prince slashed out with his halberd, the greyspace of the God Legion Paradise began to shatter.

Chapter 331: A Complete Rout

The Crown Prince was bashing into the God Legion Paradise with the power of an immortal-spirit, causing cracks to spread out everywhere in the porcelain-colored ground.

Connecting with the will of an immortal was a blessing that led to immense power, and enabled the Crown Prince to send a blast of dazzling light from his halberd into the greyspace of Yang Qi’s personal domain.

Instantly, a dazzling field of stars, a river of silver, appeared around Sage Monarch City.

The Crown Prince’s Wings of the Starry Sky were forming again, and this time, they were even stronger than before.

“Prepare to die, Yang Qi!” he said, striding forward, his halberd burning with immortal motes.

“Not good!” Chancellor Sun Moon said, his face turning pale. “The Crown Prince is already stronger than a Great Sage! Yang Qi is in trouble!”

“Qi’er,” Yang Zhan murmured, his heart pounding.

Everyone else in Sage Monarch City was just as nervous, especially the members of the Yang Clan. Yang Qi was like their patriarch, and if he died, they knew they would all be exterminated by the Crown Prince.

And yet, Yang Qi didn’t seem to be worried at all about the fact that the Crown Prince had called upon an immortal-spirit to possess him. At the moment, he was like an ancient god walking among the world of men, spreading the glory of the Lord.

“Let the halls of heaven come!”

Suddenly, he waved the sleeve of his God Legion Battle Robe, as though he intended to suck the Crown Prince’s entire starry sky into it.

RUUUUMBLE!

He began to go through the forms of the Fist of the Halls of Heaven, and although he was moving calmly and casually, to the onlookers, he seemed as fast as lightning.

Beams of sagelight shot out like holy dragons, and all of the god-spirits in the God Legion Paradise’s greyspace howled. In the blink of an eye, Yang Qi’s personal domain seemed like the most ancient of lands.

Primal-chaos paleo-energy rose up from deep within the Rich-Lush Continent as the immortal formations therein were activated.

The shattered aspects of the God Legion Paradise were healed, and everything began to tremble violently. As everyone looked on in mute shock, something like the halls of heaven appeared high in the sky. Instantly, the starlight in the area was shaken so badly that the Crown Prince’s Wings of the Starry Sky collapsed into nothing.

The halls of heaven had come.

All planes in the universe, even the immortal planes, could be crushed by the halls of heaven. After all, the halls of heaven belonged to the Sovereign Lord of the universe, who controlled the billions of planes, and the millions upon millions of aspects of reincarnation.

Sage motes began to burn behind Yang Qi as he clenched his hand into a fist, causing the halls of heaven to absolutely destroy all of the Crown Prince’s momentum and power.

“He’s burning those sage motes!”

“Considering how many Great Sages he killed, he has enough sage motes to push his cultivation base much higher. But now, he's actually burning them!”

“What did he just summon? The halls of heaven?”

“His aura is so strong that we couldn’t even get close to him if we tried.”

Some of the Great Sages had been considering making a move to help the Crown Prince, but then the halls of heaven descended, and its holy light made them feel like their sage motes were about to burst into flame. As for Yun Hailan, she directly coughed up a huge mouthful of blood.

‘How could this be happening?’ she thought. The fact that the Crown Prince had reached out to an immortal-spirit was a terrifying thought, and yet, that power was completely kept in check by the halls of heaven.

The Crown Prince had lost his source of power, as well as his Wings of the Starry Sky. He was now in a very bad position.

“You severed my connection to the higher plane?!” the Crown Prince growled. His immortal motes were fading, and at long last, a look of terror could be seen in his eyes.

“The halls of heaven belongs to the legion of gods, and will tolerate no outside auras.” As the halls of heaven hung over the God Legion Paradise, Yang Qi faced the Crown Prince and unleashed another devastating attack.

BOOM!

The Crown Prince defended himself with his Immortal-Slayer's War-Halberd, and yet, he still staggered backward, coughing up blood.

Then, he turned and ran! Without any hesitation, he flew over to the Great Sages from the Quake-Dawn Cathedral.

“All of you draw on your sage motes!” he shouted. “Yang Qi is going all out! He's burning those sage motes to get power, but that won’t keep him going for long. Once they burn out, we can kill him!”

Yang Qi took a step forward, although to everyone else, it looked like little more than a blur of sagelight. “You think I'm going all out? You people aren’t worthy of that.”

One of the Great Sages from the Quake-Dawn Cathedral tried to stop him. In response, Yang Qi punched him, causing him to explode into a haze of blood that was quickly evaporated by sagelight.

Every move he was using was deadly and intended to kill.

“Run!” That was what the other Great Sages began to shout as they saw another of their number slaughtered. Completely ignoring the Crown Prince, they tried to flee.

“The God Legion Paradise can lock down space-time. The glory of the halls of heaven will reign in the mortal world for all eternity.” Yang Qi waved his hands out in front of him, and the halls grew larger than before.

All the Great Sages who had just taken to flight suddenly slammed into a barrier of sagelight that was harder than the hardest metal.

At this point, the Crown Prince was scrambling to flee.

However, that was when Yang Qi took another step forward.

RUUUUMBLE!

Another Great Sage exploded and transformed into ash. He had been a powerful member of the Quake-Dawn Cathedral, but in the face of Yang Qi’s Fist of the Halls of Heaven, he couldn’t even defend himself. In the blink of an eye, his sage motes became part of the God Legion Paradise.

“Great Sage Heart-Incarnation, hurry. Let’s get out of here!” One of the Great Sages from the Western Continent called out to one of his companions, and yet, before he could do anything else, Yang Qi appeared in front of him and ripped him to shreds. Not even his skeleton remained behind.

Most of the lower-level experts from the Rich-Lush Continent were laying on the ground, trembling, averting their gazes from what was happening.

However, some dared to look up, and what they saw was one Great Sage after another being cut down in the God Legion Paradise.

“Another Great Sage, dead!”

“He’s crushing Great Sages like chicken eggs!”

“Those are all-powerful Great Sages who can dominate the world! How could he be defeating them each with only a single blow?”

“This Yang Qi, is he a god, or a devil!? Nobody can fight him!”

A roar of rage could be heard as Yang Qi approached the emperor of the Sky-Heaven Dynasty. He struck out, and the emperor was engulfed with sagelight, causing him to evaporate into a wisp of smoke.

A mighty emperor died, just like that.

Of the six Great Sages from the Western Continent, three were dead.

Boom!Bang!

In one short breath of time, two Great Sages from the Quake-Dawn Cathedral became ash.

Streams of sagelight filled the God Legion Paradise, which was filling with more and more sage motes. The Crown Prince was in full retreat, and could hardly defend himself. Yun Hailan stuck close to him, her face a mask of despair as she watched the nightmarish scene of Great Sages dropping like flies.

“Don’t kill me! Don’t kill me!” Emperor Sage-Ancestor blubbered. Dropping to his knees, he said, “I was forced into this. The Crown Prince made me try to kill you. I’m willing to renounce the darkness and seek the light! If you want to found a new dynasty in the Rich-Lush Continent, I’ll abdicate and pass the torch to the Yang Clan! I can even—”

BOOM!

Before he could finish speaking, he exploded.

“It's a bit late for that,” Yang Qi said.

The emperor of the Sage Ancestor Dynasty had just perished.

Of the original five Great Sages of the Rich-Lush Continent, three had been killed by Yang Qi.

“When the legion of gods strolls among mortals, their glory purifies all filth. The sordid world of men can only be cleansed by the glory of sagelight. That is the exclusive way to acquire eternal life!”

The Infernal Deity Spear appeared in his hand, and he threw it out, pinning a fleeing Great Sage from the Quake-Dawn Cathedral into the greyspace of the God Legion Paradise.

Millions of projections of the spear then appeared, glowing with sage motes as they flew forth. An agonized shriek rang out as another Great Sage died.

The Crown Prince was fleeing, and no one was there to protect him.

The nine Great Sages from the Quake-Dawn Cathedral were all dead.

“My god! So many Great Sages are dead….”

“It's a complete rout! Nobody in this entire continent can do anything about Yang Qi. He has so many sage motes it looks like a net!”

“Look, another Great Sage died! None of the people from the Quake-Dawn Cathedral are left alive.”

“Chancellor Sea God, dead. Chancellor True Dragon, dead. Emperor Sky-Heaven and Emperor Sage-Ancestor, both dead. Of the eighteen Great Sages, there are only three left, the survivors from the Western Continent!”

Chancellor Sun Moon was trembling, and musing that he was lucky to be on Yang Qi’s side. If he wasn’t, he would probably be dead already.

It almost seemed like Yang Qi had been possessed by a god-spirit, providing him with shocking battle prowess.

Suddenly, three screams rang out as the Infernal Deity Spear ended the lives of the final three Great Sages from the Western Continent.

Every single one of the Great Sages that the Crown Prince had brought with him were dead. It was truly like a nightmare.

And now, Yang Qi had so many sage motes that they were like a net on the surface of the God Legion Paradise’s greyspace.

The Crown Prince held Yun Hailan in his arms, his face alive with terror as he backed away, scarcely able to believe what he was seeing.

He had lost.

Eighteen Great Sages were dead.

It was hard to quantify that in terms of quintessence-blood or vital energy. Their sage motes had all been taken, and placed into the God Legion Paradise, which now pulsed with shocking power.

As Yang Qi hovered there, his white God Legion Battle Robe didn’t have a speck of blood on it. It shone with sagelight, pure and clean. And above him hovered the halls of heaven, making any calls to immortal-spirits completely futile.

When the legion of gods exacted punishment, what would immortal-spirits dare to do?

With that, Yang Qi pointed his Infernal Deity Spear at the Crown Prince and Yun Hailan.

“Alright, Crown Prince, Yun Hailan. Eighteen Great Sages have all been executed and sacrificed to my God Legion Paradise. And now, it’s your turn.”

Chapter 332: The Chancellor to the Rescue

Yang Qi stood there with his spear, looking like he could conquer heaven.

In very sharp contrast were the Crown Prince and Yun Hailan, who huddled in fear, trembling like a pair of kittens.

To the Crown Prince, the situation was a thorough humiliation.

From the moment he had been born, he had been the dominant force in the world. Never once had he experienced a moment of weakness. He had even fought Great Sages when he was a Legendary.

But now, he was being crushed by Yang Qi.

Escape was not an option, and he was trapped in a hopeless situation.

In the beginning of the fight, the Crown Prince actually had the upper hand. But not anymore, now that Yang Qi had taken the sage motes of eighteen Great Sages.

With power like that to back his Fist of the Halls of Heaven, he could eradicate primal-chaos, forge new heavens and earths, destroy the power of faith, and obscure the stars in the sky, making it impossible for any outside source of power to benefit his opponents.

On top of it all, the Crown Prince was only a first step Great Sage. It was only because of his unique constitution and true energy that he could reach out into space and summon the power of an immortal-spirit, which was why he had been able to astonish so many Great Sages. But now, all of his splendor was gone as Yang Qi crushed him with impunity.

Although rage burned in his heart, there was nothing he could do with it.

Yang Qi’s spear had the Crown Prince’s soul locked down, and also Yun Hailan’s. They were in a deadly situation in which there was absolutely no hope of escape. Yang Qi wanted nothing more than to kill them, and they knew that even if they somehow got away, he would follow them to the ends of the earth.

The Infernal Deity Spear quivered, not because Yang Qi’s hand was unsteady, but because it was filling up with power. In fact, it thrummed with a song of nightfall and death that was the perfect dirge to accompany the burial of the dead.

As of this moment, Yang Qi felt no desire to waste time talking to either the Crown Prince or Yun Hailan.

However, that was when Yun Hailan said, “Are you really going to kill me, Yang Qi? Don’t tell me that you don't have any feelings at all for me. I know you do!”

All of a sudden, her eyes overflowed with tenderness as she looked at him.

In response to her seduction, Yang Qi spoke in a booming voice. “Those who profane the glory of the legion of gods will suffer their punishment….”

He was no longer like a human, but rather, like a member of the legion of gods, they who existed far above the host of immortals. No earthly will could possibly sway him.

The Infernal Deity Spear reached its maximum level of power, and Yang Qi said, “The Concluding Elegy….”

The darkness of evening spread out as the spear streaked through the God Legion Paradise toward the Crown Prince and Yun Hailan.

Considering that everyone had assumed Yang Qi would die, this attack was like the nirvanic rebirth of a phoenix rising from the ashes.

It was one of the most deadly moves from the spear art of the Infernal Deity Spear, the Concluding Elegy. It was the move used to completely and utterly bury the opponent.

“As long as I'm alive, nobody can kill Yun Hailan!” the Crown Prince suddenly shouted, brandishing his halberd. “The Immortal-Slayer executed gods, and so will I! I will slaughter immortals and eradicate devils! I am the most supreme entity in the world!”

Fighting like a cornered beast, he slashed out with his halberd, igniting immortal motes as if he wished to slash apart the halls of heavens and bring war to the legion of gods.

Bam!

When the Infernal Deity Spear and the Immortal-Slayer's War-Halberd collided, the sound of the elegy rang out for all to hear. Sagelight fell from the halls of heaven like a waterfall, causing everyone present to drop to their knees in worship. And the Crown Prince staggered backward as if he had been struck by lightning, his immortal armor turning even darker now that his immortal motes were almost gone.

His halberd shattered into pieces, which rained down onto the ground of the God Legion Paradise. Meanwhile, Yang Qi’s spear, backed by the power of eighteen Great Sages, had the Crown Prince’s true energy locked down so tightly that he couldn’t draw on the power of his immortal motes.

For the Crown Prince to be using immortal motes as a Great Sage was like a toddler trying to use an enormous sledgehammer.

Whoosshhhh!

The Infernal Deity Spear stabbed through the immortal armor, and blood sprayed out.

The Crown Prince grabbed the spear with both hands to prevent it from stabbing further into him, and simultaneously coughed up a huge mouthful of blood; from the look of it, he was really in bad shape.

The humiliation in his eyes couldn’t have been clearer. As a Great Sage, he was supposed to dominate the world, but now, he was about to die at the hands of Yang Qi.

“Your immortal armor is a treasure that requires a person to back it. You’re not strong enough to use those immortal motes.” Yang Qi took a step forward, and the glow of sagelight behind him grew even stronger. At the same time, his spear seemed to fill with power as it prepared to reduce the Crown Prince to dust.

As he did that, the Heaven-Dominating Golden Swordbreaker appeared in his other hand, which he lifted up to smash Yun Hailan’s head in. Even if she were a Great Sage, it wouldn’t have done her any good. It didn't matter that she had the power of the Dragon World Plane or the Sea King Plane. Compared to Yang Qi, that power was inconsequential.

In that moment, Yun Hailan felt true fear. Yang Qi had no softness in his heart whatsoever, and would show her no mercy. He really was like a god-spirit treading amongst mortals.

RUUUUMBLE!

The Crown Prince and Yun Hailan were only one short moment away from perishing.

However, that was when an enormous hand appeared, bursting with the aura of a Demi-Immortal. Seemingly without effort, it parted the greyspace of the God Legion Paradise, and entered the domain.

This hand belonged to a very powerful Great Sage, and it moved as quickly as lightning to save Yun Hailan and the Crown Prince.

Yang Qi had no need to even look at the hand to identify who it belonged to.

“Chancellor Demi-Immortal!” he murmured.

It was obviously the chancellor of the Demi-Immortal Institute. Only when the Crown Prince was on his last legs did the man finally dare to interfere.

Without any hesitation, the chancellor drew upon the magical laws of time, and everything ground to a halt. This was a power that could end any sort of attack.

And yet, although time slowed, Yang Qi didn't seem affected at all. It was the God Legion Seal, the stirring of which negated all of the time-slowing effects. After all, time was something that was connected to the legion of gods.

Chancellor Demi-Immortal was blaspheming against the legion of gods.

However, the tiny fraction of a moment that he had bought was enough to grab the Crown Prince and Yun Hailan, pull them out of the God Legion Paradise, and then flee into the void.

Yang Qi had been foiled at the very last moment, and yet, he still remained cool-headed, and quickly sent his psychic fluctuations into the depths of space-time.

“Kill him, Ghost Emperor Yama! I’ll give you the Infernal Deity Spear the moment you do!”

“I'm on it!” Ghost Emperor Yama said, unleashing his devil energy.

Stepping out from whatever aspect of space-time he had been hiding in, he locked down onto a certain location up in the sea of clouds, then shot toward it as fast as lightning. Then, he reached out with his devilish hand, ripping the air open and causing two people to tumble out.

The first was the chancellor, a glorious Great Sage, who currently held Yun Hailan in one hand and the Crown Prince in the other. The other person was Young Lady Starlight. As it turned out, father and daughter had acted in concert just now.

Yang Qi floated up into the air, shrinking down the God Legion Paradise as he did. The vengeful souls of the eighteen Great Sages were just barely visible inside it.

Meanwhile, Ghost Emperor Yama was preparing to fight Chancellor Demi-Immortal to the death.

As for the chancellor, he tossed the Crown Prince and Yun Hailan off to the side, where he sealed them to keep them safe. Looking coldly at Yang Qi, he said, “You won a great victory today, Yang Qi. But where it is possible, you should spare your enemies. Give me some face here. Let the Crown Prince and Yun Hailan go free. I promised his mother to care for him, so clearly, I can't allow him to perish here.”

The Crown Prince didn’t say a word. He simply hovered there cross-legged, apparently trying to recover as much as possible now that he knew he was safe.

Sighing, Yun Hailan looked at Yang Qi and said, “I’ll be waiting for you. The Quake-Dawn Cathedral has plenty of experts to call upon. I won’t let you get away with all this.”

“What do you say, Yang Qi?” Young Lady Starlight said. “You killed enough Great Sages today to make you famous for all time. Don’t tell me you want more? Are you really going to kill everyone?”

“Like father, like daughter,” Yang Qi said. “You two are really a perfect match.” Of course, he wasn’t moved at all by what either of them had said. “Give you some face? Why? Why give face to the faceless? Sorry. I'm going to kill the Crown Prince and Yun Hailan today, as well as the two of you! I guess that brings the total to four.”

The chancellor sighed. “Yang Qi… you have been blinded by hatred. You want to kill me? Forgetting about whether or not you even can, let me ask you: why? What have I done to earn your wrath?”

Swishing his spear out to point at the chancellor, Yang Qi coolly said, “I represent the legion of gods. You blasphemed against their glory, and thus, you deserve to descend into the depths of hell.”

“What if I immediately hand over the position of chancellor to you?”

“The Demi-Immortal Institute exists because of you, but that doesn’t mean it needs to continue on. Considering how you’ve tried to save the Crown Prince, I'm going to completely eradicate the Demi-Immortal Institute. I won’t leave a single loyalist left alive.” Yang Qi’s spear was again building up power.

“You’ve been bedeviled,” Chancellor Demi-Immortal said. “What a pity. Considering your current state, you’ll never become an immortal. In fact, I doubt you could become a sage. I'm leaving, and not even Ghost Emperor Yama will be able to stop me. Don’t force me to show you why I'm known as the strongest person in the Rich-Lush Continent.”

All of a sudden, Ghost Emperor Yama burst out laughing. “Since when did you become the judge of who’s bedeviled or not, Chancellor Demi-Immortal? You actually dared to blaspheme the spokesmen of the legion of gods? Let me tell you this; the thing in his forehead is called the God Legion Seal. It was put there intentionally by the legion of gods, and not even a host of immortals could do anything about it. Considering how young you are, you probably don't understand what the God Legion Seal is, so let me explain. In the future, Yang Qi will be a god walking among mortals. You say the Crown Prince is some sort of ‘god from heaven descended into the mortal world’? I think not. He’s merely the transmigrated will of someone from an immortal plane.”

Chapter 333: The Chancellor&#039;s Turn

Anyone who got in Yang Qi’s way was being cut down, be they people, immortals, or buddhas.

From the very beginning, he had factored in the high likelihood that the chancellor would try to save the Crown Prince, and had even come up with a secret plan with Ghost Emperor Yama to deal with it. Ghost Emperor Yama had long since stopped viewing Yang Qi as prey, and had actually started to treat him like an equal.

Thanks to the two times he had been defeated by the God Legion Seal, and the rout of the eighteen Great Sages that had just played out, it was a foregone conclusion that Yang Qi would become a Great Sage.

There was really no question about it.

After all, he had sage motes from eighteen Great Sages, which meant that all he needed was time to refine them.

If Yang Qi was ferocious now, then who could possibly be a match for him after he became a Great Sage?

Now, it was the chancellor’s turn to die!

The chancellor had protected the Crown Prince from Yang Qi over and over again. And this time was the final straw.

Yang Qi was going for broke in every sense of the word. It didn’t matter if it meant the downfall of the entire continent, or even the dao of heaven, he would kill the chancellor, and also make sure that Yun Hailan and the Crown Prince met the same fate.

“Legion of gods? He acquired a special little technique and you decided that it made him a spokesperson for the legion of gods?” The chancellor laughed. “I'm taking the Crown Prince with me, and not even you can stop me, Ghost Emperor Yama. Don’t even try.”

“Oh really?” Ghost Emperor Yama chuckled coldly. The chancellor’s words only made him want to do the exact opposite.

“This is your final chance, Yang Qi,” the chancellor continued. “Turn weapons of war into gifts of jade and silk, and I’ll guarantee that neither the Crown Prince nor Yun Hailan will ever cause problems again for you.”

“Take the offer, Yang Qi,” Young Lady Starlight said. “You know that you can trust my father’s word. There’s no reason to fear any reprisals from the Crown Prince.”

“His word?” Yang Qi said, his voice calm, but his words biting. “How much is that worth? A few coins? You’re both about to die, and you talk about trusting his word? The moment you two saved the Crown Prince, you became archenemies to me, and I won’t allow you to live under the same sky as me. You’re exactly the same as the Crown Prince: sentenced to death!”

Both Young Lady and Chancellor Demi-Immortal were visibly taken aback by his words.

“I never could have guessed that my Demi-Immortal Institute would produce an evil creature like you,” the chancellor said. “If I had known things would turn out like this, I would never have protected you. I would have just let the Crown Prince kill you.” He sighed. “You’ve really put the people of the Rich-Lush Continent in a terrible situation. Two chancellors are dead! In all my predictions and calculations, I never considered that something like this would happen. Perhaps it’s all my fault.”

“Ghost Emperor Yama, I'm going to give you half of the technique for the Infernal Deity Spear. Chancellor Demi-Immortal still thinks he’s going to escape from you. Let's see how he manages that if you have a godly-class energy art!” With a thought, Yang Qi connected to Ghost Emperor Yama’s mind, and sent him the information.

RUUUUMBLE!

As soon as the thought entered Ghost Emperor Yama’s mind, it transformed into countless streams of true energy. In the blink of an eye, countless hells appeared behind him, and he was completely born anew. It was like he was a totally different person.

During his tens of thousands of years of imprisonment, he had constantly worked with his true energy and sought enlightenment, only to fail. However, he had built up incredibly powerful reserves during that time.

Therefore, as soon as he received the Infernal Deity Spear technique, it was like a lamp being lit in the darkness of night. Instantly, he understood things that had been confusing before, and now, the path forward was clear.

Before, it had seemed impossible for him to reach the next highest level of cultivation, but now, he had the enlightenment he needed. Yang Qi had opened the sluice gate, and the floodwaters were released.

Of course, to get the other half of the technique, Ghost Emperor Yama needed to kill the chancellor.

Raging devil energy transformed into energy of the netherworld, and as Ghost Emperor Yama changed, he stood taller. As of this moment, he didn't look like a stooped old man anymore.

His clothing looked like what an infernal king would wear in the darkness of night. He no longer looked like a simple devil, but rather, something more profound. He was tranquil, like darkness and gloom, except, his eyes glowed with terrifying brightness.

His facial features changed too; now he looked like he had when he was middle-aged.

Power flowed through him like a river, and it was clearly many times stronger than before. He was even surrounded by screaming winds and rumbling thunder.

“Today, I cast aside my devilish nature with this godly-class energy art mnemonic. What a pity it’s only half complete. However, it’s enough to kill the chancellor and get the other half.”

The darkness that radiated off of Ghost Emperor Yama was so intense that it locked down the area, and caused the light shining off of the chancellor to shrink back. As of this moment, it was obvious that the chancellor would not be able to flee, and in fact, would be forced to fight.

The chancellor was visibly stunned; he knew exactly what it meant that someone like Ghost Emperor Yama had gained new enlightenment, and it was a terrifying thought. In his effort to kill the chancellor, Yang Qi had gone so far as to give some of the mnemonic of a godly-class energy art to him.

“You're really dealing with the devil, Yang Qi?!” he said angrily.

“The legion of gods appoint the kings of hell,” Yang Qi replied. “Now, Chancellor, you will know what it feels like to be killed by a godly-class energy art. In the past, I wasn't strong enough to defy you. But now, I have Ghost Emperor Yama on my side, who can crush your personal domain, and neutralize your magical laws. I have the sage motes of eighteen Great Sages, and the Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragment. I'm definitely strong enough to hurt you. Today, both you and your daughter are going to die!”

RUUUUMBLE!

Unleashing the God Legion Paradise, he lunged forward to attack the chancellor.

As he did, a beam of bright red light shot out from the Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragment, a force that could hurt immortals, much less kill Great Sages.

Ghost Emperor Yama stretched both hands behind him, reaching into the images of the hells to pull out a long spear. Of course, it was none other than the Infernal Deity Spear, and a version that far surpassed that which Yang Qi used. In fact, it even thrummed with the power of time itself.

Whoosshhhh!

In the shortest of moments, the spear stabbed through the chancellor’s defensive true energy and headed directly toward his throat.

In virtually the exact same moment, the chancellor shouted, “Demi-Immortal Sword!”

A pure white sword emerged from his forehead, which he grabbed and then thrust out to block the spear.

Bam!

A shockwave of true energy erupted out.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi flapped his Angel Wings to slough off the effects of the blast, then shot forward until he was right next to the chancellor. Then he used two true energy arms to attack the chancellor with the Heaven-Dominating Golden Swordbreaker and the Grand Emperor's Pagoda. As for his two physical hands, one held the Infernal Deity Spear, and the other was clenched into the Fist of the Halls of Heaven. He was truly calling forth the dignity of the legion of gods in this attack.

As for the Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragment, it was still regaining power after having been drained earlier.

The chancellor was far, far above him in terms of strength and power, but with Ghost Emperor Yama keeping him in check, it was now possible for Yang Qi to make a move against him.

“Screw the hell off!” the chancellor growled. Slashing out with his sword, he destroyed the God Legion Paradise, then went on to vanquish the Heaven-Dominating Golden Swordbreaker and the Grand Emperor's Pagoda. Afterward, he destroyed Yang Qi’s Infernal Deity Spear, and even devastated the sagelight of the Fist of the Halls of Heaven.

It was a simple move, but the chancellor was the type of person who could use one sword technique to destroy a myriad of laws, to decimate a myriad of energies, to execute a myriad of devils, and terrify a myriad of immortals.

Bam!

All of Yang Qi’s moves had been defeated, and yet, he wasn’t done fighting. Without any hesitation, he unleashed a two-handed Fist of the Halls of Heaven, and even burned sage motes to power it, which caused dazzling sagelight to spill out.

“Six Daos Downfall!”

Yet again, he unleashed six specific strikes, each one a manifestation of a different dao, which went on to slam into the sword.

“You want to die? Fine, I’ll accommodate you!” The chancellor unleashed another sword move, and this one caused millions upon millions of swords to appear, which overwhelmed the projection of the halls of heaven, and defeated its sagelight.

“Time Stoppage!”

He swept his sword out again, and everything around Yang Qi went completely still. Then, the sword went on toward Yang Qi’s forehead.

In the blink of an eye, deadly sword energy entered Yang Qi’s body, piercing into his sea of consciousness, with the goal of putting an end to his soul. In this moment, the fury of the chancellor was such that could transform mountains and rivers into ash.

WHIZZZ!

However, when the chancellor’s will entered Yang Qi’s forehead, what he found was the God Legion Seal. And the golden imp seemed filled with rage that someone had attempted to use time magic against him.

Suddenly, golden light erupted from Yang Qi’s forehead, along with a golden finger that tapped onto the chancellor's sword.

Bam!

Flames erupted onto the sword, sweeping down its length and then piercing into the chancellor himself. All of a sudden, he found himself engulfed in golden flame.

His personal domain, his will, his soul, and his quintessence-blood were all burning.

It was the same thing that Ghost Emperor Yama had experienced in the past.

“What’s this?” the chancellor shouted angrily. “How could you have power this terrifying in you, Yang Qi? How dare you!”

Ghost Emperor Yama immediately burst out into loud laughter. “You dared to use Time Stoppage on Yang Qi? Time is the domain of the legion of gods! You just blasphemed against the gods, so don’t expect the God Legion Seal to let you off the hook. That thing nearly burned me to death, much less you. Have fun experiencing the punishment of the legion of gods!”

He was currently surrounded by swirling devil-dragons, and yet, he didn’t dare to get close to the golden fire.

“Soul Rebirth; Demi-Immortal Invincibility!”

The chancellor’s body exploded, and he transformed into a stream of vital energy that wrapped up the Crown Prince, Young Lady Starlight, and Yun Hailan, and carried them a short distance away. It was a nirvanic rebirth of sorts, in which he sacrificed his lifespan to shed his body and escape from certain doom.

“Kill him, Ghost Emperor Yama!” Yang Qi roared.

Ghost Emperor Yama blurred into motion, reaching the chancellor before the man could react, and stabbing him in the chest.

Then, Yang Qi again released his God Legion Paradise, instantly trapping the Crown Prince, Yun Hailan, and Young Lady Starlight.

“This is outright rebellion, Yang Qi!” Young Lady Starlight shouted. “How dare you plot against my father!” Suddenly, she began to glow with the brilliance of starlight.

“Like I said, both of you are going to die today!”

Without any warning, Yang Qi smashed the Heaven-Dominating Golden Swordbreaker into her head, reducing her to a pool of gore, which was then evaporated into nothing by sagelight.

The chancellor’s daughter was dead!

Chapter 334: The Crown Prince Killed

“Guang’er!” the chancellor cried in anguish.

Not only had his effort to rescue the Crown Prince failed, but his own daughter had been dragged into the situation and killed. He had long occupied the ultimate position of authority in the Rich-Lush Continent, and had always considered his ultimate plans to be foolproof. And yet, in the end, Yang Qi completely stymied him.

Everything had been turned upside down.

“I’ll make you pay for this, Yang Qi, if it’s the last thing I do!” Rippling light covered the chancellor, with immense levels of power that instantly destroyed the Infernal Deity Spear sticking into his chest. Then he shot upward into the sky.

He knew that if he didn't escape now, he would end up dead.

Yang Qi had destroyed any bit of face the chancellor had left, and had gone so far as to kill his daughter. And the chancellor had been grievously injured, which meant that he couldn’t possibly beat Ghost Emperor Yama.

“Myriad Devil Megapalm!” Ghost Emperor Yama shouted. He obviously wasn’t willing to let the chancellor get away that easily. After all, killing him was his ticket to acquiring the rest of the Infernal Deity Spear. A host of devil-dragons swept out to form the shape of a huge hand, which shot toward the fleeing chancellor.

C-C-CRACK!

The chancellor’s body shattered, becoming a mass of bloody chunks of flesh which immediately began to turn black from the devil energy.

“Infernal King God-Melting Formation!” Ghost Emperor Yama waved his sleeve, causing burning devil-dragons to surround the chancellor and begin melting his flesh into nothing.

“Oh great ancestors of the Demi-Immortal Institute, I am powerless to defend against this wretch-devil. Please, lend me your strength!”

Suddenly, a majestic stream of white energy appeared out of nowhere, pouring into the chancellor’s shattered body. A moment later, he exploded again, becoming a white beam of light that shot off into the distance.

“Dammit!” Ghost Emperor Yama blurted. Transforming into a beam of black light, he gave chase.

After the time it takes an incense stick to burn, he returned with a few streams of white light in his hand. “That bastard is fast. And he has the ability to split his nascent divinity into numerous aspects, which can then form together later to allow him to be reborn. Thankfully, I managed to wipe out ninety-nine percent of his quintessence energy. A little bit got away, but there’s no way he’ll be able to recover, even within ten thousand years.”

“In other words, you didn't kill him.” Yang Qi said. “This is bad. My Aunt Susu is in the clutches of some prime elders from the institute. Considering I killed the chancellor's daughter, if he escapes and finds those prime elders, she's going to be in great danger.”

“I doubt it,” Ghost Emperor Yama said. “He’s definitely going to go into hiding. Otherwise, it would be too easy for you to track him down.” He sighed. “It's a real pity I didn’t manage to kill him. I could have the rest of the Infernal Deity Spear already if I did. What about this, Yang Qi: I’ll give you some of my own boundless energy arts, and will even help you to reach the Great Sage level. In exchange, you give me the rest of Infernal Deity Spear. Okay? I simply can’t stand the idea of going around with only half of it.”

“How about instead, you go kill the chancellor,” Yang Qi replied. “I'm not giving you the rest of the spear until you do. That was our deal, remember? As for the Great Sage level, what makes you think I can’t do that on my own?”

At this point, he looked back into his God Legion Paradise, at the Crown Prince and Yun Hailan. There was also a swirling mass of starlight power that was all that remained of Young Lady Starlight.

“Nascent Divinity Starlight Body!” Ghost Emperor Yama exclaimed. “You’re in luck, Yang Qi! That girl you killed, the chancellor's daughter, had a Nascent Divinity Starlight Body! That’s a unique physique type from the ancient Starfolk. If you absorb that power into your personal domain, you’ll be able to communicate with the stars much easier, and thus, reach the Astral-Star Transformation without a hitch.”

“Oh really?” Slowly but surely, Yang Qi sent that power into the greyspace of his personal domain, which caused countless stars to appear there.

“Crown Prince. Yun Hailan. You always thought of yourself as safe within the protection provided by the chancellor, but he couldn’t even defend himself in the end. He’s been completely vanquished, and his daughter is dead. Now, you will suffer the same fate as her.”

As of this moment, Yang Qi had achieved the victory he had long sought.

RUUUUMBLE!

Sage Monarch City began to rise high up into the sky, and as it did, the powerful elites that the Crown Prince had gathered to his side dropped to their knees.

All of them had borne witness to the things Yang Qi had just done, which would eventually become the stuff of myth. Not even the founder of the continent, Grand Emperor Rich-Lush, had ever done anything this astonishing. After all, Yang Qi was still a mere Legendary, and had just slaughtered a whole group of Great Sages.

“Chancellor Yang Qi! Unifier of the Rich-Lush Continent! May you live and rule for all eternity!”

All of the students of the Demi-Immortal Institute began to shout such things as they kowtowed endlessly. Even Master Wind Gentleman and the other top experts like him joined in.

“Kill the scourge that is the Crown Prince!” Unparalleled Lightning shouted. “Remove him from these lands!” They were showing even more respect to Yang Qi than they had shown to Chancellor Demi-Immortal.

“Don’t kill me, Yang Qi!” Yun Hailan suddenly blurted, her heart brimming with terror. She knew that all of her schemes and plots meant absolutely nothing now. She had been blessed and helped up to this point, even with the sealing mark from two immortal planes. But in front of Yang Qi, she was as weak as weak could be.

“I’ll be your woman! I’ll forsake the Crown Prince! I’ll be yours, and I’ll never turn my back on you!”

Whoosshhhh!

Yang Qi blurred into motion, appearing in front of her and reaching out to place his hand on top of her head. Then he sent out a stream of energy and sagelight to incinerate her sea of consciousness, and evaporate her soul.

“Yang Qi!” she screamed. “I’ll remember this! For all eternity! Throughout all lives! I’ll never let this go!”

A moment later, she was nothing but ashes.

Yun Hailan had finally perished at the hands of Yang Qi. As she did, countless streams of dragon energy and sea energy were sucked into the God Legion Paradise, where they became part of its greyspace.

Two sealing marks appeared, one that looked like a dragon, one that resembled a sea. They were only the size of a fist, but Yang Qi knew that they could be used to communicate with higher planes. In fact, he could already sense the power of those planes through the sealing marks. Perhaps in the future, he would step through space-time to visit those locations.

In the moment that he killed Yun Hailan, it was as if an enormous weight suddenly was removed from his soul, leaving him free and relaxed.

‘I finally did it. I finally killed her.’ He thought back to so long ago, when Yun Hailan had convinced him to steal that Latent Dragon Pill, and then ruthlessly dumped him. That was when he had been struck by lightning, and given the God Legion Seal. Many events played out afterward, all leading to this point.

Upon seeing Yun Hailan die, the Crown Prince shivered and rose to his feet. Glaring at Yang Qi, he said, “I can’t believe you actually killed her.”

“Yeah, I killed her. And you’re next.” Yang Qi was supreme within his domain. Furthermore, Ghost Emperor Yama had set up a spell formation to protect the entire area. Unless an actual Demi-Immortal came along, no one would be able to interfere.

And if someone like that did step into the picture, the God Legion Seal would surely react.

Snarling, the Crown Prince said, “I’m a god from heaven descended into the mortal world! I can’t be defeated, and I’ll never die. I’ll escape, and when I come back, I’ll kill you.”

Suddenly, he burst into motion in an attempt to flee. Immortal armor once again spread out to cover him, glowing with immortal motes.

“On your knees!” Yang Qi said. Waving his hand, he caused the God Legion Paradise to suddenly shrink down rapidly. At the same time, massive vital energy converged on the Crown Prince, forcing him onto the ground in front of Yang Qi.

“I refuse to accept this! I'm a consummate genius! I'm a god!” Never in his entire life had the Crown Prince been subject to humiliation such as this.

BOOM!

Yang Qi hit him square in the chest, sending him stumbling onto his back, coughing up blood like mad.

Crack!

Even as the Crown Prince tried to struggle to his feet, Yang Qi stomped his foot down with the force of a herd of megamammoths. Instantly, the Crown Prince’s lower half was turned into a bloody pulp.

“Immortal armor!” the Crown Prince said, struggling to draw on the power of his armor again. However, Yang Qi simply reached out, grabbed the armor, and crushed it, forcing the immortal motes therein to become a part of his God Legion Paradise.

Now, the Crown Prince had nothing left to rely on.

He had reached the end of the road.

“Nine Destructions Rebirth! Come on, Yang Qi, let’s fight to the death!” The Crown Prince managed to push himself up into a sitting position, whereupon nirvanic flames engulfed him as he attempted, not only to be reborn, but to come back even stronger than before.

“Ashes to Ashes, Dust to Dust,” Yang Qi said coolly. “That Which Demises Shall Never Return.” The Lord's Eye suddenly appeared on his forehead, and dazzling white light shot out to engulf the Crown Prince.

“The Lord said that some people will descend to hell, and some people will rise to the halls of heaven…. I am the Lord, and when I say something shall be destroyed, it will never be reborn!”

A scream of anguish rang out as the Crown Prince exploded, transforming into nothing more than ash and dust.

Ashes to ashes, dust to dust.

The Crown Prince, a supposed god from heaven descended into the mortal world, had died.

Next for Yang Qi was the Hanging Mountain, his mother, and the truth about his origin.

Chapter 335: The Dust Settles

The Crown Prince was dead, and so was Yun Hailan.

Now, the dust could settle.

RUMBLE!

In the moment of the Crown Prince’s death, countless sealing marks from an immortal plane suddenly shot out and attempted to flee the God Legion Paradise. However, Yang Qi quickly grabbed them. At the same time, a string of enormous sage motes appeared, almost like a chain.

“Look at those sage motes!” Ghost Emperor Yama exclaimed. He chuckled. “This Crown Prince really had a lot of potential. Too bad for him that you showed up. With sage motes like that, he should have been able to kill a third step Great Sage, even though he was only in the first step. And yet, in the end, he got killed by a Ghost-God Legendary. The two of you are just worlds apart.”

“He also had his immortal armor,” Yang Qi said. “Sadly for him, once I formed the God Legion Paradise, he was doomed. And that’s not to mention the sage motes from eighteen Great Sages. He was just too arrogant. If he had attacked me with everyone at the same time, then he probably would have killed me.”

Yang Qi was absolutely right. It was only after killing the eighteen Great Sages that he finally reached a level in which he could come out on top in the fight.

Without the sage motes, Yang Qi would have been in the inferior position, without question.

However, the Crown Prince was the type of person who felt it was beneath him to kill Yang Qi personally. He wanted Yang Qi to be humiliated, and perhaps even make him watch as all of his friends and family were slaughtered.

In the end, it was all a dream.

A pipe dream.

WHOOSH!

As the chain-like string of sage motes became part of the God Legion Paradise, something bright and glittering rose up from the Crown Prince’s remains.

Crack!

It erupted with such power and light that it was hard to tell whether it resembled a dragon, snake, bird, or whale. It thrummed with domineering immortal energy, and instantly formed a resonance with the immortal sealing marks which had appeared moments ago. Together, they caused a massive tempest to rage within the God Legion Paradise.

“What is that thing?” Yang Qi reached out to grab it, but before he could, it pierced through the greyspace of the God Legion Paradise, and vanished into thin air.

Ghost Emperor Yama let out a frenzied shout, sending out a stream of devil energy to try to grab it. Unfortunately, not even he could do so.

“That was an Immortal-Slayer’s medallion! Dammit! How did the Crown Prince get his hands on something like that?!” Ghost Emperor Yama suddenly vanished, traversing multiple planes as he tried to acquire the thing.

In the end, he failed, and returned.

“Immortal-Slayer’s medallion?” Yang Qi asked, his eyes glittering. Clearly, he had just lost some sort of powerful magical treasure. It was obviously the type of thing that only the God Legion Seal could keep in check, and unfortunately, he didn’t have direct control of the sealing mark.

“Immortal-Slayer’s medallions are terrifying objects from certain immortal planes. I've only heard of them in old myths and fairytales. Supposedly, there was once an evil immortal called King Immortal-Slayer. He led a campaign to conquer three thousand ancient worlds, and killed numerous immortals. In the end, he was bested by tribulation, and killed. He left behind several of those Immortal-Slayer’s medallions. Or maybe they’re all fragments of one larger medallion. I’m not sure. In any case, if you can collect them all, then you can search for his core teachings and doctrines.”

Yang Qi frowned. “Wait a second. Did the Crown Prince hide his nascent divinity in that thing? Did he just escape?”

Ghost Emperor Yama shook his head. “I don't think so. When trying to track it down just now, I didn't sense any of the Crown Prince’s aura. According to the stories, an Immortal-Slayer’s medallion will only pick someone with a strong destiny. If that person perishes, then the medallion will leave to find another target. Besides, it supposedly takes away some of the destiny of whoever carries it, so actually, they’re inauspicious. Powerful, but inauspicious, and also very difficult to control.”

“Inauspicious? Maybe the Crown Prince suffered because of the talisman, which is why he perished at my hand.”

Now that the Crown Prince was dead, his soul was part of the God Legion Paradise.

His sage motes were far stronger than those of any of the other eighteen Great Sages, and over the course of the next few hours, Yang Qi made sure they were fully integrated with his personal domain.

RUMBLE!

Countless trumpeting cries filled the God Legion Paradise as ten million ancient megamammoths appeared on the greyspace of the domain. All of them pulsed with the most ancient of auras, and now, after being imbued with power by the sage motes, they had transformed. All of them were now clad in bronze armor of the most profound and ancient nature, and radiated the most holy of auras.

Of course, it was the aura of the legion of gods.

Each and every one of those megamammoths was in the process of becoming godlike, and increasing in power. They were now unlocking their most ancient genetic material, providing them with the characteristics of godmammoths.

With the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, awakening the ancient megamammoths was of secondary importance. Far more relevant was the ability to awaken the ancient genetic material of the godmammoths.

With the sage motes and immortal sealing marks from the Crown Prince, he was now able to begin that process. He had been waking up particles far too quickly lately, which was something that could lead to dangerous instability. Right now, using sage motes to improve their quality was a much better thing to do.

Thanks to the countless immortal sealing marks, as well as the numerous types of empyrean-baleful energy, not only was his God Legion Paradise growing stronger, but also, his position within the seventh Legendary transformation was stabilizing.

Every heaven and earth, every continent, had its own unique types of empyrean-baleful energy. There were always thirty-six types of empyrean heavenly energy, and seventy-two types of baleful earthly energy.

The empyrean-baleful aspects of the Rich-Lush Continent were different from the Western Continent’s, which were in turn different from other locations. If one could travel to multiple worlds to absorb different types of power, it would make one’s place in the Ghost-God Transformation more perfect. Sadly, Ghost-God Legendaries generally didn't have the ability to travel among worlds.

But now, Yang Qi was different.

Because of all the immortal sealing marks he had, he could reach out to immortal planes, and absorb their empyrean-baleful energy to improve his Ghost-God Transformation.

And it could also benefit his God Legion Paradise.

“The Crown Prince’s magical treasure bag!”

Of course, the Crown Prince had a lot more than some immortal armor and immortal motes. He had immense wealth stored away, just ready for Yang Qi to take.

Without any hesitation, he tore open the dark green bag. Instantly, massive amounts of spirit energy poured out into the God Legion Paradise as a pile of sagely-grade spirit stones appeared.

There were also a handful of stones that stood out from the others, which pulsed with a faint immortal energy, as though they came from a much higher heaven.

“Those are heavenly-grade spirit stones!” Ghost Emperor Yama exclaimed jealously. “How did the Crown Prince get access to wealth like that?”

“He got the legacy of Grand Emperor Rich-Lush, so it stands to reason he would also have inherited the man’s wealth. Eee? What’s this?” Yang Qi reached into the pile of spirit stones and pulled out a talisman that looked very much like an identity medallion. It was decorated with an image of rich and lush farmlands, golden in color and just waiting to be harvested. Within the medallion were countless consummate energy arts, including saintly-class versions, which were none other than the inheritance left behind by Grand Emperor Rich-Lush.

“Grand Emperor Rich-Lush’s identity medallion?” Yang Qi poured some true energy into it, and could sense it beginning to stir. Without hesitation, he tossed it into the Grand Emperor's Pagoda.

RUMBLE!

Instantly, the pagoda began to tremble, and it pulsed with an aura like that of a grand emperor. Soon, its energy began to resemble immortal energy, and at the same time, faint immortal motes could be seen in it.

The Grand Emperor's Pagoda was once again in a position to dominate other continents.

“A half-immortal item!” Ghost Emperor Yama exclaimed. “Who would have thought that Grand Emperor Rich-Lush actually reached that level! Yang Qi, now that you have his legacy, this entire continent is yours.”

By killing the Crown Prince, Yang Qi had truly acquired the mantle of Grand Emperor Rich-Lush.

“Of course the continent is mine, and I intend to protect it. Also, I'm going to unify all of the four institutes, and make them part of the Sage Monarch Society. The Sage Ancestor Dynasty will be dispersed, and all hellions will be executed. Henceforth, there will be no aristocratic clans or independent sects.”

With that he waved his hand, sending numerous treasures flying out. He had acquired a massive amount of items from the Great Sages he killed, everything from weapons to spirit stones. Much of it wouldn't be useful to him, but would definitely be of help to the Yang Clan and the Sage Monarch Society.

At the very least, his father would advance by leaps and bounds, and should have no problem reaching the Legendary level. And all of his sworn siblings would be able to break past their bottlenecks and become the powerful leaders he needed for his society.

“You know, Yang Qi,” Ghost Emperor Yama said, “it suddenly occurred to me that the only other Great Sage in the Rich-Lush Continent is Chancellor Sun Moon. If you leave, we'll be in a very dangerous position. A single high-powered invader could bring the entire continent to an end. Don’t forget that the Quake-Dawn Continent has been eyeing us.”

“I’ll take care of that. First, I need to consolidate all of the organizations in the continent into one powerful force.” Waving his hand, he pulled Chancellor Sun Moon out of Sage Monarch City and into his presence.

“Chancellor Sun Moon, I have a task for you. I'm sure you’ll be able to handle it with ease.”

“Sir, yes sir!”

Chapter 336: Uniting the Continent

There wasn’t a trace of arrogance in Chancellor Sun Moon’s voice.

Yang Qi had just killed eighteen Great Sages, plus the Crown Prince and Yun Hailan. He had also seriously injured Chancellor Demi-Immortal. The fight ended up as a clear rout, causing profound shock to fill the hearts of everyone who had witnessed the spectacle.

The area surrounding Sage Monarch City was occupied by countless elite energy artists, members of famous clans, and imperial princes from the former Sage Ancestor Dynasty, and all of them were trembling with fear with the thought that Yang Qi might exterminate them.

“Patriarch Yang Qi, we were given no alternative but to follow the orders of that vile Crown Prince. Please, please don’t kill us.” That was what the congregated princes, dukes, and other officials were saying.

“Prince Wei, please step forward,” Yang Qi said coolly. “Your emperor willingly followed the Crown Prince in his effort to kill me. In the end, I cut him down. You personally witnessed the result of his stubbornness.

“However, I’ll never forget how you helped me, Prince Wei. So why not let bygones be bygones? The Sage Ancestor Dynasty is no more, but I would like to invite you to join the Sage Monarch Society. Serve me in my effort to unite the continent, and we can avoid years upon years of bloodshed and war. Together, we can turn this continent into a true holy land for cultivation. Furthermore, I plan to send forces into the Western Continent to subjugate it. The six Great Sages from there are already dead, leaving their lands leaderless. Their spirit stones are essentially ripe for the taking.”

Prince Wei immediately dropped to his knees and kowtowed. “Patriarch Yang Qi, we’re absolutely ready to follow your every order.”

At this point, a Half Sage stepped forward. “Patriarch Yang Qi, a certain disciple of my clan, Gu Fenxian, once dared to insult your dignity. We’ve already executed his parents, as well as everyone else from his branch of the clan.”

He was none other than the clan lord of the Gu Clan, and he was holding a pair of heads, both of them dripping with blood. They were none other than Gu Fenxian’s parents, who the clan lord had killed as an offering to Yang Qi, in the hopes that he would spare their clan.

“I see,” Yang Qi said. Waving his hand, he transformed the severed heads into nothing more than ash. “In that case, I’ll spare your Gu Clan, and cancel my plans to plunder your wealth and execute you down to the last member.”

Breathing a sigh of relief, Clan Lord Gu said, “Many thanks for your magnanimity, Patriarch Yang Qi. Let your glory shine like the sun over all of the Rich-Lush Continent.”

Pontifex Flame and Houselord Spring-Autumn were so excited they were trembling. After all, their sons were sworn brothers of Yang Qi, and obviously, that meant that they would benefit greatly in the future. ‘Can you believe this is happening? From here on out, our prospects are limitless….’

Hua Tianxiong was laughing heartily, as were many of the other people who had chosen to follow Yang Qi. All of them knew that they had picked the right side in the conflict, and as a result, had bright futures ahead of them.

“Pontifex Flame. Houselord Spring-Autumn. Step forward.”

The two immediately presented themselves. Waving his hand, Yang Qi sent them a pile of spirit stones. “I hereby grant you with sovereign-grade spirit stones, as well as some sagely-grade. Henceforth, you are members of the Sage Monarch Society, and are tasked with turning our continent into a prosperous nation.”

“Yes sir!” they replied.

“Your first mission will be to absorb all of the clans and sects into the Sage Monarch Society. And I give you the authority to execute anyone who refuses to comply.”

“Hua Tianxiong.”

“Here!”

“Take the Sun Moon Institute to the Western Continent. Relieve them of their spirit stones and wealth, including the reserves of the Sky-Heaven Dynasty, and bring everything here to Sage Monarch City. Chancellor Sun Moon, you provide them with support. Considering there are no Great Sages in the Western Continent anymore, you’ll essentially be invincible there.”

Chancellor Sun Moon looked a bit hesitant. “But… the Western Continent is controlled by the Hanging Mountain, and the Hanging Mountain rules over lots of other planes. Considering all of the Great Sages from the Western Continent were killed, they’ll definitely send more.”

“We’ll be fine. Ghost Emperor Yama is also here to stand guard. If the Hanging Mountain sends more Great Sages, you two kill them. Besides, I’ll be heading to the Hanging Mountain shortly myself. I also need to go deal with the Quake-Dawn Cathedral, considering one of their members tried to kill me.”

“Picking a fight with the Quake-Dawn Cathedral might not be the best move, Yang Qi,” said Ghost Emperor Yama. “You need to be careful. The old-timers there are likely close to the Demi-Immortal level, and you’re not even a Great Sage. At the most, you can handle low-level Great Sages in a fight, but anything higher than that, and you’ll get killed.”

“I’ll be a Great Sage soon,” Yang Qi said with a faint smile.

“Each step within the Great Sage level is more difficult than the previous. You have a tough road ahead of you. Don't rush things, or you’ll end up killing yourself, and then all my hopes for getting that technique will be dashed.”

“I won’t be dying by heavenly tribulation, nor by the hands of any enemies, so just be patient.” Turning to his sworn brothers and sisters, he said, “Very well, the time has come to unite the continent. Brothers and sisters, come. I hereby appoint you as the founding parliament of grand elders of the Sage Monarch Society. You now have the power to oversee all affairs in the continent.”

“Yes, Brother….” His sworn brothers and sisters rose to their feet to comply. There was no doubt that, at the moment, they were the most important allies to Yang Qi. They had sworn to live and die with him, and therefore, he didn’t need to question their loyalties. “In a moment, I’ll help bolster your cultivation bases, making you even stronger. Come, all of you enter my God Legion Paradise!”

As they did, they were surrounded by holy light that extruded the impurities within them, and calmed their minds.

Without any hesitation, Yang Qi fed sagely-grade spirit stones into them, filling their seas of energy with power.

Yang Qi was essentially giving them brand new foundations, ensuring that they would be able to leave the Lifeseizing level and become Legendaries. Of course, the actual breakthrough would need to come from their own ability and enlightenment; Yang Qi couldn’t force that.

However, they would now have a much higher likelihood of succeeding. There was almost no doubt at all that they would eventually reach that fabled level of the ancient energy warriors.

As was very well known, in ancient times, Legendaries were known as energy warriors, Great Sages were called saints, Demi-Immortals were half-immortals, and Demolishers were immortals.

In terms of the levels beyond Demolishing, they were not commonly understood or talked about.

Half a month passed by. Word of Yang Qi’s deeds had already spread throughout the Rich-Lush Continent, and countless experts traveled the lands to consolidate the power of the various sects and clans, including the other institutes. Of course, there were people in the Sea God Institute and True Dragon Institute who resisted, but they were executed.

For a brief time, a rain of death and carnage struck the Rich-Lush Continent.

Many former members of the Crown Prince Society were killed, and countless other rebels were imprisoned and magically sealed.

After another half-month, things stabilized. Considering that the Demi-Immortal Institute and the former Sage Ancestor Dynasty’s Capital City were located in the very center of the Rich-Lush Continent, where the spirit energy was most abundant, it made sense for Yang Qi to relocate Sage Monarch City there. The terrain was adjusted as necessary to accommodate the change. Also, space-time wormholes were set up in the primal-chaos paleo-energy beneath the continent, allowing for the harvesting of energy from immortal planes, which further went to strengthen the city.

As a result, Sage Monarch City continued to grow and expand. It was ruled by a parliament of elders staffed by his sworn siblings and his father, who made the decisions about resources, population, governance and the like. Yang Qi didn’t need to personally handle such matters.

Another half-month went by, and Chancellor Sun Moon returned with Hua Tianxiong, carrying abundant spirit stones and wealth from the Western Continent, as well as magical treasures and slaves.

Considering all of the work that was underway in the Rich-Lush Continent, slave labor was a very useful asset. To energy arts cultivators, spirit stones were like food, and the more one had, the more one could accomplish.

With an influx of spirit stones, it meant that the inhabitants of the Rich-Lush Continent wouldn’t need to be so dependent on energy convergence pills. It was such a significant improvement that it was hard to describe in words.

There had been a lot of fighting with the locals in the Western Continent. The Blight Legion Church put up the biggest resistance, and a huge battle was fought there which ended with the church being eliminated. The Western Continent was in very poor shape now. It was almost as if hordes of ravenous locusts had swept through them. Strangely, no one from the Hanging Mountain ever showed up.

Meanwhile, the Sage Monarch Society handled matters in the Rich-Lush Continent. They put an end to demon-devils of all sorts, exterminating the devil kings of the seventy-two grottos, and the demon kings of the thirty-six caverns.

The old evils were being rooted out, allowing the common people to live lives of prosperity and peace.

Roads and canals were built, stretching out from Sage Monarch City in all directions, making travel within the continent that much easier.

Yang Qi made the decision to split the Rich-Lush Continent into nine prefectures, each of which was ruled by an expert energy artist.

A month passed, and the continent was in a very stable situation, and had reached new heights of glory. The balance of power between the four institutes and the imperial dynasty was now a thing of the past.

Chancellor Sun Moon was currently the strongest member of the parliament.

Every day, caravans would head to the Western Continent to open up new spirit stone mines.

Shipment after shipment of spirit stones flowed into the Rich-Lush Continent, and specifically Sage Monarch City. As of this moment, the Yang Clan was now the richest and most powerful force in the entire continent.

If someone could stand at a very high vantage point and look down at the Rich-Lush Continent, they would see a very flourishing place. Furthermore, there was power stirring in the depths of the lands, something that sought to expand, to change the continent from a place with a curved heaven and flat earth into a planet like the Quake-Dawn Continent.

Chapter 337: A Continent Becoming a Planet

Ghost Emperor Yama clicked his tongue approvingly. “I'm impressed, Yang Qi. Not only did you thoroughly plunder the Western Continent, you opened up new mining operations. And you connected to numerous immortal planes, allowing power from there to fill the Rich-Lush Continent. After enough time passes, and enough energy builds up, you’ll be able to change this place from having a flat earth and a curved heaven, to being a planet! That will really be something!

“Not even Grand Emperor Rich-Lush himself managed to do anything like that. He worked himself to the bone to try to do it, hoping to use the resulting power surge to push himself into the Demi-Immortal level. In the end, he failed, mostly because he never acquired the approval of the sage spirits in the Planar Pearl.”

Yang Qi closed his eyes and used his true energy to send his vision beyond the greyspace of the Rich-Lush Continent and into outer space.

From that vantage point, he could see Sage Monarch City and the spatial coordinates which surrounded it, as well as the immortal sealing marks which connected the continent to the immortal planes, and allowed boundless vital energy to enter it.

Among all the various planes of existence, places with curved heavens and flat earths were the lowest type. The next highest type of plane was the planet, and higher than that were the planetary systems.

In ancient times, the Yore-Wilds Continent had been considered a planetary system, meaning that it contained hundreds of billions of planets, as well as numerous continental plates, all of which were connected to create a huge plane of existence.

As for planes of a higher nature than the Yore-Wilds Continent planetary system, they were the fabled immortal planes.

Often, they were referred to as Such-and-Such Heaven. For example, Non-Interference Heaven, Titan Emperor Heaven, Sea King Heaven, Dragon World Heaven, and so on. They were enormous planes that consisted of millions upon billions of planetary systems, with strange types of space-time. They were almost like universes, places of profound and utter mystery.

There were higher planes beyond the immortal planes, although, no one knew what they were like.

It was virtually impossible to push a plane into a higher state of being, so actually accomplishing such a deed was considered incredibly astounding. In mortal terms, it would be like a peasant founding an imperial dynasty.

But now, the Rich-Lush Continent was already heading in the direction of becoming a planet, and it was all thanks to Yang Qi’s accomplishments. He had first saved the plane as a whole, and had then gone into the primal chaos vital energy and opened up passageways to immortal planes.

“So, Ghost Emperor Yama, are there any benefits to turning a continent into a planet?” Yang Qi asked.

“Benefits? Of course there are. Incredible benefits! First of all, the process will release a huge amount of force, countless streams of universal vital power that can be combined to benefit the person overseeing the transformation. That person can use the power to achieve virtually any breakthrough, and without the risk of heavenly tribulation. In that moment, that person would be the overlord of the lands, and therefore, heaven and earth would actually help him. That was how Grand Emperor Rich-Lush originally hoped to become a Demi-Immortal.”

“Except, turning the Rich-Lush Continent into a planet wasn’t as easy as he’d hoped, right?”

“Exactly. To do things the normal way, one would have to build up power for a few tens of thousands of years. Of course, that’s how it goes when you don’t have all the miracles you usually come up with. For example, given your current cultivation base, you can already live for tens of thousands of years without any problems. Even ordinary Never-Dying Legendaries can live for over ten thousand years, and ordinary Great Sages, tens of thousands. Given the speed of your cultivation, I'd say it shouldn’t be hard at all for you to become a high-level Great Sage in a few tens of thousands of years. By then, you could use the Rich-Lush Continent’s transformation into a planet to push you into the Demi-Immortal level. You know, that's a level most people only dream of, and being able to reach it in only a few tens of thousands of years is really miraculous.”

“Tens of thousands of years?” Yang Qi shook his head. “Unfortunately, I don’t have the luxury of laying out such long-term plans. I need to become a Great Sage sooner rather than later. Otherwise, I’ll end up getting killed.”

“Well, you did absorb the essence of that Nascent Divinity Starlight Body, so you should be able to reach the Astral-Star Transformation fairly soon. You didn’t build up a lot of energy in your month of cultivation, but I can tell that the quality of your true energy has reached a terrifying level. You’re still not quite a match for me, but given some time, you won’t even need the God Legion Seal to cause me problems.” Ghost Emperor Yama currently looked like a strapping, middle-aged man, and was as handsome as an infernal king from hell. He had an underworldly sage domain, a personal kingdom that had greatly benefited from the half of the Infernal Deity Spear that he had acquired.

Of course, Yang Qi had advanced even more than he had, thanks to defeating so many Great Sages.

He had plenty of sage motes, and even some immortal motes, all of them in his God Legion Paradise. Unfortunately, he could only work with the sage motes, not the immortal motes.

The immortal motes were buried deep in the immortal armor he had taken from the Crown Prince, and could not be easily accessed. Yang Qi would need to become a Great Sage before he could do that.

Thankfully, the sage motes he had acquired could be used to power his Fist of the Halls of Heaven, which was more than enough to slaughter Great Sage enemies.

At the moment, Yang Qi was easily able to handle first, second, and third step Great Sages. After all, among the nine Great Sages from the Quake-Dawn Continent, only one had been in the third step, and the Fist of the Halls of Heaven had destroyed him almost immediately.

Unfortunately, even though he had reached the Ghost-God Transformation, his Hell Portal could only summon hell-born monsters in the Half Sage level. Great Sages were still out of the question. It seemed likely that he would need to reach the Great Sage level before that was possible.

Another problem he currently had was that using sage motes to unleash the Fist of the Halls of Heaven was an inferior option. It was only about one percent as powerful as the full version of the fist technique.

Because of all that, it could only be imagined how terrifyingly powerful he would be as a Great Sage. Not only would he himself be far stronger, but he would be able to summon an army of Great Sage fiend-devils, something that could shake even the ancient Yore-Wilds Continent.

Yang Qi suddenly rose to his feet. “Ghost Emperor Yama, I'm leaving for a trip to the Hanging Mountain, and I don't want you coming with me. You stay here in the Rich-Lush Continent to defend against any potential invaders. Alright?”

“What? You want me stationed here? Hmm. Okay. I’ll keep an eye on the Sage Monarch Society. But are you going to make it worth it for me?”

“Worth it? Of course. With the Crown Prince and Yun Hailan dead, I have only one major goal, and that's to find out the truth about my past. I already know that my mother is Greensura, a holy daughter from the Hanging Mountain, so once I know the rest of the secrets of my origin, I can focus fully on my cultivation, and strive to reach the highest of heights. After I find out the truth of my past, I’ll give you the rest of the Infernal Deity Spear. In the meantime, I’ll give you other hellish enlightenment. What do you say? You’re strong enough to take charge here and resist any advances by the Quake-Dawn Cathedral. After all, don't forget that the Crown Prince’s mother is the Holy Daughter of the Quake-Dawn Cathedral. Considering how many of their people I killed, they’ll definitely be coming to cause problems sooner or later.”

“Okay,” Ghost Emperor Yama said, beaming with joy. “So, you’re the son of a holy daughter from the Hanging Mountain. And the Crown Prince’s mother is the Holy Daughter in the Quake-Dawn Cathedral. In some ways, you’re the same, although, the Quake-Dawn Cathedral can’t possibly compare to the Hanging Mountain. The Hanging Mountain is essentially a planetary system, and is far, far larger than the Quake-Dawn Continent. There are even people there who represent the Demonfolk from the immortal planes. The holy daughters of the Hanging Mountain are not to be trifled with, which means you’re actually pretty important. Say, what about your father? Who’s he? And why did they possibly send you to a tiny plane like the Rich-Lush Continent? It doesn’t really make sense.”

“I only have one father, and his name is Yang Zhan. I'm from the Yang Clan, and my blood is that of the Sovereign Lord, who exists above the legion of gods. That said, I still want to know the story of my past.”

At this point, he exercised a thought, and countless enlightenment of the primeval infernal deities entered Ghost Emperor Yama’s mind.

Yang Qi didn’t fear Ghost Emperor Yama anymore. In fact, he could sense that, after killing the eighteen Great Sages and the Crown Prince, the man actually viewed him as an equal.

However, the act of imparting the infernal king sutras to him, as well as half of the Infernal Deity Spear, left Yang Qi with the distinct sensation that, eventually, such things would give him complete control over Ghost Emperor Yama.

It was something Yang Qi had never imagined could happen.

The truth was that for Ghost Emperor Yama to cultivate the Infernal Deity Spear was actually an act of blaspheming against the legion of gods, and would lead to his ultimate doom. Yang Qi could cultivate it because he had the God Legion Seal, and was a spokesperson for the gods. In the end, for Ghost Emperor Yama to try to get techniques from Yang Qi was essentially suicidal for him.

Of course, Yang Qi wasn't going to tell him that. The man obviously still had it out for him, and therefore, he would draw things out as long as possible. And right now, he needed him to stand watch over the Rich-Lush Continent. Without that safety net, he wouldn’t be able to head to the Hanging Mountain to search for his mother.

“Come back as soon as possible, Qi’er,” Yang Zhan said. His cultivation base was already in Nonary Lifeseizing, putting him just on the verge of becoming a Legendary.

“Don’t worry, Father. I will.” With that, Yang Qi unfurled his Angel Wings and flew out into the void.

Chapter 338: Assassination Attempt

Yang Qi left the greyspace of the Rich-Lush Continent and entered outer space.

He was a Ghost-God Legendary, and even ordinary Legendary experts could traverse the void by means of space-time wormholes. So there was little need to mention Yang Qi’s ability to do so. After all, he had used his Angel Wings to escape Great Sage Pure Emptiness back when he was only in the second transformation.

And now, he was thousands of times stronger than back then. Perhaps even tens of thousands of times as strong.  Even without the help of a hell monsoon, he could theoretically travel to the Quake-Dawn Continent himself.

Unfortunately, the Hanging Mountain was much, much further away than that continent. If he tried to fly there with his own power, it would likely take a million years.

However, he could definitely hop through various space-time wormholes to shorten the time.

After he was in outer space, he saw an endless silver river of stars and planets. In the void, it was impossible to see the stars and planets. The only thing visible was darkness and tempests. But in outer space, there was dazzling starlight everywhere, filling anyone who could see it with a feeling of warmth.

The first thing Yang Qi did was take in the sights. Looking out into outer space, he saw the silver river, and began thinking about the universe, the planes of existence, the void, and other such things.

He even opened the Lord's Eye, and could see even more clearly the distinction between the eternal darkness and light that existed. There was a bright universe that was outer space. Within it hung countless planets, planetary systems, continents. And there was a dark universe that was the void, filled with darkness, and without any light.

The two universes did not intersect. However, they were connected by wormholes, which were very much like passageways left behind by burrowing archaean godworms.

One could enter the dark void, and leap great distances, to come out in other locations in outer space.

To do so, however, required massive amounts of power.

With his Lord's Eye, Yang Qi could see down to the substructure of the universe around him. In fact, it was now possible to determine that the immortal planes above actually existed in another universe of their own, separated by a massive greyspace.

Within this universe, the Rich-Lush Continent was like a speck of dust, which could be blown away by the slightest fluctuation. As for Yang Qi himself, he was very weak.

Of course, the mighty legion of gods was far beyond his sight. It was hard to say why; although he could sense the countless immortal planes, he had absolutely no sensation regarding whatever world the legion of gods lived in.

He could sense the will of heaven, or more precisely, numerous wills of heaven. And yet, he could not sense the mighty entity who had created the heavens above.

Looking out, Yang Qi could see the starry sky, which he knew had once belonged to the Yore-Wilds Continent. That continent had shattered, transforming into countless planets and continents. As for the other major continents, the Waste-Wilds Continent, Brute-Wilds Continent, and Proto-Wilds Continent, they were much further out in the sea of stars.

Of course, all of them fell under the jurisdiction of one of the immortal planes above them, the Titan Emperor Heaven.

Closing his eyes, he could sense the will of heaven out in the boundless sea of stars. That will was the animadestiny of the immortal plane above, or perhaps, the expression of some almighty being from there. It was essentially a manifestation of magical law.

Anyone within the planetary systems governed by that magical law would have to act in accord with it.

Throwing his head back, he shouted, “Let the power of the stars gather within me!”

Instantly, countless streams of starlight began to rush toward him.

He was making his breakthrough into the Astral-Star Transformation.

Normally speaking, making this breakthrough would require an extensive period of preparation. However, killing Young Lady Starlight had given him access to the powers of a Nascent Divinity Starlight Body, making it much easier to reach out to heavenly bodies. As such, it was no problem at all to begin creating constellations within the depths of his domain.

His God Legion Paradise was complete, but not yet perfect. After reaching the Ghost-God Transformation, he had added empyrean-baleful powers to it, and now that he was stepping into the Astral-Star Transformation, he was adding a constellation network. With that, he could use the power of heavenly bodies to attack and kill his enemies.

Starlight swirled around him like a sea. It was almost like he alone had become a hundred thousand versions of himself, all reaching out to bring in starlight.

As the starlight rushed into the God Legion Paradise, it fused with the greyspace, causing countless stars to begin to twinkle brightly within it. It was a constellation network of a mysterious and profound nature, filled with constellations such as Sagittarius, Pisces, Scorpio, and others. As a result, the God Legion Paradise grew more vast and mighty, and filled with the type of mighty aura that would exist during the early moments of a universe.

Yang Qi was completely immersed in his connection to the dao of heaven, the miracle of creation, the mysteries of the stars, and the powerful substructure of heaven and earth. Suddenly, he realized that the powerful substructure he was sensing was made up of countless smaller particles.

And he also realized that if he could push his cultivation to a certain level, then he, just like starlight, could scatter into countless particles, each of them independent, and eternally indestructible.

He was just about to step into the Astral-Star Transformation.

And yet, in that moment in which he was immersed in the dao of heaven, a shining beam of sword light shot out from the void.

The sword light contained something so incredibly profound that it could sever heaven and earth, and it instantly broke Yang Qi’s connection to the dao of heaven. It was a result of the sheer power of the sword itself, not any special move.

Yang Qi looked over, and the starlight around him faded, to be replaced by the sword light, which seemed capable of stabbing deep into his soul. It moved far more quickly than lightning, and without any sound, sliced apart anything in its path.

It was a sneak attack!

There was no time to avoid it, or even teleport away somehow. Even worse, the sword light seemed to be locked onto his soul, and preparing to absorb it.

In fact, within the light, there was actually a tiny black spot, which was none other than a black hole of vital energy.

“Superlative Defense!” Yang Qi said without thinking. As the God Legion Paradise spread out, sagelight surged, and the greyspace spread out with its turtle-shell-like pattern of interlocking crystals.

When the sword struck the greyspace, the domain shuddered, but did not break.

‘Who’s ambushing me!?’ Yang Qi opened his Lord's Eye again, and looked out to see an enormous figure lurking in the void. At the very least, this enemy was a Great Sage, and were it not for his Superlative Defense, he most likely would have been assassinated just now.

RUMBLE!

Yang Qi unleashed the Fist of the Halls of Heaven, causing space to shatter like a mirror, and collapse into dust. In the blink of an eye, the fist strike traveled thousands of kilometers, and reached the shadowy figure who had just attacked him.

The figure blurred into motion, slashing out with his sword in a way that could pierce through space itself. Clearly, whoever this was, he had supreme control of the magical laws of space.

Yang Qi leapt out into the void, holding nothing back as he leaped into the fight. Around him, space shattered, and the God Legion Paradise caused space-time tempests to spring up everywhere.

BOOM!

Without any hesitation, Yang Qi unleashed a move from the Fist of the Halls of Heaven.

“Bury Immortals!”

Magical symbols that resembled dragons swept forth from his fists, causing the heavenly bodies to send starlight streaming down into the void.

It merged with Yang Qi’s sagelight, creating numerous gravestones, each of which seemed designed to bury immortals!

A bloodcurdling shriek rang out as the fist struck the sword-wielding figure, who coughed up a mouthful of blood, and then turned to flee.

Looking over his shoulder, he said, “You’re strong, Yang Qi. No wonder you killed the Crown Prince. However, the Quake-Dawn Cathedral isn’t going to just let you off the hook. You and Ghost Emperor Yama are both going to die. I'm only the seventh most powerful killer from the Hall of Ninjas. Next time, it will be someone stronger who comes after you. As a Legendary who can destroy Great Sages, you’re something special. Our Quake-Dawn Cathedral is going to capture you, and then extract all your secrets. You’re already at the top of our kill list.”

Then, a series of something like sonic booms rang out as the figure vanished.

‘So, in the short weeks which have passed, the news has already reached the Quake-Dawn Cathedral. And they’ve already started to seek revenge.’

Unfortunately, the Great Sage assassin had escaped, and his attack had severed Yang Qi’s connection with the dao of heaven, which meant that reaching further levels of enlightenment was going to be difficult.

“I originally thought I was going to blow right through the Astral-Star Transformation and reach an even higher level. After all, I have plenty of spirit stones. But now it seems it's going to take longer. Dammit. DAMMIT! Well, I might as well keep going to the Hanging Mountain. And the Quake-Dawn Continent is on my way. Maybe I should take a look and see what this Quake-Dawn Cathedral is really like.”

Chapter 339: Looking For Trouble

Yang Qi didn't have access to a space-time wormhole leading directly to the Hanging Mountain, and thus, he decided to go the long way, and visit the Quake-Dawn Continent along the way.

Besides, there was also the issue of how the Grand-Wilds Mansion had hired him as the captain of a mercenary squad that they sent directly into Yama Mountain. That was a grudge that he wasn’t willing to simply let go of.

As far as he could tell, the best way to go about it all would be to get the Grand-Wilds Mansion into conflict with the Quake-Dawn Cathedral, and have the two of them wipe each other out. The only question was how to go about doing that.

Considering how badly he had offended the Quake-Dawn Cathedral, it was only a matter of time before they struck back at the Rich-Lush Continent. His sworn siblings, his family, and the Sage Monarch Society were all major weaknesses for him right now.

Therefore, he needed to nip things in the bud as soon as possible.

Unfortunately, the Quake-Dawn Cathedral was not the Demi-Immortal Institute. It was a massive organization that he couldn't underestimate.

One slip-up could be fatal. After all, they could theoretically kill Ghost Emperor Yama, let alone him. They had old-timers who were so strong that, unless Yang Qi became a Great Sage, he couldn’t deal with them directly.

In terms of his immediate goals, the first was to get stronger, and the second was to make sure that the Quake-Dawn Cathedral didn’t end up invading the Rich-Lush Continent.

Suddenly, his Angel Wings spread out, and he shot into the spatial tempests. He flew for the equivalent of several days in a row before he saw an enormous planet up ahead, hanging in the middle of outer space. It was surrounded by countless satellite planets, all of which moved in a specific orbital path. In the dark void between them all were numerous hell monsoons of varying size and strength, as well as hosts of fiend-devils, who would attack the greyspace of the planets and try to enter them.

This place was many, many times larger than the Rich-Lush Continent.

It was the Quake-Dawn Continent, which Yang Qi had visited once before.

At the moment, he had no idea where the Hanging Mountain was. However, there were plenty of teleportation portals and spatial nexuses in the Quake-Dawn Continent which led in that direction.

The Western Continent had once contained teleportation portals and spatial nexuses, but Yang Qi had ordered them destroyed. The last thing he wanted was an invasion of Demonfolk from the Hanging Mountain or some similar place. His plan was to secretly enter the place and start looking around for information about his past.

‘These armies of fiend-devils have the Quake-Dawn Continent completely under siege. No wonder they never sent a major force to the Rich-Lush Continent after the big fight.’ Yang Qi slipped through space, passing the fiend-devils, and eventually touching down onto the surface of the Quake-Dawn Continent. Instantly, he was surrounded by powerful spirit energy, the perfect fuel for cultivation.

Without any hesitation, he sent his divine will spreading out for thousands of kilometers in all directions.

It was a very brazen act on his part. Even Great Sages would usually keep their divine will contained within their own territory. Sending it into the territory of another person would be considered a provocation, and could lead to outright warfare. But Yang Qi was able to mix his divine will with the will of heaven, and was thus able to escape detection from anyone other than an expert like Ghost Emperor Yama.

Unfortunately, the Quake-Dawn Continent was such a huge place that he didn't have any luck finding what he was looking for.

“Get out here, Nie Chaoguang!”

Waving his hand, he summoned the lazy Nie Chaoguang from inside the Grand Emperor's Pagoda. Nie Chaoguang was already a very high-level Half Sage. And after everything he had experienced, including being able to watch first-hand as Yang Qi slaughtered countless Great Sages, he felt that he had made significant advancement toward a breakthrough.

In fact, of all of Yang Qi’s followers, he was currently the closest to reaching the Great Sage level.

However, he was from the Quake-Dawn Continent, and Yang Qi knew that if he became a Great Sage in the Rich-Lush Continent, it would be difficult to control him. Therefore, he had kept him imprisoned in the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, sealed and incapable of making any cultivation progress. Now that he was in the Quake-Dawn Continent, he was obviously the perfect person to use for information.

“How long are you going to keep me suppressed, Yang Qi?” Nie Chaoguang asked with a furious glower. “I never did anything to you. In fact, you’re the one who stole the Heaven-Dominating Golden Swordbreaker from my Spirit Origin Association.”

“I’ll keep you suppressed until you offer me wholehearted allegiance,” Yang Qi replied. “You have the legacy of an immortal, Nie Chaoguang. Keeping you close by is as dangerous as handling a viper. One bite could be deadly. However, you’re right. You never did anything to me, and therefore, I've kept you alive. So tell me about the Quake-Dawn Continent. Where are the teleportation portals, and how do I get to the Hanging Mountain?”

Not daring to talk back to Yang Qi, Nie Chaoguang looked around briefly and then said, “We're in the Mandrake Plains, which is one of the seven major plains in the Quake-Dawn Continent. This area is very fertile, and there are plenty of subterranean resources as well. All of it is kept under strict control by the Quake-Dawn Cathedral. See that city on the horizon? That’s Mandrakor, where the Quake-Dawn Cathedral’s Hall of Mandrakes is headquartered. The Hall of Mandrakes is nearly as famous as the Hall of Ninjas, and has more experts than you can imagine. It's run by multiple Great Sages, and focuses on foreign trade. As for the Hanging Mountain, if you want to get there, just head into the city. They have a cathedral there where you can most certainly acquire the right coordinates.”

“I see. Alright, you take the lead. I’ll disguise myself as a disciple of the Spirit Origin Association. Okay?”

“My life is in your hands,” Nie Chaoguang replied coolly, “so I’ll do whatever you say.”

With that, they headed toward the city on foot.

Considering how large of a plane the Quake-Dawn Continent was, even the smallest cities there were larger than Capital City in the Rich-Lush Continent.

And there was little need to mention how large a massive place like Mandrakor was.

Before even getting close to the city, Yang Qi saw massive roads crisscrossing the terrain. There were even wormholes that flickered here and there. High above the city was a glimmering shield that spread out for thousands of kilometers, an enormous aegis that contained the city. Anyone who wished to enter the city would have to pass through special entrances in the aegis, and of course, pay a tax to do so.

In that regard, it was like many of the cities Yang Qi had seen in the past.

“That’s the Mandala Vajra Aegis,” Nie Chaoguang explained. “It’s a type of ancient immortal formation that not even a Great Sage would be able to break through. It even protects the city underground. It’s cast by a magical treasure that is part of Mandrakor itself. In ancient times, an immortal item shattered in the area, and the people from the Quake-Dawn Cathedral stitched the pieces back together and combined them with subterranean ley lines to create an impenetrable defense.

“Be very, very careful when we pass through it, and definitely don’t do anything to reveal who you truly are. Otherwise, we're both dead.”

‘It’s definitely a powerful formation,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘Back in the Rich-Lush Continent, I could probably use the primal-chaos paleo-energy to break through it. But not here.’

Back in the Rich-Lush Continent, Yang Qi could benefit from the powers of the primal-chaos paleo-energy, the immortal spell formations, and even the greyspace of the plane itself. He could essentially unleash double the level of his own power. But he didn't have those advantages here.

Maintaining full vigilance, Yang Qi and Nie Chaoguang headed toward the city entrance.

The guards were Legendaries. Thankfully, they weren’t carrying out detailed investigations of those who wanted to enter the city. As long as the tax of supreme-grade spirit stones was paid, they let anyone in.

Mandrakor was clearly a very wealthy city, with abundant spirit energy. Towering buildings rose up everywhere, some of which contained their own small-scale worlds.

The streets were paved with some ancient bronze-like metal, and were untainted by even a speck of dust. There were pedestrians of all sorts, all of whom had abundant true energy. The Lifeseizers present scurried about with their heads ducked down, almost as if they were servants. Only the Legendaries seemed to carry themselves with a bit of respect, although only those who had achieved multiple breakthroughs were among the important government workers, or the nobility.

Occasionally, the raging aura of a Great Sage could be sensed; they were people who commanded universal respect wherever they went.

Of course, the situation was very different from the Rich-Lush Continent, in which Great Sages were rarely seen in public. Here, they were somewhat commonplace.

At a certain point, Nie Chaoguang pointed to a very impressive looking temple up ahead. “That’s the Ultra-Heaven Cathedral, which manages all of the Hanging Mountain’s business in the Quake-Dawn Continent, and also oversees all of the various Demonfolk here. There are plenty of demon kings and other monsters that they watch over. The Hanging Mountain is very ambitious, you know. They want to turn the Quake-Dawn Continent into a larger version of the old Western Continent.”

The entirety of the Ultra-Heaven Cathedral was made of some sort of metal, and was crafted to look like some sort of heavenly roc, with wings outstretched in very intimidating fashion. It made sense considering that it was administered by Great Sage Ultra-Heaven from the Hanging Mountain. According to the rumors, he was actually a heaven-roc, capable of achieving immense, unmatchable speed, to the point where he could travel between planes of existence as easily as snapping his fingers.

He was much more famous than Great Sage Shroud-Heaven.

Hopefully, this Ultra-Heaven Cathedral was Yang Qi’s ticket to getting in touch with the Hanging Mountain itself, and finding out information about his mother.

Even as Yang Qi was thinking about how to get into the cathedral and get the information he wanted, he noticed a group of people emerging from the structure, pulsing with demon energy. In the lead was a dignified and imposing Half Sage who was clearly on the very cusp of achieving a breakthrough into the Great Sage level.

‘Who’s that?’

Yang Qi immediately realized that this person looked familiar.

‘It’s Young Master Shroud-Heaven! I thought he ended up dead at the hands of the Crown Prince. What's he doing here?’

Chapter 340: Secrets

After the fight between Young Master Shroud-Heaven, Hua Tianxiong, and the Crown Prince, Great Sage Shroud-Heaven had gone to the Superheaven Badlands, not to kill the Crown Prince, but to work out a deal. In the end, he was able to resurrect his son, and, just like Hua Tianxiong, bring him back even closer to the Great Sage level.

“Young Master Shroud-Heaven, I heard that the Crown Prince reached the Great Sage level, but then got killed. Even your father said that he had limitless potential, and yet now, he’s dead.”

The group surrounding Young Master Shroud-Heaven were peppering him with conversation.

“Yeah, that's right. Who could have guessed that somebody would come out of nowhere and kill the Crown Prince? I heard it was some guy named Yang Qi. Apparently, he set up some deadly spell formation that killed, not only the Crown Prince, but eighteen other Great Sages. All six of the Western Continent’s Great Sages were killed, as well as nine from the Quake-Dawn Cathedral. And three from the Rich-Lush Continent were killed too. And that Yang Qi is only a Legendary.”

Young Master Shroud-Heaven sighed. “I’m not sure where that Yang Qi is really from, but he’s strong. He even managed to kill the Crown Prince.”

“For a Legendary to kill a Great Sage is completely unprecedented,” one of the demonoids said. “He must have some sort of incredibly powerful treasure. Although, I heard that he's working with Ghost Emperor Yama. Maybe Ghost Emperor Yama was the one who actually killed the Crown Prince.”

Young Master Shroud-Heaven shook his head. “No, that’s not what happened. According to my information, Ghost Emperor Yama didn’t even participate in the fight. Yang Qi did it all himself. The matter really shook the Quake-Dawn Cathedral to the core. In fact, word has already reached the Hanging Mountain, and a lot of people are thinking of trying to capture Yang Qi and drag his secrets out of him. For example, what kind of energy art does he cultivate? Although, Ghost Emperor Yama is terrifyingly powerful, and could definitely cause it to rain blood if anyone went looking for trouble. It's definitely a better idea to just sit back and see what happens. And that’s not even to mention Yang Qi’s Demi-Immortal backer.”

Trembling, one of the demonoids said, “A Demi-Immortal? Well, that makes sense. A half-immortal is definitely far beyond our ability to deal with.”

“That's why I said to keep calm and just bide our time,” Young Master Shroud-Heaven reiterated. “What a pity the Crown Prince died so soon. I wonder if someone will resurrect him. He’s the type of crafty individual who always has a backup plan, so it wouldn’t surprise me if he left behind a seed of some sort that could lead to his resurrection. For example, my father mentioned that the Crown Prince actually acquired some of the legacy of King Immortal-Slayer, in the form of an identity medallion. Maybe he somehow left something in the medallion. They have mysterious powers and abilities, and can be used to kill devils and slay immortals. When they pick someone of destiny, and that person fails to live up to the legacy, the medallion will take the destiny away from them and transfer it to someone else. You know, I’d say it’s highly likely that, after the Crown Prince died, Yang Qi got that Immortal-Slayer’s medallion.”

“King Immortal-Slayer? I've never heard of him.”

“You’ll only read about him in ancient stories. He came from an immortal plane, which means that people like us would be nothing more than dust to him.”

“Young Master Shroud-Heaven, how do you plan to deal with Yang Qi? If you can kill him, then you could get the Immortal-Slayer’s medallion. If you combined his destiny with the Crown Prince’s, you would be unparalleled under heaven!”

“That’s not the kind of thing that can be done overnight. We have to wait to see how the wind blows. I’ve dealt with Yang Qi before, and I can tell you that, sooner or later, I’ll kill him and get that medallion. I'm in no hurry though. The pressing matter at hand is the Mandrake Auction Convention. I want to get that fragment of the Jade Swivel Immortal Mural to give to the Holy Mother on her decade-birthday.”

“Hey, this is the first decade-birthday for our new Holy Mother! It’s going to be a big occasion, and a lot of disciples are going to try to earn her favor by giving her amazing gifts. Whoever she favors will definitely go up in the world.”

“Sir, if you gain her favor, then you could theoretically get her support in your effort to propose to Great Sage Ultra-Heaven’s daughter! That would be a big win for you.”

“That’s right. The reigning Holy Mother rose to her position only about twenty years ago. Supposedly, back when she was only a holy daughter, she traveled to the Rich-Lush Continent, although that might just be a rumor.”

“Shut it!” Young Master Shroud-Heaven said, lowering his voice. “Spread wild rumors like that and you’re going to get yourself killed! Whatever the Holy Mother was like as a holy daughter doesn’t matter. It's forbidden to talk about it. Don’t you know how many Great Sages have been killed over the past twenty years or so, just because they spread rumors about her? Remember Great Sage Heaven-Crusher? He was imprisoned, and is now on death’s door. Shut up and never mention the Holy Mother’s past again.”

At this point, Young Master Shroud-Heaven and his group disappeared into another nearby building.

‘Holy Mother of the Hanging Mountain?’ Yang Qi thought, who had been eavesdropping on the entire conversation. ‘Rose to her position fifteen or twenty years ago? Was a holy daughter who visited the Rich-Lush Continent? Don’t tell me….’

“Nie Chaoguang, what do you know about the Holy Mother of the Hanging Mountain?” he asked.

“Well, you asked the right person about that,” Nie Chaoguang replied. “As an elite genius in the Spirit Origin Association, I have access to a lot of top-secret information. The Hanging Mountain is a holy mountain of the Demonfolk, and oversees countless planets and continents. They protect the legacy of certain demon-immortals from the heaven above, and offer worship to demon-gods. The mountain actually has two leaders. One of them is the Holy Mother, who is consecrated from among the many holy daughters, by the will of a demon-immortal descended from heaven. She is the official leader of the female Demonfolk.

“Usually, the Holy Mother will rule for ten thousand years or so, and then another will be selected. By this point, there have been dozens of them. From that you can deduce that the Hanging Mountain actually existed back in the days of the Yore-Wilds Continent. The current Holy Mother rose to power twenty years ago, and is the most controversial of any Holy Mother. Supposedly, when she was a holy daughter, she had an affair, although nobody could ever produce any hard evidence to prove it. Regardless, when she was chosen to assume office, it caused a lot of bloody fighting in the Hanging Mountain.

“The other leader of the Hanging Mountain is called the August Patriarch, and he’s the official leader of the male Demonfolk. The August Patriarch was staunchly opposed to the appointment of the new Holy Mother, but she used all sorts of methods to quell the opposition and eventually stabilize her position. Nowadays, nobody even talks about those things, especially in the Hanging Mountain. Anyone who does gets brutally killed. In the end, this new Holy Mother has the reputation of being the strongest and most powerful in all history. And she's always meddling in the affairs of the August Patriarch and the male Demonfolk.”

“What is this Holy Mother’s name?” Yang Qi asked.

“The Holy Mother doesn’t have a name. She’s called Greensura, because that was the name of the original Demonfolk god-spirit who founded the Hanging Mountain. Throughout history, all of the Holy Mothers have been called Greensura.”

‘So, is she my mother?’ Yang Qi thought. ‘It’s hard to say right now. Supposedly, there are tens of thousands of holy daughters in the Hanging Mountain. More than the Demi-Immortal Institute has students. The chances for any of them in particular to become the new Holy Mother would be miniscule at best. But then there’s the part about her going to the Rich-Lush Continent. Hm… Maybe it really is her. In any case, I need to get to the Hanging Mountain and see her for myself. The downside is that my cultivation base definitely isn’t high enough. And if I really am her son, and word got out, it might get me killed.’

“By the way, what level is the Holy Mother’s cultivation base?” Yang Qi asked.

“Higher than a Great Sage,” Nie Chaoguang replied.

“What?! Are you saying she’s a Demi-Immortal? Wouldn’t that make her completely invincible?”

“She's definitely a Demi-Immortal, although, I’m not sure where she stands within the level. Compared to her, we’re like ants. In fact, we’re less than ants.” Nie Chaoguang sighed. “Yang Qi, it’s definitely going to take you a few thousand years before you become a Demi-Immortal. Although, you did kill eighteen Great Sages as a Personal-Domain Legendary. You know, not even any of the current Demi-Immortals did anything like that in their younger years.”

“Alright, enough jabbering. Come on, follow me. If I have to, I'm going to grab that Young Master Shroud-Heaven and force him to be my agent.” The two of them continued down the street toward the building that Young Master Shroud-heaven had entered, which was none other than the Hall of Mandrakes, one of the Quake-Dawn Cathedral’s central locations for foreign trade, and a source of massive income for them. As soon as Yang Qi neared the structure, he could sense the aura of immortal motes, and immense stores of spirit stones.

Young Master Shroud-Heaven had entered the building without being stopped, but Yang Qi and Nie Chaoguang had to speak to the Legendary guards.

“I'm Nie Chaoguang from the Spirit Origin Association. I'm here to participate in the auction convention.” Nie Chaoguang flashed his identity medallion.

“Oh?” the guard said. “Spirit Origin Association you say? Please, enter. Although, you still need to pay the entry fee. Ten royal-grade spirit stones.”

Without even blinking, Yang Qi tossed the man a hundred royal-grade spirit stones. “Here, take that and split the change among the guards. And get us a good seat while you’re at it.”

“Yes, yes of course….” The guards exchanged delighted glances, and then one of them stepped forward. “Come with me, I’ll lead you to the best and safest location. It’s the Heaven Suite; once you're inside, no one will be able to see your facial features clearly.”

“That’s perfect,” Yang Qi said. As they made their way through the auction house, Yang Qi looked around and saw quite a group of people already gathered, many of whom were Great Sages.

“What?” Nie Chaoguang suddenly murmured. “That’s Wilds Everlasting from the Grand-Wilds Mansion!”

Yang Qi followed his line of sight until he caught sight of a burly Great Sage who fairly radiated a sensation of power and splendor.

“He’s the son of the Wilds God, the leader of the Grand-Wilds Mansion!” Nie Chaoguang added.

Chapter 341: Immortal Grass

Nie Chaoguang went on to provide further explanation. “The Wilds God founded the Grand-Wilds Mansion, and everyone says that he has been a ninth step Great Sage for quite some time. Considering how close he is to becoming a Demi-Immortal, he’s one of the most terrifying among the old-timers in the Quake-Dawn Continent. And that's also why the Grand-Wilds Mansion has always been at odds with the Quake-Dawn Cathedral. Not that either of them could be considered good guys.

“For years, they have been as opposed as fire and water. But now, Wilds Everlasting is swaggering into an auction held by the Quake-Dawn Cathedral, and nobody’s causing him any trouble? That in itself is very thought-provoking. I’d say it's highly likely they plan to join forces to deal with your continent.”

‘If they plan to invade the Rich-Lush Continent, then I have to stop them,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘Even better would be to follow my original plan and get them to fight each other. But how? Perhaps Wilds Everlasting is the ticket.’

At this point, they entered the Heaven Suite, which would provide them a large measure of privacy during the auction. The main auction floor was fairly crowded, but was occupied by ordinary Legendaries. Important people like Young Master Shroud-Heaven, as well other Great Sages, were all in private rooms.

In the Quake-Dawn Continent, Great Sages were like nobility who existed above everyone else. Legendaries were also important, with Lifeseizers and everyone below them being little more than commoners struggling to rise up in the world.

In fact, Lifeseizers weren’t even allowed into this auction. According to the ancient rules of the continent, Lifeseizers were mere foot soldiers, not energy warriors, and as such, didn’t have any official position.

Yang Qi carefully sent his divine will out to probe the other private rooms. He could immediately sense all sorts of powerful auras, and from what he could tell, most of them were Great Sages.

That said, none of them seemed to be on the same level as Ghost Emperor Yama.

People like that were few and far between.

**

In one of the most luxurious of the private rooms, Wilds Everlasting was engaging in conversation with his entourage.

“Milord,” said one of the Half Sage attendants, “why exactly did you want to come participate in this auction here in Mandrakor? Aren’t we still at odds with the Quake-Dawn Cathedral? And haven't they already figured out that we sent a squad of mercenaries to the Rich-Lush Continent to free Ghost Emperor Yama?”

“I came because there’s a stalk of immortal grass up for auction that I want.” Wilds Everlasting suddenly erupted with power, the type that vastly surpassed any of the eighteen Great Sages that Yang Qi had killed. Smiling coldly, he continued, “Those mercenaries are all dead, consumed by Ghost Emperor Yama. In the end, it cost us virtually nothing to send them there. The strangest thing is that, once Ghost Emperor Yama was freed, he didn’t make contact with my father. Instead, he teamed up with some guy named Yang Qi.”

“It is indeed very strange, Milord,” another servant said. “Who exactly is that Yang Qi? I heard that he stole the Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragment and used it to kill the Crown Prince. The Crown Prince was born after the Holy Daughter of the Quake-Dawn Cathedral was possessed by a god from heaven descended into the mortal world. People say that the Crown Prince was lucky for his entire life. He got the legacy of Grand Emperor Rich-Lush, and some immortal artifacts as well. Even more shocking is that he somehow got one of King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy medallions. There were even Great Sages sent to try to kill him, but none of them succeeded. And every time he eluded their attempts to kill him, he would grow stronger because of it. But in the end, he got killed by some nobody? How is it possible?”

“A nobody? You might not be right about that. Yang Qi has a mysterious background too. Think about it. Not only is Ghost Emperor Yama following him, but he also got the approval of the Rich-Lush Continent as a whole. And he even accessed the power of the ancient immortal formations in the depths of the primal-chaos paleo-energy that cradles the continent. He’s only a Legendary, but he's killed Great Sages. With destiny like that, he might even surpass the Crown Prince!”

“Milord, I heard a rumor that Yang Qi cultivates a heavenly-class energy art. There are even whispers that it might be godly-class!”

“What? Godly-class energy art?” Wilds Everlasting looked visibly shaken. “How certain are you that it’s true?”

“I can’t say for sure. A lot of it is based on guesswork. But think about it, sir. It would have to be a heavenly-class technique, or possibly some sort of ancient immortal skill, for him to be able to kill a Great Sage when in the Legendary level. Especially a Great Sage like the Crown Prince.”

“You’re right!” Wilds Everlasting said. Clapping his hands together decisively, he said, “He's definitely benefited from some miraculous good fortune, which means we can’t let him slip through our fingers. Once this auction is over, and I have that immortal grass, I’ll go to the Rich-Lush Continent and kill him. Or maybe I’ll capture his family and use them to threaten him. Not even Ghost Emperor Yama’s relationship with the Grand-Wilds Mansion will protect him.”

“That’s a great idea,” another servant said. “Strike first, achieve lethality. Strike second, meet calamity. Take the initiative and kill Yang Qi. Get his energy art, and the Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragment. That's definitely the thing to do.”

“Yes, I’ll have all of that soon enough.” Wilds Everlasting waved his hand dismissively. “First, let’s worry about this auction.”

It was around this time that the people from the Quake-Dawn Cathedral began to bring out the treasures to be auctioned.

The first treasure glowed with bright light, and emanated streams of immortal energy. In the blink of an eye, the light became heavenly winds, clouds of lightning, dragons and tigers, and other bizarre signs. It was a patch of immortal grass, and after a moment passed, the energy flows transformed into the image of an immortal energy warrior, floating there above the grass.

“This is a patch of heavenking thistle!” the auctioneer announced. “It is said that it started out as a seed which fell from an immortal plane above. After absorbing enough spirit energy of heaven and earth, and enough quintessence of the sun and moon, it sprouted in a dangerous location in the void. After undergoing the baptism of tens of thousands of years of spatial tempests, it matured, and became the treasure you see before you. This grass will be very beneficial to the cultivation of any Great Sage, and is one of the best treasures we have up for auction today. It’s virtually priceless!”

As Nie Chaoguang sat there next to Yang Qi, his eyes glittered with envy; he could only dream of getting that heavenking thistle, and yet, knew that it was impossible.

“What a pity,” he said. “If I could get that item, I could definitely become a Great Sage sooner rather than later.” He subconsciously patted his empty dimensional sack.

Yang Qi wasn’t paying any attention to the auction or the immortal grass, and instead was using his special command of divine will in these lands, and the power of the God Legion Paradise, to eavesdrop on the people around him. ‘So, this Wilds Everlasting is already plotting against me and my family. For that, he’ll die.’

Yang Qi couldn’t stand it when people tried to use his family against him. However, as to how exactly to kill this Wilds Everlasting, that was problematic.

“Are we going to buy anything here?” Nie Chaoguang asked. “There’s got to be something that could help you with your cultivation.”

“No. I'm not here to buy things, I'm here to keep an eye on Young Master Shroud-Heaven, and this Wilds Everlasting. Don’t do anything to attract their attention.” With that, Yang Qi continued with what he was doing before.

Time passed, and the auction heated up.

People were shouting out bids left and right, and spirit stones were changing hands.

Wilds Everlasting ended up acquiring the heavenking thistle for ten heavenly-grade spirit stones.

All sorts of items appeared on the auction floor and were sold, from ancient records to medicinal pills to weapons. There were even fragments of maps and glittering jewels. Yang Qi had never attended an auction like this back in the Rich-Lush Continent, and truth be told, all of the riches from home compiled together couldn't compare to what was on display here.

The final item in the auction was the fragment of some treasured map that ended up going to Young Master Shroud-Heaven.

During the entire time, Yang Qi didn’t bid on a single item. He just looked on coldly. After all, his current path of cultivation relied on enlightenment, not on any physical objects. Considering he already had the Heaven-Dominating Golden Swordbreaker, the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, and the Infernal Deity Spear, nothing here could possibly mean anything to him.

When everything was finally over, Wilds Everlasting left, and Yang Qi followed him surreptitiously.

He was already dead set on killing the man; after all, he had a grudge with the Grand-Wilds Mansion, and Wilds Everlasting had already revealed his evil intentions. Perhaps that was how he could get the Grand-Wilds Mansion and the Quake-Dawn Cathedral into conflict. At the least, it would weaken them before they could invade the Rich-Lush Continent.

If they came with full force, then even Ghost Emperor Yama would be hard-pressed to defend against them.

After leaving Mandrakor, Wilds Everlasting headed west, until he was at the general headquarters of the Grand-Wilds Mansion.

Last time, Yang Qi had only visited one of their branch locations, in Vermillion Dragon City.

“Congratulations, Milord!” one of the attendants said. “You won the tuft of heavenking thistle!”

“That's right,” Wilds Everlasting said. Laughing, he continued, “Now I’ll head to a secret location and refine it with true flame. After the grass is reborn, and placed into my personal domain, I’ll be able to create the most powerful of sage motes. And once I achieve that breakthrough, I’ll head over to the Rich-Lush Continent and put an end to that punk Yang Qi.”

RUMBLE!

All of a sudden, a fist wreathed in sagelight descended, like a raging wave backed by the power of millions upon millions of megamammoths.

Instantly, a shock wave spread out which ripped the Half Sages to shreds. They never even knew what hit them. The only one to survive was Wilds Everlasting, who looked around with grim eyes.

“Who’s there!?” he shouted, unleashing his sage domain. “Everlasting Sage Domain!”

Another fist strike appeared, but it slammed into the sage domain and then bounced off.

“You’re dead, Wilds Everlasting!” Yang Qi said, stepping out of the void.

Chapter 342: Killing

Wilds Everlasting’s retinue was made up of powerful Half Sages.

They were a core element of the Grand-Wilds Mansion, people who it was hoped would soon become Great Sages. They were completely loyal to Wilds Everlasting, and were trusted confidantes in every sense of the word.

Sadly, Yang Qi had killed them all with a single fist strike.

In fact, the shock wave from the blast spread out for an immense distance, killing everyone else who wasn’t a Great Sage.

As for Wilds Everlasting, he was forced to resort to his Everlasting Sage Domain to defend himself.

Struggling upright, he maintained vigilance as Yang Qi floated out slowly from the haze.

“Who are you?” Wilds Everlasting said.

“Someone here to take your life,” Yang Qi replied. As he spoke, an energy field spread out to surround everything for dozens of kilometers. It was a canopy that almost looked like an eggshell, which was actually nothing other than a many-layered greyspace.

This wasn’t the God Legion Paradise, but rather, a powerful barrier that emanated from Yang Qi himself.

He had reached the level where his mere breathing created a resonance with heaven and earth. And the huge sage motes inside him definitely put him on an equal playing field with Great Sages, and could even allow him to crush them.

Wilds Everlasting was a burly fellow, and was strong enough to crush virtually any enemy. And yet, Yang Qi’s energy field made him seem puny and weak.

Energy flickered around Wilds Everlasting’s hands, as though he were powering up some powerful energy art. And his eyes flickered with brutal light; it was obvious that this interloper had no good intentions whatsoever.

“This is the Quake-Dawn Continent, and yet you dare to attack me? Don’t you know how powerful the Grand-Wilds Mansion is here?”

“I came here specifically to kill you,” Yang Qi replied. “So obviously I know who you are. I know that you’re planning to kill me, so I decided to take the initiative in the fight. Don’t worry. I’ll make sure to spread word of your death far and wide, and place all the blame on the Quake-Dawn Cathedral.”

“I'm planning to kill you?” Wilds Everlasting was at first taken aback, but then something seemed to click in his mind. “You’re Yang Qi, aren’t you? That punk from the Rich-Lush Continent who supposedly has a godly-class energy art. You've been following me, and even eavesdropped on my conversation at the auction. Am I right?”

“Very smart. I expected nothing less of the son of the Wilds God. In terms of talent, you don’t match up to the Crown Prince, but you surpass him in strength and power. You’re definitely worthy of dying at my hands.”

Wilds Everlasting burst out laughing. “Very big talk, Yang Qi. It’s obvious that you're only a Legendary, and that you have a very weak substructure. You must have a very special energy art to be able to kill Great Sages as a mere Legendary. You know, I was just about to go looking for you. Who would have guessed that you would deliver yourself up to my front door? It’s just like the old saying: you can wear out iron shoes in a fruitless search, then find what you're looking for without even trying. Well, it's time for you to become my slave. I doubt you know much about what I can do, so brace yourself. Everlasting Heaven Bow; Sun-Felling God Arrows!”

In the blink of an eye, an enormous bow made of true energy appeared in his hand. The bowstring was bright and colorful, and the bow itself thrummed with an immortal air. At each end of the bow, two primeval immortal-spirits appeared, their gaping mouths filled with razor-sharp teeth that clamped down onto the bowstring, causing it to fill with a row of enormous arrows. As for the arrows, they pulsed with an energy that seemed capable of exterminating anything and everything.

In fact, they seemed capable of piercing through the sun in the sky.

Twang. Twang. Twang. Twang….

Wilds Everlasting drew the bow and then released millions upon millions of arrows. They filled the sky like rain, piercing through the air with devastating force and speed.

“Immobilize!” Yang Qi said, extending his hand and unleashing a wave of energy. Instantly, the entire cloud of arrows stopped moving.

“Be destroyed!” Taking a step forward, he released a vortex of true energy which passed through the arrows and shattered them into dust.

Suddenly, Wilds Everlasting began to speak a dhāraṇī incantation.

“That Which Perishes Loses Radiance and Light. Only Everlasting True Will is Eternally within the World!”

In concert with the dhāraṇī incantation, the Everlasting Heaven Bow unleashed god arrows that radiated dazzling light, and were surrounded by the projected images of falling suns.

Pop!

The Sun-Felling God Arrows pierced through Yang Qi’s true energy vortex, fully a hundred times as powerful as the previous volley of arrows.

“Even the Deathless will Pass Away; Even the Dazzling will Fall. Those who Betray the Legion of Gods will Inevitably Fall from Grace.” Yang Qi clenched both hands into fists, then swept them out in front of him in movements that conformed to the will of heaven, and the legion of gods who created it.

A volcanic eruption of true energy destroyed the arrows; Yang Qi’s fists glowed with pure, porcelain-colored sagelight. It was as if they were the manifestation of the paradise of the legion of gods, as if they were the halls of heaven in the mortal world.

The Fist of the Halls of Heaven once again destroyed everything in its path.

RUMBLE!

In the blink of an eye, Yang Qi’s attack penetrated Wilds Everlasting’s sage domain, and then bore down on his person with deadly force.

‘He broke my sage domain?!’ Wilds Everlasting was shocked, but managed to keep his cool. After all, he wasn’t just the son of the Wilds God, he was also a fourth step Great Sage, far stronger than the now-deceased Chancellor Sea God or Chancellor True Dragon.

His Everlasting Sage Domain was a consummate discipline from the Grand-Wilds Mansion, and had been famous for a thousand years. And yet, Yang Qi simply broke through it and stepped inside, placing himself into what seemed to be incredible danger.

“Grand-Wilds Heaven-God! Wild and Barren Forbidden Region! Now that you're in my sage domain, the only end for you is death!” Wilds Everlasting unleashed streams of ancient mist that filled his sage domain, causing holy cathedrals to pop up like bamboo after a spring rain.

In the blink of an eye, those buildings became like a wild spell formation that trapped Yang Qi where he stood.

Yet again, Wilds Everlasting drew his Everlasting Heaven Bow, sending a hail of god arrows toward the imprisoned Yang Qi.

And yet, Yang Qi ignored the formation and the arrows. Clenching his fist, he punched out again.

“Where the halls of heaven exist, immortal-spirits shrink back in retreat!” A host of god-spirits suddenly appeared around him, and angels flew through the air around his fists as he stepped forward.

Instantly, the thousands of structures around him crumbled to the ground, and the spell formation was vanquished.

His twin fists pulsed with godly might that could end the heavens and crush the earth, and the light that shone from them seemed capable of piercing to the depths of the sage domain.

“Bring the halls of heaven to the mortal world!”

He took three steps forward, which destroyed all of the buildings that had risen up moments ago. And as he strode forward, the sage domain around him began to transform, turning into a paradise with a greyspace that looked like porcelain.

In shocking fashion, he had transformed this part of Wilds Everlasting’s domain into his own God Legion Paradise.

“DIE!” Wilds Everlasting shouted, unleashing a single god arrow that was more powerful than any of the attacks so far, and glowed with blinding light.

It was fully a thousand kilometers long, and was backed by all of the power of his sage domain, as well as his own nascent divinity. In fact, it even thrummed with the aura of the Wilds God himself.

In the blink of an eye, the god arrow was right on top of Yang Qi, ready to take away all of his life force.

However, that was when Yang Qi stopped moving, faced the god arrow, and then opened the Lord's Eye.

“Ashes to ashes, dust to dust. Return from whence you came.”

His booming voice was almost like music, and when it combined with the power of the Lord's Eye, the arrow stopped, trembled, slowly turned in place, and then rocketed back toward Wilds Everlasting.

“What?” Wilds Everlasting blurted in terror. “What energy art is that?!” Instantly, he unleashed a host of destructive fluctuations to try to defend himself against the incoming arrow.

He absolutely could not understand why his arrow was now flying toward him. Considering that he had imbued it with his own nascent divinity and quintessence energy, attacking with it had actually been a danger in and of itself.

RUMBLE!

The arrow slammed into him and exploded, causing vital energy to leak out of him like a waterfall.

He also coughed up a massive mouthful of blood which splashed out to stain the surrounding sage domain. Right now, there was only one thought in his mind: ‘I have to get out of here!’

Swish!

Spinning, he turned and flew up into the air.

BOOM!

A fist slammed into him, knocking him down to the ground and shattering his bow.

There was no suspense about what would happen next. Wilds Everlasting had received grievous injuries to his vital energy, and although he tried to pull himself back together, it was in that moment that he heard something like music in his ears.

“Ashes to Ashes, Dust to Dust. That Which Flourishes will Fade, and the Falling Leaf will Become Part of the Root Once Again.” Suddenly, the fist which had been descending toward him opened up, and turned into a hand which grabbed him.

Cracking sounds rang out as the space around him suddenly shrank down. In the shortest of moments, the shattered fragments of space closed in, creating something like a crystal ball.

Locked inside the fist-sized ball was Wilds Everlasting, who screamed in anguish, but could not escape. The crystal ball had a sizeable dimensional pocket which was perfect for containing captives, but could not be pierced even by a Great Sage.

Then, with almost no effort at all, Yang Qi crushed him to death.

Waving his hand, he plucked the heavenking thistle out from inside the ball.

When he had time, he would refine it for his own uses. Stowing the ball, he looked around at the surrounding destruction, then pulled out a few command medallions from the Grand Emperor's Pagoda and scattered them in the area.

Of course, those command medallions were from the Great Sages from the Quake-Dawn Cathedral that he had killed.

Chapter 343: People from the Hanging Mountain

After killing Wilds Everlasting, Yang Qi made sure that the blame would be shifted onto the Quake-Dawn Cathedral.

Waving his hand, he shattered all of the command medallions he had just tossed about, ensuring that the dust from them filled the area. Ordinary individuals would never notice the evidence, but any powerful experts who investigated the area would pick up on the clues.

If he made things too obvious, then anyone would be able to tell that the Quake-Dawn Cathedral was being framed.

The best thing to do was make sure the investigators were forced to work hard to uncover the evidence. Once the Quake-Dawn Cathedral was implicated, and they couldn’t provide a good explanation, it would hopefully lead to enough tension between them and the Grand-Wilds Mansion that any plans to invade the Rich-Lush Continent would be put on hold.

Yang Qi also benefited in that he now had access to Wilds Everlasting’s wealth, which included over a hundred sagely-grade spirit stones, and five heavenly-grade.

Those would be of great help in improving his cultivation base. At the moment, he was still building up his reserves. After all, he needed a huge stockpile to progress through the eighth, and ninth transformations, then become a Half Sage, and finally, a Great Sage.

And it would take a terrifying level of force to succeed at that final breakthrough.

‘Heavenking thistle….’ Nie Chaoguang thought. The sight of Yang Qi cutting down Wilds Everlasting had left him both shocked and envious.

Although some people might not know much about Wilds Everlasting, Nie Chaoguang was very familiar with him. He had been a profoundly gifted individual, who, from a very young age, progressed rapidly through his cultivation. He cultivated the Grand-Wilds Everlasting True Energy, which led to the Everlasting Heaven Bow and the Sun-Felling God Arrows. Although such weapons couldn't compare to the Infernal Deity Spear, they were still mighty.

According to the rumors, when Wilds Everlasting was only a Half Sage, he had used his Everlasting Heaven Bow and Sun-Felling God Arrows to kill a Great Sage.

Of course, it had been an ambush, not a proper fight like the kind Yang Qi had won. But even still, it was a glorious thing considering that few Half Sages could match up to Great Sages.

Later, when he became a Great Sage, he won even more amazing battles, and was considered invincible among people of his own level.

There were countless experts in the Quake-Dawn Continent who were favored by the heavens, and they were constantly fighting amongst themselves for dominance. And yet, Wilds Everlasting was considered the best of the best even among them.

But just now, Yang Qi had cut him down with seemingly no effort. How strong must Yang Qi be to have accomplished that? To Nie Chaoguang, Yang Qi just seemed to get stronger with each moment that passed.

Wilds Everlasting had been just on the verge of becoming a fifth step Great Sage, so considering that, it was almost impossible to imagine how many enemies Yang Qi would be able to defeat as a Great Sage.

The mere thought caused Nie Chaoguang to shiver physically. It almost seemed like he was living in a nightmare.

“Come on, let’s go,” Yang Qi said. “There are already some powerful auras heading in this direction.” He took a step forward, and vanished into thin air.

About an hour later, numerous space-time wormholes opened up, out of which emerged a host of Great Sages. Most were first, second, or third step, but there were some who were stronger. One of them, a terrifyingly powerful man with snow-white hair and beard, said, “That’s an aura of death. I can sense it clearly. So, it’s true. The fact that Wilds Everlasting’s animadestiny identity medallion exploded back at the Grand-Wilds Mansion was evidence of him being killed. Not even his soul or will managed to escape, otherwise we could have resurrected him. But now, he’ll never come back to life. Look around and see if you can find his remains.”

The Great Sages immediately began to scour the area. As for the sage with the white beard, he opened a rift in space to look for more deeply hidden evidence.

“Damnation. I refuse to believe that the culprit can evade my Cosmic Surveillance technique.” The old man suddenly spit out a mouthful of blood which transformed into a floating eye, with a most profoundly ancient aura to it.

“What's this?” the old man said. Waving his hand, he caused a trace of powder to emerge from an aspect of space-time, which he took and sniffed.

Suddenly, various expressions flashed across his face, and he shouted, “The Quake-Dawn Cathedral! I can’t believe they killed Wilds Everlasting!”

“What did you find?”

“It’s a command medallion from the Quake-Dawn Cathedral. It was crushed into powder, most likely in the final moment before Wilds Everlasting was killed.”

“Damn that Quake-Dawn Cathedral. They’ve just declared war on the Grand-Wilds Mansion!”

“Wilds Everlasting was one of the Wilds God’s most cherished sons. Why would they do something like this? Don’t tell me they really want to wipe out the Grand-Wilds Mansion? Dammit! They all deserve to die!”

“If it’s war they want, then it’s war they’ll get!”

“Let’s go. This is important news. We need to call a general meeting, and notify the Wilds God himself.”

“Isn’t he in secluded meditation in the Nightmare Black Hole?”

“It doesn’t matter. This is too weighty of a matter, and it pertains to the reputation of the Grand-Wilds Mansion as a whole. If we make the wrong move, the Quake-Dawn Cathedral could gain the upper hand, and wipe us out of existence. After all, we’ve been at odds with them for over ten thousand years.”

Once again, numerous space-time wormholes snapped open, and the furious sages from the Grand-Wilds Mansion left.

Off in the distance, Yang Qi was well-hidden, and had secretly watched everything playing out.

‘Their leader is incredible. Definitely beyond me.’ He sighed inwardly. ‘Whenever I finally reach the Great Sage level, I’ll truly be able to unleash the power of the Fist of the Halls of Heaven. And then, the enlightenment from the God Legion Seal will allow me to push it to the next level, and use the Hand of the One God. Unfortunately, getting more sage motes isn’t going to help me right now, at least not with the Hand of the One God. Otherwise, I would have been able to turn a lot more than a few kilometers into a crystal ball.’

Just now, Yang Qi’s final attack with the Fist of the Halls of Heaven had been a rudimentary version of the Hand of the One God.

It was might that had quickly and cleanly ended Wilds Everlasting.

Unfortunately, it was almost nothing compared to the true power the Hand of the One God was capable of. That technique was like the One God himself descending into the world to end the lives of countless living beings. Conversely, it could give birth to countless creatures with a mere thought.

That power would come only when he was a Great Sage, and had his own sage motes to work with.

‘Heavenking thistle…. Well, let’s see how effective it is. I wonder if it can push me to the next highest level.’ He took the grass out and looked at it for a bit, then circulated his true energy and absorbed it.

Considering that this item was best suited for Great Sages to achieve breakthroughs, it was definitely enough for Yang Qi.

A few days ago, he had been in the middle of breaking through to the Astral-Star Transformation when the assassin from the Quake-Dawn Cathedral had interrupted him. This time, he wouldn't let something like that happen. Instead, he was making his breakthrough in a very remote location in the Quake-Dawn Continent.

**

Meanwhile, back in the Rich-Lush Continent….

The continent was a flourishing place. Having been united under the control of the Sage Monarch Society, there were no formal sects or institutes. And there was a constant flow of spirit stones from the mining districts in the Western Continent.

Yang Zhan currently sat in a private chamber, taking deep breaths after having just broken through to the Legendary level.

The Demi-Immortal Institute and Capital City had been combined and made part of Sage Monarch City, which was filled with primal-chaos paleo-energy, making it like an immortal realm among humans.

Thanks to the abundant resources, all the young ones in the Yang Clan were making significant progress in their cultivation, and virtually all of Yang Qi’s sworn siblings were now Legendaries.

At a certain point, a rumbling noise broke out in the sky above the city, almost like numerous voices speaking together at the same time. In response, the primal-chaos paleo-energy parted, and a five-colored space-time wormhole opened up, which emanated countless streams of dazzling light.

All of those shafts of light seemed to contain a person!

The leaders in Sage Monarch City instantly went onto high alert, and Chancellor Sun Moon emerged into the open. After all, he was the only Great Sage other than Ghost Emperor Yama.

“What’s that? Why is a space-time wormhole opening up here? Is this an attack from beyond heaven?”

“Ambush! Ambush!”

Expression serious, Chancellor Sun Moon looked at the space-time wormhole and said, “Quickly notify Ghost Emperor Yama that hostile forces have arrived. They’ve even parted the primal-chaos paleo-energy.”

A woman stepped out of the wormhole, a horsetail whisk draped over her arm, red lotuses blooming beneath her feet. She was followed by a retinue of young women, who carried with them incense burners, lanterns, and jade basins.

“I am Emissary Red Lotus, sent by the Holy Mother herself. Why have you not yet offered me formal greetings?”

Chancellor Sun Moon and Yang Zhan stood there with the other leaders of the city, and they were completely stunned by the cultivation level of even just the maidservants. All of them seemed to have power that bordered on that of a Great Sage.

“They're all Half Sages….” Chancellor Sun Moon breathed.

And there was even greater power lurking within the wormhole itself.

All of them felt the urge to drop to their knees to that power.

“So, this is the Rich-Lush Continent? Looks quite different than it did before. It's been twenty years now, and the leadership has finally changed. The Yang Clan has truly become a dominant force, and will surely flourish for a thousand years. Yang Zhan, step forward. I wish to speak with you.”

Chapter 344: A Decree from the Holy Mother

This Emissary Red Lotus was a subordinate of the Holy Mother, and was here for Yang Zhan. Apparently, this was not an instance of monsters invading the Rich-Lush Continent.

Once everyone realized what was going on, they calmed down.

And it was around this point that Ghost Emperor Yama finally showed up.

Yang Qi had entrusted him with the Rich-Lush Continent, and it was a responsibility he was taking seriously. After all, if he did a good job, then Yang Qi was supposed to give him the Infernal Deity Spear, and that was a technique that, if he got it, would put him in the position of being able to kill virtually any enemy he faced.

‘She represents the Holy Mother? She’s Emissary Red Lotus from the Hanging Mountain, one of the Holy Mother’s five Lotus Emissaries!’ Not even Ghost Emperor Yama would take these women lightly. After all, they were from that most powerful of planetary systems, the Hanging Mountain.

The Hanging Mountain was known as a holy land of the Demonfolk, and in ancient times, they had been considered the most pure and orthodox of living beings. Humans had been a mere subsidiary branch of the Demonfolk. Of course, evolution amongst living beings would always lead to becoming human, and usually, even demons would take human form through the course of their cultivation.

The leadership of the Hanging Mountain was split between the Holy Mother and the August Patriarch.

The Holy Mother led the female Demonfolk, and the August Patriarch commanded the males.

Rumor had it that the forces of the Holy Mother were actually superior to those of the August Patriarch. In fact, they had built Greensura Cathedrals in many planes, continents and planets, all to spread worship of Amaranthine Greensura. Of course, as a result, they could gather the power of faith from the worshipers, and reach greater heights of cultivation.

Ghost Emperor Yama knew of such things. Although he had been imprisoned for tens of thousands of years, the will of his nascent divinity had been able to drift through the void, and thus, he was aware of much of what had occurred in the outside world.

Truth be told, Emissary Red Lotus didn’t scare him, but the Holy Mother did. He knew that she was beyond the Great Sage level, and was a person who could crush him out of existence with ease.

She was a Demi-Immortal, and even the weakest such expert, a Lesser Demi-Immortal, was as far above Ghost Emperor Yama as he currently was above a Legendary.

Chuckling coldly, Ghost Emperor Yama said, “Why might you be here, Emissary Red Lotus? Don't tell me this is an invasion of some sort?”

WHOOSH!

A host of red lotuses flew out of the space-time wormhole, swirling about to create a paradise of flowers. In the middle of it was Emissary Red Lotus herself; she was beautiful, and looked to be no more than sixteen years of age. And yet, her eyes were ancient beyond belief, and seemed capable of perceiving all matters of love, hate, and emotion.

“Ghost Emperor Yama? So, you're finally free. Well, I’m not here for you, and this is no invasion. The Holy Mother has ordered me to find an old friend. Besides, the Rich-Lush Continent is actually subsidiary to the Hanging Mountain. Yang Zhan, step forward!”

‘Holy Mother? Don’t tell me….’ Yang Zhan suddenly blurted out what he was thinking. “Wait, was Greensura appointed as the Holy Mother?”

“Yes. She rose to power twenty years ago,” replied Emissary Red Lotus. “Back then, upon cultivating the highest level of the Red-Dust Spectral-Dream Heart-Sutra, her true energy dissipated into the void. During that time, she relied on you to survive. You did much to help her, which was why she said that you could see her again when you united the Rich-Lush Continent under your rule. Of course, the Rich-Lush Continent has been united, although, not by you. Instead, your son did it.”

“Are you saying that I can see Greensura again?” Yang Zhan said, mixed emotions playing out on his face, including both grief and joy.

“No. The Holy Mother commands unmatchable respect, and controls an entire planetary system. What makes you think you deserve to see her? Besides, you’re a man. Men are not permitted to enter the land of women in the Hanging Mountain. Alright, I’ve wasted enough words on you. I'm here to issue a decree from the Holy Mother.

“Where is your son, Yang Qi? Ask him out. The Holy Mother is aware of everything that’s happened recently in the Rich-Lush Continent. Yang Qi’s phenomenal growth has exceeded her expectations, and she wants him to come see her in the Hanging Mountain.”

“Yang Qi already left on his own to go to the Hanging Mountain,” Yang Zhan replied. “You should have come a few days earlier, when he was still in the Rich-Lush Continent. He knows about his past, and wanted to go seek out his mother on his own. Although, he has no idea that she's become the Holy Mother.”

A look of shock overtook Emissary Red Lotus’ face, and she angrily said, “That miscreant! The political situation in the Hanging Mountain is very delicate right now! The mighty immortal plane above, Titan Emperor Heaven, has issued numerous decrees to us. For him to go there without permission is courting death! Hurry up and call him back! You have that ability, don’t you? Just tell him something big is happening in the Rich-Lush Continent.”

“Yes, yes of course….” Yang Zhan stammered. “I’ll send him a message via talisman and tell him to return.”

“He’s in the Quake-Dawn Continent right now,” Ghost Emperor Yama said calmly. “It won’t be hard to get him back. I’ll send him the message.”

Snapping his fingers, he produced a paper talisman, which he crushed, causing black energy to form into a dragon, which then vanished without a trace.

“Well, that’s good,” Emissary Red Lotus said, a smile returning to her face. “The Holy Mother issued orders that no one is to trifle with the Rich-Lush Continent. From here on out, this place is going to flourish for centuries and millennia on end.”

Chancellor Sun Moon was trembling inwardly with shock; the thought of a powerful Great Sage from the Hanging Mountain coming for a visit was hard to wrap his mind around. “Please, come relax for a moment. Sage Monarch City is a simple and crude place, but we’ve done our best to fix it up.”

“Very well. Everyone else, remain behind in the space-time wormhole.” Waving her hand, she sent her retinue back into the wormhole, then closed it.

**

Back in the Quake-Dawn Continent, Yang Qi was in a remote, mountainous valley, in the middle of a spell formation. Using the Grand Emperor’s Pagoda, he was absorbing subterranean spirit energy for his own uses.

Because of the energy field emitted by the pagoda, everything for a few thousand kilometers in every direction now emanated the aura of the Rich-Lush Continent. That was a function of the pagoda, and it's desire to conquer all other lands around it.

After killing the Crown Prince, Yang Qi had acquired all of the remaining legacies of Grand Emperor Rich-Lush, including his command medallion, which he had long since sent into the pagoda to be absorbed. The result was that the pagoda was now more than a sage item; it was a half immortal item.

And at its core, the Grand Emperor's Pagoda was made to conquer.

As it conquered the essence of other worlds, it would grow more powerful. Unfortunately, the essence of the Quake-Dawn Continent was far beyond that of the Rich-Lush Continent. For the weak to conquer the strong was generally an impossible task, and a backlash attack from the essence of an entire continent could easily kill even a Great Sage.

Thankfully, Yang Qi had acquired the Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragment.

The Quake-Dawn Continent had once been part of the Yore-Wilds Continent, and therefore, was powerless to resist that fragment.

Therefore, it didn’t take much work before the power of the Quake-Dawn Continent’s essence submitted to Yang Qi and poured into his God Legion Paradise.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi was working with the power of the heavenking thistle, whose strange characteristics caused pure immortal power to pour into his blood and quintessence. Moments later, immortal energy was coursing into his God Legion Paradise.

Soon, green grass began to sprout from the porcelain-like ground of the God Legion Paradise, a result of the vital energy of the heavenking thistle.

‘This might be pure immortal power, but to the legion of gods, it’s like nothing. It shall be melted in my Hellfire Crucible!’ Without even thinking about it, he summoned his Hellfire Crucible, and sent the vital energy inside. Almost instantly, the crucible surged with porcelain-colored fluid, as though it were an actual immortal being refined.

Once the power had been subdued, Yang Qi examined it closely, and found that it was like the quintessence energy of dozens of Great Sages, all combined together. If people like Chancellor Sun Moon or Chancellor Sea God were to be immersed in immortal power like that, they would be instantly killed.

No wonder Wilds Everlasting had been able to dominate his contemporaries so easily.

‘Time for the Astral-Star Transformation!’

Yang Qi extended his hand, and his fingers tore at the sky, revealing a glittering, silver river of stars. He breathed in, and the silver river oscillated. Then, the power of stars poured into his God Legion Paradise, causing constellations to gather.

The process lasted for some time, and when it was finished, the God Legion Paradise looked very different from before. It thrummed with the power of stars, and even faint traces of the energy of the sun and moon.

At the same time, massive life force rose up from the depths of the pure land, as though a new heaven and earth were being born.

RUMBLE!

Tribulation water suddenly poured down from the sky, which was followed by Night Queen Flame. This time, the tribulations were far more intense than when he had reached the Ghost-God Transformation. And yet, with the power of the heavenking thistle to support him, he easily negated it. After all, it was an immortal grass, and when it was consumed by a puny energy warrior, it was hard to imagine how much power it would provide.

A day and a night passed, and the tribulation faded away. The sky of the God Legion Paradise was now filled with countless bright stars, and Yang Qi himself was filled with their power. He took a breath, and ten million ancient megamammoths stirred within him. As of now, they were all clad in suits of armor, which were decorated with patterns of the stars. Clearly, they were like mammoths of the starry sky, and were now on their way to becoming godmammoths.

Upon entering the Astral-Star Transformation, no megamammoths within him awoke. However, the ten million he already had advanced in quality. Now, even one of them was as powerful as ten had been before. And when their power was combined, it was enough to pluck stars and snatch moons, making Yang Qi vastly more powerful than any ordinary Great Sage.

Unfortunately, Yang Qi knew that he had reached a bottleneck. Even if he reached the Never-Dying Transformation, or became a Half Sage, it wouldn’t change him on a substructural level. He absolutely needed to reach the Great Sage level to do that.

Only then would he fully understand the Fist of the Halls of Heaven, and then push forward to acquire the Hand of the One God.

It was around this time that a pitch black paper talisman suddenly flitted toward him. Grabbing it, he rose to his feet and listened to the message inside.

“Get back to the Rich-Lush Continent!”

Chapter 345: Secrets

“Emissary Red Lotus?” Yang Qi murmured. “Who is this Holy Mother? And why does she want to see me? And here I thought it was going to take some work to get to the Hanging Mountain. From the message, it's obvious they know about the Rich-Lush Continent being united under my command. And now this Holy Mother sends an emissary to me? It seems highly, highly likely that the Holy Mother is my birth mother.”

Without any hesitation, he prepared to return to the Rich-Lush Continent.

Already, his heart was beginning to beat with excitement. At the same time, he felt a bit uneasy, and also uncertain.

It was like he had been searching for something for years, toiling away in the hopes of making a bit of progress toward it, only to have it suddenly appear right in front of him.

The Hanging Mountain was widely regarded as a holy land of the Demonfolk, and now its Holy Mother, a spectacular and seemingly invincible leader, a Demi-Immortal who surpassed Great Sages, was looking for him.

Nie Chaoguang realized exactly what was going on. He knew that Yang Qi’s entire purpose on this journey was to look for his mother, who was a holy daughter of the Hanging Mountain. If Yang Qi’s mother was actually the Holy Mother of the entire Hanging Mountain, then that would be a major development.

Of course, it was all speculation until they returned to the Rich-Lush Continent and learned the details.

Yang Qi ignored Nie Chaoguang’s thoughtful look, and waved his hand to open up a rift in space-time. Stepping into the spatial tempests, he headed back toward the Rich-Lush Continent at top speed.

After using the heavenking thistle to reach the eighth Legendary transformation, the God Legion Paradise had constellation networks in it, allowing him to call upon the power of the stars. With that, he could move even faster than before.

His trip to the Quake-Dawn Continent had taken a few days and nights, but the return trip only took a few hours.

Soon, the Rich-Lush Continent was visible, and it was almost as if the primal-chaos vital energy could sense his return, and was cheering in joy.

Swish!

He opened his Lord's Eye, and instantly caught sight of the five-colored space-time wormhole in the void above the middle of the continent.

Although he couldn’t see where exactly the wormhole led to, he could see the hosts of women inside, waiting patiently.

‘When did that wormhole appear, and how come I was never aware of it?’ he thought. ‘Ever since I took control of the primal-chaos vital energy, and the ancient immortal formations, the Rich-Lush Continent has become almost like a part of me. I should have been aware of any space-time wormholes in the area. It must be a new wormhole. Hmm, seems dangerous.’

The Rich-Lush Continent was more important to Yang Qi now than it ever had been.

It wasn’t just the fact that his family and sworn siblings were all here. For all intents and purposes, the continent was now a magical treasure, and in some aspects like an animadestiny nascent divinity.

Upon becoming a Great Sage, he would be able to upgrade the continent in the same way he would upgrade a magical treasure. He would eventually turn it into a planet, and then use the resulting power surge to push himself past the bottleneck that blocked the way into the Demi-Immortal level. Without that power surge, the breakthrough would be much more difficult.

Under ordinary circumstances, it was almost impossible for cultivators to break out of the Great Sage level and into the Demi-Immortal level. It required the perfect opportunity to come along, usually, the legacy of an entire continent.

Not even a ninth step Great Sage who came along and destroyed the Rich-Lush Continent could just take its legacy. Neither could such an outsider acquire the approval of the continent, and build up the cycle of energy necessary to make it a planet.

But Yang Qi had all of those things.

WHOOSH!

He landed in Sage Monarch City, and his aura spread out in shocking fashion, causing the primal-chaos paleo-energy to surge like an army cheering the return of its general.

That energy was completely different in Yang Qi’s presence than when he was away.

WHIZZZ!

Instantly, the immortal formations in the depths of the continent all activated.

Streams of immortal energy shot into the sky, connecting to the sun, moon, and heavenly bodies. In the blink of an eye, screaming winds filled the sky above the city, and the burning power of the stars, sun, and moon shone down.

At that point, Ghost Emperor Yama appeared in front of Yang Qi, and he looked quite surprised. “Yang Qi. You’re back. How did you return so quickly? Your cultivation base advanced again?! You’re in the eighth transformation, aren’t you? And you have the power of immortal-spirits in you. You must have consumed some sort of immortal pill, didn’t you, or perhaps some immortal grass. As of this moment, you don’t even need sage motes to fight a Great Sage. You just won’t stop, will you? At this rate, it will only be four or five more years before you can completely outdo me.”

“I just happened to acquire some heavenking thistle, that’s all,” Yang Qi said coolly. “As of now, it should be relatively easy to reach the Great Sage level.”

“Heavenking thistle!?” Ghost Emperor Yama said, nearly jumping into the air. “How did you possibly get something like that? It’s precious beyond belief! You know, some Great Sages have been killed trying to consume heavenking thistle. You have to adjust it and refine it properly before absorbing it into your personal domain. And once you do, you’ll acquire the sealing mark of an immortal plane.”

“You think my personal domain needs the sealing mark of an immortal plane?” Yang Qi said. “Where is the emissary from the Hanging Mountain?”

“She’s inside waiting for you.”

Walking past Ghost Emperor Yama, Yang Qi entered the hall to find Emissary Red Lotus sitting there, as well as Yang Zhan.

At a mere glance, Yang Qi could tell that this young woman was far stronger than Wilds Everlasting. She seemed to glitter like morning dew, and her true energy was so powerful that he couldn't assess it.

At the very least, she was a fifth step Great Sage.

Yang Qi knew that he could take out fourth step Great Sages, but when it came to the fifth step, he wasn't so confident. In fact, he had never met anyone that strong, other than Ghost Emperor Yama and Chancellor Demi-Immortal.

And even those two were currently a bit beyond his ability to handle.

When Great Sages reached the fifth step, their true energy transformed in a very dramatic fashion. It was very similar to the fifth phase of the Energy Arts level, although Yang Qi still wasn’t sure of the particulars.

“So, you’re Yang Qi?” Emissary Red Lotus said, her voice light and melodic. When she looked at him, it was as if her eyes could pierce into the very depths of his soul.

Yang Qi immediately sensed that his vital energy core and his animadestiny nascent divinity were being eaten away at by some sort of demonic sorcery. It was enigmatic to the extreme, and seemed to be worming its way into his memories to extract them and plant some sort of seed inside of him. In some ways, it was very similar to the situation with the heaven-demon seed that he had encountered in the past.

“How impudent!” he said, stamping his foot. Instantly, primal-chaos paleo-energy spread out, covering him with fire that was very similar to the Night Queen Flame. A thunderous boom rang out, and a nearly imperceptible stream of true energy in the area suddenly transformed into ash. In response, Emissary Red Lotus trembled visibly.

“What incredible gall!” said one of the maidservants behind her. “I can’t believe you would dare to be disrespectful to Emissary Red Lotus! That’s a crime worthy of execution!”

“I’m fine,” Emissary Red Lotus said, surprise flickering in her eyes. “Night Queen Flame. You can control fire like that? Spectacular!”

“We've only just met, and you’re already trying to snare me with demonic sorcery?” Yang Qi said coldly. “You were just trying to invade my sea of consciousness, weren’t you? If you were any other person, I would put you to death immediately!”

“Oh? Put me to death?" Emissary Red Lotus chuckled. “Boy, do you know how different our cultivation levels are? Unless I'm mistaken, you’re only a Legendary.”

“I've killed plenty of Great Sages already,” Yang Qi replied calmly.

“Fine. You’ve got personality, that much is obvious. Just the type of person the Holy Mother would want to see. Well, even just meeting you, I've accomplished half of my mission. The other half is to bring you to see the Holy Mother. Come on, let’s go. You don’t need to worry about leaving the Rich-Lush Continent unprotected. The Holy Mother has issued a decree prohibiting anyone from coming here. Neither the Quake-Dawn Cathedral nor any Demon Sages will dare to violate her orders.”

With that, she rose to her feet and opened the space-time wormhole.

“Slow down,” Yang Qi said, frowning. “You think I'm just going to blindly follow orders from you?” He obviously didn’t trust this woman at all, and had no desire to follow her into a potentially dangerous situation. True, he wanted to go to the Hanging Mountain, but on his own terms, and definitely not with fanfare.

Besides, he had the feeling that this Emissary Red Lotus was hiding something. It didn't seem likely that she had come here in good faith.

“You should go, Qi’er,” Yang Zhan said. “It has to do with the secrets of your past.”

“He’s right, Yang Qi,” Emissary Red Lotus said. “It's a rare thing for the Holy Mother to summon anyone to see her. Plenty of Great Sages will go to ridiculous lengths to receive that honor. Now you’re getting it without asking, only to consider refusing?”

“This is an important matter,” Yang Qi said, “and I want to make sure I understand the situation clearly.” Looking at Yang Zhan, he said, “Father, my past is just that: the past. It's not worth it for me to put myself in great danger just to find out about some old stories. The future is far more important.”

As he spoke the final words, his gaze shifted back to Emissary Red Lotus.

Chapter 346: Very Confusing

“What?!” Emissary Red Lotus blurted in shock. But then, she smiled. “Well, you most likely know why the Holy Mother wants to see you. Considering how important she is, she doesn’t want your identity to be revealed. If it became public, the consequences could be horrific. In fact, the immortal planes could even get involved. She wants to see you, that's all. No tricks. Taking into account how important we are in the Hanging Mountain, we’re not going to try to fool you somehow. Besides, few people are as important to her as you. She’s not going to let you get hurt. Anyway, I can’t say anything more than that. You understand, right?”

With decisiveness that could sever nails and chop iron, Yang Qi said, “There’s no way I'm going to go to the Hanging Mountain with you just because you say I should.”

“Oh really? Well, you’re a cautious fellow.”

Emissary Red Lotus chuckled and pulled out a command medallion, which pulsed with the aura of the heaven above. Yang Qi shivered subconsciously, and backed up. Even Ghost Emperor Yama instinctively released some of his netherworldly aura to protect himself.

“That’s… a demon-god command medallion!” Ghost Emperor Yama said in shock. “With that thing, you can command demon-devils from far and wide! Demonfolk of all type have an instinctual fear of demon-god command medallions, and it comes from their very genes!”

“What’s going on here?” Yang Qi said, his voice trembling.

“The Holy Mother wanted me to loan this demon-god command medallion to you. Its energy will protect you, and ensure that no Demonfolk will cause you any problems. With this, you can enter the Hanging Mountain without fear of anything untoward happening.”

With that, she sent the demon-god command medallion flying over to Yang Qi, who grabbed it.

“Yang Qi,” Ghost Emperor Yama said, “it seems the Holy Mother really is acting in good faith. Otherwise, she wouldn’t have given you that. Demon-god command medallions are generally divided into yin-type and yang-type. Throughout history, the Holy Mother generally controls the yin side of the Hanging Mountain, and the August Patriarch controls the yang side. That way, they can restrain, oversee, and balance each other.”

Yang Qi rubbed the demon-god command medallion as he looked at it. One side featured a delicate drawing of a woman with the head of a human and the body of a snake, who seemed to be looking down with pity from heaven on high, her eyes glittering with peace and compassion.

There was also some incredible and mysterious energy within the medallion that seemed too profound for him to make contact with.

As soon as he took hold of the medallion, the energy filled him, as if he had been imbued with the glory of the ruler of an entire nation, including that person’s status and power.

With this command medallion, he would have immense power over Demonfolk, similar to how the Grand Emperor's Pagoda gave him control over the vital energy of the Rich-Lush Continent.

“Well, in that case, I guess I’ll go with you.” Although Yang Qi was still on guard, the fact that the Holy Mother was giving him this medallion seemed to indicate that she wasn't trying to screw him over.

It was almost how like mortal emperors might pass their jade ruler’s seal to the leader of a rebel army to recruit him.

At the very least, it went to show how important he was to this Holy Mother. And of course, if she turned out to be related to him, it would make even more sense.

More and more, Yang Qi was convinced that this Holy Mother really was Greensura, his birth mother.

Besides, he still had the God Legion Seal, and was fairly certain that because of it, he wouldn't face any truly deadly situation. And if he didn't go now to find out about his past, who knew when he might get another chance.

Emissary Red Lotus nodded, and seemed to breathe a sigh of relief. Gesturing with her delicate hand, she said, “Since that's settled, please follow me into the space-time wormhole.”

In response to her gesture, the five-colored wormhole appeared in the open again. However, this time, it was different from before; apparently, much of the local primal-chaos paleo-energy had imbued itself into the wormhole.

Emissary Red Lotus noticed that too, and as they headed into the wormhole, she said, “Your cultivation base truly is shocking, Yang Qi. You're actually fully fused with the Rich-Lush Continent! You want to turn this continent into a planet, don’t you? And you plan to use the energy burst to achieve your own cultivation breakthrough. That would definitely be the perfect opportunity for you. The reason Grand Emperor Rich-Lush was never able to pull it off was that he never gained control of the primal-chaos paleo-energy, and he never gained the approval of the noble spirits of the sages in the Planar Pearl.”

“I just happened to get lucky,” Yang Qi said with a nod.

“Don’t worry, the Holy Mother can help you with that. She’s a very mysterious person, you know. And the stronger you get, the more she’ll be able to help you. However, the nature of your relationship to her must be kept as private as possible. For the sake of her position and glory, you mustn’t reveal the secrets of her past. If you do, and word reached the heaven on high, then powerful entities in the immortal plane would definitely pass down orders that would harm her.”

“Are you saying that she's my mother?” Yang Qi said, not beating around the bush.

“Quiet! Don’t say that out loud!” Looking around in shock, Emissary Red Lotus locked down the area so that no one would be able to eavesdrop. “Henceforth, you absolutely, positively must not say such things.”

“So it’s like that, huh?” Yang Qi said, frowning. Everything seemed very confusing. He was being told to keep secrets, and yet had no idea what he was allowed to say, and what he wasn’t.

“Just wait until you see the Holy Mother, and then you’ll understand everything.” Emissary Red Lotus’s hands flashed with numerous magical signs, which caused the five-colored wormhole to send them into the depths of the universe.

Considering his past experiences, Yang Qi knew that they were skipping through space-time, heading toward the massive teleportation portal that sustained the wormhole from the other end.

Having nothing else to do, he settled down cross-legged and closed his eyes to meditate.

Looking out with his mind, he could see space-time speeding by, with countless stars and heavenly bodies like little more than a blur. In fact, it was impossible to tell where they were going.

He couldn't even see the planet that was the Quake-Dawn Continent.

Obviously, they were going to a location far, far away from that continent, a place that would be inaccessible without this wormhole.

“Are we heading directly to the Hanging Mountain?” Yang Qi asked.

“Yes,” replied Emissary Red Lotus. “Well, to a plane very close to the Hanging Mountain. At the moment, you can’t enter the mountain itself. It’s too important of a location, and considering you’re a man, it would be inappropriate for you to get into the part controlled by the Holy Mother. Instead, she’ll send you to a subsidiary plane called the Plateau of the Leviathan. She’ll arrange for everything for you there. You’ll eventually be disguised as one of the Demonfolk, and join one of the core factions on the male side of the mountain. Afterward, she’ll arrange for a meeting between the two of you to explain everything. Remember, in the Hanging Mountain, the male factions are led by the August Patriarch, and the female factions are led by the Holy Mother. As a male, you can’t join any of the female factions. If you want to survive, you have to be patient and deal with the status quo.”

“I'm a patient person,” Yang Qi said. Considering he would just have to wait to see how events played out, there seemed little point in continuing the conversation.

Yet again, he sent his mind out of the wormhole and into the void, where he could see countless planets, none of which he recognized. Some were pitch black and devoid of spirit energy, like enormous, lifeless meteorites.

Other planets teemed with life, although most of them contained primitive humans who were little more than hunters and gatherers, and didn’t know anything about cultivation.

Planets where people knew about true energy and could practice cultivation were few and far between.

On some planets, the primitive humans ate grain and meat, and established kingdoms and empires. And yet, without cultivation, they had to rely on large armies and mundane martial arts. Even their most powerful experts couldn’t unleash true energy outside of their bodies.

This was Yang Qi’s first time taking a journey like this, and his first time seeing so many other planets. And as a result, his understanding and enlightenment of existence itself seemed to deepen.

RUMBLE!

Suddenly, the wormhole twitched, as though some immense power were touching it.

Emissary Red Lotus’ expression flickered, and she looked over toward one particular location.

“Who dares to encroach on this wormhole!? It was established by the Holy Mother as a passageway to the Rich-Lush Continent. Unauthorized entry is forbidden!”

Suddenly, a burst of maniacal cackling filled the wormhole, along with a demonic wind.

Then, the auras of multiple Great Sages erupted from the other end.

A group of people appeared, led by a young man with abundant wretch energy. He seemed evil, mighty, ruthless, lascivious, and murderous; he fairly brimmed with darkness and gloom.

The other men who flanked him looked sinister, vicious, and crafty.

“I was wondering why a five-colored wormhole suddenly appeared,” said the vicious-looking man in the lead position. “As it turns out, the Holy Mother’s people secretly went to the Rich-Lush Continent. There was already a wormhole leading there, but instead of taking it, you expended resources to make this hidden passageway? Why might that be?”

Suddenly, the man looked at Yang Qi. “Who’s this? The Holy Mother’s faction needs women, not men. What are you doing with him?”

A particularly vile-looking one of these male Demonfolk glared at Yang Qi and said, “Who are you, brat? Talk. I'm Arhat Hate-Malice, from the August Patriarch’s half of the Hanging Mountain.”

Another powerful Demonfolk male said, “You’re from the Rich-Lush Continent, aren’t you? The Hanging Mountain has learned a lot about your continent lately. Supposedly, Ghost Emperor Yama has been freed, and is working for a youngster who conquered the entire continent. The Holy Mother’s people never act without reason, so I’m going to guess that you’re that very youngster. We’re here for you, so come with us.”

In the blink of an eye, Emissary Red Lotus suddenly looked completely vicious. “What did you bring these arhats here to do, Di Shidao? The Holy Mother has plans for this person, and he’s in my custody on her orders.”

“Well, I'm here on the orders of the August Patriarch to take this person to him. Not only is he male, but his act of taking over the Rich-Lush Continent is a violation of the rules and plans of the Hanging Mountain. Therefore, he will be put on trial.”

Chapter 347: Di Shidao

‘Be careful, Yang Qi,’ Emissary Red Lotus said to him via thought projection. ‘Di Shidao is a famous expert from among the male Demonfolk. He's a high-level Great Sage who is no weaker than me, and is classified as an Elder Sage. They must know about your special connection to the Holy Mother, which means that if you fall into their hands, they’ll definitely use you as a threat against her. Dammit. How could such a confidential matter have leaked to the public?’

Continuing to look at the interlopers with a cool smile, Yang Qi responded to Emissary Red Lotus, ‘Didn’t you just say that I was supposed to secretly infiltrate the male Demonfolk?’

‘That was the original plan. You were supposed to join the male Demonfolk, gain a high level of power and prestige, and then eventually be selected by the immortal world to join their ranks. The immortal world above is recruiting talented geniuses right now, and as the Holy Mother’s dearest relative, she wanted to help you get one of those spots. Besides, you have an amazing energy art, right? We heard that, as a Legendary, you destroyed numerous Great Sages. Well, in any case, it seems we need to change plans now. Back up into the protection of my defensive shield. I’ll handle Di Shidao.’

Seemingly unfazed, Yang Qi did as he was told, and backed up a bit until he was within the range of her defensive shield.

At this point, a faint, sinister smile spread out across Emissary Red Lotus’s face. Without any warning, she shouted, “Detonate!”

The instant she said the words, the demon-god command medallion in Yang Qi’s hand exploded, releasing power equal to the self-detonation of multiple Great Sages.

A destructive energy field spread out, with Yang Qi being in the middle of it all.

In the exact same moment, Emissary Red Lotus threw her hands out, sending five-colored light out to lock down the entire area, and causing the wormhole to begin sinking down on itself.

Nodding his head in approval, Di Shidao thrust his hand out in front of him, sending a column of black light toward Yang Qi.

“Seven Banes Profound Radiant Heavenly Net!”

“Red Lotus Karmaflame; Melt Ghosts and Gods!” Shockingly, Emissary Red Lotus was joining Di Shidao in trying to ambush and kill Yang Qi. The demon-god command medallion had been a forgery, and had actually been made from a deeper core of godlightning. Even Ghost Emperor Yama had been fooled, indicating that it had probably been created by someone stronger than him.

“He's ours! This kid is smart, but there’s no way he can escape!”

“It seems highly likely that he really is the Holy Mother’s son!” Emissary Red Lotus said. “We have to get our hands on him. We can use him against the Holy Mother; maybe she’ll even break the law for his sake.”

“That’s exactly what the August Patriarch wants to happen.”

The Demonfolk didn't care much for etiquette and convention. For two Greater Demons to team up against a Legendary wasn’t a loss of face as far as they were concerned. In fact, they found it quite amusing.

“There’s no way the brat survived the detonation, right?” one of the Demon Sages said.

“If he did survive, he’s definitely crippled.”

“That demon-god command medallion was made from Heaven-Splitting Godlightning. That detonation could punch a hole in heaven, let alone in that brat. That said, he's strong. As a Legendary, he killed Great Sages, so it’s little wonder that he's the seed of the Holy Mother.”

“Gather his remains, and his discarnate soul, to give to the August Patriarch.”

The Great Sages immediately fanned out to surround the area where the detonation had occurred.

However, even as they did, a hand stretched out from the smoke, and it looked as pure and sparkling as porcelain. Instantly, the space in the area began to crystallize, a manifestation of the most terrifying power imaginable.

Before anyone could react, one of the first-step Great Sages among the male Demonfolk fell into the grip of that hand, and let out a bloodcurdling scream. In the next moment, he exploded into a haze of blood, which then faded away.

“Fall back! Quick!”

Everyone present quickly began to back away.

Suddenly, spatial power erupted out, parting the smoke to reveal a pure land, with Yang Qi standing in the middle, completely unharmed. He glowed with holy light, and his God Legion Battle Robe fluttered in the wind. He held a shadowy form in his hand, which was all that was left of the Great Sage he had just killed. However, even as that shadow struggled, it slowly transformed into ash.

As for the sage motes which were left behind, they were quickly absorbed into the pure land around Yang Qi.

“Well played, Emissary Red Lotus, Di Shidao,” Yang Qi said coolly. “You, two Great Sages from the Hanging Mountain, actually ambushed a Legendary.” Focusing on Emissary Red Lotus, he said, “You didn't come for me on orders of the Holy Mother, did you? You’re working for someone else.”

He seemed calm, and not the least bit surprised, almost as though he had predicted that this would all happen.

“The Heaven-Splitting Godlightning didn’t even hurt you?” Emissary Red Lotus said, visibly shocked. “What sort of defenses do you have?” At this point her attention was attracted to his personal domain. “What kind of domain is that? It's so strong!”

“Cut the crap, kid,” Di Shidao said. “You think that because you avoided the Heaven-Splitting Godlightning, that you’ll escape us? In the end, you're still just a Legendary. I’m putting an end to this right now. Let the Heaven-Demon Come! Let the Devil Destroy the Human World!”

Waving his hand out in front of him, he sent demon energy swirling out, along with masses of ghost energy to create numerous ghost lamps that burned with ghostfire.

His hand thrummed with the power of sage motes as it stretched out toward Yang Qi, accompanied by the wailing of ghosts, the howling of gods, the screaming of demons, and the dirges of corpses. In the blink of an eye, countless human heads shot out, mouths gaping in terrifying fashion.

Suddenly, Yang Qi spoke. “Even the Deathless will Pass Away; Even the Dazzling will Fall….”

Then, he clenched his hand into a fist and punched out.

A heaven-rending, earth-crushing sound swept forth, destroying the ghost lamps and human heads. All of the ghostfire winked out.

Then, the fist continued on, bashing through Di Shidao’s defenses, and slamming into his personal domain. Yang Qi was using strength to fight strength.

“Billowing Blood Sea!” Di Shidao shouted. Instantly, blood-colored light spilled out of his hands, creating a massive body of water that descended with deadly force toward Yang Qi.

“The Holy Ascend to Heaven, the Evil Fall to Corruption; Ashes to Ashes, Dust to Dust….” Yang Qi stood taller in the face of the rushing sea of blood, and allowed it to slam into him.

“Red Lotus Karmafire Sword!” Emissary Red Lotus said. As she extended her hand, countless red lotus petals flew out, which clumped together into a divine sword that looked almost like fire. Grabbing it, she slashed it through the air in devastating fashion toward Yang Qi’s back.

Yang Qi spun, eyes tracking the sword as he thrust out his palm, unleashing sagelight and countless magical laws. “Radiance and Light Shall Always Appear, Darkness and Gloom Shall Always Disperse; Only My Heart Shall Pass Through the Aeons!”

RUMBLE!

His palm struck the Red Lotus Karmafire Sword, and the entire weapon shattered into dust.

In response, Emissary Red Lotus began to back away, fear flickering in her eyes.

“When the Infernal Deity Spear Comes to the World of Men, Disgraced Souls will be Harvested Like Wheat!” Yang Qi turned again, and this time, the Infernal Deity Spear appeared in his hands, and he slashed it toward Di Shidao’s sage domain. Instantly, the images from hell sprang up around it, terrifying to the extreme.

This spear could pierce the most ancient entities, could destroy mythological beings, could harvest souls, and could slaughter immortals.

Nothing could stop it as it stabbed into Di Shidao’s sage domain, which was so weak that it seemed like it was made from paper.

Eyes widening, Di Shidao quickly shrank his domain downward, and simultaneously summoned a burning flame into it, which was none other than his Despondent Demonfire.

“You really think I can’t handle you, brat? I've been cultivating the Despondent Heart Sutra for thousands of years! I've pushed it to the ultimate level, and even though you’re strong, there’s no way you’re strong enough to stand up to that. Get ready to die!”

“Despondent Heavenly Vault; Demon Saber!”

An enormous demon saber appeared in his hand, fully two-and-a-half meters long, and covered with the complex script of the ancient Demonfolk, all of which described the most despondent aspects of despair.

“Soul Severing!”

With that saber in his hand, Di Shidao seemed like a bloodthirsty god of blood, climbing out of a coffin into the world of the living.

Yang Qi faced the deadly demon saber with utter calm, his spear in hand, the darkness of night spreading out around him as he met his enemy’s move.

At that point, a mysterious smile appeared on Di Shidao’s face, as his Soul Severing move transformed into a different attack.

“You're too weak. Blood Guzzling!”

Blade light flashed, passing through a unique series of trajectories to pierce Yang Qi’s defensive true energy, and ignore the greyspace of his domain. In the blink of an eye, it was right in front of his neck.

It was a shocking saber move designed to remove the head of any enemy. After doing so, it would suck all the blood out of that person, to fulfil the ultimate meaning of the saber move Blood Guzzling.

However, even as the saber closed in on his neck, sparks showered in all directions; the blade couldn’t actually pierce his skin!

Yang Qi didn't seem the least bit flustered, as though he had been able to understand the profound secrets of the blade just by observing its movement through the air.

“That Which Profanes the Gods Shall be Destroyed; Only Those With Faith can Live for Time Immemorial.”

That was when a shocking spear strike was unleashed, smashing into the saber and reducing it to ashes.

Chapter 348: A Debut

Yang Qi’s spear and its technique were supernatural in all aspects, and were the type that few people could comprehend. As for Di Shidao, he was a fifth step Great Sage, which placed him high among other Great Sages.

The fact that Yang Qi could stand up to him, and even drive his true energy away, was shocking to say the least.

In fact, Emissary Red Lotus’ eyes nearly popped out of her skull in response.

“Di Shidao! We have to use the unique power of fifth step Great Sages! Quickly! However much vital energy it takes, connect with that ancient power and kill him! If we don’t end things, and he continues to power up, the Holy Mother’s people will realize that I betrayed her. If even the slightest clues get out, I'm dead!”

In some circles, people who reached the fifth step were called Ancient Sages, because they could reach into the many aspects of space-time to harness power from ancient worlds, and use it to temper themselves on a fundamental level. When they fought, every move they made was blessed by the power of ancient energy. With power from millions and millions of years in the past, they could even challenge the will of heaven.

Without any hesitation, Emissary Red Lotus thrust her hands out to unleash a bevy of magical laws that Yang Qi had never seen before, each of them strong enough to level mountains.

RUMBLE!

Yang Qi felt his vital energy trembling as the void around him opened, and an ancient energy erupted that didn't belong to this time period.

Emissary Red Lotus began to grow taller and larger, and she even sprouted horns from her head, until she was the picture of a consummate demon queen.

“I can control the domain of time!” Di Shidao shouted. “And I shall use the most ancient vital energy to deprive you of your life force!” Joining Emissary Red Lotus, he unleashed all of his magical laws, even drawing upon that which Yang Qi couldn't comprehend, preheaven vital energy from the ancient past.

Things referred to as “preheaven” were those types of vital energy that existed before heaven and earth were established. The Great Sage level was very mysterious and profound, and even touched on the magical laws of time itself.  Yang Qi hadn’t even come to complete enlightenment regarding the magical laws of space, much less the even higher-level magical laws of time.

Now, both Di Shidao and Emissary Red Lotus were unleashing streams of vital energy that filled the area and turned into a massive power field, with pressure that increased by a hundredfold in the shortest of moments, and prepared to crush Yang Qi out of existence.

Immediately, loud cracking sounds rang out from the God Legion Paradise.

Great Sages from the first through fourth step, who hadn’t gained understanding of time, and relied on pure power, were people that Yang Qi didn’t fear. The fifth step, however, was another level entirely. Even still, he was confident that he wouldn’t end up getting killed.

“You're both fifth step Great Sages?” he said. “Well, so what? You really think you can kill me? The mysteries of time originate with the legion of gods. Blaspheme time, and you’ll be demolished!”

He shrank his God Legion Paradise down, causing the numerous constellations networks inside to unleash vital energy. At the same time, the Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragment appeared, and emitted blinding red light that converged onto Yang Qi’s fist, like a tiny red sphere.

Instantly, intense rumbling sounds echoed out as numerous streams of ancient vital energy were swept away.

Then, Yang Qi bashed through the wall of the wormhole to step out into the void beyond. Then, he shoved his way through the spatial tempests until he was truly in outer space. At that point, he could see the true and real world, the darkness filled with endless specks of light, shooting stars, drifting continents, some of which were pitch black, others of which shone with dazzling light.

Outer space was eternal, both deathly and yet filled with life.

Smack!

Even as he entered outer space, the space-time wormhole exploded, and both Emissary Red Lotus and Di Shidao emerged to chase after him, joined by other Demonfolk Great Sages.

Instead of fleeing, Yang Qi simply turned to face them.

“You're not going to be able to kill me,” he said calmly. “Even if you had more people on your side, it wouldn’t do any good, so why waste the effort? Emissary Red Lotus, you obviously weren’t sent by the Holy Mother to summon me, were you?”

“I wasn’t,” she replied. “You're a very suspicious character, and are probably the son of the Holy Mother. That makes you very valuable. You can't escape, you know. We’ve set up an inescapable trap that you won’t be able to evade no matter how you try.”

Di Shidao took a step forward. Glaring at Yang Qi, he said, “Stand down and wait to be taken into custody. I wasted a lot of my magical laws, and even drew ancient energy through the layers of time. That cost me some lifespan, and therefore, I'm not going to rest until you're in my hands. Your cultivation level is just too low. There’s no way you can fight all of us at the same time.”

Yang Qi didn’t say anything, but instead, looked off into the distance.

“What are you doing?” growled one of the evil Great Sages. “Just standing around looking at the scenery?”

Cough….

In that very moment, the sound of a cough echoed about. It wasn’t loud, and was even a bit hard to hear. And yet, it echoed like thunder into the minds of everyone present.

Looks of shock appeared as everyone turned to look at a location some distance away, where a simple wooden door had appeared, covered with rustic decorations.

With a loud creak, the door opened, and a sickly, emaciated old man appeared.

The moment he was visible, he devolved into a fit of coughing. Eventually, the coughing passed, and the man took a breath and looked over at the group. Finally, his gaze came to rest on Yang Qi. Bowing at the waist, he said, “Young Master, your humble servant is late. I see you’ve been surrounded by villains. Well, at least you’re not hurt, sir. If you were, I would have owed a big explanation to the Holy Mother.”

“You!” Emissary Red Lotus blurted in shock. Everyone else looked similarly surprised.

As for Di Shidao, his eyes went wide, and he said, “Yan Wubing! What are you doing here?”

Everyone was visibly trembling, apparently out of fear of this sickly old man.

“I am Yan Wubing, steward to the Holy Mother,” he said, sounding somewhat weak and winded. Shifting his attention away from Yang Qi, he said, “Red Lotus, you forged a decree from the Holy Mother, and attempted to harm the Young Master. I'm here to take him away from you, and execute you for your crime. Young Master, there’s no need for alarm. The Holy Mother is currently in seclusion, attempting to connect with the will of the heaven on high. However, she is fully aware of everything which has been going on, including how you slaughtered multiple Great Sages and united the Rich-Lush Continent under your rulership. She’s very happy with how you’ve grown. Originally, she planned to wait until she was out of seclusion, and then come personally to visit you. Unfortunately, this rebel's actions came completely without warning. I suppose I can only blame my own incompetence for not picking up on the clues.”

“Run!” Di Shidao shouted, spinning to flee.

“You think you can just leave, Di Shidao? Not even your father Di Que could escape from me if he tried.” Looking as casual as casual could be, the old man stretched out an emaciated hand, and then slowly began to close it into a fist.

WHIZZZ!

The magical laws of heaven and earth suddenly constricted in exaggerated fashion. The dome of heaven seemed to collapse into Yan Wubing's hand, and even nearby heavenly bodies trembled visibly. This was a divine ability from aeons in the past, something that could be used to pluck stars and snatch moons!

In that moment, Yang Qi shivered, suddenly aware of how terrifyingly powerful this seemingly sickly old man was. He surpassed Chancellor Demi-Immortal and Ghost Emperor Yama in every way imaginable!

Di Shidao screamed miserably as he was rendered completely powerless, and drifted there like a patch of seaweed.

“Don’t forget who I am in the Hanging Mountain, Yan Wubing! I'm extremely important to the August Patriarch! How dare you treat me like this!”

Despite the boldness of his words, Di Shidao’s voice trembled with fear.

Completely ignoring him, Yan Wubing snapped his fist closed. Space shattered, and Di Shidao exploded, sending blood and gore flying out in all directions. A terrified scream escaped from his soul, only to be cut off as he was completely and utterly wiped out of existence.

A fifth step Great Sage had just perished.

“Yan Wubing! You….”

Cold dread seeped through Emissary Red Lotus’s veins at the sight of what had just played out. Without any hesitation, she caused an explosion of red lotus flowers to fill the area with projections that resembled her in every way. Then, all of the versions of herself fled in different directions.

“Flee!” The male Demonfolk Great Sages who had surrounded Yang Qi similarly tried to escape.

“Ai!” Yan Wubing said. His mere exhalation created a white energy flow that, in the blink of an eye, filled all heaven and earth with destructive power.

A Great Sage was hit by the energy flow, and then shredded into powder.

Pop. Pop. Pop. Pop! Pop!!!

One after another, Demonfolk Great Sages exploded into death. Each and every one of these individuals was famous and well-known, but just like that, they were killed by a mere exhalation!

Yang Qi’s scalp prickled with shock as the white energy then spread out and destroyed all of Emissary Red Lotus’s projections.

Soon, she was the only one left, and her beautiful face was a mask of terror. “Grand Steward Yan, please spare me! I might have betrayed the Holy Mother, but that’s not a sin deserving of death. I'm willing to pay for my crimes!”

Sounding as weak and sick as ever, Yan Wubing replied, “You were willing to hurt the Holy Mother’s son to earn a quick profit? You’re right, that’s not a sin deserving of death. It's a sin deserving of ten thousand deaths!” With that, he exhaled again, and the white energy became like a sword that streaked forth and chopped Emissary Red Lotus into mincemeat.

“Incredible….” Yang Qi breathed. There was no way he could match up to this Yan Wubing, not even if he had ten of himself added together. The only way he might come out on top was if the God Legion Seal helped him.

Chapter 349: Yan Wubing

It was with casual effort that Yan Wubing used a simple exhalation to stir magical laws and slaughter numerous enemies. It was power the likes of which Yang Qi had never witnessed.

In fact, this sickly Yan Wubing was the most powerful person he had ever encountered.

Despite that immense display of strength, the man was acting very respectfully. He even folded his hands politely at his waist. “Young Master,” he said. “I’ve eliminated all the conspirators. Do you have any other orders, sir? I'm at your service in any capacity.”

“I wouldn't dare to impose on you,” Yang Qi said politely. “I'm a mere Legendary, and you’re an expert among experts. In fact, you really shouldn’t address me as ‘young master’.” Yang Qi was still having a hard time believing that this man was here to help him.

It was true that he had just killed two fifth step Great Sages as a show of goodwill, and seemed to be acting very humbly. He even directly stated that Yang Qi was the son of the Holy Mother. After everything Yang Qi had experienced in life, there was no way he would simply take the man’s word at face value. However, deep in his heart, he didn't feel any danger, and therefore, he decided to listen to him.

“Sir, you are the son of the Holy Mother, which means that, even in the Hanging Mountain itself, you have very high standing. I'm just one of the Holy Mother’s subordinates, a mere steward. It’s only natural that I would treat you with the utmost respect, Young Master.” Yan Wubing was speaking with the deepest respect. However, at the same time, he was clearly sizing Yang Qi up, and as he did, his eyes gleamed with approval. “Young Master, your energy arts are quite shocking. You’re only an Astral-Star Legendary, and yet you were able to fight both Di Shidao and Emissary Red Lotus, both of whom are high-level Great Sages. That’s the type of thing you only expect in immortal geniuses from an immortal plane. The Holy Mother is definitely going to be very pleased to hear about this.”

“So, she really is my mother?” Yang Qi asked. “I thought she led the female Demonfolk, which means that I'm supposed to stay in hiding.”

Shaking his head, Yan Wubing said, “There’s no need for anything like that. The Holy Mother has been blessed by numerous almighty beings from the heaven above, the immortal plane. And considering how terrifying her cultivation base is, no one here could possibly be a threat to her. Sir, you are her son, which makes you an official holy son of the Hanging Mountain. Of that, there is no doubt, and therefore, there is no need to hide who you are.”

“So that’s how it is.” After a moment of thought, Yang Qi continued, “So what exactly happened back when I was born? Why did she abandon me?”

“Well, that’s simple. Throughout the generations, the holy daughters of the Hanging Mountain have always remained chaste and undefiled. If word spread that one of them bore a child, her energy arts would be crippled, and she would be imprisoned to lead a life worse than death. Back then, the Holy Mother cultivated something called the Red-Dust Spectral-Dream Heart-Sutra, an immortal skill. Upon reaching the highest level of that skill, her true energy dispersed into the void, and she lost all her powers. She was also pregnant with you during that time. To escape the danger, she fled to the Rich-Lush Continent and handed you over to Yang Zhan. Eventually, she mastered the use of her immortal skill, and became a Demi-Immortal. That was when she put an end to everyone who was scheming against her, and seized power in the Hanging Mountain. As of this point, none of those things matter anymore.”

“Why didn't she come to see me after she took power?” Yang Qi asked. “Instead, she left me to live a bitter and dangerous life in the Rich-Lush Continent. If she's the all-powerful Holy Mother, why didn’t she help me out? And don’t say it was for my own good, to help me become stronger. I got plenty of that crap from the chancellor of the Demi-Immortal Institute. He sent me to do all kinds of dangerous things on that pretext, only to reveal later that he was fully in the camp of the Crown Prince. I was severely injured, you know, and was even forced into hiding. It seems like a natural thing for a mother to help her child, if you ask me.”

“You misunderstand the Holy Mother’s intentions, Young Master. The past several years have been a rough time for her as well. Her original plan was to go get you once you were a teenager. However, after she became the Holy Mother, it was a constant struggle to establish her authority and power base. And she didn’t want people causing trouble for you. In the end, you weren’t swept up into the complicated affairs of the Hanging Mountain, and were safer because of it. Look at what happened with Di Shidao and Emissary Red Lotus. They colluded against you as soon as word of your existence began to spread. If you had been in the Hanging Mountain all this time, you would have been swept up into such matters long ago.”

“Well, I guess I can’t deny that,” Yang Qi said, nodding. The Hanging Mountain was far larger, and far more complicated of a place, than the Rich-Lush Continent, with more experts than the sky had clouds. To many people there, his fight with the Crown Prince would seem like little more than kids playing.

“Young Master, your cultivation base is still low, but your humble servant can tell that your true energy has reached an unimaginable level. This is no flattery, sir. I've lived for tens of thousands of years, and I've never seen a genius like you before.” Yan Wubing's eyes looked as though they were dim with age, and yet, he was clearly very perceptive.

“True,” Yang Qi said. “It’s not common to find Astral-Star Legendaries who can kill Great Sages, or stand up to an ambush by two fifth step Great Sages. However, in my case, it’s all due to the glory of the legion of gods.” Yang Qi wasn’t playing with words. He knew that he bore such glory, and that without it, he would be little more than trash.

In response to his words, Yan Wubing’s eyes twinkled with golden light, almost as if he were peering into the depths of Yang Qi’s very being.

“There’s no need to crack random jokes, Young Master,” he said. “The legions of gods is real, and has existed from ancient times until now. I might be a bit muddle-headed nowadays, but I’ve heard the stories of immortals who pretended to be gods, and then died at the hands of godly tribulation. Young Master, from here on out, I suggest you not blaspheme against the legion of gods. The universe will not show you mercy if you do, and you’ll end in catastrophe.”

“I’ll be fine, but, yeah, let’s stop talking about it.” Yang Qi waved his hand dismissively, aware that Yan Wubing wouldn't believe that he had accepted the legacy of the gods and their glory, and even had a God Legion Seal in him. Switching topics, he said, “Well then, why don’t you take me to see my mother in the Hanging Mountain. There’s no need for me to sneak around now, right?”

“She’s still in seclusion as she has been for a while,” Yan Wubing replied, “but your humble servant has already arranged everything for you, Young Master. From what I can tell, you’re very close to a breakthrough to the Great Sage level, is that right? When you achieve that breakthrough, your substructure will change significantly, and the Holy Mother will be able to publicly acknowledge her relation to you.” He waved his hand, and an enormous space-time wormhole opened up, in the depths of which Yang Qi could see a sprawling continent that was clearly larger than the Quake-Dawn Continent.

“Is that the Hanging Mountain?” Yang Qi asked, peering into the wormhole.

Yan Wubing shook his head. “No. It’s the Plateau of the Leviathan, an important offshoot of the Hanging Mountain. I guess in some ways you could say that it is the Hanging Mountain. Once we’re there, I’ll help you assume your new identity. By the way, the heaven above has sent a decree stating that they intend to recruit top geniuses from our world to join their ranks. If you can win such an honor, then no one will ever cause any problems for you. And the Holy Mother wants you to do just that. The first step is to become a formal member of the Hanging Mountain.”

“You want me to become a demon?” Yang Qi said, frowning. “I'm not sure that’s the best thing for me.”

Yan Wubing burst out laughing. “Who said everyone in the Hanging Mountain is a demon? The majestic immortal who founded this place left behind one primary edict: Everyone is Welcome, Regardless of Background. Humans, demons, devils, ghosts; everyone can practice cultivation here. In addition to the Demonfolk, you’ll find all sorts of sects in the Hanging Mountain. For example, of the three thousand daoist sects and hundred thousand smaller factions in the Quake-Dawn Continent, fully a tenth of them take orders directly from the Hanging Mountain.”

Yang Qi nodded as he followed Yan Wubing into the wormhole. So far, all of his intuition was telling him that this man wasn’t a danger to him. He was nothing like Emissary Red Lotus, who had seemed to abound with secrets and oddities.

But then, Yang Qi suddenly stopped in place. “Wait. There’s something else I want to know about.”

“What might that be, Young Master?” Yan Wubing replied, his tone one of utmost respect. “Could it be regarding the Rich-Lush Continent? It's safe, so you have no need to worry. I’ll take care of everything. I heard about how you killed the son of the Quake-Dawn Cathedral’s Holy Daughter, but even that's not anything to worry about. They won’t dare to do anything to you.”

Yang Qi shook his head. “No, it's not that. I’ll handle the Quake-Dawn Cathedral on my own. They’re not safe from me anymore. I want to know about my past. If my birth father isn't Yang Zhan, then who is he?”

Yan Wubing's face drained of blood, and he backed up a few steps. It was no act. Apparently, Yang Qi had touched upon a major sore spot.

“Young Master, sir, you should really avoid the topic of your father’s identity. I doubt even the Holy Mother will tell you.” He shook his head. “Drop the matter for now. Perhaps when you're much, much stronger, the truth will come to light.”

Remaining completely calm, Yang Qi said, “Come on, there’s no way I just fell down out of the sky, is there? Don’t tell me I'm like that Crown Prince, a supposed god from heaven descended into the mortal world? What, my mother dreamed of some falling stars, and then gave birth to me?”

“No, it’s not like that. Young Master, you definitely have a father, it's just that he….” Yan Wubing sighed. “There is no greater taboo. I really can’t talk about it. If I did, it could rock all creation. In fact, it would be considered a big deal even in the immortal world above. The exalted Holy Mother doesn’t wish to speak of the matter, and I warn you to never, ever, ever mention the matter to her. She’ll be very upset, and although she wouldn't do anything to you, I'm sure you’d prefer to avoid hurting her feelings.”

“So, it's like that.” Yang Qi prepared to continue talking about the subject, then decided against it. “Alright, I’ll figure it out on my own as time goes by.”

“Young Master, you’re a clever young man, and definitely no fool. As you know, the Hanging Mountain is vastly larger than the Rich-Lush Continent, and here, there are just as many villains as honest folk. Sir, you have a special status, and there are going to be plenty of enemies keeping an eye on you. I'm sure that before long, you’re going to make the Holy Mother very pleased. You know, there’s no room for you to grow in the Rich-Lush Continent. But the Hanging Mountain has dealings with the immortal planes. We used to be part of the former Yore-Wilds planetary system, and were governed by the Titan Emperor Heaven. Sooner or later, you’ll go to the immortal plane to become an immortal, and after that, a Demolisher.”

Without another word, Yang Qi stepped into the wormhole, which whisked him along to the teleportation portal at the end.

Beyond that was the Plateau of the Leviathan.

Chapter 350: Plateau of the Leviathan

Yang Qi stepped out of the teleportation portal to find himself in a vast land of pure whiteness.

Spirit energy abounded here, as well as the most ancient of auras. Stooping down, he scooped up a handful of soil and rubbed it between his fingers. It was grainy, and filled with life force, to the point where it almost seemed like some sort of spirit medicine that could be directly consumed.

The quality of this soil vastly surpassed anything from the Rich-Lush Continent.

“This place is a holy land,” he said. He then shook his head. “If the Rich-Lush Continent can ever become like this, I’ll be very happy.”

Yan Wubing looked around at the surrounding lands. “Welcome to the Plateau of the Leviathan. This entire land was once an actual leviathan from primeval times. He fused his flesh, blood, and quintessence energy into a plane, in the hopes of using the energy boost to become a Demi-Immortal. Unfortunately, he failed and perished, and his remains became this place. Later, the August Patriarch brought this land to this location to become a subsidiary ‘peak’ of the Hanging Mountain.

“Young Master, I'm aware you hope to improve the Rich-Lush Continent, so keep in mind what happened here.”

Yang Qi knew that when he eventually reached the ninth step of the Great Sage level, he would fuse with the Rich-Lush Continent, and try to use that force to become a Demi-Immortal. If he failed, then the Rich-Lush Continent would become another Plateau of the Leviathan.

This land was a plane of its own that roughly resembled the shape of an enormous whale. The depths of the continent contained enormous stone configurations that were obviously the remnants of the leviathan’s five viscera and six bowels. The remnants of his meridians were still present, except that the true energy inside them had become veins of spirit stone ore.

Primeval leviathans were massive things, and their quintessence energy surpassed that of humans by thousands of times. And when such an entity failed to enter the Demi-Immortal level, and became the continent itself, it was only natural that it would leave behind all sorts of spectacular things.

Obviously, this continent was an ideal place to practice cultivation.

‘I got quite a few immortal sealing marks from the Crown Prince’s corpse,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘By combining them with primal-chaos paleo-energy, and the ancient immortal formations, I can slowly build up power in the Rich-Lush Continent, and turn its lands into spirit soil. When the process is complete, it will be time to push the continent to a higher level.’

Merely studying the Plateau of the Leviathan itself was giving Yang Qi a much clearer idea of what to do with his own continent.

Yan Wubing looked at the thoughtful expression on Yang Qi’s face, and nodded inwardly. He was already convinced that this young master of his was a spectacular individual, and was perfectly suited to gaining enlightenment quickly.

‘Compared to the genius sons of August Patriarch Mammoth Heaven, the Holy Mother’s son actually isn’t that bad!’

Looking over, Yang Qi noticed the pleased expression on Yan Wubing’s face, and his reservations about the man yet again shrank. As a result, it was even easier for him to seek enlightenment from the Plateau of the Leviathan.

The teleportation portal they had emerged from was one of many in a large public square, with scattered groups of people walking here and there between them. Obviously, they were people from other planes, traveling to and from the Plateau of the Leviathan. Some were Legendaries, others were Great Sages. It was even more bustling than the Quake-Dawn Continent.

Clearly, this location was central to the larger planetary system of the Hanging Mountain. As for the Quake-Dawn Continent, Rich-Lush Continent, and Western Continent, they were all border territories.

By this point, Yang Qi knew a lot about the planetary system as a whole. It had once been part of the Yore-Wilds Continent, which, along with the Brute-Wilds, Waste-Wilds, and Proto-Wilds planetary systems, were subsidiary to the Titan Emperor Heaven.

Yang Qi had no idea how many locations had resulted when the Yore-Wilds planetary system shattered. But he did know that they covered a vast area so large it was almost impossible to travel between them without the help of space-time wormholes.

Perhaps when he was a Great Sage, he could leave the planetary system and travel to even further locations.

Because of its central location, the Plateau of the Leviathan had as many experts as the sky had clouds. There were even people from organizations outside the Hanging Mountain. Because of all that, it was also a major business center, with all sorts of treasures and energy arts changing hands. Obviously, there were far more prospects here than in a remote, isolated place like the Rich-Lush Continent.

As they stepped off of the teleportation portal and began to walk away, they were noticed by many of the surrounding passersby.

“Look! That’s Yan Wubing!”

“He’s the famous grand steward of the Holy Mother! He started out as a mortal human tens of thousands of years ago, and was very famous in the ancient world. I wonder why he agreed to serve the Holy Mother.”

“People say he’s a ninth step Great Sage, and that he’s just on the verge of reaching the Demi-Immortal level.”

“He's really famous here in the Hanging Mountain. What is he doing here in the Plateau of the Leviathan?”

“Look at that young man standing next to him. He’s not even a Great Sage, and yet Yan Wubing is acting all deferential toward him. What’s going on?”

“I heard rumors a while back that when the Holy Mother was young, she actually gave birth to a son. It was a big secret back then, but after she became the Holy Mother, the news spread far and wide. I’d say there’s a high likelihood that young man is her son. Think about it. Why else would Yan Wubing be treating him so respectfully?”

“The Holy Mother’s son….”

“Tsk tsk…. Yeah, the fact that she has a son is an open secret. Our August Patriarch Mammoth Heaven has tacitly approved of such talk, although the Holy Mother isn't very happy about it.”

“Through the generations, the Holy Mothers and the August Patriarchs have always struggled for dominance. It’s not unusual at all for them to be at odds.”

“Perhaps the Holy Mother sent for her son because she plans to formally acknowledge him as her offspring. Or maybe he’s here to participate in the immortal world's competition to search for geniuses. But could someone who isn’t even a Great Sage participate in that sort of thing?”

“Maybe the Holy Mother is going to personally help him rise to a higher level first. I guess we’ll just have to wait and see.”

As they headed away from the teleportation portals, Yan Wubing said, “The Plateau of the Leviathan is a terminal of sorts. Plenty of people from outside the Hanging Mountain use the teleportation portals here.”

“Interesting,” Yang Qi said. “Who is this August Patriarch Mammoth Heaven that I hear people talking about?”

“August Patriarch Mammoth Heaven? Well, the August Patriarch is one of the Demonfolk, and he occupies a similar position in the Hanging Mountain as the Holy Mother. He’s actually the incarnation of an ancient megamammoth, which makes him incredibly strong. You know, the type they say can ‘absorb stars and swallow moons’. People say that his blood comes from the most faithful adherents to the legion of gods, the godmammoths. That’s why people from his pure bloodline have always been the August Patriarchs of the Hanging Mountain.”

‘What?’ Yang Qi thought, shaken. ‘The incarnation of an ancient megamammoth?’

If there was one thing he was deeply familiar with, it was megamammoths. They were the descendants of godmammoths, but because they were actually too strong, they eventually faded away into the river of time, and became extinct. Modern-day elephants were essentially mortal creatures, and were not like the megamammoths of old, who could inhale rivers and lakes, then blast the water into the sky to create rainstorms.

All of a sudden, Yang Qi wondered what would happen if he got his hands on this August Patriarch Mammoth Heaven, extracted the godmammoth in him, and then used it to bolster his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. What kind of progress would that lead to?

In fact, forget about capturing him. Even a drop of his blood probably contained immense information about the ultimate truths of godmammoths, and would likely help Yang Qi to advance by leaps and bounds.

Although he had the God Legion Seal to help him cultivate the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, he didn’t have any actual godmammoth blood, and therefore, little way to gain deep enlightenment about the truths of godmammoths.

Even as Yang Qi considered all of these things, a nearby teleportation portal suddenly thrummed to life, and a powerful, wild aura spread out.

In the blink of an eye, Yang Qi felt the immense power of the primeval Yore-Wilds, causing him to stop in his tracks.

“Hey, Yan Wubing!” someone said. “And you, punk. Don’t go anywhere. I have something to talk with the two of you about.”

Yan Wubing turned to look in the direction of the nearby teleportation portal. Stepping off of it was an extremely tall and burly young man.

He held no weapon in his hands, but was clad in a luxurious set of armor, and had an afro. His muscles seemed to thrum with explosive power that could destroy planets and stars.

He was flanked by a solemn host of experts who were all Great Sages. Together, the entire group was carrying an enormous battle-axe, as bright as snow, and covered with complex designs. It was also spattered with blood, and surrounded by vengeful souls. In fact, fiendish embryos wiggled in the depths of the axe, thirsting for blood.

It was so large and heavy that it required multiple people to hold, and all of those people were Great Sages.

To Yang Qi’s shock, that axe actually contained numerous immortal motes, indicating that it was an immortal item.

Of course, Yang Qi had an immortal item, that being the armor he had taken from the Crown Prince. However, he had fused it with his God Legion Paradise, making it part of the domain’s greyspace. As for the immortal motes in it, they were currently buried deep in the pure land, waiting to be absorbed. Immortal motes were vastly superior to sage motes, being much tougher. Yang Qi wouldn’t be able to do anything with them until he was a Great Sage.

“You’re the Holy Mother’s son?” the burly young man asked, eyes on Yang Qi. He snorted, and it was like thunder, tearing apart the air and ripping crevices into the ground. Cracks even appeared in the sky above.

Numerous screams rippled out as passersby collapsed into unconsciousness, some of them Legendaries, some of them Half Sages.

As for the Great Sages, they didn’t pass out, and yet they trembled in fear, their faces draining from blood.

“Who is that guy? He’s so strong!”

“He just appeared, and he already unleashed his energy arts and sagely might? He didn't even care about the onlookers? Who is he? And look at that axe! It’s being carried by multiple Great Sages? How heavy could it be?”

“Hey, keep your voice down!”

“That guy is the ninth son of August Patriarch Mammoth Heaven of the Hanging Mountain! His name is Mammoth Force! Not only does he have a high position, he’s incredibly strong. Not too long ago, he used that axe to cut the mountain headquarters of an entire sect in two!”

Chapter 351: Mammoth Force

This young man was the son of August Patriarch Mammoth Heaven.

Yang Qi’s heart began to beat a bit faster as he looked at him. Already, he could sense a scrap of the aura of a megamammoth. His blood was pure, that was for sure, and it contained the surging power that had been present at the very earliest times in the universe.

It was high-level power, and considering that, this Mammoth Force was actually far superior to Emissary Red Lotus or Di Shidao.

Yan Wubing took a step forward, and stretched an emaciated arm out protectively in front of Yang Qi. “Are you here to stir up trouble, Mammoth Force? Could it be that, as the son of August Patriarch Mammoth Heaven, you feel you have the right to act like a fiendish brute, and openly provoke the Holy Mother?”

“I'm glad you stepped forward to talk, Yan Wubing,” Mammoth Force said. Taking a step forward, he clasped his hands behind his back and continued, “I have a question that needs answering. Di Shidao’s animadestiny origin lamp exploded moments ago, indicating that he perished. His father is furious, and lodged a complaint with the August Patriarch, who sent me to investigate. Did you kill him?”

“It doesn’t matter if you deny it, Yan Wubing,” said one of the experts flanking Mammoth Force, his eyes flickering with sinister light. “The August Patriarch already divined the truth, and knows that you’re responsible. What incredible gall you have! Don’t you know how important and high-ranking Di Shidao was? You think you can just go around killing people like that whenever you feel like? Aren’t you worried about the August Patriarch punishing you?”

“I'm old and sick,” Yan Wubing replied. “Little more than a husk, nowadays, so if I die, it won’t really matter. However, when the Holy Mother gives me a task, I complete it. She was the one who saved me from that deadly situation years ago, and because of her kindness, I swore to protect everyone she cares about. Di Shidao and Emissary Red Lotus colluded to harm the Young Master of my house, so of course I killed them. If Di Shidao’s father is angry about it, then just have him come to me to seek his revenge. I'd be happy to meet him in Dueling Kings Gorge to fight it out.”

Although Yan Wubing remained as stooped and withered as ever, his words were spoken with the force of a sharp sword stabbing into heaven, making him seem quite intimidating.

“Those are brash words, Yan Wubing,” Mammoth Force said. “Don’t forget that you're no Demi-Immortal! You're still a Great Sage, making you a saint at best. You might be better than a mere energy warrior, but you're not an immortal. Considering that you just admitted to having killed Di Shidao, prepare to be taken to the Hanging Mountain for punishment!”

“I can accept punishment. But only if the Holy Mother agrees. And if anyone tries to punish me without her consent, I’ll cut them down instantly. Why are you really here, Mammoth Force? Unless it’s something important, then the young master and I will be leaving.”

“Hold on!” Mammoth Force said, looking over at Yang Qi. As he did, immense, godly power erupted out of him, the kind that could pierce the heavens and form seas. Looking like the picture of condescension, he said, “So, you’re the Holy Mother’s son. From what I can tell, you’re nothing but trash. How could the Holy Mother have given birth to a son like you? Not even a Great Sage yet? I could kill you with a single hair off of my head. You listen to me: we here on the Hanging Mountain train via battle. Compared to us, you’re nothing more than a spineless coward. Why don’t you stop hiding behind Yan Wubing and face me.”

“Don’t listen to him, Young Master,” Yan Wubing said. “He’s just trying to rile you up. With me here, nobody will be able to hurt you.”

Waving his hand dismissively, Yang Qi stepped around Yan Wubing. “What are you planning to do, Mammoth Force?”

“Simple. You’re the Holy Mother’s son. I'm the August Patriarch’s son. We basically have equal standing. We're both warriors who should rise to the top through fire and blood. Look, I'm not going to bully you. All you have to do is stand up to the single flick of my finger. If you do, then I’ll let Yan Wubing off the hook for killing Di Shidao. What do you say? The alternative is for Yan Wubing to face a whole heap of trouble. Not even the Holy Mother will be able to protect him.”

Mammoth Force did nothing to conceal the vicious gleam in his eyes.

“Ignore him, Young Master,” Yan Wubing said. “I'm actually curious to see what sort of trouble he thinks he’ll heap on me.”

“The single flick of a finger?” Yang Qi took a step forward, his battle robe suddenly rippling in the wind as massive energy rose up from him, seemingly transforming him into a different person in the blink of an eye.

KABAAAMMM!

The space around him shattered, and the sky turned pitch black. Countless stars and constellations appeared above, and the power of the stars descended in heaven-shaking, earth-toppling fashion.

“You think you’re going to kill me with the flick of a finger? How about instead, I kill you!”

RUMBLE!

The Infernal Deity Spear appeared in his hand, and the God Legion Paradise began to spread out, glowing with sagelight, filled with holy hymns of both rejoicing and lamentation. At the same time, it was as if one hell after another were appearing in the mortal world.

Without any hesitation, Yang Qi lunged at Mammoth Force, the Infernal Deity Spear bursting with crackling lightning as it pierced through the air.

In the blink of an eye, the spear was closing in on Mammoth Force’s throat.

‘What?’

Mammoth Force’s pupils constricted; never could he have guessed that Yang Qi, a puny Legendary, would attack him, a Great Sage.

“How impudent!”

He immediately waved his finger through the air, a finger that was as wide as the arm of a normal individual. It was surrounded by flickering, golden light, and caused the trumpeting of megamammoths to echo out.

“The Mighty Belong to the Legion of Gods; the Eternal is Mere Emptiness!” Yang Qi’s expression was somber as he seemed to grow larger and larger. Soon, he seemed like he could crush the nine heavens and ten earths, and in fact, he was also surrounded by the trumpeting of megamammoths, and the explosive aura of a godmammoth.

An image appeared behind him, with an elephantine head and a human body, who swept his mighty trunk through the air. The entire Plateau of the Leviathan trembled.

Suns, moons, and other heavenly bodies appeared above, and all living individuals felt their vital energy trembling, as though their souls might be ripped out of them.

POP!

Without any ceremony, the Infernal Deity Spear hit Mammoth Force’s finger, stopping it cold.

Mammoth Force prepared to go all out to unleash a counter attack, except, in that very moment, he suddenly realized that he was instinctively terrified of Yang Qi. In fact, his true energy wouldn’t even respond to his direction, and was pouring into Yang Qi and becoming part of him.

Mammoth Force’s true energy was like a child that had been lost for years, only to find his mother, and rush toward her.

In some ways, the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth was actually worse of a bane to people with megamammoth blood than it was to devil-gods from hell.

“Dammit!” Mammoth Force pulled his finger back and clenched his hand into a fist.

His fist immediately began to shine with a holy nimbus, shattering the air around him, and giving him a chance to leap backward. As he did, the Great Sages behind him threw his axe up into the air for him to grab.

As soon as he laid hands on it, he slashed it out in front of him, causing the immortal will within it to connect to a certain immortal plane, and pour a sea of power into it. Instantly, several teleportation portals in the area shattered, and massive trenches were hewn out in the ground.

“The Deathless will Wither; the True will be Overturned. Only the Legion of Gods are Everlasting!” Yang Qi’s spear vibrated as he forced it to draw upon the power of the immortal motes in his God Legion Paradise. Thanks to the true energy he had just absorbed from Mammoth Force, he was now able to tap into those motes.

Spear projections emerged, as dense as a forest, which slammed into the enormous axe.

A scream erupted as one of Mammoth Force’s Great Sage attendants exploded.

Yang Qi flew through the resulting haze of blood and gore, using the same move he had used to grab Wilds Everlasting. Although he still couldn’t use the full Hand of the One God, he was able to call on some of its general meaning. Instantly, the air began to crystallize, and another Great Sage who was too slow to dodge out of the way was crushed, and then exploded.

“He killed two of them!”

“Look, another Great Sage died!”

“Is this guy human? And is he really a Legendary? He can actually stand up to Mammoth Force! And he's killing Mammoth Force’s Great Sage attendants!”

“My god! Am I dreaming?”

The host of experts who were watching the fight were visibly stunned.

“Echo Heaven, Mirror Earth!” Mammoth Force shouted in rage. Earlier, he had thought that a single flick of his finger could kill Yang Qi, only to find out that instead, Yang Qi was killing his subordinates with casual ease.

It was an utter humiliation which could completely ruin his reputation in the Hanging Mountain.

Rising up tall and straight, he locked down the air in the area, and then sent his axe flying along a profound trajectory toward Yang Qi.

“Ai!”

It was in that moment that a sigh echoed out, and a finger stopped the momentum of the axe. It was none other than Yan Wubing.

The vital energy in the area went calm, and the air turned still. White energy swirled out, quickly repairing the damage to the nearby teleportation portals.

“This is really unnecessary, Mammoth Force,” Yan Wubing said. “You and the young master have fought a few rounds already, and you obviously can’t defeat him. In fact, he’s started killing your attendants.”

“How dare you get in my way, Yan Wubing!” Mammoth Force shouted in rage as he dropped back down to the ground. Face crimson, he said, “And what's that supposed to mean, anyway? Are you trying to start a war between the Holy Mother and the August Patriarch?”

After taking a ragged breath, Yan Wubing said, “There are plenty of witnesses to what happened today. You said that if the young master could stand up to the single flick of your finger, then I wouldn't be held responsible for the death of Di Shidao. Well, you fought him for a lot more than the single flick of a finger. In fact, you even relied on a trump card technique you acquired from August Patriarch Mammoth Heaven, namely, Echo Heaven, Mirror Earth. You harmed your own lifespan to try to kill the young master, so don’t tell me you’re going to go back on your word now?”

Despite Yan Wubing's apparent weakness, no one had missed the fact that his emaciated finger had casually blocked the momentum of an immortal item.

Chapter 352: The Mammothfolk

Mammoth Force glared ominously at Yang Qi, and then back at Yan Wubing. It seemed like he was debating whether to keep on fighting, and the malice in his eyes couldn’t have been more intense. He had lost a huge amount of face, a humiliation that he couldn’t simply accept blithely.

However, after a moment, he let out a long breath which seemed to calm him down. “Your name is Yang Qi, right? You’ve made a big mistake here. But I need to take the high road, so I'm not going to stand around bickering. In the future, be careful. I know full well that you’re from the Rich-Lush Continent. Your whole family is still there, right? Piss me off, and everyone you know might get wiped out.”

“I dare you to do that,” Yang Qi said grimly. “If you touch a single person I know, or harm a single blade of grass in the Rich-Lush Continent, I’ll slaughter you. I swear it.”

Mammoth Force threw his head back and let out a stream of laughter. “You still think you’re a match for me? If old coot Yan hadn’t interfered, my Echo Heaven, Mirror Earth would have killed you, you puny Legendary. How dare you kill my subordinates! After besmirching my glory and might the way you have, if I didn't teach you a lesson, then people would think I'm a paper tiger. You just wait and see what happens eventually. It's not like old coot Yan is going to follow you around your whole life. Come on men, let’s go!”

With that, he turned and vanished, followed by his mumbling, cursing subordinates.

Yan Wubing watched them go. “Young Master, you seem to get more impressive by the moment. I wonder when you’ll finally reach the Great Sage level. Your humble servant really looks forward to that day.”

“It won’t be long now,” Yang Qi replied. Lowering his voice, he continued, “The truth is that I had to use every scrap of true energy I had to keep Mammoth Force in check just now. I'm really not a match for him. After all, he’s a high-level Great Sage, and my cultivation base is much weaker.” This was the conclusion Yang Qi had come to after the fight.

Mammoth Force was too far above him in cultivation level, and once he used that Echo Heaven, Mirror Earth energy art, Yang Qi really wasn’t a match for him. He would have lost, although, there was no way Mammoth Force would have succeeded in killing him.

“You’re right, Young Master, your cultivation level is just a bit too low. In the Hanging Mountain, Legendaries are considered ordinary disciples, and Lifeseizers are like servants. We follow the old ways, in which Legendaries are energy warriors, and are considered beginners in the ways of energy cultivation. Only when you reach the Great Sage level can you be considered a saint or sage. Young Master, please, follow me. I'm going to take you deeper into the Plateau of the Leviathan, to the perfect location to work on your cultivation. Plus, you can meet someone of very high rank here in the Hanging Mountain.”

“Sounds good,” Yang Qi said. “When do you think I’ll be able to see my mother?”

“She’ll be out of seclusion within the next few days. After everything has been arranged for you, we’ll notify her. I wouldn't be surprised if she comes out of seclusion early just to see you.”

“I can wait. After twenty years, what do a few days count for? Make whatever arrangements need to be made. Besides, I need to get to the Great Sage level as quickly as possible. I can tell that the Hanging Mountain is no place of peace and quiet. Unless I'm strong enough, I stand no chance of surviving.”

“It’s good you already understand that, Young Master. Most outsiders think of the Hanging Mountain as a holy land for the Demonfolk. And the truth is that the Demonfolk are in the majority. From ancient times until now, they’ve been a bloodthirsty and violent lot, very similar to devils. In fact, as far as many of us are concerned, there is little difference between a demon and a devil.” All of a sudden, a twinkle of pity flashed through Yan Wubing’s eyes. “In the end, we humans are the most orderly, moral, educated, and civil. Those are the areas where we are superior to demons and devils. The original sagely ancestor of humans actually invented the concepts of etiquette, virtue, and morals. He taught us how to keep desire and lust in check, which is the reason our grand culture flourished.”

Yang Qi shook his head. “Even in the Rich-Lush Continent, the law of the jungle prevails, and the weak are the prey of the strong. If you ask me, human culture isn't very moral at its core.”

“Well, the Rich-Lush Continent doesn’t count as a truly human civilization. Neither does the Quake-Dawn Continent. I’ve personally observed true human empires, ones that existed at the highest level of advancement. All of their citizens were refined, gentle and courteous. They cared for the elderly and nurtured the young. They weren’t interested in fighting and killing, nor did they compete with each other. Everyone lived peacefully, day in, day out, year after year. They were truly eternal paradises.”

Yan Wubing’s eyes seemed to lose focus, as though he were thinking about that life of eternal peace.

“Is my mother Demonfolk?” Yang Qi asked. “If the August Patriarch is a megamammoth, then it stands to reason that my mother would also have Demonfolk blood.”

“No,” Yan Wubing said, shaking his head. “She's human. And your father was human too. In fact, so am I. Like I said before, all types of living creatures are allowed in the Hanging Mountain, including humans. And any of them can become the Holy Mother or the August Patriarch. Although, from ancient times until now, the tradition was always for Demonfolk to take those positions. That’s why outsiders call this place a holy land of the Demonfolk. The truth is that, throughout history, the Demonfolk are only one major faction. Eventually, human sages and human immortals rose up, and some claimed to be guided by the legion of gods. That was when they announced that they were a different and unique people, separate from demons, devils, ghosts, and the like.”

“My mother is human? And my father too?” For some reason, Yang Qi felt a bit better. He had always lived among humans, and would have found it hard to accept that he was actually one of the Demonfolk.

Of course, by now, his blood was not that of humans, but that of the gods. And that went all the way down to his bones. But in the end, he preferred the culture and civilization of humans, not the bloodthirsty, cold, murderous lifestyle of the Demonfolk.

By this point in their conversation, Yang Qi and Yan Wubing had reached the depths of the Plateau of the Leviathan, where an enormous city rose up in front of them. It was a clean, orderly place, and although there were few people present, an immense energy lurked within it, as though this was a place where top experts would practice cultivation.

All of a sudden, before they could even reach the main gate of the city, Yan Wubing suddenly cried out in a loud voice.

“Father Leviathan! The young master is here! Why haven’t you come out to greet him? Get off that high horse of yours!”

As of this moment, Yan Wubing didn't seem sickly or weak at all.

RUMBLE!

The entire city vibrated, and a massive wave of true energy rolled out, creating a wide path for Yan Wubing and Yang Qi to walk along. As they headed into the city, Yang Qi could see that, at the end of the path, in the middle of the huge city, there was an old man with bright blue hair that draped down over his shoulders. His eyes were as blue as the ocean, and when he looked at Yang Qi, his gaze felt like the waves of the sea.

This old man was the Father Leviathan that Yan Wubing had just called out to. His name came from the fact that he was one of the Demonfolk, and was the incarnation of an actual leviathan.

Megamammoths and leviathans were similar. One was the largest type of animal on land, the other was the largest in the oceans. Both represented the ultimate level of strength. Furthermore, the entire Plateau of the Leviathan was the remains of an enormous leviathan from ancient times.

Among all the Demonfolk that resided on the Plateau of the Leviathan, it was obviously the leviathans who occupied the highest position of authority.

Father Leviathan was flanked by a group of Great Sages whose eyes flickered like lightning. All of them pulsed with demon energy, although theirs differed slightly from Father Leviathan’s. Yang Qi could sense the auras of tigers, snakes, cranes, and other wild beasts and birds.

“Young Master, this is the ruler of the Plateau of the Leviathan, the venerable Leviathan Truesoaring. Over here is Tiger Overlord, Snake Nine-Yangs, Crane Aeonson….” He went on to introduce everyone present. “Everyone here is a figure of note in the Plateau of the Leviathan, and also powerful and important in the Hanging Mountain in general. Furthermore, they’re all loyal to the Holy Mother. Young Master, you can further your cultivation here, and wait for the Holy Mother to come out of seclusion. You can also wait for word to come down from the heavens above about the upcoming training competition. Hopefully, you’ll be a Great Sage by the time that happens.”

The various demons rose to their feet in greeting.

“Well met, Young Lord.”

Apparently, it really was true that Yang Qi’s identity as the son of the Holy Mother was an open secret. The only one who didn’t rise was Father Leviathan. Cupping his hands in greeting, he gave Yang Qi an approving smile and said, “Well, you’re just what I expected to see of the Holy Mother’s son. You've lost her no face, that's for sure. I was watching your tussle with Mammoth Force, and the fact that you, a Legendary, actually stood up to him without being killed, well, that’s spectacular!”

“Senior, I wouldn’t dare to accept such flattery,” Yang Qi replied humbly.

“It’s no flattery,” Father Leviathan said. “That whelp Mammoth Force had no choice but to flee with his tail between his legs. He probably coughed up a whole stomachful of blood after he returned home. He’s violent, brutal, arrogant, ruthless, and completely cruel. You really put him in his place. Although, you need to be careful. He's the type who will seek revenge over the smallest grievance, and is no doubt already plotting a way to get back at you. We’ll do our best to keep you safe, but we can’t be by your side at all times.”

Another of the Demon Sages said, “You need to be especially careful over the next few days.”

“Many thanks for your words of counsel,” Yang Qi said. “I’ll keep that in mind. But if he’s the type that will seek revenge over the smallest grievance, then once I'm a Great Sage, I guess I’ll just kill him.” From Yang Qi’s tone of voice, it was as if he were talking about killing someone he thought to be as dangerous as a naughty toddler.

“That's the spirit!”

“This is exactly how the Holy Mother’s son should act! You know, you’re a lot like her. She wouldn’t show fear even if the sky were collapsing! Well, let’s see if you really can kill Mammoth Force after you’re a Great Sage. The megamammoths are natural-born fighters, so if you challenge him to a duel to the death, he won’t refuse.”

“I couldn't be happier that the Holy Mother’s son is like this.”

“I truly hope that you can defy heaven in the future. We’ve been getting a lot of pressure from the heaven above lately.”

“Hey, there’s no need to bring that up now. He’s only a Legendary! And even if he were a Demi-Immortal, he wouldn't be able to stand up to pressure from the heaven on high. He’d definitely need to advance into the dao of Demolishing first.”

“Alright, enough chatter,” Yan Wubing said. “Talk like this could bring tribulation down on our heads. I’ll go to the Holy Mother’s secluded meditation location to notify her of the latest updates. She’ll definitely be thrilled to hear about the young master’s debut in the Hanging Mountain.”

“Don't worry, we’ll care for the young master,” Father Leviathan said.

“I trust you, Father Leviathan,” Yan Wubing said. “In the Plateau of the Leviathan, no one is stronger than you. Of course, it would be a different matter elsewhere.” With that, Yan Wubing faded into the void, disappearing without a trace.

**

Some distance away from the Plateau of the Leviathan was a floating castle, in which Mammoth Force had devolved into a fit of rage. Slashing out with his enormous axe, he split an asteroid in two, unleashing a spatial tempest.

“Damnation! I have to kill that Yang Qi, no matter what!”

Chapter 353: The State of Affairs in the Hanging Mountain

“Young Master Force, please, calm down,” said one of his Demon Sage attendants. “We’ll have plenty of chances to take care of that brat. Now that he’s here in the Hanging Mountain, he’ll be rubbing shoulders with plenty of other disciples during training and evaluations. Besides, word came down from the heavens on high that they’re on the lookout for top geniuses. The winners will go directly to one of the heavens on high for more training, and of course, all of us will be participating in the competition. It will be a bloody affair in which we fight hordes of fiend-devils. Considering how dangerous it will be, it should be the perfect opportunity to kill that punk.”

Mammoth Force’s eyes lit up. “How come I didn’t think of that? The immortal world's training competition will be held in a dangerous hell, and the rankings will be decided by how many fiend-devils the competitors kill. It will be the perfect opportunity to make sure that brat disappears for good.”

“That’s right, Young Master Force,” said another of the Demon Sages. “All we need is the right plan. You have the blood of the ancient megamammoths, and people say that the megamammoths descended from the godmammoths. In the legends, godmammoths existed in planes far above the immortal worlds, and were created by the legion of gods to suppress hells. Because of that, Young Master Force, your blood is designed to be the bane of devil-gods. Once the training starts, and the passage to hell is opened, you’ll definitely have a huge advantage. You’ll surely rise to the top of the competition in no time.”

“You’re right. Whenever the immortal world opens a passageway to hell for training, I always benefit greatly from all the fighting. And what better way to take advantage of my official standing in the Hanging Mountain than to get rid of a rival? From what I heard, this competition is going to be far grander than any in the past. In fact, it's supposedly going to be held in a true hell, as opposed to some offshoot or lesser plane.”

Mammoth Force swung his axe through the air, and the resulting vibrations caused his Demon Sage followers to tremble in terror. His eyes were so filled with brutality and malice that he seemed to be on the verge of eating someone.

Shivering, one of his attendants said, “In previous training competitions, they always opened passageways to planes that existed nearby a hell. Are you telling me they’re actually going to send the competitors into a real hell? Hells and immortal worlds are both considered high-level planes! Sending us to a real hell would be like sending us to an immortal world! The danger would be incomprehensible. Young Master Force, please, don't treat this situation too casually.”

“It’ll be fine. This will be a great chance for me to make another breakthrough within the Great Sage level. In fact, I can't wait to see what a true hell is like. I wonder which one they’ll pick. Will it be the Hell of Suras or the Hell of Euphoria? Or maybe the Hell of Scorching Flame? The Hell of Never-Ending? The Hell of Mud Pits? Ah, it doesn’t matter. I'm excited either way! Tremble, oh enemies of mine!”

Leaping up, he swept his axe about, carving what appeared to be written text into the void.

“Young Master Force, your Echo Heaven, Mirror Earth is really incredible!” said one of the Demon Sages. The others echoed similar words, laying their flattery on as thick as possible.

“Although, we can't forget that Yang Qi is the son of the Holy Mother, and is a terrifying figure. I can’t believe that, as a Legendary, he actually managed to evade death at your hands, Young Master Force. I wonder how strong he’ll be as a Great Sage.”

“We can't let him achieve that breakthrough!” Mammoth Force shouted. “Run an investigation! Find out where he is. And think of a way to interrupt his cultivation. I don't care what rules have to be broken, he must be defeated!”

“I already looked into the matter. Yan Wubing took him to see Father Leviathan. I imagine that's where he's working on his cultivation.”

“Father Leviathan? The same one who runs that entire plane? In his element, he’s even stronger than Yan Wubing. His soul has already become one with the Plateau of the Leviathan.”

“Only a Demi-Immortal could hope to take someone like him out.”

“Father Leviathan is one of the Holy Mother’s most capable subordinates. I never could figure out how he got dragged into working for the Holy Mother, and on top of that, being so loyal to her. He’s a Demonfolk incarnation of a leviathan, and the Holy Mother is human!”

“It doesn’t matter. Keep an eye on Father Leviathan for me. If you can track down exactly where Yang Qi is, tell me, and I’ll make sure he lives a life worse than death.”

Whispering among themselves, the Demon Sages departed.

**

“What? You’re telling me that the Holy Mother brought her son to the Hanging Mountain, right out in the open? And that he’s the same famous Yang Qi who killed the Crown Prince and unified the Rich-Lush Continent under his rulership?”

Far away in outer space, there was an ancient, golden tree that was fully thirty thousand meters tall. At the very top of the tree was an enormous bird’s nest, constructed from what appeared to be golden branches with golden leaves. Closer inspection revealed that it was actually a palace of some sort.

From a distance, the tree actually seemed like a mountain that could cover an entire heaven and earth.

On some of the golden leaves of the tree were more densely packed bird nests, which were the dwelling places of numerous golden-winged rocs.

This was the lair of another famous Great Sage of the Hanging Mountain, an ancient heaven-roc named Great Sage Ultra-Heaven.

In Great Sage Ultra-Heaven’s palace in the ancient golden tree, a beautiful young woman sat on a throne, drumming her fingers. Standing in front of her was none other than Young Master Shroud-Heaven, who was treating her in very ingratiating fashion, giving her detailed information about all sorts of things.

This young woman was Great Sage Ultra-Heaven’s daughter. When she blinked, it was just possible to see that her eyelids were golden; she was the type of person who could be threatening without being angry, almost like she was an empress.

Even as Young Master Shroud-Heaven prepared to continue with his fawning, a blur entered the palace, which was someone moving as fast as lightning, accompanied by the rushing sound of wind.

A moment later, a young man appeared, clad in golden garments.

“Brother, what are you doing back?” the young woman said, rising to her feet.

“I just got some news, Saddharma,” said the young man in gold, his voice booming and sonorous. Considering the sagely might which emanated off of him, he seemed no less powerful than Mammoth Force. He was actually the heir of Great Sage Ultra-Heaven, his son, Roc Glory.

“Oh? What news?” Saddharma asked.

“Yan Wubing took the Holy Mother’s son to the Plateau of the Leviathan. He had a fight with Mammoth Force, and killed two of Mammoth Force’s Great Sages.”

Saddharma shook her head. “I can’t believe Yan Wubing is still that impulsive. He killed two of Mammoth Force’s attendants? Isn’t he worried about retaliation from the August Patriarch? It’s really strange that he would do something like that.”

“That’s not what I meant,” Roc Glory said. “Yan Wubing didn’t kill them. Yang Qi did. Yang Qi and Mammoth Force fought back and forth for a few rounds, and two of Mammoth Force’s attendants got killed in the process. The matter has caused a huge stir. What's most shocking of all is that Yang Qi is still a Legendary. I really want to lay eyes on him myself now.”

Saddharma’s face flickered with astonishment. “What? But Mammoth Force is a high-level Great Sage!”

At this point, Young Master Shroud-Heaven cut in and said, “Princess Saddharma, that Yang Qi really is an extremely rare type of genius. In the Rich-Lush Continent, the Crown Prince was often called a god from heaven descended into the mortal world. He was also a Great Sage, and yet, Yang Qi killed him. And that was even after the Crown Prince acquired the fabled command medallion of King Immortal-Slayer.”

Princess Saddharma frowned. “In the ancient mythologies, King Immortal-Slayer struck fear into the heart of the host of immortals. After he died, his command medallion was split into parts, and spread throughout creation. Even one part of that medallion would provide incredible good fortune. For the Crown Prince to have acquired one shows that he was truly extraordinary. In any case, if Yang Qi killed him, that means that Yang Qi must have acquired King Immortal-Slayer’s command medallion, right?”

Nodding respectfully, Young Master Shroud-Heaven said, “I'd say there’s an eighty to ninety percent chance he did. That’s got to be the reason he defeated Mammoth Force.”

Sitting back down on the throne, Princess Saddharma said, “Very well, I understand everything now, Young Master Shroud-Heaven. You’re dismissed. Before long, the immortal world will hold their competition to look for the top geniuses, and the passageway to hell will be opened. You need to get to the Great Sage level quickly to participate. If you perform well, the immortal world will surely reward you well.”

“You're absolutely right, Princess Saddharma. I’ll do my best.” Eyes flashing, Young Master Shroud-Heaven turned and left.

After he was gone, Roc Glory chuckled coldly and said, “That piece of trash is still after you, sister? This is definitely a case of the ugly toad lusting after the beautiful swan.”

“Enough of that talk, brother,” Princess Saddharma said. “When the time comes, let’s go see this Yang Qi. He's the son of the Holy Mother, after all, and she’s the leader of us female Demonfolk. Besides, she’s given me some advice that has been very beneficial to father.”

“You know,” Roc Glory said, “I’ve heard that August Patriarch Mammoth Heaven is behind some sort of scheme to harm the Holy Mother. In fact, I bet he’s in contact with the heavens above to have her deposed.”

“It will depend on who’s stronger between them. Ever since the Holy Mother mastered the Red-Dust Spectral-Dream Heart-Sutra, she became enlightened regarding the worldly affairs of the mortal realm, and the state of all creation. She understands the ways of the world much better than August Patriarch Mammoth Heaven. Right now she’s in seclusion, most likely to reach an even higher level of enlightenment. When she comes out, she’ll likely crush the August Patriarch into complete subservience. Besides, who cares about the immortal world above? They never send anyone down here to interfere with us.”

Princess Saddharma seemed to have complete trust and faith in the Holy Mother.

Roc Glory laughed. “You really admire the Holy Mother, don’t you, sister?”

“A true woman should strive to imitate the Holy Mother,” Princess Saddharma replied, her eyes flashing with unfeigned adoration.

**

Meanwhile, Yang Qi was listening to the blue-haired Father Leviathan explaining about the current state of affairs in the Hanging Mountain, and its relationship with the immortal worlds.

“The Hanging Mountain takes orders from the immortal worlds above. Titan Emperor Heaven, Clear Void Heaven, Birth Transformation Heaven….

“In the Hanging Mountain, there is no particular discrimination based on background. Humans, demons, ghosts, devils, spirits… they can all gather disciples and form organizations. But they all have to take orders from the will of heaven. They all have to exercise faith in some paramount entity from an immortal world.” Father Leviathan chuckled coldly. “What a pity that we cultivators value independence, which makes controlling us nigh impossible. Well, in any case, we can’t openly defy the heavens above, and therefore, we do things according to their will.”

Chapter 354: The Competition

Already, Yang Qi was getting a much better understanding of the situation in the Hanging Mountain, including some aspects which were not public knowledge.

As it turned out, the Hanging Mountain took orders, not just from a single immortal world, but from many. And the immortal worlds’ goal was to gain power from the will and faith of the people below them.

Unfortunately, there were powerful Great Sages and Demi-Immortals who didn’t wish to put their faith in others. They knew that cultivation was about independence and freedom. The focus was the self, and the proper attitude was: I am heaven, I am earth, I am the ultimate sovereign.

Putting faith in others could never lead to the ultimate heights of cultivation. That said, it was still necessary to follow the orders of the immortal worlds.

“Wait. You mean the Hanging Mountain takes orders from the immortal worlds, but doesn't exercise faith in them? How many immortal worlds are there in the universe?”

“We're not sure how many there are,” Father Leviathan said. “Perhaps as many as the grains of sand in the sea. Or maybe they exist without end. As for the Hanging Mountain, we are led by the Holy Mother and the August Patriarch. Beneath them are various elders, arhats, chiefs, majordomos and the like. It’s very much like a royal dynasty from the mortal world. For example, I'm like a feudal viceroy, with control over the Plateau of the Leviathan.”

“What about the lower-ranking disciples?” Yang Qi asked. “Is it like the Demi-Immortal Institute? Back there, the ranking went freshman, outer campus, inner campus, elite, conclave, and finally, at the top, the holy neophytes.”

“Well, that’s sort of complicated,” Snake Nine-Yangs replied. “There actually isn’t a set ranking system. It depends on which organization or faction you’re talking about. Normally speaking, the Hanging Mountain isn’t really united unless there’s a training competition organized by the immortal worlds, or perhaps some special activity that involves the mountain as a whole.

“In ancient times, the rules here were very strict, but things have loosened up in modern times. That’s amplified by the fact that there isn’t a single hegemon in charge of the entire mountain. The Holy Mother and the August Patriarch are always at odds, and that's not to mention the infighting between various factions and cliques.”

“What’s this training competition I've heard about?” Yang Qi asked. He had heard about the matter first from Emissary Red Lotus, and then from Yan Wubing. “Why are the immortal worlds recruiting from lower planes?”

“In this case," Father Leviathan said, "the competition is held by the immortal world which directly oversees us. Every so often, they have a training competition to look for new disciples, in the hope of finding promising individuals who will be loyal to them, and give them faith. Usually, the people who come out on the top of the competition are from the higher echelons in the Hanging Mountain.

“However, this competition is different from the others. Some of the winners will receive the title Child of Immortals, and will be directly imbued with power from the immortal world above. They’ll also be given a gift of godly-grade spirit stones, or perhaps immortal stones!”

“Godly-grade spirit stones!? Immortal stones!?” Yang Qi was completely taken aback. He had seen heavenly-grade spirit stones before, but never godly-grade. And that was not even to mention immortal stones.

Spirit stones were classified into low-, mid-, high-, supreme-, royal-, imperial-, sovereign-, sagely-, heavenly-, and godly-grades.

As for immortal stones, they also had their own classification system. But even the lowest-grade immortal stones were of much higher quality than godly-grade spirit stones. After all, immortal stones were normally used for cultivation purposes by immortals.

If Yang Qi could get godly-grade spirit stones and immortal stones, just how quickly could he advance? He was already virtually drooling over the possibilities.

“Senior Leviathan, how exactly does the competition work?” Yang Qi asked. “Martial arts duels? Free-for-all? And how many winners will there be?”

“Oh, no, it’s not like that,” Tiger Overlord replied. “It’s called a training competition, but the truth is it’s not an organized competition in the normal sense. The immortal world will create a passageway to a location where the competitors will slaughter fiend-devils. Of course, the higher-level fiend-devils are worth a lot more. The scores of each competitor will be magically inscribed onto a ranking chart which will be visible to everyone in the Hanging Mountain. At the end of the competition, whoever has the most points will be the ultimate winner.

“This time, the immortal world will open a passageway to a true hell, which is unusual. In the past, it was always a plane near to a hell, but not an actual hell. The top geniuses and talents from the Hanging Mountain will be participating, people like that Mammoth Force, so you’ll definitely need to be careful if you go. Of course, the unusual nature of the competition means that the prizes will be extraordinary. That’s one of the reasons the Holy Mother brought you here from the Rich-Lush Continent, for the express purpose of joining the competition. Hopefully, you can acquire that power from the immortal world, and live up to the Holy Mother’s expectations.”

‘So, that's how the whole thing works,’ Yang Qi thought.

As far as he was concerned, going to hell and killing a bunch of fiend-devils would be a simple task.

It was almost as if it was a competition designed specifically for him.

Snake Nine-Yangs shook his head. “Ai. Usually, it’s August Patriarch Mammoth Heaven’s people who have the advantage in the competitions. After all, they have the blood of the ancient megamammoths in them, and megamammoths are descended from godmammoths. Godmammoths are mythological entities even in the immortal worlds, as they were created specifically to crush hells. Fiend-devils are instinctively frightened of the aura of the Mammothfolk, and don't dare to attack them. If there is a fight, a megamammoth will always win against a fiend-devil of the same cultivation level.

“The Mammothfolk really are favored by heaven. They’re beyond demons, and almost like gods. That’s one reason why Mammoth Heaven is the August Patriarch. Even in the immortal world, megamammoths are considered the best of the best.

“There are plenty of other experts from Mammoth Heaven’s people who will be participating. In addition to Mammoth Force, outstanding individuals like Mammoth Mountain, Mammoth Spirit, Mammoth Cosmosking, and others. Even Mammoth Manyvoids will be there. All of them are stronger than Mammoth Force, and are currently in secluded meditation preparing for the competition.”

“The competition isn't far off, Yang Qi, so you need to get ready. It's going to be a gathering of top experts from all over the Hanging Mountain, and when the time comes, we won’t be able to help you. You’ll have only yourself to rely on. Going into seclusion here would be the best.”

“I understand,” Yang Qi said.

“Yang Qi,” Father Leviathan said, “in the depths of the Plateau of the Leviathan is a sea where you can practice cultivation. It contains the purest essence of the plane, and will be the perfect place to test out your strength.”

He waved his hand, and the spot Yang Qi was sitting on sank in.

In the blink of an eye, an unimaginably deep sea appeared, filled with endless waves. Within it swam fierce leviathans, sharks, and even fish-dragons.

As Yang Qi sank into the depths of the water, he ran into an aggressive leviathan.

The beast opened its mouth wide to swallow him, and yet he didn’t even look at it. Instead, he reached out with his hand, causing space to shrink rapidly, provoking an agonized shriek from the leviathan. Then, the sea around the leviathan transformed into crystal, which shrank down into a tiny sphere in the palm of Yang Qi’s hand.

This was still only the earliest manifestation of the Hand of the One God, but it was enough for this situation.

A moment later, the leviathan exploded, and all of its vital energy poured into Yang Qi.

Whoosh!

The vital energy had a very strange effect on him, and almost immediately, he felt the particles inside him stirring as if with thirst.

‘Great!’ he thought.

About the same time, Father Leviathan’s voice rang down from above. “Not bad, Yang Qi. This is the Sea of Illusions, an incarnation of the essence of the Plateau of the Leviathan. And that leviathan you just crushed to death was equivalent to a Great Sage. I have to say, I'm quite surprised. Now I understand the true extent of your fighting power. Go ahead and fight to your heart's content. The essence power of the Plateau of the Leviathan is endless, and the more leviathans you kill there, the more of it you can get. It should be able to push you into the Never-Dying Transformation. Once you gain understanding of the ultimate meaning of that transformation, you’ll be closer than ever to the Great Sage level. In fact, you might be able to completely skip the Half Sage level.”

“Many thanks,” Yang Qi said. “After I become a Great Sage, I won’t forget the kindness you’ve shown me today.”

With that, he sank further into the depths of the Sea of Illusions.

The place seemed to be both real and an illusion, all at the same time. The leviathans and other sea beasts in it were manifestations of the essence of the Plateau of the Leviathan, and were fierce to the extreme. They contained aspects of the will of the expert whose fallen corpse had created this plane to begin with. Any who entered the Sea of Illusions and was killed, would have their essence absorbed to strengthen the continent. Conversely, taking the essence of the lands by killing the leviathans was an excellent way to grow power.

In some ways, the Plateau of the Leviathan was like the Rich-Lush Continent, in that it was a continent that hoped to become a planet.

Father Leviathan had long since acquired the approval of the plane, and eventually hoped to not only push it into planethood, but also, use the resulting energy surge to reach the Demi-Immortal level.

Although Father Leviathan wasn't quite as strong as Yan Wubing, he did have ultimate control of the Plateau of the Leviathan.

And now, he was using the power of the lands around him to help Yang Qi and his cultivation.

The Never-Dying Transformation was profoundly connected to the magical laws of life and death. Upon reaching it, one's fleshly body would undergo drastic changes, and even if it were chopped up into tiny pieces, could still be put back together.

In fact, even if such a person were killed, they could be resurrected.

Hua Tianxiong was a good example. If he hadn’t been in the Never-Dying Transformation, it would have been almost impossible for Ghost Emperor Yama to reform his soul.

Back when Yang Qi had reached the Astral-Star Transformation, he had gained the ability to sense the magnetic fields within heaven and earth. And now, he would use that power, and the power of the stars, to gain enlightenment about what it meant to be ‘never dying’.

Chapter 355: The Holy Mother

Out in the void, in a location of utter darkness and gloom, with no stars or any light of any other sort, Yan Wubing strolled forward through the pitch black. At a certain point, he extended his finger, and a lamp appeared, casting light ahead of him, revealing a path.

It was narrow and cramped, and had apparently been hewn out by some almighty being.

On either side of the path, it was possible to see vicious faces, devil-ghosts who would let out spine-tingling howls, and try to break onto the path to consume whoever it was that bore the light.

Yan Wubing proceeded along the path carefully, not daring to touch the pitch-black ‘walls’ on either side. Occasionally, he would sigh, and occasionally he would cough. ‘The Hell of Gloom and Darkness is certainly powerful. But as long as I follow this passageway carved out by the Holy Mother, I should be safe. I mustn’t stray to the side, even a single pace. This hell is even more terrifying than the Hell of Suras. This is where the destruction god-devils are born. Even one of them can bring destruction to any location they visit. I wonder if this is the hell the Immortal World Assembly plans to use for the competition. The Holy Mother is here in seclusion, hoping to use her radiance and light to convert the darkness and gloom. The perseverance, compassion, and bravery required to do that is truly worthy of respect.’

As he continued onward, he slowly got the sense that there was an immense power ahead of him, a power of destruction and calamity that came from the most powerful of fiend-devils.

The fiend-devils from the Hell of Gloom and Darkness were called ‘destruction devil-gods’.

From the moment they were born, they thirsted to destroy the entire universe, and were known to be fiercer than asuras. After all, asuras had personalities. They were warlike and cruel, but at least they could be reasoned with. But the destruction god-devils had no sense of reason. They were completely insane and hysterical, with their only goal being destruction, and on top of that, more destruction.

Yan Wubing could sense that it was none other than destruction god-devils who were trying to bash their way into the passage he walked, and as a result, he didn’t let down his guard for an instant.

He was a ninth step Great Sage, just on the verge of becoming a Demi-Immortal. And yet, in the Hell of Gloom and Darkness, he was insignificant to the extreme.

Even true immortals who entered a hell like this would have to be careful.

Eventually, Yan Wubing reached the end of the path, where he saw a globe of sagelight casting illumination upon the surrounding hell. There were hordes of fiend-devils outside of the light, attacking it, hoping to break inside. And yet, when they were touched by the sagelight, it would purify them. This light was different from Yang Qi’s sagelight, which belonged to the Sovereign Lord, and had been used to create all things. This sagelight contained compassion, pity, and gentleness, like that of a bodhisattva who wished to alleviate the evils that plagued all living beings.

In the middle of the sagelight was a young woman whose facial features were obscured by the dazzling light. She sat completely still within the midst of numerous layers of the void, making it seem like she existed in a different aspect of space.

“Your humble servant offers greetings, Holy Mother,” Yan Wubing said, bowing deeply at the waist. “The young master just arrived from the Rich-Lush Continent, and is working on his cultivation with Father Leviathan. He hopes to reach the Great Sage level soon.”

A long moment passed, whereupon a voice drifted out of the sagelight. “Is Qi’er doing well?”

“Very well, Holy Mother. Ma’am, I think you’ll be very pleased when you’re finally able to lay eyes on him. He’s very strong; despite only being a Legendary, he can already kill Great Sages. Not even fifth step Great Sages can cause problems for him. To be honest, not even I'm sure what energy art he cultivates. Although… I’ve heard rumors….”

“Rumors? What rumors?” The Holy Mother's voice quivered as if with excitement.

Ducking his head, and keeping his voice down as if he might be overheard, Yan Wubing said, “Your humble servant heard that the young master cultivates a fabled godly-class energy art, something from the most ancient of times.”

“What?!” she exclaimed, sounding even more excited than before. “A godly-class energy art? In the planes of the immortal worlds, there are as many immortal skills as the grains of sand in the sea, but godly-class energy arts surpass them all. How did Qi’er get one? Are you sure about this?”

Yan Wubing ducked his head down even further. “Your humble servant isn’t completely sure. And I didn’t see him in action. However, I could sense an incomparably boundless power in him, something that could devastate the nine heavens. I didn’t dare to probe him for more information. But I can tell you that the level of power surpassed any of the August Patriarchs of the Hanging Mountain, or even the will of the heavenly worlds. In fact, I don’t even dare to speculate how powerful he is on a substructural level. Perhaps it’s because, after killing the Crown Prince, the young master took the legacy of King Immortal-Slayer.”

“Really?! When did that happen? The legacy of King Immortal-Slayer is not something easily acquired, and it almost always leads to immortal ascension. Except, such successors are considered enemies of the host of immortals, and as such, almost always die violent deaths. Although, if my son was capable of killing a successor of King Immortal-Slayer, then that means he bears the power of someone who is stronger than King Immortal-Slayer. I’ve heard of that Crown Prince. Considering he died in the Great Sage level, I guess he was never destined to succeed King Immortal-Slayer.”

“You couldn’t be more right, Holy Mother. Only the fabled legion of gods, who exist in the depths of the universe’s cycle of reincarnation, could possibly contend with King Immortal-Slayer. It seems to me that the young master must have acquired the legacy of the legion of gods, they who look with disdain upon the immortal planes. Even a scrap of that type of legacy would be shocking to the extreme. If it’s true, Holy Mother, then you can rest at ease. The young master will definitely grow up to fulfill all your expectations.”

Suddenly, the Holy Mother let out a long stream of rage-tinted laughter. Then, she spoke to someone who clearly wasn’t present. “Oh, you heartless man. Never in your wildest dreams could you have guessed that the object of your deepest desire would end up in the hands of the son you hated and despised. I wonder how you would react if you found out.” She chuckled coldly. “Your son acquired the most ancient of legacies, and now has the blood of the legion of gods. He commands honor that surpasses your own by millions and millions of times. How will you face your son now that he is connected to the gods?”

“Holy Mother, please, sate your anger,” Yan Wubing said. “You should be happy, no? In the past, the young master was weak, and despite having the potential to be a dragon, could only associate with the loaches and eels. But not anymore. He’s growing up. You know, soon he’ll want to know the truth about his past….”

A moment passed. When the Holy Mother spoke again, she seemed to have calmed down a bit. “You’re right, Yan Wubing. Thank you for taking such good care of my son. When I'm out of seclusion, I’ll do everything in my power to help you reach the Demi-Immortal level. That's the least I can do considering your years of service. In the meantime, announce publicly that my son killed the Crown Prince, and took the legacy of King Immortal-Slayer.”

“I’ll handle everything, Holy Mother. Whatever orders you give me, I’ll carry them out to the letter.”

“What do you think about Qi’er joining the training competition? I’m worried that Mammoth Heaven’s people will cause problems for him. Considering that the competition will be in a dangerous hell, it would be the perfect opportunity for them to try to kill him.”

“I think he’ll be fine,” Yan Wubing said. “He seems very confident, and when he fought with Mammoth Force, he didn't even sustain a single blow. Right now the young master is in seclusion trying to achieve a breakthrough. I suspect he’ll reach the Great Sage level soon, or at the very least, step past the Never-Dying Transformation. Considering that, I don’t think he’ll have any trouble taking care of himself in hell. In my assessment, the young master is the type of person who likes to think things through, and won’t take action unless he’s confident in succeeding. Remember, he killed the Crown Prince, unified the Rich-Lush Continent, and even drove Chancellor Demi-Immortal away.”

“Chancellor Demi-Immortal is a top genius. I met him once, you know. He reached the Great Sage level in only a few thousand years, and seemed poised to become a Demi-Immortal. My son actually sent him running? How did he manage that?”

“It must have been that enormous power lurking in him.”

“Perhaps. Once I'm out of seclusion, I’ll examine him and see exactly what type of transformations he's undergone. Go. You shouldn’t stay in the Hell of Gloom and Darkness for too long. And I can only keep this pocket of light going temporarily.”

“Very well. I’ll take my leave.”

**

Smack!

As Yang Qi sank deeper into the Sea of Illusions, he destroyed another leviathan and absorbed its true energy.

His blood was transforming, and he could sense his true energy vibrating, creating some sort of resonance with heaven and earth, as well as the magnetic field which existed therein. Once he aligned himself perfectly with that magnetic field, drastic transformations would occur.

“The magnetic field of heaven and earth; the empyrean sun and moon. The transformations of ghosts and gods; the empyrean and the baleful. Heaven and earth differ; the stars all differ. The Never-Dying Transformation; the reversal of the spiritual and physical souls….” Suddenly, rumbling sounds erupted from Yang Qi as he locked onto the magnetic field of heaven and earth, and began to undergo a dramatic transformation.

The Never-Dying Transformation was difficult to break into, and was the final obstacle within the Legendary level.

In ancient times, it was the final level for energy warriors, and was the last step before becoming a sage. Considering it was called “Never-Dying”, it was possible to imagine how difficult it was. And that was especially true for Yang Qi, who needed to build up incredible reserves before attempting breakthroughs.

All of the Demon Sages were closely watching Yang Qi’s transformation, and all of them were thinking the same thing. ‘That energy is astounding! I wonder what the young master will be like when he breaks through.’

Chapter 356: Trouble Brewing

‘The magnetic field of heaven and earth nearly defies comprehension. I don’t even understand how to connect to it.’

As Yang Qi sank into the Sea of Illusions, and continued to absorb the essence of the Plateau of the Leviathan, he built up vital energy, and continued to probe the fluctuations of heaven and earth around him. He was pushing the Astral-Star Transformation to the limit; within the God Legion Paradise, the constellations burned with radiance and light, as if an entire host of stars were in the greyspace of the domain.

Although the Astral-Star Transformation was about gathering the power of the stars, there was actually only one primary reason to do so, and that was to gain enlightenment of the magnetic field of heaven and earth.

And now, Yang Qi had his divine will pushing into that magnetic field, and grasping at its power. Unfortunately, no amount of effort on his part led to any significant progress.

The strength of the fluctuations of his own true energy were such that it seemed impossible to combine them with heaven and earth. Every time he tried, he failed. The magnetic field’s fluctuations were strong, however, Yang Qi’s true energy was that of the legion of gods, and thus, was even stronger than that.

In fact, it was too strong!

The situation was like trying to use a long, thin hair to wrap up a sharp sword. No matter how carefully one worked, the sword would always end up slicing the hair apart.

Most people had problems because the fluctuations of the magnetic field were too intense, and the slightest mistake could result in one’s fleshly body being ripped to shreds.

But Yang Qi was very different. The slightest mistake on his part would result in the fluctuations of heaven and earth shattering.

All he could do was work very hard to gain further enlightenment of the magnetic field and the fluctuations.

It required finesse and painstaking care. It was like reeling silk from the cocoon.

As he worked, and as his power built, Yang Qi realized that a new magnetic field seemed to be forming around him in the God Legion Paradise. The constellations in the greyspace shone with dazzling light, as if a new world were coming to be within the Sea of Illusions.

“Crap!”

Father Leviathan murmured, his expression flickering.

He could sense the city around him trembling, and the essence of the Plateau of the Leviathan vibrating, as though it were acknowledging allegiance to Yang Qi’s personal domain.

“What’s going on?”

“Has he failed to break into the Never-Dying Transformation?”

“No, the young master is just too strong. His true energy fluctuations surpass the natural laws of this heaven and earth. He can’t align himself with the magnetic field, and thus, is having trouble stepping into the Never-Dying Transformation. His true energy is so strong that the magnetic field is actually submitting to it! He’s actually taking control of heaven instead of becoming one with it.”

“Oh, so that’s how it is.”

“What a genius! Someone like him hasn’t been seen in the Hanging Mountain for countless years!”

“Unfortunately, he’s too strong, and this plane is too weak. The magical laws of heaven and earth aren’t enough for him, which means that he can't achieve his breakthrough!”

“You’re right! That level of power can’t be sustained by this plane, and thus, can’t lead to a breakthrough.” Father Leviathan shook his head. “Yes, but what plane could possibly work for him? We need to send him to an immortal plane, otherwise, how will he reach the Never-Dying Transformation, let alone the Great Sage level?”

“What?! He needs to go to an immortal plane?”

“But we count as the mortal world. How could we send him to an immortal plane? Are you saying the young master is literally never going to be able to achieve another breakthrough?”

“Not even Demi-Immortals can just go to an immortal plane. Only by reaching the Demolishing level and becoming an immortal can one break through the barriers and do such a thing.”

“Not necessarily.”

“What do you mean by that, Father Leviathan?”

“Have you forgotten about the training competition?” Father Leviathan said. “The immortal world is opening a passage to a hell plane, which is where the competitors will fight and earn points. Think about it. Hell planes are just as stable as immortal planes. They have incomparably high magical laws which would be perfectly suited for a breakthrough. Geniuses like the young master only come around once every several million years or so. If he can’t achieve his breakthrough here, he’ll have to do it in hell.”

At first, Father Leviathan had called Yang Qi by his name, instead of calling him young master. But after he saw what was happening in the Sea of Illusions, he experienced a change of heart. Considering that even the Plateau of the Leviathan was willing to submit to Yang Qi, how could admiration not grow in the heart of Father Leviathan?

And thus, he took to calling him ‘young master’ instead of just ‘Yang Qi’.

Although Yang Qi was not very strong compared to him now, once he reached the Great Sage level, it would be a different story.

‘The young master isn’t very strong right now,’ Father Leviathan thought as he stared at Yang Qi working on his cultivation in the Sea of Illusions. ‘But I can sense something wildly powerful in him, something that could shatter immortal worlds. Even just looking at him causes my heart and mind to tremble. Just what terrifying thing is lurking in him?’

Father Leviathan was very, very close to being a Demi-Immortal, and thus, could sense the might of the God Legion Seal inside Yang Qi. However, that was only because of the fundamental difference in their cultivation base. Once Yang Qi became a Great Sage, it would be impossible for Father Leviathan to detect such things.

The power he sensed actually caused him to feel a bit envious.

At the same time, it was unfathomable and impossible to comprehend. For some reason, Father Leviathan was sure that if the power erupted out of Yang Qi, nobody in the Hanging Mountain could match up to it. Not even the August Patriarch and the Holy Mother combined could do so.

Deep in the Sea of Illusions, Yang Qi slowly exhaled.

‘This isn’t going to work,’ he thought. ‘Not a single megamammoth particle has awoken. My breakthroughs are getting harder and harder, it seems. The magnetic field of heaven and earth here is just too weak. It seems I’ll need to go to hell to make the next attempt.’

By this point, it was obvious to Yang Qi what was going on.

It wasn’t that he was too strong, it was that this heaven and earth was too weak, and couldn't conform to him. It was really a strange situation.

“Come up, Young Master,” Father Leviathan said. “It’s to my shame that I must admit you won’t achieve any cultivation progress here. You’ll have to wait until the training competition.”

Sighing, Father Leviathan pulled Yang Qi up out of the water.

“There’s nothing that can be done about it.” Yang Qi said. “I had no idea it would be this difficult.”

“We truly look forward to seeing how strong you’ll be as a Great Sage.” Father Leviathan and the other Demon Sages were all sighing. “The competition is only half a month away.”

“Don't worry, I’ll put on a good show,” Yang Qi said. “I'm the son of the Hanging Mountain’s Holy Mother, and there’s no way I’ll lose face for her.” Yang Qi was now fully convinced that the Demi-Immortal leader of the Hanging Mountain truly was his mother. If she wasn’t, why would this group of Great Sages be acting so respectfully toward him?

Now more than ever, he wanted to meet his mother face to face.

**

RUMBLE!

In a castle which hung in outer space, Mammoth Force slashed his huge axe through the air, opening up a huge rift. Instantly, lightning shot out of the rift, and the vital energy of heaven and earth transformed into primal-chaos. Again, Mammoth Force chopped down with his axe, and the primal-chaos vital energy took the shape of mountains, rivers, lakes, and hills.

“Congratulations, Young Master Force,” one of the Demon Sages said fawningly. “You've mastered an even higher level of axe technique.

“You’ll achieve another cultivation breakthrough any time.”

“Is there any news from the spies about Yang Qi? Has he provoked any tribulation within the Plateau of the Leviathan? When people like him achieve breakthroughs, it always causes a big scene. There’s no way he succeeded without anyone noticing.”

With that, Mammoth Force flung his axe over his shoulders.

Flinching in response, the Demon Sage quickly replied, “Young Master Force, we have people in the Plateau of the Leviathan keeping an eye on him. Not even a fly would go unnoticed by them, but they haven’t reported any vital energy fluctuations. It seems no tribulation has descended whatsoever.”

“Oh? So you’re saying that punk hasn’t achieved a breakthrough? He failed, and yet still plans to join the training competition? Seems to me he doesn’t qualify. The minimum requirement is to be in the Great Sage level. A Legendary who joined would definitely end up getting killed.” Mammoth Force suddenly burst out laughing. “Although, if he doesn’t join the competition, I'm not going to be able to kill him. So I hope he does. No one will be the wiser, either. I’ll take the legacy of King Immortal-Slayer from him, that way, when my father becomes a Demolisher and ascends to the immortal plane, I’ll be the next August Patriarch. When I am, I’ll definitely put the Holy Mother to death! With her gone, I can unite the entire Hanging Mountain! It’s been a long time since the Hanging Mountain had only one ruler.”

“Congratulations, Young Master Force. May your rule last for ten thousand years! Not only will you unite the Yore-Wilds planetary system, you’ll soon go on to the Brute-Wilds, Waste-Wilds, and Proto-Wilds…. You’ll become the only leader of the entire star system, until the immortal worlds fawn over you!”

The Demon Sages all offered such brown-nosing compliments.

Mammoth Force simply laughed contentedly.

Half a month blurred by. Yang Qi remained in the Plateau of the Leviathan, and although he gained much enlightenment, he didn’t achieve any breakthrough. Thankfully, he now understood much more about his personal domain, the vital energy of heaven and earth, the world, space, and even a bit about time.

Father Leviathan and the other Demon Sages gave him tips and advice, holding absolutely nothing back.

Of course, thanks to the God Legion Seal, Yang Qi instinctively knew much about hell, and even had access to scattered memories of primeval infernal deities.

In fact, his discussions with the Demon Sages often left them shocked at his knowledge. Father Leviathan had previously assumed that since Yang Qi came from a low-level plane like the Rich-Lush Continent, he would be lacking in wisdom and understanding. However, Yang Qi had access to enlightenment from infernal deities, and was very familiar with all sorts of hell-born fiend-devils. To them, it seemed like he was an actual devil-god from hell.

Chapter 357: The Competition Begins

During the half-month of interaction with Yang Qi, Father Leviathan and the other Demon Sages got to know Yang Qi quite well, and soon, they felt like they were dealing with a deva from heaven.

And of course, they all sincerely took him to be their young master. They were happy that he was the son of the Holy Mother; it meant there was hope for her faction. He had incredible potential, and was no hedonistic silkpants. He was like a sleeping lion who, upon awakening, would be completely and utterly invincible.

Of course, Yang Qi benefited significantly during the half-month that passed. Father Leviathan and the other Great Sages all had extensive experience and knowledge, and were able to provide detailed explanations to Yang Qi about a variety of subjects, and answer many questions.

Yang Qi took all of that knowledge and assimilated it, making him even more stable in his current level, and advancing his enlightenment to the ultimate degree.

He was truly coming to understand what it meant to be Never-Dying.

However, he was now absolutely convinced that the only way to break through to the final transformation of the Legendary level was to enter hell.

The current heaven and earth was just not suitable, and that was no fault of his own.

“The most critical aspect of the Great Sage level is understanding of magical laws.” At the moment Father Leviathan was explaining important information about the Great Sage level.

“In some ways, it's similar to reaching the Never-Dying Transformation in that it involves becoming one with all creation. That is how the most ancient of daoist texts describe the process of becoming a sage. Surpass the mortal and enter the saintly. The combination of man and dao. The first step in the Great Sage level is about further strengthening the fusion with one’s magnetic field. The personal domain must have a life force magnetic field, to make one able to live and never die. Even if one is chopped into countless bits, as long as a single drop of their quintessence-blood is left, that person can be born again. It’s actually a higher state than the Never-Dying Transformation. Because of that, the first step is called the Born Again Step. It's reminiscent of the ancient phoenixes who were reborn in fire.”

“Senior Leviathan, thank you very much for your detailed explanation,” Yang Qi said enthusiastically. “What about the second step of the Great Sage level?”

“The second step involves sending one’s nascent divinity mark out into the void and outer space. After finding the correct location, you brand your mark upon it. Later on, if you die, you can achieve nirvanic resurrection, and start a second life from out in the void. Because of that, this step is called the Nirvanic Resurrection Step. As for the third step, it involves taking one’s power and incarnating it as countless particles within one's body, each one of which could be reformed into a whole body. This is the Eternal Sands Step. According to the stories, the kingdom of the ancient legion of gods had an eternal river filled with sand, which is the origin of the name. A Great Sage in the Eternal Sands Step will have incredible magical powers of incomprehensible might. Young Master, it seems to me that you already have particles in you, each of them a unique entity of sorts. It’s actually very similar to the Eternal Sands Step. I find that extremely marvelous.”

Thanks to Father Leviathan’s detailed explanation of the Born Again Step, Nirvanic Resurrection Step, and Eternal Sands Step, Yang Qi’s eyes were sparkling with enlightenment.

“Young Master, allow me to continue with further explanation,” said Snake Nine-Yangs, who had started out his cultivation as a heaven-snake. “The fourth step goes even further. It's called the True Real Step, and involves scattering one's vital energy to become particles, which can each become a separate incarnation. In this way, it is possible to create true and real things out of the void, or transform one thing into another. For example, water could be used to create oil. Stone could become metal. Or, one’s vital energy could be turned into spirit stones. Cultivators with these powers are exceptionally strong, and can summon energy weapons that become absolutely real. For example, Young Master, that spear of yours can already kill Great Sages, but when you reach the fourth step, you can turn it into something real.”

“The fifth step is about gaining enlightenment of the domain of time,” said Tiger Overlord. “Space pertains to the magical laws of immortals, but time belongs to the legion of gods. Gaining enlightenment of the magical laws of time actually violates the dao of heaven, and thus, this level is extremely difficult. If you succeed at it, you can call yourself a high-level Great Sage. This step is called the Light King Step, because light is the physical manifestation of time, and of course, kings are entities who control everything. In any case, the domain of time involves controlling light, and thus, some people call the fifth step the King of Light.”

“Time is light. Light is time. The King of Light. The Light King. So, it's about controlling time.” As Yang Qi tried to digest the information, he realized that he felt like someone who had just entered the Energy Refinement phase of the Energy Arts level.

After all, energy warriors were very different from sages.

Crane Aeonson furthered the explanation. “The sixth step is about gaining enlightenment of the workings of heaven. One refines and tempers one’s psychic abilities, and begins to contemplate the past, present, and future. Such individuals can divine information about energy arts, the fate of individuals, and such things. It's called the Heavenly Workings Step. Cultivators in this step are not to be trifled with. First, they have a very deep understanding of heaven and earth, just like the cicada who can sense the coming of fall before the first autumn wind blows. People like that can perceive deep secrets about energy arts, and can turn the foul and rotten into the rare and ethereal. They can take ordinary energy arts and use them in spectacular and mighty ways.

“Seventh step Great Sages continue to gain enlightenment about the power of the planets. Because of that, it's called the Planet God Step. They can control entire planets with ease, even crushing or refining them into objects of their own desire. Or, they can push them to higher levels of existence, even ensconce them with god-spirits. Great Sages such as this are truly terrifying. With Planet God power, they can easily travel among the planes of the universe. The eighth step is called the Without Limit Step and the ninth is the Epic Saga Step. As for those two, they’re difficult to explain. It would be better to wait until you reach them before trying to understanding them. In fact, not even we really comprehend their true nature.”

Father Leviathan shook his head. “As for me, I'm in the ninth step, the Epic Saga Step. That said, Yan Wubing has an even more profound cultivation base than me. He’s already started to produce immortal motes. I’d say he’ll reach the Demi-Immortal level sooner rather than later. In contrast, I'm not even able to gather immortal energy yet.

‘Born Again, Nirvanic Rebirth, Eternal Sands, True Real, Light King, Heavenly Workings, Planet God, Without Limit, Epic Saga….’ Yang Qi reviewed all of his newfound knowledge, information which would be of immense help going forward.

Each of the nine steps was harder than the one before it. Now, he knew why he could kill Great Sages in the fourth True Real Step; it was because, thanks to the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, he had eight hundred forty million particles in him, which made him very similar to Eternal Sands Step cultivators.

That was one of the invincible aspects to this godly-class energy art of his; even in the Energy Arts level, it actually contained elements of the Eternal Sands Step.

With all of this new information, Yang Qi felt more confident than ever, and knew that he just had to continue working hard at his cultivation.

After the Great Sage level was the Demi-Immortal level, and then, the Demolishing level, and after that, the Godmyth level, which was something Yang Qi could hardly think about at the moment. That was something that only immortals could strive for.

Right now, the top priority was to get into that hell, reach the Never-Dying Transformation, and after that, break through to the Great Sage level.

Unfortunately, his current cultivation base was nowhere near strong enough to break through the barriers of a hell plane. Besides, he had experienced hell monsoons, and even that level of power was terrifying.

The mere vibrations of a hell could cause hell monsoons, which were themselves strong enough to destroy planes and planets. From that, it could only be imagined how terrifying a true hell must be.

Thankfully, he simply had to wait for the training competition to begin, and the immortal world to open a passageway to hell.

Dong!

Ding Dong!

Even as Yang Qi was discussing matters with the Demon Sages, the sound of tolling bells reached their ears. The bells were so loud that everything trembled visibly, and everyone who heard them knew that they were a summons of sorts.

With that, Father Leviathan and the others rose to their feet. “Young Master, the time has come to go to Mount Sumeru, the main peak of the Hanging Mountain. When the Sumeru Bell tolls, its sound will echo out for several days and nights, to reach countless planes of existence. It is the official summons from the immortal world. Starting today, people from distant planetary systems will come to participate in the training competition. Come, we’ll lead the way, Young Master. This will be a good opportunity for you to learn about who the top geniuses are. Some of them will be from the Quake-Dawn Cathedral, with whom you already have a grudge. However, most of them took hundreds of years to reach the Great Sage level; none of them can match your speed, Young Master. You only took a short twenty years to do almost the same thing. Perhaps it has something to do with how, when the Holy Mother was pregnant with you, she cultivated the Red-Dust Spectral-Dream Heart-Sutra, and eventually lost her energy arts.”

Yang Qi also stood, and for some reason, it seemed as if the Plateau of the Leviathan as a whole were respectfully sending him on his way.

As for Father Leviathan and the others, they also looked at him with deep respect, as though he were someone very, very important.

And in fact, he was becoming just that.

With that, they flew up into the sky, with Father Leviathan leading the way toward a certain space-time wormhole, which was as blue as the sea. In the blink of an eye, they disappeared into it.

After the time it took an incense stick to burn, they emerged from the other end, and Yang Qi saw an enormous golden mountain hanging in the middle of the darkness up ahead.

This was the main peak of the Hanging Mountain, Mount Sumeru. Of course, Sumeru was a reference to an enormous mountain of the gods from the distant past.

Mustard seeds are incredibly small. And thus was born the saying about a mustard seed which contains Mount Sumeru, which was also used to describe people with extraordinary abilities. After all, how could the world’s smallest thing contain the world's largest thing?

As soon as Father Leviathan looked around, he exclaimed, “Look. There are so many people gathered in front of Mount Sumeru!”

Already, the top experts of the times were gathering in the area.

Chapter 358: Outstanding Heroes Gather

From what Yang Qi could see, Mount Sumeru was about as large as ten Quake-Dawn Continents put together, and it glowed brighter than a conglomeration of countless stars. It was almost like a sun, shining with golden light that became a golden tempest for millions and millions of kilometers.

However, the pure, golden light was actually a different color than the gold of his Heaven-Dominating Golden Swordbreaker. This gold was as cold as ice, and deadly in nature, like the pure metallic energy from the west that could kill white tigers.

The gold from the Heaven-Dominating Golden Swordbreaker was different, being domineering and grand.

Yang Qi reached out and grabbed a stream of golden light, to find that it was like razor-sharp sword energy that cut painfully at his skin.

Thankfully, his skin was incredibly tough, and it didn’t manage to slice it open.

“Such incredible vital energy,” he murmured. “If this mountain were used like a weapon, it could turn anyone into ash. It’s completely beyond the power of the Rich-Lush Continent’s Planar Pearl.”

“Mount Sumeru was created by an immortal in primeval times. Not even the August Patriarch himself can single-handedly wield its power. It requires a Holy Mother and an August Patriarch working together, backed by the power of over ten thousand Demon Sages. When unleashed, it can kill Demi-Immortals. It's because of Mount Sumeru that the Hanging Mountain can be the holy land that it is.” Father Leviathan sighed. “Unfortunately, nowadays, not even the combined forces of the entire Hanging Mountain are enough to activate it. We have no way to achieve the glories which we were capable of long ago.”

Yang Qi nodded, then looked around at the tide of people flowing toward Mount Sumeru from all directions. “There are so many people here,” he said.

There were all sorts of people present, including humans, demons, ghosts, and even devils. He saw some people who looked exactly like humans, except that they had wings, who were presumably the fabled Aeriefolk. There were giants, the same type who had worked as servants back in the Demi-Immortal Institute. They were none other than the ancient Giantfolk. And there were hosts of demons, who resembled creatures of all sorts, including bears, lions, horses, birds, centipedes, scorpions, spiders, butterflies, and the like. The Demonfolk congregated in groups according to their kind, and looked excited to attend this grand, universal meeting of sorts.

Suddenly, a foul wind picked up, filled with gritty, yellow sand. Then, an old man appeared, his body covered in golden fur, with a golden crown on his head. He was tall and burly, and radiated a sensation of mightiness.

“Well well, Father Leviathan, look at you!” he said. “You’ve finally taken a break from trying to reach the Demi-Immortal level and left the Plateau of the Leviathan. What are you doing here? Are you escorting someone to participate in the training competition? I heard the Holy Mother’s son came from the Rich-Lush Continent. Don’t tell me this is him? He's not even a Great Sage! How could he possibly take part in the training competition? He couldn't even enter the hell where the competition will take place.”

At a single glance, Yang Qi could tell that this old man radiated the aura of a king of beasts.

“Hello, Chief Lion,” Father Leviathan said. “You’re loyal to the Holy Mother, correct? Hurry up and offer greetings to the young master here.”

“Young master? More like young piece of crap!” said the old lion, spittle flying out of his mouth as he talked. Glaring ferociously at Yang Qi, he said, “This illegitimate bastard has no right to call himself ‘young master’. Sophistry, that's what it is! Only chaste virgins can become the Holy Mother! How could she possibly have a son, huh? Is she intentionally spurning the rules of the Hanging Mountain?! As the chief of the Lionfolk, I’ve already reported this matter to the heaven above. Let's see how the Holy Mother explains the situation, once she's out of seclusion.”

“Illegitimate bastard?” Yang Qi said, and immediately, he began to build up his true energy as if to unleash it in a mighty attack. He could tell that this old lion's cultivation base was no weaker than Ghost Emperor Yama, and as such, was beyond him. But to be openly insulted like this meant that the Lionfolk were openly declaring themselves his enemy. “Listen, you old codger, thanks to your insults, your Lionfolk are all going to die!”

He clearly wasn’t willing to back down even an inch.

“Hybrid son-of-a-bitch!” Chief Lion growled, his killing intent surging, and his golden mane suddenly flaring around him. Whoosh! Without any warning, he sent a beam of sword energy flying toward Yang Qi’s head.

However, Father Leviathan simply stepped forward, grabbed the sword energy, and crushed it into nothing. “Are you tired of living, old lion? How dare you insult the young master! So, you’re going against the Holy Mother. You’re only an eighth step Great Sage, you know. The Without Limit Step is powerful, but if you don’t back down, I’ll arrest you and make sure your Lionfolk become the lowest of the low among the Demonfolk.”

“Oh yeah?” Chief Lion chuckled contemptuously. “I admit your cultivation base is higher than mine, Father Leviathan. But you don't have what it takes to simply arrest me. You want war between the Leviathanfolk and the Lionfolk? If so, that’s fine with me.”

Suddenly, a peal of laughter rang out between them. “If the Lionfolk and the Leviathanfolk go to war, then the Leopardfolk will definitely side with the Lionfolk. In fact, so will the Rhinofolk and the Horsefolk.”

Powerful auras surged as a group of Great Sages joined the conversation, all of them chiefs of the Demonfolk.

One was a leopard, one was a rhino, and one was a horse.

With these three Demonfolk chiefs siding with the old lion, they had demon energy that could shake the heavens and topple the earth.

As for the chief of the Leopardfolk, he radiated an acrid aroma, and was clad in a resplendent suit of spotted armor. He held a spear in his hand, and had vicious claws. The way he looked at people, it seemed like he was getting ready to eat them, and would strike fear into the hearts of anyone who saw him.

The chief of the Rhinofolk looked like a tall, burly man covered with a thick, black pelt. When he clenched his fists, the void around him would collapse from the sheer force.

The chief of the Horsefolk was similarly vicious, and wore a terrifying helmet. His aura was extremely vigorous, and although he was clearly old, he was obviously full of energy.

Four Demonfolk chiefs were all standing shoulder to shoulder.

Lion. Rhino. Horse. Leopard. Their people were all prominent and numerous among the Demonfolk, and the chiefs wielded incredible power.

However, Father Leviathan merely shook his head. “That's it. You four? None of you are even in the ninth step. Even if you joined forces, what would be the point? You would still be useless vermin. Fine. The Holy Mother entrusted me to care for the young master, and since you insist on insulting him, let’s fight. I'm curious to see how strong you four chiefs really are.”

“Why are you being so rude and unreasonable, Father Leviathan? So what if you used the power of the Plateau of the Leviathan to reach the Epic Saga Step? Although we Sharkfolk and you Leviathanfolk are both sea creatures, it won’t be long before we take control!”

Unexpectedly, the chief of the Sharkfolk was inserting himself into the scene.

He had a long, pointed head and a mouth full of sharp teeth that glittered like swords. He was fierce to the core, and was glaring at Yang Qi as if he were prey to be devoured.

“So, you’re here too, Chief Shark.” Father Leviathan chuckled coldly. “The Leviathanfolk and the Sharkfolk have never gotten along. But even in ancient times, we held the superior position. We’re the kings of the sea, and trying to fight us for that position would be pointless. Alright. I, Leviathan Truesoaring, will fight all of you. Lion. Rhino. Horse. Leopard. Shark. Bring it on.”

“There’s no need for the rest of you to team up. I’ll handle this situation.”

WHIZZZ!

All of a sudden, an enormous dual-crescent-bladed halberd slashed through the void, followed by an enormous white ape with golden eyes. He was as burly as a mountain, and even the slightest quiver of his halberd seemed capable of removing the head of any enemy.

“Ape Heavenhelve!” Father Leviathan said, his expression flickering. As for Yang Qi, his heart began to beat a bit faster than normal. This Ape Heavenhelve was far larger than the other chiefs, and in fact, was roughly as tall as Father Leviathan. Furthermore, considering the faint immortal energy that seemed to pulse off of him, it was obvious that he was an Epic Saga Sage, just like Father Leviathan.

“It's the Chief of the Apefolk!”

Some of the passing Demon Sages noticed that some of the top figures among the Demonfolk were having a bit of a standoff, and they stopped to see what would happen.

The other Demonfolk chiefs who were staring down Yang Qi and Father Leviathan were all eighth step Without Limit Sages. Essentially, ‘Without Limit’ meant that they had boundless power, and could release their energy arts to devastate and dominate everything in existence. There was no limit to what they could do, and they were essentially invincible.

To put things in perspective, one could consider Ghost Emperor Yama and Chancellor Demi-Immortal, who were in the seventh step. Planet God Sages like them were far, far beneath Without Limit Sages.

In the Great Sage level, passing from the seventh step and into the eighth was a key accomplishment. Those who could make the leap, and successfully reach the Without Limit Step, were considered invincible. Those who failed, would have to slink with their tail between their legs.

Because of that, in the Hanging Mountain, all eighth step Great Sages were famous people, and generally speaking, chiefs of the various Demonfolk clans.

When it came to Epic Saga Sages, they were big shots among big shots. The only people above them were the Demi-Immortals like the August Patriarch and the Holy Mother, who were considered venerable demon-immortals.

Of course, other than the August Patriarch and the Holy Mother, demon-immortals didn’t stay on the Hanging Mountain, but instead, traveled far and wide, searching amongst the various planes of the universe for the true meaning of what it meant to be immortal.

Right now, there were so many Demonfolk converging on the Hanging Mountain that they were like streams of ants. Even still, to see a large group of eighth and ninth step Great Sages was no small matter, and was quite eye-catching.

“Look, that’s the chief of the Apefolk, Ape Heavenhelve. And that’s the chief of the Leviathanfolk, Leviathan Truesoaring. Looks like they’re having an argument about the Holy Mother’s son.”

“I can't believe the Holy Mother’s son is so weak. He's only a Legendary?”

“Don’t underestimate him just because he’s a Legendary. His cultivation base is beyond belief. He kills Great Sages like it’s as simple as eating rice or drinking water. He fought a few rounds with Mammoth Force, and casually cut down some of his Great Sage followers.”

“What?! Mammoth-Force? But he's a fifth step Light King Sage! How could a Legendary stand up to him? Are you sure you weren’t hallucinating?”

“I think that story is fake. That said, he did kill that famous guy from the Rich-Lush Continent who they called the Crown Prince. And he also got King Immortal-Slayer’s command medallion. With the powers of that medallion, it wouldn’t be surprising if he were able to kill Great Sages.”

Chapter 359: Power Struggles

Yang Qi hadn’t even considered that a situation like this would arise.

The Lionfolk, Leopardfolk, Rhinofolk, Sharkfolk, and Horsefolk were all openly aligned against him, and they were joined by a ninth step Great Sage Apefolk chief, Ape Heavenhelve. To most people, this group could be considered completely invincible and domineering.

Considering that so many Demon Sages wanted him dead, and he was only a Legendary, most onlookers assumed that he would soon begin groveling in terror. However, Yang Qi was the successor of the legion of gods, and had the God Legion Seal in his forehead. Even Demi-Immortals who trifled with the God Legion Seal would be killed, and even more telling, the seal was getting more powerful as he furthered his cultivation.

“Step forward, Leviathan Truesoaring. You’re the chief of the Leviathanfolk, and I'm the chief of the Apefolk. Both of our peoples are considered top forces in the Hanging Mountain.” The hulking chief of the Apefolk pointed his halberd at Yang Qi, and his killing intent erupted with boiling rage. “However, you’re protecting that brat, and I want him dead. Believe me, not even the Holy Mother could protect him right now.”

“Ai!” sighed Father Leviathan. “Why are you throwing your lot in with these villains, Ape Heavenhelve? What did the Holy Mother’s son ever do to you?”

“He killed a member of my clan!” Ape Heavenhelve replied coolly. Looking like he was about to cut Yang Qi in half with his halberd, he said, “Did you or did you not kill a white ape in the Blackcorpse Mountains in the Rich-Lush Continent? Did you ransack his mansion grotto? Did you steal his golden pills?”

All of a sudden, Yang Qi remembered something that happened a long time ago. Back when he first got the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, he went into the Blackcorpse Mountains to train, and encountered a white ape, who he later killed. The fight with that ape was his first real battle, and it had been a struggle to come out on top.

Later, he packed the memory of the fight away as something of little importance. But now, to hear it brought up by this chief of the Apefolk was like a bolt from the blue.

“Wait a second,” he said. “You, chief of the Apefolk, a top figure from the Hanging Mountain, just so happened to have a puny relative in the Rich-Lush Continent?”

Ape Heavenhelve threw his head back and laughed heartily. “Yes, I did. You were in the Rich-Lush Continent, weren’t you? And you're the son of the Holy Mother. Why are you surprised that a relative of mine would be in the Rich-Lush Continent? The white ape that you killed was a direct descendant of mine. He was my thirty-sixth grandson! Thankfully, his corpse was discovered and the evidence brought directly to me. Now you tell me, did he deserve to die at your hands!?”

“Deserve to die? Well, he attacked me. What else was I supposed to do?” Suddenly, Yang Qi’s expression flickered. “In this world, life and death are common things. Gratitude and grudges exist everywhere. Some people kill others, some people get killed. We see such things all the time. Hmm. Could it be possible that you want to kill me for another reason, and are just using this as an excuse? If you want to kill me, well, bring it on. You might be an Epic Saga Sage, and I'm only an Astral-Star Legendary, but I'm not scared. Besides, you couldn't kill me even if you tried.”

Yang Qi didn’t seem flustered at all, and in fact, he was completely calm.

Quite a few onlookers clicked their tongue in admiration.

“Well, that’s just what you would expect from the Holy Mother’s son. Considering how calm he is right now, it's obvious he’s no silkpants. He definitely climbed mountains of corpses and swam through seas of blood to become an Astral-Star Legendary. However, he's basically the same as an ancient eighth rank energy warrior, which is pitifully weak. I can’t believe that he’s actually standing up to an Epic Saga Sage. The two of them are on completely different levels.”

“He’s probably just bluffing. After all, he has Leviathan Truesoaring there to keep him safe.”

“I don’t think so. Even if he’s relying on Father Leviathan to protect him, he couldn’t possibly remain so calm. The levels here are just too far apart.”

“I agree. There’s too much of a disparity. Ape Heavenhelve’s psychic pressure alone is so strong that most people couldn’t stand up to it.”

“He’s definitely not bluffing. After all, he already killed some of Mammoth Force’s Great Sage followers. Considering he’s already stood up to fifth step Great Sages, it just goes to show that he's obviously the successor of King Immortal-Slayer.”

“Maybe, but Ape Heavenhelve is really worked up. There’s no way he’ll back down until Yang Qi is dead. If Leviathan Truesoaring were in the Plateau of the Leviathan, he would definitely be able to trounce Ape Heavenhelve. But here, they’re both just ninth step Great Sages. Besides, Ape Heavenhelve is the best of the best among the chiefs of the Hanging Mountain. He already has immortal motes!”

“That's right, nobody’s a match for Ape Heavenhelve, at least, not unless the Holy Mother herself shows up.”

“Let's just wait and see what happens. The Holy Mother made a big deal about bringing her son here to join the training competition. That in itself is a violation of the rules.”

“It is. The Demonfolk in general aren’t happy with her, and want nothing more than to kill this Yang Qi. Besides, he provoked Mammoth Force, and you know who he is, right? He's the son of August Patriarch Mammoth Heaven. It’s hard to say for sure, but I wouldn't be surprised if these chiefs have come to cause trouble for Yang Qi because of that incident!”

“Actually, that might be the case. Hey, look! Mammoth Force is right over there. He’s heading this way!”

A cheer could be heard from off in the distance as Mammoth Force appeared, flanked by his Demonfolk followers. All of the members of his retinue were first step Great Sages, and were relatively famous individuals among the Demonfolk. Actually, many of them were new recruits. Even though first step Great Sages were essentially nobility in the Hanging Mountain, it was still difficult for them to rise through the ranks.

The higher one progressed in the Great Sage level, the more difficult it became to acquire the spirit stones necessary to make progress. At the very least, they would need imperial- or sovereign-grade spirit stones, and preferably sagely-grade.

Some Great Sages even required heavenly-grade.

And how could ordinary Great Sages get their hands on such resources? The only way to do so was to attach themselves to an important person.

Laughing derisively, Mammoth Force said, “Well, if it isn't Yang Qi! Still on that ego trip of yours? The chief of the Apefolk wants you dead, and it’s no wonder; your mere existence is an insult to the Hanging Mountain!

“Although, you still have a chance to make it out of this alive. Hand over King Immortal-Slayer’s command medallion. I know that the only reason you can kill Great Sages is that medallion. If you give it to me, I’ll plead your case with the chiefs, and ask them to merely cripple your energy arts and turn you into a commoner.”

“Well, you can just die, then,” Yang Qi said.

“What did you just say?” Mammoth Force replied, his eyes widening. “You want me to die?”

“Exactly,” Yang Qi replied. “Don’t even think of coming back from the training competition alive. Right here, in front of all these people, I hereby openly challenge you to a fight to the death in hell. I'm only in the eighth Legendary transformation, a puny, measly Astral-Star Legendary. But I'm not afraid of you, even if you are a Light King Sage.”

A buzz instantly rose up from the crowd. Humans and demons alike were completely taken aback by Yang Qi. His cultivation level was low, but he had heart, and even more importantly, was obviously stronger than the average person.

“You just committed suicide!” Mammoth Force said angrily.

“Calm down, Mammoth Force,” said Ape Heavenhelve. “You don’t need to wait until the two of you are in hell to kill him. I’ll send him to hell right now! Yang Qi, you’re the son of the Holy Mother. However, she should never have had a son. And therefore, I will execute you to remove this humiliation from the Hanging Mountain. If word got out to cultivators from other important planes or planetary systems, or to the numerous daoist temples, then we would become a laughingstock.”

Hefting his halberd, he began to stride forward, causing enormous cracking sounds to emanate out, as if he planned to crush all heaven and earth beneath his feet.

“In that case, noble sir,” Father Leviathan said, “I suppose I have no other choice than to engage you in deadly combat.” Waving Yang Qi away, he said, “Stay clear, Young Master.”

“You think you can protect him?” Ape Heavenhelve said, laughing loudly. “The mere fluctuations of our energy arts will likely kill him. You can’t keep him safe!”

Cough….

It was in that very moment that a weak cough suddenly echoed out off in the distance. Although it wasn’t very loud, it caused everyone present to suddenly stop moving. Even Ape Heavenhelve suddenly looked around very seriously.

“There’s no need to be deliberately mystifying, Yan Wubing. Show yourself. I know that you’re a human, and that you're completely loyal to the Holy Mother. Back when you tried to reach the Demi-Immortal level, you experienced cultivation deviation, and were saved at the last minute by the Holy Mother’s Retroconversion Cosmic Reversal Immortal Skill. From then on, you became her flunky. Back when the Hell of Euphoria invaded the Yore-Wilds Continent, you might have outranked me. But you're a human, and therefore, our daos are different, and our fundamental natures, irreconcilable.”

“Yes, I'm old,” Yan Wubing said as he appeared off in the distance. Striding up to stand next to Yang Qi, he said, “But Young Master Yang Qi is the flesh and blood of the Holy Mother. Thanks to her, I was given a new lease on life, and therefore, nobody is going to harm a single hair on the young master’s head.”

“If that's your attitude, then you can die along with him!”

All of the white fur on Ape Heavenhelve’s body stood on end, making him look even more ferocious than before. “Yan Wubing, you’re the top follower of the Holy Mother, with a cultivation base better than virtually anyone in the Hanging Mountain. And everyone knows that I'm the top subordinate of the August Patriarch, also the best of the best. So that leaves an important question: which of us is number one, and which is number two? Why don't we find out right now?”

“If that’s what you want, fine,” Yan Wubing replied, completely unperturbed. “Young Master, you stay close to Father Leviathan. He’ll keep you safe. In the meantime, I’ll get rid of this damn monkey for you.”

“Be careful, Senior Yan,” Yang Qi said. “Although, you won’t lose. I bear the will of the legion of gods, and their glory will bless and protect you. Their will brings a holy paradise with it wherever it goes. Ashes to Ashes, Dust to Dust. That Which is Evil Will Perish; That Which is True and Real is Deathless. That Which is Glorious, Exists Eternally in the World of Men.”

As he spoke, he waved his hand, sending a stream of sagelight out to cover Yan Wubing. A droning sound could be heard as some boundless will connected with the old man. In the blink of an eye, Yang Qi had transferred some of the enlightenment of the God Legion Seal to Yan Wubing. It wasn’t the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, only some scattered aspects of information and enlightenment. But it was from the legion of gods in heaven on high, and was ten times anything he had given to Ghost Emperor Yama.

RUMBLE!

A look of shock played out on Yan Wubing's face, then thoughtfulness, and finally, enlightenment.

“Young Master! Sir, you….” In that moment, he realized the truth. Yang Qi had not been bragging or exaggerating. He truly did have the will of the legion of gods in him, something that vastly surpassed anything from the host of immortals.

Chapter 360: Battle of Experts

“Young Master, you’re just like the Holy Mother. You’ve blessed your humble servant with a new lease on life. I'm not going to forget this, Young Master.” Yan Wubing's face shone with enlightenment. He looked like a weary traveler who, in the middle of a pitch-black night, had suddenly caught sight of the light of an inn up ahead. Thanks to the sagelight given by Yang Qi, questions he had pondered for a long time were suddenly answered. The glory of the legion of gods made everything clear.

When a person with a cultivation base as powerful as his received sudden, profound enlightenment, it always came with a terrifying increase in power.

Crick. Crack…. All of his joints began to creak. His bones extended, and filled with more life force than before. He immediately stopped coughing, and his skin grew smoother and more lustrous. He almost looked like he had reverted to a younger version of himself.

He even began to pulse with a strong immortal energy.

No longer was he stooped and withered. His hair was long and black, and his eyebrows were like swords. His eyes seemed like they could pierce heaven above.

‘After all these years,’ he thought, ‘I finally feel like I might achieve another breakthrough.’

In the briefest of moments, Yan Wubing changed from being a sick old man into a strapping youth, capable of shouldering heaven and earth, an immortal-spirit capable of fighting relentlessly and without stop.

“The glory is from the legion of gods, but the strength is your own,” Yang Qi said, his heart as calm as could be. Raising his voice, he said, “Faith in the Legion of Gods Will be Rewarded; Betray the Legion of Gods, and Lose Everything.”

RUMBLE!

Yan Wubing clenched his hands into fists and then struck a ready fighting pose. In response, heaven and earth trembled as though they might explode and change back into primal-chaos.

‘He’s about to break through!’ Father Leviathan thought, shocked. ‘His lifespan is close to rivaling that of heaven. That means that soon, there will be a place for him in heaven!’ Shocked, Leviathan Truesoaring looked at Yang Qi and then back at Yan Wubing. ‘It was actually the young master who helped Yan Wubing break through his shackles, and head even closer to the Demi-Immortal level? This is crazy! Who… who is the young master exactly?’

Yang Qi was currently settling down cross-legged to watch events play out, with a very enigmatic and profound look in his eyes.

“We’re going to end this right now, Ape Heavenhelve!” Yan Wubing said. “You’ve profaned the name of the young master, and for that, you will die!” Without any warning, he extended his fingers, changing his hands from fists to knifehands.

Suddenly, heaven motes swirled around his hands in eye-catching fashion. In the blink of an eye, Yan Wubing seemed to connect on numerous levels with heaven and earth.

Then, he began to stride forward, his hands swirling through the air with infinite variations. Finally, they settled back into twin knifehands which slashed forward, ripping apart the air as they moved toward Ape Heavenhelve.

‘What's going on? How did things change so quickly?’ A look of shock overtook Ape Heavenhelve’s face as he said, “What is this, Yan Wubing? And you, Yang Qi… what are you doing?!”

As the chief of the Apefolk in the Hanging Mountain, Ape Heavenhelve had devoted plenty of resources to investigating Yan Wubing, and thought he knew him well. Therefore, these sudden changes had caught him completely off guard.

However, it only took him a moment to collect himself, clear his mind, and brandish his dual-crescent-bladed halberd.

Ape Heavenhelve was an Epic Saga Sage, and not the type of person who would make casual slip-ups in a fight. In the blink of an eye, he was already immersed in a state of battle-readiness.

“Seven Stances of the Heavenly Plow!” His halberd suddenly resembled an enormous plow, hewing enormous rifts into space itself, out of which poured numerous gigantic apes, all of which could perform incredible feats of martial arts.

Bam!

Yan Wubing’s knifehands smashed into the halberd, sending meteor-like sparks showering out in all directions.

Aaaiiiieee!

Some of the nearby Demon Sages were too slow to dodge out of the way, and when the sparks hit them, they were instantly transformed into ash. Everyone else who saw that immediately fled as quickly as possible.

Leviathan Truesoaring was sure to keep Yang Qi safe, but at the same time, kept his eye on the fighting.

As for Yang Qi, he also watched closely, taking note of every single attack unleashed by either party. As space shattered around them, it almost seemed like they were fighting in slow motion, but at the same time, with the speed of lightning. After all, both of them had personal domains that could interfere with time itself, which made observing them a tricky task. In the end, Yang Qi was forced to open his Lord's Eye, which revealed everything with perfect clarity.

Yan Wubing and Ape Heavenhelve fought back and forth, slowly rising higher and higher into the air as they did.

A serene look could be seen on Yan Wubing’s face; his true energy flowed with ease, and his quintessence energy surged. It almost seemed like he was connecting to an immortal plane, causing immortal energy to surge down and bolster his attacks.

“Fine, Yan Wubing. Considering you’ve broken through to this level, I'm not going to hold anything back! Echo Heaven, Mirror Earth!”

RUMBLE!

Ape Heavenhelve suddenly resorted to another powerful divine ability. He hunched over, howling at the top of his lungs as his eyes began to glow like suns and moons. Then, his forehead split open to reveal a third eye, which erupted with golden light, slamming into his halberd and releasing a stream of blood-colored magical symbols, which swirled behind him to take the shape of nine pairs of enormous wings.

“Bloodflow Wings!”

In that moment, Ape Heavenhelve’s energy suddenly seemed to surge high enough to rival that of Yan Wubing’s.

“Echo Heaven, Mirror Earth is an ancient divine ability of the Mammothfolk,” Yan Wubing said. “You’ve studied it too, I see. Seems you really have made a deal with August Patriarch Mammoth Heaven. So that's why you want to kill the young master. Sadly for you, I'm here.”

“I'm going to kill you and that young master of yours!” Ape Heavenhelve said. Then he spat out a stream of blood that turned into a river. Stepping onto the river, he threw his head back and roared, causing the stars to shake, and wild energy to surge out from every hair that covered his body. In that moment, he seemed to connect with countless planes in the universe, as though every hair on him was a space-time wormhole reaching out into the depths of heaven and earth.

“See if you can handle this move. Apefolk Ascendant: Multitudinous Phenomena!”

He slashed out with his halberd, and flapped his Bloodflow Wings.

Yan Wubing’s only reaction was to unleash another fist strike.

Bam!

The fist struck the halberd, and then Yan Wubing’s fingers slid into the shape of a hook, which latched onto the blade, completely locking it into place.

“Uproot Mountains and Rivers!” Ape Heavenhelve shouted, tugging at the halberd with shocking force. As he did, all of his fur stood on end, making him almost look like an enormous porcupine.

WHOOSH!

He finally managed to wrench the halberd out of Yan Wubing’s grasp, and then stab it back toward the man’s forehead. Clearly, he wanted to hit him in the ancestral aperture, and exterminate his soul.

And yet, Yan Wubing didn’t dodge to the side. Instead, he just reached out again, grabbed the razor-sharp blade of the halberd, and shoved it to the side.

The force of the move transformed the blade into nothing more than ash.

“Be broken!” he said, taking another step forward. With that, he struck the haft of the halberd, shattering it. In the blink of an eye, the weapon was completely destroyed.

Having no time to contemplate what move to use next, Ape Heavenhelve shouted, “Heaven-Propping Pillar!”

All of a sudden, the sky seemed to rip open, and a huge pillar appeared, rising up as if to prop up heaven, surrounded by swirling flows of azure energy.

This was none other than one of the Heaven-Propping Pillars that supported the sky.

And yet, Ape Heavenhelve leaped up, reached out with his hand into the plane which had just opened up, and actually grabbed onto the pillar. Then, he wrenched it out into the open, which made it seem as though all of the primal-chaos vital energy in the area might collapse.

“I've been training with this Heaven-Propping Pillar for thirteen hundred years in a unique plane of existence. Who would have thought that I would need to summon it early to drink of the blood of an Epic Saga Sage? Don’t blame me for this, Yan Wubing. In the face of my Apefolk Ascendant technique, you’ll become nothing but a stepping stone for me.”

With the Heaven-Propping Pillar in his hands, Ape Heavenhelve’s white fur turned golden, making him seem completely and utterly holy.

“The Golden Monkey Raises his 30,000 Catty Staff, Clearing the Dust and Creating a Sparkling Sky!”

Ape Heavenhelve struck out with the enormous pillar, with force that vastly surpassed anything he had unleashed with the halberd before. After all, the Heaven-Propping Pillar was a precious treasure of the Apefolk, and one of their most ultimate weapons. It was designed to crush heaven and earth.

In an instant, the crushing power was descending onto Yan Wubing.

Yan Wubing looked up placidly at the descending Heaven-Propping Pillar, then extended his hand. As he did, the eight trigrams and nine palaces appeared in his palm, making him seem like a primal-chaos elder-god.

Bam!

His hand clamped down onto the Heaven-Propping Pillar.

The chiefs of the Lionfolk, Sharkfolk and others were all stunned to the point where their scalps tingled.

“This….”

“Is that the fabled Primal-Origin Battle God Fist?”

“It is! That's a lost art that once belonged to the Humanfolk of primeval times, supposedly created by Celestial Primal-Origin. Each strike from that fist art can sunder heaven and crush earth! I can’t believe that Yan Wubing successfully mastered it!”

“The Heaven-Propping Pillar is a precious treasure of the Apefolk, forged in a special plane by sacrificing numerous god items! Only the most elite experts could possibly wield it. And yet, Yan Wubing stopped it with his bare hand? How strong is he?”

“Strong. Too strong! He’s reached the level in which aging is reversed, and one changes from being old to being young again. How did this happen? Don’t tell me it was the Holy Mother’s son! That brat is only an eighth level energy warrior, so how could he possibly channel planetary power into another person?”

“The mere thought is terrifying.”

Around this time, a group of Demon Sages from the Rocfolk appeared, including Roc Glory. And when he saw what was happening, he shivered in terror.

Chapter 361: Hell Opens

Roc Glory of the Rocfolk looked at his sister Princess Saddharma and said, “Sister, look, there’s Yang Qi right there, behind Leviathan Truesoaring. He's not even moving. Considering the situation, that's something you’d expect only of Great Sages. It looks like Yan Wubing just experienced a substructural breakthrough. Yang Qi gave him something via sagelight. I'd say there’s a high likelihood it’s some move from King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy.”

Then he looked back up into the shattered sky, where Yan Wubing and Ape Heavenhelve were currently fighting.

Princess Saddharma looked at Yang Qi, but all she could see was someone of a lower level than her, sitting there watching the battle via the third eye in his forehead.

But then, Yang Qi seemed to sense her eyes on him, and he shifted his gaze to meet hers.

When their eyes met, Princess Saddharma suddenly felt like she was falling into a boundless hell, filled with a multitude of infernal deities, all of them fighting viciously with various gods, immortals, and monarchs. It was like the ultimate battle between light and darkness. Above them all was the boundless Sovereign Lord, looking down with pity. Somehow, that Sovereign Lord was none other than Yang Qi.

A moment later, Princess Saddharma awoke from her nightmarish reverie to find herself soaked in sweat, and Yang Qi looking at her with a faint smile.

Averting her gaze, she said, “Brother! Is that Yang Qi really the son of the Holy Mother?”

Roc Glory looked in surprise at his sister, and noticed the expression on her face. “I don’t see how he could be anyone else. Only the Holy Mother could give birth to a son like him. What, you think he isn’t?”

Princess Saddharma shook her head. “The Holy Mother couldn’t possibly have given birth to him. I just locked eyes with him, and used my Heaven-Roc God Magic to try to look at his nascent divinity. But then I sensed a true will of the most awe-inspiring and righteous nature, something that must never be offended. That true will exceeds anything from the immortal worlds!”

“It must be the will of King Immortal-Slayer.”

RUMBLE!

Even as the Rocfolk settled in place, the fight between Yan Wubing and Ape Heavenhelve heated up. Ape Heavenhelve’s Bloodflow Wings were flapping madly, sending a blood-colored river surging forth. He also swung the Heaven-Propping Pillar like mad, causing primal-chaos to spread everywhere, and immortal motes to shine brightly.

Meanwhile, the youthful Yan Wubing only seemed to be building momentum. As he fought, numerous ancient images appeared behind him, featuring ghosts, gods, immortals, and spirits. Every strike of his Primal-Origin Battle God Fist made him seem like a god from heaven descended into the mortal world, capable of destroying all creation to found a new one of his own.

Even as Ape Heavenhelve lashed out again with his Heaven-Propping Pillar, Yan Wubing clenched both hands into fists and then bowed at the waist, almost as if he were offering worship to heaven.

“King of Battle Gods!” he said.

Instantly, the image of the enormous king of battle gods appeared behind him, who then roared, “The Battle Gods Cometh, and Rebirth Ceases; the Dust Becomes a Dragon, the Six Movements of Heaven and Earth.”

RUMBLE!

In the blink of an eye, a chiliocosm of worlds seemed to stir with six types of motion. With Yan Wubing at the center, a flurry of heavenly flowers, golden lotuses, swords, magical devices and countless other oddities appeared, swirling like a rainstorm. Then, just as quickly, they vanished into Yan Wubing’s fist.

SNAP!

Yan Wubing punched the Heaven-Propping Pillar, which shrank in on itself. Dragon-like power entered into Ape Heavenhelve, causing a spray of blood to emerge from his mouth, and his eyes to burn with rage.

He had been seriously injured.

Yan Wubing’s expression didn’t change at all. He took in a breath that caused everything to tremble, almost as if he were about to inhale the entire sky. Even Mount Sumeru began to shake, and the golden streams of light which shone off of it began to converge on Yan Wubing.

The stars in the sky seemed to tremble as though he might even absorb them, and at the same time, millions of wormholes opened, allowing streams of power to flow into his dantian region.

All sorts of strange energies were converging on Yan Wubing, who seemed just about to explode with tempestuous violence.

“DIE!” he shouted, converging all of the destructive power into a single punch.

Instantly, everything went dark. All light vanished, even that of the stars, and the golden glow of Mount Sumeru. It was almost as if this fist strike had obliterated the mountain itself.

Ape Heavenhelve looked at the incoming attack, and his eyes shone with terror. He suddenly realized that this fist strike had both heaven and earth locked down completely, and that there was no way for him to dodge or escape.

All he could see within the darkness was Yan Wubing’s two, cold eyes, out to take his life.

This fist strike would definitely end Ape Heavenhelve’s life.

“Enough!” a voice said. As it swept the darkness and gloom away, a figure appeared on Mount Sumeru. Shockingly, he had an elephantine head and a human body, and looked like he was made from gold, as if he were a buddha or a god. Instantly, a wind swept forth that froze everything in the area, and once again ensured that Mount Sumeru was dominant in all creation.

Yan Wubing’s energy art was scattered, and he stepped back a few paces. Looking over at Mount Sumeru, he said, “August Patriarch Mammoth Heaven.”

Yang Qi slowly rose to his feet.

As he did, the God Legion Seal in his forehead stirred as if with thirst. Apparently, it wanted the blood of this entity with an elephantine head and a human body, as if it might come out on its own volition to do so.

Yang Qi even realized that he was physically shaking with the desire to go take that blood for his own.

The descendants of actual godmammoths were simply too potentially useful to the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.

As soon as August Patriarch Mammoth Heaven appeared, he stopped the fighting between Yan Wubing and Ape Heavenhelve. For most people, it was impossible to even make him out clearly; he was just too glorious. Whether he was a god or an immortal, it was hard for them to say. This was the might of the Demi-Immortal level, which vastly surpassed the power of Great Sages.

“Have you had enough fighting? If so, then the time has come for the immortal world to set up the ranking list, and open the passageway to hell.” Raising his voice, he announced, “All disciples who enter the training competition will receive the mark of the immortal world, which will keep track of how many fiend-devils they kill. The Immortal World Assembly will use the score to establish who the top geniuses are, and how they’ll be rewarded.”

“Sir, yes sir!” the various Demonfolk chiefs replied in loud voices.

Yan Wubing and Ape Heavenhelve didn’t say anything.

“Young Master,” Leviathan Truesoaring said. “Soon, the summoning talismans from the immortal world will descend. All of us have taken part in this type of training competition. Everyone gets the right to participate ten times, no more. We old-timers have already used all of our entrance rights, and therefore, the competition today will be among the younger disciples.”

“So, that’s how it is,” Yang Qi said, nodding. It made sense. If there weren’t limited rights of entrance, then the chiefs and eccentrics of the various demon clans could join, which would be very dangerous for people like him.

“Young Master,” Yan Wubing said. “You have to be extremely careful in there. Once you’re in that hell, don’t go around fighting with people. Find a safe place to reach the Great Sage level. Only afterward will you be out of danger. There will be a lot of competitors, including plenty from the Mammothfolk. And they’re virtually invincible in there.”

“I know,” Yang Qi said.

Even as they spoke, an enormous heavenly eye appeared high in the sky, radiating the aura of immortal planes. It was an eye that none of them could possibly resist, and even Yang Qi didn't dare to act rashly in its presence.

All of the surrounding Demonfolk remained stock still, and didn’t dare to make the slightest sound.

Immortal will erupted from the heavenly eye, and Yang Qi felt like his heart and mind were rising into the air. A moment later, he managed to calm himself.

RUMBLE!

This power vastly surpassed that of Great Sages or Demi-Immortals. As it pierced through space, it seemed to remold the cosmos, shifting aside greyspaces that existed deep within space-time. Suddenly, an enormous vortex took shape.

Then, streams of devil energy erupted from the vortex, along with the wailing of ghosts and the weeping of gods. The devil energy was so powerful, in fact, that it seemed like it might form into actual devil-spirits.

“I wonder what hell the immortal world is going to open this time.”

“That devil energy is so powerful!”

“I'm definitely going to take first place in this training competition.”

“The Holy Mother’s son is competing, but from what I could see, he’s far too weak. He's not even a Great Sage! I wonder if he’ll survive.”

“He has the legacy of King Immortal-Slayer, so everyone is going to be trying to kill him to get it.”

“If nobody else kills him, Mammoth Force will. I heard that the Mammothfolk all have it out for him. Let’s just wait and see what happens. As long as we kill enough fiend-devils to get into the top rankings, we’ll get unimaginable rewards from the immortal world.”

As everyone discussed the matter, the heavenly eye of the immortal world continued to pierce through the numerous powerful greyspaces, and destroy the devil energy. Finally, a pinging sound could be heard, which was when the eye completed the passageway to hell.

This hell was pitch black, filled with the most powerful toxic energy and devil energy.

“That’s….” Yan Wubing’s pupils constricted. “That’s the fabled Hell of Mahānata. I can't believe they opened that hell. What’s going on with the immortal world? A hell like that isn’t even suitable for training for Great Sages!”

In ancient Helltongue, Mahānata meant ‘great, grand, boundless’.

The Hell of Mahānata was just that, a grand, boundless hell. It was a mysterious, powerful place that vastly surpassed the Hell of Suras. From the most ancient of times, it had been declared a forbidden region.

Chapter 362: Hell of Mahanata

How could anyone have guessed that the immortal world would open up a passageway to the fabled plane that was the Hell of Mahānata?

It was one of the oldest hells, and its name itself was synonymous with grandeur, profundity, and majesty.  Truth be told, it was not very well-known among the common people. It was only in ancient times that people recognized how terrifying it was in even the smallest aspects.

All types of fiend-devils existed there, including asuras, bronzeblaze fiend-devils, and giant snakes. Also among the diabolical monsters there were warmonger giant-devils, which were similar to the giants that existed among humans, but far more powerful. According to certain legends, they often took the lead in the wars against the legion of gods.

The mere thought of such creatures was terrifying.

Now that the passageway was open, powerful devil energy surged out from inside, and it was possible to see figures in the depths of the hell, struggling to break free and feast on the flesh and blood of the living.

Even people like Yan Wubing and Ape Heavenhelve seemed to shiver in fear at what they were seeing, and Mammoth Force was visibly shaken.

The experts from the Lionfolk, Horsefolk, and Sharkfolk trembled visibly.

‘I can’t believe it’s the Hell of Mahānata,’ many of them thought. ‘How could this be happening? Is this a mistake? The immortal world has gone crazy! If the fiend-devils from the Hell of Mahānata escaped into the Hanging Mountain, we would all be doomed! Not even Demi-Immortals would be of any help. We’d all be crushed like eggs!’

The megamammoths had an advantage because of their blood, but not even that would help them in this hell. Only godmammoths could possibly come out on top.

Of course, what was visible right now was only a tiny, tiny fraction of the Hell of Mahānata as a whole, and a border region at that.

RUMBLE!

High in the sky, an enormous golden ranking list appeared, filled with text, so large that it almost seemed like a heaven and earth of its own.

At this point, Mammoth Heaven spoke from the peak of Mount Sumeru. “All competitors shall send a scrap of their nascent divinity quintessence energy into the ranking list. Upon entering the Hell of Mahānata, the record of how many fiend-devils they’ve killed will appear on the list for everyone to see. The point system is as follows: ten thousand Legendary fiend-devils are worth one point. First step Great Sage fiend-devils are worth one point. Second step, ten points. Third step, a hundred points, and so on. Starting with ninth step Epic Saga fiend-devils, the point increase is greater.”

In response, everyone who was gathered at the base of the mountain shouted in acknowledgement and sent streams of quintessence energy up to the immortal ranking list.

Yang Qi did the same, and immediately felt a flesh and blood connection to the ranking list, something that could not be severed.

‘That list was created by immortal power, and comes from the immortal world. Because of the connection, it seems I locked onto some of the ancient immortal planes.’

As Yan Wubing stood next to Yang Qi, he slowly reverted back to his elderly appearance. Sighing, he said, “Young Master, you must be very careful. The further you get into the Hell of Mahānata, the more dangerous it will be. Not even I would dare to act without caution there. Something’s going on with the immortal world. I honestly can’t believe they selected the Hell of Mahānata.”

“Don't worry, Sir Yan,” Yang Qi said. “Haven’t you noticed that I'm uniquely equipped to deal with hells?” For some reason, Yang Qi felt particularly drawn to the passageway, almost as if it were tugging at him. The aura in there was clearly the perfect thing for the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.

He could sense the spatial structure of the hell itself, and could feel his true energy trembling as if with excitement, and was fairly certain that he could achieve an almost immediate breakthrough. In fact, he was already forming some sort of resonance with the will of the hell.

From what he could tell, the Hell of Mahānata was far more complex and enormous than the Hells of Euphoria, Suras, Nagas, or any of the other hells he knew about. And all of that came from just sensing its aura.

Leviathan Truesoaring sighed. “I did notice that, sir. You have the enlightenment of the primeval infernal deities, which surpasses the blood of the Mammothfolk, and makes cultivation in hell particularly beneficial. Am I right? Even still, you need to be careful. There will be plenty of people in there who are out to get you.”

Yang Qi looked over at the Demon Sages from the Sharkfolk, Lionfolk, Horsefolk, and especially the Apefolk, and saw many of them glaring at him and cracking their knuckles. And the Mammothfolk were doing nothing to hide the killing intent flickering in their eyes.

Once he was in the Hell of Mahānata, they would gang up on him as soon as they could, and he wouldn’t have Yan Wubing or Leviathan Truesoaring to help him.

Yet again, August Patriarch Mammoth Heaven’s voice echoed out. “Very well. Since all competitors are present and ready, and have passed their quintessence energy into the ranking list, then the competition will begin. Remember to leave the Hell of Mahānata before the end of the competition. If you fail to do so, the passageway will be closed, and you will remain there for all eternity.”

RUMBLE!

Suddenly, hosts of disciples, all of them Great Sages, flew through the golden light that surrounded Mount Sumeru, heading directly toward the passageway. All of them stuck together into groups; considering that this competition was going to be incredibly difficult, that seemed the only way to stay alive.

Compared to the mighty entities that existed in this hell, most Great Sages were like ants.

Only Without Limit and Epic Saga Sages could possibly hold their own single-handedly.

However, Yang Qi’s senses were telling him that the most powerful of the competitors were only seventh step Planet God Sages. The Apefolk had people that strong, as did the Mammothfolk and the Rocfolk. All of them were famous individuals, and beyond what Yang Qi could handle right now.

As for Mammoth Force, he was only in the fifth step, and therefore, not even close to being the best among the best.

Swish!

Yang Qi’s Angel Wings unfurled, and he became a streak of light that shot into the depths of the passageway. In fact, he immediately passed up everyone.

“So fast!”

“Such incredible speed! I didn’t even have a chance to react before he was past me. I couldn’t catch him if I tried.”

“Is he really only a Legendary?”

“The Holy Mother’s son is so fast!”

Many of the experts entering the passageway saw the blur go past them, and were terrified at the implications. Even people like Chief Lion, who had just been contemplating killing Yang Qi, were visibly taken aback.

Communicating via thought transmission, Chief Shark said, ‘Chief Lion, this Yang Qi is no simple character. But we've already sent out the orders to have him killed. I wonder if he’ll manage to evade everyone in there.’

‘Don't worry, he won’t escape,’ Chief Lionfolk replied. ‘He’s only a measly Legendary. Besides, he’s alone. He won’t get far in the Hell of Mahānata. Even the Mammothfolk have to be careful in there, let alone this Yang Qi.’

Other chiefs of the Demonfolk joined in on the transmitted conversation.

‘Mammoth Force and his group are going to be the first ones to try to kill him. There’s no way he’ll escape. Although, the Holy Mother is going to be really, really angry if he dies.’

‘If she gets angry, she’ll have to take things up with the August Patriarch.’

‘Well, let’s see how long it takes the brat to get killed.’

‘Yeah, you’re right. When someone dies in the competition, their name will disappear from the immortal list, so we’ll know as soon as it happens.’

Plenty of people were hoping to see the Holy Mother’s son perish. Furthermore, everyone assumed that he had the command medallion of King Immortal-Slayer, which everyone wanted to get their hands on.

It was now publicly acknowledged that, despite being a Legendary, he could kill Great Sages. However, it was all attributed to that medallion.

Of course, he was rumored to have only one fragment of the medallion as a whole, but even that would be filled with immense destiny and power.

There were plenty of competitors, and many of them wanted to kill Yang Qi, but he disappeared so quickly that they had no way to track him down.

As Yang Qi sped through the passageway, he carefully let out some of the God Legion Paradise, which immediately began to convert the darkness and gloom into radiance and light.

‘Ah, the energy of hell. It’s so abundant here! Amazing!’ His domain perfectly conformed to the energy of the Hell of Mahānata, just like a drop of water would conform to the ocean.

Immediate transformations began to occur, and all of them felt completely natural. Streams of magical laws resonated with him, as well as magnetic fields, causing his true energy to thrum, and a never-dying aura to build up within him.

He was getting very close to his breakthrough.

RUMBLE!

Soon, he reached the end of the passageway, and shot out into the Hell of Mahānata itself.

The place was filled with endless mists and devil energy. The ground was a deep golden color, making it seem like it was actually made from gold.

‘I’ll avoid everyone at first, and just head as deep as possible into the hell to attempt my breakthrough.’ With that, Yang Qi vanished, like a fish into water.

Chapter 363: Attacking Armies

A chill, evil wind swept through the area, like sharp blades that slashed against Yang Qi’s defensive true energy, causing sparks to fly. This was a wind that was so deadly it could kill even Great Sages, something that seemed to spring directly from the nine serenities.

There was a devil-ghost in the wind, and it could sense Yang Qi. It had two long horns, like that of an ox, except twisted and bifurcated at the ends. Its eyes were blood-red, and it had a devil-eye on its forehead, which was the source of the underworldly wind that surrounded it.

A Nine Serenities Devil-Eye.

This was none other than a hell-born ox-devil, and it was in the Great Sage level.

Yang Qi had inadvertently stumbled into its territory, and as soon as it noticed, it roared, the mere sound of which shredded the air in the area. The devilish wind picked up speed, and the ox-devil began to charge, throwing its hoof-like hands wide to summon masses of primal-chaos devil energy.

“Ox-Devil Majestic Force Fist!” it growled in the ancient language of the ox-devils. It was a deadly martial discipline from hell.

As the ox-devil spoke, its words contained pulses of nirvanic resurrection, indicating that it was in the second step, making it a Nirvanic Resurrection Sage.

As its hoof-like hand descended, the true energy around Yang Qi roiled violently, and yet, he didn’t even pay attention to the incoming enemy.

He reached out with the Hand of the One God, causing a soft, lustrous glow to fill the area. That glow represented the One God of the legion of gods, and caused the aura of the Sovereign Lord to abound. The trumpeting of megamammoths could be heard, with the ox-devil at the center. Instantly, the land for fifty kilometers in all directions collapsed, something that not even Great Sages could defend against. Without any warning, the ox-devil collapsed into fragments, without even a scrap of its life force remaining behind.

‘So, this place is a mountain range!’ Yang Qi thought, looking around. Sure enough, he was in an endless stretch of dark mountains, and from his vantage point, he could see other ox-devils in the area. And the fact that he had just crushed one of their number out of existence was drawing their attention.

They were all smaller, and only in the Legendary level, indicating that they were the offspring of the Great Sage ox-devil he had just killed.

Although Legendary fiend-devils didn't count for much, he wasn't going to let them off the hook. Bursting into motion, he summoned the Hellfire Crucible, and used it to call down sagefire, turning the mountains and valleys into a sea of flames. In the blink of an eye, all of the ox-devils were destroyed.

As that happened, he felt his connection to the immortal ranking list stirring, and all of a sudden, the list itself appeared in his mind.

Already, the names on the list were in motion, with certain names rising to the top, and others falling. Even this early in the competition, there were people high on the list with thousands of points, people who had clearly begun to slaughter multiple Great Sage fiend-devils. That said, he wasn’t doing bad himself, with his name being in the top one hundred.

‘The people in the top spots are definitely Planet God Sages. If I want to keep up, I’ll have to really slaughter some enemies!’

With that, he opened his Lord's Eye to peer out into the mists, allowing him to see much further. And yet, the Hell of Mahānata was so large that even the vast area he could see was a drop in the ocean.

That said, he was able to spot a location several tens of thousands of kilometers away, a mountainous region that had quite a few greater fiend-devils in it.

Not wasting any time, he headed in that direction.

RUMBLE!

More than ten Great Sage fiend-devils immediately flew forth to fight him. There were horned goat-devils, giant snake-devils, bronze-blaze fiend-devils, hyper-toxic paleo-devils, slash-devils, and more….

And they were just the ones taking the lead; following them were swarms of Legendaries.

‘Perfect timing!’

Yang Qi summoned the God Legion Paradise, and rushed forth to meet the enemy.

Smack!

The first to die was the horned goat-devil, and after it, the giant snake-devil, both of which exploded into clouds of blood and gore.

At this early stage, Yang Qi was simply resorting to mundane fighting techniques. Next in line was the hyper-toxic paleo-devil, which he hit with a roundhouse kick that exploded it.

Crack! Snap!

The bronzeblaze fiend-devil snapped at him with razor-sharp teeth, only to explode into a ball of fire a moment later.

In a very short time, more than ten low-level Great Sage fiend-devils were cut down.

Yang Qi didn’t hesitate to suck their sage motes into his Hellfire Crucible, to be melted and refined, and added to his God Legion Paradise. With every moment that passed, his connection to the Hell of Mahānata grew stronger.

After the scrap was over, he continued deeper and deeper into the Hell of Mahānata. He knew that his current location contained weak fiend-devils, who were like minnows or shrimp in a much larger ocean. The depths of the Hell of Mahānata contained Demi-Immortal fiend-devils, and even beings that surpassed that, the Demolishers. For all Yang Qi knew, there might be Godmyths as well. The kings of the devils and the suzerains of hell were like immortals, and some of them even qualified to challenge the legion of gods, which was a terrifying thought.

Some distance away on a wide-open plain was a tribe of fiend-devils whose encampment featured tents that dripped with blood.

‘That’s a tribe of yamas!’

They were the same type of fiend-devil as Ghost Emperor Yama, and were a powerful, vicious, brutal, and bloodthirsty lot.

There were Great Sages amongst them, and some of them had already locked onto him with their divine will.

And yet, Yang Qi simply charged toward them.

Then, right there in the middle of the yama's encampment, he suddenly threw his head back and roared.

Roar!

Destructive shockwaves spread out from him, and at the same time, the energy of the Hell of Mahānata connected to his fleshly body. The shockwaves caused lightning-like nebulas to spread out, transforming the nearby yamas into nothing but ash.

Shockingly, Yang Qi was stepping into the ninth Legendary transformation right here and now.

Back when he broke into the sixth, seventh, and eighth transformations, he had faced things like the Jambudvīpa Deluge and the Night Queen Flame. Now, as he reached the ninth transformation, an explosive energy built up around him, along with what appeared to be yellow clouds. Instantly, those yellow clouds descended with mountain-like force that reduced all fiend-devils it touched into pools of blood.

It was an Amber Avalanche tribulation, something that surpassed a Jambudvīpa Deluge or Night Queen Flame by many times.

Screams rang out as a fourth step Eternal Sands yama was wrapped up by the Amber Avalanche. As the yellow energy surged through it, it began to expand until it was like a yellow-tinged, blood-red sphere.

“An Amber Avalanche!” it said in Helltongue. “Is someone stepping into the seventh step of the Great Sage level?”

Smack!

Yang Qi hit it, and the yama exploded.

This tribulation avalanche would overwhelm anyone in its path, and yet, Yang Qi hardly felt any pressure from it at all. In fact, he simply began to absorb its power and add it to the God Legion Paradise. Right now, it was possible to see something like a wriggling cocoon in the depths of his personal domain.

Step by step, he was getting closer to the Great Sage level.

The Amber Avalanche was slaughtering everything for thousands of kilometers, without a single fiend-devil being able to escape.

And of course, it caused his score to skyrocket.

In the time it takes an incense stick to burn, he rose into the top ten, surpassing even Mammoth Force.

Outside, countless experts had gathered around Mount Sumeru, and were closely watching the immortal list. Sometimes, names would leap up, and sometimes, they would vanish, which would result in cries of lamentation at the loss of a Great Sage.

Considering that the competition was taking place in the Hell of Mahānata, it was a given that there would be casualties.

“Look, that Yang Qi is the Holy Mother’s son. See how quickly his score is increasing? It just jumped right to the top! He's already in ninth place! He’s ahead of Mammoth Force, who’s a Light King Sage!”

The chiefs of the Lionfolk, Sharkfolk, and Apefolk all looked on, visibly frustrated.

“Damnation!” growled the chief of the Lionfolk. “How could that Yang Qi still be alive? And how could his score keep going up? How is he doing it? Is he really killing entire armies of Great Sage fiend-devils? He’s that strong?”

Looking at the ranking list, Yan Wubing said, “The young master is doing incredible! I can sense his energy increasing. I wonder if he’s broken through yet. What do you think, Father Leviathan? Did you see how he just jumped up in the rankings? The young master must have killed a fourth step Eternal Sands fiend-devil. It seems to me he's going to reach the Great Sage level very soon. At that point, people will definitely think twice before making a move against him.”

Leviathan Truesoaring’s jaw was hanging open so wide it seemed like he might want to eat the immortal ranking list, and was literally at a loss for words.

‘Freak!’ That was what virtually all of the gathered experts were thinking as they watched Yang Qi jump into the top ten. There were too many competitors to count, with a huge number of them being in the fifth step of the Great Sage level or higher.

And yet despite that, Yang Qi only continued to climb higher.

Meanwhile, somewhere deep in Mount Sumeru, the invincible August Patriarch Mammoth Heaven was observing the change in rankings with various leaders of the Mammothfolk. And right now, his brow was deeply furrowed. The other Megamammoth elders were all Epic Saga Sages, and they were frowning just as deeply.

At one point, one of them rose to his feet and said, “August Patriarch Mammoth Heaven, what’s going on with this Yang Qi? How could he be so strong, sir? Is it possible that the Holy Mother gave him some sort of powerful weapon or ability in violation of the rules?”

August Patriarch Mammoth Heaven shook his head. “The immortal world enforces the rules too strictly. There’s no way that the Holy Mother is helping him. However, there’s something about him that reminds me of our most ancient ancestors….”

Chapter 364: Shaking the Hanging Mountain

“The aura of our most ancient ancestors…?!”

The Epic Saga Sages of the Mammothfolk shot to their feet in shock. “Sir, are you talking about the godmammoths?”

“It’s just a feeling,” August Patriarch Mammoth Heaven said, “so I can’t be certain. But it’s little surprise that the son of the Holy Mother has some supernatural talents. After all, his father is a very mysterious individual that not even I can get much information about. In fact, it’s highly likely that the man was a banished immortal.”

“So what are we supposed to do now, August Patriarch?”

“Wait and see what he can actually do in the end. Don’t forget that we Mammothfolk always put on the best showing in the Immortal World Training Competition.” With that, the August Patriarch closed his eyes, ignored the immortal list and began to contemplate other matters.

Meanwhile, back in the Hell of Mahānata, many of the competitors were paying attention to the changes on the ranking list. Maintaining the quintessence energy link to the list was one way to prevent from getting lost in the Hell of Mahānata.

Deep in a mountain range, Mammoth Force hefted the severed head of a Great Sage fiend-devil that he had just killed.

“Damnation!” he said. “What's going on here? How can that little bastard Yang Qi be rising in the ranks so quickly? I'm gonna lose all face here!”

He was surrounded by Demonfolk Great Sages of all types, including Apefolk, Sharkfolk, Horsefolk, Leopardfolk, and even some Giantfolk. They were all from the Demonfolk factions who supported the August Patriarch, and were here to keep Mammoth Force safe. There were even quite a few present who were in the fifth step.

Of course, considering that they were in the Hell of Mahānata, it was actually necessary for such individuals to stick together. As one of the Mammothfolk, Mammoth Force led the group, and was killing fiend-devils at a respectable speed. And yet, he was still overtaken by Yang Qi.

As arrogant as he was, he nearly coughed up a mouthful of blood when that happened.

“Where is that little brat hiding around here?” said one of the geniuses from the Lionfolk, a burly man with a prominent upper nose and a mane of golden hair. “How are we supposed to find him? If we teamed up, we could easily kill him.”

Mammoth Force took a moment to calm himself down. Although he had a short temper, when the situation required it, he could be cool and collected. “Track him down! Once we figure out where he is, we surround him and kill him.”

When his fellows saw how calm and focused he was, they realized that, without any doubt, Mammoth Force viewed Yang Qi as his main rival right now. After all, he would only drop his arrogant act when dealing with people he felt were worthy rivals.

A bit of time passed, after which Mammoth Force said, “Send out an order with the August Patriarch’s name on it. Tell everyone that they’re required to look for Yang Qi. Whoever provides me with his location will be given a reward of magical treasures from the August Patriarch’s treasure houses.”

Within moments, Mammoth Force’s orders were echoing into the ears of numerous disciples in the training competition.

He was from the Mammothfolk, and they were one of the dominant, ruling forces in the Hanging Mountain. Even the Apefolk would submit to them, and therefore, orders from them were taken very seriously. And that was even more so in training competitions like this, in which the Mammothfolk had a clear advantage.

Before long, numerous Great Sages were all searching for Yang Qi.

Crack!

In a certain mountainous valley, a young man and woman landed on the ground. The young man reached down into the golden soil and pulled out a fiend-devil that resembled a pangolin. Before the thing could react, he snapped its neck.

These two were from the Rocfolk. Specifically, they were Roc Glory and Princess Saddharma.

Suddenly, Roc Glory pulled a mirror out and cocked his ear as if listening to a message. When it was over, he chuckled coldly. “Guess what, sister. Mammoth Force has issued orders for everyone to track down Yang Qi.”

“Oh really?” Princess Saddharma said, her expression flickering. “That Yang Qi is strong, and particularly fast. He came into this hell alone, and immediately vanished. Not even we Rocfolk can manage the speeds necessary to chase him down.”

“Yes. And it’s impossible to say which direction he went in. His aura perfectly conforms with this hell, and he keeps rising in the rankings. Obviously, he's been doing quite a bit of killing, and if you analyze how his score has been going up, it’s obvious that he’s been killing fourth step Great Sages. From that, I would say that he's as strong as the fourth step, but not the fifth.”

“But he's only in the eighth Legendary transformation!” Princess Saddharma shivered. “In ancient times, Astral-Star Legendaries were eighth-level energy warriors. The difference between that and the fourth step of the Great Sage level is too vast to even calculate. Not even ten thousand Astral-Star Legendaries working together should be able to fight a Great Sage like that.”

“Just wait and see what happens, sister. I guarantee that he won’t be killed by Mammoth Force. At least not easily. Did you notice that he's been in the eighth transformation from the moment he entered the Hanging Mountain? He never achieved a breakthrough. That leads me to believe that the heaven and earth of the Hanging Mountain won’t permit him to break through. He needs a place like an immortal plane, and the Hell of Mahānata will do perfectly. Once he finds a stable place, then he’ll do it. You just watch, sister. Once he breaks through, he’ll advance by leaps and bounds. In fact, he might even become a Great Sage. And then Mammoth Force will die beyond the shadow of a doubt.”

Princess Saddharma gasped. “Impossible. You really think Yang Qi would dare to kill Mammoth Force? I mean, Mammoth Force isn’t the strongest of the Mammothfolk in the competition. That spot belongs to Mammoth Manyvoids. This is his tenth and last competition. As a seventh step Great Sage, he's just on the verge of breaking through to the Without Limit step. In fact, look, he's currently in first place. You really think that he would turn a blind eye to someone killing Mammoth Force?”

“I guess we’ll just have to wait and see,” Roc Glory said. “Not even I could match up to Mammoth Manyvoids right now.”

The Hell of Mahānata had oceans and seas too, except instead of water, they had golden liquid that was incredibly heavy. Powerful fiend-devils would be born in such oceans, things like dragons and snakes that could devour worlds.

Currently, a young man in a snow-white robe flew over the ocean, a lonely expression on his face. Everywhere he went, the ocean turned pure and calm, and even the Great Sage fiend-devils in it would die.

In hells such as this, Great Sage fiend-devils were like the common people of the mortal world, and existed everywhere. After all, this place was equivalent to an immortal plane.

It was only Demi-Immortal fiend-devils who bordered on being nobility.

As for this white-robed young man, he didn't need to do anything to kill the fiend-devils. His mere presence was enough. A starry nebula hovered above his head, making him seem like the incarnation of a god of the stars, come to travel about in hell.

The starry nebula bore the image of a megamammoth in it, clad in armor that made it look similar to a godmammoth. It was blurry and illusory, not realistic like the type of godmammoths that would appear for Yang Qi, and yet, the level of power definitely did surpass him.

This young man was one of the top elites of the Mammothfolk, Mammoth Manyvoids.

He hoped to break into the eighth step of the Great Sage level, and become a Without Limit Sage. Once he achieved his breakthrough, he would become a major leader among the Demonfolk.

He currently occupied first place on the ranking list, mostly because he was so strong that he didn’t even need to fight these enemies to kill them. Releasing the power of his energy arts alone was enough to kill most lower-level Great Sages.

Suddenly, he stopped moving. ‘Yang Qi…. There’s something odd about him, that's for sure, but I'm not interested in fighting him. Let’s see if Mammoth Force has what it takes to handle him. Besides, it wouldn’t be fair for me to attack him, considering how vastly separated we are in cultivation level. If I killed him, I would definitely become the subject of widespread ridicule.’

With that, he waved his hand in a complicated pattern to create a spirit talisman, which subsequently caused the ranking list to appear in the air in front of him. He was mainly interested in the individuals in second and third place: Finest Magic and Stunning Beheader.

Those two were the biggest threat to him. They weren’t very far behind him in terms of points, and were obviously interested in taking first place. After all, the fantastic rewards from the immortal world were too enticing to ignore. According to rumor, the winner would get an Immortal Spirit Body, as well as immortal items, immortal pills, immortal stones and godly-grade spirit stones.

All such things would be of incredible help in the effort to break through to the Demi-Immortal level.

And of course, Mammoth Manyvoids wasn’t going to simply let other people take away the first place spot.

Finest Magic and Stunning Beheader were both seventh step Great Sages as well. If Mammoth Manyvoids wasn’t of the Mammothfolk, and inherently the bane of fiend-devils, it was entirely possible that he wouldn’t occupy first place right now. In any case, he wasn’t about to start being lax.

‘Finest Magic and Stunning Beheader are both humans, and foreigners at that, not even from the Hanging Mountain. In that respect, they’re like Yang Qi. Well, how could I possibly let them take first place from me? That would be too much of a loss of face.’

All of a sudden, he flew high up into the air, and then began to drop massive balls of godlightning into the water below.

They were like stars that fell into the sea, causing the water to boil and bubble as they exploded in the depths.

Instantly, a whole group of Great Sages was killed below.

Waving his hand, he pulled all of their treasures up to him, all of them rare items and ores of incredible value. There were even spirit stones and immortal stones, the type of thing that were deeply tainted by the energies of hell. In fact, they were similar to the Euphoria Godstone that Yang Qi had acquired long ago in the Demi-Immortal Institute.

The golden seawater below was so packed with power that a single drop of it could taint thousands of kilometers of land. However, it could also be used to create demon-devil magical treasures, or to cultivate the dao of devils and demons.

In the Hell of Mahānata, just about everything was a treasure of some sort.

**

Hissss!

Yang Qi took a deep breath, sucking all of the Amber Avalanche into his God Legion Paradise. Looking around at the corpses of the yamas, he waved his hand, and their sage motes flew forth and entered his domain’s greyspace, where they transformed into the script of the legion of gods.

Yang Qi threw his head back and roared, and then seemed to explode into a mass of magical symbols, which then formed back into his body.

He had finally reached the Never-Dying Transformation.

Chapter 365: Subterranean Ore

‘I'm finally a Never-Dying Legendary! Next up, the Half Sage level. Or maybe not. I have enough resources that I could theoretically jump right into the Great Sage level.’

Yang Qi circulated his true energy, and found that both it and his blood were now closely tied to the magnetic field of this heaven and earth. The Hell of Mahānata and the God Legion Paradise were now connected, and the devil energy around him, which was the spirit energy of this heaven and earth, flowed freely into his Hellfire Crucible.

Once inside the crucible, it was converted into the type of power that he could use, and was then sent into his meridians.

The devil energy of the Hell of Mahānata was essentially equivalent to immortal energy. Normally speaking, humans who absorbed and worked with it would eventually turn into monsters of some sort. Furthermore, the competitors were all Great Sages who were also connected to the immortal energy of the ranking list outside, which offered protection against the encroachment of devil energy.

Without that protection, anyone who entered the hell would almost immediately be converted into a fiend-devil.

Thankfully, Yang Qi was different.

Unfortunately, no particles within him awoke during his breakthrough. However, the images of his current group of megamammoths grew clearer, and their armor made them seem more like godmammoths. There were also changes to the God Legion Paradise.

During his successive breakthroughs, he had been assaulted by the Jambudvīpa Deluge, the Night Queen Flame and finally the Amber Avalanche. That indicated that the next tribulation he needed to experience would be a tribulation of wind.

The four great elements of all worlds were earth, water, fire, and wind.

Normally speaking, Great Sages would experience all four of those types of tribulation during their breakthrough. However, Yang Qi was very different. If he could converge all of those tribulations into his God Legion Paradise, it would truly begin to transform into an actual world, instead of an illusory dimension.

He sent out a tendril of true energy, which smashed into the metallic-looking ground, and then dug hundreds of meters down until it found a vein of black ore.

Then, he waved his hand, and a chunk of the ore flew up and landed onto his palm. It was covered with vicious faces, like devils, and even sent devilish will piercing into his sea of consciousness in the hopes of turning him into a monster.

Normally speaking, a Great Sage who even just touched a rock like this would be instantly devilized.

But Yang Qi wasn’t worried about that. It took almost no effort to transform that devil energy into sagelight. Radiance and light were the complementary opposite of darkness and gloom, and the two could easily be switched back and forth.

A moment later, the devil energy was in his personal domain, in the form of a holy tree.

As for the ore, it was now a glittering crystal that emanated immortal energy, the most pure and eternal power possible.

‘Heavenly-grade spirit stone!’ At first, Yang Qi was shocked, but after reminding himself that the Hell of Mahānata was equivalent to an immortal plane, it made sense that the spirit stone veins here would be extraordinary. In fact, he wondered if he could find places to dig up godly-grade spirit stones, or perhaps even immortal stones.

‘I wonder if anyone other than me is able to purify the spirit stone here, and expunge the devilish will. If I took a whole bunch of them, I’d be rich! Maybe even the richest person in the Hanging Mountain!’ He stamped his foot down, and the golden soil cracked and split apart, revealing a five-hundred-kilometer-long vein of ore deep beneath him.

Generally speaking, the ground in the Hell of Mahānata was incredibly tough, and a Legendary who tried to break it open would completely fail. Not even using powerful weapons would help.

That golden soil could be used to create invincible devil items, and was essentially the same as immortal soil.

However, Yang Qi could unleash the power of ten million ancient megamammoths, which was more than enough force to work with.

He inhaled, and the entire vein of ore was sucked out of the ground and sent into his God Legion Paradise. Immediately, Yang Qi could sense the domain gobbling up the devil energy, and using it to provoke transformations.

He still had plenty of spirit stones that he had taken from the Western Continent, and yet, they weren’t enough to push him into the Great Sage level. But now, with virtually limitless spirit stone ore available to him in this hell, including sagely-grade and heavenly-grade, he had more than enough.

There was nothing standing in his way to reach the Great Sage level.

The only thing to do next was seek further enlightenment via combat, and also grasp the ultimate meaning of the Hell of Mahānata.

He suddenly burst up into the air, then sent out a shock wave that rolled out and slaughtered any fiend-devils it encountered.

Unexpectedly, this was very similar to what Mammoth Manyvoids could do.

Now that he was a Never-Dying Legendary, he was definitely in the position to fight fifth step Great Sages. As of this moment, if he ran into Mammoth Force, he could easily hold his own.

Not long after Yang Qi left the area, a young man appeared, with a flowing mane of golden hair that shone as brightly as the sun. Based on his energy fluctuations, he was obviously a fifth step Great Sage. Looking down in shock at the scene of destruction and carnage, he said, “This was a tribe of yamas, and based on the auras present, there must have been a few dozen Great Sages among them. The strongest was in the fourth step. Not only did someone kill them, but there’s also tribulation energy in the area. This was definitely Yang Qi. He’s a Never-Dying Legendary now! It’s too horrible to contemplate what will happen if he achieves another breakthrough.”

The golden-haired young man was flanked by a group of burly men, all of whom had similarly golden manes.

“Should we chase after him, Young Chief Lion?” one of them asked. “Or do we notify Mammoth Force first?”

“Forget Mammoth Force,” the young chief replied, smiling coldly. “I'm no weaker than him. The only reason I take orders from him in the Hanging Mountain is that I'm a head shorter than him, and also don’t have the August Patriarch as my father. But I don’t have to listen to him here. I’ll kill Yang Qi on my own, get King Immortal-Slayer’s medallion, and then advance by leaps and bounds. Pretty soon, Mammoth Force is going to be taking orders from me!”

“You’re absolutely right, Young Chief Lion,” one of the other Great Sages said. “We Lionfolk are definitely going to rise to prominence soon. From what I've heard, there are actually nine fragments of King Immortal-Slayer’s medallion. If you get all of them, you’ll acquire his legacy, and become the next King Immortal-Slayer. Then you can sweep through the immortal planes and slay immortals left and right.”

“I, Lion Hightower, will soon experience a major shift in fortune. There’s no time to lose. Let’s go. If I don’t kill Yang Qi soon, he might become a Great Sage, and that would be troublesome. Luckily for us, we’re the first ones to have caught his scent.”

The air rippled and distorted around Lion Hightower as a pair of wings unfurled behind him, which were none other than his famous Skylion Wings. Without any hesitation, he shot after Yang Qi.

The other Lionfolk Great Sages followed him, roaring as they created a unique spell formation called Roar of the Skylion.

The combined roar of so many Lionfolk Great Sages was enough to pierce through mountains, rivers, seas, lakes, and valleys to kill all sorts of fiend-devils.

In addition, the spell formation was built around the core element of Lion Hightower’s soul aura, and therefore, all of the points went to him. Because of that, his name continued to climb on the immortal ranking list.

“What’s that?” Yang Qi murmured as the sound of a roar reached his ear. Narrowing his eyes, he looked off into the distance to see a group of Lionfolk flying directly toward him.

Instead of fleeing, he stood his ground and calmly waited for them to approach.

RUMBLE!

An explosive wave of vital energy shattered the air in the area as Lion Hightower landed in front of him, looking as imperious as a king. At the same time, his attendants landed nearby and surrounded Yang Qi, making him look like a cornered rat.

“You can wear out iron shoes in a fruitless search, then find what you're looking for without even trying. Oh how true that saying is!” As Lion Hightower stood there, his golden mane shone with dazzling light. He pointed at Yang Qi. “Give me King Immortal-Slayer’s medallion. If you do, then for the sake of the Holy Mother, I’ll spare your life. Presumably, you know who I am: Young Chief Lion Hightower of the Lionfolk. My cultivation base is higher than Mammoth Force’s, so don't even think about trying to get away.”

The other Lionfolk immediately began to add fuel to the fire.

“Submit, Yang Qi. Don’t make the wrong decision here.”

“That’s right. If you don’t hurry up, you’re going to get killed.”

This group knew that Yang Qi was strong enough to kill Great Sages, and therefore, they were ready to join forces immediately to fight him. At the same time, they were making sure that they didn’t leave any openings for him to flee.

“Lionfolk, huh….” Considering all the fighting experience Yang Qi had, he wasn't flustered at all. “Back before the competition started, your chief cursed me and called me a bastard. I never got the chance to retaliate for those insults, but don’t think I forgot them. Luckily, it seems I'm going to get my chance right now. You’re the son of Chief Lion? Fifth step Great Sage? Even in the Hanging Mountain, that’s pretty impressive. Killing you is really going to sting for Chief Lion.”

Whoosh!

Yang Qi suddenly blurred into motion, and before anyone could do anything, was about to land a fist on Lion Hightower.

It was a strike that seemed strong enough to prop up heaven, and even shatter it. In the blink of an eye, Lion Hightower felt his spine creaking from the force weighing down on him.

Yang Qi was taking the initiative, and was attempting to take out the leader first.

‘Not good!’ Lion Hightower thought, the fist-wind bearing down on him like a mountain. In fact, his true energy and sage motes were already starting to crumble.

“Nine Spirits Elemental King Fist!” he shouted.

He stepped forward, and golden light erupted out, transforming into the constellation Leo, like the throne of a king that could crush all opponents.

Chapter 366: Slaughtering Lionfolk

The Leo constellation reared up like the divine king of the highest heavens. At the same time, Lion Hightower’s golden mane shone with the brilliance of the brightest sun, capable of driving away all clouds from the sky.

This was a divine fist strike that could dispel all illusions, and was surrounded by the endless roaring of lions.

It could crush heaven and earth, and yet, Yang Qi’s fist easily surpassed it.

Yang Qi’s blow was like a burning conglomeration of sagelight, bright enough to illuminate all the lands. Now that he was a Never-Dying Legendary, and had overcome the Amber Avalanche, his fist strike contained the raw power of heaven and earth. And the heaven and earth he currently occupied was the Hell of Mahānata, which was by definition grand and boundless. Because he had achieved his breakthrough in this hell, his magical laws conformed perfectly with those around him, and he was one with the magnetic field of the place.

Behind him was a flickering projection of the Hell of Mahānata, like a huge bubble hanging in the darkness, lurking, waiting for an opportunity to attack the light of other higher planes. It longed to sully the radiance and light of the legion of gods, to turn it into darkness and gloom, and cause the gods to fall.

“Mahānata Without Limit!”

In the last moment before Yang Qi’s hand hit Lion Hightower, he opened his fist into a palm, causing the brilliance of the One God to appear.

Smack!

The hand shattered all of Lion Hightower’s golden light, bashing through it like a hammer through a sheet of ice.

Lion Hightower reached out to defend himself, and gold blood immediately began to pour out of his hand. Face turning ashen, he staggered backward, clearly injured. He hadn’t even been able to stand up to a single blow.

Lion Hightower, a fifth step Light King Sage, an expert in all sorts of magical laws, was almost immediately defeated by Yang Qi. He even used a divine fist strike, a specialty of the Lionfolk. Of course, how could he possibly have known that Yang Qi had enlightenment of the Hand of the One God?

Compared to that, paltry Lionfolk techniques were meaningless.

Yang Qi’s Hand of the One God wasn’t complete, but his command of the fist techniques of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth had reached the point of perfection, the level of sage inside, monarch outside. He was already in the position to force myriad living beings into submission, and to take control of hell.

And he had the further advantage of being bolstered by the devil energy surrounding him.

Ordinary fifth step Great Sages who came to the Hell of Mahānata would have to take special precautions to stave off the devil energy. But Yang Qi did the opposite. He used that power to improve his attacks.

As Lion Hightower continued to stagger backward, his eyes shone with disbelief.

“I can’t believe your true energy is so strong! Fine. I guess I really need to show you how different the two of us are!” More than ever, Lion Hightower was determined to kill Yang Qi.

Crick! Crack!

Suddenly, energy erupted out of him, and the magical laws of time stirred. Pure, bright light surrounded him, devoid of any impurities, and filled with the raw power of time.

“Lionfolk Consummate Deathblow; Roar of Despair!”

Lion Hightower opened his mouth, and let out a roar that was laced with the power of time. This was the most powerful type of attack the Lionfolk could unleash, a roar that could subdue countless beasts.

“Young Chief, let’s join forces to kill this animal!”

At the same time, the other Lionfolk Great Sages activated their formation, unleashing additional roars that caused the entire area to shake violently.

WHIZZZ!

The soundwaves were like an army of immortal warriors besieging Yang Qi, binding him with the magical laws of time, and forcing him to die.

A vicious expression covered Lion Hightower’s face; clearly, there was no way he was going to back down in this fight.

However, that was when Yang Qi said, “Ashes to Ashes, Dust to Dust. The Deathless Will Always Corrode; Only the Gods Exist for all Aeons.”

As Yang Qi’s voice echoed out loud and clear, the God Legion Paradise expanded, and the Superlative Defense sprang up. Considering how much progress he had made recently, the Superlative Defense was vastly stronger than it had been when he fought the Crown Prince.

The turtle-shell-like greyspace appeared above, and each section contained a megamammoth. They seemed ancient, and radiated both radiance and light, as well as darkness and gloom.

Suddenly, tribulations appeared. Jambudvīpa Deluge. Night Queen Flame. Amber Avalanche.

Three of the main elements of the universe were under Yang Qi’s command.

RUMBLE!

The seemingly invincible sound waves hit Yang Qi’s Superlative Defense, and not even the magical laws of time could do anything to it. And then, the Yore-Wilds’ Heart began to shine with bright-red light.

As of this moment, the Yore-Wilds’ Heart was Yang Qi’s heart.

The consummate and deadly attack which had just been unleashed by the Lionfolk was doing absolutely nothing.

“The Yore-Wilds’ heart is my heart,” he murmured, taking a step forward. As he did, the Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragment actually flew out and entered his chest. The ground around him immediately shattered from the resulting shock wave, and time itself distorted. His God Legion Battle Robe rippled as he clenched his hand into a fist that seemed to contain the entire world.

Swish!

He became a blur of motion that shook everything, and then a terrified scream rang out. The Great Sage standing closest to Lion Hightower exploded into a haze of blood and gore, torn to pieces by Yang Qi. He was a second step Nirvanic Resurrection Sage, and yet he died so thoroughly that even the nascent divinity sealing mark that he had ensconced somewhere out in the void was also shattered.

Yang Qi wasn't showing any mercy. Suddenly, he moved again, his legwork mystifying to the extreme as he appeared in front of another of the Lionfolk Great Sages. This was a third step Eternal Sands Sage, whose true energy was as endless as the eternal sands of the universe. However, not even he could evade the deadly strike heading his way.

His head exploded, and his body turned into mush.

POP!

Yang Qi was moving so fast that everyone else seemed laughably slow. Suddenly, his fingers turned into hooks, and he dug the heart out of the chest of one of the second step Lionfolk Great Sages, simultaneously shattering the rest of his five viscera and six bowels. Then, Night Queen Flame surged out, burning the man into nothing.

WHIZZ!

In one fluid string of motions, he killed three Great Sages, and he wasn’t even close to being done. Without any warning, he shrank the God Legion Paradise down to a sixty-square-meter area, and then body-slammed a fourth step Great Sage, killing him instantly. The remains twitched as they tried to stitch themselves back together, but before they could, sagelight from the God Legion Paradise burned them into nothing.

He slammed a fist into the stomach of a fifth Great Sage, who then shattered into dust. Then, sagelight grabbed his discarnate soul and pulled it into the God Legion Paradise.

Lion Hightower was so dumbfounded that he couldn't even react. His followers were being killed left and right, making it seem like they were fighting a rabid beast from ancient times, and not a human.

It was a case of a tiger among a flock of sheep; this was wanton slaughter of the weak by the strong. Yang Qi was causing blood to rain down, and Lion Hightower didn’t even have time to set up a spell formation to use against him.

‘Dammit! How could this be happening? Why is it happening?’ Lion Hightower leaped in front of Yang Qi to block his path, and once again unleashed the time power of a Light King Sage, summoning an enormous shield that resembled the head of a lion.

“Heavenly Lion God Buckler!”

The buckler was a precious treasure that could be fused with the user’s energy arts, and to Lion Hightower’s delight, it actually succeeded in stopping Yang Qi’s momentum.

**

Outside in the Hanging Mountain, numerous experts were gathered to observe the proceedings. Many were sixth or seventh step Great Sages, and some were chiefs in the eighth or ninth step. All of them were paying very close attention to what was happening with the names on the list.

“Hey everyone, look! Several Great Sages from the Lionfolk just fell off of the immortal ranking list. They completely vanished! What's going on?”

The loss of several Great Sages all at the same time was very noteworthy.

“What happened?” Chief Lion said. This was the very same chief who had cursed Yang Qi and called him a bastard. But now, he looked quite flustered. “Did they run into some powerful fiend-devil? Well, I’ll just have to deal with their loss. At least Lion Hightower is still fine.”

However, that was when Ape Heavenhelve, chief of the Apefolk, solemnly pointed out, “Chief Lion, it seems to me that this isn’t because of a fiend-devil, but rather, some powerful expert. Maybe it's even infighting. If you kill other competitors, you immediately acquire their points, which means that it's a great way to climb in the rankings. Perhaps that's what happened to those Lionfolk Great Sages.”

“You think someone killed them to get more points?” Chief Lion growled. “But who? Mammoth Manyvoids? Finest Magic?”

RUMBLE!

All of a sudden, the immortal ranking list vibrated as another name vanished. Another competitor had fallen, and this one, a fifth step Great Sage.

The ranking list would vibrate when a fifth step Great Sage fell, the reason being that Light King Sages had a deep understanding of time. The magical laws of time were the domain of the legion of gods, and thus, the immortal ranking list would tremble with pity when such an individual died.

“A top disciple from the Lionfolk just died!” someone exclaimed. “Lion Hightower! He was killed so thoroughly that even his nascent soul sealing mark was destroyed.”

“You’re right! Look, Lion Hightower’s name vanished from the list! Where did his points go?”

“This is the first time a fifth step Great Sage has died in the competition. They’re considered high-level Great Sages, with an understanding of time. Don’t tell me that their group ran into some vicious fiend-devil!”

“That can’t be it. The passageway opened by the immortal world led to a border area of the Hell of Mahānata. There shouldn't be Demi-Immortal fiend-devils there.”

“Look, everyone! Someone just jumped really high in the rankings.”

“It’s Yang Qi. The moment Lion Hightower perished, Yang Qi jumped up several ranks. It was him! He killed Lion Hightower. That’s the only way to take points from another competitor.”

Chapter 367: Complete Extermination

Lion Hightower had perished, and Yang Qi’s total points skyrocketed.

Within moments, virtually all of the top experts from the Hanging Mountain were talking about it. It was more than obvious now that Yang Qi had killed Lion Hightower. The rules of the training competitions had always stated that if one competitor killed another, they would acquire their points.

There was no other way for points to be transferred.

Without killing someone with his own hands, there was no way Yang Qi could have acquired that many points in a single instant.

“The son of the Holy Mother just killed Lion Hightower! When he entered the Hell of Mahānata, he was an Astral-Star Legendary, which is the same as an eighth level energy warrior. Lion Hightower was a fifth step Light King Sage. The level discrepancy is too incredible to even calculate. So how did Yang Qi kill him?”

“Vicious. He’s completely and utterly vicious.”

“Even if a whole team of Demonfolk Legendaries teamed up to attack a fifth step Great Sage, they would have a very tough time. Look at Chief Lion, he seems like he's about to cry.”

“Well, this is no surprise if you think about it. Yang Qi has the legacy of King Immortal-Slayer. And you know what, I bet he doesn’t just have one fragment of the medallion, I bet he has a few.”

“Yeah. That’s the only way he could be so strong. He has the power to slay immortals, much less Great Sages.”

Whispered conversations such as this were taking place everywhere.

As for Chief Lion, his face was as pale as death, and he could still hardly believe what was happening.

“My god!” he said. “How could my son have died at the hands of that bastard! I refuse to accept this! I refuse!” Trembling, he let loose a howl of grief.

“Refuse all you want,” said Leviathan Truesoaring. “You can’t change it. Like I told you, you cursed the Holy Mother’s son, and you would suffer because of it. All of you. Horsefolk, Leopardfolk, Sharkfolk, Apefolk, Rhinofolk…. Your genius descendants are going to die one after another in this competition. Anyone who disrespected my young master, even Mammothfolk, will die.”

“What did you just say, Leviathan Truesoaring?” Chief Lion growled. “Fine, from now on, we Lionfolk and you Leviathanfolk are mortal enemies. For generations to come, the only thing that will exist between us is seas of blood.”

“It’s the same with us Apefolk,” Ape Heavenhelve spat. “If your young master can kill Lion Hightower to get his points and rise in the ranks, so can our Apefolk disciples. They’ll kill him, take King Immortal-Slayer’s medallion, and get all his points. Don’t forget, everyone, the Apefolk's top geniuses are in the competition. Ape Purgemalice is one of them. He’s currently a sixth step Heavenly Workings Sage, but it will be in this very Hell of Mahānata that he breaks through to the seventh step. Chief Lion, my son will definitely be the one to get vengeance for you.”

“Whatever happens, Yang Qi has to die,” Chief Lion said through gritted teeth.

Meanwhile, a group of ultimate experts sat on a cloud of black energy some distance away from Mount Sumeru. One of them was clad in pitch black clothing that covered everything except for his eyes. It was the perfect clothing for hunting targets in the night.

He was none other than the Quake-Dawn Cathedral’s Ninja God.

Sitting opposite him was a giant who pulsed with the ancient power of the Yore-Wilds. He was another important person from the Quake-Dawn Continent, the Wilds God, leader of the Grand-Wilds Mansion and ninth step Epic Saga Sage. He had brought the top disciples from the Grand-Wilds Mansion to participate in the training competition, in the hopes of acquiring treasures from the Hell of Mahānata, and also making cultivation advancement.

“Ninja God, the Grand-Wilds Mansion and the Quake-Dawn Cathedral have been at war for a long time. I've looked into the matter of Wilds Everlasting’s death, and I know that your people weren’t behind it. It was Yang Qi.”

He glared at Yan Wubing and Leviathan Truesoaring, his hatred bubbling deep in his bones. “I want revenge, or perhaps to invade the Rich-Lush Continent, but unfortunately, Yang Qi is the son of the Holy Mother, making it impossible. If we offend the Holy Mother, the Quake-Dawn Continent could end up being destroyed.”

The Ninja God nodded. “You’re right. We can’t touch the Rich-Lush Continent, and we can’t directly kill Yang Qi. However, many of the Demonfolk of the Hanging Mountain support August Patriarch Mammoth Heaven. Perhaps offending the Holy Mother won’t really matter that much if we have him as an ally. Although, I doubt he’ll publicly support an effort to kill Yang Qi. In any case, the best time to kill Yang Qi is right now, in the training competition. Deaths are allowed by the rules, after all.”

“My most talented son, Wilds Primeking, is in the competition already. He's a sixth step Heavenly Workings Sage, and I personally forged a Grand-Wilds Godsaber for him. He’ll definitely slaughter Yang Qi.”

“The Hall of Ninjas also sent our top disciple into the competition. Ninja Unity is definitely on the same level as your son. Why don’t we make a little bet about who will be the one to kill Yang Qi?”

“Fine. Whoever kills Yang Qi will be declared the spokesman of the top organization in the Quake-Dawn Continent. Fortunes rise and fall; the Quake-Dawn Cathedral has held sway over the Quake-Dawn Continent for many years. The time has come for the Grand-Wilds Mansion to take over.”

“Wait and see. Whoever kills Yang Qi and gets King Immortal-Slayer’s medallion will naturally be the top organization. It’s a real pity that the Crown Prince, the son of our Holy Daughter, actually had the legacy, but was killed by Yang Qi.” The Ninja God sighed.

**

RUMBLE!

The Heavenly Lion God Buckler shattered, and Yang Qi reached out to grab Lion Hightower by the neck. He didn't waste time speaking. He crushed him, tossed him into the Hellfire Crucible, and immediately began to absorb his sage motes.

It was his first time killing a fifth step Great Sage, and the sage motes that flowed into his God Legion Paradise were almost like immortal motes.

However, Yang Qi wasn’t in any rush. He would continue to build up quintessence energy in his God Legion Paradise, and when the time was right, would use it to reach the Great Sage level.

Lion Hightower had extensive experience working with energy, and all of that information had been branded into his soul. Now, it was sinking into Yang Qi’s sea of consciousness.

“The young chief died!”

“The young chief perished! He was killed. Come on, let's get out of here!” Of course, if Yang Qi killing Lion Hightower caused a stir outside, there was little need to mention how terrified his followers were. Immediately, the surviving Lionfolk Great Sages scattered.

However, there was no way that Yang Qi would simply let them escape.

Smack!

A Great Sage exploded, leaving behind nothing but a wisp of smoke. Next, more wisps of smoke appeared within the darkness of the Hell of Mahānata.

Dozens of Lionfolk Great Sages perished, just like that. In the shortest of moments, all of the Lionfolk competitors were killed.

The Lionfolk had suffered a devastating blow.

Only Great Sages could participate in the training competition, meaning that they were the best of the best. And yet, Yang Qi had killed them all. Eventually, when he was a Great Sage, perhaps in the fourth or fifth step, he would be able to wipe out all of the Lionfolk, even their chief. If that happened, the planetary system would have no Lionfolk at all, and it would all be thanks to the chief calling Yang Qi a bastard.

Yang Qi touched down onto the ground again, and the final wisps of smoke vanished. The aura of the Lionfolk was now gone.

**

Outside, the experts watched as the names of all the Lionfolk disappeared from the ranking list.

“The quintessence of the Lionfolk has been wiped out!” Chief Lion looked like he had aged by thousands of years, and his golden mane no longer glowed with bright light. Instead, he pulsed with a ruthless, killing aura, and deadly hatred for Yang Qi.

**

“Young Master Force, something big just happened. All of the Lionfolk competitors were just killed, and Yang Qi’s points jumped up rapidly. He’s already in the top five. Only a moment ago he was in something like ninth or tenth place. He’s definitely the one who did it. He wiped out the Lionfolk!”

Mammoth Force was in the middle of trying to find Yang Qi, and he was surrounded by an even larger group of Demonfolk Great Sages than Lion Hightower had been.

“Yeah, I saw that,” Mammoth Force replied in a cold voice. “I underestimated this Yang Qi. Lion Hightower wasn't as strong as me, but he was still a fifth step Light King Sage. Obviously, Yang Qi achieved another breakthrough. That's the only way he could have killed him.”

“What do we do now?”

“Call the Horsefolk, Rhinofolk, Apefolk, and Sharkfolk experts. Once we’re all together, I’ll use my Myriad Mammoths Divination Skill to lock down onto Lion Hightower’s previous location. From there, we should be able to track down Yang Qi, surround him, and kill him. There’s no way he’ll escape that. A lot of people want to kill him, and I’m first on the list. And I want King Immortal-Slayer’s medallion too.”

“Yes sir!”

Immediately, notifications were sent out into the Hell of Mahānata, and the experts began to head toward Mammoth Force.

Yang Qi was about to face unprecedented danger, but at the moment, he was gliding above a vast plain, with a black sun above that cast darkness everywhere.

“Oh how blue the sky,” he sang, “oh how green the grass….”

The plain was filled with devil grass native to the Hell of Mahānata, each blade of which was dozens of meters tall, making them almost like trees. They radiated profound devil energy, and if even one of them fell onto a planet in the outside world, that entire planet would be tainted.

There were all sorts of fiend-devil tribes lurking in the plains, but Yang Qi’s energy conformed perfectly to the Hell of Mahānata, and therefore, they didn’t notice him. As far as they were concerned, he was the same as they were.

Off in the distance, he spotted a tribe of giants.

They had pitch black, scaly skin, and had set up enormous totem poles that stretched into the sky. They were warmonger giant-devils, and Yang Qi spotted one of their number who was even stronger than a Light King Sage.

Chapter 368: Warmonger Giant-Devils

Warmonger giant-devils were experts of warfare and geniuses of battle. In that respect, they were similar to asuras. However, they were physically superior, and had deeper reserves of power.

On the battlefield, they were considered superior to asuras, but in terms of numbers, they were few. They were one of the rarer of the denizens of hell, whereas asuras were plentiful.

The Hell of Mahānata was a mish-mash of sorts, with all sorts of monsters present, especially the powerful sort.

Because Yang Qi had access to the memories of primeval infernal deities, he had a lot of hellish knowledge, and knew that rarer species such as this could produce elite warriors who were particularly difficult to deal with.

And on top of all of that, warmonger giant-devils had the blood of the Infernalfolk in them. Infernals were extremely rare among the denizens of hell, and also, extremely powerful, far more so than asuras. And because they were the descendants of infernal deities, they were sometimes referred to as the Infernal Deity Children.

Yang Qi had never personally encountered any of the Infernalfolk, but he could already sense that one of them lurked among these warmonger giant-devils. Most likely, he was the leader of this band, and possibly even their progenitor, although it was difficult to say. His infernal blood was already causing Yang Qi’s Infernal Deity Spear to itch restlessly.

That was the main reason why he was approaching them, as risky and dangerous as that was.

The infernal expert here was far stronger than Lion Hightower, most likely a sixth step Heavenly Workings Sage. Each step within the Great Sage level led to shocking transformations; generally speaking, one could expect a tenfold increase in strength, and a similar improvement to true energy.

Yang Qi was obviously strong enough to kill Lion Hightower, but at the moment, he wasn’t confident in coming out on top in a protracted battle with a sixth step opponent. The only way he could do so would be to break through again, and become either a Half Sage or a Great Sage.

Once he was a Great Sage, his God Legion Paradise, Angel Wings, God Legion Battle Robe, Infernal Deity Spear, Hellfire Crucible and Devil-God Seal would transform significantly. Furthermore, his Hand of the One God would put him in the position to deal with seventh step Great Sages, much less the sixth step.

Yang Qi’s hope was that because this was an infernal, if he attacked quickly, and killed the thing in one shot, he might succeed. After all, the Infernalfolk were strong, but Yang Qi had a very particular set of skills that were perfectly designed for dealing with them.

Normally speaking, even ten human Great Sages in the sixth step would have difficulty dealing with a single sixth step infernal. But Yang Qi was in a unique position; while he could single-handedly go up against a sixth step Infernalfolk, he actually couldn’t handle a single sixth step human.

After all, the denizens of hell were weak and paltry in the face of the energy of the legion of gods.

Roar!

Down in the devil grass, he could see numerous warmonger giant-devils going through martial arts forms. Even the young ones were extremely large; these fiend-devils were born with unique personal domains designed for fighting and warfare.

Of course, infernals were even stronger; they were actually born as Great Sages. They had Netherworld Sage Domains from the moment they came into existence, which meant that even infants among them could wreak havoc and destruction, and cause rivers of blood to flow among human cultivators. They could even cause chaos among the host of immortals.

Unfortunately, the infernal here was hiding in the depths of the camp, out of sight.

This particular tribe had many Great Sages, including several in the fifth step. Of course, Yang Qi wasn't worried about those. Although they were far stronger than Lion Hightower, he was the bane of their true energy, and thus, in the end, they were actually like nothing to him.

The only one he was worried about was the hidden infernal.

Technically speaking, this was actually a very weak infernal, which was no surprise considering that this location was on the border of the Hell of Mahānata.

Yang Qi simply walked into the camp and began winding his way through the tents and totem poles. Before long, he was in the very middle of the camp.

The tribe was savage to the core; the warmonger giant-devils would hunt down other hellish fiend-devils, then bring them back to the camp and devour them. Some of the giant-devils would extract ores from the ground to further their cultivation. Others would train in the wide-open square set aside for that purpose.

So far, none of them had noticed Yang Qi. For one thing, he was keeping his energy reined in. Also, he was already deeply connected to the Hell of Mahānata, and was essentially part of it.

Eventually, he focused on one particular tent that was larger than the others. It was stitched together from skins and hides of powerful devillings, and was obviously the work of an equipment forger. It was clearly an ancient thing, but at the same time, incredibly tough and durable. The tent was enormous, being thousands of meters high, and hundreds of kilometers from side to side.

Upon nearing the tent, Yang Qi saw the infernal expert inside, meditating.

It was huge, fully three thousand meters tall, with golden skin that made him seem noble and grand. In fact, he was the exact same color that the Infernal Deity Spear had been in the past.

At long last, Yang Qi was getting his first look at a true infernal. He had long, spiraling horns that resembled a dragon’s, except bifurcated at the end. The thing's body bulged with muscles, and his skin was covered with veiny striae. They were none other than devil striae, which were very similar to sage motes. Of course, when used offensively, they were far stronger than sage motes.

The Infernalfolk expert seemed like a huge golden mountain sitting in the middle of the tent, unmoving, an ultimate expert of martial arts that no one could possibly do anything to.

Upon approaching, Yang Qi shrank himself and the God Legion Paradise down to the size of a speck of invisible dust. Then, he floated along with the currents of devil energy, heading closer and closer to the Infernalfolk expert. As he did, he could see how similar the true energy of his Infernal Deity Spear was to this thing. And he knew that if he could get its quintessence-blood and add it to his spear, and gain a bit more enlightenment of the ‘hell’ element of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, then he would definitely be in the position to become a Great Sage.

‘Killing this thing is my ticket to the Great Sage level. And once I'm a Great Sage, nobody in the Hanging Mountain will be able to do a thing to me. Considering my current position, I need either Infernalfolk blood, or Mammothfolk blood.’

Killing intent was bubbling in Yang Qi’s heart, and yet, he managed to keep his cool. Obviously, this infernal was not something he could take lightly.

Thankfully, he had mastered the dao of the quick strike a long time ago, and also had abundant combat experience. Therefore, he simply waited and got closer to the meditating infernal.

Apparently, the thing was cultivating some supreme energy art, and currently had his mind cast out into the hell around him to contemplate the workings of heaven.

At one point, he took in a huge breath, and Yang Qi shivered.

‘It’s go time,’ he thought.

The God Legion Paradise popped out, revealing Yang Qi in the middle of it, looking every bit like a primeval infernal deity. Hefting his spear, he leaped directly toward the infernal’s head, hoping to trick him into believing that he was experiencing cultivation enlightenment from ancient infernal deities.

Whoosh!

The Infernal Deity Spear stabbed into the Infernalfolk, causing a waterfall of golden blood to spill out, turning the God Legion Paradise the same color.

He had long since combined the true energy of the Hellfire Crucible with the Infernal Deity Spear, and therefore, as soon as the spear entered the infernal’s sea of consciousness, enlightenment of the ultimate meaning of hell poured into Yang Qi. In the blink of an eye, he understood many things that he had never understood, and the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth grew even clearer to him.

However, the intense pain aroused up the infernal; there could be no worse weapon to him than this spear, and the attack had already damaged his fundamental structure and life force.

He threw his head back and howled, and the soundwaves alone caused many of the surrounding warmonger giant-devils to explode into clouds of blood and gore. Many of the tents were also shredded to pieces.

‘Not good!’ Yang Qi thought, quickly putting the Infernal Deity Spear away. Thankfully, he had already collected plenty of blood quintessence.

Endless rage erupted from within the infernal, and Yang Qi even glimpsed something like a crucible inside of him, which sent fire spewing out, a flood that shoved Yang Qi backward like a leaf in a windstorm.

‘I underestimated how strong the Infernalfolk are. And I underestimated the Heavenly Workings Step.’ As of this moment, Yang Qi was convinced that this creature was beyond his ability to deal with.

His Angel Wings unfurled, although, thanks to the devil energy in the area, they were pitch black. In the blink of an eye, he disappeared.

He had plenty of Infernalfolk blood quintessence, enough for significant enlightenment and cultivation advancement.

Of course, the infernal was not going to just let him go. Howling, he leapt to his feet, quickly transforming into what looked like a golden human of ordinary size. His wound had already stopped bleeding, leaving him free to chase after Yang Qi. As for the warmonger giant-devils around him, all of them were confused about what was happening.

“Who was it!? Who sullied the glory of the Infernalfolk!? Who took my blood!? Who has the Infernal Deity Spear, and used it to pierce my flesh?!”

Yang Qi could hear his cries. Furthermore, in the depths of the God Legion Paradise, the golden blood he had taken was wriggling as though it might come to life.

Without any hesitation, he sent sagelight crashing into it to refine it.

Chuckling, he thought, ‘Yep. These Infernalfolk are way too strong. Even the immortal worlds are afraid of them. If I could kill one, it would be better than killing a thousand fiend-devils of the same cultivation level. In fact, if I killed the one back there, I would definitely take first place in the competition.’

In hell, the Infernalfolk were grand and noble, and their blood was considered that of emperors.

Yang Qi was extremely lucky to have even encountered one. And he knew that if word spread about this one, all of the top experts in the competition would gather just to see it.

Chapter 369: Fighting an Infernal

It didn't take long for the sagelight to break down the blood of the infernal, absorb it, and add it to the Infernal Deity Spear, making it more true and real than ever.

Normally speaking, the True Real Step was integrally linked with the fourth step of the Great Sage level. But considering how many megamammoth particles Yang Qi had awakened, he had long since reached a level equivalent to the Eternal Sands Step. And with the blood of that infernal, he now had many of the marvelous aspects of the True Real Step.

Of course, he wasn’t truly in either of those cultivation levels, just similar to them in strength and certain abilities. When he actually reached that level, he would be so far beyond his current state that it was almost impossible to quantify.

At the moment, he already emanated something like a sagely aura. It was hard to say at what point he had begun to develop a sage aura and bits of sage energy. However, one thing was for certain; he was now in the Half Sage level.

The Half Sage level was more of a process, and passage into it was usually accomplished without fanfare. There was no tribulation; that only came with the breakthrough to the Great Sage level.

Of course, even though he was now a Half Sage, Yang Qi didn’t have his own true sage motes. But his aura had become sagely, and he had sage energy; now, his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth would be even more effective than before, and his Infernal Deity Spear had transformed on a fundamental level.

It now had wings. They weren’t like the Angel Wings, but rather, were golden, and inlaid with multicolored flame.

The spearhead was now serrated, making it look ghastly to the extreme. There were also entities visible within it, like emperors in the middle of various martial arts routines. The slightest swish of this new spear could slice apart heaven and earth. Even better, its power could now be turned into a sealing mark which could be used to force infernals into servitude.

WHOOSH!

Even as Yang Qi acquired these upgrades and aspects of enlightenment, the sixth step infernal caught up to him. However, when he noticed the sagely aura on Yang Qi, he stopped in his tracks and frowned.

“Half sage? You're not even a full Great Sage? How did you manage to stab me?” Then his eyes shifted to the Infernal Deity Spear in Yang Qi’s hand, and he suddenly took a step backward, a result of an instinctual fear that rose up in his heart.

“The Infernal Deity Spear?! That’s a weapon from the deities that we Infernalfolk worship. The energy art associated with it has long since been lost. Not even the top suzerains of hell can use it. Who are you? And how come you have that energy art?”

“I represent the infernal deities,” Yang Qi replied. “I wield the highest level of power possible, understand the ultimate meaning of death, and can travel to the deepest depths of hell. Considering that you recognize this as the Infernal Deity Spear, a paramount object of supreme power, how come you aren’t on your knees right now? Don’t tell me that you’re intentionally profaning the glory of the infernal deities?”

The infernal was initially shocked, but after a moment, burst out laughing.

“Well, aren't I the lucky one?” he said. “I'm a noble infernal, but I happened to offend the wrong person in the Hell of Mahānata, and was sent to this border region to work with the despicable warmonger giant-devils. But now it seems my fortunes have turned. A puny human like you has fallen into my lap with the Infernal Deity Spear. I’ll force the energy art cultivation technique out of you, and then return to the Infernalfolk and acquire an even higher position than before. And you think I'm going to get on my knees in front of you? You really are an ignorant fool….”

Sighing, the infernal suddenly vanished.

A moment later, he was above Yang Qi, his webbed fingers splayed as he extended his hand downward, like the claws of an eagle descending onto a rabbit. Obviously, he intended to crush Yang Qi into nothing.

At the same time, Yang Qi thrust his spear up toward the infernal's palm, and simultaneously activated the God Legion Paradise’s Superlative Defense. In the blink of an eye, his level of power skyrocketed, and the sagely true energy that he had recently developed poured into the spear.

The spear stabbed smoothly into the infernal’s palm, instantly causing blood to spray out.

Howling in rage, the infernal blurred to the side and unleashed another attack. However, Yang Qi’s Superlative Defense held fast. The God Legion Paradise trembled, but didn’t fall. It was little surprise; the Infernalfolk used infernal power, but that only served to make the God Legion Paradise glow more brightly.

The attacks were actually benefiting Yang Qi. It was as if he were a block of iron, and this Heavenly Workings infernal was a hammer, beating away at it to remove the impurities and turn it into a divine weapon.

The ferocious techniques of the Infernalfolk couldn’t hurt Yang Qi at all.

And now that he was a Half Sage, his true energy seemed to contain some of the will of heaven on high, and as it grew, the Hand of the One God, the ultimate manifestation of the Fist of the Halls of Heaven, inched even closer to completion.

Suddenly, porcelain-colored light flared behind him, pure fire that turned into a god-spirit with an elephantine head and a human body, with the Infernal Deity Spear in its hands. As for Yang Qi, his hands were clenched into two Fists of the Halls of Heaven, attacks that could rip open heaven and earth, and caused an image of the halls of heaven to hover above his head.

At this point, Yang Qi began to speak in Godtongue: “Those in hell lift their heads to gaze toward the halls of heaven, and they are filled with boundless hope….”

His fists flew forth with the power to destroy all evil creatures; ignoring all obstacles, they rocketed toward the infernal’s head.

“What?” The shocked infernal threw out his own fist to meet Yang Qi’s, and as soon as they made contact, he sent all of his true energy into Yang Qi in the hopes of destroying him in one shot.

However, it didn’t matter how terrifyingly powerful he was, that energy did no good against Yang Qi. Millions of holy trees appeared within the God Legion Paradise, and the power of godmammoths erupted from him. The halls of heaven grew clearer, as though they were actually appearing right there in the Hell of Mahānata.

The infernal’s energy flowed into Yang Qi without cease, in a perfect example of the dog trying to bite the hedgehog.

Smack!

The Infernal Deity Spear stabbed into the infernal, and more blood sprayed out of the wound.

“Oh primeval infernal deities,” the infernal wailed, “why did you bestow your spear upon a puny human, and turn a blind eye to me, a descendant with your blood! Heavenly Workings Secret Magic!”

At this point, the infernal stopped relying only on its physical strength, but instead, drew on secret magics of the Great Sage level, causing manifestations of the workings of heaven to stream out. Heavenly workings were generally profound and enigmatic, but when they were combined with true energy, they could unleash godly laws and godly light.

A tempest of heavenly workings rumbled toward Yang Qi, pure magical law that battered the God Legion Paradise and ripped apart its Superlative Defense.

Despite that, Yang Qi seemed completely unfazed. Even as the immense power crushed down toward him, an immortal mote suddenly flew out, transforming into a dragon-snake that sped forth to repair the greyspace of the domain. In the blink of an eye, it was even stronger than before.

That immortal mote was the combination of numerous sage motes, which created a very pure immortal will. It was all that remained of the immortal armor the Crown Prince had worn, and had originally been beyond Yang Qi’s ability to work with. But now, it was the perfect time to utilize it.

The immortal mote transformed into immortal energy, which then filled the God Legion Paradise.

As it happened, Yang Qi suddenly felt a boundless energy within heaven and earth, which was none other than sage will. He was truly heading toward the direction of becoming a sage.

A mighty wind kicked up around him, filled with what looked like enormous giant-spirits, and terrifying power.

“Eternal Godwind!” the infernal said, visibly shocked. Turning as if to flee, it said, “I can’t believe it's Eternal Godwind. What’s going on here? He's becoming a Great Sage? But even rising to the Great Sage level shouldn’t provoke a tribulation like that. Even when I reached the Heavenly Workings level, all I provoked was a Jambudvīpa Deluge….”

The screaming winds turned the area into a tempest that even the infernal couldn’t handle easily. In fact, the winds were so strong that its efforts to flee were foiled.

The Eternal Godwind was called eternal because it could transform anything it touched into wind, leaving behind nothing in its stead.

By drawing on the immortal mote, Yang Qi was initiating his breakthrough into the Great Sage level. Earth, water, fire, wind. He had already experienced the first three tribulations of Jambudvīpa Deluge, Night Queen Flame, and Amber Avalanche. The final tribulation, the Eternal Godwind, had finally appeared. Now, he had all four universal elements in his God Legion Paradise.

With this tribulation, he was finally going to step into the Great Sage level.

Chapter 370: Eternal Godwind

As soon as the Eternal Godwind sprang up, the elements of earth, water, fire, and wind began to build up in the God Legion Paradise, and sage motes began to form.

Sage motes were a key aspect of the Great Sage level, and Yang Qi had killed plenty of Great Sages, which meant that he had many such motes in his God Legion Paradise. Some he could use and some he could not, but now that he had all four tribulations and their elements, he could easily break down the miscellaneous sage motes and access their will and energy, then use them for his own purposes.

Crick! Crack!

Yang Qi was like ice being melted into water.

The godwind blew, sweeping up the infernal as well, tossing him about like a headless fly.

“Your end has come, infernal! Now that I'm a Great Sage, I can crush you beneath my feet.”

Whoosh!

Yang Qi emerged from the Eternal Godwind and immediately sent the Fist of the Halls of Heaven toward the infernal, which cracked and began to fall apart within the destructive power of the Eternal Godwind.

“Hand of the One God!” Yang Qi unleashed all of the power he could, sending the Hand of the One God toward the infernal’s head. Instantly, the will of the One God poured into the thing, and he was transformed into powder.

The amount of quintessence-blood in a sixth step Heavenly Workings infernal was shocking to think about. Even one drop of it would be like a devilish sea.

And yet, thanks to the Eternal Godwind, all of the blood rushed to Yang Qi, providing him with profound understanding of the ultimate meaning of hell. Instantly, his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth buzzed as if it were alive.

WHIZZZ!

As his sage motes took form, the Eternal Godwind grew more intense. However, Yang Qi drew more fully on the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, and then finally just sat down to contemplate the deeper meaning of the four elements of earth, water, fire, and wind.

He was now rising to the Great Sage level.

This transformation was very different from anything before; he was truly changing into something new and different. He was becoming a sage.

When the Eternal Godwind stopped blowing, his God Legion Paradise would become a sage domain, and would increase dramatically in power. It was a very critical juncture.

**

The situation in the Hanging Mountain was one of utter chaos.

After all, in the moment that the infernal died, Yang Qi’s name had rocketed up the rankings, surpassing Mammoth Manyvoids to take first place.

The number of points given for killing a sixth step infernal was equivalent to killing an ordinary fiend-devil in the eighth step, which was worth the points of ten in the seventh step.

Not even Mammoth Manyvoids, who was considered the top contender, could have done anything to an eighth step Without Limit fiend-devil. If he ran into something like that, he would have been killed without question. In fact, he would have had trouble killing a single seventh step fiend-devil, much less ten.

Not only had Yang Qi gotten lucky to run into the infernal to begin with, but he was also far more capable of dealing with it than anyone else.

RUMBLE!

Back on Mount Sumeru, the immortal ranking list trembled, and pulsed with immortal energy. And everyone could see as Yang Qi’s name surpassed Mammoth Manyvoids’. Yang Qi now had so many points that it seemed hopeless for anyone to try to catch up to him.

Not even the now-second-place Mammoth Manyvoids could possibly close the gap.

“What's going on? What just happened? How did Yang Qi suddenly take first place? Wait, don’t tell me he cheated somehow.”

“You think he cheated? There’s no possible way. How could you cheat in a competition like this? The immortal world runs this thing! Not even the August Patriarch or the Holy Mother would be able to cheat. The only explanation is that Yang Qi must have killed a powerful Great Sage fiend-devil.”

“But what kind exactly? How could he have gotten that many points?”

“This is bad!” Ape Heavenhelve said, his face a mask of shock. “Considering how many points he just acquired, he must have killed a Without Limit Sage!”

Chief Lion looked like he was about to go crazy, and his bloodshot eyes were fixed on the ranking list, and Yang Qi’s name at the top. Yang Qi was in the lead position, but was only a Legendary. This competition had Planet God Sages and Heavenly Workings Sages, and yet, they were like nothing compared to him.

“He killed a Without Limit fiend-devil?” Chief Shark said. “Impossible! He’s not strong enough. I'd say it’s more likely he killed an infernal! Even the immortal worlds fear infernals. But if you killed one, the points would be incredible.”

“Infernalfolk? They’re brutal and incredibly strong; it’s almost impossible to kill them. Besides, he would have had to kill a sixth step infernal to get that many points. How could he possibly have killed something like that?”

The chiefs of the Horsefolk, Rhinofolk and Leopardfolk were visibly taken aback, and were now starting to worry what would happen if their Great Sages in the competition tried to take out Yang Qi.

Meanwhile, Father Leviathan, Yan Wubing, and the others who supported Yang Qi were all laughing in loud voices.

“The young master is really a god!”

“Yeah! Despite all the powerful enemies in there, he managed to go right to first place. If things keep going like this, he’ll definitely be rewarded by the immortal world, and reach the Great Sage level immediately. Then who could cause any problems for him?”

“The young master is incredible! I’ve never seen another genius do anything like this. I doubt anyone like him existed even in the Yore-Wilds, or the immortal planes for that matter.”

“I have the feeling the young master has already reached the Great Sage level. Back when he was in the eighth Legendary transformation, he could take out fourth step Great Sages. If he’s really a Great Sage now, then he wouldn’t have any trouble killing Mammoth Manyvoids.”

“I guess we’ll have to wait and see, right?”

“The young master is definitely going to be famous now,” Yan Wubing said, “but you know the old saying. The tallest tree attracts the most wind. Everyone in there is going to go crazy trying to track him down and kill him. Anyone who succeeded would then take the first place spot. Things aren’t going to get any easier.”

Yan Wubing couldn’t have been more correct.

However, the Mammothfolk chief elders were starting to get very anxious. “August Patriarch, that Yang Qi just took first place. What's going on?”

“He got lucky and somehow managed to kill a sixth step infernal,” August Patriarch Mammoth Heaven said. “Even the immortal worlds fear the Infernalfolk, so killing one brings incredible rewards. That Yang Qi really has some bullshit good luck.”

“A sixth step infernal?” blurted an Epic Saga megamammoth. “That couldn’t have been easy to kill. I don’t think Mammoth Manyvoids could have pulled it off. How did Yang Qi manage it? We megamammoths always take first place in these competitions. Don’t tell me that we’re going to be deposed!”

“Not necessarily,” Mammoth Heaven replied. “As the saying goes, the most prominent tree in the forest suffers the worst damage from the wind. This Yang Qi doesn’t know how to keep a low profile, and will suffer greatly because of it. The competition is filled with elite young ones, and people like Mammoth Manyvoids and Finest Magic aren’t simply going to let Yang Qi off the hook. In fact, the fiend-devils of the Hell of Mahānata are probably aware of what happened, and will send people for him.”

“What do you mean? The point of going into the Hell of Mahānata in the first place was to kill fiend-devils. Are you saying the fiend-devils are using it as a training competition of their own?”

“That's exactly what I'm saying. Hell and the immortal worlds have been trying to destroy each other for tens of thousands of years. These training competitions are more like warmups for the real battles to come. Just wait. The true game is beginning. It won’t be long before we find out exactly how long the Holy Mother’s son can last in there.”

Yang Qi’s name was spreading out from the Hanging Mountain like a shock wave, and was astonishing experts of all sorts. Of course, most shocked of all were the other competitors in the Hell of Mahānata.

“What? How did Yang Qi surpass me? What's going on?” It was now impossible for Mammoth Manyvoids to remain calm. He no longer looked arrogant like before, and immediately flew up into the air to try to track Yang Qi down.

Now that Yang Qi was a threat to his standing, he couldn’t ignore him. In fact, he definitely had to attack him in order to take back the first place spot.

Yang Qi’s score was so far past his own now that the only way to recover was to kill him.

Mammoth Force had been doing his best to remain calm, but this news was just too shocking.

“Yang Qi is in first place?!” he blurted. “He surpassed Mammoth Manyvoids!? Find him! Hold nothing back in the search. We can’t let him get any more kills, and we definitely can’t let him achieve any more breakthroughs. And we have to figure out how he got all those points!”

Chapter 371: Great Sage Level

On a mountain somewhere in the Hell of Mahānata, Roc Glory and Princess Saddharma of the Rocfolk were looking at the mental image of the immortal ranking list, and Yang Qi’s name at the very top of it.

No one could possibly have predicted that this would happen.

“Incredible,” Roc Glory said. “He killed all the elites from the Lionfolk, even Lion Hightower. And after that, he shot right to first place. There’s no way that Mammoth Manyvoids, Finest Magic, Stunning Beheader, and the sixth step Great Sages are going to just sit on their laurels. They're definitely going to try to kill Yang Qi to take first place.

“Sister, considering that we Rocfolk can attain unmatchable speed, why don't we head over and see how things turn out? If they all gang up on Yang Qi, maybe we can eek out some good fortune.”

“Hold on a second,” Princess Saddharma said. “Brother, are you saying that we should try killing Yang Qi too? He’s the son of the Holy Mother, and I'm with the female Demonfolk. I need to support the Holy Mother! If I took part in killing Yang Qi, that would sow some very ill will that would definitely hurt me in the long run.”

“I didn’t say we should kill him. It's going to be a battle royale, so all we have to do is identify the weakest among the lot, and kill them to get their points. And if someone does manage to injure Yang Qi badly… well, that could benefit us even more.” From the way Roc Glory’s eyes glittered, he clearly took this to be an incredible opportunity.

Princess Saddharma nodded. “Fine, let’s go.”

Wings sprouted from their backs, and the two of them vanished without a trace.

**

“DIE!”

A bare-chested young man with a huge dagger-axe slaughtered a fifth step fiend-devil, and took its sage motes and devil core. Radiating the air of both a warrior and an executioner, he looked down at his weapon and said, “Well, Heaven-Beheader’s Dagger-Axe, did you notice that someone just surpassed us in the rankings? Should we go kill him?”

He swept his dagger-axe through the air, opening up a dark passage which he leapt into. As he disappeared, he murmured, “You’re dead, Yang Qi. You're the son of the Hanging Mountain’s Holy Mother, huh? Well, I'm not from the Hanging Mountain. I'm Stunning Beheader from the Waste-Wilds Continent, and I'm going to take first place. With the blessing of the immortal world, I’ll finally break through to the eighth step, and become a Without Limit Sage.”

This young man was actually human, and was the person who had previously held third place. He was in the seventh step, making him a deadly individual similar to Ghost Emperor Yama and Chancellor Demi-Immortal.

How could a person like that possibly stand for someone like Yang Qi surpassing him?

In another location was a young man in yellow clothing, who radiated the aura of powerful magic. Smiling coldly, he said, “I, Finest Magic, definitely need to go see who this person is. Is the Holy Mother’s son really that powerful? Can her son, a mere Legendary, really contend with us seventh step Great Sages? Even the child of an immortal wouldn't be able to do that, would he?”

Finest Magic was from another unknown continent out in the starry sky, and was the top disciple in his sect.

Forgetting about hunting and killing fiend-devils, he also joined the search for Yang Qi.

In the blink of an eye, countless top experts all began to search for Yang Qi.

**

“Eternal Godwind. Jambudvīpa Deluge. Night Queen Flame. Amber Avalanche!”

Meanwhile, Yang Qi was continuing his breakthrough into the Great Sage level. Dramatic changes were underway for the God Legion Paradise now that it had all four elements combined. God-spirits wrought destruction, and the destruction brought nirvanic resurrection and rebirth. Projections of numerous planes appeared, which were subsequently exterminated. Flashes of light appeared, with increasing rapidity until a powerful new divine ability formed.

Billions of planes were created and destroyed, and countless godly voices whispered scriptures. The destructive tempering of the Eternal Godwind grew more resplendent, causing Yang Qi’s Physique of the Sovereign Lord to become even stronger, until he was like a sheathed sword that grew sharper and tougher by the moment.

The halls of heaven appeared behind him, which spawned too many planes to count, and burst with hundreds of billions of divine abilities. Soon, an immortal skill began to take shape in Yang Qi’s mind.

Fractured memories began to awaken, and the profoundly enigmatic genes inside of him stirred.

Also, his Physique of the Sovereign Lord began to change and transform.

New powers and abilities grew inside of him, were stabilized, and became pure. And his meridians became like enormous dragons.

His sea of energy was like a mass of preheaven primal-chaos, the type that could purify any and all types of vital energy. The elements of earth, water, fire, and air were fusing with his true energy and giving birth to a powerful sagely will.

As he began to fully step into the Great Sage level, the God Legion Seal in his forehead stirred. The golden imp stood, and began to release numerous motes, all of them filled with profound truths of the martial path. They filled Yang Qi like a flood, and immediately pushed him to greater heights in his martial arts.

Somewhere beyond the immortal planes, which numbered as many as the eternal sands, was the world of the legion of gods. And when the golden imp released the truths of the martial path, a golden beam of godly light descended from what seemed like that very world, and plunged into Yang Qi’s forehead.

In the blink of an eye, the imp seemed to grow bigger.

All of a sudden, Yang Qi felt enlightened.

‘Ghost Emperor Yama was right. My God Legion Seal is incomplete. As my cultivation base improves, I’ll slowly awaken and repair it. In the end, I will reach the pinnacle of the legion of gods, and become their leader.’

In that moment, he came to understand the Fist of the Halls of Heaven even more deeply than before. This martial path revealed by the golden imp eventually caused Yang Qi to shudder as memories flooded into him. Every part of him seemed to be chanting in Godtongue, until the image of a hand was revealed to him.

The universe, all aspects of space-time, all planes, all light, all darkness, all elements, everything that existed and didn’t exist, were in that hand.

It was the final form of the Fist of the Halls of Heaven, the Hand of the One God.

It was a hand of mercy and a hand of destruction. It controlled the majesty of the legion of gods, and could bestow their glory. It could give life to all living things, and take it away. It could create planes with a mere thought. This was God, who surpassed heaven on high.

The might and grandeur of the Hell of Mahānata was only one ten-thousandth that of the Hand of the One God.

Profound enlightenment filled Yang Qi. From here on out, he would be able to use the Fist of the Halls of Heaven completely on his own, instead of relying on stolen sage motes.

‘The profundity of the martial path leads to sage motes. A fist that can defeat ten thousand techniques, and crush everything in the world. It can vanquish everything in the six directions, and will make me invulnerable to the five phases!’

Numerous enormous sage motes were growing inside of him, pulsing with immortal energy. As that happened, his meridians, flesh, blood, and sea of energy were linked together with the chain-like sage motes. Even his bones were connected, making him as powerful and sturdy as a mountain.

‘Time to burn some spirit stones!’

He needed a huge amount of power to fuel the sage motes, and therefore, he didn't hesitate to ignite all of his spirit stones, including the imperial-, sovereign-, sagely-, and heavenly-grade ones. As they burned, massive amounts of power rushed forth, like that of thousands of Great Sages all attacking at once.

A moment later, all of the spirit stones were gone.

Not even that level of power was enough to finish his sage motes.

Yang Qi wasn't worried though. He stamped his foot down onto the golden ground of the Hell of Mahānata, breaking it open to reveal an entire vein of spirit ore. Wrenching it up, he quickly slashed it into spirit stone form, and ignited it.

Spirit ore like this existed everywhere in the Hell of Mahānata, and only a few of the fiend-devils bothered to mine for it.

Igniting the new spirit stones gave Yang Qi plenty of power. Without coming here, he would never have been able to reach the Great Sage level. Furthermore, he was wondering how he would achieve later breakthroughs without the immense quantities of spirit stones he needed.

As the tribulation of the Eternal Godwind continued to scream around him, it gave birth to countless dragons. Wind dragons belched destructive wind fluctuations that sought to destroy anything in the area.

Heaven-devils and other monsters appeared, and began to rush toward the God Legion Paradise to try to destroy it.

Anyone who succumbed to this devilish tribulation would be devastated, and would end up crippled or dead. At the same time, the emotions of the mortal world assailed him from within.

Beautiful women, dear family members, and other personal connections filled his sea of consciousness, attempting to drag him down.

“The Eternal Will Always Withers. Those Who Perish Become the Dust. Only the Glorious Exist Always.” Yang Qi waved his hand, and sent thousands of beams of godly light out to vanquish the devilish tribulation. His will remained pure, spotless, and irreproachable.

In the depths of the God Legion Paradise, the Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragment exploded, sending bright light out in all directions, fusing inseparably with Yang Qi and his domain.

In this moment, the Yore-Wilds’ heart really was Yang Qi’s heart.

After all of these things occurred, Yang Qi was ninety-nine percent into the Great Sage level. The final step was to unify all of the various new and transformed aspects of himself. Then he would be in the first step of the Great Sage level, the Born Again Step.

Particles within him began to awaken. Before, he had been at the level of ten million megamammoths. Now, another million awoke, and then two million….

Henceforth, the particles would awaken in millions, fueling his rise to power in shocking fashion.

Chapter 372: The Heroes Strike

Even as Yang Qi opened the door and stepped into the Great Sage level, the Eternal Godwind raged so viciously that the area for thousands of kilometers around him was razed to the ground. Because of the energy fluctuations, anyone even remotely in that vicinity would be able to detect what was happening.

Great Sages were particularly sensitive to the fluctuations of tribulation, and high-level Great Sages could even tell the type of tribulation it was, and sometimes, the type of technique cultivated by the person undergoing it.

This tribulation was particularly fierce, the type that not even seventh or eighth step Great Sages would normally face.

‘What a strong tribulation!’ murmured a grim-faced young man located several tens of thousands of kilometers away, a fifth step Light King Sage, roughly as strong as Lion Hightower. He wore a suit of armor forged from sharkskin, and had his hands clasped behind his back. Behind him was the projected image of a boundless ocean, filled with hordes of fiercely-fighting sharks.

He was a young chief of the Sharkfolk, Shark Seaguzzler, and was a cohort of Mammoth Force. He had been searching for Yang Qi for quite some time already, and was thus quite delighted to sense this vicious tribulation. Obviously, this was the perfect chance to strike at Yang Qi.

“Young Chief,” a nearby Sharkfolk Great Sage said. “It must be Yang Qi in that tribulation. It’s an Eternal Godwind! The legacy of King Immortal-Slayer is really marvelous. Should we notify Mammoth Force? Or do we want to take him on alone?”

“It would be stupid to go in alone,” Shark Seaguzzler said. “He's too big of a fish for us to swallow whole. If we did that, we’d probably end up like Lion Hightower: dead.”

“Alright, let’s notify Mammoth Force!”

The message was sent, and soon, just about all of the experts in the competition knew that Yang Qi was in the middle of reaching the Great Sage level.

“Find his specific location!” Mammoth Force growled. “Shark Seaguzzler did well to remain loyal to me. Not like that fool Lion Hightower. I’ll reward him well for this. Let’s go. The sooner Yang Qi is dead, the sooner I’ll get the legacy of King Immortal-Slayer.”

WHIZZZ!

He took a step forward, and space-time shattered as he shot in the general direction of Yang Qi.

Shark Seaguzzler was too nervous to try to enter the Eternal Godwind, so he simply waited until Mammoth Force appeared.

“You’re finally here!” Shark Seaguzzler said. “Look. Yang Qi is stepping into the Great Sage level. Do we go in and try to kill him?”

“An Eternal Godwind!” Mammoth Force said, shaken. “Incredible. I can’t believe he actually provoked a tribulation like this. What will he be like if he succeeds? Listen up, everyone. Set up a Demon Horde Heavenly Paradise Formation, and sacrifice your best magical treasures to power it. We’re going to carve a passageway through the Eternal Godwind!”

“Yes sir!”

The Demonfolk Great Sages from the Sharkfolk, Horsefolk, Leopardfolk, Rhinofolk and of course the Mammothfolk, all began to throw out magical treasures and detonate them. They also sent out their will and quintessence-blood. Then, Mammoth Force combined it all to create something like a river that pierced through the Eternal Godwind. It was actually a space-time wormhole that reached all the way to Yang Qi, who was still forming his sage motes.

“Kill him!” Mammoth Force said with a cruel smile, and then he lunged into the passageway.

There were already about ten fifth step Great Sages present, and dozens of a lower level than that. With all of them combining their power, and the fact that Yang Qi had already absorbed much of the Eternal Godwind, it was little wonder they were able to get through it.

As Mammoth Force barreled forward, the projection of an ancient megamammoth appeared above him, causing his blood to pump, and allowing him to rapidly absorb the surrounding devil energy.

“Yang Qi! Your end has come. I won’t offer you even a scrap of mercy. Immortal axe!”

An enormous axe appeared in his hand, which rapidly extended to a length of three thousand meters. Without another word, he chopped the axe toward Yang Qi.

Meanwhile, Shark Seaguzzler and the other Great Sages arrived, and began to unleash consummate attacks of their own.

Brilliant demon light shone in all directions as magical laws were unleashed to devastating effect.

“Echo Heaven, Mirror Earth!” Mammoth Force shouted, rapidly expanding in size, and thrumming with powerful energy.

His eyes shone with golden light, to the point where he seemed capable of destroying mountains, much less Yang Qi.

Bam!

When the axe hit Yang Qi’s God Legion Paradise, a sonorous boom rang out, and yet, that was it. The axe did not pierce into Yang Qi’s domain.

And then, Yang Qi slowly opened his eyes, and took in a breath.

Whooooooooosh….

He inhaled the entire Eternal Godwind, and then stood up, causing all creation to shake violently.

Before Mammoth Force could do anything, Yang Qi sent an enormous hand flying toward him, a hand that could twist the universe, a hand that was powerful, merciful, and domineering, all at the same time.

The hand grabbed the blade of the axe, which subsequently crumbled as surely as if it were made from tofu. Even the immortal motes faded away.

“That Which is Deathless Will Always Fall,” Yang Qi said, his voice ringing loud and clear as he took a step forward. Instantly, a host of glowing war chariots appeared in the air around him, driven by god-spirits that burned with fire and held long spears in their hands.

Wham!

Mammoth Force staggered backward, looking almost drunk. Before he could even react, Yang Qi was right in front of him.

“You…. Yang Qi… you….”  Then, he collapsed into pieces, causing blood and gore to fly everywhere.

Sagelight erupted from Yang Qi to purify the chunks of his corpse, turning the blood into something transparent and porcelain-like, which then streamed toward his fingers.

That blood thrummed as if with the trumpeting of a herd of megamammoths from antiquity.

“Godmammoth blood. Excellent.” A moment later, he shook his head. “Sadly, it's very weak. I hope your father has purer blood than this.”

Mammoth Force had perished, and Yang Qi had absorbed the godmammoth blood he had in him. “Well, even though it’s weak, this will still help me rise within the Great Sage level. Time for another breakthrough!”

Crack! Snap!

Thunderous rumbling could be heard as millions upon millions of particles within him exploded.

This time, he reached a total of thirty million, a staggering level of force that defied imagination. Hosts of megamammoths could be seen, clad in armor, covered in totemic tattoos and the script of the Godfolk.

Even just the little bit of the godmammoth aura that was in that blood was enough to cause dramatic transformations with the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.

By now, Yang Qi had cultivated the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth far beyond the level of the ancient energy warriors. He was a saint. His sage motes trembled, then settled down like chains, tying his entire body together.

He had the strength of thirty million megamammoths, and had unlocked their genes to reveal the fundamental nature of the godmammoth.

The Eternal Godwind was gone. Mammoth Force was dead.

The remaining Demonfolk Great Sages were stunned beyond belief, and began to exchange awkward glances as they tried to figure out what to do next.

“You people came here to kill me,” Yang Qi said coolly, “and therefore, not a single one of you is going to leave here alive.”

Shark Seaguzzler was the first to regain his senses. “We have to get out of here! Retreat! Notify Mammoth Manyvoids. He’s the only one who can put up a fight.”

Then he turned and fled.

The rest of the Great Sages and young chiefs all scattered.

However, before Shark Seaguzzler could get anywhere, Yang Qi burst into motion and appeared in front of him. Then, he unleashed a single fist strike to end his life.

Just like that, a Light King Sage with power over the magical laws of time, fell. He was killed as easily as crushing a chicken egg.

RUUUUUUUUMBLE!

Yang Qi blurred into motion again, and every time he came into view, another Great Sage died. Blood rained from the sky, and screams echoed into the sky. He was an infernal deity, out collecting souls.

After the time it takes an incense stick to burn, all of the Great Sages and young chiefs from the five clans were dead. And of course, Yang Qi’s score climbed to even greater heights. There was now no hope for even the people in the second and third place spots to ever catch up.

Out in the Hanging Mountain, another huge commotion broke out. Countless experts and old-timers of the Demonfolk watched as one young chief after another disappeared from the ranking list.

“Dead! They're all dead! One after another! Mammoth Force’s name just disappeared. He was destroyed in body and soul! Shark Seaguzzler is gone. The quintessence of the Horsefolk, Rhinofolk, and Leopardfolk are no more.”

“It was Yang Qi. His score just rose again! He killed all of them in the blink of an eye. A whole group of fifth step young chiefs were slaughtered as easily as chickens.”

Chapter 373: Ape Battle

The area around Mount Sumeru was like a boiling cauldron. Of course, it started when Lion Hightower and the other Lionfolk were killed. But the reaction to that event was like nothing compared to when Mammoth Force, Shark Seaguzzler, and geniuses and young chiefs of the other clans all perished. They vanished like they were wheat being harvested, and the crowd was instantly thrown into a state of frenzy.

That was especially true of the chiefs of the Horsefolk, Rhinofolk, and Leopardfolk. They and the other leaders of their people were crestfallen and grief-stricken, and many were literally howling in rage. Although they were all Without Limit Sages, they were not humans, and thus, were not constrained by human etiquette and ceremony. They did nothing to hide their emotions and feelings, and thus instantly devolved into fits of murderous anger.

“Dead! My son is dead!” The chief of the Sharkfolk began to laugh maniacally, and glare with hateful rage at Yan Wubing and Leviathan Truesoaring.

Of course, he didn’t dare to actually attack them. Both were Epic Saga Sages, and were thus far beyond his ability to fight with.

All he could do was grit his teeth in frustration, and hope he could do something once Yang Qi emerged from the competition.

At the very peak of Mount Sumeru, a group of Epic Saga Sages were gathered with the August Patriarch. “Mammoth Force is dead! Yang Qi killed him, and a host of other young chiefs as well.”

Mammoth Heaven was trembling with rage, and from the look in his eyes, it seemed like he wanted to go into the Hell of Mahānata to take care of things himself. Of course, he couldn’t. The immortal world wanted the training competition to be for the younger disciples, and thus made it impossible for anyone else to enter.

Mammoth Heaven was no exception.

Otherwise, he would already have gone in to try to deal with Yang Qi.

“I'm aware of the situation.” he said, his eyes flashing with killing intent.

Mammoth Force was his son, who he had painstakingly helped rise through the ranks of cultivation. For him to suddenly be dead was simply unspeakable, and thus, Mammoth Heaven’s killing intent toward Yang Qi and the Holy Mother nearly defied description.

The time, energy, and resources that went into developing a fifth step Great Sage were immense. And that was not to mention the fact that only geniuses could succeed in reaching that level. People like that could be chiefs among the Demonfolk. The truth was that although August Patriarch Mammoth Heaven had many sons, he only had two that were particularly outstanding. One was Mammoth Manyvoids, and the other was Mammoth Force.

“Mammoth Manyvoids will avenge him. He has access to the ranking list just like we do, so he’s aware of what happened. He’ll definitely head over and kill Yang Qi right away.”

“We can only rely on Mammoth Manyvoids to make things right,” one of the elders growled. “After all, he is the best among your sons, August Patriarch. As a Planet God Sage who is on the very cusp of the eighth step, not even Yang Qi could possibly be a match for him.”

“The Without Limit Step is a very important threshold,” Mammoth Heaven said, “and it leads to immense energy arts power, and the ability to pool huge amounts of true energy.” He closed his eyes. “Let’s wait to see how things play out.”

“You're absolutely right, August Patriarch. He still has the Apefolk to deal with, plus the top experts from the Quake-Dawn Continent. And that’s not to mention Finest Magic, Stunning Beheader, and the others from further locations.”

**

Far out in the void, in a certain ancient golden tree, an old roc was looking at the immortal ranking list. “So, another genius has popped up in the Hanging Mountain. Well, the Holy Mother is the Holy Mother, after all. I guess it's to be expected that her son would be like this. Ai…. It seems that from now on, the Hanging Mountain is going to be run by humans. Well, it's about time the Yore-Wilds Continent rose to prominence again. It’s been many years since the shattering, and the Waste-Wilds, Brute-Wilds, and Proto-Wilds have had their shot at glory. Damn that Hell of Euphoria.”

This old roc was another invincible Epic Saga Sage, the famous Great Sage Ultra-Heaven. He was the chief of the Rocfolk, and the father of Saddharma and Roc Glory.

“Roc Glory. Saddharma. Please, recognize how strong Yang Qi is, and leave him alone. Otherwise, you’ll suffer a dismal fate. I truly hope you don't perish. Take care of yourselves.” Sighing, he headed back into his nest in the ancient golden tree.

**

Back in the Hell of Mahānata, Mammoth Force and his cohorts were all dead, and Yang Qi was finally in the Great Sage level. And after absorbing the immortal motes from Mammoth Force’s axe, he even had some immortal energy.

Normally, it was only by reaching the Epic Saga Step that Great Sages could do such a thing.

But Yang Qi was already treading the path of immortals, which would be of much benefit when he reached the Demi-Immortal level.

Furthermore, he had absorbed the power and energy from all of the Great Sages he had killed, placing it into his Hellfire Crucible to be purified. That, in turn, caused his projection of the halls of heaven to grow clearer.

He had mastered the Fist of the Halls of Heaven, and could now use the Hand of the One God, which made it possible for him to easily crush Mammoth Force and his half immortal item.

‘Well, I wiped them clean out,’ he thought. ‘I’d sure love to see the reaction of the audience. They're probably going crazy, especially Chief Lion. If he hadn’t called me a bastard, maybe his people wouldn’t have been wiped out. Now that I'm a Great Sage, his days are numbered.’

By combining the blood of an infernal with the blood of a megamammoth, he unleashed a flood of power, and the Hand of the One God reached an even higher level. It was the level of the Sovereign Lord of all heavens and all gods, the absolute peak of the legion of gods, the god of gods, the monarch of all divinities.

RUMBLE!

He slowly reined in all of his power, and prepared to make some alterations to the Jambudvīpa Deluge, Amber Avalanche, Eternal Godwind and Night Queen Flame in his God Legion Paradise.

However, even as he did, an enormous cudgel ripped open the space behind him, and the fur-covered hand of a gigantic ape appeared.

Yang Qi spun in place and thrust out his fist to meet the descending cudgel.

Bam!

They collided, and the cudgel flew backward.

As it did, the space around it exploded, and the ape stepped out into the open. His fur was not white, but rather, golden. It was a unique type of gold, sparkling and nearly translucent, making it seem electric in nature. Furthermore, each hair seemed to contain actual lightning, and emanated an aura of heavenly workings.

“Sixth step,” Yang Qi said. “A Heavenly Workings Sage.”

“I'm Ape Electrospace,” he said, hefting his cudgel and staring at Yang Qi with eyes that shone like lightning. Suddenly, he smiled, revealing a mouth full of razor-sharp teeth. “You killed Mammoth Force? And the rest of those young chiefs? With their points, it’s little wonder you took first place. But if I kill you, I’ll take your spot.”

“You must be the son of Ape Heavenhelve,” Yang Qi said, keeping his hands clasped behind his back. “Your father wants me dead, but has no way to do it himself. I suppose it will be a big blow to him if I kill you here.”

“That’s easier said than done,” a voice said, and suddenly, another ape appeared.

This ape was even stronger than Ape Electrospace, and he somehow seemed like the type of individual who had purged all malice from himself. His eyes radiated bright starlight that seemed capable of penetrating even the darkest parts of the Hell of Mahānata.

“Ape Purgemalice,” he said by way of introduction. There was something scholarly about this ape; he held a scroll in his hand, and wore a daoist robe. He virtually smelled of books, and seemed like the type of person who could found a school of learning. Yang Qi could tell that he was on the very verge of breaking through to the Planet God Step, making him similar to Ghost Emperor Yama. He wouldn’t be easy to deal with.

The Apefolk were very powerful among the Demonfolk, and were second only to the Mammothfolk. And these two were clearly the cream of the crop from their young elites.

Without any further talk, the two apes attacked him, using a formation that made them like a yin and yang taiji symbol that bore down in deadly fashion on Yang Qi.

Yang Qi nodded. “Leaping to your deaths. That's fine. You two are the quintessence of the Apefolk, right? Killing you will knock the younger generation of the Apefolk down quite a bit. Perfect….”

“Die!” Ape Electrospace shouted, and all of a sudden, lightning poured out of his cudgel, heading straight toward Yang Qi’s throat. The cudgel was like a massive dragon, but as it closed in on Yang Qi, it shrank down until it was like a tiny needle.

“Dragon Spitting a Pearl!”

When it was large, the cudgel looked like a mountain. And when it was small, Yang Qi could tell that it was just as powerful; if it actually entered him, it would likely explode to devastating effect.

Smack!

Yang Qi’s clothes rippled as he thrust his fist out, following a profoundly enigmatic path of movement to slam into the tiny needle. Instantly, he felt the power of electricity surging on the cudgel, and yet, it didn’t enter him. In fact, the cudgel began to break apart.

No weapon was a match for Yang Qi’s fists, which represented the halls of heaven.

“Ai. Purge malice, and cultivate truth. That is the real path of cultivation.” Suddenly, an enormous, violet hand shot out toward Yang Qi from the other direction.

RUMBLE!

The palm closed in on his back, and streams of violet energy from the east enveloped him.

Ape Purgemalice had unleashed a quick, vicious attack.

“God Legion Paradise: Superlative Defense.” Even as the attack closed in, the God Legion Paradise spread out and blocked its power.

Chapter 374: Powerless to Resist

The Superlative Defense was something that could defend against a myriad of attacks.

Back when Yang Qi fought the Crown Prince, not even eighteen Great Sages had been able to scratch its surface. And now, he was far, far stronger than back then. After adding the four major elements of earth, water, fire, and wind, the Superlative Defense really did live up to its descriptor, ‘superlative’.

‘Not even my Violet Emperor’s Nine Firmaments Palm could do anything to him?’ Ape Purgemalice thought. It was truly shocking to him, and he couldn’t help but wonder who exactly this Yang Qi was deep inside. Ape Purgemalice was at the ultimate peak of the sixth step, and was just on the verge of reaching the seventh. He had refined his cultivation base for an entire lifetime, and even had the legacy of an immortal. That was why he called himself Purgemalice.

Defeat malice, seek the truth.

Be boundless and without limit, indestructible and immeasurable.

And yet, his most powerful martial technique had done nothing to Yang Qi’s defenses.

“In that case, don’t blame me for what comes next. Seven Malices Heaven-Scroll!”

Swish!

The scroll in his hand opened, and a massive wind kicked up, along with a pure and boundless true energy. The reason it was called ‘Heaven-Scroll’ was because it had literally fallen from heaven. Just like the immortal ranking list, it was not something from the mortal world.

As soon as it was opened, projections of immortals appeared, who surrounded Ape Purgemalice, making him seem like an immortal king. He stood on immortal clouds, with stars surrounding his head. Then, he reached up with claw-like hands and ripped open the sky, his energy surging, bright shafts of light shooting out into space-time with the power to destroy magical laws.

“Seven Malices Heaven-Scroll; Crazed Malice Claw!”

Terrifying power erupted out, the type that could destroy thousands of worlds, and blot out the sun and moon. And all of it headed directly toward Yang Qi.

Yang Qi trembled under its might, and was even forced to bend down. But then he stood back up straight, his spine popping loudly as he did. By now, his bones weren’t really bones. They were more like chains inscribed with magical laws, and surrounded by flesh, blood, and meridians. And they were already connected on a certain level to the actual halls of heaven.

WHIZZZ!

Without any hesitation, he unleashed a fist strike to meet the Crazed Malice Claw.

When they collided, a massive shock wave rippled out that destroyed the land for thousands and thousands of kilometers.

“Maliceless Destruction!”

Ape Purgemalice became a ghostly blur that was impossible to make out clearly. However, his attacks were destructive enough to wipe out worlds.

Yang Qi simply stood there, meeting each attack with a defensive stance from the Fist of the Halls of Heaven.

When soldiers come, send a general to stop them. When floodwaters come, use earth to block them. Yang Qi did just that, adapting his measures to counteract whatever was sent toward him.

Ape Electrospace didn’t hold back either, and used his cudgel to unleash fiery lightning onto Yang Qi.

Both of these Apefolk experts were dead set on killing Yang Qi and getting his points.

As for Yang Qi, fighting two sixth step experts was the perfect opportunity to work on his fist technique. This was his first time being able to truly fight as a Great Sage.

RUMBLE!

An explosion ripped out, and the two apes were forced to back up.

Yang Qi had used another move from the Fist of the Halls of Heaven to completely vanquish their current attack.

Hardly taking a moment to recover, Ape Purgemalice suddenly pulled out a godly painting.

“Empty Malice Painting!”

The painting spread out to fill the sky, shattering the air and then weighing down with incredible force. As for Ape Purgemalice, he remained in the middle of the painting, like a general of the sky calling forth an army to crush the enemy.

Within the power of the painting, Ape Electrospace moved so quickly it was impossible to track him visually. He swept his cudgel back and forth with such vigor that it would cause dragons to twitch, black turtles to flee the water, white tigers to flee the mountains, and vermilion birds to leap into flight.

Yang Qi grinned. “Since you two want to die, I’ll accommodate you! Hell Portal, open!”

RUMBLE!

An enormous gate rose up behind Yang Qi, dripping with the blood of devil-gods, and covered with complex, terrifying artwork that seemed to be made from ancient bronze.

A voice began to speak from within the portal, speaking Helltongue. It was almost as though some suzerain of hell was waking up. “The great monarch ruler sleeps in the depths of hell, the Lord who exists above the legion of gods. In front of the mighty hell monarch, we have no choice but to show humility. Sir, you are the Lord of the legion of gods, and Your glory fills the universe. When the grand hell monarch calls, we have no choice but to answer….”

Crick. Crack….

Great Sage fiend-devils began to pour out of the Hell Portal, creating a massive army. There were all sorts of them, including asuras, giant naga snakes, bronzeblaze fiend-devils, warmonger giant-devils, euphoria god-devils, eight-armed dragon-devils, metal-smelting ghost-devils, swaying spirit-devils…. Virtually everything imaginable was coming out.

And all of them were Great Sages.

First step, second step, third step, fourth step. They were fierce and violent, and when they formed together into an army, it was a thing of terror.

This army of fiend-devils formed the perfect contrast to the godly painting Ape Purgemalice had just unfurled. It was an entire force of soldiers who didn't care at all about their own safety. If a group like that self-detonated, what would happen? It could lead to the destruction of an entire planet, and all the people on it.

The Hell of Mahānata was a huge place with endless hordes of fiend-devils, and now that Yang Qi was a Great Sage, the summoning powers of his Hell Portal had increased to the point where he could summon anything under the fifth step.

The powers of the portal were even further boosted by the fact that he was in an actual hell, and didn't need to pierce through any greyspaces.

Before Ape Electrospace could do anything, he was surrounded by fiend-devils, who then detonated. In the blink of an eye, he was lacerated by countless wounds, causing blood to spray everywhere.

Up above, the same thing happened to Ape Purgemalice, whose heaven-scroll immediately drained of power.

‘A flood of fiend-devils…?’ His face drained of blood, and he turned to flee.

Without even bothering to look at him, Yang Qi unleashed the Hand of the One God, causing the air to shrink rapidly, turning into a crystal that sealed both apes.

As they looked at him in terror, Ape Purgemalice said, “Who… who are you? How can you summon so many fiend-devils? Why do they listen to your orders?”

Yang Qi smiled coldly. “You ask too many questions. Besides, dead people don’t need explanations, do they?”

Crack!

The crystals shattered, and before Ape Electrospace and Ape Purgemalice could even scream, they were transformed into ash. Two elite fighters from the Apefolk were killed, just like that.

Yang Qi pulled their sage motes, quintessence-blood, and vital energy into the Hellfire Crucible, and the God Legion Paradise trembled as more holy trees and temples appeared in it, making it even more true and real.

WHOOSH!

Ape Purgemalice’s scroll flew over, and Yang Qi looked at it closely. The words written on the scroll were the script of immortals, which Yang Qi could read, thanks to the God Legion Seal.

Seven Malices Heaven-Scroll.

It contained a boundless energy art called the Seven Malices, which had seven sub-categories of cultivation: Raving Malice, Despoiling Malice, Depleting Malice, Purging Malice, and so on.

Obviously, it really was a scroll from heaven, an immortal item with immortal motes. It surpassed the Demi-Immortal level, which meant that it had been forged by a true immortal, a Demolisher. It was profound to the extreme, and could definitely be formidable in combat. After all, it was a treasure that surpassed even the Grand Emperor's Pagoda or the Heaven-Dominating Golden Swordbreaker.

Unfortunately, given that it had been crafted by an immortal Demolisher, there was no way that Yang Qi could currently unlock its true secrets. Without any hesitation, he tossed it into the Hellfire Crucible as well, which caused a surge of dazzling light to rise up.

“The top disciples of the Apefolk are dead now. I wonder if Ape Heavenhelve is crying his eyes out.” Yang Qi checked the immortal ranking list, and saw their two names vanishing, and his points rising.

Of course, not only did he get the points for killing the two ape brothers, but also the points for all of the fiend-devils who had just self-detonated.

Outside, the buzz of conversation reached new, frenzied heights.

“What? Ape Electrospace and Ape Purgemalice both died? Look, Yang Qi’s points are rising again. There’s no way that anybody could ever catch up to him.”

“Those two ape brothers were both in the sixth step! How did Yang Qi manage to kill them?”

“I don't know. Ape Electrospace and Ape Purgemalice were both extremely strong, and yet Yang Qi cut them down. I wonder how Ape Heavenhelve is taking it.” Many heads began to turn to look in the direction of the chief of the Apefolk, Ape Heavenhelve.

Chapter 375: Nascent Divinity Ensconcement

Ape Heavenhelve looked at the immortal ranking list, and was at first convinced that he was seeing things. But after a moment passed, he threw his head back and roared.

“Argggghhhhh!”

The agony and despair he felt defied description, and anyone who heard his cry felt their hair standing on end.

“Dead. Dead! The best disciples of the Apefolk, my two sons, both dead!? Ape Purgemalice acquired the Seven Malices Heaven-Scroll, a legacy from an immortal world. He was supposed to become an immortal. How could he be dead?

“And Ape Electrospace was born with lightning in his blood, and could communicate directly with electricity. Tribulations didn’t hurt him, they helped him. He slaughtered too many sixth step Great Sages to count, and was supposed to succeed me as clan chief. How could he be dead?”

Ape Heavenhelve’s hand clamped down onto the Heaven-Propping Pillar so tightly that it emitted cracking sounds.

He was so angry he felt like he was going crazy, and wanted to kill everyone in sight just to ease his heart.

All of the Demonfolk who had tried to cause trouble for Yang Qi had suffered greatly this day, and no one could stand in his way. It was almost like the training competition had been set up specifically for him. Mammothfolk? Apefolk? Genius elites? All they did was make it obvious how strong Yang Qi was. And everyone was wondering what kind of reward he would receive from the immortal world after he returned to the Hanging Mountain.

According to the rules, the higher one’s score, the better the reward.

“Well, Ape Heavenhelve, not even your sons could escape death.” Leviathan Truesoaring threw his head back and laughed loudly. “You bragged about killing the Holy Mother’s son, but in the end, your sons got killed. By the way, Young Master Yang Qi is the type who will seek revenge over the smallest grievance. After he returns, he’ll be blessed by the immortal worlds, and his cultivation base will definitely increase. I’d say it won’t be long before you Apefolk are completely wiped out of existence.”

Ape Heavenhelve finally lost his temper, and lunged at Father Leviathan with the Heaven-Propping Pillar.

However, Yan Wubing stepped between them and stopped the pillar with a single finger.

Smack!

“Looking to get killed, Ape Heavenhelve? Seems to me there's no reason to get in a life-or-death fight right here and now.”

Yan Wubing's aura was now so pure and powerful that he seemed like an immortal. Apparently, he was very close to a breakthrough, which would make him a Lesser Demi-Immortal.

Thanks to the enlightenment Yang Qi had given him, he was actually benefiting with every hour that passed, and was experiencing true energy transformations deep within him.

As for Ape Heavenhelve, he could sense those transformations through the pillar, and it caused a spark of fear to appear in his heart. Although he was also a ninth step Epic Saga Sage, it was obvious that Yan Wubing was stronger than him.

“Yan Wubing!” he growled. “One of these days, you and all the other people who support the Holy Mother, including that young master of yours, are going to be dead and buried.”

“Just wait until the young master is out of the training,” Yan Wubing replied coldly, “then I’ll kill you. Cut the weeds and eliminate the roots.”

Ape Heavenhelve’s eyes blazed as if with fire, and yet, he couldn't do anything.

Letting out another roar of rage, he shot toward Mount Sumeru to confer with the August Patriarch.

Upon reaching the summit, he entered the palace and said, “August Patriarch Mammoth Heaven! The Apefolk have suffered dearly in this competition. Our quintessence was wiped out, and therefore, I demand that Yang Qi be killed. August Patriarch, please, do this for the Apefolk.”

“Be calm, Ape Heavenhelve,” he said. “Calm and patient.” Of course, Mammoth Heaven’s expression was just as grim as Ape Heavenhelve’s. “The rules of the competition are clear. Some people live, some die. It's been like that since ancient times, and there’s nothing we can do about it. Once Yang Qi comes out of the competition, we can’t do anything to him openly. If we do, the immortal world would punish us dearly. Not even I can defy their rules. Understand?”

“August Patriarch, you’re a Demi-Immortal! There has to be something you can do. Two of my sons died in there. And your son Mammoth Force also died. We can’t let Yang Qi live after that! Don’t tell me my sons died for nothing! My son Ape Purgemalice had the Seven Malices Heaven-Scroll, and even you sang his praises. He was supposed to be an important leader in the Hanging Mountain. If we let Yang Qi just continue to gain power, then we Demonfolk will never see a day of peace again. August Patriarch, you can't let him keep living.”

Suddenly, one of the Mammothfolk’s Epic Saga Sages looked away from the immortal ranking list and shouted, “How impudent! Haven't you jabbered enough, Ape Heavenhelve? What's going on with you? I can’t believe you would break the rules and yell at the August Patriarch! Back down now, otherwise the August Patriarch will imprison you for all eternity.”

August Patriarch Mammoth Heaven waved his hand dismissively. “It's fine. Let him have his say.”

Forcing himself to calm down a bit, Ape Heavenhelve said, “August Patriarch, think about it. Yang Qi is currently either a Legendary or a Great Sage. If he’s a Great Sage already, he's only in the Born Again Step. And yet, he killed my sons and plenty of other experts. It’s almost like he's invincible. You know full well how strong my son Ape Purgemalice was. Not even an ordinary seventh step Great Sage could have fought against his Seven Malices Heaven-Scroll, much less killed him. That means that Yang Qi is now strong enough to defeat seventh step Great Sages. Once he comes out, he’ll be blessed by the immortal worlds, and will probably achieve multiple breakthroughs. At that point, he could theoretically kill even me. Considering he's the son of the Holy Mother, his progress will definitely be much more rapid than ordinary people. And think of how terrifying he would be as a Demi-Immortal! Perhaps not even you could deal with him, August Patriarch.”

Mammoth Heaven sat there in thought for a long moment, then said, “He’s definitely a plague that needs to be rooted out and destroyed. I've never heard of a first step Great Sage who could defeat the seventh step. I don’t think there was even a person like that back in the days of the Yore-Wilds Continent. Perhaps such geniuses exist in the immortal planes. In any case, my son Mammoth Manyvoids should be able to defeat him. He’ll definitely track Yang Qi down soon and kill him.”

“Your son Mammoth Manyvoids does have the reputation of being the top elite young one in the Hanging Mountain. Can he really kill Yang Qi though?”

“Manyvoids is about to reach the Without Limit Step, so he should be able to kill Yang Qi. When that happens, the Holy Mother will want to weep, but won’t be able to summon the tears. At least now I understand why she was willing to risk universal condemnation to give birth to that child. She must have known that he would progress like this.” With that, Mammoth Heaven began to murmur to himself as though making certain calculations.

**

Back in the Hell of Mahānata, Yang Qi was traveling about randomly.

He had already accumulated enough points to secure his spot in first place. Now, he needed to meditate more on the essence of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, and the magical laws he had command of.

It wasn't easy for a person like him to get into a true hell, which were very different from the ordinary planes that had been converted into hells later on.

The ground and air naturally contained devil energy, and the magical laws were different. Right now, he was contemplating the issue of how to break through to the second step, and become a Nirvanic Resurrection Sage.

He had to be very careful how he did it. He needed to find a very secure location, and brand it with a sealing mark from his nascent divinity. The process was called nascent divinity ensconcement. It had to be very secure, and a place where no one could acquire the sealing mark later. After all, if he died, then that nascent divinity sealing mark would be his ticket to nirvanic resurrection.

Lion Hightower, Mammoth Force, Shark Seaguzzler, and their fellows all had such abilities. Unfortunately, Yang Qi’s Hand of the One God was too powerful, and was capable of crushing anything connected to a person out of existence. It could even reach to the nascent divinity sealing marks and destroy them. That was simply how domineering a godly-class energy art was.

Yang Qi was planning to ensconce his nascent divinity in the Hell of Mahānata.

It was not an easy place to get to, not even for Demi-Immortals. In other words, if he successfully ensconced his soul here, then even if a Demi-Immortal killed him at some point, he could be born again.

Even more noteworthy, performing nascent divinity ensconcement here would connect him even more closely to the Hell of Mahānata. Eventually, he could make the entire plane his own.

Of course, that was something that would happen in the distant future, when he was more than a Demi-Immortal and more than a Demolisher.

Right now, he was simply planting a tiny seed that would eventually sprout and turn into a mighty tree.

An additional factor was that the location where the nascent divinity was ensconced would affect how much power it could be used to generate. The Hell of Mahānata was considered grand, consummate and perfect, and therefore, there was no better place for nascent divinity ensconcement.

Eventually, he found a suitable location, and drew upon his nascent divinity to begin connecting it to the magical laws of the plane. If he succeeded, he would be a Nirvanic Resurrection Sage.

It would give him access to the essence of the plane, which would recognize his soul as part of it.

As would be expected, though, the larger and more powerful a plane was, the more difficult it would be to ensconce one’s nascent divinity there.

Hardly anyone would dare to use the Hell of Mahānata for ensconcement, or even think to do so. Few people could possibly deal with the backlash they could suffer from the plane's essence.

All of a sudden, Yang Qi heard someone singing. “Myriad Mammoths, Many Voids. The Final Radiance of the Setting Sun….”

Then, a figure appeared in the distance. “Brother Yang Qi, you're quite bold. You’re actually trying to ensconce your nascent divinity here in the Hell of Mahānata?”

Chapter 376: Mammoth Manyvoids&#039; Debut

Starlight glittered around this new arrival, making it seem like he was surrounded by a river of stars.

“Mammoth Manyvoids,” Yang Qi said by way of greeting. “The strongest of his generation among the Mammothfolk. Seventh step Planet God Sage, and invincible fighter.”

Not only was Mammoth Manyvoids an elite genius of the Mammothfolk, he had previously occupied the first place slot in the ranking list. Also, he was on the verge of breaking through to the eighth step.

Every competitor was linked to the immortal ranking list, and could check it at any time. Obviously, it was common knowledge even among the competitors in the Hell of Mahānata that Ape Electrospace and Ape Purgemalice had been killed, and that it was Yang Qi who did it. His sudden increase in points made that obvious.

It seemed highly likely that, when the competition ended, Yang Qi would be proclaimed the top elite disciple in all of the Hanging Mountain. Of course, there were many people who had no desire to see that happen.

Mammoth Manyvoids was one of them; he was supposed to be the top disciple, and there was no way he would just let Yang Qi take that away from him.

“I’m a powerful expert, and so are you Brother Yang Qi. You just reached the Great Sage level, didn’t you? And your first act was to decimate the Lionfolk, Sharkfolk, and Apefolk. Presumably, you already have Ape Purgemalice’s Seven Malices Heaven-Scroll, correct?” Mammoth Manyvoids didn't seem like he was interested at all in making a move. Despite this being the first time he had ever been in Yang Qi’s presence, he was chatting as if they were old friends.

“That's right,” Yang Qi said coolly. “I got the scroll, not that I need it.”

“Of course. You have King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy. He was very nearly a god-spirit, and killed too many immortals to even count. How many of his medallions do you have?” Even as he spoke, Mammoth Manyvoids waved his hand and sent out a burst of energy, apparently in an effort to summon other powerful experts to his side.

Yang Qi let him do it. If he wanted to call more people, that was fine.

Even if he ended up surrounded by more experts than ever, he knew that this was the Hell of Mahānata, and it would only be more good training for him. In fact, maybe he could even force another breakthrough because of it.

Mammoth Manyvoids was clearly beyond the level of Ghost Emperor Yama. However, that wasn’t of any concern to Yang Qi at his current level. It was possible that an eighth step Without Limit Sage could kill him, but that would be a difficult task here in the Hell of Mahānata.

“Calling friends to gang up on me, Mammoth Manyvoids?” he said, ready to start fighting at any moment.

“That’s right, I am. You might be a mere first step Great Sage, but I can sense that it's not going to be easy to kill you. Considering who I am, it might be unfair for me to call people to team up on you. But you're strong enough that it’s necessary. Considering you’re aware of what I'm doing, why don’t you try to escape? There’s still time. You might be able to get away.”

“Leave? Why would I do that?” Yang Qi laughed. “It’s the same to me whether I fight you alone, or fight a group. Here in the Hell of Mahānata, it doesn’t matter how many people you throw at me. I’ll always win.”

It was now Mammoth Manyvoids’ turn to burst out laughing. “Well, you’re confident, I’ll give you that. People like you always plan things out, and it makes you seem like an unkillable giant. Truth be told, I admire that. It's too bad you’re the son of the Holy Mother. And it's too bad you killed Mammoth Force. Otherwise, we could have been friends.”

“Mammoth Force had a death wish. You can’t blame me for that.” Suddenly, Yang Qi began to thrum with killing intent. “And sorry, you don’t qualify to be my friend.”

“What was that?” Mammoth Manyvoids said, his eyes glittering with both shock and anger. “Yang Qi, you—”

“My friends are straightforward and upright. But you? You’re too scared to even fight me! And you’re even calling people to gang up on me. You think I want to be friends with someone as despicable and contemptible as that? No. You don’t qualify, Mammoth Manyvoids. You might be the top elite in the Hanging Mountain, but compared to me, you’re nothing but a dog.”

Yang Qi’s words were so biting that Mammoth Manyvoids’ face turned purple with rage, and he looked like he might cough up some blood.

“Die!” he shouted, and then leaped forward, thrusting his hand forward in a deadly attack that pierced through space itself. “Sun Moon Downfall!”

It was an attack powerful enough to end worlds, and it caused a network of constellations to spring up around him.

“Sorry, but this is the Hell of Mahānata. You might be in the Planet God Step, but you can’t break through the greyspace of this hell. The outside stars aren’t going to help you.” Without any further ado, Yang Qi unleashed the Fist of the Halls of Heaven.

RUMBLE!

Suddenly, his nascent divinity appeared behind him, a godmammoth with hells beneath its feet and a long spear in its hand. At the same time, a tempest of devil energy swept out, filling the entire area and completely transforming all of the magical laws.

The spear shot forward, and the Sun Moon Downfall shattered.

Mammoth Manyvoids immediately began to back away in disbelief. “That’s… a godmammoth?! Only we Mammothfolk have the pure bloodline necessary to cultivate our nascent divinity into that form. Only we can unleash the blood of the godmammoths! Don’t tell me that you're actually one of us Mammothfolk? That energy… it’s so strong! Not even my father has a nascent divinity like that. Who are you?”

“Who am I? You’ll find out after you’re dead.” Yang Qi could already tell that Mammoth Manyvoids’ godmammoth blood was far more plentiful and pure than that of Mammoth Force. Mammoth Force’s godmammoth blood had been so weak it was virtually useless. But Mammoth Manyvoids’ was very different. If Yang Qi could get it, then it would be even easier to ensconce his nascent divinity in the Hell of Mahānata, and he would be virtually invincible.

Yang Qi had built up all the energy he needed. He took a step forward, and his God Legion Battle Robe began to spread out, filling the area with pure white sagelight. It was like a sea that turned the surrounding hell into a pure paradise. Immense power filled him, and at the same time, countless Great Sage fiend-devils poured out of his Hell Portal. Not pausing for a moment, he sucked them into his fist, and then punched out.

One fist strike.

One fist strike that could sever the foundations of heaven, and rule the world.

Heaven and Earth are Boundless, the Universe is Vast. The Nascent Divinity is the True Ego, and is Eternally Deathless. The Halls of Heaven are Above, Hell is Below.

Yang Qi was an expert created by the legion of gods, and when he attacked, space vibrated, and heaven and earth spun.

“You think that’s enough to beat me?” Mammoth Manyvoids said. Leaping into the air, he sent a stream of starlight to pierce through the darkness. “And you think that the Hell of Mahānata can prevent me from calling on the power of the stars? The Planet God Step is beyond your comprehension! Planet God Sages can control heavenly bodies!

“Planetary Detonation!”

Smack!

A sea of star power fell, creating countless rotating planets, surrounded by razor-sharp blade nimbuses.

However, Yang Qi simply leaped forward into that field of planets, and struck out with the Hand of the One God.

The planets began to explode, one after another, and then, Mammoth Manyvoids let out a frenzied howl. Suddenly, he began to shrink down rapidly until he vanished, having just barely escaped the Hand of the One God. The planets faded away as well, and everything went quiet.

As Yang Qi looked around with narrowed eyes, Mammoth Manyvoids suddenly popped back into being behind him, and unleashed a fist strike.

“Destroy All Creation!”

In the universe, life could come and go at any time, which meant that everything in creation could be destroyed.

It was a deadly move, and yet, Yang Qi hardly moved in response. He simply reached out, using the Hand of the One God to isolate the weakest aspect of the move, then latched onto it and crushed it out of existence.

Crack!

The Destroy All Creation move vanished into nothing. Wherever the One God went, he could convert anything into its most fundamental and glorious nature, and force it to offer him worship.

Glory belonged to the legion of gods, and the legion of gods belonged to the Lord and One God.

The five fingers of the Hand of the One God represented the five phases, and the essence of creation. It could create minor planes without cease, and therefore, any attack that was unleashed against it would find the magical laws around it changing. When that happened, the attack would cease to exist.

Shocked, Mammoth Manyvoids went on to unleash dozens of daoist skills, but all of them were stopped by the Hand of the One God.

“Buckler of Sumeru!” He spat out a mouthful of blood which transformed into a burning shield, decorated with a mighty mountain.

Smack!

The Hand of the One God smashed into the shield like a meteor shower hitting a plane of existence. Vital energy shattered, and magical laws collapsed, sending Mammoth Manyvoids hurling backward for dozens of kilometers.

After managing to grind to a halt, he looked up at Yang Qi, hefted his shield, and said, “Nice energy art. I underestimated you. I thought I would have the upper hand, except, you’re a lot stronger than I realized. Unfortunately, that was probably your strongest move, and yet, it couldn't do anything to me. Next, it’s my turn to use a deadly attack. Watch and learn.”

His voice couldn’t have been more cruel and merciless.

RUMBLE!

Completely ignoring his words, Yang Qi blurred into motion, heading directly toward him.

Chapter 377: Experts Go All Out

C-C-CRACK!

A certain mountain in the Hell of Mahānata split open, just from the shockwaves of the Hand of the One God. In the mortal world, a mountain like that would be considered a place of gods or devils, the type of thing that could never crumble. Great Sages under the fifth step couldn’t even shake it. And yet, when battered by the Hand of the One God, it was as weak as tofu dregs.

As for Mammoth Manyvoids, he was forced to unleash true flame, and fully activate the godmammoth blood within him. As a result, vital energy flared around him, creating massive flows of energy that surrounded him like spider webs.

As the two of them competed in terms of true energy, the destructive shockwaves obliterated everything around them.

Of course, Mammoth Manyvoids couldn’t have been more shocked. He had assumed that Yang Qi was only strong enough to kill fifth and sixth step Great Sages. And considering that he was at the peak of the seventh step, he was as different from Ape Electrospace and Ape Purgemalice as night was from day. He hadn’t been the least bit worried about fighting Yang Qi.

How could he have known that Yang Qi was most definitely capable of dealing with him? In fact, with the Hand of the One God, he actually had the advantage, and was forcing Mammoth Manyvoids to gasp for breath as he fought.

There was something about Yang Qi’s energy that seemed to be specifically designed to counter him. Mammoth Manyvoids was even beginning to suspect it had something to do with his own ancestors, the godmammoths.

For a first step Born Again Sage to fight a seventh step Planet God Sage, even relying on powerful magical treasures or immortal items, was something that Mammoth Manyvoids had never even heard whispers of. Not even the most ancient records in existence talked about geniuses like that.

Even in the most fantastic stories, it was only possible for first step Great Sages to win against fifth step opponents.

But the seventh step? That defied imagination.

Not even ten thousand first step Great Sages should be able to fight a seventh step opponent.

The level discrepancy was just too great.

All of a sudden, a voice rang out, interrupting the fighting between Yang Qi and Mammoth Manyvoids.

“Well, Mammoth Manyvoids, you're really turning out to be a useless fool.”

A white-robed man appeared, a person with command over the most powerful and finest magics, his eyes glittering with malice and murder as he stared at Yang Qi.

Finest Magic.

He was considered the second-most powerful cultivator in the competition, and was a human who didn’t hail from the Hanging Mountain. He was also a seventh step Planet God Sage.

Yang Qi retracted the Hand of the One God and looked over at him. At the same time, Mammoth Manyvoids stepped back, worried about who exactly Finest Magic intended to attack.

“Finest Magic,” he said. “Let’s join forces to kill Yang Qi. Do you want the points, or King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy medallion?”

“You’re too kind to offer me the choice,” Finest Magic replied. “I’ll take the points, and you take the medallion. Of course, that means I’ll have to kill him with my own hands.” He and Mammoth Manyvoids sounded like two pirates discussing how to split up some treasure.

Suddenly, another voice rang out. “You two are going to share the booty and ignore me?”

A bare-chested young man appeared, pulsing with the aura of the Brute-Wilds Continent. He was also a seventh step Great Sage, and was considered the third most-powerful competitor, Stunning Beheader.

Now there were three vicious tigers eyeing the prey that was Yang Qi.

“We want our share too.”

Two more individuals appeared. One of them was clad head to toe in black garments, leaving only his eyes visible. He was from the Quake-Dawn Cathedral’s Hall of Ninjas. He was Ninja Unity, the apprentice of the Ninja God himself. Next to him was a hulking young man who pulsed with a wild, chaotic energy. He was Wilds Primeking, the son of the Wilds God.

Both of them were sixth step Great Sages, and yet, thanks to the immortal items they had been given by their respective organizations, they were no weaker than the seventh step. They were also in the top ten on the ranking list, and were considered to be outstanding individuals among the competitors.

Five top experts had Yang Qi surrounded.

Things had just become very real.

Considering that these were all of the top figures in the competition, this was an even more serious situation than when Ape Purgemalice and Ape Electrospace had teamed up against him.

Three Planet God Sages and two Heavenly Workings Sages had this section of hell completely locked down, making escape an impossibility.

“Have anything else to say, Yang Qi?” Mammoth Manyvoids said. “There’s no way you’ll escape this situation. And we can’t be bought off. You’ll be dying shortly, and we’ll be taking your points and everything else that belongs to you.”

“That’s right, Yang Qi,” Stunning Beheader said. “Show us your best techniques. We're going to kill you, but you can still go out in a blaze of glory. I have to admit, I really admire you. It’s hard to believe it's going to take this many high-level Great Sages to take you out. Unfortunately, your end has come, and no one can save you. Rest assured, I will tell stories of you in all of the Four Wilds. Many people will hear of your mighty accomplishments.”

Wilds Primeking stepped forward. “You’re just getting what you deserve, Yang Qi. I know you killed my brother Wilds Everlasting, and then framed the Quake-Dawn Cathedral. A lot of people died in the fighting that resulted because of that. It was only after some of the paragon elders from the two organizations used Light Refraction Reverse Modeling Divination that the truth was revealed.”

Suddenly, a thrumming sound could be heard as Ninja Unity powered up to fight. “I'm Ninja Unity from the Hall of Ninjas in the Quake-Dawn Cathedral. Today, your blood will become a sacrifice to my ninja sword.”

Yang Qi looked around coolly at his opponents.

“Make your move, people,” he said. “I'm in the first step, and you, a group of sixth and seventh steps, are trying to take me on with the advantage of numbers. Soon, the sand beneath our feet will be stained with blood. Yours. And the only question is: how many of you will become vengeful souls here in the Hell of Mahānata?”

Yang Qi’s words grated at the five Great Sages like strings of metal, and caused their expressions to flicker. In fact, no one knew what to say in response.

He was by no means exaggerating. He had already killed multiple Great Sages without being hurt at all, and if he went all out, it seemed likely that he could kill more.

More than anyone else, Mammoth Manyvoids knew that Yang Qi wasn’t bluffing.

Snorting coldly, he said, “You're too terrifying, Yang Qi. You have to be put down, or else none of us will ever be able to rest easy. Too much bad blood has built up. If we let you go now, then after the competition ends, we would definitely suffer catastrophe sooner or later.”

“He’s definitely too dangerous to let live,” Finest Magic said. “If he's this bad now, who knows how bad he would be later. And that’s not to mention what would happen if he got the blessing of the immortal world. He might reach the Without Limit Step or even the Epic Saga Step. And then, none of us would even come close to being a match for him.”

“Apparently none of you are afraid of dying?” Yang Qi said, looking around at them. “Is that right?”

“He’s trying to weaken our resolve,” Finest Magic said. “Come on, we can kill him. He looks tough on the outside, but inside, he's weak.”

Everyone knew that if they didn't work as a team, Yang Qi could theoretically pick them off one by one. And if he somehow escaped, it would spell disaster in the future. Once the competition was over, it would be difficult to get a chance to kill him, especially considering that he was the Holy Mother’s son.

“Kill him!” Mammoth Manyvoids said, his voice trembling with bloodthirsty rage. “We have to attack together, and without hesitation. If I'm the one who gets his points, I’ll make sure the rest of you get big rewards from the Hanging Mountain.”

Everyone knew that they had to attack, and end the fight quickly.

And thus, all five experts lunged forward in attack.

“DIE!”

**

Outside in the Hanging Mountain, the top names on the immortal ranking list began to emit energy fluctuations that were very telling.

“They’re fighting!” declared many of the old-timers who were paying close attention.

This was something that would always happen in the competition when the final fighting began. The top competitors’ names on the list would emit special auras and fluctuations that would give clues as to their current situation.

“Look at the ranking list. Mammoth Manyvoids, Stunning Beheader, Finest Magic, Ninja Unity, and Wilds Primeking are all fighting with Yang Qi.”

“This is it! This is the final bout. Those five are all in the top ten, and they’re teaming up to fight Yang Qi. You never see stuff like this. When Yang Qi went in there, he was in the eighth Legendary transformation. Even if he reached the Great Sage level since then, there’s no way he can take on that many powerful opponents.”

“Yeah, but it looks like he’s holding his own. What a pity we can't actually see the fighting. It must be spectacular.”

“This is bad,” Leviathan Truesoaring said, his expression grim. “Five top experts are teaming up against the young master. I don’t care how tough he is, he only has two hands. How can he fight so many enemies at the same time?”

“You’re right, it’s a dangerous situation,” Yan Wubing said, a very serious expression on his face. “Unfortunately, we can’t do anything to help him. It’s all up to the young master now.” Of course, Yan Wubing knew there was some terrifying, mysterious power lurking in Yang Qi, and that was of some comfort.

Some distance away, Chief Lion let out a string of vicious laughter, and then said, “Yang Qi is definitely going to get what’s coming to him. I can’t wait to see the little bastard die.”

At the peak of Mount Sumeru, Ape Heavenhelve’s eyes were glued to the immortal ranking list, and his blood pumped with hatred for Yang Qi.

Off to the side, a Mammothfolk expert rushed to report matters to August Patriarch Mammoth Heaven.

“August Patriarch, Mammoth Manyvoids and several other experts have Yang Qi surrounded.”

Chapter 378: Major Spectacle

“I’m aware of that,” Mammoth Heaven said. “The next thousand years of rulership will be determined by this fight. If Yang Qi dies, the power structure in the Hanging Mountain will remain the same. If he doesn’t, then my faction will slowly lose dominance.”

The Epic Saga Sage elders of the Mammothfolk were stunned.

“The situation isn’t that serious, August Patriarch,” one of them said. “Yang Qi isn’t that important. How could he change the political structure of the entire Hanging Mountain?”

“Yang Qi isn't important now. But if he successfully comes out on top of all of those experts, and receives the blessing of the immortal world, then he’ll be very powerful. And after that, his progress will only become more rapid. If we can’t kill him now when he’s just getting started, then we definitely won’t be able to in the future. Besides, one of the rewards is a place in the Titan Emperor Collegium. Whoever takes first place will become a student there.”

“What? The Titan Emperor Collegium?” The megamammoth elders were even more taken aback by this additional information. “Is the Titan Emperor Collegium even real?”

“Of course it is. In primeval times, the Yore-Wilds, Brute-Wilds, Waste-Wilds, and Proto-Wilds were all administered by the Titan Emperor Heaven. And the Titan Emperor Collegium is the governing instrument from that immortal world. It is an educational establishment designed to gather individuals of potential and groom them into real geniuses. Presumably you’ve heard the rumors of the man the Holy Mother was involved with. He came from the Titan Emperor Collegium, and was an immortal. A Demolisher. Supposedly, he committed some sort of crime, and was exiled to the lower worlds as a banished immortal.”

“What? A banished immortal?” Ape Heavenhelve blurted, having finally caught ear. “No wonder. No wonder the Immortal World Assembly made her the Holy Mother! Normally speaking, an unchaste girl like her who birthed a son should never have been appointed as the Holy Mother. Now it makes sense why the immortal world issued the orders they did.”

“August Patriarch,” one of the elders said, “do you happen to know who exactly that banished immortal was?”

“All I know is that he was very, very important, and that eventually, he went back to the immortal world. I would say it’s highly likely that he is Yang Qi’s father.”

“Does that mean we have to leave Yang Qi alone?” Ape Heavenhelve said, grinding his teeth in frustration.

Mammoth Heaven didn’t respond.

**

Outside, the audience was abuzz.

“I can't believe someone like him even exists. His level is so low, but look at how many top experts he killed. There weren’t even people like that in ancient times.”

“Yang Qi is ridiculously strong. It’s too bad we can't watch the fighting. This is going to be one spectacular finale. After all, Mammoth Manyvoids, Finest Magic and Stunning Beheader are all invincible fighters.”

“Plus, I heard that Ninja Unity and Wilds Primeking both have immortal items. Ordinary people in their level definitely couldn’t fight them.”

“Those five are apex-level fighters, and they're all teaming up against Yang Qi. I wonder how he’s going to deal with the situation.”

“It doesn't look good for him, that's for sure. Although, he could actually just run away, and would still win the competition. Whatever he does, you can’t underestimate him.”

“Underestimate him? He’s up against five peak experts, and the only way to win is to escape. Let’s see if he can pull it off.”

“You’re right. All he has to do is stay alive, and he wins. Once the competition is over, he’ll be on the same level as the chiefs of the Demonfolk.”

“Well that's obvious. Only eighth step Great Sages can be Demonfolk chiefs. And only someone in the eighth step could possibly get out of the situation he’s in right now.”

“Let’s wait and see. That's the only thing we can do now.”

The Hanging Mountain was a mix of all sorts of emotions right now. Some people were excited to watch the action, others were envious, angry, or sad….

But all of them were watching the immortal ranking list, and waiting to see which names would drop off of it next.

RUMBLE!

The fighting was just getting underway in the Hell of Mahānata.

Mammoth Manyvoids, Finest Magic, Stunning Beheader, Ninja Unity and Wilds Primeking were all unleashing deadly attacks onto Yang Qi, and calling on magical techniques and godly laws as they did.

Yang Qi had summoned his God Legion Paradise, and shrunk it down to a sixty-square-meter area. The dazzling sagelight made the domain’s greyspace look like a gigantic, magical gem.

So far, none of the godly law attacks had done a single thing to pierce Yang Qi’s defenses.

“Intangible Great Dao!” Finest Magic shouted, sending a heavenly river of paper talismans, true energy seeds, and elemental constructions toward Yang Qi.

Yang Qi simply reached out with the Hand of the One God to destroy the heavenly river.

To his godly move, techniques like that were laughable.

Then, Yang Qi blurred into motion. Conforming perfectly to the magical laws of the Hell of Mahānata, he appeared in front of Finest Magic, grabbed him with the Hand of the One God, and threw him tumbling off to the side.

“Sword of the Ninja!” Ninja Unity said, suddenly pulsing with immortal energy. A weapon appeared, long and curved, like a serpentine dragon. It had the character “ninja” 忍 on it, which was essentially the character for blade 刀 stabbing into the character for heart 心. The character itself was an immortal mote, which meant that an attack from it was nearly as deadly as the attack of an immortal.

“Hammer of the Grand-Wilds!” Wilds Primeking shouted. He waved his sleeve, sending an enormous hammer out, forged from violet gold. It weighed millions of pounds, and had been forged by the means of some powerful divine ability. With the elements of ghosts and gods that it contained, it seemed like something an immortal would make to epitomize his martial path.

Both of these immortal weapons pulsed with true energy as they descended onto Yang Qi with devastating force.

Yang Qi turned, and thrust out both of his hands, each of them powered by the Hand of the One God. Instantly, the shining light of the two weapons faded, and Wilds Primeking and Ninja Unity staggered backward.

C-C-CRACK!

Popping sounds erupted from behind Yang Qi as both Stunning Beheader and Mammoth Manyvoids attacked the God Legion Paradise, unleashing such massive power that the greyspace was broken, and the attacks bore down on Yang Qi.

“Myriad Mammoths, Many Voids!”

“Slaughter of the Heaven-Beheader!”

The two attacks seemed to perfectly complement each other, almost as if it were a prearranged strategy.

Yang Qi bent like a tree in the wind, and before the force of the attacks could reach him, they were actually sucked up by the dazzling light of the God Legion Paradise.

“Nascent Divinity Ensconcement!”

All of a sudden, his domain filled with the heaven-shaking, earth-toppling power of the Jambudvīpa Deluge, Night Queen Flame, Amber Avalanche and Eternal Godwind.

Yang Qi’s godmammoth-like nascent divinity appeared, and this time, it was in perfect resonance with the Hell of Mahānata.

It was already beginning to link with the surrounding magical laws of space and time, as well as other key elements of the plane.

“This is bad!” Mammoth Manyvoids said. “He’s trying to break through to the second step. If he ensconces his nascent divinity, he’ll become a Nirvanic Resurrection Sage. Even worse, he’ll be able to draw on the grand power of the Hell of Mahānata. We definitely won’t be able to fight him in that state!”

“Don’t give him the chance to succeed!” Finest Magic shouted as he flew back toward the fighting. He had been tossed aside by the Hand of the One God, but hadn't been seriously injured, and right now, he had a very serious expression on his face. Furthermore, he pulsed with magical power. Shockingly, there was a sealing mark within him that was shining with bright light, forming a nine-sided star. It was the sealing mark of an immortal.

Suddenly, an immortal sword appeared in his hand, which he stabbed toward Yang Qi’s nascent divinity.

“He’s not strong enough to take all five of us on. If the fight keeps going like this, he’s dead for sure. That's why he's trying to reach the second step. He has to achieve that breakthrough to beat us. Don't give him the opportunity. Kill him!”

“Yes, join forces and attack!”

“Don’t slow down. This is the perfect moment to kill him.”

“Go all out, everyone!”

RUMBLE!

Without any hesitation, the five experts unleashed all of the destructive power they were capable of. Immortal energy from multiple planes was on display. In some immortal planes, immortal energy was rigorous. In others it was bloodthirsty, and in others, it was related to swords, or to darkness….

This was the ultimate level of power that these five were capable of, backed by their sage domains.

Snap! Crack!

The greyspace of the God Legion Paradise broke open, and a space-time wormhole appeared.

Massive destruction bore down on Yang Qi.

“We got through his domain!” Mammoth Manyvoids shouted in delight. “And look, he’s just about to break through. He’s at his weakest right now. Kill him! Don’t stop now!”

WHIZZZ!

However, even as the attacks were about to hit him, Yang Qi spoke.

“The legion of gods may be weak, but I'm not. The legion of gods is not omnipotent, but I am.”

He stood there in the middle of his domain, like the origin of all the power in the universe. And then, the power of the attacks vanished into him, disappearing without a trace.

Chapter 379: Complete Slaughter

The attacks from the five experts had been just on the verge of hitting Yang Qi. However, that was when he used some mysterious ability to negate them. He was now fusing with the Hell of Mahānata, and its powers were freely mixing with his.

He was reaching the next highest level of enlightenment, and ensconcing his nascent divinity into the void around him.

RUMBLE!

Immense force was building up inside of him. At the same time, the magical laws of the Hell of Mahānata were rushing into the God Legion Paradise and toward him. As of this moment, the God Legion Paradise was the Hell of Mahānata, and the reverse was also true.

Everyone present looked on in shock as Yang Qi’s soul imbedded itself deeply into the essence of the surrounding hell.

Looking terrified, Mammoth Manyvoids said, “Go, go, go! We still have time to turn things around. Destroy his domain! His nascent divinity still isn’t completely part of the Hell of Mahānata.”

With that, he spat out a mouthful of blood that transformed into a psychic tempest. A plethora of magical symbols swirled out, which he directed with his hands.

“Let the Host of Immortals Come!” His blood became the host of immortals, which then descended onto the God Legion Paradise.

“Inaugurate the God Temple!” Finest Magic said, causing an immense temple to fly out and radiate crushing pressure.

“Axe of the Ghost, Skill of the God!” Stunning Beheader shouted. He also spat out a mouthful of blood, causing an enormous axe to appear, which he used to slash at the God Legion Paradise. The God Legion Paradise broke open again, and in the blink of an eye, the axe was on top of Yang Qi, seemingly just on the verge of slashing him to bits.

At the same time, Wilds Primeking and Ninja Unity joined forces, unleashing their immortal items, driving them with both blood and longevity to try to kill Yang Qi.

Smash!

The God Legion Paradise had been battered nearly to pieces, with the greyspace having been broken open everywhere, and the vital energy transformed into primal-chaos.

And all five experts stepped inside, hoping to kill Yang Qi in his own domain.

**

Outside in the Hanging Mountain, the audience could see Yang Qi’s name flickering and turning dark, which indicated that he was just on the verge of dying.

“Damn, the young master is in trouble,” Leviathan Truesoaring said, his face draining of blood.

“Keep your cool,” Yan Wubing said, staring at the ranking list. “The young master will surely turn things around.”

“There’s no way the brat can hold on,” Chief Lion said. “He's dead.” He and the chief of the Sharkfolk were both delightedly watching Yang Qi’s name.

**

“Everyone attack!”

In the middle of the God Legion Paradise, Yang Qi faced the combined force of five top experts, all of whom wanted to kill him.

“That Which is Glorious Shall Not Demise. That Which is Splendid Will Always Exist in My Heart. That Which is Eternal Will Always Be. That Which is Deathless Belongs Only to the Lord….” The Fist of the Halls of Heaven appeared, and the Hand of the One God reached out with the power to topple mountains and drain seas.

Yet again, the power of the five attacking experts was neutralized.

“That’s not going to work!” Mammoth Manyvoids shouted. “We’re going to kill you, no matter what you do!” With that, he burned more of his quintessence-blood and lifespan to power another attack.

Suddenly, a host of sword nimbuses appeared, which formed together into an immense spell formation that could slaughter devils and gods.

“The Heaven-Sword Cometh!”

Mammoth Manyvoids was drawing on every ounce of power and skill he could muster to send this enormous sword formation over to kill Yang Qi.

Sage domains assaulted him, and explosions rang out as the God Legion Paradise finally collapsed.

“His life force aura is going out!”

“He can’t take this level of attack!”

“His meridians, sea of energy and even his soul are vanishing.”

“Push the attack. Take his life!”

The attacks battered Yang Qi relentlessly, causing his name on the immortal ranking list to flicker and darken severely. It looked like a candle in the wind, just on the verge of winking out.

The five experts howled as they drew deeply on their true energy.

Smack!

Yang Qi finally vanished. From what everyone present could tell, there wasn’t even a single piece of ash left behind. In fact, the five experts began to look around in confusion to try to determine his location.

The only thing left behind was a gaping crater filled with devil energy and hellish ores.

The Hell of Mahānata was deep, with lands that ran down for thousands of kilometers. In fact, no one even knew how deep the earth went. No words existed to describe that level of depth.

“Is he dead?” Mammoth Manyvoids said. “Why did he just vanish? Who killed him? Did one of you get his points, because I didn’t? His quintessence energy is just gone! He must have died, right? We should be able to take his sage motes and quintessence energy now.”

“I didn't get his points,” Finest Magic said, shaking his head.

“Me either.” Stunning Beheader looked around thoughtfully for clues. Unfortunately, there was no trace of Yang Qi anywhere.

“He must not be dead!” Wilds Primeking blurted.

“Reach out to the immortal ranking list!” Ninja Unity said. “Look, his name is still in first place! The fact that his name is still there means the immortal ranking list is still connected to his energy. This is bad! He—”

Suddenly, two blood-curdling screams rang out, and Wilds Primeking and Ninja Unity were suddenly sent tumbling violently backward.

Mammoth Manyvoids, Finest Magic, and Stunning Beheader all backed up, their hackles rising.

Suddenly, a pulse of magic swept forth, making it seem like the world was about to explode.

“This is bad. Run!” Mammoth Manyvoids shouted.

Yang Qi stepped out into the open, his God Legion Battle Robe fluttering, making him look like a god-spirit strolling in the mortal world.

“I've ensconced my nascent divinity in the Hell of Mahānata!” he said.

Everyone looked over in shock and realized that, just as he had said, his godmammoth nascent divinity was now deeply connected to the Hell of Mahānata, fused with it. In fact, it was now impossible to tell the difference between Yang Qi’s true energy, and the energy of the surrounding hell.

Immediately, the entire group felt the power of expulsion building up, trying to remove them from the plane. It was almost as if the Hell of Mahānata had become Yang Qi’s sage domain; anyone who entered it against his wishes would face grave opposition.

A tempest sprang into being, with Yang Qi at the center. It contained a Jambudvīpa Deluge, Night Queen Flame, an Amber Avalanche, and an Eternal Godwind, and all of them began to bore into Yang Qi through his eyes, ears, nose, and mouth.

“Not good!” Mammoth Manyvoids shouted. He knew exactly what was happening. “He ensconced his nascent divinity! He made it part of the essence of the Hell of Mahānata! His true energy here is as boundless as Mahānata itself! And now he’s powering up.”

“The Hell of Mahānata is basically as strong as an immortal plane,” Finest Magic said. “Not even Demi-Immortals should be able to ensconce nascent divinities here. But he did it! The stronger the plane you ensconce your nascent divinity into, the more power you have! This should be impossible. How did he do it?”

Voice trembling, Stunning Beheader said, “If his nascent divinity is ensconced in hell, then… is he a god, or a devil?”

Stammering, Wilds Primeking said, “Th-those are the f-four elemental tribulations of earth, water, fire and wind? Jambudvīpa Deluge? Night Queen Flame…? Those are tribulations that normally appear for Without Limit Sages. What is he doing with them? Breathing them in? Shouldn't that kill him? How could he still be alive?”

“Get out of here!” Ninja Unity blurted. He was a top expert from the Hall of Ninjas, and thus, had no illusions at all about what was to come. There was no way they could kill Yang Qi now.

Having ensconced his nascent divinity, he was a Nirvanic Resurrection Sage. The way that he had disappeared moments ago was a function of nirvanic resurrection. For all intents and purposes, there was no way to kill him in the Hell of Mahānata.

After all, his nascent divinity had been ensconced there.

Not even an eighth step Great Sage could do anything to him now.

Eyes flashing, Mammoth Manyvoids gritted his teeth and said, “Wait. There’s still a chance. He's in the middle of facing tribulation. Cut him down! Use taboo skills if you have to!” Even as the words left his mouth, he waved his arms, which became like two blood dragons.

“Heaven-Demon Body Deformation!”

When Finest Magic saw what was happening, his eyes bulged in shock. ‘He’s using the secret magic of Heaven-Demon Body Deformation? That’s going to injure his fleshly body and his cultivation base, and will force him to drop in level. However, he’ll get a temporary tenfold boost to power. He’ll drop from the seventh step to the sixth after this!’

“He’s right!” he shouted. “We can’t hold anything back!”

RIIIIP!

Suddenly, Finest Magic’s fleshly body exploded as he also paid a steep price to let loose a deadly attack.

All of the others did the same. They were not leaving themselves any avenue of escape as they tried to put an end to Yang Qi.

“That’s not going to work,” Yang Qi said. He opened his Lord's Eye, and sky-obfuscating, land-enshrouding sagelight erupted out, along with holy hymns of praise. As of this moment, Yang Qi truly did look like some sort of sage or saint. His long hair even seemed to pulse with power that could tear open continents.

Smack!

A godmammoth lunged forward, negating Finest Magic’s attack. Then, a scream rang out as he was reduced to ash by the Hand of the One God. No amount of struggling did him any good.

In the blink of an eye, his aura vanished, and even his soul disappeared. His nascent divinity mark was ensconced in some distant plane, but unfortunately, even it was wiped out. There would be no nirvanic resurrection for him.

A seventh step Great Sage had been crushed out of existence by Yang Qi.

Chapter 380: It Ends

Finest Magic was dead, wiped out of existence by Yang Qi.

Now that Yang Qi had his nascent divinity ensconced in the Hell of Mahānata, it took almost no effort on his part to draw on the essence of the plane, which was so enormous that not even the host of immortals knew all of its secrets. The Rich-Lush Continent would be like a speck of dust if it were placed inside of it. And the fighting being between Yang Qi and the others was no more impressive than a handful of country bumpkins engaged in a wrestling contest in the mortal world. It hardly attracted any attention at all.

Yang Qi was strong, but not strong enough to have dealings with the higher entities that existed here. After all, not even Demolishers could really cause waves in the Hell of Mahānata.

Because it was so large, ensconcing a nascent divinity there was a very difficult task that not even Demi-Immortals would be able to do. Thankfully, Yang Qi had succeeded, and that opened a huge door for him, and gave him easy access to immense power.

Henceforth, it would be much easier to summon fiend-devils and devil-gods. With almost no effort, he could have huge armies at his disposal, and all of them Great Sages.

His true energy surged, and the particles within him stirred. Suddenly, the thirty million megamammoths inside of him began to transform, as their lower halves took human shape.

In other words, they were gradually turning into entities with elephantine heads and human bodies.

And that was the form of the godmammoth.

Even as Finest Magic was cut down, Mammoth Manyvoids’ momentum placed him right next to Yang Qi, who turned to face him, simultaneously expanding his God Legion Paradise. Mammoth Manyvoids’ attack hit the domain like an ant hitting an oak tree, provoking not even the tiniest reaction.

RIIIIP!

The Hand of the One God appeared, transforming everything in the area into primal-chaos, and even evaporating the air. Mammoth Manyvoids was crushed into a pulp, and the Planet God power within him spread out in all directions, dazzlingly brilliant.

“Planet God Aggregation; Personal Invincibility!”

Mammoth Manyvoids lurched backward, and the gory pulp of his body formed back; he had been born again with starlight.

And yet, the Hand of the One God was not done with its work. Before Mammoth Manyvoids could escape, he was grabbed by the hand, which caused him to rapidly shrink down until he was only a few inches tall.

“No!” he shouted, throwing his head back and howling at the top of his lungs. “Don’t kill me! I’ll give you hoards of treasure once we're out of here. I'm the son of August Patriarch Mammoth Heaven! If you kill me, you’ll make mortal enemies of all the Mammothfolk. It will cause an uproar in the Hanging Mountain!”

Crack!

Yang Qi ignored him. The Hand of the One God closed tightly, and Mammoth Manyvoids exploded. Even his magical treasures were reduced to dust. Then, sagefire burned away his remains until the only thing left was a single drop of blood. Godmammoth blood.

‘Incredible,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘This is pure godmammoth blood. With this, my Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth will definitely reach a higher level.’ He gestured, and the blood entered his body.

Mammoth Manyvoids was dead.

And with his blood, Yang Qi was already fiercer than before. Turning, he faced the final three opponents: Stunning Beheader, Ninja Unity, and Wilds Primeking.

All three were already so shaken they could hardly move.

Of their alliance of five, the two most powerful had already been killed, so there was obviously nothing they could do now to stay alive.

“Run!” Stunning Beheader shouted, turning to flee.

Ninja Unity and Wilds Primeking both fled in different directions, praying that Yang Qi wouldn’t chase them.

Unfortunately, even as it seemed they would disappear into the Hell of Mahānata, Yang Qi blurred into motion, becoming three separate versions of himself, each of which launched a Hand of the One God at one of the fleeing enemies.

RUUUUUUUUMBLE!

Three booms rang out, and three dazzling flashes of light could be seen. Three mighty experts were crushed out of existence, their immortal items destroyed.

The Hand of the One God could even destroy that which was immortal.

Five experts, all dead. Their sage motes, and anything valuable that Yang Qi wanted, were his for the taking. Yang Qi was far and away the first place winner of the competition.

After absorbing the sage motes and immortal motes, he absorbed any leftover quintessence energy into the God Legion Paradise.

The sage motes formed something like thick chains that made the God Legion Paradise even stronger and more durable than before.

The God Legion Paradise was changing again, on a fundamental level.

If an eighth step Without Limit Sage could see him now, that person’s jaw would drop. The thick, chain-like sage motes that he had were something that only ten thousand Great Sages working together would normally be able to produce. They were something that a single individual shouldn’t possess.

In other words, Yang Qi was like the equivalent of ten thousand second step Nirvanic Resurrection Sages, with true energy, psychic powers, and martial arts of the ultimate quality.

With the fighting over, he sat down cross-legged. Now was not the time to slaughter more fiend-devils, but rather, to stabilize himself. After killing five powerful Great Sages, and especially after gaining that drop of blood from Mammoth Manyvoids, he had work to do.

After he was stable, he would leave.

He didn't need a passageway created by the immortal world; he now had the capability of leaving on his own.

With his nascent divinity ensconced in the Hell of Mahānata, there would be nothing to block his passage, something that ordinary Demi-Immortals couldn’t even do.

**

The Hanging Mountain had exploded into a furor.

The old-timers had been keeping a close eye on the ranking list, and had watched Yang Qi’s name grow dim, which seemed to indicate he was about to perish. In contrast, the names of his five opponents had begun to shine brightly, from the fact that they were unleashing deadly moves.

In that moment, even Yan Wubing felt like his heart was about to lurch out of his throat.

In the end, Yang Qi’s name actually went completely dark, which meant that he had died. However, despite being dark, the name didn’t disappear, which led to wide-spread confusion.

Then, only a moment later, his name suddenly became incomparably bright, like the sun suddenly appearing on a dark night.

One by one, the names of the five other competitors he had been fighting went dark, and then vanished.

They all died!

Five top experts had been killed in body and soul.

“They all perished!”

“Mammoth Manyvoids. Finest Magic. Stunning Beheader. Wilds Primeking. Ninja Unity. All five of them just died. My god! Not even they could stand up to him? What exactly is Yang Qi?”

“Dead…? Dead…. Ai….” Many Demonfolk chiefs were sighing, and wondering if they should switch loyalties from the August Patriarch to the Holy Mother.

“This….” The chiefs of the Lionfolk, Sharkfolk, and others were all staring with wide eyes, and then many of them coughed up blood from the rage and shock. Most of them actually thought they were seeing things. “They’re all dead?”

“Miraculous! Simply miraculous….” Leviathan Truesoaring and Yan Wubing were both stunned. However, a moment later, all of their subordinates began to cheer at the tops of their lungs. None of them could ever have guessed that their young master would be this strong. Before, many of them had actually felt a bit resentful, and weren’t willing to accept this son of the Holy Mother. Although they recognized his status, they didn’t see why they should care so much about him.

But now, they understood. Now, they realized there was no other choice than to accept him with open arms.

Of course, it still seemed impossible that someone in the eighth Legendary transformation could go into the Hell of Mahānata and put on such a show. He had even killed seventh step Great Sages! The difference between the eighth Legendary transformation and the seventh step of the Great Sage level was like the difference between worlds. They were nearly ten sub-levels apart. There was simply no way to bridge that gap. Not even the sons of immortals could do something like that. The only one who might be able to was the son of a god.

There had never been a genius who ever fought someone so much higher and won.

Yang Qi had broken the fetters of reality.

“Manyvoids!” howled August Patriarch Mammoth Heaven, and from the way he exploded with energy fluctuations, it seemed like he might be considering piercing through the void to do something about the situation. Both of his most promising sons had just died.

“Mammoth Manyvoids and Mammoth Force are both dead. They were the top geniuses of their generation. Yang Qi killed them, and that damnable Holy Mother is at fault!” The Epic Saga Sage elders were all buzzing with rage, and seemed on the verge of flying out and starting a war right then and there.

“Dead? All dead?!” Ape Heavenhelve was too stunned to even move. How could he ever have predicted that Yang Qi would do this? His worst predictions had involved Yang Qi simply escaping, not sticking around and slaughtering everyone.

Was he even human?

All of a sudden, Ape Heavenhelve realized that making an enemy of him had been a very bad decision.

“Primeking!”

“Ninja Unity!”

The Wilds God and the Ninja God were howling in rage outside of the Hanging Mountain. A son and a successor had been killed, both of whom had immortal items. Now, they were buried forever in the Hell of Mahānata. Worse, there was nothing their respective organizations could do to threaten Yang Qi.

The results of the competition were now obvious, and the only thing left to do was wait for the formal conclusion. Although there were still people left alive, they were all fourth step Great Sages, so there was obviously no way any of them could kill Yang Qi or outscore him.

Chapter 381: Devil Embryo

The remaining Great Sages were all as terrified as chickens. However, Yang Qi wasn't concerned with them; they weren’t even close to being a threat to him.

He was currently in the depths of the darkness and gloom of the Hell of Mahānata, surrounded by a blood-colored fog that was nearly violet.

Right now, he needed to push his blood to an extremely high level of strength, which would produce the Blood of the One God.

The Hand of the One God was a manifestation of the Fist of the Halls of Heaven. However, that was not one of the ultimate core aspects of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. By connecting with the ancient halls of heaven, and fusing with their power, he could purify his blood and create the Blood of the One God.

If he then used that blood to power the Hand of the One God, he could reach an incredibly high level of strength. Truth be told, what he could right now do with the Hand of the One God was middling at best.

The veins of spirit ore in the depths of the Hell of Mahānata were twitching and wriggling, and occasionally, devil stones would even fly out of them, and transform into flaming fire that built up behind Yang Qi to form a projection of the halls of heaven.

As they grew clearer, they shone with increasingly abundant sagelight, and made his body seem as sparkling and translucent as crystal.

At the same time, his blood grew stronger and stronger, and began to pulse with a faint aura of the One God, something that could control all the countless heavens.

That was the first sign that he was forming the Blood of the One God.

At the moment, he was a second step Nirvanic Resurrection Sage, with his nascent divinity ensconced in the Hell of Mahānata. His cultivation vastly surpassed that of ordinary people, and could only be rivaled by rare geniuses from the immortal world.

Next up was the third step, which would make him an Eternal Sands Sage, and give him even more incredible strength.

‘The Hand of the One God. The Blood of the One God….’ As he pushed his true energy to the limit, manifestations of heavenly workings streamed into his mind. Suddenly, he found himself in a strange state. It was almost like his vision could seep into the never-ending river of history, and go trillions of years into the future.

The aura of the One God was building up in him, to the point where it was almost like a mist.

Unfortunately, it was impossible to tell how long it would take to gather enough of the aura of the One God to form the blood that was his goal. After the process went on for some time, he shivered, and then drew all of the energy he had gathered into the ancestral aperture in his forehead. There, it turned into something like a tiny drop of blood, translucent and pure, something that could create both radiance and light, and darkness and gloom. It was clearly supreme in every sense, and something that existed above the daos of all other things.

‘Great! All that work paid off. I have one drop of the Blood of the One God! With this to power my Hand of the One God, I could definitely fight an eighth step Great Sage.’

However, in that moment of elation, the God Legion Seal in his forehead apparently sensed the Blood of the One God, and let out a stream of golden light which absorbed it.

‘What?!’ From what Yang Qi could tell, the ancestral aperture in his forehead was now completely empty. That Blood of the One God was nowhere to be seen.

However, after absorbing the blood, the golden imp was now covered with a network of strange marks that almost looked like cracks. However, they weren’t cracks; they were something like immortal motes, except vastly, vastly more powerful.

Apparently, the golden imp was transforming!

The God Legion Seal was shattered and incomplete, but as Yang Qi furthered his cultivation, it would grow.

WHIZZZ!

The imp shivered, and then a profound and powerful dao streamed out of it and into Yang Qi’s mind.

All of a sudden, Yang Qi could sense the birth and destruction of the universe, the reincarnation of all lives, the orbits of the sun and moon, the beginning of all heavenly bodies, and the trajectories of the planes of existence. He sensed the many immortal worlds, the profundities of hell, and even the limitless nature of space-time.

Power coursed through him, making his aura holy and strong. In that moment, he could sense the dome of heaven, and then he opened his eyes, and looked up through the barrier that led to the immortal planes, and far, far beyond that to the halls of heaven.

The numerous chain-like fetters that existed within the God Legion Paradise, and also the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, began to change. They were filled with the aura of the godmammoths, and became, not sage motes, but god motes, which were even more stable than immortal motes. At the same time, the thirty million megamammoths inside him transformed again. They now had fully elephantine heads and fully human bodies, with trunks that could absorb the power of the halls of heaven.

The God Legion Seal had taken away the drop of the Blood of the One God, but had then used it to empower Yang Qi even more. His sage motes, were now substructurally stronger than immortal motes.

Thanks to all that, his Hand of the One God was actually just as strong as it would have been when powered by the Blood of the One God.

Looking down, he ripped a huge hole into the golden surface of the ground, creating a cavern that stretched thousands of meters down to reveal endless devil energy and a vein of local ore.

Yang Qi took a deep breath, and his God Legion Paradise became like a black hole that quickly absorbed all of the hellish devil stone.

Wherever he went in the Hell of Mahānata, he could easily take such stone, convert it into spirit stones, and use the results for his own purposes.

Sagely- and heavenly-grade spirit stones were essentially there for the taking.

The Hell of Mahānata was similar to an immortal world, but not all immortal worlds were the same. There were many immortal worlds that actually couldn’t compare to the Hell of Mahānata, and because of that, the ores available were considered extremely precious.

Of course, the devil energy had to be purified first.

Few people in the Hanging Mountain could do anything like that, and those who could do it, such as the August Patriarch, the Holy Mother, or certain Epic Saga Sages, could not do it easily, and would have to pay a severe price to succeed. Of course, Yang Qi was different.

‘What? Is that a vein of ore that surpasses the heavenly-grade?’

Shockingly, Yang Qi could sense that this ore was the level of godly-grade spirit stone!

Normally, godly-grade spirit stones were what Demi-Immortals needed to further their cultivation.

RUMBLE!

Yang Qi waved his hand, and an enormous mountain was torn up from the ground, causing preheaven devil energy to spill out.

Deep in the crater left behind by the enormous mountain, there was a vein of ore like a river.

And at the source of the vein, there was a rock the size of a building.

A massive flow of devil energy spilled out of the stone, shocking to the extreme. In fact, if it weren’t for the fact that Yang Qi cultivated the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, it would have immediately devilized him.

It was impossible to say how many countless tens of thousands of years that stone had existed, absorbing devil energy until it turned into a full-blown devil embryo.

‘That thing is incredible!’ Yang Qi thought. Not even an eighth step Great Sage could touch a stone like this safely.

Blurring into motion, he dove into the golden ground, protecting himself with the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.

Moments later, he was in front of the huge stone. To Yang Qi, it was almost like crystal, and sitting cross-legged in the middle of it was something that looked like an embryo made of stone.

It had clearly-defined features, and was constantly absorbing the surrounding devil energy.

‘A devil embryo!’ Yang Qi thought, shaken. This devilish stone had formed a devil embryo, and if it ever emerged into the world, it could shake all creation. In fact, it would come into existence at the Great Sage level or even higher.

However, if he could cleanse it, then the devil embryo would be transformed into an immortal embryo.

Chapter 382: Infernal Expert

Deep in a vein of ore in hell, a spirit stone begot a devil embryo.

It was a house-sized spirit stone that vastly surpassed heavenly- or godly-grade stone, with the power of the devil embryo being similar to that of an immortal stone.

It was truly marvelous as far as Yang Qi was concerned.

The benefits of turning this into an immortal stone embryo would be many. For one thing, when it came time for another major breakthrough, he definitely wouldn’t lack the power necessary. And after expunging the devil energy, and allowing the embryo to develop in his God Legion Paradise, it would become an out-of-body incarnation of incredible power, that he could do many things with.

With the wave of his hand, he prepared to take the vein of ore, and even more importantly, the enormous stone.

However, it was in that instant that a shocking beam of sword energy shot down from the sky, piercing into the depths of the earth and heading straight toward Yang Qi’s back.

The speed was so incredible that it seemed as though the sword could ignore the magical laws of space in the Hell of Mahānata.

Not even Yang Qi was fast enough to avoid it.

Even as the sword light was about to stab into him, he arched his back, and a shock wave rippled out from him, spatial distortions that immediately dissolved the sword light.

Then he waved his arm, and the God Legion Battle Robe rippled out and sucked up all of the spirit ore and the immortal stone embryo.

Afterward, he shot out of the ground and looked up into the sky.

He saw a devil-god radiating golden light, which quickly shrank down into the shape of a young man. He wore golden armor, and had golden eyes, and shockingly, looked exactly the same as the sixth step infernal Yang Qi had fought and killed not too long ago.

This was definitely one of the Infernalfolk, who were the most revered denizens of hell.

However, this young man’s blood and aura were definitely stronger than the other infernal Yang Qi had killed. It seemed a hundred times more powerful, indicating that he must be one of the Infernalfolk nobility.

Infernalfolk based their society on strength of the blood: the stronger the blood, the stronger the infernal, and the more power they would wield in hell.

That said, this young man’s cultivation base actually wasn't very high. He was only a third step Eternal Sands Sage, not even close to the level of the sixth step infernal from earlier. However, there was something else unique about him. Yang Qi could sense that he had also ensconced his nascent divinity in the Hell of Mahānata, and not even the countless fiend-devils who existed in this place should be able to do that. They could only perform ensconcement in the void outside of the Hell of Mahānata, which led to much weaker results.

Because of all these different factors, this third step infernal was actually a lot stronger than Mammoth Manyvoids had been.

The young infernal extended his weapon, a long sword made of shadows. “You were sent here by the immortal world for a training competition, right? I honestly can’t believe you realized that there were godly-grade spirit stones here, and an immortal-level stone with an embryo in it. Unfortunately, I need that thing, so hand it over. You couldn't do anything with it even if you wanted to.”

“What if I refuse?” Yang Qi said, an enigmatic smile playing out on his face. “You have pretty strong Infernalfolk blood. That makes you nobility, right? Rare.”

Eyes glittering, the young infernal responded, “If you refuse, then you die. I'm from here, and I know all about how the immortal world opened up a passageway to send you mortal cultivators here for training. My name is Infernal Wave, and I'm participating in a training competition of my own. We get points for hunting down and killing mortal cultivators.”

“Interesting,” Yang Qi said, flexing his fingers. “So you want to kill me to get some more points for your competition?”

“Of course. Although, you’re only a second step Great Sage, so you’re not worth much. Sadly for you, you bit off more than you can chew by taking those godly-grade stones and that immortal embryo. Well, I’ll just kill you real quick and then go find someone stronger to take out. Infernal Sword Snatches Souls!”

He attacked again with his shadow sword, which blurred into motion, heading directly toward Yang Qi’s forehead. A gravitational force erupted from the tip of the sword, which immediately began to tug at Yang Qi’s soul and nascent divinity.

Yang Qi didn’t move, and in fact, didn’t even look in the direction of the sword. He extended his hand, and time slowed. A massive wind kicked up, and the shadowy sword stopped only three inches from his forehead, and could proceed no further. Then, he tapped the blade with his finger, and a destructive shock wave swept forth, causing the sword to tremble violently.

POP!

Infernal Wave coughed up a mouthful of blood and yanked his sword back, then shot away from Yang Qi, simultaneously becoming one with the magical laws of space in the Hell of Mahānata, causing himself to vanish.

RUMBLE!

Yang Qi used the Hand of the One God to reach out in the direction he had vanished, which caused a deafening rumbling sound to echo out. Nearby mountains crumbled as the void suddenly seemed to solidify, turning into porcelain-colored crystal, trapped within which was Infernal Wave.

“Nine Transformations of the Netherworld Infernal!” he suddenly shouted, and he dissolved into a blood-colored mist which convulsed nine times, then exploded with immense power. Unexpectedly, that mist suddenly took the form of a huge worm, which vanished as though via wormhole.

‘What? Is that some sort of special Infernalfolk technique?’ Yang Qi opened his Lord’s Eye, which pierced through all the mists around him. However, he couldn’t see any trace of Infernal Wave.

‘Well he’s pretty incredible to have escaped me. He must be a top expert. The Infernalfolk who inhabit the Hell of Mahānata are too strong for me to tangle with now. I’ll just worry about killing this Infernal Wave later. Right now, it's time to head back to the Hanging Mountain. The competition is over, so I should receive a blessing from the Immortal World Assembly, and hopefully achieve another breakthrough. I’ll be bestowed with a level of power to match the Demonfolk chiefs. And hopefully I can finally get to the bottom of things with my mother.’

Turning, he vanished.

POP!

Far off in the distance, above the golden waves of the ocean, Infernal Wave dropped out of the sky and coughed up a mouthful of blood. Face ashen, he looked at his sword, which was visibly cracked and damaged.

“My Sword of Shadows was forged by a grandmaster Demi-Immortal of the Infernalfolk, and is supposed to be perfect for assassinations. I'm an elite among other infernals, and am deeply connected to the essence of the Hell of Mahānata. And my Infernalfolk blood is incredibly high-level. I can even fight eighth step fiend-devils. How could I possibly have lost to a second step human?”

He simply couldn’t believe that it was true.

His eyes glittered with flickering green light as he thought back to the fight with Yang Qi. Then, he shivered. After all, he had just been forced to completely drain himself of power to get out of the fight. In short, he had almost died.

Suddenly, the sound of clicking tongues could be heard as numerous powerful auras arrived on the scene.

They were other experts of the Infernalfolk, all of them young and with noble blood of some variety or another.

One of the female infernals landed first, looked at Infernal Wave’s injuries, and laughed. “What’s wrong, Infernal Wave? When you heard the orders from the elders to kill human cultivators, you rushed over here. What happened? You’re supposed to be a top genius with better blood than all of us, although your cultivation level is a bit low.”

Infernal Wave snorted coldly. “I lost a fight. So what? That’s what happens when you get surrounded by a whole bunch of enemy experts.”

A seventh step infernal Great Sage laughed loudly. “You're lying, Infernal Wave. We just got word that all of the top human fighters ended up killing each other. Only one of them remained alive, a guy named Yang Qi. He’s currently in first place on the ranking list from the immortal planes. The elders have ordered us and all the high-level fiend-devils to track him down and kill him. The reward for doing so is incredible: an opportunity to have a formal meeting with one of the suzerains of hell. It seems pretty obvious to me that you ran into Yang Qi and got beaten. There’s no reason to hide the truth.”

Calming himself, Infernal Wave said, “Oh, so that’s the situation.”

“So, we guessed correctly,” the female infernal said. “Come on, let’s head back to where you were just fighting, surround Yang Qi, and end his life. The rewards will be incredible.”

“Okay, let's go.” Infernal Wave didn’t hesitate to join them.

Upon returning to the scene of the fight, Yang Qi was nowhere to be seen. The only thing left behind were craters and rubble.

However, in the middle of the air, there was the clear mark of an enormous hand.

“My god, how did he leave a hand print like that there?” one of the Infernalfolk said, his eyes going wide. “The air isn’t a mountain or a tree or anything like that. To leave a mark like that, you would need to permanently alter the magical laws of space in the area. Only a Demi-Immortal should be able to do that.”

It was true, the air was like an empty void. The attacks of a cultivator might produce ripples, or even shatter the air temporarily. But in the end, those things were like splashes of water that resulted from throwing a rock into water. After enough time, all evidence would fade away.

But this was like a rock being thrown into the water, and a flower taking shape because of it.

Such was the result of Yang Qi using the Hand of the One God.

Chapter 383: The Return

The group of Infernalfolk looked in shock at the enormous hand print. A moment passed, and then the female flew over, circled it, then reached out and touched it.

Bam!

Instantly, a sound erupted out like that of metal scraping against metal.

The air solidified, turning crystal, and the most holy of auras erupted out, the type that could drive away fiends and exterminate devils.

“So strong!” the female infernal blurted, backing away in fear. Looking over her shoulder, she said, “Infernal Wave, how many moves did you exchange with this Yang Qi?”

Looking a bit embarrassed, he replied, “Just one. I attacked him, then he solidified the space around me and started crushing me. I had to use the Infernal Worm Transformation from the Nine Transformations of the Netherworld Infernal to escape. Even still, I lost about half my vital energy.”

“What? A single move?”

The other Infernalfolk began to tremble in fear. “Infernal Wave, you’re definitely one of the strongest among the young Infernalfolk. You even ensconced your nascent divinity here in the Hell of Mahānata. And yet you couldn’t last longer than one move?”

“Maybe we shouldn’t try to chase down this Yang Qi. He could probably wipe us all out. That hand print there says everything.”

“Come on, let’s get back and report this to the elders.”

“Yeah, let's go….”

With that, the Infernalfolk disappeared, gone just as quickly as they had come.

For the following several days, Yang Qi worked on his cultivation, including the Blood of the One God, as well as the spirit stone ore he had extracted.

With each day that passed, it became easier to build up the Blood of the One God. However, every time he did, the golden imp would absorb it, and then send out godpower to bless his sage motes.

To Great Sages, sage motes were as important as life essence vital energy. And the stronger and tougher they got, the more difficult it would be to destroy them.

And now, thanks to the blessing of the godly aura, his sage motes were substructurally stronger than immortal motes. Of course, that was only their fundamental nature; they couldn’t match up at all to real immortal motes. They were like a drop of mercury compared to the raging water of a river. Although the river was more powerful, the mercury was fundamentally better. One could only imagine what it would be like when he had a river of mercury.

His substructural similarities to Demi-Immortals was the main reason he had been able to leave that hand print in the air.

Given some time, his cultivation base would rise, and he would reach the Eternal Sands, True Real, and even the Light King Step. Eventually, he would reach the level of actually being able to fight and kill Demi-Immortals.

As he did, the golden imp in his forehead would also grow stronger and more glorious.

At one point, Yang Qi suddenly started, and then looked up into the sky, and beyond it, into the depths of the universe. For some reason, he had just sensed another aura that reminded him of the God Legion Seal. However, it only flickered for a moment before vanishing.

‘Don’t tell me that there are other people out there with God Legion Seals?’ he thought, shocked. ‘Well, the seal was shattered at some point. But by who, I wonder? Perhaps the shattered pieces fell from the halls of heaven, and I just got one of them. Maybe it's like King Immortal-Slayer’s command medallion, and I have to collect all the pieces to form the final whole version.’

Even as he thought about such things, he suddenly received a message from the golden imp. “Broken… reassemble… Lord… appear….”

It was almost like words left behind by some ancient god.

‘What? If I reassemble the God Legion Seal, the Lord will appear?’ The more he thought about it, the more it made sense. He knew who the Lord was: the God of gods, He who existed above the legion of gods. The Monarch and Lord of all gods.

Given his current cultivation level, there was no way he could even begin to think about such matters though. Even the immortal planes were beyond him, much less the fabled Godmyth level, or the legion of gods.

RUMBLE!

A tremor passed through him, and a gravitational force wrapped around him and began to pull him away from the Hell of Mahānata.

He didn’t struggle. The time had come for the competition to end, and therefore, the surviving competitors were being brought home.

Holy light erupted from the top of his head, which transformed into a vortex which he disappeared into. Moments later, he was gone from the Hell of Mahānata, and found himself standing on a tall platform, along with all the other competitors.

Also on the platform was the immortal ranking list.

His name was on the very top in large, brightly shining letters. There were a host of other names below him, but they were like fireflies compared to the moon.

His appearance caused a stir among everyone in the Hanging Mountain, including Demonfolk, humans, and powerful organizations of all sorts. Already, he was becoming something of a myth. He was in the eighth Legendary transformation when he entered the Hell of Mahānata, and not only did he come out alive, he slaughtered a host of experts along the way. And then he took first place. Numerous extremely important young Demonfolk had perished thanks to him. He even trampled the dignity of the Mammothfolk.

“Yang Qi’s back!”

“He dominated everyone and took first place! He’s definitely going to receive an amazing reward from the immortal world.”

“Yeah. Who would have thought that Mammoth Manyvoids, Stunning Beheader and Finest Magic would all die at his hands? Look at his cultivation level! He’s a second step Great Sage. That means he ensconced his nascent divinity somewhere.”

“Ah, the young master is back,” Leviathan Truesoaring said. “Well, that’s certainly a big weight off my mind.”

“He’s no simple individual,” Yan Wubing said, visibly shocked. “Did you notice that he has the aura of a second step Great Sage now? He’s a Nirvanic Resurrection Sage! That means he ensconced his nascent divinity. But he's been in the Hell of Mahānata this entire time, which means…. Throughout all history, no cultivator has ever ensconced their nascent divinity in the Hell of Mahānata!”

“What?!” Leviathan Truesoaring blurted in astonishment. “The young master ensconced his nascent divinity in the Hell of Mahānata?! Attempting that is virtually suicide! No. There’s no way he did that. The Hell of Mahānata is one of the most legendary and powerful hells. Only someone born and raised there as the descendant of infernal deities could possibly succeed in an effort like that. No human cultivator could do it. It would be even more difficult than ensconcing a nascent divinity in an immortal plane.”

“The young master has some mysterious abilities that enable him to control fiend-devils and purify the power of hell,” Yan Wubing said. “So actually, it's completely within the realm of possibility. The Hell of Mahānata’s essence is far more immense than that of the Titan Emperor Heaven above us. Assuming the young master could neutralize the devilish will to prevent himself from being devilized, then ensconcing his nascent divinity there would come with numerous advantages.”

“In any case, now we just have to see what rewards the immortal world will give him. He took first place, so presumably they’ll give him some abilities, and probably some magical treasures and spirit stones.” Leviathan Truesoaring was visibly excited to see what would happen.

Meanwhile, the Lionfolk, Sharkfolk, and Leopardfolk, and especially their chiefs, were all glaring angrily at Yang Qi. All of them wanted to rush the podium and slaughter him right there. Of course, they didn’t dare to. He had taken first place, and would be protected by the immortal ranking list. Anyone who violated the dignity of the immortal world would be killed, even the August Patriarch.

Up on Mount Sumeru, Ape Heavenhelve gritted his teeth and said, “August Patriarch Mammoth Heaven, Yang Qi is out now. How do we kill him?”

“We can’t do anything right now,” Mammoth Heaven replied. “The immortal world intentionally held the competition in the Hell of Mahānata to produce the most ultimate genius possible. Let’s see what they do. In any case, his level is simply too low. Considering that I'm a Demi-Immortal, he couldn’t possibly fight me. When the time is right, I’ll personally step in and just kill him.”

“What?” the Epic Saga Sages looked over in surprise. “August Patriarch Mammoth Heaven, considering your status, are you really going to kill him personally? That….”

“If I don’t, then he’ll continue to get stronger and stronger, and that will only lead to continued problems. Besides, I sense something evil in him, something that can rob power from the blood of us Mammothfolk. That’s why he absolutely must die. I've already sent word to heaven, and notified the immortal Mammothfolk about the situation. They’ll definitely be watching closely.”

“But what about the Holy Mother?”

“The Holy Mother? I’ll keep her in her place myself.”

All of a sudden, Ape Heavenhelve cried out in shock. “August Patriarch, power is descending from the immortal world…. That’s… Titan Emperor Immortal Grass and Jade Palace Golden Talismans….”

RUMBLE!

Heaven and earth trembled as a pillar of golden light shot down toward Yang Qi, as well as a river of liquid jade.

Within the river of jade were a host of talismans that pulsed with immortal energy. Some looked like mountains, others looked like birds, tongues of flames, or dragons….

The level of power on display surpassed anything from the mortal world.

Even a scrap of it would be profoundly beneficial to any energy warrior. Many of the old-timers recognized what they were: Jade Palace Golden Talismans.

The rewards being bestowed by the immortals were incredible beyond belief.

Chapter 384: Blessings

‘Such incredible power!’ As the river of Jade Palace Golden Talismans descended onto Yang Qi, he opened the God Legion Paradise for them.

The power was like an elixir from the immortal world, which could normally change individuals on a substructural level. However, it was different for Yang Qi. He could refine them with his Hellfire Crucible, and then use them to awaken the megamammoth particles within him.

Already, his Hellfire Crucible was bubbling, and another ten million particles woke up, putting him at a total of forty million.

Fifty million. Sixty million…. The process finally stopped at eighty million. He had awoken roughly one tenth of the total eight hundred forty million. Once they were all awake, he would have the strength to pluck stars and snatch moons, and would have mastered the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.

As the river of talismans poured into him, blessing him, it carried with it immortal energy, which entered his sage motes, and caused transformations to his true energy.

‘Opportunities like this don't come often. I can use this power to form more Blood of the One God.’

Sitting down cross-legged, he sent sagelight streaming out to form more drops of Blood of the One God.

The sight of Yang Qi being blessed in this way caused the other nearby competitors to itch with envy.

“Damnation! Usually, the winner of the competition can only take some of the power from the immortal world, leaving the leftovers for the other competitors. But he’s not letting any of it go!”

“What kind of a freak is he? Some ancient beast? An infernal worm from hell? Isn’t he worried about bursting from taking in too much energy?”

“That power looks even stronger than the power the immortal world usually gives. Come on, leave some for us!”

Although many of the competitors were shaking their heads with envy, none of them dared to interfere.

Even the old-timers were jealous, but at the same time, too terrified to do anything.

Yang Qi was refining all of the power in his Hellfire Crucible, and using it to boost his Fist of the Halls of Heaven and Hand of the One God, and also to form Blood of the One God. As the Blood of the One God formed, it would be taken by the golden imp and then turned into golden light that spread throughout him.

Eventually, a sonorous rumbling could be heard as the golden imp produced his own drop of Blood of the One God.

That blood was far stronger than anything Yang Qi had produced. It looked like crystal or porcelain, and seemed to contain the universe, space, time, planes, immortals, demons, hells, devils, gods, human beings, and all the scattered aspects of the mortal world….

It was true Blood of the One God.

Yet again, the golden imp of the God Legion Seal was providing amazing help. Of course, the blood that the imp produced also was Yang Qi’s blood; the two of them had long since become one.

Yang Qi was fairly convinced that the mysterious imp would continue to provide even more help as he grew higher in his cultivation.

Thanks to the power from the immortal worlds, thousands upon thousands of drops of Blood of the One God poured into the golden imp.

It was only by acquiring that vast amount of blood from Yang Qi that the imp could produce its own full version of the Blood of the One God.

With the immense power in that drop of blood, Yang Qi felt like he could rip open a passageway to the immortal world with his bare hands, or casually crush an eighth step Great Sage to death. With it powering his Hand of the One God, he could destroy worlds or create hosts of life.

Eventually, the power from the immortal world began to fade, with the final bits of it slowly taking the shape of a bow, and nine arrows.

There was also an octagonal immortal stone filled with immortal energy and motes. It looked like something produced by a Demi-Immortal.

Finally, there was a command medallion with a single character written in the script of the immortal worlds: Titan.

The sight of these things caused August Patriarch Mammoth Heaven to shoot to his feet. “That’s a real set of immortal items! The Heaven-Burying Bow and the Heaven-Wasting Arrows! They were created and blessed by a Demolisher, a true immortal! It's impossible to say how much more powerful they are than half immortal items. And that immortal stone! It's definitely enough to push a Great Sage into the Demi-Immortal level. Why are the rewards from the immortal world so incredible this time? Look, that’s a Titan Emperor Medallion, which will give him entrance to the Titan Emperor Collegium. As a student there, he’ll be on the track to becoming an immortal.”

The Titan Emperor Collegium was an ancient educational establishment, and the most powerful organization in this starry sky. It had existed from the most ancient of times all the way to the modern era, and directly oversaw the Yore-Wilds, Brute-Wilds, Waste-Wilds and Proto-Wilds Continents. And of course, the Hanging Mountain was technically a part of the Yore-Wilds Continent. In fact, all of the Four Wilds Continents had organizations like that. All of them were forced to submit to the immortal world, and were governed by the Titan Emperor Heaven, and its administrative and educational arm, the Titan Emperor Collegium.

After the hellish invasion which ended in the shattering of the Yore-Wilds Continent, the collegium gradually faded from the minds of the survivors. Because of that, virtually no one in the Rich-Lush Continent had even heard of it. Of course, some of that had to do with the remoteness of the Rich-Lush Continent.

Even in mortal kingdoms, country folk would often be ignorant regarding the important people who lived in the capital city.

‘Incredible!’ Yang Qi thought, reaching out to take the bow and arrows. Without any hesitation, he branded them to himself. As of now, the bow and arrows could join his arsenal of powerful tools like the Heaven-Dominating Golden Swordbreaker and the Grand Emperor's Pagoda.

Of course, the latter two were already on the verge of being useless. They had both been created by ninth step Epic Saga Sages. Even the Crown Prince’s immortal armor, or the immortal items he had taken from Wilds Primeking and the others, had all been forged by Demi-Immortals.

In contrast, this bow and these arrows had been created by a Demolisher.

Yet again, Yang Qi’s fighting prowess had reached another level. As he took the bow, arrows, immortal stone and the identity medallion, an expression of will from the immortal world spoke into his mind. “You are the top competitor. Take this Titan Emperor Medallion and check in at the Titan Emperor Collegium. As a student there, you will become a candidate for immortal ascension.”

‘The Titan Emperor Collegium….’ He sent some divine will into the identity medallion, which contained a star chart, in the middle of which, surrounded by countless heavenly bodies, was a dazzling collegium.

Thanks to all of the blessings, Yang Qi had made significant progress. Although he wasn’t quite in the Eternal Sands Step, he was getting close to it. The biggest benefit of all was the drop of the Blood of the One God from the golden imp, which had significantly increased his battle prowess.

With the power of eighty million megamammoths, he could easily crush just about any opponent.

After the rewards were doled out, the immortal ranking list disappeared, and the immortal energy swept back up into the sky to vanish. At long last, the Hanging Mountain began to settle down.

As for Yang Qi, he transformed into a beam of light that pierced through the sky toward Leviathan Truesoaring and Yan Wubing.

“Young Master!” they and the other Great Sages said deferentially.

“Things went very smoothly,” Yang Qi said. “Is my mother out of seclusion yet? I really want to see her.”

“Not yet,” Yan Wubing replied. “She still needs some more time. She’s aware of what you're doing, and is very pleased. Young Master, now that you have that Titan Emperor Medallion, you can join the Titan Emperor Collegium and begin to learn of the dao of immortal ascension. You’ll be a Demi-Immortal very soon.”

Before anyone could say anything else, a powerful roar interrupted them, causing everything to shake violently.

“Yang Qi!”

A lion appeared, along with several other Demonfolk chiefs.

Yang Qi looked over calmly and said, “What do you want, Chief Lion? Looking for revenge? Want to vent a bit because of me killing Lion Hightower?”

The truth was that these chiefs, despite being afraid of Yang Qi, were still furious.

“You killed my son!” Chief Lion said. “How can I live under the same sky as you? Well, for the Holy Mother’s sake, I'm not going to cause problems, but I demand compensation. Give me that Titan Emperor Medallion, right now! Only that will settle your debt with the Lionfolk. Oh. And give me the immortal stone, the Heaven-Burying Bow, and the Heaven-Wasting Arrows as well.”

“We Rhinofolk demand that you cripple yourself as punishment!”

“Quite the little mob you’ve got here,” Yang Qi said.

“What did you just say?” Chief Lion roared.

“I said that you're a mob of rabble-rousers. But that’s fine. You also called me a bastard, which is why I slaughtered all of the Lionfolk in the competition. I think it's time for the Hanging Mountain to see what I'm capable of now, and you’re the perfect training dummy.”

Without any warning, he extended his right hand.

Chapter 385: Back to Rich-Lush

If Yang Qi said he was going to make a move, he would.

And he wouldn’t give people a chance to react or prepare. After the events in the Hell of Mahānata, he was in the position to dominate Without Limit Sages in a fight.

And that was before the blessing of the immortal world. Now that the God Legion Seal had produced true Blood of the One God, he wasn’t sure how strong he was, and was curious to find out.

Considering that Chief Lion had openly insulted and provoked him, he was obviously the perfect test subject.

The Hand of the One God shot toward Chief Lion, following a profound, prescribed path of motion.

RUMBLE!

Before Chief Lion could react, the hand slammed into him, and he was sent tumbling backward, coughing up blood, and his golden mane of hair thrown into disarray.

“How dare you ambush me, you little bastard!”

“Ambush you? This is no ambush. This is a straight-up duel to the death, with plenty of witnesses.” Yang Qi began to walk toward Chief Lion. “You insult me? I kill you and all your Lionfolk. That’s how I do things.”

The other Demonfolk chiefs made to interfere, but Yan Wubing blocked their way.

“What do you think you’re doing?” he said. “The young master said he wants a fair duel with Chief Lion, right in front of all these witnesses. Don’t tell me that you Demonfolk chiefs are going to gang up on him? Are you really that faceless?”

The chiefs immediately hesitated. Although Demonfolk didn’t care as much about things like ganging up, or bullying, it was obvious that Yang Qi was in the younger generation. For an entire group of chiefs like them to join forces against him publicly would be a bit too embarrassing.

It was made worse by the fact that Yang Qi had loudly challenged Chief Lion. If Chief Lion refused to fight him, it would make him seem weak and powerless, and would make it impossible for the Lionfolk to maintain their dignity.

Chief Lion finally threw his head back and roared. “Fine, you little bastard. You want to duel me? That’s suicide for you, but I'm happy to accommodate. And considering how many witnesses there are, nobody can blame me for your death. Fury of the Lion King!”

Roar!

He thrust his hands out in front of him, causing an immense ball of lightning to form.

In the blink of an eye, it seemed like the entire universe had been turned into lightning. It was none other than his sage domain, which quickly spread out to cover Yang Qi in shocking fashion.

“That’s all you’ve got?” Yang Qi said. He thrust his hand out again, and sagelight formed into the Hand of the One God. The drop of the Blood of the One God in his forehead ignited, sending fire through his meridians and out his pores. Instantly, flames engulfed the area, shining like the brilliance of enlightenment.

Smack!

The surrounding sage domain collapsed, and the lightning vanished. Yang Qi’s five fingers were like pillars that could prop up heaven, and they struck fear deep into the heart of Chief Lion.

It was time to go for broke!

Chief Lion took a deep breath, and his golden hair suddenly burst into flame.

“Echo Heaven, Mirror Earth! Divine Throne of the Lion! I hereby sacrifice my blood to the ancestors. Let the Lion God come!”

RUMBLE!

A rift opened high above, and something that looked like a lion appeared, some sort of Lionfolk god-spirit from the highest heavens.

“Be destroyed!” Yang Qi said calmly. The Heaven-Burying Bow and Heaven-Wasting Arrows appeared, and took aim at the lion high in the sky.

Twang, twang, twang….

Immense power was unleashed as the sun-like streams of light shot up into the sky.

The lion erupted into flames, and then everything shook violently as the sky above was turned into pure primal-chaos.

“Such incredible power! That’s a real immortal item!”

“The Heaven-Burying Bow and the Heaven-Wasting Arrows!”

“It completely disrupted Chief Lion’s summoning move.”

“Look, Yang Qi is using killing moves.”

Yang Qi crossed his arms in front of him as he resorted to a consummate technique, causing dazzling sagelight to erupt out, making it impossible for anyone to see clearly what he was doing.

“Fist of the Halls of Heaven; Hand of the One God!”

He began to speed forward, burning the Blood of the One God he had, and converting it into raw power. This time, he was using the Hand of the One God to incredible effect. An immense hand appeared, a hand that could hold the legion of gods, that could inscribe myths, that was the origin of time. It was the hand of the creator of the universe.

“The Glory of the Lord is a Deluge on Space-Time, From Ancient Times Until Now….” Holy hymns could be heard, the praises of the legion of gods, spoken in Godtongue that no one could understand.

Smack!

In the blink of an eye, Yang Qi was in front of Chief Lion, destroying all of his defenses with the Hand of the One God.

Chief Lion’s eyes went wide, and he threw his hands out, roaring defiantly.

True energy erupted like a tempest as Yang Qi said, “All the hells belong to the One God.”

WHIZZZ!

The Hand of the One God continued onward with countless profound transformations. Blinding light mixed with complete darkness, like that of infinite hells from the depths of the universe.

Crack!

Chief Lion’s outstretched hands immediately were torn to shreds, and he was thrown backward into the air.

Yang Qi didn’t stop. He continued onward, pushing the Hand of the One God forward to grab onto Chief Lion, and then rip him in two.

Blood exploded, raining down everywhere, accompanied by an agonized shriek.

Yang Qi had literally ripped Chief Lion into two pieces.

Just like that, the mighty chief of the Lionfolk perished.

Despite the rain of blood, Yang Qi remained pure and clean within the sagelight, making him seem like a god-spirit descended from heaven.

Meanwhile, porcelain-colored flame descended onto the corpse of Chief Lion, burning him out of existence. No one dared to interfere, and the other Lionfolk were already fleeing.

When the process was over, Yang Qi put Chief Lion’s sage motes and magical laws into his God Legion Paradise, strengthening it further.

“Chief Lion is dead! He was an eighth step Great Sage, and Yang Qi tore him to pieces in a fair fight!”

“Chief Lion had lofty ambitions, but died at the hands of a young squirt. What a sad way to go out.”

“What’s sad about it? It was a fair fight, and the loser got what he deserved. Chief Lion said that the Holy Mother’s son was a bastard, which is a major insult to her. In the end, the Holy Mother didn’t even need to do anything. Her son killed the offender to right the wrong. The Lionfolk are in trouble now.”

“This Yang Qi is incredible. The gap between the seventh and eighth steps is immense. Normally speaking, an eighth step Great Sage should be able to kill even a dozen seventh step opponents. Clearly, Yang Qi is actually above the level of an eighth step Great Sage.”

By this point, everyone was afraid of Yang Qi. It was bad enough that he had slaughtered a whole host of young chiefs in the competition. But now, in front of the shocked gazes of a huge audience, he had destroyed the chief of the Lionfolk, who had been virtually incapable of even fighting back.

Even the Epic Saga Sages felt their bones shivering from fear.

Meanwhile, back on Mount Sumeru, Ape Heavenhelve was trembling, and didn’t know what to think.

“August Patriarch, Yang Qi is even stronger after being blessed by the immortal worlds. And it looks like he's about to achieve another breakthrough. If he gets to the third step, or the fourth, he's probably going to try to kill me.”

“Yes, I can sense his killing intent toward you, Ape Heavenhelve,” Mammoth Heaven said. “You’d better get to the Demi-Immortal level quickly. Perhaps this impetus will help you in your cultivation. Although, I did say that I would personally kill Yang Qi, and I will. He won’t be alive for much longer.”

Without another word, Mammoth Heaven vanished into space-time, gone to parts unknown.

**

After seeing how he had cast fear into the hearts of the Demonfolk, Yang Qi nodded in satisfaction. Then he discussed certain matters with Leviathan Truesoaring and the others. Considering that the Holy Mother was still in seclusion, he decided that he would go back to see how things were doing in the Rich-Lush Continent.

After bidding farewell, he tore open a wormhole and stepped inside. Before long, he was back at the Rich-Lush Continent.

The continent was cradled with power, and seemed to be growing, and was in fact merging with the Western Continent. Soon, the two continents would be one.

Swish!

After entering Sage Monarch City, he connected with the continent, and could personally sense everything that was going on. Already, the place was forming a planetary core, which was the first step in eventually becoming an independent planet.

Considering how things were going, it didn’t seem like he would have to wait for the tens of thousands of years that Ghost Emperor Yama had said it would take.

“Get out here, Ghost Emperor Yama!” he said in a loud voice.

Chapter 386: The Terror of the Ghost Emperor

Yang Qi could sense that Ghost Emperor Yama was hidden somewhere in the void, seeking enlightenment of some consummate technique. His aura was stronger than before, and his substructure seemed different.

Worse, it seemed that there was something about him that was harming the essence of the Rich-Lush Continent.

With the infernal deity information that Yang Qi had given him, as well as the first half of the Infernal Deity Spear technique, he had obviously achieved a lot of progress, and at the same time, developed even deeper ambitions.

For one thing, the fusion of the Rich-Lush Continent with the Western Continent was obviously his doing. By connecting them, he reduced Yang Qi’s influence, and later on, could theoretically use their moment of turning into a planet to push himself into the Demi-Immortal level.

Up to now, Yang Qi hadn’t been able to completely control Ghost Emperor Yama. They had been using each other, and in fact, if it weren’t for the God Legion Seal, Ghost Emperor Yama would already have killed him.

His main goal on this return visit was to resolve the situation.

At a mere glance, he could see that Ghost Emperor Yama had inserted some devilish sense into the two continents, which allowed him to connect to and use their essences. Of course, ordinary individuals would never be able to sense that.

Yang Qi could also tell that Ghost Emperor Yama had risen from the Planet God Step to the Without Limit Step.

Considering that, it was little wonder that he was getting ambitious and trying to plot against Yang Qi. Sadly for him, his efforts were very transparent.

In response to Yang Qi's call, an angry howl of rage erupted from the depths of the void.

Devil energy erupted, causing the sky to turn dark, and the sun to become like a devil eye. At the same time, foul winds swept across the Rich-Lush Continent.

“So, brat, you’re back from the Hanging Mountain. Hand over the other half of the Infernal Deity Spear.” Ghost Emperor Yama threw his head back and laughed uproariously. Apparently, he assumed that with his recent breakthrough, he was now strong enough to crush Yang Qi.

“How impudent!” Yang Qi said, and then reached out with the Hand of the One God. At the same time, everything began to shake, and all the heavenly bodies vanished. Immortal motes swept forth, creating a spell formation that was filled with the holy hymns of immortal-spirits.

Smack!

Before Ghost Emperor Yama could even react, he was sent flying. Coughing up blood, he looked back at Yang Qi with a stunned expression. However, he quickly recovered.

“How dare you, brat!” he shouted, launching himself back in Yang Qi's direction. “Guess what? I'm an eighth step Without Limit Sage now! You think you're a match for me? Yama King Ascendant!”

RIIIIP! A massive rift opened up above, and devil energy poured out.

Stepping onto the resulting devil cloud, he unleashed the most deadly of attacks.

Yang Qi ignored him, and simply extended the Hand of the One God. As it flew forth, it vaporized all of the devil energy, and caused chains to spring up around Ghost Emperor Yama.

Crack!

The undefiable Hand of the One God latched onto Ghost Emperor Yama’s throat, negating all of his devil energy. Yang Qi had Ghost Emperor Yama held up like a duck, and was clutching his neck so hard that he could only gurgle a bit.

Fear filled him, as he suddenly realized that he felt like a toddler in the presence of Yang Qi.

Not even the incredible power of a Without Limit Sage could do anything to help him.

After a moment passed, Yang Qi loosened his grip, allowing him to speak.

“Y-you….” he stammered. “When did you get so strong, Yang Qi? This isn’t the power of the God Legion Seal. It’s… your own strength?”

From the way Ghost Emperor Yama was staring at Yang Qi, it seemed he couldn’t believe his own eyes. Yang Qi exhaled, and it became dazzling sagelight that smashed into Ghost Emperor Yama and sent him tumbling backward again, the air shattering around him.

Ghost Emperor Yama’s energy arts were actually weaker than Chief Lion’s had been. And Yang Qi was the bane of devil-ghosts from hell, so obviously, there was no way Ghost Emperor Yama was strong enough to fight back.

“You’re not a match for me,” Yang Qi said. “Presumably you didn’t hear that I participated in a competition held in the Hell of Mahānata. That was where I became a Great Sage, and it's also where I ensconced my nascent divinity and became a Nirvanic Resurrection Sage. After the competition ended, I was blessed by the immortal worlds above and killed the chief of the Lionfolk. Not even you’re strong enough to deal with Chief Lion, and I killed him as easily as blowing some dust off my shoulder.”

“What?” Ghost Emperor Yama said, trembling visibly. All of a sudden, he realized that the destructive power inside of Yang Qi was definitely enough to eradicate him. “You made so much progress in such a short time? The Hell of Mahānata? That’s known as the grandest of all the hells. You… you actually ensconced your nascent divinity there?”

“Enough chit chat, Ghost Emperor Yama. Do you acknowledge allegiance to me, or not? Serve me as a slave, swear an oath on your devilish heart to be loyal, and never betray me for all eternity. If you don’t, I’ll bury you right here and now. Don’t think I'm not aware of your little plot with the Rich-Lush Continent and the Western Continent. I'm not going to just let that go.”

“Serve you as a slave…?” Ghost Emperor Yama said, hardly able to keep his mind focused on how things were developing.

Smiling coldly, Yang Qi reached out and clamped his hand onto the top of Ghost Emperor Yama’s head. Then he sent sagelight pouring into him, causing agonizing pain.

In that moment, Ghost Emperor Yama realized that it was true; he absolutely was not a match for Yang Qi.

“I’ll be your servant!” he shouted. Dropping to his knees, he swore an oath. “I, Ghost Emperor Yama, acknowledge lifelong allegiance to Yang Qi, and will serve him faithfully. If I don’t, let me be destroyed in body and soul.”

“That’s good. On your feet.” With that, Yang Qi prepared a hexing spell and inserted it into Ghost Emperor Yama’s devil energy. “Now, about the two continents….”

He waved his hand, sending out a stream of energy into the two continents, to connect with their essences, and expunge the devil energy.

Then, he forced the two continents together, causing volcanic eruptions and earthquakes in numerous locations. All such phenomena occurred in unpopulated areas, but the cultivators in the lands could sense that dramatic transformations were occurring.

Chancellor Sun Moon and the other leaders flew out and saw Yang Qi unleashing powerful energy arts, and were filled with sensations of deep reverence.

As for Ghost Emperor Yama, he was struck with profound fear at how Yang Qi was casually fusing the two continents together.

‘That’s… that’s the type of power Epic Saga Sages wield,’ he thought.

The process lasted for seven days and seven nights. In the end, the two continents became one. The demonlings from the Rich-Lush Continent began to spread through the lands of the Western Continent, and the subterranean spirit ore veins from the Western Continent began to expand into the Rich-Lush Continent. A new continent existed in the universe now.

Its greyspace was larger and tougher, and primal-chaos paleo-energy filled the lands, allowing life to flourish.

When it was all done, Yang Qi finally met with Yang Zhan.

“Qi’er, you’re back!” Yang Zhan said. “How did things go? Did you see your mother? Is it really true that she's the Holy Mother?”

“It’s true, Father, she’s the Holy Mother. One of her subordinates, an Epic Saga Sage, said that I'm a young master of her house. Unfortunately, she’s been in secluded cultivation this whole time, and I still haven’t been able to see her.”

“Why didn’t you wait until you saw her before returning?” Yang Zhan asked. “You need to find out the truth about your birth father.”

“Birth father?” Yang Qi’s smile vanished. “You’re my father. All I want to know is who exactly that man was. Other than that, he's not important. The reason I came back was to take care of Ghost Emperor Yama. Left on his own, he would definitely cause problems for the Rich-Lush Continent. But now, I've forced him into servitude, and can trust him to continue to protect the continent.”

“Milord, I’ll definitely take care of the Rich-Lush Continent,” Ghost Emperor Yama said from off to the side.

At this point, Yang Qi’s sworn brothers and sisters came, and they were clearly delighted.

“Brother,” Li He said, “who could have guessed that you would surpass us so quickly!”

“That doesn’t matter,” Yang Qi said. “You’ll always be my sworn brothers and sisters. By the way, one of the reasons I’ve come back is to make some big changes to the Rich-Lush Continent. I want it to be a holy land with incredible feng shui, perfect for cultivation. And I need your help with that. Brothers and Sisters, please, take a seat while I connect to the primal-chaos formations deep in the continent.”

Moments later, streams of primal-chaos paleo-energy erupted out, which slowly began to take the shape of a hand, like that of an ancient god.

“The hand of a primal-chaos elder-immortal!” Ghost Emperor Yama said. “In the ancient era, a powerful ruler from the Yore-Wilds Continent lost his hand, and it fell here to form the primal-chaos paleo-energy and the immortal formations. That’s the hand of an actual immortal! Yang, er… Milord, are you going to bring him back or something?”

Yang Qi snorted coldly, and the vital energy he exhaled became sagelight that shot into the depths of the continent, activating the formations there, causing the images of countless ancient battlefields to rise up.

Chapter 387: Power Brewing

Before, Yang Qi hadn’t been strong enough to draw on the deepest reserves of primal-chaos vital energy, and all of the immortal formations. But now that he was powerful enough to kill eighth step Great Sages, things were different.

Leviathan Truesoaring hoped to convert the Plateau of the Leviathan into a full planet, and Yang Qi wanted to do the same thing here. By combining the Western Continent with the Rich-Lush Continent, he could turn the two of them into what was essentially an enormous magical treasure.

When that happened, then it wouldn’t matter how far away he was, he would be able to sense what was happening back home.

The Rich-Lush Continent was his foundation. His clan and his sworn siblings were there, and he definitely needed to make sure they were never in any danger.

“Planar Pearl!”

As the ancient spell formations were activated, and the hand of the primal-chaos elder-immortal appeared, all sorts of immortal energy and magical laws were stirred.

Yang Qi waved his hand, and the Planar Pearl appeared high above, accompanied by the rejoicing of the ancient noble spirits of the Great Sages.

“Hell of Mahānata!” Yang Qi said, unleashing a magic that pierced through numerous immortal planes like a wormhole. At the same time, he could sense his nascent divinity in the hell, and could use it to draw masses of devil energy, which he sent into his Hellfire Crucible. It was quickly converted into pure immortal energy, which he sent out into the lands, causing more volcanoes and earthquakes. However, as a result, deserts became forests, and the barren mountains filled with energy.

Even the most parched areas blossomed with flowers.

“Spirit veins!”

The powers of the Planar Pearl and the Hell of Mahānata sank deep into the lands, causing massive streams of immortal energy to stretch out beneath the surface of the ground.

At first they were like writhing dragons, but soon they settled, and began to transform into liquid. It was spirit energy, which the people of the lands would need for their cultivation.

Next, he drew on his most powerful technique, the Hand of the One God, to send sagelight streaming out, speeding up the process.

The purified devil energy from the Hell of Mahānata created the most powerful of the veins of energy, which could stretch for tens of thousands of kilometers.

Everyone could sense the enormous veins then crystallizing, and turning into ore that emanated an imperial aura.

Ghost Emperor Yama was so shocked that he nearly fainted. “My god! Those spirit veins, they're… they’re becoming imperial-grade spirit stones! Only Demi-Immortals should be able to do that.”

Yang Qi had already reached the point of being able to take spirit energy and convert it into spirit stones. And imperial-grade spirit stones were perfect for Great Sages to practice their cultivation.

It was all thanks to the Hell of Mahānata, which was actually a higher-level world than most immortal planes. The devil energy from there was like high-level immortal energy, and after being purified, could create amazing spirit stones.

Of course, it wasn’t every single stream of energy that turned into imperial-grade spirit stones. There were others which were low-, mid-, high-, supreme-, and royal-grade.

Thanks to everything Yang Qi was doing, the Rich-Lush Continent’s subterranean areas were now filled with veins of ore, and the spirit energy in the place was thrumming.

Life force was abundant everywhere, which was a major benefit to all of the common people. Thanks to the spirit energy everywhere, more impressive cultivators would soon rise up.

But Yang Qi wasn’t done. Focusing completely on the primal-chaos elder-immortal's hand, he forced it to shrink down to cover Sage Monarch City. Soon, immortal motes appeared, which emanated primal-chaos vital energy that entered into his father and sworn siblings.

Then he summoned the Grand Emperor’s Pagoda for them to meditate in.

Next, he sent the power of the Blood of the One God into the pagoda to help them. Almost immediately, the lightning of tribulation appeared inside as people inside achieved cultivation breakthroughs.

However, the energy of the Blood of the One God prevented the tribulations from harming them, and in fact, it served to strengthen them.

As far as Yang Qi was concerned, tribulations like the ones appearing now were child’s play.

He had faced the Eternal Godwind, Jambudvīpa Deluge, Night Queen Flame, and Amber Avalanche, all without being hurt.

Considering that those tribulations were widely believed to be for the Demi-Immortal level, it begged the question of what he might face when he became a Demi-Immortal. It was impossible to even imagine.

“Milord, this is completely heaven-defying!” Ghost Emperor Yama said, shivering. “Are you sure you won’t face heavenly retribution for this?”

“Heavenly retribution? I call upon the name of the Lord to alter fate and strive toward deathlessness. You think I’m going to be hit with heavenly retribution? I preside over the dao of heaven, the universe, space, time, history, the future, and destiny…. The Lord doesn’t face retribution for defying heaven.”

He looked out over the lands, and as the sagelight spread out in all directions, and the immortal formations did their work, more and more immortal energy was imbued into the soil. The soil of the Rich-Lush Continent was now superior to even that of the Quake-Dawn Continent, and emanated a fragrant aroma because of the overabundance of spirit energy.

Of course, the continent as a whole was not superior. After all, the Quake-Dawn Continent was a planet, and was thousands of times larger than the Rich-Lush Continent.

But it would continue to improve and grow in the years to come.

“I’ll leave the Grand Emperor's Pagoda here as a bastion of defense, as well as the Heaven-Dominating Golden Swordbreaker. Neither of them are very useful to me anymore.” Waving his hand, he sent a streak of golden light into the ground, which became an enormous golden mountain. It was none other than the true form of the Heaven-Dominating Golden Swordbreaker, which would now stand watch over Sage Monarch City.

Now that Ghost Emperor Yama was an eighth step Great Sage, and completely under Yang Qi’s control, he would be able to protect the Rich-Lush Continent even against ninth step enemies.

Unless a Demi-Immortal came along, the continent would be safe.

**

A few more months passed, during which time Yang Qi tirelessly continued to improve the Rich-Lush Continent. Eventually, an enormous planetary core began to take shape in the center of the continent. It was a crystal of power, filled with innumerable spell formations, and connected to many immortal planes. In its depths was the Planar Pearl.

It had primal-chaos vital energy, and immortal formations, and was also connected to the Grand Emperor's Pagoda and the Heaven-Dominating Golden Swordbreaker.

Crack!

Sage Monarch City connected to the planetary core, becoming the ultimate overlord of all the surrounding lands.

The planetary core was complete, which meant that the Rich-Lush Continent was now a fledgling planet. In the years to come, even if Yang Qi didn’t actively shape it further, the planetary core would continue to gather power, and the continent would eventually become a planet. And since Yang Zhan and everyone else was in Sage Monarch City working on their cultivation, and Sage Monarch City was connected directly to the planetary core, they received untold blessings.

It wouldn't be long before some of them became Great Sages.

WHIZZZ!

In fact, in almost the same moment that Yang Qi formed the planetary core, a beam of sagelight shot into the air as someone experienced a breakthrough.

“Hmm?” Yang Qi looked over and saw that Nie Chaoguang was experiencing a major transformation as he became a Great Sage.

“Come here, Nie Chaoguang,” Yang Qi said. Waving his hand, he dispelled the tribulations that had been about to descend, and brought Nie Chaoguang over to him.

Nie Chaoguang looked at him, eyes flickering with fear as he had no idea what Yang Qi planned to do to him.

“Henceforth, you’re not surnamed Nie,” Yang Qi said. “Your new surname is Yang, and you’re a member of the Yang Clan. How does that sound to you?”

“Many thanks, Milord!” He was well aware that if Yang Qi wanted to, he could wipe him out of existence with a thought. “From now on, my surname is Yang. I'm Yang Chaoguang, member of the Yang Clan. I will never slack in my duty to watch over the Rich-Lush Continent and the people of the Yang Clan.”

“Excellent. A wise man submits to the circumstances. Eventually, we’ll go to the Quake-Dawn Continent, and I’ll announce the matter to your Spirit Origin Association. The Quake-Dawn Continent is going to be absorbed into the Rich-Lush Continent anyway. It's just the beginning of the mighty kingdom I'm forming.”

Chapter 388: The Holy Mother Emerges

The Rich-Lush Continent experienced roughly half a year of refinement, until it was thoroughly transformed.

Verdant hills and crystal-clear waters could be seen everywhere. There were no longer any barren or dangerous locations, although Yang Qi had set up special places to raise low-level demonlings and fiend-devils.

It was time for a change of names. No longer was this place the Rich-Lush Continent, it was the Sage Monarch Continent.

There were no sects or organizations present, there was only the Sage Monarch Society. All citizens were members of that society, and were provided with resources appropriate for their level.

The Sage Monarch Society was essentially an imperial dynasty, with centralized state power that exercised control over numerous clans and peoples. The age of the Sage Ancestor Dynasty and its feudal system were a thing of the past.

Everyone lived in peace and happiness, and could work on their cultivation without hindrance.

That said, as the populace rose in cultivation and grew stronger, they became a fighting force capable of unleashing incredible destruction.

WHOOSH!

A burst of energy rose high as yet another individual became a Great Sage. It was Hua Tianxiong. He had been killed by the Crown Prince, but his discarnate soul had been rebuilt. Later, he reached even higher levels of enlightenment. Then, after furthering his cultivation in the planetary core, he became the second of the new Great Sages after Yang Chaoguang. Now, if you left out Yang Qi and Ghost Emperor Yama, there were three Great Sages in the Sage Monarch Continent.

The continent was already just as glorious as the Rich-Lush Continent had been in its golden age.

And there would only continue to be more Great Sages in the future.

After all, there had been many Half Sages in the four institutes, and now all of them were trying hard to break through to the next level.

As Yang Qi worked hard to improve the Sage Monarch Continent, a pair of eyes opened in an unknown location not very far away in the starry sky.

As they looked in the direction of the Sage Monarch Continent, they burned with hatred.

The owner of the eyes was tall and lean, but as imposing as a mighty mountain. For some reason, he seemed like a leader of people. He was none other than Chancellor Demi-Immortal. He had interfered in the fight with Yang Qi and the Crown Prince, in the hopes of saving the Crown Prince. But in the end, his daughter had been killed, and he had barely escaped with his life. Now he was back, and strangely enough, just as strong as he had been before. In fact, if one didn’t know, it would be impossible to tell that he had ever been hurt. He had even reached the eighth step, and was now a Without Limit Sage.

‘I took you into the Demi-Immortal Institute, Yang Qi. I protected you, and even made sure the Crown Prince didn't kill you. How could I have made such a monumental mistake? Thanks to my mistake, the core daoist teachings and doctrines of the institute have been done away with. I can only hope that the ancestors can forgive me. To rectify my mistake, I will kill Yang Qi, with my own hands. I’ll remove his head and offer it as a sacrifice to the fallen heroes of the Demi-Immortal Institute.’

As he concluded his prayer, his killing aura surged. ‘How could I have ever guessed that you would get this powerful, Yang Qi? You reached the highest heights in the Hanging Mountain’s training competition, and even killed Chief Lion. Well, sometimes you have to fail first before you can succeed. Thanks to the spirit medicines of the Quake-Dawn Cathedral, I'm back, and even stronger than before. And I'm coming for you. You have a Titan Emperor Medallion, and will soon be studying in the Titan Emperor Collegium. But little do you know that the founder of the Demi-Immortal Institute was a student from the Titan Emperor Collegium, and therefore, it wasn’t hard at all for me to get my hands on an enrollment medallion. I’ll disguise myself a bit, enter the Titan Emperor Collegium, and wait for you to fall into my hands….’

Chancellor Demi-Immortal slowly faded away into the void, leaving behind no traces of his passage.

As the chancellor faded away, Yang Qi was sitting in Sage Monarch City, when suddenly he experienced a very odd sensation. Looking out into the void, he realized that there was a vaguely familiar aura out there.

‘Is that… the aura of Chancellor Demi-Immortal? Was he out there spying on me?’ After a moment of thought, and a bit of calculation, his eyes glittered, and his killing intent surged. Taking a step forward, he vanished, to reappear far out in the starry sky.

‘I know that Chancellor Demi-Immortal escaped, like a fish slipping out of the net…. But I can’t believe that he came back to spy on me. He’s definitely a genius, that much is shown from how he became a seventh step Planet God Sage on the backwater and impoverished Rich-Lush Continent. He’s probably even more talented than the Crown Prince. Well, he obviously hates me now, and there’s no way he’ll give up on trying to kill me. And there are other Great Sages from the Demi-Immortal Institute out there in the void. If he gathers them and then leads them against me, it could be troublesome. And what if he has Aunt Susu? How do I find her?’

Plans and ideas flitted through Yang Qi’s mind, until finally, a smile broke out on his face.

Then, he headed back to the Sage Monarch Continent to continue his cultivation, and attempt to reach the Eternal Sands Step.

Before he could begin, though, a powerful aura appeared, and Yang Qi looked over to find Yan Wubing standing in front of him.

“Young Master!” Yan Wubing said by way of greeting, as he bowed at the waist.

“Sir Yan, there’s no need to act with such formal courtesy,” Yang Qi said. “What matter has brought you here? Has the Holy Mother emerged from seclusion? Did she ask to see me?”

Yan Wubing nodded. “You hit the nail on the head, Young Master. The Holy Mother sent me here to bring you back to the Hanging Mountain and see her. Can we leave immediately?”

“Yes, of course.” Yang Qi chopped his hand through the air, opening up a wormhole.

“Such skill, Young Master!” Yan Wubing exclaimed. “It won’t be long before you surpass me.” Glancing around at the Sage Monarch Continent, he added, “You've really changed this place into a holy land. I'm sure talented geniuses will be rising up within it soon. I'm sure this won’t be the limit of what you create, Young Master. Incidentally, there are some other matters I need to discuss with you. Why don't we chat about them on the way?”

With that, they entered the wormhole. As they did, a serious expression overtook Yang Qi’s face.

“What matters might you be referring to?” he asked.

“Matters regarding your enemies, of course. First of all, August Patriarch Mammoth Heaven is secretly plotting to kill you. Personally. Sadly for them, we have eyes and ears in the Mammothfolk. As such, I notified the Holy Mother of the situation already, and she went to Mount Sumeru to confront the August Patriarch.”

Yang Qi’s eyes flickered with cold light. “He, a Demi-Immortal, wants to personally kill me? Go ahead and let him try. He won’t come out of it alive, I guarantee it.”

“Your humble servant can sense an immense power within you, Young Master. Because of that, I'm not too worried about your safety in the Hanging Mountain. After all, even as a Legendary, you slaughtered Great Sages. And with each successive breakthrough you achieve, you’ll get stronger and stronger. In any case, thanks to the Holy Mother, there’s no chance that the August Patriarch will try to do anything.

“Very well, let me move on to the second issue, which relates to Chancellor Demi-Immortal.”

“Him?” Yang Qi’s heart thumped a bit. “What’s the situation?”

“Well, he’s always been on good terms with the Holy Daughter of the Quake-Dawn Cathedral. After being defeated by you, he went there, and with her help, recovered and even reached the Without Limit Step. It’s little wonder considering how much of a genius he is, more so than the Crown Prince. He also got a Titan Emperor Medallion, which means that he’ll be going to study in the Titan Emperor Collegium. He’s definitely plotting to do something to you, Young Master. You need to be very careful when you go there.

“And now, there’s a third matter. Young Master, you have an aunt, Yang Susu, who has the blood of the ancient Spritefolk. Well, I found out that she’s long since left for the planetary system that is home to the Spritefolk.”

Considering all of the information Yan Wubing had just given him, Yang Qi was finally coming to a realization of how powerful the Holy Mother’s people were. Their network of spies and informants was clearly formidable.

“The Spritefolk have their own planetary system?” Yang Qi asked, surprised. “Where is it?”

“Not here, that’s for sure, Young Master. It’s in another starry sky. You see, this starry sky consists of the ancient Four Wilds, which are the Brute-Wilds, Proto-Wilds, Waste-Wilds, and Yore-Wilds. We’re all under the direct jurisdiction of the Titan Emperor Heaven. The Spritefolk, on the other hand, are very, very far away, under the jurisdiction of the Megaplexus Heaven. I can tell you now what the Holy Mother wishes you to do. She wants you to go study at the Titan Emperor Collegium, and begin to contemplate the dao of immortal ascension. At the same time, she wants you to probe for information about a huge secret. Young Master, as it turns out, she wants you to find out more about your birth father.”

“My birth father?” Yang Qi said, shivering subconsciously. “What do you mean? I thought we weren’t supposed to talk about that. Tell me all the details!”

“Things change, sir,” Yan Wubing said, bowing deeply. “Your father was a banished immortal, sent here from a higher immortal plane as part of a punishment of some sort. He stayed for a time in the Titan Emperor Collegium, which was how the Holy Mother came to know him. Eventually, he was pardoned by the immortal plane, and returned there, leaving behind no explanations or anything else for that matter. He did something very untoward to the Holy Mother, and she hopes that you can find out more about where exactly he went. She wishes to eventually go find him and demand answers for everything that happened.”

“Oh, I see….” Yang Qi wasn’t sure what to make of the situation. The fact that his birth father was out there somewhere had always been a distant and somewhat abstract concept. Perhaps some of it had to do with how his blood had literally changed, and was now becoming the Blood of the One God, which surpassed that of the host of immortals or even the legion of gods.

However, if his mother was giving him this responsibility, then he would follow through with the task at hand.

During the course of their conversation, they traveled through the wormhole and eventually reached the Hanging Mountain, and Mount Sumeru. Without any hesitation, Yan Wubing led Yang Qi to a palace at the summit, where there were two thrones. Seated on one was August Patriarch Mammoth Heaven, and on the other was a young woman.

Chapter 389: Bickering

This was the very core of the Hanging Mountain, a place where only the Holy Mother, the August Patriarch, the grand elders, the chiefs of the Demonfolk, and other extremely important people would gather for meetings.

Of course, Yang Qi was now a famous person in the Hanging Mountain. After his blood-drenched performance in the training competition, and his later feat of killing Chief Lion, his mere name made most disciples weak in the knees.

Therefore, no one even considered blocking his way as he went along with Yan Wubing.

However, Yang Qi was in no mood to pay attention to how people were looking at him. All of his attention was focused on the throne that stood equally as high as the August Patriarch, and the young woman sitting on it.

She actually looked younger than Yang Qi, as if she were only sixteen years old or so. She wore an ornamental thumb ring, and her hair was bound with hoops of gold.

Her aura was that of a Demi-Immortal, as if she were one with all heaven and earth, a supreme entity of all creation.

To Yang Qi, she seemed so incredibly powerful that a single breath from her could eradicate the entire starry sky.

She was obviously not an ‘energy warrior’ but rather, a ‘half-immortal’. This ‘sixteen-year-old’ young woman was the Holy Mother of the Hanging Mountain.

And apparently, she was also Yang Qi’s mother.

“Qi’er!” she said, rising to her feet, her eyes flashing with excitement. However, she maintained propriety, and sat back down calmly. “I'm your mother. Twenty years ago, I gave birth to you in the Rich-Lush Continent. I didn’t want you to get tangled up in the infighting here in the Hanging Mountain, so I entrusted you to Yang Zhan. I’d planned to come get you myself, but you grew up much faster than I'd ever anticipated. I hope life wasn’t too rough on you these past years.”

“It was rough, but not too rough. And in fact, it was a blessing. Living a difficult life can make a person strong.” Yang Qi’s heart was pounding with excitement because of what was happening, but somehow he managed to keep his expression placid. After all, August Patriarch Mammoth Heaven was there, as were many other Demonfolk. “I took first place in the training competition recently, and during the process, killed some weak nobodies. Hopefully I didn't cause any problems for you, Mother.”

“How impudent!” August Patriarch Mammoth Heaven roared angrily, leaping to his feet. “Yang Qi, perhaps I could accept that you killed two of my sons. After all, deaths are to be expected in the immortal world training competition. But do you really have to go so far as to insult them after they’re dead?”

Looking over at the August Patriarch, the Holy Mother said, “Why are you so angry because two people died, Mammoth Heaven? I heard that you planned to personally kill my son Qi’er in retaliation. Well, he's here, so why don’t you follow through? Try to kill him, and see what happens!”

Waving her hand, she wrapped up Yang Qi with a swirl of wind, and pulled him over to stand beneath her throne. As soon as her aura contacted him, he could sense the nature of her blood. Despite the fact that his blood was changing into the Blood of the One God, there were substructural aspects that remained the same. And right now, his blood was telling him that this person really was his mother. There was absolutely no question about it.

It was almost like a dream. He had assumed that finding his mother would have been some long and difficult quest, filled with impossible tasks and unexpected situations.

Not waiting for a response from the August Patriarch, the Holy Mother turned to Yang Qi and said, “Don’t worry, Qi’er. You’re with me now, and nobody in heaven or earth will be able to harm you.” The tenderness and love in her eyes couldn’t have been clearer.

“Many thanks, Mother. Although, don’t worry, I can take care of myself. Even if this August Patriarch Mammoth Heaven tried to kill me, I’d be able to handle myself.” Yang Qi was a ‘big shot’ now, and definitely not the emotional child he had been in the past, so he continued to keep his expression calm and confident.

“Grandstander!” one of the Epic Saga megamammoth elders shouted. “Maybe you took first place in that competition, but don’t think that means you can insult the August Patriarch. Doing that is a crime here in the Hanging Mountain, and we’ll punish you in the cruelest fashion if we have to.”

Suddenly, blazing, holy light erupted from the Holy Mother’s eyes, and slammed into the megamammoth elder. “Who the hell do you think you are? I'm having a chat with the August Patriarch, so mind your own business!”

Before the elder could react, he was thrown backward, blood spraying out of his mouth, and his eyes flashing with terror.

“Holy Mother!” Mammoth Heaven shouted, his true energy surging. “Did you come here to pick a fight with us Mammothfolk?”

The Holy Mother sat down slowly onto her throne, and then spoke in a very calm and light tone. “I'm not picking a fight. I'm warning you. If you do anything to my son, Mammoth Heaven, well, you know the level of my cultivation base. I was a Tyrant Demi-Immortal before, but in my session of secluded cultivation, I became a Prime Demi-Immortal! You really think you’re a match for me? If it weren’t for the fact that the Immortal World Assembly would disapprove, I’d just kill you right now and wipe out all of your Mammothfolk. Well, what are you waiting for? Do it! Try to kill my son!”

“Prime Demi-Immortal?! You really broke through?” Shivering, the August Patriarch settled back down onto his throne, looking deeply shaken. Waving his hand, he said, “Mammothfolk, hear my command!”

“Sir!” the Epic Saga elders said, stepping forward respectfully.

“Henceforth, there is no grudge between the Mammothfolk and Yang Qi. As of this moment, the deaths of Mammoth Force and Mammoth Manyvoids are written off.” From the nature of his order, August Patriarch Mammoth Heaven was revealing that he was in the weak position.

“August Patriarch!”

“August Patriarch….”

Immediately, the furious megamammoth elders prepared to offer opposing opinions.

“I didn’t ask for a debate!” August Patriarch Mammoth Heaven shouted. Glaring over at the Holy Mother and Yang Qi, he said, “The two of you are tough, I’ll give you that. But if you’re too unyielding, you might eventually break. Good luck on being this rude and unreasonable all the time.”

“Worry about your own business,” the Holy Mother said with a faint smile. “A wise man submits to the circumstances, Mammoth Heaven, and you’re a smart fellow. I just hope you’re not merely feigning compliance. And by the way, if anything happens to my son in the future, I'm going to hold the Mammothfolk responsible.”

Mammoth Heaven snorted coldly. “Your son has offended too many people, so don’t even think of blaming us Mammothfolk for every little thing that happens to him. Otherwise we're going to end up at a very deadly standoff.” With that, August Patriarch Mammoth Heaven turned and vanished.

“Let’s go, Qi’er. We have a lot to talk about.” With that, the Holy Mother left and took Yang Qi with her.

Yang Qi’s vision blurred momentarily, and then he found himself in a divine mountain somewhere beyond heaven. It was as smooth as crystal, and as lovely as jade. In fact, it was like a continent of jade, filled with jade trees and even an ocean made from liquid jade. And it was filled with dazzling light, without even a single shadow present.

“Qi’er, this is Profound Femina Mountain, and that sea of jade is the Jasper Lake, which contains true water from an immortal world. Cultivate with that, and you can achieve rapid progress. Although, it looks to me like you don't need such help.” Eventually they reached a palace at the top of the mountain. As they entered, Yan Wubing remained outside, where he stood respectfully and unmoving.

“Do you have anything else to report, Yan Wubing?” the Holy Mother said.

“Yes, Holy Mother. It's all thanks to help from the young master that I gained enlightenment of certain matters pertaining to the primeval infernal deities. I've made significant cultivation progress since then, and have already reached out to communicate with the heart of heaven. I seem to be just on the verge of a breakthrough to the Demi-Immortal level. All I need is a suitable place to go into seclusion.”

“Oh? That’s wonderful!” The Holy Mother truly looked delighted. “In that case, you’ll be the third Demi-Immortal here in the Hanging Mountain. And you’ll be a very powerful asset to my side of the mountain. Qi’er, what good fortune did you come across? According to Yan Wubing, you have power that not even Demi-Immortals could contend with. Is that true?”

“Yes, it's true,” Yang Qi replied. “Mother, it would probably be best if you refrain from making contact with it personally. You see, in their glory, the legion of gods left a sealing mark on me.”

“A God Legion Seal?! Do those things really exist?” She waved her hand, and a field of light settled onto Yang Qi, which turned him completely transparent in her eyes. There, right in his forehead, was the God Legion Seal.

The light she had summoned began to seep into his forehead, as if to probe at his deepest secrets. However, that was when a golden glow spread out, as bright as an exploding sun. The Holy Mother was shaken, and quickly floated backward, simultaneously entering another aspect of the void, along with her throne.

Eventually, the golden light faded away, and she stepped out of the void, her face flush and her eyes glittering.

“Qi’er, not even I, a Prime Demi-Immortal, am strong enough to defend against that power. If I hadn’t prepared my Preheaven Quintuple Retreat ahead of time, I would have been seriously injured just now.”

“You definitely shouldn’t try to touch it, Mother,” Yang Qi said. “I can’t control it fully, and it’s very dangerous. The power of the legion of gods cannot be blasphemed against.”

“No wonder you weren’t afraid of Mammoth Heaven. Yan Wubing said you might have the power of the legion of gods, and as it turns out, it's true.” She sighed. “With a son like this, what else could I ask for?”

“Mother, is it true that my birth father was a banished immortal?” Yang Qi asked. “And that he left for the immortal world later?”

“Don’t even mention him!” the Holy Mother said angrily, but after a moment, her expression softened. “He’s the most vicious, cruel man in the world. He's your father, yes, but nothing more. Back when I met him, I had the ancient and rare Profound Infernal Matriarch Body. He was the one who gave me the Red-Dust Spectral-Dream Heart-Sutra, which at first seemed like an amazing gift. Unfortunately, when I cultivated the technique to the ultimate level, he stole my Profound Infernal Essence, and the Myriad Matriarchs Energy. I was essentially crippled after that, which was when I gave birth to you. Luckily, I had recently encountered other good fortune, and later restored my energy arts because of it. Qi’er, I want you to promise that you’ll track down that man and kill him!”

“What?” Yang Qi said, visibly surprised.

Yan Wubing cleared his throat. “Young Master, it’s true. He’s really the coldest and most ruthless man you’ll ever meet. I saw all of these things with my own eyes. The Holy Mother worked tirelessly to develop that Profound Infernal Matriarch Body, a physique type that draws on the blood of the Profound Infernal God, and can give birth to a myriad of living things, even the cosmos itself. Unfortunately, your birth father stole virtually all of the Holy Mother’s essence. In fact, what he did almost killed you, Young Master.”

Chapter 390: Titan Emperor Collegium

Yang Qi was not in a very good mood at all.

Based on his mother’s description, his birth father was as rapacious as a wolf and as savage as a cur, the type of person who would manipulate people for his own purposes, and then get rid of them as soon as they outlived their usefulness. He was a banished immortal who had viewed human beings as bugs to be toyed with at will.

Thanks to Yang Qi’s understanding of the primeval infernal deities, he was aware of what the Profound Infernal Matriarch Body was. It was far beyond the Nascent Divinity Starlight Body or Seven Apertures Sprite Body, and if it was cultivated to completion, made immortal ascension an almost foregone conclusion.

Unfortunately, the essence of that physique had been stolen from his mother.

At that time, he had been in her belly, and had nearly died because of the situation. In other words, his birth father had nearly killed him.

Somehow, his mother had managed to escape with her life.

The fact that this was the story of his past had him very much out of sorts. However, he wanted to get to the bottom of the situation as much as his mother. Soon, he would go to the Titan Emperor Collegium, report in, and become a student there.

It was located in another heaven and earth, in the very middle of the starry sky, and was the educational establishment that oversaw the Yore-Wilds, Brute-Wilds, Waste-Wilds, and Proto-Wilds Continents.

However, there was much to do beforehand.

Months passed.

He had many discussions with his mother, who helped him to progress rapidly in his cultivation. She was a Demi-Immortal with plenty of experience, and knew much about the secrets of the past. She had secret magics, immortal skills, and countless energy arts. It was common to experience problems when practicing cultivation, but with her help, he unlocked many secrets of the Demi-Immortal level, and gained a much better understanding of cultivation in general.

He also learned that the Demi-Immortal level was divided into nine orders. They were: Lesser Demi-Immortal, Greater Demi-Immortal, Profound Demi-Immortal, Potent Demi-Immortal, Tyrant Demi-Immortal, Prime Demi-Immortal, Revered Demi-Immortal, Universal Demi-Immortal, and Paragon Demi-Immortal.

As would be expected, each level was far more powerful than the previous, and incredibly difficult to reach.

In the past, both the August Patriarch and the Holy Mother had been Tyrant Demi-Immortals. But the Holy Mother had recently become a Prime Demi-Immortal, much to the consternation of the August Patriarch. Now, he didn’t dare to get into open conflict with her. If he did, it could result in the Mammothfolk as a whole being crippled or wiped out.

One day, the Holy Mother said, “Qi’er, I think I've told you everything I can. Your physique type surpasses my old Profound Infernal Matriarch Body significantly. Going forward, you’ll have to rely on yourself alone when it comes to your cultivation. When you get to the Titan Emperor Collegium, pursue your studies, but at the same time, see if you can find out information about your father and his whereabouts. Your life is probably going to get even more complicated once you’re there. The immortal world want the Four Wilds to be united again, and the Hanging Mountain is part of that. Unfortunately, in the grand scheme of things, we aren’t very powerful. When the unification occurs, it will involve heaven-shaking, earth-toppling changes. In fact, I might even lose my position and end up serving someone else. The stronger you get in the Titan Emperor Collegium, the better we’ll be equipped to deal with those things.”

“I understand, Mother. Dangerous situations always rise up in the universe. The Hanging Mountain might seem powerful now, but things can always change. Perhaps the immortal world will send people down, or perhaps the Four Wilds will go to war with each other. Maybe another planetary system will invade and wipe everyone out. The only way to protect oneself and one’s people is to get stronger.

“Yan Wubing said he got word that Chancellor Demi-Immortal disguised himself and entered the Titan Emperor Collegium to study. He's a deadly person, and he definitely has it out for my clan and the Sage Monarch Society. I need to find him and kill him, otherwise, he's going to cause problems.”

Yang Qi was fully convinced of what he should do next. He had found his mother, and next he would find his birth father. And along the way, he would get stronger and stronger, and make sure to keep his friends and family safe. The Titan Emperor Collegium was the strongest organization in this starry sky, and if he rose to power there, then he would eventually be able to go to the immortal world.

“Qi’er, don’t worry about the Rich-Lush Continent. I’ll watch over it for you. No one will invade it as long as I'm on guard.”

“I know. Besides, the continent is connected to my flesh and blood now. If something happened there, I would know, and would return immediately. Remember, Mother, I combined the Rich-Lush Continent with the Western Continent to create a new land, the Sage Monarch Continent. Eventually, it’s going to become a planet, which is how I plan to reach the Demi-Immortal level.”

The Holy Mother let out a long sigh. “Ai. Qi’er, in some ways it’s a pity that you received a legacy from the mythological legion of gods. Your cultivation works different from normal, and I have no way to help you.”

“It's fine, Mother. I understand that I have to rely on myself to advance my cultivation. There’s no need for you to worry about it. I’ll eventually earn myself a high rank in the Titan Emperor Collegium, and make sure that you end up as the ultimate ruler of the Hanging Mountain. I’ll track down my birth father, and make sure that the grudge between the two of you is resolved once and for all. You know, as far as I'm concerned, I’ll only ever have one father, and that's Yang Zhan. Hopefully you can take the time to go see him.”

She thought for a moment, then said, “Very well. I’ll go to the Rich-Lu– er, no, the Sage Monarch Continent to pay a visit. And I’ll help him reach the Great Sage level too. Don’t worry about any of that, Qi’er.”

“Many thanks, Mother. I have a whole group of sworn brothers and sisters there who are top talents, and very loyal. Considering how closely they've stuck to me, they’re worthy of help as well.”

The Holy Mother nodded. “I'm aware that you took several sworn siblings, and that they stood with you against the Crown Prince. I’ll send some people to guide them. By the time you come back from the Titan Emperor Collegium, they should all be Great Sages.”

She wasn’t exaggerating. Back in the Rich-Lush Continent, Great Sages had been veritable mythological beings. But in the Hanging Mountain they were just nobility. And the Holy Mother was a terrifying Prime Demi-Immortal. For her to help a group of people become Great Sages might not be a simple task, but it definitely wasn’t an impossibility. And it was only natural for her to provide such help to people who were important to her. Furthermore, forgetting the God Legion Seal, she was far, far more powerful than Yang Qi. The God Legion Seal was something that even immortals would be terrified of, and therefore, it wasn’t appropriate to count it as part of Yang Qi’s actual level of power or fighting ability.

“Thanks for that, Mother. I feel a lot better now. I think the time has come for me to head to the Titan Emperor Collegium.” He rose to his feet. “Farewell.”

“Hold on a moment. There are plenty of people out there plotting to harm you. I think it would be best for me to personally escort you to the Titan Emperor Collegium. You attracted a lot of attention by winning the training competition, and on top of all that, you have the legacy of King Immortal-Slayer. By the way, Qi’er, do you have the actual medallion on you? It’s a powerful item that will surely bring you no end of trouble. The successors of King Immortal-Slayer always die violent deaths. In fact, from the days of the ancient Yore-Wilds until now, no one has ever collected all of the medallion fragments. Whenever someone begins to collect them, they rise up in a blaze of glory, only to flame out and perish in the end.”

“I don’t actually have the legacy medallion,” Yang Qi explained. “After I killed the Crown Prince, I was taking inventory of his belongings, and it flew away before I could get it. Based on my understanding, if someone who holds the medallion gets killed, it will instinctively go looking for another master. Besides, Mother, I don't really need some legacy from King Immortal-Slayer.”

“True. According to the stories, King Immortal-Slayer conquered three thousand chiliocosm worlds, but because he blasphemed against the glory of the legion of gods, they killed him. Considering you have the God Legion Seal, you’ll eventually surpass whatever level King Immortal-Slayer reached. Very well, why don’t we head to the Titan Emperor Collegium now?”

“Mother, there’s no need for you to put yourself out. I know that a lot of people out there want to kill me, but frankly, I'm not worried about it. People who get stronger without actually putting in the work of fighting always end up as trash. Besides, now that you know about the God Legion Seal, you know that anyone who really tries to kill me will end up dead. In fact, I'm actually curious to see who will dare to try to make a move on me.”

“Ai. You're really growing up, Qi’er. Well, if you're sure about that, then I won't escort you. Go ahead. When you have time, send word back to the Hanging Mountain to let me know how you're doing.”

“I will, Mother. Farewell.” Yang Qi blurred into a string of after-images that disappeared into the void. Now that he was a Great Sage, the speeds he was capable of with his Angel Wings were astounding. In fact, he hadn’t even used them in his fight with Mammoth Manyvoids, and had still won.

After Yang Qi left, Yan Wubing appeared and bowed deeply to the Holy Mother. “Holy Mother, the young master is really making a name for himself. I suspect that in the future, he will wield unimaginable power.”

“Ai, you’re right. That’s the only reason I can rest at ease.”

“Is something bothering you, Holy Mother? The young master has the God Legion Seal, which is like something from ancient myths. Even in the era of the Yore-Wilds, there were elder-immortals who had never even seen one. With that seal, I think the young master should be safe from any opponent. Could it be that you’re worried about why he ended up acquiring such immense good fortune?”

“You have no idea how powerful that seal really is. There’s definitely a reason it ended up on my son. War and fighting can sometimes be avoided in the mortal Hanging Mountain. But not in the immortal worlds. When the immortals in heaven fight, it is always deadly, and fatalities are common. Right now, it's impossible to say which member of the legion of gods is behind all of this. In any case, to the gods, our Hanging Mountain is like nothing. If the Hanging Mountain gets dragged into the affairs of such higher beings, it could end up being ground into dust. In fact, the Four Wilds and the Titan Emperor Heaven could meet the same fate. That God Legion Seal proves that my son is connected to some mighty entity from the legion of gods. Most likely, that individual is watching him even now. In fact, maybe the immortal planes are involved too. And they’ll take action eventually. Keep on the lookout, Wubing. Before long, the immortal world is definitely going to send down a decree.”

With that, the Holy Mother began to think, and mixed emotions played out on her face.

Chapter 391: The Arrival

Yang Qi sped through the vast starry river, moving at incredible speed. The universe was an immense place, and numerous planets and other heavenly bodies sped past him as he blurred along almost at the speed of light itself.

Some of the planets were enormous, filled with spirit energy and packed with spirit stones and ores. Naturally, places like that often had humans, demons, devils, or other living beings that could practice cultivation. He also saw countless continents, or even cities floating in the starry sky.

Strangely, as he followed the immortal map in the Titan Emperor Medallion, he realized that the planets he passed were growing more numerous and bustling. On more than one occasion, he came across networks of ancient planets which were linked with wormholes and teleportation portals, alliances of sorts that were larger than the Sage Monarch Continent, Quake-Dawn Continent, and Hanging Mountain combined. Eventually, there were so many planets that it was like a river. This place was like a capital city of the starry skies, whereas Yang Qi’s home was a place for ignorant country bumpkins.

‘Is this planetary river the center of the Four Wilds planetary system? I'm definitely not in the former Yore-Wilds Continent anymore.’

The planetary system that consisted of the Hanging Mountain and everything around it had once been part of the Yore-Wilds Continent, which despite being a flourishing location in the past, had been attacked and destroyed by the Hell of Euphoria. Ever since then, the entire place had been in a state of decline.

The other of the Four Wilds, including the Proto-Wilds, Brute-Wilds, and Waste-Wilds, had escaped destruction, and had continued to thrive in the following tens of thousands of years.

The Four Wilds were overseen by the Titan Emperor Heaven, and in the middle of those four great continents was a central region where the Titan Emperor Collegium was located. It was so far away from the Hanging Mountain that a low-level Great Sage who relied on space-time wormholes could take a thousand years to get there. Maybe even ten thousand.

Only a Great Sage in the eighth step, the Without Limit Step, would possibly have energy arts and true energy boundless enough to sustain the type of flight that would make such a journey possible.

As of now, Yang Qi’s cultivation base surpassed that of an eighth step Great Sage, and that was especially true of his Angel Wings. Even a single flap of those wings could propel him past numerous planets.

It was speed normally attainable only by ninth step Epic Saga Sages, and which bordered on the Demi-Immortal level. As he traveled, Yang Qi saw all sorts of astounding sights. There were enormous, heavenly trees floating in outer space, with roots that stretched far into the depths of the void. Such trees were actually worlds unto themselves, occupied by countless humans and Demonfolk.

He saw things that didn't exist near the Hanging Mountain, proving just how wide and varied the universe was.

Eventually, he reached a location that was densely packed with countless flourishing planets. At that point, he opened the Lord's Eye to look around.

All of a sudden, his view of the world changed.

He could see now that there was a central planetary system, with starry rivers stretching out in the four cardinal directions. There were also profoundly wild and ancient auras present.

The auras of the east, west, and south were grand and matchless, and strong to the extreme. Those locations led to the Proto-Wilds, Brute-Wilds, and Waste-Wilds.

Behind him to the north, the energy seemed faint and weak, and was filled with darkness and gloom. There was also strong devil energy there.

That was the old Yore-Wilds planetary system. It was obviously far, far from being restored to its former glory.

The Four Wilds planetary system surrounded what was called the Central Planetary River, which was also the location of the Titan Emperor Collegium. As for all of the countless planets here, they were organized into an immense Universal Skywide Star-Studded Grand Spell Formation.

Even the orbits of the various ancient planets conformed to the nature of the spell formation, whose defenses would make unlawful entry impossible.

To link up numerous planets into a star-studded spell formation like this was something that only an eighth order Universal Demi-Immortal could do. Only they could understand matters related to the rotations of the universe, and only they could control planets.

Obviously, it was a level that surpassed Yang Qi in every way.

Although he could fight at levels higher than his own level, Universal Demi-Immortals were nearly twenty levels higher than him. If he faced a person like that, he would be little more than a bug.

Swish!

Blurring into motion again, he flew onward before eventually landing on a particularly large planet, in a wide-open plain that was hundreds of thousands of kilometers from end to end. Streams of people could be seen flying about here and there, along with teleportation portals that brought people and sent them away without cease.

In the very middle of the plain was an immense gate, fully ten thousand meters tall, surrounded by ranks of Great Sages wearing bright yellow uniforms. Their mere auras were the type that would cause other people to shiver.

On the chests of these yellow-garbed individuals was the character ‘Titan’ embroidered in black cloth. Clearly, they represented the ruling force in this starry sky, the Titan Emperor Heaven.

‘This ancient planet is similar in size to the Quake-Dawn Continent,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘It’s actually the entranceway to the Central Planetary River proper, and the Titan Emperor Collegium. This is the only way to get past the Universal Skywide Star-Studded Grand Spell Formation.’

Just looking around, it was impossible to tell how many planetary systems existed in the Central Planetary River. In any case, they were all linked with magical power, with certain ancient planets left open as gateways to enter.

There were people from the Four Wilds here, entering and exiting, all of them high-level Great Sages, with quite a few being Epic Saga Sages.

Occasionally, immense auras would appear, causing everything to tremble. They were the Demi-Immortals. When they arrived, everyone else would put their heads together and whisper enviously. Even here in the Central Planetary River, Demi-Immortals were the objects of universal veneration.

The experts of the Four Wilds came from trillions of various planets, and included both humans and Demonfolk. Considering the vast population in question, Great Sages actually didn’t count for much.

As Yang Qi approached the gate, a young man in yellow stepped forward. “Who are you? State your background and energy arts, and pay the tax. That’s the only way to enter the Central Planetary River. Any who violate the rules and try to enter unlawfully will be executed immediately.”

“Is that so?” Yang Qi said. He quickly pulled out the Titan Emperor Medallion. “I’ve been summoned to join the Titan Emperor Collegium. Do I really count as a visitor?”

“What? Titan Emperor Medallion?” The young Great Sage could hardly believe his eyes. After studying the medallion closely, he exchanged a glance with one of his comrades and then said, “Well, if it isn’t a new student with a Titan Emperor Medallion. Congratulations. You now have a very high standing in the Central Planetary River and the Four Wilds. Even Legendary students from the collegium can crush ordinary Great Sages. As guards here, our job is to receive incoming students with Titan Emperor Medallions. Come with me. I’ll arrange everything, and help you register at the collegium.”

With that, the young man opened the glittering shield of light that covered the gate, and then led Yang Qi inside.

Beyond the gate were countless space-time wormholes that led into the Central Planetary River. That ‘river’ was made up of numerous enormous planets, which were like cities, palaces and the like. Enormous seas floated between them, and the entire place looked like a holy realm that ordinary people could not create.

There were even complex aspects of space that his Lord's Eye couldn’t pierce.

The yellow-clad young man led him into one particular wormhole, and they were whisked along until they reached a city. It had been carved out of an entire planet, and was filled with roads, squares, plains, and countless enormous buildings. It was a massive place.

“This city is called Sanitus, and is one of the thirty thousand major cities of the Central Planetary River. These thirty thousand cities surround the Titan Emperor Collegium, and are ruled by city magistrates, who are elite and auxiliary students of the collegium. Why don’t you rest here for a few days until the Titan Emperor Collegium opens again? After that, you can go get a master.”

“Okay,” Yang Qi replied coolly, having no reason to do otherwise.

Before long, he found himself a few hundred kilometers into the city, in a delightful courtyard. It was empty, but filled with spirit energy. Even the ornamental rocks were decorated with sovereign-grade spirit stones.

Yang Qi sat down to rest.

“If you have any issues, just call out,” the guard said. Then he faded away.

**

In the middle of Sanitus, in the city magistrate’s mansion, the young Great Sage who had been making arrangements for Yang Qi was now in a private chamber, exchanging words with another young man, who was none other than a young master of the city. His name was Sanitus Maximus.

“Young Master, we finally had someone with a Titan Emperor Medallion show up. It took some convincing, but I tricked him into resting in the Heart-Devil Patio. What should I do now?”

“Excellent,” replied Sanitus Maximus. “Now I’ll finally get my chance to join the Titan Emperor Collegium. The Titan Emperor Heaven has been holding training competitions in the Four Wilds to find top fighters to give those medallions to. But those ruffians don’t deserve to be students in the Titan Emperor Collegium. I’ll just relieve this fellow of his, and finally get my own spot as a student.”

“Very well, I’ll take care of everything. Although, if he did get a Titan Emperor Medallion on his own, he’s not going to be easy to deal with. And if word got out that Sanitus broke the laws of the Titan Emperor Collegium, it could cause a lot of trouble.”

Sanitus Maximus chuckled. “Don’t worry, I have a way to make him completely disappear.”

Chapter 392: Sword Seventeen

‘There’s something strange about this courtyard,’ Yang Qi thought, looking around. After doing so, he realized that there was a subterranean spell formation in the middle of the place, and that it was radiating a strange devil energy.

In addition, the plants in the courtyard were all swaying in conformity to various odd rhythms. An ordinary person would easily be wrapped up in the fluctuations, and would soon begin to lose their bearings.

All of a sudden, zither music floated out from one of the lakes in the courtyard, a devilish tune that pierced deep into the mind. At the same time, a host of beautiful immortal women flew out and began to scatter hexagonal flower petals, the six sides of which conformed to the six sensory pleasures.

The devilish music was extremely enticing, and as for the flowers, they were Six Pleasures Devil Orchids.

Snorting coldly, Yang Qi waved his hand, sending sagelight out to fill the courtyard. Then, everything erupted into sagefire, and the devilish air faded away.

“Very impressive….”

The sound of soft clapping rang out as a group of people appeared in the air above the courtyard. In the lead was Young Master Sanitus Maximus.

The rest were all young Great Sages dressed in yellow garb, who were obviously the elite forces of Sanitus.

There was only one person applauding Yang Qi, and it was of course Sanitus Maximus. Landing, he slowly approached Yang Qi, and as he did, the courtyard changed, filling with powerful devil energy.

“You’re strong, so I guess it’s no wonder you got a Titan Emperor Medallion. You didn’t even have trouble with my Six Pleasures Devil Orchids. I guess I’ll have to handle you myself. Come on. Hand over that medallion. I’ll go check into the Titan Emperor Collegium for you.”

“So, you want my medallion.” Yang Qi smiled. A quick check confirmed that Sanitus Maximus’ cultivation base was in the fourth step, making him a True Real Sage. His followers were all second step Nirvanic Resurrection Sages. Obviously those levels made the young master completely confident that he could deal with Yang Qi.

Yang Qi had already put the pieces together. Obviously, the yellow-garbed young man from earlier had been lying, and had led him to this courtyard as part of a plot to take the Titan Emperor Medallion.

They were literally planning to murder him and rob him right in the presence of the Titan Emperor Collegium.

“What I don't understand is how a mere second step Nirvanic Resurrection Sage could possibly get a Titan Emperor Medallion. Is the immortal world blind or something?” Sanitus Maximus extended his hand.

‘Should I kill this guy?’ Yang Qi thought. He knew that he was in the city of Sanitus, one of the planetary cities in the Central Planetary River, a place where there were more experts than the sky had clouds. Although he hadn’t sensed any Demi-Immortal auras yet, he could tell that there were several Without Limit and Epic Saga Sages in the area. And there were also warding spells and spell formations that would likely be activated if he killed Sanitus Maximus, which would make it difficult to escape.

WHOOSH!

Even as he considered all of these matters, Sanitus Maximus attacked.

He waved his finger, sending a stream of energy out that turned into sword light. The sword light filled the air rapidly, creating a net that instantly locked down Yang Qi.

“Thousand-Ton Sword Net!”

Yang Qi casually waved his hand and destroyed the net. However, the sword light then converged on itself into a single point, which exploded out into an enormous sword dragon that swirled around him aggressively.

“Rising Dragon Slaughter!”

This was a hidden aspect of the Thousand-Ton Sword Net, and was its most deadly function. Thousands of streams of sword light could converge into an enormous dragon which would slaughter the enemy. The sword dragon swirled, flickering with the power of both yin and yang.

A move like this was the type of sword technique that only the top grand masters of swordplay could call upon. It was far more incredible than anything Mammoth Force, Lion Hightower, or the other young chiefs of the Demonfolk could do.

Clearly, this Sanitus Maximus was the type of person who could fight and kill people higher than his own level.

And yet, it was a sword technique that Yang Qi didn’t find particularly worrisome.

The sword dragon swirled around him, then slammed into his defensive true energy, causing a rumbling boom to echo out.

‘I guess I might as well kill this group. If I just let them have my Titan Emperor Medallion, word will spread, and things wouldn’t go well for me afterward.’ In the blink of an eye, Yang Qi’s killing intent surged.

Just as he was about to make his move, another beam of sword light appeared, falling from high in the sky, moving at incredible speed. As it fell, it split into a host of smaller strands, accompanied by intense rumbling sounds.

The sword energy arrived without any warning, and before anyone could react, it shot toward the yellow-garbed Great Sages who were standing around Sanitus Maximus. Then, screams rang out as they were ripped to shreds, leaving behind nothing but wisps of green smoke.

“Who’s there!?” Sanitus Maximus shouted, sucking his own sword energy back into him and then looking around vigilantly.

“You’ve got a lot of guts, Young Master Sanitus. You know full well that this Yang Qi came to the Central Planetary River with a Titan Emperor Medallion. But instead of helping him to report in, you’re trying to steal his medallion? That's a clear violation of the laws of the Titan Emperor Collegium!”

A young man appeared, clad in green clothing, and wearing a wide, conical bamboo hat. His hands were empty of any weapon, and he seemed to be no older than twenty, although considering the level of his energy arts, he was probably much older than that. After all, the sword energy which swirled around him was like that of a sword from heaven itself, which could dominate tens of thousands of other swords and techniques.

His mere appearance on the scene caused much of the surrounding courtyard to collapse. The warding magics, the dirt, everything melted.

“Who are you…?” Sanitus Maximus asked, backing up a few paces. Obviously, this newcomer was a dangerous person.

“It doesn’t matter who I am. You broke the laws of the Titan Emperor Collegium, and therefore, you deserve to die. You and your corrupt clan are hereby sentenced to death! In fact, this entire city deserves to be wiped off the map!” He slowly looked up, revealing chiseled features, and eyes that had clearly experienced many hardships in life. In fact, it seemed as if all of the misery and suffering of human existence were visible on his face.

Based on his aura, he was a fifth step Light King Sage, and yet, there was definitely greater power lurking within him.

“Stay your hand!”

RUMBLE!

An eruption of energy transformed into a wormhole, out of which stepped an old man who clearly resembled Sanitus Maximus. His aura was roughly similar to Ape Heavenhelve’s, making him a ninth step expert.

An Epic Saga Sage.

This was none other than the chief magistrate of Sanitus.

He was the leader of one of the thirty thousand great cities of the Central Planetary River, and he was flanked by several eighth step Without Limit Sages, who were the prime elders of the city.

“Who are you? A student from the Titan Emperor Collegium?” Glaring at the young man in green, he said, “What gives you the right to kill anyone in Sanitus? Those men were my elite guards!”

“You Sanitus people have got a lot of guts. You flagrantly violated the law, and thus, not even death can wipe out your crimes. I sincerely doubt that you were unaware of your son’s plan to acquire a Titan Emperor Medallion via murder, and then join the Titan Emperor Collegium with it.”

“He’s lying, Father!” Sanitus Maximus said. “That’s not what I was doing! I was just receiving this new student, only to realize that he was secretly trying to steal treasures from Sanitus! Obviously I had to stop him from doing that!”

Yang Qi almost couldn’t believe that this young master was being so overtly shameless.

“So that’s how it is,” Chief Magistrate Sanitus said with a nod. “This is a misunderstanding, young man. Now you know the truth; this newcomer is the criminal here. Listen, I used to be a student in the Titan Emperor Collegium, and I’m still friends with many of the elders there. Who exactly are you? There are a lot of societies in the collegium. Which one do you come from? Why don’t you take this law-breaker into custody and confiscate his Titan Emperor Medallion.”

“Invert right and wrong. Turn black into white.” The young man in green chuckled. “That's exactly what you’re doing. You have glib tongues, but I know the truth. Sorry, you can’t just break the rules of the Titan Emperor Collegium and then walk free. Your son is going to die today.”

“What incredible gall!” City Magistrate Sanitus shouted. “Alright. Show me how exactly you plan to kill my son. It seems you students of the Titan Emperor Collegium get crazier every day. You're a measly fifth step Light King Sage, making you embarrassingly weak among the students of the Titan Emperor Collegium, and you dare to cause problems here in Sanitus?”

The young man in green laughed. “Ai. The ignorant always act very bravely. Fine. I guess the time has come to show you what students from the Titan Emperor Collegium are really capable of! Mysterious Principles Hail from the North Stars. Violet Auroras Summon the Profound Lord. Great Daos Slash Apart Dusk. The Heavenly Sword Develops the Preheaven!”

A long sword suddenly appeared behind him, its blade decorated with a turtle and a snake. As soon as it appeared, it swished through the air, creating seventy-two projections of itself, which then swept forth like rivers.

RUMBLE!

A divine sword had come to the world.

This young man in the bamboo hat was only in the fifth step, but he was unleashing a deadly attack on someone in the ninth step.

Instantly, the entire world turned into a chaotic, primeval realm of swords.

At this point, City Magistrate Sanitus’ face fell, and he shivered visibly.

“Preheaven Godsword Technique! That’s the Preheaven Godsword Technique! Are you from the Invincible Society?!” Suddenly, he erupted with the energy field of an Epic Saga Sage. “Dragon-Subduing Sage Domain!”

His sage domain spread out, profound and as mysterious as a dragon.

In the blink of an eye, the sword will in the area was locked down.

“Since you recognize my Preheaven Godsword Technique, then you must also know this move: Myriad Sword Ancestral Convergence!” Completely unfazed by the sage domain, the young man in green suddenly began to emit streams of sword will, even from his pores, which thundered high into the sky to form ten thousand swords.

Each sword moved as if in conformity to a great dao, and they looked like supernatural works of divine beings.

In the blink of an eye, the ten thousand swords stabbed forth.

RUMBLE!

The Dragon-Subduing Sage Domain shattered.

The domain of a ninth step Great Sage had been destroyed by a fifth step Great Sage. What kind of sword technique was it that could do such a thing? Obviously, this young man in green was a spectacular individual.

After the sage domain was destroyed, the young man in green sent a bright streak of white sword light shooting through the air to stab directly into Sanitus Maximus.

Sanitus Maximus screamed briefly before he was melted away, becoming nothing more than a green wisp of smoke.

“My son!” City Magistrate Sanitus howled.

At this point, the young man in green turned to Yang Qi.

‘Let’s go, Junior Brother,’ he said via thought transmission. ‘I'm Sword Seventeen from the Invincible Society, and Master sent me here to pick you up.’

Chapter 393: The Invincible Society

‘Sword Seventeen?’ Yang Qi replied, not sure what was going on. ‘Invincible Society? Your Master sent you to pick me up?’

‘You’re Yang Qi, right?’ Sword Seventeen said. ‘The same guy who killed those megamammoths back in the Hanging Mountain? Winner of the training competition? Killer of Chief Lion, who was an eighth step Without Limit Sage? We've heard about you here in the Titan Emperor Collegium, and my Master, the leader of the Invincible Society, has been waiting for you to show up. He wanted to convince you to join our society before any of the others recruited you. It would have been a shame for our society to lose a genius like you. Who would have thought that Sanitus Maximus would actually try to steal your Titan Emperor Medallion. It’s a crime that makes me furious just thinking about it.’

‘So we just leave the city magistrate here and go to the Invincible Society?’ Yang Qi asked.

‘Exactly. Come on, let’s go.’

SWISHHH!

The two of them flew into the air.

“Hey, where do you think you’re going? You killed my son! You’re crazy if you think I'm going to let you off the hook. Get back here. Hegemon Subdues the Dragon!”

RUMBLE!

City Magistrate Sanitus extended his hand, and then swept it from left to right. Shooting up into the air after Yang Qi and Sword Seventeen, he resummoned his Dragon-Subduing Sage Domain, and also activated the warding magics and spell formations of Sanitus.

“Screw off!” Yang Qi said, spinning in place and sending a fist strike back at the city magistrate.

It was the Hand of the One God, backed by the Blood of the One God, which caused cracks to spread out through the air and magical laws to swirl into a tempest.

The Jambudvīpa Deluge, Night Queen Flame, Amber Avalanche, and Eternal Godwind all appeared, along with a soft chanting that praised the legion of gods.

Smack!

The Dragon-Subduing Sage Domain shattered again and the city magistrate was sent tumbling out of the sky.

“I’ll let you off the hook this time, fool!” Yang Qi said. “But don't ever let me see your face again!”

With that, he unleashed another fist strike, destroying all of the barriers from the warding magics and causing the entire city to shake. Then he followed Sword Seventeen and vanished without a trace.

‘He’s only a second step Great Sage?!’ City Magistrate Sanitus was so shaken and terrified that he nearly coughed up blood. Not only was he enraged, he was humiliated and grieving for his son. ‘That was definitely Sword Seventeen from the Invincible Society. Everyone in that society is a freak. And that Yang Qi isn’t even a full student yet, but he defeated me with a single fist strike? I’m a ninth step Epic Saga Sage! Wait, have I unknowingly regressed in my cultivation?’

After a moment passed, he regained his composure, but was still shaking with fear because of Yang Qi’s fist strike.

“What do we do, City Magistrate?” one of the elders asked. “The young master is dead, killed by Sword Seventeen. There’s no way we’ll be able to get revenge. The Invincible Society is full of freaks and hellions. And their leader, the Invincible Dugu, is ruthless and violent. He kills people like a farmer harvests wheat! There’s no way our tiny Sanitus could possibly fight him.”

“I won’t let those two off the hook for my son’s death,” growled the city magistrate. “I’ll definitely make them pay for what they did. The Invincible Society might be full of freaks and hellions, but there are lots of other societies that can rival them.”

**

Sword Seventeen led Yang Qi into an enormous wormhole. Planets flew by, and in the blink of an eye they reached a location where a massive temple complex floated in the middle of heaven. Hovering in the air above it were three enormous characters written in the script of the immortal worlds: Titan Emperor Collegium.

“Junior Brother, as soon as our Master, the Invincible Dugu, heard about your deeds, he wanted to recruit you. The truth is that when it comes to fighting strength and ability, the Invincible Society is the best of the best in the Titan Emperor Collegium. There are other societies with impressive names, such as the Heaven's Origin Society, the Ultimate World Society, the War Divinity Society, and so on. All of them could be considered our rivals, and all of us are always on the lookout to recruit top geniuses. Junior Brother, you knocked City Magistrate Sanitus out of the sky with a single punch just now, which was completely incredible! Master will be very pleased when he hears about it.”

Sword Seventeen seemed to be very frank and honest in the way he spoke. In fact, it almost seemed like the two of them had been friends and fellow disciples for years.

It was quite amazing to Yang Qi; this was the first time anyone had tried to recruit him in such a manner. Considering the performance Sword Seventeen had just put on, Yang Qi had to admit that the Invincible Society seemed impressive. Sword Seventeen hadn’t seemed inferior to the city magistrate in any way. With what seemed like little more than a wave of his hand, he had killed the man’s son, which was no simple thing to do considering the gap of four levels between them.

Yang Qi was definitely interested in learning more about this Invincible Society.

The sight which met his eyes now was a sprawling complex of beautiful architecture that appeared to have no end. In fact, the way it seemed to go on forever made it look almost like an illusion.

However, it was no illusion. This was the Titan Emperor Collegium, where top experts had gathered since the most ancient of times. Even the primal-chaos elder-immortals had to obey this immortal collegium.

“Junior Brother, look—that's the Invincible Society just up ahead.”

Sword Seventeen produced a paper talisman which he used to enter into the region of palaces, then led Yang Qi to one particular building that was made from stone, although it was impossible to tell what type of stone it was. It was mottled, as if with age, and even had vestiges of bloodstains, as though countless devil-gods had been slaughtered in its presence.

There was something extremely domineering about the entire place.

Sword Seventeen landed in the outer courtyard of the palace and yelled, “Elder Brother, Elder Sister! I brought the winner of the Hanging Mountain training competition here. It’s Yang Qi.”

“What? You've been away for a while now, Junior Brother. So, you finally got him?” A young woman appeared, holding a scroll book and dressed in extravagant courtly attire. She appeared calm and educated, almost as though she didn’t practice any energy arts at all. However, Yang Qi got the feeling that it was an act and that inside, she had virtually unlimited power.

“This is Elder Sixteenth Sister,” Sword Seventeen explained. “By the way, our Invincible Society has the smallest membership of any of the societies. Not counting Master, there are only seventeen of us. I'm the lowest ranking of all of us. Pretty soon, Junior Brother, you’ll be the eighteenth member.” Sword Seventeen suddenly burst out laughing. “Hey, there’s finally going to be someone ranked lower than me!”

“What?” Yang Qi blurted in surprise. “The Invincible Society only has seventeen members? And it’s the top society in the entire Titan Emperor Collegium? Wait, the Titan Emperor Collegium controls the Four Wilds planetary systems, and is the top educational establishment in existence. And the very name of the Invincible Society seems to imply that it has a plethora of top experts and geniuses. How could it only have seventeen members?” Yang Qi was really confused. Even from the incident in Sanitus, it was possible to see what the Central Planetary River was like. After all, all of the guards in Sanitus were Great Sages.

He remembered his mother telling him that the Titan Emperor Collegium had more experts than the sky had clouds and a veritable sea of Great Sages, as many as the stars in the sky. And now, he was being told that this supposedly invincible society had only eighteen members plus the Master? It seemed to be a very low number to Yang Qi.

“You don’t understand, Junior Brother,” Sword Seventeen said. “Our Invincible Society didn’t earn its reputation by having a lot of members. Master has never accepted a second-rate disciple. Every single person in our society is a force of nature on their own, even me. Nobody under the Demi-Immortal level could possibly kill me. Why would we want trashy morons who can’t even fight people higher than their level? It would be a big waste of resources, right?”

“He’s exactly right,” Elder Sixteenth Sister said. “By the way, Yang Qi, while it’s true that Master wants you to be the eighteenth disciple, you’ll still have to participate in the school’s entrance ceremony. Only then will you be able to join a society. The only reason we brought you here today is to convince you to join us when the time comes. It's been a long time since Master accepted anybody new. Whenever he does, it's a big deal in the Titan Emperor Collegium, and even in the Four Wilds as a whole.”

“Oh really?” Yang Qi said. He still wasn’t very convinced.

“That’s right,” someone else said. This time, a young scholar appeared, empty-handed and clad in an azure garment. He had delicate features, but exuded an aura that made him seem like he was one with heaven.

‘He’s a Demi-Immortal!’ Yang Qi thought. Clearly, this young scholar was in the Demi-Immortal level. The most casual movement on his part could create drastic transformations to the world.

“This is Elder Tenth Brother, Yan Weiyi,” Sword Seventeen said. “Everyone from Eldest Brother to Elder Tenth Brother is a Demi-Immortal.”

“What?” Yang Qi said. “Hold on, if the top ten are Demi-Immortals, then how strong is the society chief?”

“You’ll have to wait until you meet Master in person before you find out about that, little Junior Brother,” said Elder Tenth Brother Yan Weiyi. “Trying to explain beforehand wouldn't do any good. Anyway, the point is that our Invincible Society only accepts top geniuses as members. Our venerable Master heard about your performance during the training competition in the Hanging Mountain and was impressed. Look—even our lowest ranking Junior Seventeenth Brother, a mere fifth step Great Sage, can actually destroy ninth step opponents.”

“Alright, enough jabbering, Elder Tenth Brother,” said Elder Sixteenth Sister. “Now that Yang Qi is here, why not just ask him if he wants to join us? If he doesn’t, that’s fine, we don't need to pressure him.”

Yan Weiyi nodded. “Well, Yang Qi, what do you say? Want to join us? We won't force you. You’re free to pick anybody, even the Heaven's Origin Society or the War Divinity Society. Societies like them have millions of members, sometimes even billions. They’re basically armies. If you’re the type who likes to have lots of people around you, that’s fine. It’ll just mean we’re not connected by destiny.”

Yang Qi thought about it for a moment, then nodded. “Okay, I’ll join.”

It was true that the Invincible Society had fewer members, but they were all exceptional individuals. And it seemed that their Master, the Invincible Dugu, was a very unique person.

Elder Tenth Brother Yan Weiyi’s face lit up with a smile. “Alright! Well, let’s get going to the entrance ceremony.”

Chapter 394: A Bunch of Freaks

Yan Weiyi warmed up immediately once Yang Qi agreed to join the Invincible Society.

“I’m coming, too,” Sword Seventeen said excitedly. “From what I understand, the immortal world held training competitions all over the place to find geniuses to recruit. I'm really curious to see how these people measure up to Yang Qi in the entrance ceremony.”

“When master picks a new disciple, he does it by going into a trance and contemplating the movement of the universe,” Yan Weiyi said. “Considering that, it's a given that he’ll pick the best candidate. That’s also why he usually spurns the people everyone else calls geniuses. Come on, let’s go!”

“I'm coming also,” Elder Sixteenth Sister said. “The entrance ceremony is always a big deal.”

“By the way,” Yang Qi said, “who are the other members of the Invincible Society? For example Eldest Brother, Elder Second Brother, and the others.”

“You want to meet them?” Yan Weiyi asked with an enigmatic smile. “You’ll have to wait a bit, but I can give you a quick introduction ahead of time. For example, Eldest Brother is the pride of the Invincible Society, and in fact, he’s the best of the best among all the societies in the Titan Emperor Collegium. Last time there was a big martial arts competition, he destroyed everyone and took first place. He’s definitely the strongest student in the Titan Emperor Collegium.”

“What? The number one strongest student in the entire collegium?” The mere thought caused Yang Qi to shiver. It was no secret that ever since ancient times, the Titan Emperor Collegium had always produced experts among experts. It was impossible to say what crouching tigers and hidden dragons existed within it, yet the Eldest Brother of the Invincible Society was the best of all of them? What level of energy arts must he cultivate to have reached that level? Apparently, it really was true that the Invincible Dugu picked only the best disciples.

“Eldest Brother is over in the starry sky of the Flood Pond Heaven to kill some Demi-Immortals who challenged our society,” Yan Weiyi said casually, “but he should be back soon. The other Elder and Junior Brothers and Sisters are all out on various missions. Right now, the only four people left behind are myself, Junior Sixteenth Sister, Junior Seventeenth Brother, and you, our new Junior Eighteenth Brother.”

‘That’s not many,’ Yang Qi thought, inwardly shaking his head. Perhaps it just went to show how amazing the Invincible Society was. Considering what he had seen from Sword Seventeen, he was now very curious to see what the other disciples were like.

As they chatted, the group of four left the ancient palace and began to make their way through the heavenly temple complex that was the Titan Emperor Collegium. The place seemed to go on without end, with the building that housed the Invincible Society like a grain of sand on the seashore.

Off in the distance it was possible to see what existed beyond the heavenly palace complex, which was a host of planets, all of them filled with people. Of course, those planets were the Central Planetary River, which the heavenly palace complex ruled over.

As Yang Qi proceeded along with the Invincible Society disciples, they attracted the attention of other students. There were all sorts of bizarre and intriguing outfits on display, even suits of armor, and all of the students seemed energetic and powerful.

Of course, a buzz of conversation could be heard.

“Look, it's those freaks from the Invincible Society. Whenever they show up, they cause a huge scene! See the one in the lead? That’s their tenth disciple, Yan Weiyi. I heard he’s only a hundred years old! How could someone that young have already reached the Demi-Immortal level?! It’s terrifying. Back when he was a Legendary, he killed Great Sages! And when he was only an eighth step Great Sage, he actually killed a Lesser Demi-Immortal. The man is a myth!”

“You see that young woman? She’s Flower Fern, another genius. I heard she’s not even human. She was actually born out of a preheaven godflower, and is innately stronger than the average human. She cultivates a deadly technique related to flowers and snow that makes her impossible to beat in a fight. Oh, see the guy in the green clothes and the bamboo hat? That’s Sword Seventeen, who was born directly out of preheaven sword energy. Back when he was a kid he would sometimes eat godswords, which was how he developed his old Heaven-Sword Origin-Cultivation Body. They say he’s the absolute best of all the sword cultivators. He’s only a fifth step Light King Sage, but he can already defeat Epic Saga Sages in battle.”

“What about the fourth one? According to the rumors, their society chief the Invincible Dugu only accepted seventeen freakish hellion disciples, all of whom are completely and utterly famous. So who's that guy? He doesn’t look like a student of the Titan Emperor Collegium.”

“Oh, he must be a newcomer. The immortal world has been recruiting from the Four Wilds, which is why there’ve been a lot of new students coming in lately. In fact, the entrance ceremony should be starting soon.”

“A newcomer? Okay, but that doesn’t explain why those three freaks from the Invincible Society would be going with him to the entrance ceremony. Hold on, don’t tell me that the Invincible Dugu took in another disciple?”

“The Invincible Dugu accepted a new disciple!? This is incredible!”

“He’s definitely a brilliant fighter and an enormous freak. That's the only kind of people the Invincible Dugu likes. Hurry up, let’s follow and see what happens. This entrance ceremony is definitely going to be interesting.”

“The Invincible Dugu picked his new disciple ahead of time? That’s definitely going to cause a scene with the other societies. And I bet it’s going to cause a lot of the other new students to target this guy.”

“Yeah, that’s probably why Yan Weiyi and the others are escorting him. The freaks of the Invincible Society have bad relationships with basically all of the other societies in the collegium. There are plenty of people who would love to teach this new disciple a lesson, although I doubt it will be easy.”

Many of the conversations reached Yang Qi’s ears, giving him a much better understanding of what the Invincible Society was like.

They definitely did their own thing within the Titan Emperor Collegium. Unfortunately, the tallest tree attracts the most wind, and would often accumulate the most enemies. Wherever people existed, it was inevitable that cliques and factions would form and power structures would emerge. It had been like that in the Demi-Immortal Institute, and it was the same in the Titan Emperor Collegium.

Yang Qi had assumed that his path in the Titan Emperor Collegium would be similar to his rise through the Demi-Immortal Institute, that he would start out as a lowly recruit, and then slowly rise through the outer and inner campus to become an elite student, a conclave student, and eventually a holy neophyte.

Instead, a group of powerful individuals had recruited him right from the get-go. So far it didn’t seem like Yan Weiyi, Sword Seventeen, and Flower Fern were crafty and deceitful individuals who were conspiring against him. And in the end, he really had made a big scene back in the training competition, slaughtering numerous experts inside before killing Chief Lion afterward.

He really was that ‘tallest tree’. Unfortunately, it could very likely put the Sage Monarch Continent in the crosshairs of certain overly-ambitious and ruthless individuals. Hopefully, he was now famous and powerful enough that not even ninth step Great Sages would consider causing problems back in his home.

“We're here!” Yan Weiyi said as they reached an enormous public square filled with thousands of stone pillars. People sat beneath many of the pillars, unmoving and apparently meditating.

“Those are the pre-registered students,” Yan Weiyi said. “Before the official entrance ceremony, they have no rank, so they have to wait here in the Auspicious Titan Hall. By the way, those pillars are made from a special type of godstone which makes one day of meditation as good as a week or more. Some of these people have been meditating here for months. If you had come earlier you could have benefited quite a bit, Junior Brother.”

As they neared the entrance, one of the student guards stepped forward and said, “Only authorized personnel are allowed in the Auspicious Titan Hall!”

“Show him your Titan Emperor Medallion, Yang Qi,” Yan Weiyi said.

Yang Qi pulled it out and handed it over. The student guard looked at it and then smiled.

“Sorry, Elder Brother Yan. I'm in charge of guarding this entrance to the Auspicious Titan Hall, so I have no choice but to stop everyone at this point. Please don’t take offense at me carrying out my duties.”

“It's fine,” Yan Weiyi said coolly. “Could you take care of this little Junior Brother of mine? He plans to join the Invincible Society after the ceremony is over.”

“What? Senior Invincible is taking an eighteenth disciple!?” The guard was visibly shocked and couldn't help but look over at Yang Qi, almost like he was some three-headed six-armed superhuman. “Well in that case, I’ll take care of everything. Everyone who joins the Invincible Society is a spectacular individual.”

The guard was a first step Great Sage and could tell that Yang Qi was only in the second step, making him just a bit stronger than himself.

In the Titan Emperor Collegium, first through fourth step Great Sages weren’t a very big deal. Usually they acted as guards, did odd jobs, took care of spirit beasts, or handled other menial tasks.

It was only when students reached the fifth step that they began to earn a bit of respect. And it was only the Demi-Immortals who were truly admired. The original founder of the Demi-Immortal Institute had been a student here, and thus it was little wonder that he modeled his own educational establishment in a similar way.

“After you, Junior Brother,” the guard said, extending his hand in a welcoming fashion. “Go ahead and pick a pillar to meditate under. Although, it won't be long before the ceremony begins. Generally speaking, rewards will be handed out based on the level of your cultivation base. The elders will observe, hoping to identify who the top geniuses are. Those who are favored will achieve incredible progress. Those who don't will be relegated to menial positions in the collegium and will have to wait for further opportunities in the future.”

Chapter 395: Entrance Ceremony

After hearing the explanation, Yang Qi understood.

The entrance ceremony was an opportunity for leaders to identify potential new recruits. At the same time, it was a chance for new students to achieve incredible progress.

Those who did not stand out would become low-ranking students with meaningless responsibilities.

Obviously, he had gotten lucky. By earning a reputation that spread far and wide, he attracted the attention of the Invincible Society and became a disciple there before even participating in the entrance ceremony.

“Junior Brother,” Yan Weiyi said, “even though master already decided to recruit you, you still need to do a good job in the entrance ceremony. Nobody in the Invincible Society is a loser, so you absolutely, positively must not lose face for master. Otherwise he’ll expel you. There’s only one rule in the Invincible Society, and that is: Live for Glory. No matter where you go, and no matter what you’re doing, you have to preserve the glory of the Invincible Society. Remember the name of our society: Invincible.”

“Yes sir!” Yang Qi had assumed that life in the Titan Emperor Collegium would involve a lot of complicated rules. How could he have guessed that the Invincible Society actually had only one rule?

Preserve glory.

Oftentimes, rules were fetters that held back, and therefore, this single rule of the Invincible Society actually suited Yang Qi quite nicely.

Yan Weiyi smiled. “Junior Brother, I bet you’re thinking that the Invincible Society doesn’t have enough rules. But that’s just how we are. If we die, we die standing up! Other societies are different. They have all sorts of complicated customs. For example, the Righteous Energy Society has a rule prohibiting men from having contact with women. They don’t drink alcohol, they don't dance, they don’t talk loudly, and every year they have to pay dues to their society. Even worse, they’re always forced to actively further the interests of their society. If they find treasure, they have to hand it in to be divvied up equally, and their disciples aren't allowed to keep even the slightest secret from their superiors. With thousands and thousands of rules like that, you’re always in danger of making a mistake.”

“With so many rules, are there even any students who want to join them?” Yang Qi said.

“Of course there are,” Sword Seventeen said. “It’s actually because they have those rules that they have so many disciples. You see, they get supposed benefits as well. For example, the way they confiscate treasure ensures that the society as a whole is very wealthy, and therefore, all of their disciples get rations of cultivation resources no matter what. In contrast, our Invincible Society doesn’t have a hoard of resources built up. We disciples further our cultivation through hard work and we get our own resources. We would never let trashy moochers like the Righteous Energy Society has into our society, no matter what. They sit around all day consuming heavenly-grade spirit stones like rice. That’s not the type of cultivation we practice. The Invincible Society doesn’t have complicated rules, we don't have a lot of members, and we don’t have a bunch of resources sitting around to dole out.”

“Okay, enough talk,” Yan Weiyi said. “Junior Brother, you head into the square and wait for the ceremony to start. We’ll wait outside.” With that, Yan Weiyi sent a string of heaven motes swirling out of him to form a minor world where he, Sword Seventeen, and Flower Fern would wait and observe the ceremony.

Upon becoming a Demi-Immortal, one’s sage domain would transform into a minor world. Legendaries had personal domains, Great Sages had sage domains, Demi-Immortals had minor worlds. Time could move differently inside minor worlds. Demi-Immortals were already capable of trifling with the magical laws of time, and thus, in their minor worlds, time could pass faster or slower than in the outside world. Perhaps seven days inside would be a thousand years outside, or a thousand years on the inside would be only a few days on the outside.

Unfortunately, using such time altering capabilities always drew heavily on the Demi-Immortal’s life force and had limitations. There were even some experts who had passed away in meditation in their own minor worlds. Therefore, those capabilities were never used casually.

Led by the guard, Yang Qi entered the square and selected a pillar to sit under.

As soon as he did, pure vital energy began to flow out of it and into him, strengthening him. It really was ten times as effective as normal cultivation. He even sensed musical notes coming from the pillar and entering his sea of consciousness, forming a resonance with his true energy and making him feel like he was one with all creation.

The guard looked enviously at Yang Qi and said, “Junior Brother, the Auspicious Titan Hall has a grand spell formation that’s called the Heaven and Earth Titan Intersection Formation. Heaven Below, Earth Above; When Heaven and Earth Intersect, That is Titan. It’s a divination sign from an ancient immortal daoist scripture, and it represents everything going smoothly. Not even ordinary students can practice cultivation in the Heaven and Earth Titan Intersection Formation. That would be a violation of the rules.”

‘Heaven and Earth Titan Intersection Formation. Heaven and earth intersecting. Heaven below and earth above. Flipping heaven and earth around represents everything going smoothly? And it’s called titan?’ Yang Qi could sense a heavenly dao in the formation, as well as immense profundities. However, he didn't understand it. Apparently his current cultivation base wasn’t high enough to understand what it meant when heaven and earth were flipped around.

Perhaps he would understand the matter when he reached a higher level of cultivation.

Almost as soon as he sat down, a number of the other new students in the area looked over at him, their gazes flashing like lightning. Clearly, they were trying to pick some of his secrets out of him.

Then a cold snort echoed into his ears, almost like thunder, shaking him down to his nascent divinity. It was almost as if someone were trying to damage his soul.

He looked over and saw that the person who had just snorted was a Great Sage sitting beneath a nearby pillar. He was burly, with veiny, copper-like skin and an aura like the sun. Clearly, he had a very masculine and yang-oriented energy.

He wasn’t an ordinary human, but some mutant human species from ancient times, with a unique body constitution similar to the Seven Apertures Sprite Body or the Nascent Divinity Starlight Body.

Yang Qi had spent nearly a year in the Hanging Mountain with his mother, Yan Wubing, and other experts, and had learned a lot during that time. For example, there were certain types of people who were innately strong and large when they were born. As for this burly man, he was actually from a race that bore the Bright Sun Truebronze Body.

It was as famous as the Nascent Divinity Starlight Body, and made the muscles and bones as tough as ancient true bronze. By the cultivation of yang-oriented true energy, this body type would provide raw power surpassing that of giants.

The burly man’s cultivation base was also high; from his aura, it seemed that he had access to magical power without limit. Shockingly, he was an eighth step Without Limit Sage, which made him strong enough to be the chief of an entire people.

He clearly despised Yang Qi, although it was impossible to say exactly why. That snort just now had been a subversive attack that would have caused an ordinary second step Great Sage to cough up blood and sustain injuries to the soul and cultivation base.

Although Yang Qi planned to ignore him, Yan Weiyi’s eyes widened and he said, “How dare he use a Destructive Sound Wave to try to harm my Junior Brother’s soul!”

“Elder Tenth Brother, you can’t interfere,” Sword Seventeen said. “That fellow is an expert from the Truebronzefolk in the Waste-Wilds. His name is Tai Cangyi. I heard he wanted to join the Invincible Society, but Master didn’t think much of him. He must have heard that Yang Qi got picked instead of him, and thus has it out for him.”

“Oh? Well, a lot of people want to join the Invincible Society, so it’s only natural that people will be jealous of Junior Eighteenth Brother. He’ll just have to deal with the situation, I guess.” With that, Yan Weiyi closed his eyes.

Meanwhile, the brief incident was already being discussed by the other students present.

“That Yang Qi is definitely strong. Tai Cangyi’s Destructive Sound Wave can wipe out ghost-gods, and yet Yang Qi just shrugged it off. It seems he’s going to be a formidable opponent in the ceremony.”

“I heard that he caught the attention of the Invincible Dugu. Supposedly the Invincible Society is going to have eighteen disciples now, which has never happened as far as I know. For Yang Qi, the entrance ceremony is just a formality.”

“Maybe, maybe not. The people from the Invincible Society are all elites among elites. If someone beats him up badly enough, he’ll lose face for the Invincible Dugu. And if that happens, there’s no way he’ll be let into the Invincible Society.”

“Well, that’s true. The people from the Invincible Society have a reputation of being invincible fighters with consummate techniques. Lots of people want to join them, but they hardly let anyone in. In fact, for years and years, they’ve only had seventeen disciples.”

“No, you’re wrong about that. There were times in the past when the Invincible Society had more than seventeen disciples. Don't forget, the Titan Emperor Collegium has been around for hundreds of thousands of years. Anyway, long, long ago, the Invincible Society did have more students, but some died and others ascended to higher levels. In fact, there are previous society chiefs who actually rose to the immortal world. That said, they always keep recruitment low.”

“Quiet down, people! Nobody in this entrance ceremony likes each other. There’s definitely going to be fierce fighting going on.”

Yang Qi ignored the conversations and simply sat there cross-legged, focusing his attention on the profundities of the Heaven and Earth Titan Intersection Formation. Circulating his true energy, he worked on the Fist of the Halls of Heaven. As he did, he realized that the halls of heaven represented radiance and light and hell represented darkness and gloom. However, they did intersect. It was a case of heaven on the bottom and Earth on top, an intersection that led to the auspicious titan divination sign.

Days passed, and occasionally more students entered the square. Eventually, a month had gone by. Then the tolling of bells could be heard, and the students present all rose to their feet.

The ceremony was about to begin.

Shadowy figures appeared up above, and rumbling sounds echoed out. Then, a middle-aged man descended, clad in a voluminous robe. Yang Qi immediately identified him as a Demi-Immortal, and one of the grand elders of the Titan Emperor Collegium.

“Ladies and gentlemen, you are all winners of various training competitions held by the immortal world. Today, you have the honor of joining the Titan Emperor Collegium. As you well know, there are elders here who will select disciples for their societies. Do your best, and don’t hold back. Some elders even wish to select successor apprentices, who will achieve meteoric progress. Those who perform badly will be freshman students who live a life of misery. Understand?”

“Yes sir!” the disciples cried back.

“Very well. In a moment, you will all enter the training facility, the World of Mirages!”

Chapter 396: World of Mirages

The instant the Demi-Immortal elder said “World of Mirages”, rumbling sounds echoed out from the far end of the square, where a doorway rose up from the ground, and an illusory, mirage-like aura spread out.

On the other side of the door, it was possible to see a mysterious and strange world.

“The immortals of our Titan Emperor Collegium used the secret magics of the Demolishing level to create the World of Mirages. Enter it and kill to your hearts’ content. There is plenty of good fortune inside, even energy arts. There are also seeds left in place by members of the senior generation which, if acquired, will enable you to achieve incredible progress. Please note that while you may fight and kill each other, anyone who is killed will not actually die. Instead, you will simply be ejected from the World of Mirages and will have failed the test of the ceremony. Any who fail will become freshman students and will lose their chance to be taken in by elders or society chiefs. Does everyone understand?”

“Yes sir!” the students shouted back, simultaneously looking over at the doorway with excited expressions on their faces. Apparently, many of them were already aware of the marvelous aspects of the World of Mirages. “In that case, enter the World of Mirages, all of you!”

RUMBLE!

Thousands of students immediately drew on their energy arts and became streaks of light that shot toward the entrance. Most stuck together in groups of three to five, and they all looked like ferocious tigers seeking prey. After all, there was plenty of treasure in the World of Mirages that was now up for grabs.

“According to the rumors, the World of Mirages is an illusory realm, almost like a game of sorts. That said, you can get wounded inside, and whatever treasures you find, you can take out. You can even further your cultivation and energy arts. In the end, it's hard to say what is illusory and what isn’t.”

“I've also heard of the fantastic nature of this place. I'm from the biggest sect back in the Waste-Wilds Continent, the famous Grand Preceptor's Cathedral. We’ve had disciples who participated in the entrance ceremony before and acquired immortal skills and legacies from the ancient past. Some have even acquired power seeds from the immortal world, or immortal items of incredible power.

“Well, let’s head in and see what treasures we can find.”

“Go, go, go! We already placed high in the Proto-Wilds competitions and were blessed by the immortal world. Let’s work together here in the Titan Emperor Collegium to do the same thing.”

At that point, someone spoke in a booming voice, “Yeah right, fools. The magical treasures in there are ours! Try to take them from us, and you’re dead!”

Yang Qi looked over to see another Destructive Sound Wave rolling out from the hulking fellow with the Bright Sun Truebronze Body. The man was fierce and fiendish, and was surrounded by similarly brutish-looking experts who all made a small team of sorts.

The sight caused a cold smile to play out on Yang Qi’s face. He had already decided to kill the man in the World of Mirages. In fact, he was already able to detect some of the aspects of what was true and real in the World of Mirages.

As had been explained, anyone who was killed in the place wouldn’t actually die, but would just be ejected. It was obviously because the World of Mirages had been created by immortals, who had changed the magical laws of life and death, and had altered the state of life force. Such alterations surpassed the mental capacity of virtually everyone present.

But Yang Qi cultivated a godly-class energy art and was somewhat familiar with the workings of immortals. He could tell that the changes the immortals had made to the magical laws of life and death were child’s play compared to what his Fist of the Halls of Heaven and Hand of the One God could actually do. In other words, he could pierce through to the ultimate true and real aspects of the World of Mirages to literally kill his opponents.

Therefore, he wouldn’t hesitate to kill that burly man the first chance he got.

WHIZZZ!

Thousands of students were streaming through the doorway and into another world filled with enchanting scenery, including towering mountain peaks, mighty rivers, and even kingdoms of mortal humans.

The World of Mirages was actually a place that existed between reality and illusion.

There were also enormous devillings, demon-devils, devil-ghosts, and hobgoblins of every sort, lurking in the depths of the world, just waiting to leap out and attack anyone who got too close to them.

After flying in, Yang Qi landed on the ground and looked around to find himself alone. Getting his bearings, he began to head deeper into the world to look for clues about what to do next.

Roar!

A shadow passed over Yang Qi and he heard howling as an enormous beast appeared above him in the sky. It descended and began ravenously devouring the mortal humans who inhabited the World of Mirages. As their screams rang out, it was like a scene from hell right in front of Yang Qi’s eyes.

However, he didn’t rush forward to save anyone. In fact, he didn't even move. He simply opened his Lord's Eye to examine the situation, which revealed what was truly happening. As the mortal humans died, they became streams of power which contained rows upon rows of data, information that the monster absorbed.

Obviously, the beasts and humans were all illusory collections of power and data. However, after thinking about it for a moment, Yang Qi realized that he himself was actually a collection of power, with his soul being a vessel for information. Even his techniques could be considered sets of data.

The only difference was that these illusory humans didn’t have any sort of substructure.

“Bodies. Power. Souls. Information. Data….” Suddenly, he sank into a state of deep thought and contemplation.

Moments later, he suddenly felt as if he could sense the profundities of the World of Mirages.

RUMBLE!

Flying up into the air, he launched a fist strike at the enormous beast. That beast was at the same level as a Light King Sage, yet it was instantly destroyed, becoming streams of power, data, and knowledge which began to drift away in the wind.

“Get over here!” Yang Qi said, waving his hand. In response, the power, information, and data became a tempest that swirled into his palm, and through it to his mind. As a result, he gained a bit more understanding of the fundamental framework of the World of Mirages.

Although he couldn’t understand everything about the things he had absorbed, he could tell that they were something like fragments of a soul.

The World of Mirages was like an enormous, multi-layered bubble floating in the universe. Each of those layers was an aspect of space, and right now Yang Qi was in one of them.

Sitting down cross-legged, he began to investigate further and soon realized that as the World of Mirages went deeper, the spatial aspects were as numerous as a labyrinth. And in the depths of the labyrinth there were mysterious locations in which lurked shocking auras. From what he could tell from the fluctuations, there were magical treasures there, or perhaps demon-devils.

Most likely, they were the hidden treasures that senior members of the Titan Emperor Collegium had left there to be found by students.

‘What’s that?’ he thought. His Lord's Eye focused on a spot a bit deeper than his current location, where he saw a bundle of power that seemed to contain an immortal item.

It was a boat that was completely covered with golden scales, making it look like a creature of some sort. Shockingly, it seemed to be on the same level as his Heaven-Burying Bow and Heaven-Wasting Arrows.

‘An immortal item! And it’s huge. I can’t believe that something so valuable is just sitting there out in the open. It looks like they really are looking to find the best of the best in this ceremony.’

Without any hesitation, he headed toward the enormous boat.

Before he could get close, though, numerous other energy surges rose up from different directions and headed toward the immortal item. Obviously, these were other experts participating in the entrance ceremony who had noticed the fluctuations of an immortal item.

Even ninth step Great Sages would covet an item which surpassed anything Demi-Immortals could create.

Meanwhile, in a heavenly palace in the highest heights of the World of Mirages, numerous powerful individuals were watching the students below.

“Hey, Old White, you’re the one who put the Golden Dragonscale Godskiff in the World of Mirages. Aren’t you worried it might cause a situation with the new students?”

“Oh, it’ll be worth it. These new students are top geniuses, and our Titan Emperor Collegium needs people like that. I heard that one of them was already recruited by the Invincible Dugu, and we all know that the Invincible Dugu really knows his stuff. He tends to look down on people that most others consider geniuses, so getting him to accept new disciples is a difficult thing.”

“Oh? Which one is the new Invincible Society disciple? I honestly can't believe someone finally caught the eye of the Invincible Dugu.”

“It’s that one right there. See him? He’s that kid heading toward the Golden Dragonscale Godskiff. Yeah. Yes! Him! That Nirvanic Resurrection Sage.”

“Oh? He's only in the second step?” A few of the people sighed, seeming disappointed.

“Look, it doesn’t matter if he’s only in the second step,” someone said. “He’s from the Hanging Mountain.”

“The Hanging Mountain? What’s so special about that place? The Yore-Wilds hasn’t been important for ages.”

“Heh. Have you forgotten? Don't you remember that certain individual who was banished from the immortal world not so long ago? He was connected to the Hanging Mountain….”

Someone gasped. “Now that you mention it, I do remember that. He had something going on with one of the daughters of the Hanging Mountain. She gave birth to a son, and later became the Holy Mother there. Are you saying… that this kid is her son?”

“That’s exactly what I’m saying. Why else would the Invincible Dugu be so interested in taking that kid as a disciple? Well, let’s just wait and see how he performs.”

Chapter 397: Golden Dragonscale Godskiff

RUMBLE!

Numerous spatial barriers within the World of Mirages shattered as a host of powerful experts closed in on the divine boat.

The students participating in the entrance ceremony were all elite figures, yet an immortal item was something that even they would rarely encounter. In fact, there were only three ways that most people could get one: by randomly stumbling across one, stealing one, or being given one by the immortal world.

No one present had ever heard of a situation in which the Titan Emperor Collegium would give one out freely.

“True Bronze Grand Destruction Hand!”

The first to close in on the item was none other than the burly Tai Cangyi from the Truebronzefolk along with the more than ten experts he had working with him. Tai Cangyi was an eighth step Without Limit Sage, except his energy arts, magical skills, strength, and power all surpassed that of ordinary Great Sages of the same level.

Plus, the friends he had working with him were all famous Great Sages who could unleash consummate techniques and powers of a similar level.

One of the most eye-catching to Yang Qi was a young man with silver hair who exuded icy coldness that could only come from the fabled Icejade Ultrafrigid Body. He was from another of the ancient human races who had unique body types. He naturally had ultrafrigid energy flowing in his meridians, which could freeze things for hundreds of kilometers around him.

With more than ten such individuals working together, it seemed like a force that could dominate the other students and possibly take all of the treasures.

In addition to this immortal item, there were plenty of other things to be had, such as power seeds, sage motes, demon cores, and scriptures of enlightenment regarding great daos. Everyone present was going to go all out in the fighting, especially considering that they didn’t need to worry about dying.

Laughing heartily, Tai Cangyi glowed with blinding bronze light as he made his move, sending out an attack that slammed into a handful of students, provoking screams as they crumbled into dust.

Moments later, those students appeared outside of the World of Mirages, their faces ashen. Although they hadn’t truly died, the drainage to their vital energy from their ‘deaths’ in the World of Mirages would not be easily recovered from.

“That group is so fierce!” said one of the newly reborn students. “They kill without even blinking. I didn't even get close to that Golden Dragonscale Godskiff before they destroyed me.”

“Their leader is Tai Cangyi from the Truebronzefolk. In fact, that whole group is from that ancient coalition of human races called the Everlasting Alliance. It was made up of the Truebronzefolk, Starlightfolk, Spritefolk, Frigidfolk, Dragonbonefolk, and a bunch of other mutant humans. They surpass ordinary Humanfolk in many ways. Most of those ancient races fell into a state of decline ages ago. But now, it seems they’ve revived their previous alliance and are trying to rise to prominence again. I wonder why the Titan Emperor Collegium is trying to recruit people like that.”

“The Titan Emperor Collegium has mutant races in it too. For example, the society chief of the Everlasting Society, Wan Zhenshan, is also a mutant human. Because of that, he openly supports the Everlasting Alliance.”

“Hmph! How disgusting. We're geniuses too, and we went through a lot to get here. After the training competitions, we got our chance to join the Titan Emperor Collegium, rise to the top, and become famous in all of the Four Wilds. But now we’re going to be stuck as freshman students with no society to back us. I'm not going to forget about what the Everlasting Alliance did to me!”

Another of the students who had just been reborn looked around nervously and said, “Uh… keep it down. We lost, alright? Stick your tail between your legs and don't say things like that. If the wrong people heard you, we could end up actually dead. The Titan Emperor Collegium has a very strict ranking system, and if you’re not strong enough you can be executed at the drop of a hat.”

All of a sudden, a handful of higher-ranking students walked over.

“Hey, what are you losers talking about?”

“From here on out, you’re all failures, and will be measly freshman students. Understand? You now have the lowest rank possible and will be given the most meaningless tasks. In fact, your first job is to put on your freshman uniform and come with us to a mining planetary system. After three years of hard labor, you’ll have a chance to be promoted from freshman students to ordinary students.”

“What? Mining? For three years? Forget it, I'm not doing that.”

POP!

The student who had just spoken suddenly found himself being slapped across the side of the face, causing him to spit up a bit of blood.

“You don't know what's good for you, do you?” said the higher-ranking student. “Fall in line, you hear? Freshman students have no authority to haggle. If you keep this up, then I’ll follow the letter of the law, and either imprison you for life or just execute you. And don’t forget that your clans will get dragged into the situation. We recruit students from the Four Wilds planetary systems to serve the Titan Emperor Collegium, not to live lives of luxury.”

“Of course, of course….” The failed students knew that they could do nothing about the situation, therefore, they quickly donned their freshman uniforms and headed toward the mines.

“Those poor freshman students have no power at all,” Yan Weiyi said, sighing. “They might as well be slaves. But that’s just how the Titan Emperor Collegium works. If you fail to succeed when you should have, then you don’t qualify to rise in the ranks.”

“Elder Brother Yan,” Sword Seventeen said, “do you think the same thing is going to happen to Junior Eighteenth Brother? What happens if he gets killed and then forced to be a freshman student? That Tai Cangyi is from the Truebronzefolk. If he and the other mutant humans from the Everlasting Alliance gang up on Junior Eighteenth Brother, I worry that he might not be able to hold out.”

“He’ll be fine!” Yan Weiyi said with a decisiveness that could sever nails and chop iron. “I trust Master in this. He picked Junior Eighteenth Brother after performing divinations regarding the rotation of the universe itself.”

“Now that I think about it,” Flower Fern said, “I suspect that if I were in there fighting those mutant humans and they all ganged up on me, even I might have a difficult time holding my own. I sure hope Junior Eighteenth Brother does well. You know, I wonder if this is actually the Everlasting Society and other society chiefs trying to cut Master down a notch. Maybe they learned that he was going to accept an eighteenth disciple, so they gathered a bunch of geniuses to pose as students and kill him. That would be a real slap in the face to Master, as well as a blow to the reputation of our Invincible Society. We've always been an unconventional group here, few in numbers, but completely overpowered in strength. I mean, Eldest Brother is the number one student in the entire collegium and everyone is jealous of him. There are definitely people who will take any opportunity they can to attack us.”

Yan Weiyi suddenly nodded in agreement. “You could be right, Junior Sixteenth Sister. In the end, we just have to wait to see how Junior Eighteenth Brother handles himself in there.”

Back in the World of Mirages, the fight for the Golden Dragonscale Godskiff was well underway. The boat itself was thousands of meters long and was floating there emanating the purest golden color possible, almost like burning flames.

Those with cultivation bases too low wouldn’t even be able to get close to it.

The thing wasn't inanimate; it had a spirit, and one that an ordinary Great Sage would never be able to tame.

BOOOM!

Explosions rang out left and right as hosts of students unleashed deadly techniques, trying to get control of the boat.

“Prepare to die!”

Tai Cangyi and his fellow mutant humans joined forces to release an incredibly powerful attack. And yet there were so many people involved in the massive fight that not even they could take the boat right away.

All of the numerous students in the entrance ceremony were elite experts, plenty of whom could stand toe to toe with Tai Cangyi and his alliance.

“You pieces of trash! How dare you resist me and my Everlasting Alliance! I'm going to destroy all of you! Out of my way!” All of a sudden, Tai Cangyi unleashed a burst of immense power in the form of a pearl that burned as brightly as the sun. In fact, the light was so intense that it was almost like a liquid that began to melt everything around it.

Muttering in an ancient language, he said, “Heaven and Earth be the Stove; Good Fortune is the Tongs. Yin and Yang be the Coal; All Creation becomes Bronze!”

Then he shouted, “Myriad Bronzes Divine Pellet! Immortal item, come forth!”

C-C-CRACK!

In the blink of an eye, a bronze pellet shot up into the air and a bronze aura spread out, shoving away the nearby students.

Swish!

Tai Cangyi flew right onto the Golden Dragonscale Godskiff, then sent out streams of bronze energy in an attempt to take control of it.

“Another immortal item! That Myriad Bronzes Divine Pellet is an immortal item from the Truebronzefolk. I can’t believe that Tai Cangyi has it!”

“Let’s retreat for now.”

“Damnation. I can’t believe that Tai Cangyi got the Golden Dragonscale Godskiff.”

“The Everlasting Alliance is really baring its teeth.”

Now that Tai Cangyi actually had the Golden Dragonscale Godskiff and was branding it with his warding spells, there was no way the other experts would do anything other than sigh and flee in fear.

Although many of the experts present were just as strong as Tai Cangyi, the fact that he had acquired another immortal item was like adding wings to a tiger. And everyone knew that there were likely other treasures in the Golden Dragonscale Godskiff, such as medicinal pills, spirit stones, or maybe even immortal stones.

“Let’s go. There are other treasures to be had in the World of Mirages. Just let Tai Cangyi and his Everlasting Alliance have the immortal item.” Everyone turned to leave.

However, in that moment a beam of sagelight fell from above.

Within it was a huge hand, which moved with unstoppable momentum until it was right above the Golden Dragonscale Godskiff.

When it hit, a huge boom rang out and the enraged Tai Cangyi was sent tumbling away.

Chapter 398: Magical Laws of Life and Death

No one could have guessed that some fiendish entity would attack like this without any warning.

The enormous hand in the sagelight even managed to strike at Tai Cangyi when he was in the Golden Dragonscale Godskiff.

It seemed that the immortal item might actually fall into someone else’s hands.

Yang Qi had made his move. Earlier, he had simply watched the fighting from a distance, including when Tai Cangyi unleashed his Myriad Bronzes Divine Pellet to single-handedly take the Golden Dragonscale Godskiff. Then, just as Tai Cangyi was about to brand the craft as his own, Yang Qi unleashed the Hand of the One God.

As easily as that, Tai Cangyi was forcibly ejected from the boat.

The Hand of the One God faded away and Yang Qi appeared on the deck of the Golden Dragonscale Godskiff, his God Legion Battle Robe fluttering around him, pulsing with an air of complete invincibility.

Sagelight poured off of him like a waterfall and entered the Golden Dragonscale Godskiff, which trembled like an imprisoned dragon.

A moment later, the boat shrank down until it fit on Yang Qi’s palm. He had completely made it his own.

The immortal item was now his and his alone.

Including the Heaven-Burying Bow and Heaven-Wasting Arrows, he now had three immortal items. As for the boat, it actually had numerous unique dimensions inside, as well as both offensive and defensive powers, and was much more powerful than ordinary immortal items.

In fact, it was similar to the Grand Emperor's Pagoda.

“Bastard!”

By the time Yang Qi had made the Golden Dragonscale Godskiff his own, Tai Cangyi recovered his composure and glared over with burning rage. He had taken the treasure into his hands, but before it could truly be his it had been snatched away unexpectedly by Yang Qi.

Whooooosh….

The other shocked experts from the Everlasting Alliance flew to surround Yang Qi, their expressions fierce and bursting with killing intent and rage.

“You’ve got guts to ambush me, dog!” Tai Cangyi growled. “I know that the Invincible Society is eyeing you for recruitment. And ever since I found out, I wanted to teach you the lesson you deserve. Unfortunately for me, you were slinking around in the shadows where I couldn’t find you. Now that you’re out in the open, I'm definitely not going to let you go. You’ve pissed off the wrong expert!”

“You ambushed me with your Destructive Sound Wave earlier, right?” Yang Qi said. Hefting the Golden Dragonscale Godskiff in his palm, he said, “Well this little ambush of mine was just tit for tat. I guess now we’re even. This Golden Dragonscale Godskiff is an immortal item with a total of thirty-six unique dimensions inside, each one better than the one before it. How wonderful it’s going to be to sit inside and drive this thing around.”

“Your name is Yang Qi, right?” The speaker was none other than the man with the silver hair and the Icejade Ultrafrigid Body. Hardly able to contain his fury at how Yang Qi was blithely talking about the amazing nature of the immortal item, he pointed at him and said, “Hand over that Golden Dragonscale Godskiff immediately. We know all about you. You come from that crappy Hanging Mountain in the Yore-Wilds, right?”

“Yeah? So?” Yang Qi frowned. Although he wasn’t sure why, he really hated it when people brought up his personal information. Of course, the silver-haired man didn't know that.

“The Yore-Wilds planetary system produced a lot of human geniuses in the ancient past,” the man continued, “but when it went to war with the Hell of Euphoria, all of the top figures died and the planetary system of the past became a barren wasteland full of barbarians. Back in ancient times, the Hanging Mountain was a wimpy sect of human-demon hybrids with impure blood that our Everlasting Alliance could reduce to ashes with the snap of a finger. You’re the son of the Hanging Mountain’s Holy Mother, right? And you run some sort of merchant clan in a place called, what was it…? Oh right, the Rich-Lush Continent. That’s where all your friends and family are, right? And you also have some fiend-devil guard, named, what? Ghost Emperor Yama. Well, they’re all weaker than chickens or dogs. We could wipe them out with a single move, so if you want to spare them, then hand over that immortal item, kowtow to us and commit ritual suicide. That way you’ll be ejected from the World of Mirages and become the freshman student you deserve to be. That's your only option at hand, got it?”

This silver-haired man was very arrogant and was talking to Yang Qi as if he were an inferior who could be executed at any moment.

In the blink of an eye, the atmosphere became very tense.

“What’s your name?” Yang Qi asked.

“You think you deserve to know my name?” The silver-haired man snorted coldly. “I hope you were listening carefully to my speech just now. I’ll give you ten breaths of time. If you don’t hand over that treasure and kill yourself by then, I’ll do it for you. Later on, I’ll go kill your entire clan, and also exterminate every living being in the Hanging Mountain. Understand?”

“If you refuse to tell me your name,” Yang Qi said coldly, “then I guess I have no choice but to turn you into a nameless ghost.”

RUMBLE!

Suddenly, he took a step forward and a wild wind sprang up, including clouds filled with dragons, tigers, turtles, snakes, and flaming birds.

He waved his finger, and a thick string of sage motes appeared, a chain that swept forth like a living dragon.

Shockingly, the magical laws of the World of Mirages stirred in response.

Yang Qi bent like a bow, then shot forth like an arrow, becoming a blur that moved so fast that no one could make him out clearly. Before the silver-haired man could react, the Hand of the One God slammed into him.

Whack!

The man’s previously arrogant expression froze and he blurted, “You–”

Before he could say anything else, cracks spread out over his skin and he exploded, causing a tempestuous rain of quintessence-blood to fall everywhere.

Yang Qi waved his hand, sucking up the blood into a sphere which then settled onto his palm, quivering slightly.

A moment later, the experts from the Everlasting Alliance recovered from their surprise and howled in rage.

“What? You killed Yu Quan!”

“You’ll die for that!”

“You've offended our Everlasting Alliance! Do you really want everyone you know to be executed!?”

Tai Cangyi strode forward, a fiendishly vicious expression on his face as he said, “Do you know who Yu Quan is? Probably not. He’s the son of a clan chief from the Frigidfolk. Considering you’ve condemned him to become a freshman student after being reborn outside, I can guarantee that he's going to wipe out your entire clan. You just wait.”

“Reborn?” Yang Qi chuckled coldly. “He won't get that chance. In fact, none of you will. Did you really think that the World of Mirages is all just an illusion? Let me tell you the truth. Everything in here is real, including all of the magical laws. The only exceptions are the magical laws of life and death. The immortals used powerful methods to tweak them a bit; that's why people who die inside are reborn outside, and also why this place seems like an illusion or mirage. There are very few people in the world who can break the magical laws of life and death and seize the souls of others. Unfortunately for you, one of those people is humble little me. Hey there, Yu Quan! Come on out….”

The wriggling sphere of flesh and blood suddenly took human shape. Although it was only about seven inches tall, it looked exactly like the silver-haired Yu Quan, screaming in rage and anguish, his soul, flesh, and blood all completely locked down, and clearly unable to be born again.

“That’s….” Tai Cangyi’s gaze sharpened as he looked at Yu Quan's flesh, blood, and soul. “Break the magical laws? Tweak life and death…?”

“Exactly. Life and death belong to the legion of gods. And things that the legion of gods control cannot be blasphemed, even by immortals. If the legion of gods says someone will die, then not even immortals can force them to be born again.”

Crack!

Yang Qi’s hand snapped closed into a fist and the screaming Yu Quan was crushed out of existence. Only his scream remained behind. That fact was proven true by the sound of various paper talismans in the possession of Tai Cangyi and the others suddenly collapsing.

Yu Quan was dead, and would not be born again on the outside.

For the first time ever, the unimaginable had occurred: someone in the World of Mirages had truly died. Yang Qi had temporarily restored the magical laws of life and death to allow enemies to actually be killed.

“Yu Quan is dead! The transmission talismans he gave us crumbled, which means that his life essence and nascent divinity are gone. He won’t be born again! How could this be happening?”

“He's really dead? Not just in the World of Mirages? But that’s supposed to be impossible! This is supposed to be an illusory game! How could someone actually die in here?”

“No! Not even Demi-Immortals should be able to tweak the magical laws of life and death in this place. How could some puny entry-level student do it?” Countless experts were stunned, especially those from the Everlasting Alliance.

As for the other students in the entrance ceremony, they began grouping together to watch Yang Qi face off with the Everlasting Alliance.

Meanwhile, the elders who were observing the events that played out were so shocked that many shot to their feet.

“What?”

“Dead? What's going on? How come the dead student isn’t being born again? From the moment we instituted this arrangement until now, that’s never happened! Many outstanding students have appeared in the Titan Emperor Collegium throughout the years, but none of them managed to actually kill someone in the entrance ceremony.”

“Dammit. Something must have gone wrong with the entrance ceremony. Maybe it’s just getting worn down after all the years of operation. Perhaps the magical laws of life and death are weakening.”

“We can't let this go on! There can’t be real deaths in the entrance ceremony. It's a matter of the reputation of the Titan Emperor Collegium! Stop the murderer this instant!” There were even certain Demi-Immortals who were about to go down and interfere with the ceremony.

Chapter 399: Number One

A powerful Demi-Immortal descended into the square, his voluminous white robes embroidered with the script of the immortal world and his hands covered with golden veins that seemed to imply he carried the power of law and order within him.

He was not an ordinary student, but rather an elder from one of the societies, with a high level of authority. The Titan Emperor Collegium was the highest educational establishment in all of the Four Wilds planetary systems. Even the freshman students and servants there were famous and powerful individuals, so it wasn’t even necessary to describe how amazing an elder would be. Obviously, they would command far more respect than any ordinary student.

Only Demi-Immortals could become elders. Anyone who was lower, even a ninth step Great Sage, could be no more than a student.

As soon as this elder touched down into the square, he began to walk toward the door that led to the World of Mirages.

However, someone blurred into motion and then came to a stop in front of him to block his path.

It was none other than Yan Weiyi.

“What do you think you’re doing, Elder White Stone?” he said. “Could it be that you're planning to interfere with the entrance ceremony? Are you really going to break the collegium’s rules like that?”

“Yan Weiyi!” Elder White Stone said. “Don’t tell me you didn’t notice the strange things going on in the entrance ceremony? The magical laws of the World of Mirages have been tampered with. A student just died! That's a big problem. I have to get in there and stop what's happening.”

“What right do you have to interfere?” Yan Weiyi replied coldly. “The rules for the entrance ceremony were set long ago. Nobody is allowed to meddle with the proceedings. All kinds of things can happen in the World of Mirages, sometimes even things that are beyond prediction. Normally, people who die inside are reborn outside, but the fact that the rules have changed just goes to show how skilled my Junior Brother is. Without such skills, do you really think the Invincible Society would have taken him as our eighteenth disciple?”

The truth was, even Yan Weiyi was profoundly surprised by what had happened. He couldn’t think of any way that Yang Qi would have been able to kill someone and prevent them from being born again. It was too hard to believe that he had actually tampered with the magical laws of life and death.

However, the details didn’t really matter. There was no way Yan Weiyi was going to allow anyone to interrupt the entrance ceremony and cause problems for Yang Qi. This Elder White Stone was from the Everlasting Society, so it was obvious what was going on. He wanted to retaliate for someone from the Everlasting Alliance dying. If that happened, it would be bad for the reputation of the Invincible Society. Besides, it was already a foregone conclusion that Yang Qi’s performance was going to cause an enormous stir. It would earn a lot of face for the Invincible Society, and thus, Yan Weiyi knew exactly what he had to do in this situation: prevent Elder White Stone from interfering and let Yang Qi earn glory in the World of Mirages. The better he performed, the better it would reflect on his master, the Invincible Dugu.

“What’s that supposed to mean, Yan Weiyi!?” Elder White Stone shouted angrily. “Am I the elder here, or are you? If I say that I'm going to go into the entrance ceremony then nobody’s going to stop me!”

Yan Weiyi didn’t take even a single step backward. “The entrance ceremony has been held in this way for hundreds of thousands of years. You think you can end the traditions of the Titan Emperor Collegium just like that? What exactly are you trying to accomplish here?”

Eyes flashing, Elder White Stone said, “You don’t qualify to interrogate elders. I'm just acting on the wishes of the other elders in general. Now get the hell out of my way!” With that, he extended his hand to push Yan Weiyi out of his way.

“Looking to die?!”

Swish!

There was a blur of light that no one could see clearly, and then Elder White Stone screamed and scrambled backward. However, he only did so with one arm. His other arm flipped through the air, spraying blood everywhere. Before he could react, a paper talisman settled onto the stump, instantly sealing it so that it could never grow back.

Normally speaking, Demi-Immortals could grow back, not just arms, but entire bodies. Their longevity was virtually as long as heaven’s and therefore, they could come back after being almost completely destroyed. But Yan Weiyi had used a divine light to seal Elder White Stone’s life force.

“Adjudicating God Nimbus!?” Elder White Stone blurted in terror, staggering back and clamping his hand down onto the stump of his arm. “You, you actually dared to attack me? I–”

“So what if I attacked you?” Yan Weiyi said coolly. “My Adjudicating God Nimbus is divided up into eighteen phases, and I only used the tenth phase just now. That’s quite a bit weaker than the eighteenth phase that my Eldest Brother can use. You’re lucky that I only took away an arm and not your life.”

“Your Eldest Brother?” Even Elder White Stone’s face fell at the mention of Yan Weiyi’s Eldest Brother, who was known as a nightmarish figure who had shed torrents of blood in his rise to the spot of number one student in the Titan Emperor Collegium.

The collegium had hosts of heroes and geniuses, and had existed for hundreds of thousands of years. Every single student was amazing, therefore, it could only be imagined what the number one student among them all was like.

Even some of the old-timers in the collegium had tangled with the Invincible Society’s Eldest Brother in the past. All of them had come out on the losing end, and some had even died.

“I already cut off one of your arms, Elder White Stone. If you don’t back down immediately, then you can only blame your own pigheadedness for getting yourself killed.”

“You wouldn’t dare!”

Yan Weiyi took another step forward. “Why wouldn’t I? If I did, what would happen? You think the Hall of Beheadings and Executions would try to punish me? Fine. I’ll have my Eldest Brother go talk things out with them. Or maybe I’ll call on my Master’s help. Hopefully it won't result in the Hall of Beheadings and Executions getting completely restructured.”

“I’m not going to forget this!” Elder White Stone said through gritted teeth. Picking up his severed arm, he continued, “And things are going to end badly for the Invincible Society because of it!” With that, he flew up into the air and vanished without a trace.

Meanwhile, the other elders were talking about the matter.

“Well, everyone, Yan Weiyi just cut off Elder White Stone’s arm. What should we do? Should we go down there and talk some reason into him?”

“Talk reason into him? He's a fiendish monster! Forget about the lower-ranking seven disciples in the Invincible Society. Their top ten are all devil kings in the flesh.”

“I agree. Whenever the students from the Invincible Society do anything, it results in storms of blood and carnage. If he wants to prevent us from going into the entrance ceremony, I don’t think any of us can do anything about it.”

“Wait patiently and watch how the situation develops. I'm curious to see what Elder White Stone does. Presumably, he’ll go report the matter to the Everlasting Society.”

Of course, none of them dared to do a single thing.

**

Outside of the World of Mirages, a violent windstorm of an event was playing out, and inside, daggers were unsheathed and bows were aimed.

The death of Yu Quan had left all of the students in the entrance ceremony shaken to the core. After all, he had really died, which was a terrifying thought.

“Kill him!” Tai Cangyi shouted. “If he can break the rules like that, it means we’re all in danger. Stamp out the source of trouble! End his life!”

His bronze skin suddenly began erupting with immense power as he once again utilized his Myriad Bronzes Divine Pellet. The power of immortal motes flowed through him, fusing with him and pushing him to a higher level, until he was as strong as a ninth step Epic Saga Sage.

Then he clenched his fist and punched out toward Yang Qi. “Extinguish Heaven, Devastate Earth!”

Heaven and earth crumbled, and power erupted with volcanic might. True energy created numerous volcanoes that sent bronze liquid flowing out with deadly force.

Yang Qi snorted coldly as his Angel Wings unfurled. He flapped them, instantly nullifying all energy arts and energy fields in the area.

Then, he called on the Hand of the One God again.

“Creation!” he said.

RUMBLE!

This was the initial form of the Hand of the One God, a move called Creation. It was a simple word, but it represented how the supreme Lord had created the universe bit by bit.

Yang Qi’s hands moved in concentric circles, and with each rotation it was as if billions of planes were coming into existence filled with mountains, rivers, streams, lands, cosmoses, yin, yang, the five phases, earth, water, fire, wind, and countless other elements.

His two hands created an image that resembled nature itself, which then rumbled toward Tai Cangyi.

Tai Cangyi’s move of Extinguish Heaven, Devastate Earth collided with Creation, and a massive shock wave rolled out in all directions, sending many of the lower-level students tumbling backward.

POP!

That single move determined victory and defeat. A fountain of blood sprayed from Tai Cangyi’s mouth as he shot backward as fast as a bullet, his immortal motes fading and the connection between his body and the Myriad Bronzes Divine Pellet vanishing.

The experts from the Everlasting Alliance were stunned, but they quickly recovered.

“Kill him!”

Without any hesitation, they unleashed their most deadly and devastating techniques, sending a torrent of divine light rumbling in Yang Qi’s direction.

There were even some other students who decided that they should hit Yang Qi when he was down and added their own attacks to those of the Everlasting Alliance.

“God Legion Paradise!” Yang Qi said without hesitation. Instantly, sagelight flared as the Superlative Defense appeared, turning everything in the sixty-square-meter area around him into a domain of the gods.

All of the incoming attacks slammed into the God Legion Paradise, but did nothing to it.

After emerging from the Hell of Mahānata, Yang Qi could kill eighth step Great Sages. Then he had practiced cultivation for nearly a year with his mother. Because of all those things, he had long since reached the point of being able to break through to the third step and become an Eternal Sands Sage. Now he could easily stand up to a ninth step Epic Saga Sage, and with an immortal item he could even kill one.

“The time has come to use my Heaven-Burying Bow, my Heaven-Wasting Arrows, and my newly acquired Golden Dragonscale Godskiff. Come forth!” Immortal energy pulsed as a bow, a group of arrows, and a divine boat appeared within the God Legion Paradise.

Intense rumbling sounds and dazzling light shone out from the three immortal items.

In one smooth motion, he grabbed the Heaven-Burying Bow and nocked a Heaven-Wasting Arrow.

Then he loosed the arrow, which vanished, only to appear a moment later right in front of Tai Cangyi’s chest.

Chapter 400: Killing People Left and Right

Tai Cangyi, the very same person who had provoked Yang Qi with his Destructive Sound Wave back before the ceremony began and then singled him out in the fighting, was about to die.

For Yang Qi, not killing him had never been an option.

Therefore, he used an explosively violent attack to wipe him out of existence. He used the Heaven-Burying Bow and a Heaven-Wasting Arrow, shattering Tai Cangyi’s personal domain and piercing into his sea of energy to wipe out his soul.

The Heaven-Wasting Arrow smashed through Tai Cangyi’s defensive true energy like a boulder crushing a drinking glass, then proceeded directly into his body.

An agonized scream rang out as a gaping hole appeared in his chest and bronze blood and gore sprayed out. Tai Cangyi was bronze inside and out, and even his sage motes looked like bronze chains.

‘Recover! I have to recover immediately! I can’t believe he has another immortal item! An immortal bow and arrows!’

Suddenly, he waved his hands out in front of him and shouted, “True Bronze Invulnerable Battle Magic!”

RUMBLE!

Veins popped up on his hands and spread out to cover the rest of his body, healing it along the way. Then he shouted, “Divine Physicality Hand!”

A shining, illusory hand appeared, which grabbed onto the Heaven-Wasting Arrow and held it in place, preventing it from stabbing into his soul.

“That’s not going to work,” Yang Qi said. “I want you dead. Therefore, nothing can save you.”

Propelling himself with his Angel Wings, he shot forward with such incredible speed that no one could even track his movement.

His speed bordered on that of light, making it seem almost as if he didn’t exist. A Demi-Immortal might have been able to catch him, but ninth step Epic Saga Sages had no hope of doing so.

Although he wasn’t necessarily invincible against opponents beneath the Demi-Immortal level, he was certainly an opponent that no one could ever hope of cornering.

In the briefest of moments, he put himself directly in front of Tai Cangyi and reached out with both hands. This wasn’t the Hand of the One God; instead, the weeping of ghosts and wailing of gods could be heard, accompanied by the darkness of an enormous black hole. Within the black hole was the essence of the Hell of Mahānata, a glorious darkness and gloom that formed the perfect foil for radiance and light.

“That’s… the power of hell….” A look of terror overtook Tai Cangyi’s face as he felt himself being dragged toward the black hole.

“Self-Detonation!” he said decisively. Suddenly, his essence power exploded with the force of a fiery volcano, and bronze blood sprayed out in all directions as his body shattered.

“Blowing yourself up? Ah, I see. Hoping that the magical laws of life and death in here will allow you to be reborn outside. Sorry. Hellfire Crucible, come forth!”

WHIZZZ!

An ancient and enormous crucible appeared, slowly rotating as it descended from above, pulsing with the power of the cosmos. In the blink of an eye, Tai Cangyi’s blood and shattered remains were dragged inside.

“No!” he screamed. “I refuse to accept this! I'm the most powerful genius among the Truebronzefolk. I'm destined to become a Demi-Immortal! How could I perish here!?”

Struggling to free himself, he pulled his body back together, whereupon the bronze immortal pellet once again appeared in his forehead.

Yang Qi didn’t even bother to look at Tai Cangyi struggling within the Hellfire Crucible. Waving his hands, he caused the crucible to shrink down rapidly.

“Tempestuous Sagefire can Immolate Immortals. What Joy Be There in Life? What Torment Be There in Death?The Dust Returns to the Void; the Pure Lands of the Halls of Heaven Are Eternal and Deathless….”

Tai Cangyi’s screams gradually grew quieter and quieter, until they were nothing but whimpers. Then they faded away entirely and his immortal pellet flew out of the crucible and into Yang Qi’s hand. He looked at it, then pushed it into his ancestral aperture.

In the blink of an eye, it was dissolved by his blood.

The Myriad Bronzes Divine Pellet was a precious treasure of the Truebronzefolk, but it was completely useless for Yang Qi. However, the materials which had made it up, as well as its immortal motes and general power, could be beneficial to his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.

In the blink of an eye, power from an immortal world coursed through him, causing his five viscera and six bowels to tremble.

Inhale, exhale!

Suddenly, an immense tempest sprang up; Yang Qi’s single breath was enough to shake mountain ranges and dry up seas.

It took a moment before the onlookers could react.

“He’s dead! Tai Cangyi died too, and his immortal item was taken and absorbed by that cultivator from the Yore-Wilds, Yang Qi! That guy is a fiendish monster! Nothing is left of the Yore-Wilds but broken-down ruins. How could someone this strong come from there?”

“Regardless, he can actually kill people in the World of Mirages, which makes him a miracle. You can’t judge him with common sense. No wonder! No wonder the spectacularly and nearly-immortal Invincible Dugu of the Invincible Society accepted him as a disciple. The people from the Invincible Society are freaks, one and all!”

“No, this Yang Qi is more than a freak. You know, there’s only one word for people who defy description. He’s a god!”

People were starting to come up speechless in their attempts to talk about Yang Qi, and were resorting to words like ‘god’.

It was just like the saying, what people can’t describe, they attribute to the gods.

Yang Qi was so strong that certain common expressions didn’t seem appropriate for him, such as ‘freak’, ‘hellion’, ‘shocking’, ‘consummate genius’, ‘rarely seen in ten thousand years’….

When people ran out of exclamations, that meant that the person they were trying to talk about was essentially a divine being. Omniscient. Omnipotent. Omnipresent.

Just like the legion of gods.

“Not even the Invincible Society’s Eldest Brother is like this, and he defeated three thousand societies, crushed the Legalist Collegium, and fought back against prime elders. Not even he could actually kill people in the World of Mirages.”

Discussions raged, and expressions of terror, anger, fear, and mute shock could be seen everywhere. As of this moment, Yang Qi was the focus of everyone in the World of Mirages, as well as the elders in the Titan Emperor Collegium who were observing the proceedings.

“Run! Get out of here! Our Everlasting Alliance isn't a match for him!” The remaining dozen or so experts from the Everlasting Alliance were already terrified to death of Yang Qi and weren’t in the mood for fighting. Right now, the only thing they wanted to do was escape the World of Mirages with their lives.

“None of you are going anywhere. You threatened my family and friends, which is something I can’t tolerate. You’re all going to die in this place!” Yang Qi stamped his foot, and the space in the area shattered, transforming into pure primal-chaos.

WHOOSH!

Suddenly, he split into a host of shadowy clone projections which shot toward the fleeing experts.

A scream rang out from the west as one of the experts was felled with a fist strike.

In the north, three experts exploded like fireworks, and were sucked into a black hole. Their sage motes, quintessence-blood, vital energy, power, and magical treasures all vanished.

They were completely and utterly dead.

Something like a megamammoth appeared off in the distance, and a moment later a whole host of experts exploded. In no time at all, everyone from the Everlasting Alliance was dead.

More than a dozen experts had been wiped out, quickly and cleanly.

The reek of blood filled the World of Mirages, filling everyone present with deep fear and leaving them with jaws hanging open. Of course, none of them dared to do a single thing, fearful that Yang Qi would wipe them out. After all, he had just crushed the Everlasting Alliance as easily as if they were dried-up weeds.

“Dead. They're all dead.”

“We absolutely, positively must not do anything rash. If we provoke that fiend, we’re all going to be dead.”

“So what do we do?”

“It would be better to just kill ourselves than wait to be killed by him. At least that way we can get out of here safely.”

“But if we kill ourselves, we’ll become freshman students. We’ll be sent to the mines for years without even a scrap of freedom. Can you really accept that?”

“Everyone calm down,” Yang Qi said, looking around. “As long as you accept your place, I won’t kill you.” Suddenly, his energy began to surge mightily; he had just absorbed the quintessence-blood and vital energy of over a dozen mutant humans, which gave him command of the natural laws of many other worlds. For example, the Bright Sun Truebronze Body gave him deep understanding into suns and bronze. The Icejade Ultrafrigid Body gave him control over the magical laws of frigid coldness. And there were others.

Only a few breaths of time had passed and he was already in the position to break through to the Eternal Sands Step.

“We’re not going to do anything,” a nearby expert said.

“Fine then,” Yang Qi replied. “I'm going to clear out the World of Mirages. You people do as you wish until the ceremony is over. If anyone tries to take treasures that belong to me, or fight me, then don't blame me for being merciless. You all saw what I can do just now. Anyone who I kill here will not be reborn outside. Death here is real death.” With that, he blurred into motion to go collect the various treasures, power seeds, and spirit stones.

The other students could only look on with envy, and none of them dared to even move.

Chapter 401: Strictly Organized Ranks

“Look, those are power crystals from an immortal world! They have Aeonic Ionization True Energy, which supposedly comes from the Aeonic God Heaven, a place far above ordinary immortal worlds. With those crystals, you could build up Aeonic Ionization Godpower.”

“Well, they belong to Yang Qi now.”

“That’s Universal Sky True Energy, also from a very high level immortal world. Power like that far surpasses that of the Titan Emperor Heaven.”

“According to what I've heard, our Titan Emperor Heaven is one of the lowest ranked types of immortal worlds. All of the stuff we’re seeing here comes from higher-level planes!”

“You’re right. The immortal worlds are ranked in a similar way to us cultivators. Among cultivators, you have Energy Artists, Lifeseizers, Legendaries, Great Sages, Demi-Immortals, Demolishers, and Godmyths. But there are even more ranks among the immortal worlds. Thirty-three in total.”

“So all of these are different types of power from higher immortal worlds.”

“What a pity that Yang Qi is getting them all.”

One glowing manifestation of power after another was taken by Yang Qi. The other students in the ceremony were dumbstruck, but didn’t dare to do anything for fear that he might cut them down.

‘Not bad,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘These powers from the immortal worlds are incredible! They definitely come from immortal planes higher than the Titan Emperor Heaven. This is really going to help me in the coming days.’

The almost constant flow of universal power entering Yang Qi went straight into his God Legion Paradise, causing the sage motes there to blaze as if they were on fire.

Thanks to his time spent with his mother and the other top experts in the Hanging Mountain, he had learned much more about the secrets of the universe. He had also formed more Blood of the One God and gained even more information from the God Legion Seal.

The universe contained endless planes and innumerable immortal worlds. However, those immortal worlds were strictly organized into thirty-three ranks.

Planes such as the Titan Emperor Heaven, Nine Yangs Heaven, and Sea King Heaven were all first-ranked immortal planes with relatively low levels of power.

There were as many first-ranked immortal planes as there were grains of eternal sand, so it was no exaggeration to say that no one knew exactly how many immortal planes existed. According to the rumors, the highest immortal planes were those that drew close to the legion of gods and were beyond the level that ordinary humans could go to.

The power of a first-ranked immortal world like the Titan Emperor Heaven was precious. However, it was completely surpassed by that of even second- and third-ranked heavens. And now, countless manifestations of high-level powers like that were being raked in by Yang Qi.

It didn’t take long for the World of Mirages to be swept clean of all treasures. The countless valuable items that students had hoped to compete over in the entrance ceremony were now in his possession.

At that point, a tremor passed through the World of Mirages and the students inside were pulled back out to the square.

Of course, the people from the Everlasting Alliance were nowhere to be seen, which caused many an expression to flicker among the other students as they received confirmation that those experts really were dead.

Oftentimes, people would not shed a tear until seeing the coffin, or in other words, they would not be convinced until faced with grim reality. Well, as of this point the students in the ceremony were seeing coffins and shedding tears. And their hearts were overwhelmed with fear.

Laughing heartily, Yan Weiyi dropped down next to Yang Qi and clasped his shoulder. “Excellent job, Junior Eighteenth Brother. You put on a better show than even Eldest Brother. Seems master really does have sharp eyes. The entrance ceremony is over, and henceforth, you are a formal member of the Invincible Society. The eighteen of us are now the bearers of invincibility!”

“Yes sir!” Yang Qi said, nodding his head. He knew that the members of the Invincible Society were viewed as unusual by others in the collegium. They were few in number, but each and every one of them was extremely strong. Now that he was a member, he at least had something to rely on; any shifty or malicious individuals would definitely think twice before targeting him.

Yan Weiyi eyed the glowing lights up above that were the elders and chuckled. “Alright, let’s go, Junior Eighteenth Brother. You killed all of the new students from the Everlasting Alliance, and once the society chief of the Everlasting Society finds out he's definitely going to explode. They’re not going to let this go, that's for sure. But don’t worry. Once Eldest Brother gets back, he’ll talk some reason into them.”

“There’s no need for that,” Yang Qi replied as they began to walk out of the square. “I like to take care of my own issues. If they try to do something to me, they’ll face the worst kind of heavenly retribution.”

Considering the advances he had made, he was essentially invincible to anyone under the Demi-Immortal level.

Besides, he really needed to do some cultivation now to maximize his benefits. Once he broke through to the third step, it would be time to make another scene in the Titan Emperor Collegium.

The collegium was an enigmatic and mysterious place, filled with all sorts of secrets. His first goal was to establish a foundation and earn a name for himself, thus providing a measure of stability to both the Sage Monarch Continent and his mother in the Hanging Mountain.

His second goal was to unearth some information about his birth father. And third, he needed to unmask Chancellor Demi-Immortal and eradicate him once and for all. Him and any other enemies there might be.

Struck by impulse, he suddenly asked, “Elder Tenth Brother, does there happen to be a ‘Demi-Immortal Society’ in the Titan Emperor Collegium?”

“Demi-Immortal Society?” Yan Weiyi thought for a moment. “There was in the past, but not anymore. From what I heard, it's been countless years since the society chief of the old Demi-Immortal Society left for some remote region to found something called the Demi-Immortal Institute, which he hoped to grow into an organization to rival the Titan Emperor Collegium. Wait a second, you’re from the Rich-Lush Continent, aren't you? That’s where he ended up and founded the Demi-Immortal Institute, which you recently destroyed. You must be worried that you already have enemies in the Titan Emperor Collegium. Well, I wouldn’t worry about that. For one thing, the Demi-Immortal Society doesn't exist anymore. And if any former members cause problems for you, our Invincible Society will simply wipe them out.”

Yan Weiyi’s voice fairly boomed with confidence, leaving Yang Qi feeling more assured than ever that he had really found a powerful group to rely on. Of course, he was getting more and more curious about what the Invincible Dugu was like.

“Elder Tenth Brother, where exactly is Master? Now that I’m through the entrance ceremony and am an official member of the Invincible Society, will I have a chance to meet him?”

Yan Weiyi stopped walking and looked Yang Qi in the eye. “You want to meet Master? I'm afraid that won't be possible. He’s in seclusion right now in a very dangerous location in the universe, attempting to enter the dao of Demolishing, which is also known as the dao of immortal ascension. If he succeeds, he’ll become a true immortal. It was from that distant location that he sent word about taking you in as a member of the society. However, even without Master here, people still won't dare to pick on us, not with Eldest Brother around. Remember, our society is invincible!”

“Right,” Yang Qi said, inwardly shocked. How could he ever have guessed that his new Master, the Invincible Dugu, was actually the highest type of Demi-Immortal there was—a ninth order Paragon Demi-Immortal, just on the verge of reaching the Demolishing level?

“What level is Eldest Brother?” Yang Qi asked.

“The same as Master, a Paragon Demi-Immortal. He’s also just on the verge of reaching the dao of Demolishing. Of course, Eldest Brother can’t match up to Master. After all, Master already used his Adjudicating Heaven Technique to form an Invincible Heart. Because of that, he aroused the jealousy of heaven, and thus, is having a lot of trouble demolishing the void and stepping into the Demolishing level. Anyway, Eldest Brother’s cultivation base puts him above the level of the prime paragon elders. In fact, it wasn't too long ago that he actually smashed a Universal Demi-Immortal prime paragon elder into dust, all because the elder plotted against the Invincible Society. From that point on, Eldest Brother’s ferocity ensured that no one in the Titan Emperor Collegium dared to mess with our society. Not grand elders, prime elders, or prime paragon elders. In fact, not even the elder kings will do anything to us.”

‘This Eldest Brother sounds like a freak!’ Yang Qi thought. Eldest Brother, a mere student, had the entire collegium bowing their heads in acquiescence.

If someone like that couldn’t match up to his Master, then what was the Master like?

“Okay, Junior Brother, the time has come for me to explain how the Titan Emperor Collegium works. Let’s start with the ranking system for the students. It goes: freshman student, common student, consecrated student, then elite student. To be honest, all of those ranks are basically just ordinary students. Above them are the noble students, who are broken up into the subcategories of mountainous, sealike, earthly, and heavenly. Above the noble students are the royal students. They also have four categories, those being celestial, terrestrial, universal, and aeonic. The highest rank of them all, the aeonic royal students, are roughly as powerful as the prime elders and prime paragon elders.

“Of course, there are students even more powerful than the aeonic royal students, and they’re the elysian children. The basic meaning behind the name is that they are like children of the immortal worlds. They’re definitely the most respected of all the students in the collegium. And they’re as powerful as the elder kings. The only person who outranks them is the supreme rector.”

“Oh?” Yang Qi could already tell that the Titan Emperor Collegium was a lot more complicated and refined than the Demi-Immortal Institute.

“Most people enter the collegium as a freshman student, or possibly a common student,” Sword Seventeen said. “Those who put on a good show in the entrance ceremony might attract the attention of one of the three thousand societies and join as a consecrated student. As you know, those who die in the ceremony become freshman students and are sent to distant planets to do mining work for three years. If they do well, they can be promoted to common students and eventually rise through the ranks, hopefully being accepted into a society as a consecrated student. In any case, Junior Brother, as a member of the Invincible Society, you are now a consecrated student.

“As you would expect, the resources available to the students vary according to their rank. For example, the noble students get daily supplies of heavenly-grade spirit stones to practice their cultivation while the royal students get immortal stones!”

Chapter 402: Joining the Collegium

There were various formalities and procedures to go through before leaving the square, but the Invincible Society took care of everything.

‘I really got lucky. The Invincible Society is taking care of me from the get-go.’ Looking around, he saw the other students looking at him, stunned, and he nodded in return. They were all common students now and were hoping that other elders would recruit them, allowing them to become consecrated students. Of course, none of the other societies could possibly compare to the Invincible Society.

Swish!

After Yang Qi left, the elders descended into the square, expressions of hatred and anger flickering on their faces.

They detested the Invincible Society, and yet, couldn’t do anything about them. There wasn’t a need to even mention the freak that was the Invincible Dugu. After all, among the disciples, even just the Eldest Brother was so strong that not even the elder kings could deal with him.

And it was useless trying to use the rules and laws of the collegium against the society as a whole.

“Damnation,” one of the elders growled. “That Yang Qi ruined the entrance ceremony, and actually killed people in the World of Mirages. He’s hiding something, that’s for sure. He actually tweaked the magical laws of life and death set in place by immortals! We should really grab him and interrogate him. Force him to tell his secrets!”

“Go ahead and try. But I'm warning you, the Invincible Society is incredible. They’re the type that defy all laws and principles, even those of the heavens. Mess with them, and you’re just asking for a catastrophe. Remember what happened last time? Five elder kings were all defeated by their Eldest Brother. Nothing was really settled in the end and the Invincible Dugu never even bothered to show up.”

“Hmph! The Invincible Dugu defies heaven with that taboo art he cultivates. I can’t believe he actually made an Invincible Heart. He still thinks he’s going to reach the Demolishing level and become an immortal? Yeah right, how could he possibly succeed? I bet that he was punished by heaven and is already dead. Ground to pieces! Destroyed in body and spirit! And that Eldest Brother is going to be the same. The best way to get people like that killed is to just let them go crazier and crazier. They’ll all suffer horrible fates.”

“Alright, enough chatter. Let's pick some of these new students. It's too bad all of the mutants were killed. They were the quintessence of the Everlasting Alliance, and were all supposed to become Demi-Immortals and royal students. Sadly… ai….”

“Well, that doesn’t matter. So what if a few new students were killed. To the Titan Emperor Collegium as a whole, they might as well have been specks of dust. The really worrisome thing is that the Invincible Society has gained another fiendish monster in their ranks.”

“That’s true. Sword Seventeen is the weakest among them, but even as a mere fifth step he can already destroy the ninth step. That’s heaven-defying enough as it is. Now they have an even more heaven-defying monster, someone in the second step who can slaughter the eighth step like squashing melons or cutting vegetables. If he can already tweak the magical laws set by immortals, what’s he going to be like later…?”

“Hmph! He’s not even close to reaching his potential,” another elder said coldly. “He’s only a second step Great Sage, that's all. In the Titan Emperor Collegium, even those in the ninth step are still just ordinary students. Only reaching the Demi-Immortal level makes you a royal student. It will take him years to reach that point, and there will be plenty of chances for him to die along the way. Considering how arrogant he is, he’ll surely meet disaster eventually.”

“Come on, let’s go. I've already decided who I want to recruit.”

The elders went on to pick their students, then left. Eventually, the new common students were left behind, feeling horrible, yet glad they were still alive and not freshman students. After all, even common students from the Titan Emperor Collegium were still extremely powerful in the Four Wilds planetary systems.

Enormous organizations like the Hanging Mountain were relatively common in the Four Wilds, yet even the leaders of such huge sects would never dare to act rashly when it came to dealing with students from the Titan Emperor Collegium.

**

The events in the entrance ceremony were causing an uproar in the collegium that wouldn’t die down anytime soon.

Now that Yang Qi was a member of the Invincible Society, nobody would casually cause problems for him. But that didn’t mean that he was in the free and clear.

In the depths of the Titan Emperor Collegium was an enormous building with a sign above the gate that read: “Preheaven Society.” Its aura was ancient, with energy flows the likes of which had come to exist before heaven and earth.

At the back of a certain palace hall inside the building was a private chamber usually used like a mansion grotto for cultivation. Within that chamber was a prayer mat, atop which sat an old man with a long white beard. His eyes were closed, and he simply sat there breathing.

He was a Demi-Immortal!

On a platform a bit lower than the old man was a young, scholarly looking individual sitting cross-legged, eyes flickering with both hatred and violence. Somehow, he seemed to radiate the aura of a powerful leader.

That young scholar was none other than Chancellor Demi-Immortal.

“Patriarch, I was the one who brought about the destruction of the Demi-Immortal Institute. I've become an embarrassment to the ancestors.” A tremor of anger passed through Chancellor Demi-Immortal as he uttered the words.

The old man sighed. “It's been countless years since the Demi-Immortal Society left the Titan Emperor Collegium and founded the Demi-Immortal Institute. Unfortunately, the institute never really took off. After the dissolution of the Demi-Immortal Society I may have had to join the Preheaven Society to survive, but in my heart I’ll always remain loyal to my original society.

“Who could have guessed that the Demi-Immortal Institute, which could once rebuke heaven and earth, would eventually fall? And it's impossible to say which aspects of space-time the old patriarchs of the institute are in now. Now here you are, the chancellor, looking for help from me. Presumably you want to kill that Yang Qi, correct? He's already a member of the Invincible Society, and they’re not to be trifled with.”

“That villain is a walking disaster. He killed my daughter, and thus, he is my mortal enemy! If I don't get revenge, I’ll never be able to live with myself. If I had only realized earlier what type of person he was, I could have done something. But by the time I realized it, it was too late. Now I'm here, a student of the Titan Emperor Collegium with a different face. I am forced to lurk in the shadows while he basks in the light. Eventually, I’ll find an opportunity to kill him.” Chancellor Demi-Immortal looked up, and his expression was one of unswerving determination.

“Well, you are a genius, of that much I'm certain. Even being stuck in the backwater Rich-Lush Continent, you still managed to reach the seventh step of the Great Sage level. And now you’re in the eighth step. With the immortal energy you have access to here, I'm sure it won’t be long before you become a Demi-Immortal. Then you can just kill Yang Qi outright.”

“Yes. I’ve also called on a lot of my connections to make sure everyone I know wants Yang Qi dead. I've even called on people I know outside of the Four Wilds planetary systems, including people in the Megaplexus Heaven, the Southern Clarity Heaven, and other places.” Chancellor Demi-Immortal clenched his hand into a fist. ‘You just wait, Yang Qi. You’re dead! Luckily for you, I intend to take the God Legion Seal from you, otherwise I would make sure everyone knew about it.’

**

In the depths of the Invincible Society, Yang Qi sat in a lovely courtyard.

The floor was as red as blood, as it was crafted from precious redflame blood stones, which were used in ancient times for cultivation purposes. The redflame blood energy within them could be used to accelerate the circulation of one's true energy and lead to a tenfold speed increase in cultivation progress.

Usually, such stones were hard to come across, yet this entire courtyard was paved with them.

As Yang Qi’s true energy flowed through his meridians, it formed countless hell vortexes. Those vortexes helped bolster his true energy and, when activated to their limit, could create explosive eruptions of true energy.

Back when he was in the mere fifth phase of the Energy Arts level, Energy Eruption, his hell vortexes could be used to embed a pebble deep into a cliffside. Nowadays, his power levels were so far beyond that level that they were like the difference between the mud and the clouds. Back then he had been an ant, whereas now, he was a divine dragon soaring in the highest heavens.

After all, his hell vortexes were like black holes that reached all the way to the Hell of Mahānata, giving him access to the essence of a true hell.

“Ten Thousand Lives; the Eternal Sands….” He felt like his entire body, including all of his eight hundred forty million particles, were shrinking and cracking. His entire person became like a grain of sand that was connected to heaven and earth. It felt like he could easily shatter and become powder then, just as quickly, resume his previous form. It was like he was made from eternal sand.

He was breaking into the Eternal Sands Step. If he succeeded, he would be strong enough to easily cut down someone in the ninth step.

Yan Weiyi was off to the side, watching, a look of surprise on his face. He was a Demi-Immortal himself, and also an invincible genius who could fight and kill people above his own level.

Therefore, he could see the streams of godpower at play, as well as universal essence and magical laws. The four elemental powers of earth, water, fire, and wind were working, as were the elemental fays of time and space.

‘This new Junior Brother of mine is incredible!’ He licked his lips in anticipation. ‘What will he be like in the third or fourth step? And if he continues to rise in the levels and becomes a Demi-Immortal, just what kind of unimaginable power will he have? Not even Eldest Brother was this strong back when he was in the second step. It seems we might have a second Eldest Brother here in the Invincible Society. I bet that when he’s a Demi-Immortal, he’ll be strong enough to kill Demolishers. If that happens, then a major storm is going to hit the Titan Emperor Collegium.’

Chapter 403: Elder Siblings

Countless bizarre signs and portents swirled around Yang Qi.

Innumerable elemental fays flew around his head, creating resplendent halos. There was also an ancient god in the depths of tribulation, watching the destruction of the universe.

The process lasted for three months.

The halos were eventually sucked into his body, then his God Legion Paradise. There, in the middle of his personal domain, a tiny infant was growing. As it lay there, it began to move, meridians snaking through its form and a sea of energy forming inside of it.

It was like a baby god, and as it emerged into the open it unleashed boundless golden light that pierced deep into the void.

The power radiating from the child was from numerous types of immortal energy and items, all of which were part of it.

The Heaven-Burying Bow, the Heaven-Wasting Arrows, and the Golden Dragonscale Godskiff had all become part of it.

Furthermore, he was filled with powerful sage motes.

“That’s….” Shocked, Yan Weiyi suddenly blurted, “An immortal embryo! According to the stories, it’s only when the boundless quintessence energy of a high-level immortal world contacts a human that an immortal embryo will eventually form. They’re the type of thing that are almost impossible to internally create. If he could turn it into an out-of-body incarnation, he would have access to boundless magical power. Some people have even abandoned their original bodies to fuse with an immortal embryo. How did Junior Eighteenth Brother get one?”

That infant was the very same treasure that Yang Qi had acquired in the depths of the Hell of Mahānata. After refining and purifying it with the energy and blood of over a dozen mutant humans, he had added the energy of the immortal world to him.

Thus, he had transformed the devil embryo into an immortal embryo, something that countless individuals could only dream of having.

“Junior Eighteenth Brother’s already turned the immortal embryo into an out-of-body incarnation!” Sword Seventeen said. “He basically has two versions of himself now, and one of them is even a child of immortals. Imagine how incredible he would be if he pushed it to maturity. Compared to this, my Bladeless Sword Body is just average.”

Elder Sixteenth Sister Flower Fern was watching Yang Qi with sparkling eyes. “You’re right. Immortal embryos are usually only created in high-level immortal worlds. Who knows how Junior Eighteenth Brother got it. But what I find strange is that the immortal embryo isn’t as strong as Junior Brother himself. What type of body does he have, I wonder?”

“Yeah, I'm wondering the same thing.” Yan Weiyi shook his head. “In the Four Wilds, an immortal embryo is a manifestation of the most impressive type of battle body and can lead to cultivation speeds thousands of times faster than normal. And yet, Junior Eighteenth Brother is already capable of cultivation speeds thousands of times faster than his immortal embryo. I don’t think there’s ever been anything like this in the Titan Emperor Collegium. I’ve never even read it in literary works from the immortal worlds.”

“Wait, could it be that he has the fabled and infinitely powerful Immortal-Slayer’s Battle Body?” Elder Sixteenth Sister said. “I heard rumors that Junior Eighteenth Brother acquired the medallion of King Immortal-Slayer. Maybe that’s the battle body he cultivates.”

“It’s highly likely,” Sword Seventeen said. “But don’t forget, there are all sorts of body types in the immortal worlds. For example, I've read in ancient immortal books about Taiji Battle Bodies, Chaos Origin Tyrant Bodies, Lightning Dragon Dueling Bodies, Life-Ending Devil Bodies, Violet Firmament Dao Bodies…. Such physiques don't exist in the mortal world, only in high-level immortal worlds. As for the heaven above us, the Titan Emperor Heaven, it has the Titan Emperor Sage Body, which one of the vice-rectors in the collegium has. Maybe Junior Eighteenth Brother has something like that.”

“Probably so,” Yan Weiyi said. “The immortal planes are very mysterious places, with as many unique battle bodies as the sands of the sea. What we know is like a drop of water in the ocean. After all, we’re like tiny bugs compared to people from the immortal planes.”

“Nascent Divinity Convergence; Second Soul Creation. Earth, water, fire, wind. Come forth, tribulations!” Yang Qi shivered as he provoked numerous tribulations. His out-of-body incarnation, the immortal child, already had muscles, bones, hands, and feet by the time the tribulations hit.

In the blink of an eye, the child’s cultivation rose, accompanied by thunderous rumbling.

He jumped from Energy Arts to Lifeseizing, and in the blink of an eye, was in Nonary Lifeseizing. Lightning crashed as he reached the Blood-Form Transformation. Then Spirit Soul, Space-Void, Five-Phases, Yin-Yang, Personal-Domain, Ghost-God, Astral-Star, Never-Dying Transformation, Half Sage, Great Sage.

First step, Born Again. Second step, Nirvanic Resurrection. Third step, Eternal Sands. Fourth step, True Real. Fifth step, Light King….

The immortal child’s cultivation base finally stopped rising when he was in the fifth step, making him a Light King Sage.

The immortal child was actually stronger than Yang Qi! To become a fifth step Great Sage in only a few months was a speed that would leave virtually anyone tongue-tied.

‘So, that's the limit….’ Yang Qi thought, looking very pleased as he examined the immortal child. He had poured all of the resources, energy, and enlightenment possible into the immortal embryo, who had advanced rapidly until he was in the Light King Step.

However, that just went to show that Yang Qi’s enlightenment of magical laws actually surpassed the level of his own cultivation base.

Although he was technically only a second step Great Sage, he was having trouble advancing, for the very simple reason that heaven and earth wouldn't let him. The magical laws of this heaven and earth were too weak, making further breakthroughs impossible for him.

He was like a whale in a pond that simply couldn’t grow larger until it got to the deep sea, where it could wave its tail and swim about freely.

If he wanted to reach the Eternal Sands Step, then he needed to take another trip to the Hell of Mahānata.

Unfortunately, despite having ensconced his nascent divinity there, he had no way to travel to the place directly. He needed some extremely powerful wormhole to do so.

Right now, he didn't have either the strength or the means necessary for that. After all, back when the training competition began in the Hanging Mountain, he had no idea how many powerful immortals had participated in the effort of breaking into the Hell of Mahānata.

It was an impasse that he currently couldn’t do anything about.

Although it was possible for him to reach certain other hells, such as the Hell of Euphoria or Hell of Suras, they were much lower than the Hell of Mahānata. The upside was that, considering how he was linked to the essence of the Hell of Mahānata, if he could get there to work on his breakthrough there would be plenty of benefits to be had.

In the meantime, he had devised something of a workaround, which was to use his enlightenment to create an out-of-body incarnation, an immortal child.

He was incredibly powerful, far more so than the average person.

Yang Qi was itching to send him back to the Sage Monarch Continent, to fuse with its essence and further his cultivation. Later, when the Sage Monarch Continent became a planet, the immortal child could use the energy surge to reach the Demi-Immortal level and form his own minor world. As for himself, he would open a passageway to the Hell of Mahānata and work on his own cultivation there, to much better effect.

It was a classic case of attacking a problem from two angles.

After all, the immortal child did not have the same things holding him back as Yang Qi, and would be able to improve his cultivation much more quickly. Furthermore, he possessed all of Yang Qi’s wisdom and knowledge.

Taking a deep breath, Yang Qi pulled the immortal child back inside of a spatial dimension within him. The immortal child was already strong enough to defeat a sixth step Great Sage. Although he wasn't capable of Yang Qi’s battle prowess, that was balanced by the fact that he could advance his cultivation much more quickly.

“Are you done with your cultivation, Junior Eighteenth Brother?” Yan Weiyi said. “You’ve been in seclusion for a few months now. Got the enlightenment you need? You didn't reach the Eternal Sands Step, but formed an immortal embryo that got to the fifth step. Obviously, you have the enlightenment of the fifth step, but are limited by the magical laws of space and time here. You're just too strong, and this heaven and earth is too weak. You need to get to a more stable location to achieve your breakthrough.” Yan Weiyi had very sharp eyes and thus easily identified Yang Qi’s problem.

“It’s not a big deal, and I can resolve the situation on my own,” Yang Qi said coolly. “I’ll achieve the breakthrough somewhere else. It was hard, but I managed to ensconce my nascent divinity somewhere very powerful. And I need to get back to that plane to continue my work.”

“Oh?” Sword Seventeen said curiously. “You must have ensconced your nascent divinity somewhere very special, Junior Brother. Do you mind telling us where?”

“I guess there’s no harm in that. I ensconced it in the Hell of Mahānata.”

Yan Weiyi, Flower Fern, and Sword Seventeen stared at him for a long moment, their eyes wide.

“You ensconced your nascent divinity in the Hell of Mahānata?” Sword Seventeen said. “That… that’s incredible! Astonishing! Even the most elite students in the Titan Emperor Heaven only went so far as to ensconce their nascent divinities in the Titan Emperor Heaven, and that made them royal students. The Hell of Mahānata surpasses the Titan Emperor Heaven by multiple levels.”

The Titan Emperor Collegium had something called the Nascent Divinity Altar, which was set aside for students who were trying to become second step Great Sages. Successfully using that altar could lead to rapid cultivation advancement, although failure came with the punishment of death.

All of a sudden, a new voice rang out. “Junior Brother, it’s quite amazing that you ensconced your nascent divinity in the Hell of Mahānata, and weren’t affected by the power of hell. But getting back there is going to be hard. That said, it won’t be impossible. There’s an ancient immortal formation called the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. You might be able to get into the Hell of Mahānata from there.”

“Elder Second Brother,” Yan Weiyi called out, “you’re back!”

Chapter 404: Treasure Hoard

There was something outspoken and forthright about the person who had just called out.

Yang Qi rose to his feet and looked in the direction of the voice to find a middle-aged man approaching. He had fair skin and wasn’t very well-built, making him seem like a frail scholar. In fact, he even wore a tall scholar’s hat.

But he strode forward confidently, in a way that made him seem to conform perfectly to the transformations and variations of space and the world, or, perhaps, vice versa. In a single breath of time, he appeared in front of Yang Qi, and from his aura it was clear that he was capable of forming a personal minor plane of existence around him.

His cultivation base was so high that Yang Qi had never met, or even heard of a person like this.

“This is Elder Second Brother, who is called Book Genius,” Yan Weiyi said. “You see, he’s not actually human. He started out as an ancient book and eventually cultivated a human form. He’s reached the level of understanding the revolutions of the universe, meaning he's an eighth step Universal Demi-Immortal. Of the eighteen members of the Invincible Society, he’s second only to Eldest Brother.”

“So, Master took in another little Junior Brother,” the enigmatic Book Genius said with a smile. “Hello there, Junior Eighteenth Brother Yang Qi. Not bad. Not bad at all. It seems Master truly does have sharp eyes. I was away recently with some of the other Junior Brothers in the deadly Burning Ferocity World, looking for a treasure stash left behind by an ancient immortal. Unfortunately, we came up empty handed. When I got word that little Junior Brother broke the magical laws of life and death in the entrance ceremony and killed a whole bunch of other students, I was worried people would use it as an excuse to cause problems so I hurried back.”

“Ah, there was no need for you to rush, Elder Second Brother,” Sword Seventeen said with a chuckle. “Remember what Eldest Brother did because of Elder Thirteenth Brother? He caused a huge scene at the Hall of Beheadings and Execution and even defeated six elder kings. The vice-rectors got involved and he ended up exchanging three moves with them, only to end in a deadlock. Ever since then, nobody has dared to threaten the Invincible Society with the so-called rules ever again.”

“You shut your mouth, Sword Seventeen!” Elder Second Brother suddenly shouted. “Feeling cocky, are we? It may be impressive that you can destroy ninth step Great Sages when you’re only the fifth step. But what would you do if a Demi-Immortal showed up? I’ll tell you what would happen, you’d get stomped like a weed. You’d better improve your cultivation as quickly as possible, alright? How much face would it lose for the Invincible Society if you got ambushed and killed?”

“Yes, yes of course….” Sword Seventeen said, although once Elder Second Brother looked away he stuck his tongue out at him.

At this point, a new voice rang out. "You’d do well to learn from Junior Eighteenth Brother! He just joined the Invincible Society, and he’s already earned us plenty of face!” Along with the voice came several top experts and it caused an immense, dazzling aura to spring into being above the Invincible Society.

There were other nearby societies who had millions upon millions of members. However, from disciples to elders, all members of such societies who looked over at the Invincible Society in this moment were ashen-faced from terror.

All sorts of talk was spreading through the Titan Emperor Collegium.

“The fiendish monsters have all returned.”

“Keep your auras hidden, and don’t go outside. Don’t give those lunatics an excuse to cause trouble. They’re usually out working on their cultivation; why did they all return all of a sudden? Did something happen?”

“It’s probably because of the new eighteenth member of the Invincible Society, Yang Qi. He actually killed people in the World of Mirages, which caused a huge commotion. It’s only natural that they’d want to come back and see the newest freak to join their ranks.”

“They might be worried that people are plotting against Yang Qi. After all, Yang Qi’s cultivation base is still really weak. All it would take to assassinate him would be to send a Demi-Immortal. It would be horrible for them to have someone with such potential killed before they could grow.”

“Let’s wait and see how things play out….”

Meanwhile, Yan Weiyi was introducing all of the new Elder Brothers and Sisters to Yang Qi.

“This is Elder Third Sister, who cultivates an ancient immortal skill called the Archaean Cauldron God-Channeling Energy. She’s already ‘become one with the cauldron’ and created her Cauldron of Mountains and Rivers, allowing her to manipulate terrain with a single thought. This is Elder Fourth Brother, who is an adept with Destiny-Chasing Soul-Ending Life-Giving Energy. Whether you’re talking about killing or healing, he’s the best under heaven….”

After being introduced to each of his various Elder Brothers and Sisters, Yang Qi would clasp hands and bow respectfully.

He had a good memory and made sure to keep track of all of their names, their unique qualities, characteristics, the energy arts they cultivated, their overall level, and other such things.

Including him, there were seventeen people present. In other words, all of the disciples of the Invincible Society were present save for the fabled Eldest Brother.

In turn, that meant that Elder Second Brother had the highest cultivation base of anyone.

At the moment, Yang Qi was a full twelve levels apart from him. If they fought, and Yang Qi didn’t get help from the God Legion Seal, he would be wiped out in the blink of an eye.

Thankfully, this was his Elder Brother, a person who would have his back no matter what.

After the introductions were made, Elder Second Brother Book Genius coolly looked around and said, “Junior Brothers and Sisters, Master is in seclusion trying to reach the dao of Demolishing. It's a heaven-defying act which will end in either complete success, or utter defeat. As for Eldest Brother, he is on a quest to kill a powerful enemy and won’t be back anytime soon. Right now, I'm the highest ranking member in the Invincible Society and will be making the decisions. Does anyone have any problems with that?”

“If you have something to say, Elder Brother, just say it,” one of the Junior Brothers said. “We Brothers and Sisters of the Invincible Society are devoted wholly to each other, and will always share both honor and disgrace. Even our Junior Eighteenth Brother is included in that.”

Book Genius nodded. “Junior Eighteenth Brother just joined our society, and although he’s obviously an outstanding and rare talent he still has much room for growth. After all, if a Demi-Immortal attacked him he would be killed in an instant. Therefore, the top priority right now is to help him improve his cultivation base.” Looking at Yang Qi, he said, “Junior Eighteenth Brother, do you have any plan about how to go about doing that?”

“I’d prefer to improve my cultivation base on my own,” Yang Qi said, although he was already feeling profoundly moved. It was clear that because the Invincible Society only had a few members, they stuck together closely. In societies with many members, villains often mixed with the honest folk and there was usually plotting and infighting. But not here. “The only way for me to achieve another breakthrough is to get to the Hell of Mahānata. Elder Second Brother, you mentioned something called the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart that could theoretically open a passageway there. What exactly is this Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart?”

“Ah, the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart,” Book Genius replied. “It’s a fabulous precious treasure left behind by ancient immortals. It took the power of many immortals to make it, but it was eventually lost in the mortal world. Because of that, all of the powerful collegiums and organizations are looking for it. Unfortunately, its precise location is currently unknown. But if you could find it, you could use it to get to multiple planes of existence. Even with a mere mortal body, you could go to an immortal world. With the power of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart at your disposal, it would be impossible for even immortals to hurt you.”

“It's that powerful?” Yang Qi said in shock.

“Yes, it is. Luckily, we've turned up a clue regarding its location. The thing is essentially an enormous treasure hoard connected to numerous planes. Among the many treasures it contains, there are even embryonic planetary cores.”

“Embryonic planetary cores?” Yang Qi was shocked. ‘Those things aren’t easy to get. If I could get one, it would be a lot easier to convert the Sage Monarch Continent into a planet. Plus, my immortal child would advance by leaps and bounds and maybe even be able to reach the Demi-Immortal level.’

“I know what you're thinking, Junior Brother,” Book Genius said. Looking a bit apologetic, he said, “You want to convert your immortal child into a Demi-Immortal, but unfortunately that’s going to be very hard. The vital energy of the Rich-Lush Continent is weak; after all, it is a mere fragment of a much larger continent from ancient times. Even if you had the raw power required, it would probably take tens of thousands of years to force the place to become a planet. And even then, it might not be enough to reach the Demi-Immortal level. If you want a breakthrough sooner, rather than later, that’s not the route. Maybe if you had a lot of embryonic planetary cores, you would be able to gain the momentum you needed. If you could get your continent to the size of the Quake-Dawn Continent, then your goal would be a lot more realistic.”

Suddenly, a man in black clothing stepped forward and coldly said, “Let’s be straight. We Brothers and Sisters should just join forces and conquer the Quake-Dawn Continent. Sacrifice that continent and fuse it with the Rich-Lush Continent. That should be enough to make it a planet, right?”

The man in black was Elder Seventh Brother, and was known as an extremely vicious character.

“Junior Seventh Brother, your devilish personality is showing again,” Elder Second Brother admonished. “Although it’s true that the Quake-Dawn Continent’s proximity to the Rich-Lush Continent would make it the perfect target, there are billions of trillions of people who live there. Do you know how evil it would be to sacrifice them all just to make a planet?”

“Ah, what are you scared of!?” Elder Seventh Brother said. “I do what I feel like, not what heaven wants me to do. The more you want to accomplish, the more evil you have to be. That’s how you get strong.”

‘Vicious!’ Yang Qi thought. ‘Completely and utterly vicious! These people….’ His Elder Brothers were casually debating the thought of sacrificing an entire continent to build a planet. It was really a defiance of all laws and principles, even those of heaven.

The Quake-Dawn Continent had three thousand daoist sects and a hundred thousand smaller factions. It had as many Great Sages as drops of rain in a rainstorm, and as many Legendaries as the grains of sand in the sea. In fact, they supposedly had Demi-Immortal experts as well. How unscrupulous would a person have to be to be willing to sacrifice all of them?

Elder Seventh Brother was named Meng Shafan, and his murderous aura was simply without compare in the world.

“Very well, Junior Seventh Brother,” Book Genius said. “I know that the energy art you cultivate is all about killing, but enough of that talk for now. We need a plan to get Junior Eighteenth Brother into that treasure hoard and there’s no time to lose. Other groups know about the treasure, including some of our biggest enemies of the Titan Emperor Collegium. For example, there are plenty of societies in the Megaplexus Collegium who are itching to get it. If they got the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, not to mention the rest of the treasure hoard, it would be a big problem for our Invincible Society. Therefore, we need to make sure we’re the ones who get it.

“Besides, the numerous planetary cores in there would be very useful to Junior Eighteenth Brother, not to mention the good training he could get from fighting the fiend-devils there.”

“That's true. Time is of the essence, so let’s come up with a plan to get that treasure hoard.”

“Okay,” Yang Qi said, nodding his head. Never could he have guessed that the first major thing which would happen after entering the Titan Emperor Collegium is that he would be made privy to an enormous secret: the details of the treasure hoard that was the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

He had heard the term Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart mentioned in the Hanging Mountain and knew that it was some sort of painting or chart created by ancient immortals as a way of traveling amongst various planes of existence. Eventually, it was lost in the mortal world. However, it would appear every ten thousand years or so, and people would enter it to hunt for treasure. It was an easy way to become a very powerful individual.

Apparently, the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart was making another appearance now.

Chapter 405: Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart

As the discussion unfolded in the Invincible Society, Yang Qi came to an even better understanding of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

It had existed since the most primeval times, and its power actually surpassed that of immortals. Every so often, it would appear in the mortal world. When it did, those who were connected to it by fate would enter and be able to search for spectacular treasures. Those who returned would become powerful hegemons and overlords.

According to some of the ancient legends, the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart was actually looking for a successor, a powerful master who, upon gaining the favor of the chart, would immediately become immortal. Not only would that person easily be able to pass through the myriad heavens, they would also be unrivalled when it came to battle.

The chart had last appeared ten thousand years ago, and had resulted in the rise of numerous powerful overlords. And now, it had returned.

One difference was that this time, the Invincible Society was one of the first to learn of the matter.

It was a major development, and the members of the Invincible Society wanted to take advantage of the situation to find the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart as quickly as possible and start collecting treasure.

In fact, that was why everyone had returned.

“According to my observations of the rotation of the universe and various divinations on magical laws, I'm fairly certain that the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart will appear somewhere in the Coiling Arc planetary system.”

Elder Second Brother Book Genius waved his finger, causing a map to appear in the air in the middle of the private chamber they occupied. It was a very detailed and realistic star chart, filled with a veritable river of stars and planets.

And Yang Qi didn’t recognize any of it.

He knew that the Yore-Wilds, Brute-Wilds, Proto-Wilds, and Waste-Wilds planetary systems were huge, with a virtually endless supply of planets and continents. But now that he was a member of the Titan Emperor Collegium, his worldview was changing again and he realized that the Four Wilds planetary system was actually a tiny corner of the universe.

There were other planetary systems beyond the Four Wilds, places that were even more spectacular and populous.

“Junior Eighteenth Brother, this is a map of our Four Wilds planetary system, which contains a total of three hundred seventy-five million planets and roughly fifty million floating continents. As for the alternate dimensions, minor planes, minor worlds, and ancient ruins, well… there are too many to even count. This is the area governed by the Titan Emperor Collegium.”

Chuckling, Elder Seventh Brother Meng Shafan looked at Yang Qi and produced a large book that he tossed over. “Take this atlas of the starry sky and study it well, Junior Eighteenth Brother. It should give you a much better understanding of our planetary system.”

“Gotcha,” Yang Qi replied, taking the book and opening it up. It was filled with all sorts of pictures and images that rushed into his sea of consciousness. Shockingly, he didn’t have to work at all to memorize the information, it branded itself into his mind automatically.

In the blink of an eye, he experienced major enlightenment.

There was an enormous, swirling vortex of brightly shining heavenly bodies, roughly divided into four sections. Each section contained millions upon millions of planets, between which was the void, as well as countless snaking wormholes. There were also shattered planes, smaller worlds, and other tiny locations in the mix.

This was the Four Wilds planetary system.

After studying the information for a moment, Yang Qi began to identify individual planets. Eventually, his gaze reached a remote location the size of a dust mote, labeled as the Rich-Lush Continent. That, of course, was where his newly created Sage Monarch Continent existed. Not too far away from it were the various planes that made up the Hanging Mountain, as well as the pebble-sized Quake-Dawn Continent.

There were various powers within the Four Wilds planetary system, some large, some small. The smallest were the type that he could wipe out with a single breath. The largest, of course, was the Titan Emperor Collegium, which was floating in the middle of the Four Wilds like the sun, casting light out in all directions.

For roughly an hour, Yang Qi studied all of the new information and became familiar with it.

There were other planetary systems that bordered the Four Wilds, places which were not administered by the Titan Emperor Heaven.

Interestingly, although the Sage Monarch Continent was actually located in a remote corner of the Four Wilds planetary system, it was actually on the edge of a sprawling void and could be considered a border region. On the other side was a location administered by another heaven: the Megaplexus Heaven, an enormous place that was larger than the entire Four Wilds planetary system.

And the Sage Monarch Continent was right on the border between the two.

Suddenly, Yang Qi broke out in a cold sweat. ‘The Sage Monarch Continent is on the border. If the two planetary systems went to war, it would be the first place to get caught up in the crossfire. In fact, it would probably be destroyed right off the bat. It seems I really do need to make it a planet as soon as possible. Once my immortal child finishes his minor world, he’ll be able to lead the defenses there.’

“So, Junior Eighteenth Brother,” Book Genius said, “now you have a basic understanding of the Four Wilds planetary system and its environs. To the east of us is the planetary system controlled by the Scorching Warrior Heaven, and to the south is Fathomless Purity Heaven. To the west is the Coiling Arc Heaven, and finally, to the north, the Megaplexus Heaven. All four of those planetary systems have collegiums similar to our Titan Emperor Collegium, which produce the top talents of their generation. As I mentioned, all of my calculations point to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart being somewhere in the territory of the Coiling Arc Heaven. We’ll need to go to that planetary system, and of course, be extremely careful as we do so. One wrong step and we could end up dead. Unfortunately, I don’t have the precise coordinates, which means we’ll need to split up to investigate. Without numbers on our side, it will be a very dangerous situation. Keep that in mind at all times.”

“Of course,” Yang Qi replied coolly. “Don’t worry, Elder Second Brother. There are a lot of people in this world who want to kill me, but not many of them will ever stand a chance of succeeding.”

“Fine. So the plan is to enter the territory of the Coiling Arc Heaven and find the entrance nodes leading to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. If you find one, fuse with it immediately.

“Remember, this thing only comes around once every ten thousand years or so. When it does, clues will pop up pointing to its arrival and location. I already tracked down enough evidence to confirm that it will appear in the mortal world very soon. If you find an entrance node and fuse with it, you’ll enter the chart and the node will close behind you. Finding your way out later will be difficult, but not impossible. For people like us, it will just take some time. Understand? Very well, here is the specific plan I worked out, with assignments for everyone. We’ll all head in a different direction….”

The discussion in the Invincible Society went on for three days and three nights, which was quite a cram session of information for Yang Qi, but, thankfully, he now had a fairly good understanding of the Titan Emperor Collegium, the Four Wilds planetary system, and the surrounding planetary systems.

The mission at hand was clear. Each disciple was assigned a different destination in the Coiling Arc planetary system, a place Elder Second Brother was fairly certain would contain an entrance node. Upon arriving, each disciple would need to track down the spatial node, fuse with it, and enter the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart to search for treasure.

At a certain point, Elder Second Brother said, “Very well, we've talked the matter over in detail over the past three days and nights and you all know what to do. Now, the time has come to part ways. Remember, the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart will definitely appear soon, and whether or not you find it will be up to your own fates. Thankfully, we have plenty of time to carry out the search and confirm the location of the entrance nodes.”

Elder Second Brother rose to his feet, gave Yang Qi a nod, and shattered into a host of glowing dots of light which faded away into nothing.

“Farewell, Brothers and Sisters. Take care!” One by one, the other members of the Invincible Society said their farewells and departed.

Even Yan Weiyi, Sword Seventeen, and Flower Fern left.

Before long, the Invincible Society was empty except for Yang Qi.

‘This Invincible Society really is full of a bunch of weirdos,’ Yang Qi thought, shaking his head. They came and went as they pleased, without a care in the world and completely at ease.

‘Well, I think I should probably head back to the Sage Monarch Continent first to make sure my immortal child fuses with the essence of the lands. According to Elder Second Brother, the immortal world will soon send down proclamations about the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Once that happens, there’s definitely going to be a lot of bloody fighting going on….” Blurring into motion, he vanished.

Now that he was a student of the Titan Emperor Collegium, and a member of the Invincible Society, his position within the Four Wilds was ten times higher than that of the Hanging Mountain.

But there was no way he was going to just forget about the Sage Monarch Continent.

Once he was out in the open, he unfurled his Angel Wings and pierced through space to leave the heavenly palace that was the Titan Emperor Collegium. With the mark of the Invincible Society that he had now, no one dared to block his path.

Technically, he was only a consecrated student, which was a relatively low rank. But everyone viewed the Invincible Society as being full of freaks, and right now nobody was going to risk causing problems by picking on him.

In the blink of an eye, he was out in the Central Planetary River and heading back toward the Yore-Wilds planetary system.

There were a pair of vicious eyes tracking Yang Qi as he left, which belonged to a yellow-robed student.

“That little brat is finally gone. Well, what do you think? How are we supposed to deal with him?”

“It's simple,” another student said. “Just wait for the right opportunity to kidnap his family and use them to threaten him. He’s keeping secrets, that's for sure. Otherwise, he wouldn’t be able to tweak the magical laws of life and death. Besides, he’s the son of the Hanging Mountain’s Holy Mother and that person.”

“I've already done some checking,” yet another student said, “and can confirm that he is that person’s son. Maybe he even knows some of the secrets relating to him.”

“That person is a taboo subject in the Titan Emperor Collegium. No wonder the Invincible Dugu wanted this Yang Qi as a disciple. By the way, what cultivation level has the Holy Mother of the Hanging Mountain reached by now?”

All of a sudden, an elder in a long white robe appeared. “What’s being discussed here?”

“Elder White Stone….” the students all said, bowing at the waist.

This was the very same Elder White Stone from the Everlasting Society whose arm Yan Weiyi had severed. Somehow, his arm was now reattached.

One of the students clasped hands respectfully and said, “Elder White Stone, sir, we were just keeping an eye on the Invincible Society. All of the fiends returned and had a meeting for three days and three nights. Then they vanished, including Yang Qi.”

“But that was after Yang Qi went into seclusion for a few months of cultivation. It seems to me he didn’t achieve a breakthrough.”

“Oh? So he’s having trouble with breakthroughs?” A serious expression appeared on Elder White Stone’s face. “That brat definitely has a high level of enlightenment regarding his cultivation base. If he can’t achieve a breakthrough, it means that this heaven and earth is too weak. So he's that strong…. It seems that the key to dealing with him is the Holy Mother herself….”

Chapter 406: Refining the Continent

Yang Qi was once again returning to the former Rich-Lush Continent, which of course he had renamed the Sage Monarch Continent.

He had a very different status than before; he was a consecrated student from the Titan Emperor Collegium and a member of the Invincible Society. As soon as he arrived, it started a whole chain of events. Cheering filled Sage Monarch City and fireworks exploded in the sky. The mood was one of exultation and joy.

The parliament of elders that ran the continent consisted of Yang Qi’s sworn siblings, including Li He and many others, and they immediately threw a huge banquet. The leaders of the nine prefectures were invited as well as representatives from countless cities and even many lucky commoners.

After all, most people had never heard of the Titan Emperor Collegium, but word was quickly promulgated by the governmental figures. It didn’t take long before everyone knew that Yang Qi had joined the highest educational establishment in the Four Wilds planetary system. Compared to the collegium, the Quake-Dawn Continent and the Hanging Mountain were about as important as ants. That meant that the Sage Monarch Continent now had a powerful protector to rely on. Anyone who wanted to cause problems would need to think things through carefully, lest they face the wrath of the Titan Emperor Collegium.

As the banquet went on, even the people who weren’t drinking felt drunk from excitement. At one point, Yang Zhan said, “Qi’er, come, drink with me! I could never have imagined that a day like this would come. You might as well be an immortal from heaven. Who would have thought that a true dragon would arise from a tiny, insignificant place like Yanhaven?”

With that, they drank together. Wiping his lips, Yang Zhan continued, “Not long after you left for the Titan Emperor Collegium, your mother came to Sage Monarch City for a visit and I finally got to reunite with her. Ai. I can hardly bear to think about those early days when I first met her.”

“Forget about the past, Father,” Yang Qi said with a faint smile. “Think about the future. You’re going to live forever, you know. Can you even imagine what it will be like to experience tens upon tens of thousands of years of happiness? Did mother do some work to improve the Sage Monarch Continent? It seems to me that the greyspace is stronger than before, perhaps because of the power of a Demi-Immortal.”

“You’re exactly right, Milord Yang Qi,” said Ghost Emperor Yama. By now, his subservience was no act, as Yang Qi’s cultivation base far, far exceeded his own.

Ghost Emperor Yama had already begun to seek enlightenment of the ninth step, putting him very close to being an Epic Saga Sage. But he could sense that Yang Qi could give him a devastating injury with little effort, enough to completely paralyze him.

“The exalted Holy Mother came for an inspection tour. Milord, she’s aware that you want to turn the continent into a planet, and therefore she drew on the godpower of many heavens and sent it deep into the primal-chaos spell formations. Because of that, the primal-chaos paleo-energy fused even more deeply with the continent and improved its essence by ten times. The magical laws are more stable and the subterranean ores are even more numerous. Even the surface of the ground has turned into spirit soil.”

Ghost Emperor Yama seemed to have no shortage of praise for the Holy Mother.

Yang Qi opened his Lord's Eye and looked around to see both primal-chaos vital energy and immortal magical laws within the surrounding void. ‘Yes, mother has definitely created a prime foundation for me.’

In the past, the Sage Monarch Continent had been a little pond, but now it was turning into a lake. And that meant that it could hold even greater levels of power.

‘I suppose I have less to worry about now,’ he thought. ‘For now, I’ll do everything in my power to expand the lands that exist. I can’t transform the continent into a planet yet, because I don’t have enough power built up. Furthermore, I need a lot more land to work with, probably thousands of times what I have now. Only then will I be able to transform this place into a planet like the Quake-Dawn Continent, and also help my immortal child become a Demi-Immortal.’

After the banquet ended, Yang Qi went into secluded meditation.

The first thing he did was pull out all of the treasures, spirit stones, crafting materials, and power vessels that he had collected. Then he set up an enormous spell formation in a plain outside of Sage Monarch City, a formation that conformed to the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth and the ancient infernal deities.

Also present in the formation were Chancellor Sun Moon, Yang Chaoguang, Hua Tianxiong, the other Great Sages, and all of his sworn brothers and sisters.

These were the core figures in the Sage Monarch Continent, and they were present to offer assistance.

“Qi’er, are you planning to push the continent to a higher level?” Yang Zhan asked. “Your mother said that there’s been a lot of activity in the Four Wilds planetary systems recently and that the immortal world is mobilizing. Considering the news that our Sage Monarch Continent is on the border of the planetary systems, that makes us a perfect springboard for any invasion. That would be a disaster for us.”

“I have a plan to deal with the situation,” Yang Qi said calmly. “I’d originally hoped to make the continent part of my sage domain. Unfortunately, my cultivation level is still too low for that and right now, I can’t achieve any breakthroughs. Thankfully, I acquired an immortal embryo which rapidly rose to a high level. Today, I shall lay out the remains of devils to create a path for the legion of gods. Let the flesh and blood of hell be offered to them as a sacrifice!”

RUMBLE!

With a wave of his hand he activated the spell formation, causing the Grand Emperor's Pagoda to rise up into the air, shining with multiple immortal motes.

A cry like that of an infant could be heard and his immortal child appeared, flying out into the center of the formation, surrounded by countless swirling magical treasures such as the Heaven-Burying Bow, Heaven-Wasting Arrows, and Golden Dragonscale Godskiff.

Yang Qi was taking all of the treasures and materials he had collected and giving them to the immortal child in the spell formation.

The truth was that, considering the level of his cultivation base, he actually didn't need any magical treasures. He himself was the most powerful of weapons in battle, as he could rip apart ancient devils, shatter heavens, crush hells, and summon the halls of heaven.

“Come forth, Hell Portal!”

The portal erupted into being behind him. It was now formed from countless bones and spikes, and was splattered with the blood of devil-gods.

Everyone present was a close friend or family member of Yang Qi, and thus, they were somewhat familiar with his cultivation base and the fact that he could summon fiend-devils from hell. Therefore, they were not surprised about what they were seeing.

Immediately, wails and howls drifted out from the Hell Portal.

As the portal opened, a hell monsoon erupted from it followed by armies of fiend-devils.

In the lead were endless waves of bronzeblaze fiend-devils, like locusts, all of them in the Legendary level. It seemed like they were all dead set on waging a campaign of war on the universe itself.

However, after emerging from the Hell Portal, and before they could do a single thing, they exploded and their quintessence energy was sucked into the spell formation, leaving behind nothing but shattered corpses.

Screams rang out as millions upon millions of bronzeblaze fiend-devils exploded, until mountains of corpses could be seen everywhere.

“Be absorbed!” Yang Qi said, waving his finger. Instantly, a black hole appeared which sucked in all of the corpses. “Let the corpses of these devils be used to create something glorious.”

Yang Qi flew up into the air as the Hell Portal grew larger, reaching a height of tens of thousands of meters tall, and fully a thousand kilometers wide. Then, more fiend-devils poured out from within it.

WHIZZZ!

A golden paleo-devil emerged, but immediately melted and became part of the ground itself.

More golden paleo-devils came out, hordes of them that obscured the sky, and all of them did the same thing.

The observers could sense all sorts of magical laws at play, causing transformations to the Sage Monarch Continent as a whole.

The corpses of the devil-gods were truly being used to remold the lands beneath their feet.

Yang Qi continued to summon all sorts of fiend-devils, including horned goat-devils, minotaur-devils, warduel-devils, gloomdark-devils, and even asuras. These were Great Sage fiend-devils, but they all died as soon as they appeared out in the open.

Suddenly, a hoarse shout rang out from one of Yang Qi’s sworn brothers, Jun Tianchou. Because of the power fluctuations and stirring of the magical laws, something was happening. Without any warning, lightning began to fall on him!

Although he was still a Legendary, he had just achieved a breakthrough, leaping from the third transformation all the way to the seventh. That was a leap of four complete levels, which was nothing short of a miracle.

Back in the days of the Rich-Lush Continent it had been a difficult thing for Legendaries to achieve breakthroughs, to the point where such individuals were considered geniuses. Sometimes, people required a thousand years to achieve even a single breakthrough.

But now, Jun Tianchou was rising as rapidly as a rocket shooting into the sky.

Perhaps it could even be considered cultivation cheating!

RUMBLE!

An enormous infernal appeared, its blood so strong that it radiated a clear aura of death.

This was none other than a fifth step Light King infernal, dragged up from the depths of hell by Yang Qi.

Ghost Emperor Yama let out an instinctual shriek, and nearly dropped to his knees in worship; after all, he was a fiend-devil from hell, so to see nobility like this in the form of an Infernalfolk was almost too much for him to handle. In hell, the ranking system was strictly enforced and when people of high blood met those with low blood, the former would suppress the latter to the ultimate degree.

And yet, as soon as the powerful infernal appeared, Yang Qi waved his hand, transforming it into viscous blood that poured into the ground.

The process continued with more Great Sage infernals, whom he could summon thanks to having his nascent divinity ensconced in the Hell of Mahānata. Unfortunately, despite the fact that he could summon such entities from there, he couldn’t use the Hell Portal to travel there.

Many powerful planes were like that: easy to leave, but difficult to enter.

In that respect, they were like mortal cities, who let citizens leave freely, but would strictly control entrance.

And thus, Yang Qi summoned streams of fiend-devils and used their bones to create glory for the legion of gods. One fifth step Great Sage fiend-devil after another was slaughtered and imbued into the Sage Monarch Continent.

Ghost Emperor Yama was completely stunned, but at the same time managed to keep count of how many Great Sage fiend-devils were being sacrificed. “A thousand. Two thousand. Five thousand…. My god. Don’t tell me that he's really going to build a planet with the corpses of fiend-devils?”

Chapter 407: Major Success with the Immortal Child

The corpses of countless devils were being poured into the Sage Monarch Continent.

As a result, its borders were rapidly expanding within the starry sky. The common people and cultivators in the lands could sense that immense changes were taking place. Thankfully, it was a very calm and peaceful expansion, with no earthquakes, volcanoes, or the like.

After several days and nights passed, the Sage Monarch Continent was fully a hundred times larger than it had been before and was continuing to grow larger.

Although it still couldn’t compare to the Quake-Dawn Continent, and was nowhere near ready to become a planet, its substructure, essence, terrain, aegis, and greyspace had all improved.

From far away in the starry sky, it looked like a huge continent within the void, surrounded by glittering sage motes and pulsing with power. Its greyspace was in the process of growing, and it was constantly absorbing spatial power from around it.

How many fiend-devil corpses had been absorbed into the continent in the process?

Yang Qi had lost track, but not Ghost Emperor Yama. “Thirty thousand. Thirty thousand Great Sage fiend-devils were absorbed into the Sage Monarch Continent. He really did use the corpses of countless devils to create a land belonging to the legion of gods. Even if you combined all of the Great Sages that came from the former Rich-Lush Continent and Western Continent, how many would there be? Probably not even three thousand.”

That was a good estimate. After all, before Yang Qi conquered and united the two continents, the Rich-Lush Continent only had the four chancellors of the institutes and the emperor of the Sage Ancestor Dynasty. What that indicated was that the vital energy of the continent itself was too weak to support any more than five Great Sages.

For a person to reach the Great Sage level required a lot of time and huge accumulation of vital energy. Unfortunately, the vital energy in the Rich-Lush Continent had been extremely limited, and had begun to wane over the years. That was why fewer and fewer Great Sages had risen up.

And yet, Yang Qi had just buried the remains of thirty thousand Great Sage fiend-devils in the lands around him, using them to bolster its vital energy and giving birth to a much more powerful energy flow within the continent itself.

The number of Great Sages would be limited in a given location, not just because of the quality of the vital energy, but also the type of energy flow created by the world’s essence. A continent was in some respects a living thing, and if it gave birth to too many top experts, who then began to fight amongst themselves, it could lead to widespread destruction. Therefore, a continent would limit the number of Great Sages to protect itself. Because of the strict control over the number of experts, it would have been impossible for the Rich-Lush Continent to produce a Demi-Immortal. After all, a Demi-Immortal would have been powerful enough to destroy the entire continent with almost no effort, or perhaps even accidentally.

There was no way a continent would produce an entity that could lead to its own destruction. Actually, truth be told, even the seventh step of the Great Sage level was technically too powerful. That was why, by means of some good fortune Chancellor Demi-Immortal encountered on his travels outside of the Rich-Lush Continent, he ended up ensconcing his nascent divinity in another location. Otherwise, he would never have been able to reach the seventh step.

Normally, the ensconcement of one’s nascent divinity in a continent, planet, or plane would be the key to successfully increasing one’s cultivation level. So anyone who ensconced their nascent divinity in the Rich-Lush Continent would never have been able to surpass the sixth step of the Great Sage level. As for the Quake-Dawn Continent, ensconcement there would limit one’s capacity to the Demi-Immortal level.

Ensconcement in an immortal plane such as the Titan Emperor Heaven would allow someone to push their cultivation to the Demolishing level.

And of course, Yang Qi had his nascent divinity ensconced in the Hell of Mahānata, an ancient plane and the most magnificent of all the hells, a place that had once waged war on the legion of gods. Who knew what limits would be placed on a nascent divinity ensconced there? After all, in Helltongue, Mahānata meant ‘grand’, and obviously only the grandest of entities could rise up from the grandest of hells.

The fact that thirty thousand Great Sage fiend-devils were now buried in the Sage Monarch Continent implied that it could theoretically allow thirty thousand Great Sages to exist.

That was not to mention the fact that some of the slaughtered fiend-devils had particularly strong blood, such as the Infernalfolk, who were nobility among fiend-devils.

And yet, Yang Qi wasn’t finished. He continued summoning more fiend-devils in the Great Sage level. After all, hells were like immortal worlds, in that they were ranked, and the Hell of Mahānata was one of the highest ranked.

Other places, like the Hells of Euphoria, Scorching Flame, Frigid Ice, or Mud Pits, couldn’t possibly compare.

Unfortunately, Yang Qi’s cultivation base limited the growth of the spore-devil, which in turn meant that he could only summon fifth step Great Sages. Not even the fact that his immortal child had a fifth step cultivation base helped, because his immortal child couldn’t summon the Hell Portal. Only Yang Qi’s true self, with the God Legion Seal, was capable of wielding such power.

Fiend-devils poured out like sand, bolstering the Sage Monarch Continent, giving it power, and causing its essence to flourish. At the same time, it caused tempests of wind and lightning to rise up in the depths of the continent.

Wind represented softness and lightning represented hardness. And the combination of softness and hardness represented eternity.

It was with a completely dazed expression that Ghost Emperor Yama continued to count in a hushed tone.

“Forty thousand. Fifty thousand. Sixty thousand. Seventy thousand….” The number climbed higher and higher and the Sage Monarch Continent continued to tremble deeply, until a flow of starlight appeared within its depths. It became a vortex that was an early sign of the formation of a new planetary system. Clearly, the Sage Monarch Continent had the potential to become, not just a planet, but a full-fledged planetary system. It could become a grand and expansive collection of worlds like the Yore-Wilds planetary system itself.

‘Right, the Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragment….’ Yang Qi suddenly thought. With a thought, he extracted the heart fragment from the God Legion Paradise and sent it into the vortex of starlight deep within the continent.

‘If I could get all of the fragments of the Yore-Wilds Heart and put them together, what would that mean for the potential of the Sage Monarch Continent?’ All of a sudden, he was filled with the ambition to do just that.

With all the heart fragments, as well as whatever treasures he might come across in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, it seemed highly likely that he could turn the Sage Monarch Continent into a planetary system. Perhaps it would not be as magnificent as the old Yore-Wilds, but maybe it would be enough for him to reach the Demi-Immortal level in that way.

It was impossible to say how difficult it would be for him to eventually reach the Demi-Immortal level. However, one thing was for certain; he would need to defeat a lot of eighth step Great Sages and take their sage motes to use as fuel.

Once he was a Demi-Immortal, he would have heaven-shaking, earth-shattering power, enough that he could rip open heaven, enter the immortal world, and have strength that rivaled a Demolisher.

“Immortal child!”

After absorbing a hundred thousand fiend-devil Great Sages and too many Legendaries to count, the Sage Monarch Continent stopped expanding. It hung there in the void, mountains towering above it, pulsing with spirit energy that was so strong it was almost liquid.

By this point, it was impossible to say how many of the commoners throughout the land had experienced cultivation breakthroughs. And from here on out, reaching the Great Sage level would no longer be an impossible dream for most.

Forgetting the Great Sage level, it was obvious that Legendaries would be springing like bamboo after a spring rain.

How many Legendary fiend-devils had Yang Qi summoned? A million? Ten million? Not even Ghost Emperor Yama had been able to keep track. All Yang Qi knew was that, for every Great Sage fiend-devil, he had summoned hundreds or maybe even thousands of weaker fiend-devils.

As for the immortal child, he was firmly linked to the essence of the continent and had grown significantly. Now he was one with the lands, and had used the immortal items Yang Qi provided to become the ultimate guardian of the continent’s greyspace.

The soil of the continent was like infinite tiny grains of crystal, which emanated a spirit energy that was like golden streams of blood.

The total area covered by the Sage Monarch Continent was now close to that of the Quake-Dawn Continent, and, in terms of its substructure, it was even denser. Although the Quake-Dawn Continent had plenty of spirit-energy-rich soil, it also had areas with ordinary soil. But in the Sage Monarch Continent, everything was spirit soil.

It was definitely a holy land of cultivation in every aspect.

**

While Yang Qi was in the middle of transforming the Sage Monarch Continent in a very significant way, there were many organizations and powers keeping a close eye on the situation.

Not too far away was the Quake-Dawn Continent and the many satellite planets which orbited around it. One such satellite was an ancient temple that was located in a hidden nexus.

The temple itself covered an area of tens of thousands of kilometers. Within that temple, a pair of eyes peered out toward the spirit-energy-rich Sage Monarch Continent.

“Holy Daughter, the Sage Monarch Continent has suddenly grown in size. In the past, it wasn’t even one ten-thousandth the size of our Quake-Dawn Continent. But now look at it. I can’t believe Yang Qi is that strong.”

This man wore completely black clothing that hid everything except his eyes. He was the Ninja God, a ninth step Epic Saga Sage, yet he could hardly believe what he was seeing.

He was standing next to a throne, upon which sat the Holy Daughter of the Quake-Dawn Cathedral. She held a moonlight scepter in one hand, and had a veil that covered her face, making it impossible to read her expression. “My son was a god from heaven descended into the mortal world, and he even acquired the legacy medallion of King Immortal-Slayer. And yet, he died at Yang Qi’s hands. Yang Qi will meet a tragic end, I tell you that.”

“Holy Daughter, is the Quake-Dawn Cathedral going to openly make a move against him? His cultivation base is so high that he can trample even ninth step Great Sages. Without a Demi-Immortal, I don't see how we could kill him. And that’s not to mention that his mother is a Demi-Immortal, or that he’s a student of the Titan Emperor Collegium. Compared to the collegium, our Quake-Dawn Cathedral is like a piece of dust.”

Obviously, the Ninja God had grown wary of making a move against Yang Qi.

“I know all that,” she replied. “But I can make use of others to do the dirty work. He killed my son, the Crown Prince, and that must be avenged. Have you forgotten that beyond the edge of the Four Wilds planetary system is the Megaplexus planetary system, which is managed by the Megaplexus Heaven? Are you telling me that they’re afraid of the Titan Emperor Collegium?”

Chapter 408: People from the Megaplexus Planetary System

Yang Qi ceaselessly tossed the corpses of fiend-devils into the Sage Monarch Continent, using them to bolster it and push toward becoming a planet, or perhaps, even a planetary system.

Right now, his top priority was to find enough resources to form the full essence and planetary core. He also needed to collect more Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragments. He wanted the continent to be a planet like the Quake-Dawn Continent, and, eventually, a planetary system to rival the old Yore-Wilds Continent. That way, he could make sure his immortal child became a Demi-Immortal and the continent became a minor world that could move about on its own. If war came to the Four Wilds planetary systems and other worlds invaded, Yang Qi wanted to be able to take the Sage Monarch Continent away to safety.

For now, it was deeply imbedded into the void and could not be easily moved. Even if he somehow managed to rip it out of its spot, he wouldn’t be able to move it very far.

His God Legion Paradise was powerful, but not powerful enough to hold an entire continent in it. Right now he was only in the second step, and unfortunately, being a Nirvanic Resurrection Sage wasn’t enough. The limits of his basic cultivation level prevented him from doing certain things that Without Limit or Epic Saga Sages were capable of.

After placing his immortal child into the Sage Monarch Continent, he erected a huge statue in the middle of the continent which resembled himself, formed from the bones of fiend-devils. That established that he was the creator of this new continent and the bearer of its essence and legacy.

Deep beneath the continent were the immortal formations and primal-chaos paleo-energy, which he had united into one force.

The continent itself shone like a sun, sending light far out into the void to illuminate the darkness and gloom.

At that point, Yang Qi had reached the limit of what he could do.

After all, his hometown, the old Rich-Lush Continent, was filled with many secrets. Many powerful organizations wanted to use it like a springboard to reach other locations via the ancient immortal formations and teleportation portals in it.

Yang Qi had lost track of time as he went about his work. Months had passed. Eventually, he opened his eyes, allowing a godly glow to spread out.

Using the Lord's Eye, he could see all of the various aspects of the continent itself. As it hung there glittering, it sucked power in from its environment and gave birth to spirit energy. Compared to the Quake-Dawn Continent, it was like a pearl resting there in the ruins of the Yore-Wilds planetary system.

But at the moment, Yang Qi was happy with his work. Now the time had come to seek out the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, get the treasure in it, then work on improving his cultivation base.

With that, he flew out into the void and flapped his Angel Wings, which propelled him forward with such incredible speed that he simply vanished. His current destination was the Coiling Arc planetary system.

His Elder Brothers and Sisters from the Invincible Society were likely already there, with him being a few months behind thanks to the work he had done in the Sage Monarch Continent. Considering the calculations Elder Second Brother had made, it seemed likely that the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart would make its appearance soon.

Based on the paths he had learned of in the ancient star atlases, he was confident that he could reach the Coiling Arc planetary system in time.

**

The Four Wilds planetary system was huge, and filled with countless planets and stars. The Yore-Wilds was in the north, but was quite disorderly and chaotic, thanks to the disaster which had visited it in the not-so-distant past. Beyond the border of the planetary system was the darkness and gloom of outer space, which extended for who knew how many hundreds of millions of kilometers, perhaps even billions.

It was known as the Dark True Void, and it was a very dangerous task to pass through it. As for the Sage Monarch Continent, it existed just on the edge of the Dark True Void.

Thanks to what Yang Qi had learned in the Titan Emperor Collegium, he knew that it was actually the demarcation between the areas governed by the Titan Emperor Heaven and those governed by the Megaplexus Heaven. At the moment, there was a nonaggression agreement between those two heavenly worlds, although the Dark True Void usually prevented interactions of any sort.

Truth be told, Yang Qi wasn’t very familiar with all of the parts of the Four Wilds planetary system that the Titan Emperor Heaven governed, much less the fabled Megaplexus Heaven. The only thing he did know was that the Spritefolk came from there, and that his Aunt Susu had been taken away to some distant location there.

After Yang Qi disappeared, the Dark True Void trembled as an enormous fleet of ships suddenly appeared, heading toward the ruins of the Yore-Wilds planetary system.

The fleet was made up of hundreds of battleships designed to traverse the depths of space, ancient in design, their hulls crafted from dragon bone and plated with bronze-like metal covered with complex patterns.

Each ship was tens of thousands of meters long, making them large enough to be cities, and they shone with dazzling light that pierced the darkness. All in all, they looked like gargantuan, vicious ghost-fish swimming through the darkness of outer space.

WOOOOSH!

Rumbling vibrations rolled off of the fleet as it stopped momentarily at the edge of the Dark True Void. The flagship was the largest, roughly twice as big as any of the others. It was covered with chain-like heaven motes which had been placed there by a Demi-Immortal.

The prow of the ship bore a mark, a character in an ancient script.

Northstar.

It was the name of a powerful clan from the Megaplexus Heaven.

On the bridge of the flagship was a group of noble-looking young men and women.

One of them was a burly young man with long black hair, who stood there with his hands clasped behind his back, looking out into the area beyond the Dark True Void.

“We’ve finally arrived in the Yore-Wilds planetary system,” he said.

The view stretched out in front of him was a sea of faintly glimmering heavenly bodies, weak and feeble to the extreme, almost deathly. A smile of scorn played out on the young man's face.

“In the distant past, many talents emerged from the Yore-Wilds. It’s hard to believe the place has sunk to such a low. The Four Wilds of the past were the Yore-Wilds, Waste-Wilds, Brute-Wilds, and Proto-Wilds. But back then, the best of them all was the Yore-Wilds. All of the top experts in the Titan Emperor Collegium came from there, and they were considered the ultimate enemy of the Megaplexus planetary system. To see that they’ve wasted away into this level of decay is actually quite pleasing.”

Standing next to the young man was a beautiful young woman. Snorting coldly, she said, “Well, isn’t it all the result of the carefully laid plans of the Megaplexus Collegium? It took thirty thousand years of scheming to make sure the gateway to the Hell of Euphoria was opened. When they invaded in full strength, the Yore-Wilds was destroyed. The only hitch was that the experts of the Yore-Wilds somehow managed to seal the breach.”

Another young man present smiled excitedly. “The ancient Yore-Wilds was nothing to look down on. They were protected by the gods and, according to the rumors, gave birth to the most mighty experts of the past, famous people who eventually ascended to the immortal world and dominated three thousand chiliocosm worlds. The unrivaled and unbeatable King Immortal-Slayer even came from there. Now, by means of the cosmic tide flow, we’ve managed to cross the Dark True Void and reach the Yore-Wilds. The time has come to accomplish our mission.”

“That’s right,” said yet another young man on the bridge. “Our Northstar Clan is one of the top clans in the Megaplexus Heaven, with numerous ancestors of the past who ascended to the immortal planes. Now it’s our generation’s turn to reach new heights of glory. According to the intelligence reports, the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart has appeared in the Coiling Arc star system, ensuring that the quintessence of the Titan Emperor Collegium are all gone. Hmph! The Four Wilds planetary system is empty and ripe for the plucking. The time has come to find the legacy medallions of King Immortal-Slayer!”

All of these young ones were ninth step Epic Saga Sages, powerful experts who radiated traces of immortal energy. Clearly, the entire group was on the very verge of reaching the Demi-Immortal level.

As they continued their discussion, a middle-aged man strode onto the bridge, emanating the fluctuations of a Demi-Immortal.

“It’s good to have so many elites from the Northstar Clan all gathered in one place,” he said.

The young ones all clasped hands in formal greeting. “Greetings, Uncle.”

The Megaplexus Heaven was divided into four major continents: the Northstar planetary system, the Southpalace planetary system, the Westgate planetary system, and the Eastwall planetary system, each of which was controlled by a powerful aristocratic clan.

“It is a momentous occasion,” the Demi-Immortal continued. “Our Northstar Clan has sent this small fleet of battleships through the Dark True Void to the Yore-Wilds planetary system to search for the legacy of King Immortal-Slayer. We must acquire all of those medallion fragments!

“King Immortal-Slayer conquered three thousand worlds and slaughtered immortals like they were dogs. Supposedly, he even stood up to the legion of gods. Although he was killed in the end, there is no question that he was absolutely peerless and unmatched. His legacy medallions contain immense energy flows and treasure hoards. With them, our Northstar Clan can ascend to new heights and wrest control of the mortal world.”

“That’s absolutely right, Uncle,” said one of the young elites. “How did your meeting with the elders go, sir? Did you divine the location of our first target? Where exactly are the medallion fragments?”

“We have some clues, of course. As we proceed along, we will plunder resources here and there. Even though the Yore-Wilds Continent is in fragments, there are still some places with impressive stores of treasures. As we carry out our search and plunder the locals, we will take any Great Sages and Demi-Immortals we find captive and turn them in for a reward when we get back to the Megaplexus planetary system. The wild blood of the people from the Yore-Wilds is much sought-after back home. Full speed ahead into the Yore-Wilds.”

The fleet quickly flew out of the Dark True Void and into the Yore-Wilds planetary system.

Boom!

Suddenly, one of the battleships hit a dead planet, which crumbled and sent out a shock wave of energy that the battleship absorbed. In the past, that tiny world had once contained a host of expensive ores, but now it was nothing but rubble.

Suddenly, one of the young Great Sages spotted the Sage Monarch Continent, glittering like a jewel on the edge of the Yore-Wilds planetary system.

“Uncle, look! Do you see? Up ahead. It's a continent! It looks full of spirit energy, like a holy land of cultivation!”

Chapter 409: Northstar Fleet

Compared to the rest of the crumbling and disorderly Yore-Wilds planetary system, the Sage Monarch Continent was actually quite eye-catching. It was much larger than the average location, almost like a planet. And although it wasn't a full planet yet, in many ways, it actually surpassed most other planets. The Quake-Dawn Continent wasn’t too far away, but seemed a bit lackluster in comparison.

In the Proto-Wilds, Waste-Wilds, and Brute-Wilds, a location like this wouldn’t be particularly noticeable. But in the devastated Yore-Wilds planetary system, it was like a pearl sitting in the dust.

The people on the bridge of the Northstar Fleet flagship were all quite surprised.

“Not a bad planet. Plentiful spirit energy, as well as a lot of life force. There’s actually heaven motes there. And look at the sage motes. The remains of Great Sages abound in the lands there.”

“I can’t believe a place like this actually exists in the rubble of the Yore-Wilds!”

“Incredible. Truly incredible! Well, we have to take it. There are definitely a lot of cultivation resources to be had, and the people there will fetch a great price back home. Captives with the blood of the Yore-Wilds are the perfect subjects to transform into death knights.”

“Hold on,” one of the young men said, his voice quivering with astonishment. “It’s actually not a planet. It’s only a continent!”

“Impossible! How could it have so much energy, but not be a planet? You almost never see this situation!”

“No, he's right. It’s not a planet yet. It’s in a state of preheaven primal-chaos, with plenty of potential for growth. Man, we really got lucky, didn’t we? If one of us ninth step Great Sages fused with that place’s essence and transformed it into a planet, we would be able to reach the Demi-Immortal level!”

“We have to conquer that continent!”

In the blink of an eye, hundreds of experts within the fleet were whipped into a state of deep excitement. They had only just entered the Yore-Wilds planetary system and had already found an incredible treasure.

“There’s more to that continent than meets the eye…” said the Demi-Immortal. “You can sense the auras of many fallen Great Sages there, almost as if the place were built on their corpses. How could someone have created a continent in that way? What happened here? Well, we came here to conquer and pillage, so the people there are destined to be our slaves. Send down orders to start the invasion.”

“Yes sir!”

Countless powerful auras sprang up as the Great Sages prepared for war.

Meanwhile, not very far away from the Sage Monarch Continent in the Quake-Dawn Continent, numerous pairs of eyes were locked onto the fleet from the Northstar Clan.

Prominent in the group was none other than the Holy Daughter of the Quake-Dawn Cathedral. She was joined by the Ninja God, Winter God, Oracle God, and War God. Also present was the founder and leader of the entire Quake-Dawn Cathedral itself, the enigmatic Lord Quake-Dawn, although he was hidden in something that resembled a bottle gourd.

Surprisingly, the main rival of the Quake-Dawn Cathedral was present, the Wilds God from the Grand-Wilds Mansion.

After watching the Northstar Fleet fly out into the open, the Wilds God snorted coldly. “So they crossed the Dark True Void to our ruined Yore-Wilds planetary system, and now they’ll take out the Sage Monarch Continent. Well, Yang Qi can only blame his own impulsiveness. I don’t know how he did it, but he somehow managed to transform that continent into a holy land of cultivation.”

Looking like a picture of vicious ferocity and venomous murder, the Ninja God said, “You're right, Wilds God. This is a case of joining forces to fight a common enemy. In the Hanging Mountain’s training competition, our best and brightest disciples were both killed by Yang Qi, and now we will use others as a weapon to kill both him and the Holy Mother of the Hanging Mountain.”

“Very well,” Lord Quake-Dawn said from within the void. “For us, this is a case of asking a tiger for its skin. Win or lose, it all ends here. The Northstar Fleet came here to plunder and conquer. Although we told them we would offer help, I'm absolutely certain that they’ll go back on their word later. After they take the Sage Monarch Continent, they’ll come for the Quake-Dawn Continent. Ladies and gentlemen, I know that all of you are wise and experienced. You know that everyone born in the Yore-Wilds planetary system has special blood that the people from the Megaplexus Heaven will pay godly-grade spirit stones to get.”

Lord Quake-Dawn controlled all of the three thousand daoist sects and hundred thousand smaller factions of the Quake-Dawn Continent, and he had the reputation of being a terrifying individual. In fact, many people from the Hanging Mountain feared him. Were it not for him, there were many factions among the Demonfolk who would have long since invaded and occupied the Quake-Dawn Continent. Instead, they only did business with them.

“What do we do now, Lord Quake-Dawn?” the War God asked. He was a tall, hulking man, clad in armor, with an enormous war hammer in his hand. That hammer was the size of a small mountain, and could easily crush the starry sky into dust. He was also a ninth step Epic Saga Sage, just on the verge of becoming a Demi-Immortal.

The Quake-Dawn Cathedral had four main halls. The Hall of Ninjas, the Hall of Oracles, the Hall of Winter, and the Hall of Warriors.

The hall masters were all ninth step Great Sages. However, the Holy Daughter was a Demi-Immortal, as was Lord Quake-Dawn.

“The time has come to get the tiger and the wolf to kill each other,” Lord Quake-Dawn said, a smile audible in his words. “Yang Qi created the Sage Monarch Continent and his mother, the Hanging Mountain’s Holy Mother, has long since come to view the place as her son’s temple. With the Northstar Fleet heading to the Sage Monarch Continent, it's a foregone conclusion that she’ll step in to defend it. And when the fighting breaks out… who knows how it will end.”

“When two tigers fight, at least one will get injured!

“When the sandpiper and the clam fight, the fisherman benefits!

“It’s the perfect plan. The Holy Mother currently reigns supreme in the Hanging Mountain. Her cultivation base has continued to rise through the years, to the point where she forced even August Patriarch Mammoth Heaven to bow his head. Now that the Northstar Clan has invaded, she’ll definitely make a move.” It really seemed as if he had everything planned out perfectly. Sounding profoundly sinister, he continued, “Ladies and gentlemen, you are the best of the best from the Quake-Dawn Cathedral. Wilds God from the Grand-Wilds Mansion, you are here to provide even further support. And the three thousand daoist sects and the hundred thousand smaller factions will provide endless supplies of Great Sages.

“The time has come to reveal the truth. I have long since gained control of the essence of the Quake-Dawn Continent, and am prepared to enact Operation Azure Heavens. When the critical moment arrives, I’ll unleash my trump card, and the Holy Mother, the August Patriarch, and the Northstar Fleet will all be wiped out! And I will reach an untold level of cultivation power.”

By the time he reached the end of his monologue, Lord Quake-Dawn’s voice trembled, as if with madness.

“What? Lord Quake-Dawn, is that really your plan?” Everyone present was completely taken aback.

He snorted coldly in response. “Operation Azure Heavens was originally intended for the Crown Prince. Sadly, he perished and lost King Immortal-Slayer’s medallion to Yang Qi. Unfortunately, I was in seclusion when that most unexpected event occurred. It was only by killing the Crown Prince that Yang Qi grew so powerful. Soon I will capture that mother of his and force Yang Qi to return King Immortal-Slayer’s medallion. I've planned everything out to the last detail, to the extent of luring the Northstar Fleet out here. Soon, all of you will see that Lord Quake-Dawn controls everything!”

Even as he spoke, an enormous spell formation appeared in the depths of the Quake-Dawn Cathedral. “Come. All of you enter the spell formation and draw on your true energy. Stick with me and I guarantee that all of you will be Demi-Immortals soon.”

Operation Azure Heavens had once again appeared in the world.

The Crown Prince had used it to reach the Great Sage level and then, in his insufferable arrogance, had led eighteen Great Sages to kill Yang Qi. Now, Lord Quake-Dawn was using Operation Azure Heavens to try to put an end to the Hanging Mountain, the Sage Monarch Continent, and the Northstar Fleet.

Without manipulating these forces to fight and kill each other, there was no way that Lord Quake-Dawn, who usually remained hidden in the shadows, could ever contend with the Hanging Mountain.

Slowly but surely, he was attempting to get the tiger and the wolf to kill each other.

As Operation Azure Heavens took effect, the entire Quake-Dawn Continent slipped into an aspect of the void and vanished from the Yore-Wilds planetary system.

The development did not go unnoticed by the lookouts in the Northstar Fleet.

“Uncle,” said one of the young ones on the bridge. “The Quake-Dawn Continent just vanished. It seems they noticed the arrival of our fleet and went into hiding.”

“That doesn’t matter,” the Demi-Immortal replied. “The monk can hide in the temple, but can't flee it. Obviously, they’re worried about getting caught in the crossfire. Unfortunately for them, our Northstar Fleet has come to conquer and plunder and we won’t let anyone off the hook. After we take this continent here, we’ll move on to the Quake-Dawn Continent. And beyond that is the so-called Hanging Mountain.”

RUMBLE!

The fleet sailed through the void, kicking up spatial tempests and even destroying certain smaller planets and asteroids that got in their way.

**

Somewhere in the Sage Monarch Continent, the immortal child was currently meditating. Suddenly, his eyes opened and he looked skyward, his vision piercing through the mists and clouds until he caught sight of the fleet above.

“An enemy invasion!” He leapt to his feet, an expression of shock on his face. “People from a foreign land. They must have come from across the Dark True Void. Ancient ships, ancient weapons, and the auras of multiple Demi-Immortals….”

The immortal child was a clone of Yang Qi, and they were essentially the same person. His cultivation base was in the fifth step, making him a Light King Sage. However, he could easily defeat seventh step opponents. Unfortunately, the incoming fleet had multiple Demi-Immortals, which meant that they could easily crush the Sage Monarch Continent into powder!

In fact, not even Yang Qi’s true self would be able to stop them.

Chapter 410: True Danger

As the huge fleet rumbled toward the Sage Monarch Continent, Yang Qi’s immortal clone could sense powerful wills pulsing within it.

As he faced the fleet, a very serious expression could be seen on his face. It came from the holy land of cultivation across the Dark True Void, the Megaplexus planetary system. It was rife with signs of Demi-Immortals, which meant that it was more powerful than any enemy force Yang Qi had ever faced.

Already, the clone felt an overwhelming sensation of danger.

Back when Yang Qi had been in the Titan Emperor Collegium, he had experienced a premonition that the Sage Monarch Continent would face danger in the near future. After all, if invaders came, the Sage Monarch Continent would be one of the first things they encountered. But he could never have predicted that the danger would be like this.

As soon as the immortal child realized what was happening, he passed the message to his true self, who was currently flying toward the Coiling Arc planetary system.

When Yang Qi realized that his family and his home were in danger, he immediately abandoned any thoughts of searching for the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Spinning in place, he headed back toward the Sage Monarch Continent at top speed, simultaneously sending a message to his mother in the Hanging Mountain.

RUMBLE!

The fleet stopped just outside of the Sage Monarch Continent’s greyspace, where it began to build up godpower to unleash a massive blow.

Deeper in the flagship than the bridge was the palace deck, where ten elders sat. All of them were Demi-Immortals. The highest ranking of them all wore a violet robe and had eyes that sparkled with violet energy.

He was the most powerful of them, an old-timer named Northstar First-Rank, who served as the admiral of the fleet.

With a thought, he reached out to the Demi-Immortal on the bridge. “Target the continent’s greyspace,” he said, “but don’t damage the continent in the process. And once they’re inside, the first priority should be to capture the rulers.”

Meanwhile, on the bridge, the Demi-Immortal passed the message along. “Be careful when you unleash the godpower. You absolutely, positively must not destroy the continent itself. And don't kill anyone. Although these people are mere ants, they’re still valuable. Each and every one of them represents a huge amount of wealth.”

“Yes sir.” The more than one hundred young Epic Saga Sages immediately complied.

However, that was when a tall, strapping figure appeared atop the greyspace of the Sage Monarch Continent. It was none other than Ghost Emperor Yama, who looked up fearfully at the fleet and sent out a stream of energy to cover the continent.

Suddenly, two figures blurred into shape in front of Ghost Emperor Yama, a young man and a young woman.

“Don’t waste your time,” the young man said. “A weakling like you might as well be an ant compared to us. I didn’t even realize people so pitiful existed.”

From the expressions on the faces of this young man and woman, they viewed themselves as noble, civilized people who had encountered a savage barbarian for the first time.

“I’m Northstar Myth of the Northstar Clan in the Megaplexus planetary system. This is Northstar Jade.” With that, the two of them just looked at Ghost Emperor Yama, as if they expected him to drop to his knees, kowtow, and beg for mercy.

“So,” Northstar Jade said, “this is a monster from the Hell of Yamas. Unfortunately, his hellish blood is too weak. He must be one of those lesser fiend-devils. And look, he’s only an eighth step Great Sage. I guess that’s enough to make him a ruler of a place like this. In the ruins of the Yore-Wilds, eighth step fiend-devils are probably rare, but in the Northstar Continent they’re a dime a dozen. Alright, fiend-devil. Get on your knees and beg for mercy. Then hand over your continent and all of its people and treasure.”

At this point, Yang Qi’s clone appeared in front of Ghost Emperor Yama. By now, the immortal child resembled Yang Qi in just about every aspect, including his size and height. And although he only had a fifth step cultivation base, he was roughly as strong as the seventh.

Yang Qi had sacrificed tens upon tens of thousands of fiend-devils to the Sage Monarch Continent and the immortal child was one with those lands, providing him with good fortune from heaven and earth.

Furthermore, the immortal child could benefit from his true self’s enlightenment. Yang Qi was currently as enlightened as a fifth step Great Sage, with a fleshly body that was even more powerful. However, his true level was only the second step.

Although he could continue to gain enlightenment of the sixth, seventh, eighth, and ninth steps, his fleshly body and cultivation base would stay at the second.

However, because they shared the same mind, his immortal clone could benefit from his true self’s enlightenment.

In other words, as long as Yang Qi got the proper enlightenment, his immortal child could increase his cultivation level.

Considering the situation, the immortal child knew that he was in charge, and couldn’t afford any slipups. At the very least, he needed to buy some time until his mother and true self arrived.

“Sir, ma’am,” he said, “you represent the Megaplexus Heaven, correct? Well, we’re administered by the Titan Emperor Heaven. As you know, well water does not mix with river water. So why don’t we just keep out of each other’s affairs?”

Northstar Myth and Northstar Jade were at first surprised to see the immortal child. But then, they chuckled. Looking amused, Northstar Myth said, “So, someone used an immortal embryo to create a clone that’s already in the fifth step? That’s pretty impressive, although it doesn’t make you any less of a piece of trash. You people have only one choice: become slaves of the Northstar Fleet. Not even death is an option for you. When we decide to take a person captive, that person would never dare to die.”

At this point, certain members of the parliament of elders flew up. Trembling with fear, Chancellor Sun Moon said, “Friends from the Megaplexus Heaven, our Sage Monarch Continent is a tiny location and could never sustain an attack from experts like you. How about we just agree to be your subjects, and you go on your way?”

“What nerve you have!” Northstar Jade said. “Subjects? Are you kidding me? You don't deserve such an honor. You only deserve to be slaves. I’ll give you ten breaths of time to save us some time and effort by opening up that pathetic greyspace of yours and completely surrendering. If you don’t, we might get pissed off and just execute all of you. Decide for yourselves. Resistance is pointless and would only result in unnecessary casualties.”

“So, you’re saying you plan to massacre us?” Yang Qi’s clone said, his eyes sparkling. He knew that now was the time to play things smart.

“Massacre you? We’re giving you a way out!” Northstar Jade said.

“Stop trying to buy time,” Northstar Myth said. “It’s obvious that you’re hoping reinforcements will arrive. What, you think your true self is going to show up? Even if he did, it wouldn't do any good. He’d just be throwing his life away. By the way, even if he tried to run, we have a secret magic we can use on you, to force him out of hiding. No matter what you do, you’re going to lose.”

“Or we could wait to see what tricks he has up his sleeve,” Northstar Jade said.

The two of them chuckled as though they didn’t have a care in the world.

“What was that?” someone said. Suddenly, a rift opened, and a young man stepped out, clad in the God Legion Battle Robe, a long spear in his hand.

Yang Qi’s true self had arrived.

Thanks to his mysterious connection to the Sage Monarch Continent, and the speed provided by the Angel Wings, he had been able to pierce through the void with dazzling speed.

Northstar Jade and Northstar Myth were initially startled, but after seeing Yang Qi they felt more confident than ever.

“You’re the true self? You're only a second step Great Sage! How come you’re so weak?”

“You have some incredible latent power in you,” Northstar Myth said. “What’s your bloodline? Do you have a battle body from an immortal world?”

“Get on your knees right now and give us three sets of three kowtows,” Northstar Jade ordered. “If you do, I’ll allow you to be my personal slave. If you get thrown in with everyone else then I can’t guarantee your safety. You’ll definitely end up getting sold and sent to some remote location where you could easily get killed. Sticking with me is the safest option.”

She was smiling as surely as if she had found an enormous pearl sticking out of the mud.

“Is that so?” Yang Qi said. “Northstar Clan, huh? Is that a really big clan?”

Northstar Jade laughed. “That’s right. The Megaplexus planetary system is made up of the Northstar Continent, the Southpalace Continent, the Westgate Continent, and the Eastwall Continent. Of all of them, our Northstar Continent is the strongest. Your Yore-Wilds used to be the strongest of the planetary systems overseen by the Titan Emperor Heaven. But the Hell of Euphoria invaded and now you’re nothing but scattered ruins. You couldn’t even come close to comparing to us. If you become my slave and serve me loyally, you’ll achieve glories you never dreamed of before.”

“Since that’s how it is, I guess—”

“Very well, on your knees,” Northstar Jade interrupted, under the impression that she had frightened him well enough.

“I wasn’t finished. Since that’s how it is, I guess I’ll kill you. Let’s see if your Northstar Clan is really that strong, or if it's all hot air!” Even as the words left his mouth, he lunged forward, surrounded by dazzling light.

RUMBLE!

His spear vibrated with destructive power and radiated sagelight filled with projections of god-spirits.

In the blink of an eye, the tip of his spear was at Northstar Jade’s chest.

Chapter 411: Slaughter

Yang Qi’s true self was only a second step Great Sage, but even back when he first joined the Titan Emperor Collegium he was able to fight ninth step Epic Saga Sages.

Later, he had gone through a session of cultivation in the Invincible Society in which he absorbed power and knowledge from multiple mutant humans. He had also studied all sorts of items from the World of Mirages.

His Elder Second Brother, a powerful Demi-Immortal expert, had given him insights regarding his cultivation base, and he had plenty of Blood of the One God. Even more relevant, he had nearly a hundred million particles awakened, which meant that a single fist strike of his was as strong as almost a hundred million ancient megamammoths.

After all of that, he had returned to the Sage Monarch Continent and spent months summoning and killing fiend-devils, which he used to build the continent into something far greater than before. The truth was that he had already gained full enlightenment of the Light King Step, and was now contemplating the Heavenly Workings Step.

Once he gained enlightenment of that step, his true self wouldn’t be able to achieve any breakthroughs, but his immortal child could, and it would result in a huge boost in battle prowess for him.

He was now definitely strong enough to slaughter Epic Saga Sages.

Sadly for Northstar Myth and Northstar Jade, that was their exact level.

During the entire conversation, Yang Qi had kept his killing intent hidden, only to launch a surprise attack at the last moment!

Before either of them could react, the Infernal Deity Spear stabbed directly into Northstar Jade's chest.

POP!

She looked down in disbelief at the spear which had pierced right through her defensive empyrean energy and into her fleshly body.

“Northstar Sage Domain!” she blurted, drawing on all the powers of an Epic Saga Sage to protect herself. Instantly, her sage domain sprang out, filled with burning flame and crashing lightning, as well as countless sage motes that formed a Go board. On the intersecting points of the board were a host of Go pieces, which were formed from her life essence spirit.

“Northstar Transmigration. Sage Invincibility!”

Grabbing the Infernal Deity Spear with both hands, she wrenched it out of her chest, resulting in a hundreds-meter-long spray of blood.

“Hand of the One God!”

Not waiting for her to launch a counter attack, Yang Qi thrust his hands out in front of him, powering it with the Blood of the One God. Instantly, winds screamed and he was surrounded by faint, shadowy figures. He looked like a giant god from ancient times, out to destroy the world, a deathless and everlasting deity that would be written about in the histories of time.

POP!

His blow hit the Northstar Sage Domain and the entire thing burst into raging flames then shattered.

A huge mushroom cloud billowed up, accompanied by an agonized shriek from Northstar Jade as she was transformed into nothing but ash.

In the blink of an eye, a ninth step Epic Saga Sage was evaporated into nothing.

This was the deadly nature of the Hand of the One God.

WHIZZZ!

After she died, all of her quintessence energy, sage motes, power, and even her martial abilities, were sucked into Yang Qi and thrown into his Hellfire Crucible.

Sonorous rumbling filled him as he received rapid enlightenment from the influx of resources. All of a sudden, he understood the fundamental nature of the universe better, and his nascent divinity trembled as he glimpsed the boundless heavenly workings visible out in the void.

The instant his enlightenment rose from the fifth step into the sixth, his immortal child experienced a cultivation base breakthrough. The four elements of earth, water, fire, and wind raged, and Space-Void Godlightning crashed, pushing the Sage Monarch Continent to even greater heights.

In the blink of an eye, the continent grew larger, stronger, and more mysterious. The spirit energy grew more powerful, and the element of lightning grew more profuse.

As the lightning crashed into the mountains of the continent, new life appeared.

Among all of the elements, lightning was the most powerful—especially tribulation lightning. And when such lightning struck land, it would provide abundant life force.

Thus, the immortal child's tribulation benefited the Sage Monarch Continent significantly.

Even as Yang Qi gained enlightenment of the Heavenly Workings Step, Northstar Myth stared at him in shock. A long moment passed before he regained his composure, whereupon he shouted, “You…. Northstar Jade is dead? You killed her? You’ve doomed yourself! Nobody in all creation can save you now, you despicable savage.”

Then he spun to flee.

Of course, there was no way that Yang Qi would let him simply run away.

He reached out with a mysterious aspect of the Hand of the One God, a move filled with a thousand variations, and as bold as a mammoth.

Smack!

The hand landed on Northstar Myth, and his sage domain exploded, causing his face to distort with pain and anger. He tried to curse, but before he could, he exploded just as Northstar Jade had, transforming into nothing but ash, his quintessence-blood and vital energy flowing smoothly into the Hellfire Crucible.

In ten short breaths of time, two Epic Saga Sages had come to nothing.

Yang Qi had taken out eighth step Without Limit Sages in the past, but this was his first time killing people in the ninth step.

The Epic Saga Step was so named because after one came to understand heavenly workings, they had to experience things the likes of which would be recounted for ages to come. At the same time, their quintessence-blood and vital energy gained information the likes of which would be recorded in ancient, epic sagas.

Obviously, the epic sagas contained within such blood could be of extreme help to lower-level Great Sages. In fact, Yang Qi already felt like he was gaining understanding of the seventh Planet God Step.

“Northstar Jade and Northstar Myth are dead. They were killed in the blink of an eye.” The deaths of the two Epic Saga Sages was causing quite a stir back in the Northstar Fleet. Although ninth step Great Sages were numerous in the clan, for them to be killed was still quite a provocation.

The experts of the Northstar Clan viewed the people of the Yore-Wilds as weaklings and savages, and therefore would never tolerate them killing people with noble blood in them.

“Attack!”

“Slaughter these savages and bring me their leaders!”

RUMBLE!

Massive energy fluctuations rolled out as a Demi-Immortal elder appeared, a man named Northstar Sea, who was a bloodline senior of Northstar Jade and Northstar Myth.

Although the entire fleet belonged to the Northstar Clan, clans like this were immense and would have many bloodline factions that would struggle for dominance. For Northstar Jade and Northstar Myth to have been killed was a big loss of face for their bloodline, which forced the Demi-Immortal expert of that bloodline to take action.

After all, even a Lesser Demi-Immortal would be a hundred times as powerful as an Epic Saga Sage. Sages were still considered mortals and couldn’t possibly compare to immortals.

Northstar Sea shot out from the fleet like a god of death and headed toward the Sage Monarch Continent. In fact, before he could even approach the mere fluctuations of his energy threatened to shatter the lands below.

“Activate the spell formations in the greyspace!” Yang Qi ordered, and down below, countless cultivation experts sank into the primal-chaos paleo-energy beneath the continent to do just that.

“You killed my relatives, you evil creatures. You’ll die for that. All of you!”

Even as Northstar Sea descended, he unleashed a palm strike that filled the sky, turning everything black as it wrapped around the entire Sage Monarch Continent.

“Hand of the One God! Creation!”

Yang Qi unleashed a profound martial discipline, and as he did, the Blood of the One God in his forehead stirred violently. The golden imp trembled and profound truths of the martial path filled his head. It was time to call upon all of the most deadly moves of the Hand of the One God.

By now, the Hand of the One God was no mere energy art. It was a martial discipline that had been refined by the Blood of the One God and blessed by the golden imp. As such, Yang Qi’s mind was now filled with the various moves and stances that made up the technique.

The Hand of the One God was befitting of the legion of gods and the paramount Lord. It was something that could end the heavens, crush the earth, and bring about the destruction of worlds.

RUMBLE!

When Northstar Sea’s fist met Creation, Yang Qi staggered backward, cracks spreading out on his skin. And then, Northstar Sea slowly finished his descent.

Eyes glittering, he said, “Not bad. Not bad at all. In fact, that was excellent. A second step Great Sage actually managed to meet the strike of a Demi-Immortal like me, with little more than surface wounds. I’ve never encountered another Great Sage who could do such a thing.”

Chapter 412: Killing a Demi-Immortal

‘So, I can’t stand up to even a single move from a Demi-Immortal.’

Even using Creation, he still ended up covered with wounds with his sage domain severely damaged. It also took a very long moment to neutralize the energy raging throughout his body.

The upside was that after getting the Demi-Immortal’s energy under control and sending it to his Hellfire Crucible, his blood vessels and meridians improved significantly.

Yet again, the unique properties of the God Legion Paradise were on display.

As long as he wasn’t killed, virtually any attack levied against him could be converted into useful energy. Even the most dangerous fiend-devil power from hell was included in that.

Although he couldn’t really fight a Demi-Immortal at the moment, at least he wouldn't be killed instantly.

Looking up, he said, “So what if you’re a Demi-Immortal? You’re only a Lesser Demi-Immortal, right?”

Laughing heartily, he shot upward, heading directly toward Northstar Sea.

The Hand of the One God parted all mists and clouds as he resorted to three stances this time. Creation. Destruction. Nature. The profoundly enigmatic truths of the martial path were clearly evident within these moves.

There were multiple stances within the Hand of the One God, but right now he only had enlightenment of three of them. The final stance, Nature, was what he had gained understanding of earlier when slaughtering the two ninth step Great Sages, thanks to the resulting increase in the Blood of the One God.

The move of Nature could slash open the cosmos itself, immediately causing numerous symbols of divination to appear. Subterranean torrents, volcanoes, pools of lightning, and other images appeared, then merged with each other to form the most imposing image of nature possible.

It was an image that represented the most mystical and supernatural elements of the natural world, all combined into one martial stance.

The transformations of yin and yang encompassed all of the connections of heaven and earth, and the transpositions of the sun and moon.

Tens of thousands of shining moons and burning suns appeared in Yang Qi’s palm as it bore down on Northstar Sea.

‘I can't believe this savage is so strong!’ Northstar Sea thought. He had only just recently become a Lesser Demi-Immortal, but that was still nothing to scoff at, and he had assumed that taking care of Yang Qi would be an easy task.

Unfortunately, Yang Qi only seemed to get stronger with each exchange of moves and was not the kind of opponent that could be taken out with a single attack.

“You want to die, you despicable barbarian? Fine, I’ll make your wish come true!” Northstar Sea suddenly exploded with the aura of a Demi-Immortal and a minor world appeared over his head. Waving his hand, he sent a streak of dazzling light through space-time to slash Yang Qi’s Nature stance into pieces.

“Trample Heaven to Pieces!” Northstar Sea growled. Numerous spell formation charts appeared beneath his feet, spreading out to form an enormous Go board which began descending toward Yang Qi and the Sage Monarch Continent.

Yang Qi’s facial expression was the picture of calm. He knew that he absolutely had to go all out to keep Northstar Sea at bay. If he didn’t, and the man’s spell formation charts hit the Sage Monarch Continent, the lands would be in dire trouble.

“Uproot Mountains and Rivers!” Yang Qi said, waving his hands out in front of him. As he did, an enormous pillar of magical laws shot up into the spell formation charts, temporarily halting their momentum.

“You, a puny savage, are forcing me to use one of my most deadly moves. I'm intrigued! You obviously have a battle body from an immortal plane, and soon it’s going to be mine. Prepare to face my Iron-Blood Warfare Energy!”

Swish!

The energies of iron and blood swirled above Northstar Sea’s head, taking the form of a huge banner. At the same time, the flames of war seemed to engulf the universe.

In response, several Demi-Immortals suddenly flew out from the Northstar Fleet.

“Northstar Sea is actually using his Iron-Blood Warfare Energy! That’s a majestic heavenly-class energy art; in other words, an immortal skill. It combines true energy and magical laws to become the Iron-Blood Battle Banner, which can unleash unimaginable destructive power. Normally speaking, it's something that would only be used to fight fellow Demi-Immortals. But he’s actually using it on that puny savage? Is that really necessary?”

“Yeah! What level is that savage anyway? He's only in the second step?”

“A second step Great Sage is fighting a Demi-Immortal and has forced him to use a heavenly-class energy art? Am I seeing things?”

“That barbarian is definitely a consummate genius. You hardly ever see battle bodies from the immortal worlds, but that’s definitely what he has. Although, for a slave to be in the possession of a battle body would be a big waste. The best thing to do would be to strip away his soul and take over his fleshly body with some sort of soul-possession technique. Obviously, that’s exactly what Northstar Sea wants to do.”

“I don’t think a battle body like that even exists in the Megaplexus planetary system. We can't let Northstar Sea get it. We have to get it!”

“Go now! Get that savage. And make sure not to harm his fleshly body, otherwise it will all be a big waste. Capture him alive!”

RUMBLE!

Clearly, Northstar Sea had been ready for a development like this. “I can’t believe you people want to steal this husk of a body. It’s mine!”

Laughing heartily, he sent out a divine glow that completely blocked the path of anyone from the fleet. At the same time, he waved his Iron-Blood Battle Banner, which swept out to wrap up both Yang Qi and the Sage Monarch Continent.

As soon as the Iron-Blood Battle Banner unfurled, Yang Qi knew that he was in a moment of life or death, and it forced him into a state of complete, emotionless calm. Without any hesitation, he sent his God Legion Paradise out, enlarging it to the point where it contained the entire Sage Monarch Continent.

Then he began growing larger, throwing his head back and raging at the heavens like an ancient megamammoth.

Under the assault of the Iron-Blood Battle Banner, the surface of the God Legion Paradise began to crack and crumble. The mad power of a Demi-Immortal almost immediately began to turn Yang Qi’s true energy into dust.

Not even the God Legion Paradise was able to stand up to this level of power.

“The God Legion Paradise is the Glory of the Lord. I am the Lord, and the Glory of the One God Protects the Legion of Gods….” Dazzling sagelight poured out of him, like the final radiance of the setting sun.

Divine light swirled over his head to resist the Iron-Blood Battle Banner and, in the end, stopped its momentum.

“Damnation! Are you trying to force me to kill you?” Northstar Sea stamped down with his foot.

RUMBLE!

The void shattered as an enormous spell formation appeared, taking the shape of a gigantic Go board.

POP!

Yang Qi finally lost control, and blood sprayed out of his mouth as he tumbled backward. He had managed to hold on thus far under the assault of a Demi-Immortal, but he couldn’t last much longer. He was like an oil lamp flickering on the verge of being extinguished.

His cultivation level was simply too low to stand up to this enemy.

“There’s no reason to keep this fight going, savage,” Northstar Sea said. “Your body is mine, and I’ll imprison your soul to experience torture like that of the worst hell.”

He waved the Iron-Blood Battle Banner again, causing it to shrink back down as it shot forward.

‘Time to go for broke!’ Yang Qi thought. With that, he prepared to cast aside the pain he felt and burn all of the Blood of the One God to activate the God Legion Seal. It was only recently that he had come to a new level of enlightenment and had an inkling of how to use the Blood of the One God to actively control the seal.

However, the Blood of the One God was extremely precious and he didn’t want to waste it. It represented all of the bitter cultivation he had practiced since leaving the Hell of Mahānata. If he destroyed that blood, he would drop back to the level of only being able to fight seventh step Great Sages.

Unfortunately, he had reached a point where he couldn’t hold back any longer.

Maintaining complete focus, he prepared to make that grievous sacrifice.

However, that was when a beam of light appeared behind him, and a hand stretched out that was as fair as crystal or jade. It was fair and slender, but at the same time, more stable than anything, and it pulsed with the aura of the most venerable, paragon-like entities.

POP!

The hand sent out a stream of true energy that could crush anything it touched, and caused everything around it to twist and distort from the boundless and mysterious level of power it contained.

When that jade-like hand touched the Iron-Blood Battle Banner, the banner collapsed into nothing.

What level of power was this?

It seemed weak on the surface, but in truth, it had the power to demolish the void.

“What’s this?” Northstar Sea blurted, instantly convinced that this hand was far beyond his own capability to deal with.

Without any hesitation, he began to back up.

As he did, the voice of a woman rang out. “Who the hell do you think you are!? Did you just call my son a savage? If anyone here is a savage, it’s you!”

A beautiful young woman appeared, hardly more than a teenager. And yet, as soon as Northstar Sea laid eyes on her, it was as if he had lost control of all of his true energy, which began rushing toward her like she was a black hole.

“You, a mere Lesser Demi-Immortal, dare to mess with my son?”

She was none other than the Holy Mother of the Hanging Mountain, and Yang Qi’s mother, Greensura.

Her mere presence and aura caused all space and time in the area to settle down.

C-C-CRACK!

Her hand was an unwavering weapon that could destroy emotions, personality, reason, and desire.

She blurred into motion, and in the same moment, appeared behind the fleeing Northstar Sea.

Northstar Sea spun, clenched his hand into a fist, and launched an attack.

“Iron-Blood Battle Dao; A Fist to Devastate the Nine Heavens!”

“Ai!” The Holy Mother merely sighed. “You, a mere firefly, seek to outshine the bright moon?” She reached out with an open palm and grabbed his fist. Instantly, creaking sounds could be heard, then crunching sounds as his bones were crushed.

Crack!

She twisted her hand, ripping his arm off of his torso.

‘Not good!’ he thought, turning to flee.

And yet, she simply took a step forward and reached out with her slender hand again. As she did, jade dragons erupted out of her palm, twisting and turning in all directions.

Her hand was like that of an infernal deity as it latched onto Northstar Sea’s head, making it impossible for him to move. In response, he screamed in agony. “This… this is the Jade-Emperor Profound-Welkin Exalted-Celestial God-Dao! How could an energy art like this appear in the mortal world!?”

“Heard of it? Then you know it’s a godly-class energy art….” When the Holy Mother spoke, her voice was soft, yet even as the words left her mouth Northstar Sea melted into a pool of blood and gore. He was dead. Utterly and thoroughly dead.

Chapter 413: The Might of the Holy Mother

The aristocratic Northstar Clan was one of the four most powerful clans in the planetary system governed by the Megaplexus Heaven. And Northstar Sea was a Demi-Immortal expert, one of the stronger people in his clan.

But in the end, he was easily killed.

The Holy Mother cut him down with a fabled godly-class energy art, the Jade-Emperor Profound-Welkin Exalted-Celestial God-Dao.

Even if Northstar Sea had been stronger than he was, and had access to better techniques, he would still have suffered the same fate: death.

‘Godly-class energy art?’ Yang Qi thought. ‘I can’t believe I'm finally witnessing another godly-class energy art! How did mother get it? Hm, it doesn’t seem quite as powerful as my Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. It lacks the glory of the Sovereign Lord.’ Thanks to the operation of the Blood of the One God within him, he had already recovered from his previous injuries.

“Qi’er, quickly absorb this Northstar Sea’s power and magical laws. You should be able to reach a higher level of enlightenment with them!” With a wave of her finger, the Holy Mother sent all of Northstar Sea’s energy into a tiny, sparkling conglomeration of light that shot into Yang Qi.

Projecting her voice into Yang Qi’s head, she said, ‘Yes, Qi’er, this godly-class energy art of mine is called the Jade-Emperor Profound-Welkin Exalted-Celestial God-Dao. When I was in the Hell of Gloom and Darkness, I found a ruined fragment of a heavenly jade palace, which was inscribed with part of a technique. It wasn't complete, but it was enough for me to begin cultivating it.

‘It can’t measure up to your technique, Qi’er. In ancient times, godly-class energy arts were divided up into various grades and ranks, as were the legion of gods. And above the legion of gods, there exists an entity called the Lord. I'm not sure exactly what level your energy art is, Qi’er, but mine is definitely weaker than it. In any case, we can discuss such matters later. Right now, you need to focus on absorbing the quintessence energy of Northstar Sea. Use it to try to push your energy arts to the next level. That will make it much easier to deal with this developing crisis.’

‘Yes, I understand, Mother,’ Yang Qi replied without hesitation.

As soon as he began the process, the quintessence energy and magical laws thrummed, and ten new drops of the Blood of the One God appeared, which the golden imp greedily absorbed.

In the blink of an eye, Yang Qi reached another limitation. More particles within him awoke, pushing him to the full level of one hundred million. He had gone as far as he could within his level.

His body contained a total of eight hundred forty million, and now he had nearly one eighth of them awake.

Unfortunately, it only squeezed him further into the bottleneck. Without pushing his cultivation level to the third step of the Great Sage level, he wouldn't get any stronger.

Not even the quintessence energy of a Demi-Immortal could help him in that regard.

Thankfully, he had his immortal child.

Waving his hand, he sent a wave of Demi-Immortal quintessence energy into his clone, causing its energy levels to skyrocket. Meanwhile, the psychic world of Yang Qi’s mind suddenly seemed to open up.

In the blink of an eye, a network of constellations appeared within his sea of consciousness. A virtual sea of heavenly bodies appeared, all of them perfectly arranged according to the mysterious rules of the universe.

Each of those stars was a god-spirit, filled with starpower that was just waiting to be absorbed. It was power that could be used to control the orbit of a planet or manipulate all sorts of living beings.

This was the enlightenment of the seventh step of the Great Sage level, the Planet God Step, which was a complement to the eighth Legendary transformation, the Astral-Star Transformation.

In terms of Yang Qi’s mental capacity, he was already a seventh step Great Sage. Although his cultivation base was stuck in the second step, once he got to the Hell of Mahānata and broke through, the results would shake the heavens and topple the earth.

And of course, since he had experienced a psychic breakthrough, his immortal child was able to undergo another real breakthrough.

Brilliant light shone as divine lightning fell, filled with immortal energy. However, as the tribulation lightning hit the immortal child, he only benefited from it.

In the blink of an eye, his level increased again.

At the same time, the Sage Monarch Continent grew stronger as well, and its greyspace became tougher. At the moment, Yang Qi’s mother had bought him some time to focus solely on cultivation.

She was a Demi-Immortal, and thus, was strong enough to hold off the Northstar Fleet all on her own for the moment. However, the danger had not yet passed, and Yang Qi knew he needed to do everything he could to get stronger. Things were only going to get more dicey, and the slightest mistake could lead to his mother, the Sage Monarch Continent, and himself all dying.

The Northstar Fleet was a terrifying force and had many more experts ready to fight, including plenty of Demi-Immortals.

In fact, the group of Demi-Immortals who had just been preparing to join the fight were now looking coldly at the Holy Mother, and at Yang Qi down below, focusing on his cultivation and his continent.

One of them, a tall man with eyes that burned like fire, strode forth and said, “You’re the Holy Mother of the Hanging Mountain? Even in ancient times, no one in the Yore-Wilds Continent was a match for the Northstar Continent, and your current resistance is just as pointless. You killed Northstar Sea, and that's a major loss to our fleet. You savages are going to pay us back for that in full!”

The Holy Mother glanced at Yang Qi, then looked back and said, “The Northstar Continent is subservient to the Megaplexus Heaven, and the Yore-Wilds planetary system is governed by the Titan Emperor Heaven. There have been no formal declarations from either immortal world indicating that we should go to war. According to the ancient stipulations, you have no authority to enter the Yore-Wilds planetary system to conquer or plunder. Aren’t you worried about the heaven above punishing you for breaking the old treaties?”

Another of the Demi-Immortal elders stepped forward. “Such impudence! The Megaplexus Heaven and the Titan Emperor Heaven have had irreconcilable differences for countless years, which clearly makes us enemies. We’ll do whatever is necessary to deal with savages like you.”

The Holy Mother chuckled. “Savages? I'm not particularly fond of that word. And was that supposed to be some kind of joke? In ancient times, your Megaplexus planetary system wasn’t even close to being a match for the Yore-Wilds planetary system. We produced too many experts to count, any of whom could have crushed your top experts. In fact, you were so weak that you had to sacrifice a whole host of immortals to break the seal holding back the Hell of Euphoria. It was the power of the fiend-devils that brought down the Yore-Wilds Continent, not you ‘people’. You’re nothing but low-down schemers, and you dare to call us savages? You really are an uneducated and ignorant lot, aren’t you?”

The Northstar Clan’s Demi-Immortal elders immediately turned crimson in the face. How could they have guessed that this Holy Mother, who looked like little more than a teenage girl, would know so many secrets regarding the ancient past?

“Damn you!”

“Capture her! She’s one of these savages’ Demi-Immortals, so she’ll definitely fetch a high price back home. We can split the profit!”

“Alright! There’s only one of her, and she can’t defend against all of us. Our Northstar Fleet will definitely come out on top!”

“Let's capture her and give her to the clan chief! Let him take her vital yin and quintessence energy. Violating her will be the ultimate pleasure!”

“Activate the Northstar Spinning Wheel Formation. Lock her down!”

“Alright, everyone get ready to move at once and force this savage girl to submit. It was expensive to cross the Dark True Void, and we already lost Northstar Sea. But if we can capture her we can make up for our losses.”

“Wheel of the Northstar!”

WHIZZZ!

More than ten Demi-Immortals joined forces and attacked at the same time. All of creation trembled, and the light of the sun and moon faded. Magical laws, true energy, and everything in the area converged to create an enormous wheel, millions and millions of kilometers in diameter.

It had eight sides, all of them viciously serrated and covered with all sorts of magical symbols. Some were fiend-devil talismans, some were the dhāraṇī incantations of evil immortals, and some were Demonfolk inscriptions, but all of them recounted epic sagas of the past, stories of ancient histories and civilizations.

This was a wheel that could crush everything and bury anything in the deepest depths.

RUMBLE!

As soon as the wheel formed, it began rolling toward the Holy Mother.

“So, this is the Wheel of the Northstar?” she said. The enormous wheel was being powered by more than ten Demi-Immortals, yet she didn’t look even the least bit afraid.

In fact, she even took a step forward.

As she did, countless streams of white jade talismans poured out, becoming a host of divine dragons.

“Jade Emperor’s Dragons Ascendant; Godly Dao of the Exalted Celestial!”

Millions and millions of white jade divine dragons shot out, like a river that could fill the universe and destroy the macrocosm. It slammed into the Wheel of the Northstar, instantly breaking it into two parts.

As for the more than ten Demi-Immortals, they immediately scrambled backward in shock.

“Take that thing!” the Holy Mother growled. The millions and millions of dragons swirled into the shape of a huge hand which reached out, grabbed the broken Wheel of the Northstar, and tossed it into the greyspace of the Sage Monarch Continent.

“Qi’er, your Hellfire Crucible should be able to handle this thing. It was created by the quintessence energy and magical laws of a whole group of Demi-Immortals. Make it part of the Sage Monarch Continent and it will push it to a higher level. Maybe the continent can use it to form a Wheel of Magical Law.”

Yang Qi didn’t bother saying anything in response. He could sense the immense power of the Wheel of the Northstar, and therefore, as soon as it entered the continent’s greyspace, he unleashed the Hellfire Crucible and sucked it in. Instantly, burning sagefire engulfed the wheel and began breaking it down into essence power for the continent.

Sure enough, that essence power began to form a Wheel of Magical Law.

He had previously imbued the continent with the magical laws of tens upon tens of thousands of fiend-devil Great Sages, filling it with sage motes. Unfortunately, those sage motes had existed in a state of disorder. But now they were actually taking the form of a wheel.

Chapter 414: Invincible in Battle

The Holy Mother had already put on an incredible show by defeating the Wheel of the Northstar with only one move. The attack of the wheel was backed by more than ten Demi-Immortal experts working in unison, but she had an incomplete godly-class energy art, the Jade-Emperor Profound-Welkin Exalted-Celestial God-Dao, that could create jade divine dragons. That jade was the most pure and true type of jade imaginable, formed from raw magical laws.

Jade represented honor, integrity, gentleness, solidity, and permanence. Furthermore, it contained the strongest of wills. It was just like the ancient saying, better to be a broken piece of jade than an intact clay tile.

Although she didn’t have the complete energy art, it was still godly-class, which meant that it came from the mysterious legion of gods and was anything but normal.

There were different types of godly-class energy arts, but even the lowest-level were still far beyond virtually all heavenly-class arts.

Normally speaking, heavenly-class energy arts were well-circulated in the immortal worlds, with the godly-class arts only occasionally appearing. And when they did, they would often lead to tempests of blood and carnage.

In the mortal world, godly-class energy arts were generally thought to be invincible things that no one ever saw.

“The Wheel of the Northstar was defeated? And she took it by force?” The ten Demi-Immortals were astonished to the core. The fact that this Holy Mother was so strong completely surpassed anything they could wrap their minds around. In their minds, the ruins of the Yore-Wilds didn’t have any worthy experts at all. And yet, contrary to expectation, they ran into a young woman who was completely decimating them.

“You know, my son wants to turn that continent into a planet, but he was low on power. Just recently I was wondering how I would ever find Demi-Immortals to kill for him. But here you are, delivering yourself up to my doorstep. What better way to help my son than to kill every last one of you?”

After defeating the Wheel of the Northstar, the Holy Mother’s tone of voice changed. She suddenly seemed awe-inspiring and righteous, the type of person one should never cross. Everything around her began to turn into fine jade, even the magical laws of time and space. All of a sudden, it looked like a god-spirit was forming within a minor world.

The Jade-Emperor Profound-Welkin Exalted-Celestial God-Dao was a consummate energy art that could crystallize magical laws and reverse the turnings of the cosmos. It could reverse the five phases, and destabilize yin and yang.

WHIZZ!

The Holy Mother’s hand shot out and she took a step forward, surrounded by torrents of sagelight as she rushed toward the ten Demi-Immortals.

It was a case of one versus ten, yet she was the one going on the offensive!

Smack!

She was like a goddess from ancient times, crushing heaven and sowing primal-chaos in the void around her. The deadly movement of her hands conformed to profound daos, and it seemed almost as if she was causing the stream of time in the immortal worlds to flicker.

The imperial dragon strides, the royal tiger paces; the love of the regal mother protects all creation.

The Demi-Immortal level was subdivided into Lesser, Greater, Profound, Potent, Tyrant, Prime, Revered, Universal, and Paragon Demi-Immortals. After much work, the Holy Mother had reached the Prime Demi-Immortal level, making her a sixth order Demi-Immortal. She understood some of the most profound truths of creation and could conduct herself as if she were the most important entity in existence.

Her command of energy arts was such that, in a single breath of time, she could shake mountains or rivers and even create planes of existence.

Of the ten Demi-Immortals she faced, there were Lesser, Greater, Profound, and Potent Demi-Immortals, with the highest among them being a Tyrant Demi-Immortal. That meant that the strongest among them was still weaker than her.

Besides, the highest energy art they had was heavenly-class, which was a far cry from even the partial godly-class energy art she was using.

It only took a single breath of time for three of the Northstar Clan’s Lesser Demi-Immortals to be hit by the white jade divine dragons, which sent them flying off to the side, their bodies shattered and their souls on the verge of dispersing. It took their entire supply of medicinal pills just to stay alive. Meanwhile, the rest of the Demi-Immortals were circling around the Holy Mother in preparation for their next attack.

“DIE!” they all shouted. Instantly, brilliant light shot forward as they called upon their minor worlds, places filled with things such as blood, blades, armies, mortality, governments, and hosts of living beings.

“Northstar Clan consummate ability, Hegemon’s Heaven Saber!”

“Northstar Clan consummate ability, Strength of the Supreme Void-Spirit!”

“Northstar Clan consummate ability, Nine Firmaments Cloud-Sky Energy!”

“Northstar Clan consummate ability, Central Empyrean Glaive!”

A host of consummate abilities appeared, deadly and devastating, all of them bearing down on the Holy Mother.

Whoosh!

She stopped in place and slashed her hands out in front of her, opening up an enormous, gaping rift that instantly swallowed up the incoming attacks.

RUMBLE!

Down below, Yang Qi was breaking down and absorbing the Wheel of the Northstar, but at the same time, he was looking up at the fight above. By now, he was completely one with his clone, and his clone was completely one with the Sage Monarch Continent.

As a result, he was gaining insight into the magical laws and godpower that had made up the Wheel of the Northstar, then making them a part of the Sage Monarch Continent. But then, without any warning, a rift opened up in the sky and massive amounts of light and power began to tumble down into the Hellfire Crucible.

Moments ago, the Holy Mother had opened a rift to swallow up the attacks sent against her, and was now delivering them directly to Yang Qi.

All of a sudden, he was inundated with the most complex, immense force he had ever encountered.

“Qi’er, I used Astral Redirection to deflect the power of those Demi-Immortals and send it to you. Your Hellfire Crucible should be able to handle all of it. There will be danger, but your God Legion Seal should protect you. Handle it well and it will benefit you. If you fail, you’ll die.”

‘What the fuck?!’ Yang Qi thought. ‘I didn't realize mother was so reckless. She didn't even ask me if I thought I could handle it! Isn’t she worried I might get killed?!’ A bitter smile appeared on his face as he focused on the astonishing levels of power currently brewing in his Hellfire Crucible, which seemed like it might explode at any moment.

It was rare for power like this to be on display, and was beyond anything Yang Qi had experienced before. Were it not for the fact that he had his clone, as well as the Sage Monarch Continent, to help bear some of the force, he probably would have exploded into bits.

Even so, the slightest misstep in this moment could result in the destruction of both himself and the continent.

Of course, danger often meant opportunity.

Throwing his head back, he howled, “Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, Absorb Myriad Worlds!”

The Hellfire Crucible had the power to melt and refine even disgraced gods, and that ability was fully on display now. The hundred million particles within Yang Qi screamed into activity, with all of the megamammoths absorbing power from the Hellfire Crucible like mad.

They were like enormous mountains with trunks that could inhale anything and everything. Power rushed into them, becoming pure white magical symbols inscribed with the text of the legion of gods. They were representations of the One God.

Each of the megamammoths he awoke could evolve and eventually become a godmammoth. The truth was that waking up the eight hundred forty million particles was only the initial stage of mastering the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. The truly perfect version of the technique was much more than that, and involved growing all of the megamammoths to their full level of maturity.

Suddenly, a stream of will erupted from the golden imp in his forehead, giving him even deeper insights into the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. It was as though the dao of heaven and all of its rules and laws were echoing in his mind.

‘There are many types of mammoths. Megamammoths are the juveniles, and eventually, they transform into dracomammoths, which are the young adults. They, in turn, become full-grown protomammoths. And finally, the ultimate form is reached—the godmammoth.’

Right now, Yang Qi only had megamammoths, which would soon be baptized with magical laws. Countless draconic magical symbols would settle onto their skin, transforming them into dracomammoths.

Dragons and mammoths were the most gargantuan creatures in the world, and the most powerful of all the godlings. And when they combined, they led to the second step of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.

Shockingly, Yang Qi’s current influx of power was actually inciting that second step and was pushing his megamammoths in the direction of becoming dracomammoths.

Unfortunately, before the transformation could be completed, he would need to awaken all eight hundred forty million particles.

Even still, because of the new enlightenment he was receiving, his cultivation base was improving. The truths that the golden imp was imparting to him pushed him to new heights until he made contact with the ultimate limitations of the universe and the void.

It was none other than the initial aspects of enlightenment regarding the eighth step of the Great Sage level, the Without Limit Step.

His soul was already deep into the seventh step and had far surpassed his fleshly body. Unfortunately, true control of energy arts and divine abilities stemmed from the body.

“How come we can’t even touch her!?” one of the Northstar Demi-Immortals shouted. “Where did she redirect our attacks to?”

The Demi-Immortals simply couldn't believe their eyes. Their attacks had simply fallen into the rift she opened up, then vanished.

“Look, she sent it to the continent, and to that savage down there.” It was one of the Profound Demi-Immortals who realized the truth; the Sage Monarch Continent was visibly growing larger and there was a heaven-shaking, earth-toppling aura in it.

“She's using our strength to help him mold that continent. But how? Dammit! Stop attacking her! Otherwise our power will be drained and her son is going to get stronger. Look how fast he works!”

“Everybody stop!”

A moment later, all of the Demi-Immortals had ceased attacking.

When the Holy Mother saw that, she took a step forward. “Well, if you’re done with your attacks, I guess it's my turn.”

Then she blurred into motion, appearing directly in front of one of the Lesser Demi-Immortals. Her palm touched his chest and he screamed as he transformed into a corpse.

Chapter 415: Tossing Corpses into the Crucible

Another Lesser Demi-Immortal, an elder from the Northstar Clan, had been killed by the Holy Mother.

With seemingly no effort on her part, she killed him and sent his corpse flying like a meteorite down to the Sage Monarch Continent.

“Qi’er, for the sake of your energy arts, I'm going to slaughter all these people from the Northstar Clan. Let’s see how strong they actually are!”

Down below, Yang Qi was breaking down and assimilating all of the power, which was already causing transformations to the continent around him.

In the past, he had done similar things with mountains of fiend-devils from hell. But the highest among them had been fifth step Great Sages, which put significant limitations on what he could do. But now he had two dead Demi-Immortals, which was already bringing about dramatic changes.

Smack!

The corpse of the Lesser Demi-Immortal fell into the Hellfire Crucible, which burned with sagefire so intense that it was almost liquid.

That seemingly liquid flame wrapped up the corpse of the dead elder, almost like a cocoon, and dragged it into the depths of the continent to become a core element of the surrounding lands.

He might only have been a Lesser Demi-Immortal, but that was still like the power of a hundred thousand fifth step Great Sages. It was a level of power that was almost without limit.

RUMBLE!

The corpse exploded in the depths of the continent, becoming countless sand-like particles filled with power that filled every corner of the Sage Monarch Continent. Mountains rose up and rivers formed. The lands were expanding again.

The power of a single Demi-Immortal was profoundly significant. After all, the old Rich-Lush Continent hadn’t been strong enough to produce even a single Demi-Immortal.

Everyone who lived on the continent could sense what was happening. The rivers around them were not ordinary water, but spirit elixir, and the fish and other creatures that grew in them were things of incredible power.

The continent was reaching a higher level yet again.

The newly birthed mountains were nearly solid spirit stones, except covered with mighty trees, spirit medicines, animals, and plants.

All sorts of seemingly primeval terrain features were springing up.

Meanwhile, the immense blessing of power was pushing the immortal child toward the eighth step of the Great Sage level, and Yang Qi’s true self was propelling his one hundred million megamammoths to the level of dracomammoths. He had the feeling that if he succeeded, his immortal child would achieve another breakthrough and might even gain abilities from the immortal world, possibly even opening a passageway to the Hell of Mahānata.

Unfortunately, creating a passageway like that would require immense amounts of power, and would be difficult to keep open.

After all, it had taken all of the might of an immortal world to open a simple passageway back during the training competitions.

Yang Qi’s complete attention was focused on enlightenment, breakthroughs, and converting energy into essence. The Sage Monarch Continent had already grown thirty percent larger than before, and now had roughly the same surface area as the Quake-Dawn Continent. It looked like an enormous jewel hanging in the middle of the darkness and gloom, shining with dazzling light that melted all of the void around it.

With his mother keeping him safe, he could rest at ease as he worked on his cultivation and meditation. At the same time, he was keeping an eye on the Demi-Immortal battle playing out above.

It wasn’t a common thing to see Demi-Immortals fighting. In fact, this was his first time. After all, the Demi-Immortals in the Titan Emperor Collegium didn’t go around dueling each other.

Generally speaking, not even ninth step Great Sages would be able to witness something like this, or even get close to it. The mere shockwaves would turn them to dust.

But Yang Qi’s cultivation base was almost as strong as a Demi-Immortal’s, and he could now kill ninth step Great Sages. Therefore, he kept his Lord's Eye open and watched the fighting, noting how the techniques were generated, how the curses were uttered, and how the magical laws worked with heaven and earth. All of that information was pouring into his soul and benefiting his cultivation base.

In fact, his soul was now twitching and wriggling as it inched closer to enlightenment regarding the Without Limit Step.

During this very short fight, his level of soul enlightenment had risen from the fifth step all the way to the seventh step and was now pushing beyond that level.

BAM!

The Holy Mother unleashed another attack; she was as powerful as a dragon or tiger and everything around her was the color of jade.

Another Lesser Demi-Immortal fell. His life force vanished as he was surrounded by jade-colored true energy, then dragged down to the Sage Monarch Continent and tossed into the Hellfire Crucible to be ignited with sagefire.

Having already dealt with the two previous corpses, Yang Qi was now completely familiar with what to do; melting and refining this third Lesser Demi-Immortal proved no problem whatsoever.

The Hellfire Crucible belched out essence power, bolstering the Sage Monarch Continent and causing it to grow yet again.

As for his immortal clone, it was impossible to determine how much power he had built up, and he was now covered with chain-like magical laws that looked like an immense spider web.

Even in the most distant past, it was unheard of for a Great Sage to refine and absorb the power of a Demi-Immortal, yet Yang Qi was doing just that.

“Get back to the fleet! This savage has a godly-class energy art! Not a single person in the Northstar Continent has one, and they might not even exist in the Megaplexus Heaven! We have to capture her and force out her secrets. We have to get the mnemonic to that energy art!”

After seeing three Lesser Demi-Immortal slaughtered, the elders from the Northstar Clan were finally coming to realize their situation.

Without any hesitation, they all formed ranks and prepared to break out of the perimeter the Holy Mother had set up and get back to the Northstar Fleet.

WHIZZZ!

Meanwhile, the ships in the fleet sent out streams of bright light to lock down the area, creating an enormous spell formation in the process.

After all, the ships themselves were magical treasures, created at great cost and effort by Demi-Immortals.

Here in the ruins of the Yore-Wilds, they had found a person with an incomplete godly-class energy art. To the aristocratic Northstar Clan, it was actually an instance of immense good fortune. If their clan could get an enigmatic art like that, they would dominate the Megaplexus planetary system and probably receive immense rewards from that immortal world.

It was at this point that an old man in a violet robe appeared at the prow of the flagship, laughing heartily.

He was clearly a figure of immense power and authority, wreathed with violet energy and pulsing with the aura of an immortal world.

‘Prime Demi-Immortal!’ the Holy Mother thought, stopping in her tracks. This old man was the same level as she was. The main difference was that she had just stepped into the level and this old man was clearly in the late stage, just on the verge of becoming a seventh order Revered Demi-Immortal.

The differences between the subcategories of Demi-Immortals were even greater than those of Great Sages.

That was why the Holy Mother had been able to stand up to the combined force of so many enemies, even using Astral Redirection to send the power of their attacks into the Sage Monarch Continent for Yang Qi to use. To her, it had been a simple task.

“I'm the admiral of the Northstar Fleet, Northstar First-Rank! Listen up, Yore-Wilds savage: it’s a surprise that you’re a sixth order Demi-Immortal. But the time has come for you to hand over that godly-class energy art. If you do, I’ll spare your life.”

At this point, another old man appeared, clad in a violet robe. Taking his place at Northstar First-Rank’s left side, he said, “Brother First-Rank is the admiral of this fleet and I'm the vice-admiral. I suggest you listen to him.”

‘Another Prime Demi-Immortal,’ the Holy Mother thought, her eyes flashing. He was obviously the type of person who could destroy planets with a wave of his hand.

The old man grinned viciously. “You’re also a Prime Demi-Immortal, a fresh one at that. But that at least earns you the right to know our names. I'm Northstar First-Truth.”

At this point, another voice rang out. “True. You know, I would love to have a sixth order Demi-Immortal slave girl. Allow me to introduce myself, I’m Northstar First-Summer!”

He was the third Prime Demi-Immortal to make an appearance.

Meanwhile, sixty to seventy other Demi-Immortals in the fleet were already pooling their power to create a shocking and deadly spell formation.

“Northstar Inert Wither-Glory Death Formation!” Northstar First-Rank said. Taking a step forward, he glared at the Holy Mother and continued, “There’s no way you can deal with this.”

Chapter 416: Three Prime Demi-Immortals

All of these experts were Prime Demi-Immortals.

Northstar First-Rank. Northstar First-Truth. Northstar First-Summer. They were virtually invincible and could easily devastate the entire Yore-Wilds planetary system. They could probably even cause rainstorms of blood in the Titan Emperor Collegium.

That wasn’t to mention the fact that in the fleet of hundreds of ships, there were dozens upon dozens of other powerful Demi-Immortals. In fact, there were nearly a hundred, including Lesser, Greater, Profound, Potent, and Tyrant Demi-Immortals.

Working together, they could power the Northstar Inert Wither-Glory Death Formation to cause all creation to wither, to eradicate heaven and earth, to destroy heavenly daos, and more. It could even absorb the souls of its enemies. It was the most powerful magical weapon the fleet could unleash, and not even top Demi-Immortals could escape its power.

And right now, both the Holy Mother and the Sage Monarch Continent were square within the crosshairs of the formation.

However, the Holy Mother’s expression was as calm as a child who had just awoken from a nap and her eyes were devoid of even a hint of fear.

In contrast, Yang Qi’s heart was pounding. In all of the Yore-Wilds planetary system, the only person who would, and could, defend him was his mother. If she couldn’t hold the line, the result would be complete and utter destruction. She was a powerful Prime Demi-Immortal, but her opponents included three experts who were actually further along in their cultivation than she was, and they were backed by nearly a hundred other Demi-Immortals who were powering a deadly spell formation. Whether it was in terms of numbers or raw strength, she was at a disadvantage.

Taking a step forward, Northstar First-Rank said, “Stand down and wait to be taken into custody, savage. We have nothing more to say to you. If you want to avoid dying, submit to us. We’ll even let your son live.”

“Your only other option is to watch your son die a horrific death,” Northstar First-Summer added. “Don’t forget, this area of space is sealed, making escape impossible. But if you surrender to us, we’ll come up with an excuse to explain how your son escaped and he’ll be free to go.”

Considering these stipulations, Yang Qi’s confidence was beginning to waver.

Meanwhile, the three Demi-Immortals were carrying on a secret conversation via thought projection.

‘Let’s unnerve the bitch first. Let her son go and make sure she completely submits to us. Afterward, catching her son again should be easy. What do you think?’

‘Sure. Unnerving her is definitely the best option.’

‘I can’t believe this savage has an incomplete godly-class energy art. What level do you think it is? Lesser godly-class? Common? Greater? Consummate? Perfect? Paramount? Lordly?’

‘It doesn’t matter. It’s an energy art from the legion of gods, and those things are rare even in the immortal worlds. Even a lesser godly-class art would be many times stronger than any immortal skill. If we could get our hands on it, we would finally have hope of reaching immortal ascension.’

The Holy Mother looked at them and could already tell what they were thinking. “You people think you can intimidate me? Demoralize me? Sorry, I'm not that weak. You have three Prime Demi-Immortals in the late stage, plus a deadly spell formation powered by nearly a hundred Demi-Immortals. That’s a lot of power. Ah, what a pity….”

Suddenly worried that he didn’t understand the situation after all, Northstar First-Rank frowned and said, “What a pity? What’s that supposed to mean?”

“What a pity that all of you are going to die,” the Holy Mother replied. “I'm going to massacre you and use your flesh, your blood, and your souls to give to my son as a gift. I want him to reach the highest level possible, and you people are the perfect tool to do that. You see, I was just working on my cultivation for several months in a row in the Hell of Gloom and Darkness. Want to see what I learned?”

Before she even finished speaking, a sound rang out like the chiming of heavenly bells. At the same time, jade-like streaks spread out in all directions, forming into ten thousand jade swords arranged into a spell formation. In some ways, they seemed like actual magical treasures, but in other ways, they seemed illusory.

Unexpectedly, these were weapons similar to Yang Qi’s Infernal Deity Spear. When he summoned it, it was usually a singular spear, but that was because of the limitations of his cultivation level. If he was a high-level Great Sage, or even a Demi-Immortal, then similar to his mother, he could summon a whole host of Infernal Deity Spears and use them to create a powerful formation.

“Primal-Origin Wondrous Jade Emperor’s Sword Formation!” As the immense sword formation thrummed with power, it made everything in the area seem like it had returned to the era of the ancient Yore-Wilds. Magical laws and true energy alike were sliced away from reality by the spell formation.

“Let the Jade Emperor Come! Divine Dao of the Exalted Celestial!” The Holy Mother’s garments rippled out, expanding to create an entire world of jade. Meanwhile, jade halos appeared behind her head, including yellow jade, green jade, white jade, and more…. There were a host of jades, all of them pure, clean, untainted, and noble in all respects.

RUMBLE!

Backed by the formation of ten thousand swords, she rushed forth to attack her three Prime Demi-Immortal opponents. It was a case of one versus three, if you didn't count the other hundred Demi-Immortals and the grand spell formation formed by the hundreds of ships in the fleet. The Holy Mother’s tenacious ferocity was on full display, and everyone who could observe it was shaken to the core.

C-C-CRACK!

Her momentum was so shocking that when she reached the defensive true energy fields of her opponents, she bashed through them like a boulder crushing a drinking glass.

“Hand of the Exalted Celestial!” Countless streaks of jade lightning formed together into an enormous hand that crushed its way into the core of Northstar First-Rank’s minor world, then bore down on the man in deadly fashion.

“What?” Before he could even react, his minor world was broken open, and the Holy Mother appeared right in front of him. He still had Northstar First-Truth and Northstar First-Summer flanking him, as well as the hundreds of ships in the fleet. But at the moment, he felt like he was facing her wrath alone. ‘How could she be this strong? She just became a Prime Demi-Immortal! How is she doing this!?’

There wasn’t any time for further consideration. As the Hand of the Exalted Celestial closed in on him, he could sense the terrifyingly deadly energy fluctuations and knew that he absolutely couldn’t let it hit him.

“Half Withered, Half Glorious; Half Mental, Half Physical: Wither-Glory Life Destruction Energy!” In the blink of an eye, Northstar First-Rank transformed. Half of him seemed to flourish gloriously, like a growing infant, while the other half seemed to wither rapidly, like an ancient god that existed only in the primeval epic sagas. He thrust his hands out, summoning an image of both life and destruction.

In this art, withering represented destruction and glory represented life. This was another miraculous technique from the Northstar Clan, a heavenly-class energy art that could rival the greatest immortal skills: Wither-Glory Life Destruction Energy.

Smack!

When the two techniques collided in the middle of Northstar First-Rank’s minor world, a vital energy shock wave burst out that shattered the world’s greyspace.

“Divine Dao of the Exalted Celestial! Let the Immortal Kings Come to the Mortal World!” The Holy Mother drew her power back into her, then summoned the projections of countless immortal kings, like Demolishers from the host of immortals. At the same time, her aura grew stronger and more majestic and numerous mystical phenomena appeared around her. Spatial rifts opened and magical laws twisted and distorted. Time and space swirled to form magical symbols, causing wormholes to spring up everywhere, connecting to parts unknown.

“Withering and Glorious Heaven and Earth! My Word Destroys, My Word Gives Life!” As the words left Northstar First-Rank’s mouth, his minor world suddenly became glorious and filled with life. This was an immortal dao that was so powerful that he could reverse life and death with a single thought.

Completely unfazed, the Holy Mother said, “Eternal Unknown!”

Her eyes seemed completely and utterly blank, empty of all emotion. Even her clothing remained motionless, making her seem like some sort of statue.

An enormous rift opened up, erupting with an energy that seemed eternally unknowable. This was one of her most deadly moves, Eternal Unknown. The past was eternal, and the unknown was terrifying. In fact, to most people, the most terrifying thing of all was the unknown.

Mystery. Terror. Banishment. Sealing…. All sorts of energies from the ancient legion of gods were on display. As soon as the rift opened, it began consuming everything in the area, causing the minor world around it to shrink, wriggle, and eventually collapse!

Northstar First-Rank’s minor world shattered. Vital energy erupted in all directions and magical laws were thrown into chaos! As for Northstar First-Rank, he tumbled backward with blood spraying out of his mouth. Shockingly, he was unable to defend himself from the Holy Mother’s attack and received a grievous injury to his vital energy.

Crack!

The Holy Mother slipped forward and chopped her hand out, moving so quickly that Northstar First-Rank couldn’t dodge the blow. Unexpectedly, he was chopped in half, causing blood to spray in all directions. He, a powerful Prime Demi-Immortal, had been sliced in half by the Holy Mother’s deadly move, Eternal Unknown.

“Wither-Glory Life Destruction; I Embody Life!” Of course, being sliced in half didn’t kill him. In the blink of an eye, he recovered.

As he did, Northstar First-Truth and Northstar First-Summer finally regained their composure and launched attacks of their own.

“Damn this savage bitch!”

“Activate the formation!”

RUMBLE!

The Northstar Inert Wither-Glory Death Formation was activated, sending numerous shafts of blinding light toward the Holy Mother and the Sage Monarch Continent.

“Deathless Demolishing!” In the shortest of moments, the Holy Mother shifted her tactics slightly and unleashed another move. Countless magical symbols spread out in all directions, creating a deathless entity, a projection of jade that fused with the Holy Mother. As the fusion occurred, her power levels skyrocketed and her long hair whipped about her.  As she thrust her hand out, both Northstar First-Truth and Northstar First-Summer were shoved backward.

Then the Deathless Demolishing move slammed directly into the reeling Northstar First-Rank.

The deathless entity appeared again, except this time it burrowed into Northstar First-Rank. A look of terror covered his face and he threw his head back and screamed.

“Don’t destroy my soul, I—”

Unfortunately, he was too late. Deathless Demolishing was a deadly move, and gave birth to a deathless entity which would enter the enemy’s body and destroy both his will and soul. Northstar First-Rank's face spasmed and he let out a final scream before his aura vanished and his life force faded away.

A moment later he was a corpse, which tumbled down into the Sage Monarch Continent and Yang Qi’s Hellfire Crucible. It only took two deadly moves on the part of the Holy Mother to slaughter a sixth order Prime Demi-Immortal. Eternal Unknown. Deathless Demolishing. They were the ultimate expressions of a godly-class energy art, similar to Yang Qi’s Creation, Destruction, and Nature.

Chapter 417: Scheming (1)

In a surprising turn of events, Northstar First-Rank, a sixth order Prime Demi-Immortal and the top expert in the Northstar Fleet, had perished.

He was actually the admiral of the entire fleet, to whom Northstar First-Truth and Northstar First-Summer always deferred. But the Holy Mother had used only two moves to shatter his minor world and kill him.

Not even his soul escaped destruction.

The Holy Mother’s godly-class energy art had truly reached a peak level.

The two moves of Eternal Unknown and Deathless Demolishing made her unkillable in this situation. If news of this spread to the other three of the Four Wilds, or even the Central Planetary River and the Titan Emperor Collegium, it would cause a huge stir. In fact, the leaders of the Titan Emperor Collegium could theoretically report the matter to the immortal world above and be rewarded as a result.

“What? Northstar First-Rank’s soul was destroyed? He’s truly dead?”

“His aura is completely gone. And his corpse disappeared after it fell onto the land below.”

“It's being refined as we speak….”

Northstar First-Truth and Northstar First-Summer both had incredible senses, and realized instantly that Northstar First-Rank was indeed dead and gone.

Never in their wildest dreams could they have imagined that this would happen. Northstar First-Rank was supposed to be the first among them to become a Revered Demi-Immortal. But now he was dead. Not even the three of them directing the Northstar Inert Wither-Glory Death Formation had been able to do anything to the Holy Mother’s energy arts.

Just how strong was she?

The moment Northstar First-Rank died, the Holy Mother’s face turned as white as a sheet and blood oozed out of her mouth. A bloody wound also opened up on her forehead; clearly, Northstar First-Rank had managed to let out a final counter-attack before he died, which ended up damaging her vital energy.

“Look, she killed him, but he managed to hurt her as he went out. He used Wither-Glory Malediction to attack her animadestiny and soul. With that curse power in her sea of consciousness, her energy arts will be significantly hindered. Now's the perfect chance to grab her.”

Grins of delight appeared on the faces of Northstar First-Truth and Northstar First-Summer. To them, it was clear what had happened. The Holy Mother was powerful, but right now she was an arrow that had reached the end of its flight.

Northstar First-Rank was no slouch, nor was he the kind of person who could be casually killed.

Right before dying, he used a curse to ensure that his enemy went out with him.

“This savage’s energy arts are too strong, but if we can capture her the rewards would be astronomical. It's sad that Northstar First-Rank is dead, but his cultivation base wasn’t that much beyond ours. He got special treatment because he was the son of one of the elder kings and always used it to tyrannize everyone. Well, with him dead, this savage girl is ours for the taking!”

Without any hesitation, the two of them fell back into the protection of the fleet.

“Everyone attack! Unleash the full power of the formation! That savage girl was injured by Northstar First-Rank’s curse and is much weaker than before!”

WHIZZZ!

Countless streams of dazzling light shot forward, like strands of silk from the spiders of hell. They created something like an enormous fiery net that began wrapping up the Holy Mother and the Sage Monarch Continent.

Meanwhile, Northstar First-Truth and Northstar First-Summer fused with the spell formation nexuses to control it more directly.

“Wither-Glory Lightning!”

In the blink of an eye, a storm of lightning fell, a blanket of death that burned with sage and immortal motes and power that seemed to come from beyond the heavens. There were even numerous wormholes that opened up and poured power into the attack.

“Exalted Celestial Globe!Ward Off Myriad Magics!” Ignoring any possible injuries she might suffer during the process, the Holy Mother unleashed her own minor world, which was an enormous globe that rapidly spread out to cover the entire Sage Monarch Continent.

The lightning, fire, wither-glory power, and everything else slammed into the globe and faded away. In fact, some of it was even absorbed.

“Mother, are you alright?!” Yang Qi said. Because of his use of the Lord's Eye, he could see that she had been seriously injured, and that her soul was contending with vicious curse power. Apparently, that curse was trying to destroy her will and mind, and could not be easily dispelled.

“I'm fine, Qi’er. Hurry up and absorb the corpse of that Prime Demi-Immortal into your Sage Monarch Continent. That’s the most important task right now. If you succeed, the Sage Monarch Continent will be just on the cusp of becoming a planet, and that will push your enlightenment all the way to the eighth step of the Great Sage level, maybe even the ninth.

“I can still hold on a little longer. I never imagined this Northstar Clan would be so strong, or that they would have curse power like this in their blood. Qi’er, you need to hurry. The curse power is unique in that, if I die, Northstar First-Rank can actually use the power of my death to be reborn via the curse. Thankfully, part of the cultivation of the Jade-Emperor Profound-Welkin Exalted-Celestial God-Dao involves fusing a jade slip of protection with your soul. That’s what’s holding off the curse for the moment.”

After hearing his mother’s explanation, Yang Qi’s confidence was bolstered a bit. However, when he returned his attention to Northstar First-Rank’s corpse floating in the Hellfire Crucible, he smiled bitterly. Despite being engulfed in sagefire, the corpse didn’t show any signs of breaking down.

The corpse of a Prime Demi-Immortal was simply too tough. There were fully five levels of difference between Lesser Demi-Immortals and Prime Demi-Immortals. Even a thousand of the former couldn’t match up to the latter; there was simply no way to compare the magical laws and substructure of the two.

The corpse had no soul or aura, only pure power, and unfortunately, Yang Qi couldn’t do anything with it. It didn’t matter that his soul enlightenment had reached the level of a Planet God Sage, his cultivation base was still only in the second step. One was like an ant, the other a dragon. If a dragon fell from the sky it would kill countless ants in the process, but there was no way the ants would then start to eat the dragon.

However, that didn’t mean that Yang Qi was out of options.

‘Blood of the One God, ignite!’ A drop of blood appeared on the tip of his finger, pure, transparent, and flickering with the light of countless magical symbols. That single drop of blood was almost like an entire universe unto itself.

He flicked the drop of blood into the Hellfire Crucible. Instantly, the flames leapt so high that they reached the greyspace of the Sage Monarch Continent. It was a pillar of fire that shot out of the continent all the way to the Northstar Inert Wither-Glory Death Formation and began destroying its vital energy.

In order to get the raw Blood of the One God, Yang Qi had to use the power of the halls of heaven and masses of sagelight. Then, every tiny drop he created would be absorbed by the God Legion Seal and refined until it was filled with the aura of the Sovereign Lord.

Only the Blood of the One God produced by the God Legion Seal was true and authentic.

And right now, he only had a dozen or so drops of that blood built up in his forehead. As such, it could only be imagined the insane levels of power that would be unleashed when burning one. The fires of the Hellfire Crucible instantly increased by thousands of times.

In the blink of an eye, Northstar First-Rank’s corpse began to melt, releasing immense amounts of power in the form of sparks that spread out to inundate the Sage Monarch Continent. As a result, the mountains, rivers, vegetation, and even the essence began to contract.

From a distance, it looked like the continent was wreathed in fire and giving off black smoke. Of course, the black smoke consisted of the impurities within the continent.

As those impurities were expelled, the soil of the continent became even more holy and crystalline.

This time, the continent didn't expand. It shrank, as the power of Northstar First-Rank caused it to grow more compact and sturdy!

Screams of shock and pain erupted from all of the millions and millions of living beings in the Sage Monarch Continent. However, they were not being injured, but rather baptized by fire, causing impurities to be expelled from their flesh and blood. Because of the process, their fleshly bodies were becoming nexuses of power.

In the shortest of moments, countless individuals found their cultivation bases rising to higher levels. Energy Artists became Lifeseizers. Lifeseizers became Legendaries.

And the members of the parliament of elders all grew stronger as well.

Yang Zhan immediately began to experience successive breakthroughs within the Legendary level. He quickly went from the seventh transformation, to the eighth, then the ninth. Then he reached the Half Sage level, after which the power coursing through him caused sage motes to swirl around him and he stepped into the Great Sage level.

Next came Yang Qi’s sworn siblings. Li He, Jun Tianchou, Hua Fengfeng, Flame Clearspring, and the others all broke into the Great Sage level.

Great Sages were rising up in the Sage Monarch Continent like bamboo after a spring rain. As for the number of Legendaries, it wasn't even necessary to comment on.

The energy housed in the corpse of a Prime Demi-Immortal was incomprehensible. A Lesser Demi-Immortal could have destroyed the Sage Monarch Continent, without a doubt. As for a Prime Demi-Immortal, a person like that could destroy the Sage Monarch Continent a thousand times over.

Conversely, taking that power and making it part of the continent could lead to untold benefits.

However, the person who benefited even more than Yang Qi’s friends and family was his immortal child and his true self.

Thanks to the burst of power, his true self’s thinking suddenly seemed to break through all limits and his soul reached a state of completeness and perfection.

This was the enlightenment of the eighth step of the Great Sage level, the Without Limit Step!

**

As momentous events occurred within the Sage Monarch Continent, a pair of ruthless eyes watched and waited….

Chapter 418: Scheming (2)

As the Sage Monarch Continent’s impurities were removed, it shrank by nearly half. However, that was actually a big improvement. Furthermore, all of the people and other living beings there experienced fundamental transformations.

Their flesh grew tougher and more compact and their blood filled with power.

As Yang Qi gained enlightenment, his immortal child sensed it and began to twitch as he was filled with an understanding of the true meaning of what it meant to be without limit.

‘The Without Limit Step!’

At the same time, a certain sealing mark far out in the void began to tremble. That was the ensconcement mark of Yang Qi’s nascent divinity, which he could sense calling to him from the Hell of Mahānata. He sent a thought out and it traveled through countless planes within the darkness and gloom until he caught sight of the hell itself. It was a dark golden color, and its incredibly thick greyspace was surrounded by endless hell monsoons that gave birth to fiend-devils without end. In fact, no one even knew exactly how large this hell was.

Unfortunately, although Yang Qi could see the Hell of Mahānata in his mind, it was impossible for him to actually go there. After all, it was like an immortal world. A mortal couldn’t just go to an immortal world, unless he broke out of the Demi-Immortal level and became a Demolisher.

For humans to go to the Hell of Mahānata involved the same level of difficulty as initially being able to pierce through space.

Of course, Yang Qi had the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, which had the power to suppress hells. He had also ensconced his nascent divinity in the essence of the Hell of Mahānata. If he could only get Demi-Immortal power, he would have a chance to go there.

Thanks to the power of Northstar First-Rank, the Sage Monarch Continent was benefiting, as were Yang Qi and his immortal clone. In fact, Yang Qi could sense that the hundred million megamammoths within him were already transforming into dracomammoths.

When the process was complete, he would experience a tenfold increase in strength.

Right now, his true self was strong enough to barely hold his own against a Lesser Demi-Immortal. But if he could convert all of the megamammoths into dracomammoths, it would be an easy task to defend himself against such an opponent. In fact, he might even be able to kill one.

The difference between megamammoths and dracomammoths was immense.

Then, beyond dracomammoths were protomammoths, which would come only after he had achieved immortal ascension. He couldn’t even imagine what protomammoths were like.

The only reason the process was beginning now was the magical laws of a Demi-Immortal. If he followed the same pattern as before, then when he reached the ninth step of the Great Sage level he would slowly awaken all eight hundred forty million particles. Then, as a Demi-Immortal, he would slowly feed Demi-Immortal magical laws into them to convert them into dracomammoths. That would obviously be a monumental task.

For all intents and purposes, his normal practice of cultivation within the Demi-Immortal level would be eight hundred forty million times as difficult as a normal Demi-Immortal and would require him to expend eight hundred forty million times as much energy.

The results, of course, would far surpass anything in existence.

Not even people with immortal battle bodies would be a match for him.

‘Alright! Now that I have enlightenment of the eighth step, my immortal clone can become a Without Limit Sage. Next, I need enlightenment of the ninth step, and after that, the Demi-Immortal level. Then I need to get into the Hell of Mahānata. If I do, I’ll experience a whole chain of breakthroughs and nobody will be able to deal with me.’

RUMBLE!

The fighting outside was intense.

The Holy Mother had used her Exalted Celestial Globe to bear the brunt of the attack just now. Unfortunately, the Northstar Inert Wither-Glory Death Formation was extremely domineering; every attack it unleashed built momentum from the previous attack, and was even more powerful.

Cracks were already covering the surface of the Exalted Celestial Globe.

It made sense. The Holy Mother had been seriously injured by a curse, and also, the defensive capabilities of the Exalted Celestial Globe were nowhere near close to that of the God Legion Paradise.

“The savage can't hold out much longer. Hit her with another attack! Bring out the immortal stones!”

Northstar First-Truth and Northstar First-Summer were both shouting out orders to the fleet. As a result, numerous immortal stones flew forth into the spell formation, some of them as large as houses.

The mere sight of the level of power here caused Yang Qi’s scalp to tingle in shock.

“Ignite!” Northstar First-Truth shouted. True energy ignited the immortal stones, and as they burned, the spell formation unleashed a deadly attack that was fully a hundred times as powerful as before. The ships in the fleet expanded, then launched a cloud of pitch black magical sealing symbols that slammed into the surface of the Exalted Celestial Globe.

“Going all out, huh?” the Holy Mother said, her eyes flashing. “Well, in that case, I guess I’ll do the same! Exalted Celestial Sacrifice. Shedding of Righteous Blood!”

With that, she spat out a mouthful of blood which rapidly expanded into an enormous crimson sea.

“Exalted Celestial Godblood!”

This manifestation of her godly-class energy art was similar to Yang Qi’s Blood of the One God, and using it was tantamount to sacrificing her life force and quintessence.

POP!

The Exalted Celestial Globe expanded again, and as it did, stars fell like rain. The ships in the fleet began to tremble and toss about like leaves in the wind. One of them began to creak and groan, then exploded, killing a whole host of Northstar Clan Great Sages.

“Damnation!” Northstar First-Truth growled. “This savage girl just won’t stop fighting. She’s really a centipede who won’t stop wriggling even after being stomped on. Immortal item: Void-Shatterer!”

“Immortal item: Myriad Oceans!” Northstar First-Summer shouted.

Both of them produced animadestiny immortal items, directly from the depths of their nascent divinities. One was a whip that could shatter the void, and the other looked like a jellyfish filled with the flow of thousands upon thousands of oceans.

Considering that these two had resorted to weapons like this, it was obvious that they had changed their minds and wanted to kill the Holy Mother instead of capturing her.

Instantly, the surrounding starry sky devolved into a state of primal-chaos.

Even as they built up power to unleash devastating attacks, the Holy Mother spat out another mouthful of blood, causing another of the ships in the fleet to explode and damaging the spell formation as a whole.

The fighting continued for seven days and nights, shattering much of the starry sky and turning nearby minor planes into nothing but dust.

No one in the Northstar Clan could ever have dreamt that their valiant invasion of the ruins of the Yore-Wilds would turn out like this, or that they would run into a fierce fiend who could stop them in their tracks.

As they fought back and forth, their vital energy draining rapidly, a pair of eyes was watching the situation from inside something that looked like a bottle gourd. Eventually, a sinister voice rang out.

“Excellent. Wonderful…. They’re really going all out to kill each other. Well, when the sandpiper and the clam fight, the fisherman benefits, and in this case I'm the fisherman. Prime Demi-Immortal, huh…. I never would have guessed that the Holy Mother reached that level so quickly. I, Lord Quake-Dawn, acquired eighteen fragments of the Yore-Wilds’ Heart over the years, and also harvested the remains of numerous immortals from heaven who descended into the mortal world. It was only in that way that I reached the same level, yet I'm clearly not a match for her. Thankfully, this is the perfect opportunity to reach the next highest level of enlightenment.

“Wilds God. Holy Daughter. War God. Ninja God. Oracle God. Winter God! Prepare the deadly formation! We will now begin to sacrifice. No lives shall be spared!”

“Yes sir!” they all said, nervously circulating their energy as they took their places in an enormous spell formation.

At this point, Lord Quake-Dawn emerged from his illusory bottle gourd. He was a middle-aged man in a blood-red robe, his face splattered with blood and his person surrounded by a bloody haze. Shockingly, his forehead bore the mark of a blood-colored moon.

As he took his place in the middle of the formation, the essence of the Quake-Dawn Continent began flowing toward him like a river.

Instantly, a tempest of blood filled the continent.

“What’s going on!? Aiiiie!” In innumerable sects throughout the Quake-Dawn Continent, Great Sages began to howl as they realized that something dramatic was happening. Countless experts who had ensconced their nascent divinities in the Quake-Dawn Continent suddenly found that doing so had been a fatal act.

Smack!

In one of the daoist temples closest to the Quake-Dawn Cathedral, the famous Heavenly Plow Daoist Rite, the dao lord of the place, a ninth step Great Sage, looked around and saw the world shaking. Unable to control the true energy within him, he exploded, and the resulting fragments sank into the ground beneath his feet.

More people in the daoist temple began to explode and become part of the continent, in much the same way that the fiend-devils Yang Qi had sacrificed ended up as part of the essence of his continent.

The same thing happened in one daoist sect after another as a gory conflagration swept through the Quake-Dawn Continent.

Lord Quake-Dawn laughed maniacally as the process continued. “The people of this continent are pigs to be slaughtered! Their vital energy and their sacrifice will temper me and push my cultivation base to a higher level. I will use the Quake-Dawn Continent to destroy the Northstar Clan and the Holy Mother! Starting today, Lord Quake-Dawn will unite the Yore-Wilds, then challenge the Titan Emperor Collegium to battle!”

The Quake-Dawn Continent was being completely destroyed by the lunatic Lord Quake-Dawn.

Chapter 419: Madness

The mysterious and enigmatic Lord Quake-Dawn was actually a raving madman, and his plan was to sacrifice everyone in his continent to absorb their power.

As he used his most mysterious and deadly techniques, eighteen blood-red halos appeared behind him, which were manifestations of the very same type of Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragment that Yang Qi had.

It was almost impossible to imagine how much power that represented.

“I've remained in hiding for too long now, and the time has finally come to make my move. The Holy Mother of the Hanging Mountain has a spectacular technique, the godly-class Jade-Emperor Profound-Welkin Exalted-Celestial God-Dao. Her son has mysterious powers as well, such as the legacy medallion of King Immortal-Slayer. I’ll soon have them for my own, and the essence of the Northstar Clan too! They're all mine!”

His face twisted as he chuckled madly. “I spent years building up the Quake-Dawn Continent, but this place is too small. It’s not worthy of my talents, and it isn’t capable of fulfilling my aspirations.”

The Quake-Dawn Continent began shrinking amidst torrents of blood, while the Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragments grew stronger and stronger.

The Ninja God, Wilds God, Winter God, War God and Oracle God were all staring in abject horror. The only one who seemed to approve was the Holy Daughter. “Crown Prince, you might have been a god from heaven descended into the mortal world, but you were still my son. You were killed by Yang Qi, who bears the mark of the legion of gods. Maybe you weren’t a match for him, but I’ll kill him, take that object, and use it to become an immortal. I’ll sacrifice his soul to heaven on high, then do everything in my power to resurrect you.”

The transformations to the Quake-Dawn Continent were dramatic to the extreme. In less than an hour, all of its inhabitants were killed, including the members of the Grand-Wilds Mansion. Only a few people survived—the core figures who were present in the Quake-Dawn Cathedral. Even the disciples of the cathedral itself were killed.

Lord Quake-Dawn didn’t spare anyone else.

From a distance, the Quake-Dawn Continent shrank down and down until it was like a ball of wriggling, bloody flesh, emanating a stench of gore and devils. It even had blood-colored dragons swimming on its surface.

It was at this point that, in completely unexpected fashion, strange patterns appeared on Lord Quake-Dawn’s skin, which rapidly took the shape of dragon scales.

“This….” the Wilds God blurted in terror. “Lord Quake-Dawn isn’t human! He's a vile dragon! An ancient blood dragon. He’s a dragon from the Hell of Fresh Blood!”

It was true. Lord Quake-Dawn was a blood dragon whose bloodline stretched back to the Hell of Fresh Blood.

“Attack!” Lord Quake-Dawn shouted and, as he did, the Quake-Dawn Continent continued to shrink down rapidly until it fused with him, forming a single blood dragon that rushed toward the Holy Mother as she fought within the trap of the Northstar Inert Wither-Glory Death Formation.

The dragon conformed to a bizarre path of travel as it sliced through the void in deadly fashion.

WHIZZZ!

The blood dragon came with a rain of blood and incredible power. In the blink of an eye, the Northstar Fleet, the Holy Mother, and the Sage Monarch Continent were cast into a shade of bright red.

“Ambush? But who?!”

Northstar First-Truth and Northstar First-Summer had called on animadestiny immortal items to fight the Holy Mother with shocking levels of power. But even with that, they were struggling, and at the moment all three of them were like oil lamps on the verge of flickering out.

How could any of them have anticipated that Lord Quake-Dawn would turn into a blood dragon and join the fight at the last minute? It was like pouring fuel on a fire and gave the Northstar Clan and the Holy Mother no choice but to try to defend themselves.

Massive amounts of vital energy erupted out as the Northstar Fleet’s flagship shattered, and both Northstar First-Truth and Northstar First-Summer were slashed viciously.

As for the Holy Mother she staggered backward, keeping her eyes on the blood dragon.

Maniacal laughter erupted out as the blood dragon resolved into the form of Lord Quake-Dawn, in whose hand was a quivering mass of bloody flesh, which was all that remained of the Quake-Dawn Continent.

“Sacrificial Blood Dragons!” he said, and blood dragons swept forth in all directions to lock the entire area down.

Lord Quake-Dawn continued to laugh in the face of the incredibly weak Holy Mother and the bedraggled Northstar Clan. As of this moment, he knew that he had ultimate control.

“Just who exactly are you?” Northstar First-Truth said from his position within the fleet.

Northstar First-Summer glared at Lord Quake-Dawn and added, “Why did you launch this sneak attack?”

“You people are idiots,” Lord Quake-Dawn replied. “The whole reason your Northstar Clan crossed the Dark True Void was because I sent you information about King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy medallion. That's why you’re here in the Yore-Wilds planetary system, isn’t it?”

“So you set this whole thing up?” Northstar First-Truth shouted. “Who are you really? How dare you offend our Northstar First Clan? You’ve got some real guts!”

“Who am I really? Wouldn’t you like to know? Unfortunately, you’re all going to die without knowing who killed you. After absorbing your power, I’ll easily be able to reach the Revered Demi-Immortal level. I’ll also have a godly-class energy art and King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy. I’ll probably be a Universal Demi-Immortal soon after, or maybe even a Paragon Demi-Immortal. And you think I'm afraid of the Northstar Clan?”

Turning to look at the Holy Mother, he said, “Holy Mother, I never could have imagined that you would get this strong. No wonder you have August Patriarch Mammoth Heaven completely under your thumb. In the end, though, it doesn’t matter. I'm going to take your godly-class energy art and your son’s godly-class energy art too. You two got lucky at first, but sadly, the truly lucky one is going to be me.”

“Let’s go!” Northstar First-Truth shouted. He and Northstar First-Summer immediately took control of the fleet and turned it to leave.

However, in response, Lord Quake-Dawn threw out the Quake-Dawn Continent, which turned into a massive sheet of blood that spread out to completely cover the fleet.

Whack. Whack. Whack. Whack! Whack!!!

Countless blood dragons swept out, causing screams to erupt as members of the Northstar Clan were stabbed through. Even the ships were pierced. In the shortest of moments, massive casualties were inflicted on the experts of the Northstar Fleet.

“You’re going to die too, Holy Mother!” Lord Quake-Dawn growled as he turned to personally attack her.

The deaths of everyone from the fleet only served to improve Lord Quake-Dawn’s energy art.

“Don’t hold back, Mother!” Yang Qi shouted in the critical moment. “Here, take this!” Suddenly, nine drops of blood flew out of his forehead and pierced into her.

It was Blood of the One God, that extremely precious substance which he had built up in his forehead.

“This….” The Holy Mother suddenly felt herself filled with a holy and pure energy that immediately drove the curse out of her soul.

All of her wounds healed up, and the damage to her vital energy was reversed. In fact, she even gained further enlightenment of the Jade-Emperor Profound-Welkin Exalted-Celestial God-Dao.

‘This is my son's blood?’ she thought. Eyes glittering brightly, she looked back at Lord Quake-Dawn and lunged forward.

RUMBLE!

Lord Quake-Dawn’s blood dragons hit her, but instead of hurting her they were simply absorbed.

Her eyes seemed to contain the destruction of countless planes of existence as she advanced into battle, everything around her turning into jade.

“Eternal Unknown!” she said, throwing her hands out in front of her. An immense rift appeared in front of Lord Quake-Dawn which gobbled up the rest of his attacking blood dragons.

“You!” Lord Quake-Dawn blurted. “You recovered your strength?! But how? You were just about to die! I was sure of it! No spirit medicine could have helped you to recover that quickly.”

“Deathless Demolishing!” the Holy Mother said, ignoring him as she drew on the same deadly technique she had used to slaughter Northstar First-Rank.

The void was demolished and a deathless entity appeared. The Holy Mother’s will seemed to fill all of heaven and her hands ripped apart reality, sending beams of godly light out like heavenly swords that slashed everything in their path as they bore down on Lord Quake-Dawn.

“Blood Dragon Emerges from Hell!”

Lord Quake-Dawn transformed into a blood dragon again, surrounded by blood energy that formed an enormous cage to trap the deathless entity.

The Holy Mother snorted. “You think becoming a blood dragon is going to help you, Lord Quake-Dawn? You did well to remain in hiding all of these tens of thousands of years, lurking in the depths of the Quake-Dawn Continent. Now you’ve shown your true form, and sacrificed the entire Quake-Dawn Continent to do it. How many experts became pigs led to the slaughter by you? Unfortunately, you’re not going to escape this fight. You plotted against me and my son. Therefore, I'm going to show you a consummate technique that I just gained enlightenment of. Immemorial Incorruptibility!”

RUMBLE!

True energy swirled out in front of the Holy Mother to create daoist symbols in which lurked incorruptible spirits, almost like angels. They even sang holy hymns and psalms, lauding the majesty of the ancient gods.

The will of Immemorial Incorruptibility spread out, piercing into Lord Quake-Dawn’s forehead and entering his sea of consciousness.

Lord Quake-Dawn screamed as shrilly as Northstar First-Rank had. As his soul was strangled, he began to gurgle and splutter, then his body collapsed and his soul and aura began to fade away.

“I refuse to accept this! How did you recover!? You were fighting for so long and were out of energy. I'm going to kill you, Holy Mother! Prison of Blood!Eternal Sealing!” Burning his last bit of life force, Lord Quake-Dawn unleashed a sealing mark in the form of a prison of blood that shot toward the Holy Mother. Truth be told, it was a fledgling version of the Hell of Fresh Blood.

“Complete crap!” The Holy Mother clenched her hand into a fist and punched out, destroying the Prison of Blood and causing a rain of gore to descend onto the Sage Monarch Continent.

Chapter 420: No One Survives

Lord Quake-Dawn tumbled down, transforming from a blood dragon back into a human as he fell.

Crunch!

The shining, blood-colored light faded away as the Holy Mother grabbed him by the neck and held him out in front of her. She had used three moves from her godly-class energy art: Eternal Unknown, Deathless Demolishing, and Immemorial Incorruptibility, to completely and utterly vanquish Lord Quake-Dawn.

His face filled with both terror and shock, he said, “Don’t kill me! Don’t—”

“If you don’t die, then who does?” the Holy Mother said, remaining as cool and calm as could be. “You plotted against me and tried to kill my son. Both are unforgivable sins.” Tightening her grip, she sent a stream of true energy into him.

“I… I won’t let this go!” he growled, his expression turning from terror to fury. However, a moment later he devolved into utter despair. All he could do was stare into the Holy Mother’s eyes as if that would drag her into hell with him.

A moment later, his soul vanished and he turned into a corpse. Lord Quake-Dawn, maniacal schemer and sixth order Prime Demi-Immortal, had perished.

As he did, the blood-colored mass that was all that remained of the Quake-Dawn Continent began crumbling.

At this point, the Holy Mother turned….

Whooooosh….

In the blink of an eye, she was in the middle of the Northstar Fleet and one of the ships exploded, transforming into fragments that floated down into the Sage Monarch Continent.

Another Lesser Demi-Immortal was dead.

In this moment, the Holy Mother was invincible. She attacked again, killing more Northstar Clan members and sending their corpses down into the continent below. She had decided that she was going to make a scene, and it would be a big one. None of the people who had threatened her son were even close to her level. Therefore, they would all die.

Thanks to the nine drops of blood from Yang Qi, she had completely recovered, expunged the curse, and restored her life force. Even more relevant, her Jade-Emperor Profound-Welkin Exalted-Celestial God-Dao had improved and transformed. However, it had all come at a price. Yang Qi was visibly ashen and withered as though he had burned virtually all of his life force, which, of course, angered the Holy Mother to no end.

A true massacre was playing out, and ultimate destruction was visiting the Northstar Fleet.

One ship after another was destroyed and sent down into the Sage Monarch Continent, until there were only two people left surviving, Northstar First-Truth and Northstar First-Summer.

Thanks to their immortal items, they were still able to hold out.

“Let us go, Holy Mother. We’ll go back to the Northstar Continent and even give you some powerful magical treasures in compensation. Our clan will also reward you for sparing us!”

“Yeah, they’ll give you plenty of treasure!”

In response to their pleading, the Holy Mother laughed coldly. “Let you go back to the Northstar Continent? You mean, let you go so you can gather even more top experts to come back and attack my son again? No. You’re dying right here. Enough jabbering.”

“You wicked savage! It's not like we can’t kill you if we really try! Die!”

“Die!” Clearly, the two Demi-Immortals were putting everything on the line in one final act of despair.

Unfortunately, the Holy Mother’s power levels were still increasing, and as they closed in on her she blurred into motion, destroying their momentum and grabbing onto their throats.

Crunch!

Majestic godpower bashed into their souls with such force that their nascent divinities, which were ensconced in the plane beneath the Megaplexus Heaven, were completely wiped out of existence.

They were dead, and they had no hope of being resurrected.

Two more corpses tumbled down into the Sage Monarch Continent.

The entire Northstar Fleet had been wiped out of existence, including tens of thousands of lower-level cultivators and roughly a hundred top experts.

But the Holy Mother wasn’t done. Waving her hand, she pulled over the wriggling mass of blood and gore that was the remains of the Quake-Dawn Continent. Also present some distance away was a majestic cathedral hovering in the void.

“Ninja God. Winter God. Wilds God. Oracle God. War God. And you… Holy Daughter. All of you, show your faces. Ant-like wimps such as you have no right to call yourselves gods.” The ninth step Great Sages powering the spell formation in the Quake-Dawn Cathedral were all dragged out into the open, as was the Holy Daughter.

“Spare us, Holy Mother!” the Wilds God wailed. “Please spare us! We had nothing to do with Lord Quake-Dawn’s plot. He forced us to do it. We’ll repent of our evils and walk the righteous path! We’ll be your slaves!”

“You think I want a crappy slave like you?” the Holy Mother said, her eyes flashing. The Wilds God screamed as his sea of consciousness was destroyed, after which he dropped down toward the Sage Monarch Continent, nothing more than a corpse.

In quick succession, she destroyed the souls of the War God, Winter God, Ninja God and Oracle God. Soon, the only person left was the Holy Daughter.

“So, you’re the one who gave birth to that Crown Prince,” the Holy Mother said. “How did it happen? Tell me. I refuse to believe that ridiculous story of you dreaming of falling stars. Your son ended up dead at the hands of my son, but he did have the legacy of King Immortal-Slayer at one point. Presumably, he was connected to some higher power in an immortal world. But who? Who’s backing you? Or was it all just some trick? After all, the immortal worlds aren’t exactly safe and peaceful places nowadays.”

The Holy Daughter burst out laughing. “Torture me, kill me, do whatever you want. But don't think for a minute that I’ll tell you anything. And if you kill me, someone will definitely come to avenge my death. My son was the transmigration of an almighty entity from the immortal world and he was supposed to be invincible here. But somehow your son got the God Legion Seal and killed him. I suppose it's the will of heaven. The purpose of King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy is to defy heaven and slaughter gods. Your son is going to die eventually. It’s predestined! The glory of the legion of gods will end in this epoch, there’s no question!”

“The legion of gods is invincible, omniscient, and omnipotent,” the Holy Mother said. “They are so mighty that no language exists which can properly praise them.

“Any who provoke them end up dead. It was that way in the countless epochs of the past, and it will remain the same in future epochs. Your son died because he deserved to die. By the way, this ‘someone’ who you say will avenge you is presumably Chancellor Demi-Immortal, right? I know that he's in the Titan Emperor Collegium, but, unfortunately for him, my son is a member of the strongest group there, the Invincible Society. That lover of yours doesn't stand a chance. Alright, since you’re not going to talk I’ll kill you and search your memories. Considering the level of your cultivation base, I’d hoped to keep you alive to be a servant girl for my son. But since you insist on being pigheaded, then get ready to die.”

As the word ‘die’ left her lips, an eye opened up on the Holy Mother’s forehead and dazzling, celestial light shot out, slamming into the Holy Daughter and killing her.

The crisis was over.

Not a single enemy escaped alive. The Holy Mother had killed them all, and as a result, the Sage Monarch Continent shone with more radiance and light than ever.

The Holy Mother floated down to Sage Monarch City, and looked anxiously at her son. “Qi’er, are you alright? We were in a very dangerous situation. Thank goodness you gave me those nine drops of blood. What kind of blood was that? After I got them, my cultivation base improved dramatically and nothing could stand in my way.”

“I’m fine, mother. But I did sustain major damage to my vital energy. Given some time, I’ll recover, though. That blood is called the Blood of the One God, and it was produced by my God Legion Seal.” It was somewhat of an effort for him to keep his eyes open, and he looked very pale. However, he was clearly excited. The Sage Monarch Continent was surrounded by broken battleships and shattered corpses, which clearly contained the power to change the face of heaven and earth. Now he didn’t need to come up with some complicated plan to get the resources he needed.

He had nearly a hundred Demi-Immortal corpses from the Northstar Clan, including three Prime Demi-Immortals, or actually four, including Lord Quake-Dawn. In terms of seventh, eighth, and ninth order Great Sages, there were simply too many to count. And the battleships were also magical treasures of immeasurable power.

He had the two immortal items, Void-Demolisher and Myriad Oceans. And that was not to mention the mass of flesh and blood that was the Quake-Dawn Continent, which had eighteen Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragments in it.

The latter was the most relevant of all.

Events were actually turning out much the way that Elder Seventh Brother Meng Shafan had suggested. He had proposed sacrificing the Quake-Dawn Continent to help Yang Qi, only to be refused by Elder Second Brother.

That casual recommendation had turned out to be quite prophetic.

‘Eighteen Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragments. Incredible. How did Lord Quake-Dawn manage to get his hands on all of them? I don’t think I could have acquired anything more valuable.’ After giving up so many drops of Blood of the One God, Yang Qi’s cultivation base had regressed significantly and the particles within him had gone backward, turning from dracomammoths into ordinary megamammoths.

Thankfully, his soul was very stable, and after observing the amazing fight he had reached the enlightenment level of a ninth step Great Sage.

With all of the resources he had at his disposal, he was confident in being able to restore his cultivation base to its previous condition. In fact, he would probably be able to wake more particles within him; possibly even all of them.

The only downside was that refining all of the corpses and materials on his own would take a very long time.

The Holy Mother settled down cross-legged in front of him. “Qi’er, there’s no way you can break down all of these corpses at once. Didn’t you have a mission from the Titan Emperor Collegium to go to the Coiling Arc planetary system and look for the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart? Why don’t you let me help out here? Besides, thanks to your help, my godly-class energy art grew more complete and is heading toward a breakthrough.”

“Out of curiosity, mother, what level is your godly-class art?”

Chapter 421: Major Accomplishments

Sighing, the Holy Mother looked at her son and said, “Qi’er, godly-class energy arts are techniques left in the mortal world by the ancient legion of gods. Whenever they appear, they lead to storms of blood and death. Who could have ever guessed that the two of us would both end up with one? Unfortunately, it’s also a very dangerous situation.

“When I was in the Hell of Gloom and Darkness, I found a crumbled jade wall, upon which was inscribed a fragment of a godly-class energy art. The information also revealed many secrets to me. In the ancient world, energy arts were ranked royal-, imperial-, saintly-, and heavenly-class. Anything beyond heavenly-class was considered an immortal skill, although most of them were actually combinations or augmentations of heavenly-class arts. Technically speaking, none of the immortal skills actually surpassed the heavenly-class arts. But godly-class energy arts are different; they completely surpass anything else that exists. Even in the countless heavenly worlds, it’s a rare thing to encounter a godly-class energy art.”

“I'm aware of that, Mother, and that’s why I’ve tried to be careful about revealing the truth of my energy arts. Unfortunately, I think word has begun to spread. In any case, I'm a member of the Invincible Society now, and my Elder Brothers and Sisters all seem very interested in protecting me. I'm not sure about my Master, though. Have you ever heard of the Invincible Dugu? Do you think he might try to get his hands on my godly-class energy art? Of course, anyone who tries to force the art out of me will run into the God Legion Seal in my forehead and end up dead. It seems to me that the God Legion Seal is only getting stronger and stronger as time goes on.”

The Holy Mother considered the matter for a moment, then said, “The Invincible Dugu is an eccentric, and although he would definitely be interested in a godly-class energy art, I don’t think he would do anything to one of his own disciples. He has an Invincible Heart that makes him about as arrogant as the legion of gods itself. Furthermore, back in the day….” she trailed off for a moment, then hesitated. “Never mind. Let’s not talk about the past. Let’s just say that as long as he doesn’t ascend to the immortal world, there won’t be anyone stronger that you can rely on. After all, my art is a lesser godly energy art.

“Godly-class energy arts are ranked as follows: lesser, common, greater, consummate, perfect, paramount, and lordly. The latter is named after the Lord of All Gods, who is omniscient, omnipotent, and created countless universes. He is an eternally deathless entity. Qi’er, if the blood you create is called Blood of the One God and your body type is the Physique of the Sovereign Lord, then I would say it’s highly likely you cultivate an energy art from the Lord of All Gods. As for your God Legion Seal, the legends in the immortal world say that it was a talisman of blessing created by numerous gods, which was given as a gift to the supreme Lord. The godmammoths were Paramount Gods that the Lord created to suppress hell.”

“So that’s how it is.” His mother’s explanation had resolved quite a few issues for him. And by this point, a bit of color had returned to his face.

“Now let me help you refine all of these resources and restore your vital energy. My son, you and I need to rely on each other in this vicious and treacherous world. That's the only way we’ll survive.” She sighed. “Thanks to your Blood of the One God, my godly-class energy art has grown more refined, and, given enough time, I should be able to piece together more of its mysteries. Perhaps it will even enable me to achieve another breakthrough.”

“I see,” Yang Qi replied. “Well, Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth is definitely a complete version. I would love to share it with you, Mother, but without the God Legion Seal, it’s impossible to cultivate. For example, I gave Ghost Emperor Yama the technique to the Infernal Deity Spear, but he can’t unlock its true essence.”

“I understand,” the Holy Mother said with a nod. “The technique is yours, and yours alone, Qi’er. Only with the God Legion Seal can its truths be revealed and the enlightenment of the One God acquired. However, I could probably benefit from information about the primeval infernal deities. My Jade-Emperor Profound-Welkin Exalted-Celestial God-Dao came from hell, and was supposedly created by a god who went there to wage war in the name of the Lord. It consists of six sections, but I only acquired one of them.”

“I’ll do everything I can to help you collect the others, Mother,” Yang Qi said.

“I believe you, Qi’er. I don’t think there’s anything in the world that my son can't do.” With that, she waved her hand, causing a whole host of corpses to fly over. Crushing them into ash, she sent them into the depths of the lands around them.

It instantly caused a host of enormous dragons to spring into being, which were none other than manifestations of magical laws.

The Holy Mother was a sixth order Demi-Immortal, thus her ability to make use of all the resources vastly surpassed Yang Qi’s. Yang Qi remained in place in Sage Monarch City, furthering his enlightenment by merely watching. Meanwhile, power built up in the depths of the lands, which rose up into him and nourished his fleshly body. Thanks to the magical laws from the Demi-Immortals, the quintessence-blood he had wasted earlier was now building back up.

“Qi’er, this is the corpse of Lord Quake-Dawn. Not only did he have a high cultivation base, but he was actually a blood dragon from the Hell of Fresh Blood. Absorb his internal pellet and you’ll get his life force quintessence, which will definitely benefit your cultivation base.” The Holy Mother waved her hand and Lord Quake-Dawn’s internal pellet flew out of him, dropping right into Yang Qi’s Hellfire Crucible.

With that, the Holy Mother moved over and placed her hands onto her son's back, sending power raging into him.

As she did, he called on the Fist of the Halls of Heaven and the Hand of the One God, making it seem as though he could actually sense the halls of heaven. Sagelight raged inside him, burning the Demi-Immortal magical laws and transforming them into the power of the halls of heaven.

A drop of Blood of the One God formed, then another, to be absorbed by the God Legion Seal, which began converting it into the purer version.

By the time he had fully absorbed Lord Quake-Dawn’s internal pellet, he had eighteen full drops of the blood in his forehead, which was double what he had lost.

By now, he was fully and completely recovered, and in fact, the megamammoths within him were turning back into dracomammoths.

As he sat there in Sage Monarch City, bursting with energy, his Hellfire Crucible appeared and began to gather vital energy.

“The hidden dragon moves, it flaps its wings, secluded in the yellow springs, a lord of the netherworld….” As he continued to draw on his energy arts, he sensed the subterranean vital energy of the continent flowing into the shape of a Wheel of Magical Law. The Sage Monarch Continent was absorbing the Quake-Dawn Continent and transforming as a result.

A very serious expression could be seen on the Holy Mother’s face. As the Quake-Dawn Continent was absorbed along with the Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragments, jade dragons danced behind her. Clearly, the vital energy being released was very beneficial to her as well.

Seven days and nights passed in which Yang Qi imparted extensive knowledge to his mother about the primeval infernal deities. As he did, she gained deeper and deeper enlightenment of the Jade-Emperor Profound-Welkin Exalted-Celestial God-Dao.

Over the course of that week, the Holy Mother was hit with numerous tribulations, but none of them did anything to her and her cultivation progressed rapidly. At the same time, the corpses of more than one hundred Demi-Immortals were absorbed into the Sage Monarch Continent, which eventually reached a size ten times as large as the former Quake-Dawn Continent. And its vital energy surged even more than that former continent.

As of now, the Sage Monarch Continent was a true land of sages.

Yang Qi’s cultivation base experienced dramatic transformations. He had one hundred million dracomammoths, and although he was only a second step Great Sage his soul was approaching the limit of the Epic Saga Step.

Given enough time, his impending breakthrough would occur with little difficulty.

The depths of the Sage Monarch Continent now had nineteen Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragments, giving the place a partial heart. As the heart fluttered, it connected the continent to the Yore-Wilds planetary system as a whole. More power flowed toward the continent and it began to work its way toward becoming the center of the entire planetary system.

“Qi’er, you’re still only a second step Great Sage, but you’re already strong enough to kill Lesser Demi-Immortals. Right now, you can't absorb the immortal items, so why not just leave them buried in the Sage Monarch Continent? They’ll be very beneficial to the continent, and especially your immortal clone, who can probably use them to become a Demi-Immortal.”

“Great suggestion,” he replied.

When the Holy Mother looked at her son, she was completely and utterly satisfied. How could she not be, with a son like this?

Yang Qi was now fully convinced that the Sage Monarch Continent had the strongest and best foundation possible. He was no longer satisfied with the idea of it becoming a planet. He wanted it to be a planetary system, like a second Yore-Wilds.

Once his soul reached the enlightenment level of a Demi-Immortal, then all the latent power in the continent could be used by his immortal clone to reach the Demi-Immortal level. At that point, Yang Qi would be strong enough to hold his own in the Titan Emperor Collegium and wouldn’t lose any face for the Invincible Society.

“I think the time has come to go looking for the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Mother, your cultivation base has improved and the Sage Monarch Continent is no longer in danger. And right now, my own cultivation base has reached its limit.” He rose to his feet. “Time is of the essence. I can’t afford to delay any longer in my search for the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.”

“Go, Qi’er. The Sage Monarch Continent is stable, and with your clone here to keep an eye on things, everything should be fine; I’ll also be here to watch over the continent. I’ll request information from the heaven above regarding why people from the Megaplexus Heaven dared to invade us.”

The Holy Mother looked on fondly as her son kowtowed three times then unfurled his Angel Wings and vanished in a blur.

Chapter 422: Coiling Arc Planetary System

The Northstar Fleet hadn’t just brought corpses and immortal items. There had also been plenty of magical treasures, spirit stones, and immortal stones. That wasn't mentioning the energy from all of the spirit stones that came with the Quake-Dawn Continent.

It was a vast amount of resources that would give rise to endless experts in the Sage Monarch Continent.

In fact, in the years to come it was highly likely that the place would give birth to Demi-Immortals.

In Sage Monarch City, the direct bloodline of the Yang Clan already had a huge stockpile of magical treasures, but that was now bolstered by the amazing things they had acquired from the Northstar Fleet.

After all, the Northstar Clan was one of the top administrative groups in the Megaplexus planetary system and the wealth they had at their disposal was unimaginable. They had equipped their fleet with everything imaginable in their mission to go acquire more slaves.

But in the end, they ran into Yang Qi and his mother, losing everything.

Lord Quake-Dawn had done the same with all of the resources of the Quake-Dawn Continent. In the end, the Sage Monarch Continent was already on the path to surpassing the Hanging Mountain.

After all, the Hanging Mountain was split between two factions, but the Sage Monarch Continent wasn’t.

At the moment, Yang Qi’s immortal clone was an eighth step Great Sage, just on the verge of reaching the Epic Saga Step, and the Holy Mother had already imparted her Jade-Emperor Profound-Welkin Exalted-Celestial God-Dao to him.

Unfortunately, not even Yang Qi’s clone could use the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. Without the God Legion Seal, not even immortals in heaven could cultivate the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. For example, Ghost Emperor Yama had already reached the limit of what he could do with the Infernal Deity Spear and found it painful to use the technique at high levels.

Of course, because Yang Qi’s immortal clone shared thoughts with his true self, it had a foundational understanding of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. And because of that, it was an easy thing for him to work with the Jade-Emperor Profound-Welkin Exalted-Celestial God-Dao.

As such, the immortal child’s powers were growing and growing. Although he was only an eighth step Great Sage, he was already strong enough to fight Lesser Demi-Immortals.

Once enlightenment was passed to the immortal child through Yang Qi, he would achieve further breakthroughs and become even more domineering.

The other inhabitants of the Sage Monarch Continent were also benefiting dramatically, and were reaching incredible heights of battle prowess. Yang Zhan, Yang Yunchong, and Yang Hualong were all Great Sages. In fact, there were already over thirty Great Sages in the lands, which was a fighting force of no insignificance.

The Sage Monarch Continent was truly rising into glory.

**

Yang Qi was now capable of even more incredible speed. He flitted past millions of planes, until he eventually left the Yore-Wilds planetary systems and reached the border of the Four Wilds. At that point he was in the Dark True Void, where he was surrounded by nothing but endless darkness.

This was a border put in place by the immortal worlds, similar to walls that might exist between mortal nations.

The Northstar Fleet had spent significant resources to cross that void, as it was a place that was easy to get lost in.

The slightest turn in the wrong direction and one could find oneself in an eternal darkness from which escape was impossible. There were billions of trillions of planes within the Dark True Void, places that not even Demi-Immortals could safely enter.

However, Yang Qi had the Lord's Eye, which made it possible for him to see in even the most difficult conditions. And his Angel Wings could propel him through all barriers, and to the most distant regions.

In fact, as soon as he was in the Dark True Void he realized that there were mysterious heavenly workings everywhere, apparently the manifestation of immortal power.

The countless distorted planes that filled the place made it impossible to gain a sense of direction.

“Let sagelight bathe the Dark True Void. Let radiance and light bring the glory of the legion of gods!”

He began shining with brilliant light, including the gaze of the Lord's Eye, which pierced through anything and everything.

Crack!

One of the planes he passed was filled with endless bones and shattered blades, and was apparently an ancient battlefield. After all, people would occasionally enter the Dark True Void on campaigns to find treasures from the ancient past. Unfortunately, even entire armies would sometimes go missing and end up floating in the darkness for all eternity.

At the same time, there were also cultivators who established mansion grottos there, taking advantage of the infinite peace and quiet to further their cultivation.

There were the remains of immortals, countless weapons, medicinal pill books, martial arts records, and internal pellets.

As Yang Qi looked down at the huge battlefield, he identified the corpses of Great Sages, although the passage of time had scraped the remains clean of any spirit energy.

With a wave of his hand, he sent down a field of sagelight that melted all of the bones.

RUMBLE!

As he did, a shock wave spread out that destroyed everything in the area and revealed that there were actually numerous wormholes present.

Blurring into motion, Yang Qi headed toward one of the wormholes that actually seemed to be moving. As he neared, he saw something that he initially mistook for a dragon or snake. It was actually a pupa, of sorts, that was devouring space itself to create a wormhole.

‘It’s a primeval godworm!’ he thought, his heart pounding with excitement.

Of all the types of godlings that existed, primeval godworms were among the most bizarre. They looked like silkworms, but vastly larger. They were born out of the void itself, and existed by consuming space and magical laws. Their passage through the countless planes of the primeval past were what created wormholes to begin with.

For the most part, primeval godworms were considered extinct.

They were incredibly powerful; if one could capture and raise one, it would be similar to having a direct connection to the magical laws of space. In fact, they could even be used to pass directly through planes of existence.

Some people said that if you could raise a primeval godworm to maturity, it would be able to eat through the barriers of immortal worlds.

In ancient times, the godworms were so powerful that they were said to be able to belch out spatial magical laws to form cocoons that were like immortal sealing marks. Because of that, immortals would risk their lives to try and capture them.

Of course, it was only the adult godworms who could seal and eat immortals.

Godworms like this would hardly ever show up in the mortal world in modern times. If they did, they would lurk in ancient aspects of space-time and become patriarchal entities who could kill millions of Yang Qis in the blink of an eye.

This particular primeval godworm was huge, but very weak at the same time. It was obviously a newborn larva. But even as weak newborns, godworms were still as powerful as Demi-Immortals, and the more space they consumed, the stronger they would get.

‘This is my lucky day! I can’t believe I ran into a primeval godworm larva! Considering that it's a newborn, I wonder if I can capture it. If it were any bigger, it would definitely be able to eat me. I bet if I feed it with the Blood of the One God, it would grow even faster. And with its abilities to eat space, bolstered by my divine abilities, perhaps I can use it to reach the Hell of Mahānata sooner rather than later.’

Before, he had assumed it would take months, or even years, for him to reach the Hell of Mahānata and that he would be stuck as a second step Great Sage for an indefinite period of time. But now, things had changed.

Getting into the Hell of Mahānata was his ticket to achieving further breakthroughs, and considering the enlightenment he already had he should be able to reach the ninth step almost immediately.

It was hard to even imagine how strong he would be then.

The godworm here was a few dozen kilometers long, beige in color, with compound eyes and a gaping maw.

Right now, all it cared about was eating as much space as possible, to the point of ignoring any danger around it.

Yang Qi reached out to grab it with the Hand of the One God.

Seemingly aware of the danger, the godworm suddenly looked up and spat godpower out of its mouth that became a spatial prison around Yang Qi.

Chapter 423: Primeval Godworm

This godworm was clearly a larva.

It had complex lineaments covering it, but its god motes had not fully formed. That indicated that it was still very young, yet had immense potential.

The instant it spat out its mouthful of godpower, Yang Qi was surrounded by a powerful seal. Everything he had been able to see before vanished and was replaced by an immense labyrinth of wormholes, almost like a prison with walls of impenetrable iron.

Even a Demi-Immortal would end up trapped in a place like this and would never be able to get out. That was how strong primeval godworms were, which was no surprise considering they were the darlings of the gods.

They were born with the power of Demi-Immortals and could dominate space the way a dragon could play with water. Other godlings, and even immortals, couldn’t come close to their ability to control aspects of space. After all, godworms were born directly out of the void and could eat space to make wormholes.

However, even though this spatial prison was the type that Demi-Immortals couldn't deal with, Yang Qi was different.

After everything he had experienced recently in the Sage Monarch Continent, there was no way that a few wormholes could cause a problem for him.

Smack!

He burst into motion, bashing through the wormhole labyrinth and shredding the godly laws of space that existed in front of him. With the burning sagelight cast by the Lord's Eye, he locked down onto the godworm itself in order to make sure that it couldn’t escape.

Obviously, considering that godworms were the original creators of wormholes, it was little wonder that they were nearly impossible to capture.

As soon as the godworm realized what was happening, it looked up and its host of eyes locked onto Yang Qi. Godly laws of space erupted from the eyes, creating an image that resembled countless planes and worlds, another seal to lock Yang Qi in place.

However, Yang Qi simply flapped his Angel Wings, becoming a blur that closed in on the godworm.

AAOOWWW!

AAAAOOOWWWW!

The worm howled as Yang Qi extended his palm and struck it, causing the thing to shake violently. Instantly, the forming god motes on it faded.

“Creation!” Yang Qi said, unleashing a move from the Hand of the One God. Blinding light erupted, causing the space around the godworm to twist and distort. The cosmos inverted and yin and yang transformed on a substructural level.

The godworm could sense Yang Qi’s immense power, but it was powerless to resist. Therefore, it began to shrink, growing smaller and smaller until it was the size of an earthworm. Finally, it just vanished.

‘This godworm is very crafty. If I hadn’t absorbed the power of a Prime Demi-Immortal through the Sage Monarch Continent, then I probably would have been sealed by it.’ Flapping his Angel Wings, he shot over to the spot where the godworm had disappeared. As he approached, he saw the trail it left as it built and destroyed wormholes at random, making it impossible to lay hands on.

It obviously had perfect innate control of space, and although it was only a larva it could travel anywhere and hide perfectly within the folds of space.

Swish!

Yang Qi followed the trail through the Dark True Void, a trail that most people would never be able to see. Thankfully, he had made immense progress recently, and had his Angel Wings.

“Nature!” he suddenly said. Having caught up with the godworm, he unleashed the third move from the Hand of the One God, causing the unfathomable power of nature to crush down onto the creature.

Daoist images formed from magical law appeared, depicting burning hells, heavenly palaces, towering mountains, raging rivers, the cycles of the sun and moon, and more. When Nature appeared, all sorts of natural phenomenon would result. After all, the Sovereign Lord had created the universe.

Suddenly, the godworm let out a piercing scream and picked up so much speed that it became almost like a single streak of light piercing through the darkness.

“Nice move!” Yang Qi said, his eyes flashing. He had to admire this worm. Unfortunately, letting it go wasn't an option. He spat out a drop of the Blood of the One God, which ignited into burning flames that pulsed with undying energy.

“Hand of the One God, Fourth Stance: Undying!”

RUMBLE!

Burning flames erupted from his palm, which surrounded the wriggling, screaming godworm and dragged it back toward him. A moment later, it plopped onto his palm.

“Be sealed!” He quickly used the Devil-God Seal, causing numerous magical symbols to stream out and cover the worm.

The worm didn’t cease its struggles, and each twitch caused immense shockwaves to spread out—the type that could shake mountains and even planets. In fact, it was hard for Yang Qi to keep his energy and blood in check.

“I am the Sovereign Lord, origin of the world, and of the legion of gods! I am the paramount dao, invincible in all respects.” He quickly drew on the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth to send streams of dazzling sagelight into the godworm, which finally caused it to settle down.

“Not bad. Not bad at all. I represent the legion of gods, and you're a godworm. Your kind were created by the legion of gods, and specialize in eating space and creating wormholes. I’ll raise you with Blood of the One God, and when you're an adult you can become a part of me….”

After speaking these words, using Godtongue, into the mind of the godworm, it went still and silent.

With that, he placed a nascent divinity sealing mark onto the godworm, branding it to himself. A moment later, a bubble of immortal energy spread out into the Dark True Void, surrounding both him and the worm. Now that the godworm had submitted to Yang Qi, it was unleashing its power to distort the space around them. Viewed with the naked eye, it would almost seem like space was dough that it could knead at will.

WHIZZ!

Yang Qi waved his hand, and a burst of energy shot into his God Legion Paradise. Thick chains appeared within the domain, which the godworm burrowed into to make a home.

The God Legion Paradise trembled, then began thrumming with the aura of a Demi-Immortal. At the same time, the legacy memories contained within the very genes of the primeval godworm poured into Yang Qi’s mind with mountain-like force.

Common devillings had legacies in their genes, thus they naturally understood certain things like equipment forging, cultivation, and how to form demon cores. Considering that, how much more would a godling like a godworm benefit from such memories? Its genes contained enlightenment regarding how the legion of gods dealt with space and magical laws.

As this information poured into Yang Qi, an ancient aura filled the God Legion Paradise and his soul reached a peak level of enlightenment regarding the Epic Saga Step.

At the same time, the powers of the God Legion Paradise’s Superlative Defense increased, thanks to the godly laws of space. As of this moment, it would be able to stand fast against the assault of even a Lesser Demi-Immortal.

Far off in the Sage Monarch Continent, his immortal clone underwent another tribulation, a deluge of lightning, earth, water, fire, and wind. In the end, he passed it and reached the ninth step of the Great Sage level. Then he began thrumming with immortal energy. All it would take would be one more step to reach the Demi-Immortal level!

Yang Qi’s true self could sense what had occurred and he nodded in approval. Before long, he would have the Demi-Immortal enlightenment, and then he could hopefully use the primeval godworm to enter the Hell of Mahānata.

When that happened, it would cause a huge stir. Whether in the Hanging Mountain or in the Titan Emperor Collegium, he would become an extremely important person.

Staring out into the darkness, he was fairly certain that he could see the golden glow of the Hell of Mahānata’s defenses. However, he knew he couldn’t break through them yet. He needed to grow his godworm and use it to eat through the hell’s greyspace.

‘It can’t be a coincidence that a primeval godworm appeared here. Could it be because of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart?’ After all, primeval godworms were supposed to be extinct, and the fact that he had found a newborn out in the middle of the Dark True Void seemed completely beyond expectation.

Chapter 424: Enemies

Acquiring the godworm caused Yang Qi’s energy arts to improve and his soul enlightenment of the Epic Saga Step to grow more profound, placing him on the verge of Demi-Immortal enlightenment.

He was also able to start gaining enlightenment of the mysterious aspects of godworm genes.  The way the legion of gods viewed space was a source of profound help to Yang Qi’s God Legion Paradise, Angel Wings, Devil-God Seal, and even his Fist of the Halls of Heaven and Hand of the One God.

Henceforth, all of his skills and abilities could benefit from the godly laws of space.

Just like the immortals of old, he would be able to bypass space to attack his enemies. Only a profound understanding of the godly laws of space could enable someone to treat them like toys to be manipulated at will.

Such godly laws were extremely profound, to the point where even immortals would have trouble mastering them. That was not to mention how such laws in the mortal world were weak, whereas in the immortal world, they were stronger. Some people could spend an entire life attempting to control them. But with this primeval godworm, Yang Qi almost immediately gained understanding that rivaled that of a Demi-Immortal expert.

Now that the worm was resting in his God Legion Paradise, its powers merged with his own and enabled him to easily create space-time wormholes within the Dark True Void around him.

Thanks to these powers, Yang Qi was effectively almost twice as strong as he was before.

Before, the godworm larva had been as strong as a Demi-Immortal and was, in fact, something that ordinary Demi-Immortals couldn’t handle. But now that Yang Qi was raising it with the Blood of the One God, it would grow dozens of times stronger.

To Yang Qi, it almost seemed like his God Legion Paradise was breathing. And every ‘breath’ it took sucked in massive spatial power from around it, which the godworm would absorb and change into the godly laws of space. That was also transforming the God Legion Paradise.

Hissss!

Yang Qi looked out and realized that he could see all aspects of space, including all the types of wormholes. Everything looked different than before, as if all reality were made up of numerous layers that ordinary people couldn’t even detect.

Suddenly, Yang Qi vanished, passing through the gaps between those layers in a way that would be impossible for onlookers to see.

As all of this was happening, his mind was also active in the God Legion Paradise, gaining new enlightenment of the Hand of the One God.

Up to now, he had learned of four main stances, those being Creation, Destruction, Nature, and Undying.

Now the God Legion Seal was giving him access to more. The fifth stance was Aeon. The sixth, Reincarnation. The seventh, Epoch. The eighth, Pāramitā. The ninth, Immortality.

The Hand of the One God had nine total stances, each one mighty to the extreme. Not only did they require massive amounts of power to back them, they also needed a strong heart and a domineering will like that of heaven itself.

If all nine were used in concert, the destructive power they would unleash would defy imagination.

Unfortunately, considering the level of Yang Qi’s cultivation base, he could only use up to the fourth stance, Undying. The fifth stance, Aeon, was beyond him; he would need to become a Demi-Immortal first.

**

The moment Yang Qi vanished into the cracks of space a stream of divine will swept through the area he had just occupied, searching it thoroughly. Then the entire area filled with destructive rumbling.

Afterward, a group of people appeared, all of them clad in garments decorated to look like Go boards. In fact, there were Go pieces embroidered into the garments, featuring end-game scenarios that seemed to contain profound truths about the universe. Each individual had a different end-game scenario and all of them seemed to pulse with the power to distort space-time itself.

“What? How could it have vanished?”

“We clearly sensed the passage of a godworm larva. We have to get it!”

“Well, it’s clearly gone. Godworms only show up once every ten thousand years or so, and the larva are even harder to come across. If you can get one, you would become like a god of space and achieve incredible cultivation advancement. If it weren’t for the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart appearing, we would never have found traces of a godworm.”

“That godworm larva definitely burrowed out of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. People say that the chart itself is a magical treasure created by the host of immortals, and is actually a full plane of existence. It’s supposedly even larger than the Megaplexus Heaven. It drifts in the void and appears every ten thousand years or so, filled with all sorts of treasures. I've even heard that it was created by immortals to defy the legion of gods.”

“That’s an old myth that you hear about in the epic sagas. It's really not relevant to us now. Our mission from the Megaplexus Collegium is to get as much treasure as possible and kill as many students from the Titan Emperor Collegium as we can. Every Great Sage that we kill will earn us a thousand merit points, and if we kill a Demi-Immortal we’ll get a hundred thousand. That's a lot of wealth!”

“You’re right. The Titan Emperor Heaven is the mortal enemy of our Megaplexus Heaven, and our two collegiums are dead set on destroying each other. But our top priority right now should be to track down that godworm.”

“Where do you think the thing ran off to? How did it disappear without leaving behind any clues?”

There were dozens of people present, most of them Epic Saga Sages. However, five were Demi-Immortals, the end-game scenarios on their garments pulsing with profound killing intent.

Yang Qi was actually hiding in a fold of space nearby, eavesdropping.

He knew that the Megaplexus Collegium and the Titan Emperor Collegium were enemies, and that both institutions tasked its students with killing those from the other.

Long ago, the Titan Emperor Heaven’s Four Wilds had been thriving places, especially the Yore-Wilds, which had abounded with powerful experts. However, it was the Megaplexus Heaven who arranged for the Hell of Euphoria to invade, giving the Yore-Wilds no other choice but to take the lead in the defense.

The result was that the Yore-Wilds planetary system was shattered, and the Titan Emperor Collegium became weak. And thus, great enmity existed between the two heavens and their respective collegiums.

“Damnation!” one of the Megaplexus Collegium students cursed. “It’s really gone. We missed a big opportunity here.”

“Thankfully, we’ll have more chances in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Hopefully we can find another larva there. After all, an adult would be too much for us to handle even if we all joined forces.”

“I heard that one of King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy medallions appeared in that crappy Yore-Wilds planetary system. Those things always cause a storm of blood and gore. Supposedly, the Northstar Continent sent a fleet over there to look for it. I wonder if they found it already.”

“Probably. The Yore-Wilds is in ruins, but the blood of the people from there is pretty valuable.”

“After we get back out of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, we should go over there and pillage the savages. Absorbing their blood comes with a lot of advantages.”

“That's right. Those damn barbarians all deserve to die.”

“Come on, let’s go. We need to find a nexus leading to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, and I have a clue where to start.”

Before the group could leave, a voice rang out. “You might as well stop right there. You want to invade the Yore-Wilds planetary system? Wrong. The only place you’ll be going after this is an early grave, and the process is going to hurt badly.”

The students all looked around in surprise.

“Who’s there!?”

“Who are you? Show your face!”

One of the Demi-Immortals spotted the newcomer and instantly launched an attack, sending out a field of true energy that looked like a Go board, accompanied by the howls of ghosts and the wail of gods.

However, the attack didn’t do anything to Yang Qi, who was clad in the God Legion Battle Robe. In fact, the attack passed through him almost as if he didn’t exist.

Apparently, he was in an alternate metadimension that existed parallel to the space occupied by the students from the Megaplexus Collegium.

“What’s going on?” one of the students blurted. “There’s no alternate dimension here, but our energy arts just passed right through him. Is he a projection? No, that’s impossible. Even a projection would have been dispelled by that attack.”

“My god. He’s using the godly laws of space and metadimensions! That surpasses our enlightenment significantly. He must have gotten his hands on the godworm! That’s the only way he could be doing something like this. Not even Demi-Immortals should have such abilities. Let’s get out of here!”

The five Demi-Immortals turned to leave. “Send a message saying we found a genius from the Titan Emperor Collegium. Call everyone over to kill him!”

Chapter 425: Metadimensions

The students from the Megaplexus Collegium immediately knew what was going on.

They were clever individuals, all of them considered natural-born geniuses who were deeply familiar with the operation of the universe.

This newcomer was obviously from the Titan Emperor Collegium and had acquired a godworm, giving him control of metadimensional godpower.

Of course, the fact that he had acquired the godworm to begin with indicated that he was an elite expert who they would be rewarded greatly for killing.

Yang Qi stepped forward to block their escape and sent a stream of energy out, creating something like a wall within the Dark True Void to prevent any of them from leaving.

It was a manifestation of the godly laws of space provided by the godworm.

The godworm had already benefited from the Blood of the One God that Yang Qi had fed it, which had unlocked even further power from within its genes. It also fed memories into Yang Qi’s sea of consciousness, making him comparable to Demi-Immortals in many respects.

“First of all, you’re not going anywhere,” Yang Qi said. “Second, you should be aware that even having more people on your side won’t do you any good. The Northstar Fleet that invaded the Yore-Wilds planetary system was completely wiped out. Northstar First-Rank, Northstar First-Truth, and Northstar First-Summer were all killed and absorbed. By me. Incidentally, I just heard you calling my people savages. Sorry, that's unforgivable.”

“Listen, you mongrel, do you really think that capturing a godworm means that you can deal with us? You're crazy!”

“Let’s see how you handle this deadly move of mine. Sinking Oblivion!”

One of the Demi-Immortals floated up, his eyes flashing as he waved his hand out. Instantly, a bizarre and mystical stream of power flew out from the Go board design on his garment. At the same time, he clenched his hand into a fist.

Instantly, countless godly nimbuses began slashing at the void, approaching Yang Qi rapidly and causing everything in the area to tremble and sink downward as if it were entering a bottomless abyss. This was a deadly move that was popular in the Megaplexus Collegium, Sinking Oblivion.

With it, Demi-Immortal students could destroy even planets.

However, the consummate deadly move simply passed right through Yang Qi.

As of this moment, it was obvious that he really was in a metadimension.

Only when someone’s control of the godly laws of space reached a pinnacle could they understand the ultimate meaning of metadimensions, which existed on a deeper level than the more common alternate dimensions.

“What’s going on here? Sinking Oblivion can destroy anything, even things that are illusory and shapeless. It can also break through the power of dimensions, yet it can’t even touch this guy?”

Suddenly, the student turned and fled at incredible speed.

Unfortunately for him, Yang Qi was even faster. Blurring into motion, he shot forward like a streak of lightning, moving so quickly that he could turn night into day.

Swish!

He slashed out with a knifehand from the Undying stance of the Hand of the One God, backing it with metadimensional power.

His opponent had no time to dodge. Before he could do anything, something like a blade sliced through him, cutting him in half and destroying the aura of his soul. Then he exploded, power erupting from him in a dazzling display like fireworks.

A powerful Demi-Immortal had perished.

Yang Qi reached out and grabbed all the scattering quintessence energy, forced it back into the shape of a corpse, and deposited it into his God Legion Paradise. As of now, space was like malleable tofu to him, and it took almost no effort for him to manipulate it.

WHIZZ!

The next instant, the entire area erupted into activity.

Metadimensional power slashed out in all directions as a massacre began.

Yang Qi appeared in front of another of the Demi-Immortals and reached out with his hand. The student tumbled away from him like a leaf in the wind, then slammed into an invisible barrier, causing all of the blood in his body to spurt out into the open.

Yang Qi had molded space into something like an iron wall, which the student had collided with.

“He killed Elder Brother Southpalace? And Elder Brother Westgate too?” All of a sudden, a wave of terror swept through the other students from the Megaplexus Collegium.

One of the leaders among them, a burly, middle-aged Demi-Immortal, stepped forward with eyes flashing, his killing intent surging. “How dare you kill students from the Megaplexus Collegium! Every one that you kill leaves a psychic imprint on you which will glow like a fire in the middle of the night. Any expert you encounter from the Megaplexus Collegium will know what you’ve done. It doesn’t matter how far you flee, we’ll be able to track you down and kill you. For the rest of your life, you’re gonna have problems with the Megaplexus Collegium. So think things through carefully. What are you going to do next?”

“Bullcrap!” Yang Qi said. Chuckling coldly, he blurred into motion and appeared behind the burly Demi-Immortal, where he unleashed another palm strike.

“Six Beasts!” the Demi-Immortal said, spinning in place. Something like an illusory bell appeared in his arms, which unleashed six different powerful sounds.

Bam!

Even hidden as he was in the metadimension, Yang Qi was shaken. In fact, he actually stumbled out into the open.

“Great job, Elder Brother Eastwall! You’ve cultivated the Six Beasts God Dao to the level of perfection. Now that you've dragged that brat out of the metadimension, let's kill him. Everyone, attack!”

“Yes, my Six Beasts God Dao energy art is an immortal skill bestowed upon me by an actual immortal. It can break into both alternate dimensions and metadimensions!” He struck the illusory bell again, causing a cacophony of sound to erupt out and numerous projections of bells to pop up in the area.

At the same time, his physical body grew tougher and heavier, beginning to pulse with immense power.

WHIZZZ!

With that, he clenched his hand into a fist and pulled it back in preparation to release a blow. Eyes shining with dazzling light, he said, “Maybe you caught that godworm, but you're not even a Demi-Immortal, are you? You’re just a Great Sage. To me, even ninth step Great Sages are ants. Ever heard of the saying about the mantis trying to stop a war chariot? That’s what’s about to happen to you. Six Beasts God Fist!”

“You’re pretty reckless, you know that?” Yang Qi unleashed his God Legion Paradise, the true energy of which immediately swept over the soundwaves coming from the bell.

Bam!

The Demi-Immortal's fist landed with the force to explode a planet, yet it didn’t even cause the God Legion Paradise to tremble.

‘Not good!’ the Demi-Immortal thought, suddenly realizing how strong Yang Qi was, and what a bad situation he was in. Backing up, he shouted, “New orders, everyone. Retreat! Get as far away from this guy as possible. He's not human, he’s a monster! I’ll hold him off to buy you some ti— AIIIIEEEE!”

Yang Qi unleashed four moves from the Hand of the One God.

Creation. Destruction. Nature. Undying.

When they all hit, the Demi-Immortal’s defensive empyrean energy, magical laws, and minor world were all crushed as easily as if they were made from dried mud.

Crack! Snap!

His expression distorted and he looked down in shock as he suddenly exploded.

BOOM!

In the blink of an eye, he became a pool of blood and gore.

Any Lesser Demi-Immortal who faced those four moves from the Hand of the One God would be killed beyond the shadow of a doubt. Only a Greater Demi-Immortal would stand a chance by shifting into a metadimension.

Yang Qi, a second step Nirvanic Resurrection Sage, could actually kill Demi-Immortals. Although his current limit was Lesser Demi-Immortals, that was still something rare even in the distant past.

When the other students from the Megaplexus Collegium saw that another of their leaders had been killed, they lost all will to act. They simply hovered there, faces ashen, unsure of whether to flee or go on the offensive.

Before any of them could do anything, Yang Qi blurred into motion, plowing into the Megaplexus Collegium students like a demon or devil. Explosions of blood appeared within the Dark True Void and the aura of death began to spread out.

One after another, all of the students died.

Not a single one could stand up to Yang Qi.

Eventually, the final scream rang out. The fight was over, and not even the five Lesser Demi-Immortal students stood a chance of being resurrected. Even having one’s nascent divinity ensconced in an immortal world wouldn’t do any good against the Hand of the One God. It would wipe out the true self, as well as the soul brand which could lead to rebirth.

Yang Qi didn't absorb the corpses into the God Legion Paradise. With the primeval godworm there, he didn't need such things.

Instead, he would turn them in to the Titan Emperor Collegium for a hefty reward.

Chapter 426: Fellow Disciples

After killing the students from the Megaplexus Collegium, Yang Qi relieved them of their magical treasures and spirit stones. There were no immortal items, but he did find a few immortal stones which he immediately fed into the God Legion Paradise.

Swish!Swish!Swish!

Regardless of which educational establishment they came from, Demi-Immortals were always elite figures. And people like that always had precious treasures.

Sure enough, Yang Qi recovered five magical treasure bags filled with spirit energy and the aura of treasures, as if each of them were a minor world unto itself. They were also decorated like Go boards. In the Megaplexus Collegium, all of the major divine abilities conformed to the dao of Go, including their spell formations and varieties of vital energy.

One by one, Yang Qi searched through the magical treasure bags, gaining enough spirit stones, magical treasures, and crafting materials to form mountains.

He also found five daoist texts.

They were written in immortal script, and after studying them for a moment Yang Qi realized that they were five deadly techniques.

One of them was titled Sinking Oblivion, and another was Six Beasts. Obviously, these were the techniques the Demi-Immortals had used against him moments ago. They were immortal skills, although that just meant that they were compilations of heavenly-class energy arts.

The other three books were entitled, Voidation, Two Realms, and Lifelessness.

If they were combined, it seemed that they would make a consummate technique that could rival the Holy Mother’s Jade-Emperor Profound-Welkin Exalted-Celestial God-Dao. Although the combined technique wasn’t a true godly-class energy art, it came close.

Yang Qi could think of two uses for techniques like this. For one, he could use them to impersonate a student from the Megaplexus Collegium. Second, he could distribute them in the Sage Monarch Continent.

He had really benefited from this encounter.

“And now to see exactly what this Coiling Arc planetary system is like. Part for me, Dark True Void.” With that, his gaze pierced through the various barriers that made up the Dark True Void, until he caught sight of a planetary system that looked very different from the Yore-Wilds, Proto-Wilds, Brute-Wilds, and Waste-Wilds. In fact, it even had different constellations. Some of them looked like arcs, whereas others looked like centaurs, vortexes, and other mysterious things.

The world was opening up to Yang Qi, making him feel like he had always been a frog in a well, unable to leap high enough to see what existed beyond.

The magical laws in the Coiling Arc planetary system were different from those in the Four Wilds. In fact, in the depths of the planetary system there was a violet-colored energy flow that was different from anything Yang Qi had ever seen before.

Waving his hand, he summoned some of the energy and studied it. Clearly, this was a type of energy that could provoke profound transformations in anyone who absorbed it.

“Proterozoic Violet Energy!”

Yang Qi murmured. “The ancient records I’ve read only mention Proterozoic Violet Energy, and yet the Coiling Arc planetary system is full of it. The people are actually born in this type of energy! They must be incredibly strong.”

From that, it could be seen how the Coiling Arc planetary system was fundamentally stronger than the Titan Emperor planetary system. Of course, much of that was because of the severe blow that the Yore-Wilds had suffered because of the invasion of the Hell of Euphoria and the resulting loss of spirit energy.

The Coiling Arc planetary system was filled with planets of human cultivators and had numerous human kingdoms. There weren’t any Demonfolk present at all. Obviously, humans ruled the place, and had established a flourishing civilization.

After all, human civilizations were unlike those of demon-devils, as they emphasized education, organization, rules, and laws. Demon-devil civilizations were rarely united, and were rife with infighting.

Keeping himself hidden, Yang Qi began absorbing the Proterozoic Violet Energy, then forming it into physical liquid. Before long he was crystallizing the liquid to create stones.

They were proterozoic violet stones, which were equivalent to heavenly-grade spirit stones.

The Coiling Arc planetary system was immense, so much so that even Yang Qi would require weeks or months to cross it. Considering that, the idea of finding the spatial nexuses leading into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart seemed like a daunting task. Thankfully, Yang Qi had captured the primeval godworm larva, which originally came from the monarch chart. Therefore, he could rely on its energy and aura to do the work for him.

He had been occupied for nearly a year in all of his recent endeavors, and the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart was sure to appear very soon. If he didn't do his best to find a nexus like his Elder Second Brother had asked him to, how could he ever face his ambitious and proud fellow disciples ever again?

The Invincible Society was full of consummate experts who were bound together in spirit and action, and Yang Qi felt much more of a sense of belonging to it than he had ever felt toward the cursed Demi-Immortal Institute.

Therefore, he was going to do his best to accomplish the mission assigned him by the Invincible Society and earn face for his Elder Brothers, Elder Sisters, and his Master, the Invincible Dugu.

As he entered the planetary system, he stayed in a metadimension and sent his divine will to scan the area. There were many planets, some of them completely occupied by cultivators and connected with wormholes and teleportation portals. In those places, Lifeseizers were nobodies, with Legendaries being like nobility, and only Great Sages and Demi-Immortals being considered top experts.

In every starry sky, there were Demi-Immortals in charge of large areas. Furthermore, they would have their own divine will spread out, and even had domains set up to prevent people from entering undetected.

Of course, their defense systems were set up to detect other Demi-Immortals, not Great Sages or Legendaries.

Right now, Yang Qi was relying on his Devil-God Seal to make it seem like he was in the Energy Arts level. Obviously, someone like that wouldn’t attract any attention at all.

Besides, considering he was concealed in a metadimension, it seemed unlikely that a Demi-Immortal would ever notice him.

As he proceeded along, he suddenly felt his Titan Emperor Medallion vibrating. Pulling it out, he looked at the star chart inside and saw a planet blinking, and at the same time, pulsing with the fluctuations of fellow disciples.

‘Is someone calling for help? I should go check it out.’

Obviously, it made sense to contact his fellow disciples before beginning his own search of the Coiling Arc planetary system. After all, different planetary systems had different methods of government and were often at odds with each other. The last thing Yang Qi needed was to stumble about in ignorance and reveal his true identity.

Swish!

Following the information from his medallion, he eventually reached an enormous planet that abounded with violet energy flows. It was millions of times larger than the Quake-Dawn Continent had been and was surrounded by a dense network of space-time wormholes and warding magics. As for all of the teleportation portals leading into the wormholes, they were closely guarded and required rigorous inspections of certain documents before they could be used. Obviously, it would be a very difficult task for intruders to get through.

Sadly for them, Yang Qi had a primeval godworm, which he had been feeding the Blood of the One God. With his newfound command of the godly laws of space, he could move about here as easily as a boat in water.

He easily slipped past the defenses and soon found himself on the planet itself. It was filled with all sorts of cities and locations, as well as numerous cultivators, sects, organizations, and the like. There were also a wide variety of human races. It was almost like an entire collection of worlds, and it actually rivaled the Central Planetary River of the Titan Emperor Heaven.

Yang Qi continued following the tugging of his medallion, which led him into the suburbs of one particularly large city. Those ‘suburbs’ consisted of sprawling mountains with villages of common folk in the Energy Arts level. Lifeseizers were also common here, with Legendaries being less common.

‘This place is really impoverished,’ Yang Qi sighed, landing on the ground.

Upon nearing one particular hamlet, he realized that the place was actually sealed by a spatial warding magic that made its interior impossible to detect from outside. That magic was called the Titan Scholar Chaos Heaven Secret Magic and it was a consummate technique from the Titan Emperor Collegium.

Chapter 427: Despicable

Not every location on this enormous planet was equal. There were tiny, poor villages, and enormous bustling cities. It wasn’t like the current Sage Monarch Continent, in which every location abounded with spirit energy and treasure.

There was no fairness here. Some cities were built directly on top of enormous veins of ore, while certain villages were devoid of even ordinary spirit energy, much less Proterozoic Violet Energy. People from those poorer locations rarely reached the Legendary level, much less the Great Sage level.

The disparity between rich and poor was dramatic, even more than it had been in the old Quake-Dawn Continent.

Right now, Yang Qi was in one of the remote, poor locations.

This was where the message from the Titan Emperor Collegium had originated.

After passing through the warding magics, Yang Qi realized that this kingdom made of cities and villages of human cultivators was more populated than he had thought. Overall, it was impoverished, which made him think back to his early days. After all, in the grand scheme of things, the Sage Ancestor Dynasty had been functionally destitute, and really, so had the entire Rich-Lush Continent.

Of course, in the eyes of the numerous immortal worlds, the Titan Emperor Collegium was probably also considered impoverished. And to the legion of gods, so were the immortal worlds in general.

In one particular village in this impoverished kingdom, Yang Qi saw a few hundred people wearing the uniforms of the Titan Emperor Collegium. In fact, some of the uniforms were particularly luxurious, almost like royal garments, which indicated that the people wearing them were royal-class students.

Obviously, they had secretly infiltrated this enormous planet and were hiding in one of the impoverished areas to avoid attracting attention.

Yang Qi could sense that this planet was a place of hidden dragons and crouching tigers, and was fairly certain that it had been created by ancient immortals.

It was only natural that infiltrators would need to be careful here, lest they end up being slaughtered.

The students were arrayed in ranks on a mountain that rose up above the sprawling, impoverished kingdom. They had even set up temporary mansion grottos in certain locations on the mountain, and from the way they carried themselves it seemed they were waiting for someone or something.

As for the royal students, they were all Demi-Immortals with profound auras.

However, they didn’t let any power fluctuations roll out, but instead kept them tightly reined in. The local kingdom didn’t even have any Great Sages, only Legendaries, and therefore they had no way of knowing that fiendish monsters were lurking in their midst.

When Yang Qi bypassed the warding magics and landed at the foot of the mountain, he immediately attracted attention. The students all looked over, their killing intent pulsing as though they intended to make a move at any moment.

However, Yang Qi quickly produced his Titan Emperor Medallion and the expressions of most of the students softened. However, a few of them continued to look at him coldly.

In fact, two of them, clad in yellow garments, went down to confront him.

“Stop right there!” one of them said.

Yang Qi complied, and looked the two students up and down. Both of them were third step Eternal Sands Sages and had arrogant expressions on their faces.

“So you’re from the Titan Emperor Collegium?” the second student said. “But you’re only a second step Great Sage! What are you doing here alone? What society are you from? Don’t you have an escort? This is the Coiling Arc planetary system, and the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart is about to appear. It's a tense situation, and a second step Great Sage like you shouldn’t be randomly poking his nose around. If you got captured, it could wreck the collegium's master plan!”

“I'm the eighteenth disciple of the Invincible Society, Yang Qi,” he replied coldly, looking at the two yellow-garbed students as if they were dead men. “I saw your message and thought you might be in trouble. But since you're not, I guess I’ll be leaving.”

The two students shivered with fear.

“What? The Invincible Society?”

“Y-you’re… you’re the one who broke the fetters of the World of Mirages and killed a bunch of the mutant humans? Yang Qi? The eighteenth disciple of the Invincible Society?”

“That’s right. Little old me. So what?” At this point, his gaze was so sharp that the two students didn’t dare to do anything other than bow their heads. With that, he turned to leave.

Before he could, someone higher up on the mountain said, “Hold it right there!”

Yang Qi turned to find one of the students with the royal garb floating down toward him, pulsing with incredible power. The rest of the students gathered on the mountain were watching to see how things would play out.

Smiling enigmatically, the royal student said, “So you’re from the Invincible Society. No wonder you’re so arrogant and overbearing.

“I’d heard that the Invincible Society accepted a new disciple. You’re supposed to be quite the genius, right? Well, we’re all members of the Titan Emperor Collegium, so there’s no reason to be petty. Why not work together? We’re all waiting here for the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart to appear, so how about you join us? Just find a place to sit and wait, Junior Brother Yang Qi. This place is called Planet Darkbright. It’s so large it's almost like a planetary system, and it has plenty of top experts. However, the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart is supposed to appear here soon. When it does, it will most likely release some treasures, perhaps even some primeval godworm larvae. We definitely have to get any godworm larvae for our collegium. I’ll provide you the perfect location to rest, Junior Brother. We’ll just wait here quietly until the time is right.”

With that, he waved his hand, causing the mountain to open up and reveal a mansion grotto, complete with a royal throne.

There were actually numerous such locations on the mountain, and instead of giving Yang Qi a place at the bottom he opened up a mansion grotto halfway up the mountain.

At this point, Yang Qi’s expression softened a bit. “In that case, I’ll wait here for the spatial nexus to open and the treasure to appear.”

Without any pretense of politeness, he flew into the mansion grotto, sat down on the royal throne, closed his eyes, and ignored everything around him.

Many of the surrounding students took that to be an insult, and their anger burned because of it. That was especially true of the royal student who had come to talk with him, whose jaw went taut with fury. It was as if he had offered Yang Qi face only to be slapped in return.

However, he kept his anger in check and flew back to the mountain peak. Waving his hand again, he caused a blanket of mist to spring up, a warding magic that cut him and the other royal students off from the rest of the world.

After they were alone, one of them snorted coldly. “The disciples from the Invincible Society are so arrogant and overbearing. They're really the scum of the Titan Emperor Collegium. Elder Brother Hua, why were you so polite to him? That brat should die for being so arrogant. Doesn't he know our status in the collegium? What is he compared to us? How dare he act like this?”

“It doesn’t matter,” Elder Brother Hua said with a sinister chuckle. “Be polite for now, and let him be arrogant. After all, the people from the Invincible Society are really popular right now. Their Eldest Brother is only a student, but he actually beat up some elder kings. Not even the people from the Hall of Beheadings and Executions can do anything about him. And remember, even though this Yang Qi is only a second step Great Sage, he’s already invincible to anyone under the Demi-Immortal level. In that respect, he’s just like Sword Seventeen. The best thing is to use him while we can, then crush him when the time is right. I could kill him now, if I wanted, but that would anger the Invincible Society and could make things difficult. Maybe we can get him into conflict with experts from the Coiling Arc Collegium and have them kill him for us.”

“Very clever, Elder Brother Hua,” one of the other royal students said. “With someone from the Invincible Society on our side, we probably have a better shot at getting treasure from the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Who knows, we might even get a primeval godworm larva.”

“Exactly,” Elder Brother Hua said, nodding. “That stubborn hothead has no idea that he’s working for us now.”

“Hold on a second. Did you sense those spatial fluctuations? I think the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart might be about to appear. Now’s definitely not the time for infighting.”

Another of the royal students produced a mirror, which projected an image of the entire planet above it, including all of the terrain features, cities, ore veins, Proterozoic Violet Energy reserves, and space-time wormholes. It also revealed that, in the depths of the planet, there existed a massive violet wormhole fully three or four hundred million kilometers in diameter, which was constantly emitting Proterozoic Violet Energy. It almost seemed like something created by an immortal.

“That ancient immortal wormhole is a forbidden location in the Coiling Arc planetary system. Not even Paragon Demi-Immortals would dare to enter it. I’d say it’s highly likely the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart will appear there!”

Chapter 428: It Appears

Of course, considering that Yang Qi had power over the godly laws of space, it was a foregone conclusion that he would eavesdrop on the royal students’ conversation. He was aware of everything happening on the entire mountain, and was now privy to all of their plots and schemes.

As he sat there, he smiled coldly. These royal students were no weaklings; they were Lesser Demi-Immortals, and in fact, one of them was even a Greater Demi-Immortal.

As for the Lesser Demi-Immortals, he could kill them all easily. Even the Greater Demi-Immortal was probably within the realm of his capability to handle.

That said, he had no desire to take things that far. In the Titan Emperor Collegium, killing fellow disciples generally came with a harsh punishment, unless you had extremely powerful backing. Although he had the Invincible Society to rely on, he was alone in this situation and didn’t want to do anything reckless.

His plan was to just wait until he could get into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart; he needed its power to get to the Hell of Mahānata. Then he would experience a whole string of breakthroughs.

Right now, he was sifting through the memories of the primeval godworm and its genetic legacy information. There were all sorts of profound and mysterious energy arts there, things which could break all sorts of barriers and lead to longevity similar to heaven’s. All of those things were of the Demi-Immortal level, which meant that Yang Qi’s soul enlightenment was reaching that point.

‘Just wait. I'm strong enough right now to kill Lesser Demi-Immortals, and can hold my own against Greater Demi-Immortals. However, that’s nothing compared to what will happen later. Once I gain Demi-Immortal enlightenment and get into the Hell of Mahānata, my cultivation base is going to rise so high that I honestly can’t predict who I’ll be able to fight.’

As he continued with his work, he kept an eye on the situation around him. He soon noticed the enormous space-time wormhole in the depths of the planet and the violet energy that swirled within it. It was clearly a dangerous location, and not even his Lord's Eye could see all the way into it.

Just as the royal students had said, that was where the spatial nexuses leading to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart would appear.

The Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart was an immense thing. The truth was that the Coiling Arc planetary system, Titan Emperor planetary system, and Megaplexus planetary system wouldn't count as even a tiny corner of the chart as a whole. It was for that reason that when people said that the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart would ‘appear in the world’, it was only a figure of speech. What would actually appear would be the spatial nexuses that led to it.

The appearance of the nexuses would coincide with the release of treasures. Supposedly, it was even possible for the nexuses to emit preheaven god vitality, among other extremely rare things. After the nexuses fully formed, cultivators could fuse with them, which would then allow passage into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

Throughout history, everyone who entered the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, then successfully left it, became famous people, such as patriarchs of huge sects. Many of them even reached immortal ascension. That said, not everyone who went inside came out alive, and those who did rarely shared the secrets of what went on inside.

Considering that the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart only appeared once every ten thousand years or so, it obviously represented an amazing opportunity.

Days passed. Occasionally, more students from the Titan Emperor Collegium would slip into the impoverished kingdom that was the rendezvous point. There were representatives from many organizations, such as the Righteous Energy Society, Grand Noble Society, Sword Society, Saber Society and more. There were even people from the Hall of Beheadings and Executions.

However, no one else from the Invincible Society came. They were really living up to their reputation of doing things on their own.

Yang Qi eventually noticed students from the Everlasting Society, who would glare at him with open hatred.

As his Elder Second Brother had explained, Yang Qi was now in a blood feud with the Everlasting Society, a conflict that could only end with either his death or theirs. After all, he had killed all of their potential recruits during the entrance ceremony, which had been a huge blow to them. They had lost geniuses who possessed the Bright Sun Truebronze Body, Nascent Divinity Starlight Body, and more. A host of eighth and ninth step Great Sages had all been slaughtered.

‘Well, the Everlasting Society singled me out to begin with, and, in the end, they all died because of it. If they target me again, more of them are going to die. Considering I'm a member of the Invincible Society, I have backup. And my Elder Brothers and Sisters are all fiendish monsters. If anybody tries to hold the law over my head, they’ll find themselves on death’s door.’

As he was quietly sitting there, the godworm in his God Legion Paradise suddenly let out a strange cry.

Yang Qi shivered and looked in the direction of the enormous space-time wormhole in the depths of the planet. Inside of it, a grand and majestic burst of godpower had appeared.

‘The spatial nexuses are about to appear. Such power! Even my God Legion Seal is shaking because of it!’

It was true; his God Legion Seal was reacting to what was obviously the imminent appearance of the nexuses.

The God Legion Seal was an exceedingly powerful thing, but the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart had supposedly been created by countless immortals all working together for the express purpose of fighting the legion of gods. Perhaps it had even been designed with the God Legion Seal in mind.

‘It’s time. Strike first, achieve lethality. Strike second, meet calamity. There’s no way I’ll let these other people take advantage of the spatial nexus before me!’

Yang Qi rose to his feet and prepared to make his move.

However, in that very moment, an immense gravitational force erupted from the throne he had just been sitting on, making it impossible to move.

Elder Brother Hua laughed uproariously. Looking over at Yang Qi, he said, “The Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart is about to appear, so be a good boy and wait right there. In a moment, the warding spell hiding us will collapse and you’ll be revealed to the planet, which will be the perfect diversion for us. Soon, all of the experts in the area will come over and crush you to death. Well, see you later! Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, here we come! It might be a bit dangerous in that space-time wormhole, but we—”

Smack!

Right in the middle of his speech, the mountain exploded, and all of the thrones and mansion grottos that had been set up inside collapsed into dust. At the same time, Elder Brother Hua was hit in the chest with sledgehammer-like force. Blood sprayed out of his mouth like a geyser as a figure blurred passed him, moving so quickly it was impossible to see clearly.

Simultaneously, a blast of vital energy destroyed the warding magic that had been protecting the area, then shot high into the air to create an enormous character that read ‘Titan’.

‘Not good!’ Elder Brother Hua thought, looking up at the ‘Titan’ character.

The students present all turned pale from fright.

“Dammit, he got away! And he shot a Titan Emperor Collegium signal up into the air. Everyone on this planet is going to realize we’re here. This is really bad!!”

“Go, go, go! Get out of here!”

“There’s already plenty of divine will heading our way! If we don't get out of here, our lives will be in danger! Go, go, go!”

One of the royal students stepped forward, a burly young man who thrust his hand out to unleash a powerful attack that pierced down into the planet itself.

“Die!” he growled.

WHIZZZ!

His attack was blocked by an unknown force, causing shockwaves to roll out and forcing him to stagger backward.

Visibly surprised, he said, “Yang Qi from the Invincible Society! I'm not going to forget this. The Martial Duelist Society won't let you off the hook for ruining our plans!”

With that, he waved his sleeve, sweeping up all of the other students and then vanishing.

That burly young man was actually the leader of the entire group, and he’d managed to unleash an attack just as Yang Qi fled. However, it failed and he was forced to simply flee with his cohorts.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi had already reached the edge of the violet wormhole.

‘Martial Duelist Society…? They’re a very mysterious group back in the Titan Emperor Collegium who practice shockingly powerful martial arts. So one of them was here all along. Seems to me he’s close to being a Profound Demi-Immortal and was strong enough to overcome my metadimensional godpower. Thankfully, I was fast enough to get away. Any slower, and I would have been killed by a “fellow student”.’

At this point, Yang Qi looked back at the kingdom he had just left.

Numerous streams of divine will were already converging on the sprawling place. As a result, mountains, lands, rivers, and other terrain features were blasted into dust. Countless humans were killed, including the emperor himself, along with all his generals and armies, and the clans, cultivators, and elite fighters that made up the nation.

It was a large and complicated country, similar to the old Rich-Lush Continent in many ways, with a rich history and countless marvelous legends.

Sadly, the arrival of numerous powerful experts ended up destroying it.

In the blink of an eye, it became nothing but a memory. All of a sudden, Yang Qi thought back to the fighting he had witnessed and participated in back home. If a whole group of Demi-Immortals had come to the Rich-Lush Continent, it would likely have been destroyed just like this nation.

“Students from the Titan Emperor Collegium have infiltrated us!” one of the local experts shouted. “How did we not notice this? Dammit! They’re obviously hoping to get into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.”

RUMBLE!

Just as the words left the man’s mouth, an immense force erupted from the violet wormhole. There was no time for Yang Qi to sit around thinking about what to do. Without any hesitation, he blurred into motion.

Chapter 429: Explosion

‘This Proterozoic Violet Energy is so strong,’ Yang Qi thought as he entered the wormhole. ‘And to think it could be converted into heavenly-grade spirit stones. It’s like I'm in a never-ending treasure storehouse.’

Actually, if it were converted into spirit stones, some of the resulting stones would probably be better than heavenly-grade, and would verge on godly-grade. Unfortunately, Yang Qi’s cultivation base was too low. As a mere Nirvanic Resurrection Sage, he had no way to converge immortal energy to form godly-grade spirit stones. That said, even being able to make heavenly-grade spirit stones was already incredible.

Normally speaking, it would take the strength of a low-level Demi-Immortal to convert the power of an immortal world into heavenly-grade spirit stones. Godly-grade spirit stones would be the realm of Universal and Paragon Demi-Immortals.

Yang Qi knew that this wormhole was considered a very dangerous location in the Coiling Arc planetary system. Although it continuously emitted Proterozoic Violet Energy, there were other dangerous things mixed in with it. He had even heard stories of Universal Demi-Immortals being killed here.

It made sense that a spatial nexus of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart would appear in a place like this.

As he proceeded along, the Proterozoic Violet Energy grew so strong that tempests began to rage. He saw enormous axes, sabers, and swords made of the magical laws of space, things so deadly they could slice a Demi-Immortal’s minor world into pieces. He even saw chains that whipped about like fierce dragons, things so powerful that they could slaughter Lesser Demi-Immortals, much less Great Sages. However, those chains were the perfect food for his godworm, and thus, it was without any hesitation that he latched onto them and threw them into his God Legion Paradise.

The godworm’s compound eyes glittered brightly as it voraciously gobbled up the spatial elements. Normally speaking, godworms ate away slowly at space, but the quality of the spatial elements here was so intense that it was almost as if there were an immortal pouring power into the godworm.

Each moment that passed here was like an entire year outside.

Over the course of the next few breaths of time, Yang Qi could sense a massive force of expulsion from within the violet wormhole. Were it not for his primeval godworm, and his Angel Wings, there would be no way for him to continue on.

Many hundreds of thousands of kilometers into the wormhole, it became so dangerous that not even Profound or Potent Demi-Immortals would survive.

Exerting maximum effort, Yang Qi shrank his Angel Wings and God Legion Paradise down as small as they would go, making him like a bullet, shooting through the spatial tempests.

At one point, an endless field of twisting light streams appeared, accompanied by the power of time.

As the light hit him and his God Legion Paradise, Yang Qi was shocked to find that his longevity and life force immediately began to decline.

It was as if time were flowing millions upon millions faster than normal. In fact, in the briefest of moments, he had already lost thousands of years of lifespan!

Considering he had cultivated the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth all the way to the second step of the Great Sage level, his longevity was already beyond the realm of a hundred thousand years. Unless something unexpected happened, he would essentially live forever.

But now these godly laws of time were eating away at that longevity, and the God Legion Paradise couldn’t do anything to protect him from it.

‘Each of these strands of light can cut away thousands of years of longevity. If I don't do something, I'm going to get killed!’

The level of danger was immense.

“Godworm, space is like time, and time is like space. Time for you to start feeding!” He waved his finger and sent a drop of the Blood of the One God into the godworm, causing it to immediately grow ten times larger. At the same time, it began to gobble up the streams of light, resulting in strange designs appearing on its skin.

Normally speaking, it wouldn’t have been able to digest the raw power of time, but with the Blood of the One God, it could.

Adult godworms could eat space, time, or anything else, but usually, the young versions could only consume space. With Yang Qi’s help, this godworm was consuming time and converting it into power that he could benefit from. As a result, his longevity was quickly restored.

In fact, his longevity was even refined, and he began to gain further enlightenment of how it worked, and how it was connected to heaven and earth.

Yet again, he was edging closer to full enlightenment of the Demi-Immortal level.

“Amazing. The combination of the Blood of the One God and the godworm is providing significant enlightenment. Time, and space. The universe is literally made of the combination of those two things.” Yet again, Yang Qi’s level of enlightenment deepened as he sank into the light.

Meanwhile, shadowy figures appeared above, radiating the aura of Demi-Immortals. The experts of the Coiling Arc planetary system had finally arrived.

Almost as soon as they entered the light, a young Lesser Demi-Immortal who was too slow to react was hit, and transformed into a stooped old man with a full head of white hair and profoundly wrinkled skin.

Even as he began screaming, he crumbled into ash.

“Stop!” called out the leader, and the Demi-Immortals halted outside the border of the rays of light.

“These are godly laws and the godpower of time. Don’t touch anything, otherwise your longevity will be eaten away before you know what's happening. The light can even pierce into our minor worlds. Without items equipped with the magical laws of immortals, you can’t defend against light like this. This violet wormhole is a very dangerous place to be in. Everyone, proceed with caution, and stay within the protection of my immortal item. Limitless Mirror!”

The leader pulled out an immortal mirror which sent light streaming out to protect them. He was a third order Profound Demi-Immortal, yet even he had to be extremely careful in their current situation.

After they entered the sea of light, other experts appeared. One of them, a fifth order Tyrant Demi-Immortal, snorted coldly and waved his finger, unleashing an attack that parted the light and allowed him to enter it directly.

As time passed, more experts appeared. Most of them were from the Coiling Arc Collegium, although there were some from the Megaplexus Collegium and a few from other, unknown locations.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi was proceeding like a fish in water, when something suddenly caught his attention. Opening his Lord's Eye, he looked up to see numerous spots of light, shining like suns and moons. Those were the experts who had just recently appeared.

‘They’re strong. Even stronger than mother. That one is a seventh order Revered Demi-Immortal! If I ended up fighting people like that in a dangerous location like here, it would be difficult to escape. I need to get deeper into this sea of light and find the spatial nexus! Once I'm in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, not even an immortal will be able to catch me.’

A tremor passed through him as he produced another drop of the Blood of the One God and fed it to the godworm. Instantly, the godworm began to gobble up the dangerous light at an even faster pace.

A moment later, the godworm suddenly shivered and howled. Unexpectedly, it was beginning to shed, indicating that it was entering the second stage of its life cycle.

The skin it shed was actually composed of raw time and space, and was similar to the God Legion Battle Robe in some ways. The main difference was that the God Legion Battle Robe was actually illusory, whereas the shed skin of the godworm was real.

Yang Qi waved his hand, dragging each bit of shed skin into his God Legion Battle Robe, making it even stronger and giving him direct protection against the dangerous light around him.

RUMBLE!

After an hour, the godworm had finished shedding. Now it had an exoskeleton that looked like white jade, and at the same time, could consume the light even more quickly.

It was completely different from before, but at the same time it had experienced an awakening of memories from within its genes. Instantly, more power and knowledge flowed into Yang Qi and his enlightenment grew more profound.

He was now on the very verge of reaching Demi-Immortal enlightenment! That was when the sound of an explosion from deeper within the sea of light interrupted his thoughts.

All of a sudden, he sensed dozens of immortal items flying up toward him from below.

Chapter 430: Nexus

In the depths of the violet wormhole, the energy flows and the powerful manifestations of space and time were strong enough to end the lives of powerful Demi-Immortals.

For Yang Qi, though, it was an incredible experience that had already pushed his soul to the point where it hovered on the verge of Demi-Immortal-level enlightenment. Furthermore, his primeval godworm had reached the second step of its life cycle.

Fueled by the Blood of the One God, it gobbled up the streams of time-light, which caused the magical laws of time to resonate within the God Legion Paradise.

In fact, it was almost as if music were echoing within Yang Qi’s domain, a chorus of sonorous voices belonging to the legion of gods.

It was the Eternal Heavenly Aria, which was the next progression of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth after the Hand of the One God.

The first major energy art that had come with the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth was the Infernal Deity Spear. After that came the Fiend-Devil Wings, Infernal Deity Plate Armor, Hellfire Crucible, Hell Portal, Devil-God Seal, Physique of the Sovereign Lord, Lord's Eye, God Legion Paradise, Fist of the Halls of Heaven, and Hand of the One God.

Next in line was the Eternal Heavenly Aria, which was intended for the Demi-Immortal level. It was a heavenly song of true energy that would fill those who heard it with the most holy of auras. Allies of Yang Qi would find their battle prowess increased as a result, whereas enemies would be greatly weakened. In fact, the song could eat away at longevity and reduce the level of an enemy’s true energy. In some ways, it was actually more powerful than the time-light in this violet wormhole.

Of course, the Eternal Heavenly Aria was only in the beginning stages of its development. He wouldn’t be able to use the full song until he was thoroughly and utterly in the Demi-Immortal level. At that point, the song could be used to bless or damn countless living things.

Just getting his soul to the Demi-Immortal level wouldn’t give him the full song; it had to be all of him.

As soon as the beginning stages of the Eternal Heavenly Aria echoed out, the time-light in the area was suppressed.

Yang Qi began dropping down faster than before, heading directly toward the immortal items and magical treasures.

WHIZZZ!

The first thing he encountered was a curved saber fully fifty kilometers from end to end that pulsed with a powerful energy flow. It was in the shape of the moon and could clearly slice anything in half.

The name of the saber was inscribed on the blade in the script of the immortal world above: Moon-Carver. Even a planet that tried to get in the way of this blade would end up carved in half. It was fairly bursting with immortal motes and completely surpassed any of the immortal items he had left in the Sage Monarch Continent, such as the Heaven-Burying Bow and Heaven-Wasting Arrows.

Immortal items were classified by how many immortal motes they had, as well as how big those motes were.

The items he had left behind were fairly low on immortal motes, and those motes were not very large. But as for this Moon-Carver, it had fully a thousand motes, all of which were very large.

‘This thing is incredible! It's going to make a great addition to the defenses of the Sage Monarch Continent!’ He reached out with the Hand of the One God to grab it, yet as soon as he touched it, the thing unleashed an unprecedentedly sharp beam of light, giving the Hand of the One God a grievous slash.

In the blink of an eye, Moon-Carver removed a significant portion of his longevity, which in turn caused the blade to radiate even more dazzling light.

“Undying!” he said with a cold smile, unleashing one of the deadly stances from the Hand of the One God. It took some effort, but he managed to grab the blade and slap numerous Devil-God Seals onto it, then toss it into the God Legion Paradise.

The primeval godworm let out a sudden howl as it sensed the immortal motes on the blade, which it apparently found to be extremely enticing.

In the blink of an eye, it lunged forward and consumed the blade, digesting the immortal motes and causing the item itself to melt into nothing.  As it did, even more complex designs appeared on the godworm’s skin.

‘What a pity,’ Yang Qi thought, sighing. ‘That Moon-Carver was incredibly powerful, and it would have been a great precious treasure to leave as a reserve item in the Sage Monarch Continent. But the godworm just ate it!’

Swish!

Another immortal item flew in his direction—a long sickle covered with blood, inscribed with the name Soul-Taker. It was even more powerful than Moon-Carver.

Yang Qi had learned from his previous experience. After grabbing and sealing the sickle, he tossed it into the God Legion Paradise, but this time he kept the godworm in check so that it didn’t eat it.

The godworm was essentially a part of Yang Qi now, fused with his soul. He even shared its memories. Therefore, keeping it under control was a simple thing, as long as he exercised control.

RUMBLE!

There were more immortal items flying up. However, Yang Qi could sense the powerful auras above him growing closer and closer.

‘Forget these immortal items,’ he thought. ‘I need to get down there and fuse with the spatial nexus. Let the other people fight for the immortal items, the most important thing for me now is to get into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. That’s where the real treasure lies, and it’s also my ticket to the Hell of Mahānata.’

His decision made, he ignored the immortal items and accelerated.

Soon, other incredible treasures appeared, such as godly-grade spirit stones, immortal stones, rare crafting materials, immortal grasses, and spirit pills.

He saw a golden streak of light that turned out to be an immortal pill that he had read about in certain ancient records. It was called a Barrier-Bashing Immortal Pill, the idea being that it helped to break through cultivation bottlenecks.

They were so rare that they could easily cause wars to spring up between sects. In fact, they weren’t even common in the Titan Emperor Collegium.

However, he didn’t need things like that. His current obstacle could not be broken by any immortal pill; he was facing a limitation of heaven and earth, not a personal limitation.

He had friends and family members who could definitely benefit from such a pill, but he ignored it just the same. Time was of the essence and he didn’t want to waste it by collecting treasure.

Suddenly, he caught the sound of shouting and fighting behind him as the experts began to struggle over the immortal items, pills, stones and the like. Of course, there were a few of the experts who, like Yang Qi, ignored the treasures at hand in the hopes of reaching the spatial nexus.

Moments later, Yang Qi saw that, deep within the violet wormhole, there was a conglomeration of Proterozoic Violet Energy that was a minor world. Not only was it raging with incredible power, but it was shooting out the immortal items, pills, and stones.

There even seemed to be immortal-spirits lurking in the area.

‘That’s the place!’ Yang Qi thought. He knew that this minor world housed the spatial nexuses leading into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. That was what he needed to fuse with to gain entrance.

“The Origin of the Dao of Heaven, the Light of the Legion of Gods. How Large the Cosmos, the Heart of Heaven and Earth!” Without hesitating, Yang Qi sent out a stream of true energy, throwing in the power of the godworm to cause the minor world to begin to twist and distort.

Now that the godworm was in the second step of its life cycle, it was equivalent to a second order Greater Demi-Immortal and it had profound control over space. Considering that Yang Qi had the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, it meant that he could unleash force similar to a Profound Demi-Immortal.

His true energy quickly gave way to the embryonic form of the Eternal Heavenly Aria. Surrounded by his God Legion Paradise, he flew toward the minor world ahead of him.

RUMBLE!

Before he could even enter the minor world, a figure appeared behind Yang Qi and unleashed a palm strike.

“Are you looking to die, brat! You're only a Great Sage, but you think you can take that nexus? How did you even get in here!?”

Light streamed out, causing everything it touched to wither. At the same time, an ancient aura filled the depths of the wormhole, destroying Yang Qi’s stream of true energy.

Everything else seemed to vanish to Yang Qi, with the exception of that mighty, god-like figure who had just appeared like an entity out of an epic saga of the past.

“It will be glorious for you to die by my Timeless Age Profound Technique, a consummate art of the Coiling Arc Collegium. Normally, you wouldn’t even be able to see something like this.”

Chapter 431: Big Fight

Yang Qi was being attacked by a third order Profound Demi-Immortal from the Coiling Arc Collegium. The explanation of the name of the level was that these were Demi-Immortals who understood the most profound truths about the universe. The level itself was also profoundly mysterious, and involved blurring the lines between what was illusory and what was real.

As the man’s Timeless Age move sliced forward, Yang Qi flapped his Angel Wings, which kicked up a deadly tempest. Then he sent his primeval godworm lunging toward the minor world to eat away at its power as he spun and entered the main fighting stance of the Fist of the Halls of Heaven.

Dazzling godlight erupted in all directions as the ancient halls of heaven appeared above him. Instantly, the power of time which had been unleashed on him shattered, and he began to go through a set of stances, moving so smoothly that it almost seemed as if he had invented them: Creation. Destruction. Nature. Undying. He backed up the stances with the Eternal Heavenly Aria.

RUMBLE!

It was definitely enough to shake a Profound Demi-Immortal. When the two of them collided, Yang Qi staggered backward a few paces toward the minor world surrounding the nexus. As for the Profound Demi-Immortal, he didn’t back up at all, yet his empyrean energy trembled unstably.

Because of that, it allowed the light surrounding him to bypass his defenses.

His life force instantly began degrading and he was forced to shore up his defensive empyrean energy to protect himself. However, that brief moment was all Yang Qi needed to get close to the minor world and pour some of his life force into it.

Instantly, it stopped spitting out magical treasures and he slipped inside.

‘Not good. How did he get into that minor world so quickly? How is it possible? Wait, is that….’ To the shock of the Profound Demi-Immortal, he saw the godworm chewing its way deeper into the minor world.

‘A primeval godworm? He actually captured one of those things? No wonder he got into the minor world so quickly. Once he succeeds, no one will be a match for him.’

Although he was shocked, he quickly recovered and tried to bash his way inside. Unfortunately, it violently repelled him.

With Yang Qi in the minor world, there was no way anyone else would be able to break into it.

According to the information which had been compiled based on past appearances of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, whenever the spatial nexuses appeared, they would be housed inside of powerful minor worlds. Whoever entered one of those minor worlds would gain complete control over it, and would even be protected by it. Normally speaking, the process was very difficult and was something that even fifth order Tyrant Demi-Immortals would have trouble with.

And yet here Yang Qi had entered the minor world with seemingly no effort, something the likes of which nobody had ever heard of.

WHIZZZ!

As the Profound Demi-Immortal was rebuffed by the minor world, other experts arrived, causing the sea of light to part and leaving a massive area completely free and safe.

“My respects, Eldest Brother Ning!” the Profound Demi-Immortal said, kneeling respectfully in front of one of the newly arrived figures.

“What’s going on here?” the man said, sending out streams of powerful energy to cover the minor world. Shockingly, this ‘Eldest Brother Ning’ was a sixth order Prime Demi-Immortal.

“Eldest Brother Ning, some punk Great Sage managed to get here before me, and he has a primeval godworm! That’s how he was able to get down here safely, and so fast.”

“A primeval godworm? Those things are incredible, and very rare. It’s a travesty for an ant-like Great Sage to have one.” Raising his voice, he said, “Set up the Arching Radiance and Light Formation. Use it to take control of the minor world and force that punk out into the open. We need to take his primeval godworm, then make sure nobody from the other sects can get close.”

As they followed his orders, he nodded approvingly then flew up into the air and unleashed millions upon millions of streams of sword energy.

It was like a kingdom of swords that shot high above them to prevent any other enemies from getting close.

Numerous spheres of glowing light stopped just outside of the swords.

They were all Tyrant Demi-Immortals from various factions, including the Megaplexus Collegium, Titan Emperor Collegium, and people from various other planetary systems.

There were even a few sixth order Demi-Immortals. One by one, the most powerful among them stepped forward to establish their authority.

“I'm Yun Leidong from the Titan Emperor Collegium, chief student from the Hegemon’s Society!” This student from the Titan Emperor Collegium was flanked by several of the students who had planned to screw Yang Qi over earlier.

“I'm Dongguo Xian from the Megaplexus Collegium, chief student from the Sun Moon Hall!” The speaker was a young woman who was as beautiful as an immortal. However, her eyes were hard as they stared at the spatial nexus within the minor world.

“I'm Xiyue Shan, chief student from the Profound Reality Collegium.” This person was from the Profound Reality planetary system, a place that Yang Qi had never even heard of.

In addition to them, there were a few others who called out introductions.

When they were finished, Eldest Brother Ning said, “You’re in the Coiling Arc planetary system right now, and that means this territory belongs to the Coiling Arc Collegium! If you think you're going to get this spatial nexus, you’re crazy.”

Eyes glittering, Yun Leidong from the Hegemon’s Society looked over at the spatial nexus and said, “Ha! That spatial nexus is already occupied by a student from the Titan Emperor Collegium. First come, first served. You know the custom.”

“What? A student from the Titan Emperor Collegium is in there?” The powerful experts from the other factions looked visibly surprised.

“Hurry up and break into that minor world!” Eldest Brother Ning shouted to his followers.

At this point, the sixth order Demi-Immortal Yun Leidong pulled out his Titan Emperor Medallion, which could do more than just send messages. Such medallions could also allow for control over the nascent divinities of others, assuming they allowed it. Without any hesitation, Yun Leidong used the medallion to contact Yang Qi.

“Junior Brother, just stay where you are and protect that nexus. We’ll get in there to help you shortly. You might control the minor world, but there’s no way you can fuse with the nexus. But we can! Send your mind into your Titan Emperor Medallion and give me control. When we all get back to the collegium, I’ll reward you handsomely.”

**

Shortly before….

Yang Qi was deep into the minor world, which was huge and filled with spell formations, warding spells, and all sorts of treasure.

However, he ignored all of those things and followed the godworm, using his Angel Wings to proceed as quickly as possible to the nexus itself. It was a conglomeration of primal vitality, a mass of magical laws which he needed to imprint his soul mark onto in order to fuse with the nexus.

As soon as he reached it, he sent some divine will that contained the true essence of the One God into it. The fusion process immediately began and the core rapidly began to shrink. Compared to the nexus, he was actually as weak as an ant.

That said, the point wasn't to control its power, but to use it to propel himself into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

After he entered the chart, the power would fade from existence. In other words, it was a temporary power, which meant that he couldn’t absorb it and use it to fight seventh or eighth order Demi-Immortals.

Thankfully, he had reached the nexus first, entering the minor world and making it impossible for anyone else to catch up without breaking through the outer layers.

As the fusion process continued, his Titan Emperor Medallion vibrated and he received the message from Yun Leidong.

“Nice try,” Yang Qi replied coldly. “You want to possess me and take control of the spatial nexus? I couldn’t care less that you’re the chief student of the… what was it? The Hegemon’s Society? And I don’t care that you're a sixth order Prime Demi-Immortal. I'm from the Invincible Society, and we don’t have any connections to your Hegemon’s Society. Just go ahead and fight to the death with everybody else out there.” With that, he deactivated the medallion.

When Yun Leidong received the message, he nearly passed out from rage. “Who cares about the Invincible Society? They only have eighteen disciples! And they can all go to hell as far as I'm concerned. I'm Yun Leidong, sixth order Demi-Immortal, a person who can call the wind and summon the rain, a royal student! And you, a mere Great Sage, dare to curse me?! Prepare to die!”

Chapter 432: Outstanding Heroes

Yun Leidong was nearly apoplectic.

He was a very important person in the Titan Emperor Collegium. Not only was he a prestigious royal student, he was also a peak sixth order Prime Demi-Immortal, meaning that he was just on the verge of reaching the seventh order. There were few people in the entire collegium who would dare to offend him, even people from other societies.

Yet here, the paltry eighteenth disciple of the Invincible Society, a mere consecrated student, was daring to cross him. It was a virtual defiance of heaven. In fact, the other students from the Titan Emperor Collegium who heard Yang Qi’s response were visibly stunned. It was almost like he was slapping Yun Leidong in the face.

As of this moment, Yun Leidong wanted to kill Yang Qi and everyone close to him, even the Invincible Society.

“Listen up, everyone. From here on out, anyone who’s friends with me, and anyone who’s a member of the Hegemon’s Society, will kill Yang Qi or die trying! Run an investigation and find out who all his friends and family are. Then track them down and bring them to me so I can torture them to death in front of him. He’s going to pay a heavy price for this lunacy!”

Yun Leidong was really going crazy.

The Hegemon’s Society was considered to be one of the top ten societies, with as many experts as the sky has clouds. When they took action, they could destroy mountains and seas, and even create planets and planetary systems.

“Kill him! Everyone, attack together! Break into that minor world and use your Titan Emperor Medallions to identify his precise location! Cut down anyone who gets in our way!”

With that, Yun Leidong became a dazzling streak of light that shot forward with unstoppable momentum, and his fist became a black hole that could consume anything in his path as he resorted to one of his most deadly moves.

“Royal Hegemon’s Ghost-God Dao! Consume Heaven!”

WHIZZZ!

The Royal Hegemon’s Ghost-God Dao had several deadly moves, including Consume Heaven, Devour Earth, Royal Monarch, Hegemon Lord, Nine Ghosts, and Channel Gods!

Each one was as spectacular as a hegemon taking control of the world and slaughtering devils.

Crack! Snap!

In one shocking move, Yun Leidong broke into the spell formation that the students from the Coiling Arc Collegium had set up.

“So, he’s trying to take us on?” Eldest Brother Ning said with a snarl. “Let’s see if this top student from the Titan Emperor Collegium is really a match for Ning Xiyuan! Three Daos of the Slaughtering Sword: Ceaseless Pain!”

Ten thousand swords merged into a single dazzling stream of sword light that shot forward from Ning Xiyuan to slam into Yun Leidong. In the blink of an eye, the two sixth order Demi-Immortals were engaged in fierce fighting.

Suddenly, a burst of laughter erupted from a different direction. “When the sandpiper and the clam fight, the fisherman benefits. Come on, everyone. Kill that brat with the godworm!”

Another expert shot toward the minor world with the spatial nexus in it.

The situation was changing by the moment.

However, a sinister chuckle echoed out, the type that would cause those who heard it to envision a devil-ghost consuming its own soul in hair-raisingly terrifying fashion.

Then a dark golden blur entered the scene, razor-sharp claws visible on its outstretched hands.

Agonized shrieks echoed out as several of the lower-level students were torn to pieces. A moment later, the dark golden figure became clear, allowing Yun Leidong, Ning Xiyuan, and others among the top experts to identify what was happening. They immediately backed away.

“Revered Demi-Immortal! And a follower of the dao of devils! Look, it’s one of the Infernalfolk from hell!”

Sure enough, the newcomer was a dark golden infernal. Among all of the various fiend-devils, infernals were among the most dangerous, and in fact, not a single human cultivator present was capable of dealing with such an enemy.

“That’s right, you bunch of ants. I'm glad you realize who I am. I’m a patriarch among infernals, and I don’t have time to mess with you fools at the moment. After I take control of the spatial nexus, I’ll slaughter the lot of you.”

Considering the level of this infernal’s cultivation base, he definitely deserved to be a patriarch.

Without any further talk, the deadly infernal lunged toward the minor world. Laughing coldly, he said, “Heaven-Devil Energy Field!”

WHIZZZ!

A bizarre field of energy sprang out which immediately broke through the outer barriers of the minor world, leaving it wide open for the infernal to enter.

“We can’t let that devil-ghost succeed. Everyone, after it! Don't let it live!”

The humans from the various collegiums temporarily put aside their differences and unleashed a bevy of attacks on the infernal patriarch.

In the blink of an eye, a massive, dazzling array of destructive energies and powers slammed into the Infernal, causing cracks to spread out all over his body.

“This is outrageous!” he shouted, his eyes glittering with terrifying killing intent. “How dare you, you suicidal idiots!”

“Heaven-Devil Devastation Incantation!” Massive pillars of devil energy shot out toward the dozen or so top experts among the humans. Like the ancient saying went, to catch brigands, first catch their chief. The infernal knew that if he took out the most powerful of the humans, the rest would scatter.

The fighting couldn't have been fiercer.

‘Perfect!’ Yang Qi thought. ‘Let the fiends fight each other to their heart's content. Compared to them, I'm pitifully weak. The longer they drag things out, the more time I have to fuse with the spatial nexus.’

The truth was that Yang Qi was feeling very nervous at the moment. Although having a second stage godworm made him stronger, it only made him strong enough to defeat third order Demi-Immortals. Enemies in the fifth or sixth order were beyond him, let alone seventh order fiend-devils. Even worse, he was now forced to focus on the spatial nexus and couldn’t divert any attention to fighting.

But thanks to the fact that his enemies were outside fighting amongst themselves, he had the perfect opportunity to go about his task with the utmost effort.

“Glory be to the Legion of Gods, Radiance and Light to Time Indefinite. Eternally Undying is He, the Deathless Sovereign Lord….” Yang Qi continued exhaling streams of milky white true energy containing his life force quintessence, longevity, and vital energy.

The power of nearly a thousand years of his own lifespan caused the spatial nexus to continue shrinking.

“Treasures, come to me!” he murmured. After all, the minor world around him was filled with treasures that had spewed out from the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. They looked like countless stars, except they were actually medicinal pills, ores, daoist texts, and even profound bits of enlightenment regarding the dao of immortality left behind by ancient immortals.

According to the rumors, there were even godly-class energy arts in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

As he went about his work, Yang Qi was able to snag some of the immortal items, medicinal pills, and ores, and throw them into his God Legion Paradise. It was definitely quite a haul.

WHIZZZ!

Outside, the infernal patriarch already had a bad feeling about how things were playing out. However, at a certain point, he cackled and said, “Whatever piece of trash is trying to fuse with that spatial nexus is a complete lunatic! I'm going to destroy you! Heaven-Devil Infernal Monarch Fist!”

In the blink of an eye, he unleashed millions upon millions of dark golden fist strikes, all of which were capable of punching holes in the fabric of the universe itself.

Yun Leidong’s immortal armor shattered and he coughed up blood as he was swept up in the power of the fist strikes.

“Retreat!” he shouted. “This monster is going crazy!”

“Get over here! That primeval godworm is mine! It’s my destiny to enter the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart! After I'm out, I’ll be a ninth order Paragon Demi-Immortal, half a step into the Demolishing level. Who will be a match for me then? I’m going to become a devil-immortal, and after that, a Godmyth, then Deathless. My throne will dominate the greatest dao of all when I become part of the legion of gods!”

The infernal patriarch’s power filled the minor world with dazzling light and immediately began wrapping around Yang Qi.

‘Not good!’ Yang Qi thought. This was a level of power that he simply couldn’t fight against. Considering that it was a deadly situation, he decided to throw caution to the wind and sent all of the Blood of the One God that he had into his forehead toward the God Legion Seal.

As the saying went, place someone on a field of death and he will fight to live, and that was exactly what was happening right now.

A dark golden hand bore down on Yang Qi’s head. But then a deadly burst of sagelight erupted from his forehead.

In the most critical of moments, the God Legion Seal provided the life-saving assistance he needed.

Normally speaking, the only outcome of a fight between Yang Qi and a Revered Demi-Immortal infernal would be his death, but the God Legion Seal was turning everything around.

Even as the infernal thought that he was about to crush Yang Qi out of existence, the golden imp appeared. Although he was small, it was obvious that the merest blink of his eyes could affect the entire universe.

“What’s that?” The infernal patriarch said, his hand melting like a snowman in the sun.

Chapter 433: Escape

“What is that?!” As the infernal’s hand melted away, he saw the golden imp unleashing a deadly attack. There was nothing he could do to defend himself as the most holy and mighty of energies stabbed toward his soul, purifying his infernal blood and eating away at his divine abilities and energy arts.

“Dammit! Primeval Heaven-Devil! Infernal Monarch Destroys Hell, All-Encompassing Subjugation!”

The infernal burned his longevity with abandon, causing immense flames that contained projections of a devil-god and an infernal monarch to erupt.

Unfortunately, the golden imp didn’t care about that.

POP!

The devil-god and the infernal monarch exploded, and the golden imp’s attack continued into the infernal patriarch.

The infernal screamed as it was inundated with holy sagelight, filling it with incredible pain.

“I have to go all out! Heaven-Devil Body Dissolution; Blood Sacrifice to the Divine Netherworld. Let my King Come through the Hellish Vortex!”

He recklessly burned even more longevity, even destroying his heaven motes. As a result, he was able to unleash a consummate energy art that actually stopped the incursion of the God Legion Seal.

Because of his technique of Heaven-Devil Body Dissolution; Blood Sacrifice to the Divine Netherworld, his cultivation level actually dropped, reverting him from a seventh order Demi-Immortal to a sixth order, a permanent regression that he would never recover from. He would eventually die as a sixth order Prime Demi-Immortal.

That said, dying later was better than dying now, and right now this was his only hope of surviving.

The infernal exploded into a mass of blood, transforming into a blood dragon that broke through the sagelight and began fleeing at top speed.

The eruption of power from the God Legion Seal also served to shove away the other experts on the outside. As of this moment, Yang Qi was alone with the spatial nexus.

‘Damnation!’ he thought. ‘I just lost all of my Blood of the One God, and my dracomammoth particles are back to being megamammoths. I must be at one tenth the level I was at before. I doubt I could take out a ninth step Great Sage right now, let alone a Demi-Immortal. It's a good thing I still have my primeval godworm.’

He was currently covered in numerous bloody wounds; this was by far the worst he had ever been injured in a fight.

This was the first time he had ever proactively used the God Legion Seal instead of waiting for it to defend him. Unfortunately, it had to be fueled with the Blood of the One God, the loss of which was a big setback to his cultivation.

‘At least I'm surrounded by a host of treasures, including immortal pills and immortal items. They’ll help me recover eventually. Right now, I have to fuse with this spatial nexus and get into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. My gains there will make up for my losses here.’

With that, he focused fully on the godworm and the work of fusing with the nexus.

RUMBLE!

RUUUUUUUUMBLE!

The nexus shrank down, causing deafening rumbling sounds to echo out. Then it vanished, taking Yang Qi with it.

“Damnation!” Yun Leidong growled. “We were too slow, and he was too strong. I can’t believe he actually defeated that infernal patriarch. He must have some powerful treasure or something.” He suddenly threw his head back and roared furiously. “I won’t ever forgive you, Invincible Society!”

The other experts were similarly frustrated, but there was nothing they could do.

“Let’s go. When the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart appears, there are always thousands of spatial nexuses. We still have a chance. That evil creature is already in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart by now. If we can find another nexus in time, we’ll still have a chance to track him down and kill him.”

“That’s right. He must have used some taboo secret magic to beat that infernal. If he’s injured, I doubt he’ll last long in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.”

“I've heard that there’s always a lot of fighting and killing in that chart. It's hard to say how many experts have died inside over the years. The more arrogant you act, the more dangerous it will be.”

“He just got lucky with that spatial nexus. The harder thing will be to survive in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.”

The experts departed, hoping to find another nexus to struggle over.

**

‘Where am I?’ Yang Qi thought, forcing his eyes open and sitting up to find himself surrounded by sprawling, forested mountains. The air was crisp and clear, and as he inhaled he felt immortal energy coursing through him, revitalizing his meridians and filling him with power.

He sent some divine will out and found that the lands extended far beyond his ability to sense.

That was actually very telling. After all, with his Lord's Eye, he could stand in the Central Planetary River of the Titan Emperor planetary system and see all the way to the Yore-Wilds, Brute-Wilds, Proto-Wilds, and Waste-Wilds planetary systems. He could even see the details of the planets in those systems, right down to the vital energy of Great Sages.

As for the Energy Artists, Lifeseizers, and Legendaries, they were too minuscule for him to detect. Normally speaking, that was a level that was possible only for eighth order Universal Demi-Immortals, who could, by their very nature, see the rotations of the universe.

If Yang Qi was on a planet, he could sense all of the life forms on it, and even the individual grains of sand.

Considering that he could see through entire planetary systems, how could he not be surprised at the sight that met his eyes now. Essentially, this place was larger than an entire planetary system!

‘Is this the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart?’ Thinking back, he remembered the spatial nexus shrinking down and down, until finally there was an explosion. Eventually, the force of the explosion faded away and he woke up to find himself in this location.

The only thing that made sense was that he was in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

‘Let's see what the magical laws of space are like here….’ He waved his hand, and light shot out from his fingers to slice at space itself.

However, to his surprise, nothing happened. He tried again, even harder, and this time a backlash hit him that left his arm tingling.

Apparently, there was no way for him to slice open space, and in fact, if he pushed too hard he would suffer a destructive reprisal from the magical laws.

‘The space here is so durable…. Not even the Hell of Mahānata was like this. So, this really is a different heaven and earth. This Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart really is miraculous.’

Rising to his feet, he checked himself and confirmed that he really had suffered a grievous blow to his energy arts. His dracomammoths were back to being megamammoths, and he was barely as strong as a Lesser Demi-Immortal. At least he still had the primeval godworm. As the saying went, a starving camel is still bigger than a horse.

‘How am I supposed to get out of here if I can’t slice open space?’ He jumped into the air to start flying, only to find to his surprise that he just dropped back down to the ground. Shockingly, the magical laws of space made it impossible for him to fly.

When he leapt into the air, it felt like millions of ancient mountains were crushing him back down onto the ground.

‘Well, isn’t this great. I can’t even fly. The magical laws here are so strong!’ Eyes flickering, he sat back down onto the ground. ‘Well, in that case, I need to see how badly I'm injured. The spirit energy here is perfect for cultivation, and I have plenty of immortal pills….’

He took a deep breath, pulling some nearby streams of immortal energy into his palm to form a pill. Looking at it, he could sense pure and terrifying energy fluctuations that were an expression of some form of universal power that he was unfamiliar with.

From the look of the energy, it seemed cultivation would progress more quickly here than even back in the Titan Emperor Collegium.

Looking into his God Legion Paradise, he saw a whole host of immortal pills floating about like stars.

He immediately began identifying certain pills that he had read about in ancient records.

‘This is an Immortal-Spirit Life-Death Pill, perfect for restoring vital energy and recovering from wounds.’

It was shaped like a burly fighter, except without facial features. It contained rumblings, as if it were made of thunder, and pulsed with the energies of both life and death.

From what he remembered, the pill was created by immortals, using some of the most mysterious immortal energies that existed in the universe—those of life and death. It was a holy remedy that could help even a wounded Demi-Immortal recover from wounds.

Without any hesitation, he consumed it and immediately felt warm currents of energy flowing through him. He drew on the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth and felt like he was in the halls of heaven. The God Legion Seal immediately leaped to life and began producing drops of the Blood of the One God.

Yet again, the one hundred million awakened particles inside him transformed back into dracomammoths.

However, the power of the immortal pill was not enough to completely heal him.

Therefore, he moved on to the other pills he had acquired, which included many that he recognized from his various studies. Five Phases Holy Pilgrimage Pill. Immortal Emperor Reincarnation Pill. Eight Treasures Monarch Cultivation Pill. Eighty-Eight Paragons Pill. Myriad Immortals Congregation Pill….

It took him about twenty hours to go through all of the pills he had collected. He also used the Hellfire Crucible to break down the immortal items he had gathered and use their immortal motes to fuel more Blood of the One God.

A day and night passed, and he opened his eyes. His particles were jumping with power and he was as good as new.

‘I'm back….’

Chapter 434: In the Chart

Yang Qi was back to normal, and felt like he was thrumming with power and energy. In fact, it seemed like he was on the verge of a breakthrough.

Apparently, the heaven and earth that was the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart was actually superior to an immortal world. Its magical laws of space and time existed at the pinnacle of their potential, and as such, it seemed just as likely that he could break into the next level here as he could in the Hell of Mahānata.

The prospect was so exciting that he decided to immediately make the attempt.

His soul enlightenment was already at the level of a ninth step Epic Saga Sage, whereas his body was only in the second step. From what he could tell, all he needed was enough power to achieve the successive breakthroughs.

Unfortunately, he didn’t have enough power to reach the ninth step immediately, but he could at least go for the third.

‘Third Step. Eternal Sands!’

He took a breath and sent his divine will out into heaven and earth to search for the proper magical laws to turn himself into eternal sand.

Unfortunately, after a long moment, he reached a certain junction that he couldn't pass. He couldn’t provoke the requisite astrological phenomena and form a resonance with heaven and earth. In the end, it seemed that a breakthrough in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart was not going to happen.

‘What’s going on here? Is it that I can’t provoke the tribulation?’

After pondering the matter for a while, he decided that the ultimate reason was the unique nature of the world he was in. After all, it was not a true world like that which existed on the outside. Instead, it was a magical treasure.

‘What a pity. I guess I really will have to wait until I get to the Hell of Mahānata. So I can’t achieve a breakthrough, and I can’t even fly. How am I supposed to get out of this place? Don’t tell me I'm stuck here forever.’ Finally, he was struck with an idea and unfurled his Angel Wings, causing raging winds to surround him.

Unfortunately, even as he rose into the air, that immense weight of millions of mountains pushed him back down.

It was almost as if the magical laws of space in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart would adjust based on the power level of the individual. For now, he was completely out of ideas on how to fly.

Crunch-crunch. Crunch-crunch. Crunch-crunch.

Suddenly, the primeval godworm flew out of his God Legion Paradise and shrank down to the size of his thumb. Looking almost like an eel, it swirled through the air and began consuming the space around it, as well as the magical laws it contained.

And of course, those magical laws began to flow into Yang Qi through the godworm. All of a sudden, Yang Qi realized that he understood a bit more about the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, as well as an inkling of an idea as to how to fly despite that immense, crushing weight.

As the magical laws and spatial power flowed into him, he shrank his Angel Wings down to a wingspan of nine meters, then flapped them. Energy flowed out of them, breaking what seemed to be invisible shackles and allowing his feet to leave the ground.

‘Excellent!’ he thought. ‘Thank goodness I have this godworm. At least I can fly now. If I were stuck on the ground, how would I ever go about searching for treasured items?’

Days passed as Yang Qi continued absorbing the power of the local magical laws of space.

The levels of power involved were the likes of which could not be gathered in a hundred years on the outside, and the quality was different as well. In fact, by using them for his cultivation, Yang Qi’s God Legion Paradise, Infernal Deity Spear, Fist of the Halls of Heaven, and Hand of the One True God had all significantly improved.

Swish!

He flapped his Angel Wings and flew up into the sky, and although he couldn’t move nearly as quickly as he could on the outside, he wasn’t slow by any means.

Looking down, he could clearly see the surrounding terrain features. He had been standing in a forest earlier and, although there were no birds or animals, there was a river and lake, both of which pulsed with an aura of life.

Considering how powerful the magical laws of space were here, it begged the question of how strong the living beings would be.

It seemed likely that they would be similar to the primeval godworm.

He flew along for a few hundred kilometers, spending enough time that, on the outside world, he could have passed by hundreds of thousands of planets and planes. Unfortunately, his speed was very limited here.

Despite traveling for such a distance, he didn't see a single immortal item, immortal pill, or even a vein of ore.

‘I thought the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart was full of treasure, so how come I haven’t seen even a single item?’

The Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart was filled with immense universal power and shocking magical laws, but nothing that would cause one's eyes to sparkle with interest. There were no mountains of treasures or immortal ruins as he had imagined there would be.

‘Eee? What's that?’

A few hundred kilometers away, he saw a village with signs of human habitation.

It seemed odd that the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, a place with no birds or animals of any kind, would be inhabited by people. And yet this was clearly a town, just like the type that would be seen in the mortal world. It was so surprising that, at first, Yang Qi thought he was seeing things.

However, as he got closer, he became certain that this was an actual village filled with people. Some were going through energy arts forms, others were forging equipment, and some were sitting there meditating. There were even market stalls set up with people selling things.

The whole place seemed like a bazaar.

Even more surprising, it seemed that most of the people present were Great Sages, although there were also Demi-Immortals present.

‘What’s going on here? I guess I should just go in and check things out.’ Landing on the ground, he walked up to the village, only to be completely ignored by everyone.

Frowning, he looked around and realized that everyone seemed to be pulsing with an aura of death.

Eventually, he walked over to one of the vendors, an old man with white hair and a long beard. He was a Lesser Demi-Immortal, and from the look of it his longevity was very close to running out.

Spread out in front of him were a variety of immortal stones and pills.

‘A Demi-Immortal at the end of his lifespan?’ Yang Qi was stunned. Although it wasn’t literally true that Demi-Immortals had lifespans equal to that of heaven, they could still live for hundreds of thousands of years.

“How much are these immortal stones and pills?” Yang Qi asked.

“A thousand years of longevity,” the man replied, barely glancing at Yang Qi. However, a moment passed and his eyes suddenly glittered. “Oh, you’re new to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, aren't you? Ah, it’s too bad you’re only a Great Sage. What a huge waste.”

“What’s that mean?” Yang Qi said, shaken by the realization that this old man wasn’t a native of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, but rather, had come from the outside.

“You can get into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, but you can’t get out,” the man explained. “At least, very few people can. You can’t improve your cultivation base inside either. No breakthroughs. Sure, you can get shocking treasures, even godly-class energy arts. But you can’t sense the universe beyond, and you can’t advance your cultivation. I got here a hundred thousand years ago and I've reached the end of my lifespan. Eventually, I'm going to die in this place.”

The old man chuckled, then began laughing loudly, almost as if in madness.

Despite how crazy he seemed, no one else in the area paid him the least bit of attention.

‘So that’s how it is,’ Yang Qi thought. More aware than ever of the aura of rot, he looked around and saw that most of the people in the village were running out of longevity. No wonder everyone seemed so depressed.

If you couldn't achieve cultivation breakthroughs in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, and couldn’t get out, then what was the point of having magical treasures or medicinal pills?

Suddenly, a burst of maniacal cackling echoed out. Looking up, Yang Qi saw an enormous fiend-devil approaching, pulsing with infernal energy.

It was one of the Infernalfolk.

However, this one wasn’t as strong as the infernal patriarch he had faced outside. He was only a second order Greater Demi-Immortal. However, the fact that he understood the magical laws of space here indicated that he was nothing to be taken lightly. As he descended, he looked around the village and said, “So, it's a whole village of decaying corpses. Well, I still want your souls to add to my longevity. It’s been about ten thousand years, so the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart should be opening again soon, and I’ll definitely be able to find a way out this time. Once I'm in the outside world again, I’ll experience breakthrough after breakthrough….” He broke out into maniacal laughter again.

From the energy fluctuations rolling out, Yang Qi was certain that this infernal was as strong as a fourth or fifth order Demi-Immortal.

Obviously, his level of enlightenment surpassed the level of his fleshly body, just like Yang Qi.

Before anyone could react, the infernal reached out, grabbed a handful of human experts, and crushed them to death. Then he absorbed their souls.

“Run!” The demoralized and rot-filled village suddenly erupted into terror, with numerous experts flying into the air and fleeing in all directions.

At the same time, the infernal lunged this way and that, using streams of infernal energy to trap as many humans as he could.

In fact, one of his streams of energy wrapped around Yang Qi.

Chapter 435: Secrets

“Be broken,” Yang Qi said calmly, exhaling an energy flow that easily negated the stream of infernal energy.

“An expert?” the infernal said, visibly shocked. “Oh, nope. You’re just a Great Sage. How did you do that just now?” Suddenly, he smiled viciously. “Oh, I get it. You’re new to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. In fact, you still have the power of a spatial nexus on you. If I absorb you, I’ll finally have hope of getting out of here.”

“Heaven-Devil Devastation Incantation!”

RUMBLE!

With the wave of a hand, the infernal sent a stream of devil light slicing through the air. Although the attack wasn’t as powerful as it would have been on the outside, it was still as strong as ten thousand devil swords.

As the swords bore down on Yang Qi, his God Legion Battle Robe flared.

Ping. Ping. Ping. Ping.

The devil swords smacked into the robe and shattered into dust.

“Creation!” Yang Qi said. Stamping his foot down like an ancient godmammoth, he shot forward in the direction of the infernal, his hand clenched into a fist.

C-C-CRACK!

All of the infernal’s defensive energy arts were destroyed and he was sent tumbling backward, his body splitting apart. After all, the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth was a bane to Infernalfolk blood.

“Dammit! How are you so strong? Infernal Monarch Sheds Tears!” The infernal chopped both of his hands out in front of him and an enormous evil eye appeared. As it opened, it shed a single tear, which exploded into a hellish domain. “Infernal Monarch's Kingdom!”

In the blink of an eye, the Infernal Monarch’s Kingdom had Yang Qi completely sealed within its borders.

Flying back toward him, the infernal said, “You puny Great Sage! I can’t believe you forced me to use my deadly Infernal Monarch Sheds Tears move. Your death is at hand!”

“You think a crappy move like that will work on me?” Yang Qi said. Suddenly, the Hellfire Crucible appeared behind him and flames erupted out of it, along with a gravitational force that sucked in the evil eye, the tear, and the Infernal Monarch Kingdom.

In the shortest of moments, the deadly attack vanished as if it had never existed to begin with.

“Creation. Nature. Undying.” Yang Qi drew on three stances, causing him to burst with majestic power.

RUMBLE!

The infernal shot up into the sky like a bullet, screaming. Meanwhile, Yang Qi stomped his foot down again and launched into the sky in pursuit. A moment later, he had the infernal by the throat and was floating back down to the ground.

The infernal looked like a captured duck, his eyes flickering with absolute terror.

“Tell me, what's the situation with this Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart?” Yang Qi said. “When did you get in here? And how do you get out?”

Yang Qi was convinced that this infernal was not like the other experts who were rotting their way into death. The creature was very much alive and had even achieved soul enlightenment, which indicated that it must be aware of the way to leave the place.

“You just got here, didn’t you?” the infernal replied. It chuckled darkly. Despite being afraid of Yang Qi, he hadn’t lost his instinctual desire to haggle for benefit. “Without my help, you’ll never learn the secret of escaping this place. You’ll be trapped here for your whole life! Let me tell you, the longer you stay here and become familiar with the local magical laws and vital energy, the more you become assimilated and the harder it is to escape. In fact, after you're inside for a few tens of thousands of years or so, it becomes completely impossible and you end up dying from old age like all those other fools.”

“Even in your position, you still have what it takes to threaten me? You really don’t know the difference between life and death, do you?” Yang Qi sent a gravitational force into the infernal and began to extract his blood, causing his bones to creak ominously.

“Agggghhhhh!” the infernal screamed. “You’re extracting my blood? I'm an infernal! How could this be happening? Are you designed to defeat me?”

Yang Qi ignored him, continuing to extract his blood. Finally, the infernal shrieked, “Stop! Stop it! I’ll talk. What do you want to know? Just stop taking my blood. I’ll tell the truth. I've been in here for ten thousand years already. I know lots of secrets. You want to know how to get out? I can tell you!”

Yang Qi stopped extracting the infernal’s blood and then stared at him coldly. “Alright, talk. How do you get out? And are there really treasures to be had?”

“There are actually a lot of ways to get out. One of them is to capture a primeval godworm larva. If you raise it to maturity it can eat through the greyspace here, as long as you can find a weak spot. Another option is to take advantage of the time period when the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart opens up and the spatial nexuses erupt. In fact, we’re in that time period right now.

“Unfortunately, primeval godworms aren’t common and the ones you do find are usually mature, which means that they’re actually a threat to us, not the other way around. Besides, the larvae are usually protected by godworm patriarchs, who are extremely dangerous. They’ll chew you up and not even spit out any bones after they’re done.”

“Primeval godworm larva? You mean like this?” Smiling, Yang Qi produced the wriggling godworm to show the infernal.

“A godworm larva?” the infernal exclaimed, so excited that he nearly bit his tongue off by accident. “You actually have a godworm larva?! My god! This is fate! Destiny! You have no idea how many old-timers in here would try to rob you of that thing if they found out. Nobody even knows how many people have gotten into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart over the years and ended up stuck here. There are even Demolishers here, you know, immortal patriarchs….”

Yang Qi tightened his grip again. “Alright, so how do you find the weak spots that can be used as exits? Serve me well, and tell me everything you know. If you do, I might take you out with me. In fact, I'm going to place a sealing mark on you from the legion of gods. If you defy me, all it will take is a single thought to turn you into dust. I’ll be aware of your every move and action. Be sealed!”

He sent a glowing seal of sagelight into the infernal, who screamed as surely as if he were being branded with red-hot iron.

“I’ll tell you everything! Look, the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart has numerous world junctions. Find one, and you can get treasures hidden there by immortals. In fact, you won’t just find immortal items, you can actually find the corpses of immortals!”

“What? Corpses of immortals?” Yang Qi was shaken by the thought. ‘Is he serious?’

Immortal corpses were entirely different things than immortal items. After all, immortal items were created by an immortal adding magical laws to weapons or other objects. Things like the Heaven-Burying Bow and the Heaven-Wasting Arrows were such items, things that had been blessed by the breath of an immortal.

To people weaker than immortals, they were stupendous treasures.

However, the corpse of an immortal was an entirely different thing. It would contain that immortal’s quintessence, which would be worth a hundred million immortal items.

If he could get one and toss it into his Hellfire Crucible, then reaching immortal ascension would be a lot easier. Either that, or he could fuse it with his immortal clone to make it vastly stronger.

He could never have imagined that the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart would have immortal corpses in it.

“I'm serious,” the infernal said, looking a bit envious at the mere thought of what he was talking about. “And there are real immortal items here, not the quasi-immortal, counterfeit immortal, or defective immortal items you come across outside…. These are real treasures branded with the quintessence-blood and nascent divinities of real immortals. The type of things they use to wage war in the immortal planes. There are also immortal pills and godly-class energy arts, although most of those are incomplete. Anyway, that stuff is all in the world junctions.”

“What are these world junctions?” Yang Qi asked. “And where do you find them?”

“They’re basically nests of primeval godworms. Each and every one of them is protected by a godworm patriarch in the Demolishing level, who usually have adult godworm subordinates. In the past, the immortals would raise them to harvest their spatial powers, and actually used them to create the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

“Godworms love to hoard treasure and protect the remains of the immortals. People say they wait for destined individuals to come to them. Considering the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart has been around for millions and millions of years, and appears every ten thousand years, it's not unheard of for destined individuals to come along, enter a world junction, and come out with treasure. As for those who are not destined, well, they just live out their lives here.”

“What do you mean by ‘destined’?” Yang Qi said, his eyes flashing.

“I don't know. There are a lot of powerful organizations that have risen up in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, and all of them want to get into the world junctions and take whatever legacies exist inside. But every ten thousand years that pass, only a handful of people succeed.”

“There are powerful organizations here? Like what?” Considering that the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart had been around for millions and millions of years, it was obvious that as long as the mortality rate wasn’t high, there would be a lot of people inside.

“Well, let’s see,” the infernal said, “there’s the Grand Emperor’s House, the Whispering Rain Pagoda, the Supreme Valley, the Exemplar God Mansion, the Demi-Immortal Institution, the—”

“Wait, what did you just say?” Yang Qi interrupted. “Demi-Immortal Institution? What's that?”

“Some experts from the Demi-Immortal Society in the Titan Emperor Collegium branched off and tried to start something called the Demi-Immortal Institute. But it never even got close to rivaling the Titan Emperor Collegium. Eventually, they came here to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart and got stuck like everyone else. Anyway, they’re very fierce. Although they can’t achieve cultivation base breakthroughs in here, they’ve managed to keep their longevity going by various means and are very powerful.”

Chapter 436: World Junctions

Who could have guessed that scum from the Demi-Immortal Institute would be in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart?

Considering that Yang Qi had done away with the core teachings and doctrines of that institute, he considered any surviving loyalists to be enemies. He hadn’t even spared the chancellor’s daughter, much less others.

Even still, he was determined to cut the weeds and eliminate the roots, and eliminate all traces of the institute and its influence.

‘I wonder if any of my Elder Brothers and Sisters are around as well,’ he thought.  ‘They’re definitely strong enough to win any fights over spatial nexuses. If they’re here, I need to help them get out. That said, it's probably not urgent. They’ll need time to go searching for treasure anyway, otherwise the trip here would end up being a big waste. The best thing of all would be to find one of those immortal corpses….’

With his primeval godworm larva, it should be relatively easy to leave the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart through a world junction. That wasn’t necessarily a priority right now, though. Although he couldn’t achieve cultivation base advancement here, he could still contemplate the magical laws and achieve rapid advancement in his enlightenment.

In fact, he was fairly certain that he could quickly achieve soul enlightenment of the Demi-Immortal level, and perhaps even advance a few orders within it.

And he could still sense his immortal clone back in the Sage Monarch Continent. With enlightenment of the Demi-Immortal level, the clone would achieve breakthroughs. And maybe he could even help open a passageway to the Hell of Mahānata.

“Fine, let’s go find a world junction,” Yang Qi said, sealing the infernal and tossing him into the God Legion Paradise. “Once I'm out of this place, you’ll be working as a guard for me back home….”

This infernal was a second order Demi-Immortal and had a much purer bloodline than Ghost Emperor Yama. He was also vastly stronger. To have a Greater Demi-Immortal guarding the Sage Monarch Continent would make it much safer, especially against people from the Hanging Mountain.

“How do we find the world junctions?” Yang Qi asked.

“They have particularly strong magical laws, so you can find them by following the fluctuations. Nobody even knows how many world junctions there are here. If you searched for a million years, you would probably never find all of them. However, a few of the most powerful factions are camped around some world junctions that were discovered recently. From what I heard, the godworm patriarchs are in trances absorbing spatial power, which makes it safe to get close and even try to go inside.”

“Fine, let’s go to one of those,” Yang Qi said. “You know the way, right?”

“Of course,” the infernal said, then began leading the way along a winding path.

As Yang Qi proceeded along, his various energy arts, including the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, all grew stronger, little by little. After all, the godworm continued to chew away at the spatial power and impart its power to Yang Qi, which filled him with more and more Blood of the One God.

Although he could not achieve breakthroughs, godworms definitely could.

And because he controlled this godworm, when its cultivation base improved it was almost the same as his own improving.

‘I need to get some immortal pills made with spatial godpower,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘Things like that would be a big help to my godworm’s cultivation base.’

“There’s a world junction just up ahead, Milord,” the infernal said. “See, there are entire cities built up around it. You need to be very careful going forward. If anybody gets even slightly suspicious that you have a godworm, you’ll get mobbed instantly. You have to keep it a secret….”

“You think I don't know that?” Yang Qi replied. Up ahead, he saw an area where space seemed to sink in on itself. It was a spatial sea of power so intense that it was like a flow of lava. And every movement sent out shocking fluctuations that shook even the soul.

Within that spatial sea were cities of cultivators. Obviously, this place was like a holy land of cultivation. As for the cities, they were on such a different level than the village from earlier that they couldn’t even be compared.

“Milord, the people in that little village from before were all nobodies. Because their lifespans are reaching an end and their battle prowess is waning, none of them would ever dare to get close to a world junction. If they did, they would probably get killed for whatever scraps of longevity they have left. The fighting that goes on near world junctions can be fierce and bitter.

“After all, every ten thousand years or so the world junctions will form spatial nexuses and eject immortal items, medicinal pills, daoist texts, and the like. Although, I guess you probably know that already. By the way, here in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, we don’t use immortal stones for currency. We use a type of immortal pill called Heavenseizing Pills. Even immortals who consume them will gain a hundred years of longevity, and they never expire. As you can imagine, they’re a lot more valuable than immortal items or daoist texts.”

Apparently, the infernal was worried about Yang Qi not being aware of important matters, thus he chattered on endlessly to make sure Yang Qi was informed.

As for Yang Qi, he was actually pleased, as it confirmed that he had the creature under his complete control.

That said, there was no way he would simply trust what the infernal said. He would definitely ask around to get his own information. Once he was certain he knew what was really going on in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, he would decide exactly what to do.

As soon as he entered the nearest city he was bombarded by divine will, causing his sea of consciousness to virtually tremble. There were cultivators everywhere selling all sorts of items for all sorts of prices.

“Immortal items! Get your immortal items! I have defective immortal items for only ten Heavenseizing Pills!”

“I have a heavenly-class energy art here, direct from inside a world junction. Grand-Sorrow True-Dragon Thousand-Leaves True-Zodiac! It’s a secret incantation cultivated by the ancient true dragons. With it, you can form a dragon-shaped true zodiac. I’ll part with it for twenty Heavenseizing Pills!”

“I have information for sale. I know a world junction that has a godworm larva in it!”

There was a dazzling array of incomplete immortal items, defective immortal items, quasi-immortal items, counterfeit immortal items, heavenly-class energy arts, and immortal stones.

Yang Qi was also surprised to notice other Great Sages present whose soul enlightenment was in the Demi-Immortal level.

All of a sudden, he felt some divine will fluctuations that he recognized.

Some distance away was a street as wide as a plain, lined with numerous mansion grottos.

At the end of the street was a sword-wielding individual in green clothing and a bamboo hat, surrounded by a host of foes.

“You want to murder and rob me?!” he shouted.

Yang Qi recognized him immediately as his Elder Seventeenth Brother from the Invincible Society, Sword Seventeen. It was Sword Seventeen who had brought him into the Invincible Society, and the two of them were rather close. As it turned out, he had found his way into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

At a single glance, Yang Qi could see that, in the time they had been apart, Sword Seventeen’s cultivation base had reached the terrifying level of the eighth step, making him a Without Limit Sage. That said, his soul enlightenment was apparently one with the dao of heaven, placing him just ahead of Yang Qi as a full Demi-Immortal.

If it weren’t for the fact that he was stuck in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, Sword Seventeen would definitely be a Demi-Immortal already.

Right now he was surrounded by six Lesser Demi-Immortals, who had him pinned in a corner with a powerful energy field. From the way they carried themselves, it seemed they were used to doing things like this.

“Don’t you know the rules here, punk? How dare you just try to buy things randomly! You obviously just arrived in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, and I bet you have plenty of medicinal pills that increase lifespan, don’t you? Well hand them over! And give us half of your longevity while you’re at it.”

This particular man’s eyes glittered with vicious, violet light. Although his energy arts were only in the Lesser Demi-Immortal level, his soul enlightenment was already in the Profound Demi-Immortal level.

Sword Seventeen had apparently been pushed to his limit. Brandishing his sword, he shouted, “Die!”

The foes who surrounded him smiled coldly. Apparently, they had been waiting for him to make the first move so they could have the excuse of defending themselves.

Even as Sword Seventeen began to stab his sword through the air, a hand reached out and stopped him.

“Hold on a moment, Elder Seventeenth Brother,” Yang Qi said. “What a surprise to see you here. There’s no need for you to lower yourself to the level of dealing with nobodies like this. Let me take care of them for you.”

Sword Seventeen looked over in surprise and delight. “Junior Eighteenth Brother! So, you got in here too! It's too bad this place is a trap. I got here a month ago, and already stumbled across quite a bit of good fortune. I made some progress with my energy arts, but unfortunately we can’t achieve breakthroughs. I got a message from Elder Second Brother. He’s around as well, although I'm not sure where exactly. This Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart is huge. Come on, let’s join forces and break free of these Demi-Immortals.”

“Break free? Why?” Yang Qi suddenly turned.

Before the Lesser Demi-Immortals could even react to the turn of events they were all slapped in the chest with a palm strike, causing blood to spray from their mouths.

Cracking sounds erupted as they exploded like ceramic vessels, then they were burned into nothing by sagefire.

Scarcely able to believe his eyes, Sword Seventeen looked at Yang Qi. “This….”

Chapter 437: Various Factions

“Surprised, Elder Brother? Come on, let’s go.” Yang Qi had just killed six top experts without batting an eyelid. Looking over at Sword Seventeen, he waved the sleeve of his God Legion Battle Robe to wrap him up, then vanished.

Before anyone in the area could react, they were gone.

With the godworm in his God Legion Paradise constantly eating away at space, Yang Qi could move around in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart with ease.

When Yang Qi vanished, the people in the area exchanged awkward glances which slowly transformed into expressions of terror.

“The Six Langya Fiends were just killed!?”

“Who did it? Who could possibly be so ferocious? Before we could even blink, the six of them were dead, and not even their bones were left behind! They were all powerful Demi-Immortals.”

“The Six Langya Fiends work for King Langya, who runs this city. And now some mysterious outsider just went and killed them? King Langya isn’t going to let this go. Come on, let’s get out of here. We don't want to be around when King Langya flips out.”

“Get out of here! King Langya is coming!”

RUMBLE!

A short moment later, an immense force erupted from the city center. Shockwaves rolled out that sent people tumbling off their feet as a tall man appeared, wearing a golden crown and clad in a jade-colored robe embroidered with ancient godlings, gobblewocks, chymeras, drakoids, and horned phoenixes, all of them extremely lifelike. In fact, it seemed entirely likely that they were real life godlings that had been sealed into the garment with magic.

He looked every bit the king and was followed by a retinue of Demi-Immortal servants who kept their hands folded respectfully at their waists and their heads down.

King Langya had arrived.

He ruled this city, which he himself had founded to watch over the world junction.

As he surveyed the scene his eyes flashed with deadly light.

“Who did it? Who killed my Six Langya Fiends? And how did he do it so quickly? You… talk!” Without any warning, he reached out and grabbed a ninth step Great Sage, who had been lurking off to the side to see how things would play out. In the blink of an eye, the man was in King Langya’s grip, as weak as a baby chicken.

“King… King Langya….” the man gurgled, clearly terrified out of his mind. “The Six Langya Fiends surrounded a guy in a bamboo hat, a Great Sage, and were trying to rip him off. But then another guy showed up wearing a glowing white robe. They didn’t even fight! The Six Langya Fiends just disappeared. And then the guy in the hat and the guy in white vanished without a trace. That’s what happened, King Langya. Please, show me mercy! We’re all stuck here together in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, so please, spare my life and I’ll—”

Smack!

King Langya waved his hand, and the man collapsed into dust.

“Trash. If I didn’t kill you, then who would I kill? I can’t believe a bug like you would beg for mercy from me. Well, your soul will be a fine addition to my Langya Eighty-One Gods Banner.”

A moment later, one of the servants said, “Your Majesty, who are those two? I can’t believe they went so far as to cause problems here in Langya City. We definitely have to make an example of them. We should mobilize every man we have to track them down.”

“Absolutely,” King Langya said, looking around with flashing eyes. Every cultivator he looked at simply stood there with head bowed and heart pounding. “Troubling times are upon us. The Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart is opening to the outside world again, which means that we can search for a way out. But at the same time, people outside will be struggling to enter. The godworm larvae in the world junctions are stirring, and getting one is the ticket to leaving here. Once I'm on the outside, I’ll be a force to be reckoned with.”

“Sir, yes sir!”

“Start the search immediately!”

“Yes sir!”

Numerous cultivators blurred into motion, heading this way and that as they began searching the area for Yang Qi and Sword Seventeen.

Unfortunately for them, their quarry was some distance away, sinking toward the bottom of an enormous sea-like lake. Yang Qi had his God Legion Paradise out and had combined its powers with that of the godworm to create an illusory region that no one could detect.

Of course, the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart was a very dangerous place, and that wasn’t just limited to the strength of the magical laws of space. Even ordinary things like mountains, rivers, and lakes could be very dangerous. For example, although this lake didn't contain any living beings, it had powerful whirlpools and flows of water that could be deadly in nature.

Suddenly, a sound like the wail of ghosts or the howl of gods rang out and a white bone hand slammed into the greyspace of the God Legion Paradise, causing a deafening boom.

Yang Qi waved his hand, sending out a stream of sword energy that pierced through the hand to whatever evil spirit was behind it and killing it.

Opening his Lord's Eye, he looked out into the lake to see the situation.

Shockingly, there were countless whirlpools at the bottom of the lake. Each one was home to an evil spirit of immense power, who would lurk about and wait for an opportunity to emerge from hiding and consume the souls of living beings.

Once the God Legion Paradise sank about halfway to the bottom of the lake, the evil spirits noticed it and began heading in its direction.

However, after slaughtering the first of them, the rest settled back down and didn't dare to get close. All of them were thoroughly cowed by the faint aura of the halls of heaven and the legion of gods.

Moments later, the lake settled into calm.

“You showed up at just the right time, Junior Brother,” Sword Seventeen said. He sighed. “The Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart doesn’t have living things like birds or beasts, but it does have world-devils. Those evil spirits out there are low-level world-devils. The higher-level ones are extremely powerful. Omnipotent, almost.”

“World-devils?”

“Yeah. As you know, the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart opens up once every ten thousand years or so. In the interval, the primeval godworms will absorb power from various planes and add it to the world around them. Of course, it's impossible to avoid absorbing baleful energy. That baleful energy combines with the magical laws of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart and forms world-devils. You know the saying: in heaven and earth, there is yin and yang, there are sages and devils. The world-devils have plenty of the power of the magical laws from the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. If you kill one and refine it with your personal true flame, you can get a lot of benefits. After being here for a month, I've already killed quite a few of them, which pushed my soul enlightenment all the way to the Demi-Immortal level. Once I'm back outside, I’ll achieve my next breakthrough without any problem. A lot of people here in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart are in the same situation. This is a great place to seek enlightenment, but a bad place for breakthroughs.”

“You seem to know a lot about this place, Elder Brother. What do you think we should do from here? I captured an infernal who gave me a lot of information, although I'm not sure I can trust him….”

With that, he went on to tell the story of how he had acquired the godworm, as well as the details of the fight with the infernal.

Sword Seventeen was his Elder Brother, thus Yang Qi trusted him implicitly. It was the same with the rest of the Invincible Society.

“What? Junior Brother, you have a primeval godworm? Well that’s great! Not only will we be able to use it to get out of this place later, but before we do we’ll be able to get our hands on a lot of treasure.” He sighed. “It’s too bad that even though our Master is invincible, he can’t get in here to save us. Not even Demolishers can break through the greyspace of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.”

Yang Qi thought for a moment, then cupped his hands respectfully and said, “Well, what do we do next? I’ll follow your lead, Elder Brother.”

“We have to team up, that much is obvious. The things the infernal told you are true. There’s plenty of treasure to be had in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, with most of it waiting in the world junctions for those who are destined to find it. Since you have a godworm of your own, we should be able to easily get into any world junction.” After a moment of consideration, he continued, “Junior Brother, it seems to me that your cultivation base is already way past mine. Just now, you killed those six Demi-Immortals with no effort at all! You’re definitely going to be a top figure once we get back to the Titan Emperor Collegium. In the end, Junior Brother, I think you’re the real genius here. How about I follow your lead?”

Yang Qi nodded, then frowned in thought. “World junctions…. Treasure hoards….” Finally, he rose to his feet. “There’s no time to lose. The Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart only opens every ten thousand years, and it will close soon. If we don’t get some treasure and get out, we’ll be stuck here for a long time.”

“True. If we can find a treasure hoard in one of those world junctions, we’ll definitely benefit immensely. And we should find our Elder Brothers and Sisters and help them get out, too. The best way to improve your godworm larva is to find other godworm larvae to feed it. We can’t improve our cultivation base, but your godworm can.”

With that, the two of them headed out to find a world junction.

Chapter 438: Endless Treasure

Sword Seventeen and Yang Qi made further plans.

Taking into account everything they knew about the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, they made some very specific plans of how to face the dangers of the world junctions.

There was obviously no way to search through all of them.

However, they were all treasure troves, in addition to being locations to escape to the outside world.

Whooooosh….

As the two of them flew out of the lake, the God Legion Paradise shrank down until it was a thumb-sized bullet that was roughly the same color as the surrounding terrain. As it zipped along with Yang Qi and Sword Seventeen inside, it was virtually impossible for anyone to spot.

At Sword Seventeen’s urging, Yang Qi continued focusing on gaining enlightenment from the primeval godworm.

Although he was still stuck at the pathetically weak second step of the Great Sage level, his enlightenment was on the verge of breaking through to the Demi-Immortal level.

He was already itching to get back out and achieve those multiple breakthroughs.

“Do you sense that energy up ahead?” Sword Seventeen said. “It's a world junction for sure. That light is like a liquid manifestation of space; have the godworm eat it and his cultivation base will grow even higher.” As they neared the world junction, the lava-like liquid that swirled around it was like liquid jade that Yang Qi quickly inhaled and sent into the God Legion Paradise. The God Legion Paradise was changing. As it filled with the godly laws of space, it no longer shone with a brilliant light. Instead, it looked ancient and mighty, like the work of supernatural beings. It now looked like it was made of stone, the type that was speckled with age and filled with the passage of endless seasons.

Sword Seventeen could sense the changes that were going on within Yang Qi, and he clicked his tongue in amazement. “Junior Brother, your energy arts and cultivation base just keep getting more and more profound. Pretty soon you’re going to outpace Eldest Brother. Trust me, once we get out of here, our Elder Brothers and Sisters are going to do everything in their power to open a passageway to the Hell of Mahānata for you. Once you get in there and improve your cultivation base, our Invincible Society is going to have another world-shaking member. When you step into the Demi-Immortal level, I’d say that not even sixth order Demi-Immortals will be able to hurt you.”

“You flatter me, Elder Brother. Say, what’s that? Are there people standing watch over the world junction?”

Up ahead, there was a rather large group of people who had set up a spiderweb-like network of warding magics to prevent anyone from getting to the world junction. They even had patrols set up.

“Those people work for King Langya,” Sword Seventeen said coldly. “He's been in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart for a hundred thousand years and has cities set up everywhere. He’s never been able to get out through a world junction, but he’s certainly hoarded a lot of treasure. You see, the world junctions are like spirit nodes that occasionally eject treasures from the immortal worlds. He treats them like his personal property, and obviously doesn’t want anyone else benefiting from them. Those people we killed earlier were also his men. They’re going to be on the lookout for us. Junior Brother, do you think your personal domain can get through those warding magics?”

“Easily,” replied Yang Qi. “To me, those warding magics are like kids’ toys.” He opened his Lord's Eye and quickly identified the loopholes in the warding magics.

In the outside world, these warding magics would be considered the most ultimate and deadly types of spell formations possible. But in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, the magical laws of space changed everything. Besides, he could benefit from the eyes of the godworm to find their weaknesses.

As he continued feeding the Blood of the One God to the godworm, it was inching ever closer to the third stage of its life cycle. When that happened, the genetic memories in the creature would pour into Yang Qi’s mind and his enlightenment would break through to the Demi-Immortal level.

Whizz!

Yang Qi sent the God Legion Paradise rocketing through the nearly liquid space that surrounded the world junction and past the patrolling guards.

RUUUUUUMBLE!

As Yang Qi and Sword Seventeen entered the world junction, an immense energy descended on the area as King Langya himself arrived.

“Your Majesty!” one of the patrolling guards said. “We’ve set up warding magics everywhere, just as you ordered. Nobody will get into this world junction now. As for those two people who killed the Six Langya Fiends, we’ve been searching but haven’t turned up any clues.”

BAM!

King Langya smacked the guard viciously across the side of the face. “Trash! You're all trash! Those two punks just went into this very world junction! I sensed the fluctuations clearly only a moment ago. Get out the Langya Ghost-God Mirror immediately, you useless bunch of fools!”

With that, he began kicking and beating all of the guards. Sadly, King Langya treated his subordinates horrifically, and would abuse or even kill them at random.

“Mercy, Your Majesty, spare us!” they shouted, kowtowing as they begged for mercy.

“I’ll let you off the hook for now. Keep an eye on Langya City while I head into the world junction and capture those two. Having trash like you working for me is completely pointless. I have to do everything myself.”

With that, he turned and vanished into the liquid sea of space that was the world junction.

Afterward, his bedraggled subordinates all breathed sighs of relief.

“Why did we have to end up stuck in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart?” one of them said. “It's bad enough that King Langya works us like pack animals, but if we make the slightest mistake, he’ll kill us. And when he needs longevity, he absorbs it from us, his own subordinates.”

“Ai!” another of them sighed. “We used to be noble students in the Destructive Calamity Collegium. Back then we had limitless prospects. But we came here in the hopes of getting some good fortune, leaving, and founding our own sects. Now we're slaves, with statuses lower than pigs or dogs. I don’t have any ambitions anymore other than getting out of here.”

“The Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart is basically a big prison. Although, it does contain big secrets regarding the legion of gods and the host of immortals. According to what I've heard, the entire chart is connected to the ancient leader of the host of immortals, King Immortal-Slayer. Supposedly, you have to have his command medallion to get the true legacy of the host of immortals.” He sighed. “In the end, we're just sacrifices to this place, with no hope of ever escaping.”

“Well, not necessarily. You know what I heard? According to certain calculations, the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart has opened one hundred and eight times. One hundred and eight is a perfect number and filled with immense profundities. In other words, this is when the bearer of King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy medallion should show up. He’ll get the legacy of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart and transform it so that we can get out.”

“Oh really? Where did you hear that?”

“Just a few days ago, in Worldking City. As you know, Patriarch Worldking is half a step into the dao of Demolishing. And he used some boundless space-time magic to divine the workings of heaven.”

“Is that so? Patriarch Worldking, huh. He’s a ninth order Demi-Immortal. I heard that he’s on the verge of becoming a real immortal.”

“Well, let’s just wait and see what happens.”

**

Yang Qi and Sword Seventeen were already in the depths of the world junction.

RUUUUUUMBLE!

As it turned out, the world junction was actually a chiliocosm of worlds, somewhat like the outside world, with a dark sky and countless planes of existence.

ROAR!

Before they could even begin searching, a powerful cry echoed out from the darkness and they saw an enormous emperor snake bearing down on them.

It was bright yellow, the same color that emperors would wear, and the color of sage items. In fact, the scales on its head actually looked like an emperor's crown, complete with dazzling jewels.

It was as large as a mountain as it bore down on them. And when it smashed into the God Legion Paradise, its greyspace began to smoke as though it might evaporate.

BAM!

Yang Qi was severely shaken, and was even sent tumbling backward a significant distance. In response, the emperor snake looked at him mockingly, then opened its mouth and lunged forward again. Shockingly, it seemed intent on consuming the entire God Legion Paradise.

Before Yang Qi or Sword Seventeen could react, the snake swallowed them up, whereupon they found themselves amidst a host of wriggling, yellow spell formations that began digesting the God Legion Paradise.

Crunch. Crunch…. The greyspace of the God Legion Paradise began to crack and split as it came under the destructive assault of the emperor snake’s digestive power.

“What is this thing?” Even as Yang Qi opened his Lord's Eye to examine the situation further, Sword Seventeen let out an excited yelp.

“Junior Brother! This is an imperial snakecharm, a talisman created by an immortal from the ancient Snakefolk!”

Chapter 439: Imperial Snakecharm

‘Wait, this emperor snake is an incarnated talisman?’

He had already determined that the snake’s cultivation base was at the level of a Profound Demi-Immortal, which made it vastly stronger than even a Greater Demi-Immortal. That put its fighting capabilities far above his own. However, while he had taken it to be some diabolical monster native to this place, Sword Seventeen was saying that it was actually a talisman.

As Sword Seventeen was looking at it in surprise, Yang Qi opened his Lord's Eye and looked at the talisman itself. It was a strip of paper a meter long and about five fingers wide, covered with an extremely lifelike depiction of a snake.

It wasn’t an ordinary snake, but rather a snake that could command all other snakes in existence.

This talisman had been created by an immortal from the ancient Snakefolk, and was mysterious and powerful to the extreme. It radiated an aura that seemed capable of consuming everything in existence. Clearly, this was a precious treasure, an immortal item that was neither defective, broken, shattered, or counterfeit. Neither was it a quasi-immortal item.

“So it's not a devilling, which should make it a lot easier to deal with. There are bound to be plenty of benefits to capturing this thing.” Without any hesitation, Yang Qi used the Hand of the One God to power a Devil-God Seal.

His Blood of the One God boiled and the godworm in his God Legion Paradise howled.

Ancient genetic memories and information from the godworm flooded into Yang Qi’s sea of consciousness as he thrust out both hands, causing a string of heaven motes to blast out with the power of the halls of heaven.

RUMBLE!

The blow blasted a huge hole in the emperor snake's stomach, allowing the God Legion Paradise to break out into the open. At the same time, the godworm turned into something like a wriggling earthworm that burrowed inside of Yang Qi, filling him with immense power. In the blink of an eye, it almost seemed like he had awakened all eight hundred forty million particles inside him.

The godworm’s cultivation base was equivalent to a second order Greater Demi-Immortal, and considering that Yang Qi controlled it, it meant that he could wield that level of power.

Even when Yang Qi was only wielding the power of a Great Sage, he could still slaughter Demi-Immortals with ease. But now he had so much power flowing through him that he could easily resort to the fifth stance of the Hand of the One God.

“Night Flows Ceaselessly through the Aeons. When Day Comes, Life Force is Eternal. Aeon!”

As he stretched his hand out, the emperor snake’s vital energy exploded and the Devil-God Seal slammed into it, causing it to shrink down into the form of a paper talisman.

“Get over here!” he shouted, and the talisman flew into his hand. As it struggled, it damaged his God Legion Battle Robe, yet it could not escape.

‘This thing isn’t a living creature. If it were a real devilling, or maybe a world-devil, it might have been more dangerous. After I get back to the Hanging Mountain, maybe I can use it to take control of the Snakefolk. According to the rumors I heard, they were second only to the Mammothfolk in ancient times, even producing Demi-Immortals. The current Chief Snake is actually stronger than Ape Heavenhelve of the Apefolk….’

Suddenly, the struggling imperial snakecharm managed to leap out of his hand, but before it could get anywhere he summoned the Hellfire Crucible, grabbed the talisman again, and threw it inside. There, it was bathed in intense sagefire as he forced his own aura into it.

Before long, he released it into his God Legion Paradise where it floated calmly above the surface of the ground.

To Yang Qi’s delight, he had acquired another immortal item.

“Incredible!” Sword Seventeen said. “Truly incredible. No wonder the world junctions are so famous. The Snakefolk immortal who created the imperial snakecharms was King Heaven-Devourer, a sworn sibling of King Immortal-Slayer. He created a total of three thousand imperial snakecharms, and if you can collect them all, you can carry on his core teachings and doctrines and become a leader of the host of immortals. Think about it! Supposedly, those talismans can control Snakefolk. Do you know how many of them exist in the world? If you got all of the talismans, you would have an army on your hands. That would be a force to rival the Titan Emperor Collegium!”

“What did you just say? There are three thousand of these things? My god. What level could you reach if you collected all of them?” After doing some brief calculations, he came to the conclusion that having all three thousand talismans would be enough power to crush seventh or eighth order Demi-Immortals.

“Yeah, there are three thousand imperial snakecharms, although some are stronger than others. I'm going to guess that they’re all hoarded here in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Only a few have been acquired and taken away. For example, I heard that the society chief of the Beastmaster Society back in the Titan Emperor Collegium acquired a dozen or so from here, about fifty thousand years ago. Obviously his collection is a lot more powerful than that single talisman of yours. Sorry, Junior Brother, but you obviously got one of the relatively weak versions. That said, once we get out of here you could probably work out a deal with the Beastmaster Society. Their society chief would probably pay a good price to get another imperial snakecharm. Each one that you add to the collection makes you exponentially stronger. It’s not like you just add the power together linearly.”

At this point, Sword Seventeen looked around in the hopes of finding more good fortune.

The world junctions of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart were legendary locations that had been talked about for hundreds of thousands of years in the cultivation world. Everyone in the know was aware that they were packed with all sorts of treasures, therefore there was no way that Sword Seventeen could agree to leave empty-handed.

“Elder Brother, watch out. There’s a—”

WHIZZZ!

Sword Seventeen turned to look in the same direction as Yang Qi, and when he did, his jaw dropped. Up ahead in the darkness and gloom were several dozen shadowy figures lurking in a deep plane.

Shockingly, those shadowy figures were all emperor snakes.

It looked like a nest, and as soon as they caught sight of Yang Qi and Sword Seventeen they began flying toward them.

They were all different sizes, but all of them were larger than the snake Yang Qi had just captured.

“Run!” Yang Qi said. Although all of these talismans counted as a massively valuable hoard of treasure, there was no way he would try to take it.

Not even his mother could handle so many emperor snakes.

The only choice they had right now was either flee or die.

Turning, he blurred into motion and joined Sword Seventeen to shoot with meteoric speed through the world junction.

Unfortunately, the other imperial snakecharms could sense that Yang Qi had some of their aura on him and gave chase. Even with his Angel Wings, and even using space-time wormholes, he still couldn’t shake them.

As he fled, he looked over his shoulder and counted how many there were. “One, two, three….”

In total, there were twenty-seven. Counting the one he had captured, that meant that they were a nest of twenty-eight. And clearly, the twenty-seven were not going to just let him take one of their number without a fight.

“Dammit, look!” Sword Seventeen said. “Some world-devils are blocking our way up ahead!”

He was just as nervous as Yang Qi, aware that if they got trapped by the emperor snakes they would definitely be killed, and in a very painful fashion. And now the situation was made worse by a group of world-devils.

They looked like ancient giants, with razor-sharp claws and complicated tattoos. They lurked on a shattered plane, and as soon as they saw Yang Qi and Sword Seventeen, they let out deafening roars and shot forth aggressively.

Sword Seventeen immediately called upon a host of swords that slashed the world-devils to bits and absorbed their power.

Yang Qi followed suit, unleashing streams of energy to drag the world-devils into the sleeve of his God Legion Battle Robe, where they instantly became power.

Unfortunately, this brief delay allowed the emperor snakes to get even closer.

“We're done for,” Sword Seventeen said, a look of despair on his face. “Damn. I can’t believe I'm going to meet my end like this.”

“Hold on, we can turn things around,” Yang Qi said coolly. “Shrink!” Instantly, his God Legion Paradise shrank down to the size of a grain of sand.

“Shrinking it down won’t help,” Sword Seventeen said. “The imperial snakecharms can create a Heaven-Devouring Spell Formation that can destroy anything, big or small.”

Even as the words left his mouth, the situation proved him correct, as an immense spell formation surrounded the shrunken God Legion Paradise.

Yang Qi exerted himself to resist it, but was already trembling from the effort.

It was at this point that someone clicked their tongue disapprovingly.

“Some amazing treasures here. So the one hundred and eighth opening of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart really has changed things. The imperial snakecharms have appeared, the legacy of the ancient King Heaven-Devourer. With twenty-seven of them, I’ll be invincible!”

RUMBLE!

A lightning-like streak slammed into the snakes, shattering their formation. Without any hesitation, Yang Qi and Sword Seventeen took advantage of the opportunity to flee to safety.

Turning back around, they caught sight of a black-garbed cultivator fighting the twenty-seven talismans. He had a long beard and wielded a jade-colored horsetail whisk with silver strands. Each movement of that whisk would rip holes in the sky.

Chapter 440: Grand Emperor Rich-Lush

Just when Yang Qi was about to be overwhelmed by a whole host of imperial snakecharms, a powerful individual came and, with the mere sweep of his whisk, sent the talismans flying off to the side.

As a result, Yang Qi and Sword Seventeen were both freed from the impasse.

However, after moving some distance away, they turned and looked back to see that although the newcomer had dealt a significant blow to the imperial snakecharms, he hadn’t fully defeated them.

Meanwhile, the black-robed figure noticed their retreat and turned to look at them.

“Eee? Two nobodies?”

It took only a moment for this Demi-Immortal to come to the realization that Yang Qi and Sword Seventeen were only Great Sages. To Demi-Immortals, Great Sages were like nothing.

When he realized that Yang Qi and Sword Seventeen wanted to stay and watch him fight the imperial snakecharms, he snorted coldly and said, “Listen, brats. You should be glad an emperor like me was willing to save you from the imperial snakecharms. Are you really going to try to take further advantage of me? Don’t tell me you hope that the battle will end with both sides suffering injuries, and you’ll be able to swoop in and win the ultimate victory? You two clearly don't know the height of the heavens and the breadth of the earth. Prepare to die! Dual World Cleaving!”

Swish!

He swept his whisk out in front of him and a beam of silver light shot forth, quickly turning into a shining moon that headed in Yang Qi’s direction.

“Watch out, Junior Brother!” Sword Seventeen said, his eyes flickering with shock. “Dual World Cleaving is nothing to take lightly!”

“Oh really?” Without any hesitation, Yang Qi reached out and summoned his Infernal Deity Spear and unleashed four successive moves. “One Flourish Shakes the Four Directions. Two Flourishes Summons Tempests. Three Flourishes Locks Down Mountains and Rivers. Four Flourishes Alters the Cosmos.”

The four attacks created a forest of spear projections that stabbed into the shining moon, causing it to shatter into countless fragments. The Dual World Cleaving move had been completely vanquished.

This self-proclaimed emperor looked at Yang Qi in surprise and said, “So, you two measly Great Sages are strong enough to stop my Dual World Cleaving? How is that possible? You must really have some good fortune from heaven. Well I’ll just kill you and take it! With that imperial snakecharm you already have, and these additional twenty-seven, I’ll have a total of twenty-eight! The same as the number of constellations! Pagoda Suppression!”

RUMBLE!

Suddenly, a projection of a precious pagoda shot out over his head, covered with carvings of god-devils, immortal-buddhas, spirit creatures, beasts, mountains, and rivers. The mere appearance of the pagoda seemed to cause space to freeze up and everything in the macrocosm to go still.

‘That’s….’

Yang Qi felt his God Legion Paradise stirring in response to this pagoda. It was something that could shake heaven and earth to the point where ghosts and gods would weep, and seemed capable of actually creating macrocosms.

“So strong!” Sword Seventeen exclaimed. “This black-robed daoist is at least a seventh order Revered Demi-Immortal!” Drawing his sword, he said, “Heaven Cleansing Solitary Sword. Seventeenth Sword!”

A massive sword nimbus appeared as Sword Seventeen prepared to put everything on the line.

‘That pagoda really reminds me of the Grand Emperor's Pagoda, although it's obviously many times stronger.’ The sight of the pagoda left Yang Qi feeling very shaken. Just looking at it made him feel like he was peering into a macrocosm, as if the pagoda represented a prismatic representation of space.

In fact, the unique arrangement of the spatial nexuses which made it up caused his godworm to reach a new level of enlightenment. Even he felt like he was on the verge of experiencing a breakthrough.

All of a sudden, Yang Qi began singing a song. “The will of the macrocosm governs space, but one day the universe will collapse into ruins. Even the macrocosm will rot. Only the Eternal Heavenly Aria will resound for all time….”

It was the ability that came after the Fist of the Halls of Heaven and the Hand of the One True God, the one designed for the Demi-Immortal level. The Eternal Heavenly Aria.

The lyrics of the song could create a chiliocosm of worlds, and would flow for all eternity into the very depths of the universe. The Eternal Heavenly Aria was a source of power for anything and everything.

Crack! Snap!

As the lyrics floated around him, Yang Qi began floating upward and, at the same time, everything around him was locked down. A moment later, he and Sword Seventeen vanished without a trace.

‘What energy art was that?’ the black-robed expert thought. ‘It actually broke through the spatial fetters of my Macrocosm Pagoda?’ Looking around with flashing eyes, he tried to determine where Yang Qi and Sword Seventeen were, but couldn’t find any clues.

Normally speaking, even the most powerful of experts would be restricted by the godly laws of the world junction. However, Yang Qi had his primeval godworm and was exempt from such things. He could move about in the world junction as easily as a fish in water, and also reach incredible speeds.

‘Gone? Well, that’s fine. I’ll take these twenty-seven imperial snakecharms, and then use their aura to track down those brats. They can run to the ends of the earth, but they won’t be able to escape me.’

With that, he resumed his fight with the imperial snakecharms, using a host of devastating and powerful energy arts. Originally, the twenty-seven imperial snakecharms had been part of a larger nest that included the one Yang Qi had taken. Now, being incomplete, the tide was shifted in favor of this black-robed cultivator.

Just as the black-robed man seemed on the verge of winning the fight and taking hold of unheard-of treasure, cackling laughter rang out and a palm appeared, bursting with deadly power. Before the black-robed cultivator could react, that palm passed through his defensive empyrean energy and slapped him square on the back, sending him tumbling to the side, coughing up blood.

“As you well know, Grand Emperor Rich-Lush, those imperial snakecharms are from King Heaven-Devourer, and are thus extremely valuable. Even immortals would fight to get them. You think you can just hog them all for yourself? Those things are connected to me by destiny!”

Spinning, the black-robed man summoned his pagoda and turned to look at the new arrival that had ambushed him.

“King Langya!” he growled.

‘I knew that guy’s pagoda seemed familiar!’ Yang Qi thought. He and Sword Seventeen were hidden in the depths of a nearby plane and were able to see everything that was happening.  ‘So, he’s actually the creator of the Grand Emperor's Pagoda! He’s Grand Emperor Rich-Lush!’

Grand Emperor Rich-Lush was the creator of the Rich-Lush Continent and had founded its first royal dynasty, which was called the Rich-Lush Dynasty. Back in those days he was a ninth step Great Sage, but had never been able to step into the Demi-Immortal level. But here he was in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, a seventh order Demi-Immortal.

He was so strong that, without the godworm and the imperial snakecharm, it would have been impossible to escape him.

But now, Yang Qi could sit on the mountaintop and watch the tigers fight, then reap the spoils when they tired out. As of now, Grand Emperor Rich-Lush and King Langya were both involved in fighting with the twenty-seven imperial snakecharms.

Three major forces were struggling for dominance.

Unfortunately, Grand Emperor Rich-Lush and King Langya were completely at odds with each other, therefore the snakecharms were actually turning the tide of battle.

The massive shockwaves of the battle had thrown the true energy in the area into chaos and was turning this part of the world junction into ruins.

“We’re way weaker than any of them, Junior Brother. But you never know, we might be able to swoop in at the end like the fisherman.” Sword Seventeen seemed itching to make a move, although, in the end he knew that they weren’t strong enough and ran the risk of getting killed.

“We might get that chance,” Yang Qi said. “Grand Emperor Rich-Lush and King Langya aren’t holding anything back. Let’s wait until they start running low on true energy….”

Sword Seventeen sighed. “With those twenty-seven talismans missing the one in your hands, they’re incomplete. Otherwise they would definitely be causing big problems for those two.”

“Let’s just keep waiting. That’s the only thing we can do.” Eyes sparkling, Yang Qi reached into his God Legion Paradise and pulled out his imperial snakecharm. He sent some vital energy into it and opened his Lord's Eye. Instantly, all aspects of the thing became visible to him.

It was marvelously created and filled with a heaven-devouring will, as though it desired to consume all creation. Yang Qi could also sense how it was connected to the will of King Heaven-Devourer, that ancient contemporary of King Immortal-Slayer. All of a sudden, Yang Qi saw an enormous, vastly powerful snake inside of the talisman, struggling as it fought a godmammoth. In fact, the snake had its mouth open wide as it attempted to consume the godmammoth.

Snakes devour mammoths.

In the moment before it succeeded, light flashed and the vision ended.

Yang Qi had just glimpsed the ultimate meaning of the imperial snakecharms.

It was a shocking revelation. The ancient snake that was King Heaven-Devourer had destroyed numerous planes of existence and shaken even immortal worlds. In fact, he was so large and powerful that he could consume low-level immortal worlds. In his name, the ‘heaven’ aspect referred to immortal worlds, thus consuming heaven meant consuming immortals. King Heaven-Devourer had been just as famous as King Immortal-Slayer, and had been a royal individual and an immortal. His will was focused on waging war on the godmammoths and consuming them!

Chapter 441: The Fisherman

“Die!”

The fighting in the depths of the world junction continued to grow more intense as Grand Emperor Rich-Lush and King Langya went all out, trying to defeat and capture the twenty-seven imperial snakecharms. They weren’t holding anything back in their attacks and were using their deadliest techniques.

Unfortunately, they were two of the most powerful figures in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart and were perfectly matched up. Even more relevant, the presence of the imperial snakecharms made it impossible for them to fight as freely as they normally would have.

As the battle progressed, their true energy began to wane, making them increasingly desperate.

As for the imperial snakecharms, they also seemed to be weakening. They were magical treasures, not humans or even devil-ghosts. They had no intelligence and operated solely on instinct. If either of the two experts could get control of them and power them with true energy, they would be thousands of times stronger in the blink of an eye.

In some ways, they were like a consummate divine sword that would do little good without an expert swordsman to wield it. Once in the hands of such an expert, though, such a sword could unleash unlimited slaughter.

As the fierce fighting raged outside, Yang Qi and Sword Seventeen remained hidden in the darkness. Interestingly, Sword Seventeen wasn't paying any attention to the fight between Grand Emperor Rich-Lush and King Langya. Instead, he was watching Yang Qi.

Yang Qi sat there cross-legged in his God Legion Paradise, sending streams of quintessence energy into his imperial snakecharm. As he did, puffs of empyrean energy emerged from it, forming the projection of an enormous snake that was trying to devour the godmammoth true energy that existed in Yang Qi.

Even Sword Seventeen could sense that the imperial snakecharm had immense power brewing in it.

Soon, voices began to echo out from the talisman. “Snakes devour mammoths. Snakes devour mammoths….”

Deep in the talisman, scales swirled wildly to form a huge snake.

The aura of the ancient King Heaven-Devourer was domineering and peerless, and was actually very different from that of King Immortal-Slayer.

The legacy medallions of King Immortal-Slayer had the aura of massacre and slaughter. It was an aura of incomparable sharpness, like that of the most unparalleled of swordsmen.

In contrast, King Heaven-Devourer’s aura conformed to the dao of demons, like that of a consummate and august patriarch.

One was piercing and the other was overbearing, but both belonged to outstanding immortals.

As for King Heaven-Devourer’s imperial snakecharms, they seemed to want to do battle with godmammoths. And they contained profound truths regarding the saying ‘snakes devour mammoths’.

All of a sudden, the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth reached a peak level of power and a clear, ear-piercing sound erupted in the depths of the imperial snakecharm, almost like an immortal plucking a zither. Then a domineering voice spoke out.

“Heaven-Devourer… Heaven-Devourer… three thousand imperial snakes… achieve the great dao, combine them into King Heaven-Devourer’s Talisman… a primal-chaos elder-snake.”

‘So, that's how it is,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘The true energy of my Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth tapped into the most primal state of the imperial snakecharm and unlocked a message from King Heaven-Devourer. If I can collect all three thousand imperial snakecharms and put them together, it will turn into King Heaven-Devourer’s Talisman, the ultimate primal-chaos elder-snake.’

As of this point, Yang Qi was now certain that King Heaven-Devourer had been an ancient primal-chaos elder-snake, a being formed out of primal-chaos itself. He had been an entity even more powerful than a primeval godworm. After all, primal-chaos elder-snakes were comparable to actual god-spirits.

‘I don’t think there’s anyone better equipped to deal with these three thousand imperial snakecharms than me. With my godmammoth true energy, I can feed the talismans the energy they need to release the true potential of the primal-chaos elder-snake that was King Heaven-Devourer.’

To Yang Qi’s eyes, the snakecharm was now an enormous snake swirling about in his God Legion Paradise. As he fed godmammoth true energy into it, it continued growing larger and fiercer, and, from what he could tell, as long as he didn’t run out of true energy its potential was limitless.

The talisman wasn’t just mighty. It was beyond mighty! In fact, Yang Qi’s current level of true energy wasn't enough to fully power it. That was telling, considering that he could already operate broken, defective, and counterfeit immortal items.

Unfortunately, this talisman of King Heaven-Devourer was different. After all, King Heaven-Devourer was a person who defied the legion of gods. As such, he must have been stronger than the Godmyth level.

The world of cultivation consisted of the nine phases of the Energy Arts level, the nine seizings of the Lifeseizing level, the nine transformations of the Legendary level, the nine steps of the Great Sage level, the nine orders of the Demi-Immortal level, the nine stages of the Demolishing level, and the nine divisions of the Godmyth level. As for what came after that, Yang Qi wasn’t sure.

In the mortal world, the highest level possible was the ninth order Demi-Immortal. As for Demolishers and Godmyths, they only appeared in the immortal worlds. The level after Godmyth was approaching the territory of the legion of gods; no information about it had ever spread beyond the immortal worlds.

Yang Qi had no way of understanding such things as that. After all, he was still only a second step Great Sage. He was far, far away from even the Demolishing level, let alone the Godmyth level.

As Yang Qi continued pouring godmammoth true energy into the imperial snakecharm, the battle raged outside. Grand Emperor Rich-Lush and King Langya were both coughing up blood, but at the same time unleashing their most vicious and deadly moves. Both of them were putting their lives on the line to get those twenty-seven talismans.

“Alright, watch this King Langya. Macrocosm’s Rigor; Grand Emperor’s Vigor!” Blood sprayed out of his mouth and bloody wounds opened up all over him as he drew upon some mighty entity to bless himself with power. Instantly, the animadestiny nascent divinity that was his grand pagoda transformed into something made purely from blood.

Then intense rumbling sounds echoed out as the pagoda shot toward King Langya.

“Looking to die? Fine. Nine Heavens of Langya: Myriad Army-Slaughtering Grand Battle Energy!”

King Langya also coughed up blood as an enormous blood cloud appeared above him, filled with an army of chariots and warriors which seemed to be celestial soldiers from an immortal world, ready to carry out mass slaughter.

“The heaven-supporting clouds crusade against all; the troops of the immortal world can level demons and devils!” King Langya was leading an army of bloodthirsty heavenly soldiers against Grand Emperor Rich-Lush in what seemed to be the climactic moment where victory and defeat would be determined. If the battle wasn’t concluded in this moment, whoever came out on the bottom of this clash would be incapable of winning in the end.

‘The perfect opportunity!’ It was in that moment that Yang Qi decided to make his move. However, he didn't interfere with the fighting between Grand Emperor Rich-Lush and King Langya. Nothing he did would have any major influence on the outcome. Not even detonating his primeval godworm would do anything. Yet, even termites can destroy a dam.

‘Prepare to consume a godmammoth, primal-chaos elder-snake!’ Yang Qi pushed his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth to the ultimate limit, summoning a massive amount of true energy to form the image of a godmammoth, which he then sent into the talisman.

Roar!

The talisman responded by bursting with a strange power and energy that transformed it into an enormous snake formed of primal-chaos, which immediately shot toward the fight.

Yang Qi hadn’t held anything back, and the result was an attack power equivalent to a sixth order Demi-Immortal.

That level of power couldn’t hurt the imperial snakecharms.

Not even a Demolisher could harm the talismans created by King Heaven-Devourer, and in fact, neither could Godmyths.

As for the twenty-seven other talismans, they weren’t powerful enough to truly cause problems for Grand Emperor Rich-Lush or King Langya. But….

WHIZZZ!

Yang Qi’s talisman entered the battlefield and joined the other twenty-seven talismans, which caused them all to suddenly pulse with the will of the ancient King Heaven-Devourer.

Now the talismans were filled with the energy of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, which caused an enormous primal-chaos elder-snake to appear right in the middle of the fight. The snake instantly shot high up above the battlefield, simultaneously transforming into twenty-eight enormous stars. These were not ordinary stars, but rather, immortal stars.

Each of those stars represented an immortal world, and in total they created the ancient Twenty-Eight Mansions. It was an immense, deadly spell formation.

King Langya and Grand Emperor Rich-Lush immediately sensed that something was happening.

“What’s that? Why is this happening?”

“Crap, those are the Twenty-Eight Mansions from the immortal worlds! There’s no way I can defend against that! Somebody activated the imperial snakecharms!”

“Dammit!”

A tempest of destruction began sweeping through the world junction, exerting such force that the entire place trembled on the verge of collapse.

Hissss!

Back in his God Legion Paradise, Yang Qi pulled out a handful of immortal pills and began popping them into his mouth.

Never before had he drained himself as severely as this. He felt like his cultivation base and meridians were completely dried up. Thankfully he had the godworm to continue powering his God Legion Paradise, otherwise the shock wave from the blast would have killed him.

Sword Seventeen also helped shield him from the blow, simultaneously shouting, “Get ready!”

Chapter 442: Getting the Talismans

By pouring all of the godmammoth true energy he could muster into the imperial snakecharm, Yang Qi had provoked a most startling transformation. The will of the ancient King Heaven-Devourer was fully tapped into, and all of the twenty-eight talismans released their ultimate level of power.

As a result, the talismans transformed into the Twenty-Eight Mansions of the immortal world and Grand Emperor Rich-Lush and King Langya were caught within their power. However, the two Demi-Immortals attacked back with everything they could muster and the formation was broken.

Primal-chaos raged, destroying countless planes in the world junction.

Screams rang out as both Grand Emperor Rich-Lush and King Langya were severely injured and pushed to the point of near-death.

‘It’s go time!’ Yang Qi thought. Having recovered some of his energy, he knew that now was the perfect time to sweep in and make his move.

“Hand of the One God: Worldly Capturing!”

RUMBLE!

This was the Nature stance, and as soon as it was unleashed, all of the twenty-eight talismans, which had just been hit with a devastating attack, began to rush toward him.

By means of his one talisman, Yang Qi was able to capture and control all of the others.

It was made easier by the fact that the other twenty-seven talismans were unprecedentedly weak at the moment. As soon as he had the talismans, Yang Qi began refining them for his own use with the Blood of the One God.

The Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth was particularly effective against these talismans, therefore it only took a moment to connect them to his nascent divinity. He also sent some of their vital energy into the primeval godworm.

Yang Qi was familiar with the talismans’ general structure after the research he had just performed, and he knew that this moment of weakness was the perfect opportunity to take full control of them.

They contained the will of King Heaven-Devourer, and if that will wasn’t suppressed they would easily be able to consume power from the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart to recover. If that happened, they would be difficult to control and potentially deadly.

‘This is incredible! I have all twenty-eight of the talismans. If Grand Emperor Rich-Lush and King Langya hadn’t been fighting this whole time, it would never have happened. Thanks to what I’ve learned, and the nature of my energy arts, I can tap into their profound secrets even better than a Demi-Immortal.’

Once the twenty-eight talismans were in his God Legion Paradise, he found, to his surprise, that they began forming back into the Twenty-Eight Mansions!

As a result, his previously depleted true energy began to recover, and in fact, became even more refined than before.

At the same time, a primal-chaos elder-snake began crystalizing within the magical laws of space in his God Legion Paradise. The godworm cried out in delight, and even Sword Seventeen could sense the mighty power.

“I can’t believe that King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans are so powerful!” Sword Seventeen said. “Just twenty-eight of them are that miraculous? What would it be like if you collected all three thousand?”

Sword Seventeen had sword bones inside of him, and as the aura of the primal-chaos elder-snake touched them he grew more flexible and agile.

Of course, Yang Qi benefited even more. A hundred million particles suddenly stirred within him as if they might awaken at any moment.

“Junior Brother,” Sword Seventeen said, “with those twenty-eight talismans, your true energy is sufficient to fight sixth order Demi-Immortals, or maybe even seventh order. Considering that Grand Emperor Rich-Lush and King Langya are really worn down right now, it would be the perfect time to take them out!” Eyes glinting maliciously, he continued, “We could take their treasures, and you could even feed their corpses to your godworm to fuel its growth!”

The same thought had already occurred to Yang Qi, and that was especially true considering that Grand Emperor Rich-Lush’s essence would be particularly helpful in turning the Sage Monarch Continent into a planet. Considering how he had just attempted to kill them, it was obvious he was not a kind and merciful person, so Yang Qi felt no compassion for him whatsoever.

Without the slightest hesitation, he waved his hand and sent a stream of true energy into the twenty-eight talismans he had just acquired.

The talismans greedily gobbled the energy up, then flew out to form the spell formation of the Twenty-Eight Mansions yet again.

As the power of the spell formation shot toward Grand Emperor Rich-Lush and King Langya, Yang Qi began singing the Eternal Heavenly Aria again. At the same time, he unleashed all five moves of the Hand of the One God, aiming his attack at King Langya.

Whack!

King Langya had no time to react and the fist smashed into his chest, sending destructive vibrations throughout his fleshly body and causing him to vomit a mouthful of blood.

“Bastard!” he shouted. “It was you who killed my Six Langya Fiends! Now you’re ambushing me?! How audacious!” Looking like a cornered beast, he interlocked his fingers into a dhāraṇī incantation and thrust his hands out. “Langya True Heaven; Great Dao Blessed Land; Eighty-One Paragons!”

The projection of an entire immortal world sprang out of his hand, followed by an army of heavenly soldiers and officers. He was like an immortal emperor, summoning his army to decimate the consummate demon-devil that was Yang Qi.

“Idiot! You’re so weak right now you can’t even unleash a hundredth of your normal strength, and I have twenty-eight imperial snakecharms on my side. I’ll crush you as easily as crushing an egg with a rock!” Yang Qi let loose another stream of true energy into the twenty-eight talismans, which transformed into a primal-chaos elder-snake again. Instantly, the snake began consuming King Langya’s heavenly troops.

Then Yang Qi closed in and smashed King Langya’s chest with another fist strike. The power of the primal-chaos elder-snake entered King Langya, and, as a result, he began withering away as his magical laws were absorbed.

In the blink of an eye, King Langya dropped to one thousandth of his original cultivation base level.

An agonized shriek rang out as he was dragged into Yang Qi’s God Legion Paradise and bound with shackles. No longer was King Langya a mighty and fiendish figure; instead, he screamed as he was slowly drained of power and killed.

Turning, Yang Qi said, “Don’t even think of running, Grand Emperor Rich-Lush. You’re too weak to escape these twenty-eight imperial snakecharms!”

With a wave of his hand, he sent the talismans into the same formation as before, trapping Grand Emperor Rich-Lush.

Grand Emperor Rich-Lush actually had no intention of running. Instead, he pulled out a fist-sized medicinal pill to deal with his loss of energy and his wounds. Unfortunately, his minor world was badly damaged, so his sea of energy couldn't possibly recover in a short period of time.

Glaring at Yang Qi and the Twenty-Eight Mansions formation, he said, “Not bad, boy. I really can’t think of any way you could be controlling those twenty-eight talismans. You really put King Langya and me in a bad situation. However, you’re running low on energy yourself. In your current state, I could kill you a hundred times over. You’re making a mistake here. I'm Grand Emperor Rich-Lush, conqueror of worlds! How could I possibly die at the hands of a nobody like you? Let me go immediately, and I’ll think about sparing your life.”

“You’re wrong, Grand Emperor Rich-Lush,” Sword Seventeen said. “My Junior Brother isn’t a nobody. He’s the eighteenth disciple of the Invincible Society in the Titan Emperor Collegium. I’m the seventeenth. You’ve probably heard of our Master, the Invincible Dugu, and you know how vastly superior he is to you.”

“The Invincible Dugu?!” Grand Emperor Rich-Lush said, visibly taken aback. “So, you’re his disciples? Back in the days of the Yore-Wilds planetary system, he and I were friends, of sorts, in the Titan Emperor Collegium. How about we turn weapons of war into gifts of jade and silk? Trust me, it won’t be as easy as you think for the two of you to take me out. I just consumed a Life-Death Dragon-Revolution Pill. I'm definitely strong enough to deal with those talismans, and you two are far weaker than them.”

“Oh really?” Yang Qi said. He had been paying close attention to Grand Emperor Rich-Lush’s state and knew that he was in a state of recovery. Although the process would take years to complete, it was possible that the man could still unleash deadly attacks.

Worse, taking out King Langya had drained Yang Qi of enough true energy that he wasn’t completely confident in his ability to handle Grand Emperor Rich-Lush. Therefore, he needed to buy a bit of time to build up energy. Hopefully, he could power up enough to unleash a massive attack with the twenty-eight talismans, an attack that would hopefully kill Grand Emperor Rich-Lush.

“Turn weapons of war into gifts of jade and silk? That’s funny, Grand Emperor Rich-Lush. You literally just threatened to kill us. And back when we first met, you tried to cut us down in cold blood. Luckily I was fast enough to dodge that attack, otherwise I’d be a vengeful soul right now. That said, we do have our connections. After all, I'm from the Rich-Lush Continent, and I acquired the actual Grand Emperor's Pagoda there.”

Chapter 443: Seizing the Grand Emperor

“What? You're from the Rich-Lush Continent? And you have my Grand Emperor's Pagoda?” Grand Emperor Rich-Lush was visibly shocked. Looking closer at Yang Qi, he said, “I made the Rich-Lush Continent from a chunk of the old Yore-Wilds’ Heart. Although it’s small, it's actually very important. It has a base of primal-chaos paleo-energy as well as ancient immortal formations, including teleportation portals. It’s like a springboard, of sorts. The entire thing was only possible because of the severed hand of a primal-chaos elder-immortal. Everyone born there has a special energy flow in them.”

Yang Qi snorted. “Energy flow? I couldn’t care less. I already merged the Rich-Lush Continent with the Western Continent, and even added the Quake-Dawn Continent into it. It’s a new land now, called the Sage Monarch Continent. Listen, Grand Emperor Rich-Lush, you’re strong, and your connection to the essence of the Rich-Lush Continent is very important. You’re going to die today, and later I’ll sacrifice you to improve the essence of my new continent and help it become a planet.”

“Oh, so that's your plan. Not bad. I shed blood, sweat, and tears making the Rich-Lush Continent, yet I was never able to complete the work. Later, I ended up stuck in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.” All of a sudden, his killing intent faded away and he started laughing.

“What’s so funny?” Yang Qi asked.

“Your ridiculous waste of resources. The Rich-Lush Continent isn’t supposed to be a planet, and you couldn’t make it one even if you tried. It was created from a special portion of the Yore-Wilds Continent, and if I hadn’t ended up in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart I would have gone back to use it correctly. How about this: I’ll tell you the secret of the Rich-Lush Continent, and you let me go. What do you say?”

‘Are there really other secrets regarding the Rich-Lush Continent?’ Yang Qi thought. He had long since made the continent his own and searched it as thoroughly as he could. He knew about the primal-chaos paleo-energy and the immortal formations. As for the formations, some were broken so badly that not even his mother could fix them. Others were inscribed with extremely ancient spatial coordinates that he couldn’t make sense of.

Eyes flickering, Grand Emperor Rich-Lush continued, “A mortal couldn’t possibly uncover the truth about the Rich-Lush Continent. There’s one damaged spell formation there that, if repaired, could be used to gain access to the immortal worlds. Understand? To put it another way, you could get to an immortal plane without having to become a Demolisher first. It's a formation created by patriarchs in the ancient Yore-Wilds. An immortal formation, something you could never figure out how to repair on your own. However, I have an ancient legacy that will enable me to do just that. Besides, I also have tens of thousands of years of enlightenment from here in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. I could easily repair that formation, as long as I get out of this place…. So, what do you think? Without me, you’re stuck.”

Grand Emperor Rich-Lush was quite impressed with his speech, and was certain it was enough to convince Yang Qi.

‘The formation has the power to send someone to the immortal worlds before becoming a Demolisher?’ Yang Qi thought.

“That’s impressive,” Sword Seventeen said. “Not even the Titan Emperor Collegium can do something as heaven-defying as that. In fact, I doubt it's true. If a formation like that existed, the Titan Emperor Collegium would be aware of it.”

Grand Emperor Rich-Lush laughed coldly. “You think you’re real smart, don’t you? Well let me explain things for you. In the ancient era, the Titan Emperor Collegium always considered the Yore-Wilds as the most powerful of all the planetary systems. In fact, even though the collegium was said to oversee the Four Wilds, they could never produce as many experts as the Yore-Wilds. So what makes you think your collegium would know all of its secrets? Are you kidding me? There are plenty of ruins within the old Yore-Wilds planetary system that your Titan Emperor Collegium would never dare to enter. Not even immortals. Listen, brats. If we can get to an immortal world together, what’s the point of grudges? The resources available there vastly surpass anything from the mortal world. You can't even imagine. Once you’re there, reaching the Demolishing level would be a simple thing.”

Grand Emperor Rich-Lush wasn’t lying about that; the differences between the mortal and immortal world were vast. The power, resources, magical laws, and everything in the heaven above were such that even ordinary individuals from the mortal world who got there could easily become Great Sages. And in the immortal world, there were many, many times as many Demi-Immortals as there were below.

If Yang Qi could repair that immortal formation and use it to get resources from the immortal worlds, the children of the Yang Clan would achieve spectacular progress. It would probably only take a few hundred years for his clan to outmatch the Titan Emperor Collegium. That said, the idea of going to an immortal world wasn’t particularly attractive to Yang Qi at the moment. What he needed to do was get power from hell.

The energy available in the Hell of Euphoria or the Hell of Yamas might be bad for most people, but as far as he was concerned, it was high-level universal power and actually more beneficial to him than anything from the immortal worlds.

Of course, his friends and family couldn’t enter hell. Going into a hell for temporary training was possible, but the vital energy there would eventually eat away at one's humanity, leading to disastrous consequences.

‘For some reason, I have a feeling that a big storm is about to hit the mortal world. Should I try to repair that formation and take my people to an immortal world?’ Although most people revered and admired the immortal worlds, Yang Qi was different. To him, the cultivation of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth was far superior.

Godmammoths could suppress millions upon millions of hellish planes, therefore the immortal worlds were not particularly impressive.

After thinking about the matter for a moment, he snorted coldly. “Those are some clever and flattering words, Grand Emperor Rich-Lush. Unfortunately, I'm not swayed by things like that. Like I said, I'm going to kill you and extract your magical laws. Then, after I leave the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, I’ll just extract the information about the immortal formation.”

He took a step forward and launched the Hand of the One God directly toward Grand Emperor Rich-Lush’s head.

“Dammit, brat. Do you really think I was blabbering on in the hopes of you letting me go? I just needed to recover a bit.” Grand Emperor Rich-Lush lunged forward to meet Yang Qi’s palm strike. “See if you can take this move. Profound Femina Mother Fist: Heavenly Fight, Earthly Smite; Profound Femina Golden Light!”

Grand Emperor Rich-Lush leaped up, then descended toward Yang Qi with power like that of seas and hells. At the same time, a true energy projection of his Macrocosm Pagoda appeared above his head.

“I was well aware you were using the power of an immortal pill to restore your energy just now. Unfortunately for you, my recovery speed is much faster!” By this point, Yang Qi was already quite proficient in the use of the imperial snakecharms and managed to vanish right into the formation created by the twenty-eight talismans.

POP!

A burst of vital energy erupted from the formation as Yang Qi yet again powered them to produce a primal-chaos elder-snake. As Grand Emperor Rich-Lush closed in, the snake opened its mouth and devoured him.

A miserable shriek rang out, which was then swiftly cut off.

Moments later, he was just like King Langya—physically dead and sealed in the God Legion Paradise, reduced to a source of power as his magical laws were extracted. Of course, despite being physically dead, his soul and mind were still active.

“Bastard! I won’t let you get away with this. I'm Grand Emperor Rich-Lush! I created the Rich-Lush Continent! You were born as a citizen of mine! This is regicide!”

“Just be a good boy and help me power my domain. Don’t worry, you won’t truly die in there even if you wanted to. Your essence is too important. Once we're out of here, I’ll drain you dry.” Yang Qi waved his hand, pulling Grand Emperor Rich-Lush’s magical treasure bag and horse whisk out of the God Legion Paradise.

Grand Emperor Rich-Lush had been in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart for many years and had a whole host of valuable treasures. For example, his whisk was filled with immortal energy, and was obviously a true immortal item. Its most casual movement would send silver light streaming out to form a massive net that could capture virtually any opponent.

“That's an Immortal World Dense Cloud Whisk!” Sword Seventeen said, breathing a sigh of admiration. “Back in the Titan Emperor Collegium, only royal students and above would have access to immortal items like that. Let’s see what else this Grand Emperor Rich-Lush had in his magical treasure bag. Oh, what about King Langya’s bag? Both of them were major bigshots in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. They must have incredible stuff.”

“Here, Elder Brother,” Yang Qi said handing over both the bags. “I’ll let you take inventory. Keep anything you want.”

Sword Seventeen did just that. After rummaging through the bags for a moment, he threw his head back and laughed heartily, startling Yang Qi.

“So many immortal pills!” he said. “Magical treasures, immortal items… there are daoist texts too, and immortal stones. These are two treasure troves of immense proportion. My god….” Waving his hand, he produced an immortal item that looked like a mountain. “This is the Heavenking Mountain. I can’t believe it! The Heavenking Mountain! Its powers of suppression are unrivaled, and if you add it to a minor world you can make it incredibly stable. It will even suppress the fluctuations of vital energy in space.”

“You have a sword body, right? And your personal domain has already turned into a sword crypt. Adding that mountain to it would be perfect.” With that, Yang Qi looked in the bags as well. “Hey look, there are some magical swords here; why don’t you add them, too?”

As Yang Qi made the comment, Sword Seventeen sensed a sealing mark of some sort within one of the bags that was fairly bursting with sword energy.

Chapter 444: Godworm Nest

“That’s not a magical sword, it’s a sword bone!”

The sword energy radiating out of the magical treasure bag wasn't coming from a sword, but a piece of bone. It was white as snow, pulsing with a frigid energy, and covered with complex designs. Sword Seventeen reached out and grabbed it, and as he swished it through the air in front of him, dazzling light shone out from it and the designs on its surface resolved into lines of script. There were numerous types, including bird script, seal script, hieroglyphic script, and even immortal script.

There were thousands of them, but they were all variations of the same character: sword 剑.

The host of sword characters flowed almost like a river. Even more interesting was that they weren’t carved into the surface of the bone, but existed there naturally. Each one carried different meanings, including different aspects of sword will, sword energy, sword divinity, and sword hearts.

“It’s a thousand swords bone!” Sword Seventeen exclaimed in delight. “According to the stories, if someone cultivates the dao of the sword to the ultimate level and gains the most profound enlightenment of sword will, their body will become sharper than a sword. Sword energy will become a part of their bones and eventually form sword characters.

“If I absorbed this sword bone, my sword technique would reach a much higher level. At the very least, I would become ten times stronger than I am now. What a pity there's only one piece. This obviously came from some consummate sword cultivator who passed away in meditation, but there should be a complete corpse. With all the bones together, it would be a ten-thousand swords skeleton. If I got something like that I could easily kill enemies three or four levels higher than me. In other words, second and third order Demi-Immortals. And those in the fourth order might be beyond my ability to kill, but they also wouldn’t be able to kill me.”

“A sword bone…” Yang Qi said, sighing in admiration. Even just looking at the numerous sword characters, he could imagine what enlightenment this bone could bring regarding the dao of the sword.

Of course, it wouldn’t do Yang Qi much good. He didn't cultivate sword techniques or focus on ‘sharpness’, but rather on the imposing strength to crush everything. The Sovereign Lord existed above all creation, controlled the cosmos, and inhaled and exhaled suns and moons.

WHOOSH!

Sword Seventeen absorbed the bone, and a moment later his cultivation base pulsed with the aura of a heavenly sword. Instantly, his sword will, sword energy, sword divinity, and sword techniques all became more profound.

To Yang Qi’s senses, Sword Seventeen seemed to suddenly shrink down into a point like the tip of a sword. If Sword Seventeen wanted, he could focus all of his power and energy down into that single point and use it to conquer every obstacle. Not even Yang Qi’s Hand of the One God could do something like that. In terms of precise attack power, none of Yang Qi’s energy arts could compare to Sword Seventeen’s.

Yang Qi’s only viable tactic when facing a powerful opponent was to bash through the person’s defenses. But Sword Seventeen could become the razor-sharp tip of a sword and slice through such defenses.

“Alright, Junior Brother, I need to go find more sword bones. These things are perfect for the sword-based physique I cultivate. Even with just the enlightenment from this single bone, I should be able to break through to the Demi-Immortal level as soon as we get out of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.”

“Alright. Let’s get going!”

There was nothing else in the magical treasure bags that could give them any immediate benefit, so the two of them continued exploring the world junction in the hopes of finding treasures.

The deeper they got, the more Yang Qi realized that the space here was unpredictable and erratic. Sometimes it was as soft as water, and other times it was as hard as steel. Even Demi-Immortals who tried to travel through places like this would have difficulty and would have to skirt certain areas.

A few times, Yang Qi was speeding along rapidly only to run into an extremely solid, mountain-like expression of space. The mere impact caused his God Legion Paradise to tremble violently.

Occasionally, he would find himself in mazes of spatial hardness, which he had to navigate with great difficulty. Thankfully, he had his primeval godworm, which was strong enough to eat through the walls of such labyrinths.

Hours passed without a single treasure appearing, nor any other cultivators. However, the world junction was so large that even if millions upon millions of cultivators were present, they would be like grains of sand tossed into a river.

Thankfully, the journey itself was beneficial to Yang Qi, and especially his true energy. As the primeval godworm ate the space around it, it caused Yang Qi’s sea of energy to expand and his God Legion Paradise to grow more stable.

His twenty-eight imperial snakecharms also grew stronger. In fact, he was now convinced that with enough true energy, and the help of the snakecharms, he could actually fight an enemy more than ten levels higher than himself.

Like ordinary magical treasures, true immortal items were limited in power; if they were imbued with too much true energy they would explode. And when that happened, the immortal motes in them would disappear.

The imperial snakecharms were different, though. As long as they had enough power, they could be used to stop immortals.

The strength of King Heaven-Devourer was beyond question. Right now, the issue wasn’t weakness on the part of the item, but rather the fact that Yang Qi didn’t have enough true energy. If he could awaken all eight hundred forty million particles within him, he would be on the level of a prime paragon elder in the Titan Emperor Collegium.

Roar!

As Yang Qi and Sword Seventeen were traversing a spatial labyrinth, they suddenly heard a roar coming from some location an unknown distance away. There was something about the frequency of the sound that caused Yang Qi’s primeval godworm to shiver, almost as if it were the familiar sound of its mother calling to it.

“Another primeval godworm!” Yang Qi said. “But it's a lot stronger than mine.”

Yang Qi’s godworm was no longer a larva. It was already in the second stage of its life cycle and as strong as a Greater Demi-Immortal, or perhaps even slightly stronger than that. However, it still had a lot of growing left to do.

From the fluctuations of the roar just now, he was certain that this was at least a fifth stage godworm, something so powerful that not even dozens of demon-devils or humans of a similar level could stand up to it.

“Come on, let’s go check it out,” Sword Seventeen said. “We’re too far into the world junction to head back now. Either we pull this off spectacularly, or we die trying!”

Yang Qi was aware that they had reached the point where finding a path back would be too difficult. The best thing would be to continue onward and find a way out. After all, neither he nor Sword Seventeen had a huge desire to return to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. The only thing that awaited them there was eventual death.

Yang Qi immediately called on the power of his godworm to send out the twenty-eight talismans, which transformed into a primal-chaos elder-snake. With that snake, he could travel about much easier, albeit at the cost of a lot of true energy.

“The energy fluctuations are coming from just up ahead.” The primal-chaos elder-snake shot forward at incredible speed, as though it were a part of the primal-chaos itself.

Before long, they arrived at an enormous plane of existence, a vast land the color of flame, like an enormous nest hanging there in the space of the world junction. And in the middle of the nest was a huge godworm belching fire.

It wasn’t an ordinary fire, but rather a peak manifestation of the magical laws of space called space flame. It was immensely powerful and could destroy anything it touched. Compared to flame like that, even the strongest cultivator would be like an ant.

As Yang Qi looked around, he saw that there were other individuals present.

There were Great Sages and Demi-Immortals, thousands of them, most of them standing within spell formations. They were clearly besieging this fiery plane in the hopes of capturing the godworm. Among them were big shots similar to King Langya and Grand Emperor Rich-Lush, who sent their minions into the fight with no regard for their lives.

“So many experts!” Sword Seventeen exclaimed. “I've heard of some of these people. There’s Emperor Diabolo and Lady Motherwing, and that's Empress Netherdark and Guru Army-Smasher. All of these people are famous in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, and here they are working together to try to capture that primeval godworm.”

They were all famous people who Yang Qi couldn’t hope to fight directly. He had only been able to deal with Grand Emperor Rich-Lush and King Langya because they had been weak and injured, unable to muster more than one one-hundredth of their full fighting capacity.

But no one in this new host of experts was even hurt.

In addition to the enormous godworm in the flaming plane, there were also a whole host of eggs, a mountain of roughly a hundred. Each of those eggs represented the possibility of a larva, therefore everyone present was going all out to succeed here.

“That godworm is so strong!” Yang Qi said. “My heart goes cold just thinking about how much power it has in its substructure. However, it seems weak. I wonder why?”

“Probably because it just laid all those eggs,” Sword Seventeen said. “Normally speaking, these people wouldn’t dare to make a move on a godworm nest like this.”

Chapter 445: Chaotic Fighting

Because it had just laid eggs, the godworm was incredibly weak. Even just the eggs were incredibly enticing, and they were already the focus of much attention. Top experts from all sorts of factions who were stuck in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart were here, ready to risk everything to get them.

Yang Qi was no less covetous. Those eggs were just as important to him, and he could only imagine how much control over the magical laws of space he would have if he could give them all to his own godworm. Where could he travel to?

The mere thought caused him to shiver with anticipation.

Unfortunately, it didn’t seem even remotely possible that he could acquire them. There were too many top experts here, and all of them were ready to fight. There were even a dozen or so who were just as strong as Grand Emperor Rich-Lush and King Langya. If a ‘nobody’ like him tried to make a move, they could crush him into a pulp with hardly a thought.

Hopefully, he could find an opportunity. That was how he had dealt with Grand Emperor Rich-Lush and King Langya. Besides, he was already a lot stronger than he had been when he dealt with those two. And in the end, he would be happy to get even just a few of the eggs.

“Junior Brother,” Sword Seventeen said, “we absolutely, positively cannot let this godworm nest go to waste. Your godworm needs food, and besides, I would love to have a godworm of my own. We have to figure out a way to get some of those eggs. After all, your lone godworm isn’t going to be enough to get us out of the Myriad Worlds Monarchs Chart. Multiple godworms can be used to create a spatial spell formation, and that’s our best shot.”

“Don’t worry, Elder Brother,” Yang Qi said solemnly. “I’ll definitely help you to get your own godworm.”

“Let’s stick to the shadows and wait for our opportunity. If we stick around in the open, we’re going to get killed. There are just too many famous experts here.” Sword Seventeen shivered with excitement. However, he kept his cultivation base focused and drew on the power of the thousand swords bone, keeping himself ready to attack at a moment's notice. Thanks to that bone, he was now a lot stronger than before, and despite still being an eighth step Without Limit Sage he was strong enough to beat a first order Demi-Immortal, perhaps even a second order.

RUMBLE!

In almost the same moment that Yang Qi and Sword Seventeen concealed themselves, a mushroom cloud rose up some distance away.

Two powerful Demi-Immortals had just begun fighting. One of them was a young woman in imperial garments, and the other was a burly man with a three-hundred-meter-long saber. They fought even more fiercely than Grand Emperor Rich-Lush and King Langya, to the point where gods and buddhas would back away in fear, and even ghosts and devils would cower.

“That’s Empress Netherdark and Guru Army-Smasher,” Sword Seventeen said. “A few tens of thousands of years ago, they conquered multiple planetary systems. But after they went into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, they were never heard from again. Everyone assumed they perished inside, but as it turns out, here they are, stronger than ever. They obviously didn’t increase their cultivation level, so they must be using other means to unleash such power. They're completely domineering!”

Massive vital energy shockwaves exploded out in all directions as a result of their fighting. The fluctuations were so powerful that even the God Legion Paradise was shaken, hidden as it was like a speck of dust in the folds of space. In fact, it was nearly knocked out into the open.

Thankfully, Yang Qi’s enlightenment regarding space had reached the point of perfection. Plus, he was at one with his godworm and had twenty-eight imperial snakecharms to add to his overall power. He exhaled some vital energy and the primal-chaos elder-snake merged with the God Legion Paradise, making it one with primal-chaos and separating it from the fluctuations. From here on out, nothing could shake Yang Qi hard enough to reveal him. In fact, he was actually able to get closer to the fighting, and to the godworm nest.

He eventually reached its greyspace, which was incredibly strong and would often erupt with spatial flames that burned almost anything they touched. However, when that fire touched the God Legion Paradise it was actually gobbled up.

Yang Qi was like a parasite, leeching away at the power of the greyspace.

As that power caused transformations within him, neither the experts fighting some distance away, nor the godworm inside the nest, noticed him at all.

There were multiple factors at play. First of all, the fighting was incredibly intense, and even the godworm was focused on that, and how it affected its defenses. The massive vital energy shockwaves were far beyond anything that the tiny parasite that was Yang Qi could produce, so why would the godworm possibly notice him?

Second, because Yang Qi had a godworm in his God Legion Paradise, his overall aura was not threatening to the godworm in the nest.

Third, the primal-chaos elder-snake he had created was immensely powerful, able to devour vital energy so efficiently that no one would notice it. After all, the will of King Heaven-Devourer was the type that could consume heaven, much less the forces at play here.

‘This is incredible….’ As he surreptitiously consumed the quintessence-blood and vital energy of the godworm via the greyspace, he could sense that, before laying its eggs, it had expended all of its quintessence-blood, vital energy, and magical laws to make its nest. The purpose of the nest was to offer it protection during its moment of weakness, and also to act as a preheaven placenta designed to nourish the newly hatched larvae.

However, it was also proving useful to Yang Qi and his own godworm. In fact, it caused spatial flames to fill his God Legion Paradise, making it shine like the sun itself.

“Such pure power!” Sword Seventeen exclaimed. He also benefited from the flames, as they made the true sharpness of his body even more apparent and molded him into a consummate divine sword.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi’s godworm continued powering up, and his soul enlightenment slowly climbed. He had already been at the absolute peak of the ninth step of the Great Sage level, on the very verge of becoming a Demi-Immortal. Now he could vaguely sense the heavenly heart of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

In some ways, the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart was a unique heaven. A heavenly world. In its depths it was like an immortal world, therefore it had its own heart and its own great dao, things that were mysterious and pure, formed from pure fate.

As Yang Qi experienced further enlightenment from the spatial fluctuations and the flames of the godworm nest, he came to a deeper understanding of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. In addition, he realized that, right now, his only hope of getting out rested in further soul enlightenment.

He had already benefited greatly. For one thing, there were the imperial snakecharms, plus all sorts of magical treasures that could cause wars in the outside world. But if he could get those godworm eggs and feed them to his own godworm, it seemed like a foregone conclusion that he would be able to reach the Hell of Mahānata as easily as blowing some dust off his shoulder. And when that happened, he would be in the ideal place to push his cultivation base to a higher level.

The fighting was growing even more intense. Empress Netherdark, Guru Army-Smasher, and other top experts were going all out to oppose each other and, at the same time, assault the godworm nest. Unfortunately for them, the mother godworm was extremely fierce and would send out flames to negate all of the vital energy attacks.

‘This is the perfect chance,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘I need to use the distraction of their fighting to feed power into my godworm.’ As his godworm grew, he could sense that there were even more profound memories locked deep within its soul, genes, and sea of consciousness.

Primeval godworms were similar to godmammoths, in that they had been created by the legion of gods. As for the godmammoths, they were representations of power. And the godworms? They represented space-time.

Because of that, all godworms possessed ancient memories, locked in their genes from the moment they were born. By breaking through certain natural barriers, those memories could be unlocked and give them access to greater powers and abilities.

They were genetic barriers that weren’t unique to godworms. Devillings and Demonfolk of all types had similar genetic barriers. In ancient daoist terminology, they were called shackles of fate. Only those who unlocked the shackles of fate would eventually become deathless.

The transformations occurring to the godworm were a form of further enlightenment for Yang Qi, and rivers of information were flowing into his mind.

All of a sudden, he realized that a mysterious memory had suddenly been unsealed!

Ancient information regarding the dao of heaven filled his soul, causing power to bubble up within him. The particles within him rejoiced, and the spatial flames became like pāramitā flowers that would never wither.

In that moment, he reached soul enlightenment of the Demi-Immortal level.

Chapter 446: Demi-Immortal Breakthrough

Out in the Yore-Wilds planetary system, countless planets were filled with cultivators who, day after day, year after year, would practice their cultivation, build up vital energy, train with energy arts, gain enlightenment of the dao of heaven, and manipulate magical laws. All sorts of living beings lived their simple lives, and the demon-devils, monsters, and humans waged war back and forth.

The Yore-Wilds was invaded, and ultimately shattered, by the Hell of Euphoria, and yet there was a wild energy that remained behind. Over the years, it had slowly built back up. If things went on without interference and millions and millions of years passed, it was possible that the Yore-Wilds’ Heart would grow again and the Yore-Wilds Continent of old would take shape. Maybe after a hundred million years or more, the Yore-Wilds would once again be a planetary system of immense power and strength.

Right now, Great Sages would travel within the old Yore-Wilds to other planets, looking for fellow souls to befriend. And sometimes, Great Sages would come from other planetary systems, hoping to find things of benefit in the ruins of the Yore-Wilds. After all, there were many planes that existed there, and some had ancient wills or magical treasures. People from the Waste-Wilds, Brute-Wilds, and Proto-Wilds would often come there looking for legacies, or other ways to boost their cultivation base.

Many immortals had participated in the war between the Yore-Wilds planetary system and the Hell of Euphoria, and many of them had fallen. The sun and moon went dark, and countless planes of existence had been wiped out of existence. Space shattered, and new wormholes were formed to facilitate the movement of troops. And of course, the will of many of the dead immortals remained where they had fallen.

If a mortal could acquire the will of an ancient immortal, they would advance by leaps and bounds, quickly rising to greater heights of existence.

**

On the border of the Yore-Wilds planetary system, near the Dark True Void, powerful fluctuations spread out, accompanied by dazzling, celestial light and immortal chants. An aura spread out that contained longevity the same as heaven itself, and it came from one particular continent.

That continent continuously absorbed the wild power and the ancient aura around it, constantly growing larger as a result.

It was none other than the Sage Monarch Continent.

Dramatic transformations were occurring in the Sage Monarch Continent, and it was a matter of great rejoicing. Everyone who lived there knew that their ultimate leader, Yang Qi, had left behind an immortal clone, and that the clone was about to become a Demi-Immortal.

Back in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, Yang Qi’s true self had reached enlightenment of the Demi-Immortal level, thus his clone also received the same enlightenment.

There were no obstacles to his rise in cultivation, and in fact he immediately began absorbing power from the world around him. In the depths of the continent was an immortal formation that activated, releasing energies of primal-chaos that had long since been brewing in embryonic form.

The corpses of countless Demi-Immortal experts were buried in the continent, including sixth order Prime Demi-Immortals. That power also came to the aid of the immortal clone, causing deafening rumbling sounds to fill all creation.

RUMBLE!

Numerous planets near the Sage Monarch Continent exploded.

However, they exploded not into rubble, but rather with brightness, creating numerous suns that cast light onto the continent. The Dark True Void near the Sage Monarch Continent was illuminated by the new suns, which began orbiting the lands in prescribed trajectories.

Suddenly, a figure floated up from the middle of the continent, and as he did, lightning bolts larger than planets fell from above. It was hard to say where in the universe they originated, but they were actually humanoid in shape, with halos made of seas of lightning.

They shot down like lightning dragons, heading directly toward the ascending figure.

That figure was, of course, Yang Qi’s immortal clone, and as he stepped into the Demi-Immortal level he had to face Demi-Immortal tribulation, which came in the form of Space-Void Godlightning.

The event did not go unnoticed.

“That's some incredible tribulation lightning. Look, they resemble daoist paintings that could crush anything in existence, yet they're not doing anything to that new Demi-Immortal.”

“That’s right. Looks like our Yore-Wilds planetary system is going to have another Demi-Immortal. The Rich-Lush Continent used to be a tiny place, but someone conquered it and began raising it to new heights. I heard that the Holy Mother of the Hanging Mountain had something to do with it. There was a war in which Lord Quake-Dawn from the Quake-Dawn Continent ended up getting killed, along with a whole bunch of invading experts from the Megaplexus planetary system. All of them became part of this new Sage Monarch Continent.”

All sorts of cultivators were talking about what was happening, and many a sigh could be heard. After all, the appearance of a new Demi-Immortal in the Yore-Wilds planetary system was a major event. Great Sages were considered top figures, but Demi-Immortals were top figures among top figures.

The Hanging Mountain was thrown into a huge commotion, with countless Demonfolk chiefs looking out into space to watch Yang Qi’s power grow.

Leviathan Truesoaring and Yan Wubing both flew out, watching as the glowing figure floating above the Sage Monarch Continent reached out, grabbed the lightning bolts, crushed them out of existence, then sucked in the resulting energy as if it were fresh water.

“The Demi-Immortal level… he’s actually a Demi-Immortal! The Hanging Mountain only has two Demi-Immortals right now, the August Patriarch and the Holy Mother. But now there’s a third. The young master is going to be a Demi-Immortal!”

Not too long ago, Yang Qi had come to the Hanging Mountain as a Legendary and participated in the Hanging Mountain’s training competition. Back then, people thought he was a nobody, but he had already reached this amazing point step by step.

From here on out, the positions of the August Patriarch and the Holy Mother would be significantly different, with the Holy Mother occupying a clearly superior position. Numerous Demonfolk chiefs had already made their minds up to switch loyalties from the August Patriarch to her. Many of them thought back to how, when Yang Qi had only just risen to the Great Sage level, he had killed numerous elite youths, and had even cut down Chief Lion.

Considering he had done that back when he was a ‘nobody’, none of them could even imagine how terrifying he would be as a Demi-Immortal. Would he simply go around and execute everyone who had ever offended him?

And that was not to mention the well-known fact that Yang Qi had long since joined the Titan Emperor Collegium in the Central Planetary River, a place of immense luxury and invincible power. Even a single student from the Titan Emperor Collegium was the type of person no one in the Hanging Mountain would dare to offend.

“Don't forget, Father Leviathan, that’s actually the young master's clone,” Yan Wubing said. “His true body is in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. He’s obviously gained soul enlightenment of the Demi-Immortal level, which means that once he makes his way to the Hell of Mahānata, his cultivation base is going to reach an incredible level.”

Leviathan Truesoaring, chief of all the Leviathanfolk, simply shivered in response. The same thing had just occurred to him, and he actually couldn’t wrap his mind around how terrifyingly powerful Yang Qi’s true self was.

“Look, the young master’s clone has already passed the lightning tribulation. Now it's time for immortal punishment!”

WHIZZZ!

Lightning clouds spread out in all direction, casting down immortal light that would instantly dissolve a ninth step Great Sage.

“That's Immortal-Exterminating Sunset Glow!” Yan Wubing blurted, sounding nervous. “I would never have guessed that the Holy Mother would have passed on her lesser godly-class energy art to the young master's clone. That’s the sign of the Jade-Emperor Profound-Welkin Exalted-Celestial God-Dao! Considering that the young master’s clone cultivates that energy art, it's no wonder that he's provoked punishment from heaven and earth.”

“True. But as I recall from the descriptions of the Godmyth level from ancient daoist texts, the godly-class energy arts are divided into the subdivisions of lesser, common, greater, consummate, perfect, paramount, and lordly. I can’t help but wonder what level of art the young master’s true self cultivates, but it’s definitely high on the list.”

“I’d agree with that. However, we’ll have to wait until he gets out of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Charts before we know for sure.”

“I'm actually a bit worried. There are plenty of treasures in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, even godworm larvae that can be used to gain mastery over the godly laws of space-time. And many people have come out of the chart to become overlords of their time. But getting out is hard, and a lot of people never return.”

“That’s true. I would personally never dare to go into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.”

“Our Hanging Mountain is strong, but we don’t count for much, compared to the planetary system as a whole. And we’re even less important when it comes to the Titan Emperor Collegium. And what about other places like the Megaplexus Heaven and Coiling Arc Heaven?”

“It was fairly recently that the Northstar Clan from the Megaplexus planetary system invaded and were wiped out. That's really a death knell. There’s no way their main clan is going to stand for so many of their people being killed. We need to get ready. If a larger invasion occurs, we’re going to be in trouble, and a lot of people will either be killed or captured.”

“Well, the Holy Mother is ready for that. After gaining a major revelation from the young master, she went into seclusion. I bet that when she comes out, she’ll have reached an even higher level of enlightenment.”

“Come on, let's head back. That immortal punishment isn’t going to hurt the young master's clone. He’ll be done with his breakthrough shortly.”

Yan Wubing, Leviathan Truesoaring, and other Demonfolk chiefs who were loyal to the Holy Mother all sighed. Meanwhile, Yang Qi’s clone was directly consuming the glowing light of the immortal punishment, making him look like an immortal emperor. After all, he cultivated the Jade-Emperor Profound-Welkin Exalted-Celestial God-Dao. As such, he had the divine will of an exalted celestial, which could easily vanquish immortal light.

RUMBLE!

He absorbed the last bit of the immortal light and, as he did, the aura of a Demi-Immortal spread out to fill the Sage Monarch Continent.

Yang Qi’s clone was now a Demi-Immortal. As a result, many individuals abandoned their wildly ambitious thoughts of jumping in to take advantage of the tribulation and attack the clone. As of this moment, Yang Qi was stronger than ever.

Chapter 447: Chief of the Snakefolk

As Yang Qi’s clone stepped into the Demi-Immortal level, there was quite a stir in an area deep in the Hanging Mountain.

Mount Sumeru no longer shone with dazzling light. The August Patriarch, leader of the ancient Mammothfolk, had been suppressed to the limit.

The greatest changes had occurred after the Northstar Fleet crossed the Dark True Void with the intention of wreaking havoc in the Yore-Wilds planetary system. After the Holy Mother slaughtered the entire fleet, she reported the matter to the heaven above, the mighty Titan Emperor Heaven. The result was that she had been blessed with a stalk of immortal grass. With the universal power that came with it, she grew even stronger than before.

Henceforth, the August Patriarch’s faction would be incredibly weak, and many of the forces who had once clung closely to the Mammothfolk had already switched loyalties to the Holy Mother.

At the moment, one of the Epic Saga Sage megamammoth elders was currently in a discussion with the August Patriarch and a third party, a young man.

“Ai. August Patriarch. Chief Snake. That brat Yang Qi’s clone just reached the Demi-Immortal level. If things keep going on like this, will the Mammothfolk even be able to survive?”

The young man was obviously not a megamammoth. He seemed cold and vicious, and was surrounded by a hissing aura. That said, his cultivation base was actually on the same level as Mammoth Heaven’s. He almost seemed to be coiled up as he sat there, and anyone who was strong enough would get the sense that he was the type of person who could devour anything.

He was obviously a demonic snake in human form.

Snakes devour mammoths.

It was for that very reason that August Patriarch Mammoth Heaven actually feared this person and would have loved to expel him from Mount Sumeru. Unfortunately, they had important business to discuss.

This young man was the chief of the Snakefolk, and also a student from the Titan Emperor Collegium. He was a member of the Beastmaster Society, and his clothing was embroidered with a tiny “royal” character.

That meant that he was a royal student.

Snorting coldly, Chief Snake said, “That brat joined the Invincible Society, which is the most outrageous, domineering, and overbearing society in the entire Titan Emperor Collegium. For the time being, we can’t do anything about him. If his Elder Brothers and Sisters caused problems, not even the society chief of our Beastmaster Society could do anything to stop them. The Invincible Dugu isn’t a Demolisher yet, but he’s already strong enough to slaughter immortals! That said, the brat isn’t going to last for much longer. You know the saying: he who is too unyielding will eventually break.

“Back in the entrance ceremony, he killed all sorts of people he shouldn’t have killed. He offended the Everlasting Society, and they’re one of the most powerful societies there is. Besides, the Invincible Dugu is off trying to achieve a breakthrough. When he does, he’ll ascend to the immortal world, leaving the Invincible Society with no backbone. When that happens, we can definitely cut that brat down to size.”

“Oh really?” August Patriarch Mammoth Heaven said, his eyes flickering with cold light. Inside, though, he was feeling very nervous. He had no interest in getting swept up in the affairs of the Invincible Society. If even one of their members came to cause problems for him, he would have no hope of coming out alive in the end.

The type of fighting that went on in the Titan Emperor Collegium was intense to the extreme.

“Chief Snake, correct me if I'm wrong, but the majestic society chief of the Beastmaster Society has never had a good relationship with the Invincible Society.”

“That’s right,” Chief Snake said. “The Beastmaster Society and the Invincible Society have been at odds for a long time. The Invincible Dugu is strong, but our society chief isn’t that far from him. Furthermore, he's sent a clone into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart to search for the treasures of the ancient King Heaven-Devourer. Once he gets that legacy, the Invincible Dugu is definitely dead!”

“Didn’t Yang Qi’s true self also go into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart?” Mammoth Heaven asked.

“Yeah, he did,” Chief Snake replied, then burst out laughing. “That brat is definitely suicidal. Considering how many times the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart has appeared throughout the years, it's obvious that going inside is a virtual death sentence. That’s why our society chief only sent in a clone to search for the talismans of King Heaven-Devourer. And that was only after doing countless years of research into the secrets of the place. Who would dare to send their true self in nowadays?”

“So that’s how it is.” Mammoth Heaven nodded. “Chief Snake, back in the days of the Yore-Wilds planetary system, your Snakefolk were a very important race in the Hanging Mountain. At that time, mammoths and snakes were allies and the humans could only dream of ruling the Demonfolk. But now the Holy Mother is growing stronger, and she’s really putting the pressure on us. I'm afraid that, before long, the Hanging Mountain will have a Holy Mother, but no August Patriarch. That’s why I invited you here from the Titan Emperor Collegium to discuss the possibility of restoring our previous alliance. What are your thoughts on the matter?”

“That’s no trifling matter you’re talking about,” Chief Snake said, his voice turning very serious. “Unfortunately, we can’t do anything about the Holy Mother, considering she’s connected to that banished immortal. If we did something to her, and he found out about it, it would cause a stir that would rile up the entire Titan Emperor Collegium. However, I think our Beastmaster Society can be of some help. In the next few days, our society chief will issue an invitation for you to join our society, and even bless you with the rank of noble student. Once that happens, the Holy Mother won't be able to do anything to you.”

“Excellent,” Mammoth Heaven said. “By the way, if Yang Qi is really the son of that banished immortal and we do something to him, such as kill him, then….” His voice trembled, and he didn't even finish his sentence.

“Don’t worry about that. Remember, that banished immortal was completely shocked that the Holy Mother gave birth to a son, and even tried to kill him. Unfortunately, she somehow managed to escape and secretly left her son with some nobody in the Rich-Lush Continent, a fact which remained secret until only recently. Anyway, there’s no way that the powers that be will allow the father and son to reunite.”

After revealing this profound secret, Chief Snake concluded by saying, “In the end, we can feel free to kill the banished immortal’s son, but not the Holy Mother. At least, not openly. However, considering that that banished immortal has long since returned to the immortal world and stopped caring about the matters below, if some ‘accident’ befell the Holy Mother, he probably wouldn’t think to blame us….”

He chuckled in sinister fashion. “You were part of the reason the Northstar Clan came here, weren’t you, Mammoth Heaven? You hoped that they would deal with the Holy Mother and that your hands would be clean.”

“So what if I hoped someone else would do my dirty work for me?” Mammoth Heaven said coldly. “Besides, considering how things played out, the matter is already resolved. Once word gets back to the Northstar Clan about the Holy Mother killing their people, they’ll definitely come seeking revenge. Considering the Northstar Clan is part of the Megaplexus Heaven, there’s no way they’ll worry about some banished immortal.

“If I'm going to become a royal student at the Titan Emperor Collegium, then I’ll definitely be able to control the Hanging Mountain in the future. I can’t let the Holy Mother complete her rise to prominence. I will be the one to unite the Demonfolk and become the greatest demon-immortal in the Titan Emperor Heaven!”

Mammoth Heaven threw his head back and laughed uproariously.

“In that case, I’ll wait to hear from you,” Chief Snake said. Then he rose to his feet and vanished without a trace.

Moments later, he was far out in the starry sky, where he looked back at the Hanging Mountain, then off toward the Central Planetary River. ‘Beastmaster Society. The society chief. The imperial snakecharms… I joined the Titan Emperor Collegium with the whole purpose of finding those imperial snakecharms. The ancient King Heaven-Devourer, a veritable god-spirit, actually fought against the legion of gods. He was a primal-chaos elder-snake, and the founding ancestor of the Snakefolk. Well, those imperial snakecharms belong to us! The fact that the society chief has a few dozen is a huge waste. They belong to those with the blood of the Snakefolk in them, and we’re the only ones who can unlock their full potential. Well, I’ll get them eventually. Even if I have to kill the society chief, I’ll definitely be the one to rule all of the Snakefolk!”

With that, he faded away.

**

In the depths of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, the fighting continued just as fiercely as before. Numerous top experts were battling back and forth to get to the godworm nest and the eggs therein. Some of them even hoped to tame the mother godworm herself.

Of course, in the end, none of them had any hope of succeeding in that endeavor. She was just too strong.

The only one who was currently benefiting was Yang Qi, who was still hidden atop the greyspace of the nest, absorbing power.

As soon as Yang Qi achieved soul enlightenment of the Demi-Immortal level, he suddenly felt as if the entire world were different. Before, he had felt separated from heaven and earth, but after the breakthrough the vital energy of heaven and earth seemed like it was part of him. He could absorb streams of it into the particles inside of him with almost no effort.

In the blink of an eye, all eight hundred forty million megamammoth particles stirred, as if they might wake up. Sadly, the magical laws of space in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart made that impossible.

Yang Qi could sense that, once he left the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, he would undergo dramatic transformations on a substructural level.

‘So my soul has reached the level of a Demi-Immortal, giving me understanding of those unique magical laws of Demi-Immortals, which are on an equal footing with heaven. The next major breakthrough will be into the Demolishing level. In the Demolishing level, you demolish heaven and become an actual immortal. Unfortunately, even if I leave the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, the heaven and earth outside will still be too weak to sustain my breakthrough. I have to get to the Hell of Mahānata….’

As he pondered these matters, he suddenly heard an echoing howl from inside the God Legion Paradise as his godworm grew strong enough to climb higher in its life cycle.

From the fluctuations of the howl, Yang Qi sensed that the godworm was extremely hungry.

“Fine, I’ll get you plenty to eat. What the legion of gods creates, the legion of gods protects and blesses for all eternity. Open, God Legion Paradise!” With that, he allowed even more power from the godworm nest to pour into his godworm.

As the godworm reached a higher level, legacy memories poured from its soul into Yang Qi. His soul and sea of consciousness filled with genetic memories, and power coursed through him, provoking drastic transformations.

As this occurred, a heavenly song echoed out into the God Legion Paradise. It was the Eternal Heavenly Aria, and it sounded like it was actually being sung by the legion of gods. It was perfect, an ancient epic saga recounting the way the gods created the planes of existence, and how the magical laws of the Lord came to be.

The Eternal Heavenly Aria was originally sung as praise to the Lord, which was why it was called ‘eternal’. After all, even the legion of gods could eventually wither and decay, but not the Lord.

As the Eternal Heavenly Aria echoed out, the God Legion Paradise twitched, and began absorbing even more power from the fiery greyspace.

Chapter 448: Primeval God Skills

‘Such intense magical laws of space…’ Sword Seventeen thought, shivering as the godworm rose to the third stage. As the magical laws in the God Legion Paradise became the Eternal Heavenly Aria, he was blessed, and hundreds of halos appeared around his head.

They were halos of blessing, calmness, prayer, glory, protection and simplicity….

“God skills!” he blurted. “These are primeval god skills….” The sensation he was experiencing was indescribable, and he couldn’t help but give voice to his astonishment.

Thanks to the blessing of the Eternal Heavenly Aria, his sword technique was actually improving, and he was fully twice as strong as before.

One of the halos that had sprung up was platinum and contained the image of a metallic white tiger, which poured immeasurable sharpness into his sword bones. Sword Seventeen recognized it immediately. It was an ancient god skill called the Light of the Cutting Edge, something that sword cultivators and sword immortals dreamed of acquiring.

It was said that the Light of the Cutting Edge was a daoist skill passed down by the legion of gods that could significantly improve the might of one’s sword technique. Even a Great Sage who cultivated sword techniques that was blessed by the Light of the Cutting Edge would be capable of felling Demi-Immortals. Of course, the benefit was only to the sword technique, and did not improve one's inherent strength.

However, there was also a blood-colored halo that was imbuing raw power directly into him.

It was the Light of Power, another primeval god skill.

As Sword Seventeen continued examining the numerous halos, he recognized others, such as the rock-colored Light of Protection, which would boost his defenses and make them impenetrable, even to Lesser Demi-Immortals.

It was a terrifying thought.

There were numerous other halos which he didn’t recognize by name, but that he knew represented god skills that were rare even in ancient times. Even back then, the blessings being provided by Yang Qi would have been considered heaven-shaking and earth-toppling.

If the Titan Emperor Collegium and the Megaplexus Collegium went to war and Yang Qi gave the Light of Power, the Light of the Cutting Edge, and the Light of Protection to his fellow students, they would become an unstoppable force in the fighting.

They might even be able to take out entities like Empress Netherdark and Guru Army-Smasher.

After a bit of time, the Eternal Heavenly Aria faded away and the halos surrounding Sword Seventeen’s head disappeared.

Yang Qi sighed. “I never realized that the Eternal Heavenly Aria would provide such incredible benefits. Unfortunately, my cultivation base is still a bit too low. All I have is soul enlightenment of the Demi-Immortal level. As a Nirvanic Resurrection Sage, the most I can do is use a bit of the power of the aria. Right now, the halos of blessing can only provide a double increase in power, energy, perception, foundation, and the like.”

“Double is strong enough as it is!” Sword Seventeen said. “You’ll be able to do more eventually?”

Yang Qi probed himself inwardly, then said, “I can keep the song going for about eighteen breaths of time before I have to stop. Each time I give the blessing, it significantly drains my true energy. If I tried to do it three or four times, I would damage my vital energy.”

All of a sudden, Sword Seventeen’s eyes lit up. “Hey, can your Eternal Heavenly Aria produce halos of damnification? For example, there’s a primeval god skill called the Light of Weakness.”

Yang Qi waved his hand and another halo appeared around Sword Seventeen’s head, along with echoes of obscene music. This halo emanated a noxious aroma and was pitch black. In the blink of an eye, Sword Seventeen began weakening significantly, and even felt dizzy. His thinking slowed, and both his mind and his eyes went completely blank.

A moment later, Sword Seventeen shook his head and shouted, “Sword Will Ascendant: One Sword to Destroy Myriad Laws!”

Sword energy erupted from his nascent divinity and smashed into the Light of Weakness. However, he couldn’t drive the light away; primeval god skills could only be dispelled in a specific way. For example, the Light of Weakness could only be counteracted with the Light of Benediction. Other daoist techniques and energy arts would be useless.

Yang Qi quickly dispelled the Light of Weakness. Thankfully, it wasn’t deadly. That said, it was a technique that had long since been lost in the sands of time, making it a complete surprise that it showed up in Yang Qi’s hands. The Eternal Heavenly Aria didn’t just contain light that offered blessings, it also contained halos of damnification.

Already recovered, Sword Seventeen laughed heartily. “Incredible. So strong! If you told the supreme rector of the Titan Emperor Collegium that you could do this, he would be overjoyed.”

“Let’s keep it between us for now,” Yang Qi said. “I don’t know this supreme rector, and you can never be too careful. Anyone could turn out to be a villain.”

“Of course, Junior Brother,” Sword Seventeen replied, his eyes flashing. “This matter is important. Extremely important. The infighting between societies in the Titan Emperor Collegium is nothing to take lightly. Conspiracies and plots abound, and the only people you can trust are in the Invincible Society. You definitely can’t let anyone know about this ability of yours until you’re much stronger. Otherwise, it’s just going to cause a lot of trouble.”

“Exactly.” Yang Qi had benefited greatly just now. He had reached the soul enlightenment of a Demi-Immortal and pushed his godworm to the third stage. And because of the Eternal Heavenly Aria, he was now four or five times stronger than before.

He was still leeching off of the fiery greyspace of the godworm nest and had not been detected by either the other cultivators or the mother godworm.

One of the types of light that he had access to now was the Light of Emptiness, which he could use to move out of the three realms and the five phases. In other words, it made him impossible to detect.

And of course, he had applied that effect to the God Legion Paradise as a whole.

“Hey, look… the fighting out there is getting even more intense.”

RUMBLE!

Vital energy shockwaves continued rolling out from the attacks of the powerful experts. However, they weren’t fighting each other any longer. They had apparently come to an agreement and were turning their attacks onto the fiery greyspace of the godworm nest.

“So they’re working together now,” Yang Qi said. “That mother godworm is in trouble, but if we want to benefit the most, we need to make sure that both sides get weak and hurt, just like we did with King Langya and Grand Emperor Rich-Lush.”

“We’re stronger now, Junior Brother, but there’s no way we can fight so many enemies. Look, they're all third, fourth, and fifth order Demi-Immortals. A few of them are even in the sixth order. Maybe we should just play it safe and wait until they break into the nest. Then we can slip in and grab a couple eggs.”

“No way,” Yang Qi said. “This is too good of an opportunity. We’re gonna get all those eggs, plus the mother godworm, and even whatever other treasures there are to be had.”

“Alright, Junior Brother. I’ll follow your lead. What’s the plan?”

“When they think they finally have the upper hand against the mother godworm, I’ll make my move. I’ll bless her with my Eternal Heavenly Aria, giving her far more power than before. Then, after both sides are hurt and injured, we’ll grab the godworm and the eggs. Look, we’re not going to get another opportunity like this, are we? So let’s seize the moment!”

Sword Seventeen’s blood started boiling with excitement. “You’re right. Let’s do this!”

Chapter 449: Complete Success

Roughly a dozen enormous hands of vital energy smashed into the greyspace of the nest, shaking the mother godworm so badly that she let loose an agonized shriek.

Spatial flames erupted, turning the entire area into a kingdom of fire.

WHIZZZ!

Yang Qi immediately absorbed as much of it as he could, causing his meridians and sea of energy to grow even stronger than before, and his true energy capacity to increase. Even his Blood of the One God was benefiting.

After reaching the soul enlightenment level of a Demi-Immortal, the God Legion Seal had stirred.

Yang Qi had known for a long time now that the seal was fragmented, and that other parts of it existed in other places. Perhaps they were in the mortal world, perhaps in the immortal planes. Maybe some of them had even fallen into hell. There was also the possibility that they were in the kingdom of the gods.

Eventually, Yang Qi hoped to gather all of the God Legion Seal fragments, which would indicate that he could exercise control over the legion of gods and that he was the boundless and supreme Sovereign Lord.

**

“Come on, everyone. This mother godworm is nearly done for. Stick to the agreement and share those eggs!”

“That’s right. Stop bickering, Empress Netherdark and Guru Army-Smasher. Cooperating is the only way to succeed here. We’ve been waiting for tens of thousands of years to get some godworm eggs, and we're never going to get another opportunity like this.”

Howling, the group of experts focused their attacks on the greyspace of the godworm nest.

From the fluctuations rolling out, Yang Qi could tell that the nest was weakening, and was about to break open.

“Everyone join forces and unleash the Doomsday War-Dragon!”

RUMBLE!

The vital energy of all of the experts present fused together, creating an enormous dragon formed from magical laws. Baring its claws, it shot toward the godworm nest.

Roar!

The dragon was an ancient spell formation called the Doomsday War-Dragon, and it was mighty enough to destroy heaven and crush the earth. When that dragon of war appeared, it meant the end of days had come.

Howling, the mother godworm shrank her nest down, yet that didn’t seem like it would do anything to save it from the deadly attacks of the Doomsday War-Dragon.

Suddenly, the mother godworm opened her mouth and spat out a sparkling and translucent internal pellet. It was fully fifty kilometers in diameter and immediately threw the godly laws of space into chaos, causing dazzling light to shine out.

Within that dazzling internal pellet was a daoist painting.

“A Space-Time Retroconversion Painting!” Sword Seventeen said. “The godworm mother is putting everything on the line! Junior Brother, now’s the time to act. If she gets killed, the shock wave will probably take us out!”

“I know,” Yang Qi replied. “We're on the razor's edge here.”

Without any hesitation, he began singing the Eternal Heavenly Aria and a halo of blessing appeared on the mother godworm.

Smack!

The godworm had no idea what exactly was going on, but all of a sudden she felt herself tremble and her energy and blood began to recover from its previous losses. In the blink of an eye, she was stronger than she had ever been before, by double.

The internal pellet raced forth like a shooting star and slammed directly into the Doomsday War-Dragon. Blinding light exploded out in all directions and everything trembled violently.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi shrank the God Legion Paradise down to the size of a piece of dust and sent it flying into the depths of the godworm nest.

Opening his Lord's Eye, he looked back outside and saw that the impact between the Doomsday War-Dragon and the godworm’s internal pellet had been catastrophic. Space had been shredded in devastating fashion, and the experts were all coughing up mouthfuls of blood.

As for the mother godworm, her internal pellet was severely weakened. She had been slashed apart into several pieces, which caused blood to flow like rivers.

‘This is it! They’re both hurt!’

Without any hesitation, Yang Qi reached out with the Hand of the One God, grabbed the mother godworm and the more than one hundred eggs, and threw them into a magical treasure bag. Then he expanded the God Legion Paradise.

RUMBLE!

The Eternal Heavenly Aria echoed out again, and in the blink of an eye the God Legion Paradise had devoured the entire godworm nest.

As it turned out, having a primal-chaos elder-snake that could devour anything was turning out to be very useful.

Next, Yang Qi shrank the God Legion Paradise down to the size of a dust mote and it vanished without a trace. All of this happened before the shockwaves from the explosion had even died away.

The attacking experts had just felt a sudden power surge from the godworm, then watched as a spectacular attack defeated their Doomsday War-Dragon. They all suffered significant damage to their vital energy and were forced to retreat, coughing up mouthfuls of blood.

However, as they recovered they looked around to see that the surrounding space was completely empty. There was no mother godworm, no nest, and no eggs.

“What's going on here?” Empress Netherdark shouted angrily. “Where’s the mother godworm? Where’s the nest? Where’s the eggs? They’re all gone? How could they have vanished?”

“Gone,” murmured another of the experts, his eyes turning blank, “all gone. Were we hallucinating? This was our hope to finally get out of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Now we’re all going to die in here.”

“Someone must have snatched them during that explosion just now. That was obviously a primeval god skill on display. That was how the mother godworm got so powerful all of a sudden. Whoever it was, he was the fisherman and we were the sandpiper and the clam. Damnation! Come on, let’s track him down.”

These were clever people, and they quickly pieced together the clues to figure out what had occurred. But by that time, Yang Qi and Sword Seventeen were long gone.

After snatching the treasure, they headed deeper into the world junction, using the power of the third stage godworm to conceal themselves in the labyrinthine aspects of space that existed there.

After fleeing for a few hours, they stopped and looked around to make sure they were safe.

“We’re rich, Junior Brother!” Sword Seventeen exclaimed, nearly leaping with joy. “So many primeval godworm eggs! Not even the Titan Emperor Collegium has one of these things. If we took even a single one out and handed it to the Hall of Feats and Virtues, we could take away any treasure we wanted. The elders would personally pass on energy arts to us, and we would receive physical and mental baptisms!”

Yang Qi laughed. “Yeah, but who cares about techniques from the elders? And besides, what better baptism could there be than my Eternal Heavenly Aria? Forget about stuff from the collegium, Elder Brother. We’re the type of people who get stronger on our own, right? Come on, let’s rest for a bit. I’ll set up a spell formation to keep us safe, then I’ll help you hatch one of those godworm eggs. In total, we have a hundred and thirty of them.”

“A hundred and thirty?! My god! We're so rich!” Sword Seventeen suddenly slapped himself on the cheek to make sure he wasn’t dreaming.

Eggs like these were incalculably valuable. Even Paragon Demi-Immortals could only dream of getting one. After all, a Demi-Immortal of that level could use a godworm they raised to reach the Demolishing level.

“I need a drop of your blood!” Yang Qi said. Sword Seventeen’s eyes turned serious and sharp.

Extending his hand out, he squeezed a drop of blood from his heart out through the tip of his finger. Shockingly, the drop was actually the shape of a sword! As soon as it entered the egg, the egg began to vibrate. Spatial power began rolling off of it, and tiny wormholes even appeared around it, which led to the Dark True Void.

Eventually, cracks appeared on the surface of the egg, then a faint howl echoed out as the godworm larva appeared.

“Hurry! Use your animadestiny nascent divinity to fuse with it! That will turn it into a clone of yours.”

“Alright. Invincible Heart!”

A stream of nascent divinity energy shot out of Sword Seventeen’s forehead and hit the godworm, wrapped it up, and dragged it back into his forehead. A moment later, Sword Seventeen’s sword will grew even more grand and magnificent. Now it seemed like the type of thing that could slice apart space-time.

“What energy art was that? It seemed like….” Yang Qi said.

“It’s Master’s secret legacy, a godly-class energy art,” Sword Seventeen said. “The Prodigious Proto-Epoch, Invincible War-Steppe!”

Chapter 450: Legacy of King Immortal-Slayer

Fusing with the primeval godworm caused Sword Seventeen’s cultivation base to improve dramatically.

Most impressive of all to Yang Qi was the Prodigious Proto-Epoch, Invincible War-Steppe, which was actually a godly-class energy art. All of a sudden, it made sense why the Invincible Dugu was so powerful.

So far, the only godly-class energy art he had seen, other than his own Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, was his mother's Jade-Emperor Profound-Welkin Exalted-Celestial God-Dao. This Prodigious Proto-Epoch, Invincible War-Steppe was the third.

In the mortal world, heavenly-class arts were generally perceived to be the highest possible arts to cultivate. Sometimes, multiple heavenly-class energy arts would be combined to create what were called immortal skills, and even they were rare. That went to show what godly-class energy arts were like. Even lesser godly-class arts were the type that most people could never even see.

Of course, Yang Qi wasn’t impressed with such lower arts and, at best, would give them to his clone to cultivate.

“None of us in the Invincible Society have cultivated the full Prodigious Proto-Epoch, Invincible War-Steppe. We only have half of it. To truly cultivate it, you have to produce an Invincible Heart, which is an actual heart made from true energy that functions like an eternal furnace. Once we get out of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, I'm sure Master will pass the technique on to you.”

Even as Sword Seventeen explained these things to Yang Qi, he used his godly-class energy art to absorb the memories of the godworm larva.

‘I guess I’ll give it to my clone,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘He has the Jade-Emperor Profound-Welkin Exalted-Celestial God-Dao from my mother, so if he masters this Prodigious Proto-Epoch, Invincible War-Steppe he’ll become even more formidable.’

After some time passed, he turned his attention to the God Legion Paradise, which contained the godworm nest and the mother godworm. The latter was still struggling, just like a centipede that would not stop wriggling even after being stomped on.

Obviously, primeval godworms couldn’t be killed easily. Cut one in two and it could still recover. And this mother godworm was in the seventh stage, with life force that was shocking even to Yang Qi.

‘If I fuse with this thing and make it part of my God Legion Paradise, my command over space will increase tenfold.’ Yang Qi quickly summoned the Hellfire Crucible and tossed the chunks of the godworm into it, along with some of his Blood of the One God. Instantly, the chunks began wriggling, then psychic sealing marks suddenly began to shine on it.

The light turned into a human shape. It was a beautiful, middle-aged woman who stared at Yang Qi with murderous eyes. “How dare you try to refine me, cultivator. Do you know who I am? I'm nobility among godworms! A single psychic fluctuation from me will cause this world junction to explode and kill everything in it, including you.”

‘Hm. The godworm’s psychic seal manifests itself as a female cultivator. Unfortunately for her, she's completely mistaken.’ Ignoring her threat, he exhaled vital energy and called upon the Eternal Heavenly Aria. Instantly, numerous halos sprang up around the projected woman.

They were all nightmarish manifestations of primeval god skills. The Light of Weakness, the Light of Balefiends, the Light of Devilization, the Light of Disorder, the Light of Nirvanic Extermination, the Light of Enfeeblement…

The projected image of the woman immediately grew blurry.

One of the halos was the Light of Nightmares, which would cause the target to descend into a state of never-ending mental horror from which they could never escape. As of this moment, the godworm was completely under Yang Qi’s control.

“Psychic Seed: Nascent Divinity Branding….”

Yang Qi began singing the Eternal Heavenly Aria once again, and the godworm began stitching itself back together. Soon, it took up a position in the God Legion Paradise opposite of Yang Qi’s original godworm, one in the north, the other in the south.

His original godworm was in the third stage, but this mother godworm was in the seventh, which was a level of power equivalent to a Revered Demi-Immortal. The two godworms were so far apart in level that it was impossible to put into words.

Whizz!

The mother godworm’s psychic seal shattered and she fused with Yang Qi, becoming part of the essence of the God Legion Paradise. As the process occurred, memories flooded into his sea of consciousness. Part of it was a complete picture of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

There were so many world junctions that they were like the stars in the night sky. It was a beautiful image, filled with power, magical laws, treasure troves, and countless other secrets.

Obviously, the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart was not just some magical treasure. It was like a hell, or heavenly world. Or even a chiliocosm of worlds. In any case, it definitely surpassed the level of an immortal item.

Only someone with energy arts like those of the legion of gods would possibly be able to make something like it.

Yang Qi’s original idea had been to find the spirit automaton that controlled the monarch chart, kill it, and take over the thing as his own. But from the information he was getting from the mother godworm, he could see that such an idea was ridiculous. It was like an ant trying to shake a tree.

For anyone other than a Demolisher to think of wresting away control from it was wishful thinking.

That didn’t mean he was weak, though. He had control of a seventh stage godworm that was as strong as a Revered Demi-Immortal. Now, as a mere second step Great Sage, he was actually strong enough to trounce fifth order Demi-Immortals, and perhaps survive in a fight against one in the sixth order. And that wasn’t even mentioning what would happen when he reached the Hell of Mahānata.

“Alright, mother godworm. I know now that godworms love to hoard treasure, and you have a treasure trove hidden inside you. Spit it out.” The godworm complied, and a moment later a mass of treasure appeared in the God Legion Paradise in the form of an entire palace.

Sword Seventeen’s eyes went wide. “That’s… that’s a famous immortal item from primeval times! It’s the legendary Mourn-Parting Heaven-Palace, created by an immortal from a very high plane of existence, the Mourn-Parting Heaven. Although, it looks like only a corner of the entire palace, perhaps a single hall. According to the stories, there were nine thousand, nine hundred and ninety-nine halls that made up the Mourn-Parting Heaven-Palace. Who would have thought that this mother godworm would have an immortal item like this!”

“Mourn-Parting Heaven-Palace, huh?” Yang Qi said, looking it over. It appeared to be made from bronze, and was obviously not the work of mortal hands. It was filled with all sorts of weapons, magical treasures, medicinal pills, bottle gourds, and even immortal stones.

Godworms loved to collect treasures, and would never use them, not even immortal items. And this mother godworm had kept her collection in the tiny hall of the Mourn-Parting Heaven-Palace.

Even that tiny hall was still a shocking thing. For example, if someone as low as a Legendary used it as a weapon, they could destroy an entire planet, although the process would probably kill them.

In the hands of a Great Sage, it would be even more powerful.

In fact, Yang Qi could tell that this palace was just as strong as an imperial snakecharm.

“It was made by King Mourn-Parting,” Sword Seventeen went on to say, “who was just as famous as King Heaven-Devourer. Both of them worked with King Immortal-Slayer, and considered him their leader. They fought against the legion of gods and, in their efforts, created the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, which they used to safeguard all of their treasures. Of course, over the millions and millions of years which followed, the monarch chart would appear every so often and many of those treasures were taken away. I wonder if King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy medallion was originally stored in here?”

“Oh really? King Mourn-Parting. King Heaven-Devourer….” Right now, Yang Qi had twenty-eight of the three thousand imperial snakecharms created by King Heaven-Devourer. And of the nine thousand, nine hundred and ninety-nine halls of King Mourn-Parting’s heavenly palace, he had one.

It was in this moment that a new voice reached their ears.

“That’s right. King Mourn-Parting created the Mourn-Parting Heaven-Palace, and now you have one of its halls. It seems the two of you are very lucky. But your luck is going to end now that you've run into me.”

Startled, Yang Qi and Sword Seventeen looked over at the source of the voice.

At the same time, Yang Qi reined in all of the power of his various techniques, shrinking the God Legion Paradise down to a sixty-square-meter area.

There within the labyrinth of space-time, a person had just appeared.

He was young and wore tight-fitting yellow clothing. He had a buzz cut, which was unusual among cultivators, who usually grew their hair long and kept it bound in a topknot. It was almost as if this newcomer came from a different time period.

Yang Qi and Sword Seventeen were in a complicated part of space-time that not even seventh order Revered Demi-Immortals would enter, yet this yellow-garbed young man was approaching with complete ease. The most shocking thing of all was that Yang Qi could clearly see the level of his cultivation base, and he wasn’t even a Demi-Immortal! He was a mere Great Sage.

From the look of it, he was in the third step, making him an Eternal Sands Sage.

Outside, that might be impressive, but in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, that would make him like an ant. This yellow-garbed young man with the buzz cut had a terrifying aura, giving him much the same feeling Yang Qi had experienced when he first encountered the Crown Prince back in the Demi-Immortal Institute.

Chapter 451: Successor of King Immortal-Slayer

“Who's this guy?” Sword Seventeen murmured. The mere sight of this newcomer gave him goosebumps. He knew how terrifyingly powerful someone would have to be to approach Yang Qi and himself. Now that he had fused with a primeval godworm, he was even more sensitive to spatial fluctuations, so the fact that this person had approached them without being noticed was very telling.

It was exactly the same with Yang Qi, who had even better control of the godly laws of space than Sword Seventeen.

The yellow-garbed young man with the buzz cut was only a third step Great Sage, which meant that he must have unique talents similar to Yang Qi’s. For some reason, Yang Qi felt like he was finally facing off with a true rival, a sensation he hadn’t experienced again after killing the Crown Prince. As for the sixth and seventh order Demi-Immortals that he had dominated recently, he had known all along that he would eventually beat them. Never had he considered them rivals.

Only the strongest and most terrifying opponents could claim that right.

“Who might you be?” Yang Qi asked, keeping his attention fully focused on the newcomer, wrapping some energy around the godworm eggs in case he needed to use them to boost his power.

“Me?” the young man replied, staring at Yang Qi like a hunter would look at prey. “You don’t know me. But guess what? I know you. You’re Yang Qi from the Rich-Lush Continent, who joined the Titan Emperor Collegium and the Invincible Society. Here you are in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, using primeval god skills and acting like the fisherman dealing with the sandpiper and the clam. You have a mother godworm and her treasure trove, including part of the Mourn-Parting Heaven-Palace.

“As you can see, I know everything about you. You killed some piece of trash called the Crown Prince, and got King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy medallion from him. Because of that, it's little wonder you’ve accomplished so much. Well, hand over the godworm eggs and your primeval god skills, as well as your treasure. And especially King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy medallion. Give me everything you possess and serve me as my slave.”

“You do know a lot, don’t you?” Yang Qi said, frowning slightly. The truth was that he wasn't the least bit angry to hear this young man’s demands. “There’s a familiar aura on you. It’s the aura of King Immortal-Slayer, isn’t it? You have one of the other legacy medallions, don’t you?”

“Wrong,” the young man replied, his eyes flickering with scorn. He extended his hand and two medallions appeared, which had been fused together. “I have two, which I happened to acquire from other successors of King Immortal-Slayer that I killed. They were far, far stronger than that scum the Crown Prince. Every time you acquire one of these medallions, your energy arts, energy flows, divine abilities, and magical strength all increase by tenfold or more. Sometimes even a hundredfold. Once I get the third medallion from you, I’ll be well on my way to acquiring all nine. Then I’ll become the reincarnated King Immortal-Slayer and will be able to take control of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Of course, even just three medallions will be enough to let me travel freely in and out of the chart. Henceforth, this place is going to be like my backyard.”

Sword Seventeen was starting to get very annoyed at this yellow-garbed young man with the buzz cut. The young man didn’t seem to come from this space and time, and was looking at the two of them like they were primitive savages or aborigines.

“Considering how big your mouth is,” Sword Seventeen said, “aren’t you worried about biting your tongue?”

“Oh? You dare to talk back to me, vermin? Thanks to that little quip about me biting my tongue, I'm not going to kill you. I'm going to cripple your energy arts and turn you into a mortal. Then I’ll cut your tongue out so that you can wallow eternally in the misery of human suffering.

“I know that you're from the Invincible Society, and that everyone is scared of your Eldest Brother and the Invincible Dugu. They’re both Paragon Demi-Immortals, just on the verge of becoming Demolishers. But to me, the mighty successor of King Immortal-Slayer, they’re not worthy to be anything other than slaves. Eventually, the Invincible Society, and the Titan Emperor Collegium as a whole, will all serve me. If you knew what was good for you, you’d join me now. I’ll treat you well.”

“Anyone who insults my Master will DIE!” Sword Seventeen had reached his limit, and without any warning he attacked.

SWISH!

A beam of sword light shot out, the expression of a consummate sword technique that flew like an eagle directly toward the young man in yellow.

“Invincible Sword: Live Forever!”

The sword light flowed like a mighty river that went on forever. All cultivators hoped to live forever, and that was the inspiration for this sword move: Solitary Sword Lives Forever.

RUUUUUUMBLE!

The sword will reached the target before the sword energy. This sword move was not somber and deadly, but rather vigorous, ancient, and abundant with life and movement.

From what Yang Qi could tell, it was something that could even kill second order Greater Demi-Immortals; obviously Sword Seventeen had greatly benefited after fusing with the godworm.

“Oh? Solitary Sword Lives Forever? That’s a consummate sword technique. Sadly for you, I'm the successor of King Immortal-Slayer. The point of being immortal is to live forever, and I'm designed to slay immortals. I'm the bane of your existence! I can slay anything and everything, so, to me, the idea of ‘living forever and never dying’ is a complete and utter joke!”

BZZZ!

The young man extended a finger and touched the tip of the incoming sword. In response, sword energy exploded with deadly ferocity, yet none of it entered him.

Shockingly, he had stopped the sword move with his finger!

Creak. Crunch.

Sword Seventeen’s sword began bending under the force, and the mockery in the young man’s eyes grew more intense. “Considering the level of your cultivation base, you don't deserve to even fight my finger. I should kill you with a mere breath. However, to prevent any funny business from Yang Qi, I’ll go the ridiculous extent of killing you with this one move.”

“Hope!” Sword Seventeen shouted, suddenly switching moves to Solitary Sword Fosters Hope. Streams of true energy that resembled faith poured into the sword, and in the blink of an eye, the tip began to shine with light as dazzling as the sun, which stabbed slowly into the young man’s defensive vital energy.

“Well, this move is a bit better,” the young man said, chuckling coldly. Flicking his finger, he sent all the sword energy back in the opposite direction.

This entire time, he hadn’t taken a single step forward or back.

“Piety!”

RUUUUUUMBLE!

A pious expression could be seen on Sword Seventeen’s face. There was no doubting the fact that he was piously devoted to the dao of the sword, and energy arts. This move took that piety and transformed it into a devastatingly powerful attack.

This was Solitary Sword Displays Piety.

Solitary Sword Lives Forever. Solitary Sword Fosters Hope. Solitary Sword Displays Piety.

The three moves combined, creating a destructive river that could overwhelm anything and everything.

“Hmm?”

At this point, a look of surprise appeared in the eyes of the yellow-garbed young man. Never could he have guessed that Sword Seventeen, who he had looked down upon so much, could release such might in battle.

It was actually miraculous, as far as he was concerned.

Solitary Sword Displays Piety pierced through his defensive true energy, forcing him to acknowledge that trifling with disciples of the Invincible Society wasn’t a good idea. Even the weakest of their number could unleash spectacularly devastating moves.

“You really think I'm going to make a mistake and lose this fight, bug? No, you’re too weak.” All of a sudden, he erupted with blinding light that focused on his finger, creating unprecedented sharpness. “Chaos in the World!”

Instantly, it was as if the entire world had been thrown into chaos. Vital energy went wild, the flames of war leapt high, and time seemed to slow. Life became torment.

Sword Seventeen was tossed backward, as if he had been struck by lightning. His nascent divinity was thrown into chaos, and blood sprayed out of his mouth as he tumbled backward like a kite with its string cut.

However, that was when Yang Qi made his move.

Without any warning, he began singing the Eternal Heavenly Aria, the sound of which wrapped up Sword Seventeen, baptizing him in halos and instantly healing all of his wounds.

Then Yang Qi reached out and summoned the Infernal Deity Spear. By this point, the spear was so real that it looked like an actual immortal item. It was covered with complex designs, including numerous eyes that very much resembled those of fiend-devils.

Pointing his spear at the young man, he said, “I don’t care if you’re the successor of King Immortal-Slayer. If you mess with me, you die. Just like that other successor, the Crown Prince. King Immortal-Slayer? He’s some loser who tried to fight the legion of gods and failed. And you’re going to end up like him. Dead. That's your fate.

“By the way, I don’t have that legacy medallion. You think I want something from an immortal like King Immortal-Slayer? The legion of gods crushed him, and I'm going to do the same to you.”

“What?” the young man said. However, Yang Qi was already blurring toward him, so he clenched his hands into fists and shouted, “A Thousand Autumns!”

The young man’s fist hit the spear, and he flew backward. “You're not a successor of King Immortal-Slayer? How dare you speak so rudely to one who is!”

Chapter 452: Yellow-Garbed, Buzz Cut

“Bullcrap!” Yang Qi barked. Brandishing his spear, he leaped forward, sliding through space like primal-chaos slipping through the depths of the universe. Without any sound or vibration, he appeared right behind the yellow-garbed young man.

“I’ll show you exactly how powerful King Immortal-Slayer was. You’re the first person in heaven and earth to ever disrespect his name.” The young man spun and unleashed a fist strike onto the tip of the spear. In this case, it didn’t matter how mysterious and enigmatic the spear was; the fist strike smashed into the true energy nodes which held it together and the true energy collapsed.

“Eternal Heavenly Aria!” Yang Qi said, and began singing the song. Instantly, halos of blessing sprang up around him, including the Light of Power, Light of Protection, Light of the Cutting Edge, Light of Dao Enlightenment, Light of Space-Time, Light of Reincarnation, and more…. These were primeval god skills, which immediately elevated numerous aspects of himself to higher levels, including his martial disciplines, his techniques, his defenses, and his overall power.

At the same time, he sent halos of damnification onto the young man in yellow. The Light of Nightmares, Light of Weakness, Light of Blood-Draining, Light of Inversion, Light of Chaos and Disorder, Light of Confusion, and the Light of Enticement. There were dozens of them, and they immediately weakened the young man’s energy and momentum and sent waves of dizziness to assault his mind.

“This…. So many primeval god skills! What energy art is this? That song has hundreds of primeval god skills built into it. So many halos surrounding me. Immortal-Slayer’s Power: Scatter and Disperse!”

He tapped the legacy medallion of King Immortal-Slayer, sending a stream of true energy out that slammed into the halos of damnification and caused them to scatter and disperse.

The sight of it caused Yang Qi’s eyes to widen. Normally speaking, the Eternal Heavenly Aria should have been impossible to defeat in such a way. However, there were two factors at play. First was the fact that he wasn’t truly in the Demi-Immortal level, which meant that he couldn’t unleash the true might of the song.

Second was the fact that the legacy medallion wielded by this yellow-garbed young man was simply too strong. In the distant past, King Immortal-Slayer had conquered three thousand major worlds and was virtually invincible, to the point where he challenged the legion of gods in battle. Therefore, it was little surprise that his legacy medallion could defeat Yang Qi’s incomplete Eternal Heavenly Aria.

“Useless weakling!” Yang Qi said. “We only just started fighting and you already had to use that legacy medallion? Why don’t you fight with your own power? Let me see how strong you really are. Otherwise, what are you going around boasting for?”

Hoping to crush his opponent's confidence, Yang Qi tossed the Infernal Deity Spear into his left hand and drew upon a deadly tactic of the primeval infernal deities. The Nightfall Symphony appeared again, causing the darkness of night to swirl in deadly fashion around the spear.

At the same time, he used the Fist of the Halls of Heaven and the Hand of the One God with his right hand.

Creation. Destruction. Nature. Aeon. He used five attacks in quick succession to unleash a power so deadly that the labyrinth of space around them began collapsing.  Now that he had a seventh stage mother godworm, including access to her memories regarding space-time, his control of space was so high that he could easily defend against the most powerful martial disciplines.

“King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy medallion belongs to me. It’s part of me. Every ounce of power here is my own! Alright, punk. I guess the time has come to show you what I'm really capable of. Immortal-Slayer's War-Halberd!”

Swish!

He extended his hand and a dual-crescent-bladed halberd appeared, spattered with the blood of countless god-devils.

Years ago, the Crown Prince had also used the Immortal-Slayer's War-Halberd, only to have it shattered by Yang Qi. As for this version summoned by the yellow-garbed young man, it was many times more profound and powerful. As he brandished it, the power of an immortal-slayer was unleashed, creating a churning, screaming, roiling sea of godpower wreathed in mist.

Immediately, the young man began thrumming with a powerful spirit of battle. “Everlasting Night of Darkness!”

An everlasting night fell, without any sun or moon, a darkness reminiscent of the netherworld itself. Pitch black godpower filled the area, transforming all of heaven and earth into a state of absolute black.

“Begone!” Yang Qi said, slashing his spear out in front of him and shattering everything in the void. Instantly, light sprang out into the darkness of night.

“Reconstruct Reincarnation!”

The young man in yellow didn’t seem fazed at all. He swung his halberd again, causing streams of light to shoot out from the blade, connecting to the surrounding universe as if to control it like a marionette.

He was tapping into numerous strands of reincarnation and using them to attack Yang Qi.

In response, Yang Qi stamped his foot down and a shock wave spread out as the God Legion Paradise expanded around him. “The Legion of Gods Controls All; they Suppress Hell Itself!”

“Heaven and Earth Lament!” said the young man in yellow, his eyes gleaming with a very serious light. By this point, he realized that Yang Qi was most likely the strongest opponent he had ever fought, and he knew that he couldn’t afford to slip up. He exhaled, causing a stream of light to erupt from his mouth, filling the area with the sound of weeping and lamentation. All of a sudden, Yang Qi felt as though he had become the enemy of all of heaven and earth and that the universe lamented his existence.

Meanwhile, the Immortal-Slayer’s War-Halberd danced like a dragon or snake as it stabbed toward him.

Remaining calm, Yang Qi swept the Infernal Deity Spear out in concentric circles to meet the incoming attack.

“Heaven and Earth Lament? Fine! If creation rejects me, I’ll destroy it and create a new heaven and earth. The legion of gods created all things, and if heaven and earth defy me it means they rebel against the legion of gods. I hereby sentence this heaven and earth to death! Destroy Heaven, Extinguish Earth! Re-Establish Primal-Chaos!”

A godmammoth of antiquity appeared above Yang Qi’s head, clearer than it had ever been. Godmammoths specialized in dominating the magical laws of the universe, and could easily unravel them and return everything to a state of primal-chaos.

In shocking fashion, Yang Qi simply reached out and grabbed the blade light of the Immortal-Slayer’s War-Halberd.

That light could slice through virtually all living things, yet it didn’t do a single thing to Yang Qi’s hand. The yellow-garbed young man reacted with visible shock, but quickly recovered.

“King Immortal-Slayer’s Legacy Medallion!”

Yet again, he resorted to using the medallion, which sent out a burst of immortal power, creating a shadowy figure that seemed capable of dominating everything under heaven. In fact, it seemed to rival the godmammoth in terms of size and strength.

That shadowy figure was a remnant of a nascent divinity essence sealed into the medallion. It came directly from the animadestiny will of King Immortal-Slayer, and even that scrap was enough to shake Demi-Immortals.

RUMBLE!

The mere vibrations caused all of the halos around Sword Seventeen to shatter and sent him plummeting into the God Legion Paradise.

Vibration after vibration passed through Yang Qi as he reached the very limits of what his energy arts were capable of. Those vibrations were affecting his soul, and even destroying his godmammoth true energy.

Laughing loudly, the young man in yellow shouted, “Die. DIE! Since you’re not a successor of King Immortal-Slayer, and don’t have his legacy medallion, it makes you that much easier to deal with. The will of King Immortal-Slayer can shake all creation! He created the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart with the help of countless other immortals, and this legacy medallion contains some of that will. How dare you try to fight me! You’re going to die beyond the shadow of a doubt! Then I’ll leave this place and achieve breakthrough after breakthrough!” With that, he dissolved into hearty laughter.

Yang Qi knew that with King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy medallion in play, the situation had reached a critical point. Years ago, the Crown Prince had only just fused with the legacy medallion when they fought. After killing him, the medallion had flown away and he had been powerless to do anything about it. And right now, this yellow-garbed young man had fully drawn on the will of King Immortal-Slayer, something that was rare in the mortal world. In fact, it was likely that the mortal world had never seen this happen. Even in the countless immortal planes, the will of King Immortal-Slayer was a rare and powerful thing.

However, there was definitely something that could counter it.

“God Legion Seal….”

WHIZZZ!

Without any hesitation, Yang Qi sent some Blood of the One God into the God Legion Seal, causing an immediate eruption of power.

Myriad worlds crumbled, and the monarch chart around them cracked. An immensely powerful figure made of pure gold shot out of Yang Qi’s forehead, causing everything in the area to tremble as though the bane of its existence had appeared. It was as if space had ceased to be, replaced by a palace belonging to the legion of gods. Even the mighty projection of the will of King Immortal-Slayer was completely shocked by what was happening.

Everything seemed to go still, as though the scene were transforming into an eternal painting.

It was impossible to tell how much time passed. Perhaps it was hours, perhaps only a second. However, after a certain time, the projected will of King Immortal-Slayer finally moved his hands as he prepared to fight against the God Legion Seal.

It was a contest of power between kings and gods.

As of this point, neither Yang Qi nor the young man in yellow could actually see what was happening. They could only see boundless golden light and the power of an immortal-slayer slamming into each other.

BOOM!

Yang Qi tumbled backward, head over heels, making it impossible to gain his bearings. As for the yellow-garbed young man, he let out a bloodcurdling scream as he sustained grievous injuries. “I'm going to remember this, Yang Qi. You actually have a God Legion Seal! How did something like that fall onto you? It’s… it’s impossible! Those things are basically mythological! That’s the only thing that could possibly control the will of King Immortal-Slayer. NO! I have to carry on the core teachings and doctrines of King Immortal-Slayer. I will kill you… you just wait….”

His voice seemed to echo from a distant location as he vanished without a trace. At the same time, the God Legion Seal returned to Yang Qi’s forehead.

A bit of blood floated there in space, which was the only thing left behind of the yellow-garbed young man with the buzz cut.

Yang Qi reached out, grabbed it, and opened his Lord's Eye to examine it more closely.

Chapter 453: The Future

“Who could have ever predicted we would randomly run into an enemy of such terrifying power?” Sword Seventeen said. “If he escaped into the outer world, it would mean that we have a new archenemy. Most importantly, we don't have any idea where he's from. He came and went with no warning whatsoever, and seemed to know everything about us. If we run into him again, we have to kill him.”

“I have no idea where he's from either,” Yang Qi said. “All I know is that he had two legacy medallions from King Immortal-Slayer. Thankfully, he left behind some blood, which contains his genetic information.”

As Yang Qi stared at the blood with his Lord’s Eye, it bubbled and boiled, eventually producing a blood-colored image formed of countless magical symbols. The image depicted a hodgepodge of shadowy figures that flickered back and forth, as well as a river of fate.

The Lord's Eye glittered as he watched. However, as the genetic performance reached a key moment, a strange power of magical law appeared and the blood simply faded out of existence. It was almost as if it didn’t belong in this part of space-time.

Sword Seventeen’s jaw dropped. “It… it actually provoked a reversal of magical law? Wait. That means… that blood contains the power of the future!”

“The power of the future?” Yang Qi said, shaken. “What's that?”

“The past, the present, the future,” Sword Seventeen replied quietly. “All three of them are deeply miraculous. It’s possible for people from the past to travel to the present. And it's even possible for people from the present to travel to the past. Of course, from our perspective, we live in the present. But to people from the past, we exist in the future. Master once told me about such matters, although I never quite understood them until now. That person we just fought definitely had the power of the future on him. One possibility is that he acquired good fortune that originally existed in the future. The other possibility is that he is from a future aspect of space-time, and he traveled back in time to here.”

“Sounds complicated….” Yang Qi was unable to make sense of it, and simply shook his head.

“Yeah, it's complicated alright. However, there’s no need to overthink it. The past, present, and future are all different levels of time. When it comes to traveling to the past or the future, it's something that not even immortals can do. According to the stories, it's only possible for Godmyths or higher. Only they have the power to travel through the different levels of space-time, in other words, to go back and forth between the past, present, and future.”

“Godmyth level or higher? That’s so far beyond us it's hard to even imagine. I guess you’re right. There’s no reason to worry too much about the details. Wherever that guy in yellow came from, one thing's for sure: he’s an enemy.”

Sword Seventeen nodded. “Exactly. From here on out, we have to be on guard against him at all times. Right now, the most important task at hand is to figure a way to get out of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. It won’t be long before it closes permanently and we’ll have to wait for ten thousand years for another chance. Considering you’ve already fused with that mother godworm, does your new understanding of the godly laws of space give you what it takes to open a passage? Are you confident enough to give it a try?”

“Before, I would have said no. But after the fight, I had an idea. First, though, consider this: that guy in yellow was confident that he could leave the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, so why don’t we follow him? Maybe he’s our ticket out of here.”

“But he's long gone. How are we supposed to follow him?”

Yang Qi smiled. “Just now when we were fighting, I locked onto his aura. Furthermore, when he attacked the halos from the Eternal Heavenly Aria, some splinters of light remained on his person. I'm guessing I can use the Eternal Heavenly Aria to pick up on his tracks and find him.”

“Well what are you waiting for? Let’s do it!”

**

In the depths of the world junction, the young man in yellow sped through a labyrinth of space with the ease of a fish in water. With the legacy medallion he had, nothing posed an obstacle for him. Even the world-devils that occasionally appeared would either avoid him, or offer respectful greetings when he got close to them.

One of the marvelous aspects of King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy medallions was that they provided a measure of control over the essence of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

‘Dammit. How could Yang Qi be that strong? No wonder he ended up killing that Crown Prince. He has a God Legion Seal! That also explains why he didn’t take the Crown Prince’s legacy medallion after he killed him: King Immortal-Slayer and the legion of gods are like oil and water. But that raises the question of where that legacy medallion ended up.’

The young man snarled as if he were thinking about devouring Yang Qi’s flesh. After a moment, he regained his composure. ‘In the end, Yang Qi has no idea who I am, whereas I know everything about him. He basks in the light, but I am clad in darkness. It's easy to dodge a spear thrust in the light, but hard to ward off an arrow fired in the darkness. One of these days, he’ll fall into my hands and I’ll take all of his treasures and all of his daoist techniques. Then I’ll force the God Legion Seal and King Immortal-Slayer’s medallion to combine, and create something greater than either of them.’

At this point, a burst of energy appeared as he produced a handful of immortal pills which he used to heal himself and restore his energy.

‘These Heaven-Seizing Good Fortune Immortal Pills are really miraculous,’ he thought. ‘I've found quite a few lovely treasures here in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, all thanks to this legacy medallion. Now I need to get back to my lair and unleash the power of my heaven-defying spell formation to get out of here. The monarch chart is closing soon, so there’s no time to lose.’

He blurred through the spatial labyrinth, until he reached a place that he had altered for his own purposes. He had manipulated the various greyspaces of the labyrinth here to create an enormous spell formation that resembled the azure heavens. It was none other than a manifestation of Operation Azure Heavens, the very same type of spell formation that the Crown Prince had used, although far larger in scope.

‘Those who acquire the legacy of King Immortal-Slayer always benefit from immense good fortune, but eventually perish, to have their energy and destiny absorbed by the medallion, which is then passed on to the next successor. Now that I'm back in this age of energy arts cultivation, I’ll have to reach the Godmyth level before I can return home through space-time. I wonder who ended up with the Crown Prince’s medallion. Most likely, it’s someone in the Yore-Wilds planetary system. It was difficult enough to find the two I have. If I’d had a third, I would definitely have had an advantage against Yang Qi and his broken God Legion Seal.’

With that, he settled down into the spell formation.

There were piles of magical treasures here and there, and even more shocking, there were nine spell formation eyes, out of which jutted nine mammoth tusks. They were enormous, like giant pillars, fully three thousand meters tall and covered with complex carvings, including many instances of the character ‘mammoth’.

They radiated the aura of ancient megamammoths, but at the same time, the aura of dragons. That, and the fact that the designs carved into them also featured dragon motifs, went to indicate that these were actually the tusks of dracomammoths.

They were immortal items, incredibly sharp and bursting with immense power, taken from the corpses of demon-immortal dracomammoths. In other words, they were relics from the corpses of Demolishers.

The young man in yellow had used his legacy medallion to track them down in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, then used them to build his Azure Heavens Grand Spell Formation. That was his way to leave this place.

‘Hopefully Yang Qi ends up stuck in here for the next ten thousand years. He’ll remain at his current cultivation level, and by the time I come back I’ll be able to snuff him out with ease. Very well, the time has come to begin.’

Raising his voice, he said, “Nine Mammoths Shake Heaven and Pierce the Void. Let the Nine Combine!”

He waved his hand, and the nine mammoth tusks began to vibrate, sending powerful fluctuations out into the world junction, causing it to shake violently.

Light shot up from the nine tusks, becoming like heavenly pillars that began to burrow out of the world junction. Slowly but surely, the vital energy of the world junction began to fade, and it soon became possible to see the starry sky of the universe beyond.

‘Such immense power….’ the young man thought as he gasped for breath. ‘Each one of those nine tusks holds incalculable power, power that I shouldn't even be able to wield. Thankfully, I have the Azure Heavens Grand Spell Formation and plenty of immortal stones to burn.’

The mountains of treasures and immortal stones located throughout the spell formation were burning brightly. This level of wealth was what the spell formation required to operate, and was something that only this yellow-garbed young man with the buzz cut could have possibly accumulated in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. And only he would burn them in this fashion.

Unfortunately, there was no other way to power the nine dracomammoth tusks.

**

Yang Qi had been slowly following the traces left behind by the young man in yellow. At a certain point, he sensed a burst of energy up ahead.

“What an intense aura. What is that?” Looking over with his Lord's Eye, he saw the nine mountain-like tusks, a sight so shocking that he initially thought he was hallucinating.

“Those are ancient megamammoths who became dracomammoths. Those tusks come from demon-immortals! As far as I'm concerned, those are even more precious than the corpse of an immortal! If I got those tusks and absorbed them for my own use, then once I get to the Hell of Mahānata my Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth would advance like crazy….”

There didn’t seem any reason not to try to get them, especially if he could simultaneously strike a grievous blow against the young man in yellow.

“Now I’ll use the immortal-slayer’s power to open the monarch chart….” The yellow-garbed young man spat out a mouthful of blood, causing the nine mammoth tusks to begin spinning. At the same time, the piles of immortal stones burned even more brightly.

At that point, the spell formation began to shrink down and rise up into the sky.

“This is our chance!” Yang Qi said.

Chapter 454: A Good Person

‘This guy in yellow really is a good person,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘Yeah, he ambushed me, and ran his mouth quite a bit, but he brought me some really good fortune. Nine mammoth tusks? And from Demolisher dracomammoths? Once I get them, what other cultivators in my level could possibly beat me in a fight? Besides, I can also use them to get out of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.’

He almost couldn’t hold back from just heading over and openly thanking the mysterious young man. Not only was this fellow opening the way to the outside world, but he was also offering a wonderful gift. What other term could be used to describe him other than ‘good person’?

Around this time, the Azure Heavens Grand Spell Formation began to really pulse with power.

“Eternal Heavenly Aria. Hand of the One God!”

WHIZZZ!

As the formation built up its power, Yang Qi drew on all of his energy arts to attack. As he did, he split the power of the Hand of the One God into nine parts, sending one to each spell formation eye. Of course, this was the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, thus the godmammoth energy conformed perfectly to the tusks.

Immediately, a crackle of thunder echoed out. These nine tusks were holy items, the type that ordinary people normally couldn’t use. Even the yellow-garbed young man had only done so by means of King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy medallion, and by burning massive amounts of immortal stones. But Yang Qi was different. As he made contact with the tusks, they absorbed the power of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth and, at the same time, sent a spectacular expression of will into his soul and sea of consciousness.

Inside of himself, he saw the images of nine ancient mammoths, covered with draconic scales. They were dracomammoths, expressions of the will of the very demon-immortals that these tusks had once been part of. And they seemed defiant.

‘Refusing to submit? Your original ancestors, the godmammoths, were created by the legion of gods! Your wills cannot possibly resist me. Acknowledge allegiance!’ A majestic expression of will rose up from his forehead, shattered the wills of the nine mammoth tusks, and added a branding mark from Yang Qi onto them, connecting them to his soul.

In the blink of an eye, the change affected the spell formation.

Mysterious transformations occurred, and the path to the outside world was thrown into chaos. The spell formation suddenly stopped moving and remained hovering there, almost as if it were stuck in the greyspace between the monarch chart and the outside.

“What’s going on? What happened? How is this possible? DAMNATION!” Looking quite flustered, the young man in yellow shot to his feet and looked around at the chaos in the spell formation, which was when he caught sight of Yang Qi and Sword Seventeen, right in the middle of the sixty-square-meter God Legion Paradise.

“It’s you two swine! I've already sworn an oath to end your lives, so I'm going to kill you like the dogs you are. How dare you damage my spell formation! You deserve to die ten thousand deaths!” Howling in rage, he rushed forward as fast as lightning, using King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy medallion, sending out beams of dragon-like immortal light like a tempest of destruction that headed directly toward Yang Qi and Sword Seventeen.

“God Legion Paradise: Superlative Defense!”

The immortal light slammed into the Superlative Defense, and didn’t so much as scratch it.

“You showed up out of nowhere and tried to kill us!” Yang Qi said. “Just consider this tit for tat. I’ll take these nine mammoth tusks of yours. After all, it’s a big waste for you to have things as precious as that. Only I can release their full potential. By the way, I’d like to offer my thanks for all your help. Now I can get out of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart without your spell formation. Godworms, come forth!”

Boom, boom, boom, BOOM!

Successive explosions rang out as Yang Qi wrenched the nine mammoth tusks out of the formation, then shrank them down and tossed them into his God Legion Paradise. At the same time, his two godworms shot out and began digging a wormhole out into the void.

Crack!

The wormhole vanished, and the enormous hole that had been punched into the greyspace quickly healed up.

“Die! Both of you must DIE! My Azure Heavens Grand Spell Formation! Immortal Slayer Medallion: Immortal Slayer’s Power!” In his fury, the yellow-garbed young man spat a mouthful of blood onto the legacy medallion, then shot up into the air and vanished.

As of this moment, Sword Seventeen and Yang Qi were no longer within the world junction, nor were their auras present anywhere in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

Outside, the starry sky looked familiar, and the vital energy was back to normal. There was no interference from the magical laws of space.

Looking around, Sword Seventeen shook his hands out a bit and said, “We’re out? We’re free? No more Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart?”

He waved his hand, and before he realized what was happening, a tempest of spatial power erupted forth, sending out a blast that destroyed a small nearby planet.

“We are. We're out in the mortal world! I can feel power building up inside of me. A tribulation is coming. I'm definitely going to become a Demi-Immortal!”

Sword Seventeen felt like a dragon back in the sea, or a tiger returned to the forest.

Throwing his head back, he laughed uproariously.

“You’re right,” Yang Qi said. But then he sighed. “The only downside is that now we can’t get back into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart for another ten thousand years. We definitely made out like bandits, though. Considering how many primeval godworm eggs we have, we’re definitely the fattest cats in the whole Titan Emperor planetary system.”

“Exactly. A hundred and thirty-eight! Forget the Titan Emperor planetary system. We’d be considered moneybags in the Megaplexus, Coiling Arc, Highest Clarity, and Limitless Violet planetary systems…. Combine all of those places together and we’d still be the top tycoons. That's not even mentioning the imperial snakecharms, the Mourn-Parting Heaven-Palace, and the other treasures we acquired.” Sword Seventeen sighed in admiration. “Thanks to you, Junior Brother, I'm now totally rich.”

“Why don't you wait until we get back to the Invincible Society before you attempt your breakthrough, Elder Brother? Not only will that be safer, but you’ll have an audience. It will definitely serve to impress upon them how incredible our Invincible Society is.”

“Good idea,” Sword Seventeen replied. With that, the two of them looked around. “I wonder where we are. Which planetary system is this? I don’t recognize any of the constellations, and I can’t sense the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, either.”

Without being a Demolisher, there was no way for Yang Qi to determine where the mysterious Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart actually was. And without a point of reference, he had no way to determine his current location.

“Let me see….” Sword Seventeen rifled around in the fold of his robe and then pulled out an astrolabe decorated with a complex, layered assortment of stars, heavenly bodies, and constellations. After studying it for a while, he said, “Well, we’re not in the Coiling Arc planetary system anymore. Looks like we’re in the Gyroscope planetary system. This is a dangerous place that isn’t administered by any heaven in particular. It’s a massive place where humans, devils, demons, ghosts, and the like all mix freely. It's basically a lawless, wild frontier.”

“How far is it from the Titan Emperor planetary system?”

“Far. Very far. There are countless starry seas separating the two. Generally speaking, it would take a Demi-Immortal several years to get here from the Titan Emperor planetary system. Thankfully, we have our primeval godworms. If we create some wormholes, we can probably make the trip back in a few months.”

“That’s a long time,” Yang Qi said. “In that case, maybe we shouldn’t worry about getting back before you break through. You could theoretically just face your tribulation here. My main worry is that the fluctuations might attract attention. And what would happen if some monster found us that we couldn’t deal with? That’s not to mention that I still need to get into the Hell of Mahānata somehow.”

“No, we need to get back as quickly as possible. The Gyroscope planetary system is not a good place to be.” Sword Seventeen seemed to be taking the matter very seriously. “The biggest demon-devil organization here is the fabled Devil Sauvastika Assembly, which has Universal and Paragon Demi-Immortal devils. If they find out that we’re in possession of primeval godworm eggs, we're dead for sure.”

“Oh? They definitely sound like bad people.” Yang Qi opened his Lord's Eye and looked out into the field of heavenly bodies, and could immediately see that the area was rife with devil energy.

Unfortunately, the stars and heavenly bodies seemed to go on without end, making it impossible to see anything clearly after a certain point.

However, there was one thing he was certain of. The depths of this planetary system contained a host of planets that were arranged in an enormous spell formation that resembled the character ‘卍’.

‘The Devil Sauvastika Assembly….’ Yang Qi thought, committing the name to memory.

“Let’s go!” Neither Yang Qi nor Sword Seventeen had any desire to stick around in a place like this. Producing their primeval godworms, they burrowed wormholes through the spatial tempests and headed in the direction of the Titan Emperor planetary system.

However, just when they were about to vanish, an enormous hand appeared a short distance away. It was pitch black, with a bright red sauvastika character in the palm, and it headed toward Yang Qi and Sword Seventeen with lightning speed!

The fingers were hundreds of thousands of kilometers long, and they shot through the void as if it were dirt, destroying tiny planets along the way.

The hand closed and retracted, empty. At that point, a terrifying voice spoke out. “Who were they? I definitely sensed the aura of a godworm! How did they escape me? Look into the matter immediately! The Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart appeared recently. Did some godworms escape from it? With a godworm, I would finally have hope of reaching the Demolishing level!”

Chapter 455: Devil Sauvastika Assembly

The enormous hand completely ignored the power and strength of space, crushing it like tofu or mud, yet it didn’t snag Yang Qi and Sword Seventeen. After the initial reaction of rage, cracking sounds could be heard as the hand shrank down into a humanoid shape. From its aura alone, it was obvious that it wasn’t human.

It appeared to be an extremely attractive woman, even seductive, but with a cold, vicious aura. She had long, graceful eyebrows and almond-shaped eyes, with bright-red lips and pure white teeth. A bright red sauvastika could be seen on her forehead, pulsing with a power that seemed capable of entrancing the soul of anyone who looked at it.

“I have to get that primeval godworm! Even if I have to track it to the ends of the earth, it's mine!”

The seductive demon-devil took a step forward and vanished into thin air as she attempted to track Yang Qi and Sword Seventeen.

Surprisingly, she was actually a clone made from vital energy. That said, she was still immensely powerful, being an eighth order Universal Demi-Immortal. The eighth order specialized in observing the rotations of the universe, and, as such, could destroy cosmoses, perform dramatic teleportations, and were invincible even to the sun and moon.

“That was some powerful demon-devil just now,” Sword Seventeen said.

The God Legion Paradise was now the size of a fist, and it shot along like a speeding bullet. Back in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, Yang Qi had learned to use the power of the godworm and its wormholes to traverse space-time labyrinths. The spatial laws of the mortal world were like children's toys, compared to those in the monarch chart.

Therefore, there was little need to even mention the ease with which he could travel in the mortal world.

Space-time tempests and distorted energy fields were no problem, nor were the even rarer phenomena, such as interstellar tempests, primeval hurricanes, yin-yang magnetic fields, and the like.

Demi-Immortals in the third, fourth, and fifth orders would fear the naturally occurring black holes, white holes, and the rarer oblivion holes. There were also ancient pockets of baleful energy or killing intent that could grab Demi-Immortals and kill them. That was why most Demi-Immortals would never dare to travel directly between planetary systems. Of course, Great Sages were even more at risk and could be killed without a moment’s notice.

But Yang Qi didn’t even need to pay attention to such things.

“It seems we were spotted by the Devil Sauvastika Assembly,” Yang Qi said, “and now we’re being followed. Luckily, you didn’t start your tribulation, otherwise we would have been dead.”

Yang Qi was keeping an eye on what was happening behind them and had noticed how space seemed to be collapsing, as if from the passage of a powerful expert. The Gyroscope planetary system was really turning out to be dangerous.

“I wonder who it is,” Sword Seventeen said, his eyes flickering with a ferocious gleam. “If it’s a clone, maybe we can team up and take him out, whoever he is. Absorb his power.”

“That’s too risky,” Yang Qi replied. “It would definitely take a Universal Demi-Immortal to lock on to us so quickly after we arrived. Even if it’s only a clone, we might not be able to get the upper hand. Right now, a fight between us and a seventh order Revered Demi-Immortal would end in a draw. We definitely need to get out of the Gyroscope planetary system before we decide what to do next. Come on, let’s speed up. Time to call on my primal-chaos elder-snake!”

He exhaled some vital energy that transformed into twenty-eight imperial snakecharms, which then took the shape of a primal-chaos elder-snake. With that additional power, the God Legion Paradise accelerated to a speed multiple times greater than before.

As they passed along, the imperial snakecharms devoured the space in front of and around them, leaving an empty gulch in their wake.

As the chase went on, Yang Qi focused on the nine mammoth tusks, continuing to absorb their true energy, and the godmammoth blood locked in the complex lineaments on their surface. Considering these tusks came from ancient demon-immortals, it was obvious that they surpassed the quality of anything from August Patriarch Mammoth Heaven or any of his ilk, such as Mammoth Manyvoids. If Yang Qi could fully absorb all of the quintessence-blood, it would lead to untold advancement with his cultivation.

He inhaled deeply, and one of the tusks floated over to him and broke out into sagefire. Strands of quintessence energy began flowing off of the surface of the tusk and mixing into Yang Qi’s true energy. Before long, his true energy was pulsing with explosive, deadly power.

WHIZZZ!

As streams of power coursed through him, the particles within him began trembling, then finally exploded into growth and transformation.

Before, he had reached a limit of one hundred million dracomammoths. But with the demon-immortal godpower of these mammoth tusks, more particles were waking up.

One million. Two million. Three million…. Ten million. Fifty million….

One hundred million!

It took about an hour for Yang Qi to absorb most of the godpower from the mammoth tusk and awaken even more megamammoth power within him. He was now at the level of two hundred million!

Unfortunately, the new batch of one hundred million contained only megamammoths. There were no dracomammoths; they would require time and the nutrients of the Blood of the One God.

The demon-immortal godpower from the tusks was extremely pure, meaning that fully absorbing it was very difficult.

“Nine Tusks of Truth; Hellfire Crucible; Eternal Heavenly Aria; Fist of the Halls of Heaven; Hand of the One God….” Yang Qi used all sorts of methods to draw on the tusk and send its power into his Hellfire Crucible. Thanks to the influx, he became almost like a storage tank for true energy, to the point where it seemed unlikely that he would ever run out of it in a fight.

Unfortunately, it would still take some more time to fully break down the tusks and absorb their vital energy. In fact, he would likely have to wait until he was a Demi-Immortal. After all, he was still just a measly second step Great Sage.

Soon, the Dark True Void was just ahead. However, that was when a voice rang out.

“Sauvastika Devil Overhead; Devil Shakes the Nine Provinces!”

All of a sudden a host of monsters descended from above, as well as an enormous sauvastika character powered by a devil embryo. Leading them was a bewitchingly charming woman.

She was the one who had been chasing Yang Qi, and at the moment it wasn't certain who exactly she represented. However, the blood-red sauvastika on her forehead seemed to tug at the souls and quintessence energy of both Yang Qi and Sword Seventeen.

“Where might the two of you be running off to?” she asked. “I'm the third-ranking assembly chief of the Devil Sauvastika Assembly. Call me Dreamy Smoke. Where are you from? I can sense the power of primeval godworms on you. Why don’t you come to our headquarters for a chat?”

‘A monstress? Dreamy Smoke?’ Yang Qi could immediately tell that this woman was incomparably powerful, all the way down to her substructure. She was definitely the type of person who was not to be trifled with.

As for Sword Seventeen, he shivered and said, “Dreamy Smoke? You mean Queen Dream-Devil?”

“Oh? You’ve heard of me, boy?” She suddenly seemed to be very interested in Sword Seventeen.

Lowering his voice to keep the conversation private, Sword Seventeen explained, “She’s nobody to take lightly, Junior Brother. Even in ancient times, her name was feared in many important planetary systems. She started out as a dream-devil from the Hell of Nightmares. During her path of cultivation, she fused with an immortal devil and acquired a human body. It’s impossible to say how many enemies have fallen to her. The truth is that it’s extremely unlucky on our part to have run into her.”

Then he looked at Dreamy Smoke, raised his voice, and said, “Senior, you’re a very famous person, so of course I've heard of you. You’re the primeval Queen Dream-Devil, with the most noble of blood. Surely you won’t cause trouble for two youngsters like us. By the way, you might have heard of our Master. In fact, maybe you’re even friends with him.”

Queen Dream-Devil frowned slightly. “Your Master? And who is he?”

“The Invincible Dugu,” Sword Seventeen said. “Ever heard of him? I'm his seventeenth disciple, and this is his eighteenth. We just got out of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, and were called by Master to check in and give our report. Senior, I really hope you won’t cause any delays for us. We’re just following orders, after all.”

“The Invincible Dugu?” she replied, visibly shocked. “You’re his disciples?”

“Indeed we are.” Sword Seventeen waved his hand, causing a bit of true energy to flow out that slowly took the shape of an Invincible Heart. “This is my Master’s godly-class energy art, the Prodigious Proto-Epoch, Invincible War-Steppe….”

As of this moment, Queen Dream-Devil had no doubts in her mind at all. The Invincible Dugu wasn’t just famous in the Titan Emperor Collegium. He was known in many planetary systems. All of the top figures knew that killing one of his disciples would arouse his wrath and could lead to entire clans being wiped out of existence.

Despite that, Queen Dream-Devil couldn’t get over the fact that these two young men had godworm auras on them….

Chapter 456: A Deal

The Invincible Dugu was known throughout the universe as an eccentric and extraordinary individual. At least in the mortal world, his mere name could shake the hearts of countless old-timers and luminary leaders of men. Throughout the years, he had killed gods and slaughtered buddhas, and had campaigned in so many wars it was impossible to count them all. In all the battles he had fought, he had never encountered an opponent who could defeat him. He had never lost. He had even fought banished immortals from heaven and come out on top. To most people, he was literally invincible, a person who no one could ever vanquish in a fight.

Even the Devil Sauvastika Assembly from the Gyroscope planetary system knew of him.

To Great Sages, the weakest of Demi-Immortals were incredibly powerful. But eighth order Demi-Immortals could contemplate the rotations of the universe, and were far beyond such weaker individuals.

Therefore, the truly consummate experts generally knew each other, no matter how far apart they were. Most of them had had dealings with each other, even if it was in the remote past, and knew something of each other's energy arts and level of strength. Obviously, this Queen Dream-Devil knew how strong the Invincible Dugu was, and realized that not even the entire Devil Sauvastika Assembly was strong enough to take him on.

Yang Qi looked on silently, aware of what this monstress’ clone was thinking.

At the moment, fighting her wasn’t an option. Perhaps if he could get into the Hell of Mahānata and rise to the Demi-Immortal level, he might be able to take her on. But not now. After a moment of thought, an idea occurred to him.

“Queen Dream-Devil,” he said, “you probably want to get a primeval godworm, right? If you got one, you would gain enlightenment of the godly laws of space and would have a chance to become an immortal Demolisher. So why don’t the two of us work out a deal?”

“Oh? What kind of deal?”

“I happen to have this godworm egg that I acquired in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.” He pulled an egg out to show her. “I originally planned to give it to Master, for him to use with his upcoming breakthrough. But Master said he didn’t need it, therefore I was thinking of turning it in and exchanging it for some treasures, medicinal pills, and blessings from the elder kings. However, if you really need it, then how about I give it to you in fair trade? Just name your price.”

Obviously, he was trying to buy time to get to the point where she wasn’t a threat to him.

“So, you do have a godworm egg!” she said, her eyes sparkling as she looked at it. Her first instinct was to take it with force, but then she thought about the Invincible Dugu and put such thoughts aside. “You want to ‘work out a deal’ with me, huh? Apparently the two of you don't know how I do things. I don’t do business, I slaughter people! If I want something from someone, I kill them and take it. And when I take lives, I cut the weeds and eliminate the roots by killing everyone they know! I have a different suggestion. How about the two of you give me that egg as a gift. I won’t haggle, and in fact I’ll owe you a favor in the future.”

Yang Qi burst out laughing. “Nice one. So I'm supposed to take this priceless godworm egg, an object worth more than countless planets put together, something that you can’t even buy in your planetary system, something that surpasses the value of spirit stones or immortal stones, something more valuable than hundreds of thousands of immortal items, and just give it to you? Nice plan, but sorry to say, NO. Come on, Sword Seventeen, let’s go. That’s the Dark True Void up ahead, and once we get into it, she won't be able to do a thing to us. She can do whatever she wants, here in the Gyroscope planetary system, but once we get into another planetary system, her aura will instantly attract the attention of the top experts there and they’ll definitely slaughter her.”

With that, Yang Qi and Sword Seventeen took to flight, and within moments they were on the edge of the Dark True Void.

When Yang Qi and Sword Seventeen entered another planetary system, it wouldn’t attract much attention. But Queen Dream-Devil was different. She was a Universal Demi-Immortal, which meant that her comings and goings would definitely be noticed.

“You’re not going anywhere!” Queen Dream-Devil shouted angrily, sending out a spatial sealing mark formed from an enormous sauvastika character. Before it could lock the area down, Yang Qi sent out nine streaks of white light that resembled mountain peaks, which slammed into the sauvastika and shattered it. Then he and Sword Seventeen disappeared into the Dark True Void.

“Damnation!” Queen Dream-Devil immediately chased them into the Dark True Void. And yet, even as days passed, she couldn't catch up. Before long, the Dark True Void parted, revealing another planetary system, a place that abounded with immortal energy and was filled with incredibly beautiful scenery.

‘The Pure Brightness planetary system!’ Queen Dream-Devil thought, and she immediately hid her aura. As she well knew, the Pure Brightness planetary system was a holy land of cultivation, populated entirely by human cultivators. They were staunchly opposed to the Devil Sauvastika Assembly from the Gyroscope planetary system and, in fact, often warred with them.

Queen Dream-Devil had no choice but to keep her tail between her legs here, lest she start a major conflict.

At this point, Yang Qi turned and laughed loudly. “We’re in the Pure Brightness planetary system now, Queen Dream-Devil. The people here hate your Devil Sauvastika Assembly. So now what? Considering the speeds I'm capable of, and the fact that you're a clone, there’s no way you can catch up to me here. Why don’t we make a deal? It would be really annoying to have you stalking us all over the place.”

“You still want to make a deal?” she asked. “What do you want? Tell me.”

“Nothing really. I'm not interested in magical treasures, immortal items, immortal skills, or even heavenly-class energy arts. In fact, my Master is going to give me a godly-class energy art, so not even something like that could tempt me. How about you promise to accomplish three tasks for me? If you do, the godworm egg is yours.”

“Three tasks?” Queen Dream-Devil said. “What if you ask me to do something impossible? I'm not that easy to fool, brat.”

“I'm not trying to fool you. You want something that belongs to me, and you don't have any way to pay for it. Besides, I can guarantee that whatever I ask you to do will be possible, given the level of your cultivation base. How about I give you a messaging talisman, and when I'm back in the Titan Emperor planetary system, I’ll send you a message and you’ll come in your true form? I promise that it will be within a year. And after the three tasks are accomplished, I’ll give you the godworm egg.”

“A year?” Queen Dream-Devil’s expression softened a bit. “I can wait a year. How about I convert this clone of mine into a talisman that you can just take with you? When it comes time to summon my true self, I can use my Nine-Heavens Ten-Earths Demon-Devil Dao to reach you wherever you are.”

With that, Queen Dream-Devil's clone dissolved into streams of vital energy that converged together to form a devil talisman with a sauvastika character on it. It almost looked like it was made from seas of blood and a host of vengeful souls and baleful energy.

The devil talisman floated over to Yang Qi, who grabbed it.

As soon as it touched his hand, he could sense that the immense level of power inside was something that he couldn’t absorb or refine. Obviously it wasn’t just a messaging talisman. It could be used to watch over him as well.

However, he didn't care. Now he had the option of using Queen Dream-Devil to help him. For example, she might be able to open a passage to the Hell of Mahānata. Or what if he had to deal with conspirators in the Titan Emperor Collegium?

After the deal was made, Yang Qi felt more at ease. With that, he and Sword Seventeen resumed their journey. Thanks to their relatively low level, they didn’t attract any attention.

The trip took roughly three months, and they passed through all sorts of planetary systems. It really opened up their view of the universe, and they saw numerous amazing sights. For example, there was one planetary system that consisted of an enormous tree, the fruits of which were the planets that the cultivators lived on. It was called the Swaying Leaves planetary system.

There was another planetary system that was an ocean, with islands the size of planets. That was the Origin Water planetary system.

There was one system that had a sun in the middle of it. The entire place was a sea of flames that was so intense no humans could live there. There were only fire-type demon-devils, and flame giants who were natural-born cultivators. That was the Raging Flames planetary system.

Then there was the Profound Ice planetary system. It consisted of hundreds of billions of planets, all made from ice. Even divine weapons and magical swords that entered it would freeze and crumble into dust. However, it was the perfect place for cultivators with frigid yin physiques. In fact, the place abounded with all sorts of cultivation sects.

There was another place called the Metallic Gold planetary system, where every single planet was made from gold.

In addition to such fantastic places, there were also ordinary planetary systems. After going through so many new locations, Yang Qi thought of a common expression. In the chiliocosm of worlds, there is no lack of strange things.

Being able to observe so many different worlds was also a source of much enlightenment. After all, reading thousands of books is not as useful as traveling for thousands of miles.

Eventually, their journey brought them to the Central Planetary River and the Titan Emperor Collegium. It was just as prosperous and bustling as before, with students going in and out and a buzz of activity everywhere.

Of course, both Yang Qi and Sword Seventeen were mere consecrated students, which gave them a relatively low rank in the collegium as a whole. Only the fact that they were members of the Invincible Society gave them a bit of status.

Upon catching sight of the collegium, Yang Qi sighed and said, “The time has come for me to truly become a dragon and reach the highest heights.”

Chapter 457: Elysian Children

Yang Qi had plenty of work to do now that he was back.

He needed to get to the greyspace of the Hell of Mahānata, that most ancient and grand of hells.

He was currently a Nirvanic Resurrection Sage, with soul enlightenment of the Demi-Immortal level. As soon as he had access to the magnificent power of the Hell of Mahānata, he would achieve a whole string of breakthroughs.

Once he was a Demi-Immortal, all eight hundred forty million megamammoth particles within him would wake up and transform into dracomammoths. At that point, not even Universal Demi-Immortals would be able to cause problems for him. In the Titan Emperor Collegium, Universal Demi-Immortals were either famous elder kings or the highest-ranked students, elysian children.

The student ranks of freshman, common, consecrated, and elite were considered low. Above them were the noble students, who were divided into mountainous, sealike, earthly, and heavenly. Obviously, the mountainous noble students were the lowest in that category, yet even they were people who no one took lightly. The sealike and earthly noble students had immense power, and heavenly students generally participated in devising the important strategies and plans of the societies they belonged to.

Above the noble students were the royal students, who had the subcategories of celestial, terrestrial, universal, and aeonic. The celestial and terrestrial ranks came with the requirement of being at least a Demi-Immortal. As for the universal rank, those were for second, third, fourth, and fifth order Demi-Immortals.

As for the aeonic royal students, they were sixth and seventh order Demi-Immortals.

Above them all, and the highest level of all for students, were the elysian children, who were eighth order Universal Demi-Immortals. Considering that neither Yang Qi nor Sword Seventeen were Demi-Immortals yet, it was only natural that they were ranked low in the Titan Emperor Collegium. In fact, in terms of seniority, they were nobodies.

With their consecrated student uniforms, they entered the collegium with little fanfare or ado.

Just as they prepared to hurry back to the Invincible Society to see if any of their Elder Brothers and Sisters had returned, voices rose up ahead of them.

“Step the hell off to the side!”

Soon, teams of students became visible, all of them wearing the uniform of the Hall of Beheadings and Executions, and as they walked down the street they shoved the other students off to the side. They looked almost like soldiers from the mortal world.

It was quite a scene as numerous common, consecrated, and elite students scrambled to get out of their way. Of course, Yang Qi and Sword Seventeen were among those ordinary students.

“Some high-ranking students must be about to come out of seclusion,” Sword Seventeen said with a disdainful shake of his head. “Do they really need to put on such a ridiculous show? Come on, let’s just keep going. We might rank low in the Titan Emperor Collegium, but this spectacle has nothing to do with our Invincible Society.”

However, as they prepared to continue on, they found that the actual path leading to the Invincible Society was being blocked by a large group of mountainous noble students, most of them grouped into smaller squads of three to five students. The squads were keeping a close eye on the area, and any students who dared to get close would end up being cursed, or even attacked with energy arts.

In that same moment, a voice spoke from an unknown location, causing everything to tremble. “Seventeen aeonic royal students of the Hegemon’s Society, who have been in secluded meditation for three thousand years, will be emerging in seven days’ time. Everything within one hundred and fifty thousand kilometers of the Hegemon’s Society will be locked down during that time to prevent unexpected monster invasions. All students will remain indoors and refrain from going out. On the authority of this elder king command medallion, we will kill any students who cause problems!”

“What?” Sword Seventeen said, his brow furrowing with anger. “Locked down for seven days?”

Yang Qi looked over at the group of noble students standing there as though they owned the world. “What exactly is going on here?” he said. “They want to lock the Invincible Society down for seven days? Are they feeling suicidal?”

Walking directly toward the nearby noble students, Sword Seventeen said. “We’re proceeding whether you like it or not. Which of you dares to block our way?!”

Yang Qi joined him.

The Titan Emperor Collegium had countless buildings and structures, all of which were bolstered by spell formations. It was almost impossible to determine how many millions upon millions of kilometers the collegium occupied. In fact, it actually contained multiple planes of existence. Its streets stretched for hundreds of kilometers and were flanked by palaces, buildings, corridors and the like. It was like an immortal realm. To people from the mortal world, even Lifeseizers and Legendaries, this place really was a heavenly palace. Yet, tens of thousands of kilometers of streets were being locked down by the Hegemon’s Society.

Seeing that Yang Qi and Sword Seventeen were walking toward them, the three mountainous noble students flew forward to stand directly in their path.

“What gall!” one of them shouted. “Where are you two from, you puny consecrated students? We're locking this place down in preparation for an important ceremony. The only people who will cause problems here are those who are tired of living!”

Considering their rank, these students were definitely eighth step Great Sages, or perhaps even ninth step. They were nearly Demi-Immortals, thus they stared down their noses at Yang Qi and Sword Seventeen with open sneers.

“Drop to your knees and beg for mercy, then screw the hell off. You two are really courting death to even show up in this place.”

Not even waiting for Yang Qi and Sword Seventeen to comply, one of the ninth step noble students laughed and waved his sleeve, sending out an explosive tempest filled with wind sabers, swords, axes, and the like. Unexpectedly, it was a heavenly-class energy art!

“Strength of the Tempestuous Sky!”

“Get the hell out of my way!” Sword Seventeen said, sending out a stream of sword energy. From the outside, he looked like an eighth step Great Sage, but the truth was that he was already strong enough to kill second order Demi-Immortals.

Swish!

His sword sliced right through the tempest and cut the noble student in half.

“Aaaiiiieee!” the student screamed. His two halves wriggled back together and began stitching back into one, yet Sword Seventeen’s sword light was not the ordinary type. It had a sharpness that could harm even Demi-Immortals!

Before the two halves could unite, flames burst out and engulfed the noble student, who screamed for a moment before being transformed into ash.

A famous noble student had been cut in half and burned to death by Sword Seventeen!

The other two noble students were visibly terrified. Lunging backward, they began to cry for help.

“How dare you kill someone here! Ambush!”

“They must be punished! Notify the Hall of Beheadings and Executions! Tell them that two puny consecrated students just dared to murder a noble student! This is outrageous!”

“Punish us? I'm curious who would dare to try! We're from the Invincible Society! I'm the seventeenth disciple, and this is the eighteenth. How dare you block our path back to our society! You want to punish us? Fine! In fact, that’s wonderful! We’ll wait for the Hall of Beheadings and Executions to come find us in the Invincible Society. Sound good? I really can’t wait to see who will dare to come ‘punish’ us.” Turning to Yang Qi, he said, “Come on, let’s go.”

With that, they strolled onward to the Invincible Society. No one got in their way, nor did anyone even speak to them.

Of course, there were plenty of onlookers who were already discussing the incident amongst themselves.

“I heard that the disciples from the Invincible Society were all trapped in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. The chart already vanished into the depths of the void, and isn't supposed to be back for another ten thousand years. How did those two find their way out?”

“That Sword Seventeen is a fiendish, vicious sword devil, and Yang Qi is a complete monster. You know, when he joined the collegium he broke the rules and actually killed some mutant human experts.”

“They’re definitely vicious fiends. It's no wonder they dared to openly kill a noble student. But you know, it might come back to bite them. Think about it. The Hegemon’s Society is one of the most mysterious societies in the Titan Emperor Collegium. They’re a lot more powerful than anyone realizes, with over a billion common students as members, and who knows how many freshman students. This whole thing is happening because seventeen of their aeonic students are coming out of seclusion after three thousand years. There are definitely a few of them who achieved breakthroughs to the eighth order. As Universal Demi-Immortals, they’ll become elysian children and receive rewards from the immortal world. They aren’t the type of people you can just casually disrespect.”

“Well, this is going to be a fun show, that’s for sure. The Invincible Society really went overboard this time, especially considering there are only two of them. People say that the Invincible Dugu is in the depths of the universe, trying to achieve his next breakthrough, so he's obviously not coming back any time soon. And their Eldest Brother is in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, so he can’t help them. The Invincible Society is really weak right now. Why would they go and act so overbearing?”

“That’s what I was thinking. Well, let’s wait and see what happens. Things are definitely about to get interesting.”

There was already a buzz among the students. Some were talking about how arrogant the Hegemon’s Society was, but others hated how overbearing the Invincible Society acted. Either way, just about everyone wanted to see the two societies come to blows.

**

The Invincible Society was cold and empty, like it usually was. There were no servants or staff, just empty courtyards and rooms. It almost seemed like a ghost town. That said, the defensive spell formations were set up by the enigmatic Invincible Dugu and Eldest Brother, therefore no one could possibly break through them.

Outside the entrance, Sword Seventeen produced a paper talisman, which he placed on the enormous slab stone that served as a front gate. The door opened, revealing a minor world that served as the interior of the Invincible Society. The two entered and closed the door behind them. Everything went completely silent.

“Whew!” Sword Seventeen said, breathing a sigh of relief. Now that they were actually in the Invincible Society, the warding magics would keep them safe. They were home.

“Now we can work on our cultivation without any fear of interference.”

Chapter 458: Mahanata Greyspace

Curious, Yang Qi reached out to observe the Invincible Society’s warding magics and was immediately shocked at how powerful they were.

The way they rotated and operated was profoundly enigmatic, and they were clearly deadly. Just getting near them filled one’s mind with the howling of ghosts and the wailing of gods. No one would ever dare to challenge formations like that.

All of the societies in the Titan Emperor Collegium had defensive spell formations that made their headquarters like impregnable fortresses. The collegium was sort of like an empire, with the societies being feudal cities that had the right to fight and even kill rivals.

Now that he was actually within the confines of the Invincible Society, Yang Qi felt safe; even safer than he felt when he was back in the Sage Monarch Continent. Back there, fifth, sixth, seventh, and even eighth order Demi-Immortals would die before breaching the defenses of the continent. After all, his mother was there to watch over things. Here in the Invincible Society, though, not even ninth order Demi-Immortals would be able to breach the defenses.

There could be no safer place to challenge tribulations and work on cultivation.

This was the Invincible Dugu’s lair.

“Finally, we can focus on cultivation,” Yang Qi said. “Good luck on your heavenly tribulation, Elder Brother. I'm going to set up a spell formation and see if I can get to the Hell of Mahānata.”

“I should be fine, Junior Brother. Once I break through to the Demi-Immortal level, I’ll be able to use my increase in strength to help you.”

“Just focus on your work,” Yang Qi replied. “I'm familiar enough with how the spell formations here work that I can use their power to help me. I should be able to make my journey through the planes without any problems.”

Yang Qi hadn’t been a member of the Invincible Society for very long, but his Elder Second Brother had explained all of the spell formations to him earlier—including the teleportation portals. There was even a Void-Piercing Immortal Formation, which was designed for interplanar travel.

If he could become a high-level Demi-Immortal, such as a Universal Demi-Immortal, then there was another formation that he could use to return to the Invincible Society whenever he wanted. It was the Retrosummoning God Formation, which the Invincible Dugu had created by means of a taboo technique from an immortal world.

“Alright, Junior Brother. I know that your abilities surpass mine by far. I’ll get to work. Good luck with everything.” With that, Sword Seventeen entered one particular formation, sat down cross-legged, and activated it. That formation could create its own minor world that was able to connect with outside powers, including the immortal worlds above. It was another immortal formation created by the Invincible Dugu, called the Nine Firmaments Soaring Clouds Formation.

It was the perfect option for disciples who needed to face tribulations. The way that it absorbed the vital energy of heavenly tribulations made them much easier to successfully pass, and would also result in a much more stable cultivation base afterward.

The Invincible Society had all sorts of unique and powerful formations, which was a testament to how incredible the Invincible Dugu was.

Almost as soon as Sword Seventeen settled down, thunder rumbled and lightning took the shape of sabers, swords, spears, cudgels, axes, lances, hooks, and tridents. As they smashed into him, it initially seemed like he would be killed. But then he took a deep breath, inhaling the tribulation and using it to temper himself.

This was the tribulation of the Epic Saga Step, which was still a far cry from the Demi-Immortal level.

It took only a moment for Yang Qi to confirm that Sword Seventeen would have no trouble passing the tribulation, then he went further into the depths of the Invincible Society until he found the spell formation he was looking for.

“Heaven’s Equal Grand Formation!” It was surrounded by jutting mountain peaks that seemed to reach so high they were on the same level as heaven. This was yet another spell formation, created by the Invincible Dugu for the purpose of allowing his disciples to reach other planes to further their cultivation.

If powered to its limit by a Demi-Immortal it could send one to a relatively low-level hell such as the Hell of Euphoria, allowing the disciple to hunt fiend-devils for training, to cultivate their nascent divinity, or to hunt for devil cores.

Unfortunately, it wasn’t suitable for traveling to mighty places like the Hell of Mahānata.

However, Yang Qi had come prepared. As soon as he stepped into the Heaven's Equal Grand Formation, he reached out and connected to his immortal clone in the Sage Monarch Continent.

“Open!” Instantly, the formation opened up a space-time wormhole.

Reaching into the God Legion Paradise, he grabbed the physically dead corpse of Grand Emperor Rich-Lush and tossed it into the wormhole.

A moment later the corpse appeared in the Yore-Wilds planetary system, and the Sage Monarch Continent. From the depths of the Sage Monarch Continent, an enormous hand of primal-chaos energy emerged, which grabbed Grand Emperor Rich-Lush.

“Stop!” Grand Emperor Rich-Lush shrieked. “You can’t treat me like this, Yang Qi! I’ll be your slave! I’ll do anything you want. Don’t sacrifice me like this. Link me to the continent and I’ll tell you how the immortal formation works. You can go right to the immortal world above!”

“No thanks,” Yang Qi and his clone replied in unison. “Absorbing you and taking your memories will be a lot more beneficial.”

Without further ado, he destroyed Grand Emperor Rich-Lush and buried him in the depths of the continent.

RUMBLE!

Instantly, the continent and its essence began changing again. Sagelight erupted from deep within, transforming into what looked like an ancient god, ready to stand guard patiently and defend all the lands.

All of a sudden, an ancient immortal formation within the continent activated.

‘So, it’s just like he said. There really is an immortal formation hidden in there. Well, King Langya, I guess you’re next.’

RUMBLE!

King Langya’s corpse flew out and entered the Sage Monarch Continent.

Yet again, dramatic transformations occurred.

After all, Yang Qi had collected numerous Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragments, and now he had the power necessary to use them.

It only took a glance for Yang Qi to identify the immortal formation’s function, now that it was fully activated.

‘So, it’s a Hell-Piercing Reincarnation Formation!’ As it turned out, when the Yore-Wilds Continent was fighting the Hell of Euphoria, the top experts had created a spell formation for the purpose of traveling to hell to wage war.

Yang Qi’s true self was in the Invincible Society, and his clone was in the Sage Monarch Continent. But with the Heaven's Equal Grand Formation, and the Hell-Piercing Reincarnation Formation, he had the power to pierce the boundless void and create a world junction.

‘It’s working! I should be able to use this new world junction, along with the power of my godworm, to get to the Hell of Mahānata! As for how to return afterward, well, I guess I’ll have to cross that bridge when I come to it. Considering I should be a Demi-Immortal by then, it shouldn’t be too difficult.’

He stood up and vanished, and when he reappeared he was in the world junction that had just been created. This world junction was a passageway that Yang Qi could only create with immense amounts of power, based on everything he had learned while in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

Upon entering it, he began to tremble from the sheer levels of power. Then, he used the godworm to harness the power of both spell formations and pierce through multiple planes of existence. As the massive force began propelling him forward, he could already sense the Hell of Mahānata.

Smack!

Before he knew what was happening, he slammed into a golden barrier.

It was impossible to tell how thick it was, and it made a booming sound like a bell when he hit it. Looking around, he realized that he was on the greyspace of the Hell of Mahānata.

It was enormous, seemingly never ending. At a single glance, it was obvious that this place was bigger than the Titan Emperor planetary system, the Megaplexus planetary system, the Coiling Arc planetary system… and even more such planetary systems all put together. Compared to the Hell of Mahānata, such things were like drops of water in the ocean.

A hundred million of the Titan Emperor planetary systems wouldn’t match up, and, in fact, even the Titan Emperor Heaven was like nothing more than a village in comparison.

Most immortals had no idea how large the Hell of Mahānata actually was. And now that Yang Qi was on its greyspace, he realized that there was definitely no way he could break through it. It was even stronger than the greyspace of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart!

But he had a primeval godworm! Without any hesitation, he sent the godworm at work eating away at the greyspace.

“Mammoth tusks!”

At the same time, he drew on his mammoth tusks to help fuel the godworm, and also summoned his primal-chaos elder-snake and all of the energy of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.

Bzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz!

A tiny hole appeared in the greyspace, little more than the prick of a needle.

RUMBLE!

Even as Yang Qi entered the Hell of Mahānata’s greyspace, it reacted, rapidly sealing the tiny hole behind him. As of this moment, Yang Qi was actually trapped inside the greyspace! He didn’t even have time to try to jump back out.

‘No way…’ he thought. Already, he could feel spatial godpower pushing onto him, suffocating him.

‘Well, I'm not dead yet. I refuse to believe I can’t get through this greyspace!’ It was a dangerous moment. He had no idea how thick the greyspace was, and there was always the possibility that he could get halfway through and then run out of vital energy. If that happened, he would end up as a desiccated corpse, stuck in the greyspace. Yet he knew what he had to do.

Chapter 459: Very, Very Hard

Bzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz!

Yang Qi was like a needle piercing into the greyspace of the Hell of Mahānata. He had shrunk the God Legion Paradise down as far as it would go and was using the power of two primeval godworms to devour the space in front of him.

The spatial power at play was incredible. Even the godworms found the dark golden devil energy here to be formidable, and that was with Yang Qi helping with his Hellfire Crucible. Thankfully, the nine demon-immortal mammoth tusks in his sea of energy provided him with a seemingly inexhaustible source of true energy. The work was unprecedentedly tiring.

Yang Qi was soon deep into the greyspace, but he was already exhausted. Every moment that passed felt like a life-or-death battle.

Even worse was the pressure weighing down on him. Based on his calculations, even a sixth order Prime Demi-Immortal in this situation would already be dead, consumed by the greyspace itself. The only thing that was keeping him going was the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.

However, he was making progress. And, in some ways, it was beneficial, with his true energy receiving incredible tempering and his nascent divinity growing stronger. Also, the fact that his nascent divinity was ensconced in this hell had ensured that the forces of expulsion being levied against him were less than they would be for other cultivators.

Days passed. Yang Qi allowed himself to grow a bit larger, and the godworms were working faster than ever. Yet the greyspace was no less tough than before.

Yang Qi felt like a mortal man trying to move a mountain by scooping out one handful of dirt at a time.

RUMBLE!

Suddenly, the greyspace stirred, sending streams of devil energy to pierce into the God Legion Paradise. His godworms let out piercing screams as the devil energy entered them, causing scales to ripple out over their surfaces as though they were about to be devilized.

“Eternal Heavenly Aria! Be Blessed!”

Halos sprang up around the godworms, driving out the devil energy. Meanwhile, Yang Qi summoned his Infernal Deity Spear and began to personally dig at the greyspace.

Gasping for breath, he sent some blood into the godworms and, at the same time, drew on power from the nine mammoth tusks.

He was very lucky to have those mammoth tusks; without them, he would never have gotten this far. After all, they were the remains of dead Demolishers.

The mammoth tusks vibrated, and his mammoth particles stirred as though they might experience another breakthrough. In the blink of an eye, Yang Qi began piercing through the greyspace even faster.

At the same time, his nascent divinity ensconcement mark seemed to be growing stronger.

He stabbed the Infernal Deity Spear into the greyspace, backing it with the will of the primeval infernal deities. The greyspace crumbled, and before it could recover he continued on even deeper.

Bit by bit, he was making progress. The sagelight of the God Legion Paradise was stained dark gold, but that only seemed to purify it. Yang Qi looked up and felt like he could see the halls of heaven looking down on him with approval. In fact, his Blood of the One God even seemed to be getting stronger.

It was almost as if being in the depths of hell made it easier to look up and see the sagelight of the halls of heaven.

WHIZZ!

He unleashed the Hand of the One God to dig at the dark golden greyspace, and as he made progress, what he had dug away filled in behind him immediately.

‘Mahānata is limitless….’ he thought, suddenly even more aware of how grand and majestic the substructure of the Hell of Mahānata was. It actually seemed possible that it could rival the power of the legion of gods.

It was obviously a place that had grown out of a great dao of fighting against the gods.

Yang Qi knew that of the billions of planes of the universe, and the never-ending worlds that existed, great daos represented magical laws. As for the legion of gods, they existed above all great daos, and could even destroy natural laws if they wished. They had created everything, including those great daos and magical laws. However, after being created, the great daos and magical laws had spurned the constraints of the gods and created hells. That was where the devils arose who resisted the legion of gods. What they claimed to seek was balance. In a sense, hell was what gave birth to freedom.

All of a sudden, Yang Qi came to understand this great dao.

RUMBLE!

His sagefire grew purer, and in fact, in the depths of the God Legion Paradise, it actually formed into a humanoid figure, complete with long wings and surrounded by fire.

His sagefire had produced a fiery angel.

The Hellfire Crucible appeared again, and it spat out flames filled with fire angels who began to melt the greyspace as surely as if it were tallow. Yang Qi was making even better progress now.

‘Excellent. I think this is one of the most difficult things I’ve ever done. However, it's good training. After this tempering, I should be able to fully absorb the nine mammoth tusks and awaken all of the eight hundred forty million particles within me. Maybe I’ll even push them to the protomammoth level. At that point, not even Universal Demi-Immortals will be a match for me.’

Yang Qi was safely making his way into the Hell of Mahānata but, considering how difficult it was, it could only be imagined if someone else tried the same thing. Even an immortal would likely have failed.

As the godworms ate away at the greyspace, fueled by the true energy of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, they also grew stronger. The weaker one that was in the third stage began shining with fiery light similar to what Yang Qi had seen back at the godworm nest. Before long, it was in the fourth stage.

As for the seventh stage mother godworm, she also grew more powerful.

Overall, Yang Qi was like a tiger that had grown wings and was now making his way more quickly than ever through the greyspace. By this point, months had passed, and Yang Qi could tell that the greyspace left in front of him was very thin. Knowing that, he pushed forward with more speed than ever.

RUMBLE!

All of a sudden, the greyspace shattered and he flew out into the open, finding himself in a land of dark gold.

The ground was incredibly sturdy, and stepping on it would cause sonorous echoing to erupt out. Yang Qi took a breath and confirmed that everything around him was dark golden devil energy, the type that would be profoundly useful for fiend-devils.

‘The Hell of Mahānata! This is it! I'm back!’

He had a second order Demi-Immortal infernal in his God Legion Paradise, who suddenly looked around, first in excitement, then in terror.

Yang Qi had captured this infernal in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, and intended to use him as a guard for the Sage Monarch Continent. Since he was coming to the depths of hell, it was the perfect opportunity to push the creature to a higher level.

‘It took months of digging, but I got through the greyspace of the Hell of Mahānata. I doubt even heaven-immortals could do something like that. Now I need to find a good place to set up a spell formation and work on my breakthroughs. It's time to benefit from all the enlightenment I received in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.’

“Congratulations, Milord, congratulations!” the infernal said, kowtowing in full sincerity. “Now that you’re in the Hell of Mahānata, you’ll reach untold heights! Your humble servant can hardly wait to see what amazing progress you achieve!”

Yang Qi ignored him. Taking a breath of the local devil energy, he reached out to his nascent divinity ensconcement mark and leaped into the air and began flying. As he sent his divine will out, he could see all of the various monsters for billions of miles in every direction.

He was now vastly more powerful than he had been the last time he was here, and also had a much deeper understanding of hells.

‘I'm on the edge where there aren’t even any Demi-Immortal monsters. The highest are ninth step Great Sages. Well, that's fine. I’ll set up my spell formation and face my tribulations here. Hopefully I’ll reach the Demi-Immortal level, but even if I don't, I’ll definitely advance by leaps and bounds.’

The magical laws of this place conformed perfectly to him, so he knew that achieving his breakthroughs wouldn’t be a problem. However, they would involve incredible surges of power, so he would need to be careful to avoid attracting the attention of powerful fiend-devils. After all, this place was like an immortal world, filled with dangerous entities of all sorts.

There were Infernalfolk here who were Demolishers, and there were even leaders who were Godmyths.

If a Demolisher appeared, they could wipe Yang Qi out of existence as easily as blowing some dust off of their shoulder. And that wasn’t even to mention what a Godmyth could do.

“Arise, god-spirits of the nine heavens!”

He exhaled some vital energy, and it spread out to create a five-hundred-kilometer cage that slammed down securely into the dark golden soil. The Hell of Mahānata was filled with rich veins of ore, and he planned to use them in his breakthrough.

Chapter 460: Goals Met

To most any cultivator, the aura of the Hell of Mahānata would be the most deadly poison. Not even Demi-Immortals would be able to stay there long-term. During the Hanging Mountain's training competition, the Great Sages had all received a measure of protection from the immortal world. Without it, they would have been quickly devilized.

But the nearly liquid devil energy was quite pleasing to Yang Qi, and the magical laws of space, and the sprawling lands around him, filled him with a sense of wonderment.

High above, a dark golden sun crept across the sky, casting burning heat onto the hell below. This place was enormous, so much so that even the mind-bogglingly large Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart couldn’t compare.

After all, the Hell of Mahānata had been born from the magical laws and great daos of the most ancient universe.

King Immortal-Slayer. King Heaven-Devourer. King Mourn-Parting. In their effort to fight the legion of gods, they had all worked together to create the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Yet in the end, they all perished. In contrast, the leader of the Hell of Mahānata was also in opposition to the legion of gods, and yet was very much alive. The difference between the two places was obvious just from that.

The legion of gods and the various hells had always been diametrically opposed.

‘After countless trials and tribulations, at long last, here I am in the Hell of Mahānata.’ He took a deep breath, causing golden vital energy to rush toward him from as far as thousands of kilometers away.

He stomped his foot, causing crevices to open and reveal veins of ore, then, with the wave of a hand, he caused numerous sagely-, heavenly-, and godly-grade spirit stones to form mountainous heaps beneath his feet. He even snagged a few immortal stones.

The riches buried within the Hell of Mahānata surpassed that of nearly all the immortal planes.

There were thirty-three ranks to classify immortal planes, and in that ranking system, the Titan Emperor Heaven would count as the lowest, whereas the Hell of Mahānata would be somewhere in the top five.

The difference was almost impossible to quantify.

Yang Qi set up a spell formation to seek out more subterranean resources. The lands of the Hell of Mahānata went down for billions of kilometers, and all of it was the same deep gold color. And there were many layers to the lands, including spatial rifts and nests of hell-born fiend-devils.

But when Yang Qi’s will descended, even the Demi-Immortal fiend-devils were killed, and their quintessence energy sucked into the grand spell formation.

He also used the Hell Portal to summon them from more distant regions. Now that he was in hell itself, the Hell Portal was even mightier. Furthermore, it had been bolstered by the godworm’s spatial powers. As a result, it could operate a hundred times more efficiently than before.

“Twin Hell Portals!” Yang Qi shouted, and all of a sudden a second, identical Hell Portal appeared. Being able to summon a second Hell Portal was an advanced transformation of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. In fact, as Yang Qi reached higher levels of enlightenment, he would be able to unleash even further instances, enabling him to summon even more fiend-devils.

Yang Qi was already undergoing rapid and dramatic transformations thanks to being in the Hell of Mahānata.

Because of the spell formation, the baleful energy in the area swept back and forth and space-time distorted, creating a complex labyrinth around him that would ensure that no one could possibly be able to get close to him, at least, not unless they had a primeval godworm of their own.

Yang Qi was calling upon the same methods that were used to create the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

‘Alright, the time has come for the tribulations to begin. Before, I might not have had enough power to reach the Demi-Immortal level. But with the nine mammoth tusks I acquired, I should have more than enough.’

When Yang Qi increased a level, he required many millions of times more vital energy than an ordinary cultivator of the same level would require. For an ordinary person, rising from the second step of the Great Sage level to the third would probably require about a hundred heavenly-grade spirit stones. But for Yang Qi, it would require around ten billion of them. It was a number that would likely cause most cultivators’ jaws to drop.

“Mammoth tusks!”

The nine mammoth tusks shot out into the spell formation and burst into flames as their quintessence energy flowed out.

RUMBLE!

Almost instantly, tribulation lightning formed above. There was lightning formed from earth, water, fire, and wind, as well as the magical laws of space and time. All together, they formed a massive tribulation cloud filled with images of immortals, monsters, ghosts, and demons.

Yang Qi’s infernal looked on with shock, fully aware of what type of tribulation this was. ‘Human Ghost God Grand Tribulation!’

The Human Ghost God Grand Tribulation was something that only appeared for the most heaven-defying individuals, the type of people who could conquer and unite numerous planes of existence.

WHIZZ!

Yang Qi floated up into the air, continuing to absorb power as he smashed his fist into the tribulation cloud. The cloud dispersed and the demons, devils, ghosts, and monsters scattered. Moments later, the power of the tribulation turned into a torrent of sagelight that rumbled loudly as it descended onto him.

“Longevity like the eternal sands, a heart like dust.”

All of a sudden, the power of the heavenly tribulation caused Yang Qi to physically explode, transforming into a constellation chart filled with orbiting stars as numerous as sand on the seashore. Each one of those stars was like a particle that contained an ancient megamammoth bursting with power.

Crack. Rattle.

In the blink of an eye, Yang Qi broke into the third step, making him an Eternal Sands Sage. He knew how to transform his body into dusty sand that could shine with the profundities of the stars.

The breakthrough process had been as easy as taking a drink of water. However, the simplicity belied the increase in power. Fueled by the power of the tribulation, particles began to wake up like mad inside of him.

Within the shortest of moments, he reached the level of three hundred million megamammoths. It was almost as if he had traveled back into the primordial chaos, where he could command countless living beasts to conquer innumerable planetary systems.

Of the three hundred million particles that were awake, one hundred million were dracomammoths, while the other two hundred million remained at the level of megamammoths. Already, he had the same power levels as an ordinary Demi-Immortal.

As his true energy surged within him, his Blood of the One God grew stronger and he was fairly certain that he could sense joy pulsing in the God Legion Seal in his forehead.

Without any hesitation, he pushed on toward the True Real Step.

That step involved taking all of one’s illusory true energy and transforming it into something true and real. If Yang Qi succeeded, his energy arts would immediately receive a significant boost.

The True Real Step was very important to Great Sages; once they reached it, their energy arts would be so powerful that not even armies of lower-level Great Sages would be a threat to them.

‘Alright, the time has come for the fourth step. I need a lot more energy than before, but thankfully that shouldn’t be a problem. And once I break through, my Infernal Deity Spear, Hellfire Crucible, Hell Portal and even my Eternal Heavenly Aria will progress by leaps and bounds!’

RUMBLE!

Another immense tribulation built up, this one fully ten times the level of that which had come for the Eternal Sands Step. Within the tribulation was something that seemed reminiscent of immortals, devils, demons, and ghosts, and yet was none of those things.

‘Heavenly Tribulation of the Radiant King!’ The infernal was so shocked by what he was seeing that he nearly passed out.

Heavenly Tribulation of the Radiant King was a fabled type of tribulation that was described in certain ancient daoist texts. However, there was no recorded history of anyone surviving it. It was sent against those who challenged the heaven above and was said to be able to turn anyone into nothing more than dust.

Instantly, the void began to solidify. A radiant king became visible, reaching out with hands that could crush worlds out of existence. Shockingly, his hands had nine fingers each and were surrounded by shining halos. They were primeval god skills, including the Light of Weakness, the Light of Destruction, the Light of Devastation, and more.

This heavenly tribulation contained primeval god skills!

‘Great! Wonderful!’ Shooting up into the air, Yang Qi began singing the Eternal Heavenly Aria and the halos collapsed. Then, shockingly, he began consuming the resulting fragments of light! In the blink of an eye, Yang Qi had become like a primal-chaos elder-snake that wanted to devour all heaven and earth.

The Heavenly Tribulation of the Radiant King seemed fiendish and vicious to the extreme, yet he devoured it in a single bite! Then, as the resulting power surge flowed through him, he began transforming. Now, his energy was filled with the most ancient of auras.

At the same time, the two Hell Portals began to crumble and reform, with the bones that made them transforming into something new. Now, they looked like stone covered with fresh blood.

He was now in the fourth step, making him a True Real Sage.

Chapter 461: Rising Rapidly

Yang Qi’s cultivation base was climbing higher by the moment, and none of the fierce heavenly tribulations seemed to pose even the slightest problem. The instant he reached the True Real Step, another hundred million megamammoth particles woke up.

The power of the nine mammoth tusks was almost liquid as it poured into Yang Qi, filling him with power that originated from Demolishing level demon-immortal dracomammoths.

Four hundred million megamammoths!

POP!

Yang Qi waved his hand, digging up massive amounts of golden soil. Normally speaking, the Hell of Mahānata was so strong and durable that not even eighth or ninth step Great Sages could have hewn it open. But to Yang Qi, it was as malleable as tofu, and he could excavate it as easily as blowing some dust off of his shoulder.

Buzzzz.

Immense veins of subterranean ore resembling clawed dragons were pulled up, and immortal energy flourished. Of course, to most cultivators it would count as devil energy.

One of the ore veins that he dug up burst into flames, becoming power that fueled the spell formation and furthered the breakdown of the mammoth tusks. As a result, Yang Qi’s rise in cultivation only accelerated.

Suddenly, his Hell Portals erupted with seas of blood that seemed to wash over and cleanse them, until they became gateways made of actual flesh and blood that radiated the aura of the legion of gods. At the same time, their surfaces came to be covered with sealing marks, countless complex designs, images, and textual inscriptions that made them the most holy of portals.

Scores of Demi-Immortal fiend-devils flew out of the portals, as well as giant devils, beasts, snakes, and even Infernalfolk.

Unfortunately, he was currently limited to being able to summon Lesser Demi-Immortals.

Even so, it was a terrifying thought. After all, what level of might could an army of a hundred thousand Lesser Demi-Immortal fiend-devils command? That would cause profound shock even within the Titan Emperor Collegium, where the Demi-Immortal level was the requirement to be named a royal student.

Of course, as Yang Qi rose through the steps of the Great Sage level, he would be able to summon increasingly powerful fiend devils, including those in the second, third, and fourth order… eventually, he would even be able to summon fifth order devil kings.

At that point, Yang Qi would be able to summon an army that even the elders in the Titan Emperor Collegium would be terrified of.

That was not even mentioning the improvements which would come from the Eternal Heavenly Aria. If he blessed a Tyrant Demi-Immortal fiend-devil with halos of light, they would become even more terrifyingly powerful.

And then there was the Hand of the One God….

‘The Light King Step is about enlightenment of the magical laws of time. Although I’ve gained soul enlightenment already, I also need a practical understanding. Among Great Sages, the fifth step is a watershed that is not easily surpassed.’

Settling down cross-legged, he entered a deeply meditative state.

The rapid and dramatic rise in power that Yang Qi was experiencing also had an effect on his immortal clone back in the Sage Monarch Continent.

At the moment, the clone’s level of power actually surpassed that of his true self.

‘Excellent,’ the clone thought. ‘My true self is in the Hell of Mahānata, and has already reached the True Real Step. And the energy he’s projecting to me is incredible.’

As the clone sat there in Sage Monarch City, a wormhole appeared above his head, pouring preheaven true energy into him and allowing him to improve with every moment that passed.

The clone couldn’t cultivate the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, but he had been working on the Jade-Emperor Profound-Welkin Exalted-Celestial God-Dao, thus the vital energy from his true self was pushing him higher and higher.

The true self was the source of the clone’s power, therefore, as the true self improved, so did the clone. Of course, if the true self died, so would the clone.

The Sage Monarch Continent had improved dramatically in recent times. It had absorbed the Quake-Dawn Continent, along with the corpses of countless god-devils and Prime Demi-Immortals, plus over a hundred Revered Demi-Immortals. And that wasn’t mentioning the immortal items and spirit stones. By now, it was millions of times above the level of the old Rich-Lush Continent.

Children born there started out as ninth phase Masters of Energy, and even with the barest minimum of training they could reach the Lifeseizing level.

‘Magical law!’

All of a sudden, another stream of power entered the immortal clone and he gained numerous new aspects of enlightenment. Waving his hand, he sent countless streams of true energy out into the air, which pierced into the Sage Monarch Continent’s greyspace and caused streaks of jade to appear in it.

As the streaks of jade expanded and interlocked, the entire Sage Monarch Continent transformed into what looked like a planet made from jade itself—perfect, complete, and consummate in every way.

“What’s going on here?” Yang Zhan said, his eyes suddenly snapping open. “Why does it feel like the magical laws of space here in the Sage Monarch Continent have suddenly grown stronger? They’re not weak like before!”

He wasn’t the only one. Other top experts, such as Ghost Emperor Yama, Chancellor Sun Moon, Jun Tianchou, Hua Tianxiong, Hua Fengfeng, and others, all had the same reaction. All of Yang Qi’s sworn siblings were now Great Sages and they could sense the magical laws transforming, spreading out like chains of jade to stabilize space and make it more secure.

Normally speaking, one needed to reach the third Legendary transformation, the Space-Void Transformation, to be able to tear rifts into space and pierce through it. It had always been that way in the Rich-Lush Continent.

But now, the jade-type energy art cultivated by Yang Qi’s clone was making space vastly tougher. As of this point, the third transformation would definitely not be the threshold to pierce through space. In fact, not even Yin-Yang or Personal-Domain Legendaries would be able to do so. At the most, they would be able to fly.

The stronger a plane was, the sturdier its space became and the more difficult it would be to pierce through it. Supposedly, in the immortal worlds, it was impossible for even Great Sages to perform teleportations. Only Demi-Immortals could struggle to succeed at them.

“Wonderful!” Yang Zhan said. “With space becoming more stable, the continent’s rise to a higher level has finally come. Qi’er wants this place to become a cultivation planet, a place vastly superior to the old Quake-Dawn Continent.”

“I never thought I would live to see the day that this place became a planet,” Chancellor Sun Moon said excitedly. “Can you believe that petty and insufferably arrogant Crown Prince tried to get me to side with him? How could he have ever compared to Yang Qi? Chancellor Demi-Immortal was really blind to throw all his support to the Crown Prince. It’s too bad Chancellor Demi-Immortal survived. Although, considering all the things that have happened since then, I'm sure he’ll do little more than skulk in the shadows for the rest of his life.”

‘I can’t believe our sworn brother is so mighty….’ That was what many of Yang Qi’s sworn siblings were thinking. All of them were deeply touched, and knew that they would reap rich rewards as they continued to reach higher levels.

Deep within the Hanging Mountain, in a nameless spatial nexus, the Holy Mother opened her eyes. ‘What? I can’t believe Qi’er’s clone reached such a high level in the cultivation of the Jade-Emperor Profound-Welkin Exalted-Celestial God-Dao. He's already gained enlightenment of the preheaven jadesource. Normally speaking, it should take thousands of years to do that.’

The Sage Monarch Continent was like a glittering sphere of jade, although all of its light was projected inward, instead of outward, which indicated that it had reached the level of propagating its own vital energy and not losing any.

In some ways, the rise of a continent to a planet was like the process of human cultivation.

Meanwhile, in the depths of the void, a pair of eyes glittered with hatred.

‘Damnation….’ The owner of those eyes seemed to radiate the aura of a leader, as though he were used to occupying a very lofty position. Now, though, he occupied no such office.

He was Yang Qi’s old adversary, someone far more dangerous than the Crown Prince. He was Chancellor Demi-Immortal, who had long since been lurking in the Titan Emperor Collegium, hoping to get a chance at revenge. Unexpectedly, he was now a Demi-Immortal. However, the mere sight of the Sage Monarch Continent reaching new heights caused jealousy, hatred, and anger to bubble in his heart.

‘The Holy Mother and Yang Qi have both put on impressive displays recently. They wiped out the Northstar Fleet, and even destroyed the Quake-Dawn Continent. They also exterminated the Holy Daughter of the Quake-Dawn Cathedral. I couldn’t help any of them….’ There was a trace of pain on the chancellor’s face; obviously, he really did have feelings for the Holy Daughter. After all, he had risked everything to protect her son, the Crown Prince. But in the end, he had accomplished nothing but watching him die. And now, the Holy Daughter herself was dead and part of this new continent’s essence. The result was a pain that the chancellor could hardly endure.

He had been completely powerless to do anything but watch the people he loved be killed.

‘So, Yang Qi, you escaped from the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Well, I'm still not going to let you off the hook. You and Sword Seventeen made a big show on your return to the Invincible Society, even going so far as to kill a noble student from the Hegemon’s Society. That should be more than enough for me to cause you endless trouble. There are plenty of people who hate the Invincible Society now. Your end days have come.’ Swishing his sleeve, he turned to leave.

Chapter 462: Planet Sage Monarch

Chancellor Demi-Immortal was like a wounded viper, willing to remain in hiding for as long as it took to land a single deadly bite onto Yang Qi. Unfortunately, the more time that went by, the less likely it seemed he would succeed. Yang Qi’s cultivation base continued to climb, and even his clone was beyond Chancellor Demi-Immortal’s ability to catch up to.

In his despair, the chancellor had already decided that he needed to seek outside help.

Gritting his teeth, he prepared to leave, but before he could, someone clicked their tongue.

“Well, well, if it isn’t the famous Chancellor Demi-Immortal, genius of cultivation. Unfortunately, you’re little more than a pitiful stray dog nowadays. You know, you could probably benefit from my help.”

“Who’s there?” Chancellor Demi-Immortal said, spinning around in shock to find someone hovering right in front of him.

It was a young man clad in yellow clothing, with a buzz cut. He seemed to be in good spirits, yet as he stared at the jade sphere that was the Sage Monarch Continent, his eyes flickered with deadly venom. It was almost as if he could hardly control himself, and would attack the place at any moment.

This was the successor of King Immortal-Slayer, who had suffered at the hands of Yang Qi in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Although he was only a third step Great Sage, his aura vastly surpassed Chancellor Demi-Immortal’s, to the point where it seemed like a fight between the two would be no contest. That realization caused Chancellor Demi-Immortal to shiver in fear and the hair on the back of his neck to stand on end.

“Don’t be afraid,” the young man said, chuckling. “I bear you no ill will. But I hate that Yang Qi. He screwed me over in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart and benefited greatly because of it. For example, did you know that he has over a hundred primeval godworm eggs?”

“What?” Chancellor Demi-Immortal blurted in shock. “A hundred? Are you sure? I thought those things were fictional. How could he have gotten so many?”

“By clever planning,” the young man replied. “He tricked a whole group of top experts and snatched the eggs right out from under their noses. What do you think? If word spread about that, it would cause a huge commotion in the Titan Emperor Collegium. I bet the old-timers there would try to force him to hand them over, and if that happened we could essentially strike at Yang Qi without lifting a hand.”

“Why are you telling me all this?” Chancellor Demi-Immortal said suspiciously.

The young man in yellow closed his eyes. “If we join forces, we might be able to take Yang Qi out. But if we wait too long, it will reach the point where we will be powerless to do anything. By the way, I want something from you.”

“You want something from me? What, exactly?” Chancellor Demi-Immortal had no idea who this young man was or where he came from, and had no idea what his true motivations were.

“Where is King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy medallion?” the young man asked casually. “When the Crown Prince died at Yang Qi’s hand, he had one of them. Rumors spread that Yang Qi took it, but I found out that those rumors are false. Apparently, the medallion flew off on its own accord. No one was closer to the Crown Prince than you, therefore I suspect that you’re involved in its disappearance. In fact, I bet you know exactly where it is.”

“Legacy medallion? I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Cut the act. I'm a successor of King Immortal-Slayer and I already have two of the medallions. You have no idea how much stronger I am than the Crown Prince, and you’re also clueless about how to use the legacy medallions. If you tried to use one, it would drain your energy and kill you. But if I had a total of three, I could freely enter and exit the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. There would be no waiting around for ten thousand years! If I successfully managed that, I would be more than willing to take you into the monarch chart with me. Think of how much that would benefit you. And think of the glory you could achieve if you joined me when I took control of the entire thing.”

“What?” Chancellor Demi-Immortal said, staring at the young man. “You already have two of King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy medallions? Your destiny seems to surpass that of the Crown Prince! But he was a god from heaven descended into the mortal world, or at least an expert from an immortal world. Are you saying that you were born in an even more unbelievable fashion than that?”

“That’s exactly what I'm saying. I surpass him in ways you can’t even imagine, and in fact, you couldn’t guess my origin if I gave you infinite guesses. And thus, I’ll ask you again. Where is that legacy medallion?”

“What’s in it for me?” Chancellor Demi-Immortal said. “Unless I profit, I'm not going to work with you. And don’t think you’ll be able to kill me if I refuse. You might be strong, but I have a thousand and one ways to escape. Very few people alive could possibly kill me, although you’re welcome to try.”

The young man in yellow looked at him for a long moment, then said, “Very crafty, you old fox.”

Reaching into his garment, he pulled out a jade booklet and a jade-colored bottle gourd that contained a minor world built around a medicinal pill.

“This is a manual for a lesser godly-class energy art, the Great Dao Vital Energy Heavenspan Painting Amulet. And this is a Great Dao Heavenspan Deathless Gold Pill. With these, you’ll have a godly-class energy art at your disposal. I got them from the remains of an ancient immortal in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. I thought of cultivating it, but I already have King Immortal-Slayer’s Myriad Monarchs Immortal-Slayer’s Energy, which is actually far superior. Besides, I don’t have time to cultivate anything else. I’ll give you these two things, but don’t even think of trying to use them against me.”

“A lesser godly-class energy art? Seriously?” It was something Chancellor Demi-Immortal could previously only have dreamed of, and would lead to rapid cultivation advancement. “Give it to me! Give it to me, and I’ll tell you where King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy medallion is. Yang Qi took everything that belonged to the Crown Prince after killing him, but apparently the most mysterious thing of all flew off into the depths of the Yore-Wilds planetary system, where it ended up in some ancient ruins.”

“Ancient ruins? Which ones?”

“Give me that energy art,” Chancellor Demi-Immortal said. Obviously he was familiar with the old saying you don’t release the hawk until you’ve seen the hare.

“Alright, fine,” the young man said. “But first, swear an oath that you’ll help me get that third legacy medallion.”

“No problem.” Chancellor Demi-Immortal immediately swore a deadly oath, whereupon the young man in yellow tossed over the daoist text and the medicinal pill. Chancellor Demi-Immortal didn’t do anything with them for the moment. He placed some magical seals on them and then put them away.

“You really do play things safe,” the young man said. “Don’t worry, I'm not up to any mischief, and I didn’t mess with either the manual or the pill. Now, what are these ruins you just mentioned?”

“In years past, when the top experts of the Yore-Wilds fought the Hell of Euphoria, there was a battlefield that later came to be known as the Chaos-Devil Danger Zone. The truth is that I knew all along that the Crown Prince had that legacy medallion, and I actually took him to the Chaos-Devil Danger Zone for training purposes on several occasions. Unfortunately, I was never able to get inside, thanks to the lingering killing intent of the immortals and devils. Do you really think you can get in?”

“Hah. Danger zone? I doubt it can compare to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Let’s go. Once I get that third legacy medallion, I’ll help you achieve your ends in the Titan Emperor Collegium. Do you think you can arrange for me to join the collegium? That would make it much easier to deal with Yang Qi.”

“Of course. Come on, let’s go.”

Even as they were preparing to leave, more rumbling sounds echoed out from the Sage Monarch Continent as the place experienced another major transformation. The two of them turned to see what was happening.

RUUUUUUMBLE!

The Sage Monarch Continent was now a beautiful, emerald-green planet, like something that would adorn the scepters of the ancient legion of gods. From a distance, it looked like a perfectly smooth sphere hanging in the darkness and gloom, emanating a jade-like glow. Upon nearing it, one could see spirit mountains, holy lands, and beautiful scenery of all sorts.

As it rotated, it created spatial tempests that would prevent anyone from casually approaching it.

There were already hundreds of satellite planets visible. Although they were tiny, they surpassed anything which had existed near the Rich-Lush Continent. In fact, some of them were already holy lands of cultivation, although none of them could rival the new Planet Sage Monarch.

With those satellites, it was clear that this place would eventually be a planetary system.

Not even the old Quake-Dawn Continent had possessed satellites such as this.

As time went on, they would be colonized and begin to build up vital energy. And more satellites would come into being as the mother planet grew stronger and bigger.

As of this moment, both the young man with the buzz cut and Chancellor Demi-Immortal could sense that Planet Sage Monarch’s defenses were vastly stronger than before.

“Let’s leave,” the young man said. “Parlor tricks like this make me laugh.” Waving his sleeve, he turned and left.

**

Looking around, Yang Qi’s immortal clone thought, ‘The continent has finally become a planet.’

Vast lands of jade stretched out around him, and the spirit energy was stronger than ever. And there were one thousand eight hundred satellite planets, the smallest of which was double the size of the old Rich-Lush Continent.

Of course, the power surges were felt by Yang Qi’s true self back in the Hell of Mahānata.

As he sat there, eyes closed in meditation, a wormhole opened up above his head and power poured into him. It was almost as if he had just consumed an incredible medicinal pill.

‘Alright, I'm ready for the fifth step tribulation. It's time to become a Light King Sage! I wonder what the tribulation will be like.’

RUUUUUUMBLE!

As he rose to his feet, a tidal flow of tribulation built up within the Hell of Mahānata.

Chapter 463: Three Periods Tribulation

It was no easy task to reach the Light King Step.

Only a few hours after reaching the Eternal Sands and True Real Step, Yang Qi was attempting his breakthrough into the fifth step, something unheard of throughout all history.

The Light King Step involved the magical laws of time, which was the realm of the legion of gods. They could peer into the past and the future, and could even halt the movement of light. They were like kings of light itself.

Only people with absolute determination could break into the Light King Step. Once the attempt began, there was no turning back, and failure would result in horrific death. In some cases, it was a death of complete annihilation, with no remains being left behind at all. In other cases, it involved slowly withering away into death.

The tribulation that came with the Light King Step was vicious. It was not a tribulation cloud, but rather a tribulation of time.

The Godlightning of Time would illuminate all heaven and earth, and was a light that contained time itself. When it hit a cultivator, that person would age rapidly until their life force ran out, an effect Yang Qi had encountered before in the world junction in the Coiling Arc planetary system. He had even seen Demi-Immortals age into death in the blink of an eye after being struck by the light there.

As the tribulation built, the Hell of Mahānata filled with the light of time, which descended upon him and caused dramatic transformations to his substructure. However, it didn’t harm him, much less destroy him. Instead, power built up in the depths of his being, to the point where he felt like he could flatten the universe itself with his bare hands.

RUMBLE!

A glowing sphere of light fell, exploding above him to bathe him in Godlightning of Time. The power of time joined the true energy lightning and was wrapped up in baleful energy, creating an enormous, deadly spell formation.

As the formation rotated, a churning river made of raw time itself appeared above Yang Qi’s head. Within the river, three dharma clones of Yang Qi appeared, one of them fierce, one of them vicious, and one of them evil.

They all seemed to contain various aspects of power belonging to Yang Qi, and all of them had malevolent smiles on their faces as they reached out and tried to pull Yang Qi into the depths of the darkness and gloom of the river of time.

“That’s….” Yang Qi’s infernal servant was stunned as he looked at the river of time and the three dharma clones. “It’s the Three Periods Tribulation! I’ve heard that this tribulation usually appears for Demolishers, so how could it have come for Yang Qi? That river of time connects to the past, present, and future, and those are dharma clones of the three periods that reflect the most evil versions of the self. If you can’t resist the tribulation of the three selves, you’ll be pulled into the river of time and perish!”

It was one of the most mysterious, evil, and miraculous of all heavenly tribulations, one that could easily be deadly. After all, it involved killing reflections of one’s past, future, and present self. Oftentimes, the self could be the most difficult opponent to defeat. And in this case, one had to face three selves.

“Three Periods Tribulation? Alright, let’s do it!” Yang Qi had read of this tribulation in ancient daoist texts, yet he didn’t feel any fear at all. Flying up toward the three versions of himself in the river of time, he immediately unleashed a fist strike that caused sagelight from the halls of heaven to fill the area.

“Creation!”

Unexpectedly, one of the three periods dharma clones in the tribulation also attacked with the Hand of the One God, as well as the God Legion Paradise. The Hell of Mahānata was instantly thrown into chaos. Vital energy raged, soil erupted like water, and even the subterranean baleful energy was affected.

“Undying!”

Yang Qi held nothing back and fought to his heart's content. He knew that these three periods dharma clones were just reflections of himself, and were essentially tools of the natural laws of the universe. Although they were using his power and energy arts, they did not have any magical treasures; they had no godworm, no imperial snakecharms, and no mammoth tusks.

All of a sudden, a primal-chaos elder-snake appeared, sweeping forth to smash into the spell formation created by the Godlightning of Time.

Considering the level of Yang Qi’s true energy right now, he was actually gaining new enlightenment by using the imperial snakecharms. Truth be told, they were not limited by levels or realms; as long as one had enough true energy, their higher-level functions could be unlocked.

The last time he had used the imperial snakecharms he had been a second step Great Sage, but now he was in the fourth step, and the difference was immense.

As soon as he unleashed them, he could sense certain martial disciplines lurking in their depths. A moment later, he drew on one of those deadly abilities.

“Heaven-Devouring God Dao!”

The primal-chaos elder-snake coiled up, transforming into a vortex that erupted with a gravitational force. Instantly, the wails of ghosts and the howls of gods echoed out from inside.

POP!

The clone of the past couldn’t sustain the force and was sucked into the ancient snake, becoming raw power. In short order, the clones of the present and future suffered the same treatment.

Absorbing the three periods clones immediately pushed Yang Qi’s enlightenment of the magical laws of time to a much more profound level. Now, he was surrounded by a swirling power of time that was so dense it was almost liquid.

This was a critical moment in reaching the Light King Step.

Crack. Crunch….

A hundred million particles awoke inside of him, pushing him to the level of five hundred million megamammoths. With this power, he could truly pluck stars and snatch moons, and even alter the rotation of entire planes of existence.

Changes occurred to his God Legion Paradise as well. Streams of light swirled throughout it, giving rise to an aura like that of a king. As that light merged with the godly laws of space, they formed numerous chains of space-time.

Within the depths of the God Legion Paradise, space-time sank in on itself, creating a flow that was different from the outside world and would occasionally even cease to move.

This was the power of the Light King Step.

The Infernal Deity Spear, the Hell Portal, and the Hellfire Crucible all improved, but the most dramatic transformations were to his Angel Wings, which grew larger. They became a purer white color, shining with dazzling light and covered with decorative designs representing time and light.

As of this moment, the speeds Yang Qi was capable of vastly surpassed anything from before. The Light King Step involved the control of time, and its magical laws bolstered his Angel Wings to the point where other ordinary godly-class energy arts could never compare to them. Right now, not even a seventh order Revered Demi-Immortal could ever hope to catch Yang Qi if he fled from them.

“Three Hell Portals!” he said. Another Hell Portal appeared behind him, erupting with fiend-devils who tumbled directly into his Hellfire Crucible, instantly being converted into more vital energy to power the spell formation.

‘Next is the Heavenly Workings Step. There’s no stopping now. I’m going to drain these nine mammoth tusks until I reach the Demi-Immortal level! I get stronger with each breakthrough, so there’s no reason to give up. Once I'm a Demi-Immortal, who in the collegium will possibly be willing to cause trouble for me? Only the near-Demolishers, those eighth and ninth order Demi-Immortals, would dare to cross paths with me.’

Next up was the Heavenly Workings Step, in which one contemplated the workings of heaven and the profundities of the universe. One would also meditate on the truths of energy arts, which would push their energy arts and true energy to a higher, more consummate level.

Throwing his head back, Yang Qi drew fully on the nine mammoth tusks, and also used his Hell Portals and Hellfire Crucible to summon Demi-Immortal fiend-devils to serve as the fuel.

Finally, one of the mammoth tusks crumbled and the bone fragments were sucked into Yang Qi to become a part of his own bones. At that point, a membrane appeared on his bones which appeared to be the godly skin of megamammoths. Instantly, his bones became tougher and more resilient.

Everything began trembling, to the point where it seemed like a rain of stars was falling.

In the blink of an eye, Yang Qi felt like the universe was being flooded with water. It was as if his slightest movement could cause dramatic transformations to the universe at large. He felt just like the mythological crocodiles from ancient times, who had continents on their backs and whose slightest movement could cause earthquakes that killed countless living beings.

It was a truly profound and enigmatic experience.

At this point, another tribulation arrived.

There were various types of lightning and light that weren’t associated with earth, water, fire, or wind. Instead, they were magical laws that stretched out in lines to form a Go board. Then the game pieces on the board shot toward Yang Qi in an attack. In fact, he himself was a game piece, and everything was moving in accord with the workings of heaven. In the blink of an eye, the entire Go board was set up into a deadly scenario.

This was Heavenly Workings Tribulation.

The workings of heaven were just like a game of Go.

Chapter 464: All the way to the Ninth

‘Trying to make things hard for me, you crappy Heavenly Workings Tribulation? Don’t make me laugh. Just watch how I unlock the workings of heaven and smash you to bits.’

Yang Qi remained unflustered as he faced the Go board formed by the magical laws of the tribulation. As he went about destroying it, he was also contemplating the profundities of the workings of heaven, and both efforts came with ease.

Moments later, the Go board exploded and he absorbed all of the resulting energy as he entered the Heavenly Workings Step. Now that he was in the sixth step, his power levels didn’t increase dramatically, but his energy arts grew more refined and his life force flourished. The Hellfire Crucible shattered, then formed anew, even stronger than before. It was the same with the Infernal Deity Spear, Hell Portal, and Angel Wings. Yet even as they reformed, they shattered again, before forming back together.

Flames flickered as the process went on over and over again, while Yang Qi used his true energy to make himself more complete and perfect, without the slightest weakness. That was the power of the heavenly workings, which so few people could even contemplate, much less understand.

The “heavenly workings” were truths that governed vital energy and its structure, as well as various complexities of magical law. Coming to understand such things would lead to a much more stable physical body, increased longevity, and the ability to defy heaven with impunity.

As Yang Qi became a Heavenly Workings Sage, his immortal clone on Planet Sage Monarch sensed the change, and more satellites popped into being around the planet, conforming to the design of powerful spell formations.

Exhaling deeply, the clone sent a stream of jade-colored true energy out to form a series of spell formation charts, each of them hundreds of thousands of kilometers across. Unexpectedly, he was making significant progress with the Jade-Emperor Profound-Welkin Exalted-Celestial God-Dao.

The godly-class energy art he cultivated had many levels, each one with new powers and abilities. The ability to make spell formation charts and transform them into lineaments of the dao of heaven indicated that he had made a major breakthrough. As of this moment, Yang Qi’s clone was strong enough to defeat third order Profound Demi-Immortals.

Of course, that would only be the case if the Demi-Immortal in question didn’t cultivate a godly-class energy art.

As of this moment, Planet Sage Monarch’s rotation conformed even more with the dao of heaven.

As the satellites orbited around it, they began forming nexuses connecting it to an immortal world, a plane called the Jade-Emperor Exalted-Celestial Heaven. Connecting to it provided power in the form of a jade liquid that was perfectly suited for use in cultivation.

Planet Sage Monarch continued to get stronger and stronger as time marched on. It was also expanding, and the jade-like vital energy that filled it caused new satellites to spring up left and right. As the process continued, a small planetary system began to form. And of course, the energy arts of the inhabitants also grew more powerful.

‘My true self is a sixth step Great Sage, so now I can adjust the orbits of the satellites to conform to the dao of heaven. Next up is the Planet God Step, which will be a major advancement. At that point, I’ll be able to use the godpower of the trillions of heavenly bodies in the universe to start forming a planetary system. After that comes the Without Limit and Epic Saga Steps.’

The clone could hardly wait for all that to happen.

‘My son is really advancing by leaps and bounds,’ the Holy Mother thought. 'Considering what’s been happening with the Sage Monarch Continent, it seems he finally got to the Hell of Mahānata and is facing his tribulations. I wonder how far he’ll go. Wherever he ends up, he’ll definitely surpass me.’

Back in the Hell of Mahānata, a host of planets appeared overhead. Some were dark gold, some were the color of blood, some were verdant and green, and some were as white as bones. All of them were part of the Hell of Mahānata.

The Hell of Mahānata had a sky, a void, a planetary system, a universe, and heavenly bodies of its own. It was like a unique chiliocosm of worlds with more planets than the mortal world could ever contain. Yang Qi could see one up above that was larger than ten thousand Quake-Dawn Continents put together, and was made entirely of bone. If someone who cultivated bone-type divine abilities could practice breathing exercises on a planet like that, their cultivation would quickly reach extraordinary levels.

There were other strange planets too, far too many of them to count.

There could be no better place to break into the Planet God Step than this location, especially considering that Yang Qi had ensconced his nascent divinity here.

‘Time for the Planet God Step!’

Another tribulation began.

This time it was the Planetary Armageddon Tribulation, in which countless planets would sense his breakthrough and unleash baleful energy in the form of planetary projections. Those projections would then attempt to crush his soul, nascent divinity, and fleshly body out of existence.

Another name for this type of tribulation was ‘Fury of the Planet God’.

Only if a cultivator could resist the fury that the god-spirits of planets could unleash would they possibly be able to control an entire planet.

Of course, there were more planets in the Hell of Mahānata than could be found anywhere in the mortal world. And when they unleashed their fury, it was unimaginably intense. Any cultivator who faced it would find it to be brutal to the extreme.

One after another, projections of planets appeared in Yang Qi’s sea of consciousness, bashing him with immense force. However, his sea of consciousness was broad and deep, and he had enlightenment of the grand will of the Hell of Mahānata. In fact, his sea of consciousness was so deep that it could easily contain countless fallen planets, along with every other manifestation of nature.

Closing his eyes, he began meditating, completely unfazed by the assault of the planets. The more planets a cultivator faced when reaching the Planet God Step, the stronger the result would be after the breakthrough.

Normally speaking, cultivators in the mortal world who faced the tribulation of the Planet God Step would only face a maximum of one hundred twenty-nine thousand, six hundred planets. After all, that was a prescribed number affixed by heaven.

But as Yang Qi sat there meditating, hundreds of thousands of planets unleashed baleful energy to attack him. Then the number climbed to a hundred million. Then two hundred million. Three hundred million….

One billion. Ten billion.

There seemed no end to them, as if they were the eternal sands of the universe. Eventually, another mammoth tusk crumbled and became part of Yang Qi’s bones. Yet the planets were still angry.

Crick. Crack!

After an indeterminable period of time, the tribulation ended and Yang Qi’s true energy capacity rose again.

As he made his initial foray into the Planet God Step, power poured through the wormhole and into Planet Sage Monarch. As it did, his immortal clone rose and inhaled, causing hundreds of satellites to come into existence. The nascent planetary system expanded and vital energy grew more abundant.

At the same time, many individuals experienced breakthroughs; for example, Ghost Emperor Yama reached the Demi-Immortal level.

Rapid advancement was occurring on both sides of the wormhole. Of course, Yang Qi wasn’t slowing down at all. He was heading toward the Without Limit Step, the eighth in the Great Sage level. Successfully passing the tribulation would mean that his divine ability and magical power would be without limit.

Yang Qi threw his head back and howled as tribulation clouds formed above him, within which lurked the projections of immortals. At the same time, devil kings, devil emperors, and devil suzerains appeared in the depths of the hell around him. Foul winds screamed and blood rained from the sky. Shockingly, each of those drops of blood was a minor world, and each of them contained a heaven-devil.

“Unrestrained Heaven-Devil Blood Immortal Tribulation!” the infernal mouthed. He was already numb to what was happening, having seen numerous tribulations that he considered legendary, and things that would normally never appear in the mortal world.

The blood rain turned into a world of blood and the heaven-devil blood immortals appeared, burrowing into Yang Qi’s acupoints and attacking the very cells that made up his body as it tried to turn him into a lifeless husk.

This was a devil tribulation that came, not as an external attack, but as a parasitic invasion. Each drop of blood was called a heaven-devil blood immortal, unfettered within the world, thirsting to devilize with devilblood and transform their victim into a new heaven-devil blood immortal.

However, Yang Qi had immense willpower. Drawing on his energy arts, he ignited his true energy and the particles within him erupted with glorious light. The heaven-devil blood immortals were set on fire and began to burn away. Instead of devilizing him, the devilblood was serving to increase his power.

The blood rain fell harder and the attack intensified. But it was to no avail. Yang Qi slowly rose to his feet, allowing himself to be baptized by the tribulation.

An aura that seemed to contain no limits appeared in his sea of energy, which already contained a fledgling projection of the Hell of Mahānata.

He was now in the Without Limit Step, meaning that he could generate true energy without limit.

Another mammoth tusk collapsed, pouring more power into his sea of energy. As a result, the particles within him surged. Six hundred million. Seven hundred million. Seven hundred forty million! When the process stopped, he was only one hundred million particles away from full awakening.

His clone sensed the change, yet didn’t take immediate action. Instead, he bided his time, waiting for the proper moment to explode into action.

‘The Without Limit Step was simple. Now for the Epic Saga Step!’ As he focused on the matter, a primeval image appeared in the sky above, which was none other than a deadly tribulation.

It was the final step in the Great Sage level, and was so named because one’s true energy would become like something from the distant past. One had to understand what it meant for a boulder to melt away from the passage of time, and the result would be a profoundly ancient true energy, something completely different from anything that had existed before.

Chapter 465: Eight Hundred Forty Million Particles Awake

The power of the Epic Saga Step was completely beyond anything beneath it. It was filled with the most primeval and ancient of auras, the type that could easily vanquish most opponents. Only by becoming an Epic Saga Sage would one truly come to understand what was ancient and archaic.

Yang Qi looked up at the ancient, godly image above, and he knew that victory or defeat would be determined very shortly. Of course, this was just the appetizer. The true meal came with the Demi-Immortal level.

Yang Qi unleashed a fist strike at the godly image, yet it didn't shatter! Instead, yin transposed with yang, reversing the effects of the attack. However, Yang Qi made adjustments conforming to the dao of heaven.

RUMBLE!

The godly image erupted like a lamp, sending flames leaping toward Yang Qi. He flicked his finger, sending sagelight out to meet them. The fire then transformed into a long spear which stabbed toward the pit of his stomach.

Yang Qi adjusted again, grabbing the spear, shattering it, and unleashing another attack. In response, the godly image grew larger and a massive, mystical army appeared within it, filled with celestial soldiers and generals bearing deadly weapons of all sorts.

“Talisman of the One God! Execute all Traitors!”

Suddenly, a mighty heavenly soldier appeared. He had three heads, six arms, and was mounted on a dragon-horse, with an executioner’s axe in his hands.

Yang Qi didn’t even look at him. With a slap of the Hand of the One God, he reduced the soldier to a bloody paste.

But then, things went crazy. More celestial soldiers poured out to surround him as if he were the incarnation of some primeval monster. All of a sudden, he felt like he was in the ancient era, when mortals and immortals mixed freely and the Heavenly Court was still taking shape.

‘This is what primeval times felt like,’ he thought. ‘This is the tribulation of the Epic Saga level. Well, it’s not that bad. Heavenly Court? Celestial soldiers and generals? I’ll destroy them all! They’re mere tools of the immortal world, whereas I carry on the teachings and doctrines of the legion of gods. I am the Sovereign Lord incarnate! How dare they try to wage war on me! This is profanely disgraceful!’

He began singing the Eternal Heavenly Aria, causing numerous halos to spring out around the heads of his enemies. Almost immediately, the celestial soldiers and generals began to fade out of existence.

At this point, the tribulation changed again. Tribulation clouds roiled out of the godly image, within which were immortal kings, some clad in yellow robes, some wearing imperial regalia, and some wearing armor.

As they rushed forth to attack, Yang Qi attacked with the ruthlessness of a wolf or tiger. Drawing on the Hand of the One God, he started with Creation, then went on to Destruction, Nature, Undying, and Aeon. He even used the sixth stance, Reincarnation.

Countless black holes appeared, except they weren’t pitch black. There were actually six different versions, each of them a different color. Some were bright and some were dark. Some seemed violent and some seemed peaceful. They represented none other than the six daos of reincarnation, those being the daos of devas, humans, evil spirits, asuras, hells, and beasts.

After all, the sixth stance of the Hand of the One God was about the power of reincarnation. As the move was unleashed, the godly image shattered and the celestial soldiers, celestial generals, and immortal kings were sucked into reincarnation, never to appear again.

The godly image began shrinking in on itself and Yang Qi’s true energy became more ancient and archaic. The ultimate meaning of the Epic Saga level was alive in his soul, and his cultivation base was reaching unprecedented heights.

Pop. Pop. Pop. Pop!

The final group of one hundred million particles woke up inside of him, prompting him to throw his head back and let loose a long cry. At long last, all eight hundred forty million particles were awake. At the same time, a shadowy image of him could be seen within the greyspace of the Hell of Mahānata.

His psychic level was now so far beyond that of an ordinary cultivator that no such person could ever do anything to him.

As an Epic Saga Sage, Yang Qi could easily kill sixth or seventh order Demi-Immortals.

He was now worlds apart from his previous level of second step Great Sage. His old self could be considered as laughable as an ant. Yet he had only progressed from being an ant into a snake. If he wanted to be a dragon, he needed to reach the Demi-Immortal level.

‘Is it really going to be that hard to reach the Demi-Immortal level?’ He reined in the aura of the Epic Saga Step and closed his eyes to gather his thoughts. Around him, the spell formation continued rotating within the confines of the God Legion Paradise.

After a long moment of contemplation, he realized that it was not the time to proceed with powering up. Although he wanted to reach the Demi-Immortal level as quickly as possible, he needed to rest for a short time. He had just gone directly from the second step of the Great Sage level to the ninth, a leap of seven levels that would leave even immortals shocked.

He was innately skilled, and had the Physique of the Sovereign Lord, but even he could get tired. And right now, he very much needed to stabilize himself before attempting further transformations.

‘Time to leave! Considering the level of my cultivation base, I can get back to the Hell of Mahānata much more easily than last time. I need to go rest for a bit.’

Blurring into motion, he burrowed through the greyspace of the Hell of Mahānata, reappearing outside a few moments later. Looking back down at the dark golden greyspace, he nodded in satisfaction.

He was now vastly stronger than before, and, with his godworm, could easily get in and out of this greyspace. After resting and recuperating his vital energy, he would return and climb to the Demi-Immortal level. Besides, having ensconced his nascent divinity here, and now that he knew the spatial coordinates, he could use the Hell Portal to open a passageway any time he wanted.

The Hell of Mahānata may as well have been his backyard, putting him in a true position of invincibility. After all, if he ended up fighting an opponent who was too strong for him, he could just teleport inside and not even powerful immortals would dare to follow him.

Then he could work on his cultivation inside and come out stronger to defeat his enemy.

With eight hundred forty million particles awake, Yang Qi knew that he was on a peak path of power.

Using the same teleportation route as before, he returned to the Invincible Society.

Upon returning, he found that Sword Seventeen was almost finished with his tribulation. He was currently beset by heaven-devils, yet every slash of his sword cut them to bits.

He had benefited greatly in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, and now he was drawing on all of that to achieve heaven-shaking, earth-shattering results. His sword energy blazed dazzlingly as sword crypts appeared all around him, destroying the heaven-devil tribulation with impunity.

One Sword to Break Heavenly Tribulation!

Two Swords to Become a Demi-Immortal!

Three Swords to Break the Vault Above!

Four Swords to Rend the Universe!

Five Swords to Become a Godmyth!

Six Swords Corroborates the Deathless!

Sword Seventeen rose to his feet and slowly exhaled, sending a stream of sword energy out that swept the area clean of the vital energy of the tribulation. At the same time, intense rumbling sounds echoed out, confirming that he was now a Demi-Immortal. His godworm larva had also grown significantly and had fully fused with him. With his sword technique, he could now create wormholes, making him deadlier than ever.

“Congratulations, Elder Brother!” Yang Qi said. “You're a Demi-Immortal now, which means you’ll be promoted to royal student.”

Sword Seventeen opened his eyes. “Royal student? Hah. We in the Invincible Society don’t care about that stuff. We get our own resources and further our own cultivation. We don't need to rely on the bureaucracy of elders in the Titan Emperor Collegium.” Looking over, he narrowed his eyes and performed a quick test to check the limits of his cultivation base. A stream of true energy snaked out of his forehead, but was incapable of entering Yang Qi. It was almost as if Yang Qi didn’t exist to it.

At the same time, Sword Seventeen could tell that there was something powerful in Yang Qi, like the rage of lightning—something that could slaughter any individual who didn't respect the legion of gods.

Obviously, Yang Qi was far stronger than him.

Not even his most recent breakthrough had pushed Sword Seventeen’s level past Yang Qi’s.

“Did you finally reach the Demi-Immortal level, Junior Brother?” he asked.

Yang Qi chuckled. “No. I'm just an Epic Saga Sage. I can reach the Demi-Immortal level any time, but I decided it would be better to let my vital energy build up a bit first. And now I can get back to the Hell of Mahānata any time I want, so I'm not in a hurry.”

“Only a ninth step Great Sage and you’re that strong?” Sword Seventeen said in naked astonishment. “What will you be like as a Demi-Immortal? Just how strong are you?”

“Strong enough that I could kill seventh order Demi-Immortals without using a magical treasure,” Yang Qi replied casually. “Even a Revered Demi-Immortal with a godly-class energy art wouldn’t be a threat to me. If I relied on magical treasures like my imperial snakecharms, then I could definitely decimate an eighth order Demi-Immortal.  As soon as I step into the Demi-Immortal level, my guess is that I could defeat Universal Demi-Immortals. I’ll essentially be indestructible at that point and could even escape alive from immortals.”

“My god! You’re just about as strong as Elder Second Brother!” Sword Seventeen looked him up and down, then suddenly burst out laughing. “We can do whatever we want in the Titan Emperor Collegium now! We’re strong enough that not even the elder kings would dare to cause problems for us without thinking long and hard about it first. And I bet you have some tricks up your sleeve to use in a pinch.”

“That’s right. I still have some of those mammoth tusks left, which means I could get a big boost of power, if necessary. And my seventh stage mother godworm is building up power as well. By the way, have any of our other Elder Brothers and Sisters returned?”

“No,” he said with a concerned shake of his head. “I have the feeling that they’re all stuck in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.”

Chapter 466: Get Out Here!

“What? None of them got out?” Yang Qi said in shock.

Sword Seventeen nodded grimly.

Months had passed, and the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart had long since closed up; once that happened, no amount of powerful divine abilities or incredible energy arts could be used to exit it. In other words, his Elder Brothers and Sisters were all going to be stuck inside for the next ten thousand years.

And their Master, the Invincible Dugu, was in some unknown aspect of space-time, working on his cultivation in seclusion.

Eldest Brother’s whereabouts were unknown, and for all they knew he had also gone into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. As of this moment, the mighty Invincible Society only had two members present: Sword Seventeen and Yang Qi.

They made for a small and pitifully weak force.

Even working together, the two of them couldn’t accomplish much. Before, Yang Qi had felt like he truly had a powerful force to rely on, but now he was trying to clap with one hand. There were many, many societies in the Titan Emperor Collegium, and most of them were at each other’s throats. And now the Invincible Society was in a very weak position. If people ganged up on them, it would be hard to take a stand.

“Regardless, our priority is to get stronger,” Sword Seventeen said. “Besides, I believe that virtuous people will naturally receive the help of heaven. Our Elder Brothers and Sisters will be fine, wherever they are. We people from the Invincible Society are all miraculous in one way or another. Even if they’re all stuck in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart for now, they’ll figure out a way to get out.”

Yang Qi thought about the situation and, after a moment, snorted coldly. ‘Once I'm a Demi-Immortal, I’ll truly be invincible and nobody will cause problems for me. In fact, even now I doubt there are many people I would consider a threat.’

Not even the thought of Revered Demi-Immortals with godly-class energy arts bothered him. If he absolutely had to, he could use the Blood of the One God to take control of his God Legion Seal. And there definitely weren’t many people who could stand against that level of power.

He now had ten times as much Blood of the One God as he had before, and as things progressed he knew that he would eventually gain complete and utter control of the God Legion Seal. Unfortunately, even though he had a bit of control over the seal, using it now would cause him to become incredibly weak afterward.

After some thought, Yang Qi said, “Let’s keep working on our cultivation, Elder Brother. We got plenty of immortal items in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. For example, why don’t you take the Mourn-Parting Heaven-Palace?”

When brothers act as one, they will be as powerful as a sharp blade that can cut any metal.

The Mourn-Parting Heaven-Palace had been created by King Mourn-Parting, who was as famous as King Immortal-Slayer or King Heaven-Devourer. There were a total of nine thousand, nine hundred and ninety-nine parts of the palace, and if they could all be connected together, they would create the Mourn-Parting Heaven.

Even one fragmented hall of the palace was a minor world that could be used to pierce the dome of heaven and travel freely in the universe. In that respect, they were similar to the imperial snakecharms.

“Maybe,” Sword Seventeen said. “We did get a lot of treasure, that's for sure. However, you have your Planet Sage Monarch to think about. There are plenty of disciples and family members back there who could benefit from what we found in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. With those things, your clan could reach new heights in only a few hundred years. Besides, I cultivate the dao of the swords, so most of the treasures we found won’t help me much.”

“That's true,” Yang Qi replied. “And one of my main goals in going to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart was to find things that would help my continent become a planet, or even a planetary system. Why don’t we head back to Planet Sage Monarch and see if there are any geniuses of the dao of the sword who you might be able to train a bit?” With that, he rose to his feet.

However, before either of them could do anything else, a muffled boom rang out and the Invincible Society trembled silently. It almost sounded like someone had struck a blow onto the main entrance.

Then, a voice which fairly dripped with killing intent spoke. “Sword Seventeen! Yang Qi! Get out here right now! The Hall of Beheadings and Executions has issued a warrant for your arrest for the murder of a noble student. Come with us to stand trial.”

Yang Qi looked outside and saw that a group of experts had gathered at the entrance. All of them wore suits of armor engraved with the ancient character for “behead”, and they were so fiendish and vicious-looking that anyone who saw them would shiver with fear.

“So,” Sword Seventeen said, “the experts from the Hall of Beheadings and Executions have come. See that Tyrant Demi-Immortal? His name is Unmerciful Beheader, and he has the reputation of being a top genius.” He chuckled coldly. “Well, we're not going anywhere. Who has time for houseflies like them? And it’s not like they can break through the Invincible Society’s warding magics. Going to the Hall of Beheadings and Executions would make us two lambs in the tiger’s den.”

“You’re right,” Yang Qi said with a nod. Raising his voice, he said, “Who’s causing a ruckus out there? The Hall of Beheadings and Executions? I've never heard of you. And we don't admit to committing any so-called crime. If you people have a problem, have your elder kings go talk with our Master. He ordered us not to come out of seclusion. Now kindly screw the hell off. Elder Seventeenth Brother and I have ten thousand years of cultivation to work on. During that time, please don’t disturb us.”

“Dammit!”

The experts from the Hall of Beheadings and Executions were so mad they were nearly fuming. One of them, who wore the garb of a royal student, turned to the one Sword Seventeen had called Unmerciful Beheader and said, “Elder Brother Unmerciful, those two are like a clog in a sewer line: disgusting and difficult to deal with. Thanks to the warding magics of the Invincible Society, they’re acting like they're unequalled under heaven! What do we do?”

Unmerciful Beheader was a tall man with sword-like eyebrows and arrogant eyes. When he heard Yang Qi’s words, his jaw tightened, making him look particularly fierce. “Don’t worry. They’ll come out. The rest of the Invincible Society is all in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Who knows how these two got out, but they definitely have tons of treasure. The fact that they didn’t hand any over to the collegium is disgraceful. Then, they went and murdered a noble student. Those crimes alone have earned them the death sentence. The parliament of elders is already discussing the matter, and once they issue a formal decision these two will get what's coming to them.”

Another royal student said, “Elder Brother Unmerciful, I heard that Yang Qi got some primeval godworm eggs. Do you… do you think it's true?”

The faces of everyone else present flickered with greed.

“I also heard the rumor,” Unmerciful Beheader said, “and I'd say there’s an eighty to ninety percent chance it's true. In fact, that’s why I asked you to come help me arrest these two. I might be a genius, but my chances of reaching immortal ascension are small. But not if I can get a godworm.”

“But they're like turtles with their heads in their shells! What options do we have?”

“Watch and see,” Unmerciful Beheader said, chuckling coldly. Raising his voice, he said, “Don’t think that you can stay hiding in there forever, you two. The Invincible Society is part of the Titan Emperor Collegium, and it won’t be long before the Invincible Dugu achieves his breakthrough and abandons you. By the way, your Eldest Brother is stuck in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, so you have nobody to back you up.”

“Bah!” Sword Seventeen said. “You talk big, but that’s about it. Maybe we should just let down the warding magics, come out, and crush your bones into dust.”

“What?” Unmerciful Beheader said, taking a step back. However, a moment later, his smile turned even more vicious than before. “Who the hell do you think you are, Sword Seventeen? You were a fifth step Great Sage last I saw you, placing you far beneath me. Even if the rumors are true and you’re a Demi-Immortal now, you’re still like the mud and I'm like the sky. Look, I'm done wasting my breath.

“Listen up, Yang Qi, you brat. If you insist on being stubborn, fine. The Hall of Beheadings and Executions will cut the weeds and eliminate the roots. We’ll send experts to your Yore-Wilds planetary system and arrest everyone from Planet Sage Monarch and the Hanging Mountain. That includes your mother. Then we’ll see whether or not you agree to come out of there. You really think we don’t have ways of dealing with you? Let me tell you: you’re weak. Way too weak. You want to drag your family down with you? Fine. When it comes to lawbreakers and rebels like you, our Hall of Beheadings and Executions shows no mercy. We execute everyone, down to the chickens and dogs. So I'm going to give you this one last chance. Get out here and come with us to the Hall of Beheadings and Executions. Be a good boy and stand trial. If you do, we might spare your life. Keep being stubborn, and you know exactly what fate you’re going to suffer.”

Slam!

The door opened and Yang Qi and Sword Seventeen both walked out.

No expression could be seen on Yang Qi’s face as he looked dead at Unmerciful Beheader. “Nice speech. So you’re threatening my friends and family to get me to go with you to the Hall of Beheadings and Executions. Is that it?”

“See, I knew you could behave,” Unmerciful Beheader said, looking very pleased with himself. “Men, arrest him. Use the Titan Emperor Immortal Steel. Drill it into his scapulas, and then drag him to the Hall of Beheadings and Executions.”

“We’ll handle it,” one of them said. “This brat is way too arrogant. I can’t believe he kept us waiting for so long. Well, we’ll make sure he lives the rest of his life wishing he could die.”

Two royal students rushed forward with steel chains in their hands, the ends of which were vicious hooks covered with complex designs that were obviously immortal motes. They were tools designed to capture top experts and prevent them from fleeing.

Wham! Bam!

Even as the two royal students reached Yang Qi, he unleashed a burst of empyrean energy that slammed them into the ground, where they coughed up mouthfuls of blood.

He smiled coldly. “Give you people an inch, and you take a mile. I’ll come with you to the Hall of Beheadings and Executions. But there’s no way you’re arresting me.”

His killing intent was already bubbling, and he was ready to make a huge scene. Because of that one threat uttered by Unmerciful Beheader, he had already decided that the man must die.

“Elder Seventeenth Brother, I'm interested to see what supposed hidden dragons and crouching tigers are in this Hall of Beheadings and Executions. Let’s go.” Ignoring Unmerciful Beheader, Yang Qi began walking directly toward the Hall of Beheadings and Executions. Smiling viciously, Sword Seventeen followed him.

Unmerciful Beheader was initially too stunned to do anything. However, he quickly recovered and shouted, “After them!”

With that, he and the other royal students scrambled after Yang Qi and Sword Seventeen.

At first, Unmerciful Beheader thought that the two of them would make a break for freedom, but when he realized they were really going to the Hall of Beheadings and Executions, his heart filled with venom. ‘Perfect. You could have strolled your way to heaven, but instead, you barged into hell. Even if you both had three heads and six arms, it wouldn’t help you. We’ll extort a confession out of you, take your treasure, and cripple your energy arts. That’s what will happen to you in the end. And of course, your family and friends are all going to die too!’

Chapter 467: You Can All Just Die

“That's the Hall of Beheadings and Executions just up ahead, Junior Brother. It’s the largest organization in the Titan Emperor Collegium, with too many disciples to count. They’re in charge of enforcing all of the countless laws, and they even have freshman students working for them out in the mining planets.”

An enormous structure became visible ahead of them, visibly imposing and pulsing with a killing aura that could cause one's blood to run cold.

As Yang Qi landed in front of the place, he eyed the warding magics that protected it. Immediately, the guards stepped forward.

“Who are you?” one of them shouted. “Which society are you from? How dare you try to enter the Hall of Beheadings and Executions without permission? Tired of living? Or are you here to lodge a petition? If it’s the latter, then step to the side, get on your knees, and pray for three days and three nights. Afterward, you can strike the Drum of Petition to request a hearing.”

The Hall of Beheadings and Executions was a place where students could come to resolve differences or report murders or thefts. If one had the proper connections, one could go right in. If not, the requirement was to pray for three days and nights, then strike the Drum of Petition. Any who tried to skirt the rules would be accused of committing a crime, and then, not only would their petition not be heard, but they would also be arrested and sent to the mines.

Yang Qi and Sword Seventeen didn’t even respond to the guard. They simply stood there calmly until Unmerciful Beheader and his fellows caught up.

“These are two dangerous criminals,” Unmerciful Beheader shouted, “Sword Seventeen and Yang Qi from the Invincible Society! Hurry up and activate the grand formation to lock them down. Call on the warding magics! Quick, before they attack us!”

The other disciples from the Hall of Beheadings and Executions all began clamoring in shock and surprise.

“What?”

“The Invincible Society!?”

“So this is the Yang Qi that somehow got out of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart with a bunch of treasure? When he joined the collegium, he went crazy during the entrance ceremony and killed a bunch of people!”

“Incredible, I can’t believe we captured someone as arrogant as this. Great, now we can make his life so full of pain that he’ll wish he could die. In fact, he’ll beg for death!”

“There’s no need for your warding magics,” Yang Qi said. “I’m not going anywhere. I don’t care if your Hall of Beheadings and Executions is as dangerous as a dragon’s pool or a tiger’s den, I'm going inside. Besides, I thought you wanted to interrogate me. Let’s see what tricks your elders try to pull, and just how strong you people really are.”

Without any further fanfare, Yang Qi walked into the main entrance, completely ignoring the effects of any of the warding magics.

“What’s going on here? Our spell formations are deadly and impenetrable! How could he just walk right in? Are the formations just ignoring him?”

“Amazing,” Unmerciful Beheader said. “So the stories are true. He really does have a primeval godworm! And he fused with it! He has enlightenment of the godly laws of space. Otherwise, how could he possibly just waltz into the Hall of Beheadings and Executions? Quick,” he shouted, “tell the grand elders, they’ll definitely want to lead the interrogation.”

Earlier, Unmerciful Beheader had felt a bit embarrassed at being steamrolled by Yang Qi, but now things were different. Yang Qi had seemingly thrown himself into an inescapable trap and was definitely heading toward an early grave.

Bugle cries rang out everywhere, and countless streams of killing intent erupted from the depths of the Hall of Beheadings and Executions. Within moments, everyone knew that an important case was about to be tried.

“This is where they perform interrogations and hear cases,” Sword Seventeen said as they emerged from a corridor into a spacious hall, at the end of which was a handful of royal thrones. In front of the thrones was a massive table adorned with writing implements and command medallions. There was even an incense burner that was apparently used to offer sacrifices to heaven. It looked very much like the kind of court that would be seen in the mortal world.

As Yang Qi and Sword Seventeen walked in, bugle calls echoed about. At the same time, a host of figures blurred through the air and took their places on the thrones. These were the top experts of the Hall of Beheadings and Executions, including the elders, grand elders, prime elders, and prime paragon elders. Numerous elite disciples also rushed in, bearing vicious instruments of torture as they glared menacingly at Yang Qi and Sword Seventeen.

Of course, Unmerciful Beheader was there in the crowd.

It took only a few short moments for the entire courtroom hall to be roused, and as they assembled their gazes flickered with animosity, jealousy, and greed. In short, there wasn't a single good and honest person among them.

Sword Seventeen looked around at the forces arrayed against them, his heart pounding. “Well, Junior Brother, it seems the Hall of Beheadings and Executions is going all out to try to deal with us. Word really spread quickly that we got those godworm eggs, and who could avoid getting jealous of the level of wealth they represent? That’s not to mention how important godworms can be when it comes to immortal ascension. Although, you can’t help but wonder how the rumors started.”

“Don’t worry, I’ll handle it,” Yang Qi said through gritted teeth. “If we don’t give these people a good thrashing, how can we maintain the reputation of the Invincible Society? But first, let’s see if we can get a better idea of what they want.”

Unmerciful Beheader walked out from the crowd, kneeled to the three prime paragon elders, and loudly said, “Prime Paragon Elders, these are the rebel students Yang Qi and Sword Seventeen. First they resisted arrest, then they forced their way into our headquarters. For that alone, they should die ten thousand deaths! There’s no need to hold any trial. Just execute them right here in the courtroom hall, then slaughter their clans down to the last living person.”

“Calm down,” said one of the prime paragon elders as he and his compatriots studied Yang Qi and Sword Seventeen.

Transmitting his voice via divine will, Sword Seventeen said, ‘Junior Brother, these are the three top overlords of the Hall of Beheadings and Executions. Heavenly Beheader. Earthly Beheader. Mortal Beheader. Collectively, they’re known as the “Heavenly, Earthly, and Mortal Patriarchs Three”. All of them are seventh order Revered Demi-Immortals. You definitely can’t take them lightly. They have a joint technique that they can employ called the Hell-Beheading Triple-Treasure Immortal-Punishing Grand Formation.’

Yang Qi didn't respond to Sword Seventeen. He simply nodded, then raised his voice and said, “Why did your Hall of Beheadings and Executions send people to the Invincible Society to arrest us? What crime did we commit? I came here today to get some answers. If you're just randomly tossing around trumped up charges then things aren’t going to end well for you today.”

Immediately, the crowd erupted.

“Things won’t end well for us? HAHAHAHAHAHA!”

“How arrogant! How conceited! Sadly, your Invincible Society’s Eldest Brother is trapped in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart and the Invincible Dugu is in seclusion. In fact, he might have ascended already.”

“You two brats are the only ones left in the Invincible Society, and you dare to say that things won’t go well for us? Execute them! Skin them alive, sever their tendons, and leave them to rot!”

“No! Cut their tongues out first.”

“Inflict the worst torture possible on them, but don’t let them die!”

“How impudent!”

BAM!

Mortal Beheader slammed his palm down onto the table and glared around at the disciples in the courtroom hall, who instantly went quiet. Then he looked back at Yang Qi and Sword Seventeen and said, “You want to know what crime you committed? A whole group of students from the Hegemon’s Society was set to emerge from seclusion and become elysian children. The entire area was locked down! That’s what our rules of etiquette demand! But you two caused a big scene, even murdering a noble student! That’s your crime! It’s punishable by death, and that includes your whole clan!”

Yang Qi snorted. “Unlawfully barring entrance to the Invincible Society is a bigger crime. We never got any orders from Master saying that the entrance could be blocked! We're the top society in the Titan Emperor Collegium! Sealing our entrance without advance notification is an outright plot against us, and is punishable by death.  Furthermore, if you want to arrest us, you had better well notify our Master about it first.”

“What outrageous gall you have!” Earthly Beheader said with a cold chuckle. “Even at this point, you’re still carrying on with your ravings? The Invincible Society is done for. Henceforth, the Titan Emperor Collegium will no longer tolerate you people. Understand? Your society is a malignant tumor! Not only do you not contribute resources to the Titan Emperor Collegium, but you go around breaking the rules and acting with complete arrogance. Without excising you, our collegium can never cast its glory onto the surrounding world. Men, bind these two and force them to their knees. The time has come to announce their punishment.”

“Slow down!” someone said, their voice instantly cutting through the building killing aura. It was none other than Heavenly Beheader. The slightest wave of his hand caused everyone in the hall to stop moving. Looking at Yang Qi and Sword Seventeen, he said, “According to the heaven above, there is virtue in sparing life. You two committed a heinous crime, and normally speaking you would be executed and your entire clan wiped out. There’s really no reason whatsoever to pardon you. However, I have the authority to do just that, as long as you provide a significant contribution to the collegium. I heard that you acquired a stash of treasure in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, including some primeval godworm eggs. Those things are quite valuable. As immoral criminals, it’s definitely inappropriate for you to have such a collection. Hand them over to us, the proper authorities, and you’ll be forgiven.”

Yang Qi’s eyes flickered as he looked around at the forces arrayed against them. Obviously, the three patriarchs were playing good cop, bad cop, all in an attempt to get his godworm eggs.

‘So,’ he thought, ‘it’s true that rumors have spread about me having some godworm eggs. But who started the rumors? I never told anyone, and neither did Sword Seventeen.’ Laughing, he raised his voice and said, “You went to all this trouble just to get my godworm eggs? Well, let me tell you the truth. Although I do have a big collection, I don't have any extra to hand out. Not even one.”

“Oh really?” Heavenly Beheader said, his smile turning sinister. “Don’t be impulsive, boy. I’ll lock you up in the worst prison we have here in the Hall of Beheadings and Executions and only let you out when your head is clear. In the meantime, we’ll round up all of your family, including the Holy Mother from the Hanging Mountain. Perhaps they can convince you to hand over your treasures. Hopefully you’ll do the right thing when the time comes. Your mother might be famous in the Hanging Mountain, but compared to the Titan Emperor Collegium that place is like a speck of dust. Men, take him away and start using the Ten Brutal Torture Methods until he talks. Unmerciful Beheader, you go to the Yore-Wilds Continent to round up his family. If anyone resists, kill them on the spot.”

“Yes sir!” Unmerciful Beheader said, chuckling coldly.

At this point, Yang Qi sighed. “I would never have guessed that you people from the Hall of Beheadings and Executions would be so faceless. I don’t even think you know the meaning of the term face. Well, I suppose I’ll just kill you all.”

Chapter 468: Weaklings

Yang Qi had made up his mind to cause a huge scene. The moment they went so far as to threaten his family, he knew that the situation had reached the point where it couldn’t be resolved in a simple fashion. Therefore, he would cause havoc and make sure that these lowlifes knew exactly how spectacular the Invincible Society was.

He bitterly detested anyone who threatened his family and would never show such people mercy. Worst case scenario, he could just use the God Legion Paradise to take Planet Sage Monarch off to another location.

“Well, I suppose I’ll just kill you all.”

As he spoke the words, he suddenly began thrumming with the most fiendish and deadly aura imaginable. The Hall of Beheadings and Executions had as many experts as the sky had clouds, yet not a single one of them could see Yang Qi clearly as he unexpectedly blurred into motion.

Crunch!

Unmerciful Beheader had just been standing there looking very pleased with himself, but as of this moment, his evil-looking smile was suddenly frozen in place and his cheeks began turning scarlet.

A hand was now wrapped around his throat and he felt himself being lifted up into the air. He kicked. He struggled. And yet, he was unable to draw on a single energy art. Unmerciful Beheader was a fifth order Demi-Immortal, an expert whose most casual move could destroy planets and create planes of existence. He could pierce through space-time as easily as taking a stroll through the park. But now that Yang Qi had grabbed him, he felt as weak as a baby chicken.

“You….” Unmerciful Beheader could never in his wildest dreams have guessed that Yang Qi would suddenly make such a ruthless move. He had been burning with the desire to cut Yang Qi down, only to suddenly realize how far apart they were in terms of strength. How could a punk Great Sage be doing this? Unfortunately for him, it was only in this moment that he realized that it really was possible for Great Sages to kill Demi-Immortals.

He was surrounded by a veritable army of allies in this particular courtroom hall. But struggling there in Yang Qi’s grasp, he felt completely alone and helpless.

Terror bubbled up in his heart.

“What's the meaning of this!?” someone shouted.

“Put Unmerciful Beheader down this instant! You still have a chance to leave here alive, but if you kill him then you and your entire clan are all dead.”

Many of the onlookers erupted in rage, but the majority were too shocked to do anything other than stare at what was happening.

Meanwhile, Mortal Beheader slapped the table, shot to his feet, and stared at Yang Qi. He realized that the situation was out of hand, but still felt confident in being able to deal with Yang Qi. “You’d better not harm a hair on Unmerciful Beheader’s head, Yang Qi. If you do, we won’t let you and your clan off—”

Before he could even finish speaking, Unmerciful Beheader suddenly shrieked, “No, don’t—”

Pop!

Unmerciful Beheader exploded, with his soul, sea of energy, quintessence-blood, and bones crumbling into a jewel-like manifestation of true energy that was a śarīra. The only thing left behind other than that was his skin, which flopped onto the ground like a pile of cloth.

“What a lovely śarīra,” Yang Qi said. “It’ll make a great decoration for my God Legion Paradise. Or maybe I’ll send it to Planet Sage Monarch to become a satellite planet.” Looking down at the pile of skin, he said, “The Invincible Society isn't decorated very well. Once Master is out of seclusion, I think I’ll suggest using more human skin as rugs for the floor.”

Although his tone of voice was rather calm, everyone who could hear him felt their hearts turning as cold as ice. A powerful expert of the Hall of Beheadings and Executions had been reduced to a pile of skin. The mere thought was spine-tingling.

“You monster!” Earthly Beheader shouted. “You’ve just signed your own death warrant! Unmerciful Beheader was a spectacular genius and was just about to become an elysian child. You just murdered him! This has never happened before! No one has ever killed an officer of the Hall of Beheadings and Executions in cold blood!”

The three prime paragon elders were reeling in shock. They all knew that the disciples of the Invincible Society were ruthless and difficult to deal with, but they had never seen anything like this.

Unmerciful Beheader was a genius in their organization, one of their most important disciples. Now he was a pile of skin and his killer was talking about turning him into a rug. It was the most horrific of humiliations.

There was no need for the three patriarchs to even think about what to do next. Without any hesitation, they attacked, sending out three heavenly god nimbuses rumbling toward Yang Qi and Sword Seventeen.

“Destroy All Living Things. Cosmic Dharma Fist!” they shouted as the courtroom hall trembled around them.

“You three weaklings don’t even have a godly-class energy art? Just an immortal skill? And yet you dare to go crazy in my presence? You really are looking to die.” The God Legion Paradise sprang out around Yang Qi, filling a sixty-square-meter area, and the attack slammed into it. Not even a crack appeared as a result.

The combined move of three prime paragon elders dissipated as surely as a spring breeze.

Yang Qi was already strong enough to kill Revered Demi-Immortals who cultivated godly-class energy arts. He could even survive the assault of a Universal Demi-Immortal. Considering that, these three prime paragon elders were definitely not a match for him.

From what Yang Qi understood, in all of the Titan Emperor Collegium, only the Invincible Dugu cultivated a godly-class energy art.

Killing intent surging, Yang Qi said, “You people from the Hall of Beheadings and Executions are all weaklings who don’t know the difference between right and wrong. I tried to give you some face, but you wouldn’t back down. No more. I'm going to kill all of you and turn your skin into rugs for the Invincible Society.”

RUUUUUUMBLE!

Singing the Eternal Heavenly Aria, he unleashed a deadly move from the Hand of the One God, Reincarnation. The three elders immediately staggered backward, their energy and blood in chaos. Then screams rang out as Yang Qi took advantage of the time he had bought to slaughter some of the nearby elders and disciples.

“No! You can’t kill me! This is rebellion! Rebell— AIIIEEE!” A fourth order Potent Demi-Immortal, a royal student, had become nothing but a pile of skin that flopped down on the ground.

“No! I refuse to accept this! I'm an elder! I have years of longevity left! Nobody in the Hall of Beheadings and Executions would dare to defy me! How could I die like—” An elder was chopped to pieces, his soul crushed out of existence.

“I'm a prime elder! I kill people, not the other way around. How could a nobody like you possibly—” The prime elder tried to flee, but Yang Qi was too fast and crushed his soul and sea of consciousness out of existence, as dead as dead could be.

In a flash, scores of elders and students had met their end. There was absolutely no way any of them could stand up to Yang Qi.

The sight of it caused the eyes of Heavenly Beheader, Earthly Beheader, and Mortal Beheader to turn completely bloodshot, to the point where tears of blood began dripping down their cheeks. In all the tens of thousands of years that the Hall of Beheadings and Executions had existed, no one had ever had the outrageous gall to do something like this.

Even the Invincible Society’s Eldest Brother had only cursed them, not gone on a killing spree. As far as they were concerned, Yang Qi was definitely a monster that anyone had the right to punish.

“He’s killing so many people!” Heavenly Beheader said in mute shock. “He’s a monster! Quick, notify the elder kings and the elysian children. In fact, send messages to the vice-rectors. The Invincible Society is outright rebelling! Send people to the Yore-Wilds Continent to wipe out his clan.”

Then he leaped forward to try to stop Yang Qi’s massacre.

“You three old codgers are all about to die,” Yang Qi said, pulling out his Infernal Deity Spear, which was already surrounded by halos of blessing from the Eternal Heavenly Aria. After all of the tribulations he had passed through recently, his energy arts had reached a level that was completely enigmatic and impossible to predict. As he brandished the spear, the Concluding Elegy of the Nightfall Symphony spread out, making the entire area like the netherworld itself.

CRACK!

The weakest of the three elders, Mortal Beheader, had his defensive true energy completely disregarded by the spear, and his minor world was completely shattered in the blink of an eye.

“My minor world! It’s supposed to be invincible! I created it with the ultimate power of beheadings and executions!” He immediately began falling back.

Yang Qi just smiled coldly and said, “Die.”

Using the Blood of the One God, he unleashed the Hand of the One God directly at Mortal Beheader.

BAM!

The blow hit the man’s chest, destroying the final bits of his defensive true energy and severely damaging his sea of energy and meridians.

“You're not going anywhere,” Yang Qi said, grabbing the top of Mortal Beheader’s head and digging his fingers into his skull until they were just touching his brain. “Nobody move, otherwise your Mortal Beheader is dead.”

“What? He captured Elder Mortal Beheader?! But he’s a seventh order Revered Demi-Immortal! He’s almost on the same level as the elder kings!”

“What exactly is going on here?”

“How is that Yang Qi so strong?”

Chapter 469: Arrogant and Despotic

Blood oozed out of the holes Yang Qi had punched in Mortal Beheader’s skull as he held him, forming a very terrifying sight. Mortal Beheader was a seventh order Revered Demi-Immortal and was considered one of the top experts in the Titan Emperor Collegium. He had practiced cultivation for tens of thousands of years and was shown respect wherever he went. But now he looked about as strong as a baby chicken and was clearly terrified.

Mortal Beheader’s life was in Yang Qi’s hands, therefore no one dared to act rashly.

The people in the crowd exchanged awkward glances, but didn’t utter even the slightest sound. The ground was littered with the skins of numerous disciples, and even some prime elders. It was a scene of utmost horror and lunacy, and an extreme humiliation to the Hall of Beheadings and Executions. Normally speaking, the Hall of Beheadings and Executions took the lead in executing lawbreakers. But now the executioners were being executed.

No one knew what to do.

However, after a long moment passed, Heavenly Beheader stepped forward and angrily shouted, “Yang Qi, Sword Seventeen, Invincible Society… you’ve really gone and done it this time. You can’t turn back from this, you know. You’re dead and there’s nobody out there who can save you. You can only blame yourself for not leaving a way out for yourselves.”

“Leave a way out?” Sword Seventeen replied angrily. “How exactly were we supposed to do that? As soon as you showed up at our front door you started talking about killing us and exterminating our clans. And now you're talking about leaving a way out? If we didn't stand up for ourselves, we would be more dead than these people here. You backed us into a corner, so we’re going to wipe you out. We’ll see soon enough who’s more vicious: us, or you. You see, the Invincible Society doesn't go around threatening people. We’ve caused tempests of blood to rain down many times throughout history, and we’re not afraid of anybody. We’ll make you suffer, even if we die trying.”

“Enough, Elder Brother," Yang Qi said. “These pigheaded fools wanted to end our lives, but that's fine. I’m in the mood for some killing. I'm going to show them what a fiendish killer can do, and I'm also going to show them what it means to be invincible. We’re going to improve our society’s reputation again here. Eldest Brother forced their elder kings to cough up blood, and there’s no way I'm going to do anything less amazing.”

Voice as cold as ice, Heavenly Beheader said, “Let Mortal Beheader go, Yang Qi. This incident has already caused a stir in the upper echelons. If the elder kings get involved, how will you resolve the situation? You still have a chance to atone for your crimes, but only if you let Mortal Beheader go.”

“Either you die, or your whole clan dies,” Earthly Beheader said. “Which do you want? Think things through clearly.”

“Even with death staring you in the face, you still insist on being stubborn?” Yang Qi shook his head. “Do you people really think I'm afraid to go all out? Do you really think I’ll let you off the hook after everything that's happened? Let me tell you, once I decide to do something, I do it. No matter what. I'm going to cleanse the Hall of Beheadings and Executions with a river of blood and expunge it from the Titan Emperor Collegium for all time.”

“Oh really?” a voice cut in, echoing through the Hall of Beheadings and Executions, accompanied by an aura that seemed to contain the rotations of the universe.

A figure appeared, clad in royal garments and surrounded by an air of majesty.

Countless experts in the Hall of Beheadings and Executions immediately shouted out in shock.

“Kingly Beheader!” Heavenly Beheader said, “These people from the Invincible Society are in outright rebellion! They’ve been bedeviled! The whole Invincible Society is bedeviled. You elder kings need to wipe them out of existence. That’s the only way to maintain the dignity of the Hall of Beheadings and Executions!”

“Elder King, look, he took Mortal Beheader captive!” Earthly Beheader said. “We’re all hesitating to shoot the rat for fear of breaking the vases!”

“Very well. Let me talk things out with this evil creature.” Kingly Beheader was one of the top leaders of the Hall of Beheadings and Executions and rarely made public appearances. He spent most of his time in seclusion, pondering the heavenly dao of Demolishing. The fact that he had come to handle the situation went to show how much of a scene Yang Qi had caused.

Looking at Yang Qi sneeringly out of the corner of his eyes, he said, “So, you evil creature, did I just hear you say that you would expunge the Hall of Beheadings and Executions from the Titan Emperor Collegium? Do you know how far back our history stretches? Do you know how many students work for us, or how strong we are? You really think that your tiny Invincible Society can do anything to us? I don’t think so. You won’t be exterminating anyone. Our Hall of Beheadings and Executions represents rule and law. Without rules, you can’t have a functioning society, and without laws, you can’t have a powerful sect. Considering the things that just came out of your mouth, your Master the Invincible Dugu is going to have to accept responsibility for this situation. We’ve already reported the matter to the supreme rector and sentenced both you and your entire clan to death.”

“Still going to be obstinate, Yang Qi?!” Heavenly Beheader said. “Let Mortal Beheader go! There’s no way you’ll defy an elder king, not with your life and the lives of your family on the line.”

“Who the hell do you think you are?” Yang Qi said. “And who the hell are the elder kings? How dare you people try to tell me what to do.”

Heavenly Beheader was so shocked by Yang Qi’s response that he couldn't even say anything in response. Even Kingly Beheader was visibly stunned, and his face was starting to turn crimson. In fact, if he weren’t worried about accidentally hurting or killing Mortal Beheader, he would already have attacked Yang Qi.

“Let Mortal Beheader go,” he said, taking a step forward.

“Okay,” Yang Qi said, and Kingly Beheader stopped in his tracks. “I understand what’s going on here, Elder King. You’re worried that if you shoot the rat, you might break the vases. That’s why you’re holding back. Alright, considering how worried you are about that, why don’t we just skip to the part where we fight?”

“Oh? You’re going to let Mortal Beheader go? So, it turns out you are afraid of breaking the law after all. Well, did you really think the Invincible Society was actually invincible? Listen, everyone has to follow the rules, that’s just the way things work. I can tell you’re strong, so after you let Mortal Beheader go, I’ll only hit you three times. If you survive, I’ll spare your clan and only execute you. What do you think?”

Yang Qi burst out laughing. “You’re a real moron, you know that? You think I was talking about letting Mortal Beheader go? Wrong. I meant that I would kill him so we could just start fighting. Not even you’re strong enough to stop me. When I said I would make it rain blood here in the Hall of Beheadings and Executions, I was dead serious. However many people you have, that’s how many I’ll kill. Understand? And we're going to start with Mortal Beheader.”

Without any hesitation, he sent a burst of power into Mortal Beheader.

“I refuse to accept this! I can’t die here! I'm a Revered Demi-Immortal. I'm supposed to become an elder king. I'm– AIIIIEEE!”

BOOOM!

The man’s head exploded and his soul was wiped out of existence, leaving behind only the echo of his dying scream.

The Hand of the One God completely destroyed him, even the branding mark where he had ensconced his nascent divinity, ensuring that he would never be reborn.

Just like that, a mighty prime paragon elder was killed.

Yet again, something had occurred in the Hall of Beheadings and Executions that had never occurred before.

“What?” Kingly Beheader’s face went as white as a sheet and his hands began to tremble. He had experienced many things in life, and had encountered many ruthless individuals, but he had never seen anyone as brutal as Yang Qi. Yang Qi was the merciless type of individual who would defy all laws and principles, even those of heaven. Not even the Invincible Dugu could compare to him, his own disciple. Back when the Invincible Dugu had been a Great Sage, he hadn’t been able to kill Revered Demi-Immortals. The two levels were so far apart from each other that the former was like a beggar while the latter was like an emperor.

“He killed Mortal Beheader? He really killed him?” Kingly Beheader simply couldn't believe what he was seeing.

He, an elder king, turned out to be completely incapable of saving one of his own subordinates. Not even killing Yang Qi would restore the face the Hall of Beheadings and Executions had just lost in this blood-soaked episode.

“Yeah, I killed him,” Yang Qi said, looking completely calm. “Alright, Elder King. Let’s fight. I want to see how strong you are. Remember, this isn’t play fighting. It’s life or death combat. I’m going to kill you, then I’m going to wipe out the entire Hall of Beheadings and Executions. Anyone who talks about exterminating my friends and family will find that very thing happening to them. The only way to make sure this collegium remains balanced is to resolve the enmity between the Invincible Society and the Hall of Beheadings and Executions, right here, right now.”

The leisurely way Yang Qi spoke left the surrounding experts completely thunderstruck. Yang Qi was in a location that most people would consider as dangerous as a dragon’s pool or a tiger’s den, yet he was the picture of calm confidence.

“You!” Kingly Beheader shouted, completely and utterly enraged.

“Alright fine, you measly Great Sage. You ant. You want to fight me, an elder king? I tell you this: the only way you’ll walk out of the Hall of Beheadings and Executions today is over my dead body. I'm going to kill you, the Invincible Society, and everyone else connected to you. Except your mother from the Hanging Mountain. I’ll make sure she lives a life worse than death. The guilty can never escape justice from heaven! World of Magical Law!”

Streaks of light sped out to form a huge net above them, filling the courtroom hall and causing the power of space-time to thrum in the area.

At this point, a faint smile appeared on Yang Qi’s face. “Heaven and earth are inseparable. Mahānata is boundless. The sun and moon cycle endlessly. I hereby call upon the power of the One God to perform spatial teleportation! Time to learn a little bit about how the universe works. Void Teleportation: World Splitting Power!”

RUUUMBLE!

Suddenly, golden light shot out of his forehead and filled the courtroom hall, which began peeling away from its current place in space and time.

Unexpectedly, Yang Qi was taking the entire place with him to the Hell of Mahānata.

Chapter 470: World Splitting

Immense power filled the courtroom hall, cutting it away from the space it occupied. In the blink of an eye, the place came to exist as a unique aspect of space and time, and was then taken away by Yang Qi.

Once he took it into the Hell of Mahānata, everyone inside the hall would die. The Hell of Mahānata was Yang Qi’s home ground, and not even Kingly Beheader could survive there. Furthermore, Yang Qi could break into the Demi-Immortal level there whenever he wanted.

At his current level, he could only fight an elder king to a draw, but as a Demi-Immortal he would definitely be able to kill one.

This had been Yang Qi’s plan all along.

He knew that if the situation kept developing, the highest echelons of leadership in the Hall of Beheadings and Executions would get involved, and possibly even top experts from the Titan Emperor Collegium in general. And if that happened, he wouldn’t be able to hold his own. After all, the collegium was a massive place that dwarfed even the Hall of Beheadings and Executions.

It was impossible to say how many students were arrested by the Hall of Beheadings and Executions on a daily basis. Therefore, Yang Qi’s ‘trial’ was not really anything special; the number of trials that were held every day was impossible to even count. However, the vital energy shockwaves that would roll out from Yang Qi fighting Kingly Beheader would not go unnoticed.

Therefore, he decided to go all out and do the most vicious thing anyone could imagine. He would make sure that no one ever dared to look down on either the Invincible Society or himself. By climbing mountains of corpses and swimming through seas of blood, he would establish himself as someone that no one could ever trifle with.

He called upon the God Legion Paradise, the Eternal Heavenly Aria, the Hand of the One God, his primal-chaos elder-snake, and his primeval godworm. With all of that power at his disposal, he grabbed the Hall of Beheadings and Executions and vanished.

There were tens of thousands of courtroom halls like this in the Hall of Corrections.

For one of them to suddenly vanish would definitely be noticed, but in the grand scheme of things it wouldn’t really cause a massive stir at first. In fact, some of the students and elders outside who sensed the fluctuations assumed that it was Yang Qi being killed by Kingly Beheader.

POP!

The courtroom hall appeared just outside of the dark golden greyspace of the Hell of Mahānata.

This time, the passage through the greyspace was much easier. In fact, it actually parted for Yang Qi, allowing him to enter without any obstruction.

Instantly, devil energy rushed in and nearly crushed the courtroom hall. Pillars collapsed and spell formations shattered. Empyrean energy, immortal energy, and everything else was destroyed by the force of expulsion that suddenly hit everyone and everything.

Fiend-devils would not be rejected by the Hell of Mahānata, but human cultivators would. And the stronger they were, the stronger the force of expulsion would hit them. As for Great Sages and Legendaries, they were weak enough that the essence of the hell would only try to devilize them.

But Demi-Immortals could not be simply devilized, and would thus be violently rejected.

Even worse, all of the people present cultivated energy arts that conformed to the dao of immortals, and they were all in the Demi-Immortal level. Because of that, the essence of the Hell of Mahānata immediately took action against them. In the blink of an eye, their cultivation base power dropped by a third, making them even weaker in comparison to Yang Qi, who was like a fish in water in this place.

“Where are we? This devil energy is so strong! It's eating away at my defensive empyrean energy. If this keeps up, we’re going to get devilized….”

“Hell. We’re in hell!”

“What? How could we be in hell? This devil energy is so strong! It must be a high-level hellish plane!”

“Be careful, everyone! Yang Qi and Sword Seventeen have already turned into monsters!”

Kingly Beheader immediately pulled out a magical item that spread out to form a protective covering filled with immortal energy. It was an immortal item called the Pure Space Immortal Rampart, which Kingly Beheader had painstakingly forged with his own hands. It was designed to turn an area into an immortal land and was very beneficial when used in cultivation.

“That’s right, everyone,” Yang Qi said. “We're in the Hell of Mahānata now, which is where I ensconced my nascent divinity. You see, Kingly Beheader, if we fought back in the Titan Emperor Collegium, I'm afraid you would have eventually called some other elder kings to gang up on me. I brought us here to the Hell of Mahānata so that we could fight fairly.”

Yang Qi looked around at the several hundred experts of the Hall of Beheadings and Executions, and for some reason, he looked like a butcher eyeing a group of caged pigs.

Kingly Beheader was no exception.

“The Hell of Mahānata?” Kingly Beheader said. “This is the fabled Hell of Mahānata? No wonder the devil energy is so strong.” He, Heavenly Beheader, and Earthly Beheader were all visibly taken aback. However, after looking around, he focused on Yang Qi and said, “So, evil creature, it turns out you really are a monster, just like I said. It seems I really will be ridding the world of devils and demons today, and the Titan Emperor Collegium will be freed from a dangerous, hidden threat.”

Kingly Beheader strode forward, bringing his blessed land of immortal energy with him. Although his Pure Space Immortal Rampart was impressive, Yang Qi’s eyes could see that the essence of the Hell of Mahānata was eating away at the man’s power. Even more relevant was the fact that the entire group from the Hall of Beheadings and Executions had no way to get back home.

Obviously, Kingly Beheader didn’t want to kill Yang Qi, but rather capture him and use him to get free.

“Your end has come, Kingly Beheader,” Yang Qi said. “I'm going to establish a legend today. I, a mere Great Sage, am going to slaughter an elder king from the collegium. I’ll take your head back and put it on a spike above the entrance of the Invincible Society.”  His killing aura surging, Yang Qi leaped forward and started fighting.

RUUUUUUMBLE!

He started with the Hand of the One God, using all the stances he knew. Creation. Destruction. Nature. Undying. Aeon. Reincarnation. At the same time, he drew on halos of blessing from the Eternal Heavenly Aria and cursed Kingly Beheading with halos of damnification.

He exhaled some true energy and a projection of a godmammoth appeared above his head, the Infernal Deity Spear in its hand as it lunged forward to attack Kingly Beheader.

Killing Kingly Beheader, Heavenly Beheader, and Earthly Beheader was a dangerous undertaking. If he really did put their heads on spikes at the Invincible Society, it would likely have major repercussions in the Titan Emperor Collegium. Maybe the vice-rectors and elysian children would come to cause problems for him. But he didn't care. The fact that he was willing to kill an elder king would strike fear into the hearts of all, and would ensure that everyone thought twice before dealing with him.

As the deadly fighting began in the Hell of Mahānata, the disappearance of the courtroom hall back in the Hall of Beheadings and Executions had finally been noticed. When people went over to check the situation, they saw the mass of primal-chaos energy that was all that remained of the hall and were flabbergasted.

Soon, three elder kings showed up to investigate.

These were people who had roughly the same standing as Kingly Beheader. They were Imperial Beheader, Sovereign Beheader, and Godly Beheader.

“What happened here?” one of them asked.

One of the students dropped down in front of them and kowtowed. “Unmerciful Beheader went to arrest Yang Qi and Sword Seventeen and bring them in to be interrogated regarding the murder of a noble student from the Hegemon’s Society. However, those two rebels refused to cooperate. They started fighting and one of the elder kings came—Kingly Beheader. But then Yang Qi started fighting him. The energy fluctuations were shocking, but then the entire courtroom hall just vanished, almost like it was teleported away by some incredible force. We didn’t dare to take charge of the situation, which is why we notified you.”

“What?” Imperial Beheader said. Turning to his companions, he said, “I can’t understand incoherent babbling like this. Why don’t we use our Reverse Light Stream technique to just see what happened? I refuse to believe that some puny student from the Invincible Society actually caused such a scene here in the Hall of Beheadings and Executions.”

“Sure. The people from the Invincible Society are far too arrogant. We need to find out what happened and report it to our superiors. At long last we can give the Invincible Dugu the punishment he deserves: execution!”

Without wasting any time, the three elder kings set to work, sending streams of reflective light out. Soon, a shadowy projection was created that showed everything which had played out earlier.

“Well, I suppose I’ll just kill you all.”

“Once Master is out of seclusion, I think I’ll suggest using more human skin as rugs for the floor.”

“You three old codgers are all about to die.”

“Alright, Elder King. Let’s fight.”

They heard all of the arrogant, domineering, and fearless things Yang Qi said.

“He killed Unmerciful Beheader?” Imperial Beheader said, looking completely astonished. “And all of those elders? And even Mortal Beheader? And he picked a fight with Kingly Beheader? What gall! How did he get so strong? How could a puny Great Sage be so domineering? Don’t tell me he got possessed by an immortal or something? Maybe a fiend-devil took him over. That must be it.”

Managing to keep his cool, Sovereign Beheader said, “Keep watching. Let’s see where they went.”

Soon, their magical technique revealed a dark golden greyspace far out in the void. At that point, the image faded away.

“Hell. He took them into a hell. But which one? Which hell is that? And how come its aura was so incredible?”

“That was the Hell of Mahānata, one of the most grand of all of the hells! We couldn't get in there even if we tried! It would take immortals to do that. How did Yang Qi get inside?”

“This is big. Sound the alarm! Call the vice-rectors! He’s collaborating with hell! This is a defiance of heaven!”

Chapter 471: Demi-Immortal Tribulation

News was spreading like wildfire. All of the disciples in the Hall of Beheadings and Executions knew that something big was happening.

Plenty of people had been present to witness the results of the Reverse Light Stream technique, which clearly showed Yang Qi killing Unmerciful Beheader and a prime paragon elder. Then, after starting a fight with Kingly Beheader, he took the entire courtroom hall deep into hell.

Within less than an hour, news had spread to countless societies within the collegium. It was even causing a scene amongst the elder kings and prime paragon elders from the other societies. To many people, it actually wasn’t a very big deal. In fact, many of them were reveling in the misfortune being experienced by the Hall of Beheadings and Executions. After all, that hall had the authority to execute people in the collegium, and because of that there was always friction between them and the other organizations.

There were even some elder kings who hoped the conflict would get worse, and that they might be able to benefit as a result.

All sorts of rumors were being spread.

“Did you guys hear? A big fight broke out between the Hall of Beheadings and Executions and the Invincible Society!”

“The Invincible Society? They don't have many members, but every single one is a fiendish monster. But I heard that they all got stuck in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, so how could they be causing problems now?”

“It’s like this: the two weakest members, Sword Seventeen and Yang Qi, somehow managed to get out. Somehow, the Hall of Beheadings and Executions found out that they got their hands on a lot of treasure, including some primeval godworm eggs. So they cooked up an excuse to arrest them. The only thing is that it turned into a real tragedy for them.”

“The people from the Hall of Beheadings and Executions are complete scoundrels. Screw them.”

“Yeah, but think about it. If we had a chance to get some godworm eggs, we would probably do the same thing. Those things are priceless. Not even a thousand immortal items put together would be worth as much as a single one.”

“Hey, how did Yang Qi get such impressive energy arts and divine abilities?”

“Who knows. He’s a strange one. Considering what happened earlier today, he's definitely going to be considered the top genius in the Titan Emperor Collegium. It seems he can even keep the elysian children in check. He’s only an Epic Saga Sage, but he actually killed Mortal Beheader, who’s a prime paragon elder. Afterward, he started fighting with Kingly Beheader, who’s an elder king. Then he used some mysterious divine ability to take the entire courtroom hall into hell. It seems to me that the Hall of Beheadings and Executions is really going to pay the price for what they did.”

“I doubt it. Do you know how big and powerful the Hall of Beheadings and Executions is? They have more disciples than any other organization. That’s why they always tyrannize us students. They’re definitely not going to take this lying down. Didn’t you notice that three of their elder kings went to meet with the vice-rectors?”

“That’s true. Well, either way, it’s like a fight between a dragon and a tiger. Although, at the moment, the Invincible Society is small and pitifully weak. Their Eldest Brother is gone and the Invincible Dugu is in seclusion. I’d say that Yang Qi is actually in a bit of trouble. We’ll see whether he manages to hold out. If he loses, and the Hall of Beheadings and Executions gets their hands on those godworm eggs, they’re going to get even more arrogant. And that will be bad for us.”

“Don't worry. Things aren’t as simple as you’re making them out to be. You think the Invincible Dugu won’t step in eventually? No way. He’s not going to just sit around and watch his disciples die.”

“Let’s just watch the fireworks. Hopefully the Hall of Beheadings and Executions gets beat into the dust like they deserve.”

The entire Titan Emperor Collegium was completely abuzz.

Meanwhile, in the depths of the Hell of Mahānata, Yang Qi was engaged in an epic battle with Kingly Beheader, Heavenly Beheader, and Earthly Beheader.

He wasn’t holding back. He was using his imperial snakecharms, primeval godworm, and the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth to full effect. Every breath he took caused devil energy to blot out the sky. His attacks leveled the surrounding land for hundreds of kilometers and left it pitted with craters.

“You puny monster!” Kingly Beheader shouted, unleashing a bout of true fire. “The Titan Emperor Collegium made a mistake letting you join. How could we allow a villain like you to exist in our ranks? I'm going to rid the world of devils and demons today by completely destroying you!”

Kingly Beheader had a host of immortal skills and was drawing on everything from flame lightning to god-nimbuses to fight Yang Qi. Shockwaves rolled out constantly, causing everything around them to twist and distort.

Universal Demi-Immortals could affect the starry sky as they fought, using teleportations in the middle of combat and setting up deadly spell formations in the blink of an eye. They understood the rotations of the universe and could use just about everything in creation as a tool or weapon.

Unfortunately, this was the Hell of Mahānata.

The magical laws of this plane were so powerful that they defied imagination. Kingly Beheader was having trouble manipulating space and drawing on the power of the heavenly bodies here. And the essence of the place was constantly eating away at his true energy. As a result, all of his energy arts were operating at only seventy to eighty percent of their full potential.

Yang Qi chopped his hand out and hit Heavenly Beheader, whose body began to crack and crumble as a result.

Then he blurred back and forth on the battlefield, cutting down weaker elders and disciples with each movement. Not even Kingly Beheader could protect them.

Yang Qi was like a dragon in the sea, or a tiger in the forest. His enemies simply couldn't do anything against him.

“Aaaiiiieee!” a grand elder screamed as he died.

Shooting through the air like a bullet, Yang Qi returned to Heavenly Beheader and reached out toward him. The man had already suffered a grievous chest wound, therefore Yang Qi just reached in, grabbed his beating heart, and ripped it out into the open.

Blood sprayed out of Heavenly Beheader’s mouth along with a garbled scream. “The agony! Why is my life of cultivation ending in such a nightmare? Was it all for nothing? I refuse to accept this! I refuse!”

“You pissed off the wrong person,” Yang Qi said. “Me.” He struck out, shattering Heavenly Beheader’s body and leaving his head to tumble down. Yang Qi quickly grabbed it and threw it into his God Legion Paradise. After all, he planned to pin it on a spike when he got back to the Invincible Society.

“Heavenly Beheader!” shouted Kingly Beheader, his voice tinged with grief and anger. Worst of all was that Yang Qi was moving so quickly that he couldn’t even keep up.

“It seems I have to use a truly consummate energy art!” Spitting out some blood, he said, “Titan Emperor True Heaven; Five Sacred Mountains and Five Hells; Devastate the Aeon; Shatter the Dome of Heaven. Turn Sorrow to Joy!”

Whizz!

The blood he had just spat out shot up and created an enormous ‘titan’ character, which subsequently locked down the entire area and even caused problems for the God Legion Paradise.

“Watch out, Junior Brother,” said Sword Seventeen, who was safe in the God Legion Paradise. “He’s actually burning Universal Demi-Immortal magical laws to use a forbidden secret magic of the Titan Emperor Collegium. Turn Sorrow to Joy is an immortal skill that originally came from the immortal world above. It's completely terrifying.”

Although Sword Seventeen was a Demi-Immortal now, there was no way he was strong enough to fight people like Prime or Revered Demi-Immortals. And of course, there was no need to mention Universal Demi-Immortals like Kingly Beheader. All Sword Seventeen could do was watch the fighting.

As he did, he felt the urge to prostrate himself in admiration of his Junior Brother Yang Qi.

Of all the people in the Invincible Society, the only ones who would dare to pick a fight with an elder king would be Eldest Brother, Second Elder Brother, and Third Elder Brother. And now, Yang Qi. Although the other Elder Brothers and Sisters were all amazing, none of them would dare to fight a Universal Demi-Immortal.

“Titan Emperor secret magic? Turn Sorrow to Joy? Are you kidding me? Watch and learn as I use a real divine ability.”

Suddenly, he threw his head back and let loose a long cry. “Demi-Immortal level!”

RUUUUUUMBLE!

Countless streams of vital energy flowed toward him from every corner of the Hell of Mahānata. As they pierced into his God Legion Paradise, it almost seemed like the surrounding hell shrank. Space-time was thrown into chaos, winds screamed, and projected images of dragons and tigers danced.

Boom. Boom. Boom. Boom. Boom!

Rumbling sounds rang out as enormous immortals suddenly appeared high in the sky, seated on thrones as they looked down at Yang Qi. Then they leaped off of their thrones and rushed toward him in attack. However, they exploded before they could even get close, turning into raw power that sought to destroy the defenses of the God Legion Paradise.

The true energy fluctuations were so powerful that Yang Qi winced in pain.

And they were so strong that all of the students from the Hall of Beheadings and Executions were instantly killed.

In the blink of an eye, the only enemies left on the battlefield were Kingly Beheader and Earthly Beheader. They were strong enough to survive the initial volley, yet there was still an army of immortals diving downward in suicide attacks. The sight left them completely shaken.

“That’s… Immortal Army Suicide Tribulation! What is that type of tribulation doing here? That’s the most heaven-defying, deadly tribulation there is! It’s only sent to people that heaven and earth refuse to accept! What’s going on? The only people who have provoked tribulations like this are dead! King Immortal-Slayer. King Mourn-Parting. King Heaven-Devourer. They faced tribulations like this when they reached the Demolishing level! But this beast is getting it as a Demi-Immortal?!”

Crack. Crunch.

Another blast of energy surged out from the dying immortals, and in the blink of an eye the enormous blood-colored ‘titan’ character was wiped out of existence.

In the face of a host of exploding immortals, secret magics like that were like children’s toys.

At this point, heavenly palaces and courts appeared in the tribulation, which subsequently exploded and smashed into the God Legion Paradise and Kingly Beheader.

POP!

It was too much to take, and blood sprayed out of Kingly Beheader’s mouth. The cataclysmic forces of destruction were on full display!

Chapter 472: Viciously Shaking the Collegium

Yang Qi was provoking heavenly tribulation right there in the Hell of Mahānata. And this wasn’t any ordinary tribulation—it was his Demi-Immortal tribulation.

He had killed a lot of people from the Hall of Beheadings and Executions, including Demi-Immortals, whose souls he had taken for his own purposes. Two of them were seventh order Revered Demi-Immortals, and also prime paragon elders, people the likes of which he hadn’t even fought back in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

Mortal Beheader, Heavenly Beheader, and Earthly Beheader were all considered major luminaries of their time. That wasn’t even mentioning Kingly Beheader, who was an even more potent figure, someone halfway into the dao of immortals.

The whole reason he had killed Mortal Beheader and Heavenly Beheader was for their Demi-Immortal quintessence energy. In fact, he had brought the entire courtroom hall here to the Hell of Mahānata for the express purpose of facing tribulation.

But this was Immortal Army Suicide Tribulation!

Right now, the only thing visible in the sky were countless tribulation clouds filled with heavenly palaces and immortals, descending like a rain of destructive mountains and rivers, unleashing enough power to shake the universe itself.

Yang Qi threw his arms wide and blasted through a wave of tribulation power, then turned to face the only enemies who remained alive, Earthly Beheader and Kingly Beheader.

BAM!

A flow of power slammed into Earthly Beheader, causing his entire body to shatter. Before anything else could happen, Yang Qi grabbed his head and threw it into the God Legion Paradise. As for all of the quintessence energy Earthly Beheader had built up over his tens of thousands of years of cultivation, Yang Qi threw it into the Hellfire Crucible to turn into power suitable for himself.

The man’s cultivation base far surpassed that of Grand Emperor Rich-Lush, and as it sizzled and hissed in the crucible Yang Qi felt even more confident about being able to pass the Immortal Army Suicide Tribulation.

As of this moment, Kingly Beheader was the only enemy left standing. An elder king.

He was already having trouble holding out, and was all alone.

He had participated in a meeting with the highest echelons of leadership and been tasked with subjugating Yang Qi and Sword Seventeen. But right when the primeval godworm eggs had been there in front of him, just waiting to be taken, Yang Qi used a spectacular ability to slice the courtroom hall away from the world and take it to hell. If Yang Qi ended up killing him, an elder king, he would definitely become the most ferocious student in the Titan Emperor Collegium.

In fact, rumors were already spreading that he was already the most ferocious student. So if he did kill Kingly Beheader, his reputation would surpass that of his Eldest Brother and there was no way that anyone would ever dare to cause problems for him.

All Eldest Brother had done to the elder kings was give them a few cuffs and kicks, causing them to cough up some blood. He hadn’t dared to go as far as killing them. After all, there was the larger picture to consider. But Yang Qi didn't have any taboos, and would cut down enemies as if he were harvesting wheat.

“Monster! Evil creature! You’ll pay for this!”

Kingly Beheader was so taken aback by the Immortal Army Suicide Tribulation that he was finally just trying to escape. He simply couldn’t take the situation any longer. His vital energy was seeping out and being replaced by devil energy from the Hell of Mahānata, weakening him with every passing moment. If it kept going, Yang Qi would definitely kill him and end up as the first student in the history of the collegium to ever slaughter an elder king.

The Titan Emperor Collegium had been founded at least a million years ago, which was indeed a very long time. Yet no student had ever killed an elder king during that entire time. For Kingly Beheader to become the first would make him a complete laughingstock, and his name would forever be despised by all students.

“I'm not going to let you get away with this, you evil creature. You monster. The Titan Emperor Collegium is overseen by the Titan Emperor Heaven and they won’t let this happen. This is outright rebellion! You’ve killed so many people! It’s an open violation of the law and a clear defiance of heaven!” As he spoke, he was backing away.

“Oh, so you’re finally trying to get away? Sorry, too late.” Yang Qi began singing the Eternal Heavenly Aria, and its profundities actually dispelled the Immortal Army Suicide Tribulation, turning it into something like sweet dew that splashed into the Hellfire Crucible.

As that ‘sweet dew’ fell into the burning sagefire, a violent reaction occurred and dazzling, holy light spilled out in all directions, transforming the surrounding hell from a dark gold color into porcelain.

At the same time, cracking sounds rang out from inside Yang Qi.

The rest of the mammoth tusks crumbled, sending out streams of power to replenish his vital energy, and push him closer to the Demi-Immortal level. At the same time, most of the remaining eight hundred forty million particles within him became dracomammoths, and in that moment he became a Demi-Immortal, with longevity the same as that of heaven.

His power levels were skyrocketing, and they showed no signs of slowing down. As his cultivation level increased, his aura grew stronger and stronger.

He threw his head back and roared, then began sucking in the falling immortals. They howled, but could do nothing as he devoured them, making him seem very much like King Heaven-Devourer. After all, King Heaven-Devourer had actually devoured immortal worlds and high-level planes of the universe, according to the stories.

As Yang Qi continued powering up, he suddenly began chasing after the fleeing Kingly Beheader. As he closed in, Kingly Beheader stopped in his tracks and clenched both of his hands into fists.

“Titan Cauldron Establishes Heaven!” he shouted, unleashing a double fist strike in an attempt to defend himself. However, the only result was that Yang Qi smashed him into the ground, where he was surrounded by countless streams of devil energy.

“Infernal King!” Yang Qi swept his finger through the air and a stream of devil energy swirled into the shape of an infernal king, standing on a lotus of white bones, his hand flickering with gloomy devil light. Looking like the picture of viciousness, the infernal king lunged toward Kingly Beheader.

In the same moment, Yang Qi’s hands slipped into the Hand of the One God, causing a stream of water to flow out that created an endless sea of suffering. Then, civilizations appeared within his palm, one after another after another.

This was the next transformation of the Fist of the Halls of Heaven, Epoch.

As he attacked, a massive wave of energy was unleashed that seemed to contain the histories of countless civilizations. It smashed through everything Kingly Beheader threw in its way. Then Yang Qi’s hand latched onto him, sending streams of true energy into him and rendering him completely immobile.

Climbing through the cultivation levels of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth was a very difficult thing. After all, it seemed very likely that it was not an ordinary godly-class energy art, but rather something that belonged to the Lord.

Because he had eight hundred and forty million particles to deal with, it meant that his breakthroughs were eight hundred and forty million times as difficult as ordinary cultivators. However, that also meant that Yang Qi was like eight hundred forty million Lesser Demi-Immortals all put together. Or perhaps even more fierce than that.

What did that imply?

An army of ants could still hurt an elephant. And eight hundred forty million Lesser Demi-Immortals could definitely cause a problem for a Universal Demi-Immortal, or even kill one.

Holding the famous Kingly Beheader out in front of him, Yang Qi chuckled and said, “Well, what do you think, Kingly Beheader? Didn’t you say you were going to exterminate my clan? Well, I'm right here. Let’s see some exterminating!”

“How dare you!” Kingly Beheader said, nearly passing out from shock and rage. “If you do this, things won’t go well for you. The Titan Emperor Collegium will—"

“You’re still hoping the collegium will help you?” Yang Qi interrupted in a cold voice. “Actually, this is what's going to happen. You represent law and punishment, so I'm not going to kill you here. I’ll take you back with me to the Titan Emperor Collegium. Then, outside the main gate of the Invincible Society, in front of all onlookers, including any elder kings who show up, I’ll execute you. After that, I’ll put your head on a spike. That way everyone will know what happens when you offend the Invincible Society. You want to exterminate my clan? Then that's what I’ll do to you. Everyone related to you is doomed now. I’ll hunt them all down and get rid of them. Cut the weeds and eliminate the roots.”

POP!

Kingly Beheader choked up a mouthful of blood because of the sheer terror he felt. If Yang Qi was willing to kill him, an elder king, then what was there that he wouldn’t do? He almost couldn’t take the thought of dying a humiliating death in front of a crowd and his clan being wiped out. However, he still held hope. Glaring venomously at Yang Qi, he said, “You just wait. I refuse to believe that you’ll actually kill me right in the middle of the Titan Emperor Collegium.”

Yang Qi ignored his comment and blurred into motion to leave the Hell of Mahānata, which might as well have been his backyard at this point.

Not even immortals from heaven would be able to enter it as casually as him. This time he just flew directly back to the Titan Emperor Collegium, following a profound and mysterious trajectory.

Back when he had emerged from the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, he had been capable of shocking speed. But that was when he was only a second step Great Sage, and now he was a Demi-Immortal. The difference between the two levels was immense, and that included his speed.

He didn’t try to sneak into the collegium. Instead, he flew right in with his energy surging.

RUUUUUUMBLE!

Everything for millions and millions of kilometers around him trembled, causing buildings to sway back and forth. Instead of heading to the Hall of Beheadings and Executions, he went to the Invincible Society.

Everyone who realized what was happening was shaken to the core.

Rumors had already been raging like wildfire, and this only added oil to the fire.

Landing in front of the Invincible Society, he raised his voice and said, “Hear ye, Hall of Beheadings and Executions. Your elder king, Kingly Beheader, tried to overwhelm me with numbers, but I beat him in a fair fight and killed all of his lackeys, including Heavenly Beheader, Earthly Beheader, and Mortal Beheader, all of them prime paragon elders. Now, watch and learn. This is the fate of any who offend the Invincible Society. Their heads will adorn the Invincible Society on spikes, for everyone to see.”

Whoosh. Whoosh. Whoosh!

Three heads flew up, splashing blood everywhere as they were nailed to the wall above the entrance.

Heavenly Beheader, Earthly Beheader, and Mortal Beheader stared out into the world with vengeful, dead eyes, a shocking sight that many people present initially refused to believe was real.

The Titan Emperor Collegium was thrown into a pandemonium the likes of which had never occurred before in history.

Chapter 473: Cutting Down an Elder King

Savage. Cruel. Fierce. Ruthless!

Yang Qi’s absolutely fearless personality was fully on display. The Invincible Society labeled itself invincible, and yet had never had a member as incredible as this. The three blood-soaked heads spiked to the wall were a testament to that. And then there was the elder king he currently had captive and awaiting execution.

As a result, the Titan Emperor Collegium exploded into action. There were tens of thousands of societies in the collegium, so to say that they exploded was no exaggeration. Some people rushed out to watch the excitement. Some trembled in terror. There were other emotions on display as well, including hatred, jealousy, frustration, regret, and astonishment.

Many people were quite pleased with how things were playing out.

A good number of people believed that the Invincible Society and the Hall of Beheadings and Executions were both insufferably arrogant. However, the main difference between the two was that the eighteen mysterious members of the Invincible Society only acted haughty and despotic to the higher levels of leadership. Normally speaking, they were kind to those who were weaker than themselves. Because of that, most students didn’t have particularly negative feelings toward them.

The Hall of Beheadings and Executions was very different.

They had the authority to send students to mining planets in the middle of nowhere, or even execute them outright. When it came to the mining facilities, they were run by disciples of the Hall of Beheadings and Executions, who constantly inflicted the most bitter aspects of the rules on their fellow students.

At one point or another, just about every student ended up angering the Hall of Beheadings and Executions and, because of that, the fact that Yang Qi was causing a big scene—even killing some prime paragon elders—was actually very pleasing to many students.

The leaders of the collegium could only grit their teeth at his open rebelliousness. There were many powerful entities in the depths of the collegium who were now watching the scene play out, trying to figure out who exactly Yang Qi was, and how he had caused such a commotion.

Whoosh. Whoosh. Whoosh. Whoosh.

Hosts of students flew up into the air to observe. There were common students, consecrated students, elite students, noble students, royal students, and even some elysian children. There were so many observers that they began to blot out the sky.

This level of commotion was completely unheard of.

“Th-this… this… this….” Never in his wildest dreams could Sword Seventeen have guessed that his Junior Brother would be this rash. His jaw nearly dropped when he saw him holding up an elder king by the throat for everyone to see. However, after a moment passed he composed himself and took a calm step forward.

“Junior Brother Yang Qi,” he said. “You’ve accomplished a feat that the Invincible Society has never seen before. Don't worry. As long as we hang in there, Master will find out, and he’ll definitely reward us.” Looking up at the throngs of people who had gathered, Sword Seventeen raised his voice and yelled, “Ladies and gentlemen, we emerged from the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart with plenty of treasure, including some primeval godworm eggs, which we intended to give as a gift to our Master. But the Hall of Beheadings and Executions coveted them and tried to rob us. They cooked up some imaginary charges and even threatened to exterminate our clans. My Junior Brother had no choice but to fight for justice and kill these law-breaking hooligans.”

RUMBLE!

Three figures who were far stronger than Kingly Beheader appeared, flanked by a host of prime paragon elders and an army of disciples. All of them held weapons in their hands and bristled with killing intent.

“What incredible gall!”

“Out of the way! Everyone stand back! The invincible experts of the Hall of Beheadings and Executions are here. They're all elder kings! Imperial Beheader, Sovereign Beheader, and Godly Beheader. And look, behind them are the Thirty-Six Empyrean Executioners and the Seventy-Two Baleful Fiends! The former are prime paragon elders, and the latter are prime elders. Their Empyrean Baleful Grand Spell Formation can kill gods and slay immortals. It's impossible to count how many students they’ve executed over the years.”

The students in the area all began backing away.

Imperial Beheader, Sovereign Beheader, and Godly Beheader landed in front of the entrance of the Invincible Society and looked up at the heads on the spikes. As they did, their faces turned white from rage.

“Rebel!” Imperial Beheader shouted, his voice echoing like thunder. “You're a monster among monsters! A devil prince!”

He looked like he was on the verge of smashing the Invincible Society into rubble, except for the fact that Yang Qi had Kingly Beheader captive. Yet again, it was a situation of hesitating to shoot the rat for fear of breaking the vases.

After all, Kingly Beheader was an elder king just like Imperial Beheader.

If Kingly Beheader were killed here, the Hall of Beheadings and Executions would lose every ounce of face they had. Not even killing Yang Qi in revenge could make up for it.

“Kill him!” Kingly Beheader shouted in seemingly righteous indignation. “Forget about me. He's already forged an alliance with the Hell of Mahānata! He’s an out-and-out fiend-devil! He gave his soul to the suzerains of hell and dragged us there to be slaughtered by an army of monsters! That’s how I ended up in this shape.”

Of course, he was twisting his words by trying to make it sound like he had been defeated by an army of fiend-devils, and not Yang Qi. At least that might save him some face. And if he convinced everyone Yang Qi was a devilish monster, it would further that effort.

“Bah! Are you really an elder king?” Sword Seventeen shouted. “My Junior Brother went into the Hell of Mahānata to face a tribulation and become a Demi-Immortal. He wiped your lackeys out with no effort at all, then took you captive. And now you’re trying to change the story? Are you even human? My Junior Brother is a consummate genius who purifies hells and eradicates fiend-devils. He's the bane of evil! In fact, he has the purest energy art there could be!”

“Shut your mouth!” Sovereign Beheader shouted. “You monsters! Everyone in the Invincible Society is a monster! I can’t believe the Invincible Dugu brought horrors like you into his society. Obviously, he has evil intentions and is fully bedeviled. Otherwise, why would he do something like this? Release Kingly Beheader immediately and we might let you live. Remember, we have the Titan Emperor Collegium completely under our control. Even if you were stronger than you are, there’s no way you could escape this place.”

“I have no intention of trying to escape!” Yang Qi said, visibly sizing up the group. Then he shook his head. “Your Hall of Beheadings and Executions is rotten to the core. Cries of complaint about you echo out everywhere in our collegium, and now you want to try to talk tough? You listen to me: the moment you people threatened my family, your fate was sealed. The three of you show up on my doorstep with a gang of thugs? You think that’s enough to handle me? Sorry, but you’re all about to die! But first, I’m going to execute Kingly Beheader for everyone here to see. You want to compete with me in ruthlessness?”

As the words left his mouth, his hand shot out and he dug his fingers deep into Kingly Beheader’s skull.

“Aaaiiiieee!” Kingly Beheader had rebuked heaven and earth for countless years, but now he was about to die at the hands of Yang Qi.

“Stay your hand!”

“What outrageous gall you have!”

“How dare you!”

“If you harm him, you monster, I swear to exterminate your entire family!”

Imperial Beheader, Sovereign Beheader, and Godly Beheader all lunged forward, unleashing a bevy of attacks on Yang Qi. He didn't even look at them.

“Superlative Defense!”

Waving his hand, he summoned the glowing defenses of the God Legion Paradise, completely neutralizing the attacks. His cultivation base was now strong enough for him to kill Universal Demi-Immortals, and even hold his own against Paragon Demi-Immortals. So how could he possibly be worried about attacks from these people?

WHIZZZ!

However, there were more experts on the way. Off in the distance, a beam of sword light rocketed forth, pulsing with a most paragon-like aura, as though it existed above all other types of sword will.

A Paragon Demi-Immortal!

The ninth order!

Yang Qi’s cheek went taut and he clenched his free hand into a fist, which he used to unleash the Hand of the One God to defend against the sword attack. The golden light of his attack hit the tip of the sword, and in the blink of an eye, massive power was coursing through his meridians toward his sea of energy.

“That’s the Cardinal Motionless Sword Zodiac!” Sword Seventeen blurted. “Watch out, Junior Brother. You’re about to face one of the Hall of Beheadings and Executions’ top students. An elysian child, blessed directly by the immortal world above. He’s almost strong enough to become a vice-rector!”

“I'm not worried,” Yang Qi said as he diverted the flow of power from the sword into his Hellfire Crucible.

Swish!

When the owner of the sword felt its energy being sucked away, as if into a bottomless pit, he pulled the tip back and landed in front of Imperial Beheader, Sovereign Beheader, and Godly Beheader.

He was a young man in white clothing, his hands empty and weaponless. As he stood there with clasped hands, looking down his nose scornfully at Yang Qi, it was impossible to see any sword on his person.

“Elder Kings,” he said, offering a polite salute, “as an elysian child of the Hall of Beheadings and Executions, I came over as quickly as I could. It's truly criminal that this monster is causing problems for us.”

“Ascendant Beheader, you came just in time. This monster made a deal with the suzerains of hell, and is using their power to stain our collegium with hellish evil. Hurry up and kill him!”

“Yes, sir. I can definitely sense the power of the suzerains of hell on him. Just now, my Cardinal Motionless Sword Zodiac was stopped in its tracks by his evil energy. It even consumed my sword zodiac energy. He’s obviously in league with hell.”

“You ignorant fools really love to babble, don’t you!” Yang Qi said coldly, staring at the white-garbed Ascendant Beheader. “At first, I assumed you were actually a Paragon Demi-Immortal, but it turns out you’re not. Your substructure is actually at the Universal Demi-Immortal level, and you’re using an immortal item to push yourself a bit higher. I can’t believe that everyone in the Hall of Beheadings and Executions is such complete and utter trash. You're the top genius? Well, I'm going to kill you. But first, I need to execute Kingly Beheader. Can you stop me?”

“I won’t let you off the hook even if I die, Yang Qi!” the man screamed. “The Hall of Beheadings and Executions will avenge—”

RIP!

Yang Qi wrenched his hand up, ripping Kingly Beheader’s head off of his shoulders.

Chapter 474: Intrepid Slaughter

RIP!

Right in front of a host of students and elders of the Titan Emperor Collegium, Yang Qi decapitated an elder king. It was a profoundly blood-soaked and provocative scene.

A moment later, Kingly Beheader’s dying curses faded away. Silence prevailed as the crowd looked on, completely stunned. Never in the history of the collegium had an elder king been killed, much less by a student. The sight of his severed head dripping with blood was something that no one present would ever be able to forget.

With their elder king having met this fate, the Hall of Beheadings and Executions would never again be able to command the respect and authority they once had. They had lost more face than anyone thought was possible, and, to many of the onlookers, it was a beautiful thing.

Howls of grief and rage rose up from the students and elders of the Hall of Beheadings and Executions, as well as from Imperial Beheader, Sovereign Beheader, and Godly Beheader. None of them had been able to stop Yang Qi from killing Kingly Beheader, and now they had to watch as he nailed the head to the entrance of the Invincible Society with a spike.

From the spike, Kingly Beheader stared out with empty eyes that reflected the defiance and rancor he had experienced in the moment of his death. It was really a terrifying sight.

“Alright, I killed him. Are you people going to do anything about it? Anyone who offends the Invincible Society is going to end up dead!” Of course, Yang Qi took Kingly Beheader’s corpse and vital energy for himself. There was no way he was going to let a Universal Demi-Immortal’s corpse go to waste. It would be a big help in reaching the second order.

“I’ll give your Hall of Beheadings and Executions one choice. Round up Kingly Beheader’s friends, family, and allies, and bring them to me. Understand? I’ll execute them to pay for his crimes. If you don't comply, I'm going to apply to the rectors and the heaven above to have your organization dissolved and all of your members sent to the mines to serve as slaves. If that doesn’t happen, then going forward, every time I see someone from the Hall of Beheadings and Executions I’ll kill them on sight, without the slightest mercy!”

These were bald-faced threats of the most unbridled, domineering nature.

There were representatives of tens upon tens of thousands of societies present. The Hegemon’s Society. The Everlasting Society. The Sun Moon Society. The Medicine Paragon Society. And more. Yet all of their members were trembling like cicadas in winter.

Of course, the Hegemon’s Society and the Everlasting Society both had bad relationships with Yang Qi. The Everlasting Society hated him for what happened in the entrance ceremony, and the Hegemon’s Society wouldn’t let go of the fact that he and Sword Seventeen had killed one of their noble students in an argument. Both societies wanted to crush Yang Qi into the dust, and hopefully, get his primeval godworm eggs.

However, not a single person from those societies dared to say a word. They were actually subconsciously edging backward.

According to the ancient saying, when the emperor wanted silence, not even the horses would neigh. And that was exactly what was happening now. Even the host of experts from the Hegemon’s Society and the Everlasting Society were too scared to attract attention. As of this moment, Yang Qi had definitely earned his reputation as the fiercest student in the Titan Emperor Collegium.

Of course, that didn’t mean that things were over.

Elder kings were top leaders in the institute, and the death of one was equivalent to the death of a royal prince in an imperial court. There was no way the matter would just be dropped.

“Kill them! The Invincible Society must be exterminated!”

“Did you really just murder Kingly Beheader!? Dammit! He was as close as a blood brother to me! For tens of thousands of years we rid the world of devils and demons and loved each other like family! I can’t believe you killed him!”

“You could never possibly atone for this. The only thing to do now is to carry out a blood purge. The freakish hellion that is Yang Qi shall be purged, as will everyone else connected to him. That's the only way to regain face. That’s the only way to erase this humiliation. With blood!”

Everyone in the Hall of Beheadings and Executions was going completely crazy, including the elysian child Ascendant Beheader.

Sword Seventeen could see that the situation was escalating, so he quickly said, “Junior Brother, let’s retreat into the warding magics of the Invincible Society. They won’t be able to break inside. And even if they did, our Master would be notified and would definitely hurry back.”

“There’s no need,” Yang Qi said coldly, and the God Legion Paradise began brightly shining. “Elder Brother, you can go hide inside if you want. But I won’t. These people can’t do anything to me. If they want a blood purge, I’ll be happy to oblige! I’ve been too kindhearted up to this point. I never did anything to provoke them, yet they try to kick me when I'm down? Well, since we have a whole bunch of witnesses, I'm going to show everyone that Yang Qi is not the type of person who tolerates being bullied. Time to purge the Hall of Beheadings and Executions with blood! I'm going to kill them all, down to the dogs and chickens!”

RUMBLE!

Yang Qi’s true energy began surging, as if it were a mighty river filled with the ultimate truths of the martial path. It even contained traces of the dao of gods. The Infernal Deity Spear appeared in his hands as he lunged forward into the forces of the Hall of Beheadings and Executions. In the blink of an eye, a forest of spear projections appeared.

The weakest of the disciples present were first, second, and third order Demi-Immortals, and all of them exploded into death the moment the spear projections touched them. Then the Concluding Elegy of the Nightfall Symphony began.

As the sound resonated out, Yang Qi swept the spear back and forth, reaping life, a blur that no one could see clearly. All they could tell was that something like an infernal deity from hell was out taking the souls of the living. And with every kill, the Infernal Deity Spear grew a bit stronger.

Now that Yang Qi was a Demi-Immortal, the spear’s true appearance and function could be used, and it was vastly superior to before. The stabs of that spear brought the fall of night and could cause even a host of immortals to perish in feebleness.

The Hall of Beheadings and Executions had expected him to retreat, but instead, he had lunged into their midst and begun cutting them down with ultimate ferocity. In fact, it was such a terrifying offensive that everyone stumbled backward in fear.

“This little bastard is too fierce! He’s a complete savage!”

The elders from the Hegemon’s Society were in full retreat, wiping the sweat from their brow as they did. They were normally an overbearing lot, but in the face of Yang Qi’s savage performance they were terrified to the point where their knees knocked together.

The Everlasting Society was equally in fear, and had no desire whatsoever to join the fight against Yang Qi. They were more than happy to let the Hall of Beheadings and Executions deal with him.

“Die!”

This single advance of Yang Qi’s resulted in over a hundred students being hit by the Infernal Deity Spear and exploding. And of course, the fact that they lost their souls meant that they could never be born again.

In the blink of an eye, Yang Qi was bearing down on Imperial Beheader, Sovereign Beheader, and Godly Beheader.

Ascendant Beheader bore the appearance of a ninth order Demi-Immortal, but the truth was that he was only able to do that with the help of a magical treasure. Yang Qi wasn’t afraid of him at all, and was actually confident in being able to kill him. Therefore, he pushed the fight to them. He wanted everyone to understand the horrific consequences of provoking him.

“How vile!” Ascendant Beheader growled, summoning his sword to meet the Infernal Deity Spear. Imperial Beheader, Sovereign Beheader, and Godly Beheader also rushed forward to engage Yang Qi. At the same time, the thirty-six prime paragon elders and seventy-two prime elders used their Empyrean Baleful Grand Spell Formation to do the same.

Unfazed, Yang Qi began singing the Eternal Heavenly Aria, causing halos of blessing to surround him and halos of damnification to surround his enemies, halos that they were incapable of dispelling. The Light of Nightmares. The Light of Torpidity. The Light of Weakness…. The lights threw them into a state of mental sluggishness and made their bodies instantly heavier.

Thump! Plop!

Some of the Demi-Immortals flopped to the ground, unable to sustain flight.

Now that Yang Qi was a Demi-Immortal, his Eternal Heavenly Aria was different from before. The ancient halos which appeared reflected the true glory of the legion of gods and were unable to be expelled.

Back when he faced the yellow-garbed young man with the buzz cut, two legacy medallions of King Immortal-Slayer had successfully vanquished the halos of light. But at Yang Qi’s current level, not even three of those legacy medallions could do the trick.

Hidden deep in the shadows of the Titan Emperor Collegium were a group of powerful entities who immediately recognized what they were seeing.

“Primeval god skills! He’s using primeval god skills!”

“How does he have so many? Is he even human? Primeval god skills are taboo in the heavenly worlds. Only heaven-immortals of the highest rank can use them. But even then, it should only be one or two. How can he have so many? They’re authentic! You can’t drive them out! You can’t dispel them!”

“What’s going on here? He’s not a fiend-devil! If he was, there’s no way he would be using real and authentic god skills!”

“Primeval god skills are handed down by the legion of gods! They’re usually part of a godly-class energy art! Look at that one, it’s as clear as fresh water! It’s the Light of Life Force. Even someone who was mortally wounded, but was touched by that light, would have their life force restored.”

“That one is the Light of Weakness. Anyone who gets hit by it will find their energy arts reduced by at least thirty percent.”

“They're so strong. This is unbelievable!”

“If the other students could learn primeval god skills, then waged war on another collegium, how much stronger would they be? Just about any opponent they faced would surrender for sure….”

“This is unimaginable. Inconceivable. Unfathomable….”

“This turns everything around. Those primeval god skills prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that Yang Qi isn't a fiend-devil. He’s too important for our Titan Emperor Collegium to lose!”

Whether it was the Light of Life Force, the Light of Weakness, or any of the others, they were primeval god skills, techniques that someone could cultivate to completely dominate the enemy. Yet Yang Qi’s Eternal Heavenly Aria caused hundreds of them to appear at once. Even immortals would be shocked by the sight.

Chapter 475: Vice-Rectors

Imperial Beheader, Sovereign Beheader, and Godly Beheader, all three of them elder kings, as well as the elysian child Ascendant Beheader, reacted with open shock to the Eternal Heavenly Aria. Yang Qi was suddenly covered with halos of blessing, while they were cursed with halos of damnification that they couldn't expel.

Yang Qi was using his most powerful trump card. The Eternal Heavenly Aria could challenge anything under heaven by turning him into something like a magical treasure designed to face higher-level opponents in battle.

“So, Ascendant Beheader, people say that you’re the top disciple in the Hall of Beheadings and Executions. After I cut you down today, you’re going to be nothing but history.” He struck out with his spear, unleashing countless variations that forced Ascendant Beheader to lunge backward at top speed.

Ascendant Beheader didn't dare to let that spear touch him. He was the best disciple from the Hall of Beheadings and Executions, but when fighting Yang Qi, he was almost completely useless. Yang Qi’s seemingly casual moves immediately gained him the upper hand.

As for those powerful figures watching from the shadows, some shook their heads, some gasped, some sighed in admiration, and some glared at him with flickering killing intent as if they wanted to go out and fight him.

Of course, Yang Qi had already prepared for such an outcome.

“Epoch!” he growled, using his ultimate fist stance. The Hand of the One God shattered, creating a whirlpool of death that contained the destruction of the dome of heaven, the rotations of the sun and moon, the eradication of aeons, and the death of the host of immortals.

Epoch was a move that was akin to the end of the universe itself, like a heavenly great dao or a punishment from the highest heights.

Now that Yang Qi was a Demi-Immortal, he was so overtly terrifying that countless individuals from the Hall of Beheadings and Executions already regretted provoking him. Aggravating him was like poking a hornet’s nest.

Drawing on his sword energy, Ascendant Beheader shouted, “Dao of the Titan Emperor Heaven! Be Suppressed by Heaven!”

His sword energy swirled out and formed the character ‘titan’, which then transformed into a cage that dropped down onto Yang Qi.

RUMBLE!

Yang Qi didn’t care. Eight hundred and forty million particles within him erupted with power and he stabbed out with the Infernal Deity Spear once again, causing a vortex to fill the field of battle. In the blink of an eye, everything within that vortex began peeling away from the world around it. Shockingly, he was heading back into the depths of the Hell of Mahānata.

It was the very same tactic Yang Qi had used earlier on Kingly Beheader that had resulted in him breaking through to the Demi-Immortal level. Of course, the ability was even stronger now.

“Watch out!” Imperial Beheader shouted. “He’s trying to drag us into the Hell of Mahānata. If we get stuck in there, we’re dead!”

“Trying to stop me won't do you any good,” Yang Qi said. “I can kill chickens and dogs like you as easily as flipping my hand over! Prepare to learn what despair is, and what it means to suffer eternal torment!”

He threw his hands out, and a beam of godlight arced through the air, something that seemed no one could possibly block.

“Stay your hand!” someone shouted, and immense power suddenly erupted onto the scene. It was dazzling immortal energy that looked like chains, which spread out and wrapped around the space in the area, locking it down tight.

Frowning, Yang Qi looked over to see four newcomers clad in suits of golden armor etched with dragons, phoenixes, and other primeval godlings. These four individuals wore crowns, making them look like emperors on a conquest.

They were vice-rectors!

They ranked higher than the elysian children and were second only to the supreme rector in terms of power.

“Restrain yourself, Yang Qi,” one of them said. “Do you really think you’re going to wipe out the entire Hall of Beheadings and Executions? Not even the Invincible Dugu would dare to do such a thing. You’re being a bit rash, don’t you think?”

Now that the vice-rectors were present, the scene seemed to naturally go calm.

The forces of the Hall of Beheadings and Executions all stood down, as did Yang Qi.

“Well this is a surprise,” Yang Qi said, clasping hands behind his back and looking at the four vice-rectors calmly. “I never would have guessed that the vice-rectors would get involved in a little tussle between the Invincible Society and the Hall of Beheadings and Executions. Are you really that bored? You have nothing better to do than interfere in a minor squabble?”

“What?” said another of the vice-rectors, stepping forward. “You call this a minor squabble? You killed prime paragon elders—even an elder king! You put their heads on spikes above your main gate! Everyone saw you do it. If that’s a minor squabble, then how do you define a major one?”

“I'm just tidying up my front porch,” Yang Qi said casually. “There’s no reason for you to get all excited. In a flagrant violation of the rules, the Hall of Beheadings and Executions tried to rob me of my valuables. So, I decided to teach them a little lesson.”

“Teach them a lesson?” another rector said. “Who do you think you are? Unless I'm mistaken, you’re only a consecrated student. What gives you the guts to be this arrogant?”

“What gives me the guts? My fist. That’s what.” Yang Qi knew that the vice-rectors had come to stop the fight, and he wasn’t inclined to bicker with them. “Look, you’re on the side of the Hall of Beheadings and Executions, aren’t you? In other words, you’re against the Invincible Society and you want to take my belongings. Cut the crap and tell me what you want. Come on. Out with it.”

The vice-rectors were all ninth order Paragon Demi-Immortals, meaning that they were essentially invincible in the mortal world. If they joined forces, they would definitely be difficult to deal with. However, Yang Qi could enter the Hell of Mahānata whenever he wanted, and could also activate the warding magics of the Invincible Society at any time to protect himself. So in his current situation, he wasn’t very worried.

Even if they all attacked together, he could still handle the situation.

Now that he was a Demi-Immortal, there were few people in the world who could possibly cause problems for him, and unless one of those people truly managed to back him into a corner, they could never kill him.

The Demi-Immortal level was a watershed divide in which a cultivator became half immortal. It was also a level where the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth would release some of its most impressive, unbeatable abilities.

“You’ve got a lot of guts, brat,” said another of the vice-rectors. “You’re only a consecrated student, but do you know who we are? We’re vice-rectors and we exist far, far above you. Even royal students who encounter us will immediately drop to their knees. You're insane. Completely and utterly insane. Considering how disrespectful you’re being, we could imprison you this instant if we wanted.”

“Oh really?” Yang Qi replied coolly. “Does that mean you came to cause trouble for me at the behest of the Hall of Beheadings and Executions? You want to destabilize the Invincible Society? Elder Seventeenth Brother, did you hear that? This conspiracy goes all the way back to the vice-rectors! Make sure to send that information to Master, and let him decide what to do.”

“Alright,” Sword Seventeen said from his position within the warding magics of the Invincible Society.

Ascendant Beheader burst out laughing. “You’re going to send a message to the Invincible Dugu?” he said. “Good luck with that. The supreme rector sent him plenty of messages last time we had a collegium-wide meeting. He never responded. Either he’s ascended to the higher heaven, or he’s stuck in a cultivation bottleneck. Of course, it’s also possible that he's dead. If you think the Invincible Dugu is going to come and settle this matter, you might as well stop dreaming.”

“That’s right, you two arrogant brats,” one of the vice-rectors said. “We should just take you captive and force the Invincible Dugu to show his face.”

“Who exactly are you?” Yang Qi said, turning his attention to the one who had just spoken.

The vice-rector chuckled in contempt. “What, you want to know my name? You don't qualify. Not considering your status compared to mine.”

“Is that so? From what I can tell you’re worse than a stray dog. And since you think I don’t qualify, let me teach you a little something about qualifications. Based on what you just said, you deserve to die. So does your whole clan. I just killed an elder king, and I can kill a vice-rector too. If you’re so strong, why don’t you fight to the death with me? Right here, right now. Do you dare? I do. If you’ve got what it takes, let’s go. But if you keep hiding like a rat in a hole, then I don’t care what your status is—you’re nothing but a rat bastard. So come on. Fight me. Or are you scared?”

His words left no way out for the vice-rector, whose face flickered between shades of white, red, and green and looked extremely unsightly. He had just been challenged to a duel in front of too many witnesses to count. If he backed out, the loss of face would be incredible.

Of course, as a vice-rector in the Titan Emperor Collegium, he was no fool. He knew that the so-called rules and laws didn't mean anything. Only strength and power were important.

If an ant-like weakling had challenged him, he could have ignored it. But Yang Qi had just killed an elder king, which went to show how fierce and terrifying he was. For the vice-rector to ignore his challenge would definitely be taken as a sign of weakness.

After a moment of thought, the vice-rector smiled viciously and took a step forward. “Well, if you want to die, I’ll accommodate you. In front of all these witnesses, I’ll clean up the collegium a bit. Let’s see how long this little monster will keep up his arrogant front.”

‘It seems killing elder kings won’t be enough,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘In that case, I’ll kill a vice-rector. That will show people how mighty the Invincible Society is. If you kill chickens and the monkeys don't care, then that means it’s time to kill a monkey.’ Yang Qi’s eyes briefly swept the crowd, and wherever his gaze passed, people silently looked away. He was definitely the fiercest student in the school at this point.

“Prepare to die!” the rector shouted, lunging forward with a knifehand glittering with godlight that could pierce the void.

The light transformed into a saber nimbus spell formation, filled with saber-wielding immortals and gods.

“Invincible Saber of heaven; Shapeless and Incorporeal;Incorporeal Immortal-Slaughtering Saber!”

The vice-rector immediately resorted to a deadly move, the type that could kill immortals. And as the saber light spread out, Yang Qi had no leeway to dodge or evade. Boundless saber energy filled the entire area with the force to destroy the cosmos.

Chapter 476: Invincible

“Consummate skills? As far as I'm concerned, you’re children playing house!”

As the blade nimbuses reached Yang Qi, they shattered into fragments thanks to the Hand of the One God, and the stance Creation, which caused every lineament they contained to be absolutely destroyed.

Then Yang Qi made his move.

He didn't hold anything back at all, and as he drew on his power a minor world appeared right there in front of the Invincible Society. Of course, it was a manifestation of the God Legion Paradise.

Legendaries had personal domains. Great Sages had sage domains. But Demi-Immortals had minor worlds.

Back in the Hell of Mahānata, he didn't rely on his God Legion Paradise to fight Kingly Beheader. For one thing, he hadn’t been completely familiar with all of his new capabilities as a Demi-Immortal. But by the time it came to exchanging blows with the vice-rector, he was comfortable enough to do so.

“Hell Portals!” he said, and six Hell Portals appeared within the God Legion Paradise. Now that he was a Demi-Immortal, he could summon six Hell Portals, which perfectly corresponded to the six daos of reincarnation.

“What’s that?”

“A minor world. It's a minor world!”

“How could his minor world be so strong? Retreat! The magical laws here are going to be different now.”

“Everyone says that he has a primeval godworm, and that means his minor world contains the godly laws of space! We can’t stand up to that!”

“What are those six gates?”

“Look at the devil energy spilling out of them. Those are some sort of summoning portals, but what do they do? Don't tell me he can summon something as strong as the vice-rector?”

It only took moments for the square outside of the Invincible Society to completely empty of spectators as it filled rapidly with devil energy from the six Hell Portals.

Then a massive roar of rage shook the area as an enormous, pitch black entity suddenly appeared, seemingly built out of metal and pulsing with the aura of a seventh order Revered Demi-Immortal. Even as it emerged, halos of blessing surrounded it.

Some distance away, Ascendant Beheader said, “That’s… a black-iron power-devil! And it's a Revered Demi-Immortal! That thing is strong, but it won't be enough to deal with the vice-rector.”

He chuckled coldly. However, a moment later, his eyes went wide.

Rumble! RUUUUUUMBLE!

Countless fiend-devils poured out of the six Hell Portals. There were destruction devil-gods, giant asuras, yama kings, giant snakes, vampire kings, and nightmare devils. Even more shocking, there were Infernalfolk.

Entities abounded which could dominate entire worlds. All of them were Demi-Immortals, with the weakest being in the fifth order and some of them being as strong as the seventh. If even a single seventh order Demi-Immortal fiend-devil appeared in the Central Planetary River, it would cause major problems and would take a large force of powerful experts to deal with. But now, Yang Qi had summoned a veritable army of them.

They were like clouds of wasps or locusts, filling the entire square, each and every one of them vicious and evil to the extreme. Minor worlds popped up everywhere and devil energy surged, shattering many nearby warding magics.

“Not good!” the vice-rector gasped. Pouring power into his own minor world, he turned and tried to flee.

A swarm of ants can bring down an elephant, and in this situation, with so many fifth, sixth, and even seventh order fiend-devils on his hands, the vice-rector knew that, although he could start slaughtering them, his vital energy would drain quickly. That wasn’t to mention what would happen if Yang Qi continued to summon more and more.

Many famous potentates had existed back in the days of the Yore-Wilds, powerful Demolishers who had led the fight against the Hell of Euphoria. In those times, fiend-devils had blotted out the sky and lands alike and had been slaughtered relentlessly. But even then, top experts had run out of energy and fell in battle.

Right now, Yang Qi was casually summoning fiend-devils from the Hell of Mahānata, a place that surpassed the Hell of Euphoria by many times over. He already had hundreds upon hundreds, to the point where some people were having trouble keeping track of them.

Now that Yang Qi was a Demi-Immortal, he could summon seventh order fiend devils. However, there was more to it than that. His overall capacity had increased as well. At this level, he could summon tens of thousands of such creatures. And if he disregarded his own safety, he could summon an even larger army, a sea of fiend-devils that could drown the entire Titan Emperor Collegium.

There were too many fiend-devils in the Hell of Mahānata to count. Even billions or tens of billions would count for nothing there.

“Running? How could you be so weak, Vice-Rector?” Laughing, Yang Qi shot toward him. “Seems to me you shouldn’t be called vice-rector, but rather vice-rat!”

POP!

A mouthful of blood erupted from the vice-rector’s mouth.

“Stay your hand!”

“Stop right there!”

“You fiend-devil!”

Whooshing sounds could be heard as the other three vice-rectors flew out to block Yang Qi’s path and defend their compatriot.

“What energy art is that?” one of them said. “How can you summon so many powerful fiend-devils? Don’t tell me that you’re bringing fiend-devils to attack the Titan Emperor Collegium?”

“You pieces of trash want to keep fighting?” Yang Qi said. “Fine, I’ll tell you what you want to know. These are my Hell Portals, and they can summon an endless stream of fiend-devils. You know what happened when the Hell of Euphoria invaded the Yore-Wilds planetary system. If you piss me off, I’ll bring the same chaos onto your heads.”

Although Yang Qi wasn't making any aggressive moves, he seemed just as fierce as ever.

“Come forth, fiend-devils of the Hell of Mahānata. These people called me a monster, so I'm going to show them what monsters really look like. As virtue raises one foot, the devils raise ten! Let's see how you people deal with this!”

KABAAAMMM!

The void seemed to explode as endless masses of dark gold devil energy poured out of the Hell Portals, beyond which were the shadowy forms of endless fiend-devils.

As everyone watched, the Hell Portals grew larger and larger, providing a glimpse of the interior of the Hell of Mahānata and the hordes of fiend-devils that Yang Qi apparently wanted to bring to the Titan Emperor Collegium.

When the four vice-rectors saw what was happening, their faces turned ashen. They weren’t afraid to fight Yang Qi alone, but they had no confidence to be able to face an army like this. In fact, they knew that blood would rain from the sky if they did.

Never in all their lives had they encountered a freak like this Yang Qi.

Yang Qi stood there, ready to summon even more fiend-devils if he had to. He would cause an even bigger scene if these vice-rectors chose to fight him.

Furthermore, he would bless the fiend-devils with his Eternal Heavenly Aria, making them even stronger and more terrifying. After all, there were Infernalfolk who already surpassed humans in every way; if they were augmented with primeval god skills, they would become strong enough to consume worlds.

Certain parts of the ground were already turning dark gold as they were devilized and transformed into wriggling flesh and blood.

RUMBLE!

In that very moment, a voice rang out. “Yang Qi, stay your hand!”

A rumbling, invincible aura suddenly filled the area, suppressing Yang Qi’s true energy and shoving the fiend-devils back through the Hell Portal. In the blink of an eye, Yang Qi’s energy arts were negated.

This was pure, raw power that surpassed the Demi-Immortal level. It was like the strength of an actual immortal, and the only people who could do such things were Demolishers.

“Who goes there?” Yang Qi said in shock.

As for Sword Seventeen, he shouted, “It’s Master! Our venerable Master is here!”

At that point, Yang Qi stopped worrying about the situation. Although he had never met his Master, he knew the man could shake heaven and earth.

As the power radiated down, a handsome and refined figure appeared overhead, wearing a green garment that made him look like a scholar.

It was an incarnation of the Invincible Dugu.

As soon as he appeared, everything went completely silent.

Looking down, he said, “Well done, my disciple. You’ve lived up to your reputation. Very overbearing and domineering! It’s too bad you cultivate a unique divine ability of your own, otherwise you could develop an Invincible Heart like mine. In any case, you've done well here. You’ve even surpassed your Eldest Brother! Once everyone is out of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, it will be interesting to see which of the two of you is actually superior.”

“Greetings, Master!” Yang Qi said, now fully confident that he wouldn’t be punished for his actions.

“There’s no need for formal greetings. You did all of this to earn face, which is completely understandable. However, those Hell Portals of yours are too powerful. If you really summoned all those fiend-devils into the collegium, we would be in a terrible situation. Although I could probably keep things in check, word would get back to the immortal worlds. That would be bad.” Turning his head to look deeper into the collegium, he raised his voice and said, “Listen up, you old fogies. I know you’ve always wanted to see me fail, but if I hadn’t interfered right now, the Titan Emperor Collegium would have been destroyed. As you might have noticed, I had to hold back my disciple, not your vice-rectors. In fact, now that I think about it, my disciple was already holding back even before I arrived.”

Chapter 477: Shocking Renown

Normally, this clone of the Invincible Dugu wouldn’t come out into the world, but now that he had, he seemed more than happy to intentionally provoke the leaders of the Titan Emperor Collegium. As his voice echoed out like thunder, everyone present could clearly hear his words.

In response, several cold snorts could be heard from the depths of the collegium.

“Are you shielding your disciple, Invincible Dugu?”

“I knew you would show up eventually, Invincible Dugu. You love to shield your students from repercussions, but this is too big of an issue. You might as well have not come back. The Titan Emperor Collegium has rules, you know. We old-timers rank as high as you, so we can’t do anything to you. But don't forget, we can contact the heaven above at any moment. If you cause too much of a scene, they’ll definitely banish an immortal down here to deal with you.”

“Shielding him? I think you people are the ones who don’t understand. If I was shielding him, why would I step in and interfere with the fight? Let me tell you people, my disciple is beyond your capability to deal with. As all of you clearly saw, if I hadn’t stepped in he would have unleashed the full power of his Hell Portals and turned this place into a sea of fiend-devils. During the fighting, he would definitely have achieved another breakthrough. Right now, he’s a Lesser Demi-Immortal, but he can already summon seventh order fiend-devils. So, what do you think would happen if he became a Greater Demi-Immortal in the middle of the fight? Or a Profound Demi-Immortal? How many fiend-devils would he be able to summon then? And if he sent Universal Demi-Immortal fiend-devils after you, would you even be able to fight back?”

As the Invincible Dugu’s words echoed out, many a thoughtful expression appeared on the faces of those who could hear him. And many people looked over at Yang Qi as if they were in the presence of a complete freak.

Everything the Invincible Dugu had said was correct. If Yang Qi had summoned Universal Demi-Immortal fiend-devils, the entire Titan Emperor Collegium would have fallen into ruin.

Revered Demi-Immortals could dominate the battlefield, but not if they ran into a Universal Demi-Immortal, who could cast the sun, moon, and heavenly bodies into chaos, and who understood the rotations of the universe.

If Yang Qi had the power to summon Universal Demi-Immortals, there was no way anyone could possibly deal with him, and there wouldn’t be a single person who would dare to treat him with disrespect.

The Invincible Dugu got straight to the point, and his candid words instantly caused newfound respect for Yang Qi to glimmer in the eyes of everyone present. In some ways, it was an added form of protection. After all, if the situation got too out of hand, the Invincible Dugu knew that not even he could do anything to change the course of events.

“You old fogies know full well that these aren’t empty words. As you can clearly see, my disciple cultivates a godly-class energy art, and no simple one at that. In fact, it surpasses the Prodigious Proto-Epoch, Invincible War-Steppe that I cultivate. You saw the primeval god skills he used, didn’t you? If he blessed the fiend-devils with them, how much stronger would they be in battle? Think about it a different way: if our collegium could benefit from such blessings, how much better equipped would we be to fight our enemies in battle? The Megaplexus Collegium is turning into more and more of a threat lately, and you want to get rid of a genius like Yang Qi? What happens if we go to war with him on our side? With his primeval god skills and an army of fiend-devils at his back, which side do you think would have an advantage? Us! And it would be overwhelming.

“You myopic fossils need to stop being so short-sighted. This disciple of mine is far too valuable to harm. If we want the Titan Emperor Collegium to be restored to its former glory, and return to the golden age of the ancient Yore-Wilds, we need him!”

After a moment of thought, one of the mysterious old-timers said, “You have a glib tongue, Invincible Dugu. There’s no need to talk up your disciple so much.”

“I'm not talking anything up. There are plenty of experts in the collegium who were watching things play out, and all of them know how strong Yang Qi is.” Normally, the Invincible Dugu talked in a very arrogant and domineering fashion, but this time he was being calm and reasonable.

Already, people in the area were whispering amongst themselves as they discussed the situation.

“Everybody says that the Invincible Dugu is imperious, bossy and completely domineering. They say he's never willing to listen to reason, and that if his disciples make a mistake, he shields them from any repercussions. So why is he acting so different today?”

“I heard the same thing about him. Supposedly, he won’t even take orders from the supreme rector. But everything he’s saying now seems perfectly reasonable. It must be because he's so pleased with the fact that nobody can handle this new disciple of his. In a situation like this, of course he's happy to be the good guy. The stronger his disciple is, the stronger he is. It’s basically good cop, bad cop!”

“You’re right. That Yang Qi is far too overbearing. He killed a whole bunch of people right in front of us all, and even nailed the head of an elder king above the entrance of the Invincible Society. And that’s nothing compared to the fact that he opened the gates of hell right here in the middle of the collegium and threatened to destroy it. Maybe we could have stopped those fiend-devils in the end, but the casualties would have been massive.”

“Everything the Invincible Dugu said is true. This Yang Qi is so strong! For one thing, he has those primeval god skills. And he can also summon fiend-devils. If we went to war, he would be the ultimate weapon for our side. I mean, he can already summon seventh order fiend-devils! Those things are just as strong as prime paragon elders, or universal-level royal students. Normally speaking, it takes blood, sweat, and tears to develop someone that strong, and he can just casually summon them! It’s like cheating!”

“You’re right, it’s basically cheating. Ai. The Invincible Dugu is enough of a freak on his own. Who could have guessed that he would raise an even more freakish disciple? Is the Invincible Society just plain lucky?”

“When it comes to the most overbearing person in the Invincible Society, nobody can top this Yang Qi.”

Many people in the crowd had hit the nail right on the head. The Invincible Dugu was most definitely a domineering individual, but in this instance he had been outdone by his own disciple, which meant that it was the perfect situation for him to play ‘good cop’.

Aware that the Invincible Dugu was playing good cop, Yang Qi knew that he should go all out in playing bad cop.

“Master, there’s really no need to waste words on these people,” Yang Qi said. “These four rectors should never have interfered in a personal grudge between our Invincible Society and the Hall of Beheadings and Executions. But since they did, I had no choice but to make sure they understood the consequences of their actions. And you’re right, Master. I’m just about to reach enlightenment of the Greater Demi-Immortal level. If a fight broke out, I wouldn’t get hurt and would actually reach an even higher level. If worse came to worst and things went south, I could always use another ability I have to secure safe passage right into hell. If I escaped into the Hell of Mahānata, I refuse to believe that any of them would dare to chase after me. And anyone who had the guts to do so would never return. I’d make sure of that!”

The response to his words was not an outpouring of rage. Instead, everyone felt their hearts going cold with fear. Most people in life will take advantage of kind people, but fear the vicious. And though there were people who didn't fear viciousness, Yang Qi had pushed far beyond the limits of what was reasonable. Even people who normally weren’t intimidated by viciousness still felt a touch of fear.

“Well, what do you think, you old fogies?” the Invincible Dugu said with a chuckle. “If you really want to keep fighting, I’ll just let my disciple do whatever he wants. By the way, his cultivation base is advancing rapidly. Today he can kill elder kings and hold his own against the vice-rectors. Who’s to say what he’ll be like tomorrow? Maybe he’ll even be strong enough to handle you fossils. In any case, he has his own dao, and you couldn’t kill him even if you tried.”

The old-timers went silent for a bit, then one of them finally said, “Fine. Fine, Invincible Dugu. You picked an excellent disciple this time. We were actually waiting for you to come back and save him. However, we could never have guessed that you would actually step in before he went too far. As it turns out, you aren’t shielding him, a fact which leaves us speechless, to say the least. However, we hope you can advise your disciple not to cause a pandemonium like this. Did he really plan to summon the fiend-devils of the Hell of Mahānata to destroy the Titan Emperor Collegium?”

“I agree,” another of them said. “We won't look into this matter any further. However, your disciple did kill prime paragon elders and an elder king, an act which cannot be left unpunished. There must be compensation paid. The truth is that we already discussed the matter earlier, and have a suggestion. The Immortal Army Battlefield will be opening soon, and top experts from many other collegiums will be competing inside. As way of compensation, your disciple will be required to attend and kill as many geniuses from the other collegiums as possible. How about a minimum of one hundred elysian children? What do you think?”

“Fine,” the Invincible Dugu said. “No problem at all. As a student of the Titan Emperor Collegium, it's only natural that my disciple would fight on our side. Even without the events of today, I would have had him participate. The Megaplexus Collegium has been eyeing us like a tiger eyes its prey, so killing some of their elysian children would definitely cut them down a notch. And our Invincible Society could always use a few more heads to decorate the front gate. What do you think, Yang Qi?”

With his final words, he looked over at Yang Qi.

Yang Qi nodded. “That sounds great, Master. The Megaplexus Collegium invaded the Yore-Wilds planetary system recently and nearly wiped out my home. There’s no way I’ll let that go unanswered. I’ll kill every single Megaplexus Collegium student I find from now on!”

“Very well, the matter is concluded,” the Invincible Dugu said. “The Hall of Beheadings and Executions has no choice but to eat their losses. Besides, they started the fight, so all their casualties were all deserved.”

Imperial Beheader, Sovereign Beheader, and Godly Beheader were visibly enraged. “For you to protect your disciple like this is completely outrageous, Invincible Dugu. Are you saying that our prime paragon elders and elder king died for nothing? How is the Hall of Beheadings and Executions supposed to enforce the law going forward?”

“Are you saying you still want to fight my disciple? If that’s the case, I’ll just step back and let things play out.” The look in the Invincible Dugu’s eyes was enough to cause anyone’s heart to turn as cold as ice.

“Forget it,” said Ascendant Beheader, glaring at Yang Qi with such hatred it seemed he wanted to eat him alive. “But we’re not going to forget what happened today. As an elysian child, I already have a spot waiting for me in the immortal world. I'm going to report this matter to the heaven on high, and they’ll definitely side with justice.”

“Whatever,” Yang Qi said with a smile. “I can’t guarantee you’ll come out unscathed if you do that. As far as I'm concerned, elysian children are lower than dogs. I destroy people like that as easily as trampling weeds.”

Chapter 478: Immortal Army Battlefield

“You!” Ascendant Beheader blurted, nearly coughing up a mouthful of blood from fury at hearing Yang Qi’s response. His face turned scarlet and he nearly leaped forward to start fighting, except he knew he couldn’t. With the Invincible Dugu present, the Hall of Beheadings and Executions was at rock bottom, and any fighting that broke out would inevitably end in a rout.

That said, even a fish on the chopping block will still struggle and jump.

“You have the upper hand for now, Yang Qi,” Ascendant Beheader begrudged. “But you and your master are defying the heaven above. It won’t be long before they punish you. And even if they don’t, when we’re all on the Immortal Army Battlefield the Hall of Beheadings and Executions definitely won’t let you off the hook!”

“Is that so? Fine. I’ll be waiting. In the meantime, you might as well prepare your clan to be exterminated, since it's going to happen sooner or later. Every friend and every family member of your Hall of Beheadings and Executions had better watch out for me. Otherwise, they might end up as fiend-devil food.” Yang Qi was making overt threats, and apparently didn’t care if anyone noticed.

The gall and ferocity on display was sure to strike terror into the hearts of anyone who did.

After today, there wouldn’t be a single person in the Titan Emperor Collegium who would dare cause problems for Yang Qi. At worst, there might be people who would try to strike at him from the shadows.

“Let’s go!” Ascendant Beheader and all the other elders left, casting subconscious glances at the heads nailed to the entrance of the Invincible Society. Despite the rancor they felt in their hearts, they had no choice but to suppress such feelings. They had lost all face, and would never rest until they saw the Invincible Society humiliated and destroyed.

On the other hand, many of the other societies were delighted. The Hall of Beheadings and Executions was an important organization, but their humiliation this day would make it impossible for them to continue easily bullying other organizations. In turn, that would give the other societies better access to resources.

There were countless mining planets located in the Central Planetary River, as well as numerous planets filled with all sorts of spirit medicines and places devoted to the forging of magical treasures. In all of the aspects of space-time and the planes of existence, there were massive hoards of wealth built up by the collegium over hundreds of thousands of years. And the Hall of Beheadings and Executions got the biggest shares of everything. In contrast, the Invincible Society took virtually nothing.

“I wonder if the Invincible Society will take advantage of the situation to take more resources.”

“They only have eighteen members. What would they do with that many resources? I doubt they’ll do anything. The Invincible Society might be arrogant and domineering, but the best thing about them is that they don’t take any resources from the collegium. They’re not like the Hall of Beheadings and Executions, who bully and extort the common students. I think we need to take advantage of this situation to strike a devastating blow to the Hall of Beheadings and Executions. Let's kick them so hard while they’re down that they’ll never get up again!”

“That’s right. Our Sword Society has had a grudge against the Hall of Beheadings and Executions for a long time. There was an incident on a mining planet a while back in which one of our disciples got in a fight with one of theirs. Ever since then, they’ve taken every opportunity to hurt us. There was even a time when they arrested a few hundred of our disciples and executed them. We haven’t forgotten about that, and now it’s time for their comeuppance!”

“Kill them! If I see any disciples from the Hall of Beheadings and Executions, they’re going to die!”

“The Saber Society won’t allow the Hall of Beheadings and Executions to exist under the same sky as us!”

Already, plenty of students were making plans to move against the Hall of Beheadings and Executions. And the fact that the Hall of Beheadings and Executions had so many students meant that there were plenty of targets. They were about to suffer a grievous blow.

When Yang Qi heard the talk around him, he gave an inward nod of approval. After all, he was familiar with the benefits of beating a drowning dog, and was more than happy to apply that maxim to the Hall of Beheadings and Executions.

“Very well, you're all dismissed,” the Invincible Dugu said. “There’s nothing left to see here. Carry on.” He waved his hand, causing dazzling light to fill the square as he pulled Yang Qi into the Invincible Society. Then he sealed the entrance with a shining shield, making it impossible for anyone to see inside.

It was clear that the Invincible Society as a whole was now in a state of seclusion. One of the most shocking and astonishing events to have ever played out in the collegium was over.

In the end, Yang Qi had prevailed, and earned the reputation of being the most vicious character imaginable. His name would not only be well-known in the collegium, but would soon spread to other planetary systems as well.

At the moment, there were only three people in the Invincible Society: the Invincible Dugu’s clone, Sword Seventeen, and Yang Qi.

As the three of them sat down cross-legged to confer, Sword Seventeen said, “Master, did you pass your Demolishing tribulation? Are you a Demolisher now?”

“I am,” the Invincible Dugu replied. “I passed the tribulation three days ago, and am now a heaven-immortal. Specifically, I'm in the first stage of the Demolishing level, making me a Void-Demolisher. My true self has already ascended to the immortal world, leaving behind only this clone, which has roughly thirty percent of my vital energy. Unfortunately, I won’t be able to power the clone for much longer, so our time is limited.

“I had no choice but to intervene just now, Yang Qi. You really caused a scene, and if things had proceeded any further, even I would have had difficulty dealing with the aftermath. After all, some of the old-timers in the collegium are not to be taken lightly.”

Sword Seventeen was visibly surprised. “Master, if you’ve ascended to the immortal world, then what are we supposed to do? We're in a really bad situation here. Eldest Brother, Second Elder Brother, and everyone else is trapped in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. The only people who are free are Junior Eighteenth Brother and me. How are we supposed to keep the society going?”

“Don’t worry, your Junior Eighteenth Brother is already strong enough to do it on his own. From the fight today, I can see that he’s already on the way to being a top figure here in the mortal world. He can definitely keep the Invincible Society going. Yang Qi, from now on, you’re not a consecrated student. I hereby transfer the title of society chief to you, making you just as powerful as the vice-rectors, and outranked only by the supreme rector himself.”

The Invincible Dugu waved his hand, sending a command medallion flying over to Yang Qi. It had a sealing mark of blessing on it which conformed perfectly to Yang Qi’s aura. That sealing mark was the identifying sigil of the society chief of the Invincible Society.

Next, the image of a blood-red heart appeared on Yang Qi’s palm, which was a projection of the Invincible Dugu’s Invincible Heart.

“That Invincible Heart contains my godly-class energy art, the Prodigious Proto-Epoch, Invincible War-Steppe. I'm passing my mantle on to you, Yang Qi. Cultivate whichever aspects of it you wish, or just discard it. It's up to you. I'm aware that you raised an immortal embryo into a clone in the Rich-Lush Continent, and it might not be a bad idea to pass the Invincible Heart to him. Incidentally, I can’t help your Eldest Brother, Elder Second Brother, and the others to escape from the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, now that I've ascended. I’ll leave that up to you. You’re the leader of the Invincible Society now, understand? Recruit new members as you see fit, and even change the rules if you want. Whatever you do, remember that I’ll be in the heaven above, waiting for you.”

With that, his clone slowly began to fade away.

“Master!” Sword Seventeen cried.

“Remember to listen to your Junior Eighteenth Brother. His destiny and fate are far more profound than mine. If you follow him, you’ll definitely reap immense rewards. You’ll be a Void-Demolisher soon, and we can reunite in the heaven above.”

“Master,” Yang Qi said, “who is my father? I heard that he was a banished immortal and that you were close to him. Is that true?”

“Your father was the transmigration of a royal figure of no small repute. Unfortunately, the details pertain to a secret of heavenly proportions. Knowing the details won't do you any good right now. If you want to know the truth, reach the Demolishing level and become an immortal. That is when your true path of cultivation will begin. Legendaries. Great Sages. Demi-Immortals. Those are all titles given to mortals, and represent weakness. Their struggles are like battles between ants. When you become a Demolisher, the world will open up to you and you’ll realize how, right now, you’re truly a frog in a well.”

By this point, the Invincible Dugu’s clone had almost completely faded away. “The power of my clone will now gather in the Invincible Heart on your palm. With that power, you should be able to reach even higher levels of enlightenment. Hopefully you can achieve multiple breakthroughs within the Demi-Immortal level. If you can summon Universal Demi-Immortal fiend-devils, you can dominate the mortal world. Remember, everything beneath the Universal level is small scale. But once you understand the rotations of the universe, you can become a truly dominating force….”

At that point, the clone disappeared.

A long moment passed before Sword Seventeen recovered his composure.

“Master really ascended,” he murmured. “Now it's only the two of us. There’s tough work ahead, and a long way to go. We're simply too weak right now.”

“Don’t worry. The fact that Master ascended isn't public knowledge, and it's not like we’ll be spreading the news. Let’s take advantage of every moment we have to further our cultivation and become stronger. Master was right; if I can achieve a few breakthroughs, and eventually summon Universal Demi-Immortal fiend-devils, then hardly anyone in the mortal world could fight me. It would take immortals to keep me in check.”

Yang Qi looked down at the blood-colored heart on his palm and could sense the power within it, power that seemed invincible. The heart pulsed, almost as if it were a real, beating heart. And the light which shone off of it seemed to contain magical laws of the dao of immortals.

Absorbing its power would definitely take time.

As for the godly-class energy art within it, he planned to give that to his immortal clone.

“Come on, Elder Brother. Let’s head to Planet Sage Monarch. I want to turn it into a planetary system!” With that, the two of them vanished without a trace.

Chapter 479: Creating a Planetary System

Yang Qi returned to Planet Sage Monarch in complete secrecy.

Everyone on the outside assumed that he was in seclusion with the Invincible Dugu, receiving some sort of consummate skill. The truth was that he was gone. Although the Invincible Dugu’s mere ‘presence’ would be enough to keep any hostile forces at bay for a short time, word would eventually get out that he had ascended, at which point chaos would ensue.

Therefore, Yang Qi wanted to take advantage of every moment to push his cultivation base as high as possible.

Hopefully, by the time the news spread, he would be strong enough to hold his own. Perhaps he wouldn’t be as strong as the Invincible Dugu himself, but he could at least be on the same level as Eldest Brother.

Planet Sage Monarch was Yang Qi’s foundation. It already bore the semblance of a planetary system, with a main planet being orbited by hundreds of thousands of smaller satellite planets. Just like the main planet, the satellites were the color of jade and abounded with spirit energy.

In the final analysis, though, it still wasn’t a planetary system. Planetary systems were immense, and required the power to conform to the rotations of the universe. They usually contained hundreds of billions of planets and planes, all of which had their own unique orbits and paths of movement.

Thankfully, now that Yang Qi could summon fiend-devils in the Revered Demi-Immortal level, he had access to the resources he needed to make a planetary system. The first order of business was to give the planetary system a guardian deity that could defend it against countless enemy experts.

“Qi’er, you’re back!”

As soon as Yang Qi’s true self landed in Sage Monarch City, a host of people ran out to meet him, including Yang Zhan, Yang Yunchong, Yang Hualong, as well as a crowd of sworn siblings. The Sage Monarch Continent had long since become Planet Sage Monarch, and when its inhabitants looked up they could see the countless heavenly bodies, which were shining satellites. There was a powerful energy field thrumming throughout the planet, giving strength to the living beings there and helping their cultivation. The disciples of the Yang Clan flourished, and there were even some outstanding individuals among them who had been sent to rule over some of the satellites above.

Yang Qi’s immortal clone was stronger than ever, and presided over the influx of jade-like power from that mysterious immortal world that he could connect to with the godly-class Jade-Emperor Profound-Welkin Exalted-Celestial God-Dao.

After all of the initial greetings and formalities were over, Yang Qi said, “There’s no time to waste, everyone. Get into position. I'm going to use the immortal formations deep within the lands below us to assimilate the essence of Grand Emperor Rich-Lush and strengthen our defenses. According to what I learned, one of the immortal formations has ancient, heaven-defying dao lineaments that can lead directly to an immortal world.”

If the legends were true, and he could send Planet Sage Monarch to such a world, it would be worth any effort spent. Unfortunately, he had the feeling that Grand Emperor Rich-Lush had been exaggerating. Even so, he knew he had to try.

Whoosh. Whoosh. Whoosh.

Everyone flew into the depths of Planet Sage Monarch toward the embryonic planetary core, which was billions of kilometers down in the center of the planet, formed from countless layers of primal-chaos. It also contained the ancient immortal formations. Yang Qi had never finished his work with it, and had previously assumed that he would need to accumulate more power before being able to draw on its most miraculous aspects.

In some ways, returning to this place was like a walk down memory lane. He saw the ruined immortal formations he had passed by when he first acquired the Yore-Wilds’ Heart fragment. He had been in the mere sixth Legendary transformation when he had his big fight with the Crown Prince, but that event now seemed as abstract as smoke in the wind.

He actually missed having a rival like the Crown Prince, someone to put constant pressure on him and force him to become stronger as fast as possible. Back then, he had constantly advanced by leaps and bounds. But things were different nowadays. Although he had plenty of adversaries, none of them were really worth worrying about.

Of course, there was that yellow-garbed young man with the buzz cut who he had met in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. He was definitely a very mysterious individual, and had apparently traveled through time to arrive in Yang Qi’s world. Furthermore, he had two of King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy medallions. He was very strong, and seemed to come and go like the wind.

All of a sudden, Yang Qi realized something. It was probably that very young man in yellow who had spread rumors about the godworm eggs. A smile broke out on Yang Qi’s face. ‘A rival,’ he thought. ‘A worthy rival. This makes things much more interesting. Well, I’ll kill him one way or another. Eventually.’

Looking out at the primal-chaos paleo-energy and the ruined immortal formations, Yang Zhan said, “Qi’er, while you were away, I spent a lot of time in seclusion, studying the primal-chaos paleo-energy and the immortal formations. These formations truly are mysterious. Unfortunately, they’re all in a state of ruin. Actually, similar ruins exist throughout the entire Yore-Wilds planetary system.”

One particular formation caught their attention, and they flew over to investigate. It appeared to be made from ancient stone slabs and totemic pillars that radiated an archaic aura. They were also carved with ancient poems written in an unknown script. Yang Qi was far more perceptive than he had been in the past, and instantly identified some of the marvelous aspects of this mysterious immortal formation. It contained yin and yang, the five phases, taiji, the eight trigrams, and ancient godly abilities. The totems were from the ancient era of the Yore-Wilds, and had been carved by some heaven-defying, almighty entity.

If he could get it functioning again, he could pierce from the lowest universal planes to the highest.

‘Power!’

Without any hesitation, he sent a stream of power into the immortal formation, hoping to repair it. Unfortunately, no matter how much power he poured into it, it didn't seem to do anything. It still seemed like nothing more than a chunk of ruined stone.

‘Hmm. Seems I need to restore its essence. If I bathe it in the power of time, perhaps that would return it to its previous glory.’ He sat down cross-legged and waved his hand, sending out the power of time, which wrapped up the formation and began cleansing it of dust. Eventually, it began shining dazzlingly.

Without any hesitation, he sent out more power of time.

Of course, he alone wasn’t strong enough, so he called on the Hell Portal to summon hordes of fiend-devils, all of them Revered Demi-Immortals.

The first to appear were a hundred asuras, whose surging devil energy created an ancient devil-eye formation. They dropped to their knees, began silently praying, while the power of time erupted out.

The immortal formation creaked and groaned, yet no transformations occurred.

However, the asuras didn’t stop. Spitting up mouthfuls of quintessence-blood, they caused the dazzling time power to grow even stronger, to the point where their bodies began to wither up. Their lifespan began running low and they grew old and feeble. And yet they continued going all out to call on the magical laws of time. After all, because they had been summoned by Yang Qi via the Hell Portal, they had absolutely no choice but to follow his every command.

Thump!

All of a sudden, one of the asuras shivered and then collapsed into dust.

Then another.

Without even blinking, Yang Qi proceeded to summon more fiend-devils and use their command over the power of time to restore the immortal formation. It was an extravagant method, something that no one else could possibly pull off. In the shortest of moments, Yang Qi caused a hundred Revered Demi-Immortal fiend-devils to perish, something that no one in the Titan Emperor Collegium could ever have done.

After all, seventh order Demi-Immortals were prime paragon elders, and no one would possibly sacrifice them to do something like this.

“Infernalfolk! Armored dragon-devils! Giant snakes from the Hell of Nagas!” He summoned one fiend-devil after another and drained them of power until they perished.

Days passed, to the point where it was impossible to keep track of how many fiend-devils had been sacrificed. By this point, the embryonic planetary core pulsed with the power of time.

As for Sword Seventeen, he looked on in numb shock.

The sea of quintessence energy which surrounded them was incredible, and was the type that couldn't possibly exist in any other location.

Buzzzzzzzzzzzz….

Without any warning, the immortal formation stirred and the totem pillars began to glow with bright light. Immortal power burst out of it, instantly transforming into an enormous, heavenly net that filled the void outside of Planet Sage Monarch.

As of this moment, Yang Qi sensed that the immortal formation was linked to a vast heavenly kingdom far, far above. It was an immortal world that seemed perfectly on par with the Hell of Mahānata.

“Is that…!?” Sword Seventeen said, his eyes widening. “It is! That’s the Tusita Heaven! It’s one of the highest of all the thirty-three types of immortal worlds! According to the stories, of all the billions and billions of immortal worlds, the Tusita Heaven is one of the highest-ranking of all. It’s like the Hell of Mahānata. It has power the likes of which the Titan Emperor Heaven and the Megaplexus Heaven can’t even compare to. The universal power there can’t be looked down upon at all.”

“Is that so? Tusita Heaven?” Yang Qi looked at the immortal formation for a moment, then sent some divine will into it. Immediately, he sensed irresistible majesty, prompting him to use the Hand of the One God to reach into the formation. There, he encountered a violet stream of power, which he grabbed. In the blink of an eye, it turned into a violet jewel that was none other than an immortal stone.

‘This level of power is incredible!’ he thought.

Chapter 480: Tusita Heaven

A tiny scrap of power had leaked out and immediately turned into an immortal stone? What did that imply? In the mortal world, immortal stones were a rarity. Even a Demi-Immortal who accumulated them would view them as precious beyond belief and carefully keep their power in check.

In some places, heavenly worlds had intentionally left behind veins of ore containing immortal stones. However, such ores were usually guarded by powerful sects, or even the collegiums, making it impossible for outsiders to get remotely close to them. Forget the Sage Monarch Continent. Not even the Hanging Mountain had access to immortal stones.

Demi-Immortal experts would rush to fight over such resources yet, here, this immortal formation had only just linked with the Tusita Heaven and instantly produced an immortal stone. If word got out, it could lead to a catastrophe of epic proportions. And of course, there were more secrets to this immortal formation.

As Yang Qi peered into it, he saw a wormhole that apparently connected directly to the Tusita Heaven.

‘Can I go through it?’ he thought.

Waving his hand, he summoned a nascent divinity sealing mark that transformed into a life-like clone, which then leaped into the wormhole. Instantly, a powerful force of expulsion locked onto the clone and a tempest of violet immortal energy smashed into him, ripping him to shreds.

“What’s going on?” Yang Qi said. Apparently, the rumors of being able to reach the Tusita Heaven were nothing more than a story.

“Ah, come on, did you really think it would be that easy?” Sword Seventeen said. “Junior Brother, the Tusita Heaven is an incredibly high-ranking immortal world that is close to the kingdom of the gods. If you could just hop into a spell formation and go right there, well, that would be too simple. From what I can tell, this immortal formation is designed to draw on the power of the Tusita Heaven to create a holy land of cultivation. It’s basically a power source for our Planet Sage Monarch, a reserve of immortal stones that can ensure the strength and prosperity of the lands for a countless number of years. But it’s not a two-way tunnel.”

“Alright. But it still seems to me there’s more to this formation than meets the eye. I think I’ll understand when I'm a bit stronger.” Setting aside the matter of the spell formation’s enlightenment, he drew on the power of his nascent divinity and focused on his immortal clone, who was sitting nearby.

He extended his hand, sending the Invincible Heart flying out to land on the clone. A short time later, the clone began to pulse with a strong battle spirit, as well as godlight that resembled both steel and blood.

The clone had already made some progress with the Jade-Emperor Profound-Welkin Exalted-Celestial God-Dao, and now he would be able to cultivate the Prodigious Proto-Epoch, Invincible War-Steppe. With the added empyrean energy from the latter, his two godly-class energy arts would be incredibly shocking.

Of course, he was benefiting from the Invincible Dugu’s Invincible Heart, which was the absolute quintessence of his energy arts, and would make progress much quicker and more efficient. In this energy art, the combination of steel and blood made one vastly more capable in a fight.

Soon, the sensation of steel veins filled the entire planet, causing everyone on it to pulse with vigor.

“Come forth, Tusita Violet Energy!” Yang Qi said. The formation erupted with violet energy, creating a mighty river that poured into the depths of Planet Sage Monarch, transforming into veins of immortal ore.

At the same time, he summoned more fiend-devils, who rose into the sky, their minor worlds transforming into devil planets. After all, even the minor world of a first order Demi-Immortal could transform into an actual planet. That was why the transformation of a continent into a planet could push a ninth step Great Sage into the Demi-Immortal level. Many Demi-Immortals throughout history had perished, only to have their quintessence energy eventually transform into a planet.

Yang Qi was summoning seventh order Demi-Immortal fiend-devils to become devil planets, which he then assigned specific orbital paths in the newly forming Sage Monarch planetary system. As they pulsed with devil energy, they became an enormous, deadly spell formation. Eventually, the devil planets also conformed to the rotation of the universe and slowly began forming undying devil souls, which was a function of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.

Slowly but surely, Yang Qi could sense the power of the Sage Monarch planetary system growing, and, at the same time, he felt the rotations of the universe. Although he was only a first order Demi-Immortal, the truth was that he already had some enlightenment of Greater, Profound, Potent, Tyrant, Prime, and Revered Demi-Immortals. If he built up enough power, he could skyrocket through all of those levels.

However, the Universal Demi-Immortal level was difficult to gain an understanding of.

Now, as he summoned fiend-devils and transformed them into devil planets, they began to inch toward forming undying devil souls. That, in itself, allowed him to seek enlightenment of the rotations of the universe and pushed his psychic abilities higher. Slowly but surely, he was pushing past the peak of the Lesser Demi-Immortal level and heading toward becoming a Greater Demi-Immortal.

Days passed as Yang Qi, and everyone else in the Sage Monarch planetary system, focused on their cultivation. Already, the place looked dozens of times larger than before, with countless new satellite planets popping into being everywhere. There were hundreds of thousands of them, all bursting with power that seemed to increase exponentially as they linked together.

**

Off in the distance, two people had just emerged from the depths of some ancient ruins. One of them was the yellow-garbed young man with a buzz cut, and the other was Chancellor Demi-Immortal. Both of them were many dozens of times more powerful than they had been before, obviously the result of recently-acquired good fortune.

Laughing heartily, Chancellor Demi-Immortal said, “Who would have thought that I would acquire the legacy of an ancient immortal right here in these ruins. I actually acquired the cassock of True Gentleman Twin Polarity, giving me a significant boost to my overall power levels. And you acquired another of King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy medallions. Now we’re even better equipped to meet our common goal of dealing with Yang Qi.”

He didn't have much time to revel before his attention was drawn to the distant Sage Monarch planetary system.

“Yang Qi is getting more and more powerful….” he murmured.

“This is definitely out of the ordinary,” said the young man in yellow. “Yang Qi is getting stronger too quickly.” Despite the recent advancements he had made, the sight of the Sage Monarch planetary system caused a very serious expression to cover the young man’s face. “What he’s doing is something rarely seen. He's obviously a Demi-Immortal, with abilities on par with a Universal Demi-Immortal. In fact, he might even be as strong as a Paragon Demi-Immortal. You need to look into this, Chancellor Demi-Immortal. Find out what's going on. Before we entered the ruins, I made sure that rumors would spread about him having those primeval godworm eggs. Why hasn’t anyone come to cause problems for him yet? Hurry up and contact your people within the collegium.”

“Okay.” Glaring with open hatred at the Sage Monarch planetary system, Chancellor Demi-Immortal pulled out a command medallion.

Before long, he received a response that contained the latest news.

“Incredible. As soon as Yang Qi got out, he killed a prime paragon elder from the Hall of Beheadings and Executions. He even killed an elder king! And then he fought four vice-rectors. In the end, the situation got so out of hand that the Invincible Dugu showed up. The final outcome… well, there’s no need to waste words. One of my people used his water-type energy arts to record the entire event. See for yourself.”

An image appeared, revealing all of the recent events with Yang Qi. His domineering nature and seeming invincibility on the battlefield was on full display. Eventually, the image showed the heads of the elders on spikes above the Invincible Society, dripping with blood.

Both the yellow-garbed young man and Chancellor Demi-Immortal fell into a deep silence for a long moment.

“He’s an outright devil,” Chancellor Demi-Immortal said. “Humans can't do things like that. Well, it might seem like a victory, but he’s really put himself in a bad position. He has more enemies than ever, now. And the old-timers in the collegium are definitely not happy with him. It seems it won’t be long before the Invincible Dugu ascends. Once he does, Yang Qi is dead! It doesn’t matter how overbearing he is. He has too many treasures, and even primeval god skills. There are going to be plenty of people willing to take him out to get them. In fact, the immortal world above might even send an immortal down to kill him.”

“I've considered all of that,” said the young man in yellow. “Once the Invincible Dugu ascends, it will be possible to kill Yang Qi. We just need to find the right opportunity. After acquiring this third legacy medallion, I have access to the Crown Prince’s will, although I haven’t had time to completely absorb it. The Crown Prince was a powerful person, the transmigration of an almighty entity from a high-level plane somewhere in the universe. Normally speaking, no one in the mortal world should have been able to kill him. However, Yang Qi has a fragment of the God Legion Seal, which can destroy anything and create anything. Not even King Immortal-Slayer could fight something like that. And so, the Crown Prince died. However, a centipede does not stop wriggling even after being stomped on, and the sealing mark he left in the medallion still struggles on. However, given enough time, I’ll refine and absorb it.”

“You can enter and exit the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart freely now, correct?” Chancellor Demi-Immortal said. “Now you have access to the treasures there, as well as its core power. With all of that, you should be able to kill immortals. I’ll be getting my share as well, won’t I?”

“Of course. There’s plenty of treasure to be had in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Although, while it’s true I can enter and exit at will, it still takes an incredible amount of power, enough that it could cause my cultivation base to regress. I need to spend some time working on my cultivation before I try to do that. In fact, maybe we could even work with Yang Qi to get inside.”

“What?” Chancellor Demi-Immortal said, visibly taken aback. “You want to work with him? Isn’t that asking a tiger for its skin?”

“Not in this case,” the young man replied. “His Elder Brothers and Sisters from the Invincible Society are still stuck there. Unless he wants to wait ten thousand years, he’ll need to find another way to get back inside. So we take advantage of the situation. Once we get inside, I can turn the power of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart against him, kill him, and take the God Legion Seal.”

Chapter 481: Secret Meeting

As Yang Qi went about turning Planet Sage Monarch into the Sage Monarch planetary system, a high-level meeting was being held in the depths of the Titan Emperor Collegium.

It was being held on an ancient plane of existence formed by ancient stones of power. People with sharp eyes would be able to tell that the power which had formed this plane was the very same power that initiated the creation of the universe. This was the highest-level plane within the Titan Emperor Collegium, known as the Plane of Initiation. It was set aside for the old-timers of the collegium to use for cultivation purposes—a place to communicate with heaven and earth, and build up power.

There was only a thin barrier separating the Plane of Initiation with the immortal world above. Of course, even though the barrier was small, it didn't change the fact that the difference between the two locations was like the difference between heaven and earth.

In the middle of the Plane of Initiation were dozens of thrones, upon which sat the oldest members of the collegium, the people who had actually founded it. Technically speaking, they didn’t have any position of authority in the collegium. They were not rectors, or even vice-rectors. Collectively, they were called the Initiators. And even though they didn't hold official rank, they were the most powerful people in the collegium, and were its true leaders.

There were dozens of initiators, and yet, few people even knew of their existence. For example, not even universal royal students had heard mention of them.

Seated in a position of authority among the initiators was a man wearing a crown and a long robe, along with a mask that had no facial features whatsoever. That man was the supreme rector, and he was currently discussing recent events with the initiators.

“Ladies and gentlemen, what is your stance on this student, Yang Qi?” he asked. “He is incredibly strong, and has a lot of potential; as a mere Lesser Demi-Immortal, he was able to dominate ninth order Paragon Demi-Immortals in battle. Not even the Titan Emperor Heaven has geniuses like that.”

“He’s a miracle, that's for sure,” said one of the initiators. “He has the aura of a high-level godly-class energy art. In fact, I suspect that he might have received the personal legacy of some ancient god. Based on that song he sang, and the primeval god skills he used, I would say he has an energy art the likes of which doesn't exist even in the Titan Emperor Heaven. Godly-class energy arts are divided into lesser, common, greater, consummate, perfect, paramount, and lordly. Even in the Titan Emperor Heaven, they wouldn’t have anything higher than common godly arts. But my guess is that, at the minimum, Yang Qi has a consummate godly-class energy art. That's nothing to take lightly. Whatever force backs him, it surpasses our capacity to scheme against.”

“Exactly. We’re talking about the power of the legion of gods, which surpasses even immortals. We’d do best to not stick our noses where they don’t belong. That said, my fate does not conform to the will of heaven, nor that of the gods. Besides, there’s nothing saying we can’t get Yang Qi under control. If we could acquire the mental dharma and cultivation technique of a consummate godly-class energy art…. Well, if we were equipped in such a fashion, then by the time we ascended to the Titan Emperor Heaven, we would have positions of power just waiting for us.”

“You're right. It's because we don't have a godly-class energy art that the Invincible Dugu has always been so unstoppable. With his Prodigious Proto-Epoch, Invincible War-Steppe, he’s essentially a one man army. But if we could get a godly-class energy art, or even part of one, we would be viewed completely differently by the immortal world above.”

“There’s some truth to that. However, how could we possibly convince Yang Qi to hand over any of that energy art? The Invincible Dugu is protecting him. Besides, he's obviously a consummate fiend. You know the saying: better to be a broken piece of jade than an intact clay tile. If we don’t do something now, then by the time we're all in the immortal world, none of us would be a match for him.”

“He's a double-edged sword. Use him well and he could kill our enemies for us. But use him the wrong way and we’ll end up the victims. The Hall of Beheadings and Executions is the perfect example. Look at how much face they lost.”

“He's definitely a double-edged sword, and one that won’t be easy to wield by any stretch of the imagination. The slightest mistake and we’ll be seriously hurt. I’d say that as long as the Invincible Dugu still hasn’t ascended, there’s no way we’ll get that godly-class energy art from Yang Qi.”

At this point, the supreme rector said, “Yes, but the Invincible Dugu will be ascending soon. In fact, he might have already ascended. When he stepped in to help Yang Qi, he released the power of a Demolisher. Doesn’t that imply that he’s already in the Demolishing level? That would make him stronger than all of us put together. Logically speaking, he won't stay here for very much longer. Although, I wouldn’t be surprised if he had some ability that allowed him to escape the notice of the immortal world and stick around to groom Yang Qi. If we want Yang Qi’s godly-class energy art, we need to find out for sure where the Invincible Dugu is. If he hasn’t ascended yet, and we try to push Yang Qi, we could create a major enemy. We might even end up falling victim to other collegiums.”

A moment passed, then another of the initiators said, “I agree. This matter is too important, and we can’t exert too much pressure. If we do that, and make ourselves his enemy, we’ll end up in a position we’ll never recover from. It would be better to get on his good side. Besides, he could revitalize our entire collegium! He would even be important to the immortal world above.”

“Yes, he’s too valuable. Unfortunately, he’s going to be difficult to control. That’s his biggest downside. In fact, I’d say getting on his good side won't work. Considering how troublesome it would be to try to win him over with force, might it not be a good idea for the supreme rector to talk the matter over with the Invincible Dugu?”

“That goes without saying. Unfortunately, not even I know where he’s in seclusion, otherwise I would have already contacted him. Perhaps it would be best to reach out to the immortal world and see if he’s ascended.”

“Do we really want to report this to the heaven above? If we tell them that someone like Yang Qi has appeared in the Titan Emperor Collegium, they would definitely take action. I wouldn’t be surprised if they banished an immortal down to do something about it.”

“We can’t let that happen!”

“We definitely can't let the immortal world find out. We deserve our fair share of good fortune as well, after all.”

“Absolutely right. Unfortunately, it seems likely that people from the Hall of Beheadings and Executions will report the matter.”

“Then stop them! Who the hell do they think they are, trying to bypass us and report things to the heaven above? This matter must be kept a secret. Otherwise, we’ll be stuck between a rock and a hard place.”

“I think our decision is made. For now, don’t do anything to Yang Qi. We’ll wait to see if we can get a response from the Invincible Dugu. In the meantime, keep a close eye on him. Also, we should send someone to the Sage Monarch planetary system to talk with him. And offer some gifts to the Hanging Mountain as a show of support for his mother there. Pretty soon, Yang Qi will go to the Immortal Army Battlefield, which will be an opportunity for us to observe him closely, and also benefit from his service to the collegium.”

At this point, the supreme rector made the final decision.

“Very well. We’ll try to get on his good side at first, and will only make a move later if it becomes necessary. Until then, we’ll do our best to make sure he doesn’t achieve any cultivation base breakthroughs. If he does as the Invincible Dugu suggests, and reaches the point of being able to summon Universal Demi-Immortal fiend-devils, he’ll be impossible to keep in check. At that point, our only option would be for an immortal to descend to the mortal world to handle things.”

With that, they went on to discuss the matter further.

**

Yang Qi was still going about his work in the Sage Monarch planetary system. The lands grew larger, and more devil planets were popping into being. At this point, he had over a million satellites of various sizes, organized into a massive Undying Devil Formation.

Within the middle of the formation was a devil embryo—a growing undying devil soul. Yang Qi was using the fire of the Hellfire Crucible to slowly refine it, transforming it into an undying god soul.

Eventually, it would be so strong that not even a Paragon Demi-Immortal would be able to forcibly enter the planetary system.

Most importantly was the fact that it came with a function called Void Teleportation. If there was a major assault on the planetary system, it could be used to rapidly shrink the border regions and take the entire place into the Hell of Mahānata.

Right now, his cultivation base couldn’t sustain such a maneuver. But as he built up accumulations of power, it would eventually be possible. At the moment, it seemed likely that it would take several years of refining the undying devil soul before the teleportation became possible.

By that time, he was fairly certain that his cultivation base would be in the Greater Demi-Immortal level. Meanwhile, the mother godworm was voraciously consuming the violet energy from the Tusita Heaven, causing it to grow and, simultaneously, produce more and more Blood of the One God. Already, that godworm was at the peak of the seventh stage.

If the mother godworm succeeded in achieving a breakthrough and became a Universal Demi-Immortal, it would unlock more genetic memories. That would also help Yang Qi’s cultivation, putting the third and fourth order within the realm of possibility.

“Father. Brothers and Sisters. Come!”

RUMBLE!

Summoning his family and friends, he waved his hand and sent enormous eggs out to all of them.

They were primeval godworm eggs, items considered valuable and precious even in the immortal worlds. With those eggs, his friends and family would be able to gain command of the godly laws of space, which would push their energy arts to a much higher level.

Making his friends and family stronger was simply investing in the future.

Chapter 482: Negotiation

Yang Qi had acquired one hundred and thirty-eight godworm eggs from the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, and now he was passing out dozens of them to his friends and family to help them with their energy arts.

Fusing with godworms provided immense help with the godly laws of space. When such laws bolstered certain energy arts, they could strengthen them by a minimum of tenfold, and sometimes even a hundredfold. And as the godworms grew, they would provide important genetic memories.

Normally speaking, Great Sages, and even Demi-Immortals, sought enlightenment of the mere magical laws of space.

But the genes of godworms contained information about godly laws.

Magical laws and godly laws were fundamentally different. The latter were created by the legion of gods, whereas the former were simply rules that governed the operation of the universe. Considering that the legion of gods could create one universe after another, it was only natural that their laws surpassed magical laws.

Even more relevant to the situation was that godworms would hatch at the Demi-Immortal level. In other words, if his friends and family raised the eggs to the point of hatching, they would gain what was essentially a Demi-Immortal clone. That was nothing to look down on, and would ensure that their rise to the Demi-Immortal level went much more smoothly.

By this point, the Sage Monarch planetary system had completely surpassed the Hanging Mountain, and it was no exaggeration to say that it was the strongest force in all of the Yore-Wilds planetary system. In fact, even taking all of the Four Wilds into consideration, there was nothing that could equal it, besides the Titan Emperor Collegium.

The strongest person in the Hanging Mountain was Yang Qi’s mother, who was a sixth order Prime Demi-Immortal. The August Patriarch was only a Tyrant Demi-Immortal, and although no one knew how strong Chief Snake was, he was definitely not a Revered Demi-Immortal.

Right now, Yang Qi could effortlessly summon seventh order Revered Demi-Immortal fiend-devils, thus, if he joined forces with his mother, they could dominate the entire Hanging Mountain.

‘I need to find time to go visit mother and give her a godworm egg. When the time is right, I can wipe out the Mammothfolk and use their blood to advance the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. I can destroy elder kings in the Titan Emperor Collegium, so what does the Hanging Mountain count for? Nothing. In fact, I’ll absorb it into the Sage Monarch planetary system. Eventually, I’ll unite all of the Yore-Wilds under the banner of the Yang Clan.’

Yang Qi was already forming a master plan.

Bam. Bam. Bam. Bam. Bam. Bam! Bam!! BAM!!!

Rumbling sounds erupted from Yang Zhan, Yang Yunchong, Yang Hualong, and others as Yang Qi helped them to fuse with the godworm eggs and use their animadestiny true flame to unlock the power within them. Their cultivation bases rose and genetic memories flooded into their minds, instantly making it possible for them to create space-time wormholes.

Yang Qi was pleased with the progress they were making, and finally felt he could rest at ease regarding the Sage Monarch planetary system. It now had tens upon tens of thousands of satellite planets formed from Greater Demi-Immortal fiend-devils, and the system as a whole had an undying devil soul that was already being converted into an undying god soul. No ordinary force would be able to break into the planetary system, not even an invasion like the recent one from the Megaplexus planetary system.

RUUUUUUMBLE!

Just as he was preparing to complete his work, he sensed an eruption of power from some distance away, which pierced into the center of the Sage Monarch planetary system. Although no one else detected it, Yang Qi did, and he reacted by drawing on the full power of the entire planetary system. He quickly bolstered the satellite planets with the Eternal Heavenly Aria, which sent the projection of the god soul out.

Instantly, an enormous hand appeared which destroyed a certain portion of space, revealing an old man. His black robes were embroidered with gold thread that depicted majestic creatures such as dragons, phoenixes, and qilins. Just from the way he carried himself, he was obviously an important person.

“Who goes there?” Yang Qi said, rising to his feet along with Sword Seventeen. “Who dares to invade the Sage Monarch planetary system? What plot is this, trespasser? If you don’t explain yourself immediately, don’t blame me for being rude.”

Both Yang Qi and Sword Seventeen assumed that this was some hostile invader, thus they were already bracing themselves for a fight. Both of them could sense that this old man had a profound cultivation base that surpassed the vice-rectors of the Titan Emperor Collegium. In other words, he was probably half a step into the Demolishing level.

“What gall you have, Yang Qi! I'm an initiator of the Titan Emperor Collegium, with equal ranking to the supreme rector. How dare you use a spell formation to block my path! What’s the meaning of this?” Although the old man didn’t show it, he was actually surprised that the power of the undying god soul could keep him at bay.

“What? Initiator?” Sword Seventeen said with visible shock. “You’re an initiator?”

“What’s an initiator?” Yang Qi asked quietly.

Keeping his voice down, Sword Seventeen replied, “They’re the original founders of the Titan Emperor Collegium, and have immensely powerful cultivation bases. They reside on the Plane of Initiation, and normally speaking, not even royal students are aware of their existence. However, Master told me about them. They rank so high that even the supreme rector kowtows to them. They’re the true patriarchs of the collegium.”

Yang Qi snorted coldly. “He thinks I’m going to kowtow? As the society chief of the Invincible Society, I rank just as high as these so-called initiators. What, am I supposed to be afraid of them or something?” Raising his voice, he said. “Listen up, initiator. What are you doing trying to sneak into my Sage Monarch planetary system? My Master the Invincible Dugu already talked things out with you, didn’t he? Are you really going to keep pushing the matter? Are you really trying to make me an enemy of the Titan Emperor Collegium?”

“You, a mere student, dare to be so impolite?” This initiator had originally come to befriend, and even recruit, Yang Qi. But now he realized how ambitious and ruthless Yang Qi was, and saw that it would be no easy task to recruit him. It seemed that getting Yang Qi’s godly-class energy art would be much more difficult than they had imagined.

“I'm not a student anymore,” Yang Qi said, producing the command medallion of the Invincible Society.

“What? The Invincible Dugu gave you his command medallion? You’re the society chief of the Invincible Society?” The initiator was shocked at first, but after a moment, he chuckled. “Oh, I understand. The Invincible Dugu ascended, didn’t he? Otherwise, why would he do something like that?”

Instead of outright answering the question, Yang Qi provided a cryptic response. “Master said that if he ascended, you people would try to take my godly-class energy art, my godworm eggs, and all my other treasure. As it turns out, his predictions were spot on.”

“What?” Moments ago, the thought of the Invincible Dugu having ascended caused the initiator to breathe a sigh of relief, and had led him to believe that it would be much easier to deal with Yang Qi. But then Yang Qi plainly stated exactly what the initiator had secretly planned to do. Struck with sudden dread, the initiator surreptitiously looked around to see whether or not the Invincible Dugu was lurking somewhere nearby.

A moment passed, and he said, “You’re wrong. I came here to offer you a reward, and hopefully get on your good side. I have no plans to take anything from you. You see, we initiators are all on the verge of breaking into the dao of immortals and reaching immortal ascension. Why would we need to take anything from you? No, we want to give you things. We initiators had a meeting and came to the decision together. Originally, we intended to give you the rank of vice-rector. However, considering that you're already the society chief of the Invincible Society, I guess that's not necessary.

“This is a bottle gourd full of Supreme Unity Complete Golden Immortal Pills. Back during the God-Devil Apocalypse, the Titan Emperor Collegium took the lead in fighting the Hell of Euphoria, and these pills were part of the reward given to us by the immortal world above. They can aid in breakthroughs and bolster your nascent divinity. We’re also going to issue a proclamation giving your mother complete rulership over the Hanging Mountain. As for August Patriarch Mammoth Heaven, he’ll leave to become a disciple of the Beastmaster Society. What do you say?”

‘Ah, that’s too bad….’ Yang Qi thought. He had hoped to wipe out the Mammothfolk, and thus remove one of his major enemies from the picture.

Reaching out, he took the golden bottle gourd from the initiator. It was roughly the size of a person, and, in fact, was a minor world of its own. Peering inside with true energy, Yang Qi saw stacks of golden pills that resembled embryonic children. They glittered with dazzling light and immense power, obviously the handiwork of immortals.

These were items which would be considered extremely rare in the mortal world, similar to godworm eggs.

“Now that you've been given this reward, Yang Qi, what do you have to say for yourself?” Even as the words left his mouth, the initiator was contemplating the next phase of his plan.

“There’s no need for the double-talk, initiator.” Yang Qi placed the bottle gourd into his own minor world. “My Master told me all about your plan. You want to get on my good side, then figure out a way to control me. You want to prevent me from improving my cultivation base. That way you can wait until my Master ascends, then force me to reveal the secrets of my godly-class energy art. As I'm sure you people know, my art is far beyond the lesser godly-class level. You hope that it will be the key to your own breakthrough and ascension, and that it will give you a high position in the immortal world. Right now, we're all in the mortal world, and nothing we do here can be considered relevant. Only the numerous immortal worlds above matter. Without ascending, and without becoming a Demolisher, we can all be considered wimpy schoolchildren.”

Yang Qi’s biting words caused the initiator’s face to drain of blood. However, the real reason for that was that he was worried about the Invincible Dugu, who apparently knew all about their plans and had instructed Yang Qi on how to deal with them.

Before, he had been convinced that the Invincible Dugu had ascended, but now he was sure of the opposite.

“Where exactly is your Master?” he asked, frowning. “I know you’re out there, Invincible Dugu! Show your face!”

Chapter 483: Duped

The initiator was convinced that the Invincible Dugu was somewhere in the area. However, calling out to him didn’t provoke any response.

“Don’t worry, my Master isn’t right here,” Yang Qi said. “But he’s aware of every move and action you initiators make.” Yang Qi chuckled inwardly, aware that he had this initiator completely duped.

It was now obvious that a whole group of initiators were plotting against him. Considering that he knew exactly what they were after, he decided that instead of feigning politeness and compliance, he would just challenge them outright. Unfortunately, he could only take on one of them in a fight, not all of them. Therefore, his best bet was to sow division amongst them, a method he had used on other occasions in the Titan Emperor Collegium.

The initiator remained silent for a long moment, then said, “I underestimated you, boy. However, that conspiracy theory of yours is all wrong. As a student here, you’re required to provide contributions to the collegium.”

“Whether or not I provide contributions depends on my mood. As you well know, I’ve never collected a single resource from the collegium. Look, I know that not all the initiators want to get my godly-class energy art. After all, if I ascend, it's entirely likely that I’ll leave my energy art behind as a reward for people loyal to me.” Not allowing the initiator to respond, he shifted the conversation topic. “It’s also possible that I’ll leave behind some primeval god skills.”

“Are you serious?” the initiator said. His eyes glittered for a moment, before going flat. “Well, we’ll all ascend long before you do.”

“What does that have to do with anything?” Yang Qi said. “When I was in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, I got my hands on well over a hundred primeval godworm eggs. I've used some since, but I still have over a hundred. How many of you initiators are there? A few dozen? It would be a simple thing for me to just give all of you an egg.”

“What? You got over a hundred?” The initiator’s eyes flashed with avarice, yet he couldn’t help but look around suspiciously. He was still convinced that the Invincible Dugu was around somewhere, therefore he suppressed any errant thoughts.

Considering his status, and the potential threat of Yang Qi’s Master, he said, “If you give one to each of us, that would count as an incredible act of virtue. In fact, you would be appointed to succeed the supreme rector after he ascends to the immortal world. Including me, there are sixty-four initiators, so please prepare sixty-four eggs.” With that, the initiator held out his hand expectantly.

In response, Yang Qi snorted coldly. “My Master pointed out that there were some very stubborn initiators who still have it out for me. In fact, after you use me to kill enemy students in the Immortal Army Battlefield, they’ll cause even further trouble, even going so far as to rob me. I definitely won’t be giving godworm eggs to anyone like that.”

“No such people exist!” the initiator said, a surprised look on his face. “Look, we just had a big meeting, and everyone agreed. We want to get on your good side! You're obviously a genius, so why would the collegium just abandon you for no reason?”

“If that’s the case,” Yang Qi said casually, “then I’ll just follow my Master’s instructions. I’ll wait until I become a Greater Demi-Immortal, or even reach the Profound Demi-Immortal level. At that point I’ll be able to summon Universal Demi-Immortal fiend-devils, and will feel comfortable giving you the godworm eggs. Besides, considering that my master will be ascending soon, I need to take advantage of his protection to further my cultivation as quickly as possible. Think about it. My Master already passed the Invincible Society on to me. He obviously knows that once he ascends, people could cause problems for me. Do you think he would really just leave me unprepared and vulnerable?

“Very well, oh exalted initiator, please see yourself out. Go explain to the supreme rector and the other initiators that I have no plans to betray the Titan Emperor Collegium. However, if you try to force my hand, or conspire against me, then that will make the two of us enemies. And in that case, some very bad things are going to happen.”

“You want something from us, don’t you?” the initiator said. “What is it?”

“Simple,” Yang Qi replied. “My Eldest Brother and Elder Second Brother are currently in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. I want you to arrange to have them freed.”

“How could we possibly do that!?” the initiator replied furiously. “We’re all mortals, and the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart is an impossible nut to crack for anyone but immortals.”

“There’s someone who can get in out of the monarch chart at will.”

“Who?” The initiator couldn’t help but be curious about this sudden shift in conversation. If there was someone who could freely enter and exit the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, he would be just as valuable as Yang Qi, if not more.

“The person who spread rumors about me having godworm eggs. You see, I gained a rival in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, someone who knows everything about me, including the fact that I acquired the godworm eggs. He also has two of King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy medallions. Without him spreading the news, there’s no way you, or anyone else, could know about the godworm eggs.”

The initiator looked at Yang Qi through narrowed eyes, but after a moment, came to the conclusion that this was really some new information. After all, the initiators hadn’t looked into the source of the rumors, although now it seemed as if they should.

“Who is this person?”

“Take a look.” Yang Qi waved his hand, causing a mist to swirl out in front of him, within which was an image of the yellow-garbed young man with the buzz cut. He was even holding King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy medallion. “This is him. I suspect that he joined the Titan Emperor Collegium already. Either that, or he's searching the Yore-Wilds planetary system for his third legacy medallion. If he gets it….”

“Wait, you mean you didn’t take the Crown Prince's legacy medallion?”

“No, I didn’t. Incidentally, who exactly was the Crown Prince? Which heaven did he come from?”

“He came from the Crapemyrtle Heaven, but as for his original identity, none of us are sure. When he descended, we received strict instructions from the immortal worlds not to look into him. In fact, we were supposed to act as though we weren’t aware of his existence. Nobody could possibly have guessed that you would kill him.”

Looking back at the young man in yellow, Yang Qi said, “If this young man is in the Titan Emperor Collegium, he’ll definitely have assumed a disguise. You need to look into the matter. Think about what it would mean if we could freely enter and exit the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Would my godly-class energy art matter very much then? After all, in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, godly-class energy arts abound. And do you know how many primeval godworm eggs there are to be had?”

Yang Qi knew that he had successfully managed to divert this initiator’s attention.

“Freely enter and exit the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart…?” All of a sudden, new plots and schemes began taking root in the initiator’s heart. “Have you told anyone else about this?”

“Of course not. You think I would just go around telling people a secret this important?” Yang Qi could see that this initiator wanted to keep the information, and the rewards, to himself. “Obviously, I want to track down that yellow-garbed young man with the buzz cut, take his legacy medallions, and get into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.”

The initiator nodded. “This is an important matter, Yang Qi. You absolutely, positively must not tell anyone about it. I'm going to head back and discuss the matter with the other initiators. Whatever you do, don’t inadvertently alert that young man to the fact that we're on to him. I want to capture him and force him to reveal the secrets of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. With that information, our collegium would immediately surpass the Megaplexus Collegium in terms of power, and the Coiling Arc Collegium as well. We would become the number one force in the mortal world. We’d be invincible! There’s no time to lose. I’ll leave immediately!”

“Forgive me for not escorting you off,” Yang Qi said, watching him leave, a slight smile on his face. Everything had gone according to plan. For the time being, the initiators’ interest in the young man in yellow would alleviate a lot of pressure.

“You handled things perfectly, Junior Brother,” Sword Seventeen said, clicking his tongue in admiration. “Three birds with one stone! First, you diverted the attention of the initiators. Second, you struck a blow against that buzz-cut kid in yellow. And third, you made significant headway in saving Eldest Brother, Elder Second Brother, and the others.”

“That’s right,” Yang Qi said. “Those initiators harbor evil intentions and we can’t take them lightly. Hopefully I've bought enough time to achieve another breakthrough. My mother godworm is about to reach the Universal Demi-Immortal level. When that happens, I’ll break through to the Greater Demi-Immortal level and be able to summon even more powerful fiend-devils.”

“Those initiators are definitely up to no good. What’s your plan for them in the long run?”

“Kill them! Nothing more, nothing less. You see, I’m not just going to take over the old Yore-Wilds. I’ll absorb the Proto-Wilds, Waste-Wilds, and Brute-Wilds as well. And I'm going to take the Central Planetary River and the Titan Emperor Collegium too.”

At this point, his eyes flickered with killing intent. “Elder Brother, could I trouble you to stay here and keep watch over the Sage Monarch planetary system? I need to head to the Hanging Mountain and talk to my mother. Once she has a godworm of her own, she’ll be able to reach an even higher level of enlightenment.”

Sword Seventeen nodded. “Of course! No problem. Hurry up and get to it!”

Swish!

Yang Qi took a step forward and vanished into the boundless starry sky.

Before long, he was closing in on the Hanging Mountain. The first thing he noticed was that the golden Mount Sumeru was no longer as majestic as it had once been. For one thing, the areas formerly occupied by the Demonfolk were almost completely empty.

There weren’t even any Mammothfolk present.

It had once been a prosperous and flourishing place, but now it looked bleak and desolate.

Apparently, the Mammothfolk had left to join the Titan Emperor Collegium.

Chapter 484: The Beastmaster Society

As Yang Qi looked at Mount Sumeru, the former dwelling place of August Patriarch Mammoth Heaven, a voice reached his ears.

“Young Master, I've been waiting here for you for some time.”

Looking up to the palace at the peak of the mountain, he saw Yan Wubing.

“Yan Wubing, you’ve reached the Demi-Immortal level!” Yang Qi said. “Congratulations!”

Yan Wubing bowed at the waist. “Compared to you, Young Master, I'm like nothing. News has already spread of your deeds in the Titan Emperor Collegium. An edict came down appointing the Holy Mother as the leader of the Hanging Mountain, and the August Patriarch was summoned to the collegium to be a student. Apparently he’s not fit to lead the Demonfolk anymore. Young Master, you’re virtually invincible in the Titan Emperor Collegium! You slaughtered elder kings and nearly destroyed the Hall of Beheadings and Executions. Everyone was shocked by the stories. In fact, many of the societies brought gifts to the Hanging Mountain because of you.”

“I heard about that,” Yang Qi said. “In any case, there’s no reason to think too much of it. Besides, the tallest tree attracts the most wind. The Yore-Wilds planetary system is still in ruins, and the Megaplexus planetary system could invade in full force at any time. If they do, we need to take the lead in the defense. By the way, it seems to me that they must have taken Mammoth Heaven away to protect him. Which society did he join?”

“Very astute, Young Master,” Yan Wubing said. “Although August Patriarch Mammoth Heaven lost his position of authority, he's actually stronger than ever. And now he’s even more of a threat to the Holy Mother. He’s benefited from his setback, and we’ve been set back because of his benefit. He’s in the Beastmaster Society and, from what I’ve heard, already has a high standing there.”

“The Beastmaster Society?” After a moment of thought, Yang Qi recalled that their society chief was a mysterious individual who had a big collection of imperial snakecharms. “So, he joined them.” He chuckled coldly. “Obviously, they’re trying to make things difficult for me. In that case, I don’t see why they need to exist any longer.”

“Young Master, please, don’t do anything rash,” Yan Wubing said. “The Holy Mother is trying to achieve her breakthrough, although she hasn’t succeeded so far. Why not wait until she’s out of seclusion?”

“What level is mother currently at?”

“After slaughtering those people from the Northstar Clan, she gained enlightenment of the Revered Demi-Immortal level. Afterward, she went into the Hell of Gloom and Darkness to try to unlock more secrets of the Jade-Emperor Profound-Welkin Exalted-Celestial God-Dao. At the moment, she’s still trying to reach the Universal Demi-Immortal level.

“She left orders that if you came here to the Hanging Mountain, I was to take you to see her in her secluded meditation facilities in the Hell of Gloom and Darkness.”

Yang Qi nodded. “Alright, lead the way. You know, I have a knack when it comes to hell. Mother really should have reached out to me. I could have altered that hell and subdued the fiend-devils for her.”

Yan Wubing waved his hand to open up a wormhole leading into the depths of darkness. As they entered, devil energy swirled and space-time rotated madly. Faces drifted here and there, devil-spirits that even Yan Wubing needed to be careful about touching.

Of course, Yang Qi wasn’t worried about them at all. Since he could enter the Hell of Mahānata, going to the Hell of Gloom and Darkness wasn’t anything to fear.

Yang Qi casually waved his hand and dazzling, holy light spread out into the wormhole. Instantly, the devil-spirits dropped to their knees in trembling supplication. Even the devil-gods that were lurking in the shadows kowtowed, as if they were facing the bane of their existence.

“Young Master, this is an ancient, secret passageway that the Holy Mother discovered some time back, a treasure trove left behind by of a certain god-spirit. It’s the godrelic that enabled the Holy Mother to achieve such spectacular cultivation speeds. Unfortunately, she lacks control of the lineament she discovered, which was why she wanted you to come see her. Perhaps you could gain further understanding of the godrelic, and achieve even further advancement in your cultivation.”

“Wonderful,” Yang Qi said. Looking around, he saw the endless mists within the darkness and could tell that this was a hell that focused on destruction. The devil energy itself was rife with a sense of ruination that significantly differed from the Hell of Mahānata.

The only inhabitants of the Hell of Gloom and Darkness were the destruction devil-gods.

That was another difference with the Hell of Mahānata, which was inhabited by all sorts of entities. Although the Hell of Gloom and Darkness couldn’t measure up to the Hell of Mahānata, it was higher than the Hell of Euphoria and was a place unsuitable for humans. Its devil energy was a high-level universal power, and was perfect for the cultivation practices of fiend-devils. In fact, it would increase fiend-devils’ battle prowess until they went mad.

As the passageway led through the hell’s greyspace, Yang Qi realized that he could sense the aura of the legion of gods. Apparently, it really was a god-spirit that had opened this passageway.

Normally speaking, hells were powerful enough that if their greyspace was pierced, the damage would quickly be repaired. Ordinary individuals couldn’t create permanent passageways into them, not even immortals. That was the realm of god-spirits alone.

This tunnel itself was truly an ancient godrelic.

Eventually, Yang Qi and Yan Wubing reached the end of the passage and entered the Hell of Gloom and Darkness. The power of destruction was formidable, and the devil-ghosts around them screamed with fury at the sight of them. However, the light of the God Legion Paradise caused them to immediately scatter.

Yan Wubing wiped the sweat off his brow. “Every time I come here I have to exercise the utmost caution. Without the god-spirit’s passageway, even a Demi-Immortal who came here would be ripped to shreds by the fiend-devils.”

“This is nothing,” Yang Qi said. “You should see what it's like in the Hell of Mahānata. In any case, don't worry. I'm strong enough now that, unless we ran into a Demolisher fiend-devil, we shouldn’t have any problems. I can even destroy Paragon Demi-Immortal fiend-devils.”

As Yang Qi looked around, he realized that he could probably open a passageway to the Hell of Gloom and Darkness just as he could to the Hell of Mahānata.

ROAR!

All of a sudden, a rift opened up and devil energy surged toward them. An enormous devil-god hand slammed into the God Legion Paradise. It was fully five hundred kilometers from end to end, scaled, and covered with countless devil-eyes that would strike fear into the hearts of any person who saw it.

This was obviously a destruction devil-god who possessed royal blood.

The instant Yang Qi caught sight of it, he struck out with his hand.

RUUUUUUMBLE!

A huge shock wave rolled out, casting the area into primal-chaos. Then, space-time shrank down into the form of a crystal, within which was a tiny destruction devil-god upon whose forehead was the character ‘royal’.

“It’s a royal fiend-devil!” Yan Wubing said. “Nobility among the destruction devil-gods!”

“A fifth order fiend-devil? I've killed enough Infernalfolk that this fiend-devil is like nothing. Might as well just kill it.” Closing his fingers around the crystal, he crushed it, and the fiend-devil, out of existence.

At the same time, the black smoke in the area dissipated, revealing a shining path in front of them that led off into the distance.

Yang Qi sent his divine will ahead of him and saw that the destructive essence of the Hell of Gloom and Darkness wasn’t present. Reaching out, he plucked a sliver of jade out of the air. It was the source of whatever power had carved this path through the Hell of Gloom and Darkness.

‘It really is the power of an ancient god-spirit.’ He crushed the sliver of jade, which dissipated without a sound into the space around him.

As he proceeded forward, he saw more such jade slivers, floating here and there. There were no fiend-devils whatsoever, almost as though the jade itself exerted a power of expulsion.

However, when Yang Qi drew on the power of the Blood of the One God, that force didn’t affect him at all. As for Yan Wubing, he could use what he knew of the Jade-Emperor Profound-Welkin Exalted-Celestial God-Dao to proceed along.

At the edges of the jade power, fiend-devils were helplessly lurking.

Yan Wubing looked at them and frowned. “I'm not sure why, Young Master, but lately the fiend-devils have been gathering at the edges of the godrelic. There are even greater fiend-devils. The Holy Mother isn’t sure why, either. She suggested that there might be some forthcoming transformation to the godrelic. Her dao comes from this location, and if something goes wrong her cultivation advancement could suffer.”

“I’ll see what I can do. That’s mother just up ahead on the altar, right?” Further ahead within the jade was an altar hanging in space, almost like a sphere. It looked something like a jade sun.

Sure enough, the Holy Mother was seated cross-legged atop that sphere, meditating.

Yang Qi could sense that she was indeed a Revered Demi-Immortal, and was currently trying to break into the Universal Demi-Immortal level. She was incredibly strong, perhaps as strong as he was.

Apparently, her rapid progress in cultivation was thanks to this world of jade she had discovered, which was none other than an ancient godrelic.

The jade sphere she sat on emitted a constant stream of true energy which contained the script of the Jade-Emperor Profound-Welkin Exalted-Celestial God-Dao.

Unfortunately, it was incomplete.

“You came, Qi’er!” the Holy Mother said, opening her eyes. “You’ve certainly made your mark on the Titan Emperor Collegium. I heard about how you killed that elder king.”

Chapter 485: The Godrelic

“Greetings, Mother,” Yang Qi said with a slight smile. “No, that little show of mine isn’t worth mentioning. In fact, I'm worried it could cause problems for us.” He knew that his actions in the Titan Emperor Collegium had been so dramatic that the news was likely even spreading to other planetary systems.

“We should be fine,” the Holy Mother said. “However, you need to be wary of the society chief of the Beastmaster Society. He has the chief of the Snakefolk on his side, and also August Patriarch Mammoth Heaven. We also learned that the hallmaster of the Hall of Beheadings and Executions is going to be coming out of seclusion soon, and he obviously won’t be happy with you.

“Unfortunately, there’s no way I can handle such a force of enemies for you, my son. That’s one reason why I sent Yan Wubing to fetch you here to this godrelic. If you can help unlock its secrets, then not only would I be able to achieve another breakthrough, but you also might get more enlightenment regarding the quintessence of the legion of gods. And that could help you reach a higher level of enlightenment.”

“Don’t worry, Mother, I should be able to help.” Looking around at the world of jade, including the jade sphere and the streams of true energy, he said, “Do you have any idea which god-spirit left behind this godrelic?”

Even the mere exhalation of a god-spirit could create a world, thus, this godrelic was definitely home to profound and enigmatic secrets.

“A god associated with jade,” the Holy Mother replied. “I've spent years seeking enlightenment atop this enormous jade sphere, which is the core of this world. But it contains the will of that ancient god-spirit, and whenever I attempt to send my own will inside, I'm rebuffed. Nothing I try works. Worse, the Hell of Gloom and Darkness has been stirring recently, causing fluctuations to fill the jade sphere and the world of jade. I have the feeling that, before long, the jade essence will be destroyed. Before that happens, I have to get the full legacy of that ancient god-spirit.”

“I’ll handle it. I suspect that the essence of the Hell of Gloom and Darkness has changed, creating friction with the godrelic.” He thought for a moment about everything he knew about hell. “You know, Mother, this might be an opportunity in disguise. We can probably use the friction to give you full control of the godrelic! And if that happened, you’d probably achieve an immediate breakthrough.”

“Good idea,” the Holy Mother said. After a bit of thought, she continued, “The godrelic contains immense amounts of power, power that surpasses immortals. Not even an immortal descended into the mortal world should be able to fuse with it. But perhaps the conflict with the essence of the Hell of Gloom and Darkness will give me an opening. And you have a special understanding and control over hell, right Qi’er? You’re essentially the lord of hell, so perhaps you can see what’s going on around us.”

“I’ll give it a try,” Yang Qi said. He sat down and sent his nascent divinity into the altar. As soon as he did, he sensed that the jade wasn’t actual jade, but rather, a high-level expression of power. In fact, it was of such a high level that not even he could absorb or fuse with it.

It was stronger than immortal stones, and was not the type of power that was native to the mortal world.

‘The lord of hell commands the godmammoths and controls the crucibles! Eye of the Sovereign Lord!’

He opened his Lord's Eye and saw the Hell of Gloom and Darkness stretching out in all directions. He saw countless devil planets in the dome above, and vast tracts of land filled with endless fiend-devils. He saw mountains, rivers, lakes, seas, and deserts. There were actually many planes of existence, layers upon layers of them, a labyrinth whose depths contained fiend-devils so powerful they could create worlds.

The soil that made up the Hell of Gloom and Darkness was mysterious and impossible to comprehend. There was simply no way for him to completely take in this hell, not even as a Demi-Immortal.

However, by drawing on the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth he was able to reach out to its essence. And when he did, he realized that the essence was in fact active, and was actually sinking toward a certain location.

‘The Eye of the Sovereign Lord can perceive the boundlessness of the universe!’

To Yang Qi’s shock, he realized that the sinking portion of this hell’s essence was evidence that someone was invading it. Either that, or the hell was fighting entities on a higher plane. In other words, war was being waged somewhere in the Hell of Gloom and Darkness! According to the myths and epic sagas, when hells warred with immortal worlds, it would cause problems for the essences involved.

‘Could it be that this hell is really fighting one of the immortal worlds? Is that war causing a backlash that will result in the godrelic being destroyed?’ He could sense powerful fluctuations emanating from the depths of space, yet no amount of focus could tell him exactly where they were coming from.

His cultivation base was too weak, and he just couldn’t cast his vision far enough to see what he needed to see. Considering that, there wasn’t even a need to mention participating in the conflict.

Yang Qi retracted his gaze. “Mother, I found out what’s going on. The Hell of Gloom and Darkness is at war with one of the immortal worlds—a high-level one at that. The war has changed the fluctuations of this hell's essence, which is causing problems for the godrelic. Considering the resonance that's forming, I'd say the godrelic will shatter soon. After all, it doesn’t represent the full force of the legion of gods, only a tiny sliver of it. And that sliver has wasted away over who knows how many hundreds of millions of years. In any case, it's not going to last for much longer.”

“So that's the situation. A war between a hell and an immortal world is no small matter. No wonder the essence fluctuations are so intense, and there are so many devil-ghosts roving about at the edges of this world of jade. Qi’er, there’s no time to lose. If you wait too long, the Titan Emperor Collegium’s initiators might do something to you. If not them, the other society chiefs will. The Invincible Dugu informed me about the situation before he ascended.”

“Master contacted you?” Yang Qi said, a bit surprised. “It seems to me the news about his ascension won't remain a secret for long. The initiators are definitely already suspicious, and they’ll surely uncover the truth soon. I have to achieve my next breakthrough as quickly as possible. Hell of Gloom and Darkness! Let your essence heed my command!”

Without any hesitation, he sent out some divine will, causing the Hellfire Crucible to appear within the world of jade. It was enormous, fully hundreds of kilometers wide, and it immediately began to gobble up the devil energy from the surrounding hell. At the same time, six Hell Portals appeared.

Fiend-devils immediately began pouring out of the portals, giving rise to powerful essence fluctuations.

RUMBLE. RUUUUMBLE….

The essence of the Hell of Gloom and Darkness had been provoked and immediately began to wrap around the godrelic, which trembled violently. As for the jade sphere in the middle of it all, it began crumbling.

“Blood of the One God!”

A drop of blood flew out of his fingertip, pulsing with a holy will as it entered the jade sphere.

WHIZZZ!

The immense power within the jade sphere belonged to the legion of gods, and was something not even powerful immortals would casually profane. However, Yang Qi’s Blood of the One God contained the most paramount of wills, that of the Sovereign Lord which existed above the legion of gods. Therefore, it provoked a chain reaction as soon as it entered the jade sphere.

A powerful will erupted from the sphere, filling the world of jade and causing it to shake. At the same time, it became possible to see the faint outline of an enormous figure, something large enough that it could stride through the immense planes of the universe with ultimate ease. Yang Qi, the Holy Mother, and even Yan Wubing could clearly see that figure.

“Who carries the glory of the paramount and supreme Sovereign Lord?”

“Who is it that has the Lord’s blood?”

“Who has accepted the sealing mark of the legion of gods?”

“Why is the God Legion Seal fragmented?”

“Who profanes the glory of the legion of gods?”

Numerous voices spoke out from various planes of the universe, all of them converging on Yang Qi’s forehead, expressions of will that sought to shatter his sea of consciousness. Before they could, the God Legion Seal stirred. The golden imp appeared and blocked the incursions, sending golden light out to fill the world of jade.

“The legion of gods perished? The seal was broken? The Lord vanished? After the gods experience nirvanic rebirth, a new epoch will be born? Is it deathless, or eternal? Is it pāramitā, or is it destruction?”

The enormous, projected figure appeared to be conversing with the golden imp.

In the end, Yang Qi somehow managed to guide the God Legion Seal to absorb the will of that enormous figure.

Information poured into his mind, which was when he saw something happening in the depths of the universe. He saw planes that surpassed the host of immortals, an ancient universe of space-time that was pure primal-chaos. In innumerable godly worlds, the gods fell from grace and the glory of the Lord went dark.

‘After the gods experience nirvanic rebirth, a new epoch will be born?’

For some reason, those words seemed to etch themselves in his mind and engrave themselves in his deepest thoughts. He suddenly sensed the profundity of the legion of gods, and felt as though he had touched upon the most profound secret of the universe, something that affected the past, present, and future.

Suddenly, the Holy Mother shot to her feet, her eyes glowing with enlightenment. “The jade sphere is transforming. It’s actually made from the blood of a god-spirit! The image inside is a message! I understand! Be absorbed!”

Reaching out, she drew on the Jade-Emperor Profound-Welkin Exalted-Celestial God-Dao and sent her energy to surround the sphere. Not even an immortal could have drawn out that figure from within the jade sphere. But because it had made contact with the God Legion Seal, it began transforming.

In that moment, the Holy Mother realized that it was definitely not a magical treasure, but rather a drop of blood belonging to a god-spirit. That drop of blood had become a jade sphere and given birth to the surrounding world of jade.

It was impossible to say how it had occurred, but in the heat of battle that god-spirit had sustained a blow which caused a drop of its blood to fall here in the Hell of Gloom and Darkness as a godrelic.

Chapter 486: God Blood

God blood.

The jade sphere was actually a drop of god blood.

The blood of immortals was considered precious and valuable. And the nine demon-immortal mammoth tusks that Yang Qi had acquired had contained immense reserves of power. Therefore, it was difficult to imagine how much power would be contained in a drop of blood like this.

As of this moment, everything clicked for the Holy Mother.

She extended her hand and absorbed the drop of god-spirit blood, which she then began to refine. In fact, all of the spatial jade in the area began flowing into her. As it did, her nascent divinity experienced a massive transformation.

The aura of heavenly tribulation filled the area and tribulation clouds flew in from beyond heaven. Lightning, earth, water, fire, wind, void monsters, heaven-devils, inner devils, and countless other entities assailed her, throwing her vital energy into chaos.

Normally speaking, only immortals could subjugate god blood, which contained the will of the ancient legion of gods. In fact, some weaker immortals who made the attempt would end up perishing.

However, that immense figure who seemed capable of traversing planes of existence seemed to be communicating with the God Legion Seal. As it was pacified, the god blood became mighty power that the Holy Mother could subjugate and take for herself. As a result, she blasted through the barriers that blocked her path to the Universal Demi-Immortal level.

God blood was immensely powerful, and the Holy Mother was only able to access one billionth, or even less, of its full potential. The rest would have to wait until she reached the Demolishing level. Even so, what she already had would be of immense help on her path of cultivation.

And once she did become an immortal, the god blood would make her much more powerful than other average immortals.

Of course, Yang Qi was also benefiting as well. As his God Legion Seal communicated with the mighty will within the god blood, thoughts flooded into his mind. Right now, what he lacked wasn't power in general, but rather, enlightenment. In terms of power, he was already strong enough to reach a very high place within the Demi-Immortal level. And the Hell of Mahānata was like his backyard, with a nearly endless supply of fiend-devils that he could use as fuel. Even the ancient Infernalfolk abounded there.

Of his eight hundred forty million particles, a hundred million were already dracomammoths, while the rest were still ordinary megamammoths. Once he converted them all into dracomammoths, he would be able to kill Paragon Demi-Immortals, and perhaps even hold his own against half-Demolishers like the initiators.

Now that he was in contact with the will of this ancient god, his soul was like a balloon that was suddenly being inflated.

Whoosh!

All of a sudden, a nascent divinity branding mark flew out of Yang Qi and entered the essence of the Hell of Gloom and Darkness. In the blink of an eye, he became one with the hell around him.

‘What’s going on?’ He had yet again ensconced his nascent divinity, which actually came as a great shock to him. After all, it was second step Great Sages who, as they entered the Nirvanic Resurrection Step, would ensconce their nascent divinity somewhere. It was an iron-clad rule that the ensconcement could only happen once. In fact, it was as much of a constant as the equation 1+1=2. Never before had anyone ever ensconced their nascent divinity twice.

Yet Yang Qi had just ensconced his nascent divinity in both the Hell of Mahānata and the Hell of Gloom and Darkness. It wasn’t just a miracle, it was a complete contradiction of the fundamental principles of cultivation.

‘It's a violation of universal truth….’ he thought.

All of a sudden, a booming voice filled his mind. ‘The legion of gods can change truth. Truth exists beneath us….’

Whizz!

The essence of the Hell of Gloom and Darkness swirled to surround Yang Qi and bolster his cultivation base. As of this moment, he had another backyard. Now that he had two nascent divinity ensconcement seals in two different hells, he experienced a major breakthrough.

His vital energy erupted and the mother godworm in his God Legion Paradise began shedding. Powerful godly laws of space rippled out, and more ancient genetic memories from within the godworm were unlocked.

The mother godworm was stepping into the eighth stage, making her as strong as a Universal Demi-Immortal, and as Yang Qi received the blessings of the godly laws, he broke through and became a second order Demi-Immortal.

“Hell of Mahānata. Hell of Gloom and Darkness. Be linked!”

Rumbling sounds echoed out as Yang Qi chopped his hand out in front of him, opening a space-time wormhole that sprang out of the Hell of Gloom and Darkness and caused a dark golden greyspace to appear in front of him. It was a passage leading directly to the Hell of Mahānata.

Yang Qi had created a way to go from one hell directly to another.

The essence of the Hell of Mahānata flowed freely over to mix with the Hell of Gloom and Darkness, and the result was a brand new world. Even as that new world formed, Yang Qi faced tribulation.

This time, it wasn’t just the suicidal host of immortals that descended; he faced the decline of the universe as a whole.

‘Is that Destruction of the Heaven-Dao Tribulation?’ the Holy Mother thought, shocked. ‘How could that tribulation be coming for my son? According to the ancient records of the dao, it should only appear when one is breaking through to the Godmyth level. Well, good. If it appears in full, this entire hell is going to be shaken.’

Meanwhile, Yang Qi was inhaling and exhaling the magical laws of two enormous hells as he rapidly ascended to a higher level. As he became a Greater Demi-Immortal, fifty million particles within him transformed into dracomammoths. At that point, the will of the ancient god faded away and the God Legion Seal returned to his forehead, ending the tribulation.

The mother godworm was in the Universal Demi-Immortal level, and Yang Qi’s cultivation base made him a second order Greater Demi-Immortal.

RUUUUUUMBLE!

He made a grasping gesture, and an enormous figure flew out of his Hell Portal. It was thousands of meters tall, and burly, almost like an ancient divine mountain, an entity whose mere breathing could cause planets to tremble. It was an infernal in the Universal Demi-Immortal level.

That was now Yang Qi’s limit of summoning.

The infernal immediately dropped to his knees to offer obeisance. “Greetings, Milord. I'm Infernal Skysurge.”

“Go defend the Sage Monarch planetary system,” Yang Qi said with a wave of his hand, and the infernal flew into a wormhole to do just that.

“Qi’er, you can summon Universal Demi-Immortal fiend-devils now!”

The Holy Mother was delighted. Not only because of that, but also because of her own profound transformation. She was completely different from before, with a new mastery of the Jade-Emperor Profound-Welkin Exalted-Celestial God-Dao. The god blood she had absorbed had given her boundless godpower, and she even had some of the basic defensive measures provided directly by the god blood. Because of that, she could now easily face Paragon Demi-Immortals in battle.

Yang Qi shook his head. “I can summon them, Mother, but not in large quantities. It’s thousands of times more difficult than summoning Revered Demi-Immortals. And it's a big drain on my true energy. I need to rise a few more levels before I can summon an army large enough to deal with the Titan Emperor Collegium, or other collegiums. When the time comes, though, even heaven-immortals will fall beneath my forces.”

After a moment of thought, the Holy Mother said, “Even so, it’s very impressive. Qi’er, considering the level of your cultivation base now, you don’t even need to fear heaven-immortals.”

“Yeah. In a one-on-one fight, I could definitely kill one of the initiators. Unfortunately, if they teamed up, I would lose. I definitely need to get stronger.” As of this point, Yang Qi would essentially be invincible in any duel in the mortal world.

Of course, there were always freaks in the world, such as the yellow-garbed young man with the buzz cut. People who had ancient, secret techniques could always defy logic.

“Mother, how is your cultivation base now? With the godrelic under your control, and that ancient god blood, you must have made big progress with your Jade-Emperor Profound-Welkin Exalted-Celestial God-Dao. You’re right on the cusp of the Demolishing level, right?”

“Yes. I won't be able to fully absorb the god blood until I reach immortal ascension, but it's still a never-ending wellspring of power for me.” The merest effort on her part caused an immense world of jade to spread out around her in all directions.

“It seems the both of us really benefited,” Yang Qi said. “Who would dare to cause problems for us now? The Beastmaster Society? Hallmasters? Initiators? We could slaughter them all. The time has come to make the Titan Emperor Collegium and the Megaplexus Collegium my subordinates. Soon, I’ll rule the entire mortal world….” It almost seemed like Yang Qi was ready to ascend to the immortal world right now.

“Let’s go to the Hanging Mountain. Now that I'm a Universal Demi-Immortal, I understand the rotations of the universe and I can help you make the Hanging Mountain part of the Sage Monarch planetary system.” She rose to her feet and began flying, and Yang Qi followed.

“Mother, what's the secret to becoming a Paragon Demi-Immortal?” Yang Qi asked quietly.

“Universal Demi-Immortals understand the rotations of the universe and the movement of the constellations. That's why they can create planetary systems and set up enormous spell formations to govern the orbits of planets. Paragon Demi-Immortals go beyond that. They understand the most profound secrets of existence and can create entire planes of existence. They can even cut worlds apart. With the god blood I have, I should reach that level very soon.”

“Alright, let's get back as quickly as possible.”

With that, Yang Qi and his mother shot out of the Hell of Gloom and Darkness.

Meanwhile, two people stepped into the Beastmaster Society back in the Titan Emperor Collegium.

One of them wore yellow clothing and had a buzz cut covered by a wide-brimmed hat. The other was Chancellor Demi-Immortal.

Chapter 487: Liege Beast

The yellow-garbed young man with the buzz cut had assumed a different appearance and joined Chancellor Demi-Immortal in the Beastmaster Society. There, they met Chief Snake and August Patriarch Mammoth Heaven, who were flanked by other disciples of the society.

The young man's aura placed him in the first order of the Demi-Immortal level. Although that might seem strong, in the Titan Emperor Collegium there were as many experts as the sky has clouds. Therefore, he didn’t stick out much.

However, few people would dare to treat him lightly. He pulsed with an aura that seemed capable of slaying anything in existence and seemed every bit a top expert.

Waving in greeting, Chancellor Demi-Immortal said, “August Patriarch Mammoth Heaven. Chief Snake. It's good to see you two again.”

“So it's Chancellor Demi-Immortal,” Chief Snake said, his eyes flashing. “I heard that you came to the Titan Emperor Collegium looking for revenge, but I never imagined you would come here. What do you want? Is Yang Qi too powerful for you now, so you're hoping to join forces to get that longed-for vengeance?”

“Not exactly,” Chancellor Demi-Immortal replied. He pulsed with an aura that was very difficult to describe, and had obviously advanced in his energy arts recently. Glancing at the young man in yellow, he chuckled. “I’ve invited this expert to see the society chief here. We have some important matters to discuss, regarding how to deal with the Invincible Society and Yang Qi.”

“Expert?” Mammoth Heaven said. He and Chief Snake looked at the young man, and both of them laughed. “Surely you don’t mean this fellow. A Lesser Demi-Immortal? You call someone like him an expert? And you want to have a meeting with the society chief? Is this some sort of practical joke? Our society chief is a grand and venerable individual, one of the old-timers here in the collegium. There’s no way you're going to see him.”

Smiling, the young man in yellow said, “Yang Qi was a Lesser Demi-Immortal when he turned the Hall of Beheadings and Executions into a sea of blood and corpses. He cut down an elder king and used his head to decorate the entrance of his society. So cut the crap and go announce me to the society chief. I have important matters to discuss.”

“You’ve got a lot of guts, boy!” Chief Snake said, his expression flashing with anger.

“Screw off!” said the young man in yellow, waving his sleeve and sending out a burst of power that caused all light in the area to suddenly go dim. Shockingly, Chief Snake was powerless to defend against it, staggering backward several paces before finally losing control and falling into a sitting position.

Both Chief Snake and Mammoth Heaven were fifth order Tyrant Demi-Immortals, just on the verge of becoming Prime Demi-Immortals. For Chief Snake to have been knocked off his feet by a casual gesture went to show that he was vastly weaker than the young man in yellow.

“You….”

Chief Snake crawled to his feet and looked at the young man in shock. Their brief clash had alerted other experts of the Beastmaster Society, many of whom were rushing over to check the situation.

“Well, what have we here?” someone said. “Experts seem to be coming out of the woodwork, these days. It's hard to believe. Is it a defiance of heaven? Where are they coming from? Don’t tell me we really have another Yang Qi on our hands.”

A young man appeared, clad in fiery-red clothing, with a flame sigil dancing on his forehead.

The other disciples present reacted with open shock.

“It’s Elder Brother Vermillion, an elysian child!”

“Elder Brother Vermillion is the incarnation of a divine vermilion bird! His cultivation of the dao of heaven led to his current, profoundly enigmatic level.”

“He’s one of the top geniuses of the Beastmaster Society!”

“Well, now we can see how strong this guy in yellow really is. He wants to see our venerable leader?”

This newcomer was one of the elysian children of the Beastmaster Society, an eighth order Universal Demi-Immortal.

“So, you're a vermilion bird?” said the young man in yellow, looking him over. “You vermillion birds are embodiments of the mournful fire of the dazzling south. Your cultivation base is the ultimate expression of fire, but sadly, becoming a god of burning flame is no easy task. Without a complimentary water aspect, you won’t progress much further. Luckily, I happen to have a water-type energy art. If you work with me, reaching the Demolishing level won’t be very difficult at all.”

“Are you crazy?” Elder Brother Vermillion said. “You think you qualify to talk about things like that with me?”

Suddenly, he flicked his finger and sent out a fist-sized fireball that rapidly expanded into an entire kingdom of flame. It was almost as if an ancient god of fire had suddenly invaded the world of men.

“Burning Flame of the Immolation Heaven!”

The young man in yellow looked at the expanding fireball and smiled. “Complete crap. Why even use that technique? Be destroyed!”

Cracking sounds rang out as a watery light appeared, which swished toward Elder Brother Vermillion’s finger like a divine dragon in the middle of a heavenly river. In the blink of an eye, it overwhelmed the fire and wrapped around Elder Brother Vermillion, keeping him pinned in place and incapable of doing anything.

Face falling, Elder Brother Vermillion said, “That’s… a godly-class energy art! And it's water-type!”

“Exactly. It's an ancient godly-class energy art, the Heaven-River Surging-Wave Paragon True Energy. Like I said, stick with me and I can help you. Water and fire are complementary, and it could be a big benefit to your energy arts.”

“Dammit,” Chancellor Demi-Immortal said quietly, “we’re right here in the Beastmaster Society and you just completely dominated an elysian child. You’re as domineering as Yang Qi! We were supposed to come talk things over with the society chief, but now you’re making them lose all face! How are we going to work out a deal now?”

“Calm down,” the young man replied. Raising his voice, he called out, “Chief Beastmaster! Get out here. I'm here to talk about dealing with Yang Qi. By the way, I’ll share a little secret with you. He has twenty-eight imperial snakecharms. Did you know that? It’s big news, wouldn’t you say? If you could get those snakecharms, you’d probably reach the Demolishing level and be no less powerful than the Invincible Dugu.”

“Are you serious?”

Hummmmmm….

A strange sound suddenly filled the entire hall and all of the disciples present suddenly turned and walked out, their eyes completely blank. At a single glance, the young man in yellow realized what had just happened. All of the disciples had lost their memories of what had occurred in the past few moments.

Soon, the only people left behind were Chancellor Demi-Immortal, the young man in yellow, Chief Snake, August Patriarch Mammoth Heaven, and Elder Brother Vermillion.

At this point, a newcomer appeared. He was a middle-aged man with an extremely long, pitch black beard. His eyes shone with the primeval dao of beasts, as though he were the lord of all animals. He was accompanied by the aura of primal-chaos elder-snakes, the type that could consume all heaven and earth. There was no doubt that he possessed a host of imperial snakecharms and could easily draw on their power.

“Liege Beast,” said the young man in yellow by way of greeting. Smiling, he continued, “In ancient times, you were the famous leader of the heaven-beast tribes. Now here you are, a society chief in the Titan Emperor Collegium.”

Liege Beast looked at the young man in yellow for a long moment. “It's been a million years since anyone called me that. Not many people know about my past. Those few who do have either died or ascended. Where exactly did you come across this information? Tell me! Otherwise I’ll kill you where you stand! Where are you from? Explain immediately!”

The young man in yellow snorted coldly. “You’re impressed that I know about your past? How about I tell you your future? In three hundred years, your cultivation will reach a consummate level and you’ll ascend to the Titan Emperor Heaven, where you’ll become a famous immortal. Unfortunately, a well-known treasure trove will appear and you’ll encounter your old enemy Dao Lord Frost-Sky. He’ll kill you, and that will be the end of your path of cultivation.”

“What?” Liege Beast said, visibly shocked. “Dao Lord Frost-Sky? My future? How do you know my future? Dao Lord Frost-Sky is my archenemy, but he ascended years and years ago. Nobody even knows about our rivalry. How did you find out? Have you been spying on me? How could you know about my future?”

That one brief statement by the yellow-garbed young man had won him a victory over Liege Beast, who was now completely flustered.

“Everything I just said is the truth, Liege Beast. That’s your fate. However, now that you've met me, your fate can be changed. I can make sure you don’t get killed by Dao Lord Frost-Sky. In fact, it might even be possible for you to kill him instead.”

“How do I know I can trust you?” Liege Beast said. “What if you’re just making this all up? Where’s your evidence? Perhaps I should just seize you and force out your secrets. You won’t be able to hide your trickery then. Seems to me you just need help dealing with Yang Qi, who’s obviously a rival of yours. Let me tell you, you can’t do anything about him. I know all about Yang Qi. If it weren’t for the Invincible Dugu, I would kill him immediately. And if I can kill him, that means I can kill you.”

RUMBLE!

Liege Beast stepped forward and his energy surged like the waves of the ocean, causing the young man’s yellow garments to flap.

“Hold on!” the young man said, looking as calm as ever. “You can’t do anything to me, Liege Beast, so there’s no need for a scene. I know everything about you and your capabilities. I know which energy arts you cultivate, and I know what level you’re at. I know what magical treasures you have, and I even know other secrets about you. Otherwise I wouldn’t have just walked right in here. Your Primal Beast True Energy is at the seventeenth level, which means you can summon seventeen totems. Unfortunately, you’re one totem short of reaching the consummate level. And you don’t know how to get that final totem….”

The young man in yellow didn’t make a single move. He just outright stated Liege Beast’s cultivation weakness, causing everyone else present to reel in shock.

Every single thing the young man said left Liege Beast feeling more discomfited. Yet he still gritted his teeth and said, “If you know all of that, and even know all of my weaknesses, then why don’t you know the same about Yang Qi? Why don’t you go handle him yourself?”

“Because Yang Qi is a person who exists outside of fate. He exists in the current timeline, but not in the future, thus it's impossible to say what he will do. It’s a mystery and a miracle at the same time. That’s why I don’t know about his past or his future. However, I know how to fight him. And right now is the time, before he reaches his full potential.”

Chapter 488: Incredible

“What’s your name?” Liege Beast asked, quashing any thoughts of fighting. Although he found this young man terrifying, he was also extremely curious about who exactly he was.

“Just call me Future One,” replied the young man in yellow. “I don’t have a surname or given name. You won’t find any evidence of my existence, so don’t even bother wasting time trying to investigate me. No trace of me exists anywhere in the Titan Emperor planetary system.”

“What?” Liege Beast said, looking a bit pale in the face. “Future One? Are you telling me that you're from a different aspect of space-time? That, somehow, you’ve traversed the paths restricted by the legion of gods?”

“Yes. And that's enough about that subject. I want to work with you, which is why I’ve revealed some of my secrets and showed how much I know about you. You can’t hide anything about yourself from me—not your past, your present, or your future.”

Liege Beast thought for a moment, then said, “This is all simply… terrifying. Will working with you be a blessing, or a curse?”

“A blessing, of course. Meeting me is probably the best thing that ever happened to you. You can't change the past, but you can definitely change the future. Your future ends in death, but now that you’ve met me I can provide unheard-of blessings. Not only will you escape death, but you will break the fetters of fate. And you can kill your greatest enemy. Anyone can change their fate, as long as they meet the right person. According to an ancient daoist text, if you fly as high as a dragon in heaven, you will profit by meeting a benefactor. You’ve met a benefactor in me, so naturally, you will fly like a dragon.”

Liege Beast snorted coldly. Although he was losing face, he really had no choice but to believe this yellow-garbed young man. Everything he had said was true, and, at the same time, there was a strange and unidentifiable power within him. It almost seemed like the merest wave of his hand could destroy starry skies and eradicate divine abilities. Liege Beast wasn’t confident in being able to beat him in a fight, and also wasn't willing to turn him into an enemy.

“Well then, Liege Beast. Consider me the newest disciple of your Beastmaster Society. I hope that you can keep the news of my presence a secret. Otherwise, it could bring disaster on our heads. Believe me, Yang Qi is not the buffoon he seems to be. He’s very smart, and is likely aware that I escaped from the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. If he leaks information about me to the collegium leadership, it could be dangerous.”

The young man stopped for a moment, as if in thought, then continued, “By the way, working with you is a risk for me as well. After all, you could easily betray me. In fact, let’s be frank. If you tell anyone about me, our cooperation ends immediately. And if you betray me, I won’t reveal any details about your future, which means that you’ll be fated to die. Don’t even think of trying to trap me in some sort of spell formation. I could escape without even trying. Chancellor Demi-Immortal, why don’t you tell Liege Beast about my little secret?”

“Exalted Liege Beast, he knows many secrets about King Immortal-Slayer. In fact, he can freely enter and exit the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Not even the Titan Emperor Collegium’s deadly Three Yang Auspicious Titan Devil-Exterminating Grand Formation would be able to do anything to him. If you work with him and gain his trust, you’ll definitely be able to get into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart to search for treasure. Think about it. If people in the collegium found out about all this, would you be able to maintain control? There are definitely key items in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart that you could use to ascend to the Titan Emperor Heaven above, and perhaps become a leader there. After all, what does the Titan Emperor Heaven count for? The ancient King Immortal-Slayer, King Mourn-Parting, and King Heaven-Devourer could consume that place without even thinking. There are more imperial snakecharms to be had in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, and if you can get all three thousand of them, would you be afraid of immortals?”

Liege Beast’s jaw nearly dropped from shock. “Freely enter and exit the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart? I didn’t even realize that power existed in the universe.”

At this point, the yellow-garbed young man glanced at Chief Snake, August Patriarch Mammoth Heaven, and Elder Brother Vermillion. “These three need to have their memories erased now. If you don’t do it, I will. The secrets we’ve discussed here are too big to risk letting them get out.”

“Fine,” Liege Beast said. With a wave of his hand, he erased their memories.

“That vermillion bird still has some room to grow,” the yellow-garbed young man said. “Give him to me as a servant and I’ll impart a godly-class energy art to him. Incidentally, Liege Beast, the only reason you can't compare to the Invincible Dugu is that you don’t have a godly-class energy art. I’ll give you a lesser art that should make you the top domineering figure in the Titan Emperor Collegium.”

“How many godly-class energy arts do you have?” Liege Beast asked, shocked.

“However many King Immortal-Slayer had in the past, that’s how many I’ll eventually have. Now, I want you to put all of the Beastmaster Society’s eyes and ears to work trying to get information on Yang Qi and what he’s doing.”

“No problem. First, give me that godly-class energy art. Pretty soon, the Immortal Army Battlefield will open, and the top students from the collegiums will go inside for training. A lot of immortal worlds will be involved. Yang Qi will be there, and I can arrange to sneak both of us in as well. Hopefully, we can get others to do our dirty work for us. The Megaplexus Collegium will be there, as well as the Highest Clarity Collegium and the Coiling Arc Collegium. There will be plenty of students, all fighting and killing each other.

“In fact, perhaps that’s what the initiators want. They must be after Yang Qi’s godly-class art. By the way, do you know where Yang Qi got it? It’s incredibly powerful. He can even summon greater fiend-devils from hell with it.”

“Unless I’m mistaken,” the young man replied, “it’s a consummate godly-class art or higher. It’s completely terrifying, the kind of thing that can destroy the heavens and extinguish the earth. As for what energy art it is, I’ll look into it on my next journey to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Don’t worry, I’ll take you with me when I go. Remember, the rest of the Invincible Society is in there, including Yang Qi’s Eldest Brother and Elder Second Brother. It might be a good idea to capture them to use as hostages. Either way, with the two of us working together, Yang Qi is dead.”

“Good idea. I never liked those people from the Invincible Society. I would have wiped them out a long time ago if it weren’t for the Invincible Dugu….” All of a sudden, his eyes went wide. “The Invincible Dugu! Do you know what happens to him in the end? What’s his future like? Do you think I could kill him? If so, I’ll go do it right now. No matter how much he begs and grovels, I’ll cut him down and assimilate him.”

“The Invincible Dugu? He exists in the future. He acquires the legacy of a god-spirit and achieves incredible glory. However, he meets a bitter and tragic end. That said, he lives longer than you, all the way until the great war between immortals and gods. That’s when he perishes. Of course, everything is different now, so his fate could change. You see, in the future, he has no disciple named Yang Qi. Now that the two of them are connected, it's similar to you and I in that his fate could be different. Maybe he won't perish in the end. In any case, there’s no way you could take him down right now. He’s already ascended, and earlier than in the future. In other words, his fate is already starting to ripple and distort.”

“What? He already ascended? Are you sure?”

“Of course. There’s no mistaking it. What, you doubt my power?”

Liege Beast burst out laughing. “If he ascended, that's perfect! Now we can just make a move directly against Yang Qi. We don't even need to wait for the Immortal Army Battlefield!”

“Yang Qi’s cultivation base is constantly advancing. Right now, I'm not confident that we could handle him. I need to finish cultivating an incredibly powerful energy art beforehand. When I have the right trump card, I’ll make my move and kill him. Why don’t you send people to check into what he’s doing? And see what's happening with the Sage Monarch planetary system. Maybe that will give us some good clues to work with.”

“Alright!”

Thus, a conspiracy was born.

**

Meanwhile, back in the Sage Monarch planetary system, heaven and earth were changing dramatically as the place combined with the Hanging Mountain. How large was the Hanging Mountain? It was made up of hundreds of thousands of planets and countless continents, as well as numerous planes of existence that were ancient ruins of the past. For example, the golden tree that was home to the Rocfolk was part of the Hanging Mountain.

Combining the Hanging Mountain with the Sage Monarch planetary system was an immense task that ordinary phrases and idioms could not be used to describe.

At the moment, countless hosts of Demonfolk were gathering. Above them was an enormous dharmic likeness of the Holy Mother, surrounded by a kingdom of jade, waiting as the gargantuan Sage Monarch planetary system floated toward them.

Dozens of gigantic fiend-devils worked tirelessly to assist, all of them eighth order Universal Demi-Immortals. That was Yang Qi’s current summoning limit. If he tried to do any more, his Hell Portals would crumble and he would lose control of the fiend-devils, allowing them to attack him.

It was a big difference from Revered Demi-Immortals, of which he could summon as many as he wished.

Among the Rocfolk was Great Sage Ultra-Heaven, who was flanked by his son and daughter.

“That’s the Holy Mother’s son, Yang Qi,” he said. “He’s so strong! He can even move planetary systems! It’s only been a few short years since the training competition and he's already dominated this entire starry sky.”

“Father,” Princess Saddharma said, “is this combination of the Hanging Mountain and the Sage Monarch planetary system going to be a blessing or a curse? August Patriarch Mammoth Heaven already left for the Titan Emperor Collegium. He might have lost his power here, but, in some ways, he's been promoted.”

Chapter 489: Transformations

“Don’t worry,” Great Sage Ultra-Heaven said. “Yang Qi killed an elder king in the Titan Emperor Collegium, earning a terrifying name for himself. Nobody could possibly defeat him at the moment, so how could August Patriarch Mammoth Heaven possibly cause problems?

“Besides, Yang Qi has turned the Sage Monarch planetary system into a holy land for cultivation and his subordinates are becoming Demi-Immortals left and right. They’re already stronger than the Hanging Mountain, overall. Becoming part of the Sage Monarch planetary system will only benefit us.”

Even as he spoke, the enormous planetary system approached, complete with its host of satellite planets. Spirit energy erupted like blooming flowers, and it was possible to watch with the naked eye as it surrounded the Hanging Mountain and its associated planes.

The spirit energy of the Sage Monarch planetary system came from an immortal formation which constantly drew on the power of the Tusita Heaven to form immortal stones. Considering that, it was hard to imagine how beneficial it was. Not even the Titan Emperor Heaven had energy of this level.

And with Yang Qi stationed in the Sage Monarch planetary system, he could open passageways to the Hell of Mahānata and the Hell of Gloom and Darkness, from which he could extract devil stones to convert into either spirit or immortal stones. In fact, some of the planets orbiting the planetary system were actually made from spirit stone, making it very similar to the Central Planetary River.

“Such incredible spirit stone energy!” Great Sage Ultra-Heaven said, reaching out and grabbing a stream of energy. As the moments passed, it coalesced into a spirit stone. Shockingly, it was a sovereign-grade spirit stone, the type that would be profoundly beneficial even to Great Sages.

“What level of universal power is this? Even a bit of energy can become a sovereign-grade spirit stone?!”

All of a sudden, an immense wave of power descended onto the ancient golden tree that was the home of the Rocfolk. Then Yang Qi was right there in front of Great Sage Ultra-Heaven.

“That’s right,” he said. “The universal power of the Sage Monarch planetary system is like that of high-level immortal worlds. This type of power must surpass the Titan Emperor Heaven by tens of thousands of times. I’ll do my best to help you Rocfolk. After all, back in the training competition, you didn’t oppose me. I haven’t forgotten that.”

Yang Qi knew that there was potential within the Rocfolk, and he liked that they stayed out of the power struggles. Even more importantly, they had never joined forces with August Patriarch Mammoth Heaven. As such, he had decided to help them grow.

Great Sage Ultra-Heaven immediately bowed low and said, “We welcome your presence with open arms, Young Master.”

He knew that things had changed. He was a ninth step Great Sage, but Yang Qi was a person who had slaughtered elder kings. Obviously, the mere flick of Yang Qi’s finger could wipe out all of the Rocfolk in the blink of an eye.

“There’s no need for such courtesy,” Yang Qi said. “Your people need to get stronger! In the near future, war will come to the Yore Wilds and beyond, even to the Titan Emperor Heaven itself. It will likely be more intense than the war with the Hell of Euphoria. If things go as I expect, it will be a major upheaval for this heaven and earth. The only way you’ll survive is if you get stronger and stick with me. I won’t let you down. Your ancient golden tree is a relic from primeval times, but unfortunately, it’s withering. If you want to stimulate its life force, you’ll need greater enlightenment of the dao of heaven and also, a source of immense power. Thankfully, I can help with that. Incidentally, although you’re known for your flying speed, I think you can improve in that regard.”

The flight skills of the golden rocs were famous, even in the ancient era. However, their speed couldn't come close to that of the Angel Wings. Yang Qi’s cultivation level was so high now that he could easily see the defective aspects of the rocs’ arts.

“Many thanks, Young Master!” Great Sage Ultra-Heaven said jubilantly.

“Watch,” Yang Qi said, and flicked his finger. A dazzling halo settled onto the ancient golden tree, which trembled, then suddenly erupted with life force. Leaves sprouted everywhere on it and it began shining with golden light.

There were even soft shoots that stretched out with flower buds on the end.

“Father, the ancient golden tree is actually blooming!” Princess Saddharma exclaimed. Flying over, she landed on a flower bud that was fully dozens of kilometers from end to end and emanated a fragrant aroma. There were minor worlds inside of the flower buds, all of them filled with light and power. “This is the stuff of legend! Not even the ancestors spoke of the ancient golden tree blooming. The golden flowers of this tree are worlds of their own that provide immense benefit to cultivation.”

Cheers rose up from the Rocfolk.

“This is nothing,” Yang Qi said. “Great Sage Ultra-Heaven, take this flying technique I devised. Fuse it with your true energy, and I guarantee that you’ll be three to five times faster than before.”

He waved his hand and a pair of wings sprouted behind him. They had a span of dozens of meters and shone with dazzling light. Instantly, the script and will contained within the wings flowed out, imparting a consummate energy art to Great Sage Ultra-Heaven.

It was a unique flying art that Yang Qi had created, based on his understanding of the Angel Wings and the enlightenment he had received from his godworms regarding the godly laws of space. It was enlightenment that the Rocfolk would definitely benefit from.

Great Sage Ultra-Heaven took it, then settled down cross-legged to analyze it. Almost immediately, his face shone with joy. “Many thanks, Young Master. Many thanks! I’ll be a Demi-Immortal soon with this.”

At this point, hearty laughter reached their ears along with a sonorous voice. “Young Master, if you’re willing to help the Rocfolk in this manner, then might I beg for some assistance? We Levianthanfolk could use some help as well.”

It was none other than Leviathan Truesoaring.

“You Leviathanfolk provided me with a lot of assistance, so of course I’ll take care of you. I already created a special planet in the Sage Monarch planetary system, an ocean of true water that the Levianthanfolk can call their home. I’ll also give you some supreme divine abilities that will unlock your genes and allow you to surpass, not only the ancient ordinary leviathans, but the dracoleviathans.” Smiling, Yang Qi waved his finger and sent a stream of bright light into Leviathan Truesoaring.

Leviathan Truesoaring threw his head back and roared as countless tribulation clouds popped into being above him.

“Demi-Immortal tribulation!” Great Sage Ultra-Heaven blurted in shock. Obviously, Yang Qi had bestowed some unknown will and true energy onto Leviathan Truesoaring, instantly allowing him to achieve a breakthrough!

Things proceeded in this fashion as the Hanging Mountain was integrated into the Sage Monarch planetary system, thanks to the seventy-two Universal Demi-Immortal infernals that Yang Qi had summoned for that purpose. Countless Demonfolk received help from Yang Qi, including the Tigerfolk, Cranefolk, and many others.

Henceforth, the Yore-Wilds wouldn't contain any so-called Hanging Mountain. It would only have the Sage Monarch planetary system.

The Sage Monarch planetary system was now ten times larger than before, and its vital energy was even more plentiful.

Yang Qi worked as hard as he could. When the seventy-two infernals were done with their work, he refined them into seventy-two devil-god pillars. They were now like magical treasures that would help defend the planetary system.

There was little other choice for Yang Qi. Without refining them into the devil-god pillars, he wouldn't be able to summon any other fiend-devils. With them, and the power of the undying god soul, the planetary system could hold out against a Paragon Demi-Immortal for an extended time, even without Yang Qi there to help.

Acts of creation occurred throughout the Sage Monarch planetary system. New space-time wormholes were set up, and new channels of communication. If there was an attack, the populace could pool their magical power to bless the undying god soul and bolster the defenses.

The Sage Monarch planetary system grew more stable with every moment that passed.

Now that the Holy Mother had taken the godrelic for her own, she didn’t need to travel to the Hell of Gloom and Darkness to further her cultivation. She could remain on the mother planet of the Sage Monarch planetary system full time.

“Qi’er, with that god blood, my energy arts are even more powerful. Soon, I’ll have enlightenment of the Paragon Demi-Immortal level, and perhaps even step halfway into Demolishing. There’s even a slight chance I’ll be able to proceed directly into becoming a Demolisher. In any case, you can rest your heart at ease and go about whatever travels you deem necessary. The Sage Monarch planetary system will be safe for the time being.”

“Wonderful. Sword Seventeen and I need to get back to the Invincible Society and see what’s been happening in the Titan Emperor Collegium.”

With that, he and Sword Seventeen headed back.

Yang Qi was returning in a much different condition than he had been when he left. His cultivation base had increased and his battle prowess had climbed. Unless an immortal came along, he could win a one-on-one fight with anyone in the mortal world.

Upon their return, Sword Seventeen and Yang Qi found that the Invincible Society, and the area surrounding it, were peaceful and quiet. Apparently, it had become a forbidden region of sorts. No one dared to even go close to it, for fear of ending up dead.

Considering the scene Yang Qi had caused, no student in the collegium dared to look down on him.

“We really established a name for ourselves, Junior Brother,” Sword Seventeen said, chuckling. “When Eldest Brother gets back, I think even he will admire you.”

They began bantering back and forth, but then Yang Qi’s society chief command medallion vibrated as a message came in. “Yang Qi, get over to the Plane of Initiation immediately. The initiators have business to discuss with you. The immortal worlds have passed down word that the Immortal Army Battlefield will be opening soon. You need to safeguard the genius students from our collegium and lead the slaughter of the students from the others.”

“Oh? It’s starting already? Time to meet some experts from the other collegiums?”

He and Sword Seventeen immediately flew up into the air.

Chapter 490: Endless Experts

Just like that, Yang Qi found himself on the Plane of Initiation.

It was the most mysterious place in the Titan Emperor Collegium, home to the initiators, who had founded the collegium. Most of the initiators were half a step into the Demolishing level, people who, if they could get a godworm egg, could without a doubt achieve their next breakthrough and become immortals.

Yang Qi didn’t have a good impression of this pack of initiators. Back during the incident with the Hall of Beheadings and Executions, they had simply watched as the vice-rectors acted with open discrimination against him. In that scenario, they had obviously been the fisherman hoping to swoop in and benefit at the last minute. Were it not for the fact that they were still uncertain about whether or not the Invincible Dugu had ascended, they would likely have already made a move against Yang Qi.

They were vermin, hungry wolves who would rip him to pieces at the earliest opportunity.

In fact, there was only one word that occurred to him when he thought about them: kill!

Eventually, he would wipe them all out and turn them into planets for the Sage Monarch planetary system.

Some people talked about having a sense of belonging toward the collegium, of maintaining its glory and honor. Not so with Yang Qi. The collegium had never done anything good for him. On the contrary, he had been at odds with other societies from the very beginning. In fact, there were plenty of wretch-devils here who would instantly resort to threatening his friends and family.

He didn't care a whit about the collegium. In fact, if he got the chance, he would do the same thing to it as he had done to the Demi-Immortal Institute, and raze it to the ground.

The Plane of Initiation was an elliptical universe unto itself. It was made entirely from primal-chaos paleo-energy and actually bordered the heaven above. With his Lord's Eye, he could actually see the greyspace overhead, which seemed to be inset into an even more majestic plane of existence. There was immense power in that higher plane, including pure yang energy. There was no doubt that such true energy belonged to the Titan Emperor Heaven.

The Plane of Initiation’s proximity to the Titan Emperor Heaven made it perfect for the initiators’ cultivation. It was a place that could avoid the contamination of the energy of the mortal world. Furthermore, it was more convenient for the power and edicts of the Titan Emperor Heaven to reach the initiators, giving them deeper insight into the immortal world.

“I’ve never been to the Plane of Initiation before,” Sword Seventeen said, looking around nervously. “The power here is incredible. Although, it actually doesn’t compare to the Sage Monarch planetary system.”

“Well, that’s a given,” Yang Qi said. “My planetary system gets power from the Tusita Heaven. That level of universal power surpasses the Titan Emperor Heaven by tens of thousands of times.” He chuckled coldly. “These initiators are complete trash. All they do is hide here, working on their cultivation and hatching plots and schemes. They want to make a move on me, which ensures that they’ll be wiped out eventually.” Given the level of Yang Qi’s cultivation base, he could wipe out the initiators if he wanted, therefore he wasn’t worried about the situation.

As Yang Qi and Sword Seventeen chatted, they reached the border of the Plane of Initiation, when a voice spoke out. “Come in, Yang Qi.”

At the same time, numerous streams of divine will reached out to inspect his true energy.

Ignoring them, he used a divine ability to cause himself to shine with brilliant sagelight. As a result, the numerous streams of true energy and divine will were shattered. Glowing brightly, he entered the Plane of Initiation with Sword Seventeen.

Just like that, he had vanquished the power of all the initiators.

Yang Qi knew that these despicable schemers were the type of people who would bully the weak and fear the strong. Therefore, he decided to put on a show of strength to intimidate them and quash any wild ambitions they might be harboring. He wanted to make it clear that he could defend himself, if necessary, and didn’t need to rely on his Master.

Of course, his act caused the initiators to break out in a cold sweat and immediately carry out a projected conversation between themselves.

‘He’s so strong? How did he progress so rapidly? He wasn’t this strong when he killed that elder king. He's ten times as powerful now! Back then, I was confident that I could keep him in check, but now I'm not so sure. This is terrifying! He’s far stronger than me!’

‘We initiators are all halfway into the Demolishing level. How could he possibly be stronger than us? Look! Look at his aura!’

‘Yes, he’s a Greater Demi-Immortal! Back when he killed that elder king, he was only a Lesser Demi-Immortal. How did he rise to another level so quickly? It should be millions of times harder for him to achieve breakthroughs than ordinary cultivators. What lucky break did he get to succeed so easily?’

‘Did you notice that the Sage Monarch planetary system fused with the Hanging Mountain?’

The initiators turned their attention to the Sage Monarch planetary system and saw the immense mass of shining planets, so dazzling that it was hard to see clearly. However, they could just barely make out the seventy-two devil-god pillars.

That planetary system seemed to contain power that could destroy the heavens and extinguish the earth, something that would cause even immortals to tremble. Obviously, that was because of the Holy Mother’s god blood.

‘So incredible! How did this kid do it? Is he unstoppable? How could this be happening?’

‘Look, it doesn’t matter. He’s still only one person, and he has a weakness in all of those sworn siblings he has. We still have a chance to get his godly-class energy art and his godworm eggs.’

‘Stop conversing with divine will! The crafty brat might be able to eavesdrop, and if he figures out what we're up to it would be a big problem.’

‘That’s right. Let’s see how the supreme rector handles things.’

The fluctuations of divine will died down, and the initiators focused their attention on a masked figure in a yellow robe. He was the supreme rector, the highest-ranking entity in the Titan Emperor Collegium and the only person more powerful than the initiators. According to rumors, he was a direct bloodline descendant of some important person from the Titan Emperor Heaven.

He had been privy to the discussion just now, and was also unsure of what was going on with Yang Qi.

“Yang Qi,” he said, “It's good that you’ve come. Your cultivation base advanced again.”

“That’s right, Supreme Rector. My cultivation advances with incredible speed, and I'm already a Greater Demi-Immortal. Now that I can summon Universal Demi-Immortal fiend-devils, I can definitely crush any enemy who gets in my path. In a one-on-one fight, I would be invincible in the mortal world. In fact, I'm already at the point of being able to kill Paragon Demi-Immortals, and probably even half-Demolishers. Considering the fact that I progress with every day that passes, it won’t be long before I'm a Profound Demi-Immortal. At that point, it will be possible for me to summon Paragon Demi-Immortal fiend-devils.”

His words struck clearly into the minds of all of the initiators, who were visibly taken aback.

Even the supreme rector looked surprised; he had known that Yang Qi was strong, but hadn’t been able to ascertain the details.

“By the way, I've accepted the position of society chief in the Invincible Society,” Yang Qi continued, hoping to drive the final nail into the coffin. “Don’t worry, ladies and gentlemen. I’ll definitely bring greater glory to the Invincible Society than even the Invincible Dugu did.”

The supreme rector took a long moment to collect his thoughts. Finally, he said, “Wonderful! In that case, we pass all responsibility to you in the upcoming Immortal Army Battlefield. It's your task to bring glory to the Titan Emperor Collegium. As you likely know, the immortal worlds are always struggling amongst themselves. Such struggles affect us lower worlds. Every so often, they open the Immortal Army Battlefield as a training ground for us. Whatever victories we earn there will gain face for the immortal worlds above. Last time, our Titan Emperor Collegium lost to the Megaplexus Collegium, and as a result we were punished. We all lost face because of that. Therefore, failure is not an option this time.”

“What kind of place is this Immortal Army Battlefield?” Yang Qi asked. “I participated in the training competition held by the Hanging Mountain, is it like that?”

“That training competition is like a small-scale version of the events hosted by the immortal worlds,” the supreme rector replied. “The Immortal Army Battlefield is where true tempering and glory resides. It's held in a mysterious and ancient dimension filled with demonlings and fiend-devils. There are also ancient ruins present. Of course, the primary focus is combat. There will be experts from the collegiums of all sorts of planetary systems, and each one that you kill will provide you with points. Of course, the number of points you accumulate determine your final reward. If you score high enough, you could be appointed to serve as an immortal official, a higher rank than ordinary immortals can achieve.”

“Bring in the rest of our forces,” one of the initiators said.

Numerous wormholes opened up and a host of students stepped through them. They quickly formed ranks in the Plane of Initiation according to the various societies they came from. By the time they were in order, it was obvious that there were over a million people present.

Most were Great Sages, although there were also Demi-Immortals. The highest-ranking among them were elysian children, but each and every one was considered a genius, regardless of their rank.

Yang Qi looked over the crowd, but didn't see anyone he recognized. August Patriarch Mammoth Heaven wasn’t present, nor were Chief Snake or Chancellor Demi-Immortal.

Then he looked back at the initiators, including the one that he was supposedly cooperating with. His hope was that he might get a bit of information about the yellow-garbed young man with the buzz cut, and whether he was in the collegium.

Unfortunately, the man simply closed his eyes as if he were entering a meditative trance.

‘Fine, you wily old fox,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘One of these days I'm going to cut you down.’

“Yang Qi,” the supreme rector said, “these are the students you will lead in the Immortal Army Battlefield. Since you have the highest cultivation base, it's your task to keep them safe, and make sure they don't get killed by students from other collegiums.”

Chapter 491: The True Battlefield

“I’ll do my best to take care of all these Junior Brothers and Sisters,” Yang Qi said. “However, considering how large the battlefield is, they need to exercise caution. I won’t take responsibility if they get killed.”

Truth be told, he didn’t have any intention of ‘taking care’ of them. He couldn’t care less if they ended up dead. Besides, he knew that there were plenty of experts here who hoped to harm him.

If it came down to it, he might even end up killing them himself.

“Very well. Open the gateway to the Immortal Army Battlefield!” The supreme rector waved his hand, and a beam of light appeared which widened to reveal an ancient plane of existence. It was dusky and overcast, making it seem almost like hell. However, there was no devil energy, just an overwhelming will of battle and combat. It really did seem like some sort of ancient battlefield, complete with the sound of clashing weapons and armies on the move. There were even war drums.

This was the Immortal Army Battlefield, a plane where the host of immortals had once waged war. Later, it became a location for mortals to train and practice, which was very apt, considering it had a history of slaughter, death, and blood.

The students of the various collegiums were tasked with killing other students, and their performance could earn them rewards from the immortal worlds. The Titan Emperor Heaven and the Megaplexus Heaven hated each other deeply, as was common amongst various immortal worlds, and such feelings extended to the various students from the lower-level worlds, who wanted to earn face for those above them.

Of the millions of students who would be participating, many were elysian children, and there were even a few vice-rectors. They were people who had been to the Immortal Army Battlefield before, thus they were well-acquainted with the horrors therein. And they also had significant advantages because of such experience.

“Let’s go!”

As soon as the gateway opened, the students began to pour inside, most of them keeping together in tightly-knit groups. Yang Qi stuck with Sword Seventeen, and the two of them promptly vanished without a trace.

“Bah! That Yang Qi is way too conceited. He’s going to face the Immortal Army Battlefield with only one partner? Doesn’t he realize how many students will be trying to slaughter him in there? Even immortals can get killed if they’re not part of a big team. It’s possible to be ambushed by thousands upon thousands of enemy students. If they use spell formations, it’s possible that they could even cut down Demolishers!”

“Hmph! We Titan Emperor Collegium societies all agreed to team up. That's the only way to stay alive in the Immortal Army Battlefield. People as arrogant as Yang Qi have only one fate in store for them: death.”

“I've seen a lot of arrogant geniuses in my time, but I’ve never seen someone as unscrupulous as Yang Qi. Hopefully he gets killed, and we can somehow swoop in and get his godworm eggs.”

“Enough blathering. We’re going into the Immortal Army Battlefield, so we need to focus on sticking together. Otherwise, we're dead.”

“Well that’s obvious. Thankfully, our society chiefs all imbued nascent divinity will into our spell formations and magical devices. We’re definitely going to take out some enemy students this time.”

After the students entered the Immortal Army Battlefield, the Plane of Initiation settled into silence.

“What do you think, Supreme Rector?” one of the initiators said. “We picked the best students, and even imbued them with nascent divinity power. We’re definitely going to do well this time. We’ll definitely kill more enemies than we lose students.”

“We need to keep a close eye on Yang Qi,” the supreme rector replied. “It’s obvious that he’s obstinate and unruly, and in no way loyal to our collegium. If we get the chance, we definitely need to put him down and take all of his treasures."

“Yes,” another initiator said. “The leaders of the Hall of Beheadings and Executions and the Beastmaster Society disguised themselves as students and entered the Immortal Army Battlefield. And they weren’t the only ones. The society chiefs of the Everlasting Society and the Hegemon’s Society also went in. With so many people in there to cause problems for Yang Qi, he’s definitely going to end up dead.”

“I’ve confirmed that the Invincible Dugu already ascended,” the supreme rector said. “Considering that, we don’t have anything to worry about. In the past, we might not have been able to deal with Yang Qi. But he’s a villainous schemer, and has plenty of treasure that he never donated to the collegium. Considering how much of a rebel he is, we need to get rid of him as soon as possible. Otherwise, we might have a problem maintaining our control and power of the collegium.”

“By the way,” one of the initiators said, “if you’re certain the Invincible Dugu has ascended, and Yang Qi is stuck in the Immortal Army Battlefield, then why don't we attack the Sage Monarch planetary system and capture his clan and his mother? That way we can be prepared on all fronts.”

The supreme rector considered the suggestion for a moment, then said, “We could do that. However, I'm worried about Yang Qi’s clone. If we did something like that, his true self would be notified immediately and he might do something unexpected. If he really does command the godly laws of space, he might be able to leave the Immortal Army Battlefield, which would be disastrous.”

“So we just wait patiently and watch how the situation develops,” another initiator said. Turning to the initiator Yang Qi had initially dealt with, he said, “Old Yu, you were the one who met with Yang Qi to begin with. Did you get any useful information?”

“Nothing,” was the reply. “He’s a tough nut to crack, that kid. Very disrespectful. And now that he’s the society chief of the Invincible Society, that makes him no less influential than us. Not even I could keep him under control.”

Inside, that very same initiator was thinking, ‘I tried hard to find that yellow-garbed young man with the buzz cut, but couldn’t get any concrete information. The society chiefs are always accepting new students, and not even an initiator like me can check through all of them. However, based on what clues I did turn up, I have a sneaky suspicion the Beastmaster Society is involved….’

The man had hoped to keep the information to himself and be the sole beneficiary, but unfortunately hadn’t acquired any information he could use.

‘Hmph! I imbued my nascent divinity power into one of the vice-rectors. Let’s see if he can uncover any information. If Yang Qi and the young man in yellow are archenemies, they’ll definitely clash in the Immortal Army Battlefield. When that happens, I’ll find out and be the fisherman to their sandpiper and clam.’

A sinister smile creeped out across the face of the initiator.

WHIZZZ!

The gateway to the Immortal Army Battlefield closed.

Inside, Yang Qi found himself in an immense, seemingly endless world. Almost immediately, he felt like he had run into a powerful barrier. The space around him thrummed with an iron-clad battle spirit that battered into him, going to show how sturdy the space was here.

Landing on the ground, he looked around and saw mountains, rivers, and other terrain features. When he unleashed an experimental fist strike, space sank in, accompanied by a sound like the grating of metal.

‘So they have warding spells set up here to make the place incredibly sturdy. Seems to me that not even Demi-Immortals would be able to move about easily. Of course, compared to the greyspace of the Hell of Mahānata, this is like nothing.’ Shaking his head, Yang Qi looked up and saw a hazy blue sky overhead, stretching up so high it was impossible to tell its height. The ground beneath his feet was pockmarked and damaged, making the entire place seem wild and desolate. It really did look like some war had been fought here in the past.

He stamped his foot down, and the ground violently trembled as rifts opened up here and there.

“Let’s get going, Junior Brother!” Sword Seventeen said. “The other students will be here soon, and we want to stay out of their sight. There will probably be society chiefs in disguise amongst them.”

“Oh?” Yang Qi said in surprise. “I thought that only students could go to the Immortal Army Battlefield. Isn’t that the rule set by the immortal worlds?”

“Who said anything about a rule like that? Any expert from the mortal world can participate. Even the supreme rector could come if he wanted to. But people like him usually live like princes. They won’t do anything unless it provides a chance to ascend to the immortal world. Don’t forget, there are millions of top experts here, and they can use deadly spell formations. There was once when a supreme rector did go to the Immortal Army Battlefield, then got mobbed by students and killed. Those students got a huge reward from the immortal worlds and quickly ascended. You see, personal strength and power aren’t as important here as the strength of one’s team or group. Not even a Paragon Demi-Immortal could stand up to a spell formation powered by tens of thousands of weaker students.”

“Well, they’re complete trash,” Yang Qi said. “I'm a Greater Demi-Immortal, and not even a billion other Greater Demi-Immortals could do anything to me.”

“That’s obvious, Junior Brother. We're invincible, as everyone knows! However, there’s one important question. Can you summon armies of fiend-devils from the Hell of Mahānata here?”

“Of course. Not even the warding spells they have set could cause problems for me. When I was in the Hell of Gloom and Darkness I acquired the will of an ancient god, which significantly improved my God Legion Seal. This Immortal Army Battlefield is a thing of immortals, and obviously can't compare at all to my God Legion Seal.” He waved his hand and there was a sudden pulse of devil energy. “In fact, I can now connect directly to both the Hell of Mahānata and the Hell of Gloom and Darkness. I'd say that nobody on this battlefield could possibly defeat me.”

Smiling broadly, Sword Seventeen said, “You know what, Junior Brother? Master really knew what he was doing when he put you in charge of the Invincible Society. I'm going to bet that guy in yellow is here, so if we find him, we should kill him. Maybe you can’t use those legacy medallions of King Immortal-Slayer, but I could. And if we could control the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, we would be far more powerful than right now. In fact, we could purge the Titan Emperor Collegium, and even kill the supreme rector.”

Chapter 492: Enemies Everywhere

“Let’s go,” Yang Qi said. “I can sense an aspect of space up ahead where some fighting is already breaking out. It’s not power from the Titan Emperor Collegium, so it must be from some other planetary system.”

Yang Qi and Sword Seventeen immediately shot forward into the folds of space.

Suddenly, a peal of laughter rang out. “Someone took the bait, boys! Turns out it was worth it to lay a trap here. It's two students from the Titan Emperor Heaven. Kill them!  Every student we kill is worth points!”

As the voice rang out, rumbling sounds filled the area and the power of a spell formation rose up.

Countless streams of lightning turned into a huge, heavenly net, in the middle of which were numerous eyes formed of electricity. Experts from another collegium lurked in the eyes, each and every one of them radiating auras of avarice, ferocity, bloodthirstiness, and slaughter.

“It's the famous true-empyrean Thunder-Lightning Void-Shattering Immortal Formation from the Great Metropolis Collegium!” Sword Seventeen exclaimed. “Watch out, Junior Brother. These people must have figured out where the students from the Titan Emperor planetary system would emerge and set this trap for us.”

“We’ll be fine. I’ll just break the formation!” Yang Qi threw his hands out to meet the dense net of lightning. As he drew on the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, the projection of a godmammoth appeared above his head. It swished its trunk out and inhaled the lightning, and in the blink of an eye, the formation became very weak.

“Eternal Heavenly Aria!” Next, halos of blessing sprang up around Yang Qi.

RUMBLE!

He was like a wild beast as he tore his way through the spell formation, destroying everything in his path as he headed toward one of the eyes of lightning.

The expert in the eye wore dark blue robes embroidered with heavenly cities and palaces, garb unique to the Great Metropolis planetary system.

The fact that Yang Qi was closing in on him was obviously a big shock. Shooting to his feet, he said, “Who goes there? How dare you encroach on the eye of our immortal formation? I'm an elysian child from the Great Metropolis Collegium, fool! If you want to hand your life over to me, fine, I’ll take it!”

Shink!

He drew an enormous saber that crackled with lightning, then swept it out in front of him in a godly display of saber technique.

“Saber Slashes the Starry River!”

Scintillating saber light appeared, along with an eternal starry river, which then exploded, sending starry shrapnel out to destroy the void. Obviously, this saber move was a boundless divine ability from the Great Metropolis Collegium, a thing of profound mystery, something that could easily cleave any opponent in half.

However, when the saber light reached Yang Qi, he simply reached out with the Hand of the One God and grabbed it.

Crack! Snap!

The saber shattered and the elysian child staggered backward, coughing up gobs of blood. He had tried to evade Yang Qi’s assault, but failed.

Yang Qi stepped forward and unleashed several moves from the Hand of the One God, all of which contained millions upon millions of variations.

RUMBLE!

The elysian child shrieked in agony as his body was smashed into a pancake of gore, which was subsequently burned up by sagelight until he was nothing but ash.

Yang Qi then attacked left and right, punching holes in space and destroying any enemy student he saw. Pops rang out like firecrackers and dazzling light shone everywhere. It only took one blow for him to kill an elysian child, so there was little need to even mention the weaker students. Some who wore royal robes were obviously royal students from the Great Metropolis Collegium, yet they dropped like flies.

As he killed the enemy, Yang Qi saw their discarnate souls being sucked into him, where they formed a number. That was a function of the natural law of the Immortal Army Battlefield, which would keep track of the number of kills one had carried out. It was how rewards would be doled out later.

Ding. Dong.

Back in the Titan Emperor Collegium, on the Plane of Initiation, a shining light appeared, covered with a list of names. Of course, Yang Qi’s name was there, and it was rising high, while other names fell off the list. Already, his name shone with a bright light, compared to most of the other names. In the blink of an eye, he occupied the first place spot.

“He already killed an elysian child and that many royal students?”

The supreme rector and the initiators were completely taken aback. “How could he be so strong? My clone in there hasn’t even laid eyes on him yet, and he already has such a high score. If he makes it out alive, the reward he’ll get from the immortal world will be incredible. We won’t be able to stop him at that point! And the more enemy students he kills in there, the worse it will be. He might even achieve cultivation base breakthroughs. If that happens… nobody will be able to do anything about him!”

“Don't worry. The more he sticks out now, the faster he’ll get killed. In the Immortal Army Battlefield, there are as many experts as the sky has clouds. A lot of old-timers send incarnations in there to rack up points. Yang Qi is just going to attract their attention and get cut down. That will be our time to make a move.”

“Exactly. Make sure to keep track of him. Don't let him out of our sight!”

“We need to get our own incarnations to work immediately!”

“Yes. I depleted myself by eighty percent to form that incarnation. We have to track down Yang Qi.”

Meanwhile, the army of students from the Titan Emperor Collegium had entered the Immortal Army Battlefield and split up into countless teams. Numerous spell formations had already sprung up like mountain peaks, formations which pulsed with immortal true energy. All of them were essentially immortal items.

The spell formation set up by the Beastmaster Society appeared to be formed from the skeletons of numerous snakes, and the primal-chaos vital energy it belched took the form of a primal-chaos elder-snake.

That snake could easily devour heaven and earth, and the swish of its tail was an attack most people could never block.

It was a formation Liege Beast had gained enlightenment of thanks to his study of the imperial snakecharms, and was one of the most formidable presentations among all of the societies. It was also why the Beastmaster Society usually suffered the fewest casualties, and accumulated the most points, in the Immortal Army Battlefield.

“Liege Beast, Yang Qi just disappeared into that fold of space. Let’s follow him!”

Standing in front of Liege Beast was a middle-aged man clad in a suit of armor. The armor featured mysterious decorations, and it was hard to say what it was forged from. Gold, steel, silk, hemp, bamboo? Perhaps even keratin. No one could tell. However, it was very impressive and would keep the wearer’s aura completely cloaked, making him seem invincible.

Furthermore, no one would ever be able to see exactly who was wearing the armor.

The person concealed in the armor was the yellow-garbed young man with the buzz cut. It was a magical treasure that was intended to perform two functions. First, conceal his identity, and second, to make him strong enough to be able to kill Yang Qi.

“What kind of armor is that?” Liege Beast asked. “It’s not an immortal item. How come I can’t get a read on it? It's so strong!”

“It’s something I came across in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart,” replied the young man in yellow. “It’s called the Horned King Armor. It was created by a contemporary of the ancient King Immortal-Slayer, a powerful expert named King Wilds-Horn. According to legend, the armor was stitched together from eight thousand separate fragments. The complete set can be transformed into a wild and powerful god of ancient times. Right now, I only have a few pieces. Even so, with this armor, I'm invulnerable to anyone other than an immortal.”

“So it's a magical treasure similar to the imperial snakecharms,” Liege Beast said. “Miraculous! Chancellor Demi-Immortal, that daoist robe of yours is also an unparalleled immortal item, isn’t it? And you also have a godly-class energy art. Seems to me you’ll be achieving another breakthrough soon.”

Chancellor Demi-Immortal had also advanced significantly. Not only did he have a godly-class energy art, but he also had the True Gentleman Twin Polarity’s cassock, which caused him to pulse with a mysterious aura. Of course, to Liege Beast, he was still a weakling. The only one Liege Beast cared about was the young man in yellow.

“You flatter me….” Chancellor Demi-Immortal said, aware that Liege Beast wasn’t impressed with him. However, he managed to force a smile onto his face for a moment.

“Let’s not waste time talking. We need to track down Yang Qi.” Swish! The young man in yellow flew into the air and vanished.

Snorting coldly, Liege Beast followed.

As for Chancellor Demi-Immortal, he looked at them for a moment, then used some special technique to turn invisible and followed them. Although he wasn’t particularly strong compared to everyone else, he still hoped to jump out from the shadows at a certain point to gain some benefit.

Even as the three of them headed out, there were other mysterious figures who were tracking them, like orioles stalking a mantis.

**

“Kill him! Whoever this guy is, kill him! How dare he burst into our immortal formation and kill so many people.”

“This could be a big blow to our Great Metropolis Collegium!”

The enormous spell formation of lightning covered countless tens of thousands of kilometers, and had too many lightning eyes to count, each of which was occupied by an enemy student. And Yang Qi was going from one to another with impunity.

Each blow he struck was a fatality, with the spell formation eyes being powerless against the Hand of the One God. None of the enemy students could do anything to stand up to him.

Eventually, Yang Qi realized that the formation was being powered by a thousand flags that were stabbed into the void, each one of them covered with motifs of wind and lightning.

Chapter 493: Overlords Fight

‘Those magical flags are powering the formation,’ he thought. ‘They’re definitely not the handiwork of mortals. They must have been made by a Demolisher. But what level, I wonder? The Demolishing level is broken up into nine stages, but I haven’t found what those stages are, yet. In any case, I'm going to take this spell formation!’

The true-empyrean Thunder-Lightning Void-Shattering Immortal Formation was made up of over a thousand flags that, when powered by cultivators, unleashed protomagnetic power and deadly lightning. It could even function to absorb the power of heavenly tribulations.

An immortal formation like this could be a big boost to the Sage Monarch planetary system, so there was no way he would just pass it up.

Considering how many spell formation eyes there were, Yang Qi had no idea how long it would take him to wrest control of it. Therefore, he held nothing back and resorted immediately to his most deadly trump cards.

“Hell Portals!”

One Hell Portal after another popped into being, seething with armies of fiend-devils that immediately began pouring out into the open.

Seventh and eighth order fiend-devils instantly swarmed the spell formation. As they moved along, they ripped out the banners that had been stabbed into the void.

A moment later, the spell formation began to collapse and the lightning that had filled such a large area began to fizzle.

“Kill everyone,” Yang Qi said, waving his hand to send the fiend-devils into the shape of an enormous devil-ghost head that consumed every enemy student in sight.

Yang Qi had no idea how many points he was earning from all this, but in the Plane of Initiation, his name shone with blinding light, with all the other names being dark in comparison. That formation had been powered by three or four thousand students, and all of them had been wiped out.

Suddenly, a violet conglomeration of light appeared in Yang Qi’s palm, within which was a host of roughly a thousand flags. All of them were immortal items which contained dazzling lightning fays.

“Junior Brother,” Sword Seventeen said, “those things contained sealed lightning spirits from an immortal world. That set of flags is a precious treasure the likes of which you hardly ever see in the mortal world! Lightning spirits like that can’t even be born outside of the immortal world!”

“The lightning in the immortal world surpasses that from the mortal world by hundreds of millions of times.” Yang Qi shook his head. “This spell formation will be great for the defenses of the Sage Monarch planetary system. These pieces of trash had no idea how to even unlock its full potential. But I'm different. Let my myriad of devils power the banners!”

RUUUUUUMBLE!

The host of fiend-devils he had summoned all roared as they took control of the banners and activated the spell formation. Instantly, pillars of lightning shot up and a host of entities appeared, including lightning spirits, dragons, snakes, horses, birds, and immortals.

It was obvious that the spell formation was already far more powerful than it had been before.

As Yang Qi studied the spell formation, his God Legion Seal suddenly stirred. ‘Hmm. Someone’s following me. That aura seems familiar.’

Tightening the focus of the God Legion Seal, he saw an image of the yellow-garbed young man with the buzz cut, with three legacy medallions on his person.

‘It's him again.’ Yang Qi’s eyes flashed. ‘Three legacy medallions from King Immortal-Slayer. That means he must have found the Crown Prince’s medallion, and his cultivation base has improved. It might be hard to kill him now, but not necessarily impossible.’

“Let’s get out of here, Elder Brother,” Yang Qi said. Retracting the spell formation, he pulled Sword Seventeen into the God Legion Paradise and vanished.

A short while later, the young man in yellow appeared, along with Liege Beast. “He's gone already. He killed all those students and even took the spell formation. He’s getting stronger every moment.”

“Based on the aura, this must have been the true-empyrean Thunder-Lightning Void-Shattering Immortal Formation from the Great Metropolis Collegium. And he defeated it. Of course, that means the Lightning Society from the Great Metropolis Collegium is going to be furious with him. Their society chief is Lei Jiuzhou, who I'm familiar with. He’s been a top expert since before my time, and is half a step into the Demolishing level. I wouldn't be surprised if he’s here in the Immortal Army Battlefield as well. The Great Metropolis Collegium has always been at odds with us, so there’s no way that Lei Jiuzhou won’t retaliate for the deaths of so many of his disciples. Let’s wait and see what happens.”

“Is that so?” the young man said with a mysterious smile. “Alright, let’s keep following him.”

The terrain in the depths of the Immortal Army Battlefield was extremely rugged. Here and there, dazzling light would shine up as armies of students clashed. Spell formations were at play, unleashing devastation between the various forces. Students with all sorts of uniforms charged across the battlefield with bloodshot eyes as they rained carnage on each other.

The overall terrain was varied. There were plains, seas, mountains, deserts, and also numerous hidden planes of existence. The entire place seemed profoundly ancient.

In a certain location known to be particularly dangerous, tens of thousands of students were gathered in front of a winding mountain range of immense height. The mountains seemed to connect to the sky itself and ran on without end, glittering with colorful light that caused the space-time around them to twist and distort. Shockingly, these mountains were not made of soil or rock, but rather, protomagnetic true stone. This was a naturally-formed part of the Immortal Army Battlefield, not a spell formation.

The host of students gathered here wore the uniforms of the Lightning Society from the Great Metropolis Collegium. They were from the same society as the students that Yang Qi had just massacred.

As for why they were gathered here, it was hard to say.

There were many hidden dragons and crouching tigers among this group of tens of thousands of students, figures of immense power and ability. However, the most notable among them was a burly man clad in a suit of armor that crackled with lightning. He held a spear in his hand that had been forged from lightning itself, and he stood ramrod straight in front of the host of students.

He was the society chief, Lei Jiuzhou.

Next to Lei Jiuzhou was a female disciple who said, “Master, these protomagnetic mountains are a natural stronghold, and one of the most dangerous locations in the Immortal Army Battlefield. Supposedly, they hold the legacy of an ancient immortal, named Truelord Polar Light. The śarīra of the Preheaven Magnetic King is also here, correct?”

Strangely, when this young woman spoke, she remained absolutely still, almost as if she were a mountain. Her forehead seemed to contain the brewing power of an entire minor world of lightning and she seemed to pulse with an aura that bordered on a Demolisher. It actually seemed that she might ascend to the immortal world at any moment. Just like Lei Jiuzhou, she was halfway into the Demolishing level.

“That’s exactly right. The legacy of Truelord Polar Light isn’t worth thinking about. However, the śarīra of the Preheaven Magnetic King is nothing to look down on. He suffered untold hardships to reach the level of cultivation that he did. The energy arts of our Lightning Society can be used to control primeval god lightning, and as we all know, lightning comes from explosions of protomagnetic power and the perfect intersection of yin and yang. That’s why lightning cultivators first need to cultivate the powers of magnetism. And thus, the śarīra of the Preheaven Magnetic King, which abounds with primal-chaos magnetic power, is vastly superior to anything from Truelord Polar Light.

“There are many important legacies hidden in these mountains, thus we don’t need to participate in the general slaughter. Once we get that śarīra, our cultivation will advance by leaps and bounds and we’ll be able to easily hold our own against immortals. Incidentally, you might be the same level as me, halfway into the Demolishing level. But you absolutely, positively must not rush into your next breakthrough. Build up the energy you need before you try to ascend. If we ascend to the Great Metropolis Heaven as weaklings, we would be captured, enslaved, and end up working in the mines. Ascending with the proper reserves of power is the only way to succeed at becoming an immortal.”

Lei Jiuzhou stood there with his hands clasped behind his back as he reveled in his knowledge of the mountains they were about to enter.

POP!

Suddenly, a loud sound could be heard from within the female disciple's robe. Expression flickering, she pulled out a mirror, which revealed the news about Yang Qi killing their fellow disciples and taking the spell formation.

“Master,” she said through gritted teeth, “someone just slaughtered a group of our Lightning Society disciples, and took the Thunder-Lightning Void-Shattering Immortal Formation. Dammit. Who is that guy?”

“One person? Or a team?” Lei Jiuzhou asked, turning to look at her.

“One,” she replied. “He actually summoned a whole army of fiend-devils who helped him win the battle. Then he disappeared with the formation. That formation was a reward from the immortal world! We can’t let him just take it!”

“I know exactly who he is,” Lei Jiuzhou said. “He’s Yang Qi from the Titan Emperor Collegium. He caused a huge scene there not so long ago; he’s only a first order Demi-Immortal, but slaughtered an elder king and decorated the gate of his society with his head. The news spread fast, so lots of the collegiums know about it. As we probably should have expected, he's putting on quite the show here in the Immortal Army Battlefield.”

“Now that you mention it, I remember hearing about that.” All of a sudden, the female disciple's eyes sparkled with interest. “Back when the Hell of Euphoria invaded the Titan Emperor Collegium, they lost a lot of geniuses, so it’s somewhat of a surprise that a person like this appeared in the Yore-Wilds. Of course, the more you stick out, the more people want to kill you. Everyone likes a challenge!”

“You want to go kill him? I approve. In fact, I'm interested in killing him too. I imagine the experts from a lot of the collegiums feel the same. Send messages to tell everyone where he is. Let them try to handle him first. For the moment, we’ll sit back and try to find the śarīra of the Preheaven Magnetic King. Once we get it, we can be a lot more confident in making a move. Not only will we be able to kill Yang Qi, but we’ll also be able to take out a lot of the other geniuses.”

Chapter 494: More and More Emerge

“What? You mean that vicious Yang Qi from the Titan Emperor Collegium is here? And he declared war on the Great Metropolis Collegium?”

“Who’s Yang Qi? How come I've never heard of him before?”

“Have you been living under a rock or something? The biggest news lately is about a new genius in the Titan Emperor Collegium, a guy named Yang Qi. He killed an elder king there, and even fought some of their vice-rectors. The craziest thing is that he's only a first order Demi-Immortal. Everybody’s been talking about it.”

“He’s that strong? Where did he come from? He must have benefited from some immense good fortune. If we can kill him, we can take that good fortune for our own, along with whatever other magical treasures he has.”

“Of course we need to kill him. The longer he stays alive here in the Immortal Army Battlefield, the bigger the threat is to all of us.”

“Kill him! We have to kill him!”

News began to spread rapidly, and before long just about everyone in the Immortal Army Battlefield knew that Yang Qi had slaughtered the disciples of the Lightning Society from the Great Metropolis Collegium.

Experts and geniuses of cultivation always had high ambitions, therefore a whole host of people already wanted to find Yang Qi and take their shot at killing him. It was a common thing for the top geniuses to view themselves as unparalleled under heaven, people that no one could beat in battle.

“Do you want to find more enemies to slaughter, Junior Brother?” Sword Seventeen asked as they flew along inside Yang Qi’s God Legion Paradise. Yang Qi had used the power of his primeval godworm to throw up a shield that blended perfectly with the space around them, leaving no trace of their passage and making it impossible to see them.

When one had mastered the godly laws of space, it was a simple thing to become invisible.

“No slaughter for now,” Yang Qi said as he sat cross-legged. “Let’s wait and see what happens after the incident from before.

“Our enemies want others to do their dirty work for them, but I'm going to make them eat their own medicine. I couldn't care less about the so-called geniuses from all of the collegiums. But that buzz cut kid in yellow isn’t from the mortal world like everyone else. It seems highly likely that he traveled here from the future, possibly because of King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy medallions. He’s a big threat to me, thus, I need him out of the picture. Immediately.”

“I agree,” Sword Seventeen said. “The mere sight of that punk disagrees with me.”

By this point, Yang Qi was so thoroughly invisible that not even his aura could be detected by any outsider.

Further back, Liege Beast, Chancellor Demi-Immortal and the young man in yellow all stopped in their tracks.

“What's going on? Why did his energy fluctuations suddenly vanish?” The yellow-garbed young man looked off into the distance. “Don’t tell me he realized we were following him.”

“I doubt it,” said Chancellor Demi-Immortal. “It’s probably just a precaution against enemies in general. Strutting around in the open here is a good way to get killed. Trust me, I know Yang Qi better than just about anyone, and he’s full of craft and cunning. We'd better go into hiding ourselves, otherwise we just might end up getting killed by his other enemies.”

“You’re right,” the young man replied. After all, he had suffered at Yang Qi’s hand before. “He's definitely not easy to deal with. If we're not careful, our pursuit is going to turn into a reverse trap.” Suddenly, he started to fade out of visual sight. “Immortal-Slayers Power: World of Kings!”

A new world appeared around him, filled with the aura of a king. It surrounded both Chancellor Demi-Immortal and Liege Beast, then vanished into the folds of space.

“This is the power of King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy medallion, the World of Kings. Its power exists on a higher level than most planes of existence and will ensure that no one can detect our presence. We are now like monarchs that exist above the dao of heaven, able to calmly gaze about the Immortal Army Battlefield.”

“This World of Kings is so strong!” Liege Beast said. “It even distorts magical laws. It’s like the kingdom of an immortal. No one will be able to detect our presence now, much less see us.”

“Yang Qi has a powerful personal domain of his own, so it’s only natural that I’d want to compete with him. The World of Kings came with the third of King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy medallions. With it, I'm safe from virtually any danger I might encounter.” The young man burst out into hearty laughter.

However, even as his laughter rang out something slammed into the World of Kings.

BOOOOM!

In the blink of an eye, cracks and fissures spread out over its greyspace, making it seem like it might collapse.

“What?” the young man blurted, looking around in shock.

SWISH!

A beam of light entered the greyspace of the World of Kings and headed straight toward the young man.

There was no time to ponder what to do, so he unleashed a devastating fist strike, which slammed into the beam of light. The World of Kings faded out of existence, ejecting its three occupants into the open.

Looking over at a distant, shadowy figure, the young man said, “Yang Qi? Is that you?! How did you see me? How did you do it?”

The shadowy figure blurred toward him, and stopped only a few dozen meters away a moment later. Of course, it was none other than Yang Qi.

“It’s been a while since we met face-to-face,” Yang Qi said. He chuckled. “Who would have guessed that you really would track down that third legacy medallion? You know, if you do things like the Crown Prince, you’re not going to meet a good end. Remember, it was me who slaughtered him.”

“You might have a high cultivation base, Yang Qi, and you might have the God Legion Seal, but don’t forget that the seal is broken. And problems have arisen amongst the legion of gods. Heaven and earth are changing! After the gods experience nirvanic rebirth, a new epoch will come about. I'm here to watch that happen; and it's only by getting back to that era of godly nirvanic rebirth that I can shed the most powerful fetters of all and become something that surpasses the gods.”

Other than Yang Qi, no one present had a clue what the yellow-garbed young man was talking about.

However, at this point he ignored the young man in yellow and shifted his gaze to the left. “Well, hello there, Chancellor Demi-Immortal! In case you forgot, I used to be a student at your Demi-Immortal Institute. Sadly, thanks to you, I ended up eradicating the institute’s core teachings and doctrines. Oh, and I killed your daughter too. Sorry about that.”

“You monster!” Chancellor Demi-Immortal growled, his voice alive with hatred. “I should never have let you stay alive. If I had known how things would turn out, I would have had the Crown Prince kill you!”

Yang Qi snorted coldly. “Even now, you persist in your obstinate ways. You know, if you hadn’t tried to jump in and save the Crown Prince during our duel, your daughter wouldn’t be dead right now. Instead of remaining impartial, you chose sides. So don't blame me. That said, if you want to reunite with your daughter, I’d be happy to kill you right here and now.”

Obviously, there was no way Yang Qi was going to let Chancellor Demi-Immortal off the hook for everything that happened in the past.

Hardly able to keep his voice steady, Chancellor Demi-Immortal said, “Don’t forget, Yang Qi, I have that aunt of yours under my control.”

“My Aunt Susu?” Yang Qi’s eyes shone like beacons of light. “She has a Seven Apertures Sprite Body, and she's long since joined that ancient race of people to further her cultivation.”

Chancellor Demi-Immortal burst out laughing. “I guess you didn’t know that one of the founding patriarchs of the Demi-Immortal Institute resides amongst the Spritefolk. I’ve already been in contact with him, and all it will take is a single word from me to cause endless deadly trouble for your aunt. What do you think? Still refuse to bend the knee to me? Maybe if you grovel and beg, I’ll spare your aunt's life.”

“The only thing you’re doing, Chancellor Demi-Immortal, is ensuring that you die sooner rather than later. If my Aunt Susu passes away, fine. I can resurrect her. Once I reach the Demolishing level and become an immortal, my energy arts will produce a Wheel of Fate. With its power, resurrecting people becomes simple. You can’t beat me in a fight, Chancellor. I'm a god who controls my own fate, and as my energy arts grow more powerful, any hope you have to survive grows thinner and thinner.”

“You!” Chancellor Demi-Immortal said through gritted teeth. “You’re not going to leave the Immortal Army Battlefield alive!”

At this point, Yang Qi turned his attention back to the yellow-garbed young man.

“Brother,” he said, “we have no real grudges or animosity between us. You’re a miracle, and I'm a miracle. So why don’t we just join forces? We could definitely dominate the mortal world, then move on to control the immortal world. What do you think? If you agree to join me, and kill Chancellor Demi-Immortal and this society chief, I’ll use my energy arts to help you find the rest of King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy medallions. I know that there are nine in total, and considering you have three, I have the feeling you’ll end up tangling with other foreordained opponents who have medallions. With my help, you could easily kill them all.”

Yang Qi’s glib words caused the yellow-garbed young man’s aura to flicker, as though he were considering the offer.

“You….” Both Chancellor Demi-Immortal and Liege Beast were visibly taken aback, and obviously worried that the young man might actually follow through. And if he betrayed them, it was obvious that they would die in the blink of an eye. With the yellow-garbed young man and Yang Qi on the same side, there wouldn’t be anyone who could stand in their way.

However, after a long moment, the young man started laughing uproariously.

“What’s so funny?” Yang Qi said, frowning. “You don’t like my proposal?”

“No, it’s a great proposal. Really. I like it. And you know, I’d love to work with you. You’re right. Before long I’ll be up against two other opponents who both have legacy medallions. The fighting will be fierce, and whoever comes out on top will be the ultimate successor of King Immortal-Slayer. Unfortunately, we can’t team up. You see, you’re one of the Fateless Ones. You don’t exist in the future.”

Chapter 495: Different Daos

“To people like me, you Fateless Ones are completely terrifying. You exist outside of the bounds of fate, making it impossible to predict anything about you. We Future Ones exist within fate, and, in fact, the whole reason I came here is to change what happens to me. But you have no fate. Our daos are different, thus we can never be on the same side.”

“That’s a pretty preposterous reason to refuse me,” Yang Qi said. He chuckled. “Fate? Complete nonsense. Seizing the moment is the only way to live. If you and I fight each other to the death, we’ll lose out and others will benefit. Don’t you think that would be a bit ironic?”

“It would be,” replied the young man in yellow. “Since you understand that truth, allow me to explain further. I'm not stupid. Even if I killed Chancellor Demi-Immortal and Liege Beast, I know that you would turn on me the instant it served your purposes. I know you, Yang Qi. For example, that Elder Brother of yours. What’s his name? Sword Seventeen, right? You want him to get all of King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy medallions, and have already conspired with him to achieve that very end. You think I didn't know? I would never, ever trust you. Working with you would be like asking a tiger for its skin. I'm interested in staying alive, in case you didn’t realize. Work with you? No, that’s only asking to get killed.”

Yang Qi’s eyes narrowed into slits. “I see. Well, if you refuse to do things the easy way, we’ll do them the hard way. I'm done being polite. The time has come to kill all of you!”

With that, he drew on his energy arts and unleashed a sudden attack.

It was a combination of the Hand of the One God and the Infernal Deity Spear, an attack that shot like a meteor shower to encompass all three of his opponents. Of course, Chancellor Demi-Immortal had the weakest energy arts, making him a prime target.

“Who do you think you are, Yang Qi?” Liege Beast shouted in fury. “You think you can kill me, just like that? Give me your imperial snakecharms immediately! If you beg for your life, I’ll only cripple your energy arts!”

As far as he was concerned, Yang Qi was from the junior generation and wasn’t worth even worrying about. Liege Beast was a mighty society chief, making him as important as the initiators. Furthermore, he had been famous since ancient times. To have a person—essentially a child—threatening him made him so angry he was about ready to explode.

“Back me up, you two. I'm going to kill this dirty little swine! Just make sure we don't get ambushed while I do. This is the Immortal Army Battlefield, so you never know what devils might attack at any moment.” Liege Beast exhaled, causing primal-chaos paleo-energy to turn into the shape of a snake that quickly destroyed Yang Qi’s attacks.

Then forty-nine imperial snakecharms appeared, transforming into a primal-chaos elder-snake that vastly surpassed Yang Qi’s. It was the kind of thing that could devour heaven and earth and destroy all types of vital energy.

“Get ready to face my godly-class energy art, Yang Qi. Wild-Beast Void-Devouring Fiend-God Grand True Energy!”

AAAAOOOWWWW!

Ten thousand howling beasts appeared behind him, each one of them fiendish and ancient in appearance. Looking like the most terrifying of killers, they lunged at Yang Qi.

At this point, the yellow-garbed young man waved his sleeve and pulled Chancellor Demi-Immortal to his side.

“Don’t be alarmed,” he said to Chancellor Demi-Immortal. “Your fate is already set, and it’s not one of death. You’ll definitely ascend and become an immortal, after which you’ll come across immense good fortune. In the future, you’ll be very influential. Eventually, you’ll become a Godmyth who leads an entire immortal world. One of the reasons I'm helping you is because of your future destiny as a powerful expert. In any case, you really don't need to worry. Just watch Liege Beast and Yang Qi fight. Liege Beast is a half-Demolisher, so with his Wild-Beast Void-Devouring Fiend-God Grand True Energy, he’s like a tiger that has grown wings. Yang Qi won’t find it easy to kill him. Besides, if I have the chance, I’ll take those twenty-eight imperial snakecharms of his, which will weaken him severely!”

“Hold on,” Chancellor Demi-Immortal said, ignoring most of what the young man had just said, and focusing on the part that related to him. “That’s my fate? I'm really going to rule an immortal world?”

“Yes, exactly. If you didn’t have a good fate, why would I work with you? Of course, you need to ascend to an immortal world first. Then I can help you find the good fortune you need. Thankfully for you, now that you have me on your side you won’t even need to reach the Demolishing level to do that. We can go to the immortal worlds above via the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Again, don't worry. Let’s focus on weakening Yang Qi to the point where he’ll have trouble ever recovering. Then we can go search for that good fortune of yours. I know exactly where it is.”

“Alright, but isn’t my fate tangled up with Yang Qi now?” Chancellor Demi-Immortal asked. “Couldn’t it change? Should I really follow the same path now?”

“It’s hard to say for sure,” the young man replied casually. “That’s why you need to stick with me. After all, your ultimate fate is actually a dismal one. Even though you become the ruler of an immortal world, you eventually end up getting killed. And not by a random person, but by Yang Qi’s father. He kills you with his own hands.”

“What? Yang Qi’s father?”

“Yep. He’s a very enigmatic and powerful person, and his true identity is cloaked in mystery. I would guess that he’s a Future One like me. You see, in the future, he has no son named Yang Qi. The fact that Yang Qi popped up is a potential catastrophe of epic proportions. Obviously, his father realized that he was a Fateless One, which is why he tried to kill him. The only question is how Yang Qi managed to escape with his life. Alright, enough of this topic. Let’s watch the fight playing out.” Raising his voice, he said, “Don’t show me any of your weaknesses, Yang Qi. Otherwise you’re dead!”

Booms and explosions were ringing out nonstop as Yang Qi and Liege Beast fought. Liege Beast had profound techniques, and was indeed halfway into the Demolishing level. And ever since the young man in yellow gave him a godly-class energy art, his imperial snakecharms had become even more formidable.

The primal-chaos elder-snake harried Yang Qi relentlessly, and countless other beasts popped up to attack him, as though the Immortal Army Battlefield were filled with primordial chaos that could give birth to the most primeval creatures.

“This is all you can do, Yang Qi? And you dared to kill an elder king? Unfortunately, it’s too late to repent after the fact! Prepare to die!”

Liege Beast leaped up, preparing to crush Yang Qi with an enormous, mountain-like fist strike.

“What the hell is that supposed to be?” Yang Qi said, smiling derisively. Reaching out with the Hand of the One God, he quickly identified the weaknesses in Liege Beast’s cultivation base. At the same time, he unfurled his Angel Wings and shot forward, dodging back and forth between the gaps in the attack until he was right behind Liege Beast. “Haven’t you heard the expression, you could have strolled your way to heaven, but instead, you had to barge into hell!?”

RUMBLE!

The halls of heaven appeared in his left hand, surrounded by dazzling sagelight. At the same time, the inky blackness of hell appeared in his right hand.

Heaven and hell combined into an unprecedented manifestation of his godfist, which slammed into Liege Beast’s defensive true energy.

“Aaaiiiieee!” Liege Beast screamed. His true energy shattered and cracks spread out across his body. That one fist strike had damaged his minor world and severely injured his meridians.

He looked like a cornered wild beast, yet he wasn’t ready to give up.

“Ancient Imperial Snake; King Heaven-Devourer!” he shouted, unleashing another fist strike. Heaven and earth violently trembled as forty-nine imperial snakecharms merged with Liege Beast, transforming him into an enormous scaled creature with the head of a human and a body of a serpent.

It was almost as if he had transformed into King Heaven-Devourer himself, healing his wounds in the process. Glaring at Yang Qi, he said, “Give me your imperial snakecharms. Now! Will of the Heaven-Devourer!”

WHIZZZ!

Shockingly, Yang Qi’s twenty-eight imperial snakecharms suddenly twitched within the God Legion Paradise, as if they might fly toward Liege Beast of their own volition.

The yellow-garbed young man burst out laughing. “I used my legacy medallion to reforge Liege Beast’s imperial snakecharms, Yang Qi! Now he can unlock even more of their secrets! Those twenty-eight imperial snakecharms won’t be yours for much longer!”

Suddenly, he sent out a burst of energy, trying to lock Yang Qi in place on the battlefield. It seemed the young man in yellow was about to make a move!

“Be suppressed!” Yang Qi said, and he began glowing with a bright light that suppressed the power of the imperial snakecharms. Face completely expressionless, he said, “It's a bit too early for you to try to take my imperial snakecharms.”

“Wrong. Now’s the perfect time!” The yellow-garbed young man extended his hand with a flourish and the Immortal-Slayer's War-Halberd appeared. He swept it through the air, causing a crescent-moon-shaped beam of light to shoot out with enough power to split worlds in half. He powered the attack with his cultivation base and King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy medallions, clearly hoping to cleave apart the God Legion Paradise and kill Yang Qi where he stood.

Gong!

Yang Qi thrust the Infernal Deity Spear out to meet the Immortal-Slayer's War-Halberd.

“Nightfall Symphony!” Instantly, music poured out of the spear.

“That’s not going to work!” Liege Beast shouted. “You can’t suppress the will of King Heaven-Devourer! I hereby sacrifice my life force to King Heaven-Devourer! Prepare for the true power of the imperial snakecharms!”

As Liege Beast burned his life force to unleash a primeval secret magic, a new will sprang up within Yang Qi’s imperial snakecharms, the will of some enormous snake from ancient times, something that represented the dao of heaven itself.

BOOM!

The twenty-eight imperial snakecharms suddenly broke free of the fetters of the God Legion Paradise and began flying toward Liege Beast.

Liege Beast burst out into maniacal laughter. “Another twenty-eight imperial snakecharms are mine! I'm going to be as strong as a heaven-immortal! I’ll be able to crush Demolishers! So, Yang Qi, you’re a so-called Fateless One? Now that you’re facing me, all you’re going to do is tremble and die! I’m going to absorb these snakecharms, then carry on the will of King Heaven-Devourer!”

Just as the imperial snakecharms were about to reach Liege Beast, Yang Qi smiled.

“That's some deadly recklessness, my friend.”

Chapter 496: Deadly Recklessness

As the twenty-eight imperial snakecharms entered Liege Beast, immediate transformations occurred. He was bathed with primal-chaos paleo-energy, and the new snakecharms began to fuse with his original ones.

Once the fusion was complete, not even a Demolisher would be able to deal with him.

However, before anything else could happen, something strange began to play out.

The aura of the twenty-eight snakecharms erupted with power and the animadestiny branding marks that Yang Qi had placed on them suddenly revealed the image of an ancient god, an entity more than strong enough to suppress the will of King Heaven-Devourer.

RUUUUUUMBLE!

It was a jade-like god who could transform the entire universe into liquid jade, and who immediately suppressed the forty-nine talismans that Liege Beast had long since collected.

Whizz!

The powers converged and the group fused together, but Yang Qi’s twenty-eight snakecharms were in the dominant position. Then, as one, they lurched free of Liege Beast’s control and shot out of his body.

In the blink of an eye, Liege Beast shrank down as if he had been drained of all his energy.

His human-headed, snake-bodied form shattered, and he anxiously shouted, “Come back! My snakecharms! My power! Come back to me! What’s going on? You belong to me, why would you leave me! Come back!”

Coughing up blood, he flew after the imperial snakecharms.

“Beat it!” Yang Qi said, waving his hand to create a heavenly canopy that blocked Liege Beast’s path. Then he reached out and grabbed the imperial snakecharms.

“Where did you get the will of an ancient god?!” blurted the young man in yellow. He stabbed through the air, becoming one with his halberd as he attempted to stop the imperial snakecharms from changing owners.

“You think you can stop me? Hah. King Heaven-Devourer and King Immortal-Slayer are like nothing to me. The will of an ancient god can crush anything and everything!”

It was no surprise to Yang Qi that the young man would try to stop him; he spun and threw the Infernal Deity Spear with all his might, causing it to spiral forward, radiating an intense gravitational force.

“Not good!” the young man shouted, sending out a stream of battle energy that became a huge vortex filled with an entire army of troops. Countless giant-spirits of battle lunged forward, filling the entire area with uncharacteristically brilliant light.

The two attacks met, and the Infernal Deity Spear shattered into pieces.

However, Yang Qi wasn’t injured at all. Instead, he took advantage of the moment to further harry the yellow-garbed young man. Flying into the air, he said, “Hand of the One God, Boundless Fist Technique. Halls of Heaven, Depths of Hell; Sun and Moon, Immortality!”

In the blink of an eye, boundless fist techniques were unleashed.

He went from Creation to Destruction, and on through the various stances all the way to Reincarnation and Pāramitā. The only thing he held back was the final move, Immortality.

Each move was more shocking than the last, and in the end they formed a perfect cycle of true energy. In that moment, the energy of the fist made it seem as though the One God had come, ready to destroy the universe in his fury.

With those eight stances, Yang Qi’s momentum reached the peak of its potential. He brought forth both heaven and hell, and as he did, netherworldly dragons and heavenly gods appeared.

RUUUUUUMBLE!

With one movement, he grabbed all of the imperial snakecharms.

Once they were in his hand, he made them his own, and the aura of countless primal-chaos elder-snakes raged through him. However, he quickly took control of them with his vital energy and the help of the God Legion Seal.

Crash. Boom.

The forty-nine snakecharms exploded, as all of the warding magics Liege Beast had placed on them were destroyed.

As it happened, Liege Beast coughed up mouthful after mouthful of blood.

He had fused deeply with those talismans, and being ripped away from them badly damaged his vital energy.

“My imperial snakecharms!” Liege Beast screamed hysterically. “I spent blood, sweat, and tears on them! Without them, I’ll never reach immortal ascension! That’s five hundred thousand years of work, gone! Five hundred thousand years!”

“You brought it on yourself,” Yang Qi said. “Not bad. Twenty-eight imperial snakecharms were strong enough, but now I have another forty-nine. Now, not even heaven-immortals could cause a problem for me. It's time to bury the lot of you!” He waved his hand and the space in the area began collapsing.

As of this moment, the twenty-eight imperial snakecharms combined with the forty-nine to make a total of seventy-seven, which could create a divine snake that pulsed with the most ancient of universal power.

It was a level of strength that dwarfed anything from before.

King Heaven-Devourer’s original form was on display, and it was so powerful that this part of the Immortal Army Battlefield couldn’t take it and began crumbling like soft tofu.

In the blink of an eye, Yang Qi’s primal-chaos elder-snake turned and shot toward Liege Beast, Chancellor Demi-Immortal, and the yellow-garbed young man.

“Not good!” the young man said. “Now that he has those imperial snakecharms, we're definitely not a match for him. We can only hope that other people gang up on him.” Because of his Horned King Armor, it was impossible to see how ashen his face was, but Yang Qi had an idea.

The young man had hoped to use Liege Beast’s snakecharms to steal Yang Qi’s. But in the end, he tried to steal a chicken only to end up losing the rice used to lure it.

It was impossible to even calculate how much Yang Qi had benefited. He had more than doubled the number of imperial snakecharms he had originally possessed. With his current primal-chaos elder-snake, he could dominate entire planes of existence, or even devour them. It was far beyond the level of an ordinary immortal item.

Whizz!

The young man in yellow quickly activated his World of Kings and sucked Liege Beast inside. He knew that he couldn't fight Yang Qi right now, and if he didn’t escape he would end up dead.

Yang Qi had nearly killed a half-Demolisher just now, which indicated that few people present were anywhere close to being a match for him. For all intents and purposes, he was unbeatable to anyone under the Demolishing level.

After grabbing Liege Beast, the young man drew on a powerful escape technique. “You just wait, Yang Qi! I can already draw on the power of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart! I own that place now. I'm the king of all worlds!”

All of a sudden, a burst of power from a strange world descended and wrapped up the young man. Somehow, it seemed to contain the aura of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

Yang Qi unleashed a fist strike that smashed the young man’s world to bits, yet the young man was already an illusory projection.

His shattered world faded away along with him, leaving behind no clue that it had ever been there to begin with.

Everything went still.

‘What a pity,’ Yang Qi thought, a very serious expression on his face. ‘He used some power of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart to escape. He’s obviously a lot stronger than the last time we met. If he really gets control of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, I won’t be a match for him.’

Clearly, he would not be killing the young man in yellow today.

However, Yang Qi had taken note of the term ‘Fateless One’. It was a profound topic that he knew deserved further scrutiny, and likely pertained deeply to his own future.

All of a sudden, the yellow-garbed young man’s voice projected into Yang Qi’s mind, albeit quite faintly. “Yang Qi, I already spread word of your position. A lot of people are going to be coming to kill you soon….”

“That’s fine,” Yang Qi projected back. “It just so happens I feel like doing some killing. The souls of some top experts will do a lot to help refine this new primal-chaos elder-snake. It won’t be long before I get back into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Then we’ll see who has the upper hand.”

As Yang Qi stood there, he intentionally released his aura to full effect, as if he were inviting people to come find him. All of a sudden, he was like a shining torch on a dark night.

After all, he really was in the mood to do some killing.

“What? It's Yang Qi? The same one from the Titan Emperor Collegium? I heard that he has a high-level godly-class energy art. If we kill him, we can take it! Who would have thought that the Titan Emperor Collegium would have a genius like that working for them? We have to kill him!”

“Are you serious? There’s no place for your Profound Yang Collegium in this matter! We from the Ignis Flame Collegium will handle it.”

“Hah. That will be up to whoever manages to kill Yang Qi first, don’t you think?”

“Yeah, that’s right. Let’s all attack. He’s like a cornered beast, so it's hard to say who will land the death blow. As for who will get all of his treasures, it will all come down to luck.”

In the briefest of moments, Yang Qi became the main target for everyone in the Immortal Army Battlefield, all of whom took him as little more than an animal to be put down.

He stood there amidst the craters and crevices, the Infernal Deity Spear in his hand, looking up into the sky as the numerous streams of divine will converged on his location.

Chapter 497: A Big Fight

As Yang Qi stood on the pitted and scarred battlefield, countless top experts arrived and killing intent began to fill the area. All of them knew exactly who Yang Qi was, and from the way they carried themselves, it was as if they were all teaming up to take down a devilling sitting on a hoard of treasure.

WHOOSH!

All of a sudden, a shocking beam of sword light sliced through the air, seemingly capable of destroying anything it touched, including greyspaces and dimensional barriers.

Sword Seventeen immediately identified it. “That's the Northern Deity’s Grand Sundering Sword Technique, a top energy art from the Dragon Brilliance Collegium! It’s a secret magic of the dao of the sword, Junior Brother. Be careful! It combines preheaven metallic elements with the dao of the Northern Deity, then adds in eighty-one types of profound yang true flame and the transformations of the five phases. But by cultivating it with the esoteric variations of the sun and moon, it creates an unparalleled and erudite manifestation of the ancient dao of the sword!”

“Is that so?” Yang Qi flicked his finger, sending out a stream of light that instantly shattered the sword energy.

BOOM!

As the scattered bits of sword energy drifted apart, a young man stepped out of thin air. He looked like the embodiment of a sharp sword, capable of slicing through anything that got in his path. His unparalleled dao of the sword was one in which ‘the sword became the body, the body became the dao, the dao became heaven, and heaven became life’.

“I'm Dragon Sun-Chaser, also known as King Sunsword from the Dragon Brilliance Collegium!” He was a Universal Demi-Immortal that was even stronger than the half-Demolisher Liege Beast.

That said, both Yang Qi and the young man in yellow were low-level Demi-Immortals who could fight and kill half-Demolishers.

Yang Qi opened his Lord's Eye to examine Dragon Sun-Chaser and immediately realized that he was immensely strong on a genetic level. ‘This guy’s genes surpass that of an ordinary person by tens of millions of times. I never even imagined that someone like him could exist. Some immortal must have altered his genes and helped him cultivate a profound secret magic.’

In terms of genes, Yang Qi was essentially eight hundred forty million times as strong as an ordinary cultivator, which was really an astonishing thing. Of course, that was all because of the God Legion Seal.

Ordinary geniuses would often be ten times stronger than an ordinary cultivator, or perhaps a hundred times stronger. People who were a thousand or ten thousand times stronger than normal were the type of top apex individuals who only came around once in ten thousand years.

When it came to individuals who were a hundred thousand, a million, or ten million times as strong as ordinary cultivators, they were considered freaks and eccentrics, the type of invincible fighters who were rare even in the immortal worlds. If a cultivator had genes ten million times as strong as ordinary, it meant that person would have ten million times as much power and enlightenment regarding magical laws. Usually, such people either weren’t human, or had some sort of primeval blood.

Once you got past the level of a hundred million, that most definitely wasn’t human, but was more likely related to the blood of a god-spirit. As for Yang Qi, he was eight hundred forty million times stronger than normal, a number that bordered on one billion. Genes like that couldn’t be described by simply talking about the blood of god-spirits. No, there was only one way to describe Yang Qi: Fateless One.

Fate had not decreed that he would exist, yet here he was.

As for the yellow-garbed young man, his genes were roughly a hundred million times as strong as ordinary, making him essentially invincible. Liege Beast was only ten thousand times as strong as normal, so naturally he wasn’t a match for Yang Qi.

At the moment, cultivators whose genes made them ten million times stronger than normal weren’t even worth Yang Qi’s attention.

The stronger one was on a genetic level, then the longer one practiced cultivation the more terrifying the results would be. For example, a Universal Demi-Immortal who was ten million times stronger than normal would be on the same level as a half-Demolisher.

Another example was the Infernalfolk, whose genes were millions of times stronger than normal, but still never surpassed the level of ten million.

The elder king Yang Qi had killed, Kingly Beheader, only had genes which were ten thousand times normal. And Yang Qi had cut him down with impunity.

“Dragon Sun-Chaser from the Dragon Brilliance Collegium….” From what Yang Qi could tell, this arrogant, sword-wielding young man was used to cutting down anyone who got in his way and viewed himself as the ultimate swordsman under heaven. “So you want to kill me too? Why, exactly? I’ve never even met anyone from the Dragon Brilliance Collegium, much less offended one.”

Dragon Sun-Chaser chuckled coldly. “I don’t need a reason to kill people. I heard you’re a top genius, so I came over to have a look for myself. Your genes are strong, that's for sure, so your path of cultivation must have been very astonishing. Luckily for me, I have a great technique for out-of-body incarnations. Do you mind giving me your physical body to use as a host? Of course, I promise to wipe out your nascent divinity quickly beforehand. No pain involved.”

“In your dreams, Dragon Sun-Chaser!” someone said, laughing loudly.

A powerful blast of saber energy filled the area, the kind that could destroy anything in creation. A burly young man appeared, clad in beast hide, with an enormous saber strapped to his back and a profound wild aura surrounding him.

“So, this is Yang Qi?” he said in a deep, booming voice. “He’s mine. His perfect genes would be great for my beast-rearing magic. I’ll transform him into a beast slave with plenty of battle prowess.”

At this point, a new voice rang out. “How come you people from the Ancient Gloom Collegium are all barbarians and savages? Can’t you even try to be civilized?” A young woman stepped forward. “The Titan Emperor Collegium is the archenemy of our Megaplexus Collegium, so this punk Yang Qi is mine for the taking. The rest of you had better back up immediately.”

“Southpalace Jade?!” Dragon Sun-Chaser said. “You people from the Megaplexus Collegium really think a lot of yourselves, don't you? Yang Qi would be perfect for my possession technique. And he has a lot of treasure, too. His perfect genes and blood are going to make a great medicinal pill!"

Southpalace Jade laughed loudly. “Well, considering so many collegiums want this walking treasure trove, I guess it will all come down to who’s stronger and better. Whoever kills him first will get him, right?”

“I want him alive,” said the young man with the saber. “That way I can transform him into a slave beast.”

Yang Qi slowly shook his head. “So I'm just a devilling with treasure to you people?”

“You’re no devilling,” said Southpalace Jade. “You’re a fat sheep! And you’re doomed to die this day, or at least be captured. I’ll give you one chance to come over and surrender to me. If you do, I’ll keep you alive and take you with me back to the Megaplexus Collegium to be my servant. Agreed?”

“Nice try!” Dragon Sun-Chaser said. “Listen, brat. Stick with the Dragon Brilliance Collegium, and I’ll make sure you stay alive. There’s no way Southpalace Jade can keep you safe. We from the Dragon Brilliance Collegium are the descendants of ancient divine dragons. What do you think? Just bow to me and seal your power. That's the only way for you to evade catastrophe.”

“Stick to the Coiling Arc Collegium, punk!”

“Come over to the Highest Clarity Collegium! We're the strongest of all collegiums.”

“Your Highest Clarity Collegium is like nothing compared to the Crapemyrtle Collegium.”

Yang Qi was surrounded by a ring of top experts, all of whom wanted to get their hands on him.

“Since you people think I'm a devilling, I suppose I’ll just massacre all of you.”

He suddenly burst into motion, causing a string of sonic booms to echo out. In the blink of an eye, he was like a primal-chaos elder-snake bearing down directly on Southpalace Jade.

“I've been waiting for you to make a move!” she said with a chuckle. “You think a surprise attack is going to work on me? Megaplexus Labyrinth; Space-Time Passageway; Eternal Sealing Mark; Thousand-Year Trap; Dream of a Thousand Years!”

Mist poured out and created something like a Go board, a space-time labyrinth that seemed partly real and partly illusory. It was a consummate technique from the Megaplexus Collegium, the Dream of a Thousand Years. Inside the board, the powers of both space and time were interlaced in a devious fashion, making it virtually impossible to escape. When someone got stuck inside the trap, they would pass through millions upon millions of years of time.

The Dream of a Thousand Years spread out, immediately trapping Yang Qi. However, that was when he unleashed a fist strike strong enough to shatter universes.

Space-time collapsed, with suns, moons, planets, and planes crumbling. The labyrinth exploded, devastated by the Hand of the One God, which could decimate three thousand chiliocosm worlds in the blink of an eye.

WHIZZZ!

Yang Qi sprang out into the open like an uncaged tiger thirsting for blood!

Southpalace Jade’s face turned ashen, as though she were just about to cough up a huge mouthful of blood. However, she hadn’t lost her cool.

“The fat sheep is fighting like a cornered beast! But you’re still weak! Immortal Dao Formation: Megaplexus Golden Painting!”

She waved her finger and a golden image flew out, filled with innumerable golden taiji symbols. The taiji symbols were filled with razor-sharp lines that could slice apart anything in existence, and all of them were flying directly toward Yang Qi.

“What bullshit is this?” Yang Qi said. Extending his hand, he said, “Pāramitā!”

It was a stance that could part the sea of bitterness and cause the opposite shore of pāramitā to appear. When it hit the Megaplexus Golden Painting, the entire thing shrank down to the size of a handkerchief, which Yang Qi then grabbed.

At this point, Southpalace Jade couldn’t hold back any longer, and blood sprayed out of her mouth.

Yang Qi chopped his hand out in front of him, causing a red line to spread out along her neck.

Her face filled with terror. “Impossible! How could you be a match for me, you punk?!”

“Prepare to die!” Yang Qi finished chopping his hand through the air and her head flew off her shoulders.

Chapter 498: Crushing Weeds and Smashing Twigs

As soon as Southpalace Jade’s head flew off her shoulders, her corpse tumbled downward. And before it could reach the ground, a stream of sagelight shot out and burned it into nothing. She had been in possession of many magical treasures, spirit medicines, and other precious items. Now, all of those things belonged to Yang Qi.

With one move, he had destroyed her. She had been the pride and joy of the Megaplexus Collegium, but not anymore.

Of course, her head was still alive. As she watched her body fade from existence, she screamed. “Impossible! How could I die here? I'm invincible! I have the daoist legacies of numerous powerful immortals! My good fortune was supposed to take me all the way to the dao of Demolishing! Someone even divined my future! They said my fate was incredible and full of blessing. I was supposed to rise to the highest heights, not die in a place like this!”

“Everything changed when you met me,” Yang Qi said. “I'm a Fateless One. My fate is to change the fates of others.” Even as Yang Qi’s voice entered Southpalace Jade’s sea of consciousness, her head exploded, leaving no trace of evidence that she had ever existed.

Yang Qi turned to face the young man from the Dragon Brilliance Collegium, the one with the long sword.

“Alright, Dragon Sun-Chaser. You’re up next. Supposedly, you’re the fiercest of them all, right? Now it's your turn to die.”

Without a pause, Yang Qi blurred into motion toward him.

Dragon Sun-Chaser was quick to react. “Sun-Chasing Godsword: Heavenly Furnace Burns Bright!”

He shot forward with lightning speed, rotating as he flew along and unleashing a sword move that could dominate anything in existence. One sword to subdue heaven. One sword to shatter earth. One sword to slaughter man. Three swords combined, three treasured moves with infinite variations.

“The deathless sword energy can stab through all darkness and gloom in the dome of heaven,” he said, “and bring radiance and light to the world of mortals!” His sword became like a silver river pouring down from the highest heavens, destroying everything, causing the universe to sink down and hell to emerge.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi’s hand blurred back and forth, and as it did the flesh in his palm pulsed, almost as though it were an enormous beating heart.

BOOOOOOOM!

The palm met the sword energy over and over again and, with each exchange, Yang Qi’s power built up until he finally overwhelmed Dragon Sun-Chaser. All eight hundred forty million particles were alive within him, pulsing with immense genetic power that completely surpassed Dragon Sun-Chaser.

“I can't believe a piece of trash like you would dare to screw with me,” Yang Qi said. “Your genetic power is only ten million times ordinary? Allow me to show you what truly perfect genes are like. This is life force from the legion of gods.”

He reached out with splayed fingers, the roars of ancient megamammoths surrounding him. This was absolutely pure power, without the slightest impurity whatsoever.

Whizz!

The instant that power appeared, all of the opposing sword energy was vanquished and sealed, with no hope of ever breaking free.

Still, Dragon Sun-Chaser wasn’t fazed.

“You might also have ten million times the power of an ordinary cultivator, but my sword qi can dispel all of it! Sword Energy Astral Redirection Dispellation Power!” Dragon Sun-Chaser’s sword spun, creating a yin dragon and a yang dragon that swirled into a taiji symbol that shot forth to dispel Yang Qi’s power.

“You think you’re strong enough to dispel my energy?” Yang Qi said. He took a step forward, and when his foot landed it shook everything, causing mountains to crumble and rivers to divert their course. Even the dao of heaven seemed like it might collapse. No magical laws could do anything to the power Yang Qi was unleashing.

This was the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, so powers of dispellation, evasion, negation, or absorption were all completely useless, and in fact were little more than jokes.

Clang. Crack.

Two sounds rang out, the sounds of sword energy shattering and metal collapsing.

Dragon Sun-Chaser let out a frenzied shout as he saw immense, insane power rushing toward him. First, it destroyed his sword, then, it exploded his defensive true energy. His suit of armor turned into nothing more than dust.

“How could this be happening? My nascent divinity is about to be injured? I refuse to accept this! Boundless Sword Heart: Rapid Evasion!”

Without any hesitation, he converted his quintessence energy, flesh, blood, and soul into a single Boundless Sword Heart of flesh and blood that pierced through the air and began fading out of existence.

“Trying to run? Your genetic power and meticulously cultivated sword energy would be perfect for my Elder Brother.”

Yang Qi reached out, sending an enormous hand projection flying out into the air that crushed everything in its path.

A rift was torn open and the flesh-and-blood sword heart appeared, which he grabbed. There in Yang Qi’s hand was a bright red sword heart, pulsing and emitting sizzling sounds.

A voice echoed out from the sword. “Mercy! Spare me! I can help you! Don’t you want one of the ten geniuses from the Dragon Brilliance Collegium as an ally? My death would be a huge loss, and my collegium wouldn't rest until my death was avenged. Do you really want to start a war between the Titan Emperor Collegium and the Dragon Brilliance Collegium?”

Yang Qi laughed loudly. “Start a war? I just so happen to love starting wars. In fact, let’s start it right now. Elder Seventeenth Brother, I got this Boundless Sword Heart just for you!”

“Don’t!” screamed Dragon Sun-Chaser. “I’ll work myself to the bone for you! Just don’t kill me! Aaaiiiieee!”

His final, agonized shriek rang out clear for all to hear as Yang Qi gave the sword heart to Sword Seventeen, who promptly absorbed it. Instantly, Sword Seventeen’s genes erupted with power and his sword techniques climbed to a higher and more enigmatic level. It was as if he had become one with heaven and fused with the natural laws of the universe to create something far sharper than before.

Almost immediately, he entered a state of latent cultivation advancement.

Yang Qi laughed. “Once we’re out of here, you can really be of assistance to me. After you fully assimilate that Boundless Sword Heart, your energy arts will increase dramatically and your sword techniques will advance by leaps and bounds.”

In a flash, two top experts had met their end.

Southpalace Jade was dead.

Dragon Sun-Chaser was no more.

Before anyone else present could even react, Yang Qi was standing in a crater in the middle of the battlefield. Everyone else had been planning to hold back and make a move later, and as a result, they were now just standing there in shock.

“I'm out of here,” murmured the barbaric young man with the long saber, the very one who had boasted of turning Yang Qi into a slave beast. Then he realized that Yang Qi was looking at him, and a feeling of foreboding rose up in his heart. Turning, he slashed a rift open in the air with his saber in the hopes of escaping.

Unfortunately, there was no escaping when Yang Qi locked down onto someone with his gaze.

“I thought you wanted to transform me into a beast? How about I transform you into a dog?”

Yang Qi blurred into motion, using his Angel Wings to move at speeds unmatched in the mortal world. That wasn’t even mentioning his additional forty-nine imperial snakecharms, which gave him even greater control when moving through space-time.

ROAR!

Soundwaves rolled out from Yang Qi, throwing everything into chaos and forcing the barbaric young man to stop in his tracks.

Then, Yang Qi was in front of him.

SWISH!

Yang Qi’s hands were like curved claws that shot out and locked onto the young man’s throat.

“You want to fight?” the young man said, growling viciously. “Fine, let’s duel! This saber of mine is an immortal item and its name is Fiend-Subduer. It was created to deal with fiend-gods with immense killing energy, and is the strongest weapon from the immortal world it originates in. Now you’re going to get an idea of exactly how strong I am!” Howling, he slashed out with Fiend-Subduer, causing the energy of a fiend-god to erupt out without mercy.

In the blink of an eye, the saber was right in front of Yang Qi.

However, that was where it stopped. Yang Qi reached out and grabbed the blade with his hand. Not only did it not cut him, it couldn’t budge an inch.

Bam!

Yang Qi twisted his hand and the saber snapped in two.

“Fiend-Subduer? Are you serious? The strongest weapon from which immortal world? You see, the strongest weapon here is my hand. And compared to me, you’re as weak as could be. In fact, why don’t you just die?”

Meanwhile, the barbaric young man’s move had broken him away from Yang Qi, although he was staggering backward and coughing up blood.

Even as he prepared to continue fighting, Yang Qi stepped forward, grabbed his neck again, and hoisted him up like a captive duck.

The young man gurgled a bit, then managed to force some words out. “Let me go. I'm not going to turn you into a slave beast after all. I’ll name you my chief rival! Just let me go, and we can have a bet! We’ll meet up again in ten years and I’ll beat you. You beating me this one time doesn’t count for anything. I’ll only acknowledge your superiority if you beat me twice! If you do, I’ll humbly submit!”

“You think this is some kind of kid's game? You’ve clearly lost, but now you’re asking to have a duel in ten years? Are you insane? Sorry, you only get one chance. And failure means death. In your next life, remember not to be such a lunatic. Delusions of grandeur will only earn you an early grave.”

CRACK!

Just like that, the arrogant, barbaric young man was crushed to death.

Chapter 499: Terrified

Southpalace Jade had died in the blink of an eye.

Dragon Sun-Chaser, with genes tens of millions of times stronger than the average person, had also died.

And now the barbaric young man with the saber was no more.

Three experts. Three famous individuals from powerful collegiums, the type of geniuses who only appeared once every ten thousand years or so. Yet when they encountered Yang Qi, a Fateless One, they were like jokes.

Yang Qi had perfect genes that made him eight hundred forty million times as powerful as an average person, and he used that power with deadly purpose.

As soon as the barbaric young man died, Yang Qi blurred into motion and began cutting down every person who stood in his way. He was a tiger among a flock of sheep.

SNICK!

An elysian child from the Coiling Arc planetary system was sliced to pieces in the blink of an eye. Before the pieces could stitch back together, a primal-chaos elder-snake appeared and gobbled them up to be converted into primal-chaos vital energy. After all, the talismans of King Heaven-Devourer were known to be able to devour anything in existence.

Now that Yang Qi had an additional forty-nine talismans, his primal-chaos elder-snake was vastly stronger than before, to the point where devouring Universal Demi-Immortals was no problem for it.

Flying up, Yang Qi took his place on top of the huge snake’s head.

The snake was over five hundred kilometers long, making it look like a divine dragon that was too big to fit into anyone’s field of vision. The imperial snakecharms were unique in that they had no limitations; as long as one could feed true energy into them, they would become stronger. Usually, immortal items and spell formations had limits which, if surpassed, would lead to a devastating explosion and the loss of the item itself.

But not the imperial snakecharms. Even in the immortal worlds, there was no one who could push so much power into them that they would explode.

Yang Qi controlled the snake from atop its head, directing it without mercy and unleashing a rain of blood everywhere.

“Aaaiiiieee!”

A Paragon Demi-Immortal from the mysterious Eight Degrees Collegium was smashed to the side by the primal-chaos elder-snake’s tail, severely damaging his vital energy. Before he could launch a counter attack, a spear appeared, which immediately stabbed through his defenses and into the pit of his stomach. In the blink of an eye, his quintessence energy was sucked out of him, leaving nothing behind but a patch of skin.

Yang Qi hefted the Infernal Deity Spear and popped into being in front of another enemy, this one a woman from the Highest Clarity Collegium, who he ended with a single spear stab.

It was only at this point that the numerous collegium experts in the area began to burn with anger.

“Hmph! Does this guy really think he's better than all the heroes under heaven?”

“Considering how many of us there are, does he really think he can cut us all down? Who is he, an immortal from heaven descended into the mortal world? Even if he is, we’re still going to destroy him!”

“Set up a spell formation and kill him!”

RUMBLE!

Immediately, the elysian children and elder kings from the Great Metropolis Collegium led the other students in setting up a huge spell formation.

In the blink of an eye, the stars spun and the sun and moon sank down. Tens of thousands of students activated a spell formation that created an enormous tribulation cloud which spread out over Yang Qi. A moment later, dazzling lightning began to fall everywhere.

The mysterious, chaotic colors were terrifying to the extreme.

However, before anything else could happen, a hulking figure appeared, wreathed in lightning, including lightning dragons, snakes, and other divine beasts. The lightning soon took the shape of an ancient god of lightning.

“We’re from the Lightning Society in the Great Metropolis Collegium. And our Preheaven Protomagnetic Nine Metropolises Immortal Formation is inescapable! He’s definitely going to die! Considering how many of our society he slaughtered, if he doesn’t die, it would prove that there is no heavenly justice!”

Immortal energy of the Demolishing level began to pulse from this hulking figure. This person was obviously just on the verge of immortal ascension.

“Demolishing level! He’s a Demolisher!”

“Who is that? Who’s about to become an actual immortal? Immortals can’t stay for long in the mortal world before the magical laws of space reject them. However, during the short time they can stay, they’re essentially invincible.”

“Hey, it’s Lei Jiuzhou! He’s the society chief of the Lightning Society from the Great Metropolis Collegium. I thought he was only a half-Demolisher? How come he has the aura of an actual Demolisher now?”

“I heard that he came to the Immortal Army Battlefield to search for an ancient, powerful legacy—the śarīra of the Preheaven Magnetic King. That’s an apex-level immortal legacy. And nobody even knows how high the Preheaven Magnetic King went in the Demolishing level.”

“Wow, the śarīra of the Preheaven Magnetic King. That’s a treasure that would be considered rare even in ancient times. If Lei Jiuzhou used something like that to ascend to the immortal world, he wouldn’t be an ordinary immortal in any sense of the word. He would definitely be promoted immediately.”

“Alright, now that Lei Jiuzhou is making a move with immortal power, he’s definitely invincible. Nobody could possibly fight him. This Yang Qi is definitely dead.”

“Yeah, let’s hope that we can benefit a bit ourselves. This Yang Qi’s obviously not an easy opponent to beat. He already killed Southpalace Jade and Dragon Sun-Chaser, both of whom were half-Demolishers. Yang Qi is a beast!”

“Let’s back up a bit. We can only hope that these two will end up hurting each other.”

“Right. If they injure each other badly enough, we can be the fisherman to their sandpiper and clam! Wouldn’t it be great if we could get both the imperial snakecharms and the śarīra of the Preheaven Magnetic King?”

“Look, they’re about to start fighting. A Demolisher versus a Demi-Immortal.”

Everyone began backing away. The aura of a heaven-immortal in the mortal world could destroy countless planets, so there was no way these people were going to try to pick a fight with such a person.

‘A heaven-immortal?’ Yang Qi thought. ‘Someone on the boundless path of the Demolisher?’ He was mentally shaken, but quickly calmed himself. Looking over, he realized that this veritable god-spirit with control over the magical laws of lightning was staring right at him. At the same time, he was also facing a spell formation powered by the energy arts of countless experts.

“You did well to last this long in the Immortal Army Battlefield, Yang Qi,” Lei Jiuzhou said. “But your path stops here. Believe me when I tell you that your divine abilities, your energy arts, your momentum, and everything else that makes you up is about to fade into the wind. Look around, because this is the last thing you’ll ever see in your life.”

“So, you’re a measly heaven-immortal?” Yang Qi replied. “You know, I’ve never killed a Demolisher before, and I'm itching to find out what it’s like. I wonder what I’ll be able to use your soul to make.”

“You damned animal!”

RUMBLE!

Heaven and earth shattered as Lei Jiuzhou unleashed his attack, splaying his fingers and sending out an enormous hand with five fingers like mountains of lightning.

“Five Lightnings Deathblow!”

Instantly, the entire area became a sea, a hell, and a starry sky of lightning. In response, Yang Qi shot to his feet on the head of the primal-chaos elder-snake, then sent out an enormous hand of sagelight. When the two palms slammed into each other, a massively destructive shock wave rippled out.

**

Ding. Ding. Ding….

Back in the Titan Emperor Collegium, on the Plane of Initiation, pinging sounds rang out from Yang Qi’s name, which was the complete focus of attention of the initiators and the supreme rector.

“Yang Qi is killing so many experts in there. His score is climbing every moment. This is a massacre!”

“Correct. My nascent divinity clone has a lock on his position. He’s got some guts, that’s for sure. Instead of hiding, he intentionally released his aura to attract as many nearby experts as possible. Then he started killing them.”

“Is he crazy? What does he think he is, a Demolisher or something? I mean, not even a Demolisher would be able to come out on top against the experts of so many collegiums all fighting together. He’s definitely going to die.”

“You’re right. He’s really showing how presumptuous he is.”

“I’ve got him in sight! Incredible! He’s fighting Lei Jiuzhou, who’s already reached the Demolishing level! How did Lei Jiuzhou do it?”

“He must have found the śarīra of the Preheaven Magnetic King. With that, he could form preheaven vitality lightning, and if he fused with it, it would definitely push him into the Demolishing level. Well, Yang Qi is really down on his luck to be fighting a heaven-immortal.”

“But in the end, Yang Qi is a genius of our collegium. Should we save him?”

“Bah. Why save him? You're right he’s a genius, but he’s also a complete rebel. We’ll be better off with him dead. Although, we can’t let him die in vain. Letting Lei Jiuzhou kill him would be a waste.”

“Supreme Rector, what are your thoughts?”

At this point, all gazes shifted to the supreme rector as they waited for him to make a decision.

“Obviously we ‘save’ him!” the supreme rector said. However, there was a sinister gleam to his eyes. “If he dies, we need to make sure we have access to his corpse, and his soul. They will be very valuable. The question is how do we ‘save’ him?”

“Do you have a plan, Supreme Rector?” said one of the initiators, who was clearly unsure of what the supreme rector meant.

“Simple. Wait until Yang Qi and Lei Jiuzhou wear each other down, or until Yang Qi is about to lose. Then we charge in and ‘save’ him. Because we’re from the Titan Emperor Collegium, Yang Qi will let his guard down, and that will be our chance. Strike a deadly blow to his vital energy, grab him, and take him out of the Immortal Army Battlefield! Then we can do whatever we want to him!”

The supreme rector threw his head back and laughed loudly.

Chapter 500: The Supreme Rector&#039;s Plot

“Supreme Rector, you’re like an incarnation of wisdom! How did you ever come up with an idea like that?”

“Excellent plan. Fighting our way in there and saving Yang Qi in his moment of crisis will be of immense benefit to us. Once we have him, we can lock him up and extract his secrets at will.”

“Exactly.”

“Hmph! Yang Qi’s not going to escape this time.”

“That little brat killed Kingly Beheader and nailed his head to a spike outside his main gate. What an insult to us! If we don't kill him, how can we maintain our authority in the collegium? He needs to die as an example to others!”

“But if we do this, it’s crossing the river and burning the bridge. There’s going to be a lot of gossip afterward.”

“Ah, what are you scared of? If anyone dares to say the wrong thing, we can just have them killed. Once we capture Yang Qi, we can go destroy the Sage Monarch planetary system and get his mother too. What do they call her again? The Holy Mother. According to my information network, the Sage Monarch planetary system and the Hanging Mountain fused and her aura improved significantly. She’s probably as strong as any of us initiators.”

“What? How did she get so strong so quickly? Last time I checked she was a Prime Demi-Immortal!”

“Apparently she came across a godrelic in the Hell of Gloom and Darkness. She and Yang Qi both achieved cultivation breakthroughs at the same time and, in all likelihood, it was because of that godrelic. That’s the only way Yang Qi could already be strong enough to fight a Demolisher.”

“Well, if we kill him and his mother, we can get the power of that godrelic too.”

All of a sudden, a new voice rang out within the Plane of Initiation, a voice thrumming with killing intent.

“You're right. Kill them. I’ll go along with the Supreme Rector’s plan in every aspect.”

A middle-aged man appeared, who was none other than the hallmaster of the Hall of Beheadings and Executions. He was a half-Demolisher who surpassed even Liege Beast, and after his most recent session of secluded meditation, pulsed with an immense immortal energy that indicated he was close to a major breakthrough.

“You’re out of seclusion, Hallmaster!” the supreme rector said, nodding his head in polite greeting.

“Yes, I just came out. Ascendant Beheader told me about all the horrific things that happened while I was away. I don’t care what happens, I will avenge the insult! And once I break through, I’ll go find the Invincible Dugu and kill him too. He's going to find out the hard way just how powerful my nascent divinity secret magic is, the Recondite Slaughter God Refrain. With my recondite nascent divinity complete, I only have one small barrier separating me from the Demolishing level.”

“Wonderful,” the supreme rector said. “Please have a seat in the southeast corner. In a moment, we’ll call on the grand spell formation of the Plane of Initiation to teleport into the Immortal Army Battlefield and break up the fight between Yang Qi and Lei Jiuzhou. We’ll also draw upon the Initiation Power that we’ve been accumulating over the past million years here in the Titan Emperor Collegium.”

“We can't do that!” one of the initiators blurted, and even the hallmaster’s expression flickered.

“Supreme Rector, please, consider this matter again. We initiators built up the Initiation Power to deal with major threats to the collegium. Wouldn’t it be a big waste to use it on a nobody like this Yang Qi?”

“No, it wouldn't,” the supreme rector said, his eyes flashing with an incomparably sinister light. “My intuition is telling me that Yang Qi will not be easy to deal with. If we make a move on him, but fail to come out on top, think about the potential consequences. He’s already so strong that not even a Demolisher can easily kill him. In fact, it's entirely possible that we might not be strong enough to take him out. And what if he achieves another breakthrough? He could completely destroy us. Think about what would happen if he summoned an army of Paragon Demi-Immortal fiend-devils to attack the Titan Emperor Collegium!” Glaring at the gathered experts, he continued, “Yang Qi has something that surpasses our Initiation Power in every way. Think about what it would mean for us to be able to summon fiend-devils any time we wanted. We could easily conquer countless planetary systems.”

“Very well. We’ll follow your lead, supreme rector. We need to cut the snake’s head off with the first blow, otherwise we’ll be bringing about our own destruction.”

“I agree.”

“I see the light now.”

“Yes, kill him. We have to kill him.”

“Very well. Enough chit chat. Fill the grand spell formation with the Initiation Power, otherwise the majesty and dignity of the Titan Emperor Collegium will never be restored. It's all up to us.”

At the supreme rector’s command, immense power began building up in the Plane of Initiation, a power that surpassed even that of the new heaven-immortal, Lei Jiuzhou.

A grand conspiracy was afoot.

**

Meanwhile, Yang Qi and Lei Jiuzhou were fighting back and forth.

Lightning crackled and sagelight shone. Lei Jiuzhou drew fully on his heaven-immortal power, and as Yang Qi remained atop the primal-chaos elder-snake, he used his Infernal Deity Spear and Fist of the Halls of Heaven to dispel the lightning.

All of a sudden, the five-hundred-kilometer-long primal-chaos elder-snake shrank down until it was only a few dozen meters long. In fact, it ended up looking much like a python from the mortal world.

However, closer examination would reveal that it had undergone a very profound transformation. Each scale of primal-chaos on its body was a minor world, within which was a character formed from primal-chaos: snake.

Yang Qi remained on the snake’s head, controlling it, making him seem very much like that most ancient creator of the world, the Sovereign Lord.

‘Fate… fate….’ Yang Qi wasn’t at a disadvantage when fighting this heaven-immortal, Lei Jiuzhou. In contrast, he was actually building up momentum! Suddenly, the halls of heaven appeared overhead and sagelight and quintessence energy within him caused more Blood of the One God to form. At the same time, information poured into him from the God Legion Seal, a string of text that was none other than another energy art.

The Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth had many energy arts. The first was the Infernal Deity Spear, then the Fiend-Devil Wings and the Infernal Deity Plate Armor. After those came the Hellfire Crucible, Angel Wings, and God Legion Battle Robe. There was also the God Legion Paradise, Fist of the Halls of Heaven, Hand of the One God, and Eternal Heavenly Aria. But now, he was acquiring another.

Streams of magical symbols became the quintessence of a dao, forming something that was like a brilliant full moon. It was the Wheel of Fate, which made it possible to control fate itself.

What was fate? Luck. Natural Law. Everything. That was fate. And when the Wheel of Fate came into being, nothing could stop it. It could affect the luck and fate of anyone near it, and could also destroy anything that got in its way.

Of course, Yang Qi was only gaining initial enlightenment and couldn’t summon the entire thing.

If he could, he wouldn’t need to expend any effort at all to kill a heaven-immortal like Lei Jiuzhou. But even with only initial enlightenment, he was still significantly stronger than before.

Yang Qi’s face was completely devoid of emotion. There was no trace of happiness, anger, sorrow, or joy, as though he were a manifestation of the dao of heaven itself. In that moment, the basic feeling of his energy arts transformed into something different. Instead of being bold and audacious, they suddenly became profound and flexible.

They were difficult to read, and could pierce through any resistance.

They were just like fate itself, something that no one could see, but at the same time, was forced to follow.

‘What just happened?’ Lei Jiuzhou thought. ‘Why did his energy arts style suddenly change?’ Without hesitation, he unleashed a powerful move, summoning eighty-one lightning dragons to serve as clones of himself.

“Lightning Shocks Mountains and Rivers: Exterminate Immortals and Slaughter Devils!”

Whizz!

Eighty-one lightning dragon manifestations of Lei Jiuzhou swirled into a fist of lightning that smashed toward Yang Qi with incredibly destructive power.

“Die!” he howled.

“How dare you act so crazy in my presence?” Yang Qi said. “Suicidal fool! ‘Lightning Shocks Mountains and Rivers’? Sounds like a move made up by a child. Be destroyed!”

Yang Qi surged with unprecedented levels of battle prowess and the Blood of the One God in his forehead surged, releasing the true energy of the One God to fill the God Legion Paradise.

Instantly, everything in the area began trembling violently as Yang Qi released a sound wave attack. As it rolled out, the primal-chaos elder-snake shrank down and wrapped around his Infernal Deity Spear.

“Fate….” Yang Qi breathed.

As soon as the word left his mouth, it seemed to cause the universe to spin as if it were being moved by the Wheel of Fate itself. As it happened, Lei Jiuzhou’s attacks slammed into Yang Qi, yet their power was shifted away. That was the magical function of the wheel. It could change the course of life itself to negate all sorts of magical effects. It could change fate.

In other words, once Yang Qi perfected the Wheel of Fate, he would be almost impossible to defeat.

“What energy art is that?” Lei Jiuzhou said, dropping down out of the sky and staring at Yang Qi. He was suddenly starkly aware that he couldn’t lock down on Yang Qi’s energy, almost as if he were illusory. And yet, all of Lei Jiuzhou’s senses were telling him that Yang Qi was real.

The transposition of reality and illusion nearly caused him to cough up blood.

Chapter 501: Magnetic King Sarira

With just a sliver of enlightenment of the Wheel of Fate, Yang Qi’s true energy underwent heaven-shaking, earth-toppling transformations. He now had a basic grasp of the ultimate meaning of fate itself, making him tougher and more dangerous in every way. Lei Jiuzhou was a Demolisher, yet couldn’t measure up to the freak that was Yang Qi.

Thanks to Liege Beast, Yang Qi had grown his collection of imperial snakecharms to a total of seventy-seven, and that made him fully capable of tangling with immortals. And his basic grasp of the Wheel of Fate made him like a tiger that had grown wings; for all intents and purposes, he was invincible in the mortal world.

It was almost as if no incoming attacks could touch him. It was a type of defense that surpassed the God Legion Paradise itself. Generally speaking, the God Legion Paradise could absorb the force of most attacks that were roughly the same level as Yang Qi’s own strength. However, attacks that vastly surpassed him could still pierce its defenses.

But the Wheel of Fate could change fate itself and ensure that no attacks could even reach him.

It didn’t matter if it was the so-called power of dispellation, or daoist techniques of immense power. Any attack that was fated to hit him would be touched by the power of the Wheel of Fate, whereupon its fate would change. Instead, it wouldn’t touch him.

It was a profound and enigmatic thing that touched on the most mysterious of great daos.

It involved fate itself.

If an attack was fated to not hit Yang Qi, then not even immortals could hurt him.

Of course, because the Wheel of Fate wasn't fully formed, he could only tweak the fates of others. Otherwise, he would already have killed this Demolisher Lei Jiuzhou.

‘Why? Why can't my attacks even touch him? It’s like I’m fated to be defeated! Why do I have this strange feeling?!’

Lei Jiuzhou’s attacks were all failing, and the frustration almost caused him to cough up blood.

“This is pointless, Lei Jiuzhou,” Yang Qi said, walking toward him. “Accept your fate! You and your Lightning Society, and even your so-called Great Metropolis Collegium, are all fated to perish!”

He unleashed a palm strike, destroying the eighty-one lightning dragon clones and reducing them to ash.

“Don’t be so cocky, Yang Qi!” cried a nearby young woman who was flanked by a whole host of disciples from the Lightning Society. “Protomagnetic Godmountains: Great Dao of the Sun and Moon!”

Suddenly, immense protomagnetic mountains began rising into the air, taking the shape of an immense spell formation.

The other disciples from the Lightning Society shouted, “Preheaven Converse: Give Birth to Primal-Chaos!”

In the blink of an eye, the entire area seemed to revert to its state at the beginning of the universe. At the same time, every member of the Great Metropolis Collegium, which included all of the top experts from the Lightning Society, joined forces to attack Yang Qi.

Within their Magnetic King Grand Spell Formation, they were seemingly invincible and already had Yang Qi completely locked down.

The fight seemed to be reaching a climax.

Countless observing experts were itching to see how it would all play out. Victory or defeat would definitely be determined here; either Yang Qi would break the formation, or the disciples from the Lightning Society, led by their Demolisher Lei Jiuzhou, would kill Yang Qi.

However it turned out, everyone now recognized that Yang Qi was the type of person who was not to be trifled with. His blood-drenched performance so far had made that clear.

Of course, it was possible that both parties would end up so wounded that others would be able to swoop in, capture them, and absorb their nascent divinities.

Some of the nearby experts were already building up their power to make a move, with some of them preparing spell formations.

RUMBLE!

As Yang Qi stood in the middle of the spell formation and faced the attacks of Lei Jiuzhou, he seemed to grow stronger with each moment.

He looked like a god-spirit, with a strange and unseeable wheel forming behind him, partly real, and partly illusory. It was like an alternate dimension of some sort that could twist the fate of the entire world. Any attack that faced that enormous wheel would simply fade out of existence.

“Die!” he said, stepping forward to face one of the enormous Protomagnetic Godmountains. Reaching out with sky-obfuscating, land-enshrouding power, he smashed his hand into the mountain, which rumbled down into a single point of shining light on his palm.

He had absorbed the entire mountain!

Each of those Protomagnetic Godmountains was like something created by an immortal. They were filled with protomagnetic preheaven energy, which would allow them to rapidly suck in any metal-type objects in the area. In fact, for that reason, they were the bane of people who cultivated five phases metal-type energy arts.

Anyone trapped within the formation would find the balance of the five phases completely disrupted, and would quickly experience cultivation deviation, then death.

With countless disciples of the Lightning Society powering the formation, even a half-Demolisher who ended up trapped inside would be powerless to escape, and would likely fall into cultivation deviation.

Of course, Yang Qi didn’t need to worry about such things.

Back when he was in the Legendary level, he had gone through the Five-Phases Transformation, during which time he gathered plenty of five phases quintessence energy. Later, when he became a Great Sage, that energy was transformed by the Blood of the One God and came to exist outside of the three realms and five phases.

Because of that, the Protomagnetic Godmountains were useless against him.

RUMBLE!

As soon as he absorbed the mountain, he sent some divine will inside and encountered something immensely powerful.

‘Thou mayest call me the Magnetic Witch-King. I began as a scrap of protomagnetic quintessence energy, then eventually cultivated my way to becoming an immortal. I created three hundred and sixty Protomagnetic Godmountains. Collect them all, and you can create a deadly zone of protomagnetic power, a grand spell formation that inverts the five phases, converges yin and yang, transforms life force, and melts vital energy….’

‘Interesting,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘So this is a magical treasure created by some ancient immortal. I already took the command flags for the Thunder-Lightning Void-Shattering Immortal Formation, and was going to add them to the Sage Monarch planetary system. If I include these Protomagnetic Godmountains, it will make the place even more invincible.’ Yang Qi was very impressed with the magical treasures this Lightning Society had at their disposal.

“Get over here, all of you! Hand over those Protomagnetic Godmountains!”

WHIZZZ!

Godly light erupted from Yang Qi as he sent out a nascent divinity incarnation, which immediately headed toward the nearest Protomagnetic Godmountain.

Now that he had one Protomagnetic Godmountain, he had created a gap in the overall formation of floating mountains. Now they would be more difficult to operate. Even worse, Yang Qi was harrying them with his nascent divinity. Already, some of the dazzling light shining off the mountains had dimmed, revealing their surface to be some sort of black metal, like a magnet.

“Clever move, you bastard!” Lei Jiuzhou said, his face dark from rage.

Here he was, a Demolisher leading an entire army of disciples to employ a massive spell formation. Yet not even that was enough to deal with this second order Demi-Immortal. Obviously, if word spread about this, it would be impossible to maintain face in public.

“It’s time to show you what the śarīra of the Preheaven Magnetic King can really do! Quintessence-Blood Libation; Dragon Moon Hangs over Nine Prefectures; Pierce Heaven with Five Phases; Subvert All Virtue!”

Whizz!

Lei Jiuzhou spat out several mouthfuls of blood, and at the same time the howling of ghosts and wailing of gods could be heard. It almost seemed like heaven and earth were reverting to their most original, wild state in which the five phases were in complete chaos.

Then an enormous śarīra shot out of Lei Jiuzhou’s head.

It appeared to be a rotating planet bursting with explosive, magnetic power, to the point where it almost looked like lightning. Popping sounds rang out as the five phases vanished and everything turned upside down.

This was the śarīra of the Preheaven Magnetic King.

Everyone who was looking on reacted with shock, and as the five phases energy was thrown into chaos, everyone under the level of a Universal Demi-Immortal trembled as though they might explode.

“Aghhh! What's going on!?” cried a seventh order Demi-Immortal. Then he screamed as he dissolved into a pool of blood and his energy was sucked into the śarīra, which began glowing with a faint hint of red light.

The śarīra pulsed, as though it were about to erupt with power at any moment.

At the same time, the Protomagnetic Godmountains seemed to have been powered up, and began shining with dazzling light. Even the mountain Yang Qi had taken trembled, then shot back to join the group.

Streams of protomagnetic godlight began whipping about, transforming anyone they touched into ashes.

“How dare you, Lei Jiuzhou! I can't believe you’re killing people from the Crapemyrtle Collegium!”

“Run! Everybody run! Lei Jiuzhou is going all out!”

“Those Protomagnetic Godmountains are totally invincible!”

“Get out of here! One of our elder kings just died!”

“Don’t hit me! Don’t hit me, please….” Even elysian children from various collegiums were in full flight. They knew that if they were unlucky enough to get hit by the protomagnetic godlight, they would instantly be turned into ash. Not even their nascent divinities would be left behind.

The area was completely empty within moments, except for Yang Qi and Lei Jiuzhou.

“Prepare to die, Yang Qi!” Lei Jiuzhou said. He took a breath, sucking all of the mountains inside of him. At the same time, the world seemed to tremble on the verge of collapse around him.

At this point, a very serious expression overtook Yang Qi’s face.

Chapter 502: Initiation Power

The final moments of the battle were about to commence.

Lei Jiuzhou was using his trump card, drawing on the śarīra of the Preheaven Magnetic King and the Protomagnetic Godmountains to send out godlight that destroyed anything it touched.

As the protomagnetic godlight seethed, the images of planets, moons, suns, and universes became visible, as well as the transformations of space-time. This was a power that seemed capable of killing anything that wasn’t an immortal.

All of a sudden, Yang Qi felt the pressure of the situation. It was almost as if he were suddenly facing tens of thousands of heaven-immortals which not even the Wheel of Fate could evade.

This level of attack power was just too great.

He could use the Wheel of Fate to avoid any single attack, but now there were just too many individual attacks to deal with. He would need a higher level of enlightenment for that.

RUMBLE!

RUUUUUUUUMBLE!

As the attacks came in, the God Legion Paradise absorbed some of the power, and the Wheel of Fate caused others to miss him. However, some connected.

His Angel Wings unfurled, and the magical laws of the godworm stirred within him. Drawing on everything he had at hand to use, he fought back against the spell formation.

“I'm sacrificing both lifespan and quintessence-blood to power this śarīra!” Lei Jiuzhou shouted. “There’s no way you can escape. You're dead!”

Lei Jiuzhou was like the incarnation of the Preheaven Magnetic King himself as he held the śarīra in hand and pressed the attack.

All of a sudden, Yang Qi brimmed with unprecedented battle-spirit; a megamammoth appeared above his head and the will of hell spread out on the Immortal Army Battlefield as he opened passageways to the Hell of Mahānata and the Hell of Gloom and Darkness.

Devil energy erupted like an endless river, and the devilish will of the Hell of Mahānata slammed destructively into the protomagnetic godlight.

“Creation, Destruction, Nature, Undying, Aeon, Reincarnation, Epoch, Pāramitā….”

Yang Qi drew on all eight stances of the Hand of the One God, flowing smoothly from one to the other, stacking their power to unleash a power beyond imagination.

Sagelight flowed through all creation, within which were a host of angels singing holy psalms and chanting hallowed poetry, as if they wished to baptize the world into something new.

Instantly, the light shining from the Protomagnetic Godmountains faded a bit, and even the śarīra seemed on the verge of being overwhelmed.

“You think you can stifle me?!” Lei Jiuzhou shouted madly. “Impossible! I'm the most exalted individual in all heaven and earth! I'm invincible in the mortal world!” With that, he drew even more deeply on the śarīra, as if he wished to bring the immortal Preheaven Magnetic King back to life right there and then.

“You’re pretty tough after all,” Yang Qi said. Then he smiled disdainfully. “But that’s not going to do you any good. Let’s see how many mouthfuls of blood you can cough out before you dry up into a desiccated corpse!”

“Imbecile!” Lei Jiuzhou shouted. He strode forward, surrounded by shining light. Suddenly, thirty-six Protomagnetic Godmountains appeared around him, which dropped down with astonishing power.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi drew on the power of the God Legion Paradise, the energy of hell, the Hand of the One God, and the Wheel of Fate, hoping to gain an advantage. Their fierce fighting caused flames of battle to rage everywhere.

At this point, no spectators were even close to the scene of the fight.

It was simply too dangerous, so most of them were far off in the distance, watching and waiting.

As the fight went on, Yang Qi slowly began regaining lost ground, even creeping toward occupying the high ground in the fight. Lei Jiuzhou’s expression was flickering madly; he could tell that if the fighting kept going like this, Yang Qi would eventually gain the upper hand, which would end in his own defeat and death.

“The Magnetic King Rules the World!Immortal World Sacrifice!”

At this point, Lei Jiuzhou decided to draw on another powerful trump card.

The śarīra shot up above his head and transformed into a tempest of rain, each drop of which was an entire incarnated immortal world. Anyone destroyed by the rain of immortal worlds would die so thoroughly that they would never, ever be born again.

“Immortal World Sacrifice? Hah. Doesn't seem much different from the Destruction of the Heaven-Dao Tribulation. You want to use something like that to deal with me? That’s a joke if I've ever heard one!” Yang Qi shot up into the air, his fists blurring this way and that as he smashed into the tribulation.

As of this moment, the battle had reached a true fever pitch.

**

Back in the Titan Emperor Collegium, on the Plane of Initiation, the initiators were joined by numerous society chiefs as they closely watched the fighting between Yang Qi and Lei Jiuzhou. Eventually, it reached the most critical of moments.

At that point, supreme rector raised his voice and said, “The time has come to make our move, ladies and gentlemen. Activate the spell formation with the Initiation Power. Join forces to unleash the Godly Curse of Titan Emperor Caleb’s Utopia! Pierce through to the battlefield, cut down Lei Jiuzhou, and capture Yang Qi. Understand?”

“Yes sir!”

Murmured discussions immediately began.

“Alright! This is our chance. We have to grab it before it disappears.”

“And here I thought Lei Jiuzhou could actually kill Yang Qi. But apparently not. Who could have guessed that he would get dominated in the fight! This is really miraculous!”

“This just proves that we absolutely must kill Yang Qi,” said the hallmaster of the Hall of Beheadings and Executions. “If he survives, he’ll undoubtedly undermine our power in the Titan Emperor Collegium. Supreme rector, you’re truly wise to have foreseen all this. I fully back your decision—we can’t leave Yang Qi alive!”

“You’re right, we have to kill him,” one of the initiators said. “We could hardly control him before. If he comes back from the Immortal Army Battlefield stronger than ever, it will become impossible.”

“Everyone get ready,” said Chief Hegemon. “Don’t hold anything back. Burn your lifespan and quintessence-blood if you have to. We have to strike with ultimate force. As you can all see, he’s even able to gain the upper hand against a Demolisher! If we don't kill him, it's going to be a disaster for us.”

“We understand,” said Chief Everlasting. “He’s too brutal and fierce. If he stays alive, he's only going to throw more weight around in the collegium. Who could possibly keep an animalistic brute like him in check?”

RUMBLE!

All of a sudden, the entire Plane of Initiation trembled violently, to the point where it seemed it might crumble. Everyone looked up in shock and saw Yang Qi, shining with bright light in the Immortal Army Battlefield. From the look of it, the final moment of the fight had arrived.

“This is it!” shouted the supreme rector. “They’re almost done fighting! Activate the curse formation!”

As the spell formation activated, the Plane of Initiation suddenly vanished without a trace. Initiation Power blazed, surpassing the strength of a heaven-immortal as the entire plane shot into the Immortal Army Battlefield.

The space that made up the Immortal Army Battlefield was incredibly tough, but not tough enough to keep out the Plane of Initiation. Numerous planes that made up the place shattered, and countless experts from other collegiums were killed.

Flames wreathed the Plane of Initiation as it destroyed everything in its path.

“Aiiee! What's that!?”

“What is that thing? It’s killing people left and right? Someone flew a plane of existence in here? Who is it? Who would enter the Immortal Army Battlefield this way, and why? Why kill all these people?”

“It's the Titan Emperor Collegium! Those bastards! That's their Plane of Initiation! What are those old codgers doing? They're sacrificing their Plane of Initiation? Initiation Power is the essence of the Titan Emperor Collegium! They’ve been saving that stuff up for over a million years. Collegiums only draw on power like that to defend against the most horrific of catastrophes. What are they doing?”

“That’s Initiation Power!? Back up! You can't fight it! The Titan Emperor Collegium is going all out here! But why, exactly? Aren’t they worried about repercussions? Once they use all of that power, they’ll be defenseless against all sorts of calamities.”

“Wait, are they trying to save Yang Qi?”

“Everybody get out of here! The Titan Emperor Collegium is pulling out all the stops.”

“We can’t defend against this! Who would have thought that the Titan Emperor Collegium would draw on their reserve power, all for Yang Qi? There’s no way we can take advantage of this situation now, not without using the reserve powers of our own collegium. But that would leave us defenseless. What idiot would use reserve power offensively like this? Well, in any case, it seems Lei Jiuzhou is done for.”

“I just don’t get it. Yang Qi has the upper hand. Isn't Lei Jiuzhou going to die anyway? Why would the Titan Emperor Collegium use their Initiation Power? Have they completely lost their minds?”

Streams of divine will spread out as everyone went on high alert.

“You’re right!”

“This really is strange. Wait, maybe this isn’t about Lei Jiuzhou at all. Maybe they’re going after Yang Qi. That must be it! Yang Qi recently went crazy in the Titan Emperor Collegium. He even killed an elder king! They must be trying to get rid of him.”

“Look! The Plane of Initiation is about to reach Lei Jiuzhou and Yang Qi!”

By this point, Yang Qi realized what was happening, and the sense of impending danger immediately raised his hackles.

Chapter 503: One Massive Attack

A tremor passed through Yang Qi.

‘What is that thing? And why do I suddenly have such a profound feeling of imminent danger?’ This wasn’t any instinctual feeling of fear, but rather a message from the Wheel of Fate.

There were innumerable paths leading into the future, and something as innocuous as a sneeze could sometimes change them. But right now, all of those paths seemed to have gone dark, as if to indicate that he didn’t have any future ahead of him at all.

‘Not good. Someone’s trying to kill me. And this seems like something I can’t fight. Life or death is on the line here.’

RUMBLE!

Without any hesitation, he burned the Blood of the One God in his forehead to activate the God Legion Seal. He needed its power!

From the moment he had begun to build up Blood of the One God, he knew that he could use it to draw on the power of the God Legion Seal. That said, he couldn’t use very much of that power.

The God Legion Seal would eventually be strong enough to easily wipe out an entire immortal world, although his seal wasn’t at that level of strength, yet.

Ever since he had gained the ability to actively use the seal, it had ceased to function as an automatic defense system for him. Perhaps that was because he had fully fused with it. He was now the seal, and the seal was him.

As burning godpower poured into the Wheel of Fate, Yang Qi himself blurred into motion to enter it as well. Then, the Wheel of Fate began turning, unleashing the power to shift the void, fate, the world, the cosmos, the universe, and space-time itself….

However, in that critical moment, a voice rang out.

“Lei Jiuzhou! Your Lightning Society and Great Metropolis Collegium are all looking to die! How dare you trifle with one of the top geniuses of the Titan Emperor Collegium! Yang Qi is the society chief of our illustrious Invincible Society. Once we old-timers ascend, he’ll be the new supreme rector! How dare you try to put our future supreme rector to death! We've come out in full strength to destroy all of you from the Great Metropolis Collegium!”

The Plane of Initiation appeared overhead, moving forward with a heaven-defying momentum. Even before it arrived in full, its aura caused heaven and earth to melt, and the local natural laws and vital energy to conform to it.

The initiators and society chiefs were there, with the supreme rector in the lead. These were the most powerful individuals of the Titan Emperor Collegium, and they were all shouting battle cries at the top of their lungs. The sound was so intense that many of the lower-level spectators dropped to the ground, dead.

As for certain other old-timers who had come in secret to the Immortal Army Battlefield, they fled the area. Most of them already knew what was happening, and they couldn’t help but hold the Titan Emperor Collegium in contempt for making such an overt move to kill Yang Qi.

As for Yang Qi, he knew full well that they were here to kill him, and he chuckled coldly at the thought. Now more than ever, he was determined to eventually wipe out the Titan Emperor Collegium.

‘Bring it on, you people! There’s no way I’ll let you prevail. I’ll take out Lei Jiuzhou, seize the śarīra of the Preheaven Magnetic King, and disappear. When your Initiation Power begins to run low, I’ll come back. And then we’ll see what you have to say for yourselves.’

It took a lot of energy for Yang Qi to keep the Wheel of Fate going. It required Blood of the One God to draw on the power of the God Legion Seal, and those drops of blood were all incredibly valuable.

He had used so much right now that he had no idea how long it would take to make up for the loss. Perhaps killing Lei Jiuzhou and taking the Preheaven Magnetic King śarīra would help.

Lei Jiuzhou was a true Demolisher, but a new one. He had not yet been baptized by the magical laws of an immortal world, and thus was deficient in many ways. However, his quintessence-blood was still powerful beyond compare.

The flesh and blood of a Demolisher would definitely be of immense help to Yang Qi once he assimilated it via the Hellfire Crucible.

RUMBLE!

In the time it takes a spark to fly off of a piece of flint, a tempest of destructive power spread out to fill the area.

The Plane of Initiation was here.

Everything turned into chaos, almost as if a Jambudvīpa Deluge had arrived, joined by an Eternal Godwind.

‘What is that?’ Lei Jiuzhou thought. ‘Initiation Power? They’re using Initiation Power against me? No. Wait. They’re not targeting me. They’re targeting Yang Qi! He’s threatened the overall power structure of the Titan Emperor Collegium and they want to take him out!’ Lei Jiuzhou was a wily old fox, so it only took him a moment to piece together the clues.

Considering that Yang Qi had already gained the upper hand in the fighting, there was no way his collegium would suddenly draw on their strongest reserve powers to help him.

‘This is the perfect opportunity for me. I’ll just bow out of the fight and let them beat each other up.’

Chuckling, he began backing away from the deadly advance of the Plane of Initiation.

Unfortunately, he was too late.

RUMBLE!

Yang Qi had already come up with a new plan.

“Wheel of Fate!”

An enormous wheel appeared above Lei Jiuzhou’s head and, as it turned, the pressure caused blood to ooze out all over his body. In the blink of an eye, his minor world was shattered like a clay tile.

“Agggghhhhh!” he screamed. “What is that? How could it be so strong? My heaven-immortal magical laws can’t do anything to it! Fine, it's time to go all out!”

“Go all out?” Yang Qi said. “Sorry, you don’t qualify to do that. You're a puny Demolisher who hasn’t even ascended and been baptized by an immortal world. The only thing you’re going to do is die!” He waved his hand and sagelight glittered as the God Legion Paradise spread out around him, sucking in Lei Jiuzhou and his three hundred and sixty Protomagnetic Godmountains along with the Lightning Society disciples who had been powering them.

Then the Hellfire Crucible appeared, tipped over, and poured molten sagefire onto them.

Meanwhile, the Plane of Initiation continued descending, turning everything around it into ash. Entire swaths of the Immortal Army Battlefield had been destroyed, revealing the inky black of outer space beyond.

This was a destructive power that rivaled what had been unleashed on the ancient Yore-Wilds by the Hell of Euphoria.

Countless old-timers and students alike were watching closely to see what would happen, yet they were unable to make out anything clearly. There was only a massive tempest of primal-chaos. A few unlucky individuals who got too close in the hopes of getting more information were sucked in, never to be seen again.

That caused everyone else to back up.

For a full four hours, everything trembled violently, until the primal-chaos finally faded and the enormous Plane of Initiation became visible. It was cracked and covered with craters, and there were numerous society chiefs and initiators on it, the cream of the crop from the Titan Emperor Collegium. At the moment, they were exchanging awkward glances with each other as they tried to determine exactly what had happened.

Already, a divine will conversation was playing out among them.

“What happened? Did our attack kill Yang Qi?”

“I can sense some instability in the void. We definitely hit something. The Plane of Initiation is damaged, and our million years of Initiation Power is gone, vanished forever. I don’t see Yang Qi or Lei Jiuzhou. Don’t tell me that we literally wiped them out of existence?”

“Impossible!” said the hallmaster of the Hall of Beheadings and Executions. “Lei Jiuzhou was a heaven-immortal. He even had the śarīra of the Preheaven Magnetic King, who was a Thought-Demolisher, if not an Origin-Demolisher. There’s no way a śarīra could actually be destroyed.”

“There’s also no way that Yang Qi could have died,” said Chief Hegemon. “Or if he did, the power inside of him would have been released and we would be able to sense it.”

Frowning, the supreme rector said, “Why did I get the sensation that, in the middle of our attack, there was some mighty force absorbing our Initiation Power? None of this falls into what I predicted would happen. Lei Jiuzhou and Yang Qi should have been killed by our attack, or at the very least, seriously injured. But instead, they vanished.”

“It doesn't matter,” said Chief Everlasting. “We need to find them, whether they’re alive or dead. Start searching. Where are Yang Qi and Lei Jiuzhou?”

“Yes, everyone start searching. Draw on the power of the Plane of Initiation.” The supreme rector did not look happy at all. If their attack had failed to kill Yang Qi, it would be a huge loss for them. The Initiation Power they had been building up for a million years was gone now, which meant that they were without any reserve defense. If word leaked, it could be a huge disaster.

Capturing Yang Qi would make up for that loss, but right now the situation seemed grim.

With that, the Plane of Initiation began powering up as they searched the area.

But then, a voice rang out. “Initiators. Supreme Rector. Hallmaster. Society Chiefs. What might you be searching for? Don't tell me it's me?”

Yang Qi appeared off in the distance.

Chapter 504: Dumbstruck

Yang Qi sounded extremely grim when he spoke, his voice lacking even the tiniest scrap of emotion. Anyone who heard his words would feel chilled to the bone.

In fact, even the Plane of Initiation physically trembled a bit as it hovered there in front of him.

As for all of the people on the plane itself, they were shocked to the core. Even the supreme rector’s face was as white as a sheet.

The leaders of the Hegemon’s Society, Everlasting Society, and Hall of Beheadings and Executions were all shaking and sweating. In the blink of an eye, they engaged in a lengthy conversation via divine will.

“Yang Qi is still alive!?”

“What happened? How could he have survived? He doesn’t even look hurt!”

“He's not injured at all!”

“What do we do? What do we do?! We just wasted the reserve power of the entire collegium. Our Initiation Power is gone, but he's still alive. It looks like Lei Jiuzhou is dead as well. We got nothing, and now Yang Qi is right here in front of us. Do we kill him, or not?”

“Kill him!” said the hallmaster of the Hall of Beheadings and Executions. “There’s no turning back now. Either we win, or we die! Besides, it’s highly likely that Yang Qi suffered internal injuries. He’s definitely an arrow that's reached the end of its flight. He might look tough on the outside, but we should be able to cut him down. We need to end him now. If we give him time to recover, the consequences will be dire!”

“That’s exactly right!” said Chief Hegemon and Chief Everlasting. Clearly, they were itching to take action.

“Supreme Rector, let’s all attack at the same time!”

“Yeah! This is our best chance to slaughter Yang Qi. If we give him time to recover, we’re going to be the ones who end up dead.”

During this very short moment, the supreme rector had recovered his composure. He looked at Yang Qi thoughtfully, as though he had finally made a decision about what to do.

However, he didn’t have time to say a thing before Yang Qi started walking in his direction.

Although the step he took seemed casual in nature, it was actually filled with space-time power that could pierce through multiple planes of existence.

A moment later, he was on the Plane of Initiation, right there in the presence of the initiators and society chiefs. The energy he seemed to radiate caused even the supreme rector to shiver, and his heart to drain of confidence.

“Incidentally, Supreme Rector, I already killed Lei Jiuzhou and absorbed his heaven-immortal magical laws. I also have the śarīra of the Preheaven Magnetic King. However, there’s one thing I don’t quite understand. Why, when I was on the very cusp of achieving victory, did you suddenly draw on the Initiation Power of the Titan Emperor Collegium to launch a deadly attack?”

Every word he spoke struck the listeners to the core. In fact, the initiators all looked like they had been stabbed with knives, and they were visibly trembling with anxiety. Considering how Yang Qi had just casually stepped onto the Plane of Initiation, none of them believed that he was low on fighting power.

Although the Plane of Initiation was damaged, the initiators, society chiefs, and supreme rector were all half-Demolishers. If they pooled their strength, they should be able to kill heaven-immortals. But considering what Yang Qi could do, were they a match for him? At the moment, none of them dared to even move a finger in an attempt to find out.

A tense moment passed, then the supreme rector burst out laughing. Rising from his ostentatious throne, he smiled and said, “Well done, Yang Qi. Well done! You are a true treasure of the Titan Emperor Collegium. I hereby declare you to be my successor as the supreme rector. As soon as I ascend to the immortal world, you will be in charge! You see, we already discussed this matter at length. You are so extremely important that we couldn’t risk you being hurt by Lei Jiuzhou. Therefore, in the interests of your safety, the initiators of the Titan Emperor Collegium all took action to come here and rescue you. Now that the task is accomplished, we can return home. This place is simply too dangerous, and we wasted all of our Initiation Power to help you. As word spreads among the other collegiums, we could end up in serious trouble.”

“Oh, really?” Yang Qi said, looking at the smiling supreme rector. Voice turning even icier, he said, “The thing is, I don’t need your help. I killed Lei Jiuzhou, a mere heaven-immortal, on my own. You knew full well that I had the upper hand in the fight, yet you used Initiation Power to launch a sneak attack. Your goal wasn't to do anything to Lei Jiuzhou—it was to kill me!”

“That’s complete nonsense!” the supreme rector said. “Besides, we sent you a message before we came. You must have received it. Yang Qi, I just named you my successor! How could you be so petty? Well, I guess I understand. How about this: after we get back, I and all of the initiators will send a petition to the heaven above to name you supreme rector immediately. That way, there will be no suspicions between us. Agreed?”

Yang Qi looked at the supreme rector as if he could see all the way into his soul. He didn’t say anything, and the tension mounted.

The leaders of the Hegemon’s Society, Everlasting Society, and Hall of Beheadings and Executions all exchanged glances, as they hoped that Yang Qi and the supreme rector would have a complete falling out. They were in a blood feud with Yang Qi that couldn’t possibly be resolved without death. If Yang Qi became the supreme rector, their days would obviously be numbered.

After a moment passed, the hallmaster of the Hall of Beheadings and Executions snorted coldly. “Can’t you tell good from bad, Yang Qi? The Titan Emperor Collegium wasted all of its Initiation Power to save you. Now you suspect us of plotting against you? Do you know what that is? That’s the wild, evil ambition of a wolf, and the actions of someone from the dao of devils! You want to succeed the supreme rector? Let me tell you, we already reported all of this to the heaven above! It's only going to be a few days before they hand down a punishment!”

“That’s right,” said Chief Hegemon, who had obviously decided to throw caution to the wind. “Supreme Rector, our whole purpose in coming here was to eradicate this rebel. This monster. Since he realizes what's going on, what's the point of carrying on the charade? Let’s just kill him. He’s obviously weak right now. I refuse to believe that he’s already assimilated the power of Lei Jiuzhou. In fact, it’s entirely likely that Lei Jiuzhou is trapped in his minor world right now, struggling to escape.”

“Exactly,” said Chief Everlasting, gesticulating wildly. “Initiators! Society Chiefs! Supreme Rector! We have to attack right now and kill this man! If we get his godly-class energy art and absorb his nascent divinity, we can get all of that Initiation Power back.”

Obviously, all three of these leaders were hoping that the supreme rector would use the power of the Plane of Initiation to deal with Yang Qi right here and now. The initiators had all been hoping that Yang Qi could be fooled, only to have the truth blurted out right in the open.

The situation had escalated to the point where it could only end in killing.

At that point, Yang Qi snorted coldly and sent a primal-chaos elder-snake flying out toward the three leaders. Before they could react, it swirled around the three of them, trapping them.

“I understand the situation, Supreme Rector,” Yang Qi said. “It seems some crafty villains have wormed their way into our collegium. And those villains are these three! I’d say that executing them is the only way to keep our collegium united!”

“Are you feeling suicidal, Yang Qi? How dare you do something like this in front of the initiators!”

RUMBLE!

Lunging forward, the hallmaster of the Hall of Beheadings and Executions shouted, “Myriad Magics Combination: Godly Dao of the Grandmaster!”

Dazzling light shot out of him as he launched an attack at the primal-chaos elder-snake. However, the snake simply inhaled, absorbing the power of the attack as if it were nothing.

“Hegemon Ascends to Heaven!”

“Everlasting Azure Heaven!”

The other two society chiefs launched killing moves of their own.

“Everyone, join us! Kill this Yang Qi! We can’t let a beast like him stay alive!”

“Is that what you think of me?” Yang Qi said. A śarīra suddenly shot out into the open, radiating streams of protomagnetic godlightning that slammed into his three opponents, provoking agonized shrieks.

“That’s….” As of this moment, the supreme rector realized that Yang Qi really had defeated Lei Jiuzhou and taken the śarīra of the Preheaven Magnetic King. He quickly made his decision. Snorting coldly, he said, “The leaders of the Hegemon’s Society, the Everlasting Society, and the Hall of Beheadings and Executions are all villains to the core. How dare they plot against Yang Qi? That’s a crime deserving of death! Even Yang Qi killing an elder king as an example couldn’t force them to abandon their evil ambitions. The Hall of Beheadings and Executions has taken the lead in enforcing the law in the Titan Emperor Collegium for years now, but complaints about them have been building. All students hate them to the core. Yang Qi was simply cleaning house when he killed the elder king and those prime paragon elders. All of the students cheered at the sight of those heads nailed to the front entrance of the Invincible Society. There is nothing more gratifying than punishing evildoers! Sadly, death cannot wipe out your crimes, you three! Initiators, join forces with Yang Qi to clean house and execute these traitors!”

“Yes sir!”

The initiators and other society chiefs all breathed sighs of relief, immediately producing various magical treasures and medicinal pills to aid them in their attacks on the leaders of the Hall of Beheadings and Executions, Hegemon’s Society, and Everlasting Society.

“You bunch of degenerates! This is crossing the river and burning the bridge! You’re an evil snake, Supreme Rector! You were the one who came up with the idea to kill Yang Qi! Now you’re teaming up with him to kill us!? It's rare to ever see scum as low as you!”

“You're a complete backstabber, Supreme Rector, you– AIIIIEEEE!”

Of course, there was no way the three of them could possibly stand up to the combined attack of so many opponents, and they were quickly ripped to shreds. Even as their magical treasures flew out into the open, Yang Qi sent the primal-chaos elder-snake to consume their discarnate souls.

In the blink of an eye, they were killed in body and soul, without a trace of their very existences left behind.

With that, the supreme rector said, “Make an announcement that the villainous plotting of the Hegemon’s Society, Everlasting Society, and Hall of Beheadings and Executions has been brought to light. Their leaders have been executed, and those societies will now report to Yang Qi. If necessary, he can execute any other traitors, including elder kings and elysian children!” Then he turned to Yang Qi. “You have a lot of power now, Yang Qi, and you’re responsible for maintaining law and order in our collegium. Hopefully, you can cleanse the taint of the Hall of Beheadings and Executions and return the Titan Emperor Collegium to shining glory.”

The cloying righteousness of the supreme rector's speech caused the initiators to exchange awkward glances, yet none of them said anything.

Before, Yang Qi had been the society chief of the Invincible Society, a position that didn’t have any overarching power and authority. But now he commanded three societies. That was very different. As of this moment, he was essentially the most powerful person in the collegium, aside from the supreme rector.

It was hard for the supreme rector to keep a wry smile off of his face after he made the announcement, yet he was out of options.

Chapter 505: Axes to Grind

The supreme rector had been backed into a corner. Now he knew how strong Yang Qi was, and that the fight between him and Lei Jiuzhou hadn't been one of mutual injury.

Otherwise, he would have made his move instantly, and killed him.

Yang Qi had revealed he was in possession of the śarīra of the Preheaven Magnetic King, which was evidence that he really had killed and absorbed Lei Jiuzhou. That put him far beyond the supreme rector’s ability to deal with.

In fact, making a move on him would likely result in the supreme rector’s death, a major blow to the Titan Emperor Collegium as a whole.

Whenever possible, it is always preferable to sacrifice a chariot to defend the general. And in this case, the leaders of the Hegemon’s Society, Everlasting Society, and Hall of Beheadings and Executions were the chariots, and the Titan Emperor Collegium itself was the general.

Three agonized shrieks rang out as three top experts met their end. All three of them were the top leaders of their organizations, and half-Demolishers. For all intents and purposes, they were guaranteed to reach immortal ascension. They were peak figures within the collegium, and their losses would sting painfully.

But there was no other choice at the moment. The supreme rector’s heart dripped with figurative blood, yet he managed to keep a righteous expression plastered onto his face. What else could he do in the face of Yang Qi’s viper-like cunning?

‘There’s no need to get anxious,’ the supreme rector told himself. ‘After I pacify this fiendish monster and everything calms down, I’ll submit a petition to the heaven above. Once the Titan Emperor Heaven realizes what’s going on, they’ll definitely do something about Yang Qi….’

He was confident in his immortal world backing and knew that people from there wouldn’t fear Yang Qi at all, no matter how fierce he was. If Yang Qi raised too much of a ruckus, they would definitely banish an immortal down to deal with him. And perhaps he had already pushed things too far.

Even the most mediocre of immortals sent from above would be ten times as strong as Lei Jiuzhou. After all, he had achieved his breakthrough but had not yet been baptized by the magical laws of the immortal world, which would have brought about transformations on the deepest level.

Reaching the Demolishing level was important, but ascending was even more important. Without it, one’s battle prowess would remain stuck in a much lower state. And of course, Lei Jiuzhou had only reached the first stage of the Demolishing level.

Just like the Demi-Immortal level, the Demolishing level had nine sub-levels, each of which were as separated from each other as the sky from the land.

“Yang Qi, we’ve executed the three degenerates who were plotting against you,” the supreme rector said. “You’re now the leader of the Hegemon’s Society, Everlasting Society, and Hall of Beheadings and Executions. Your first job is to return to the collegium and clean house a bit. And, we need to shore up our defenses. The Titan Emperor Collegium is in a critical state now and we can’t afford any slip ups. Understand? The other collegiums realize that we’ve completely drained our Initiation Power and might take advantage of the situation to attack us.”

Yang Qi stared hard at the supreme rector, a man who had lived through countless years and come out on top, yet who, in this moment, still seemed terrified. A moment passed, and he said, “You’re right. The Titan Emperor Collegium is in the middle of a potentially deadly crisis. As a society chief, I’ll do everything I can to protect the collegium. My first act will be to clean house and consolidate my power. I’ll also set up a grand spell formation to draw on the good fortune and profound mysteries of the universe. And I'm going to execute any infiltrators or invaders. I won't leave even a trace of their existence!”

Then he blurred into motion, and before anyone could react, had left the Immortal Army Battlefield and was heading back to the Titan Emperor Collegium.

Ding. Dong.

The moment he returned, he was met by the tolling of bells. It was almost as if the immortal world had locked onto him with a spell that automatically activated upon his return.

“Titan Emperor Collegium student Yang Qi killed countless enemy experts, and rose far above the crowd. He thus earned face and glory for the Titan Emperor Heaven. Let him be gifted with a daoist text, nine immortal items, a bottle of high-grade immortal pills, and high-grade universal power in the form of a collection of Double Profundity Vital Energy.”

RUMBLE!

A space-time wormhole opened and all of the aforementioned items descended.

‘Oh,’ he thought, ‘it’s actually a sword!’

The nine immortal items were actually a set, pieced together to form a sword. Its surface was covered with a Nine Palaces Spell Formation, indicating that this was a Nine Palaces Godsword, pulsing with sword energy and an aura of death. The daoist text was a sword technique, the Nine Palaces Swordplay. In addition to that, there were immortal pills and universal power that were all focused on killing and slaughter.

These things were perfect for Sword Seventeen.

“Elder Brother, why don’t you take them,” Yang Qi said, handing them over. After all, he had no interest in such things.

After absorbing Dragon Sun-Chaser’s nascent divinity and quintessence-blood, Sword Seventeen’s genes had exploded to a level tens of thousands of times that of an ordinary cultivator, making him even more of a freak than he had already been.

His eyes were shining brightly. “Junior Brother, why didn't you kill those bastards from the collegium? They’re all venomous schemers, especially the supreme rector!”

Although Sword Seventeen had been working on his cultivation in the God Legion Paradise, he was still privy to the conversation between Yang Qi and the others.

“Now’s not the time,” Yang Qi replied. “I managed to suppress Lei Jiuzhou’s nascent divinity, but because he’s an immortal his branding mark is safe in the Great Metropolis Heaven. I need some more time to wipe it out and make sure he isn’t reborn. Once I do, my cultivation base will reach an even higher level, and at that point not even an immortal from heaven would be able to do anything to me.”

A profound gleam appeared in Yang Qi’s eyes. “I'm not going to let the leaders of the Titan Emperor Collegium off the hook. But killing them now would be counterproductive. There are too many enemies eyeing us like tigers eye their prey. They drained all of the collegium’s Initiation Power to try to kill me, and considering the other collegiums know, they’ll definitely make a move eventually. That will be the perfect opportunity to get other people to do my dirty work for me! I'm mainly curious about what the heavenly world will do. The stance of the Titan Emperor Heaven is key here.”

“You've really thought things through, Junior Brother. No wonder Master appointed you as his successor. Well, what do we do right now?”

“Simple. We seize the resources of the Everlasting Society, Hegemon’s Society, and Hall of Beheadings and Executions and send them to the Sage Monarch planetary system. If the initiators think they’re going to stop me, they’re fools. I'm going to beat them at their own game, and clear out the Titan Emperor Collegium!”

At this point, Yang Qi landed in front of the entrance to the Hall of Beheadings and Executions.

RUMBLE!

The entire headquarters trembled as students poured out of it, unsure of what was happening.

Meanwhile, Sword Seventeen flew out in front of Yang Qi, bursting with an aura that could trample Universal Demi-Immortals.

WHIZZZ!

Instantly, the entire area shone with sword light and an aura of killing.

“Listen up, disciples of the Hegemon’s Society, Everlasting Society, and Hall of Beheadings and Executions!” Sword Seventeen said in a loud voice. “My Junior Brother Yang Qi, society chief of the Invincible Society, has been acknowledged by the supreme rector and the initiators as your new leader. All disciples are hereby ordered to gather in this square, along with the elder kings and prime paragon elders. You have four hours to comply, and any who fail to come will be either expelled or executed as examples!”

The students who had already gathered erupted into pandemonium.

“What?! How did this happen?! In the entire history of the Titan Emperor Collegium, there’s never been a society chief who took over another society! There’s no way these orders are genuine!”

A group of people emerged, the very same vice-rectors and geniuses from the Hall of Beheadings and Executions that Yang Qi had faced before, including the elysian child Ascendant Beheader.

The latter glared furiously at Yang Qi, and said, “Yang Qi, you mongrel, I can’t believe you forged orders from the supreme rector! There’s no way our hallmaster will tolerate atrocious behavior like this!”

Sword Seventeen burst out laughing. “You’re real trash, do you know that, Ascendant Beheader? I can’t believe you would dare to jabber in this situation. Do you know what just happened in the Immortal Army Battlefield? The leaders of the Hegemon’s Society, Everlasting Society, and your own Hall of Beheadings and Executions were all proven to be traitors! My Junior Brother joined the supreme rector himself to execute them!”

“Yes, we have three new decorations for the main entrance,” Yang Qi said. With a wave of his hand, he sent the heads of the three leaders up to the main gate to join the others, where they stared out with rancor and fury.

“Aaaiiiieee!” A horrified shriek escaped Ascendant Beheader’s mouth as he dropped to his knees. “Master! How could you have died such a cruel death? Fear not! Everyone in the Hall of Beheadings and Executions, from students, to elders, to prime elders, to prime paragon elders, to elder kings, will kill the fiend-devil who did this to you. We will avenge your death! Everyone, to arms! The Hall of Beheadings and Executions would rather die in battle than beg for our lives!  If you’ve got what it takes, Yang Qi, try to wipe out the entire Hall of Beheadings and Executions! We’ll never accept you as our hallmaster!”

“You animal! You beast!”

“We’re doomed. Doomed! But we’ll never surrender!”

“We won’t stand for this. We stand for law and justice, forever!”

With Ascendant Beheader egging them on, countless students and elders from the Hall of Beheadings and Executions howled in righteous indignation. Their blood was clearly boiling, and they were ready to risk life and limb to get their revenge.

As for the students and elders from the Hegemon’s Society and Everlasting Society, they were also eyeing Yang Qi with rage and were clearly not ready to submit.

From the look of things, this was a level of force that would be impossible to fight against. Not even Sword Seventeen had anticipated that the reaction would be like this, and looked over nervously at Yang Qi.

Looking like the picture of calm, Yang Qi said, “Excellent. I approve of your suggestion, Ascendant Beheader. The time has come to execute all of you. Henceforth, anyone in the Titan Emperor Collegium who refuses to submit to me will be cut down without mercy.”

Chapter 506: Kill You All

The enraged Ascendant Beheader had whipped up all of his fellow disciples and elders into a frenzy, hoping to make it a situation where the law cannot be enforced when everyone is an offender.

Even the disciples from the Hegemon’s Society and the Everlasting Society seemed ready to fight Yang Qi.

These three organizations had so many members that, when combined together, they formed a force of over a hundred million. That was a group that could shake the heavens and topple the earth, and was not something that anyone could look down on. If they truly went all out, even the supreme rector would have to think twice before taking them on.

However, Yang Qi was far fiercer than the supreme rector, and wasn’t the type of person who cared about keeping the peace. He was more than willing to cause a big scene. Furthermore, it was obvious that this mob was being secretly egged on by powerful entities hidden in the shadows, possibly even the initiators. Therefore, Yang Qi decided to simply suppress the mob and quell the uprising.

Sadly for them, his way of doing so was to simply kill them all.

Even if all of the students in the entire collegium rose up against him, he wouldn't care. He was the representative of the legion of gods, and with his Wheel of Fate, could pass judgment on all the masses in heaven and earth. Considering that his perspective came from gods who could create and destroy the universe, this handful of rebels were like nothing to him.

“Fine, go ahead and try to kill us all!” Ascendant Beheader shouted.

“I will,” Yang Qi replied. “Anyone who refuses to submit is going to die, even if it means wiping out every disciple and elder in the entire Hall of Beheadings and Executions.”

He drew on all the stances of the Hand of the One God, and they were filled with the power of the five phases, six directions, seven stars, eight trigrams, nine palaces, and ten daos.

“Fiend-devil!” Ascendant Beheader shouted, falling back.

Unfortunately, he was too late.

Yang Qi could kill heaven-immortals, much less this measly Ascendant Beheader. The Hand of the One God unceremoniously destroyed his magical treasures, defensive true energy, and minor world. Then it slammed into Ascendant Beheader himself like a sledgehammer hitting an egg.

“Aaaiiiieee!”

Ascendant Beheader didn’t even have time to react before he became a pile of skin on the ground, with his flesh, blood, soul, and everything else that made him up absorbed. The only thing that remained was a magical treasure in the form of a small box covered with ancient, flowery text, which Yang Qi grabbed.

‘What a nice treasure,’ he thought. ‘It’s from a high-level immortal world! Ascendant Beheader was only a Universal Demi-Immortal, but he could use this treasure to unleash the power of a Paragon Demi-Immortal. This will be a great gift for mother.’

He put it away.

Then he blurred into motion and began slaughtering the elders of the Hall of Beheadings and Executions.

POP!

Blood fell like rain and heads flew. To the shock of everyone present, multiple elder kings were being executed by Yang Qi.

“Kill him! Death before surrender!” one of the prime paragon elders shouted. Rushing forward with no regard at all for his own life, he continued, “Disciples of the Hall of Beheadings and Executions, prepare to die for justice! Don’t hold anything back!”

“Die for justice!”

“Die for justice!”

“Die for justice!”

Numerous students threw their heads back and howled at the tops of their lungs.

“You want to die for justice? Fine. I’ll make sure you see justice. In death. The Hall of Beheadings and Executions has chosen to stand against me, and they’ll die because of it.” Yang Qi lunged forward again without the slightest hint of mercy.

RUMBLE!

Flames burned as the God Legion Paradise spread out, destroying any attacks that hit it. Yet again it was like the situation with the Destruction of the Heaven-Dao Tribulation.

“Let the world come to a halt!” he said. As his words spread out, all of the disciples in the area suddenly stopped moving. Their bodies began to expand, almost like inflating balloons, and the bloody explosions began.

“Oh, the horror! This is a nightmare!”

“Why? Why can’t I move? AGHHHH!”

“I don’t want to die!”

“Forget dying for justice!”

One after another, agonized screams rang out as elders and disciples exploded into clouds of blood. No matter how they struggled, there was no escaping. This one short move killed well over ten thousand individuals, all of them top experts from the Hall of Beheadings and Executions.

“You don't want to die for justice? Well, then you can just plain die.  Everyone who just jabbered about justice a moment ago is doomed. Nobody can save you!”

Yang Qi’s words couldn't have been more cruel and ruthless. As the rivers of blood flowed, he waited to see if anyone else shouted about dying for justice.

WHIZZZ!

As he continued with the slaughter, he abandoned the use of any particular energy arts. The mere shockwaves from his movements were enough to cause any nearby disciples to explode. Not even their nascent divinities were left behind.

He was like a dragon of death, killing people wherever he went.

A rare slaughter was being carried out.

The Hall of Beheadings and Executions had become a place of gore and carnage, and as of this moment, there were only explosions, and definitely no cries of dying for justice.

“Aaaiiiieee….”

Some of the experts retreated and activated the spell formations of the Hall of Beheadings and Executions, hoping to escape into the vast starry sky.

However, in the moment before they left, Yang Qi hurled his spear toward them, stabbing them through.

“Be destroyed!” he growled, floating up above the Titan Emperor Collegium.

He waved his hand and a sea of lightning descended onto the disciples below, causing bloodcurdling screams to ring out.

In the end, they all died. From common students to elysian children, everyone who had been present in the Hall of Beheadings and Executions had been wiped out of existence. From this moment on, there would be no organization with that name.

“The entire Hall of Beheadings and Executions was wiped out…?”

“It was an enormous organization, but it was wiped out as easily as crushing an egg. How could this be possible? Isn’t Yang Qi risking universal condemnation here? Did he really kill everyone? No way. I must be dreaming.”

Everyone was completely taken aback, especially the elder kings and prime paragon elders from the Hegemon’s Society and the Everlasting Society. Most could hardly believe their eyes.

At this point, Yang Qi turned to look at the rest of the assembled crowd. “Hegemon’s Society. Everlasting Society. Your two organizations really seemed to be itching to do something a moment ago. Are you also looking to die for justice?”

RUMBLE!

An enormous hand appeared, locking down space-time, then descended to crush ten elder kings from the Hegemon’s Society into pulp. Not a single one of them was anywhere close to being a match for Yang Qi.

Then, Yang Qi prepared to carry out further massacres.

Plop. Thump.

Countless disciples dropped to their knees and began to wail piteously.

“We’ll acknowledge allegiance! We’ll even become slaves. Just don’t kill us! We acknowledge your strength, and we don't want to die for justice!”

As of this moment, the disciples and elders from the two remaining societies understood what true mercilessness was. Considering how mighty Yang Qi was, the expression there is safety in numbers was nothing more than a joke.

Yang Qi paused for a moment as he considered what to do. After all, he could kill everyone present with less effort than it would take to blink.

“Hmph! I guess this is enough,” he said, letting his hand drop to his side. “A wise man submits to the circumstances, and so can you. If you want to live, obey this one simple order: bring out all the treasure and wealth of your societies and take it with you to the Sage Monarch planetary system. You’ll work for the Yang Clan there, and will spend the next ten thousand years forging magical treasures and concocting medicinal pills. At that point, you’ll regain your freedom. For all intents and purposes, you are no longer noble or royal students. You’re slaves. Understand?”

Even as his words rang out, he waved his hand to open a wormhole leading to the Sage Monarch planetary system. Moments later, friends and family of his emerged, all of them with very high cultivation bases.

When his older brother Yang Yunchong looked around and saw the blood, gore, and kneeling disciples, he was visibly stunned. “Third Brother, what did you do?”

“Hello, Eldest Brother,” Yang Qi said casually, “these students are now slaves of the Yang Clan in the Sage Monarch planetary system. Please take them and their riches away with you.”

“This is the Titan Emperor Collegium!” Chancellor Sun-Moon said in astonishment.

Yang Qi snorted coldly, then said, “It won’t be long before the entire Titan Emperor Collegium belongs to the Yang Clan. When you think about that, the wealth of these fallen societies doesn't count for much.”

Thus began a great migration.

The wealth of the Hall of Beheadings and Executions, the Hegemon’s Society, and the Everlasting Society was hauled out from where it was hidden, including rare treasures, daoist texts, spirit pills and medicine, and other rarities. And all of the disciples of those organizations were enslaved.

As these things happened, the members of the other societies in the collegium trembled in fear, aware that major changes were underway. Perhaps the collegium might even have a new leader soon.

On the Plane of Initiation, the initiators watched helplessly. Not a single one of them dared to put a word in edgewise, or interfere in any way. Soon, the wealth of the three defunct societies was gone, and Yang Qi had vanished.

Only at that point did one of the initiators tremble and furiously shout, “Shocking! Outrageous! This is heresy! Outright heresy from a wretch-devil!”

“Supreme Rector! This is intolerable! Yang Qi isn't even human!”

After a very long moment passed, the supreme rector replied, “We have to go along for now. Notify the heaven above, and let them decide what to do….”

Chapter 507: Praying to the Heaven Above

Yang Qi’s ferocity and unbridled mercilessness were shocking to everyone. Initiators and society chiefs alike now realized that he was even more ferocious than the Invincible Dugu. More ferocious by a hundred times, perhaps even a thousand.

Not even the Invincible Dugu would ever have massacred an entire society. In one short action, Yang Qi wiped out all of the members of the Hall of Beheadings and Executions who were present in the Titan Emperor Collegium.

Other than certain freshman students, who were off on mining planets in other parts of the Central Planetary River, the Hall of Beheadings and Executions was no more. Yang Qi didn’t want any loose ends lying about that could eventually turn around and bite him.

The supreme rector felt that Yang Qi had gone too far. Never could the man have guessed that he would be so cruel and ruthless. Obviously, if the disciples from the other two main enemy societies even talked back to Yang Qi, they would likely be wiped out.

Yang Qi had crossed the line, as far as the initiators and the supreme rector were concerned.

After all, he had robbed and enslaved the other two societies, an act of personal profit that was a clear detriment to the collegium as a whole. Forcing students to work as slaves for the Yang Clan was a blow to the foundation of the collegium.

It was obvious that Yang Qi didn’t care about anyone else, and that he was fine with undermining the entire organization.

Of course, it was a blow in terms of reputation as well.

Henceforth, most students and elders would care more about Yang Qi’s words and actions than those of the supreme rector or the initiators.

“Supreme rector, we have to report this matter to the heaven above. If we don't, we’ll all end up dead eventually. Yang Qi obviously realized we’ve been plotting against him, and he’s just waiting for the right moment to make his move. When he does, he’ll strike like lightning.”

“That’s right. If things go along as they are, we’ll end up like the people from the Hegemon’s Society and the Everlasting Society. Slaves. Miners. Magical treasure forgers and pill concocters. I'd rather die than end up a whipped and bullied slave.”

“I agree. We initiators are grand and majestic individuals. We’re half-Demolishers! If we sink to that level, we might as well just die.”

The initiators knew that it was a grim situation and they needed to take immediate action.

“Fine. Let’s join forces to submit a petition to the heaven on high. Tell them what’s happened, and ask them to deliver us from this tribulation.” The supreme rector sliced open his finger and waved it through the air, using the blood to create a handful of paper talismans.

“Let us pray together,” he said. “Read with me.”

“Yes sir!”

With that, they joined their voices and said, “We, the initiators and supreme rector of the Titan Emperor Collegium, servants of the heaven on high, have carried out our responsibilities dutifully for a million years. When the Hell of Euphoria invaded, we led the collegium to make heroic contributions to the war effort. Now, a wretch-devil named Yang Qi is threatening to topple the foundation of the collegium. Oh immortal world, we beseech you to banish an immortal here to slay the wretch-devil and restore justice. Our enemy has a boundless godly-class technique that surpasses us all, and can even summon wretch-devils from hell. As a mere Greater Demi-Immortal, he can summon Universal Demi-Immortal fiend-devils….”

They went on to elaborate on Yang Qi’s deeds in the hopes of getting a reaction from the immortal world.

Whizz!

As the words of the prayer were uttered, they became a dragon which swirled high into the sky and then vanished without a trace.

Some time passed, then immortal light suddenly shone from above.

“The immortal world accepted our prayer!” the supreme rector murmured, his face glowing with delight.

A long moment passed, then a voice spoke into their minds. “Your report has been received. The heaven on high understands the gravity of the situation. In a few days, we will provide a formal response. In the meantime, wait patiently and don't do anything rash.”

“Many thanks, oh immortal world!” the supreme rector said, dropping to his knees along with all of the initiators. Turning his attention to the initiators, the supreme rector said, “The heaven on high knows of the situation, and has provided an initial response. The situation is tense now, so we have to keep a low profile. Absolutely, positively don't do anything to provoke Yang Qi. Incidentally, what happened to the society chief of the Beastmaster Society?”

“He went into the Immortal Army Battlefield and even fought with Yang Qi,” one of the initiators said, “but his current whereabouts are unknown.” He sighed. “Truth be told, the day I initially contacted Yang Qi, he told me a bit of useful information. His greatest arch-nemesis is actually a new member of the Titan Emperor Collegium.”

“What?” the supreme rector said. “Why didn’t you mention this before? Tell us the details!”

The initiator went on to explain about the yellow-garbed young man with the buzz cut. “I would say it's highly likely that young man in yellow was working with the Beastmaster Society. If he really has the power to freely enter and exit the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, and we could gain access to that power, then we would easily be able to deal with Yang Qi. In fact, we could probably rule the universe!”

“If this is all true, we need to contact Chief Beastmaster immediately!”

“We have to talk to this young man in yellow. That’s our only chance to come out on top.”

“This is our best hope of turning things around!”

Thus, it was with great fanfare that they went to the Beastmaster Society.

**

“What do we do now, Junior Brother?” Sword Seventeen asked. “There’s no way the supreme rector and the initiators are going to just let us do whatever we want. Although they can’t stop you themselves, they can reach out to the immortal world and slander your name.”

“I would guess that they’ve already done it,” Yang Qi replied coolly. “If they banish some immortals down here to deal with me, I guess I’ll be slaughtering some banished immortals. Absorbing power from people like that will do a lot to push me into the Demolishing level. Right now, I'm only a second order Demi-Immortal, and further breakthroughs are going to require a huge amount of power. In fact, I don’t think such power exists in the mortal world.”

“You’re sure about that?” Sword Seventeen asked.

“Of course. It will only take me a few more days to completely absorb Lei Jiuzhou’s nascent divinity and assimilate the śarīra of the Preheaven Magnetic King. Once I do, I’ll likely jump up by two levels. Once I'm a fourth order Potent Demi-Immortal, I won’t have anything to fear from any banished immortals.”

“In that case, congratulations, Junior Brother! Alright, shouldn't we head back to the Sage Monarch planetary system?”

“Yes, let's go.” A moment later, the two of them were at their destination.

The Sage Monarch planetary system was a very bustling place now. In fact, it was already close to rivaling the Central Planetary River, with new planets constantly being born thanks to the power of the Tusita Heaven. And the glory of the planetary system was currently rising even more rapidly thanks to the wealth from the Hegemon’s Society, Everlasting Society, and Hall of Beheadings and Executions.

The Holy Mother sat in a spell formation in the depths of the planetary system, cultivating her consummate godly-class energy art, which transformed countless surrounding planets into pure jade.

“You’re back, Qi’er,” she said as her son approached. Rising to her feet, she continued, “I was looking over at the Central Planetary River and noticed that the entire Titan Emperor Collegium seemed bathed in killing energy.”

“Well, Mother, let me explain….”

He went on to do just that. When he was finished, he said, “In any case, you don't need to worry. Before long, I’ll take out the entire Titan Emperor Collegium and replace it with the Sage Monarch planetary system. When I killed Ascendant Beheader from the Hall of Beheadings and Executions, I acquired a jade flute that is definitely a powerful immortal item. It can actually boost you to a higher level. Considering it's from some sort of jade immortal, I imagine it’s perfect for your Jade-Emperor Profound-Welkin Exalted-Celestial God-Dao.”

With that, Yang Qi produced the very jade flute he had just mentioned.

It was very small, to the point where it almost looked like a whistle. However, it had numerous finger holes which could be used to produce music like that from nature itself.

“This….” The Holy Mother took it and looked at it carefully, then put it to her lips and exhaled some of the true energy of the Jade-Emperor Profound-Welkin Exalted-Celestial God-Dao.

Instantly, the flute began glowing with bright light and emanating music that could pierce the very soul. Anyone who listened to that music would experience a genetic transformation and become more perfect as a result.

In fact, ordinary people who transformed like that would easily become a thousand, ten thousand, hundred thousand, million, or even ten million times as strong as an ordinary person.

As the music continued, it was almost possible to see an imperial entity within it.

The Holy Mother’s face lit up. “Don’t tell me this is the legendary Jade Sovereign’s Flute?”

“Jade Sovereign's Flute? What’s that?” Yang Qi asked.

“According to the legends, The Jade-Emperor Profound-Welkin Exalted-Celestial God-Dao was created by a member of the legion of gods in ancient times. Whichever god created it was known as the Jade Emperor, or sometimes the Jade Sovereign. This flute isn’t an immortal item. It’s most likely a god item! You see, the Jade Emperor had plenty of musical instruments in his palace, all of which were god items. My Jade-Emperor Profound-Welkin Exalted-Celestial God-Dao can definitely unlock the godly majesty of this item. Its music is a baptism that makes genes more perfect and can impart the true blood of gods. In combination with the godrelic I have, I can definitely get to the Paragon Demi-Immortal level. In fact, even the Demolishing level might be within my grasp. Qi’er, you’re truly a blessing!”

“I'm not a blessing,” Yang Qi said coolly. “I'm a Fateless One.”

“Fateless One?” the Holy Mother replied in shock.

“Yes. I was told that by someone who I'm fairly certain came from the future.” With that, he went on to explain about the yellow-garbed young man with the buzz cut. “Apparently, I don’t exist in the future. However, the fact that I exist here means that I'm a Fateless One. And that means I have a lot of enemies.”

All of a sudden, the Holy Mother’s eyes flashed, as if with understanding. “Qi’er, your father mentioned something like this! After you were born, he was furious, and told me he wanted to kill you. He said that you didn’t exist in his future, and that your birth would lead to a heavenly catastrophe.”

Chapter 508: Birth Origin

“Mother, I'm strong enough now to kill heaven-immortals. And soon I’ll reach an even higher level. Don't you think the time has come to tell me about my father?”

From his tone of voice, he obviously took the matter to be very serious.

“I guess you've waited long enough, Qi’er. Your father is unusual, even by the standards of immortals. You just mentioned that young man in yellow who you said was a Future One. Well… I think it’s highly likely that your father is also a Future One, and that he traveled through time to get here. He was always extremely skilled at making predictions; he even knew my fate, and the things that would happen to me. Apparently, the reason he got close to me was because he knew that I would acquire the blood of a god and become very important because of it. After all, he was a banished immortal, making him one of the most powerful of entities in the mortal world. I was a mere holy daughter. The two of us should never have ended up together. Yet he sought me out….”

“So, that's what happened,” Yang Qi said. “Please keep going, Mother.”

Her eyes faded a bit as she recalled distant memories. “Things changed when I became pregnant with you. From that point on, his predictions always failed. And he tried to kill you. Several times.

“That was when I fled. Thankfully, I already had a godly-class energy art to cultivate. And because you were in my belly, there was a barrier between me and many heavenly workings. No one was able to track me down during that time. Of course, my hiding place was none other than the miniscule Rich-Lush Continent. While I was pregnant, I found myself in a lot of strange and dangerous situations.

“However, whatever energy touched me always ended up being absorbed by you. That was when I realized that there must be something very special about you. To be honest, I had put such matters to the back of my mind, but now that you call yourself a Fateless One it all comes rushing back. According to your father, you don't exist in the future. But you're here now, and you’re my son.”

Yang Qi nodded. “True. My existence now is true and real, and my future is changeable. No one knows what will come to be, not even the Future Ones. And the fact that there are Future Ones here indicates that some big change is coming. Whatever that change is, we need to turn it to our advantage. That young man in yellow said ‘after the gods experience nirvanic rebirth’, a new civilization would gradually rise up.”

The Holy Mother’s eyes suddenly flickered, but before she could say anything, Yang Qi continued, “Mother, you stay here and work on your cultivation. Try to achieve that next breakthrough. I'm going back to the Hell of Mahānata. When I return, the two of us will conquer the Titan Emperor planetary system, and expand our territory until we control the entire mortal world!”

With that, he reached out with both hands and tore a rift into the canopy of heaven, beyond which existed the dark gold greyspace of the Hell of Mahānata. By this point, he could enter the Hell of Mahānata without expending any effort at all.

He inhaled, exhaled, and was inside.

Any fiend-devils he encountered exploded on sight, turning into vital energy that he funneled into his Hellfire Crucible.

Of course, the Hell of Mahānata was a massive place. It was so large that even if there were a hundred billion, a trillion, or trillions of Yang Qis all slaughtering fiend-devils at the same time, it would only be like a drop of water in the ocean or a grain of sand in a desert. The Hell of Mahānata was a thorn in the side of the legion of gods, even in ancient times.

However, Yang Qi was like the fledgling lord of this hell, and as he grew stronger he would gain more and more control over it. In fact, he would eventually come to control millions upon millions of hellish planes.

At this point, Yang Qi pulled out a nascent divinity.

“Alright, Lei Jiuzhou,” he said. “Do you know where we are? The Hell of Mahānata! Even in ancient times it was the most mysterious, fiendish, and largest of hells. And I rule this place! My battle prowess here is ten times normal!”

“The Hell of Mahānata!?” Lei Jiuzhou blurted. He glared at Yang Qi. “So you're planning to wipe me out of existence? Why don’t we make a deal instead? It's obvious that the leaders of the Titan Emperor Collegium want to kill you. They used their Initiation Power to strike at you, and surely they have the backing of the Titan Emperor Heaven. There’s no way you can deal with people like that. Why not join the Great Metropolis Heaven and lead them in war against the Titan Emperor Heaven?”

Yang Qi laughed. “Even now, you have a very glib tongue. You see, I couldn’t care less about the Titan Emperor Heaven. The Hell of Mahānata is my true headquarters. You think the Titan Emperor Heaven is going to invade here? Cut the crap. You’re going to die in a moment, and I’ll absorb your nascent divinity, as well as the śarīra of the Preheaven Magnetic King. What do you think will happen to my cultivation base then?”

“Stop!” Lei Jiuzhou said. “I’ll join you! I’ll be your slave. I'm a Demolisher! I have a high rank in the Great Metropolis Collegium! With me serving you, you could take over my collegium! The Great Metropolis planetary system is ten times as rich as yours!”

“It's still part of the mortal world,” Yang Qi replied, “and that means I'm not very interested in it. I’ll be ascending soon, and eventually the plethora of immortal worlds will be mine. Compared to them, the Great Metropolis planetary system is like nothing. Therefore, you're of little value to me. I wouldn’t even care if you handed the Great Metropolis planetary system to me on a silver platter!” Without further ado, Yang Qi smacked his hand down onto Lei Jiuzhou’s head.

RUMBLE!

Lei Jiuzhou let out a bloodcurdling scream. He cursed Yang Qi to die a horrible death and vowed to slaughter his entire clan, but Yang Qi ignored such words. True energy stabbed into Lei Jiuzhou, backed by the immense power of the Hell of Mahānata.

POP!

Lei Jiuzhou’s heaven-immortal nascent divinity shattered like a porcelain jug. Heaven-immortal magical laws flowed into Yang Qi, and Lei Jiuzhou’s memories streamed into his sea of consciousness.

All of a sudden, he was filled with enlightenment regarding preheaven protomagnetic power.

Everything clicked and he threw his hands wide, summoning the śarīra of the Preheaven Magnetic King. As he poured true energy into it, a sealing mark was revealed, which then shattered and caused dazzling protomagnetic power to form an entire world.

From the immense levels of power on display, it was obvious that this was actually an embryonic immortal world.

‘Incredible! The śarīra of the Preheaven Magnetic King truly lives up to its hype. This quintessence energy can be used to create a full immortal world! Only Godmyths have what it takes to create immortal worlds.’

There were more immortal worlds out in the void than there were eternal grains of sands in the universe. Some had come to exist naturally, but others had been created by powerful entities in primeval times.

Truth be told, the million-year history of the Titan Emperor Collegium wasn’t very impressive.

There were immortal worlds who had histories that stretched back ten billion years, or even a hundred billion. Throughout all those years, many of the entities that had created such worlds had ended up dying. Sometimes there were even multiple successions of such lordly individuals.

There were even extremely ancient immortal worlds whose histories stretched as far back as trillions, hundreds of trillions, or quadrillions of years. An immortal world with a history of ten billion years was considered very young, like a toddler just learning to walk.

As for the Preheaven Magnetic King, he had begun work on creating an immortal world, but then somehow perished. And now that Yang Qi was making his śarīra part of the God Legion Paradise, it grew hundreds of times stronger.

‘Time to break through! Third order, Profound Demi-Immortal!’

RUMBLE!

Heavenly tribulation formed, a dense conglomeration of tribulation clouds that swirled overhead, filled with heaven-devils of all sorts. In fact, there were even devil lords, entities which ruled over myriads of devil kings!  This was a grand tribulation of dao corroboration, something that would normally only come when ascending to an immortal world. Yet here it was facing Yang Qi, an invasion of heaven-devils.

Unfortunately for the tribulation, Yang Qi was a Fateless One who had long since grown used to the idea of facing immense tribulations. A mysterious wheel of vital energy appeared above him, causing the devilish tribulation to fade away like smoke. It was none other than the Wheel of Fate. Although it wasn’t fully formed, it was still incredibly powerful.

Normally speaking, Yang Qi should have been forced to reach the Demolishing level before being able to fully use it. But now that he had absorbed a Demolisher, and owned an embryonic immortal world in the form of a śarīra, he already had the magical laws of Demolishers and could summon an even more complete version of the Wheel of Fate.

“Fate decrees that tribulations of all sorts have no effect on me!” Yang Qi murmured.

As the tribulation vanished, power from the Hell of Mahānata poured into him and he began rising to a higher, more profound level. This was the Profound Demi-Immortal level!

‘Another breakthrough! Fourth order, Potent Demi-Immortal!’

He waved his hand, and an even stronger tribulation appeared overhead.

‘Another tribulation to demolish….’ He waved his hand, and the Wheel of Fate took shape again. As it turned, the tribulation was destroyed.

Chapter 509: Fierce Breakthrough

Yang Qi had perfect genes that were eight hundred forty million times stronger than the average person. Considering that, it was difficult to contemplate the type of tribulations that he would face. It was like eight hundred forty million Demi-Immortals all experiencing tribulation at the same time. That was a power that could wipe out an entire planetary system!

Yet the Wheel of Fate simply crushed the tribulation out of existence.

That enormous wheel seemed capable of shaking an immortal world so hard that it could open up a passageway there.

‘Fourth order Potent Demi-Immortal breakthrough!’ Yang Qi absorbed the vital energy of the tribulation and used it to convert the surrounding power of the Hell of Mahānata into something he could use.

Being here in the Hell of Mahānata meant that he had plenty of power to work with, and with the quintessence energy and blood of the heaven-immortal he had absorbed, could achieve two successive breakthroughs.

As the power within him began fading, Yang Qi realized that his breakthrough momentum was over. His cultivation level was stabilizing, and thanks to the transformation of his quintessence-blood and vital energy, another hundred million megamammoth particles within him were converting into dracomammoths.

The difference between dracomammoths and megamammoths was immense. After all, megamammoths could inhale the cloud cover and unleash brute power of epic proportions. But they couldn’t pierce through the air and fly. In contrast, dracomammoths had a combination of the godpowers of heaven dragons and megamammoths, a preheaven power source that gave them the marvelous ability to soar among the clouds.

‘Power! My power levels have increased by at least tenfold. Now I can definitely summon Universal Demi-Immortal fiend-devils without any problems whatsoever. And I can probably summon Paragon Demi-Immortals as well….’

He waved his hand and nine Hell Portals appeared. Within them it was possible to see all sorts of fiend-devils, including asuras, infernals, giant snakes, bronzeblaze fiend-devils, destruction devil-gods, metal-smelting ghost-devils, blood-drinking great-devils, bleach-boned true-devils, and more.

All of them were ninth order Paragon Demi-Immortals, entities which would be considered impossible to defeat in the mortal world. They were things that could dominate entire planetary systems.

But Yang Qi could summon them with ease.

“Greetings, exalted master,” they said, kneeling and bowing their heads.

“Go and stand guard over the Sage Monarch planetary system,” he said. “I'm establishing a new world here within the Hell of Mahānata, a pure land that will serve as a backup line of defense for the Sage Monarch planetary system, a place where it will be completely undefeatable.”

With that, he waved his hand and opened a passageway. He was now so deeply connected to the essence of the Hell of Mahānata that he could manipulate it with ease, and now that he was a Potent Demi-Immortal he was more than strong enough to fight and kill heaven-immortals. In fact, if he fought someone like Lei Jiuzhou right now, he would be able to crush them with the snap of his finger.

In a fight in the mortal world, he would truly be invincible, even if a host of enemies ganged up on him.

However, he wasn’t ready to leave the Hell of Mahānata yet. He wanted to establish a pure land here, a bastion of retreat for the Sage Monarch planetary system. After all, he was more worried about his friends and family than anything else.

If war broke out and experts from other planetary systems came to lay siege, it could result in the destruction of the Sage Monarch planetary system. Although setting up a lair in the Hell of Mahānata would be dangerous, not even experts from the immortal worlds would take the fighting there if he was successful.

Unfortunately, the devil energy of the Hell of Mahānata was so intense that it would be a big danger to the Sage Monarch planetary system, and could easily devilize it.

Therefore, he wanted to set up a spell formation filled with pure immortal energy. And the best way to do that would be to convert the local devil energy into immortal energy.

Normally, not even heaven-immortals would be able to do something like that. But to someone who cultivated the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth and commanded the Wheel of Fate, it was definitely possible if enough effort was exerted.

“As the universe rotates, the śarīra of the Magnetic King gives birth to an immortal world, and hell blossoms….”

As he sat there cross-legged, he drew on his energy arts and sagelight swirled around him. It almost looked like a blossoming lotus flower.

Hell blossoms.

Power bubbled up from the dark golden soil and then poured into the lotus Yang Qi had created.

“The śarīra of the Magnetic King gives birth to an immortal world!”

He extended his hand and the śarīra caused everything around it to twist and distort as an enormous kingdom came to be.

“Hellfire Crucible!”

As the Hellfire Crucible appeared in the middle of that enormous kingdom, a vortex popped into being above it and sucked in all of the dangerous devil-energy that had immediately begun to corrode it.

“Thunder-Lightning Void-Shattering Immortal Formation!Protomagnetic Godmountains! Imperial snakecharms!”

In a single breath, Yang Qi sent out all of his most powerful magical treasures to surround the kingdom.

The imperial snakecharm became a primal-chaos elder-snake and began devouring huge mouthfuls of devil energy, sending it into the Hellfire Crucible.

A variety of spell formations appeared, bolstering the kingdom in its place in the middle of the Hell of Mahānata.

This kingdom of Yang Qi’s counted for almost nothing, compared to the enormous Hell of Mahānata as a whole, therefore it didn't attract the attention of any of the extremely powerful entities that also existed there.

Eventually, the kingdom began to take physical shape. Devil energy abounded outside of it, but inside, it was rife with immortal energy. And any devil energy that came inside was instantly converted to the immortal type.

‘Great! Wonderful!’

Yang Qi called upon his primeval godworms, which opened up numerous wormholes to less dangerous locations that disciples could travel to to fight fiend-devils for training.

The Sage Monarch planetary system was currently a flourishing place where danger didn’t even exist. Unfortunately, life springs from sorrow and calamity, and death comes from ease and pleasure. If the inhabitants lived lives of pure safety, it would eventually lead to disaster.

Fighting battles in hell was the perfect training, and they would allow the disciples of the various organizations in the Sage Monarch planetary system to steadily advance and become stronger.

Even if war didn't come soon, Yang Qi wanted his people to be ready. He wanted a new generation of geniuses to be groomed, thus he would have the disciples from his planetary system come here to train in hell.

After the kingdom was complete, Yang Qi stepped outside, looked back to examine it, and was very pleased.

At this point, he finally returned to the Sage Monarch planetary system. There, his mother was deep in a meditative trance, surrounded by swirling lights as she attempted to achieve her next breakthrough. Yang Qi examined her, and could see that her cultivation base was stable, and that her genes were transforming in a very profound way.

At high levels, the Jade-Emperor Profound-Welkin Exalted-Celestial God-Dao would cause one’s blood and energy arts to transform. In the end, his mother’s genes would make her hundreds of millions of times as powerful as ordinary cultivators. Although she wouldn’t get close to the level of eight hundred forty million like Yang Qi, she would still be considered a rare genius even in the immortal worlds.

“Father!” Yang Qi called.

Yang Zhan immediately flew over and said, “What's going on, Qi’er?”

“I created a wonderful kingdom in hell,” he replied, “a place perfect for cultivation. Gather the core disciples of the Yang Clan, as well as my sworn siblings, and send them all there. Leave a few people behind in the Sage Monarch planetary system to oversee things. Right now, training is of the utmost importance. We have to stabilize our foundation, and not be careless in anything.”

Yang Zhan sighed. “I understand. The wind sweeping through the tower heralds a rising storm in the mountains. Trouble will be coming our way soon. The Sage Monarch planetary system has grown very strong. To think that we were like a clan of ants a few years ago.”

His words couldn’t have been truer. Only a few short years ago, the Yang Clan had been ants in Yanhaven, weak to the extreme and struggling with the other aristocratic clans just to survive. Now, they had truly become a noteworthy force in the world. Unfortunately, compared to all the other planes of existence and planetary systems, they were still small and weak. And that wasn't to mention the immortal worlds.

“Don’t worry,” Yang Qi said. “One day I’ll make sure our Yang Clan stands at the peak of existence. We’ll be the ultimate force in the universe and will look down on all living beings.” With that, Yang Qi called forth all the administrators of the Sage Monarch planetary system and began issuing orders.

Even Ghost Emperor Yama was there. By now, he was little more than a wretched-looking tramp who got along by begging and stealing. And thanks to the fact that his cultivation was based on the Infernal Deity Spear, he could rise no further in the Demi-Immortal level. Years ago, he had been an all-powerful ghost emperor who shook all creation. But not anymore.

All around him, disciples of the Yang Clan had been achieving breakthrough after breakthrough, and it was the same with Yang Qi’s sworn siblings. Despite his setbacks, he still hoped to do the same one day.

“Milord!” Ghost Emperor Yama said. “The Infernal Deity Spear you passed on to me is too difficult to cultivate. I was hoping you—”

POP!

Yang Qi waved his hand, and Ghost Emperor Yama exploded into a cloud of blood and bone dust. It happened so quickly that he didn’t even know what happened.

“Scum,” Yang Qi said. “All you wanted to do was leech off my godly-class energy art. You were a catastrophe in the making, and the Sage Monarch planetary system is a lot safer with you gone.” Yang Qi took the scrap of Infernal Deity Spear true energy that Ghost Emperor Yama had cultivated and tossed it into the Hellfire Crucible.

As of this moment, Ghost Emperor Yama was a thing of the past. He had always been a deadly viper, hoping to make a comeback. For all anyone knew, he might very well have. In any case, Yang Qi would never allow anyone else to possess even a bit of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.

Another possible future threat had been eliminated.

Chapter 510: A Banished Immortal Arrives

As a Potent Demi-Immortal with perfect genes, Yang Qi was invincible in the mortal world.

He had established a kingdom in the Hell of Mahānata, using the śarīra of the Preheaven Magnetic King as its foundation. That kingdom was protected by protomagnetic godlightning and his imperial snakecharms, so if anything unexpected happened in the mortal world, he could easily take the Sage Monarch planetary system there to be safe.

Upon seeing Yang Qi’s kingdom, Sword Seventeen pulled out the fragment of the Mourn-Parting Heaven-Palace that he had.

“It's too bad we don’t have the complete Mourn-Parting Heaven-Palace,” he said. “The imperial snakecharms represent slaughter and devouring, so using them as a defensive measure is like using a sledgehammer to crack a nut. But King Mourn-Parting’s Mourn-Parting Heaven-Palace would be the perfect thing to add to your kingdom’s defenses. Here.”

Although it was a powerful immortal item, it didn’t conform to his cultivation. After all, he focused on sword technique, including sharpness, killing blows, accuracy, and the like. The Mourn-Parting Heaven-Palace was a precious treasure perfect for defense, complete with spell formations, shields, and other things that could defend against immortal items.

“Good point,” Yang Qi said. Taking the Mourn-Parting Heaven-Palace, he added it into his kingdom.

After being refined by his true energy, it began glowing with a bright light and transformed into an immense palace that was as dazzling and splendid as a jewel, except with immense defensive powers.

“Godworm,” Yang Qi said, and a godworm egg flew out. It hatched a moment later, and he sent the newborn godworm larva into the Mourn-Parting Heaven-Palace to grow.

“There are nine thousand, nine hundred and ninety-nine halls that make up the Mourn-Parting Heaven-Palace,” Yang Qi said. “Right now, we have one. I wonder where the others are. I imagine I’ll run into them eventually. Each one I find, I’ll add to my kingdom here.”

Days passed, and many key figures from the Yang Clan went to Yang Qi’s kingdom in the depths of hell. That place was now like a second nascent divinity for Yang Qi, and with his soul branding mark in it, it was completely fused with the Hell of Mahānata, giving it the most consummate of foundations.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi’s immortal clone was also making significant improvements. Now that he had cultivated both the Jade-Emperor Profound-Welkin Exalted-Celestial God-Dao and the Prodigious Proto-Epoch, Invincible War-Steppe, he had reached an even higher level, and had improved his genes and substructure significantly.

The clone had started out with genes that were ten million times as powerful as ordinary genes, but cultivating godly-class energy arts had improved that.

Everyone was advancing by leaps and bounds.

Of course, the Sage Monarch planetary system was still a part of the Yore-Wilds planetary system, which was in turn part of the Titan Emperor planetary system. There were other planetary systems as well, including the Waste-Wilds, Brute-Wilds, and Proto-Wilds, and the experts there were aware of what was happening in the Yore-Wilds. To them, it had become a forbidden region; they all knew that if their disciples went there and somehow offended Yang Qi, it could lead to a massacre.

In fact, many clans had already begun contemplating whether or not to support, or even join, Yang Qi. Slowly but surely, the Sage Monarch planetary system had begun to undermine the Titan Emperor Collegium.

**

The Plane of Initiation was now battered and damaged, covered with craters and debris.

In some ways, that dilapidated state represented the general decline of the Titan Emperor Collegium as a whole. Right now, the supreme rector was holding a meeting with the initiators and certain society chiefs. All of them were drawing deeply on their vital energy in an attempt to repair the damage to the Plane of Initiation. At the same time, they were waiting to hear from the immortal world above.

All of a sudden, a beam of dazzling light shot down from the highest heaven.

A holy and magnificent figure appeared, descending from on high and radiating magical laws of the dao of immortals that caused the Plane of Initiation to brim with life force.

Looking up, the supreme rector said, “That’s… an immortal emissary! The immortal world really is taking the situation seriously! We have hope! Hope!”

The initiators immediately began buzzing with excitement.

“Everyone offer greetings to the immortal emissary! We're all servants of the immortal world, so we can’t afford to show any neglect in receiving this emissary!”

“On your knees! Everyone on your knees to receive the immortal emissary!”

“Greetings, oh Immortal Emissary!”

“We offer respectful greetings, Immortal Emissary! May your glory last throughout the ages!”

The supreme rector, the initiators, and all of the society chiefs dropped to their knees to offer obeisance.

“You wretched scum!” the mighty figure shouted angrily. “You can't even handle the simplest matters! I can’t believe the collegium has descended into such chaos! How could you possibly practice cultivation for a million years only to be such useless curs?”

“Please, forgive us, Immortal Emissary,” the supreme rector said, his voice trembling with fear. “We did everything we could! But that wretch-devil is just too heaven-defying! He’s only a second order Demi-Immortal, but he killed the Demolisher, Lei Jiuzhou! We’re not a match for him. We wanted to kill him, and even used all of our Initiation Power in the attempt. But we failed! And now he's causing a reign of terror and carnage in the collegium!”

“I obviously know about that already!” As the majestic figure took shape, it was revealed to be a middle-aged man in an immortal’s robe. He had eyes that glistened like a river of stars, and radiated a glory the likes of which didn’t exist in the mortal world. “Your pathetic weakness is a real shame to the immortal world. When we received your petition, it was taken very seriously, and I've been sent here to resolve the situation. I’ll apprehend this Yang Qi and take him back to the immortal world to have his blood examined. From the look of things, he might be a genius that surpasses even the geniuses of the immortal world.”

“Many thanks!” the supreme rector bubbled joyously. “The immortal world clearly knows what is right and proper. That freakish hellion must be taken away and thoroughly researched.”

The truth was that even the supreme rector was ignorant and superstitious regarding the immortal worlds.

“Very well. Where is this Yang Qi?” the immortal emissary said. “Considering how strong he is, he surely has a few tricks up his sleeve. Why don’t you invite him here so that I can arrest him without incident? If things work out, and the immortal world benefits from this, they’ll surely send gifts down to compensate you for your losses. The million years’ worth of Initiation Power that you lost can easily be restored.”

“Of course. Many thanks, Immortal Emissary! We’ll send a decree to the Sage Monarch planetary system right away.”

Pointing to a handful of the initiators, he said, “Go to Yang Qi and tell him that I'm about to ascend. Say that I'm done with the mortal world and want to pass my mantle on to him. Tell him that we need to communicate with the heaven above before making the change official. In that moment in which we ‘appeal to heaven’, Immortal Emissary, sir, you can use an illusion to trick him into thinking the heaven above is about to bless him with power. Then, when he least expects it, you can capture him. We definitely want to avoid a situation in which the centipede does not stop wriggling even after being stomped on.”

“Not a bad plan,” the immortal emissary said. “I would never have guessed that you would be so shrewd. Once I apprehend Yang Qi, I’ll head back to the immortal world, at which time I’ll make sure that you're handsomely rewarded. Once you ascend, you won't start out as a low-level immortal, but will immediately rise in the ranks of officialdom.”

“Many thanks, Immortal Emissary!” the supreme rector said, his heart pounding with joy.

The initiators were already whispering amongst themselves.

“This immortal emissary is incredible! His grace is like the sea and his might is like hell! No matter how Yang Qi tries to get out of this situation, he's going to get caught. Then we can destroy the Sage Monarch planetary system and everyone in it!”

“Exactly. People are saying that the Sage Monarch planetary system has a lot of treasure in it. After all, he came out of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart with lots of loot. They say he has entire planets filled with wealth. That’s not to mention the godworm eggs and immortal items he has. We’re finally going to get our chance to become Demolishers! And once we ascend, we’ll be immortal officials right off the bat! Just imagine the luxuries we’ll enjoy!”

“I heard that the immortal world above is rich beyond imagination, and a place of ultimate beauty. It's a far, far better place than the mortal world. You could even say that the Titan Emperor planetary system is a prison, and that we're trapped here just waiting to achieve freedom and independence.”

“This is an incredible opportunity.”

“Once we ascend, we can forget about everything in the mortal world.”

“That’s right.”

Meanwhile, the initiators the supreme rector had spoken to moments ago flew off in the direction of the Sage Monarch planetary system. When they reached it, they didn’t dare to enter it. The devil energy and killing intent within the place was strong enough to rip even them to shreds.

That fact caused expressions of terror to appear on their faces as they suddenly realized that, if nothing happened to change it, the Sage Monarch planetary system would eventually surpass the Titan Emperor Collegium. And of course, two tigers cannot live on one mountain; eventually, the latter would come to serve the former.

“We bear a decree from the supreme rector!” the lead initiator said. “He will ascend soon, and cannot allow the Titan Emperor Collegium to go leaderless for even a day. Yang Qi will bear his mantle and lead the collegium into glory. Yang Qi, please come with us to the collegium, where we will appeal to the heaven above to approve the measure.”

Their booming voices ensured that everyone in the Sage Monarch planetary system heard the announcement.

In response, Yang Qi quickly gathered all of the key figures.

“Something fishy is going on here, Junior Brother,” Sword Seventeen said. “Do you think the supreme rector might have set a trap for you?”

“He’s right, Qi’er,” said Yang Zhan. “You probably shouldn't go.”

Chapter 511: The Trap

All the top leaders in the Sage Monarch planetary system heard the announcement and immediately used various wormholes to follow Yang Qi to the central meeting location. All of them felt that something suspicious was going on and advised Yang Qi to avoid going.

However, Yang Qi merely chuckled.

“I knew it was a trap the minute I heard it,” he said. “Besides, if I want his position, I’ll just go take it. I won’t sit around waiting for him to give it to me. It’s obvious the supreme rector isn't going to ascend right now. It’s a conspiracy, plain and simple.”

“In that case, Qi’er, why would you go?” Yang Zhan asked.

“Because the reason they set this trap is likely because they sent a petition to the immortal world asking for help. If my speculations are correct, there’s probably a banished immortal waiting for me at the collegium.” Above his head, it was just possible to make out an enormous, spinning wheel. Thanks to that wheel, he could see into the depths of all matters and perceive things which were normally hidden.

“So what are you planning to do?” Yang Zhan asked. Knowing that Yang Qi would be going in forewarned and forearmed, he felt a lot more confident.

“I’m going to go see what's going on,” Yang Qi replied, “and just how strong this person that they sent to deal with me is. I just achieved multiple breakthroughs, and the power levels I need to continue onward surpass anything in the mortal world. I could go to the Hell of Mahānata and hunt immortal-level fiend-devils. But that would be dangerous, and it could attract the wrong kind of attention. A banished immortal from the heaven above would be a different story. That could be just the ticket I need to achieve another breakthrough. I'm a Potent Demi-Immortal, but if I rose another level, I might be strong enough to break open a passageway into the immortal world and ascend on my own. Besides, I could also use this opportunity to conquer the Titan Emperor Collegium, then unite the Four Wilds and the Central Planetary River. At that point, I could formally found the Sage Monarch Collegium.”

His eyes glittered brightly. “I'm done waiting around. I'm going to go execute those scourges and put an end to the Titan Emperor Collegium. Waiting too long would reduce my chances of success. After I take down the collegium, and cut off lines of communication with the heaven above, the magical laws of the mortal world will cut off any immortals who are here. In other words, I wouldn’t need to fear reprisal from the Titan Emperor Heaven. And even if they try to do something, I have a backup plan with my kingdom in the Hell of Mahānata.”

Yang Zhan nodded. “Just be careful, Qi’er.”

Turning to Sword Seventeen, Yang Qi said, “Let’s go, Elder Seventeenth Brother. Let’s see what the initiators and the supreme rector have to say for themselves.”

“Alright,” Sword Seventeen said, looking very stern and awe-inspiring as he pulsed with boundless sword energy. “We're strong enough now that we can definitely take on Paragon Demi-Immortals. I'm curious to see what actual immortals are like.”

With that, they flew out to meet the initiators.

When the initiators saw them, their faces lit with joy. “There you are, you two! Hurry, we don’t want to keep the supreme rector waiting any longer than necessary!”

“Oh?” Yang Qi said with an enigmatic smile. “Is the supreme rector that anxious to hand his position over to me? I was just heading toward a cultivation base breakthrough, so I really don’t want to waste any time.”

“Is that so?” The initiators exchanged pleased smiles. “Society Chief Yang Qi, are you saying you haven’t achieved any breakthroughs recently?”

Yang Qi nodded. “Achieving that next breakthrough is very important, but once I heard the news from you I suppressed the energy flows. I’ll proceed after I'm the supreme rector.”

‘This fool really wants to become the supreme rector, doesn’t he? Sadly, the only place he’ll end up is an early grave.’

‘This guy is dead already. He might as well stop dreaming about being the supreme rector. Who would have thought that we would work so hard to lay a trap and he would just jump in head first?’

All of the initiators were contemplating how much they hated Yang Qi and couldn’t wait to see him dead. However, they didn’t let any such feelings or thoughts show on their faces.

“Society Chief Yang Qi, it's only going to be a short time before we’re addressing you as Supreme Rector. We really hope that you’ll take care of us at that point.”

“Well of course I will!” Yang Qi said coolly, the way a superior would talk to a subordinate. “However, the lot of you will need to know your place. I won't be lenient at all. Anyone who breaks the rules will be executed promptly.”

The initiators reacted with visible astonishment, nearly choking from shock.

Inside, they began cursing him, and actually had to hold themselves back from simply attacking him. ‘This little punk is really looking to get killed. How faceless do you have to be to openly chide us like that?’

‘He’s definitely courting death, and we’re not going to let him off the hook.’

Inside, the initiators were howling with fury, but on the outside, they pretended to be all smiles.

“Of course!” one of them said. “Supreme Rector, you’re absolutely right. From here on out, we’re going to be completely loyal to you. We can’t wait to get to work on bringing the collegium back to glory.”

“Yes, of course….” another said. They all laughed, but their expressions made them look like they were crying.

Sword Seventeen chuckled inwardly. ‘These mongrels love to abuse their power, but my Junior Brother has them wrapped around his finger. This is awesome.’

‘What a bunch of ridiculous morons,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘In a moment, they’re going to look even more ridiculous.’

Before long, the Titan Emperor Collegium appeared ahead of them and Yang Qi immediately spotted the bedraggled Plane of Initiation. At first, nothing about it looked amiss, but by stealthily drawing on the power of the Wheel of Fate he was able to sense that danger lurked there. That confirmed his suspicion that this was a deadly trap. However, the Wheel of Fate was also telling him that he would be able to come out alive in the end.

Keeping his guard up, he entered the Plane of Initiation.

The initiators were gathered in the middle, with the supreme rector in the lead. When he saw Yang Qi, he immediately rose to his feet. “So you finally came, Yang Qi!”

“Supreme Rector, I heard you want to pass your position to me already. But honestly, I don't see how I could fill your shoes. I'm afraid I have to decline your offer and—”

“Oh, there’s no need for that,” the supreme rector quickly interjected. “You're definitely qualified to be the supreme rector. You see, I’ve already contacted the heaven above and they agreed to my proposal. All we need to do now is go through the formalities, and the heaven above will bless you and formally name you the supreme rector. At that point, all of the initiators will bow their heads to you.”

“Is that so?” Yang Qi said, then paused dramatically, during which time everyone stood there with bated breath. Some of the initiators were even trembling with anxiety.

“There’s no need for deliberation!” the supreme rector suddenly said. “Come, everyone. Offer your respects to the new supreme rector!”

With that, he gave a meaningful look to the initiators, vice-rectors, and society chiefs.

“Er, of course!” Everyone hurriedly stepped forward, bowed their heads respectfully, and offered respects.

“Yang Qi, please. Accept the position of supreme rector, and send your petition to the heaven on high so that we can formally address you as such.”

Laughing heartily, Yang Qi said, “Alright, fine. Since you all seem to want this so much, I’ll accept your magnanimity. I wouldn't want to be impolite, after all. Let’s start the ceremony, Supreme Rector.”

“Very well,” the supreme rector said, beaming with joy. “You stand in that spot right over there and offer your prayer to the heaven on high. They’ll send down a decree momentarily.”

“Really? Wonderful.” Yang Qi took two steps forward to the spot the supreme rector had indicated, where a circle had been imprinted on the ground. Then he glanced up into the sky. The supreme rector looked on eagerly as he waited for Yang Qi to start praying.

However, Yang Qi didn’t offer any prayers. Instead, he pointed off into the distance and said, “Hey, what's that?”

“What?”

Everyone turned to look at the direction in which he pointed.

It was all the distraction he needed.

RUUUUUUMBLE!

He suddenly shot up into the air, transforming into an enormous wheel that rumbled loudly as it turned. The entire Plane of Initiation was instantly covered with its might as it drew on the power of fate to twist and distort even the dao of heaven.

“Immortal from heaven descended into the mortal world? Emissary from the immortal world? You think you can sneak around and plot against me? I was expecting that! This is the Wheel of Fate, and it can change your future. You weren’t fated to die here originally, but as soon as the Wheel of Fate begins to turn, it can change everything. And now, your fate is to be buried!”

Then he unleashed the most powerful attack he could.

When he was only a second order Demi-Immortal, he could already fight and kill Lei Jiuzhou, a powerful Demolisher. Now he was in the fourth order, many tens of times stronger than before, and with the profound Wheel of Fate on his side.

And now, he was using all the power he could muster to launch an attack at the Plane of Initiation.

“Aaaiiiieee!”

An agonized shriek echoed through heaven and earth as the Plane of Initiation trembled violently, then began collapsing.

Yang Qi had already severely injured the immortal emissary!

Chapter 512: Devastating an Immortal

Yang Qi made a snap decision, then followed through with a deadly, lightning-fast strike that not even the immortal emissary could evade. Although he didn't have the full Wheel of Fate yet, it was still filled with the might of the legion of gods, which was something that few people could stand against.

He took perfect advantage of the moment to seriously injure his opponent.

The immortal emissary screamed miserably, but that did no good.

When Yang Qi attacked, it was filled with immeasurably destructive power, the type that could shake the universe, cast space-time into chaos, invert yin and yang, surpass the five phases, and destroy entire planes of existence.

“Hand of the One God. Creation. Destruction. Nature. Undying. Aeon. Pāramitā. And the final stance: Immortality!”

Although the Wheel of Fate had utterly devastated the immortal emissary, Yang Qi wanted to play things safe. Thus, he unleashed all nine stances of the Hand of the One God, culminating in the strongest of them all, Immortality.

Intense rumbling sounds echoed out as countless god-spirits appeared, figures of immense power, all of whom were praying to one individual.

That nameless entity was none other than the Lord.

A will descended onto Yang Qi, something that could surpass the river of time itself and ignore the past, present, and future. As a result, his fist strike was the type that could command the legion of gods. It could even manipulate immortality and destroy the future.

Whizz!

Without any hesitation, he sent that destructive force directly toward the immortal emissary.

It was only at this point that the emissary appeared in the open. He looked like a middle-aged man, splattered with blood yet pulsing with an immortal energy that surpassed Lei Jiuzhou’s tenfold.

Despite that, Yang Qi’s final fist strike slammed into his chest, blasted through his body, and came out his back.

When his hand emerged into the open, it was holding a semi-transparent, porcelain-colored heart that twitched as it emitted the power of an entire immortal world.

It was the heart of a heaven-immortal.

Upon ascending, immortals would create an immortal body and be baptized by the immortal world, giving them access to immense power. They would transform in every aspect, including their organs, their skin, their bones, and everything else. As a result, they would acquire battle prowess ten times higher than before they had ascended.

Unfortunately, the increased effectiveness of the organs in the body meant that, if one was lost, the resulting damage to vital energy would be severe.

With immortal bodies, every limb and organ was like an irreplaceable immortal item. If an immortal lost such a thing, they would need spectacular reserves of universal power to recover from the loss, and would even need to refine themselves in an actual pill furnace.

In the Born Again Step of the Great Sage level, it was possible to reform lost organs and even bodies. But upon becoming an immortal, it was very difficult to be born again. After all, immortals were no longer mortals.

Every single hair on the head of an immortal was unique and irreplaceable, and was so strong that it could kill even a Demi-Immortal. How could such things be casually copied or replaced?

Yet Yang Qi only needed a single attack to rip out the heart of this immortal emissary. Considering how valuable an organ the heart was, it was only possible to imagine how the immortal’s power was thrown into chaos.

At this point, the Infernal Deity Spear appeared and Yang Qi thrust it toward the immortal emissary’s head.

“Dammit! Dammit! My heart!” In the blink of an eye, the immortal emissary felt his power draining and his immortal skills thrust into disharmony.

Of course, this was the mortal world, thus, this immortal was a peak entity. Even without a heart, he could have slaughtered someone like Lei Jiuzhou. But Yang Qi was different. Yang Qi had perfect genes and battle prowess the likes of which surpassed the mortal world.

The immortal emissary finally regained his composure and took action. “Five Phases Activation; Nimitta and Animitta; the Profound School of Buddhism; Unify the Cosmos!”

Minor worlds sprang out from his hair, burning with power.

Each hair on his head was a powerful immortal item, and he was using them as weapons to attack Yang Qi.

“Still fighting even after I ripped your heart out?” Yang Qi blurred into motion, evading the destructive power and summoning his Wheel of Fate yet again.

“Nightfall Symphony!”

The Infernal Deity Spear thrummed with a song of death, thirsting for life force to consume as Yang Qi stabbed it toward the immortal emissary’s forehead.

“You’ve got a lot of guts!” the immortal emissary blurted. “How dare you try to kill me! I'm an emissary from the Titan Emperor Heaven! Don’t you fear punishment from heaven?” Terrified, he threw his hand up to block the path to his forehead.

However, that was when a loud ripping sound could be heard as the Infernal Deity Spear stabbed into his palm.

“I’m killing you regardless of the Titan Emperor Heaven. What’s the Titan Emperor Heaven anyway? A low-level immortal world? I’ll be ascending soon, and everyone in the Titan Emperor Heaven will end up as my slaves. I know about your little conspiracy. You have no intention of making me the supreme rector of this collegium. You want to arrest me and take me to the immortal world above. Sorry, but you’re about to die.”

Without any hesitation, Yang Qi used the Blood of the One God to power the Wheel of Fate, which smashed invincibly onto the immortal emissary.

Thump!

The immortal emissary’s head began crumbling like a clay roof tile, causing blood to ooze out everywhere. Of course, that was no ordinary blood; it was filled with universal power and the magical laws of an immortal world. Even a drop of such blood would become like a sea of power in the mortal world and could give birth to endless living creatures.

“Hellfire Crucible!”

In the blink of an eye, Yang Qi shoved the badly injured immortal emissary into the crucible, then locked it tight with the Devil-God Seal. Then, he shrank the crucible down to the size of a fist and threw it into the God Legion Paradise.

The immortal emissary was a paragon-like entity who even the supreme rector and the initiators would kowtow to without thinking. But now he was trapped, and could be refined at will by Yang Qi.

Yang Qi threw his head back and laughed uproariously, then floated down from on high to land on the Plane of Initiation, where he looked around at the stunned supreme rector, initiators, society chiefs, and vice-rectors.

The fight which had just occurred had ended in the blink of an eye, and no one present had any idea of what to do next. Acting on pure instinct alone, they backed away from Yang Qi. Before they could even regain their composure, the fight was over, the immortal emissary was imprisoned, and Yang Qi was standing in front of them with a vicious smile on his face.

“W-what… what just happened?” the supreme rector stammered.

“What just happened?” Yang Qi said. “You don’t know? Well, let me summarize. You lured me here on the pretext of making me the next supreme rector. But in reality, it was a trap, and that immortal emissary was waiting here to apprehend me. Thankfully for me, I realized what was happening, so I captured the immortal emissary instead, who I will kill and assimilate later. The real question is what to do with you lot.”

As he spoke, he walked over and sat down on the supreme rector’s throne, then tapped his finger on it, causing a clear, resonant sound to echo out.

At this point, one of the society chiefs lost control. “Yang Qi!” he screamed. “How dare you! You killed the immortal emissary?! It's bad enough that you’ve sown chaos in the mortal world, but now you’ve gone and insulted the immortal world!? You’ve sullied the name of the heaven on high!” Pointing his finger accusingly at Yang Qi, he continued, “Release the emissary immediately! Then kowtow and admit to your crimes. If you go back to the immortal world with the immortal emissary, you might even end up living through all this. If not, the immortal world will rain fury onto your head and you’ll be completely powerless to defend yourself.”

“Oh? You're the society chief from the Pill Society, right? Lucky for you, I need a good slave to concoct pills for my clan, so therefore I won’t kill you.”

He waved his hand.

RUUUUUUMBLE!

An eruption of vital energy dragged the society chief over and forced him to his knees in front of Yang Qi.

“No!” the society chief shouted in fury, yet he was powerless to rise to his feet.

Chapter 513: Sage Monarch Collegium

Yang Qi really didn't want to waste Chief Pill, who was an expert in pill concocting.

Grandmaster pill concocters could create all sorts of foundational spirit pills that were very useful to low-level cultivators, such as those in the Energy Arts or Lifeseizing levels. Killing this society chief would be a big waste. In fact, Yang Qi planned to keep the entire Pill Society around to serve as slaves to the Yang Clan.

There were other societies he wanted to keep as well, such as the Swordsmith Society and the Forging Society.

“Not willing to back down, Society Chief?” Yang Qi said. “Fine. I have a boundless devil art that I’ll use to plant a devil seed in your sea of consciousness. If the seed activates, your life will turn into endless torment. Only if you exercise full faith in me will it remain dormant.”

Yang Qi flicked his finger and a tiny bullet of devil energy appeared, complete with a ferocious human face. In the blink of an eye, it shot out and embedded itself into the pit of the society chief’s stomach.

“Aaaiiiieee!” he screamed in agony, writhing on the ground as though he had been bitten by ten thousand vipers. Having been sealed, he couldn’t unleash any energy arts, making him look almost like an ordinary mortal.

The horrifying nature of his screams caused everyone else present to tremble physically, even the initiators and the supreme rector.

Considering how many countless hell-born fiend-devils Yang Qi had summoned, it was only natural that he would have picked up some fiend-devil energy arts along the way. The devil seed technique was quite miraculous. If the subject wasn’t completely loyal, the devil seed would cause them endless torment and make it impossible for them to use any energy arts.

“Were you about to say something, Supreme Rector?” Yang Qi asked, ignoring the screaming society chief, whose pain would subside automatically once he acknowledged allegiance.

“Are you really dead-set on making us your enemy, Yang Qi?” the supreme rector said, his face ashen. “We're backed by the Titan Emperor Heaven! If you kill us all, even if you wipe out the collegium and the entire planetary system, the immortal world won’t let you off the hook! You're going to receive an incomprehensible punishment from the heaven above! Look, I’ll hand over my position to you right now if you just let the immortal emissary go. What do you say? It’s—”

SMACK!

Before the supreme rector could finish speaking, Yang Qi smacked him across the side of the face and sent him tumbling to the ground.

Howling in both humiliation and rage, he tried to struggle to his feet, but before he could, a foot stomped on his face and shoved him back down.

This was humiliation. Raw and utter humiliation. The supreme rector was essentially the ruler of this entire planetary system, and had been for a million years. He was the type of person who no one would ever humiliate. In fact, his words were law in the mortal world. Numerous experts in the Yore-Wilds, Waste-Wilds, Brute-Wilds, and Proto-Wilds would tremble when he spoke.

But now, here he was, powerless and being trampled into the dirt.

“Your position?” Yang Qi said. “Sorry, I'm not interested. I wouldn't be interested even if you offered to let me rule the Titan Emperor Heaven itself. Who do you think you are? You conspired against me over and over again, constantly throwing more fuel on the fire!” He stamped down on the supreme rector’s face again, adding in some of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth to provoke an agonized shriek. “It would defy the natural order of things for me to not kill you. Titan Emperor Heaven? Hmph! I’ll kill every single immortal emissary they send my way. With the energy arts I cultivate, I can turn the Titan Emperor Heaven into a graveyard if I feel like it.” He stomped down again, causing blood to spurt out of the wounds on the supreme rector’s face.

“Let the supreme rector go!”

“You’re an outright rebel, Yang Qi!”

“We should never have recruited you!”

Although the initiators were all shouting angrily, none of them dared to make a single move. After all, if Yang Qi could take out an immortal emissary, it was obvious what he could do to them.

Whack!

A scream rang out as Yang Qi waved his hand toward the loudest of the initiators, sending him flying. Then, even as the man tumbled through the air, he suddenly exploded, causing the entire Plane of Initiation to tremble.

Deathly silence followed.

“On your knees, all of you. Henceforth, there is no Titan Emperor Collegium. Instead, we will have the Sage Monarch Collegium. Furthermore, the Titan Emperor planetary system will now be referred to as the Sage Monarch planetary system. Understand? From now on, you are citizens of the Sage Monarch planetary—wait. No. You’re slaves of the Sage Monarch planetary system, with equal standing to dogs.” Grabbing the supreme rector by the neck, he lifted him into the air and said, “You’re a slave too, Supreme Rector. In fact, you’re going to become a court eunuch, the lowest of all ranks.”

“Bah!” the supreme rector said. “I refuse to acknowledge you, rebel! You can't kill me. My soul branding mark is ensconced in the depths of the Titan Emperor Heaven! Even if I die, I’ll be resurrected in the immortal world! I’ll live for all eternity, unlike you, who will soon suffer a horrific death!”

“Are you trying to piss me off? Maybe hoping that I’ll kill you sooner? Sorry, I'm not planning to kill you. No, I’ll be crippling your energy arts.” Without any warning, Yang Qi reached out with his other hand and pierced his fingers into the supreme rector's skull.

The supreme rector screamed shrilly, but could do nothing to stop the shocking pain that flowed through him. Slowly but surely, all of his magical laws and quintessence-blood were extracted, becoming a blood-colored śarīra that dropped onto Yang Qi’s palm.

This was another boundless technique from the dao of devils, which could be used to extract the pure quintessence of an individual and leave them completely crippled. It could even extract a person's genes and essence.

“What a lovely blood śarīra!” Yang Qi said. “Supreme Rector, your genes are definitely many tens of millions of times more powerful than normal. Wonderful! Your genes will help me to raise an entire generation of top experts.” Having reduced the supreme rector to something less than a dog, Yang Qi tossed him off to the side. “Sword Seventeen, take the supreme rector to the Sage Monarch planetary—no. Wait. Nail him to the walls of the collegium by his arms and legs. That way, everyone will know full well there has been a change of leadership.”

“Will do, Junior Brother!” Sword Seventeen grabbed the supreme rector and took him off to nail him up.

“Now, what to do with the rest of you….” Yang Qi murmured, looking around at everyone else present.

After a moment, his gaze came to rest on the two-faced initiator he’d had some dealings with early on. “You. Get over here and kowtow. You’re going to be a workhorse in the Sage Monarch Collegium.”

“Yang Qi!” the man shouted. “When the enemy yields, you should spare his life! I’ll work for you! I’ll acknowledge allegiance! Why are you talking about turning us into slaves? It's a complete humiliation!”

“Oh? You don't want to work as a slave?” Yang Qi said with an enigmatic smile.

“Of course not! We're the initiators, all of us half-Demolishers on the cusp of ascending. There’s no way we could agree to work for a bunch of Great Sages and Demi-Immortals. How about this, Yang Qi: treat us fairly, and we’ll work ourselves to the bone for you. We’ll help you set up your Sage Monarch Collegium. There’s no way you’ll be able to do it without our assistance.”

From the way the initiator was jabbering, it seemed he was very confident Yang Qi would agree to his proposal.

But that was when Yang Qi said, “So you’re saying being a slave is worse than dying? In that case, fine. I’ll make sure you live a life worse than death!”

“Aaaiiiieee!”

Another scream echoed out as Yang Qi used the same energy art from before to extract his blood and essence. Afterward, the man flopped to the ground like a sack of potatoes.

With that, Yang Qi summoned an enormous devil-god and said, “Nail him to the walls also. Make sure he’s put somewhere high where everyone can see him.” Looking around, he continued, “So what about the rest of you? Does anyone else refuse to be a slave?”

“We agree! We agree to be slaves!” All of the initiators, society chiefs, and vice-rectors began clamoring, dropping to their knees and kowtowing in fear.

“Oh? All of you? Unfortunately, there are a few of you that I can’t leave alive.” Obviously, Yang Qi knew that the entire group would turn on him the moment they could.

Boom, boom, boom, BOOM!

Dazzling light shone from his eyes, causing several of the initiators to explode into clouds of blood and gore. The same thing happened to numerous society chiefs and vice-rectors. At the same time, Yang Qi made sure to destroy their soul branding marks.

When it was over, the survivors all shouted the same thing. “Don’t kill us, Milord! We’ll work for you! We’ll be loyal!”

Chapter 514: Complete Annihilation

Yang Qi had killed a whole host of initiators, vice-rectors, and society chiefs with brutal efficiency, and the survivors were all struck cold with fear.

BAM!

It was only when the society chief of the Rampage Society died that he finally stopped the killing.

“Since the rest of you have acknowledged allegiance, I’ll stop here,” he said with a vicious smile. “As long as you remain in line from here on out, and tend to your slave duties, you’ll be allowed to live. However, don't even think of trying to improve your lot in life. You’re going to live out the rest of your days as slaves. Understand?”

“Yes, yes of course! Praise be to you, Milord. We’ll do whatever you say!” Some of the initiators were literally knocking their foreheads onto the ground as they kowtowed. They no longer had any sense of self-respect or dignity and were ready to act in full subservience.

“Very well. You’re all dismissed. Now go to all the planets that make up the new Sage Monarch planetary system and make sure everyone agrees to fall in line. Execute any who resist.”

“Yang Qi, please, stop the killing!” cried the society chief from the Righteous Energy Society. “The Titan Emperor Collegium was already running low on manpower, and could hardly stand up to the other collegiums. If you keep killing people, and we get invaded, how can we defend ourselves!?”

“Feeling suicidal, are we!?” Yang Qi said. Reaching out, he stabbed his fingers in to the society chief’s skull and extracted another blood śarīra. “I'm honestly shocked you would think you have the right to directly speak my surname and given name. All of you, remember that I’m your lord, and you are lowly slaves. I run this collegium now, and if I want to kill someone, I’ll kill them. When I give you orders to execute someone, you do it. You have no authority to question my orders. You’re not government officials, you’re slaves. You’d do well to affix that fact into your minds. You have no position, no soul, no thoughts of your own, and no freedom.”

Everyone shivered in terror.

“You think we're running low on manpower? Listen well. I don’t need so-called manpower. I can summon an infinitude of fiend-devils from hell, including Paragon Demi-Immortals. The fact that I'm allowing you pieces of trash to live is quite a kindness. To be honest, you’re of no use to me whatsoever. Understand? If you don’t, then I’d be happy to kill all of you.”

Everyone kept their heads bowed, hearts pounding with fear at the reminder that Yang Qi could summon armies of fiend-devils.

Yang Qi felt absolutely no pity for them. He knew that giving them positions of power wasn’t an option. After all, if they had succeeded in their plans, his family and friends wouldn’t even be alive right now. He had to crush them thoroughly and make sure they accepted their place as slaves. Otherwise, with cultivation bases as high as theirs, they would definitely cause problems.

Soon, the purge began.

It wasn’t just a purge of the Titan Emperor Collegium, but rather, the entire Central Planetary River. That was the nucleus of the Yore-Wilds, Waste-Wilds, Brute-Wilds and Proto-Wilds, a place with millions upon millions of planets inhabited by countless powerful and important cultivators.

In the past, it was assumed that living in the Central Planetary River put one in a position of supreme safety. But now it was being thrown into complete chaos.

A storm of blood rose up, with magical fluctuations causing everything to tremble. When it all began, a voice floated out to the ears of everyone present.

“The debauched and tyrannical Titan Emperor Collegium is no more. The grand immortal Yang Qi of the Sage Monarch planetary system deposed the supreme rector and conquered the collegium. Henceforth, new laws govern this place. All students will be required to bear the insignia of the Sage Monarch planetary system, and all clans in the Four Wilds have three days to come to the Central Planetary River to offer obeisance and fealty. Those who come will be welcomed into the Sage Monarch Collegium. Those who refuse will be exterminated.”

Soon, hordes of students swept out to enforce the new laws, led by summoned fiend-devils who would follow Yang Qi’s orders to the letter. Anyone who resisted them was immediately killed.

As for those students who refused to submit, they were summarily executed.

After the Central Planetary River was brought under control, the Yore-Wilds, Waste-Wilds, Brute-Wilds, and Proto-Wilds were handled.

As blood rained in the former Titan Emperor planetary system, Yang Qi remained in his central position, using the Hell Portal to summon endless waves of devil-ghosts.

Ten thousand. One hundred thousand. One million. Ten million. One billion.

Before long, there were fully ten billion fiend-devils of all sorts in the collegium, making it seem like hell had come to the world of men.

Yang Qi knew that he would definitely meet resistance from the Four Wilds, if he dismantled the Titan Emperor Collegium. Some inhabitants would flee, or perhaps organize resistance. Therefore, he ceaselessly summoned fiend-devils and created an enormous army. That was his way to keep control.

At the same time, he reached into the Yore-Wilds and began to pull the existing Sage Monarch planetary system toward the Central Planetary River.

The Titan Emperor Collegium was a massive heavenly palace that had been built by countless experts over a million years or more. It was filled with treasure troves and countless other secret locations protected by warding magics. Once he fused all of those locations with the Sage Monarch planetary system, he would have access to more power than ever. And the resources that would now be available to the Yang Clan and his sworn siblings would enable them to advance by leaps and bounds. Obviously, he wouldn’t waste resources on the enslaved students. After all, they could never be trusted. In fact, even fiend-devils were more trustworthy.

That said, now was not the time for a massacre, which was why he enslaved them instead of killing them.

RUUUUUUMBLE!

At this point, the Holy Mother awoke from her meditative trance and heavenly tribulation immediately formed above her. However, she dispelled it with ease and was halfway into the Demolishing level.

Even as she looked around at the buzz of activity, she heard Yang Qi’s announcement.

‘Incredible, my son,’ she thought, her eyes sparkling. ‘You’re stabilizing the planetary system, and will soon rise to heights that will surpass me in every way.’

As the Sage Monarch planetary system expanded, Yang Qi focused his attention on the Hellfire Crucible and the immortal emissary inside.

“So, Immortal Emissary, what’s your name? I like to know the names of people I kill. In a moment, you’ll be dead, and I’ll assimilate your power. Have any last words? Not that I’ll honor any requests that you have. Other people might respect you as an immortal emissary, but to me you're less impressive than a dog.”

“How dare you!” the immortal emissary shouted. “You rat bastard! I'm a heaven-immortal! I’m invincible in the mortal world. You’re not just showing disrespect, you’re outright rebelling! You’re going to die a horrible death, I promise you— AAIIEEE!”

Yang Qi’s fingers latched onto the immortal emissary’s skull, and a vortex formed. In the blink of an eye, the immortal emissary began visibly wilting.

“Ai. Can’t you say anything more imaginative? Well, I guess I’ll just use you to push myself toward another breakthrough.”

Chapter 515: Big Matter for the Immortal World

“Don’t kill me! Please, don't kill me!” The immortal emissary could tell that Yang Qi was really about to kill him. “My name is Titan Duelbringer! I'm not just some random immortal, I'm from the imperial clan in the Titan Emperor Heaven! I have the blood of the boundless Titan Emperor in me. Killing me wouldn’t be like killing an ordinary immortal; once the Titan Emperor Heaven found out, they would wipe out your entire Sage Monarch Collegium. Listen, just spare my life, and I can report back to the immortal world and tell them that everything is going fine here. I can even request that they send resources down here. Just think of how much you could profit!”

“Oh?” Yang Qi said, relaxing his hand.

If this emissary could really send back word mollifying the immortal world, and possibly even request resources, it would definitely be worth it to spare him.

“Yes, I'm serious. I spent thirty thousand years, and immense amounts of universal power, to cultivate this immortal body. I really don't want to die! Just show mercy, and I’ll make it worth your while!”

Yang Qi thought for a moment. “Alright, I’ll spare you for the time being. But don't think that I trust your word. How about this: send word to the heaven above right now. Tell them that the Titan Emperor planetary system is in danger, and that it could be invaded at any moment. Ask them to send down some magical treasures and medicinal pills, as well as some disposable immortal talismans. If I'm happy with the results, you’ll have your life. But if I'm not happy… well, don’t blame me for being merciless.”

“Of course, of course,” Titan Duelbringer said, nodding his head vigorously. “I’ll say that there's a big situation here and that I need more resources. And I’ll explain that I won’t return until I have the situation under control. Look, considering that I'm an imperial clansman, they’ll definitely agree to my request.”

“Well, then. What are you waiting for?”

With that, Yang Qi allowed Titan Duelbringer to emerge from the Hellfire Crucible.

Then he sent some divine will into the emissary’s mind, making it possible to kill him with a thought if he tried anything funny.

With that, Titan Duelbringer reached out to the heaven above and began to pray. “Oh immortal officials in the heaven on high: the Titan Emperor Collegium has become haunted by freakish hellions, and other collegiums are threatening to invade. The situation is dire! Even worse, I was ambushed and am having trouble recovering from my wounds. If I perish, the entire planetary system could fall into enemy hands and we would lose our foundation in the mortal world. Please, show pity and send some magical devices to help me deal with the wretch-devils and enemy forces!”

Yang Qi watched as the divine will rose high, heading toward what he knew was the Titan Emperor Heaven.

He was interested in seeing what the immortal world was like, and knew that if he assimilated Titan Duelbringer it would be an easy thing for him to step into the Demolishing level. However, now was not the time for that. He needed to stabilize his foundation first.

His army of devil-ghosts were out in the Four Wilds, arresting dissident clans and exerting control. However, it would take more time before the Titan Emperor planetary system truly became the Sage Monarch planetary system. And it would take even longer before people could forget about the old Titan Emperor Collegium.

**

“What’s going on here? Is the Hell of Euphoria invading again?”

The Proto-Wilds planetary system was a rich and flourishing place, with hundreds of billions of planets and resplendent constellations everywhere. It had all sorts of powerful organizations, including churches, temples, nations, halls, organizations, and societies. It was a hive of both villains and heroes, connected by countless wormholes that allowed cultivators to travel here and there and carry out trade. In terms of population, it surpassed the Yore-Wilds by a hundred million times.

There were plenty of regional tyrants, dictators, and plenty of people who were connected to the Titan Emperor Collegium. And many of the leaders were eighth, or even ninth order Demi-Immortals.

Normally, people like that would remain calm even during catastrophes. But right now, they were in full panic as massive armies of fiend-devils began encroaching on their territory. Some of those fiend-devils were even eighth and ninth order Demi-Immortals.

“An ambush!” people shouted.

However, to the shock of many of the powerful old-timers, these armies of fiend-devils were actually being led by initiators and society chiefs from the Titan Emperor Collegium. As they approached, they announced, “The Titan Emperor Collegium has been toppled and replaced by the Sage Monarch Collegium. A new Mandate of Heaven has been enacted. The leaders of all clans and organizations will travel immediately to the Central Planetary River to offer fealty. Any who refuse will be killed.”

“Impossible!” shouted a Paragon Demi-Immortal. “The Titan Emperor Collegium was destroyed!? We demand to contact the heaven above and ask for more information about—”

Before he could finish speaking, a dozen Paragon Demi-Immortal fiend-devils lunged forward and ripped him to shreds. Then they went on to eradicate the man's entire organization, wiping it completely out of existence.

Screams rang out and blood flowed.

“Those who refuse to submit will be exterminated!”

There were a few others who didn’t give in, and they were also wiped out of existence by the fiend-devils. Slowly but surely, the Proto-Wilds planetary system was pacified.

Similar scenes played out in the Waste-Wilds and Brute-Wilds.

**

“Astral Redirection; Invert Heaven and Earth; Reverse the Cycle of Sun and Moon….” Meanwhile, Yang Qi was using various divine abilities and burning massive amounts of power to transform the Sage Monarch planetary system on a fundamental nature. Soon, it was directly above the Titan Emperor Collegium and began descending.

RIIIIP!

Numerous planets in the Sage Monarch planetary system melted, turning into liquid that became raw power. As the process continued, it fused with the heavenly palace that was the Titan Emperor Collegium.

‘Power. Boundless and never-ending power. This heavenly palace is a majestic and incomparable plane of existence! It's too bad that all the Initiation Power was drained, otherwise my cultivation base could rise to even greater heights!’ As the planetary system fused with the Titan Emperor Collegium, Yang Qi’s immortal clone was baptized and his cultivation base rose higher.

By now, the clone was one with the Sage Monarch planetary system. Therefore, as the system grew stronger, so did he.

When the fusion process was completed, the only person who could surpass the clone would be Yang Qi’s true self.

Yang Qi also took the broken Plane of Initiation, as well as the corpses of the initiators and society chiefs, and added their quintessence energy to his immortal clone.

Soon, the Central Planetary River had taken on a very different appearance from before. It abounded with sagelight, and angels flew here and there singing holy hymns and psalms. The entire place looked like an enormous palace for the legion of gods.

This was the Sage Monarch Collegium. It pulsed with the aura of god-spirits, making it vastly more holy than the Titan Emperor Collegium had ever been.

Next, Yang Qi had the fiend-devil armies bring in the leaders from the various surrounding organizations for the ceremony of fealty.

It was a bright, sunny day in the Sage Monarch Collegium. Yang Qi sat on a throne, and arrayed in front of him were the former initiators and the leaders of the various clans and organizations from the four surrounding planetary systems. Many of those leaders were furious, and cursing inwardly. However, the pillars that lined the square were adorned with the corpses of plenty of famous individuals who had put up resistance. The supreme rector was still alive, and was currently strung up on one of the pillars as well.

“You criminal, Yang Qi!” he shouted “You were a student in the Titan Emperor Collegium! You rebel! The immortal world will definitely punish you for this! They won’t let you off the hook!”

Everyone could hear his curses. Many were thinking the same thing, but none of them dared to do anything for fear of Yang Qi wiping them all out.

Even as the supreme rector continued cursing, a rift suddenly opened up above and immortal light spilled down, accompanied by a voice from the immortal world. “Listen, ye in the lower realm. In order to defend against foreign incursion, and to defend the honor of the Titan Emperor Heaven, we are hereby granting this lot of immortal items, immortal pills, immortal talismans, and immortal stones.”

RUUUUUMBLE!

Within the immortal light were all of the aforementioned items, which piled up in the square for everyone to see.

Jaws everywhere dropped.

Chapter 516: The Overall Structure

Treasure poured down like rain from the immortal world, and everyone present gaped in utter shock.

They had all assumed that, for dismantling the Titan Emperor Collegium, Yang Qi would be severely punished with the full wrath of the immortal world. Instead, they heaped treasures on him! It was completely and utterly unimaginable.

“No!” the supreme rector shouted hoarsely. “This hellion has brought havoc to the cosmos! Open your eyes, Heaven! This freak has a god item! Why are you showering him with treasure?!”

Unfortunately for him, no one was listening. His energy arts and quintessence-blood had been fully extracted, making it impossible for him to communicate with the heaven on high.

There was no question who was in charge now. With the immortal emissary under Yang Qi’s control, he was in charge of the entire mortal world. He could even pull the wool over the eyes of the immortal world above. The society chiefs, vice-rectors, elder kings, and initiators couldn’t contact the immortal world, and were forced to work as slaves.

Before, some people had been chafing inwardly, even contemplating rebelling. But now, it seemed clear that the immortal world approved of the Sage Monarch Collegium taking over the Titan Emperor Collegium.

All rebellious thoughts were suppressed, and everyone agreed to follow Yang Qi’s arrangements. The overall structure had changed.

“Junior Brother,” Sword Seventeen said, “look at all these immortal items, immortal pills, and immortal stones! We’re rich! The children of the Yang Clan are going to be equipped with immortal items from head to toe!” He sighed in admiration. “I almost can’t believe it. Look, there’s even immortal clothing and armor. Rings, boots, bracelets, and earrings, all of them completely miraculous in nature! The only downside is that they’re all just low-grade immortal items.”

“Low-grade immortal items are still immortal items,” Yang Qi said. “Back in the days of the Rich-Lush Continent, the top organization was the Demi-Immortal Institute, and the best equipment there was damaged or counterfeit immortal items. With so many low-grade immortal items, our battle prowess as a fighting force is going to be incredible!”

“What a pity we weren’t able to capture that yellow-garbed young man. If we had King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy medallions, we could freely go in and out of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. With the treasure from there, we could probably invade the Titan Emperor Heaven itself and take it over. Junior Brother, now that the overall structure of the planetary system has changed, we definitely have to figure out a way to rescue our Elder Brothers and Sisters of the Invincible Society.”

Yang Qi nodded. “Of course. The Invincible Society has treated me with great kindness, and I’ll never forget that. I'm going to figure out a way to get into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart and free our Elder Brothers and Sisters. In fact, I'm actually really worried about what could happen if they run into that young man in yellow. I can't even kill that fiendish villain out here. Once he's back in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, he’ll be stronger than ever and even more difficult to deal with.”

“I wouldn't worry about that. Eldest Brother has the ancient bloodline of a god, and is protected by an amazing destiny. He can deal with any difficult situations he encounters. Right now, we should just focus on getting into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Considering that you’re literally invincible in the mortal world, I think you should be able to figure out a way.”

Yang Qi thought for a moment. “That kid in yellow is a Future One, and considering that I'm a Fateless One, he thinks of me as his biggest enemy. Maybe I can use that to set a trap for him. He’s keeping tabs on us at all times, so there’s no way he’s unaware of me ending the Titan Emperor Collegium and putting a new order of things into place. He’ll definitely be coming out of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart soon, to get a better sense of the situation. Now that I have the Wheel of Fate, I might be able to use it to get a lock on his location.”

“That’s good. Junior Brother, I think you need to spend some time putting the new collegium in order. It will probably take a good month to get the Four Wilds completely pacified.”

“You’re right. Once things are in order, the true campaign will begin, in which we bring destruction onto the heads of the Megaplexus and Coiling Arc planetary systems. We’ll capture and enslave everyone from there, then take their riches for the Yang Clan and the Sage Monarch Collegium. I'm going to create a truly colossal monster of an organization that will eventually become a new immortal world.” Yang Qi’s eyes glittered brightly.

Now that the Sage Monarch Collegium had opened its doors, the Central Planetary River looked very different. Armies of fiend-devils occupied many of the larger planets to keep order, and Yang Qi even set up permanent military bases.

He also set up command centers on planets close to the Dark True Void to keep an eye out for any invaders.

Fiend-devil forces were in locations throughout the planetary system, channels of communication were set up, and key, strategic locations were locked down.

Some wormholes were closed and others were opened. As for those which were left open, they were kept under strict watch by loyal cultivators.

Fiend-devil patrols were set up to inspect the wormholes and surrounding territories and imprison any unlawful travelers.

It didn’t take long before law and order completely took over the new Sage Monarch planetary system.

All cultivators were required to follow the new laws, which included strict controls over travel.

It was a centralized state power that was enforced with unheard-of stringency, more so than even the most exacting imperial dynasty in the mortal world.

From his throne in the Sage Monarch Collegium, Yang Qi looked out at the Four Wilds and was pleased with how orderly and duteous things were.

In the mortal world, it had long been a common practice for martial artists to use their skills to violate the law. They could defy whatever governments existed over their heads, and they spread death and violence at will. Although such individuals would start out as mere worms or eels, they could eventually turn into powerful dragons.

And that wasn’t even to mention those who practiced higher levels of cultivation.

Back in the days of the Titan Emperor Collegium, no heed had been paid to such law-breaking. Feudal rulers of various sects and clans controlled different parts of the Four Wilds, and all of them looked out for their own interests. The Hanging Mountain had been just such a place.

But now, Yang Qi was using armies of fiend-devils to impose strict control. He dismantled the existing practices of numerous clans, sects, churches, and other holy lands, and put new laws into place. And he sent representatives to countless planets to enforce them! Any who refused to comply were executed. It was only through that baptism of blood that the new legal system took shape.

Immense power was all in the hands of a single individual.

As a result, the power of destiny and faith flowed toward Yang Qi like a river. There were even places where divine likenesses of him had been erected in the form of statues, to which people would pray and chant sutras on a daily basis.

Any who failed to pray regularly to the divine likeness would be arrested by the fiend-devil army, thrown into prison, and have their energy arts crippled.

Throughout the vast new planetary system, countless cultivators offered such prayers to Yang Qi, from mighty half-Demolishers all the way down to mortals.

A month later, administrative offices and divine likenesses had been set up on all planets, even the remote locations occupied by simplistic savages.

Thus, the boundless power of destiny and faith constantly flowed into Yang Qi, causing his eight hundred forty million particles to thrum. Those particles which had not yet transformed into dracomammoths began to stir and grow stronger. Thanks to the power of faith, Yang Qi’s Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth became further integrated into his body, and Blood of the One God was produced even more quickly.

The greatest changes of all occurred to the God Legion Seal. The faith power caused the seal to shine with a scintillating, golden light, which arced about in his sea of consciousness and formed magical symbols.

As the magical symbols took shape, the Wheel of Fate grew more complete.

Astonishingly, the speed of his cultivation had also increased tenfold.

In fact, Yang Qi was fairly certain that, if things went on like this, he would be able to reach the Demolishing level within a hundred years.

That was one reason why he was so focused on establishing a permanent rule over the planetary system. He needed the faith and destiny power of the living beings there to be able to push his energy arts closer to the apex.

The fiend-devils he summoned via his Hell Portal weren’t just useful in battle; he even demanded that they pray to him and offer faith. By receiving faith from cultivators and fiend-devils both, he could benefit in greater ways than ever.

‘Even without assimilating the immortal emissary, I can still rise to the Tyrant Demi-Immortal level. Now I need to figure out a way to track down that kid in yellow. And then there’s my father, who is likely another Future One. Maybe if I capture the kid in yellow, he can tell me more about these Future Ones and what they’re capable of.’

As Yang Qi sat there, the power of faith flowing into him, a rift opened out in the Dark True Void and a group of people appeared.

Chapter 517: Boundless Faith

“How could the Titan Emperor Collegium have changed so much?”

When the group emerged from the Dark True Void and looked around at the planetary system stretched out in front of them, they could immediately tell that a much stricter mystical system of laws had taken effect.

In the mortal world, a single word uttered by an emperor could change the fates of countless individuals. They held the ultimate power, and could institute laws that would govern all of their subjects.

As for the Sage Monarch planetary system, it had a mystical system of laws that was designed to benefit the ultimate leader there: Yang Qi. It was similar to the mortal world, except millions upon billions of times more exaggerated. On top of that, the flow of faith and destiny that reached Yang Qi benefited his Wheel of Fate, allowing his cultivation to advance by leaps and bounds.

This group who had just entered the Sage Monarch planetary system wore voluminous, devilish robes.

One of them was a woman who had profoundly powerful energy arts, and who somehow seemed dreamy and illusory in nature. She was the very same woman who had come to an agreement with Yang Qi in the Gyroscope planetary system, the third-ranking assembly chief of the Devil Sauvastika Assembly, Dreamy Smoke, also known as Queen Dream-Devil.

She was flanked by nine other individuals, who were other assembly chiefs, powerful followers of the dao of devils who jointly oversaw an entire planetary system.

One of them, a middle-aged man with horns, looked at Queen Dream-Devil and said, “Third Assembly Chief, didn’t you say that this Yang Qi and his godworm eggs were from the Titan Emperor planetary system? Everyone knows that this place is like a dish of loose sand, completely disunited. How could they have such strict measures of law in place now?”

“I’m not sure,” she replied, a very serious expression on her face. “As I'm sure you’ve heard, the Hell of Euphoria invaded the Titan Emperor planetary system some years back, and the Yore-Wilds section was reduced to nothing but ruins. Yang Qi and I came to a verbal agreement, but haven’t been in contact since. He’s not easy to deal with, which is why I invited you to come here with me. Together, we can take everything that belongs to him, including those godworm eggs.”

Another of the men turned to their leader and said, “First Assembly Chief, you’ve already mastered the boundless dao of devils and will achieve Demolishing ascension at any time. Of course, you won't be going to an immortal world, but rather, to a hell. If you can get a godworm egg and raise it to maturity, your path of travel will be much easier.”

There were ten people present, all of them top experts in the mortal world.

As for the first assembly chief, he had a keratin exoskeleton and already pulsed with the aura of a Void-Demolisher. Shockingly, he was already an immortal, but had chosen to remain in the world of men. He was like Lei Jiuzhou in that respect, except even stronger.

“We will definitely take those godworm eggs,” he said. “However, we also need to determine why these big changes have occurred in the Titan Emperor planetary system. It's not natural for cultivators to be ruled so strictly. Those who cultivate truth always value freedom, and chafe under law. Not even the immortal worlds are ruled as strictly as this. We absolutely have to capture this Yang Qi and see what sort of mysterious powers exist within him.”

“Yes,” another of the assembly chiefs said. “Let’s continue on into the planetary system. Why don’t we sneak into the Central Planetary River?”

“There’s no need for sneaking,” said the first assembly chief. “We’ll just walk right in. There aren’t any experts of note in the Titan Emperor planetary system. Even their supreme rector is a mere half-Demolisher. I could crush him to death with ease. We’ll just go demand that he hand over Yang Qi. If he refuses, we’ll cause a storm of rain and gore that covers the entire Titan Emperor planetary system.”

“But what about the Invincible Dugu?”

“Hmph. Him? I’ll kill him too.” The first assembly chief’s eyes shone with a brilliant light and he projected an aura of domineering invincibility. “The Prodigious Proto-Epoch, Invincible War-Steppe that he cultivates is a mere low-grade godly-class energy art. I acquired a much more powerful energy art from a deadly entity in hell. My Asiryangguk Sauvastika Devil Grand Infernal Energy borders on being a greater godly class art. It took me tens of thousands of years to cultivate it to completion, and, if I have to, I’ll sacrifice the Invincible Dugu to it!”

“Congratulations, First Elder. So, you finally mastered the Asiryangguk Sauvastika Devil Grand Infernal Energy! Our Gyroscope planetary system will finally be able to conquer other planetary systems!”

“Let’s go!”

RUMBLE!

The first assembly chief quickly opened up a wormhole. It erupted with the power of space-time, causing everything in the area to tremble violently. Before they could enter the wormhole, bugle calls of war rang out, and other wormholes popped into being, out of which swarmed armies of eighth order fiend-devils.

For every hundred Universal Demi-Immortals, there was a fiend-devil captain who was a Paragon Demi-Immortal.

And for every ten captains, there was a lieutenant who was a half-Demolisher.

Ghostfire burned and devil energy surged as this army of fiend-devils seemed to erupt from hell itself.

Terror rising in her heart, Queen Dream-Devil said, “First Assembly Chief, what’s going on? There are so many fiend-devils! And they’re so strong! Don’t tell me we somehow ended up in hell?”

“Remain calm!” the first assembly chief said. “I'm not sure what’s going on, but there’s no way these fiend-devils are going to pin us down.” Of course, his heart was already pounding. The sight of such a large number of Universal Demi-Immortal fiend-devils was a clear indication that something unusual was going on. There were so many of them that even heaven-immortals who faced them would be nervous.

One of the fiend-devils stepped forward, surrounded by devil energy that took the shape of devil-dragons.

“Who are you people?” he barked. “How dare you open up space-time wormholes without permission here in the Sage Monarch planetary system. Are you people all looking to die?”

“One of the Infernalfolk!” the first assembly chief said, visibly taken aback. “We're from the Gyroscope planetary system! Since when did the Titan Emperor planetary system become the Sage Monarch planetary system? And what are you fiend-devils doing here? Did some hell take over this place? I'm also a fiend-devil, from the Hell of Jova. What devil dictator led you people here? Perhaps we could work out a deal.”

“Hmph!” the infernal replied. “Foreigner! Our grand and magnificent lord, the Sage Monarch Yang Qi, dismantled the Titan Emperor Collegium and deposed its supreme rector. Then he founded the Sage Monarch Collegium. He summoned us fiend-devils from hell to act as his servants. Once he reaches a high enough level of cultivation, he’ll help us to cast aside our fiend-devil bodies and be purified into glorious angels.

“The fact that despicable villains like yourselves have invaded our planetary system goes to show that you’re really just suicidal. According to our laws, anyone who opens an unlawful wormhole in the Sage Monarch planetary system will be executed, along with that person’s entire clan. Men, take them into custody to be sent to trial!”

“What did you just say?” Queen Dream-Devil said, her face draining of color. “Yang Qi destroyed the Titan Emperor Collegium and established the Sage Monarch planetary system? And he summoned you from hell?”

At this point, the first assembly chief chuckled coldly. “Prepare to kill them all! This many fiend-devils will be an excellent benefit to my Asiryangguk Sauvastika Devil Grand Infernal Energy. With their souls as fuel, I can push it to the next level. Prepare to die, all of you!”

All of a sudden, an enormous sauvastika appeared above his head. In the middle of the sauvastika was a devil lord, burning with devil light that caused all of the nearby fiend-devils to cough up blood and then explode.

“Die!” the first assembly chief shouted, leaping forward to fight. “All of you can just die! Fiend-devil army? We’re fiend-devils too! And our substructure is far more evil than yours. You want to be angels? That’s a betrayal of our most ancient ancestors!”

Of course, he hoped to kill as many fiend-devils as possible and convert them into true energy for himself to use. However, in almost the same instant that the sauvastika appeared, an enormous net of laws appeared, in the depths of which was an enormous wheel, like the dao of heaven, or fate itself.

Whack!

The first assembly chief coughed up a mouthful of blood as his sauvastika shattered.

Then the wheel began rolling forward, and at the same time an enormous hand appeared.

“Watch out! Be careful!”

“Run! It's an ambush!”

The other assembly chiefs immediately used space-time flight techniques, trying to escape. However, the hand had locked down the entire area—including the magical laws—making escape impossible.

RUMBLE!

The ten assembly chiefs suddenly looked up in shock to see an enormous palace above them, complete with a throne, upon which sat Yang Qi.

“Queen Dream-Devil,” he said by way of greeting. “I didn't summon you to see me, so what exactly are you doing here? And why are you slaughtering my fiend-devils? Are you people just looking to be massacred?”

At that point, his gaze shifted to the first assembly chief.

“A heaven-immortal? You’re even stronger than Lei Jiuzhou. Perhaps you’re not as strong as my immortal emissary, but you’ve still got a lot of power in you.”

“So, you’re Yang Qi?” the first assembly chief said, having recovered his composure. He took a step forward. “You summoned these fiend-devils?”

“Who the hell do you think you are?” Sword Seventeen said, taking a threatening step forward. “How dare you talk back to my Junior Brother!”

“It’s fine,” Yang Qi said coolly. “He has a common godly-class energy art, so he thinks he’s tough stuff. Unfortunately, jabbering like that in front of me is going to get him killed. I’ll take his energy arts and nail him above the entrance gate to be tormented by fire and pain for all time.”

Chapter 518: Taking an Energy Art

The truth was that if the Devil Sauvastika Assembly hadn't come to find him, Yang Qi would have completely forgotten about his agreement with Queen Dream-Devil.

His deal with her had actually been a sham. He had considered using her help to handle the Titan Emperor Collegium, but in the end, his own energy arts had advanced so rapidly that he didn’t need outside help. And that wasn’t to mention the assistance from the godrelic. By the time it came to fighting with the initiators, he hadn’t needed Queen Dream-Devil at all.

But here she was at his front door, and her people had immediately begun slaughtering his fiend-devil soldiers.

Even more noteworthy was the fact that the first assembly chief had a godly-class energy art, and had gone to the outrageous length of making rude demands. There was no way Yang Qi would let that stand.

No, he would rip the Devil Sauvastika Assembly up by its roots, then establish his own rule over the Gyroscope planetary system. By increasing his faith power in that way, his cultivation would advance even more rapidly.

“On your knees!” Yang Qi said. “Kowtow and admit your faults. Otherwise I’ll wipe out your entire clan!”

“Are you feeling suicidal or something?” the leading first elder shouted. Suddenly, he leaped up, transforming into a stream of devil light. “The Horde of Devils Convulses; Turmoil in All Creation!”

The wail of ghosts and weeping of gods filled heaven and earth, along with a rain of blood that turned into an enormous sauvastika.

“Be still!” Yang Qi said as the attack closed in on him. In the shortest of moments, space in the area turned solid and the first assembly chief found himself locked in place, completely unable to move.

Yang Qi rose off of his throne and stepped forward to look at the man locked in the crystalline aspect of space. Smiling coldly, he said, “Do you really think you’re a heaven-immortal or something? You think I don’t know how to handle people like you? I’m in charge here, and the boundless power of faith sustains my laws. Now that you’re in the Sage Monarch planetary system, I can send the essence of the entire planetary system against you at will. I can take everything from you with a single word.”

“How could this be happening? The first assembly chief is a Demolisher! He's basically a heaven-immortal! And he even has a godly-class energy art.”

“It's time to put everything on the line! We have to save the first assembly chief!”

“Wait, don’t do anything rash. The first assembly chief is ten times stronger than any of us. The fact that he's been captured means we're no match for this Yang Qi.”

Ignoring the other assembly chiefs, Yang Qi reached into the crystalline area of locked space and pulled a magical symbol out of the first assembly chief.

It was a talisman in the shape of a sauvastika.

It had a very powerful aura, like the energy of countless devil-ghosts all combined. It was none other than the boundless energy art of one of the suzerains of hell. It was a godly-class energy art that actually surpassed the Jade-Emperor Profound-Welkin Exalted-Celestial God-Dao and Prodigious Proto-Epoch, Invincible War-Steppe.

It was the Asiryangguk Sauvastika Devil Grand Infernal Energy. The name came from the suzerain of hell who created it, Asiryangguk.

Yang Qi already knew what he was going to do with it. He would give it to his immortal clone as his third godly-class energy art. The clone would definitely be able to keep watch over the Sage Monarch planetary system with it, allowing Yang Qi’s true self to travel to other locations without worrying about home.

“Aaaiiiieee!” screamed the first assembly chief. However, Yang Qi showed him no mercy whatsoever. After the extraction process was over, the man sagged like a limp worm.

His energy arts, quintessence-blood, and magical laws had been extracted and fused into the sauvastika.

“Come forth, my clone!” Yang Qi said, and a second version of himself appeared.

The clone reached out, took the magical sauvastika, and inhaled it. Almost immediately, his cultivation base began rising. Shockingly, magical laws of heaven-immortals appeared, along with the aura of the Demolishing level.

Bam. Bang. BANG!

Yang Qi suddenly blurred into motion and killed one of the other assembly chiefs, who died before he realized what was happening. Next, another assembly chief exploded.

“Run!” screamed the surviving assembly chiefs, who were like little more than toddlers compared to Yang Qi.

“Run?” Yang Qi said. “Where to?” Every move he made caused another assembly chief to explode into clouds of gore and quintessence energy.

“No!” screamed one of the few survivors. “We assembly chiefs have been sworn siblings for hundreds of thousands of years! We conquered our planetary system and founded the Devil Sauvastika Assembly!”

Yang Qi ignored everything they said, and within moments, had killed everyone except for Queen Dream-Devil. She stood there facing him, trembling in fear.

“W-what… what are you going to do with me?” she asked.

“Nothing,” he replied. “In fact, I'm going to bless you with riches and glory.” A blood-colored śarīra suddenly appeared in his hand, pulsing almost like a blood dragon. “After killing the other nine assembly chiefs, I took their quintessence-blood and divine abilities and created this śarīra. Assimilate it, and your cultivation base will advance by leaps and bounds. Then return, and take control of the Devil Sauvastika Assembly and the Gyroscope planetary system. What do you think? Join me, help me bring the Gyroscope planetary system under the control of my law, and earn me its faith.”

“You….” Queen Dream-Devil wasn’t sure what to make of the offer. “But there's no way I can assimilate all of that quintessence energy.”

“You’ll be fine. In fact, I’ll help you. I can give you a dao of devils unique to the ancient Infernalfolk, something called the Live-Forever Devil-Smelting Sutra. With it, you can cultivate nine nascent divinities which can be used to absorb all of the quintessence energy. Having those nine nascent divinities will make you like all ten assembly chiefs in one. Understand? Follow me, and you’ll likely become a Demolisher. All you need to do is kowtow and call me lord, right here and now. You can choose between life and death. Keep in mind that if you don’t agree to help, I’ll just find someone else who will.”

“Milord! Please, accept the humble greetings of a most faithful slave!” Queen Dream-Devil was the type of person who could adapt to new circumstances, therefore she immediately dropped to her knees.

“Excellent. Now, listen carefully. To Live Forever, Smelt the Devils….” With that, he placed his hand on the top of her head. A moment later, she trembled as nine nascent divinities appeared within her. Of course, he also inserted a warding magic into her sea of consciousness, which would allow him to communicate with her at will and keep tabs on her activities.

Queen Dream-Devil shot to her feet, threw her head back, and let loose a long cry. After the blessing from Yang Qi, she felt far more powerful than before. It was almost as though she could exert control over all creation. Then she looked over at Yang Qi and shivered, aware that he had ultimate control over her.

A mere glance from him could wipe her completely out of existence.

“Go! Return to the Gyroscope planetary system, and take this army of five billion fiend-devils with you! Understand? Five billion! They're all Demi-Immortals, and they’re all under your command. You have one month to conquer the Gyroscope planetary system and establish the Sage Monarch Collegium as the ultimate authority. If you fail, I’ll extract your soul and nascent divinities and give them to someone else to pick up your slack. Got it?”

“Got it!” Queen Dream-Devil said. “Your humble slave will definitely accomplish this mission and collect endless amounts of faith for you.”

Inwardly, she was shivering from fear. ‘Five billion fiend-devils? And all of them Demi-Immortals? My god… I don’t think there are even a billion Demi-Immortals in the Gyroscope planetary system.’

“Thinking about those five billion fiend-devils?” Yang Qi asked, chuckling. “Five billion is nothing. I could summon fifty trillion if I wanted. Follow me, and we’ll conquer the mortal world. And after that, the heavenly worlds. If anyone refuses to comply, just execute them. Understand?”

“Y-yes, yes, of course….”

“Yang Yongjin!” Yang Qi said, waving his hand.

“Here!” A genius from the Yang Clan flew out, a Demi-Immortal who had always been staunchly loyal to Yang Qi. To the Yang Clan, Yang Qi was an invincible leader who they viewed as nothing short of a god.

“Yang Xingshi!”

“Here!”

One of the old-timers stepped forward and dropped to his knees. He had once been the ultimate patriarch of the Yang Clan, but in the following years, even he had come to view Yang Qi like a god. “Oh great and exalted ancestor, what orders do you have for me?”

“Take these commander’s tallies and join Queen Dream-Devil in the conquest of the Gyroscope planetary system. Gather all the faith that exists there! And plunder any wealth you see fit. I’ll be opening a permanent wormhole connecting the Sage Monarch planetary system with the Gyroscope planetary system to facilitate the easy transport of goods!”

“Yes sir!”

Glowing light shone as two commander’s tallies flew out, one to Yang Xingshi and the other to Yang Yongjin.

With great pomp and grandeur, they and Queen Dream-Devil led the massive army of fiend-devils away.

“You’re really starting to expand your territory, Junior Brother,” Sword Seventeen said. “It’s too bad our Elder Brothers and Sisters don’t know about this. They would love to serve as top generals in your campaign.”

Yang Qi clasped Sword Seventeen on the shoulder. “Don’t worry. This should all serve to lure out that kid in yellow. Even if we don’t end up capturing him, we can at least use his aura to find out how to get into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart!”

It was at this point that the Wheel of Fate suddenly appeared above Yang Qi’s head.

“In fact, I just locked onto his aura right now!”

Chapter 519: He&#039;s Back!

A rift opened somewhere in the Dark True Void near the Sage Monarch planetary system and three people appeared, accompanied by the aura of a monarch.

The first was none other than the yellow-garbed young man with the buzz cut, whose cultivation base had reached an entirely more profound level. His eyes looked like immortal worlds, and clearly contained the magical laws of the dao of immortals. He was so strong that he seemed like an entity who could put an end to entire immortal worlds, very much like the ancient King Immortal-Slayer, who had conquered three thousand chiliocosms of worlds. Clearly, the return trip to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart had benefited the young man greatly.

Next to him were Chief Beastmaster and Chancellor Demi-Immortal.

Chief Beastmaster had previously been only a half-Demolisher, but he had encountered something in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart which pushed him even higher. Now he radiated the aura of Demolishing.

However, the person that benefited the most was Chancellor Demi-Immortal.

He seemed to be surrounded by the godlight of the dao of heaven, which caused lotuses to bloom with every step he took. And the projection of an ancient, golden god hovered above his head, which appeared to be a buddha of some sort.

“Chancellor Demi-Immortal!” Chief Beastmaster said. “I would never have guessed that you would acquire the legacy śarīra of King Cenobite-Buddha. With his core teachings and doctrines, your energy arts have advanced by leaps and bounds. It seems to me you’ll be reaching immortal ascension very soon. King Cenobite-Buddha was one of the great kings of primeval times, similar to King Immortal-Slayer, King Heaven-Devourer, and King Mourn-Parting. That said, he was the most mysterious of all of the buddhist cultivators in the universe. From what I've heard, buddhist cultivation is a mysterious practice that was once the domain of the legion of gods. Obviously, the gods didn’t approve of lesser beings practicing such cultivation, but those who do become incredibly powerful.”

“It was just a fluke,” Chancellor Demi-Immortal said. “Truth be told, nothing causes greater sorrow than despair. Right now, the sole purpose of my existence is to kill Yang Qi and avenge my daughter’s death. That brute beat her to death with a golden sword-breaker, and every time I think about it I’m filled with endless pain.”

Chancellor Demi-Immortal gritted his teeth as hatred for Yang Qi bubbled up from within his bones.

The higher his cultivation base grew, the more he thought back to the fight between the Crown Prince and Yang Qi. He had interfered, which was when Yang Qi lashed out and killed his daughter. It was a nightmare that haunted him constantly, and not even an endless river of water could possibly wash away that rancor.

“Cheer up, Chancellor Demi-Immortal,” said the young man in yellow. “Remember, you’ll eventually be the ruler of an entire immortal world. Now that we have control over the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, we can move on to accomplish great deeds in the immortal worlds. And of course, killing Yang Qi is on the top of that list.”

At this point, they emerged from the Dark True Void and saw the transformed Central Planetary River.

“What’s going on here?!” Chief Beastmaster blurted. “Where’s the Titan Emperor Collegium? What happened to the Central Planetary River? It’s all gone. Nothing looks the same anymore!”

Sagelight glittered everywhere, filled with glorious angels who seemed illusory, but pulsed with battle prowess at the same time.

“The mystical network of laws is so rigid!” The young man in yellow instantly identified the major changes, and also saw the faith power of millions upon millions of planets flowing toward the Central Planetary River. “This is bad. How did Yang Qi unify the planetary system so soon? It’s like every breath he takes in cultivation is equivalent to hundreds or thousands of years of work for ordinary people! He's going to surpass me at this rate. We can’t let him live. We have to get back into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart!”

As for Chancellor Demi-Immortal and Chief Beastmaster, they were visibly astonished. Originally, they had assumed that their recent advancements would make it easy for them to kill Yang Qi. Yet, contrary to anything they could have predicted, Yang Qi had gone and changed the face of heaven and earth.

As a Future One, the young man in yellow knew exactly how formidable a mystical network of laws could be. Perhaps ordinary people wouldn't understand it, but he knew that all of the faith and destiny flowing to Yang Qi would be of immense help to his cultivation.

All of the young man’s plans went out the window at the sight of the faith power on display. His original plot had been to sneak back into the Titan Emperor Collegium and conspire with the initiators and supreme rector to crush Yang Qi. He had even considered reaching out to the immortal world above to get more power.

But Yang Qi beat him to the punch, adhering to the old adage of striking first to achieve lethality.

“How vicious of you, Yang Qi! Well, you are one of the renowned Fateless Ones after all, the greatest enemy of we Future Ones. This universe won’t tolerate people like you, and that’s because great changes are about to befall heaven and earth. The nirvanic rebirth of the legion of gods will gradually bring about a new civilization.

“I need to seize my chance now to become a deathless god. After all, everyone who travels to this time period has that opportunity. But the Fateless Ones are natural-born founders, people who can forge new great daos.

“Unfortunately for you, Yang Qi, although Fateless Ones rank fewer in number than we Future Ones, there are more than one of you. You’re not the only person with a God Legion Seal, and there’s no way you’ll last until the final battle. There are other Fateless Ones who have risen far higher than you can ever imagine, people who have accomplished great deeds in the millions upon millions of immortal worlds that exist. Compared to them, you’re like an ant! One day, they’ll take your God Legion Seal from you and you’ll be powerless to stop them.

“Of course, if I can kill you before I ascend, I will. Maybe I can get your God Legion Seal and combine the powers of a Future One with a Fateless One! Then there are the Eternal Ones. If I can kill one of them, and gather even more destiny, perhaps I really can become a deathless god.

“Come on, let’s go.” He waved his hand and, in the blink of an eye, was shooting through the Dark True Void to another planetary system.

It was called the Incarnated God planetary system, which had countless planets filled with cultivators, as well as an enormous educational establishment known as the Incarnated God Collegium. There were all sorts of other powerful organizations as well. It was a place where both dragons and snakes abounded.

Of course, the young man in yellow ignored all of those powerful organizations. He, Chancellor Demi-Immortal, and Chief Beastmaster slipped through the planetary system into one of the ancient ruins that were so common in places like this. Some such ruins had been left behind by ancient immortals or gods and were used as training grounds by the locals. Upon reaching the ruins, the three co-conspirators disappeared inside.

Unbeknownst to them, they had been followed.

“Elder Brother Sword Seventeen, I would bet that those ruins were left behind by King Immortal-Slayer, or someone like him, and it’s probably where the kid in yellow plans to use the power of his legacy medallion to return to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. If we hurry, we might be able to follow their tracks right inside.”

“You're right, Junior Brother. And here I thought you were planning to actually lay hands on him. Considering the level of your cultivation base, you're completely invincible in the mortal world. You could fight armies of enemies and destroy them as easily as chickens or dogs. Why are you being so careful about those three ants?”

“That kid in yellow is no ant. He's a Future One, and based on what I can tell from my Wheel of Fate, that gives him immense benefits from the vital power of heaven and earth. I might be able to beat him in a fight, but I don’t think I would end up killing him. If he gets away and hides in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, we might never get another chance to take him out. Instead, we're going to sneak inside and help ourselves to plenty of treasure. Think about it. Considering what I'm capable of now, virtually any treasure in there will be ours for the taking. We might even be able to get more primeval godworms to take back to the Sage Monarch planetary system. If we do, not even an invasion of immortals would be a threat. Also, we might be able to get more halls of the Mourn-Parting Heaven-Palace, or perhaps other items belonging to the ancient monarchs. One of these days, we’ll ascend, and things like that will be very helpful in the immortal world.”

“With the life force quintessence of Dragon Sun-Chaser, and some of the other magical treasures I got, I'm fairly certain that I can reach the Paragon Demi-Immortal in a few years. Maybe even become half-Demolisher. I also have my primeval godworm. With that, the Demolishing level might even be possible within less than a hundred years. Although, I have no idea what progress you’ll make during that time. I bet you don’t even know. You know, Junior Brother, if you cause enough of a scene down here in the lower realms, the Titan Emperor Heaven is eventually going to do something. I hope we’ll be able to survive when the time comes. Remember, ascending isn’t necessarily a good thing.”

“Let’s not overthink things. We have a general idea of what’s going on in the Titan Emperor Heaven, and we’re not planning to ascend right now anyway. There are millions upon millions of immortal worlds up there, and the Titan Emperor Heaven is one of the weakest. We definitely don't need to worry about them. Come on. Let’s get into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart and get some loot!” Yang Qi sounded like he wasn’t afraid of anything.

“Okay, let’s go!”

“Alright!”

The two of them blurred into the ruins in the Incarnated God planetary system, hot on the trail of the yellow-garbed young man with the buzz cut.

Chapter 520: Into the Monarch Chart Again

The ruins were actually an enormous castle that hung in the starry sky, surrounded by spatial tempests. It was so large that it was nearly a planet unto itself. Thanks to the baptism provided by the tempests, its exterior was pitted and mottled, making it seem profoundly ancient. It was considered a very dangerous location in this part of the universe; even Demi-Immortals who traveled here risked being ripped to shreds by the tempests.

Inside the castle, the tempests grew even more severe. Even Universal and Paragon Demi-Immortals would have to be careful. However, to a person like Yang Qi, there was little to fear. The tempests couldn’t even ruffle the hair on his head. As for the other deadly aspects of the castles, such as void pitfalls and space-time shrapnel, none of it could pierce the God Legion Paradise.

Sword Seventeen was also kept safe within its defenses.

Above the main gate of the castle was a sign that read: Castle God-Slaughter. Unfortunately, any godpower that had once existed within the castle was long gone.

WOOOOSH!

Yang Qi and Sword Seventeen flew in through the gate to find themselves on a winding staircase, cut from raw stone.

“I've heard about this Castle God-Slaughter,” Sword Seventeen said. “It’s a dangerous location in which spectral souls lurk, remnants of perished immortals from the most ancient era. Anyone who falls prey to one of those spectral souls will die, beyond the shadow of a doubt. There are also all sorts of deadly spell formations here. The entire castle is essentially a magical treasure of immense proportions, something so large that not even an immortal could take possession of it. I heard that, some time back, a hundred thousand top experts from the Incarnated God Collegium went inside to try to move the castle back to their collegium, only to be swarmed by spectral souls and killed. There were even half-Demolisher society chiefs in that group. Ever since then, everyone has been terrified of the place. The Incarnated God Heaven even issued orders forbidding students of any collegium from entering.”

“Sounds pretty dangerous,” Yang Qi said. Reaching out, he grabbed a nearby tornado, which swirled down into the shape of a vicious snake that lunged toward him with a gaping maw.

BAM!

The snake shattered, revealing a spectral spirit that howled in rage and grief, causing the surrounding space to shatter.

“Come on, let’s go,” Yang Qi said. Waving his hand, he shrank the God Legion Paradise down to the size of a mote of dust, then vanished into the depths of Castle God-Slaughter.

As they proceeded along, they realized that the interior of the castle was a labyrinth so complex and confusing that even immortals would likely get lost inside. Thankfully, Yang Qi’s Wheel of Fate had already locked on to the aura of the young man in yellow. As the wheel spun, they continued into the depths of the castle.

At a certain point, Sword Seventeen clicked his tongue. “This Castle God-Slaughter is huge. What’s it made of, anyway? I’ve never seen anything like it. Is it some sort of godstone?”

“It’s actually something called heaven-demon soul stone,” Yang Qi replied, “which comes from the depths of hell. If you fully refine them, heaven-demon soul stones unleash something called Heaven-Demon God-Slaughtering Magic, which was created by the ancient primal-chaos demon-devils to fight the legion of gods. It can absorb souls, which is why this castle has all of these spectral souls.”

“I wonder if this castle was actually built by one of King Immortal-Slayer’s sworn brothers, King Heaven-Demon,” Sword Seventeen said.

“Be careful,” Yang Qi said. “That kid in yellow is somewhere ahead working with a powerful divine ability. We don’t want to alert him to our presence.”

“Right.” Keeping their auras concealed, they proceeded onward. With the Wheel of Fate in action, both of their fates were separated from the world and could not be detected by anyone.

They eventually reached the depths of Castle God-Slaughter, where an enormous altar, dozens of kilometers from end to end, had been erected, apparently constructed from bleached bones. The bones were enormous, and were covered with magical symbols that radiated the most profound of powers. There were also a host of flags built into it.

The young man in yellow stood in the middle of the altar, a śarīra in his hand that pulsed with a demon energy so strong it would demonize any ordinary person it touched. It was none other than the śarīra of a white-bone heaven-demon.

‘That’s a śarīra from a primeval demon-immortal,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘It's no less impressive than the śarīra of the Preheaven Magnetic King. Who would have guessed that the kid in yellow would have stuff like that in his treasure trove? Is that just the luck that comes with being a Future One? Or is it just that the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart is full of wealth?’

Off to the side, Chief Beastmaster said, “Chancellor Demi-Immortal, this Castle God-Slaughter is a magical treasure of its own, something that no one in the mortal world can take possession of. Brother Future One, do you think you have what it takes to seize control of it?”

“You want Castle God-Slaughter?” replied the young man in yellow. “Unless you’re an Origin-Demolisher, or perhaps a Space-Demolisher, you might as well forget about it. You see, it's only because of the power of King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy medallion that I can turn these ruins into a world junction. That’s how we’ll get into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Using the legacy medallion on its own to get inside is too much of a waste of power. But with this altar here, we can go inside without such wastage.”

“Incredible!” Chancellor Demi-Immortal said. “We didn't get much treasure last time we went into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, so we can’t hold anything back this time. We have to get some precious treasures that we can use to turn the tables on Yang Qi and kill him.”

“Don't forget, the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart is huge,” said the young man. “It doesn't just have immortal items, but also god items. Immortal items are classified as low, common, high, supreme, kingly, imperial, and sovereign. Then come god items, which are grouped into lesser, common, greater, consummate, perfect, paramount, and lordly. If we could get a god item, we would definitely be able to dominate the immortal worlds. Of course, such items need a complementary godly-class energy art, otherwise they can be deadly to try to use.

“According to the stories, the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart’s strongest magical treasure is a paramount god item! King Immortal-Slayer and his sworn siblings underwent immense tribulations in order to acquire building materials imbued with paramount godly laws. After shedding blood, sweat, and tears, and absorbing the true will of the mortal world for a million years, they transformed it into a god item. Once I get all nine of King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy medallions, I’ll take complete control of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart and get that god item!”

At this point, the altar began rotating and the power of the legacy medallion shot out to create a mysterious world junction.

“Let’s go!” the young man said, and he leaped into the world junction, followed by Chancellor Demi-Immortal and Liege Beast.

Almost immediately, the world junction began to shrink down. However, Yang Qi and Sword Seventeen blurred into motion and entered it before it closed as well.

Last time they had gone into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart they had benefited a bit, but not in great measure. This time, they hoped to gain ten thousand times as much as before.

As soon as they were inside, they again felt the increased toughness of space-time. The will of monarchs pushed onto their hearts and minds, making it impossible to connect with the vital energy of the outside world. In fact, Yang Qi was even cut off from the faith power of the Sage Monarch planetary system. Thankfully, his clone was still outside and could benefit from the power of faith.

They were surrounded by mountains, forests, and other beautiful scenery. As for the ground, it wasn’t ordinary soil, but rather a porcelain-colored jade, immensely strong and impossible to dig into. The yellow-garbed young man was nowhere to be seen, although that was no surprise, considering how huge the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart was.

Thankfully, Yang Qi’s Wheel of Fate had kept Sword Seventeen close to him after the teleportation finished.

“Junior Brother, now that we’re inside I can send out a message and see if we can reach Eldest Brother and the others. That said, how are we going to get back outside once we track him down?”

“We’ll be fine,” Yang Qi said. “We can track down that kid in yellow and use him to get out, if we have to. Besides, we’re in no hurry to leave just yet. Let's see what treasure we can find. Maybe we can get an immortal, patriarch-level godworm. Or maybe some more parts of the Mourn-Parting Heaven-Palace, or some imperial snakecharms.”

Nodding, Sword Seventeen produced a paper talisman inscribed with the word ‘invincible’. It was a messaging talisman created by the Invincible Dugu, which the other disciples would sense once it was burned.

Chapter 521: Siblings Reunite

The Invincible Society didn’t have a lot of members. Including Yang Qi, there were only eighteen. Because of that, the Invincible Dugu had created special communication talismans that could be used to track down other members who were close enough.

The higher-level members were particularly sensitive to the fluctuations of such talismans.

As soon as Sword Seventeen ignited it, Yang Qi could sense an energy swirling out into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart to locate the other members of the Invincible Society.

As he stood there waiting, he drew on his energy arts to tap into the essence energy of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. The ground beneath his feet instantly sank down a bit and sagefire filled the area, turning everything for dozens of kilometers into a vacuum.

In the past, he had been unable to draw on the essence of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. But with his Wheel of Fate, it was now possible. In the blink of an eye, he was able to sense the wills of the numerous powerful entities who had created the chart to begin with.

Magical laws, energy arts, and wills swirled back and forth in his mind.

In the blink of an eye, his enlightenment level broke into the fifth order of the Demi-Immortal level. Back in the Sage Monarch planetary system, his clone sensed the change and took a deep breath as he began another breakthrough.

The clone already cultivated three godly-class energy arts, those being the Jade-Emperor Profound-Welkin Exalted-Celestial God-Dao; the Prodigious Proto-Epoch, Invincible War-Steppe; and the Asiryangguk Sauvastika Devil Grand Infernal Energy. The latter was the most recent and had come with the true energy the first assembly chief of the Devil Sauvastika Assembly had built up over hundreds of thousands of years.

With all of that immense power, the immortal clone could, as a Tyrant Demi-Immortal, fight actual heaven-immortals. He could now be considered a truly invincible expert within the mortal world.

About twenty hours passed, during which time Yang Qi focused on his cultivation and gaining enlightenment of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart itself.

As his Wheel of Fate turned, the God Legion Seal in his forehead shone with a dazzling, golden light, almost as if it wished to break free and escape to the outside world.

‘It seems I'm going to gain enlightenment of the most profound secrets of this place. Before long, I won't need that kid in yellow to get out.’ As his cultivation base grew higher, Yang Qi gained more control over the God Legion Seal. He was also coming to realize that the seal was actually an aspect of his being a Fateless One.

‘One of these days, I'm going to go see who else has God Legion Seals. What other Fateless Ones exist out there?’

Roar!

All of a sudden, a beastly roar reached his ears from off in the distance, and he opened his eyes. Immediately, he saw dazzling blade nimbuses flying toward him and Sword Seventeen.

He recognized that aura.

“Elder Second Brother!” Sword Seventeen exclaimed. “I knew you were in here somewhere. Where’s Eldest Brother and everyone else?”

Elder Second Brother Book Genius was the very same individual who had initially helped Yang Qi so much with his energy arts. Back then, he had been a Universal Demi-Immortal, with energy arts that made him much stronger than that level. Now, he was surrounded by a mysterious saber energy that seemed to indicate he had acquired an immortal item.

“Sword Seventeen! Junior Eighteenth Brother! I've tried to reach you numerous times since we got into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. How come you never responded? I thought maybe you didn’t end up getting inside. Junior Eighteenth Brother, you—” All of a sudden, Elder Second Brother’s jaw dropped. “Your… your cultivation base….”

Elder Second Brother was favored by the heavens, and could dominate countless enemies in combat. He was also remarkably perceptive. After having been in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart for so long, he had acquired much good fortune, yet it was nothing that could possibly compare to the advancement Yang Qi had made recently. Yang Qi’s mere breathing seemed to stir the dao of heaven, making him seem like someone who could defeat any foe.

Elder Second Brother didn’t even get a sensation like this when in the presence of the Invincible Dugu.

Furthermore, he clearly remembered how weak Yang Qi had been when they first met. In fact, he had been so weak that Elder Second Brother worried about accidentally killing him by exhaling too deeply in his presence.

Swallowing hard, he said, “How… how could someone so strong exist in the mortal world?  Junior Eighteenth Brother, what good fortune did you come across?”

Sword Seventeen burst out laughing. “You have no idea what's happened recently, Elder Second Brother. You see, we did get into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart a while back, but we escaped. Outside, Junior Brother is basically invincible. He killed an elder king, then went on to dismantle the entire Titan Emperor Collegium!”

With that, Sword Seventeen went on to provide a lengthy and detailed account of the things he and Yang Qi had done after leaving the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. He talked about how they had caused a scene in the Hall of Beheadings and Executions, and described Yang Qi killing the elder king and nailing heads to the entrance of the society. He also touched on the complications with the initiators, the Immortal Army Battlefield, the immortal emissary, the death of the supreme rector, and the establishment of the Sage Monarch Collegium.

It almost sounded like a mythological story.

As Elder Second Brother listened, his eyes grew wider and wider, and when the story was finally over, he said, “Are you serious about this? You actually destroyed the Titan Emperor Collegium?”

“It’s absolutely true,” Yang Qi replied. “We came back here to get the rest of you out. I need your help running the new planetary system, and also expanding into the rest of the mortal world. I don’t have many people I can trust to run things and enforce the new laws. With you Elder Brothers and Sisters to help, I think we can keep things under control. Elder Second Brother, considering the level of your cultivation base, I think you’re in the perfect position to act as the new supreme rector.”

“Junior Eighteenth Brother….” he began, but trailed off, temporarily at a loss for words. “The Titan Emperor Collegium is gone? Really…? Wiped out of existence by a Junior Brother of the Invincible Society…?”

“What’s wrong, Elder Second Brother?” Sword Seventeen said. “Don’t tell me you cared about the Titan Emperor Collegium?”

Elder Second Brother shook his head to clear it. “Cared about it? No. We disciples of the Invincible Society listen only to our Master. Whatever he says, we do.”

“I guess now would be a good time to mention that Master has already ascended,” Sword Seventeen said. “Before he left, he handed over the position of society chief to Junior Eighteenth Brother. Show him the command medallion, Junior Eighteenth Brother.”

“It’s right here,” Yang Qi said, producing the medallion and activating a certain feature inside, which caused a projection of the Invincible Dugu to appear.

“Master!” Elder Second Brother said, dropping to his knees.

“Disciples of the Invincible Society, hear my orders. I, the Invincible Dugu, hereby pass my mantle on to the profoundly auspicious Yang Qi. He will lead the Invincible Society to create a new heaven and earth, and all of his Elder Brothers and Sisters need to help him. You're all consummate geniuses, but as you know, heaven is jealous of such individuals. With Yang Qi to lead you, your path will be smooth and you will overcome the countless tribulations to come. Having left this message behind, I will ascend. We'll reunite in the immortal world.” With that, the projected image faded away.

Getting back to his feet, Elder Second Brother looked over at Yang Qi, his eyes shining brightly. “Junior Brother, you’re the new society chief. From here on out, we’ll follow you, no matter what. Your word is our command.”

“Excellent,” Yang Qi said. “Don't worry, I won’t let any of you down.”

“By the way, Elder Second Brother,” Sword Seventeen said, “how come you're the only one who responded to my call? Where’s Eldest Brother and everyone else? I could sense their presence when I sent out the message.”

“Don’t worry. Eldest Brother is here in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, and he rallied all the other Junior Brothers and Sisters. Working together, we acquired a lot of impressive stuff. For example, this immortal saber of mine is called the Dragon-God General-Beheading Saber, and it's a royal-grade immortal item. It surpasses anything that exists in the Titan Emperor Collegium. Or should I say the old Titan Emperor Collegium. Now that I've fused with it, it's become my animadestiny saber energy, and I can use it to easily cut down half-Demolishers. Right now, Eldest Brother is leading everyone else to try to acquire an actual god item! If we succeed, we’ll all advance by leaps and bounds!”

“God item!?” Yang Qi said, his eyes widening. He immediately thought of the jade flute he had acquired from Ascendant Beheader, an item left behind by an ancient god. It wasn’t an actual god item, but it was imbued with the aura of a god-spirit. But even just having been used by a god-spirit made that item incredible.

As for true god items, they were things that were actually created by members of the ancient legion of gods, which they expended blood, sweat, and tears to fill with godly laws.

“Yes,” replied Elder Second Brother. “It's a god item that people say was used by one of King Immortal-Slayer’s sworn brothers to fight one of the ancient god-spirits. It's damaged, but it's still enough to shake the nine heavens and ten earths, and devastate hosts of immortals and devils. It’s an enormous mirror that currently isn’t owned by anyone. Unfortunately, we're having trouble taking it. Eldest Brother has spent months trying to refine it with true flame, but nothing seems effective in diminishing its power. You got here just in time, Junior Eighteenth Brother. With your divine abilities and energy arts, maybe you can help take control of it. With that god item, we could definitely get out of this place.”

“A god item in the form of a mirror?” Yang Qi nodded. “Alright, let’s go take a look. Our Invincible Society is like a family, and we don't want something that amazing to fall into the hands of an outsider! With that god item, my plans for my planetary system will be even easier to carry out.”

“Alright, Junior Eighteenth Brother. Let’s go. I’ll lead the way!”

Elder Second Brother flew up into the air.

Chapter 522: God Item

For a god item to have been discovered was no small matter.

Of course, the Mourn-Parting Heaven-Palace and the imperial snakecharms were both fragmented pieces of god items. There were nine thousand, nine hundred and ninety-nine halls that made up the Mourn-Parting Heaven-Palace, and there were three thousand imperial snakecharms. In their fragmented state, they were immortal items. However, if they were pieced together, they would thrum with god power and godly laws, and would become true god items.

In fact, they would be even more formidable than average god items.

Yang Qi and Sword Seventeen followed Elder Second Brother as he blurred into motion. It had taken a good twenty hours for Elder Second Brother to come find them in the first place. Considering the level of his cultivation base, he could move so fast that he could traverse entire planetary systems with ease, which just went to show how far away he had been.

Of course, he was somewhat deficient compared to Yang Qi. Therefore, Yang Qi poured some power into his Elder Brother’s sea of consciousness, allowing him to identify the route he planned to take.

Then he waved his hands to summon his Angel Wings. Instantly, the space around them shattered and they began moving faster than even light itself.

They flew for the time it takes an incense stick to burn, not hindered at all by the labyrinthine nature of the interior of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

“So fast!” Elder Second Brother said. “Not even the Flying Apsara Wings from my Supreme-Unity Flying-Apsara Grand Energy Art can produce speed like this! This trip took me over twenty hours! We’re already here, but only enough time has passed for an incense stick to burn. That’s… how fast are you? Junior Eighteenth Brother, you’re already fast enough to travel within an immortal world!”

“That's the spot up ahead with the god weapon. That mirror is huge!”

A shattered plane of existence rose up in front of them, with a mirror hanging above it. It almost looked like a slowly rotating moon that gave a glimpse into the chiliocosm of worlds that existed within it. It was as large as an entire planet, and it was impossible to tell what material it had been constructed from. However, it pulsed with god power, and was clearly something that ninth order Paragon Demi-Immortals, or even half-Demolishers, couldn’t possibly budge.

“Is that a Chiliocosm Mirror?” Yang Qi said. Back in the days of the Rich-Lush Continent and Yanhaven, he had pillaged the Chen Clan and found a Chiliocosm Mirror forged from Nine Heavens godjade. It could be used to create an illusory world to practice cultivation in without any fear of cultivation deviation. Apparently, that mirror had been a lesser version of this one.

“You’ve heard of this god item before, Junior Brother?” Elder Second Brother was visibly surprised. “We discovered it a few months ago, and the ancient god script on it says that it’s the Chiliocosm Mirror. According to the stories, it was created by God-King Chiliocosm and supposedly contains an actual chiliocosm of worlds inside. Look, there’s Eldest Brother and everyone else right there.”

There was a group of people gathered near the mirror, all of whom were pulsing with immense true energy the likes of which could shake the heavens and topple the earth.

One of them was particularly eye-catching. He was burly, and wore a suit of white armor. He had eyebrows like swords, and looked almost like a god in human form. He also radiated the destructive aura of a Demolisher.

Obviously, he was Eldest Brother.

At a single glance, Yang Qi could tell that his genes were far stronger than a hundred million times normal! He obviously had the bloodline of some ancient god.

As soon as Yang Qi and Sword Seventeen arrived, they attracted attention.

As for Eldest Brother, he looked at Yang Qi with a piercing gaze designed to inspect him on a deep level. However, the God Legion Paradise blocked it immediately.

“Hmm?” Eldest Brother shivered and a look of surprise appeared on his face. Already, he could tell that Yang Qi was enigmatically powerful, more so than himself, and was the type of person who could probably destroy worlds.

Eldest Brother was the spiritual pillar of the Invincible Society. He had dominated the Titan Emperor Collegium for years, and had come to be known as the top student there. In fact, no one had ever dared challenge him.

Originally, he had assumed that Yang Qi was a top genius, but nowhere near his level. Now, he could see how terrifying he was. Even with his bloodline of a god, he couldn't stand up to Yang Qi and would be easily defeated in a fight with him. In fact, he probably wouldn't even last for ten rounds of combat.

“Retract your gaze, Eldest Brother!” shouted Elder Second Brother. “This is Junior Eighteenth Brother, and he’s truly invincible. He destroyed the Titan Emperor Collegium and set up his own network of laws! Also, Master passed leadership of our society to him. He has divine abilities and energy arts so strong that he was able to leave the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart and come back. And he’ll be able to take us out with him, too. He’s the type of conqueror who forces people to submit to him, or perish in resistance!”

“What? All that really happened?”

All of the Elder Brothers and Sisters were shocked beyond belief, and some of them even wondered if it might be some sort of trick.

As for Yang Qi, he kept his cool and said, “As Brothers and Sisters of the Invincible Society, we live and die together, and share both glory and humiliation. I really did destroy the Titan Emperor Collegium. When the time comes to go home, you can see the supreme rector nailed to a pillar, his energy arts crippled, eternally tormented by sagefire. Everyone else, from elder kings to students, have all become slaves. Incidentally, I also destroyed the Devil Sauvastika Assembly from the Gyroscope planetary system. Before long, that entire planetary system will be mine. And next will be the Megaplexus and Coiling Arc planetary systems, although I’ll need your help for that.”

A long moment passed, then Eldest Brother broke out into a stream of hearty laughter. “Incredible! I've heard about you, Junior Eighteenth Brother. Everyone said you were incredible, but I have to admit, I didn't believe them. Apparently, not only were they not exaggerating, but they actually didn't know how incredible you are! In only a few months, you changed the face of heaven and earth out there! The Titan Emperor Collegium is gone? Not even Master would have dared to do something like that. He would have been worried about punishment from the immortal world. But not you. You actually captured an immortal emissary? Now that’s what I call invincible. That is the true spirit of our Invincible Society!”

“There’s no need for flattery, Eldest Brother,” Yang Qi said, smiling. “The Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart isn't safe right now. But considering we seem to be connected to this god item by destiny, let’s go ahead and finish the task. It's going to be a foundational treasure for our Invincible Society.”

Eldest Brother was visibly taken aback. “You think you can take this god item, Junior Brother? Your other Elder Brothers and Sisters have been working with me for three months, but we haven’t made any progress.”

“Watch and learn. Cycles of Heaven and Earth; Glory of the God Legion; Grandeur to Command Ghosts and Gods!”

RUMBLE!

Yang Qi suddenly grew in size until he was as large as a planet, simultaneously reaching out toward the Chiliocosm Mirror with the Hand of the One God, his fingers glowing with sagelight. The godlight of the mirror shattered, completely incapable of stopping the Hand of the One God.

“Incredible!” Eldest Brother exclaimed. “I can’t believe you broke the light of the mirror so easily!” He exchanged a glance with Elder Second Brother, and it looked like the two of them had to hold back from letting out whoops of excitement.

WHIZZZ!

However, just when Yang Qi seemed on the verge of grabbing the mirror, it began spinning and emitting a depraved sound like evil music. All of a sudden, the entire world seemed to be falling into the mirror, and Yang Qi felt space-time transforming rapidly around him.

‘Not good!’ That was what everyone was thinking as they watched an enormous shaft of light stab out from the rotating mirror, wrap around Yang Qi, and drag him inside.

“The Chiliocosm Mirror has a full chiliocosm of worlds inside of it!” Eldest Brother said. “If you activate its warding spells, it will try to drag you inside. Once you get lost in the countless planes of existence inside, you’ll be stuck there forever! Everyone listen. We need to go all out! Use your secret immortal magics to rescue Junior Eighteenth Brother!”

At this point, Yang Qi’s voice echoed out from inside the mirror.

“I'm fine! Don't do anything rash. This Chiliocosm Mirror is powerful, but the godly laws inside of it are damaged. I'm forcing them to submit right now. The rest of you stand guard for me as I work. All I need is the time it takes an incense stick to burn. In a moment, I’ll brand this thing with an animadestiny sealing mark of the dao of the legion of gods. That will be a critical moment, during which I can’t be interrupted. If I suffer a backlash, I could end up being transformed into the spirit automaton of the mirror, at which point anyone could refine and assimilate me! Be careful!”

“What?” Eldest Brother said. “Junior Eighteenth Brother is so brave! He just went into the mirror to force it to submit? Okay, everyone. Set up our Destructive Invincible Empyrean Energy Grand Formation. Keep this area locked down! We have to defend Junior Eighteenth Brother, even if we die in the process!”

“Yes sir!” the other Junior Brothers and Sisters shouted, springing into action.

As the spell formation sprang up, it locked down the entire area.

Enough time ticked by for an incense stick to burn, which was when the most critical juncture arrived. And that was right when a strange voice echoed out.

Chapter 523: Elder-Immortal

It was that critical moment in which Yang Qi was using his energy arts to link his nascent divinity with the Chiliocosm Mirror itself. Unfortunately, it was a moment of extreme weakness for him in which he could suffer dismal failure.

And it was also when a beam of divine light appeared, accompanied by laughter that filled all of heaven and earth.

“So, someone is trying to take the Chiliocosm Mirror? Who might it be? You pieces of trash have been here for months, but don't have a thing to show for it. I've been watching you, just waiting for the right moment to strike and enslave the lot of you. Who would have guessed that you would actually succeed with the mirror? Well, whoever’s inside is about to be transformed into the mirror's spirit automaton and remain in there for all eternity.”

An old man appeared overhead, clad in black clothing and holding a steel pitchfork. He had a long, narrow face with square pupils in his eyes, and from the way he moved it seemed like he might be capable of passing in and out of various aspects of space-time, making it impossible to lock on to his aura.

“Elder-Immortal Hyperfiend,” Eldest Brother said, flying up into the air and clenching his hands into fists. “Sun Moon God Art: Cyclical Grand Brightness!”

Eldest Brother knew that this was one of the most powerful entities to have ever been trapped in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. He was Elder-Immortal Hyperfiend, a person who could destroy worlds and create planes, an expert whose magical laws of the dao of immortals would make him invincible in the mortal world.

He had benefited greatly over his years in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. For example, his weapon was a devil item that had supposedly been forged by an actual devil-god in hell. It was called the Myriad Fiends Pitchfork, and was equivalent to an immortal item from an immortal world.

King Immortal-Slayer and his sworn siblings hadn’t created the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart just to fight the legion of gods. They had also waged war on the fiend-devils of hell, and the Myriad Fiends Pitchfork had been used to slaughter even preeminent devil dictators. The devil dictators of hell were similar to immortals: powerful entities in the Demolishing level who could create immortal items.

Elder-Immortal Hyperfiend was an evil person who cultivated both wicked and righteous energy arts. After acquiring the Myriad Fiends Pitchfork he became stronger than ever, to the point where he could dominate all heaven and earth. Now here he was, hoping to break through the line of defense, defeat Yang Qi, and take the Chiliocosm Mirror.

“You scum think you can stop me? Before I got trapped in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, I was a powerful immortal who slaughtered people wantonly in the immortal worlds. In fact, I came here to hide so that I wouldn’t be tracked down and held accountable for my crimes! You people who haven’t ascended, and have no magical laws from the immortal worlds, are essentially trash. I can hardly think of a funnier joke in the world than the idea of you trying to fight me.”

With that, Elder-Immortal Hyperfiend lunged forward and stabbed his Myriad Fiends Pitchfork toward the spell formation, causing a deafening rumbling sound to echo out.

Eldest Brother was sent staggering backward as a result.

“Dammit! Why did this old monster have to show up? An immortal?” Not pausing for a moment, Eldest Brother shot back up into the air and unleashed a fist strike, sending beams of godlight rocketing upward to meet the Myriad Fiends Pitchfork.

“God Bloodline!” Eldest Brother was fighting this elder-immortal with the bloodline of a god, using it to fuel the most ultimate energy arts possible. Without any hesitation, he resorted to the Prodigious Proto-Epoch, Invincible War-Steppe, causing him to pulse with a sensation of iron and blood. “Let the war drums beat, let the battle banners fly! Heart and mind of steel!”

His energy art made him seem to pulse with veins of steel as he unleashed a burst of power to stop the advance of the Myriad Fiends Pitchfork.

Apparently, Elder-Immortal Hyperfiend was also drawing on an immortal body. Cackling madly, he said, “How dare you get in my way, vermin! Bloodline of a god? I doubt it. I'm not an ordinary immortal, I'm a consummate elder-immortal! My immortal body surpasses anything you could imagine! Myriad Fiends Pitchfork: Let an Evil Will Come!”

RUUUUUUMBLE!

In the blink of an eye, it was as if the Myriad Fiends Pitchfork had reached out to the source of all evil and began summoning something profoundly wicked. The pitchfork spun through the air and a fiendish god descended.

Shockingly, Eldest Brother was stabbed in the chest by the pitchfork!

Blood sprayed out of his mouth as he stumbled backward; at the same time, Elder-Immortal Hyperfiend burst into the spell formation and turned in the direction of the Chiliocosm Mirror.

“Excellent,” he said, “you do have the bloodline of a god. Otherwise, my fiendish god would have done a lot more than cause you to cough up some blood. Once I take this Chiliocosm Mirror I’ll refine you into a wonderful magical treasure!”

Laughing maniacally, he strode toward the mirror.

“Listen up, brat! I find it hard to believe that you can force that Chiliocosm Mirror to submit. You must be a tough character. Unfortunately, you’re not tough enough. Once you're the spirit automaton of the mirror, I’ll refine you for my own use.”

In the blink of an eye, Elder-Immortal Hyperfiend leaped into the Chiliocosm Mirror. Looking around, he saw a burning ball of sagelight in the depths of the mirror that was contending with the mirror's essence. The mirror's godly laws were a type that ordinary immortals couldn't deal with. Only someone with the bloodline of a god would be able to handle them—or someone with incredibly powerful energy arts. As for Eldest Brother, he had the bloodline of a god but hadn’t reached the point of being able to use it to subdue god items, yet.

“You’re completely fused with the essence of the god who created the mirror, aren’t you?” he laughed loudly. “So, someone else has the bloodline of a god. Well, you’ll be a perfect spirit automaton for me.”

At this point, another stream of laughter erupted from the Chiliocosm Mirror, although this time it wasn’t from Elder-Immortal Hyperfiend. “So, an immortal showed up? And one with an immortal body? Perfect. Heaven really seems to be helping me. It seems you’re easily fooled. You think I'm in a moment of danger right now? That was a trick to lure out people just like you. I'm already the new nascent divinity of this Chiliocosm Mirror!”

All of a sudden, Yang Qi became visible within the essence, and without any hesitation, he unleashed the God Legion Paradise, which filled the interior world of the Chiliocosm Mirror.

The Chiliocosm Mirror had numerous planes of existence within it, ensuring that it was filled with a spider web of greyspaces. And the godpower and magical laws of the dao of gods was abundant. Normally speaking, no ordinary individual would ever have magical power sufficient to cover all of the millions upon millions of worlds inside.

Yet, a wave of Yang Qi’s hand was enough to draw on all of that true energy.

“God Legion Seal!”

The golden imp appeared, along with a stream of magical symbols. In the blink of an eye, the God Legion Seal had linked with the essence of the Chiliocosm Mirror, causing Yang Qi to thrum with a unique aura.

The God Legion Seal had been created by the legion of gods so far in the past that numerous universes had come into being and been destroyed since then. It was completely linked with Yang Qi, and represented the eternal Sovereign Lord, the creator of all things.

Because of that, all god-spirits would feel an affinity to it.

The Chiliocosm Mirror trembled as Yang Qi took control, gaining access to everything inside of it, including various god formations.

“Aaaiiiieee!” screamed Elder-Immortal Hyperfiend. “What’s going on? How could this be happening? How did you force the magical laws here to submit?”

Before he even knew what was happening, he found himself locked in place and unable to move. Outside, he could have used all sorts of profound techniques to break free, but inside the Chiliocosm Mirror he was limited and unable to do anything. It was like he had just thrown himself into the tiger's den.

“I control the rotation of the chiliocosm, and I run this cosmos. Reincarnation is under my regulation, and I oversee your fate!” In the blink of an eye, the Hand of the One God was smashing down toward Elder-Immortal Hyperfiend.

All of a sudden, Elder-Immortal Hyperfiend surged with fiend energy. “I’ll show you what an immortal body can do! You think you can pin me down? Impossible! Be destroyed!”

The Myriad Fiends Pitchfork appeared again, and he used it to unleash even more destructive power than before, causing the entire Chiliocosm Mirror to fill with the weeping of ghosts and wailing of gods.

Elder-Immortal Hyperfiend was using a consummate and deadly technique to try to blast his way out of danger. He couldn’t believe that a mere Demi-Immortal like Yang Qi could possibly cause so much trouble for him.

How could he have known that Yang Qi was a Fateless One, someone who represented the Sovereign Lord and creator of all things? The God Legion Seal could force any and all god items to submit. The only exception might be a god item in the hands of the god who had created it.

“Sacrifice all things to destruction; the cycles of the sun and moon, the empyrean great daos, the invincible cosmic original, all worship the legion of gods.” Yang Qi didn't seem worried at all about the fact that Elder-Immortal Hyperfiend was fighting back. Once again, he began growing larger. Then he threw his head back and howled, making it seem like the entire interior of the Chiliocosm Mirror was about to shatter.

“AAAAAAAAIIIIIIEEEEE!” Elder-Immortal Hyperfiend screamed as his nascent divinity was severely damaged. Rips and tears appeared all over him and fresh blood violently spurted out.

All of a sudden, he thrust his pitchfork out again with the power to destroy planetary systems.

“Fiends Face the World; Fiendish Evil Abounds!”

Yang Qi reached out to the Myriad Fiends Pitchfork and godlight shone in abundance, entering the weapon and causing it to shrink down until it was only a few inches long. Then he absorbed it into his body.

Chapter 524: Assimilation

As it turned out, everything had been a part of Yang Qi’s plan.

Why else would he have loudly announced that he was entering a dangerously unstable state in which he couldn’t afford to be disturbed? Things had played out exactly as he expected, and a hidden expert in the area had been lured out. Now he had Elder-Immortal Hyperfiend in his clutches, to be used as he saw fit.

When he drew deeply on the God Legion Seal, his battle strength would rise to the level of being able to slaughter everything in his path, even pierce through immortal worlds.

After grabbing the devil item that was the Myriad Fiends Pitchfork, he sent energy from the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth into it, instantly forcing it to submit. It was powerful enough to be the signature weapon of an entire sect, but now it was his. It even surpassed his seventy-seven imperial snakecharms—at least for the moment.

Even better, once he took full control of the Chiliocosm Mirror he would have something even better than the Myriad Fiends Pitchfork.

Elder-Immortal Hyperfiend screamed and struggled, hoping to break out of the world of the Chiliocosm Mirror. But he was even weaker now that he didn't have the Myriad Fiends Pitchfork, and thus, he was no match for Yang Qi.

He tried using the various immortal skills he knew, and all the combined righteous and evil cultivation techniques he had at his disposal. But they were all suppressed by Yang Qi’s sagelight.

“Myriad Devils Formation Cleaving!”

He unleashed a fist strike that sent a myriad of roaring devils out, an army that swarmed toward Yang Qi and even managed to bash through his sagelight.

Unfortunately, that was when Yang Qi flicked his finger, sending out true energy that melted the myriad of devils as if they were an army of snowmen on a hot summer day. Then he chopped out with both hands.

To meet the attack, Elder-Immortal Hyperfiend summoned a kingdom of darkness, filled with lightning and fiendish tempests that spread out in a powerful defense.

“Kingdom of Myriad Fiends!”

This was the kingdom he had produced after an entire lifetime of cultivation.

“Nice,” Yang Qi said. “A kingdom of both righteousness and evil. A combination of an immortal skill and a fiend-devil energy art. Unfortunately, that’s not going to be enough to deal with me. Even if we weren’t in the Chiliocosm Mirror, I would still be able to crush you. You have no idea of the limits of my cultivation base!” He began singing the Eternal Heavenly Aria, causing countless primeval god skills to appear and blessing himself into a state ten times stronger than before.

Here in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, he was actually far more powerful than he had been on the outside. After all, he had just gained enlightenment of the Tyrant Demi-Immortal level.

Sadly, the limitations of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart itself made it impossible to achieve cultivation base breakthroughs. That said, thanks to his enlightenment his true energy flowed with more strength and speed.

Therefore, his God Legion Paradise, Hand of the One God, and Eternal Heavenly Aria were all slightly stronger than before.

Thanks to the blessings of the Eternal Heavenly Aria, he shot forward with great speed, splaying his fingers to create a palm strike millions of kilometers wide.

Crack!

The Kingdom of Myriad Fiends shattered as surely as a chicken egg thrown against a rock. Then he dragged Elder-Immortal Hyperfiend out, like pulling a fish from the water. Without any hesitation, he slapped him with the Devil-God Seal, leaving him as tightly wrapped as a glutinous rice dumpling.

The Devil-God Seal could seal devil-gods, much less immortals.

After the process was over, Elder-Immortal Hyperfiend was immobile and completely helpless.

“What is this?” Elder-Immortal Hyperfiend said, trembling. “How can this seal be so strong? I refuse to believe this! How could you possibly shackle my immortal body!? You’re only a punk Demi-Immortal! I'm an elder-immortal who can rebuke heaven and earth in the immortal worlds!”

Yang Qi shook his head. “I don’t think so. Your cultivation level isn't nearly high enough for you to dominate immortal worlds. That said, your immortal body will make the perfect spirit automaton for this Chiliocosm Mirror. Hellfire Crucible!”

The enormous crucible appeared, burning with intense flames. Without any hesitation, Yang Qi tossed Elder-Immortal Hyperfiend inside, whereupon miserable shrieks rang out, the type that could shake all heaven and earth. Outside, Eldest Brother, Elder Second Brother, and the others all felt their hair standing on end from horror.

But Yang Qi didn’t even flinch.

Exhaling, he sent true flame into the crucible, causing Elder-Immortal Hyperfiend’s body to slowly melt, releasing numerous motes of bright light that Yang Qi subsequently sent into the god essence of the mirror.

Yang Qi was rapidly wiping out the immortal’s will and turning him into a puppet of pure power. With the burst of energy, his acquisition of the Chiliocosm Mirror sped up. Without Elder-Immortal Hyperfiend, it would have taken a lot more effort to succeed.

But now it took almost no effort at all, and in fact, the process was leading to even further enlightenment.

The idea of the levels of power that would come with a god item had Yang Qi itching with anticipation.

“I refuse to accept this!”

At this point, one final howl erupted from the fading Elder-Immortal Hyperfiend. He suddenly erupted with a black mist that turned into a monster wearing a greenish robe. It was none other than a heaven-devil!

“Yin-Yang Heaven-Devil Soul-Reversal Dao!” in the blink of an eye, a whole host of heaven-devils descended to assist Elder-Immortal Hyperfiend.

“Heaven-devils? You think they can cause trouble for me?” Yang Qi waved his hands, and when the power of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth was unleashed, the heaven-devil’s faces became masks of dread. Howling, they faded away into nothing.

“AIIIEEE!” Elder-Immortal Hyperfiend let out a final scream as his last-ditch effort to escape was foiled.

Yang Qi clasped his hand onto the elder-immortal's head and poured godpower into him, wiping out his soul. Then he ignited his immortal body, transforming it into pure power.

Buzzzzzz.

The entire Chiliocosm Mirror began trembling.

From outside, Eldest Brother and Elder Second Brother could clearly see everything that was happening.

The mirror pulsed with light, rapidly shrinking down until it was only the size of a fist, whereupon it dropped onto Yang Qi’s palm. Now it looked like nothing more than an ancient copper mirror that had seen nothing but disuse for ages. Although it was covered with fanciful designs, it didn’t seem extraordinary in any way.

With the mirror in hand, any magical fluctuations in the area vanished into thin air.

“That’s the Chiliocosm Mirror, Junior Brother?” Eldest Brother said, somewhat skeptical. Accepting it from Yang Qi, he flipped it over in his hands and even sent some true energy into it, with no result.

“It’s the Chiliocosm Mirror, alright,” Yang Qi said. “However, it’s only in its earliest stages of development. Give it some time before trying to use it. I’ll keep feeding true energy into it to develop its space-time and activate the spell formations. It’s a god item, but unfortunately it's the kind of thing not even top Demi-Immortals could use. Not even you, Eldest Brother. If you try to use it without an immortal body, it will suck away your quintessence-blood before you know what's happening.”

Yang Qi sighed. “Upon fusing with it, I personally watched it wither Elder-Immortal Hyperfiend up. It’s a truly domineering item. On the other hand, his Myriad Fiends Pitchfork is a powerful devil item. Why don't you take it, Eldest Brother? I'm sure you can make good use of its power.” With that, Yang Qi extended the Myriad Fiends Pitchfork to Eldest Brother, who took it and handed the mirror back to Yang Qi.

“I can't believe we actually got a god item,” he said. No amount of true energy that he poured into it had done anything. “Not even my secret magic enables me to use it. Maybe I could burn some lifespan to improve my true energy by tenfold. However, losing the lifespan wouldn’t be worth it. Junior Brother, you’re really an invincible figure. You're only a fourth order Demi-Immortal, but you can already use a god item.”

“You flatter me,” Yang Qi said. “I happen to have acquired the most powerful type of godly-class energy art. Thanks to that, and a host of other factors, my genes have transformed into something inconceivable. Incidentally, Eldest Brother, now that the Invincible Society is back together, why don't we go see what other treasures we can find, then get out of this place? What do you think? I still have plenty of primeval godworm eggs. All we have to do is hatch them. They can eat through the void of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart and earn us plenty of benefit.”

As he spoke, he pulled out an egg for each of his Elder Brothers and Sisters.

He had originally acquired one hundred and thirty-eight eggs, but had given many out as rewards to his father, his sworn siblings, and various children of the Yang Clan.

After distributing eggs to his Elder Brothers and Sisters, he only had about eighty left.

Even still, that represented an immense amount of wealth.

“Incredible, Junior Brother!” said Elder Sixteenth Sister, Flower Fern. “You definitely deserve to be Master’s successor. How generous of you! We did some searching of our own after we got in here, but none of us were able to find even a single primeval godworm. But here you are, giving all of us godworm eggs.”

“Enough chatter, Junior Sixteenth Sister,” said Eldest Brother. “Hurry up and fuse with the egg, and hatch the godworm. Then we’ll see what else Junior Brother Yang Qi has in store for us.” Eldest Brother was the type who took quick and decisive action, and had already begun imbuing the egg with quintessence vitality. A moment later, the egg cracked and a godworm appeared, which Eldest Brother absorbed into his dantian region.

A broad smile broke out on his face. “With a godworm, not only will I be able to achieve my next breakthrough, but I should be able to draw on the power of the immortal world above before ascension! I should be able to form an immortal body early! According to the ancient daoist texts I've read, forming an immortal body in the immortal world is very dangerous. But doing it in the mortal world is much safer and will lead to huge benefits after ascension.”

“I can help you with that, too,” Yang Qi said, chuckling. “Once I break through to the eighth order and become a Universal Demi-Immortal, I’ll be able to tear rifts into heaven and harvest power and magical laws from immortal worlds. Furthermore, my Sage Monarch planetary system has an immortal formation that can connect to one of the highest of all the immortal worlds, the Tusita Heaven. With magical laws from there, creating immortal bodies shouldn’t be a problem at all. Elder Brothers and Sisters, your ascension is going to be no simple matter. But once it happens, we’re going to conquer the Titan Emperor Heaven, and you’re going to be the new rulers of the immortal world.”

Chapter 525: In This Together

Eldest Brother gasped. “The Tusita Heaven!? According to the most ancient daoist texts, although there are billions of planes that make up the immortal worlds, they’re all organized into thirty-three levels. And only the highest of them border on deathless space-time, the kingdom of the gods. One of those extremely high-level planes is the Tusita Heaven.”

“Exactly,” added Elder Second Brother. “Although thousands and thousands of planetary systems from the mortal world couldn't compare to a single immortal world, the fact of the matter is that the Titan Emperor Heaven is the lowest type of immortal world. As for what a high-level location like the Tusita Heaven is like, we have no way of knowing. Eldest Brother, you’re the most knowledgeable of us all—do you know anything about the Tusita Heaven?”

“It’s a very mysterious place. Supposedly, even the tiniest scrap of energy from there can lead to incredible cultivation advancement. I even heard that people born there come out as immortals.

“If we really have access to magical laws from the Tusita Heaven, then forming immortal bodies would make us millions upon millions of times stronger than immortals from the Titan Emperor Heaven! And once we ascend there, we would be able to dominate anyone we faced. That said, Junior Brother, I worry your goals are a bit too lofty. After all, it’s built on the supposition that you could conquer and unite the entire mortal world, and establish a mystical network of laws to feed you the power of faith. That won't be an easy task. If you can pull it off, conquering the Titan Emperor Heaven wouldn't be a problem. That said, your father is a very powerful person. I've seen what he can do, and you definitely can’t underestimate him. His will is so powerful that he doesn't even care about the immortal worlds.”

“What?” Yang Qi said, head swiveling as his eyes locked onto Eldest Brother. “Are you saying you’ve met my father, Eldest Brother?”

“I have, although I couldn't get much of a read on him. He’s a grim fellow who never talks. However, when he loses his temper, it’s like a thunderstorm from heaven. Back in the days of the Titan Emperor Collegium, even the supreme rector and the initiators were like cicadas in winter when in his presence. Apparently, he’s a Future One, and very close to the ruler of the Titan Emperor Heaven. From that alone, it’s obvious he has a very high standing. I even heard one story that implied the ruler of the Titan Emperor Heaven is afraid of him.”

Yang Qi was nearly bowled over with surprise. “Future One? Eldest Brother, you know about the Future Ones?”

“Of course. Future Ones are among the most mysterious figures in all heaven and earth. For a variety of reasons, they’re able to travel from the future to the present. There are other special people as well. For instance, Past Ones can travel from the past to the present. And there are also people called Eternal Ones. But I think the most powerful of them all are the Fateless Ones.” Eldest Brother didn’t seem to be holding anything back and was explaining everything he knew.

“Er, I'm a Fateless One,” Yang Qi said, still a bit stunned.

“What?” This time, Eldest Brother was the one to react with shock. “Junior Brother, did you just say that you're a Fateless One? That’s no joking matter. Fateless Ones have enemies everywhere. According to the ancient daoist texts, they inevitably end up being targeted by the host of immortals, the horde of devils, the multitude of demons, and even the heretical sects. Such groups want to extract and refine their souls to escape from the river of fate and turn misfortunes into blessings. Junior Brother, you definitely can’t let anyone know about this, otherwise it will bring disaster on your head.”

At this point, Elder Second Brother burst out laughing. “Don't worry, Junior Brother, we’re all in this together. Anyone who tries to kill a single one of us will find themselves dead at our hands! It’s no wonder Master told us to follow Junior Brother Yang Qi. If we stick close to him, a Fateless One, then we can escape from the river of fate and open up boundless prospects for the future.”

“Come on, Elder Brothers and Sisters,” Sword Seventeen said, “we're wasting too much time. Let’s figure out what we’re going to do next. We need to figure out a way to escape this place, but before that, we should take advantage of whatever treasures we can find. And we need to watch out for that yellow-garbed young man with the buzz cut.”

“The ‘yellow-garbed young man with the buzz cut’?” Eldest Brother asked. “Who’s that?”

Sword Seventeen had left that aspect out of his story earlier. Now, he went on to explain about the young man in yellow, and when the story was over everyone stood in thoughtful silence for a moment.

Finally, Eldest Brother said, “This is big. So, he can freely enter and exit the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart? That means he’s on the path to gaining full control of it. And if that happens, we’re in big trouble. Future Ones are extremely mysterious, and are not to be taken lightly. And if he has King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy medallions, that makes him even more dangerous. We probably can't beat him in a fight!”

“I wouldn't worry about it too much,” said Elder Second Brother. “Considering what Junior Eighteenth Brother is capable of, I’d say he really is invincible. Even inside the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, I doubt there’s anyone who could keep him in check. Besides, he even took control of the Chiliocosm Mirror, a god item. Forewarned is forearmed, and Junior Brother is definitely not going to be taken by surprise.”

“You’re absolutely right,” Yang Qi said. “My energy arts have reached the point where I can manipulate fate itself. I’m going to be keeping my eye on that kid in yellow, and once we get back to the outside world, I’ll handle him as necessary. For now, let’s just be on the lookout for him. Let’s get going. There’s plenty of treasure to be had in here, plus more primeval godworms. Even in the immortal worlds, primeval godworms are virtually extinct. This is the only place where they propagate.”

“He’s right,” Eldest Brother said. “In the ancient records, it says that certain rulers of immortal worlds would collect godworms, refine them, and then transform them into primordial chaosworms, which they would use to rise to the world of the legion of gods. Of course, godworms can naturally evolve into primordial chaosworms, allowing them to open rifts in boundless primordial chaos.” Eldest Brother seemed to be getting really excited.

Without hesitation, all of the Brothers and Sisters flew up into the air and headed deeper into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, hoping to find an appropriate world junction to enter.

The Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart was actually larger than an immortal world, so much so that one could spend a lifetime in it and still never exhaust its supply of treasures. It was essentially an enormous god item.

On Yang Qi’s first trip here, his cultivation base had been too low, and he had been ignorant of how the place worked. But now things were much clearer. In fact, his Lord's Eye could see numerous world junctions off in the distance.

WHIZZZ!

All of a sudden, he slowed down and looked at a distant space-time labyrinth. The Chiliocosm Mirror vibrated, and a coppery light shot out from it. Instantly, the space-time labyrinth shattered and a palace hall was revealed, speeding through space-time, flickering back and forth in a way that would make it almost impossible to track.

“Mourn-Parting Heaven-Palace halls!” Sword Seventeen shouted. “There must be thirty of them! We have to get them!”

“You're right!” Yang Qi said. “The power of more than thirty halls of the Mourn-Parting Heaven-Palace combined would be incredible. Normally, not even an immortal could take that. But with the Chiliocosm Mirror, those halls won't escape!”

The mirror was a god item that could reverse space-time, invert the five phases, transpose yin and yang, and overturn the cosmos. Yang Qi quickly sent some true energy into it, and the mirror shone brightly. Space rippled, and the light locked on to the aura of the Mourn-Parting Heaven-Palace halls.

Instantly, the image of the Mourn-Parting Heaven-Palace halls became visible within the mirror.

“Got it! The transformations of the Chiliocosm Mirror contain the magical laws of the dao of gods!”

He rotated the mirror and the light transformed, piercing through space-time with no effort at all. Yang Qi and everyone else followed the shining light into parts unknown.

Eventually, they saw the more than thirty halls of the Mourn-Parting Heaven-Palace up ahead, locked in place by the light of the Chiliocosm Mirror.

“There are thirty-six,” Yang Qi said, “formed into a spell formation with the power of the thirty-six empyrean constellations. Such power! Without a god item like the Chiliocosm Mirror, it would be impossible to deal with this formation.”

He thrust his hand out, using the Hand of the One God in combination with the Chiliocosm Mirror to create a black hole that sucked in all thirty-six halls.

With them, his kingdom in the Hell of Mahānata would be even stronger and more profound. The Mourn-Parting Heaven-Palace had originally been created as a god item by King Mourn-Parting, and was just as profound as the imperial snakecharms.

In the same moment that Yang Qi was just about to lay hands on the halls of the Mourn-Parting Heaven-Palace, an enormous wormhole suddenly appeared some distance away and a huge shock wave rolled out as a planet-sized godworm appeared from within it.

Visible on its head were ancient lineaments of the dao of immortals; unexpectedly, this was a primeval godworm in the Demolishing level! It was so strong that its mere presence caused space-time in the area to tremble violently.

It lunged forward and directly devoured the thirty-six halls of the Mourn-Parting Heaven-Palace!

‘Little bastard,’ Yang Qi thought, ‘I could rise to the heavenly world above with those halls! I need them to create the passageway!’ Unfortunately, this was an immortal, patriarch-level godworm that was virtually impossible to fight.

However, Yang Qi simply growled, “Get over here!” and turned the Chiliocosm Mirror toward it.

That was when the voice of a young woman rang out. “What? Chiliocosm Mirror? That’s a god item! I can't believe an ant like you got his hands on something like that.”

Only then did Yang Qi realize that a young woman was standing on the head of the godworm.

Chapter 526: Passageway to the Immortal World

Unexpectedly, an immortal-level godworm had appeared, ridden by a young woman.

What kind of woman would it take to control a Demolisher godworm?

Godworm genes were automatically a hundred million times as strong as normal, and all of them had the bloodline of gods. For one of them to reach the cultivation level of an immortal was a nearly incomprehensible thing! Even a hundred ordinary immortals working together would end up being consumed by something like that.

Considering that, there was no question that this woman was, at the very least, an immortal. And there was no way that she was a first stage Void-Demolisher.

Both Elder-Immortal Hyperfiend and the immortal emissary Yang Qi had captured were first stage Void-Demolishers, people who could demolish the void and use it to create true and real immortal bodies.

As for Eldest Brother, and even Lei Jiuzhou, they were people who had gained enlightenment of the dao of Demolishing, but had only reached the most basic, foundational level of Void-Demolishing.

This young woman, however, had a very different aura than Elder-Immortal Hyperfiend. She wasn’t in the first stage, but rather the second stage, making her a Space-Demolisher.

According to ancient daoist texts, the Demolishing level was broken up into nine stages, each of which required enlightenment of various magical laws of the dao of immortals. The first stage was Void-Demolishing, in which one created an immortal body. The second was Space-Demolishing, in which one pierced through space and cultivated reality.  The third was Thought-Demolishing, in which one destroyed one's own thoughts with the purpose of creating new thoughts. Those new thoughts could be used to create boundless immortal skills, unparalleled magics, and incredible nascent divinities. Of this level, it was said that one thought can create a world.

As for the Demolishing levels beyond that, they were profoundly mysterious.

For example, one of the levels was Origin-Demolishing, which was about destroying essence to fuse with the universe and conform to the aeonic dao. People like that, who became indistinguishable from the essence of the universe, were like emperors among immortals.

‘What is someone this strong doing in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart?’ That was what both Yang Qi and Eldest Brother were thinking as they exchanged a glance, then looked back at the enormous godworm that had just snapped up thirty-six halls of the Mourn-Parting Heaven-Palace. For the moment, both of them were holding back from taking action.

‘Who might you be?’ Yang Qi thought. Although he wasn’t pressing the fight at the moment, he wasn’t going to just let the situation drop. The Wheel of Fate was already rotating above his head, allowing him to assess the young woman’s fighting prowess. He needed to know as soon as possible whether he could fight her, or possibly kill her and take her godworm and the halls of the Mourn-Parting Heaven-Palace.

It had taken a lot of work to make the Chiliocosm Mirror his own, then use it to track down the Mourn-Parting Heaven-Palace halls. He needed them to strengthen his kingdom in hell, which was a very important bastion of defense for his clan.

“I was the one who tracked down those Mourn-Parting Heaven-Palace halls!” Yang Qi said loudly. “What gives you the right to just take them from me?” Although he plastered an offended look onto his face, his heart was already pulsing with killing intent. He was also preparing to use both the Wheel of Fate and the Chiliocosm Mirror to unleash a lightning strike, if necessary.

The young woman on the godworm wore elegant red garments and was literally looking down her nose at Yang Qi and the others from the Invincible Society. Snorting coldly, she said, “Who the hell are you people? How dare you talk to me like that! You don’t even have immortal bodies! You’re mortals! Demi-Immortal slaves at best. Of all the people here, only you—” she pointed at Eldest Brother, “—are in the Demolishing level, and are poised to become an immortal. Seems like you have the bloodline of a god as well. Well, in that case, I’ll explain that I’m an immortal officer from the Neon Red Heaven, here in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart looking for treasure.” Staring piercingly at Eldest Brother, she said, “You. What's your name?”

“I’ll tell you my name when you give us those Mourn-Parting Heaven-Palace halls,” he replied. Eldest Brother was obviously a very fierce person, and was not happy at all with what this young woman had just said.

“You really don't know what’s good for you, do you?” she said, her expression turning very frosty. “Well, a genius like you with the bloodline of a god would make a great slave. You see, the Neon Red Heaven can create passageways into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. You people are stuck in here with no way out, but I can go back to the Neon Red Heaven at any time. I’ll make you an offer. Kill your fellows and submit to me. If you do, I’ll take you with me when I leave.”

‘What? Passageway to an immortal world?’ Yang Qi thought. ‘This woman isn’t from somewhere in the mortal world, she’s from above. I’ve never heard of the Neon Red Heaven before. They opened a passageway here? What level of magic must have been involved in that? It’s got to be a temporary passageway, but even that must have been extremely costly to produce. If I can capture this woman, maybe I could use that passageway to go take a look at this Neon Red Heaven.’

Even as Yang Qi pondered his next course of action, Eldest Brother shouted, “Are you feeling suicidal or something?”

All of a sudden, he seemed like a razor-sharp, unsheathed saber, his aura deathless and capable of slaughtering any living thing it encountered.

Eldest Brother had long since been a top expert among top experts. Plus, he had benefited greatly in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, even before Yang Qi gave him a godworm egg. Now that he had a godworm of his own, he had even better control of the godly laws of space and had advanced to higher levels of enlightenment.

The fact that this woman from the Neon Red Heaven had suggested he kill his Junior Brothers and Sisters, then acknowledge allegiance to her, only made him want to cut her down.

“I want to see exactly what an actual immortal can do. Let the War God Come! A Great Dao to Dominate Space!” A black stream of energy flew out of his palm that was none other than the devil item Yang Qi had just given him, the Myriad Fiends Pitchfork.

Yang Qi had purified the devil energy in the item with the Blood of the One God, making it pure and holy. Now it was like a combination between a god and a devil, an expression of both righteous and evil cultivation paths.

As soon as Eldest Brother unleashed it in an attack, fiend energy erupted out, causing the entire area to turn into a fiend-devil kingdom.

“Reckless moron!” shouted the young woman in red. Waving her hand disdainfully, she said, “Divine Rainbow Descends; Five-Colored World; Dream of Red Dust; Grand and Boundless Void.”

The godly laws of space seemed to wail as boundless and scintillating red dust spread out to fill the area. It was entrancing, causing the entire world to spin as though reason were being ended for all time. Even magical laws were suppressed.

All of a sudden, an enormous vortex sprang into being, which cast Eldest Brother’s fiend energy into disorder and caused him to stagger backward, his true energy in chaos.

Unexpectedly, he wasn’t even close to being a match for this young woman.

She was an expert that surpassed Void-Demolishers, an actual immortal who was virtually invincible in the mortal world.

“I tried to give you face, scum, but you refused. I don’t know how you mortals got into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, but if you think you’ll take its greatest treasures then you’re insane. We from the Neon Red Heaven have already staked our claim to everything here. You, and you. Give me that devil item and that Chiliocosm Mirror. Immediately! For vermin like you to have a god item is a pure insult.”

Even as she spoke, she unleashed streams of divine will in a deadly attack.

Dazzling light shot from her eyes, light that could pierce the void and end worlds. It created a strange five-colored flower that rocketed toward Eldest Brother, simultaneously exerting a powerful gravitational force. In fact, it seemed powerful enough to suck in numerous planets.

Blood sprayed out of Eldest Brother’s mouth, yet he didn’t seem worried at all. Instead, he unleashed a devastatingly powerful energy art. “Capacious Mountains and Rivers; Verily, Heaven doth be Exhilarating!”

A profoundly ancient voice began chanting from the depths of his soul, and although it was not quite on the level as the Eternal Heavenly Aria, it was obviously a psalm written by an ancient god-spirit.

His hand clenched into a fist and his vital energy began to surge, making him seem like a mountain or river which radiated the unchangeable aura of the aeons.

“What fist technique is that?” said the young woman in red, looking somewhat surprised. But then her killing intent surged and she reached out with her finger to send crushing power onto the fist strike, making her seem like an enormous immortal out to exterminate a consummate monster.

“Magnific Seas and Oceans; Verily, Water doth be Invigorating!”

Eldest Brother’s fist technique changed again, causing an immense shock wave to roll out through the air, his true energy like a sea that could drown the entire world with tribulation and destruction! When this blow was met by the red-garbed young woman, her godworm suddenly let loose a long cry of pain.

“Be suppressed!” the young woman shouted, throwing her arms out in front of her. “Let’s see how long you can keep burning your quintessence-blood! You've forced me to draw on thirty percent of my power to deal with you, slave. It will definitely be worth it to get you!”

“Iconoclastic Monarchs; Verily, Royalty doth be Reverberating!”

In that moment, Eldest Brother seemed to slip into a state of emotionlessness as he drew on his deepest reserves. His eyes went black as he became empty, but not empty; not empty, but empty. He seemed to cast aside the entire universe, and drew upon the power of nirvanic rebirth to push his fist technique to the absolute limits, something beyond space-time. It was as if he had stepped into the eternal kingdom of the gods. He looked like a monarch, pulsing with the most royal, majestic dao, and all of it was focused on his fist.

It was impossible to describe exactly how his fist moved. It cast vital energy into chaos, destroyed everything in its path, and shattered the young woman’s vital energy, sending her stumbling backward.

“Killing Fist of the Dao of Monarchs!” Eldest Brother growled, finally revealing the technique he was using.

“Fine. Fifty percent power!” the young woman shouted angrily, her killing intent boiling. “I'm going to kill you! It’s too bad I’ll have to lose a genius like you, and I'd rather keep you alive. But since you refuse to back down, I’ll use a full fifty percent of my power. I can’t believe someone from the mortal world is forcing me to do this! Your grand performance ends right now!”

A surge of power seemed to come from the immortal world itself and fused with the young woman as she prepared a final deadly attack.

Chapter 527: Killing Fist of the Dao of Monarchs

“One Thought Focused on the Past Dust; Heart and Mind on the Former; Forget the Old Matters; Indefinite Future of the Soul!”

The red-garbed young woman spoke sixteen characters to meet Eldest Brother’s consummate technique, the Killing Fist of the Dao of Monarchs. She was drawing on fifty percent of her overall power!

And when she said ‘Indefinite Future of the Soul’, all of heaven and earth changed color and the heavenly bodies shifted. Great daos shattered, and all creation seemed to collapse. It was as if the end of the entire universe had come, leading one to feel completely lost in both body and soul.

A destructive tempest swept from the young woman’s palm to wash over Eldest Brother, completely covering him.

At this point, the immortal-level godworm opened its mouth, as though it were preparing to consume Yang Qi and everyone else.

RUMBLE!

That was when Yang Qi finally made a move.

He could tell that Eldest Brother had finally reached his limit. His Killing Fist of the Dao of Monarchs was profound and mysterious, but was actually an incomplete set of techniques. By way of example, if Yang Qi was only limited to the first three stances of the Fist of the Halls of Heaven and the Hand of the One God, he would be at a big disadvantage.

Considering the circumstances, he didn’t hold anything back.

Up to now, he had been using the Wheel of Fate to keep his aura masked and his true abilities hidden. After all, he didn’t want the red-garbed young woman to know anything about him. But then he suddenly exploded with an attack that could shatter three thousand worlds and destroy anything in creation.

As he unleashed the Hand of the One God, he went right to the Pāramitā stance. A boundless sea of bitterness appeared, with Yang Qi in the middle of it all. He was like the savior of the world, someone who brought hope and endless blessings to all living beings. The true profundities of the Hand of the One God were on display.

After all, the true purpose of the Hand of the One God wasn’t to destroy the people of the world, but to save them and bring them into the eternal kingdom of heaven.

The vital energy fluctuations immediately halted all of the destructive power the young woman had released. The universe returned to its proper state, and the godworm began to tremble and look fearfully at Yang Qi. All of a sudden, it realized deep in its heart that this person was someone it couldn't fight against. It immediately backed away from Eldest Brother, allowing Yang Qi to bring him into his God Legion Paradise.

“Eldest Brother, what did you say that fist technique was called? The Killing Fist of the Dao of Monarchs? It's obviously an amazing godly-class energy art. Too bad it's not complete.”

“That’s right, Junior Brother, it's the Killing Fist of the Dao of Monarchs. I got it here in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart when I sensed a location filled with a mysterious will and power. It actually came from one of the sworn brothers of King Immortal-Slayer, a fiendish monarch named King Homicide. It’s definitely something on the level of the legion of gods. It has a total of seven stances, each of which correspond to an ancient set of wisdom. If you master all of the stances, you can actually slaughter gods. Unfortunately, what I acquired seems to be only part of the remaining power of King Homicide, with only three stances. If I have time to keep searching the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, maybe I can find the other four.”

From his tone of voice toward the end, he was clearly not pleased to only have the three moves he did.

However, he transmitted the three stances he knew to Yang Qi with a thought.

‘Capacious Mountains and Rivers; Verily, Heaven doth be Exhilarating.

‘Magnific Seas and Oceans; Verily, Water doth be Invigorating

‘Iconoclastic Monarchs; Verily, Royalty doth be Reverberating.’

Each stance was filled with boundless transformations of mountains, seas, heavens, monarchs, heavenly might, and more. When combined, they could lead to deadly results.

Its might did not surpass that of the Hand of the One God, but unfortunately Yang Qi’s immortal clone couldn't use the Hand of the One God. Those nine stances could only be cultivated by Yang Qi’s true self. Therefore, if he passed these three abilities onto his clone, it would make him even stronger and more capable of slaughtering immortals.

“Eldest Brother, why don’t you fall back while I kill this woman.” With that, Yang Qi stepped forward and looked up at the young woman on the godworm’s head.

The planet-sized worm had shrunk down until it was only a few thousand meters from end to end, with countless prolegs.

As for the young woman, she was clearly shocked by what had just played out. Never in her wildest imagination could she have guessed that Yang Qi would have energy arts powerful enough to shatter her true energy.

“Apparently I wasn’t paying close attention to the situation,” she said. “So, we have another top expert here. You're a fourth order Potent Demi-Immortal, but your energy arts are far, far stronger than that. That said, you're still a weakling, and you clearly don't understand the vast gap between true immortals like me and mortals like you.”

“True immortal?” Yang Qi said with a jeering smile. “I just met another ‘true’ immortal, someone named Elder-Immortal Hyperfiend. He tried to take my Chiliocosm Mirror, so I killed him and made him the mirror's new spirit automaton. But maybe I should replace him and make you the new spirit automaton.”

“Well, aren’t you amusing? I've sure met a lot of interesting characters on this trip to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.” Instead of being angry, she actually seemed amused. Eyes glittering, she continued, “I'm a very high-ranking person in the Neon Red Heaven. You can call me Immortal Officer Fallen Red. You seem even stronger than this Eldest Brother of yours, so why not join me? I’ll forget about any rudeness and blasphemy up to this point, and even give you a very high position. There isn’t a single crappy society in the mortal world that will do you any good. And if you go to the immortal world on your own, you could end up captured, stripped of your vital energy, and killed.”

“Oh? So you’re recruiting?” Yang Qi laughed. “Sadly, I've never heard of this… what was it? Neon Red Heaven? Maybe if you were from the Tusita Heaven or a place like that, I might consider your offer. And sadly, your cultivation base isn’t impressive at all. Perhaps if you were a Godmyth, I might take you seriously.”

Face turning grim, she said, “Fine. If you refuse to do things the easy way, we’ll do them the hard way! It would be a waste for a talent like you to end up stuck in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, so I mercifully offered to take you with me. But you treat me like a joke? Well, now you’re out of chances. The only thing left for you to do now is die.”

“Cut the crap. Hand over those Mourn-Parting Heaven-Palace halls and you might survive this encounter.” Truth be told, Yang Qi wasn't in the mood for banter. Not waiting for a response, he summoned the Infernal Deity Spear, which ignited with burning flame as he stabbed it through the air. It wasn't sagefire, but rather the fire of nightfall and death. Anyone who saw fire like that would be reminded of the final radiance of the setting sun and plunge into a mournful state of mind.

The Infernal Deity Spear had improved along with Yang Qi, and was currently at an unimaginable level. In fact, it was nearly a god item. At the same time, it was essentially a part of him and he could use it with skill that no one could possibly match. His command of it vastly surpassed his ability to use the Chiliocosm Mirror.

As the spear stabbed forth, piercing through everything in its path, it appeared directly in front of Immortal Officer Fallen Red.

Normally speaking, primeval godworms exerted ultimate command over space and were surrounded with space-time distortions so intense that no one could approach them without their consent. Not even immortals. As such, Immortal Officer Fallen Red didn’t see how anyone could possibly get close to her, much less pierce the defenses of her personal kingdom.

But no such barriers could halt Yang Qi’s Infernal Deity Spear.

In the blink of an eye, Immortal Officer Fallen Red was about to be stabbed in the forehead.

“God-Corrupting Finger Strike!” she shouted, not hesitating to utilize a godly-class energy art. However, this didn’t seem like something pure created by a god-spirit, but rather something like a devil art from fiend-devils in hell. Apparently, it was a fusion of righteous and evil that contained something from some unknown god-spirit.

As her finger shot forth, it radiated the glory of evil and holiness combined, something that could corrupt gods.

“That Which is Holy will be Corrupted! That Which is Deathless will be Scattered!” All of a sudden, Immortal Officer Fallen Red seemed to transform into something different. “The duality of yin and yang; the dance of righteous and evil. That is the only eternal truth in heaven and earth!”

SNICK!

The God-Corrupting Finger Strike touched the Infernal Deity Spear. Both Yang Qi and Immortal Officer Fallen Red trembled as a result, yet they seemed evenly matched and neither fell back.

“God Strolls Past Myriad Immortals!” Immortal Officer Fallen Red’s godworm shrank down even further, causing shockwaves to roll out that seemed like a god wandering amongst millions upon millions of immortal worlds.

“Chiliocosm Mirror!” Yang Qi extended the Chiliocosm Mirror, simultaneously slashing his finger open and using the blood that poured out to draw an image on the surface of the mirror. As a result, the mirror seemed to connect with everything around it, causing streams of godlight to shoot out from inside.

A kingdom of copper spread out and the Chiliocosm Mirror vanished, to be replaced by an actual chiliocosm of worlds.

RUMBLE!

None of Immortal Officer Fallen Red’s countless techniques could help her in this moment. She was grabbed by the magical laws of the Chiliocosm Mirror, and not even her godworm could break free from them.

Now that the mirror had become a chiliocosm of worlds, its true ferocity was on display.

“The Chiliocosm Mirror is strong,” she said. “But did you really think I wouldn’t have a god item too?  Golden Wheel of Nirvanic Extinction!” Golden light took the shape of a wheel with eight sides, each of which represented a different element. As it spun, it sent more golden light out, which caused the copper world created by the Chiliocosm Mirror to begin trembling.

Two god items were clashing, releasing a tempest of wild destruction.

“I can’t believe she has a god item too!” Eldest Brother murmured. “She must have found it here in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. I’ve read about the Golden Wheel of Nirvanic Extinction in certain ancient daoist texts. It was created by the God of Extinction, who fought with King Immortal-Slayer himself. Apparently, his golden wheel somehow ended up in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.”

“The Chiliocosm Mirror is a good god item,” Immortal Officer Fallen Red said. “But it was forged by a Lesser God. And although my Golden Wheel of Nirvanic Extinction is the same level, my cultivation base vastly surpasses yours.”

Chapter 528: Plundering

The Golden Wheel of Nirvanic Extinction was evenly matched with the Chiliocosm Mirror. Normally speaking, if an immortal tried to wield a god item it would quickly wither them to death.

But Immortal Officer Fallen Red clearly had no problems at all. In fact, it begged the question of where she got the true energy and power needed to use it. When the two god items clashed, massive shockwaves rolled out that were so strong they could rip space-time to shreds and kill any ordinary Demi-Immortal they touched. Thankfully, the experts of the Invincible Society were under the protection of the God Legion Paradise and weren’t affected.

“Clearly, my god item is capable of holding your god item at bay,” Immortal Officer Fallen Red said. “So what other tricks do you have up your sleeve? I have plenty of treasures on hand, including the thirty-six Mourn-Parting Heaven-Palace halls I just took. However, I'm curious to see what you’re capable of. And I want to make sure you understand what a true immortal body, and a completely unopposable energy art, is like.”

Without waiting for a response, she leaped off of her godworm and flew toward Yang Qi with her finger extended.

It was her God-Corrupting Finger Strike again, a combination of both righteousness and evil.

SWISH!

The light of gods and devils swirled out, combining in a consummate way.

When yin diminished, yang flourished. When yang diminished, yin flourished.

Two god nimbuses appeared, growing larger and larger and causing all heaven and earth to tremble as they smashed into the God Legion Paradise, piercing its defenses and proceeding on toward Yang Qi.

“God-Corrupting Finger Strike?” Yang Qi said. He smiled. “That technique was created by a corrupted god, and it combines elements of righteousness and evil. It’s an amalgam of gods and devils, but unfortunately it’s defective. You want to see what a true fusion looks like? My Hellfire Crucible is specifically designed to refine corrupted gods. Watch and learn.”

RUMBLE!

The Hellfire Crucible appeared, burning with intense sagefire that could melt anything and everything.

Instantly, the screams of countless corrupted gods could be heard echoing out from within it. And when the two nimbuses of the finger strike reached that sagefire, they were burned out of existence. Thus was the power of the Hellfire Crucible.

“What? That thing can neutralize heterogeneous true energy?”

Looking particularly intimidating, Immortal Officer Fallen Red switched from a finger attack to a palm technique. The auras of gods and devils surged wildly, and numerous enormous, bizarre flowers appeared. They seemed black, but not black; white, but not white; red, but not red; green, but not green. They were holy to the extreme, but at the same time abounded with devil energy. They were flowers that conformed to both gods and devils, containing the most extreme aspects of both.

“God and Devil Flowers!” she said. “Petals fall in profusion, causing grief in heaven and earth. Every flower can destroy entire planes of existence, and when they bloom out in the void, yin diminishes and yang flourishes. Yang diminishes and yin flourishes.”

Flowers such as these could give birth to worlds, and also destroy them. It was a truly amazing divine ability.

God and Devil Flowers fell in profusion until Immortal Officer Fallen Red disappeared within the petals. As the flowers hit the God Legion Paradise, massive rumbling sounds echoed out, as though ancient gods were attacking it with axes.

“God Legion Paradise, retract,” Yang Qi said. As it shrank down, he looked up at the profusion of God and Devil Flowers and waved his hand, causing a gravitational force to spring out from the Hellfire Crucible.

Instantly, the flowers began streaming into the crucible, which trembled so violently it looked like it might explode.

“Those God and Devil Flowers contain incredibly destructive power formed from my own true energy,” said Immortal Officer Fallen Red. “No one could possibly last for long in that profusion of petals. They’re burial flowers! Your little crucible is going to be destroyed, and you’ll be buried along with it.”

Seemingly in concert with Immortal Officer Fallen Red’s voice, the countless flowers began to swirl into the shape of a dragon, which lunged at the Hellfire Crucible.

RUUUUUUMBLE!

Suddenly, it seemed like the Hellfire Crucible might not be able to withstand the force and cracks began spreading out over its surface.

Then, it exploded!

“Well, you are an ant, after all. An ant with a powerful weapon is still only an ant, and it could never contend with a divine dragon.”

Appearing in the open once again, Immortal Officer Fallen Red shot toward Yang Qi, unleashing another claw-like palm strike. This one seemed to contain projections of numerous immortal planes of existence.

“Corrupted God Claw! Destroy Immortal Worlds!”

“You think you’re pretty smart, don’t you?” Yang Qi said. Although he had seemed incapable of preventing the Hellfire Crucible from exploding, when he looked at the incoming claw attack a slight smile appeared on his face.

When the claw was roughly three thousand meters away, a sound like a tolling bell suddenly rang out. Then a reddish copper furnace popped into being. Shockingly, it wasn’t the Hellfire Crucible, but rather another sort of godly furnace. It was filled with blazing fire that looked almost like bright red, liquid copper. It contained the energies of both yin and yang, swirling constantly as if to produce good fortune.

An ancient voice spoke from within the furnace.

“Heaven and earth be the furnace, good fortune the worker. Yin and yang are the fuel, all creation the copper.”

At long last, the Hellfire Crucible had experienced a major transformation.

The Fiend-Devil Wings had become Angel Wings. The Infernal Deity Plate Armor became the God Legion Battle Robe. And the Hellfire Crucible, after absorbing enough power from the God and Devil Flowers, transformed into the Heaven and Earth Furnace.

The power Immortal Officer Fallen Red had unleashed as part of her attack had been absorbed by Yang Qi and used for his own purposes.

“Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, I demand your power!” Yang Qi shouted. Suddenly, winds sprang up, and the sun and moon shone with dazzling light. A stream of molten copper shot out, melting all creation and causing heaven and earth to burn with an intense heat as the furnace slammed into Immortal Officer Fallen Red.

It was only one attack, yet it sent Immortal Officer Fallen Red staggering backward. Power from the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart flowed toward the furnace and melted, becoming a stream of power that caused the particles within Yang Qi to explode with activity. Instantly, megamammoths began stirring, as if they might turn into dracomammoths at any moment.

The Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart had been created by King Immortal-Slayer and numerous fellow monarchs, and as such, it contained shocking reserves of power.

Normally speaking, not even immortals would be able to refine and use that power, but with Yang Qi’s Heaven and Earth Furnace he had a huge advantage. In this moment, he was like the lord of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, and with that power he didn’t hesitate to unleash the Hand of the One God, which was already ten times stronger than before.

“Not good!” Immortal Officer Fallen Red barely managed to dodge out of the way.

Yang Qi ignored her as he looked up into the sky where the Chiliocosm Mirror and the Golden Wheel of Nirvanic Extinction were still locked in opposition. “You have a wheel, huh? So do I. Let’s see whose is stronger. Come forth, Wheel of Fate.”

The Wheel of Fate looked more distinct than ever as the aura of fate erupted into the open, pulsing with the dao of heaven, destiny, gods, devils, and immortals. It seemed to contain nothing and everything at the same time. After all, the legion of gods could manipulate fate, and the Sovereign Lord controlled the legion of gods.

As for the Golden Wheel of Nirvanic Extinction, it trembled violently, as if it had come face to face with the bane of its existence. Before it could do anything, Yang Qi waved his hand and the Wheel of Fate slammed into it.

Buzzzz.

A deafening grating sound rang out as the Golden Wheel of Nirvanic Extinction was crushed by the Wheel of Fate, its will completely exterminated in the process. Eventually, it was nothing more than a palm-sized wheel that dropped down into Yang Qi’s palm. He had acquired another god item.

“My god item!” Immortal Officer Fallen Red shrieked, nearly coughing up blood. Never could she have guessed that Yang Qi would actually manage to defeat and take her Golden Wheel of Nirvanic Extinction.

‘I have to get out of here!’ she thought. She was a powerful person, ambitious and ruthless to the core, yet she knew how to read the direction of the wind. There was nothing she could do in this situation, thus she flew back up toward her Godworm, hoping to flee the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

Of course, Yang Qi had been expecting that. Exhaling deeply, he sent out a stream of energy backed by the Blood of the One God. When his breath touched the Chiliocosm Mirror and the Golden Wheel of Nirvanic Extinction, the two god items flew forth and locked down the godworm’s spatial power. It shrieked miserably, unable to do anything despite being an immortal-level creature.

The Chiliocosm Mirror could lock down space-time, making it impossible for an enemy to flee, and the Golden Wheel of Nirvanic Extinction had added a destructive element to its powers.

Yang Qi blurred into motion, swooping toward Immortal Officer Fallen Red like a hawk toward a rabbit. There was absolutely no way she could possibly escape.

Whizz!

Before she could reach her godworm, she was blasted out of the sky.

“I’ll destroy you or die in the attempt!” she shouted. “You just wait! The Neon Red Heaven sends experts into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart all the time. Someone will come and kill you. Immortal Body Immolation!” Her immortal body suddenly burst into flames, giving her a brief bit of extra power that just managed to break her free from Yang Qi.

Unfortunately, her godworm was still some distance away, struggling mightily against the descending Heaven and Earth Furnace.

‘What a pity,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘If I didn’t need to subjugate this godworm, I could chase after her.’

Chapter 529: Heaven and Earth Furnace

In the end, Immortal Officer Fallen Red chose to flee.

Thankfully, Yang Qi had made out with plenty of benefits. Not only did he get the godworm, he also gained another immortal-level god item. And the godworm’s belly was a kingdom of layered space-time of its own that had the Mourn-Parting Heaven-Palace halls, as well as other treasures.

Immortal Officer Fallen Red had been raising that godworm as a pet for a very, very long time, and cherished it deeply. But in order to escape with her life, she abandoned it; that alone went to show what bad shape she was in.

Once Yang Qi had the godworm suppressed in his Heaven and Earth Furnace, he began assailing it with the molten copper energy flow. The godworm howled and trembled, then exploded with a flow of thoughts and will that resembled magical laws.

Slowly but surely, Yang Qi wiped out the warding spells Immortal Officer Fallen Red had placed on the godworm’s genes, then took control of the worm for himself.

‘And now for the thirty-six halls of the Mourn-Parting Heaven-Palace!’

He sent his divine will into the world inside the godworm and found an enormous collection of treasures. However, what first drew his attention were those thirty-six halls. Without hesitation, he sent a stream of true energy into them, causing them to shrink down into thirty-six motes of light that flew over to his palm.

‘So many treasures! It seems Immortal Officer Fallen Red used this godworm as her personal storage location!’

After taking the Mourn-Parting Heaven-Palace halls, he branded the godworm with his nascent divinity, fusing with its thoughts. Then it opened its mouth and exhaled, summoning an enormous kingdom that Eldest Brother, Elder Second Brother, Sword Seventeen, and everyone else flew into.

When they saw the hoard of magical treasures, medicinal pills, talismans, and the like, they were completely stunned.

It was almost like an entire planet filled with wealth.

Most of them were immortal items, immortal pills, and other such things, items that would be given as gifts and rewards by an immortal world.

WHOOSH!

Eldest Brother, Elder Second Brother and the others all flew into the middle of the treasure hoard, where they found a palace with a crystal pillar in it that resembled the type that would prop up heaven. Within the pillar were eight compartments, all of which contained dazzling treasures. It seemed this was the true location of this area’s most valuable items.

“Heaven-Bracing Godwood?” Eldest Brother said. “It is. This is Heaven-Bracing Godwood! Supposedly, there are certain immortal worlds that are propped up by pillars such as this. In the primeval age, even one such pillar of wood would give rise to a storm of blood and destruction. It’s a god item made from the most spectacular of materials. I wonder what this thing is doing here.”

“Such immense godpower!” Yang Qi said. When he sent a blast of energy onto the crystal pillar that was the Heaven-Bracing Godwood, all it did was cause a wisp of smoke to rise up from the warding magics protecting it. If an ordinary person tried to physically force their way into the pillar, it would likely kill them.

Thankfully, Yang Qi had his Heaven and Earth Furnace, which was able to absorb the backlash and negate its strength.

WHIZZZ!

He performed some magical incantation gestures, which caused the pillar to begin vibrating loudly. Then the first of the compartments opened, unleashing one of the treasures, which was none other than a command flag. It was impossible to say what it was made of, but it was decorated with heavenly wind and flame lightning.

Eldest Brother was the most worldly-wise of them all and instantly recognized what it was.

“Greater Immortal Thunderbolt's animadestiny command flag! According to the legends, Greater Immortal Thunderbolt was a Godmyth who very nearly reached the Deathless level, which would have made him part of the legion of gods. This treasure of his is definitely filled with profound and mysterious power. It should be possible to absorb it and use it to become a heaven-immortal without any problems.”

Unfortunately, even though it was a god item it was not very powerful when compared to other god items.

“Eighth Junior Brother, you have a Heavenborn Violet Lightning True Body and the bloodline of a lightning spirit. Greater Immortal Thunderbolt’s animadestiny command flag would be perfect for you. Assimilate it and you’ll advance by leaps and bounds. Once we're out of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, it should only take a hundred years of cultivation for all of us to step onto the boundless immortal dao, and accomplish everything Junior Eighteenth Brother wants us to.”

Hearing this, Yang Qi waved his hand and sent the command flag over to Eighth Elder Brother.

Next was the second treasure, which was a green bottle gourd that contained millions upon millions of streams of dazzling saber light.

It was a treasure created by a greater immortal many years in the past, the Myriad Sabers Gourd. It had been created from a vast collection of preheaven saber light, and boundless empyrean-baleful true energy. When unleashed in a fight, it couldn’t be recalled until it drew blood, and it had been used to kill countless experts throughout the years.

That particular item went to the ruthless killer that was Elder Seventh Brother Meng Shafan, the very same one who had suggested sacrificing the Quake-Dawn Continent to help Yang Qi.

Although Yang Qi had never intended to follow through with such an idea, in the end, his mother had taken the destroyed Quake-Dawn Continent and made it part of the Sage Monarch planetary system anyway.

The third treasure to appear was a long spear. The fourth was a sextant, the fifth was a śarīra, the sixth was a hoop, the seventh was a rope, and the eighth was a sealing mark.

All of them had been created by either greater immortals or Godmyths who were close to becoming part of the legion of gods.

They were extremely powerful, and the type of immortal items that never appeared in the mortal world. In fact, they would be considered rare even in an immortal world. And low-level locations like the Titan Emperor Heaven would likely never see them.

Yet this Immortal Officer Fallen Red from the Neon Red Heaven had eight of them, as well as the Heaven Bracing Godwood. Yang Qi was starting to get the nagging sensation that Immortal Officer Fallen Red was no ordinary individual, and the Neon Red Heaven was of a much higher level than the Titan Emperor Heaven.

That made sense considering it would take a high-level immortal world to open a passageway into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

‘It’s too bad she got away,’ he thought. ‘I might have been able to use her to get into the Neon Red Heaven. I'm really curious about what kind of place it is.’ Sighing, he distributed the eight treasures to the Elder Brothers and Sisters who would benefit from them the most. Then he threw his new godworm into the depths of the Heaven and Earth Furnace, where it was refined into a magical symbol that he could keep in his sea of energy.

As the process went on, his true energy swirled and numerous megamammoth particles within him stirred as if they might transform into dracomammoths!

Thanks to the Heaven and Earth Furnace, he felt his cultivation advancing and his true energy transforming. Now he could cast his senses further into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Furthermore, the golden imp in his forehead seemed to be breathing, and with each inhalation it sucked in some of the surrounding vital energy.

Within that energy was traces of god power, which the God Legion Seal could use to strengthen Yang Qi’s energy arts.

Yang Qi already had the feeling that, eventually, he would be able to break free from the fetters of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart and connect to the magical laws of the Hell of Mahānata and the Hell of Gloom and Darkness and achieve another breakthrough.

Just about anything was possible with the God Legion Seal.

He had already benefited greatly. Not only did he get the Mourn-Parting Heaven-Palace halls, he also got the Heaven Bracing Godwood, which would be the perfect material to bolster his immortal kingdom in hell.

It would protect the place from the encroachment of devil energy, and also emit immortal energy that could be used for cultivation.

“Incredible. Completely incredible!” he exclaimed. “Elder Brothers and Sisters, let’s get going. Maybe we can find some more god items! And we also need to find that kid in yellow. He’s likely our ticket out of here.”

With that, the eighteen of them began searching here and there in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. At the moment, they weren’t afraid of anything. Yang Qi had just sent an immortal fleeing for her life, and he’d gotten stronger in the process. Who could they possibly have to fear? Even if they were attacked by multiple immortals, they were confident that Yang Qi could defeat them.

**

Back in the Sage Monarch planetary system, the mystical network of laws continued growing stronger, and fiend-devil armies patrolled the space-time wormholes and their surroundings.

Yang Qi’s immortal clone was using the more than twenty godworms he had to expand the network of wormholes, connecting the various worlds even more deeply. That way, if any incidents occurred, it would be easier to move troops back and forth.

If invaders came, the wormhole defense network would allow the fiend-devil armies to meet them in battle immediately, and crush them.

It was something that no other planetary system could possibly do.

WHIZZZ!

A vortex swirled up above the immortal clone as he sat there on his throne. Then, spirit light rained down on him without cease.

It was the power of faith—the destiny of an entire planetary system—and it was now under his control.

As the power flowed into him, he felt his own true energy growing stronger and stronger.

Faith. Destiny. The dao of monarchs. All such things combined in the clone, and he advanced by leaps and bounds.

RUMBLE!

All of a sudden, a certain type of faith power suddenly flowed through the vortex into him, and he rose to his feet.

“Excellent job, Queen Dream-Devil. You conquered the Gyroscope planetary system already?”

Chapter 530: Father Appears

‘So,’ thought the clone, ‘Queen Dream-Devil finally finished conquering the Gyroscope planetary system. What an immense power of faith and destiny. I think I'm already twice as strong as before! My genes are essentially perfect and will soon break past the level of a hundred million times normal. I’ll be close to having the bloodline of a god.’

Using spirit stones or immortal stones to practice cultivation couldn’t lead to a dramatic increase in the strength of one’s true energy. Nor could it drastically transform such true energy and increase its level.

But with the faith and destiny that Yang Qi could absorb, it was possible to control true energy to a much higher level, including forming nascent divinities and other profoundly mysterious things.

It was at this point that the voice of his mother reached his ears. “Qi’er, your plan worked perfectly. Now that Queen Dream-Devil has conquered the Gyroscope planetary system, I can already sense the increased power of faith. Given some time, the mystical network of laws there will stabilize and you’ll have access to ten times as much faith as the old Titan Emperor planetary system. After all, the Titan Emperor planetary system was a withered and faded place, thanks to the invasion of the Hell of Euphoria. If you add the power of faith and destiny into the Exalted-Celestial God-Dao, your true energy levels will rise so high that it will border on immortal energy.”

Holy Mother Greensura, Yang Qi’s own mother, was advancing by leaps and bounds. After acquiring god blood, her cultivation had reached the highest of levels; she went from Revered Demi-Immortal to Universal Demi-Immortal to Paragon Demi-Immortal and all the way to half-Demolishing, smashing through all barriers like a hammer crushing an ice cube. None of the tribulations had done the slightest thing to her.

As of this moment she was extremely close to becoming an immortal, to the point where a breakthrough was just around the corner.

However, she was in no hurry to achieve that breakthrough. Using her perfect genes, she planned to build up even bigger reserves of true energy first. Then, when she succeeded, her cultivation base would be much stronger than the average immortal.

The Demolishing level was a major gateway to pass through. If the proper preparations were made, it would lead to immense benefits. However, if the task were rushed then one's path of cultivation would end up being filled with impassable obstacles.

“Qi’er, on the path of cultivation, the boundless Demolishing level isn't a destination, it’s a starting point.” The Holy Mother sighed. “You definitely can’t rush the matter. From what I can tell, the higher level your genes reach, the more you should slow down. Push them to the perfect level, then step into Demolishing. Only then can you acquire more of the essence of heaven and earth and the quintessence of great daos.”

“I know, Mother,” his clone replied. “My true self is currently in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart and has acquired immense benefits. He’ll be out in a few days, and when he's back he’ll be able to slaughter immortals with the snap of a finger.”

Not even the Holy Mother could have ever guessed that her son would be this strong. And he was only a fifth order Tyrant Demi-Immortal; what would he be like as a Universal or Paragon Demi-Immortal?

Her eyes suddenly gleamed with an intense hatred. “Qi’er, I hope that you can quickly reach the point of being able to slaughter that certain heartless man.”

“I’ll eventually conquer the cosmos, Mother,” the clone said. “Don't worry. I’ll definitely kill that heartless man. You know, I’ve come to a realization. If he's a Future One, and I'm a Fateless One, it doesn’t seem likely that he’s really my father.”

Yang Qi was slowly coming to realize that Fateless Ones didn’t have the blood of humans in them. After all, they were individuals who had never been fated to exist.

“Mother, what exactly happened back when I was born?” Yang Qi asked.

She let loose a long sigh. “I suppose I should reveal the truth. Although I tried to convince myself otherwise for many years, in the end, I don’t think that heartless man was responsible for your birth. You see, on one particular day during a session of meditation, I experienced cultivation deviation. My mind was cast into chaos and I slipped into unconsciousness. There, I dreamed that the legion of gods was falling from the sky. Within the boundless kingdom of gods, they experienced nirvanic rebirth and the entire universe was cast into an age of darkness. All living things experienced the most horrific of torments. However, after the gods experienced nirvanic rebirth, a new civilization rose that brought hope. It was a new epoch. A new hope. When the dream ended, light shone from heaven above, falling down onto me. I awoke, and much later realized that I was pregnant.”

“After the gods experience nirvanic rebirth, a new civilization rose and brought hope? And you became pregnant with me after some sort of dream?”

He had first heard of the term ‘Fateless One’ from the yellow-garbed young man with the buzz cut. And that young man had also mentioned something about a new civilization gradually rising up after the gods experienced nirvanic rebirth. Now his mother had said almost the exact same thing. It seemed like some sort of profound, mysterious principle pertaining to all heaven and earth.

“Yes, I remember that dream like it was yesterday,” the Holy Mother replied. She sighed. “Back when I first realized I was pregnant, that heartless man accused me of being unfaithful. He even tried to kill me, although I escaped. Luckily, you changed fate and made it impossible for him to divine my hiding place. With you in my belly, I had the strange sensation of being innately invisible. From what I can tell, it was your manner of conception and birth itself that led to you acquiring the God Legion Seal.”

“Who would have thought? So what exactly does it mean to be a Fateless One? I wish I could think of some way to search for answers.” The more he thought about it, the more he came to the conclusion that his identity probably didn’t have anything to do with a blood relationship to the Holy Mother. It was more likely related to some secret aspect of the dao of gods from ancient times.

As for his so-called father, the man obviously had nothing to do with him.

Unfortunately, considering the current level of his cultivation base, it wasn’t feasible for him to perceive the deepest aspects of the workings of heaven. Therefore, it was not possible for him to understand what Fateless Ones were.

However, he did know that, as his cultivation continued, he would get an answer. Eventually. Eventually, all of the secrets would be unraveled and explained.

“Mother, don't worry. I’ll take care of everything for you. I'm already strong enough to face any enemy in the mortal world. I’ll soon expand, conquering one planetary system after another and spreading my mystical network of laws. With each system that I conquer, my cultivation base will grow stronger and my reserve of faith power will increase. Eventually, it will be with the snap of a finger that I slaughter immortals. Then I’ll ascend to the immortal world, and nothing will be able to cause problems for me.”

“Of course, Qi’er. You’re already invincible in the mortal world. Although, you need to be careful. That heartless man is not to be taken lightly. He’s a powerful and mysterious person, and he’s probably strong even among Future Ones. He wants you dead, and won’t hesitate to plot against you to achieve that goal.”

“I'm not worried about that,” Yang Qi said. “I'm always on my guard.”

It was in that very moment that a voice drifted down from heaven above. It started out quiet, but was soon booming with deafening loudness.

“Oh really?”

“Who’s there?” Yang Qi’s clone said, looking up. He wasn’t anywhere close to being as strong as his true self, and couldn't use the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. He had three godly-class energy arts, those being the Jade-Emperor Profound-Welkin Exalted-Celestial God-Dao, the Prodigious Proto-Epoch, Invincible War-Steppe, and the Asiryangguk Sauvastika Devil Grand Infernal Energy. Considering he had cultivated them all to the highest level, he was definitely able to kill immortals.

However, this voice resonated in a way that filled him with a profound sense of danger.

“It’s you!” the Holy Mother snarled. She recognized the voice, and it caused a feeling of near-hysteria to rise up in her heart. Looking up into the void, she said, “What are you doing here? I thought you went back to whatever high-level immortal world you came from? Why are you back among the mortals? You shouldn't be able to pierce through the paramount magical laws that protect the low-level planes.”

Turning to the clone, she said, “The heartless man is here! Retreat to your immortal kingdom in the Hell of Mahānata!”

“What?” Yang Qi had long assumed that he would become an immortal and travel to the immortal worlds before he would have a chance to meet that ‘heartless man’ his mother had talked about, that so-called ‘father’, who was no blood relation of his.

As of this moment, he could clearly sense that this interloper was extremely powerful. In fact, he was too strong to fight against. Thankfully, all of the strongest individuals from the Sage Monarch planetary system were already in the Hell of Mahānata.

“You’re not going anywhere.”

A burst of power spread out to lock down the entire area, and at the same time a figure appeared.

He looked human, and was obviously a top expert from a very high plane of existence. He was surrounded by strange and mysterious energy flows that were azure, like the sky itself.

His features became visible, revealing a young man with a high-bridged nose who was handsome to the point of being pretty. He didn’t appear to be any older than twenty years of age, yet his eyes sparkled with the life and death of billions of planes of existence. His fingers were long and slender, yet were filled with power. And he pulsed with an aura that made him seem like he was billions of years old.

Chapter 531: Extreme Danger

Who could possibly have guessed that such extreme danger would visit the prosperous Sage Monarch planetary system, with its strict mystical network of laws and immense powers of destiny and faith?

There was no question about it: great jeopardy had come.

The handsomely pretty young man was none other than the ‘heartless man’ that Holy Mother Greensura had so often mentioned to Yang Qi. His father, at least in name.

As Yang Qi’s clone stared at the man, he could tell from his powerful aura that he was too strong to fight. In fact, not even Yang Qi’s true self would have been able to do anything about him, much less the clone. Maybe if his true self used the God Legion Seal, he might stand a chance. But not on his own strength.

“Proud Heaven!” the Holy Mother grated. “What are you doing here?!”

“What am I doing here?” He looked over at Yang Qi. “Well, my wonderful son, you caused a big stir. You actually destroyed the Titan Emperor Collegium, slaughtering and enslaving everyone. You instituted a new mystical network of laws and unified the planetary system. Although the mortal world is like nothing compared to the immortal world, it’s still nothing to scoff at. You might have been able to fool your superiors, but you couldn’t pull the wool over my eyes.”

Although Proud Heaven was handsome, his smile seemed particularly wicked.

Yang Qi’s clone looked back at him and said, “I heard you’re a Future One, which means you don’t even belong in this part of space-time. You're a clone, aren’t you? What exactly are you doing here?”

“Future One…?” Proud Heaven looked at Yang Qi’s clone for a long moment, then coolly continued, “So, you're a clone too. What a pity. Your true self isn’t here, so killing you won’t do me any good. I couldn’t care less about your three godly-class energy arts. Your true self is the Fateless One. He’s the one I need.”

“Tell us why you're here, Proud Heaven,” the Holy Mother said coldly. “Don’t tell me you’re planning to kill us?”

“Oh, no. Not that. I wouldn’t kill you, Greensura. However, I am going to take you with me.” Another vicious smile spread out on his face. “I'd hoped to kill the Fateless One, my so-called son. But since his true self isn’t here, I guess he’ll survive to live another day. Sadly, this clone of mine can't stay in the mortal world for long, so waiting for him to come back isn’t an option. I’ll take you with me to ensure that he’ll come looking for me later.”

“You’re a spineless animal, Proud Heaven!” the Holy Mother shouted.

He suddenly burst out laughing, apparently not angered at all by her words. “Spineless animal? You still have a sharp tongue when it comes to cursing, Greensura. Well done. I'm curious what other inventive curses you’ll hurl at me after I take you captive. Don't worry, I won’t hurt you. I’ll just use you to lure out my son, the Fateless One Yang Qi. Within the boundless immortal worlds, there are still some people who can rival the legion of gods. And among them are the Fateless Ones, who are beyond even my ability to handle. But now that I have a chance to get one for my own, there’s no way I’ll let him get away.”

He looked back at Yang Qi’s clone. “Well? What do you think, Yang Qi? You have only one chance to join me. Right here, right now. Follow all of my commands down to the letter. If you don't, you’ll never see your mother again.”

“How dare you!” the clone said, his killing intent surging as he took a few steps forward. “If you take my mother away, I’ll kill you. I’ll make sure you never get reborn again, not for all eternity.”

“Oh?” Proud Heaven’s voice suddenly turned cold and hard. “You think you’re strong enough to stand up to me? Back the fuck down!”

He suddenly let loose a palm strike, causing azure vital energy to flow out and create something like a primeval azure heaven.

“You might be a Fateless One, brat, but your true self isn’t here. You’re a puny immortal clone, and you think you can defy me? Watch and learn. This is a greater godly class energy art! Primeval Azure Heaven Fist!”

As the fist flew forth, heaven and earth seemed to grow larger. It was as if Proud Heaven’s fist strength were giving birth to the boundless azure sky of the primeval era. This was a power that could split apart heaven and earth, establish a new cosmos, and break apart planes of existence.

“Triple godly-class energy arts!” the clone said, his pupils becoming dots as he looked at the spectacular attack Proud Heaven had unleashed. In the blink of an eye, the clone’s three godly-class energy arts swept forth to meet the Primeval Azure Heaven Fist.

POP!

When they smashed into each other, the clone staggered backward, his skin ripping and tearing, causing blood and vital energy alike to spray out of him.

In this most critical of moments, Yang Qi’s clone nearly went crazy and resorted to a boundless, taboo technique.

“Ultimate Faith!”

As the words left his mouth, endless streams of faith power converged on him, healing all of his wounds and powering him up to a level of strength ten times beyond what he had before.

An image appeared above his head that represented every living being in both the Gyroscope planetary system and the Sage Monarch planetary system, as well as a dazzling array of millions upon millions of planets.

Each of those planets teemed with life, all of whom were kowtowing and chanting the same sutra: “The Sage Monarch is Deathless, Yang Qi is Eternal…”

That was the requirement for everyone who lived under the mystical network of laws Yang Qi had created, to chant such sutras on a daily basis. Every practitioner of cultivation would offer worship to Yang Qi when practicing meditation. Any who failed to do so would be sentenced to death, along with their entire clan.

And of course, that immense wellspring of faith had a profound effect on the clone, and allowed him to use Ultimate Faith as a deadly trump card. After all, Yang Qi had prepared Ultimate Faith just in case the immortal worlds sent some powerful person down to deal with him. And of course, it could be used just as well on Proud Heaven.

The move drew on the faith and thoughts of all living beings, causing everyone in both the Gyroscope planetary system and the Sage Monarch planetary system to suddenly see a mental image of a powerful enemy, who was none other than Proud Heaven.

In that moment, they all denounced him mentally, as though he were a most evil and vicious devil-ghost, an enemy of all living things.

Hatred!

This was raw hatred!

And it rose up from the depths of the hearts of all living beings.

Suddenly, a tempest arose that shattered the Primeval Azure Heaven Fist.  It was impossible to count how many living beings inhabited the millions upon millions of planets that filled two enormous planetary systems. How strong would their combined powers of faith be? How much hatred could that generate?

Enough to hate heaven, hate earth, and hate all ghosts and gods!

Seemingly infinite hatred turned into a powerful attack of faith, which was channeled through Yang Qi’s clone to strike at Proud Heaven.

“Oh, so you know how to do that?” Proud Heaven’s pupils suddenly constricted. “I never thought your clone would have such an incredible trump card, brat. But it's not enough to deal with me!” In the blink of an eye, an ancient azure god appeared above his head. It wore a kāṣāya, and its head was surrounded by an azure halo. It looked very much like a monk, or perhaps an ancient buddha!

“Buddha Shakes Mountains and Rivers!”

In the blink of an eye, boundless buddha power descended with crushing force. This was a profound combination of a godly-class energy art and a buddhist cultivation energy art, something profoundly mysterious in every aspect.

As for the buddhist cultivation energy art, it was the type that could neutralize sin and dilute hatred.

“Mother, get out of here! Get into my immortal kingdom in the Hell of Mahānata! This Proud Heaven is only a clone, so there’s a limit to how long he can stave off the magical laws trying to expel him. I’ll just keep chipping away at his power! Clone Sacrifice!”

The Holy Mother quickly turned toward the passageway to the Hell of Mahānata.

“Sorry, you’re not going anywhere!” Proud Heaven said, a cruel smile on his face. “I'm really surprised at how strong you are for a clone. Unfortunately, I'm not letting Greensura out of my sight. I don't care what bait you use to try and distract me!”

“Reversal of Heaven and Earth; Future Dao of Gods! Boundless Future!”

A strange and majestic will emanated from Proud Heaven, becoming a dazzling light that surrounded him until he glowed with godlight! In the blink of an eye, he could move thousands of times faster than before.

Proud Heaven’s clone form fell to pieces as he fought against the power of Yang Qi’s Ultimate Faith, becoming nothing but a blur of godlight shooting toward the Holy Mother.

Her face fell as she realized that she wouldn't have time to reach the passageway to the Hell of Mahānata.

“You’re coming with me.” The godlight wrapped around the Holy Mother, then pierced through to an immortal world above. Then, both the light and the Holy Mother faded away into nothing, leaving behind not a trace that either of them had ever existed.

The only thing that remained behind was a final message from Proud Heaven. “If you want your mother back, Yang Qi, ascend to the immortal worlds. Come to the planes above and search for me. I’ll be waiting.” Then he burst into laughter, which slowly faded away into nothing.

“Dammit. Dammit!” Yang Qi’s clone threw back his head and let loose a long cry. Unfortunately, there was no way he could break through the barriers of the immortal world above to give chase.

“Proud Heaven! Your name is Proud Heaven, huh?” Clenching his hand into a fist, he struck out at nothing, causing the space around him to shatter. “You just wait. I’m going to find you and kill you with my own hands! I can’t believe you came down here and kidnapped my mother!”

Yang Qi had lost badly in this encounter.

Not even he could have guessed that he would end up facing an opponent like this.

Chapter 532: Irreconcilable

The mysterious Proud Heaven had appeared without warning, absconding with Yang Qi’s mother.

As of this moment, Yang Qi was absolutely furious. There was now enmity between him and Proud Heaven that could never be resolved. However, even though his fury boiled, he forced himself to calm down and think about what to do next.

This Proud Heaven was profoundly enigmatic. Just like the yellow-garbed young man with the buzz cut, he was a Future One, and seemed to know many secrets about Yang Qi. That made him difficult to defend against.

He also had extremely powerful energy arts, and could apparently easily send a clone to lower worlds. That alone made him much more terrifying than the young man in yellow.

Although both Proud Heaven and the young man in yellow were Future Ones, it was obvious that the latter had only recently traveled to the present from the future. He didn’t have particularly impressive energy arts, whereas Proud Heaven had reached an extremely high level.

Thankfully, there were obvious limits to what Proud Heaven could do with his clone in the lower worlds. If he had been able to stay for much longer, the situation might have ended differently.

With his mother captured, Yang Qi knew that the only course of action was to kill Proud Heaven.

If his true self hadn’t been in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, he could have used the God Legion Seal and Ultimate Faith to power up to thousands of times his base level of power. In that case, he would have struck a hard blow to Proud Heaven’s incarnation, and likely wouldn’t have lost his mother.

Although, it almost seemed as though Proud Heaven had intentionally chosen this specific moment to act. He had acquired a very important pawn that he could later use against Yang Qi in deadly fashion.

Yang Qi was now fairly certain that Proud Heaven was keeping a very close eye on him.

The main thing he needed to decide was whether to focus on conquering other planetary systems, or go to the immortal worlds to search for his mother.

‘I think I need to get to the immortal worlds as quickly as possible, and try to turn up clues about Proud Heaven. I can’t stay in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart for any longer than necessary. I’ll leave my clone in the mortal world to handle the expansion, and go with my true self to find mother.’

That was his general plan, although he needed to work on the particulars. He obviously wouldn’t just abandon his plans in the lower worlds. Unfortunately, he knew that he couldn’t hide the truth from the Titan Emperor Heaven for long. And once they found out what was going on, they would rain down fury and fire.

When that happened, it could very well be doomsday.

That said, the power of faith he was getting from the mystical network of laws was very beneficial to the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. From what he could tell, he was progressing with ten times the speed of before. Perhaps even tens of times.

If he practiced cultivation on his own, he could never achieve such results.

The faster his planetary system expanded, the larger the mystical network of laws would become. And in turn, he would have access to more faith power, which would further his cultivation with even greater speed. The sooner he gained control of the mortal world, the sooner he would have hope of dealing with Proud Heaven.

“If the immortal world above wants to vent their wrath on me, fine. We’ll see what they can do. Worst case scenario, we go to war. With my true self and an army of fiend-devils here, we can fight the immortal world! If it turns out we really can't beat them, I can just take everyone into hiding in the Hell of Mahānata. However, if I defeat them, my progress will accelerate even more!”

He was already planning on how to deal with punishments from the Titan Emperor Heaven.

Right now, he had no plan to flee, or to abandon the mortal world. When soldiers come, send a general to stop them. When flood waters come, use earth to block them.

Just now, he had nearly defeated Proud Heaven’s clone with the power of faith. If the mystical network of laws grew even stronger, then what would he be capable of?

**

Back in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, Yang Qi’s true self knew of everything that had just occurred, and of course, he was not happy. He stood there with teeth clenched, shivering as if from cold, with Eldest Brother, Elder Second Brother, Sword Seventeen, and all the other Elder Brothers and Sisters looking on. They knew that something was happening, but weren’t sure what. Considering the immense good fortune they had just come across, there was clearly something off.

As a Demolisher, Eldest Brother was even more acutely sensitive to Yang Qi’s mood fluctuations. “What's wrong, Junior Brother? You’re acting a bit strange. Did something happen?”

“Yes. Something big just happened outside. A guy named Proud Heaven came and kidnapped my mother. Damnation!” He provided a few more details, then went on to say, “We can’t stick around here exploring the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Although there is plenty of treasure to be had, my plans have changed. Proud Heaven’s evil scheme succeeded, but thankfully he didn’t actually harm me directly. That said, I'm not going to just let this go. Furthermore, it's only a matter of time before the Titan Emperor Heaven realizes what’s going on and attacks the Sage Monarch planetary system. My true self has to be out there to summon an army of fiend-devils if that happens. The forces out there right now aren’t strong enough to defend against an immortal world.”

Eldest Brother was the type of person who didn't fear anything in heaven or earth. However, when he heard the name Proud Heaven, he reflexively shivered. “What? That’s crazy! So, he came back?”

“But isn’t he your father, Yang Qi?” Elder Second Brother said. “Considering he took your mother hostage instead of trying to kill her, it probably means she’s not in danger. Don’t worry!”

“Father?” Yang Qi’s expression turned grim. “The truth is that my mother dreamed of the nirvanic rebirth of the legion of gods and the birth of a new civilization. That was when she became pregnant with me. I don’t think her pregnancy had anything to do with the man. If I were really his son, how could I be a Fateless One? And him kidnapping her was just a move against me, so I definitely can't afford to be lax in dealing with him.”

Sounding worried, Elder Second Brother said, “Junior Eighteenth Brother, you’re the lord of the Sage Monarch planetary system now. You destroyed the Titan Emperor Collegium and took an immortal emissary captive. Those are no small things. In fact, your actions are even more momentous than when the Hell of Euphoria invaded the Yore-Wilds planetary system. Once the immortal world finds out, they’ll definitely send an army down to crush you. And right now, there’s no way we could defend against something like that.”

After a moment of thought, Eldest Brother said, “There’s no need to be so pessimistic! Ever since reaching the Demolishing level, I’ve been able to sense the heavenly heart above. That was when I came to realize the truth. When the Hell of Euphoria invaded, the Titan Emperor Heaven sent important people down to help. Unfortunately, both sides suffered severe casualties. In the final parts of the war, the Hell of Euphoria very nearly broke into the Titan Emperor Heaven, severely damaging its essence in the process. Although the current situation down here might enrage them, they won’t go to war over it. At most, they might send an expert or two down. And whoever they do send won’t be extremely powerful. After all, the most paramount of magical laws ensures that the stronger someone is, the more difficult it is for them to reach a lower plane.”

“Are you sure about that?” Sword Seventeen asked. “You're saying we actually stand a chance at defending against the immortal world? People down here think of the immortal world above as being holy and impossible to deal with. If they wave a finger, anyone down below can be executed. And when they pronounce a death sentence, the condemned won’t survive to the next watch of the night. You really think we can fight an immortal world? Ai, there are just too many variables to know the truth!”

“Come on, there’s no need for all the sighing,” Elder Seventh Brother Meng Shafan said. Chuckling coldly, he continued, “What’s so amazing about the immortal world above? If they come down here, we can just kill ‘em! Kill ‘em all! Maybe the people in the Titan Emperor Collegium were reverent and respectful of the immortal world. Maybe they acted like faithful officials. But those kind of people make me sick. Junior Brother here completely wiped out the Titan Emperor Collegium, and you know what? I couldn’t feel better about it! So if the immortal world comes, let’s slaughter them down to the last man! Let’s see what slaves and flunkies they try to send against us!”

“You’re going to get your wish, Elder Seventh Brother!” Yang Qi said, smiling. The more he got to know Meng Shafan, the more he liked him. “Considering the level of your cultivation base, you’re definitely in a place to fight true immortals. However, I don't think you could single-handedly take on an army. Once we get out of here, I’ll summon an army of fiend-devils to help you unleash a technique used by the primeval infernal deities. It’s called the Infernal Deity Soul-Refining Grand Formation. You can use it to assimilate ten billion fiend-devils and develop the body of a primeval infernal deity! That will make you many, many times more capable of dealing with immortals.”

“I’ve never even heard of a divine ability like that!” Meng Shafan said, visibly taken aback.

“It’s pretty incredible. Normally, it would be hard to collect ten billion fiend-devils. Not even the strongest immortal from the heavens above would be able to do it. But I can summon them right to you, no problem at all. If I didn’t go around doing heaven-defying things, what kind of Fateless One would I be?”

Looking up, his gaze sharpened as if he could see all the way out of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

“Let’s go!” he said. “We have to find that kid in yellow. He has the legacy medallion of King Immortal-Slayer, so he can get out of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart with ease.”

The Wheel of Fate began spinning, and within moments he had a lock on the aura of the legacy medallion.

WHOOSH!

Yang Qi led the way, and they all disappeared.

**

The interior of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart was like a labyrinthine maze of space-time. Deep inside, in the ruins of a godrelic, the young man in yellow sat cross-legged in the presence of Chancellor Demi-Immortal and Chief Beastmaster.

The godrelic was actually a ruined tower, originally constructed from some marvelous material. Its surface was covered with pits and slashes left by sabers, swords, axes, and the like. It was also splattered with blood.

However, there was a godliness to the godrelic that persisted even now.

The young man in yellow was using some extremely powerful divine ability that caused a vortex to appear above his heart which was actually extracting the godliness of the godrelic!

What was godliness? It was the product of godly laws, godly quintessence energy, and godly will, an essence that pertained directly to the legion of gods.

Every god item, and every ruined godrelic, would contain a certain amount of godliness.

The fact that this young man could extract godliness was purely heaven-defying.

Off to the side, Chief Beastmaster had just summoned a primal-chaos elder-snake. Shockingly, it was more complete than before. He actually had a collection of one hundred and eight imperial snakecharms!

Chapter 533: Killing Chief Beastmaster

A primal-chaos elder-snake formed from one hundred and eight imperial snakecharms swirled around Chief Beastmaster. His original group of imperial snakecharms had been taken by Yang Qi, but now he had even more than his earlier collection. Clearly, he had experienced a very successful search for treasures in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

As for Chancellor Demi-Immortal, he was in the process of fusing with an ancient magical device resembling a sailing vessel. It was covered with a dense array of eyes, making it look particularly freakish.

That said, it radiated a godly might that indicated it was an ancient god item.

“The Multi-Eye God Schooner!” he said. “This thing is amazing. According to the stories, it was created in the primeval age by God-King Multi-Eye.” Suddenly, his voice thrummed with hatred as he continued, “I'm not weak anymore, Yang Qi! You just wait! I’ll get my revenge. You killed my daughter and I’ll never let that go. My heart won’t rest at ease until you’re dead!”

“Calm down,” said the young man in yellow. “There’s no hurry. We’ll kill Yang Qi, eventually. Arrogant and despotic people like him always die, beyond the shadow of a doubt. I can’t believe he had the gall to set up his own system of teachings and doctrines. And he’s already started harvesting faith. That’s a big taboo, from the perspective of the immortal world above. It won't be long before they realize what's going on, and they’ll definitely punish him. If a war breaks out, it could be just the opportunity we’re looking for.”

“That's right,” Chief Beastmaster said. “I can’t believe he actually destroyed the Titan Emperor Collegium. All of the disciples and elders from my Beastmaster Society were killed, and he even wiped out my clan. Damn him….”

The mere thought of what had played out caused hatred to bubble in Chief Beastmaster’s veins.

He was a mighty society chief from the Titan Emperor Collegium, with an enormous clan. It was impossible to say how many offspring he had sired over the past million years, yet after Yang Qi established his new mystical network of laws, they had all been wiped out.

How could Chief Beastmaster not hate Yang Qi for that?

Right now, this group of three was scouring the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart for magical treasures that they could use to kill Yang Qi. Chancellor Demi-Immortal and Chief Beastmaster both hated him deeply, to the point where nothing could ever remove that animosity.

“This legacy medallion can actually absorb godliness!” the young man in yellow said coldly. “This level of power is incredible! We’ve found godrelics and god items here in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, and I've collected plenty of leftover godliness from them. Soon, the legacy medallion will be able to sense the location of the fourth piece I need. And godliness can also help me to purify my body and perfect my genes. Yang Qi’s genes are already a hundred million times stronger than normal, which is something that only people with the bloodline of a god can achieve. However, I won’t be defeated at his hands. I'm going to surpass him!”

Snap. Crack.

A moment later, the last of the godliness slipped out of the godrelic, which subsequently crumbled into pieces. Godliness was deathless, thus, any object sustained by it was also deathless. Unfortunately, when the godliness was removed the object would collapse.

At this point, the young man in yellow stood up. “Let’s get out of here and find more treasure hoards. We might even be able to find the core of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.”

“Alright!” Chief Beastmaster said. Gritting his teeth, he continued, “Even if we only control a hundred millionth of the power of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, we’ll still be able to wipe Yang Qi and his clan out of existence. I can’t wait to see how he screams when I get my hands on him. I won’t let him die a quick death, that's for sure!”

If words could kill, Yang Qi would already have been dead ten thousand times over. But….

“Oh really?”

RUMBLE!

An enormous hand appeared above, locking down space as tightly as an iron chest. It was none other than the Hand of the One God.

When the Hand of the One God was in action, it was like a new civilization that spread and wiped out all old civilizations, exterminating everything in its path and reducing it to nothing but dust.

Aaaiiiieee!

Chief Beastmaster was a powerful individual, but there was no way he could match up to Yang Qi. After all, Yang Qi had defeated Immortal Officer Fallen Red and taken her primeval godworm. He possessed two god items, and had produced his Heaven and Earth Furnace. He could already defeat second stage Space-Demolishers, and could probably even hold his own against third stage Thought-Demolishers.

On top of it all, he had attacked without any warning, resorting to a very vicious move.

After Proud Heaven had shown up and stolen his mother away, a fire had been lit in his heart. Every single attack he unleashed was designed to kill, to the point where even the young man in yellow would have difficulty standing up to him, much less Chief Beastmaster.

“Fall back! Quick!” said the young man in yellow, his eyes flashing with terror. Not bothering to try to save Chief Beastmaster, he grabbed Chancellor Demi-Immortal and turned into a stream of godlight that flew out of the path of the Hand of the One God.

Sadly, Chief Beastmaster wasn’t as lucky as the other two. He had just acquired a hundred and eight imperial snakecharms, making him stronger than he had ever been. And he had just been ruminating about his future revenge against Yang Qi. But before he could, Yang Qi came for him!

One attack.

The Hand of the One God was so powerful that before it even hit Chief Beastmaster, his true energy was shattered and his primal-chaos elder-snake exploded into a mass of snakecharms, which Yang Qi immediately absorbed.

Then, the palm smashed into him and blood sprayed out everywhere.

“Damn you, Yang Qi! What are you doing in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart? How did you get inside? It's only supposed to open once every ten thousand years!” Eyes filling with madness and despair, he looked at his two retreating comrades and screamed, “Help! Save me!”

“Nobody can save you,” Yang Qi said in a cold, expressionless voice. The Heaven and Earth Furnace descended and the burning flames immediately covered Chief Beastmaster, causing hissing and popping sounds to ring out.

“Yang Qi!” he screamed in terror. “I'm sorry! I was wrong! Forgive me! I'm already a Demolisher, don’t kill me! You already wiped out my clan! You’ve gone far enough! Don’t commit more evil. You won't be able to turn back after this. When people beg for mercy, you should grant it!”

“When people beg for mercy, I should grant it? But are you a person? I think not. You’re a dog! A greedy and cold-blooded son-of-a-bitch!” Yang Qi waved his hand, slamming shut the lid of the Heaven and Earth Furnace, whereupon the screams of Chief Beastmaster rang out as he was transformed into ash.

Within moments, he was wiped out of existence so thoroughly that not even the legion of gods could have brought him back.

After slaughtering Chief Beastmaster and taking his quintessence energy, Yang Qi was poised to achieve even further cultivation advancement. However, he wasn’t done. Opening his Lord's Eye, he sent beams of light shooting out in the space-time labyrinth around him until he found Chancellor Demi-Immortal and the young man in yellow.

“Not good!” the young man said. “How did you reach this level, Yang Qi? And how did you get back into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart? It doesn’t make sense!”

“It doesn’t need to make sense,” Yang Qi replied coldly. “Consider yourself lucky to be so stupid! Hand over King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy medallions and I’ll let you go. You sit around all day and night plotting against me, but in the end I just beat you like a stray dog. I actually feel bad for you. In fact, maybe I should just put you out of your misery!”

All of a sudden, he drew on the nine stances of the Hand of the One God, and as his power levels built, the Heaven and Earth Furnace suddenly appeared above his head, focusing the attacks.

In that very same moment, enlightenment poured into him regarding numerous divine abilities he had never thought of before. Taking the power he had just acquired from Chief Beastmaster, he sacrificed it and poured it into the Heaven and Earth Furnace.

“Sacrifice an Immortal! Dao of Immortality!”

The move Immortality was the ninth of the set that made up the Hand of the One God, and it was the most powerful. For most people, practicing cultivation for an entire lifetime couldn’t unlock secrets like this.

But now, Yang Qi understood how to sacrifice an actual immortal to power one of the fist technique’s most deadly moves. Every immortal that was sacrificed in that way would lead to a higher level of power.

The instant the move was unleashed, the young man in yellow knew that he couldn’t defend against it.

“Yang Qi!” he howled. “I'm going to destroy you or die in the attempt! You think you have what it takes to deal with me? In the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, I'm invincible! I can’t die here! And I ensconced my nascent divinity here too! Even if you somehow manage to kill me, I will be reborn. Worldly Immortal-Slayer; Cycle of the Sun and Moon; Invincible Paragon; Hope of a Great Dao!”

All of a sudden, his three legacy medallions appeared, creating a bright halo around his head.

The halo instantly connected with the essence of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, causing the power of monarchs to surround him. Then, as fast as lightning, that power turned into a swirling black hole that swallowed up the young man.

He vanished, without a trace left behind.

Snorting coldly, Yang Qi used the Heaven and Earth Furnace to grab the black hole, which left behind a tiny rift in space-time.

“I just need the power of King Immortal-Slayer to open a way out of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart,” he said. “You think I was trying to kill you, boy?” He knew full well that the young man in yellow would not be easy to take out. His attack just now had been a ruse, and had worked perfectly. Now that he had a rift to work with, he could expand it into an exit, and get his Elder Brothers and Sisters back into the mortal world to prepare for invasion.

The fury of the immortal world would soon begin raining down.

Chapter 534: Returning

Yang Qi had borrowed the powers of King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy medallion to break a hole in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart and escape from inside. Because he had fled, the young man in yellow was unaware of that fact. If he knew the truth, he likely would have coughed up blood from fury.

Of course, it was better for Yang Qi to have the young man unaware and wasting time on further plots and schemes. Besides, the spell formation that Yang Qi had used to enter the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart was still in place, which meant that he could return to the chart any time he wished.

That said, once Yang Qi reached the Universal Demi-Immortal level, his Wheel of Fate would become even more true and real, and he might be able to break his way into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart on his own. Perhaps he could even wrest control of it away from the young man in yellow.

If he had the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart as a weapon, it would mean Proud Heaven’s end days had come.

Even if Proud Heaven were stronger than he was, there was no way he could rival King Immortal-Slayer, the creator of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. After all, the chart actually surpassed the power of its own creator.

As soon as Eldest Brother and Elder Second Brother were back in the mortal world, they began pushing toward breakthroughs. In fact, tribulations began for all of Yang Qi’s Elder Brothers and Sisters.

They had all gained significant enlightenment in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, but were bound by the limitations therein and had been unable to improve their cultivation bases. But now, they were free.

RUUUUUUUUMBLE!

Heavenly tribulations of all sorts formed, causing massive seas of lightning to spread out that actually destroyed numerous nearby planets.

It lasted for several days. Some of the Elder Brothers and Sisters experienced three or four successive tribulations, resulting in massive improvements in their energy arts and divine abilities.

Especially noteworthy was Eldest Brother, who radiated the sensation of an immortal body, although he had not yet begun to actually form it. After all, when he found out that Yang Qi could tap into the power of the Tusita Heaven, he became dead set on using that particular power. An immortal body powered by the Tusita Heaven would be particularly strong among immortals.

When everything was said and done, Eldest Brother said, “Junior Eighteenth Brother, we wasted a lot of time with our breakthroughs. We need to get back to the Sage Monarch planetary system as quickly as possible.”

“Alright!”

With that, the entire group shot with lightning speed toward the Sage Monarch planetary system.

As they approached, it was obvious that the system was not in a bad situation of any sort. The mystical network of laws was still in place, and the patrols made their way constantly from one place to another via the wormholes.

After all, no one knew of the situation with Proud Heaven, nor did any of them have any clue that the immortal world above might arrive at any moment, bursting with rage.

Obviously, Yang Qi didn’t intend to make an announcement about it; that would only serve to incite panic. The more faith and destiny that he could acquire, the further his cultivation would advance.

And panicky, nervous people couldn’t provide a steady, burning stream of faith and destiny.

Of course, word had long since spread that Yang Qi sent a huge army of fiend-devils to conquer the Gyroscope planetary system. As a result, the inhabitants of the Sage Monarch planetary system felt more devoted and pious than ever. Everyone who was in the know realized that Yang Qi’s power kept growing and growing, and that he was not a person anyone could resist. As a result, their prayers grew even stronger than before.

Yang Zhan had led many other key figures into the Hell of Mahānata to kill fiend-devils as training. Because of that, many children of the Yang Clan had advanced by leaps and bounds. They were now intrepid warriors with vast experience in battle, capable of unleashing rains of blood wherever they went.

They were now elites among elites.

Of course, Yang Qi’s clone had long since passed information about the Holy Mother to those who needed to know. Thus, as soon as Yang Qi returned, Yang Zhan hurried out of the Hell of Mahānata to meet him. Looking very anxious, he said, “Qi’er, is it true that Greensura was kidnapped by that animal?”

“Don’t worry, Father, I'm going to kill Proud Heaven and get mother back. Right now, we need to worry about reprisals from the immortal world above. As long as we hold strong, I’ll continue to build up more faith power, getting stronger as a result. Father, please focus on the training in the Hell of Mahānata. We also need to start production of large quantities of immortal pills for healing and resurrection. Distribute them to all key disciples so that they’re prepared for the fighting to come.”

“Alright,” Yang Zhan replied.

Thus, major preparations began.

Eldest Brother and Elder Second Brother were Yang Qi’s top assistants. They went about identifying the most consummate geniuses in the Sage Monarch planetary system and using the good fortune they had acquired in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart to help them advance by leaps and bounds. It was just like the old saying, when brothers act as one, they will be as powerful as a sharp blade that can cut any metal.

It was all handled very systematically. Immortal items were doled out to loyal disciples, as were masses of medicinal pills, power reserves, spirit stones, and the like. Then the disciples were sent to the Hell of Mahānata for training. They would go out into the wild to hunt fiend-devils, training with sword techniques and martial disciplines, honing themselves into powerful weapons.

And Yang Qi continued to summon hordes of fiend-devils from all sorts of hells.

He also connected to the Hell of Mahānata and the Hell of Gloom and Darkness to successfully pass the tribulation of a fifth order Demi-Immortal. As a Tyrant Demi-Immortal he was stronger than ever, and his Wheel of Fate seemed like a daoist technique of the most ultimate level of perfection.

Of course, he still had plenty of room for growth; he needed to cultivate the path of the most powerful of the infernal deities.

The God Legion Seal was packed with information from hell, including magical techniques from the primeval infernal deities. Unfortunately, many such techniques were not only difficult to use, they were one-use only.

That said, Yang Qi didn’t overthink things. Working together with his various allies and using the fiend-devils as fuel, he created a dao of gods originating with the primeval infernal deities.

In the blink of an eye, the Sage Monarch planetary system was filled with devil energy and the constant weeping of ghosts and wailing of gods.

Among the millions upon millions of planets that made up the planetary systems, the members of countless organizations and clans could see what was happening and trembled with both fear and anticipation at what their lord was doing.

The Heaven and Earth Furnace appeared, as did nine Hell Portals.

The Hell Portals were as large as planets now, and they trembled as they ejected masses upon masses of fiend-devils, all of them at least fifth or sixth order Demi-Immortals. There were even some who were in the eighth or ninth order.

They swarmed like locusts into the Heaven and Earth Furnace, where they were melted, their vengeful souls and devilishness posing a sharp contrast to the godliness that was already present. In the blink of an eye, magical symbols formed, covered with the script of the dao of devils in the shape of primeval infernal deities.

Slowly but surely, numerous magical items formed from the dao of devils appeared.

RUMBLE!

Fully ten billion Demi-Immortal fiend-devils were transformed into devilishness that swirled around Elder Seventh Brother Meng Shafan, who was currently muttering a primeval devil curse. As the devilishness surged into him, his blood transformed, until an enormous śarīra of the dao of devils took shape above his head.

In the end, as the śarīra was completed, a devil-god appeared inside of it. It had pitch black scales and a thousand arms, all of which were covered with devil-eyes. Shockingly, it was none other than a primeval infernal deity.

Meng Shafan had finally completely cultivated a secret magic of the dao of devils!

“Elder Seventh Brother, this is a boundless aspect of the dao of devils in which ten billion fiend-devils can be used to form a devil-dao śarīra that is subsequently converted into a primeval infernal deity. It can be an out-of-body incarnation for you, and will allow you to slaughter heaven-immortals. Now I’ll summon some more fiend-devils and turn them into devil items for the infernal deity to use! Keep in mind that once the fighting starts, the infernal deity will slowly lose power until it completely dissipates. In fact, it will probably fade away after you kill a heaven-immortal.”

With that, Yang Qi began summoning more fiend-devils, which he then converted into a variety of devil items, including hooks, pitchforks, lances, nooses, and more.

Each of them was built with immense amounts of devilishness, and they were all incredibly powerful.

Next, Yang Qi went on to make infernal deity incarnations for all of his seventeen Elder Brothers and Sisters. By the time he was finished, the Invincible Society was easily in a position to slaughter immortals and kill buddhas.

Afterward, he sacrificed countless fiend-devils to set up numerous deadly devil formations. He even connected with the Hell of Gloom and Darkness and the Hell of Mahānata to make preparations for an invasion. If the immortal world above sent forces down, it would result in a scene the likes of which occurred back when the Hell of Euphoria invaded the Yore-Wilds.

When all the major preparations were done, Yang Qi began working on his own cultivation. After all, helping his Elder Brothers and Sisters build their infernal deity incarnations had pushed his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth to an even higher level.

“God items! Chiliocosm Mirror! Golden Wheel of Nirvanic Extinction!”

The two god items flew into the Heaven and Earth Furnace, where they began to bubble and hiss as Yang Qi attempted to extract their godliness and use it for his own purposes.

It was something he had thought to do after seeing the young man in yellow doing something similar with his legacy medallions. Of course, the young man in yellow had been using the legacy medallions, whereas Yang Qi was using an energy art, which was vastly more difficult in nature.

Although the two god items would be ruined after their godliness was extracted, the fact remained that Yang Qi’s Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth actually had a ‘god’ aspect that would greatly benefit as a result.

If the immortal world above really sent an army down to exact punishment, he couldn't hold anything back in his attempts to get stronger. Time was of the essence, and ruining two god items was a price he was willing to pay.

Hopefully, he could become an eighth order Universal Demi-Immortal before the invasion began.

Chapter 535: Godliness

The Golden Wheel of Nirvanic Extinction and the Chiliocosm Mirror sank into the Heaven and Earth Furnace.

Burning flames began melting them as Yang Qi attempted to extract their deathless godliness. By making that godliness a part of him, Yang Qi would be able to add a bit of deathlessness to himself, as well. It would make him almost eternally indestructible. At the same time, further enlightenment of godliness would help improve his cultivation in general.

Godliness surpassed the dao of heaven and was difficult to describe with words. Those who gained understanding of it were fundamentally qualified to rise to the level of the primeval legion of gods.

Of course, an average person who acquired godliness would find it impossible to understand, and would never be able to make it part of their own body. In fact, doing so could lead to literal self-destruction.

Oftentimes, god items were created by actually imbuing deathless godliness into godly building materials. If you tried to do the same thing with immortal building materials, the item would simply explode.

Working with godliness was a dangerous thing; one misstep and the item being worked with could be destroyed, killing the person manipulating it.

Thankfully, Yang Qi had the God Legion Seal and the Physique of the Sovereign Lord, therefore, absorbing godliness was not a dangerous matter for him.

“Eternal Heavenly Aria!”

Resonant lyrics filled the Heaven and Earth Furnace, causing it to burn with even more power than before. Yet the two god items were not yet melting. Both of them had been forged by Lesser Gods, thus making them lesser godly items. Even still, they were profoundly tough, things that no immortals would even be able to damage, much less destroy.

At the moment, not even Yang Qi’s Heaven and Earth Furnace was able to do anything to them.

SPLAT!

Yang Qi spat out a mouthful of quintessence-blood into the Heaven and Earth Furnace, causing the flames to leap higher and turn a more pure color that represented deathless godliness.

CRACK!

The Chiliocosm Mirror began breaking apart, crumbling bit by bit. The god item simply couldn’t stand up to the might of the Sovereign Lord and was forced to acknowledge allegiance.

The legion of gods had rankings. Lesser God. Common God. Greater God. Consummate God. Perfect God. Paramount God. Sovereign Lord! Yang Qi’s will was a type that could crush anything beneath it and force even the godliness of Lesser Gods to submit.

Yang Qi’s Elder Brothers and Sisters watched, trembling, as the Chiliocosm Mirror shattered, and they couldn’t help wonder what level of deadly force was required to destroy a god item. A normal immortal who tried to do such a thing would be destroyed in the blink of an eye.

RUMBLE!

As the mirror melted, the godly materials that had been used to create it flowed into the Heaven and Earth Furnace and a boundless, deathless godliness appeared. It looked like an actual god-spirit who wished to leap away to the highest heavens.

However, Yang Qi unleashed the Hand of the One God and completely trapped the godliness. Then he inhaled, breathing it into himself.

As soon as the stream of godliness entered him, spatial scales spread out over his skin, as though he were being imbued with the spatial glory of the gods. It was evidence that the godliness was attempting to transform him into a god item.

Unless he got it under control, he would change into another, more powerful Chiliocosm Mirror. Thankfully, Yang Qi had the God Legion Seal and was vastly stronger than any other person. A moment later, the godliness began flowing through him into his sea of energy.

From there, it was distributed into the numerous particles that made him up.

In the blink of an eye, he began inflating like a balloon.

Megamammoths exploded into dracomammoths, causing immortal energy to surge through him. In the shortest of moments, he gained enlightenment of the Prime Demi-Immortal level.

Next, the essences of the Hell of Mahānata and the Hell of Gloom and Darkness shot toward him and a new world appeared above him. Heavenly tribulation began, causing the entirety of the Sage Monarch planetary system to tremble, as though an apocalypse were beginning.

Countless individuals dropped to their knees in worship.

‘I'm a Prime Demi-Immortal, but I need more deathless godliness!’

He waved his hand and the Golden Wheel of Nirvanic Extinction exploded within the Heaven and Earth Furnace. Instantly, a powerful stream of godliness shot into him, causing more dracomammoths to awaken, fully six hundred million.

Another heavenly tribulation descended, but he ignored it.

“I'm now a Revered Demi-Immortal!  Those two god items each had enough godliness for a single breakthrough. I need more god items! I need more godliness to reach the Universal Demi-Immortal level. Once I'm a Universal Demi-Immortal, I’ll be able to summon Demolisher fiend-devils from hell! With an army of immortal fiend-devils on my side, it won’t matter if the immortal world above invades. Unfortunately, I'm going to need more than two god items for the next breakthrough; I’ll need many. Demi-Immortal fiend-devils are still mortals. Only Demolisher fiend-devils are immortals. The power levels required to make that leap are immense!”

Yang Qi had proceeded smoothly through multiple tribulations. He went to Prime Demi-Immortal and then Revered Demi-Immortal, placing him only a step away from Universal Demi-Immortal.

Deathless godliness was an immense benefit to his cultivation level, and it also provided profound benefits to the God Legion Seal, allowing it to make more Blood of the One God than before.

Having just jumped up by two cultivation levels, Yang Qi found that he wanted more god items. The sad thing was that they were so rare. It was the same even in the immortal worlds, perhaps with the exception of high-level places like the Tusita Heaven or the Mourn-Parting Heaven.

In any case, searching for god items in the mortal world was a lost cause.

‘I bet there are more god items in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart,’ he thought. ‘Next time I go in, I’ll try to find more godliness to absorb. If I got enough, I might even be able to step into the Demolishing level!’

Settling down, he contemplated the matter of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

His energy arts had already dramatically improved. His Infernal Deity Spear, Angel Wings, God Legion Battle Robe, Fist of the Halls of Heaven, Hand of the One God, and Hell Portals were all stronger than before. He could use all three thousand blessings from the Eternal Heavenly Aria, which would ensure that even a first order fiend-devil that he summoned could fight fifth or sixth order enemies, and possibly kill the latter in mutual destruction. And if he blessed a ninth order half-Demolisher fiend-devil with those primeval god skills, it could easily fight immortals with immortal bodies.

Yang Qi’s guess was that if the immortal world invaded, they would likely send Demolishers without immortal bodies. At most, they might send some that had only just formed immortal bodies. After all, the stronger an immortal was, the more difficult it would be for them to descend to the lower worlds.

Of course, in the mortal world, even the weakest immortal was still vastly beyond any other cultivator. Even a small squad of them would dominate any planetary systems it encountered. Thankfully, Yang Qi’s Eternal Heavenly Aria had reached the perfect level and, in combination with his Hell Portals, would be a deadly weapon against such an enemy force.

The way things were going, unless Yang Qi did something monumentally stupid, he should be able to defend against an army from the immortal world above.

“Get out here, Titan Duelbringer!” he said. Without any further ceremony, he pulled out the sealed, trembling immortal emissary, who immediately knelt in front of him. “I recently received a visit from someone named Proud Heaven. Presumably you’ve heard of him? What’s his relationship with the leader of the Titan Emperor Heaven?”

“Mercy! Spare me! Proud Heaven? He’s a very mysterious person who’s definitely not from the Titan Emperor Heaven. In fact, he's only there in clone form, of that much I'm certain. Nobody knows what his true self is like. He’s very close with the leader of the Titan Emperor Heaven. Some time back, he was assigned as a banished immortal to descend to the Titan Emperor Collegium. However, he doesn’t have the power to command the forces of the Titan Emperor Heaven.”

“I see,” Yang Qi replied coldly. “The time has come for a little test. Reach out again to the heaven above. Ask them for even more resources than before. If they agree, it will prove that Proud Heaven didn’t reveal what he knows about things down here. But if they refuse… it means we're about to enter a fight to the death! If it’s a fight they want, I’ll give them one!”

“Yes, yes of course!” Titan Duelbringer knew what Yang Qi wanted, and also knew that he was powerless to resist. Drawing on his quintessence vitality, he began praying, “Oh heaven above, things have not been going well here in the lower world. Various planetary systems are eyeing me like a tiger eyes its prey. Please, bestow more immortal items upon me. Ideally, some god items….”

Chapter 536: The Immortal World Invades

The immortal emissary Titan Duelbringer did exactly as Yang Qi asked, and began praying to the Titan Emperor Heaven. He held nothing back, asking for immortal items, pills, stones, and even god items.

Even in immortal worlds, god items were extremely rare, definitely not things which were casually thrown around as gifts.

Of course, Yang Qi didn’t actually expect to get such rewards. He was simply probing for information.

As Titan Duelbringer prayed, Yang Qi surreptitiously used an energy art to watch for a reaction from the immortal world. He knew that Titan Duelbringer had some level of important status, and as such there would definitely be a response to his prayer. It wouldn't be like the supreme rector of old, who despite leading an entire group in prayer, could never be certain that he would get a response.

After Titan Duelbringer finished with his prayer, time passed. Roughly two hours later, a dark cloud appeared above a mountain peak in the Plane of Initiation. It wasn’t devil energy, but was filled with killing power and the muffled rumbling of thunder. It looked like flames of fury were brewing inside of it.

Crack! Snap!

The glow of lightning appeared, which formed into the shape of an enormous sledgehammer, something that could easily crush planets into rubble. Obviously, this was a punishment from the immortal world!

Indeed, a voice rang out from within the sledgehammer. “How dare you, lower world monster! How dare you defy heaven and the dao! You destroyed the Titan Emperor Collegium, established your own mystical network of laws, and began gathering faith for your own. That runs contrary to the interests of the host of immortals and profanes their will. You deserve to die ten thousand times over for your crime. Within moments, your network of laws and faith will all be destroyed! You will be taken captive to the immortal world, where you will forever be tormented by immortal flame! Tremble, mortal! The armies of the immortal world are coming. Just wait until your network of laws is smashed to bits! Those who defy the immortal world never live long. As for you, Titan Duelbringer, how dare you help this monster! For your act of scamming the immortal world, you are also sentenced to death! Your name has been stricken from all records in the Department of the Imperial Clan! Prepare to die!”

Lightning from the immortal world instantly began falling.

Titan Duelbringer immediately sagged weakly; he knew there was no way he could fight the immortal world. He could do nothing but wait to be cut down.

POP!

Yang Qi punched the lightning sledgehammer, which collapsed in the blink of an eye. Then he reached up with the Hand of the One God to rip apart the cloud which had just formed.

RIIIIP!

Even as the dark cloud was torn to shreds by the Hand of the One God, planet-sized fireballs began falling down with destructive force that seemed capable of destroying the entire Sage Monarch planetary system. Clearly, the immortal world had no patience for chaos below and was planning to simply wipe everything out and start over with new life.

“All Rivers Run to the Sea; Heavenly Flames Converge Together!” Yang Qi said. Immense power swept out and pulled the fire into his Heaven and Earth Furnace, where it was forced into the shape of a fist-sized śarīra filled with fiery fays. Clearly, it had become a fire-type precious treasure!

It was a śarīra of heavenly flames.

“Elder Sixth Sister!” Yang Qi said. “This śarīra of heavenly flames is no inferior to a greater godly item. Take it. It will be of immense benefit to your Preheaven Flame Spirit Vital Body.” Yang Qi immediately threw the śarīra to his Elder Sixth Sister, a young woman who wore bright-red clothing and was sometimes called Auntie Flamedance. Her unique physique was born out of primeval preheaven true flame and was extremely powerful.

“Many thanks, Junior Brother,” she said with a smile. “Based on that prayer, it seems the immortal world knows about what's happened here, and their army will certainly arrive soon. What orders do you have now? We Elder Brothers and Sisters will follow any instructions you give. We definitely need to take action immediately.”

“You're right, the immortal world will be invading shortly. Get ready. And send down orders to get into battle formation. We will form the core of the fighting force, and our objective will be to defend the central area of the Sage Monarch planetary system. I'm fairly certain that, after they emerge from the passageway, they’ll spread out and try to kill all the leaders. After that, taking the rest of the planetary system would be easy. Unfortunately, their abacus calculations are off. I'm not going to be as easy to deal with as they think. In fact, I'm actually very curious to see just who will lead their forces against me.”

His voice thrumming with killing intent, he continued, “Fear not, Titan Duelbringer. You did well, and I’ll make sure you survive this. You’ve been expunged from the imperial clan registry, yet that doesn’t matter. Just wait until I defeat this invasion. Stick with me, and later on we’ll take the fight to the Titan Emperor Heaven, executing any who stand in our way. In the end, I’ll make you the new ruler of the immortal world. There, you will uphold my mystical network of laws and gather faith for me.”

“Many thanks, Milord! Henceforth, I, Titan Duelbringer, will risk life and limb to serve you faithfully!” Titan Duelbringer kowtowed over and over again. After all, he now had nowhere to go, therefore offering loyalty to Yang Qi was his best option. As for Yang Qi, having an immortal attendant would definitely be of much use later on.

“Milord, there’s something important you need to know.” Clearly, he was placing all bets with Yang Qi. “There’s unrest in the Titan Emperor Heaven! When the Hell of Euphoria invaded, the quintessence of the immortal world was damaged and many important people died. Quite a few other immortal worlds are just waiting for a chance to take over the Titan Emperor Heaven. All of the strongest people are occupying defensive positions there. There’s no way they’ll take important forces out of strategic locations and send them to the mortal world. I’d say it’s highly likely that they’ll send their lowest-ranking armed force, a fiendslave battalion. It's an army formed from criminals and lowlifes of all sorts. They’re more vicious than monsters, but they don’t have high cultivation bases. And because they’re not given any cultivation resources, they have no hope of ever achieving cultivation base breakthroughs. They’re essentially demented slaves that are viewed as little more than cannon fodder. Every immortal world has soldiers like that, which are usually used to deal with lower worlds or thrown away in minor squabbles with other immortal worlds.”

“Oh? Well, that’s a very useful bit of information. Fiendslave battalion, you say?" Yang Qi thought for a moment. “How many soldiers will be in this fiendslave battalion?”

“Too many to count. I mean, not even I know exactly how big the Titan Emperor Heaven is! Not even a thousand planetary systems from the mortal world would be as large as it is. The immortal worlds are complicated, and it's not like I'm a leader there. I'm not even considered high-ranking.”

“The immortal worlds are that big?” Yang Qi shivered. The Sage Monarch planetary system was made up of the Four Wilds, plus the Central Planetary River. And it contained hundreds of billions of planets, each of which was inhabited by tens of billions of living things! Calculating the population of a place like that would be a difficult task. And apparently, an immortal world was larger than a thousand planetary systems all put together. It seemed impossible to determine how many soldiers they could muster. If an entire fiendslave battalion was sent down, they would definitely be difficult to deal with.

There was obviously a bitter fight to come.

Around this time, Yang Qi suddenly felt a sense of danger from above, something weighing down on his heart and mind from the dome of heaven. Everything began trembling, and as he looked up, he could see a rift opening in the sky.

“Get ready everyone! The immortal world will be invading soon. This is a critical moment of life or death, so hold nothing back. As long as we stand firm, we have great glory ahead of us. The Titan Emperor Heaven is nothing to marvel at and is beset by infighting! Fiend-devils, assemble! Prepare to be blessed by the boundless Eternal Heavenly Aria!”

WHIZZZ!

He began singing and the Eternal Heavenly Aria spread out through the planetary system, blessing countless fiend-devils. As the primeval god skill touched them, it was almost as if they were transformed into god-spirit-like god-devils.

Bursting with power, they began flying up into the sky.

RUMBLE!

Meanwhile, high in the dome of heaven, a planet-sized rift had been torn open which radiated killing intent and heavenly might, the type that completely surpassed any of the devil-ghosts below.

That was the aura of a fiendslave battalion. Just as Titan Duelbringer had described, the soldiers who made it up were all criminals and people viewed as the scum of society. All of them were fierce and vicious, making them the perfect type of cannon fodder.

Even so, they were all immortals, thus could not be taken lightly. Even peak entities from the mortal world couldn't rival them. As Yang Qi looked up, his Wheel of Fate trembled, a clear indication of the dangerous gravity of the situation.

Next, a voice rang out from the rift. “Lower worldlings, listen. Yang Qi, the Sage Monarch Collegium, and all the monsters who work with him have looked down on the magical laws of the immortal world. For these crimes, an army has been gathered and will soon descend. Citizens of the lower world, if you renounce the darkness and seek the light and rise up in resistance, you might have a chance to get out of this situation alive. But any who insist on following the evildoer Yang Qi will be trampled by our army!”

The words instantly spread out to fill the entire planetary system.

In all of the Four Wilds, countless planets, sects, churches, and clans heard the words. Numerous experts could sense the rift above and knew that something big was about to happen.

Many people who had been forced to follow Yang Qi, especially people from the Titan Emperor Collegium, such as the initiators, were already trembling in anticipation. They had long since decided to betray Yang Qi and this decree from the immortal world cemented that decision.

‘So, they want to betray me?’ Yang Qi thought. After all, his mystical network of laws instantly informed him of what such people were thinking. Obviously, he couldn't stand for such sentiment. “Fiend-devil army, find any betrayers and execute them immediately!”

Meanwhile, he reached out and spoke into the minds of everyone in the Sage Monarch planetary system. “Give me your faith. Other than me, no true god exists for you….”

Chapter 537: Fierce Fighting

Of course, the decree passed down by the immortal world caused many to tremble with anxiety. And many of the initiators and powerful society chiefs immediately betrayed Yang Qi in their hearts. Luckily, the fiend-devil army had everything locked down tight and were keeping a close eye on potential rebels. Otherwise, the invasion of the immortal world might have caused the Sage Monarch planetary system to descend into chaos.

Thankfully, Yang Qi had been prepared for that to happen.

Right now, his cultivation base was almost unspeakably powerful. He could casually send his thoughts and divine will to spread from the Central Planetary River to the Four Wilds and beyond.

Even when he was only a fourth order Potent Demi-Immortal, he had still been able to dominate all heaven and earth around him. He had defeated the second stage Immortal Officer Fallen Red and taken her god item and godworm.

But now, Yang Qi had absorbed deathless godliness and achieved successive breakthroughs. Now he was a seventh order Revered Demi-Immortal.

The ‘revered’ character in that level was the same character that would appear in words like paragon, respect, and honor. And such Demi-Immortals commanded levels of power that were astonishing within the mortal world.

If he ended up fighting Immortal Officer Fallen Red right now, he would be able to kill her with the snap of a finger. Not even a discarnate soul would be left behind. In fact, at the moment, he wasn’t sure of the limits of his fighting abilities when it came to dealing with immortals.

As his divine will spread out through the mystical network of laws, he touched the hearts and minds of all living beings, who heard his voice speaking in their sea of consciousness.

“I am the only true god… I am the only true god… I am the only true god….”

Considering he had taken faith from all these people, he could use the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, and of course the Wheel of Fate, to influence their thoughts. In their souls, he really was the only true god.

In the blink of an eye, the emotions of everyone in the Sage Monarch planetary system calmed and everyone stood united against the invasion of the immortal world. Not a single person abided by the edict which had just been delivered.

“What gall you have, mortals! So you're dead set on working for this monster? Since you cannot expunge your inner devils, there’s no need to leave you alive. Immortals of the fiendslave battalion, listen! You shall cleanse this lower world by killing everyone in it! Don’t leave anyone alive!”

It was a harsh decree, and it caused fear to fill the planetary system. At the same time, a cruel and brutal aura fell from above.

Yang Qi opened his Lord’s Eye and looked up, in the hopes of finding out how many soldiers made up this fiendslave battalion. Unfortunately, they were too numerous. They were like a horde of locusts that would bring calamitous destruction on anything that got in their way.

“Nine Hell Portals!” Yang Qi didn’t hesitate, and began summoning endless waves of fiend-devils, which shot up and began to fight the immortals of the fiendslave battalion.

As for the fiend-devils he had just blessed with the Eternal Heavenly Aria’s primeval god skills, he had them set up enormous spell formations, or in some cases, squads of fighters.

RUMBLE!

Heaven and earth shattered and space collapsed on itself in numerous locations.

Enormous, planet-sized holes opened and erupted with destructive energy arts, smashing into the advancing fiend-devils.

Some of the lower-level fiend-devils immediately fell.

Yang Qi was summoning fiend-devils in the Demi-Immortal level, whereas this fiendslave battalion was made up entirely of immortals. The difference between the two was just too vast. Unfortunately Yang Qi was not able to summon half-Demolishers, who, upon being blessed, could vanquish immortals. Right now, he was limited to Tyrant, Prime, Revered, Universal, and Paragon Demi-Immortals.

In the mortal world, such fiend-devils could crush anything in their path, but not so when dealing with the forces of the immortal world.

“Plunder! Attack!”

“Kill all the men, but leave the women alive!”

“Our fiendslave battalion might be weak in the heaven above, but here in the lower world nobody can stand in our way. Although there’s not much worth taking here, I don’t mind having some women to take back as pleasure slaves.”

“Ah, this is going to be great!”

Unfortunately, the immortals of the fiendslave battalion were more devilish than actual devils.

Swarms of villainous, evil immortals were approaching. In fact, they didn't seem like immortals at all, but more like wicked bandits.

After all, not everyone in the immortal world bore the demeanor of a transcendent being.

The soldiers and commanders of the fiendslave battalion were not equipped with uniform armor, and not all of them had immortal items. Most of them were criminals, and there was no way such people would be given high-quality equipment.

But they were still immortals. And they were like a swarm of hornets that descended onto the Sage Monarch planetary system with destructive intent.

Compared to immortals, the greyspaces in the mortal world were weak. Almost immediately, everything was thrown into a state of primal-chaos.

Even the Dark True Void rippled violently and began crumbling in places.

Crack! Snap!

Immense force weighed down everywhere.

Yang Qi looked up, saw countless soldiers of the fiendslave battalion heading toward him, and shouted, “Attack!”

The immortals had already been met with various patrolling fiend-devil armies, and now the fighting was beginning in earnest. The intense combat on display was already like something from an epic saga of the past.

Boom. Boom. Boom. Boom! Boom!

Explosions rang out everywhere and corpses of fiend-devils began falling left and right. Some of the fiend-devils were even reduced to powder.

That said, the spell formations formed by the fiend-devils were also enough to cause casualties in the fiendslave battalion, and immortals began perishing.

In the end, though, the fiend-devil forces were just too weak. Not even being blessed by primeval god skills put them in a position of being able to deal with so many immortals.

Heavy casualties were almost instantly inflicted on the fiend-devils, whereas only a handful of immortals had fallen.

If things went on in this fashion, there was no way the immortal army could be resisted! They would win with overwhelming force of numbers!

“Profound school of heaven and earth; union of hells!Path to Mahānata, darkness and gloom in hell!Nine Hell Portals, open wide!Endless fiend-devils, I summon you!”

Yang Qi blurred into motion, heading directly toward the immortal army. Nine Hell Portals opened wide and more armies of fiend-devils swept forth.

These were elite troops from the Hell of Mahānata and fiendish monsters from the Hell of Gloom and Darkness. Yang Qi was holding nothing back, calling on every tool he could to win this fight to the death.

One million!

Ten million!

One hundred million!

With every moment that passed, more fiend-devils poured out of the Hell Portals. Hundreds upon hundreds of millions of them, all blessed with the primeval god skills of the Eternal Heavenly Aria!

This time, the fiend-devils did not come as a disorganized horde. They were organized, and as they swept forth they created countless primeval infernal deity devil formations that could unleash shocking fighting prowess.

There were all species of fiend-devils in the armies, and they could cooperate in a way that the immortals of the fiendslave battalion never could.

All of a sudden, it seemed as if the tide of battle might turn.

By this point, many of the leaders in the fiendslave battalion had identified Yang Qi, and began shouting, “Kill him!”

After all, Yang Qi was so powerful that he was like a torch burning on a dark night.

Besides, he was flanked by nine enormous Hell Portals that were belching out endless streams of hell-born fiend-devils. It was no surprise that he became the biggest target on the battlefield.

The first of the immortals approached, transforming into a stream of immortal light that headed directly toward Yang Qi.

“Brothers! Let's kill him! He's the traitor Yang Qi, who's summoning all the fiend-devils! Kill him, and we’ll get a huge reward! Then maybe we can finally stop being soldiers in the fiendslave battalion. Maybe the immortal world will reward us with immortal bodies! This is our chance to be approved!”

In the blink of an eye, over a thousand immortals all began charging toward Yang Qi.

Despite the fact that they were all Demolishers, Yang Qi didn’t seem worried at all. After all, none of them could equal Elder-Immortal Hyperfiend. Thanks to the information from Titan Duelbringer, Yang Qi already knew that not all immortals in the immortal world actually had immortal bodies. And those who tried to forcibly form one without permission would be severely punished. Usually, one had to perform services first, before the magical laws of the immortal world would permit one to form an immortal body.

As for the low-class soldiers of this fiendslave battalion, how could they possibly have immortal bodies?

“Heaven and Earth Furnace!”

In the blink of an eye, an enormous furnace appeared, which the first handful of immortals ended up flying right into before they realized what was happening. And that was when the horrified screams began.

Chapter 538: Epic Battle

This fight was guaranteed to be like something from an epic saga and would be as climactic as when the Hell of Euphoria invaded the Yore-Wilds of old.

In the blink of an eye, Yang Qi wiped out over a dozen immortals by sucking them into his Heaven and Earth Furnace. Instantly, he felt massive power brewing inside the furnace. After all, although these immortals didn’t have immortal bodies, they had lived in the immortal world for years on end and were fully suffused with its aura. Thus, their power surpassed any Demolisher that existed in the mortal world by a long shot.

People like Lei Jiuzhou and the assembly chiefs of the Devil Sauvastika Assembly couldn't compare at all.

Immortal power coursed through Yang Qi’s body, and as he sacrificed it to the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, and especially the God Legion Seal, he felt himself growing stronger, and his Hell Portals also grew larger.

Although this battle seemed extremely dangerous and almost impossible to win, to Yang Qi it was actually a big opportunity.

In what other circumstance in the mortal world would he possibly have a chance to kill so many immortals? If he went to hell and started slaughtering Demolisher fiend-devils, it would attract too much attention from even more powerful and dangerous devils. Comparing the Titan Emperor Heaven to the Hell of Mahānata was like comparing a grain of sand to the ocean, and the latter had suzerains of hell who were comparable to the legion of gods.

But now he could slaughter immortals left and right without a care in the world.

Considering he had defeated Immortal Officer Fallen Red, these fiendslave battalion soldiers with no immortal bodies weren’t even worth mentioning. The God Legion Paradise spread out as he advanced, flanked by armies of fiend-devils. As the godlight shone brightly, it made him look like he was leading god-devils into battle.

Meanwhile, even more of the fiendslave battalion soldiers and generals began streaming in his direction.

He sang the Eternal Heavenly Aria again, and in the briefest of moments, his fiend-devils were blessed, becoming fiercer and stronger.

At the same time, his enemies were all hit with halos of damnification. The Light of Torpor. The Light of Sluggishness. The Light of Hemophilia. The Light of Vertigo. The Light of Weakness. The Light of Decay. The Light of Degeneration. In the shortest of moments, the victims of the halos dropped down to a state weaker than Paragon Demi-Immortal fiend-devils. The Eternal Heavenly Aria was a perfect weapon for large-scale conflict, as it augmented allies and weakened enemies.

In fact, it had the potential to completely change the tide of battle. After all, primeval god skills were based on the dao of heaven and had been created by the ancient legion of gods to fight the fiend-devil armies of hell.

In those times, fiend-devil armies had numbered in the trillions.

“AAAAAIIIIIIIEEEE!”

Hundreds of immortals were weakened by the primeval god skills and began screaming in terror as they realized that not even their immortal skills could counteract the effects. They were forced to watch in horror as their movement slowed, their quintessence energy was drained, and their lifespan was eaten away.

They even had trouble circulating their true energy.

Then they began exploding into clouds of blood. Obviously, Yang Qi was not showing a scrap of mercy! The Heaven and Earth Furnace flew forth again as hundreds of fiendslave battalion soldiers were sucked inside and converted to power for Yang Qi. Suddenly, the ancient halls of heaven appeared above his head and he began glowing with holy light as his quintessence-blood was rapidly converted into Blood of the One God, a stronger version than before.

After all, considering what assimilating hundreds of immortals could do was a terrifying thought.

Meanwhile, Eldest Brother, Elder Second Brother, and the others were waiting down below. Although they were strong enough to kill heaven-immortals, that only applied to small-scale skirmishes. Considering there were thousands upon tens of thousands of immortals in the advancing force, there was no way they could wade into the fighting without being immediately killed.

Instead, they remained in the Sage Monarch planetary system, powering spell formations and watching as the fiend-devils tried to hold the line of battle.

Without the fiend-devils, the Sage Monarch planetary system would have been wiped out within a few breaths of time, from the Four Wilds to the Central Planetary River.

Thankfully, Yang Qi had long since set up powerful devil formations down below to prevent incursions. Although they couldn’t stop immortal soldiers and generals for long, at least they could buy time.

After more fighting, Yang Qi finally made a decision.

“Eldest Brother, Second Elder Brother, forget about trying to fight. This fiendslave battalion is nothing to take lightly, so I’ll hold them off up here while you take everyone into the Hell of Mahānata. Start with the key figures before moving on to everyone else. There’s no way this immortal army would dare to go into the Hell of Mahānata. Forget the Titan Emperor Heaven, not even the Tusita Heaven would dare to do that! That said, be ready to destroy the passageway behind you at a moment’s notice.”

Instantly, Eldest Brother, Elder Second Brother, and the others began to oversee the retreat.

All of it had been planned out in advance. As the evacuation began with the most important figures in the Sage Monarch planetary system, more fiend-devils were summoned by Yang Qi up above. Halos of both blessing and damnification sprang up everywhere, and Yang Qi himself was bathed in godly light that shone with dazzling brightness. More and more immortals were falling!

“How dare a mere mortal kill immortals like us! This is an outrageous rebellion!”

RUMBLE!

Eventually, it reached the point where Yang Qi had killed fully a thousand of the heavenly soldiers and generals.

This fiendslave battalion was made up of countless smaller squads and teams, none of which were particularly inclined to cooperate with each other. In fact, there were a whole host of such smaller groups who wanted to kill Yang Qi on their own and keep the reward for themselves.

Some of them were even fighting each other in the hopes of getting to Yang Qi first.

Suddenly, a particularly tall and burly general appeared, thrumming with saber energy and holding a three-pronged great saber. He led a force of seven or eight hundred immortal soldiers, who powered a spell formation as they charged toward Yang Qi.

“Ah, a heavenly general. A top expert among the immortals here. Excellent!” Yang Qi flicked his finger and power swirled into a rice-sized expression of flame that shot toward the general at a hundred million times the speed of a comet.

Obviously, it was backed by deathless godliness!

This was a new transformation of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, an aspect of the Wheel of Fate called the Flame of Hope! Unfortunately, just like the wheel of Fate, it was not complete. Even so, it was incredibly powerful.

It had come thanks to Yang Qi killing so many immortals and using them to build up Blood of the One God.

He was massacring immortals to his heart’s content and using their power to improve himself. There was no purer form of power in the mortal world than the Blood of the One God, and now was the perfect opportunity to augment it.

POP!

The rice-sized flame shot through the commander’s saber light, whereupon the man just stopped in place right in mid-air. He was dead!

Suddenly, a godmammoth appeared above Yang Qi’s head. It inhaled, sucking in the dead general and the rest of his troops and depositing them in the Heaven and Earth Furnace.

Once again, Yang Qi’s blood was purified and sent toward the God Legion Seal.

Thanks to the power of the immortals, the God Legion Seal shone with the glory of the halls of heaven and pumped out a complete drop of the Blood of the One God.

As it emerged, Yang Qi heard a voice speaking in his soul, a voice that was profoundly ancient and bleak. “The Blood of the One God! The paramount Sovereign Lord! Weak at first, but bolstered and purified by the sacrifice of the souls, flesh, and blood of immortals!”

Yang Qi looked at his blood, and saw the Blood of the One God within it. Surprisingly, the blood actually had the text of the legion of gods in it, showing how strong it was.

One ten thousandth.

His blood was currently one ten thousandth as strong as the complete Blood of the One God.

The Lord existed above the legion of gods, and one could only wonder how many drops of blood he had. He could create immortal worlds! Right now, Yang Qi’s blood was one ten thousandth as strong as the Lord’s, which was still incredibly powerful.

It was only after absorbing deathless godliness, as well as numerous immortals, that he had succeeded. This new drop of the Blood of the One God was filled with the power of actual godliness! Comparatively speaking, the previous Blood of the One God that he had formed might as well have been the blood of pigs or dogs.

From this point on, producing Blood of the One God would be incomparably difficult, but also vastly mightier.

“Hand of the One God! Immortality!”

With this new strength, Yang Qi was more powerful than ever!

In the blink of an eye, over a hundred heavenly soldiers and commanders were flattened and absorbed by the godmammoth projection.

“Ten Hell Portals!”

The Hell Portal improved again, adding another gate that belched boundless devil energy. Now, even more fiend-devils poured out into the open, even stronger ones than before.

Within the planetary system, there were hundreds of billions of planets, all of them filled with people who were looking up in terror at the chaotic battle taking place. As space shattered, ruins from ancient times became visible.

After all, there were plenty of ruins in the Yore-Wilds and the magical fluctuations and shockwaves of the battle were causing many of them to be revealed. Sparks flew and primal-chaos reigned.

Chapter 539: Holding the Line

Yang Qi’s energy arts were now so powerful that they could encompass the entire Sage Monarch planetary system, including the Four Wilds and the Central Planetary River.

The godmammoth projection inhaled, its power reaching out to all of the countless ruins out in the void.

In the blink of an eye, everything began rushing toward Yang Qi, including two godrelics whose godliness he didn’t hesitate to absorb. Power erupted within him and another hundred million megamammoths transformed into dracomammoths.

‘Excellent. Godrelics! In the urgency to prepare for this war, I forgot to check what power reserves might be hidden out in the old Yore-Wilds.’

As of this moment, he had a total of seven hundred million dracomammoths!

Unfortunately, that placed him in something of a bottleneck.

Considering the forcefulness with which he was advancing his cultivation, he was already grasping at traces of universal rotations. That meant that a breakthrough to the Universal Demi-Immortal level was approaching.

Yang Qi wasn’t holding anything back. With his armies of fiend-devils bolstered by the Eternal Heavenly Aria, he blasted immortals into dust wherever he went. The experts of this fiendslave battalion were actually unable to take him down, even by mobbing him in great numbers.

Perhaps if Yang Qi had been fighting alone, they would eventually have been able to overwhelm him. But he had his Hell Portals, and there was no way the Titan Emperor Heaven could possibly compare to the Hell of Mahānata.

In a massively large-scale conflict, the Eternal Heavenly Aria was a complete game-changer.

More and more immortals were falling in battle.

Obviously, the forces of this fiendslave battalion were not happy with how the battle was going. Therefore, it came as no surprise when some of the leaders called for their troops to use immortal formations.

“This monster is too strong! Everyone, join forces. We've got to kill him! Use the Heaven-Shattering God-Sword Void-Slicing Immortal Formation! Attack!”

Swish!

An enormous god-sword appeared, slicing through the void with incredible speed. It even destroyed planets as it headed toward Yang Qi, casting everything into primal-chaos.

Crack! Snap!

Sword energy slashed fiend-devils to bits, killing too many to count and devastating their devil formations.

Then the enormous sword was right in front of Yang Qi, backed by the power of countless tens of thousands of immortals.

“Excellent. Go ahead and hit me with a sword. My body is deathless!”

Yang Qi faced the incoming sword and drew on the power of the Wheel of Fate. Then he threw out the Hand of the One God, imbuing it with yin and yang, the five phases, and the eight trigrams.

WHIZZZ!

Massive amounts of godpower slammed into the dazzling light of the god-sword and a destructive shock wave blasted out in all directions.

“Die, you freakish hellion! The will of the Void-Slicing God-Sword can sever all emptiness!”

Countless tens upon tens of thousands of soldiers from the fiendslave battalion were pooling their true energy to unleash an immortal curse, which poured more power into the massive god-sword. As the magical symbol created by the curse entered the sword, it grew larger than before.

Unexpectedly, Yang Qi was unable to vanquish this sword!

As he stood there holding the sword at bay, countless immortals suffered backlashes and screamed as they were transformed into dust. Meanwhile, endless numbers of fiend-devils exploded, to the extent that not even ten Hell Portals could make up for the losses.

In the blink of an eye, the Sage Monarch planetary system was placed in grave danger.

“Screw this! Void-Slicing God-Sword? Not even immortal sword formations can stand up to me!” As Yang Qi quivered with rage, the Blood of the One God in his forehead stirred and the Infernal Deity Spear appeared in his hand. This time, the spear was stronger than it had ever been.

In fact, it was far larger than the Void-Slicing God-Sword!

Yang Qi was going all in!

Swish!

As the spear stabbed forth, countless fiend-devils were sucked into it, adding to its power and causing it to burn with infernal flame, the type that could actually injure members of the legion of gods.

When the spear hit, the Void-Slicing God-Sword crumbled like a dried twig!

Then the spear went on to stab deeply into the immortal formation, shattering it and sending infernal flame shooting into the countless immortals who had been powering it. Any immortal touched by the flame was instantly transformed into a monster and sucked into the spear.

“Attack!”

Yang Qi advanced like a dragon or tiger, slashing the spear back and forth, slaughtering immortal soldiers everywhere.

Meanwhile, higher up, heavenly soldiers and commanders alike were in the middle of slaughtering fiend-devils when they looked down and saw Yang Qi slaughtering their fellow members of the fiendslave battalion.

“How dare you, fiend-devil!”

Instantly, some of the troops began carving their way through the fiend-devils to a central position on the battlefield. These were particularly fierce members of the battalion, soldiers with extensive training who were highly adept at working with spell formations. As they formed ranks, they began chanting an ancient hexing curse.

RUMBLE!

An enormous god-weapon appeared, a lance that was larger than a planet.

Then another massive weapon appeared, an enormous saber.

An axe!

A pitchfork!

A hammer!

Five enormous god-weapons appeared, all of them stronger and larger than the Void-Slicing God-Sword. Furthermore, together they conformed to the five phases.

Gong!

Yang Qi had just killed a whole group of immortals and was in the middle of bolstering his power reserves. Before he could finish, he was being hit with another powerful attack—five enormous god-weapons that, despite not being corporeal, were each backed by over a hundred thousand heavenly soldiers and commanders.

In other words, Yang Qi was being simultaneously struck by five hundred thousand enemy immortals. That was enough power to destroy an entire planetary system.

Even as the five god-weapons were merely closing in on Yang Qi, he was hit with a suffocating gale-force wind.

He couldn’t even rely on the Wheel of Fate. He had to bear the brunt of the blow. If he didn't, the Sage Monarch planetary system would be destroyed, crushed into ash. As for the fiend-devil army, it wasn’t able to bear the force and shattered.

“The Sovereign Lord of the gods is paramount and holds the great dao in his hands, and magical law in his heart!” In the shortest of moments, Yang Qi became like an ancient heaven-god with ten thousand heads and ten thousand arms, pulsing with deathless godliness!

Even as he transformed, his two primary hands performed a complex sealing incantation as he shoved them out in front of him. All of the countless hands then went through the nine stances of the Hand of the One God, unleashing the power to connect the mortal world with the immortal world.

As the two attacks collided, the ten Hell Portals shattered and uncountable numbers of fiend-devils were transformed into ashes. They didn’t even have a chance to scream!

POP!

Yang Qi coughed up a mouthful of blood filled with chunks of energy from the projected body of pure power he had transformed into. The attack of the five god-weapons had completely vanquished his incarnation!

Those five weapons were so powerful that no one in the mortal world could possibly stand up to them—not even Yang Qi! Just as the old adage explained, two fists are no match for four hands.

Not even the deathless godliness in Yang Qi’s cultivation base was enough to equal five hundred thousand immortals. Perhaps if those five hundred thousand enemies were completely disunited, he might have stood a chance. But instead, they were working together in spell formations.

“Good. We almost killed him. Unfortunately a centipede does not stop wriggling even after being stomped on. Don't give him a chance to catch his breath! Now that he can’t summon any more fiend-devils, let’s join forces and end him!”

Howling battle cries, the soldiers of the fiendslave battalion rushed forward.

RUMBLE!

This time, the enemy forces summoned an enormous pagoda, large enough to contain over ten thousand planets, and it was clearly far mightier than the five god-weapons.

It was the Planet-Burning God-Pagoda, which was formed by a combination of three hundred thousand heavenly soldiers and commanders! They were going all out in the hopes of killing Yang Qi and being rewarded by the immortal world.

As the Planet-Burning God-Pagoda descended, Yang Qi felt as if the sky were spinning and locking him in place.

‘God Legion Seal, please, unleash your might!’

Yang Qi was incapable of moving, and the entire Sage Monarch planetary system was in grave danger.

His Blood of the One God stirred and the God Legion Seal erupted with power. The golden imp connected to Yang Qi’s nascent divinity, making him seem as though he was the legion of gods, and the legion of gods was him.

“I am the most paramount entity in existence. I control the legion of gods. My breath creates heaven and earth. The snap of my finger brings about the universe. I decree fate. I am pāramitā….”  He allowed himself to be sucked into the pagoda, where he sat down and began glowing with a bright golden light as the power of the God Legion Seal swept through him.

He was staking everything on this one move!

Instantly, all of his injuries and wounds were healed. Next, he opened his mouth and a godmammoth appeared around him, which inhaled deeply.

Crack. Crunch.

The immense Planet-Burning God Pagoda suddenly began crumbling, allowing its power to flow into Yang Qi.

Chapter 540: Going All In

Yang Qi was putting everything on the line, and had even gone so far as to burn that incredibly strong drop of the Blood of the One God that he had just formed.

That blood was so strong that it could push him to a level of fighting prowess ten times normal.

To deal with the Planet Burning God-Pagoda, Yang Qi burned it without hesitation, unleashing the full power of the God Legion Seal. In the blink of an eye, his fighting prowess began to skyrocket.

He took a breath and the Planet-Burning God-Pagoda shattered, transforming into power that he inhaled. As the Heaven and Earth Furnace began burning even more brightly than before, Yang Qi shot into motion, breaking through the walls of the pagoda and appearing out in the open.

“AAAAIIIIEEE!!!”

The countless nearby members of the fiendslave battalion were hit with a tremendous force, and all of them sustained grievous injuries. Then, Yang Qi began singing the Eternal Heavenly Aria and the enemy forces immediately began to weaken and wither. Power streamed out of the Heaven and Earth Furnace, incinerating countless immortals and sucking them back in to start replenishing the wasted Blood of the One God.

RUMBLE!

Ten Hell Portals popped into being, and waves of fiend-devils poured out of them.

Yang Qi was preparing to unleash a massacre again!

The weeping of ghosts and wailing of gods drifted out as countless tens of thousands of fiendslave battalion soldiers were mowed down. In the shortest of moments, Yang Qi’s Blood of the One God was restored!

Yang Qi was back, stronger than ever. It was almost as though he were an unkillable god!

“What's going on? Is this guy really impossible to kill? The five god-weapons clearly hit him, and even shattered his incarnation. Then he was crushed by the Planet-Burning God-Pagoda. He should have ended up sealed in the pagoda, unable to get out. But somehow he broke free, and even took some power from the pagoda! What level is he? Don’t tell me we're going to fail to kill him?”

Although these immortals from the fiendslave battalion were fiendish, vicious killers, as of this moment they were terrified. Yang Qi was so strong that it seemed he might be impossible to kill. They were hitting him with power that could destroy planetary systems, yet he came out alive every single time. Worse, he seemed to be getting stronger.

Who wouldn’t feel terrified when facing a person like that in battle?

Suddenly, some of the heavenly soldiers and commanders began backing up.

These were people who were used to treating good people with ferocity, not the other way around! They all thirsted to live, and were not the type who would flock to their own deaths for the sake of the immortal world they came from. In fact, they all hated the immortal world, and would have rebelled against it if they could. Now that they could see firsthand just how deadly and merciless Yang Qi was, why would they put their lives on the line to fight him?

In the shortest of moments, the immortals’ morale collapsed.

The soldiers were thrown into pandemonium, and as they retreated, their overall fighting ability suffered a stunning eighty percent reduction.

WHIZZZ!

The entire force scattered. Yang Qi had just forced a hundred thousand heavenly soldiers into chaos. Moments ago, the soldiers had been working in teams to kill him with the five god-weapons, but now, most of that group was dead. And no one else had the heart to fight.

Of course, troops in chaos were much easier to kill.

Even the fiend-devils could slaughter them.

RUMBLE!

Yang Qi summoned more and more fiend-devils through the ten Hell Portals. This time, they were all vicious asuras.

Yang Qi had connected to the hell most fully aligned with the martial path: the Hell of Suras.

The asuras immediately began falling into spell formations and releasing terrifyingly destructive force on the enemy.

Each of the asuras was a half-Demolisher, and also blessed by the Eternal Heavenly Aria. They had no regard for personal safety and they charged forth like an enormous chisel, piercing deep into the forces of the fiendslave battalion.

The corpses of immortals began falling like rain.

Whizzing sounds could be heard as a huge vortex opened, which swallowed the corpses midway through their descent. Each corpse would be a fount of resources, thus, the vortex sucked them in and sent them directly to the kingdom in the Hell of Mahānata.

Eldest Brother and the other important people were there to receive the power, and were using the Heaven Bracing Godwood and other unique items to strengthen the kingdom around them.

Therefore, when the immortal corpses arrived they couldn’t have been more delighted. In the blink of an eye, the kingdom’s greyspace grew stronger and thicker.

Eldest Brother sent the thirty-six halls of the Mourn-Parting Heaven-Palace into the kingdom, then produced the seventy-seven imperial snakecharms, which transformed into a primal-chaos elder-snake that flew out to aid Yang Qi.

“Junior Eighteenth Brother, at this point we don’t need the imperial snakecharms to strengthen the kingdom! Take them and use their power to slaughter more of those heavenly soldiers!”

“Excellent, with those seventy-seven added to the one hundred and eight from Chief Beastmaster, I have a total of one hundred and eighty-five. What a terrifying level of power!”

Yang Qi combined all of the imperial snakecharms into one huge primal-chaos elder-snake.

Ordinary people would have trouble wielding the imperial snakecharms, but not Yang Qi, especially since he had taken deathless godliness from god items and godrelics. By now, the snakecharms were pulsing with the will of the original King Heaven-Devourer and were stronger than ever.

Roar!

Yang Qi stood atop the enormous snake as it devoured immortals this way and that. With each bite, hundreds, or possibly even thousands, were consumed.

“Time to restore the glory of the original King Heaven-Devourer. Talismans, combine with me! Be bolstered by the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth! Primal-Chaos Elder-Snake: Snakes Devour Mammoths!”

Yang Qi suddenly vanished as he fused with the primal-chaos elder-snake, fueling it with the essence of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. Instantly, the snake grew even larger and began gobbling up the immortals even more ferociously.

Another group of a hundred thousand soldiers managed to get into a spell formation and unleash another god-weapon. But at this point, would it do them any good?

The primal-chaos elder-snake opened its mouth wide and devoured the weapon and all of the heavenly soldiers and commanders. They were like ants compared to this snake! Yang Qi was absolutely destroying this fiendslave battalion.

POP!

Suddenly, another Hell Portal popped into being, giving him a total of eleven. Now, it wasn’t asuras pouring out of them, but the more noble Infernalfolk. They wore dark golden armor, making them look like ancient gods, and they struck fear into the hearts of the immortals.

A moment later, and another hundred thousand heavenly soldiers had been wiped out of existence.

The immortals of the fiendslave battalion continued pouring down from the immortal world, and those who appeared launched attacks at Yang Qi, including god-weapons. Yet they couldn't do anything to the enormous snake.

By this point, the snake had configured itself into a formation. Attack the head, the tail would defend. Attack the tail, the head would defend. Attack the middle, both the head and the tail would defend.

The ancient King Heaven-Devourer had waged war in the form of a primal-chaos elder-snake, and would devour immortal world after immortal world. As for a tiny place like the Titan Emperor Heaven, he could devour ten thousand of them with ease. He had even devoured ancient gods. Of course, Yang Qi didn’t have all of the imperial snakecharms. He only had a bit less than two hundred, with the total possible number being three thousand. However, he had more than enough to deal with a few immortals.

And with the God Legion Seal powering the primal-chaos elder-snake, it could crush these enemies like dry weeds.

In the shortest of moments, it had consumed hundreds of thousands of soldiers, storing their power for later use.

After all, when Yang Qi went for his next breakthrough, he would need a huge amount of power.

Of course, achieving that breakthrough would be easier said than done. To reach the Universal Demi-Immortal level, he would need much more deathless godliness in reserve.

At the moment, he was now able to hold his own against this fiendslave battalion, and was convinced that the immortal world wouldn't continue to just throw its troops away. They would definitely retreat soon.

If they didn’t, he would just keep slaughtering them. And if he couldn't last that long, he would fall back to his kingdom in the Hell of Mahānata. With the corpses he had on hand, he would have enough power to sustain his clan for ten thousand years.

More fiend-devils poured out of the Hell Portals, and more heavenly soldiers and commanders descended from above. Neither side seemed capable of completely tipping the scales. No matter how many immortals Yang Qi’s primal-chaos elder-snake consumed, more would come. And it was the same with the fallen fiend-devils.

The falling corpses of the immortals continued being fed to the Hell of Mahānata, where they made the Yang Clan stronger and stronger. Of course, losses such as this were still within the realm of acceptability to the immortal world.

And the fiend-devils were dying in numbers tens or even hundreds of thousands greater than the heavenly soldiers.

RUMBLE!

All of a sudden, another portal opened from the immortal world and even more fiendslave battalion soldiers poured out.

Yang Qi could immediately sense that these people had god items; these were obviously crack troops.

His hope of gaining a victory suddenly faded a bit….

Chapter 541: A God Item Appears

Battle raged between the Fiendslave Battalion and the armies of fiend-devils.

The killing aura had already pierced through the entire Dark True Void to the neighboring Megaplexus planetary system, and the shockwaves from the fighting had even destroyed some of the planets there. The cultivators in those parts were fleeing in terror.

Of course, the top experts in the Megaplexus planetary system were aware of what was happening.

Their planetary system was a much more flourishing place than the Titan Emperor planetary system, with as many experts as the sky had clouds. In fact, they had multiple old-timers who had already passed their Demolishing level tribulations.

When the Demolishers realized what was happening in the neighboring planetary system, they flew up in shock to see what was happening. And without fail, they all trembled in fear when they saw the truth.

This was a fight that they definitely couldn’t participate in. Some of them considered that when the sandpiper and the clam fight, the fisherman benefits, but in the end, not even that was an option. This was a battle the likes of which existed only in the epic sagas of the past. When immortal worlds and fiend-devils waged war, ordinary people could only tremble like weak insects.

“Hurry up and lock down the planetary system before we get sucked into this disaster! My god! How could a fight like this even be happening? Is it an invasion from hell?” Some of the experts from the Megaplexus Collegium were even considering evacuating the planetary system as a whole. The nearby fighting was just too intense.

One of the experts who was in the know stepped forward and said, “I think I know what’s going on here, Supreme Rector. A rebel student rose up in the Titan Emperor Collegium, a guy named Yang Qi. He’s a matchless genius who actually overthrew the collegium. However, the immortal world found out and sent down an army to punish him. Neither side is willing to back down, and it’s hard to say how things will turn out in the end.”

“What? That’s crazy! This rebel, Yang Qi, is incredible. He actually destroyed the Titan Emperor Collegium? And now he's fighting with the immortal world above him? How could he have so many fiend-devils on his side? Is he the son of one of the suzerains of hell?” The supreme rector was trembling with astonishment and fear. Although his cultivation base was close to the level of the heavenly soldiers and commanders, he knew that if he were to join the fighting, he wouldn’t even count as cannon fodder.

“In the end, Supreme Rector, it doesn’t matter. We have to report the matter to the immortal world above. The Titan Emperor Heaven has sent one of their fiendslave battalions down, and if they get out of control it could affect our Megaplexus planetary system. Those soldiers would be worse than a swarm of fiend-devil locusts!”

“That's right. Notify the immortal world immediately. Let them come take charge. That stupid Titan Emperor Heaven! They’re too weak right now anyway, and all the immortal worlds look down on them. If they dare to invade our Megaplexus planetary system, it would be an outright provocation of the Megaplexus Heaven. And there’s no way the Megaplexus Heaven will let them run amok.” The Supreme Rector considered the matter, taking into account his good relationship with the immortal world above.

Meanwhile, similar scenes were playing out in other affected planetary systems, such as the Coiling Arc and Highest Clarity planetary systems. All such locations sent notifications to the heavens above them.

In a hidden location in the depths of space, the yellow-garbed young man with the buzz cut looked at the epic battle playing out and said, “Chancellor Demi-Immortal, are you seeing this? The fighting has finally begun. Who would ever have guessed that Yang Qi would be this strong? He’s surpassed me in every way. Ai. After all of my cultivation progress in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, I thought that I would be able to take him on. But he progressed even more than I did.”

He knew that if he were involved in the fighting, he would be killed beyond the shadow of a doubt. Compared to the immortal army or the fiend-devils, he was little more than an ant.

Gritting his teeth, Chancellor Demi-Immortal replied, “Damnation. I can’t believe Yang Qi has reached that level. He’s even capable of contending with the immortal world above! That being said, the Titan Emperor Heaven is huge. There’s no way he’ll be able to hold out forever. We’ll still get our chance.”

“No. We're no match for him right now. If we want to kill him, I have to gain complete control of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. And you need to go to the immortal worlds above and look for your chance to inherit the core teachings and doctrines of one of their leaders.”

The young man sighed. “Considering how strong Yang Qi is, I'd say that even if the immortal world continues sending people against him, he’ll still survive. After all, he could always just retreat to the Hell of Mahānata. It’s not like the immortal world will take the fight there. Not even the ruler of the Titan Emperor Heaven would have the guts to do that. Yang Qi is clever, and always leaves a path of retreat open. That kingdom in the Hell of Mahānata is the perfect place to fall back to. Right now, he's basically unbeatable! And the more immortals he kills in battle, the more resources he builds up for his own cultivation. After this fight is over, he's going to be stronger than ever, and we won’t have any hope of catching up to him. Come on, let’s go. We have no chance of gaining anything from this situation!”

“But… but this is such a good opportunity!” Chancellor Demi-Immortal clearly didn’t want to back down.

“No, it’s not. It’s a good way to get killed, that’s all. We don’t have what it takes to handle Yang Qi right now. Let's go, before it's too late.”

Gong!

Meanwhile, the sound of a bell echoed out on the battlefield, a tolling filled with deathless godliness.

It was a god item!

The fiendslave battalion had suffered casualties of over a million soldiers, and the fiend-devil forces only seemed to be growing more numerous. At this point, the top experts in the battalion finally resorted to a god item in the hopes of killing Yang Qi and seizing victory.

A soldier appeared, a hulking, burly young man in a shining suit of armor. His shoulders seemed broad enough to prop up mountains, and his eyes were like the deepest of seas. In his hand was an enormous copper bell, which was currently quivering after having been struck.

“Bell of the Dueling Titan!” the young man shouted. Glaring at Yang Qi, he continued, “Surrender, fiend-devil! Otherwise you’ll regret what's coming next! I'm Titan Firstdragon, imperial clansman and general in this battalion. This god item is designed to crush hordes of wretch-devils. I’ve used it to kill more fiend-devils than you could even count. And you’re next!”

This Titan Firstdragon seemed no weaker than Immortal Officer Fallen Red. He was at least a third stage Thought-Demolisher, whose mere thoughts could be incarnated as worlds.

“Thousand Worlds!” He blinked, and worlds shot out of his eyes, interlacing, overlapping, and causing deafening grating noises filled with godliness to echo out. Instantly, he became the focus of the entire battlefield.

Moments ago, Yang Qi had used his primal-chaos elder-snake to consume over a hundred thousand heavenly soldiers and commanders, giving him access to an immense conglomeration of power that simply couldn’t be refined and absorbed in any short amount of time.

The power that continued flowing into him allowed him to summon fiend-devils in even greater numbers.

Ten billion. A hundred billion. The fiend-devils poured out of hell and onto the battlefield, creating a force that seemed capable of completely crushing the fiendslave battalion.

Many soldiers in the fiendslave battalion were already trembling in terror, and had lost their will to fight. They wanted to return to the immortal world, but knew they couldn’t. Given the current state of battle, it seemed possible that their entire battalion would end up being wiped out.

When Yang Qi saw Titan Firstdragon and his Bell of the Dueling Titan, a slight smile appeared on his face, and he knew that a critical moment in the fight had begun.

“Prepare to die!” he said. Then he once again activated the God Legion Seal. “Celestial heaven, terrestrial earth, the universe of yore; the actions of the gods, the fate of the Sovereign Lord….”

In the blink of an eye, power surged through him and he erupted into flame.

The primal-chaos elder-snake vanished. The Hell Portals disappeared.

No more fiend-devils were summoned.

Yang Qi became a brightly burning fire that spread out to cover an area of several dozen kilometers. Strangely, the fire actually didn’t emanate any heat and looked very much like a flower.

Primordial chaos appeared within it, as well as a sensation of intense hope that filled everyone present with anticipation for the future.

Yang Qi had become a flower that only an ancient god should possess. It was hope embodied as a flower, a flower of fire, a flame of flowers. It was the next manifestation of the Wheel of Fate.

The Flame of Hope.

POP!

The fire pierced through the array of worlds, shining with the hope of the ancient legion of gods, filled with radiance and light, as well as the thrum of blessings.

Titan Firstdragon didn’t even have a chance to react. The Flame of Hope stabbed through his defenses and then into his chest. In the blink of an eye, everything about him was removed. His essence, power, heart, lungs, kidneys, intestines, and even his sea of energy. It was all gone, leaving behind only the husk of an immortal body.

“Aaaiiiieee!” he screamed, stumbling backward, his eyes shining with disbelief. “How could this be happening? What energy art is that? Only one move pierced through my Thousand Worlds?”

RIIIIP!

The Flame of Hope shot past him, then circled back around.

His head flew off of his shoulders, and the rest of his body turned into pure power that the Flame of Hope burned away. Then, the Bell of the Dueling Titan fell into the depths of the fire.

“What an incredible god item!” Yang Qi said. The Flame of Hope burned the god item away, consuming a godliness that surpassed the Chiliocosm Mirror and the Golden Wheel of Nirvanic Extinction by several times over.

More deathless godliness poured into Yang Qi.

“Time for a breakthrough! Eighth order: Universal Demi-Immortal! Fiendslave Battalion, your end is nigh! Now get the hell out of the mortal world!”

Chapter 542: Reaching the Eighth Order

Titan Firstdragon’s god item, the Bell of the Dueling Titan, was not a lesser godly item. It was a common godly item.

That meant that it had ten times the amount of godliness as lesser godly items, and was vastly more powerful. Weaker immortals wouldn’t even be able to use something like that, and would actually end up killed by the process.

Yang Qi knew full well how amazing this god item was.

That was why, as soon as it appeared, he had already made up his mind about what to do. He struck with lightning speed, like a falcon dropping onto a hare, except with the force of a dragon god.

It was a deadly strike of the most vicious nature, and was reminiscent of the occasion years ago when he had taken out a black floodwyrm with a single blow.

In a straight duel, Titan Firstdragon was simply no match for him. After all, Yang Qi was far stronger than he had been in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, where he had defeated Immortal Officer Fallen Red and took her god item. Titan Firstdragon was stronger than her, but not strong enough to make him a match for Yang Qi.

Titan Firstdragon descended from the immortal world with a god item designed to crush wretch-devils. Never in his wildest nightmares could he have imagined he would be reduced to dust by a single attack and have his god item snatched away.

It happened so quickly that many of the onlookers felt their heads spinning.

However, the fighting continued in most places, with the fiend-devils and the fiendslave battalion soldiers slaughtering each other in great numbers. And even after Titan Firstdragon died, the soldiers of the fiendslave battalion continued pouring down into the lower world; clearly, the Titan Emperor Heaven was still not ready to back down.

As for the crack troops that Titan Firstdragon had been leading, they struck with both grief and fury. They knew that, considering Yang Qi had killed Titan Firstdragon, if they didn’t avenge the death, they would be executed. After all, they were all nobodies in the immortal world and would be punished strictly for the slightest mistake.

“He killed General Titan Firstdragon! And he took the Bell of the Dueling Titan! We have to kill this wretch-devil! If we go back to the immortal world without his head, we’ll be severely punished!”

“You’re right! Join forces and attack him. If we don't, we're finished! Titan Firstdragon was an imperial clansman, so his death is going to be a big deal!”

“Kill him! Ghost Warrior Heaven Soldier!”

“Painting of Immortal Immolation!”

Without any hesitation, they rushed forward and attacked Yang Qi.

Millions and millions of heavenly soldiers formed ranks and pulled out god-weapons as they closed in. One of the particularly powerful items was a painting depicting the immolation and assimilation of immortals.

The Painting of Immortal Immolation.

‘What?’ Yang Qi thought. ‘Painting of Immortal Immolation? I remember an aristocratic clan here in the mortal world that had an energy art like that. What clan was that…? The Gu Clan. Who would have thought I would see this thing again. So, this is the full version. Hmph! Thankfully, I put the Gu Clan in their place. This thing is actually really powerful!’

Yang Qi glanced expressionlessly at the incoming forces, then shifted his attention to the tribulation forming overhead.

This was an eighth order tribulation, which would end with him reaching the Universal Demi-Immortal level. As it formed, heaven and earth transformed and primal-chaos spread. In the blink of an eye, countless planets came into being, all of them immense and incredibly tough.

At first, the planets were bare and devoid of life. But within moments, they sprouted mountains, oceans, spirit energy, and power. They quickly became beautiful fonts of life, places filled with good fortune and the wonder of nature.

Because of the fighting between the fiend-devils and the fiendslave battalion, many surrounding planets had been reduced to rubble. But now that Yang Qi was breaking into the Universal Demi-Immortal level, the tribulation itself was replacing those planets. In fact, there were a hundred times as many planets as before. There were hundreds of billions of them, and after the tribulation passed, they would remain as places that living beings could flourish in.

And they would also become very useful to defend against future enemy invasions.

The descending planets also affected the fiendslave battalion, and many of the soldiers who had been charging toward Yang Qi were crushed out of existence by them.

It was a heavenly tribulation of unprecedented intensity. Massive amounts of lightning spread out, assailing Yang Qi with incredible force. The forces of earth, water, fire, and wind attacked him, and a host of immortals flew toward him in suicide attacks. The dao of heaven shattered, and cosmic rays slammed into him. However, in the end he simply absorbed the power and refined it for his own use.

There were even heaven-devils present, but he assimilated them all.

Yang Qi was stepping into the Universal Demi-Immortal level!

It was an important level, and a bottleneck within the overarching Demi-Immortal level. When ordinary cultivators reached that point, they could pluck stars and snatch moons, perform astral redirections, move planets, set up massive spell formations, create planetary systems, and unleash numerous aspects of the dao of immortals. But considering Yang Qi was breaking through with eight hundred forty million particles and perfect genes, his capabilities could not be described in ordinary terms.

Massive energy flows were currently wrapping him up. Suns, moons, and other heavenly bodies floated around him, and his Blood of the One God surged, advancing to the level of two ten-thousandths. Each advancement of the Blood of the One God required dozens, or even hundreds of times the power and godliness of the previous step.

More deathless transformations occurred in Yang Qi.

Crack. Crunch.

The final one hundred and forty million particles within him became dracomammoths. They were megamammoths, except covered with scales and with curving, draconic horns on their heads. They were like mammoths, but not. They were like dragons, but not. And they pulsed with a godly might that originated in ancient times.

The divine abilities of dracomammoths surpassed those of megamammoths by many times. They could traverse space, move planets, pierce through planes, and consume the void. They were like god-dragons of immense and invincible godly might.

He now had eight hundred forty million dracomammoth particles, all awake.

His Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth was now so incredible that not even immortals could rival it.

“Eighteen Hell Portals! Twenty-four Hell Portals. Thirty-six Hell Portals! Come forth, fiend-devil Demolishers!”

RUMBLE!

He threw his hands wide and the heavenly tribulation was destroyed.

Then, one Hell Portal after another popped into existence, and fiend-devils poured out of them, armies that vastly surpassed the fiendslave battalion.

The aura spreading out made it seem like hell had come to this mortal plane.

Demolisher fiend-devils of all sorts appeared. Asuras. Giant snakes. Destruction devil-gods. Infernalfolk. Bleachbone devil dictators. As they emerged and formed ranks, they were blessed by primeval god skills, causing them to howl at the tops of their lungs and lunge toward the fiendslave battalion, their eyes burning bright red.

Now that Yang Qi was a Universal Demi-Immortal, he could summon fiend-devil Demolishers, who were true immortals. In a single breath of time, the fighting prowess of the fiendslave battalion was matched. In fact, the hell-born fiend-devils had genes that made them stronger than the heavenly soldiers and commanders.

The battlefield was thrown into chaos.

The two sides slammed into each other, and shockingly fierce fighting broke out. Blood fell like rain, creating a most shocking scene.

The old invasion of the Hell of Euphoria was like nothing compared to this.

Millions and millions of fiend-devils and heavenly soldiers fell, and their corpses went straight into the kingdom in the Hell of Mahānata, where they piled up like mountains. It was actually a terrifying sight—even to Eldest Brother, Second Elder Brother, and the others.

Before long, the fiendslave battalion soldiers were struck with absolute fear.

They were thinking, feeling immortals, unlike the summoned fiend-devils, who literally didn't care if they died and would fight with crazed insanity.

The heavenly soldiers were cursed with halos of damnification, while the fiend-devils were blessed, making them even stronger than normal. How were the soldiers supposed to fight in conditions like that?

The tide of battle had been tipped to the point where one fiend-devil could slaughter ten fiendslave battalion soldiers before falling.

“Begin the counteroffensive!” Yang Qi shouted. Bugle calls echoed out and war drums were beaten. Banners waved and blood surged. It almost seemed like the past, present, and future were trembling from the force of it all.

As the fiend-devils advanced, the heavenly soldiers and commanders were powerless to fight back and began dropping like flies.

It was a major blow to the immortal world, a disaster and an absolute humiliation.

Millions of heavenly soldiers fell, their corpses dropping to the planets below, to the Hell of Mahānata, and even into Yang Qi’s Heaven and Earth Furnace.

He would use their power to both bolster the Sage Monarch planetary system, and make himself stronger.

“Flee!”

At long last, the invaders lost all heart.

They fled like bees from a fallen hive, heading not to the immortal world, but in every other direction.

They knew that returning to where they had come from would mean death. Instead, they would find places in the mortal world where they could establish authority and be rulers in their own right. Perhaps they would never achieve cultivation advancement, but at least they wouldn't end up dead.

The immortal world's army had been completely routed.

Chapter 543: The Immortal World Defeated

The moment Yang Qi reached the Universal Demi-Immortal level, he became capable of summoning fiend-devil Demolishers. And when he blessed them with the Eternal Heavenly Aria, they became even more and more amazing.

It took only moments for this fiendslave battalion to be absolutely devastated. Not a single soldier was able to fight back against the fiend-devils that were now present, and the outcome of the conflict was a foregone conclusion. The fiendslave battalion from the immortal world was doomed.

Yang Qi would smash them into pancakes, then reduce them to nothing but ashes.

His Lord’s Eye shone with dazzling light, and wherever he looked, he locked down members of the fiendslave battalion.

Screams rang out one after another.

Enormous holes had been punched in heaven, and some of the soldiers began trampling each other to death in their attempts to reach their portals and escape back to the immortal world.

“Mend heaven!” Yang Qi said forcefully. “The dao of heaven has mercy; use my power to mend the vault of heaven; cut off the immortals above!”

Complex godly laws shot out and primal-chaos paleo-energy erupted, filling in the holes above. As for the soldiers who had been fleeing through them, they were killed, sealed inside the energy like flies in amber.

Yang Qi was mending heaven.

As a result, it would be impossible for heavenly soldiers and commanders from the Titan Emperor Heaven to descend.

Generally speaking, the most paramount of magical laws would prevent immortals from descending to lower worlds. The Titan Emperor Heaven had forcibly opened passageways, an act which required a big expenditure of power.

Now, Yang Qi was using primal-chaos paleo-energy to fill in those holes and seal them tight.

The process lasted for several days, during which time the fiend-devils tracked down as many remaining soldiers as they could. In the end, Yang Qi sealed heaven tightly, adding in deathless godliness and creating numerous deadly spell formations as well.

As for the Four Wilds, the Central Planetary River, and the Sage Monarch planetary system as a whole, they had all been severely damaged in the fighting. But now they were transforming. More planets were being born, adding to the influx from the heavenly tribulation. And many of the planets were being strung into god formations.

As time went on, the smaller god formations were then collected together to form a larger, overarching god formation.

Hundreds of billions of planets hung there, packed densely all the way to the edge of the Dark True Void. No longer did this planetary system seem desolate and wasted, like before.

The Yore-Wilds planetary system was a thing of the past, and the only thing that remained was Yang Qi’s new planetary system, which he had created himself. The Sage Monarch planetary system had risen.

The first stance of the Hand of the One God was Creation, and he was using it to full effect now.

Every planet abounded with spirit energy, and beautiful terrain features could be seen everywhere. All individuals who practiced cultivation here would consider the place a blessed land.

Heaps of immortal corpses had fallen onto the various planets, allowing their greyspaces to become full and strong. Furthermore, the entire Sage Monarch planetary system abounded with immortal energy, making the place seem like a small-scale immortal world.

Meanwhile, the fiend-devil armies spread along the edge of the Dark True Void, setting up bases and garrisons and keeping everything in perfect order. The fiend-devil armies were completely different from the fiendslave battalion. The latter was plagued with deadly infighting and was generally disunited. But the fiend-devils were completely loyal to Yang Qi and had all sorts of daily tasks such as patrols and training. They also prayed to Yang Qi, delivering their faith to him.

Soon, the dust settled.

Days passed as Yang Qi mended heaven and continued strengthening his planetary system. After destroying the Titan Emperor planetary system, he created his own small-scale immortal world, whose environment rivaled the Megaplexus or Coiling Arc planetary systems. Soon, top geniuses would rise up.

After all, the place was also a graveyard of immortals.

“You can come out now,” Yang Qi said via divine will, speaking to those who were in his kingdom in the Hell of Mahānata. That included his clan, the slaves from the former Titan Emperor Collegium, and numerous pious followers from the Four Wilds.

As of this moment, everyone who had witnessed the great battle between devils and immortals was fully convinced that Yang Qi was their leader, and would pray to him from day to night here on out.

Yang Qi’s Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth had improved and become more pure, and he now had much more Blood of the One God.

“The immortal tribulation has passed,” Yang Zhan sighed. “What do we do now, Qi’er? The Titan Emperor Heaven suffered a big loss. What if they send down an even stronger force to make up for it?”

“They won't,” Titan Duelbringer said. “The Titan Emperor Heaven is surrounded by danger on all sides. Lots of other immortal worlds want to invade them, and they hardly have enough manpower as it is. The lord of the immortal world spends all his time in meetings. And considering what just happened to this fiendslave battalion, they’re no match for milord now. They can’t afford to waste any more cannon fodder on us, and there’s no way they’ll send crack troops. It wouldn't be worth it for them to waste any effort on a minor situation here in the lower world. Most likely, they’ll pretend nothing happened here. Don’t ask, don’t tell. But they’ll obviously be keeping a close eye on any immortals who ascend, and kill any they find suspicious.”

“So that’s how it is,” Yang Qi said. “Are you saying that, when I ascend, I have to go to the Titan Emperor Heaven? Can’t I go to another immortal world?”

“Since ancient times, the Titan Emperor Heaven has kept reactive immortal energy in the planetary system around us. Anyone born here, who later ascends, will go to the Titan Emperor Heaven. It's a magical law that can’t be ignored. But don’t forget, Milord, considering your strength and capabilities, the immortal world above will definitely detect you if you go there. And the only way to get to other immortal worlds is to go to the Titan Emperor Heaven first.”

It was good that Titan Duelbringer was here to explain such matters. Although many ancient daoist texts in the mortal world had partial descriptions and explanations of these things, they obviously couldn’t match up to what an immortal emissary knew. The immortal worlds could change on a daily basis, and there were as many of them as the eternal grains of sand in the universe. Furthermore, immortal worlds were born and died constantly.

For all anyone knew, some almighty entity could descend and wipe out the Titan Emperor Heaven at any time, replacing it with a different immortal world.

“Wait a second,” Eldest Brother said. “You’re saying that if I ascend, I absolutely have to go to the Titan Emperor Heaven? Wouldn’t that be a death sentence? And considering that our Master ascended recently, do you think our actions could be a detriment to him?”

“There’s no choice other than the Titan Emperor Heaven. Some of what happens after you ascend depends on where you end up. Some locations there are sparsely populated. If you ended up somewhere like that, then as long as you didn’t disturb the natural laws of the immortal world by working on your immortal body, no one would notice you. But if you ended up in a densely populated area, people would definitely notice you and you’d be arrested immediately.”

Eldest Brother frowned even more deeply. “So I could go to the immortal world, but I couldn't form an immortal body or advance my cultivation base?”

“That’s right. According to imperial law, anyone who ascends to the immortal world and forms an immortal body is supposed to go to the court to register. Theoretically speaking, you could just not register. But if you did that, then formed an immortal body, you would face heavenly tribulation. Not only would you have to deal with the deadly tribulation, but the clouds that form above you would be visible for great distances. It would be impossible to stay hidden.

“Those rules don't just affect people who ascend; even natives born and raised in the immortal world have to go and register when they form an immortal body. Although the mystical network of laws in the immortal world is not as strict as it is here in the Sage Monarch planetary system, it still exists. In many ways, the immortal world operates on a structure of centralized state power, just like an empire of mortals.”

“I see,” Yang Qi said. “Eldest Brother, don’t ascend for the time being. Just work on building up your immortal power and on cultivating your godly-class energy art. Considering all the immortals I killed, you should have plenty of resources to keep your cultivation going. Besides, forming an immortal body in the Titan Emperor Heaven would actually be something of a waste of your potential. Once my cultivation base is a bit higher, I hope to be able to pierce to the Tusita Heaven and use their magical laws for that purpose.”

“Of course,” Eldest Brother replied. “Who wants an immortal body from the crappy Titan Emperor Heaven? I'm fully relying on you for everything, Junior Brother. You know, the fact that you defeated an army from the immortal world is completely unprecedented. There are definitely going to be epic sagas written about this. It'll be a myth that will last for all eternity. Now we need to focus on conquering other planetary systems. Why don't you let us Elder Brothers and Sisters do that for you? Give each of us an army of fiend-devils, and send us out to expand your mystical network of laws. The Invincible Society can conquer the world, and there won’t be anyone who can stand in our way.”

“I agree,” Yang Qi said, nodding. “How about I give each of you an army of ten billion fiend devils, and a hundred fiend-devil Demolishers? That should be more than enough for the campaign.”

“Perfect!” said Meng Shafan, the biggest killer of them all. “Whoever refuses to submit to your rule will be slaughtered down to the last man, Junior Brother. Faith only comes at the price of blood and fire.”

“Elder Seventh Brother is right,” Sword Seventeen said. “You need blood and fire to earn faith. That's how the legion of gods was born, and that's the only way to develop deathless godliness.”

Around this time, a fiend-devil Demolisher flew over and knelt in front of Yang Qi. “Sir! Supreme rectors have come from the Megaplexus, Coiling Arc, Highest Clarity and other planetary systems. They want to offer greetings, and wish to discuss matters with you pertaining to decrees from the immortal worlds.”

Chapter 544: Suing for Peace

“Oh?” Yang Qi opened his Lord's Eye and looked out into the Dark True Void that surrounded his planetary system on all sides. What he saw were passageways that glittered with immortal light, indicating that there were immortals in them. However, they didn't dare to simply enter without invitation.

Considering Yang Qi had routed the fiendslave battalion and sealed the dome of heaven above him, word of his deeds had spread like wildfire.

The other planetary systems had sent word to the heavens above them, asking for direction about what to do. Considering that Yang Qi had single-handedly defeated an entire army of heavenly soldiers and commanders, it was only natural that other immortal worlds would direct the supreme rectors of their mortal collegiums to go pay respects.

“Well, Junior Brother,” Eldest Brother said, “who would have thought that the supreme rectors would come to offer their respects so quickly? They must have guessed that you’re considering wiping them out. Are you going to see them?”

Yang Qi thought for a moment, then said, “It would be the wrong move to refuse them an audience. The most relevant thing to consider is that all of the planetary systems have an immortal world backing them. And those immortal worlds are all stronger than the Titan Emperor Heaven. If I offend all of them, and they joined forces to besiege us, we wouldn’t be able to fight back. The truth is, we’re actually very weak right now. True, I’m invincible among the planetary systems of the mortal world, and I could easily destroy them and institute my own mystical network of laws. But honestly, that’s not a very realistic goal.”

“What if you asked them to form an alliance, with you as the leader?” Eldest Brother said. “Then you could negotiate to split the faith power of the planetary systems with them. Even if you only got one percent of the faith, it would still be a lot. You could also demand that the other planetary systems offer you tribute on a yearly basis, and their top geniuses must join the Sage Monarch Collegium. Eventually, everyone would come to view the Sage Monarch Collegium as the ultimate holy land for cultivation.”

“I like that idea, Eldest Brother!” Yang Qi said, smiling approvingly at Eldest Brother. “It really goes to show how experienced you are. As the saying goes, ginger gets spicier the older it is. Alright, I’ll summon the supreme rectors and talk things out with them. There are millions upon millions of planetary systems in the mortal world, and there are at least a few thousand in our immediate vicinity. I'm in a solid position right now, so they had better be willing to offer some concessions. If it comes to it, I’ll destroy a planetary system or two to prove what I'm capable of. After all, with my kingdom settled in the Hell of Mahānata, I always have a backup in case things go south.”

“We definitely have to take advantage of the moment. You made a big impression by devastating the Titan Emperor Heaven’s heavenly soldiers and commanders. It would be a big shame not to make use of the capital you’ve earned.”

**

There were several thousand supreme rectors gathered out in the Dark True Void, accompanied by various experts. All of them were looking at the Sage Monarch planetary system, with its dense network of glittering planets and surging immortal power.

They all seemed terrified.

What they found especially noteworthy were the enormous castles that had been erected on the borders of the Dark True Void. They looked ancient, and pulsed with devil energy. Even more terrifying, they swarmed with fiend-devils, including terrifying Demolishers.

Eyes flickering with fear, Supreme Rector Coiling Arc said, “Supreme Rector Megaplexus, what do we do? That Yang Qi must be the son of a suzerain of hell! He’s strong on his own, but look at these armies of fiend-devils! And all of them are offering faith to him through prayer. If we could do the same thing, our cultivation bases would advance by leaps and bounds.”

Supreme Rector Megaplexus shook his head. “Yang Qi is definitely beyond anything the mortal world has seen before. He’s the kind of genius that only existed in the ancient past. This isn't a simple matter of having the bloodline of a god. The fact that he defeated the army from the Titan Emperor Heaven just goes to show that he’s invincible in the mortal world.”

Supreme Rector Highest Clarity was an old man with a wispy, flowing beard and the demeanor of a transcendent being. Looking a bit disdainful, he snorted coldly and said, “Maybe he's invincible, maybe he isn’t. There are plenty of hidden dragons and crouching tigers in the mortal world! I know of certain old-timers who set up kingdoms of their own and refused to ascend. They're the type who wield god items, and can definitely handle immortal worlds. Do you really think Yang Qi did all of that on his own? Considering that we’re here to negotiate with him, don’t look scared. We come with decrees from the immortal world! We must be bound together in spirit and action. Otherwise, he's going to take us out one by one. I refuse to believe that if we stick together he would dare to offend us. He would never go so far as to invade our planetary systems. Remember, our collegiums are all backed by heavenly worlds!”

“Yes,” said another of the supreme rectors. “As we all know, we’re here with decrees from the immortal worlds above. The purpose of today’s visit is to negotiate with Yang Qi and make sure he doesn't invade our planetary systems. We’re in a weak position, and he’s the vicious and merciless type who will slaughter people like scything flax. There’s no way any of us can fight him. Remember when he rebelled? He destroyed the supreme rector of the Titan Emperor Collegium and nailed him to a pillar, where he experiences burning torture day and night. Then he purged the entire planetary system. That said, we can’t allow ourselves to be intimidated by him.”

“You're absolutely right, Supreme Rector Crapemyrtle. We can't let ourselves be intimidated, and we can’t let ourselves get forced into any unfair agreements. We definitely can’t allow the Sage Monarch planetary system to continue expanding. Ladies and gentlemen, we have to trust each other. I know some of us are old enemies, but this is an important matter. Forget about grudges for the moment. Let’s work out a peace agreement before worrying about other things. This Yang Qi is as ambitious as a wolf, and obviously wants to conquer the mortal world. Since we represent the planetary systems closest to him, we’ll obviously be first on his list of targets. If he attacks us, we won’t have anywhere to run to.”

The various supreme rectors nodded, all of them aware that they needed to present a unified front.

Buzzzz.

A space-time wormhole suddenly opened up in front of them, filled with an army of fiend-devils who were all blessed by primeval god skills.

Bugle calls rang out and war drums beat, causing everything to tremble. The atmosphere immediately changed, and the supreme rectors and their expert followers felt fear rising in their hearts.

After all, the fiend-devils in the wormhole were all Demolishers, with auras far higher than anyone present.

This was like a force from an immortal world! Usually, planetary systems would only have one or two individuals like this. Large planetary systems might have ten, and enormous ones would have no more than a hundred.

But here, they were facing thousands! Not even the largest planetary systems, the ones which were a hundred times larger than the Titan Emperor planetary system, could match up to that.

A few of the supreme rectors were from such places, and as of this moment even they realized that Yang Qi was definitely not someone to trifle with.

Few of them had actually witnessed the battle between Yang Qi and the immortal world, and had assumed that many of the stories were exaggerated. But the sight of a whole host of fiend-devil Demolishers ensured that they were fully aware of the truth.

None of them could possibly fight against something like this.

At this point, Yang Qi’s voice drifted out from the depths of the wormhole. “Welcome, Supreme Rectors. It’s always wonderful to have neighbors come for a visit. Come in, come in. Please note that we just had a big war with the immortal world above, and the entire planetary system is in a bit of a mess. There are still many issues to handle after the fighting. I couldn’t find any suitable place to have a meeting, so instead I created a new spatial dimension just for today. Please, come!”

One of the Demolisher fiend-devils stepped forward, a three-thousand-meter-tall infernal with golden skin and spiraling horns. From his aura it was obvious he cultivated a godly-class energy art.

“Ladies and gentlemen,” he said, “please step into the space-time wormhole.”

The mere sight of him caused everyone present to shiver.

One of the supreme rectors, hoping to put on a brave face, cleared his throat and said, “Come on, let’s go!”

The other rectors exchanged meaningful glances, then entered the wormhole.

In the middle of the Sage Monarch planetary system, Yang Qi was waiting for them on an immense plane of existence that was cut off from everything else, a temple dedicated to the legion of gods. Obviously, he didn’t want these outsiders spying on the work that was going on in the planetary system.

Although he didn't fear the supreme rectors on their own, he knew that they were all backed by immortal worlds. He could sense the wills of immortals on them, and knew that there would be people spying through their eyes.

The immortal worlds wouldn’t just let their top leaders walk right into a trap. After all, if Yang Qi just killed them all, it would be devastating to the planetary systems they came from.

Numerous thrones were set up in the temple, arranged in a circle around a larger throne in which Yang Qi sat.

Strangely, no matter where the other thrones were placed, those who sat in them could only see Yang Qi sitting directly in front of them. It was almost as if his back didn’t exist.

Chapter 545: Negotiation

‘What’s going on? We’re all seated in a circle around Yang Qi, but all of us are directly facing him? And we can’t see his back? How is it possible?’ That was what everyone was thinking, and their hearts were already pounding. Not even their divine will could sense Yang Qi’s back.

It seemed completely impossible, yet no matter what type of vision they used, Yang Qi literally had no back.

All of a sudden, one of the supreme rectors realized something.

‘He’s a god! That’s a sign of the legion of gods!’ He was so shocked he almost yelled the word aloud.

In the ancient myths describing the gods, it was said that they had no backs. No matter what angle someone looked at them from, they would only ever be able to see their front.

That was because the legion of gods didn’t exist in the same space-time as ordinary humans.

Humans existed in one point within the dimensions of space and time, making them like a ripple within the river of time itself. The legion of gods existed in all aspects of space-time. They were omnipresent and existed in the past, present, and future simultaneously. People existed in one dimension, but the legion of gods existed in all dimensions. Thus, humans could never see anything but the front of a god.

The fact that there were different dimensions of space-time was a truth that was in some ways impossible to explain.

Because Yang Qi’s Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth had absorbed deathless godliness, he was gradually coming to understand those profound secrets regarding the many dimensions of space-time. Although he didn’t have full enlightenment of them, it was enough to pull the wool over the eyes of these individuals who didn’t even understand the magical laws of immortal worlds.

Of course, people who did understand the magical laws of the immortal worlds would easily be able to see Yang Qi’s back.

It was said that the Demolishing level was divided into nine stages, and that one of them was referred to as World-Demolishing. That was the stage in which one began to gain an understanding of space-time hyperdimensions. Hyperdimensions were something that surpassed general space-time, and were difficult to explain.

In any case, as all of the supreme rectors sat down they were filled with a sense of wonderment and awe.

The godliness here pierced into the depths of their souls with mountain-crushing, sea-shattering force. In fact, the wills of the powerful entities from the immortal worlds who were hidden on many of the people present were also completely taken aback.

Yang Qi had successfully shaken everyone to the core. Chuckling, he said, “Ladies and gentlemen, please, get comfortable. I'm aware of why you’ve come today. You want to sign a non-aggression pact, am I right?”

Before anyone could respond, Eldest Brother stood up from one of the thrones and loudly said, “Junior Brother, you definitely can’t sign any agreement like that!” Looking around coldly at the supreme rectors, he continued, “We’re not even afraid of heavenly soldiers and commanders from the immortal world above. You killed millions upon millions of immortals and stacked up their corpses into mountains here in the Sage Monarch planetary system. Afterward, your cultivation base reached an untold level in which you understand truths related to the legion of gods. What do you need to negotiate with people like this for? In fact, considering that we have them all in one place, why not just slaughter them and turn them into magical treasures? What could these pieces of trash have to say that’s worthwhile?”

From Eldest Brother’s harsh tone of voice, it sounded like he wanted to start the killing right away.

Some of the supreme rectors were weaker-willed than others, and began trembling from fear. Eldest Brother was a top expert, and had benefited greatly from the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. He was just on the verge of becoming a heaven-immortal, and also cultivated a godly-class energy art. In fact, Yang Qi had imparted the Jade-Emperor Profound-Welkin Exalted-Celestial God-Dao to him. He had all sorts of magical treasures, and plenty of consummate energy arts. All he had to do was get immortal magical laws from Yang Qi, then form his immortal body, and he would be a first step Void-Demolisher.

He had long since been able to kill ordinary immortals in battle, and had been famous for a very long time. And that wasn’t just in the Titan Emperor planetary system. People from other planetary systems knew his name and recognized him as the number one student in the old Titan Emperor Collegium.

Although Yang Qi had come along and outshone him recently, that didn't mean people had forgotten about him and his past deeds.

Almost as soon as Eldest Brother finished speaking, a new voice echoed out, soft and oily. “You used to be a student of the Titan Emperor Collegium, Mage Cloudwalker, and one of the most mysterious at that. You have the blood of the ancient Magefolk, a group as mysterious and noble as the legion of gods itself. But instead of striving forward on your own, you’ve become a lackey. You betrayed the Titan Emperor Collegium! Since ancient times, it has been said that a loyal subject never serves two masters. Yet you joined the rebel, went on a murderous rampage, and now you’re trying to act tough? Who do you think you’re going to scare? Do you think we’re stupid? It's obvious you and Yang Qi are playing good cop, bad cop.”

Everyone looked around awkwardly, trying to identify the speaker. And of course, everyone was wondering who would dare provoke Eldest Brother in this way.

There were indeed vicious characters in this group who didn't fear him. However, none of them would dare to provoke Yang Qi, and they all knew that provoking Eldest Brother was, by extension, doing just that.

Yet, despite the circumstances being as they were, someone had spoken up.

Who was it?

It was with deeply furrowed brow that Eldest Brother looked around in the hopes of identifying the source of the voice.

However, it seemed to float about randomly, making it impossible to tell where it came from. Before anything else could happen, the voice spoke again. “You won't be able to find me, Mage Cloudwalker. My cultivation base is vastly beyond yours. I’m an immortal from heaven, from the most boundless and mysterious of kingdoms, and I know everything about you. Stand down. Let Yang Qi and I negotiate this non-aggression pact. That way, the planetary systems will experience lasting peace and quiet.”

No one could identify the location of the speaker, as though he didn't even exist in the world around them.

“Heaven-Earth Supreme Soulsearch!” Eldest Brother said, quickly drawing on a consummate energy art to summon the projection of a devil-ghost’s head.

The head let loose an ear-piercing scream, along with green flames that raced out in all directions.

As for the supreme rectors and their attendants, they all subconsciously drew on defensive energy arts to protect themselves.

The flames spread out, then dissipated, having produced no effect at all.

Eldest Brother looked around with another deep frown.

The Heaven-Earth Supreme Soulsearch relied on green flames that were part of the ancient dao of devils. It could be used to lock down on the aura of a target, not in order to harm them, but in order to pull them out of a state of invisibility. Even an enemy who had shrunk down to the size of a grain of sand would be revealed by the soulsearching flames.

It was a combination of righteous and evil cultivation types that Yang Qi had imparted to him, something that infernal deities would use.

However, his search of the area turned up nothing, then the same voice from before unleashed a stream of laughter.

“There’s no need to waste energy, Mage Cloudwalker. Was that an energy art from the dao of devils? What did you say it was? Heaven-Earth Supreme Soulsearch? Unfortunately, that kind of thing won’t work on me. You know, you don’t really deserve to be a descendant of the Magefolk. It would be a big shame if they knew you were cultivating an energy art from devil-ghosts. You and I aren’t on the same level, so stop making a fool of yourself. I don’t care how much of a genius you are, if you think you can pull me out into the open you’re a complete fool. Not even that Yang Qi could do so.

“You people think you’re pretty tough, don’t you? You plan to conquer the other planetary systems and set up your own mystical network of laws to gather faith. But that would never happen if I step in and kill you. And there’s nothing you could do to prepare. Therefore, let’s negotiate. I won't kill you, and you’ll put an end to any ambitions you have regarding the other planetary systems. By the way, Yang Qi, don’t think I'm unaware of your little kingdom in the Hell of Mahānata. You think that with that lair as your backup, you can do whatever you want and the immortal worlds won’t go after you. But don't forget, there are a lot of experts in the mortal world, and plenty of them can break the fetters of hell.”

By this point, it was more than obvious that the owner of this voice was making open provocations and threats.

Few of the rectors had even a clue of who the owner of the voice might be, but the sight of Eldest Brother's Heaven-Earth Supreme Soulsearch failing left them all feeling quite pleased.

The supreme rectors immediately began conversing with each other using divine will.

‘So, some almighty entity has decided to mess with Yang Qi’s plans….’

‘Exactly right. Whoever this is, they’re extremely powerful. They slipped in here with us, and nobody could tell. Most likely, a rector from one of the really powerful planetary systems brought the will of some almighty immortal in with them.’

‘Yang Qi set up this meeting to scare us, only to have someone stronger come along and slap him in the face!’

‘Ah, this is great. I'm loving it!’

However, that was when Yang Qi finally spoke. “Hey there, friend. Is this supposed to be some kind of a joke? These people came here to negotiate terms of peace, but here you've gone and created a scene. You think I can’t pull you out into the open? That technique of yours is like child’s play to me.”

Chapter 546: The Very Strange Voice

This very strange voice spoke without the slightest scruple, and was clearly besmirching the dignity of the Sage Monarch planetary system.

The speaker implied that he would pursue them into the kingdom in the Hell of Mahānata, if necessary, which was an outright threat. That kingdom was Yang Qi’s last line of defense, and if anyone encroached on it, blood would flow and heaven and earth would crumble.

Yang Qi rose to his feet and opened his Lord's Eye, sending out a pulsing beam of dazzling light.

The first supreme rector who the light touched let out a surprised yelp. All of a sudden, he felt like he was completely transparent, as if he were made of glass or crystal. His five viscera, blood vessels, and everything else inside of him was clearly visible. The true energy in his meridians could be seen pulsing to his sea of energy, and the minor world that existed inside him was also clearly visible, including all of the treasures and powers it contained. All of his secrets were completely laid bare.

In fact, anyone who studied the true energy seeds within him, and the paths of power, would be able to learn his techniques and weaknesses.

“How could this be happening!?” he murmured. Just as he was thinking of fighting back, he looked around and realized that all of the other supreme rectors were experiencing the same thing. No secrets could be kept in this moment. It was like they were all standing naked in front of Yang Qi. This move of his was something they couldn’t stand up to at all, and in fact, they could all sense that, if Yang Qi wanted to, he could ignite their true energy and turn them into human torches.

The supreme rectors as a group were so shocked that they nearly collapsed into unconsciousness.

Never before had anything like this happened to any of them.

There were some almighty individuals who drew on certain energy arts to try to repel the incursion. But all such attempts failed. After all, the Lord’s Eye was not just some magical technique. It could peer into chiliocosms of worlds, perceive the rotations of the universe, and witness all of the living beings therein. It could even see through aspects of time, and touched on matters pertaining to hyperdimensions.

In the briefest of moments, the Lord's Eye swept through the entire enormous plane, then through every inch of space, flowing like mercury into every nook and cranny.

However, that was when the strange and sinister voice continued, “You can’t find me, Yang Qi. Just forget about it. You’re not capable of dealing with the methods I employ. Those paltry energy arts of yours will never locate me. Don’t think that just because you wiped out the cannon fodder that was a fiendslave battalion that suddenly you’re some amazingly domineering figure. There are more immortal worlds than there are eternal grains of sand in the universe, and compared to them all, you’re less than an ant. And that’s not to mention those worlds that exist above the immortal worlds, the true realm of the gods.”

Considering how much he was being taunted, Yang Qi didn’t bother with any explanations or responses. “Show your face!”

He flicked his finger and a tiny spark of flame flew out, which pierced into a certain aspect of space, shattering it. Instantly, everything seemed to slow down, but then a moment later, speed up. It pulsed in a strange, nearly sickening fashion that left everyone present feeling dizzy.

“Wheel of Fate: Void Trajectory.” He extended his hand and splayed his fingers, each of which erupted with a shaft of god light that stabbed deeply into the void.

RIIIIP!

It was impossible to say who was in that hyperdimension pocket, but Yang Qi was ripping them out into the open, forcibly teleporting them into the space-time he occupied.

“Detonate!”

Space-time exploded and a figure became visible, tall with broad shoulders, clad in brocade robes. He was young, with sword-like eyebrows and eyes that glittered like stars. He held a folding fan in his hand, crafted from gold and jade, which emanated an air of deathless godliness. Unexpectedly, it was a god item!

He seemed to have fused with it, allowing him to float effortlessly within the void, completely outside of the detection of anyone else in the normal world.

“W-what… what type of flame was that? It actually burned into a different space-time hyperdimension! It shattered the godliness of my Fan of Mists and knocked me out into the open!”

The young man couldn’t have looked more shocked, and clearly had no idea how Yang Qi had located him.

Upon hearing the young man’s words, one of the supreme rectors blurted, “Fan of Mists!? A god item!? Is this guy from that fabled holy land called the Misty Kingdom? That’s a planetary system that borders on being an immortal world! There are literally too many planetary systems in the mortal world to count. But there are a few who have existed since the most ancient of times and don’t adhere to any of the immortal worlds. And one of them is the Misty Kingdom.”

“That’s right. But there are hundreds of thousands of planetary systems between us and the Misty Kingdom. It would take years upon years to fly from there to here. What is this guy doing in the Sage Monarch planetary system? Did the news really travel that quickly?”

“The supreme leader of the Misty Kingdom has an incredible cultivation base, and is actually an immortal who never ascended to the immortal worlds. In fact, he doesn’t even need to: he found some ancient ruins that had a godrelic which enabled him to form an immortal body. He’s an ambitious schemer, and is so powerful that he's virtually invincible. He created his own immense planetary system with that godrelic he found, which allows him to defy the heavens above. Supposedly, he plans to convert his planetary system into an immortal world, with him as the ultimate ruler. I’ve heard stories about the Misty Kingdom ever since I was young, but it’s so far from here that I’ve never even seen someone from there. But here’s one of them now!”

Already, discussion was raging, and it seemed that just about everyone was impressed by this newcomer.

Although the young man was shocked, he quickly recovered. “That’s right, I'm Prince Mist from the Misty Kingdom, and I've long since stepped onto the boundless level of an immortal. I'm here to see exactly what you’re capable of, Yang Qi. If you have what it takes, I’d like to invite you to the Misty Kingdom to meet with my father and discuss matters pertaining to establishing nations! You offended an immortal world, and as such you will eventually suffer a dismal end. But my father has already established a planetary system that can rival the immortal worlds. If you want to do the same, we could be of much help. What do you think? Interested in working with us?”

Before Yang Qi could respond, Eldest Brother growled, “So, you’re Prince Mist from the Misty Kingdom! No wonder you know so much about me. Years ago, I was traveling through the Grand River planetary system when I ran into some Misty Kingdom troops, specifically one of your grand prince’s royal guards. As it turned out, they were willing to slaughter everyone in that planetary system just to get an immortal item. They were burning and pillaging everything in their path until I slaughtered them. Of course, I ended up being chased far and wide by you people afterward.”

The royal prince snorted, then coolly went on to say, “Looting and pillaging is a common thing in the mortal world. What gives you the right to stick your nose where it doesn't belong? You deserved to be executed for murdering people from the Misty Kingdom! That being said, you're pardoned of your crimes. Now, let’s return to the matter at hand. Yang Qi, do you agree to work with us? If not, it’s going to be hard to escape the punishment that's coming to you.”

“Junior Brother!” Eldest Brother said. “The Misty Kingdom is an enormous planetary system, and their supreme leader is capable of many things. He does indeed have a godrelic, and he intends to make his planetary system into an immortal world. However, I think it’s all wishful thinking. His kingdom is full of cruel, merciless people who never keep their word. You definitely can’t risk working with them.”

Prince Mist snarled, “Do you really want to get yourself killed, Mage Cloudwalker?”

RUMBLE!

Even as the words left his mouth, Yang Qi took a step forward, and spoke in a voice that filled the entire planetary system.

“You’re the person looking to get killed. You came to my territory uninvited and tried to be deliberately mystifying, even going so far as to threaten me. Then, after I unmasked you, you didn’t apologize. Instead, you went on to threaten my Eldest Brother. If you think I'm just going to let all that slide, you're sadly mistaken. If I don’t kill you right here and now, how could I ever convince all these people to join me and accept my system of laws? How could I convince them to give me their faith? Prepare to die.”

Without waiting for a response, he made a move, resorting to the Hand of the One God. Power erupted, including the dazzling works of nature, accompanied by holy hymns and psalms.

“You really do think too much of yourself!” the prince said. “Ladies and gentlemen, it’s clear this Yang Qi is a natural-born monster who isn't worth negotiating with! Were you listening just now? He openly said that he wants you to join him and accept his system of laws. He even wants your faith! He obviously doesn’t care about your planetary systems. So what are you waiting for? Unleash your power! It's better to be a broken piece of jade than an intact clay tile! In the end, all of you will bend the knee to the Misty Kingdom!”

One thing was for sure: this Prince Mist had a glib tongue and good arguments. Already, many of the supreme rectors were considering taking action.

Meanwhile, a stream of light that looked like a dragon-snake swirled around the prince and he dodged the Hand of the One God, then began speeding away in a blur. Apparently, he was trying to break free from Yang Qi’s territory.

“Where are you going?” Yang Qi said. “Do you really think your parlor tricks will protect you from me? You think you can just come and go as you please? What kind of a weakling do you think I am?”

The Wheel of Fate popped into being above Yang Qi, locking down on the god item fan and interfering with its functionality.

“That’s not going to work on me!” the prince said, snorting coldly. “Godly-class energy art: Void Mist Mountain and Sea Interstice!” In the blink of an eye, the prince turned into an illusory projection. Then he waved the fan out in front of him and a hurricane sprang up in the area, filled with the wailing of ghosts and weeping of gods.

“The Breeze is Still; the Waves are Quiet!” Yang Qi smashed his palm down and the hurricane suddenly went as still as if it had been frozen.

“Deathless Godliness; Enter the Body; the Mists are Formless; Mountain and River Mirage! Watch and learn. This is my inherent formless divine ability!” A killing aura sprang up around the prince like a god dragon emerging from the water, piercing through all space to bear down directly on Yang Qi in a deadly attack.

Chapter 547: Misty Kingdom

This prince from the Misty Kingdom was quite gutsy. He didn't hesitate to fight back, drawing on power like that of a god dragon rising from the water. Deathless godliness filled his movements as he unleashed a godly-class energy art, the Void Mist Mountain and Sea Interstice. Combined with the power of his fan, it was nothing to take lightly.

The god dragon emanated godly might as it shot forward, nearing Yang Qi’s throne in the blink of an eye. There, its claws stretched out with seemingly limitless power.

“Vast and Widespread Wisdom and Knowledge, Consummate and Perfect Like the Sea!” Prince Mist spoke eight words, each of them a dhāraṇī incantation that represented the mighty and profound core meaning of an energy art.

The eight words fused with the claws of the dragons, creating a powerful move designed to capture an opponent. This was one of the consummate arts of the Misty Kingdom, known as Good Fortune in Hand, which could capture even immortals. It was a profound skill that the legion of gods would use to grasp at good fortune.

Having unleashed this move, the prince of the Misty Kingdom was absolutely convinced that he would reach Yang Qi and leave him either severely injured or dead.

“You're forcing my hand, Yang Qi! I know about your ability to summon fiend-devils, but that won’t do you any good. I alone am more terrifying than an entire nation of enemies!”

His mere voice contained a deadly battle technique which would pierce into his enemy’s sea of consciousness. Combined with Good Fortune in Hand, it would unleash a most profound and boundless power.

RUMBLE!

The dragon claw of Good Fortune in Hand slammed into Yang Qi’s chest! He didn’t dodge, and he didn’t defend himself. He just watched as the godly-class energy art hit him.

“You’re dead!” the prince shouted in glee. With that, the dragon claw sank into Yang Qi to dig out his sea of energy.

However, as soon as the claw was inside Yang Qi, the prince realized that something seemed off. In fact, his energy art seemed to be sinking into the sea of energy like a rock into water. And when he tried, he couldn’t pull it back out.

‘How could this be happening?’

Lunging forward, he plunged his physical hand into Yang Qi’s chest to grab his heart.

But then he found his hand stuck as well.

Then Yang Qi’s flesh began wriggling, almost as if it were a swamp filled with quicksand. Suddenly, the prince found himself being sucked inward, and no matter how he struggled it did no good.

“What’s going on?” he blurted. He tried to jerk his hand free, but Yang Qi was shining with a brilliant light that pulled relentlessly at Prince Mist’s true energy, nascent divinity, and soul.

He was completely incapable of taking even a single step backward.

“Oh, nothing,” Yang Qi said. “I'm just going to assimilate you and take your god item.” Suddenly, he trembled even more violently and complex designs sprang out, wrapped around Prince Mist, and sucked him in.

It was a completely shocking sight.

Prince Mist screamed, but could do nothing to stop his arm from being sucked in. Then it was his shoulder, and his screams intensified.

The thousands of supreme rectors and other top experts who were watching shook with fear at this sight that completely defied imagination.

“Let me go this instant!” Prince Mist screamed. “If you offend the Misty Kingdom, you’ll never escape the consequences!”

By this point, half of his head had been absorbed. He screamed, threatened, and cursed, but Yang Qi didn’t say anything in response.

His body was a bottomless swamp ready to devour any living thing.

“AIIIIIEEEE—”

Finally, the screams were cut off, as Prince Mist and his Fan of Mists were completely absorbed by Yang Qi.

It was almost impossible to describe how terrifying the scene was.

A top expert had just made threats and vows, only to be absorbed in the blink of an eye. The bizarreness of the situation struck fear into the hearts of many of the experts present.

Even Eldest Brother was staring with wide eyes at Yang Qi. “Junior Brother… this… did you really just devour Prince Mist?”

“Yep. He had ill intentions, and wouldn’t stop boasting.” Yang Qi looked completely unruffled, as though nothing had just happened. His face completely expressionless, he said, “Not even death can wipe out his crimes. And if the Misty Kingdom dares to invade, I’ll wipe out everyone they send down to the last man. His Fan of Mists has some deathless godliness which will be perfect for my own boundless energy art. I should be able to reach a higher level soon. Who knows, maybe I’ll be a Paragon Demi-Immortal soon. At that point, I’ll be able to summon fiend-devils with actual immortal bodies, enough to overwhelm the entire mortal world.”

As an eighth order Demi-Immortal, Yang Qi could currently summon fiend-devil Demolishers that didn’t have immortal bodies. Being able to summon actual immortals would make him even stronger, to the point where he could pick a fight with an immortal world.

The crowd’s response to his words was utter silence.

After all, they had just witnessed the terrifying sight of a top expert being casually consumed.

Yang Qi’s other allies who were present, such as his Elder Brothers and Sisters, had previously been very upset by how Prince Mist had disrupted the dignity of the occasion.

However, the way Yang Qi handled the situation had only helped them in the end. Yang Qi had not killed a chicken to frighten the monkeys, he had killed a monkey to frighten the chickens. And now all of the chickens were sitting there trembling in fear.

At this point, Yang Qi brushed off his clothes and looked around with a genial smile. “There’s no need to be alarmed, ladies and gentlemen. I'm not the type of person who’s easy to kill. When friends come to visit, I'm quick to drink with them. But when an enemy comes, I send them to hell. Now that you're all here, let’s get down to business. I plan to form an enormous planetary system, and I’d originally envisioned my hands soaked with blood from the effort. But as they say, there is virtue in sparing life. Therefore, I'm not going to launch any offensive. That said, I happen to cultivate an incredible energy art that requires immense amounts of faith and destiny. And since you have all come here with honest intentions, I want you to go back to your various planetary systems and set up temples to me so that I can gather faith. I also want you to send your top experts here for special training. What do you say? I would like to institute a hard and fast rule requiring that I get one half of the faith of your populations. Well?”

Yang Qi was clearly angling to profit handsomely during these negotiations.

His original plan had been to ask for one hundredth of the faith of the various planetary systems, which wouldn’t have been anything particularly outrageous.

But devouring Prince Mist had firmly established his might and he wasn’t nearly as nervous as he had been before. Therefore, he decided to up the ante.

In response to his words, the expressions of the various supreme rectors flickered with numerous emotions.

“What?!” someone said. “You want faith from our planetary systems? We can’t open that can of worms!”

“But can we refuse? You saw what he just did. He’s not even afraid of the Misty Kingdom. And if he can summon fiend-devils with immortal bodies, how could we possibly fight him? This guy defies all laws and principles, even of those of the heavens!”

“So what are we supposed to do? If we really start giving him faith, we’ll lose control of our own planetary systems. And besides, that faith belongs to the immortal worlds above.”

“We definitely can't do this. Demanding faith from us is crossing a bottom line!”

“Offering tribute is a possibility, but definitely not faith. That violates the decrees of the immortal worlds. If we cross that line, we might as well declare war on ourselves.”

At this point, one of the supreme rectors stood up. “Yang Qi, this is completely and utterly outrageous. We owe our faith to the immortal worlds, and if we break that stipulation things will turn very bad. You know the saying. Better to be a broken piece of jade than an intact clay tile. We all agree: death before dishonor! Considering you’ve offended the Titan Emperor Heaven, it's only a matter of time before you suffer a severe punishment. By the way, if you offend our Great Metropolis planetary system, I'm afraid… well, you won’t be able to deal with the aftermath.”

“Oh? Great Metropolis planetary system?” Yang Qi thought for a moment. “Did your collegium have a student named Lei Jiuzhou? Society chief of the Lightning Society? I met him in the Immortal Army Battlefield. He had just become a heaven-immortal, but sadly I had to kill him. I even assimilated his power afterward. You think it's better to be a broken piece of jade than an intact clay tile? Fine. I hereby cut off negotiations with your planetary system, and sentence you all to death.”

Yang Qi produced a command medallion which he tossed over to Eldest Brother. “Eldest Brother, hurry over with an army of fiend-devils and dismantle the Great Metropolis planetary system. You can have ten thousand fiend-devil Demolishers and a hundred billion ordinary fiend-devils. Open the space-time wormholes immediately. Give everyone you encounter a chance to join the Sage Monarch Collegium. If they refuse, kill them.”

“Yes, Junior Brother! I’ll handle it!” Smiling grimly, Eldest Brother accepted the command medallion.

“How dare you! How dare you! You’re deranged, Yang Qi! Demented! Do you really defy all laws and principles, even of those of heaven? Have you no respect?”

“Defy the laws and principles of heaven?” Yang Qi said coldly. “Laws belong to me. And as for heaven, well, I am heaven. Look, I demand faith. That’s my bottom line. Cross it, and I’ll shed rivers of blood.”

“In that case, I'm done with all of this! We’ll meet again on the field of battle! Then we’ll see who comes out on top!” Supreme Rector Great Metropolis turned to leave.

“Where do you think you’re going? And what makes you think you can even leave? I already sent the orders to conquer your planetary system, and that makes you an enemy deserving of death! You said that the faith in your planetary system belongs to the Great Metropolis Heaven, right? I’ll give you one chance to live: pray to the heaven on high. See if your immortal world will save you. If it works, I’ll spare you, and even let you have the Great Metropolis planetary system back.”

He waved his hand, locking down space-time in the area. “Well? Start praying! Your faith belongs to the immortal world, so let’s see if they’ll help you.”

“You!” Supreme Rector Great Metropolis blurted, his face flushing red, then turning ashen white.

Chapter 548: Mass Surrender

Yang Qi hadn’t actually taken action yet, and was simply looking at Supreme Rector Great Metropolis. The man was a Demolisher, but had not yet formed his immortal body. Yang Qi knew that if he wanted to, he could reduce the man to dust with the flick of a finger.

However, he had his reasons for not killing him outright. He wanted to see exactly what the man was capable of.

He was certain that he would pass information to the immortal world he reported to, and would likely receive a decree in return. Yang Qi was ready to see it through to the finish, no matter what. If he actually tried to wipe out the Great Metropolis planetary system, would the immortal world above them do anything?

“Pray to your heaven on high!” Sword Seventeen said. “See if they’ll save you! If they don’t, then you can’t complain about dying here today. It’s not like the void is sealed around here. Pray and see if your heaven hears you.”

Thump!

Supreme Rector Great Metropolis dropped to his knees and began to pray. “Oh great heaven, a vile monster has threatened the lives of the millions upon millions of students in our collegium. I entreat you to intervene. Send down a boundless divine ability to stop this wretch-devil! Purify our faith….”

He went on and on, with his thoughts and prayers drifting to the great heaven above.

Before long, the supreme rector finished his prayer, and from what everyone could tell, it had been received on the other end. Space opened up above his head and power erupted out, pure immortal energy that contained arcane symbols which were none other than magical laws of the dao of immortals.

Some boundless, almighty entity was blessing Supreme Rector Great Metropolis, enabling him to form an immortal body!

“AAARGGHHH!” he howled as the magical laws spread out over him like rushing water. A short time later he was a real and true immortal!

WHIZZZ!

All of a sudden, an enormous śarīra descended, entering him and causing his face to twist and distort, then settle into features that somehow weren’t those of the supreme rector. This new version of the man stood up straight, looked at Yang Qi, and spoke in the booming voice of an immortal.

“See what you've done, Yang Qi? Good job! I’m a boundless immortal general from the Great Metropolis Heaven. Call me General Metroplexus! I once led forces in battle against the Titan Emperor Heaven, so when I heard that you wiped out a fiendslave battalion, I was actually quite pleased. I'm curious what types of folks exist in the mortal world nowadays. You want to wipe out the Great Metropolis planetary system? How about we have a little wager? If you can defeat this incarnation of mine, the Great Metropolis Heaven promises to give you fifty percent of the faith of the populace of our planetary system. We’ll even set up the new worship centers for you. What do you say?”

The immortal worlds had actually sent an expert down to deal with the situation.

A mighty general.

Yang Qi could already tell that this man was far more powerful than any other immortal he had faced. Even though he was just a clone, his killing aura pulsed with unprecedented intensity.

“Alright!” Yang Qi said, looking at the possessed Supreme Rector Great Metropolis. “Bring it on. I'm curious to see what a general from an immortal world can do.”

“Nine Heavens Consummate Slaughter: Metroplexus Godfist!”

POP!

General Metroplexus moved so quickly it was almost impossible to track him. He left behind a string of afterimages as he pulsed with immortal power and energy that could destroy the heavens and extinguish the earth.

Yang Qi didn’t move. He simply extended both hands and sent fire racing out of all ten fingers, which destroyed all of the afterimages. Then he took a step forward and slammed a flaming fist out to meet the incoming attack and stop it in its tracks.

“Ten Suns Rise in Heaven!”

General Metroplexus threw both palms out, causing ten suns to appear above his head, burning with immortal flame. These were suns of the immortal world, not the suns from the land of mortals.

Mortal suns were heavenly bodies that emitted light and heat. But the burning suns of the immortal worlds were things of legend. Supposedly, they represented a peak level of power, even a tiny spark of which could cause a massive tribulation. There had been occasions in the past where immortal worlds were broken open and the flames of their suns fell into hell, causing profound catastrophes there.

“Heaven and Earth Furnace!” An enormous furnace appeared above Yang Qi, which gobbled up the fire, then the ten suns. In the blink of an eye, they became fuel for Yang Qi.

“Many thanks, General! The fire of immortal suns will be of immense help to me. I just devoured Prince Mist and took his Fan of Mists. To be honest, the deathless godliness in that god item is a bit beyond me, but with this fire I have just what I need to refine them!”

RUMBLE!

Yang Qi began shining with boundless godlight and the magical laws of gods. An aura of deathlessness appeared and his might began skyrocketing. As his energy arts grew more powerful, the Wheel of Fate appeared behind him, completely neutralizing any attacks General Metroplexus sent against him. Then he sent a massive river of force back to slam into the general, sending him staggering backward.

“Not bad. Not bad at all! Alright, try this next move out! Endless Hatred in Perpetuity!” His fist technique transformed, becoming mournful, bitter, and filled with towering hatred. It was the animosity that came from ten generations of a blood feud, the likes of which could never be reconciled.

As the fist strike launched forth, true energy twisted and distorted, wrapping around Yang Qi and sending him spinning backward.

Yang Qi landed hard on the ground, waving his hands out to dispel the energy, sending shockwaves out in all directions.

“Life and Death Together!” General Metroplexus said, unleashing another move. He held nothing back, and each fist strike contained the might to shatter heaven and earth. The projection of an immortal world appeared above his head, which sent a surge of power toward Yang Qi, destroying the move of Creation which he had just used.

Yang Qi held his ground, using his own fist techniques to negate the attacks. Meanwhile, he reached out to lock down the entire planetary system, protecting it in case the general went crazy with his attacks.

“Great Dao Flows Align!”

General Metroplexus deserved his reputation. He was using one deadly move after another, with a precision that rivaled the works of nature or the magical laws of heaven. And within every move was profound killing intent.

As he unleashed one dazzling move after another, he forced himself closer and closer to Yang Qi.

“Buddha’s Nirvanic Extermination!”

By using Great Dao Flows Align, he got close to Yang Qi, and once there he used a move from the ancient buddhas, who were on a similar level to the legion of gods. An enormous golden buddha appeared above his head, which unleashed a massive fist strike that overflowed with deadly, destructive power.

It was impossible to say where General Metroplexus might have acquired the mighty godpower of an ancient buddha. But the true energy he was unleashing seemed to contain a never-ending cycle of destruction.

Eyes flashing, Yang Qi unleashed the God Legion Paradise, which was a glowing sphere that surrounded him and formed an impenetrable barrier to the incoming attack.

“Nirvana of Myriad Buddhas!”

RUMBLE!

The level of destructive power increased!

General Metroplexus transformed into a myriad of golden buddhas, all of whom rained down destructive blows onto the God Legion Paradise. It almost sounded like the God Legion Paradise was in the middle of a rainstorm.

Pop. Pop. Pop. Pop! POP! POP!!!

Rifts and crevices started to spread out into the Sage Monarch planetary system.

“Enough is enough,” Yang Qi said. Eyes blazing with dazzling light, he shoved his hands out in front of him and used all nine stances of the Hand of the One God. Fire appeared in his palm, which was none other than the Flame of Hope that was backed by the godliness he had just absorbed from Prince Mist.

SNICK!

He severed all of General Metroplexus’ energy arts, then slammed his hand into his chest and grabbed his śarīra.

“Aaaiiiieee!”

General Metroplexus let out a scream as his power was forcibly sealed, leaving behind only the supreme rector, who flopped onto the ground, twitching and seemingly on the verge of losing his life.

At this point, the voice of General Metroplexus boomed down from above. “Well done, Yang Qi. Your cultivation base is incredible, and you clearly deserve your reputation. The Great Metropolis Heaven would love to have you as one of ours. That śarīra contains the quintessence of my energy arts and the magical laws of the Great Metropolis Heaven. If you assimilate it, and later ascend, then you can come to our immortal world. If you do, you’ll have an excellent position waiting for you, with plenty of power. What do you say? You plan to oppose the Titan Emperor Heaven, so why not join the Great Metropolis Heaven to do that? We can help you.”

At the same time, shining light descended onto Supreme Rector Great Metropolis, who struggled to his feet with a dazed expression on his face.

“You flatter me,” Yang Qi said coldly. “I know I have a decision to make. But right now, the question is whether or not you’ll keep your word. I’ll hold back from destroying the Great Metropolis planetary system. But if you withhold the faith you promised, I won’t show a lick of mercy. I’ll wipe you all out down to the chickens and dogs.”

“Supreme Rector, accept his demands,” General Metroplexus said. As his voice faded away, he said, “That is the decree of the immortal world.”

“I accept the decree,” Supreme Rector Great Metropolis said. “Please, stand down, Yang Qi. I’ll do whatever you want, as long as it doesn’t involve a massacre.”

“As long as you agree to my demands,” said Yang Qi, “then of course I won't resort to a massacre.” Turning his attention to the larger group around them, he continued, “None of you need to worry. Stick with me, and be loyal, and I won’t kill anyone. In fact, I’ll help you. I can even give godly-class energy arts to the top geniuses in your collegiums. And I'm confident that, in a very short time, I’ll be able to open a passageway into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart! Those who cooperate with me and give me faith will have access!” His words caused immediate shock.

“What?”

“A passage to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart that can be opened at any time?”

“Is that even possible? Not even the immortal worlds know how to do that. If they can't do it, how can he?”

A moment passed, then one of the supreme rectors stepped forward. “Yang Qi, I promise to meet your demands. I just communicated with the immortal world, and they agreed.”

Then another supreme rector stepped forward. Then another.

Chapter 549: Establishing a Network of Laws

Yang Qi had assimilated an imperial prince from the Misty Kingdom, then defeated General Metroplexus from the Great Metropolis Heaven. Those two acts caused fear to grip the hearts of many of the supreme rectors. Many of them had bits of immortal will on them, but even those wills remained silent. In the end, the supreme rectors decided to agree to Yang Qi’s demand, giving him fifty percent of the faith from their planetary systems.

Furthermore, Yang Qi would establish collegiums where he would hold competitions to recruit the top experts.

The numerous planetary systems in the area would all view the Sage Monarch planetary system as their core, and treat it like a holy land of cultivation.

Of course, the planetary systems made their own demands: they wanted Yang Qi to provide protection from enemy forces, including fiend-devil invaders.

It was a common thing for fiend-devil armies to invade other planetary systems, where they would burn, loot, and devour humans. Many planetary systems were too weak to eliminate such threats, and in fact, some of them that bordered various hellish planes were always under the threat of experiencing the same fate as the Yore-Wilds had when the Hell of Euphoria invaded.

In the past, the Titan Emperor planetary system had built huge reserves of Initiation Power for the express purpose of defending against fiend-devils.

But now Yang Qi was the bane of fiend-devils, and could even force them to work for him. And when the various immortal worlds realized that, they were actually pleased by the protection he could offer.

Considering everything, Yang Qi had no reason to refuse such demands.

Before long, an actual agreement was written up, which Yang Qi and the supreme rectors all signed. At the same time, they swore official oaths to abide by the terms.

When it was all official, Yang Qi turned to certain members of the Yang Clan and nodded meaningfully. The clan had grown fast and strong in recent years, and right now there were already hundreds of thousands of crack disciples. Nowadays in the Yang Clan, there were even young children who were in the Legendary level.

It was common for young ones in the Yang Clan to reach the Great Sage level in their teen years. Even a pig that grew up surrounded by immortal energy would quickly reach a high level, much less the bright young ones of the Yang Clan.

In response to Yang Qi’s summons, a host of such young elite ones stepped forward to lead fiend-devil armies to the other planetary systems, where they would establish the collegium branches and work to gather faith. Not only would they be helping Yang Qi by their efforts, but they would also gain valuable experience.

All of the elite young ones had fiend-devil Demolishers working for them, ensuring their safety no matter what dangerous situations they encountered.

Even more relevant, all of them had ensconced their nascent divinities in the Hell of Mahānata, so even if they somehow met their end they could be born again. And of course, such disciples all had primeval divine abilities from the dao of devils, which meant that if they were ambushed, the worst that could happen is they would end the fight in mutual destruction.

That said, with armies of fiend-devils at their command it seemed unlikely that any truly deadly situations would arise.

Now, all Yang Qi needed to do was wait until the faith and destiny began to roll in, and he would be able to head toward new breakthroughs.

The first task at hand was to deal with Prince Mist’s god item, the Fan of Mists, as well as the new godly-class energy art he had acquired, the Void Mist Mountain and Sea Interstice.

Of course, he planned to give the latter to his immortal clone.

The clone now had a collection of five such arts. The Jade-Emperor Profound-Welkin Exalted-Celestial God-Dao; the Asiryangguk Sauvastika Devil Grand Infernal Energy; the Killing Fist of the Dao of Monarchs; the Prodigious Proto-Epoch, Invincible War-Steppe; and the Void Mist Mountain and Sea Interstice. Individually, they could be described as heaven-shaking and earth-shattering. But combined, they were even more formidable. And considering Yang Qi planned to go alone to the immortal world and leave his clone behind, it definitely gave the clone an immense advantage.

In fact, Yang Qi planned to use the new faith power he would receive to bolster his clone and put him in the position of being able to ascend to heaven at any moment.

“Fiend-devil!” he said, waving his hand to summon an enormous infernal in the Demolishing level, who immediately knelt in front of him.

Drawing on his energy arts, he tapped the infernal on the head, causing it to unleash a howl of agony.

“Fear not,” Yang Qi said. “My Wheel of Fate is going to reverse your essence. According to the legends, all hell-born fiend-devils originated as creations of the primeval legion of gods. In the beginning, fiend-devils were actually angels. Now that my Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth has reached a high level, I can reverse the change and expunge the baleful energy of fiend-devils from your genes. Upon being purified and made holy, you will become an angel.”

Holy light shone as Yang Qi drew on his energy arts, causing a white color to spread out over the fiend-devil’s skin.

Of course, the legends were true. Originally, hell-born fiend-devils had been angels created by the legion of gods. Unfortunately, they became corrupted and fell into hell, and as epochs passed they came to fight against the legion of gods. But now, Yang Qi was using the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth to transform fiend-devils back into angels.

The fiend-devil was being reverted to its original state, its genes awakened and its baleful energy expunged. If the process went smoothly, it would end up as an angel. When that happened, its fighting prowess would increase by tenfold and it would be able to defend against all sorts of magical abilities and daoist techniques.

In ancient times, angels had been far purer, and far stronger than fiend-devils. After all, upon falling into corruption their genes had been cursed by the legion of gods.

Once that curse was removed and they returned to their original state, they would advance by leaps and bounds, reaching the point of being able to kill countless opponents.

If he succeeded in this effort, the ability to turn fiend-devils into angels would be a powerful trump card; it would make his fiend-devil army even stronger, and they would no longer pulse with devil energy and the dao of devils.

Sagelight glittered as the enormous fiend-devil was slowly purified, bit by bit. Its wings began to sprout white feathers, all of which were inscribed with shining magical symbols written in an ancient, holy script.

Soon, Yang Qi realized that there was something holy growing within the genes of the fiend-devil, proving that it had originally been a pure creature that was later corrupted.

“Wheel of Fate!”

The Wheel of Fate appeared and smashed into the fiend-devil, causing it to tremble as its devil energy converged into a śarīra. The fiend-devil transformed, becoming an entity of pure holiness, neither male nor female, an angel whose pure white wings fluttered as it hovered in the air, sending out sagelight filled with inscriptions from the legion of gods.

And its fighting prowess skyrocketed! In fact, this was no mere tenfold increase.

From what Yang Qi could tell, this fiend-devil was at least a hundred times as powerful as it had been before. The curse of the legion of gods had been completely removed, along with its devil energy.

Now it emanated the genetic power of angels.

“Fiend-devil śarīra!” Yang Qi said, and the śarīra appeared on the palm of his hand. It contained all of the corrupted devil energy, as well as an almighty curse power. In fact, if he inserted this śarīra into someone, they would immediately transform into a boundless fiend-devil, bereft of any original personality or intelligence. Not even an immortal would be able to stave off the effects.

“The curse power in these fiend-devil genes is incredibly powerful. In fact, it’s like a precious treasure. What a pity that purifying a fiend-devil is such a drain on me. I definitely can’t gather armies of them the way I can summon fiend-devils with the Hell Portals. I guess I'm just too weak right now. I need to reach the Demolishing level, whereupon the dracomammoths of my Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth will transform into protomammoths. At that point, my magical power will increase by a hundred times, and I should be able to purify an army of angels to lead in conquest of the immortal worlds.”

Looking at the angel, he said, “I summoned you as a powerful infernal, but now you’ve been purified and are an angel. You are no less mighty than my immortal clone, therefore I will bestow you with a name. You will be Yang Morningstar, child of the Yang Clan.”

Taking a knee, the angel said, “Many thanks, Milord. Thank you for giving me a name.”

Meanwhile, perfect faith power erupted from the angel and its pure white wings, a power completely devoid of any impurities. Yang Qi was very pleased; he now had another capable person to handle matters after he ascended.

At the moment, he was waiting for the faith power of the other planetary systems to arrive. When it did, he would aim for another breakthrough, or perhaps more than one. Soon, he would be a Paragon Demi-Immortal, then a half-Demolisher, and ultimately a Demolisher.

At that point, he could ascend to the immortal world above.

Although his cultivation base was high enough to sneak into an immortal world if he wanted to, the problem was that he was just too weak. If he ran into powerful figures there, they would likely see through any disguise he used.

He needed to track down the Future One, his so-called father, Proud Heaven. In the course of his search, he would surely deal with all sorts of powerful immortals. Therefore, he needed to be absolutely prepared.

In addition, he wanted to acquire the magical laws of the dao of immortals from the Tusita Heaven, which he would use to help Eldest Brother, and others, form immortal bodies. After all, they couldn’t just remain stuck in their current cultivation level forever.

Only after all of those things were accomplished could he be confident in ascending.

Right now, he entered into a state of intensive cultivation.

Days passed.

Soon, half a year had gone by.

WHIZZZ!

At that point, the power of faith began to flow toward him like an immense river. Clearly, a mystical network of laws had been put into place in the Megaplexus planetary system.

And then, in the days to come, more and more similar streams of faith appeared—thousands of them, in total.

Chapter 550: Cultivation

‘The disciples of the Yang Clan have been handling matters well over the past few months. Although the power of faith isn’t completely pure, and the specific amounts vary, it's still incredible. When you add all the thousands of streams together, it can fill my nascent divinity within moments.’

As the dazzling streams of faith poured through the void and into him, a nascent divinity true flame appeared within his cultivation base.

It was none other than the Flame of Hope. With the power of faith he was gathering, it had entered a new state, as had the Wheel of Fate.

The Wheel of Fate was currently illusory, and it required huge amounts of faith and destiny to operate properly. The true and real Wheel of Fate would be many hundreds of times more powerful, perhaps even a thousand. Unfortunately, such changes could not occur overnight.

But with the faith from the thousands of planetary systems he now had access to, Yang Qi was still making progress. Both his clone and his true self became wrapped up in passing on daoist techniques to their subordinates, including the great dao of the infernal deities.

A year passed in a blur.

Outstanding transformations were occurring in the Sage Monarch planetary system. On almost a daily basis, sagelight ate away at the Dark True Void. Radiance and light spread, and the seal restricting the heaven above grew stronger.

By this point, word had spread far and wide regarding the incident between Yang Qi and Prince Mist, across countless tens of thousands of planetary systems, all the way to the Misty Kingdom. Strangely, they didn’t respond at all, and most definitely did not send an army to confront him. Perhaps even they realized how ferocious he was.

After all, thanks to the agreement he had formed with the other planetary systems around him, he had immense resources when it came to faith power. He also had armies of Demolisher-level fiend-devils patrolling the space-time wormholes in his own planetary system. His prestige had reached such a point that no groups in the mortal world wanted to cause problems for him, and that included the Misty Kingdom.

During the year which passed, the representatives of the Sage Monarch Collegium set up numerous campuses throughout the other planetary systems, and they held competitions with enticing rewards to attract many of the top geniuses. Later, those geniuses would be able to join the Sage Monarch Collegium as students.

As a result, the other planetary systems were gradually weakening.

All of the various supreme rectors could see that, based on the never-ending supply of fiend-devil soldiers Yang Qi had, resisting him was obviously useless.

Of course, Yang Qi was careful not to be too oppressive and didn’t make demands of tributes from the other planetary systems. Quite the contrary. When they experienced disasters, such as fiend-devil invasions, he would immediately send his own troops to keep the peace.

Peace and tranquility spread; with Yang Qi in charge, no one needed to fear fiend-devil raids, and the population could flourish.

As things grew more stable, Yang Qi focused less on external matters and more on his cultivation. He contemplated the magical laws of the dao of heaven and the legion of gods. He gathered deathless godliness and pushed himself to further heights of perfection. And he also summoned powerful infernals to purify their genes. In addition to Yang Morningstar, he eventually created a group of twenty angels to serve as his secret weapons.

For now, they resided in his kingdom in hell as part of a spell formation, ready to spring out into the open at a moment's notice. Meanwhile, his immortal clone also continued to work on his cultivation.

The kingdom in the Hell of Mahānata was stronger than ever, having greatly benefited from all of the countless treasures from the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

Everything seemed to be going well. Apparently, the Titan Emperor Heaven had decided to lay down the flag and still the drums and was not planning to inflict any further punishments. It seemed the immortal world had abandoned the lower world, and they most likely knew of the alliance that Yang Qi had formed with the other collegiums.

As Yang Qi gathered more faith, his Wheel of Fate grew more corporeal and he came to see things that had previously been hidden. For example, when he looked up, he could see that momentous and dangerous events were occurring in the dome of heaven. Apparently, the Titan Emperor Heaven had fallen into grave circumstances.

Things were not going well for it as an immortal world.

Of course, that could be an opportunity for Yang Qi to achieve some of his big goals.

However, he still needed to wait for his cultivation base to improve. Without being a Demolisher, it was too dangerous to ascend to the immortal world above. If he did, he could very well fall right into the hands of the Titan Emperor Heaven. He wanted to turn the Sage Monarch planetary system into its own minor immortal world, and also reach the Demolishing level. Then he would form his immortal body and be in the same position as the leader of the Misty Kingdom.

Reaching a high level of fighting prowess was absolutely necessary to the goals of the Sage Monarch planetary system.

Many of his friends had also made incredible progress during the months that had passed. That was especially true of Elder Second Brother and Elder Third Sister, both of whom were now half-Demolishers on the verge of a major breakthrough.

As for Yang Qi’s father, Yang Zhan, he was now a high-level Demi-Immortal.

The sworn siblings he had gained back in the days of the Rich-Lush Continent were now all Demi-Immortals. And of course, they had access to abundant cultivation resources—even immortal stones. He had also passed on the five godly-class energy arts he had collected for them to work on. Other than the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, he passed along everything he knew.

Thus three more years passed in the blink of an eye.

To those who practiced cultivation, three years, three thousand years, and even thirty thousand years could seem like little more than the snap of a finger.

During that time, Elder Second Brother, Elder Third Sister, and some of the others reached the Demolishing level.

Yang Zhan reached the Universal Demi-Immortal level, and countless breakthroughs had occurred among the various children of the Yang Clan.

As for Yang Qi, his cultivation base had reached an almost perfect level and his Wheel of Fate pulsed with the color of primal-chaos. In fact, if he rapped it with his knuckles it would resonate with a metallic hum.

Swish!

In the depths of the Sage Monarch planetary system, there was an enormous spell formation formed from primal-chaos paleo-energy. In the middle of it was a wormhole tens of thousands of kilometers wide, which continuously emitted violet-colored crystals of power that were none other than immortal stones.

This wormhole was the god formation that connected to the Tusita Heaven.

Yang Qi sank into the depths of the formation, immersing himself in the vital energy and connecting to the Hell of Mahānata and the Hell of Gloom and Darkness, allowing their essences to rush toward him.

He was provoking tribulation!

It was the tribulation of Paragon Demi-Immortals; the final tribulation. And it required incomprehensible levels of power. Thankfully, he had been building up the power of destiny and faith for four years. Also, he was thoroughly and completely familiar with the usage of the god formation, and knew that he could unlock its ultimate power with the Blood of the One God. In fact, by using this method he would be able to ensconce his nascent divinity in the Tusita Heaven itself.

And that was how he intended to acquire the magical laws of the Tusita Heaven.

Normally, cultivators would only ensconce their nascent divinity once. But Yang Qi was different. He surpassed common sense and general rules, and had already ensconced it twice. Now he was aiming for a third time, and perhaps, eventually, a fourth and a fifth.

“Heavenly tribulation, have at me!”

RUMBLE!

A Go board suddenly appeared above him, a labyrinth of heaven and earth that immediately trapped him in its complexity. Suddenly, he was like a Go piece in the midst of being assailed by countless other Go pieces.

However, he simply drew on the Wheel of Fate and the Go board shattered.

Next, a golden lantern appeared, raining destructive fire onto him.

POP!

He unleashed a fist strike and the lantern shattered.

Two fiend-devils appeared in the tribulation, incarnations of the suzerains of the Hell of Mahānata and the Hell of Gloom and Darkness. They were formed of boundless devil energy and were the type who could shatter endless armies of immortals with no effort.

Yet Yang Qi wasn’t afraid. Becoming an incarnation of a godmammoth, he went to war with the two fiend-devils. Heaven quaked and the earth rocked. The sun and moon went dark. Everything reverted to a state of primordial chaos.

In response, the essence of the Tusita Heaven, which was in the formation, began trembling, then merged with Yang Qi’s thoughts.

RUMBLE!

He pushed the formation to its limits and a violet stream of energy emerged, forming a projection of an ancient immortal who was none other than the lord of the Tusita Heaven.

In this moment, Yang Qi was facing three powerful enemies, and as he did, his dracomammoth power surged. The fight lasted for seven days and nights, during which time he drew heavily on his faith reserve powers. Finally, he unleashed three powerful fist strikes onto the three powerful lords he was fighting.

All of them collapsed and he quickly absorbed their power.

‘The perfect opportunity!’

As he experienced his breakthrough, the Wheel of Fate flew out into the formation. A nascent divinity ensconcement mark appeared, then pierced through countless immortal worlds to its final destination.

That destination was a location of violet energy, pure, clean, noble, and holy to the extreme. It was like the halls of heaven.

Yang Qi could feel his nascent divinity branding mark settling into the greyspace of the Tusita Heaven.

As it did, the formation transformed and began emitting pure power, causing a seven-colored light to swirl around him, which contained the magical laws of the Tusita Heaven.

As Yang Qi rose to the Paragon Demi-Immortal level, he acquired the magical laws of an immortal world—the Tusita Heaven.

“Eldest Brother!” he cried, and Eldest Brother appeared in front of him.

Looking around in shock, Eldest Brother said, “Junior Brother, did you do it? Did you get the magical laws of the Tusita Heaven?”

Chapter 551: Immortal Body

Yang Qi reached out and grabbed a gossamer strand of multi-colored power.

It looked like seven-colored silk, something that would come from a primeval mountain of the gods. Thunderous rumblings echoed out and Yang Qi’s fingers trembled, as though the strand might shatter them and break free at any moment.

Such were the domineering magical laws of an immortal world.

Immortal worlds were broken up into thirty-three ranks. The Titan Emperor Heaven was the lowest type, and the Tusita Heaven was the highest type. The difference between the two was like the difference between a beggar and an emperor.

“Exactly,” Yang Qi said in response to Eldest Brother’s question. “These are the magical laws of the dao of immortals, straight from the Tusita Heaven. Unfortunately, they’re extremely strong. Eldest Brother, do you think you can use them to form your immortal body? If it works, you would be many times stronger than an ordinary immortal from the Titan Emperor Heaven.”

“They are powerful!” Eldest Brother said, a smile breaking out on his face. “Don’t worry, Junior Brother. I have the bloodline of the ancient Magefolk, which is just like the bloodline of a god. I'm not afraid of some magical laws from an immortal world. With your help, I’ll definitely be able to absorb them and use them to form my immortal body! And with an immortal body I’ll be without peer in the mortal world!”

“Great! Henceforth, Eldest Brother, the Sage Monarch planetary system is going to rely on you to keep the peace and maintain order.”

“No problem at all! By the way, I recently established a black ops division to infiltrate the Misty Kingdom. Because of how you killed one of their imperial princes, they also infiltrated us and are planning to make a sneak attack soon. They even have experts in place in nearby holy lands, just waiting to strike.”

When Eldest Brother said ‘holy land’, he actually meant other particularly large planetary systems. Places that didn’t adhere to immortal worlds, or require help from above to facilitate the creation of immortal bodies, were usually called holy lands of true cultivation.

Right now, the Sage Monarch planetary system was viewed as such a place.

Holy lands of true cultivation were rumored to be enormous. They were usually hundreds or thousands of times as large as ordinary planetary systems and produced countless top experts, people who often rivaled individuals from immortal worlds.

In ancient times, the Yore-Wilds planetary system had been considered a place like that. The top experts there had scoffed at the power of the immortal world above, instead relying on godrelics to acquire the magical laws of the dao of immortals, and thus, form immortal bodies. As such, they had been able to reach incredible heights, even when in the mortal world.

Yang Qi was attempting to restore the glory that had been present in the Yore-Wilds of the past. In his view, there was no need to worry about the face of the immortal worlds.

“As long as the Misty Kingdom doesn’t bother me, I’ll leave them alone,” Yang Qi said coldly. “But if they mess with me, I won’t hold back. Considering the system I've set up, and the faith I have access to, I can create godpower the likes of which they can’t easily disturb. And in a few years, I’ll reach the Demolishing level and ascend! Once I do that, I'm sure there will be plenty of evil scoundrels who come to cause problems. That's why I want to make sure to purge all potential problems before I leave.”

“I can handle all of that,” Eldest Brother said. “Once I have my immortal body, you won’t have to worry about any interlopers. No matter which other holy land invades, I’ll uphold your name and reputation. I know that you’ve long since surpassed me, Junior Brother; you’re a Fateless One, so it’s to be expected.”

Just as ever, Eldest Brother was a frank and courageous individual.

Yang Qi chuckled. “In that case, Eldest Brother, I won’t worry about the matter. Come, sit. Let me impart the dao of gods to you!”

They sat down together and Yang Qi flicked his finger, sending a stream of seven-colored magical laws out to create a heavenly mantle that settled onto Eldest Brother.

Eldest Brother immediately threw his head back and let loose a long cry. Apparently, the magical laws were trying to slice his body away from his soul, yet he said, “Don’t do anything to interfere, Junior Brother! The magical laws of the Tusita Heaven are incredible! The slightest mistake, and I’ll explode. However, I have to do this on my own. That's the only way for me to form my immortal body. And that’s the only way for me to unlock the gene power of the Magefolk. The end result will be a change to my life force substructure and the creation of a boundless Mage Portal! Then I could dominate the children of god-spirits in battle!”

Thus, Eldest Brother proceeded with his cultivation without assistance.

Yang Qi made no move to interfere. As long as Eldest Brother succeeded, then the fact that he did so with no assistance would provide immense benefits. This was the moment in which Eldest Brother provided tempering to his will and dao heart.

The magical laws of the Tusita Heaven poured into him and wrapped him up until he looked like a cocoon. Then his life force aura began growing weaker and weaker. At this point, the slightest slip-up would result in him dying beyond the shadow of a doubt.

Yang Qi looked on nervously, wondering what he would do if something went wrong.

“Mage Ancestor Séance! Great Dao Sacrifice!”

A flag appeared above Eldest Brother’s head that was covered with the script of mages, writing that exuded a sensation of profundity and civilization.

This was his animadestiny nascent divinity.

It was not human-shaped, but rather was an ancient totemic flag.

As the flag unfurled, Eldest Brother’s fleshly body exploded into a shower of sparks. Then his flesh and blood stitched back together, wriggling and twitching as the process went along. Then the flag wrapped around his flesh and blood and burning true flame erupted, which began absorbing the surrounding light.

This was a divine ability of the ancient Magefolk, the sacrifice of one’s flesh and blood.

Eldest Brother sacrificed his body to pass the tribulation and absorb the magical laws of the Tusita Heaven.

Months passed as he took the light he had captured, merged it with his flesh, blood, and nascent divinity flag, and created a brand new body.

RUMBLE!

Lightning swirled around him, along with roiling clouds and immortal energy.

His immortal body was already forming.

WHIZZZ!

Eldest Brother stepped out into the open, surging with power, his eyes glittering. His flesh looked like bronze and seemed to pulse with true flame. He had beaten the odds to become an immortal, and with the magical laws of the Tusita Heaven he was vastly stronger than he would normally have been.

Eldest Brother was now a truly powerful expert, and although he couldn’t match up with Yang Qi, he was still thousands of times stronger than anyone else he might face in battle in the near future.

Laughing heartily, Eldest Brother said, “I did it, Junior Brother! Hmph! Who cares about the Titan Emperor Heaven? I can now sense how pitifully weak their magical laws are. Even if a whole gang of immortals from there tried to fight me, I could crush them all to death. Junior Second Brother, Junior Third Sister, Junior Fourth Brother… all of them have reached the Demolishing level now. They need to use the magical laws of the Tusita Heaven to form their immortal bodies, too.”

“Exactly,” Yang Qi said. “I need to continue studying this spell formation and fuse with it more thoroughly. I already ensconced my nascent divinity in the Tusita Heaven, making myself like a god item in human form. In the years to come, it should be much easier to harvest magical laws from the Tusita Heaven and use them for the inhabitants of the Sage Monarch planetary system to form immortal bodies. Before long, I won’t need any immortal world to ascend or improve my cultivation base! Soon we’ll be our own immortal world, the Sage Monarch Heaven!”

“Definitely. You've got some grand aspirations, Junior Brother! Although, you still need to get to the Titan Emperor Heaven to find Master and bring him back.”

Eldest Brother clearly missed the Invincible Dugu a lot.

“Of course, there’s no question. After much contemplation over the past few years, I’ve come to realize that the Titan Emperor Heaven is in a bad situation. In fact, it might be destroyed soon. It’s honestly not a very big deal. The millions upon millions of immortal planes are as numerous as the eternal sands of the universe. Immortal worlds are born and destroyed on a daily basis. In any case, I definitely need to take a trip up there to look around.”

“Well then, I’ll call the other Junior Brothers and Sisters over to form their immortal bodies. Then you can rest at ease when you ascend.”

Eldest Brother made a beckoning gesture, and Elder Second Brother and the others came. When they saw that Eldest Brother had formed his immortal body, they were visibly stunned. “Eldest Brother, you did it!”

“Indeed he did,” Yang Qi said with a nod. “I succeeded in securing the magical laws of the Tusita Heaven. Now you don’t need to worry at all about forming your immortal bodies. Unfortunately, those with weak genes can’t work with magical laws like this—it's just too dangerous. But I can use the formation here to pacify the magical laws and make them easier to work with. Now, calm any anxiety and work slowly on your cultivation. Get your genes into the perfect state, then you can succeed in one fell swoop.”

“Junior Brother is right. There’s no hurry. Just work on your cultivation, and prepare for the final moment. Once you’re ready, Junior Brother will definitely make sure you succeed.”

“Alright!”

With that, they sat down to work on their cultivation.

In the blink of an eye, years passed.

It was now a decade from the date when Yang Qi had slaughtered the heavenly soldiers and commanders, unifying the surrounding planetary systems. Nothing unusual happened during that time. Top experts continued coming to the Sage Monarch planetary system, which was definitely a holy land of true cultivation.

Eventually, word spread that Yang Qi had helped someone to form an immortal body, and the news shook the other planetary systems.

After all, there were many experts in surrounding planetary systems who wished to free themselves from the control of the immortal worlds above them. Right now, when such immortal worlds sent decrees down they had to obey them no matter what. Everyone longed to practice cultivation on their own, without being directed by others.

During the decade that passed, the power of faith continued growing stronger and purer, flowing in rivers to the center of the Sage Monarch planetary system, and Yang Qi.

Chapter 552: Decade

Ten years had passed.

For those who cultivated the dao, it was like the snap of a finger.

But for the Sage Monarch planetary system, it was a period of profound advancement. During those ten years, Eldest Brother, Elder Second Brother, and Elder Third Sister and all the other members of the Invincible Society became heaven-immortals. Even Sword Seventeen reached the boundless Demolishing level.

As their cultivation advanced, they made their genes more and more perfect. And with Yang Qi’s help, they used the magical laws of the Tusita Heaven to form their immortal bodies and advance their cultivation bases.

Yang Qi’s twenty angels became stronger and mightier during the decade. They naturally had perfect genes, as they were true sons of the god legion.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi had long since reached enlightenment of the boundless dao of Demolishing.

As for his immortal clone, he passed his Demolishing tribulation and used the magical laws of the Tusita Heaven to form his immortal body. Considering he had five incredible energy arts to work with, he could combine them in accordance to the five phases, causing a void halo to spring up around him. Furthermore, the clone could also benefit from faith power.

During the ten years that passed, the clone’s genes reached the level of being a hundred million times stronger than normal and were even advancing toward two hundred million times stronger than normal.

Together, the clone and the angels could form a spell formation that would defeat even the most powerful old-timers in the mortal world.

With immortal bodies, Yang Qi’s seventeen Elder Brother and Sisters had a fighting prowess so domineering that they could only be surpassed by Yang Qi’s true self.

Yang Qi didn't provoke the Demolishing tribulation yet. After all, he knew that his Demolishing tribulation would be particularly severe, and would likely cover the entire planetary system with tribulation clouds. In fact, it could even reduce the Megaplexus and Coiling Arc planetary systems to dust.

It was a situation not to be taken lightly, a tribulation in which extremely dangerous things would be sent to try to destroy him.

Another factor was that, since he had ensconced his nascent divinity in the Hell of Mahānata, Hell of Gloom and Darkness, and Tusita Heaven; once he stepped into Demolishing, dangerously powerful streams of energy from those high-level planes would flow toward him.

During the decade that passed, Yang Qi performed plenty of calculations and divinations to try to pin down the precise moment when he should strive toward immortal ascension. Calculations made with his Wheel of Fate told him that now was not the time for a breakthrough. The process of the breakthrough alone would attract other powerful experts, who would likely try to take advantage of him in the moment. After all, unlike previous tribulations it was something which provoked a complete and utter change to one’s life and life force.

To cultivators, becoming an immortal was like gaining a new life, like being completely born anew. The days spent before becoming an immortal were like time spent as a fetus or toddler. Eventually, matters of the mortal world would be deemed completely inconsequential.

After becoming an immortal, one could truly begin cultivating the dao.

In the end, it was clear that Yang Qi’s immortal ascension would surpass anything ordinary. It would be a domineering act that would cow the sun and moon, cause planets to fall, terrify immortals, fill heaven and earth with blood, and cause ghosts and gods to weep.

Therefore, he didn’t want to casually provoke that tribulation in the mortal world. Instead, he chose to remain as a half-demolisher for some time, building up reserves of power and energy.

That said, he was already strong enough to make the effort if he wished. After all, he was now so powerful that no one could possibly stand up to him. He was a half-Demolisher who was enlightened regarding the dao of Demolishing. The only thing he lacked was the baptism of tribulation.

He was prepared in all ways, to the point where he had an enormous śarīra hovering in his sea of energy. It was a crystalline expression of the power of faith, as large as a planet hanging in the starry sky and filled with the power of the Tusita Heaven. It was a level of power that came close to that of the kingdom of the gods, filled with godliness.

The śarīra had also been packed with quintessence energy from thousands of planets, the sagelight of the halls of heaven, the quintessence-blood of innumerable god-devils, and essence power from the Hell of Mahānata, Hell of Gloom and Darkness, and Tusita Heaven. The truth was that not even Yang Qi was sure how much power that śarīra contained.

It would be his biggest asset when stepping into the Demolishing level, and would ensure that he could make the attempt anywhere he wanted.

“Qi’er, why haven’t you stepped into Demolishing?” Yang Zhan asked one day. “Many members of the Yang Clan have pushed their cultivation to the heights of the Demi-Immortal level. Some are even Universal Demi-Immortals. The clan has dramatically advanced and the children are truly growing up.”

“I’m glad to hear that, Father,” Yang Qi replied. “For now, I'm not going to step into Demolishing. There are too many bad things that could happen to the planetary system as a result. After I leave, Eldest Brother will take care of everything here. He has the bloodline of the ancient Magefolk, and has already mastered the five godly-class energy arts I gave him and completed his immortal body. He can also control the god formation to draw magical laws from the Tusita Heaven.”

“Wait, Qi’er, do you mean you’re leaving? Where are you going to go?”

“To find mother, of course.” Eyes burning with animosity, he continued, “Proud Heaven kidnapped her, therefore, I wouldn’t deserve to be her son if I didn't get her back, and kill him in the process. Based on my reckonings, the Titan Emperor Heaven will undergo a major tribulation soon, something that could end with its ultimate destruction. I need to go investigate, and try to figure out where Proud Heaven is. Supposedly, he’s the sworn brother of the lord of the Titan Emperor Heaven, so there is no better location for me to get the information I need.”

“I see,” Yang Zhan said. Frowning worriedly, he continued, “But it's already been ten years since Greensura went missing.”

“Don't worry. He kidnapped mother to lure me out. But I'm going to beat him at his own game, no matter what he's capable of or where he's from. He’s on my kill list, and people like that are doomed to suffer a dismal fate. It was like that with the Crown Prince, and it's the same with Proud Heaven.”

“In that case, Qi’er, when are you planning to leave? You slaughtered a whole host of heavenly soldiers and commanders, so many that some of the corpses are still lying around waiting to be refined. If you go up there and get captured, then what?” Yang Zhan simply couldn’t keep his concern hidden.

“Don’t worry about that, I’ll be going in undercover. Besides, Titan Duelbringer is familiar with the place, and he’ll be a lot of help. In fact, I hope to immediately infiltrate the higher levels of leadership there. No fooling around at the bottom rungs.”

In the years that had passed, Yang Qi had helped Titan Duelbringer form a new immortal body using the magical laws of the Tusita Heaven. As such, he was far stronger than before. And considering how much he knew about the Titan Emperor Heaven, it would be a simple thing to sneak back up into the heaven above.

Normally speaking, people needed to be Demolishers before they could attempt to rise to the immortal world above. But as a Fateless One, Yang Qi was different.

After all, he could even pierce through the greyspace of the Hell of Mahānata, much less the weaker greyspace of the Titan Emperor Heaven.

“The Sage Monarch planetary system is stronger and more prosperous than ever,” Yang Zhan said, “and we have an endless supply of fiend-devils. Your kingdom in hell is a bastion of safety, and the seventeen other experts of the Invincible Society are famous throughout the universe. In fact, it was only three years ago that your Eldest Brother Mage Cloudwalker went to the Misty Kingdom and challenged all eight of their imperial princes to duels. Defeating them caused the Misty Kingdom to lose a lot of face, and forced them to admit how superior we are. With your Eldest Brother in charge, I think we’ll be fine.”

“Incredible!” Yang Qi said. “Other than me, Eldest Brother must be the most domineering figure around. He’ll definitely continue advancing by leaps and bounds, and also help my immortal clone to grow stronger.”

The time had come. Yang Qi summoned all of the core figures of the Sage Monarch planetary system, including Eldest Brother, Elder Second Brother, and the rest of the Invincible Society, and his blood brothers Yang Yunchong and Yang Hualong, who were both powerful eighth order Demi-Immortals. Thanks to the corpses of the heavenly soldiers, they would continue to advance their cultivation and soon reach the Demolishing level.

Looking around at the crowd, Yang Qi said, “After building up reserves for the past decade, I'm stronger than ever. Unfortunately, I have a lot of enemies. Once I leave, all of you need to be very careful. Of course, I can always return here to help deal with any enemies that show up.”

“Don’t worry, Junior Brother,” Eldest Brother said coolly. “My investigations over the years have identified the organizations which secretly oppose us, and I’ll get rid of them soon enough.”

“I trust you to handle it, Eldest Brother. Unfortunately, my true enemies are from the immortal worlds. Incidentally, watch out for that kid in yellow. He’s another of the biggest threats, and has likely reached the level of being able to achieve breakthroughs in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.”

Chapter 553: Arriving in the Immortal World

After making all the necessary arrangements, Yang Qi ascended to the immortal world above.

He had planned and calculated for ten years before making this move, trying to account for all the things that could possibly play out.

His clone would remain in the mortal world and gather faith power, which he would then pass on to Yang Qi via wormholes.

He took plenty of godliness with him just to play it safe. That being said, his Wheel of Fate had indicated that he wouldn’t encounter any major problems in the Titan Emperor Heaven. Unfortunately, he didn’t have time to waste trying to get into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

Considering the threat posed by the yellow-garbed young man with the buzz cut, Yang Qi repeatedly urged his Eldest Brother to be on guard against his scheming.

Eldest Brother knew the kid in yellow was strong, and wouldn’t take him lightly. In fact, he immediately started making specific plans to deal with him.

Yang Qi unfurled his Angel Wings and drew on the powers of his God Legion Battle Robe and primeval godworms. One of those godworms was the immortal-level one he had acquired from Immortal Officer Fallen Red. The others included the mother godworm and the one which had started out as a smaller larva.

All three godworms were now in the immortal level, with immortal bodies. They had their places in the God Legion Paradise, where they could consume spatial power, making even the toughest greyspace no barrier at all for Yang Qi.

He also had his one hundred and eighty-five imperial snakecharms, which could take the shape of a huge primal-chaos elder-snake. Those charms originated with King Heaven-Devourer and were also particularly useful when it came to devouring the power of greyspaces, even those of heavenly worlds.

With all of the resources he had, reaching the Titan Emperor Heaven would be a simple task for Yang Qi.

Transforming into the size of a speck of dust, he shot upward through the clouds, passing through empyrean winds, the icy void, regions of burning heat, magnetic fields, immortal light, and other bizarre and fantastic scenery. Eventually, he reached the greyspace of the Titan Emperor Heaven.

Even immortals who made that trip would need to do so carefully, and would constantly pray to the immortal world above for guidance.

But Yang Qi didn’t have such cares or worries. As soon as he reached the greyspace, he transformed into something like a piercing awl that shot directly inside.

The greyspace was terrifying, but Yang Qi had a lot of experience. And compared to the greyspace of the Hell of Mahānata, this was nothing.

His primal-chaos elder-snake began eating away at it, causing it to shine with radiance and light.

When the snake devoured the greyspaces of immortal worlds, it would convert the magical laws into Heaven-Devouring True Energy, which could benefit whoever wielded the talismans. Heaven-Devouring True Energy was one of the highest-level sources of power in the universe, actually rivaling godly-class energy arts.

Yang Qi was only now coming to realize that the imperial snakecharms had this ability.

The Heaven-Devouring True Energy flowed into his palm, flickering like primordial chaos. It seemed black, but not. White, but not. It was ancient and peculiar, and flowed unceasingly. The true energy became a vortex of devouring that only served to increase Yang Qi’s power levels and make him feel like he was part of the primal-chaos of the void. It was also quite beneficial to his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.

By way of experiment, he sent some of the Heaven-Devouring True Energy into the śarīra in his sea of energy and found that it immediately expunged some of its impurities, making it more holy than ever. There were even impurities that the Heaven and Earth Furnace had not removed, that the Heaven-Devouring True Energy effortlessly crushed into nothing.

As the Heaven-Devouring True Energy accumulated, it pulsed with the mighty godpower of a primal-chaos elder-snake, a combination of righteous and evil elements.

‘Who would have guessed that the imperial snakecharms could do this?’ he thought. Considering how invincible the Heaven-Devouring True Energy was, he was now starting to realize why the ancient King Heaven-Devourer had been able to fight with the legion of gods.

If he had known this before, he would have long since started using the imperial snakecharms to devour the greyspace of the immortal world to benefit his clan and friends.

Unfortunately, he couldn’t go back and change things now.

However, he wasn’t without options.

All of a sudden, his three godworms let out shrill cries as they began carving wormholes leading from heaven down to the lower world, which Yang Qi immediately sent power into.

Down below, his immortal clone suddenly shivered as a wormhole opened above his head and Heaven-Devouring True Energy poured onto him.

It looked like a primal-chaos elder-snake swirling in and out through his eyes, ears, nose, and mouth, expunging the heterogeneous true energy in him and removing the impurities.

Although the clone had long since mastered his five godly-class energy arts, there had occasionally been situations in which they came into conflict. But with the Heaven-Devouring True Energy, they became a perfect cycle of five.

As the true energy continued pouring down, the immortal clone called Eldest Brother and others to come and benefit as well. Immediately, impurities which had built up over the years from spirit medicines and other things were cleansed.

All of the key figures of the Sage Monarch Collegium and the surrounding planetary system entered a session of important cultivation and cleansing.

“This stuff really is true energy!” Eldest Brother said, laughing loudly. “With my godly-class energy arts improved, I’ll soon be able to create my own consummate technique.”

“Same here!” Elder Second Brother said, and there were similar comments from Sword Seventeen and the others. Rapid advancement was being made across the board. Thus the core power of the Sage Monarch planetary system grew greater and more stable.

Of course, the fact that they had Heaven-Devouring True Energy was kept a strict secret, lest it lead to deadly consequences.

Eventually, Yang Qi was deep in the greyspace of the Titan Emperor Heaven and was surrounded by warding magics of all kinds.

Days passed. Eventually, he lost track of how much time he spent devouring the greyspace and sending Heaven-Devouring True Energy to the lower world.

One day, an immense rumbling sound echoed out, and bright light met his eyes.

A new world became visible.

An immortal world.

This was his first time seeing something like this, and at first he was astonished. Even though it was only a low-level immortal world, it was still stunning and beautiful beyond compare.

He had been in the Hell of Mahānata, but that was a place covered with dark clouds, filled with abundant devil energy. Everything there was either dark gold or pitch black.

But here in the Titan Emperor Heaven, everything was bright and glowing. There was no darkness or gloom anywhere, and the landscape was filled with mighty mountains and rivers, as beautiful as a painting.

The sky was filled with endless stars, as well as a shining sun and moon. Apparently, there were no divisions of day or night. Although Yang Qi’s vision was such that he could see across numerous planetary systems, he definitely could not see the ends of the Titan Emperor Heaven.

As for the magical laws of space, they were profoundly sturdy.

He flicked his finger and immediately heard a grating sound like that of metal upon metal.

In the mortal world, he could shatter space with a mere exhalation. But here in the Titan Emperor Heaven, space was much stronger. In fact, it was beyond the compare of the mortal world.

The mountains, rivers, lakes, plants, and everything else looked strange and foreign. Mighty trees towered up, rising thousands of meters into the air and making the place look like a kingdom of giants.

A gust of wind rose up, like a mighty dragon that swept across the lands. It became a tornado which slammed into a nearby mountain peak, where a group of immortals was practicing cultivation. Shockingly, the immortals were sucked up and killed in the blink of an eye.

“These energy flows are incredible,” Yang Qi murmured, sighing.

Titan Duelbringer immediately began offering explanations. “Milord, that was a Vile Dragon Gale. Here in the Titan Emperor Heaven, the energy flows can reach a state that will kill even immortals. If I'm not mistaken, sir, you’ve brought us to a place called the Stormwind Plains. The storms here are intense, and usually cover an area as large as hundreds of planetary systems from the mortal world combined. Because of the geography here, and the storms, a lot of people gather in this region who don’t obey the commands of the imperial court.”

“What? There are actually people who dare to defy the imperial court?” Yang Qi asked.

“Yes. It wasn’t like this in the past, but nowadays there’s a lot of unrest. The court’s ability to manage the immortal world has waned, and corruption has flourished. It's not uncommon for powerful immortals to seize territory and declare independence. Besides, most of the court’s armed forces are outside the greyspace, defending against incursions by other immortal worlds. Those people who were just killed by the Vile Dragon Gales were obviously in the process of making immortal bodies. The whole reason they’re out here is that they don’t want to register with the court and end up as cannon fodder in a fiendslave battalion.”

“So, that's how it is. It seems the Titan Emperor Heaven really is in a lot of chaos. Come on. Let’s cross the Stormwind Plains and see what things are like in the imperial court itself!”

Chapter 554: Imperial Court

At long last, Yang Qi was in the Titan Emperor Heaven.

His imperial snakecharms continued devouring the surrounding magical laws, and in fact, the will of King Heaven-Devourer seemed to be urging them to actually devour the entire world. The magical laws of any immortal world would contain faint traces of the will of heaven, which could not be resisted. That was why each immortal world had a name that conformed to the convention ‘Such-and-Such Heaven’. And it was also why King Heaven-Devourer was so-named.

Of course, Yang Qi continued devouring the magical laws, converting them into Heaven-Devouring True Energy, and sending them down to the world below.

He was currently in the Stormwind Plains, which covered more area than hundreds of planetary systems from the mortal world. The magical laws here were strong and the terrain was complex, stretching far beyond the limits of sight.

From what Yang Qi could tell, there was some immense power that lurked within the Stormwind Plains that gave birth to the tempests.

The Vile Dragon Gales could kill immortals, so the catastrophe they would wreak if they swept through the mortal world could only be imagined.

The winds screamed as Yang Qi proceeded along.

At one point, he was swept up by one of the Vile Dragon Gales, which was like a tornado large enough to swallow up planets within its scope. As soon as it happened, he dropped to the ground and planted his feet in place.

The wind was so strong that it uprooted some nearby mountains and threw them toward him with deadly force.

He sent the God Legion Paradise spreading out to block the mountains, which crumbled into dust because of the impact. As the rubble spread out in all directions, Yang Qi realized that, here in the immortal world, even the blades of grass and the dirt could be turned into immortal items.

‘What if I turn this Vile Dragon Gale into a talisman?’

Even as the wild wind whipped about him, he reached out and traced a talisman in the air, using the vital energy of heaven and earth to form the strip of paper.

A vortex sprang out of the talisman, which slowly began dragging the Vile Dragon Gale into it. As it shrank down, it became a whipping dragon-snake that eventually disappeared altogether.

Afterward, everything was still and calm. Yang Qi looked at the talisman, within which was a wind dragon that was twisting, turning, and howling as it tried in vain to escape. Obviously, if it were released it would unleash heaven-destroying, earth-extinguishing power.

“Milord, you actually sealed a Vile Dragon Gale inside a talisman!?” Titan Duelbringer said. “That’s incredible. Usually, it would take a fifth stage Demolisher, an immortal marquis, to do something like that. But you made it look easy!”

“The power in this talisman could destroy an entire planetary system in the blink of an eye. It's really terrifying. No wonder immortals view the mortal world as being useless.” Yang Qi sighed. “Even the blades of grass and the dirt here would be considered priceless treasures down there. By the way, did you just say that fifth stage Demolishers are called immortal marquises?”

“That’s right, Milord,” Titan Duelbringer said. “The Demolishing level is broken up into nine stages. The first stage is Void-Demolishing, and those people are called immortal soldiers. For example, that fiendslave battalion you fought was made up of such people. In fact, I'm also an immortal soldier, although I had a much higher status because I was an imperial clansman. Second stage Space-Demolishers are called immortal warriors. Third stage Thought-Demolishers are immortal officers. Fourth stage Origin-Demolishers are immortal generals. Fifth stage World-Demolishers are immortal marquises. Sixth stage Abstrusity-Demolishers are immortal paragons. Seventh stage Wilds-Demolishers are immortal ancestors. Eighth stage Antiquity-Demolishers are immortal emperors. And ninth stage Dao-Demolishers are called sovereigns of heaven.

“After that is the Godmyth level, although there are no Godmyth experts in this immortal world. Even the lord of the entire Titan Emperor Heaven is only a Dao-Demolisher, and isn’t even close to the Godmyth level.”

“Oh?” Yang Qi said. “Are there other immortal worlds that have Godmyths?”

“Of course, Milord. The Titan Emperor Heaven is a very low-level immortal world. And as you know, the number of immortal worlds rivals the grains of eternal sands in the universe. There are definitely immortal worlds out there who have Godmyths. According to the stories, the Godmyth level is broken up into nine divisions, after which is what they call the Deathless Throne. People in that level enter the kingdom of the gods and become part of the legion of gods. They aren’t immortals anymore.” The envy in Titan Duelbringer’s eyes couldn’t have been clearer. “Unfortunately, people like me could never reach that level. Compared to even Godmyths, we Demolishers are like ants. And that's not to mention the deathless legion of gods.”

‘Well, he’s right about that. The more I cultivate the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, the more I realize that my energy art is so profound that I have no way of understanding it's true complexities right now.’

Yang Qi had long since come to the conclusion that immortal ascension was vitally important. Rising through each of the nine stages of the Demolishing level was more difficult than progressing from the Energy Arts level all the way to the Demi-Immortal level.

As for the Godmyth level, it was incomprehensibly invincible. The culmination of the nine divisions of the Godmyth level was the Deathless Throne, which led to the level of the legion of gods.

The legion of gods were Deathless.

Yang Qi still had a long path ahead of him.

Energy Arts. Lifeseizing. Legendary. Great Sage. Demi-Immortal. Demolishing. Godmyth. Deathless.

As for the ancient legion of gods, Yang Qi knew that they were grouped as Lesser Gods, Common Gods, Greater Gods, Consummate Gods, Perfect Gods, Paramount Gods, and the Sovereign Lord.

But such levels were so far away that they seemed like a thing of dreams.

Yang Qi’s thoughts had wandered, but he pulled them back and looked at the Vile Dragon Gale Talisman he had created. Clearly, the vital energy of heaven and earth in this immortal world was so incredible that it could destroy the heavens and extinguish the earth in the mortal world.

“Milord, if you want to look into the matter of the Holy Mother, we need to go to the imperial city first. The Titan Emperor Heaven might only be a low-level immortal world, but it's still huge, and there’s no way you can search it thoroughly on your own. Considering the level of your cultivation base, it shouldn’t be a problem to sneak you into a leadership position in the imperial city. From there, you can investigate Proud Heaven much more easily, and maybe determine his whereabouts.”

“What about your status here?” Yang Qi asked. “Weren’t you branded a traitor? I thought the decree said that you were to be executed.”

“I should be fine. As an imperial clansman, I know a lot of people. Trust me, I put quite a bit of thought into this. During the ten years which have passed, I’ve thoroughly transformed, thanks to you. With the magical laws of the Tusita Heaven, I'm far stronger than before. Besides, I have godly-class energy arts now. And I’ve reached the Space-Demolishing level, making me an immortal warrior. I actually have a lot of powerful friends in the imperial city, and even have connections to a princess.

“We can say that you’re some enemy of the Sage Monarch Collegium, and you helped me escape from a dangerous situation. I brought you here to the immortal world to help me restore my name. I should be able to get my old position back, and get you official status as well. We definitely have to do that, otherwise we’re nothing but illegal residents! Once we’re in the imperial city, we’ll have to be very careful. If we're exposed, we could be imprisoned, with no hope of escape. Milord, your cultivation base makes you as powerful as a fifth stage immortal marquis, and although such individuals are domineering, in the imperial city they don't count for much.”

“Wow. You have put a lot of thought into this plan.” Yang Qi nodded. “You’ll be well rewarded for all of this. Once I track down some information about Proud Heaven, I’ll help you advance your cultivation even further. Your genes will get pushed even closer toward perfection.”

“Many thanks, Milord!”

“Okay, let’s get going.”

He unfurled his Angel Wings and disappeared in a blur. Following Titan Duelbringer’s directions, he headed through the Titan Emperor Heaven so fast that no one could detect his passage.

One of the first things he realized was that the Titan Emperor Heaven really was huge.

At first, the dangerous but beautiful Stormwind Plains were difficult to navigate, but as he got used to them, he sped up. Two hours later, he was at the edge of the plains.

In the mortal world, he would have passed through hundreds of planetary systems, but here in the immortal world, things were very different.

Suddenly, Titan Duelbringer pointed to an enormous city on the horizon. “Milord, look! That’s Stormwind! It's the biggest city here in the Stormwind Plains, and is actually controlled by the imperial court! It's led by the famous general, Wind Stormwood. He has a godly-class energy art called the Wood Wind Kunlun Eternal Heaven Dao. According to the rumors, it comes from a daoist text from a very high-level immortal world, the Kunlun Heaven!”

The city looked like a fortress made of steel that rose high over the surrounding plains. It was larger than the entire Sage Monarch planetary system and was filled with houses, moats, streets and the like, all of which surrounded a central keep. Immortals came and went, and heavenly soldiers and commanders strolled about on patrol everywhere. As for the violent winds on the plains, they were kept outside of the city limits by means of powerful warding spells.

This was Yang Qi’s first time seeing a city in an immortal world, and it reminded him of a beehive from the mortal world. No wonder everyone longed to ascend to the immortal worlds.

“Hold on, why are there so many people in there who aren’t Demolishers?” Yang Qi asked.

“Oh, those are the serfs who have no talent for cultivation. Normally, natives will give birth to babies that are already in the Great Sage level. Usually, they’ll reach the Demi-Immortal level by the time they're a few years old, and later, will join the army. But some people have no cultivation talent, and even after growing up, will never reach the Demolishing level. Since they have no hope of becoming actual immortals, they serve as serfs. People like that aren’t even fit to serve in a fiendslave battalion.”

Chapter 555: Status

Social standing in the immortal worlds was a very strict affair. And most of the populace was made up of serfs who couldn’t reach the Demolishing level, or immortals who were only immortal soldiers. The truth was that any nation, small or large, would have a large base of low-class citizens.

Those whose cultivation made them immortal warriors were like the landed gentry of the mortal world, and even that only gave them middling status at best. They had limited power and wealth, but no more.

Only the immortal officers could be considered influential rulers. Immortal generals would lead troops into battle, and when it came to immortal marquises, well, they were truly powerful government officials.

People like that were few and far between in the immortal world.

Upon leaving the Stormwind Plains and entering Stormwind itself, it was possible to see the complex nature of the city and its structure. Immortals were everywhere, and Yang Qi could immediately sense a flourishing energy that nothing in the mortal world could compare to.

The city was protected by warding spells that prevented flight, but Yang Qi had his imperial snakecharms and the Heaven-Devouring True Energy they provided, which negated such restrictions.

He also had three godworms, which inherently understood the most fundamental and mysterious aspects of space, and Angel Wings that made him capable of seemingly impossible speeds.

In fact, if he wanted to, he could cloak himself in invisibility, enter the city, and look around without anyone being aware of his presence.

However, he didn’t choose to sneak around in such a way. Based on the divinations he had performed with the Wheel of Fate, he knew that something big would happen to the Titan Emperor Heaven soon. And if it were to fall, he wanted to find the heart of the immortal world and gain access to its essence first, which would be of great benefit to his cultivation base.

He passed through Stormwind, whereupon he reached a seemingly endless sea that Titan Duelbringer explained was called the Crystal Ocean. It had been created by the immortal Waterfolk and was covered with a vast array of islands. Of course, each of the islands was as large as a sprawling continent from the mortal world. In the depths of the water, there was a crystalline palace that was apparently a mansion grotto of some sort.

The Crystal Ocean was even larger than the Stormwind Plains, and had even more violent storms. There were also sea monsters and demonlings in its depths that would attack and kill immortals whenever possible.

Armed forces patrolled the surface of the sea and would do their best to kill any of the beasts they could.

At one point, to Yang Qi’s amazement, he saw a group of immortal soldiers surrounding a nine-headed sea snake. Shockingly, the snake was a third stage Thought-Demolisher, the level in which ‘one thought could create a world’.  That was the level of the immortal officers, yet the snake was so strong that it could equal dozens of immortals of the same level as it. As the battle raged, it devoured hundreds of immortals before the army forces finally created a spell formation strong enough to capture it.

Scenes like this played out all the time in various locations in the immortal world.

Titan Duelbringer sighed. “The Titan Emperor Heaven started descending into chaos hundreds of years ago. How could the local demonlings be so powerful and out of control? I wonder if it has something to do with our old rival, the demon-immortal world called the Hanging Heaven.”

“What? Hanging Heaven?” Yang Qi immediately thought of the holy land of the Demonfolk, the Hanging Mountain. Stunned, he asked, “What’s the situation?”

“The Hanging Heaven and the Titan Emperor Heaven have a longstanding grudge,” Titan Duelbringer explained. “However, it's a complicated issue, far beyond anything an insignificant imperial clansman like myself would understand. Supposedly, when the Hell of Euphoria attacked the Titan Emperor Heaven in ancient times, the Hanging Heaven helped in its defense. But later, there was a falling out. In any case, the Hanging Heaven is a kingdom of pure Demonfolk.”

“So, that’s how it is.” Yang Qi didn’t ask for any further details. Instead, he focused on navigating the Crystal Ocean.

Eventually, they reached a mountain range in which the peaks soared to unimaginable heights. In fact, they were so high that even immortals would likely find them impossible to scale. Demonlings and immortal creatures were everywhere, and baleful energy drifted to and fro.

At one point, Yang Qi saw an enormous toad demonling lurking in a swamp, exhaling vital energy that caused the surrounding mountains to tremble.

“That's a primeval toxitoad,” Titan Duelbringer said. “Be careful, even certain powerful immortals would find it impossible to deal with. These mountains are called the Endless Forest, and supposedly the demonlings multiply here without end. The imperial court has tried dealing with them permanently, but simply can’t. They’re not even able to establish outpost cities here.”

Ignoring Titan Duelbringer’s advice, Yang Qi reached down and grabbed the toad, and before it could even struggle he shrank it down and refined it. Moments later, it was nothing more than a tiny trinket that emanated powerful magical fluctuations.

“That was a divine ability from the primeval infernal deities,” Yang Qi said. “Netherworld Soul Trinket Refinement. You can use it to refine toxic demonlings into their fundamental essence. Here, take it.” He tossed the trinket to Titan Duelbringer.

“This… this is at least a high-grade immortal item!” he said, clearly delighted.

Yang Qi was feeling more than a bit excited. This immortal world was incredible. He could casually grab a passing demonling and turn it into a precious treasure that would be a thing of dreams in the mortal world.

After passing the Endless Forest, Yang Qi continued on toward the imperial city. The imperial city was the core of the Titan Emperor Heaven, and the location where he would hopefully be able to make great progress in his search.

He had no idea how much distance he had traveled. He passed countless cities and regions, including the Scorchflame Plains, the Ice Kingdom, the Alkaline Wastes, the Bloodgore Marshes, Lightshine City, the Jadeite Municipality, the Proterozoic Mines, and more. Only now did Yang Qi finally grasp just how rich and prosperous the immortal worlds were. Eventually, he found himself in front of the imperial city, which was grand and magnificent in every aspect of the word.

It looked like it had been created by the legion of gods itself, and towered so high it could touch the dome of heaven. It appeared to have been crafted from jadeite and was holy, pure, and pulsing with immortal energy.

It was impossible to count how many palaces and structures made it up, or how many streets wound their way through the city. Immortals flew here and there, and the tides of people were so vast it was stunning.

“Here we are, Milord,” Titan Duelbringer said. “The imperial city!” Mixed emotions could be seen on his face, including fear and reverence. “It’s fully half a light-year tall, and contains so many levels you couldn’t walk them all in a lifetime. Right now, we can’t fly in, otherwise the warding magics might melt us into nothing. We have to land, approach on foot, and submit to inspection. Don’t worry about that. As an imperial clansman, I know plenty of rogues and scoundrels in the city. I can definitely get us inside, and get you a new identity, without a problem.”

“In that case, I’ll follow your lead,” Yang Qi said. “That said, I’ll definitely use the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth to change my facial features. It's a given that the immortal world knows what I look like, and has me listed as wanted.”

“Not necessarily,” Titan Duelbringer said. “Milord, you caused a huge ruckus in the lower world, but to be honest it’s not really something that the immortal world would worry much about. What you did would be akin to someone in the mortal world killing a few people. Sure, it’s a crime. But right now, the Titan Emperor Heaven is completely focused on defending against incursions from other immortal worlds, and definitely aren’t paying much attention to the mortals. That said, it never hurts to be careful."

Nodding, Yang Qi drew on his energy arts to transform himself into a slender and elegant-looking young man. “From now on, my given name will be Dragonguard. Remember it! Don’t go around calling me ‘milord’. Just stick to the story that you stumbled across some good fortune in the lower world, and that I came to your aid.”

“Yes sir!” Titan Duelbringer said, nodding his head.

With that, they landed and walked down the road to the entrance of the imperial city, which was extremely wide and made of gold.

If gold from the immortal world made its way to the lower world, it could be used to make all sorts of deadly immortal items. But here, it was paving material. Yet again, the wealth of the immortal world was clearly on display.

Almost as soon as they started walking, a passing patrol of about ten heavenly soldiers noticed them.

“Halt!” one of the immortals said. The entire group was clad in armor, clearly not cannon fodder from a fiendslave battalion. Their quintessence energy thrummed with power and they possessed consummate magical laws. “Who are you people? State your names and show us your identification.”

Snorting coldly, Titan Duelbringer pulled out an identity medallion. “I'm an imperial clansman. I was out on a mission and am back for my debriefing. How dare you get in my way!”

“Imperial clansman?” The soldier was visibly shocked, but after looking closer at Titan Duelbringer, recognized him. “Titan Duelbringer!”

“Huh?” Looking somewhat taken aback, Titan Duelbringer looked closer at the soldier, then exclaimed, “War Violence? It's you! When did you get promoted to captain?”

“Hey, didn’t you get sent down—”

Before he could finish speaking, Titan Duelbringer stepped forward and pulled him off to the side. Lowering his voice, he said, “Look, it's a long story. I could really use your help here, I'm in a tough spot.”

“Ah, gotcha,” Captain War Violence replied. Obviously, he was more than just a passing acquaintance of Titan Duelbringer. Waving his men off, he said, “Continue on the patrol. This is a friend of mine and we need to catch up.”

“Yes sir!” the troops said, and then they were gone.

**

Some distance away in the command center, Titan Duelbringer, War Violence, and Yang Qi all sat down to talk.

Already, Yang Qi was feeling very pleased that he had chosen to spare Titan Duelbringer. The young man was already proving very useful. Although he wasn’t a very important person, he had connections that would make it much easier to acquire a new identity.

Looking contemptuously at Yang Qi, War Violence said, “Brother, what are you doing traveling with a serf? Who is this guy? I heard about how you ended up getting sent to the disgusting lower world. According to the rumors, you actually got killed by someone down there. What are you doing back here?”

Chapter 556: Infiltration

As far as War Violence was concerned, Yang Qi wasn’t a Demolisher and was therefore nothing but a serf. However, as soon as the words left his mouth, Titan Duelbringer started in shock and said, “Brother, this is a great benefactor of mine. In the lower world, I fell into the hands of monsters and only managed to escape with his help. His cultivation base makes him enigmatic and impossible to predict. Forget about the fact that he's not a Demolisher. He can already devastate immortal officers and immortal generals.”

“What?!” War Violence blurted, shooting to his feet and looking in amazement at Yang Qi. “He’s that strong? I find that hard to believe.”

“Please, be seated,” Yang Qi said. Not bothering to stand, he simply waved his hand in a downward motion.

RUMBLE!

Immense force suddenly weighed down on War Violence.

Crack!

War Violence’s bones began quivering and his true energy started evaporating. Letting loose a muffled exclamation of shock, he dropped back down into his seat and began to gasp for breath.

“You….” he murmured, staring at Yang Qi with a look of terror in his eyes. Facing Yang Qi felt like facing heaven itself, like staring into the eyes of a god. There was literally nothing War Violence could do to stand up to him, and it caused profound fear to rise up in his heart.

He didn't even have the courage to move his hand.

“Well, what do you think?” Titan Duelbringer asked, clapping his hands together in delight. “Brother War Violence, is this benefactor of mine incredible or not? Right now, what I lack is an official position. By the way, Brother, I'm no weaker than you now. Take a look at the level of my immortal body.”

“What?” War Violence said, his heart still pounding. Looking over at Titan Duelbringer, he realized that his immortal body was much stronger than before and was filled with seven-colored magical laws.

“You abandoned the magical laws of the Titan Emperor Heaven?” War Violence blurted in shock. “You reformed your immortal body?”

“That’s right,” Titan Duelbringer said proudly. “I used the magical laws of the Tusita Heaven. What do you think? Those magical laws surpass the local magical laws by so many times over I don’t even know how to quantify it. And my cultivation base puts me just on the verge of breaking through to the third stage of Thought-Demolishing.”

“The Tusita Heaven!” War Violence was completely bowled over. “That place is the stuff of legend! It’s far higher-level than the Titan Emperor Heaven. If they sent down an immortal, even our boundless emperor of heaven would treat them with the utmost respect.”

“You’re right about that. Well? Will you help me, War Violence? What if we gave you some of the magical laws of the Tusita Heaven? They would help your immortal body and ensure that you rise far higher than captain. You would likely become an immortal marquis or paragon.”

Titan Duelbringer was being sure to clearly lay out all the benefits he could bring.

“What do you want me to do?” War Violence asked.

“Simple. Get me into the local Department of the Imperial Clan so that I can grease whatever palms are necessary to have my criminal record expunged. And I also need to get an identity for my friend here, the benefactor. Furthermore, I need to get in touch with my old friends to try to get me a job working for Princess Jadefall. Preferably a bodyguard position.”

Titan Duelbringer had thought things through already, and Yang Qi was very pleased with how he was handling things.

“Princess Jadefall? She’s important. Way too important for me to have any connections to. Wait. I remember hearing that you were friends with one of her stewards. Don’t tell me—”

“It's true. I'm actually a sworn brother of one of her stewards, and he owes me a favor. Right now, I have no official position so I can’t get into the imperial city. That’s what I need you for. Once I'm inside, I can get in touch with my friend in the Department of the Imperial Clan, who will help me expunge my record. After that, I’ll be in the clear.” Titan Duelbringer was being perfectly upfront.

“Seems like a good plan,” War Violence said. “So all you want is for me to take you into the imperial city? I can do that. Things are tense in the Titan Emperor Heaven now, and because of the threat of war the imperial city is under strict control. They question everyone that goes in and out of the city, and if they don’t like what they hear they arrest you. But I am a captain, after all.”

At this point, Yang Qi finally broke into the conversation. “Thank you for your trouble. Why don’t you take this immortal stone? I'm sure you could find a use for it.”  He handed over a violet immortal stone that abounded with the aura of a king.

War Violence took it, and his eyes went wide. “Such immense levels of power! That’s got to be a royal-grade immortal stone at the very least! It must be worth a fortune.”

Of course, it was one of the immortal stones Yang Qi had brought from the lower world, which he had created from power from the Tusita Heaven. Even in the Titan Emperor Heaven, an immortal stone like this would be considered very high level.

“It’s a power stone from the Tusita Heaven,” Yang Qi went on to say. “Absorb it, and you’ll be able to make changes to your physique and fleshly body. With magical laws from the Tusita Heaven, you’ll be far stronger than any other immortal in the same level as you.”

“Brothers,” War Violence said, “come with me. I’ll make sure you get safely into the imperial city.”

Thus Yang Qi and Titan Duelbringer followed him into the city.

The city was immense and tightly guarded. But inside, it was like a different world. Planes of existence were connected to other planes of existence by means of a maze of corridors, streets, and roads. Paradisiac blessed lands were everywhere, and there was heavy traffic in every direction. Business flourished and just about everything imaginable was for sale, as long as you could pay for it.

There was one plane set aside for business, and others for residency. And there were some immense structures that were imperial yamens or military bases.

Killing intent simmered everywhere, and the atmosphere was one of glory and majesty.

Eventually, they entered an immense memorial arch that led to a plane filled with pagodas and buildings, as well as streets patrolled by burly soldiers.

No one stepped forward to ask questions of Titan Duelbringer or Yang Qi.

However, as soon as they entered someone hurried over.

It was a gaunt, middle-aged man whose eyes glittered like torches. “Titan Duelbringer, what are you doing here? You committed a grave crime in the lower world, and now you dare to come back? Aren’t you afraid of getting sent to the Immortal Execution Block?”

“Calm down, Titan Shroudsun. Come on, aren’t we old friends? I know how things work in the Department of the Imperial Clan. So I made some mistakes in the lower world. Now that I'm back, all it’ll take is the right word here or there to clean my record. Look, let’s not waste words. I know what you want. I brought some great stuff back from the lower world. It should be enough to grease some palms, don’t you think?”

Titan Shroudsun chuckled. “Money talks, my friend. It's true, you made some mistakes, but you didn't commit any horrendous crime. A minor screw up—that's all, right? The fact that you even went down to the disgusting lower world should count as a big service. Come, let’s head inside where we can talk freely.”

Gesturing, he led them to a hall deep inside the Department of the Imperial Clan. As for War Violence, he was no imperial clansman, so he left.

The Department of the Imperial Clan was responsible for handling matters relating to imperial clansmen. When one of them committed a crime they wouldn’t stand trial in an ordinary court, but rather, come here for judgment.

Naturally, it was where Titan Duelbringer would come to receive punishment as well. However, as long as he had enough money, he could bribe his way out of any punishment and possibly end up getting a reward instead.

There was no question, the Department of the Imperial Clan was corrupt to the core.

Titan Shroudsun, Titan Duelbringer, and Yang Qi all sat down.

“Who might this be?” Titan Shroudsun said, looking over at Yang Qi.

“This is a benefactor of mine, who has incredible divine abilities at his disposal. His energy arts are invincible. Although he’s from the lower world, Brother, you absolutely, positively cannot underestimate him.”

“Don’t worry,” Yang Qi said. “As long as you handle everything smoothly, I can make it very worth your while!” He waved his hand, causing immortal stones to tumble out in a tiny, mountainous pile.

“Oh. My. God!” Titan Shroudsun’s eyes went wide and he very nearly passed out. “You never see collections of immortal stones like that, even here in the immortal world! Are they from a higher level plane?”

“Exactly. These immortal stones should take care of everything right? Including a new identity for my benefactor here? He needs to be an imperial clansman.”

“That’s easy. Thanks to the war, the Titan Emperor Heaven is in chaos. Many imperial clansmen have fallen from grace, and some have even had their clans exterminated. Getting your benefactor an identity shouldn’t be a problem, but the only problem is his cultivation base.” Looking a bit embarrassed, he continued, “It's too low! He's not even in the Demolishing level. As a serf, it will be very difficult for him to accomplish anything.”

“That shouldn't be a problem,” Yang Qi said coolly. “If I want to rise to Demolishing, then I’ll rise to Demolishing.” He waved his hands, causing a burst of immortal energy to seep out. After all, he had three primeval godworms who were all in the Demolishing level, and their aura was far stronger than that of an ordinary immortal.

“Oh, I see,” Titan Shroudsun said. “You’re hiding your strength. In that case, this will be easy.” With that, he left to handle certain particulars.

“Great,” Titan Duelbringer said, quietly so that only Yang Qi could hear. “Once our identities are taken care of, I’ll go find my friend who’s a steward of Princess Jadefall. Hopefully, I can arrange for both of us to work as bodyguards in her mansion. She’s one of His Imperial Majesty’s most favored granddaughters. Getting into her employ should get us a lot of great opportunities and could be our path to reaching the higher echelons.”

“So, we get into Princess Jadefall’s mansion, earn her trust, and perhaps end up getting an audience with the emperor and get answers directly from him?”

“Exactly!” Titan Duelbringer said. “Of course, most of it will be up to you, Milord. I can handle all of the initial stages, and maybe even get you into the higher echelons. As for what to do after that, it will be your decision to make.”

Chapter 557: The Mechfolk

Thus Yang Qi became Titan Dragonguard, imperial clansman. He went from being a wanted criminal from the lower world to someone of incredible importance in the Titan Emperor Heaven.

And it was all thanks to Titan Duelbringer.

The entire process revealed to Yang Qi just how corrupt this immortal world was. With enough immortal stones to pave the way, anything was possible. It was even possible to purchase new identities.

Of course, this level of corruption was a big indication that the imperial dynasty was on its last legs. Otherwise, how could a fugitive like him so easily infiltrate the imperial ranks?

Official documents were generated, as well as an identity medallion. They also received new sets of clothing. The story was that Titan Dragonguard was the descendant of a brave hero who died in battle. That hero’s descendants eventually fell from grace, mixed with the common people, and were forgotten. Years later, the Department of the Imperial Clan revisited the matter and tracked down the hero’s final descendant, who was none other than ‘Titan Dragonguard’.

As for Titan Duelbringer, it was a much simpler task to simply wipe his record clean based on ‘meritorious service’ in the lower world. Once again, Titan Duelbringer was now an official son of the imperial clan.

“Milord, you have a new identity, but unfortunately you’re somewhat lacking in cash. You see, here in the Titan Emperor Heaven, we don’t just use immortal stones for currency. Because we’re a member of the Thirty-Six Thousand Immortal Worlds Coalition, we use an immortal currency called brahmanints. Like this.”

With that, he pulled out a metallic coin. It looked exactly like coins from the mortal world, with a round outer shape and a square center hole.

However, the coin had been sealed with an immortal skill, transforming it into a magical treasure.

“Milord, you have a lot of power stones, but considering they’re all formed from the power of the Tusita Heaven, they’re too eye-catching. If we can convert them into hard currency, it will make things a lot easier, whether we’re here in the Titan Emperor Heaven or in other immortal worlds.” He thought for a moment. “Our next step is to infiltrate the mansion of Princess Jadefall and try to get information about Proud Heaven. So we definitely need to make sure we’ve thought everything through beforehand. Princess Jadefall is not one to take lightly. She’s immensely ambitious and commands entire armies of elite soldiers. Her forces have kept enemy invaders at bay for years and years. Once we're in her mansion you absolutely, positively must not reveal any of those power stones. It would be far too suspicious.”

“Thirty-Six Thousand Immortal Worlds Coalition, huh?” Yang Qi murmured. The mere name was somewhat frightening. Considering that he couldn’t perform a thorough search of the mere Titan Emperor Heaven in even a hundred years, how could he possibly handle a coalition of thirty-six thousand immortal worlds? All of a sudden, he was struck with awe at how large the universe was. No matter how powerful one’s divine abilities and magical powers, they were still a drop of water in the ocean at best.

Taking the brahmanint, he sent some divine will into it and found the immortal skill that had sealed it. Because of it, the coin emanated immortal might, and he could tell that if enough were gathered together, millions upon millions, it would be enough to release power fatal to immortals.

That said, releasing that power as a weapon would destroy the brahmanint.

Seeing how Yang Qi was studying the coin, Titan Duelbringer continued to explain, “Milord, brahmanints are miraculous things. They’re actually a core element of the Thirty-Six Thousand Immortal Worlds Coalition and are distributed by the Brahman Society. The seal inside the coin is actually a brahman skill. One of the key functions is how the coins can be pooled together to unleash explosive power. That said, they’re precious, and therefore most people would never use them as a weapon unless absolutely necessary. It would be too much of a waste.”

“Yes, I can see that,” Yang Qi said. “These brahmanints contain incredible power. It seems to me they were created by a godly-class energy art from the ancient legion of gods, the type that could be the foundation of a major sect or organization. My guess is that the Brahman Society must have something to do with the ancient buddhist schools. If I have a chance, I should go look into them.”

“We’re a long way off from becoming members of the Brahman Society,” Titan Duelbringer said. “Even the lowest member of that society outranks the emperor of heaven here in the Titan Emperor Heaven, and he's the lord of an entire immortal world!

“Milord, let’s go exchange your power stones for brahmanints. The imperial city is a major center of commerce, and there are plenty of shops to be found that specialize in currency exchange. And truth be told, the chaos in the Titan Emperor Heaven means that business is booming. That’s what often happens when war strikes immortal worlds. Goods exchange hands on a daily basis, especially imported goods. Actually, Milord, if you want your lower world to transform into an immortal world, you might as well start sending down building materials now.”

“Not a bad idea,” Yang Qi said, turning his eyes up in thought.

Although he had a mystical network of laws in place below, he wasn’t particularly rich in resources. The treasures he had couldn’t even match up to the mere soil of the immortal world around him.

And his kingdom in the Hell of Mahānata was by no means perfectly complete. Sending down building materials from the immortal worlds would definitely be a big help.

With the power of faith, combined with building materials from an immortal world, perhaps he could build an Altar of Faith for cultivation purposes.

Furthermore, immortal materials could probably help his immortal clone to further perfect his five godly-class energy arts.

“Alright, let's get going,” he said, tucking away his identity medallion. As Titan Dragonguard, imperial clansman, he now had nothing to fear and could freely move about the imperial city. Getting information would be a lot easier.

Soon, he and Titan Duelbringer arrived at a plane specifically set aside for business purposes.

Troops were on patrol everywhere, but considering the two of them now wore the clothing of imperial clansmen, complete with identity medallions, no one stopped them.

Even down-and-out members of the imperial clan were still considered wealthy experts who ordinary soldiers wouldn’t dare cause problems for.

The streets and shops in the business plane seemed endless. Just about everything was available, shipped in through space-time wormholes from places near and far.

On one occasion, Yang Qi saw a procession of chariots emerging from a certain wormhole. The chariots themselves were crystalline and dazzling in nature, and they were each pulled by eight horses. The horses were marvelous; they glowed with bright white light and had horns on their heads, as well as halos.

“Milord, look!” Titan Duelbringer said. “Those are ultra-radiance godhorses! They have particularly noble blood and are rare mounts even here in the immortal world. They’re incredibly fast and strong, and can absorb spatial power via breathing. They can even create natural greyspaces, and their passage will create deadly tempests. The nobility in many immortal worlds prefer them as mounts, although they’re very rare. Here in the Titan Emperor Heaven, you have to reach the immortal officer level to even have a chance at getting one. And the only place to purchase them is the Heaven Spring Consortium.”

RUMBLE!

They watched as the chariot procession went along through the business plane until it reached a particularly large mansion. Obviously, they were delivering goods, although it was hard to say exactly what.

A moment later, more rumbling sounds could be heard as another wormhole opened up.

This time, a host of vessels appeared that resembled snakes.

Each one was fully five hundred kilometers long and wreathed in crackling lightning that formed wings on either side.

“Those ships belong to the Mechfolk. They’re called Lightning Snake Battlecruisers. The Mechfolk don’t belong to any particular immortal world, but you’ll find them just about everywhere. They’re very skilled at equipment forging, the creation of machinery, and the assembly of magical treasures. Normally speaking, it takes a lot of work for immortals to make magical treasures. But the Mechfolk can make them in batches of thousands, tens of thousands, or even hundreds of thousands. Then they’ll use ancient spell formation charts to piece them together into larger machines. The result is a power that could never be unleashed by a single magical treasure. See, the Lightning Snake Battlecruisers are actually made from over a million different immortal items. Even just one of those battlecruisers could cause big problems for an army from an immortal world. The Titan Emperor Heaven isn't powerful enough to create such battlecruisers, so you can imagine what would happen if they crossed the Mechfolk. They would get destroyed. The imperial court has purchased a few, but they’re so expensive that the fleet is almost nonexistent.”

“Nothing short of miraculous,” Yang Qi said, his eyes glittering. The workmanship that went into the Lightning Snake Battlecruisers was incredible, and almost seemed like something from a different, more fascinating civilization.

And with his Lord's Eye, Yang Qi could see that the ship had enormous cannons on it that could surely unleash devastating power. The entire ship looked like something from a lost civilization.

Truth be told, legends spoke of an ancient mechanical civilization whose people were physically weak, and rarely lived more than a hundred years. However, they were particularly intelligent, creating machines so powerful they could kill immortals and even threaten the legion of gods.

The Mechfolk actually inherited the legacy of that ancient mechanical civilization.

One could imagine what would happen if two immortal worlds clashed, and one brought a disorganized fiendslave battalion while the other brought immense warships. Obviously, the disorganized army would be ripped to pieces.

Flesh and blood couldn’t possibly be a match for advanced machinery.

‘I think I need to pay a visit to these Mechfolk,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘I wonder if I can buy some of their battlecruisers and send them to the lower world….’

Chapter 558: Treasures Galore

The business plane in the imperial city was one of the most flourishing places in the entire Titan Emperor Heaven. Massive quantities of treasures were shuttled back and forth, and money changed hands constantly.

Yang Qi could see many things that glowed with faint godliness. They weren’t god items, but rather divine objects that had been passed down from the kingdom of the gods, things that were naturally imbued with deathless godliness. Obviously, such items would be considered extremely valuable even here in an immortal world.

At one point, Yang Qi sensed something familiar.

‘What’s that? Why does it remind me of imperial snakecharms?’ He even felt his one hundred and eighty-five imperial snakecharms stirring, as though they sensed something similar to themselves.

There were a total of three thousand imperial snakecharms in existence, which corresponded to the existence of three thousand great daos. As for where the other snakecharms were, it was impossible to say. All he knew for sure was that each talisman he added to his collection represented an immense increase in power.

He had started with twenty-eight snakecharms, then increased the number to seventy-seven, and now he was up to one hundred eighty-five. That made him strong enough to directly devour the essence of immortal worlds and turn it into Heaven-Devouring True Energy.

He was already using that true energy to grow his internal pellet, combining it with the power of faith and the magical laws from the Hell of Mahānata and the Hell of Gloom and Darkness. That was the power he would use to step into the Demolishing level and become an immortal.

Thanks to the Heaven-Devouring True Energy, the internal pellet he was forming contained almost no impurities and was close to being deathless godliness.

However, if he could get more imperial snakecharms, he could form stronger Heaven-Devouring True Energy and make his internal pellet even purer. Eventually, it would radiate the glory of actual godliness and, when he used it, it would cause his genes to rise to a higher level.

For a Demi-Immortal from the mortal world to use genes eight hundred forty million times stronger than normal to become an immortal would lead to incomprehensible power.

Yang Qi pointed to a street lined with buildings that glittered with decorations of pearls and jade, which was the location that had just caused his imperial snakecharms to stir. “Let’s go to that area over there.”

“Milord,” Titan Duelbringer said, sounding a bit hesitant, “that’s the Heaven's Net Consortium, which has deep connections to the imperial court here, and also other immortal worlds. They illegally mark up their prices and—”

“I don’t care,” Yang Qi said coldly. “They have something I want. I just sensed an aura with deathless godliness, as well as imperial snakecharms.”

“Alright, Milord. Just be aware that if they do have imperial snakecharms, they’ll definitely charge an astronomical price for them, if they offered them for sale at all. The people from the Heaven’s Net Consortium are very unscrupulous, and there are even rumors floating around that they have competitors assassinated. But, thanks to their connections in the court, they’re never investigated. Thankfully, we’re from the imperial clan, so they’ll be hesitant to do anything to us. Maybe they’ll even drop prices a bit.”

“Understood. Let’s go.”

The street that was the Heaven's Net Consortium was lined with shops and businesses of all sorts. A dazzling array of immortal items, weapons, clothing, armor, and jewelry could be seen, as well as immortal pills, fruit, and herbs.

There were some shops that offered crystal vases with spatial pockets in them, which were occupied by mutant immortal creatures. There were dragons, qilins, heaven-rocs, cloudtreaders, nine-headed snakes, and more. All of them were very rare creatures, the kind that immortals might use as mounts.

There were other shops that sold mechanical humanoids and beasts, things that harkened back to the ancient mechanical civilization. Such mechanical beings could be extremely powerful, perhaps even as strong as the immortals who created them.

That said, the techniques used to create mechanical items were degraded by the immortal skills used on them, and couldn’t possibly compare to the actual machines created by that ancient civilization. They hadn’t used even the tiniest bit of magical power from the dao of immortals, but their machines could kill Godmyths and threaten the actual legion of gods.

‘Ai, what a dazzling lineup of goods,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘I want all of it! Just imagine how amazing it would be if I could send all of these things down to the lower world.’

Sighing, he and Titan Duelbringer entered one particular shop. At the far end was a raised dais upon which sat an immortal, who was obviously a clerk tasked with keeping an eye on the customers and handling any transactions.

It was actually a pawn shop, which meant it was the perfect place to exchange his Tusita Heaven power stones for brahmanints.

Approaching the dais, Titan Duelbringer pulled out a violet immortal stone and said, “We’d like to pawn some of these for cash. How much will you give us?”

At a glance, Yang Qi could tell that the clerk had only recently stepped into the Demolishing level. However, he was clearly a shrewd fellow, a fierce fighter, and a cunning businessperson.

At first, the clerk looked at them like a vicious wild animal eyeing its prey.

But then he noticed that they wore the clothing of imperial clansmen and the avarice vanished. Taking the power stone, he inspected it visually, then pulled out a mirror that he used to illuminate it with magical light, revealing its quality and strength.

The more closely he looked at it, the more his face flickered with shock. Finally, he gripped the stone as tightly as he would a precious treasure, and looked up at them. Trying to sound casual, he said, “This immortal stone is middling at best. Considering how average it is, I can only offer ten brahmanints for it.”

“What?!” Titan Duelbringer blurted, his eyes bulging with fury. “That’s a high-level immortal stone! The immortal power in that thing surpasses anything from the Titan Emperor Heaven by so many times it's incalculable. An ordinary immortal stone is worth ten brahmanints, and you’re offering us that much for this!? It's worth ten thousand brahmanints at the very least! In fact, that might be undervaluing it! I knew the Heaven’s Net Consortium was unscrupulous, but I never imagined you were this bad!”

The immortal clerk snorted coldly and said, “How brash! I can’t believe you would dare to call the Heaven’s Net Consortium unscrupulous! The only reason I'm not striking you down right here and now is that you’re imperial clansman! Do you know who the Heaven’s Net Consortium has backing us? Obviously not! Get the hell out of here right now! I'm keeping this immortal stone, and if you even think of causing more trouble I’ll make sure the Department of the Imperial Clan arrests you!”

“You!” Titan Duelbringer growled, and it looked like he might start a fight right then and there. After all, ever since Yang Qi helped him transform his immortal body and gave him five godly-class energy arts, he was in a completely different position than he had been in the past. How could he possibly take such insults standing?

“Hold on a moment,” Yang Qi said, reaching out to stop Titan Duelbringer from doing anything. Looking at the immortal proprietor, he said, “I see how the Heaven’s Net Consortium runs their pawning business now. If this is how you want to do things, fine. I couldn't care less if you take that one immortal stone. I have plenty more where it came from. And if I can’t pawn them here, I’ll just go somewhere else. Don’t blame me for losing out on such a good deal.”

“What? You have more of them?” the clerk said, visibly taken aback. He had previously assumed that these were two imperial clansmen down on their luck. The Heaven’s Net Consortium wasn’t worried about reprisals from the imperial clan, much less two nobodies who were in dire straits. Under the impression that they had just come across a power stone, he had decided to take it, confident that there would be no repercussions. But now he was being told that they had more, and he realized that he’d made an unwise miscalculation.

Although he realized his mistake, it was too late to suddenly start fawning over these two customers. As a result, his face flushed, then turned a sickly green, and finally deathly white.

Of course, their dialogue was already the subject of attention; people had looked over the moment Titan Duelbringer pulled out the power stone. The dazzling light and sensation of magical laws that it emanated were very eye-catching.

After a short, awkward silence, a tall, imposing figure walked out from the depths of the shop.

Glaring at the clerk, he said, “Who trained you for this position?! I can’t believe you actually treat customers this poorly. You’re dismissed immediately. I’ll figure out how to punish you later.”

“Y-yes, yes of course, Sir Sun.”

The proprietor handed the power stone over and scurried away.

“My dear customers,” Sir Sun said, “our clerk was very unprofessional just now, and I’ll make sure he pays dearly for that.” He brushed off the power stone and handed it back to Yang Qi. “Brother, did I just hear you mention you have a large collection of power stones like this? If so, I'm sure we can work out a deal. The clerk just now offered you ten brahmanint, which was truly an insult. In fact, I think I’ll fire him. Come, come. Why don’t we head inside to discuss the particulars of the deal?”

‘Now this is more like it,’ Yang Qi thought. Inside, he was laughing coldly at this Sir Sun’s act of cordiality. However, he kept his face calm and relaxed. “I can’t refuse such a warm and thoughtful invitation,” he said. “You know, if we seal a deal I think it will be very beneficial for your Heaven’s Net Consortium. After all, I’ve heard you don’t have a very good reputation.”

“Oh, you can’t trust gossip!” Sir Sun said, though he couldn’t keep his cheek from twitching. “Those are just rumors spread by other consortiums. Besides, Brother, if you heard we have a bad reputation, why would you come to us to do business?”

“Er, good question….” Titan Duelbringer said. “Well, you might have a bad reputation, but that doesn’t mean you can’t give us a good deal. Besides, I'm hoping that this incredible deal of ours will actually help boost your reputation.”

Chapter 559: More Imperial Snakecharms

In a certain pavilion in the depths of the Heaven’s Net Consortium, Yang Qi and Titan Duelbringer sat with Sir Sun, talking business. They were on the top level of the pavilion, looking out over the bustling city, an amazing view that was simply impossible to take in with a single glance.

“As a supervisor here in the Heaven’s Net Consortium,” Sir Sun said, “your humble servant has a bit of power, including the authority to authorize big business deals. What exactly did the two of you have in mind? As long as there’s profit to be had, the Heaven’s Net Consortium won't turn down a good deal. We’ll even purchase god items, if you have them. By the way, I'm Sun Jianhou.”

Gesturing slightly with his finger, he sent out an awe-inspiring and righteous pulse of sword might, indicating that he cultivated a consummate dao of the sword. Clearly, he had immortal bones and also had extraordinary genes.

‘This guy is actually an immortal warrior!’ Yang Qi thought, surprised. ‘He's a second stage Space-Demolisher, with sword bones like Sword Seventeen’s. He’s clearly a sinister schemer, and won’t be easy to deal with. However, if he thinks he can keep us in check with the dao of the sword, he’s just looking to get killed. Let’s see if I can trick him into revealing how many imperial snakecharms the Heaven’s Net Consortium has.’

As the bitingly cold sword energy weighed down on them, Yang Qi and Titan Duelbringer exchanged a glance. Then Yang Qi let out a stream of warm energy that instantly negated the sword will.

Visibly stunned, Sun Jianhou said, “Shouldn’t people as amazing as you be famous? How come I've never heard of you before?”

“Famous?” Yang Qi replied. “Considering the chaos and war around us, what would be the point of that? Haven’t you heard the saying people should fear fame like pigs fear being fattened up?”

“Well, that’s true,” Sun Jianhou said. “Danger abounds in the Titan Emperor Heaven nowadays. If things turn really bad… the famous people will be the first to die.”

“Let’s get back to the topic at hand. I have a lot of power stones, and I want to know how much you’re offering for them.”

With that, he waved his hand and produced a spatial crystal, within which was a mountain-like pile of power stones from the Tusita Heaven.

Because Yang Qi had his nascent divinity ensconced in the Tusita Heaven, it was a very easy task for him to open a passageway there. Although he couldn’t travel through the passageway, he could extract power and magical laws from it. That made it possible for him to create what were essentially the rarest type of immortal stone.

In the Titan Emperor Heaven, people would devolve into fighting to get such stones.

“So many immortal stones!” Sun Jianhou said, gasping. Eyes flickering with greed, he said, “I just don’t get it. How did you acquire so many immortal stones like this? And how could they have such powerful magical laws? Which immortal plane do they come from?”

“I’ll be straight. They’re from the Tusita Heaven! You see, I do a lot of traveling, and I recently found a godrelic on the edges of our immortal world, inside of which was a huge stash of immortal stones. I suspect that an immortal in ancient times had been collecting them to make an altar, but was killed before beginning the work.” Yang Qi didn't hesitate at all to make up a complete lie. “Even a tiny scrap of power from the Tusita Heaven is thousands of times more powerful than anything from the Titan Emperor Heaven. We both know that, so please dispense with the rigmarole of trying to trick me into underestimating their value.”

“You’re right, they’re definitely very valuable,” Sun Jianhou said, his heart starting to pound with fear as he realized what type of person Yang Qi was. Although he was sorely tempted to try to take the power stones by force, he didn’t dare. First, he wasn't sure how strong Yang Qi was, and second, he couldn't forget that he was dealing with two imperial clansmen, which meant that he couldn’t just kill them outright. “Well, how many brahmanints do you want per stone?”

“A hundred thousand. Look, I'm not interested in haggling. I have ten thousand of these stones, which means that I want a billion brahmanints. Surely you can part with a bit of change like that. Truth be told, ten thousand is only a fraction of what I have access to. But the main question is, can you even afford ten thousand power stones like this? Or would you like to pay for a portion with something more valuable than brahmanints? For example, I heard rumors that the Heaven’s Net Consortium has imperial snakecharms, which are considered to be powerful enough to shake three thousand chiliocosms of worlds.”

“What did you just say?” Upon hearing Yang Qi ask for a billion brahmanints, Sun Jianhou initially looked a bit embarrassed. After all, he didn’t have the authority to make a business deal that immense. But then he heard Yang Qi talking about imperial snakecharms, and his expression flickered. “Where did you hear about the imperial snakecharms? That’s top-secret information! Please, tell me the details, otherwise I might get in big trouble.”

“We're from the imperial clan,” Yang Qi said with an enigmatic smile. “We control the entire Titan Emperor Heaven, so what is there that we don't know? Look, do we have a deal, or not? I have plenty of power stones, and all of them are packed with magical laws. Seal this deal, and think of how many top experts in your consortium will be able to achieve spectacular cultivation progress.”

“I don’t have the authority to make a decision like this on my own. I have to report it to my superiors.” With that, he rushed off.

“Milord,” Titan Duelbringer said quietly, “you can see in his eyes how vicious this guy is. Do you think he's going to try to pull a fast one? There’s no doubt that he's greedy, and we can't forget that the Heaven’s Net Consortium is the most untrustworthy group around.”

Yang Qi chuckled coldly. “It's fine. I could tell from the beginning that this place is full of scoundrels. And it seems he’s still trying to be slippery. Well, he's going to get more than he bargained for. For now, I just want to see how many imperial snakecharms they have. Every single one I get is a boost of power. And they definitely have a larger collection than mine….”

"In that case, Milord, congratulations. Whenever you set your sights on something, you get it.” Titan Duelbringer seemed to be laying it on quite thick.

“I actually used a technique of the primeval infernal deities to put a bit of divine will on him. Nobody will notice it, but it’ll let me spy on his every move. If he’s plotting against me, I’ll bury him. Besides, Sword Seventeen could benefit a lot from his sword bones.”

Shortly thereafter, Sun Jianhou returned, smiling broadly. “Brother, those power stones of yours are really precious. We agree to purchase them. If you have ten thousand, then we can definitely pay a billion for them, cash up front.” He held out a purse, which clinked as though it contained a massive assortment of coins.

Not bothering to look inside, Yang Qi nodded. “Fine. A billion brahmanints. So, your Heaven’s Net Consortium really is rich after all.”

With that, he took the purse and handed over the immortal stones. Then he continued, “Now, what about the imperial snakecharms?”

Instead of answering the question, Sun Jian said, “Brother, don’t tell me you also have some imperial snakecharms? If so, then why not sell them to us as well? We’ll give you an amazing price for them. Perhaps we could interest you in some god items?”

“Unfortunately, I don’t have a single imperial snakecharm. But I have plenty of immortal stones, as many as you want, if you’re up for a deal.” Swishing his sleeve, he turned as if to leave. “Farewell. I think our business is over now.”

“Please come back soon,” Sun Jianhou said, all smiles as he escorted them out.

Once they were gone, Sun Jianhou hurried to a location hidden deep in the Heaven’s Net Consortium, a place protected by powerful spatial warding magics. There, an altar had been set up that pulsed with godliness, as well as something faintly demonic. It also had strange, totemic designs on it.

Surrounding the altar were seats occupied by figures in voluminous black cloaks, complete with hoods that concealed their facial features, who were muttering divine incantations.

Interspersed among the figures in black were a handful of people in cinnabar-colored clothing, one of whom looked up and said, “Was your report accurate, Sun Jianhou? Does he really have some imperial snakecharms?”

“Yes he does. Sir, there’s absolutely no way that the imperial clan knows of our collection. That guy definitely used his own snakecharms to sense the presence of ours. That said, his cultivation base is exceptionally high. It's going to take some top experts to kill him.”

“I see,” said another of the figures in cinnabar. “Excellent. Now that this altar is complete, we can continue with our plan to destabilize the Titan Emperor Heaven. The imperial snakecharms are elements of a boundless god item created by the ancient King Heaven-Devourer. Each charm contains the quintessence of a primal-chaos elder-snake, specifically designed to devour the heavenly will of immortal worlds. Once the Titan Emperor Heaven is shattered, its heavenly will shall be fully released, at which time we can use the imperial snakecharms to devour it. That is the mission of our grand leader, and we can’t allow any slipups. He’s been planning this affair for years. Thankfully, you can wear out iron shoes in a fruitless search, then find what you're looking for without even trying. And sure enough, this boy showed up at our doorstep to help us. We can’t let him get away! Get his imperial snakecharms! If we do, our leader will reward us greatly. Understand?”

“Yes sir!” Sun Jianhou said. “But they’re both imperial clansmen. If we kill them, it could cause big problems.”

“This is about imperial snakecharms!” said another of the figures in cinnabar. “We can deal with any potential consequences! Each talisman from King Heaven-Devourer represents a greater ability to devour the will of heaven!”

Chapter 560: Princess Jadefall

‘Aha!’ Yang Qi thought. ‘Well, I already learned quite a bit. So, it turns out the Heaven’s Net Consortium really is full of schemers. They have an altar that they’re preparing to collect the heavenly will and essence of the Titan Emperor Heaven! The heavenly will of an immortal world is like the soul of a human, and is nothing to be taken lightly. It can be used to do all sorts of mysterious and unfathomable things, like controlling countless living beings.’

Yang Qi and Titan Duelbringer were out of the Heaven’s Net Consortium, and in fact, had already left the business plane.

As they walked down the street, Yang Qi was fairly certain they were being followed. Thankfully, Yang Qi had plenty of energy arts to deal with situations like this. Upon turning a corner, he created projected incarnations of himself and Titan Duelbringer, which continued to walk along. Meanwhile, he cast a cloak of invisibility on their true selves, then followed along some distance behind. At the same time, he used his Lord's Eye to check in on what was happening in the Heaven’s Net Consortium.

Of course, he saw all of the black-robed men muttering ancient god curses, as well as the individuals in cinnabar. Right now, all of them were in the middle of sending vital energy into the altar they were situated around. Within that altar was a primal-chaos elder-snake, swirling back and forth, absorbing the essence of the surrounding immortal world to produce Heaven-Devouring True Energy. Obviously, the primal-chaos elder-snake was made from King Heaven-Devourer’s imperial snakecharms. Yang Qi could tell that this snake was made of a total of six hundred and sixty-six individual snakecharms, making it incomparably powerful. It also meant that the number of snakecharms could be represented with the numerals 666.

‘Well, isn’t this wonderful….’ he thought, his heart pounding a bit as he thought of what it would mean to acquire six hundred and sixty-six of King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans.

Even with the mere one hundred and eighty-five that he currently had, his primal-chaos elder-snake was strong enough to fight heavenly soldiers and commanders and vanquish immortal formations. If he could get six hundred and sixty-six more, and refine them with the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, he wouldn’t need to fear anyone in the entire Titan Emperor Heaven.

He would also no longer need to worry about the tribulation that would come when stepping into the Demolishing level.

He had already divined that his Demolishing tribulation would be able to shake macrocosms and would arouse the jealousy of the horde of devils, the host of immortals, and the multitude of demons. In fact, it might even incite the envy of the magical laws and essence of the universe itself. If demons, immortals, and devils all tried to interfere, it could be a moment of unprecedented danger that vastly surpassed the situation when he faced that fiendslave battalion.

Entities from the Hell of Mahānata, the Hell of Gloom and Darkness, and the Tusita Heaven would all sense the matter, and would likely try to prevent him from breaking through. And they would definitely take advantage of the moment to try to capture him, assimilate him, and use his blood and energy to create out-of-body incarnations.

It was a common belief that the aura of heavenly tribulation would bring the most incredible dangers imaginable. However, if he had an additional six hundred and sixty-six imperial snakecharms, his powers of devouring would increase by thousands or tens of thousands of times. In that case, he could simply consume the tribulation, along with any devils or immortals which came to cause problems. With Heaven-Devouring True Energy, he could pass any tribulation, and simultaneously increase the power of his genes and his overall strength.

Right now he was strong enough to beat first stage Void-Demolishers, second stage Space-Demolishers, third stage Thought-Demolishers, fourth stage Origin-Demolishers and even fifth stage World-Demolishers. Whether it was immortal soldiers, immortal warriors, immortal officers, immortal generals or immortal marquises, none were his match.

Unfortunately, the Titan Emperor Heaven was a place where there were as many experts as the sky had clouds, which meant that there were definitely old-timers with profoundly powerful cultivation bases. They were definitely people higher than the level of immortal marquises. When it came to immortal paragons, immortal ancestors, immortal emperors or sovereigns of heaven, a fight with them would end up with him being defeated and captured.

But with an additional six hundred and sixty-six of King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans, everything would be different.

His main purpose in ascending to the immortal world had been to search for clues about Proud Heaven. But right now, he was in something of a bottleneck that needed to be passed.

The downside to all of this was that he had no idea how to deal with the Heaven’s Net Consortium and actually take those six hundred and sixty-six imperial snakecharms. They obviously had many powerful experts in their organization, otherwise they would have long since been overthrown.

Therefore, he needed to take his time.

Titan Duelbringer could tell what Yang Qi was thinking, and said, “Milord, why don’t we go to Princess Jadefall’s mansion? I know one of the stewards there, and he should be able to get you a job as a bodyguard. Then you can just wait for the right moment to make your big debut. Right now, most of Princess Jadefall’s forces are stationed at the border, defending against foreign invaders. Considering the level of your cultivation base, it shouldn’t be difficult for you to eventually get transferred there and perform some meritorious services. You’ll definitely get promoted quickly, and that should make it a lot easier to deal with the Heaven’s Net Consortium. In fact, if you get promoted high enough within the army, you might even have enough authority to lead a campaign to purge them.”

“Agreed. Let’s go!”

Soon the two of them arrived at another plane of existence within the imperial city. It was a quiet and peaceful place, filled with immortal energy and protected by warding magics that would make it impossible for anyone to enter unlawfully.

In the middle of the plane was an enormous structure that was clearly a paradisiac blessed land. It contained multiple levels and roads and passageways of all sorts, all of them filled with guards, menservants, and maidservants.

It was a place where high officials and noble persons resided, and the atmosphere here was very different from the business plane. It was a tranquil place where the immortal energy was so dense it was almost liquid in nature.

Obviously, random passersby would never be admitted.

However, Yang Qi and Titan Duelbringer were both imperial clansmen now, plus they were loaded with brahmanints. Therefore, any guards in their way let them pass almost immediately.

Eventually, they reached a towering, majestic mansion, guarded by a host of troops who clearly took their duty very seriously.

A servant, who was waiting for them at the entrance, waved them over and took them in through a side door. Only very important people could go through the main entrance. Everyone with lower status, even imperial clansmen, had to use the side entrances.

‘Such strict rules,’ Yang Qi thought. That said, even the side doors were crafted from pure gold and protected by miraculous warding magics. In fact, the entire mansion was made from incredible materials from ancient times.

As soon as they were inside, the servant turned and said, “I never thought you would come back from the lower world, Titan Duelbringer. And you’re rich, too? According to the rumors, you committed some grave crime down below, but instead of getting punished for it you were rewarded? Not only that, but you greased just about every palm that exists in the Department of the Imperial Clan?!”

“Look, it's simple,” Titan Duelbringer said. “My friend is looking for a place to stay. We know that Princess Jadefall is an important person in the Titan Emperor Heaven, and we're hoping that sticking with her will be good for him in the long run. Once he builds up some military credit, maybe he can start a business.” Titan Duelbringer was the type of person who had a lot of connections. Although many of those connections were lowly in standing, the fact that they worked for powerful people made them invaluable. As long as he had enough money to fund his efforts, he could curry favor anywhere.

“This will be worth it for you too,” Yang Qi said, handing a bag to the servant.

The servant opened the bag, and his eyes went wide at the sight of all the brahmanints. Smiling, he said, “I can take care of everything. And from now on, you come to me if you need any help. As you may know, Princess Jadefall has the top mansion in the imperial dynasty, and we have too many bodyguards to count.”

Even as he spoke, the servant led them to a side chamber.

“This is the steward’s hall, go ahead inside.”

Standing by the door, he gestured for them to enter.

Titan Duelbringer and Yang Qi entered the hall, which was narrow and wide. A tall, slender man stood inside, with eyebrows like swords and eyes that glittered like stars. His expressionless face seemed threatening without being angry, and overall, he was as imposing as a mountain.

“Greetings, Steward!” Titan Duelbringer said and bowed deeply, as did Yang Qi.

“Rise,” the steward said, and his voice caused Yang Qi’s heart to thump as he realized that the man’s gaze seemed to be piercing into him. Thankfully, the techniques of the primeval infernal deities kept him safe.

A moment passed, and the steward said, “Oh? Who would have thought you have an energy art like that? And your genes are very strong. So, a real genius. Excellent. And here I thought you just came to ask for favors, Titan Duelbringer. Instead, it turns out you’ve done quite well. I’ll arrange some training for your friend, and afterward he can join one of the princess’ armies. Once he goes on a few missions and builds up some military credit, it should be an easy thing for him to get a promotion.”

“Many thanks, Steward. Many thanks, truly.” As Titan Duelbringer nodded in appreciation, Yang Qi produced a bag of brahmanints which he handed to the steward.

The steward gave an enigmatic smile but didn’t take the bag. “I heard that you encountered some ancient ruins and got power stones with magical laws from the Tusita Heaven. Mind giving me some of those instead?”

“Of course, no problem!” Fully aware that this steward was an important person, Yang Qi immediately produced some power stones and handed them over.

Around that time, a voice could be heard from outside. “The princess is back!”

Chapter 561: Immense Energy

“The princess has returned!”

“The princess is back!”

Voices rose up everywhere as an immense, grandiose energy suddenly began weighing down on the mansion.

Yang Qi shivered, acutely aware that this was something he couldn’t possibly fight against.

Titan Duelbringer dropped to his knees. “Princess Jadefall… she’s returned?”

Yang Qi quickly followed suit and fell to the ground. For now, he would keep a low profile and wait until he had a secure position in the immortal world. Only after he passed his heavenly tribulation would he consider making more of a scene.

The energy he was sensing was the type that could cause heaven and earth to shake violently, and seemed completely invincible. It surpassed anything he had ever sensed before, and he knew that if it descended to the mortal world, could wipe out tens upon tens of thousands of planetary systems with no effort whatsoever.

Up above, an enormous door appeared.

As countless soldiers and generals bowed in the direction of the door, a host of servants appeared, carrying lamps, parasols, incense burners, and various other ceremonial gear.

Next, a palanquin appeared, within which sat a young woman.

As soon as she appeared, the sky went dim, and all the vital energy in the area began flowing toward her of its own accord, as if she were the ultimate, most domineering entity in all heaven and earth.

She wore simple, but elegant palace attire and looked like a goddess who had just stepped out of an ancient myth. Although her aura was otherworldly, she seemed to radiate power beyond comprehension.

She was none other than Princess Jadefall.

Yang Qi could tell that she was incredibly strong. At the very least, she was too strong of an opponent for him to deal with.

He immediately wondered what her cultivation level was. Seventh stage of Demolishing? Eighth stage? Ninth?

Of course, the sovereign of heaven in this immortal world, the emperor, was no higher than the ninth stage, so there was no way this woman was a Godmyth.

As she entered her mansion, everyone else dutifully bowed low and didn’t dare to look up. There was something about her that seemed to hint of godliness, as though she had a god item on her person that was tightly sealed up.

It was something that ordinary immortals would be unable to detect, but because Yang Qi had his God Legion Seal, his senses were far more acute than those of others and he noticed the clues.

Of course, he had his own aura sealed tight for fear of anyone noticing anything unusual. If he attracted the wrong attention from Princess Jadefall, it would be a very bad situation. She was too terrifyingly strong for him to fight, and besides, he was hoping to work for her.

And yet, as soon as she entered the mansion, she actually walked in their direction.

As she neared, the steward called, “Welcome back from court, Princess. Have things taken a turn for the better? If they have, perhaps you can lighten your workload. Considering how many military responsibilities you have to attend to, it's a pity you’re always occupied with affairs of state.”

“How could things take a turn for the better so quickly?” she said, her voice as charming as pearls. “No, things are getting worse.”

As Princess Jadefall neared, Yang Qi again felt his heart pounding, as if with excitement. ‘Her life force substructure is so strong!’ Yang Qi thought. ‘She’s definitely not an ordinary cultivator. She actually reminds me of that kid in yellow! Based on her aura… wait. Don’t tell me she's a Future One! No. Her aura is different from that of a Future One.’

Looking over at Yang Qi and Titan Duelbringer, she said, “Two imperial clansmen? What are they doing here?”

“Er, it's like this. These two are down on their luck right now, and are hoping to make a comeback. That’s why they’ve come here looking for work. I was planning to assign one of them to a mission or two. I already looked into his background. This here is Titan Dragonguard, who has a particularly strong aura. He promises to work hard for you, and the nation as a whole.”

“Oh really?” Princess Jadefall's gaze locked onto Yang Qi.

Instantly, he could sense her peering deep into him. Thankfully, he had already pulled his true quintessence energy into the God Legion Seal and used the abilities of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth to disguise his meridians and sea of energy to make them seem weaker than they were.

Crack! Snap!

A sudden burst of psychic power flowed through his flesh and blood, and even peered into his vital energy. A moment passed, and Princess Jadefall nodded. “You’re right. Not bad at all. Nowadays, most imperial clansman are lazy buffoons who don’t know how to truly practice cultivation. It’s unusual to find geniuses who have pursued cultivation to this level. Send him to the Special Reconnaissance Division and see how he does.”

“Sir, yes sir!” the steward said with a nod. At that point, Princess Jadefall moved on, and the three of them rose to their feet.

“Princess Jadefall is very strict with how she runs the army,” the steward said. “The Special Reconnaissance Division is focused on spying and gathering information. They also go behind enemy lines and act as scouts. Joining them will be good experience, and you’ll have the chance to perform some very meritorious service. Come on, I’ll take you to the barracks. I wouldn’t be surprised if they have a mission waiting for you. With every mission that you accomplish, you’ll earn military credit, and once you have enough you can apply for a promotion.”

Yang Qi nodded. “Yes sir!”

“Are you interested in enlisting too, Titan Duelbringer?” the steward asked.

“Nah,” Titan Duelbringer replied, smiling. “I’m not suited for all the fighting and killing. The Department of Internal Affairs has some work for me. Stuff related to purchasing and business. If you have any issues with logistics, just let me know.”

“Right, you’ve got a lot of connections. Alright, if I end up needing help with any business situations, I’ll be in contact. Take care.” Waving his hand, he said, “Men!”

“Here, sir!”

Two burly heavenly soldiers entered.

“Take him to the Special Reconnaissance Division! These orders come directly from the princess, and must be followed! Understand?”

“Sir, yes sir!”

“Come on, let’s go.”

With that, Yang Qi was escorted away toward the Special Reconnaissance Division. The two men led him to a twisting, winding wormhole that eventually opened up to a military camp in another plane of existence. As soon as he stepped out of the wormhole, Yang Qi felt killing energy buffeting his face.

There were a host of camps set up in all directions, as well as countless wormholes leading here and there. And there were as many experts as the sky had clouds. Almost instantly, he felt numerous streams of divine will sweeping over him, the type that no demon, devil, ghost, or monster could repel.

Kill! Kill! Kill! It was as if an innumerable host of warriors were all shouting into his mind at the same time.

One of the soldiers who had escorted him from the mansion raised his voice and said, “Princess’ orders! This is Titan Dragonguard, sent here to join the Special Reconnaissance Division.”

“Bring him over!” someone shouted from further in the camp.

Eventually, Yang Qi found himself in front of some sort of general or officer, who had eyes like a tiger, a long beard, and big hands. He was also a hunchback.

“This is General Yuan Kuohai, who leads the Special Reconnaissance Division. Hurry up and offer respects!”

“Greetings, General!” Yang Qi said, offering a quick salute.

General Yuan Kuohai snorted coldly. “An imperial clansman who wants to join the army? It’s not easy to serve in the Special Reconnaissance Division. All of our scouts are tough soldiers who can operate on their own, infiltrating enemy strongholds, assassinating important people, and the like. They have to be able to get to places other people can’t reach. Can you do all that?”

“Yes sir, I can!”

Even as the words left his mouth, he realized that he had not responded correctly. Based on everything he had experienced in life, including fighting endless swarms of heavenly soldiers and commanders, he knew that things worked differently in the armed forces. One needed to puff one's chest up and impress others right away. Therefore, he continued on and said, “Sir, I'm here to bring glory to the imperial clan. To fight! To rain blood down on the enemy! You need ambitious soldiers working for you, right? People who will fight hard no matter what? Well, sir, I might be a nobody from the imperial clan, but I know full well that the empire only exists because of the army! If you think I'm not worthy, general, then give me your most dangerous mission. If I fail, then I don’t deserve to live. I’ll take any position you offer me!”

General Yuan Kuohai’s eyes glittered as he realized that Yang Qi was neither servile nor obsequious. With a firm nod, he slapped the table in front of him and said, “Excellent. I like you, kid! I can tell you’re confident, and that’s a good thing. In that case, I'm not going to give you a hard time. Right now, there are a lot of open missions here in the Special Reconnaissance Division, and I know of one that’s perfect for you. Not too far away in the Endless Forest, the demonlings have been particularly active recently. It seems likely they’ve fallen under the influence of demons from another world, specifically the Hanging Heaven. According to what we know so far, a demon-immortal from there arranged for an altar to be set up and is using it to gather the local demonlings into an army. I'm assigning you to one of our crack teams, the Obliterators. Your mission is to get into the Endless Forest, gather some specific information, and destroy the altar!”

“Sir, yes sir!” Yang Qi replied in a loud voice.

“Alright. Men, bring the Obliterators in.”

“Sir, yes sir!”

A moment later, devilish light flickered and an aura like that of endless waves of blood filled the encampment. Five armor-clad soldiers appeared, all of them tall, strong, and clearly very experienced as fighters.

“These are the Obliterators, one of the elite teams we have here in the Special Reconnaissance Division.” Looking at the team of five, he said, “You have a new team member now. This is Titan Dragonguard, an imperial clansman. The six of you will head into the depths of the Endless Forest, scout out the location of the Hanging Heaven’s altar, and destroy it. Good luck.”

“What?” one of the soldiers said. “This kid wants to join us, the Obliterators? Everyone knows that we’re fiendish killers! We used to have a lot of members, but most of them were eliminated on the countless missions we’ve accomplished. We five survivors are the best of the best. And now we're supposed to add a newbie?” Looking over at Yang Qi, he said, “Aren’t you afraid of being eliminated too?”

The soldier's armor was covered with countless vicious-looking spikes, and he had triangular, compound eyes that seemed to indicate he cultivated a powerful vision technique. Anyone who looked into those eyes would feel their hair standing on end, the same way one would feel when staring into the eyes of a deadly viper.

Chapter 562: The Obliterators

Each member of the Obliterators was a crack soldier, and obviously, they looked down on new recruits like Yang Qi. The fact that he was an imperial clansman probably made things worse, as most people thought members of the imperial clan were spineless cowards.

“Listen well, Titan Dragonguard,” General Yuan Kuohai said. “Being a soldier in the Special Reconnaissance Division is very dangerous. You could get eliminated at any time, so you’d best prepare yourself mentally.”

“No problem at all!” Yang Qi replied in a loud voice. “I can handle any mission.”

“Fine, you’re all dismissed!”

Whoosh. Whoosh. Whoosh.

The five members of the Obliterators blurred into motion as they left, completely ignoring Yang Qi, and even hoping that he would fall behind and lose track of them.

Yang Qi merely chuckled coldly as he followed along, keeping right on their trail.

Yuan Kuohai watched in surprise. ‘That imperial clansman is fast! Who would have guessed that the imperial clan would have an expert like him nowadays? No wonder the princess sent him here. Seems she’s as incredibly perceptive as ever. Although, the Obliterators are no slouches. I wonder if he’ll be able to fit in with them.’

By this point, the Obliterators had disappeared into a wormhole.

The military plane had all sorts of wormholes leading to various other locations in the imperial city, as well as to the immortal world at large. Because of that, it was a travel hub of sorts. As for the wormholes, they were an ancient type that had been created in a much earlier time period to facilitate military travel.

The immortal world was immense, and without wormholes it would be impossible for the army to move about and put out whatever fires might arise. It was easy to imagine what would happen if a rebellion erupted and it took the army years to get there.

Unfortunately, after the Obliterators had traveled through the wormhole for a short time, the passage ended abruptly and they popped out in a huge desert.

“The wormhole is broken!” one of the experts said. “What a pity. Because of all the wars here in the Titan Emperor Heaven, a lot of the wormholes have been damaged or broken. It’s too bad we don’t have any primeval godworms in our immortal world. When immortals make wormholes, they’re very unstable. Using godworms is the only way to create stable, permanent versions. I guess we're going to have to fly the rest of the way to the Endless Forest.”

“I wonder if that imperial clansman managed to keep up.”

Without any hesitation, they sped out across the desert, moving as fast as lightning.

“That piece of trash is only going to hold us back. We’ve worked hard in our cultivation to reach the immortal warrior level, and from his aura he’s clearly just stepped into Demolishing. He’s as far below us as earth is from heaven. We’re veterans of numerous battles who have killed too many enemies to even count. And we have perfect genes, too. Our fighting prowess is so incredible that not even immortal officers would stand a chance against us.”

“Exactly. He obviously doesn’t know the height of the heavens and the breadth of the earth. What does he think the Special Reconnaissance Division is? A playground for kids?”

“More like a game of death in which you enter alive and leave on a stretcher. Come on. I'm in no mood to wait around for him. If he can’t keep up with us now, there’s no way he’ll survive the Endless Forest.”

“The Endless Forest is a maze. Once we’re inside, he’ll never be able to catch up. He’ll just end up wandering around on the outskirts.”

“Oh really?” someone said.

“What?”

The five Obliterators stopped in their tracks and immediately fell into a battle formation that conformed to yin, yang, and the five phases. In the blink of an eye, their power levels climbed to a stunning level.

“Who’s there?”

“Me, of course,” Yang Qi said, stepping out of a fold in space and looking coldly at the Obliterators. “We’re all members of the Special Reconnaissance Division, aren’t we? Why are you trying so hard to shake me?”

Yang Qi could tell that these five soldiers were indeed crack troops who were comparable to the members of the Invincible Society. They were strong willed and obstinate, but, unfortunately, they lacked the incredible reserves of power and resources that were required for further breakthroughs.

In immortal worlds, ordinary people couldn’t just achieve breakthroughs at will. One needed a corresponding technique, energy art, and cultivation technique, as well as immense power and plenty of magical laws. The slightest lack in any of those would make success impossible. This group of five had no techniques that could push them past second stage Space-Demolishing, and were thus stuck as immortal warriors.

The Obliterator with the spiked armor said, “So, you managed to keep up. Nice job, buddy. Seems you’re skilled at covert tactics. In that case, let’s see how strong you are in a fight. If you're good enough, maybe we can accept you after all.”

“That’s right,” another of the soldiers said, staring at Yang Qi with triangular eyes. “You just joined the Special Reconnaissance Division, so you probably don't know what kind of reputation we Obliterators have. We’re the fiercest group in the entire division, and we slaughter people like harvesting wheat. My call sign is Deathly Serpent. This fellow with the Hundred Spines Immortal Armor is our Eldest Brother, Savage Dragon. And these three are Brutal Tiger, Callous Panther, and Vicious Vulture.”

Savage Dragon, Brutal Tiger, Callous Panther, Vicious Vulture, and Deathly Serpent.

The five call signs were intended to be fiendish and intimidating, to make sure that anyone who heard them would know that these were people who shouldn’t be trifled with. But when Yang Qi heard the five call signs, he burst out laughing inside.

However, he managed to keep a straight face. ‘And here I thought everyone in the immortal world had the demeanor of a transcendent being and floated around on clouds. Obviously, I was wrong. This place is basically the same as the mortal world—power is everything. In any case, these five seem like they would be good followers.’

“Don’t just stand there, buddy,” Eldest Brother Savage Dragon said. Waving a finger, he said, “Deathly Serpent, why don’t you test him and see how strong he is? If he's good enough, maybe he can be your sidekick and handle chores for you.”

“Sure thing!” Deathly Serpent flew into the air. “Alright, kid, let’s see what you imperial clansmen can do!”

RUMBLE!

He splayed his fingers, sending magical law streaking out in the shape of serpents, which then grouped together into a formation. “Rise of the Heaven-Snake; Sun-Moon Obfuscation; Seven-Extinctions Entangling-Serpent Grand Immortal Skill!”

This was actually a group of heavenly-class energy arts combined into an immortal skill.

It was something reminiscent of ancient times, filled with immense danger and boiling with killing intent. It contained both magical laws in serpent form, and also a host of immortal souls shaped into something like a fierce snake god.

In fact, the souls came from immortals that Deathly Serpent had personally killed, and there seemed to be too many to count. Few people in the mortal world could survive being hit by a blow like this. After all, who in the mortal world could go around killing countless immortals and using their souls to power an immortal skill?

The Seven Extinctions Entangling-Serpent Grand Immortal Skill shot toward Yang Qi, as if to devour him; obviously, Deathly Serpent was using a deadly move that would kill Yang Qi if he didn’t manage to block it.

“What the hell is this?” Yang Qi said. “I can’t believe you would use something as ridiculous as this against me!”

He waved his sleeve, and a spinning wormhole vortex appeared, which the snake-like manifestation of the immortal skill fell into.

“The flick of my sleeve can open the cosmos,” Yang Qi said coolly.

In the blink of an eye, the grand immortal skill was gone.

“What’s going on?” Deathly Serpent said, staggering backward. Before he could do anything else, Yang Qi leaped forward, causing heaven-rending, earth-crushing godly might to rumble out as he extended his hand in a move that Deathly Serpent couldn’t possibly evade.

Crack!

Before Deathly Serpent could react, Yang Qi’s hand clamped onto his throat, and he felt himself being lifted into the air, sealing marks slamming into him that completely locked down his magical power.

“Deathly Serpent!”

“Deathly Serpent… are you alright?”

“Put him down!”

Savage Dragon, Brutal Tiger, Vicious Vulture, and Callous Panther all leaped forward and unleashed deadly moves of their own, making sure to lock down every avenue of escape.

“You bunch of weaklings. Did you really think all imperial clansmen are pushovers?” Laughing, Yang Qi spun in place, sending a shock wave out in all directions. “Heavenly Shockwave Shakes Space; Let the Infernal King Come; Curse Heaven and Earth; Transpose the Cosmos!”

Pop. Pop. Pop. Pop!

Four popping sounds rang out as Savage Dragon, Brutal Tiger, Vicious Vulture, and Callous Panther were knocked out of the sky, dazed, their true energy seeping out like mad.

However, they were quick to recover.

“Quick, back in formation!” Savage Dragon shouted, sending out a host of black chains toward Yang Qi.

“You think you can beat me that easily? All of you, back down!” Yang Qi’s hand shot out in front of him and intense rumbling sounds filled the area. The Hand of the One God crushed space down into crystalline form, and in the blink of an eye all four of the other Obliterators were sealed in crystal bonds, causing them to drop down onto the desert floor with looks of terror etched on their faces.

Yang Qi’s cultivation base was simply too powerful; not even four of the Obliterators working together had been able to deal with him. In fact, he beat them within the blink of an eye. It almost seemed like he had been playing.

“Y-you…” Deathly Serpent said, trembling, “just who are you? How could an imperial clansman like you have joined the army? Shouldn’t you be a high official or something?”

“That’s none of your concern. But if you join me, I can guarantee that all of you will get promotions. In fact, I can probably help you achieve cultivation base breakthroughs. Understand?” He flicked his finger, and more popping sounds rang out as the crystal bonds shattered, freeing Savage Dragon, Brutal Tiger, Vicious Vulture and Callous Panther. The four of them rose to their feet, exchanging awkward glances. None of them were quite sure what to do.

“Starting now, I'm the leader of the Obliterators,” Yang Qi said. “Alright? Feel free to disagree. You can even run away, if you want. But if you flee the entire Titan Emperor Heaven, I’ll track you down with no effort at all, no matter where you go.”

Chapter 563: The Endless Forest

The five Obliterators all stood together. The situation had developed so quickly that it almost seemed like a dream to them. However, considering Yang Qi’s powerful aura, they all knew that it was no dream. It was very, very real.

“What, not willing to accept me as your captain?” Yang Qi asked, his voice pulsing with killing intent.

“We’re willing,” Savage Dragon said. “We Obliterators respect strength above everything, so we can acknowledge allegiance to someone stronger than us. Sir, considering we have someone as invincible as you in our ranks now, we’ll definitely surpass all the other teams like us. Hopefully, you can make us the strongest squad in the entire Special Reconnaissance Division.”

“Well, that's a given,” Yang Qi said. “In fact, that’s my exact plan. We’ll become the top team in the Special Reconnaissance Division, and from there, reach even greater heights. Alright, starting now, you take orders from me. Also, I have a few questions for you.”

“What questions do you have, Captain, sir?” Savage Dragon was fully convinced that Yang Qi was stronger than him, and not just by a little bit. Therefore, he didn’t harbor even the hint of a thought of scheming against him.

To him, strength was everything, and anything else was just an illusion.

“I want to know about the Heaven’s Net Consortium. Who are they? What are their connections to the imperial court?” Yang Qi was still thinking about those six hundred and sixty-six imperial snakecharms that the Heaven’s Net Consortium had, which were crucial to him passing the tribulation of the Demolishing level.

Army scouts were well-informed and had access to lots of information, even more so than the well-connected Titan Duelbringer.

“What?” Savage Dragon said in surprise. “Captain, how did you know the Heaven’s Net Consortium is connected to our mission in the Endless Forest?”

Inwardly, Yang Qi was shocked, but he didn’t let it show on his face, ‘Our mission is to go to the Endless Forest and to destroy the magical altar set up by the Demonfolk sorcery of the Hanging Heaven,’ he thought. ‘Don’t tell me the Heaven’s Net Consortium is also wrapped up in the whole thing.’

“It’s like this, Captain,” Vicious Vulture said. “The Heaven’s Net Consortium has a lot of connections to the imperial court. But their biggest backer is actually an almighty figure from the Hanging Heaven, who has been plotting to overthrow the imperial court for who knows how long. Unfortunately, no one has ever been able to turn up any hard evidence to prove it. Worse, the Heaven’s Net Consortium has been seeding the court with infiltrators. It’s a big problem that’s been getting worse and worse over the years, but nobody can do anything about it.”

“Well, that makes sense,” Yang Qi said. “No wonder I sensed the aura of Demonfolk when I visited the Heaven’s Net Consortium earlier.” After all, the original creator of the imperial snakecharms, King Heaven-Devourer—who was himself a primal-chaos elder-snake—had been an august patriarch of the Demonfolk.

No wonder the Hanging Heaven had so many snakecharms.

“Let’s go!” Yang Qi said. “The Endless Forest is just up ahead. Let’s start by dismantling that altar, then we can look into the secrets of the Heaven’s Net Consortium. If they’re plotting against the imperial clan, then it’s my duty as a clansman to see them destroyed.”

He flew into the air and waved his hand, causing space to bend as a wormhole opened up. This wormhole was almost crystalline and was obviously much more stable than the broken wormhole they had traveled through earlier.

The Obliterators were all shocked.

“This wormhole….”

“Captain, do you have a primeval godworm?”

“Indeed I do,” Yang Qi replied coolly. “That makes it very easy for me to make stable wormholes. As long as the five of you are loyal to me, I can eventually get you your own godworms.”

“Many thanks, Captain! We’ll work for you to our dying day! We won’t flinch even if you ask us to climb mountains of blades or cross seas of fire!”

The five Obliterators were completely and utterly convinced of Yang Qi’s strength and superiority.

They entered the wormhole and sped along until they sensed some sort of demon power up ahead, blocking the wormhole. At that point, they dropped back down into the open and Yang Qi waved his hand, causing the wormhole to fade from view.

They were no longer in a huge desert, but a region of towering mountains covered with dense vegetation. It looked like a primeval forest, with trees that stretched high into the sky and vines stretching between trees and limbs. The foliage was so dense that, once inside the forest, it was impossible to see the sky.

“Captain, this is the Endless Forest,” Savage Dragon said. “Nobody even knows the full extent of its borders, and it’s filled with demonlings of all sorts. Some of them are very dangerous and have had lairs here since ancient times. Not even the armies of the imperial court have been able to subjugate this region. Some of the trees have demon souls and will attack immortals who fly too close to them. We definitely can’t just go right in. We have to be very careful as we search for that altar, and—”

Whoosh!

Before he could finish speaking, a screaming sound filled the air and a vine shot toward the group of six.

Swish!

Brutal Tiger leaped forward, a vicious Tiger King Battle Saber in his hand that he used to slash the vine apart. However, the vine didn’t die. Instead, the two halves began extending, looking even more vicious than before. Apparently, cutting them in half only made them stronger!

But then a blast of searing heat shot out from the Tiger King Battle Saber and burned the two vines out of existence.

“Nice,” Yang Qi said with a nod. “Excellent saber technique. Each strike is fatal and contains an immortal skill built into it. Unfortunately, your true energy flows are imbalanced, and haven’t combined the dao with reality.”

Suddenly, more vines shot toward them, yet Yang Qi didn’t even look in their direction. He waved his hand, causing Brutal Tiger’s saber to fly over to him. Grasping it by the hilt, he unleashed a blade nimbus that shredded all of the vines to pieces in a single move.

RIP!

Then he thrust the saber forward, provoking an agonized shriek from the main trunk of the vine.

“Amazing saber technique!” Brutal Tiger said in admiration. “That one move released a flowing blade light that could end all life and even destroy souls. You didn’t even need to use flames to wipe those vines out of existence. I couldn’t reach that level if I practiced for a hundred years!”

“You wouldn’t need to. It's a secret move I know that I can teach you. Practice it for a couple years and you’ll reach a much higher level.” Yang Qi dropped back down onto the ground. The surface of the forest was a bed of dead leaves, and looking up, the only thing visible was dense vegetation.

Occasionally, snakes or bugs would appear in nearby trees and would lunge out to attack them. However, Yang Qi had the God Legion Paradise out, which protected everyone.

Whack. Bam!

When the snakes and bugs hit the God Legion Paradise, it sounded like metal spears hitting metal shields.

‘They’re so strong and fierce!’ Yang Qi thought, sighing in admiration. Suddenly, a buzzing sound rose up and a cloud of mosquitos appeared.

They were the size of grains of rice, yet they seemed to be made of metal. And they were vicious and bloodthirsty. When they slammed into the defensive empyrean energy of the God Legion Paradise, it trembled and blasts of fire rose up.

“Those mosquitos are incredible.”

“Captain, those are the Endless Forest’s obsidian mosquitos,” Savage Dragon said. “When they come in groups, they're almost like locusts. They could turn an ordinary immortal into a desiccated corpse in no time at all. They even absorb true energy. The fact that your personal domain can keep them at bay like this is really incredible.”

“What would you use to deal with them?” Yang Qi asked.

“We have something called Covert Heavenly Incense. With the aura of that incense, pests and vermin of all types will avoid you. Most people wouldn't be willing to waste their own true energy defending against things in the Endless Forest.”

“In my case, I'm not worried,” Yang Qi said. “I once cultivated something from the dao of devils, a divine ability from primeval infernal deities in hell. With it, I can create all sorts of toxic magical treasures. For instance, these Devil-Louse Godrot Banners!”

All of a sudden, a stream of devil energy shot out of Yang Qi’s hand.

As it converged on itself, it turned into five banners, each of which depicted a horned fiend-devil holding a trident. Devil energy then began pouring out of their mouths and formed a roiling vortex.

He handed one banner to each of the other Obliterators. Almost immediately, any immortal pests and vermin in the area who got too close were sucked into the banners, and their quintessence-blood and toxic energy absorbed.

“These Devil-Louse Godrot Banners are magical treasure from primeval devil-gods,” Yang Qi said coolly. “They can absorb endless venomous insects, force them to devour each other, then use them to create godrot lice! Or you can store the venomous insects inside the banners and unleash them like weapons later!”

“What amazing treasures!” All five of the Obliterators were delighted.

In the lower world, Yang Qi had been unable to produce banners like these. After all, there were no venomous pests down there like there were in the immortal world.

But in this situation, they were the perfect tool.

Chapter 564: The Demon Altar

Thanks to the Devil-Louse Godrot Banner, venomous pests flowed toward them like water as they proceeded through the forest. And thanks to the influx, the banners grew stronger and stronger.

Inside the banners, the pests were fighting and devouring each other, causing the banners to grow with increasingly boundless devil light. Within that devil light were the pests that survived the carnage inside, who had grown larger and fiercer as a result.

“Simply marvelous!” Savage Dragon exclaimed. “Captain, these treasures actually make the venomous insects stronger!”

“That’s right,” Yang Qi said casually. “The banners are like a hell for venomous pests. Not only do they absorb the insects, but they can be used offensively by driving the pests crazy and making them stronger. And when the venomous insects devour each other, they can eventually produce godrot lice. That said, forget about the godrot lice for now. You’ll need to refine the banners for a few thousand years or so, continually adding venomous insects during that time. Godrot lice are terrifying. They were originally created by the suzerains of hell to fight the legion of gods. They can even eat their way into the kingdom of gods, that’s how fierce they are. With them, you could easily fight and kill someone three or four levels above you.”

Thanks to the will and memories of the primeval infernal deities that he had in the God Legion Seal, he had insight into all sorts of terrifying treasures and techniques from the suzerains of hell.

Some of them were devil treasures that could be considered consummate and invincible.

Unfortunately, some things like that required a huge amount of resources, and sometimes more than a hundred million years of work to complete.

As for the Devil-Louse Godrot Banners, they could release godrot lice after about a few thousand years. But to make an army of them would take over a hundred million years.

Of course, Yang Qi didn’t need anything like that. He could accomplish a lot more by just focusing on his own cultivation.

Deep in the Endless Forest, venomous pests abounded, and the cries of wild beasts echoed amongst the enormous, ancient trees. Some of the trees flickered with demon light, indicating that they had gained souls, and even contained their own spatial dimensions.

Yang Qi wasn’t surprised at all by this. After all, he was in an immortal world now.

The Endless Forest was filled with tree-like Demonfolk who, in the mortal world, would be considered completely invincible.

Thankfully, Yang Qi and the Obliterators had the Devil-Louse Godrot Banners, which were intimidating even to the trees with souls.

As for the venomous pests, they weren’t afraid of death and would stream toward them in endless numbers. There were gold-headed centipedes, striped yin-yang scorpions, ten-legged spiders, ribbed wasps, ghost-face flies, hypertoxic lizards, and more. Even third stage Thought-Demolishers would have a hard time traversing a place like this and coming out on the other end alive.

But for Yang Qi and the Obliterators, the pests were like gold.

Each one they absorbed caused their banners to shine with more powerful devil light and made the trident-wielding fiend-devils seem more lifelike.

“So strong!” Brutal Tiger said as his banner sucked in countless venomous insects. The pests devoured each other, with some coming out on top and transforming on a genetic level. The newly formed pests were the size of a thumb and had nine heads, each of them the size of a grain of rice. Each head had a symbol on it written in script from the dao of devils. They read: death, entombment, toxin, corpse, corrode, rot, waste, ghost, misery.

The nine-headed pests had a hundred legs each, and a hundred wings. Furthermore, they were surrounded by toxic true energy that could melt space and consume human hearts.

They were none other than the most basic form of the godrot louse, although they weren’t even in the larval stage yet. That said, even this very initial form of the godrot louse was still extremely strong. After all, godrot lice larvae were terrifyingly fierce and ordinary immortals couldn’t even fight them.

Although they only contained a tiny portion of the true nature of the godrot louse, the five members of the Obliterators knew that their own fighting ability had already doubled because of them.

As for Yang Qi, he wasn’t spending time working on a Devil-Louse Godrot Banner. As he strode through the Endless Forest, he did his best to avoid the stronger demonlings to ensure that the trip went quickly and smoothly.

His Lord's Eye was open, revealing everything around him in complete detail.

At a certain point, something up ahead caught his attention. He saw a ring of towering totem poles, all of which pulsed with demon energy. Heaps of demonling corpses were piled up in front of them, and the entire place was awash with blood. And in the middle of the totem poles was a huge altar made from bones, decorated with complex totems. Unexpectedly, the totems on this altar were just like the designs on the altar in the Heaven’s Net Consortium. The only difference between the two was that this one had no primal-chaos elder-snake.

A glob of quintessence-blood floated in the air above the middle of this altar, quivering and pulsing with energy, looking like it might shoot up into the sky at any moment. Shockingly, the projected image of a megamammoth was visible within the blood.

A tremor passed through Yang Qi, and he thought, ‘That’s… one of the ancient Mammothfolk! That blood must be from some Demonfolk immortal. In fact, there’s even a slight Godmyth aura to it.’

With that, he drew as deeply as he could on his Lord's Eye.

There were cinnabar-garbed individuals surrounding the altar, and thanks to the Lord’s Eye, Yang Qi could not only see them clearly, he could also eavesdrop on their conversation.

“This quintessence-blood comes from the descendant of a godmammoth, one of the megamammoth patriarchs who reached the Godmyth level. After acquiring it, our lord used various magical techniques on it, all for the purpose of driving the demonlings of the Endless Forest completely mad.”

“Exactly. Megamammoths are one of the two main races that led the demon-devils of the past. They’re descendants of the godmammoth, who the legion of gods created to crush hells underfoot. The Sovereign Lord blessed them with immense power, so even a tiny drop of their blood can be used to command the horde of devils and the multitude of demons. Back when the Titan Emperor Heaven was founded, there was a set of ancient ruins in this location that the Endless Forest eventually overran. It’s been occupied by demonlings for years, so if we can whip them up into a frenzy and direct their fury, we could destroy countless cities in the vicinity. We might even be able to sow chaos in the Titan Emperor Heaven as a whole! Then, when the time is right, we’ll make our move and destroy this immortal world!”

“Yes. Certain ancient immortals set up warding magics in the Endless Forest to ensure that none of the demonlings born here could become intelligent, or band into organized groups. Instead, they would constantly be at each other’s throats, fighting and killing each other. We need to dismantle those immortal warding magics and allow the demonlings to gain intelligence. Then we can unleash them on the cities, and when the chaos spreads the headquarters of our Heaven’s Net Consortium can unleash Operation Devour Heaven.”

“Once Operation Devour Heaven is underway, we will have our chance to take the complete essence of this immortal world. And when the Titan Emperor Heaven is weak enough, our boundless lord will use the power of King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans to devour it, reaching the highest of cultivation levels.”

“By the way, I heard that some nobody in the imperial city has a few of King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans. What's the situation with that? Did we ever track him down?”

“Oh, it was an imperial clansman. Somehow, he found out that we have the snakecharms in the Heaven’s Net Consortium.”

“Well that’s nothing to take lightly. If the imperial clan finds out, it could completely ruin our plans.”

“Don’t worry, we have contingencies in place already. We sent some top experts to kill that brat and take his snakecharms. In fact, the end result will be that our plan will work even more effectively.”

“So, heaven is really helping us. Our lord has done everything very carefully, and although six hundred and sixty-six of King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans should be enough, now we have some more being delivered right to our doorstep. How lucky!”

“Excellent. So, when will we perform the big sacrifice here? When will we drive the demonlings crazy and send them out to attack the immortal world?”

“It’s a dangerous undertaking. We need to make sure we’re fully prepared. What would happen if the demonlings turned on us?”

“Don’t worry about it. Our commander has an aura that will force everything from demonlings to the snakes, bugs, and rats to follow his commands. They won't attack us. In any case, we can’t activate the altar now. We need to wait until the wormhole opens and the lord sends us the god item we’re waiting for. That will be our ticket to destroying the warding magics protecting the Endless Forest.”

“Oh, we're waiting for a god item? It’s hard to believe that our lord would part with something like that. I wonder what it is.”

“It’s definitely a low-level god item. That said, I've heard it was forged by an expert from among the Mammothfolk, called the Protomammoth Flag. Our commander will use it to exert even more control over the demonlings after we destroy the warding magics. Wherever he points that flag is where they’ll attack.”

Yang Qi heard all of this discussion and more.

‘Awesome. Destroying this altar is going to be a windfall for me. I’ll get that quintessence-blood, which will be a huge boost to my energy arts, and will help purify my internal pellet. And who knows how incredible that Protomammoth Flag will be.’ Looking around at the surroundings, he issued orders to the Obliterators to get into places of concealment.

Unfortunately, because he was in an immortal world, he couldn’t summon armies of fiend-devils, which would have been the perfect strategy.

The magical laws protecting the immortal world were too strong, making it impossible to create passages to hell.

He would have to wait until he was a Demolisher before he could do that.

Chapter 565: An Incredible Opportunity

Yang Qi instantly realized that this mission into the Endless Forest was a huge opportunity for him. For one thing, he had a chance to get a drop of blood from a Godmyth level megamammoth. There was also a god item called the Protomammoth Flag, which was something he normally couldn’t even dream of acquiring. With it, he would be even more confident in being able to reach the Demolishing level.

Once he was a Demolisher, his magical power and energy arts really would be invincible. And he would be able to break through the barriers of the immortal world around him to summon hordes of fiend-devils. Who knew how many Hell Portals he would be able to summon at that point.

Based on his calculations, he was fairly certain that, as a Demolisher, he would be able to summon fiend-devils that were two or three levels higher than himself.

In other words, he could get an army of third step Thought-Demolishers and fourth step Origin-Demolishers. In the immortal world, such levels were considered nobility. Yet he would have them as cannon fodder, which would instantly put him in the position to be able to lay siege to immortal worlds.

And that wasn’t to mention how much more powerful his Hand of the One God, Wheel of Fate, and Flame of Hope would be when he became an immortal.

The Demolishing level was a threshold that led from being mortal to being an immortal. Without reaching Demolishing, it didn't matter how strong one got, one’s genes were still those of a mortal.

Thus, it was no surprise that Yang Qi was constantly thinking about that next breakthrough.

‘Such incredible demon energy!’ That was what all of the five Obliterators were thinking as they went into hiding. For the moment, they put their Devil-Louse Godrot Banners away. The banners had absorbed plenty of venomous pests, and if they unleashed their power now, the pests that would fly out would be able to injure Thought-Demolishers, or even Origin-Demolishers. And such immortals who fell victim to the poison would find it difficult to survive.

Savage Dragon slowly crept forward through the forest, getting closer and closer to the altar. Soon, he saw numerous black-robed figures dancing and chanting in front of the altar, and cinnabar-garbed figures directing them.

The figures in cinnabar were all third step Thought-Demolishers, making them immortal officers. As for those in black, they were Void-Demolishers or Space-Demolishers, making them mere immortal soldiers and warriors.

“So many powerful figures,” Brutal Tiger said. “It seems to me the mission of destroying the altar isn’t going to be very easy to accomplish. Look! In addition to those experts in cinnabar, there’s someone in the middle wearing golden clothing. He looks like a general! He’s a fourth step Origin-Demolisher, an immortal general! Immortal generals are too fierce to even describe. In fact, the ultimate leader of the Special Reconnaissance Division, Yuan Kuohai, is an immortal general, and he’s virtually invincible in the army. If he gets pissed off, it'll be like the fury of heaven raining down!”

“That’s right!” Vicious Vulture said. “We're all second step immortal warriors who can fight immortal officers. But these immortal officers here are all clearly the veterans of numerous battles. We probably couldn’t even fight them one-on-one. Maybe if the five of us use our combined attack, and don’t think about escaping afterward, we might be able to take out the altar and accomplish the mission.”

“Oh?” Yang Qi said, smiling faintly. “You five are really tough! Even with an immortal general guarding the altar, you still think you can finish the mission? No wonder the Obliterators are considered a crack team in the Special Reconnaissance Division. You really have my respect. However, as your captain, I don’t want you talking about suicide attacks. Just be patient. We’ll destroy that altar, snatch the incoming god item, and kill everyone present. We’re going to accomplish every aspect of this mission!”

Considering that all of these people worked for the Heaven’s Net Consortium, there was no way he was going to show them mercy.

The group of six melted into the forest, sending out traces of vital energy that connected them to the essence of the Endless Forest. As he inhaled and exhaled, Yang Qi cast his senses out around him, taking note of everything from the trees, to the demonlings, to the warding magics in the ground. Soon, he identified the warding magic that was intended to keep the demonlings in check.

From what Yang Qi could tell, the Endless Forest was as big as several planetary systems from the mortal world combined. It was also riddled with overlapping aspects of space, as well as deep reserves of power just waiting to erupt.

‘Don’t tell me this Endless Forest is actually some sort of magical treasure?’ he thought. All of a sudden, an outrageous idea began forming in his mind, although he shook his head after a moment. It just didn't seem realistic. However, he couldn’t shake the thought, and the more he considered it the more it seemed like a possibility.

If the Endless Forest really was a magical treasure, it was likely more powerful than the average god item.

“Captain, it’s starting. There's a wormhole opening above the altar!” Sure enough, bright light and deathless godliness spread out as a wormhole began opening. Immense power descended onto the demon altar, swirling around as expressions of powerful demon energy.

Within the deathless godliness, a will echoed out, causing everything to tremble and forcing the vital energy of all heaven and earth into subservience. “You have done well with the altar. You shall all be rewarded!”

Yang Qi drew on his Wheel of Fate to keep himself concealed as the vital energy around him crackled and crunched.

“What a powerful will!” Savage Dragon said, trembling along with the other Obliterators. “How could something so terrifying be here? Captain, without you here to keep us safe, we would be dead.”

“That will could devastate anything and everything!”

“What a terrifying entity. It won’t come here, will it? If it does, there’s no way we’ll finish this mission.”

After listening to the chatter, Yang Qi nodded. “If that thing comes here in person, we would have no choice but to retreat. But it won’t. It’s just opened a temporary passageway. If something that strong remained here for very long, it would attract the wrong type of attention.”

Sure enough, the powerful will faded away a few moments later, leaving behind nothing more than a flag.

However, that flag emanated deathless godliness of a most profound and enigmatic nature. It was the Protomammoth Flag, which would be fused with the blood of a Godmyth level megamammoth expert.

Instantly, an immense power spread out from the altar, the type that could cow countless beasts and demons.

As it spread through the Endless Forest, the demonlings suddenly went still, and even the snakes, bugs, and rats stopped moving as though some other will were taking over their minds.

Yang Qi watched as countless warding magics in the depths of the Endless Forest began crumbling. As it happened, the altar was actually set up in almost the exact center of the Endless Forest.

“Lord’s Eye! Grant me sight!”

All of a sudden, Yang Qi realized that there was a kingdom of emerald green in the depths of the forest, within which was what appeared to be a person. However, closer inspection revealed that it was not a person, but rather a human-shaped suit of armor.

The armor was emerald in color and radiated a boundless life force that filled the Endless Forest, almost as if this entity were the ultimate creator of the place.

That armor was a god item!

As Yang Qi inspected it, he saw some words inscribed on the breastplate of the armor, written in the script of the legion of gods. Few people would be able to read that script, but he could. It said Chartreuse Sovereign.

Chartreuse Sovereign God Armor!

Yang Qi couldn’t have been more surprised to realize that there was a god item in the Endless Forest.

Meanwhile, back on the demon altar, the Protomammoth Flag and the drop of blood were fusing and a ferocious demon was appearing. It looked like a megamammoth, and apparently it was about to merge with the Chartreuse Sovereign God Armor.

At this point, the immortal general in gold clothing shouted, “Pay close attention! We're already in contact with the essence of the Endless Forest, a god item! We should be able to use the Protomammoth Flag to draw out the Chartreuse Sovereign God Armor! Then we’ll gain command of all the demonlings in the Endless Forest and lead them into the depths of the imperial city to fuse with King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans as a gift to our lord. There could be no better way to plan for the destruction of the Titan Emperor Heaven and its essence!”

The demon altar trembled and began sinking into the ground.

Meanwhile, down below, the suit of armor trembled and began to rise up toward the altar. When it arrived, it started merging with the Protomammoth Flag and the megamammoth quintessence-blood. Meanwhile, all of the figures in black and cinnabar were chanting ancient curses and pouring their will into both the armor and the Protomammoth Flag.

All of heaven and earth filled with a rain of blood, and the wailing of gods and weeping of ghosts spread out through the Endless Forest.

“Now’s our chance!” Yang Qi said.

He unfurled his Angel Wings and blurred into motion, shooting forward like a bolt of lightning and moving so quickly that he arrived at the altar before anyone realized what was happening.

Although it was protected by warding magics, Yang Qi’s Flame of Hope burned through them all like a red-hot cleaver slicing through a stick of butter.

As soon as he was close to the Chartreuse Sovereign God Armor, it unleashed a powerful wave of energy, designed to prevent anyone from taking it. And the Protomammoth Flag pulsed with deadly true energy.

“Return to your home! Hell-Crushing Godmammoth!” Without even pausing to think, he unleashed the Hand of the One God and grabbed both the flag and the armor.

Chapter 566: Immense Gains

‘These things are amazing! Two god items! Chartreuse Sovereign God Armor, Protomammoth Flag, and the quintessence-blood of a megamammoth! If I refined the godliness out of these things, I probably wouldn’t need those six hundred and sixty-six imperial snakecharms to pass my Demolishing tribulation. Or I could at least use it to complete my internal pellet. And then I would be much stronger.’

As soon as he took the Chartreuse Sovereign God Armor and the Protomammoth Flag, he felt a stirring within him, as though they perfectly conformed to his God Legion Seal. After all, the God Legion Seal was a sealing mark crafted by the blessing of the legion of gods, and it naturally exerted authority over god items.

It took almost no effort to shrink them down to the size of grains of dust and absorb them into his body, where he could keep them until he found an appropriate time to refine them.

Meanwhile, he was using the God Legion Battle Robe to conceal his facial features; he obviously didn’t want the surrounding enemies to know who he was. If they notified the Heaven’s Net Consortium that he was here, it would cause a host of problems.

“You beast!” shouted the immortal general in gold. The figures in cinnabar and black also howled in fury at the sight of him bursting onto the scene and grabbing the Chartreuse Sovereign God Armor and the Protomammoth Flag. However, before they could do anything, he unleashed a burst of vital energy, destroying the demon altar and causing blood to spray out of their mouths as they staggered backward.

“Prestigious Heaven Dragon; Boundless Magical Curse; Cosmic Dragon Motif; Sun Moon Devastation!”

RUUUUUUMBLE!

All of a sudden, a thousand suns and moons appeared around the golden immortal general, whose light illuminated everything in the area and even pierced into the void. Boundless magical laws poured out in what was clearly a deadly attack.

“Grand Palm of the Limitless Heaven Dragon. First Stance: Dragon Motif Impedes Space!”

Crick. Crack.

Dragon motifs swirled out to form dragon scales, which became the burning suns of countless nations. An image of a world, seemingly composed of dragons, formed and shot toward Yang Qi with unstoppable force.

“What did you just call that move? Dragon Motif Impedes Space? What kind of a trashy technique is that? Be broken!” Yang Qi let out a powerful roar that sounded like the charge of an army, which slammed into the incoming flow of dragons, completely wiping it out of existence.

The general in gold was so furious he actually didn’t quite know what to say, so he resorted to some generic curses. “What gall! You’re dead, fool! Leave those god items where you found them! I'm going to wipe out your entire clan!”

Rising into the air, he unleashed another immense palm attack, causing what seemed like the true energy of a host of dragons to surge toward Yang Qi from beyond the heavens.

“Host of Dragons Rises to Heaven!”

RUUUUUUMBLE!

Yet again, a group of dragons shot toward Yang Qi with deadly force.

Yang Qi responded with the Hand of the One God, which could dominate three thousand chiliocosms of worlds. Before the dragons could even get close to him, they were destroyed.

“Myriad Dragons Emerge from the Sea!” The golden general spat out a mouthful of blood, drawing on his deepest levels of power. In the blink of an eye, the preheaven essence power of a fourth stage Origin-Demolisher appeared.

“Grand Dragon Looks Back!

“Vile Dragon Becomes a Devil!

“Buddha Dragon Converts Beliefs!

“God Dragon Smashes Worlds!

“Immortal Dragon Coils in Space!

“Golden Dragon Forges Swords!”

One dragon after another appeared, launching forth and destroying everything around them, causing suns and moons to fall and meteors to descend like rain. A kingdom of dragons was taking shape! When all creation turned into dragons, not even ghosts or gods could flee.

‘What energy art is that? Don’t tell me this guy in gold is actually from the Dragonfolk! I think he is! I can sense the aura of Dragonfolk on him. Well, whether he's a dragon, a buddha, an immortal, or a god, I'm still going to kill him. Devour earth. Devour all creation. Heaven-Devouring True Energy can devour anything and everything!’ Yang Qi knew that he couldn't let this battle drag out. If he did, it was possible that the ‘lord’ who backed these people might arrive again. Or perhaps the forces of the Heaven’s Net Consortium would show up. If that happened, he would have a hard time defending himself. He needed to kill everyone present, then escape and find a place to grow stronger using the Chartreuse Sovereign God Armor and the Protomammoth Flag.

Once he was back at the main military base, no one would be able to make a move on him.

All of a sudden, a tremor passed through him as he transformed into a primal-chaos elder-snake. Lunging forward, he opened his mouth and took a deep breath. A massive tempest arose as everything in the area sank down and all energy arts, divine abilities, magical techniques, and immortal skills were negated. Even the ground began rising up toward his mouth.

The general in gold was also sucked toward him, struggling mightily the whole time. But then a tongue shot out of the snake’s mouth, wrapped tightly around him, and dragged him inside.

Yang Qi also devoured the altar, as well as the nearby trees, rocks, totem poles, demonlings, and everything else.

“Devour heaven, consume earth. All creation becomes food. The will of King Heaven-Devourer is invincible!” Yang Qi was one with the primal-chaos elder-snake, and his every move caused the black-garbed and cinnabar-clothed men to be sucked into the mouth of that snake.

Primal-chaos elder-snakes would devour anything in their path without showing the least bit of mercy.

What made it all even more effective was that the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth was the perfect impetus to drive King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans. In fact, Yang Qi would likely be able to eventually use them to greater effect than the original King Heaven-Devourer had. After all, King Heaven-Devourer had been born with a will and purpose that conformed to the saying 'snakes devour mammoths’.

As a primal-chaos elder-snake, he sought to devour godmammoths and become an entity to rival the Sovereign Lord. Unfortunately for him, he had perished before achieving his goals.

By adding godmammoth true energy into King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans, Yang Qi could unlock more of their power.

Miserable screams rang out from the figures in black and cinnabar. However, it didn’t take long before everything in the entire area was completely gone.

The five members of the Obliterators nearly swallowed their own tongues from astonishment.

“This….”

“What just happened? They're all wiped out? Devoured, down to the last one? Am I dreaming? How could the captain be this strong? And what is he doing in the Special Reconnaissance Division? He could go to the imperial court and be appointed a grand prince, or possibly even a vice prince.”

“We’re not dreaming. The captain just drew on the boundless dao of gods to kill everyone here! With a captain like this to lead us, the entire Special Reconnaissance Division will be ours soon!”

“So what do we do now? Fall back?”

“Yeah, let’s go.”

“Agreed,” Yang Qi said. “Let’s get out of here. We killed everyone and destroyed the altar, so there’s no need to stick around. However, let’s not head back to base right now. I need to find a location to deal with the Chartreuse Sovereign God Armor and the Protomammoth Flag. If I extract their godliness, I can probably achieve another breakthrough. Then we can go back to camp and cause a big stir.”

Sending out a blast of wind to pick up the five Obliterators, Yang Qi vanished without a trace.

Some time after he left, a wormhole suddenly opened in the same spot and an enraged will appeared, which examined the nearly ten percent of the Endless Forest that had been completely wiped out of existence.

“Who was it? Who destroyed my demon altar! I'm going to kill him!” However, the expression of will had no way to find Yang Qi, and no clue which direction he had left in.

After some time, the will faded away.

“What a powerful will,” Yang Qi said, chuckling. “If I hadn’t left quickly, it would have buried me there.” That said, he was still shaken. From his position far from the Endless Forest, he could still sense how powerful the will was. Whether it was an immortal emperor, or perhaps even a sovereign of heaven, he wasn’t sure. Maybe it was more powerful than that. Perhaps it was an invincible Godmyth.

Thankfully, his Wheel of Fate had allowed him to make a clean escape. By tweaking fate, he could make his aura vanish and make it impossible for people to perform divinations about him. Besides, he was also a Fateless One, which made the cultivation of the Wheel of Fate particularly effective.

“Captain, sir, who exactly are you?” Savage Dragon asked numbly.

“That’s not important,” Yang Qi replied coolly. “Just think of me as an imperial clansman hoping to revitalize my clan. That’s all you need to know. And remember, keep today’s events secret or I’ll be forced to kill you.”

“Yes, yes, of course,” they all said, nodding repeatedly. “Captain, we’re your loyal followers now. Whatever you tell us to do, we’ll do.”

“Well, that's good.” Yang Qi settled down cross-legged, then waved his finger, causing the ground to open up and allowing the six of them to sink down into its depths. Afterward, the ground closed back up, leaving no trace of their presence.

The earth in all immortal worlds was incredibly tough and almost impossible to dig into. Most divine abilities wouldn't be able to penetrate it. But Yang Qi was capable of breaking open the dark golden soil of the Hell of Mahānata, so what need was there to mention a tiny place like the Titan Emperor Heaven?

As they sank down, they saw all sorts of glittering crystals which were none other than subterranean veins of immortal stone.

This was where Yang Qi planned to carry out his session of cultivation.

Chapter 567: Protomammoth Particles

The pitch black depths of the immortal world were very different than the depths of hell. In hell, the soil was full of devil energy, whereas the immortal world had immortal energy. Both were incredibly deep.

In fact, even if one went down several billion kilometers, it still wouldn’t even be considered scratching the surface.

As he went down, he passed through layers of rock, ore, metal vital energy, flame, and baleful energy. He also passed through certain empty sections that had once been cultivation chambers for immortals in ancient times.

The empyrean-baleful energies in the immortal world were the same as everywhere else. In the sky, the empyrean energy gave birth to wind, and under the ground, the baleful energy carved out passages of soil.

There were also subterranean channels of fire and water.

All of it conformed to the general classification of elements: earth, water, fire, and wind.

The intensity of the forces surpassed those of the mortal world by thousands of times, but to immortals they were nothing out of the ordinary. There were also earth-type demonlings that had established territory underground and would flock toward interlopers like flies buzzing toward fresh blood.

Of course, Yang Qi wasn't worried about such things and simply cut them down as they got near. Eventually, he found a cave that had obviously been used for cultivation purposes by some immortal in the distant past.

It was located in a vast layer of gold and wasn’t particularly large. Apparently it was nothing more than a meditation chamber. Other than some lingering warding magics, it was empty. No magical treasures. No daoist texts. No medicinal pills. Nothing.

Of course, it was entirely possible such things had existed in the past and had long since been taken away by other immortals. In the immortal world, there were plenty of people who had techniques for traveling about under the ground, where they would search for treasure and other miraculous things.

Perhaps, if Yang Qi went further down, he might find an immortal’s mansion grotto that had things worth taking. But right now he was primarily focused on cultivation, and this seemed the perfect place to work with the Chartreuse Sovereign God Armor, the Protomammoth Flag, and the megamammoth quintessence-blood.

This layer of gold was part of a large vein that stretched roughly fifty million kilometers from end to end and was about a hundred million kilometers thick.

Although those numbers might seem huge, in the immortal world they were not particularly impressive. After all, the depth of the lands in the immortal world were usually measured in light-years.

“True Gold Transformation: Golden Sphere.”

Yang Qi waved his hand, unleashing magical power into the gold, which immediately began transforming it. To the shock of the five Obliterators, it started twitching and wriggling into the shape of a sphere.

They could hardly imagine the force necessary to transform a vein of metal fully fifty million kilometers from end to end.

It didn’t take long to transform the immortal’s mansion grotto into a golden sphere roughly fifty kilometers in diameter, which Yang Qi entered along with his five followers. Then, the golden sphere began descending deeper into the earth.

Settling down cross-legged, Yang Qi exhaled a stream of vital energy and a host of items appeared in front of him. The Chartreuse Sovereign God Armor, the Protomammoth Flag, the megamammoth quintessence-blood, the crumbled remnants of the demon altar, the totem poles, and the corpses of the individuals in black and cinnabar. Only the golden general was still alive.

“Who are you!?” he asked. He knew that escape was impossible, yet didn’t stoop to begging for mercy. “Why did you attack our demon altar? Aren’t you afraid of the paragons of the Hanging Heaven? They could cut you down!”

“Tell me what's going on with the Heaven’s Net Consortium. Are you working for the Hanging Heaven? And where did you get those six hundred and sixty-six imperial snakecharms? Help me get them and I might spare your life. You’re a fourth stage Demolisher, which is a level of cultivation few people can achieve. It would be a real pity for you to die at my hands.”

“I’ll never betray my lord, you beast!” the general shouted. “He’ll avenge me if I die!”

“I have plenty of ways to extract your memories even if you’re dead,” Yang Qi said coldly. “I tried to give you some face, but you refused. Fine then. Die.”

CRACK!

He exhaled, and his breath was like a blade that stabbed right into the body of the general. He screamed briefly, but was quickly reduced to a pool of blood and gore, with even his soul having been wiped out of existence.

Then Yang Qi clenched his hand into a fist, causing the Chartreuse Sovereign God Armor, the Protomammoth Flag, and the megamammoth quintessence-blood to crumple into a stream of magical symbols. After a moment, two primary symbols appeared, written in the script of the ancient Godfolk.

Mammoth.

Demon.

Yang Qi immediately began refining the deathless godliness with true flame, causing a dazzling light to shine about.

The Heaven and Earth Furnace appeared and he tossed the two symbols inside, causing the flame to burn higher as he absorbed their power.

Instantly, the dracomammoth particles within him began transforming into protomammoths.

Dracomammoths had scales and horns and looked like a combination of dragons and mammoths. But now they were turning into protomammoths, which looked very different. The horns retracted and the scales vanished, revealing smooth skin covered with totemic patterns. As it turned out, protomammoths closely resembled elephants.

However, there was something about them that was more perfect than elephants. The totemic markings were like records of ancient times, histories of the most distant past. Furthermore, each protomammoth had a symbol on its forehead that resembled two fish intertwined like yin and yang.

That was the symbol of the protomammoth, indicating that it was the prototypical representation of all living things.

Protomammoths were like the origin of anything and everything, and were not only invincibly powerful, but also repositories of incomparable magical laws as well as the most ancient flow of time.

After taking the deathless godliness, roughly three hundred million particles within Yang Qi converted into protomammoths, giving him unbelievable power.

As for Savage Dragon, Brutal Tiger, Deathly Serpent, Vicious Vulture, and Callous Panther, they looked on, trembling like mice in the presence of a tiger.

“There’s no need for alarm,” Yang Qi said. “As long as you stick with me, I’ll make it worth your while.” He flicked his finger and a spark appeared, rapidly transforming into burning dragons of fire that shot into them. Instantly, their connection to the magical laws of the Titan Emperor Heaven were destroyed and replaced by the magical laws of the Tusita Heaven. In the blink of an eye, they transformed on the deepest level. As of this moment, they were like invincible figures from a high-level immortal world and were dozens, if not a hundred times stronger than they had been before.

Furthermore, they would be able to innately exert pressure on anyone from the Titan Emperor Heaven.

The five Obliterators felt themselves surging with newfound power, causing them to throw their heads back and let loose long howls.

“With these new magical laws, we’re like people from a much higher immortal world!”

“Exactly,” Yang Qi said. “You’re no longer like the weaklings from the Titan Emperor Heaven. Henceforth, you will be without compare on the field of battle. Continue your cultivation, and achieving breakthroughs will no longer be a pipe dream for you. Furthermore, I’m going to give you a set of godly-class energy arts that will allow you to accomplish shocking things.”

“Many thanks, Captain. Many thanks!”

All five of them dropped to their knees and kowtowed so deeply that their foreheads hit the ground.

Yang Qi had altered their fate. To them, he was like an enigmatic and mysterious god-spirit who was capable of anything.

“Alright, now we can go back to the Special Reconnaissance Division and report our success. I wonder how we’ll be rewarded.” As he flew up, he refined the golden sphere with burning fire, reducing it to countless grains of golden sand, sharp, with impressive auras.

Then he clenched his hand into a fist and the golden sand condensed into five small swords.

They were immortal items!

“These swords come from an ancient and consummate sword art from the dao of gods. They're called Multimillion Golden Sand Swords. Use them together and you can fill the sky with deadly golden sand.”

“Many thanks, Captain!” The five Obliterators said, taking hold of the swords.

“Captain,” Savage Dragon said, “who would have thought that you’re also a grandmaster of equipment forging. You surpass even the grandmasters in the imperial city! You can even imbue these Multimillion Golden Sand Swords with spirits!”

“That’s nothing,” Yang Qi said. “With the deathless godliness I can extract, as long as I have the right materials I can easily make immortal items of a quality that surpasses any grandmaster from these parts. And if I can get better materials, I can create the highest level immortal items possible.”

With that, they flew toward the imperial city.

The mission was accomplished and he had benefited greatly. He even learned a bit about the Heaven’s Net Consortium, and next, would make his attempt to get the six hundred and sixty-six imperial snakecharms.

Chapter 568: Back at the Base

When it came to the mission in the Endless Forest, Yang Qi and the Obliterators were in and out. Then they went into a session of cultivation for a few days, finally returning to their base in the imperial city via wormhole.

The base was a busy maze of a place, with soldiers constantly coming and going through wormholes.

Yang Qi and his five followers threaded their way through the base and were soon at the Special Reconnaissance Division’s headquarters.

As soon as they reported their mission a success, the soldier in charge looked at them oddly and said, “The general is in an important meeting right now and normally wouldn’t be able to see you. Fierce fighting has broken out with the forces of the Megaplexus Heaven, and the situation is grim. But he left standing orders that if you returned and said you had accomplished your mission, you should be brought in to explain the details. If you really accomplished the mission, you’ll be given a huge reward of military credit and the general will be informed immediately.”

Savage Dragon could already sense that something unusual was going on. Stepping forward, he angrily said, “Are you saying the general doesn’t believe that we could succeed?”

“To some extent, yes,” the officer replied. “You see, the general got new intelligence reports after you left that said the demon altar in the Endless Forest was guarded by a much stronger force than we originally thought. He sent messages for you to fall back, but you had disappeared. Now here you are, saying you accomplished the mission, therefore the general wants all the details. This isn’t the place, though. Please, come inside.”

He gestured for them to follow him.

“Captain?” Savage Dragon said, looking at Yang Qi.

Yang Qi chuckled. “If that's how they want to do it, fine. We did something quite momentous, so it’s only natural that they would be suspicious. Let’s go in and explain everything.”

With that, he led the way inside.

‘Did he just call him captain?’ the officer thought, looking even more shocked than before. ‘The five Obliterators are fiendish killers who never accept anyone new into their ranks. Why are they calling this newbie captain?’

The officer led Yang Qi and the Obliterators into the headquarters, to a room filled with soldiers. At the end of the room, a table had been set up, which was populated by a host of top experts. General Yuan Kuohai was there, and from the look of it he had just finished discussing some important matter.

Instantly, all eyes in the room swiveled to lock on to Yang Qi and his team. Some people looked surprised, others smiled coldly, and more than a few looks of disdain could be seen. From the look of it, some of them were expecting a show to play out.

Yang Qi gave a meaningful look to Savage Dragon, who stepped forward and said, “General, we accomplished the mission in the Endless Forest. We destroyed the demon altar and those who were guarding it, and are back to report in.”

“What? You six really destroyed the demon altar in the Endless Forest?” Yuan Kuohai replied, clearly suspicious.

Savage Dragon looked at Yang Qi, and seeing how calm and collected he was, raised his voice and said, “Yes. We wiped it out of existence. If you don’t believe us, General, you can go check the location yourself. If anything we've reported is untrue, we’d be happy to go to trial by court-martial.”

At this point, one of the other officers sitting at the table snorted coldly and said, “You six are obviously brazen liars! We got new information stating that a mighty individual from the Hanging Heaven sent an expression of will into the Endless Forest to drive the demonlings mad and use them as a weapon against us. Even worse, they sent a top expert named General Goldrhino there, a demon-immortal who is the incarnation of a powerful rhinoceros. Apparently, he stole a boundless fist technique from the Dragonfolk and is immensely strong. He’s an Origin-Demolisher, just on the verge of achieving a breakthrough to become an immortal marquis. With someone in charge of their forces who’s just as strong as our General Yuan Kuohai, there’s no way that you six weaklings, none of whom are even a third stage Thought-Demolisher, could possibly accomplish that mission. And yet you dare to come back and claim to have done just that?”

“That’s right,” another of the officers said. “I just had my people check, and it's true that the demon altar exploded, leaving behind a massive crater in the Endless Forest. Clearly, the altar malfunctioned and detonated on its own, and you lot are trying to take credit after the fact.”

Leaning over to Yang Qi, Savage Dragon quietly said, “Captain, those two are the captains of the Tuskers and the Rampagers. They’re longstanding rivals of we Obliterators, and always do everything they can to try to take us down a notch.”

Yang Qi immediately understood the situation.

“We already know everything that happened in the Endless Forest,” someone else in the room said. He was a third stage Thought-Demolisher, an immortal officer, and his words were an obvious accusation. “These shameless braggarts look down on military law and are clearly useless. If we don't execute them now, we’re doing a disservice to the army as a whole. Set an example with them immediately!”

“That’s right. Either execute them or lock them up.”

“Submitting false reports is a big crime. If we don't punish them, how can we maintain discipline?”

Unexpectedly, everyone was calling for Yang Qi and the Obliterators to be severely punished.

At a certain point, Yuan Kuohai snorted coldly and said, “Quiet down, everyone. First, let’s see what the Obliterators have to say for themselves.” Looking at them, he continued, “If the six of you failed the mission, the worst that will happen is you’ll be sent to lockup for a few days. I understand that it was a particularly difficult mission. But fabricating a report is a different matter altogether. Taking credit for killing enemies you didn’t kill is a serious crime. If we don't punish you for something like that, wouldn’t it be just asking for big trouble down the line? Now talk! Admit your crimes! If you don’t, we’ll execute you and deny you a proper burial.”

“Calm down,” Yang Qi said, looking around at all the malicious gazes locked on to him. “General, what makes you so certain we didn’t accomplish the mission?”

“Are you seriously asking that question?” said the captain of the Tuskers. “Considering the level of General Goldrhino’s cultivation base, not even all of you working together could defeat him. In fact, even if you were ten times stronger than you are, you would still be killed. And you want us to believe you finished the mission by—”

Thump!

Before he could finish speaking, a corpse plopped onto the ground, clad in golden garments. It was none other than General Goldrhino.

Jaws dropped in the room as everyone looked at the corpse in utter shock. “Is that General Goldrhino? That’s really his corpse?”

Yuan Kuohai shot to his feet, walked forward, and examined the corpse more closely. After confirming it was really General Goldrhino, he turned to look at Yang Qi, his eyes flickering with amazement.

“What,” Yang Qi said. “You think its fake or something?” Although he had fully refined General Goldrhino, it was a simple thing to restore him to his previous condition. One thought to destroy all things. One thought to create all things. That was what the gods were capable of. After all, the first stance of the Hand of the One God was called Creation.

“How do we know you didn’t just find the corpse and take it?” said the captain of the Tuskers. “According to my information, that almighty entity from the Hanging Heaven sent a god item to the forces in the Endless Forest. If you have that, maybe we could believe that you were the ones who destroyed the altar.”

“Oh really?” Yang Qi waved his hand, and a burst of deathless godliness spread out as a flag appeared, causing pressure to weigh down on the entire base.

“The Protomammoth Flag! A god item!” someone shouted, and then the entire room devolved into an uproar.

After the commotion died down, Yang Qi said, “What do you say? We accomplished the mission, General. Now, how are you going to reward us? How much military credit do we get?”

“Hold on a second!” said the captain of the Rampagers.

“What,” Yuan Kuohai said. “You have something else to say?”

“It’s an incredible thing that the Obliterators finished that mission. But they should have handed over the corpse and that god item, as well as any other magical treasures you acquired. Selfishly keeping them for themselves is a big crime of its own. They should hand them over immediately!” Obviously, the captain of the Rampagers wanted to get his hands on the Protomammoth Flag and wouldn't stand for it being kept by the Obliterators.

“I agree on this point,” said Yuan Kuohai. Despite being an important general, not even he had a god item. To him, even low-level god items were amazing things. At most, he could get sovereign-grade immortal items, therefore, the chance to get a god item was something he wouldn’t pass up.

“Hand over the god item,” he continued. “It will count as a big service if you do. Remember, you Obliterators are all members of the army. Understand?”

Smiling faintly, Yang Qi said “Unfortunately….”

“Unfortunately what?” Yuan Kuohai asked.

“Unfortunately, I already assimilated it,” Yang Qi said coolly. “So I can’t hand it in. In any case, did you really think I would just give you a god item? General, did you suffer brain damage recently? How could you not understand how things like this work? Give you a god item? Although, I guess it makes sense. Myopic people like you probably don't understand how much god items are worth.”

“W-what? What did you just say?” Yuan Kuohai said, visibly astonished. “D-did… did you just say I have brain damage? Y-you… how dare you! This is unforgivable!”

“Unforgivable! Unforgivable!” shouted the captains of the Tuskers and the Rampagers.

Stalking back to his place at the table, Yuan Kuohai pointed at Yang Qi and the Obliterators and said, “You people have no face at all. Perhaps you accomplished your mission, but then you went on to be disorderly, and even cursed at an officer. Not even execution can wipe out crimes like that. Men. Arrest them!”

Chapter 569: Dominating the General

Yuan Kuohai was beyond enraged. The fact that Yang Qi had accused him of having brain damage right in front of a host of other soldiers was a humiliation he simply couldn’t accept.

When he shouted for Yang Qi and the Obliterators to be arrested, soldiers rushed in from the outside, tall, burly, clad in armor, with sabers in hand. Some of them held rope that was obviously used for binding captives.

“Immortal-Trussing Rope!”

Whooosh!

The soldiers with the ropes threw them out, causing them to become like dragons that shot toward Yang Qi and his followers.

“What’s that supposed to be?” Yang Qi said. He flicked his finger and a spark shot out, burning all the ropes into nothing.

“What incredible gall!” the soldiers shouted, rushing forward with weapons bared.

“Drop!” Yang Qi said, and the God Legion Paradise suddenly popped into being, sending out a shock wave that slammed into the soldiers.

A few shrieks rang out, but then the soldiers dropped to the ground, silent and unconscious.

“You!” Yuan Kuohai growled, leaping to his feet along with the other officers. Apparently, they were about to charge forward and deal with Yang Qi personally.

“Yuan Kuohai,” Yang Qi said. “I killed General Goldrhino as easily as slaughtering a dog. And then you people go and demand that I hand my god item over? Are you feeling suicidal or something? Listen well. All of you are going to do exactly what I say. Not a single one of you can leave the base without my permission, as my domain has the entire place locked down. You couldn’t break free even if you all joined forces.”

“What?” Yuan Kuohai said. Clearly unconvinced, he looked up and launched a fist strike up into the sky, only to see a flash of light as the attack was negated.

“Immortal Detonates Nine Planets!”

Without any warning, he launched an attack on Yang Qi, moving with blinding speed as he summoned nine enormous planets, each and every one filled with countless planes of existence and immortal cultivators. As the planets neared Yang Qi, the immortals all used energy arts of self-detonation to create a devastating shock wave that seemed capable of destroying anything.

Yuan Kuohai clearly wanted to take Yang Qi down.

However, when the destructive power reached Yang Qi it simply faded away. Yuan Kuohai felt like he had just punched the air or dropped a pebble into the ocean.

RUMBLE!

Before Yuan Kuohai could do anything else, Yang Qi stepped forward and reached out, grabbing him by the neck and lifting him up like a captive duck. A look of immense terror filled Yuan Kuohai’s face as he realized that his life was completely in Yang Qi’s hands.

Struggling, he shouted, “Don’t you know who I am?! I'm a general! This is a serious crime! This is rebellion! It doesn’t matter if you're an imperial clansman, you’ll still be held accountable!”

“I'm not going to kill you,” Yang Qi replied. “I just want to make sure you understand what you’re allowed to do, and what you’re not allowed to do.” Suddenly, a pitch black devil seed appeared in his other hand, which transformed into a vicious ghost head that he sent flying into Yuan Kuohai’s head.

Immediately, Yuan Kuohai sensed something like a devil-ghost in his sea of consciousness, something he couldn’t drive out. It was almost like a nightmare.

“What… what kind of devil-ghost did you implant me with?” he said, his voice trembling. “What is that thing?”

“Oh, it's nothing,” Yang Qi replied coolly. “Just something from the ancient dao of devils. It's just an infernal king seed. It won’t hurt you. But if you don’t do everything I say, or if you even think of plotting against me, I’ll activate the seed and you’ll experience so much pain you’ll wish you could die. Henceforth, you’re under my control.”

Thump.

Yang Qi tossed Yuan Kuohai back into his chair, where he sat, various expressions flashing across his face as he tried to wrap his mind around what had happened.

Instantly, the entire room went crazy.

The captains of the Tuskers and the Rampagers were both shouting at the tops of their lungs. “You disgraceful rebel! You’re breaking military law! You need to be executed immediately! You think you can take on the whole army?”

“Pig-headed fools,” Yang Qi said, sending out a stream of power that picked them up and slammed them down into the ground.

“Evil creature! I’ll kill you if it’s the last thing I do!” howled the captain of the Tuskers. Spitting out a mouthful of blood, he growled, “Divine Tusks; No Stronghold Too Powerful; Cycles of the Sun and Moon; True Empyrean Domination!”

WHIZZZ!

The blood he had just spit out turned into an enormous mouth with huge tusks that lunged toward Yang Qi.

“I’ll go for broke too!” shouted the captain of the Rampagers. Leaping up into the air, he said, “Rampage in Heaven and Earth; Wherever I Roam, Everyone Exults; Grand Sun Radiance!”

WHIZZZ!

A huge sun appeared and sent burning light out like a river, sweeping forth to shatter everything in its path.

Both of these captains were going all out in their attempt to crush Yang Qi.

POP!

Yet Yang Qi didn’t move a muscle. He simply exhaled, which caused a vast mist to rise up that obscured everything and negated any energy art or immortal skill that touched it.

Then the mist wrapped around the two captains, swirling about until they looked like two cocoons, leaving only their heads visible as they flopped to the ground.

All the other people in the room were leaders in the Special Reconnaissance Division, and all of them were completely stunned.

“This….”

“We weren’t plotting against you, Titan Dragonguard. Please, spare us.”

“Yeah. We won't say a word about any of this. Our lips are sealed.”

“Please, let us go. We’ll keep this a secret. Right, everyone?”

“You’re not going to lock us up or something, are you? The higher-ups will look into the situation eventually, and you’ll be found out. The Special Reconnaissance Division is very important in the army. We’re a part of all of the major operations.”

“Are you trying to take control of the Special Reconnaissance Division or something?”

All of the various leaders were clamoring to be heard, some begging for mercy, some trying to be reasonable, and some attempting to entice Yang Qi with clever words. However, Yang Qi wasn’t interested in any of them or their words.

He simply waved his hand, sending devil seeds into all of them. Screams rang out and everyone dissolved into panic. However, they were powerless to do anything. Within moments, all of them had devil seeds in their seas of consciousness.

“Do you have a death wish, Titan Dragonguard?” one of the relatively impatient captains shouted angrily. “I can’t believe you put devil seeds into all of us!”

Yang Qi looked at him, and suddenly he heard the sound of countless devil-ghosts howling within his sea of energy.

“AAAAAIIIIIIIEEEEE!” he screamed, dropping to the ground and grabbing his head with both hands. Then he started beating his chest with his own fists. The screams that escaped his lips were horrifying; no one had ever seen an immortal degraded in such a way.

Thus were the effects of the devil seeds.

“I beg of you, stop!” he shrieked. “Stop the devil seed. I was wrong! I admit defeat! I’ll work for you. I’ll do anything you’ll say! I’ll be your servant. Just stop the devil seed. Hurry! AIIIEEEE!”

“Fine, go kill the captain of the Tuskers,” Yang Qi said. He waved his finger, deactivating the devil seed. The impatient captain struggled to his feet, his face flickering between a variety of expressions.

“Well?” Yang Qi said.

“Fine. I’ll kill him. Just don’t activate that devil seed again.” Cold sweat dripping down his neck, he walked over to the captain of the Tuskers. Looking down, he said, “You can only blame your own incompetence for this. You pissed off someone you shouldn’t have, and now he wants me to kill you. Why don’t you just surrender?”

“Bah! You’re not gonna live much longer either. Don’t you know what it means to die rather than submit? You’re breaking military law, which is treason!”

“Treason? He’s an imperial clansman and we’re all ordinary citizens. How could he be committing treason? I was trying to help you, and you just cursed me? Fine. Die!” With that, he stomped his foot down onto the face of the captain of the Tuskers.

Crack!

Blood spurted out in all directions as the man’s head was crushed.

“Well done,” Yang Qi said. Waving his hand dismissively, he pulled the corpse into his Heaven and Earth Furnace, where it began to sizzle and pop.

Now the captain of the Rampagers was alone.

Pointing at Yuan Kuohai, Yang Qi said, “General, kill the captain of the Rampagers. Consider it a blood tribute to me. And don’t even think of crossing me. As you can see, the devil seed will make you wish you could die. Even if you were ten times stronger than you are now, you wouldn't be able to deal with the torment. Live. Or die. The choice is yours.”

“You monstrosity….” Yuan Kuohai said. Never in his wildest dreams could he have guessed that Yang Qi would be this ambitious and ruthless. He, a mere new recruit, was making a huge scene in the Special Reconnaissance Division and was clearly willing to slaughter anyone who got in his way.

“Monstrosity? If you people hadn’t tried to strong-arm my god item away from me, I wouldn’t have had to do this. Stupid fools. Little do you know that your fate is yours to set now. You just picked the wrong direction. Alright, hurry up. Do the deed. I have more plans for you once you’ve done it.”

“Oh, how far I’ve fallen,” Yuan Kuohai said. “Fine. Whatever. Sorry, Captain. Don’t blame me for this, I'm just going with the flow.”

RIP!

Yuan Kuohai unleashed a fist strike, and the captain’s head exploded.

Chapter 570: A Rise in the Ranks

After killing the captain of the Rampagers, Yuan Kuohai seemed to age visibly.

“I, Yuan Kuohai, who dominated the world for years undefeated, general of the Special Reconnaissance Division with an amazing battle record, have truly fallen. Is it punishment for all the people I killed?”

“It’s a blessing for you, General,” Savage Dragon said. “We’ve already benefited a lot by following our captain. We’re a hundred times stronger than before! Let me tell you something. The Special Reconnaissance Division doesn't count for anything. Even if every single soldier here attacked the captain, he would wipe them out of existence with no effort at all. That demon altar was defended by countless experts, yet he wiped them out in only a few breaths of time. You might think the captain is a minor figure, but you’re wrong. You see, we're all blessed to follow him. After all, he can truly transform us. Have you taken a look at the magical laws in me? They’re not low-level magical laws from the Titan Emperor Heaven.”

All eyes locked onto the five Obliterators as they revealed their big secret.

“Such high-level magical laws!” Yuan Kuohai exclaimed. “Those definitely aren’t from the Titan Emperor Heaven. They must be dozens of times stronger than the magical laws here. How did this happen? I can’t believe you pulled off the heaven-defying act of breaking through reality and reforming your immortal bodies. It defies common sense!”

“That's exactly what happened,” Yang Qi said coolly. “It’s because I'm strong enough to shatter natural law. They’re right; you’re all blessed to have me here. You can’t even comprehend the true nature of my cultivation base. Become my followers and you too can be stronger. But betray me, and you’ll die.”

“Just who exactly are you?” Yuan Kuohai said, his voice trembling. “There’s no way you’re an imperial clansman. If someone like you existed in the imperial clan, you would have long since risen to a position of prominence to rival Princess Jadefall.”

“I am an imperial clansman. Just a very unique one. There are plenty of people in the imperial clan who get jealous very easily. And when a storm strikes the forest, the tallest tree falls first. Do you people understand? I'm wrapped up in the internal fighting of the imperial clan, so the main reason I came here was to stay safe. The second reason was to gain power and influence in secret.” Obviously, there was no way Yang Qi would tell these people the truth about who he was. “As long as you just do what I say without any question, you’ll be fine. Got it?”

Yuan Kuohai sighed. “When you stand under low eaves, you have no choice but to bow your head. Well, what now? If you want to take over the Special Reconnaissance Division, it won’t be a simple matter.”

“I'm not interested in the Special Reconnaissance Division,” Yang Qi said. “I’d prefer to operate from the shadows for now. I just want you to give me the military credit I earned, and maybe a slight promotion. You remain the general of the Special Reconnaissance Division, and I rise to captain. Understand? We’ll take things slowly, so you’re not put in an awkward position. That said, there is something I want you to look into. I want to know everything about the Heaven’s Net Consortium. They’re operating in the imperial city’s business district, and they’re involved in some sort of plot. I’ll give you three days to tell me everything about them, including who they have working for them. As long as I get the information I'm looking for, I can make sure everyone present gets a reformed immortal body.”

“What?!” blurted the impatient captain from moments ago. “You’re going to help us all reform our immortal bodies? Are you serious? We can only dream of having access to magical laws from a higher plane. The Titan Emperor Heaven is in a dangerous position right now. If it suffers a deadly blow and its magical laws are damaged, all the immortals here could die. A strike at the essence of our immortal world is a strike at us, and we don't want to die. We want out of this place!”

“Right. None of us want to die. We want to leave this immortal world.” Quite a few people began saying the same thing.

Eventually, Yuan Kuohai nodded. “If you could do that for us, we’ll definitely follow any order you give us.”

“Excellent,” Yang Qi said. “Well, let’s begin.”

Three days later, a report of Yang Qi’s meritorious service was sent up the chain of command and he was officially promoted to captain. He was also gifted with some immortal stones, brahmanints, and some low-level immortal items that were useless enough to him that he passed them out as rewards to people in the headquarters.

Yang Qi now controlled the entire Special Reconnaissance Division, although on paper he was merely a captain under Yuan Kuohai’s command. That said, everyone in the division knew who he was, and that he controlled everything.

No one could even allow errant thoughts into their head, thanks to the devil seeds and the threat of torment they brought. Slowly but surely, his place in the army was growing stable, and going forward he would continue building his power.

Later, in the general’s office, Yang Qi sat adjusting his vital energy when Yuan Kuohai walked in with a handful of information. “Captain, we finished our investigation into the Heaven’s Net Consortium. We have a complete list of their members in the imperial city, and information about all their resources and warding magics. The only thing we couldn't uncover was the exact purpose of that demon altar in their headquarters.”

“Excellent work. But don’t worry about the demon altar. I know what it’s for, so there’s no need for any further investigation about that.” Looking through the information, he nodded. “Incidentally, do you happen to know the level of Princess Jadefall’s cultivation base? And how many divisions does she control?”

“Her cultivation is enigmatic and impossible to read. Years ago, she was in the eighth stage of Demolishing. But I would imagine she’s in the ninth stage by now. She’s a very important person, and considered a top genius. She also has the legacy of an ancient god-spirit. She’s very important to the imperial clan, and she’s performed plenty of services for the court. The sovereign of heaven trusts her as well, which comes as no surprise, considering he’s her father.

“In terms of how many divisions she commands, well, let’s see. Of course, there’s us, the Special Reconnaissance Division. She also oversees the Formation Dismantling Division, the Assassinations Division, the Siege Division, the Acquisitions Division, the Flame Division, the Funerary Division, the Heaven-Dragon Division, the Domination Division, the Amitabha Division, and more. Hundreds of divisions, actually.

“You see, the elite forces of the Titan Emperor Heaven are organized into a few major corps. The first corps is directly overseen by His Majesty the emperor. It includes the Imperial Forest Brigade, the Godwing Guard, the Heavenly Strategy Sentries, and so on. The second corps is led by the Grand Prince of Jade Warfare, and includes the Guarding Immortal Division, the Fallen Immortal Division, the Driven Immortal Division, and others, a total of thirty-six divisions. The third corps is sometimes called the Heaven-Unifying Army, and is led by the generalissimo of the armed forces, Proud Warpatience. It includes the Heaven-Beheading Battalion, the Heaven-Punishing Battalion, the Heaven’s Glory Battalion, and so on. A total of seventy-two battalions. The fourth corps is comprised of the various divisions led by Princess Jadefall. And the fifth is made up of the endless fiendslave battalions commanded by Seven Scourges Huang. In the end, the forces at the command of the imperial court are led by those five commanders-in-chief.”

“I see.” Yang Qi felt his head spinning from all the new information, but at least he had a clearer idea of the overall picture now. “So the three of them—the emperor, the prince, and the princess—are all members of the imperial clan. They’re unlikely to be rebels. But what about the other two? Who is this generalissimo of the armed forces, Proud Warpatience? And what about that Seven Scourges Huang?”

“Seven Scourges Huang is a complete fiend. He used to be a bandit who traveled amongst immortal worlds, pillaging both wealth and energy resources. Later, His Majesty personally recruited him, after which he became one of the emperor's most trusted advisors. As far as Proud Warpatience goes, well, he’s no one to take lightly. According to the rumors, His Majesty has a sworn brother by the name of Proud Heaven, who’s a very important and even invincible figure. Proud Warpatience is an important apprentice of Proud Heaven’s, so therefore he's about as important as an imperial clansman. Years ago, the Titan Emperor Heaven was in a very bad situation and Proud Heaven defeated the enemy, saving the entire immortal world. In some ways, it's karma.”

“Proud Heaven, you say?” Yang Qi said, doing his best to hide his profound shock. It was just like the old adage, heaven helps those who help themselves. He had finally turned up a clue about Proud Heaven!

Proud Warpatience was the generalissimo of the armed forces in the Titan Emperor Heaven, and was connected to Proud Heaven. And that meant that he was now on Yang Qi’s list of people to look into further. For now, he would leave him alone. After all, Yang Qi needed to advance his position and stabilize his power. Only then would he dare to make a move. That said, he was very pleased to be collecting clues already.

“What level cultivation base does Proud Warpatience have?”

“I'm not sure,” Yuan Kuohai said, shaking his head. “He’s a mysterious person who rarely makes public appearances. But from what I've heard, he's impossible to beat in a fight. He's definitely one of the top experts in the imperial court, the kind of person nobody would dare to offend.”

‘Proud Warpatience,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘I’m going to meet him sooner or later. Considering he’s the generalissimo of the armed forces, he's definitely an incredible figure. Most likely, I'm not a match for him now. I have to get those imperial snakecharms, pass my tribulation, and achieve as many breakthroughs as possible. If I can become an immortal officer, or possibly an immortal general, then I would probably be able to confidently take action.”

Yang Qi knew that as long as he could break through to the Demolishing level, he would most likely rise through several of its sublevels right away.

Unfortunately, he wasn't quite ready for that yet.

“Excellent. You did very well, Yuan Kuohai.” Pulling out a power stone, he said, “This is from the Tusita Heaven, and its magical laws will surely benefit you. Take it to prepare for changing your immortal body.”

“Many thanks, Captain!” Yuan Kuohai said enthusiastically.

“After I finish studying this information, I’ll be heading to the Heaven’s Net Consortium to get some information of my own. You stay low, and don’t let anyone know what’s going on.”

Chapter 571: A Deeper Look at the Consortium

As Yang Qi looked through the various intelligence reports, he nodded in satisfaction. ‘It feels great to be in a position of power again. It makes it so much easier to get information. And the fact that the Special Reconnaissance Division specializes in recon is perfect.  The more my power grows within the army, the easier it will be later on to take over this entire immortal world.’

To any onlooker, it would look like Yuan Kuohai was running the Special Reconnaissance Division as usual. But the truth was that Yang Qi was its true leader now.

And it was all thanks to his devil seeds.

The devil seeds were impossible to extrude, destroy, or be extracted. They would fuse with the soul of any immortal they entered, making Yang Qi privy to their very hearts. He was the only one who could remove them, thus anyone who had a devil seed in them wouldn’t dare to even think about rebelling against him. No, they would be completely and utterly loyal to him.

Eventually, it would reach the point where he could remove the seeds, and they would still serve him faithfully.

‘Proud Warpatience… I’ll ignore you for now. But once I get King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans, I’ll come for you.’ After finishing with the intelligence reports, Yang Qi decided that it was time to probe deeper into the Heaven’s Net Consortium.

He had greatly benefited from the demon altar in the Endless Forest. The Chartreuse Sovereign God Armor, Protomammoth Flag, and megamammoth quintessence-blood had allowed him to awaken protomammoth particles within himself. Not only was he now more able to mask his aura and true capabilities, but the deathless godliness ensured that few people could match him in a fight.

‘So, the Heaven’s Net Consortium has a sixth stage Abstrusity-Demolisher—in other words, an immortal paragon. Right now, I'm strong enough to deal with the fifth stage, but probably not the sixth. I might even get killed if a fight broke out. The godliness from two god items helped me a lot, but my overall level is still too low. The energy arts within the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth can’t reach their full potential. And in the end, I'm still only a mortal. Not an immortal. Well, I still need to go poke around for some information. If I can get some of those imperial snakecharms, great. If not, I’ll just leave.’

Although the reports confirmed that the Heaven’s Net Consortium did have a sixth stage Demolisher, whoever it was came and went like a ghost, making it impossible to determine their identity.

All that was certain was that an immortal paragon had been seen.

What kind of people were immortal paragons? The sixth stage of Demolishing was called Abstrusity-Demolishing, and it involved opening the most abstruse and profound of doors, making one a paragon among paragons. One's energy arts became vastly more profound, and one’s lifespan would increase significantly. Furthermore, it would make one capable of leaving to travel among other immortal worlds.

Normally, not even fifth stage World-Demolishers, immortal marquises, could leave their immortal world without using a teleportation portal.

The planes that were immortal worlds were definitely nothing like the planetary systems of the mortal world. They essentially existed in a different universe.

From what Yang Qi could sense, the immortal worlds were like bubbles hung in the universe, within which immortals existed.

And the bubbles didn't touch each other.

No, there were vast distances between the various immortal worlds, space that was occupied by a cosmic vacuum and deadly universal tempests. Only upon reaching the immortal paragon level could one venture through such regions.

However, not even immortal paragons could surpass the essence of the immortal world they came from. People who made immortal bodies with the magical laws of the Titan Emperor Heaven were fated to be forever connected to that immortal world.

If that immortal world were destroyed, all the immortals in it would also be destroyed. Not even ninth step Dao-Demolishers, sovereigns of heaven, were an exception.

The only way to rise above that limitation was to reach the Godmyth level. However, Yang Qi had already helped Titan Duelbringer and many others to reform their immortal bodies with the magical laws of the Tusita Heaven. As of now, their fate was tied not to the Titan Emperor Heaven, but to the Tusita Heaven.

The Tusita Heaven was a virtually invincible location, a place where Godmyths abounded, and was a place that would last for aeons upon end. It was quite the opposite of the Titan Emperor Heaven, which hovered in the shadow of destruction.

As for Yang Qi, he was tied to the essence of the Hell of Mahānata, the Tusita Heaven, and the Hell of Gloom and Darkness. And as time went on, he would likely perform ensconcements in other immortal worlds and hells. There were millions upon millions of immortal worlds and hells, and performing ensconcements there would ensure that, as long as they weren’t destroyed, neither would he be. Eventually, he wouldn’t need ensconcements of any sort. He would join the legion of gods and be able to create worlds. He would be truly invincible, and eternally deathless.

After taking some time to plan his next move, he left the military plane and headed to the business plane.

There were countless planes that made up the imperial city, which was overall a massive, extremely crowded place. By now, he had a somewhat respectable standing and wasn’t stopped by any passing patrols.

He headed right into the business plane, where he saw all of the countless wormholes with people coming and going with various goods. It almost made him feel like he was back in the mortal world.

Eventually, he found a remote, empty alley a short distance from the Heaven’s Net Consortium. Ducking inside, he murmured, “Lord of gods, transform me to dust.”

Then he slowly shrank down to the size of a mote of dust, which began floating through the air toward the consortium.

The entire business plane had warding magics everywhere, designed to negate the effects of certain daoist techniques used for transformation. Even divine abilities designed to mimic the functions of heaven and earth would be viciously suppressed.

After all, immortals could change their size at will. If they wanted to be as large as a mountain, they could. If they wanted to turn into dust, they could. However, upon entering the imperial city, such techniques couldn't be used. It was a function of the magical laws that filled the area. After all, if a fight broke out and everyone suddenly became as large as mountains, it would obviously cause chaos.

But Yang Qi had deathless godliness and magical laws from the legion of gods. And the God Legion Seal in his forehead had the Blood of the One God. As such, he could easily surpass the magical laws that governed the imperial city. The ability to keep hidden was the most important tool in his plan to get into the Heaven’s Net Consortium and try to get those snakecharms.

As he approached, he realized that the street that housed the Heaven’s Net Consortium was filled with black-garbed individuals going here and there. It seemed that something big was going on. At the same time, they had the street locked down so that outsiders couldn’t enter.

And it looked like all sorts of goods, especially immortal items, were being brought into the consortium.

‘I bet the incident in the Endless Forest was a big blow to the Heaven’s Net Consortium. They look like they’re preparing to deal with some major enemy. Well, the more chaos they’re in, the better my chances of succeeding.’ As he proceeded in, he realized that there was some latent power in the air that was crystallizing even outside dust.

Obviously, it was an added precaution to prevent people from sneaking in.

‘Another warding magic? As if something that crappy could stop me.’ Chuckling coldly, he drew on the transformation powers of the God Legion Paradise, shrinking down to the point where he had no shape at all. Then, using the Wheel of Fate, he slipped through the crystallized dust.

None of the black-garbed individuals or figures in cinnabar noticed him.

Deeper he went, relying on the details from the intelligence reports he had just read to make his way along. Eventually, he reached a place protected by powerful auras and many warding magics, things that would protect against any intruder. Except Yang Qi.

WHIZZZ!

He passed into the inner hall, where he saw a mirror whose light almost fell onto him and revealed him.

Luckily, he had a mirror of his own, the Chiliocosm Mirror. And thus, he fought mirrors with mirrors and continued on. He knew that he was skating on thin ice, and was doing his best to get in and out as quickly as possible.

Eventually, he reached a storeroom filled with high-grade immortal items, as well as sabers, spears, swords, staffs, axes, halberds, hooks, tridents, and shields. There was even immortal armor.

At the same time, there were other types of armor that lacked immortal power or magical laws from the dao of immortals. Yet there was something innately marvelous and powerful about them, as if they had been manufactured by uncannily skilled hands. In fact, they were mechanical suits of armor from the ancient mechanical civilization. Mechas.

Yang Qi could tell immediately that these mechas had been put together by the Mechfolk, who carried on the legacy of that ancient civilization. They were filled with such immense power that even a mortal who suited up in one of them would be able to kill immortals.

It was a level of power that was no less than immortal armor. However, there was a big difference. Immortal armor required a powerful individual to use it. The more powerful the immortal armor, the stronger the person needed to be to wear it.

In immortal dao civilizations, immortal items and magical treasures were designed for use by people who were already powerful. In some ways, they were like embellishments.

But the machines from that ancient civilization didn’t require the user to be particularly powerful. Even the weakest mortal could use them.

The two civilizations were very different in that regard.

However, that only begged the question of how terrifying they would be if combined.

Surprisingly, Yang Qi had found a stockpile of mechas here in the Heaven’s Net Consortium, as well as mechanical weapons of all sorts. He wanted to take them all, but didn’t want to alert the enemy to his presence. Right now, the imperial snakecharms were the most important thing.

He passed through the storeroom and continued toward the altar. With his Lord's Eye, he could already see the altar, and the primal-chaos elder-snake swirling about within it, devouring the essence available from the immortal world. There were a host of experts surrounding the altar, absorbing the Heaven-Devouring True Energy that the snake was producing.

And in the very middle of the group was a young man in a long robe that flickered like primal-chaos itself and was covered with snake-like designs. His eyes were closed, and Heaven-Devouring True Energy swirled within him, making him seem extremely abstruse.

Shockingly, he was an immortal paragon!

Chapter 572: Immortal Paragon

An immortal paragon. A sixth stage Abstrusity-Demolisher, a virtually invincible figure.

Yang Qi quickly reined in the fluctuations of his magical power. He knew that he was incredibly strong, but in the end he was still only a ninth order Demi-Immortal, a mere half-Demolisher. He was far, far from the true Demolishing level. And he was currently seven levels away from immortal paragons.

There was a huge gap between the levels of mortals and immortals. And the difference between each level for immortals was like the difference between a first level Energy Artist and a ninth order Demi-Immortal.

Could a mortal who had just stepped into Energy Absorption possibly fight a high-level Demi-Immortal?

That gap was roughly the same gap Yang Qi faced in this immortal paragon.

In this moment, he was walking on thin ice and had to exercise utmost caution. But in the end, he simply couldn’t resist the sight of that primal-chaos elder-snake, and the six hundred and sixty-six imperial snakecharms that made it up.

If the current ruler of the Titan Emperor Heaven was the same one who had created the immortal world, he would definitely have realized that its essence was being devoured. But that was not the case. This place was a very ancient immortal world. It had been ruled by different dynasties throughout the years, much like the Rich-Lush Continent had started out being ruled by the Rich-Lush Dynasty, then gone through other dynasties until the Sage Ancestor Dynasty held sway. Because of that, the ruler of this particular immortal world didn't hold absolute control over every aspect of the lands. It was very similar to emperors in the mortal world.

‘What a miserable waste for this thing to have fallen into the hands of the Heaven’s Net Consortium,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘If I could get it, I could unlock its true potential. With the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth powering those snakecharms, they would be even stronger than if King Heaven-Devourer himself used them.’

A cinnabar-garbed individual suddenly rushed in.

“Immortal Paragon Night-Kṣetra, we have new information. After the altar in the Endless Forest was destroyed, our lord told us to look into the matter. Unfortunately, we don't have much to work with. The lord is furious, and will definitely come down soon to exact punishment. Please, we need your help! Since you’re adept with preheaven god skills, can you perform a divination to identify the culprit?”

Immortal Paragon Night-Kṣetra opened his eyes and said, “Fine. General Goldrhino had an average cultivation base, yet he dared to take responsibility for the altar in the Endless Forest. He deserved to die. That said, we can't afford to fail in this mission assigned by the lord. I've already used the essence of the immortal world around us to form nine heaven-devouring śarīras filled with Heaven-Devouring True Energy. They should provide more than enough power to divine the identity of the culprit.”

Nine popping sounds rang out as nine huge śarīras appeared, which flew out into a formation that resembled the character 品. Then they began rotating as the divination process began.

Shaken, Yang Qi summoned his Wheel of Fate and quickly located the power that was seeking to divine his identity.

‘Clever bastard,’ he thought. ‘He’s using a preheaven god skill to try to locate me. Luckily, I have just the technique to deal with that. Perhaps confusing him will give me the opportunity I need to grab those six hundred and sixty-six snakecharms. I need those things to truly establish my position in this immortal world.’

With that, he began sending out divination power of his own. ‘Wheel of Fate Confuses and Blurs; Boundless Red Dust Disturbs the Heart.’

“Hmm?” Immortal Paragon Night-Kṣetra frowned as an image slowly took shape within the śarīra formation. It showed a place at the edge of the immortal world, where a devilish specter existed in the depths of the earth, pulsing with the aura of the Protomammoth Flag and the Chartreuse Sovereign God Armor.

Of course, it was a complete fabrication created by Yang Qi’s ability to alter fate, designed to fool the immortal paragon into believing that a monster lurked somewhere on the edges of the immortal world.

“Excellent. So it was some monster from hell. And it has the aura of a god item. Ordinary people would never be able to divine the location of a being like that, but thankfully I've been working with this Heaven-Devouring True Energy long enough to expel all impurities from within me. With a mind as pure as fresh snow, how could this thing possibly hide from me?” Immortal Paragon Night-Kṣetra flew up into the air. “I’ll go capture this monster, you people guard the altar.”

“Yes sir! You’re invincible and divine, Immortal Paragon Night-Kṣetra, you’ll definitely succeed!”

WHOOSH!

Immortal Paragon Night-Kṣetra opened a wormhole, stepped in, and was gone.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi kept the illusion going with the Wheel of Fate, ensuring that the workings of heaven were in chaos. He waited for a full two hours just to make sure that Immortal Paragon Night-Kṣetra was truly gone.

As of this moment, the altar had no powerful guardian.

It was the perfect moment.

Yang Qi suddenly blurred into motion.

“Primal-chaos elder-snake. King Heaven-Devourer!”

In the blink of an eye, a resonance sprang up between his one hundred and eighty-five talismans and the six hundred and sixty-six talismans on the altar. Without hesitation, Yang Qi’s talismans shot toward the altar.

WHIZZZ!

As the one hundred and eighty-five talismans approached, the six hundred and sixty-six immediately attempted to devour them. Of course, Yang Qi’s primal-chaos elder-snake wouldn’t just allow that to happen and the two snakes began fighting each other.

‘What powerful energy, and what a strong will. Sadly for it, this is the imperial city, and wills from beyond the heavens are suppressed here. The will of those six hundred and sixty-six snakecharms simply can’t stand up to me. The God Legion Seal can break all boundaries, touch all things with the power of the gods, and draw on the great dao of the azure heavens!’

RUMBLE!

Boundless power rose up in Yang Qi as he used the God Legion Seal to activate his Blood of the One God. Golden light flared as he suddenly transformed into an enormous sun-like entity made of pure gold.

Crack! Snap!

The immense will shattered and the primal-chaos elder-snake exploded, transforming into six hundred and sixty-six individual talismans that scattered in all directions.

‘Defracted Projection Gathering!’ Yang Qi reached out and the talismans flowed into his hand.

‘Excellent, I got all six hundred and sixty-six. Now I just need to assimilate them, and I’ll be unstoppable. In ancient times, King Heaven-Devourer was an invincible figure, and now I have a quarter of his talismans. Reaching the Demolishing level shouldn't be hard for me at all.’

With this new influx, Yang Qi now had eight hundred and fifty-one imperial snakecharms, although he still had to fully fuse with the new ones. Next, he needed to find a safe place to make them part of his nascent divinity so that no one could ever take them away.

‘Time to get out of here!’ Before anyone could react to the sudden development, he transformed back into a dust mote and vanished.

Only then did the people guarding the altar realize what had happened, and a huge commotion broke out.

“Are you feeling suicidal or something?” someone howled. It was none other than Immortal Paragon Night-Kṣetra, who finally realized he had been duped and was rushing back, filled with fury.

Obviously, if he lost all of the imperial snakecharms he would be executed by his lord.

Yang Qi was already out of the imperial city, but unfortunately for him the immortal paragon had already locked onto his aura.

‘Immortal paragons are so strong!’ he thought, transforming back to his normal size. He could sense Immortal Paragon Night-Kṣetra’s will locked onto him, and knew that he couldn't shake it at the moment. After all, Immortal Paragon Night-Kṣetra had worked with the snakecharms for so long that they were linked to his quintessence-blood and vital energy. Until Yang Qi fully fused with them, he would be able to sense them wherever they were.

That said, Yang Qi wasn't worried about it. Summoning his Angel Wings, he shot off at top speed.

WHOOSH!

WOOOOSH!

He blurred into motion, instantly reaching speeds unheard of in the Titan Emperor Heaven. Moments after he vanished, a wormhole popped open behind him and Immortal Paragon Night-Kṣetra’s aura erupted out of it.

“Even if you flee to the ends of the earth, I’ll track you down and kill you! How dare you steal those imperial snakecharms! That primal-chaos elder-snake has my heart-blood in it, and the will of my lord. Do you think you can break them? You've committed a crime worthy of ten thousand deaths! Nine Profound Heavenly Transformations! Eternal Kṣaṇa! Travel the Unknown!”

RUMBLE!

Immense power erupted out of him as he shot through the air in pursuit of Yang Qi.

It only took moments before both of them were far from the imperial city, deep into the immortal world.

‘This immortal paragon really is no joke,’ Yang Qi thought as he flew along, rising higher and higher into the sky of the immortal world where the empyrean energy grew stronger and stronger. The sky of the Titan Emperor Heaven was so high that it would actually be impossible for Yang Qi to fly to the top of it. After all, the higher one went, the more dangerous the empyrean energy grew, creating immortal lightning and other forces of destruction.

Chapter 573: The Fury of Night-Ksetra

Night-Kṣetra truly was furious. He was an immortal paragon, an Abstrusity-Demolisher who had destroyed profundity and abstrusity.

Yet Yang Qi continued flying higher and higher into the empyrean winds and the dangerous lightning.

This was a height that most immortals wouldn’t dare ascend to.

The empyrean winds contained deadly ball lightning, the detonations of which could wipe even high-level immortals out of existence. Anyone who flew near such lightning would definitely be courting death.

Yet Yang Qi was a blur as he shot through it, with Immortal Paragon Night-Kṣetra hot on his trail.

Although Night-Kṣetra was having trouble catching up, he could see Yang Qi, and was convinced that he was the source of all the misfortune.

“Who are you?” he shouted. “How dare you steal King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans? Aren’t you worried about having your entire clan wiped out by us? You can’t escape! Getting those talismans won’t do you any good. If you stop right there I’ll spare your life, and even help you to become a truly powerful expert. Join the Heaven’s Net Consortium and you’ll have endless prospects!”

Yang Qi burst out laughing. “You’re very reckless, aren’t you Immortal Paragon Night-Kṣetra. You set up those talismans right in the middle of the imperial city for the purpose of consuming the immortal world’s essence and weakening its foundation. If word leaks out that you’re trying to subvert the imperial clan, you’ll be in big trouble. I'm just helping you get out of that predicament! You should thank me for being so righteous and helpful!”

In response, Immortal Paragon Night-Kṣetra very nearly coughed up a mouthful of blood. “You… you evildoer! You’ll die for this! I'm going to teach you a lesson you won’t ever forget, you little punk! Profound Gate of Heaven and Earth!”

Rumbling sounds echoed out as a gate appeared above his head, which exerted a profound gravitational force that even shattered the empyrean energy in the area and dragged it inside.

WHIZZZ!

Yang Qi suddenly found himself slowing down.

“Shatter the Five Phases; Reconstruct Heaven and Earth; Order of the Immortal Dao; Inescapable Net of Justice!” Immortal Paragon Night-Kṣetra shoved his hand out and true energy exploded like rain to create an enormous net designed to capture any opponent. “Coiled Dragon God Silk!”

It was a divine ability that Immortal Paragon Night-Kṣetra had created himself, combining the quintessence energy and souls of ten thousand dragons, the essence of the immortal world, and Heaven-Devouring True Energy, and using it to create an enormous magical net.

“Inescapable Net of Justice?” Yang Qi laughed. “What kind of bullshit is that? The Hand of the One God suppresses hell; the horde of devils submits to the holy one!” He spun in place, eyes shining with boundless light as he threw his hands out in front of him, sending out numerous shockwaves of destructive power.

RUMBLE!

A swirling vortex appeared as he went through all nine stances of the Hand of the One God, causing everything to tremble violently. A moment later, the magical net shattered and the gate exploded.

A huge hand filled the air, suppressing everything as it shot toward Immortal Paragon Night-Kṣetra.

“You dog bastard!” Immortal Paragon Night-Kṣetra shouted. “How dare you fight with me. Night-Kṣetra Profound-Heaven Spirit-Channeling God Fist! Heaven and Earth Spirit!”

This time, Immortal Paragon Night-Kṣetra threw his hands out with even more viciousness, causing what sounded like the chanting of spirits to fill the air.

Apparently, this fist strike allowed him to channel the power of spirits of heaven and earth to bless himself. He suddenly grew stronger and taller, making him seem like a ghost-god who could challenge the might of the great heaven above.

“Nice move,” Yang Qi said. “Now it’s my turn. Good fortune is the worker, yin and yang are the fuel, all creation is the copper. Heaven and Earth Furnace!” The Heaven and Earth Furnace appeared, filled with red-hot liquid as it shot toward Immortal Paragon Night-Kṣetra.

“Are you feeling suicidal or something?” Immortal Paragon Night-Kṣetra growled. “Myriad Spirits Pilgrimage!” He unleashed another fist strike, making him seem like the most holy figure in all heaven and earth, with ten thousand spirits rushing toward him and filling him with power and magical laws. Heaven and earth transformed, causing an immense tempest to spring up around him, filled with lightning and clouds.

At the same time, the Wheel of Fate slowly began turning, ensuring that no attacks could land on Yang Qi. He then drew fully on the nine stances of the Hand of the One God, and various other martial disciplines of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. Martial memories of the primeval infernal deities emerged from the God Legion Seal as he and the immortal paragon fought back and forth amidst the empyrean winds.

“Myriad Magics Channel Spirits!”

“The Dao of Spirits is Paragon!”

“Pierce Through the Spirit World!”

“God-Spirit Creation!”

A host of spirits appeared. Some were true-spirits, others were ghost-spirits, immortal-spirits, god-spirits, nether-spirits, or spirit automatons.

Then Immortal Paragon Night-Kṣetra unleashed true flame, his most ultimate technique. It was a combination of numerous energy arts that caused worlds to pop into being, complete with the cycles of the sun and moon and never-ending destruction and rebirth.

Yang Qi was instantly surrounded on all sides.

‘This guy is really incredible. I'm going all out, and still can’t get the upper hand. I don’t think I’m a match for him, although he doesn’t have what it takes to kill me.’ Yang Qi used every move he could think of to defend himself, simultaneously seeking an opportunity to strike back.

At the same time, he worked on fusing with the imperial snakecharms.

In fact, he was just on the verge of wiping out the quintessence branding mark, which would allow him to draw fully on their power.

When Immortal Paragon Night-Kṣetra realized what was happening, he burned with even greater fury than before and intensified his attacks, hoping to prevent Yang Qi from succeeding.

“Heaven-Born Slaughter Technique!” he growled. A god of slaughter rose up behind him, complete with three heads and six arms. Each hand held an instrument of death, and he was flanked by numerous banners of massacre. There was even a flickering projection of the character ‘kill’ floating behind him.

“Die!” Night-Kṣetra howled, throwing everything he had at Yang Qi’s defenses.

“Nice killing energy. And nice move. Unfortunately, you’re just helping me to wipe out the branding mark on these talismans!”

Suddenly, Yang Qi transformed into a primal-chaos elder-snake and lunged forward and consumed the incoming energy, preventing any of it from hitting him.

Crack! Snap!

Loud sounds echoed out of Yang Qi as his meridians were opened and primal-chaos vital energy surged through him.

‘Not good!’ All of a sudden, Immortal Paragon Night-Kṣetra realized that something bad was about to happen.

Unfortunately, he didn’t react quickly enough. The primal-chaos elder-snake began shining with dazzling light that locked down Night-Kṣetra’s vital energy and shoved his god of death backward. Suddenly, he was sealed, temporarily incapable of moving.

“I’ll be leaving now, Immortal Paragon Night-Kṣetra,” Yang Qi said. “There’s no need for you to see me off. And don't worry. I’ll come looking for you after I'm a Demolisher. Then I’ll wipe both you and the Heaven’s Net Consortium out of existence.”

The primal-chaos elder-snake shot away in the blink of an eye without leaving behind a single trace of its passage. Unlike before, there would be no way for Immortal Paragon Night-Kṣetra to track down Yang Qi.

As Immortal Paragon Night-Kṣetra registered Yang Qi’s words, his mind began spinning.

‘What? Become a Demolisher? Does that mean he's actually not a Demolisher right now?’ All of a sudden, he broke out in a cold sweat. ‘Who was that guy? He’s not even a Demolisher, but he’s already that fierce? I'm an Abstrusity-Demolisher and he nearly killed me! What will he be like after he breaks through?

‘This is impossible. Even if he were the offspring of a god, there’s no way he could be that strong. I've seen the offspring of gods before. They have invincible blood and perfect, immensely powerful genes. But not even they could do something like this. Maybe this guy was just trying to trick me.’

A moment later, his face fell. ‘I'm finished. Done for. I have no way to track him down, and he took the six hundred and sixty-six snakecharms. The lord is not going to let me off the hook for this. My god. What should I do? If I go back and confess, I'm dead for sure. I should run. Yes! Flee! I can't stay in the Titan Emperor Heaven any longer. I have to find someone else to work for. Considering I'm in the sixth stage of Demolishing, I can definitely face the spatial tempests of the universe and leave this place. It will be dangerous, but it’s better than being punished by the lord.’

Having reached this point in his train of thought, he turned and sped away.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi reached a suitable location and dropped to the ground.

‘Excellent. This couldn’t have gone better.’

He had landed in a wide plane bordered by beautiful mountains and peppered with random cities and buildings. It looked very much like a rustic hamlet district from the mortal world.

Yang Qi could sense that there were no cultivation experts in the area, which meant that he could get to work. The primal-chaos elder-snake in his hand was roughly the size of a thumb, and it wriggled and twitched constantly. However, it was continuing to devour the essence of the immortal world around it, converting it into Heaven-Devouring True Energy in its belly.

He had jumped from nearly two hundred talismans to well over eight hundred, and that was not merely a quadrupling in raw power. It actually boosted him by nearly a hundredfold. And each talisman he acquired from here on out would provoke more heaven-shaking, earth-toppling changes.

Chapter 574: Major Success

‘I finally accomplished something big. Six hundred and sixty-six of King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans!’

Yang Qi took a deep breath and the Heaven-Devouring True Energy in him surged, first crystallizing, then liquefying, and finally solidifying again into a śarīra inside of him.

He could now make Heaven-Devouring śarīras, each of which would contain immense power, like a precious treasure that could be crushed to release a wave of destructive power.

Or he could give them to other people, who could use them to extrude heterogeneous true energy and become incomparably pure, thus significantly advancing their cultivation.

Heaven-Devouring śarīras could also become worlds with impenetrable defenses that could provide safe havens for cultivation. And any heart-devils or heaven-devils that assailed the cultivator while using such a śarīra would be immediately absorbed and assimilated.

BUZZ!

The Heaven-Devouring śarīra took shape in his palm, a tiny white vortex that constantly consumed the immortal world essence, strengthening itself by means of the devouring. Bright light shone out in all directions, as well as spatial fluctuations, the combination of which produced a small world in the area.

‘Excellent. Truly excellent. In the future, I can install Heaven-Devouring śarīras in my kingdom in hell for use by important disciples. By fusing them with their nascent divinity, they’ll be able to unleash the will of King Heaven-Devourer and boost their fighting prowess by many times over.’ Yang Qi looked around, trying to find a suitable location to make his breakthrough to the Demolishing level.

Considering how many imperial snakecharms he had now, he wasn’t afraid of anyone who might try causing problems for him.

Yet he hadn’t forgotten that immortal worlds were dangerous places, and that he should never let his guard down. It would be impossible to say how many people throughout history had been ambushed in the middle of a tribulation and killed. Whether it was the horde of devils, the host of immortals, or the throngs of buddhas, there were always plenty of jealous individuals out there who would not tolerate a rise of power among others.

‘First let me fully fuse with all eight hundred and fifty-one talismans and use them to make a few more Heaven-Devouring śarīras. With those śarīras as a spell formation, I can have multiple minor worlds set up around me to keep me safe. Then I can work on my breakthrough.’

He exhaled, and his internal pellet appeared, which contained the essences of the Hell of Mahānata, the Hell of Gloom and Darkness, and the Tusita Heaven. There was also plenty of deathless godliness. All of that power combined would actually rival the will which had descended into the Endless Forest some time back.

Now, Yang Qi was adding the Heaven-Devouring śarīra to the mix.

At the same time, he prepared to create more of the Heaven-Devouring śarīras to add to his internal pellet and create a spell formation for defensive purposes during his breakthrough.

WHOOSH!

As King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans continued absorbing energy, he turned and headed back toward the imperial city, curious to see how the Heaven’s Net Consortium would respond to the developments.

This ‘lord’ who ruled the consortium was definitely a very mysterious figure. Considering the vicious blow Yang Qi had struck, he would obviously try to get revenge. So there was no way Yang Qi would enter a critical breakthrough tribulation right at that moment.

That would only be asking for trouble.

He would wait patiently and watch how the situation developed before taking any action. With the talismans he had now, he could probably fight to a draw with Immortal Paragon Night-Kṣetra if he had to.

In other words, he was now as strong as a sixth stage Abstrusity-Demolisher.

Once he stepped into the boundless dao of Demolishing, he would definitely be able to handle seventh, and even eighth stage opponents. At that point, he would essentially be invincible within the Titan Emperor Heaven, able to rain down fury wherever he went.

Right now, he would go back to work on his cultivation, and at the same time dig for information about Proud Warpatience. Eventually, he planned to capture the man and force him to reveal information about Proud Heaven.

Before long, he was back in the Special Reconnaissance Division, where he found General Yuan Kuohai pacing back and forth nervously. Upon catching sight of Yang Qi, he said, “Captain, something really big just happened. Someone robbed the Heaven’s Net Consortium! They suffered a huge loss!”

“Oh? What did they lose?” Yang Qi asked coolly.

“We're not sure. We just know that the consortium reported the theft to the Imperial Guard, who is already running an investigation. Captain, didn’t you mention that you had a business deal going with the Heaven’s Net Consortium? And then you disappeared for a while. Wait… are you the one who robbed them?”

“Yes I did,” Yang Qi replied coolly. “Do you know what they were doing? They set up a demonic spell formation to steal the essence of the Titan Emperor Heaven. They were subverting the imperial dynasty and trying to destroy this entire immortal world, all by using the talismans of King Heaven-Devourer. Thankfully, I have the talismans now. I'm stronger than ever before, and when I achieve my next breakthrough I’ll be able to dominate seventh and eighth stage Demolishers. In fact, it won’t be long before I can even defeat a ninth stage sovereign of heaven!”

With that he extended his arm and revealed the primal-chaos elder-snake wrapped around his wrist, biting its tail to make it like a bracelet.

The sight of it caused Yuan Kuohai to shiver. As the general of the Special Reconnaissance Division, he was an important person in the immortal world, someone who had seen many things and was considered very experienced. He could instantly tell that the primal-chaos elder-snake was powerful enough to destroy the entire military plane, and likely consume the imperial city itself.

After all, in yesteryear, King Heaven-Devourer had been known for devouring countless immortal worlds.

Now that Yang Qi had roughly a quarter of the total talismans, it begged the question of how powerful he would be if he unleashed their power.

“King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans! They form a god item! An unbeatable god item! Captain, did you already fuse with them?”

“Yes, I'm completely at one with them. This is going to be a secret weapon of ours; if we get in a really bad situation, I can release power to rival that of King Heaven-Devourer himself. Okay, I have a new mission for you: I want you to look into Proud Warpatience. I need to know his background, how strong he is, who he has working for him, and everything else that’s relevant.”

Yuan Kuohai shivered again. “Captain, you want to take on Proud Warpatience? He's a very important person. As generalissimo of the armed forces, not even the imperial court can tell him what to do. He has a very powerful intelligence-gathering wing, the Ninja Division, which specializes in assassination. Compared to them, our Special Reconnaissance Division is like a group of ants. They could wipe us all out with a mere sneeze.”

“We’ll be fine. I don’t want you to make any open moves against them, just dig around for some information, that’s all. Right now, you’re a fourth stage Origin-Demolisher. But you won’t be stuck there for long. I can cleanse you with Heaven-Devouring True Energy, which will make your next breakthrough much easier. Understand?”

The primal-chaos elder-snake flew out and bored into Yuan Kuohai, causing him to physically tremble. As the Heaven-Devouring True Energy coursed through him, his heterogeneous true energy was cleansed in a way that he could never have done himself.

“Aaaiiiieee!”

He let loose a long cry as his true energy levels rose higher, and he rapidly underwent the most thorough of temperings.

“Tusita Heaven magical laws: immortal body refinement!”

Wham!

Yuan Kuohai exploded into a cloud of flesh and blood that fused with the magical laws of the Tusita Heaven, then stitched back together into an embryonic form.

A moment later, the embryo exploded and Yuan Kuohai reappeared. Except he was now much stronger than before, to the point where a single fist strike could punch holes in the fabric of the universe.

WHIZZZ!

He took a step forward, and everything in the area trembled. Laughing heartily, he said, “I finally started to break through! I've been stuck in that level for years! Once I succeed, I’ll be in fifth stage Demolishing. I’ll be an immortal marquis! I’ll finally be able to get a promotion! Many thanks, Captain. Many thanks!”

“That was nothing. As long as you serve me loyally, I can give you even greater responsibilities later on. Perhaps you can even lead an immortal world. You need to do more work before you achieve your breakthrough. But first, get to work on that information I need. I'm going to focus on my cultivation.”

“Yes, yes of course,” Yuan Kuohai said. “I’ll personally make sure you get everything you need to know.”

“As expected. You’re dismissed.” Yang Qi then waved his hand and opened a wormhole, out of which emerged Titan Duelbringer.

“What can I do for you, Milord?”

“Nothing. I'm just going to make you a bit stronger.” He sent a stream of bright light into Titan Duelbringer, filled with Heaven-Devouring True Energy. A moment later, Titan Duelbringer began shining brightly.

“I now have over eight hundred imperial snakecharms. There are plenty of truths hidden within them that can be unlocked. Why don’t you join me for a session of cultivation? I can sense that, with enough true energy, information about the legacy of King Heaven-Devourer can be revealed. He definitely had a godly-class energy art, perhaps in the consummate level. Imagine the possibilities.”

He sent some true energy into the primal-chaos elder-snake, which twitched and began releasing an expression of will.

Chapter 575: Proud Warpatience

Each of King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans contained some of his legacy, a godly-class energy art. However, that legacy would be impossible to cultivate with only a small amount of them.

But Yang Qi had enough that, with the added impetus of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, he was able to unlock some of its secrets. Not even the ‘lord’ of the Heaven’s Net Consortium would have been able to do the same thing.

A primal-chaos elder-snake swirled through the air, radiating a powerful energy that quickly turned into a magical script. Then, a booming voice rang out that simultaneously seemed like the hiss of a snake.

“Who has my talismans? Who are you? Somehow, you’ve drawn on the deepest aspects of my talismans. And you’ve achieved my deepest desire, to consume godmammoths! Are you an Eternal One? A Future One? Or are you a mysterious Fateless One or Heaven Moving One? A Reincarnated One?”

The voice was the will and legacy left behind by King Heaven-Devourer.

“Since you have unlocked the will hidden deep within the talismans, it means we are connected by destiny. Thus, I will impart to you a boundless energy art, something which existed before I came to be; a divine ability I gained enlightenment of by contemplating primal-chaos itself. With it, you can inhale the good fortune of heaven and earth, and draw on the abstruse secrets of primal-chaos magics. It's called the Heaven-Devouring Good-Fortune Non-Existent-Gods Dao. The Heaven-Devouring aspect refers to me. Good-Fortune is the foundation of the art. And the Non-Existent-Gods refers to the absolute destruction of the legion of gods and the devouring of all the heavens! Even the legion of gods will become fodder for me to consume. I will devour anything and everything. That is the invincible will of this energy art!

“You have eight hundred and fifty-one talismans, therefore I can only give you one quarter of the technique. Once you acquire more talismans, you will incite their will to acquire more of the Heaven-Devouring Good-Fortune Non-Existent-Gods Dao. Listen well, as I will now impart to you a consummate godly-class energy art. This is a level that can be surpassed only by the energy arts of the Sovereign Lord. Cultivate my art, then go deprive the legion of gods of their quintessence!”

WHIZZZ!

A stream of innumerable magical symbols appeared and began flowing into Yang Qi’s mind.

It was one quarter of the Heaven-Devouring Good-Fortune Non-Existent-Gods Dao, which he immediately imparted to Titan Duelbringer as well.

Even though it was incomplete, it would still be boundlessly domineering. After all, even the ruler of the Titan Emperor Heaven only cultivated a lesser godly-class energy art, which was far below a consummate art.

If things went on as normal, then perhaps in a thousand or ten thousand years, Titan Duelbringer would become a chief elder in the Titan Emperor Heaven, and eventually its emperor. Of course, that was built on the premise that the Titan Emperor Heaven would survive for that long.

As Yang Qi gained enlightenment of another godly-class energy art, back in the mortal world, in the Sage Monarch planetary system, his clone also received the new information. As he gained knowledge of the art, he immediately began cultivating it.

Now he didn’t have five godly-class energy arts, but six. Earlier, he had begun combining the five arts he had possessed, but never completed the task. Now that he had a sixth, he would integrate it into the combination.

Jade-Emperor Profound-Welkin Exalted-Celestial God-Dao.

Prodigious Proto-Epoch, Invincible War-Steppe.

Asiryangguk Sauvastika Devil Grand Infernal Energy.

Killing Fist of the Dao of Monarchs.

Void Mist Mountain and Sea Interstice.

All five of the arts were built on different systems, therefore the immortal clone had integrated them separately into his five viscera, where they formed a perfect balance. The Heaven-Devouring True Energy had helped significantly in that effort. Now, the Heaven-Devouring Good-Fortune Non-Existent-Gods Dao made the combination even smoother, and at the same time caused the clone to rapidly grow stronger. In fact, he was already about as strong as a third stage Thought-Demolisher, an immortal officer.

The immortal clone had long since broken through to Demolishing, and formed an immortal body with the magical laws of the Tusita Heaven, as well as those of the Hell of Mahānata and the Hell of Gloom and Darkness. In fact, he had even drawn on the magical laws of the Hell of Suras, the Hell of Euphoria, the Hell of Yamas, and many other hells. He was like a god-devil who would be invincible against most enemies.

Yang Qi’s forces in the mortal world continued to grow stronger as time went by. His Elder Brothers and Sisters of the Invincible Society, the Yang Clan, and his sworn siblings from the Rich-Lush Continent days all benefited from the open link Yang Qi had created between the Tusita Heaven and the mortal world. He continued passing down resources, allowing everyone to achieve amazing baptisms at an almost constant rate.

Eventually, they would surpass the level of the geniuses in the immortal world above them.

After Yang Qi left, many of them became Demi-Immortals, and some of the key figures were closing in on Demolishing.

Once Yang Qi himself reached Demolishing, he would make an even bigger passageway and send down higher levels of power to the mortal world below. And of course, he would continue to develop his kingdom in the Hell of Mahānata, pushing it toward the level of an immortal world.

Six months passed, during which Yang Qi and Titan Duelbringer worked constantly on their cultivation. During that time, Yang Qi’s cultivation base grew more refined and he formed multiple Heaven-Devouring śarīras. He also gained deep enlightenment of the Heaven-Devouring Good-Fortune Non-Existent-Gods Dao.

As it turned out, this technique was a perfect complement to the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.

Already, Yang Qi’s flesh and blood were filled with a strange power that made him like a god-spirit. One drop of his blood that escaped to the open could create a sea of gore, filled with tempestuous waves that would drown anyone who got caught in its depths.

He was now so much stronger than before that if he got in a fight with Immortal Paragon Night-Kṣetra, he would definitely have the upper hand.

He had dozens of Heaven-Devouring śarīras, and was ready for his Demolishing tribulation.

During the half year which passed, Yang Qi earned some meritorious service here and there, allowing him to be promoted within the Special Reconnaissance Division.

Meanwhile, Titan Duelbringer was also rising in the ranks of the Department of Internal Affairs. It helped that he had plenty of brahmanints to work with. Having coin always made it possible to achieve more, and considering that he was very familiar with how the system worked, he actually rose through the ranks much faster than Yang Qi.

Even more significantly, Titan Duelbringer was starting to form his own power structure, a society of sorts within the imperial clansmen in the city. He was also making connections with powerful and influential people, and overall, was enjoying life.

Of course, the society he was building made it easier for Yang Qi to get information about Proud Warpatience. As an apprentice of Proud Heaven, it was no wonder the man was so mysterious. He had defeated many opponents in the immortal world and won countless battles, eventually becoming the generalissimo of the armed forces. In fact, it was said that he had never lost a fight.

No one knew what energy arts he cultivated. They only knew that it didn’t matter what deadly moves were used against him, he would turn them on his opponent to strike mortal blows. There was something strange about it, as though he knew everything about every energy art in existence.

He was a pure legend who looked down upon all other fighters.

Wham!

On one particular day, Yang Qi finished with his ninety-first Heaven-Devouring śarīra. As he did, Yuan Kuohai rushed in and said, “Captain, big news just came in! The military is going to be participating in war games, pitting Proud Warpatience’s forces against Princess Jadefall's! It’s a test of the overall strength of the forces and an assessment of superiority.”

“Oh? What’s the situation? Tell me all the details.”

Considering how much time he had been in the immortal world, he was now much more familiar with how things worked.

“Apparently a big argument broke out in the imperial court between Proud Warpatience and Princess Jadefall, and neither of them are willing to back down. Proud Warpatience claims that he is more suited to lead troops into battle than Princess Jadefall, so the two agreed to a sort of contest. Princess Jadefall is taking the matter very seriously, and has demanded that we win. It’s going to happen in three days on the parade ground here in the imperial city. I’d say it’s a really good opportunity for us. If we can help secure a victory, we will be rewarded by Princess Jadefall, and might even get promoted. That would give us a lot more power in the military.”

Yuan Kuohai was obviously confident that Yang Qi was strong enough to help secure them the victory.

“You’re right, it does sound like a good opportunity. I’ve pretty much mastered the cultivation of this Heaven-Devouring True Energy. I could definitely dominate any opponent they sent into a fight. Let me ask you, though, what exactly were Princess Jadefall and Proud Warpatience arguing about?”

Obviously, both Proud Warpatience and Princess Jadefall were very important people, with vast armies under their command. Surely whatever they were arguing about was something very important. And such arguments could affect the entire dynasty. Yang Qi had already decided to strike a blow against Proud Warpatience, and eventually kill him. If the man was in conflict with Princess Jadefall, it was obviously a major opportunity.

“They were arguing over troop movements in the Hanging Heaven. They used to be our ally, but ever since Proud Heaven left they’ve been hostile. They’re deploying troops and spies everywhere, and the imperial court is getting tired of it. Princess Jadefall wants to lead the military in an invasion of the Hanging Heaven, and says that a victory would do a lot to cow the other immortal worlds who threaten us. But Proud Warpatience disagreed and said the matter isn't worth deploying troops over.”

Even as Yuan Kuohai explained things, Titan Duelbringer showed up.

“Milord,” he said, “Princess Jadefall and Proud Warpatience had an argument that’s culminated in war games. From what I can tell, it could be a big opportunity for us. There are some people in the Department of Internal Affairs who also serve in the court, so I have all the details.”

“Very good.” Yang Qi said, rising to his feet. “Let’s start preparing immediately. Other people might not be able to tell what type of energy arts this Proud Warpatience had, but as long as I can lay eyes on him, I’ll be able to find out.”

Chapter 576: Two Armies Face Off

They had three days until the war games, and Yang Qi was very excited.

Hopefully, he would get a look at Proud Warpatience and learn something about him. In turn, that might give him clues about Proud Heaven. Perhaps getting a glimpse of Proud Warpatience’s energy arts would give him an idea of how to deal with Proud Heaven.

“Captain,” Yuan Kuohai said, “the war games are in three days, so perhaps we should go to the business district to buy some immortal items, magical treasures, and medicinal pills. The Special Reconnaissance Division is always in need of new equipment and we never have enough funds to do it. Considering your resources, Captain, do you think you can help?”

Titan Duelbringer snorted coldly. “What good would immortal items, magical treasures, and medicinal pills do? My lord is plenty rich, and if he wants to increase his fighting prowess, he wouldn’t resort to things like that. He would go straight to god items. Unfortunately, you people are too weak to use god items. Why not go to the Mechfolk instead, and see if they have any mechas that we could use against Proud Warpatience’s forces?”

“What? Mechfolk mechas?” Yuan Kuohai was visibly taken aback. “But those things are incredibly expensive! Even a low-level mecha would be far beyond our budget.”

“Forget about the budget,” Yang Qi said. “Let’s go take a look. In this case, money isn’t an object.” Yang Qi had been thinking for a while about going to the Mechfolk emporium to learn more about their terrifying mechas. He had long since learned about how the ancient mechanical civilization used mechas to enable even the weakest of humans to kill immortals and challenge the legion of gods.

Although the Mechfolk didn’t have access to the most profound secrets of that ancient mechanical civilization, the information they did have was immensely powerful. And the mechas they created didn’t run on magic, but rather power stones.

In other words, as long as you were inside a mecha you wouldn't need to use any true energy at all to unleash incredibly destructive power.

Virtually any cultivator would love to have an item like that.

Besides, Yang Qi wanted to see what the Mechfolk were like in general. Perhaps he could acquire some of their legacy and make his own mechas.

If he could, then his lower world would yet again become more powerful.

Flicking his sleeve, Yang Qi left to find the Mechfolk emporium.

As soon as they arrived at the business plane, they saw soldiers hurrying back and forth everywhere. All of the shops were crowded, and money and magical treasures were being handed back and forth like mad.

Titan Duelbringer led the way. “Milord, the Mechfolk emporium is called the Lost Civilization Consortium. It’s right over there. As you can see, news has spread of the conflict between Princess Jadefall and Proud Warpatience and people have already come to start preparing for the war games. Everyone is here in the business district, hoping to find something that will give them an advantage.”

“Captain, look over there. See those fellows in sky blue armor and clothing, with the ancient characters for ‘war’ and ‘patience’ on them? Those are Proud Warpatience’s men. And see everyone in the yellowish armor, with the golden-green aura? Those are Princess Jadefall’s troops.”

Yuan Kuohai pointed out a few of the people he was referring to.

‘Too bad Proud Warpatience isn’t here,’ Yang Qi thought, scanning the crowd for powerful auras, but not finding any.

Before long, they were standing in front of an immense castle that didn't resemble anything from an immortal dao civilization, but rather some lost civilization of the past.

“Here we are,” Titan Duelbringer said. “The Lost Civilization Consortium. The Mechfolk set really high prices, so usually only rich and noble people come here. They sell mechas, weapons, and battleships, the type that very few people can afford. Not even the imperial court is rich enough to buy a true fleet of battleships. You know, some of those battleships have plasma cannons that can break through the greyspaces of immortal worlds!”

“Interesting. Come on, let’s go in.”

As soon as they were inside, Yang Qi finally saw the Mechfolk. They had very low cultivation bases, to the point where they didn’t emit magical fluctuations. They were physically small, with abnormally large heads, and just looking at them they seemed unusually intelligent. In fact, they actually pulsed with what seemed to be unusual psychic abilities.

“Mechfolk have cultivation bases so low they’re not even worth mentioning,” Yuan Kuohai explained. “Generally speaking, it would be hard to find one who was a Demolisher. And those who become immortal officers are viewed the same as we would view a sovereign of heaven. However, you absolutely, positively must not underestimate them. They possess precious treasures from the ancient mechanical civilization. Even just one or two such items can give them fighting prowess millions upon millions of times their actual level. All said, they’re one of the most terrifying races in all of the immortal worlds.”

Yang Qi nodded. “I'm getting that sense already.”

As soon as they entered, one of the Mechfolk hurried over. He was short, but very energetic, almost as if he couldn’t stand still.

“Greetings, honored customers! Allow me to introduce myself. I'm Mech Tremor of the Mechfolk. Welcome to the Lost Civilization Consortium. I’d be happy to show you around and help find whatever it is you need!”

“I'm interested in purchasing some mechas. Mind helping me out?” Yang Qi's eyes slid past Mech Tremor to look at all of the various objects that apparently came from the ancient mechanical civilization. None of them had the auras of magical treasures, but instead were machines that pulsed with raw power. They were things which could pierce through space, slash open the void, reverse space-time, and perform incredible teleportations.

And some of the weapons were obviously rare items with outrageously powerful energy functions.

“The mecha gallery is a place for nobility,” Mech Tremor said. “Everything is very expensive. After all, each mecha is handcrafted by one of our people’s grandmasters.”

“Money’s not a problem,” Titan Duelbringer said, producing a money purse, “as long as the price is reasonable. Here, take a small gratuity up front.”

Mech Tremor accepted the money purse with a smile. “Ah, so you are nobility. Big spenders. Please, come with me.”

With that, he led them deeper into the castle, to a unique plane of existence, formed from spatial manifestations that looked like crystal. Countless mechas hung suspended in the air within enclaves of crystal, with displays listing their various functions and abilities.

“Our mechas are divided into twelve specific classes. Starting at the bottom, we have zodiacal, starry, moonlit, and sonic. Next come terrestrial, celestial, earthly, and heavenly. And finally: primeval, archaic, universal, cosmic. The cosmic-class mechas are the top-of-the-line models, with universal and archaic below them. And so on down through all the other classes. The most basic models are the zodiacal-class, which, when fully powered, are equivalent to Demolishers. As for the cosmic-class mechas, they’re as strong as Godmyths. There are even some models that can rival the legion of gods. Unfortunately, we’re out of stock of cosmic-class.”

“I understand,” Yang Qi said. “What’s the highest-level model you have in stock?”

“Those would be the sonic-class mechas, the pride of our emporium here. We have three of them, which I suppose is fortuitous since there are three of you. We also have ten moonlit-class mechas, although, if you need more we could probably transfer some in from another location.”

“I see. And how strong are the sonic-class mechas?”

“When fully powered, the sonic-class mechas are equivalent to immortal marquises. The moonlit-class correlates to immortal generals, and the starry-class versions are the same as immortal officers. Incidentally, the sonic-class mechas have elemental cannons which are strong enough to at least injure immortal paragons.”

“Elemental cannons?” Yang Qi said. “Can I take a look?”

“Of course.” Mech Tremor led Yang Qi to one particular crystalline enclave filled with dazzling light and impenetrable mist. He waved his hand and the mists faded away, revealing a towering mecha covered with designs resembling primeval godlings. It had a protruding horn which was also covered with complex designs that harkened back to the mysterious mechanical civilization of the past. That ancient civilization had clearly been incredible; the mecha pulsed with destructive power that, if unleashed, would definitely be capable of destroying humanity.

“Such power!” Yuan Kuohai said. “This mecha is a real treasure. It’s far stronger than any of the immortal armor I've seen.”

“Well, that goes without saying,” Mech Tremor said. “By means of our eternal shrines, we Mechfolk have access to billions of ancient engineering skills. We use building materials in the form of all sorts of metals from various immortal worlds, and we imbue our power sources with all of the five phases. And we fill our mechas with genetic technology that allows them to repair and heal themselves automatically.”

Eyeing Yang Qi for a moment, Mech Tremor went on to say, “The sonic-class mechas go for fifty billion brahmanints. No haggling.”

“This thing is amazing,” Yang Qi said, breathing a sigh of admiration. Although the price was staggering, he could see why.

However, even as he was considering the matter, a voice suddenly reached them from outside.

“Fine. If the price is fifty billion, then fifty billion I’ll pay.”

A group of Mechfolk appeared, clustered around a handful of military officers.

Almost immediately the gazes of all the officers locked onto Yang Qi and his group.

The person who had spoken just now was a young man.

“Sixtieth Young Sir Proud, do you really want to buy that mecha?” one of the Mechfolk said. “Sir, as the sixtieth son of Proud Warpatience, I know that you have plenty of money, but this mecha—”

“I know. Fifty billion brahmanints. You're right, I can’t afford to pay that much. But I also happen to know that you Mechfolk love power stones. Take a look at these ones and tell me what they’re worth?”

He held out his hand, revealing a violet power stone. It was one of the immortal stones that Yang Qi had condensed from the magical laws of the Tusita Heaven.

Chapter 577: Sixtieth Young Sir Proud

‘Sixtieth Young Sir Proud? Son of Proud Warpatience?’

Yang Qi was stunned. Of course, he knew that Proud Warpatience had a big family in the Titan Emperor Heaven. He had hundreds of sons, all of whom had sons of their own. And including the grandchildren and further progeny, the population of his clan reached the hundreds of thousands. In that respect, they were similar to the Yang Clan in the mortal world.

It was a common thing among powerful people.

This particular Sixtieth Young Sir Proud had a profound cultivation base; at the very least, he was an immortal general. And he acted the part. Each step he took was accompanied by what sounded like muffled thunder, and he seemed surrounded by an aura of dragons and tigers.

Furthermore, he was bossy to his core.

As for the violet power stone he held, it made him seem even more impressive than normal.

“That’s a power stone from the Tusita Heaven, filled with magical laws!” one of the Mechfolk exclaimed. “There’s nothing we Mechfolk could value more! We would pay plenty of brahmanints for a stone like that. Sir, if you have an entire lot of them, we’ll give you a million brahmanints per piece!”

“Milord,” Titan Duelbringer said gravely, “your power stones have been changing hands over the course of the past several months. They caused quite a stir, and a lot of top experts have been trying to get their hands on them. Proud Warpatience’s army managed to acquire quite a few of them.”

“He's right, Captain,” Yuan Kuohai said. “Those power stones of yours are precious. I’ve heard of people offering five or six hundred thousand brahmanints a piece for them, only to find no takers. They’re virtually priceless. Do you have any more? If you reshaped them into currency, it would probably significantly devaluate brahmanints.”

“I don’t think that would be a good idea,” Yang Qi said. “Brahmanints are from the Brahman Society, and they’re quite ferocious, right? Not even we would come out on top if we provoked a conflict with a society that holds sway over thirty-six thousand immortal worlds. Tangling with them would be too dangerous. Although it's true that I have a virtually endless supply of those power stones, I don't want to start flaunting them publicly. Using them to buy a few things here or there is fine, but reshaping them into a new currency is off the table.”

“You’re absolutely right, Milord,” Titan Duelbringer said. “I've risen a bit in the ranks of the Department of Internal Affairs lately, and according to some of the confidential information I've gained access to, dynasties in immortal worlds are forbidden from minting their own currency. The penalty for violating that rule is death. The Brahman Society doesn’t care much about other things, but they’re very strict when it comes to currency.”

Of course, they kept their voices down as they said these things.

Meanwhile, Sixtieth Young Sir Proud said, “I don’t have many of these power stones, but I do have a lot of immortal items that I could offer in trade. And brahmanints, too. I intend to clean out all of your mechas today. That Princess Jadefall is a fool to pick a fight with my father. During the war games three days from now, his forces are going to crush hers. Then he’ll humiliate her personally, and eventually take control of her armies. In the end, she’s going to end up as his maidservant!”

It was only at this point that he looked over at Yang Qi, Titan Duelbringer, and Yuan Kuohai, and noticed that they were all wearing the uniforms of Princess Jadefall’s troops. Suddenly, his expression turned vicious. “So, you scum are lackeys of Princess Jadefall. How dare you stand in my presence! Fuck off!”

RUMBLE!

Without any warning, he thrust out his palm, wreathed in lightning. “Five-Lightnings Heavenly-Heart True Magic!”

Sheets of lightning surged out in sheets, creating a world of lightning that shot toward Yang Qi and his companions.

Bzzzzzzzz!

Before anything else could happen, spatial fluctuations rolled out from Mech Tremor, dismantling the Five-Lightnings Heavenly-Heart True Magic and completely negating its effects.

“Please, no fighting!” he said. “You’re all customers, and it's against the rules of our emporium to fight inside! If you do, you’ll brand yourselves as enemies of the Mechfolk!”

Yang Qi’s eyes widened with shock. The power that existed in the Mechfolk was completely different from true energy from the dao of immortals. Apparently, it was based on the power of physics instead.

“Are you looking to die?!” Sixtieth Young Sir Proud shouted. “How dare you interfere! Do you Mechfolk want to stop doing business in the imperial city!?”

“Sixtieth Young Sir Proud, please calm down,” another of the Mechfolk said, his voice cold. “No one from any immortal world would ever dare to offend us Mechfolk. Forget a low-level immortal plane like the Titan Emperor Heaven, even places of a much higher level than this treat us with the utmost respect. We're in the business of making money, and we prohibit customers from fighting in our emporiums. If you dare to violate our rules, you won’t be welcome here and we’ll expel you. Furthermore, your entire clan will be banned from doing business in any Mechfolk emporium.”

Sixtieth Young Sir Proud took a step back, looking somewhat intimidated. Then a moment passed, and he snorted coldly. Looking back at Yang Qi and his companions, his gaze settled onto Yuan Kuohai. “You’re Yuan Kuohai, aren’t you? General of the Special Reconnaissance Division? Well, you’re a nobody as far as I'm concerned. Three days from now, our Ninja Division will show you a thing or two.”

“Oh?” Yang Qi said with a smile. “And who the hell might you be? Do you really think you’re some big shot or something? Let me tell you something. The Titan Emperor Heaven belongs to the imperial house, the Titan Clan. You Proud Clan people are like pet dogs to us. And it’s a grave offense for a dog to bite its master. A very grave offense.”

Yang Qi was taking full advantage of his identity as a member of the imperial clan, and was cursing to his heart’s content. In fact, Sixtieth Young Sir Proud was so infuriated he nearly coughed up blood and could hardly hold back from starting a fight right then and there.

When he finally gained his composure, he said, “That’s a very sharp tongue you have. Well, I’ll make sure you regret those words, scum. How dare you insult me! In three days' time, I’ll make sure you die a horrific death. Listen up, Mechfolk. I'm buying all of your mecha. Get them boxed up immediately.”

“Slow down,” Yang Qi said. “I want these mecha, and I have the power stones to pay for them.” He waved his hand, producing a single power stone, pulsing with violet energy. “How much will you give me? A million brahmanints per stone? I can give you a very large lot. You’re asking fifty billion for the sonic-class mecha, right? Let’s see. One stone is a million. A hundred stones would be a hundred million. Fifty thousand stones would be fifty billion. And I want all three sonic-class mechas. What do you say—how about two hundred thousand power stones?”

In response to Yang Qi’s words, all of the Mechfolk began clamoring at the same time.

“Really?”

“Are you serious?”

“If you really have that many power stones from the Tusita Heaven, then not only will we give you a big discount but we’ll consider you a top customer of the Mechfolk. No matter which Mechfolk emporium you visit in the future, you’ll have access to the best merchandise. And if you're ever in trouble for any reason, you can seek refuge with us.”

“Two hundred thousand power stones? My god! Am I hearing things? Do you really have that many? The Tusita Heaven is so high up it’s incomprehensible! The ancient mechanical civilization operated completely on power stones. And the better quality the power stones, the stronger the mechas are. We actually have mechas that won’t work because we don't have the proper power stones. But if you can provide us with Tusita Heaven power, we could activate our cosmic-class mechas!”

“Excellent! Now this is doing business. Assuming you’re not trying to pull a fast one.”

Obviously, some of them didn’t even believe he was telling the truth.

“This is a business deal of immense proportions,” Yang Qi said. “If we can work out all the details, I might be interested in buying some of your battleships as well. What do you think? I’ll pay for them with power stones too.” Looking at Sixtieth Young Sir Proud out of the corner of his eye, he smiled faintly and said, “This probably isn’t the best place to talk about the details. Do you have somewhere more private to finish the negotiations? I really don’t like being stared at.”

“Of course, of course. Please, right this way.” Mech Tremor waved his arm, causing a wormhole to spring up in front of them. Of course, it had been created not by Mech Tremor’s personal power, but by the machinery he had on his person.

As soon as it opened up, Yang Qi and his companions followed the Mechfolk inside.

Meanwhile, a few of the lower-ranking Mechfolk remained behind with Sixtieth Young Sir Proud.

“Young Sir,” one of them said, “I'm afraid there’s nothing we can do about the situation. Someone else already reserved these mechas. If you really want to, you can place an order and wait a few months for new models to arrive.”

“Screw you!” Young Sir Proud shouted angrily. “Screw all of you! Come on, men, let’s get out of here. I'm not going to forget this, Mechfolk. I'll be watching you. And I'm going to find out who exactly that imperial clansman was. He’s going to die, too. The Proud Clan is the real imperial house as far as this immortal world is concerned. If it weren’t for our patriarch Proud Heaven, this place wouldn’t even exist!”

“We’ll run investigations immediately, Sixtieth Young Sir,” one of his fellows said. “However, I think the most pressing question is where that imperial clansman got so many power stones. We need to find out immediately. Perhaps we should pass this information up the chain of command. So far, we know that the power stones have come from the Department of Internal Affairs and the Heaven’s Net Consortium. But where did they get them? Who is the ultimate source?”

“You’re right,” Sixtieth Young Sir Proud said. “That imperial clansman is a nobody. There’s definitely a much bigger fish backing him. If we could find out who, maybe we could hook ourselves an actual dragon. It seems to me we might have a treasure hoard on our hands. Maybe even a godrelic filled with power stones. Only the ancient legion of gods could possibly gather the power of the Tusita Heaven like that.”

Thus, Sixtieth Young Sir Proud left the Mechfolk emporium.

Chapter 578: Lost Civilization

‘I’m not going to just allow this Sixtieth Young Sir Proud to go on his merry way. I’ll leave a psychic branding mark on him, which might even get me some clues about Proud Warpatience.’

Sixtieth Young Sir Proud had no idea, but right before Yang Qi stepped into the wormhole, a tiny, undetectable stream of light had flown out and landed on him, a psychic branding mark that would keep the two of them connected. It was something Yang Qi had gained from King Heaven-Devourer’s will, an energy art that could dominate everything, as immense as a god dragon and as tiny as an earthworm.

One of the reasons Yang Qi had decided to flaunt his wealth was in the hopes that it would attract the attention of Proud Warpatience. If he could beat the grass to startle the snake, perhaps that could lead to drawing the snake out of its hole. Then maybe he would finally get an idea of what this apprentice of Proud Heaven’s was like. Was he really as superhuman as everyone claimed?

Regardless, Yang Qi was convinced that he must have at least some idea of where Proud Heaven was. Unless he really was incomprehensibly powerful, Yang Qi would simply face his tribulation, become a Demolisher, then capture the man. Then he would take him out of the Titan Emperor Heaven and find an appropriate place to interrogate him about Proud Heaven.

‘I wonder if I can make it all happen,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘There are obviously ups and downs. Normally speaking, I wouldn’t have flaunted my wealth. If word got out that I have that much money, it could cause problems. But without doing that, how could I get Proud Warpatience out into the open where I can assess his energy arts and cultivation base?’

As he followed the Mechfolk, he was simultaneously keeping an eye on Sixtieth Young Sir Proud via the psychic branding mark.

Eventually, they reached their destination, a fold of space in which negotiations could be finalized.

“Do you really have that many power stones?” one of the Mechfolk asked. “If not, you’re asking for trouble. We Mechfolk don’t take kindly to being scammed.”

Smiling, Yang Qi said, “Don’t worry. As an imperial clansman, I would never try to scam you.” He knew that the Mechfolk had offended Sixtieth Young Sir Proud over this, and if it turned out he didn’t have the power stones they would be furious. He would feel the same if something like that happened to him. The Mechfolk were primarily businessmen who prided themselves on maintaining a reputation of treating all customers fairly.

Even as the Mechfolk looked at him suspiciously, Yang Qi extended his hand and masses of power stones began tumbling out of the sleeve of the God Legion Battle Robe, rapidly piling up into a tiny mountain. There were hundreds of thousands of them, each of them the size of a walnut and bursting with the power of a high-level immortal world.

One of the Mechfolk rushed forward and grabbed one of the stones, flipped it over in his hand, and sent some true energy into it. As a result, the stone immediately projected an image of a violet-colored immortal world, which was none other than the Tusita Heaven.

“They really are Tusita Heaven power stones! Look at the magical laws!”

“Incredible. Amazing! Now those are power stones. They’re far superior to what we've used in the past. They’re fairly bursting with energy!”

“Wonderful. These power stones are marvelous. With them, our machinery will be without peer.”

“This level of power is exactly what our eternal shrines are missing!”

“Report this to our superiors. We’re going to get a big bonus for this!”

Yang Qi nodded in satisfaction. After getting the six hundred and sixty-six imperial snakecharms, his ability to extract power and magical laws from the Tusita Heaven had grown even more formidable. As a result, the power stones he could produce were even stronger than before.

“Please note, friends,” he said, “these power stones are superior to any similar ones you might have acquired recently. As such, I think they’re worth more.”

The Mechfolk reported the matter to their superiors, took the time to properly assess the stones, and, eventually, offered a fair price.

“We’ll give you five million per stone.”

“Perfect,” Yang Qi said. “You Mechfolk really are honest businessmen.” He was very impressed. The Mechfolk were definitely not like the slippery and slimy Heaven’s Net Consortium, who had tried to rip him off and paid a heavy price for it.

Yang Qi was the type of person who preferred to cut the weeds and eliminate the roots. When the time was right, he would go back and wipe out the Heaven’s Net Consortium, and not show an ounce of mercy. Leaving a group like them in existence was just allowing them to take advantage of who knew how many people.

Yang Qi acquired three sonic-class mechas, as well as several moonlit-class and starry-class. He also gained status as a preferred customer of the Mechfolk. In addition, he signed a contract order for a battleship, which he would return for sometime in the future.

Of course, Yang Qi didn’t need the mechas for himself; he would bestow them on his subordinates in the Special Reconnaissance Division, which would earn him a bit more loyalty and make them far more domineering than before.

In the beginning, he had forced the Special Reconnaissance Division to work for him by means of the devil seeds, and many of them resented him for that. But in the half a year that had passed, he had bestowed many rewards and benefits and shifted some hearts. Bestowing mechas on his subordinates would only further reinforce the growing attitude that working for him came with a lot of benefits.

**

Sixtieth Young Sir Proud was fuming with rage. ‘Dammit, who exactly was that imperial clansman? And how did he get so rich? I definitely have to look into this and report the matter to father.’

After leaving the business plane, he headed to a special teleportation portal area within the imperial city.

RUUUUUUMBLE!

Stepping into the wormhole, he vanished. When he reappeared, he was in a unique plane of existence high in the sky, nestled amongst the dense winds and empyrean lightning.

It was so high in the sky of the immortal world that measuring the distance would require light-years. The sky of the immortal world had many layers. There was the empyrean wind layer, the profound ice layer, the raging flame layer, the heavenly distribution layer, the star field layer, the rising constellation layer, and more. The sky also had planets, and rivers of stars that were far more numerous than in the mortal world.

Beyond all of that was the greyspace.

Within one of the scintillating rivers of stars hung a palace, heavily guarded by armed troops and filled with beautiful immortals from parts unknown.

No one blocked Sixtieth Young Sir Proud’s path as he entered; obviously everyone knew who he was. However, eventually he reached a point deep within the palace where the guards stopped him.

“Young Sir Proud, if you want to see Generalissimo Warpatience, we’ll have to go in and submit a request first.”

“Do it,” Sixtieth Young Sir Proud said. “I've discovered the source of those power stones and need to talk to father about it. You’d better not cause any delays, understand?”

“Yes, yes of course!” the guards said, and a handful of them hurried inside.

**

Back in the Special Reconnaissance Division, deathless godliness surged as Yang Qi used an energy art to reconstruct the god item that was the Chiliocosm Mirror.

Within the mirror, it was possible to see an image of Sixtieth Young Sir Proud as he waited to see his father, Proud Warpatience. A moment later, the guards returned to lead Sixtieth Young Sir Proud inside.

As they proceeded through corridor after corridor, Yang Qi saw many things. He saw immortal items being forged, and he saw mechanical treasures and weapons. In fact, the entire palace itself was a combination of mechanical objects and precious treasures from the dao of immortals. He could even sense deathless godliness.

It made sense. Proud Warpatience was the generalissimo of the armed forces, so it would be quite ironic if he didn’t have god items and other such things.

Unexpectedly, many of the guards were equipped with mechas.

At a certain point, the guards and Sixtieth Young Sir Proud reached a twisted and distorted area of space-time that caused interference for the Chiliocosm Mirror, making the image blurry. In response, Yang Qi sent out Heaven-Devouring True Energy and immediately removed the interference.

The path took too many twists and turns to count, until eventually, Sixtieth Young Sir Proud reached a spacious audience hall. There was no roof; directly above was a dome of primal-chaos. In the middle of the hall was an altar and throne, both empty.

Sixtieth Young Sir Proud rushed in, knelt before the throne, and said, “Greetings, revered Father. I hope that in the war games in three days, you remove all face from Princess Jadefall and crush her forces beneath your heel.”

RUMBLE!

An immense force descended from the primal-chaos above and caused everything to tremble violently, even cracking the Chiliocosm Mirror.

‘Such incredible power,’ Yang Qi thought, shaken. At the same time, he sent some true energy into the mirror to repair it.

Before long, a figure became visible on the throne. He looked like an emperor, aloof and dismissive. “Dispense with the jibber-jabber and tell me about the power stones.”

Chapter 579: Immense Power

“Yes, dear Father,” Sixtieth Young Sir Proud said. “An imperial clansman named Titan Dragonguard somehow got his hands on a whole bunch of power stones. My guess is that he found an ancient godrelic. He cleared out all of the mechas at the Mechfolk emporium! Thanks to him I couldn’t buy a single one!”

With that, he went on to describe all the events at the emporium.

“Although you didn’t end up buying the mechas, you successfully drew the snake out of its hole. Well done, my son. I’ll reward you handsomely for this.”

“Many thanks, Father,” Sixtieth Young Sir Proud replied excitedly. “What am I supposed to do next? Should I investigate further? Find out more about this Titan Dragonguard? Figure out where his stash of treasure is?”

“Exactly. Continue with your investigation.” The projection of the mighty generalissimo of the armed forces, Proud Warpatience, sat there thoughtfully for a moment. “How about this. I’ll give you my Ninja Command Medallion. Pick a few of the top ninjas to add to your manpower. Get to the bottom of this situation. If you do, I’ll impart a boundless energy art to you that will easily get you to the level of an immortal marquis.”

A golden command medallion flew out, which Sixtieth Young Sir Proud grabbed, already itching to take command of some of his father’s top experts. The infighting in the Proud Clan was intense. After all, Proud Warpatience had hundreds of sons, and all of them were elite cultivators. As the sixtieth of the sons, if Sixtieth Young Sir Proud could perform some meritorious services and be rewarded by his father, he would stick out from the crowd and improve his standing in the clan.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi was watching all of this through the Chiliocosm Mirror. Unfortunately, although he now had a better idea of what his enemies were doing, he still hadn’t secured the most relevant bit of information he needed: the exact level of Proud Warpatience’s cultivation base.

WHIZZZ!

He sent some more true energy into the mirror, clearing up the image and looking more closely at Proud Warpatience.

The man’s face was bright red, like burning sulfur, which Yang Qi took as an indication that he cultivated some profoundly mysterious godly-class energy art. His eyebrows were like swords, his eyes were like those of dragons, and he was surrounded by a kingdom filled with empyrean-baleful energies.

As generalissimo of the armed forces, Proud Warpatience had immense power and influence. The mere wave of his hand could cause countless lives to be ended. He was a true king, a monarch who controlled a powerful network of laws.

Yang Qi could sense that the primal-chaos dome of heaven above contained a brewing deathless godliness that flowed constantly into this projection of Proud Warpatience. Unfortunately, Yang Qi just couldn’t identify his exact cultivation level. That said, he was certain the man was no weaker than Princess Jadefall. That meant that he was an eighth stage Demolisher at the very least, and possibly in the ninth stage.

It was a level that Yang Qi simply couldn’t fight against.

‘What energy arts does he cultivate? Why does his face look as red as fire? Is it a fire-type godly-class energy art? It makes it seem like he has the legacy of an ancient fire god. Except, he doesn’t actually have an aura of flame.’

Even as Yang Qi analyzed the situation, Proud Warpatience somehow sensed that something strange was happening.

“Hmm?” Narrowing his eyes, he looked deep into space-time and could apparently see the Chiliocosm Mirror! All of a sudden, he shouted, “Villain! How dare you spy on me! Who are you?”

Wham!

The Chiliocosm Mirror shattered as a hand stretched out, burning with intense fire.

“Primal-chaos elder-snake. Heaven-Devouring Will!” Yang Qi had been prepared for something like this and instantly transformed into a huge snake with a gaping maw, which lunged forward and devoured the incoming hand. At the same time, the Heaven and Earth Furnace appeared to provide support.

“Treacherous villain!” Proud Warpatience shouted, leaping to his feet and casting his senses about in the audience hall. Eventually, his attention was drawn to Sixtieth Young Sir Proud. Reaching down, he grabbed him and lifted him into the air.

“Father, what are you doing?! I didn’t do something to offend you, did I?”

“You piece of trash! I just gave you a reward and you repay me by being a tool for outsiders to spy on me? Someone hit you with a psychic branding mark in the hopes of finding out about my cultivation base. You had no idea, did you?”

Suddenly, a stream of fire appeared that transformed into a ghost-god, which shot into Sixtieth Young Sir Proud. A moment later, it reappeared holding a tiny mote of light, which Proud Warpatience grabbed and destroyed.

“He’s a clever little bastard, isn’t he? My attack didn’t even touch him. Seems his cultivation base is nothing to look down on.” Proud Warpatience lowered his son to the ground. “That's the strength of a sixth stage immortal paragon, and he has god items at his disposal. You’re obviously no match for someone like that, so I forgive you for your mistake.”

“What? He’s a sixth stage Abstrusity-Demolisher? An immortal paragon? How is that even possible? If an imperial clansman reached that level, he would definitely have a very high position. He would probably be appointed as a prince. But this guy is an ordinary soldier in the army!”

“I didn’t say that he's in the sixth stage. I said that he’s as strong as the sixth stage. His actual cultivation level isn’t very high. In fact, he might not even be a Demolisher. And yet, that only proves how terrifying he is. The war games will be the perfect opportunity to keep an eye on him. I wonder what level of cultivation base he has and what other secrets he's keeping. Seems to me he’s probably not just an ordinary imperial clansman.”

“Father, considering your own cultivation base, there’s no way he can do anything to you, right? As long as he’s here in this immortal world, you could capture him any time you wanted and force his secrets out.”

“I’ll have you know that I'm currently cultivating an energy art imparted to me by your Grandmaster Proud Heaven. It’s the Cardinal Grand Brahma Punishes the Fire God Energy Art. I'm currently ensconcing my nascent divinity in the primal-chaos paleo-energy above, and thus I can’t descend in my true form. This is only a clone. If I succeed in my effort, I can break free from the Demolishing level and become a Godmyth. At that point, I can take over the Titan Emperor Heaven, destroy the imperial clan’s core teachings and doctrines, and put an end to the dynasty for all time. That is the secret mission given to me by your Grandmaster.”

At this point, Proud Warpatience waved his hand dismissively. “Go now.”

“Grandmaster is nothing short of a god!” Sixtieth Young Sir Proud said. “Very well, Father, I’ll take my leave now.”

“Yes he is a god. Before long, he’ll reach the Deathless Throne. And once he’s on the same level of the ancient legion of gods, he’ll form a god legion kingdom. At that point, we who exercise faith in him can rise to heaven and transcend all tribulations. Hmph! This Titan Emperor Heaven is called an immortal world, but the people here are all frogs in a well. They’re the lowest of all immortal worlds in the Thirty-Six Thousand Immortal Worlds Coalition. And even the Brahman Society, which thinks of itself as so powerful, is nothing but a toy in the hands of your Grandmaster.”

Suddenly, Proud Warpatience’s body erupted into flames and a vicious smile appeared on his face. “The only reason the emperor of the Titan Emperor Heaven is still alive is because Master divined that a Reincarnated One would rise up from the imperial clan soon. And Master needs to devour someone of that physique type to reach the Deathless Throne. In fact, he needs many physique types. Future One, Past One, Fateless One, Eternal One, Heaven Moving One. But considering that the Reincarnated One is supposed to be appearing now, I’d say it's highly likely that it’s none other than Princess Jadefall. Once Master devours her, he’ll finally reach the Deathless Throne. We don’t have much longer to wait….”

With that, he vanished.

Back in the Special Reconnaissance Division, Yang Qi summoned his Heaven and Earth Furnace, within the flames of which could be seen a hand formed of vital energy.

Of course, it was the hand Proud Warpatience had attacked him with, the manifestation of a godly-class energy art.

‘Proud Warpatience is no ordinary person. Obviously, his cultivation base is on par with the ruler of the Titan Emperor Heaven. He must be at the very limit of the Demolishing level, just on the verge of becoming a Godmyth. Thankfully, I used the power of King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans to devour some of his godly-class energy art. With the God Legion Seal, I can unravel some of the secrets of that art and perhaps come up with a strategy of how to handle him.’

Sitting down cross-legged, he drew on the power of the God Legion Seal to try to suppress the godliness and godly laws within the true energy hand.

Before long, the godly laws were streaming out of it, forming rippling characters in the air that gave Yang Qi just what he was looking for.

‘What an incredible energy art. It's called the Cardinal Grand Brahma Punishes the Fire God Energy Art. And it seems there are four other arts associated with it, one for earth, wood, water, and metal. By combining them, it can release an ancient god, Cardinal Grand Brahma. He’s obviously a very important god for the God Legion Seal to have such detailed information.

“If Proud Warpatience’s cultivation base is this incredible, then how incredible is Proud Heaven’s? And why would he possibly become a sworn brother of the sovereign of heaven here in the Titan Emperor Heaven? He could crush the sovereign of heaven with a single move. Maybe he has other goals here. Wait a second. He sent a clone down to the lower world to marry mother, most likely because his divinations had revealed to him that a Fateless One was about to appear in the world. Could it be that he’s divined information about some other important person from the Titan Emperor Heaven?”

Yang Qi sank into thoughtfulness.

Meanwhile, in a location on the border of the Titan Emperor Heaven, the ground sank down as a wormhole opened and two individuals stepped out.

One had yellow garb and a buzz cut.

Chapter 580: Two Tigers Fight

“So, this is the Titan Emperor Heaven?” said Chancellor Demi-Immortal. “Considering we've secretly made our entrance, will anyone notice us? Or will the lord of this immortal world be notified? If we're found out, it could cause some big problems. After all, your Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart would be a very tempting item to anyone who noticed it.”

The yellow-garbed young man with the buzz cut and Chancellor Demi-Immortal had somehow managed to create a wormhole that went right through the greyspace of the Titan Emperor Heaven.

As for Chancellor Demi-Immortal, he was already feeling like a person from the countryside who had entered a big city for the first time.

Dropping to the ground, he peered at a tuft of immortal grass and exclaimed, “Whoa! That’s crimson pearl barley! Can you imagine if you made immortal pills from something like that?”

Reaching down, he plucked the grass up, which was when he noticed the dirt clinging to its roots. “This is immortal soil! It has immortal energy built into it! You could make incredible magical treasures with this stuff. Or it could be the basis of entire mountains or even planets in the mortal world.”

“Congratulations,” the young man in yellow said dryly. “That's just ordinary grass here in the immortal world, and literally everything here is full of immortal energy. Look, can you stop acting like such a rube? Are you going to go around collecting dirt and trash like it’s treasure or something? You’re right, grass and soil from an immortal world would be the stuff of legend in the mortal world. Great Sages and even Demi-Immortals would treasure it. But do you really think that stuff is going to help you here? You're a Demolisher already, with an immortal body. And with the boundless godly-class energy art you got in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, the Heaven-Dao-Reversing God-Forming Grand True Energy, you remoulded your physique into the fabled Hundred Worlds Magical Body. If you can upgrade it to the Thousand Worlds Magical Body, or perhaps even the Ten Thousand Worlds Magical Body, you’ll be in an even better position to beat Yang Qi. You think some flowers and dirt are going to help you do that?”

“I'm going to slaughter Yang Qi one day!” Chancellor Demi-Immortal said, his eyes shining with more hatred than ever. “Unfortunately, he has access to the faith of over three thousand planetary systems. And the mystical network of laws of the Sage Monarch planetary system has turned it into a holy land of true cultivation. Not even the Misty Kingdom can stand up to him. That Eldest Brother from the Invincible Society completely squashed them. Considering the training his forces undergo, countless invincible experts are rising up. If things keep going on like this, he’ll have a never-ending supply of fighters. Our hopes of getting revenge just keep getting weaker and weaker.”

“And that’s why we've come here to the immortal world. Based on our calculations, I'm convinced that Yang Qi left his clone in the mortal world to collect faith, while his true self ascended here to plot and scheme away. Our only option to deal with him was to ascend. He has a God Legion Seal, but thankfully it's not complete. If it were, not even the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart would be enough to beat him. That said, he’s a Fateless One and I'm a Future One. Both of us are essentially prodigies. There’s no saying that I couldn’t eventually be a match for him. All I need is to acquire a certain thing from the Titan Emperor Heaven and I’ll definitely be able to crush him.”

The young man chuckled coldly.

“A certain thing?” Chancellor Demi-Immortal said. “What, some sort of god item?”

“No,” the young man replied nonchalantly. “Not even a god item from here would help. Don’t forget that the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart is a god item. Not even the bit of power it can release would be enough to take down Yang Qi. No, I'm talking about a person.”

“A person?” Chancellor Demi-Immortal frowned.

“Exactly. A person. A very unique individual that one of the spell formations in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart helped me identify. You see, this person is a Reincarnated One. Reincarnated Ones are unique entities similar to Past Ones, Future Ones, Fateless Ones, and Heaven Moving Ones. Even more interesting, this Reincarnated One is a woman. If I can capture her and absorb her yin vitality, or even devour her completely to acquire her genes, I would definitely become invincible. If I could become a combined Future One and Reincarnated One, I would definitely have what it takes to deal with Yang Qi. And when I defeat him and consume his genes, I’ll add Fateless One to my identity. At that point, I would be the most powerful person in all heaven and earth!”

“In that case, I’ll offer you early congratulations,” Chancellor Demi-Immortal said.

“Don’t feel in a rush or anything,” the young man said. “Remember, in the future, you acquire the legacy of an entire immortal world. Just wait until I get this Reincarnated One. After I do, I’ll take you to get that legacy, whereupon you’ll advance to the highest heavens!”

Although Chancellor Demi-Immortal simply nodded in agreement, inside, he was full of plots and schemes. ‘I bet you want to get the legacy of that immortal world too, don’t you? Otherwise, why would you be so willing to deal with a complete stranger like me? You just want my help to achieve your own ends. Although… I'm no slouch either. You’re a Future One and she’s a Reincarnated One? I’ll devour you both! With your genes, I’ll be stronger than ever and I can get my revenge on Yang Qi. After adding Fateless One to my identity, I’ll have the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart and the God Legion Seal for my own. Then I’ll finally be able to resurrect my daughter and rule the universe! After that will be the Deathless Throne, whereupon I can become a member of the ancient legion of gods!’

Obviously, Chancellor Demi-Immortal had grand ambitions of his own.

Back when he had led the Demi-Immortal Institute, he was a famous person who achieved his goals by means of all sorts of crafty plots and machinations. He had hoped to manipulate both the Crown Prince and Yang Qi to get what he wanted, but in the end he only got his daughter killed. But now, here he was again, up to his same old tricks.

The young man in yellow glanced at Chancellor Demi-Immortal and smiled faintly, but didn’t say anything further.

Thus, the two of them vanished into the Titan Emperor Heaven. Considering how vast the immortal world was, they were little more than tiny grains of sand in the universe, and didn’t attract any notice whatsoever.

**

‘Future Ones. Reincarnated Ones….’ Yang Qi was currently grappling with the situation at hand, and wondering why powerful people like Proud Heaven seemed to be so interested in a low-level immortal world like the Titan Emperor Heaven. The fact that Proud Heaven had gone to the length of becoming sworn brothers with the lowly ruler of this place went to show a lot. And from what Yang Qi could tell, it seemed highly likely that it was about people like himself with unique physiques. It also seemed highly likely that Princess Jadefall was just such a person.

The more he thought about it, the more likely it seemed. Regardless, he knew that he had to kill Proud Warpatience, which would both foil Proud Heaven's plans and benefit himself.

Yang Qi knew that both the kid in yellow and Proud Heaven were Future Ones. He himself was a Fateless One. As for Past Ones, obviously, they were people who traveled to the present from the past, although he hadn’t run into any yet.

As for Reincarnated Ones and Heaven Moving Ones, he had no idea what they were capable of, but was of course interested in finding out.

As the days passed, he contemplated the energy art he had stolen from Proud Warpatience, the Cardinal Grand Brahma Punishes the Fire God Energy Art. The cultivation technique was incredible, and as he worked with it, he found that it caused the God Legion Seal to tremble with anticipation and fuse more deeply with his nascent divinity.

One day, he would make the God Legion Seal completely part of him. The seal would be his heart, and his heart would be the seal. When that happened, he knew that he would truly become invincible.

‘You have a powerful energy art, Proud Warpatience. But once I have enough Heaven-Devouring śarīras, I’ll rise to the Demolishing level, and then it will be time to tangle with you. The higher I rise, the sooner you’ll meet your end.’

At a certain point, bugle cries rang out, the signal that the war games were about to begin.

Yuan Kuohai rushed in. “Captain, everyone is gathering on the parade ground. We need to go. The day has finally come for the clash between the forces of Princess Jadefall and Proud Warpatience. This is going to be a big competition. A major showdown. By the way, those mechas we acquired have really boosted morale. I'm certain that we’ll achieve victory today.”

“Good. Alright, let’s get going. I'm curious to see how this conflict plays out.” Yang Qi was completely confident and not afraid of anything. He could provoke his Demolishing tribulation at any time he wanted. However, after all of the work he had put into developing his second identity, he didn’t want to just throw it all away for no reason. For now, it wasn’t worth it to do anything risky.

It took almost no time at all for the Special Reconnaissance Division to muster all of its troops and organize into ranks. Then Yuan Kuohai led them toward the main parade ground in the imperial city.

There were other troops moving in the same direction. Princess Jadefall had as many soldiers working for her as the sky had clouds, and from what Yang Qi could sense that included sixth stage Abstrusity-Demolishers, all of them important people.

Before long, they were at the main parade ground.

It was huge, stretching on seemingly without end, and built from some sort of immortal metal that was incredibly tough and could absorb the force of just about any attack without being damaged. It was actually the largest square in the entire Titan Emperor Heaven, and it could hold huge amounts of troops.

At a certain point, Yang Qi noticed armies approaching from the east. They were Princess Jadefall’s main army, and they were so disciplined that they didn’t need anyone to lead them.

They were all crack experts with mighty skills and abilities, people who could shake universes.

Next, bugle cries rang out from the west as swarms of troops emerged from wormholes and teleportation portals. It was an army that thrummed with viciousness and ferocity, yet it was slightly less organized than Princess Jadefall’s.

‘So,’ Yang Qi thought, ‘these are the troops of the generalissimo of the armed forces, Proud Warpatience. They’re not very disciplined, are they? Seems the generalissimo might have a thing or two to learn from Princess Jadefall.’

Chapter 581: Reincarnated One

Proud Warpatience’s forces rolled out from the west in seemingly endless waves. Despite their general disorder, they were still grouped into various divisions. And even the weakest members still had immortal bodies, unlike the cannon fodder from the fiendslave battalions.

In the end, Princess Jadefall’s troops were the picture of military might and order, while Proud Warpatience’s army was intimidating and fierce. Although the two armies had not made contact with each other, their killing auras had already clashed, creating a tempest within the middle of the vast open area.

This was definitely going to be a huge battle in which plenty of veins of steel were on display.

Thump-thump. Thump-thump! Thump-thump!!

Drums boomed and flags were unfurled. Everyone could feel their blood pumping, and the entire parade ground was like a cask of gunpowder just waiting for a spark to hit it.

RUMBLE!

Suddenly, a figure appeared, pulsing with a color of combined gold and jade. Multiple halos surrounded her, and her aura seemed eternal and ancient, almost deathless. She stood in a chariot pulled by four primeval godlings, who were attended by a host of expert cultivators.

It was Princess Jadefall.

‘Those godlings, they’re gobblewocks!’

It painted a very different picture from the last time Yang Qi had seen her in her mansion, back when he had been so worried about her seeing through to the truth of his power. And that was before he had acquired an additional six hundred and sixty-six imperial snakecharms or worked on his cultivation for half a year. Considering his current state, he could actually spy on Princess Jadefall now if he wanted, and in fact that was exactly what he planned to do.

‘Lord’s Eye. Furtive Scrutiny!’

He opened his third eye, and immediately saw the power flowing through Princess Jadefall. It was explosive, destructive, and overwhelming, almost as if a minor universe were forming inside her.

Furthermore, there was something ancient about that universe, something that was almost like godliness, and yet was not. It was something in her blood that seemed to reach out to Yang Qi and even formed a resonance with him.

‘Incredible,’ he thought. ‘So this is what a Reincarnated One is like?’ He was now convinced that she was indeed one of the fabled Reincarnated Ones. Unfortunately, although he could sense that there was something unique about her physique, unless he saw her in action he wouldn’t be able to identify exactly what it was. That said, he was sure that if he, a Fateless One, practiced cultivation with Princess Jadefall, that they would complement each other perfectly and it would lead to immense benefits.

Long ago, before he heard of Fateless Ones, he had never gotten the sense that there was anything special about himself. But after acquiring so many imperial snakecharms, and also gaining enlightenment of godliness, he came to an understanding of fate, and what it meant to be fateless.

As Princess Jadefall’s chariot slowly descended from above, the four gobblewocks leading it constantly devoured the true energy around them, causing black holes to spring up here and there. Virtually everyone had heard of the ancient gobblewocks—they were godlings that consumed anything they encountered.

“Well, what are you waiting for?” Princess Jadefall said, her voice causing everything to tremble.

Her words were met with raucous laughter. The sky went dark and stars appeared above as a figure descended, wreathed in flame and looking like a god of fire. Yang Qi instantly recognized him as Generalissimo Proud Warpatience.

“I'm curious to see what you're capable of, Princess Jadefall,” he said, his voice cold. “Do you really have what it takes to deal with my army? Over and over again in the imperial court, you lock horns with me. On this parade ground, you will lose all face. All branches of the military here today will witness your disgrace.”

“Oh really?”

From the dialogue already, it was obvious that Princess Jadefall and Proud Warpatience were diametrically opposed to each other, even wishing they could kill one another.

Obviously, this was a conflict that had been brewing for a long time in the imperial court.

“Proud Warpatience, as generalissimo of the armed forces, you command all armies. Yet instead of trying to solve the problems the dynasty faces, you block my effort to invade the Hanging Heaven. And you even threaten me. What are you thinking? Could it be that you’re planning a rebellion?”

Chuckling coldly, Proud Warpatience looked contemptuously at Princess Jadefall and said, “I couldn’t think of a more foolish idea than invading the Hanging Heaven. It would be pure suicide! A complete waste of troops. Look, you bitchy cunt, I'm not interested in wasting words on someone as stupid as you. You’ll find out soon enough that your troops can't stand up to a single charge of my army.”

“Fine. Let the war games begin. For the sake of the emperor, I won’t fight you personally, although the day will come when I cut you down.”

“Enough bullshit!” Proud Warpatience growled. “Sooner or later, I'm going to crush you and force you to acknowledge allegiance to me. Then I’ll make you my maidservant. Ninja Division! Go cut the Special Reconnaissance Division down to size!”

“Yes sir!”

Swish! Whoosh!

A host of black-clad figures sped out from within the army, only their eyes visible as they took places on the battlefield.

They were elite experts from Proud Warpatience’s Ninja Division, masters of covert intelligence and assassination operations. Generally speaking, they occupied a very high position within the army.

“Princess Jadefall, your Special Reconnaissance Division and my Ninja Division specialize in the same thing. Why not let them fight it out a bit and see which army is superior?” As he spoke, he looked over at Yang Qi with eyes that seemed capable of piercing into him.

Yang Qi felt like he was suddenly being overwhelmed with fire, and that his true energy might explode at any moment. He quickly drew on an energy art to stifle the effects.

‘Proud Warpatience already knows about my mechas, and is still challenging me. Well, little do you know that this is all going according to plan. Without you to call me out, how could I make a big scene and rise to the top?’

Yang Qi chuckled coldly in his heart.

Looking over at Princess Jadefall, he said, “Princess, I am Titan Dragonguard from the imperial house. I’ve heard of the insulting and vicious behavior of this Proud Warpatience. Despite how generously the emperor has treated him, he acts with treachery, and even seeks to extort the imperial clan. Princess, allow me to be the first to fight for your honor today!”

Looking over in surprise at Yang Qi, Princess Jadefall said, “Impressive! Most imperial clansmen nowadays are lazy and weak, so it's good to see a genius like you volunteering for military service. Go ahead and fight. If you win, you’ll earn a much higher rank!”

“Yes ma’am!” Yang Qi replied. It was obvious he had made an impression on Princess Jadefall, and now he just needed to follow through and win a big victory. If he did, he would get the promotion he needed to further his plans. Not only would he be in a position to deal directly with Proud Warpatience, but he would also be able to seek information on Proud Heaven.

Swish!

He blurred into motion, heading right out into the middle of the parade ground.

‘He’s so fast!’ many people were thinking. ‘It looks like he just stepped into Demolishing and formed his immortal body, and he’s already this strong? Incredible!’

Of course, Yang Qi wasn’t a Demolisher; he was releasing some of the aura of his godworms to make it seem like he was.

“Windblast Ninja, you handle this!” Proud Warpatience said. “Capture him alive and bring him to me. I'm curious to see what the hell imperial clansmen are like nowadays.”

“Yes sir!” said one of the ninjas, whose chest was embroidered with the character ‘wind’. He also blurred into motion, and in the blink of an eye he was only nine meters away from Yang Qi.

“I'm Windblast Ninja, vice-commander of the Ninja Battalion,” he said. “Considering you’re an imperial clansman, I won't kill you. But I will capture you and hand you over to the exalted Proud Warpatience. I’ll give you one chance to strike at me, and one chance alone.”

From the aura of this black-clad ‘Windblast Ninja’, it seemed he was a fourth stage Thought-Demolisher.

In response to the introductory words uttered by Windblast Ninja, Yang Qi actually didn’t move a muscle. He spoke. One word.

“Die.”

Windblast Ninja’s true energy started fading away.

“What’s going on here? Grand Lightning Mecha!”

RUMBLE!

Lightning suddenly swirled around him, forming into a sonic-class mecha. Specifically, it was a Grand Lightning Mecha, and it crackled with what looked like lightning dragons and worlds made of lightning.

Again, Yang Qi didn't do a single thing. He just said, “Detonate!”

Pop. Crack.

All of a sudden, booms rang out from inside the mecha, accompanied by blood-curdling screams that raised the hackles of everyone who heard it.

Then, a moment later, the Grand Lightning Mecha shrank down into a metallic plate the size of a coin, which landed on Yang Qi’s palm. Vice-commander Windblast Ninja, a top expert, was no more.

Chapter 582: Word Becomes Law

Deathly silence prevailed and many a jaw dropped among the throngs of onlookers. Even Yuan Kuohai and those familiar with Yang Qi were flabbergasted. Although they had been confident he would win, they never could have guessed that he would win so decisively.

He didn’t use any energy arts. In fact, he literally didn’t move. No one had been able to detect the slightest stirring of true energy or power on his part. He had simply uttered two words. Die. Detonate.

As a result, his opponent died and his mecha detonated. Not even a corpse remained behind.

How did Yang Qi do it? Was it an energy art? A daoist technique? A curse?

In the immortal world, cultivators were particularly perceptive and were deeply familiar with all sorts of energy arts, daoist techniques, and curses. Generally speaking, they would be able to identify any move that they saw, at least on a foundational level.

Yet no one present, not even Proud Warpatience or Princess Jadefall, had any idea how Yang Qi had used two simple words to defeat his opponent. The ability to speak words and have them become reality touched on the most enigmatic of natural and magical laws, truths, great daos, and divine magics.

His words had become law!

Truth be told, no one present had even heard of anything like this.

The reality was that it was a new energy art that Yang Qi had only recently gained enlightenment of. The turnings of the Wheel of Fate could alter a person’s fate. Words could become heavenly mandates. Speech could become reality. His enunciations could kill a person, depriving them of all their life and power.

This new energy art was an augmentation of the Flame of Hope and was called Glad Tidings of the Lord. Instead of being powered by true energy, it drew heavily on the power of fate to produce shocking results.

Ordinary people couldn’t grasp the meaning and function of fate, but Yang Qi was a Fateless One. He had his God Legion Seal and the Wheel of Fate, therefore, he could pronounce the glad tidings of the One God. When he spoke, it was just like the adage which talked of a golden mouth and jade words. In his case, his mouth spoke magic and his words contained the dao.

His utterances were nothing less than daoist magic.

‘Who the hell is this guy?’ Princess Jadefall thought, her gaze locking onto Yang Qi. Of course, she was very pleased. ‘He’s a genius. A genius among our imperial clan. I have to report this to His Imperial Majesty, and also promote him immediately. With someone as powerful as him to lead our troops, our victory in battle will be guaranteed.’

As for Proud Warpatience, he was obviously enraged and clearly wanted to capture Yang Qi and assimilate him. ‘Dammit, what daoist technique was that? Where did this guy come from? No wonder my son wasn’t a match for him. Not even I can figure out what he just did. Wait, could he be someone with a unique physique type? What is he? A Past One? A Heaven Moving One? Or… could he be an Eternal One?’

Proud Warpatience’s energy arts and psychic power converged in his eyes, creating what looked like an enormous net, filled with the power of an apocalypse. Volcanoes, earthquakes, meteor showers, floods, lightning storms, and all other types of destructive power could be seen in his gaze.

Yang Qi was aware that Proud Warpatience now wanted to kill him. And yet, that just fell in perfectly with his plan. The more he pissed off Proud Warpatience, the more Princess Jadefall would approve of him. The higher he rose in the ranks of the immortal world, the more possible it would be to achieve his broader goals.

Raising his voice, he said, “Oh exalted Princess Jadefall, I've killed this supposed Windblast Ninja, and am now ready to fight again and earn another victory. Soon, Proud Warpatience’s army will come to the realization that your forces don’t need to charge into battle. One simple soldier is all it will take to crush them into utter defeat. We imperial clansmen are the treasures of the empire and we take pride in preserving the traditions and destiny of the Titan Emperor Heaven. Random flunkies and losers can’t compare to us. Even the supposed generalissimo of the armed forces is little more than a lackey or dog. He is literally courting death by causing trouble for you, ma’am.”

It would have been difficult to speak more bitingly.

The officers in Proud Warpatience’s forces were enraged beyond belief by his words, wanting nothing more than to wipe him out of existence.

“Are you looking to die!?” shouted one of the ninjas. His clothing was embroidered with the character for ‘king’, and he obviously occupied a much higher rank than Windblast Ninja. Leaping out into the middle of the battlefield, he said, “Generalissimo, allow me to slaughter this barbarian!”

Nodding, Proud Warpatience said, “Fine, do it.”

This was Ninja King Liao, the ultimate commander of the Ninja Division. He had an out-of-body incarnation, a second nascent divinity that made him extremely dangerous in a fight. He also had all sorts of magical treasures that allowed him to perform short-range teleportations on the battlefield. That wasn’t to mention all of the other mysterious energy arts he cultivated. All in all, it was virtually impossible for anyone to lock onto his true self in combat.

“I'm Ninja King Liao, commander of the Ninja Division,” he said. “I don’t know what evil technique you used to kill Windblast Ninja, but it doesn’t matter. Your life ends here and now. I’ll sacrifice your blood to my fallen brother, lest his death be meaningless. The fact that you’re an imperial clansman won’t help you at all. You’ve taken a life, and you will pay for it with your own.”

As he spoke, thousands upon thousands of shadowy forms sprang out, a host of clones that would make it virtually impossible for anyone to determine where his true body was.

In response, Yang Qi stretched out his hands and said, “Enfold.”

His words rumbled like thunder, causing a sound wave to roll out that didn’t contain any true energy or power fluctuations. And yet, it caused a bizarre scene to unfold.

All of the projected clones were crumpled together into one, and Ninja King Liao’s true self was revealed.

Eyes flashing with astonishment, he said, “What’s going on here? What just happened? My Manifold Illusory Projection Grand True Energy is invincible! My arts of substitution are without peer. I've never lost in a fight, not even against higher power levels than me. How could you possibly have done this? Wait—you aren’t using raw power, you’re using magical laws, aren’t you? Or could it be heavenly stipulations and natural regulations?”

“You like to talk a lot, don’t you?” Yang Qi said coldly. “Sadly, that won’t help you escape death today.” Then he spoke two more words. “Corpse shredding.”

Only two words.

Crunch!

As everyone looked on in wide-eyed shock, Ninja King Liao was literally ripped to shreds. It was a rather slow process, allowing him to scream, “The pain! Generalissimo, save me! I don’t want to die! My soul is being ripped to pieces! Without my soul, I’ll become nothing, I’ll—

"Aaaiiiieee!”

As the chunks of his remains tumbled to the ground, Yang Qi said, “Gather.”

Waving the sleeve of his God Legion Battle Robe, he collected all of the pieces of the corpse together and caused them to vanish without a trace. Another top expert had been killed, and Yang Qi still hadn’t moved.

The eyes of all onlookers shone with terror. Some of the soldiers were trembling and had trouble containing the trepidation that gripped their hearts.

“So, how many other experts from the Ninja Division would like to test out the Special Reconnaissance Division? Step forward. I'm ready to accept the challenge and kill the lot of you.” Of course, there were a few other ninjas who had flown out earlier. He pointed at one of them and said, “You. Die.”

Flop!

The man dropped to the ground like a log, his aura gone. It was impossible to say exactly how he had died; it was almost like he had been fated to just drop dead right then and there.

“Explode.”

Yang Qi pointed at another top expert, who went on to explode loudly, becoming a pool of blood and gore on the ground.

“You lot. Be exterminated.”

He waved his finger at an entire group, who withered and shriveled as though they had contracted some deadly disease. Yang Qi wasn’t expending any true energy at all, yet he was massacring all the opponents who faced him.

It was something that seemed to defy logic and common sense.

“What is this? Is he a devil?”

The seemingly diseased ninjas all dropped to the ground, dead as dead could be. Their auras didn't exist anymore, and even if someone examined their corpses it would be impossible to determine the cause of death. They were just dead. Not fated to exist any longer, without even a discarnate soul left behind to indicate that they had ever been alive.

The morale among Proud Warpatience’s troops was crumbling, leaving behind only a terrified instinct to flee from Yang Qi and make sure that he didn’t even look at them. If they could have their way, they would have turned invisible on the spot.

If Yang Qi had killed these opponents in a fight, it would have been easier to accept. But his methods were just so bizarre and strange that everyone was filled with raw terror.

Any expert would feel like that when facing an opponent who could kill people in such an inexplicable way. After all, no one could defend against something they didn’t even understand.

What they didn't know was that, given the level of Yang Qi’s cultivation base, he was only completely confident in being able to alter the fate of fifth stage World-Demolishers. Anything higher than that would require the use of true energy and Blood of the One God.

Right now, the fate of sixth stage Abstrusity-Demolishers was too strong for him to affect with mere words. The abstruse magical laws and truths they possessed gave them control over their own fate, making it much more difficult to harm them with the Wheel of Fate.

That said, it was all wrapped up with the level of Yang Qi’s cultivation base.

Once he was a Demolisher himself, he could definitely kill sixth stage immortal paragons with a word, and even affect seventh stage immortal ancestors.

In the ancient era, during that golden age which was nearly mythological in nature, the Sovereign Lord could slaughter or cripple gods with a word. He could destroy the Deathless Throne, create worlds, overturn universes, establish primal-chaos, and do any number of things, all by speaking. He had a golden mouth and jade words, and his utterances could not be defied.

“So, who’s next? Come at me en masse if you wish. I can handle it.”

No one responded. Apparently, not even Proud Warpatience was willing to tangle with Yang Qi.

Chapter 583: Terrorized Masses

Yang Qi’s actions had terrorized the masses to the point where no one dared to step forward to fight him. He had a divine ability that allowed him to kill people with a single word, and at the moment everyone was busy trying to wrap their minds around that. As for Princess Jadefall, her eyes were glittering with delight.

These war games had originally been held for the two armies to stage a large-scale contest, yet Yang Qi had single-handedly routed Proud Warpatience’s forces. Proud Warpatience had endless numbers of top experts working for him, including plenty of people whose cultivation level vastly surpassed Yang Qi’s, yet not even they dared to make a move against him.

Yang Qi had just wiped out nearly the entire Ninja Division, striking a major blow against the army as a whole. In fact, their morale was so low it was almost nonexistent, making it nearly impossible for them to hold their own in a fight. If looks could kill, then Proud Warpatience’s gaze would have burned Yang Qi out of existence where he stood.

“Who dares to step forward?” Yang Qi taunted. “Anyone?” He had made a huge impression, and was taking every opportunity to needle the opposing army. In some ways, it was reminiscent of his days in the mortal world, when he single-handedly vanquished an immense fiendslave battalion and subsequently used their corpses to fortify his kingdom. Even to this day, not all of those corpses had been fully refined.

And he was far stronger now than he had been in those days.

He was going all out in his attempt to piss Proud Warpatience off, and hopefully learn a bit more about him by doing so.

After calling out some more taunts, and seeing no one step forward, Yang Qi laughed coldly. “I honestly can't believe that scum like you would dare to challenge the imperial clan. Whether you live or die, your souls belong to the Titan Emperor Heaven. So why are you following a rebel like Proud Warpatience? Doesn't that make you criminals? You know, even if nobody else stood up to you today, I would. I’m committing all of your faces to memory, so if you don’t step forward to renounce the darkness and seek the light, then I’ll eventually track you down and kill you. Beg Princess Jadefall for mercy, and perhaps you’ll survive. I’ll give you ten breaths of time to step forward and renounce membership in Proud Warpatience’s gang of villains.”

“One!”

“Two.” Yang Qi wasn’t beating around the bush, and he wasn’t scared either. He had outright called Proud Warpatience a rebel and villain, a person who everyone had the right to punish.

Even Princess Jadefall was visibly stunned at what this ‘imperial clansman’ of hers was doing.

Yang Qi’s countdown finally pushed one of the top experts among Proud Warpatience’s forces over the line.

“Hmph!”

A cold snort echoed out, filled with volcanically destructive quintessence energy. At the same time, the empyrean winds in the sky above the immortal world parted and a figure appeared.

He was clad in a boa robe and had a golden crown on his head. Glittering on his forehead was a magical symbol that resembled a tadpole, except that it was actually a third eye, something that could grant eternally long life and protect against calamity of all sorts.

Obviously, he was a very important person!

“A duke! He’s an official duke appointed by the imperial court!”

“That’s Grand Duke Bloodstabber, who some people call Immortal Paragon Bloodstabber. He’s a sixth stage Abstrusity-Demolisher!”

“Now he’s a top expert. I heard that Immortal Paragon Bloodstabber cultivates a bizarre godly-class energy art called the Murky Cavern Never-Dying Sanctuary Energy Art. He can produce never-dying calamity-reversing godcharms, which can stand in place for him in death. In other words, nobody in the world can kill him!”

“Yeah, that’s right. I heard that on one occasion, he infiltrated another immortal world to gather intelligence and ended up fighting a seventh stage Wilds-Demolisher. And he survived the battle!”

“I heard about that, too. Because of the fact that not even an immortal ancestor was able to kill him, he’s considered truly invincible. When he returned with the intelligence report, he was rewarded by the imperial court, given a dukedom and the title of grand duke. Now he’s a true noble of the court, with an immense official stipend.”

“Forget all that. The mere fact that he's an immortal paragon makes him a big shot around here; he’s far more important than the inspector generals or governors of the lands.”

“Let’s see whether or not this imperial clansman Titan Dragonguard can kill someone like that.”

“He definitely can’t. Grand Duke Bloodstabber cultivates the mysterious Murky Cavern Never-Dying Sanctuary Energy Art! Considering he’s ‘never-dying’, how could someone possibly kill him?”

“Well, let’s wait and see what happens. Who’s going to be stronger, Titan Dragonguard or Grand Duke Bloodstabber?”

Yang Qi’s eyes locked onto Grand Duke Bloodstabber, and he could instantly tell that he was no slouch. He was a sixth stage Abstrusity-Demolisher who vastly surpassed Immortal Paragon Night-Kṣetra. He also had a godly-class energy art, whose function was similar to the Wheel of Fate. It could produce magical charms that could be used to stand in his place in death. In other words, no matter how anyone tried to kill him, he could avoid death.

Godly-class energy arts like that were definitely a rarity. It begged the question of where it came from. After all, Yang Qi had never heard of anything like it before. But based on the buzz of conversation, he knew it was called the Murky Cavern Never-Dying Sanctuary Energy Art and had gained a smattering of information about what it could do.

“Listen up, boy,” Grand Duke Bloodstabber said. “You might be able to kill some operatives from the Ninja Division by shouting a bit. But I can tell that you’re using some sort of godly-class energy art to do it. And imperial clansmen don’t have access to consummate techniques like that. Must have come across some good fortune somewhere, am I right? Perhaps a hoard of power stones that have magical laws from a high-level immortal world like the Tusita Heaven. You found a godrelic, didn’t you? Well? I can read you like I can read the back of my hand.”

“Are you saying you want to fight me?” Yang Qi said coolly.

“I didn’t come to fight you. I came to give you some advice.” Eyes sparkling with blood-colored light, he continued, “I heard your lunatic ravings a moment ago. Let me tell you, Proud Warpatience is completely loyal to the Titan Emperor Heaven. Everyone praises his integrity, except you, who dared to call him a traitorous villain. It doesn’t matter if you’re an imperial clansman, words like that make you worthy of death! In fact, your actions also implicate Princess Jadefall. Has the time come for us to purge the court? You have one chance to get out of this alive. Step forward, admit your crimes to the exalted Proud Warpatience, and beg for forgiveness.”

“How impudent!” Princess Jadefall said. “Titan Dragonguard, this Grand Duke Bloodstabber is a famous individual in the Titan Emperor Heaven, and a top expert from the imperial court. You’ve done enough today. You’ve already performed immensely meritorious service in front of everyone, earning the right to request any reward you wish. Grand Duchess Violet-Moon, step forward to relieve Titan Dragonguard. Let him rest up a bit.”

“Yes ma’am.” A young woman flew out in a swirl of violet garments, holding a sword in her hand, her expression calm and focused.

Landing next to Yang Qi, she looked at him with a gleam of approval in her eyes and said, “You did well. I never would have guessed that we had someone like you in the imperial house. You truly have the spirit of our ancestors. Unfortunately, your daoist techniques are a bit lacking. There’s no way you can stand up to Grand Duke Bloodstabber.”

“Oh really?” Yang Qi said, not moving a muscle. “Much respect, Grand Duchess Violet-Moon, but why don’t you stick to the sidelines for a moment longer? Grand Duke Bloodstabber might have a ferocious reputation, but even he will die if he tries to fight me. I understand that he has his Murky Cavern Never-Dying Sanctuary Energy Art. Sadly for him, whoever defies my will is doomed to die. Anyone in heaven and earth that I decide to kill will end up dead, no matter where they run to.”

“Oh?” Grand Duchess Violet-Moon’s pupils constricted. “You have that level of godly-class energy art? You can really kill anyone by just speaking a word?”

“If you don’t believe me, Grand Duchess Violet-Moon, just wait and see what happens next. If this Grand Duke Bloodstabber formally challenges me to a duel, he’ll die. Godly-class energy art or not.”

Grand Duke Bloodstabber was initially shocked by Yang Qi’s confidence, but quickly recovered. He knew that in this situation, he absolutely, positively could not afford to look weak. If he lost face, he would never recover from it. Besides, he was very confident in his Murky Cavern Never-Dying Sanctuary Energy Art.

“Stop trying to act tough, boy. You think you can scare me with talk like that?”

He had gone through countless trials and tribulations throughout the years, yet never once had anyone managed to beat his energy art. Therefore, he simply didn’t believe that this Titan Dragonguard would be able to kill him.

How could someone like that possibly exist in this immortal world? If he were really that strong, he would be an unstoppable force.

‘There’s no way someone as freakish as that could possibly exist.’ Grand Duke Bloodstabber thought. ‘It would create too much imbalance in heaven and earth. He just got a legacy from a godrelic, nothing more.’

“Come on!” he said loudly. “Are you really that tough? Or are you all talk? I hereby challenge you to a duel. Well? Can you really talk me to death?”

Even as the words were leaving his mouth, Grand Duke Bloodstabber leaped into action.

“Stab Myriad Archaisms; Blood-Form God-Dao!”

A streak of blood-colored light shot through the air with unstoppable momentum, completely surrounding Yang Qi and leaving no avenue for escape. Grand Duke Bloodstabber clearly knew of the old adage: Strike first, achieve lethality. Strike second, meet calamity.

He was hoping to wipe out Yang Qi with one devastating move, before he could use his speech-based attack.

Who could possibly have predicted that a top expert like Grand Duke Bloodstabber would resort to such a sinister and underhanded trick? First, he talked about giving Yang Qi a chance to use his ability, yet before he could, he struck a mortal blow. No one could argue the fact that it was a disgraceful move.

“Not good!” Grand Duchess Violet-Moon blurted. Unfortunately, even she had been caught off guard and couldn’t react in time. As Grand Duke Bloodstabber closed in, he resorted to a second move, causing a stream of blood-colored light to erupt from his forehead, locking Grand Duchess Violet-Moon in place and making it impossible for her to come to Yang Qi’s aid.

In the blink of an eye, his Stab Myriad Archaisms, Blood-Form God-Dao was right in front of Yang Qi. It was also in that moment that Yang Qi spoke in a voice that could shake the universe.

“In the name of the Lord. Be deprived!”

Chapter 584: Never-Dying Disappears

In a moment of utmost danger, Yang Qi opened his mouth and spoke.

When he said ‘in the name of the Lord’, he had spoken very quietly, to the point where no one could hear him clearly. But when he said ‘be deprived’, everyone could hear it. It was almost like a clap of thunder that rolled out across the parade ground, causing the ground to split and crack.

The surface of the parade ground was specifically designed to be extremely durable, yet the mere sound of Yang Qi’s words actually broke it. His voice was not the manifestation of some energy art or daoist technique. It was just his voice, projected from within his body.

Crack!

A moment later, everything went silent.

Grand Duke Bloodstabber’s move of Stab Myriad Archaisms; Blood-Form God-Dao stopped, right there in front of Yang Qi. Even as Grand Duke Bloodstabber stared in disbelief, his true energy began to pop and crack, almost like fireworks.

Next, a stream of magical symbols flew out of him, then faded out of existence.

Shockingly, he had just been deprived of the Murky Cavern Never-Dying Sanctuary Energy Art, which he had painstakingly cultivated over countless years.

“What’s going on here? My energy art just left me?” Without hesitation, Grand Duke Bloodstabber shot backward across the field of battle. No longer was he interested in killing Yang Qi. No, he knew that of the thirty-six stratagems of war, retreat was often the best option. Only a moment ago, he had been brimming with confidence in his ability to kill Yang Qi. Who could have guessed that, only a moment later, this would happen?

However, even as Grand Duke Bloodstabber fled, hoping to escape the battlefield, Yang Qi spoke again. “Plummet!”

Instantly, a thumping sound could be heard as Grand Duke Bloodstabber tumbled out of the sky like a kite with its string cut.

Numerous onlookers were so shocked their eyes nearly popped out of their skulls.

As for Proud Warpatience, he was the picture of burning fury.

“Get over here!” he shouted, leaping out into the middle of the parade ground and sending an enormous hand shooting in the direction of Yang Qi and Grand Duke Bloodstabber.

But then Princess Jadefall flicked her finger, sending a beam of light out that was the color of both gold and jade. “Please, Proud Warpatience, can you refrain from such shamelessness? This is a formal competition! Chalk death up to fate, and honor as the blessing of heaven.”

The light slammed into the enormous true energy hand and a huge shock wave rolled out.

“You think you can save your minion so easily, Proud Warpatience?” Yang Qi said loudly. “Well, you’re gravely mistaken!” Taking a step forward, he said, “Melt!”

“Aaaiiiieee!”

An agonized scream rang out, like one would expect if a living person were doused in boiling water.

It was spine-tingling and terror-inducing. Everyone watched as Grand Duke Bloodstabber, who had only just fallen onto the ground, began physically melting. A moment later, he was nothing but blood streaming out on the ground, with only his head remaining intact.

His expression was one of both fury and torment as he screamed, “I surrender! I admit your superiority, Titan Dragonguard! I’ll join your side! Even being a servant would be worth it. Just spare me!”

“Spare you?” Yang Qi thought about it for a moment. Then, face completely expressionless, he once again said, “Melt!”

Plop!

The head sank down into the blood, which Yang Qi subsequently assimilated, causing himself to shine briefly with a blood-colored glow that gradually faded away into something pure and holy.

‘What an incredible energy art,’ he thought. ‘The Murky Cavern Never-Dying Sanctuary Energy Art is miraculous, to be sure. As of this point, I have seven godly-class energy arts. That combination will make my people in the lower world even stronger than before. They’ll be virtually indestructible.’

It had taken quite a bit of effort to use the Glad Tidings of the Lord on Grand Duke Bloodstabber. In fact, it had drained him of a lot of Blood of the One God. However, after absorbing the man’s quintessence-blood and life force, he was able to restore some of what he had lost.

After all, Grand Duke Bloodstabber had some deathless godliness built up, the result of godrelics which he had obviously come across in the past. Not only was that godliness helping Yang Qi to recover from the drainage he had experienced moments ago, it also went to further refine his cultivation base.

In fact, the Blood of the One God in his forehead was now at the terrifying level of ten ten-thousandths. It was actually a big boost. After all, back in the mortal world, his blood had been at the level of two ten-thousandths.

“Princess,” he said, “now that I've slaughtered Grand Duke Bloodstabber, I doubt any other evildoers will dare rise up and oppose the imperial court. Any who defy the imperial house will die.”

His voice resonated out in a very intimidating fashion.

Silence reigned.

No one made even the tiniest peep. Everyone had been thoroughly cowed by Yang Qi, to the point where even Grand Duchess Violet-Moon and Princess Jadefall were flabbergasted.

As of this moment, everyone completely and utterly believed in the invincible power of Yang Qi’s words.

No one dared to step forward to challenge him, and even Proud Warpatience was inwardly shaken. After all, he had no idea how Yang Qi was doing these things. Not even the Murky Cavern Never-Dying Sanctuary Energy Art had been sufficient to defend against him.

“Alright, who’s up next? Anybody dare to fight me?” Yang Qi said loudly. “I honestly can’t believe that trash like you would dare to oppose Princess Jadefall’s army. Are you all suicidal? If so, I can make your wishes come true.”

Sixtieth Young Sir Proud was there among the troops and was literally weak at the knees. ‘How could this be happening? How?! That was Grand Duke Bloodstabber, one of the most powerful fighters in the entire army! Not even a seventh stage Wilds-Demolisher should have been able to kill him. I heard people saying that once you fully cultivate the Murky Cavern Never-Dying Sanctuary Energy Art you can summon twenty-four heavenly dharmic guards, which you can use to escape death twenty-four times in a row. Even after all twenty-four of them die, you can make them again, as long as you put enough effort and resources into it. But Titan Dragonguard killed him with a few words. Just what exactly is going on here? If he had tried to kill me during our encounter, what could I have done to protect myself? Nothing.’

That thought caused Sixtieth Young Sir Proud to break out in a cold sweat.

In sharp contrast, Princess Jadefall looked quite pleased. “Very well done, Titan Dragonguard. You’re truly an invincible vanguard. The imperial house is blessed to have someone like you in it.” She had previously assumed that Yang Qi had a secret magic of some sort. However, after seeing him kill Grand Duke Bloodstabber, she knew that whatever secret magic it was, it surpassed anything she had imagined it might be, and was definitely nothing to take lightly.

“Well. What do you have to say for yourself, Proud Warpatience?” Princess Jadefall said, her voice echoing out across the parade ground. “Your army is in chaos, and its morale has dropped out of existence. Why don’t we end these war games? You’ve lost, and even if we agreed to another competition at a later date, there’s no way it will turn out any differently. I have Titan Dragonguard, who can defeat anyone you throw at him. Think about it. Not even Grand Duke Bloodstabber could stand up to him, and Grand Duke Bloodstabber should have been invincible to a seventh stage Wilds-Demolisher. He dropped like a fly, which means that Titan Dragonguard is stronger than immortal ancestors. And how many people like that do you have in your forces?”

In response to her words, Proud Warpatience’s face turned bright red, then ashen white, then sickly green, and finally a mottled blue.

At this point, it was obvious that he was caught between a rock and a hard place. It wouldn’t even help if he took action personally; that would be too much of a loss of face. Besides, he had no idea whether or not he might suffer the same fate as Grand Duke Bloodstabber.

Snorting coldly, he said, “Let’s go. Sound the gongs of retreat. You win, Princess Jadefall. At least this time. Next time I’ll be the victor, and I’ll make you pay for this little incident with full interest!”

Gong…. Gong….

Gongs were sounded and Proud Warpatience’s troops slowly retreated like an ebbing tide.

Soon, only Princess Jadefall’s forces were left on the parade ground and the tense mood faded. Everyone breathed sighs of relief, then started cheering. Yang Qi alone had struck fear into the hearts of the enemy, defeated numerous opponents, and had earned the respect and admiration of everyone present.

Furthermore, he had resolved a situation that would have surely led to fierce and bitter fighting, and most likely casualties. In the end, the overall strength of the dynasty as a whole would likely have suffered a big blow.

‘He’s going to rise to the top after this,’ Yuan Kuohai thought. ‘Rise to the top for sure!’

That was what all of Yang Qi’s subordinates were thinking. As of this moment, they were completely and utterly devoted to him. Even without devil seeds, they would swear loyalty to him and would never betray him.

His actions were far more effective than any devil seed. A single word from him could kill his enemies, which was something unheard of and terrifying to the extreme. There was no doubt that he would be greatly rewarded. After all, it was widely said that Princess Jadefall was a very generous leader.

In fact, as the cheering died down, she raised her voice and said, “Listen up, everyone. All divisions will prepare for an immediate strike on the Hanging Heaven. Before we leave, I’ll reprovision all troops. Prepare to strike a stunning blow for the immortal world, and prove to everyone that we're not to be provoked. Titan Dragonguard, you come with me for a private audience. You’ll be rewarded handsomely for your services. The example you’ve set will be an inspiration to everyone in the armed forces.”

She was absolutely right. Not a single soldier among her troops remained unconvinced of Yang Qi’s strength. And in the years to come, all members of Proud Warpatience’s forces would tremble at the mention of his name.

Chapter 585: A Frank Discussion with the Princess

A great din rose up as the troops turned to leave.

Princess Jadefall had won an enormous victory. She had crushed the generalissimo of the armed forces, earning the right to lead her campaign against the Hanging Heaven. She had come out on top in every way possible, and it was all thanks to Yang Qi.

After dismissing her troops, she wanted to meet with him. She had to find out who this Titan Dragonguard was, and what kind of energy arts he practiced. After all, his defeat of Grand Duke Bloodstabber was a shocking matter in which he simply spoke and the man died.

“Come with me, Titan Dragonguard,” she said. “You may step onto my chariot.”

“Your humble servant wouldn't dare!” Yang Qi blurted.

“Quit exaggerating. Considering the level of your cultivation base, what are you scared of? And considering the services you’ve performed, you’ve earned rewards and glory of no small amount.” Waving her hand, she sent out a spatial fluctuation that grabbed Yang Qi and pulled him up to her chariot.

Once inside, Yang Qi realized how large it was. In fact, it contained a minor world, within the depths of which was the aura of some primeval godling. Unexpectedly, this chariot was actually a god item, filled with immense deathless godliness.

“Surprised? This chariot is a powerful god item called Titan’s War Chariot. You see, Titan was one of the ancient gods of the past, and is our ancestor. That's why we all bear the surname Titan. All members of the imperial house have the blood of Titan. In other words, the bloodline of a god. I already checked with the Department of Internal Affairs, and I’m aware of your background. You’re the son of a commoner and a down-and-out imperial clansman. However, the Department of the Imperial Clan tested you and confirmed you have the blood of Titan, which proves you’re no imposter.”

As it turned out, Princess Jadefall had already looked into Yang Qi’s identity.

He smiled inwardly. ‘My God Legion Seal has the blood of the legion of gods, much less the blood of Titan. Seems I've truly secured my place as an imperial clansman.’

As of this point, he was convinced he could proceed with his master plan. He would now be able to show the full might of the gods instead of hiding in the shadows. Although keeping a low profile was fine, it made it impossible to rise through the ranks.

Now, Yang Qi was feeling a lot more confident in being able to capture Proud Warpatience and use him to get information about Proud Heaven.

If he could work things out with Princess Jadefall, it would mean the time had come to safely step into the Demolishing level. After that, he wouldn’t fear any sort of danger. With Princess Jadefall on his side, he could definitely secure a safe location for the breakthrough.

Once he succeeded, who could possibly be a match for him? Not even the sovereign of heaven would be able to.

“As an imperial clansman, it's my duty to protect the honor of Titan,” Yang Qi said. “That Proud Warpatience gets most of his clout from Proud Heaven, and he's only getting stronger and stronger. If we don't do something about him now, the consequences could be too dire to even contemplate. Princess, I've heard rumors that Proud Heaven somehow saved the Titan Emperor Heaven? Do you know the full story? I’ve never even seen this Proud Heaven before.”

“Proud Heaven is a legend, but the details are unclear. He came to the Titan Emperor Heaven as a clone, not his true self. He has clones among other immortal worlds as well. In fact, the top society in the alliance of thirty-six thousand lesser immortal worlds, the Brahman Society, is run by one of his clones. He’s virtually invincible, and his Mass Cloning ability indicates that he’s most likely a Godmyth. Perhaps he’s even broken through to the Deathless Throne. When the time comes, I can tell you more about him. From what I understand, he did save our immortal world; however, it wasn’t out of any sort of good will. He wanted something. Unfortunately, no one here is strong enough to stand up to him, otherwise we would have long since executed Proud Warpatience.”

Unfortunately, what Princess Jadefall was telling Yang Qi only made him more leery of Proud Heaven.

Soon, the chariot reached Princes Jadefall’s mansion, where a teleportation portal appeared, leading to another aspect of space that seemed constructed of true gold and covered with ancient totemic designs that depicted the grandeur of the ancient god Titan. They depicted an enormous giant without facial features, wielding a massive hammer as he crushed universal planes out of existence as easily as chicken eggs.

“This is the Kingdom of Titan, a secret cultivation chamber built for the use of the imperial house. There’s a godrelic here that contains copious amounts of Titan True Energy, which only we of the imperial house can use. It can lead to incredible advancements in cultivation. Only those with the bloodline of Titan can benefit from this place. Any others who try to do so will die as a result.”

She reached out and a stream of ancient vital energy converged on her hand, becoming a gray streak of light that caused thunderous rumblings to ripple out.

Yang Qi took a breath, inhaling one of the gray streaks. Once it was inside him, his God Legion Seal sent out some power to neutralize it, then added it to his internal pellet of true energy. His action only further served to cement his identity as a member of the imperial house.

“Okay,” Princess Jadefall said, finally convinced of his identity. “You performed a truly amazing service, Titan Dragonguard. What reward do you seek? I can confer you with the title of marquis right here and now! You should be able to rise to the rank of duke relatively easily. In fact, considering your blood, becoming a minor king, vice prince, or grand prince would also be possible.”

“Princess, I do have a request,” Yang Qi said. “I need a safe place to work on a breakthrough. In terms of a title, I’ll accept whatever you give me. Titles are just titles, after all. I'm more interested in getting personally stronger and being able to restore the glory of Titan. If other immortal worlds try to bully and humiliate the Titan Emperor Heaven, I’ll exterminate them! I want our immortal world to rise to much higher heights!”

“Very ambitious of you,” Princess Jadefall said. “That’s exactly what I wish to do as well. As you probably know, the immortal worlds are like the eternal grains of sand in the universe. There are a total of thirty-three ranks for immortal worlds, and our Titan Emperor Heaven is the lowest of those. Worse, various calamities throughout the years have damaged our essence, making it easy for other immortal worlds to pick on us. We really need to change that.”

As she spoke, this famous young princess’ eyes shone with inimitable battle spirit, making her seem like a valiant and formidable figure.

Yang Qi couldn’t help but sigh in admiration. The truth was that he ultimately intended to devour this immortal world and use it to strengthen the Sage Monarch planetary system and his kingdom in hell. With this immortal world as a foundation, he could ensure that his friends and family all had a safe place to grow and thrive.

Sadly, that meant that Princess Jadefall was destined to be his enemy. In turn, that meant he had no choice but to be two-faced in this situation. After all, he knew that Princess Jadefall was a Reincarnated One.

“You can work on your cultivation here, Titan Dragonguard,” she said. “Right now, you’re a Demolisher, but are still working on your immortal body. That makes you an immortal soldier. Once you reach the second stage, Space-Demolishing, you’ll become an immortal warrior.” Seeing the vigilant look that had just sprung up on Yang Qi’s face, she continued, “Don’t worry. Your secret is safe with me. And I won't ask any questions about your cultivation. I know that you acquired some ancient godrelic which enables you to mask your true power. Everyone has secrets—even me. But I'm convinced that you have the blood of the imperial house and are loyal to the empire. So of course I’ll help you. And you did cut Proud Warpatience down a notch today.”

“Many thanks, Princess!” Yang Qi said, bowing his head.

“You have no lack of power stones for use in cultivation, right? You're rich. Because of that, I won’t bother offering you power. As for the Kingdom of Titan, I can’t come and go freely here. I'm limited to using it a few times per year. This time, that limit is seven days, and I’m giving it all to you. Consider that your reward. Don’t underestimate the Kingdom of Titan. Even the grand princes of the court are only allowed to come here occasionally for their cultivation. The aura of Titan here is very beneficial to people with blood like ours. I look forward to seeing what progress you make in seven days. By the time you’re out, my request for your promotion will have been processed and you’ll have your title. You’ll also have your own army. When we make our move on the Hanging Heaven, I’ll be relying on you and your experts to kill as many enemies as possible. After the campaign is over, we’ll see about promoting you to duke, vice prince, or grand prince! With a higher title like that, you’ll be an important government official who has a say in the politics of the nation. At that point, your ability to serve the imperial house will reach new heights.”

If Yang Qi were an ordinary person, Princess Jadefall would never have spoken in such flowery language about him. And of course, Yang Qi couldn’t help but chuckle inwardly at it all, although he didn’t let that show on his face.

After offering a few more bits of advice, she departed and left Yang Qi alone in the Kingdom of Titan.

He looked around a bit, then began absorbing the aura of Titan, which was when he realized that this definitely was a godrelic. In fact, it seemed to be a place that Titan himself had used for meditation and breathing exercises in the past.

There was a faint godliness that was beneficial to Yang Qi’s cultivation base and solidified his decision to further his cultivation here. Perhaps he could learn some secrets from this spatial kingdom as well.

Eventually, he found one corner of this plane of existence where a deep chasm existed, within which was a power vortex that no amount of psychic power could pierce into.

Chapter 586: Titan

Yang Qi was absorbing the very same energy that had been absorbed by an ancient god. And as the deathless godliness flowed into him, his Blood of the One God grew stronger. Titan had been particularly powerful among the ancient legion of gods and was known for raw power.

Because of that, as Yang Qi went through his breathing exercises, his internal pellet grew stronger.

‘What a mysterious place,’ he thought. ‘It’s so full of killing intent!’ Not even he was able to fully cast his divine will into the godrelic. But he could sense that there were many areas protected by deadly immortal formations that could kill any expert who tried to break into them.

The location he was currently in was one of relative calm and peace. However, moving outside of that area would be very dangerous.

‘Mechas? Battleships?’

All of a sudden, Yang Qi’s divine will encountered an area where numerous treasured items were stored. There were even mechas immersed in what seemed like the liquefied aura of Titan, which was being used to strengthen them. Apparently, this place also served as a storehouse for the imperial dynasty.

This godrelic was obviously one of the most important locations for the Titan Emperor Heaven.

Originally, Yang Qi had hoped to pass his tribulation in here, but now he realized that probably wasn’t a good idea.

What if the tribulation actually destroyed the godrelic or the things in it? Furthermore, what if he somehow provoked an unexpected, dangerous reaction? Therefore, he decided to spend the seven days of cultivation here perfecting his internal pellet, which would make it much easier to pass his tribulation when the time came.

‘What's this?’

After looking at some of the locations packed with treasure, he sent his divine will deeper into the Kingdom of Titan and found a place where the Titan energy grew so strong it began to liquefy.

There, within the depths of the ancient godrelic, was a planet-sized sphere floating within the energy flows. It appeared to be made of liquid, a manifestation of some strange sort of power that radiated the aura of Titan.

It also pulsed with immense deathless godliness.

‘That's the blood of a god! I can’t believe they have a drop of Titan’s blood in here. Eternal deathlessness the size of a planet, and no one has ever assimilated it. Ah, what a pity. And what a waste for this clan to have such an incredible treasure. If I had that blood, I could truly use it in heaven-defying fashion. Apparently, not even the emperor has what it takes to assimilate it. Someone who did would definitely break into the Godmyth level. After all, even the effects of that jade blood mother got in the Hell of Gloom and Darkness were indescribable.’

This was the true foundation of the godrelic, and the foundation of the Titan Emperor Heaven itself.

Yang Qi could sense that the blood had the immortal world’s essence locked down. Without the blood to restrict its flow, it would be much easier for certain almighty entities to leech off the essence.

‘I can’t get the full essence of this immortal world right now,’ he thought. ‘Titan’s blood has it locked down. Without assimilating that blood, trying to take the essence would be as effective as throwing a cup of water on a burning cart of firewood. Although I can get a bit with my imperial snakecharms, it’s not enough to truly shake the foundation of this immortal world. Time to make some more Heaven-Devouring śarīras!’

Drawing on the power of King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans, he summoned a primal-chaos elder-snake, which he then fused with. Then, numerous black holes sprang up inside him, which began madly devouring the Titan energy in the area.

The power levels were immense, and the flows were so strong that he actually felt the immortal world essence stirring deep in the godrelic. Here, he was able to make Heaven-Devouring śarīras much, much faster than he could in the outside world!

WHIZZZ!

A fist-sized Heaven-Devouring śarīra appeared within his sea of energy, glittering brightly.

Then another, and another, like numerous suns.

At the same time, he used the essence of the Hell of Mahānata, Hell of Gloom and Darkness, and Tusita Heaven to temper his internal pellet.

Gradually, he was able to form the Heaven-Devouring śarīras into a Heaven-Devouring Grand Formation. It was something he had picked up from the one-fourth of the Heaven-Devouring Good-Fortune Non-Existent-Gods Dao energy art he had acquired.

The more śarīras he made, the stronger that formation would be.

Later, when he faced his breakthrough tribulation, he could situate himself within that Heaven-Devouring Grand Formation, and any who sought to disturb him by entering it would find their cultivation base weakening until they dropped dead.

Time passed, although he wasn't sure how much.

Thanks to his hard work, he soon had a total of three hundred and sixty śarīras in his internal pellet, which could be used to make a very powerful Heaven-Devouring Grand Formation.

Even more amazing, his Blood of the One God had grown stronger, being at the level of eleven ten-thousandths.

His eyes sparkled brightly at the realization that he had made some major advancement, even with his Glad Tidings of the Lord.

This session of cultivation had been very beneficial.

Eventually, everything began to spin and distort as he was slowly extracted from the Kingdom of Titan and relocated to the outside world. Seven days had passed and he was automatically teleported out of the godrelic.

As for his target destination, it was somewhere in Princess Jadefall’s mansion.

Princess Jadefall was all smiles as she stood there, flanked by a few administrators from the Department of Internal Affairs. As soon as she laid eyes on Yang Qi, she said, “Titan Dragonguard, your commission has arrived. The sovereign of heaven has issued a decree!”

“Imperial clansman Titan Dragonguard, ready to accept my commission!” Yang Qi said, dropping to his knees and plastering a solemn expression onto his face.

One of the administrators stepped forward and said, “His Imperial Majesty has decreed that Titan Dragonguard, whose imperial blood runs strong and whose cultivation base is particularly high, has distinguished himself as a top expert and will henceforth serve as the Marquis of Military Security. In addition to the title, he will be given command of ten divisions and will accompany Princess Jadefall on a campaign to conquer the Hanging Heaven.”

The administrator that had just spoken was none other than Titan Duelbringer, who had long since heard of the incredible show Yang Qi put on during the war games. More than ever, he was glad that he had chosen to stick with Yang Qi, as it was obviously benefiting himself as well.

“Congratulations, Titan Dragonguard,” Princess Jadefall said. “You have your title, as well as ten divisions of troops. Henceforth, you will lead the following divisions from my armies: the Special Reconnaissance Division, Formation Dismantling Division, Covert Operations Division, Winged Immortals Division….” She went on to list all ten. “They're all under your command, and you have complete authority to direct them. The campaign begins in three days! The time has come to invade the Hanging Heaven!”

“Yes ma’am!” Yang Qi said, offering a crisp salute.

He finally had a place among the nobility in this immortal world, and it hadn’t taken ten years like he had assumed it might. To people in immortal worlds, ten years was like nothing. They would often spend that time just in meditation. In fact, not even lengths of time like millions of years were considered lengthy to immortals.

He now had official power, and was also a trusted confidant of Princess Jadefall. In the coming days, he would associate with her further and learn more about her status as a Reincarnated One.

He had the feeling that she was no simpleton. Even though she hadn’t revealed her powers to him, he was fairly convinced that Proud Heaven was after her, and that she was why he had become a sworn brother of this place’s sovereign of heaven.

If Yang Qi made it his job to protect her, it would most likely mean that he would eventually butt heads with Proud Heaven.

Of course, he was nowhere near ready for a fight with Proud Heaven. But he would continue preparing. Hopefully, he would be able to get another piece of the God Legion Seal, or possibly even complete it, before he came into contact with Proud Heaven again. Unfortunately, he had no idea where to look for the other pieces, nor did he have any clues.

**

War was about to begin in the immortal world, and it was the same in the lower world.

Everyone in the Sage Monarch planetary system was united and ready, and white streams of dazzling light flowed constantly into the centrally-located Sage Monarch City.

That white light was the power of faith.

Yang Qi’s immortal clone was constantly benefiting from the faith, improving his cultivation base and pushing closer to a breakthrough.

“Junior Brother!” said Eldest Brother, who had just called an urgent meeting. “My network uncovered evidence that the Misty Kingdom has allied with other holy lands to oppose us. The City of Twilight and the Swamp of Cosmic Primality are among the other members of the alliance. I need to take command of our armies and beat them to the punch. Strike like lightning, and destroy the Misty Kingdom to scare the others into submission. The only way to grow the power of faith at our disposal is to expand our borders. Right now we have the faith of a few thousand planetary systems, but that's not enough. It's impossible to calculate how many trillions of other planetary systems there are out there. What do you think, Junior Brother?”

“I agree, Eldest Brother,” the clone said. “Increasing our inflow of faith would definitely be a good thing. Please take charge and handle things as you see fit. I’ll give you a huge army of fiend-devils to work with. However, before you set off on the campaign, please call a meeting of all our core people. I have some new godly-class energy arts from the immortal world for you to use.”

Yang Qi had acquired the Cardinal Grand Brahma Punishes the Fire God Energy Art, as well as the Heaven-Devouring Good-Fortune Non-Existent-Gods Dao and the Murky Cavern Never-Dying Sanctuary Energy Art.

Adding them to the Jade-Emperor Profound-Welkin Exalted-Celestial God-Dao, the Prodigious Proto-Epoch, Invincible War-Steppe, the Killing Fist of the Dao of Monarchs, the Void Mist Mountain and Sea Interstice, and the Asiryangguk Sauvastika Devil Grand Infernal Energy, he now had a total of eight godly-class energy arts.

Plus, Heaven-Devouring True Energy could be used to negate the effects of the heterogeneous true energy conflicts between them all. Best of all, the Murky Cavern Never-Dying Sanctuary Energy Art could be used to completely evade the effects of death.

Chapter 587: Big Developments

It was hard to quantify how powerful a combination of eight godly-class energy arts would be.

Even in immortal worlds, godly-class energy arts were considered consummate techniques. And in the Titan Emperor Heaven, not even members of the imperial house had them. At best, they had immortal skills, which were really just combinations of various heavenly-class energy arts.

One downside to heavenly-class arts were that they led to slower cultivation advancement. The upside was that because they were so weak, they were much less likely to lead to cultivation deviation.

But godly-class arts were different. They were far more powerful, but at the same time, came with a much greater danger of experiencing a violent death because of errors in cultivation. Throughout history, there had been many cultivators who experienced cultivation deviation when using them.

Furthermore, godly-class energy arts were profound and deeply meaningful, making them difficult for people to understand. Incorrect cultivation base advancement could lead to onslaughts of heaven-devils or infestations of heart-devils. Many people through the years had gone insane because of such things.

Generally speaking, the success rate for cultivating godly-class energy arts was very low, with the majority of people dying violently, going insane, experiencing cultivation deviation, or simply passing away in meditation while cultivating them.

And that wasn’t even to mention what would happen when cultivating multiple godly-class energy arts.

People who could overcome heart-devils and master the true energy of godly-class energy arts were generally viewed as geniuses. Those who could cultivate two such arts and not experience cultivation deviation were world-class geniuses.

Three? Consummate, world-class geniuses.

Four? Freakish hellions.

Five? Mythological legends.

Six? Well, no one had ever heard of such a thing.

Therefore, it wasn’t even necessary to mention seven or eight. People like that didn't conform to the magical laws of the universe, and in fact, defied reality.

Yang Qi, of course, was different. Considering he had the God Legion Seal and understood some of the core truths of the legion of gods, he could cultivate millions upon millions of godly-class energy arts without a problem. Furthermore, he had Heaven-Devouring True Energy, which could be used to negate the effects of any heterogeneous energy.

It was actually because of Heaven-Devouring True Energy that his people in the mortal world who were not as powerful as him could cultivate multiple godly-class energy arts. Although few could go to the extent of cultivating eight of them, it was definitely possible to reach a limit of four or five.

Right now, Yang Qi wanted as many of his Brothers and Sisters as possible to cultivate the Murky Cavern Never-Dying Sanctuary Energy Art, thus developing dharmic guards that could replace them in death. It would essentially give them extra lives, making them far harder to truly kill and also enabling them to fight people much higher than them in cultivation.

Already, Yang Qi’s many Brothers and Sisters had gathered in response to the call of his clone, joined by key figures from the Yang Clan, including his father Yang Zhan.

“Let power from the immortal world come!”

RUUUUUUMBLE!

Grand Duke Bloodstabber had been a sixth stage Abstrusity-Demolisher, thus even a scrap of his true energy would be enough to destroy millions upon millions of cultivators in the mortal world. Yang Qi had assimilated all of that true energy, and was now planning to use a bit of it to make sure that his loyal followers in the Sage Monarch planetary system could cultivate the Murky Cavern Never-Dying Sanctuary Energy Art.

He had already purified it with his God Legion Seal and Heaven-Devouring True Energy. Thus, when the energy entered the bodies of the people in the lower world, it didn’t cause true energy conflicts, but instead instantly provoked transformations that made their genes stronger and more perfect.

Instantly, everyone sank into a state of deep meditation and cultivation.

The forces of the Sage Monarch planetary system were growing rapidly stronger. In fact, thanks to Yang Qi and the great daos he could transmit through his clone, even pigs in the lower world could advance by leaps and bounds and eventually become immortals.

There were already plenty of core individuals who were Demolishers who had used the magical laws of the Tusita Heaven to form their immortal bodies, making them far stronger than the immortals from the Titan Emperor Heaven.

Days passed.

Sage Monarch City grew stronger and stronger, much to the terror of other people in the mortal world. The place had long since become a holy land of true cultivation.

That said, Yang Qi wasn’t about to relax. He would continue doing everything possible to make his people stronger and expand his territory. Even the several thousand planetary systems he had under his control were like a drop of water in the ocean. There was always the possibility that some colossal monster of an organization would come along and grind the Sage Monarch planetary system into dust.

He wanted to add more of those holy lands of true cultivation to his territory, strengthening his faith power. Of course, the most important thing of all was that his true self grow stronger. That was the crux of everything, the basis by which he would enable his people in the lower world to become invincible.

Eldest Brother opened his eyes and let loose a long cry. Twenty-four heavenly dharmic guards could be seen behind him, arrayed in a circle around his true body. He had successfully cultivated the Murky Cavern Never-Dying Sanctuary Energy Art, which also served to advance his cultivation base. He was now just on the verge of reaching second stage Space-Demolishing, which would make him an immortal warrior.

In the mortal world, half-Demolishers were generally considered top experts and were often the patriarchs of huge organizations. And full Demolishers were absolute hegemons of all existence.

Right now, Eldest Brother was such a person.

One by one, Yang Qi’s other Elder Brothers and Sisters from the Invincible Society opened their eyes and looked over at him.

“Listen up, everyone,” he said. “We’re going to go take out the Misty Kingdom, as well as their allies. Angels, come forth!”

“Yes sir!”

All twenty of Yang Qi’s angels appeared, glowing with dazzling light and holiness. The mere flutter of their wings could create spatial tempests of the most destructive nature, the type that could destroy anything and everything.

These angels had once been fiend-devils, but Yang Qi perfected their genes and transformed them into entities that could slaughter immortals. They could lead his armies of fiend-devils to destroy or conquer anything in their path.

The Invincible Society, the twenty angels, and the Yang Clan elites all poured into various space-time wormholes as they began their campaign to conquer the universe.

**

In a location far, far away, there was a holy land of cultivation made up of over a thousand planetary systems. It had a greyspace inset with a godrelic, and was a very bustling place in its part of the universe.

This holy land of true cultivation was the Misty Kingdom.

It was a mysterious place in which people cultivated godly-class energy arts and were known to be victorious in every battle they fought. There were even multiple immortals there, people with immortal bodies. Ordinary planetary systems couldn’t even compare to this place.

Yet in this moment, calamity was nigh.

Eldest Brother, the Invincible Society, and the Yang Clan were leading the expansion of their planetary system, and that meant that war was breaking out. Of course, most other planetary systems were backed by immortal worlds who would not just sit idly by while their territory was taken.

Therefore, the best targets for initial expansion were places that had no connection to any immortal world. The so-called holy lands, most of which were built on the foundation of godrelics, were places that could be conquered without any fear of retaliation from above.

Besides, the spoils of war included godrelics.

**

BAM!

As war broke out in the mortal world, a table in the immortal world shattered. That table had been crafted from true metal and was incredibly tough. Not even heavenly fire would have been able to harm it. But now something like the hand of a flame god smashed it into a liquid state, almost like mercury, which rained down onto the ground below. The power of that hand clearly bordered on the strength of gods.

“I'm so pissed!” Proud Warpatience shouted. “I can’t believe Titan Dragonguard actually killed Grand Duke Bloodstabber! This is outrageous. Never in my entire life have I been beaten like this!”

He was truly fuming with anger over the loss he had just suffered. His army had been completely demoralized and his position within the immortal world had dropped significantly. In fact, his authority over his troops had begun to wane.

Never in his wildest dreams could he have imagined that a dark horse would rise up and do this. How could Titan Dragonguard, a mere imperial clansman, be this strong? And how could he possibly use mere words to kill his opponents? What kind of power was that?

Often, the unknown was the most terrifying thing of all, and right now he had no idea how to deal with this new enemy.

‘I think I need to burn some incense to send a message to Master. Maybe after I tell him about all this, he’ll come in person to help.’ After much contemplation, the only idea Proud Warpatience could come up with was to beg for help from his Master, Proud Heaven.

However, in that moment, one of his soldiers rushed in. “Generalissimo, there’s someone outside asking to see you!”

“Oh? Who is it? If it’s someone from the army, just make them leave. I have important things to do right now.” As a powerful figure in the imperial court, there were always people coming to see him about certain matters. Even governors and city magistrates were common visitors. But he was obviously not in the mood to entertain guests.

“No, it's not someone from the Titan Emperor Heaven. There are actually two guests. One of them said he's from a distant land and came here specifically to help you resolve the current situation. Generalissimo, he said that if you don't see him, it will result in your death!”

“Oh? What psycho would dare to say things like that?” However, after a moment, Proud Warpatience’s eyes narrowed, and he said, “Fine, see him in.”

Chapter 588: Hanging Heaven

Chancellor Demi-Immortal and the yellow-garbed young man stood at the entrance of Proud Warpatience's palace, conferring via divine will.

They had already accomplished quite a bit after arriving in the Titan Emperor Heaven. When they heard the news about the so-called ‘Titan Dragonguard’ vanquishing Proud Warpatience’s army, how could the young man in yellow not have put the pieces of the puzzle together? He immediately suspected that Yang Qi had something to do with it, and in fact, that Titan Dragonguard was Yang Qi.

Therefore, he sought out Proud Warpatience in the hopes of working with him, not only to deal with Yang Qi, but also in the hopes of finding more information about the supposed Reincarnated One.

As for Chancellor Demi-Immortal, he was worried that they were putting themselves in danger.

“I heard that Proud Warpatience’s cultivation base is incredibly high. He's far beyond our ability to deal with as an opponent. Aren’t we asking a tiger for its skin? What if he attacks us? There’s no way we would be able to defend ourselves.”

“Don’t worry, Proud Warpatience can’t kill us. Remember, I set up that special spell formation in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart before we left. With that in place, nobody can hurt us.” He chuckled coldly. “Considering the preparations I've made, not even the Fateless One Yang Qi could possibly be a match for me. He might have a few advantages if we got in a fight, but in the end he would lose.”

Around this time, the soldier came hurrying back. “The generalissimo will see you. Follow me.”

Thus the young man in yellow and Chancellor Demi-Immortal were led into the depths of the mansion to meet with Proud Warpatience.

“Who are you people? And why are you here?” As soon as Proud Warpatience saw them, he unleashed a gaze of such power that the entire mansion trembled. It was so strong that it would cause ordinary mortals to immediately collapse into unconsciousness.

However, Chancellor Demi-Immortal and the young man in yellow didn't seem affected at all. In fact, there was some bizarre force within the young man in yellow that actually seemed to convert the offensive energy into something beneficial to him.

“So, the two of you are no weaklings,” Proud Warpatience said, visibly surprised. Thanks to the incident with Yang Qi, he was now a lot more cautious than before. “So who are you two? Honest people do not resort to insinuation, and I hope the two of you are honest people. Those are the only type I’ll work with.”

“I come from a mysterious land,” the young man said, “and I want to cooperate with you long-term. I know you’re in a tough situation here, and that Titan Dragonguard inflicted a heavy blow on the morale of your troops. I can tell you where Titan Dragonguard actually comes from, what kind of energy arts he cultivates, and who he really is.

“You see, he’s no one to take lightly. His energy arts are based on the workings of fate, although the truth is that his true power doesn't have anything to do with energy arts. He can alter the fates of others, and also use fate to attack them. If he says someone will die, they will die. The upside is that, right now, his cultivation base is low. His energy arts are heaven-defying in every sense of the word, making him the envy of the host of immortals, the horde of devils, and the swarms of ghosts. If he successfully increases the level of his cultivation base, he’ll become very difficult to deal with, and in fact, nearly impossible to kill. From what I can tell, he’s currently amassing power to work toward his next breakthrough. The time to kill him is now!

“Don’t worry, Generalissimo. He’s actually not a match for you right now. You need to be wary of his fate-based techniques, but in the end his cultivation level is too far beneath yours. Right now, he can only manipulate the fate of sixth stage Abstrusity-Demolishers.”

“Oh? So he can alter fate and attack with it?” Proud Warpatience was actually quite taken aback by that, and it suddenly made the whole situation much clearer. It also opened up many new avenues of possibility. “Who even knew that such powers existed in heaven and earth?”

“There’s nothing strange about it. The god legion kingdom surpasses anything mortals can conceive of. Consider this: we are immortals, but to us, the people in the mortal world are so weak as to be irrelevant. And to the legion of gods, people like us are essentially mortals. So, what do you think? Are you willing to work with me to eradicate Titan Dragonguard? If you are, I’ll need an identity to allow me to remain hidden within your army.”

Eyes glittering with a sinister light, Proud Warpatience said, “Fine. Let’s work together. Princess Jadefall’s army is about to wage war on the Hanging Heaven, and Titan Dragonguard will lead the campaign. He’s been appointed the Marquis of Military Security, a position of much authority. Considering how important he is to the imperial house, an open attack on him won’t work. We’ll have to strike from the shadows.”

“I know. The war on the Hanging Heaven will be the perfect setting to strike him down. When the actual moment comes, Generalissimo, I’ll need you to strike the fatal blow. Of course, I’ll be off to the side to assist. And I’ll have a grand spell formation set up to make sure he can’t escape.” Although no one could detect it, there was something sinister in the young man’s eyes as he stared at Proud Warpatience….

Two powerful individuals had formed an alliance.

**

Meanwhile, Yang Qi had begun making arrangements among the heavenly soldiers under his command.

His troops were far more disciplined and dangerous than any of the fiendslave battalions. They were no cannon fodder, and their leaders were all fourth stage immortal generals, Origin-Demolishers. There were even some immortal marquises who were World-Demolishers. Such individuals had titles similar to Yang Qi’s.

Normally speaking, they were obstinate and unruly people who wouldn't listen to anyone other than Princess Jadefall. However, Yang Qi’s recent devastating performance had completely won them over.

After gathering the officers, Yang Qi looked them over and found them all to be valiant individuals who bubbled with killing intent. They looked like veterans of numerous battles, and he couldn’t have been more pleased. Nodding, he said, “Today we lead the armies of the Titan Emperor Heaven to invade the immortal world that is the Hanging Heaven. All ten armies must follow my orders to the letter, understand?”

The officers were too intimidated to even look at him, and kept their heads bowed. However, in response to his orders, they all loudly said, “Yes Sir!”

“We’ll do whatever you order, sir, even climb mountains of daggers and swim through seas of flames!”

“Excellent. Considering the meritorious services we’re about to perform, the imperial court will definitely reward us handsomely. That said, I'm offering personal rewards. Any of you who kills an enemy of the same cultivation level as yourself will be awarded a sonic-class mecha, as well as a hundred power stones!”

He waved his hands, causing a small pile of power stones to build up in front of him.

A buzz of surprise rose up from the officers. All of them knew how valuable power stones from the Tusita Heaven were. Although they had heard that Titan Dragonguard had discovered a godrelic and gained access to a large supply of such stones, seeing it with their own eyes was a different matter.

Thanks to the way Yang Qi was handling things, morale was high, and as the bugles of war sounded, Princess Jadefall’s forces headed toward the Hanging Heaven.

Glittering light could be seen everywhere as numerous ancient teleportation portals were opened, leading to a location far from the Titan Emperor Heaven.

Yang Qi had thus far seen only one immortal world, and had no idea what others might look like. He led the armies into the teleportation portal, then watched as space whizzed by. Soon, they were out of the greyspace of the Titan Emperor Heaven.

RUMBLE!

Although they were in the passage created by the teleportation portal, they were still able to see outside of it. The greyspace behind them was a dark yellow color and protected the immortal world from the deadly tempests beyond, which were millions upon millions of times stronger than the similar tempests from the mortal world. They were strong enough that they could destroy any immortal world that didn’t have the protection of a greyspace.

This was the vacuum that existed between immortal worlds, filled with preheaven primordial chaos and proterozoic empyrean winds.

From this vantage point, Yang Qi could see that the Titan Emperor Heaven was an enormous sphere, so large that even thousands of the Sage Monarch planetary system put together would be like a speck of dust compared to it. In fact, from this position he couldn’t even see the full sphere.

Eventually, the teleportation portal led Yang Qi and the troops to an enormous asteroid hanging in space. From here, it was still possible to see the Titan Emperor Heaven far behind them. Meanwhile, another spherical immortal world was visible in the opposite direction in front of them.

It was pitch black, with a greyspace that actually rippled as if it were made from water. It contained boundless demonic energy, and was obviously an immortal world inhabited by demonic entities.

The sight of it actually caused Yang Qi’s heart to pound in his chest.

Despite the fact that he could see both of these immortal worlds with his eyes, he knew that they were so far apart that, without a teleportation portal, it would take years to fly between them.

Chapter 589: Fighting for the Asteroid

‘It’s an entire kingdom of demon-immortals,’ he thought, standing on the enormous asteroid and looking at the black greyspace of the Hanging Heaven. The demon energy roiled in a sinister and mysterious fashion, seemingly the opposite of the warmth and liveliness of humanity.

As for the asteroid, it was covered with teleportation portals and wormholes of all sorts, some of them leading to the Titan Emperor Heaven, others to the Hanging Heaven. In essence, this asteroid was a travel hub that had to be passed through to get from the Titan Emperor Heaven to the Hanging Heaven. As such, it was a strategically vital location.

Whoever controlled it could prevent armies from using it to go back and forth. After all, without using a hub, and the portals and wormholes attached to it, one would have to brave the spatial tempests that existed between immortal worlds. Forgetting the fact that an army would likely be wiped out of existence by those storms, there was also the fact that it would simply take too long. Even Yang Qi, with his incredible speed, would need years to go from one immortal world to another.

As soon as Princess Jadefall’s armies stepped onto the asteroid, demonic winds sprang up, filled with demon energy.

The asteroid was massive, too large for any single person to explore alone, and was apparently the remnants of something created by some ancient god.

The truth was that it was a godrelic.

Looking down, Yang Qi tapped his foot on the ground and found that it was metallic in nature. Even stomping his foot down with incredible force didn’t leave the slightest mark. It was obviously very tough. Taking control of it with a branding mark also wouldn’t be possible.

“Marquis,” Yuan Kuohai said, “according to the stories, this asteroid was created by an ancient god to facilitate travel between the Titan Emperor Heaven and the Hanging Heaven. Both immortal worlds branded it with their mark, making it impossible for even a sovereign of heaven to take control of it. Only Godmyths could possibly attempt something like that. Whenever fighting breaks out between the Hanging Heaven and us, it usually happens right here. Hopefully, this time we can actually continue on and strike at the heart of the Hanging Heaven. Remember, the Hanging Heaven is occupied by Demonfolk immortals, so when you kill them you can harvest both demon cores and immortal pellets. Not only will they count toward your service record, they can also be used to make immortal pills or magical treasures. Of course, the Demonfolk immortals want to kill us to get our nascent divinities to make their demon items and demon pills. In the end, our two forces are diametrically opposed and will stop at nothing to kill each other.”

Yang Qi nodded. “I see.”

At the moment, a fiendslave battalion was arrayed in front of the main army, facing the Demonfolk forces on the other end of the asteroid, who also had a fiendslave battalion out in front. As the two sides advanced, they began fighting, causing both demon light and immortal light to rise up.

Yang Qi opened his Lord's Eye to look closer at the situation. Instantly, he could see that most of the soldiers from the enemy’s fiendslave battalion had fused their demon cores with various magical treasures, flags, banners, gourds, and the like. And whenever they killed one of their immortal counterparts, that person’s nascent divinity would be absorbed by the demon core.

The Hanging Heaven’s fiendslave battalion was populated with savage, barbaric fighters who were clearly veterans of many battles. Some resembled tigers, others snakes. Some were like leopards, and there were even some that were fish-like. All of them seemed like fierce beasts of yore. Although they all bore humanoid shape, sometimes they would revert to their original form, which made it easier for them to manipulate vital energy and would also boost their fighting prowess.

‘Incredible. Their fiendslave battalion is actually far superior to the Titan Emperor Heaven’s. Our side can hardly stand up to them!’

The two forces were so mismatched that every demon soldier who fell took ten immortal soldiers with it. As the fighting wore on, the battle lines on the Titan Emperor Heaven’s side began crumbling.

Suddenly, the color of gold and jade appeared as Princess Jadefall emerged from a teleportation portal, surrounded by elite troops. Immediately, the pounding of drums could be heard as she raised her voice and said, “All divisions, support the fiendslave battalion! Push those demon soldiers back!”

The drums boomed like thunder, each beat boosting morale a bit and causing the troops’ blood to surge through their veins.

Looking over at Yang Qi, she said, “Titan Dragonguard, your ten divisions will be the vanguard. Lead the charge and stab your way into the enemy forces. Destroy their momentum! If you succeed, I’ll reward you handsomely!”

“Yes ma’am!” Yang Qi replied. In some ways, this was a unique opportunity. Here were plenty of Demonfolk soldiers, all immortals, and he could slaughter them without restraint. Their demon cores would allow him to start collecting the essence of the Hanging Heaven. He had to be careful absorbing the essence of the Titan Emperor Heaven; if he went too far, it could attract the wrong kind of attention. But when dealing with the Hanging Heaven he had no such scruples.

Since this was an outright battle, he could even use his Heaven-Devouring Grand Formation to mow down more Demonfolk. Of the quintessence-blood and vital energy he harvested, he would keep some for the improvement of his internal pellet and send the rest down to the lower world.

RUUUUUUUUMBLE!

Without any hesitation, he turned into a long stream of bright light that shot right into the fighting.

In the blink of an eye, he was on the other end of the asteroid, surrounded by enemies.

Right in front of him were a bunch of Demonfolk immortals with human bodies, the heads of eagles, and majestic wings. They were Eaglefolk, all of them vicious fighters with eyes that glowed with malicious, blood-colored light. Their razor-sharp claws could easily slice an opponent into pieces with no effort at all.

When they saw Yang Qi flying toward them, one of them shouted, “A powerful enemy! Get in formation. Eagle Strikes from the Sky!”

In response, over a thousand of the Eaglefolk threw out their demon cores, causing black energy to roil in all directions and create the projection of an enormous, gigantic eagle that lunged forward with bared claws.

Yang Qi completely ignored it. In fact, he sped up, blasting through the formation. Before any of the Eaglefolk could even react, they were dead.

“Devour!”

Yang Qi opened his mouth and sucked in all of the corpses with a single breath.

Then he exhaled, and a composite demon core appeared.

Although it was only the size of a hand, it contained the quintessence-blood and vital energy of over a thousand Eaglefolk demons. Considering that each of those demons had been terrifying figures who could destroy virtually any prey they went after in the universe, it was obvious that this demon core was a magical treasure. By imbuing it with true energy and throwing it out, it would transform into an enormous eagle, the same type that had just appeared within the spell formation.

In the shortest of moments, Yang Qi had pierced through enemy lines and inflicted a grievous blow on their forces.

“Stop him! He’s an expert from the Titan Emperor Heaven! Kill him, and the demon emperor will reward you!”

Psychic fluctuations surged out in waves, causing Yang Qi to look around for their origin. The Demonfolk army around him was so vast it made it seem like he was in a sea of ants.

HISSSSSSSSSSSSS!

An expert suddenly lunged out at him, a creature with a human body and the head of a snake, with a long sword in his hand that was bifurcated like a serpent's tongue. He was an expert from the Snakefolk, and it was without hesitation that he slashed his sword out with the force to devastate universes.

This expert was not from the fiendslave battalion. He was an elite warrior whose sword was a product of his own cultivation. He was actually a world-class assassin who was used to leaving behind seas of blood wherever he went.

WHIZZZ!

Yang Qi didn’t even move. He simply reached out with his hand, causing a sound that resembled metal grating against metal. In the blink of an eye, the deadly sword snapped in half. Then Yang Qi’s hand was at the Snakefolk demon-immortal’s throat. He squeezed and it exploded, revealing its demon core, which he took.

Then he blurred into motion, slaughtering a group of several hundred more Snakefolk and collecting all of their demon cores.

They were far more powerful than the Eaglefolk, and the mere flick of their tongue could destroy countless enemies. But Yang Qi was slaughtering them left and right.

“These Snakefolk cores are incredible. They’ll be very useful later. Bring it on, Demonfolk. The more of you the better!”

Chapter 590: Slaughtering the Enemy

Yang Qi was off on his own, slaughtering the enemy within their own ranks.

He was surrounded by a seemingly never-ending sea of vicious faces, a horde of Demonfolk, all of whom wanted to kill him. No matter how many he killed, more were there to replace them.

“Die!”

A squad of demon soldiers appeared. They had human heads, the torsos of wasps, and were the size of horses. Their wings buzzed as they flew forward and launched clouds of what appeared to be poisoned arrows.

They were actually poison stingers that were the product of these wasp-like demon-immortals’ cultivation and were capable of piercing through all sorts of defensive empyrean energy. In short, they were completely fatal.

Thankfully, Yang Qi had his God Legion Paradise.

Ping. Ping.

The stingers all shattered upon impact. Then Yang Qi unleashed the Hand of the One God.

RUMBLE!

Space shattered as if an ancient god had personally smashed it, and the wasp demons exploded. With a wave of his hand, Yang Qi collected their quintessence energy, souls, and demon cores, crumpling them down into a huge composite demon core which he then absorbed into his internal pellet.

In the shortest of moments, over ten thousand of the wasp demons were wiped out of existence.

POP!

Next, Yang Qi went on to a group of flying spider demons, all of whom were the size of mountains. As soon as they saw him, they released heaps of spider webs to try to bind him. The webbing was also the result of the demon magic they cultivated, and when used in a formation was something most ordinary people would find impossible to escape.

“Complete crap. I can’t believe you’re trying this move on me.”

He waved his hand and the God Legion Paradise appeared again, filled with King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans, which quickly devoured the spider web and sucked the spider demons in as well.

A moment later, they were refined into another demon core.

As of this moment, he had acquired four composite demon cores, one from the eagles, one from the snakes, one from the wasps, and one from the spiders.

It was almost as if the battle had turned into a contest to see how many demon cores Yang Qi could get.

Cores such as these would be incredibly useful, whether to work on his internal pellet, to craft magical treasures, or to form spell formations. The more of the essence of the Hanging Heaven he could build up, the more beneficial it would be toward his upcoming breakthrough.

After slaughtering the spider demons, a roar of rage echoed out, along with a string of magical symbols from a dhāraṇī incantation. This roar was no divine ability of the Demonfolk, but instead the function of an ancient spell formation designed to suppress wretch-devils, something created by some almighty figure from an ancient buddhist school.

The Lionfolk were considered divine and holy, the kings among all of the beasts. Long ago, members of the ancient Lionfolk had sat in leadership positions in the buddhist schools, which was why modern-day Lionfolk inherently had strange buddhist divine abilities at their disposal.

“Bamiḍala… Höng. Höng. Höng… Țuluo’duoluô, Yeshejué….”

Over a hundred thousand lions appeared up above, formed into ranks that caused an immortal kingdom to spread out from them, sending holy light out in all directions. It looked like the constellation Leo, and the dhāraṇī incantation they chanted created golden magical symbols that swept forth to crush Yang Qi.

The symbols took numerous shapes. Lotuses, vajras, kāṣāyas, alms bowls, banners, flags, and wheels. There were also countless golden buddhas, making this attack seem like something completely invincible.

After all, those golden buddhas were things that could destroy all types of wretch-devils. Unexpectedly, this was a godly-class energy art that came as a spell formation.

“Namaḥ Myriad Buddha Vajra Great Compassion Mantra Art!” As soon as the power of the dhāraṇī hit Yang Qi, it was like millions upon millions of golden mountains crushing down on him, power that would make it almost impossible for anyone to breathe.

These holy lions were vastly stronger than the eagles, snakes, wasps, and spiders from before. They were true elites, lion immortals with fur as pure and white as angels’ wings. Furthermore, they were all immortal officers at the very least, which went to show how indescribably powerful they were. And their godly-class energy art was completely unique to Lionfolk.

RUMBLE!

The magical symbols grew denser, and the power of the mantra grew more intense. Yang Qi’s God Legion Paradise was even starting to crack and crumble.

Yet he only smiled coldly as the enormous Wheel of Fate appeared above him and began turning. The mantra being used against him instantly went silent, the magical symbols fluttering down to land on his God Legion Battle Robe.

In the blink of an eye, the robe transformed, making it seem like a holy kāṣāya covered with buddhist iconography such as magical treasures, śarīras, golden buddhas, and the like. It was like an entire kingdom of buddhas.

“Grow!” Yang Qi said, and his God Legion Battle Robe suddenly swept out in all directions.

Hundreds of snow-white lions were swept into the robe and transformed to embroidery on its surface. In the blink of an eye, a huge hole was punched into the battle lines of the hundred thousand lion immortals.

“The God Legion Battle Robe can contain worlds….” Yang Qi exhaled some true energy and black holes sprang up everywhere on the God Legion Battle Robe, within which were coiled primal-chaos elder-snakes that began devouring the surviving lions.

Yang Qi was showing no mercy and didn’t intend to let a single lion escape. No, he would kill them all, then extract that buddhist godly-class energy art from them. There were also far, far more demon cores to be had from these lions than from any of the demons before.

Lions were being sealed left and right.

Then Yang Qi exhaled and used Mass Cloning to produce so many versions of himself that each lion faced a copy. The clones crushed the lions, and just like that a hundred thousand of them were destroyed.

Next, he transformed them into a huge śarīra, fully the size of a human head, within which were endless buddhist chants coming from a buddhist rite center.

‘What an incredible demon core. Or should I say a buddha core? There isn’t any demon energy at all inside of it. Just buddha energy on par with the holiness of the legion of gods.’ He placed the śarīra next to his internal pellet and the Heaven-Devouring śarīras. ‘If I could get a few more buddha cores like this, it would be great. I wonder what type of Demonfolk rule this Hanging Heaven. I wouldn’t be surprised if they were Mammothfolk.’

The ancient megamammoths were true rulers, and had the most advanced blood of all Demonfolk. After all, they were the descendants of godmammoths who had been created to suppress hells, as well as demons and devils.

By the time Yang Qi smashed through the eagles, snakes, wasps, spiders, and lions, he was close to the teleportation portals on the other side of the asteroid. They were all active, continuously funneling more and more Demonfolk from the Hanging Heaven.

‘This would be the perfect chance to get into one of the portals and head directly into the Hanging Heaven. Then I could directly absorb the essence of the place.’ As he drew closer, a pack of wolf demons leaped toward him. They all had crescent moon sigils on their foreheads, the mark of an ancient evil god, one of the suzerains of hell.

They were descendants of the Moonlight Wolf God.

According to legends, the Moonlight Wolf God was the suzerain of the Hell of Endless Night, and was either as strong as the members of the legion of gods, or was in fact a former member. If the latter were true, it meant that he had forsaken the glory of the god legion and the light of the Lord to become a ruler of hell.

These descendants of his in the immortal worlds were moonlight devilwolves.

The moonlight devilwolves were strong, but Yang Qi didn’t hesitate to leap into their midst, causing blood to rain down everywhere.

Every one that exploded added another demon core to his collection, and soon he was right in front of the teleportation portal. Without hesitation, he jumped in and vanished.

“Wow!” Grand Duchess Violet-Moon said, watching the battle using a magical mirror. “Titan Dragonguard went in on his own! He cut through the eagles, snakes, wasps, spiders, lions, and some wolves too. And then he went into the teleportation portal. He's going to the Hanging Heaven!”

“What nerve!” Princess Jadefall said. “He’s definitely got guts. And considering how many enemies he’s killed already, he's already earned himself the title of vice prince.”

Chapter 591: Absorbing Essence

Yang Qi essentially walked up to the front door and just entered the Hanging Heaven.

Even Princess Jadefall felt that he was being recklessly greedy. Thankfully, his charge through the Demonfolk army had left a virtual chasm in their ranks, leading directly to one of the teleportation portals. And Princess Jadefall was the type of person who didn’t hesitate to take advantage of any opportunity she came across.

“Push onward to the teleportation portals! Follow the Marquis of Military Security into the Hanging Heaven!”

With a wave of her hand, she sent her own forces pouring into the gap that Yang Qi had created.

“Yes ma’am!”

“This is awesome. Our experts are all slightly weaker than the soldiers from the Hanging Heaven. Thankfully we have the Marquis of Military Security to carve out a path of blood for us to follow!”

“Attack! Kill our way into the Hanging Heaven, then kill our way out. This is unheard of! Once word gets out of the battle today, it will bring glory to the Titan Emperor Heaven!”

“That’s right. Morale has gotten low back at home, with everyone thinking that our immortal world is going to be destroyed soon. If we can crush the enemy today, it will definitely lift everyone’s spirits. Maybe we can finally restore our glory!”

“We're the restorers of glory! And that means we’ll get handsomely rewarded!”

“Charge! Attack! Follow the Marquis of Military Security! His cultivation base is unfathomable. After he killed Grand Duke Bloodstabber with mere words, I heard he entered the Kingdom of Titan to cultivate for seven days in a row. Who knows how much more powerful he is than before?”

“You’re right. And look, he just took out a hundred thousand Lionfolk with godly-class energy arts. Who could match up to strength like that?”

“The Marquis of Military Security is a genius! He’s going to save our immortal world! Who would ever have thought that the lousy imperial house would first produce an almighty being like Princess Jadefall, and then the Marquis of Military Security, Titan Dragonguard? I guess the will of heaven just doesn't want the imperial house to fall.”

Everyone was buzzing about Yang Qi’s performance and felt their morale surging as they leapt forth to battle their way to the teleportation portals.

The Demonfolk lines of battle were already wavering, and some of the demons seemed to be on the verge of fleeing. It certainly looked as if Princess Jadefall’s forces would gain victory this time.

**

‘This is amazing,’ Yang Qi thought. After emerging from the teleportation portal, everything changed. He was in an enormous new heaven and earth, a place filled with demon energy. Mountains, rivers, and everything else were suffused with demonic miasma. There were enormous trees, hundreds of kilometers in diameter, that stretched tens of thousands of kilometers into the sky like worlds unto themselves.

The Hanging Heaven was not a place of culture and civilization, but rather one of savagery and barbarism. It was only in such places that wild, powerful, and bloodthirsty Demonfolk could rise up.

Of course, there were Demonfolk armies pouring through the surrounding forest toward the teleportation portals.

Almost immediately, Yang Qi felt killing intent locking onto him. Looking around, he realized he was surrounded by more moonlight devilwolves. They had wolf heads and furred human bodies, with crescent moon sigils on their foreheads.

Howling, they rushed toward Yang Qi with deadly intent.

One of the leaders of the wolves, an immortal general with particularly long claws, leaped forward and cried, “Stormwind Devilwolf Claw!”

Normally speaking, a savage and deadly energy art like this would cause an opponent's cultivation base to drop just from the fear. Humans were usually at a disadvantage when fighting demons, even when those demons had lower cultivation bases. That was because Demonfolk had killing intent and a disregard for safety built into their genes. It created an instinctual fear within the hearts of human cultivators.

In fact, even the legion of gods could fear them, much less mere immortals.

Wham!

Yang Qi reached out and casually crushed the devilwolf’s head into a cloud of blood and gore.

Looking back, he saw that troops from Princess Jadefall’s armies were already heading in his direction, which provoked a slight smile. Then, he transformed into a stream of magical symbols that resolved into a primal-chaos elder-snake.

In response, all of the moonlight devilwolves dropped to the ground and began howling submissively. In their souls, they felt as though they were in the presence of the lord of demon-devils, making it impossible for them to use their energy arts, or do anything else for that matter.

When Yang Qi backed his primal-chaos elder-snake with the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, the results were very terrifying.

The helpless wolves were consumed by the primal-chaos elder-snake, which then went on to devour the essence of the immortal world in the area. Trees. Soil. Demon energy. Spatial dimensions. The snake ate everything.

It was almost as if this immortal world were a pancake, and Yang Qi was just gobbling it up. King Heaven-Devourer specialized in devouring heavens, and immortal worlds were heavens.

On the other side of the portal, Princess Jadefall was able to use the full power of her cultivation base to distract the powerful enemy generals, leaving Yang Qi free to slaughter the Demonfolk around him and take the immortal world essence.

In the Titan Emperor Heaven, he had to devour immortal world essence carefully and secretly so as not to disturb the general equilibrium. But not so here. And even better, the essence of the Hanging Heaven was much stronger, enabling him to make Heaven-Devouring śarīras much more quickly.

After slaughtering all of the Demonfolk in the area, and forming numerous composite demon cores, he headed into the mountains to look for treasures.

RUMBLE!

An enormous hand suddenly descended from above, wreathed in flame and covered in elemental fays and burning magical symbols.

“Since when did someone like you rise up in the Titan Emperor Heaven? How is your Titan bloodline so strong!?”

Yang Qi looked up and saw an entity that resembled an angel. Of course, he had created angels who were pure and pulsed with sagelight, so he could tell that this wasn’t an actual angel. This person was covered with fire and had wings with feathers made of pure flame.

Opening his Lord's Eye, he saw that the angel-like entity was actually a huge, fiery bird, whose fire was so intense it could burn up entire planets. It was none other than a fabled flamecrane.

This particular flamecrane was a sixth stage Abstrusity-Demolisher.

“You’re from the imperial house of the Titan Emperor Heaven, aren’t you? What’s your name? And how did you get those snakecharms? Hand them over immediately and beg for your life, otherwise you’ll be nothing but ashes within moments! I'm Immortal Paragon Flamecrane Ascendant, and you’re no match for me! Ten Thousand Fiery Mountains!” The flamecrane waved its hand and entire mountains of fire descended to lock Yang Qi in place.

Next, its fingers flashed in a magical incantation as it sent out fire, forming a kingdom of flames to destroy the snake.

“River of Flames!”

“Moron!” Yang Qi said, and the primal-chaos elder-snake suddenly shrank down to a size of only three thousand meters long. Then it opened its mouth and devoured all of the fiery mountains, as well as the river of flames.

In the blink of an eye, all the fire was gone.

“The great dao is formless,” he chanted, “the sun and moon dazzle; yin and yang interact, swirling evermore….”

Suddenly, the primal-chaos elder-snake shrank down into a streak of sword light that shot directly toward Immortal Paragon Flamecrane Ascendant.

“Aaaiiiieee!” the flamecrane screamed, and a moment later was nothing more than a corpse.

“Hand of the One God!”

He reached out and a crystalline śarīra appeared, which was all that was left of Immortal Paragon Flamecrane Ascendant. Within the śarīra, a fiery bird glided back and forth, going through the forms of some sort of fire-type energy art.

Flamecranes were god birds, and thus were born with inherent godliness. And their energy arts naturally had some deathlessness at their core. This flamecrane's blood was going to be very useful to the fire-type energy arts that Yang Qi had.

Chapter 592: Besieged by Demons

Yang Qi had recently acquired a fire-type energy art, namely the Cardinal Grand Brahma Punishes the Fire God Energy Art.

Based on his own cultivation, he knew that he would have a hard time developing the flame of his own godliness. But after assimilating this flamecrane, and the godliness from its demon core, a fiery golden seed appeared within his internal pellet.

His internal pellet now had Heaven-Devouring True Energy and śarīras, as well as numerous demon cores. And this addition immediately benefited him immensely. His Blood of the One God grew stronger, and advanced to the level of twelve ten-thousandths.

Every ten-thousandth bit of advancement was a tiny bit closer to the level of that ancient monarch who presided over the legion of gods, the paramount and boundless Sovereign Lord. And once his Blood of the One God reached the complete level, it would mean that he had one full drop of the Sovereign Lord’s blood, a level of power so immense that he could kill people like Princess Jadefall and Proud Warpatience with a mere breath.

He waved his hand, sending out streams of light that cut down any Demonfolk it touched. Armies rushed forward in floods, only to be cut down with impunity.

At one point, a group of fox demons appeared, all of them beautiful women with long fox tails. They didn’t attack with weapons, but rather, used seductive dancing and enticing true energy. Anyone who looked at them would feel the most profound attraction to them. Their leader was so bewitching that she could topple kingdoms with her good looks. Her gentle, undulating dance would tug at the soul of anyone who observed it.

The Foxfolk were legendary creatures, about whom stories were told amongst everyone, from common mortals to the most powerful immortals.

Soon, it became apparent that these dancing Foxfolk were operating a huge spell formation for the purpose of seducing Yang Qi. The Foxfolk were considered particularly intelligent within the Hanging Heaven, and were also important figures within the army. And with little effort on their part, they could sow heart-devils within the enemy.

“Cosmic Heart-Devils; Pleasure and Desire; Six Desires and Seven Emotions; Corrupt the Legion of Gods; Undermine the World; the Gods are Debased; Pollute Heaven and Earth….”

As it turned out, the leader of these Foxfolk was an expert similar to the flamecrane he had just killed. As she chanted, the lyrics of her song turned into heart-devils that wormed their way toward Yang Qi.

‘Foxfolk? Heart-devils? Nice. It would be a pity to slaughter so many beautiful women. Instead, I’ll keep them around as servant girls.’ He quickly drew on the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, stirring the God Legion Seal to defeat the heart-devils and the power of enticement and turn them into replenishment for his true energy.

To him, these things were like children’s toys.

Swish!

He flew into the formation, shining as brightly as a buddha as his God Legion Battle Robe flapped in the wind. Then the God Legion Battle Robe spread out, instantly enveloping all of the Foxfolk.

In the blink of an eye, his minor world became filled with hosts of beautiful women.

“Who are you?” their leader shouted, eyes flashing with anger as she flew toward him aggressively.

“Don’t bother trying to fight me,” he said. “I just killed that flamecrane, and he was a sixth stage Abstrusity-Demolisher. And your energy arts are much weaker. In fact, your arts of enticement are completely useless on me. Killing you would be as easy as turning over my hand. I want you and the rest of your bewitching Foxfolk to be my new servant girls.”

“You talk big, but did you really think we wouldn’t have other methods to deal with you? I'm Immortal Paragon Enchanting Rain. Haven’t heard of me before, have you? Ai! People always get so focused on our beauty that they don’t expect us to be such strong fighters. Watch and learn. You’re going to see what a real attack looks like! Ultimate Moon Life-Ending Lexicon, Volume One: Full-Moon Heaven-River!”

Swish!

All of a sudden, a bright moon appeared behind her, radiating a cold glow that turned into numerous streams of sword light. They were things that could end all life and kill people so efficiently they didn’t shed blood.

As the sword light shot forward, wriggling magical symbols appeared that took the shape of the character ‘kill’, dripping in blood.

A river of blood swept out from this ‘life-ending lexicon’, causing Yang Qi’s gaze to harden as he sent out sagelight to stop it.

“Volume Two: The Pen Paints Spring and Autumn.”

An enormous brush pen appeared behind Immortal Paragon Enchanting Rain, like a dragon which began to paint volumes of death.

“Excellent energy art!” Yang Qi realized that some of these volumes contained the ultimate meaning of life, and some of them contained death! Both life and death were under their purview, yet he reached out with his palm, grabbed them, and crushed them out of existence.

“Volume Three: Heaven and Earth Wither and Thrive.”

Immortal Paragon Enchanting Rain wasn’t holding anything back. She resorted to another powerful divine ability, sending out deathly true energy that could surpass both time and space.

This power could dominate both life and death, and could change fate itself.

In response, Yang Qi summoned his Wheel of Fate, which reversed the momentum of the withering, thriving true energy and sent it right back to Immortal Paragon Enchanting Rain.

“What’s going on here?” she blurted as her own body was thrown into chaos. Then, before she could do anything else, Yang Qi reached out and slapped his Devil-God Seal onto her, completely locking her down.

“Just kill me!” she cried, closing her eyes, fully aware that she was completely under Yang Qi’s control now, and completely helpless. If he wanted, he could cripple her energy arts at will.

“Hmph! Why would I kill you? You’re going to stay right here in my God Legion Paradise, sealed and compliant. One day, if you devote yourselves to me, I might let you go. But now's not the time for chatting. I have plenty more Demonfolk to kill before my next breakthrough.”

He reached out and ran his hand down her cheek, and all of a sudden he felt a strong feeling of desire rising up in him, trying to force him into degradation.

“Not bad,” he said. “Even someone with incredible willpower who touches your skin will be forced into depravity. Except me. I control fate and am the sovereign of all things. I've already transcended all forms of attraction. My will does not belong to this world any longer.”

He waved his hand, sending sealing marks out onto all of the other tens of thousands of beautiful Foxfolk, imprisoning them in the God Legion Paradise.

BOOM!

An enormous axe suddenly slammed into the greyspace of the God Legion Paradise, causing a shower of sparks. During the time in which Yang Qi was subduing the Foxfolk, other Demonfolk armed forces had charged forth to attempt to rescue them.

The Foxfolk were important, and it was no wonder that such a rescue attempt was being made. Unfortunately, a primal-chaos elder-snake was there in the God Legion Paradise, ensuring that any attack which hit it was devoured.

But this enormous axe was an exception.

An enraged roar echoed out as a young man appeared, axe in hand. He was enormous, not because he was fat, but because he was covered with bulging, perfectly-formed muscles. In fact, even Yang Qi could sense that his blood was holy and pure, the type that could vanquish myriads of demons and devils. This was godmammoth blood! This was a megamammoth demon-immortal!

This young man reminded him of Mammoth Force, who he had killed back in the Hanging Mountain. Except this young man was many, many times stronger than Mammoth Force. And the blows of his axe were the type that could destroy the heavens and besiege suns and moons. He was past the seventh stage of Wilds-Demolishing! He was an immortal ancestor! Immortal ancestors were terrifying entities that Yang Qi’s Glad Tidings of the Lord couldn’t affect. The level gap was just too incredible.

“Release my fiancée immediately!” the megamammoth said, his voice quivering with rage. “If you touch a hair on Immortal Paragon Enchanting Rain’s head, I’ll take your life! Even hiding in the depths of hell won’t do you any good!”

Chapter 593: Megamammoth Immortal Ancestor

Seventh step Wilds-Demolishers were also called immortal ancestors, and were usually individuals with monstrous killing intent. As it turned out, the Immortal Paragon Enchanting Rain that Yang Qi had taken captive was actually the fiancée of this immortal ancestor, who was now thoroughly enraged by his act.

The axe descended again, and the greyspace of the God Legion Paradise shook violently. Even Yang Qi felt the force of the blow.

“You want to kill me? Sorry, it won't be that easy.” He shrank the greyspace down, then shot into motion, disappearing into the surrounding Demonfolk armies.

“Running around won’t save you from me. You’re still going to die. I'm Mammoth Dharma-Heaven, and there’s no way a nobody like you could deal with someone like me. How dare you intrude on our Hanging Heaven. Heaven and Earth Schism!”

RIIIIP!

Mammoth Dharma-Heaven’s axe fell again, slicing directly into the army, creating a massive gulch in space and slamming into Yang Qi, forcing him to a standstill.

‘Who is this guy?’ Yang Qi thought. He had assumed that jumping into the middle of the Demonfolk army would lead to his opponent hesitating to shoot the rat for fear of breaking the vases.

Who would have thought that Mammoth Dharma-Heaven would send out a ruthless attack that would actually lock down on Yang Qi himself, almost as if it were intelligent? For an attack to have intelligence of its own, for true energy to have its own soul and nascent divinity, was a thing that only the most invincible individual could accomplish.

“Prepare to die!”

The axe slashed through the air yet again.

Yang Qi met it with a fist strike, and a destructive shock wave rolled out in all directions as a result. Next, Mammoth Dharma-Heaven seemingly became one with his axe, spinning it around himself so rapidly that it made what seemed like a metallic bubble that began rolling toward Yang Qi with destructive force.

In the blink of an eye, Yang Qi felt like he was surrounded by swinging axes, each of which could destroy worlds and universes. And it seemed impossible to escape.

Not even the Wheel of Fate could help him.

The higher the level of an opponent, the less effective the Wheel of Fate would be in altering fate. Mammoth Dharma-Heaven was an immortal ancestor, which meant that Yang Qi was at a big disadvantage.

“Profound Heaven Slash!”

Axe light shone, and the space around Yang Qi shattered in layers.

His God Legion Paradise shrank down, and he resorted to the Superlative Defense.

“You don’t have what it takes to stand up to me!” Mammoth Dharma-Heaven growled. “I’ll capture your nascent divinity and make you live a life worse than death. Your level is low, but you’re extremely strong, so you’ll make a great research subject. I’ll extract your flesh and blood and hire the Mechfolk to analyze the substructure of your genes!”

“I've got your fiancée right here, Mammoth Dharma-Heaven!” Yang Qi shouted. “You’d better not do anything rash, otherwise I’ll defile her right in front of you!” Yang Qi’s words provoked exactly the effect he had been aiming for.

“What gall! You really want to end up dead, don’t you? Fine. Go ahead and try that. I'm an emperor here in the Hanging Heaven, so if my fiancée dies, I can get a replacement easily. There are plenty of beauties among the Foxfolk. So go ahead and defile her, then I’ll go defile all the immortal beauties in the Titan Emperor Heaven! And I’ll turn that Princess Jadefall of yours into the most depraved of all possible pleasure slaves!”

Yet again, there was no reaction of hesitating to shoot the rat for fear of breaking the vases. Instead, Mammoth Dharma-Heaven attacked with increased ferocity.

As he lunged forward, his skin began to glow with an azure color like that of swirling primordial chaos.

“Incantation of the Azure Heaven Hegemon!”

He exhaled, and true energy swirled out to form an image of suns, moons, stars, and chaos. It was almost like each breath he took could create minor universes.

“Infernal Deity Spear!”

At this point, Yang Qi realized that there was no avoiding this fight, so he summoned his spear, causing the aura of infernal deities to fill the area. He hadn’t used the Infernal Deity Spear in a long time, not because it lacked power, but, in fact, because of the opposite reason. As his Blood of the One God grew stronger, the Infernal Deity Spear grew mightier, and its mere swish could cause an aura of death to fill millions upon millions of kilometers, creating a kingdom of death like the netherworld itself.

It was actually too strong.

If he had used it in the Titan Emperor Heaven, the effects of the aura of death would have attracted notice and many experts among the immortals would have come to ‘rid the world of devils and demons’ because of it.

But here in the Hanging Heaven, fighting against Mammoth Dharma-Heaven, he had no such misgivings. In fact, calling forth a kingdom of death would be helpful in the fight against the demon soldiers.

Another property of the Infernal Deity Spear was that the more enemies it slaughtered, the more vital power of death it could release. In other words, it would grow stronger and stronger, until it became like the sovereign of death.

Gong!

The Infernal Deity Spear hit the enormous axe and Yang Qi was sent tumbling backward, flipping head over heels several times before he managed to slide to a halt. He looked a bit ashen, but didn’t hesitate to launch another volley of tens of thousands of attacks.

In the blink of an eye, countless demon soldiers in the area were slaughtered and the resulting vital power of death was absorbed by the spear, causing it to thrum with light.

Mammoth Dharma-Heaven could never have guessed that Yang Qi would do something like that.

“Prepare to die!” he growled, flying up into the air and brandishing his axe. “The Wheel Comes Full Circle. Wilds-Demolishing!”

RUMBLE!

It was almost like the ancient, wild lands of old were being destroyed as Mammoth Dharma-Heaven drew on the power of the seventh stage to launch his next attack.

The axe flew forth with such deadly power that it seemed like it was slicing from the future to the present, destroying everything in its path, even the power of death.

Crack!

The axe and spear collided again, and this time, the Infernal Deity Spear shattered! Then, Mammoth Dharma-Heaven hefted his axe and prepared to deliver another blow. Yang Qi was instantly placed into a position of mortal danger.

“Fine, I won’t waste any more words.” Despite his Infernal Deity Spear having been destroyed, Yang Qi wasn’t flustered. Instead, a cold smile appeared on his face. He had decided earlier that he needed to draw on one of his trump cards and had lured his enemy closer on purpose.

“I’ve been missing a powerful sacrifice to fuel my next breakthrough. But with your quintessence-blood, vital energy, and divine abilities as the core of my spell formation, then I can definitely succeed. Your axe is a god item, right? I can sense that it has deathless godliness. And you’re actually a megamammoth, with plenty of godmammoth blood in you. Well, I’ll take your life, soul, and fate.”

Yang Qi’s voice sounded like the booming pronouncement of an actual god.

“Time for a breakthrough! In the boundless Demolishing level, one ascends to immortality and leaves behind that which is mortal. Cosmic Resonance; World-Ranking Deathlessness; Royal Throne of Heaven!”

RUMBLE!

As the axe descended, he released his hold on his aura and finally prepared to face his Demolishing tribulation.

His soul had long since reached enlightenment of that level. And in the mortal world, his clone had already formed an immortal body and reached the second stage of Space-Demolishing. But his true self was still a ninth order Paragon Demi-Immortal, a mere half-Demolisher. During his entire time in the immortal worlds up to this point, he had been building up resources.

In fact, even he didn't know how much power he had at his disposal.

But in this moment, he cracked open his internal pellet and released it.

Crack!

Force surged out in all directions, instantly killing countless demon soldiers in the area and sucking them into the internal pellet.

“Heaven-Devouring Grand Formation!”

One Heaven-Devouring śarīra after another flew out, conforming to the paths of the sun, moon, and stars to create an enormous spell formation. All of creation shook violently, and before Mammoth Dharma-Heaven realized what was happening he was dragged into the formation.

Instantly, a look of profound terror filled his face.

“What exactly is going on here? You’re… you’re not even an immortal? You’re not in the Demolishing level? You’re a mortal?! I can’t believe you have a cultivation base and divine abilities like that! Who the hell are you? You’re not a human, but you’re not a demon either. Are you a god-spirit? You're just too strong! I refuse to believe that someone like you can even exist. For a non-immortal to slaughter countless immortal paragons, and also stand up to me, is like an ant fighting a dragon!”

Despite seeing everything with his own eyes, Mammoth Dharma-Heaven couldn't believe that this was all true. Yet that only made him more terrified.

Chapter 594: Boundless Demolishing

At long last, Yang Qi was finally facing his Demolishing tribulation.

His clone had long since succeeded, and now it was time for his true self. The downside was that his true self had genes that were too heaven-defying, and went contrary to common sense. When he stepped into Demolishing, it would arouse the jealousy of all kinds of powerful entities.

And the power fluctuations that would roll out would attract a lot of attention.

Anyone who could swoop in and snatch his nascent divinity during the tribulation would be able to refine it into a magical treasure the likes of which was rarely seen in the world. Furthermore, there would be no end to the number of experts who would love to get their hands on the God Legion Seal.

Therefore, Yang Qi had been using the imperial snakecharms to convert immortal world essence into Heaven-Devouring śarīras. With them, he set up the Heaven-Devouring Grand Formation, which would hopefully keep his aura locked tight instead of letting it spread through the world around him.

As soon as he set up that formation, Mammoth Dharma-Heaven was sucked into it.

Who was Mammoth Dharma-Heaven? He was the descendant of godmammoths, which meant that he had the blood of gods in him. And his axe was a god item with immense deathless godliness in it, a weapon of the utmost power.

For Yang Qi to sacrifice him to the spell formation meant that his own genes would become even more perfect. In fact, they would likely jump to the level of being several billion times stronger than normal, maybe even ten billion.

Right now, his genes were eight hundred forty million times stronger than normal, which was the absolute limit for mortals. But upon becoming an immortal, his soul and fate would rise to a higher level.

Upon being sucked into the formation, Mammoth Dharma-Heaven looked around to see a chaotic, primeval universe around him. Then he saw a primal-chaos elder-snake coiled in the center of that universe that he was slowly being dragged toward. Considering the unstoppable force, he quickly realized what was happening. After all, King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans were the bane of godmammoth blood.

“Heaven-Devouring śarīras? The imperial snakecharms of King Heaven-Devourer? So, it was this guy who stole the imperial uncle's six hundred and sixty-six talismans. This guy deserves to die ten thousand times over!”

The most fundamental aspect of King Heaven-Devourer was the saying snakes devour mammoths. He wanted to devour godmammoths to get their blood.

RUUUUUUMBLE!

Yang Qi’s true self was also there in that seemingly ancient universe, and countless space-time wormholes were alive around him.

Immense power was on display as heart-devils, heaven-devils, flying-devils, and other entities surged toward him in attack. All sorts of unheard-of tribulations assailed him, yet the primal-chaos elder-snake devoured them all.

Mammoth Dharma-Heaven had never seen anything like this. After all, not even the ‘imperial uncle’ he had mentioned could possibly have used King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans at this level.

The Heaven-Devouring Grand Formation was being pushed to its limits.

From the outside, it looked like Yang Qi was wrapped up in some chaotic spell formation, almost like a tornado. Any of the Hanging Heaven’s demon soldiers who got too close would tumble into the formation and die screaming.

Some of the top experts could see lightning falling within the formation, as well as wormholes that belched out things like heavenly palaces, golden lamps, immortals, god-spirits, giant-spirits, lightning-devils, lightning dragons, snakes, and more.

At a certain point, the essence of the immortal world produced a power to suppress devils, empyrean lightning that flowed down like a destructive river into the spell formation.

“The will of the immortal world will instinctively destroy monsters,” explained one of the demon-immortals. “That level of power is incredibly destructive.”

Another demon-immortal said, “This guy set up that spell formation to fight Mammoth Dharma-Heaven and his Axe of Domineering. Mammoth Dharma-Heaven has immense godpower from that item, plus he himself has the blood of godmammoths. He’s strong enough to destroy worlds, so that spell formation won’t hold him.”

“Back up, everyone! Don’t get sucked into that spell formation. As you can see, it's terrifying, and any of you who get trapped by it will be ripped to pieces. It seems it’s strong enough to suck in immortal world essence.”

“Hold on, we can’t retreat! We have to capture that guy. Call all the demon soldiers in the area to set up a Heaven-Demon God-Slaughtering Grand Formation. We can use it to break inside, then join forces with Mammoth Dharma-Heaven to kill him. That guy is obviously a top genius, so his blood will be a lot of help to Mammoth Dharma-Heaven. Once His Imperial Majesty ascends to a higher immortal world, Mammoth Dharma-Heaven is going to be the new emperor, so if we help him now it will benefit us a lot later.”

Obviously, not all of the demon generals agreed about what to do. However, after a brief discussion via divine will, they came to an agreement. Orders were passed down, and the Demonfolk began to get into formation.

These were ancient spell formations that the heaven-demons of the past had used to fight with the legion of gods, and now they were being set up to destroy the Heaven-Devouring Grand Formation.

Inside the formation, Mammoth Dharma-Heaven burst out laughing. “Perfect. They’re setting up the Heaven-Demon God-Slaughtering Grand Formation. The boundless power of heaven-demons can even injure god-spirits, so there’s no way you can handle it. Your formation is about to be destroyed, and then I’ll have your blood for my own use.”

“You think it’s going to be that easy? I want you to be fuel for this formation, and you're going to be. Even if the legion of gods and the horde of devils came from the nine heavens and ten earths, it still wouldn’t change your fate.” As Yang Qi stood in the middle of the formation, absorbing the power of the countless tribulations, he felt an imminent breakthrough forming.

Suddenly, all creation began trembling, not from the force of the Heaven-Devouring Grand Formation, but rather because an even more powerful tribulation was arriving.

It was impossible to say how many countless shafts of dazzling light shot out from the Heaven-Devouring Grand Formation, which, as it spun, was like an immortal world, or hell, all of its own. The glow contained both darkness and light, with the light being the immortal worlds and the darkness being hells.

They were like the eternal sands of the universe within the formation.

Crunch!

Cracks spread out over Yang Qi’s skin.

Meanwhile, a look of horror appeared on Mammoth Dharma-Heaven’s face as he said, “No! What tribulation is this? It’s immense! It’s Myriad Worlds Resonance Tribulation! According to the myths, only almighty experts who have reached the Deathless Throne should face tribulation like this. This is from the kingdom of the gods! What is it doing here? I have to get out of here! I can’t stand up to this level of power. Don’t drag me into death with you here! The resonance with the essence of the world around us could eradicate the deathless!”

RUUUUUUMBLE!

The myriads of immortal worlds and hells descended with crushing force, shattering Mammoth Dharma-Heaven’s body. In the blink of an eye, he became nothing but a bloody mist. And his god item, the axe, shattered into dust.

As for Yang Qi, blood oozed out of the cracks in his skin, blood that emanated deathless godliness. Yet he didn’t look worried at all. “This is great. This is the kind of tribulation I need to pass to become invincible. My genes will be destroyed and made anew, even more perfect. Paramount.”

BAM!

He sent out his divine will, and his fleshly body suddenly exploded into a cloud of gore. Yet, that flesh and blood contained immense life force. It quickly transformed into an enormous mouth that lunged forward and consumed the remains of Mammoth Dharma-Heaven and his god item.

Devour ten thousand worlds.

Yang Qi howled as he swept back and forth as if he were devouring immortal worlds and hells left and right. In the shortest of moments, the tribulation was negated and the talismans of King Heaven-Devourer grew even stronger.

Meanwhile, outside, a host of enormous black holes popped open and began sucking in the demon soldiers, who were still setting up their spell formation.

“Aaaiiiieee!”

One of the demon-immortal generals was sucked toward a black hole so relentlessly that he abandoned his body and tried to flee with his true energy, nascent divinity, and soul.

But then an enormous tongue of primal-chaos snapped out of the black hole and dragged him inside.

A moment later, the tongue appeared again and began dragging more demon soldiers in. It was almost like an anteater feasting on ants. Within only a few breaths of time, millions upon millions of demon soldiers were devoured.

Back in Yang Qi’s formation, his flesh and blood was stitching back into humanoid shape as his immortal body formed. It was a critical moment. If he succeeded, and formed his immortal body, then he would become a boundless Demolisher.

In that critical moment, something unexpected happened.

A wormhole popped open right in the middle of the Heaven-Devouring Grand Formation and a yellow blur appeared.

Chapter 595: Dangerous Ambush

Not only was Yang Qi using the Heaven-Devouring Grand Formation to mask the aura of the tribulations, he was also using the primal-chaos elder-snake to devour their power, as well as the power of the god item and Mammoth Dharma-Heaven.

Just as he was on the verge of successfully breaking into demolishing, an uninvited guest arrived.

And that guest was wearing yellow clothing.

Yang Qi had already shrunk the Heaven-Devouring Grand Formation down significantly, focusing its power in a way that would make entering it a deadly task for any expert who made the attempt.

However, this intruder in yellow apparently understood and could control hyperdimensions, which were normally the domain of the legion of gods. Thus, he had no trouble at all dealing with the power of the Heaven-Devouring Grand Formation.

Yang Qi immediately got the sense that his power wasn’t sufficient to touch this figure in yellow. Or, more precisely, the yellow intruder was backed by the power of a world that would make attacks against him useless.

‘The yellow-garbed kid with the buzz cut!’ Yang Qi thought, struck by the familiar sensation he was experiencing. He opened his Lord’s Eye and gazed at the yellow newcomer, who looked like little more than a ball of vital energy connected with the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart!

He was using the power of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart!

After their previous clash, the young man in yellow had returned to the depths of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart and acquired a mysterious legacy that gave him immense control over the power of the chart and let him unleash the true potential of the power of an immortal-slayer.

Only the power of a top expert like King Immortal-Slayer could possibly be a match for the power of King Heaven-Devourer.

King Immortal-Slayer had been the ultimate leader of the multitude of monarchs of the ancient past. He had also been the Eldest Brother of King Heaven-Devourer. The latter was a primal-chaos elder-snake, but as for the former, no one knew for certain what his true form was. Some of the myths in the ancient records of the immortal worlds claimed that he was an ordinary human who eventually became so almighty that he could fight the legion of gods.

There were countless epic sagas written about him, filled with everything from romance to tragedy. It was impossible to even know for sure how many amazing things he had accomplished.

The instant the young man in yellow arrived with the power of King Immortal-Slayer, Yang Qi felt as if a major confrontation was about to occur. From what he could tell, this was a type of power naturally opposed to the legion of gods, which wished to destroy his God Legion Seal and the legacy he bore.

‘Yang Qi….’ the young man in yellow thought as he looked at Yang Qi in the middle of his transformation. Instead of immediately launching an attack, he held his ground. ‘Who would have guessed that you had snuck your way into an immortal world. You kept yourself very well hidden. Unfortunately for you, this is the end of the line. You will die shortly, and I will take everything from you, including the God Legion Seal, which I will use to finally suppress the will of the multitude of monarchs in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. I will then assimilate the chart, acquire its legacy, and become embodied as a myriad of worlds. I will form my dao fruit and become a god-spirit. My path to the Deathless Throne will be short and sweet. I’ll soon be a Godmyth!’

RUMBLE!

At this point, majestic godpower rushed out of him toward Yang Qi.

Yang Qi looked at the incoming power and then sent a beam of dazzling light shooting from his forehead to stop it. At the same time, immense force churned within him as his body formed anew and he became stronger.

Already, a more perfect version of himself was taking shape.

Ghosts and gods wept, and blood rained from heaven. At the same time, an image appeared of a myriad of falling worlds. This was no tribulation, it was the power of the young man in yellow.

In the blink of an eye, an enormous, godly image stretched out overhead.

It was something he could form from his access to the essence of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. By using the King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy medallion, he formed an ‘auxiliary chart’, which couldn't compare to the full Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, but was still on par with any god item. As soon as it appeared, it immediately locked down Yang Qi’s Heaven-Devouring Grand Formation, magical treasures, and quintessence energy.

Worst of all, Yang Qi was in an extremely weak state now, in which his power, will, quintessence, and true energy were all being reshaped. At the moment, he was virtually powerless to fight back.

The auxiliary version of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart was backed by an immortal-slayer’s power, making it almost completely invincible.

RUMBLE!

Meanwhile, an enormous fist appeared, smashing through the greyspace of the Hanging Heaven and shooting in the direction of the auxiliary chart. Then it transformed into a palm that bore down on Yang Qi.

“Friend, didn’t we agree to deal with Titan Dragonguard together? Considering he's only a mortal, but is already this strong, he’s obviously keeping plenty of secrets. And once I get them, I’ll be the top expert in the Thirty-Six Thousand Immortal Worlds Coalition! No longer will I be the generalissimo of the armed forces in the paltry Titan Emperor Heaven! Leave this punk to me.”

Shockingly, the person speaking was at the level of being a sovereign of heaven, and it was none other than Generalissimo Proud Warpatience.

He struck with immense force, obviously hoping to crush Yang Qi out of existence before he could fight back.

Proud Warpatience essentially represented the peak level of power within the Titan Emperor Heaven. Other than a few old-timers who never made public appearances, he was the fiercest fighter there was. If he wasn't, then how could he have attained the position of generalissimo of the armed forces?

Back during the war games, Yang Qi had killed one of his top subordinates, and had lost him a huge amount of face. Obviously, none of that could be rectified without Proud Warpatience cutting him down.

Of course, he had to make sure he killed him quietly. He was still the generalissimo of the armed forces and Yang Qi was doing a big service by bringing the fight to the Hanging Heaven. But in the end, if Yang Qi began rising in the ranks of the imperial house, it would make him harder and harder to get rid of.

Thus, Proud Warpatience decided to make his move here and now. And he was interfering with the young man in yellow in the hopes of taking Yang Qi’s cultivation base for himself.

“You people want to kill me? How could snakes and rats like you do that? Stepping into the Demolishing level makes me the envy of both fate and good fortune, who will use all sorts of enemies to strike at me. I have no greater enemies now than you two, therefore I was expecting you to attack me! Otherwise, why would I incite so many tribulations? Boundless Essence of Faith!Activate!”

Crack! Snap!

All of a sudden, a passageway opened up above his head and a dazzling stream of white light shot out. It was nothing other than faith from thousands of planetary systems, which poured into him and blessed him with strength.

The campaign of war had long since begun in the lower world, and the holy lands of true cultivation had all been conquered. Faith power had been gathering in the Sage Monarch planetary system for Yang Qi’s true self to use.

As he reached out to the reserves of faith, they became a beam of white light that reached him in a blink of an eye. There, they transformed into beautiful night queen flowers, which rained down on him.

As the white flowers descended on Yang Qi, his new body rapidly formed and the God Legion Paradise bore the brunt of Proud Warpatience’s attack. This was the ancient body of a god, the Physique of the Sovereign Lord! When the halls of heaven descended, hells were crushed into subservience!

Light from some unknown aspect of space-time appeared, ancient sagelight like that which existed in the halls of heaven, filled with deathless godliness that infused Yang Qi with strength and power.

Instantly, the Blood of the One God in his forehead grew stronger.

Thirteen ten-thousandths. Fifteen. Sixteen. Twenty. Soon it reached the level of one hundred ten-thousandths. In other words, one percent.

It was a terrifying increase.

Crack! Snap! His genes also improved, blowing past the level of eight hundred million, as all of the particles within him converted from dracomammoths to protomammoths.

In another shocking development, the total number of particles increased. Instead of having eight hundred forty million, he had eight billion one hundred million. Intense rumbling rolled out as Yang Qi’s immortal body formed and he stepped into Demolishing.

In that moment, it was as if he became infinitely ancient, but brand new at the same time.

The moment before immortal ascension and the moment after it were completely and utterly different. He had been a mortal before, but now it was as if he had just been born.

Immortals were different from humans down to their substructure. One was a lowly form of life, the other was a powerful entity in the universe. Mortals had limited lifespans, but immortals could live as long as heaven and earth existed.

“You’re too late to do anything about me, Proud Warpatience. I have my immortal body now. So, should we do a little test and see what my cultivation base is like?”

He suddenly sucked the God Legion Paradise back into him, then lashed out at Proud Warpatience with the Hand of the One God, unleashing all nine of its stances!

Chapter 596: Finally, Success

It was with the boundless power of faith that Yang Qi finally succeeded. He assimilated Mammoth Dharma-Heaven and his god item, taking that deathless godliness and adding it to the immortal world essence and Heaven-Devouring True Energy.

His genes reached the level of being eight billion one hundred million times stronger than normal, and he also had eight billion one hundred million protomammoth particles.

His blood was one percent that of the Sovereign Lord, and of course, all of his energy arts had improved. The Infernal Deity Spear, Heaven and Earth Furnace, God Legion Battle Robe, Devil-God Seal, Hell Portals, Hand of the One God, Flame of Hope, Wheel of Fate, and Glad Tidings of the Lord were all many times more powerful than before.

His ability to use King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans had also improved, and when he powered the primal-chaos elder-snake with his true energy, it could gobble up massive amounts of energy in the shortest of moments. The speed with which he could take immortal world essence and turn it into Heaven-Devouring śarīras was vastly increased.

With almost no effort at all, he could send his will into the Hell of Mahānata and the Hell of Gloom and Darkness, and with the slightest movement of his fist he could shatter the greyspaces of immortal worlds to make wormholes. And of course, he could reach to the lower world at any time and bring his people up.

He could now call three hundred and sixty Hell Portals, using them to summon fifth step immortal marquis fiend-devils. It was a terrifying thought. And as long as he had enough true energy to work with, he could summon such fiend-devils without end. That was obviously enough to completely overwhelm any given immortal world.

Compared to immortal marquises, the fiend-devils he had been able to summon before were like nothing. In fact, even one of them would be more than enough to destroy an entire holy land of true cultivation in the mortal world.

It made one wonder what he could do with an army of them.

After all, even in immortal worlds, immortal marquises were powerful and important people, usually with very high positions. Before meeting Yang Qi, the general of the Special Reconnaissance Division, Yuan Kuohai, had been a mere fourth step Origin-Demolisher.

Obviously, an army of immortal marquises would make it easy to crush a place like the Titan Emperor Heaven.

As of this moment, Yang Qi felt supremely confident, and absolutely not scared of anything—at least in low-level immortal worlds. As long as he didn't end up facing a Godmyth, he wouldn’t need to run from any fight.

Not even ninth step Dao-Demolishers, those called sovereigns of heaven, would be able to handle him.

RUMBLE!

When the Hand of the One God hit Proud Warpatience’s Cardinal Grand Brahma Punishes the Fire God Energy Art, a deafening boom rang out, and Yang Qi shivered, but didn’t slow down for a moment. Instead, he pressed the attack. “Alright, Proud Warpatience. Watch and see what a real godly-class energy art can do. And as for you, buzz cut boy, I can’t believe you’re scheming against me here in the immortal worlds. It’s a real pity your plans are all going to fail. You're a Future One, but unfortunately you have no way to properly scheme against me. I'm a Fateless One, which makes that impossible. That said, your physique type could be a real help to me. So I'm going to take it. When I combine the properties of Fateless Ones and Future Ones, I’ll be more invincible than ever.”

All of the words he sent into the young man’s mind were psychic attacks against him.

When Proud Warpatience saw Yang Qi meeting his attacks without even flinching, and even launching counter-attacks, he couldn’t have been more shocked. In fact, he now realized that he should probably try to escape.

Unfortunately, Yang Qi had him locked down.

Exhaling a breath of true energy he said, “Proud World Hegemon!”

Instantly, an enormous nascent divinity appeared, a proud hegemon equipped with what appeared to be a mecha, pulsing with power that could surely destroy immortal worlds.

“Be broken!”

Yang Qi pushed his palms together, then shoved them out in front of him. In the blink of an eye, an attack shot forth filled with millions upon millions of variations, which slammed into the enormous hegemon and shattered him into fragments.

Unfortunately, by the time the pieces finished raining down, Proud Warpatience had vanished.

He had used the classic strategy of slipping out of a predicament like a cicada sloughing its skin.

Now Yang Qi only had the young man in yellow left to deal with. Looking over, he sent his hand out, encompassing everything as he drew on his godly-class energy art. Instantly, killing intent filled the area and white flowers began falling everywhere.

‘I have to get out of here. NOW!’ Shivering with fear, the young man sent his auxiliary version of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart rushing toward Yang Qi.

As Yang Qi grabbed it, the young man dodged into a hidden passageway and vanished without a trace.

The auxiliary chart was essentially a shrunken version of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. It featured what appeared to be a myriad of worlds, filled with heavens, earths, stars, and heavenly bodies. There were also gods and monarchs inside, pulsing with deathless godliness.

Without any hesitation, Yang Qi inhaled all of the godliness.

This godliness surpassed that of Mammoth Dharma-Heaven’s god item, and as soon as it was inside him, he found himself being pushed toward the second stage of the Demolishing level, that of the immortal warrior.

The fighting was over.

Proud Warpatience had fled, as had the young man in yellow. The only thing left nearby was the army of Demonfolk.

However, Yang Qi wasn’t interested in slaughtering Demonfolk right now. Waving his hand, he caused a white beam of light to slash out, clearing the area around the teleportation portals.

With that, he sent out a projected message. “Princess Jadefall, I’ve pushed back the Demonfolk army. Feel free to come see for yourself.”

Back on the asteroid, where the battle still raged between the Demonfolk and the immortals, Princess Jadefall got the message and was delighted. “Everyone, press the attack!”

A bloodbath instantly ensued, and as the demon soldiers were mowed down, the forces of the Titan Emperor Heaven finally entered the Hanging Heaven.

Eventually, a consummate expert rose up from the Demonfolk: the famed Grand Prince Tor. He and Princess Jadefall fought for three days and three nights with neither coming out on top. Eventually, Princess Jadefall looked around and realized that they had slaughtered so many demon soldiers that they could consider the campaign a victory. At that point, she called for her forces to fall back.

It was a huge win for the Titan Emperor Heaven, with heavy casualties inflicted on their opponents.

However, Yang Qi never appeared, not even toward the tail end of the fighting. That was probably a good thing, considering that it would have been a bad idea to attract attention from even stronger entities deeper in the Hanging Heaven. And the fact that he had slaughtered Mammoth Dharma-Heaven was already enough to earn him the rank of grand prince.

A few days later, news of the victory had spread through the imperial court, which was already buzzing with anticipation.

It had been known for some time that the Titan Emperor Heaven was in a precarious position, and few people had a good impression of the court because of it. Some of the people who occupied the border regions, even some of the old-timers, were preparing for the collapse of their immortal world. But this battle changed everything. All of a sudden, everyone felt as though the essence of their world were pulsing with life and that the dynasty was going to enter a new stage of revitalization.

There finally seemed to be hope for the imperial house.

Princess Jadefall brought back plenty of plunder from the Hanging Heaven, as well as a whole host of captive demon soldiers. The sovereign of heaven, the actual emperor of the immortal world, would finally begin holding sessions of court and recruiting new ministers and officials again.

Bells tolled throughout the imperial city.

Yang Qi followed Princess Jadefall and some of her top officers to receive their rewards for the services they had performed. This was Yang Qi’s first time actually attending court, and he was immediately struck by the countless guards everywhere, some standing proudly in the open, others hiding in the shadows.

This palace was the most enigmatic and mysterious place in all the lands, and was where all of the most important people resided.

That said, Yang Qi was vastly more powerful than he had been in the past, and could trounce even the old-timers if he had to. And if he summoned an army of fiend-devils, he could unleash even more heaven-shaking, earth-toppling force.

There was no need for that, though, as he was to be appointed as a grand prince, which was a very big honor. As of now, his plans to eventually take over the Titan Emperor Heaven didn't seem like they would be very hard to accomplish at all.

As they walked along, Princess Jadefall used divine will to speak directly into Yang Qi's mind.

“Titan Dragonguard, as an imperial clansman, you qualify to be promoted within the dynasty. Thanks to the services you provided by killing Mammoth Dharma-Heaven, I applied to have you appointed as a grand prince. I’d say there’s an eighty to ninety percent chance they’ll approve the request.”

“Many thanks, Princess. I’ll definitely work hard to repay your kindness.”

“Noted. When you see His Imperial Majesty, remember to follow all the court etiquette. Proud Warpatience will likely make an appearance, and he’s still very important. Many of the old-timers still heavily support Proud Heaven because of what he did all those years ago. If they oppose your promotion to grand prince, be careful in how you handle it. Don’t give them anything they could use against you.”

“Yes ma’am. I understand. Proud Heaven really is an ambitious wolf. He basically left behind agents to keep an eye on the imperial house. Well, one day I’ll root those people out for good.” Obviously, Yang Qi would do everything in his power to oppose Proud Heaven’s plans.

As for Proud Warpatience, he didn’t fear him in the least and was already working on a plan to kill him.

Even as he contemplated his plans, a voice rang out. “Ministers and officials, please enter to see His Majesty. Maintain order at all times.”

The time had finally come to meet the emperor, the most important person in the Titan Emperor Heaven.

Yang Qi cleared his thoughts and calmed his true energy. At the same time, he made sure that his blood emanated the energy of Titan, to an even stronger degree than Princess Jadefall.

‘The blood of Titan is so strong in him,’ she thought. ‘It seems even stronger than mine! No wonder he’s so powerful.’

Chapter 597: Wrangling

Yang Qi had specifically increased the strength of his ‘Titan blood’ to ensure that the sovereign of heaven wouldn’t deduce his true identity. It was an easy matter to use the godliness he possessed to make it seem like he was the descendant of a god and a member of the imperial house.

Upon entering the main hall of the imperial palace, he looked left and right and saw that the place was filling up rapidly with ministers and officials of all sorts.

All of them pulsed with incredible true energy and some of them were overtly assailing him with psychic power.

Earlier, the might would have felt like an immense pressure weighing down on him, but now that he was a Demolisher with an immortal body, and genes eight billion one hundred million times stronger than normal, he was on the same level as the sovereign of heaven here. Therefore, the psychic power simply rolled off of him.

All of a sudden, a piercing voice rang out from an immortal who looked very much like a court eunuch.

“All ministers of merit, offer formal greetings to the sovereign of heaven!”

At the end of the hall was the fabled Throne of the Nine Heavens, upon which sat the emperor himself, clad in the Crown of the Peaceful Heaven. His aura was thoroughly ancient, making him seem like a Godmyth. Although Yang Qi couldn’t see his face, he could sense that the man was vastly more powerful than Proud Warpatience. It made it very obvious why Proud Warpatience didn’t dare to act out of line; unless Proud Heaven himself came along, this emperor could crush him.

He was clearly an invincible figure who wasn’t even in the same space-time hyperdimension as everyone else.

‘I need to rise a few more levels before I can deal with someone like him,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘That said, he wouldn’t find it easy to kill me if he tried. It’s almost hard to believe he’s so vastly above other ninth stage Dao-Demolishers. Both Proud Warpatience and Princess Jadefall are in that level, yet the emperor is so far above them that they seem like children in comparison. I wonder if it’s because he’s been approved by the essence of this immortal world and is literally its ruler. His every word and action is connected to the might and dignity of the lands around him.’

Slowly and carefully, he began rotating the Wheel of Fate.

“Salutations, Your Majesty!”

All of the gathered ministers dropped to their knees and kowtowed deeply to the most important person in all of the Titan Emperor Heaven.

“On your feet,” the emperor said. As he spoke, his eyes opened and he looked at Yang Qi, and they flickered in shock at the realization of how strong his Titan blood was.

Of course, Yang Qi didn’t reveal his true aura. By keeping the Wheel of Fate turning, he hid his true nature as surely as if some ancient god had done so.

He was a well-known person. Everyone knew that he had ‘found an ancient relic’ that gave him immense wealth and that he was astonishingly powerful. He was an important person in the imperial house now, an adherent of Princess Jadefall. With a supporter like her, and all of the military credit he had earned, it was obvious that he would receive a promotion soon. He was now a rising star in the Titan Emperor Heaven.

Everyone rose to their feet.

The sovereign of heaven looked around at all of the civil and military officials and said, “Princess Jadefall invaded the Hanging Heaven and won an incredible victory. Her invasion led to the death of one of their important princes, the Wilds-Demolisher Mammoth Dharma-Heaven. For this merit, I shall reward her handsomely. And I have rewards for the other members of the imperial house who served with valor. I hereby confer Princess Jadefall with the title of eminent princess, a rank higher than a grand prince or princess. And Titan Dragonguard, whose pure blood proves him to be a true descendant of the great god Titan, whose hand it was that felled Mammoth Dharma-Heaven, whose valiant charge led to the teleportation portals, has earned such credit that, in accord with the imperial rules system, I hereby confer him with the title of grand prince. Ministers and officials, do you agree?”

Apparently, the sovereign of heaven was actually asking the opinions of the others present.

“I object!” someone cried out in a clear voice. One of the officials stepped forward, an expert in a royal gown. “Your Majesty, an eminent prince or princess would be second only to you in power and glory, and would command all of the other grand princes and princesses. As everyone remembers, the previous eminent prince was an imperial uncle who went missing ten thousand years ago. Ever since then, his position has remained empty. No grand prince or princess has ever dared to take it. But now Princess Jadefall thinks she can become our leader, all because she performed some minor service? How could we ministers and officials possibly agree to something like that? Furthermore, Titan Dragonguard is a mere marquis! How could he possibly jump three ranks to become a grand prince? I would say that promoting him to duke would be more than sufficient. Rising through the ranks too quickly can lead to all sorts of arrogant and inappropriate behavior.”

Her expression flickering with anger, Princess Jadefall leaned over and said to Yang Qi, “That’s the Prince of Jade Warfare, who has always bitterly opposed me in court. That said, I'm honestly surprised my father the emperor is suggesting appointing me to the position of eminent princess. It’s no wonder the grand princes are all upset. If I got that position, I could cause big problems for them. They and the vice princes would all be forced to treat me with the utmost respect.”

“I see, Princess,” Yang Qi replied quietly. “I wonder if His Imperial Majesty is set on changing things up.” Inwardly, Yang Qi was pleased at the fact that he was now a true confidant of the princess, someone she could ask for advice and help from. It made sense, considering how she had witnessed his power first hand.

“I completely agree with the Prince of Jade Warfare!” another of the grand princes said, a strapping man who was none other than the Prince of Godly Warfare. Looking over at Princess Jadefall and Yang Qi, he continued, “The position of eminent prince or princess comes with immense power. To award Princess Jadefall with that position for the trifling deeds she performed would be completely excessive. Your Majesty, please rescind your proclamation.”

“I agree as well,” Proud Warpatience said. Obviously, the strides Yang Qi had made ensured that Proud Warpatience couldn’t reveal how much he wanted to kill him. Henceforth, his only chance would be to strike at him in secret.

Before anyone else could say anything, Yang Qi spoke up. “What was that, Proud Warpatience? Weren’t you the one who opposed Princess Jadefall’s suggestion of invading the Hanging Heaven? Then, you forced her into the war games, which you lost in humiliating fashion. Even after being thoroughly beaten, you’re still colluding with other ministers to oppose her? It’s really inappropriate, and it’s obvious that you’re just jealous. The appointment of princes is a matter relating to the imperial house. How dare an outsider like you try to butt in!”

Obviously, Yang Qi was ready to go tit for tat with Proud Warpatience. And it was more than clear that he despised him.

“You!” Proud Warpatience growled. Then he chuckled coldly. “Have you forgotten where we are? What qualifies you to talk to me like that? Disrespect like this is a grave sin. Understand? Get on your knees and beg for forgiveness!”

“We're in the imperial court,” Yang Qi replied. “I'm an imperial clansman, and you’re a foreign minister. You say that I don’t qualify, yet you, a foreign minister, are qualified?” As Proud Warpatience stared at him with his jaw hanging open, Yang Qi continued. “It seems to me you’re likely working with the Demonfolk from the Hanging Heaven! You’re trying to destabilize the dynasty, and likely overthrow the imperial court!”

Seeing that Proud Warpatience was in quite a predicament, some of the grand princes came to his rescue.

“What incredible gall!”

“How dare a measly imperial clansman be so disrespectful to the generalissimo of the armed forces! Proud Warpatience has always served us with complete loyalty. Compared to what he's done, your services are like nothing. Considering how rude you’re being here in the imperial court, you should be stripped of any title you have and sent to the Department of the Imperial Clan to be formally expelled.”

“That’s right,” Proud Warpatience said, smiling coldly. “You found some godrelic and got rich all of a sudden. But did you turn over any of that wealth to the court? What ambitious plans might you have? Considering everything, if you accept the position of grand prince then you definitely have to hand that godrelic over!”

“Who said I found a godrelic?” Yang Qi asked. “Those are just rumors, presumably spread by you to attack me. And as for all of you other grand princes, the lot of you abuse your positions and don’t do a thing to advance the interests of the dynasty. You’re all ignorant and useless. Our immortal world is in great danger, but instead of going out and helping you sit around accusing other ministers in the court and stirring up trouble.”

“Enough!” said the sovereign of heaven, sighing. Instantly, the entire court went completely quiet and immense pressure weighed down everywhere.

Looking over at one of the royal figures standing off to the side, he said, “Crown Prince, what do you think?”

It was a young man wearing the garments of a grand prince who, up to this point, hadn’t looked up. He had almost seemed like a statue, to the point where Yang Qi hadn’t even noticed him.

However, considering how the emperor had just addressed him, he was obviously a crown prince.

“Father, you’re the emperor. When you make decisions, the ministers shouldn’t argue.” Even when he spoke, he didn’t actually move.

‘This guy seems pretty strong,’ Yang Qi thought, somewhat shaken. The fact that this crown prince could stand there unnoticed was very unnerving and went to show how powerful he was.

The emperor nodded. “In that case, fine. My proclamation stands.” Clearly, the emperor was in no mood to listen to the ministers and officials.

Thus the appointments were carried out.

Princess Jadefall was named Eminent Princess Jadefall. She now outranked all of the grand princes.

As for Yang Qi, he was named Prince of Military Security.

His true identity had not been revealed. It was hard to say what the young man in yellow was thinking, but apparently he hadn’t told Proud Warpatience about Yang Qi.

Yang Qi was given a princely robe and command of more men. He now had a hundred divisions. At the same time, he was given governorship of numerous cities, including places with names like Stormwind, Warthrive, Sparkspace, Pill Cauldron City, and others. The city magistrates of all of those places now answered to him.

And of course, he was now a favored subordinate of Princess Jadefall. Everyone knew that he was the valiant fighter who had killed Mammoth Dharma-Heaven in combat. He was climbing in the ranks of the imperial court and was becoming a very important person.

Chapter 598: Stable Foundation

“Congratulations, Milord! Congratulations! You're a grand prince now, with command over countless troops. If your rise continues, you’ll eventually be the most powerful person in the Titan Emperor Heaven!”

In the depths of the imperial city, an immense banquet had been thrown in a certain mansion. Yuan Kuohai, Titan Duelbringer, and other loyal followers of Yang Qi were all there. They had been promoted, thanks to Yang Qi's victory in the Hanging Heaven, and had also been given immense wealth as part of their reward. Their small group was now turning into a powerful faction in the dynasty.

“Yes. As a grand prince, I finally have some formal power and clout. Eventually, we’ll be the most influential force in this immortal world. Stick with me, and your prospects will be endless.”

The mansion they were in was part of his reward for being appointed a grand prince. It was packed with all sorts of wealth and magical treasures, although Yang Qi didn't care about any of that. The only important thing to him that he had gained in this venture was the title of grand prince. He had the full support of Princess Jadefall, and would eventually crush all those who opposed him. The Prince of Jade Warfare, the Prince of Godly Warfare and Proud Warpatience would all fall to him. In the end, he would get the information he sought about Proud Heaven.

Proud Heaven had been the sworn brother of the emperor and was no one to take lightly. In fact, he was definitely the most powerful person connected to the Titan Emperor Heaven. Although he was gone, it was as the saying went: the tiger may leave, but his threat remains. Who knew when he might return, or how dramatically the Titan Emperor Heaven would change when he did?

Raising his voice, Yang Qi addressed his loyal followers, “The time has come for me to impart some consummate arts for you to cultivate. The only way to crush everyone else is for us to become as strong as possible.”

With that, he began distributing godly-class energy arts—four in total—along with Heaven-Devouring śarīras to help extrude the heterogeneous true energy that would result from cultivating them together.

Yang Qi actually had ten godly-class energy arts at his disposal.

Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.

Jade-Emperor Profound-Welkin Exalted-Celestial God-Dao.

Prodigious Proto-Epoch, Invincible War-Steppe.

Cardinal Grand Brahma Punishes the Fire God Energy Art.

Heaven-Devouring Good-Fortune Non-Existent-Gods Dao.

Murky Cavern Never-Dying Sanctuary Energy Art.

Killing Fist of the Dao of Monarchs.

Void Mist Mountain and Sea Interstice.

Asiryangguk Sauvastika Devil Grand Infernal Energy.

Namaḥ Myriad Buddha Vajra Great Compassion Mantra Art.

The shocking power they could unleash when combined defied description.

Of course, only Yang Qi himself could cultivate them all at the same time, thanks to King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans, which allowed him to combine all of their true energy and effects. Because of that, he was slowly pushing toward forming something called virtual godhood.

Thanks to his Wheel of Fate, he had long since analyzed the structure of all of these energy arts and determined how to make them even more effective. He had also adjusted the mental dharma aspects to make them easier to cultivate.

As a result, he was much more confident in giving them to his followers.

Everyone accepted the Heaven-Devouring śarīras and the energy arts, and they fairly quivered with excitement. Energy arts and cultivation level were the two things that could ensure safety and progress for anyone.

After a short session of cultivation, Yang Qi dismissed everyone and his mansion quieted down. It was a huge minor world of its own, filled with endless pagodas and structures and the like. There were even oceans, lakes, rivers, and other terrain features. But no people. According to custom, a newly-appointed grand prince would be given servant girls and bodyguards. But Yang Qi had sent all of his staff back to the Department of Internal Affairs.

There were secrets he kept that guards and servants might discover, and that needed to be avoided.

After everyone was gone, he sent his divine will out to cover the entire manor, activating the numerous deadly spell formations that were there to keep out intruders. The two main priorities in the construction of these mansions were safety and privacy. Obviously, anyone who reached the rank of grand prince would have secrets to be kept from outsiders.

Yang Qi was no exception.

As his divine will spread through his mansion, he found certain spell formations that contained elements designed to spy on him.

Instead of destroying them, he used certain special divine abilities to lace them with warding spells that would create illusions. Whoever it was that planned to spy on him through them would soon begin receiving very incorrect information. And he could reach back through the spell formations to identify who was spying on him, or possibly even injure them.

After everything was set up, not even the sovereign of heaven would be able to catch him unawares.

“Three Hundred Sixty Hell Portals!”

RUMBLE!

Three hundred and sixty Hell Portals appeared behind Yang Qi, all of which belched roiling devil energy. He had finally broken through the constraints of the immortal world around him to reach out to high-level hell planes.

“Come forth! Valiant warriors, officers, and kings of hell, I am the paramount and unparalleled Sovereign Lord. It is with the blessings of the Lord that I call you forth to extirpate yourself from the bindings of hell. I will return your genes to their original state and make you the most holy of angels!”

With that, he began to recite an enchantment, and soon, powerful entities began striding out from the Hell Portals.

Towering devil emperors appeared, all of them peak fifth stage World-Demolishers who were more powerful than their immortal contemporaries in every way.

The Demonfolk from the Hanging Heaven had all been immortal marquises, and each was capable of defeating several immortal marquises of the same rank from the Titan Emperor Heaven. But these devil emperors could defeat dozens of similar experts from the Hanging Heaven!

They were Infernalfolk, descendants of the infernal kings and deities.

“Salutations, Milord!” shouted the three hundred and sixty enormous infernals as they dropped to their knees and kowtowed to Yang Qi.

If these fiend-devils let their auras free, anyone who sensed it would be terrified to the core. After all, they were all elites where they came from, consummate geniuses of the most extreme nature.

“Excellent. The time has come to cleanse your devil energy away and turn you into angels. Your cultivation bases will become stronger, and as you revert from evil to righteousness your auras will become holy.” He waved his hand, sending a host of sealing marks flying out. The halls of heaven seemed to appear, from which descended finger-sized entities of holy light. The light entered the fiend-devils, and instantly their faces twisted as if they were in pain. But then pious expressions overtook them, including faint smiles. They even clasped their hands together in front of their chests as their bodies were transformed.

Pure white wings sprouted from the backs of all the fiend-devils, complete with glowing feathers. Halos appeared behind their heads—manifestations of the dao of heaven, pure, holy, and incomparably connected to the surrounding magical and natural laws.

Angels had originally been created by the legion of gods, and the magical laws they contained made them like machines of war designed to punish those who disrespected the gods. Countless epochs in the past, angels had been feared in all of the millions upon millions of planes of the universe, and were considered unassailable and irreproachable entities by even the most profound experts.

And now Yang Qi was restoring their might and glory.

After the gods experience nirvanic rebirth, a new civilization will once again be born from the ruins of the old civilization.

RUMBLE!

As the process completed and the three hundred sixty fiend-devils became angels, their battle prowess rose tenfold. Their ancient genes were unlocked and their each and every move harkened to the might of the legion of gods.

“Excellent. The latent genes of the angels are strongest in the Infernalfolk, making them the most suitable for transformation. Asuras, giant snakes, bronzeblaze fiend-devils… all of them are pure fiend-devils, not fallen angels. They cannot be transformed.” Yang Qi had only recently come to this realization.

One of the angels stepped forward, knelt, and said, “Milord, we are angels, and in the immortal worlds, angels are a thing of the past. If we appear in the open, it would cause a huge stir. Considering you’re still developing your godly abilities, that could lead to unfortunate complications.”

“I'm aware of that. I'm going to give you a godly-class energy art that you can use to mask your features and make you look like ordinary immortals. Then, when the time is right, you can reveal your true nature. Although you are currently immortal marquises, you can easily defeat even immortal paragons. And, as angels, you are more in sync with the dao of heaven, which will prove immensely beneficial to your cultivation. That is a result of your angel blood. It won’t be long before all of you reach the sixth stage of Abstrusity-Demolishing.”

Chapter 599: Shopping Spree

Three hundred and sixty angels, all of them in the immortal marquis level, were given amazing techniques by Yang Qi that shrank them down and turned them into ordinary immortals. That said, all of them had immense battle prowess and incredible life force. Their mere presence breathed new life into Yang Qi’s grand prince mansion.

He couldn’t trust the soldiers and servant girls assigned to him by the Department of Internal Affairs, but he knew that he could have complete trust in these angels.

“Take positions in the defensive spell formations. And take these power stones and Heaven-Devouring śarīras for your cultivation.”

He sent out three hundred and sixty fist-sized Heaven-Devouring śarīras to them, which entered the angels’ hearts. Going forward, the śarīras would remove the heterogeneous true energy in them and make them even purer than before. And of course, they would be more dangerous in battle.

The angels settled down in the depths of the spell formations and began working on their cultivation.

Of course, considering their immense life force, the faith power they could provide to Yang Qi was formidable. Meanwhile, Yang Qi kept his three hundred and sixty Hell Portals open and emitting hell-born fiend-devils.

Although all of them were in the immortal marquis level, none of them were close to being as formidable as the three hundred and sixty angels.

The initial three hundred and sixty angels had been specially selected as top experts. As for the fiend-devils he would continue summoning, he didn't pay as close attention. As long as they were immortal marquises, he would summon them.

Over the course of the next month or so, he continued summoning fiend-devils until he had a total of thirty-six thousand, all of them immortal marquises. In other words, each of his angels now had command over a hundred immortal marquis fiend-devils, which was a nearly incomprehensible level of power. As his forces continuously prayed, immense changes occurred in the depths of his mansion.

If anyone had somehow forced their way inside during this moment, they would have found themselves in a situation as dangerous as a dragon’s pool or a tiger’s den and would not likely have been able to escape alive.

In the short month that had passed, he’d turned his mansion into a virtually invincible stronghold.

‘Alright. The time has come to go to the Mechfolk emporium to buy some more goods. If I send materials from there to the lower world, my planetary system and kingdom will grow even stronger than before.’

Leaving his mansion, he headed toward the business plane in the imperial city.

In a surprise turn of events, he found that the Heaven’s Net Consortium had ceased all operations. Apparently, his theft of the six hundred and sixty-six imperial snakecharms had truly been a devastating blow to them. Furthermore, they were connected to the Hanging Heaven, so after the big defeat there recently it was only natural that they would go into hiding. However, he knew that they hated him and would surely cause trouble eventually. He had revealed the snakecharms during the fighting, and many Demonfolk experts surely noticed. Thankfully, he was a Demolisher now and wasn’t afraid of anything short of a Godmyth.

Another surprising development in the business plane was that the Lost Civilization Consortium was expanding and had taken over the previous territory of the Heaven’s Net Consortium.

As soon as he entered the emporium, the Mechfolk rushed over with looks of reverence on their faces.

“Congratulations, Grand Prince Titan Dragonguard! Sir, words of your shocking deeds in battle have been spreading everywhere!”

“Our emporium has expanded! We’ve taken over the entire street that used to belong to the Heaven’s Net Consortium. Our headquarters has chosen to invest a lot of capital in our business here in the Titan Emperor Heaven! And we have some new products available, mechas that surpass the sonic class! We have terrestrial class, celestial class, earthly class, and heavenly class mechas now! Oh, and we finally have battleships suitable for you. Were you still interested in those, Grand Prince?”

“That’s wonderful. I'm interested in all of them.” Looking around, Yang Qi saw that the emporium was a lot bigger than before. Nodding, he continued, “As long as you have products worth buying, I have power stones to pay for them. Price isn’t important. As an important military officer, I can pay whatever price is necessary to improve the fighting prowess of my troops.”

“Please, step in and take a look.”

**

Meanwhile, back in the mortal world, all of the planets in the Sage Monarch planetary system were bubbling with excitement and joy. Lanterns and colorful banners lined the streets, and a mood of celebration filled the air. The occasion being celebrated was the defeat of the holy land of true cultivation that was the Misty Kingdom. The top experts had been defeated and all of their resources had been plundered, even godrelics.

“Look!” The cultivation experts in the Sage Monarch planetary system rose to their feet as an army of fiend-devils and angels approached, carrying one of those godrelics with them.

It was an enormous sphere that contained streams of misty god energy that were collectively referred to as Misty Essence. This was the former Misty Kingdom’s most powerful godrelic, which contained an ancient god formation that allowed experts to form immortal bodies without ascending to an immortal world.

It was this item that enabled the Misty Kingdom to rise to the level of a holy land of true cultivation.

Unfortunately for them, the godrelic now belonged to Yang Qi.

As soon as it arrived in Sage Monarch City, Yang Qi’s immortal clone called a meeting of all the important people in the realm. Eldest Brother and Elder Second Brother were there, in very high spirits after all the gains they had made during the conquest.

Yang Qi’s sworn siblings, as well as his family, had all gained valuable experience in the fighting and had experienced a baptism by blood and fire.

Upon arriving, Eldest Brother said to the clone, “Junior Brother, we purged the Misty Kingdom of all enemies. Unfortunately, their supreme leader escaped to another holy land of true cultivation. In fact, some of those other places have formed an alliance to oppose us. And there are other immortal worlds that are so worried about us invading them that they’ve sent experts to infiltrate our forces and interfere with our plans. I think that, for the time being, we need to cease our recruitment efforts.”

“Understood,” the clone responded. “Let’s take a look at this godrelic. It seems incredible.” With a wave of his hand he sent some power into the godrelic, causing it to collapse into a stream of deathless godliness that shot up into the sky and disappeared into the immortal world above.

RUMBLE!

A moment later a rift opened, emanating a heaven-destroying, earth-extinguishing aura.

Soon, the source of that aura became visible: a mecha.

It was enormous, its surface covered with golden magical symbols that flickered with dazzling light. It was surrounded with dao lineaments and spatial magical laws, and pulsed with universal power. Eldest Brother, Elder Second Brother, and everyone else trembled at the sight of it, and began backing up.

“What's that? It's not a magical treasure. And how come it has no aura of the dao of immortals? Is it…?”

“This thing is called a mecha,” the clone explained. “There is a race of people in the immortal worlds called the Mechfolk, who use the mechanical abilities of an ancient, lost civilization to create things like this. As long as a mecha has a source of power, even mortals who don’t have true energy can use it to kill immortals. My true self has already reached the Demolishing level and become a grand prince in the Titan Emperor Heaven, so now he’s in a position to send things like this down here.

“This is a heavenly class mecha which is strong enough to fight and kill sixth stage Demolishers, and hold the line of battle against the seventh stage. It’s a Warrior Paragon model, and it’s intended for you, Eldest Brother. There are many more mechas to come, enough for everyone, all selected based on the level of your cultivation base. Understand? We need to step up our invasion efforts and speed up our acquisition of new territory. That faith power is very important, and we need more of it.”

RUMBLE!

More power emanated from above as a host of mechas descended.

Yang Zhan was given a heavenly class mecha, the Warrior Sovereign model. With mechas like these, they would be absolutely invincible in the mortal world. In fact, they would be a powerful force even in the immortal worlds.

After all, the mechas were designed to crush seventh stage Wilds-Demolishers, and even more relevant, were fueled by power stones from the Tusita Heaven. Not even the Mechfolk could easily power up the suits to that level. The power stones required by heavenly class mechas were just too rare, which meant that they were usually just created as display models.

Several hundred mechas descended, and in the blink of an eye the fighting force of the Sage Monarch planetary system increased by thousands of times.

After the mechas descended, more rumbling could be heard as an enormous battleship appeared.

It was neither an immortal item nor a god item, and it was so huge that it rivaled many continents in size.

“This is one of the most powerful battleships that the Mechfolk had in stock. It’s a Vile Dragon model, and is strong enough to break through the greyspaces of immortal worlds.”

Chapter 600: All the Enemies Meet

“Grand Prince, that Vile Dragon model you just purchased was one of the most powerful battleships we have in stock and was actually constructed from the corpse of a vile dragon. Of course, we augmented the corpse with various other building materials, using the special engineering methods of the ancient mechanical civilization. For instance, the techniques of spatial compression, time compaction, particle separation, and so on were all very useful.

“It takes a crew of several hundred thousand to operate, but it can house over one billion personnel if necessary. It can easily cruise through the spatial tempests outside of the immortal worlds, although it requires massive power reserves to do so. At the very least, it would need power from a fifteenth-ranked immortal world. That said, Grand Prince, considering you have power stones from the thirty-third ranked Tusita Heaven, you shouldn’t have any problems.”

The top Mechfolk experts from the Lost Civilization Consortium continued jabbering, describing their machines using a host of terms Yang Qi didn’t understand. They were using terminology that came, not from an immortal dao civilization, but instead from some other culture.

Although Yang Qi didn’t understand what all of the words meant, he got the general picture: the battleship he had purchased was very powerful. Furthermore, it had size-altering properties. At its largest, it could cover an entire continent. But when shrunk down, it could fit in his pocket. It was a space-folding function that rivalled the techniques one could attain with the magical laws of the dao of immortals.

The downside was that it required tremendous power.

The Titan Emperor Heaven was a first-ranked immortal world, thus it couldn’t ever hope to power a battleship that needed the power of a fifteenth-ranked immortal world. Places like that were vastly superior to the Titan Emperor Heaven. In fact, not even ten thousand Titan Emperor Heavens put together could match up to a location like that. Not even the emperor of the Titan Emperor Heaven was strong enough to go to such locations.

Yang Qi had just concluded a major business transaction with the Mechfolk, using heaps of power stones to purchase mechas and battleships. Both sides had benefited greatly. After all, the Mechfolk lacked power stones from high-level planes in the universe, and Yang Qi’s forces in the lower world were now far better equipped to conquer the other holy lands of true cultivation. He needed the faith from those lands to start building the reserves of power he would require for further breakthroughs.

That said, the faith he did have access to caused his blood to sizzle and the Blood of the One God in his forehead to grow stronger.

Even as Yang Qi concluded his business with the Mechfolk, a meeting was taking place in an enormous mansion somewhere else in the imperial city.

Proud Warpatience was in attendance, yet he wasn’t presiding over the meeting. The person in charge wore the robes of the imperial house. His face was blank of any expression, and he didn’t even emanate a scrap of an aura. He was none other than the crown prince, the same man who had been such a shock to Yang Qi by remaining completely out of sight.

No matter where this crown prince stood, no one would ever notice him. That just went to show how powerful he was. It was also why no one ever dared to look down on him; his divine abilities defied description.

“Crown Prince,” Proud Warpatience said, “Your Majesty, I have to say that it seems Princess Jadefall is really turning into a threat to you.” From the way he spoke, it was obvious that he feared the crown prince. He kept his voice down and was very respectful as he offered his musings and advice. “Your main goal is to become a boundless Godmyth and ascend to a higher immortal world. Later, you will return and take over rulership of our Titan Emperor Heaven. Unfortunately, Princess Jadefall was appointed as the eminent princess. Now she has enough clout to clash with you openly! In the mortal world, only the crown prince would have the right to succeed the emperor, but we do things differently in the immortal world. Succession is based on cultivation level and Princess Jadefall has a special physique, with immense power coursing in her blood. As time progresses, she's only going to get stronger. That’s especially true considering that her right-hand man is Titan Dragonguard. With him, she’s like a tiger that has grown wings! Crown Prince, you really need to handle this situation with finesse.”

“I honestly don’t care much about the issue of succession,” the crown prince said in a cool, calm voice. “The core teachings and doctrines of the Titan Emperor Heaven aren’t even important. That said, Princess Jadefall is going to be a tough opponent. As for her special physique, it makes her what the ancient mythological texts refer to as a Reincarnated One. Although she technically does have Titan blood in her, the truth is that her blood surpasses the god Titan’s. You see, right before Princess Jadefall was born, her mother dreamed of six earthquakes and was infused with a blast of quintessence energy. Princess Jadefall thinks the matter is a big secret, but I knew about it long ago. The more time that passes, the bigger threat she will be.”

‘So she's a Reincarnated One!’ Proud Warpatience thought. At long last he had proof of his earlier suspicions, thanks to the crown prince. ‘My Master Proud Heaven actually made a mistake in his calculations. As it turns out, the low-level Titan Emperor Heaven does have a Reincarnated One. Luckily, Princess Jadefall doesn’t have full control of her powers yet, and won’t until she reaches the Godmyth level. If she does unlock the full powers of her reincarnation, she’ll be impossible to beat. I definitely need to notify Master Proud Heaven and tell him to get back here as quickly as possible.’

Of course, he didn’t give any clue as to his true thoughts. Eyes flickering, he said, “Crown Prince, what exactly is a Reincarnated One? I’ve never heard of anything like that before. Is it some kind of powerful body? I mean, there are definitely plenty of powerful body types in the immortal worlds. For instance, there’s the Nine Yins True Body, the Nine Yangs Origin Spawn, the Heptametal Body, the Five Phases Spirit Body, and so on. They all lead to rapid cultivation advancement.”

“Forget about that for now,” the crown prince said. His face remained as expressionless as ever, yet a knowing look flickering in the depths of his eyes as he looked at Proud Warpatience. “Princess Jadefall will be difficult to deal with, but it seems to me that the bigger problem is Titan Dragonguard.”

“No way,” one of the grand princes said. “He’s a nobody, and isn’t even close to reaching a truly high level of cultivation. How could he possibly be more difficult to deal with than Princess Jadefall?”

Ignoring the grand prince, the crown prince said, “What do you think, Proud Warpatience?”

From the way he looked at him, it was almost as if he understood secrets that Proud Warpatience thought were hidden.

‘Wait. Don’t tell me that the crown prince knows about my fight with Titan Dragonguard back in the Hanging Heaven!’ Proud Warpatience was surprised, but didn’t let it show on his face. Nodding, he said, “It shouldn’t be hard to dig up more information on Princess Jadefall, including the techniques she cultivates, her habits, et cetera. But Titan Dragonguard is a mystery. In less than a year, he went from being a minor figure to being a grand prince. Nobody knows what divine abilities he has, or what techniques he cultivates. We do know that he's a vicious killer that currently seems invincible. That’s what makes him seem like such a terrifying force. Crown Prince, as we all know, you cultivate a consummate technique that makes you virtually omniscient, able to comprehend the most profound rotations of the universe, with eternal wisdom and knowledge. Can’t you divine some information about Titan Dragonguard’s background?”

“Yes, I can. Otherwise I wouldn’t have called this meeting with the various grand princes, and other important officials like you, Proud Warpatience.” Looking over at one of the other officials, he said, “Director, what information do you have about Titan Dragonguard?”

The Director of Internal Affairs rose to his feet respectfully and said, “Roughly a year ago, Titan Duelbringer and Titan Dragonguard paid a ‘fine’ to the Department of Internal Affairs in the form of power stones, to expunge their record and get new positions. At that time, Titan Dragonguard was a down-and-out descendant of someone from the imperial house who had fallen so low in society he lived among the commoners. That story is probably a cover, and he likely has another identity altogether.

“As for Titan Duelbringer, he previously worked in the Department of Internal Affairs and was sent as an emissary to the lower world to handle a minor problem. Unfortunately, he failed in his mission and was said to have been killed. Somehow, he survived and he snuck back up here, greased palms here and there in the Department of Internal Affairs, and started putting together a network of powerful allies. In fact, he’s so influential now that his word sometimes outweighs my own. And since he holds positions in both the Department of Internal Affairs and the Department of the Imperial Clan, unless the Superintendent of the Imperial Clan and myself work together, he’s too powerful to deal with.”

“Something is off here,” the crown prince said, then a slight smile appeared on his face. “Titan Dragonguard’s story is definitely a sham. Perhaps that's what we can use to put some pressure on him.”

“You think he’s an imposter?” one of the other grand princes said. “But he definitely has the blood of Titan. We can all sense it. In fact, his blood is so strong that he seems like a clan member from generations past.”

“That’s what's so suspicious,” the crown prince said. “His blood is so pure that it seems likely it's fake. Considering how many generations have passed, the Titan blood in the imperial house is weak. It can be strengthened with certain difficult types of cultivation, but how could he possibly have access to techniques like that? From what I can tell, this Titan Dragonguard is the biggest threat we face, and I even suspect he wants to overthrow the dynasty. Unfortunately, he's a grand prince and is allied with Eminent Princess Jadefall. Therefore, we can’t make a move against him openly, and an assassination wouldn’t be wise. For now, we just have to keep an eye on him and set a trap that he’ll never be able to escape from.”

“What exactly do you have in mind, Crown Prince?” Proud Warpatience said, well aware that the crown prince was enigmatic, impossible to predict, and far more intelligent than the grand princes in general.

“We start by interrogating Titan Duelbringer,” the crown prince replied coolly. “There’s definitely something fishy going on with him. Have him secretly arrested, using the failure of his mission in the lower world as the pretext. Accuse him of bribing officials as well. I refuse to believe that Titan Dragonguard will be able to come up with any reasonable justification to interfere. He was just appointed grand prince, so if he breaks any rules it will make it that much easier to make a move against him.”

“Clever! Very clever!” said another of the grand princes. “We interrogate Titan Duelbringer and see how Titan Dragonguard reacts. A great plan!”

Unbeknownst to everyone present, the yellow-garbed young man with the buzz cut and Chancellor Demi-Immortal were hidden in that very same meeting hall, eavesdropping on the meeting.

“Why didn’t you reveal that Titan Dragonguard is actually Yang Qi?” Chancellor Demi-Immortal asked. “If you did, he wouldn’t be able to establish a foothold in the Titan Emperor Heaven.”

Chapter 601: Arresting Titan Duelbringer

The young man in yellow knew that Chancellor Demi-Immortal wanted to reveal Yang Qi’s hidden identity and thus sow chaos. However, he didn’t agree that doing so was the best plan. “Revealing the information would indeed prevent him from establishing himself in this immortal world. But would it ensure his death? He’s already in the Demolishing level and I doubt anyone in this immortal world could kill him, even if they tried. If he gets spooked and runs, how would we track him down?”

Chancellor Demi-Immortal frowned. “But, he already has a strong foundation in the mortal world. The Sage Monarch planetary system generates him immense amounts of faith, so there’s no way he’ll abandon it. If his true identity is revealed, he’ll become the mortal enemy of the entire immortal world. And if open conflict results, perhaps we could swoop in and be the ultimate winners.”

“Swoop in and be the ultimate winners?” the young man said. “That’s easier said than done. The Titan Emperor Heaven is extremely unstable now, and there’s no way to say for certain if they would truly oppose Yang Qi. For all you know, they might join forces against us. Yang Qi is crafty and treacherous, and knows that my legacy of King Immortal-Slayer—and the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart—could easily be used against the immortal world. Right now, Yang Qi has firmly established himself as Princess Jadefall’s trusted advisor. He has her ear, and she's apparently abandoned her previous advisors. Who knows, maybe she even had them killed. The point is, if we spread news about Yang Qi’s identity, there’s a good eighty percent chance that it will only cement the relationship between him and Princess Jadefall and they’ll work together to kill us. Even Proud Warpatience might turn on us.”

“He won't,” Chancellor Demi-Immortal said. He knew full well how vicious people could be. In fact, he already planned to kill this young man in yellow, eventually, and take his legacy. And right now, he felt more strongly than ever that the young man was trying to manipulate him. Regardless, he would bide his time until the right moment came to act.

“Chancellor Demi-Immortal, I think even you realize that unmasking Yang Qi isn’t the right move. Let’s wait and see how his conflict with the ministers and officials play out. There’s no way the two sides will reconcile, which means that it will end in some sort of deadly climax. Besides, we’re not in any rush. If revealing his identity makes sense in the future, we can always do it. Before making our move on Yang Qi, we need to make sure that we have a foolproof plan that will end with him being dead. If we set a trap for him and he survives, then he could just brush the dust off his shoulders and vanish. Then what would we do?”

Chancellor Demi-Immortal nodded. “Fine. I’ll follow your lead on this.”

Of course, as far as Chancellor Demi-Immortal was concerned, as long as the young man in yellow and Yang Qi were at each other’s throats, he would come out on top in the end.

**

Titan Duelbringer was feeling very pleased. He had positions in both the Department of the Imperial Clan and the Department of Internal Affairs. Even better, now that Yang Qi was a grand prince, he had even more clout.

Everyone knew that he was the confidante of Grand Prince Titan Dragonguard, thus everyone in both departments would jump to follow his orders. He had a whole group of henchmen who were completely devoted to him, and even his own mansion.

Today, he had a host of visitors at his mansion, most of them his own henchmen there to make requests and petitions. For the most part, they were unimportant guards and low-ranking officials in the imperial city.

They didn't have very high cultivation bases, but they were perfect as spies and moles. They could get information and news from all corners, and were part of a large network of relationships that was strong enough to be terrifying to many people.

“Titan Duelbringer, sir, you’ve really treated us well. Considering you work for the Prince of Military Security, it’s no surprise you're rising through the ranks along with him. Just don’t forget about us when you get promoted again….”

“Sir, if you can grant this one request of mine, then I promise to go through hell and high water for you for the rest of my life!”

“Sir, please, let me toast you. I hope that you also get promoted to the level of grand prince soon. Who knows, maybe you can even take over as the Director of Internal Affairs or the Superintendent of the Imperial Clan. With power like that, you would be truly formidable.”

Everyone was full of praise for Titan Duelbringer.

Nodding magnanimously, he said, “I’ve already mentioned all of your various issues to the grand prince himself, and he’s promised to take care of everything. As long as you carefully attend to all of the matters pertaining to the Prince of Military Security and Eminent Princess Jadefall, your requests will all be granted.”

He was doing everything possible to make sure Yang Qi had a reliable network of henchmen.

CRASH!

With no warning whatsoever, the main door of the mansion suddenly exploded and a host of mechas stormed in. In the blink of an eye, a huge spell formation was set up, instantly locking down the entire area.

“Who—” Titan Duelbringer shot to his feet, an expression of astonishment on his face. It only took a moment to assess the situation. These were troops from the Department of Internal Affairs, the famous Devil Crushers.

“Why have you charged in here uninvited?” Titan Duelbringer said. After his most recent session of cultivation with Yang Qi, he had plenty of divine abilities that ensured he wasn’t worried at all about the current situation.

One of the guards stepped forward, a dignified and imposing man who seemed like the type of person that no one would dare to disobey.

“You’ve been accused of a major crime, Titan Duelbringer,” he said. “The crown prince himself ordered that the Department of Internal Affairs arrest you and take you in for interrogation.”

All of the guests in the mansion immediately dropped to their knees and said, “Greetings, Director.” This man was none other than the Director of Internal Affairs, a very mysterious and powerful man. The fact that he had come personally to arrest Titan Duelbringer was very telling. And the orders came from the crown prince himself. Two very important people were apparently working together in this situation.

The people present were trembling like cicadas in winter, and didn't dare to voice any opinions or objections.

This was obviously a very high-level conflict.

Remaining completely calm, Titan Duelbringer said, “What crime did I commit, Minister?  I've worked hard for the Department of Internal Affairs, and performed many services.”

“I think you know exactly what you did,” the minister responded. “You were sent to the mortal world to pacify the chaos. But in the end, a lot of fiendslave battalion soldiers died. You actually rebelled, tricking us into sending you resources for personal gain! You were sentenced to death, yet here you are, alive. You snuck back into the immortal world and used power stones to bribe officials to alter your records. You think we didn’t know? Look, I'm not going to waste my breath talking to you. You're coming with me, and once you’re behind bars you're going to answer all of the questions I have for you.”

“What if I refuse to come?” Titan Duelbringer said coldly. “You know who I am in the Department of the Imperial Clan. If you want to arrest me, you have to get a warrant from there too.”

The minister chuckled. “These orders come from the crown prince, who can direct both the Department of Internal Affairs and the Department of the Imperial Clan. If you refuse to do things the easy way, we’ll do them the hard way. You're coming with me, whether you like it or not.”

“The Department of the Imperial Clan and the Department of Internal Affairs are very important organizations to the imperial house, and in the past the eminent prince held posts in both. With the eminent prince missing for so many years, the crown prince stepped in to fill his shoes. However, there’s a new eminent princess. According to ancestral law, if the crown prince wants to do something like this, he has to report the matter to the eminent princess beforehand. This is a gross abuse of authority and a violation of ancestral law. So of course I'm not going to just go along with it.”

“Ancestral law? You're citing ancestral law?” The director burst out laughing. “The crown prince needs to consult with the eminent princess on important matters? You think us arresting you falls into that category? This is a minor affair, and the crown prince is well within his rights to do this.”

“Of course it falls into that category,” Titan Duelbringer responded. “Minister, I suggest you go back to the crown prince and grand princes and talk this matter over one more time."

The minister snorted coldly. “Men, arrest this pig-headed brat!”

“Yes sir!”

“If he resists arrest, kill him!”

“Get him!”

The faces of all of Titan Duelbringer’s guests went ashen, and many of them huddled on the ground, nearly in the fetal position as they tried to make themselves as small as possible.

At this point, a new voice echoed out. “What exactly do you think you’re doing?”

A figure appeared in front of Titan Duelbringer, hands clasped behind his back, pulsing with energy that seemed capable of shaking the dome of heaven.

It was Yang Qi.

He and Titan Duelbringer could communicate mentally, therefore he had been aware of the situation all along. And there was obviously no way he was going to allow Titan Duelbringer to be arrested.

“It's the Prince of Military Security!” people began shouting.

He was already a legend who everyone knew had slaughtered countless enemies, and had never been defeated in a fight. He was Princess Jadefall’s right-hand man and was already one of the most famous members of the court.

Looking calmly at Yang Qi, the Director of Internal Affairs said, “What are you doing, Prince of Military Security? Are you really going to interfere with the Department of Internal Affairs and defy the orders of the crown prince? As a grand prince, you surely know how important and powerful the crown prince is. Even you have to treat him with respect.”

“Crown prince? Never heard of him. I work for Eminent Princess Jadefall, and couldn't care less about anyone else. Nobody is allowed to lay a hand on Titan Duelbringer. Even if your so-called crown prince comes here personally, it won’t change a thing.”

“Fine. So you’re opposing the court, and violating ancestral law.” The director's eyes glittered sharply. “Prince of Military Security, just because you killed that Mammoth Dharma-Heaven doesn’t mean that you have the right to strut around like this. You rank the same as the crown prince, and if you don’t back down I’ll arrest you too, and hand you over to the Department of Internal Affairs for punishment.”

Chapter 602: Blocking

In response to the director’s words, Yang Qi snorted coldly. “Apparently, I haven’t done enough to establish my authority. Perhaps killing a few people will help. According to the rumors, the Director of Internal Affairs and the Superintendent of the Imperial Clan are considered top experts. Director, from what I can see, you're an eighth stage Antiquity-Demolisher, with access to the most ancient of essences. Sadly, I’m not impressed.”

The Director of Internal Affairs oversaw all of the finances of the imperial house, and as such was a very powerful person. It was a position which only the most powerful of old-timers could assume, and the bare minimum required to fill it was to be an eighth stage Antiquity-Demolisher. There were even times in the past when it had been held by ninth stage Dao-Demolishers.

As for the Superintendent of the Imperial clan, he was in charge of enforcing the law and punishing criminals. Similarly, it was a position that only powerful old-timers could assume.

Those two were second in power only to the emperor, crown prince, and eminent princess. They were essentially as influential as the grand princes, and in some ways even surpassed them.

After all, the grand princes were all members of the imperial house, so if the emperor wanted one of them to be punished, the Department of Internal Affairs and the Department of the Imperial Clan would take the lead in doing so.

Yet here Yang Qi was defying the Director of Internal Affairs. Obviously, the man was furious about that. As far as he was concerned, this ‘Titan Dragonguard’ was a newly-appointed grand prince and had an unstable position. There was no way he should be acting in defiance like this, and he definitely needed to be taught a lesson.

“I see what’s going on here,” the director said coolly. “You think that because you have the backing of Eminent Princess Jadefall, you can do whatever you want? You think you can just defy the laws around here? Well, I really do need to arrest you then, and call her over here to decide what to do with you. You and Titan Duelbringer colluded to bribe officials in the Department of Internal Affairs, and there’s no way you can deny it. The evidence is right there for everyone to see, as bright as the sun and moon. Men, stand down.”

“Yes sir!”

The guards immediately fell back, leaving a wide-open space in the middle of the mansion.

“Alright, Titan Dragonguard,” the director said. “Let’s see what you've got. Take your shot at me now. It’ll be your last chance to do so.”

“Ai….” Yang Qi sighed. “Some people really do just want to get themselves killed. Well, you can’t blame me. If that’s what you want, so be it.”

He suddenly reached out and splayed his fingers, causing an energy field to spring up. All of heaven and earth trembled and space-time folded in on itself. Godly might erupted, along with a chaotic, primeval aura, as though a great god were stepping out of the river of time to suppress all sorts of evil and wicked energies.

His forces in the mortal world had recently conquered the Misty Kingdom and acquired an incredibly powerful godrelic. After Yang Qi took its deathly godliness, it allowed him to advance his cultivation even further, and make his Blood of the One God purer.

Furthermore, months had passed since he reached the Demolishing level. During that time, he had worked hard on his cultivation, built up greater reserves of faith power, and amassed even more true energy. His mastery of his energy arts had reached the point of perfection and he was now ready to break through to the second stage of Demolishing.

He was now vastly stronger than he had been during his clash with Proud Warpatience in the Hanging Heaven.

WHIZZZ!

When a true expert acts, real skill will be displayed.

The moment Yang Qi extended his hand, the Director of Internal Affairs’s face fell. He had come with a whole group of guards, but in this moment he was standing right out in the open. And right now, he felt as though the spot he was standing in had been ripped out of the world and placed into another location.

“AIIIEEE!” The so-called Devil Crushers all dropped to their knees from the sheer force radiating off of Yang Qi. As for all of the henchmen Titan Duelbringer had gathered, they were still on their knees, clutching their heads in their hands. But the moment Yang Qi took action, they felt boundless power entering them, purifying them, raising their spirits, and filling them with mettle.

In the shortest of moments, Yang Qi had completely turned the situation around.

“Director of Internal Affairs, you’re an old-timer from the imperial house, but if you think you can fight me, you’re more of a fool than I took you for. Why are you so loyal to the crown prince? Why not join Eminent Princess Jadefall? If you do, you’ll have a future filled with boundless glory. But if you fight me, you're going to lose all face. I’m going to give you one chance. Join me. Give Eminent Princess Jadefall your loyalty. Otherwise, you’ll lose so much face you won’t be able to serve as the Director of Internal Affairs.”

Yang Qi was still holding his hand out in front of him, his five fingers splayed, not yet having done a thing to the Director of Internal Affairs.

“Have a death wish, you pansy?” the director roared. “How dare you threaten me! Nirvanic Extermination Zen Source True Void Energy! Cosmic Nirvanic Extermination!”

RUMBLE!

True energy erupted out of him, making him turn into something that looked like a god of nirvanic extermination. With seeming ease, he shattered the sealing magic Yang Qi had just unleashed.

Crack!

Yang Qi’s fingers stretched backwards from the force, making it seem like his hand might explode at any moment.

“What kind of crap is this? Fine. Don't want to do things the easy way? We’ll do them the hard way. You’re about to find out what humiliation really is! Be broken!” Boundless godlight shot out from Yang Qi’s eyes, filling the entire area as he snapped his fingers closed into a fist.

Crackle! Crash!

Thunder rumbled, like the anger of ghosts and gods descended into the world of man to spread destruction and chaos. Power surged, a heavenly might that could not be defied, and godliness and magical laws poured down like rain to crush all life.

“Aaaiiiieee!”

The Director of Internal Affairs couldn’t stand up to it; his defensive true energy shattered into dust, and at the same time, his clothing, armor, immortal robes, jewelry, accouterments, magical treasures, and everything else were shredded out of existence. He even had a god item, but Yang Qi just destroyed it.

In the blink of an eye, the Director of Internal Affairs was left standing there completely and utterly naked.

“On your knees! I tried to give you some face, but you refused. You think that having the crown prince on your side qualifies you to fight with me? Let me tell you something. I know you planned to use Titan Duelbringer to try to get to me. But sadly, I'm not even remotely scared of any of you. Crafty plots and machinations won’t get you anywhere with me. If I have to, I’ll just wipe the current Department of Internal Affairs out of existence and make a new one!”

Yang Qi waved his hand again, sending out a burst of pressure that resulted in a hoarse shout from the Director of Internal Affairs as he was forced onto his knees.

This was humiliation. Raw, unabashed humiliation. Yang Qi had literally stripped him naked and forced him to his knees. It was actually worse than death.

“What, Director? I thought you had endless magical powers and amazing divine abilities? You're one of the most senior members of the imperial dynasty, yet here you are in front of me, naked and on your knees.”

“W-what… what just happened?”

“Don’t tell me Titan Dragonguard is really this strong!”

“How brazen! How audacious! He really defies all laws and principles, even of those of heaven. The Director of Internal Affairs is even stronger than the grand princes! For Titan Dragonguard to humiliate him like this is a challenge to all the customs and laws of the imperial dynasty! Not even Princess Jadefall would have done something like this!”

“It doesn’t matter. He's so strong! Too strong! The Director of Internal Affairs really has lost all possible face here.”

The henchmen Titan Duelbringer had called here had initially been terrified of the Director of Internal Affairs and had hoped to find an opportunity to flee. But the sight that met their eyes now was completely and utterly terrifying. Titan Duelbringer’s backer was just too incredible. Too vicious, too violent, too daring. He defied all laws and principles, trampling everything from custom to regulation, underfoot with impunity.

“Stay your hand!”

“Stop right there, evil creature!”

“You’d better back down immediately! You’ve already broken plenty of the rules of the imperial house!”

“This is outrageous! Strip him of the title of grand prince and lock him up!”

“Everyone, join forces to arrest this brat!”

“We have to maintain law and order!”

In that very same moment, countless streams of will converged on the location and numerous wormholes popped open.

Obviously, a host of experts had been watching the situation. And Yang Qi really had gone too far. Humiliating the Director of Internal Affairs the way he had was something these people couldn’t tolerate.

“That’s the imperial guard! The true old-timers from the imperial house!”

“There are so many of them! So many top experts!” Although the henchmen present were all unimportant figures, they were experienced and knowledgeable. They instantly recognized the imperial guard, which was made up of the oldest and strongest members of the imperial house, people who usually spent time cultivating in the Kingdom of Titan and only came out to handle big threats or situations.

“Be destroyed!”

Countless streams of divine will crushed down onto Yang Qi, yet he didn't care. He unleashed the nine stances of the Hand of the One God, a perfect cycle of moves that was the most profound of divine abilities.

Crack!

A barrier which had stood strong since ancient times suddenly shattered.

It was said that the Hand of the One God had been created by the boundless Sovereign Lord as a means to pursue the eternal dao. It could break the fetters of civilization to create new civilizations, and that was especially true when powered by the Blood of the One God.

POP!

Dazzling light shone everywhere, making it seem like a white-hot sun was burning in the middle of the imperial city. Instantly, the divine wills and true energies being levied against him were wiped out.

Yang Qi had just singlehandedly blocked an attack by a whole host of the imperial guards!

“Shatter!”

The white-hot sun exploded and all the encroaching streams of vital energy were destroyed. Grunts could be heard from the void as the old-timers who had released them were hit with a powerful backlash.

Chapter 603: You&#039;re Digging Your Own Graves

Yang Qi was truly ferocious. In front of countless onlookers, he stripped the Director of Internal Affairs naked and forced him onto his knees. It really was humiliation worse than death.

A host of experts had been secretly looking on, and in the critical moment they had decided to act, sending out divine will to crush Yang Qi. And yet, with a single move, he dismantled the attack. Not a single bit of divine will touched him, nor any energy arts, true energy, divine abilities, or magical techniques.

Yang Qi was so strong right now that no one present was a match for him, not even the experts from the imperial guard.

A sphere of light suddenly appeared, surrounding Yang Qi protectively. Then he sent out his own powerful expression of divine will.

“Anyone who makes a move on me will be putting in an official request to be executed. And anyone who messes with my people will also be asking to be killed. Those of you who attacked me today, I'm committing all of your auras to memory. You’re marked for death now. Just wait and see.”

RUMBLE!

His divine will spread out, causing his words to rumble like thunder in the ears and seas of consciousness of everyone in the imperial city, causing many a face to turn ashen in shock.

‘This…’ Proud Warpatience murmured to himself, his face falling. ‘He’s so incredibly arrogant….’

Everyone in the secret meeting had been watching events play out, and contrary to all expectations, Yang Qi was actually strong enough to fight back.

They had hoped that the situation would develop in a way that would let them crush him. But in the end, the attack had failed miserably.

‘His energy arts are even more terrifying than they were the last time we clashed.’ Even when he had fought Yang Qi back in the Hanging Heaven, he had been incapable of getting the upper hand. And now Yang Qi seemed many times stronger than that. He had so much deathless godliness that he could probably take control of the immortal world essence in the imperial city. Right now, Proud Warpatience had no confidence at all that he could take out Yang Qi.

In fact, he was certain that he would lose.

‘Impossible! I'm a ninth stage Dao-Demolisher! I'm already close to becoming a Godmyth. With the right good fortune, I could break through immediately. How could I be so helpless against this guy? And how could the imperial house turn out a person like this? Is he the ghost of the great god Titan himself? Or is this going to turn into a common thing among the coming generations? No, there’s no way. The bloodline of Titan is definitely about to fade away for all time.’

Proud Warpatience wasn’t happy at all. He was a person who defied all laws and principles, even those of the heavens, and he viewed himself as the top figure in this immortal world.

Yet Yang Qi had thoroughly surpassed him and there was nothing he could do about it.

At this point, he looked at the enigmatic leader of their group and said, “Crown Prince, what are you going to do now? It seems the only way to keep Titan Dragonguard in check will be for you to handle the matter personally. If he develops much further, he’ll be completely impossible to deal with.”

A grim expression could be seen on the crown prince’s face. Never in his wildest dreams could he have guessed that something like this would happen. Yang Qi was vastly stronger than anyone had imagined.

“This Titan Dragonguard is too reckless and arrogant. He must die, or else—”

Even as the words left his mouth…

RUMBLE!

A burst of vital energy filled the entire meeting hall, pulsing with Yang Qi’s aura. Then Yang Qi’s voice spoke, “I see you hiding in there, Crown Prince, plotting and scheming against me. Sadly for you, you’re not a match for me. If you don't believe me, come out and we can fight a bit. But if you do, there’ll be no going back. I’ll strip you of all face as well, and depose you. After all, there are plenty of competent individuals in the imperial house. If one crown prince is lost, another will take his place. It’s up to you—do you feel like testing me?” He burst out laughing.

The group gathered in the secret meeting all heard his words and were visibly shocked.

“You!” the crown prince growled, shooting to his feet, visibly fuming with rage. It almost looked like he was about to take action. However, as soon as he was out of his chair he got himself under control. Although his face was still crimson, he simply stood there unmoving.

He knew that if he attacked Yang Qi, the ramifications would be severe and the outcome would not be favorable for himself. After all, if Yang Qi himself had caused this much of a ruckus, what would happen if Eminent Princess Jadefall got involved?

Even if the crown prince somehow managed to get Yang Qi under control, the downsides would be too immense. Furthermore, the fact that Yang Qi was openly challenging him seemed to indicate that he had some trump card to rely on to win if a fight broke out.

The crown prince had backup plans of his own, and unfortunately the current situation was like the two old sayings if you ride a tiger, it's hard to get off and once you nock the arrow to the bow, one cannot but shoot it. If he let Yang Qi come out of this interaction with the upper hand, it would be a big blow to his reputation. The emperor had many sons and daughters, more than even Proud Warpatience, all of whom wished to win the title of crown prince or princess for their own.

Some of those sons and daughters were too weak to even mention, but some of them were incredibly powerful. And quite a few had him in their sights like a tiger eyeing its prey.

‘I can't back down now,’ the crown prince thought. ‘If I do, I’ll become a laughingstock, and no one will ever dare to work for me again. A loss of face here could be fatal. Even father would come to think of me as weak and incompetent.’

Even as the crown prince was trying to decide whether or not to fight to the death to protect his reputation, a new figure flew onto the scene, an extremely handsome man in a white garment.

“You’d better think this through, Crown Prince,” he said.

Quite a few people recognized him.

“It’s the Superintendent of the Imperial Clan!”

The Superintendent of the Imperial Clan was a grand prince, and, at the same time, a very mysterious figure.

“What are you doing here, Superintendent?” the crown prince asked coldly, his heart burning with fury.

“My respects, Crown Prince,” the superintendent said politely. “This Titan Dragonguard is a lunatic, but at the same time is incredibly tough. Furthermore, he has a whole host of top experts in his mansion. In fact, I heard he has an army of tens of thousands of soldiers, all of them immortal marquises or higher!”

“What?” the crown prince said, looking visibly shocked. “Tens of thousands of troops? All of them immortal marquises or higher?”

Even Proud Warpatience leapt to his feet in astonishment. “How could that even be possible? Immortal marquises are all landed gentry here in the Titan Emperor Heaven! They run cities or other important locations. How could anyone amass an army of them? Tens of thousands? It's impossible!”

“According to my sources, Titan Dragonguard recently concluded a transaction with the Mechfolk at the Lost Civilization Consortium. He paid them huge sums of money for a group of mechas all at the immortal marquis level or higher. And they had a whole bunch of experts from his mansion come to pick up the goods. His Imperial Majesty ordered me to place warding magics in Titan Dragonguard’s mansion to surveil him, but he created an illusory region which negates their effects.”

At this point, the superintendent produced a scroll case. Upon opening it, light filled the entire meeting hall.

“This is a god item, the Heaven’s Net Profound Netherworld Scroll!” The crown prince’s eyes glittered.

“Titan Dragonguard cannot be taken lightly. The fact that his will can reach this place means that he can listen in on our conversations. Therefore, His Imperial Majesty gave me this Heaven’s Net Profound Netherworld Scroll so that we can have some privacy. You see, although Titan Dragonguard set up that illusory region in his mansion, the imperial house has access to powerful god items. For example, we have the eye of Titan, which is the literal eyeball of a god. It’s the foundation of our imperial house, and its protection will ensure that we’re never exterminated. Only a Godmyth can unleash the full might of the eye, but we can still use some of its true energy. It can pierce through all sorts of illusory regions, thus we’ve seen what’s in his mansion. He has all sorts of powerful experts standing guard there. It's a virtual hornet's nest that could explode at the slightest provocation. If it did, it would be a complete catastrophe for the imperial city.”

“What? My father knows about all this?” the crown prince said, his fury simmering dangerously.

The superintendent smiled. “How could someone that deadly exist in the imperial house without us being aware of him? Of course the emperor knows. And in order to prevent you from doing something rash, he sent me here to tell you to stand down and come see him in the palace!”

“Yes sir!”

The crown prince had his excuse to extricate himself from the potentially embarrassing situation. He immediately departed with the superintendent, leaving behind a host of officials and ministers exchanging awkward glances.

Back at Titan Duelbringer’s mansion, Yang Qi expelled the naked Director of Internal Affairs from within, as well as all of the Devil Crushers. “Screw the hell off,” he said with divine will. “If I see any of you around here again, I’ll beat the living daylights out of you. Even your behind-the-scenes supporters are scared of me, so what do you think you’re going to do? Go report back to your superiors and see what to do next.”

Chapter 604: Shaking Court and Commoners Alike

The Department of Internal Affairs had come to arrest Titan Duelbringer, only to have ‘Titan Dragonguard’ show up, strip their director naked, and force him to his knees. The news flew as surely as if it had wings. Within a day, everyone in the imperial city had heard the story, from the most important people down to the most insignificant figures, and everyone was shocked to the core. Of course, they were also very curious to see how the imperial court would punish Titan Dragonguard for flagrantly violating the rules.

However, what happened next defied all predictions. The court didn’t punish him at all. In fact, they didn’t even respond to the situation, as if they didn’t care at all about the fight that had played out.

Some people in the know were aware that the Director of Internal Affairs was backed by the crown prince, and they were hoping to see a fight break out between the crown prince and Titan Dragonguard.

But soon the reality became clear. After Princess Jadefall was promoted to the position of eminent princess, she was just as powerful and influential as the crown prince. And of course, Yang Qi was her most trusted subordinate.

“Incredible. I can’t believe that Titan Dragonguard fought so many of the imperial guard. He didn't back down an inch, and even threatened to take the fight to the crown prince.”

“Titan Dragonguard is amazing. He really earned face for Princess Jadefall. With him as her right-hand man, she's like a tiger that has grown wings.”

“A year ago nobody had ever heard of Titan Dragonguard. Who could ever have guessed that he would be so strong?”

“Let’s wait and see what happens. Surely the imperial court will punish him eventually. The Director of Internal Affairs really suffered a dismal fate. The mere thought of what happened is terrifying.”

All of the talk in the imperial city was either about Yang Qi and the Director of Internal Affairs, or about the crown prince and Princess Jadefall. It was fairly obvious to any perceptive people that the latter two were in conflict, and that Princess Jadefall had won a big victory. For someone as important as the crown prince to have suffered such extraordinary shame and humiliation was a big matter, and there was no way he wouldn't react.

As the court and the commoners were all talking about the matter, Yang Qi was meeting with Princess Jadefall in her mansion.

“You went a bit too far, Titan Dragonguard,” she said. She looked different than when she led her forces into battle. She wore a long robe embroidered with gold thread that accentuated her lithe form. Now she looked like the picture of a beautiful, young woman.

“If someone tries to make a move on me,” Yang Qi replied, “I strike back with lightning force. The fact that I didn't kill the Director of Internal Affairs was enough of a show of mercy.” He sat in front of Princess Jadefall at a tea table, upon which she prepared cup after cup of tea for them to enjoy. The steaming tea emitted spirit energy that wafted into the air and took the shape of immortal cranes, clouds, heavenly wind, dragons, tigers, and the like.

It was God Incarnation Tea, which came not from the Titan Emperor Heaven, but from a higher-level immortal world, and could strengthen vital energy and benefit one on a genetic level.

Princess Jadefall chuckled. “You were a bit heavy-handed, that’s all. You know that the Director of Internal Affairs is backed by the crown prince, right? He might be holding back from doing anything now, but if he truly makes a move it could get bad quickly. The crown prince is full of crafty plots and machinations, and sometimes his victims suffer horrific ends before he's even made an open move. Considering how badly you humiliated him, it’s impossible to say what schemes he might resort to. You really need to be careful.”

“That’s actually the exact reason why I caused trouble for him,” Yang Qi replied. “You see, the arrest of Titan Duelbringer was part of a larger scheme on his part. If he had succeeded, he could have invented all sorts of accusations based on ‘information’ taken from Titan Duelbringer during ‘interrogation’. It would be better to be punished by the court for being a bit too domineering than to be accused of greater crimes backed by false evidence.”

“Oh?” Princess Jadefall said, sounding surprised. After a moment, though, she smiled again. “So, you do have secrets. Am I right? You know the saying: if one has not done wrong, one need not be afraid of the knock in the night.”

“Of course I have my secrets,” Yang Qi replied. He knew that Princess Jadefall was no one to take lightly. And the fact that he had caused such a scene must surely have aroused suspicion on her part.

“What might those secrets be? Any chance you could let me in on them?” Princess Jadefall was still smiling, almost as if she were playing a game of some sort. “I always thought it was odd that someone like you existed in the imperial house. I can already tell that you’ll surpass me eventually. In fact, it might happen within only a few years. Although, you would know better than me about that. Come, be honest. I can’t believe that you have no ambitions at all. Is your goal to take over the Titan Emperor Heaven?”

She had hit the nail right on the head, yet Yang Qi didn’t feel any fear. Taking a sip of tea, he said, “What do you think, Princess? Do I seem like the ambitious type?”

“It's really hard to tell,” she said with a light laugh. “If I could tell for sure, why would I be asking the question? Why not tell me the truth about your identity. Who are you, really? I have the feeling you’re not really an imperial clansman, but rather some mysterious infiltrator. And you definitely have some master plan. I looked into your identity, by the way. Based on what happened with Titan Duelbringer, my guess is that you're actually someone from the lower world. Someone mysterious and powerful, perhaps from one of the holy lands of true cultivation. If you had conquered enough planetary systems, you would have plenty of faith power, which would explain a lot about you. Could it be that you’re somehow connected to the leader of the Sage Monarch Continent, Yang Qi?”

“Oh?” Yang Qi had long since assumed that word of his deeds in the lower world would eventually spread, yet his heart was still pounding a bit.

Although the mortal world wasn’t crucially important to the immortal world, it was still considered its property. Besides, there were godrelics hidden in many of the planetary systems, and certain particularly dangerous locations that were actually no weaker than the immortal world itself. And that wasn’t to mention that the mortal world was essentially a buffer between hells.

If a hell wanted to invade an immortal world, it would need to send its armies of fiend-devils through the mortal world first, and vice versa.

There were also the remains of fallen immortals and the ruins left behind from the God-Devil Apocalypse.

The Titan Emperor Heaven was huge, but it wouldn’t be long before Yang Qi would actually be able to see how large it was. In contrast, the mortal world was so large that doing so would be impossible.

The mortal world lacked spirit energy, but the fact that it was the barrier between hell and the immortal world meant that it was an important location that couldn't be overlooked. And the fact that Yang Qi had recently caused storms of blood in the mortal world made it only natural that people in the immortal world would notice.

“Princess Jadefall, I'm honestly surprised that you know so much about the mortal world. It’s a place full of ruins and lacking in spirit energy, and I can’t help but wonder why the immortal world cares so much about it.”

“You didn’t answer my question. Could it be that you are Yang Qi?”

As she looked at him, her eyes glowed with the images of suns and moons, as though she were using some particularly powerful energy art.

“Yes. I'm Yang Qi. The same one who slaughtered countless soldiers from that fiendslave battalion. Enemy of the Titan Emperor Heaven. I infiltrated the imperial house, and have worked my way all the way to the rank of grand prince.” He could have tried to come up with some sort of story to explain himself, but there seemed little benefit to lying. Instead, he just sat there casually and told the truth. He had expected his identity to be revealed eventually anyway.

She let loose a long breath, “So, you really are Yang Qi! My suspicions are now officially confirmed. However, there’s one thing I don’t understand. How can you have such strong Titan blood? It really is authentic, that much is true. There’s no way to fabricate or imitate that blood. Even if you had killed some imperial clansman and assimilated his blood, there would have been evidence left behind. Your Titan blood is so unimaginably strong, it's stronger than any other imperial clansman.”

“Well, that relates to a secret of mine that I’ll keep for now. Besides, how do you know I wasn't just born with Titan blood? Maybe the great god himself is the one who guided me to the point of becoming a grand prince.” Throughout this conversation, Yang Qi was keeping his cool, making it seem like casual chatting.

Clearly surprised, Princess Jadefall said, “Now that I know who you really are, what are you going to do?”

“What am I going to do? Nothing. I'm a grand prince now, and you’re the only one who knows my true identity. Revealing the truth would be like cutting off your own arm, wouldn’t it? With me helping you, you're stronger than ever and can accomplish a lot to help the Titan Emperor Heaven.”

“To be honest, that’s exactly what I was thinking.” She poured some more tea, then said, “However, if I can uncover the truth about you, then so can the crown prince. And that’s not to mention my father the emperor, who is the most mysterious and unpredictable person in all the imperial house. I would say it’s highly likely that he already knows the truth about who you are. What’s really puzzling is the fact that he hasn’t done anything about it. I just can’t figure out what he's thinking.”

Yang Qi nodded. “I’ve prepared for that possibility. As I grow stronger and more powerful, it becomes more and more likely that my identity will be revealed. In fact, it’s a foregone conclusion that it will happen. At this point, I don't actually care. I'm strong enough to deal with any consequences.”

“You’re that strong? Unless you’re a Godmyth, there are definitely ways that the immortal world could crush you. Aren’t you worried about that? I heard that you can summon armies of fiend-devils down in the mortal world. Don’t tell me you can do the same thing here too?”

Chapter 605: Glib Tongue

“Come out and offer greetings to Princess Jadefall,” Yang Qi said.

RUUUUUUMBLE!

He waved his finger and a wormhole appeared, several dozen meters tall, out of which three hundred and sixty warriors appeared, all of them in mechas and radiating the auras of powerful warriors. Lining up in ranks, they dropped to their knees in a salute, and said, “Our respects, Eminent Princess!”

“Where did you get warriors like this?” Princess Jadefall said, her voice quivering from shock. “They’re so strong! And they’re not fiend-devils? No, they have an extremely pure, holy aura. Don’t tell me these are the legendary sage-spirits? They’re definitely strong enough to devastate sixth stage Abstrusity-Demolishers! In the Titan Emperor Heaven, fifth stage immortal marquises are usually stationed as officials at the border regions, and sixth stage immortal paragons are considered extremely important and powerful. How did you get so many?”

“This is nothing,” Yang Qi said. “Look further into the wormhole.”

She peered inside and saw a huge plane of existence filled with locust-like swarms of fiend-devils, all of them sitting cross-legged in cultivation. All of them were at the immortal marquis level and were clearly valiant fighters who didn't fear death. If this force were unleashed on the imperial city, it might be defeated in the end, but the resulting casualties and destruction would be devastating.

To Princess Jadefall’s shock, her initial estimate put the total number of fiend-devils at well over a million. It was hard to say if there were even that many immortal marquises in the Titan Emperor Heaven as a whole.

Within that same plane of existence, there were three hundred and sixty enormous portals, leading to locations that thrummed with devil energy. In short, they led to hells.

Princess Jadefall was a powerful expert, a ninth stage Dao-Demolisher who was nearing the Godmyth level. And once she fully woke the power of a Reincarnated One that existed within her, she would become even stronger than that.

But even she was shocked by Yang Qi’s ability as a summoner.

“How… how many fiend-devils can you summon?” she asked.

“However many I want,” he replied confidently. “You see, the Department of the Imperial Clan set up warding magics to spy on me and I let them see this. That's why the imperial court hasn’t done anything to me. They know I have an army of fiend-devils that I could release at any moment. And if I did, it would be a big problem for them. They’re hesitating to shoot the rat for fear of breaking the vases. And truth be told, summoning an army of a few hundred thousand immortal marquises is like nothing to me. I could summon millions. Tens of millions. Hundreds of millions. I recently reached the first stage of the Demolishing level, and in a few days I’ll reach the second. Then I’ll be able to summon even more powerful fiend-devils, those in the sixth stage. With an army like that at my control, I would be able to destroy just about everyone in the imperial court, with the only exception being a handful of the old-timers. So. What do you think? Do I have anything to be afraid of around here?”

“Obviously not,” Princess Jadefall replied with a wry smile. “No wonder you’re not worried. But considering you’re this strong, what are you doing fooling around as a grand prince? Go somewhere for a decade or so to work on your cultivation, and you could come back and overthrow the dynasty.”

“Like I said, that’s not my goal. I'm interested in my archenemy, Proud Heaven. The main reason I came here in the first place was to find information about him. I've asked around and know that he’s extremely powerful, but little more. Something else that interests me is you. You see, there’s something about you that could be beneficial to my own cultivation. And actually, Proud Heaven might be after you for the same reason. Thus, helping you is another way I might be able to lure him out into the open.”

“Proud Heaven might be after me?” she replied, visibly taken aback. “But he’s vastly stronger and more important than any of us. He saved the entire Titan Emperor Heaven before I was even born. And by the time I was born, he was long gone. Why would he be interested in me?”

“Simple. He’d figured out that a Reincarnated One had appeared in the imperial house of the Titan Emperor Heaven. He just didn’t know who exactly it was. You’re that Reincarnated One, did you know that? You have immense potential, and eventually he's going to come back for you. I'm the same. Proud Heaven wants me because of my special identity. I'm a Fateless One. You see, the two of us have a lot in common.”

“Reincarnated One. Fateless One.” Princess Jadefall muttered the words a few more times. “No wonder. I remember hearing my father mention that term once. He looked very serious when he said it. I had no idea what he was talking about at the time, but now I realize it must have been me.”

“Yes, you’re a Reincarnated One. Just like me, you’re from a select group of unique people in the universe, people who certain other individuals want to control, no matter what price they have to pay. That’s why I think the two of us should work together. We’d only be stronger if we did.”

“What do you mean work together?” she said. “For some time now I've sensed an unusual power within me, something I’m unable to release. If I could, my cultivation base would reach a much higher level. Is that the power of a Reincarnated One? And can you help me to unlock it?”

“I'm not totally sure. The only way I came to know even a little bit about these matters is that I’ve had some interactions with a Future One. Based on my understanding, that Future One acquired some of King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy and has control over part of the power of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. I ran into him in the Hanging Heaven, and from what I can tell he’s working with Proud Warpatience. He knows my true identity, and I doubt it will be long before he reveals the truth. He wants me to get in a fight with Proud Warpatience and his allies, then swoop in to take advantage of the situation.

“It’s highly likely that Future One realizes you’re a Reincarnated One, which would mean that he has his eyes on you as well. If he gets the chance, he’ll kill you and assimilate you. There’s no doubt Proud Warpatience knows about you too, and might even have passed the information on to Proud Heaven. I’d say your time is limited. If you hadn’t run into me, you would definitely fall into Proud Heaven’s hands sooner or later. Not even the two of us together are a match for him, which is exactly why we have to join forces. If we do, we’ll have a chance to pass the tribulations to come. Furthermore, we might be able to kill that Future One I mentioned. If we could get his powers, as well as the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, we’d be even better equipped to handle whatever Proud Heaven plans to throw at us. My goal, of course, is to kill him and use his power to shake the universe. I’ll conquer one immortal world after another and spread radiance and light everywhere, until I eventually reach the Deathless Throne.”

Yang Qi was certain that if he and Princess Jadefall joined forces, and she lent him her power, he could most likely achieve multiple breakthroughs.

After the scene he had caused, there was no doubt that plots were being hatched against him, and a blow would soon be struck from the shadows. He needed to be strong enough to deal with that when the time came.

After a long moment of consideration, Princess Jadefall made her decision. “Fine. You’re right, we have no time to lose. I'm already in the ninth stage and have successfully cultivated my Jadefall Dao Heart, which is covered with cracks. Those cracks are the initial step of Dao-Demolishing. However, I need to fully crush my dao heart to reach the next higher level and become a Godmyth. Perhaps unlocking the divine abilities of a Reincarnated One will be what I need to take that next step.”

Although working on her cultivation with Yang Qi would be risky, for some reason, she believed and trusted him.

“What? You’re really agreeing? You want me to try to unlock the power of the Reincarnated One in you?” Yang Qi was more than a little taken aback. “Aren’t you worried I might try to just take the power for my own?”

“I'm a good judge of character, and I can tell you wouldn’t do that.” She smiled. “You're quite famous in the lower world, so it wasn't difficult to get information about you. You’re the type of person who knows when to show gratitude and when to hold grudges. You’re not someone who will bite the hand that feeds you or kick people when they’re down.”

“True,” he said, nodding. Then he drew on his Wheel of Fate to begin making calculations.

“In that case,” she said, “why don't we get to work right away? We can go into seclusion here.” With a wave of her hand, everything around them changed and Yang Qi suddenly sensed immense deathless godliness. Apparently, they were now inside some sort of god item that resembled an enormous pearl.

“This is my Jadefall Origin Pearl, a god item that I acquired in my travels. Although I can’t draw on its full power, it should be more than enough to keep us safe during cultivation.”

Looking around, Yang Qi thought, ‘She says she trusts me, but she’s still being cautious. Otherwise, why would she want to use her Jadefall Origin Pearl?’

Chapter 606: The Power of a Reincarnated One

Yang Qi had worded everything perfectly and won over Princess Jadefall. Now it seemed that he would finally be able to take a look at the power and nature of a Reincarnated One. And perhaps her blood would be a benefit to his Fateless One blood.

If it worked, both of them would advance by leaps and bounds.

Despite trusting Yang Qi to a certain extent, Princess Jadefall was still being cautious. Thus, she summoned her Jadefall Origin Pearl, a god item that was now surrounding both her and Yang Qi. In her mind, working on their cultivation in that pearl would keep her safe.

Yang Qi didn't mind. This development was no surprise to him, as Princess Jadefall was no fool. She was a ferocious character who wouldn’t place herself in incredible danger for any reason. Although she had said she trusted him, it wouldn’t make sense for her to be reckless.

Little did she know that, from what Yang Qi could tell, this god item wasn’t nearly as strong as he was. If he wanted to, he could just absorb its powers for his own use. However, he didn’t point this out to Princess Jadefall. He had no intention of doing anything untoward to her, and in fact, wanted to work with her.

“In the World of Jadefall, the Yellow Springs are Boundless….”

Suddenly, a stream of yellowish light appeared within the Jadefall Origin Pearl, streaming out to surround both Princess Jadefall and Yang Qi.

Then a river appeared in the depths of the pearl, its surface covered with surging waves. Princess Jadefall floated down to the surface of the river and a lotus flower bloomed beneath her as she lowered herself into a sitting position.

Smiling, Yang Qi lowered himself down until he was in front of her, and as he did, a night queen flower bloomed beneath him, which emanated an aura like a mixture of life and death, something that, just like the night queen flower itself, could exist or die at any moment. It was profoundly mysterious.

As Yang Qi settled down, a deafening rumble echoed out from him as he clenched his hand into a fist, causing a stream of lightning to shoot out from his palm.

The lightning streamed around Princess Jadefall, transforming into a host of white night queen flowers covered with lightning motifs.

When Princess Jadefall saw the lightning motifs, she reacted with visible shock. “What… what kind of lightning magic is this? How come I've never seen anything like it before?”

“It’s Life-Death Void-Destruction Lightning, from a godly-class energy art that I cultivate.” Truth be told, this was another facet of Yang Qi’s energy arts that he had gained access to upon reaching the Demolishing level. After the Hand of the One God, there was the Wheel of Fate, the Flame of Hope, the Glad Tidings of the Lord, and the Life-Death Void-Destruction Lightning. With one bolt of this lightning, life or death could be determined.

Lightning represented tribulation and justice. It symbolized the will of heaven, and any daoist technique that was cultivated to the limit would always involve it. And now, Yang Qi’s Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth had reached the point of producing lightning. Of course, it was the type of lightning that could both destroy universes and give birth to endless life. After all, at the beginning of everything there had been no life, then lightning struck. That was the moment in which life began and countless living beings began to spread through the universe.

Now Yang Qi was using this lightning to try to awaken Princess Jadefall’s power as a Reincarnated One.

Only someone who had lived and died could possibly have been reincarnated and have the boundless power of reincarnation within them. Yang Qi was different. He didn’t have any past lives, nor was his future set. He was a Fateless One, who didn’t exist anywhere else in the endless streams of time and fate.

It was as if he existed within a void, a person who could appear on the scene, but who had no previous lives and had never been reincarnated.

Reincarnated Ones were different. They were people who had, in the past, been supremely powerful entities that had died and been reincarnated many times. They were people who had been sealed by the gods and were waiting for their memories to awaken.

Right now, Yang Qi was probing to see what kind of person the reincarnated Princess Jadefall really was.

“Remain still,” he said. “Let my Life-Death Void-Destruction Lightning enter you and see if it can awaken the power of reincarnation within you. I’ll take a bit of your reincarnation power, but at the same time give you a portion of my fateless power. The combination will be beneficial to both of us, pushing us to new heights. Make sure not to resist the lightning in any way, otherwise it will likely destroy you.”

“Oh? Wow, this lightning really is powerful. I've never seen lightning magic that comes close to this. The destructive power virtually defies comprehension.”

Princess Jadefall gently stirred her nascent divinity as the lightning entered her.

Instantly, she began to tremble, and a look of enlightenment appeared on her face, as though some immense vital energy inside of her was waking up.

“What kind of power is this?”

In the blink of an eye, Yang Qi’s psychic vision revealed an ancient image resting within Princess Jadefall’s mind.

It was an image of endless chaos giving birth to all sorts of living things, including a primal-chaos elder-snake that was King Heaven-Devourer. Back then, there was no such thing as heaven and earth and the universe itself had not yet taken shape. There were no immortal worlds and the energies of primal chaos abounded everywhere, going on with seemingly no end.

There were other entities being born, all of them like god-spirits.

In fact, the entire legion of gods was there.

They were enormous within their deathless kingdoms, and some were obviously stronger than others as they created planetary systems and immortal worlds.

Some of the gods had not yet been born, and existed as godspores within the primal-chaos.

At this point in time, the gods were actually very weak. Occasionally, godspores would be consumed by other entities and the gods within them would perish.

Yang Qi ‘watched’ as an aura from within Princess Jadefall pulsed out, hitting his sea of consciousness with such force it seemed like it might shatter. It was the most ancient of auras, from before the existence of heaven and earth. It was a preheaven aura.

The entities that had existed back in that original primal-chaos were so powerful that Yang Qi couldn’t even compare to them. They were the type whose mere twitch could turn the Titan Emperor Heaven into dust.

‘Don’t tell me that Princess Jadefall is the reincarnation of some ancient creature like that? Is she something like King Heaven-Devourer? Is that the type of energy inside her? Or could she be a member of the legion of gods from that ancient primal-chaos?’ Yang Qi wasn’t sure of the details, but he was absolutely shocked. Clearly, the powers of a Reincarnated One were vast, which made sense, considering they contained mysteries relating to the universe and reincarnation.

‘Alright, I'm going to push a bit harder into the depths of the preheaven primal-chaos image inside her and see if I can figure out exactly who—or what—Princess Jadefall is. If I can get more information this way, it will benefit me greatly!’

The mysterious preheaven energy that was coursing into him as he viewed the image felt very soothing, and he could sense that there was familiarity between it and the god legion essence within him.

Whizz!

Bright light shot into his forehead, connecting with the God Legion Seal, which began vibrating as if it were excited by the fact that Yang Qi was getting new enlightenment.

Boundless sagelight appeared above his head, a projection of the halls of heaven. It was almost as if he had turned into an ancient god of radiance and light, boundlessly glorious.

“This is incredible!” Princess Jadefall said, a rapturous look on her face as she sank into the sensation of the power coursing through her. At the same time, her cultivation base began rising in power, and every inch of her flesh began to transform on a substructural level. Holy light shone as her bones changed, and at the same time impurities were extruded from the top of her head, where they evaporated into a porcelain-colored sweet dew that fell down upon her, bathing her with purity.

Slowly but surely, her clothing faded way, leaving her naked, although she wasn’t aware of that.

Sadly, Yang Qi didn’t notice either. His vision was cast inside of her, peering at the scene of primal-chaos filled with the power of the gods and reincarnation.

The primal-chaos didn’t take note of the passing of time.

Countless years flowed by, yet it was as if none had passed. The primal-chaos would eternally be primal-chaos, constantly battling with itself forever. The legion of gods fought with other ancient entities, and even amongst themselves. More powerful entities were born, and others died.

RUMBLE!

At a certain point, something attracted Yang Qi’s attention in the far corner of the primal-chaos. There, after countless millions upon millions of primal-chaos years had passed, a porcelain-colored godspore suddenly stirred.

A sound rang out like the cry of a hungry infant. Then the godspore began sucking in the surrounding primal-chaos vital energy, gobbling it up voraciously. As the porcelain godspore feasted, it grew larger and stronger.

Eventually, it reached a size that left Yang Qi shocked at the sight; it was many thousands of times as large as the Titan Emperor Heaven, yet it was still devouring the primal-chaos vital energy!

It was at this point that certain other strange beings out in the primal-chaos finally noticed what was happening. Then a primal-chaos elder-snake flew over with a gaping maw and swallowed it up.

Yet that did no good.

The godspore was impossible to break open.

After a moment passed, the primal-chaos elder-snake spat it out.

Chapter 607: Porcelain Godspore

As Yang Qi studied the power of the Reincarnated One that was Princess Jadefall, he saw countless powerful entities rushing toward a porcelain godspore in the hopes of taking it for their own. Primal-chaos heaven-rocs, dragons, phoenixes, elder-snakes, and all other types of creatures were there. There were also primal-chaos elder-gods joining in the fight.

It was a shocking scene, especially when the primal-chaos elder-gods unleashed their massive divine abilities and magical powers. They were all godly-class energy arts, completely rare, filled with magical symbols and curse power, as well as magical laws that could sunder heaven and crush earth.

RUMBLE!

Claps of thunder rang out in his sea of consciousness, making it seem like it might crumble at any moment. The primal-chaos aura here surpassed what any ordinary immortal could possibly contain in their sea of consciousness.

WHIZZ!

He bellowed in rage, forcing the aura into submission and crushing the wills of the primal-chaos elder-gods.

Once again, he could see clearly.

As the primal-chaos entities struggled, the porcelain godspore began weakening, and soon it was engulfed with flames.

Crick!

A crack spread out on its surface and countless enormous hands appeared as the elder gods reached forward to try to take the godspore. But then a porcelain-colored stream of light shot out from within the godspore.

Within the light was a wailing baby girl, who only appeared for a moment before vanishing without a trace. The hosts of primal-chaos elder-gods and other primal-chaos entities had no way of capturing her.

After the girl vanished, everything went still and quiet.

At the same time, a massive blast of power erupted, shaking all heaven and earth—it was the power of a Reincarnated One.

‘Wow. So as a Reincarnated One, Princess Jadefall is actually that same porcelain godspore from the ancient primal-chaos?’

After coming to this realization, Yang Qi drew upon the will of the One God that existed within his blood and the God Legion Seal in his forehead trembled. Then it flew out into the open in the shape of a golden imp, who sent golden light streaming directly into Princess Jadefall’s head. At this point, Princess Jadefall opened her eyes and instantly realized that the golden imp was something she couldn’t possibly struggle against. In fact, she could tell that no one in the Titan Emperor Heaven could possibly fight it. Not even the ancient god Titan, her original ancestor, could have.

“You… Yang Qi, what are you doing? What is that thing?”

“Don’t panic. Keep calm. According to what I just saw, you began life in the ancient primal-chaos as a porcelain godspore. As a Reincarnated One, you have many past lives and your body itself contains deathless godliness that surpasses your ancestor, the great god Titan. Only my God Legion Seal can suppress the godliness within you to allow you to awaken. Don’t struggle. If you do, you could explode and be reincarnated into your next life.”

“What? God Legion Seal? I've heard of those things. They’re the ultimate blessing from the legion of gods! They’re the most powerful sealing marks that exist and are eternally deathless. How could you possibly have something like that? Who are you?”

Princess Jadefall was yet again completely bowled over, and at the same time had finally realized that she could truly trust Yang Qi. After all, they were alone in her god item, so if he wanted to assimilate her power he could easily do so with the God Legion Seal.

Thus she fully cooperated, relaxing her hold on her power.

As she did, countless porcelain streams of light appeared within her, pulses of deathless godliness that contained the boundless power of reincarnation.

The God Legion Seal absorbed it, causing the sage power of the halls of heaven to pulse within Yang Qi and push his cultivation base to a higher level.

‘The legion of gods is boundless, the Sovereign Lord is invincible….’ All of a sudden, heavenly tribulation appeared, countless bolts of lightning that shot down toward him as he reached second stage Space-Demolishing.

Suddenly, what seemed like a profound manifestation of spatial emptiness exploded. It contained a will of something absolutely true and real, as well as the ultimate truths of what it meant to cultivate reality.

Demolishing space meant returning to what was true and real.

As he progressed through the Demolishing level, Yang Qi got closer to that.

Unexpectedly, the heavenly tribulation bashed through the defenses of the god item, yet as it did, Yang Qi transformed into a primal-chaos elder-snake and devoured it. Once inside him, the power of the tribulation shattered and became part of him, causing his blood to grow even stronger.

Thanks to the power of a Reincarnated One, he was now stepping into the second stage of Space-Demolishing. He could now form a total of seven hundred and twenty Hell Portals, and the countless devilish specters that emerged from them could form a Preheaven Devil Formation.

Now that he was a Space-Demolisher, he could summon fiend-devils that were immortal paragons. A group of such sixth step Abstrusity-Demolishers in the form of an army would be more than enough to trample the immortal world around him.

And of course, Yang Qi himself was now much stronger.

An immense aura rushed through him and he could sense something that surpassed the power of fate, something that was illusory and unreal, but at the same time very true and real.

‘It’s my constitution as a Fateless One,’ he realized.

Adjusting the power levels within himself, he exhaled some energy, something like primal-chaos, or a sword, which pierced into Princess Jadefall’s porcelain aura.

RIIIIP!

Their auras mixed together. One was a Reincarnated One, the other was a Fateless One. Both of them had unusually rare constitutions. And now they were combining them. Instantly, a supreme manifestation of reason and magical law formed, causing a host of daoist scriptures to appear. It almost seemed like the ancient legion of gods was howling out these scriptures and causing them to rush into both Yang Qi and Princess Jadefall.

That was especially true, considering that right above Princess Jadefall’s head, a porcelain-colored śarīra was forming, bright and shining, and inscribed with legends of aeons past.

Her eyes snapped open again and she said, “I did it. I have a basic understanding of the ultimate meaning of the Godmyth level. I have my reincarnation śarīra, and also your fateless power. Although I don’t understand that fateless power, I’ll learn more as I study it. And I can tell you now, I’ll be a Godmyth within three thousand years!”

“That’s good to hear,” Yang Qi replied. “I'm now a second step Space-Demolisher, and with the reincarnation power you’ve given me, I can guarantee you that I can make you a Godmyth in much less than three thousand years. More like three years. By that point, I’ll be much higher in my cultivation and I’ll be able to summon an army of fiend-devil immortal paragons to conquer all of the immortal worlds.”

Yang Qi was feeling very high-spirited and full of mettle in this moment. He had gained much from this session of cultivation. For example, his Blood of the One God was now at the level of two percent. As such, he wasn’t worried at all about getting in a fight with any other Demolisher, not even the mysterious emperor of this immortal world.

He had firmly established his place in the Titan Emperor Heaven.

Princess Jadefall had also greatly benefited during their session of cultivation. She had awakened her power as a Reincarnated One, even adding fateless power to make significant advances. Once her power was fully awakened, she would be able to rise to higher immortal worlds.

Laughing heartily, Yang Qi rose to his feet. “Princess, this will be the first of many times we practice cultivation together. In the coming days, we can continue refining our cultivation bases together, and as we mix the powers of a Fateless One with a Reincarnated One, we will grow stronger and stronger. Eventually, we should be able to kill that Future One, and acquire three separate identities each. At that point, no one in this measly Titan Emperor Heaven will possibly be able to do anything about us.”

“I like the sound of that. You’re my lucky star, Yang Qi. Without your help, I'm sure I would have run afoul of Proud Warpatience sooner or later.” At this point, she suddenly flared with killing intent. “Now that I know the truth, I think we need to do something about Proud Warpatience and the other loyalists Proud Heaven left behind. If we don’t, when Proud Heaven returns it could turn very bad for us. In fact, maybe we can prevent his return altogether.”

Chapter 608: Emissaries from the Brahman Society

As Yang Qi and Princess Jadefall worked together to push their energy arts to new heights, all sorts of things were happening in the imperial court.

Of course, Yang Qi had earned a lot of clout by humiliating the Director of Internal Affairs, defeating the imperial guard, and publicly standing up to the crown prince.

Now everyone knew that his cultivation base was so strong that he could devastate multiple ninth stage Dao-Demolishers. That was the highest cultivation level in the Titan Emperor Heaven, and in many other immortal worlds as well. Such people were called sovereigns of heaven, and they qualified to lead entire immortal worlds.

As for Princess Jadefall, the fact that she had such a powerful right-hand man went to improve her own reputation. And now many people were speculating that after Emperor Titan ascended, the Eminent Princess Jadefall would become the new ruler of the place.

It didn't matter that the emperor had already named a crown prince. Obviously, that crown prince was now in a very tenuous position.

There were now two major forces within the court to consider.

Even more worrisome to many was the fact that no punishment had been inflicted on Yang Qi. Many of the more conniving factions in the imperial city were wondering if perhaps the court was thinking of disposing with the crown prince and naming Eminent Princess Jadefall the crown princess.

Titan Duelbringer was hard at work recruiting new henchmen and expanding his society to new levels of power and influence.

As for Yang Qi, he was doing his best to strengthen Princess Jadefall’s forces. It helped that he had plenty of wealth at hand, which he had long since handed over to Titan Duelbringer to manage. All in all, recruitment was going marvelously.

One day, the sound of tolling bells could be heard in the imperial city as the monthly session of the imperial court was called.

Whenever court was held, all of the countless civil and military officials would come for a huge meeting. This time, the bells tolled nine times in a row, indicating that there was something special about this particular session.

Officials of all sorts were streaming into the imperial palace, and naturally that included Yang Qi and Princess Jadefall.

The mood was somber and there were soldiers on guard everywhere, including giants in mechas, armed to the teeth and standing there on full alert. Considering their auras, they seemed like killers who had slaughtered entire battlefields full of enemies and had climbed mountains of corpses and swam through seas of blood to reach their current level.

“Those are the Slaughterplexus Godguards,” Princess Jadefall said to Yang Qi, visibly surprised. “They’re the most elite troops at the command of the emperor, all of them fiendish killers. You don't see them very often, which makes me wonder what exactly is going on here today.”

“I wonder if something unusual is going to happen,” Yang Qi said. “It's been a month since I was named grand prince and you were appointed as the eminent princess. Shortly after that, I humiliated the Director of Internal Affairs and the court didn't say a single thing. Now they have all this special setup in place. It seems fishy. We need to be careful.”

“I wouldn’t worry about it. You’re a Space-Demolisher now, right? You can even defeat Dao-Demolishers like me. And you also have armies of fiend-devils at your command, enough to take down this entire immortal world. With all of that, what do you have to be afraid of?”

“I'm not afraid,” Yang Qi replied. “But that doesn’t mean I want to resort to using my armies. Maybe I'm strong enough to defeat everyone here, but I'm not strong enough to truly control the entire Titan Emperor Heaven. Besides, if I overthrew the dynasty, the result would be absolute chaos and there are plenty of other immortal worlds out there who would take advantage of the situation. If I did all the hard work and someone just came and took the prize away from me, what would be the point? Right now, the best thing to do is to maintain the balance.”

“So, you really do want to take over this place eventually?” Princess Jadefall said.

“Of course. The resources here are vital for the growth of my people in the lower world. That said, if you want this place then I'm sure we can come to an agreement. After all, there are plenty of immortal worlds. Once I'm a bit higher in my cultivation, I’ll go destroy the Hanging Heaven, the Megaplexus Heaven, and so on.”

“I'm fine. If you want this immortal world, you can have it. Ever since I awakened my powers as a Reincarnated One, I'm less interested in political power. I just want to break through the fetters separating me from the Godmyth level. I need to demolish my dao heart. Everything else is irrelevant to me now. Even if you handed me this immortal world, I wouldn’t care.”

“We’re almost at court.”

Upon arrival, they saw countless officials taking their places. Considering Yang Qi’s rank of grand prince, he had a place toward the front. Matters of rank were strictly adhered to in the imperial house.

Princess Jadefall stood directly next to the emperor, in an equal position as the crown prince.

The crown prince was as expressionless as ever and didn’t even look at Yang Qi. In another part of the hall was Proud Warpatience, flanked by other henchmen of Proud Heaven, a mix of grand princes and important ministers, who were looking at Yang Qi with mocking smiles.

‘Hmm,’ Yang Qi thought. From the looks on their faces, it seemed they thought that something bad was going to happen to him during this session of court.

‘Something’s off here. Aren’t they afraid of me fighting back if they punish me?’ It didn't seem likely that the emperor would be so foolish as to do something like that, especially considering that he was allied with Princess Jadefall.

Yet there didn’t seem to be any explanation for the mocking smiles other than them anticipating him falling to some disaster.

Feeling more than a little suspicious, he drew on his Wheel of Fate to try to divine what danger he might be in. However, that was when a beam of dazzling light descended and imperial might filled the entire hall.

The emperor had arrived.

Everyone dropped to their knees to kowtow, and joined voices in saying, “Our respects, Your Imperial Majesty!”

“Rise,” the emperor said, and all of the civil and military officials complied. “This session of court is very special. Just recently, we received a message from the Brahman Society, the strongest faction within the Thirty-Six Thousand Immortal Worlds Coalition. They will be sending an emissary here today for an inspection, although for what specific reason I'm not sure. That said, the Brahman Society made it clear that we should support their emissary in every way possible. Now, activate the teleportation portal!”

RUUUUUUMBLE!

All of a sudden, an enormous teleportation portal opened in the middle of the hall. Immense power erupted out, a tempest of energy from beyond the heavens. Everyone trembled as they sensed something like a wretch-god of evil stepping out of the portal, ready to bring destruction to all mankind.

The officials trembled in fear. After all, the mere mention of the Brahman Society was like a lightning bolt to their hearts.

They were the largest society in the entire Thirty-Six Thousand Immortal Worlds Coalition, and essentially controlled the entire alliance. Compared to the Brahman Society, the Titan Emperor Heaven was nothing.

In fact, for years, the Brahman Society had completely ignored the Titan Emperor Heaven and had never sent a single emissary there for any reason. Therefore, everyone was wondering why exactly this emissary had come.

Whoever this person was, they were obviously a top expert and some sort of fiendish killer. The wretch-god aura they emanated actually resembled that of a Godmyth.

‘Don’t tell me they sent a Godmyth,’ Yang Qi thought, his heart starting to pound a bit. ‘No, it doesn’t seem so. More like a half-Godmyth.  Even so, this is no one to take lightly.’

Crunch. Creak.

As the immense aura radiated out of the teleportation portal, a host of shadowy figures appeared, led by a tall man in an inky-black robe embroidered with suns, moons, and planes of existence. He strode out with the dignified manner of an emperor, looking down his nose at everyone present.

As was proper in this situation, the emperor rose from his throne, clasped his hands, and loudly said, “Emissaries, your presence brings light to the humble Titan Emperor Heaven. Welcome!”

“Forget the pleasantries,” the emissary said harshly. “The Titan Emperor Heaven might be the dregs of the thirty-six thousand immortal planes of existence that make up our alliance, but you’re still a member. I've been sent here by the leaders of the Brahman Society to investigate a certain matter, which is the only reason I would ever come to a remote place like this.”

Of course, the officials weren’t exactly pleased by his words. They were important leaders in an immortal world and oversaw millions upon millions of immortals. But as the saying goes, there is always a heaven beyond heaven, and there are always people more important than you. In the presence of this important figure from the Brahman Society, they felt like country bumpkins, or at best, nouveau riche farmers.

In the end, when you stand under low eaves, you have no choice but to bow your head.

Throughout history, there had been many situations in which the Brahman Society executed an entire imperial court of some immortal world and established a new court. Considering how weak the Titan Emperor Heaven was, there was no way they would do anything to defy the Brahman Society.

“Whatever the Brahman Society wishes to investigate, please just say the word,” the emperor said. “We’ve gathered all of the imperial court’s officials here today. Whatever it is you want to know, I'm sure we can get to the bottom of it.”

“It’s nothing particularly important. Recently, large amounts of power stones have been coming out of the Titan Emperor Heaven.” The emissary extended his hand and a violet power stone appeared on his palm, the size and shape of a coin. “This type of stone comes from a high-level immortal world, the Tusita Heaven. And it's done severe damage to the brahmanint. Nowadays, the Mechfolk aren’t even accepting brahmanints for the purchase of mechas. I'm here to investigate. I want to know who exactly has been devaluating the brahmanint! Whoever it is, they’ll be punished to the full extent of the law!”

Chapter 609: Brought to Justice

The Brahman Society had arrived.

They had come without any warning to run an investigation into the Tusita Heaven power stones, which of course had come from Yang Qi. Supposedly, the power stones had devalued the brahmanint, and because of that he needed to be ‘brought to justice’.

In the blink of an eye, countless hearts lifted and numerous gazes flickered to land on Yang Qi. Obviously, everyone in the imperial court knew that Yang Qi had acquired some ancient legacy, and as a result was immeasurably wealthy. After all, it was common knowledge that he had personally purchased large amounts of mechas, and even a battleship. If things continued on in that fashion, he would eventually be a major force to be reckoned with.

Never could anyone have guessed that the Brahman Society would actually take note of the matter.

There seemed little suspense regarding what would happen next. The Brahman Society was many times more powerful than this entire immortal world, and when they wanted to investigate something, there was nothing that could get in their way. In fact, if they wanted to interrogate the emperor he would cooperate without the slightest complaint.

‘So, this guy from the Brahman Society wants to investigate me,’ Yang Qi thought, frowning slightly. ‘No wonder Proud Warpatience and his cronies look so happy. A punishment from the Brahman Society would obviously be many times worse than anything the imperial court could do.’

The mood suddenly became very tense.

“Make no mistake, everyone,” the emissary said as the power stone floated in the air in front of him, “this is no minor affair. The Brahman Society is taking the situation very seriously, and truly hopes that the lot of you will offer your full cooperation.”

“It was him!” Proud Warpatience said, pointing at Yang Qi. “He's the culprit. He got his hands on a whole bunch of power stones and has been spending them left and right. It's his fault the Mechfolk don’t accept brahmanints anymore, only power stones. Thanks to him, the imperial treasury is packed with completely useless brahmanints. He definitely deserves to be executed over this. Please, arrest him immediately!”

Proud Warpatience had just tossed a spark into a vat of oil.

All of the Brahman Society emissaries looked over at Yang Qi, and the leader with the wretch-god aura said, “Step forward.”

Looking like the picture of calm, Yang Qi complied. “That's right, I was the one who spent those power stones. But I never interfered with the Brahman Society’s business.”

“Our business? What did you think was going to happen when you threw all those power stones into the economy? You essentially minted your own currency!” By this point, the immortal emissary was staring at Yang Qi with a gaze that crushed down on him like Mount Tai.

“The Mechfolk are to blame for that,” Yang Qi said bluntly. “All of the power stones I gave them were in raw form. It was obviously the Mechfolk who turned them into coins.”

“What nerve you have!” one of the other emissaries said. “Who do you think you are? Our Brahman Society leads the entire Thirty-Six Thousand Immortal Worlds Coalition! Any immortal world that we emissaries travel to treats us with the utmost respect, groveling before us as if we were emperors. You criminal! Get on your knees this instant and await your sentencing!”

As he spoke, an immense energy rushed out of him, filling the entire area with screaming winds.

“You think a little bit of pressure like that is going to hurt me?” Yang Qi said. All of a sudden, an energy fluctuation rolled out from him, negating the immortal emissary’s attack.

“What?” the emissary said, visibly shocked. Then his eyes turned even more vicious, and he began walking toward Yang Qi. “What outrageous gall! How dare you defy me! We were sent by the Brahman Society to investigate this situation, and anyone who refuses to cooperate will be executed!”

Seeing that Yang Qi was in a dangerous situation, Princess Jadefall took a step forward and said, “What’s the meaning of this? This is the imperial palace of the Titan Emperor Heaven, and Titan Dragonguard is a grand prince. If you want to interrogate him, fine, but you don’t need to humiliate him. Wait, don’t tell me you’re looking for an excuse to destroy our immortal world?”

“Who the hell do you think you are?” the emissary shouted. “Are you really interfering with a Brahman Society investigation? This is outright rebellion! Your measly Titan Emperor Heaven is a remote backwater, and you dare to defy the Brahman Society? How dare you! Do you really want your imperial house wiped out of existence?”

“The Brahman Society shouldn’t be interfering with the internal affairs of the imperial court,” the emperor said. “That said, there’s no way that we would ever violate your laws. You’re investigating a single person, not the imperial house itself. Please, just take the offender away with you.”

“Fine. Considering you wish to abide by the laws of the Brahman Society, we won’t cause problems for your house. But we’re taking this criminal with us.”

“Father!” Princess Jadefall said. “If Titan Dragonguard gets taken away by the Brahman Society, he’ll never return. He’s performed incredible services to the imperial house!”

“Eminent Princess Jadefall,” the crown prince said, “you need to consider the big picture. The Prince of Military Security did indeed serve the imperial court well, but unfortunately, he minted his own currency. And that has caused big problems for the court. Just think about all of the useless brahmanints in the imperial treasury! What a horrible situation for us! The immortal citizens of our Titan Emperor Heaven are poised on the brink of an abyss of suffering because of all this.”

“That’s right,” the lead emissary said. “Considering you have people here that are willing to consider the greater good, we won’t cause problems for you. Come on, let’s go. As a grand prince, we’re not going to treat you too harshly, but you’d better not cause any problems. If you do, you’ll regret it.”

“Titan Dragonguard, you can’t go with them!” Princess Jadefall said anxiously.

“I’ll be fine,” Yang Qi said. “I don’t want to drag the imperial house into this. Besides, all I did was buy some things with power stones. I didn’t mint any currency, which I'm sure the Brahman Society will realize after we talk things out.” Even as he said these things out loud, he sent a message into Princess Jadefall’s mind using divine will. “I'm not worried about this Brahman Society. Actually, I want to check them out and see if I can get any information from them about Proud Heaven. If they try to make any moves on me, I’ll just kill them all.”

“Be careful,” she replied. “People say that there are Godmyths in the Brahman Society.”

“Is that so? Well, I guess I’ll finally be able to see how strong Godmyths really are. After I'm gone, make sure to defend your position well. You’re now strong enough to stand up to whatever the crown prince throws at you.”

“Alright. I’ll be waiting to see what commotion you cause in the Brahman Society.” Princess Jadefall knew that Yang Qi was the type of person who didn’t fear anything in heaven and earth. Considering he had his God Legion Seal, it seemed unlikely the Brahman Society would really be able to do anything harmful to him.

“Come with us,” the lead emissary said, and Yang Qi walked over.

“Men, seal him in the Immortal Void-Cage.” A few of the lower-ranking emissaries flicked their fingers, sending out some paper talismans that turned into a cage around Yang Qi. Then all of them vanished into the teleportation portal.

Silence reigned in the imperial court.

The insufferably arrogant Prince of Military Security had been taken away, just like that.

He had made his debut a year before as Titan Dragonguard, slaughtering his way to the position of grand prince. He had defied the crown prince, humiliated the Director of Internal Affairs, and shaken the entire imperial court. But in a completely unimaginable turn of events, he had been arrested. Everyone could well imagine what miserable fate he would eventually suffer. Considering how rich he was, there was no way the Brahman Society would let him go—obviously, they wanted to strip him of his wealth.

After a long moment passed, Proud Warpatience sighed audibly. “At long last things have quieted down. Your Imperial Majesty, the bossy and overbearing Titan Dragonguard brought dishonor to the imperial court and committed all sorts of acts to undercut your power. Now that he's been taken away to be executed, it’s crucial to purge his henchmen. I would like to humbly suggest that you arrest all of his henchmen, especially Titan Duelbringer and his associates. If we rake them over the coals, it's possible we could get our hands on Titan Dragonguard’s treasure hoard before the Brahman Society does.”

The suggestion was met with surprise by virtually everyone present.

“I agree, Your Majesty. Arrest all his henchmen!”

“Generalissimo Proud Warpatience couldn’t be more correct. The arrogant and despotic Titan Dragonguard abused his power and oppressed the people. Now that justice has caught up with him, we have to hold his henchmen accountable, too. They should all be executed!”

“You people are shameless!” Princess Jadefall said angrily. “Titan Dragonguard served the court well and has been taken away to be questioned, not executed. You don’t know if he’ll be found guilty or not. You’re just trying to hit him when he’s down!”

“Eminent Princess Jadefall, please lower your voice,” the crown prince said. “His Imperial Majesty can make his own decisions in this regard. Everyone knows that Titan Dragonguard has no hope of getting out of this situation. He just has too much wealth on his hands. If His Majesty can get that wealth, he could establish himself as one of the greatest powers in the universe.”

Many of the other officials and ministers were quick to chime in with expressions of agreement.

It only took a short moment for Titan Dragonguard to be viewed as a criminal who had no hope of getting out of his current situation alive.

“Considering everything….” the emperor began as he returned to his throne. In that moment, everyone was certain that he would follow through and try to get Yang Qi’s treasure hoard.

However, even as the emperor sat back down, a voice suddenly filled the imperial city, causing everything to shake as violently as if there had just been an earthquake.

It was none other than Yang Qi

“Proud Warpatience. Crown Prince. I know you want to hit me while I'm down, but know this: the crappy Brahman Society won't be able to do a thing to me. I can get out of this Immortal Void-Cage with no effort at all. I wanted to go to the Brahman Society, to find out what secrets they’re keeping. If you touch a single one of my henchmen, I’ll kill these emissaries down to the last one. Then we’ll see what the Brahman Society does to your immortal world. What will you do then?” Then he burst out into hearty laughter.

Chapter 610: Threats

Yang Qi’s voice was deafening, booming into the hearts and minds of everyone present and leaving them so shaken that they couldn’t speak. When he spoke, it was almost like a heaven-god making a pronouncement from above.

It was a completely invincible proclamation, the kind that could destroy the dome of heaven and shake the world.

Everyone was completely stunned, even the emperor. Never in his wildest dreams could he have guessed that ‘Titan Dragonguard’ would be this strong. Despite being sealed in a cage by emissaries from the Brahman Society, he could still project his voice through the void to the Titan Emperor Heaven and threaten the top experts there.

Even the eighth stage Antiquity-Demolishers were physically shaking.

And he wasn’t done speaking. “These people from the Brahman Society are fools to think that they can lock me up, and in fact they fell right into my trap. Whichever of you lay a hand on any of my subordinates will find your entire clan in the direst of circumstances.”

As he continued speaking, the soundwaves of his voice turned into magical symbols that swirled in the air next to Princess Jadefall, eventually forming into a projection that resembled Yang Qi in every aspect. It was an out-of-body incarnation of incredible power.

Although it only had about a tenth of the power of his true self, that was still a terrifying level of strength. And the fact that he could create a clone like this so easily indicated that he could return to its side at any time he wished.

The sight of the clone left everyone mute from shock. As for the people who had been calling for his henchmen to be arrested, they broke out in cold sweats and exchanged awkward glances.

The emperor was also visibly shaken, and was staring at Yang Qi’s clone.

“Your Imperial Majesty,” the clone said coldly, “the Brahman Society has viciously bullied our imperial court, and I'm going to make them pay dearly for that. Don’t worry, I’ll advance the interests of our immortal world as I do. It’s my duty to fight for our glory.”

“If that’s your intent, wonderful,” the emperor said, his voice quavering as if from fear. “This session of court is over. Everyone is dismissed.”

Still stunned, the gathered ministers and officials gave a formal voicing of thanks, then left.

Thus, a most bizarre and unusual event ended.

Not long after, Proud Warpatience, the crown prince, and various other grand princes and ministers were all gathered to discuss the situation. Slowly but surely, the crown prince’s stupefaction transformed into an expression of vicious ferocity.

“I never could have guessed that Titan Dragonguard would have divine abilities like that. It’s terrifying! His cultivation base is exponentially stronger than the last time he used it. How could this have happened?”

“It must be because he and Princess Jadefall joined forces in their cultivation,” Proud Warpatience said. “That said, he shouldn’t have grown so strong so quickly. I wonder if he has a special type of constitution. It doesn’t seem likely.”

“Proud Warpatience, your Master Proud Heaven had a clone in the Brahman Society for a while. Is he still there? Were you the one who got the message to the Brahman Society? Is that why they came to arrest Titan Dragonguard?”

“Exactly, Crown Prince,” Proud Warpatience said. “The Brahman Society was actually founded by a clone of my Master, Proud Heaven. He also left behind plenty of disciples and followers. Unfortunately, my Master later disappeared into the void in search of his deathless kingdom. Afterward, the Brahman Society evolved, and eventually, many of the disciples loyal to him were purged and expelled. But there are still loyalists in positions of power. And of course, I have contacts there. Because of that, the Titan Emperor Heaven is currently safe within the Thirty-Six Thousand Immortal Worlds Coalition. Nobody will cause any problems for us.”

“Well, that’s good,” the crown prince said. “Well, maybe Titan Dragonguard can handle a few emissaries, but there’s no way he can take on the Brahman Society as a whole. We need to make sure he ends up getting killed. If he doesn’t, and his cultivation base continues to advance, who could possibly stand up to him? He will definitely come back eventually to wipe us all out.”

“I’ll make the arrangements immediately,” Proud Warpatience said. “I’ll reach out to my contacts in the Brahman Society and ask them to send someone to execute him immediately. Afterward, we can track down his treasure and make sure that you can crush Princess Jadefall.”

“Excellent. Go take care of it all.”

The crown prince waved his hand dismissively, and Proud Warpatience rose to his feet and vanished without a trace.

After he was gone, the crown prince looked around at everyone else present and said, “Did you see that? Did you see how loyal Proud Warpatience is?”

“I still think he’s secretly planning to betray you,” one of the ministers said. “He knows his place, but he’s deeply ambitious. For example, he called on the help of the Brahman Society without notifying you, Crown Prince. And we can’t underestimate the network of agents and followers left behind by his Master Proud Heaven. That said, they’re the perfect tools to use against Princess Jadefall and Titan Dragonguard. Who knows, maybe if they end up at each other’s throats, we can swoop in at the end and be the ultimate victors?”

“True,” the crown prince said. After a moment of thought, he continued, “Very well, pay close attention. Continue to recruit more men to our cause. I'm going to go see if I can figure out how Proud Warpatience is contacting the Brahman Society. I’ll also see if I can determine what’s going on with Titan Dragonguard and the Brahman Society. Maybe if they’re fighting, I can figure out a way to benefit from it.”

With that, he faded away into nothing.

Meanwhile, Chancellor Demi-Immortal and the young man in yellow were hidden elsewhere in the imperial city, using a special technique from the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart to eavesdrop.

“Let’s go,” said the young man. “If Yang Qi is fighting with the Brahman Society, maybe we can take advantage of the situation to strike a fatal blow.”

“You really think that the Brahman Society can't handle him?” Chancellor Demi-Immortal said, his eyes glittering. Apparently, he thought that the time had come to make his big move.

The young man snorted coldly. “At this point, I don’t think even a Godmyth could kill him. Those emissaries seemed really impressive, but he can probably kill them with the most casual move.”

“There’s no possible way! How could his cultivation base be improving so quickly?”

“He and Princess Jadefall definitely practiced dual cultivation together. By combining the powers of a Reincarnated One with a Fateless One, he achieved spectacular cultivation base progress. If you don’t believe me, just look.” He waved his hands through the air, causing the image of a moon to fly out.

As the moon shone, it revealed a sweeping, universal image, which quickly zoomed forward until it revealed Yang Qi and the Brahman Society emissaries.

Yang Qi was in the cage and they were interrogating him as they moved along, occasionally using magical techniques to torture him. From the look of it, Yang Qi seemed trapped and unable to escape from the cage.

“Yang Qi is usually so aggressive,” Chancellor Demi-Immortal said. “Why would he allow them to humiliate him like that?”

“You really think it’s that simple?” replied the young man, his voice as cold as the winter wind. “Look more closely.”

A moment later, Chancellor Demi-Immortal gasped as he realized that the Yang Qi inside the cage was actually an illusion. He was using some sort of magical technique to confuse the hearts and minds of the emissaries, who had absolutely no idea what was really happening.

Then he noticed a shadowy figure lurking above them, which none of the emissaries could see.

Of course, it was Yang Qi.

Obviously, he was in a position to kill all of the emissaries with the mere wave of his hand.

“Well, what do you think? The time has come to leave the Titan Emperor Heaven. If we stick around here, we’ll never catch up with Yang Qi.”

WHOOSH!

The two of them flew up into the sky and vanished.

A moment later, another shadowy figure appeared and resolved into Princess Jadefall, her eyes glittering with a strange light.

‘The aura of a Future One! Yang Qi was right. It’s someone just like Proud Heaven, lurking right here in the Titan Emperor Heaven. We definitely need to take his power. If we got King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy and the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, why would we possibly need to fear the Brahman Society? In fact, if we wiped them out we could control the Thirty-Six Thousand Immortal Worlds Coalition. It would be impossible to say how many godrelics, god items, and other resources we would control then. There might even be other special bloodlines to be found.’

Princess Jadefall was obviously a very ambitious woman, and she didn’t hesitate to pass the new information on to Yang Qi.

Chapter 611: Drawing the Snake out of its Hole

Within the depths of the universe, the spatial tempests and energy flows were dangerous enough to kill fifth stage World-Demolishers. There were even some areas of particular chaos and severity that would be deadly even to sixth stage Abstrusity-Demolishers and seventh stage Wilds-Demolishers.

Whizz!

A wind of blades appeared, filled with blade light. It was referred to as a ‘heavenblade squall’, and it was immensely powerful and dangerous.

However, the emissaries from the Brahman Society had no trouble at all dealing with things like that. They were all ninth stage Dao-Demolishers, so as soon as they saw it approaching they threw up a shield of light to protect themselves.

The heavenblade squall slammed into the shield and thunderous booms rang out.

“This heavenblade squall is strong,” one of the emissaries said. “It sure is dangerous traveling about the universe. If you’re not careful, you could easily get sucked into a deadly vortex. We have to stick to the paths outlined by the immortal worlds, otherwise we’ll end up lost forever. Only Godmyths are strong enough to just travel about at will.”

“You want to be a Godmyth?” the leader said. “I've been in the ninth stage for tens of thousands of years, yet not even I have any hope of reaching the Godmyth level.”

Another of the emissaries fawningly said, “How many lineaments do you have on your dao heart, Captain? Once you reach the ninth stage and form your dao heart, you have to experience nine tribulations. And with each tribulation, a lineament is formed on the dao heart. The number of lineaments shows your progress, and when you finally get enough, your dao heart shatters and your nascent divinity becomes mythological. At that point, you reach the Godmyth level.”

The leader snorted. “I only have three lineaments. And you can drop the act. There’s no need for brown-nosing. We have a big opportunity on our hands here. We really hooked a big fish.”

He looked over at Yang Qi in the cage. “The fact that he can spend power stones the way he did means that he came across some sort of good fortune—probably a godrelic. We just need to force the details out of him and we can all advance by leaps and bounds.”

“Exactly,” another of the emissaries said. “We’re on orders to bring this guy back to the headquarters, but that doesn’t mean we can’t profit a bit along the way.”

“Come on,” the leader said. “Let’s find a good place to finish the interrogation and drag all of his secrets out of him. My Nine Heavens Deadfall Soulsearch technique can scrape his sea of consciousness clean of all the information. In fact, it will even pull up things that he’s forgotten.”

Within the cage, Yang Qi appeared to be twitching and moaning because of the various torture techniques that the emissaries were throwing at him.

Of course, no one realized that it was just an illusion and that the real Yang Qi was literally looming over their heads.

‘So, Princess Jadefall says that the buzz cut kid and Chancellor Demi-Immortal appeared.’ Because of their shared cultivation—and because they were a Reincarnated One and a Fateless One, respectively—Princess Jadefall and Yang Qi were connected and could communicate with each other at any distance.

Of course, Yang Qi could sever their connection at any time, if necessary. But for now, her help was invaluable and came with many benefits.

Right now, he was using these Brahman Society emissaries as bait, in the hopes of catching a big fish such as the kid in yellow. He was a Future One, with King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy and the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart; if he continued to grow in strength and power, he would eventually be a big threat. Although Yang Qi was certain the kid in yellow and Chancellor Demi-Immortal had come to the Titan Emperor Heaven, he had no way to track them down. The immortal world was simply too big.

But now he was about to hook them.

As long as he could get the kid in yellow to reveal himself, he could crush him and get the power of a Future One. Of course, King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy, and the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, would also be immensely helpful.

With the chart, he might finally be in a position to tangle directly with Proud Heaven.

It was impossible to say how many clones Proud Heaven had, or where his true self was. And who knew what other secrets he harbored. Most likely, he was a Godmyth, and it was even possible that he had reached the Deathless Throne.

Even with all of his secret weapons, there was no way Yang Qi was in the position to handle someone like that right now.

Continuing his conversation with Princess Jadefall, Yang Qi said, “I’m going to crush this kid in yellow out of existence once and for all. Only by assimilating him and his Future powers will I be able to get an idea of what Proud Heaven is going to be like. And that’s my only chance to strike at him and save mother.”

Princess Jadefall was a Dao-Demolisher, and had reached an even higher level thanks to her session of cultivation with Yang Qi. That said, she still wasn’t a match for the kid in yellow. She was currently shadowing him and reporting his position back to Yang Qi.

**

“Alright, we’ve tortured this bastard enough for now. Let’s find a good place to soulsearch him.”

“Very well.”

“I've already prepared the perfect location,” the leader said. “A while ago, I set up a mansion grotto halfway between the Megaplexus Heaven and the Five Blooms Heaven. The gravitational interaction between those two immortal worlds creates something like a preheaven labyrinth, which is the perfect place to hide. Not even a Godmyth would be able to find my mansion grotto in there. It’s the perfect place to conduct our interrogation, and also split up the profits once we track down his treasure.”

“But… what happens when we finally take him back to headquarters. What if they interrogate him and find out what we did?”

“It doesn’t matter,” the leader said. “We can just say that the stubborn imperial court from the Titan Emperor Heaven ambushed us after we left and rescued him. Headquarters will definitely send people to wipe the Titan Emperor Heaven out of existence after that. Trust me, I've done this sort of thing too many times to count.”

“Alright, we’ll follow your lead, big bro.”

The others nodded, convinced that it was a foolproof plan.

Cold light gleamed in the leader’s eyes as he summoned a wormhole which they all flew into. They went along for about fifteen hours or so before they were in the very depths of the universe, halfway between two enormous immortal worlds.

One of them was covered with intersecting lines like those on a Go board. That was the Megaplexus Heaven.

The other seemed to swirl with five types of colorful energies. It was none other than the Five Blooms Heaven that the leader of the emissaries had just mentioned.

The interactions between these two enormous immortal worlds created a twisting, turning space-time labyrinth that seemed impossible to navigate. It was immense; in the mortal world, it would be able to contain hundreds of thousands of planetary systems. There were certain areas that had volcanic eruptions of energy that went on for light-years. Even high-level Demolishers who came here would face the risk of being killed.

“Stick close to me,” the leader said. “My mansion grotto is hidden in the depths of this labyrinth. I created it specifically to hide from Godmyths, if necessary.” With that, he flew right in, winding his way through the twists and turns with practiced ease.

As for the shadowy Yang Qi, he had no trouble keeping up.

He could already guess what was really going on. This leader wanted Yang Qi’s wealth for himself and was just leading the other emissaries to their deaths. It was a real pity the other emissaries were too naive to realize that.

Some distance into the labyrinth, all light vanished. Everything turned pitch black, and not even powerful daoist techniques could illuminate the area.

“What’s going on here? Why did everything get so dark all of a sudden? This is almost like the Hell of Gloom and Darkness!” The emissaries all started crying out, and some of them even summoned nascent divinity true flame to light the area, but it did no good.

CRACK!

One of the emissaries vanished, consumed by the darkness.

One by one, attacks smashed into the other emissaries.

“Sir, what’s going on? This place is extremely dangerous! Where’s your mansion grotto? Why did you take us—” He let out an agonized shriek as some enormous beast devoured him.

“This is my mansion grotto! I emulated the Hell of Gloom and Darkness to create a spell formation called the Kingdom of Gloom and Darkness! You can all rest in peace here, fuel for my spell formation. Once I rise to power in the Brahman Society, I’ll make sure to take care of anyone you left behind. You think I'm going to split my loot with you? Impossible!”

Chapter 612: Getting Them All in One Shot

Within the darkness and gloom, the leader of the emissaries transformed into something profoundly vile.

Bloodcurdling screams rang out as he mercilessly cut down his fellow emissaries one after another. Within moments, half of them were dead. Most terrifying of all was that, now that they were within this labyrinth of pitch black, there was nowhere to escape to.

The emissaries were all top experts, thus there was no way that the leader could cut them all down at the same time. If even one of them escaped, it would lead to his ultimate doom.

In the Brahman Society, killing fellow disciples was a high crime that came with the penalty of death.

The leader was going all in; he had to kill all of his fellows, then force Yang Qi to tell him about the ‘godrelic’, and ultimately reach the Godmyth level. If he could do all that then he would become a patriarch in the Brahman Society.

Screams rang out one after another.

Soon, only three were left, the strongest of the group, the eighth stage Antiquity-Demolishers. Immortal emperors. All of them were fighting tooth and nail to survive.

“You’re an outright fiend-devil, Hu Latu! How dare you try to kill us. We're fellow disciples! Aren’t you worried about being punished by the Brahman Society!?”

“You think you can escape me?” Hu Latu said. “You might as well just give up. This is my kingdom, which I built with blood, sweat, and tears. It’s locked tight! Not even your souls will be able to escape. Stand still and let me kill you!”

“You rapacious villain, Hu Latu!” Obviously, the final three emissaries weren’t willing to go down without a fight.

“Fine. Prepare to die. Darkness-Gloom Mud-Plowing Profound-Yin Fist!”

Hu Latu unleashed a pitch black fist strike that caused sinister yin winds to sweep out, accompanied by the weeping of ghosts and wailing of gods. Yet even as looks of despair covered the faces of the final three emissaries, absolutely nothing happened.

Radiance and light blossomed and a sea of sagelight appeared, driving away all of the gloom and darkness. In fact, all of the twists and turns of the labyrinth became clear as crystal.

The darkness and gloom was completely eliminated and Hu Latu was sent stumbling backward, sealed by Yang Qi along with the other three emissaries.

“You!?” he shouted, a look of shock overtaking his face. He looked down at a crystal he was holding in his hand, within which was another version of Yang Qi. However, even as he watched it, the illusion inside the crystal faded away.

“You really think you could imprison me that easily?” Yang Qi laughed coldly. “That was an illusion. Killing fellow disciples is a big crime, so get on your knees and forget any thoughts of running away. Those three are all the proof I need. If I let them go, you’ll have the entire Brahman Society after you. Where will you run to if that happens?”

The other three emissaries were locked down by Yang Qi as well, but upon hearing his words they breathed sighs of relief.

“Hu Latu!” one of them shouted. “You rapacious villain! Now that the truth is revealed, your crimes are going to earn you death!”

Eyes narrowing, Hu Latu said, “I underestimated you, you little punk. But this is my territory. You really think I wouldn’t set up a way to escape from just such a situation as this?”

“So, not willing to shed a tear until you see the coffin?” Yang Qi began walking toward Hu Latu, and every step he took turned the area around him into a land of pure holiness in which all other hexing magics and magical techniques faded out of existence.

“You!” Hu Latu blurted. He was burning paper talismans and spitting up blood to fuel them, but none of it did any good.

“Calm down, I'm not going to give you a hard time,” Yang Qi said. “How about I let you live, and you work for me? Help me infiltrate the Brahman Society.”

“You’re not going to kill me? Alright, fine. I can help you expunge your record in the Brahman Society.”

“Expunge my record?” Yang Qi laughed. “Considering the level of my cultivation base, I can defeat Godmyths. Give me a year or so and my cultivation base will be even stronger. And then what will the Brahman Society count for? My armies will soon overwhelm immortal world after immortal world. You think I want your help to expunge my record? Wrong. I'm going to destroy the Brahman Society and take over the Thirty-Six Thousand Immortal Worlds Coalition.”

“What? You’re going to destroy the Brahman Society?” Hu Latu began trembling. “Who exactly are you? I've never met someone as ambitious as you! The Brahman Society has as many experts as the sky has clouds!”

“Experts? Like I care about experts. Look, I don’t have time for chit chat at the moment. Some of my biggest enemies are on the way here right now, and I want to draw the snake out of its hole. In fact, not just a snake. Snakes. So I'm going to give you to the count of three to make your decision.

“One.

“Two.”

“Wait, there’s something I want to ask you about—”

“Ask me later. Three. Time to die.”

RUUUUUUMBLE!

He leaped forward, becoming a streak of destructive light that could shatter universes and destroy great daos.

Hu Latu drew on every ounce of power he had to stand up to the onslaught, but still staggered backward from the force, much to the shock of the other three emissaries.

“Nope. Not good enough,” Yang Qi said, slamming into Hu Latu again and sending him flying. However, even as Hu Latu seemed just on the verge of being killed, something flew out of the top of his head that resembled a heart, or perhaps a strange-looking fruit.

It was a dao heart, sometimes called a dao fruit, and it had three lineaments on it, making it look particularly shocking.

As soon as it was out in the open, it released waves of incomparably strong magical power. But Yang Qi’s Hand of the One God was immeasurably strong and could control heaven, earth, yin, yang, the cosmos, and all magic.

In the blink of an eye, the hand seized the heart, causing Hu Latu to suddenly deflate like a popped balloon.

“Hell Hexing Magic: Devil Seed Infiltration.” Devil energy swirled out of Yang Qi like a snake, wrapping around the dao heart and turning it pitch black before sending it back into Hu Latu.

Hu Latu rose shakily to his feet, his face ashen. “What… what did you do to my dao heart? What was that thing?”

“A curse from hell, that's all. Something from the primeval infernal deities. It stems from my Devil-God Seal, and anyone I hit with it will obey all of my commands. Even a Godmyth.”

Yang Qi moved his finger through the air and Hu Latu suddenly began dancing like a wooden marionette.

“Hu Latu.”

“Yes, Milord!” he replied, dropping to his knee. When you stand under low eaves, you have no choice but to bow your head. Those sealed by Yang Qi’s devil seed would have no choice but to fear him down to their souls.

“Listen well to my orders,” Yang Qi said. “I know that you have a god item in your lair, so go inside and use it to put up an illusory region. I want it to look like you and I are in a fierce fight there.”

“Yes, Milord. I’ll do exactly as you say. That god item is called the Trident of the Water God, and I can set up very formidable spell formations with it. Please, come inside and tell me exactly how you want me to set up the illusion.”

Yang Qi waved his finger and sent devil seeds into the other three emissaries, then followed Hu Latu inside.

**

Around that time, Chancellor Demi-Immortal and the young man in yellow appeared at the midway point between the Megaplexus Heaven and the Five Blooms Heaven. The first thing that caught their attention was the seemingly never-ending space-time labyrinth, filled with deadly vortexes and the like.

“The universe of the immortal worlds is far more dangerous than the mortal world below,” the young man said. “What is this labyrinth? And what is Yang Qi doing inside?”

He yet again used his spying magic to pull up an image showing Hu Latu using a water-type god item to fight Yang Qi in the depths of the labyrinth.

“Excellent. This couldn’t have gone better. So the leader of those Brahman Society emissaries set up a lair here with a god item in it. And it’s obviously strong enough to capture Yang Qi. Even so, I think he underestimated Yang Qi. The Brahman Society is going to be defeated shortly.”

“So what do we do?” Chancellor Demi-Immortal asked. “If Yang Qi is in trouble, does that mean our chance has arrived?”

“There’s no rush. Let’s stay hidden and wait to see if Proud Warpatience and the Crown Prince arrive. If they go in and start fighting Yang Qi as well, that will be the perfect time to strike.”

The young man in yellow quickly drew on an invisibility technique and faded from view.

RUUUUUUMBLE!

Shortly after, everything trembled violently as Proud Warpatience appeared, followed by the crown prince.

One after another, they flew into the labyrinth. Smiling cryptically, the young man followed.

Chapter 613: Slaughtering All Enemies

‘So, they all took the bait,’ Princess Jadefall thought, her heart pounding as she realized that Yang Qi’s plan had worked. Proud Warpatience, the crown prince, the kid in yellow… all of them flew into the labyrinth.

Yang Qi had lured the snakes out of their holes and was preparing to take them all out at once.

If he succeeded, it would be a windfall and he would definitely be able to completely overturn the general structure of the Titan Emperor Heaven. In fact, it would likely change the Thirty-Six Thousand Immortal Worlds Coalition in a dramatic way.

For him, getting the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart would be a complete game-changer.

With it, taking over thirty-six thousand immortal worlds would be simple. Even three hundred million would be within the realm of possibility, and he would also be able to strive ahead directly toward the Deathless Throne.

Princess Jadefall drew on the twin energies of a Fateless One and a Reincarnated One, causing a primal-chaos image to spring up behind her, within which was a porcelain godspore.

That godspore was her true form, how she had started out as a Reincarnated One. No matter how many times she was reincarnated, her substructure would never change. After going through multiple reincarnations, her inherent nature had become muddled, but now she had been reminded of its past, and her previous wisdom and knowledge awakened by Yang Qi.

Without any hesitation, she flew into the labyrinth.

‘They’re all here,’ Yang Qi thought. His divine will had long since filled the entire labyrinth, allowing him to keep a close eye on everything.

The trident Hu Latu had spoken of was fully thirty-thousand meters long and covered with raging waves. As it turned out, it contained a water-type godly-class energy art within it. Surprisingly, it was none other than the Cardinal Grand Brahma Punishes the Water God Energy Art.

Yang Qi had acquired the fire-type version of this same art from Proud Warpatience. Apparently, both of them were part of a set that included metal, wood, water, fire, and earth.

The complete set would conform to the five phases and could unleash a consummate and mysterious power that could shake all creation.

‘Great! I got another part of the set!’ He inhaled, sucking the god item into himself until it turned into a spring of water flowing into his blood, filled with deathless godliness.

‘Now that I have the water- and fire-types together, I can definitely release even more impressive godpower. Unfortunately, it’s not quite enough to push me to third stage Thought-Demolishing. Once I'm at that level, I’ll be able to summon seventh stage Wilds-Demolishers and truly dominate anyone in the Titan Emperor Heaven.’

Proud Warpatience was the first to arrive at the location where Titan Dragonguard was ‘fighting’ with Hu Latu. Proud Warpatience didn’t hesitate to leap into the fight.

WHOOOOOSH!

“Your life is mine, brat!”

Immediately, the clone that was fighting Hu Latu looked over and shouted, “Proud Warpatience? I can’t believe you’re ambushing me!”

From the look of things, it would be very difficult for him to keep fighting Hu Latu and defend against Proud Warpatience at the same time.

Proud Warpatience immediately resorted to his Cardinal Grand Brahma Punishes the Fire God Energy Art, summoning a host of flames that took the form of numerous flowers, including hibiscuses, peonies, night queen flowers, chrysanthemums, and the like, all of them burning with the raw power of the universe.

Yang Qi’s true self remained off to the side, invisible, but drawing on his Wheel of Fate to summon crackling lightning that he added to the illusory region. It was Life-Death Void-Destruction Lightning, which could not only vanquish evil, but could also overturn the senses of people caught in its power, making them confused and befuddled. It only added a further bit of realism to the illusion at play.

Even as Proud Warpatience leaped into the illusory region and began battling Yang Qi’s clone, more people approached, namely the crown prince, the kid in yellow, and Chancellor Demi-Immortal.

Instead of taking action, Yang Qi kept in communication with Princess Jadefall and simply allowed them to come.

Eventually, the fight with Proud Warpatience had been going on for many hours and Yang Qi’s clone seemed to be weakening. Yet nothing Proud Warpatience tried had succeeded in killing him.

“Crown Prince,” Proud Warpatience shouted. “I know you were right behind me! You’re just waiting to swoop in and take advantage at the end of the fight, aren’t you!? If we don’t win this fight today, and he escapes, it would lead to grave consequences.”

“Since you put it that way,” the crown prince said coolly, “I guess I’ll stake everything on this one blow! Titan Godpower!”

An enormous hammer appeared in his hands, which he thrust out with explosive power that surpassed even Proud Warpatience.

It was another god item, the famed Hammer of Titan.

It was even more powerful than the eye of Titan, which was kept in the middle of the Titan Emperor Heaven. And the crown prince’s cultivation base seemed linked to it on an enigmatic level, to the point where even just striking out with it seemed capable of crushing the entire lair within the labyrinth.

During the entire time, Yang Qi sat there, quiet and unmoving.

He was still waiting for the young man in yellow to make his move.

He was the true target, and Yang Qi would pay almost any price to make sure he ended up dead.

As the fighting intensified, Yang Qi poured out more vital energy to make sure the illusion was realistic and that the crown prince and Proud Warpatience were both completely wrapped up in it.

It was very draining to have both of these individuals stuck in the illusion, but it was worth it.

“Should we make our move?” Chancellor Demi-Immortal asked of the young man in yellow as they remained hidden and invisible nearby. “It looks like Yang Qi’s vital energy is running low. If we strike now, we could probably kill him. What if one of them goes all out or flees, and the whole fight is thrown out of balance?”

“Just wait a moment,” the young man in yellow said. “Something about this situation seems odd. It doesn’t make sense that Yang Qi would be this weak. What if this is all a trap, and we're just about to fall right into it?”

“A trap? Impossible. Even if Yang Qi were stronger than we realized, he’s not a Godmyth. He's fighting the crown prince, Proud Warpatience, and the Brahman Society emissaries. How could anyone deal with so many ninth stage Dao-Demolishers?  Even sovereigns of heaven would have trouble with that many enemies. The fact that he's holding his own is impressive enough. If he were any stronger, how could we possibly deal with him?”

“Look, calm down. Just keep watching until they waste a bit more vital energy.” For some reason, the young man in yellow felt profoundly nervous about how things were playing out.

‘Why aren’t they taking the bait?’ Yang Qi thought. The young man in yellow was the true target. Without snagging him, it wouldn’t matter if Yang Qi killed Proud Warpatience and the crown prince. It wasn’t as if taking their power would benefit him much.

“Jadefall! Do something to up the ante!”

In response, Princess Jadefall released some energy fluctuations which the young man in yellow instantly detected. Face falling, he said, “This is bad. That’s the aura of a Reincarnated One. Yang Qi must be on his last legs and is calling out to Princess Jadefall to come help. If the two of them join forces, they’ll be unstoppable. We have to kill him now!”

“I told you we shouldn’t have waited this long!” Chancellor Demi-Immortal said.

“It’s not too late! Come on!”

The young man in yellow leaped forward, throwing out a paper talisman that shredded into pieces and transformed into three legacy medallions. He spat blood on them, and rumbling sounds echoed out as a projection of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart appeared. Fusing with it, he shot toward Yang Qi’s clone.

‘Alright!’ Yang Qi thought. Although he felt a surge of delight, he quickly forced himself into a state of calm. All emotions, be they anxiety, fear, delight, or anything else, completely vanished.

In the blink of an eye, he became like a golden god from ancient times. At the same time, the illusory region vanished and Proud Warpatience and the crown prince suddenly lurched to a stop, completely locked in place and unable to move.

A golden cage sprang into being, rumbling down and locking onto everyone present!

Yang Qi really was preparing to take everyone out at once!

Crack!

Without any hesitation, Yang Qi unleashed a stream of golden, porcelain power that smashed into his archenemy, the young man in yellow. The force was such that the entire lair around him was wiped out of existence!

“ARRGGH!”

Both the young man in yellow and Chancellor Demi-Immortal were caught completely off guard and the projection of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart was ripped apart. The two of them let loose agonized shrieks as blood sprayed out of numerous wounds on their bodies.

“This is bad! He tricked us!” The young man in yellow was the quick-thinking type who could make snap decisions. Without any hesitation, he said, “Immortal-Slayer Power! Primeval Execution!”

WHACK!

He smashed a hole into the golden prison Yang Qi had created, and leaped toward it. However, in his rush, he didn’t notice that the cage was surrounded by even more glowing light that he crashed right into. His escape attempt failed!

“Damnation!” he cried, feeling crazed madness rising up within him. “King Immortal-Slayer’s Soul!”

Behind him, an immense figure popped into being.

Chapter 614: Crushing the Buzz Cut Kid

‘This guy actually summoned the soul of King Immortal-Slayer?’ Yang Qi was more than a little shocked. The shadowy figure behind the kid in yellow was an immortal of boundless power who had even slaughtered ancient gods, and seemingly radiated insurmountable power.

“God Legion Seal: Slaughter King Immortal-Slayer!” There was no time for thought or contemplation. Leaping into motion, Yang Qi sent the power of the God Legion Seal rocketing toward the enormous, shadowy figures.

Unfortunately, by this point the young man in yellow had already broken free of the golden cage and was obviously attempting to make a break for it.

“Trying to run? It won’t be that easy!” Princess Jadefall appeared, transforming into a porcelain godspore as she shot forward to block the path of the young man.

“Bitch!” the young man snarled. Yet no matter what he did, he couldn’t get past the porcelain godspore. Finally, he threw back his head and let out a howl of anguish. He had sacrificed a mass of quintessence-blood to call the soul of King Immortal-Slayer, but not even that was enough to escape this critical danger.

He was a Future One, and with his advance knowledge of how events were to play out, he was usually able to turn all sorts of misfortunes into blessings. He could seek out luck and intentionally avoid calamity.

But none of that could help him when dealing with Yang Qi.

As a Fateless One, who didn’t exist in the future, he was a constant variable. The young man knew that because of all the factors at play he was in great peril.

“I'm not going to let you come out on top! I'm a Future One! Future Essence: Space-Time Transposition!”

RUMBLE!

Space-time power erupted out of the young man, an immense force that pierced into the void to travel back to the future.

“Trying to go back to the future? Sorry, but you're dealing with me. And that means you’re doomed to die!” The God Legion Seal surged with power and the golden imp appeared. This time, his facial features were visible as he reached out, creating a golden wormhole that sucked in all of the space-time power. In the blink of an eye, it was totally gone.

“The power of the God Legion Seal?! I refuse to accept this!”

The young man in yellow sagged in defeat, fully aware that he had delivered both himself and Chancellor Demi-Immortal right into Yang Qi’s hands. Another golden cage appeared, which dropped down onto him.

Whoosh!

The three legacy medallions of King Immortal-Slayer flew out of him; they were so opposed to the God Legion Seal that they were attempting to escape on their own initiative.

“Jadefall, grab those medallions!” Yang Qi shouted. “They’re our ticket to opening the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart!”

Princess Jadefall immediately complied, lunging forward and slapping a sealing spell onto the legacy medallions.

“Don’t fuse with them!” Yang Qi said. “They’re infected with an ancient curse, so whoever fuses with them is doomed to die a violent death, and then they move on to a new host. It's an endless cycle that I suspect is actually a trap. I think the medallions are absorbing the destiny of numerous geniuses to eventually bring King Immortal-Slayer back into the world! Just keep them safe for now and we’ll study them later. I can probably use the God Legion Seal to suppress the spirits of the medallions and fully unlock their secrets. Then, maybe we can harness the true power of the legacy inside.”

Princess Jadefall had been just about to fuse with the medallions, but upon hearing Yang Qi’s warning she simply put them away.

King Immortal-Slayer had been the greatest enemy of the ancient legion of gods, and also the greatest enemy of the immortal worlds. He wanted to slay anything and everything then establish his own, new system of order and civilization.

The young man in yellow and Chancellor Demi-Immortal were both locked down, and Princess Jadefall had the legacy medallions. Proud Warpatience and the crown prince were stuck in the spell formation. The situation was already starting to wind down, so Yang Qi called for Hu Latu to emerge.

“It’s you people?” the crown prince murmured in shock. He and Proud Warpatience stared wide-eyed at Yang Qi, Hu Latu, and Princess Jadefall, then over at the young man in yellow. From the short fight that had played out between the young man in yellow and Yang Qi, it was obvious that both of them were as strong as Godmyths.

And that was power far beyond anything they could handle.

Whether it was the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, the legacy medallions, or the God Legion Seal, they were vastly beyond even god items.

“What about us?” Yang Qi said coolly. “We put on a little show and snagged us a Future One. We’ll deal with you after him. You’re like turtles in a jar now. Either acknowledge allegiance to me, or die. Your choice.”

“This is outrageous!” the crown prince said. “You plotted against us? I'm the crown prince of the Titan Emperor Heaven! However things play out, you’re still a loyal member of the court!”

“Titan Emperor Heaven? You think I care about that backwater?” Yang Qi laughed. “Compared to even these Brahman Society emissaries, your entire imperial dynasty is like a stray dog, or even worse. I don't see why it even needs to exist. Once I’m done here, I’ll go back, put the emperor to death, and give Princess Jadefall control. A new immortal world is about to rise up to control the Thirty-Six Thousand Immortal Worlds Coalition. And that will be a true reason to hold our heads high.”

“Come on, Yang Qi,” Princess Jadefall said. “After we get back, we can force father to resign. There’s no need to kill him.”

“There is no such thing as familial love when it comes to imperial power,” Yang Qi said, his voice brimming with a decisiveness that could sever nails and chop iron. “Fathers and sons fight and kill each other all the time in such situations. If you want to found a dynasty that lasts for all time, you have to rule with a hard heart. Besides, that emperor of yours was perfectly happy to see me dead. He handed me right over to the Brahman Society without even a thought to seeking justice.” Yang Qi frowned. “Look, for the sake of your face, I’ll spare him. But I'm still going to remove his energy arts and turn him into a mortal.”

Princess Jadefall didn't respond. In the end, she knew that there wasn’t any other option.

“Are you people even human?” the crown prince growled. “By the way, what's your real name? Yang Qi? Or Titan Dragonguard?”

“It’s Yang Qi, not Titan Dragonguard.” He laughed. “I’m from the lower world, the founder of the Sage Monarch planetary system, conqueror of all. I'm going to take over your puny Titan Emperor Heaven and there’s nothing you can do to stop me.”

“You!” Proud Warpatience said, his expression twisting with rage. “You’re the son of my Master, Proud Heaven! You’re Yang Qi! Why are you doing all of this?”

“Proud Heaven? You think I'm his son? That's a pretty good joke. I'm a Fateless One, born out of primal-chaos. I don’t have anything to do with Proud Heaven. But he kidnapped my mother, and I'm going to get her back and kill him in the process.”

“Yang Qi?” the crown prince said. “Princess Jadefall, he's not even a true member of the imperial house! You knew this all along, didn’t you? And you joined him in his rebellion?”

“Rebellion?” Princess Jadefall replied. “In immortal worlds, the law of the jungle prevails. Besides, our Titan Emperor Heaven is the lowest of the low when it comes to immortal planes, and we get bullied constantly. But Yang Qi can change that. The only thing you morons know how to do is fight among yourselves. You’ll never be able to rise up and accomplish anything. Proud Warpatience has been colluding with the Hanging Heaven for years, Crown Prince, and you knew it all along. In fact, you considered him to be your follower. Now that is rebellion.”

“Enough, Jadefall,” Yang Qi said. “There’s no point in bickering with them. Just assimilate them. We’ve gone all in, so now we have to see it through to the finish. Brace yourself, Proud Warpatience. I'm about to use one of the most wicked, vicious devil arts from hell to soulsearch you. You’ll wish you could die, but I won’t let you.”

Proud Warpatience glared at Yang Qi and said, “I’m going to fight you to the death, Yang Qi! My Master, Proud Heaven, will make you pay for this. You're a Fateless One and that slut Jadefall is a Reincarnated One, so he’s going to devour both of you!”

Clenching his fists, he lunged forward aggressively.

In response, Yang Qi snorted coldly and smashed a palm onto Proud Warpatience’s head. Of course, Proud Warpatience was no match for him and was instantly sealed.

Without wasting any time, Yang Qi flew over and sent another palm strike at the crown prince, filled with countless variations and rumbling with power that could destroy the heavens and crush the earth.

RUMBLE!

The crown prince didn’t even have time to react.

The palm landed on the top of his head, and Yang Qi locked on to his dao heart and pulled it out into the open.

“My dao heart! I spent hundreds of thousands of years perfecting it!” He sagged weakly. “Mercy! Spare me! I’ll just disappear, and you’ll never see me again. Don’t kill me! I’ll even work for you if you want!”

“The only enemies I trust are dead ones,” Yang Qi said, and crushed the dao heart. As the power coursed into him, he began inching toward yet another breakthrough.

Meanwhile, the crown prince screamed, and a moment later, was dead.

Yang Qi tossed him and his hammer into the Heaven and Earth Furnace, where they turned into deathless godliness that strengthened his Blood of the One God.

Yang Qi had truly taken out all of his enemies in one blow.

Chapter 615: Secrets of a Future One

Yang Qi had won a complete and thorough victory.

Once he took the power of the young man in yellow, it would only be a matter of time before he was in a position to defeat Proud Heaven. And with the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, he would have an even more stable position. No longer would he need to fear someone coming along and besieging his friends and family.

Although the Sage Monarch planetary system was a powerful force in the mortal world and was conquering everything in its path, there were always immense powers in the universe that could cause problems for it. And if an immortal world stepped in, the entire planetary system could easily be turned into dust.

But the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart was a game changer. In ancient times, not even the legion of gods has been able to destroy it. To be able to casually enter something created by King Immortal-Slayer and his host of sworn siblings would put Yang Qi’s forces in a very stable position.

With all of his enemies restrained, Yang Qi walked further into the maze-like mansion grotto. “Hu Latu, this mansion grotto of yours is quite impressive. What are those power channels I see deep inside?”

In the depths of the grotto, there were streams of power that converged in natural preheaven spell formations.

Not even Yang Qi would be capable of creating or destroying something like it; anyone who ventured too deeply inside would likely be lost for all time and would eventually die of natural causes.

“This place was originally put together by some almighty entity in ancient times,” Hu Latu explained, “back when the two nearby immortal worlds were first created. Milord, I only added a bit onto what had already been created, and have never been into the true depths of the place. Considering how strong you are, it shouldn’t be hard for you to turn this lair into an even more formidable place.”

“True. This does seem like a very safe place to work on cultivation.”

He explored the area a bit until he found one particular channel that was stable and surrounded by numerous natural spell formations that formed a larger, greater spell formation.

Yang Qi sat down in the formation, and Princess Jadefall sat down in front of him.

Hu Latu and the others waited outside to stand guard.

There was a flash of yellow, and the young man and Chancellor Demi-Immortal both appeared, right between Yang Qi and Princess Jadefall. They were both bedraggled, and didn’t look even the least bit strong or impressive, like they had in the past.

“Alright, buzz cut kid. We were rivals for a long time, but sadly that’s about to end.”

As for the young man, he knew that he had reached the end of the line, yet he refused to give in, and his eyes overflowed with venom.

“What are you looking at me like that for?” Yang Qi chuckled. “You have no reason to hate me. Back when we first met in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, I was minding my own business when you attacked me. Later, I even offered to work with you, except you refused. This whole time you’ve been treating me like some archenemy, and to be honest I don’t know why. Is it because you’re egotistical and want to crush everyone underfoot? Or were you worried that I would be a threat, so you decided to take me out? Well, I guess it doesn’t matter. I’ve beaten you, and you have no hope of turning the tables.”

“Is that so? Don’t be so quick to rejoice, Yang Qi. I'm a Future One, which means you can’t kill me. My original form still exists in the future and can always come back here again. Kill me, and you succeed in this one specific hyperdimension. But since I don’t come from this aspect of space-time, if I die here my overall fate will be adjusted to see out its intended course. You see, I'm only part of me here.”

Yang Qi burst out laughing. “You really are crazy, aren’t you? Sure, Future Ones who cease to exist in this part of space-time will have their fate adjusted. In other words, they’ll be automatically sent back to the future, where they originally started. Sadly, being killed by me changes things. Thanks to my understanding of the legion of gods, I know about the limits of space-time. I’ll make sure your fate is locked down, thus, when I kill you, you’ll cease to exist even in the future.”

“You….” A look of panic appeared on the young man’s face. He knew that Yang Qi was right, and that everything he had just said was true. Yang Qi had the God Legion Seal, and understood many of its profundities. It was a key that could unlock the secrets of the Sovereign Lord and reveal the most true and boundless dao.

“The time has come. Prepare to die.” Yang Qi extended his hand toward the young man and a brightly burning flame appeared.

“Hold on!” the young man blurted. “If you spare me, I’ll give you a really important clue, a clue that will help you contend with the legion of gods. Just don't kill me.”

“A clue?” Yang Qi said coldly. “What clue? Why don’t I just assimilate you and get the information from your memories and soul? Frankly speaking, you're in no position to negotiate.”

“I have a sealed memory pocket in me that I can destroy before you kill me. You’ll never get access to that clue unless I give it to you. Without it, you’ll end up facing a major catastrophe in the future, a catastrophe you’ll never escape.”

“I doubt it,” Yang Qi said, completely unfazed. “I'm going to kill you, take your Future One power, then seize both King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy medallions and the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Before long, I'm going to be the most powerful person in existence. What catastrophe could possibly befall me?”

“It’s about the God Legion Seal,” the young man said. “Victory or defeat, it all comes down to the seal. The dao begets one. One begets two. Two begets three. Three begets all things. You only have a fragment of the full God Legion Seal. Years ago, it was broken into three parts, and you have one of them. Those who possess the other two pieces are your greatest enemies, understand? Right now, you have no idea who they are, but I have a clue about one of them. What do you think? Spare me, and we can work together. I’ll help you find that person with the God Legion Seal. Agreed? Without me to lead the way, you’ll never succeed. That person’s energy arts are far beyond yours. He’s already reached the Deathless Throne, which means that he’s a member of the legion of gods. Even if he’s only a lowly Lesser God, you still stand no chance against him. In fact, if you faced him, your God Legion Seal would fly out and abandon you in the blink of an eye. You would be dead instantly.”

“Oh?” Yang Qi was fully aware of how important a matter this was.

He had long since come to the knowledge that he only had a fragment of the full God Legion Seal, and he had no idea where the other fragments were. It definitely was a potential disaster.

The God Legion Seal was so powerful that not even he was sure about its limits. It was obvious that any other person who had a fragment would be similar to him, some sort of consummate, freakish genius.

“You need to think this through clearly,” the young man said. “I'm telling you, the person I know about that has the God Legion Seal isn’t from this time period. He's from the future. From the same age as me. His life has nothing to do with yours, so there’s no way that you’ll ever just run into him on your own. Understand?

“Without me, you’ll never be able to pierce through space-time and go to the future. The only option you have is to work with me. I’ll take you there to search for this person with the God Legion Seal fragment. We can kill him together, and you’ll get another fragment. You’ll have two parts out of three, and will be the most domineering figure in the world. You’ll control the past, the present, and the future.”

A thoughtful expression appeared on Yang Qi’s face as he considered the offer.

As for Princess Jadefall, she just waited. She knew how important this matter was; it was more important than a hundred million of the Titan Emperor Heaven put together. It pertained to the creation and destruction of universes, of the workings of fate and the transformations of worlds. It related to the past, present, and future. To the god legion kingdom.

After a long moment of thought, Yang Qi smiled, then laughed.

“Nice one,” he said. “I used to think I had a glib tongue, but it turns out you really take the cake. Did you really think I was going to let you go? Or were just trying to buy time in the hopes that someone stronger than me would come along and save you? Sorry, I'm not that easily fooled.”

“What?!” the young man said, his face falling. “Think things through! This has to do with your own life and death. If you miss this chance, you’ll regret it until your dying day.”

“Oh really?” Yang Qi laughed again. “Go ahead and try to destroy that so-called memory pocket.”

The young man tried to do so, but realized that his mind and thoughts were locked down. Looking up, he saw the Wheel of Fate above him, which had taken control of his thoughts and fate.

“You’re really full of craft and cunning, aren’t you? You Future Ones aren’t easy to deal with, that's for sure. But your glib tongue isn’t going to help you now. Die!” Yang Qi shoved a burning palm onto the young man, who began to melt like a candle, his flesh becoming a liquid that flowed down to the ground with magical symbols streaming up from it.

They were symbols that didn’t belong to this aspect of space-time. No, they were from the future. Almost as soon as they appeared, they began fading away as they prepared to go back to the future. But before they could, Yang Qi drew on the powers of the God Legion Seal to seal space-time, locking them in place.

Chapter 616: Gone Forever

“Yang Qi! Y-you’re… you’re really assimilating me?! You’re going to meet a horrible end for this!”

The young man’s cries were spine-tingling, filled with venom, hatred, defiance, and a rancorous energy that could form the most powerful of curses.

Even Princess Jadefall was deeply shaken by them.

Yet Yang Qi didn’t seem fazed at all. “There’s no need for such animosity, Future One. In conflicts like ours, the winner is deemed righteous, and the loser is always in the wrong. Besides, you tried to kill me over and over again. As you know, he who tries to kill others will always be killed. It’s a simple fact. So why not just compose yourself and die with dignity. The only other option is increased torment.”

“No! I refuse to accept this! I'm going to turn defeat into victory!”

He continued struggling, but the Wheel of Fate was too strong and prevented him from accessing any of his divine abilities. In fact, he had completely lost control of his body. He had truly been defeated by Yang Qi.

As he continued to melt, magical symbols poured out and Yang Qi took them.

“Jadefall, you take some of the symbols too. They contain the power and constitution of a Future One. Normally speaking, Future Ones should be the most powerful individuals in whatever part of space-time they exist in. We’ve taken down someone with invincible destiny like this only because of the power of the legion of gods. We can’t let this chance slip by.”

“Alright!” Princess Jadefall said. Shivering, she reached out to absorb some of the magical symbols rising up from the young man in yellow.

Before long, the young man’s quintessence energy was completely drained, to the point where his facial features were starting to distort. He really did look like a melting candle.

Gurgle. Plop.

After watching the horrifying scene, Chancellor Demi-Immortal and Proud Warpatience wished they could commit suicide to avoid the pain that they knew would be coming for them soon. Unfortunately, they were so thoroughly locked down that they couldn’t die, even though they wanted to. No magical power or daoist technique could possibly break through the bounds of the Devil-God Seal.

‘This power is incredible, and is perfectly suited for me. Henceforth, I'm not just a Fateless One. I also have the constitution of a Reincarnated One and a Future One.’ Yang Qi felt his energy growing stronger and his Blood of the One God pushing from the level of two percent to three. Then four and five, causing his entire body to glow with boundless sagelight.

Furthermore, as he absorbed the power of a Future One his sea of consciousness filled with information directly from the future.

In the future, there were boundless planes of existence and a vast void in the universe. There were enormous battleships, some of them the size of multiple planets put together, which cruised from plane to plane within the universe. Obviously, such battleships were the product of a mechanical civilization.

Apparently that ancient mechanical civilization had once again risen to prominence in the future.

As the information poured in, Yang Qi slowly came to understand the future that the yellow-garbed young man had come from.

In the future age, gods, devils, immortals, and mortals all coexisted. In fact, there were so many mortals that they were like the eternal sands of the universe. They formed the foundation of society, with rank upon rank of nobility and officialdom rising up in something like a pyramid. At the top of that pyramid was a supremely powerful entity who ruled over everyone.

It was a different power structure than in the present.

In the future age, the mortal world, the immortal worlds, and even the kingdom of the gods were not separated from each other. They had all been combined into one enormous universe. Humanity united everything, and eventually the original gods ceased to exist. And in the end, that supreme entity at the top of the pyramid ruled over all humanity.

‘After the gods experience nirvanic rebirth, a new civilization would once again rise? Don’t tell me that this is that new civilization? I find it hard to believe that such an abnormal civilization could exist.’ As Yang Qi digested the scattered bits of information, he came to the conclusion that the future world was a bitter and cruel place, a world without hope that was filled with despair.

The young man in yellow had come from one of the lowest levels of nobility. Although he wasn't a commoner, he was still nothing special by any stretch of the imagination. Somehow, he came across some good fortune, that being one of King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy medallions. Eventually, he pierced through space-time to arrive during the golden age of the immortal dao civilization. But in the end, he had perished at Yang Qi’s hands.

After absorbing enough of the power of the Future One and combining it with the two aspects of his constitution, a pulse of space-time godpower erupted out, becoming a magical symbol that resembled written script that Yang Qi didn’t recognize. It was the script of the future.

After absorbing it, he noticed that his mental image of the future included a mysterious aura that reminded him of his God Legion Seal. He instantly realized what it was: the one third of the God Legion Seal that existed in the future.

And it was in the hands of someone very strong and powerful.

In the future, the mechanical civilization advanced more rapidly than ever, vastly surpassing anything the Mechfolk could achieve. The battleships of the future could easily rip Godmyths to shreds.

‘So the buzz cut kid wasn’t lying. There really are three pieces to the God Legion Seal. I have one, and someone in the future has one. So does that mean that the third one lies in the past? Because they exist in three different ages, it's impossible for the God Legion Seal to become complete by natural means. That said, it still contains the power of the legion of gods. Well, one day I’ll break through the fetters of space-time and combine them all. Then I’ll change the face of the universe itself and stabilize history and the passing of time.”

Yang Qi finally understood everything.

Thanks to the memories of the young man in yellow, and the details he acquired about the future, he now knew much about the creations of the mechanical civilization.

In fact, the information he now had would be extremely valuable to the Mechfolk, who would likely go crazy if he told them the details. Truth be told, the Mechfolk were extremely powerful in the immortal worlds, and their mechanical inventions put them on a similar level as the Brahman Society. But in the end, their abilities were limited.

‘So, I finally beat the kid in yellow and took his power and memories….’ Yang Qi breathed a sigh of relief. That said, he could still sense the rancorous energy of the young man and knew that his curse would not simply fade away.

‘Such a powerful curse,’ he thought. ‘Seems his rancor was truly formidable. Fine. I’ll use the ancient dao of devils to create a Rancorous Emperor śarīra. That should be useful in the future.’

He waved his finger and a bright light appeared, which gathered all of the rancorous energy and enfolded it into a śarīra.

At long last, every little bit of the young man in yellow was gone, completely and utterly faded into nothing. Neither the present nor the future contained even the slightest evidence of his existence. A mortal malady had been expunged.

‘After I consolidate all of this power, I should be able to rise to third stage Thought-Demolishing. Perhaps even the fourth stage. But I need to combine all three of these constitutions first.’ Closing his eyes, he inspected his Blood of the One God and saw that it was at the shocking level of ten percent.

As it turned out, absorbing these special constitution types was the best type of cultivation. It completely surpassed the effectiveness of the power of faith and the devouring of god items.

No wonder Proud Heaven was so intent on getting Princess Jadefall.

Now Yang Qi realized the truth. He needed to devour other constitution types, such as those from Eternal Ones, Past Ones, Heaven Moving Ones, and so on. By doing so, he would advance by leaps and bounds, and enter the Godmyth level much sooner than expected.

Afterward, the next step would be the Deathless Throne, the level of the legion of gods.

At that time, he would be able to call on the ultimate might of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth and the God Legion Seal, not just the scattered bits he had access to now.

‘Once I purify all of this energy and pass my tribulation, I’ll be an immortal general. At that time, I’ll be able to summon fiend-devils who are eighth stage immortal emperors. With armies like that, I’ll be able to conquer any low-level immortal world I want. Very well, the time has come to deal with Proud Warpatience.’

Opening his eyes, he saw that Princess Jadefall was still working on her own cultivation with the godpower of the Future One.

“Alright, Proud Warpatience. Are you going to tell me Proud Heaven’s secrets now?” He flicked his finger and a spark flew over to Proud Warpatience, causing him to burst into flames. Instantly, a scream escaped his lips, yet he refused to say anything.

Shaking his head, Yang Qi said, “Oh? Feeling stubborn, are we? If I have to, I’ll soulsearch you and drag your memories out by force. I actually didn’t want to kill you, and had even planned to help you reach the Godmyth level. Having you join me would have been a big blow to Proud Heaven. Or at least it might have been enough to lure him into a trap. But since you insist on being pigheaded, I’ll find someone else to help me do that.”

However, before Proud Warpatience could respond, Chancellor Demi-Immortal butted in. “Yang Qi, are you really going to kill me? You started out in the Demi-Immortal Institute, and back when you were at odds with the Crown Prince I made sure to keep you safe. You killed my daughter, but if you let me go I'm willing to call things even. What do you say?”

Chapter 617: The Mysteries of the Monarch Chart

“What’s the point of this jibber-jabber, Chancellor Demi-Immortal?” Yang Qi said. “Things between us can only be resolved by one of us dying. Either I die and you live, or the other way around. There won’t be any ‘calling things even’. Based on the memories I just got from the kid in yellow, I know that you’re supposed to have a promising future. You’ll eventually get the legacy of an immortal world and become its ruler. Sadly, that’s not going to happen now. You fell into my hands, thus, you’re going to die.”

At this point, Chancellor Demi-Immortal realized that he had no hope whatsoever of getting out of this situation alive.

Grinding his teeth, he said, “You really don’t want to know where your Aunt Susu is? You could turn the mortal world upside down looking for her, but you’ll never find her. I can tell you, if you kill me, you’ll never see her again.”

“What?” Yang Qi said, his eyes flashing. All he knew was that his Aunt Susu had been taken away to the Spritefolk. After destroying the Demi-Immortal Institute and unifying the planetary system, he then went on to conquer other planetary systems, starting with the holy lands of true cultivation. Yet the Spritefolk were nowhere to be found, and he didn’t have any clues about how to find them.

He had an odd feeling about the whole thing. It was almost as if there was some mysterious force out there manipulating everyone who was important to him.

Perhaps it was a conspiracy backed by Proud Heaven, or perhaps it was someone else.

In any case, he was constantly on his guard because of it. And the fact that Chancellor Demi-Immortal had brought the subject up now immediately sparked his anger. “It would have been a lot better for you if you hadn’t mentioned that. All you’ve done is ensured that I’ll track down every last patriarch from the Demi-Immortal Institute and slaughter them all. I won’t even give them a chance to transmigrate. As for you, I'm going to send you to reunite with your daughter in death too!”

POP!

He waved his head, and Chancellor Demi-Immortal exploded into a cloud of blood and gore, leaving behind only a lingering cry. “You’re going to die for this, Yang Qi! I curse you for all eternity! You’ll never find your aunt or your mother again!”

“Nice curse, but thankfully I have this Rancorous Emperor śarīra.” Chuckling, Yang Qi used the śarīra to absorb the power of the curse. At the same time, he realized that there was something in Chancellor Demi-Immortal’s remains that connected to a mysterious treasure hoard, perhaps the legacy of an immortal world.

‘So he really was supposed to get some sort of immortal’s legacy. Sadly, the young man in yellow was planning to betray you the first chance he got. And you were planning to do the same thing. No wonder the two of you never accomplished much together.” After assimilating Chancellor Demi-Immortal, Yang Qi also took the legacy that he had acquired.

Interestingly, it wasn’t from a minor place like the Titan Emperor Heaven, but rather a much larger immortal world.

According to the memories of the young man in yellow, it was a place that could rival the Tusita Heaven, the Mourn-Parting Heaven, or even the Hell of Mahānata. And it was a legacy that couldn’t be benefited from without reaching the Godmyth level first.

With Chancellor Demi-Immortal dead, all that remained was Proud Warpatience. Yang Qi was still set on forcing him to acknowledge allegiance, thus creating the perfect pawn to use against Proud Heaven in the future.

“Yang Qi, why don’t we start working with King Immortal-Slayer’s medallions?” Princess Jadefall said, opening her eyes. “With your God Legion Seal to suppress them, we should be able to acquire the power to enter the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. According to the stories, there are hoards of god items there, and numerous primeval godworms.

“The power of that Future One was immense, and it’s a struggle for me to keep it under control. It will take me some time before I can fully assimilate it. That said, it will definitely push me into the Godmyth level within ten years. Before, I’d expected it to take three thousand years or more. This is really going to benefit our immortal world.”

Obviously, Princess Jadefall didn’t dare to work with King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy medallions on her own. The most ancient of daoist texts all said that whoever took control of the medallions would eventually be violently killed. And the fate that the young man in yellow had just suffered was still fresh in her mind.

“Alright, take them out,” Yang Qi said.

She waved her hand and the medallions flew out, three streaks of black light that pulsed with the power of a monarch.

‘What a treasure,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘Sadly, it's diametrically opposed to my God Legion Seal. Until I reach a vastly higher level than I’m at now, I won’t be able to combine them. But with Princess Jadefall to act as the intermediary, at least I can benefit a bit.’

Yang Qi was actually very familiar with these medallions now. There were nine of them, which conformed to the adage nine divided by nine is one. Right now, the other medallions were out in parts unknown. However, Yang Qi knew that eventually they would find their way together, and when they did, the mysterious secrets of King Immortal-Slayer would be revealed.

“Heaven and Earth Resonance!Immortal-Slaying Godpower!” Yang Qi waved his finger and the God Legion Seal stirred.

The golden imp waved his finger in an exact reflection of what Yang Qi had just done. As a result, the medallions began glowing with radiance and light. Yet again, the soul of a powerful monarch appeared, mighty and fierce, the type who wanted to put an end to the dao of immortals.

It was the will of King Immortal-Slayer himself.

And when it crossed the will of the God Legion Seal, it caused an explosive tempest to spring up, the likes of which could destroy anything and everything.

Princess Jadefall very nearly coughed up a mouthful of blood, and a serious expression overtook Yang Qi’s face.

“Excellent,” he said, “The two mighty wills have collided. Let us continue our cultivation within the maelstrom. This tempering will strengthen us beyond imagination.” His entire person began shining with a brilliant light that wrapped up Princess Jadefall as they entered the tempest.

Instantly, flows of power stabbed into their bodies, threatening to kill them. Thankfully, Yang Qi was strong enough to stave off the danger and harness the immortal-slayer’s power.

“God Legion Seal: Destroy the Many Heavens, Suppress the Deathless!” Blood of the One God merged with the God Legion Seal and sent out a boundless god light that suppressed the power of King Immortal-Slayer’s medallions.

As the moments ticked by, something like a golden shell began forming on the surface of the medallions. They twitched, they wriggled, and it looked as though they might possibly be able to break free.

“Be subdued!” Yang Qi said, and the medallions tumbled down into his hand.

“Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart entrance, appear!” An enormous wormhole opened up in front of them, belching the energy of monarchs.

“It's the entrance to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart!” Princess Jadefall exclaimed. “Yang Qi, did you really fuse with the legacy medallions?”

Yang Qi shook his head. “No. They’re too difficult to fuse with, and I can sense that King Immortal-Slayer’s curse still lives inside them. If you fuse with them, you really will die a violent death. Then your energy will be stored to eventually resurrect King Immortal-Slayer. I've used the power of my God Legion Seal to suppress his will and tap into some of his abilities. That's how I opened this entrance to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. What a pity this is all I can do….”

The medallions were starting to tremble more and more violently, as if they refused to be restrained and demanded to fly free. There was obviously no way he could fully control them.

“It is a pity,” Princess Jadefall said. “That said, the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart is the stuff of legend. Let's get inside and find some god items, or even better, its core!”

“There’s no hurry. I can use the power I already have to open this entrance at any time. Great storms are about to hit the immortal worlds and we need to be ready. If we were to be invaded, we could be destroyed in the blink of an eye. The best thing to do now is to get back and take control of the Titan Emperor Heaven. With the crown prince dead, we can simply head back, force the emperor to abdicate, and make you the new empress. If you work hard to improve the place, and I back you with my fiend-devil armies, we can conquer the Hanging Heaven and get access to even more resources. After your power is solidified, I’ll go to the Brahman Society, destroy them, and take over the Thirty-Six Thousand Immortal Worlds Coalition.”

“Alright,” Princess Jadefall said. Then she looked over at the final remaining foe, Proud Warpatience. “What about him?”

Proud Warpatience had been enduring torment this whole time, to the point that his flesh was blackened.

“I’ll do it!” he wailed. “I’ll join you, Yang Qi. From now on, I serve you, Milord!”

“Fine,” Yang Qi said. He waved his hand, sending a stream of black energy into Proud Warpatience. “I'm placing a devil seed in your nascent divinity, which will ensure that you truly acknowledge allegiance to me in my fight against Proud Heaven. If you serve me faithfully, I’ll never need to use that devil seed. Furthermore, I'm changing your name. You’re no longer Proud Warpatience. You’re Yang Warpatience.”

“Yes, yes of course, Milord,” he said, scrambling to kowtow to Yang Qi. “Your humble servant Yang Warpatience is at your service.”

Chapter 618: Seizing Power

It was time for another monthly session of the imperial court in the Titan Emperor Heaven.

The previous session of court had been filled with the most shocking of events, things which all of the ministers recalled vividly. Yang Qi had seemed completely domineering, only to have emissaries come from the Brahman Society and arrest him. Then, just as the crown prince prepared to hit him when he was down, Yang Qi sent a clone back to oppose him, which kept the equilibrium.

Strangely, as the ministers arrived for the latest session of court, they found that neither the crown prince, Princess Jadefall, nor Proud Warpatience were present.

And the emperor seemed very out of sorts as he sat on his throne.

“Ladies and gentlemen, ministers,” the emperor began, “the Titan Emperor Heaven is in extreme danger. What are your opinions on the situation with the Brahman Society and Titan Dragonguard?”

One of the ministers stepped forward. “Your Majesty, no one has seen Titan Dragonguard’s clone since he first made his appearance. I'm afraid it was simply a bluff. There’s no way he’s strong enough to stand up to the Brahman Society. Your humble servant believes that we need to seize Titan Dragonguard’s mansion and search it thoroughly. Supposedly, he has troops hidden in there waiting to launch a rebellion, so we can’t let the situation drag on any longer. Furthermore, Titan Dragonguard openly cursed ministers and threatened officials during the last session of court. He didn’t abide by any of the court etiquette. If we don’t get rid of him, how can we possibly maintain law and order?”

“That’s right,” said one of the generals from the army, stepping forward and taking a knee. “Your Majesty, that Titan Dragonguard is obviously a revolutionary at heart, and cares nothing at all for the dynasty. Your humble servant would be more than willing to lead some troops over to his mansion and purge it from top to bottom!”

The moment this general stepped out in the open, jaws dropped.

As it turned out, he was one of Generalissimo Proud Warpatience’s top subordinates, Seven Scourges Huang. He had once been a notorious bandit and killer and had roved from immortal world to immortal world, committing all sorts of crimes. Eventually, Emperor Titan captured him and somehow earned his loyalty. Now he led the fiendslave battalions and was himself an enigmatic and fierce fighter. Normally speaking, he stuck to the sidelines and just followed the emperor's orders, never talking about politics. But now here he was, offering to plunder Titan Dragonguard’s mansion. It seemed obvious that he was acting on the behalf of the emperor in this.

As soon as Seven Scourges Huang finished speaking, many of the other officials began clamoring for Yang Qi to be officially accused of misconduct. And there were plenty of people willing to list out his crimes.

“Well, in that case,” the emperor said, “I suppose I have no choice. Seven Scourges Huang, purge Titan Dragonguard’s mansion. And pass orders to the Department of the Imperial Clan to strip him of his title and demote him to commoner. Arrest all of his henchmen and interrogate them to find out where his power stones are hidden.”

“Yes sir!” Seven Scourges Huang said, turning to leave.

However, that was when a new voice rang out.

“Hold on!” The sound of a teleportation portal filled the air as Princess Jadefall appeared. “Your Majesty, it’s quite inappropriate to talk about punishing Titan Dragonguard.”

Spinning, Seven Scourges Huang shouted, “How dare you! You might be the eminent princess, but you must still abide by His Majesty’s imperial edicts! How dare you challenge him! Don’t tell me this is some sort of rebellion?”

“That’s exactly what it is,” she said. “Rebellion.”

Even as her voice rang out, Yang Qi walked out into the open, his eyes flickering. He was flanked by Hu Latu, the terrifying emissary from the Brahman Society.

Striding forward, he spoke in a loud voice. “Considering you just made the decision to oppose me, Emperor, I’d say there’s no reason for you to continue serving in your position here in the Titan Emperor Heaven. Please. Abdicate.”

Before anyone else could say anything, Hu Latu said, “I'm the Brahman Society emissary Hu Latu. Henceforth, I work for Titan Dragonguard. Incidentally, the Brahman Society has named him as the new prime minister of the Titan Emperor Heaven, and supports Princess Jadefall as the new empress! Who here dares to defy the commands of the Brahman Society?! If you do, you’re asking to be killed, and I'd be happy to oblige!”

The ministers and officials were so taken aback that they weren’t sure how to react.

“What?”

“How did this guy convince the Brahman Society to back him?”

“That emissary is no joke.”

“What’s going on here? I don’t even understand what's happening!”

Eyes blazing as if with fire, Seven Scourges Huang shot into the air. “Rebels and traitors! Eminent Princess Jadefall, I honestly can’t believe that you’re calling for revolution! Fine, I’ll take all of you into custody and cut the head off of this rebellion before it even starts! DIE!”

RUMBLE!

Seven Scourges Huang was just as famous as Proud Warpatience, and the truth was, his energy arts were even more advanced. He had been powerful as a bandit, but after throwing his loyalties in with the Titan Emperor Heaven, his cultivation base had advanced and he could fight with heaven-rending, earth-crushing force.

Without any hesitation, he unleashed seven stances of his fist technique. The stances had names such as White Tiger, Rapacious Wolf, Formation Destruction, and the like. When they were all used together, the seven moves created a battle array that could destroy countless opponents.

“Feeling pretty cocky, huh?” Yang Qi said. Then he exhaled and a stream of white light shot out, destroying anything it touched.

“Aaaiiiieee!” Seven Scourges Huang, a ninth stage Dao-Demolisher and leader of the fiendslave battalions, could only watch in wide-eyed shock as Yang Qi’s mere exhalation destroyed all of his energy arts. Then he crumbled into powder, right there in midair.

“Rebels… and… trait—” Before he could even finish speaking, he was gone, completely wiped out of existence.

All of the ministers, officials, and grand princes were so terrified that they were physically trembling.

Yang Qi hadn’t stopped walking. Before anyone could do anything else, he strode up to the throne and reached out toward the emperor as if to grab him by the neck.

Gripped by a sensation of profound danger, the emperor shot to his feet. “Jadefall, after how well I treated you, how dare you ally with an outsider in this conspiracy!”

Princess Jadefall didn't do a single thing. Sighing, she said, “Father, the time has come for you to step aside. Under your leadership, the Titan Emperor Heaven has gone downhill. If things keep going the way they are, it will disappear soon. I had no choice but to rebel in this way. Please, just abdicate and live out the rest of your life in comfort.”

“You think you can force me to abdicate, just like that? Immortal World Essence!Eye of Titan!”

RUMBLE!

The essence of the immortal world swirled out, surrounding the emperor in the form of an enormous eye and causing everything to tremble violently.

It was the most formidable god item in the entire Titan Emperor Heaven, something that wasn’t a god item, but rather an actual body part belonging to an ancient god. It surpassed the level of a god item. Although it had lost much of its godliness through the years, it was more than enough to shake a Godmyth. And it was because of this very item that the Titan Emperor Heaven had been able to hold out for so long against all of the other aggressive immortal worlds in the area.

Yang Qi hardly even looked at the eye.

“Be sealed!” he said. Shoving his hand out, he sent a host of sealing marks flying out, which converged on the eye of Titan. Even as all of the ministers, officials, grand princes, dukes, and other important people watched, the emperor and his eye of Titan were surrounded by an enormous cage.

“Enough, Emperor,” Yang Qi said. “This is all pointless. I'm strong enough now that nobody in your pitiful immortal world can match up to me. Incidentally, I already killed the crown prince.”

“What? You killed my son?” The emperor’s eyes went wide with fury. “Who are you? You’re not really from the imperial house!”

Crack!

Yang Qi didn’t bother to reply. He reached out, placed his hand on top of the emperor's head, and extracted his dao heart, which had five lineaments on it. Obviously, the emperor was a very powerful individual, even stronger than Hu Latu. All along, he had been keeping his true strength hidden.

Yang Qi crushed the dao heart, causing a stream of true energy to flow into him. As for the emperor, he collapsed onto the ground like a diseased dog. His energy arts had been crippled.

“Now you can abdicate, Emperor. Ladies and gentlemen, officials and ministers, Eminent Princess Jadefall is the new empress!” He waved his hand, causing a stream of light to surround the emperor, who vanished a moment later, taken away to some unknown location. “Well? Do you agree or not? Does anyone oppose Princess Jadefall? Yang Warpatience, come out here.”

“Yes, Milord!” Yang Warpatience stepped out of the teleportation portal and knelt in front of Yang Qi. “Whatever orders you have, I will follow. My army is at your command.”

Considering all of this, who present would possibly voice a word of dissent? It was just like the saying, when the emperor wanted silence, not even the horses would neigh.

One by one, they dropped to their knees. “Your humble servant offers congratulations to Eminent Princess Jadefall on her ascension to the throne.”

Henceforth, Jadefall would serve as the empress of the Titan Emperor Heaven.

“I will take the throne today to prevent the Titan Emperor Heaven from ultimately being destroyed,” she said. “Starting today, we begin preparations for war. For conquest! Our first target is the Hanging Heaven, then we’ll move on to other weak immortal worlds such as the Black Sand Heaven. We will wipe them out and take their power and resources for our own.”

“What? No!” one of the officials said. “Your Highness, ma’am, that’s just going to get us destroyed! Our armed forces are too weak, and conquering an entire immortal world is no small task. It’s hard enough for us to hold our own! If other immortal worlds join forces against us, we won't stand a chance.”

“He’s right, Your Highness. We can’t afford any wars of aggression.”

“We’re essentially the weakest of all the immortal worlds right now.”

“This isn’t the right course of action.”

POP!

Empress Jadefall smacked the arm of the throne and glared around with burning eyes. “What are you people sniveling about? I obviously have a reason for deploying troops. Brother Dragonguard?”

Empress Jadefall was still calling Yang Qi ‘Titan Dragonguard’ for safety purposes.

“Listen up, everyone. Your armies are going to have a helping hand from me. Fiend-devil armies, come forth!” Then, the Hell Portals opened.

Chapter 619: A Visit

Fiend-devils began pouring out of the Hell Portals, all of them immortal marquises or immortal paragons. As they organized in ranks, they seemed to stretch on without end.

In the Titan Emperor Heaven, people that strong were always top officials who lived lives of luxury and would never risk getting into deadly fights.

But a fiend-devil army was a different matter. They would slaughter anything they could, fighting without regard for their own safety. They would even self-detonate without hesitation if Yang Qi wanted them to.

Joining their voices together, they said, “Milord, you will conquer the universe and rule the immortal worlds for all the ages!”

The imperial city violently trembled, and many of the soldiers, ministers, and officials present for court very nearly passed out. Even the most elite troops would tremble at the sight of so many fiend-devils.

“I can summon armies like this without end,” Yang Qi said. “So as you can see, we can easily devastate any low-level immortal world we want. You civil and military officials need to support Empress Jadefall with all your hearts. And if I see any signs of disloyalty, I’ll destroy you with a wave of my hand. Understand?”

“Yes, yes of course….”

Countless grand princes dropped to their knees to kowtow, still unsure of whether to be happy or grieve. With armies like this, it definitely did seem possible to conquer other immortal worlds, which made them happy. But at the same time, they were being oppressed in the most vicious and decisive fashion, which made them grieve. Obviously, it would be little more than a joke to claim that there was someone more powerful than him.

Yang Qi nodded. “Excellent. As it turns out, you people are fairly sensible after all. Henceforth, anyone who betrays the throne will be executed immediately, along with everyone related to them.”

“We’ll support Empress Jadefall with all our hearts!”

Everyone gave voice to similar determinations as they kowtowed deeply.

He waved his hand and the fiend-devil armies retreated back into the Hell Portals. Everyone present looked back at Empress Jadefall sitting on the throne, feeling almost like they had just dreamed the whole incident.

In the briefest of moments, the Titan Emperor Heaven had experienced a most dramatic transformation.

As of now, Yang Qi was confident enough to bring people from the Sage Monarch planetary system up to this immortal world, and at the same time openly send resources down below and make his foundation stronger than ever.

But then war drums began to sound within the depths of the imperial city.

Boom, boom…. Boom, boom….

Apparently, enemy forces were approaching!

Jadefall rose from the imperial throne and said, “Immortal emissaries from other locations are coming. Let’s see what their purpose is. Open the teleportation portal.”

Creak. Crack.

The enormous teleportation portal opened and shafts of dazzling light spilled out, along with a booming voice.

“Our coalition of emissaries from the Hanging Heaven, Coiling Arc Heaven, Black Sand Heaven, Megaplexus Heaven, Five Blooms Heaven, and Kestra Mural Heaven, have come to discuss matters.”

Next, numerous powerful auras spread out into the open, six different varieties. They were followed by a group of hundreds of thousands of individuals, all of them bursting with terrifying killing intent.

Emissaries from six separate immortal worlds had arrived in a completely unexpected fashion, for reasons unknown.

The ministers and officials present were all completely terrified.

“Sovereigns of heaven! They’re all ninth stage Dao-Demolishers!”

“You’re right. That’s Sovereign Black Hand from the Black Sand Heaven. I heard that he has a godly-class energy art called the Black Hell God-Imprisoning Hand. He’s incredibly famous in the armed forces there, similar to Proud Warpatience here. Except he’s actually a lot stronger than Proud Warpatience.”

“Look! That’s Reverend Five Willows, one of the genius Dao-Demolishers from the Five Blooms Heaven, and a grand prince there. He has an amazing Five Skhandas Many-Voids Grand Dao Fruit and is rumored to be extremely powerful. He once went to the Hell of Suras and killed a whole bunch of asura fiend-devils. Nobody even knows everything he's capable of.”

“And over there are Mammoth Ninetruths, Coiling Peak, Plexus Jade, and Mural Child-Ink. They’re all incredibly famous in their immortal worlds, fierce fighters and top officers in the armed forces. Each and every one of them is probably strong enough to take out our entire immortal world.”

Although their specific goals were unclear, it was obvious these unexpected visitors had not come with good intentions.

Empress Jadefall looked the group over with flashing eyes, then said, “Might I ask why so many famous individuals from other immortal worlds have come to visit?”

The eminently formidable Sovereign Black Hand from the Black Sand Heaven stepped forward, laughed heartily, and said, “What happened to the old ruler, Emperor Titan? We heard that there was a rebellion here in the Titan Emperor Heaven and that the traitors murdered a whole bunch of people. We came to do the Titan Emperor Heaven a favor by executing the rebels and restoring balance to his immortal world. Considering that you're sitting on the imperial throne, Princess Jadefall, am I correct that you’re the one who seized power? Did you harm the old emperor? That’s a high crime! Please, confess your sins. Our small alliance of six immortal worlds has a huge army outside, just itching to take action. If we invade, then within three months we can conquer the entire Titan Emperor Heaven and imprison everyone here.”

“That’s right!” Mammoth Ninetruths said. Waving his hand, he caused a mirror to appear, which provided a view of a host of troops amassing on a certain asteroid. The soldiers seemed as numerous as locusts, and they were all chomping at the bit to invade the Titan Emperor Heaven.

“Did you really have no idea this would happen, Jadefall? You invaded our Hanging Heaven and killed one of our princes, Mammoth Dharma-Heaven. Did you think we would just let that stand? No. The time has come for reprisal, and we're going to wipe your Titan Emperor Heaven out of existence!”

Another ninth stage Dao-Demolisher stepped forward, a general from the Coiling Arc Heaven. “That’s right. Our six-world alliance has your Titan Emperor Heaven surrounded. Your position is as precarious as a pile of eggs. Understand? As for all you ministers and officials, we’ll give you one chance to surrender and join us.”

Yang Qi found this all very suspicious. He had literally just deposed Emperor Titan and installed Jadefall in his place, only to have an alliance of six immortal worlds show up a moment later. It seemed likely that someone was feeding them information—but who?

“Ladies and gentlemen,” he said, “our emperor abdicated, and that's our personal business. What the hell are you doing here meddling in our affairs? And who are you working for?”

Mammoth Ninetruths stepped forward. “Are you that brat they call the Prince of Military Security, the upstart who killed Mammoth Dharma-Heaven? Well, you’re not going to escape this time.”

“So what if I killed him? Who cares? Now that we have a new empress, we were just planning to go conquer all of your immortal worlds anyway. But you’ve made things a lot easier by coming to us. I’ll kill the lot of you and wipe out your armies. Your six immortal worlds will make a great foundation for my new alliance.”

RUUUUUUMBLE!

Yang Qi waved his finger and the Glad Tidings of the Lord rolled out.

“Return to your original form,” he said. All of a sudden, Mammoth Ninetruths, the grand and famous general, looked like he was in pain. Dropping down onto all fours, he transformed into an actual megamammoth, his skin covered with complex designs and flowing magical symbols. The fabled megamammoths were said to be able to pluck planets out of the sky with their trunks, and cause stars to fall like rain.

Mammoth Ninetruths was a famous person in the Hanging Heaven, a megamammoth with godmammoth blood. But all it took was a word from Yang Qi and he was forced to return to his original form.

“Come here,” Yang Qi said.

Without hesitation, Mammoth Ninetruths shuffled over to him.

“Lie down.” Yang Qi waved his finger, and Mammoth Ninetruths prostrated himself on the ground. Then, without another word, Yang Qi waved his hand, causing a throne-like saddle to appear on his back. Flying up, he sat on the throne, having successfully turned Mammoth Ninetruths into a mount.

Mammoth Ninetruths was a ferocious general, and one of the top figures from the Hanging Heaven. He was a ninth stage Dao-Demolisher whose dao heart had at least two or three lineaments. But now he was a mount, and it hadn’t taken Yang Qi any effort all.

Terror gripped the hearts of everyone present.

“What?”

All of the uninvited visitors began to back up, their eyes flashing with fear as they looked back and forth from Yang Qi to Mammoth Ninetruths.

Yang Qi’s abilities obviously surpassed any sort of daoist technique that any of them had ever seen or heard of.

“W-what… what sorcery was that?” Sovereign Black Hand stammered, his knees knocking together.

“Sorcery?” Yang Qi chuckled. “Why did you scum dare to come here and pick a fight? Were you feeling suicidal? I have the most ancient and mysterious of all godly techniques, something that you couldn’t possibly understand. Anyone under the Godmyth level who dares to come to the Titan Emperor Heaven is just looking to get killed. Now it's your turn. Kneel.”

Sovereign Black Hand dropped to one knee, but managed to hold back from fully kneeling. “No!” he shouted. “I refuse! I'm Sovereign Black Hand and I have the legacy of a god, the Black Hell God-Imprisoning Hand!”

Chapter 620: Subduing Six Worlds

Sovereign Black Hand threw his hand out in front of him, drawing on the godly-class energy art that was the Black Hell God-Imprisoning Hand. Darkness and gloom spread everywhere, and the muffled rumble of thunder filled the area as he tried to resist Yang Qi.

He held nothing back. There was no way that he would agree to get on his hands and knees and serve as a mount. He would rather die first.

Sovereign Black Hand was widely regarded as being invincible, the type of person who could destroy the heavens and extinguish the earth, and at the same time create suns and moons. He was the sole commander in chief of an entire immortal world army, so how could he possibly kneel to some other person?

“Is that really a godly-class energy art? As far as I'm concerned, it’s nothing but child’s play. Begone!” Yang Qi flicked his finger and a stream of light shot out that completely dispelled the darkness in the area.

Then he reached out with his hand and forced Sovereign Black Hand down on both knees.

“I hate you!” he howled madly. “I hate this heaven, this earth, and I hate all the people here! I'm going to exterminate the entire Titan Emperor Heaven!” He struggled violently to stand, but could not. After a moment, he collapsed into a pool of blood and gore.

“Become a mount!” Yang Qi said calmly, simultaneously flicking his finger to send out a stream of primal-chaos energy straight from King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans.

It entered the blood and gore, which began to twitch and wriggle as it turned into a freakish creature with a human head and the body of a snake. It was a vicious looking thing, seemingly ancient, and pulsing with a ruthless aura. It was some sort of monster that could serve as another mount!

“Titan Duelbringer!”

“Sir!?” Titan Duelbringer said, stepping forward.

“I'm appointing you as grand prince, and giving you command over the Department of Internal Affairs and the Department of the Imperial Clan. Now that Sovereign Black Hand has become a mount, he’s stronger than before, but at the same time will serve you loyally. Use him to keep the imperial house under strict control. I’ll be going to conquer these six immortal worlds, expand the empire, and grow the power of the two departments you lead. Don’t use your power for personal profit. Understand?”

He waved his finger and the enormous snake that was Sovereign Black Hand slithered over, allowing Titan Duelbringer to climb on his back. Sovereign Black Hand still retained his mind and thoughts, but was completely sealed and infected with a devil seed. As such, he would follow all orders from both Yang Qi and Titan Duelbringer.

“Yes, Milord. I’ll take care of everything.”

Next, Yang Qi pointed at the emissaries from the Five Blooms, Coiling Arc, Megaplexus, and Kestra Mural Heavens. “The rest of you four, don’t even think about trying to leave. You’re all going to become mounts to pull Empress Jadefall’s chariot.”

Coiling Peak, Plexus Jade, Mural Child-Ink, and Reverend Five Willows were all famous sovereigns of heaven and commanders of numerous soldiers. They had all joined forces with the intention of conquering the imperial city of the Titan Emperor Heaven, but unfortunately for them, they had run into Yang Qi.

Moments before, when they saw both Sovereign Black Hand and Mammoth Ninetruths turned into mounts, they were filled with terror and realized that they couldn’t fight back against this level of power.

Thus they had immediately flown up into the air in the hopes of escaping.

But Yang Qi wouldn't let them.

“All of you, get back down here!”

RUMBLE!

As the sound waves rolled out, they crushed the magical laws in their path.

Smack! Thump!

Four top experts fell out of the sky like kites with their strings cut. Then, a wave of Yang Qi’s hand caused them to collapse into piles of blood and gore, which subsequently wriggled and twitched until they looked like snakes with human heads.

Most times, an immortal world would never have more than five sovereigns of heaven, yet here were four that were acting as mere mounts.

“Empress Jadefall, in the future, you’ll have four excellent mounts to pull your chariot when you ride to war!” With that, his Hell Portals appeared again and armies of fiend-devils poured out of them.

Flying up into the air, he said, “Now, we wage war on these six immortal worlds. We’ll take them all out in one fell swoop!”

“My people,” Jadefall said, “the time has come to bring glory to the Titan Emperor Heaven! A new golden age is coming! To war! No longer will we be a weak immortal world. We will become strong, and our glory, splendor, and wealth will never end!”

“Yes, Your Highness!” the officials responded excitedly.

Bugles and drums rang out as wormholes popped into being and the armies flew up into them.

**

The campaign only lasted three months.

Yang Qi had endless fiend-devils, all of them blessed with the primeval god skills of the Eternal Heavenly Aria. Any who stood in their path were crushed like weeds. The armies of the six immortal worlds met defeat after defeat. Countless resources were plundered and innumerable famous generals were killed, or taken captive. Some of the old-timers conspired to assassinate Yang Qi, but all of them ended up becoming mounts. Many captives were sent to the lower world as slaves to help the growth of the planetary systems there.

Eventually, the six immortal worlds sued for peace.

In accordance with Yang Qi’s will, Empress Jadefall agreed to negotiate with them, making strict demands, including massive amounts of resources, as well as god items.

As the spoils of war filled the Titan Emperor Heaven, Yang Clan disciples from the lower world were brought up to hold office in the government and further their cultivation.

By this point, the Sage Monarch planetary system was filled with immortal energy, clearly on the path to becoming an immortal world of its own.

Anyone would be able to tell how different it was from the surrounding planetary systems, and those who wished to enter it would instantly sense the difference in the magical laws of space and time, and the energy flows. On a substructural level, they were completely different from anything else in the mortal world.

**

Eldest Brother stood atop a high tower in the Sage Monarch Collegium, looking out at the planetary system.

He could tell that the planetary system was reaching the point where it would transform. Its magical laws would change and it would develop the aura of an immortal world. All of the god formations that Yang Qi had set up in the past were still fully functional, constantly emitting immortal energy from various immortal worlds.

Yang Qi’s cultivation base had reached a completely unfathomable level, and it was now a simple task for him to set up formations in other immortal worlds to harvest their magical laws and essence.

The largest of the god formations featured a flow of violet energy. Roughly three months earlier, the power flows had changed, flickering with strange light, almost as if they came from magical treasures. Of course, this was the formation linked to the Tusita Heaven.

‘The Tusita Heaven formation has grown larger recently,’ Eldest Brother mused. ‘I wonder why. Don’t tell me that Junior Eighteenth Brother has advanced to an even higher level. The immortal world essence isn’t particularly plentiful, but as it seeps into the Sage Monarch planetary system, it slowly pushes it toward the level of an immortal world. Of course, I know Junior Eighteenth Brother wants to merge the Sage Monarch planetary system with other holy lands of true cultivation and turn them all into a new immortal world. Then, he can use that to reach the Godmyth level.’

The force involved in creating a new immortal world would be enough to push its creator into the Godmyth level. Eldest Brother, Elder Second Brother, and the rest of the Invincible Society, as well as all of the key figures from the Yang Clan, were all working hard to reach the goal of creating an immortal world.

As they expanded through the mortal world, gathering more faith, conquering more holy lands of true cultivation, and taking more godrelics and other resources, the Sage Monarch planetary system was growing stronger and stronger.

Thus, their goal drew nearer and nearer. It was like a caterpillar that was starting to build a cocoon.

Someone like Emperor Titan would never have been able to create an immortal world. In the ancient era, the person who had created the Titan Emperor Heaven only succeeded by using Titan’s Eye. Later, that person had eventually left the immortal world he created. If that person had remained behind, it might not have been possible for Yang Qi to seize power the way he had.

‘Junior Eighteenth Brother is a really important person now. I can’t believe he actually invaded six other immortal worlds and won! We now have immortal slaves here to help us build spell formations and planets. What is it all going to end up like?’

In numerous locations in the planetary system, it was possible to see immortal slaves being commanded by fiend-devil armies, using immortal energy and essence to create spell formations and planets. Spirit energy abounded everywhere.

At a certain point, Yang Qi’s clone approached. “Eldest Brother, before long, the Sage Monarch planetary system will be able to leave the mortal world. It will become a high-level plane in the universe, and eventually, it will actually surpass the immortal worlds and become a deathless kingdom.”

Chapter 621: The Brahman Society

The Sage Monarch planetary system was on its way toward becoming an immortal world.

In the Titan Emperor Heaven, Empress Jadefall administered the surrender of the six other immortal worlds, making decisions about how to redistribute their population, wealth, and essence. As a result, the Titan Emperor Heaven’s warriors grew stronger, while the imperial court was being strengthened and its territory expanded.

They were on their way to glory.

Eventually, Yang Qi left the Titan Emperor Heaven along with Hu Latu and the surviving emissaries from the Brahman Society.

Their destination was the heart of the Thirty-Six Thousand Immortal Worlds Coalition, where the Brahman Society was strongest and its members abundant.

In some ways, the Brahman Society was like a scourge to the Thirty-Six Thousand Immortal Worlds Coalition, controlling it with an iron hand. It was the strongest force within the alliance, by far, and had been founded by a clone of Proud Heaven. Hopefully, a trip to its headquarters would reveal some of his secrets. According to Yang Warpatience, in its depths there was a divine likeness of Proud Heaven, which Proud Heaven himself would sometimes visit to give orders to the society. However, it had been nearly ten thousand years since anything like that had happened, and the new leaders of the Brahman Society had firm control over the organization.

Yang Qi was convinced that if he could get inside and find that divine likeness, it would give him some of the clues he sought. In fact, perhaps if he used the Wheel of Fate on it, he could determine where Proud Heaven’s true self was.

Right now, Yang Qi was only a second step Space-Demolisher, an immortal warrior. But he had some of the power of a Future One and some of the power of a Reincarnated One. Combined with his powers as a Fateless One, he was reaching a point where few could be his match.

He would soon become a third stage Thought-Demolisher, an immortal officer. And after that, he would become a fourth stage Origin-Demolisher, an immortal general. But for now, instead of breaking through, he focused on combining the three major types of power he had.

At the same time, he was researching King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy medallions and the power of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. His current plan was to wait until his breakthrough to leave his animadestiny soul branding mark on the chart. If he did, he would be able to fully control it.

The moment in which he overcame the tribulation and broke through would be when his life force burned the strongest, and that would be the ideal time to do the branding. He didn’t want to miss out on any opportunities that heavenly tribulation would bring.

After he fully assimilated the two other kinds of power he had acquired, he would enter the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart and face the tribulation.

Generally speaking, it was impossible to achieve cultivation breakthroughs in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Who knew how many people throughout history had ended up trapped inside, eventually wasting away in death. But Yang Qi had to achieve the breakthrough there to acquire the approval of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart and seize control of its core.

After all, there were still six of King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy medallions out there, and if someone got them it could be a big threat to him. They could even force the three medallions he had to fly out of his control and form the unified command medallion.

Then he would lose control of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, which would put him in a dangerous situation he might not be able to escape without calling on the God Legion Seal.

At the moment, the God Legion Seal and King Immortal-Slayer’s medallions were diametrically opposed, which meant that, at the moment, he couldn't fully control the three medallions he had. The slightest slip-up would lead to them escaping. And considering how dangerous they were, he didn’t want to leave them with Empress Jadefall. Only when he was absolutely sure he could suppress them, and also knew everything about them, would he attempt to fuse with them.

A streak of light emerged from one wormhole, then entered another. The process happened over and over as Yang Qi and the members of the Brahman Society left the Titan Emperor Heaven and advanced toward their destination.

This was Yang Qi’s first time being able to see so many other immortal worlds. The space between immortal worlds was vastly larger than similar spaces in the mortal world. Yang Qi felt like a tiny fish that had just jumped out of a gutter and landed in a mighty river.

There were immortal worlds everywhere. Each one was the size of tens upon tens of millions of planetary systems from the mortal world put together, hung within raging spatial tempests and pulsing with immense gravitational forces that Yang Qi could feel tugging him toward them.

“Milord,” Hu Latu said, “that’s the Swan Magnet Heaven, whose magnetic light can attract all types of metal, even those within your flesh and blood. It's dangerous to get close to, unless you cultivate protomagnetic divine abilities. To anyone else, even a sixth or seventh stage Demolisher, it can mean death. It’s generally considered a deadly location that no one will go to. Nonetheless, there are some extremely powerful individuals who explore the place to search for preheaven protomagnetic quintessence energy to turn into spirit medicines.”

“That’s right,” said another of the emissaries. “Considering we're at the Swan Magnet Heaven, it means we’re close to the headquarters of the Brahman Society. Truth be told, the headquarters is surrounded by a deadly location that even ninth stage Dao-Demolishers won’t enter. It’s called Lord Brahma's Ambuscade. The Swan Magnet Heaven is like an auxiliary defense of sorts that we’ll need to skirt to get inside.”

“Interesting. The magnetic light really is strong, isn’t it?” Yang Qi waved his hand and a sea of protomagnetic godlight swirled out toward him.

Hu Latu and the others went pale from fear. “Er… Milord… sir, only a Godmyth should be able to draw out the essence of an immortal world safely!”

“It’s nothing,” Yang Qi said, waving his finger to send out more than eight hundred talismans that transformed into a primal-chaos elder-snake that began devouring the immortal world essence. Soon, Heaven-Devouring śarīras appeared, one after another, all of them filled with protomagnetic light that could vanquish numerous other types of true energy.

“Here, take these Heaven-Devouring śarīras as a reward. They’ll help you neutralize the negative effects of the godly-class energy arts I've given you and advance your cultivation bases. I have the feeling I'm going to be in the Brahman Society for quite a while, and you’ll be my main assets. So the stronger you are, and the higher you can rise within the Brahman Society, the better.”

“Yes, Milord!” Hu Latu said. “I'm a Dao-Demolisher, and have a fairly high status in the Brahman Society. My dao heart has three lineaments, but with the help you’ve provided I should be able to increase it to four very soon. To truly be powerful and glorious in the Brahman Society, you need five lineaments or more.”

Nine was the limit for lineaments in the Dao-Demolisher level. And once the dao heart shattered, one would either become a Godmyth, or die. Rumor had it that, considering how many innumerable immortal worlds there were, there were always ninth stage Dao-Demolishers with nine lineaments, trying to reach the Godmyth level. However, the success rate was staggeringly low.

In fact, many experts kept their cultivation level capped and would never attempt a breakthrough. No amount of outside assistance could help—not even adding god items or the legacies of ancient gods.

But those who succeeded in reaching the Godmyth level would be far, far closer to the Deathless Throne.

The Deathless level was above the Godmyth level. All members of the ancient legion of gods were in the Deathless level. They started out as Lesser Gods, then moved on to become Common Gods, Greater Gods, Consummate Gods, Perfect Gods, and then Paramount Gods. Above them, and above everything, was the creator of the great dao, the creator of civilization, the Lord who could destroy universes, the Lord of All Gods, the Father and Monarch of Divinities.

Yang Qi nodded. “Let’s wait here until you cleanse yourselves with those śarīras.”

After a few days of cultivation, the Brahman Society emissaries were all ruddy-faced from their energy arts advancement. That was especially true of Hu Latu, who had successfully formed his fourth lineament.

“Let’s go,” Yang Qi said. “Take me to the headquarters of the Brahman Society, this Lord Brahma's Ambuscade.”

“Yes sir!”

Although Hu Latu had killed some of his fellow emissaries, it was an easy thing to explain. He would just say that they were ambushed along the way to the Titan Emperor Heaven by some powerful enemies. Yang Qi had used his energy arts to change his appearance and assumed a new name: Hu Yanmeng.

Hu Yanmeng was actually one of the other emissaries Hu Latu had killed.

Thankfully, Yang Qi had absorbed the man’s quintessence energy after he died, which meant that not even a Godmyth would be able to see through his disguise.

They skirted the Swan Magnet Heaven and continued on through the void until they reached a bleak location that seemed ancient and wild, filled with dilapidated palaces, mountains, continents, planets, and bones.

Chapter 622: Infiltration

When Hu Latu noticed Yang Qi studying their surroundings, he said, “These are a set of ancient ruins, Milord. They were once a rite center belonging to the ancient legion of gods. Eventually, one particular god-spirit fought another and the place was destroyed. In the countless years that have passed, the ruins were further degraded to the state you see around you. That said, Milord, don’t underestimate these crumbling palaces, continents, mountains and the like. They’re filled with deadly power that would kill an ordinary person the instant they entered. In fact, that's one reason why the Brahman Society built its headquarters in this region.”

“Yes, I can see that this place is full of ruined godrelics. Sadly, if I tried to absorb the godliness from here, it would attract the attention of the Brahman Society, so I’ll have to leave them for now.”

Off in the distance, he saw a divine likeness over a hundred and fifty thousand kilometers in height, hovering in space. Originally, it featured over a thousand arms, ten thousand eyes, and hundreds of heads. But now, many of the arms, eyes, and even heads were gone, possibly stolen by looters.

It was an ancient, desolate statue that would cause a feeling of deep veneration to rise up in anyone who looked at it. Yang Qi could sense boundless godpower and godliness within it, hidden so deeply that no one would ever be able to extract it. In fact, most anyone who tried would likely be destroyed by the statue’s godliness. He would have simply taken it for himself, if it wouldn’t have caused such a big scene.

He saw continent after continent, most of them roughly the same size as the old Rich-Lush Continent, many of which were filled with ancient god formations. Although none of the formations were currently active, they also contained deathless godliness.

‘If I get the chance, I'm going to take all of them,’ he thought, shaking his head in disappointment. Following the emissaries, he headed deeper into the ruins.

RUMBLE!

At a certain point, they reached a raging river that sliced right through the spatial tempests, so long it was impossible to see its end. It was a river, not of water, but of the liquefied magical laws of space-time. An immortal who was thrown into a river like that would be melted away into nothing without any hope of ever being resurrected.

Hu Latu waved his hand and a boat appeared, which they leaped onto and headed down the river.

“Milord,” one of the emissaries said, “this is the Brahman River, although it’s sometimes called the Flow of Space-Time. It’s very powerful. We don't know the specific details about how it was created, but we do know it was left behind by a mighty god-spirit from the ancient era. The only way to measure its length is to use that unit of measure from the ancient mechanical civilization, the light-year. This river is how we get into headquarters.”

“Incredible! It’s so majestic!” Yang Qi could sense mighty, invincible power within the river, and knew that if it were to be categorized as a god item, it would definitely surpass the level of lesser, common, and greater godly items. It would definitely be at the consummate level. And whoever wielded it would be able to kill Godmyths.

“Is this another of your natural lines of defense?” Yang Qi asked.

“No,” Hu Latu said. “It’s actually one of the most powerful signature god items of the Brahman Society. However, it's not possible for a single person to wield it. It would take a host of Godmyth patriarchs to draw on its power. With that level of strength, it would be possible to exterminate an immortal world with complete ease.”

“Wow,” Yang Qi said. “That’s incredible. From what I can sense, the essence of the Titan Emperor Heaven doesn't count for anything compared to this river.”

“You’re right. Beyond the Brahman River is the fifth ranked Brahman Immortal World. As you probably know, there are as many immortal worlds as there are eternal sands in the universe, and they're organized into thirty-three ranks. Every three ranks counts as a step. The Titan Emperor Heaven is the lowest-ranked type of immortal world, whereas the Hanging Heaven, Black Sand Heaven, and places like that are second ranked. Most immortal worlds within the Thirty-Six Thousand Immortal Worlds Coalition are in the second or third rank. That’s why the Brahman Immortal World is able to control them.”

“So that’s how it is.” Slowly, Yang Qi was starting to understand the bigger picture. “Is that the Brahman Immortal World up ahead?”

In the distance, there was an enormous floating world that surpassed any other immortal world he had ever seen. There was no way it could be anything other than the fifth rank Brahman Immortal World.

Even more things clicked for Yang Qi upon seeing it. If the Brahman Immortal World was a city, then the Titan Emperor Heaven, Black Sand Heaven, Five Blooms Heaven, and similar immortal worlds were like hamlets or towns outside that city.

There were other such ‘cities’ in the various other planes of existence that made up the universe. As for which immortal world existed at the top of the pyramid of other worlds, and oversaw them all, Yang Qi wasn’t sure. Maybe it was the Tusita Heaven, maybe not. He knew that the Tusita Heaven was one of the thirty-third ranked immortal worlds, but surely there were other thirty-third ranked worlds. And it seemed likely that not all of those worlds were equal.

“Milord, we’re here. Soon, the guard tasked with receiving incoming emissaries will notice us.”

After thirty-three days and nights on the river, a shore was visible ahead. When they were noticed by the people on the shore, a host of smaller crafts shot out onto the river toward them.

“Halt!”

Several black-robed individuals became visible on the smaller boats, their garments embroidered with golden dragons that seemed to indicate that they occupied special positions. When they got close enough, one of them said, “Hu Latu! So, you’re finally back from the puny Titan Emperor Heaven. How come so few of you have returned?”

“Well, if it isn’t Brahma Mountain-River,” Hu Latu said. “We accomplished our mission, but suffered a huge setback and lost some team members. That said, we understand the dangers of going on missions like ours. You never know when you might get killed.”

Brahma Mountain-River burst out laughing. “Well said, you piece of trash. You were sent to investigate a situation in the Titan Emperor Heaven, and now you’re back with your tail between your legs? Considering how many people you lost, I bet you’ll end up imprisoned with your energy arts crippled. Our Brahman Society has suffered major losses because of those power stones! The Mechfolk used to recognize brahmanints as the currency of the Thirty-Six Thousand Immortal Worlds Coalition, but now they only sell mechas for power stones! You were supposed to figure out who was responsible and arrest them! Well? Where’s the culprit?”

“Arresting people is the job of the Hall of Law Enforcement!” Hu Latu shot back. “Since when is that our responsibility?”

“If you refuse to do things the easy way, we’ll do them the hard way! I'm placing you under arrest and taking you to the Hall of Law Enforcement immediately!” Brahma Mountain-River reached out with both hands and slid them through the air to form a circle. As he did, brilliant green light shone out in all directions.

“Cardinal Grand Brahma Punishes the Wood God Energy Art!”

Yang Qi immediately recognized this as one of the five major godly-class energy arts of the Brahman Society.

Hu Latu snorted coldly. “I never thought a nobody like you would try to show off so much!”

He placed his palms together, then threw his hands out in opposite directions, causing fire and water to swirl out and wipe the brilliant green light out of existence. Then he stepped forward and struck Brahma Mountain-River so hard he fell down into the river below.

“Aaaiiiieee!”

Screaming, he struggled to fly out of the water, coughing up blood as he stared at Hu Latu. “You… you can actually cultivate fire and water!? How is that even possible? You have the Cardinal Grand Brahma Punishes the Fire God and Water God Energy Arts? And you’re not dead? This defies reason!”

“Did you really think I would remain stuck in my cultivation forever?” Hu Latu said, feeling very pleased with himself. “While I was away, I succeeded in mastering a boundless energy art that can combine the glories of water and fire. And I also acquired the fourth lineament on my dao heart. Soon, I’ll have a fifth! The elders are going to find out about this, and when they do, I’ll be named a genius!”

With that, Hu Latu led Yang Qi to the shore, looking very imperious the whole time.

Nobody on the other boats moved a finger to stop him.

Only after he was gone did some of the other people on the boat look over at Brahma Mountain-River. “Young Sir! Are you alright? That Hu Latu might have failed his mission, but he advanced his cultivation by leaps and bounds. There’s no way the elders will punish him if he can cultivate both water and fire!”

“Damnation!” Brahma Mountain-River grumbled. “Fire and water cultivation. Only the higher-ups in the Brahman Society are allowed to study one of the five godly-class energy arts, and it has to conform with one’s own constitution. People who can simultaneously cultivate two are the kinds of consummate geniuses who only come around once every ten thousand years! What good fortune did Hu Latu come across? I refuse to accept this….”

Chapter 623: Five Phases Combination

“Milord, that was Brahma Mountain-River, the son of one of the elders in the Brahman Society. Well, I'm the son of an elder too. Both of us are considered important people. If you think about the fact that the Brahman Society has the power over the economy of the Thirty-Six Thousand Immortal Worlds Coalition, as well as legal authority, it’s no wonder there’s often fierce infighting within the leadership. Brahma Mountain-River is a personal opponent of mine and we’ve fought each other on many occasions in the past.”

Hu Latu seemed so thrilled to have defeated Brahma Mountain-River that he wanted to sing a song. At the same time, he was starting to feel very pleased that he was working for Yang Qi.

After leaving the river, they entered the Brahman Immortal World itself. It had incredibly strong magical laws, therefore Yang Qi didn’t hesitate to surreptitiously use King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans to start siphoning away some of the immortal essence and using it to create Heaven-Devouring śarīras.

‘I wonder what it will be like when I finally get all three thousand of these talismans,’ he thought. ‘When I turn them into an incarnation of King Heaven-Devourer, I’ll be stronger than ever, and won’t have to fear anything in heaven and earth. In fact, I bet they would be strong enough to suppress King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy medallions.’

Although King Immortal-Slayer was considered the leader of his contemporaries, King Heaven-Devourer was by no means weak. Yang Qi was convinced that those talismans, combined with the God Legion Seal, would be able to overwhelm King Immortal-Slayer’s power.

After thinking about the matter a bit longer, he said, “Hu Latu, am I right that cultivating two of the five phases energy arts makes you special among the higher-ups?”

“That’s right, Milord,” Hu Latu said. “Only the higher-level members of the Brahman Society can cultivate them. And throughout the tens of millions of years of history in our organization, only our original founding ancestor, the god Brahma, was able to combine all five. Ever since then, no one has ever been able to do it. Usually, one of them is the limit, with only top geniuses being able to cultivate two. People like that are as rare as phoenix feathers or qilin horns. And in terms of cultivating three, well, they would be priceless assets to the society. As for cultivating four, throughout the entire history of the society, only three people have ever succeeded at that, and one of them was Proud Heaven.”

“Hold on,” Yang Qi said. “I thought you said Proud Heaven was the founding patriarch of the Brahman Society? But now you're talking about the core teachings and doctrines of Brahma?”

“It’s not really that complicated,” Hu Latu said. “Brahma founded the Brahman Immortal World. After he was gone, the entire place descended into chaos before Proud Heaven and his sworn siblings united it. Then they established the Thirty-Six Thousand Immortal Worlds Coalition. Afterward, a lot of dramatic things happened and many things changed. But in the end, it’s Brahma who is our ultimate ancestor.”

“So that’s how it is,” Yang Qi said with a bit of a sneer. “I should have guessed that they were just using Brahma’s name.”

“Watch out,” Hu Latu murmured, “there are people up ahead. Remember, Milord. You’re Hu Yanmeng. From here on out, I won’t call you Milord. Please don’t take offense.”

“It’s fine,” Yang Qi replied via divine will. “I wouldn’t expect anything otherwise. You help me maintain my secret identity, and I’ll make sure you get a third energy art—maybe even the fourth and fifth. It seems to me that the Brahman Society puts so much value on how many of those energy arts someone can cultivate that you can use that to get away with all sorts of crimes.”

“That’s exactly right,” said another of the emissaries, his lip curling sarcastically. “So what if a few emissaries died under Hu Latu’s command. That’s not important at all in the grand scheme of things. It should just take a wink and a nod, and the matter will be forgotten. Well, assuming none of Hu Latu’s enemies or rivals get involved. Milord, considering that both you and Hu Latu have two godly-class energy arts, it means your position is incredibly high.”

The Brahman Immortal World was filled with immense palaces and cities, all crafted from the most beautiful jade and jewels. It was like an immortal world among immortal worlds. There were massive warships floating here and there, and too many wormholes to count.

The entire place was stunning, bustling, glorious, affluent, and advanced. In a word, it was the picture of civilization.

Unexpectedly, it actually resembled the future world that Yang Qi had glimpsed through the memories of the young man in yellow. The main difference was that the future world was much larger.

RUMBLE!

At a certain point, an enormous battleship floated down in front of Yang Qi and the others. There was a space portal atop it, which opened to reveal an old man. “Hu Latu! You’re back? I heard you failed your mission, but acquired some good fortune and can now cultivate both water and fire? Is it true?”

“Elder Meng!” Hu Latu said, rushing forward and offering a respectful salute. “I just returned, sir. I'm afraid I failed my mission. I know it's a crime deserving of death, but I did acquire some good fortune, so the first thing I did was come to report back in and see what I can do to make up for my failure.”

“First of all, stop blathering,” someone said, and another elder walked out from behind Elder Meng. His skin was bright red, almost as if he were about to start bleeding. “Hu Latu, your father Hu Layuan is also an elder, so you know full well how the rules work in the Brahman Society. The mission you failed at can't be made up for with a simple task here or there. However, considering that you can now cultivate both fire and water without any dangerous side-effects, that means you're a top genius, and according to the rules of the society we have to give you special training. That's an unchanging rule. Unfortunately, I don't quite believe you. Why don’t you give us elders a demonstration? If it’s true, your crimes will be wiped out and you’ll earn a reward!”

“Yes sir!” Hu Latu said. “I wouldn’t dare to refuse an order from you, Elder Blood.”

Without any further hesitation, he swept his hands out in front of him and released two energy arts, one based on water, the other fire. As they intertwined, they created what looked like two god-spirits. One with a thousand heads and ten thousand arms, the other with ten thousand eyes and ten thousand legs. Obviously, these were gods who controlled fire and water, respectively.

As Hu Latu manipulated the true energy of fire and water, quite a few people on other passing warships noticed and looked over to watch.

“Excellent,” said Elder Blood, his eyes shining with praise. “You really do have perfect command over two godly-class energy arts. No slip-ups whatsoever. The fact that you can overcome the conflicts between those two arts makes you a genius through and through. That’s something you definitely can’t force or fake.”

Other elders emerged and began offering their congratulations.

“Wonderful. You make your father proud.”

“Incredible. This makes you a very important person in the Brahman Society. You're a Dao-Demolisher with four lineaments, and closing in on five. You’re almost on the same level as the old-timers here.”

“Soon you’re going to rank the same as us, or perhaps even surpass us. Congratulations!”

“Many thanks for exonerating me, sirs!” Hu Latu said excitedly. “However, I wasn’t the only one to come across good fortune. My Junior Brother Hu Yanmeng was with me. Please, take a look and see what he's capable of.”

The elders were shocked.

“Oh? Someone else who can cultivate fire and water together?”

“One genius after another is popping up. This is miraculous. Should we take this as a good omen for the Brahman Society as a whole?”

“Why don’t you demonstrate your abilities, Hu Yanmeng?”

Chuckling, Yang Qi waved his finger, causing fire and water to swirl out, creating two entire worlds, complete with four unique tribulations raging within them.

“What?” Elder Blood said, his eyes nearly popping out of his skull. “Two minor worlds? The kingdoms of fire and water? And you even managed to add the four tribulations of Success, Steadiness, Destruction, and the Void into them?”

It was said that the Cardinal Grand Brahma energy arts could summon the four tribulations of Success, Steadiness, Destruction, and the Void.

Success referred to the creation and growth of a world. Steadiness referred to that world becoming stable. Destruction was when catastrophe struck and the world fell apart. And the Void referenced how the destroyed world would once again fade into nothing.

Only by understanding the ultimate meaning of these four tribulations could one master the greatest divine abilities.

Within the Brahman Society, there were very few people who understood the tribulations of Success, Steadiness, Destruction, and the Void, all of them invincible geniuses or powerful old-timers.

“Hardly anyone understands such truths. Even the big competition we hold every thousand years to look for talent usually only produces four or five people who understand the four tribulations.”

“How could a genius like this have come around?”

“We can't let word of this get out! It’s too important!”

At this point, another elder appeared on the ship, a massive man who looked almost like a giant. He was obviously the highest-ranking elder present.

“Elder Law!” All of the other elders quickly saluted him.

Yang Qi’s heart nearly skipped a beat as he looked at this newly arrived elder; his cultivation base was, at the very least, at the level of seven or eight lineaments.

“You, Hu Yanmeng,” he said. “And you, Hu Latu. You’re now considered elites in the Brahman Society. You must go to the Brahman Institute immediately for further training, and to stabilize your cultivation bases. The Brahman Institute is the top educational establishment in our Brahma Immortal World, and after you graduate you’ll become important leaders. However, the dropout rate is extremely high and the competition is brutal. Understand?”

“Yes sir!” Hu Latu said, a nearly rapturous look on his face.

Chapter 624: Children of Brahma

Thus, Yang Qi and Hu Latu skyrocketed into the higher ranks of the Brahman Society.

The Brahman Institute was a very prestigious establishment in the Brahman Immortal World, and at the same time, very mysterious. Anyone who got in would be treated as an important future leader within the society.

In fact, the students of the Brahman Institute were referred to as children of Brahma.

All of the top leaders in the Brahman Society started out as children of Brahma. Some of the original founders were still present, but they were all in seclusion and didn’t pay attention to daily affairs, only coming out in the direst of circumstances.

“Milord, we really got lucky,” Hu Latu said. “Once you enter the Brahman Institute, you become a child of Brahma, and eventually a leader within the society, privy to all sorts of secrets. Furthermore, only people in the Brahman Institute can get access to the divine likeness that Proud Heaven left behind years ago. Congratulations, Milord. Considering the level of your cultivation base, all you need to do is establish a good foundation, then work on combining all of the five phases godly-class energy arts into one. Then you’ll dominate everything under heaven.”

“That’s right!” one of the other emissaries said. “I heard that the top child of Brahma in the Brahman Institute is Brahma Echo-Silk, whose cultivation base is astonishing to the extreme. She has three godly-class energy arts and has already reached enlightenment of the four tribulations of Success, Steadiness, Destruction, and the Void. People say that she even has nine lineaments on her dao heart. Right now, she's the most likely candidate to fill the last spot and join the other nine leaders of the society.”

“Right now, Milord, you could possibly surpass her and become the tenth leader.”

“That’s right. Compared to you, Milord, her cultivation base isn’t impressive at all.”

“Milord, if you eventually combine all the five phases energy arts, you’ll shake the entire Brahman Society. You would become the most powerful among all the leaders.”

“A perfect combination of the five phases would be flabbergasting. I've seen someone who cultivates four, and understands Success, Steadiness, Destruction, and the Void. Even that was almost too much.”

The other three emissaries seemed to be trying to one-up each other in terms of brownnosing.

“Alright, enough,” Yang Qi said. “After Hu Latu and I join the Brahman Institute, you two work with those Heaven-Devouring śarīras and follow us. But take your time. If all of us make a scene at the same time, it will attract the wrong kind of attention.” He waved his hand and sent a stream of Heaven-Devouring True Energy into them, which immediately provoked new transformations in their cultivation and caused their faces to glow with a sparkling and translucent radiance.

Afterward, Yang Qi and Hu Latu passed through a host of wormholes, teleportation portals, and even cities, until they finally reached the Brahman Institute. The trip alone impressed upon Yang Qi how immensely large the Brahman Immortal World was.

Compared to it, the Titan Emperor Heaven could be considered tiny. Most impressive of all was the infrastructure. In the Titan Emperor Heaven, there were plenty of remote, unpopulated areas filled with forests, swamps, and the like.

But in the Brahman Immortal World, there weren’t any wilderness areas at all. Everything was developed, and there were teleportation portals everywhere. There were even cities floating in the sky, with enormous battleships floating back and forth among them. Minor worlds and mansion grottos were everywhere.

There didn’t seem to be a single inch of open space.

This was a truly flourishing place, an actual holy land of true cultivation. This was where the true dao of immortals could be seen, a place that not even ten thousand of the Titan Emperor Heaven could rival.

To compare the Sage Monarch planetary system to it would be like comparing a muddy puddle to the vast ocean. All in all, the Brahman Immortal World made Yang Qi realize that his goal of turning the Sage Monarch planetary system into an immortal world was far, far from being realized.

Brahman Institute.

The characters on the plaque above the main entrance glowed as brightly as suns. However, the sight of the word ‘institute’ caused Yang Qi to smile.

For some reason, his entire life always seemed to revolve around educational institutes, as if he were tied to them by destiny.

He had started out at the Demi-Immortal Institute, where he caused one scene after another before eventually destroying the entire place. Then he went to the Titan Emperor Collegium, where he also caused one scene after another and ultimately dismantled the place and pinned the supreme rector to a pillar to be tormented day and night.

It was almost as if every place he went, he destroyed. He was like a child of destruction.

Unfortunately, even if he wanted to, there was no way he could destroy the Brahman Institute or the Brahman Society. They were part of the Brahman Immortal World, which was simply too large, with too many powerful entities in it. Not even his armies of fiend-devils could tackle it now. Maybe if the place were more sparsely populated, like the Titan Emperor Heaven, he would stand a chance. But it was just too big.

Besides, the mystical network of laws was extremely strict. And there were military forces everywhere, all of whom were very disciplined, unlike the lax and independent forces of the Titan Emperor Heaven.

With the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, Yang Qi had his Wheel of Fate, which could easily be used to manipulate the fates of others. Unfortunately, the overall fate of the Brahman Society was so immense and complex that it was obvious there were immensely powerful old-timers backing it from behind the scenes.

If Yang Qi tried to overthrow the place, there was no doubt that the old-timers would fight back. To do anything to the Brahman Society, he would need to advance his cultivation base first.

Thankfully, doing that wouldn’t be hard. All he needed to do was continue absorbing the immortal world essence around him and refining the Future One power he had acquired.

There was another relevant factor. Yang Qi was fairly certain that there were people in the Brahman Society who had unique constitutions, similar to himself. If that proved true, and he could assimilate their power, then his cultivation base would obviously advance. Reaching the fifth, sixth, and seventh steps shouldn’t be hard at all.

“Milord,” Hu Latu said, “once we’re in the Brahman Institute, we should really be able to spread our wings.”

Before they could walk through the entrance, a booming voice rang out.

“Halt! This is the Brahman Institute. Unlawful entry will be punished by execution!”

A host of devilish yakshas appeared in the air in front of them, vicious-looking and pulsing with fighting prowess. They were hired dharmic guards tasked with keeping order in the Brahman Immortal World; all of them had very powerful cultivation bases and were blessed by the immortal world essence of the Brahman Immortal World.

“We were just admitted to the institute!” Hu Latu said. “Here, check these command medallions we were given by the parliament of elders.” He and Yang Qi threw out their medallions.

After checking the medallions, the yakshas became very respectful.

“So you’re new children of Brahma,” one of them said. “Please, come in.” With that, the yakshas faded from view.

Yang Qi and Hu Latu entered and found themselves in another world, filled with all sorts of buildings as well as mountains and rivers floating through the sky. There were also hosts of planets, some of which looked like nothing but seawater. They weren’t naturally formed planets, but rather collections of preheaven true energy, things so rare that ordinary people who simply looked at them would be able to reach immortal ascension.

‘What an incredible aura,’ Yang Qi thought, inhaling deeply. ‘So many treasures. So many energy flows.’ There was even faint godliness in the energy flows, which vastly surpassed anything from the Kingdom of Titan.

As they looked around, a voice reached their ears.

“New children of Brahma? Come check in.”

Then a huge hand appeared, rushing toward them at top speed.

Yang Qi’s initial reaction was to fight back, but Hu Latu quickly said, “There’s no need to resist. That’s one of the teachers.”

The hand grabbed them in a nonthreatening way, then whisked them away to the depths of a hall somewhere in the institute.

A handful of patriarchs were sitting there in thrones looking down at them, looking almost like gods.

“You’re Hu Latu and Hu Yanmeng?” one of the patriarchs asked. “Elder Law said that both of you cultivate dual godly-class energy arts of fire and water.”

“That’s correct, teacher,” Hu Latu said respectfully.

He knew that the people present were important leaders of the Brahman Society. Although they weren’t the highest-ranking of the leaders, they were still incredibly powerful and all of them came from important clans. They weren’t the kind of people that ordinary individuals would ever be able to have contact with.

“Why don’t the two of you demonstrate your skills?” one of the patriarchs said.

Yang Qi and Hu Latu complied, showing what they could do with the two godly-class energy arts.

“Excellent. So, you even succeeded with the four tribulations of Success, Steadiness, Destruction, and the Void. And you pushed the tribulations to the second level. When it comes to the tribulations there are a total of eighty-one levels, in other words, eighty-one reincarnations.”

Inside, Yang Qi smiled coldly.

When it came to Success, Steadiness, Destruction, and the Void, each manifestation represented a single cycle of reincarnation. He had just demonstrated two such cycles of reincarnation, except it had been intentional. He didn’t want to show off by revealing too many.

Chapter 625: Unique Constitution

Anyone who could cultivate the Cardinal Grand Brahma Five Phases Energy Arts to the level of eighty-one cycles—in other words, to unleash the power of Success, Steadiness, Destruction, and the Void eighty-one times—would end up having a shocking cultivation base. In fact, such a person would likely be a Godmyth.

Most times, even just reaching the level of four tribulations made one a genius.

For example, Hu Latu, despite using the Heaven-Devouring śarīras to expunge his heterogeneous true energy, could not yet fully gain enlightenment of the four tribulations. As for Yang Qi, given the level of his cultivation base, he could now reach the level of a few dozen cycles.

And once he got the rest of the five phases godly-class energy arts, he would quickly be able to reach the level of eighty-one.

When that happened, he would be able to fight for a leadership spot in the society.

“Not bad,” one of the patriarchs said. “Not bad at all. You two really can cultivate both fire and water techniques, and can ignore the dangers of heterogeneous true energy. I hereby appoint you as children of Brahma. Starting now, you occupy a very high position within the Brahman Society, almost like princes in the mortal world. Understand?”

“Yes sir!” Hu Latu said with an excited salute. Inside, Yang Qi was chuckling coldly, but followed Hu Latu’s lead. There wasn’t any need to cause trouble in the Brahman Society. Yet.

“Children of Brahma are a rarity in the Brahman Institute,” another patriarch said. “There are only a few tens of thousands. Some of them are very famous and skilled, but since you’re new, your status among them will be low. Be sure to adhere closely to the rules of etiquette, being polite and modest to your superiors. Of course, there will be missions and tasks that involve competition with others. Be warned: such competition can be brutal. Many children of Brahma die in such situations!”

‘Considering how massive this immortal world is,’ Yang Qi thought, ‘the fact that there are only a few tens of thousands of these children of Brahma makes them really rare. Fierce competition is only natural.’

The population of the Brahman Immortal World was so incredible that it was essentially impossible to use numbers to describe it. A single city could easily have a billion people in it, with some larger cities having populations of over ten billion. And the cities were virtually innumerable. That wasn't to mention the countless illusory kingdoms which also existed there, populated primarily by clans of old-timers from the Brahman Society. Even the leaders of the society would find it hard to calculate how many people there were in total.

Considering that the Brahman Society controlled the Thirty-Six Thousand Immortal Worlds Coalition, it was impossible to say how many geniuses would eventually be identified.

For example, the Titan Emperor Heaven had Princess Jadefall, a Reincarnated One. It begged the question of what types of people might be out in the other immortal worlds, and how powerful the Brahman Society really was, considering that all of those people would follow their commands.

The Brahman Institute only seemed to get more and more mysterious as Yang Qi learned more about it. Furthermore, it was obvious that taking action against it wasn’t a good idea.

“Very well, the two of you can go into seclusion in the private meditation chambers you have been assigned as students in the Brahman Institute. Any spirit pills or medicinal herbs you need will be provided. You’re dismissed.”

Two identity medallions flew out into the hands of Yang Qi and Hu Latu, each of which were inscribed with a set of numerals written in the script of the immortal world.

Yang Qi had #93,841, and Hu Latu had #93,842.

Obviously that indicated their place within the children of Brahma.  From the look of things, it wouldn’t be long before there were more than a hundred thousand children of Brahma, princes who were all future leaders of society.

“Those identity medallions contain teleportation formations, as well as spatial coordinates for the important places in the Brahma Institute. You’re free to go anywhere you wish, with the exception of a few restricted areas.”

“Yes sir!” Yang Qi and Hu Latu said, then drew on the teleportation formations to travel to their mansion grottos, which were located deep within the folds of space-time in the institute. The grottos had numerous spell formations set up to gather high-level universal power for cultivation purposes. All sorts of five phases power and godliness were available.

‘This place is great,’ Yang Qi thought as he looked around. There were no ornamental rocks or decorative water features, just abundant spirit energy and a greyspace filled with natural spell formations.

There were also passageways leading to locations filled with good fortune and treasure.

“Milord, now that we have our mansion grottos, we should definitely go to the Scripture Pavilion! From what I heard, it contains all sorts of ancient records and energy arts. You should be able to get the other energy arts of the Wood God, Earth God and Metal God.”

“Alright!” Sending his divine will into the identity medallion, Yang Qi found a map of the entire Brahman Institute. When looking at the institute as a whole, it resembled a paper talisman, twisting and distorting within the void. It almost seemed like something the legion of gods had left behind, a spirit talisman that had later been converted into a school.

‘What an incredible talisman!’ Yang Qi thought. ‘The Brahman Immortal World seems different from other immortal worlds. They have the Brahman River as an impenetrable outer defense, and then this Brahman Institute is actually a talisman of some sort. I think this is going to be the perfect place for me to reach Dao-Demolishing.’

Right now, he was a second stage Space-Demolisher, and each breakthrough required an astronomical level of power. Obviously, going all the way to the ninth stage would be no easy task.

‘The Brahman River! The Brahman Institute! Two god items. I have to figure out a way to get them. Unfortunately, that’s not going to be easy. But where else would I find high-level god items like this?’

It seemed highly likely that those two god items were the ultimate foundation of the Brahman Immortal World as a whole.

‘Right. The Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart! Once my cultivation level is high enough, I’ll get a new aspect of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth called the Sagely Sacrifice, which will allow me to gain power by sacrificing virtually anything in existence. With the Sagely Sacrifice, I could theoretically sacrifice an entire immortal world—for instance, these two god items. And the power of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart will help me do that.’

Yang Qi’s eyes glittered with bright light at the prospects which were open to him.

In the blink of an eye, he and Hu Latu went to the Scripture Pavilion. It was an entire plane of existence of its own, an enormous wooden structure that looked like a pyramid from some ancient and advanced civilization.

“Milord, as children of Brahma, we can cultivate any energy arts or immortal skills we want. Even godly-class energy arts will be ours for the taking, as long as we can deal with the resulting heterogeneous true energy. Considering your cultivation base, you shouldn’t have problems with any of them.”

“I'm not interested in energy arts or immortal skills,” Yang Qi said. “When you have gold, why would you care about lousy copper or weak iron? Come on, let’s see if they have those other five phases arts. I’ll help you to get at least three or four. Maybe even five, if you can handle it. And we’ll definitely push toward the level of eighty-one cycles of reincarnation.”

“What? Many thanks, Milord!” If it weren’t for the fact that they were right at the entrance of the Scripture Pavilion, Hu Latu would have dropped to his knees to kowtow in thanks.

Continuing to chat, they entered the Scripture Pavilion, and were instantly assailed by the fragrant aroma of books. There was a seeming infinitude of bookshelves, stretching off in all directions.

As for the books, they radiated the aura of immortal-spirits and were filled with the powerful expression of will from those who had created them.

Some such creators had incredible cultivation bases. Some were written by Dao-Demolishers, or other types of immortals. At a glance, Yang Qi confirmed that there weren’t any that were written by Godmyths.

He was itching to get his hands on something like that. Considering his level, if he could gain some insights into the mysteries of Godmyths it would provide a lot of help to his own cultivation.

The truth was that nobody in the institute really cared about these books, most of which contained immortal skills. Children of Brahma were generally such geniuses that none of them would be interested in low-level abilities like that.

However, there were some things present that Yang Qi felt could benefit him. For instance, there were books with information about the Mechfolk, as well as the ancient mechanical civilization.

With divine will, it was possible for Yang Qi to quickly scan large amounts of books and gain information from them. It was a shocking thing considering that these books had been written by powerful immortal-spirits and other experts. Normally, the immortal script they used was not the type that could be easily scanned with divine will. But Yang Qi was already so strong that he could fight multiple Godmyth patriarchs. Thus, he was in a much better position to gain knowledge from the books.

Slowly but surely, they proceeded to the second level of the Scripture Pavilion.

Just as they were about to step off the stairs, intense rumbling sounds filled the area. A powerful aura erupted, causing them to physically tremble. It wasn’t a result of spell formations or a warding spell, but rather the mere aura of the books that filled the second level.

Before they could even get their bearings, a cold snort echoed out. “Are you two pieces of trash new children of Brahma or something? Get back down to the first level. The second level is filled with books written by Godmyth patriarchs. Their energy could destroy your souls! You don't qualify to be here!” As the words rang out, a tall, strapping figure appeared in front of Hu Latu and Yang Qi, a man who had unusually sturdy legs.

Yang Qi quickly called on his Wheel of Fate, which revealed to him that this burly fellow had a unique constitution!

Chapter 626: Business in the Scripture Pavilion

The second level of the Scripture Pavilion was a restricted area. All of the works there had been penned by Godmyth patriarchs, and contained incredibly powerful auras.

Restricted areas were set up, not in order to withhold important resources from children of Brahma, but rather to protect them from danger. Some books written by Godmyths were filled with divine will so strong it could kill people who were too weak to withstand it.

Thus, some children of Brahma weren’t allowed to even walk in the door of certain areas. And if they tried, the energies at play would repel them, sometimes injuring them in the process. Therefore, they usually needed to reach a particularly high level before going to the second floor of the Scripture Pavilion.

If Yang Qi and Hu Latu had encountered only one book, it might not have been a big deal. But here there were millions of books collected together, which meant that the power level on display could create worlds and destroy suns and moons.

WHIZZZ!

As for the person who blocked their path, there was something unique about him, as if he could traverse the most distant corners of the universe. And he seemed like the type of person who, if he fled, could never be caught.

He definitely had a unique constitution. In fact, three words popped into Yang Qi’s mind. Heaven Moving One.

Yang Qi had already gained a lot of detailed information about the various types of unique constitutions that existed.

He had read plenty of ancient records during his time in the Titan Emperor Heaven, and had benefited even more during the conquest of the six immortal worlds who had allied against him, using plundered resources to create incredible libraries for the Sage Monarch planetary system.

“You two are too weak, so hurry up and get the hell out of here. Work on your cultivation for another ten thousand years, then you might qualify to come to the second level.” Even as this Heaven Moving One spoke, more children of Brahma appeared behind him, clearly his juniors. One of them was a young man with sword-like eyebrows and eyes that glittered like stars. He was good looking and elegant in a way that surpassed ordinary people.

Sneering, he said, “Of course, you could always agree to work for my Elder Brother Brahma Erudite. He can help you get into the second level much earlier. If you rely on your own cultivation, you might never get in here. Understand? Why not swear your oaths right now to remain loyal to him and him alone?”

Yang Qi immediately realized what was going on: there were factions and cliques within the children of Brahma, and these people were from one of them. Obviously, there was a reason why students in the Brahman Institute were said to be princes! The infighting amongst them was obviously brutal.

In the mortal world, an imperial dynasty might have a few dozen princes, all of whom would form alliances as they tried to eliminate each other from the succession. Their lives were never ones of peace and quiet.

Of course, this was an immortal world that ruled over thirty-six thousand other immortal worlds. All of the children of Brahma were struggling amongst themselves to acquire leadership positions and eventually become Godmyths. It was only possible to imagine how terrifying the competition amongst them was. They would do anything to achieve their goals, including forming factions, carrying out plots, stealing, and even assassinating rivals. And now, Yang Qi and Hu Latu were being forcibly recruited into some faction or another.

“Hmph!” Hu Latu had been working for Yang Qi long enough that his personality had changed a bit. Even earlier on, he had been a vicious, savage killer. After all, he had once set a huge trap to murder his fellow emissaries, all for his own benefit. Now that he was working for Yang Qi, he was even more confident and ruthless. So there was no way he would tolerate threats and humiliation like this.

“You think we don't qualify to enter the second floor?  We became children of Brahma because we’re on the way to becoming leaders of the Brahman Society. You think some divine will left behind by a few Godmyths can do anything to us? Fuck off!”

RUMBLE!

Hu Latu unleashed a powerful stream of energy that slammed into the divine will and pushed it back, allowing him to step into the second floor.

“Are you feeling suicidal or something?” said the younger man with sword-like eyebrows. “Become leaders? You’re already talking about that? It seems I need to teach you a lesson about the height of the heavens and the breadth of the earth. You think you can just join the children of Brahma and instantly have a high position? Outside, we children of Brahma have incredible power and everyone respects us. But inside the Brahman Institute, you need to grovel like the dogs you are!”

He waved his hand, sending out two streams of energy that became two dragons, one of them azure and one vermillion. The azure dragon burst with preheaven wood energy, and the vermillion dragon thrummed with preheaven fire energy.

Obviously, this was a combination of the Cardinal Grand Brahma Punishes the Wood God Energy Art and the Cardinal Grand Brahma Punishes the Fire God Energy Art. The two dragons swirled forth like yin and yang, forming into a perfect taiji symbol that spun without end. Within the azure and vermillion dragons, it was possible to see Success, Steadiness, Destruction, and the Void. As the four tribulations flowed through reincarnation, it became evident that they had reached the level of thirty-six cycles!

‘So strong!’ Hu Latu thought as he unleashed his fire and water energy arts to slam into the four tribulations of Success, Steadiness, Destruction, and the Void. How could he ever have guessed that the first children of Brahma he would clash with would have four tribulations with thirty-six cycles of reincarnation!? Obviously, there was no hope of him coming out on top of this fight.

Closing his eyes, he prepared to go absolutely all out. However, that was when an immense force suddenly entered his mind, filling his meridians and sea of energy and pushing his energy arts to an invincible level. In the blink of an eye, his palms unleashed powers of water and fire that contained fifty-four cycles of reincarnation.

POP!

The two palm strikes met, and the young man with the sword-like eyebrows was flung off to the side by Hu Latu. He screamed as massive wounds were ripped open all over him, causing blood to spurt out everywhere. “Water and fire cultivation? And fifty-four cycles of reincarnation? How is this even possible? I came across immense good fortune that let me cultivate thirty-six cycles of reincarnation. And I even ate a sprig of god grass! How could a new student be so strong?”

“Nice move!” said the Heaven Moving One, Brahma Erudite. Taking a step forward, he glared at Yang Qi and said, “You just infused him with strength, didn’t you? His cultivation hasn't actually reached the level of fifty-four cycles of reincarnation, has it? Who could have guessed that a top expert like yourself would rise up in the children of Brahma. Let’s see what you’re really capable of!”

RUMBLE!

Three streams of destruction energy shot out of Brahma Erudite, one metallic, one yellow, and one like water. Swirling into a triangle that represented heaven, earth, and man, they shot viciously toward Yang Qi.

“Sadly, you only cultivate two energy arts, and therefore you’re no match for me. I cultivate three! And I can unleash the power of seventy-two cycles of reincarnation. This attack is going to take you down!”

Shockingly, Brahma Erudite had five lineaments on his dao heart. And he cultivated the energy arts of metal, earth, and water, which made him vastly stronger than any other ordinary person with five lineaments.

When he attacked, he kept the magical laws of space firmly under his control.

Chuckling, Yang Qi took a step forward and flicked his finger, sending out a bright stream of light that turned into a snake. In the blink of an eye, the light dissolved the three godly-class energy arts, then shot toward Brahma Erudite with deadly force.

“What energy art is that?” Brahma Erudite blurted. “That’s not the Cardinal Grand Brahma Five Phases Energy Arts! In fact, it's not from the Brahman Immortal World at all!”

“Yeah, I just picked a random energy art to defeat you with, Brahma Erudite. Look, this is the Scripture Pavilion, which is not a good place for a duel. Why don't we pick a date in the future to have a rematch?”

“Hmph!” Brahma Erudite stamped his foot and an entire world was born, which shot toward Yang Qi. “Three Worlds Slash!”

“Be destroyed!” Yang Qi said, and as a result, the world collapsed and Brahma Erudite staggered backward, his face turning as pale as death. It was obvious who had won and who had lost in this exchange. Brahma Erudite was clearly beneath Yang Qi, and incapable of matching up to him.

This time, he didn’t follow up with another attack. “Well played. It’s hard to believe that someone as strong as you has appeared within the children of Brahma. You’re right, the second floor of the Scripture Pavilion isn’t an appropriate place for a fight. We wouldn't want to damage or destroy any of the books, right? We would both be punished if that happened. So I’ll let you off the hook today. In the future, we can have a bit of a duel. I’d love to ‘learn’ a thing or two from your divine abilities. By the way, what are your names?”

“Hu Latu. And this is my Elder Brother, Hu Yanmeng. Whenever you want tips about energy arts, just come looking for us.”

“Let’s go!” Brahma Erudite snapped to his followers. “I'm going to remember the two of you. And one of these days, you’re going to get what's coming to you.”

With that, he vanished into thin air.

After they were gone, Yang Qi thought, ‘This Heaven Moving One obviously has more skills and abilities that he didn’t use. Trump cards, even. He’s hiding his true strength.’

“Milord,” Hu Latu said, “I don't know much about the Brahman Institute. My clan isn’t important enough to ever have dealings with the children of Brahma. Please forgive me for not having more information about them.”

“You’ve done nothing wrong,” Yang Qi said, waving his hand dismissively. “Come on, let’s explore the second level. The energy art I just used might have attracted some attention. Although most people wouldn’t know what they were looking at if they saw the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, it’s likely that a Godmyth would identify it immediately. I need to get the rest of the five phases energy arts and cultivate them to the perfect level. Only then can I be confident enough to win any fight around here. Only then can I start working to take over the Brahman Immortal World!”

Chapter 627: Combining Eighty-One

Thus, Yang Qi and Hu Latu stepped into the second floor of the Scripture Pavilion.

The place had a total of three levels, with the second containing books and records penned by Godmyth patriarchs. Such works had been labored over so intensively that they were essentially magical treasures! Some of the books had gained spirits, making them book-demons who could absorb the quintessence energy of people who read them and use it for their cultivation purposes.

The second floor was so much larger than the first floor that it was hard to compare, and its energy was vastly grander.

Upon looking around, Yang Qi noticed some enormous books that were larger than planetary systems hanging within the depths of space, kingdoms of their own that gave birth to hosts of minor book-demons.

This second floor of the Scripture Pavilion was like its own universe of books. Shockingly, some of them had divine abilities that were no weaker than those of the children of Brahma.

Obviously, some of the books were intelligent and could communicate with each other. When children of Brahma came to this location to peruse them, they would often have to subjugate the books first, or make deals to convince them to share their contents.

WHIZZZ!

As Yang Qi began walking through the second floor, he could sense numerous streams of will conversing with each other.

“These children of Brahma are strong!”

“Brahma Erudite is considered to be in the top hundred children of Brahma. He’s incredibly strong, with five lineaments on his dao fruit, and just on the verge of a sixth. And he has three godly-class energy arts.”

“Ah, what a pity that Brahma Erudite hasn’t awoken the Heaven Moving One power within him, otherwise it would have been an amazing fight. The Scripture Pavilion is such a boring place! I wish we had top experts coming here to duel all the time.”

“Well, these two new children of Brahma want to read our contents. How should we deal with them?”

“It depends on how strong they are. Regardless, they have to pay the price of quintessence-blood and vital energy. Those are the rules. If they don’t pay, they don’t get access.”

Of course, this interchange was going on between the most powerful of the books, the book-demons and book-immortals.

“Exactly. We want to break through and become patriarchs on the third floor of the Scripture Pavilion. Most of the books up there were left behind by the legion of gods, although some were written by Godmyth patriarchs. If we can get enough quintessence-blood from the children of Brahma, we would have a chance to move up.”

As Yang Qi scanned the area with his own divine will, he noticed some particularly powerful energy fluctuations. They were coming from a marvelous book that looked like a huge ship, which was barely being held in restraint by the bookshelf. Apparently, it had been authored by a Godmyth patriarch.

Looking at it closer, Yang Qi saw that the title of the book was Secrets of the Mechanical Civilization!

‘Nice! I think I’ll take a look at that one!’ Thanks to the memories of the young man in yellow, Yang Qi was much more familiar with how mechanical civilizations worked. But if he could learn some of their secrets, then maybe he could start making his own mechas and battleships.

Without any hesitation, he reached out toward the book.

However, before he could reach it, a shield of light flared and blocked his way. At the same time, an ancient voice spoke to him: “Young child of Brahma, if you wish to gain access to my knowledge, you must first pay the price. I want precious materials of heaven and earth, as well as quintessence-blood and power for a breakthrough. Here is a list of what I want. Leave, find it, and when you return you can learn all about the ancient mechanical civilization. I was written by a Godmyth patriarch who acquired some of the ancient records of that civilization, so there’s no way I’ll give up what I know for free.”

Yang Qi snorted coldly. “So, you old fogies lock up your knowledge and sell it for a price? Despicable. I'm a child of Brahma and this is the Scripture Pavilion. Don’t think that because you’re strong, you can blackmail me. Get over here!”

RUMBLE!

Light flared, and the enormous ship trembled. Warding magics crumbled and Yang Qi laid hands on the book, then slowly dragged it out into the open.

In the blink of an eye, knowledge flooded into his mind.

He saw the creations of the ancient mechanical civilization, the building materials, the theories, and countless other facets of their culture. The book was strong, but compared to Yang Qi it was weaker than a child.

“Impossible! How could you be so strong? It's like I'm powerless!” The book-immortal transformed into what looked like a burly man, yet no amount of struggle could free him from Yang Qi’s grip.

Realizing that struggle was useless, he called out, “Hey everyone, don't let this guy break our rules! Draw on your power to kick him out!”

“That's right! We can't let him break our rules. If you want to benefit from our knowledge, you have to make it worth it for us. That's the rule of the Scripture Pavilion. Anyone who defies that rule makes an enemy of all book-immortals!”

“Kick him out!”

“Attack!”

RUMBLE!

Waves of energy shot toward Yang Qi, pulsing with the power of the Godmyth level.

Yet Yang Qi didn’t even move. He summoned the God Legion Paradise and the entire second floor turned into a crystalline, holy kingdom. The attacking streams of energy collapsed, then his own divine will swept through the bookshelves, seeking out whatever information he pleased.

“What’s going on!? How did he neutralize our attacks?”

“Impossible! How could he be so strong? Even the strongest of all the children of Brahma, the supreme Brahma Echo-Silk, isn’t this strong!”

“Who is this guy? He must be some new expert. How did he get so powerful?”

“Crap, none of my attacks are strong enough to do anything to him! He’s taking away all of my knowledge!”

Chuckling coldly, Yang Qi said, “I'm not just going to take your knowledge, you book-immortals. I'm going to extrapolate the fates of the people who wrote you.” He suddenly radiated an immensely powerful aura as the Wheel of Fate appeared above him, spinning endlessly. Within moments, figures appeared on the wheel, who were none other than the experts that had written the various books on the second floor.

The author of Secrets of the Mechanical Civilization appeared, and as Yang Qi examined his fate he learned all sorts of scattered information.

One by one, he went through countless books, learning about the Godmyth patriarchs that had written them. As he benefited from the knowledge and experience of thousands of Godmyths, his psychic level increased and his sea of consciousness burned with psychic fire.

At a certain point, Hu Latu said, “Milord, look, up ahead. There’s an ancient painting depicting the five phases. That must be the Cardinal Grand Brahma Five Phases Energy Arts. It’s not a book-immortal, which means any of the children of Brahma can study it.”

He looked over at the painting, which featured five glowing beams of light that seemed to contain all things, even worlds.

“Alright, the time has come to complete the five phases and succeed with eighty-one cycles of reincarnation!”

Within the five beams of light were countless magical symbols, which were a cultivation technique of the most profound and mysterious nature. Although ordinary people might not understand the text, Yang Qi had the God Legion Seal and the countless memories that came with it. In the blink of an eye, he clearly saw all of the secrets of the five phases energy arts.

Streams of true energy gathered behind him, connecting his nascent divinity to the image and imparting the details to him.

The God Legion Seal almost seemed to breathe, and with each inhalation it connected to the high-level universal plane that contained preheaven five phases vital energy.

Slowly but surely, five entire worlds appeared behind him, filled with the four tribulations of Success, Steadiness, Destruction, and the Void, rotating in cycles of eighty-one.

He had successfully cultivated the full technique!

Chapter 628: Blending into the Brahman Society

‘The five phases, complete! Eighty-one cycles of reincarnation. Five-colored godlight that can overwhelm all creation. Preheaven five phases quintessence energy to form the full and complete Cardinal Grand Brahma Five Phases Energy Arts! Although this can't compare to my Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, it’s still shockingly deadly. And it contains numerous profound mysteries that will aid me in my enlightenment of the universe and the creation of immortal worlds.’

It only took a moment for Yang Qi to use the knowledge and experience he had gained from the Godmyth level books, combine it with the power of his God Legion Seal, and push the Cardinal Grand Brahma Five Phases Energy Arts all the way to the perfect peak.

He had instantly surpassed what any child of Brahma throughout history had done.

Normally speaking, one could not reach the level of eighty-one cycles of reincarnation without being a Godmyth. Even less possible was reaching the perfect level of the five phases, with five-colored godlight. To reach the perfect five phases, and also have eighty-one cycles of reincarnation, was something for the legion of gods.

However, within the God Legion Seal was a trace of the blood of the god Brahma, as well as some of his core teachings and doctrines. Because of that, anyone with a God Legion Seal might as well have been a direct descendant of Brahma with his blood pumping in their veins. The end result was that Yang Qi’s cultivation in situations like the present would go incredibly smoothly. If word got out, it would throw the entire Brahman Immortal World into pandemonium.

Obviously, that wasn't what he wanted, so he didn’t plan to reveal his success with the five phases. In the fight earlier, the Heaven Moving One Brahma Erudite had used three of the five arts, and that had been difficult enough to deal with. Without his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, Yang Qi would have been in a tight spot.

Right now, he had five of the godly-class energy arts, and if he released them all at once there probably wasn't anyone in the Brahman Society who could match up to him. That said, the wiser course would be to rise through the ranks slowly but surely, and only gradually reveal his true strength.

Right now, he had all of the five phases godlight in his God Legion Paradise, making it impossible for anyone to see them, even the book-immortals and book-demons.

The fact that he was in front of the five phases painting was no surprise; many children of Brahma would come to study it in the hopes of reaching a higher level of power with the Cardinal Grand Brahma Five Phases Energy Arts.

At a certain point, Yang Qi called Hu Latu into the God Legion Paradise, and when he realized what had occurred, he reacted with visible shock.

“Congratulations, Milord! You succeeded with the five phases energy arts! Soon you’ll be able to dominate the entire Brahman Immortal World, and after that, the Thirty-Six Thousand Immortal Worlds Coalition!”

“It's thanks to my God Legion Seal, that's all,” Yang Qi said. “I couldn't ever have done it on my own power, nor could a Godmyth have. Okay, prepare yourself to be baptized as I impart five phases true energy into you. Work for a few months and you’ll definitely reach the level of mastering three of the five.”

The level of five was something only Yang Qi could accomplish. After all, according to the legends, even the founder, Proud Heaven, had only ever succeeded at combining four. Rumor had it that the most famous of the children of Brahma was also at the level of four.

Even as Yang Qi waved his hand to send five phases true energy into Hu Latu, he pondered the matters at hand. He wasn’t holding back in helping his follower. That said, he had benefited a lot from the books on this second floor. In fact, he was now reaching the point where he felt like he might soon form his dao heart.

‘That Brahma Erudite’s energy arts were incredible. Apparently he's a Heaven Moving One, and is in the top hundred in the children of Brahma. I wonder how strong Brahma Echo-Silk is.’

At the moment, he was still only a second stage Space-Demolisher, also known as an immortal warrior. However, his enlightenment was more like that of a fifth stage World-Demolisher.

When he finally went for his next breakthrough, the results would be incredible.

**

In the lower world, a passageway had been created in the center of the Sage Monarch planetary system that led to the Titan Emperor Heaven. It was almost like a bridge, allowing immortals to easily come to the lower world, and vice versa. Of course, the Yang Clan kept the entrance closely guarded. Only people who had performed great services for the Sage Monarch planetary system would be allowed to go up as a reward.

As Yang Qi’s immortal clone sat in meditation, working on his cultivation, a stream of five phases godlight suddenly appeared and entered him.

Even though Yang Qi was on the second floor of the Scripture Pavilion in the Brahman Immortal World, after his breakthrough with the five phases energy arts, he could pass through the seals of the immortal world around him and create a secret passage to funnel power to his clone.

Almost immediately, heavenly tribulation began brewing as the clone’s energy arts grew stronger. Endless lightning fell on him as he rose to fifth stage World-Demolishing.

At the same time, he mastered the use of three of the five phases arts, which was nothing to scoff at.

The clone currently had access to virtually endless faith power, which would eventually be used, along with the essence of the Sage Monarch planetary system, to push it to the level of an immortal world. The clone would be the spirit of the immortal world, its guardian. Right now, he was only a fifth stage World-Demolisher, yet was already strong enough to deal with enemies three levels higher than himself.

Of course, that wasn’t enough.

After seeing the Brahman Immortal World, Yang Qi knew full well that the Sage Monarch planetary system didn’t have a solid enough foundation. With his true self gone, all it would take would be an enemy with nine lineaments on their dao heart to completely destroy the place. Right now, the most important task at hand for him was to improve his cultivation base.

‘The Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart abounds with godpower!’

RUMBLE!

All of a sudden, his clone erupted with boundless levels of energy. Unexpectedly, it was the power of an immortal-slayer!

In the ancient era, immortal-slaying power was a peak level of power that rivaled the legion of gods. It could be used to slaughter immortals and cow the millions upon millions of immortal worlds. In fact, even all of those immortal worlds working together had been nearly wiped out by King Immortal-Slayer.

Yang Qi’s clone didn't have the God Legion Seal, thus he couldn’t cultivate the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. Therefore, Yang Qi wanted to see if he could accept the legacy of King Immortal-Slayer and control the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

As the immortal-slaying power wrapped up Yang Qi’s clone, it turned into a pitch-black suit of armor, covered with magical symbols made from blood. In fact, those symbols almost seemed to have been splashed onto the armor from slain immortals. It was also surrounded by hosts of immortal souls.

RIIIIP!

Numerous arms sprang out from the armor, all of them holding magical devices and weapons such as sabers, swords, spears, pitchforks, halberds, banners, flags, nets, hooks, and staves and the like. All of them looked vicious to the extreme.

A smile appeared on the immortal clone’s face. ‘Wow, immortal-slaying power really is incredible. Look at what it's done to me! It’s just too bad I can’t use this power to the fullest right now. Well, given enough time, I’ll reach that level.’

Yang Qi’s clone had transformed on a deep level, with even his genes having become new. Before, he had been an impressive figure in the mortal world, but nothing special in terms of immortal worlds. Although he might have been stronger than some ordinary immortals, there were plenty of people there who could outdo him, especially people with unique constitutions.

But with immortal-slaying power, he now had a constitution like that of the ancient King Immortal-Slayer. He was now the absolutely strongest person in the Sage Monarch planetary system, and would be impressive even in immortal worlds.

“Come forth, Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart!”

Suddenly, the clone exploded into a haze of draconic larvae, which swirled through the air, then combined, wriggling and twitching as they reformed his body. These were immortal-slaying dragons, things that were very similar to the godmammoth particles from the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.

After the clone's body was reformed, he reached out and three medallions appeared in his palm, which were none other than King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy medallions.

Chapter 629: Meeting of the Children of Brahma

“Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, open!”

With the power of three of King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy medallions, Yang Qi’s immortal clone was now far more powerful than the young man in yellow had ever been. Not even a ninth stage Dao-Demolisher would be able to threaten him.

As he immersed himself in the immortal-slaying power, a portal appeared above his head, which was a passage to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

“Eldest Brother, Second Elder Brother,” the clone said, “I'm leaving the Sage Monarch planetary system in your hands for now. I’ll head into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart to search out good fortune, and hopefully the core of the chart. If I get that core, I’ll finally control the entire chart. The Sage Monarch planetary system’s foundation is secure, so if you run into any problems, just seek out Empress Jadefall. Although she’s often busy with important matters, she’ll do anything necessary to help out here.”

With that, the clone flew up into the passage and disappeared into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

In addition to searching for treasure in general, the clone would especially be on the lookout for more parts of the Mourn-Parting Heaven-Palace and imperial snakecharms.

Considering that the clone could now freely enter and exit the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, it made complete sense for him to conduct such searches on his own, leaving his true self free to attend to other matters.

Right now, his true self was in the Brahman Immortal World, in the Scripture Pavilion. Although the three legacy medallions were not in his possession, he and his clone were inextricably linked; therefore, it would be an easy thing for him to get into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart if necessary. He could just have his clone open a passage from inside.

The session of cultivation on the second floor of the Scripture Pavilion lasted for a full year. That was how long it took Hu Latu to gain the enlightenment he needed from the five phases essence power.

When the process was complete, he exhaled, and three streams of godlight streamed out of his mouth, pulsing with the vital energy of fire, water, and wood.

If word of this got out, his position within the children of Brahma would rise dramatically and his clan would greatly benefit.

Both Hu Latu and Hu Yanmeng were from a noble clan in the Brahman Immortal World, except, that clan was far from being one of the most powerful. But with two powerful children of Brahma like this, everything would be different.

That said, Yang Qi had no plans to help the Hu Clan. He couldn’t care less if they survived or thrived and had no desire to wrap up his karma with theirs.

“Come on, let’s go. Now that we’re done with our cultivation, the time has come to make a scene and start rising through the ranks.” With that, Yang Qi and Hu Latu left the Scripture Pavilion.

Just before leaving, Yang Qi suddenly had the urge to go back and see what the third floor was like. But then he drew on his Wheel of Fate and received a strong warning not to follow through with the idea. It was too dangerous.

Obviously, there were profound secrets kept on the third floor. It was said that the third floor contained ancient writings from the legion of gods, including recollections, prophecies, and historical records.

Such things would be very useful to Yang Qi, but at the same time he would never take the warnings of the Wheel of Fate lightly. Later, when he had a higher cultivation base, and controlled the Brahman Institute, the measly third floor of the Scripture Pavilion would definitely be on his list of destinations.

‘I wonder if there are other children of Brahma with unique constitutions,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘If there are, I doubt there are many. That said, the children of Brahma should essentially contain the most elite forces of all of the Thirty-Six Thousand Immortal Worlds Coalition. And they squabble worse than princes in a mortal empire. If I do find someone with a unique constitution and a fight breaks out, I’ll definitely kill them and devour their power. And the first one on my list is that Brahma Erudite.’

During the year which had just passed, nothing of note occurred within the Brahman Institute. Generally speaking, time was not something that people in immortal worlds worried about. As long as a given immortal world wasn’t destroyed, its people wouldn't die, and although they weren’t technically deathless, they could basically live forever.

To such individuals, the endless passage of time was something they were used to. Sometimes people would sit in meditation for a thousand years, thus a single year was like the snap of a finger.

After leaving the Scripture Pavilion, Yang Qi decided to tour the Brahman Institute and get used to its layout. After all, he knew that in addition to being built from a god item, the depths of the institute contained a divine likeness of Proud Heaven, which would likely be of much help in determining where he was.

BOOM!BOOM!BOOM!

Before Yang Qi could begin his search, the thunderous pounding of drums filled the air, and at the same time an ancient voice spoke from his identity medallion.

“All children of Brahma shall gather in the main square for your centennial meeting. Everyone is required to attend!”

During the centennial meeting of the children of Brahma, the top talents would be revealed, rewards would be handed out, and new missions and tasks would be assigned.

Yang Qi’s heart began pounding a bit as he headed in the direction of the main square. It was an enormous plane of existence, with seats that had numbers on them corresponding to the identity numbers of each child of Brahma. Yang Qi and Hu Latu were in the very last spots, clearly identifying them as the newest recruits.

Before long, an immense energy filled the entire square, making it seem almost like the legion of gods had arrived. They were the children of Brahma, some of whom had hints of deathless godliness on them. Yang Qi could also sense the presence of people with unique constitutions, although he wasn’t sure exactly who they were. When all of the children of Brahma were together in one place, they pulsed with a power that could shake worlds.

There were roughly a hundred thousand of them, and it took only one short hour for them to gather. Unfortunately, there were just too many people for Yang Qi to fully assess all of their auras.

Obviously, each child of Brahma was a legend of their own, with colorful histories full of stories that seemed like myths.

‘Incredible,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘Only ten thousand of these children of Brahma would be more than enough to destroy the Titan Emperor Heaven and the Sage Monarch planetary system. In fact, probably only a few thousand would do.’

And if these children of Brahma teamed up against him, he wouldn't stand a chance.

Now more than ever, he was glad that he was here undercover and no one knew who he really was. If he couldn't handle the children of Brahma, how would he deal with the old-timers?

As the hundred thousand children of Brahma gathered, some unleashed their minor worlds and others brandished god items. Clearly, they were all attempting to put on an impressive show.

Looking around, Yang Qi identified at least a few dozen who he didn’t think he could beat in a fight.

‘There’s no need to get nervous,’ he told himself. ‘I'm still consolidating my power. Plus, my clone is in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, and eventually I’ll be able to use that as a weapon, too. Once I reach the immortal marquis level, I can use the Sagely Sacrifice. And then these children of Brahma will just be fuel for my cultivation!’

He kept his energy sealed tight; he definitely didn't want anyone knowing about the progress he had made with the five phases godly-class energy arts.

Closing his eyes, he visualized the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

It was actually larger than the entire Thirty-Six Thousand Immortal Worlds Coalition, hanging somewhere within some unknown plane of existence. Considering the recent transformations to his immortal clone, it seemed most proper to call him an immortal-slaying clone. Right now, that clone was in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, searching for treasure and god items and battling immortals he encountered.

There were many top experts stuck inside, but now Yang Qi’s clone was hunting them down and killing them to ensure that none of the benefits within the chart were wasted on outsiders.

As the clone found god items, he would break them down and send the godliness through the void to Yang Qi to improve his cultivation base.

All of a sudden, Yang Qi felt his Wheel of Fate tremble, as though some immense danger were approaching. Quickly severing his connection to his clone, he looked around suspiciously. Everything began shaking, and all of the children of Brahma suddenly felt like they were suffocating.

A Godmyth had arrived!

Chapter 630: Heaps of Experts

The pulsing energy quickly transformed into streams of holy magical symbols, dazzlingly bright, like heavenly flowers fluttering through the air. Although they were not deathless, the godpower they contained made them seem like they stemmed from some sort of false god.

Truth be told, the Godmyth level was sometimes referred to by another name: the False God level.

In other words, such individuals were not true gods, but rather imposter gods. That said, even the imposter gods were still able to brush shoulders with true gods, and were powerful enough to destroy the heavens and extinguish the earth.

Yang Qi knew that he could fight against some Godmyths. But the Godmyth level was divided into nine divisions, each one of which was vastly superior to the previous. As for what exact type of Godmyth level he could fight, Yang Qi wasn’t sure. He would need to reach that level himself before he had an idea.

‘So this is the power of the Godmyth level, huh? Those heavenly flowers are like worlds of their own. Worlds within worlds, an endless cycle.’

The heavenly flowers gave birth to worlds, which in turn produced more worlds, creating a never-ending cycle that surpassed ordinary immortal flowers.

WHIZZZ!

Up above the congregated children of Brahma, an enormous, ancient figure appeared, with eyes like suns and moons, whose mere gaze seemed able to penetrate the very souls of those he looked upon.

“Greetings, Patriarch!” the children of Brahma said, dropping to their knees to kowtow. Yang Qi had no desire to attract the attention of a Godmyth, so he followed suit.

Of course, it was no rarity for children of Brahma to keep secrets, and have a variety of strange and unusual auras. The patriarch didn't seem to have any interest in looking closely at them, and as they kowtowed he simply nodded in approval.

“Rise,” he said.

“Yes sir!”

Many of the children of Brahma yet again resorted to various divine abilities in the hopes of standing out. Some turned invisible, some began thrumming with various magical powers, and others simply stood there calmly.

“Welcome to the centennial meeting of the children of Brahma,” the patriarch said. “Today, your recent service to the institute will be assessed, and you will be assigned new missions. There is nothing unusual about today’s meeting, so I won’t go into any unnecessary explanations.”

“Yes, Patriarch!” the children of Brahma all said. “Please, let’s begin!”

“You are the cream of the crop in the Brahman Society, the top disciples who will eventually go on to be leaders in our organization. Even now, your position vastly surpasses the countless ordinary disciples outside. You have access to plentiful resources, and can cultivate all sorts of remarkable abilities that are normally kept secret. However, the greater your experience and strength, the more responsibility you bear. You get more, but you must give more in return. That is why, every one hundred years, you are assessed, and depending on the results are either rewarded or punished. Now, we will begin announcing your accomplishments!”

As the words left his mouth, streams of power swept over the children of Brahma, who remained completely silent. Within that energy was a streak of killing intent, and they knew that any who failed to meet up to the proper standards would instantly be punished!

Yang Qi could feel the immense pressure and kept his true aura tightly locked down to prevent the Godmyth from noticing anything unusual about him.

An enormous ledger suddenly appeared in the Godmyth’s hand, as well as a quill pen.

“Brahma Echo-Silk! Step forward!”

“Yes sir!”

A figure floated up from among the children of Brahma. Unlike most everyone else present, this person didn't seem to fear the Godmyth and, in fact, was close to him in cultivation. This was the legendary number one figure in the children of Brahma. She cultivated four of the five phases godly class energy arts, which meant that, although she couldn’t compare to Yang Qi, she was vastly beyond almost anyone else.

‘She’s strong,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘So strong that I might not be able to kill her in a fight!’ Brahma Echo-Silk was a beautiful young woman, but she wore men’s clothing. Yet that didn’t do anything to mask her good looks or lithe figure. At the same time, she had a cold look to her that made her seem aloof, and perhaps even narcissistic. Even more relevant, Yang Qi was sure that she had a unique constitution.

As his Wheel of Fate turned, he realized that she had an aura of enlightenment regarding great daos. And she seemed uniquely connected to the magical laws of heaven and earth, as if she were tied directly to the immortal world around her and the universe at large.

‘She’s an Enlightened One!’ he thought. The second floor of the Scripture Pavilion had contained plenty of information written by Godmyth patriarchs, including information about the various unique constitutions that existed. Because of that, Yang Qi knew that Enlightened Ones were far superior to Heaven Moving Ones.

Throughout the years, a total of three thousand unique constitutions had been identified, all of them particularly powerful in some way. The number itself represented the operation and principles of the three thousand great daos.

Of course, some of the constitution types were ranked higher than others.

For example, Fateless Ones were considered to be in the top three.

Future Ones and Past Ones weren’t even in the top ten, nor were Reincarnated Ones. In contrast, Enlightened Ones most certainly were in the top ten. They could master any daoist technique or energy art with absolutely no instruction, merely by looking at it. No matter what type of cultivation they practiced, it would go smoothly, and they would not risk cultivation deviation under any circumstance.

‘Incredible. An Enlightened One. It's too bad there aren’t any Eternal Ones, Fortuned Ones, or Timeflow Ones. Only people like that could possibly stand a chance of dealing with me.’

That was especially true of the terrifying Fortuned Ones and Eternal Ones. Those were the other two constitution types which occupied the top three with Fateless Ones, and it was impossible to say how they matched up in terms of the top spot. It was no wonder that Proud Heaven was dead set on devouring Yang Qi.

Even just one of those constitution types would be enough to dominate all of heaven and earth and make one invincible.

“Brahma Echo-Silk, you have done well in recent years. You succeeded in the mission you were assigned one hundred years ago, by going to the seventh-ranked immortal world the Azure Sacrifice Heaven and stealing the treasure of Patriarch Chemdawn, the Preheaven Vital Energy Golden Pill. You also saved the life of one of the prime elders. For your meritorious service, you are being rewarded with a god item, the Nine Clouds God Cassock, as well as an infusion of Godmyth true energy. In addition, you can spend a month practicing cultivation on the third floor of the Scripture Pavilion!”

Many of the other children of Brahma were visibly shocked by the reward, but when they thought about how difficult it must have been for Brahma Echo-Silk to accomplish what she had, they realized it made sense. Going to a seventh ranked immortal world to steal a golden pill from a Godmyth eccentric was no easy task.

“Many thanks, Patriarch,” Brahma Echo-Silk said. Accepting the reward, she returned to her seat. There, true energy streamed around her like silk, wrapping her up into a dazzlingly beautiful cocoon.

“Brahma Peace-War!” the patriarch said. In response, a lanky young man stepped forward hesitantly, nearly trembling as he dropped to his knees. “Brahma Peace-War, you are one of the elites among the children of Brahma. Unfortunately, you failed your most recent mission. You were tasked with infiltrating the sixth ranked immortal world, the Buddhaflame Heaven. Even more outrageous, you devolved into madness and killed the proctors who had been sent to check your progress, then framed someone else for the crime."

The Godmyth patriarch’s words were like bolts of lightning that slammed into the trembling young man.

“No!” he cried. “I didn’t kill the proctors! Someone else did! And there’s a good reason I failed the mission!”

“You thought you could hide the truth from us? That we wouldn’t find out what really happened? That’s a joke if ever I've heard one.” The Godmyth patriarch smiled coldly. “Your crimes cannot be forgiven. I hereby sentence you to death!”

RUMBLE!

Immense pressure weighed down, and Brahma Peace-War exploded into a haze of blood and gore. It immediately began to wriggle and twitch, as if it wanted to pull back together, but before it could, flames erupted and burned it out of existence. A piteous scream rang out, but the Godmyth patriarch ignored it.

Eventually, the screams died out. All that was left of Brahma Peace-War was a glittering internal pellet, which the Godmyth patriarch quickly transformed into a medicinal pill.

Everyone else present shivered like cicadas in winter. The level of brutality on display surpassed anything that Yang Qi had anticipated. The children of Brahma were experts and geniuses, yet one of them had been slaughtered without the slightest bit of mercy.

“Brahma Erudite!” the patriarch called. Brahma Erudite was the Heaven Moving One that Yang Qi had fought on the second floor of the Scripture Pavilion. “You’ve done well. You accomplished your mission of searching for ruins of that lost civilization. It was a very difficult and dangerous mission, and for the one section of ruins you recovered you shall be rewarded with the medicinal pill created from the remains of Brahma Peace-War. Assimilate the energy arts he cultivated, and his destiny, and your own divine abilities and quintessence energy will dramatically improve.”

“Many thanks, Patriarch!” Brahma Erudite said, accepting the medicinal pill. Then he turned and cast a vicious glare in the direction of Yang Qi and Hu Latu.

Thus, things proceeded. The Godmyth patriarch went through all of the names, either rewarding or punishing the various children of Brahma. It was obvious that, in the Brahma society, no one could escape the law.

It also became clear to Yang Qi that the identity medallions the children of Brahma carried also served to monitor their actions. That said, he wasn't worried about that. His Life-Death Void-Destruction Lightning could be used to create illusions that would fool even that identity medallion.

Hours upon hours passed, until the patriarch finally began assigning new missions. One mission immediately attracted Yang Qi’s attention.

“Brahma Drakefame. Brahma Coldmoon. Hua Mengxin. Zhou Datong. Chen Da. You five are hereby assigned to travel to the Titan Emperor Heaven and investigate recent disturbances. Identify the culprits and kill them all. Understand?”

Chapter 631: Mission

‘Dammit, I can’t believe that’s one of the missions!’ Yang Qi’s heart tightened upon hearing the mission and killing intent surged within him, although he made sure not to show it. He was already coming up with a plan for how to deal with the situation.

Children of Brahma were going to kill Princess Jadefall, destroy the imperial court, and by extension, end both the Titan Emperor Heaven and the Sage Monarch planetary system. Obviously, he couldn’t allow that.

Therefore, he took note of the names of the children of Brahma who had been assigned that mission. If worse came to worst, he would simply kill them.

If missions were checked every hundred years, then it would be that much time before the act were discovered. Although that was a short time for cultivators, it was enough for him to work with.

By the time a hundred years had passed, he would definitely be strong enough to stand up to the Godmyth patriarchs. In fact, he might even be a Godmyth himself by that point.

It was amazing to think of what he had accomplished so far in his life. Back in the days of Yanhaven in the Rich-Lush Continent, he had been crippled, only to rise to the point of nearly being a Godmyth in a few short decades.

Considering that, it was almost impossible to imagine how strong he would be in a hundred years.

“Hu Latu. Hu Yanmeng. Luo Dan. Wang Chen. Su Zhen. You five are new children of Brahma, and are thus unfamiliar with the brutality that comes with your lofty position. Presumably, today’s meeting has left a strong impression on you. If you fail in your missions, you will be punished by expulsion or death! Listen carefully to your new assignment.” At this point, the Godmyth patriarch switched to communication via divine will, as the details of the mission were top secret. “The five of you will travel to the fifth ranked immortal world, the Regal Event Heaven. There, you will seek to acquire ‘imperial snakecharms’, which are animadestiny talismans left behind by King Heaven-Devourer. Based on our intelligence reports, a certain top expert in the Regal Event Heaven has collected one thousand of them. You need to seize as many as you can, and then return them to the society. Unless you acquire at least two hundred, you will be severely punished. Of course, if you succeed you will be handsomely rewarded.”

‘What?’ Yang Qi thought. At first he was stunned, but then delighted. ‘Imperial snakecharms? A thousand of them are in the Regal Event Heaven? I have to get them! You can wear out iron shoes in a fruitless search, then find what you're looking for without even trying. Who would have guessed that this would happen? If I tried to find those imperial snakecharms on my own, I might never have succeeded. The Brahman Society really has a good intelligence network, that's for sure. If I could get a thousand of them, how much immortal world essence could I absorb? I could probably suck an immortal world dry in a few decades!’

Right now, he had a bit over eight hundred of the talismans, so an additional one thousand would more than double his collection and make him vastly more powerful. It would take him almost no time at all to absorb all of the essence of a place like the Titan Emperor Heaven, leaving it nothing more than an empty husk floating in the universe.

That was what it meant to devour heaven!

It would lead to cultivation speeds thousands of times faster than normal and would make him much more confident in being able to deal with Proud Heaven. Furthermore, it would put him in command of more than half of the total collection of imperial snakecharms, which in turn would make it possible for him to detect the aura of the others and track them down. If he could get all three thousand of them, reaching the Godmyth level wouldn’t be any trouble at all.

“What do we do, Milord?” Hu Latu said nervously. “The Regal Event Heaven is a fifth ranked immortal world just like the Brahman Immortal World. It's a bit weaker, but still nothing to take lightly. It’s not going to be easy to just sneak in there and take those imperial snakecharms. How are we supposed to succeed in only a hundred years? And what are you going to do about the children of Brahma who were assigned to go take care of things in the Titan Emperor Heaven?”

“Don't worry about those five,” Yang Qi replied coldly. “I’ll stop them. With the five phases arts I have, I can kill them as easily as turning over my hand. That said, I’ll hold back from striking a deadly blow. If they got killed, the institute would definitely run a further investigation, which would cause even more problems for the Titan Emperor Heaven.”

“So you have some other plan, Milord? What are you going to do, capture them? Maybe wait for a hundred years until your energy arts improve, and take out the Brahman Society patriarchs?”

“I doubt we could drag things out for a hundred years. There are too many things that could happen during that time. My current plan is to use an aspect of the Wheel of Fate to weaken them, draining them of their true energy and leaving them in complete agony. The Titan Emperor Heaven belongs to me, and I won't take any threats to it lightly. Thanks to the Wheel of Fate, not even the Godmyth patriarch will be able to see what’s happening.”

At this point, all of the missions had been assigned.

“Very well, children of Brahma, now that you have been assigned your missions, the time has come for another important announcement. Henceforth, missions and assessments won't come every hundred years, but rather every three years. And that applies to your current mission. Understand?” The Godmyth patriarch might as well have just dropped a bomb onto the children of Brahma.

“What? Three years?! We only have three years between assessments now? But why? And how can we possibly accomplish our missions in that short a time? Even a hundred years doesn’t seem like enough.”

“Three years? What can we do in three years?”

“Why? Why would they do this? Why would they reduce the time we have for the missions?”

The children of Brahma couldn’t hold back from making loud exclamations of shock.

“As children of Brahma, you wield incredible power, but at the same time have a duty to serve the institute. We Godmyth patriarchs have deduced that, in the coming days, the Brahman Society will face a dangerous crisis. And you children of Brahma are the primary defenders of the society. Therefore, we are increasing the pressure on you now in the hopes of bringing out your full potential. When the future crisis comes, you need to be ready. For all we know, even many of us Godmyth patriarchs will perish when the time comes.”

Some of the children of Brahma reacted with shock.

“What? What kind of crisis is he talking about? Even Godmyth patriarchs might fall?”

“It seems this matter really is serious.”

“But still, three years? We can't accomplish our mission that quickly!”

Others reacted with cold chuckles.

“If you scum can’t finish your mission, you’ll be expelled!”

“If a crisis is coming to the Brahman Society, and you people can’t do your job, then you deserve to be either killed or expelled.”

And there were others like Yang Qi who simply stood there without reacting at all.

“Enough!” the Godmyth patriarch shouted, and the entire square went silent. “These are the new rules, and those who refuse to follow them will be considered rebels deserving of execution! You’re all dismissed!”

Without any further ado, he faded away into nothing.

“Let’s go. We don't have much time to work on these missions. Only three years!”

“Go, go, go! Come on, hurry up!”

“We have to work together on this, otherwise we’ll never accomplish the missions. Why don’t we help your group, and you people help us? The more hands we have working on an individual mission, the easier it will be.”

“That's true. Our mission is to kill a wandering bandit and take his stash of treasure. That shouldn't be too hard.”

“Okay, let’s work on that mission first.”

Some of the children of Brahma were forming alliances, although others refused to cooperate. Some seemed excited, while others seemed crestfallen. A few were even secretly scheming of ways to take advantage of the situation.

Just as Yang Qi and Hu Latu were preparing to leave, three people flew over, two young men and a young woman.

“Hold on, you two!” one of them said, a grave, stern man who looked down his nose at Yang Qi and Hu Latu. “The patriarch gave us the mission to go to the Regal Event Heaven and get those imperial snakecharms. We have to work together on this if we want to succeed. Since the two of you are the newest here, you don't know how things work around here. First of all, don’t go off and do anything crazy. Second, you take orders from us. Got it? If you cause problems for the mission as a whole, the consequences will be grave.”

Irritated, Hu Latu looked over at Yang Qi and saw a vicious gleam in his eyes. Turning to the person who had just spoken, he said, “Who are you? And what makes you think you can talk to us like that?”

“What incredible gall!” the man replied, his eyes flashing like swords. “I'm Luo Dan, and you can call me Elder Brother. If you refuse to be polite, I’ll take you down a notch or two, got it?”

“That’s enough, Elder Brother Luo Dan,” said the young woman. "There’s no need to try to scare these little brats. As long as they cooperate with us to finish the mission, we don't need to make things hard for them.”

Chapter 632: True Energy Curse

“I'm Su Zhen, and you can call me Elder Sister. Since you two are new, you don’t know how missions work, or the rules. We can forgive you for that, but if you don’t follow proper etiquette from here on out, I'm afraid we won’t be kind.”

“Alright, enough chit-chat with the two newbies,” the third child of Brahma said, the one named Wang Chen.

He had a very short sword in his hand that was almost a dagger. It glowed with dazzling light and was covered with complex designs that seemed formed by the souls of countless slain foes.

Even just looking at the dagger would cause most people to shiver with fear.

“This dagger of mine is called Soul Devourer,” he continued. “The more people I kill with it, the more devilishness it builds up. Hopefully the two of you are the sensible type, otherwise you’ll end up as deceased souls in Soul Devourer.”

“Oh really?” Yang Qi said coolly. “Look, I know the Godmyth patriarch assigned this mission to the five of us, but he never said we had to work together. As long as I get my hands on those two hundred talismans, the mission will be a success. And what does that have to do with you three? You’re already trying to bully the two of us because we're new. In fact, I bet you’re hoping to use us as cannon fodder.”

If they had at least made a pretense of being cooperative, he wouldn't have caused problems for them. But instead, they tried to take advantage of him right off the bat.

“Cannon fodder?” Luo Dan said, and he laughed. The other two joined him. “That’s actually the perfect word to use. I take it you two don't like the idea? Well, too bad. You’re going to be cannon fodder for us. You’re going to find out where the imperial snakecharms are, and if you don’t, you’ll end up dead. Remember, we only have three years to pull this off. And if we fail, we’re all dead! You see, the two of you really have no choice in the matter.”

“Is that so?” Yang Qi said. “In that case, I’ll just wait and see what happens.” He and Hu Latu didn’t spend time arguing or getting into a fight. Instead, they just vanished into thin air.

“Huh?” Su Zhen said. She took a step forward to try to stop them, but Luo Dan reached out and blocked her path.

“We can't lay a hand on them while we’re in the institute,” he said. “It would be bad if word got out about us breaking the rules. If they don't want to work for us, fine. But if they’re serious about finishing this mission, they still have to go to the Regal Event Heaven, and in that case, they can’t truly escape us.”

“True,” she replied. “My clan looked into those two earlier, and although their clan is respectable, they aren’t anything special. They definitely don’t match up to my clan. If we have to, we can use clan pressure to try dealing with them.”

“Good idea. We can attack the problem from two angles! The problem is, three years just isn't enough time. If things weren’t so rushed, we wouldn’t need to go to all this trouble.”

Tossing Soul Devourer up and down in his hand, Wang Chen snorted and said, “Those two really don't know what they’re doing. I can’t believe they were so rude to us. But what happens if we can’t get them in line? How do we maintain our reputation then? Maybe we should just grab them and convert them into puppets to use as cannon fodder!”

“Absolutely, positively not!” Luo Dan said. “Turning them into puppets would be an open violation of institute rules. And a big one at that! Don't get muddle-headed because of that new three-year rule. There are other ways we can force them to work for us. Ways that don't violate the rules so flagrantly.”

“Let’s go. We need to come up with a plan to get those talismans. There are a total of one thousand up for grabs, and we need to turn in two hundred for the mission. That means that we can keep the other eight hundred for our own. I heard that King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans can transform into a primal-chaos elder-snake that can devour immortal world essence! Then it converts the essence into Heaven-Devouring True Energy, which you can use to purify heterogeneous true energy. Think about it—if we could cultivate four of the five energy arts, we would be like Brahma Echo-Silk. In fact, maybe one of us could take the number one position from her.”

“I have a good idea about what to do!”

With that, the three of them flew away.

**

“Damnation!” Hu Latu said, slapping his palm down onto the table in front of him, crushing it. He held a mirror in his hand, which they had just used to watch the conversation between the three children of Brahma. “Those three must die! They actually want to use my clan to threaten us!”

“In that case, I won’t let them off the hook,” Yang Qi said with a cold smile. “I’ll curse them with my Wheel of Fate, which will cause their true energy to fade away and weaken them to the point where they bow their heads to us of their own volition.”

Suddenly, eight streams of godlight sprang into being, spreading out like the tail of a peacock. Next, the Wheel of Fate appeared, causing the godlight to gradually transform into eight blurry humanoid shapes that resembled faceless puppets.

“Energy Convergence; Take Shape.” He waved his hand, sending eight streams of true energy into the figures. Instantly, faces appeared on the eight puppets. Three of them looked like Luo Dan, Su Zhen, and Wang Chen, while the other five were the children of Brahma who had been assigned the mission to the Titan Emperor Heaven. Yang Qi grabbed them all.

“The Remote Dao of Heaven; Cycles of the Sun and Moon; Five Energies Face the Origin!Deprive Fate; Reverse the Cosmos; Invert Yin and Yang; Confuse the Seven Stars.” As Yang Qi spoke the words of the curse, the puppets’ facial features became more and more clear, then they even began moving and speaking.

Five of them appeared to be doing nothing more than sitting around talking.

In fact, as Yang Qi unleashed this daoist technique, somewhere deep in the institute, five children of Brahma were in the middle of a discussion. This was the group that had been assigned to the Titan Emperor Heaven.

One of them was a burly man who held a jug of alcohol that he constantly guzzled from. Laughing, he said, “We got such an easy mission! All we have to do is go take care of some unrest in the Titan Emperor Heaven. So easy! They could have sent some ordinary disciples from the Brahman Immortal World to do this. Why did they call on children of Brahma? It's like using a battle-axe to kill a chicken.”

The man’s alcohol jug was pitch black and metallic. Apparently, it contained an endless minor world inside, filled with sounds like that of ocean waves. Except, this ocean was made of alcohol. The man had thick eyebrows and angry eyes, with a broad nose that vaguely resembled a lion. His aura was so powerful that it seemed capable of devastating heaven and earth.

“We still can't take the situation lightly,” said a young woman. “There must be something difficult about the mission for them to have chosen children of Brahma to handle it. That said, it's good we didn't get one of the really difficult missions.”

“You’re right. Some people were assigned secret missions that will definitely be extremely challenging. Ours is fairly straightforward.”

“Exactly,” one of the other men said. “Some of the missions were explained by the patriarch via divine sense, and you know those ones are going to be really hard. We definitely got one of the easier ones. Three years should be plenty of time. The Titan Emperor Heaven is only a first ranked immortal world, so weak that it's pathetic. We might as well just go overthrow the current government.”

“Let’s do it!”

“Yeah, let’s get started right away, agreed?”

“The sooner we finish the mission, the sooner we can rest at ease. Considering they changed the assessments from every hundred years to every three years, it seems that some major events are coming our way. I bet the Godmyth patriarchs want to push our immortal world to the sixth or seventh rank. If they do, there will be a lot of new enemies to face. That’s probably the catastrophe they’re referring to.”

“What? You really think our immortal world is going to reach the sixth or seventh rank? From what I've heard, there are a lot of benefits to rising in the ranks, with the big downside being that other immortal worlds will oppose you.”

“Well, that’s a given. If we rise in the ranks, we’ll be able to take even more essence from the different members of the Thirty-Six Thousand Immortal Worlds Coalition, and that will reduce their lifespan. Of course, this is all speculation on my part, I don't have any evidence.”

“Let’s just get going. Leave the important stuff to the Godmyth patriarchs.”

“Yes, let’s quell the unrest and hurry back to work on our own cultivation. I heard that the Titan Emperor Heaven has a few god items! For example, there’s an eye left behind from the ancient god Titan. We definitely have to get that.”

“Exactly. Even the weakest places usually have things to loot. Leaving an eye like that in the hands of such a weak immortal world is like throwing a bright pearl out into the darkness.”

“Okay, so we wipe out the imperial court of the Titan Emperor Heaven and install a puppet ruler. That won’t be anything hard.”

With that, the five of them flew out of the Brahman Institute and into a wormhole. Eventually, they were out of the Brahman Immortal World and flying through the universe.

One by one, immortal worlds sailed past them as they continued on their way.

“Arrggggghh!”

All of a sudden, the burly man with the alcohol let out an agonized shriek and doubled up in pain. In the blink of an eye, the surrounding spatial tempests bashed through his defensive empyrean energy.

Chapter 633: Regal Event Heaven

As soon as the burly man with the alcohol doubled up in pain, his four companions rushed over and made a defensive barrier around him.

“What’s wrong?!”

“I don’t know what’s going on!” the burly man said in a quavering voice. “My five phases true energy just went into chaos and won't flow smoothly. It’s almost like I'm experiencing cultivation deviation. Nothing like this has ever happened to me before.”

He was trembling so hard he could hardly move, and if it weren’t for his companions helping him, he would likely have been ripped to shreds by the spatial tempests.

“Cultivation deviation? How could any of us experience cultivation deviation? We all cultivate the same five phases godly-class energy arts. Once you reach a high level, you can essentially live forever with them.”

“Maybe he’s been rushing his cultivation, and that destabilized his vital energy,” one of his companions said. “Come on, let’s pour some power into him.”

They immediately began feeding true energy into him, yet it did nothing. It almost felt like they were just pouring their true energy down the drain.

RUMBLE!

All of a sudden, the five-colored light that surrounded them was thrown into chaos, and their true energy began to wane.

“Impossible!” the young woman said. “We each cultivate two godly-class energy arts, and between the five of us we can call upon all of the five phases. Why are we losing control? This doesn’t make sense! When the five phases combine, they’re invincible under heaven! Any wretch-devil or unorthodox cultivator will flee in terror. Have we been cursed or something? But even that doesn’t make sense! Curses shouldn't affect the consummate combination of the five phases!”

Usually, the Brahman Institute would assign five children of Brahma to missions to make sure that they could combine the five phases, and thus defend against any enemy.

Even in a situation where a team failed in some aspect of their mission, they wouldn’t necessarily lose their lives.

But now, before the team of five had even reached the target of their mission, the Titan Emperor Heaven, their true energy was draining away in what was apparently some sort of cultivation deviation. It was a case of embarking on a campaign only to die before achieving success.

“Just what exactly is going on here?”

“Hurry up, take out whatever magical treasures you have! We have to find a quiet place to settle down and get our true energy under control!” The five children of Brahma had no choice other than to land on the nearest immortal world, find a place to hide, and try to figure out how to deal with their problem.

Yang Qi was very pleased with how the situation turned out. ‘Hmph! You five are lucky I'm not killing you. Instead, I’ll drain your five phases true energy to give to my immortal-slaying clone!’

Right now, his own five phases energy arts were already at the perfect level and didn't require any further cultivation. However, his immortal-slaying clone did need to do more work. Cursing these five to drain their true energy would be immensely helpful.

Converting his immortal clone into an immortal-slaying clone had increased its power by many times. Considering that the clone had Heaven-Devouring śarīras, plus over ten godly-class energy arts, he would be considered a top figure even in many immortal worlds.

Yang Qi and his clone were hard at work. The latter was exploring the mysteries of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, and the former was preparing to get more of King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans to further his cultivation base.

“Milord, what about the other three?” Hu Latu said. “Are you going to curse their true energy, too? Don't forget they threatened my clan.”

“For now, no. I can handle them at any time. Let’s head to the Regal Event Heaven first. I already set up a spell formation to lead them astray. They won't be doing anything to your clan. I’ll turn the tables on them later. If I have to, I’ll use them as cannon fodder in the Regal Event Heaven, just like they were planning to do to us!”

“Awesome, Milord. You’ve thought everything through!” Hu Latu was obviously not hesitating at all to brownnose.

“Let’s go. We have three years to take a crack at those talismans. The more we get, the better! In fact, hopefully we can get all one thousand in only a few months. If I go into cultivation for the rest of the three years, I’ll come out stronger than ever. Then I can take down the entire Brahman Society and destroy any Godmyth patriarch that tries to stand in my way! It's too bad I haven’t been able to get any information about Proud Heaven yet.”

With that, Yang Qi waved his sleeve and the two of them disappeared.

Out beyond the greyspace of the Brahman Immortal World, Yang Qi unfurled his Angel Wings and shot into the Brahman River. Yet again, he was impressed by how powerful it was. If he could acquire it, it would be the perfect tool to use in his attempt to take control of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

Opening his Lord's Eye, he looked back at the Brahman Institute, which he knew was an enormous talisman. This time, he could make out the details much more clearly, and could see that there was a miraculous column of light that pulsed with a powerful aura in the very center of that talisman. Apparently, some immense treasure was located there!

‘So, that’s how it is. That miraculous light is coming from the Scripture Pavilion! The third floor there definitely contains some profound secrets. Perhaps it’s even the fulcrum of the entire place. If I can get in there, maybe I could take control of the institute as a whole. But not now. First, I need to get those imperial snakecharms.’

With that, they blurred into motion and headed off into the distance. Now that they had the identity medallions of children of Brahma, getting in and out of the Brahman Immortal World was a simple matter. The warding magics completely ignored them, and there were no formalities. They could just come and go as they pleased.

They continued on for some time, passing countless immortal worlds. Some beautiful, some desolate, some ancient. One thing was for sure—the universe was a chaotic place, filled with life.

Swish!

Eventually, Yang Qi unfurled a star chart, a map of the universe of immortal worlds that was contained within his identity medallion. There were hundreds of millions of worlds, with the Brahman Immortal World at their very center. The map had been created by Godmyth patriarchs in the Brahman Immortal World, and although it was only the tip of the iceberg when it came to the vast conglomeration of immortal worlds, it was still the result of lifetimes of work by the patriarchs.

The Regal Event Heaven was highlighted on the map. Much like the Brahman Immortal World, it was a fifth ranked immortal world, with control over twenty-four thousand lesser-ranked immortal worlds.

Considering the level of danger involved in the mission, it was good that Yang Qi was capable of tangling with Godmyths. He was also familiar with matters pertaining to the void and illusions. Thus he was able to slip past most ordinary warding magics.

“The map has more than a billion immortal worlds on it,” Hu Latu said, “as well as numerous dangerous locations. However, the highest ranked worlds on the map are in the teens. It seems that even the Godmyth patriarchs of the Brahman Immortal World can’t explore anything higher than that. According to the stories, immortal worlds with ranks higher than ten are very miraculous places. Too bad there’s no way for us to learn about them.”

“Don’t worry. Once I'm in the Godmyth level, I’ll be able to go all the way to thirty-third ranked immortal worlds.” After studying the map for a bit and confirming the location of the Regal Event Heaven, he yet again unfurled his Angel Wings and shot straight toward it.

After ten days and nights of travel, they finally left the territory controlled by the Brahman Immortal World and entered that controlled by the Regal Event Heaven. At that point, they began traveling more stealthily in order to avoid attracting the wrong kind of attention.

The Brahman Immortal World controlled the Thirty-Six Thousand Immortal Worlds Coalition.

As for the Regal Event Heaven, they held sway over a smaller number: twenty-four thousand. Despite the disparity in numbers, it was widely believed that the Regal Event Heaven was a bit stronger than the Brahman Immortal World, the reason being that the former supposedly had more godrelics left behind by the legion of gods.

Immortal worlds sped by until Yang Qi checked the map again to confirm that he was closing in on the Regal Event Heaven itself. As they closed in, they sensed a strong, ruthless aura. Up ahead was an immortal world that seemed covered with a white shell. Closer inspection revealed that the ‘shell’ was actually made of bones that constantly wriggled and twitched as if they were alive. It almost seemed like the Hell of Bleached Bones had made a foray into the world of immortals.

“Let me check something!” Hu Latu said. He was apparently prepared for a situation like this, and quickly pulled out a geomantic compass. After making some adjustments and looking at the results, he said, “Yes, this is the Regal Event Heaven. According to rumor, the Godmyth patriarchs there learned some divine abilities left behind by the Bone God, who was a member of the ancient legion of gods. That allowed the patriarchs to connect to the Hell of Bleached Bones and use the devil energy from there for cultivation purposes. After several hundred million years passed, the entire immortal world came to be surrounded by this kingdom of bones, which will assimilate anyone who enters it!”

“So that’s how it is!” Yang Qi said. “I was wondering why this place seemed so much like the Hell of Bleached Bones. Well, here I thought it was going to take a lot of work dealing with that Godmyth patriarch. But as it turns out, things are going to be very simple.”

“What do you mean, Milord?” Hu Latu said. “You already have a plan?”

“You’ll see.” Yang Qi smiled. “This immortal world is filled with the energy of the Hell of Bleached Bones, so they did most of my work for me.”

Chapter 634: Hell of Bleached Bones

Yang Qi was very familiar with the power of hell. Thanks to cultivating the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, he was adept with the use of all sorts of godpowers and could easily summon hordes of fiend-devils. And here, the Regal Event Heaven had connected to the Hell of Bleached Bones by means of a spell formation. Yang Qi couldn’t have asked for a better setup.

“Come on, let’s go in.” Yang Qi quickly opened a Hell Portal that pulsed with devil energy. Inside the portal, views of countless hell planes sped by until it reached a scene of endless bones, mountains of corpses, and seas of blood. Countless devil-gods could be seen, howling and screaming in the hopes of devouring more living beings to add more bones to their surroundings.

Much like the Hell of Suras, the Hell of Bleached Bones was a vicious and violent place.

Yang Qi immediately sent his nascent divinity branding mark into the hell, and used the God Legion Seal to ensconce it there.

The vital energy of bleached bones then began pouring into him, rapidly forming into a bone-white suit of armor. Then he descended into the kingdom of bones below, toward the depths of the Regal Event Heaven.

Hu Latu also received a suit of bone armor, allowing him to move about as easily as a fish in water without having to worry about a single warding magic.

“This is incredible!” he laughed. “It’s impossible to say how many people have failed to get into this kingdom of bones. I even heard that once, in the distant past, the Brahman Immortal World fought the Regal Event Heaven and it resulted in devil-gods from the Hell of Bleached Bones devastating our forces. I bet those three pieces of trash won’t even be able to get inside.”

“Not necessarily,” Yang Qi said as they sped along. “Based on my connection to them, I'm fairly certain they've disguised themselves as merchants and are sneaking in from another direction. They’re trying to find us, but the confusion spell I cast on them has them completely lost.”

“Do you think they already know the location of the imperial snakecharms?”

“That’s very likely.”

He waved his hand, and three tiny puppets appeared, with the faces of Luo Dan, Wang Chen, and Su Zhen. As they went here and there in their searching, all of their activities were made plainly clear.

Yang Qi’s abilities with the puppet curse were such that not even a Godmyth patriarch would be able to identify it.

After passing through the barrier of bones, they reached the greyspace of the immortal world, a place which was no smaller than the Brahman Immortal World. Transforming into a primal-chaos elder-snake, Yang Qi dove into the greyspace and began devouring it like an enormous termite.

Three days later, they were inside the Regal Event Heaven.

It was immediately obvious that this place was not as flourishing as the Brahman Immortal World. The biggest difference was that the Regal Event Heaven seemed ancient and traditional, whereas the Brahman Immortal World didn't hesitate to mix aspects of the ancient mechanical civilization with that of an immortal dao civilization. As a result, their immortal world seemed futuristic, almost like a reflection of the future world.

Yang Qi was fairly certain that was Proud Heaven’s doing.

That said, the combination of machines and the immortal dao led to terrifying levels of power. In terms of overall fighting prowess, the Regal Event Heaven wasn’t even close to the Brahman Immortal World. That was one reason why the latter controlled thirty-six thousand immortal worlds, and the former, only twenty-four thousand.

‘This place seems so old,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘The energy is ancient. It’s like it’s a remnant left behind by the ancient legion of gods.’ Looking around, he saw endless floating mountains filled with mansion grottos, sects, and cities and the like. All sorts of cultivation were practiced that were exactly what would be expected in an ancient immortal world. And of course, there were sect wars large and small being fought.

**

“Well, Su Zhen, the Regal Event Heaven has nine major sects. The leader among the nine is the Mādhyamika School, which leads the Sun Moon Sect, the Devil Bone Church, the Cauldron Heaven Association, and other such groups. They all have their own territory and are always at odds with each other. However, with the Mādhyamika School as the leader of their alliance, they’ll abide by calls to action from them. That said, there are always plots and schemes of some sort or another going on. Although the Regal Event Heaven rules over many other immortal worlds, it's nothing compared to the unity commanded by the Brahman Society. If we attacked them, they definitely wouldn’t be able to stand up to us.”

“Is that so?” Su Zhen replied. “Well, you really did your research into the Regal Event Heaven. I guess we should be able to get our hands on those imperial snakecharms fairly easily, shouldn’t we?”

“They’re in the hands of one of the Mādhyamika School’s Godmyths, namely, August Patriarch Fire Dragon. As you would imagine, he started out a hundred million years ago as a fire dragon, although he eventually cast aside the husk of his body.”

“How are we supposed to get the talismans?”

“It's going to be very difficult, especially considering we only have three years. First we need to get into the Mādhyamika School, and somehow get close to August Patriarch Fire Dragon. Then we can come up with a more detailed plan. Based on the information I got, ever since getting the talismans, August Patriarch Fire Dragon has been building up Heaven-Devouring True Energy in secluded meditation. I bet his cultivation base is only going to get stronger and stronger.”

“Thanks to my clan’s information network, I learned that the Mādhyamika School actually recruits new disciples on a yearly basis. It shouldn’t be hard to get in.”

As the three of them discussed their plan, Yang Qi listened in to every word with his five phases puppets. He also allowed Hu Latu to hear.

“Those three are a lot smarter than we thought,” Hu Latu said. “They’re already closing in on the target. Milord, what should we do? The talismans are in the hands of a Godmyth patriarch in the depths of the number one sect in the Regal Event Heaven. What if those three beat us to the punch and somehow manage to get the talismans?”

“I'm not worried about it,” Yang Qi said, smiling coldly. “And there’s no need to overthink it. I’ll also infiltrate the sect and look for a chance to beat the grass to startle the snake. Mādhyamika School. Nine sects. Whatever. This place is set up like a typical immortal world, with a whole bunch of forces all at each other’s throats. There’s no way they’ll work together in anything. And rewards come only with risk. I’ll just lure August Patriarch Fire Dragon out into the open, trap him in a spell formation, and kill him.”

“What? Milord, are you sure you want to be so direct about it? That August Patriarch Fire Dragon is a Godmyth! If you somehow fail to take him out quickly, it could cause a huge disaster. Considering he's been in seclusion with the imperial snakecharms for so many years, are you sure you can get him out into the open? It’s got to be impossible to just walk into the Mādhyamika School and kill him. And he’s not the only Godmyth they have. What if they join forces against you? I'm afraid you’d likely end up dead.”

“Well, you’re right about that,” Yang Qi said. “Even if I were stronger than I am, I couldn't take on the entire Mādhyamika School. But as for luring him into the open, it shouldn’t be hard. And although I'm not completely confident in being able to kill a Godmyth, I'm willing to take a chance. I sense that something big is going to happen in the near future, and I need to get stronger before it does.”

“Oh right, Milord, I almost forgot. You already have some imperial snakecharms. If you call on their power, August Patriarch Fire Dragon will definitely sense it and come investigate.”

“Exactly, Hu Latu. It seems you've gotten a bit wiser along with the energy arts I've given you recently. Come on, let’s go. If I leave behind a scrap of my aura here, August Patriarch Fire Dragon will definitely come after me.” He sat down cross-legged and sent out his God Legion Paradise. Then more than eight hundred talismans flowed out, which he used to create a Heaven-Devouring śarīra.

Because of how disunited the Regal Event Heaven was, it was an easy task to make Heaven-Devouring śarīras here. That said, Yang Qi still needed to worry about the top patriarchs of this place—especially those old-timers who had the power of the Hell of Bleached Bones.

Thankfully, the connection he had made to that very same location made him like one of the suzerains of hell, thus he wouldn’t stick out here.

Yang Qi immediately called on the power of the talismans, sending true energy swirling out in the form of a primal-chaos elder-snake, which turned into a taiji symbol. However, instead of a taiji symbol with yin and yang, it was composed of the colors of primal-chaos.

The chaos of night filled the entire area, making it like a mirror. Within the depths of the mirror, there were other talismans, grouped around what looked to be a fire dragon.

It was huge, the type that could consume immortal worlds with a single gulp, and was constantly devouring the immortal world essence from around it to form Heaven-Devouring śarīras.

‘August Patriarch Fire Dragon,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘Godmyth!’

Considering that this fire dragon also had some of King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans, it was going to make dealing with him even more difficult. But if you ride a tiger, it's hard to get off. Yang Qi had to take action now, otherwise he would never get those talismans. And August Patriarch Fire Dragon would only get stronger and stronger, and more and more difficult to deal with. In fact, it would eventually reach the point where sparking a conflict with him would probably end in Yang Qi’s death.

After all, he had a thousand talismans and Yang Qi only had eight hundred.

“Let’s go!”

After making his preparations, Yang Qi and Hu Latu flew off into the distance in the Regal Event Heaven, leaving behind a mass of primal-chaos.

RUMBLE!

A short time later, a burning hand of fire appeared, which shrank the primal-chaos down into the form of a crystal.

The hand belonged to a young man in a fiery-red daoist robe. Looking around with delight, he murmured, “More of King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans!”

Chapter 635: August Patriarch Fire Dragon

The young man in the fiery-red robe looked down at the crystallized primal-chaos in his palm and could just barely make out the image of a primal-chaos elder-snake inside.

‘This is definitely from imperial snakecharms!’ he thought. ‘Why are they here in the Regal Event Heaven? Are they connected to me by destiny? Considering I already have a thousand of them, I definitely need to get more. When I do, who knows what incredible transformations they’ll produce. All I do know is that after getting fifteen hundred, I’ll be able to sense the presence of other talismans. Based on the aura of this primal-chaos paleo-energy, this is a collection of eight hundred. If I can get them, I’ll have more of the talismans than anyone in all of history! I’ll be the most powerful person in the Regal Event Heaven, able to crush all nine major sects under my heel and unite this immortal world under my leadership. Afterward, I can start devouring other immortal worlds and eventually become the new King Heaven-Devourer.’

He literally trembled with excitement, but then collected himself, causing a cold expression to overtake his face. ‘As a fire dragon, I'm closely connected to primal-chaos elder-snakes. If I can actually change my substructure to that of an elder-snake, my cultivation base would reach a much higher level of enlightenment. And if I can get all three thousand of the talismans, I might have a chance to reach the Deathless Throne. This is my chance to become part of the legion of gods, and I have to seize that chance! So, where did the owner of these snakecharms go?’

He exhaled, and a thousand imperial snakecharms flew out and began spinning in front of him.

The wailing of ghosts and weeping of gods echoed out, and the sun and moon went dark as an enormous snake appeared. As the snake swirled through the air, it provided fleeting, flickering images that August Patriarch Fire Dragon examined closely.

Three days and nights passed before he was finally able to piece some of the clues together. ‘So, someone has come to this immortal world to devour its essence. During the process, he sensed the elder-snake aura I possess and realized that he’s no match for me. Thus, he fled. From what I can tell, he’s only a Demolisher! Perfect! Considering he's only a measly Demolisher, what do I possibly have to worry about?’

August Patriarch Fire Dragon had been worried that he would be dealing with someone like himself, a Godmyth patriarch with imperial snakecharms. A fight with someone like that would have been a deadly affair, but now that he knew he was dealing with a Demolisher, he could rest at ease.

Chasing and killing someone like that would be a simple task.

Nor was he worried that the entire thing was a trap. The aura of the imperial snakecharms told him everything he needed to know about who held them. Besides, even if it was a trap, the fact that he was dealing with a Demolisher meant that it wouldn’t be dangerous.

‘You can wear out iron shoes in a fruitless search, then find what you're looking for without even trying! Heaven is helping me, and now my future prospects are boundless!’ With that, August Patriarch Fire Dragon vanished into the depths of the Regal Event Heaven as he began his pursuit.

‘He took the bait!’ Yang Qi thought, a very serious expression on his face. He was out in the depths of the void, in the middle of a spell formation, surrounded by streaming magical symbols, dazzling sagelight, and a host of angels.

It had been three days since he left the Regal Event Heaven and came to this place, where he used the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth and the faith of the lower world to create this spell formation, which was filled with the glory of the halls of heaven.

Now he was simply waiting quietly for August Patriarch Fire Dragon to arrive.

August Patriarch Fire Dragon was a Godmyth, and Yang Qi knew that if he didn’t end him quickly, it would be a catastrophe. If things went south, escape would likely not be an option.

There was also the possibility that he would be able to kill August Patriarch Fire Dragon, but would have to pay a very high price to do so.

He had sent Hu Latu away; not only would he be of no help in the fight to come, it was also possible that he would be killed by the fallout.

‘This is going to be a battle of life or death. But if I can get those one thousand talismans, it will be worth it. They’re my ticket to getting the full collection of three thousand.’

He had a feeling that the rest of King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans were in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. But since he had no way to sense them, it was an almost impossible task to track them down. With half of the collection, boosted by the power of King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy medallions, he could send out a call in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart and simply summon the remaining snakecharms to him.

Of course, any snakecharms which were already in the possession of others couldn't be summoned.

At a certain point, he concealed the presence of the spell formation, making it seem like he was simply floating all alone in the void.

Some time later, an immense force weighed down on the area and a raging sea of flames appeared. The fire expanded and grew, turning into a kingdom of flames. Not the type from the five phases, but rather dragonfire. There were also fire dragons swirling here and there, making the entire place seem like a world of fire dragons.

August Patriarch Fire Dragon approached through the void, and when he saw Yang Qi’s vital energy fluctuations, his eyes widened with surprise, but then he smiled.

“You seem very confident in yourself, boy.”

Having confirmed that his target was a Demolisher, and that there were no Godmyths lurking in ambush, he felt even more confident than before.

“I am. You’re August Patriarch Fire Dragon, right? I heard that you have a thousand imperial snakecharms. By chance, I also happen to have a few. I was hoping you would be willing to part with yours and give them to me.” He smiled coyly. “Oh, before I forget, I should tell you that I'm a child of Brahma from the Brahman Society, and I'm on a mission to get those snakecharms. Without them, I’ll fail my mission.”

With this one simple statement, he accomplished a lot. For example, if he succeeded in taking the talismans, but didn’t kill August Patriarch Fire Dragon, the Brahman Immortal World would gain a powerful enemy.

“Oh? So you’re from the Brahman Society?” August Patriarch Fire Dragon’s face flickered with killing intent. “You people really are dead set on subjugating us, aren’t you? How did you find out about my imperial snakecharms? Actually, it doesn’t matter. Considering you have some, not only are you going to fail in your mission, you’re going to get yourself killed. You have one option here. Give me your talismans and beg me for your life. You’ve got a lot of guts to face me on your own, with your Demolishing cultivation base. There aren’t a lot of people like you in the immortal worlds. How about you join me as an apprentice? I’ll treat you well, what do you say?”

“If you want to negotiate, you’ll have to talk to the leaders of the Brahman Society. I'm just following orders.” Yang Qi was doing his best to make sure that August Patriarch Fire Dragon hated the Brahman Society with a passion. For all Yang Qi knew, it might be possible to get the entire Mādhyamika School involved. If war broke out between them and the Brahman Society, it could lead Yang Qi into a situation in which the sandpiper and the clam fought, and the fisherman benefited.

“I'm going to destroy the Brahman Society eventually anyway. And since you refuse to back down, I’m going to kill you too!”

August Patriarch Fire Dragon could sense the aura of the imperial snakecharms on Yang Qi, and it caused him to itch with anticipation.

With a wave of his sleeve, he sent a raging wind out to slam into Yang Qi, accompanied by a roaring fire dragon.

In response, Yang Qi didn’t even move. Bright, fiery godlight rose up behind him, flowing forth and overwhelming the fire dragon, which subsequently disappeared without a trace. Then the light spread to fill the kingdom of fire, filling it with incomparable brightness.

“Godlight? Eighty-one cycles of reincarnation? That’s the Cardinal Grand Brahma Punishes the Fire God Energy Art!” There was no way that August Patriarch Fire Dragon could ever have guessed that his own energy art would be so easily dispelled. “You actually cultivated that art to the level of eighty-one cycles of reincarnation?”

“That’s exactly right!” Yang Qi said. “Why else do you think I would be confident enough to try to rob you?”

August Patriarch Fire Dragon burst out laughing. “Are you kidding me? You think that qualifies you to beat me? I'm a Godmyth! You can’t just ignore the disparity in our levels. Perhaps if you had cultivated all of the five phases energy arts to the perfect level of eighty-one cycles, you would have a chance. But that's impossible. The only way that could happen would be if the god Brahma was resurrected and did it himself.”

“Is that so? Wow, you really are ignorant.” All of a sudden, five streams of godlight appeared behind Yang Qi, which shot toward August Patriarch Fire Dragon, pulsing with godliness as they destroyed everything in their path.

“What? You really have all five cultivated to perfection? How is that even possible?” At first, a look of terror appeared on August Patriarch Fire Dragon’s face, but it was quickly replaced with glee. “A genius. You’re a top genius! Boy, did I get lucky today. There’s no way I’ll let someone like you become my apprentice. No, you have a special constitution, so I’ll just kill you, assimilate you, and take that constitution for my own! My cultivation is going to rise to new heights! I’ll definitely reach the Deathless Throne now. Heaven is helping me! Heaven is on my side! Heaven-Dragon Paragon Seal!”

WHIZZZ!

He thrust out his palm and an enormous sealing mark of true energy shot out, which slammed into the five streams of godlight and crushed them.

“Those five phases godly-class energy arts are incredible, but sadly your cultivation level is just too low!”

Chapter 636: Big Fight

“Did you really think those five phases are the only energy arts I have? Actually, I just used them as a ruse. Take a look at my real trump card!”

RUMBLE!

Yang Qi’s Angel Wings unfurled and he unleashed the Hand of the One God, sending out a fist strike with such speed that, before August Patriarch Fire Dragon could react, it was right on top of him.

In the long night, thoughts run wild; how can the dao of immortality be obtained?

There were nine stances that made up the Hand of the One God, and the final stance was Immortality! All creation turned pitch black, creating a sea of suffering that no person could possibly cross and ensuring that the other shore of pāramitā would never appear for all eternity.

This fist strike vastly surpassed the five phases godlight. It was an energy art from the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, something that even the ancient Brahma would have acknowledged as superior to him.

In the blink of an eye, August Patriarch Fire Dragon found himself in incredible danger. As a top expert of cultivation, he immediately realized that Yang Qi was someone who could not be easily dealt with. In fact, he was no weaker than a Godmyth patriarch.

“Paragon Seal!” he shouted, throwing his hands out in front of him and sending a paragonic sealing mark out to meet the incoming fist strike. The two moves collided and Yang Qi staggered backward, leaning to the side as if he might fall. To any observer, it would seem obvious that he was unable to stand up to the full-powered attack of a Godmyth patriarch.

‘This is my chance!’ August Patriarch Fire Dragon prepared another attack. Flames enveloped his body as his fingers curved into hook-like claws that slashed toward Yang Qi's chest. Clearly, he wanted to rip his heart out then slash him to pieces.

“You fell for it,” Yang Qi said with a cold smile. Suddenly, he vanished, and an enormous spell formation flared to life. Vital energy exploded in all directions, throwing everything into disarray as primal-chaos planets popped into being and dropped down toward August Patriarch Fire Dragon.

“A formation made from King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans?” August Patriarch Fire Dragon said. A broad smile appeared on his face. “You moron! I can’t believe you think you could use the talismans to trap me. Do you know how many more of them I have than you? Talisman Transformation!”

WHIZZZ!

Rumbling sounds echoed out as a thousand talismans swirled around August Patriarch Fire Dragon, combining with him as he transformed into a primal-chaos elder-snake. Opening his mouth, he prepared to consume the descending primal-chaos planets. In the blink of an eye, the formation collapsed.

“What?” Yang Qi blurted, spinning in place. Then he flapped his Angel Wings and sped away in the opposite direction.

“You think you can get away?” There was no way that August Patriarch Fire Dragon was going to let a genius like Yang Qi slip through his fingers. He wanted to devour him and stabilize his path to the Deathless Throne. At this point, having extra snakecharms would just be the icing on the cake.

Yang Qi didn’t respond to his words. He just fled at top speed, leading to a chase that quickly turned into a days-long affair.

As the days and nights passed, Yang Qi would occasionally stop to fight August Patriarch Fire Dragon. Each time, he always had the disadvantage. His cultivation level was just too low. He could handle everything up to ninth stage Demolishers, but when it came to Godmyths he just wasn't strong enough. Thankfully, he had gone into the fight fully prepared, and although August Patriarch Fire Dragon had the advantage, he wasn’t in a place to defeat him.

But in the end, August Patriarch Fire Dragon was an invincible Godmyth. And considering he had some of King Heaven-Devourer’ talismans, it was an easy thing for him to use them to replenish his vital energy. So if things kept going on the way they were, August Patriarch Fire Dragon would eventually come out on top. Even as the fight dragged on, he grew more and more confident in being able to secure victory.

“You thought you could hook a big fish, didn’t you, brat. Instead, you brought catastrophe down on your head. You didn’t hook a fish, you hooked a dragon!” Over and over, August Patriarch Fire Dragon lashed out in the hopes of getting his hands on Yang Qi.

If he could only capture him, he could use any number of godly-class energy arts to seal him. Unfortunately, Yang Qi’s Angel Wings made him very fast and slippery.

All of a sudden, Yang Qi said, “I'm done playing games, August Patriarch Fire Dragon. Keep your imperial snakecharms safe until I come back for them!”

An enormous spatial portal appeared in front of him, which he ducked into and then vanished.

“Hmm?” Surprised, August Patriarch Fire Dragon sent some divine will out to check the portal, which he found to be very strange, and was likely a trap. However, he was the kind of person who believed that true confidence stems from superb skill, and felt that he had nothing to fear. Besides, there was no way he was just going to let his prey escape. ‘I don’t care where you try to hide. You won't be able to escape my clutches.’

Transforming into a primal-chaos elder-snake again, he shot into the spatial portal.

A moment later, the portal winked out of existence.

Yang Qi looked around and found himself in a place that abounded with the power of monarchs. Then he turned and waited for August Patriarch Fire Dragon to arrive.

Sure enough, August Patriarch Fire Dragon was following close behind. Upon arrival, he looked around suspiciously. Considering the energy of monarchs that he sensed, he was already certain that he was in some sort of magical treasure.

Walking forward, he looked at Yang Qi and said, “Where are we, brat? Inside some sort of god item? You think that you can trap me in here or something? What a laugh. To me, your divine abilities aren’t worth a thing! You’re just throwing your life away, and wasting a god item as well.”

“I think not,” Yang Qi said, chuckling. “You really are an ignoramus, aren’t you, August Patriarch Fire Dragon. You don't know what god item this is? Well let me tell you, not even someone from the legion of gods would be able to take it away from me. Take a moment to examine your surroundings. Do you sense the power of monarchs? Is that something you can fight against?”

“The power of monarchs?” August Patriarch Fire Dragon’s face twitched a bit as he took a moment to inhale deeply and analyze the power around him. All of a sudden, four words appeared in his mind. “Is this the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart?”

“Exactly. We're in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart! Let me ask, do you really have a plan to escape from a place like that?”

“What? The Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart? Impossible. It only opens once every ten thousand years, and it opened up just a short while ago.”

“If I couldn’t open an entrance at will, then how did we get here?” Yang Qi asked. “How else could I fight you? I lured you in here because there are plenty of things in here that I can use to my advantage. So now, let’s see what you're capable of.”

“You can open an entrance to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart any time you want? No wonder you have so many imperial snakecharms.” It only took a moment for August Patriarch Fire Dragon to recall various legends and stories he had heard. “This is amazing! You're really a miracle. No wonder you managed to evade me, a Godmyth patriarch. And no wonder you thought you could take my talismans. Unfortunately, I need to kill you to get everything I want. So prepare to die! It took me tens of thousands of years to cultivate the Myriad-Dragons Holy-Pilgrimage Faith-Master God-Dao! See how you fare against an invincible dragon god!”

He threw his hands above his head as he performed a powerful summoning. Instantly, dragon god power erupted and he was surrounded with deathless godliness. His power rocketed to tenfold its previous level, and he looked at Yang Qi with vicious, greedy eyes.

The Myriad-Dragons Holy-Pilgrimage Faith-Master God-Dao was an ancient divine ability of the heaven-dragons.

Supposedly, the heaven dragons were almost like god-spirits. Some were even born as immortals, and, in the past, many had become Godmyths who could rival the legion of gods.

Right now, August Patriarch Fire Dragon was using a secret magic to connect to a certain mighty immortal world that was legendary in every aspect of the word. It was called the Eight Tribes Heaven! Supposedly, the Eight Tribes Heaven was filled with ancient heaven dragons and god dragons. It was an immortal world that existed on the same level as the Tusita Heaven.

“Ah, what a pity, August Patriarch Fire Dragon. Not even divine abilities like that can harm me. In the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, you can’t achieve cultivation breakthroughs. In contrast, I have partial control of this place and have access to power that will lead to breakthroughs.” Yang Qi waved his hand, and suddenly numerous passageways opened up around him, connecting to the outside.

“It’s time to break through to the third stage, Thought-Demolishing. And then the fourth, Origin-Demolishing!”

At long last, Yang Qi was facing his tribulations and making a breakthrough.

Chapter 637: Immortal General

Yang Qi had been suppressing his cultivation base for some time now, just waiting for the right time for his breakthrough.

Now, he planned to use the tribulation to brand his soul to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, which, after enough time passed, would enable him to turn it into a second nascent divinity.

Normally speaking, not even Godmyth patriarchs could achieve breakthroughs in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. But Yang Qi had King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy medallions, which enabled him to connect to any of the many heavens and draw on the requisite vital energy and magical laws.

The Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart had been created when King Immortal-Slayer and King Heaven-Devourer devoured countless immortal worlds and combined them together. Now that Yang Qi understood more about the profound secrets of the thing, he was able to make its essence part of him and use it as if it were his own power.

He had intentionally lured August Patriarch Fire Dragon into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart so that he could achieve a breakthrough there, or even multiple breakthroughs, and take advantage of that circumstance to create a deadly spell formation to kill August Patriarch Fire Dragon. After all, there was no way August Patriarch Fire Dragon would be able to flee the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, which meant that he was fully in Yang Qi’s control. The Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart was a god item so powerful that it could even trap almighty members of the legion of gods. Although Yang Qi was only capable of drawing on a fraction of its power, right now, it was still more than enough to deal with August Patriarch Fire Dragon.

As the deadly heavenly tribulation descended on Yang Qi, a primal-chaos elder-snake appeared behind him and simply devoured the tribulation. Normally speaking, facing tribulation was a terrifying and painful thing, and could be made even more dangerous if onlookers tried to take advantage of the situation.

But Yang Qi felt very safe dealing with tribulation in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. After acquiring so many of King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans, he could devour anything—even tribulations. It was for that reason that, throughout history, cultivators often used the snakecharms as protective talismans.

In the Lifeseizing level, even one of them would be enough to propel the drive to the Legendary, Great Sage, or sometimes even Demi-Immortal level. After all, the ability to devour tribulations and turn them into power for oneself made it that much easier to rise through the levels of cultivation.

‘What? He’s facing tribulation? Don't tell me he’s going to try to reach the Godmyth level!’

August Patriarch Fire Dragon began backing away, until he realized that the tribulation clouds were not those associated with the Godmyth level. Instead, the fluctuations were those of the third or fourth stage of the Demolishing level.

In other words, this opponent was only a second stage Space-Demolisher, an immortal warrior.

Normally speaking, August Patriarch Fire Dragon viewed people like that as ants, or at best slaves. He could kill thousands of them with a mere exhalation. Yet here this person was, able to hold his own in a fight. How terrifying was that?

If Yang Qi had been a ninth stage Dao-Demolisher, then August Patriarch Fire Dragon might have felt a bit better. After all, there were consummate geniuses with special constitutions who were known to be able to fight Godmyths while only in the Demolishing level. But for a second stage Space-Demolisher to be able to do so was literally unheard of. There weren’t even stories of things like that happening in ancient times. Not even children of the gods had been able to do that.

“Who exactly is this guy? He’s a second stage Space-Demolisher, but he can fight me to a standstill?” Yet again, August Patriarch Fire Dragon’s terror soon turned into glee. “This is incredible! In fact, it couldn't be better. How did he cultivate his constitution? Well, it doesn’t matter. I'm going to take it and use it to reach the Deathless Throne! Prepare to die, boy!”

He waved his hand, transforming into an enormous snake yet again, and devouring the heavenly tribulation in his path as he shot toward Yang Qi.

“I don’t think so!” Yang Qi said. Continuing to devour the tribulation, and power up as he did, he drew on the powers of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart to cause an enormous hand to appear, which shot forward and snapped down onto the mouth of the enormous snake.

“You’re not going to escape this, August Patriarch Fire Dragon. You might be a Godmyth, but we're in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, which means I can cut you down.” More heavenly tribulation descended, and chaotic flows of vital energy swirled around Yang Qi as he continued to grow stronger.

Meanwhile, an enormous megamammoth appeared behind him, which inhaled the primal-chaos through its trunk.

“Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart? Special constitution? Unique energy arts? They’re all meaningless. Even if you do break through, boy, you’re still nothing but a piece of Demolisher trash. I can’t believe you would dare to fight a Godmyth patriarch like me. What a joke! Watch and see what people like me are really capable of!”

Howling, August Patriarch Fire Dragon spat out a mouthful of blood that transformed into a daoist painting. The painting spun rapidly, becoming a Godmyth talisman that sent down enormous pressure in all directions; unexpectedly, August Patriarch Fire Dragon was actually locking down this part of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

Then he made a grasping gesture, and a god item appeared, a nine-meter-long snakelance.

Countless ancient snakes swirled around it, a clear indication that it was a powerful god item. “Do you know what kind of snakelance this is? It was once wielded by the apprentice of King Heaven-Devourer himself, King Infinisnake, who eventually joined the legion of gods! It took blood, sweat, and tears for me to get this snakelance, and it's more than enough to break through your defenses!”

Without hesitation, he stabbed out with the snakelance.

WHIZZZ!

Vibrating, the lance stabbed into the God Legion Paradise and was soon closing in on Yang Qi. Not even bothering to look in its direction, Yang Qi clenched his hand into a fist and punched it.

It sounded like countless bells slamming into each other; Yang Qi’s fleshly body was already strong enough to stand up to god items, and therefore this snakelance couldn’t do a thing to him or his fist.

“I’ll use these tribulations to become an immortal general!” Yang Qi shouted. “Fourth stage Origin-Demolishing!”

Countless tribulations converged on Yang Qi as he became an immortal general. He had just increased his cultivation levels twice, meaning that his energy arts were now four or five times as strong as before, which was a frightening thought.

Even more terrifying was the fact that his Hell Portal could now summon eighth stage experts.

Once he was an immortal marquis, that limit would increase to the ninth stage. Further breakthroughs would increase the limit of the ninth stage experts he could summon, starting with one or two lineaments, then increasing to nine lineaments.

For now, though, summoning fiend-devils was not the way to deal with August Patriarch Fire Dragon. After all, August Patriarch Fire Dragon was not only extremely powerful, the fact that he had so many imperial snakecharms meant that throwing fiend-devils at him would only be helping him get stronger.

Bursting with godly might, Yang Qi shot up into the air, surrounded by holy light as he prepared to finally start fighting back against August Patriarch Fire Dragon.

He unleashed a consummate fist strike, shattering the energy of the primal-chaos elder-snake. In the blink of an eye, the thousand talismans that made it up flashed with bright light as though he were about to assimilate them.

‘Dammit. He just jumped two cultivation levels? How is he that strong?’ August Patriarch Fire Dragon immediately unleashed a countermove. Obviously, if he lost his thousand talismans to Yang Qi right now, he wouldn’t have any hope of getting out of the encounter alive.

“I've already become one with these talismans. There’s no way you can take them away from me!” August Patriarch Fire Dragon swirled through the air to create a huge spell formation. “And I have more talismans than you! You’re doomed to lose! Just give me your talismans!”

He threw his hand out, fingers splayed, and this time it was Yang Qi’s eight hundred talismans that began twitching.

‘The perfect opportunity!’ A crafty smile appeared on Yang Qi’s face as he suddenly threw out his own eight hundred talismans, which shot right into August Patriarch Fire Dragon’s talismans.

Instantly, the two groups combined.

One thousand eight hundred and fifty-one talismans became a swirling vortex, with two expressions of will within them that began viciously fighting.

Two primal-chaos elder-snakes appeared, snapping at each other, dueling. One had a face that resembled August Patriarch Fire Dragon, and the other resembled Yang Qi.

“What? You want to have a contest of wills? You really are looking to get killed. Fine, I’ll fulfill your wish!” As the two fought back and forth, primal-chaos spread through the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

August Patriarch Fire Dragon still had the advantage, and at first it seemed like Yang Qi couldn't even fight back effectively.

“You’re not going to be killing me, boy! I'm taking your imperial snakecharms! And then cutting you down will be a simple task. You got greedy, but in terms of will, I'm far your superior!”

Chapter 638: Taking a Thousand Talismans

August Patriarch Fire Dragon once again had the upper hand. He had a hundred and forty-nine more talismans than Yang Qi, and a much higher cultivation base, so it was little wonder.

Even more terrifying, as a fire dragon he inherently possessed some of the blood of a primal-chaos elder-snake. That, and the fact that he had the lance of King Infinisnake, made his energy even more dreadful.

There was no doubt about it, Yang Qi was in a deadly struggle.

“Snakelance Bolstering!”

Without any warning, August Patriarch Fire Dragon’s snakelance suddenly crumbled, becoming a stream of quintessence energy that shot into the imperial snakecharms and doubled the power of the primal-chaos elder-snake. It opened its mouth and swallowed up the other eight hundred talismans, as well as Yang Qi.

“Perfect!” August Patriarch Fire Dragon said. “This is my trump card. It cost me a god item, but it’ll be worth it to assimilate you and your vital energy!” He burst out into hearty laughter, yet didn’t take time for celebration. Dropping down cross-legged, he suddenly exhaled a stream of fire. “You have some of King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy medallions? Hand them over! Give them to me, and I’ll make your end less painful. Otherwise, you’ll experience the terror of being roasted alive by thousands of different types of true flame!”

“Oh really?” a voice said. Suddenly, golden light appeared within the depths of the primal-chaos elder-snake. It started out as a tiny speck, but quickly spread out, causing the huge snake to twist and writhe with pain as it shone with a golden color.

“What’s going on?” August Patriarch Fire Dragon said, clearly shocked. “What’s happening?”

Yang Qi burst out laughing. “I wanted you to swallow me. That made it much easier for me to use my God Legion Seal to strike at you. You completely fell for my trick, August Patriarch Fire Dragon. In the end, you're actually not a match for me. Now give me those talismans!”

WHIZZZ!

The golden imp appeared, and August Patriarch Fire Dragon’s kingdom of fire was defeated again and again as the golden light spread.

RUMBLE!

Eventually, the primal-chaos elder-snake exploded and the golden imp reached out to grab the one thousand, eight hundred and fifty-one talismans before they could fly away.

POP!

Yang Qi exhaled some true energy and the talismans began wriggling as golden light expunged the fire dragon branding mark from the thousand that had them.

Bloodcurdling screams rang out as the branding marks were erased, and August Patriarch Fire Dragon himself trembled as he was overwhelmed with the pain of having his vital energy damaged.

“No! How could this be happening? Who is that golden imp? And how could you possibly have a God Legion Seal?” August Patriarch Fire Dragon was one of the top leaders of an immortal world, with access to all sorts of ancient legends. How could he possibly not know what the God Legion Seal was?

For one thing, it was a blessing from the ancient legion of gods. It wasn’t something that could be searched for and found, thus it was a complete shock to find one here with Yang Qi.

August Patriarch Fire Dragon wanted to flee, but had been thoroughly locked down by the power of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Even as he struggled, the monarch power in the area surged together and a projection of King Immortal-Slayer appeared behind August Patriarch Fire Dragon.

“Stop struggling, August Patriarch Fire Dragon,” Yang Qi said, his voice booming. “I’ve summoned the soul of King Immortal-Slayer and he’s standing right behind you.”

August Patriarch Fire Dragon could sense the profoundly sinister aura behind him, yet when he turned around, he didn't see anything. The truth was that no matter which way he looked, King Immortal-Slayer would remain behind his field of vision.

But he could still sense him, and that was a terrifying thing.

He spun in place, then spun again, and again, almost like a top. But it was all to no avail.

‘Finally,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘Eighteen hundred and fifty-one talismans. That’s more than half!’

The swirling, primal-chaos elder-snake that he could now control was powerful enough that it could cause sprawling areas within the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart to turn into a true void of primal-chaos.

As the snake swirled around him, he pulsed with godpower and magical laws, deathless godpower filling every part of him.

“And now, I’ll call upon all the unclaimed talismans in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart! Come to me!” His primal-chaos elder-snake roared, and from within the depths of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, responding howls rang out and more primal-chaos elder-snakes appeared.

They were small, as each of them corresponded to a single talisman. Normally speaking, searching for them one by one in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart would have been an impossibility. But now Yang Qi could simply summon them to him.

Furthermore, he would be able to sense any talismans that were currently held by another person.

One. Two. Three….

Eventually, one hundred and forty-nine more talismans flew to join the enormous primal-chaos elder-snake. Yang Qi now had a total of two thousand of the talismans, fully two thirds of the total three thousand.

With this many talismans, he could easily crush an immortal world, and was fully as strong as a Dao-Demolisher with nine lineaments. Of course, when he finally reached the Godmyth level, the tribulation he would incite would defy imagination. In fact, it would surpass anything that any member of the legion of gods had faced in the past. Therefore, his current collection of talismans wouldn’t be enough to devour it.

Perhaps if he got all three thousand, he could.

After all, Yang Qi wasn't just a Fateless One now. He also had the constitution of a Reincarnated One and a Future One. He was a combination of three unique constitutions.

With the two thousand talismans in hand, Yang Qi unleashed devastating power onto August Patriarch Fire Dragon.

August Patriarch Fire Dragon howled in rage. He knew that he was done for, but wasn’t ready to resign himself to his fate. As a Godmyth patriarch, how could he possibly allow a mere fourth stage immortal general to defeat him?

“You think you can kill me? I’m a Godmyth! I'm eternally indestructible! I'm very nearly deathless! How could a brat like you defeat me?” Throwing his hands out, he shouted, “Myriad-Dragons Holy-Pilgrimage Faith-Master God-Dao!”

RUMBLE!

Ten thousand true dragons erupted from within him and converged on his palm as he prepared to fight to the death.

Yang Qi walked forward, and as he called on the Hand of the One God, a brilliant light spread out in all directions, completely overwhelming the Myriad-Dragons Holy-Pilgrimage Faith-Master God-Dao!

“Dragon Returns to the Sea! Eight Tribes Godfist!”

August Patriarch Fire Dragon quickly transformed into a four-headed, eight-armed entity, with each head being that of a divine dragon. Looking like he was going crazy, he began raining fist strikes down on Yang Qi, drawing on all of his vital energy.

“Divine Dragon Emerges from Water!

“Eight Dragons Fly to Heaven!

“Hornless Dragon Enters its Cave!

“Battle Dragon Retires in Peace!

“Grand Dragon Turns its Head!

“Vile Dragon Devours a God!”

In the time it takes a spark to fly off a piece of flint, a host of moves were unleashed, transforming the entire area into a reflection of the Eight Tribes Heaven and causing an enormous pagoda to appear above him.

This was an animadestiny pagoda created from his dao fruit, and was a secret incantation from that world of dragons. It was the most holy of pagodas from the Myriad-Dragons Holy-Pilgrimage Faith-Master God-Dao, the Eight Tribes Stūpa! As of this moment, the true power of the Godmyth level was on display.

Yang Qi’s true energy was blasted away by the technique, yet he still had the advantage.

“You're really putting up a hard fight. Sadly, it's useless. Prepare to die!” He threw his hands out and sagelight erupted, filled with projections of the legion of gods, all of whom were chanting curses. It was the Sagely Sacrifice, the next energy art transformation of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.

Supposedly, when the Sagely Sacrifice was cultivated to completion, it would invoke projections of the legion of gods, who would gather sacrifices for the Sovereign Lord.

“Let the glory of the Lord be preached throughout the world….”

“The blessings of the Lord will shower upon all living beings….”

As the projections chanted, the power of the Sagely Sacrifice slammed into August Patriarch Fire Dragon.

Yang Qi felt his true energy surging out of him, evaporating almost like steam. Clearly, the Sagely Sacrifice required a huge expenditure of true energy.

“Agggghhh!”

August Patriarch Fire Dragon felt himself being crushed and devastated by the Sagely Sacrifice. Not even he, a Godmyth, could stand up to it.

Chapter 639: Assimilating August Patriarch Fire Dragon

The Sagely Sacrifice had arrived.

No energy art could be used to defend against it, and in the blink of an eye August Patriarch Fire Dragon had been put in an extremely dangerous situation. All of his Godmyth powers had been vanquished, and he was now struggling just to stay alive.

However, a centipede does not stop wriggling even after being stomped on, therefore Yang Qi didn’t relax his vigilance. His gaze became like a razor-sharp saber that slashed down onto August Patriarch Fire Dragon, instantly causing his skin to split and tear.

“Damnation! I refuse to accept this! I'm an invincible Godmyth patriarch! How could I perish at the hands of someone like you? I united the Mādhyamika School! I'm eternally indestructible!” He tried again to unleash the Eight Tribes Godfist, but was completely stopped by the power of the Sagely Sacrifice.

It was true, his cultivation base was powerful, but it still wasn’t enough to stand up to Yang Qi’s Sagely Sacrifice. August Patriarch Fire Dragon had lived for over a hundred million years, and even some of the top old-timers weren’t a match for him. Sadly, he had run into the ultimate freak that was Yang Qi.

Yang Qi had the God Legion Seal, King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans, King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions, the power of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, and multiple godly-class energy arts. He had the advantage now, and there was no way he was going to let August Patriarch Fire Dragon escape.

Throwing his head back, Yang Qi howled, “Myriad Gods Sacrifice; Blessing of the Sovereign Lord!”

Dazzling sagelight irradiated August Patriarch Fire Dragon, causing his true energy to evaporate and sending a reddish mist rising up from him, within which was a host of magical symbols that contained the quintessence of his godly-class energy art, the Eight Tribes Godfist.

The Eight Tribes Godfist was a consummate martial discipline that was in no way inferior to the five phases godly-class energy art. In fact, it was particularly useful when used offensively. It drew on the godpower of the Eight Tribes Heaven, and could only be cultivated by someone with the blood of the Dragonfolk.

Yet that didn't stop Yang Qi from forcibly taking it.

“Aiiee!” August Patriarch Fire Dragon shrieked. “You fiend-devil! That’s my Eight Tribes Godfist!”

“Eight Tribes Godfist? Incredible.” As soon as Yang Qi acquired the art, he realized how incredible it was. It was divided into eight sections that corresponded to the Eight Tribes of the Dragonfolk: the Heaven, True, God, Infernal, Bone, Netherworld, Devil, and Buddha Dragon Tribes.

The godfists of each tribe were an energy art of their own right, and any ordinary person who cultivated even just one would be in command of power that could shake an immortal world.

For all intents and purposes, it was impossible to fully cultivate all eight. Not even anyone in the Eight Tribes Heaven had done so. In that respect, it was like the five phases energy arts that Yang Qi had acquired. In the Brahman Immortal World, no one had ever mastered all five, not even the legendary Proud Heaven.

August Patriarch Fire Dragon had cultivated the Heaven Dragon Tribe and the True Dragon Tribe, and thanks to King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans he had been able to negate the effects of the heterogeneous true energy.

If he had ever managed to add an additional tribe’s art, he would have been even more powerful and been able to transform into a primeval heaven dragon. With the godpower of over a hundred million heaven dragons at his disposal, he would have been able to destroy immortal worlds with ease.

But now that was all little more than a dream.

His godly-class energy arts had been taken and his imperial snakecharms were gone, making him not even half as formidable as before.

Yang Qi used the Devil-God Seal to lock him down tight, until he was little more than a statue, three inches tall and very lifelike. Yang Qi grabbed him and pronounced a curse on him, provoking a roar of defiance. Then, in the blink of an eye, Yang Qi extracted his Godmyth magical laws.

Yang Qi knew that assimilating August Patriarch Fire Dragon would be a big boost to his cultivation base. However, for the time being, he wouldn't do that. It wouldn't lead to a breakthrough, therefore he would rely on himself for his next breakthrough.

“Immortal-slaying clone!” he said, and a moment later a spatial passageway opened and his immortal-slaying clone stepped out. As of now, the clone was adorned in all sorts of god items, including rings, bracelets, garments, boots, a belt, a helmet, armor and the like.

All of them were things he had found in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, including the Mustard in Sumeru Ring, the Buddhist Bracelet of Suffering, and the Lightflame Cloud Soaring Boots. All of them were things from ancient times.

“Clone, although you have immortal-slaying power and King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions, if you run into a true Godmyth you won't come out on top. Therefore, I'm going to use the Sagely Sacrifice to impart August Patriarch Fire Dragon’s godpower to you. With that, you should be able to defeat a Godmyth, if necessary, and truly defend the Sage Monarch planetary system against any invaders.”

The power of a Godmyth patriarch couldn't be underestimated. It could shake immortal worlds and was the type of thing no one would ever take lightly.

His clone immediately sat down cross-legged and Yang Qi placed his palm on his back, sending the Eight Tribes Godfist into him.

Before long, the image of an immortal world of heaven dragons appeared above his head, roiling with vital energy in the form of dragon scales and the aura of dragons.

That dragon aura flickered as it settled onto August Patriarch Fire Dragon himself.

“No! What are you doing? You’re going to refine me into an incarnation? Stop! I’ll be a slave for you! A bodyguard! I’ll serve you for all lives and all lifetimes and never betray you! Just don’t refine me into an incarnation! Leave my will intact!” To August Patriarch Fire Dragon’s horror, he realized Yang Qi planned to turn him into a puppet by wiping out his nascent divinity.

“Leave your will behind so that you can stir up trouble later? Sorry, I don’t know you, and I don’t trust you either.” Ignoring August Patriarch Fire Dragon, Yang Qi went on with the session of cultivation, imparting the Eight Tribes Godfist to his clone and helping him with his true energy.

“I curse you!” August Patriarch Fire Dragon howled. “I curse you to never achieve a great dao!”

Unfortunately, his curse wasn’t strong enough to do anything to Yang Qi. Eventually, he stopped howling and began panting for breath.

Time passed, roughly a year or so. At that point, Yang Qi howled, “Eight Tribes Stūpa, Form!”

Bright light shone, and magical symbols wriggled like tadpoles to form into a pagoda. At that point, August Patriarch Fire Dragon let out a final shriek as he was forced into the pagoda. As of this moment, he was the pagoda, and the pagoda was him.

Then the pagoda entered the immortal-slaying clone, who immediately transformed into something very different from before. He radiated the aura of a Godmyth! And with King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions, he had even better control of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart than ever.

“Very well, my clone. Your place in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart is now even more stable.” At this point Yang Qi looked around and realized how much time had passed. ‘It’s been a whole year!?’

Thankfully, there were still two years before the mission was due. That said, there was no way he was going to give them the talismans. He had to think of a way to increase his own cultivation level to the point where he could defeat Godmyth patriarchs and destroy the entire Brahman Immortal World.

With that, he ripped open a passageway and left the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, returning to the same spot he had left from. The task of exploring the rest of the chart remained in the hands of the clone.

Back in the depths of the universe, tempests raged outside of the immortal worlds. He actually hadn’t been paying attention to where he was during the chase with August Patriarch Fire Dragon. He had just run for enough time to make the chase seem realistic, then opened the nearest spatial nexus leading to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Thankfully, he could sense the Titan Emperor Heaven, and quickly locked onto its location and began flying there.

After passing a few random immortal worlds, he reached a place that stuck out to him. ‘If I'm not mistaken, I'm in the territory of the Sage Sword Heaven, a sixth ranked immortal world. It’s actually stronger than both the Brahman Immortal World and the Regal Event Heaven and controls fifty thousand other immortal worlds in the third rank or less. And everyone there cultivates the dao of the sword.’

Yang Qi had reached the point where, with almost no effort, he could send his divine will to encompass entire first-rank immortal worlds like the Titan Emperor Heaven and devour their essence. Given a hundred years, he would actually be able to devour the entire immortal world. As for third ranked immortal worlds, he could use his divine sense to scan them in full detail.

After all, third ranked immortal worlds and lower wouldn’t have Godmyth patriarchs.

And only Godmyth patriarchs were strong enough to detect his divine will.

As it turned out, his chase with August Patriarch Fire Dragon had led him to the chaotic region of the Sage Sword Heaven, which was constantly at war with the seventh ranked immortal world, the Ancient Beast Heaven.

It was because of the general state of war and chaos that his fight with August Patriarch Fire Dragon had gone unnoticed. Normally speaking, other Godmyths who detected the fluctuations of their fight would have come to investigate.

Swish!

As Yang Qi flew along, a stream of sword light appeared that was deadly enough to slice apart millions upon millions of immortal worlds. He reached out and grabbed the sword light between his fingers; it was like a spirit snake that whipped and writhed against him, simultaneously emitting shafts of blinding light.

Yang Qi sent out a stream of fire that immediately dissolved the light.

‘That wasn’t an attack against me. It was a spark of sword energy cast off by some top expert! Incredible. It’s definitely from a Godmyth, and probably one that’s in the middle of a fight. I need to go check out the situation and see if I can turn it to my advantage. The more Godmyths I can assimilate, the better.’

Chapter 640: Incomparable Sword Dao

More sparks of sword light shot toward Yang Qi, which he grabbed. This sword light was even more powerful than the bit from before, to the point where it almost seemed to have a spirit of its own. Whoever had created sword light like this was obviously someone no weaker than August Patriarch Fire Dragon.

Obviously, this person was an expert in the dao of the sword, and also an invincible Godmyth.

Yang Qi also sensed an aura of rage, a true flame that resulted from a bitter fight with powerful opponents. Whoever this person was, they were not someone to take lightly. But there was no way he would pass up an opportunity like this.

If there were two top experts fighting each other, and both were significantly wounded, then he could theoretically have a chance to swoop in and assimilate both of them! He needed to accumulate a huge amount of power before he could achieve more breakthroughs, and he definitely needed those breakthroughs before he went back to deal with the patriarchs in the Brahman Immortal World.

So he shot toward the source of the sword energy, flitting through space like a fish swimming through water. Eventually, he found a location where an incomparably vast swath of sword energy had created a world of its own.

Thankfully, his cultivation base had improved after defeating August Patriarch Fire Dragon and getting a total of two thousand imperial snakecharms. Therefore, it was possible for him to simply devour the sword energy.

‘Is this… a godrelic?’ Yang Qi thought. Opening his Lord's Eye, he caught sight of three individuals engaged in combat within a bleak and desolate kingdom. It looked like the ruins of a castle that were as large as a planet, hanging within space-time and surrounded by spatial tempests.

One of the three figures was a young woman who wielded a long sword and fought with casual ease. Her attacks could sever heavenly rivers, and seemed like the combination of myriads of heavenly swords. In fact, her technique surpassed anything that Yang Qi had ever seen.

She was clad in snow-white clothing, making her look as pure and holy as a white lotus. She seemed completely without flaw, like the ultimate picture of beauty, a goddess descended from a divine world.

Fighting this woman were two enormous devils, pitch black and wearing no clothes whatsoever. They had long, razor-sharp fangs and weapons such as saw-tooth blades and bone staves that released towering devil energy. Obviously, they were devil emperors from the depths of hell.

And they were Godmyths too.

They were entities so powerful that Yang Qi couldn't summon them with his Hell Portals. Given his current cultivation base, his limit was eighth stage immortal emperors, or possibly ninth stage sovereign of heavens.

From what he could tell, he would probably need to wait until he was a Godmyth before he could summon monsters like this. Even at the point when he had nine lineaments on his dao heart, he would still be limited to fiend-devils in the same cultivation level as himself. At least, he was fairly certain of that.

The reason was that Godmyths were very close to the Deathless Throne, which changed the summoning requirements.

“Immortal Maid Ice Spirit, don’t you know what it means that we just escaped from Castle Heaven-Devil?” one of the devils said, sending out a ripple of divine will. “And here you are trying to kill us? Getting free was a big drain on our vital energy, but thankfully you showed up. We can just absorb your blood quintessence and yin vitality to get us back to full power!”

A ruthless, violent aura surged out of him like a sea of boiling blood.

‘Castle Heaven-Devil?’ Yang Qi thought, a bit surprised. He had never seen any real-life heaven-devils. Rumor had it that they came from a hell that was actually very similar to an immortal world.

Heaven-devils were like immortals and devils at the same time. And the hell they came from, or perhaps it was an immortal world, was called the Unrestrained Heaven.

Usually, there was a clear and obvious difference between hells and immortal worlds. But the Unrestrained Heaven was different—it had both the characteristics of a hell and the characteristics of an immortal world. Therefore, the beings that came out of it were heaven-devils, which were sometimes also called immortal-devils.

As for the planet-sized castle, it was a godrelic nestled in the void, filled with all sorts of mysteries and energies. And from the fluctuations rolling out of it, Yang Qi was fairly certain it served as a passageway that led to a plane of existence whose devil energy rivaled that of the Hell of Mahānata in terms of ferocity and violence.

‘Don't tell me it's a passageway to the Unrestrained Heaven,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘Not many places can outdo the Hell of Mahānata. Other than the fabled kingdom of the gods, I think the Unrestrained Heaven is probably the only one. Either way, this Castle Heaven-Devil was originally created by the legion of gods, and can suppress countless devil-gods.’

Swish!

Suddenly, an array of sword light shot out, creating numerous white lotuses which descended onto the Godmyth devils. Then, the young woman in white sent out ripples of divine will.

“You two monsters are doomed to die,” she said. “I won't allow you to damage the foundation of the Sage Sword Heaven. It’s my job to guard Castle Heaven-Devil and make sure things like you can’t escape!”

‘So, that's how it is!’ Yang Qi thought. The Sage Sword Heaven knew that this passageway was dangerous and kept it under constant guard. Yet despite how powerful this young woman was, she was having trouble dealing with the two Godmyth heaven-devils.

Even more noteworthy, Yang Qi could sense that there were sealing marks being loosened within the depths of the castle. Devil energy was pouring out of them, as though even more powerful devils were trying to break free inside. If they did, it would lead to an even bigger disaster.

Suddenly, one of the devils cackled and said, “Our brothers are about to break free from those seals. The power of Castle Heaven-Devil is waning, and its creators, the legion of gods, have all perished. Their godpower is fading away, and soon, we devils will emerge and exterminate the world of humans. Then, only devils will exist! Once those sealing marks are gone, you’ll die whether you’re willing or not.”

With that, the two heaven-devil patriarchs unleashed a devilish curse, causing the wailing of ghosts and weeping of gods to echo out.

The young woman in white stumbled backward, looking very much like she was about to lose the fight.

At this point, Yang Qi decided to take action. “All who follow the dao of immortals are duty-bound to rid the world of devils and demons. Don't worry, miss, I’ll slaughter these devils for you!”

A blinding stream of fire dragon true energy shot out, concealed within which was a primal-chaos elder-snake. In the blink of an eye, the devil energy that had just been released was gobbled up.

RUMBLE!

Then Yang Qi appeared right in front of one of the devils, whom he struck viciously with both hands, causing him to cough up a huge mouthful of blood. Not too long ago, Yang Qi would never have dared to ambush a Godmyth like this. But after all of his recent gains, including his clone’s mastery of the Eight Tribes Godfist, he had improved significantly.

His sudden attack, and the severe wounds it had inflicted on the devil, immediately brightened the young woman’s spirits.

Relying heavily on the speed provided by his Angel Wings, Yang Qi unleashed another attack before the devil could even react. This time, he backed his strike with the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, sending the power of the Sagely Sacrifice right into his opponent.

“Aaaiiiieee!”

A look of profound shock appeared on the devil’s face at this sudden turn of events.

“Devil-God Seal!” Yang Qi poured more of the Sagely Sacrifice into the devil, along with a stream of sealing marks. At the same time, he chanted the Eternal Heavenly Aria, causing halos of damnification to fill his enemy as he simultaneously used King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans to devour his vital energy.

All of this happened within only a few breaths of time! The devil exploded, and the fragments turned into a tiny imp that screamed with agony as Yang Qi viciously sealed it.

Yang Qi burst out laughing at the fact that he now had a Godmyth devil under control.

Spinning, he faced the other heaven-devil.

This heaven-devil had been completely incapable of reacting as Yang Qi defeated his companion. Now, he was obviously at a big disadvantage.

The young woman didn’t hesitate and began peppering him with deadly sword strikes. At the same time, Yang Qi burst into motion. Clamping his hand down onto the heaven-devil’s head, he locked the thing down so that it couldn’t move. Then he sent out a stream of primal-chaos energy that tightly wrapped it up.

The young woman sheathed her sword and looked at Yang Qi for a moment. “Many thanks, Daoist Brother. Without your help, those heaven-devils would have escaped, and the consequences would have been too horrible to contemplate. That said, you only sealed them. You need to be very careful; if they somehow worm their way into your spirit, you could easily experience cultivation deviation.”

“I’ll be fine,” Yang Qi said, chuckling. “And there’s no need for thanks. I happen to cultivate a technique that uses heaven-devils as fuel. Assimilating them will be a big boost to my cultivation base. Miss, I actually need to thank you. Without you here, I would never have been able to take out these heaven-devils so easily.”

“You can use Godmyth heaven-devils as fuel?” The young woman was visibly shocked, and at the same time, wary. ‘Who is this guy? He must be some consummate expert.’

Chapter 641: Castle Heaven-Devil

To this young woman, Yang Qi was profoundly mysterious. He popped on the scene, then quickly and efficiently captured two Godmyth heaven-devils, who he then claimed he would assimilate. Yet she could sense that he was only a Demolisher, a cultivation level that she would normally completely dismiss. But considering how he had handled the two heaven-devils, she was definitely not looking down on him now.

At the moment, her assumption was that he must be hiding the true level of his cultivation base and was actually an incredibly powerful patriarch of some sort. There didn't seem any other explanation for how someone so weak could take out two Godmyths.

Truth be told, this young woman was herself a high-ranking matriarch from the Sage Sword Heaven. As someone tasked with guarding Castle Heaven-Devil, she was the type of person who few people could beat in a fight.

Yang Qi could sense her suspicions, but didn't go into any explanation about his cultivation level. At the moment, he preferred to keep things a bit of a mystery. “Miss, did I hear them call you Immortal Maid Ice Spirit?”

As he spoke, he allowed a bit of August Patriarch Fire Dragon’s aura to seep out to reinforce her conjectures that he was really a Godmyth patriarch.

“You overheard those two monsters, Daoist Brother?” She smiled. “Yes, you can call me Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit. Many thanks for your help here. Unfortunately, the vital energy of heaven and earth has changed recently, and the seals here in Castle Heaven-Devil have been weakening. In a few decades, they’ll likely break completely and allow hordes of fiend-devils to emerge. If that happens, my immortal world is going to be in great danger, and blood and carnage will reign.”

“Oh?” Yang Qi thought for a moment. “Would I be right in speculating that Castle Heaven-Devil has a passageway leading to a boundless heaven-devil world, the Unrestrained Heaven?”

“That’s right,” she said with a nod. “A member of the legion of gods created Castle Heaven-Devil countless years in the past to lock down that passageway. You see, hells number as many as the eternal sands of the universe, and the Unrestrained Heaven is unique among them all. It is where countless devil kings gathered, and if the way to that hell is opened by means of this castle, it would be the springboard for a hellish invasion that will lead to the destruction of countless immortal worlds. In fact, even just the heaven-devils sealed in the castle would be a disaster beyond imagination. In the end, it would take intervention from a thirty-third ranked immortal world to defeat the invasion. Senior, could it be that you have a method to strengthen those seals?”

At this point, Yang Qi couldn’t help but ask, “Are you telling me the Sage Sword Heaven has entrusted a matter this important to only one person?”

“Daoist Brother, are you saying my sword technique is deficient?” she asked dryly. “I'm one of the Eighteen Sectlords from the Sage Sword Heaven, and there is no one more qualified than me to stand guard here, and also, no one stronger.”

“You misunderstand me, miss,” Yang Qi said. Obviously, Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit was a proud individual, and a top leader of her immortal world. “What I meant was that considering this is a passageway to the Unrestrained Heaven, you would think that it would be guarded by a hundred Godmyth patriarchs, not just one.”

“Well, that’s true,” she replied, her expression softening a bit. “Actually, we Eighteen Sectlords take turns keeping watch here. The heaven-devils that occasionally get free from the seals make for good training. Right now, I'm at the peak of the first division of the Godmyth level, the Seer God level. Soon, I’ll reach the second division, the Tempered God level. You see, if a heaven-devil breaks free, it could be the perfect opportunity to push toward another breakthrough. Unfortunately, it was to my complete surprise when two heaven-devils came out.”

“I understand,” Yang Qi said. “Well, Castle Heaven-Devil is a godrelic, so it shouldn’t be taken lightly. Look, how about this. Why don’t we let a few more heaven-devils out? My technique is specifically designed to crush all kinds of devils and monsters. And if I can get enough heaven-devils, I can fully cultivate my Devil-Suppression True Body! Afterward, I’ll help you secure Castle Heaven-Devil from the outside, or perhaps join you in entering to explore a bit.”

“That sounds splendid,” Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit replied. “I was thinking the same thing, I just didn’t want to be presumptuous. Although, you do realize that Castle Heaven-Devil is a very dangerous place, right? There are multiple levels, and the deeper you go, the more powerful the sealed heaven-devils are. I'm only strong enough to train on the first level, as the heaven-devils there are all Seer Gods. But if you go deeper, you can find Tempered Gods, or sometimes even terrifying Incarnated Gods.”

“Sounds like a good opportunity for me,” Yang Qi said, and he wasn’t exaggerating at all. Each Godmyth heaven-devil that he acquired would be incredibly beneficial, and would help during his future breakthroughs.

Although Yang Qi could enter hell at any time to try hunting Godmyth fiend-devils, it was easier said than done. Getting a solitary fiend-devil of the right level would be difficult, and if he were to be mobbed it could quickly turn into a disaster. However, here in Castle Heaven-Devil, it would be possible to unseal individual fiend-devils, which would be much more manageable.

Besides, if he could absorb some of the energy of the Unrestrained Heaven, it could lead to some very impressive power stones. They would likely be superior to Tusita Heaven power stones.

Yang Qi’s current goal was to reach the Godmyth level as quickly as possible. If he succeeded, the endless immortal worlds would be his to subjugate. His Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth would reach a higher level, and he might even be able to take the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart as a magical treasure.

At that point, he would also be a lot more confident in handling Proud Heaven, assuming he hadn’t reached the Deathless Throne by then.

“There’s no time to lose. Let’s get going.” Yang Qi waved his sleeve, sending out a stream of energy that entered Castle Heaven-Devil and suppressed much of the devil energy inside. Before, the castle had been twitching and vibrating almost as if it were alive, but now, it settled down. Considering the place was merely planet-sized, it was only natural that Yang Qi could envelop the whole thing with his energy.

‘That really is an impressive devil-subduing magic,’ thought Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit. She had stood watch over Castle Heaven-Devil for many years, and knew the terrifying nature of the devil energy inside. That energy had only been growing stronger in recent years, leading to the sealing marks getting weak. For years, the castle had actually been considered a holy land of cultivation, a place the Eighteen Sectlords took turns training in.

Now, though, it was a place where life-and-death battles were often fought.

Yet Yang Qi had sent out a soft energy flow and almost immediately dispelled that dangerous devil energy. It was also possible to hear heaven-devils inside, howling in agony.

Smiling faintly, Yang Qi said, “Come on, Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit. Let’s get inside. I've negated the devil energy, which should stop the seals from weakening. Now we can go in and slaughter some fiend-devils.”

“Quite the domineering one, eh?” she replied. “Alright, but I'd better benefit as well. Some of those sealed fiend-devils have magical treasures and even god items.”

“That’s fine. How about this. When we kill a heaven-devil, I get the corpse, and you get whatever magical treasures or medicinal pills they have.”

“Alright,” she said, grinning from ear to ear. “Besides, I'm not interested in trying to assimilate the corpses. The risk of backlash from the devil energy would be too severe. Actually, beating them in a fight isn’t the hard part—killing them is. You see, heaven-devils have infinite shapeshifting abilities, and that's especially true of those in the Godmyth level. They can even turn invisible. As for me, it would take about ninety-nine percent of my true energy to completely wipe a heaven-devil out of existence. But you can do it with almost no effort, so this arrangement couldn’t be better.”

With that, the two of them entered Castle Heaven-Devil.

The inside was a sinister and dark place, in which streams of devil energy still wafted to and fro. One might have expected the place to smell acrid and vile, but it was actually the opposite; a fragrant aroma filled the air, sickly sweet like countless flowers.

Yang Qi extended his arm and pulled streams of devil energy into his hand, where it eventually formed a conglomeration the size of a sesame seed. Shockingly, it was a power stone that was vastly stronger than those from the Tusita Heaven.

‘This thing is incredible!’

With that, he began absorbing more of the devil energy and sending it right into his God Legion Paradise to be devoured by the primal-chaos elder-snake there. The snake dissolved the devilishness, then started producing a pile of stones.

Slowly but surely, the surrounding area within the castle began to brighten up.

Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit watched in shock as it all happened. ‘Who is this guy? And how can he absorb that devil energy like that? I have to recruit him. He would be a huge asset to the Sage Sword Heaven.’

Chapter 642: Eruption of Magical Power

As Yang Qi sucked away the devil energy in Castle Heaven-Devil, its true visage was revealed.

It was actually formed from stone, and appeared to have been naturally formed. When Yang Qi sent his true energy into it, the energy disappeared like a statue of an ox tossed into the sea.

That was quite a shock to Yang Qi. After all, his true energy could assimilate god items, yet did absolutely nothing to the stone that made up this castle. He had to wonder exactly what this stone was.

At a certain point, he realized that the stone contained something that seemed like the flesh and blood of a god-devil. It was twitching and wriggling, and seemed capable of absorbing any power that was used against it and sending it to other planes of existence.

‘Don’t tell me this Castle Heaven-Devil can redirect power to the Unrestrained Heaven? If so, does that mean that not even the strength of the legion of gods would be sufficient to destroy it?’

Deep within the castle were a host of pillars, covered with magical symbols that looked like blood. Obviously, those pillars were locations in which devil-gods were sealed.

Some of the pillars abounded with devil energy, creating isolated kingdoms around them, some of them hundreds of kilometers from end to end. Such kingdoms echoed with howls of rage and the sound of chains clanking against each other.

‘Who would have thought that this place would have so many Godmyth heaven-devils sealed inside? If they did escape….’ Yang Qi almost couldn’t wrap his mind around the concept.

Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit had entered the castle with utmost caution, keeping herself wrapped up in a black cloud. But after Yang Qi cleansed the castle of devil energy, she was even more convinced that he was a person she should make friends with.

“Daoist Brother, I still haven’t had an opportunity to ask you for your name.”

“You can call me Yellow Future,” he replied. If he were doing something treacherous, he would have no problem using his Hu Yanmeng identity to cause problems for the Brahman Immortal World. But there was no need for that now. Therefore, he drew inspiration from the young man in yellow, who was a Future One, to come up with a new assumed name.

“Yellow Future?” Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit murmured.

Eyes flashing, Yang Qi said, “See that pillar up ahead? That appears to be the weakest of the heaven-devils. In fact, it seems to be hovering on the brink of death already. Let's start with that one.”

He extended his hands and four streams of true energy shot forth, shaped like dragons. When they slammed into the pillar, it trembled violently, as though it might collapse at any moment.

All of a sudden, a stream of devil energy appeared, accompanied by a cackling voice. “Sage Sword Heaven scum! You finally fell for my trap! I made myself seem weak in the hopes you would attack me! Now I can free myself and slaughter you all!”

The devil energy transformed into a devil hand that slammed into the four streams of dragon energy from the Eight Tribes Godfist. Then the pillar began to crack and crumble as an enormous devil-ghost appeared. It had green skin, white hair, red eyes, long fangs, and claws that were fully nine meters long. Without any hesitation, it used a devil art to attack Yang Qi.

“Heaven-Devil Phantom Projection!”

It was a consummate devil art that used illusory projections to pull people into a world of illusions.

“That's the Heaven-Devil Phantom Projection Grand Energy Art! Be careful!” Shocked, Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit slashed her sword out to defend herself.

“I’m fine,” Yang Qi said. Even as the devil-ghost claw descended onto his head, he opened his mouth. As he did, he physically vanished, leaving behind only a gaping maw of primal-chaos with razor-sharp teeth. The mouth lunged forward and gobbled up the Godmyth heaven-devil, immediately beginning to chew it up, and provoking agonized shrieks.

Afterward, the mouth transformed back into Yang Qi, who glowed with devil light.

He now had three Godmyth heaven-devils, all of them Seer Gods, which indicated that they had only just begun to glimpse the dao of gods. That said, they were still in the Godmyth level, which meant that they had already cultivated their virtual godhood.

Assimilating them would give him access to a huge amount of raw power. It was a level of power so unimaginable that he couldn’t even begin to quantify it. All he knew was that based on what he could sense inside of him, he was pushing toward a breakthrough into fifth stage World-Demolishing.

Obviously, he wouldn’t make that breakthrough here, though.

‘With these heaven-devils’ will and virtual godhood, I should be able to combine the different facets of the Eight Tribes Godfist. Combine the Eight Tribes into one, and eight dragons together.’

Virtual godhood was second only to deathless godliness and could lead to all sorts of power. In fact, if he used his Sagely Sacrifice on it, he could convert virtual godhood into the godpower of the Sovereign Lord. And with enough power, he could do with the Eight Tribes Godfist exactly as he had done with the five phases godly-class energy arts.

In its perfect state, the Eight Tribes Godfist would be even more powerful than the five phases arts. He would be able to connect to the Eight Tribes Heaven—a place like the Tusita Heaven—to take its power and magical laws.

The Eight Tribes Heaven, the Tusita Heaven, and the Unrestrained Heaven were all peak locations within the immortal worlds, thirty-third ranked heavenly worlds. As for the Unrestrained Heaven, its combination of devils and immortals made it high even among those thirty-third ranked worlds. In fact, it was like a kingdom of half-gods.

Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit saw Yang Qi’s aura surging and noticed the passageway he had opened, as well as the dragon-scale-like magical symbols falling onto him.

Eventually, the eight streams of energies transformed into eight different types of dragons, four of which were virtually corporeal. On the other side of the passageway, it was possible to see an entire world of dragons whose cultivation base surpassed her own.

‘He cultivates the Eight Tribes Godfist, the combination of the godly-class energy arts of eight different tribes of dragons. Anyone who cultivates them all will become the king of all dragons, their god! Does he really think he can do something like that?’

Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit was a Godmyth patriarch from a seventh ranked immortal world, the Sage Sword Heaven. She was stronger and more important than even the patriarchs from the Brahman Immortal World, and was vastly more informed than them. Therefore, it was no wonder that she recognized the incredibly famous Eight Tribes Godfist. According to legend, the Dragonfolk existed in all civilizations. In fact, most immortal worlds had detailed records about them.

Right now, Yang Qi had four, which was astonishing enough as it was. Throughout history, any of the Dragonfolk who managed to cultivate four of the eight techniques could shake heaven and earth.

WHIZZZ!

A dragon appeared that was made completely of white bones. It was a manifestation of the techniques of the bone dragons, and was the fifth of the godly-class energy arts that made up the Eight Tribes Godfist.

Unfortunately, making progress within the Eight Tribes Godfist was incredibly difficult, even harder than the five phases arts.

He had only managed it because of the godhood of the heaven-devil patriarchs he had just defeated. Any further progress would be very difficult. That said, he wasn't worried. There were plenty more heaven-devils in this castle that he could use to progress further.

The Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth was actually connected to the Eight Tribes Godfist in a mysterious way, which was not the case with the Cardinal Grand Brahma Five Phases Energy Arts.

After all, dragons and mammoths were both holy creatures among the Demonfolk. Originally, megamammoth genes had been inferior to those of the Dragonfolk. However, the Sovereign Lord, ruler of the legion of gods, was worried that the Dragonfolk would eventually pose a threat. That was another reason he had created the godmammoths.

During his act of creation, he had taken the genes of the dragons into consideration, which was why the megamammoth particles in Yang Qi would become dracomammoths as part of their transformation.

When Yang Qi cultivated the Eight Tribes Godfist, he could sense how it could benefit from the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. It actually made his true energy stronger, made it even more possible to connect to the godpower of the Sovereign Lord, and improved his Blood of the One God.

‘I’ve mastered the techniques of the Heaven, Devil, God, Infernal, and Bone Dragon Tribes, leaving only the True, Netherworld, and Buddha Tribes. I have to finish the final three!”

Chapter 643: The Full Eight Tribes Godfist

POP!

Another pillar collapsed, and as the Godmyth heaven-devil emerged, Yang Qi devoured it. He was getting stronger and stronger with every moment that passed. With two thousand imperial snakecharms, he could devour immortal worlds, much less some Seer God patriarchs.

Furthermore, each heaven-devil that he devoured helped push his Eight Tribes Godfist to a higher level. In turn, that made it easier and easier for him to fight the heaven-devils. It helped a lot that they were sealed, and thus weakened and more susceptible to being injured.

Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit almost wondered if she were dreaming.

“Here, take this weapon I just got,” Yang Qi said. “It's not a god item, but it looks like the devil that created it spent a lot of effort turning it into an animadestiny magical treasure.”

He sent a stream of devil light over, which contained a devil sword. It looked like it was made from either bone or metal, although it was difficult to say for sure. It thrummed with devil energy, was as white as frost, and was inscribed with all sorts of magical symbols related to swords.

“What?” Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit said, looking visibly surprised. “This is a preheaven vital energy sword from the Heaven-Devil Unrestrained Sword Technique. It requires mixing a nascent divinity with preheaven origin metal, then refining it with five phases energy. Only then can you produce this ultimate expression of the dao of the sword. If I meditate using this sword, my own dao of the sword will dramatically improve!”

“You're right. The Heaven-Devil Unrestrained Sword Technique is full of many profound secrets. Considering your cultivation involves using the sword to reach godly ascension, you have to avoid other kinds of energy arts. I have a good friend who also cultivates the dao of the sword, but has never found the proper legacy to help him. Perhaps in the future I can send him to the Sage Sword Heaven to continue his studies. What do you think?”

Yang Qi couldn’t help but think of how hard Sword Seventeen worked at his cultivation. Unfortunately, he didn't have anyone to direct him and was thus stuck around the third or fourth stage of the Demolishing level. Considering that the Sage Sword Heaven was focused specifically on sword cultivation, and had Godmyth patriarchs, it seemed like the perfect place for him.

The thought of Sword Seventeen reminded Yang Qi of his Master, the Invincible Dugu.

‘It's too bad I have no idea where Master is. He obviously ascended to the Titan Emperor Heaven, but even after I conquered the place he was nowhere to be found. How come it seems like people who are close to me always end up disappearing? Is there some conspiracy afoot? Not even my Wheel of Fate can give me answers. Aunt Susu. Master. Mother. Could it be that Proud Heaven absconded with all of them!?’

All of a sudden, his heart sank.

“No problem at all,” said Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit. “Considering the level of your cultivation base, Daoist Brother, I would guess that you could easily master the dao of the swords if you wanted, and give some advice to your friend. Although, if he wants to come to the Sage Sword Heaven to learn of our dao of the sword, then we would welcome him. And we would treat him like an honored guest.” Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit obviously wanted to develop a good relationship with Yang Qi.

Yang Qi nodded. “That would be perfect.”

At this point, Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit hesitated, then cautiously said, “By the way, Brother Yellow, I was wondering if you could help me out with something regarding the dao of the sword.”

Pausing from his work of destroying the god-devil pillars, Yang Qi said, “Help you out? How?”

“Hundreds of years ago, there was a matriarch of the Sage Sword Heaven who reached the second division of the Godmyth level. She was entrusted with some precious treasures of our immortal world: the seven sage swords of King Life-Killer. Unfortunately, she lost her life in the depths of Castle Heaven-Devil, and I was hoping you could help me find her remains. If we succeed, you would be considered a major benefactor of the Sage Sword Heaven. And we would owe you a favor, too.”

“The sage swords of King Life-Killer?” Yang Qi said, looking surprised.

King Life-Killer was another of the numerous sworn brothers that included King Immortal-Slayer, King Heaven-Devourer, King Mourn-Parting, and King Wilds-Horn. In fact, he ranked very highly in that group, albeit beneath King Immortal-Slayer, King Heaven-Devourer, and King Mourn-Parting. According to the stories, King Life-Killer wasn't a person, but rather a consummate god item. He was a sword that eventually gained a spirit and rose to a level of power high enough to rival the legion of gods.

Rumor had it that he forged seven thousand seven hundred and seventy-seven sage swords. Just like the Mourn-Parting Heaven-Palace or the imperial snakecharms, each of those swords contained immense killing energy, and were extremely destructive in nature. As it turned out, the Sage Sword Heaven had seven of them. They were precious treasures that were considered the signature weapons of that immortal world, and had been entrusted to a top master who went on to use them against vicious monsters. Yet, contrary to expectation, that master was killed in the fighting and the sage swords were lost.

Many experts from the Sage Sword Heaven had attempted to retrieve them in the past, but unfortunately none had succeeded. If Yang Qi could do so, he would definitely be something of a hero.

‘This could be worth it,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘The Sage Sword Heaven’s dao of the sword makes them very formidable in battle. If they owed me a favor, then maybe I could pit them against the Brahman Immortal World. Right now, my cultivation base is too low to be of any advantage against the Brahman Immortal World. I definitely need to increase a few levels before I'm in that position. Besides, the Brahman Immortal World surely has some secret weapons, as well as former patriarchs like Proud Heaven who would return to defend the place. It’s not going to be easy to take over the place. But if I did, I would have access to the faith power of thirty-six thousand immortal worlds and my cultivation base would advance by leaps and bounds.

‘Yes, the safest bet on my part is to use the Sage Sword Heaven as a defense against the Brahman Immortal World.’ Having reached the conclusion that this was definitely the best idea, he nodded decisively.

“Fine, I agree. However, I really need to perfect my Eight Tribes Godfist first. Then we can head deeper in and look for King Life-Killer’s sage swords. Don’t worry, we’ll get those treasures back to the Sage Sword Heaven.”

“Alright!” Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit said, visibly pleased. “If we get them back, I promise that we’ll go through hell or high water to pay you back in any way you wish.”

It was at this point that she suddenly registered what he had just said. “Hold on. You're going to push the Eight Tribes Godfist to perfection? How is that even possible? According to the rumors, only masters from eight specific dragon tribes can cultivate that energy art. And all of the ancient daoist texts say that it’s impossible to cultivate them to the perfect level.”

“Are you kidding me?” Yang Qi scoffed. “Just because no one has done it before doesn’t mean it can’t be done. Besides, I've already cultivated five of them to the consummate level. Watch.”

POP!

He punched the nearest god-devil pillar, sending his fist inside to grab the Godmyth heaven-devil sealed within. Before it could even react, it was crushed into a bloody paste. Yang Qi quickly absorbed its energy and began glowing with boundless godlight as a result.

The heaven-devil also had an animadestiny precious treasure, a Devil-Asura śarīra, which he tossed over to Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit.

“I don’t really need this Devil-Asura śarīra,” she said, “but I can use it to create an incredible magical treasure. Add a true-spirit to it, and it will serve as the perfect guard for my mansion grotto. It will be a devil-spirit as strong as a Godmyth.”

There were thousands upon thousands of the pillars, and Yang Qi moved back and forth like a dragon among them, smashing them with impunity.

At a certain point, he struck out with both hands, hitting two pillars at the same time and dragging out two heaven-devils, which he then destroyed. He used Sagely Sacrifice to absorb their vital energy and souls, causing his own energy to rise to new heights. And of course, he tossed two new magical treasures over to Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit.

She couldn’t have been more delighted. Standing guard over this place on her own was no casual matter, and the fights with the heaven-devils were always dangerous and difficult. Never could she have hoped to slaughter them like chickens the way Yang Qi was doing.

Over the course of the next several hours, he destroyed more than a dozen pillars, netting him that same amount of heaven-devils, plus plenty of Godmyth-level treasures for Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit.

With them, she would be able to reach even greater levels of strength. In fact, she was fairly certain that, after it was all over, she would easily be able to reach the second division of the Godmyth level, making her a Tempered God.

“Destroy them all!” she suddenly said, ready to fight a huge battle with Yang Qi. In that moment, he let out a blast of destructive wind that slammed into numerous pillars, causing many of their seals to begin crumbling.

Suddenly, cackling laughter rang out. “I finally broke through the seal! Are you crazy, boy? You really think you can kill all of us?”

A host of devils shot out into the open, causing immense devil energy to suddenly fill all of Castle Heaven-Devil.

Terror gripped Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit’s heart. ‘This is bad! He’s gone crazy! He's broken all the seals of the first level. All of the heaven-devil patriarchs are coming out!’

Chapter 644: King Life-Killer

Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit was truly terrified. Numerous god-devil pillars all exploded simultaneously, and hundreds of sealed heaven-devils emerged. It was a force that could destroy anything up to a fifth ranked immortal world.

Her first instinct was to simply turn and flee.

“Calm down,” Yang Qi said. “These devil-gods are about to become a lovely snack for me. Take a look at King Heaven-Devourer!”

An enormous primal-chaos elder-snake appeared, opening its mouth and creating a massive vortex of destruction. The Heaven-Devouring Grand Formation sprang up as well, filled with churning primal-chaos that returned the entire area back to the time before everything had been created.

Pop. Pop. Pop. Pop. Pop. Pop!

One devil-god after another was sealed, then exploded into powder. Howls rang out as they were sucked into the enormous snake, atop whose head Yang Qi stood, laughing heartily. Winds screamed as he opened a channel to the Eight Tribes Heaven, causing dragon energy to swirl down into him.

Without any hesitation, he drew on the powers of his special constitution. His identity was that of a Future One, a Fateless One, and a Reincarnated One, all together at the same time.

A mysterious image featuring numerous dragons suddenly appeared behind him, this time with an additional dragon!

Now he had the arts of the Heaven, True, God, Infernal, Bone, Netherworld and Devil Dragon Tribes.

The only one left was the most mysterious and powerful type of dragon there was, the type that rivaled the legion of gods: the buddha dragon.

Legend had it that the buddha dragons were the progenitors of all other dragons, their essence and origin. It was also said that the person who founded the buddhist schools in the ancient era had actually been a buddha dragon from the Dragonfolk.

RUMBLE!

“Let the buddha dragon come. Buddha is a dragon!” As Yang Qi floated up into the air, the remaining fiend-devils stuck in the Heaven-Devouring Grand Formation were drained of their power. Some tried to flee, but it was too late.

‘My god,’ Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit thought. ‘How is this even possible? The first level of this castle has so many Godmyths! But he’s killing them all like crushing chicken eggs! How strong is this guy?’

Over a hundred Godmyth heaven-devils were killed at the same time, causing devil energy and virtual godhood to flow toward Yang Qi. Godhood was the quintessence of the magical laws of the Godmyth level, something that most people could never have the chance to gather for cultivation purposes. It was also the perfect fuel for the Eight Tribes Godfist.

“Buddha Dragon: Form!” Yang Qi shouted. All of the remaining fiend-devils exploded, their virtual godhood rushing into Yang Qi like burning godfire.

As the godfire burned, the image of another dragon appeared.

Dragons roared and golden light raged as streams of vital energy formed together into the character ‘dragon’. Yang Qi was blessed with power as he completed the perfect version of the Eight Tribes Godfist. He was the first person to have ever done it, even among the Dragonfolk!

‘He actually completed the Eight Tribes Godfist?’ Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit thought, feeling completely overwhelmed with shock. She had the feeling that this was only the first of many miracles to come from this ‘Yellow Future’.

‘Maybe he really is going to take me to find those seven swords.’

As Yang Qi reined in his abilities, his aura surged. Now that he had the perfect version of the Eight Tribes Godfist, he could fully connect to the Eight Tribes Heaven. And in combination with the perfect version of his five phases godly-class energy art, he would be virtually unbeatable in a fight.

Of course, the two techniques didn't match up to the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. But right now, using the Sagely Sacrifice was just too much of a drain on his true energy.

The first level of Castle Heaven-Devil had been cleared out, and didn’t have even a scrap of devil energy left. All of the sealed devil-gods had been slaughtered. Throughout the entire history of the Sage Sword Heaven, no one had ever done something like this.

“And now for their treasures,” he said. “Here are one hundred and thirty-eight animadestiny magical treasures that once belonged to Godmyth patriarchs. Many of them are god items, all of which I promised to you. And I always keep my word.” He waved his hand, sending all of the magical treasures flying over to Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit.

“This….” Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit said hesitantly. If she took all of the magical treasures, it would probably make her the richest person in the Sage Sword Heaven.

The Sage Sword Heaven had eighteen powerful sectlords, and although they were generally united, there was always competition between them. And their subordinates, apprentices, and disciples were always fighting and plotting against each other. Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit’s faction was neither the most powerful nor the weakest, but with this wealth she could definitely rise to the top.

‘Hmph. I nearly lost my life at Castle Heaven-Devil this time. Sectlord Emptydeath, Sectlord Vile-Crusher, Sectlord Ghost-Banisher… I'm going to crush you all. You knew that the seals here were weakening and it would be a very dangerous situation. That's why you voted me into guard duty early, in the hopes that I would die—or at least be responsible for releasing some of the heaven-devils, whereupon you could condemn me publicly. I bet you never could have guessed that someone would help me to kill all the heaven-devils, and even recover our seven lost swords. When I get back, I'm definitely going to become a Tempered God and take full control of our immortal world!’

After some thought, she looked at Yang Qi and said, “I'm truly ashamed. You killed all of those heaven-devils, and I already got more than a dozen magical treasures. I think taking any more would be downright greedy. Brother Yellow, why don’t you give these magical treasures to your own apprentices and disciples, or use them to benefit your cultivation base. Here.”

“Fine,” Yang Qi said. Obviously, Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit had a sense of propriety. Waving his hand, Yang Qi took the god items, crushed them, and absorbed their godliness.

Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit looked on mutely, never having seen anything like that happen.

“Come on, let’s go,” Yang Qi said. “The first level is clear and I’ve completed the Eight Tribes Godfist. Let’s go to the second level and see how strong the devils are there.” Up ahead was a pitch-black corridor that emitted powerful devil energy, which was none other than the passageway to the dangerous second level.

“The devil energy there is a hundred times stronger than the first level,” Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit said. “There are second division Godmyths sealed there, Tempered Gods who I'm no match for. They could kill me as easily as drinking water. If we go there, we have to be extremely careful. You know, considering you cleared the first floor, it’s going to be thousands of years before the seals have any chance of breaking. You’ve won a great victory for the Sage Sword Heaven here.”

“Don't worry, I know what I'm doing. Tempered Gods are indescribably more powerful than Seer Gods, right? Considering I can kill so many of the former, I'm not worried about trying to take down a few of the latter. And we can stick to the weaker devil-gods. After I kill a few and absorb their virtual godhood, we can reassess the situation. By the way, I'm not sure that what you just said is correct. Clearing the first level might not necessarily buy you a few thousand years of breathing room. There are mysterious transformations brewing in Castle Heaven-Devil, and I wouldn’t be surprised if, in only a few decades, this place explodes and all of the devil-gods inside are released. Your Sage Sword Heaven had better start preparing for that possibility now.”

“What? That soon? I find it hard to believe it will only be in a few dozen years. If that happens, our immortal world is doomed to be destroyed. Are you sure about this?”

“I'm sure. Come on, let’s keep exploring this place. I'm curious to learn more secrets about devils and gods.” Yang Qi wasn’t just being an alarmist. After entering Castle Heaven-Devil, he had drawn on his Wheel of Fate and learned that there was definitely some impending catastrophe looming. And now he was determined to find more information.

The pitch-black passageway spiraled down into even stronger devil energy, although it didn't pose any threat to Yang Qi.

Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit followed along nervously.

After about two hours, they reached the enormous second floor. There were no god-devil pillars, but instead altars, each of which was fully five thousand kilometers from end to end. They were made from stone and drenched in blood. Atop them lay skeletons and dried-up corpses, and a sinister breeze wafted about, carrying the wails of ghosts.

Crack!

Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit took a wrong step and snapped a bone, freeing a black smoke that rose up in the shape of a vicious face.

Looking down, she realized that there were swords embroidered on the robe which hung on the skeleton she had just stepped on. “This skeleton. It’s one of our matriarchs who died here a million years ago!”

Chapter 645: Tempered God

“I see,” Yang Qi said, picking up the embroidered robe. It was clearly a magical treasure, although it had been drained of any residual spirit energy and the formations inside it were broken. Being corroded by devil energy for so long had completely ruined it.

Next, he looked over at the crushed skeleton and waved his hand, causing it to rise into the air and return to a whole state. Then his vital energy washed over the skull, causing flesh and blood to wriggle out until the corpse’s original facial features were made clear.

“Is that… it is! It really is one of my Sect Grandaunts!” Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit was visibly shocked. “I've seen her portrait in our sect headquarters. You see, my sect is unique in that we’re led exclusively by sword matriarchs. Not all of the sects in the Sage Sword Heaven are like that. Can you resurrect her?”

“Resurrect her?” Yang Qi smiled. “No, I used a powerful energy art to get a glimpse at her face, but I can’t restore her body. Perhaps one day, when my cultivation has reached an extremely high level, I could do something like that, but not now.”

Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit let out a long sigh. “At the least, I need to take her remains back to be properly buried. She was a second division Tempered God, yet she perished in the depths of this castle. What a pity. Her death is one of the reasons why our Ice Spirit Sword Sect is in its current weakened state.”

“The fact that a Tempered God died here is a good reminder for us to be very careful,” Yang Qi said. “If my speculations are correct, the devil sealed in that altar over there is the very same one who cost your Sect Grandaunt her life.”

His eyes were locked onto an altar just off to the side. It was covered with a host of glittering magical symbols and layers of dried blood. It was also decorated with carvings of devil-ghosts, and sitting atop it was a bottle gourd. Considering the deathless godliness that it radiated, it was clearly a god item.

Truth be told, just about all of the altars in the second level had god items like this.

Although they were quite a temptation, Yang Qi knew that he couldn’t take them. If he did, the fiend-devils sealed within the altars would be freed, and that would be a huge disaster.

After all, if one fiend-devil got out, and he wasn’t able to kill it, it would start freeing other fiend-devils.

“That devil energy is so powerful!” Yang Qi murmured, looking closer at the altar. He even sent some divine will inside and saw a vast sea of blood, with some enormous entity lurking in its depths. Clearly, whatever devil was sealed here was something mysterious and unpredictable.

“Tempered Gods are so much more powerful than Seer Gods that it's hard to quantify,” Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit said. “Seer Gods have just begun to see the profound mysteries of their virtual godhood, but Tempered Gods are different. Their virtual godhood has reached the consummate level, allowing them to unleash power reminiscent of the legion of gods.”

Yang Qi definitely wouldn’t take Tempered Gods lightly. However, that didn’t mean that his hands were tied here. After all, he was dying to use a Tempered God to further his cultivation base. And given the level of his cultivation base, plus the synergy between the Eight Tribes Godfist and the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, he suspected that he might actually be strong enough to take out a Tempered God.

The main problem was that, if it turned out he wasn't strong enough to actually kill such a monster, letting it escape wasn’t an option.

“Let me think for a moment,” he said, dropping down cross-legged. After a bit of time passed, he said, “Okay, I'm going to try to kill this fiend-devil. First, I’ll set up a composite spell formation. And I’ll need your help. Use whatever sword formations you can think of to bolster the formation. Then we’ll strike simultaneously. If we can take out a Tempered God fiend-devil, it will be a big accomplishment!”

“Alright!” she replied, mustering her courage. “I know just the sword formation to use, and I’ll power it with my animadestiny quintessence-blood. It might be strong enough to take down a Tempered God.”

“Perfect!” Yang Qi said, sending out his primal-chaos elder-snake to coil around the base of the enormous altar. The altar was fully five thousand kilometers from end to end, but truth be told, that wasn't very large. Yang Qi’s primal-chaos elder-snake could consume entire planets, and even third ranked immortal worlds. So an altar like this was actually tiny.

Next, Yang Qi sent out true energy to form a banner that was fully thirty-thousand meters long, embroidered with true dragons. It emanated a majestic, holy aura that immediately began suppressing the devil energy in the area.

Then he created another banner, then another, and another. The devil energy in the area was being purified as hundreds of thousands of banners were laid out in a complex pattern around the altar. The area was soon filled with divine dragons, flying about as they prepared to crush the altar to bits.

These banners were a devil-suppressing art from the Eight Tribes Godfist. They were called the Eight Tribes Devil-Suppressing Dragon Banners, and they could draw on the magical laws and godpower of the Eight Tribes Heaven to powerful effect.

Of course, it involved a huge drain on true energy. Normally speaking, even a powerful Godmyth like August Patriarch Fire Dragon would only have been able to call on about a thousand of the banners.

The banners would disappear after being used, and could easily inflict severe injury to the vital energy of the user.

After setting up hundreds of thousands of them, Yang Qi waved his hand, causing them to fade from view. Then he flicked his finger, sending out pellets of sagelight that turned into numerous angels, who hovered there singing holy hymns to the Sovereign Lord.

WHIZZZ!

Another spell formation took shape.

Yang Qi exhaled and called on his five phases godly-class energy art, with its eighty-one cycles of reincarnation. Yet another spell formation popped into being.

“The Cardinal Grand Brahma Five Phases Energy Arts?!” Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit said as she set up her own formation, complete with thousands of swords flying back and forth. “That's a consummate art from the Brahman Immortal World. People say that it’s actually impossible to cultivate all five phases to the perfect level. How did you possibly do it? It's a miracle!”

Yang Qi smiled. “You’d be surprised how many miracles I can pull off. In fact, if you’re going to work with me, I’d appreciate it if you stop being so surprised all the time.” Waving his hand, he began to set up another formation, this one featuring countless spears, which of course were manifestations of his Infernal Deity Spear.

Three days and nights passed, during which time Yang Qi and Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit set up a whole host of enormous formations. After the main work was done, they set about adjusting their vital energy and preparing for their deadly strike against the fiend-devil.

Sometimes Yang Qi would jump into a fight without much thought, but not this time. He was being very cautious in all the preparations.

‘This area is great. I took down August Patriarch Fire Dragon, allied with Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit, and finally ended up in Castle Heaven-Devil. I originally thought it would be impossible to use the three years on my hands to reach the Godmyth level. But if I can take down a Tempered God, it might actually happen.’

Another three days and nights passed, and Yang Qi’s vital energy was back to full level.

Looking over at Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit, he asked, “Are you ready?”

She nodded. “Ready.”

“Alright, brace yourself. I'm going to remove the god item sealing the altar. Once the fiend-devil is out in the open, it's going to be a life or death battle. Win or lose, it all ends here!”

RUMBLE!

He sent out a projected hand to grab the god item, which looked like a jade bottle gourd and was filled with ancient devil-subduing godlight. Clearly, the godlight had slowly been drained away over the years and would eventually run out, at which point the fiend-devil would be freed.

Without any hesitation, Yang Qi took the bottle gourd and threw it in with the rest of his belongings.

The altar instantly began to tremble, and an expression of devil will rolled out from it.

“It’s been so long! So many years! I've been suppressed for so long. But I’ve finally broken through the ancient seals. I'm finally awake! Foolish humans. You released me all for the sake of that god item?! My thanks to you. I’ll now reward you by killing you, taking your souls, and adding them to my Blood Throne. Thus, you will live forever as my slaves.”

All of a sudden, a mountain of corpses and a sea of blood appeared, which took the shape of an enormous throne. Then a devil-god appeared on the throne. He looked like a middle-aged man clad in a blood red robe. His eyes were green, and glowed with a sorcerous light that seemingly contained the transformations of life and death from countless devil worlds.

He had long, sharp fingernails that were also blood-red, and he tapped them on the throne as he looked at Yang Qi and Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit.

All of a sudden, their vision was overtaken by endless blood and they felt their nascent divinities being overwhelmed by nightmares. It didn’t matter how many spell formations they had set up if they couldn’t activate them, thanks to being trapped in a nightmare.

‘What a powerful fiend-devil!’ Yang Qi thought. This was definitely the strongest opponent he had ever faced, yet he wasn’t about to let himself be suppressed by a nightmare. He waved his hand and a beam of sagelight shot out to activate the spell formations.

“Eight Tribes Devil-Suppressing Dragon Banners! Detonate!”

BOOM!

The hundreds of thousands of banners exploded, turning the sea of blood into a mist and causing the enormous throne to crack and crumble. Then Yang Qi began activating all of the other countless formations, sending a terrifying attack against the fiend-devil. If the fiend-devil didn’t fall, the consequences would be too horrible to contemplate.

Chapter 646: Bloodsea Heaven-Devil

The detonation of the hundreds of thousands of banners was a trump card that sent hordes of heaven dragons, true dragons, and the like against the evil, miasmic blood sea, wiping it out of existence.

This was a bloodsea heaven-devil, and as soon as the attack hit it, it howled in rage and forced its crumbling blood throne back into its original shape.

Bursting with devilishness, it shouted, “Foolish humans! How dare you ambush me! Freeing me is the biggest mistake you’ve ever made. Don’t you realize that I'm a Tempered God!? The blood sea is paragon, and it controls reincarnation! It controls everything! All creation will be overwhelmed with blood! You two are no exception! Prepare to be sacrificed to my blood sea!

“Blood Sea Cosmos!

“Blood Fills Rivers and Mountains!

“Blood Splatters on Heaven and Earth!

“Blood Devils Cometh!

“Blood World Ruins Arise!”

RUMBLE!

It attacked without regard for its own life, its sea of blood reforming overhead. It seemed invincible, almost as if it hadn’t wasted even a tiny drop of vital energy.

‘Crap, this thing really is ruthless!’ Yang Qi thought, his heart starting to pound. He had hoped that the detonation of the Eight Tribes Devil-Suppressing Dragon Banners would at least hurt this monster. Yet, contrary to expectation, it only seemed to anger it. Obviously, it was turning into a very dangerous situation.

Perhaps if it was a simple duel, Yang Qi wouldn’t have been as worried. But if this thing started destroying the god items on the other altars and freeing more devils, the fight would turn deadly very quickly.

“Imperial Snakecharms, Activate! Infernal Deity Spear Formation! Flame of Hope! Eternal Heavenly Aria!”

Countless formations activated. The primal-chaos elder-snake lunged forward with a gaping maw to devour the sea of blood, converting it to Heaven-Devouring True Energy that helped Yang Qi recover from his vital energy losses.

Millions upon millions of Infernal Deity Spears shot toward the fiend-devil, bursting with the aura of the primeval infernals.

“What’s that? The Infernal Deity Spear?! That’s the legendary weapon of the infernal deities, which can dominate everything in hell. It’s the bane of all devil-gods! How did you get it?”

The mere sight of the spear caused the bloodsea heaven-devil’s face to become a mask of terror. “No! That spear can’t hurt me. I'm a heaven-devil from the Unrestrained Heaven! I'm different from other devils. The Unrestrained Heaven is a combination of an immortal world and a hell. We have the benefits of both places! There's no way the Infernal Deity Spear can do anything to my Heaven-Devil Blood-Sea Without-Limit God-Dao!”

“Blood World: Form!”

WHIZZZ!

A blood-colored greyspace that resembled a kingdom of gods appeared, spreading out rapidly to defend against the Infernal Deity Spears.

The fact that this bloodsea heaven-devil could summon a virtual kingdom of gods indicated that it was at the absolute peak of the Tempered God level. Virtual kingdoms such as this were not true kingdoms of gods, but they were extremely powerful in terms of defensive capabilities. That said, they couldn’t match up to Yang Qi’s God Legion Paradise.

If Yang Qi were a Godmyth, then this bloodsea heaven-devil’s virtual kingdom of gods would take no effort at all for him to defeat. Unfortunately, right now Yang Qi’s level was too low. He was still just a fourth stage Origin-Demolisher. He was an immortal general that wasn’t even on the same level as an immortal marquis, much less a Tempered God.

Crack!

The numerous projections of the Infernal Deity Spear slammed into the virtual kingdom of gods, and although the greyspace was cracked and damaged, it held strong and the bloodsea heaven-devil wasn’t hurt at all.

“Myriad Sword Attack; Slaughter the Nine Provinces!”

It was in this moment that Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit activated her sword formation, launching an extremely powerful attack on the virtual kingdom of gods.

“I'm gonna defile you, slut!” the bloodsea heaven-devil howled, its eyes burning with hatred. “Bloodying Heaven Sabers!”

Gong!

Boundless blood-colored light shone out, swirling through profound and enigmatic paths until it transformed into a host of brutal and deadly-looking sabers. These were Bloodying Heaven Sabers, forged in the depths of a sea of blood, whose most casual slash could devastate universes.

The clash of metal on metal could be heard as the Bloodying Heaven Sabers clashed with Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit’s sword formation. The force of the blow traveled backward to Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit, slicing strips of flesh off of her arms with brutal efficiency.

POP!

She coughed up a mouthful of blood, clearly unable to stand up to the forces at play.

“God Legion Battle Robe!” Yang Qi shouted. In this moment of extreme danger, he flicked the sleeve of his God Legion Battle Robe, sucking in the Bloodying Heaven Sabers.

“You’re quite the formidable opponent,” the bloodsea heaven-devil said, a maddened, but serious, light flickering in its eyes. “But if you think you can deal with me, you’re wrong. I'm going to make you wish you could die, and then I'm going to free all my compatriots!”

All of a sudden, the bloodsea heaven-devil seemed to pulse with even greater power than before, as if he were about to unleash a devastating attack.

Yang Qi’s heart sank. He could devour the attacks sent against him and convert them into vital energy for himself with his primal-chaos elder-snake, so he could continue fighting for quite a while without worrying about being defeated. However, if the bloodsea heaven-devil slipped out of his grasp and started freeing its fellows, it would be a disaster.

Laughing maniacally, the bloodsea heaven-devil screamed, “Prepare to die!”

Then it shrank down into a sphere no larger than a fist. Blood-colored light flared as it transformed into an evil devil embryo!

RUMBLE!

The sphere exploded, and all of the spell formations, altars, space, vital energy and everything else in the area began vibrating.

“Blood Sea Detonation! Blood Murder Godflight!Blood Void Nirvanic Extermination!Blood Sea Without End!” In the blink of an eye, a host of energy arts unique to bloodsea heaven-devils were unleashed.

Bam. Bam. Bam. Bam!

All of Yang Qi’s spell formations were crushed out of existence, and the god items keeping the altars sealed began to shake as powerful expressions of devil will seeped out of them.

When Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit saw what was happening, she was overwhelmed with regret. ‘Finished. We’re finished! If those monsters get free, our Sage Sword Heaven is going to be destroyed. I shouldn’t have gone along with this guy’s plan. He’s too rash!’

Even as it seemed the bloodsea heaven-devil would get free and begin releasing his comrades, Yang Qi’s cold voice rang out.

“Trying to run? To where? You want me to use my trump card? Fine! You’ve forced my hand!”

Off to the side, Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit sensed a boundless and holy aura expanding, accompanied by golden light. Before she even realized what was happening, she instinctively dropped to her knees to offer obeisance.

Out of the corner of her eye, she saw a golden figure blur toward the bloodsea heaven-devil and smack it!

The heaven-devil let out an agonized shriek as the blood-colored light surrounding it shattered and it was transformed into a listless and weak devil. Yang Qi then waved his hand and opened a huge portal that erupted with the power of monarchs, which immediately wrapped up the heaven-devil.

“Finally subdued this thing!” Yang Qi said, dropping down cross-legged. Waving his hands out in front of him, he sent out streams of dazzling godlight.

Seven days and nights passed as a golden sphere formed in his hands. Inside the sphere was a struggling, blood-colored figure who screamed and howled, causing the sphere around it to ripple and distort. Obviously, the bloodsea heaven-devil was not yet fully suppressed.

“What’s going on?” Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit said, shivering. Obviously, if Yang Qi lost control, it would lead to a horrific outcome.

“I’ve temporarily sealed this bloodsea heaven-devil. However, it will take more time and effort to assimilate it. And not just a day or two. More like a year. Thankfully, it won't be freeing any of the other Tempered God heaven-devils.” In the end, Yang Qi had been forced to use the God Legion Seal. And now he knew that, at least in his current state, he couldn’t casually pick fights with Tempered Gods. That said, after he assimilated this bloodsea heaven-devil, he would be much stronger.

“So now what do we do?”

“Nothing. Let me clear out the devil energy in the area and stabilize my cultivation base. Then I’ll strengthen all the sealing marks. Why don’t you look around for the remains of that matriarch you were looking for, and King Life-Killer’s swords. Then we’ll leave. Thanks to my help, you’re going to be the most powerful and influential person in the Sage Sword Heaven, aren’t you?” After teaming up with Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit, Yang Qi had gained an ally in the form of the Sage Sword Heaven, a seventh ranked immortal world. It seemed that the destruction of the Brahman Immortal World was imminent. Of course, Yang Qi knew that now was not the time to reveal his true identity. There were surely some old-timers in the Sage Sword Heaven who, if they knew who he really was, would cause major problems. Therefore, he needed to rely on Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit to accomplish all of his aims.

“Find King Life-Killer’s swords?” At first Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit was visibly delighted, but then she frowned. “Unfortunately, I don’t think the swords are here. We probably need to go down another level….”

Chapter 647: Seven Holy Swords

Although Yang Qi had subdued the bloodsea heaven-devil, it would take time to assimilate it.

Not even King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans could help in that regard. The virtual godhood of Tempered God heaven-devils was just too tough, and Yang Qi’s overall level was too low. In fact, without his God Legion Seal, he would never have been able to defeat an opponent like this.

Therefore, spending any further time in this castle wouldn’t do him any good. However, he had promised Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit to help her search for those seven swords, which were apparently one level down. That third level was nothing to underestimate.

The sealed fiend-devils in there were all at the third division of the Godmyth level, making them Incarnated Gods. If even one of them got free, it would be a disaster of epic proportions. It was said that immortal worlds beneath the tenth rank couldn’t even produce Incarnated Gods. One had to go to higher heavenly worlds just to encounter them.

In other words, places like the Brahman Immortal World or Regal Event Heaven, or even seventh ranked immortal worlds like the Sage Sword Heaven, would never have any third division Godmyths. At most, they might have second division Tempered Gods. And when Tempered Gods reached a certain level of cultivation, they would leave their immortal world and search for a higher place to achieve their breakthrough. Because of that Tempered Gods were somewhat of a rarity in lower immortal worlds.

Yang Qi rose to his feet. “Let’s go. I have this bloodsea heaven-devil under control for now, so it won’t cause any problems. Let’s go down and see what these Incarnated God heaven-devils are like.”

“Seriously? You’re really going to go down there?” Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit clearly had some misgivings. “Those Incarnated Gods might not be able to break free from their seals, but their psychic power should still be able to assault intruders. It's going to be very dangerous down there. After all, the matriarch we’re seeking was a Tempered God, and not even she could survive. In fact, the Sect Grandaunt we just found was definitely here trying to find those holy swords, only to be killed on the second level.”

“We’ll be fine. Psychic attacks and devil energy are nothing to me. I have a profound art that can turn devil energy into the very power I need to assimilate that bloodsea heaven-devil. Going down to the next level is exactly what I need to do.” He swished his sleeve. “Unfortunately, your cultivation base is a bit low, so stick close to me. You never know, we might find something that could push you to the Tempered God level right here and now.”

‘Did he just say my cultivation base is low?’ She smiled wryly. She was an extremely powerful and important matriarch from a seventh ranked immortal world, the subject of reverence and adoration of millions upon millions of people. Never had anyone told her she had a weak cultivation base. But in the end, she had no comeback. After all, the current foray into Castle Heaven-Devil was almost one hundred percent Yang Qi’s work and had little to do with her.

Considering the danger they were about to face, she had every intention of sticking close to Yang Qi.

WHOOSH!

Speeding past the various altars, Yang Qi led the way deeper into the castle. The devil energy grew more intense, and soon it was possible to see the air twisting and distorting into what appeared to be the gaping mouths of devil-ghosts, just sitting there waiting for unsuspecting prey to devour.

Devil will formed vicious smiles and terrifying, cackling laughter could be heard. The boundless divine will of these fiend-devils could slip past the sealing marks that held them and gather devil energy that, over the course of thousands, or even tens of thousands of years, could be used to create out-of-body incarnations.

It was almost too much for Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit to take, but Yang Qi didn't seem worried at all. A primal-chaos vortex popped up around him and began to suck in the devil energy and turn it into vital energy. At the same time, a projection of the Eight Tribes Heaven appeared above him, giving him dragon gods as dharmic guards.

“Ghost-god!” Yang Qi breathed, causing a magical sealing mark to appear on his hand. At the same time, one of the gaping mouths hidden in the darkness and gloom transformed into a śarīra which dropped into his palm.

“A heaven-devil śarīra!” Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit said.

They were very close to the third level now.

Three days and three nights passed, until a new scene eventually met their eyes. Stretching out in front of them was a boundless starry sky, filled with countless devil planets.

The planets were all enormous tombs, with greyspaces of their own, pulsing with devil energy that wished to consume heaven and earth and cause all suns and moons to rot. Each of those tombs contained multiple sealed devils. Even one of those creatures could wipe Yang Qi out of existence with ease.

‘These sealed tombs are so sturdy!’ Yang Qi thought. ‘They must have been created by the legion of gods!’ Because of the memories that were locked deep within the God Legion Seal, he knew that the Incarnated God devils sealed here were definitely extremely powerful.

The numerous planetary tombs in this devil world drifted about in accord to some profound orbital arrangement. But Yang Qi, with his Lord's Eye, could analyze all of it. As for Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit, all she saw was boundless devil energy and inky blackness. In fact, the devil energy was so dense it was almost liquid, and it immediately began to corrode her defensive true energy.

“Crap, what kind of place is this? The devil energy is incredible!” The liquefied devil energy was so strong that it formed into devil hands that grasped and scraped at her defenses, prompting her to draw her sword and slash away at it.

She severed a devil hand, only to have it transform into a host of snakes that wrapped around her sword, hissing violently. If any of that devil energy pierced all the way through her defenses, she would be in horrific danger.

POP!

Seeing what was happening, Yang Qi exhaled and flames burst out to cleanse the devil energy. Then he made a grasping motion, gathering the energy into his hand where it formed another heaven-devil śarīra.

“Primal-chaos elder-snake!”

His imperial snakecharms flew out, causing intense rumbling sounds as it devoured any devil energy it encountered.

After a few hours, even Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit was able to gain a glimpse of the devil world around them, including the starry sky and the enormous tombs.

“Heaven Sword Surge: King Life-Killer!” Drawing on a profound art, she spat out a mouthful of blood that took the shape of a geomantic compass. The compass needle spun wildly as it looked for the signature swords she sought.

After a moment, the compass needle stopped moving and she said, “The swords are over there!”

Yang Qi looked over and involuntarily gasped.

The compass was pointing to a glittering tomb that had so much devil energy it was pitch black, but at the same time, jade-like in appearance. In fact, there was something about it that reminded Yang Qi of the Jade-Emperor Profound-Welkin Exalted-Celestial God-Dao. And obviously, the devilishness here was many times stronger than average devil energy.

Whatever was sealed here, it was no ordinary monster, but rather something like a devil emperor. A devil among devils.

The closer he got to the tomb, the more dangerous it felt.

It was surrounded by countless withered corpses, as well as scattered clothing and magical treasures. It seemed that, throughout the years, many experts had explored this area, only to die in front of the jade-like tomb.

“That's where the seven swords of King Life-Killer are!” Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit said. There was one particular corpse that had seven swords stacked up next to it, as well as a sword case that radiated even more energy.

“There are more than just these seven!” Yang Qi said. “Obviously, this matriarch of yours wasn’t here to kill monsters, but rather to collect King Life-Killer’s swords. King Life-Killer originally created seven thousand seven hundred and seventy-seven swords, and every group of seven that you collect gives you deeper insight into the true meaning of the Seven Killings and an incredible increase in power. Come on, let’s go get the seven swords, then see if we can collect some of the others.”

“Alright!” Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit very nearly rushed over to the swords, but held back out of fear. “That tomb is very creepy. It's made of jade? Considering the matriarch died here, could there be traps? I have the feeling that whatever monster is sealed inside that jade tomb is incredibly dangerous. What if….”

“You’re absolutely right,” Yang Qi said, nodding. “There’s a devil ancestor in that tomb that has reached the level of cultivation of being both a devil and a god. I doubt even I could handle it. That said, we still need to go in and look around. Maybe we can communicate with whatever monster is in the tomb. Besides, if I can manage to assimilate the bloodsea heaven-devil, then it's entirely possible that I could handle the situation. If not, then we just flee.”

After all, if absolutely necessary, Yang Qi could escape to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart at any time. And once he was inside, not even the legion of gods could break in to chase him.

Chapter 648: Jade-Colored Tomb

Yang Qi began heading directly toward the jade-colored tomb.

The devil energy wasn't a problem; he simply absorbed any of it that got close to him, strengthening himself. Eventually, he sensed that, if he wanted to, he could provoke the tribulation of a fifth stage World-Demolisher and become an immortal marquis.

As he slowly but surely assimilated the devil energy of the second stage Tempered God he had killed, as well as the virtual godhood of the bloodsea heaven-devil, the particles within him were stirring, as though they might soon advance from protomammoths to godmammoths.

He also drew on the godhood power of the over one hundred Seer Gods that he had taken, refining and sending it deep into himself.

In the depths of his dantian region, there was a consummate god embryo forming, which was apparently the beginnings of the next state of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.

The most current state to have been revealed was the Sagely Sacrifice. The next step was to use his animadestiny quintessence energy to form a sage child in his dantian region. This animadestiny sage child was essentially a copy of the golden imp in the God Legion Seal, and once completed, it would allow him to absorb the godpower of the halls of heaven at a speed of ten, one hundred, or even one thousand times normal.

At that point, the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth would undergo even more dramatic transformations. Thus, Yang Qi feared devil energy less and less. From what he could tell, the entity sealed in this tomb was likely a leader of this group of Incarnated Gods, and he was very curious to see what it was like.

Using his Angel Wings, he moved like lightning, heading closer and closer to the jade tomb. However, the jade-colored devil energy that surrounded it seemed very difficult to pass through.

Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit became a stream of sword light that slammed into the devil energy, and although sparks showered out, she didn't even dent it. Ignoring her, Yang Qi threw his hands wide and began spinning, turning into a spiraling blur as he tried to bore his way through. Unfortunately, it did no good.

WHIZZZ!

A jade-colored magical symbol flew out, a character from the script of the devils that was pulsing with devilishness. In the blink of an eye, Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit felt her true energy being drained away and saw scales spreading out over her skin. Her teeth extended into fangs and her hair began turning white. This was obviously some sort of devilization! As she scrambled to expunge the devilishness, Yang Qi waved his finger and she returned to her normal state.

‘This devil energy is incredibly strong,’ he thought. ‘I love it! My Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth is really benefiting!’ He felt like he was bathing in a hot spring. Inhaling, he sucked the devil symbol into him and the golden imp detonated it, turning it into raw power.

At this point, he reached the tomb.

There were bones scattered everywhere, as well as magical treasures of all sorts. Clearly, many people had met dismal ends here.

“King Life-Killer’s sage swords!” He reached out and grabbed the seven swords from the corpses, and as they connected together, they unleashed bubbling killing intent. The Greedy Wolf, the Star of Destruction, the Seven Killings, and other ancient, fiendish zodiac stars appeared. The swords were as cold as autumn frosts and winter winds, and the will of King Life-Killer within them seemed impossible to comprehend.

As soon as Yang Qi laid hand on the swords, one word filled his mind: KILL!

‘What incredible swords,’ he thought. With a wave of his hand, he sent them flying over to Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit. Of course, she had worried all along that he wouldn't live up to his word and would keep the swords for himself instead of giving them to her. Therefore, she accepted them with the most profound gratitude.

After all, without him, she wouldn’t even have been able to get past the first level of the castle.

As soon as she got the swords she began fusing with them, branding them with her sealing mark and mental dharma. As she did, the swords transformed into seven beams of godlight that hovered behind her. Her sword technique had already improved by an entire level.

Next, she looked over at the sword case, which obviously contained more of King Life-Killer’s holy swords. Obviously, she would love to add more to her collection, yet she was a bit nervous to try taking advantage of Yang Qi.

“What a nice sword case!” Yang Qi said, reaching through the jade-colored devil energy to grab it. It trembled, emitting a sound like the roar of a dragon or tiger, or countless fighters shouting “kill” at the same time.

He opened the box and a burst of sword energy emerged, mysterious and deadly.

Shockingly, there were a full forty-nine beams of sword light inside!

“My god! Forty-nine of King Life-Killer’s holy swords!? This….” Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit very nearly passed out right then and there. Just seven of the swords had been an incredible boost, probably enough to reach the Tempered God level. But to have forty-nine would be so beneficial it was almost impossible to comprehend.

“Take them!” Yang Qi said, and the forty-nine swords became silver streaks of light that shot into him. A moment later, he exhaled and forty-nine swords shot out, dazzling and scintillating. “They had very nearly been corroded into nothing by the devil energy. But I've expelled the devil energy, which will make them much easier to fuse with. And they should do a lot to help you reach the Tempered God level. Once you get back to your Sage Sword Heaven, you’ll be able to seize control immediately.”

“Many thanks! If I can do that, I’ll definitely do everything in my power to repay this debt to you.” Considering how much it had taken to reach her current level of cultivation, she was no fool. She knew that Yang Qi was helping her because he expected a favor in return.

“Don't worry, I won’t ask you to do anything outrageous,” he said. ‘Just eliminate an immortal world weaker than your own.’

With that, she sat down to fuse with the forty-nine holy swords. She now had a total of fifty-six, and once she had them all under control she was certain she could attempt a breakthrough.

However, that was when something completely unexpected happened. Without any warning whatsoever, she let out an agonized shriek and collapsed into unconsciousness.

Yang Qi reacted with complete astonishment. There had been no warning or indication of any amount of danger, and he hadn’t had even a moment to react.

Without any hesitation, he unleashed the God Legion Paradise in preparation to fight a host of fiend-devils.

But then a voice rang out. “There’s no need for alarm, young friend. I just want to have a little chat with you, so I knocked out that clown to have some privacy. I'm aware of the secrets you keep, and surely you don't want her to know the truth, do you? You’re only an immortal general, a piteously low level. However, you have the combined constitutions of a Fateless One, a Future One, and a Reincarnated One.”

“And you are…?” Yang Qi said, his heart shivering with fear.

A jade-colored figure appeared within the devil energy, an old man in a billowy robe, who had the demeanor of a transcendent being.

“I am your humble servant, Jade-in-Stone. You really are incredible, young man.”

“Jade-in-Stone?” Yang Qi said. He chuckled coldly. “So, you’re the devil sealed inside this tomb. You disguised yourself as some sort of transcendent being in the hopes of fooling me? Since you know my cultivation base makes me an immortal general, then you must also know that I could break through to the next level at any time. Then I would be an immortal marquis, or possibly even an immortal paragon or an immortal ancestor. Whatever trick you have that you think you can use to beat me, I’ll remind you that, although your true form is formidable, your will projection isn’t nearly strong enough to beat me.”

“I'm aware that you're strong,” the old man said coolly. “That’s why I didn’t attack you. Instead, I came to talk. Can’t you tell I’ve come in good faith?”

“You want to talk? Alright. Talk.” Yang Qi didn’t trust this fiend-devil at all. Every creature in this place was one that had climbed mountains of corpses and swam through seas of blood to reach their current level of power.

“I've been a monster for hundreds of millions of years,” Jade-in-Stone said, “but this is the first time I’ve ever encountered someone with a legendary God Legion Seal. Of course, it’s incomplete, but still formidable. Considering you have such a seal, you know the truth: gods and devils were once the same. People like me started out as angels of war created by the legion of gods, only to be transformed later on.

“Listen, young man, why don't we work out a deal? You help free me, and I’ll help you reach the Godmyth level. What do you say? I think it's a fair trade. I know that you’re a Demolisher, and that every rise in level is a big struggle that requires a huge amount of vital energy. Unfortunately, your set of imperial snakecharms is incomplete, which means that you can’t just go around devouring immortal worlds to become a Godmyth. Without help from me, I doubt you’ll succeed.”

“Free you?” Yang Qi laughed. “You've got a good imagination. Monsters like yourself are completely untrustworthy and will go back on their word in the blink of an eye. If I set you free, the first thing you would do is kill me. You might look like some transcendent being, but that’s just a disguise. You're a killer to the core. I cultivate the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, so I know all about hell-born creatures like you. The best rule of all is to never make deals with fiend-devils!”

Chapter 649: Tempting

Who would have thought that an Incarnated God fiend-devil would come out for a negotiation? At first, a thoughtful smile had appeared on Yang Qi’s face. After all, there was no doubt that this devil, Jade-in-Stone, had techniques that could help him get stronger. But asking a tiger for its skin was always dangerous.

So he refused the offer.

“Really? You're really rejecting my offer?” Jade-in-Stone seemed genuinely surprised. “I suggest you think the matter over again. I can guarantee that, after I'm free, I won’t do anything to you. If you don’t believe me, I’ll use a heart-devil enchantment to swear an oath to that effect. And not only will I help you with your cultivation, I’ll let you make three demands of me. I'm making this offer in good faith. You’re right, devil-ghosts are usually untrustworthy and multifarious. But I’ll remind you that I'm a combination of god and devil, and I don’t want to be constrained by the limitations of an evil heart.”

‘He’ll swear a heart-devil oath? And bind himself with an enchantment?’ Yang Qi thought for a moment. ‘And he’ll even let me make three demands of him? I have to admit it’s a very tempting offer. Unfortunately, I'm still going to have to refuse. I don't put much faith in heart-devil oaths. And why would I hand a person a sword hilt first? However, I should probably see what else he’s willing to offer.’

Frowning, as if he were struggling to decide what to do, he said, “If I want to reach the Godmyth level, I would need a lot of power. And enlightenment of the cultivation levels. If you’re really willing to help with that, maybe we can work together after all. Maybe I can free you. After all, if I became a Godmyth, then at least I wouldn’t have to be scared about you going back on your word since I would be strong enough to fight you.”

“Well, that’s obvious. Working with me will come with many advantages and absolutely no disadvantages!” Eyes glittering with delight, Jade-in-Stone continued, “And of course I can get you the power you need. Look around you. Do you see how many Incarnated Gods are sealed here in Castle Heaven-Devil? I'm a king among devils, and all of them are subordinates of mine. I can easily grab a few of them for you to use. What do you say? Think about it. Do you know how much you would benefit if you could assimilate an Incarnated God? They’re vastly more powerful than that bloodsea heaven-devil you got your hands on. In terms of increasing your cultivation level, I can give you a godseal technique from the dao of devils, which will impart to you my lifetime of experience surpassing tribulations. You’re smart, so achieving multiple breakthroughs with that knowledge shouldn’t be a problem.”

“Well said,” Yang Qi said, clapping softly. “Now I know that you actually have no intention of cooperating with me in good faith. I’ll be leaving now. Try to stop me if you dare. I'm fairly certain my God Legion Seal is more than enough to crush your divine will.” With that, he turned to leave.

“Hold on!” Jade-in-Stone said urgently. “What do you mean I have no intention of good faith cooperation? What makes you say that?”

Yang Qi snorted coldly. “Do you think I'm a three-year-old child or something? In order to do all of those things you just mentioned, you would first need to be freed. And like I said, the first thing you would do would be to kill me. Doesn’t sound like a particularly good deal to me. If you believe I'm going to free you before getting any benefits, well, you’re just indulging in wishful thinking.”

Yang Qi had known from the beginning that this fiend-devil was trying to pull a fast one on him, but he still wanted to see if he could benefit from the situation.

“Oh? My, you’re really mistaken! Look, how about I first help you become an immortal marquis? Then will you trust me?”

Even as the words left his mouth, he waved his hand, sending a bright beam of light flying over.

Yang Qi didn’t dare to touch it. Swishing his sleeve, he stopped the light in its tracks, revealing an enormous finger filled with powerful streams of godpower. It appeared to have been recently severed from a hand, and even dripped with blood. It was the color of jade and was apparently sealed by a kingdom of devilishness. Were it not sealed, it would likely have flown up to create an immortal world around it, complete with living things.

“That’s the severed finger of an ancient god called the Jade Emperor. Seek enlightenment from that and try to absorb its deathless godliness. The only thing in heaven that can assimilate godliness is your God Legion Seal, right? So take it. And if you free me, you’ll benefit even more. Don’t you want to know what else I have?”

Jade-in-Stone was obviously working very hard to convince Yang Qi to trust him and free him.

“What do you have?” Yang Qi said. Whatever it was, he knew that it would incredible. “Don’t tell me it’s—”

“It is!” Jade-in-Stone jumped in. “I have the body part of an ancient god! The Jade Emperor’s arm! The arm of a god! Because of being sealed in this tomb, I can’t do anything with it or tap into its boundless power. Originally, it was used to seal me, but after all of these millions of years of confinement, I had a bit of a revelation and used the power of jade to gain control of it. Well, what do you think? Free me, and you can absorb the entire arm of the Jade Emperor. Just imagine how powerful you would become!”

‘So the Jade Emperor’s arm was severed in a fight with King Life-Killer in ancient times and has remained here ever since, suppressing this wretch-devil.’ Already, Yang Qi’s heart was pounding. Back in the Titan Emperor Heaven, they had an eye of the great god Titan, which was the foundation of their entire immortal world. His God Legion Seal could assimilate body parts of gods, but he couldn’t do that with the eye, otherwise the entire Titan Emperor Heaven would go up in smoke.

‘Should I do it?’ he thought. Getting a big boost to his cultivation base would obviously be a good thing. However, breaking the seal and freeing Jade-in-Stone would be extremely dangerous. On the other hand, if he didn't accept the offer, he had no idea how many months, or years, it would take for him to reach the Godmyth level.

Jade-in-Stone was also in a very nerve-wracking position, thanks to the God Legion Seal. If any other person had come here, he wouldn’t have come out to negotiate, but would have just killed them instead.

Another factor at play was that Yang Qi knew that Jade-in-Stone was not really a transcendent being. By using his Lord's Eye and the Wheel of Fate, he could see that, deep inside, he was a profoundly evil entity that surpassed most ordinary fiend-devils. It seemed almost a guarantee that, if freed, he would immediately turn on Yang Qi and try to kill him. The bones scattered around the jade-colored tomb were a testament to that.

After some thought, he said, “Alright! I agree!”

The truth was that, inside, he was thinking, ‘This fiend-devil is plotting against me, so it's only natural that I should plot against him. Rewards come only with risk. I’ll assimilate that finger, then decide how to proceed.’

“Great!” Jade-in-Stone said. “I hereby swear a heart-devil oath that, if I plot against you after emerging into the open, the rest of my life will be plagued with misery.”

“Okay.” Yang Qi reached out, and golden light glittered as he used the God Legion Seal to take the finger.

Godpower surged into him; the finger of the Jade Emperor seemed to be a never-ending source of it, to the point where he felt like he might not have enough room inside of him for all of it.

He wasn’t sure how much time passed, but during the process of absorbing the godpower from the finger, Jade-in-Stone didn’t do a single thing. He simply sat off to the side, watching. Of course, Yang Qi was keeping half an eye on him the entire time, and was ready to open a passageway to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart at any moment.

Considering that Jade-in-Stone didn’t know about the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, it was Yang Qi’s biggest asset.

‘Time to become an immortal marquis!’

Catalyzing the power within himself, he began pushing his cultivation base to a higher level. Instantly, numerous passageways opened and heavenly tribulation rumbled down. Clouds covered his head, along with immortal lightning and destructive godlight.

‘Such an intense tribulation!’ Jade-in-Stone thought. ‘That could destroy gods!’ The tribulations smashed through the devil energy. Shockingly, some of the tribulation even contained the will of heaven-devils from the Unrestrained Heaven. Yet, in the end, the God Legion Seal vanquished them all.

A few days later, the tribulations vanished. Yang Qi had successfully reached the immortal marquis level, and when he opened his eyes, they shone as if with lightning. All of his abilities had improved, including his Blood of the One God.

And that was just from one finger. What exactly would the entire arm do? Even more astonishing, Yang Qi had only used one-fifth of the godpower in the finger. The rest he had saved up inside of himself; it would likely be enough to push him past the immortal paragon level and into the immortal ancestor level, assuming he had the requisite enlightenment.

Thanks to his true self breaking through, his immortal-slaying clone in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart smiled coldly, sat down cross-legged, and began a session of cultivation. Soon, heavenly tribulation formed for him, including the power of monarchs. When it was over, an auspicious cloud could be seen overhead, within which the soul of King Immortal-Slayer could be seen.

It was a remarkable new ability from King Immortal-Slayer.

Yang Qi’s immortal-slaying clone had absorbed the godpower of August Patriarch Fire Dragon, advancing by leaps and bounds. When the critical moment came, he would be the one to deliver a fatal blow to Jade-in-Stone.

Chapter 650: Rewards Come Only With Risk

The old devil Jade-in-Stone watched as Yang Qi absorbed the finger and passed his tribulations. Then he smiled, looking very pleased. “You’re already much stronger. If you assimilate the entire arm, you’ll definitely reach the level of an eighth stage Antiquity-Demolisher, at the very least. Well, what do you think? That was a nice gift I gave you, don’t you agree? Don’t tell me you’re going to back out of our agreement now.”

With decisiveness that could sever nails and chop iron, Yang Qi said, “Don’t worry. I always honor my promises. Besides, there’s nothing in heaven and earth that could be more useful to me than that arm. The benefits I got from a mere finger were incredible.”

Waving his hand, he pulled Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit over and put her into his God Legion Paradise. If fighting broke out, he didn't want her getting hurt or killed by any of the shockwaves.

Unfazed, Jade-in-Stone waved his hand and an opening appeared in the surface of the jade tomb. “Please come in, Daoist Brother. Welcome to my tomb. The sealed arm is just inside.”

“Of course.” Yang Qi stepped inside looking completely and utterly confident in himself. The truth was that he was actually quite nervous. He was taking a very big risk here and was convinced that this Jade-in-Stone was out to harm him. Most likely it would be in the moment he tried to take the arm of the god; Jade-in-Stone would then try to break free, kill Yang Qi, and take all of his belongings.

The Wheel of Fate spun madly above his head; it was telling him that he was indeed in a very dangerous situation, but that there was the potential for immense gain. He just had to stay in control. After all, he was a Fateless One, therefore, natural laws and the dao of heaven couldn’t control his future. He was the one who would determine how things played out.

The inside of the jade-colored tomb was an immense minor world. There were numerous paper talismans visible, all of them inscribed with sauvastika characters perfectly suited to suppress wretch-devils. Unexpectedly, they were the work of some ancient buddhist school.

So far, Yang Qi had never met a single cultivator from an actual buddhist school. Supposedly, such organizations were extremely rare, existing only in very high-level heavenly locations. And yet, here in Castle Heaven-Devil, the devil Jade-in-Stone had been imprisoned by buddhist sealing magic.

For some reason, Yang Qi had a very strange feeling about all of this.

Half-mumbling, Jade-in-Stone said, “Those talismans were put in place by that damned, er—” he looked over at Yang Qi “—monk. That damned monk. He used some sort of buddhist zen art to seal me and I ended up stuck here for a hundred million years!”

“Don’t worry, I know a bit about the buddhist schools, including their techniques and mental dharmas. I can take care of these talismans.”

As Yang Qi walked further into the tomb, he sensed increasingly powerful godpower, which pushed away the devil energy and threatened to dispel Jade-in-Stone’s projected form.

“Dammit, that's the arm right there.” Jade-in-Stone pointed, and Yang Qi continued walking forward until he saw an enormous arm. Despite missing a finger, it held a nation of heaven-devils in its hand, gripping down tight as if to crush it. The arm was covered with the images of countless golden buddhas. Apparently, those buddhas were what gave the arm the power to suppress Jade-in-Stone.

“Incredible,” Yang Qi said. He was now certain that if he took this arm he would advance by leaps and bounds, possibly even leaping directly into the Godmyth level. Flying over, he raised his voice and said, “I'm going to assimilate it, Jade-in-Stone. You stand as my dharmic guard. And give me some of your devil energy; I’ll need it to properly work with the arm.”

Yang Qi was still plotting to make a move against Jade-in-Stone. He had known all along that Jade-in-Stone was planning to wait until the most critical moment to attack him.

“Alright!” Jade-in-Stone smiled in delight, then waved his arm, sending a stream of devil light into Yang Qi.

As a result, Yang Qi felt his true energy surging mightily.

“I’ve been cultivating that Heaven-Devil Unrestrained True Energy for a hundred million years,” Jade-in-Stone said. “It will improve any true energy it touches, and contains both the magical laws of an Incarnated God, as well as virtual godhood. Use it carefully. With it and your God Legion Seal, you shouldn’t have any trouble assimilating that god arm.”

“No problem at all!” Yang Qi said. But he didn’t let the energy actually touch any part of him. Instead, he sent it into a passageway hidden in his sea of energy, which led directly into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

As Yang Qi’s cultivation base improved, so did his clone’s. And after all the time the clone had spent in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, his command over King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions had reached the point of perfection.

Yang Qi had no doubt that the energy he had just been given was haunted in some way. There was no way Jade-in-Stone would just hand over true energy out of the goodness of his heart. Most likely, he planned to use it to possess Yang Qi. But Yang Qi was using his scheming against him; in the moment that he actually tried to carry out the possession, Yang Qi would send him to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart and continue working on his own cultivation in peace and quiet.

Thrummmm!

Yang Qi activated the power of the God Legion Seal and sent it into the arm, instantly creating a resonance with the countless golden buddhas. At first, the power of the buddhas put up resistance, but the God Legion Seal easily dispelled it.

The power of the God Legion Seal was specifically designed to deal with entities that possessed godliness.

The arm soon began to twitch and wriggle—even emitting popping and cracking noises—as though it might break free and fly off on its own.

Yang Qi drew on the Blood of the One God, causing boundless light to shine out of the God Legion Seal. As a result, the twitching of the arm began turning rhythmic and godliness began seeping out of it. This godliness was so powerful that it surpassed anything he could have acquired from god items by hundreds of thousands of times.

His first inhalation was like absorbing over a hundred god items. After all, a single drop of blood from an ancient god would be virtually invincible, much less an entire arm.

‘This is amazing,’ Yang Qi thought, sighing contentedly. ‘At this rate, I can probably reach the Godmyth level in a year and a half!’ As the Wheel of Fate and the God Legion Seal worked together, he tapped into the mysterious genes within the god arm. Those genes contained the secrets and memories of the god the arm had belonged to, and would normally be completely inaccessible. However, Yang Qi was different. As he absorbed the godliness, he analyzed the genes and gained immense benefits to his cultivation base, continually inching toward the Godmyth level.

POP!

Rumbling sounds filled his mind as his level of enlightenment reached that of an immortal paragon. Although his true self didn’t face a tribulation to increase his level, in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, his clone did. Fire dragons swirled around the clone and the soul of King Immortal-Slayer appeared. He inhaled the tribulation, passing it easily—another manifestation of the mysterious immortal-slaying power he possessed.

Considering the incredible level of control the clone now had over the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, he was completely confident in being able to keep Jade-in-Stone under control later.

‘Time to form my sage child!’

The godliness he was absorbing turned into the true energy of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, which he used to form his sage child. The sage child began to breathe, and sagelight fell like rain, pulsing with the power to suppress devils. In fact, as it touched Jade-in-Stone’s clone, an expression of revulsion and even pain appeared on his face.

‘Damnation! I have to get rid of this guy. This is going to be great. He's a Fateless One with a God Legion Seal, and has all sorts of treasures. I can’t believe he actually trusted me. Once he’s assimilated about a third of that god’s arm, my deathless will can break free and possess him. My physical form has long since wasted away, so what I need right now is a good body. And what could be more perfect than a Fateless One! This is like a dream come true!’

Jade-in-Stone waited patiently, watching Yang Qi assimilate the god’s arm and anticipating the moment that he could break free.

Thus, days began passing. Godliness swirled into Yang Qi, refining his abilities and pushing him into a state of enlightenment that could only be considered extremely rare.

‘Almost there. Just a bit more….’ Jade-in-Stone was starting to get nervous as the moment approached in which he knew he could finally break free.

Yang Qi inhaled, then exhaled, causing golden light to spread out and cover the arm. The arm began to tremble, and in that moment the devil will inside broke free. In the blink of an eye, the entire area became a devil world unto its own.

Laughing maniacally, Jade-in-Stone said, “Freeing me was the worst mistake you’ll ever make! I'm going to take your blood and soul for my own!”

Chapter 651: An Incomparable Seal

After Yang Qi assimilated the god's arm to a certain extent, it loosened the seals on Jade-in-Stone until he was able to break free and try to possess Yang Qi.

Jade-in-Stone’s physical husk had long since faded away, leaving behind only his deathless devil will. Now he needed a new physical form, and Yang Qi was the perfect target. After all, even taking into consideration all of the immortal worlds, where could he possibly find a Fateless One to possess?

“Heaven is helping me!” Jade-in-Stone laughed. “Heaven is really helping me! I thought I was going to be stuck for so long that even my deathless devil will would fade away. Who could have ever guessed that a domineering person like this would deliver his physical husk up to me! As long as I focus on my cultivation for ten thousand years or so, I’ll recover all of my energy arts, and probably even reach a higher level of enlightenment. Next will be the Deathless Throne, after which I’ll take control of the legion of gods and become a god above the gods!”

He was a boundless heaven-devil, a third division Incarnated God who knew about matters like the God Legion Seal and Fateless Ones. Obviously, if he successfully possessed Yang Qi, he would be one of the most powerful entities in existence.

“Heaven crumbles, earth collapses; heaven releases killing intent; the stars realign; dragons overturn continents, people release killing intent; death collapses, heaven crumbles; devils release killing intent; universes sink into ruin!”

His deathless devil will became hundreds of thousands of black suns which rose high, ready to destroy the cosmos and rip apart reality. In the blink of an eye, the devil will shot into Yang Qi and connected to the energy which Jade-in-Stone had given him earlier.

The black suns all developed vicious-looking, devilish faces that viciously burrowed into Yang Qi’s meridians. Then a shadowy figure loomed over Yang Qi, obviously preparing to enter his body and possess him.

“Give your physical husk to me!” Jade-in-Stone said through a vicious smile. Before, he had looked like a transcendent being, but now he pulsed with wretch energy, like an evil god who had come to put an end to all living beings. Of course, Yang Qi had been waiting for this to happen.

“Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart!” Without any hesitation, he opened the passage to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart and shoved the devil will inside. “Now I’ll devour this god’s arm, and the tomb as well!”

RUMBLE!

King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans shot out into the open and rushed toward the arm and the tomb.

Meanwhile, Jade-in-Stone’s devil will popped out into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. At first, he had no idea where he was. He only knew that his possession art had failed.

“What is this place? Where am I? The space-time here is so sturdy! I can’t get out! Don’t tell me this is a god item of some sort. That doesn’t make sense. An ordinary god item wouldn’t be able to trap me! But I can tell that I'm trapped!”

All of a sudden, an enormous soul appeared, accompanied by a cold voice. “Prepare to be crushed by King Immortal-Slayer’s soul!”

“King Immortal-Slayer’s soul?! My god! What is that thing doing here? King Immortal-Slayer?! He devastated countless worlds and even struck fear into the heart of the legion of gods!”

Jade-in-Stone was an incredibly powerful fiend-devil, but even he was struck with terror by the aura of King Immortal-Slayer. Not even the heaven-devil suzerain of the Unrestrained Heaven would have been able to fight King Immortal-Slayer.

According to the stories, King Immortal-Slayer had reached the Paramount God level, which was just below the level of the Sovereign Lord. He and his seventy-one brethren resisted the rulership of the Sovereign Lord, but in the end, they were defeated by him. Afterward, they vanished into the river of time, becoming nothing but ashes in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

“Wait. No, it’s just a slip of divine will! That can’t suppress me! This is the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, isn’t it! So, you have the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart! Wait, hold on. How could you possibly use King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions and the God Legion Seal!”

After realizing that he was in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, Jade-in-Stone was actually delighted. Although King Immortal-Slayer’s soul was formidable, it was just a shell, and Jade-in-Stone quickly destroyed it. However, even as it faded away, an enormous hand shot forward and grabbed him. Then the jade tomb popped into being around him, complete with countless paper talismans and the buddhas.

“I refuse to accept this!” he howled begrudgingly.

“Not willing to accept it?” Yang Qi said, stepping into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. “You're about to die, Jade-in-Stone. I took you from Castle Heaven-Devil to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, the power of which can erase your soul. Let’s see how long you can hold out. It only took me a moment to figure out how to use this jade tomb; with it, and the power of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, there’s no way you’ll be able to escape. Your vital energy is going to be a big help to me.”

“You… you villain!” Jade-in-Stone shouted. “This is complete treachery! I can’t believe you had the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart all along. You tricked me! How could I have fallen for your crafty plots and machinations? Monarch Chart Inversion; Invincible Sun and Moon; Boundless Rivers and Mountains!”

He suddenly unleashed another barrage of devil will.

But then Yang Qi’s immortal-slaying clone descended, crushing the devil will with King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions and the power of the chart.

“DIE!” Jade-in-Stone screamed, sending out more streams of devil will. But a primal-chaos elder-snake appeared and devoured it ravenously. As of this moment, Jade-in-Stone realized that he had truly fallen into a deadly trap.

His opponent’s strength and energy arts were growing stronger by the moment, whereas he was weakening. If things kept going this way, there was no way he would survive.

Finally, he pulled his devil will back and settled down. “You can't fully control the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, boy,” he said. “All you can do is lock me up here. In ten thousand years, the chart will open again and I’ll be free. And then you’re dead!”

Yang Qi burst out laughing. “Ten thousand years? More like four or five years. At that point, I’ll be far stronger than you, and I’ll come back to destroy you, and all the other monsters imprisoned in Castle Heaven-Devil as well. I guess I should thank you in advance. For now, I’ll be heading back to the castle to assimilate all of the second division Tempered Gods there. When I come back stronger than ever, then what will you do?”

Yang Qi waved his hand, tightly locking down the entire area, and preventing Jade-in-Stone’s devil will from escaping. Only then did Yang Qi breathe a sigh of relief. Truth be told, he had been very nervous this entire time. Although Jade-in-Stone had no fleshly body, his devil will was strong enough to be virtually invincible.

Although Yang Qi had greatly benefited already, by reaching the immortal marquis level, it still wasn't enough to deal with Jade-in-Stone. Thankfully, he had prepared well, and pulled everything off smoothly.

With that, he returned to the second level of Castle Heaven-Devil, which was filled with sealed Tempered Gods.

It had taken a huge amount of effort to crush the bloodsea heaven-devil earlier, but now he was many times stronger and could easily vanquish such foes.

POP!

He waved his hand and boundless sagelight erupted out, smashing one of the altars. Bones poured out from the ruins of the altar, taking the shape of a bone throne, upon which sat a bleachbone heaven-devil.

Before it could do anything other than look at him, Yang Qi attacked. The sage child in his dantian region breathed and a boundless stream of divine light shot out, creating the projection of a city that crushed down onto the bleachbone heaven-devil. The bleachbone heaven-devil shattered and the primal-chaos elder-snake devoured its remains, which became an enormous sphere of power in Yang Qi’s God Legion Paradise. It was virtual godhood!

Yang Qi tore open another altar, and a Tempered God fiend-devil emerged. This one was the color of gold, making it look almost like a buddha. Sadly for it, Yang Qi attacked with utter ruthlessness, giving it no hope of escaping.

It became another sphere of power that was virtual godhood.

He destroyed altar after altar, absorbing all of the devils and taking any god items that they had.

These were god items that the devils had worked for countless years to create, and often turn into animadestiny magical treasures. Truth be told, they were of little use to Yang Qi, but could be of immense help to his subordinates.

Yang Qi lost track of time. He got more efficient as he went along, destroying altars left and right and absorbing gobs of godliness. And of course, his cultivation base grew stronger and stronger, until the slightest wave of his hand would turn Tempered God fiend-devils into dust.

‘Three hundred and eighty-one. Three hundred eighty-two…. Four hundred….’ Soon, he had an enormous sphere of virtual godhood in his God Legion Paradise, as large as a planet, shining with the most dazzling of light.

If he were to take it into the open, it would be enough to illuminate and empower hundreds upon hundreds of immortal worlds.

In fact, it was currently too much for him to assimilate, but he could use it to set up a grand spell formation to deal with Jade-in-Stone.

Chapter 652: Sage Sword Heaven

Yang Qi was now very, very rich. He had taken the quintessence energy of hundreds of Tempered Gods, and combined their virtual godhood into a batch of enormous power.

He couldn’t assimilate it, but he could take it into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart and use it to create a spell formation to crush the monster, Jade-in-Stone. Afterward, he could slowly begin absorbing it and eventually break through to the Godmyth level.

In the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, power flowed into the jade-colored tomb, becoming more and more paper talismans. The godly laws at play were so strong that Jade-in-Stone was completely suppressed, and at the same time, filled with terror.

Trembling, he said, “You… you’re crazy! Demented! I can’t believe you killed all of those Tempered Gods!”

“That’s nothing,” Yang Qi replied. “I'm going to assimilate you too, and then I’ll become a Godmyth. Afterward, everything in Castle Heaven-Devil is going to be mine.” Yang Qi knew that leaving Jade-in-Stone alone in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart was just asking for trouble. After all, there were still plenty of old-timers holed up in various nooks and crannies of the place, and if they somehow freed him, the consequences would be too horrible to contemplate.

But now Yang Qi had plenty of capital to work with. The virtual godhood he had built up would be of immense assistance to his immortal-slaying clone as well, and would push him to an enigmatically high level. No longer did the clone need to search for god items and treasure hoards; he could just sit atop the jade-colored tomb and absorb power from the virtual godhood. Immortal-slaying power swirled within the legacy medallions, causing the clone’s physical body to advance in dramatic fashion. His aura was growing stronger and his blood was being converted into the blood of King Immortal-Slayer, which was redder than red, like the blood of millions upon millions of universes condensed down into its purest form.

Jade-in-Stone’s terror mounted. “You've got a lot of guts, boy! I can’t believe you’re cultivating the God Legion Seal and King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions at the same time! Maybe you’re using a clone, but you two share the same soul! Things might seem fine now, but when you reach a high level it will be like cultivating water and fire together. Don’t you understand? When the will of King Immortal-Slayer fully awakens and sees your God Legion Seal, he’ll try to possess you. I'm like nothing compared to King Immortal-Slayer; even if you reach the Deathless level, the level of the ancient legion of gods, you still won’t be a match for him. King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy is actually a curse. A curse, you hear me? Anyone who gets those legacy medallions ends up dying a horrible death! Your destiny gets taken by the medallions and turned into power to resurrect King Immortal-Slayer. Look, I’ll give you one chance to avoid that. Just let me free and I’ll explain the details!”

Yang Qi laughed out loud. “Poor you, Jade-in-Stone. You really think I don't know the danger here? Let me tell you, as long as I don’t collect all the medallions together, they won't know about the God Legion Seal. And even if I do collect them, I have my ways to handle them. Look, stop worrying about that. Too much worry on your part might interfere with me assimilating you. Although, even if you were stronger than you are, and even if you had craftier plots and machinations, you still won’t escape the fate of being assimilated. Understand? Just settle down and enjoy this wonderful turn of events.”

The ruthlessness of Yang Qi’s words caused rage to explode in Jade-in-Stone’s heart. “I'm going to escape! And then I’ll go to your Sage Sword Heaven and turn everyone into either slaves or monsters. I won’t even spare the chickens and dogs!”

His words were an actual curse, filled with magical power.

“Keep cursing. It's only going to make me stronger. The more rancorous energy you throw my way, the better.”

**

Swish!

Back in Castle Heaven-Devil, Yang Qi waved his sleeve, finally sending Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit out into the open. Opening her eyes, she looked around and said, “What happened? Did that fiend-devil attack me?”

“Yes, it did. The devil in the tomb tried to make a move on you, but I saved you. It's all over now. I crushed him, and also cleared out the first and second levels of Castle Heaven-Devil. You can go back to the Sage Sword Heaven now and seize power. Once you do, I want to make a big attack on the Brahman Immortal World.” Yang Qi didn't bother trying to mask his ambitious intentions.

“So you're at odds with the Brahman Immortal World. Fine, no problem. That's a fifth ranked immortal world, and they’re currently stockpiling resources to try to reach the sixth rank. Compared to a seventh ranked world like the Sage Sword Heaven, they’re nothing. In fact, we would have attacked them eventually, whether you asked us to or not.” It was only at this point that Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit registered everything Yang Qi had just said. “Hold on. You cleared out the top two levels? Completely? And you subjugated that other devil? How?”

“The details aren’t important,” Yang Qi replied. “Suffice it to say that I’ve performed a great service for your immortal world. The devilish tribulation you feared will not come. You acquired fifty-six of King Life-Killer’s swords, and now I'm going to help you reach the Tempered God level. Once you get back to the Sage Sword Heaven, you’ll be the top ruler. And with me backing you, no one will dare to make a move against you.

“I'm also going to call that friend of mine over to practice sword cultivation with you. He can be your apprent—wait, that wouldn’t be appropriate. He already has a Master. Perhaps you can step in for his Master to train him a bit. He can be your Junior Brother.”

Considering that Yang Qi and Sword Seventeen were fellow disciples of the Invincible Society, if Sword Seventeen became the apprentice of another Master, then that would mean Yang Qi would have to show respect and defer to that new Master. And that wouldn’t do.

Rumbling sounds echoed out as a passageway opened and Sword Seventeen leaped out, sword in hand. He radiated incredible sharpness, making him seem like an unsheathed sword. He seemed connected to heaven, conforming to that ancient expression of the dao of sword: Man is Heaven; Heaven is the Sword; the Sword is the Dao; the Dao is Me.

Man, Sword, Heaven, Dao. It was a combination of four that was similar to the Success, Steadiness, Destruction, and the Void of the five phases.

Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit sized up Sword Seventeen and instantly realized that he had a lot of potential. “Such energy! Your sword technique is so incredible I'm at a loss for words! The only problem is that your cultivation level is low.”

“Boss!” Sword Seventeen said. He had followed Yang Qi’s summons and come directly to him via the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. He was already an immortal general, a fourth stage Origin-Demolisher. That made him invincible in the lower world, capable of crushing any holy land of true cultivation that he went to. Unfortunately, in immortal worlds he wasn’t necessarily that impressive.

Yang Qi had explained the situation to Sword Seventeen before he arrived. Of course, Yang Qi had grown so powerful that his Elder Brothers and Sisters had long since stopped addressing him as Junior Brother, and usually called him ‘boss’.

“Sword Seventeen, are you willing to join the Sage Sword Heaven?” Yang Qi asked.

“Of course, Boss! As long as I can cultivate the boundless dao of the sword, I’ll do anything you ask.” Sword Seventeen’s eyes sparkled as he looked at Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit, revealing how much he thirsted to advance his own dao of the sword.

“Good. I’ll step in for your Master to train you. I accept you as my Junior Brother." Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit knew she had to accept the situation whether she agreed or not.

It was obvious that Yang Qi was putting one of his own people with her in an attempt to start building a power base. Later, he would ascend to even higher heavenly worlds, leaving behind this follower to grow stronger and eventually take over the Sage Sword Heaven.

Considering everything he had done, it was only natural that Yang Qi would expect her to accept the situation.

One thing Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit didn't understand was that, considering how strong Yang Qi was, why he didn’t just attack the Brahman Immortal World himself. Why was he resorting to plots and schemes?

“Very well, the matter is settled,” Yang Qi said. “Now, I’ll help you pass your heavenly tribulation!” Yang Qi placed his palm on Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit’s back and sent power from the virtual godhood he had acquired. Instantly, her true energy surged.

The tribulation of a Tempered God appeared, and not an ordinary one at that. She cultivated a powerful dao of the sword, therefore the dao of heaven was strongly opposed to her. Suddenly, a boundless divine sword appeared, which shattered into countless streams of sword energy that covered her, Yang Qi, and Sword Seventeen. “Mass Extinction Murderous Heaven-Dao Sword Energy!”

It was a sword light that would devastate any ordinary second division Godmyth. As for Sword Seventeen, he immediately began coughing up huge mouthfuls of blood. Yang Qi waved his finger, sending some true energy into him to heal and stabilize him, then protect him.

“Elder Seventeenth Brother, this is a Godmyth level tribulation for a top expert in the dao of the sword. I've created an empyrean energy shield around you to protect you. Go into the tribulation for some training. The benefits will be unimaginable!”

Chapter 653: Tempered God Tribulation

With Yang Qi’s protection, it was now possible for Sword Seventeen to further his cultivation in the midst of Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit’s Tempered God tribulation.

This level of tribulation was so intense that it could easily destroy a first ranked immortal world. The magical laws of tribulations varied depending on the enlightenment of the person involved. For instance, this particular tribulation contained countless deadly flying swords, some of which crackled with lightning. It wasn’t lightning formed from protomagnetic energy, but rather from the raw magical laws of heaven and earth. This was an expression of the fury of the dao of heaven.

The Godmyth level was all about challenging the dao of heaven, whose natural laws wouldn’t permit such entities to emerge. The reason for that was because after the Godmyth level was the Deathless Throne.

That was the level of the ancient legion of gods, and it surpassed any great dao. Great daos couldn’t do anything to the legion of gods. In fact, the gods created new great daos from within primal-chaos itself. Since great daos couldn’t do anything to the legion of gods, it was obvious that they wouldn’t want other entities to rise to the level of gods. And Godmyths were candidates to join the legion of gods.

The natural laws of the dao of heaven would send tribulation to destroy such cultivators, and would show them no mercy in the process. It was no exaggeration to say that Godmyth cultivators were in staunch opposition to the dao of heaven, and only by gaining victory after victory against it could they establish a right to reach the Deathless Throne.

Crack!

The tribulation grew more and more intense, until millions upon millions of swords fell like a destructive rain. Each sword was strong enough to pierce the greyspace of an immortal world and was filled with the most deadly power imaginable.

Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit threw her own sword up to defend herself, until it finally snapped under the force.

Of course, she had been prepared for something like that, and didn’t lose her composure. She exhaled, and fifty-six of King Life-Killer’s swords flew out with the lethal force to destroy anything and everything. The descending swords were destroyed, and Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit absorbed all of their sword energy.

The magical laws of the dao of heaven then transformed; they would not rest until she was dead. A godly eye opened up above, larger than countless immortal worlds put together. As it opened, dazzling light shot down to illuminate all creation and purify it.

“Heaven-Eye God-Destroying Tribulation!”

“What is that tribulation doing here?” A grave expression appeared on Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit’s face as she sent her true energy out to cover King Life-Killer’s swords, causing them to converge into a sword world.

WOOOOSH!

The light from the eye could burn even the void into nonexistence, and according to the rumors, could even be damaging to gods.

While she faced the bitter challenge, Sword Seventeen practiced his own sword technique. Thanks to the true energy defenses Yang Qi had given him, he was safe; without them, he would have died many times over. At a certain point, he threw his head back and howled as his cultivation base unexpectedly rose to the World-Demolishing level.

Suddenly, a burning sphere of sword light appeared above Sword Seventeen, which coalesced into a tiny, dazzling sun. Apparently, the tribulation he was to face was going to be much easier than Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit’s.

The truth was that the dao of heaven was too furious with Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit to pay much attention to him. Compared to her, Sword Seventeen was like a child playing off to the side.

‘Spectacular,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘The dao of heaven truly is furious. Of course, measly tribulation like this couldn’t hurt me. I could just fuse with my primal-chaos elder-snake and devour it!’ He called on his Wheel of Fate, and confirmed that, as far as he was concerned, the fury of the dao of heaven was weak. Perhaps it was because of weakness on the part of Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit, or perhaps it was because she was doomed to fail in her attempt to reach the Deathless Throne. In fact, it seemed likely to Yang Qi that she wouldn’t be able to progress from the Tempered God level to the Incarnated God level.

It made him think about how, when he tried to reach the Tempered God level, the dao of heaven would surely note his potential. He could hardly imagine how furiously it would oppose his path to the Deathless Throne. After all, people with unique constitutions received special attention from the dao of heaven, especially those in the Godmyth level. Their tribulations would be thousands of times as difficult as ordinary individuals.

That said, when they passed the tribulations, they reached incredibly advanced levels of strength.

After observing for a bit longer, Yang Qi came to a conclusion. ‘Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit clearly doesn’t have a unique constitution! Not many people can actually reach the Godmyth level, and of those who do, few befriend me. Most could spend a lifetime unable to reach the Tempered God level. Well, since I'm here, I might as well help her get through this tribulation more quickly. That will save precious time for me as well.’

WHOOSH!

He transformed into a primal-chaos elder-snake, which streaked through the air with gaping maw and devoured stream after stream of tribulation.

In the end, he even devoured the enormous eye.

After consuming the last of the tribulation, Yang Qi exhaled, sending out a stream of pure vital energy and Tempered God magical laws into Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit. As a result, she trembled and vibrated as she fully stepped into the Tempered God level!

“I finally did it! I'm going to be the most powerful expert in the Sage Sword Heaven! Once I return, I'm going to lead the Ice Spirit Sword Sect to new heights!” Already, Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit was planning her next ambitious move.

As for Sword Seventeen, he was off to the side, meditating.

“So you're confident you can seize leadership of the Sage Sword Heaven?” Yang Qi asked.

Her eyes shone with a piercing light, then she frowned. After biting her lip for a moment, she said, “In the Sage Sword Heaven, the dao of the swords is maintained by eighteen sects. No one is higher than the Tempered God level, but technically speaking, that level is usually broken up into nine subcategories. The strongest sect is the God-Slashing Sword Sect, led by Sectlord Traceless Slasher. There’s no one stronger than him in the Sage Sword Heaven, and according to the rumors he has a unique constitution. They say that he’s a Slashing One.”

“Slashing One?” Yang Qi thought for a moment.

Based on the records of the Godmyth patriarchs in the Brahman Immortal World, there were three thousand unique constitutions, and he did remember the Slashing Ones being mentioned. Slashing Ones drew on the ultimate meaning of sharpness and could slash apart all heaven and earth. Although they couldn’t compare to Fateless Ones, Fortuned Ones, or Eternal Ones, they were still nothing to take lightly.

And of course, when Slashing Ones cultivated the dao of the sword, they were particularly formidable.

Anyone with a special constitution who reached the Godmyth level was someone Yang Qi couldn’t afford to take lightly.

It was true that he had killed the young man in yellow, but despite being a Future One, he wasn’t even close to the Godmyth level. In other words, there were many special skills and abilities that he hadn’t unlocked. If he had been a Godmyth when they fought, there was no question at all regarding who would have ended up dead: Yang Qi.

Only after reaching the Godmyth level could someone with a unique constitution unleash their potential and become true genius paragons. The ancient daoist texts Yang Qi had read made these points very clear.

“A Slashing One? Who cares!? I’ll go with you to the Sage Sword Heaven and help you seize power. If this… what was his name? Traceless Slasher? If he doesn’t back down, then I’ll help you defeat him. If a measly Slashing One thinks he can cause problems for me, well, that’s a joke if I've ever heard one!” After all of his gains, thanks to all the Tempered God fiend devils, and of course Jade-in-Stone, Yang Qi had gained a far higher level of fighting prowess. And with another year and a half of improvement, he would assimilate Jade-in-Stone and improve his cultivation level again.

He was now simply letting his power build as he prepared for his next breakthrough.

His soul enlightenment was already at the immortal paragon level, and soon it would rise higher, going from immortal ancestor, to immortal emperor, to sovereign of heaven, and ultimately to the Godmyth level.

“Let’s go!” Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit said. She knew how strong Yang Qi was, and considering he was fully supporting her, she was supremely confident. Without any hesitation, they headed toward her headquarters in the Sage Sword Heaven.

As a seventh ranked immortal world, it was a flourishing place that felt very different from the ancient Brahman Immortal World.

As soon as they entered, Yang Qi saw countless cultivators flying about on swords. Obviously, they had impressive sword technique, a testament to how this sword dao civilization had developed without restraint.

As one of the eighteen leaders of the Sage Sword Heaven, Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit was very important; as soon as she entered the place, everyone got out of her way. Cultivators would drop to kowtow, and people soon noticed that her aura was different from before, indicating that she had recently achieved major progress.

“Up ahead is the foundation of our Sage Sword Heaven, an enormous sword nebula that’s protected by warding magics only Godmyths can get through.”

Without any fanfare, Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit led them toward the sword nebula.

At a single glance, Yang Qi could tell that it was no ordinary nebula. No, it was a cloud of sword energy created by the breathing exercises of countless experts in the dao of the sword.

Chapter 654: Eighteen Sword Sects

‘It has a majestic atmosphere,’ Yang Qi thought, ‘but to be honest, I'm not particularly impressed.’

The Sage Sword Heaven was huge, and its sword nebula warding spells were impressive. However, after taking a closer look, he realized that this place was actually not superior to the Brahman Immortal World. The Brahman Immortal World was only a fifth ranked immortal world, but it had deep reserves and the place was full of crouching tigers and hidden dragons. After it had built up enough power, it would be able to unleash it in a way that actually surpassed the Sage Sword Heaven.

Yang Qi couldn’t help but smile coldly in his heart at the thought of taking the Brahman River and the talisman that was the Brahman Institute. He wondered if Proud Heaven would show up when he destroyed the Brahman Institute.

Of course, Yang Qi didn't want to be there when it happened. He wanted to borrow the power of the Sage Sword Heaven, making it impossible for Proud Heaven to identify the true culprit. He wanted to instigate a classic sandpiper, clam, and fisherman situation.

As Yang Qi, Sword Seventeen, and Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit shot into the sword nebula, its deadly warding magics recognized Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit and let them right through.

They were soon in the interior of the Sage Sword Heaven, where the energies on display were even stronger. The ground appeared to be made of gold, and the entire area radiated an aura of metallic sharpness.

There were buildings and towers that were made entirely of gold, even cities. And all of them radiated powerful auras that would induce goosebumps among those who sensed them.

There were space-time wormholes everywhere, which facilitated travel. Soon, Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit led Yang Qi and Sword Seventeen into just such a wormhole, whisking them toward the Ice Spirit Sword Sect.

Several hours later, they emerged from a teleportation portal to find themselves in the midst of hundreds of thousands of towering mountains, filled with icy energy. Countless flying swords were stabbed into the mountains, more than Yang Qi had ever seen in one place. And there were hosts of young women flying back and forth who were obviously the disciples of the sect. The Ice Spirit Sword Sect only had women as disciples; not a single one was a man.

Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit’s aura created a resonance with the enormous mountains and she was immediately noticed by everyone present.

“We offer respectful greetings on your return, Sword Matriarch!”

“There’s no need for such formality, everyone,” she said. “The Ice Spirit Sword Sect has two honored guests here today. All leaders are hereby summoned to the main meeting hall. I have something important to announce!”

“Yes ma’am!”

The fact that the leader of the sect had brought two men in for a meeting was a shocking thing, and it was even more shocking to hear that they were honored guests. All of the disciples knew that their sword matriarch had gone to Castle Heaven-Devil to stand guard, and she shouldn’t have returned for several more years. Obviously, something strange was going on.

The top experts immediately began gathering at a palace deep within the sword mountains.

Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit sat on a throne at the head of the hall, and had two other thrones brought in for Yang Qi and Sword Seventeen.

Looking around at the gathered experts and matriarchs of the sect, she said, “The first thing to announce is that I will step in as this young man’s Master to offer him training. This is Junior Brother Sword Seventeen, who is the newest member of the Ice Spirit Sword Sect. He’s now your Sect Uncle, understand?”

An uproar immediately ensued.

“What?”

“But our Ice Spirit Sword Sect doesn’t accept men! Why would our sectlord bring a man in!?”

“What exactly happened?”

“The sword matriarch went to stand guard at Castle Heaven-Devil. Maybe she was infected with devil energy and experienced cultivation deviation!”

“This is completely inappropriate!” someone said in a booming voice. At the same time, a beam of sword light shot into the depths of the hall and an old woman appeared. She had hair as white as frost and was flanked by three other old women, all of them with white hair and skin wrinkled from age.

They were all Godmyths, but clearly none were past the Seer God level.

“This is the Ice Spirit Sword Sect!” one of the old women said in a screeching voice. Pointing an accusing finger at Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit, she said, “We’ve never had a male disciple, so this is completely inappropriate. What possible reason could there be for breaking the rules!?”

“That’s right,” another old woman said. “Under no circumstances can we do something like this. Furthermore, we prime elders would like to know why you left Castle Heaven-Devil early! We have strict rules about how long to stand guard, and if any of our enemies found out about this, who knows what they would do. Coming back early is a big crime that comes with a stiff penalty! Well? What do you have to say for yourself?”

“Shut your mouth!” Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit shouted, slapping her hand onto the arm of her throne. “When you talk to me, you address me as a superior. Who leads this sect, me or you? You stubborn fools. Maybe you’re Godmyths, but you failed to successfully cultivate our sect's godly-class energy art, which forever ruined your good looks and leaves you looking like doddering fogies. You lost your qualifications to vie for the spot of sectlord, and have resented me ever since. That's why we always butt heads. Am I right?”

“What are you talking about, Sword Matriarch?” one of the old women said. Chuckling coldly, she continued, “You might lead the sect, but we’re prime elders and we have the right to correct errant behavior on the part of the sectlord. And we’re especially responsible for enforcing the rules. Now get back to Castle Heaven-Devil immediately to stand guard! We’ll take care of everything here in the sect.”

“How impudent!” Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit said, her voice ice-cold. “Look, I'm not interested in banter. Be quiet while I make my second announcement. Castle Heaven-Devil has been permanently locked down. Cleaned out. The devil energy is deactivated, and I recovered the holy swords of King Life-Killer. Furthermore, I’ve reached the Tempered God level.”

Countless disciples and elders were so shocked that their jaws dropped. The old women began trembling as they stared wordlessly at Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit. A very long moment passed. Then, finally, one of the old women said, “I don’t believe you. Not even Traceless Slasher from the God-Slashing Sword Sect could do that. How could you have pulled it off?”

“On your knees!” Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit shouted in fury. All of a sudden, massive force weighed down on the hall, causing the trembling old women to all drop to their knees.

The level disparity that was on display was now very obvious.

Now that Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit was a Tempered God, she could dominate this crowd with ease. Even if the old women all teamed up, they were only Seer Gods, making them as far from a Tempered God as the dirt was from the sky.

“You think that just because Traceless Slasher can't do something, I can’t either? You prime elders are always causing a scene around here, and you never treat me with respect. Maybe I should sacrifice you to my sage swords as a punishment!”

Whiz. Whiz. Whiz. Whiz!

Killing energy pulsed off of Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit as fifty-six sage swords appeared, flying through the air and pointing directly toward the old women.

One of the old women, visibly terrified, said, “Those… those are King Life-Killer's sage swords! Not seven. Fifty-six!? How could there be so many? Our Sage Sword Heaven used to have seven, and not only did you recover them, you—”

“Yes, I found a large cache of King Life-Killer’s sage swords in Castle Heaven-Devil. What do you think? Can Traceless Slasher compare to that? Your sins are too severe. Not even death could pay for how you’ve defied me.”

The old women immediately began kowtowing and begging for their lives, even swearing oaths.

“Mercy! Mercy!”

“We're prime elders, please, at least take that into consideration and spare us. And we're Godmyth matriarchs! Killing us would be a huge blow to the Ice Spirit Sword Sect.”

“We swear to serve you loyally, Sword Matriarch!”

“Hurry up, the rest of you. Swear oaths!”

“I swear to support the sword matriarch with all my heart, and if I ever stray, let heaven execute me.”

Considering how they were groveling, they didn't seem like Godmyths at all. The mere sight of it caused Yang Qi to shake his head in disapproval.

Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit could tell what he was thinking, and said, “Curious about their sudden change of heart, Daoist Brother? It's because of King Life-Killer’s sage swords. They’re just too impressive. I don’t think you really understand how important these swords are to our Sage Sword Heaven.”

Ding dong. Ding dong.

All of a sudden, bells of alarm tolled, the sound spreading out and filling all of the Sage Sword Heaven.

“What? What happened?” Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit said, rising to her feet. “The God-Slashing Sword Sect is sounding the alarm bells? They’re calling a meeting of all the sword sects? Considering this is happening right upon my return, it must have something to do with me.”

Looking down at the old women, she said, “Considering you scum just swore oaths of loyalty to me, fine, I'm going to pardon you for your crimes.” Looking back up, she continued, “This is actually perfect timing. The God-Slashing Sword Sect is calling all of the eighteen sword sects together. This will be the perfect chance to crush my opposition and unite the Sage Sword Heaven.”

“I absolutely agree,” Yang Qi said, similarly rising to his feet. “I’ll go with you to this God-Slashing Sword Sect. If they don't submit, they’ll die.”

The old women struggled up and looked over at Yang Qi, unsure of why he seemed so confident in the situation. But when they saw how reverently Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit treated him, they knew he must be someone very important and powerful, likely a consummate old-timer from some incredible location.

Chapter 655: God-Slashing Sword Sect

In the Sage Sword Heaven, the top organization was the God-Slashing Sword Sect, and their bells were tolling to summon the other sects to a meeting. Almost immediately, the elders, sectlords, and other important people were on the move. Refusing to comply with the God-Slashing Sword Sect’s orders was considered outrageous rebellion, and no one would ever risk incurring their wrath.

That said, the God-Slashing Sword Sect wouldn’t just casually call for a big meeting like this. The alarm bells would only be sounded in the case of a major event. After all, there was always the remote possibility that the other seventeen sects could rally against the God-Slashing Sword Sect and strike such a grievous blow they would lose their position as the top sect.

The God-Slashing Sword Sect was powerful, but not powerful enough that they could ignore the anger of the masses.

“Come on, let’s go,” Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit said. “If the God-Slashing Sword Sect wants to call for a meeting, fine. I'm very curious to see what they’re up to. They know that Castle Heaven-Devil was set to erupt in a few dozen years, and most likely, they sent me there to stand guard in the hopes I would get killed. Did they really think I wouldn’t figure that out? I'm definitely going to get justice! They’ll submit to me and prosper, or oppose me and perish!”

Her imposing display immediately lifted the spirits of everyone in the Ice Spirit Sword Sect, filling them with confidence and tenacity.

RUMBLE!

The top leaders from the Ice Spirit Sword Sect transformed into a draconic beam of sword energy, bursting with power as it shot out of the warding magics protecting their mountainous headquarters.

As soon as they left, the warding magics activated again and sealed the mountain tight. At the same time, a teleportation portal appeared, a glittering immortal formation that the leaders flew into without hesitation.

Creak. Crack.

They emerged in a central region of the Sage Sword Heaven.

Yang Qi had his divine will out, just as he had from the moment he arrived in the Sage Sword Heaven, assessing and analyzing the immortal world around him. And he had King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans and the Sagely Sacrifice ready to unleash at a moment's notice.

If things went bad here, and the Sage Sword Heaven as a whole turned against him, he could simply disappear into an illusory fold of space-time, then use the Sagely Sacrifice, the Wheel of Fate, and the imperial snakecharms to quickly eat away at the essence of the immortal world.

By the time people realized what was happening, the immortal world would be withering away, and before they would be able to react it would become a land of death, devoid of life force. Then it would crumble like dust into the universe.

Of course, Yang Qi would only do that as a last resort if things went really bad.

From what he could tell, the Sage Sword Heaven was enormous, and was likely built on an ancient dao of the sword, and godrelics of some sort of a sword god.

‘I wonder what would happen if I really used Sagely Sacrifice on this place,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘Would it become a sword pellet that could be refined into a spectacular god sword?’

Upon stepping out of the teleportation portal, Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit said, “Here we are, Daoist Brother. The God-Slashing Sword Sect.”

Yang Qi shook his head to clear his thoughts, then looked around and saw that he was in front of an enormous rift that led to parts unknown. It bubbled with the sharpest power imaginable, something that surpassed even the essence of the Sage Sword Heaven.

“This is the headquarters of the God-Slashing Sword Sect,” Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit explained. “One of their top experts slashed open this rift with a sword, connecting this location to a mysterious plane of existence comprised of a godrelic. It continuously emits power that we can use for cultivation. It's because of this rift that the God-Slashing Sword Sect produces so many top talents, and the fact that they control this area is one of the reasons their sect leads the others.”

“Oh?” Yang Qi nodded. “Were the eighteen sword sects always separate?”

“No. In the ancient era, there was only one sect, which carried on the core teachings and doctrines left behind by one of King Life-Killer’s apprentices. Later, the sect fragmented into eighteen factions, which eventually became standalone sects. Technically speaking, we still consider ourselves united and don't generally wage war against each other. That said, we're always scheming and plotting against each other. And we do have a mutual enemy, the Ancient Beast Heaven. They're always invading and raiding us, causing chaos of all sorts.”

RUMBLE!

All of a sudden, the teleportation portal activated again and more sword experts emerged, obviously members of one of the other sword sects. They wore black garments and had long swords strapped to their backs, swords that were surrounded by the vengeful souls of innumerable slain enemies. Apparently, these people cultivated a dao of the sword focused on pure killing.

“The Emptydeath Sword Sect!” Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit said, her eyes glinting with a cold light that seemed to indicate she viewed this sword sect as an enemy.

“Aiyo!” said one of the black-robed figures, an old man with a particularly sharp gaze. “I can’t believe you returned early, Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit. What incredible gall! According to the rules, you should still be standing guard at Castle Heaven-Devil. Instead, you abandoned your post? What if one of the monsters breaks free and goes on a rampage? If people end up in a terrible situation as a result, you’ll take the blame.”

Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit snorted coldly. “Simmer down, Sectlord Emptydeath. I completely sealed Castle Heaven-Devil as a whole, so drop the talk of me abandoning my post. If there are any problems with monsters in the future, I’ll take full responsibility. By the way, I haven't forgotten about the issue of your male disciples harassing my female disciples. You still owe me for that.”

Sectlord Emptydeath burst out laughing. “Harassment? Come now, you’ve heard the saying young gentlemen love to pursue fair maidens. If there’s any harassment going on between our sword sects, it’s because your female disciples are too flirtatious. They cultivate a bewitchment technique designed to seduce male disciples, thus, the blame lies with you.”

“I should have expected shamelessness like this from you, Sectlord Emptydeath. It's obvious why your disciples act the way they do—they learned it from you.” Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit’s heart was pulsing with killing intent, although she didn’t let it show on her face.

Sectlord Emptydeath’s expression suddenly turned very cold and his eyes glittered. “You really like to run your mouth, don’t you, Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit? Considering how rudely you’re throwing around insults, I think I’ll have to teach you a bit of a lesson today.”

“You’re going to teach me a lesson? Sounds good! Bring it on, you old codger! Just who the hell do you think you are? Let me put this all out in the open. You’re an absolutely shameless piece of trash, and yet you think you deserve to lead the Emptydeath Sword Sect? As far as I'm concerned, we might as well remove your sect from our immortal world. It's a good thing we're having this big meeting; it’ll be the perfect situation to settle accounts. And it's going to end with your sect being dismantled and your disciples demoted to slave status. As for you, since you're a dog bastard, I’ll see you turned into a sect watchdog. You can sit around the front entrance, and when visitors show up you can bark a bit to announce their arrival.”

The rest of the young women from the Ice Spirit Sword Sect all burst out into laughter.

“Not bad. Not bad at all. It’ll be great to have the disciples from Emptydeath Sword Sect be our pet dogs. Whenever we go out on training, we can bring our leashed dogs and sic them on our enemies. That will be amazing.”

“Yes, turning them into dogs is the perfect idea. Make them crawl on their bellies all day and night in front of us.”

“Exactly. Soon there won't be an Emptydeath Sword Sect anymore.”

“I think we should just take everyone from the Emptydeath Sword Sect and cut off their tongues and limbs. Turn them into human monstrosities.”

The laughter and sarcastic comments coming out of the mouths of the female disciples were so humiliating that the people from the Emptydeath Sword Sect fumed with rage. Sectlord Emptydeath couldn’t contain his anger, and let out a wolf-like howl of fury. He was so infuriated that he was literally seeing red.

Historically speaking, the disciples of the Ice Spirit Sword Sect feared those from the Emptydeath Sword Sect. But the young women knew that their sword matriarch had reached the Tempered God level and obtained a host of King Life-Killer’s sage swords. Because of that, they weren’t worried at all about the Emptydeath Sword Sect.

“I can’t believe you would actually say something like that, Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit. You slut! Since when did you become so audacious? Do you really think you can defy laws and principles, even those of heaven? You know full well that our Emptydeath Sword Sect outranks your Ice Spirit Sword Sect. If you try to force a conflict here, you're going to be like an egg thrown against a boulder.”

“Is that what you think?” she replied coolly. “Alright, make a move and see what happens. Disciples of the Ice Spirit Sword Sect, draw swords and prepare to fight. When I say the word, slaughter everyone from the Emptydeath Sword Sect. Don’t even spare chickens or dogs!”

“Yes ma'am!”

Chink. Swish. Snick.

In the blink of an eye, a host of swords left their sheaths, and killing intent boiled.

“What?” The people from the Emptydeath Sword Sect were shocked as they realized that this group of leaders from the Ice Spirit Sword Sect really were dead set on winning this fight. And they weren’t sure what to do about it.

“Attack!” Sectlord Emptydeath said. He knew that he couldn’t allow himself to seem weak in this moment, otherwise it would be a huge loss of face that he might never recover from.

RUMBLE!

Suddenly, a shout of rage drifted out from the nearby rift, “Enough with the melodrama!”

An enormous figure appeared, bursting with energy. He was a middle-aged man in a voluminous robe, with sword-like eyebrows and eyes that were vortexes of killing intent. After coldly looking around, his gaze came to rest on Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit.

“This is the entrance of the God-Slashing Sword Sect. And I, Inexorable Slasher, hereby prohibit any fighting. You two are supposed to be sectlords, but here you are squabbling like children?”

This was the third-most powerful person from the God-Slashing Sword Sect, the famous Inexorable Slasher!

A Tempered God!

Everyone from the Emptydeath Sword Sect bowed their heads.

“Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit, you owe us an explanation. Why did you return early from Castle Heaven-Devil!? First, you abandoned your post, and then you showed up at the entrance of our sect, stirring up trouble. Do you admit your crimes?”

Chapter 656: Traceless Slasher

The third-ranked Inexorable Slasher had made some dramatic accusations toward Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit, and was clearly trying to put her in her place.

In response, she smiled coldly. “So, the God-Slashing Sword Sect has already picked sides?”

Inexorable Slasher snorted coldly. “Picked sides? How dare you say something like that! The God-Slashing Sword Sect is the leader of the eighteen swords sects. We have the power and authority to enforce the law, and you abandoning your post has nothing to do with the Emptydeath Sword Sect. If something bad happens at Castle Heaven-Devil, you’ll be at fault. You know full well how we handle people like you. Offer an apology to Sectlord Emptydeath immediately, and maybe we can let you off the hook for your other crimes. Otherwise I'm going to punish you for breaking the rules set by our sect alliance.”

“The exalted Inexorable Slasher is absolutely correct,” Sectlord Emptydeath said. “And he's talking about a formal apology, not just a few words. As part of the apology, the Ice Spirit Sword Sect will send a hundred—no, a thousand female disciples to the Emptydeath Sword Sect to serve as slave girls. Only then can we call things even.”

RIIIIP!

In response to his words, the eyes of the young women from the Ice Spirit Sword Sect burned with fury. The altercation had progressed from light insults to ignominious humiliation. To send a thousand female disciples to the Emptydeath Sword Sect would be shameful beyond belief, and it would cause the rest of the disciples from the Ice Spirit Sword Sect to be forever incapable of holding their heads up with pride. It would also affect the lower-ranked immortal worlds their sect controlled, and they would likely lose control of them.

By this point, Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit’s killing intent burned with incredible intensity, and yet her face seemed like the picture of calm. “What’s your decision here, Inexorable Slasher?”

Snorting coldly, he replied, “You will do exactly as Sectlord Emptydeath demands. Giving them a thousand servant girls is a reasonable way to resolve the situation. However, that doesn't address the issue of you abandoning your post. There are sixteen other sword sects present, and you will give all of them a thousand female disciples to be servant girls. Of course, the God-Slashing Sword Sect is bigger than the other sects, so you’ll give us five thousand.”

Sectlord Emptydeath was vicious, but Inexorable Slasher was even more vicious! With his single pronouncement, he had put the Ice Spirit Sword Sect on the brink of destruction.

To the surprise of everyone present, Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit just started laughing. “Ah, Inexorable Slasher, it seems that I really do need to carry out a big purge. You want to dismantle our dao of the sword, but sadly for you, things aren’t going to turn out that way. And since your motives are so vile, I'm not going to go easy on you. You think that because you’re a Tempered God, you can push me around? Big mistake. Since we have so many witnesses present, now is the perfect time to show you that the Ice Spirit Sword Sect is no longer a second-tier sect around here. We’re first-tier!”

RUMBLE!

A beam of sword energy shot out of her, transforming into a majestic dragon of sword energy that crushed everything in its path.

The faces of both Inexorable Slasher and Sectlord Emptydeath flickered with shock. “You reached the Tempered God level?!” Inexorable Slasher blurted. “How is this possible? Based on your talent, you should never have been capable of doing this! Well, considering you just broke through, you’re dreaming if you think you qualify to show off in front of me!”

Whoosh!

Sword light shot out from him, millions upon millions of streams filled with spirits, souls, devils, and immortals made of swords. It was like an entire sword world!

The sun and moon went dark, and the stars seemed to fall as the sword light spread out to cover everyone from the Ice Spirit Sword Sect.

“That’s… Inexorable Slasher’s boundless dao of the sword. It’s the Sun-Moon Heavenly-Body Glorious-God Sword Dao! People say that one strike of that sword can conquer all evil and fill the world with radiance.”

“Incredible. I'm afraid Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit is in a bad situation now.”

“Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit is definitely strong. I can’t believe she actually reached the Tempered God level. Given some time, she could definitely be a very domineering figure. Unfortunately, right now she’s pretty weak. After all, the God-Slashing Sword Sect is the top sect for a reason.”

“So she actually dared to make a move on Inexorable Slasher. It doesn’t matter if she is a Tempered God, she’s going to perish here.”

“Inexorable Slasher is definitely going to kill her. And good riddance.” Sectlord Emptydeath was already backing away from the conflict; he was only a Seer God, and thus, was sweating with fear. Only now did he finally understand why Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit had been so arrogant earlier. Without the God-Slashing Sword Sect there to intervene, he would have been in a very dangerous situation.

There was absolutely no way he could stand up to a Tempered God. In fact, he would likely have been defeated with the first move, and the rest of his sword sect wiped out of existence shortly after. Thankfully, the God-Slashing Sword Sect was here, and now he could sit on the mountaintop and watch the tigers fight, then reap the spoils when they tired out.

In his heart, he was absolutely convinced that Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit would be defeated shortly.

But then something completely unexpected happened. Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit opened her eyes and a stream of sword light shot out that could illuminate all nighttimes throughout history. In fact, it was so bright that all of the onlookers were forced to close their eyes.

Whoosh!

All of Inexorable Slasher’s sword energy was wiped out of existence, leaving not a trace of it behind.

Then the light proceeded onward, shattering Inexorable Slasher’s defensive empyrean energy, destroying his minor world, and slamming into his god armor, which collapsed. A wide gash opened up on his face, and blood spurted in large quantity.

Within him, magical laws were broken and virtual godhood cracked. A look of confused shock appeared on his face. A long moment passed, then he reached up and touched his cheek, wiping away some of the blood. Only then did he let out a hysterical shriek and stagger back like a wounded animal, his eyes radiating both terror and fury.

“You… I can’t believe you actually hurt me!” he raved madly. “How could I have been injured! Damn you! You deserve to die! Everyone in your entire Ice Spirit Sword Sect deserves to die! You should be wiped out from the Sage Sword Heaven! You should cease to exist!”

“Is that so? I guess we’ve reached the point where either the fish dies, or the net splits. I'm about to kill you, Inexorable Slasher. Let’s see if you can defend yourself. My bet is that you’re a scummy piece of trash who can’t possibly stand up to me. Without Traceless Slasher to help you, you would never have reached the Godmyth level.”

With Yang Qi to support her, Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit wasn’t afraid of anyone present.

She knew that ‘Yellow Future’ could easily destroy all of the experts in this immortal world, but had instead decided to back her attempt to seize power. So therefore, she was going to do just that.

Having already come out on top in the fight with Inexorable Slasher, she gathered her sword energy in preparation to finish him off. She wouldn’t hold back, that was for sure.

Inexorable Slasher had just been preparing to fight back. But then he heard her words and saw the deadly sword energy bearing down on him, seemingly locking down both his virtual godhood and his nascent divinity. Unable to fly and unable to flee, he suddenly felt himself gripped by terror.

“Y-you’re… you’re actually using a deadly move?” he stammered. “How dare you! You’re actually trying to kill me!? That’s the Grand Life-Killing Sword Technique! That’s the aura of King Life-Killer’s sage swords….”

At this point, a cold snort rang out like thunder, accompanied by a devastating stream of sword energy that wrapped around Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit’s sword light like a snake, giving her no other choice but to back up.

“You've really got some damn guts, Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit! How dare you use a deadly move on my third brother. Trying to kill one of the leaders of the God-Slashing Sword Sect right at our front door is completely outrageous behavior!”

Traceless Slasher had finally made a move! His voice rang out like the booming of a bell and his sword technique obviously existed at the most peak, ultimate level. Even the most consummate of experts would have a hard time matching up to him.

Furthermore, he had a unique constitution. Although Yang Qi couldn’t see him yet, he could already tell that Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit wasn’t a match for him. Instead of doing anything openly, though, he surreptitiously sent a stream of true energy into her, causing King Life-Killer’s sage swords to fly out into a sword formation. The fifty-six swords hit Traceless Slasher’s snake-like sword energy and shredded it out of existence.

Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit also knew that she wasn’t a match for Traceless Slasher, and that Yang Qi had helped her just now. And she also knew that now was not the time to show weakness.

“Nice move, Traceless Slasher,” she said. “Unfortunately, you can’t do anything to me. I already cleared out Castle Heaven-Devil and acquired fifty-six of King Life-Killer’s sage swords. These swords represent the essence of our immortal world, and whoever controls them leads us all. Now that you can see them with your own eyes, drop down and kowtow immediately! Or would you rather show disrespect to our founding ancestor!?”

Chapter 657: Slashing One

Traceless Slasher was the top figure from the most famous organization in the Sage Sword Heaven, and he had the unique constitution of a Slashing One. But not even he could handle Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit.

Who was Traceless Slasher? He was the pillar of this entire immortal world; without him, the God-Slashing Sword Sect wouldn’t have the reputation it did. The sect had killed experts from countless other immortal worlds and was very famous. Because of them, and specifically Traceless Slasher, it was said that the immortal world would soon rise to the tenth rank.

Whenever a fight broke out and Traceless Slasher showed up, things would immediately calm down.

Yet, this time, he was powerless against Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit.

Sectlord Emptydeath was so shocked he nearly passed out, and was staring at Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit as if she were some sort of freakish monster. As for her, she ignored him as surely as if he were a corpse. She simply stood there, radiating an icy energy that filled the area.

But Sectlord Emptydeath knew that it didn’t mean he was off the hook. Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit would definitely want to settle accounts, and it filled him with the inclination to try to flee.

Of course, the onlookers were discussing the subject.

“What? Traceless Slasher attacked Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit, but it didn't do anything? When did she become so strong? Traceless Slasher is one of those mysterious Slashing Ones. His dao of the sword vastly surpasses other ordinary techniques, making him an impossible foe to fight. I heard that even though he’s only a Tempered God, his cultivation base is so strong that he can defeat Incarnated Gods in battle. Not even someone from a tenth ranked immortal world would be able to beat him.”

“That’s right. Traceless Slasher’s cultivation base is heaven-shaking and earth-shattering. He’s impossible to beat in a fight. So what exactly is going on here? Is it something to do with King Life-Killer’s sage swords?”

“King Life-Killer’s sage swords are mysterious and unpredictable. But my guess is that it's because Traceless Slasher didn’t use a deadly move. Let’s see what happens next. We can't get involved with the matters of the God-Slashing Sword Sect and the Ice Spirit Sword Sect.”

The sectlords, experts, and leaders from the other sects would normally follow the orders of the God-Slashing Sword Sect without question. But now they were holding back.

They could all see that Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit’s cultivation base was incredible, and they knew that offending her could be a fatal move.

“What’s this?” a voice said, sounding somewhat puzzled.

Everyone present felt like they were suffocating, as power weighed down that seemed capable of ripping them to pieces. A young man appeared, seemingly only fifteen or sixteen years old. He wore silver clothing that glittered dazzlingly, and he glowed with silver light that pierced the eyes of those who looked in his direction. He didn’t have a sword on him—probably because he himself seemed like a sword incarnated, a sword that could devastate all heaven and earth.

Traceless Slasher had finally shown his face.

After looking Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit up and down, he waved his finger, sending a burst of power into his brother Inexorable Slasher, causing his wounds to stitch up, and healing his injuries.

From that alone it was obvious that his cultivation base made him hundreds of times more powerful than Inexorable Slasher.

When Traceless Slasher spoke, his voice echoed with deafening loudness. “I never could have guessed that you would achieve progress like this, Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit.”

“Oh, it's nothing really,” she replied. “I just happened to come across King Life-Killer’s sage swords. They gave me a bit of King Life-Killer’s sword techniques, as well as some of his will. He wants me to rule the Sage Sword Heaven and spread the glory of the Life-Killing Sword Dao. Why are you targeting me, Traceless Slasher? Your little brother wants to dismantle my Ice Spirit Sword Sect and turn my disciples into slave girls. I obviously had no choice but to fight back. Look, if we both end up hurting each other in a big fight, that’s not going to benefit you, is it?”

In the past, Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit had acted like a lackey around Traceless Slasher, but not anymore, now that she had Yang Qi’s support.

“What, you want to take over the Sage Sword Heaven?” Traceless Slasher’s eyes glittered with rage. His master plan had always been to unite the eighteen sword sects under his own leadership, change their name, and begin gathering faith from the entire Sage Sword Heaven to turn it into a tenth ranked immortal world.

At that point, the immortal world essence would rise to a higher level and he would finally have the chance to become an Incarnated God. Reaching that level would be a major accomplishment. After all, it was hard enough for an ordinary person to reach the Godmyth level, and then cultivate all the way to the third division and become an Incarnated God. But Traceless Slasher was a Slashing One, and that meant the process would be even more difficult. The only way for him to do it was to increase the rank of the immortal world he was part of.

For Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit to come along and vie for power with him meant that all of his plans were being threatened, and there was no way he would simply go along with that.

“You think you can just come along and take over the Sage Sword Heaven? Sorry, but it’s not that simple. For one thing, you have to have the support of the other sects. The reason I called this meeting today is because I wish to unify all of the eighteen sword sects. Then I’ll gather together all of the immortal worlds we control and sacrifice them, destroying their essences and all of their cultivators to power a unique type of sword cultivation. The Life-Killing Sword-Sacrificing Art. With the resulting power, we could rise to the level of a tenth ranked immortal world! Well? What do you all think?”

Everyone was completely flabbergasted, and initially just exchanged awkward glances.

As a seventh ranked immortal world, the Sage Sword Heaven ruled over countless first, second, third, and fourth ranked immortal worlds. There were tens upon tens of thousands of them, all filled with the most plentiful and abundant resources, as well as innumerable living beings.

In what seemed like the most insane of suggestions, Traceless Slasher was suggesting that they destroy all of them to improve the level of the Sage Sword Heaven.

Not even Yang Qi would consider something so demented. After all, even the Titan Emperor Heaven, a first ranked immortal world, was still full of living beings and immortals. The idea of literally destroying even a single world like that seemed like madness, much less hosts of them.

And if such an act were not perfectly executed, it would likely lead to interference from other high-level immortal worlds, and likely, war.

“Let me point out that if anyone interferes with my plan, you will face my wrath. Think this through, Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit. This is all for the good of the Sage Sword Heaven. You wouldn’t oppose the advancement of our world, would you? Perhaps you came across some good fortune, but you’ll never reach the Incarnated God level unless you work with me. If you help me push our immortal world to a higher level, then you will have a hope of eventually reaching the Paramount God level.”

There was something odd and enticing about his voice, something that caused the expressions of many of the people present to turn blank.

Even Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit seemed to be considering his words carefully.

All of a sudden, Yang Qi’s voice rang out within Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit’s mind. “Be careful. He’s using a psychic disorientation technique to enchant you and infect you with his own dao of the sword.”

“Hunh?” she murmured. In the blink of an eye, she was awake. Shivering, she smiled faintly, raised her voice, and said, “Clever bastard. I underestimated, you, Traceless Slasher. Your cultivation base is even more profound than I realized. You snuck your sword energy into your words, hoping to force us to agree to your plan. And I bet you planned to include all of us in your sacrifice, didn’t you? Unfortunately for you, I have King Life-Killer’s sage swords, therefore that little trick won’t work on me.”

“Fine!” Traceless Slasher said, eyes glittering at the realization that Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit had freed herself from his spell. “So, you can actually negate my ability. But did you really think that you're the only person with some of King Life-Killer’s sage swords?”

RUMBLE!

All of a sudden, a streak of sword light shot out of the rift that was the God-Slashing Sword Sect. The light split into ninety-nine separate beams which came to hover around Traceless Slasher. Shockingly, he had ninety-nine of King Life-Killer’s sage swords!

“Surprised? There are seven thousand, seven hundred and seventy-seven of King Life-Killer’s sage swords. Our founder had seven, and that was enough to be completely domineering. I happened to explore a godrelic recently, and acquired ninety-nine of them. Based on the profound techniques I gained from the swords, I assumed I was more than prepared to unify the eighteen sects and our immortal world. Who could have guessed that you would suddenly cause problems, threatening my master plan? Sadly for you, I'm going to crush you and take those sage swords.”

Traceless Slasher’s sword energy suddenly roiled out, causing the immortal world essence around him to vibrate as he connected to it. In the blink of an eye, he was the immortal world, and the immortal world was him.

“What? You’re controlling the immortal world essence?” Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit said.

“Yes, exactly. Submit to me and prosper, or oppose me and perish. Sectlords, what is your decision? Will you acknowledge allegiance to me, or not? If not, you’ll be destroyed. I’ll take your nascent divinities, your flesh, and your blood, and sacrifice it to the essence of our immortal world.”

Everyone reacted with visible shock.

Then Sectlord Emptydeath dropped to his knees. “I acknowledge allegiance. Oh exalted Traceless Slasher, you will soon reach the Deathless Throne and become a god! Now please, execute this Sword Bitch Ice Spirit!”

Chapter 658: Taking On a Slashing One

Who would ever have guessed that Traceless Slasher, a Slashing One, would have ninety-nine of King Life-Killer’s sage swords? He had more than Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit! For years, legends said that anyone who found the seven lost swords would push their dao of the sword to a higher level. Their sword technique would reach a peak state that could dominate, and even absorb, all other sword techniques.

The fact that Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit had found fifty-six had been shocking enough. Considering how many more Traceless Slasher had, what level did he currently stand in?

No wonder his ambition was to take control of the world and raise it to a higher level. As an Incarnated God, he could likely acquire more of the sage swords and become even stronger. Maybe he would even be able to reach the Deathless Throne.

“I'm willing to acknowledge allegiance….”

“Me too.”

Following Sectlord Emptydeath’s lead, more of the experts and leaders began dropping to their knees and kowtowing. They knew that with ninety-nine sage swords, and the constitution of a Slashing One, Traceless Slasher was unstoppable.

In fact, he could kill everyone present with the slightest wave of his hand.

A wise man submits to the circumstances, and in order to preserve their own core teachings and doctrines, and avoid destruction, they were all willing to bow their heads.

In the shortest of moments, the tables were turned. The other sects were all indicating that they would join Traceless Slasher in opposing Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit.

“Acknowledge allegiance? Or not? What’s your decision, Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit? If you don’t, you die. There is no third option.” Traceless Slasher pointed his sword at her, clearly ready to make a move at a moment’s notice. The immortal world essence at play weighed down heavily, causing the sun and moon to go dim, twisting and distorting the magical laws, and even affecting space-time.

An extremely unsightly expression overtook Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit’s face as she realized that she was absolutely incapable of standing up to Traceless Slasher’s cultivation base.

The other sectlords began chiming in.

“Come on, Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit. Are you really going to refuse to acknowledge allegiance? Do you want to die?”

“That’s right! Maybe you got fifty-six of King Life-Killer’s sage swords, but Traceless Slasher has even more than that. You’re like a firefly trying to compete with the full moon. There’s no way you’ll win. Cast your sword aside and surrender. Putting the interests of our immortal world first is obviously the right choice.”

“Being united will advance all of our interests.”

“Hurry up and surrender. If you don’t, your entire Ice Spirit Sword Sect is going to be slaughtered and sent to the Yellow Springs!”

The only sectlord who wasn’t putting pressure on her was Sectlord Emptydeath. “Oh exalted Traceless Slasher, please, kill this woman. She obviously won't submit to you, and if she escapes, she could spread word to other immortal worlds of your master plan and ruin the whole thing. You can’t let her free.”

Reaching out to Yang Qi with divine will, Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit said, “What do I do?”

Yang Qi sighed, then strolled out and looked over at Traceless Slasher.

“I can’t believe you lucked out like this, Slashing One,” he said. “I guess I have no choice but to interfere. I'd hoped to support Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit from the shadows, but sadly that’s not an option now. At least now I can jump right to the part where I take your Slashing constitution and cultivation base.”

Suddenly, everything in the area began spinning as the surrounding immortal world essence rushed in Yang Qi’s direction. A primal-chaos elder-snake lunged out and began to devour it rapidly.

“What? Another expert? And you have King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans?” Traceless Slasher backed up a bit. “So you’re on her side?”

“That’s right,” Yang Qi said, his energy pulsing with such power that everyone was forced to edge away from him. “All you have are King Life-Killer’s sage swords. Of the seventy-two sworn brothers of ancient times, he ranked fourth. In first place was King Immortal-Slayer, followed by King Heaven-Devourer, then King Mourn-Parting. Do you really think that ninety-nine of King Life-Killer’s sage swords could possibly do anything to two thousand of King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans?”

“Two thousand?!” Traceless Slasher said. Suddenly, a sinister smile played out on his face. “Well, this is perfect. Getting those treasures will make my plan even easier to carry out. I hereby call upon the mighty will of the Sword God to turn all of the millions upon millions of immortal worlds beneath me into a sword dao civilization. Then, the great Sword God can finally be resurrected! Immortal World Essence; Paramount Rift; Ancient Founder; Boundless Heavenly World; Sword God of the Void; Come!”

All of a sudden, Traceless Slasher leaped up into the air and transformed into a divine sword, pulsing with godpower and a mighty will.

In the blink of an eye, Yang Qi realized that he was in a very dangerous situation.

‘The boundless will of the Sword God? Supposedly, one member of the ancient legion of gods was the Sword God, who was killed by King Life-Killer. Later, King Life-Killer used his flesh, blood, and soul to forge his sage swords. Now Traceless Slasher is drawing on that Sword God’s core teachings and doctrines! He wants to create a grand sword dao civilization, and use the sacrifice to resurrect the Sword God. Terrifying! Simply terrifying!’

As Yang Qi realized what was happening, his Wheel of Fate spun like mad, causing the power of fate to surge within him.

‘Who cares about some Sword God? He was killed, right? Now he's stirring up trouble and trying to act like the Sovereign Lord? He thinks he can control all the gods of the many heavens? As far as I'm concerned, the will of the Sword God is like a candle just waiting to be snuffed out!’

Yang Qi threw his hands wide, releasing an explosion of magical laws.

“Dragon of Fate!”

RUMBLE!

Streams of fate power transformed into a savage dragon that swept out like a chain to wrap around and seal the enemy’s sword energy.

“That’s not going to work!” Traceless Slasher growled. “Sword Dao God-Spirit; Boundless Legion of Gods; I Accept the Dao of Gods; Sharpness Ascendant; Slash Everything to Bits!” As the incarnation of a sword, he slashed back and forth, destroying the Dragon of Fate, then shot up into the sky, a mighty expression of will that made it seem like the Sword God was once again about to appear in the world.

“Let the Sword God Come! Welcome the Heavenly Sword!”

Suddenly, the emotions of joy, anger, sorrow, fear, love, hate, and desire swirled out as an expression of sword light that bore down on Yang Qi.

“Seven Killings, Seven Emotions; One Sword, Seven Stances; One Stance, One Emotion; Seven Emotions Combined Causes the Gods to Fall!”

Traceless Slasher was unleashing a dao of the sword based on the seven emotions, something that could cause even the legion of gods to perish.

Yang Qi wasn’t fazed, and in fact, seemed like an invincible monarch hovering in the air. As he drew on the power of the God Legion Seal, the golden imp appeared, surrounded by a golden sphere of light that resembled an egg. The incoming sword energy slammed into that golden light and faded away. Then Yang Qi unleashed his primal-chaos elder-snake. “If that’s all you’re capable of, Traceless Slasher, then sorry, it's not good enough. You might want to turn the Sage Sword Heaven into a tenth ranked immortal world, but if I consume your power that's not going to happen. In fact, I'm curious how much power there is for the taking here.”

“Bastard!” Traceless Slasher growled, his face a mask of fury and rage. Then he vanished, reappearing a moment later directly behind Yang Qi. “Lifespan of Heaven and Earth!”

Sword light shot out that seemed to move slowly, but actually traveled millions upon millions of times faster than the speed of light. In fact, anyone watching would likely cough up blood just from the sight of it.

The light began to grow thicker and stronger, filling the world until, without any warning, it snapped down to the size of a single strand of hair!

Yet, in that size, it was even more dangerous.

Whoosh!

The tiny strand of sword light slashed through the projected light of the God Legion Seal. Normally speaking, the move of Lifespan of Heaven and Earth should never have been able to do such a thing; unfortunately, Yang Qi’s overall cultivation level was still too weak. He was still only a fifth stage World-Demolisher. Traceless Slasher was vastly higher than him in terms of cultivation base, and was also being supported by the will of the Sword God. In the blink of an eye, his attack was about to hit Yang Qi.

Yang Qi didn’t seem shocked at all, though. He merely said, “Excellent!”

He reached out with a quickness that surpassed even the sword light, revealing might and skill that surpassed any arts of fighting from the mortal world. This was more like the realm of the legion of gods and the godly laws of the Sovereign Lord.

Crack!

He grabbed the sword light, forcing it to stop moving!

Traceless Slasher appeared again, his eyes red with fury! Yang Qi had grabbed the ninety-nine sage swords, and it seemed impossible to wrench them out of his grasp.

Chapter 659: Inspiring One

Traceless Slasher had unleashed a devastating attack of sword energy onto Yang Qi, yet it didn’t hurt him in the least.

Yang Qi ultimately resorted to the divine abilities of the God Legion Seal, and had actually grabbed all ninety-nine of King Life-Killer’s sage swords, holding on to them so tightly they couldn’t escape his grasp.

Traceless Slasher howled in rage, but had to admit that Yang Qi was the most formidable opponent he had ever faced. However, Traceless Slasher had fused with those sage swords, so there was no way he would just let them be taken away. Suddenly, the combined swords flared with light as bright as the sun and began vibrating, as if they might break out of Yang Qi’s grasp at any moment.

Without any hesitation, Yang Qi relied on a dhāraṇī incantation.

“Be broken!” he said. Instantly, the sage swords exploded, transforming into numerous streams of sword energy composed of countless magical symbols that read ‘kill’. They were expressions of will that had been placed there by Traceless Slasher during the process of subjugating and fusing with the sage swords.

Yang Qi turned to face the magical symbols and inundated them with true flame; in the blink of an eye, they shattered.

POP!

Traceless Slasher coughed up a huge mouthful of blood as the sage swords were ripped out of his control.

“Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit,” Yang Qi said, “take these ninety-nine sage swords. I have no idea where this guy got them, but that doesn’t matter. With them, you should be able to take control of the Sage Sword Heaven and subjugate the God-Slashing Sword Sect. After you successfully fuse with them, not even this Traceless Slasher will be able to deal with you.”

“Yes sir!” she said. Inhaling deeply, she sucked the ninety-nine swords into herself and combined them with her existing collection. A moment later, her energy surged and her dao of the sword became something that could shatter the greyspaces of immortal worlds.

“This is incredible!” she exclaimed. “Each sage sword pushes my sword techniques to a higher level. This Slashing One is already no match for me.” She let loose a stream of contented laughter. “Any of the other seventeen sword sects that refuse to submit to me will be completely and utterly destroyed. Don’t worry, Traceless Slasher, I’ll help you achieve your goals. You wanted us to become a tenth ranked immortal world, right? I'm going to start the process by sacrificing you and your God-Slashing Sword Sect to the cause!”

“You animal!” Traceless Slasher shouted, his eyes wide with fury. He wanted to rip Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit to shreds, but with Yang Qi there it was impossible.

“Don’t sacrifice Traceless Slasher,” Yang Qi said. “He has one of the three thousand unique constitutions, and I need that. Although he's nothing but a mere Slashing One, his complete set of abilities could be of some use to me. I’ll assimilate him, which will also accomplish the task of killing a chicken to frighten the monkeys. Then we’ll see who refuses to submit to you.”

He reached out, using the Hand of the One God to create numerous motes of sagelight. It almost seemed like the ancient legion of gods was reaching out to destroy the endless hells that existed.

“Aaaiiiieee!”

Traceless Slasher’s vital energy had already been damaged when Yang Qi forcibly took the ninety-nine sage swords away from him. Considering how weak he was now, there was no way he could stand up to the current onslaught.

As the Hand of the One God descended, space and time cracked and shattered.

“I'm not going to let you do this. You think you’re really that strong? You’re mistaken! The Sword God can provide boundless power! Sword God Possession! One Sword, Nine Prefectures!”

RUMBLE!

Traceless Slasher was making one last-ditch effort to extricate himself.

A mysterious power suddenly shot out from the nearby rift, devastating everything in its path. Nine shadowy figures could be seen within it, like swords of immeasurable sharpness.

In ancient times, the ‘nine prefectures’ had nothing to do with the mortal world. Nor were they continents that made up high-level universal planes of existence. Instead, they were prefectures that divided up the god legion kingdom. And now these swords were bringing them to the world of men.

Yang Qi strode forward and thrust his palm out, causing the projections of the nine prefectures to shatter into nothing.

“Sword Shakes Distant Lands!”

Traceless Slasher unleashed another consummate divine ability, a sword move that caused a heavenly river to appear, the kind that could sweep through the most distant lands. This was power like that from the bottom of the sea or the depths of hell, a tidal flow that swept forth like a devastating tempest. It contained the power of high-level planes and universal energies that sought to crush Yang Qi into dust.

Considering the level of Yang Qi’s cultivation base, there was no way he could exchange blows with Traceless Slasher. He drew on the Wheel of Fate and the attack flowed past him and into the primal-chaos elder-snake, which converted it into sword energy that he could use. Instantly, Traceless Slasher weakened and Yang Qi grew stronger.

“Life or death, it's down to this. Time to go for broke!” Traceless Slasher suddenly unleashed a burst of divine will. “All disciples of the God-Slashing Sword Sect, hear my command. Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit has betrayed our immortal world; she summoned an almighty enemy here to destroy us. We can't let her scheme come to fruition! All disciples attack together to kill this villain! The only way to save our Sage Sword Heaven and eventually reach the tenth rank is to cut him down!”

BUZZ!

There was some entrancing and inspiring power within his voice, perhaps something related to one of the unique constitutions that Yang Qi had read about, that of the Inspiring Ones. Instantly, all of the experts from the God-Slashing Sword Sect unleashed their sword energy and attacked Yang Qi, Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit, and the disciples of the Ice Spirit Sword Sect.

It was such a dazzling display that it was almost impossible to quantify how powerful of an attack it was.

All Yang Qi could see was boundless, dazzling sword light. Nothing else was visible—no vital energy, trees, rocks, treasures, or anything else. Just sword light.

“You scum really want to fight me?” Yang Qi quickly opened his connection to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart and drew on the immense collection of virtual godhood he had built up after killing hundreds of Tempered Gods. Without hesitation, he unleashed the Sagely Sacrifice.

The fire of the Sagely Sacrifice raged, and everywhere it went, the sword light evaporated. Some of the sword experts were hit and burst into devilfire. The flames resembled the heads of devil-ghosts, and they viciously tore away at the victims’ empyrean energy and began sucking their quintessence energy away.

“I assimilated hundreds of Tempered God fiend-devils from Castle Heaven-Devil, making me strong enough to decimate Incarnated Gods! And you think you qualify to fight me? Stop fighting, Traceless Slasher. Once I assimilate you, your lackeys will be leaderless!”

Yang Qi attacked like a dragon or tiger, lunging through the sword light directly toward Traceless Slasher. He thrust his palm out, and it contained power to destroy myriads of worlds and crush magical laws of all types. All truth existed in that palm, truth that existed outside of truth, nothing else. It was with casual abandon that Yang Qi controlled the truths of safety and defense. These were actions that were within the realm of the legion of gods!

Traceless Slasher’s jaw dropped as he realized that this palm attack was something that no daoist technique or sword energy could do anything about. Anything sent against this technique would be instantly fettered; it could change metal to wood, wood to water, and so on. It could completely subvert the five phases! It was a power that Yang Qi could only use by drawing fully on his Blood of the One God, thanks to the level of his cultivation base.

It was only a small fraction of the full potential of the technique; if he used it to the fullest, it could alter the truths of the dao of heaven.

As he thrust his palm out, numerous heavenly eyes popped open above his head, containing countless heavenly tribulations that attacked him.

After all, this was an incredibly domineering move that defied the natural laws of the dao of heaven. There was no way the dao of heaven could accept it, thus it rained fury down on him in the form of heavenly tribulation.

However, the tribulation did nothing to him, for as soon as it descended it was devoured by the primal-chaos elder-snake.

POP!

Yang Qi’s palm landed on Traceless Slasher, who screamed as he exploded into a cloud of quintessence energy, magical symbols, and godliness.

“Slashing One, huh? Yang Qi said. “Another unique constitution to add to my collection, pushing me further toward the perfection of the legion of gods. However, I sensed the inspiring nature of your voice, and how it drew people to follow you. That’s the power of an Inspiring One, isn’t it? Where did that power go? Do you have someone else backing you?”

He inhaled deeply, absorbing the power into himself, yet found no clues about this Inspiring One.

Chapter 660: A Huge Secret

Inspiring Ones possessed one of the three thousand special constitution types that existed, but they were completely different from Slashing Ones. Slashing Ones were completely and utterly focused on fighting and combat. Their cultivation level would usually rise to incredible heights, and they were essentially natural-born war machines.

But Inspiring One were often strategists, tacticians, or advisors, and were skilled at inspiring the masses. They were exceptionally smooth talkers who could win people over with their words, and were sometimes even preachers or diplomats. Truth be told, they were terrifying, as they could essentially control large groups of people, even people stronger and more powerful than themselves.

Traceless Slasher obviously had the power of a Slashing One, yet when he spoke he revealed bits of the power of an Inspiring One. Yang Qi had originally guessed that he had assimilated an Inspiring One to acquire the power of an additional constitution type.

However, one blow devastated Traceless Slasher, and after analyzing his remains Yang Qi found no vital energy from an Inspiring One. That seemed to indicate that Traceless Slasher had not assimilated such a person, but was instead backed by one. Perhaps that was where he got the idea to destroy countless immortal worlds as a sacrifice to push the Sage Sword Heaven to become a tenth ranked immortal world.

Ordinary, sane individuals would never try to do something outrageous like that. But it was definitely something an Inspiring One would aim to accomplish.

Yang Qi knew that, within the three thousand types of constitutions, there were some that were not focused on fighting, yet were far more terrifying than those which did. The Inspiring Ones were like that. They would infiltrate an immortal world and inspire its people to do dramatic things. That immortal world would eventually degenerate into chaos, and ultimately be destroyed. Of course, the Inspiring One would benefit by that, and could bypass countless years of bitter cultivation that were usually required to make progress.

Right now, Yang Qi had incredible fighting prowess, but wasn’t necessarily adept at inspiring people. However, if he could assimilate the constitution of an Inspiring One, the benefits would be incredible and would actually be superior to increasing his cultivation base by several levels.

Unfortunately, he had no idea who the Inspiring One was, and he had no clues to follow.

‘Inspiring Ones. Leading Ones. Administrating Ones. Shadowy Ones. Those constitution types would be perfect for me, if only I could find them.’

Waving his hand, he pulled Traceless Slasher’s vital energy toward himself and began devouring it.

“No! Nooo!” Traceless Slasher no longer was the silver-clad young man who seemed like a razor-sharp sword. Instead, he was a sniveling and screaming worm. “Don’t assimilate me! I have a special constitution! I was supposed to reach the Deathless Throne, you can’t do this to me! I surrender. I’ll acknowledge allegiance to you. You can have the Sage Sword Heaven. I’ll even give you the God-Slashing Sword Sect, alright? I know a lot of secrets. If you spare me, it’ll be worth your while!”

“Spare you? To learn some secrets? I couldn't care less about secrets. I'm going to assimilate you and add another constitution type to my collection.” As the power of a Slashing One entered Yang Qi, he felt his Blood of the One God undergoing incredible transformations.

“Help! HELP!” howled Traceless slasher. “Oh paramount benefactor, save me! You're from a tenth ranked immortal world, so you can definitely save me! I bore your will! I was about to conquer all of the immortal worlds in the face of the impending catastrophe. But someone stopped me at the last moment! You can’t just watch me die. I refuse to accept this!”

He continued to scream in this fashion, until finally…

RUMBLE!

All of a sudden, immense force began to weigh down, focusing on Yang Qi. A mighty figure parted the greyspace above and began to descend. It emanated an energy that wasn’t even close to being that of a Tempered God. No, it vastly surpassed that; this was the power of a third division Incarnated God.

“Traceless Slasher, you might be a Slashing One but you're completely useless,” the figure said in a deep, manly voice. “I gave you so much help in your quest to improve your immortal world and face the impending catastrophe, but in the end, one of your own subordinates defeated you. Look, you’re almost dead already! What use are you to me now? That said, you have been working for me for a long time now. And if you cursed me, it could add a level of difficulty to my upcoming devil tribulation. I wouldn’t want karma like that.” Addressing Yang Qi, he said, “Let him go, boy. He’s a Slashing One. You can’t just blithely assimilate someone like that.”

The man reached toward Yang Qi, who felt like he was about to be dragged up into the air as a result. Immediately, Yang Qi realized that this Incarnated God was not one to take lightly.

However, he just snorted coldly. “You think I'm worried about an Incarnated God? The fiend-devil Jade-in-Stone was a peak Incarnated God, and I crushed him. You’re just an ordinary Incarnated God, and you dare to act crazy in front of me? Do you really think that everyone beneath a tenth ranked immortal world is an ant or piece of trash?"

Yang Qi exhaled and a gale force wind sprang up, filled with destructive energy that slammed into the Incarnated God’s palm attack and completely negated its effects.

Chuckling lightly, Yang Qi continued assimilating Traceless Slasher’s Slashing One energy.

Considering he had King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans and the virtual godhood of hundreds of Tempered Gods, as well as his Sagely Sacrifice, it only took a moment before nothing was left of Traceless Slasher.

‘Time for some tribulation. Sixth division Abstrusity-Demolishing! Make me an immortal paragon!’ Heavenly tribulation popped into being above Yang Qi, the rage of the dao of heaven. Yet he simply devoured it. In fact, it happened so quickly that most people present didn’t notice what had just occurred. The magical laws of the dao of heaven seemed to weep with grief, as if they knew that this person was foreordained to join the legion of gods, then ultimately destroy them.

In the shortest of moments, Yang Qi became a sixth stage Abstrusity-Demolisher, and yet again, his energy arts transformed.

That said, most observers didn't realize anything had happened. They saw Yang Qi twitch and assumed that he had used some sort of taboo technique the dao of heaven despised. But then some energy flared that forced the rage of the dao of heaven to dissipate.

Only at this point did the descending figure come fully into view. He looked like a middle-aged man who seemed to have a third eye on his forehead, which was locked onto Yang Qi. He wore a long, voluminous robe, the color of which was that of primal-chaos. In fact, there didn't seem to be any marks of stitching or fabrication, as though the garment had actually been created directly out of primal-chaos itself.

“Not bad,” he said. “So, you’re quite the genius too. Who would have thought that someone like you would appear in the lower worlds? Excellent. As a mere sixth stage Abstrusity-Demolisher, you can slaughter Godmyths, and even defeated a Tempered God Slashing One. Sadly, catastrophe is coming and people like you are doomed to be the first to die.”

“Who are you, and what tenth ranked immortal world do you come from?” Yang Qi asked, maintaining full vigilance. “And why are you down here manipulating a seventh ranked immortal world?”

At this point, Yang Qi realized that he had been a bit reckless. In all his calculations, he had never considered that the behind-the-scenes opponent in this affair would be an Incarnated God from a tenth ranked immortal world.

The man in the primal-chaos robe laughed. “This seventh ranked world reports to me, so what's so strange about me manipulating it? What about you? Are you from an immortal world that I control? It's rare to find a person like you anywhere lower than a tenth ranked immortal world. Don’t worry, I'm not going to do anything to you. You’re worth a lot more than that piece of trash Slashing One. It’s only to be expected that you would assimilate someone like him. That said, if you don’t join me, you’re going to bring a major catastrophe down on your head—something you can’t handle.”

Yang Qi burst out laughing. “Catastrophe? What catastrophe? I'm not even afraid of the dao of heaven. Catastrophes and tribulations can’t do anything to me. You saw the dao of heaven weeping just now, didn’t you?”

“The ignorant are often fearless,” the man said with another chuckle. “You know what catastrophe I'm talking about. It comes from the future. Armies from there will soon invade our immortal worlds, and eventually, the god legion plane. In the future, it's possible to open up the aeonic time tunnels and travel to the present. Even ordinary people can make that trip. The subsequent baptism by natural law will turn such people into Future Ones with unique constitutions. Do you really think you can deal with people like that? Stick with me, and we might have a chance to hold back the impending catastrophe.”

“What?” Although most people might find the man’s words to be preposterous and completely beyond belief, to Yang Qi they were like a lightning strike to the brain.

He knew how strong Future Ones were, and the thought of an entire army of them was terrifying. And most likely, the real reason for the invasion was to find his God Legion Seal.

Chapter 661: A Conspiracy

RUMBLE!

In one short moment, countless puzzle pieces clicked together in Yang Qi’s mind. Catastrophe was coming, and although he wasn't sure of every specific detail, there were many aspects that he could extrapolate.

He had long since felt as if something immense were looming over him, hanging there, ready to fall and crush him. No amount of thought or calculation had provided him with any insights about it, but now, a few short words from this nameless expert had revealed just about everything.

As it turned out, experts from the future world were planning an invasion! The past, present, and future were the three major linchpins of time, and normally travel between them wasn’t possible. The karmic relationships that connected them were contingent on great daos and magical laws, and theoretically speaking, tampering with such forces could lead to the destruction of everything.

Only the legion of gods could successfully cross the river of time and travel to the past, present, and future. Occasionally, Future Ones and Past Ones would appear, but they were extreme rarities. Furthermore, they couldn’t produce any measurable change in history. However, if large numbers of them took action together, it could cause a major collapse and throw the river of time into absolute chaos. It could turn everything primeval and lead to ultimate extinction.

Unfortunately, Yang Qi knew that such circumstances would definitely come.

And it was all because of the God Legion Seal.

That seal contained the blessings of the legion of gods, and was a god item belonging to the Sovereign Lord himself. It existed in three parts, one of which was in the primeval era, in the past. The second existed in the present, with Yang Qi. And the third was in the hands of some expert in the future.

Thanks to the urgings of time itself, those three pieces would eventually combine. However, to do so would require crossing the river of time, and would need an overlap of past, present, and future.

‘No wonder!’ Yang Qi thought. ‘Now it makes sense why Proud Heaven would create the Brahman Society and stir up trouble in the Brahman Immortal World. That's why he wanted the Brahman Immortal World to resemble the future world. It's because the future world is planning an invasion. Proud Heaven is a Future One, and the Brahman Immortal World is where he’s laying the groundwork for the invasion!

‘So that’s how it is. So that’s how it is! No wonder I can't find Mother, Aunt Susu, and my Master, the Invincible Dugu. Proud Heaven must have taken them with him to the future world. They're not even in my present time! If they were, my Wheel of Fate would have picked up on at least some clues by now. I suppose it's also possible they could be in the past, but one thing’s for certain; they’re not here. Unfortunately, there are still so many unknowns. I wonder if working with this guy would help clear up some of the important secrets….’

The man in the primal-chaos robe was an Incarnated God, and for some reason Yang Qi felt inspired to work with him.

‘Hold on!’ he thought. All of a sudden, his God Legion Seal stirred and he felt as if he were waking up. ‘I normally have such a strong mind. What's going on here? I don’t even know this guy’s name, but suddenly I'm thinking of teaming up with him? He has a special constitution. He’s the Inspiring One who was working behind the scenes with Traceless Slasher to control the Sage Sword Heaven. And he comes from a tenth ranked immortal world.’

At this point, Yang Qi burst out laughing. Feeling very relaxed, he said, “So, you’re the Inspiring One. You nearly fooled me, and I almost fell for your inspiring power. Well played. So, where exactly are you from? Depending on where it is, I might think about working with you. By the way, don’t try to use your powers on me; they won’t work. You see, I have a special constitution as well.”

“You have a special constitution?” The Inspiring One was clearly shocked to see that Yang Qi had come to his senses. “Not bad. Not bad at all. Only people with unique constitutions can slough off my powers so quickly. Yes, I'm an Inspiring One, and I can tell you exactly where I'm from. I'm one of the top leaders from a tenth ranked immortal world called the Martial Blood Heaven. I want to control as many immortal worlds as possible as I prepare to defend against the invading armies of Future Ones. It won’t be long now before space-time is fractured and their forces come to our world. Things will get very bad when that happens. Many immortals will be enslaved, and even people like myself will face immense catastrophe. You see, the people in the future world have carried on the core teachings and doctrines of the ancient mechanical civilization. But they’ve done more than that. You know the old saying indigo blue is extracted from the indigo plant, but is bluer than the plant itself. That perfectly describes the future world. They took the daos of immortals, devils, wretches, buddhas, and dragons, and combined them all. They're terrifyingly strong, and as part of their journey here, their people gain the invincible constitution of Future Ones.”

Suddenly, another wave of Inspiring One power entered Yang Qi’s mind, urging him to cooperate, but this time he was ready for it.

“That’s a pretty big secret,” Yang Qi said. “As a matter of fact, I know of an immortal world that was likely founded by a Future One. Presumably, he plans to use it as a starting point for the invasion. Why don’t the two of us join forces to destroy it, and take out anyone working for that Future One?”

“What? You know of a place like that?” The man smiled. “Tell me which immortal world it is, and I’ll definitely go destroy it. To forestall is better than to amend, as they say.”

“Well, that’s simple. It's a fifth ranked immortal world that’s currently building its power to rise to the seventh rank. Who knows, considering how miraculous and ambitious they are, perhaps they’ll reach the tenth rank. You might want to keep this confidential, but it's called the Brahman Immortal World. It was founded by Proud Heaven, who is a Future One. What do you think? I'm making a good faith offer to work with you here. Otherwise I wouldn’t reveal such a big secret.”

The Inspiring One burst out laughing. “So, you're an enemy of the Brahman Immortal World. Look, I learned a long time ago about them. It's not some secret. At least, not to us people in the know. That said, the Brahman Immortal World isn’t a place to casually cause problems for.” Expression turning cold, he continued, “Although they’re only a measly fifth ranked immortal world, it just so happens that one of our patriarchs went there some time ago, a third division Incarnated God. And he never returned, which indicates he perished. Do you understand what that means? An Incarnated God perished! We don’t know exactly how he died, but do you think it's an easy thing to put an end to someone like that?”

“Oh?” Yang Qi’s heart was already starting to pound. He had previously assumed that because the Brahman Immortal World was a fifth ranked location, he could easily crush it. But now this Inspiring One was telling him that things weren’t going to be that easy. With his current cultivation, taking on the Brahman Immortal World might lead to his own death. It made sense, considering that the place had been set up as a stronghold by a Future One and was imbued with the power of the future world.

“Listen, boy. I'm not going to bicker about the fact that you killed Traceless Slasher. But I can’t abide you defying me. Are you going to work with me, or not? I’ll definitely take care of the Brahman Immortal World, eventually.”

Yet again, the Inspiring One reached out to Yang Qi with his powers, this time doing nothing to try to hide it. “We’ve had our eyes on the Brahman Immortal World for a while now. And we’re very familiar with the Proud Heaven you mentioned. He’s an important person in the future world, a very powerful individual with millions upon millions of clones that he uses to control everything under heaven. If he weren’t so powerful, how do you think a place like the Brahman Immortal World could exist right under our noses? If you don’t join us, it’s highly likely that Proud Heaven himself will eventually take note of you and try to take your constitution. In fact, maybe he already has you in his sights. Once he does, he won’t rest until he devours you. Another upside to working with us is that we’ll help you search the Brahman Immortal World for the secret passage leading to the future world. If you travel to the future, you can gain the status of a Past One, which is nothing to look down on. It might even push you to the Godmyth level. It would be incredible tempering! Your cultivation base is impressive as it is, so if you became a Godmyth just about anything would be possible for you. The only downside is you need far, far too much power—more than you’ll ever get on your own.”

His words were incredibly enticing as they tugged at Yang Qi’s heart.

Unfortunately, Yang Qi knew that agreeing to work with an Inspiring One would be like asking a tiger for its skin. In the daoist texts he’d read, the ones penned by Godmyths, Inspiring Ones always used people like cannon fodder. They could sense the feelings and thoughts of others and use them to fabricate complete falsehoods. No one ever benefited by cooperating with them. They were always untrustworthy villains who brought doom to those who got close to them.

There was no way that Yang Qi would ever trust the words of an Inspiring One.

“My apologies,” Yang Qi said, his expression hardening. “I’m afraid I have to reject your offer. I'm not impressed by tenth ranked immortal worlds. Maybe if you were from a thirty-third ranked world like the Tusita Heaven, Unrestrained Heaven, Mourn-Parting Heaven, or the like, I might think about it. But no, I won’t be working with you. So please leave, and also forget any thoughts of causing trouble for the Sage Sword Heaven. Incidentally, I’ll be reaching the Godmyth level soon, and I don’t need your help to do it. Work with you? I'm not stupid. You would be plotting against me from the beginning, and I probably would never reach the Godmyth level.”

“What?” the man said, his face flickering with killing intent. “And if I don’t leave?”

“If you don’t leave?” Yang Qi said. “Then you’ll die.”

Chapter 662: Exploitation

“You’ll die.”

The atmosphere immediately became very tense.

This was an Inspiring One, a leader in the tenth ranked Martial Blood Heaven. Even more relevant, he was a third division Incarnated God, a person of immense power who could look down on virtually any expert from any lower-ranked immortal world.

Yet not only did Yang Qi refuse his offer, he also threatened to kill him. Yang Qi was completely and utterly throwing caution to the wind. Truth be told, he wasn’t just defying this Inspiring One’s powers, he actually aimed to assimilate him. He was already acutely aware of how powerful Inspiring Ones were; their abilities to affect people on a mental level would be a big help during a fight.

Right now, Yang Qi had the powers of a Fateless One, a Future One, and a Reincarnated One, and had just devoured a Slashing One. Furthermore, he had risen to the level of an immortal paragon, and was poised to continue on to become an immortal ancestor and even an immortal emperor.

Truth be told, the level of the ninth stage Dao-Demolisher was not out of the question, at which time he would be a sovereign of heaven.

Considering his cultivation base and power reserves, he was essentially the strongest person in existence under the Godmyth level. If he could take the power of an Incarnated God, who was also an Inspiring One, he would then have five special constitutions and would be able to take on hundreds of Tempered Gods at the same time and defeat them as easily as a boulder crushing a drinking glass.

Furthermore, during the course of a fight like that, he would be able to use King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans to devour his enemies’ true energy. For all intents and purposes, he would be unbeatable.

That wasn’t to mention the benefits such a fight would bring to his Blood of the One God.

Right now, that blood had reached the level of fifty percent and was closing in on another breakthrough. At the moment, he was at the level that an Incarnated God wouldn’t find it an easy task to defeat and kill him.

Ultimately, Yang Qi was itching to get the power of an Inspiring One. Once he got it, he could head into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart and use it on the fiend-devil Jade-in-Stone. If he could assimilate Jade-in-Stone’s deathless devil will, he would definitely have no trouble breaking into the Godmyth level.

“What? You want to kill me? You’re crazy, aren’t you?” Even the most even-keeled person would react with anger to Yang Qi’s words, much less an Incarnated God and Inspiring One. Now that it was abundantly clear to the Inspiring One that his powers wouldn’t work on Yang Qi, his expression flickered and he prepared to crush him using cultivation base alone.

The truth was that his offer to cooperate with Yang Qi had been as false as Yang Qi guessed. He had been planning to ultimately kill him and absorb his constitution. That was actually the same thing he had been planning to do to Traceless Slasher. Inspiring Ones were always duplicitous schemers, and they were never good people.

He waved his sleeve and a burst of Martial Dao True Energy rolled out, pulsing with an aura of steel and blood.

“Steel Blood Universal Cosmos!”

The weeping of ghosts and wailing of gods echoed out as a world of steel and blood spread, covering everything and causing it to tremble. Vengeful souls flitted here and there, which were apparently the remains of all the people who had been killed throughout the years by this attack.

Instantly, immense pressure weighed down on Yang Qi as the devastating attack approached.

Yang Qi chopped his hands out in front of him, then swirled them to create what looked like a black hole, but was really the mouth of a primal-chaos elder-snake.

“You think you can use a primal-chaos elder-snake to devour my vital energy? You're really naive. Your cultivation level is so pitifully weak that no amount of magical treasures or special techniques will help you. Not even your special constitution will help you. Who do you think I am, some piece of trash like Traceless Slasher? I could have killed him with the flick of a finger. You simply don't comprehend the vast difference between an Incarnated God and a Tempered God, do you? A Tempered God could never possibly surpass an Incarnated God. Understand?”

POP!

Yang Qi’s palm attack met the sleeve swipe of the Inspiring One, and the vital energy of steel and blood poured into Yang Qi.

Instantly, Yang Qi was thrown backward, tumbling through the air and coughing up blood like mad. It looked like he had been seriously injured by only one simple move on the part of his opponent.

However, even as he tumbled through the air, he took the energy inside him and sent it into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. The truth was that he hadn’t been hurt. It was all an act. As his cultivation base grew, it became easier to reach into his sea of energy and open the passage to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. And when he did that, it was easy to channel the power of incoming attacks there.

For all intents and purposes, attacking Yang Qi was like attacking the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. And the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart was something that couldn’t be destroyed by the most elite experts, even members of the legion of gods. At the most, such entities might be able to shake it slightly. As for this Incarnated God Inspiring One, his attack disappeared into the chart like a stone dropping into the ocean.

That said, the vital energy didn’t just vanish. Instead, it was wrapped up and sent hurtling toward the deathless devil will of Jade-in-Stone.

In other words, Yang Qi was taking the Inspiring One’s attack and using it on Jade-in-Stone.

“Aaaiiiieee!”

Jade-in-Stone was completely imprisoned and incapable of moving, and unfortunately Yang Qi wasn’t strong enough to truly harm him. But now things were different. Instantly, an opening appeared in the warding magics binding Jade-in-Stone and he was hit with a direct blow.

The aura of steel and blood seemed to contain the cosmos itself and instantly inflicted a big injury on Jade-in-Stone’s vital energy.

“Just what exactly is going on here?” he blurted. “How could this be happening? Is that the fabled Steel-Blood Universal-Cosmos Nine-Profundities True Art?! That's a godly-class energy art, and it can definitely hurt me. But you have to be an Incarnated God before you can cultivate it. Damnation! How did that brat get the help of an Incarnated God to help assimilate me? This is really, really bad! I refuse to go along with this! I'm going to defy heaven and turn all of this around!”

He began sending furious attacks at the passageway connecting to Yang Qi, but Yang Qi merely redirected them outward.

“So, brat, you’re finally trying to fight back!” Flying up into the air, the Inspiring One launched a trump card attack at Yang Qi. “Steel-Blood Universal-Cosmos Nine-Profundities True Art! Second Stance: Steel Blood Dominates All!”

A domineering energy poured out into the world, seemingly capable of attacking everything that existed in the Sage Sword Heaven and destroying it all.

All of the nearby experts were fleeing at top speed, fearful of getting caught up in the crossfire.

Even Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit was trembling in fear, aware that if Yang Qi lost this fight, he would be killed, and she—and everyone else—would likely meet the same fate.

POP!

The second stance hit Yang Qi, smashing into his chest and sending him flying backward, more blood spraying out of his mouth.

“Third Stance: Steel Blood Without Limit!”

The next move was a palm strike that multiplied into hundreds of billions of palms that slammed into Yang Qi, bashing him left and right like a rubber ball and sending massive amounts of power into him that should have squashed him into a meat pancake.

Those watching the fight were shivering in terror at the horrific sight and knew full well that if they were in Yang Qi’s position, they would be dead already.

But the truth was that although Yang Qi was coughing up blood, he wasn’t actually hurt. It was all an act to get the Inspiring One to continue attacking him.

“You're tough, brat. Whatever your constitution is, it makes you strong enough to stand up to three moves from an Incarnated God. You might not be dead, but you’re badly injured and the best thing you could accomplish now would be to escape alive. It must be because of King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans. That's the only explanation for how you’ve held out so long. Unfortunately, you’re not the actual King Heaven-Devourer and there's no way you can handle all of the true energy I'm pumping into you with these attacks. Fine. I'm going to use all of the rest of the stances from the Steel-Blood Universal-Cosmos Nine-Profundities True Art. I’ll devastate those imperial snakecharms and take them for my own. Then no one will be a match for me!”

Obviously, there was no way the Inspiring One would pass on a rare chance to get some of King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans.

“Steel Blood Destroys Worlds!”

“Steel Blood Nirvanic Reincarnation!”

“Steel Blood God Forging!”

“Steel Blood Eight Polarities!”

“Steel Blood Nine Transmigrations!”

RUUUUUUUUMBLE!

Five moves slammed into Yang Qi, who flipped and tumbled, blood spraying out of his mouth. And yet he wasn't destroyed.

“Aaaiiiieee! Daaammit!”

Within the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, Jade-in-Stone twitched and writhed under the force of the attacks, simultaneously cursing Yang Qi to death.

Chapter 663: Retreat

“Who is it? What bastard Incarnated God is helping this brat attack me!? Once I get out of here I’m going to sever your tendons and skin you alive! You’re dead, you bastard!” Jade-in-Stone was virtually frothing at the mouth, yet sadly, there was nothing he could do. In fact, the attacks were getting more severe. And if he knew that Yang Qi was actually redirecting the attacks of an Inspiring One onto him, he would have passed out from rage.

Sadly, both of Yang Qi’s opponents were completely in the dark and had no idea what was happening.

‘This is great!’ Yang Qi thought. ‘I'm letting the devils handle the devils, while I just sit off to the side. Once Jade-in-Stone loses enough of his vital energy, I’ll assimilate his deathless devil will and my energy arts will improve even more. I should be able to kill this Inspiring One at that point. In fact, I bet I would even be able to handle Proud Heaven. Then I could go back to the Brahman Immortal World and uncover all of its secrets on my own. Maybe I can just go right to the future world to look for my mother and the other God Legion Seal fragments.’

As Yang Qi planned and schemed, he continued with his act. Both of his opponents were still completely unaware of what was really going on. Jade-in-Stone thought Yang Qi was working with a powerful ally to attack him, and the Inspiring One was sure that he was just about to kill Yang Qi and assimilate him.

Eventually, though, the Inspiring One started to get a strange feeling. ‘Hmph. There’s more to this little brat than meets the eye, isn’t there?’

He was now fairly certain that Yang Qi was actually absorbing the power of his attacks. And he could clearly sense the backlash attacks from Jade-in-Stone, which he needed to use vital energy to negate. Those backlash attacks seemed to contain power from someone who had cultivated the dao of devils all the way to the Incarnated God level.

‘Don’t tell me this brat’s cultivation base has some of the power of an Incarnated God!? That must be it. His cultivation base is just too low. There’s no way he’s accomplished everything he has on his own. He obviously has some almighty entity backing him. If I kill him, that almighty being will probably show up. Well, there’s no need to get nervous. I'm backed by the Martial Blood Heaven, so what do I have to be afraid of? After I get his vital energy and treasures, I’ll go into secluded cultivation. There’s a good chance I can reach another breakthrough and become a fourth division Shattered God.’

Shattered Gods had to shatter their virtual godhood, then form it back into something more true and real than before.

It was a level that Incarnated Gods couldn’t possibly compare to.

POP!

He unleashed another round of attacks.

“Steel Blood Hundred Transformations!”

“Steel Blood Completely Invincible!”

“Steel Blood Snatches Gods!”

“Steel Blood True Void!”

“Steel Blood Loyal Heart!”

One attack after another flooded out, forming flames of steel and blood that engulfed Yang Qi. However, he funneled them all into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, causing Jade-in-Stone to scream and howl with murderous rage.

“What Incarnated God got tricked into working for that brat? Don’t you realize that you're wasting your vital energy!? You’re hurting both of us! You couldn’t possibly be that selfless!” Jade-in-Stone was truly confused. Even if Yang Qi had somehow convinced an Incarnated God to help him, that person shouldn’t have gone to such outrageous lengths, to the extent of treating Jade-in-Stone like the most deadly of enemies.

Incarnated Gods like that didn’t even exist, did they? He just didn't understand.

Little did he know that it wasn't a case of someone trying to help Yang Qi, but rather someone going all out to kill him.

“Fine!” Jade-in-Stone growled. “I guess I need to put everything on the line, too. Eighty-Eight Profound-Jade Devil Art: Origin-Returning Grand Energy Skill!”

RUMBLE!

Heaven-destroying, earth-extinguishing devil energy rushed out, the type that could topple universes.

A devil hand stretched out from Yang Qi’s sea of energy, flying directly toward the Inspiring One.

Whack!

Never could the Inspiring One have surmised that Yang Qi had such invincible power within him. He instantly realized that he had been tricked, but before he could react the devil hand had already smashed his defensive empyrean energy and battered his virtual godhood. Blood sprayed out of his mouth as he suffered a grievous injury.

“You!” he blurted. Then he bit his tongue, spitting out a mouthful of blood that turned into a streaking arrow and shot into Yang Qi. “I never imagined you would be hiding something like that! You were hiding a paper talisman, weren’t you? You’re backed by an almighty Incarnated God who gave you some animadestiny quintessence energy in talisman form that you could unleash in an unexpected attack! Sadly for you, although your trick worked, I just hit you with my Steel-Blood Vital-Energy God-Slaying Arrow! You won’t live for much longer now!”

The arrow of blood entered Yang Qi’s sea of energy, and promptly entered the passageway to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. When it stabbed into Jade-in-Stone’s devil will, he trembled as the fire of steel and blood enveloped him. ‘My god! He's actually going all out! He just hit me with an animadestiny god arrow? I'm down to eighty percent of my vital energy!’ His devil will was flickering unstably; he had obviously sustained such terrible injuries that he was no longer the fierce and domineering devil he had been before.

To the Inspiring One’s surprise, Yang Qi began laughing and erupted with sagelight. As of this moment, he looked more energetic and dangerous than ever. Even as he floated up into the air, the sagelight swept over his body and erased all of the blood and supposed wounds he had ‘suffered’.

“Many thanks to you. I know you thought you were hurting me just now, but you were gravely mistaken.” Yang Qi was like a god from heaven that had descended into the mortal world. He wasn’t hurt at all, but had instead reached an unprecedented level of strength. It was as if he were the kind of person who could contend with heaven-gods.

“You see, I have an invincible monster sealed inside me, a monster that really has it out for me. I’ve been redirecting your power to attack him instead of me. Before long, his vital energy will run out and I’ll assimilate him. Did you really think I would normally just stand around like an idiot and let someone hit me over and over again?

“It took a lot out of you to shoot that blood arrow at me, didn’t it? And now you’ve been injured by the very same monster I've been using you against. So. Where are you going to run to now? Why not be a good boy and let me assimilate you? I assimilated your pawn, Traceless Slasher, and now I'm going to assimilate you. The constitution of an Inspiring One is going to be a big help.”

Yang Qi thrust his hand out in a series of attacks that contained countless variations. Each attack was like the strike of heavenly lightning, causing deafening booms to ring out everywhere. He drew on all the power he could muster, even the natural laws of the great dao. It was something no one could possibly stand up to.

WHOOSH!

He became a streak that moved millions upon millions of times faster than the speed of light as he attacked the Inspiring One.

The Inspiring One immediately called on his robe of primal-chaos to defend himself, but it did him no good. His robe was shredded to pieces as Yang Qi’s blow landed square on his chest, then pierced into his body toward his heart.

“Aaaiiiieee!”

The Inspiring One jerked to the side, just managing to avoid the fate of having his heart ripped out. Unfortunately, he received a grisly wound that burned with an intense fire.

Of the thirty-six stratagems of war, retreat is often the best option.

He was fully aware of that axiom, and realized that he was no match for Yang Qi. Here he was, about to lose to someone from a low-ranking immortal world, someone far younger than him, and over a very inconsequential matter. Obviously, that was unacceptable.

Suddenly, he flared with light the color of steel and blood, and simultaneously began shrinking down. In the blink of an eye, he became a flickering mote that shot upward and vanished.

Yang Qi rushed forward, reached out, and grabbed something. Even as he did, a voice echoed into his ears. “I'm going to remember you, boy. Things aren’t going to go good for you. You think you control the Sage Sword Heaven now? You’re delusional. Everything here is controlled by the Martial Blood Heaven, and this rebellion isn’t going to go unnoticed. When I return, I'm not going to be a mere Incarnated God. Once I’m back, you’re dead!”

Ignoring the voice, Yang Qi looked down at his palm, where he held a tiny, wriggling clump of flesh and blood. It was the last remaining bit of the enemy he had just fought, and although it struggled to free itself and fly away, Yang Qi had it completely under his control.

‘This is some nice flesh and blood, and it contains some of the aura of an Inspiring One. If I assimilate it, I’ll have a fraction of the power of an Inspiring One. Although I won’t have all of the aspects of the constitution type, it will still be better than nothing.” Without hesitation, he consumed its quintessence.

The battle was over.

No one could ever have guessed how things would play out. Yang Qi had cut down Traceless Slasher and assimilated him with ease, then, when an Inspiring One showed up and everyone assumed Yang Qi would die, he turned the tables and ended the fight in a completely unexpected way.

Those who were present and observed the fight stared around with gaping mouths.

That was especially true of the people from the God-Slashing Sword Sect, who felt like they were dreaming. Only after a long moment had passed did they finally start to recover.

Their sectlord was dead, and without someone to lead them they had no idea of what to do next.

Chapter 664: Uniting an Immortal World

The dust was still settling. Yang Qi had killed Sectlord Traceless Slasher of the God-Slashing Sword Sect, and also struck a grievous blow against his backer, an Inspiring One. As a result, he now had complete control of the Sage Sword Heaven, a seventh ranked immortal world full of plentiful resources. It went without saying that the resources he now had access to vastly surpassed anything from the Titan Emperor Heaven, or even the Brahman Immortal World.

However, he couldn’t stop thinking about the Inspiring One’s parting words. He had promised to return and cause more problems, and it didn't feel good to have that threat hanging over him. However, there was nothing he could do about the matter, other than just forget about the Sage Sword Heaven. His current plan was to come up with a plan for how to make the best use of this place to benefit his lower world.

‘It’s time, to turn the Sage Monarch planetary system into an immortal world,’ he thought. ‘Or is it? It’s a period of extreme unrest, and creating a new immortal world would likely attract a lot of attention. Maybe I should just keep funneling resources down there to stockpile. Besides, raising it to a first rank immortal world would be pointless, and wouldn’t come with any benefits. It would just make the place a big target.’

Making the Sage Monarch planetary system a first ranked immortal world would put it on par with the Titan Emperor Heaven. In fact, it might even start out smaller than that. Other surrounding immortal worlds would definitely take notice, and would very likely send people to try to conquer it.

Yang Qi also knew that, in some locations, newly ascended immortal worlds became the target of top experts, who would attempt to assimilate them to improve their cultivation base. Although he was fairly certain he could defend against such people, he also didn't want to go through that trouble.

The best thing to do would be to stockpile enough resources to make the Sage Monarch planetary system a fifth ranked immortal world, at the very minimum. A place on roughly the same level as the Brahman Immortal World would be able to stand on its own amidst the endless forest of other immortal worlds.

Another factor that played into the situation was that he really didn't know what he was doing when it came to creating and improving immortal worlds. Learning a bit more would probably be a good thing.

As Yang Qi thought about all these things, Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit contemplated how long delays usually lead to trouble, and said, “Daoist Brother Yellow, you've killed Traceless Slasher and driven off the Incarnated God. What do you plan to do next? We’re all here, ready to take orders. People are unsure of what to do at the moment, so you need to act quickly to prevent word from spreading. If the immortal worlds under our control learn of what has happened, it could cause big problems. Many of them might try to free themselves from our rule and defect to higher-ranked immortal worlds. And the Ancient Beast Heaven is always itching to invade us, which could turn out to be a big disaster.”

Yang Qi nodded. “Yes, that’s a good point. Thanks for the reminder. Our top priority now is to win the hearts of the populace and make sure they acknowledge allegiance to you.”

RUMBLE!

A boundless energy flow shot out from Yang Qi, filling heaven and earth, reaching the far corners of the immortal world and completely locking it down. Immediately, he could sense the magical laws of this world, which were based on the essence of the dao of the sword. Normally speaking, he wouldn’t have been able to take control of them, but after assimilating a Slashing One it was a different story.

Traceless Slasher had spent countless years practicing cultivation here, inhaling and exhaling this place’s essence. He was essentially at one with the immortal world around him, and now that Yang Qi had absorbed him, he could easily take control of the place.

Everyone present was trembling in fear. They all felt that a catastrophe was looming over their heads, and they knew that there was nowhere to run to. They were the leaders of the Sage Sword Heaven, therefore there was no one they could reach out to for help.

“I've locked down all passages leading in and out of this immortal world. Not even a fly could escape. Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit, I have no interest in this place. Go ahead and unify this immortal world into a single sword sect under your control. Afterward, I’ll need your help to accomplish something even grander.”

If Yang Qi refrained from taking control of the immortal world himself, it would leave him more flexible in the impending catastrophe. Thus, he handed it over to Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit. An enormous throne suddenly appeared, in which he sat and waited for her to handle matters.

“Sectlord Emptydeath, step forward,” Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit said. She had control now, as well as the backing of Yang Qi, thus, she wasn’t afraid of anything.

The first thing to do was purge her immortal world, and naturally she would start with the sect that hated her the most—especially its sectlord.

“You… you slut! I’d rather die than submit to you. Leaders of the Emptydeath Sword Sect, hear my command. It’s better to be a broken piece of jade than an intact clay tile. So flee! I’ll take my stand, and the rest of you escape from here. Even if only one of you makes it, you can work hard to avenge my death!” Sectlord Emptydeath waved his hand, sending a beam of sword light slashing toward Yang Qi, hoping to delay him for long enough to allow the Emptydeath Sword Sect disciples to escape.

“You’re suicidally reckless aren’t you?” Yang Qi said. “Begone!”

The sword light shattered and Sectlord Emptydeath was locked in place, unable to move, bound by the magical laws of space. Yang Qi hadn’t used any true energy whatsoever, only the Glad Tidings of the Lord.

“You think your Emptydeath Sword Sect can escape under these circumstances,” he continued. “I have this entire immortal world locked down. And not even an Incarnated God and Inspiring One is a match for me. So what do you think you can do? The divine will of an Incarnated God can cover an entire tenth ranked immortal world, and I'm just as strong as that. What, you think I'm trying to pull a fast one on you or something?”

“That's right,” Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit said. “Run? To where? Daoist Brother Yellow, please, I beg of you, allow me to deal with him. I'm going to peel his flesh off of his body bit by bit and use his suffering to resolve my hatred.”

“If that’s what you want, fine. He’s completely and utterly immobilized, so do as you wish.”

At long last, terror rose up in the eyes of Sectlord Emptydeath. “Daoist Brother Yellow, er, I mean, um, Senior Yellow, I know that I'm in the wrong here. Please, let me off the hook and I won't cause any more mischief. I won’t oppose the Ice Spirit Sword Sect. I’ll acknowledge allegiance to you! And… right, I’ll even hand over all of the disciples of my sect to be slaves. Please, just spare my life!”

Completely ignoring his words, Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit said, “Die!”

King Life-Killer’s sage swords flew out and sliced the shrieking Sectlord Emptydeath into pieces. They fell to the ground, a wriggling mass of blood and gore that seemed to want to shape back together into human form, but was incapable.

Sectlord Emptydeath had been chopped into thousands of pieces, but was not dead. And each piece was wracked with indescribable pain. It was a horror the likes of which would be expected in hell, and was the worst type of torment possible from the dao of the sword. Thanks to the power of King Life-Killer’s sage swords, Sectlord Emptydeath wasn't even able to kill himself. His soul was simply forced to endure the torment.

The agonized shrieks he made in the moment before being chopped to pieces still lingered in the hearts of everyone present, causing their faces to drain of blood, and cold sweat to break out all over their bodies.

It was three days and nights before his energy finally drained away. Everyone else present was so frightened that they didn’t even dare to think about trying to run away. For all they knew, the monster Yang Qi would see such torment inflicted on them.

They had been frightened into a submission that would ensure they never acted out of line.

“Sword Seventeen, step forward!”

“Alright!” Sword Seventeen said, leaping out into the open.

“Assimilate him.” Sword Seventeen immediately began to take Sectlord Emptydeath’s quintessence energy. The sectlord was a Godmyth who had cultivated the dao of the sword for countless years. After cleansing his quintessence energy with sagefire, Yang Qi sent it to Sword Seventeen. Sword Seventeen was able to immediately assimilate some of it, but kept the rest stored for later use; it was obviously too much power for him to handle right now.

“Daoist Brother Yellow, what do we do with everyone else from the God-Slashing Sword Sect? Their sectlord Traceless Slasher is dead. Should we kill Inexorable Slasher too? I doubt he’ll offer allegiance, and considering the hatred in his heart he’ll surely cause trouble later.” As she turned to look at Inexorable Slasher, he dropped to his knees.

“I’ll acknowledge allegiance,” he said. “Traceless Slasher was acting on his own, and for the trouble he caused, he deserved to die at the hands of the heaven-god. Henceforth, I offer my faith to this heaven-god. I’ll become a believer and do whatever he asks!”

In his hope of saving his own life, Inexorable Slasher was willing to treat Yang Qi as a heaven-god.

“Fine,” Yang Qi said, nodding. “I accept. The faith of a Tempered God will be very useful. Definitely better than killing you.” Waving his hand, he sent a beam of sagelight into Inexorable Slasher’s head. “That is my Light of Faith. If you ever even think about plotting or scheming against me, I’ll know, and your efforts to save yourself will have been in vain.”

Chapter 665: Secrets of the Brahman Immortal World

Of course, Yang Qi had long since begun to gather believers and use their faith power, which was one of the purest types of power within heaven and earth, a blessing from countless living beings. In ancient times, the paramount Sovereign Lord had received such blessings from the countless gods beneath him.

The blessings of the legion of gods were what led to the creation of the God Legion Seal. That seal had been scattered into the past, present, and future. As a result, it was not possible for it to be united at the moment. Of course, the faith of the gods vastly surpassed the faith of ordinary living beings.

The stronger the cultivation base and soul of those who offered faith, the greater the power it would provide. Thus it could be imagined how beneficial it was for Yang Qi to have the faith of a second division Tempered God. Going forward, his cultivation would undergo significant transformations. Furthermore, his immortal-slaying clone would be able to benefit from the boundless power of faith, enabling him to have greater control over King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions and pushing him closer to the point of being able to resurrect the will of King Immortal-Slayer.

Inexorable Slasher’s initial reaction to the sagelight shooting toward him was to resist it. Truth be told, he was already full of crafty plots and machinations, and was hoping to get revenge one day. However, he also realized that he had no options right now. Therefore, he did not resist. The light entered him, and within moments his thoughts of vengeance faded away and he became a true believer.

“My Lord!” he said, and it almost seemed as if he had gained one of the three thousand special constitutions and become a Pious One. Prostrating on the ground, he said, “My Lord, you are the most glorious of monarchs. Henceforth, I will devote myself fully to you and exercise utmost faith. Your blessing will bring glory to all creation. Even if I have to sacrifice my own life, I will see to it that your will and majesty are protected and defended.”

“Good,” Yang Qi said. Waving his hand dismissively, he said, “Now stand off to the side.” Yang Qi could already sense himself growing stronger, thanks to having a new, powerful believer. Furthermore, he had complete control over Inexorable Slasher’s thoughts; the man would now do anything Yang Qi wanted without the slightest hesitation or resistance. He would even go so far as to kill himself.

‘Perfect. I can send this faith power to my immortal-slaying clone, which will help him control King Immortal-Slayer’s soul when it fully awakens. Otherwise, his will would probably try to possess me.’ Yang Qi was fully aware that King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy medallions were not like the God Legion Seal; instead, they were a disaster waiting to happen.

“Inexorable Slasher,” Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit said, “now that you’re a true believer of Daoist Brother Yellow, why don’t you tell us where to find your second brother, Shadowless Slasher? He needs to be killed, or become a true believer of Daoist Brother Yellow. Otherwise, he’ll be a danger to us and our immortal world.”

The God-Slashing Sword Sect had always been run by three brothers. The eldest brother was Traceless Slasher, the Slashing One.

The second brother was Shadowless Slasher, who was rarely seen in public. In fact, no one knew where he was. However, anyone who refused to comply with the God-Slashing Sword Sect’s teachings and rules would end up dead at his hands. As for Inexorable Slasher, he was the one who handled most of the daily affairs.

“The truth is that Shadowless Slasher also has a unique constitution that makes him no weaker than a Slashing One. He’s an Infiltrating One, and at the moment, he’s undercover in a tenth ranked immortal world, working toward becoming an Incarnated God. Unfortunately, not even I know which world it is, and I have no way to contact him. My Lord, why not use me as bait to lure him back here? Then you could have an Infiltrating One as a true believer.”

Yang Qi nodded. “That sounds like a good plan. You three brothers are really incredible. One of you was a Slashing One, and one is an Infiltrating One. Seems you’re the only one without a special constitution. Your parents must have been very unique. Fine, wait here for your second brother. When he makes contact with you, I’ll know. Eventually, I can add the constitution of an Infiltrating One to my collection.”

Turning to Sword Seventeen, he said, “I'm going to leave you in charge here. I’ll set up a passage leading to the Sage Monarch planetary system to allow people from there to come here for training. Select the best and most talented disciples from the Sage Monarch Society. The Titan Emperor Heaven is too small and weak to allow for true growth, but the Sage Sword Heaven is different. Also, take any resources or magical laws from here that you need and send them to the lower world. We need to start building up the power and reserves to push the Sage Monarch planetary system to the level of an immortal world.”

“Of course,” Sword Seventeen said. “Don’t worry, I’ll take care of everything.” Just being in the Sage Sword Heaven had already improved Sword Seventeen’s cultivation base, and he would only continue to grow stronger as he cultivated his profound sword technique. He would definitely be able to handle matters well.

As for Yang Qi, he was already as strong as an Incarnated God, so it was an easy task for him to open a passageway to the lower world.

For the Sage Monarch planetary system to have an infusion of power and resources from a seventh ranked immortal world caused its magical laws to grow stronger. Golden planets formed everywhere in the Sage Monarch planetary system, which cultivators of the dao could use to forge flying swords and other magical treasures that were innately immortal items, filled with immortal energy.

Countless disciples of the Yang Clan cheered, and the leaders, such as Yang Zhan and all of Yang Qi’s sworn siblings, couldn’t help but contemplate what future glories would come.

“Excellent. Perfect.” With the passage having been opened. Eldest Brother and the others from the Invincible Society came to the Sage Sword Heaven and began gathering resources.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi took the magical treasures he had acquired from Castle Heaven-Devil and handed them over to his father to be distributed to the Sage Monarch Society and the Yang Clan.

With that upgrade, Yang Zhan would easily be able to defend against ordinary Godmyths, or at least escape with his life.

Everything went smoothly. Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit took care of most daily affairs, and was supported by Inexorable Slasher.

Many days passed. The disciples of the Sage Monarch planetary system underwent their training, and all of them grew stronger as a result.

By this point, the Sage Monarch planetary system had reached a level that was in no way inferior to an immortal world.

There were tens upon tens of thousands of other immortal worlds that were subservient to the Sage Sword Heaven, and it was also possible to gather resources from those places to help the growth of the Sage Monarch planetary system.

Godrelics and spell formations were bolstering the Sage Monarch planetary system, and there were immortal slaves who constantly worked to strengthen its greyspace. The core of it all was the Sage Monarch Collegium. When the time came, Yang Qi planned to have his immortal-slaying clone send Jade-in-Stone there, along with the virtual godhood of the hundreds of Tempered Gods, to fuel the drive to become an immortal world.

However, the work underway didn’t need his supervision. His clan and sworn siblings would handle it all, and in the process it was possible that some of them might even become Godmyths.

‘I need to get back to the Brahman Immortal World. Originally, I thought I could overthrow the place myself, but based on what that Inspiring One said, it seems that the place really is actually an outpost for the future world. There must be many experts hiding there. I have to be very careful. The future world is a civilization that combines science and technology with the daos of immortals and gods, and that leads to terrifying power.’

Yang Qi blurred into motion and left the Sage Sword Heaven. It was time to start unlocking the secrets of the Brahman Immortal World.

His mission had been to go to the Regal Event Heaven and steal King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans from August Patriarch Fire Dragon. It had been two years since that mission had been handed out, and not only had Yang Qi succeeded, he had gone on to conquer a seventh ranked immortal world. It was a completely shocking development that he obviously couldn’t reveal publicly.

Upon arriving at the Brahman Immortal World, he once again disguised himself as Hu Yanmeng, child of Brahma.

Considering how much he had advanced since leaving, his view of the Brahman Immortal World was now different. He could see that in the very center of the Brahman Institute, there was a sealed passageway, which he knew led to the future world.

Chapter 666: Passage to the Future

‘Just as I expected, the Brahman Immortal World is filled with more secrets than anyone could have guessed. Considering that Proud Heaven built it, I can’t afford to underestimate this place. I think the first place I should start my investigation is the divine likeness of Proud Heaven himself. Maybe I can find some clues there that will lead me in the direction of my mother. Although, I have the feeling that Proud Heaven took her to the future world.’

His run-in with the Inspiring One had been fortuitous to say the least. Without the information he had gained during the encounter, it was impossible to say how long it would have taken him to begin unraveling the secrets of the Brahman Immortal World.

WHOOSH!

As Yang Qi proceeded on his way, he considered the fact that there was still about a year left before the time came to report his mission completed. That was how much time he had to learn everything he could, and also come up with a new plan. After all, when the time came to hand in missions, his identity as Hu Yanmeng would be useless.

‘Why did the Brahman Immortal World change the mission deadline from the usual one hundred years to only three years? It's really a dramatic difference. How do they expect the children of Brahma to finish the missions? In any case, I now have a year to try to acquire some more unique constitutions. For example, there’s Brahma Erudite, the Heaven Moving One. And the top child of Brahma, Brahma Echo-Silk, who’s an Enlightened One. With their constitutions, I could make significant progress toward the Godmyth level.’

He was especially interested in the Enlightened constitution.

As a child of Brahma, it was easy for him to go through the Brahman River and into the depths of the immortal world. As he did, he noticed an intangible power stirring, something that ordinary Demolishers wouldn’t be able to detect. It was almost as if the vital energy and magical laws in the area were bubbling. It was definitely something that only Godmyth patriarchs would notice.

It was evidence that this immortal world was about to rise to a higher rank. But at the same time, there was destructive energy brewing in the depths of the Brahman Institute.

‘I’d bet the Brahman Immortal World is going to become a sixth or seventh ranked immortal world.’ When he focused on the talisman that was the Brahman Institute, he could sense the passageway that it was sealing, and knew that it was so powerful that he would be destroyed if he opened it.

‘Could it be power from the future world that will propel the Brahman Immortal World to a higher rank? Probably. Normally, it should be impossible to travel from the future to the present. But the future world has been united, and its leader is like me, a person with a God Legion Seal. And whoever that leader is, their divine abilities are vastly superior to my own. This entire effort to set up a stronghold in the present, and expand influence and territory, must be an effort to find my God Legion Seal. To find me.’

It made sense why the future world had chosen the Brahman Immortal World as the stronghold, instead of some higher location. Someone must have divined that the God Legion Seal would appear in the territory of the Titan Emperor Heaven, and specifically the Titan Emperor planetary system. Perhaps they had even narrowed the location down to the Rich-Lush Continent, although that seemed unlikely.

Regardless, the catastrophe from the future would likely end up focusing on Yang Qi himself.

‘I can’t let this passageway remain. Right now they’re just sending power, but next it will be resources, and after that, armies. If they send experts from the future to start looking for me, how long could I possibly last? That said, maybe I can use the passage to get to the future world on my own. The only downside is that whoever has the God Legion Seal there would then sense mine. I have to figure out a way to mask its aura. Probably the only way is to get all nine of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions. Or at the very least, six of them.’

Yang Qi’s mind operated like a well-oiled machine as he considered all sorts of plans and possibilities.

As soon as he arrived, he found Hu Latu.

“Milord, you’re finally back. Did you kill August Patriarch Fire Dragon and get those talismans? There’s still a year left for the mission, which isn’t much time. The atmosphere here in the Brahman Institute is very tense. People are saying that the parliament of elders and the Godmyth patriarchs are in session, preparing to push our immortal world to a higher level. I have a feeling some big changes are coming.”

“Yes, I killed August Patriarch Fire Dragon. And I accomplished some other things as well, although they don't concern you. Let’s head to the Brahman Institute. Didn't you say there's a divine likeness of Proud Heaven there?”

“That’s right, Milord. Proud Heaven’s divine likeness is in the Unknown Temple. Actually, there are divine likenesses of many top experts there, including all of the founding patriarchs. The children of Brahma can go there to offer worship and gain inspiration from the statues, and sometimes, blessings. If a given patriarch takes kindly to one of the children of Brahma, the godpower left behind in the statues can reward them. For instance, Brahma Echo-Silk once acquired a god item from one of the divine likenesses.”

As they proceeded together into the Brahman Institute, Yang Qi felt more than ever that there was immense power simmering underfoot. It was terrifying, making it feel like he was walking on the edge of a volcano.

This was the sealed godpower of the future world, a place that had united billions upon trillions of immortal worlds into one immense empire, ruled by someone with a God Legion Seal. The fact that such forces were after his own God Legion Seal caused Yang Qi to shudder.

‘I wouldn’t be surprised if there were other founding patriarchs who were also Future Ones,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘That said, the young man in yellow was also from the future, and he was just an ordinary person who, by chance, happened to travel to this time period.’

Before long, Hu Latu and he were in front of the Unknown Temple.

Children of Brahma were coming and going. Some were in high spirits; they were obviously ones who had already completed their mission even though only two years had passed. Others were scowling on the verge of tears; they hadn’t finished their missions, and had obviously returned to the institute in the hopes of getting help from others. And there were other children of Brahma who seemed to be privy to confidential information walking around with mysterious smiles on their faces.

Some of the elders seemed unprecedentedly busy. Many were returning from distant locations with deliveries of materials that were shuttled into the depths of the Brahman Institute.

The atmosphere was very tense, and machines of war could be seen everywhere.

Even the most moronic fool would be able to tell that big changes were underway. However, while many people would assume that it was all centered around the improvement of the immortal world, Yang Qi knew that the truth was more complicated. Perhaps the Brahman Immortal World would rise to the tenth rank or so, but the true purpose was to allow for the arrival of an army of Future Ones.

Even an army of ordinary people who traveled to the present from the future would be baptized by the process, ending up as Future Ones with terrifying fighting prowess. And there was no way that the future world would send an army of commoners. They would obviously send crack troops.

Thanks to the memories of the young man in yellow, Yang Qi knew that the future world had armies filled with ninth division Godmyths, people who were close to being in the legion of gods.

For ages, the children of Brahma had come to the Unknown Temple in the hopes of gaining the favor of the divine likenesses there. That was even truer now, considering how many of the children of Brahma had missions to accomplish. It was truly a case of embracing Buddha's feet only in one’s hour of need.

As Yang Qi and Hu Latu prepared to enter, they saw Brahma Erudite walking out. They locked eyes, and Brahma Erudite flashed a cruel smile.

“Well if it isn’t Hu Latu and Hu Yanmeng, the two scumbags. You two sure are in a hurry. Didn’t finish your mission, did you, so you've come to beg for help from the patriarchs? Sadly, the divine likenesses aren’t going to give you a lick of help.”

Hu Latu chuckled coldly. “Don’t worry. I've been wanting to beat the crap out of you for a while now, but luckily for you, we’re here in the Unknown Temple in front of the divine likenesses. It wouldn’t be good to stir up trouble here. After we hand in our mission next year, I can teach you a lesson.”

Brahma Erudite snorted. “You just wait until you’re out of the temple. I’ll make sure you wish you were dead!” Not even he would dare to cause problems in the Unknown Temple. Although he would normally defy even the grand elders of law enforcement, he didn’t dare risk the fury of the patriarchs. In the past, there had been children of Brahma who started fighting in the Unknown Temple, only to be blasted into ashes by the wrath of the divine likenesses.

Without another word, Brahma Erudite stalked off.

As for Yang Qi, his eyes glittered as he watched him leave. Obviously, there was no way he was going to let a Heaven Moving One slip through his grasp.

Chapter 667: Divine Likeness of Proud Heaven

The Unknown Temple was filled with the divine likenesses of the patriarchs. They were all extremely powerful individuals who had long since left the Brahman Immortal World. Some had perished, while some had vanished to parts unknown.

The divine likenesses were still powerful, though. In fact, some contained seemingly endless seas of energy.

Yang Qi’s heart pounded as he walked in and sensed the mysterious energies and powers. From what he could tell, the divine likenesses were actually spatial nexuses that connected to the past, the future, and other hyperdimensions. And the powerful entities they were linked to could send power and energy through them from those distant locations.

Yang Qi had relied on his own power to pierce through the greyspace of the Titan Emperor Heaven, and that had been an incredible effort. He could only imagine the power required to pierce karma and connect to the present from the future.

‘The future world is terrifying,’ he thought. ‘I remember that buzz cut kid saying that in the present era, the gods are all dead. But he also said that a new civilization would gradually rise up. I wonder if the civilization he was referring to is the future era he came from, or some even more distant time beyond that. Could it be that people from that more distant time have come back here to seize control?’

There were many things that Yang Qi had heard in the past that he had no way to understand. Thankfully, the God Legion Seal—and the things he could see and sense in the Unknown Temple—were giving him deeper enlightenment. At a certain point, they passed a divine likeness that depicted a scaled half-human, half-dragon patriarch.

When Yang Qi stopped to look at it, Hu Latu said, “Milord, this is August Patriarch Proud Dragon, an ancient buddha dragon and another of the founders. He was a subordinate of Proud Heaven, and also a younger brother of his.”

The statue was gold, and emanated the aura of buddha dragons. Considering that Yang Qi had mastered the Eight Tribes Godfist, he knew how terrifyingly powerful the eight dragon tribes were. And he also knew that buddha dragons were the most powerful of the dragons.

‘So Proud Heaven has a little brother who’s actually a buddha dragon. Terrifying.’ Yang Qi's heart continued pounding as he looked around for Proud Heaven’s divine likeness.

“Milord, Proud Heaven’s divine likeness is further inside. You know, considering how strong you are, it’s a given that you’ll be able to learn something from these things.”

Hu Latu didn’t feel any particular respect toward the divine likenesses. After spending so much time with Yang Qi, he had been somewhat infected by his attitude and all but looked down on divine likenesses and other such things.

“True. Before we go on, let’s see what I can gain from Proud Dragon’s likeness. It’s only a statue, could it really be that impressive?”

Looking more closely at the divine likeness of Proud Dragon, Yang Qi placed his palms together to make it look like he was offering worship to it. Making sure no one would notice, he drew on the Wheel of Fate and the Glad Tidings of the Lord, as well as the God Legion Seal, and sent it out toward the statue.

He could unleash levels of power that rivaled an Incarnated God, thus no children of Brahma present could possibly detect his activities. Without anyone noticing, he slipped the stream of power into the divine likeness itself.

What he saw shocked him. ‘This statue is no ordinary divine likeness, it’s a power double! Incredible! It’s a convergence of power the likes of which I’ve never seen in person before. It’s created by breaking down magical laws and genetic material, then forming them back together into a manifestation of future science and technology called a photonic computer!’

Thanks to the memories of the young man in yellow, Yang Qi knew a lot about various mechanical and technological products from the future, such as photonic computers. Photonic computers were essentially repositories for information. There were different types, with different specific powers and functions, but the most formidable were the kind made from the magical laws of the future. Such photonic computers could unleash immortal skills and energy arts, and could even create new cultivation techniques for godly-class energy arts. And there were whispers that some of them could even calculate information about true godhood!

Virtual godhood and true godhood were completely different. Some highly advanced photonic computers, if they had the proper power supply, could actually create virtual godhood. In other words, an ordinary person who gained access to a photonic computer like that could acquire virtual godhood and easily reach the Godmyth level.

‘Terrifying. Completely terrifying. I can’t believe this divine likeness is actually a photonic computer!’  There was no way that Yang Qi could ever have guessed that the divine likeness would turn out to be something like this, a device that could analyze anyone standing in front of it and calculate what would benefit them the most.

WHIZZZ!

As he stood in front of the ‘divine likeness’ of Proud Dragon, it apparently sensed his presence, causing bright red light to shine out from its eyes and cover over him. Many other children of Brahma in the area noticed and looked over in curiosity.

“Look. That child of Brahma provoked a reaction from the divine likeness of August Patriarch Proud Dragon. For some reason, the divine likeness took a liking to him, but the question is will he get a reward?”

“This is unusual. I can’t believe he got August Patriarch Proud Dragon’s statue to react. Usually, August Patriarch Proud Dragon only responds to people who have acquired Dragonfolk blood, and are incredibly loyal to the Brahman Institute. A while back, there was one child of Brahma who killed a true dragon and brought the blood here to August Patriarch Proud Dragon. He was rewarded with a god item, the Dragon-Subduing Whip. Later, that child of Brahma reached the Godmyth level, and is one of the current patriarchs.”

“August Patriarch Proud Dragon is analyzing that guy’s blood right now.”

“Hmph! I bet he's going to get punished. Anybody who isn’t absolutely, completely loyal to the Brahman Institute will get discovered by the divine likenesses. If you have rebellious thoughts, you’ll be found out in the Unknown Temple and treated accordingly.”

“There’s no possible way! No student would ever betray the Brahman Institute!”

There were all sorts of discussions, with reactions varying from envy, to excitement, to indifference.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi quickly got his thoughts under control and drew on the virtual godhood he had access to. He focused his mind on how amazing and perfect the Brahman Institute was, and at the same time, let some of the true energy of the Eight Tribes Godfist seep out.

All of a sudden, the divine likeness of August Patriarch Proud Dragon spoke.

“Wonderful.” It was a voice devoid of all emotion, almost as if it had been produced by a machine.

A dragon egg appeared in the statue's hand, covered with dense, complicated designs that indicated it came from some mysterious and enigmatic species of dragon. As it floated toward Yang Qi, the voice continued, “Thou dost cultivate the divine abilities of the Dragonfolk, and are loyal to the Brahman Institute. I hereby reward you with this dragon egg from the ancient buddha dragons. It contains Buddha Dragon True Energy that can push your cultivation base to a higher level and improve your Dragonfolk divine abilities.”

The dragon egg sank into Yang Qi’s body and a burst of quintessence energy filled him, improving his Eight Tribes Godfist.

‘Not bad at all!’ Yang Qi thought. Now he knew for sure that the divine likenesses here were indeed from the future world. Apparently, the future world had left power and treasures in the statues to be distributed to students in the Brahman Institute.

It really was a heaven-defying arrangement.

Obviously, it was a tool to make the Brahman Immortal World more powerful, and push it toward being a tenth ranked immortal world.

After a moment, the divine likeness of August Patriarch Proud Dragon went dark, and Yang Qi knew the moment of testing had passed. And now, none of the other divine likenesses would react to him. Obviously, all of them were connected to some immense supercomputer in the future that controlled all of them.

Perhaps if he changed identities and returned, he could get a reward from another divine likeness. But he didn’t want to do anything to attract the wrong attention from Godmyth patriarchs.

With that, he continued deeper into the temple.

Along the way, Hu Latu continued to make introductions. “That’s August Patriarch Proud Ninestates. And that’s August Patriarch Proud Deathcrier. Over there are August Patriarch Proud Truestar and August Patriarch Proud Mystery….” There were over a hundred of them, all of whom had worked with Proud Heaven in the ancient past.

“Look, there’s Proud Heaven right up ahead.” An expression of fear flitted across Hu Latu’s face as they looked up at Proud Heaven’s divine likeness.

“Very good,” Yang Qi murmured, looking at the enormous divine likeness that occupied the main position within the Unknown Temple.

The statue wore an azure garment that corresponded perfectly to the color of the great dao. The great dao was like the azure heaven, a godpower that controlled reincarnation, the past, the present, and the future.

There were already several children of Brahma in front of Proud Heaven’s divine likeness, all of them on their knees praying.

Among them was the beautiful young Brahma Echo-Silk. And apparently, her prayer was working: all of a sudden, a stream of power descended toward her.

‘Virtual godhood!’ Yang Qi thought, a bit surprised. ‘She was actually blessed with virtual godhood!’

Chapter 668: Boundless Rewards

A mote of power floated into Brahma Echo-Silk.

Yang Qi wasn’t the only one to be surprised. Hu Latu and the other children of Brahma who were present were all shocked. Of course, every child of Brahma was a consummate expert, the kind of genius who could literally be considered one in a billion. Some were even rarer than that. Many of them were ninth stage Dao-Demolishers, some of whom had as many as seven or eight lineaments on their dao hearts. A few even had nine.

All of them were experienced and knowledgeable, so every person present knew exactly what that mote of power was. It was pure virtual godhood.

To reach the Godmyth level, one had to destroy one’s dao heart, subverting their magical laws and distorting the quintessence of one’s great dao. Only then could one produce virtual godhood. It wasn’t true godhood, but it was still the main path to becoming a powerful patriarch.

Only by getting virtual godhood could a ninth stage Dao-Demolisher break into the Godmyth level.

Usually, it was impossible to accept virtual godhood that hadn’t been personally cultivated with one’s own nascent divinity. In other words, even if some almighty being managed to kill a first division Seer God and take their virtual godhood, they wouldn’t be able to pass it down to their own lower-level disciples. That disciple would probably explode, and even if they didn't, they wouldn’t actually be able to use the power.

But the virtual godhood being provided by the divine likeness of Proud Heaven was different. It was absolutely pure and flawless, not stained with any postheaven aura. It was preheaven virtual godhood that would be of immense benefit to anyone who acquired it. Pure virtual godhood like this was something so rare that, even in ancient times, there were no stories of it.

‘Truly, truly incredible,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘So that’s what a photonic computer from the future world can do? It can actually create virtual godhood?’ Although Yang Qi was terrified by what he was seeing, his immediate thought was that he hoped he could use the divine likeness of Proud Heaven to somehow fool that photonic computer into providing virtual godhood that he could give to his family and friends. How much could they accomplish if they were all Godmyths?

The reactions among the other Children of Brahma ranged from excited to terrified as everyone wondered what this implied for the days to come.

“Brahma Echo-Silk actually got some virtual godhood as a reward? But how? She must have offered the purest of sacrifices. And her soul must be completely devoted and faithful to August Patriarch Proud Heaven.”

“Throughout all the years, I don’t think that virtual godhood has ever been given out as a reward.”

“I can't believe that Brahma Echo-Silk got this lucky. Is it because she’s an Enlightened One? No, it can’t be that. Not even the constitution of an Enlightened One would earn her the heaven-defying reward of virtual godhood.”

“When did our Brahman Immortal World become so strong? Pure virtual godhood given out as a reward? People say that even in thirty-third ranked immortal worlds, paramount places like the Tusita Heaven, Mourn-Parting Heaven, and Unrestrained Heaven, they can’t produce pure virtual godhood. That’s the power of the legion of gods!”

“Are we really just a fifth ranked immortal world?”

“How did our Brahman Institute get access to such terrifying godpower?”

Gong!

The tolling of a bell rang out as certain patriarchs apparently noticed that Brahma Echo-Silk had acquired the virtual godhood and came to investigate. One of them wore a yellow robe and resembled an emaciated monkey with flaming golden eyes.

Raising his voice, he said, “All children of Brahma in the Unknown Temple take note: this matter is not to be divulged! Any who fail to comply will be executed!”

“Yes sir!” the children of Brahma all replied, nodding their heads vigorously.

If word spread, even tenth or twentieth ranked immortal worlds would likely invade the Brahman Immortal World because of it.

Pure virtual godhood was something that could be used to create new Godmyths. And one could only imagine what could be accomplished by an army of such individuals.

Yang Qi and Hu Latu remained as motionless as the other children of Brahma, looking over to see how Brahma Echo-Silk would react.

After taking the virtual godhood, she rose to her feet. As she did, Yang Qi saw the tiniest flash of ridicule in her eyes as they lingered on the statue in front of her. No one else noticed it, but thanks to the level of his cultivation base, Yang Qi could see it clearly. He immediately suspected that she had somehow fooled the divine likeness into giving her the pure virtual godhood.

‘Don’t tell me that Brahma Echo-Silk is actually an infiltrator like me?’ he thought. He chuckled inwardly. ‘Is she not a true believer, born and raised here in the Brahman Immortal World?’ Although it was only a guess, he felt convinced that this was the case.

Of course, he wouldn't act on the suspicion just yet. He would wait and see how things developed. If he jumped out and made accusations without evidence, he would come across as a fool. Besides, whatever benefits he could earn by discrediting her right here and now would surely be outweighed by finding a time to have a private conversation with her about the subject.

Perhaps it would be worth it to work with her.

Just like that, the Brahman Immortal World transformed into something vastly more complicated than a mere fifth ranked immortal world. Considering it was wrapped up with the future world, it was obviously a colossal monster of an organization that had already surpassed any tenth ranked immortal world.

“Many thanks for your reward, August Patriarch,” Brahma Echo-Silk said, bowing formally to the divine likeness again. She looked completely emotionless, and as calm as a tranquil pond.

“Wonderful. Wonderful!” one of the patriarchs said. “This is completely unprecedented. Brahma Echo-Silk, congratulations on acquiring a reward of pure virtual godhood from the August Patriarch. Before long, you won’t just be a child of Brahma, you’ll become a patriarch like us. The parliament of elders is meeting now, please come to provide a thorough description of what it's like to be blessed by August Patriarch Proud Heaven’s divine likeness in such a way.”

Yang Qi took advantage of the opportunity to take a close look at the several dozen Godmyth patriarchs, all of whom were first division Seer Gods. It was instantly obvious that this immortal world’s forces were far superior to that of the seventh ranked Sage Sword Heaven.

‘Seems the forces of the Brahman Immortal World are only showing a tiny fraction of how strong they really are.’ Yang Qi remained in his spot, completely unmoving. He didn’t dare to use his divine will to search Proud Heaven’s divine likeness now. He could sense that this statue was the strongest of them all, and unfortunately that meant that its secrets would have to wait until later.

“All children of Brahma, remember: the matters you have witnessed today must be kept an absolute secret. Any who unlawfully divulge the information will be executed, along with their entire clan. Furthermore, their nascent divinity will be condemned to spend all eternity in the Hell of Nine Serenities.”

In addition to the orders, the Godmyth patriarchs sent talismans into the nascent divinities of everyone present that would activate if any of them spoke of the day’s events.

Furthermore, the monkey-like patriarch flicked his finger, sending out a golden globe of light that rose up into the air in the Unknown Temple and then exploded, sending down a rain of golden light. The light entered the heads of all of the children of Brahma, branding them with spell formations of warding.

Yang Qi wasn’t concerned. With a quick surge of true energy, he negated the warding spell, then did the same for Hu Latu.

The monkey-like patriarch was a mere Seer God, one that Yang Qi could kill a hundred times over without any effort.

Eventually, Brahma Echo-Silk left, and the other children of Brahma dispersed. Before leaving, Yang Qi looked one more time at the divine likeness of Proud Heaven and resolved to come back later to probe its secrets. Before he did, he wanted to talk with Brahma Echo-Silk and find out if she had really tricked the thing into giving her virtual godhood.

If so, then perhaps he could do the same thing to help his friends and family. For example, Empress Jadefall currently had nine lineaments on her dao heart, but thanks to her being a Reincarnated One she was having a lot of trouble breaking through to the Godmyth level.

Yang Qi returned to his mansion grotto in the Brahman Institute and sat down to work on his cultivation; he also thought deeply about his current situation. Using a Reverse Light Stream technique he had picked up long ago, he reviewed the images from the past. And he also combed through the memories of the young man in yellow. He could currently sense the aura of the future world bubbling and roiling. He knew that the crux of everything was the talisman that was the Brahman Institute. Once the breakthrough occurred for this immortal world, the forces of the future would come.

Yang Qi stayed in seclusion for a month, during which time he reached the absolute peak of sixth stage Abstrusity-Demolishing. He was now just on the verge of breaking through to the seventh stage, which would make him a Wilds-Demolisher and an immortal ancestor.

Reining in his energy arts, he opened his eyes.

Hu Latu had just neared. “Milord, I have news. After Brahma Echo-Silk got that virtual godhood, it only took her three days to break through to the Godmyth level. She went to a secret location within the Brahman Immortal World to pass her tribulation, which was said to be shockingly powerful—ten times what ordinary Godmyth patriarchs face. But she didn’t have any problems with it. She’s a matriarch now, and the only people who outrank her are the Tempered God patriarchs.”

“I see. Well, this is fortuitous. I’ve been wanting to go talk to her and see what secrets she might be hiding.” Yang Qi rose to his feet.

“What?” Hu Latu said, looking quite nervous. “Milord, now that Brahma Echo-Silk is a matriarch, it’s not going to be easy to get an audience with her. We’re not important enough.”

Yang Qi laughed. “Don’t worry, I know exactly what to do.”

Chapter 669: Slaughtering a Heaven Moving One

The atmosphere was tense in the Brahman Immortal World. Emissaries were being sent to all sorts of immortal worlds to gather resources, including the Titan Emperor Heaven.

Thankfully, Empress Jadefall had a very strong character, and whenever emissaries came, she always managed to stall and buy time. As for the children of Brahma who had been assigned to deal with the Titan Emperor Heaven, they were still unable to extricate themselves from the dangerous situation Yang Qi had arranged for them.

Truth be told, Yang Qi didn't care much about the Titan Emperor Heaven anymore now that he had the Sage Sword Heaven, which was a vastly superior place. However, he didn't want to lose the Titan Emperor Heaven. If some other immortal world came along and took it, it could lead to the deaths of everyone in it, including Empress Jadefall.

If worse came to worst, Yang Qi could always shrink it down and put it in his God Legion Paradise. His cultivation base was now strong enough for him to do such a thing with a first ranked immortal world. As he got stronger, he would be able to do it with higher-ranked immortal worlds.

Producing a magical treasure that resembled a flat disc, Yang Qi said, “Hu Latu, this is an animadestiny magical treasure I got from a Tempered God monster I killed. It’s called the Anarchodevil Gyre. With it, you can transform yourself into a majestic anarchodevil, which will boost your cultivation base to the point where you can conquer every obstacle. Take it. You should be able to use it to beat Dao-Demolishers with nine lineaments. You might even be able to hold out against Godmyth patriarchs. Also, I'm going to impart the Eight Tribes Godfist to you.”

Yang Qi did just that, and Hu Latu’s cultivation base immediately became four or five times stronger than before.

“Go back to your clan and take a look around. Find some people you think would be of use to me and recruit them. Pretty soon, I'm going to destroy the Brahman Immortal World and seal the passageway they’ve opened to the future world. Got it?”

Hu Latu promptly kowtowed. “Of course, Milord. As your loyal servant, I’ll handle everything.”

“Very well, you’re dismissed.” Closing his eyes, Yang Qi thought, ‘Brahma Echo-Silk. Ah, Brahma Echo-Silk. I'm very curious to see where you’re really from. You’ve surely got a very complicated background. How did you fool that divine likeness of Proud Heaven into giving you virtual godhood? Not even I could have pulled off something like that. Don’t tell me that you have a second identity. Are you also a Fraudulent One?’

Yang Qi had sensed a strange aura that he suspected could be that of a Fraudulent One. That was a special constitution type that was even more impressive than an Inspiring One.

At the moment, Yang Qi had combined four of the special constitutions. Fateless One. Reincarnated One. Future One. Slashing One. He also had a fraction of the vital energy of an Inspiring One. Technically speaking, that put his collection at the level of five constitutions. Combined with the power of his God Legion Seal, it made him capable of unleashing very profound and mysterious transformations. Next, he planned to kill Brahma Erudite and add the constitution of a Heaven Moving One to his collection. And later, he would use his pawn in the Sage Sword Heaven to get the Infiltrating constitution of the second brother Shadowless Slasher. And hopefully, he could cooperate with Brahma Echo-Silk to get the constitution of an Enlightened One.

With all of that, he would be even more invincible than ever and could perhaps travel to the future world and get another part of the God Legion Seal. After all of that, he would also need to travel into the ancient past to get the third piece.

He knew now that, ever since he had acquired the God Legion Seal he was destined to eventually be at odds with whoever had the other parts of the seal.

There was really little choice in the matter. Either he would get the seals from those other individuals, or they would kill him.

‘Before going to see Brahma Echo-Silk, there are two things I need to do. First, kill Brahma Erudite and get the constitution of a Heaven Moving One. Second, assimilate the devil will of Jade-in-Stone.’ His plans set, Yang Qi vanished into thin air.

He had been able to redirect the attacks of the Inspiring One to hit Jade-in-Stone over and over again, weakening him severely.

Unfortunately, Yang Qi wasn’t completely confident in being able to completely vanquish Jade-in-Stone. Therefore, he decided to start by taking out Brahma Erudite. Perhaps with the constitution of a Heaven Moving One, he would have a better chance against Jade-in-Stone.

He was a blur as he shot through the Brahman Immortal World, tracking down the branding mark he had left on Brahma Erudite, until he found him in a mansion grotto.

The grotto was located on a towering mountain that rose high into the sky and stretched deep under the ground. It fairly pulsed with high-level universal power and was covered with all sorts of warding magics.

‘Nice place,’ Yang Qi thought. It was definitely a blessed land for cultivation, and although it wasn’t in the Brahman Institute itself, it still had large reserves of godpower. Apparently, it was a minor godrelic, the kind that was perfect for meditation on the profundities of the Godmyth level.

The defensive spell formations were hardly an obstacle to Yang Qi. After passing through them, he saw Brahma Erudite, sitting atop a god item and meditating.

Brahma Erudite was from the enormous Brahma Clan, which had controlled the Brahman Immortal World since ancient times. The most common surname in this immortal world was Brahma, and as for Brahma Erudite, he came from a very important and influential branch of the clan. He had been showered with cultivation resources since he was young, and was also a Heaven Moving One. Because of that, his cultivation progressed rapidly. As a Heaven Moving One, he could move much more quickly than average cultivators. In fact, the reason for the name of this constitution type was that he could move more quickly than the magical laws of the dao of heaven would permit.

In terms of raw speed, Heaven Moving Ones could match Yang Qi with his Angel Wings, which made it easy for them to escape from bonds, pass through spell formations, and slip past warding magics.

Because of that, Brahma Erudite was able to easily enter all sorts of godrelics and acquire the treasures therein. That was what had pushed him all the way to the brink of the Godmyth level. Sadly, in terms of pure strength, he wasn’t even close to Yang Qi, who was essentially as strong as a Tempered God.

In fact, Yang Qi had already defeated an Inspiring One who was an Incarnated God. Considering that, Brahma Erudite was like a stray dog compared to Yang Qi.

Brahma Erudite sat there doing his breathing exercises, godpower flowing into him and being crystalized in preparation to break his dao heart. When that happened, he would be ready to enter the Godmyth level. Unfortunately, he wasn’t quite at that level yet.

Most cultivators who had a godly-class energy art could crystalize godpower and turn it into virtual godhood. Without doing so, entering the Godmyth level was impossible.

Grinding his teeth, Brahma Erudite muttered, “Damnation! I can’t believe that Brahma Echo-Silk got that virtual godhood. And it was pure, flawless virtual godhood! Now she's a Godmyth matriarch. I have to get to that level. This just isn’t fair! I got this Godjade Prayer Mat from one of the patriarchs, which improved my cultivation speed by tenfold, and I thought that was amazing. But compared to Brahma Echo-Silk, I'm like nothing. And then there are the damnable Hu Latu and Hu Yanmeng. I can’t believe they insulted me the way they did. I'm going to kill them and wipe out their entire clan!”

“Is that so? You're going to wipe out my clan?”

Brahma Erudite’s eyes snapped open, and he found a young man standing in front of him.

“Hu Yanmeng!”

Swish!

He leaped to his feet, a vicious gleam in his eyes that was mixed with profound surprise. “I have a host of deadly spell formations protecting my mansion grotto. This place is an impenetrable fortress! How did you get inside?”

“You did set up a lot of defenses,” Yang Qi said coolly. “Sadly, they’re complete trash as far as I'm concerned. Weaker than tofu. And your cultivation base is trash too. That said, your constitution is unique, and that's what interests me. You should feel honored, actually.”

Brahma Erudite’s expression turned even more vicious as killing intent burned in his heart. “You… what happened to you, Hu Yanmeng? You must have come across some good fortune. But aren’t you afraid of getting killed? We’re not in the Brahman Institute right now, so if I kill you, nobody will ever know.”

“You want to attack me?” Yang Qi laughed. “Good, you frog in a well. You’ve bitten off a bit more than you can chew, my friend. You see, I'm not Hu Yanmeng. And considering you’re about to die, I guess I’ll show you my real face.”

“What!? Who are you?!” All of a sudden, Brahma Erudite felt like he was suffocating as Yang Qi unleashed his true aura.

“My name is Yang Qi. I killed Hu Yanmeng and took his identity. Originally, I was planning to wait until you were in the Godmyth level before I took your Heaven Moving powers. But other factors have forced me to move up my timetable. Therefore, I'm going to kill you now. Sorry.”

“So, you’re an evil villain. And you’ve got a lot of guts. Well, once I spread word about this, you’re definitely dead!” All of a sudden, Brahma Erudite burst into motion, moving so quickly it was impossible to track his movement.

But then he let out a muffled shriek and stopped moving.

Chapter 670: Brahma Echo-Silk

“Aaaiiiieee!”

Before Brahma Erudite could even react, he was smashed into a bloody pulp by Yang Qi and his Heaven Moving powers immediately began dissipating. Of course, Yang Qi quickly locked those powers down and began pulling them toward him.

“I can’t believe scum like you would really try to fight me,” Yang Qi said. “There are only two things which happen to people who oppose me. Either they die, or they become believers. You picked option one, and now you have to deal with the consequences.”

“No!” Brahma Erudite howled. “I refuse to accept this! I'm a Heaven Moving One! Nobody can match my speed, how did you possibly catch me!”

“You think nobody can match your speed? Then explain my Angel Wings.” As Yang Qi absorbed the powers of a Heaven Moving One, he unfurled his Angel Wings, upon which appeared a host of magical symbols, all of which were the character for “move”. The blood of Heaven Moving Ones could be formed into the ancient script of the legion of gods and would take the shape of that character. It was the quintessence and ultimate meaning of their constitution.

The character “move” encapsulated the concept of speed.

Yang Qi unhesitatingly absorbed all of Brahma Erudite’s power, making him faster than ever. At this point, not even an Incarnated God would possibly be able to catch up to him in a chase.

Settling down on the Godjade Prayer Mat, he focused on his cultivation. With the various warding magics in place on the mountain, no one had any idea what was happening inside.

Eventually, heavenly tribulation descended from the void.

Yang Qi was breaking through to the seventh stage of Wilds-Demolishing, which made him an immortal ancestor. Almost immediately, he reached the peak of that level. Meanwhile, within the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, tribulation hit his immortal-slaying clone, who broke out of the immortal ancestor level and became an immortal emperor.

The clone merely needed to call on the powers of King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy medallions to push himself into breakthroughs.

As for his true self, he had the enlightenment of the immortal emperor level, but needed a bit of time to consolidate his power before attempting another breakthrough.

‘Excellent. My immortal-slaying clone is stronger again, and can call on even more of the power of those legacy medallions. Once he’s a Godmyth, he can finally search for the core of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Maybe he can even find the corpses of some of the fallen monarchs.’

Yang Qi reached out and ripped open a passage, causing the power of monarchs to spill out and revealing Jade-in-Stone, sealed there within the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

“How are you feeling, Jade-in-Stone?” Yang Qi asked coldly. “Comfortable? If not, I can give you a little massage.”

“You shameless little bastard! What Incarnated God did you get to help you earlier? Whoever it was, he went all out to fight me. Was it your father? But I doubt even your father would have wasted his life force quintessence like that. That much of a loss of energy would make it almost impossible to reach the Shattered God level!”

“Nobody was helping me,” Yang Qi replied coolly. “I was fighting someone and redirected his energy to use on you. And I did the same with your attacks, injuring him so badly he fled.”

POP!

Jade-in-Stone immediately coughed up a mouthful of blood in response. Of course, he had no physical shape—he existed only as deathless devil will—so the blood was really an expression of vital energy and power. But he coughed it up nonetheless, and it resulted in a significant injury to him.

“Enjoy your last moments, Jade-in-Stone. I'm going to assimilate you and make your devil will part of me!”

Yang Qi sat down cross-legged and began to draw on the virtual godhood he had built up. Igniting it with sagefire, he poured it into his Flame of Hope, causing it to burn brighter and more intense with every moment that passed.

The Flame of Hope was an energy art from the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, something that Yang Qi had previously been unable to use. Its function was to assimilate anything and everything, and thankfully the virtual godhood he had collected was just the fuel he needed for it.

It started out as a spark that quickly turned into something like a spirit snake, which then burrowed into the sealed Jade-in-Stone, who let out a miserable shriek.

“This… this is the Flame of Hope! People say that the legion of gods filled the world with hope, and in order to bring future blessings, they created a spark that could burn godhood to create a better future. How are you able to use something like this?”

“I have a God Legion Seal,” Yang Qi replied, “so why wouldn’t I be able to use it? You might be an Incarnated God, Jade-in-Stone, but that's not very impressive. With my Flame of Hope, I’ll easily assimilate you.”

“Let me go!” Jade-in-Stone wailed. “If you do, I’ll help you take over Castle Heaven-Devil! You can have all of the Incarnated Gods there!”

“Sorry, no. I don’t need your help with that. Once I assimilate you, I’ll be able to take out any Incarnated God I want. That means Castle Heaven-Devil will be mine. You think I'm going to let a duplicitous villain like you sit around and scheme against me?” Even as he spoke, Yang Qi kept the Flame of Hope burning strong, and before long, Jade-in-Stone began weakening.

He called down curses and calamities and drew on all sorts of energy arts from the dao of devils. But none of it could do anything to Yang Qi. He simply absorbed the curses into śarīras, completely negating their effects.

Eventually, Jade-in-Stone ran out of energy and was slowly converted into a sparkling and translucent heaven-devil śarīra. It was a fist-sized expression of virtual godhood, something so powerful that it caused this corner of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart to violently tremble by its mere presence.

Yang Qi chuckled. “Virtual godhood from an Incarnated God. For now, I don’t need it. My immortal-slaying clone can make better use of it. He can use this heaven-devil śarīra to further control those legacy medallions, which will make it that much harder for anyone to take them from him.”

Flicking his hand, he sent the śarīra to his clone.

With Jade-in-Stone gone, the sealing marks were all unraveled and an enormous arm became visible. It was the arm of the Jade Emperor, which had been severed by the sword of King Life-Killer. The godpower in that arm had never fully dissipated; although the Jade Emperor was only a Lesser God, he was still a god. A true god. Thus, he existed above even the most powerful Godmyth expert.

Yang Qi knew that this arm only contained one ten-thousandth of the power it had originally held and its true godhood was no more, destroyed by King Life-Killer’s sword. What was left behind was essentially some mangled flesh and blood, yet that was still enough to push his drop of the Blood of the One God to the level of one hundred percent.

‘God Legion Seal, come forth and subjugate the arm of this god!’ The God Legion Seal appeared, larger and stronger than before. Upon seeing the arm of an actual god, it unleashed golden light that immediately began assimilating the thing. Godpower surged into the meditating Yang Qi and his Blood of the One God grew purer almost immediately.

As time passed, it reached the level of one hundred percent and was the size of a mote of dust. Despite how small it was, it was boundlessly powerful. As it thrummed, Yang Qi felt the essence of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart trembling and could sense its greyspace. Upon sensing the power of the Blood of the One God, the immortal-slaying power in the chart tried to suppress it.

Unfortunately, King Immortal-Slayer was only a Paramount God and couldn't compare to the Sovereign Lord.

Lesser God. Common God. Greater God. Consummate God. Perfect God. Paramount God. Sovereign Lord. The Sovereign Lord existed above all other gods. He was the Lord over the legion of gods, the god of gods, the monarch of ten thousand divine beings.

Although Yang Qi only had one tiny speck of the Blood of the One God, that blood was the blood of the Sovereign Lord and was not something the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart and its greyspace could suppress. As of now, Yang Qi realized that his power surpassed that of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart and he didn’t need King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions to enter or exit it.

That was how powerful a single pure drop of the Blood of the One God was.

Of course, part of that was because of how, in the past, he had searched out the spatial nexuses leading into the chart, which made it that much easier for him to lock onto its location. It was a god item that surpassed space-time and was connected to the past, present, and future.

“My Blood of the One God reached the consummate level early. It’s now at one hundred percent strength. Unfortunately, it's still only one drop. That said, considering I'm not a Godmyth, it's an incredible amount of power. Once I get enlightenment of the Godmyth level, I can use that one drop to break through without even needing to fear the wrath of the dao of heaven.” Yang Qi could tell that he was strong enough to kill some Godmyths without any effort.

For some, it would take only a single blow and they would be dead, with no hope of fleeing. The time had come to pay a visit to Brahma Echo-Silk.

He surreptitiously left the mountain and went back to the Brahman Institute. Before long, he had locked onto Brahma Echo-Silk’s aura.

Chapter 671: Meeting

Yang Qi had long since identified Brahma Echo-Silk’s aura with the Wheel of Fate, which would allow him to launch an attack at her any time he wished as long as he was close enough to her. He could also use it to summon her to him, but she could resist that call if she wished, albeit with great difficulty.

Right now, he had no interest in attacking her. After all, he was fairly certain that she had secrets and perhaps even mysterious backers. If he made a move against her, it could lead to a whole string of problems. It might even place himself right in the path of the future world’s invasion.

For now, he just wanted to talk to her.

He didn’t plan to go talk to her as Hu Yanmeng, but rather, as Yang Qi. After locating her soul fluctuations, he issued a summoning call to her, then left the Brahman Immortal World and flew out into an alternate dimension, a high-level plane that drifted randomly within the universe of immortal worlds.

That was where he would wait for her.

**

Brahma Echo-Silk sat meditating in her personal kingdom in the depths of the Brahman Institute. All of a sudden, she opened her eyes. ‘What’s this? Someone's calling to me? They want to talk? This is no hallucination or heart-devil. I'm a Godmyth now, as well as an Enlightened One, so I should be able to fool even the dao of heaven. I need to get to the bottom of this.’

Suddenly, power erupted from her head and transformed into a treasure banner, the surface of which glittered with representations of magical treasures, śarīras, pearls, jade jewelry, necklaces, and all sorts of other items.

‘My Myriad Treasures God Banner is an invincible god item, able to extrapolate information about all living things, all wills, and the rotations of the universe.’ She was using a godly-class energy art, and not one from the Brahman Immortal World. Instead, this was some divine ability from an enormous god-spirit.

Clearly, she did have a very mysterious background.

The Myriad Treasures God Banner improved with her own cultivation base, and was like a conglomeration of thousands upon thousands of magical treasures that provided her with immense defensive capabilities.

‘So that’s how it is. Some top expert locked onto my aura and issued a call of summoning to me. He says he wants to talk, but who knows whether or not it's an ambush. Not going isn’t an option, though. He could just keep calling out to me over and over, and that would get frustrating very quickly. I might as well go see what he wants. Besides, there aren’t very many people who would be willing to stir up trouble with me.’ Brahma Echo-Silk, who had deceived the divine likeness of Proud Heaven himself, blurred into motion and quickly vanished from the Brahman Immortal World.

Following the summoning call, she traveled out into the depths of space to a location that seemed to hover between reality and illusion. It was almost like a thirty-third ranked immortal world, but at the same time it seemed unlike such a place. It existed, and it didn't exist. It went back and forth between such states in a mysterious and profound way that defied description.

Within that mysterious aspect of space, Yang Qi rose to his feet. Not beating around the bush, he said, “Miss Brahma Echo-Silk, I'm honored by your presence. Please excuse me for not coming out to meet you. I am your humble servant Yang Qi, one of the leaders of the Titan Emperor Heaven. I'm also the ruler of the Sage Monarch planetary system, one of the lower worlds. I heard about how you acquired some pure virtual godhood, and would like to ask how you accomplished that. Although I'm capable of slaughtering Godmyth patriarchs and simply taking their virtual godhood, I'm currently incapable of actually reaching the Godmyth level.”

After assimilating August Patriarch Fire Dragon, he had given the resulting virtual godhood to his clone to improve his cultivation base. But that wasn’t enough to push the clone to the Godmyth level, much less himself.

Even the heaven-devil śarīra and virtual godhood of the Incarnated God Jade-in-Stone had only been enough to reach the eighth stage, making his clone an immortal emperor.

All those types of power were far beneath the pure virtual godhood that had been created by the technology of the future world and imparted to the Brahman Immortal World by means of photonic computers.

“Yang Qi? Titan Emperor Heaven? Sage Monarch planetary system?” Brahma Echo-Silk had originally assumed she would be dealing with some extremely important individual. As it turned out, she was talking with a nobody from a first ranked immortal world. And his true origin was the mortal world. At first, killing intent flickered on her face; it was a big insult for someone like this to casually summon her to talk. But then he spoke of slaughtering Godmyths and taking their virtual godhood and she was profoundly taken aback, although she didn't let it show on her face. That said, considering the level of her cultivation base and her willpower, she wasn't just going to take his words at face value.

“What exactly do you want from me? I remember hearing about the Titan Emperor Heaven before. It's some tiny location that falls under the administration of the Brahman Immortal World, but has risen up in rebellion. And now you’re saying you’re one of the leaders from there? You've got a lot of guts, that's for sure. You actually came here to the Brahman Immortal World and called for a meeting with me? I'm a Godmyth matriarch now, aren’t you worried I might attack you and wipe you out of existence?”

Yang Qi chuckled. “Cut the comedy, Brahma Echo-Silk. Forgetting the issue of how weak you are compared to me, let’s talk about how you’re working for someone very powerful. Just like me, you’re a mole, an infiltrator working against the Brahman Immortal World.”

“Oh?” Even as the words left her mouth, she summoned her Myriad Treasures God Banner, which she could use to attack Yang Qi at any moment. After all, he had just spoken some of her greatest secrets out loud. “You're a real psycho, aren’t you? Maybe you thought some crazy talk like that would frighten me, but in the end you’re nothing more than a rebel leader, and therefore, you're going to die beyond the shadow of a doubt.”

“I'm not interested in banter,” he replied, waving his hand dismissively. “You used the powers of a Fraudulent One to convince Proud Heaven’s divine likeness to give you virtual godhood from the future. You might have fooled everyone else, but you didn’t fool me. The Brahman Immortal World is a very dangerous place, far more dangerous than a tenth or even a twentieth ranked immortal world. You and I both know that. It contains a passageway leading to the future world, making the place a stronghold they’ll use as the launching point for an invasion. Every warrior that comes here will be baptized by space-time, making them Future Ones. Think of what it would mean to have millions upon millions of such warriors invading us and our culture. I somehow doubt that whoever is backing you will simply sit idly by while it happens. You’re an Enlightened One, and your backer is a Fraudulent One. Why don’t we join forces? We can work together to destroy the Brahman Immortal World, dismantle the time-traveling efforts of the future world, and make sure there is no invasion. What do you say? If we work together, we both win.”

“You….” With each word that Yang Qi said, Brahma Echo-Silk's shock mounted. Never could she have guessed that this Yang Qi would know so many tightly kept secrets.

“You know too much,” she said, and without any warning she flicked her finger, sending a beam of dazzling light shooting toward Yang Qi. Right in front of him, it exploded, creating a host of scintillating planets like a river of light.

“People who know too much never live long. I can’t risk those secrets being revealed, and therefore you have to die! This is the Myriad Planets Comprehensive Destruction. According to the stories, when the legion of gods perished, their corpses entered countless mysterious planets, locations of profound deathliness and desolation. Such places lack will or life, and upon entering them you will die, and remain dead for all time.”

POP!

This was an attack that could slaughter Tempered Gods, and it made it more than evident that the Enlightened One Brahma Echo-Silk was no ordinary cultivator.

Yet Yang Qi just looked on coldly, not moving a muscle. A shield of light sprang up and the countless destructive planets slammed into it, unable to proceed any further.

Yang Qi’s drop of the Blood of the One God had reached the level of one hundred percent. He had assimilated the devil will of Jade-in-Stone, the Heaven Moving powers of Brahma Erudite, and the arm of the Jade Emperor. That made him strong enough to kill peak Incarnated Gods, and even treat Shattered Gods with impunity.

Although Brahma Echo-Silk’s attack was profound and deadly, it was incapable of overcoming the God Legion Paradise.

“Stop it, Brahma Echo-Silk. You’re no match for me. In fact, even your backer probably couldn’t do anything to me. Let’s get down to business and discuss how to work together. If you insist, go ahead and keep attacking me. Hit me with everything you’ve got. If I can last for three days and three nights, will that convince you of my superiority?”

Gasping, Brahma Echo-Silk let loose another volley of attacks, a host of brilliant lights that could have destroyed an immortal world. But Yang Qi didn’t even flinch. He just looked at her with a sarcastic smile.

“What are you, a girl playing house? Come on, hit me harder!”

Chapter 672: No Way Out

“Light-Year Lightning Bolt!”

Seeing her attack fail, Brahma Echo-Silk resorted to a different move. This was no magical treasure attack, but a true trump card that summoned an enormous lightning bolt, a river of pure light that stabbed toward Yang Qi in a most piercing attack.

When it hit him, he trembled physically. Nodding, he said, “That’s a bit stronger. Unfortunately, it’s still not enough to do anything to me. What else do you have up your sleeve?”

“Flip Heaven, Invert Earth!” Brahma Echo-Silk suddenly began spinning like a top, causing everything in the area to flip and invert. Yet Yang Qi was still unaffected.

“Preheaven Eight Trigrams!” She threw her hands out to control an eight trigrams symbol that descended from above. Clearly, it was quite a drain on her quintessence energy. But Yang Qi hardly even looked at the symbol falling onto him. He exhaled, causing a sharp sword to appear that slashed through the eight trigrams symbol.

“Greater Millstone of Heaven and Earth!” The eight trigrams transformed, becoming an enormous millstone that sought to crush Yang Qi into dust.

In response, he simply sent his true energy to meet it and the millstone shattered.

“Clouds in the Azure Heaven; Water in the Bottle!”

Flying upward, Brahma Echo-Silk reached out and a jade bottle appeared in her hand. She tipped it over and Azure Heaven Empyrean Energy poured out, filled with white clouds and divine water, like an enormous sea that rushed toward Yang Qi.

“Be suppressed!” Yang Qi said. Spatial fluctuations rolled out in all directions, suppressing everything they touched. The clouds and water vanished, and after a breath of time passed, Brahma Echo-Silk’s bottle collapsed into fragments.

“Alright, you've gone through plenty of moves already. That Clouds in the Azure Heaven; Water in the Bottle is a boundless energy art from the ancient Azure Heaven God. Who would have thought that you actually cultivate more than one godly-class energy art? The heterogeneous true energy really doesn’t cause a problem for you? Seems the constitution of an Enlightened One is quite useful, although it still doesn’t measure up to me. Come, let’s sit and talk. If you refuse to be reasonable, then don’t blame me for doing to you what I did to Brahma Erudite. I’ll kill you and take your Enlightened constitution, if I have to.”

“What? You killed Brahma Erudite?” Brahma Echo-Silk’s eyes flickered. “But he was a Heaven Moving One. If he wanted to flee, he could escape with speed unmatchable in heaven and earth.”

“Compared to me, he wasn't fast at all,” Yang Qi said coolly. “And it will be the same for you if you try to run. So for now, sit there quietly and don’t try anything funny.”

Brahma Echo-Silk had just been preparing to use a powerful magical treasure to try to make her escape, but considering what Yang Qi had said, she quickly abandoned the idea.

‘If I had known things would end up like this, I would never have come here. This guy is so strong! I don’t even think my uncle would be a threat to him. He definitely surpasses Incarnated Gods. No wonder he knows so many secrets about the Brahman Immortal World. Could it be that he really wants to help me?’

At this point, she finally changed her mind.

Dropping down to sit in front of Yang Qi, she said, “Fine, Yang Qi. I can tell that you’re strong enough to overpower me. But that doesn’t make you strong enough to tackle the Brahman Immortal World, or the future world. Do you know how strong the future world is? Creating virtual godhood is nothing to them. Did you know that their most powerful photonic computers can likely create true godhood?”

“True godhood? In that case you’re talking about actual gods, and they’re invincible. Even Lesser Gods could crush all of the immortal worlds out of existence. I really doubt that the leader of the future world can create true godhood. He needs something else before he could do that, and I'd say it’s highly likely that’s why he’s orchestrating this invasion.”

“He needs something?” Brahma Echo-Silk’s eyes flickered with surprise. “You know what he's after, don't you? If the future world gets it, then we’ll all fall under its rule. We’ll be slaves for all eternity.”

“Yes, I know what he’s after. The God Legion Seal.” As Brahma Echo-Silk’s eyes widened with visible shock, he continued, “The God Legion Seal exists in three parts. One is in the primeval era, one is here in the present, and one is in the hands of the leader of the future world. If the leader of the future world can get a second part, then for all intents and purposes he would have succeeded in getting all three.”

“How do you know all this?” she asked, clearly confused about how he could be privy to such information.

“Because I assimilated a Future One,” he replied. Obviously, he wasn’t going to casually reveal that he had a God Legion Seal. Smiling, he continued, “That Future One’s memories told me quite a bit of information. In fact, I've even seen what the future world looks like. Now, I have a question for you. Who is Proud Heaven?”

“Proud Heaven? He's very important in the future world, probably one of the chief elders in the empire. And he's close to the level of the legion of gods. If he hasn’t broken through to the Deathless Throne already, he soon will. The fact that his divine likeness can give out virtual godhood further goes to show that he’s anything but ordinary.”

“I see,” Yang Qi said. “So, how did you trick the divine likeness?”

“Well, that….” Brahma Echo-Silk initially wasn’t sure how to respond. But then her eyes glittered and she said, “Hold on, I remember you now, Yang Qi. You’re Proud Heaven’s son! I remember looking over your information once. Proud Heaven sent a clone to the mortal world looking for someone with a special constitution. A Fateless One. That’s one of the top two or three of the three thousand constitutions, of roughly equal standing with the Fortuned One and the Eternal Ones. Your mother’s name is Greensura, isn’t it? She's not very important in the big scheme of things, but I imagine she’s very important to you. Someone matching her description was seen in one of the parliament of elders’ secret meetings some time ago.”

“What?” Yang Qi blurted in astonishment. “Don’t tell me mother is in the Brahman Immortal World!”

“No, how could that be possible?” Brahma Echo-Silk replied carefully. “It was back when the parliament of elders was communicating with the future world. Normally speaking, it takes a huge amount of power and resources to send someone to the future world, but somehow they sent her into the space-time passageway, never to be seen again. I can't attest to the details, because I wasn’t there to see it happen. But after I reached the Godmyth level, I got access to certain privileged information.”

“I see….” Yang Qi thought, his heart pounding, ‘Proud Heaven will use any means possible to get at me, fair or foul. He actually did send my mother to the future world, knowing that once I found out, I would follow, essentially handing myself over to him. Of course, I speculated from the very beginning that this was the case, and I knew that I would eventually end up going to the future world. My Master is probably there as well, and Aunt Susu. If they were still in the present, my Wheel of Fate would have told me—even if they were dead.’

“What do you think, Yang Qi?” Brahma Echo-Silk said. “I know a thing or two about you, just as you know something about me. But why exactly do you want to work together? Do you really just want to get your hands on some pure virtual godhood? If that’s what you want, I can tell you right now that it’s impossible. Not even I could do the same thing again right now. It took me years to first become a child of Brahma, then more years to perform all of the services and get all the rewards that I needed before I made my move. If you’re thinking about trying to get virtual godhood for your subordinates, you might as well forget about it. There’s no way Proud Heaven’s divine likeness would allow that much manufactured virtual godhood to be sent here from the future world.”

He was actually fairly certain she was right. If Proud Heaven’s divine likeness continued to dole out virtual godhood, the people in the future world would notice. ‘I guess the main priority right now is to ruin the future world’s invasion plans. Afterward, I’ll have to figure out a way to mask my God Legion Seal and go to the future world. After all, it wouldn’t do to have the leader of the future world detect me as soon as I arrived, and there’s no way I’m a match for him now.’

“I'm not dead set on getting more virtual godhood,” Yang Qi said. “Truth be told, my main goal right now is to wreck the future world’s invasion plan. Then I might try to use the space-time passageway to take a trip of my own to the future world. What do you think?”

“You want to go to the future world? I’ve considered the same thing myself. If we did so, we would gain the constitution of Past Ones, which would tremendously improve our cultivation bases. It seems our goals really do coincide. Unfortunately, we don’t have very much time. The Brahman Immortal World plans to upgrade to a higher level in only a few months. When that happens, it will become, at a minimum, a tenth ranked immortal world. It’s possible that it could even reach the fifteenth rank. And of course, that process will cause all the core leaders in the Brahman Immortal World to advance by leaps and bounds. That includes me. Considering how much power and energy that will take, the future world will be at its weakest in that moment and it will be the perfect time to stop the invasion and go to the future world.”

“How exactly do you plan to do all that?” Yang Qi said, not willing to simply trust her immediately. “Tell me. Who are you really? You're not Brahma Echo-Silk, that’s for sure. I'm going to guess that you possessed Brahma Echo-Silk, making you a clone or a doppelgänger.”

“You’re right. I'm actually from the thirteenth ranked Glorious Treasure Heaven. And yes, I'm a Fraudulent One. You can call me Goddess Treasure. It’s all thanks to my Fraudulent powers that I was able to possess Brahma Echo-Silk without anyone being the wiser. My true self is currently in secluded cultivation. If I came here with my true body, then as an Incarnated God I don't think you would have an easy time dealing with me.”

Chapter 673: Limited Time

Brahma Echo-Silk was actually Goddess Treasure from the Glorious Treasure Heaven, an Incarnated God who had possessed the original Brahma Echo-Silk.

It was no surprise to Yang Qi.

“I'm no ordinary individual either,” Yang Qi said. “I'm an Inspiring One from the tenth ranked Martial Blood Heaven. I'm also an Incarnated God. Although our immortal world can’t compare to your Glorious Treasure Heaven, we're still nothing to look down on.” To reinforce his claim, he released a bit of the aura of an Inspiring One.

“What? So you were possessed as well? Perfect! We’re cut from the same stock, you and I. Alright, I’m going to arrange for you to get an identity in the Brahman Immortal World, that way we can work together more easily toward our goals.”

“Wrong. I'm not possessed. I actually joined forces with an Inspiring One some time back, and he gave me some of his will to add to my arsenal of tools.” Not wanting to belabor the point, Yang Qi quickly continued, “That said, the Inspiring One I dealt with was a weasel. He tried to scheme against me, until I turned the tables. The point is that I want to make sure you realize that I'm not just some nobody from the Titan Emperor Heaven. I have full access to the power of the Martial Blood Heaven.”

Yang Qi was mainly just trying to make Brahma Echo-Silk feel that he was something of a threat. After all, most of what he was saying was complete nonsense.

“Incidentally, I already have an identity in the Brahman Immortal World. I'm one of the children of Brahma, Hu Yanmeng.”

Yang Qi’s features rippled until he once again looked like Hu Yanmeng. Smiling, he continued, “What do you think? If I can get enough virtual godhood to reach the Godmyth level as Hu Yanmeng, then I’ll become an official patriarch too.”

“Very good,” Brahma Echo-Silk said. “Although the children of Brahma aren’t important enough to be privy to the core secrets of the Brahman Immortal World, it does qualify to you to officially work for me.”

“That’s fine,” Yang Qi said, nodding.

“First I’ll take you to the Temple of Patriarchs to look around and get the lay of the land. That will make things easier for you when the time comes to make a move. Besides, when the future world sends power here, it will be a good chance for us to achieve cultivation breakthroughs as the immortal world rises to a higher level.” The corners of Brahma Echo-Silk’s mouth lifted up in the smile of a Fraudulent One.

In the end, Yang Qi didn’t care if she was lying to him. It was the nature of Fraudulent Ones to deceive those around them, and never tell the truth. In the end, he could always open a way to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart and escape there, if the need arose. He would beat this woman at her own game, whether she called herself Brahma Echo-Silk or Goddess Treasure.

Whoosh. Whoosh. Whoosh.

She led the way as they flew back into the Brahman Immortal World and toward the Temple of Patriarchs, a location Yang Qi had never been to. It hung in space above the Brahman Institute, looking down on everything below. The entire institute was visible from this vantage point, making it very easy to keep tabs on the children of Brahma there.

It also made it obvious that the talisman that was the institute actually wasn’t particularly large, and that its true core was the third floor of the Scripture Pavilion.

Rumor had it that mysteries of the legion of gods were hidden there.

Turning to Brahma Echo-Silk, he said, “Wasn’t part of your reward a trip to the third floor of the Scripture Pavilion? Did you see any of the ancient records of the legion of gods? What are they like?”

“There are some records in there from the legion of gods, and although they’re impressive, they’re only there for show. The most impressive thing on the third floor is a heart. It’s no ordinary heart; it pulses with immense power that forms the bridge between the present world and the future world. And that heart isn’t dead either. It’s bound tightly by power from the future world, which keeps it in check.”

Opening his Lord's Eye, Yang Qi looked down into the Scripture Pavilion and could see something pulsing on the third floor.

“Don’t tell me that’s the heart of the god Brahma?” Yang Qi murmured.

“That’s exactly what it is,” Brahma Echo-Silk replied coldly. “And the heart still beats.”

“A beating heart….” Yang Qi shivered. He had assimilated the arm of the Jade Emperor, which had been cut off by King Life-Killer’s sage sword and was in fact dead. Virtually all of its soul and energy had drained away, yet even the tiny scrap that remained had been formidable. If it had been a full and complete arm, then there was no way that Yang Qi could have assimilated it, and in fact, trying to do so would have killed him.

And here there was a live, beating heart? How much power would it contain? After all, Brahma had been far stronger than the Jade Emperor.

“The heart of the god Brahma is extremely important to the future world,” Brahma Echo-Silk explained. “Years ago, Brahma fell to King Immortal-Slayer in battle, and his corpse was chopped into several pieces that were then scattered into different space-time aspects of the universe. According to the stories, his head ended up in the future world while his heart remained in the present. It's the connection between his head and his heart that allowed the future world to create the passageway here. I suppose I should give you some more details about what the future world plans to do. Right now, you could say that the passageway between the future world and the present world is actually illusory. But they want to strengthen the connection between Brahma’s heart and head to make that passage real and permanent.”

“Changing a virtual passageway to a corporeal passageway….” Yang Qi immediately realized the significance of such a change. One was a passage created by pure power, and the other was physical.

He couldn’t help but admire the ingenuity of the future world. They planned to use the body parts of a god to create a permanent connection between the future and the present. It was definitely something that ordinary individuals would never even think to do.

Even more shocking, the remains belonged to a god who was technically still alive, just in a state of deep slumber. If that god were to be overstimulated and eventually woke up, who could possibly comprehend the fury he would unleash?

Yang Qi shook his head. ‘The future world isn't afraid of a god like this? And to think that the Titan Emperor Heaven has the sealed eye of Titan, who is actually dead. If he were alive, who knows how strong that eye would be?’

To mortals, a tiger would be considered extremely dangerous even if it were asleep, and in fact, most animals wouldn't dare to approach it. As for a dead tiger, it could be used to frighten weaker entities, but any intelligent beast would likely just treat it as food.

Gods were the same.

Brahma Echo-Silk continued, “My specific plan is to wait until the moment when this immortal world is rising to a higher level, and in that moment, loosen the seals on Brahma’s heart, freeing it. After being awoken, the heart will surge with power and fly to the future world of its own accord, breaking through space-time and leaving a passageway in its wake. We can use that moment of chaos to follow Brahma to the future world. Understand? When Brahma’s heart and head combine in the future world, it will throw the future world into chaos, which is when we can take advantage of a crisis for personal gain. I already have lots of contingencies in place for when we're in the future world; it shouldn’t be a problem to get back here after we achieve our goals.”

Although Brahma Echo-Silk had clearly put thought into her plans, Yang Qi could already see some weak spots.

“Your entire plan revolves around breaking the seals that currently suppress Brahma's heart. But how are you going to do that? That sealing mark is definitely incredibly powerful, and not the kind that can easily be damaged. If that part of your plan fails, the entire thing fails.”

“You’re right,” Brahma Echo-Silk said. “But I have my ways. Besides, I have you to help me now. Didn’t you say you can draw on the power of the Martial Blood Heaven? With the powers of two immortal worlds working together, just about anything is possible.”

Yang Qi shook his head. “I don’t think even two immortal worlds working together will be enough. Don’t think me a fool. If Brahma’s heart is really still alive, it has power that could easily destroy a twentieth ranked immortal world.”

“That’s true. But in the moment of the immortal world’s ascension, the sealing mark will be infused with immense levels of power. At the same time, Brahma’s heart will be struggling harder than ever to get free. In other words, we can help release the heart. With the slightest push on our part, it will destroy the seals, shatter the Brahman Immortal World, then pierce directly into the future world. It’s like the old saying a single ant-hole can cause the collapse of a thousand-kilometer dike. Surely you're aware of that principle.”

Brahma Echo-Silk waved her hand and a painting appeared which depicted the specific location of the sealing marks. They were made of countless magical symbols, filled with the power of godrelics and natural law.

“This is a depiction of the sealing marks. Study it well, and when the time comes we can join forces to destroy them. If we draw on the full powers of our immortal worlds, we’ll instantly be hundreds of times stronger than normal. That’s assuming that you really do have the support of the Martial Blood Heaven.”

Clearly, Brahma Echo-Silk didn’t quite trust everything Yang Qi had told her.

“Alright, fine,” Yang Qi said, chuckling. “I can definitely use the power of the Martial Blood Heaven to help you. Okay, we're going to work together to save all of the endless immortal worlds. We’ll stop the future world from invading and earn a lot of favor with the dao of heaven.”

“Perhaps, perhaps not. The dao of heaven has no emotions. Even if we help it it won’t necessarily feel any gratitude.”

Chapter 674: Contingency Plans

Thus, Yang Qi finalized plans with Brahma Echo-Silk. Things were chaotic now in the immortal worlds. The Brahman Immortal World was in communication with the future world, and was planning to rise to a higher level. If Brahma Echo-Silk’s plan worked, they would free Brahma’s heart, open a way to the future world, and go there to look for treasure.

The civilization of the future world was very different from that of the present, and would likely provide many opportunities to improve their cultivation base. Most relevant of all, it was said that in the future world, it was possible to acquire true godhood and thus become an actual god.

Virtual godhood and true godhood were completely different. When one pushed beyond the ninth division of the Godmyth level and acquired true godhood, they could become a true god. And supposedly, the mighty photonic computers under the control of the ruler of the future world could create godhood, thus becoming truly deathless—a true god.

The Godmyth level relied on virtual godhood, but true gods were different. And what was false could not compare to what was perfect and true.

If Yang Qi really was going to go to the future world, he couldn’t be lax in any way. He had to find a way to hide his God Legion Seal, which currently was a task so difficult it might as well be impossible. Thankfully, he had time. With the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart and King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions, he might have a chance. Hopefully it would work, because he had to find his mother, his Master, and his Aunt Susu.

As fate would have it, another part of the God Legion Seal existed in the future world, which meant that, eventually, he would have no choice but to go there. Of course, the potential trip to the future world wasn’t the only thing he had to worry about. He also had to come up with contingency plans. He needed to decide what to do about the Titan Emperor Heaven, his clan, and everything else under his control.

And he had to make sure the Sage Monarch planetary system was well-hidden. If he went off to the future world, all it would take would be for one powerful enemy to come along and everyone he knew could be wiped out of existence. Throughout the years, he had made plenty of enemies, including an Incarnated God from a high-level immortal world. At the moment, none of his friends or family in the Sage Monarch planetary system were Godmyths, which meant that they were all in very dangerous circumstances.

WHOOSH!

After concluding matters with Brahma Echo-Silk, Yang Qi left the Brahman Immortal World and headed back to the Titan Emperor Heaven. The first thing he did was meet with Empress Jadefall, who was shocked by all the recent developments.

“What? You’re saying the Brahman Immortal World is going to ascend to a higher level by working with the future world and simultaneously destroying countless lower worlds? No wonder we’ve been getting orders to deliver resources to them. They even want our magical laws and immortal world essence. So it’s all a big, despicable conspiracy. What are we going to do?”

“We’ll be fine. I have the power to teleport immortal worlds now, and I've come back with the express purpose of putting contingency plans into place. Also, I have a plan to deal with both the Brahman Immortal World and the future world. Their conspiracy won’t come to fruition.”

“Where exactly do you plan to teleport us to?” Empress Jadefall could never have guessed that Yang Qi would try to pull off something as audacious as this. Teleporting an immortal world was a virtually unimaginable undertaking. After all, immortal worlds were usually fixed within the void, entrenched deeply in space-time like an enormous tree rooted in the ground. Teleporting a world could lead to irreparable damage, or even outright destruction, just like it could to a towering tree that was ripped out of the soil.

“I'm going to use the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart,” Yang Qi replied. “It’s going to be tough, but I'm confident I can do it. I'm also going to bring along the Sage Monarch planetary system and all the other planetary systems I control. Furthermore, I'm going to take the other nearby immortal worlds, such as the Hanging Heaven, Black Sand Heaven, and the like, and assimilate them all. I’ll take them, plus the seventh ranked Sage Sword Heaven and all the immortal worlds it controls, and use them to bolster the immortal world essence here. It will provide an increase of a thousandfold or more, and might even be enough to upgrade our immortal world.”

“That should work,” Empress Jadefall said. “I never would’ve guessed you would do something like that. In that case, we don’t have much time to work with. We should get started immediately.”

“Calm down. First, I want to get you to the Godmyth level.” Yang Qi laid his hand on Empress Jadefall and true energy began to course into her, filled with the power of deathless godliness. Instantly, streams of virtual godhood began building up in her, and although it wasn’t pure, it was more than sufficient for her purposes. It immediately gave her new insights and enlightenment into the quintessence of godhood. And of course, considering she was a Reincarnated One, she completely surpassed ordinary people in this regard.

Yang Qi knew that in the primeval age, she had started out as a porcelain godspore, and as a Reincarnated One, if she could eventually unlock all of her potential she would compare to the legion of gods.

Crash! Rumble!

Yang Qi’s cultivation base made him so incredibly strong that he could dominate tenth ranked immortal worlds, so helping Empress Jadefall was a simple task for him. Within moments, she was entering a state of ancestral awakening. Porcelain godlight streamed out of her, wrapping her up like a cocoon until she transformed back into a porcelain godspore, covered with countless streaming magical symbols and pulsing with the mysterious magical laws of primal-chaos.

“Porcelain purifies all blemishes,” she murmured from within the godspore. Godliness began to coalesce, crystallizing into virtual godhood.

As Yang Qi watched, he nodded. ‘This is what I would expect of a Reincarnated One. Definitely stronger than Heaven Moving Ones, Fraudulent Ones or Inspiring Ones. It’s too bad that she still can’t completely unlock her potential.’

Snap! Crack!

Three days and nights passed. Eventually, Empress Jadefall opened her eyes, looking as beautiful as a goddess. Smiling at Yang Qi, she said, “I’ll soon reach the Godmyth level. Many thanks for your help. I wouldn't have been able to do this with only the resources of the Titan Emperor Heaven to work with.”

“It was my pleasure,” Yang Qi said. “It’s a good thing I have magical laws from very high level immortal worlds to work with. Now I’ll go assimilate the Black Sand Heaven, the Five Blooms Heaven, and of course the Hanging Heaven.”

RUMBLE!

Yang Qi became an enormous blur that seemed like an ancient god, perhaps even Titan himself. After leaving the Titan Emperor Heaven, he reached out with fingers splayed like heaven-propping pillars to grab its greyspace and lift it up from its spot.

Crack! Snap!

The Titan Emperor Heaven was deeply rooted by the magical laws of the universe that held it in place within the surrounding spatial tempests. But as he lifted it up, it sent shockwaves rolling out to hit other surrounding immortal worlds. Countless ninth stage Dao-Demolishers from the surrounding immortal worlds shot out into the open.

“What’s going on? How could this be happening?”

“My god! Is something lifting that entire immortal world up?”

“What force could possibly lift an immortal world out of the void? Don’t tell me some Godmyth patriarch has come! Wait. According to the oldest daoist texts I've read, not even Godmyth patriarchs should be this strong.”

“It must be the ancient god Titan waking up! This is the power of the legion of gods!”

“But why would he lift the Titan Emperor Heaven up?”

They had recently been completely vanquished by the Titan Emperor Heaven, so at the moment, the assumption that the place was being destroyed had them feeling delighted, to say the least.

As Yang Qi hovered behind the Titan Emperor Heaven like a heaven-god, he said, “You pieces of trash are really useless. You’ve already admitted your inferiority to the Titan Emperor Heaven, and now you have no choice but to face my wrath and be absorbed!”

He reached out toward the Hanging Heaven, Coiling Arc Heaven, Black Sand Heaven, Megaplexus Heaven, Five Blooms Heaven, and Kestra Mural Heaven, and with seemingly no effort, he severed their connections to magical law and ripped them out of their place within the spatial tempests of the universe. Shocked to the core, the Dao-Demolishers immediately flew over and began kowtowing for mercy.

Chapter 675: Invincible God Might

“Spare us, oh exalted Yang Qi! Sir, you’re our supreme patriarch, an invincible Godmyth! Do you really need to cause problems for paltry low-level immortal worlds like ours? Please, let us go. It’s been hard enough to stay alive up to this point.”

“That's right, oh exalted one. Please, let our immortal worlds off the hook and spare our lives.”

“Mercy! Mercy! We’ll offer any tribute you want, just don’t destroy our immortal worlds!”

The lords of the six immortal worlds were ready to offer complete and utter allegiance. They, and all of their court officials, grand princes, chief elders, and the like, dropped to their knees to beg and pray to Yang Qi.

In response, he gave a cold harrumph. “I'm not planning to destroy your immortal worlds, I'm saving them! The Brahman Immortal World is about to experience a major transformation that requires essence and power from many lower immortal worlds. Once the process starts, they’re going to become a black hole that devours the thirty-six thousand worlds beneath them. I'm going to teleport you to safety. At the same time, I'm going to take the magical laws of your immortal worlds and add them to the Titan Emperor Heaven and my Sage Monarch planetary system. Doing so will create a larger, combined immortal world. In the end, you won't die, you’ll actually become stronger. Understand? Of course, you’ll all owe me your faith as a result.”

“Oh, well that’s wonderful.” The lords of these immortal worlds knew that they had no alternatives, and therefore they kowtowed to Yang Qi. There was no way they could compare to someone who could literally lift up immortal worlds. If they resisted him, it would only end in their deaths. Besides, he was offering to save their lives, and all they had to do was give him their faith.

“Rise!”

Lifting up all of the immortal worlds, Yang Qi opened a space-time wormhole, which pulsed with the power of monarchs. Obviously, his plan was to place the Titan Emperor Heaven and the surrounding six immortal worlds into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart to keep them safe.

“Now for the Sage Monarch planetary system!” Yang Qi tore open a rift and reached down, lifting up the Sage Monarch planetary system like grabbing a fish out of water. Truth be told, it had such strong magical laws that it already surpassed the Titan Emperor Heaven and was just as impressive as any other immortal world.

Without hesitation, Yang Qi sent it into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart as well.

Then Yang Qi himself vanished, leaving nothing behind but empty space.

Seven immortal worlds and a planetary system had vanished, just like that.

Yang Qi also reached into the Hell of Mahānata and took his kingdom from there, placing it alongside everything else in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

Inside the chart, Yang Qi drew on numerous magical laws and powers to ignite the greyspaces of all the immortal worlds.

The living beings from inside came out and watched the process, mixed emotions on their faces.

The countless immortals looked like streams of ants, with so many billions upon trillions of them that they were impossible to count. To them, Yang Qi was like the most sovereign of imperial figures. Even his Elder Brothers and Sisters, his father, Empress Jadefall, and everyone else he knew all viewed him as being beyond human. He was a god, a creator of worlds.

After all, what type of godpower did it take to uproot so many immortal worlds and toss them into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart? What kind of might? What kind of true energy?

Yang Qi drew upon the virtual godhood of hundreds of Tempered Gods, creating a nearly liquid stream of power that flowed into the immortal worlds.

Slowly but surely, the six worlds, the Titan Emperor Heaven, and the Sage Monarch planetary system were all merging together. Magical laws connected and a brand new immortal world emerged.

It looked like a godspore floating in the middle of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, pulsing with power like a god about to be born.

At this point, Yang Qi blurred into motion, appearing outside of the Sage Sword Heaven near Castle Heaven-Devil.

The final level of the castle contained numerous Incarnated God fiend-devils, as well as a sealed passage leading to the Unrestrained Heaven. After assimilating Jade-in-Stone, as well as the Heaven Moving One, Brahma Erudite, Yang Qi could easily slaughter such Incarnated Gods.

POP!

A tomb cracked open and boundless devil will spilled out, which Yang Qi immediately crushed and burned with an intense flame. A scream rang out as a heaven-devil śarīra appeared, pulsing with virtual godhood.

One after another, Yang Qi slaughtered the heaven-devils. In the end, he put an end to one hundred and eight of them. It was a number of heaven-devil śarīras that even a tenth ranked immortal world would never be able to produce or collect.

He also collected all of the god items that had been sealed in with the fiend-devils. After bringing everything back to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, he used the one hundred and eight śarīras to create a hexagramic foundation for the pulsing godspore that was the new immortal world, which slowly rotated as it grew.

'Excellent. The Sage Monarch Heaven is finally taking shape. My ultimate goal is for it to be a tenth ranked immortal world upon completion. Unfortunately, that’s not going to be a simple task.’ Addressing the congregated immortals, he said, “Everyone, please enter the primal-chaos spore and begin working on your cultivation. And begin setting up spell formations to prepare to push it to a higher level. In roughly a thousand years, it will emerge from the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart and take its place in the spatial tempests of the universe as a tenth ranked immortal world!”

Next, Yang Qi unleashed a burst of godpower and began setting up various spell formations.

‘Time to connect to the Eight Tribes Heaven!’

Draconic true energy appeared behind him, which swirled forth to make a dragon spell formation shaped like eight different dragons. Immediately, more power was poured into the growing Sage Monarch Heaven.

The power of the Eight Tribes Heaven was on par with that of the Tusita Heaven. Both were thirty-third ranked immortal worlds, with power that could be of immense help to a newly-forming immortal world.

Yang Qi was using all of his resources, all of his accumulated treasures, and all of the godpower he had built up to aid the process. Furthermore, he held nothing back to set up more contingency plans. He and his clone used all of the magical power they could muster to create space-time labyrinths in the surrounding area of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

‘It’s too bad I only have three of King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy medallions. Even one more would definitely help me locate the core of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. With the core under my control, I could seal this place down so tight that not even the legion of gods could break in!’

Having only three of the medallions was a low level of power; getting even one more would provide a boost of severalfold.

Unfortunately, he currently had no idea of how to track down any of the other medallions.

And that meant that once the current ten-thousand-year time period ended, the monarch chart would naturally open, and people would be able to enter. Yang Qi had that much time to try to find more legacy medallions and use them to completely lock down the place.

Already, the Yang Clan was organizing the influx of immortals. Some were made slaves, others were ordinary citizens, and some became nobility. Some were recruited into the armed forces, while others were assigned as kings to rule over other immortals. The Sage Monarch Heaven was set up like an enormous empire, a place of complete order and structure.

For the moment, his people were safe.

Now that his contingency plans were all in place, he could muster the gumption to cause a scene in the Brahman Immortal World. And whatever godrelics, treasures, powers, or corpses he acquired could be sent right into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart to aid in the growth of his own immortal world.

Strictly speaking, what Yang Qi was currently working with was simply a plane of existence, not an immortal world. When he truly raised it to the level of an immortal world, the dao of heaven would surely react with fury and send tribulation. And tribulations sent against immortal worlds surpassed those sent against cultivators in just about every way imaginable.

Not even the tribulations of hundreds of trillions of Demolishers all put together could compare to the kind sent against a new immortal world.

And that was what happened when a holy land of true cultivation from the mortal world tried to become a first ranked immortal world. But Yang Qi wasn’t doing that—he wanted to go directly to the tenth rank. What kind of heavenly tribulation would that involve?

Not even Yang Qi’s Wheel of Fate could tell him. All he did know was that if he tried to become a Godmyth in his own newly forming immortal world, the tribulation would likely destroy the place, thus he didn’t dare to make the attempt.

For the moment, he left the Sage Sword Heaven alone. It was a seventh ranked immortal world, led by Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit, and adding it into the mix would be difficult. For now, he was limited to fifth ranked worlds. That said, he could still benefit from resources sent down from the Sage Sword Heaven.

As he looked out at his work, Yang Qi nodded in satisfaction. ‘It’s time to really make a splash. I'm very curious to see how powerful the future world really is. I'm coming for you, Proud Heaven. I’ll track you down, even if I have to come to the future world. And I'm going to kill you.'

Chapter 676: Great Fanfare

Yang Qi had decided to go to the future world, but there was still a pressing matter that needed to be handled: he had to figure out what to do about his God Legion Seal. Getting more of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions would do the trick, but Yang Qi knew he couldn’t force that particular issue.

‘I’ll just cross that bridge when I come to it,’ he thought.

When the Brahman Immortal World activated their spell formation to draw on the power of the future world, Yang Qi’s cultivation base would improve and hopefully give him a solution to the problem.

When Brahma’s heart took action and created the space-time passage to the future world, it was entirely possible that, in the resulting chaos, he could take advantage of a crisis for personal gain. And maybe he would finally be able to get an idea of what the Brahman Institute really was.

Yet again, he surreptitiously re-entered the institute.

To his shock, the mysterious power of the future world seemed to be weighing down heavier than ever. Quickly drawing on King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans, he began absorbing it and using it to refine his cultivation base.

Most people wouldn’t be able to detect that power amidst all the other complex mixtures of vital energy. But considering that Yang Qi now had the constitution of a Future One, his powers of observation allowed him to immediately assess the situation and identify that specific power.

He inhaled deeply, then used the sagefire and faith power inside of him to break apart the vital energy and isolate the power of the future world. It was far stronger and more mysterious than power from the Tusita Heaven, and also purer.

Eventually, a stream of vital energy spun around the tip of his finger that looked like some sort of spirit snake. It had scales covered with complex, beautiful patterns that made them look almost like snowflakes. It was a unique product of the civilization of the future world, a combination of countless universal planes of existence.

The vital energy of the future world contained elements of the mortal worlds, the immortal worlds, the god worlds, and even primal-chaos itself. It wouldn’t be very far into Yang Qi’s future when a universal-scale explosion would occur, causing all heavens and earths, all worlds, and everything else to vanish and be replaced by a new, unified universe.

In preparation for the invasion, the future world had improved their vital energy using photonic computers, making it almost like power from the god world. It had a certain level of intelligence, but at the same time it could be absorbed by common people, providing them with immense benefits.

‘Not bad. Not bad at all….’ Yang Qi thought. After examining the vital energy from the future world, he decided it would be a good idea to send it into his own growing immortal world to speed up its growth.

Instead of using the snake-like vital energy for his own purposes, he turned it into a medicinal pill that resembled a śarīra, within which it was just possible to make out the image of godrelics from the future.

He quickly coined a name for it: Future Pill.

He continued absorbing the vital energy and sending it into the God Legion Paradise to become medicinal pills. As the process went on, his understanding and enlightenment of the future world grew.

He was now simply cultivating and waiting.

Until the future world made a move, he would focus on improving his enlightenment and getting stronger. The more he improved, the more confident he would be in being able to deal with Proud Heaven and get his mother back.

Gradually, he sank into a profoundly deep trance, to the point where everything around him vanished.

Primal-chaos vital energy swirled around him as he slowly breathed. When he inhaled, he would seemingly inflate, and when he exhaled, he would dry out and wither up. Any Godmyth who saw him practicing cultivation in this way would instantly realize that he had reached an incredibly mysterious level in which his breathing conformed to the universe itself.

The universe also breathed. When it inhaled, life flourished and expanded without limit. When it exhaled, the universe withered and became desolate, and all life ceased. In the end, after everything shrank down it would explode again. Of course, the breathing of the universe occurred over countless trillions of years.

The fact that Yang Qi’s breathing conformed to that of the universe indicated that his cultivation was similar to that of the legion of gods.

Even as Yang Qi’s cultivation reached a higher level, a meeting was underway deep in the Temple of Patriarchs in the Brahman Institute. Lately, such meetings were being held on a near-daily basis.

However, this meeting was different. It was a very formal affair in which a handful of thrones had been set up, which were clearly waiting to be occupied by extremely important patriarchs who normally didn’t show their faces. In fact, Brahma Echo-Silk was completely shocked by what she was seeing.

She had only recently been able to attend such meetings, which were normally graced by the presence of Seer God patriarchs with perhaps one or two Tempered Gods in attendance. But today, there were over a hundred Tempered Gods and all of them were on their feet, apparently waiting for an even more exalted figure to arrive.

‘I can’t believe that the puny, fifth ranked Brahman Immortal World is this powerful,’ she thought. ‘Who are they all waiting for? An Incarnated God?’

Suddenly, immense pulses of vital energy spread out as figures began to appear, standing in front of the empty thrones. Their auras were so powerful they seemed capable of wiping out entire immortal worlds. Obviously, they vastly surpassed Brahma Echo-Silk’s level of strength.

‘Dear lord, there are nine Incarnated Gods!’

Even more shocking, however, was the fact that the nine Incarnated Gods didn’t sit down.

‘Don’t tell me that someone stronger than an Incarnated God is coming?!’

RUMBLE!

Even as the thought passed through her head, an immense pressure suddenly weighed down and a swirl of paper talismans appeared, all of them shaped like dragons. A figure appeared on the central throne, a strong-looking young man with delicate features. He was dressed in simple robes decorated with starlight and wore no headgear. In fact, he didn’t have long hair either. He had a buzz cut, and his eyes were so sharp and burning that they seemed capable of immolating immortal worlds.

‘Who is this guy? He’s so strong that I feel like I'm suffocating.’ Brahma Echo-Silk quickly bowed her head, shivering subconsciously as she dropped to her knees along with the other Seer Gods.

‘He's got to be in the fourth division. That would make him a Shattered God! Only a Shattered God could put such pressure on me. Dear lord. Not even our thirteenth ranked Glorious Treasure Heaven has any Shattered Gods. How could a fifth ranked place like this have one? People like that only appear in fifteenth ranked immortal worlds or higher!’

“We offer respectful greetings, August Patriarch Proud Wing!”

“August Patriarch, you’re finally back from your hundred-thousand-year session of meditation. At long last, our Brahman Immortal World can accomplish the grand task at hand!”

“The ancestors’ plan of a hundred thousand years is finally going to come to fruition!”

All of the various patriarchs present were offering similar words of praise to this August Patriarch Proud Wing.

“It’s good to see you all,” August Patriarch Proud Wing said. He waved his hand slightly and caused a stream of devil power to roll out, quieting everyone. It was immediately clear that he was a natural-born leader, with intrinsic leadership abilities.

‘So, he’s a Leading One. And he has the aura of a Future One. Two special constitutions. How terrifying. As a Leading One, he can innately compel the hearts of his followers and lead his forces anywhere in the universe, against any type of enemy.’

Brahma Echo-Silk’s heart was already pounding with fear.

Looking around, August Patriarch Proud Wing said, “For some time now I've been in the twentieth ranked Honored Capital Heaven. After breaking through to the Shattered God level, I had hoped to continue achieving further breakthroughs. However, the other August Patriarchs requested that I come here to take charge. We have a very important task at hand—that being the invasion of the future world. Although most of you are from this world, at the end of the day you are essentially citizens of the future world. The future world will conquer this present world and acquire a most important artifact for the ultimate leader of our world. And that artifact will lead to the civilization of the legion of gods. If you succeed in activating the spell formation and drawing the forces of the future world here, you will have performed an incredible service and will forever remain protected and secure. Understand?”

Everyone present felt affected down to their very souls by his words, immediately joining voices to respond, “We understand!”

“Good. Now, tell me the latest developments. Has anything not gone according to plan? Was there any trouble in uniting the immortal worlds? Each of the thirty-six thousand immortal worlds are important nodes in the massive spell formation. We need those thirty-six thousand nodes for the formation to be complete.”

Chapter 677: Leading One

In response to August Patriarch Proud Wing’s words, the Seer God Patriarchs present all exchanged awkward glances. And they were all thinking the same thing. ‘What? The thirty-six thousand immortal worlds are all spatial nexuses? Um….’

“What, is there some problem?” August Patriarch Proud Wing asked. “Did something go wrong with the preparations?”

One of the Tempered Gods stepped forward and began stammering an explanation. “Aug-August… August Patriarch, please, don’t be angry. It’s like this. Everything was going fine, except we just got a report there was a minor uprising among some very inconsequential immortal worlds, which subsequently vanished. The Titan Emperor Heaven, the Black Sand Heaven… a total of seven of them. They’re gone. We were just about to send people to investigate when this meeting was called. August Patriarch, please, you absolutely, positively must not get angry. It's not that we didn't follow instructions! This is just very, very strange! How could a bunch of immortal worlds just disappear? It would be one thing for there to be a rebellion. That’s a common occurrence. But immortal worlds are all deeply inset in the spatial tempests of the universe! How could someone move them away?”

Normally speaking, these patriarchs were tyrannical and overbearing individuals, but not now. They were so terrified they could hardly compose themselves, and were convinced that August Patriarch Proud Wing might wipe them out of existence at any moment.

“Seven immortal worlds just vanished?” August Patriarch Proud Wing said, looking surprised. “Not even an Incarnated God should be able to do something like that. It would take an incredible amount of power to move an immortal world, especially without anyone noticing. Not even I could do that. Did some consummate expert discover our plan? No, that can’t be it. If someone wanted to interfere with our plan, they would strike at the Brahman Immortal World. Why would they go and move some inconsequential immortal worlds like that?”

Meanwhile, Brahma Echo-Silk looked on, her face completely expressionless as she realized that August Patriarch Proud Wing seemed to be performing some sort of calculation or divination. ‘Whether it’s something from the future civilization, or his own energy arts, he must have a way to see through to the truth of the matter. Terrifying!’

“Take me to the location where the immortal worlds disappeared. Perhaps I can determine what happened. Considering the important things that are about to happen, we can’t afford to take this matter lightly. A single ant-hole can cause the collapse of a thousand-kilometer dike. Even the slightest slip-up could cause major problems for the master plan.”

August Patriarch Proud Wing stepped off of the throne and sent out a wave of power that gathered up all the patriarchs, including Brahma Echo-Silk, and teleported them away.

Brahma Echo-Silk’s shock only continued to mount. ‘This Yang Qi is incredible. He actually teleported an entire group of immortal worlds away as part of his plan. But to where? I assumed he would be worried about his clan in the mortal world, as well as his people in the Titan Emperor Heaven, and that I could use it to take advantage of him. But he’s not so simple a person. I have to be very, very careful in working with him. We're both out for our own self-interest, and there’s no spirit of loyalty or self-sacrifice here. Considering that I was plotting against him, he’s definitely plotting against me.’

Soon, the group of patriarchs was in the location previously occupied by the Titan Emperor Heaven, which was now nothing more than empty space and severed magical laws.

August Patriarch Proud Wing’s expression flickered as he reached out, grabbed one of the severed magical laws, and looked at it closely.

“What mighty godpower. Whoever this person is, he's terrifyingly strong.” Suddenly, six streams of bright light shot out from August Patriarch Proud Wing, which transformed into six mirrors. Their surfaces immediately began shining with dazzling light as divinations were performed, then one of them revealed an immense figure grabbing the seven immortal worlds and taking them into parts unknown.

August Patriarch Proud Wing tried to continue the divination, but the mirror shattered.

‘He can tell I'm trying to find him?’

He tried to perform more divinations, but none of them actually worked. It was as if the subject of his search existed outside of fate itself.

‘A Fateless One? I can’t believe there’s one here! But who is it?’

Even as he considered the matter, one of the other patriarchs stepped forward respectfully and said, “I'm afraid this matter must have something to do with one of the lower worlds, a place called the Sage Monarch planetary system.”

“Sage Monarch planetary system? I've never heard of it. Tell me more.”

“Well, it’s like this….” The patriarch went on to describe the rise of the Sage Monarch planetary system and how they had taken control of the Titan Emperor Heaven. Then he explained that the Brahman Immortal World had dispatched some children of Brahma to take care of the situation, only to have them fail.

“In summary, this really is our fault. We thought it was a simple matter of a rebellious immortal world. Never could we have guessed that things would end up like this. The Sage Monarch planetary system is a tiny place, but not a location to be taken lightly. August Patriarch Proud Heaven once sent a clone there to look for something. Later, he returned with a young woman, then used our passageway to return to the future world with her. Perhaps all of this is tied together. Thankfully, you’re here to take charge, August Patriarch Proud Wing.”

With that, the patriarch bowed his head and waited for a response.

‘So this is all wrapped up with August Patriarch Proud Heaven?’ Proud Wing thought. All of a sudden, a serious expression overtook his face and he felt nervousness gripping his heart. ‘August Patriarch Proud Heaven is my Senior, and even in the future his cultivation base is considered mysterious and unpredictable. No one even knows how strong he truly is. It’s possible he’s already reached the Deathless Throne and is just as invincible as the legion of gods. Considering this is all connected to him, I might as well stop investigating. He surely has all sorts of plans in place, so the best course of action would be to just report the situation to the future world. Missing a few low-ranking immortal worlds shouldn’t be a huge issue. We can just go conquer some more to take their place.’

Just like that, what could have been a major storm passed.

In that same moment, Yang Qi was deep in the Brahman Institute, smiling faintly. ‘It seems my daoist techniques have improved again. Not even August Patriarch Proud Wing, a fourth division Shattered God, can divine my location. That said, he has the dual constitutions of a Future One and a Leading One, so I don't think I could take him out in a fight. I need to increase my cultivation speed! I have to get to the Godmyth level, or at the very least, the Dao-Demolisher level.’

With that, he sank back down into a trance to further his cultivation.

Already, he could tell that his connection to the future world was giving him deeper enlightenment. His divine will was at the level of an immortal emperor, or in other words, eighth stage Antiquity-Demolishing. And now he was pushing closer to ninth stage Dao-Demolishing.

Meanwhile, his immortal-slaying clone was also working on his cultivation deep in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. The clone was currently in the immortal emperor level, slightly higher than his true self, thanks to the power of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions.

Because of the enlightenment from August Patriarch Fire Dragon and Jade-in-Stone, as well as his connection to the Sage Monarch Heaven, the clone’s power over the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart had reached a point where it could cover an area the same size as several hundred immortal worlds.

However, no one knew exactly how large the chart was. It covered endless hyperdimensions and could fit millions upon millions of immortal worlds inside.

The part that Yang Qi currently controlled might as well have been a drop of water in the ocean. There were parts further in where spatial tempests raged, and there were dangerous locations that contained primal-chaos godrelics that even immense levels of power couldn’t open. Even certain true gods who came into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart could end up trapped and killed.

After all, King Immortal-Slayer and his brethren had used the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart to devastate the god world and kill too many god-spirits to count. In some ways, the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart also served as a tomb of gods.

Yang Qi had no idea how long it would be before he controlled the chart as a whole.

Considering how small the portion he did control was, he was essentially like a village chief or town mayor in an enormous empire.

Even if he had all of King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy medallions, he would need to push his cultivation base to the same level as King Immortal-Slayer himself, the Paramount God level, before he could take the chart for himself.

RUMBLE!

In another tiny corner of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, far, far away from Yang Qi’s immortal-slaying clone, a wormhole suddenly opened up, out of which emerged a group of people.

The person in the lead opened his eyes, took a deep breath, and said, “I've finally reached the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Excellent! Soon, this chart will be mine and I’ll become the most powerful entity in existence! No one will be a match for me!”

He looked like a young man of no more than fifteen or sixteen years of age and he held himself with a proud arrogance. He was flanked by a host of other young ones, all of them geniuses in their own right, with powerful cultivation bases. Upon hearing the words uttered by the first young man, one of them stepped forward and said, “Young Master Leaf, you’ll definitely become like one of the gods. We’re all from the thirty-third ranked Tusita Heaven, but you, sir, are the only one with King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions!”

Chapter 678: Tusita Heaven, Immortal-Slaying Medallions

Generally speaking, it was impossible for anyone to enter the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart before it opened naturally, even a member of the legion of gods. Only individuals with King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions could do so.

In total, there were nine such medallions and it required a minimum of three to open the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Obviously, the leader of this group had at least three of them.

This ‘Young Master Leaf’ was extremely attractive and had a profound cultivation base. He was a powerful and important person, otherwise he wouldn’t have so many other young geniuses as his followers. Including Young Master Leaf, there were a total of seventy-two individuals in this group.

And all of them were from the Tusita Heaven!

As a thirty-third ranked immortal world, the Tusita Heaven was considered to be very glorious and prestigious among immortal worlds. Top experts proliferated there, and compared to it, places like the Sage Sword Heaven, Brahman Immortal World, Martial Blood Heaven, and Glorious Treasure Heaven were mere ants.

Not even Yang Qi had ever seen the Tusita Heaven, nor did he know exactly what it was like. The immortal formation he had created to connect to it was merely a channel for power, not a passage for transportation.

“King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions are useful,” Young Master Leaf said coolly, “but they’re difficult to acquire and inherently dangerous. Normally, anyone who fuses with them eventually dies a violent death and has their destiny absorbed and sent into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart to increase the power of King Immortal-Slayer’s will. Then the medallions will seek someone else to attach to. It's a seemingly endless cycle that will eventually end with King Immortal-Slayer being resurrected. But I don’t care about that. I think of it as a challenge! As long as my will can defeat King Immortal-Slayer’s, I can surpass him.”

“That's right, Young Master Leaf,” said one of the other young men. “You’ve long since become famous among the clans of the Tusita Heaven, and your cultivation base is strong enough to subjugate countless planes of existence. Now that we’ve gotten into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, there’s going to be plenty of treasure for us seventy-two brothers. We're going to follow the example of the ancient seventy-two brothers, including King Immortal-Slayer, and devastate the legion of gods and challenge the Lord himself!”

This young man had an incredible aura that made it clear that if he faced someone with a similar cultivation base to his own, but who was from a lower immortal world, that person wouldn’t be a match in any way.

That was what happened when one was born in a high-level immortal plane. Individuals from the lower immortal worlds were like peasants, while those from the high-level planes were like nobility. When it came to people from the Tusita Heaven, they were like members of an imperial clan.

“The seventy-two brothers of the past all perished in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, and their treasures are still here to be taken. Now that I have three of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions I can start searching for the other pieces, and eventually combine them. It doesn’t matter where the medallions end up; people will find them, combine them, and eventually come to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. In fact, I might as well just lay here in wait.”

Young Master Leaf chuckled. “I'm very curious to see who else qualifies to collect these medallions. And yes, the main reason I’ve brought you all with me here is to follow the example set by King Immortal-Slayer. All of you are geniuses with special constitutions. For example, Tusita Master, you’re a Courageous One. Medicine Mortal, you’re a Heavenly Medicine One. Eternal Drum, you’re an Emptyheart One.

“All of the seventy-two brothers had special constitutions as well. King Immortal-Slayer was an Eternal One, and King Heaven-Devourer, a primal-chaos elder-snake, was a Devouring One. King Mourn-Parting was a Resentful One, King Life-Killer was a Life-Killing One, and King Wilds-Horn was a Guarding One. With me as your leader, we’re an unimaginably powerful force. We might be small, and we might not be the most intimidating group from the Tusita Heaven, but if we stick together we’ll eventually crush everything in our path. The Tusita Heaven is huge, but that just makes it a perfect stage for us.”

One of the other young men stepped forward. His skin was bright red and his eyes sparkled with fire, identifying him as a Flamedancing One. “Young Master Leaf, you’re definitely the only person who could have possibly gathered us all together. All of us have unique constitutions and are the obstinate and unruly type who don’t like to work with others. But you managed to unite us. It must be because you have the most powerful of the three thousand constitution types. You’re a Fortuned One, which makes you just as strong as King Immortal-Slayer, who was an Eternal One.”

“You’re right, I am a Fortuned One. And in addition to the Eternal Ones like King Immortal-Slayer, there is a third constitution that exists high above all the others. The Fateless Ones. That said, no such individual has yet appeared in our time. According to the legends, anyone who can acquire the power of a Fateless One will become invincible and will surpass all the other three thousand constitution types. If I can find a Fateless One, I’ll devour him without a second thought! Then I’ll combine all three thousand constitution types, doing what has never been done from ancient times until now and become the leader of the legion of gods!”

Young Master Leaf certainly had a big mouth. As he and his fellows flew through the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, they continued discussing matters.

“Young Master Leaf, that looks like a city up ahead. It seems quite populous.” Sure enough, there was a plane of existence in front of them in which a large number of experts had gathered.

Some of them were Demi-Immortals from the mortal world, with a few being Demolishers. There were even some Godmyth patriarchs. The Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart opened every ten thousand years, but that was only to let people in. Getting out was another matter, and those who remained stuck inside would often form societies and cultures that resembled immortal worlds.

“Perfect. Wipe them out. The Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart is mine, and these people are useless to me. How dare they steal treasure from my own house!”

This particular plane of existence was roughly as large as an ordinary immortal world and was presided over by a handful of Godmyth patriarchs.

Places like this were common in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. After all, over the countless years that the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart had existed, it was impossible to say how many people had entered.

However, this mysterious Young Master Leaf from the Tusita Heaven was obviously not going to tolerate their presence. He viewed the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart as his own personal treasure, every last inch of it.

As far as he was concerned, everyone else in this place was just trash to be cleaned out.

POP!

He attacked immediately, unleashing a devastating force that caused some of the Demi-Immortals and Demolishers to explode before it even touched them.

A group of Godmyth patriarchs flew out in response. Facing the group of seventy-two, they said, “Who are you? And why are you attacking us? This plane of existence remains neutral in the affairs of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.”

“I'm not interested in talking with scum like this. Kill them all. Don’t leave a single one alive. Other than us, no living thing is permitted to exist in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart!”

“Yes, Young Master Leaf!”

The other young men charged forward and destroyed the entire plane of existence, killing everyone present—even the Godmyth patriarchs, who didn’t even last a single round of combat with them.

After the time it takes an incense stick to burn, a plane of existence that had been inhabited by billions of cultivators was completely gone.

Young Master Leaf waved his hand, collecting together the countless howling souls of the dead. Looking at them, he shook his head. “What a bunch of despicable souls. How dare they profane the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart! They don't even deserve clean deaths. Be refined!”

Flames burst out of his palms and the souls were eradicated.

“Excellent. Keep clearing this place out. Er, what? Sections of the Mourn-Parting Heaven-Palace?”

In the wreckage of the destroyed world, there was a rancorous energy that Young Master Leaf noticed. Making a grasping gesture, he pulled up a collection of what looked like several hundred small houses. “Perfect! These are three hundred rooms from the Mourn-Parting Heaven-Palace! Murmur Hatred, step forward!”

“Yes sir!” A young man stepped out, pulsing with a rancorous energy that made him seem like he wanted to kill everyone in the world.

“Murmur Hatred, take these halls from the Mourn-Parting Heaven-Palace! You're a Resentful One, just like King Mourn-Parting himself. One of our main goals here in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart is to equip the seventy-two of us with treasures that conform to our constitutions. Once we’re fully equipped, we can return to the Tusita Heaven stronger than ever before. And then who will dare to underestimate us?”

Young Master Leaf obviously had some high ambitions. “Let’s go. Kill everyone you see. They’re like a cancer that needs to be purged from the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. How could we possibly allow the treasure and weapons of the seventy-two brothers to fall into the hands of despicable curs like them?”

A reign of carnage had descended on the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. There would no longer be peace in the place, as countless outposts were attacked and destroyed. Even Godmyth patriarchs were wiped out by Young Master Leaf and his associates. There were also primeval godworm lairs that were destroyed and taken.

Certain experts usually remained hidden in secret locations in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, but even they were terrified.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi sensed that something strange was happening.

Chapter 679: Fortuned One

Moments before, Yang Qi had been contemplating the mysteries of the future world and gaining scattered bits of enlightenment.

Eventually he exhaled, and the quintessence around him trembled with a sensation of extreme ancientness. He was finally stepping into the Antiquity-Demolishing level, causing tribulation to appear. He summoned his God Legion Paradise, which made the tribulation seem weak in comparison.

Within his sea of energy, his sage child stirred and the rage of the dao of heaven and its heavenly tribulation turned into vital energy that coursed through him. The particles inside him were like chains that wrapped around the energy and kept it locked down tight.

Moments later, Yang Qi was fully in the eighth stage of Antiquity-Demolishing, making him an immortal emperor.

Unfortunately, that wasn’t high enough. He had to at least reach Dao-Demolishing, and hopefully the Godmyth level. Therefore, he didn’t pause for even a moment, but instead continued with his cultivation, burning his own life force in the attempt.

RUMBLE!

A tremor ran through him as lightning of fate formed, and even as he prepared to push forward into another breakthrough, his soul trembled and he opened his eyes. ‘What’s happening? I have a strange premonition. And it’s not connected to me personally, but rather my immortal-slaying clone in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.’

The Wheel of Fate appeared above his head, allowing him to see into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Inside, there were fluctuations that seemed to be instigated by some event some distance away.

It was like a butterfly effect of some sort.

Apparently, something big was happening in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart—something that wasn’t an immediate threat to him, but could turn into incredible danger.

WHOOSH!

He rose to his feet and flew into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, heading to the location where his immortal world was growing. This was his foundation, his true headquarters, and he had put it here so that he could be free to act without hesitation on the outside. But now he had the same sensation one would experience when a fire broke out in one’s own backyard.

“Did anything happen recently?” he asked of his father, Yang Zhan, who was now one of the most important patriarchs in the Yang Clan and had a hand in almost all of its daily affairs.

“Nothing! Everything has been very peaceful and quiet. As you can see, everything is quite orderly. The Sage Monarch Heaven is like an enormous empire. The population has already exceeded three hundred trillion and is continuing to grow.”

It was hard to imagine what the faith power of three hundred trillion cultivators was like, but Yang Qi could sense it pouring toward him at all moments.

“I see, Father. Very well, keep things going as they are and focus on your cultivation. I expect to come across some good fortune soon, and when I do I’ll help you to reach the Godmyth level.”

Leaving his father, Yang Qi headed to the center of the Sage Monarch Heaven to find his immortal-slaying clone.

“I sensed the same strange fluctuations,” the clone said, his brow furrowed. “It seems to me that someone very powerful is carrying out a massacre. That’s the only thing which would give rise to a killing aura like this. Based on what I can sense, there’s someone else here in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart who has some of King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy medallions. Perhaps you should use the power of the God Legion Seal to lock down this part of the chart, lest this other individual sense your medallions.”

“I’ve already done that,” Yang Qi’s true self said. “Right now we need to determine what exactly is happening. We’re heading into a very critical juncture, with the Brahman Immortal World just on the brink of rising to a higher level. The passage to the future world will be opening soon, and the last thing we need is a disaster here.”

“Let’s get started, then.”

The clone and the true self immediately set to work.

The clone produced the legacy medallions which were covered with a protective golden light. Meanwhile, the Wheel of Fate turned and eventually produced an image. It looked like billions of trillions of souls howling in rage, and countless destroyed planes of existence.

“Whoever this is, he’s masking his presence. But my Wheel of Fate can see through anything and everything.” He spat some blood energy onto the Wheel of Fate and the image first grew blurry, then began resolving into spots of violet light.

There were a host of violet figures, pulsing with incredible energy. Although it was impossible to see their faces clearly, they were obviously very strong.

“That… that aura. It’s so familiar. Those magical laws, they’re from the Tusita Heaven! Don’t tell me people from the Tusita Heaven are here! That's a thirty-third ranked immortal world, and definitely not to be taken lightly. These people must be terrifying!”

Yang Qi felt himself going taut from anxiety as he realized that the situation was definitely grim.

“Destiny Piercing; Tusita Heaven Magical Laws; Be Broken!” He exhaled not blood energy, but rather the same violet energy that formed the magical laws of the Tusita Heaven. After all, he had long since built up such magical laws and violet energy within himself. It swirled out to form a dazzling śarīra, which then entered the Wheel of Fate, causing intense rumbling sounds to echo out along with bright violet light. Within that light, the figures from the Tusita Heaven became clear.

‘Dear god. So many unique constitutions!’ Yang Qi’s eyes nearly popped out of his skull at the sight of the seventy-two individuals. ‘Are they even human? Well, they’re not the children of gods. That’s a Devouring One. A Resentful One. A Courageous One! They actually have a Courageous One!’

Courageous Ones were said to be the most daring and audacious cultivators that existed, and they always made rapid cultivation progress. They were always able to fight people above their own cultivation level, making them virtually invincible as fighters.

‘A Sagacious One? And that… that must be their leader. He has some of King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy medallions. Three of them. No wonder he was able to get inside the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. They’re killing everyone! He must have a unique constitution as well. But which one? I've never seen anything like it before, but it seems on par with my constitution. Don’t tell me he’s an Eternal One. Or possibly a Fortuned One.’

The entire group of young men were stronger than the Shattered God Proud Wing. They were clearly bent on destruction and were not holding anything back, destroying everything in their path.

Yang Qi could tell that he wouldn’t be a match for even one of this group.

And if all seventy-two of them joined forces, they could kill him millions of times over. It seemed apparent that they wanted to take control of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart and exterminate any other living beings inside.

Initially, Yang Qi had been pleased at the thought of more of King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy medallions coming to him. But that pleasure had been short-lived. Each and every one of these newcomers could bring complete catastrophe to his growing immortal world, and there was nothing he could do about it. And that wasn’t to mention the fact that their leader would no doubt want to take his own legacy medallions.

The only advantage he might have was his God Legion Seal and his Blood of the One God. With them, he could suppress the aura of the legacy medallions and remain hidden from this new opponent.

‘This is terrifying. Seventy-two people from the Tusita Heaven, all of them with unique constitutions. Wait. Are they trying to model themselves after King Immortal-Slayer and his sworn brothers? I can see already that they have a lot of the treasures originally belonging to those seventy-two brothers. The Mourn-Parting Heaven-Palace. The Wilds-Horn God Armor. King Life-Killer’s swords. Imperial snakecharms. One of them actually has several hundred imperial snakecharms! That’s quite a collection.’

The one with the imperial snakecharms was a Devouring One, just like the ancient King Heaven-Devourer. If Yang Qi could get him, he would get much closer to the point of having all three thousand talismans. After acquiring two thousand, he had come to find that acquiring more was very difficult. But each one he added provided a huge boost in strength.

Now more than ever, Yang Qi thirsted for more.

Collecting King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy medallions could lead to dangerous consequences, but there was nothing like that with King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans. Collecting more of them just gave one greater access to King Heaven-Devourer’s legacy.

‘It's too bad I'm not even close to being in a position to deal with these people. I need to keep out of their way for now, and think of a way to take advantage of them later. The Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart is so huge that it would take me decades to clear it out and search it. They’re getting closer and closer to me, though. Soon, they’re going to notice my immortal world. After all, it’s nearly at the tenth rank. Worst case scenario, I guess I can just seal it up and take it somewhere else.’

He had originally assumed the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart would be the safest location, but then these fiends showed up and he realized he needed to change his plans.

He obviously needed to become a Godmyth before he could face this group.

‘The one with King Immortal-Slayer’s medallions seems like a Fortuned One. How can I manipulate a Fortuned One…?’

Chapter 680: Sudden and Unexpected Disaster

It really was a sudden and unexpected disaster, and the only option at the moment seemed to be flight.

Considering how much effort Yang Qi had put into creating a secure foundation for his immortal world, it was a really depressing situation. Thankfully, August Patriarch Proud Wing hadn’t continued looking into the missing immortal worlds, otherwise Yang Qi would have definitely been stuck between a rock and a hard place.

‘Ah, whatever. These fiends are just too strong for me at the moment. Maybe if I were on my own, things would be different, but I have my people to worry about. If a fight broke out, it would definitely end with all of us being wiped out.’

After putting some more thought into the matter, Yang Qi wasn’t any more resigned to the situation, but couldn’t think of what exactly to do. The perfect situation would be to somehow set this group of people in opposition to the Brahman Immortal World and the future world.

‘First things first. I need to teleport my immortal world to a safe place. Either somewhere among the mortal worlds, or perhaps in some high-level place in the immortal worlds. Hopefully it will just be temporary.’

Yang Qi and his immortal-slaying clone carefully tapped into the power of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart and sent the growing Sage Monarch Heaven to a remote location among the immortal worlds, a desolate place filled with endless spatial tempests, that had no other worlds floating nearby.

The tempests were particularly fierce, and as they battered the greyspace of the Sage Monarch Heaven, it trembled violently, forcing Yang Qi to use a defense technique from the Eight Tribes Godfist to protect it.

Things had been much better in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. There, his immortal-slaying clone could call upon the power of monarchs to protect his people no matter where they went. But there was no other option.

The seventy-two interlopers were simply too fiendishly powerful, and eventually they would have found the Sage Monarch Heaven and destroyed it.

‘I can’t just let those fiends run amok,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘I should go back in there and take a closer look at them. I need to figure out who exactly they are, and what their plan is. If they notice me, then I can use King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy medallions, my God Legion Seal, my Angel Wings, and the Heaven Moving constitution if I have to flee. Maybe later I can use the power of the Brahman Immortal World to wipe them out and even assimilate them.’

Yang Qi was convinced that Brahma Echo-Silk wasn’t telling him the full truth about her plan. For one thing, he knew that unsealing Brahma’s heart would be very dangerous, but perhaps he could use that explosive force to his advantage. In the blink of an eye, plots and schemes erupted within him. Perhaps he could get the tiger and the wolf to kill each other!

‘Actually, this is perfect! They’ll definitely be sensitive to King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions. When the time comes, I can just unseal my own medallions and use them as bait to lure them in.’ A crafty smile appeared on Yang Qi’s face.

“Clone, come with me. Let’s see exactly how strong these people are!”

With that, the two of them headed back into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

Thankfully, King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy medallions made it possible for them to enter the chart anywhere.

**

Young Master Leaf and his companions had just destroyed another plane of existence. It was impossible to say how much destruction they had wreaked so far, or how many cultivators they had killed. They were purging the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

“Dammit. How come this place is infested with so many bugs? No matter how many we kill, more seem to pop up. We must have wiped out ten thousand worlds already, but it seems like only a drop of water in the ocean. How long is this process going to take?”

One of the young men held a Godmyth patriarch in his hand, making him look like little more than a bedraggled chicken. The Godmyth begged for mercy, but was assimilated in the end. That young man was the Devouring One, who had several hundred of King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans that he had originally acquired in the Tusita Heaven.

“Who cares?” said another young man, clad in a suit of armor. “The more there are, the more we kill. What are you, scared? Thanks to wiping out so many strongholds, I now have several hundred pieces of King Wilds-Horn’s suit of armor. It’s a perfect match for me, considering I'm a Guarding One. Now my defensive capabilities are exponentially stronger than before.”

Another young man who pulsed with a killing aura said, “Coming to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart really was the right choice. I already found several of King Life-Killer’s sage swords.”

“And I found several hundred halls from the Mourn-Parting Heaven-Palace,” said the Resentful One.

Even as everyone excitedly discussed how they had benefited, their leader Young Master Leaf was staring off into the distance with a somewhat surprised expression on his face.

“Young Master Leaf, is something wrong?”

“No, nothing. I just sensed a fluctuation in the essence power of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Not many people could produce something like that. I wonder if someone else with a collection of King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy medallions has entered the chart.”

“What? When did that happen? Whoever it is, they’re courting death!”

“It’s like they always say: you can wear out iron shoes in a fruitless search, then find what you're looking for without even trying.”

“Let’s go, Young Master Leaf. We’ll kill this guy and get you at least three more of King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy medallions. With six of them, your cultivation base will become even more unfathomable than it already is! Given some time, you’ll definitely end up as the top figure in our Tusita Heaven, a ninth division Godmyth.”

The entire group of young cultivators was getting very excited.

“Calm down. The power is very weak, and I suspect that rushing over there won’t do any good. I'd rather just wait for this person to come to me. We’re in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, after all, so we're bound to run into each other. If I release some of the aura of my medallions, he’ll sense it and come running into my hands. I’ll kill him, and won’t even give him a proper burial. After all, I am the only rightful successor of King Immortal-Slayer. In fact, I'm going to surpass him.”

Young Master Leaf waved his hand, destroying a godrelic which was home to over ten billion cultivators. All living beings there died instantly. Young Master Leaf was a merciless killer who knew exactly what he wanted and how to get it.

“Keep going!” he shouted. “There's another huge godrelic up ahead. There are even some of the Dragonfolk there! They must be from the Eight Tribes Heaven. Don't let any of them live!”

Howling, they rushed forward to attack.

Sometime later, Yang Qi appeared and saw the wreckage of the godrelic. Not even a scrap of godpower had been left behind in it. ‘Incredible,’ he thought, ‘these people are so strong!’

SNICK!

A chunk of debris the size of a small planet shot in his direction, moving with enough force to shatter the greyspace of an immortal world. Yang Qi reached out and grabbed it, stopping its motion. Upon inspection, he realized that it was incredibly sturdy, and tapping it caused a booming sound like a bell to ring out.

‘This was made from preheaven god-steel, yet they casually destroyed it. Even I would have trouble breaking a godrelic like this. But they destroyed it completely, and even wiped out the ancient will that was part of it.’

With that, Yang Qi continued shadowing the seventy-two interlopers.

The Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart was essentially an enormous space-time labyrinth, a place so solid and tough that not even Godmyths would be able to break their way through the maze.

But now, the place was being devastated.

And the seventy-two young men were going to places that Yang Qi would never have dared go because of the danger involved.

‘I can’t believe there are so many secret locations here in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. For all intents and purposes, I never went beyond the border regions. Obviously, my cultivation base is just too low.’

Demi-Immortals could hardly even scratch the surface of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Demolishers could go a bit further, and Godmyths could explore its depths. Those who surpassed the Godmyth level, and were on the level of the legion of gods, could uncover an ever greater world within.

It all depended on the level of one’s cultivation base.

POP!

A barrier fell and Yang Qi saw an enormous godrelic up ahead, set into an area of magical law that was incomprehensibly tough.

Right now, he didn’t dare to draw on the powers of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions. If he did, he would definitely attract notice and get killed. For the moment, he was just relying on the speed of his Angel Wings and the constitution of a Heaven Moving One.

‘It’s too bad I don’t have the constitution of an Infiltrating One. Then I could move around without attracting any notice at all.’ The godrelic up ahead pulsed with power, and was larger than any godrelic Yang Qi had ever seen before.

It was shaped like a disk, and was silver in color. It was larger than tens of thousands of immortal worlds put together, and as it slowly rotated, it glittered with countless dazzling lights. It looked like a magical treasure, yet was not. It seemed like a god item, but wasn’t. Unexpectedly, it was an object from the ancient mechanical civilization!

And it pulsed with the auras of countless Godmyths.

Yang Qi couldn’t help but wonder who might be in possession of such a terrifying object from the ancient mechanical civilization. Whoever it was, they were extremely powerful.

Even as Young Master Leaf and his companions closed in on the thing, the disk suddenly emitted a booming voice. “This is a Mechfolk base! Who dares to enter uninvited?!”

Contrary to expectation, the Mechfolk had a base set up in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart!

Chapter 681: Mechfolk Base

Yang Qi was so astonished he nearly passed out.

Usually, he was the one who shocked people, but in this case it was the reverse. The enormous spacecraft hanging in front of him was beyond the compare of any god item he had ever seen. At least, other than the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

Even more remarkable was that the spacecraft was not a magical treasure. With a large enough crew, and enough power reserves, even mortals could operate it. After all, it was a remnant of the ancient mechanical civilization.

The Mechfolk had turned this enormous spacecraft into a base, and at the moment, a host of their patriarchs flew out into the open, all of them Godmyths. There were even some third division Incarnated Gods.

There were also ancient entities within the spacecraft that were so powerful they were impossible to assess. Yang Qi had previously been operating under the assumption that he had secured over fifty percent control over the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. But now he realized how wrong he had been.

The gigantic spacecraft hovered there glittering like some primeval god-spirit, descended to the world of men to spread culture and civilization. Dazzling light shields shot out from it, spreading in all directions to protect everyone inside.

When the Fortuned One Young Master Leaf saw the spacecraft, his eyes lit up with shock. “I can’t believe it—it’s actually a part of the ancient Cruiser of Civilization!”

All Yang Qi knew was that this spacecraft was incredibly large. He didn’t know anything about its history. In contrast, Young Master Leaf was from the thirty-third ranked Tusita Heaven, and was very experienced and knowledgeable. He was familiar with the ancient mechanical civilization, which had possessed a number of powerful objects they had used to dominate the many heavens, and even challenge the legion of gods. The Cruiser of Civilization was one such tool.

As for this spacecraft here, it was only one part of the larger Cruiser of Civilization. From that, it could only be imagined how gargantuan the full Cruiser of Civilization itself would be.

It had been designed to disseminate mechanical culture and civilization, even to the legion of gods. According to the stories, the Cruiser of Civilization had been used to travel from one plane of existence to another, locating primitive agricultural people and teaching them about technology.

Because of using such advanced machinery, people didn’t need to practice cultivation to challenge the gods. Obviously, that posed a big threat to the legion of gods, and even the host of immortals. That was why the humans who had made up the mechanical civilization were eventually destroyed.

Later, the Mechfolk picked up what was left of their civilization and continued its traditions.

Here in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, there was a spacecraft left behind by the mechanical civilization. Clearly, King Immortal-Slayer and the mechanical civilization had had dealings with each other, although it was impossible to say whether they were friends or foes.

Fists balled with anticipation, Young Master Leaf said, “Attack them! Destroy the defenses of these Mechfolk! The pieces of the Cruiser of Civilization are as valuable as god items. With this spacecraft, we can return to the Tusita Heaven thousands of times stronger than before. We’ll be invincible! These Mechfolk are scum who couldn’t possibly unleash the true potential of the Cruiser of Civilization. This is incredible! I can’t believe we lucked out so much here in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart!”

RUMBLE!

Without hesitation, he unleashed a palm strike onto the Cruiser of Civilization.

Blinding light shot out, and many of the Mechfolk who had been preparing to fly out to repel the invasion were destroyed. Some coughed up blood, while others were simply ripped to shreds.

In the blink of an eye, a whole host of Mechfolk perished.

“Mechas!” some of the Mechfolk howled, and scintillating light erupted as they suited up into their mechas. Instantly, their fighting prowess rose to incredibly high levels. Obviously, these mechas were vastly superior to any of the ones Yang Qi had purchased in the past. Compared to these, his were trash from the bottom of the barrel.

“Demolishers, stay within the spacecraft! This enemy is too powerful. Activate the Light of Civilization! Don’t let these fiends past our shields. If we don't hold the line, our base is going to be wiped out of existence!”

Truth be told, if it weren’t for the shields built into the Cruiser of Civilization, the Mechfolk would have already been wiped out by Young Master Leaf.

It was impossible to say for sure what the exact level of Young Master Leaf’s cultivation base was. He was a Godmyth, that much was clear, and he was terrifyingly powerful. Not even Yang Qi could possibly fight him. Up to this point, no spell formation, no godrelic, and no defenses of any sort had posed any challenge for him. Any expert who tried to fight him had died after only one or two moves.

But this part of the Cruiser of Civilization had stopped him in his tracks.

All of a sudden, an enormous torch appeared atop the spacecraft. Intense flames shot out of the torch, a burning power so radiant that it was painful to look at. The fire quickly spread out, covering the entire spacecraft in an impenetrable defensive shield.

“The Light of Civilization is certainly powerful,” Young Master Leaf said. “It doesn't even need a cultivation base to back it, only raw power. With enough power reserves, it can hold strong forever. Sadly, you Mechfolk obviously don’t have unlimited power, do you? Nirvanic Extinction Godfist!”

RUMBLE!

Hundreds of thousands of arms suddenly appeared behind him, all of them with fists clenched. A destructive hail of fist strikes then descended onto the shield that was the Light of Civilization, causing it to tremble violently. The Cruiser of Civilization itself shook back and forth, and many of the Mechfolk patriarchs looked on with sinking expressions.

At this point, an ancient voice spoke out. “Friend, why are you attacking us Mechfolk?”

From what Yang Qi could tell, the owner of this voice was no weaker than August Patriarch Proud Wing. He was likely a fourth division Shattered God. But this group of seventy-two cultivators were the kind of people who could look down on all opponents. Anyone from a fifteenth ranked immortal world or weaker couldn’t possibly stand up to them.

And Young Master Leaf was like an invincible devil-god who could fight forever without getting tired.

“Who the hell do you think you are? How dare you call me ‘friend’! As far as I'm concerned, you Mechfolk are all trash.” Young Master Leaf obviously wasn’t interested at all in being polite. “Don’t even think of trying to escape either. No begging and pleading will do you any good. I'm going to slaughter all of you, down to your very souls!”

Young Master Leaf wasn’t the kind of person to make idle threats or engage in negotiation, nor did he rely on crafty plots and machinations. He just brought complete despair to the battlefield.

“Yin Yang Heaven-Toppling Palm!”

Suddenly, Young Master Leaf's palms shot out in an expression of yin and yang, like a cosmic millstone that slammed into the Light of Civilization with destructive force.

Dzzzzz. Dzzzzz.

In the blink of an eye the Light of Civilization began to falter.

At this point, one of the other seventy-one young ones shouted, “Young Master Leaf, let’s attack together and wipe out these trashy Mechfolk!”

“Fine, hurry up,” Young Master Leaf said. “Long delays usually lead to trouble, and there are surely other almighty beings here in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Although I fear nothing, I don't want any unexpected delays.”

Whoosh!

He attacked alongside his brethren. Seventy-two dazzling beams of light shot out, slamming into the Light of Civilization and wiping it out of existence. Before the Godmyth patriarchs of the Mechfolk could react, they were hit head on, and several of them were reduced to ashes.

As for the enormous torch that had been emitting the Light of Civilization, it was nearly destroyed. The moment the shields went down, Young Master Leaf charged forward. The Mechfolk were now in an extremely dangerous situation and were about to be completely wiped out by the savage Young Master Leaf, who never took prisoners, and was modeling himself after King Immortal-Slayer, who killed gods and slaughtered buddhas.

“Retreat into the spacecraft!” one of the almighty Mechfolk shouted. “Stay inside! And tap into the backup power reserves!” The Mechfolk instantly complied. At the same time, the spacecraft began to wriggle and distort as it used some ancient organic technology to absorb the force of the attacks slamming into it. Then, the power reserves deep in the craft were opened and immense amounts of power poured out into the enormous torch.

“The torch will not be extinguished, nor shall civilization!” shouted another of the almighty Mechfolk. “The Light of Civilization shines eternally upon the world. Your immortal dao civilization is barbaric and primitive! You seek to only benefit the individual. Our civilization of technology is superior and complete! It will fill the universe. The future is our era!”

His words seemed to contain the power of faith itself, which bolstered the Light of Civilization and prevented it from being destroyed.

“What kind of good-for-nothing logic is that?” Young Master Leaf said, clearly unfazed. “Show me how strong you are! Use all your backup power. Let’s see how long it lasts!”

“Go! Get us out of here!” the almighty Mechfolk said. The spacecraft immediately began powering up, shining with dazzling light as it prepared to skip through space-time.

Apparently, Young Master Leaf had been prepared for something like that. “Maybe outside, you would be able to get away from me. After all, the Cruiser of Civilization is one of the most powerful god items created by the ancient mechanical civilization. But in here, you’re not going anywhere. The Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart is mine! Be bound!”

The power of monarchs descended like fetters onto the spacecraft, locking it in place.

Chapter 682: Cruiser of Civilization

The Cruiser of Civilization made to leave, but Young Master Leaf locked it down, much to the anxiety and anger of the almighty beings inside. After all, they were rapidly burning through their power reserves.

Again, one of the almighty beings in the spacecraft spoke. “Sir, what exactly do you want? Why don’t we negotiate? Considering you have some of King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy medallions, you can freely enter and exit the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. We Mechfolk have been stuck here for over a million years. Cease your attack, sir, and free us. If you do, you’ll become a very important friend to the Mechfolk. We have outposts in many immortal worlds, even some of the thirty-third ranked ones. We can provide you with immense rewards, and even perform services for you. Just think of how powerful you would be with the Mechfolk as your ally!”

“Nonsense,” Young Master Leaf said, clearly unimpressed. “No fancy words from you are going to save you from me. In fact, thanks to your jabbering, after I take the Cruiser of Civilization I'll ensure you die a painful death. The only way to escape that would be to kill yourselves!

“Who cares about the Mechfolk? You think I want to have friends as despicable and lowly as you people? You have no hope whatsoever of gaining my friendship. I'm going to exterminate all despicable races such as yours. I don't even need the friendship of the legion of gods. I'm Young Master Leaf, and I don’t go around making friends. People who face me either die or become slaves! Sadly for you, you don’t even qualify to be a slave.”

His words contained nothing but despair. Even Yang Qi had to shake his head; this Young Master Leaf was clearly a deranged lunatic.

‘I need to think of a way to help these Mechfolk with their Cruiser of Civilization. It's obviously very powerful, but at the moment it’s getting very low on power. Well, I can give it more power.’

He had done business with the Mechfolk and was considered by them to be an important customer. Overall, he had a good relationship with them and knew that they treated all customers fairly. They also valued their reputation. In contrast, Young Master Leaf was obviously a threat. Once he found out that Yang Qi had some of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions, he would never let him off the hook. He was definitely going to be an enemy, and a far greater threat than the young man in yellow had ever been. All in all, helping the Mechfolk out of this situation would be like helping himself.

‘What should I do? How can I help the Mechfolk without revealing myself? Getting into their spacecraft isn’t going to be easy, especially considering they have that Light of Civilization up. And even if I did get in, they would probably assume I was an enemy. Maybe I can use my Sagely Sacrifice to open a line of communication.’

He crept toward the battlefield and, when he was close enough, summoned an altar to sit on. Then he drew on the God Legion Seal and the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, causing a projection of the halls of heaven to appear. “Boundless Faith; Endless Psychic Power!”

A ball of vital energy appeared between his palms, which quickly took the shape of the Cruiser of Civilization.

Only a godly-class energy art like the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth could be used to create a perfect replica of the Cruiser of Civilization in this way. Yang Qi carefully sent his divine will inside, backing it with the power of faith. It soon became an expression of will that hovered between existence and nonexistence, and could manifest as a faint voice.

Meanwhile, in the depths of this piece of the Cruiser of Civilization, countless Mechfolk were hurrying about, converting their vital energy into power for the spacecraft. Unfortunately, it was like throwing a cup of water on a burning cart of firewood.

On the bridge of the spacecraft there were several dozen thrones arrayed in front of an enormous photonic computer, which was working at top speed to negate the incoming attacks and divert power to relevant systems.

The thrones were occupied by Mechfolk patriarchs, all of them sweating profusely because of the deadly situation. They were Godmyths, none of them weaker than Proud Wing, yet so inferior to Young Master Leaf that they were all simply waiting to die.

“Devil tribulation. This is a true devil tribulation,” one of the patriarchs said, an elderly Mechfolk with a long white beard and a similarly white robe. His beard was so long it reached the deck beneath his feet, although the deck was absolutely clean, free of even a speck of dust. “What do we do? If things keep going on like this, we’re going to run out of power. We're not going to last long.”

“We might as well take them out with us,” said another of the patriarchs, who was bald and had a hunched back. “Let’s use the last power we have to fire the Cannon of Civilization. Hit them with everything we have!”

“No, you know that won't work,” another of the patriarchs said. “This part of the Cruiser of Civilization isn’t focused on battle, but rather operational elements. Yes, we can use the Cannon of Civilization, but at its strongest it can only take down Lesser Gods, and right now we only have access to a trillionth of its full power. You think that's going to do anything? Not only would it not kill our enemy, it would drain our power even faster.”

“Then what do we do? Just sit here and wait to die?”

“Power! We need power! That's the only way we can hold out!”

“But where do we get more power from? We've been stuck in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart for a million years, and the entire time we've been collecting scattered bits of power. But it's not enough. And now we’re locked down and incapable of moving.”

An atmosphere of dread had long since filled the entire spacecraft.

“Mechfolk friends….”

All of a sudden, a faint, mysterious voice drifted into the ears of the patriarchs.

“Who’s there? Who are you?”

“Did you hear that?”

“What? I don’t hear anything. Er, wait. Yes! I can just barely hear it! Has someone come to save us?”

“That shouldn’t be possible. How could the Cruiser of Civilization possibly be talking? Maybe the spirit automaton of the spacecraft has woken up because of the danger we're in.”

“Bah! That's impossible. This spacecraft isn’t a magical treasure. How could it have a spirit automaton?”

“Maybe it doesn’t have a spirit automaton, but the ship itself is intelligent!”

“Yes but the power levels we have aren’t enough to wake it up. We would need to reach at least fifty percent power before that could happen. Right now we’re at one trillionth of normal power levels. Enough with the crazy talk!”

A moment later, the patriarchs all quieted down and cocked their ears.

“I'm no illusion, Mechfolk friends. I'm here to help. My name is Yang Qi, and I'm an honored customer of your people. This Young Master Leaf is a monster from the Tusita Heaven, bent on destroying everything in his path. He has a special constitution, and considering you’re low on power, there’s no way you can beat him. Not even I'm a match for him. However, I have a way to fool him. Just get me into your Cruiser of Civilization, and I can provide you with the power you need.”

“A savior has come!”

“Slow down. How do you know it’s not a trick!?”

“There’s no way it’s a trick. Our enemy is a crazy lunatic who's battering us with immense levels of power. Why would he need to resort to a low-down trick? Besides, the fact that this person has sent a psychic message to us indicates that he must not be on the side of our enemy.”

“Whoever he is, he’s strong. The Light of Civilization should be able to block anything, even a psychic intrusion.”

“It’s simply marvelous.”

“In a situation as dangerous as this, you might as well give medicine to a dead horse. You never know what might work.”

A host of red warning lights were shining on the bridge’s photonic computer, indicating that power levels were dangerously low.

The patriarchs really had no choice. “Friend, although we can’t completely trust you, we’re out of options. Please, save us. If you do, the Mechfolk will consider you a friend and benefactor for all lives and all lifetimes. In fact, we’ll even become your servants. Just don’t try to pull a fast one on us. If you do, we’ll make sure that you die along with us.”

“Don’t worry. I've done business with the Mechfolk before, and I won’t let you down. In a moment, I’ll send you my coordinates. Use whatever power you can to guide me to you, and I’ll use my energy arts to mask my presence. Just make sure I can get through the Light of Civilization.”

WHIZZZ!

With that, Yang Qi sent them his coordinates.

The patriarchs fed them into the photonic computer, whereupon Yang Qi saw something like a wormhole open up in front of him. He stepped in, and a moment later was in the spacecraft.

“Incredible. That was no wormhole. It was a god tunnel! A passage fit for the legion of gods.”

Inside, the Mechfolk faced him as though he were an invader.

However, he waved his hand and sent out the identity medallion he had been given by the Mechfolk identifying him as a valued customer. When the patriarchs saw it, they breathed sighs of relief. “So, you really are an important customer. Please, do what you have to do to save us!”

Buzzzzz!

Suddenly, the lights went dim and the entire spacecraft shook back and forth.

Claxons screamed in piercing fashion.

“This is bad. It took a lot of power to open up that god tunnel. We can’t hold on any longer!”

“I have just the power you need,” Yang Qi said. Exhaling, he sent forth a river of Tusita Heaven power stones.

Chapter 683: Helping the Mechfolk

After acquiring two thousand of King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans, Yang Qi could take power from the Tusita Heaven, Eight Tribes Heaven, Unrestrained Heaven, and Hell of Mahānata that surpassed anything from before by a hundred times over.

He had refined it, absorbed it, and transformed it into countless power stones that he usually kept stored in his God Legion Paradise.

Originally, he had planned to use them for a future breakthrough, or to improve his immortal world. But now he had the chance to save these Mechfolk and learn some of the secrets of the Cruiser of Civilization, and by extension the mechanical civilization.

Of course, his understanding of that ancient civilization actually rivaled that of most grandmasters of the Mechfolk. That was thanks to both the information he had perused in the Brahman Immortal World and the memories of the young man in yellow. Furthermore, during his time in the Brahman Institute he had gained a lot of information from the power of the future world, having absorbed it and turned it into śarīras.

As such, he actually felt something of a sense of familiarity with the Cruiser of Civilization, which was one of the most advanced products ever created.

“Those… those are power stones from the Tusita Heaven?” The patriarchs’ eyes lit up. Then they made some adjustments to the photonic computer, which sent the power stones into the Cruiser of Civilization’s main power reactor.

Instantly, the previously red lights on the photonic computer screen turned yellow, then green, indicating that the power levels had reached their current maximum limit.

Outside, the Light of Civilization flared and easily blocked the attacks of the seventy-two brothers.

“What's going on? Where did that power surge come from? Their defenses suddenly grew stronger!”

Young Master Leaf and his compatriots all had sudden ill premonitions.

“It’s nothing out of the ordinary,” Young Master Leaf declared. “They probably just had some secret power reserves. The Mechfolk always have some trick or another up their sleeves. Don’t worry. Just keep attacking. Let’s see how long they’ll last before they’re out of power. After all, I have them locked in place with immortal-slaying power. There’s no way they can escape. Multitudinous Lightning Streaks; Nine Heavens Immortal-Slaying God Lightning!”

Young Master Leaf suddenly unleashed an attack consisting of streaks of black lightning, which slammed into the Light of Civilization. A rain of lightning slammed into the Light of Civilization, causing the entire spacecraft to shake violently. It seemed like Young Master Leaf was now resorting to more powerful techniques.

‘Incredible,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘He seems to have no end of dangerous techniques. Even with the extra power I've provided to the spacecraft, it can’t escape. Eventually, my own power reserves will run out and we’ll all fall into his hands.’

One of the Mechfolk patriarchs looked over and said, “Friend, thank you for the influx in power. But unfortunately, you’ve treated the symptoms but not the root cause. Sir, there’s no way you have access to unlimited power. We're still eventually going to fall into the hands of this fiend-devil. What are we supposed to do?”

“Don’t worry. I have enough power to keep us going for a bit longer. But you’re right. Even I'm going to start running low.” He thought for a moment. “This part of the Cruiser of Civilization is obviously incredible, but unless the power levels are maximized, it won’t be able to break free.”

“That’s right,” one of the Mechfolk elders said. “This spacecraft is strong enough to travel into the depths of the universe, and should even be able to get in and out of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. At least, the full Cruiser of Civilization would be able to. But this is just one piece. Another option we have would be to fire the Cannon of Civilization at these fiend-devils. Unfortunately, we just don’t have enough power.”

Yang Qi’s heart thumped a bit. “Where is this Cannon of Civilization?”

“We’ll take you there.”

The fact that Yang Qi was continuing to give them power stones had earned him the trust of the patriarchs. And now they knew that he was definitely their best chance of survival. They quickly led him to a deck in the spacecraft that held a huge photonic computer, whose power readouts were all in the red.

Beyond the photonic computer was an enormous white cannon, so long and enormous it seemed to stretch on without end. The surface of the cannon was a maze of complex symbols. They weren’t magical in nature, but rather conformed to the complex truths and natural laws of heaven and earth.

The interior of the cannon was pitch black, as though it could shoot out the darkness of hell itself. Even just looking at it, Yang Qi could tell that, if fired, this cannon could destroy any immortal world, fifth ranked or lower.

“It’s said that if fully charged, the Cannon of Civilization could devastate even the god legion kingdom. Of course, we’re running on one trillionth of the power of the full Cruiser of Civilization, so that’s not possible. Even still, the cannon can definitely unleash heaven-shaking, earth-shattering force.”

This particular bearded patriarch seemed eager to see the might of the cannon on display.

“I'm not sure the power I have can operate this thing,” Yang Qi said, shaking his head. Looks of despair appeared on the faces of the patriarchs. “This weapon is miraculous, though. It’s definitely superior to any god item. How did the mechanical civilization create things like this that could threaten even the legion of gods?” He frowned. “I'm not sure I can do it, but I’ll give it a shot.”

Even as the words left his mouth he threw out a śarīra, which pulsed with dazzling light and mysterious power from the future world. It was one of the śarīras he had formed during his session of cultivation in the Brahman Institute, and it definitely surpassed the Tusita Heaven power stones.

Future power was nothing to underestimate, and as soon as Yang Qi called on it, he felt his energy and blood surging. He wasn't sure what would happen if he used this power on the Cannon of Civilization, but he was willing to try.

For one thing, he knew that the civilization of the future world utilized science and technology to the fullest. And it seemed likely that there were kinds of power there that could be used to operate products from the ancient mechanical civilization.

Sure enough, as soon as the śarīra entered the Cannon of Civilization’s power transformer, the weapon’s photonic computer spoke.

[Power fusion complete! Compatibility level: one hundred percent! Perfect power! The Cannon of Civilization is now operational. Let the grandiose civilization awaken!]

The Mechfolk patriarchs’ jaws all dropped, and it took a long moment before any of them could react.

“What?”

“How could this be happening? The compatibility level is one hundred percent? Only almighty beings from the ancient mechanical civilization who harvested power stones from the god world should be able to do that.”

Of course, power stones could be classified in levels from low to high.

Considering how much power the Cruiser of Civilization needed, its furnaces would eat through ordinary power stones at a very rapid rate. To hear of a one hundred percent compatibility level was just completely shocking.

Upon receiving the influx of power, the Cannon of Civilization began rising up, and the countless complex designs covering its surface started pulsing with light and power. Clearly, it was preparing to fire.

“Take another śarīra!” Yang Qi said. It was somewhat of a surprise that the power from the future world was this useful. From that, it could be seen how seriously the leader of the future world was treating the Brahman Immortal World.

He threw another śarīra in, and the photonic computer’s power readouts turned yellow.

[Power reserves full. Activate cannon. Firepower level will soon reach three one-trillionths.]

“What?” Yang Qi said. “I can get it to three one-trillionths?!”

Shocked, he threw some more śarīras in, and the photonic computer went on to describe the increase in firepower level.

“That’s enough!” one of the patriarchs said. “We’re already at the level of one one-trillionths. That’s enough to fire the cannon and force Young Master Leaf into retreat. Lock onto the target. Scan him and check the probability of landing a blow.”

A buzzing sound could be heard as a psychic fluctuation rolled out. A moment later, Young Master Leaf appeared on the photonic computer’s screen. Just about everything about him was clear to see, even how the energy was distributed in his body. Unfortunately, the areas around his head and dantian region were blurry and they were the most crucial of all.

[Power insufficient. Power insufficient. The target cannot be sufficiently assessed. Scan failed.]

“It doesn't matter,” one of the patriarchs said. “Scanning him is just a waste of time. Just open fire! This guy is too mysterious. He must have some precious treasure shielding his sea of energy and mind. That’s the only reason the Cruiser of Civilization would fail to scan him properly.”

“Fire!” one of the patriarchs howled.

RUMBLE!

The Cannon of Civilization emerged from the surface of the spacecraft, locking on to Young Master Leaf and his seventy-one brethren. Then a stream of bright white light shot out of it, screaming directly toward them.

Crack. Snap. Crash!

The fetters created by the power of monarchs all shattered. The blast of the cannon caused even Yang Qi to shiver. He could tell that if he were to be hit by that weapon, he might not die, but he would definitely suffer grievous injury to his vital energy, injuries he might never recover from.

Chapter 684: Cannon of Civilization

“This is bad, Young Master Leaf! The monarch bonds shattered, and they unleashed their biggest attack yet!” Quite a few of Young Master Leaf's young companions were shouting in fury. They could sense that this cannon was unleashing incredible power, yet they were too proud and arrogant to flee.

Of course, even if they had tried to flee it wouldn’t have done them any good.

The photonic computer that controlled the Cannon of Civilization had already locked on to them. The only possible way to escape would be for Young Master Leaf to call on King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions and leave the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

Young Master Leaf snorted coldly. “They say the Cannon of Civilization could devastate the god legion kingdom. But there’s no way it's fully powered up. What could it possibly do to us? They’re putting everything on the line with this one shot! After it’s over, their power reserves are going to be completely empty. So what if they can unleash an attack to devastate the god legion kingdom? I'm destined to surpass the legion of gods! To me, the Cannon of Civilization is a mere tool. In fact, I want it for my own!”

“Heaven, Earth and the Cosmos; Ultimate Core of Tusita; Tome of Abstrusity!”

Intense buzzing sounds filled the area as an enormous book took shape in front of Young Master Leaf, its pages filled with text describing the most profound and abstruse aspects of heaven and earth.

It was the Tome of Abstrusity.

According to certain legends, it was a book written by the gods, which contained unknowable and eternal secrets that remained mysteries even to the legion of gods. It wasn’t a magical treasure, but rather a godly-class energy art. It was impossible to say how Young Master Leaf had acquired it, but he was a Fortuned One, so it was little surprise that he would be able to summon something that would be a mystery even to the legion of gods.

The beam of light shooting out from the Cannon of Civilization slammed into the Tome of Abstrusity, but, although it damaged its surface, it still couldn’t pierce through it.

Then the book flipped open, and as its pages blurred, filled with lines of text describing incomprehensible questions, the light from the Cannon of Civilization was absorbed.

“Amazing. Dammit!” Yang Qi was actually shaking with amazement and fury. How could he ever have guessed that Young Master Leaf would have energy arts like this? He was even able to stand up to the onslaught of the Cannon of Civilization.

“Fine, I’ll throw in more power. Let’s see how long this Tome of Abstrusity can last!” Gritting his teeth, Yang Qi sent over a hundred power śarīras into the cannon’s reactor. There was an immediate response from the photonic computer.

[Scanning. Target has deployed the Tome of Abstrusity. Flaws… input… output… defenses… destroy… truth….]

Yang Qi had no idea what the photonic computer was talking about or trying to do. However, he could hear the Cannon of Civilization thrumming, as if with rage, as it sent an even more blinding column of light out, filled with immense destructive power that slammed into the Tome of Abstrusity.

Suddenly, a loud ripping sound could be heard, as well as something like the hiss of intense flames, as the Tome of Abstrusity was ripped to shreds and the light of the Cannon of Civilization slammed into Young Master Leaf.

The patriarchs were delighted.

“It worked! He's definitely going to end up hurt. Maybe even dead!”

“Good. We’ve finally eliminated that monster. Let’s see him try to act arrogant now!”

“What kind of power was that? It actually had a compatibility level of one hundred percent!? So strong and mysterious!”

“Now we can make our escape.”

“Don’t celebrate yet,” Yang Qi said coldly. His words were like a splash of cold water. “Look, not even the Cannon of Civilization can do anything to him.”

Sure enough, the patriarchs looked over and saw that although the Cannon of Civilization had pierced through the Tome of Abstrusity and struck Young Master Leaf, the young man was surrounded by streams of magical symbols that formed an immortal garment. It was another energy art that protected him from the Cannon of Civilization; nothing else happened other than him backing up a few paces.

“Not bad,” Young Master Leaf said. “Not bad at all.” His cold smile was enough to cause anyone to shiver with fear upon hearing them. And his eyes were the stuff of nightmares. They looked less like human eyes and more like those of a devil. In fact, the most terrifying god-devils from hell couldn’t match up to his baleful energy, nor his wicked aura.

‘Is he even human?’ Yang Qi thought. ‘Is this what all Fortuned Ones are like? I guess it doesn’t matter. We have to hit him again, then make our retreat. I have a feeling that, as long as the Cruiser of Civilization has enough power, we can get out of here.’

Raising his voice, he said, “This monster is too strong. We’re definitely not a match for him. I'm going to power the ship up again and then we can flee. Agreed?”

“Alright!” the patriarchs responded. Originally, they had hoped to fight back against this Young Master Leaf, but now it was obvious that he was a god-devil they couldn’t match up against. They quickly discussed the particulars.

“This spacecraft has a propulsion reactor that can be used to pierce through space-time. It’s called the Permiverse Reactor, and it requires a huge amount of power. In fact, from the time we acquired this spacecraft until now, we've never even used it. After all, it can't be used to leave the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart anyway, so it would have been a big waste of power. If we can get away now, there’s no way this Young Master Leaf will be able to catch up at first. But the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart is huge, and since he has some of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions, he controls this place. Eventually, we’ll run out of power and he’ll catch up.”

“That’s true. But in the end, we have to get out of here as quickly as possible. The Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart is huge! There’s no way he can catch up any time soon. Besides, as long as we have enough power, we can use the Permiverse Reactor to enter different hyperdimensions. We could even try to travel through the Flatverse. I refuse to believe that this Young Master Leaf would be able to follow us there.”

As they discussed the matter, one of them fiddled with the photonic computer, after which a door opened next to the Cannon of Civilization that led to another area on the deck. This area featured an enormous power reactor, within which was what seemed to be a tiny universe of its own. Within that universe were countless pairs of white wings that actually resembled Yang Qi’s Angel Wings. The main difference was that Yang Qi’s version was made of pure power, whereas these were obviously some form of technology.

‘It seems the mechanical civilization drew inspiration from the wings of angels to create this incredible machine. Interesting. These wings actually seem more complete than my Angel Wings. Maybe studying them will help me make some improvements. After all, my cultivation level is just too low to unlock all the secrets of the Angel Wings. It seems to me that whatever almighty being created this thing must have actually glimpsed the Sovereign Lord creating the Angel Wings.’

Yang Qi looked at all of the various wings and already felt his enlightenment growing.

“Hurry up and produce your power stones, friend,” one of the patriarchs said.

“Alright!” Yang Qi replied, his eyes glittering. He produced more śarīras and tossed them into the Permiverse Reactor, whereupon the countless wings inside began to flap. Yang Qi felt his Angel Wings stirring as if in reaction.

[Engage!] the photonic computer said. In response, the entire spacecraft suddenly shrank down by thousands of times, taking Yang Qi and everyone in it into another universe, a flat place that seemed to lack an up or a down. Every living being that entered it became flat.

Yang Qi felt as if he had entered another time, as if everything from the previous universe were inconsequential.

‘This is marvelous! And here I thought it was amazing that there were different planes of existence and immortal worlds. As it turns out, my understanding of the universe is actually very superficial. So this is the Flatverse?'

Meanwhile, on the outside, the light cast by the Cannon of Civilization faded away and Young Master Leaf watched as the spacecraft shrank down and vanished.

“It pierced through the void?” he said, sneering. “Doing that here in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart will do nothing but drain their power. Get back here!” Making a grasping gesture, he said, “Heavenly-Empyrean Vital-Incarnation Paragon Palm!”

An enormous hand appeared, ripping through the void as if to drag a fish out of water. Cracking and crunching sounds rang out, and energy blasts rolled out. He almost looked like a god reaching down and rifling among the immortal worlds as if they were grains of sand.

Unfortunately, even after a long moment, he couldn’t find any trace of the Cruiser of Civilization.

“What did they do? How did they manage to escape me?” His anger quickly mounted until it was a raging fire. “Damnit! Nobody escapes from me! Be destroyed! Raging Flame God!”

Everything around him shattered, until he caught sight of something very strange.

It was a completely flat streak of light, which he reached out to grab.

“The Flatverse! A function the Cruiser of Civilization can utilize with enough power. So, they entered the Flatverse. That’s close to the power of the legion of gods.” He chuckled. “Unfortunately, although they can enter the Flatverse, they can’t use it to leave the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart!”

Chapter 685: The Flatverse

“You people can't escape!” howled Young Master Leaf. It seemed like he was getting stronger with every moment that passed, making it impossible for anyone to assess the true level of his cultivation base.

Not even Yang Qi was able to do so after observing him at length. He was a Godmyth, but what specific division? Perhaps he had just become a Godmyth, or perhaps he was at the peak of the level. If the latter were true, it wouldn’t be a very big deal, but if it were the former, that would be terrifying.

People who were extremely strong at low levels were always terrifying.

Yang Qi was no exception. He was an immortal emperor, but could already devastate fourth division Shattered Gods in combat. Once he became an actual Godmyth, he would likely be able to defeat Young Master Leaf, but unfortunately he wasn’t making progress that quickly.

The further along he proceeded in his cultivation, the more difficult it became to progress. He had originally assumed that after assimilating the arm of the Jade Emperor, reaching the Godmyth level would be easy. Unfortunately, every bit of advancement he made was thousands of times more difficult than anything before. Thankfully, he had his sage child to constantly fill him with power.

“After them! They’re in the Flatverse, but that will only last until they run out of power. Once they emerge, we’ll crush them!” Even as he spoke, Young Master Leaf flew forth trying to find more clues as to their specific location.

Obviously, when a piece of the Cruiser of Civilization popped out into the open, it would send out powerful fluctuations, which he could then use to grab it.

Meanwhile, as the fragment of the Cruiser of Civilization flew through the Flatverse toward parts unknown, Yang Qi and the patriarchs were forced to communicate via “flat” divine will.

“What now?” one of the patriarchs said. “Traveling along like this isn’t a permanent solution. Once we leave the Flatverse, we’ll be back in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart and he’ll find us.”

“You’re right,” Yang Qi said. “I can only provide so much power. But I said I'm going to help you, so I’ll help you to the end.” By now, Yang Qi was gradually starting to comprehend the various functions of this fragment of the Cruiser of Civilization.

Considering he had the powers of a Future One, there were some aspects of the spacecraft that he innately comprehended. Furthermore, the Mechfolk couldn’t acquire the approval of the photonic computers the way that he could.

The patriarchs exchanged awkward glances.

“Why are you helping us?”

“You couldn’t possibly be able to leave the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, could you? If we could get out into the outside universe, then Young Master Leaf wouldn’t be able to restrain us and we could definitely escape. Out in the immortal worlds and universal planes, we could get help from the countless other Mechfolk bases.”

“That’s right. Not even that fiend-devil could deal with the wrath of the Mechfolk as a whole.”

“Once we're out of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, we’ll have nothing to fear. It’s been a million years since we entered the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. It took a lot of hard work to get this one fragment of the Cruiser of Civilization, and ever since we got it we’ve been stuck. If we could get out, then even more of our people would be able to research this fragment and our science and technology would climb to an even higher level.”

“Alright!” Yang Qi said. “Since you put it that way, I’m going to help you even more than before. King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy medallions: activate!”

Immortal-slaying power rushed out of Yang Qi, filling the Cruiser of Civilization.

RUMBLE!

The spacecraft began shining with dazzling godlight, then, with no further fanfare, it popped out of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

‘Not good!’ In that very moment, Young Master Leaf suddenly had a very bad premonition. He immediately cast his vision deeper into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. There, in a distant corner, he saw the rippling remnants of immortal-slaying power and a passageway closing up.

RIIIIP!

He reached out and grabbed a strand of lingering vital energy, which he ignited, causing the scene from moments ago to appear in front of him.

He saw dazzling light, and the fragment of the Cruiser of Civilization. Then, immortal-slaying power flared and the spacecraft broke through to the outside world.

“They have some of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions. At least three!” He threw his head back and howled in fury. “I can’t believe they have the objects of my deepest desire! Bloody hell! If I’d known, I would have used my Nine-Destructions Revitalized Blackened-God Paragon Profound Art! It would have burned half of my life force, but I could have broken through that Light of Civilization!”

Reaching out, he ripped open a passage and left the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, followed by his seventy-one brethren. Unfortunately, there was nothing in the area around them, and no clue about where the Cruiser of Civilization was. He couldn’t even sense King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy medallions.

“Who the hell was it? Who had those legacy medallions!? And why can’t I sense them? Logically speaking, now that I have access to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, I should be able to form a resonance with the rest of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions.” Young Master Leaf again let loose a howl of rage. But afterward, quiet descended and he looked around coldly. Whether he was in a rage, or was quiet and collected, he was terrifying. It was like the polar opposites of fire and ice.

“I'm going to get that piece of the Cruiser of Civilization, and also those legacy medallions. After them! We’ll track them to the edges of reality if we have to!”

“Young Master Leaf, there aren’t any traces of them. How are we supposed to find them?”

“Kill!” Young Master Leaf replied. “Kill with impunity! The Mechfolk defied me, and therefore, they’ll die. We go to the nearest Mechfolk base and slaughter everyone there! Once the blood starts raining down, our quarry will deliver themselves to our hands. Let’s go!”

He threw his arms wide and baleful energy spread out, accompanied by an aura of blood that made it seem like heaven and earth were howling in pain and grief.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi and the patriarchs were speeding along through the spatial tempests in the Cruiser of Civilization. Looking out, they saw immortal worlds stretching for countless light-years in all directions, hanging within the tempests like a scintillating river of stars.

Their hearts felt light with relief, as they were all aware that they had just barely escaped with their lives. Young Master Leaf and his seventy-one brethren were simply too terrifying, like devil-gods descended from above.

One of the white-haired patriarchs looked at Yang Qi and said, “Friend, who could ever have guessed that you actually have some of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions? No wonder you can go in and out of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Excellent. Truly excellent. Considering you’ve saved us, we owe you our profound thanks. Come, we’ll send a transmission to the nearest Mechfolk base. Once we’re there, sir, we’ll make you an honorary member of the Mechfolk! From here on out, you can have a seventy percent discount on any treasures you purchase from us. And there will be other rewards as well.”

“Sounds good,” Yang Qi replied. “I'm interested in seeing what the Mechfolk bases look like around these higher-level immortal worlds.”

Saving these Mechfolk had earned Yang Qi a closer relationship with the Mechfolk as a whole, and that would be good for his immortal world as it rose higher and higher.

The immortal worlds that surrounded them were enormous, larger than the Sage Sword Heaven by far. Even the weakest were fifteenth ranked. When it came to immortal worlds, every three ranks was considered a minor tier, and every five ranks was considered a greater tier. And it was only the fifteenth ranked worlds that could give birth to Shattered Gods.

Considering the immortal worlds here were higher, it was no surprise that the spatial tempests were also more dangerous. Not even Godmyths would travel about casually here, lest they be ripped to shreds. The tempests surrounding the Titan Emperor Heaven couldn’t come close to comparing.

The almighty experts of the Mechfolk immediately began sending out electrocasts, and before long, they got a response, much to their delight.

“There, to the southeast! It’s a twentieth ranked immortal world set up by us Mechfolk, the Mechwave Heaven. Once we’re there, we’ll be safe.”

‘A twentieth ranked immortal world? Amazing.’ Twentieth ranked immortal worlds could produce even more powerful experts, such as fifth division Nirvanic Gods. Just how powerful would this Mechfolk base be?

The Cruiser of Civilization flew along for a while before eventually reaching a gargantuan immortal world that wasn’t spherical, but instead somewhat elliptical, with pointed ends. In fact, it resembled a ship. And instead of having a surface formed from ordinary immortal energy, it looked like it was covered with metallic plates. The entire thing thrummed with immense power. Almost as soon as the fragment of the Cruiser of Civilization appeared, a host of enormous ships flew out to meet it.

Although the fragment was normally enormous, it was currently shrunk down to the size of an ordinary battleship.

A flagship approached and a voice was transmitted from it.

“Welcome back, Mechfolk. Please open the hatch and let us in for a debriefing.”

“Our people have really progressed in the past million years!” one of the patriarchs said. “Look at this immortal world! It’s incredible. We Mechfolk are just getting more and more powerful!” With that, the patriarchs excitedly opened up the ship.

A beam of light shot out from the flagship and entered the fragment of the Cruiser of Civilization. A moment later, Yang Qi saw an almighty figure appear, suited in a mecha and pulsing with a destructive aura that made him seem like he was ready to fight a deadly battle at any moment. Yang Qi frowned.

Chapter 686: Ungrateful Curs

More and more experts in mechas appeared, who the patriarchs on the Cruiser of Civilization welcomed with open arms. As the mechas’ visors opened, the experts’ faces were revealed.

The leader was a handsome young man who was obviously taller than the average Mechfolk. He radiated a sensation of nobility and royalty, and even his mecha seemed unusual. Apparently he was an important person among the Mechfolk.

“Someone from the imperial house!”

When the patriarchs realized whose presence they were in, they all respectfully bowed their heads.

“Our respects, Prince! It’s a true honor to have someone like you come to meet us.”

When the prince noticed that Yang Qi hadn’t bowed his head, his eyes flickered with displeasure. Looking back at the Mechfolk patriarchs, he said, “It’s good that you haven’t forgotten about the ancient protocols. It’s quite proper for you to show respect to those with imperial blood. You've performed a great service by bringing back an object from the ancient mechanical civilization. You actually found a fragment of the Cruiser of Civilization! We’ll take this fragment to the parliament of elders to be researched and studied. Of course, this matter is classified and can’t be revealed to any outsider.”

“Uh….” The patriarchs’ faces twitched a bit as they realized that this prince intended to take the spacecraft from them. Considering it was an incredible specimen of technology from the mechanical civilization, they were loath to simply relinquish control of it.

But in the end, this was a prince with noble blood, a person all Mechfolk would instinctively offer allegiance to.

“What, not happy?” the prince said. “You discovered this spacecraft, so it’s only natural you would think of it as your personal property. But unfortunately, it’s beyond your ability to research and study. We’ll be notifying almighty members of our people from thirty-third ranked immortal worlds to come deal with it. This will allow us Mechfolk as a whole to advance by leaps and bounds. Soon, we will control all the immortal worlds and restore the glories of the ancient civilization! Don’t worry, you’ll be rewarded for your services. You’ll be given titles, and who knows—after the research is concluded, you might even end up in the imperial clan.”

One of the warriors standing behind the prince stepped forward aggressively and said, “Don’t tell me you’re going to defy the prince?! Rebel against the Mechfolk!?”

“Of course not!” one of the patriarchs said, offering a respectful salute. “We would never betray our people. We entered the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart a million years ago to look for this fragment of the Cruiser of Civilization. The entire time since then, we’ve ruminated about how to further serve our civilization. It couldn’t be more of an honor to offer this treasure to you, Prince.”

“What!?” the prince blurted. “You came from the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart? But it only opens once every ten thousand years, and although it’s easy to enter, leaving is a different matter. How did you get out?” The prince had instantly identified what seemed like a big hole in their story.

It seemed this prince was a clever individual, and wouldn’t be easy for Yang Qi to deal with.

“It's all thanks to our new friend here,” one of the patriarchs said. “Without him to save us, we would have died at the hands of a vicious fiend-devil in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Prince, this new friend of ours is incredibly strong, and he also has three of King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy medallions, allowing him to get in and out of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart at will. Unfortunately, we're being chased by someone else who also has three of the legacy medallions.”

“Exactly,” added another patriarch. “Prince, we really hope that you’ll offer a handsome reward to our new friend. He’s a powerful ally to us Mechfolk.”

“What? He can get in and out of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart?! He has King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions?!”

All eyes instantly locked on to Yang Qi.

RUMBLE!

One of the warriors couldn’t control himself. Stepping forward, he said, “Alright, brat, you refused to offer respect to our prince, and that’s a crime. That itself cancels out any services you’ve performed. Hand over those legacy medallions. And you patriarchs, since you’re on the side of our prince, lock down this spacecraft immediately to make sure this brat can’t escape!”

“This….”

The mood instantly changed.

The patriarchs knew exactly what was happening. This prince wanted King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions, which was little surprise considering how much of a temptation the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart was. After all, they had found this fragment of the Cruiser of Civilization in there, and there were likely other fragments yet to be discovered.

“No!” one of the patriarchs blurted. “Prince, he’s offered us immense help! You can’t repay a benefactor’s kindness with hostility!”

“Hmph! This is all for our people! You know how difficult it’s been for us Mechfolk to drift to and fro among the immortal worlds for hundreds of millions of years! In the beginning, we were always on the run, always being chased and killed. Eventually, we built a trade empire, and yet, there are always powerful entities who ignore our rules, who rob us and steal from us. Do you know how many of our people have been killed because we lack power?!”

Another of the Mechfolk warriors stepped forward. Glaring at Yang Qi, as if he was worried he might flee, he began setting up a deadly spell formation.

“That’s exactly right,” the prince said. “Friend, I don’t want to cause problems for you. But the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart has more remnants of the mechanical civilization. They belong to us, and we can’t allow them to fall into the hands of others. Please, cooperate with us. We’ll simply put you under house arrest until we finish clearing out the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Then you can be on your way.”

“I'd advise you to not struggle,” one of the other warriors said, grinning viciously. “Otherwise we’ll grind you into a bloody paste. Incidentally, that’s my specialty. I love crushing people into nothing.”

The mood was growing more tense, with killing energy surging. It seemed like fighting might break out at any moment.

As far as Yang Qi was concerned, these people were ungrateful curs. Apparently, there were degenerates everywhere, even among the Mechfolk. Smiling coldly, he turned to look at the patriarchs he had just recently saved. “What’s your stance in all this? Are you really going to kick your benefactor in the teeth? Return evil for good?”

Face flushed with embarrassment, one of the patriarchs said, “Er, friend, that’s not what we want….”

“Listen, you lot,” the prince said, taking a step forward. “All of this is for our people. Seize this man! Use the powers of the Cruiser of Civilization to bind him. That’s an order! For the services you’ve performed, you’ll be well rewarded. You’ll become important people among the Mechfolk. Maybe you’ll even be appointed as princes!”

At first, they hesitated. But then one of the patriarchs made up his mind.

“For our people!” he shouted. “Maybe we have to kick our benefactor in the teeth, but that’s a price we’re willing to pay. Sorry, friend. I promise that we won’t kill you. Just hand over King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions and you’ll live!”

“To the photonic computers!”

“War of Civilization, activate!”

“Space-Time Fetters!”

The patriarchs all leaped to activate various functions of the ship. Instantly, the Cruiser of Civilization trembled and streams of bright light shot toward Yang Qi.

In response, he laughed. “So, you really are a bunch of ungrateful curs. I saved you, and this is how you treat me? Fine, I won’t be courteous. What’s more, I'm going to take this fragment of the Cruiser of Civilization. And I'm also going to make you my slaves! You’re going to be making new mechas for me soon!”

RUMBLE!

When the streams of light hit Yang Qi, they didn't actually bind him up. Instead, something very strange happened. The voice of the photonic computers began to speak.

[Power compatibility, one hundred percent. Drawing on the mechanical legacy of the creator…. Beginning the binding process. Binding countdown initiated. Ten. Nine. Eight. Seven. Six….]

All of a sudden, all of the hatches in the Cruiser of Civilization slammed shut.

RUMBLE!

No matter what the patriarchs did, the photonic computers of the Cruiser of Civilization wouldn’t follow any of their commands. Instead, they were listening to Yang Qi.

He was the new captain of the ship.

“What exactly is going on here?” shrieked one of the patriarchs. “We took control of the photonic computers a million years ago! We run this ship! How could it be binding itself to him? How is he doing this?”

Yang Qi snorted. “You think trash like you can control the high-level technology from the ancient mechanical civilization? My power is one hundred percent compatible with the Cruiser of Civilization. I could have drawn on its full potential earlier, but I held back out of politeness. Now you’ve forced my hand. Death isn’t good enough for backstabbers like you!”

Yang Qi had realized much earlier that, if he wanted, he could simply take this fragment of the Cruiser of Civilization. His will and nascent divinity had already connected with the photonic computers, which recognized him as the rightful captain of the ship.

But not even he had thought he would need to use those abilities like this.

“Kill him!” the prince shrieked in terror. “Kill him this instant! If he takes full control of this ship fragment, we won’t be a match for him. This thing was designed to fight the legion of gods! Heaven-Warrior Battle-Mecha! Profound Myriad Transformations!”

The warriors all lunged toward Yang Qi. But before they could reach him, he suddenly vanished. Then a stream of light wrapped around all the Mechfolk, transporting them to a hidden location.

“I already took control of the primary computer. Watch and learn!”

Chapter 687: Taking the Spacecraft

As it turned out, the Mechfolk were despicable folk who were quick to forget favors and violate justice.

He had saved these patriarchs by taking them out of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, and hadn’t even considered robbing them of their spacecraft. He just wanted to work with them to build a good relationship with the Mechfolk as a whole. But in the end, one of their princes tried to take King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy medallions from him.

At the very least, the patriarchs should have tried to help him make a getaway.

But instead, they went along with the prince and tried to take Yang Qi captive. And they even had the audacity to claim they were sparing his life. It was a level of ingratitude that virtually defied description.

And thus, he wouldn’t let any of them off the hook.

Although Yang Qi could be ruthless when he needed to, he was definitely not an ungrateful person. He would repay kindness with kindness, and would deliver retribution only against enemies. He despised people like these Mechfolk and wouldn't show them the slightest compassion. So he simply seized control of this piece of the Cruiser of Civilization.

After the authentication process was complete, he immediately used his command over the ship to send out streams of light that transported the prince, his warriors, and all the other Mechfolk to the brig.

He would either assimilate them or turn them into slaves to make mechas for the Sage Monarch Heaven. With experts of mechanical engineering like this, he could increase the overall fighting prowess of his people many times over.

“This is bad!” one of the white-haired patriarchs said. “He’s activated the spacecraft’s God-Imprisoning Reactor! That reactor is designed to imprison the gods! The upside is that it requires a lot of power to operate. He wasted plenty of his power saving us, so I doubt he can activate all the functions of the ship. We might still be able to break free and capture him! Fear not, Prince! Who would have guessed that this brat had such villainous ambitions! He was planning to steal our spacecraft all along! Otherwise, how could he be so familiar with its operations? We really invited the wolf into our house.”

“That’s right,” another patriarch said angrily. “He really has some rapacious ambition! But he’s no match for you, Prince. You saw right through his true nature and immediately tried to capture him. I can’t believe we trusted that fiend-devil to begin with.”

“Enough blabbering. Prince, can you and your warriors use your divine abilities and amazing combat techniques to break through the God-Imprisoning Light? With that mecha of yours, you could devastate even the legion of gods or horde of devils!”

The patriarchs were all clamoring to catch the prince’s ear.

As for the prince, he looked out at the God-Imprisoning Light holding them captive, which was only growing brighter by the moment. Scowling viciously, he said, “Bloody hell, you bastard! You actually imprisoned me? I'm a prince of the Mechfolk! Offending me is offending all Mechfolk! You would do best to just follow my orders instead of being a rebel!”

“Is that supposed to be a joke?” Yang Qi said. “Rebel? Very funny. You must have been coddled by your fellow Mechfolk for too long if you think everybody is going to follow your orders. I'm not a Mechfolk, and to me you’re no prince. You're a clown. I'm going to kill you, then wipe out the rest of the Mechfolk!”

“Help!” the prince suddenly shrieked. Somehow, he managed to project his voice outside of the Cruiser of Civilization and all the way to the twentieth ranked Mechwave Heaven. Instantly, their fleet of battleships powered up and began flying over.

“The prince is in trouble! Open fire on that old spacecraft! Use the immortal-exterminating cannons! Fire!”

WHIZZZ!

The thousands upon thousands of battleships all began firing, sending blasts of bright light toward the Cruiser of Civilization.

Yang Qi had expected something like this to happen.

“Light of Civilization, activate!” Dazzling light shot out to cover the entire spacecraft. The incoming fire was powerful, but couldn’t compare at all to the attacks of Young Master Leaf, therefore they weren’t a threat at all.

“Be destroyed!” the prince howled. “War God Profound Yang; Invincible Battle Mecha!”

Cracking sounds rang out as his mecha powered up. He clenched his hand into a fist, and at the same time, a projection of a god of war appeared behind him. Without any hesitation, he slammed a fist into the God-Imprisoning Light.

The entire brig filled with bright flashes of light as the other warriors also used the full power of their mechas to try to break free.

POP!

Yang Qi trembled as though he were about to succumb to the attack.

These people were fierce, and considering the current level of Yang Qi’s cultivation base, he was only in the position to fight Shattered Gods. Unfortunately, with his mecha, this prince was as strong as a peak Nirvanic God. If it weren’t for the fact that the prince was confined in the brig, there was no way Yang Qi could do anything other than run away from him.

Not to mention all of the prince’s warriors, who also had powerful mechas and invincible cultivation bases that made them as strong as Shattered Gods.

These were people from a twentieth ranked immortal world, so it was only natural that they were top experts.

Yang Qi had spent most of his time in places lower than tenth ranked immortal worlds, so it made sense that he would have difficulties dealing with the forces of a much higher location.

Thankfully, he still had some power left that he could feed into the Cruiser of Civilization and use it to keep these people confined.

RUMBLE!

All of a sudden, an enormous figure shot out from the nearby immortal world, emanating a suffocating aura that Yang Qi immediately identified as that of a fifth division Nirvanic God.

“Who dares to rise up in rebellion?”

Numerous thoughts raced through Yang Qi’s mind. ‘I have to get out of here and into the Flatverse! Get back to the Brahman Institute! I need more universal power from the future to operate the Cruiser of Civilization. Only then can I deal with people like this!’

Right now, having the prince and the other Mechfolk imprisoned was just a disaster in the making. It took a lot of power to keep them locked down, so he needed to get back as quickly as possible before he ran out.

He sent out a host of śarīras, then shrank the spacecraft down so that it could enter the Flatverse.

Meanwhile, the enormous Nirvanic God who had just appeared on the scene reached out toward the Light of Civilization. “You're not going anywhere, brat! You can’t escape!”

Yang Qi could sense that his spacecraft was about to be snatched. Howling, he filled it with even more power, then sent it through the fingers of the hand and right into the Flatverse.

A moment later, a middle-aged man appeared, clad in an imperial robe. The experts among the fleet of battleships all recognized him.

“Emperor Mech!” they cried, dropping to kowtow. This man was the leader and strongest expert from the Mechwave Heaven.

“My son has been kidnapped!” Emperor Mech growled. “Dammit! Send out electrocasts to all Mechfolk bases throughout the universe. Have everyone start looking for him! Whoever it was that kidnapped him will be chopped into mincemeat when I catch them!”

Yang Qi was long gone, but he had secretly left behind a spell formation made from god lightning, which enabled him to hear what was being said behind him. ‘You’re the one that will be chopped into mincemeat.’

RUUUUUUUUMBLE!

He activated the main function of the spell formation, unleashing a devastating god lightning attack on Emperor Mech.

Not even bothering to move, Emperor Mech sent out a blast of energy that caused the lightning to collapse.

“You think some god lightning can hurt me, scum!?” he said.

However, as the lightning dissipated, a voice rang out from within it. “Of course this little bit of lightning can’t hurt you. But it's going to attract a wonderful enemy to your little immortal world. Have fun!”

Also within the lightning was some immortal-slaying power, which immediately began drifting out in all directions.

“Hmph! Sensationalist talk, that’s all that is.” Despite his words, Emperor Mech still looked around cautiously. “This guy’s a nobody. I don’t know how he managed to kidnap my son, but I have a feeling that my son will be able to break free. Then he’ll slaughter that bastard. My son is a top expert, and he and his men always come out alive in the end. Send out those orders. Track them down!”

Immediately, orders began streaming out from the Mechwave Heaven to all of the various Mechfolk bases in the universe.

Even as Emperor Mech was about to recall the fleet, everything around him began trembling.

RUMBLE!

Powerful fluctuations rolled out, causing everything to turn dark as numerous rifts suddenly opened up.

“Not good!” Emperor Mech blurted. “Everyone, back to the immortal world!”

Unfortunately, he reacted too slowly. Immense energy fluctuations exploded out as a young man appeared, followed by seventy-one other young men. It was none other than the vicious and fiendish Fortuned One, Young Master Leaf.

In a most clever and vicious move, Yang Qi had used immortal-slaying power to lure them here. It was common to fight poison with poison, and when he realized how hypocritical and unrighteous the Mechfolk were, he decided to sic Young Master Leaf on them.

As soon as Young Master Leaf appeared on the scene, he looked at the twentieth ranked Mechwave Heaven and said, “Immortal-Slaying Eye!”

Everything he looked at burst into flames, including battleships and powerful Mechfolk experts.

“Damnation!” Emperor Mech blurted, activating all of the powers of his mecha to block the power of the eye and give his battleships time to fall back.

“How dare you get in my way!” Young Master Leaf shouted, then unleashed a palm strike.

Chapter 688: Gaining at Others&#039; Expense

Young Master Leaf was a very harsh and unreasonable person. He had already killed plenty of Mechfolk and was obviously uninterested in talking things out reasonably. And as soon as Emperor Mech got in his way, he just attacked.

RUMBLE!

The explosive palm strike erupted forth, filled with dazzling, spectacular images of the legion of gods, as well as King Immortal-Slayer and his seventy-one brothers.

When Emperor Mech saw how devastating this attack was, he launched a palm move of his own as a counter strike. The two clashed, and a huge shock wave rolled out.

“Vastmight Mecha!” Emperor Mech roared, causing power and might to surge within his mecha.

Meanwhile, a vicious expression flashed across Young Master Leaf’s face as he said, “Detonate!”

Killing energy surged out from his dantian region as an enormous disc of pure good fortune appeared behind him, which shot forth to slam into Emperor Mech.

Crack! Snap!

Emperor Mech’s mecha exploded and he was sent tumbling backward, completely naked and coughing up mouthfuls of blood.

“Get back here!” Young Master Leaf growled as he reached out and pulled Emperor Mech over to him.

Emperor Mech didn’t even have a chance to react.

“Talk. Why did I sense immortal-slaying power from here? Did a fragment of the Cruiser of Civilization enter your Mechfolk immortal world?”

“Y-you…” Emperor Mech stammered, seemingly at a loss for words in the face of this fiendish monster.

“Not gonna talk? Fine. I’ll kill you and soulsearch you. People like you don’t even deserve to live.” He then drew on a powerful ability and prepared to kill Emperor Mech.

“Die!” All of a sudden, Emperor Mech’s eyes flickered with a crafty gleam. Then his bones began thrumming, almost as if they were mechanical. Suddenly, his flesh and blood vanished, leaving Young Master Leaf holding a robot with glowing red eyes. The robot then spoke in an emotionless voice: “Be destroyed, enemy!”

POP!

The robot exploded, unleashing force that could easily devastate a tenth ranked immortal world.

“Hmph!” Young Master Leaf was right at the epicenter of the explosion, yet wasn’t harmed at all. In fact, not even his clothing was damaged. “So the Mechfolk actually use ancient mechanical puppets to replace them in death. Unfortunately, every Mechfolk in this immortal world is going to die today.”

At this point, Emperor Mech’s voice rang out from within the Mechwave Heaven.

“Fortuned One?! You’re a Fortuned One!?” He sounded terrified. After all, the mechanical puppet he had just sacrificed to save himself had taken many years to complete. He could use it to gain a second life, but it would take a long time to replace afterward.

Right now, this Young Master Leaf had him feeling cold from fear.

At this point, an even more ancient voice rang out from the depths of the immortal world.

“Fortuned One, why have you come to cause problems for us Mechfolk?” Apparently, some of the truly older ones had awoken. “Are you after that fragment of the Cruiser of Civilization? And that bastard with King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions? He already escaped, and he took the Cruiser of Civilization with him. It’s a real problem. Sir, he lured you here in the hopes that we would end up hurting each other in a fight, thus benefiting him.”

“Bullcrap!” Young Master Leaf barked. Then he laughed. “Who the hell do you Mechfolk think you are? You think you have what it takes to hurt me? That piece of the Cruiser of Civilization was being run by Mechfolk, and now you’re telling me they ‘fled’? You've just convinced me that the fragment is right there in your immortal world. Hand it over. And King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions too. If you do, I might not exterminate you. But if you don’t, I’ll crush you into bone dust.”

“There’s no need to go overboard, friend. You’re an almighty fighter, but you still don’t have what it takes to fight the Mechfolk people!”

“Fucking Mechfolk. I'm just going to wipe you out. There’s no need for an immortal world like yours to exist anyway.”

Obviously, Young Master Leaf was not in a patient mood. He waved his hand impatiently. “Brothers, attack. Destroy this immortal world and all of its despicable inhabitants.”

To Yang Qi, twentieth ranked immortal worlds were very impressive, but not so with Young Master Leaf. He was from the thirty-third ranked Tusita Heaven, so to him, places like this were lowly.

Within the depths of Mechwave Heaven, countless battleships and spell formations opened fire and the power of machines was unleashed. “Help! Mechfolk everywhere, come help defend against these fiend-devils!”

Fierce fighting was already underway.

**

Within the Cruiser of Civilization, Yang Qi was looking at a photonic computer screen that showed the fight playing out between Young Master Leaf’s forces and the Mechfolk.

‘They’re really fighting each other!’ Yang Qi thought. ‘Hopefully they both suffer major casualties.’

That was one of the marvelous functions of the Cruiser of Civilization; as long as it had enough power, its scanners could reveal just about any scene, anywhere.

“Prince, you and your trashy warriors should look at this. Your Mechwave Heaven is about to be destroyed.” Yang Qi sent the images into the God-Imprisoning Brig, provoking immediate howls of rage.

“Dammit! This is a catastrophe! Heaven’s not going to let you off the hook for this, you fiend-devil!”

Yang Qi snorted coldly. “I'm a fiend-devil? Even a true fiend-devil is a million times better than backstabbers like you.” Yang Qi looked back at the screen and found that the battle was reaching a fever pitch. Young Master Leaf and his compatriots had set up a spell formation that they were using to try to assimilate the entire immortal world, and the Mechfolk were fighting back viciously. Massive shockwaves rolled out through the immortal world. Cities were destroyed, and battleships crashed. Countless warriors were vaporized.

Mechwave Heaven was truly descending into calamity.

Other battleships continued arriving, forces that were responding to the distress signals that had been sent out. Yet they all fell to Young Master Leaf and his brothers.

Young Master Leaf was unleashing destruction and death like a devil-god, wiping out everything down to the grass and the roots.

‘This is brutal,’ Yang Qi thought, shivering. ‘In tenth ranked immortal worlds and under, I'm a top expert. But I'm far, far from being a match for this guy. I need to get stronger. Fast. Otherwise, I’ll end up getting killed before I realize what's happening. I have to reach the Godmyth level. I guess my first step will be to return to the Brahman Institute and absorb as much future power as possible. That way I can call upon the powers of the Cruiser of Civilization, if I need to.

‘It’s hard to say how long the fight will last between Young Master Leaf and the Mechfolk. If I had enough power, I could keep watching, then maybe swoop in at the last minute. Young Master Leaf is vicious, but I really doubt he can hold out against all the Mechfolk in the universe. Even the legion of gods would have trouble doing that. I’ll work on my cultivation a bit, then check back to see what the situation is.’

Pouring more power into the Cruiser of Civilization, he headed back to the territory of the Brahman Immortal World.

At that point, he shrank the fragment down to the size of his hand and put it away. Then he slipped back into the Brahman Immortal World.

The Cruiser of Civilization was going to be a huge asset. Right now, his cultivation level wasn’t high enough to truly use the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart; he would need to be as strong as the legion of gods before that would happen. But the fragment of the Cruiser of Civilization just needed enough power to operate. He had been authenticated by the photonic computers, which were machines that even mortals could use.

After turning back into Hu Yanmeng, he reentered the Brahman Institute without any issues and soon reached the Unknown Temple, and the divine likeness of August Patriarch Proud Dragon. Settling down, he began ‘praying’ to the divine likeness.

The other children of Brahma in the temple didn’t pay any attention.

Of course, the truth was that he was absorbing large amounts of energy from the future world. After all, this temple was where it was most abundant. No one had any idea what he was doing.

The fragment of the Cruiser of Civilization was currently in his God Legion Paradise, and as the power of the future world poured into it, the power readings in the photonic computers began to rise. Soon, the computers’ emotionless voices yet again spoke.

[Power grade increase. New functions now available.]

[Power grade increase. Cannon of Civilization upgraded.]

[Power grade increase. Defensive shields activated.]

[Power grade increase. Hyperdrive functions reactivated.]

To Yang Qi’s delight, the Cruiser of Civilization was already becoming vastly more powerful. In fact, he almost couldn’t wait to overthrow the Brahman Immortal World and take all of the future power to use on the ship.

Of course, he had to be patient. If the Brahman Immortal World weren’t backed by the future world, it might be a different story. But he had no confidence in being able to take on the future world.

Thanks to the increase in power, the God-Imprisoning Brig grew even more secure.

“Aaaiiiieee!”

One of the warriors shrieked as light suddenly shot out, destroyed his mecha, and bound him up.

Chapter 689: A Violent Tempest

Power. Endless, endless power. And Yang Qi was taking it all.

There really didn’t seem to be an end to what he could take from this divine likeness in the Unknown Temple. Furthermore, the quality was incredible. Obviously, the leader of the future world hadn’t held anything back in opening the passageway.

Generally speaking, it was not a type of power that the people in the present could benefit from. Most people couldn’t even sense it. But Yang Qi could. And he could tell that the power was being used to suppress something immensely strong, something pulsing in the depths of the Brahman Institute, something struggling to break free. Only this power from the future could keep that object in check.

It was obviously Brahma’s heart, which had been kept sealed for countless years by the future world. Yang Qi’s guess was that it was all the masterwork of Proud Heaven. The more Yang Qi’s cultivation progressed, the more he realized how powerful Proud Heaven must be. He’d seen the man’s clone back when he was in the Titan Emperor Collegium, and although that clone hadn’t been particularly powerful, he had been strong enough to keep Yang Qi completely in check.

Future power flowed into the God Legion Paradise to be devoured by King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans and sent into the fragment of the Cruiser of Civilization, filling its power reactors.

This level of power surpassed anything the Mechfolk patriarchs had managed to gather during the million years they had possessed the spacecraft. After all, Yang Qi was siphoning from the resources that were being sent to keep Brahma’s heart in check.

That said, not even this much power was enough to fully satiate the Cruiser of Civilization. From what Yang Qi could tell, he actually couldn’t sustain the power flows that would be necessary to do that. The way he was filling the power reactors now was like using an eyedropper to fill an ocean. At the current rate, he probably wouldn’t even succeed in a hundred million years.

Perhaps when he was a Godmyth, and had all three thousand of King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans, his power would be like that from the god legion kingdom. But that was a long way away.

In the end, the Cruiser of Civilization was still a miraculous thing. As he poured power into it, new systems and functions came online. There were power shields, weapons systems, calculation systems, heavenly imaging systems, civilization dissemination systems, genetic systems, organic technology systems, and other even more unbelievable systems, all of which were coming online and being upgraded.

From what Yang Qi could tell, as long as the genetic manufacturing and organic technology systems had enough power, they could actually take ordinary flesh and blood and turn it into people who could rival ancient devil-gods. Such entities were called genoforms, or morphites. They had no true energy of their own, but were pure expressions of power.

Yang Qi was learning a lot from the photonic computers. For instance, one of the powerful functions of the Cruiser of Civilization was to create fate warriors, who could fight and kill members of the legion of gods.

‘This thing is really amazing. With enough power, I could use it to alter the genes of the members of my clan, making them even more perfect! And according to this information here, I can eventually make Godmyth-level genoforms. It's similar to how the future world can create virtual godhood. Science and technology are really incredible. Unfortunately, I’ll need much higher levels of power before I could do anything like that.

‘But at least I now have what it takes to deal with these obstinate and unruly Mechfolk. That prince is a Shattered God, so I’ll use his lifeblood and genetic serum to make myself stronger. These genetic systems use science and technology to forge a path very different from those of immortal dao civilizations. Civilizations like ours involve painstakingly improving our own power, with the slightest mistake leading to death by tribulation. But with these organic and genetic systems, you can extract serums to improve your genes. Such serums can instantly give you abilities comparable to devil-gods, with no risk of heavenly tribulation! Is this real? Is it because the dao of heaven approves of this kind of thing? Or could it be that immortal cultivation is considered evil, while science and technology based on genetics is righteous?’

Yang Qi was fairly certain that these questions involved the dao of heaven, and fate itself, and that if he pondered on them he would improve his own cultivation level and thinking ability.

Rumble!

Around this time, he heard a bellow of rage as his prisoners began acting up again, trying to break free from the brig. Unfortunately, no matter how hard they tried it didn’t do them any good.

The brig had been constructed by a civilization that had pushed science and technology to the ultimate limits. The Mechfolk’s machinery wasn’t even at the level of one ten-thousandth of that ancient civilization. Thus it was no surprise that this prince’s mecha couldn’t possibly do anything to the Cruiser of Civilization.

“You’re just making a fool of yourself, Prince,” Yang Qi said. Addressing the photonic computers in the spacecraft, he said, “Activate genetic systems! Remove his mecha! I want it!”

[Powering up. Removing mecha now.]

Without any hesitation, the photonic computer followed the orders. A stream of light shot out toward the prince and wrapped around the mecha. Then the mecha vanished. The prince immediately coughed up a mouthful of blood as his connection to the mecha was severed.

“Take all the mechas, then bind the prisoners!”

Power surged out from the Cruiser of Civilization, stripping all of the Mechfolk of their mechas, then binding them with light.

After the process was done, silence reigned.

Yang Qi strode into the God-Imprisoning Brig and looked around at the individual cells, within which were the prince, the patriarchs, and the various warriors. All of them looked back at him with fury in their eyes.

“We were blind to have let you into our spacecraft!” one of the patriarchs shouted. “You’re far worse of a villain than that fiend-devil Young Master Leaf!”

“You people are as rapacious as wolves and as savage as curs. You forget favors and violate justice! If it weren’t for me, you would already be dead at the hands of Young Master Leaf.” Yang Qi walked up to the patriarch who had just spoken, looked at him sharply, then suddenly reached out and ripped his beard off, including bits of skin.

“Aggghhhh!” The man screamed and writhed about like a crazed spirit-snake. Next, he burst into flames, all while Yang Qi looked on without the slightest bit of mercy. Considering how these people had returned evil for good, he absolutely wasn’t inclined to let them die quick, painless deaths. After the patriarch died, Yang Qi looked around and made a quick estimate of how many Mechfolk were present. He had imprisoned the entire crew, putting the number at several billion. Obviously, putting them to work making mechas for him would be ideal. If they refused, he had no compunctions about executing them.

“I’ll give the lot of you one chance to live,” he said.  “Acknowledge allegiance to me. Open your souls and give me your faith. Become my believers. If you serve me well as engineers, I’ll spare your lives.”

“Hell no!” one of the warriors shouted. “I’ll never work for you. You'd better let our prince go right now, otherwise the Mechfolk will never let you off the hook!”

“If that’s how you feel, then just die and give me a good portion of genetic serum! Besides, I don’t really need Incarnated Gods like you. Mere fighters are easy to recruit!”

Power swept over the warrior, who let loose an agonized shriek as he slowly began to melt. Gradually, his genes were isolated, purified, cleansed, and combined. After a long moment passed, they became a serum that Yang Qi collected. “Perfect. Science and technology really are amazing things. I’ll use this serum later to make some really terrifying Godmyths.”

It was no medicinal pill, but a serum formed from an Incarnated God, that could be used to help other Godmyths to improve their constitution. Yang Qi would give it to Empress Jadefall to try out.

Unfortunately, it couldn’t be used to improve one’s cultivation level, only one's general strength. Cultivation enlightenment would still require contemplation of the dao of heaven and natural laws. Furthermore, although genetic serums could be very powerful, they could harm the soul and create obstacles for soul enlightenment. Obviously, they had their ups and downs.

“We won’t work for a fiend-devil like you!” one of the patriarchs said, putting a very pious expression on his face. “Just kill all of us!”

Yang Qi shook his head at how fake these ungrateful curs were. In some ways, it was almost funny.

“Fine. Since you’re not afraid of dying, I’ll start with this prince of yours.” He walked up and, without any warning, gave the prince a vicious slap across the side of the face, causing blood to spray out of his mouth.

“Bastard!” he howled.

All Yang Qi did by way of response was say, “On your knees!”

Chapter 690: A Change in Plan

“No!” the prince howled. His voice trembled with incomparable grief and indignation, yet he refused to back down in humiliation.

“On your knees!” Yang Qi repeated, increasing the pressure. The light flared brighter and brighter until the prince finally flopped onto his hands and knees like a dog.

“You’re a precious prince of the Mechfolk, with the blood of the imperial house in your veins, yet here you are on your hands and knees in front of me.” Yang Qi laughed. “Since you refuse to offer me your allegiance, I'm going to kill you to convince everyone else of the error of their ways.” He slowly raised a hand above his head as he prepared to deliver the fatal blow.

Yang Qi wasn’t actually as strong as this prince, but with the powers of the Cruiser of Civilization, he could crush him.

In response to Yang Qi’s actions, the patriarchs all began clamoring in sorrow and anger.

“Don't!”

“Don’t harm our prince!”

“As long as you don’t hurt him, we’ll acknowledge allegiance!”

“If you dare harm him, we’ll get revenge on you, even if it’s as ghosts!”

Yang Qi chuckled coldly. “So, you are willing to negotiate. Either offer me complete allegiance, or watch your prince die. I won’t have a bunch of disloyal traitors in my spacecraft.”

“We’ll submit! We’ll submit!”

Grabbing the prince by the top of the head, he tossed him back into his cell.

As they had all agreed to offer allegiance, Yang Qi drew on his accumulation of faith power and sent sagelight into their hearts and souls. In the blink of an eye, they all became loyal believers in Yang Qi.

Just like that, billions of Mechfolk converted and Yang Qi could sense the boost in faith power. Some of the patriarchs were Shattered Gods, which meant the accumulated faith power they could provide was equivalent to an immortal world. In fact, it actually surpassed the Titan Emperor Heaven as a whole.

After all, first ranked immortal worlds usually didn’t have Godmyths. And Shattered Gods only came from fifteenth ranked immortal worlds or higher.

People like that could easily destroy thousands of first ranked immortal worlds.

‘What an incredible boost in faith! If I share this with my immortal-slaying clone, he should easily be able to step into ninth stage Dao-Demolishing.’

There were at least a dozen Shattered Gods among the Mechfolk prisoners, and with their combined power it would be an easy task to turn the Brahman Immortal World into a wasteland. Yang Qi wouldn’t even need to use the Cruiser of Civilization!

The only individual among the Mechfolk who didn’t offer allegiance was the prince.

Thus it was with complete ruthlessness that Yang Qi first infected him with the Devil-God Seal, then used the cruiser’s genetic systems to analyze his genes and extract a genetic serum from him.

Genetic serum had one function: to improve the fleshly body and push it to a state that could rival the legion of gods.

Unfortunately, it wouldn’t provide any help when it came to cultivation levels. Whether it was in the ancient mechanical civilization, or in the future world, there were plenty of people who would use genetic serum to improve their fleshly body and become shockingly powerful. The downside was that because their souls would sometimes have trouble handling such strength, they would sometimes lose control and turn into raving, murderous monsters.

Unfortunately, although some genetic serums could reorganize one’s genes to the point where one could slaughter gods and devils with a single fist strike, it also made it impossible to cultivate immortal skills and energy arts. All in all, genetic serums had outstanding upsides, but also incredible downsides.

The prince howled in anguish as his blood was extracted and turned into genetic serum. Yang Qi didn’t kill him, but at the same time did nothing to alleviate the incomparable anguish he experienced because of the process.

Shifting his focus back to the Unknown Temple, Yang Qi thought, ‘I think I’ve taken about as much power as I can. If I keep going, the divine likeness and the photonic computers of the future world might realize what’s happening. The Cruiser of Civilization can mask my power theft, to a certain degree, but the science and technology of the future world is no less advanced than that of the ancient mechanical civilization. In fact, they might even be superior!’

He stood up. ‘It’s not worth the risk. When the time comes, the future world will send waves of power through the passageway that are so strong they could destroy me millions of times over. That's when I can steal some more. Hmph. Brahma Echo-Silk wants me to unseal Brahma’s heart, but she has a deeper scheme at play. Most likely, she knows that the power surge will kill me, and intends to sacrifice me to further her own cause. But with this piece of the Cruiser of Civilization, everything is different. I’ll use the ship to absorb the power, and maybe even push the reserves past the level of one ten-thousandth. I wonder what’ll happen then?’

The cruiser’s power supplies were divided into several levels: one one-trillionth, one one-hundred-billionth, one one-billionth, one ten-thousandth, one one-thousandth, one one-hundredth, and one tenth. After that, the power reserves would be absolutely full. And each major tier of power would come with dramatic transformations.

Going from the level of one one-trillionth to one one-hundred-billionth was hard, and it would take a long time. Reaching one ten-thousandth would be even more difficult.

But at that point, Yang Qi was fairly certain he would be able to create genetic warriors, and analyze all sorts of daoist techniques and energy arts. He would even be able to enact transformations to his own power. Using science and technology to research one's own genetics would make reaching the Godmyth level much easier.

Yang Qi was also fairly certain that pushing the Cruiser of Civilization to the level of one tenth power would make it possible for him to kill Young Master Leaf.

And full power would make it possible for him to dominate even ninth division Godmyths and conquer all sorts of immortal worlds. Unfortunately, only gods could possibly push the cruiser to full levels of power.

‘And all of that is with only one piece of the cruiser. What would it be like if it was complete? Could it compare to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart?’

Yang Qi’s heart was full of admiration for that ancient mechanical civilization.

WHOOSH!

He left the Unknown Temple and returned to the Sage Monarch Heaven, where it hung in a desolate and empty part of the universe. There, he found Empress Jadefall practicing cultivation by means of an enormous eye.

The eye looked somewhat faint and dark, and was emitting an outflow of deathless godliness. Within the eye, it was possible to see a swirl of godrelics. Of course, it was the eye of Titan.

‘What a pity that eye is completely dead,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘That said, if it were still alive then the paltry Titan Emperor Heaven wouldn’t have been able to keep it suppressed. It would have eventually flown off to the boundless god world.’

As Empress Jadefall breathed and circulated her energy arts, she emanated faint traces of the Godmyth level. She was already starting to form virtual godhood.

“Yang Qi? You’re back! How have things progressed?”

“I've brought you a bottle of genetic serum from the ancient mechanical civilization,” Yang Qi said. “I acquired an enormous god item recently, a spacecraft from that civilization. After powering it up, I used it to extract the genes of an Incarnated God. You can use this serum to significantly boost your power, and probably reach the Godmyth level. The downside is that it will limit your ability to achieve enlightenment, which will make it harder for you to progress through the Godmyth level. What do you think?”

“That’s fine,” she replied with a pleased smile. “The harder it is to achieve breakthroughs, the more incredible they are. I was aware that the ancient mechanical civilization achieved incredible insights into genetics, far beyond anything that we immortal dao cultivators can comprehend.”

“Very well, here you go. I’ll stand as dharmic guard for you while you use it.” Yang Qi handed her the bottle, which she opened and carefully sniffed. Closing her eyes, she took some time to analyze the aura, then summoned a flame into her palm which quickly absorbed the serum.

Her genes immediately began to restructure and grow, causing magical symbols and porcelain light to swirl all over her.

Crack!

Yang Qi watched as numerous heavenly tribulations formed above her as the dao of heaven expressed its fury at her stepping into the Godmyth level.

“What’s going on?” Yang Qi murmured, unsure of what exactly was happening.

“The genetic serum is being absorbed by the porcelain godspore in my sea of energy!” Empress Jadefall exclaimed. “As a result, my Reincarnated powers are greatly benefiting! That’s what’s pushing me into the Godmyth level. If I can get more genetic serum in the future, my porcelain godspore will absorb it! I can sense the godspore’s pleasure!”

To Empress Jadefall’s delight, the heavenly tribulation was also absorbed by the porcelain godlight around her, leaving her completely unharmed. In fact, it even boosted her power a bit.

The process lasted a few days. When it was over, Empress Jadefall was a Godmyth.

“So you can just devour genetic serum without any downside? What exactly is that porcelain godspore?” Yang Qi had no idea.

Chapter 691: Rapid Development

Yang Qi was very pleased that Empress Jadefall had reached the Godmyth level.

She was no ordinary person; because she was a Reincarnated One, she was able to use a very enigmatic method to become a Godmyth. In fact, she was actually stronger than the average Reincarnated One. Because of practicing cultivation with Yang Qi, she was touched by the aura of a Fateless One. And she also had the power of a Future One thanks to the young man in yellow.

The combination of all those powers made her constitution very special. And now that she was a Godmyth, she could draw more fully on all of those special powers.

Yang Qi knew full well that the porcelain godspore inside her was something that would strike fear even into the legion of gods. And based on his studies, he knew that Reincarnated Ones were beings that started out as part of ancient primal-chaos, some of whom were stronger than others. In fact, they were grouped into nine specific subcategories, which were further grouped into three major overarching categories.

As for Empress Jadefall, she was most likely the strongest type of all. After all, Yang Qi had personally witnessed how, back in primeval times, the porcelain godspore had been assaulted by all sorts of gods—even primal-chaos elder-snakes. Obviously, the porcelain godspore was a profound thing, and one of the most enigmatic things in all of heaven and earth.

Considering that Empress Jadefall only had a bit of Fateless power, and yet was this amazing, Yang Qi was starting to get an inkling of what it would be like when he was a Godmyth.

The fact that the porcelain godspore had so easily devoured the genetic serum caused Yang Qi to speculate that the godspore was somehow actually connected to the ancient mechanical civilization.

“Cruiser of Civilization,” Yang Qi said. All of a sudden, the enormous spacecraft appeared, causing a huge vortex to appear that was not a wormhole, but rather a god tunnel, the kind that the legion of gods could create. The god tunnel devoured the Sage Monarch Heaven, sucking it directly into the Cruiser of Civilization.

Yang Qi laughed in relief. “Finally. With my immortal world safe in the Cruiser of Civilization, I can finally rest at ease! And I can use the immortal formations in it to feed power into the Cruiser of Civilization when necessary. If I ever run into Young Master Leaf again, I should be able to escape without any problems. The biggest issue I have now is that I need access to more power!”

[Beep-beep. Beep-beep.]

Even as Yang Qi was contemplating what to do next, the Cruiser of Civilization spoke in its emotionless voice.

[Emergency. Emergency. Embryonic immortal world contains heterogeneous power. World has the potential to reach the tenth rank, but power levels are currently insufficient. It must be either liquefied or upgraded. Beep-beep. Beep-beep. Liquefaction of the immortal world will provide power influx. Liquefy or upgrade?]

‘So, the Cruiser of Civilization has the ability to upgrade immortal worlds?’ Yang Qi was stunned at this unexpected development. Of course, he didn’t want to liquefy or upgrade it at the moment.

“I'm fine with the status quo. Leave things as is.”

[Order received.]

The photonic computers processed the order and the Cruiser of Civilization quieted down.

At this point, Yang Qi sent his divine will out into all corners of the spacecraft, which was when he realized that it contained countless worlds, some of them little more than seeds. With enough power, those seeds would transform into full worlds of their own.

‘Amazing. There are world seeds in here.’

It was only after starting to truly power up the cruiser that Yang Qi was able to see more about what it could do. The more he discovered, the more he felt like prostrating himself in admiration to science and technology. Back during the universal Big Bang, countless world seeds had exploded out into the primal-chaos void, and as they absorbed power from their surroundings they would become full-fledged worlds.

That was how many immortal worlds had started out. It was similar to how trees would spread seeds that would themselves eventually turn into trees. At the same time, some smaller seeds would become grass.

Of course, some immortal worlds had been directly created by immortals. Those were essentially fabricated by human hands, but the principles of their creation were the same.

In any case, with enough power provided to the Cruiser of Civilization, the countless world seeds within it could erupt into immortal worlds.

Compared to all of them, the Sage Monarch Heaven was like nothing.

What was more, in its complete state, the Cruiser of Civilization could even create more world seeds.

There were other mysteries to the Cruiser of Civilization which Yang Qi had yet to unlock.

As for the billions of Mechfolk, he already had them hard at work making mechas and battleships. They had already studied the Cruiser of Civilization for a million years, and were thus superficially familiar with how to use it for those purposes.

Even better, because of the resources from the Hell of Mahānata, the Sage Sword Heaven, and other immortal worlds Yang Qi had access to, it was possible to create all sorts of weapons and medicinal brews.

The Sage Monarch Heaven was developing rapidly.

In addition to the general rise in population, there were many disciples who had been hopelessly stuck in their cultivation that could now use genetic serums to become powerful warriors.

There were now two general paths in the Sage Monarch Heaven. One was the path of science and technology and the other was the path of immortal cultivation. Almost immediately, friction began developing between the two paths.

Yang Qi saw that, and did nothing to interfere. In the end, it was actually a good thing. As long as science and cultivation could exist side by side, when the time came for war his immortal world would be supremely equipped to fight.

Now that the Sage Monarch Heaven was buzzing with activity, Yang Qi took some time to spy on the ongoing battle between Young Master Leaf and the Mechwave Heaven.

An image soon popped up on the screens in the Cruiser of Civilization. The battle was still raging. Mechfolk battleships rushed to the aid of their immortal world, but were mowed down by Young Master Leaf and his seventy-one brethren. That said, the latter force was clearly starting to tire out.

If things continued this way, it seemed likely that Young Master Leaf would achieve victory, albeit at great cost.

‘I’ll leave them alone for now and wait until the very last moment to swoop in. The Sage Monarch Heaven is safe, and as long as I have enough power I can use the Cruiser of Civilization to the fullest advantage. My biggest weaknesses right now are my cultivation base and my lack of access to power. I guess I’ll head back to the Brahman Immortal World and try harvesting some more power. Who knows when I’ll get another chance like this?’

Yang Qi had the feeling that even if he eventually traveled to the future world, he wouldn’t be able to absorb power of this quality. There were many kinds of power in the future world, and the power that was being sent through the space-time passageway to suppress the heart of Brahma was of the highest type. It was a unique opportunity that he had to take advantage of while he could.

Thus, Yang Qi returned to the Brahman Immortal World with his fragment of the Cruiser of Civilization.

The moment he returned to the Brahman Institute, his jaw dropped. He hadn’t been away for very long, but massive changes had played out. The entire place was pulsing with immense levels of power, to the point where many children of Brahma with low cultivation bases were ejected.

As for the higher-level children of Brahma, they were delighted and absorbed the power to improve their cultivation bases.

In the very depths of the institute, the power was so strong it was like steel. And all of it was coming from the divine likenesses in the Unknown Temple.

‘The perfect opportunity!’ Yang Qi blurred into motion, heading directly inside and absorbing massive amounts of power for the Cruiser of Civilization.

As the power reserves grew, Yang Qi realized that he might have a chance to kill Young Master Leaf sooner rather than later.

[Power reserves at one one-hundred-billionth. Two one-hundred-billionths….]

A smile broke out on Yang Qi’s face as the power levels grew higher and higher, and he only wished he had some clones here to help him absorb power faster. There was so much that not even the ancient King Heaven-Devourer could have consumed it all.

Dong. Dong. Dong.

Numerous bells tolled, followed by an ancient voice. “Children of Brahma, the final preparations are being made to upgrade our immortal world. The three-year time period for missions is over. Gather in the square to give your reports.”

The children of Brahma immediately flew out to follow the orders.

As for Yang Qi, his heart was pounding as he also followed along, simultaneously absorbing as much power as he could. Something big was about to happen. Very likely, the future world was about to begin their invasion.

Chapter 692: Power Eruption

Of course, Yang Qi was supposed to be Hu Yanmeng, child of Brahma, who had been assigned a mission to acquire two hundred of King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans from August Patriarch Fire Dragon.

The three year deadline for the mission was now up, and failure would come with a severe punishment. Thankfully, Yang Qi had long since come up with a plan for how to deal with the situation.

Hu Latu was currently in the Sage Monarch Heaven. He and Yang Qi were both branded with the mark of the Brahman Institute, which meant that no matter where they went, they could be tracked down. Yang Qi’s cultivation base was far and away strong enough to remove the branding mark, but he hadn’t.

Right now, his plan was to hand over the talismans, then secretly use them to devour more power and feed it to him.

WHOOOOOSH!

Numerous children of Brahma were gathering at the main square, as were the patriarchs.

In the lead was August Patriarch Proud Wing, who was a fourth division Shattered God. He was the kind of person who would be a patriarch even in a fifteenth ranked immortal world, much less a fifth ranked one like the Brahman Immortal World. He would even be considered powerful in a twentieth ranked world.

Once upon a time, Yang Qi had been afraid of him. But not now. With the piece of the Cruiser of Civilization that he had, he could easily crush him.

Brahma Echo-Silk was among the patriarchs, and when she saw Yang Qi she projected a message to him. “Are you ready, Yang Qi? And did you succeed in the mission to get the talismans?”

“Of course I'm ready,” he replied. “And yes, I have the talismans. It seems something big is about to happen; most likely they’ll lock down this entire area and send future warriors here. I definitely don’t want to be stuck on the outside when that happens.”

“Good. Remember to stick to the plan. When the power eruption occurs, you get into the Brahman Institute and break that seal and I’ll back you up.”

“I know,” Yang Qi replied, shifting his attention to the Brahman Institute.

‘This brat only gets more and more arrogant,’ Brahma Echo-Silk thought, and all of a sudden realized that she might not be able to control him after all. ‘In any case, the patriarchs of the Glorious Treasure Heaven have pooled their godpower and are ready to take action. As long as he can even loosen that seal, Brahma’s heart will attack the future power, and chaos will erupt. He’ll die, and I’ll finally be able to get my hands on his treasures.’

After everyone was settled, August Patriarch Proud Wing raised his voice and said, “Ladies and gentlemen, as we wait to begin the upgrade of this immortal world, you will report in regarding your missions. Normally, we give a hundred years to finish missions such as this, but this time the deadline was three years. Those who succeeded will be given rewards a hundred times greater than in the past. And when the immortal world is upgraded, you will all become patriarchs sent out to conquer other immortal worlds.”

With that, names began to be called out.

“Brahma Fury, you were sent to search for the Flower of Time. Did you succeed?” A rather fat child of Brahma stepped forward nervously and dropped to his knees. “Patriarch, I… I didn’t find the flower. But give me three more years and I’ll definitely succeed! I dug up some big clues.”

“Useless fool! I hereby sentence you to death!”

Dazzling godlight shot out of August Patriarch Proud Wing’s eyes, slamming into the fat child of Brahma and causing him to burst into flames. Everything trembled as he was quickly reduced to a glob of power.

Quite a few jaws dropped from shock, and virtually all of the children of Brahma went grey in the face.

“All children of Brahma who failed in their missions are incompetent pieces of garbage. The institute has spent immense amounts of wealth to help them grow, yet they provide no contributions in return? In that case, we’ll take back what was given. Any child of Brahma who didn’t succeed will be instantly executed!”

Children of Brahma had lofty positions and were very overbearing, but today, those who failed their missions met miserable ends.

One by one, the names were called out. Those who succeeded in their missions were delighted, as they knew they would receive incredible rewards after the immortal world around them was upgraded. Those children of Brahma who failed their missions all hesitated to step forward, and August Patriarch Proud Wing’s gaze would reach out and kill them in body and soul.

A few of them would growl something along the lines of, “Forget this. I'm not going out without a fight!”

Howling, they would try to fly away, only to be crushed by the patriarchs.

“Hu Latu. Hu Yanmeng!”

Yang Qi and Hu Latu stepped forward and offered up two hundred of King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans.

August Patriarch Proud Wing’s eyes glittered as he waved his hand to collect them. As they flew up, they transformed into a primal-chaos elder-snake that immediately began absorbing the immortal world power and transforming it into Heaven-Devouring True Energy. Proud Wing smiled. “Excellent! You two disciples have performed an incredible service. After this immortal world is upgraded, I’ll personally reward you with virtual godhood to help you rise to the Godmyth level.”

Even as the words left his mouth, he sent some divine will into the talismans to assimilate them. Hu Latu and Yang Qi looked on with ashen faces, as if they were completely dismayed at having lost a valuable treasure.

Looking very pleased, August Patriarch Proud Wing said, “You’re dismissed!”

Yang Qi and Hu Latu offered respectful salutes, then stepped back. Just barely visible on Yang Qi’s face was a cold, mysterious smile. There was absolutely no way he would allow August Patriarch Proud Wing to take the talismans for his own. The truth was that Yang Qi had taken control of them using his God Legion Seal, thus not even King Heaven-Devourer himself could have taken them away.

August Patriarch Proud Wing only had a surface-level control, but didn’t truly own them.

Furthermore, Yang Qi could take them back with a single thought.

For the moment, he wouldn’t, though. They were a very important factor in the game he was playing.

Turning to some of the other patriarchs, August Patriarch Proud Wing said, “Hurry up and take these talismans to the area of sealing. Their ability to absorb power will make it easier to keep that thing in check.”

The patriarchs accepted the talismans and hurried into the institute to do as they had been told. Eventually, Yang Qi could sense that the talismans had reached an area filled with abundant power flows, power so pure it was virtually crystallized and bordered on godhood. Tapping into the talismans, he sent the energy flowing into the Cruiser of Civilization. Soon, the power reserves there reached the level of six one-hundred-billionths.

By now, the overall power reserves were a hundred times more plentiful than before.

‘When the true influx of power begins, I’ll use all two thousand of King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans. Maybe I can even send the Cruiser of Civilization in through the Flatverse to directly absorb some of the power!’

Yang Qi’s master plan was finally starting to take shape.

“The other three children of Brahma who were assigned the mission of finding the talismans obviously deserted,” August Patriarch Proud Wing said coldly. “Activate their branding marks and execute them!”

Three patriarchs stepped forward, each of them holding an oil lamp. Those lamps represented the three children of Brahma who had tried to make things hard for Yang Qi, whom he had subsequently sent on a wild goose chase.

POP!

The lamps were extinguished and faint, agonized cries rang out as their three nascent divinities were destroyed.

The observing children of Brahma were so terrified that many of them prostrated themselves on the ground and didn’t dare to lift their heads.

Thus, rewards and punishments were handed out to everyone. Of the original group of one hundred thousand, nearly seventy thousand were executed. The weak were culled, leaving behind only the most elite, powerful, and capable.

Soon, silence reigned.

The tense atmosphere made it seem like the Brahman Immortal World was about to face a powerful enemy.

Looks of anticipation could be seen on the faces of all the patriarchs.

RUMBLE!

Time ticked by, and Yang Qi focused on absorbing as much power as he could. The Cruiser of Civilization was inching toward the level of one ten-billionth, which would unlock more abilities of the spacecraft.

Yang Qi was itching to find out what would happen at that point.

But then a rumbling sound rose up, and Yang Qi knew that something big was happening. His Wheel of Fate turned as he observed the dao of heaven and the natural laws around him, and he realized that they were shattering.

Cheering rose up from the children of Brahma.

“My cultivation base is improving!”

“I'm breaking through!”

“I'm actually achieving a breakthrough. I already have nine lineaments on my dao heart, which means I'm going to become a Godmyth! But why isn’t there any heavenly tribulation?”

And it wasn’t just them. In many areas of the immortal world, ordinary cultivators were rising to a higher level, which should have provoked heavenly tribulation. But no tribulation could be seen.

All of them felt like immense weights had been lifted from their shoulders.

August Patriarch Proud Wing broke out into hearty laughter. “The power of the future world has shattered the dao of heaven here. The dao of heaven’s fury and natural laws won’t do anything. We’re on our way to becoming the overlord of worlds! Not even thirty-third ranked immortal worlds will be able to do anything to us. An amazing future is on the way!”

RIIIIP!

Immense power descended, wrapping up the Brahman Institute and even entering the Brahman River.

To Yang Qi’s shock, the god item that was the Brahman River was being activated. As it awoke, it grew larger and larger, crushing all of the spatial tempests it encountered. Soon, it even threatened to overwhelm other immortal worlds.

Chapter 693: Godly Might of the Brahman River

‘The Brahman River is so huge it takes Godmyths to wield it. Is it really that strong? It can destroy immortal worlds just like that?’

Yang Qi could see far and wide with his divine will, plus, the photonic computers on the Cruiser of Civilization gave a clear view of the Brahman River as a whole.

The Brahman Immortal World controlled thirty-six thousand lower-ranked immortal worlds, which were now being swallowed up by the rapidly expanding river.

POP!

The image on the photonic computer flickered as the river reached an immortal world, causing a shower of sparks to explode out that was comprised of the immortal world essence, the humans, the immortal cultivators, the devillings, the godrelics, and countless other treasures all exploding.

An entire immortal world, filled with millions upon millions of cultivators, was destroyed just like that.

An immortal world was essentially like a whole collection of planetary systems from the mortal world. And even just one planet in a planetary system might have countless empires, civilizations, and a sprawling history. As for the civilizations and history of an immortal world, it would usually be too extensive to record in full.

It was truly lamentable and appalling, as far as Yang Qi was concerned.

However, he could do nothing to stop it. The Brahman River was simply too powerful, so much so that Young Master Leaf and his seventy-one brethren probably couldn’t do anything to slow its momentum.

After all, this wasn’t being fueled by the power of the Brahman Immortal World, but rather the future world. It was almost like the rampaging of an angry god.

Countless lower-level immortal worlds were being overwhelmed as a river of tribulation spread through the universe, and before long, all thirty-six thousand immortal worlds were destroyed.

RUMBLE!

As the quintessence energy and power flowed into the Brahman Immortal World, its greyspace trembled and terrain features such as mountains and rivers began transforming. Even the plants and vegetation were affected. Numerous cultivators flew up into the air to observe the changes.

“Immobilize!” August Patriarch Proud Wing shouted and the power of magical laws swept out, forcing all living beings into a state of immobility. Every cultivator who wasn’t a Godmyth was incapable of moving.

The patriarchs from the Brahman Immortal World were exulting as the Brahman River continued to expand.

“The immortal world is about to rise to a higher level. The Brahman River has been imbued with the godpower of the august patriarchs of the future world, and we will soon occupy a higher place in the universe. Eventually, all immortal worlds will be devoured by the Brahman River. We will not rise to the level of a seventh ranked immortal world, nor the tenth, twentieth, or even thirtieth rank!”

“We’re all going to become supreme beings!”

“Our immortal world is going to stand side by side with the most ancient and powerful of immortal worlds!”

Before long, the river reached the region of the Regal Event Heaven, which ruled over many smaller immortal worlds, and had once been the home of August Patriarch Fire Dragon, who Yang Qi ended up killing.

POP!

The threat to the immortal world caused numerous top experts of the Regal Event Heaven to emerge. When they saw the situation, their faces drained of blood.

Meanwhile, August Patriarch Proud Wing burst out in maniacal laughter. “Regal Event Heaven, you have long opposed our Brahman Immortal World. After a hundred million years of fighting, the time has finally come to destroy you. Let’s see you stand up to the might of the Brahman River! Die. All of you, die!”

Countless cultivators could only watch as their immortal worlds were overwhelmed. And when they were severed from the essence that supported their life force, they exploded. Only Godmyth patriarchs could separate themselves from their immortal world, although in this case it did them no good. The waters of the Brahman River were too fast, quickly overwhelming and killing them.

The patriarchs of the Brahman Immortal World were howling in triumph at their immortal world’s rise to prominence.

“Nobody will escape. No one will flee with their lives! No one!”

They were a mere fifth ranked immortal world, but they now had the power necessary to devour numerous heavens! Not a single immortal world could stand up to the Brahman River; they all collapsed and had their essence absorbed.

As the Brahman River expanded with increasing speed, it soon reached the central area of the Regal Event Heaven. It was at this point that patriarchs from higher immortal worlds sent down godpower to resist the advance of the river.

The Regal Event Heaven wasn't strong enough to stop the Brahman River on its own, but there were patriarchs from there who had ascended to work on their cultivation. Upon finding out that their original home was in danger, they either sent power down to assist, or actually came down in person.

‘This is bad,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘If the Regal Event Heaven falls, then countless tens upon tens of thousands of other immortal worlds are going to be destroyed. It will eventually reach the Sage Sword Heaven. I need to get the Sage Sword Heaven into the Cruiser of Civilization as quickly as possible! Power Convergence; Analog Clone. Flatverse Travel!’

Calling on the power of the Cruiser of Civilization, he used raw power to quickly create a minor clone that resembled him in every way. Then he used the cruiser to slip into the Flatverse and leave the Brahman Immortal World.

He soon arrived at the Sage Sword Heaven, which was the center of a collection of many immortal worlds. The Godmyth patriarchs from there all hurried over with anxious expressions on their faces.

Obviously, the events with the Brahman Immortal World were causing widespread panic. After all, the godpower fluctuations were clearly detectable by sixth through tenth ranked immortal worlds.

“Daoist Brother, you’re finally here!” Sword Matriarch Ice Spirit said. “What’s going on? The immortal worlds are in chaos!”

“You’re right, turmoil has erupted. I don’t have time to explain all the details. Suffice it to say, it’s a major catastrophe. The shape of the universe is changing, and it’s likely that the civilization of the future is preparing to invade. We're entering a time of chaos.”

From the grave way he spoke, he almost seemed like a god from an ancient epic saga. “I want to take the Sage Sword Heaven and put it into a boundless magical treasure I acquired. That will keep it safe from the Brahman River.”

At this point in time, the Brahman River seemed completely unstoppable.

But with the Cruiser of Civilization, Yang Qi was like a god from heaven descended into the mortal world. Without any hesitation, he pulled the Sage Sword Heaven out of its place and put it into the cruiser, and did the same with several hundred other nearby immortal worlds.

He wished he could take more, but there wasn’t enough time.

Rumbling sounds could be heard off in the distance, and everything was violently trembling as numerous Godmyth experts died. The Regal Event Heaven couldn’t stand up to the Brahman River and collapsed.

Yang Qi shrank down again, then used future power to shoot back to his original position. Thanks to the Cruiser of Civilization, future power, and his God Legion Seal, he was able to slip in and out of the Brahman Immortal World for now. But as it grew stronger and stronger, it would become more difficult to rely on that trick.

[Beep-beep-beep. Beep-beep-beep.]

The power reserves had just reached the level of one ten-billionth. The next major milestone was one one-billionth.

Back in the Brahman Immortal World, he watched as the Brahman River destroyed the Regal Event Heaven and countless cultivators lost their lives. Many almighty entities who had come to defend it were swept over and perished.

The people of the Brahman Immortal World felt power surging around them, and many laughed heartily. That was especially true of the Godmyth patriarchs; as their immortal world rose to a higher level, they would also rise within the Godmyth level, all without the threat of heavenly tribulation!

There was currently no dao of heaven in the area, and natural laws weren’t functional. It was almost like the era of ancient primal-chaos, where there was no order and the legion of gods was still on the rise.

The fact that the Regal Event Heaven fell was shocking, even to Yang Qi.

At this point, Brahma Echo-Silk’s heart was pounding. ‘What do we do? What do we do? I thought the Brahman Immortal World would ascend in the normal fashion. Who would have thought that they would go around devouring other heavens? If they simply rose to the tenth rank, my immortal world could probably stand up to them. But now I can see it won’t be that simple.’

Finally, she sent a message to Yang Qi. “Yang Qi, get in there and break that seal. If it works, we can stop the Brahman River! Otherwise, it’s only going to be a few days before the Brahman River reaches my Glorious Treasure Heaven, and then we’ll all be doomed.”

“Are you crazy?” Yang Qi replied without a hint of politeness. “You want me to do something right now? Are you trying to get me killed?”

Chapter 694: Entering Glorious Treasure Heaven

As far as Yang Qi was concerned, Brahma Echo-Silk really was crazy.

Although the Brahman Immortal World was currently transforming, it hadn’t reached a critical moment and yet she wanted him to go in and loosen the seal. The power of the future world hadn’t reached the moment of full eruption, so if he tried to take action now, he would be painting a target on himself and putting himself in great danger. The experts of the Brahman Immortal World would surely notice him, pounce on him, and kill him.

It was as if Brahma Echo-Silk just wanted him dead.

Thus, he responded with a sarcastic quip. He knew that Brahma Echo-Silk was a Fraudulent One, and that because of that she probably spouted as many lies as she did truths.

When he had originally suggested that the two of them work together, it was because he was too weak. But now that he had acquired a piece of the Cruiser of Civilization, he was ready to end their cooperation. After all, from the moment they started ‘working together’ until now, he hadn’t actually benefited at all as a result of the agreement.

“You’re just trying to get me killed, Brahma Echo-Silk,” he said. “I'm done. You’re on your own now.”

Brahma Echo-Silk reacted with fury.

“You’re really not going to help me, Yang Qi?” she said via divine will. “Things have gotten out of control. If the Brahman River keeps devouring more and more immortal worlds, more and more people are going to suffer and die. Don’t you want to help them? Look, another one just got destroyed. Millions upon millions of living things just died! This is a tragedy. An atrocity! Are you really that indifferent?”

Yang Qi laughed. “So now you’re trying to appeal to my sense of righteousness? Sorry, I don’t trust you. You’re a Fraudulent One, and I have no way of knowing exactly how you might be trying to take advantage of me. If those immortal worlds die, then so be it. Life and death are both common things that happen every moment of every day. There are millions upon millions of immortal worlds, and destruction is a common thing among them. I couldn’t save them all even if I tried. Besides, life and death are fixed by heaven and earth. When the legion of gods takes a breath, a myriad of worlds are destroyed. When they take another breath, a myriad of worlds are born. Please, don’t use such ridiculous excuses to try to sway me.”

Although his words infuriated Brahma Echo-Silk even more, she simply smiled coldly. “So you're saying you’re not going to help me? You’re going to break our agreement?”

“Break our agreement? Did we actually have a formal agreement? What was it, for me to take your place in death? I have the right to change plans at any time, and you’re a Fraudulent One, who had ill intentions from the beginning. You think I wasn't aware of how terrifying that seal is? Breaking it open would probably rip me to shreds.” Not interested in bantering with this woman, he said, “From here on out, you do your thing and I’ll do mine. We can each rely on our own skills to get through this catastrophe.”

“Yang Qi! You!” A moment later, Brahma Echo-Silk’s expression turned sinister. “If you don’t get in there, open that seal, and release Brahma’s heart, I’ll reveal your secret identity. Then who will be in the bad position? You’ll end up crushed!”

Yang Qi didn’t seem worried at all by the open threat. “You have a secret identity, too. Maybe I’ll reveal that. I’d advise you to not go down this route.”

“Go ahead and try that. You see, this body really does belong to the old Brahma Echo-Silk, the Enlightened One. I just possessed it. My true self, the actual Fraudulent One, is in a distant immortal world, a place you can never reach. But you’re different. You're here as your true self, aren’t you? If we do this, I may lose a clone, but you’ll actually die. Think this through carefully, Yang Qi.”

‘I knew all along this woman was a schemer.’ Immediately, Yang Qi’s heart filled with killing intent. ‘If I hadn’t acquired the fragment of the Cruiser of Civilization, I would have been completely stuck. Considering she's a Fraudulent One, I can’t leave her alive. And I can’t spare her Glorious Treasure Heaven either. If the Brahman River is going to consume her and her immortal world eventually anyway, maybe I should just step in and do so first.’

“Well, what do you think, Yang Qi? I’ll give you the time it takes an incense stick to burn. Live. Or die. It's all in your hands.”

As Brahma Echo-Silk hovered high above the children of Brahma with the other patriarchs, she looked down at Yang Qi with a faint smile.

“If you don’t agree to my demands, I’ll reveal your identity. If you try to bite back by revealing my identity, there’s no way the parliament of elders is going to believe you. Your death, and your counterstrike, will both be meaningless.”

“Well played, Fraudulent One!” Yang Qi said through gritted teeth. “You really live up to your name. However, I'm not interested in playing your games. Boundless Parasitization!”

Without any warning, Yang Qi sent the Cruiser of Civilization through the Flatverse right into Brahma Echo-Silk’s body.

She suddenly felt something in her sea of energy, and when she cast her senses inside, it was to her shock that she saw a tiny spacecraft. Before she could react, the spacecraft’s powers spread through her meridians, locking down her nascent divinity and making it impossible for her to move.

Then an exact copy of her appeared, a power double, while she ended up being sucked into the Cruiser of Civilization.

Inside the Cruiser of Civilization, Yang Qi strode toward her with a vicious smile on his face. “Brahma Echo-Silk! You thought you were strong enough to threaten me? Little did you know that I could handle you with ease. Once the power eruption begins, I’ll detonate your power double. People will assume you experience cultivation deviation and accidentally self-detonated.”

“You sinister villain!” she blurted, backing away from him. “Please, don’t. Don’t do this. I was mistaken just now, I would never reveal your identity!”

“Too late for that.” Yang Qi reached out and placed his palm on the top of her head. In the blink of an eye, she collapsed into an expression of vital energy that pulsed with the aura of an Enlightened One. He quickly absorbed it. She also had the will of a Fraudulent One which tried to escape. But how could it possibly flee from inside the Cruiser of Civilization?

Yang Qi grabbed the will and devoured it. Along with it came the coordinates of the thirteenth ranked immortal world, the Glorious Treasure Heaven.

‘I need to go wipe out this Glorious Treasure Heaven. Long delays usually lead to trouble, and I need to get to the level of one one-billionth power as quickly as possible. At that point, I’ll be able to travel through the universe in many ways. Forget the Flatverse, I’ll have access to the Octoverse and the Sextuverse.’

WHOOSH!

Yang Qi vanished.

**

As the Brahman River continued devouring immortal worlds, powerful forces rose up and fought back. Unfortunately, the Brahman River was fierce and only seemed to get more and more powerful as it went along.

“Patriarch, this is where the Sage Sword Heaven is supposed to be. But it's gone. Vanished without a trace!”

“It doesn’t matter. The Sage Sword Heaven is only a seventh ranked immortal world. We’ll soon rise to the level of being able to consume tenth ranked immortal worlds!”

August Patriarch Proud Wing and the other patriarchs were all focused on prayer, using their psychic connection to pour power into the Brahman River and continue its expansion.

Meanwhile, at another high-level immortal world, the current events had the entire place in chaos. It was a place that glittered with the aura of treasures and magical items, and was none other than the Glorious Treasure Heaven.

POP!

Within the depths of that immortal world was an Incarnated God patriarch who had called a meeting. Present in the meeting was a beautiful woman, who was sitting there with her eyes closed. Suddenly, her eyes snapped open and blood sprayed out of her mouth.

“Did it work, Goddess Treasure!?” one of the other Incarnated God patriarchs asked.

“Did it work? No. Damn!” Grinding her teeth, she continued, “I'd tricked a powerful young man named Yang Qi into sacrificing himself. But at the last minute, he defied me. He’s ruined my entire plan. Dammit!”

“So what do we do now?”

“There’s nothing we can do. The Brahman River is going to continue to devour its way upward. In a few days, the apocalypse will come. Right now, it's devouring the Martial Blood Heaven!”

“Let’s leave this place. We Godmyths can do without an immortal world. We can just leave and drift about in the universe.”

“That’s probably for the best,” Goddess Treasure said. “I'm not going to let you off the hook for this, Yang Qi. Soon enough, you’ll know what a Fraudulent One can do!”

“Oh really?” a voice said, and at the same time an enormous spacecraft appeared outside of the immortal world. Goddess Treasure let out a shriek as the immortal world around her began trembling, then she flew up and tried to escape through the greyspace. Before she could, a hand reached out and grabbed her by the neck. “Goddess Treasure. Fraudulent One. Your Glorious Treasure Heaven was about to be destroyed by the Brahman River, but I got here first.”

“You! I can’t believe you’re so strong, Yang Qi! How did you get here so quickly?” Glaring at him in anger, she said, “Why are you doing this?”

“No special reason,” he replied. “I need resources, and the Glorious Treasure Heaven is obviously full of magical treasures. Your immortal world is going to be a big boost for me.”

Looking down, he waved his hands and all of the magical treasures from the Glorious Treasure Heaven flew into the Cruiser of Civilization. At the same time, he bound all of the top experts, including Goddess Treasure, and they all disappeared. Then, disciples from the Sage Monarch Heaven poured out and began conquering the Glorious Treasure Heaven.

Chapter 695: Brahma&#039;s Heart

Having done these things, Yang Qi returned to the Brahman Immortal World.

The power converging there was so intense that, as Yang Qi entered again, he felt a force of expulsion repelling him. Shocked, and worried that someone might notice him, he quickly began absorbing as much of the power as possible.

It resembled numerous dragons streaming into the Cruiser of Civilization’s power reactors, causing the power level readouts on the photonic computers to constantly rise.

‘Alright!’ Yang Qi thought. ‘I'm benefiting a lot here. Although it seems I can’t stop the invasion of the future world, at least I’m able to gather a huge amount of power. I guess what I need to do now is kill Young Master Leaf and get his three legacy medallions. Then I might be able to start causing problems for the forces of the future world. If I can get those six medallions, I should be able to use them to cloak my God Legion Seal.’

A tenth ranked immortal world appeared within the Brahman River. It resembled a warrior's shield that seemed to pulse with an aura of steel and blood, an aura that thrummed with the glory of the martial path. Obviously, this was a world that focused on fighting and warfare.

‘That’s the Martial Blood Heaven!’ Yang Qi thought.

Yet the Brahman River slammed right into it.

Yang Qi’s heart thumped as he recalled the Inspiring One he had met who hailed from the Martial Blood Heaven. Having assimilated both Brahma Echo-Silk and Goddess Treasure, he now had the constitutions of an Enlightened One and a Fraudulent One. Added to his constitutions of a Fateless One, Future One, Reincarnated One, Heaven Moving One, and Slashing One, he had the ability to sense the deepest profundities of the universe.

Unfortunately, that didn't actually count for much.

Right now, he really needed to think of a way to handle Young Master Leaf and his seventy-one brethren.

Every one of that group of seventy-two had a unique constitution; if he collected them all, how strong and fierce would he be? The attacks of Godmyths would definitely be child’s play to him and he would be well poised to reach the Deathless Throne, which was the realm of the gods.

As the Brahman River swept over the Martial Blood Heaven, their glowing defenses of steel and blood shattered. There were experts that began fighting back, but Yang Qi didn’t sense the aura of an Inspiring One among them. It was almost as if that person had fled.

“Destroy. Destroy. Destroy…. Destroy this tenth ranked immortal world!” Back in the Brahman Immortal World, numerous patriarchs were praying, causing even more power to surge forth. The waves on the surface of the Brahman River rolled forth with such intensity that the very foundation of the Martial Blood Heaven was ripped up.

Yang Qi watched as the entire immortal world collapsed, until the entire place was wiped out of existence.

‘Ai. I know that powers rise and fall, sometimes in the blink of an eye. But I refuse to believe that the Brahman River will just keep doing this. There’s got to be some high-level immortal worlds that will come to interfere. That’s when the real conflict will begin and the passageway to the future world will truly open. I wonder if actual warriors from the future are going to come through?’

After the Martial Blood Heaven was gone, Yang Qi could sense transformations in the Brahman Immortal World. In the Unknown Temple, the divine likeness of Proud Heaven spoke with the emotionless voice of a photonic computer.

[Power levels full. Begin upgrade to thirteenth ranked immortal world!]

Immense changes were underway as the depths of the Brahman Immortal World became like an enormous furnace. Mountains quaked and heavenly bodies fell. As the greyspace expanded, cataclysmic forces rocked the entire world, resulting in many low-level individuals being unable to withstand the fluctuations and exploding.

POP!

In that exact moment, Yang Qi detonated Brahma Echo-Silk’s power double.

It caused a heaven-shaking, earth-shattering explosion so intense that it immediately overwhelmed several nearby Godmyth patriarchs, shredding them into powder.

Shocked, August Patriarch Proud Wing waved his hand to get the power of the explosion under control. “What just happened!?” he shouted furiously. “Brahma Echo-Silk was a genius among us, blessed with virtual godhood from August Patriarch Proud Heaven himself! How could she have just exploded?”

“August Patriarch, it seems most likely that she pushed her cultivation forward too quickly and experienced cultivation deviation. There are probably quite a few greedy disciples who are recklessly absorbing the power available right now. Under such circumstances, the slightest mistake could lead to a violent death.”

“Trash!” August Patriarch Proud Wing growled. “They're all trash! In fact, it's good that people like that die! Continue with the upgrade!” Volcanoes erupted all over the immortal world, causing widespread catastrophe. New mountains rose up, rivers changed courses, and mighty castles and fortresses crumbled to the ground.

As the power surged, Yang Qi began absorbing it at an even faster rate. The power reserves of the Cruiser of Civilization were closing in on the level of one one-billionth.

After devouring the Martial Blood Heaven, the Brahman River continued expanding, and the Brahman Immortal World continued transforming atop it.

One after another, tenth ranked immortal worlds fell.

Yang Qi couldn’t help but shake his head at the terrifying, majestic sight, something that most people would never see in their entire lives.

Eventually the Brahman River reached a fifteenth ranked immortal world, which was when it finally began to falter. Power erupted from this immortal world, a conflagration of sword energy, plus a host of enormous spell formations.

Then, a booming voice rang out.

“So, the future world has come to cause mischief and throw the dao of heaven into chaos. We are an alliance of twentieth ranked immortal worlds called the Dao Defense League. We will slaughter all villains from the future world and purge all Future Ones!”

From the way the voice thrummed in Yang Qi’s ears, he could tell that this was some entity that surpassed the level of a Shattered God. This must be a Nirvanic God, or perhaps someone even more almighty than that.

A group of immortal worlds had finally banded together to stand up to the Brahman Immortal World. Without something like the Dao Defense League, perhaps the future world’s invasion would have been unstoppable.

Thankfully, there were still almighty beings among the immortal worlds who could take a stand.

It seemed that the end of the war was in sight.

In response, August Patriarch Proud Wing burst out into wild laughter. “You think a bit too much of yourself. Dao Defense League? Twentieth ranked immortal worlds? Compared to the combined might of the patriarchs of the future world, you’re little more than chickens or dogs. Now we will truly begin praying, opening the passageway to the future world and allowing corporeal entities to pass through!”

Without hesitation, the patriarchs all began fervently praying.

Meanwhile, the enormous spell formations sent streams of sword energy slashing into the Brahman River, only to be overwhelmed by the enormous waves.

Considering the energy flows at play, Yang Qi was certain that if he hadn’t acquired his fragment of the Cruiser of Civilization, he would be in great danger. This was a war between two great civilizations. Two worlds. It was present versus future, and the conflict would likely only grow more intense, casting the universe into chaos and causing immense tribulation.

RUMBLE!

Soon, the prayers began to take effect and power poured into the Brahman Immortal World from the future that surpassed anything from before by ten thousand times.

Suddenly, Yang Qi’s photonic computers began to send out urgent notifications as the power level readouts rapidly rose.

[Beep-beep-beep. Beep-beep-beep. Power levels have reached one one-billionth. Two one-billionths….]

Obviously, the future world was finally going to send actual armed forces through the passageway. Up until now, they had merely been sending power, but future warriors would soon begin coming forth in great numbers.

‘Keep sending that power!’ Yang Qi thought. ‘Once my fragment of the Cruiser of Civilization reaches a power level of one one-hundred-millionth, things are going to change and I’ll be able to fight Young Master Leaf. I have to find an opportunity to get those legacy medallions from him.’ Gritting his teeth, Yang Qi held nothing back in his attempt to acquire as much power as possible.

At the same time, he could see that, deep in the Brahman Institute, layers of power were peeling away as a sealing mark was removed. An entire world became visible, an enormous heart that was connected to both primal-chaos and the future itself. It was impossible to describe exactly how large it was.

At first, it seemed to be pumping slowly and casually, but then it began rapidly speeding up.

Boom, boom…. Boom, boom….!

It was like the pounding of the drums of war as an enormous passageway was slowly revealed.

‘Such incredible power!’ As Yang Qi watched, he realized that this was a level of power that made him so weak he was virtually useless. As of this moment, all of his suspicions of Goddess Treasure the Fraudulent One were proven true. Thankfully, he had been cautious, and hadn’t gone through with the plan to sneak into the Brahman Institute to undo the seal himself. If he had, he would have been killed instantly.

This was the living heart of the ancient god, Brahma, and it pulsed with immense godly might.

As it twitched and writhed, a pitch-black passageway was opened that led to the future. Even from a great distance, Yang Qi felt like he was going to be dragged into it and wiped out of existence.

‘So that's the passageway to the future world, one that corporeal entities can pass through. Is this the power of the legion of gods?’

RUMBLE!

The passageway trembled, then unleashed an aura like that of a primeval godling that wanted to devour countless immortal worlds.

Then a shadowy figure emerged. The future warriors had finally come!

Chapter 696: Out of Hand

The situation was truly out of hand.

The future world had fully opened a passageway. People from the future world could now tap into the power of time travel to come to the present, transforming their constitutions and making them Future Ones. All of a sudden, Yang Qi realized that traveling through this passage would be incredibly difficult. Apparently, getting to the future world wasn’t going to be a simple task.

All of a sudden, the photonic computers began speaking.

[Power reserves at one one-hundred-millionth. New units of measurement available. Genetic systems, power dissemination systems, hyperdrive systems, weapon manufacturing systems, and future extrapolation systems have available upgrades. Proceed with upgrades?]

The mere arrival of the future warriors had brought such a surge of power that the Cruiser of Civilization immediately reached a higher level.

Yang Qi could sense that there was immense potential here, yet he knew that now was not the time and place.

“For now, don’t perform any upgrades. Continue storing power.”

The photonic computers immediately complied with the order, and power continued streaming into the reactors. Even people in the Sage Monarch Heaven were able to sense the profound developments, but Yang Qi wasn’t focused on such things right now. ‘How do I get through that passageway and into the future world? I have to save mother, Aunt Susu, and Master! I guess I just have to bide my time for now. The future warriors are here, and more power from the future is on display.’

RUMBLE!

The first of the future warriors to arrive was in a mecha that emanated such incredible power that not even ancient devil-gods could compare to it. The chest of the mecha featured the head of a tiger, and its helmet looked like the head of a dragon. The spaulders on its shoulders resembled gobblewocks, and the knee covers looked like the heads of chymeras.

Its elbow pieces were like the heads of frazzlefreaks, its girdle was a golden lion with a gaping maw, and its boots looked like anacondas.

This warrior seemed to pulse with the genes of all sorts of primal-chaos godlings, and upon entering the Brahman Immortal World he looked over at August Patriarch Proud Wing and the others.

August Patriarch Proud Wing let out a whoop of delight. “With future warriors, we can slaughter immortals and subjugate immortal worlds!”

“Greetings, everyone,” the future warrior said in a grating voice that sounded like metal scraping against metal. With no further fanfare, he entered the Brahman River and flew toward the defensive formations set up by the old-timers from the Dao Defense League. Seemingly unimpressed, the future warrior unleashed an attack.

Yang Qi knew that those formations would definitely devastate his God Legion Paradise, but they didn’t have any effect at all on the future warrior’s mecha.

Howling, the future warrior smashed his fist into one of the formations and pulled out a handful of Godmyth patriarchs as easily as if he were harvesting carrots.

Bang! Bam! Boom!

The Godmyth patriarchs were crushed as surely as if they were chicken eggs, and the spell formation collapsed.

“Freakish hellion! Wretch-devil!” shouted the other patriarchs from the Dao Defense League as they unleashed divine sword strikes.

Meanwhile, more future warriors were coming to join the fighting. Blood fell like rain as close-quarters combat broke out everywhere, and more future warriors emerged from the passageway. Meanwhile, the power of the Brahman Immortal World grew so intense that it formed something that looked like a golden shell around the immortal world, making the place look like an enormous castle. In some regards, it actually resembled the Cruiser of Civilization.

It almost wasn’t an immortal world any longer, but rather a plane of existence formed from the science and technology of the future. At the same time, it still had the power of the dao of immortals.

Crack! Snap!

All of a sudden, a bolt of god lightning descended from above, causing the Brahman Immortal World to tremble. Yang Qi looked up, and to his surprise he saw an almighty daoist, brimming with the power of the universe itself. It was obviously a seventh or eighth division Godmyth that had descended from a much higher immortal world to provide assistance.

By now, the conflict had far surpassed a level that Yang Qi could participate in.

‘I have to get out of here,’ he thought. ‘Otherwise I'm going to end up getting killed.’ He knew he had to leave soon, but before he did, he wanted to make one last effort to absorb as much power as he could. Of course, he had to be very careful about how he did it.

‘I think now is the time to use King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions! Young Master Leaf can use the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart to get into the Brahman Immortal World, so I should lure him here. That would really throw things into chaos. And I could take advantage of that to get my hands on even more power, possibly even taking out Young Master Leaf. Of course, I should let him fight with the future warriors until he’s on his last legs, then swoop in at the last minute and strike a fatal blow!’

After a moment of thought, Yang Qi drew on the power of his fragment of the Cruiser of Civilization to secretly slip into the Brahman Institute and head toward Brahma’s heart.

It was a restricted area in the institute, and a place that was currently brimming with immense power. However, now was his best opportunity; if he waited for the fighting to calm down, he would definitely be discovered.

Considering that numerous almighty entities were joining forces to attack the Brahman Immortal World, who would possibly stop to consider that something was going on within its defenses?

‘This pure power is so strong!’ Yang Qi thought as he remained within the Flatverse and produced heaps upon heaps of power stones. The power stones he could create thanks to the future world were on par with what was available from the god world. They surpassed the power of the Tusita Heaven by far.

Right now, he was like a tiny ant who was slowly eating away at an enormous dyke.

Of course, he really wanted to get far enough inside to reach Brahma’s heart. The power in that area was so incredible and pure that not even Yang Qi was able to wrap his mind around it.

He caught sight of śarīra-like crystals from the future that looked almost like diamonds. He had actually read about objects like this, and knew that they were god crystals.

By assimilating them, one could acquire power directly from the god world.

With these, the power reserves of the Cruiser of Civilization could reach an even more incredible level.

After reaching the level of one one-hundred-millionth, further upgrades would come much more slowly, and each one would require so much power that Yang Qi wasn't sure how to calculate it. In fact, under normal circumstances it would’ve probably been impossible.

He got closer and closer to the nucleus of the power, and at a certain point he was suddenly struck with inspiration and unleashed some immortal-slaying power.

Immortal-slaying power was something very mysterious, and only people with King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions would be able to detect it. As expected, back in the Mechwave Heaven, Young Master Leaf suddenly shot to his feet.

“Brothers,” he ordered, “you keep up the fight here in the Mechwave Heaven. Wipe out all of the Mechfolk and get that fragment of the Cruiser of Civilization. I just sensed one of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions. I have to get it!”

RUMBLE!

He took a step forward and pierced through space-time, until he was right at the location of the battle between the Dao Defense League and the Brahman Immortal World. Immediately, a look of fear flitted across his face.

‘What a catastrophe! Our Tusita Heaven predicted that something like this would happen. Space-time has been reversed and the future world has come to throw heaven and earth into primal-chaos. The legion of gods perished. When the gods experience nirvanic rebirth, a new civilization will once again be born. And King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions are here? I have to get them. Who cares about the future world! Can they even do anything to stop me?’

Blurring into motion, he turned into a razor-sharp sword that slashed directly into the Brahman Immortal World.

“An ambush!”

“It’s so strong!”

“What a powerful enemy! Hurry up and block his path!”

“The Brahman River can’t even stop him! He must be using some invincible god item!”

Suddenly, a host of future warriors poured out of the pitch-black passageway, swarming toward Young Master Leaf like locusts.

“Fuck off and die!” Young Master Leaf shouted. Even as he looked around trying to find King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions, he unleashed a fist strike that slammed into several future warriors and caused them to explode. However, the leader of the future warriors quickly moved over to get in Young Master Leaf’s path. “King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions? The Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart? Hand them over now, or die!”

Young Master Leaf responded with a burst of laughter. “That's my line! I can’t believe you would try to use it. What a joke! Prepare to be no more!”

A massive fight broke out.

Young Master Leaf wasn’t holding back anything at all. As he fought, wormholes popped into being above him that erupted with the power of monarchs, taking the shape of countless clones that he then sent into battle. He was clearly much stronger than he had been the first time Yang Qi met him.

‘Terrifying,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘He’s definitely a seventh or eighth division Godmyth. When you add in the power of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions and the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, I definitely wouldn’t be able to beat him without being seriously injured in the process! And even then, victory wouldn’t be guaranteed!’

The mere sight of what was happening caused Yang Qi’s heart to pound with fear. Thankfully, he had already used the God Legion Seal to cover up the aura of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions.

Meanwhile, he kept moving deeper toward Brahma’s heart. He was already at a point where the energy fluctuations could kill a fifth or sixth division Godmyth. Thankfully, his God Legion Seal was protecting him from harm and enabling him to further absorb power.

‘I'm finally at a place where I can get god crystals!’

He was now in so deep that he could hardly move.

Up ahead of him were a host of god crystals. Here, the power of the future world crushed down on Brahma’s heart, causing numerous such power crystals to appear, all of them thrumming in a way that surpassed anything from the immortal worlds.

Chapter 697: Taking God Crystals

‘God crystals, right here in front of me. If I can get my hands on a bunch of those, I’ll be in a much better position. I can just get out of here and wait for the future world, the Dao Defense League, and Young Master Leaf to fight it out, then jump in at the last minute to take advantage of the situation. In terms of going to the future world, my cultivation base is obviously too weak right now. I definitely need to be a Godmyth before I even consider that. And I need to somehow get Young Master Leaf’s three legacy medallions, so I have a total of six.’

As he proceeded deeper, he finally ran right into a god crystal.

Without hesitation, he sent out some divine will to wrap up the crystal. However, as soon as he did, an immense, ancient, and desolate will emerged from the crystal, like something from primal-chaos itself. In the shortest of moments, he found himself incapable of movement. Even the Cruiser of Civilization was locked down.

‘What’s going on?’ he thought in shock.

The will entered his sea of consciousness and seemed just on the verge of overwhelming his own will. However, as soon as it reached his forehead, the God Legion Seal suddenly unleashed boundless god might and devoured the encroaching will.

With the invincible God Legion Seal in his forehead, there was no incursion of outside will that would have any effect on him.

“God Legion Seal? Fateless One!? What are you doing here? Don’t tell me this is my fate?”

All of a sudden, Yang Qi felt like everything around him was spinning and realized that he was in some ancient aspect of the void.

Right in front of him was an enormous, pulsing heart. None of the outside powers or attacks had any effect on him here, and no one from the future world could see him.

The voice from moments ago had come from that heart.

‘What just happened?’ Yang Qi thought, quickly quelling the panic that had risen up in him moments ago.

“You're the will of the god Brahma, aren’t you?” he said. “You must be. I have a third of the God Legion Seal, and I'm a Fateless One. You were imprisoned here by the power of the future world. I'm no enemy of yours. In fact, I'm an enemy of the future world! Why don’t we become friends?”

Caught up in the moment, Yang Qi hardly had time to consider the fact that he was communicating with the will of Brahma’s heart, an actual god! This was no fake god, no Godmyth with virtual godhood. This was a god, with true godhood—someone who could drift forever through the river of time!

All that remained was a heart, but the will of the god was still present, and the power it pulsed with could destroy anything and everything. It was obviously something that Yang Qi himself couldn’t do anything against.

“Become friends? With you, boy?” The ancient will of Brahma seemed to smile. “I'd say that, at the moment, you’re about one quadrillionth as strong as me. Even if you fully powered that fragment of the Cruiser of Civilization you have, you still wouldn’t be a match for me. And you want to be friends with me? I’ve never heard of a mortal becoming friends with a god before.”

“I'm foreordained to become a god,” Yang Qi replied confidently. “The God Legion Seal fell to me and that’s proof enough, isn’t it?” He wanted to make sure he didn't sound weak in any way. Here in this moment, when the flames of war were about to engulf all heaven, the god Brahma had called out to him. In a desperate situation like this, it wasn’t time to sit around pondering possibilities and consequences. Instead, he would throw caution to the wind and see what exactly Brahma’s heart wanted.

“It is a curious thing that you have the God Legion Seal, boy. Even I'm not sure why you have it. Based on my understanding, the seal was split into three parts. One rests eternally in the primeval era, one exists in the present, and one exists in the future. Those that exist in the past and the future fell into the hands of two invincible, almighty entities there. You’re definitely the weakest of the three. So weak you’re hardly worth mentioning. I truly don’t understand why the ancient Sovereign Lord would arrange things in this way. However, that is the arrangement, and there must be a reason for it all. I shouldn’t presume to question such matters. Since you have the God Legion Seal, why don’t you consider making a deal with me?”

“What sort of deal?” Yang Qi said.

“I need your help,” Brahma replied. “Long ago, I fought a battle with King Immortal-Slayer and his seventy-one brethren. I lost, and was dismembered, with my corpse being scattered in various locations. My heart is here, my head is in the future world, and my limbs are in various ancient god ruins. As for my torso, it’s in the depths of a certain enormous immortal world. All of them are sealed, and I need your help to break free. What do you say? Only when my body is returned to a whole state can I be resurrected and finally return to the god world.”

“Find the pieces of your body? I don't think I'm powerful enough to do that.” Yang Qi could tell right off the bat that it was an impossible task. Perhaps in the past he would have had the confidence to say that he could do it, but now that he’d seen first-hand how incredibly powerful this heart was, he realized that any such confidence was wishful thinking.

It almost seemed like he was dreaming. Here he was, trying to work out a deal with an actual god.

“It’s not something I expect to happen overnight,” Brahma replied. “I can wait. Plus, I’ll reward you, to the point where you might even reach godly ascension. Right now, you’re a Demolisher mortal. That’s really just too weak. And when you do reach the Godmyth level, the dao of heaven will be furious, sending a tribulation that will be very difficult to overcome. Your fleshly body and your enlightenment are both beyond where they should be. How about this. Help me with the first task of traveling to the future world, finding my head, and unsealing it. I can even give you the coordinates. To help, I’ll give you boundless power that will completely power up that fragment of the Cruiser of Civilization. If you were to try doing that on your own, you’d probably never succeed.”

“Oh? So the first task is to go to the future world? And you’ll give me directions?” Yang Qi nodded. Of course, if he followed through with this plan, he would be able to search for benefits of his own. “I do need to power up the Cruiser of Civilization first, otherwise I’d never make it through the space-time passageway to the future world.”

“Very well, boy. Remember your promise. I’ll use my power to gather all of the god crystals in the area. They contain power from the future world, as well as my own godpower. Just one of the crystals should be enough to provide one one-hundred-trillionth of the power needed by that fragment of the Cruiser of Civilization. There should be enough here.”

Brahma’s will spread out and numerous god crystals began flying toward Yang Qi’s hand.

“Normally speaking, you would never be able to collect these god crystals, because they’re located too close to my heart. Furthermore, the Cruiser of Civilization is one of the greatest machines created by the science and technology of the Lord of Civilization, who ruled the ancient mechanical civilization of the past. It’s neither a god item nor a magical treasure. It surpasses god items, and the fact that you acquired it indicates that destiny is taking care of you. Hopefully, you can find more fragments of the cruiser. The Lord of Civilization was a god who surpassed most of us. He reached a peak that few reach, the Paramount God level. Now, go! When you reach the Godmyth level, come back here and I will help you go to the future world to look for my sealed head!”

WHIZZZ!

Before Yang Qi could react, an immense surge of power wrapped around him and whisked him through the universe until he was far away from the Brahman Immortal World.

‘Great!’ Yang Qi thought as he hovered far away from the battlefield. Although he was delighted, he now had a very important mission for the god Brahma, something he definitely couldn’t take lightly. Brahma hadn’t forced him to make any promises, nor had he talked of any punishment. But if a god wanted to punish a mortal, it would be a simple task. And Yang Qi didn’t have the complete God Legion Seal.

He looked back and could see surging vital energy and dazzling sword light. It was obvious that the future world was strongly entrenched in the Brahman Immortal World now, and that numerous immortal worlds had come to do battle.

Immortals were falling left and right, and the future world’s momentum continued.

At the moment, Yang Qi wasn’t worried. There were plenty of experts among the immortal worlds. Even the high-level immortal planes were as numerous as the eternal sands of the universe. There were already twentieth ranked immortal worlds involved, and the thirtieth ranked worlds would soon step in as well.

Eventually, a burst of will began spreading out, a message sent by the almighty entities of the Dao Defense League.

“The vicious future world has invaded! Anyone who cultivates the dao of immortals, be you righteous or evil, come stand in defense! Catastrophe has come. The dao of heaven is collapsing and the universe is about to be overturned. All cultivators have the responsibility to rally together during this time of crisis!”

“Any ambitious cultivators out there should come join the Dao Defense League!”

“Any cultivator who fights well shall become a disciple of the Dao Defense League, or even an elder. You’ll have access to endless magical treasures and cultivation resources. And those who kill the future warriors can absorb their constitution to gain the powers of a Future One!”

Yang Qi smiled coldly. Obviously, they were recruiting cannon fodder, and it was the perfect opportunity for him to become part of the Dao Defense League. Of course, he didn't want to be cannon fodder. He would become an elder and get handsomely rewarded as a result.

War had come, and no immortal world was safe. As far as Yang Qi was concerned, the battlefield was the best place to profit, and the best way to look for a chance to get to the future world.

‘I wonder if Young Master Leaf is still in the midst of the fighting. Or is his true energy starting to run low? It obviously took a lot out of him to fight the Mechwave Heaven, how could he be so full of energy?’ He pulled up an image of Young Master Leaf on the screens of the photonic computers and saw that he looked just as high-spirited as he had in the beginning.

Obviously, he had some sort of divine medicine that could restore his spirit and energy. Either that, or he had some unknown magical treasure.

Chapter 698: Dao Heart Formation

Young Master Leaf was keeping far too many secrets, thus Yang Qi had no confidence in being able to beat him in a fight right now. And at the moment, it didn’t seem like it would be possible to take his legacy medallions. However, the one advantage Yang Qi had was that, thanks to the photonic computers, he could secretly observe him at any time.

Also, he could always sense his general location thanks to the legacy medallions. But because of the God Legion Seal, Young Master Leaf couldn't sense him.

As it was said, if you know yourself and know your enemy, you’ll always be victorious. So Yang Qi would use every scheme and trick in his book to get information on Young Master Leaf. Of course, the most important task at hand would be to improve his cultivation and get stronger.

Right now, both he and his clone were eighth stage Antiquity-Demolishers. In other words, they were immortal emperors. And soon enough, they would reach ninth stage Dao-Demolishing, which was the highest point in the Demolishing level.

The difference between the eighth and ninth stage was immense, more than the normal difference between two distinct levels. After all, one formed a dao heart in the ninth stage—sometimes called a dao fruit—which led to another subdivision of nine levels. As dao lineaments appeared on the dao heart, one progressed further toward the peak. Of course, the peak was nine lineaments, after which one could break through to the Godmyth level.

As of yet, Yang Qi hadn’t formed a dao heart.

Doing so was a major accomplishment that was essentially equivalent to creating a power double, and would lead to a tenfold increase in power, or perhaps even a hundredfold. Unfortunately, it was very difficult to make a dao heart, and it required a combination of immense power, magical laws, and will.

Thankfully, Yang Qi had a huge collection of resources, including the god crystals given him by the god Brahma. He also had a deep understanding of the profundities of power itself. And as his photonic computers were further unlocked, he grew more deeply aware of how genes, vital energy, science, and technology all worked together, which gave him further cultivation benefits. Because of that, breaking through to the Dao-Demolishing level shouldn’t be a major issue for him. And so he found a place in the depths of the spatial tempests of the universe, where he sealed himself in seclusion.

He would need to be very careful during this session of cultivation, but at the same time he couldn’t wait to see what transformations would occur with the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth when he achieved his breakthrough. And how far would he get, considering the reserves he had built up?

In terms of the tribulation to come, he wasn’t worried about it. The fury of the dao of heaven could be defeated by a simple fist strike, and usually turned out to be a great influx of nutrients.

As he began his session of cultivation, the various abilities of the Cruiser of Civilization started upgrading and the ship’s systems reached new levels. It was a good thing that Yang Qi had refrained from these upgrades back when he reached the requisite power levels back in the Brahman Immortal World. As it turned out, the fluctuations being released were significant.

Power tempests raged around the spacecraft and the photonic computers flickered as they produced intelligent, illusory projections. This was a high-level function of the photonic computers, actual living beings produced from raw data. Because of their structure, they were capable of incredible speeds.

[Life support systems fully operational.]

[Genetic systems fully operational.]

[Weapons and power systems fully operational.]

[Mecha and warship systems fully operational.]

[Defense and shield systems fully operational.]

[Hyperdrive systems fully operational.]

[Replicator systems fully operational.]

[Diagnostic systems fully operational.]

Yang Qi couldn’t have been more delighted to hear the reports coming in from the various photonic computers. And this was before he had even absorbed the god crystals. Once that happened, there was no saying how much further the Cruiser of Civilization would advance.

Ignoring the weapons and power systems for the moment, he focused his attention on the genetic systems.

“Scan me and analyze my genetics!”

Yang Qi was now tapping into the most advanced science and technology from the ancient era, using it to analyze himself, and the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, in the hopes of a better understanding of himself.

A beam of light swept over him from head to toe, and the photonic computers began to report. [Perfect genes that surpass the magical laws of gods…. Currently in prototype state. Power double not yet created…. Power core activated…. Perfect core…. Dao heart… insufficient… recovering… replenishing….]

Even as the words echoed out, the photonic computers projected images of Yang Qi that had been taken from six different hyperdimensional angles. Everything about him was visible, including his vital energy fluctuations and gene combinations, among other things.

‘So that’s how it is. So that’s how it is! My Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth isn’t complete! I have a perfect foundation of magical laws, but I'm incomplete. In fact, I'm only at one third of what I could be.’

Thanks to this analysis, many previous areas of confusion in cultivation were cleared up. Many things were made clear, as if he had suddenly been given access to a mirror that reflected himself perfectly.

He even had answers to questions he hadn’t realized existed.

Instantly, Yang Qi felt as if he understood everything more clearly. He realized that in terms of improving his divine will, psychic abilities, strength, energy, will, mind, vitality, and blood… they were all internal factors.

Yang Qi burst out laughing. ‘No amount of power from the Cruiser of Civilization is going to help me. Thanks to that analysis, I now understand myself in a way that ten thousand years of rumination would never have provided. It was just like the ancient saying seek the dao at dawn, die fulfilled in the evening.’

What Yang Qi lacked was not power, but enlightenment. Immortal pills, miraculous medicines, the corpses of god-devils… none of those things would be particularly helpful to him. He needed to understand himself! Not even power from a god would help. Once he fully understood himself, though, nothing could stop him.

Thanks to this analysis, he now realized that he only had one third of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, and that the other aspects were in the other two parts of the God Legion Seal.

Only by completing his God Legion Seal and acquiring the full legacy of the most paramount of Lords could he truly advance by leaps and bounds. At that point, he would surpass the magical laws of the gods and usher in a new civilization.

“Dao heart, form!”

Now was the time to start forming his dao heart.

Actually, thanks to his sudden burst of enlightenment from moments ago, he had already broken through to Dao-Demolishing. He had already converged his quintessence-blood and vital energy into a clump, which was a brewing dao fruit.

“Fateless dao fruit!”

His divine will flickered like lightning and a burst of vital energy surged out above his head, where it took the shape of something that looked like both a fruit and a heart, yet was neither. It pulsed with an aura of fatelessness, and it seemed like, if it burst into the open, it would twist and distort great daos and magical laws, transforming the fates of all living things in the world.

RUMBLE!

Universal fluctuations rolled out, creating tribulations that could destroy hundreds upon hundreds of immortal worlds. The dao of heaven was furious, and it immediately created a tribulation cloud that would cause the hearts of even Shattered Gods to grow cold.

However, as soon as the fateless dao fruit appeared above Yang Qi’s head, a soft pulsing music echoed out and provoked instant transformations among the tribulation clouds.

As soon as the music touched one of the tribulation clouds, it became an auspicious cloud filled with god-spirits and power-warriors, as numerous as ants, all of them prostrating in worship, surrounded by the beating of drums and other immortal music.

It was as if the tribulation clouds were infected by some sort of plague, as one after another was transformed into auspicious clouds.

It was a scene the likes of which was unprecedented in all ways.

Throughout all of history, there had never been a situation in which tribulation clouds were transformed into auspicious clouds. And that was the result of the mere forming of Yang Qi’s fateless dao fruit. It could change the direst calamity into good luck. That was what resulted from controlling the power of fate. It could subvert the power of all karma, spread good tidings to all living things, and avoid all catastrophe.

As the auspicious clouds gathered above, beautiful music, sagelight, and holy hymns echoed out above him as though the Sovereign Lord of the many heavens was blessing all creation.

“It worked!”

The auspicious clouds flowed into him, entering his dao heart, becoming a part of it, and filling him with a sensation of power.

“Aaaiiiieee!” The scream of a woman suddenly echoed out as Goddess Treasure from the Glorious Treasure Heaven appeared in his grasp.

“There’s no need for such ridiculous screaming,” he said. “I'm not going to do anything to you, as long as you follow my instructions.”

“Okay!” Goddess Treasure blurted. “Just let me go, and I’ll do anything you want. I'm a Fraudulent One, I can fool just about anyone for you!”

“Is that so? Considering you Fraudulent Ones are expert scammers, how could I possibly trust you?” It really was impossible to tell how many crafty plots and machinations existed inside of her. Therefore, he reached out, clamped his hand down on the top of her head, and drew on the powers of his fateless dao fruit. Instantly, distorted images began to rise up, howling and screaming defiantly.

Yang Qi devoured them, and soon his dao heart gained the sensation of being full of crafty plots and machinations.

Goddess Treasure writhed for a bit, then turned limp, seemingly unable to lift a finger. Terror filled her eyes as she realized that although she still had all of her magic and she was still an Incarnated God, her ability to scheme and plot was gone. And her head felt like it was splitting apart.

“You… you took my Fraudulent constitution! But how? I was born a Fraudulent One! My entire life consisted of scamming people!”

“Fraudulent Ones are born because they have preheaven vital energy from primal-chaos itself, filled with crafty plots and machinations. I just extracted that preheaven vital energy, returning your constitution to that of a normal person. It’s something I only just learned how to do!”

Chapter 699: Dao Defense League

Now that Yang Qi was a ninth stage Dao-Demolisher with a fateless dao fruit, many of his energy arts had reached a more miraculous level. For example, he had just extracted the constitution of a Fraudulent One and added it to himself, giving him a host of new abilities.

And now, the former Fraudulent One that was Goddess Treasure had lost her most valuable asset, which instantly struck a blow to all of her various ambitions.

“Well, what do you think, Goddess Treasure? Now you’ll slave away for me, making magical treasures. Perform well for a few hundred years and I’ll make you an ordinary citizen. Remember, though, you have to work hard. If you don’t, I won’t give you your freedom.

By the way, I'm well aware of how you deceived me about the situation with the seal on the heart. That said, I already made a deal with Brahma, and now no one will open that seal. In any case, considering how you plotted against me, the fact that I'm not making you the lowest of the low among women is actually quite a kindness.”

Eyes bulging with rage, Goddess Treasure shouted, “Forget it! I'm an Incarnated God! I should have a high position!”

Yang Qi snorted coldly. “Well, if you refuse to do things the easy way, we’ll do them the hard way. Eldest Brother!”

“Here!”

Yang Qi’s Eldest Brother from the Invincible Society appeared. He was now a Dao-Demolisher with nine lineaments, just on the verge of becoming a Godmyth. He had been entrusted with watching over the Cruiser of Civilization. Grabbing Goddess Treasure by the neck, he lifted her up and said, “I’ll teach this woman a lesson. She's a grandmaster of treasure-forging, so if she doesn’t produce plenty of magical treasures on a daily basis, I’ll make sure she lives a life worse than death!”

“Good,” Yang Qi replied. “Also, assimilate the Glorious Treasure Heaven. I'm leaving everything in your hands. I'm a Dao-Demolisher now, and have the nine sub-levels to handle.”  Eldest Brother vanished into the depths of the spacecraft, and Yang Qi put a bit more thought into his upcoming plans. Then he headed in the direction of the Dao Defense League.

He had just spent about a year in his session of cultivation, and much to his surprise, the war between the Dao Defense League and the future world had actually widened in scope. Now it seemed like it would be even easier to infiltrate the Dao Defense League and wait until the right moment of chaos to seize the advantage for himself.

By now, Yang Qi realized that he was a portent of evil for any organization he joined. Whatever new group he joined always seemed doomed to be destroyed.

In the mortal world, it had started with the Rich-Lush Continent’s Demi-Immortal Institute, which ended up thoroughly eliminated. Later, it was the Titan Emperor Collegium, which he wiped out of existence. Even the Titan Emperor Heaven as a whole was no more.

He was now very familiar with the process of joining some group as a lowly, unimportant individual. If he started out by attacking from the top in an overt grab for power, the leaders would obviously resist him and make things hard. But by slowly improving his cultivation and winning the approval of higher-ups, he could consolidate power and eventually overthrow the leadership.

‘Time to get started!’ He sent the Cruiser of Civilization into his God Legion Paradise, where it would continue to power up and become more miraculous. Soon, it would be far more useful than any god item.

Yang Qi flitted along through the planes of the universe until he saw numerous immortal worlds linked together in alliance. There were worlds in the twentieth rank, the tenth, and even some in the fifth or sixth, all strung together to create a line of defense like an enormous ocean.

It was impossible to say how many there were. But they stretched for trillions upon quadrillions of light-years, creating a defensive bulwark that not even the future world could break.

In fact, the Brahman Immortal World and the forces of the future world were actually surrounded on all sides.

Unfortunately, they formed such a colossal monster of an organization that its expansion still couldn’t be stopped. Even twentieth ranked immortal worlds were not safe from being attacked and destroyed, and that was not to mention the lower-ranked worlds.

Yang Qi could sense the baleful energy caused by the fiery destruction of such places, and it was so intense it was almost liquid.

He reached out and vital energy converged on his hand, seemingly oozing with blood.

Up ahead, he caught sight of numerous battleships from the future world. They were manned by future warriors, who were locked in combat with experts from the immortal worlds. Perhaps in the beginning, these experts had all started out as cannon fodder. But thanks to the training of actual combat, they were becoming top fighters.

Yang Qi adjusted his aura so that he seemed like an ordinary ninth stage Dao-Demolisher, then headed toward the rear lines of the forces of the Dao Defense League. Thanks to the year of intense fighting, the forces of the Dao Defense League were now much stronger than before, able to hold the line as their top experts took on the top experts from the future world.

‘Wow, now that I’m approaching the front line, the divine will of tens of thousands of experts is scanning me. It’s a good thing I can hide my identity.’

Sure enough, the divine will of numerous experts kept the entire area under strict lockdown. It was terrifying how seriously they took the defenses.

Of course, the divine will didn’t even pause upon reaching Yang Qi. He was a measly ninth stage Dao-Demolisher, not even a Godmyth. There were so many low-level individuals like that flocking to join the Dao Defense League that they could hardly be counted. By now, the conflict with the future world had come to affect countless immortal worlds, thus, many immortals were stepping forward to fight the encroachments of the future warriors. After all, cutting down a Future One in battle would provide immense benefits. One’s quintessence energy would improve dramatically, and the constitution of a Future One could improve one’s own genes and cultivation level in an unmatchable fashion. And that wasn't to mention the mechas to be had, all of which were precious treasures of science and technology from the future. Acquiring a mecha was an easy way for cultivators to defend themselves against even the most dangerous of heavenly tribulations.

The benefits were immense.

Yang Qi saw immortals everywhere, including immortal officers, generals, marquises, and ancestors. Many of them had excited expressions on their faces.

“Did you hear that after joining the Dao Defense League, so-and-so ended up fighting a fiend-devil from the future? He killed the thing and took a powerful mecha as loot. He also got the constitution of a Future One. Afterward, the Dao Defense League decided to groom him for leadership!”

“Yeah, I heard! There was some punk kid from our sect who joined as cannon fodder, but by some bullshit fluke, he managed to come across a future fiend-devil and an immortal expert who killed each other in the final blow of a fight. That punk swooped in, took their quintessence energy and magical treasures, and instantly got promoted. Now he bosses us around constantly, and I couldn’t be more pissed off!”

“Come on, let’s go. We need to join the Dao Defense League too. Just imagine all the loot to be had on the battlefield.”

Streams of immortals headed to join the Dao Defense League. Furthermore, the area far behind the front lines was filled with countless cities devoted to trade. Everything was bustling.

Because of the war, the alliance of countless immortal worlds had suppressed the spatial tempests, and driven away or killed any roving fiend-devils or beasts. Traveling was now very safe, as long as one stayed away from the front lines.

At a certain point, Yang Qi checked his legacy medallions and his heart pounded with the realization that Young Master Leaf was somewhere in the Dao Defense League. Yang Qi knew he had to remain fully on guard. Young Master Leaf was from the thirty-third ranked Tusita Heaven, and would obviously have a very high position in the alliance. Most assuredly, he had stood out in the fighting with the future world and been taken in by some almighty entity. Perhaps he had even become an elder in the Dao Defense League by this point.

As Yang Qi entered the sea of immortal worlds, the vital energy and magical laws grew stronger and he saw powerful and deadly spell formations everywhere. The immortals who manned the spell formations wore a variety of outfits. Some were clad in immortal robes, others wore armor, and some were even bare-chested. But they all had a golden magical symbol glowing on their forehead that read “dao”, indicating that they were official members of the Dao Defense League.

“Halt!” someone shouted. “Who goes there!?”

Nine low-ranking members rushed forward to block Yang Qi’s path, bristling with killing intent. Their captain had eight lineaments on his dao heart, and considering that Yang Qi had none, the man obviously ranked much higher according to the general way of doing things. Because of that, the man seemed full of mettle as he glared at Yang Qi and said, “Who are you? Here to check in? Want to join the Dao Defense League? First you need to undergo a background check to make sure you’re clean.”

“Hello, friends. I’m from the Dragonfolk. The name’s Dragon Proudheaven. I've heard about the famous Dao Defense League, and how you’re fighting the fiend-devils from the future world. I came here for training, and hopefully some good fortune that will help me reach the Godmyth level. Friends, could you perhaps give me some advice on what to do? I'd really appreciate it.”

As soon as Yang Qi made up the story about being one of the Dragonfolk, he thought of Proud Heaven for some reason. Thus he decided to call himself Dragon Proudheaven, which sounded like a very mighty and domineering name. Before the captain or any of his men could react, Yang Qi reached out with a flourish to produce a wrapped bundle, within which were nine magical treasures that pulsed with virtual godhood. “These nine magical treasures were created by a Tempered God patriarch from my clan. They’re nine Heaven-Dragon Devil-Subduing Swords. They’re powerful, but honestly, I can’t use them. I’d like to offer them to you nine as a gift.”

“What? Magical treasures made by a Tempered God?”

The captain took the bundle and pulled out the nine swords, which glittered and pulsed with virtual godhood. Considering that he was only a Demolisher, he was vastly weaker than any Godmyth, so treasures forged by such an individual would be the kind of things he could only dream about.

Instantly, a smile broke out on his face and he looked over at Yang Qi as if they were close friends. Laughing heartily, he said, “Brother, you’re obviously an extraordinary individual to give out spectacular items like this as gifts. And you actually come from an ancient and respected clan! No problem at all. Welcome to the Dao Defense League. We’d be happy to help you find a place here.”

Chapter 700: Infiltration

As simply as that, Yang Qi doled out nine Heaven-Dragon Devil-Subduing Swords to buy his way into the Dao Defense League. And it worked. Oftentimes, greasing palms was the best way to get ahead. It was just like the ancient saying: the king of hell is easy to deal with, but minor devils are hard to handle. Usually, the ‘minor devils’ handled day-to-day affairs, and if you didn’t take them seriously, it could lead to a disaster. But treat them well, and they would make your path smooth.

Just as he’d expected, this group offered to vouch for him and help him out. In fact, they immediately began treating him like the important offspring from an aristocratic clan that he was supposed to be. Although he’d supposedly come for training, he understood how things worked and immediately tried to make some friends. Everyone liked people such as that.

Now it was time to proceed with the next part of the act. Yang Qi unleashed some of the fundamental nature of the Eight Tribes Godfist and used it to tap the captain, who staggered backward as a result.

Immediately, the captain’s previous expression of veiled contempt was replaced with one of respect and veneration. In the immortal worlds, respect was offered to the strong. Moments before, this small team of nine had assumed the Yang Qi was just a young noble from an aristocratic clan who relied on the backing of his family to get ahead in the world. They had even considered taking advantage of him in some way. But now that they realized he knew some of the ancient secrets of the powerful Dragonfolk, the Eight Tribes Godfist, they couldn't help but shiver in fear. And they didn’t dare do anything to offend him.

With virtually no work at all, Yang Qi essentially became the new leader of their little group, capable of issuing any orders he wanted and having them followed without hesitation. Of course, some of the reason for that was because he had acquired the powers of a Fraudulent One and an Inspiring One. It now took little effort to convince people to acknowledge allegiance.

“Young Sir Dragon Proudheaven, we’re disciples of the Nine Yangs God Sect from the twenty-sixth ranked Supreme Immortal World. It's a very prestigious sect, and we have a lot of power in the Dao Defense League. Right now, we can take you to see one of the Godmyth elders from our sect, who is directly in charge of our team.”

“That’s right, Young Sir Dragon,” said one of the female disciples. “You’ll get a lot of benefits by joining us.” Obviously, she was trying hard to get on Yang Qi’s good side.

“Fine,” Yang Qi said, nodding. “If I can rise a bit in the ranks of my clan by means of this training, then I’ll offer profound thanks to all of you.” With that, they led him to a certain immortal world, and a temple whose outer courtyard was filled with a random assortment of cultivators, clearly people who had come in the hopes of joining the Nine Yangs God Sect and fighting the future warriors for the Dao Defense League. Of course, Yang Qi knew that these people would be treated as little more than cannon fodder.

“Line up, everyone, line up!” shouted one of the disciples of the Nine Yangs God Sect. “Prepare to be inspected! You need to prove to the patriarch that you’re strong and useful, and that you can really fight the future warriors!”

The potential recruits didn’t dare to give voice to their anger at being yelled at and berated like children; instead, they meekly stood there.

Upon seeing Yang Qi approaching, a handful of particularly vicious disciples approached and said, “What do you think you’re doing? You’re not allowed inside the temple! Looking to die? If you take another step we’ll cut you down!”

“Aiyo!” the captain of the team shouted, rushing forward to stand between Yang Qi and his vicious fellow disciples. Smiling at the disciple who had just spoken, he said, “Calm down, Junior Brother Yang.”

“Well, if it isn’t Elder Brother Zhen!” the disciple replied, narrowing his eyes. “What, you’re taking this guy in to personally see the patriarch?”

“That’s right,” the captain replied. “This is Young Sir Dragon Proudheaven. He’s not an ordinary person, and the patriarch definitely needs to see him in person. You absolutely, positively must not offend him.”

“Oh?” The other disciples didn’t seem inclined to trust the captain. But before anything else could happen, Yang Qi produced another magical treasure forged by a Godmyth patriarch, a pearl filled with god lightning. “Friends from the Nine Yangs God Sect, please, take this introductory gift.”

After conquering the thirteenth ranked Glorious Treasure Heaven, Yang Qi had acquired quite a collection of magical treasures.

Although the Nine Yangs God Sect was from a twenty-sixth ranked immortal world, that immortal world was a huge place with an immense population and a lack of resources. It was like a monastery with many monks but not much congee. It wasn’t as if every disciple from there would have a chance to get an item forged by a Godmyth patriarch.

Junior Brother Yang’s eyes went wide at the sight of the pearl, and he held his hand out invitingly. “Please, Young Sir. Come with me to see the patriarch.”

“After you, Young Sir!”

It was with utmost courteousness that they escorted Yang Qi inside. That immediately led to a buzz of conversation among the other disciples waiting outside, which soon threatened to turn into a commotion. However, the disciples of the Nine Yangs God Sect were quick to shut them up.

“If anyone dares to make a racket you’ll be kicked out!”

“Do you people want to make yourselves an enemy of the Dao Defense League?”

“Hey, you! Get over here!” They grabbed one of the particularly loud complainers, strung him up, and gave him a lashing with a whip. He screamed piteously for a long moment before passing out.

Yang Qi saw, and shook his head. That was the fate that awaited trouble makers.

In fact, if he hadn’t greased palms with magical treasures, he might have similarly suffered. Thankfully, he was now on his way to see the Godmyth patriarch directly.

Inside the temple, Yang Qi caught sight of the patriarch, a first division Seer God who sat there with his eyes closed, cultivating his energy arts. At this point, Yang Qi could easily kill a hundred Seer Gods with a mere exhalation. However, he didn't want to make too much of a scene right now.

As they entered, the patriarch opened his eyes and said, “What's going on here? I told you to select the best of the best and have them gather outside. Why did you bring this fellow in here?”

Despite being a Godmyth, it was obvious that this man didn’t hold a very impressive position within the Nine Yangs God Sect. In a sect from a twenty-sixth ranked immortal world, a Godmyth level would be important, but not necessarily very highly ranked.

“Patriarch,” one of the disciples said, “this is Young Sir Dragon Proudheaven, who has the blood of the Dragonfolk and comes from a very important clan. He wants to join our Nine Yangs God Sect! He's very strong!”

Another of the disciples said, “Patriarch, please assess him!”

“Excellent. Blood of the Dragonfolk? That definitely makes you unique among immortals. Let's see how strong you are!” The patriarch waved his finger, sending a dazzling stream of sword energy out.

‘Well,’ Yang Qi thought, ‘this is just what I would expect of a Godmyth from a twenty-sixth ranked immortal world. He's definitely stronger than the average Godmyth. That sword energy is dangerously sharp!’

Clenching his hand into a fist, he said, “Eight Tribes Godfist!”

A beam of bright light shot out, true energy in the shape of a dragon that caused muffled booms to ring out as it destroyed the sword energy.

“What?” the Godmyth patriarch murmured, visibly taken aback. Never could he have guessed that this new recruit would be so strong. With that, he went on to unleash a few more attacks. Yang Qi kept his true strength hidden and used only one one-hundred thousandth of what he was capable of with the Eight Tribes Godfist. Even that was more than enough to vanquish all of the sword energy.

“Excellent,” the patriarch said, rising to his feet. “That was the Eight Tribes Godfist, a godly-class energy art! I almost can’t believe you’ve cultivated four of them. And I can tell that you’re actually holding back. I'd say that you’re clearly capable of tangling with a first division Seer God patriarch from a twentieth ranked immortal world. And your cultivation base is only ninth stage Dao-Demolishing. You're definitely a genius, and whatever aristocratic Dragonfolk clan you come from, it's clearly beyond ordinary.”

“You flatter me, Patriarch. Many thanks. Unfortunately, calamity has struck, and we all have a responsibility to fight back against the future world. They want to throw the dao of heaven and karma itself into chaos. If they succeed, we won’t be able to practice cultivation, and eventually, all heaven and earth will descend into nirvanic extermination. It's a true catastrophe. As someone who cultivates the dao of immortals, I want to fight these wretch-devils, if for no other reason than to save myself and everyone else.” Yang Qi’s words fairly thrummed with righteousness and inspiration. “The Nine Yangs God Sect is famous everywhere, and I’ve always admired it. I brought a gift from my clan’s patriarchs, and if you think you could make use of it, I will happily give it to you.”

Even as the words left his mouth, Yang Qi produced a heaven-devil śarīra.

The patriarch was visibly stunned. “That’s a heaven-devil śarīra created from the quintessence energy of a Tempered God! It has virtual godhood! In order to create something like that, you would have to kill a Tempered God heaven-devil with one clean blow, then seal it to make sure it didn't use any special divine abilities to destroy its own body. Only an Incarnated God could possibly do something like that!”

“Actually, this was made by one of the Shattered Gods from my clan,” Yang Qi said in what was an obvious boast.

The Godmyth patriarch nodded his head and sized Yang Qi up again. “I accept this amazing gift of yours. It will be a lot of help in gaining enlightenment of the Tempered God level. Considering you've offered to join our Nine Yangs God Sect and help fight the future warriors, I’ll make sure that you aren’t disappointed in how things turn out. We're one of the most important factions in the Dao Defense League. Our leader, Sectlord Nine Yangs, is a ninth division Chaos God, just on the verge of reaching the Deathless Throne.”

‘A ninth division Chaos God?’ Yang Qi thought, shivering. ‘There’s no way I can deal with someone like that right now. Just exactly how strong is he, I wonder?’

Because of how the Dao Defense League had taken the lead in fighting back against the future world, it was destined to grow much mightier, and would eventually be a major force in the millions upon millions of immortal worlds that were spread like eternal sands through the universe. Having a high status in that alliance would be very beneficial to Yang Qi. And by giving this Godmyth patriarch a heaven-devil śarīra, Yang Qi had acquired a new friend who would surely be useful in the days to come.

“Henceforth, Dragon Proudheaven, you are a member of the Dao Defense League. Here’s your magical identification symbol!” A golden beam of light shot into Yang Qi’s forehead, creating a symbol that read ‘dao’. It had no powers of its own and was only an identification mark.

“Do you want to go right now to fight some future warriors? Or do you want to observe some of the fighting first to see what you’re up against?”

“I’ll wait for a bit before taking on any future warriors,” Yang Qi said. “I’d like to first see exactly how strong they are, and get used to the Dao Defense League.”

“Whatever you wish. Men, come. Arrange for a rite center for Young Sir Dragon Proudheaven to work on his cultivation in!”

Chapter 701: Nine Yangs God Sect

Yang Qi had a place in the Dao Defense League now as an official disciple. In fact, he actually had a higher position than the average disciple.

Considering how strong he was, plus the fact that he had the enticing powers of both a Fraudulent One and an Inspiring One, it was easy for him to gain supporters. In only about half a month, he had quite a few low-level disciples who were loyal to him, and even several Godmyth patriarchs that he knew would be useful later, including the one who had originally assessed him.

The truth was that he was strong enough to recruit even Incarnated Gods if he wanted to, but for now he had decided to hold back in the interests of keeping a low profile.

Slowly but surely, he was asking around to find out the full situation in the Dao Defense League. Its core was made up of several hundred immortal worlds that were all twenty-fifth ranked or higher. There was even a thirtieth-ranked immortal world that was a member, the Śakra Heaven.

None of the thirty-third ranked immortal worlds had joined. Perhaps they were waiting to see how things played out with the future world, or perhaps they had already secretly sent agents to provide support behind the scenes.

As for how many lower-ranked immortal worlds supported the alliance, it was impossible to say for sure. There were definitely billions. Experts and heroes abounded, and there were always battles being fought and dramatic events occurring.

Yang Qi was also interested in information about Young Master Leaf. After paying out plenty of magical treasures and power stones, he learned that Young Master Leaf had become one of the top elder kings in the alliance. As for his seventy-one brethren, they were all prime paragon elders. Apparently, they had even formed a new sect.

They were all important and respected people, and fought with particular savagery against the future world. Of course, they still hated the Mechfolk, who refused to show their faces nowadays and avoided contact with the Dao Defense League.

After getting his finger on the pulse of things, Yang Qi began taking missions to earn service credit and slowly climb through the ranks of leadership. His initial goal was to see if he could find an opportunity to get some of King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy medallions from Young Master Leaf. After all, without those medallions he couldn’t risk going to the future world.

The power available in the Dao Defense League was vastly superior to anything from the old Brahman Immortal World, and it didn’t attract any attention when Yang Qi absorbed it.

**

Far from the front lines in the Dao Defense League, in a remote, mysterious location, a group of a few dozen disciples from the Nine Yangs God Sect traveled along. Most of them were ninth stage Dao-Demolishers, led by Yang Qi, who they treated with the utmost respect.

“Boss, how come all we do is go out on patrol?” one of the other disciples asked. “When are we going to stick out and make an impression?” This particular disciple was a burly, bare-chested man who carried an ax in each hand. He was a powerful person who pulsed with baleful energy, and was clearly going to become a Godmyth one day.

Of course, the ‘boss’ he had just referred to was Yang Qi.

“Just wait for a bit longer,” Yang Qi replied. “I'm fairly certain the future world isn’t going to stand for just being boxed in the way they are. Pretty soon, they’ll try to break through the blockade. And when the future warriors lead the offensive, that will be the time for us to jump in and help.”

Eventually, they reached a sizeable asteroid and landed to rest for a time. This particular asteroid had been crafted by immortal hands, and was something of a marketplace. Immortals from the Dao Defense League would often stop here on journeys to do a bit of buying or selling.

As soon as Yang Qi and his team landed, they headed toward one of the tea houses. Everyone scurried to get out of their way; it was well-known that disciples from the Dao Defense League were very strong, and not to be provoked. Inside the restaurant, a buzz of conversation could be heard as people ate and drank to their hearts’ content. Before they could even find seats, a cold snort echoed out.

“Hmph! Scum!”

The other disciples with Yang Qi looked over in the direction of the voice.

“Boss, look!” the burly disciple said. “We were just cursed by that girl! What do we do? Her cultivation base isn't bad, she’s at least in the first division of the Godmyth level. I don’t think we could beat her in a fight, but as members of the Nine Yangs God Sect and the Dao Defense League, we can’t just take such insults standing!”

“That's right, we can’t stand for this! Let’s go call for some backup, then return and take her captive. What's she going to do to one of our Godmyth patriarchs? People who insult the Dao Defense League and the Nine Yangs God Sect all deserve to die!”

All of Yang Qi’s men were itching to take action.

He looked over to find a young woman dressed in emerald green staring at them with cold derision. She seemed to be about twenty, and radiated the aura of a first division Seer God.

Suddenly, she slapped the surface of the table and shouted, “Manager!”

The manager, an immortal, hurried over with head bowed. “Matriarch, what can I do for you?”

Pointing directly at Yang Qi and his men, she said, “Go search those people and take their tea money. I'm worried they won’t pay later! I've seen a lot of disciples from the Dao Defense League acting like tyrants and bullying the common people. What's the deal with this Dao Defense League anyway? They're supposed to be defending the dao and executing devils. They’re supposed to be holding the line against the future world. But now they’re turning into the fiends!”

“Er….” The manager looked over at Yang Qi and his companions, and clearly had no desire to offend them. He operated a place of business, and if he had a falling out with the disciples of the Dao Defense League it would be hard to stay afloat. And here this girl wanted him to take their money up front and settle accounts later. The manager was seriously worried that it would turn into a deadly confrontation.

“Damn you!” the Nine Yangs God Sect disciples shouted. Clearly they wanted to just attack her outright.

“Calm down, all of you,” Yang Qi said to them via divine will. “I’ll handle things. This girl obviously knows that we're from the Dao Defense League, yet she isn’t afraid of offending us. She must have a powerful backer, perhaps even someone from the Dao Defense League. For now, don’t make her an enemy.”

Beckoning, he said, “Manager, please come over.”

The manager bustled over. “Exalted customers,” he said apologetically, “please, don’t take offense, I apologize for this….”

Yang Qi waved his hand dismissively. “It’s nothing. Paying for what you consume is heaven’s law and earth’s principle. Here, take this magical treasure, which was forged by a Godmyth expert. It should cover the cost of our visit, plus any Dao Defense League disciples who skipped out on their bills recently.”

The manager accepted the magical treasure, which resembled a sextant but was covered with magical symbols engraved with primeval vital quintessence. It also pulsed with an aura of virtual godhood that caused projections of sextants to fill the air around it. It was not only a powerful defensive treasure, but was also ridiculously valuable.

The manager bobbed his head as he offered thanks over and over again.

Upon seeing Yang Qi meekly hand over such an expensive magical treasure, the young woman in green laughed coldly and said, “You’re smart. If you hadn’t done that, you would have found yourself in real trouble.”

“Let’s go!” Yang Qi said. Worried that his followers would cause a scene, he turned and began herding them out. Of course, they weren’t very pleased at all with how things had played out, but Yang Qi had established his authority to such an extent that they wouldn't disobey his orders.

Upon leaving the teahouse, the group felt so much pent up frustration that they really wanted to vent.

“Boss, why did you act so patient in there?” the burly disciple asked. “Considering how strong you are, and the fact that we were there to back you up with a spell formation, there was no need to eat crow. It’s hard to accept that we just have to back down without putting up a fight.”

“That girl is crafty,” Yang Qi said, “and I like to know what I'm getting into before laying a trap. You see, I locked a tracking device onto her that I originally got from one of the Incarnated Gods in my clan. She’s only a first division Seer God, so she might think she can push us around, but she definitely won’t notice that I’m tracking her movements. Before long, I’ll get information from the device telling me exactly who, and where, she is. Then I’ll let you vent your frustration.”

“That’s why you’re the boss. Awesome!”

“You’re vicious, Boss!”

“Boss, once you become a Godmyth, there won’t be any limits to what you can do.” The Nine Yangs God Sect disciples were virtually cheering with admiration for Yang Qi.

He could secretly track a Godmyth, which was something that these Demolisher disciples couldn’t imagine being able to do.

POP!

Even as they murmured amongst themselves, discussing how to get their revenge, an intense rumbling sound filled the area. Heart thumping, Yang Qi looked off and saw what looked like an endless power tempest rolling in their direction, destroying everything in their path.

“Something big is happening!” Yang Qi’s initial thought was that it must be the very event he had predicted: the future world was trying to break open a path to freedom, allowing the future warriors free reign to wreak havoc throughout the universe.

If the future warriors scattered and became like elusive bandits, it would be very difficult for the Dao Defense League to deal with them.

After the initial eruption of power, a host of shadowy figures appeared, which was none other than billions of trillions of future warriors charging forth into battle. Yang Qi had never seen such a spectacular sight.

All of a sudden, a booming voice echoed out from the center of the Dao Defense League and reached the deepest corners of the universe.

“All disciples of the Dao Defense League, prepare for action. The villains from the future world have broken through our blockade and are about to scatter among the immortal worlds. If we want to maintain order, we have to kill them. Any disciple who kills a future warrior will be gifted with a magical treasure, as well as a promotion. And you can keep any loot you find.”

“Alright!” Yang Qi said, delighted. “It’s time to earn some service credit!”

Already, a group of a few hundred future warriors was heading in their direction.

However, before he could take action, he saw a green blur shooting forward, heading directly toward the advancing enemy. It was the girl in green who they had just met.

Even as she flew out, she waved her hand and sent out an emerald-green net that swept out and covered Yang Qi and his men, completely immobilizing them.

Chapter 702: Girl in Green

The disciples from the Nine Yangs God Sect were bursting with rage at the sight of this girl and her green net. In fact, the burly disciple slashed his axes out in an attack, yet the canopy wasn’t harmed at all. It didn’t even ripple.

“Dammit! That girl in green really is way stronger than us!”

“You tyrannical bullies think you have what it takes to fight these future warriors better than me?” the girl said to them via projection. “You keep your tails between your legs in there. And maybe next time don’t be so arrogant! My Green Smoke Miasma is a deadly poison, and anyone who tries to attack me through it will be infected, and their energy arts will immediately waste away. So go ahead and attack me, if you’re stupid!”

Even as the burly disciple pulled his axes back from his attack moments ago, they began emanating green smoke.

The burly man inadvertently inhaled some of the smoke and began turning green himself. His true energy suddenly stopped circulating and pain filled him, prompting an agonized shriek.

“Agghhh!”

Face completely expressionless, Yang Qi exhaled some flame, which burned all of the smoke away then turned into a tiny dragon, which bored into the burly man and excised the miasma.

Then he said one casual phrase.

“Be broken!”

The Green Smoke Miasma exploded into flame and burned into nothing. At the same time, a dragon shot out of Yang Qi, passing the girl in green with its mouth agape.

Then it quickly formed an enormous formation filled with writhing true dragons and dragon columns that rose high into the air. In the blink of an eye, the future warriors were completely surrounded.

Then there was a flash of light, and the warriors disappeared.

There had been at least two Godmyth experts among them, yet they didn’t even have a chance to defend themselves before the dragon formation crushed them and they were dragged into the Cruiser of Civilization.

Obviously, they weren’t crack forces from the future. But if they had escaped to roam amongst the immortal worlds, they would have been dangerous bandits.

After all, they had mechas that could absorb power from the universe around them, which meant that they would never weaken. Furthermore, at this stage in the conflict it was known that they had the power to create morphlings, an army of which could devour immortal world essence and grow in number. Because of that, future warriors would be a terrifying force wherever they went.

It took a long moment for the girl in green to react to Yang Qi destroying her treasure, then defeating and capturing the future warriors. When she did recover, she was incensed and her face turned icy cold.

“You! How dare you damage my Green Smoke Miasma! And you also lost me my chance to capture those future warriors! Dammit!” Suddenly, she flicked her finger, sending out over ten thousand streams of deadly sword light in what was obviously a trump card attack. “Ten Thousand Swords Combine. Ten Thousand Sword Torrent!”

Deng! Dong! Ding!

A host of bucklers appeared around Yang Qi, which were apparently magical treasures that made it unnecessary for him to use his own power to defend himself. Despite the severity of the attack being unleashed by this girl in green, Yang Qi was defending himself with magical treasures, just like a hedonistic silkpants would. He really did seem like an important member of an aristocratic clan, the kind who had been blessed with numerous magical treasures by his elders.

This girl was a Godmyth, and Yang Qi was only a Demolisher. Normally speaking, they should have been beyond compare with each other. But now Yang Qi had the advantage; how could this girl possibly just accept that?

After the sword energy had slammed harmlessly into his defenses, Yang Qi said, “Miss, you demanded we hand over our money back in that teahouse, and I decided not to complain about that. You also said some sarcastic things, but I didn’t bicker with you. But then, in the face of an attack by future warriors, you tried to trap us with your magical treasure. We didn't do anything to offend you, but you insulted us and even tried to hurt us? If it weren’t for the fact that I know what I'm doing, we might have been killed!”

Up to this point, he had still not yet unleashed an attack.

Retracting her sword energy, the girl in green snorted coldly and looked over at Yang Qi. “You’re from the Dragonfolk, that much I can tell from the draconic true energy in all those magical treasures you have. Since you’re from the Dragonfolk, I'm not going to hold you accountable for destroying my Green Smoke Miasma. But you need to hand over those future warriors right this instant. Do it, and I’ll forgive you and let you screw the hell off.”

“Sorry, I need those future warriors. Besides, there are plenty more out there to be had. Instead of wasting time talking, why don’t you just go catch some more?” With that, Yang Qi turned to leave.

“Where are you going? Go ahead, I dare you to take another step. You might think you're special because you’re from the Nine Yangs God Sect and have the blood of the Dragonfolk. But what are you going to do if I choose to take you captive? I happen to cultivate a type of medicine that needs Dragonfolk blood. You would make the perfect sacrifice for it.”

“Oh?” Yang Qi was really starting to get annoyed with this stubborn, unreasonable young woman. She was the type who would kill first and never ask questions. Yang Qi wondered how any parent could raise a person with a personality like this.

“If that’s how you want to do things, Miss, then how about we exchange a few moves? You’re a Godmyth, and I'm just a Demolisher. That’s a big difference, but don’t think it means you can push me around.”

With that, Yang Qi prepared to make a move.

However, that was when several whistling sounds echoed out and three powerful auras weighed down on the scene. Three patriarchs appeared, all of them young, with Incarnated God cultivation bases. Almost immediately, Yang Qi’s dozens of men from the Nine Yangs God Sect realized that this was a force they couldn’t deal with, causing fear to play out on their faces.

“Young Lady Green Blaze, it’s you!” the patriarchs said. They had been summoned by her earlier, and now that they were in her presence they treated her with the utmost respect. Obviously, she was an important person.

“My god!” said one of the disciples from the Nine Yangs God Sect. “They’re all Incarnated God patriarchs! That makes them prime elders in the Dao Defense League! Why are they acting so respectful to that girl in green?”

All of the disciples were visibly fearful, even the burly man with the axes, whose knees were now trembling.

“Well, you certainly took your time, didn’t you?” Young Lady Green Blaze said, completely ignoring Yang Qi. “Where’s my brother? The clan elders sent me here to find out what’s going on. Have there been any developments with the Mechfolk?”

“The young master is fine,” another patriarch said. “He’s with Young Master Leaf, and they all joined the Dao Defense League. They founded something called the Immortal-Slayer’s Sect that has already absorbed plenty of immortal worlds and become a very formidable force. Young Lady, you arrived just in time. It’s not safe out here. The future world broke free of the blockade and their warriors are running rampant. It would be horrible if you got hurt, so please, come with us to the Immortal-Slayer’s Sect.”

“Well, of course I want to go see my brother, and Young Master Leaf as well.” Eyes flashing, she turned back to look at Yang Qi. Chuckling coldly, she said, “Kill these people for me!”

The three Incarnated God patriarchs looked over and saw Yang Qi with his followers from the Nine Yangs God Sect.

“But they’re from the Dao Defense League, Young Lady. There’s no need to be rash. You people, apologize immediately. On your knees!”

“Hmph! This is the younger sister of Young Master Green, one of the seventy-two patriarchs of the Immortal-Slayer’s Sect. If you offend them, not even the Nine Yangs God Sect will be able to protect you.”

“Young Lady, they’re from the Dao Defense League, so we probably shouldn’t kill them. Just cripple their true energy and extract their quintessence vitality. Make them commoners, then hand them back over to the Nine Yangs God Sect.”

“There’s no need for that, just kill them!” Young Lady Green Blaze said. Then she pointed at Yang Qi. “Except for him. I want him alive. He has some treasures from the Dragonfolk that I can use. He’ll pay for destroying my Green Smoke Miasma! He went so far as to challenge me to a fight. Look! Look at how arrogant he is, just standing there. I'm going to make sure he lives a life worse than death!”

Yang Qi’s expression flickered slightly.

This Young Lady Green Blaze was apparently subservient to Young Master Leaf, and was the younger sister of some Young Master Green, who was one of the seventy-two brethren. They represented unimaginable strength and power, and within the Dao Defense League their Immortal-Slayer’s Sect was particularly domineering. Not even the Nine Yangs God Sect could do anything about them. And right now, Yang Qi was essentially a nobody from the Nine Yangs God Sect.

“Let’s go!” Yang Qi said. Making a snap decision, he swept up all his comrades from the Nine Yangs God Sect and made a break for it. “If you want to kill me, Young Lady Green Blaze, you’ll have to catch me first!”

“After him!” Green Blaze shouted. “Don’t let him escape!” Sending a projection to Yang Qi himself, she said, “If you flee, I’ll just go to the Nine Yangs God Sect and start slaughtering people!”

Yang Qi replied with a projection of hearty laughter. “If you, a young lady and three Incarnated God patriarchs, can’t catch me and these disciples, then would you really have the face to go to the Nine Yangs God Sect? What if word got out? You would lose so much face you wouldn’t have any left!”

“Damnation!” Young Lady Green Blaze blurted, aware that Yang Qi was right. If quarry such as this escaped, they could never have the face to go cause problems in the Nine Yangs God Sect. Yet she was convinced that she would be able to catch them. After all, they were nothing more than Demolishers.

“How dare you insult us! Death would be too good for someone as worthless as you. You think a couple of magical treasures will be enough to escape from us? Many Heavens Acceleration Magic; Path of Godly Flight!”

The three patriarchs and Young Lady Green Blaze unleashed a consummate move that first surrounded them with clouds and lightning, then propelled them forward in a blur.

The chase was on, yet Yang Qi maintained the lead. Not even their secret magic enabled them to catch up. Eventually, Young Lady Green Blaze devolved into a smoldering rage.

“Who would have guessed that this punk would have a magical treasure that would make him so fast?” one of the Incarnated Gods said. “The difference between ninth stage Dao-Demolishers and people like me is the same as the difference between ants and dragons. He must have a really powerful magical treasure, probably a god item.”

“Let’s see how far he can go before his true energy runs out!”

Chapter 703: Counter Attack

“Boss, can we really get away? Those are Godmyths back there! And three of them are Incarnated Gods and prime elders. Lowly disciples like us can’t even compare to them!”

All of the disciples from the Nine Yangs God Sect were trembling in fear.

It seemed obvious to them that if these pursuers caught up, they would end up dead and buried. It was true that they were all members of the Dao Defense League, but if prime elders wanted to kill ordinary disciples, that was their prerogative. They wouldn’t even need to hold a trial. It was a very tense situation. After all, the future warriors were breaking free from the blockade and causing problems, and it would be easy to blame them for the deaths.

“Calm down, all of you. These people aren’t a match for me. Did you really think that I, Dragon Proudheaven, would be so easy to push around?” As Yang Qi fled, he was finalizing his plan for what to do next.

If he wanted to, he could simply use the Cruiser of Civilization to flee.

In fact, considering he was a Dao-Demolisher now, his fateless dao fruit had pushed his energy arts to higher levels, including his Angel Wings. The mere flap of those wings would be a devastating attack that would likely kill his pursuers.

Thus, he flew along, making sure that he kept enough distance between them to make the chase seem real, but at the same time give his enemies the hope of catching up. He also put on a front of running low on true energy, making sure that they stayed focused on the chase as he led them to some unknown location within the universe.

The chase went on for three days and nights.

Eventually, Yang Qi stopped in front of a certain spatial tempest.

“Hurry!” Young Lady Green Blaze cried out in delight. “His true energy is running out. Surround him! So, you’re finally out of steam, huh, you little punk. I never would have guessed that your magical treasure would be this strong. Whatever god item it is, hand it over and you’ll save yourself a lot of pain.”

The three Incarnated God patriarchs slowly spread out, vicious smiles on their faces as they set up a huge spell formation around Yang Qi and his fellows.

“Listen up, Dragonfolk brat,” one of them said. “Hand over your magical treasures and maybe we’ll spare you!”

Laughing madly, the three patriarchs began advancing on Yang Qi.

“Aren’t you people worried our Nine Yangs God Sect will get revenge for this?” one of the disciples shouted. “Our sectlord is a ninth division Chaos God! He’s about to reach the Deathless Throne. There’s no way your Young Master Leaf is a match for him. You’re going to murder us, just like this? Don’t you care at all about the rules?”

Green Blaze laughed loudly. “Rules? People make the rules. And right here and now, that means us. It’s time to die, scum. The Nine Yangs God Sect won’t care at all about your deaths. We’ll just say you were killed fighting future warriors. Right, patriarchs?”

“Exactly,” replied one of the patriarchs. “Why would we ever chase some useless Demolisher brats? It was obviously the future warriors who killed them.” Laughing maniacally, he said, “Hey brat, where did you think you were going to run to? Want to try again? How about I break your legs first, then we’ll see how far you can get!”

“Are you people really that sure you can beat me?” Yang Qi said with an enigmatic smile. “Actually, what you said just now couldn’t be more correct. Any deaths here can just be blamed on future warriors. And I doubt anyone will mourn your passing. Besides, who would ever suspect me of killing you people? If I'd wanted to escape from you, I could have done it from the beginning.”

As the last words left his mouth, Yang Qi suddenly began growing physically larger and his aura rumbled out, causing everything to tremble violently.

RUMBLE!

It was like myriads of devils and myriads of gods had all descended into the world of men at the same time. The huge spell formation collapsed as a kingdom of gods spread out, filling an area larger than hundreds of immortal worlds. It was really a shocking development.

“What’s this?!” Young Lady Green Blaze blurted. She and the three Incarnated Gods backed up, looking at Yang Qi with dazed expressions as they wondered if perhaps they were dreaming.

“No, this is an illusion!” one of the young patriarchs said. “Don’t be fooled! He’s obviously just a Dao-Demolisher. He’s a nobody! This is preposterous! He’s using a magical item to try to confuse our minds!”

With that, he unleashed a palm attack on Yang Qi. “Preheaven Adjudication Grand Palm Strike!”

Yang Qi merely looked on coldly and said, “Quite the reckless one, aren't we? Fine. Die!”

Not even moving a muscle, he unleashed the Glad Tidings of the Lord. Instantly, the Wheel of Fate appeared above his head, rotating slowly as something like the will of heaven descended from above.

“Aaaiiiieee!”

The Incarnated God’s true energy vanished and he began withering, then slowly crumpled up into a ball of twitching gore. His head was left behind, but that took only a moment to melt away. Soon, he was nothing but a sphere of vital energy that Yang Qi grabbed and set ablaze. A moment later, he had the śarīra of an Incarnated God, crystalline and translucent.

An Incarnated God and prime elder had just died. And Yang Qi hadn’t even unleashed an attack! Just like that, he became a śarīra. No one present even had any idea how he died, and could do little more than stare wide-eyed. Even the disciples from the Nine Yangs God Sect were staring at him with jaws slack from astonishment.

“Just what exactly is going on here?” Young Lady Green Blaze said, backing up a bit. All of a sudden, she didn’t feel very confident at all in carrying out an attack. “You didn't even do anything, but he’s dead?”

Ignoring Young Lady Green Blaze, Yang Qi turned to the disciples from the Nine Yangs God Sect and said, “There’s no reason to be afraid. The truth is that I'm a consummate expert who has been hiding out in the Nine Yangs God Sect. Don’t worry, I'm not out to hurt you people. My main interest is opposing the Immortal-Slayer’s Sect. Stick with me, and you’ll receive benefits without end.”

Trembling, the burly disciple looked at Yang Qi and said, “Boss, are you really some consummate expert?”

“That’s right. Watch.”

He knew that he had just implanted these disciples with immense confidence in himself, to the point where they viewed him almost like a god from heaven. Henceforth, they would be his main foundation in the Nine Yangs God Sect.

“You’re quite the unlucky one, Young Lady Green Blaze,” Yang Qi said, looking quite sorrowful. “You might be in the position to bully other people, but you went and picked me to provoke. Ai! Was it really worth the trouble? Now that you know my secret, I'm afraid I can’t afford to let you live.”

“How dare you!” Young Lady Green Blaze growled. “I'm Young Master Green’s little sister, and he's one of the seventy-two brethren who founded the Immortal-Slayer’s Sect! There’s no way they’ll let you off the hook!”

“That’s right, brat,” one of the surviving patriarchs said, hoping to frighten Yang Qi. “Don’t you know how powerful the Immortal-Slayer’s Sect is?”

“Immortal-Slayer’s Sect? That crappy sect founded by Young Master Leaf? He and I have been at each other's throats for a while now. He wants to get my legacy medallions, and I want to get his. Sadly for him, I’ve actually been playing him this whole time. I have his every move and action under my control, and sooner or later I'm going to kill him. Now you’re trying to threaten me with his name? That just goes to show how foolish you are.”

Yang Qi was done being polite.

He extended his hand, within which were three legacy medallions that pulsed with the aura of King Immortal-Slayer. Upon seeing them, Green Blaze’s jaw dropped. Then a moment passed and she said, “So, it's you! You’re the guy that Young Master Leaf has been searching for. You’ve been in hiding as a lowly disciple in the Nine Yangs God Sect. But why?”

“Young Lady, please, enough with this chatter,” one of the Incarnated Gods said. He chuckled. “He’s already decided to kill us, otherwise he wouldn't reveal secrets like this. It seems catastrophe is unavoidable here.”

Young Lady Green Blaze’s face turned ashen as she realized what it meant that Yang Qi had shown them King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions. Obviously, he wouldn't let them go now, otherwise they could spread word about his secrets.

Suddenly calming down, she said, “What exactly do you want, anyway? My Green Clan is an aristocratic clan from the Tusita Heaven. If you just let us go, I’ll give you anything you ask for. And I’ll swear an oath to never reveal anything from today. I’ll even be a mole for you! If you want to get close to Young Master Leaf, I could be your best asset! What do you think? I’ll devote myself to you!”

Yang Qi was frankly surprised at how quickly she collected herself and made a decision. She might be crafty, but she also knew how to make snap decisions when necessary. Besides, her offer was a valid one. He could definitely use a pawn on Young Master Leaf’s side. Who knew what benefits that would lead to?

“Alright, fine. Since you put it that way, I won’t kill you. Open your souls and give your faith to me. Allow me access to your thoughts and believe in me like you would a god. Once you get back to the Immortal-Slayer’s Sect, do whatever I say, and send me useful information.” He clasped his hands behind his back. “If you do, I’ll spare your lives. Very well, begin.”

“Alright! I acknowledge allegiance!” Young Lady Green Blaze replied quickly. “As long as you don't kill me, I’ll do anything. I made a big mistake here, and I have to pay the price. I understand that principle.”

“Excellent. A wise man submits to the circumstances. Or should I say woman?” Yang Qi sent some sagelight into Young Lady Green Blaze’s head, which she initially instinctively resisted. But then she relaxed and allowed Yang Qi’s thoughts to fill her.

She was now completely bare before him and devoted to him in her very soul, as faithful as a slave.

Chapter 704: Morphblight

Yang Qi unleashed godly might, cutting down a Godmyth and forcing Young Lady Green Blaze to acknowledge allegiance. He then forced his faith into the souls of the other two Godmyths. In the past he had used a similar technique using devil seeds, but this was something far superior. And it was such a subtle thing that no casual observer would ever realize what had happened to them.

Eventually, the light of faith faded away. Now that Young Lady Green Blaze had been subjugated, she became much more docile. Flopping onto her knees, she said, “Oh exalted lord, your slave servant offers greetings!”

“Excellent!” Yang Qi said, nodding. “You may leave now. If you have anything to report, do so via your soul. And avoid meeting personally with Young Master Leaf as best as possible. He’s mysterious and unpredictable, and if he realized what happened to you and these two Godmyths it could turn bad very quickly. Be very careful. Understand?”

“Yes, Milord!”

The three of them all kowtowed, then rose to their feet and flew away.

Eyes glittering, Yang Qi looked at the group from the Nine Yangs God Sect.

Thump!

They all dropped to their knees and looked at him for a long moment, then the burly man said, “Boss, we never would have guessed that you’re some consummate, invincible expert. Henceforth, we follow orders from you, not the Nine Yangs God Sect or the Dao Defense League. We’ll serve you faithfully and follow your orders to the death!”

“That’s right,” the other disciples shouted. “To the death! To the death!”

“Stick with me and I’ll reward you well,” Yang Qi said. “Take the corpses of the several hundred future warriors I just defeated. There are three Godmyths among them. Hand them in for service credit rewards, and your positions within the sect and the Dao Defense League will rise to new heights.”

Yang Qi waved his sleeve and a host of corpses and mechas tumbled out.

“Right now, your nascent divinities and daoist techniques are too weak. If you get hit hard enough, your immortal bodies will explode and you’ll never form them again. I'm going to improve your life force, genes, and instincts, pushing your fighting ability to a new level. Take this genetic serum!”

A host of bottles flew into the hands of his followers.

As they drank the contents, their genes transformed, causing their energy to grow stronger and making them pulse with the aura of primeval devil-gods and primal-chaos beasts. Their fleshly bodies had completely changed, giving them raw power that could shatter space and detonate magical laws.

As they felt the new power coursing through them, they let out whoops of delight. That was especially true of the bare-chested burly man, who threw his head back and roared at the top of his lungs. “Power! This is power! My fleshly body is strong enough that I could fight a Godmyth!”

“Yes. If the sect elders ask how you got stronger, just say that you ambushed some future warriors and took their medicinal brew, which you used to improve your fleshly body and transform your genes. When the Nine Yangs God Sect hears that, they’ll definitely groom you for leadership positions.”

With that, Yang Qi waved his sleeve, gathering up his followers and moving as fast as a lightning bolt toward the main headquarters of the Dao Defense League.

Out in front of the headquarters were mountains of corpses and seas of blood. Buildings and structures lay in ruins, bodies floated through space, and enormous stretches of gore could be seen everywhere. Shattered bones drifted here and there, and unbonded magical treasures flew chaotically about.

Also on the seemingly endless battlefield were hordes of immortals and locust-like swarms of future warriors, locked in fierce combat.

The future warriors were bizarre; although they had the auras of Future Ones, those powers would dissipate in almost the same moment they died, making it virtually impossible for the immortals to take their powers.

They had to be captured alive and have their power extracted by force.

As soon as Yang Qi noticed this, he looked closer and realized that the Future power had been altered to contain an element of self-detonation. As soon as a Future One called on that power, they would disappear into a destructive mushroom cloud strong enough to wipe out an immortal world.

Even worse, the resulting explosion would send their flesh and blood scattering out in all directions, and if it touched any immortals it would stick to them and burrow inside them. Afterwards, strange things would happen to them; they would grow spikes, become more muscular, gain scales, and transform into entities that resembled wild beasts.

It was extremely terrifying.

Thanks to his knowledge of the future, Yang Qi knew exactly what he was looking at.

‘Morphlings!’

In the future, scientific research led to the creation of a poisonous serum that would be released upon the violent death of a future warrior. It could pierce through space to find the nearest and strongest living being, infect them, then turn them into a morphling. That morphling would then go on a destructive rampage.

It was an extremely dangerous weapon in the arsenal of the future warriors.

Off in the distance, a group of immortals had a single future warrior surrounded and on his last legs. In the moment before he fell, he violently exploded.

Blood splattered in all directions, landing on all of the immortals, suddenly transforming them into morphlings. In fact, the blood moved so far and so fast that it pierced through Yang Qi’s true energy defenses and landed on his skin. It instantly caused his skin to ripple and distort as something like a fungus began to spread out over him.

Not even a bit worried, Yang Qi sent out some fire to burn the poison away, leaving behind a small bit that he took into the Cruiser of Civilization for study and analysis.

‘Excellent. The Cruiser of Civilization has science and technology like this, but the future world’s version is even better.’

[Beep-beep-beep. Beep-beep-beep.] The photonic computers blazed to life, and a moment later began speaking. [Future science and technology. Data acquired. Analyzing. Improving.]

‘The more science and technology I can get,’ Yang Qi thought, ‘the better my fragment of the Cruiser of Civilization will become. I wonder what benefit this bit will provide.’

ROOOOAAAR!

Meanwhile, the newly transformed morphlings all rushed aggressively toward Yang Qi.

In response, he waved his hand, sending out a stream of vital energy filled with magical laws toward them. Instantly, the half-human, half-beast entities were locked in place and incapable of movement.

“Allow me to extract the contaminated poison and cure you!” A stream of godlight shot out and entered the morphlings, slowly extracting the contaminated blood, which he then melted into nothing.

Their transformation had been something like a disease which, upon being cured, returned them to their previous form. All of them looked stunned and could do little more than exchange speechless glances. After a long moment, they focused on Yang Qi.

“You cured us?” one of them asked. “You can actually neutralize the contaminated blood?”

“At first I thought we were hallucinating! The morphblight from the future world directly infects your genes and transforms your true form. It’s a variation on the vital energy of heaven and earth and can even affect you if you inhale it. It’s so strong that there’s no cure.”

“You saved our lives!”

“So there is a way to save people who’ve become morphlings.”

“I wonder how many people it could bring back.”

All of the immortals realized that they had been given a new lease on life by this enigmatic and mysterious person.

“Ladies and gentlemen, I'm Dragon Proudheaven from the Dragonfolk, a member of the Nine Yangs God Sect and the Dao Defense League. I did save you just now, but it wasn’t because of my own power. One of the elders of the Dragonfolk, a Chaos God who has almost reached the Deathless Throne, deduced ahead of time that the future world would invade and knew that they would bring this morphblight. The morphblight virus is incredibly strong, far beyond any ordinary devilblight. It can thoroughly vanquish the dao of immortals.”

Of course, Yang Qi made up the story about a Chaos God from the Dragonfolk in the hopes that it would squash any suspicions. “Later, that elder happened to acquire some relics from the ancient mechanical civilization. Studying them helped him come up with some ways to deal with the future world, one of which is a cure for morphblight. If you have any friends or family who were infected by the virus, send them to the Nine Yangs God Sect. I’ll give the rest of the antidote I have to the elders there, and they can use it to save as many people as possible!

“Now, I have other matters to attend to, so I’ll take my leave. Remember—I'm Dragon Proudheaven from the Nine Yangs God Sect!”

Swish!

Leaving the deadly battlefield behind him, he entered the main headquarters.

Obviously, he had a plan.

Considering that he had a way to cure the morphblight virus, it was impossible to say how many top experts would want to be his ally now. One thing was for sure: all he had to do was sit and wait in the Nine Yangs God Sect and benefits would start rolling in.

Not long after he returned to the Nine Yangs God Sect, one of the Godmyth elders rushed over urgently and said, “Dragon Proudheaven, you’re finally back! The situation outside right now is critical. The future world broke through our blockade and is finally starting to fight back. The fighting is fierce! If you have nothing else important to do right now, do you mind joining a meeting with the other elders to try to decide what to do?”

“That’s fine. Certain elders among the Dragonfolk gave me magical treasures that should be of help. Also, the disciples I led out earlier ended up killing a bunch of future warriors. Their corpses are intact, and they have mechas as well. That should earn them a big reward from the Dao Defense League, right?” He waved his hand and the several dozen disciples flew out and handed over the corpses and the mechas.

“What? You took out so many future warriors!? And their corpses are whole? These warriors are very dangerous, and they’re infected with a deadly virus. If they explode, they’ll turn anyone nearby into morphlings and there’s no cure!” The elder immediately took a few steps back, a look of terror overtaking his face.

Chapter 705: God-Doctor

The morphblight virus had caused true fear to fill the hearts of the immortals.

It was highly contagious and would change one’s genetic structure, turning them into something beastly. Furthermore, the effects were said to be as irreversible as the transformation of a caterpillar into a butterfly.

Once someone was infected and turned into a morphling, they were essentially doomed to die. Even low-level Godmyths were defenseless against it. Only those in the fifth division or higher could block it, and even then the slightest mistake could lead to infection. At that point, some could manage to expel it, but would sustain severe damage to their vital energy in the process.

Worse, the future world had recently developed a special version of morphblight to use on higher-level cultivators.

“Elder, don't worry,” said the burly disciple. “Our boss here can actually reverse the effects of morphblight! He can save immortals who have been turned into morphlings! It’s something he learned from a Chaos God of the Dragonfolk. This is going to be a blessing for the Nine Yangs God Sect! As the war drags on, it's impossible to say how many experts will come here for treatment!”

The elder’s eyes went wide. “What? Y-y-you… you can save people from morphblight? How is that even possible?”

But then he thought about how mysterious and unpredictable the Dragonfolk were, and how powerful a Chaos God would be. After a moment, he realized it wasn’t beyond the realm of possibility.

“This is big! Men, lock down this hall and make sure no one comes in. I'm going to report this matter to the patriarchs. This is a great opportunity for the Nine Yangs God Sect!”

This Godmyth elder was no fool, and had instantly realized how much the sect could profit. Not only would they be able to provide a huge service to the alliance, they would also gain an incredible boost in reputation.

He quickly lit a stick of incense and closed his eyes to issue prayers.

RUMBLE!

A moment later, an immense aura filled the entire hall and Yang Qi caught sight of an elder who was clearly a fourth division Shattered God.

Right now, Yang Qi was strong enough to defeat a person like this with his own power. And if he used the Cruiser of Civilization, then even a fifth division Nirvanic God would be within the scope of his ability to handle. In fact, it might even be possible for him to take on sixth division Revisionist Gods.

Many of the disciples in the hall recognized this newcomer and immediately dropped to their knees.

“Greetings, Paragon Elder!”

“Paragon Elder Yang Cauldron!”

In the Dao Defense League, first division Godmyths were elders, while those in the second division were grand elders. The third division earned the rank of prime elder, fourth division paragon elders, fifth division prime paragon elders, and sixth division elder kings.

The ranks were divided according to cultivation level and were strictly maintained.

“There’s no need for formalities,” Paragon Elder Yang Cauldron said. “Is what you said true? Is there someone who can cure morphblight? Where is he?”

“It’s him,” the elder said, pointing at Yang Qi. “Imagine what the Nine Yangs God Sect will be able to do now! People will be lining up to get in!”

“It's you? So, boy, you’re from the Dragonfolk? And you just recently joined the Nine Yangs God Sect?” Elder Yang Cauldron’s eyes glittered brightly. “There’s a time and place for jokes, but this isn’t one of them….”

Keeping his cool, Yang Qi replied, “If you don’t believe me, Paragon Elder, I'd be happy to prove my capabilities. There must be some morphlings held captive here in the Nine Yangs God Sect. Why not give me one to save?”

All of a sudden, another booming voice echoed out seemingly from nowhere and another Shattered God appeared, an old man with flowing white hair. “Alright!”

“Greetings, Paragon Elder Yang Rainbow!”

“No need for formalities!” the old man said, walking forward to stand in front of Yang Qi. “My son was infected by the future warriors’ morphblight! He was changed into a morphling, forcing me to keep him locked in a cage. If you can save him, I’ll give you anything! Anything! You would be a benefactor to my entire clan!”

“Please let me see your son, Paragon Elder,” Yang Qi said coolly. Obviously, the best way to surprise the elders and begin his rise to power in the Nine Yangs God Sect was to actually make a demonstration.

Paragon Elder Yang Rainbow waved his hand and an enormous cage appeared, within which was a morphling that was fully three hundred meters tall and covered with scales and keratin spikes. It had bright red eyes and roared constantly, making it obvious that if it escaped its cage, it would kill anyone in its path. Occasionally, drops of blood would fly out of its mouth and corrode the cage around it; it seemed likely that the cage would be eaten through sooner rather than later!

Yang Qi sighed. “This morphblight is particularly strong. So the young sir was also a Godmyth. No wonder no one can save him.”

“What?” Paragon Elder Yang Rainbow shouted. He almost looked like he wanted to rip Yang Qi to shreds right then and there. “Are you saying you can’t save him?”

Yang Qi remained unfazed. “I meant no one else could save him. Of course I know how to.”

Even as the words left his mouth, Yang Qi’s eyes blazed, sending a stream of intense light slamming into the cage. The cage rattled and Paragon Elder Yang Rainbow edged backward, unsure of what exactly Yang Qi was doing.

Cracking sounds echoed out as the cage shattered and the huge morphling emerged, emanating spatial fluctuations filled with the elements of water, fire, light, and darkness.

“Be suppressed!” Yang Qi said, waving his hand.

Instantly, another stream of light wrapped up the morphling and the scales began vanishing. Contaminated blood began to seep out and gather on Yang Qi’s palm. The morphling went quiet, and over the course of the next few moments it shrank down into the shape of a young man, who lay there on the ground with severe vital energy injuries.

“My son!” Paragon Elder Yang Rainbow blurted, rushing forward, wrapping his arms around his son, and sending vital energy into him.

Yang Qi sent flames out to engulf the sphere of blood that had gathered on his palm, burning it into nothing.

“Eight Tribes Dragonfire!” said Paragon Elder Yang Cauldron, his eyes shining. “Such intense and mysterious power. You really do have noble Dragonfolk blood in you. How did you cultivate the Eight Tribes Godfist to such a high level?”

“It’s not my personal power,” Yang Qi said, extinguishing the flame. “It was given to me by an elder in my clan. Afterward, he sent me out into the world for training and experience.”

“Excellent! The fact that you can save people infected with the morphblight virus makes you a god-doctor! Even the brightest of patriarchs can do little to morphblight victims other than kill them and burn away the poison. Actually extracting the poison is as difficult as reeling silk from the cocoon, and can only be done by almighty beings who understand the power of life force and genetics.” Raising his voice to issue orders, Paragon Elder Yang Cauldron said, “Henceforth, Young Sir Dragon Proudheaven is the most honored guest of the Nine Yangs God Sect and will receive the same pay as a paragon elder. Now we need to discuss what price the Nine Yangs God Sect’s god-doctor will charge to heal people.”

All of the elders knew that this was an important matter.

With Yang Qi stationed there as a ‘god-doctor’, experts from countless sects would definitely come asking for treatment. It was almost impossible to predict how much they could earn, or how many good relationships they could form. There was no question that the Nine Yangs God Sect was going to profit handsomely.

Of course, Yang Qi would get his share. The elders and patriarchs of the sect were no morons, and had no intention of trying to take advantage of him.

Perhaps if he had been a loner, they might have considered imprisoning him and forcing him to work for them. But he had firmly established the fact that he was Dragonfolk, and no one would dare to cause problems for them. And no one questioned his story. After all, he was a mere Demolisher, so other than having boundless divine will and an incredible technique given him by a Dragonfolk elder, how else could he accomplish such things?

The Nine Yangs God Sect was strong, but there was no way they could take on the legendary Dragonfolk. Therefore, the elders unanimously agreed to treat him like the most honored of guests, and not do anything to put pressure on him.

RUMBLE!

Even as the various elders continued discussing the matter, an enormous roaring sound erupted outside of the temple, causing everything to tremble violently.

“Who was that? Who would dare to act so atrociously in the Nine Yangs God Sect!?”

The elders were all furious, and Paragon Elder Yang Cauldron waved his hand, sending a stream of light out to open the main doors of the temple hall. Outside in the main square were a group of young people led by a vicious, animalistic young man with sinister eyes. “We heard one of the disciples of the Nine Yangs God Sect can cure morphblight!” he cried out in a piercing voice. “He's coming with us, right now! One of the disciples from our Immortal-Slayer’s Sect contracted morphblight, so if you don’t hurry it up, your ass is fucking mine!”

His loud and piercing voice struck deeply into the hearts of the disciples of the Nine Yangs God Sect.

Of course, Yang Qi’s expression remained calm.

“You're from the Immortal-Slayer’s Sect?” Paragon Elder Yang Cauldron said angrily. “You really defy all laws and principles, even of those of the heavens! How dare you be so ridiculously rude here! Young Sir Dragon Proudheaven is an honored guest of the Nine Yangs God Sect, and yes, he can cure morphblight. But he only performs healings here within our sect. If you have someone for him to treat, bring them here. And you’ll also need to pay the fee, which is no small amount!”

“How impudent!” shouted the young man from the Immortal-Slayer’s Sect. Looking like the picture of arrogance, he said, “We have a lot of infected disciples in the Immortal-Slayer’s Sect. You want us to bring them all here? We have orders directly from Young Master Leaf to bring your healer to our sect. Of course he will be rewarded properly, assuming he really can perform the healings. If not, he won’t be returning.”

“That's right,” said another of the young men, chuckling coldly. “If his healing doesn’t work, then you’ll never see him again. But if he's got any amount of skill, he’ll get a big reward. What gives your Nine Yangs God Sect the right to keep a treasure like this to yourselves!?”

Chapter 706: Conflict

Arrogance. Rampant and unbridled arrogance.

The hubris of the Immortal-Slayer’s Sect was fully on display as they made it clear they wanted to abduct Yang Qi from the Nine Yangs God Sect and take him to their headquarters. It was no invitation, but outright abduction.

The animalistic young man looked over at Yang Qi with shining eyes, and spoke yet again in his booming voice, “Get out here and come with us. We’ll give you incredible glory and incomparable rewards!”

Unbeknownst to anyone present, the young man was actually targeting Yang Qi with some sort of soul enchantment.

Without any warning, Yang Qi snorted coldly, the sound echoing out like a peal of thunder.

Crack!

The vicious young man staggered backward, caught completely by surprise. The enchantment technique he had just used was a secret magic that no one had ever been able to resist when he used it on them.

He was an expert among experts, a Shattered God! Otherwise, why would he have been selected to come kidnap someone from another sect? He had originally assumed that his soul enchantment art would cause the target to simply walk straight into his arms. After all, this ‘Dragon Proudheaven’ was nothing more than a Dao-Demolisher ant. It should have been a simple thing to capture him.

Instead, the moment his soul enchantment technique entered Yang Qi, he felt something like an explosion, then his own soul very nearly collapsed. It felt like his brain had been hit with an enormous sledgehammer, and as he staggered backward he even coughed up a mouthful of blood.

“What’s going on here?” his companions said, clustering around him.

“He has only himself to blame!” Yang Qi said, chuckling coldly. “He used a soul enchantment art to try to force me to join him. I bet he never guessed that a Chaos God elder from the Dragonfolk gave me a special gem that protects my nascent divinity and my mind. Trying to use a soul enchantment on me is just pure masochism!”

Upon hearing Yang Qi’s words, the elders in the temple hall erupted into a fury.

That was especially true of Paragon Elders Yang Cauldron and Yang Rainbow, both of them Shattered Gods who were so angry that blue veins bulged out on their necks and faces.

“This is outrageous insolence! What shame and humiliation! How dare you bully our Nine Yangs God Sect like this, right out in the open. Is this how you ask for help from a doctor? We're going to report this to the Dao Defense League legislative assembly! They’ll definitely levy sanctions on you!”

The vicious young man struggled to his feet, spat out some blood, and said, “Sanctions?! I’d love to see somebody try to enforce sanctions on the Immortal-Slayer’s Sect!”

Apparently, he relied on some sort of medicinal aids in his cultivation, because he recovered immediately and took a step forward, moving with such blinding speed that it was hard to track his movement as he blurred toward Yang Qi.

In response, Paragon Elders Yang Cauldron and Yang Rainbow jumped in his way and unleashed attacks to try to stop him.

“What incredible gall!”

“Evil creature!”

Who could ever have guessed that this young man from the Immortal-Slayer’s Sect would be so domineering and dauntless, and would use outright force to get what he wanted?

“You people think you can stop me? You half-baked eggheads! How dare you stand up to the Immortal-Slayer’s Sect! If you don't get out of my way this instant, the seventy-two patriarchs of my sect will destroy the entire Nine Yangs God Sect down to the chickens and dogs!”

Two enormous arms suddenly appeared behind the young man's back, the hands of which performed a complex incantation gesture.

“Seal of the Monarch. Fist of the Hegemon. Palm of the Celestial. Energy of the Terrestrial!”

A profoundly rare and powerful divine ability was being unleashed!

Wham! Bam!

Yang Cauldron and Yang Rainbow were both sent tumbling violently away.

Both of them were fourth division Shattered Gods, yet this animalistic young man had sent them flying seemingly without effort. The difference between their power levels was obvious. In terms of strength, the two of them just couldn't compare.

It was similar to how not even a trillion low-level immortals working together could possibly match up to Yang Qi.

“This is bad. How dare you!”

“Traitor! How dare you try to kidnap Young Sir Dragon Proudheaven. The Nine Yangs God Sect won’t ever let this go. Your Immortal-Slayer’s Sect will feel our wrath!”

The two paragon elders could tell that Yang Qi was about to be taken away, and they were so furious they nearly suffered internal injuries from the rage. They simply couldn’t believe how much the Immortal-Slayer’s Sect looked down on rules and laws.

They were essentially a scourge to the Dao Defense League as a whole.

“Not willing to accept it? Well what are you going to do about it? Our seventy-two patriarchs are all exalted figures from the Tusita Heaven! Are you going to offend the Tusita Heaven? We can talk about it after I take this healer of yours.”

The vicious young man lunged forward again, sending out a field of energy to cover Yang Qi. “Alright brat, I know you have a lot of treasures. But now you’re going to give them all to me! Don’t worry, I’ll take care of them for you. Going forward, you’re a slave of the Immortal-Slayer’s Sect; you’ll do everything we say, making us rich in the process. Eventually, we’ll ransom you back to the Dragonfolk elders and make even more profit. You’re really quite valuable, aren’t you?”

Laughing maniacally, he spread his fingers out like a huge net.

Yet even as the net descended, Yang Qi suddenly vanished.

Left in his place were eight dragons, all of them howling as if to unleash the rage of the dragon world itself.

RUMBLE!

The raging dragons destroyed the net of five fingers, then slammed into the vicious young man, sending him flying backward, head over heels.

“Impossible! That’s the Eight Tribes Godfist. All eight! How is that even possible? Someone from the dragon world actually cultivated all eight energy arts that make up the Eight Tribes Godfist?! That true energy is incredible!”

As the vicious young man landed on his feet and staggered backward, he watched as his defensive shields were destroyed and the fist strike entered his body. Immediately, his face flickered with incomparable dread. “The eight tribes combined? According to the legends, only the ancestor of all dragons from the legion of gods ever did that!”

Crack! Snap!

The Eight Tribes Godfist raged through him, flinging him onto his back on the ground, where blood oozed out of him in rivers.

The power of dragons pulsed as Yang Qi appeared, the projection of an enormous true dragon swirling in the air behind him. “How repulsive you are, boy! You dare to threaten a child of the Dragonfolk? Who the hell gives a crap about the Tusita Heaven? Our Eight Tribes Heaven will come to settle accounts with you sooner or later. Now screw off!”

The pulsing dragon power on display was so intense that Yang Cauldron and Yang Rainbow prostrated themselves on the ground and didn’t dare even move. ‘It's true! Dragon Proudheaven really is from the Dragonfolk, and he has the backing of some almighty figure! That's the projection of a true dragon! It even has traces of deathless godliness! That aura is so strong!’

“You just wait!” the vicious young man growled. “I'm not going to let you Dragonfolk off the hook. You old codger!” Finally convinced that he couldn’t turn the situation to his favor, he turned and fled in a streak of light.

His companions all burst into motion, following him like a flock of birds scattering into the forest.

The true dragon projection behind Yang Qi faded away.

“Good job!” said Yang Qi’s immortal-slaying clone from his place within the Cruiser of Civilization. He gave a nod of approval to the photonic computer he stood in front of. “Who would have guessed that once the genetic systems were powered up, they could create such a realistic projection of a true dragon? That was such an incredible illusion!”

[Beep-beep-beep.] The photonic computer then began making its report. [With sufficient power expenditure, false images of the Dragonfolk can be created. Seventh division Measureless Gods are possible. Unfortunately, the illusion contains no true fighting prowess.]

“Maybe it was only an illusion, but it was more than enough. Everyone was scared out of their minds. It seems my identity as Young Sir Dragon Proudheaven has been firmly established. I’ll definitely be venerated by the Nine Yangs God Sect now. As long as nothing unexpected happens, I imagine I’ll be visited by someone even more powerful from within the sect. I’ll be given even more authority, which will make it easier to heal even more important experts.”

The photonic computer didn’t respond to his musings, but instead continued with various normal operations.

“Computer, can you tell the ups and downs of being a ninth division Godmyth? I want to know all the details about that level of cultivation, and all the other levels too, in fact. Use this god crystal to power the calculations!” With the addition of the god crystal, the photonic computer was capable of even faster processing speeds.

[Beep-beep-beep. Beep-beep-beep.] Soon, the emotionless voice of the photonic computer rang out again.

[The first division is the Seer God level, in which one can see virtual godpower.]

[The second division is the Tempered God level, in which one tempers the virtual godpower.]

[Third is the Incarnated God level, which involves taking virtual godpower and creating a mental incarnation.]

[Fourth is the Shattered God level, in which you shatter the virtual godpower and enter another state.]

[The fifth division is the Nirvanic God level, which alludes to nirvanic rebirth. After being shattered, the virtual godpower is reborn, leading to an entirely new and mysterious state.]

[Sixth is the Revisionist God level. This involves revising one’s dao and gaining an understanding of the profound correlations between heaven and the gods.]

[Seventh is the Measureless God level. ‘Measureless’ refers to the vast expanse, grand energies, boundless majesty, and that which is primeval. The measureless heaven is great, wild, and ancient. In this level, the virtual godpower becomes the great energy of the vast expanse, like the wilds of primeval times.]

[The eighth division is the Buddha God level. Buddhas are serious, weighty, and profoundly meaningful, the consummate expression of morality. The name of the level implies wisdom without limit.]

[The ninth division is the Chaos God level. The dao of primordial chaos involves being enlightened regarding the dome of heaven. There is no higher aspect of the Godmyth level. Afterward is the Deathless Throne. Of course, to reach that higher level requires much preparation and cannot be achieved casually.]

In addition to the spoken analysis, there were all sorts of images on the screens to provide further detail to Yang Qi.

Already, new enlightenment was brewing in his mind.

“I want an analysis of the Deathless Throne! Show me the power of the legion of gods! Calculate!”

The response from the photonic computer was a bit different this time.

[Sorry. Cannot perform calculations regarding the legion of gods. Power insufficient. Photonic computers incomplete. More fragments of the Cruiser of Civilization are required. More power is required.]

“Find more fragments? Forget that. I can hardly provide enough power for this one piece. What would I do with more of them?” Shaking his head, Yang Qi returned his thoughts to the matters at hand.

Chapter 707: A Big Stir

“Young Sir Dragon Proudheaven, was that really a nascent divinity projection of one of your Dragonfolk elders? It was definitely at the level of an eighth division expert!”

“Yeah, was that really the aura of you Dragonfolk? You’re not from some random immortal world, are you? You’re from the Eight Tribes Heaven!”

“So someone in the Eight Tribes Heaven actually combined the Eight Tribes Godfist? Young Sir Proudheaven, could the power of that fist technique have come from a talisman given to you by one of your elders?”

Things had calmed down, and Yang Cauldron and Yang Rainbow’s impression of Yang Qi had changed dramatically. As Shattered Gods, they normally wouldn’t pay the slightest attention to people who weren’t even Godmyths. But now their change in attitude was clear.

Things had changed in a heaven-shaking, earth-toppling way, and they were convinced that Yang Qi wasn’t exaggerating; he really was backed by immensely powerful forces.

The illusion cast by the Cruiser of Civilization had frightened them deep in their hearts.

At the same time, they were deeply ashamed that they hadn’t managed to keep him safe. If he had been kidnapped, and then Dragonfolk elders came from the Eight Tribes Heaven to ask questions, what would they have done? Would the Nine Yangs God Sect even have survived?

The Eight Tribes Heaven was a thirty-third ranked immortal world just like the Tusita Heaven. In fact, the Eight Tribes Heaven was actually a bit stronger than the Tusita Heaven. After all, their immortal world was inhabited not by humans, but by heaven dragons! Dragons in general were divine creatures second only to the legion of gods.

“You’re right,” Yang Qi said. “The power I unleashed just now came from a talisman given me by an elder in my clan. As for whether or not anyone has cultivated the Eight Tribes Godfist to completion, I don’t really know.” Obviously, Yang Qi gave answers filled with half-truths. There was no way he would reveal any of his own secrets.

“From here on out, we’ll do everything possible to ensure your safety, Young Sir. Don’t worry. Nothing like this will ever happen again. We’ll immediately report the matter to the elder kings and punish the Immortal-Slayer’s Sect for their deeds! Men! Come take Young Sir Dragon Proudheaven into the main hall of our Nine Yangs God Sect. The elder kings will come soon, and we’ll see who dares to cause problems then!”

After the event which had just played out, it was obvious that Yang Qi would begin rapidly rising through the ranks. He had already been invited into the inner parts of the sect where an enormous plane of existence held invincible god items, countless warding magics, and numerous expressions of divine will. If anyone from the Immortal-Slayer’s Sect tried to get into this place, it would be very difficult.

Before long, an old man who had the demeanor of a transcendent being appeared. He introduced himself as Yang Heaven-Bracer, and he was a Revisionist God who was one of the old-timers in the Nine Yangs God Sect, an elder king. He was one of the true leaders of the sect, and he was the one who was formally receiving Yang Qi.

They had a pleasant chat, in which Yang Qi drew heavily upon information about the Dragonfolk that he had acquired from the Cruiser of Civilization. He released some of the aura of the dragons, and the man was soon convinced that Yang Qi really was an elite young one from the Dragonfolk.

After all, the genetic systems of the Cruiser of Civilization were based on the science and technology of the ancient mechanical civilization, and such systems could not have been created without input from the Dragonfolk. Dragonfolk genes were extremely mysterious and very close to the genes of the legion of gods.

After all of the discussions were over, the Nine Yangs God Sect opened a hospital for Yang Qi to treat morphblight victims. Before long, experts were flocking in to get treatment. In some cases, he could transform them back to being immortals. In other cases, the infections were too severe to counteract.

Most of the people who came looking for treatment were powerful and important people. Weaker individuals who ended up infected would usually be killed in combat, not captured and locked up. After all, morphlings were dangerous and had all sorts of abilities and powers. Any who were taken captive, but subsequently escaped, would cause huge problems and rapidly spread infection.

Thus, the victims Yang Qi treated were usually important and could always provide ample payment. The Nine Yangs God Sect also assigned some top disciples to assist Yang Qi. Eventually, he began imbuing energy into medicinal pills and elixirs that could be administered by the disciples, otherwise he would never have been able to keep up with demand. The true aim of the sect was to have the disciples learn some of his secrets. Unfortunately, no one could reproduce the results.

Despite that, the sect still lavished him with all sorts of rewards. Most of them, he secretly sent into the Cruiser of Civilization for his family and friends to use in cultivation or to give out as rewards to his followers.

Several months passed, and Yang Qi was famous in the Dao Defense League. Plus, he was incredibly rich. Everyone knew that the Nine Yangs God Sect was working with a young man from the Dragonfolk, someone named Dragon Proudheaven who could heal morphblight infections.

And of course, more and more people came to seek treatment. They seemed to come without end.

In addition to working in the hospital, Yang Qi worked on his cultivation and tried to keep tabs on Young Master Leaf. Of course, he had a master plan that he was slowly unfolding.

There were obviously people from the Immortal-Slayer’s Sect who ended up being struck with morphblight, who then came to seek treatment. However, Yang Qi refused to treat them unless they left their sect and swore an oath to never have dealings with it again. Thus he slowly ate away at the membership of the Immortal-Slayer’s Sect.

The Immortal-Slayer’s Sect was already champing at the bit to make a move on Yang Qi, but their hands were tied. Yang Qi was locked away deep in the Nine Yangs God Sect, and they couldn’t afford to launch a full scale assault just to get at him.

After all, there were numerous top experts in the interior of the Nine Yangs God Sect.

It was said that Sectlord Nine Yangs was a spectacular Chaos God who understood the dao of primordial chaos. Even in the Tusita Heaven, he would be respected and feared.

Yang Qi was doing his best to draw the snakes out of their holes.

As the war between the Dao Defense League and the future world wore on, it got more intense. The future world was constantly trying to expand its borders, and as they infected more people with morphblight, Yang Qi had more and more business at the hospital. Because of him, the Immortal-Slayer’s Sect was becoming more and more isolated within the alliance.

Everyone knew that stemmed back to how the Immortal-Slayer’s Sect had tried to kidnap him and turn him into a slave. In fact, whenever Yang Qi saw a patient, he would find out if they had anything to do with the Immortal-Slayer’s Sect. If they did, he would refuse to treat them!

Everyone agreed that the Immortal-Slayer’s Sect had been acting far too rude and aggressive. It was really outrageous that they would just show up at some other sect, try to take someone’s treasures, then force them into servitude to earn their own sect profit. No one would be able to tolerate such behavior.

And so Yang Qi was slowly but surely eroding the reputation and majesty of the Immortal-Slayer’s Sect.

**

“Dammit! Failed again!”

POP!

A morphling screamed and exploded into a shower of blood, which was quickly burned away by intense fire. A young patriarch stood by, clad in a green garment, a sinister expression on his face. Next to him stood several other young men, one of whom was the vicious fellow who had tried to kidnap Yang Qi some time back.

Upon seeing that the young patriarch in green had failed to cure the morphling, the vicious young man dropped to his knees and said, “Patriarch Green Merchant, this is all my fault. Because I didn't get my hands on that Dragon Proudheaven, our Immortal-Slayer’s Sect is in a passive position and has sustained serious losses. Not only that, we can’t get healing services from the Nine Yangs God Sect.”

“It's fine,” replied the young patriarch named Green Merchant, who was one of the seventy-two brethren. He emanated a powerful aura that contained the unique constitution of a Berserk One, which meant he had berserk and crazy genes that contained the mysteries of primal-chaos. When he got mad, he would become as crazy as a devil and exterminate everything in sight. Of course, in that state he would have access to tenfold power.

At the moment, his eyes glittered with profound violence. “It doesn’t matter how many disciples get infected with morphblight. Let them die. They don’t deserve to be saved by us. Don’t forget, Young Master Leaf and me, and the rest of the seventy-two brethren, arrived in the Dao Defense League with absolutely nothing. It didn’t take long for us to establish the Immortal-Slayer’s Sect and start growing. So what are we afraid of? That punk Dragon Proudheaven won’t live out the year. He defied the Immortal-Slayer’s Sect, so he deserves to die!”

“Yes, yes of course….” the vicious young man replied. Although he felt cold at heart, he didn't dare to question Patriarch Green Merchant. Instead, he said, “These trashy disciples definitely don’t deserve our attention. But at the same time, we have to be careful about morale. If we can't save our disciples, recruitment is going to drop to nothing.”

“Hmph! Young Master Leaf is completely focused on the boundless technique he’s cultivating. He’s in seclusion and has left the Immortal-Slayer’s Sect in the hands of the rest of us seventy-one brethren. I can’t believe this punk is causing problems like this. He’s not even a Godmyth, yet he's openly challenging us! If we don't get rid of him, we’re going to become a laughingstock.” He suddenly shot to his feet. “If we’re going to kill him, we have to capture him first. Keep him under surveillance. If he comes out into the open, we can easily surround him. Can you think of any way to lure him out? Well? I refuse to believe that he’ll stay in hiding forever. He can’t reach the Godmyth level without coming out to do some training!”

“Right, right. You’re completely correct, Young Master Green. Don’t worry, we already sent people to keep an eye on him. If he comes out, they’ll instantly surround him! The only downside is that he has a talisman given him by some Dragonfolk expert. He’s probably going to be hard to kill. It’ll probably take one of you seventy-two patriarchs to take him down. At the very least, Young Master Green, you’ll need to join in.”

Young Master Green nodded. “I'm aware of how strong he is. Don’t worry. As long as he comes out in the open I’ll step through the void and strike at him like lightning. I’ll definitely kill him. Let’s see if those old fogies from the Dragonfolk can save him if I do that!”

All of a sudden, a disciple rushed in. “Patriarch! I have an urgent report. Some more disciples contracted morphblight, and there’s one who hasn’t completely transformed into a morphling. There's still a chance to save him.”

Several more disciples appeared, carrying one of their comrades, who was only half-transformed into a morphling and still using his energy arts to stave off the final bits of the transformation.

“Scum! You want us to save you? Just die!”

Young Master Green lashed out with his palm, transforming the disciple into ash. The display of savagery caused the other disciples’ hearts to grow cold.

Chapter 708: The Fish Takes the Bait

“Young Sir Dragon, please, save him! He’s our only son! If he dies, we’ll have no offspring! We’ll do anything. Just save him!”

“Yes, you have to save him! If you do, we’ll give all of our treasure to you and the Dragonfolk!”

“Right, right, right! We were exploring a godrelic once, and found several buddha dragon dragonpearls that had taken the shapes of actual buddhas! Kindly accept them, Young Sir Dragon!”

In an enormous hall in the Nine Yangs God Sect, medicinal ingredients and texts were piled up everywhere. An enormous medicine cauldron occupied the middle of the hall, surrounded by a handful of Godmyths who fanned the flames carefully and occasionally added ingredients to the bubbling brew inside.

In the depths of the hall was a huge placard that read: Heaven-Dragon Medicine Hall.

This was the culmination of the healing enterprise that Yang Qi had set up in the Nine Yangs God Sect. Every day, people came here to request healing.

It was a far more grand and elegant place than anywhere in the Titan Emperor Heaven, Sage Monarch Heaven, or Sage Sword Heaven. The Heaven-Dragon Medicine Sect was Yang Qi’s faction within the Nine Yangs God Sect. It was all above-board and officially approved by the sect; they even allowed him to recruit his own disciples. Yang Qi found plenty of reliable applicants, who he took in as novitiates to assess their temperament and personality. All of this was slowly improving the foundation of the Sage Monarch Heaven.

The developments that had occurred in the past year were surprising even to Yang Qi. It was really a case of sticking a willow branch into the mud, only to have it grow into a shade tree.

The Sage Monarch Heaven was advancing far more satisfactorily now that it wasn't stuck in a remote, desolate part of the universe. Thanks to the fact that people came on a daily basis to seek healing from Yang Qi, and would pay just about anything to get it, he was able to send a constant flow of magical treasures, building materials, medicinal pills, daoist texts, magical incantations, and the like down to the Sage Monarch Heaven. Add in the fact that it was also benefiting from the Cruiser of Civilization and it was no exaggeration to say that it was literally improving on a daily basis.

At the moment, Yang Qi was there in the Heaven-Dragon Medicine Hall, consulting two very important people.

They were a middle-aged husband and wife known as the Confucian Cloud Immortals. He looked like a scholar, and she was spectacularly beautiful. Both were fifth division Nirvanic Gods.

They were there to seek aid for their son, who lay still, unmoving, and hardly able to breathe on a cot in front of them. His skin pulsed with dark energy, and was gradually transforming into scales. Once the process was completed, he would be a morphling.

The Confucian Cloud Immortals were from a very important sect called the Sagely Confucian Institute, which in turn was from a twentieth ranked immortal world.

Instead of immediately treating the young man, Yang Qi tapped his finger on the table and said, “I heard that the Sagely Confucian Institute has dealings with the Immortal-Slayer’s Sect.”

“No!” the husband blurted.

“Never!” the wife echoed. “Of course not!” They stared helplessly at Yang Qi. Considering the level of their cultivation bases, and the fact that Yang Qi was a mere Dao-Demolisher, they knew that they could force him to drop to the ground and kowtow to them if they wanted.

But they didn't dare to make a single move. Young Sir Dragon Proudheaven had the full backing of the Dragonfolk elders. In the past, certain experts had tried to kidnap him, only to face the treasures of the Dragonfolk and be instantly knocked unconscious.

Although this Dragon Proudheaven wasn’t a Godmyth, he had a reason to be brash. And there were always countless individuals from the Nine Yangs God Sect watching out for him. As he grew more and more important, it had reached the point where even if people as strong as the Confucian Cloud Immortals tried to do something to him, they would end up dead.

“Everyone in the Immortal-Slayer’s Sect is arrogant and conceited,” the wife said. “Our Sagely Confucian Institute cut ties with them long ago. There used to be some disciples from there that had come to our institute to study, but we expelled them. Furthermore, we swear that if anyone from the Immortal-Slayer’s Sect dares enter our presence in the future, we’ll drive them away!”

“Good. Hopefully you’ll keep your word. I accept your gifts, and will ensure that your son doesn’t turn into a morphling. Incidentally, even if he had become a morphling, and was killed, I could use his blood to resurrect him.” With that, he collected all of the treasures they had brought as payment.

They had provided quite a collection, including sabers, swords, medicinal pills, power stones, jade, and jewels. Most eye-catching of all were three fist-sized dragonpearls.

They were amber in color, and within them flickered the images of swirling dragons chanting buddhist songs. They thrummed with the aura of dragons and a power the likes of which Yang Qi had never seen before.

Obviously, they were śarīras left behind by buddhas.

The strongest of the Dragonfolk were the buddha dragons. They would eventually become buddhas, and after experiencing buddhist death and nirvanic rebirth, they would leave behind śarīras of incredible power as they pierced through to pāramitā, the other shore of the universe.

Buddhist death was another level of existence for high-level experts from the buddhist schools. If they failed to reach the Deathless Throne and join the legion of gods, then all of the power within them would become a śarīra. Their soul, their thoughts, and their memories would vanish into the void of the universe. In the end, they were deemed failures. But even failures could leave behind incredible power.

Yang Qi knew that these three śarīras were priceless, and they went to show how much this couple wanted to save their son. Normally speaking, he would have refused because of the fact that the Sagely Confucian Institute had worked so closely with the Immortal-Slayer’s Sect in the past.

But he needed these three śarīras.

He rose to his feet and waved his hand, sending out a rumbling stream of energy that entered the young man and caused him to float up into the air. Instantly, the effects of the morphblight virus crumbled away, and moments later he looked around with brightly shining eyes.

“I removed all of the virus from the young sir’s body,” Yang Qi said coolly. “I also used the mysterious arts of the Dragonfolk to improve his vital energy. In the future, his cultivation base will advance by leaps and bounds.”

“This… this is wonderful!” the husband said. “Son, let’s go.” With that, the Confucian Cloud Immortals excitedly rose to their feet.

“No!” the young man said. “I want to stay here. I want to take Young Sir Dragon Proudheaven as my Master!” The young man dropped to his knees and began kowtowing. “Young Sir Dragon Proudheaven, please, take me as your apprentice. I want to learn how to cure morphblight and help other people!”

“Son!” the husband said. “Young Sir Dragon Proudheaven is only a Demolisher! How could a Godmyth like yourself take him as a Master?”

“Who cares about that?” the young man said, kowtowing again. “Young Sir Dragon Proudheaven is an extraordinary person. He vastly surpasses me, and if I learn from him I could surely pick up some amazing daoist techniques, and maybe even accept his legacy! If the young sir agrees, I’ll join the Heaven-Dragon Medicine Sect and go through hell and high water for him!”

‘What's this?’ Yang Qi thought, his eyes flickering with suspicion. He didn’t immediately respond. But as he thought about it, he realized that taking this young man as an apprentice would come with many advantages and few, if any, disadvantages. His parents had incredibly profound cultivation bases, and they came from an important organization. Having a good relationship with them would be a big advantage. And although Yang Qi already had some novitiates from important sects, none of them were Godmyths.

Normally, a Godmyth would never be willing to lose face by taking a Demolisher as a Master. In fact, this would be the first time a second division Tempered God had ever done such a thing.

When the young man saw Yang Qi muttering to himself in consideration, he quickly unfurled a scroll painting, which caused dazzling light to shoot out, filled with majestic godpower. Shockingly, it was a treasure map, its surface covered with a depiction of a starry sky, immortal worlds, twisting space-time, and void flows. At first glance, it was impossible to determine what part of the universe it depicted.

“Master, this is my initiation gift. I found this treasure map in an ancient godrelic. It's called the Aeonic God Psalter. Please, Master, take it!”

When other people in the hall saw it, they gasped. There were even some old-timers from the Nine Yangs God Sect who sent their divine will over to inspect it more closely.

“It really is the Aeonic God Psalter!” Yang Qi said. “That thing is incredible!” Yang Qi knew that the Aeonic God Psalter was on par with the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. In ancient times, it had been used to record the location of various holy objects left behind in the universe by the legion of gods. It was split into seven parts, and when they were whole they could be used to find a huge stash of treasure. In fact, it was said that one of those treasures was a legacy that would make it possible to reach the Deathless Throne.

“Fine, I accept your gift of this treasure map. And you are now the first Godmyth apprentice of Dragon Proudheaven.” Yang Qi quickly put the Aeonic God Psalter away under the envious eyes of everyone present.

“Many thanks, Master!” the young man said. “I'm Confucian Daoless, and hereby kowtow in thanks to you!”

“There’s no need,” Yang Qi said. “Rise. From here on out, you’ll study with me here in the Heaven-Dragon Medicine Sect.” The Confucian Cloud Immortals rose to take their leave, whereupon Confucian Daoless said, “Master, allow me to see my parents out. I'm sure they have a few matters to discuss with me.”

“Go ahead,” Yang Qi said, waving his hand dismissively.

A short time later, the Confucian Cloud Immortals and their son were some distance out in the void. At that point, the father said, “Son, where did you get that treasure? And why didn't you tell us about it? Also, where did you get the idea of becoming the apprentice of Dragon Proudheaven? Considering his cultivation base, do you know how much of a loss of face it is for all of us?”

Confucian Daoless snorted. “You think I give a crap about that guy? I have only one Master, and that’s Young Master Leaf. The fish took the bait! Dragon Proudheaven is doomed to die!”

Chapter 709: Aeonic God Psalter

“What? What did you just say, son?”

The Confucian Cloud Immortals were shocked to the core. It was almost as if they didn't know their own son. “That’s your plan? When did you take Young Master Leaf as a Master?”

“Hmph! That’s none of your concern. Let me tell you, I was never in danger from that morphblight infection. Young Master Leaf had it under control, so even if Dragon Proudheaven didn't save me, I would have been fine. Young Master Leaf was in seclusion, seeking enlightenment, but he’s out now. He’s actually been negotiating with the future world, and he’s going to conquer all of the immortal worlds! No matter how strong you are, there’s always someone out there that’s stronger than you. And your Sagely Confucian Institute is just too weak. Eventually, I'm going to kill the supreme rector of the Sagely Confucian Institute, and you two can take over.”

Confucian Daoless threw his head back and laughed maniacally. “Oh Dragon Proudheaven, you’ll soon be kowtowing to me! You’ll beg for your life, and then you’ll beg to die! And I’ll get my Aeonic God Psalter back soon enough. When the time comes, Young Master Leaf will spring his trap and Dragon Proudheaven will be our slave!”

“Son, you really do have some lofty ambitions,” his father said, sounding very impressed. “We always thought you were just an ordinary silkpants. Who would have thought that you had kept your true nature so deeply hidden?”

“It’s all thanks to Young Master Leaf,” Confucian Daoless said. “He really opened my eyes to the world. Now I know that only power and superiority matter in the world. Submit to me and prosper, or oppose me and perish! Go, do your thing in the Sagely Confucian Institute. Keep grooming geniuses for the Immortal-Slayer’s Sect. When Young Master Leaf conquers the immortal worlds, we’ll be important people!”

“Alright! We’ll do everything we can to help you achieve your ambitions, son. That Dragon Proudheaven is a weakling who survives only because of the treasures given to him by his elders. I can’t believe that, with all that, he still isn’t a Godmyth yet. At first it seemed ridiculous for you to take him as Master, but now that we know you’re working for Young Master Leaf, it all makes sense. He’s a genius from the Tusita Heaven, from a very important clan. He also has some of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions, which means that he’ll eventually control the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Compared to him, Dragon Proudheaven is little more than a joke. Young Master Leaf will definitely outsmart him, sooner or later. In fact, if it weren’t for the support of the Nine Yangs God Sect, he would have done so already.”

They exchanged a few more words, then the Confucian Cloud Immortals vanished.

Sighing with relief, Confucian Daoless sank into some spatial tempests, where he remained in hiding, waiting. Before long, a beam of light appeared, within which was Young Master Leaf.

“I salute you, Master!” Confucian Daoless said, a look of crazed fanaticism filling his face. “Master, I did exactly as you ordered and succeeded in becoming an apprentice of Dragon Proudheaven! This is a real humiliation, Master. I can’t believe someone as weak and useless as him is trying to defy you. I’ll definitely find an opportunity to kill him!”

“Good,” Young Master Leaf said. “When heaven is about to confer a great office on a man, it first exercises his mind with suffering! Rise. The humiliation you suffer today will be exchanged with glory and honor tomorrow. Your small show of endurance will pay off in the end. Dragon Proudheaven can cure morphblight and is backed by old-timers from the Dragonfolk. We have to make sure we take him out in one move! If one of those Dragonfolk experts actually showed up to defend him, there’s no way we could kill him. And we don’t know what other Dragonfolk tricks he has up his sleeve. Although most people don't realize it, the Dragonfolk from the Eight Tribes Heaven are extremely adept at schemes and plots. Otherwise, they would never have survived under the pressure of the legion of gods.”

“You’re right, Master,” Confucian Daoless said. “That said, we really have to kill him as quickly as possible. For me to brush shoulders with those other weak subordinates of his is a real humiliation, and I can hardly stand it.”

“You’re not having second thoughts, are you?” Young Master Leaf said. “I know that working with ants like this is a humiliation. But you have sole responsibility for luring Dragon Proudheaven out into the open! He’ll definitely come to you asking for information about the Aeonic God Psalter. For instance, he’ll definitely want to know where you acquired it. When he asks, you can offer to take him there. I’ll be lying in wait with a huge spell formation set up, one that will lead him into certain catastrophe.”

“Yes, Master!” Confucian Daoless said, turning to leave.

“Hold on! Considering how much you’re helping me, you deserve a little reward. Although Dragon Proudheaven cured you of morphblight, I still need to make sure you stay alive. After all, I've been in touch with the future world.”

Young Master Leaf threw his hands wide and space began vibrating. A moment later, a shadowy figure appeared. It was none other than a strange-looking mecha that didn’t seem to belong in this universe. Unexpectedly, it was a future warrior!

Confucian Daoless immediately felt his throat tighten. When it came to the terrifying future warriors, those who followed the dao of immortals would turn pale at the mention of the tiger.

“Greetings, Young Master Leaf, successor of King Immortal-Slayer,” the future warrior, who was clearly an officer of some sort, said. “How goes the matter we discussed? Are you really going to help us dismantle the Dao Defense League? The alliance is strong, and is a major obstacle in our path. Because of it, we are unable to expand into the rest of the universe. But with your help, perhaps we could remove this snag! We’ll reward you well if you do! I, Light Dancer, offer my solemn commitment in that regard.”

“Commitment?” Young Master Leaf said coolly. “Bullshit. I don’t trust commitments. As long as you follow through with my requests, it’s enough. We're still enemies. What’s your name again? Light Dancer? Look, you might be strong, but as far as I'm concerned, you’re middling at best. First, I want some true godhood to reach the Deathless Throne and the level of the legion of gods. Second, I know that you have some of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions in the future world. Do you have one? Two? Or do you have three? In any case, I want them all.”

In response, Light Dancer simply said, “Sorry. True godhood is too expensive to manufacture. Our boundless leader has no way to fulfill that request. As for your second demand, yes, the future world is in possession of one of King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy medallions. Not three. It's currently being researched, but if you help us take out the Dao Defense League you can have it.”

Young Master Leaf laughed raucously. “What kind of an empty promise is that? You’re really not going to provide me with any compensation at all? You want me to work for you for free? Not likely. Well, since you haven’t come to me in good faith you can forget my offer of cooperation. And don't even think of going anywhere, Light Dancer. You’re staying behind as my slave.”

Seeing that Young Master Leaf was about to make a move, Light Dancer said, “Hold on a moment, Young Master Leaf. We really do come in good faith. But we can’t just hand over one of King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy medallions. We know what kind of person you are. Once you get it, you’ll turn on us without hesitation. There obviously can't be any trust between the two of us.”

“Alright, then,” Young Master Leaf growled, “what are you going to give me?”

“We know that you’re at wit’s end thanks to the morphblight virus. And we also know that someone in the Dao Defense League can cure it, except he's an enemy of yours. You want to do something about that, but are unable. First, we’ll give you an antidote to morphblight. Second, we’ll help you deal with that enemy of yours. We have a bit of information about him already. He’s a young elite from the Dragonfolk, backed by one of the Dragonfolk elders.”

This Light Dancer seemed perfectly composed, as if he weren't worried at all that Young Master Leaf might suddenly try to kill him.

Young Master Leaf smiled mysteriously. “Fine. You people from the future world are very impressive. You seem to know exactly how I think. That said, I never come to a negotiation emptyhanded myself. I’ll pitch in something as well.  As soon as I get my enemy out into the open, I’ll notify you and you can take action. You’d better not send any weaklings who screw things up.”

“Don't worry about that. I'm going to call on six of the strongest Warriors of the Great Dance. Myself, Light Dancer. Also, Flame Dancer, Gloom Dancer, Lightning Dancer, and Sand Dancer. And our leader, Void Dancer, will also participate. We’ll kill that brat, and the Dragonfolk elder too, if we have to. Afterward, our leader, Void Dancer, will compare notes with you to settle accounts.”

Light Dancer threw his arms out in front of him, causing a faintly glowing sphere to appear. “This is a photonic computer that contains all sorts of information about the virus. It also contains a spatial dimension with a mecha in it. Anyone who equips that mecha will be as strong as a Shattered God. It will be a good gift to one of your disciples.”

With that, Light Dancer shrank into a streak of light and disappeared.

Young Master Leaf frowned, but then smiled viciously. “Their leader is called Void Dancer? And he's going to ‘compare notes’ with me? When the time comes, all of you are dead! I’ll use the power of your souls to cultivate my profound art from the Tusita Heaven.”

With that, he turned on the photonic computer and sent some divine will into it. Pulling out the mecha, he gave it to Confucian Daoless.

“Assimilate the mecha later,” Young Master Leaf said. “I’ve already revised the magical symbols in it to make it even stronger. And take these power stones I acquired in a god ruin. They’re actually god crystals!”

“Yes sir!” Confucian Daoless said, visibly excited. “I'm definitely going to help you put an end to that dirty little swine Dragon Proudheaven. How could a punk like him possibly deserve my Aeonic God Psalter?”

“Go!” Young Master Leaf said. After Confucian Daoless disappeared, he turned his attention back to the photonic computer, whereupon his expression turned livid. “Dammit! So that's how they want me to deal with morphblight!? It would require damaging my preheaven soul essence power! So the future world thinks they can get me to weaken myself like this, do they? Well played. Too bad I'm not so easily fooled. You people from the future world are all dead!”

Chapter 710: Turning the Tables

“Aeonic God Psalter, huh?”

A power double of Yang Qi sat in a study in the depths of the Heaven-Devil Medicine Hall, surrounded by heaps of ancient books and scrolls. Anyone who could see him would assume he was in the middle of a session of cultivation.

Meanwhile, his true self was in the Cruiser of Civilization, examining the treasure map that was the Aeonic God Psalter.

It was now obvious that it was a fragment of a larger piece, but it still contained all sorts of profound information. Supposedly, those who entered the map could get access to a boundless legacy.

It was said that whoever acquired the Aeonic God Psalter could directly ascend to the Deathless Throne.

Upon spreading the map out, an enormous star chart was visible, filled with mysterious immortal worlds that included those of the thirty-third rank. In fact, Yang Qi saw the Tusita Heaven, the Eight Tribes Heaven, the Unrestrained Heaven, and the Mourn-Parting Heaven. And deep within it all was some sort of ancient path, piercing its way through the universe.

It was a road that stretched through the aeons.

Along the path were what looked like lighthouses, designed to lead the way in a certain direction. Looking closer, he saw that the path the road followed actually spelled out some sort of ancient energy art. There were magical symbols on it that began to twist and move, and when they sensed his true energy they formed scriptures right in front of him.

It was a godly-class energy art!

‘Aeonic Heaven-Dao Life-Destruction Zen Art? Combine seven parts into one to create the ultimate compendium? Every fragment of the treasure map has one technique? And this is one of them. If I can piece together the full map and complete this boundless art, I can access the godly treasure hoard and enter the deathless world.’

Yang Qi took the energy art and focused its power, and a stream of true energy appeared which turned into the shape of gate behind him. It was an aspect of the energy art called the Aeon Portal.

‘Incredible. This Aeonic Heaven-Dao Life-Destruction Zen Art isn’t as good as the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, but it’s still incredible. It surpasses the Eight Tribes Godfist and the Cardinal Grand Brahma Five Phases Energy Arts, that's for sure. This must be the consummate technique of a Paramount God. Entities like that are second only to the Sovereign Lord.’ He shook his head. ‘What a pity it’s not complete. This is only one part out of seven. With the complete art, the Aeon Portal could be used to absorb preheaven power from all sorts of universal planes of existence and make me almost unbeatable in battle. No wonder this treasure map is the subject of such envy. And Confucian Daoless handed it over to me in public, with so many people watching? What a malicious move! I refuse to believe he's so kind-hearted. I don’t usually make mistakes in judging people, and I can tell this guy is ambitious and disloyal. He’s definitely plotting against me. Well, let’s see how he tries to play things. If I kill him now, people would accuse me of being ruthless and unjust.’

Yang Qi’s distrust of Confucian Daoless continued to grow, and he was convinced that there was more to him than met the eye. They had only just met, but the man seemed so impressed by dragon energy that he had immediately kowtowed and offered up his treasure map, seemingly for no reason. It was simply far too suspicious.

Besides, with his fateless dao fruit, Yang Qi could sense matters of fate. And his Wheel of Fate bolstered those abilities. That revealed to him some dark energy on Confucian Daoless, as well as the sensation that the man was condescending and hateful. He was obviously the kind of person who would slip a knife into Yang Qi’s back at the earliest possible moment.

Yang Qi intended to turn the tables on him. He would wait to see exactly which faction he worked for, and what other treasures he might possess. Then he would make a move.

With that, he sent the Aeonic Heaven-Dao Life-Destruction Zen Art down to the leaders of the Sage Monarch Heaven. Although it was only one-seventh of the full art, it was still full of profound secrets and incredible potential. He had one now, and it was likely that he would gain more pieces in the future. In the end, it could become one of the key assets of his people.

After all, only Yang Qi could cultivate the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. Back when Ghost Emperor Yama had attempted to cultivate even a tiny part of it, he had very nearly experienced cultivation deviation.

Outside of the study, a voice rang out, “Master, I'm back!”

Tidying up quickly, Yang Qi’s power double laughed and said, “Wonderful, Confucian Daoless. Come in!”

Confucian Daoless hurried in and offered a very formal and exaggerated salute, the kind that made him seem like the most respectful of students. Maintaining the bow, he said, “Master, I saw my parents off. Now I can focus fully on studying with you, sir. Did you benefit at all yet from studying the Aeonic God Psalter?”

“You know, you’re a very wise person!” Yang Qi said loftily. “Of all the Godmyths I've encountered, you’re the first to take me as Master. The truth is that they all think I’m a Demolisher, but the fact is that my cultivation base is so beyond them that they can’t even assess it. They’re as short-sighted as rats!”

“Oh, how’s that, Master? Don't tell me that you’re not a Demolisher after all? Are you really in the Godmyth level? Are you hiding your true strength?” Confucian Daoless was inwardly shocked, and was suddenly starting to wonder if he had put himself in a dangerous situation.

“Oh, no, not that. I really am a ninth stage Dao-Demolisher. But I'm a lot stronger than that level. You see, I cultivate an incredibly powerful ability that keeps my level suppressed. Otherwise, I would already be a sixth or seventh division Godmyth.” Yang Qi laughed heartily. “Truth be told, once I actually reach the Godmyth level, I’ll be able to dominate the many heavens and have a completely invincible cultivation base!”

‘What a braggart!’ Confucian Daoless thought, his heart filling with killing intent. He managed to keep himself under control, though, and respectfully said, “Master, it's only natural that you're completely invincible and powerful. You’ve got people buzzing around you all the time, and you’re constantly having to heal people. I bet you have a huge amount of income in the form of magical treasures and the like.”

“Well, that’s a given. Alright, enough chit-chat. It was a great service of you to give me this piece of the Aeonic God Psalter. Obviously, I want to reward you in kind. Why don’t you tell me about any enlightenment you got during your own studies of it?”

“Unfortunately, I’m something of an idiot and didn't gain a bit of enlightenment. Maybe that thing just isn’t destined to work for me!”

“Really? You didn’t get any benefits from it at all? I managed to get something called the Aeonic Heaven-Dao Life-Destruction Zen Art. Here, you can have it. It’s only one seventh of the full art, but as long as I give you some true energy to help, you’ll advance by leaps and bounds with it. Once I find the other parts of the treasure map, we can improve on the art and eventually combine all seven parts. At that point, you can use the Aeon Portal to devour just about anything!”

It was now Yang Qi’s turn to cast out some bait. Waving his hand, he sent some true energy and will into Confucian Daoless.

Confucian Daoless shivered and quickly began absorbing it, whereupon he found that it really was a pure expression of true energy along with a powerful cultivation technique. “Many thanks, Master! This is beyond belief! I can't believe I had that treasure map for so many years and didn’t get enlightenment like this.”

Although he spoke praise and compliments, he was actually starting to fear Yang Qi. ‘This guy is so strong! I can’t believe he actually unlocked such profound secrets from the Aeonic God Psalter. Young Master Leaf gave that to me, and not even he was able to do the same thing. I have to report this matter to Young Master Leaf. He’ll definitely reward me for it!’

“Very well, you're dismissed. Work on that technique, and you’ll rise to the highest heights! As long as you work hard enough, you’ll definitely get strong enough to reach the Incarnated God level. I need to keep seeking enlightenment from the Aeonic God Psalter. I’ll be in seclusion for a month. Feel free to do as you wish, as long as you don’t cause any trouble.”

“Yes sir!” said Confucian Daoless, and he hurried out.

Looking over his shoulder, he flew out, heading toward the depths of the universe, where he suddenly created a host of clones that all shot in different directions. Of course, he vanished along with the clones.

After he was certain he wasn’t being followed, he breathed a sigh of relief. Settling down, he waited for a while until a burst of energy descended that resolved into a clone of Young Master Leaf.

“What is it? Did you already get that dirty swine Dragon Proudheaven to come out of hiding?”

“Master, he’s in seclusion working with the Aeonic God Psalter. That swine is really something else!” Grinding his teeth, he continued, “He actually gained enlightenment of a technique called the Aeonic Heaven-Dao Life-Destruction Zen Art. And he can make something called an Aeon Portal. How did he possibly remove the godwarding items on the treasure map?!”

“What?” Young Master Leaf blurted. “Dammit! I underestimated him again! I had the Aeonic God Psalter for years, and I knew it had secrets hidden inside, but I wasn’t sure how to unlock them. The will of the legion of gods protects it, and I assumed you had to have a large collection of King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy medallions to access them. How did he do it so quickly?”

“Master, I can transfer the art to you!” Without any hesitation, Confucian Daoless did just that.

Young Master Leaf frowned briefly, then his face lit up with enlightenment. “So, the Aeonic Heaven-Dao Life-Destruction Zen Art. Miraculous! You did well. Very well. My cultivation base is going to reach a much higher level now! That Dragon Proudheaven is really looking to get killed, isn't he? You need to hurry up and figure out a way to get him out into the open. Once I get my hands on him, I’ll find out exactly what other secrets he's keeping!”

“Yes, Master. He's going to be in seclusion for a month. I haven’t been able to confirm what type of cultivation he practices exactly, but I did confirm that he’s in ninth stage Dao-Demolishing.” Confucian Daoless chuckled. “He’s a real fool to act so tough with such a low cultivation base. But he said that if he reaches the Godmyth level, he’ll be completely invincible. I'm worried that not even you would be able to handle him then.”

“Don’t worry,” Young Master Leaf said. “As long as you lure him into the open, I’ll be fine. The truth is that I have two more pieces of the Aeonic God Psalter. Once I capture him, I’ll force him to tell me how to unlock the godwardings! In fact, why don’t you use those other pieces as bait! Now that he has one piece of the map, he’ll definitely want the others!”

“Good idea, Master. I’ll get right on it!” Confucian Daoless turned to leave.

“Hold on!” Young Master Leaf said. “You deserve a reward for your success so far. Take a bit of immortal-slaying power. I’ve been working on this bit for some time. Absorb it, and you’ll be much stronger!”

With that, he sent a bit of power into Confucian Daoless.

Confucian Daoless slowly floated up, stronger, and having become very similar to Yang Qi’s immortal-slaying clone.

Chapter 711: Heaven Beyond Heaven

Upon seeing Confucian Daoless shining with dazzling light, Young Master Leaf nodded and said, “I've given you an immortal-slayer’s body, which makes you my true successor. Very soon now, you’ll be able to reach the Incarnated God level, and after that your progress will continue. Go. Be careful around Dragon Proudheaven. If he figures out what’s going on, you’re done for.”

“I’ll definitely be careful.” Confucian Daoless dropped down, kowtowed, and left.

Young Master Leaf’s clone watched him leave. ‘This guy really is fanatically devoted to me. Let’s see how his luck turns out. If he can stay alive, I’ll continue grooming him. If not, then too bad for him.’

Swish!

The clone vanished into nothing.

**

Deep in the territory of the Nine Yangs God Sect, in the main hall of the Heaven-Dragon Medicine Sect, Yang Qi finally emerged from a month of secluded meditation. His eyes glittered like lightning, piercing through numerous universes all the way to the other shore of pāramitā. Then he retracted his gaze, as though he had just seen something very important.

‘Now I know the general location of the other pieces of the Aeonic God Psalter. Excellent!’ During the past month, the Cruiser of Civilization’s photonic computers had performed numerous calculations to help locate the rest of the Aeonic God Psalter. The Wheel of Fate had also helped, and in the end he now knew where all of them were.

And of course, he sensed that two pieces were in the depths of the Dao Defense League—specifically, in the Immortal-Slayer’s Sect.

It was obvious that the piece he possessed had been given to Confucian Daoless by Young Master Leaf, and that the former was a mole trying to lead Yang Qi to his doom.

Presumably, he would use the other pieces of the Aeonic God Psalter to try to lure him out.

‘Each piece of the Aeonic God Psalter comes with part of the Aeonic Heaven-Dao Life-Destruction Zen Art. And I don’t want to miss out on any of them. Young Master Leaf wants to get all the pieces of the map, and all of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions. Well, I'm going to beat him at his own game.’

Yang Qi knew that he would eventually have to reveal himself and lure his enemy into a trap.

Unfortunately, he wasn’t quite ready to face Young Master Leaf yet. It would be difficult to beat him quickly, and right now he couldn’t wrest the legacy medallions away from him. And Yang Qi didn’t want to waste a single opportunity in that regard.

Instead of rushing into a dangerous battle, the outcome of which was unsure, it would be better to bide his time. Beating the grass and startling the snake would be counterproductive.

The big downside was that he had no way to quickly grow stronger. Despite the month of cultivation, he had not added a single lineament to his dao heart. From the look of it, his fateless dao fruit was incredibly tough and couldn’t easily be cracked. To place even a single lineament on it was an effort that defied imagination.

That was a consequence of being incredibly strong, and it was a truth that governed the universe in general. The stronger one was, the stronger one’s dao heart, and the more difficult it was to crack and demolish it. Each and every lineament was monumentally difficult. According to the rumors, there were some illustrious people throughout history whose dao hearts were so strong that they never managed to acquire a single lineament. In the end, they perished and faded away into nothing.

That was the problem Yang Qi was currently facing, and he couldn’t think of any way to get the power he needed.

“Master!” Confucian Daoless said from outside. “You’ve been in seclusion for a month now. Are you finished with your cultivation? I've been tracking certain rumors, and also did a lot of contemplation about how I acquired that piece of the Aeonic God Psalter. It was in a certain godrelic, and the more that I think about it, the more I bet there are other treasures there. In fact, maybe there are other parts of the treasure map there.”

‘So, he’s back already,’ Yang Qi thought. Raising his voice, he said, “So that’s how it is! Excellent. Please, come in!”

Rushing in, Confucian Daoless offered a deep salute, “Master! Your energy arts have improved again! You’re virtually at the Deathless level!”

“No, that’s the level of the legion of gods!” Yang Qi replied. “I'm not even a Godmyth yet.” As he spoke, he used his Wheel of Fate to analyze Confucian Daoless. And it took only a moment to realize that he was dozens of times stronger than when they initially met. Now, he seemed strong enough to pierce through the greyspace of an immortal world. And there was something very familiar about his aura.

‘An immortal-slayer’s body!’ Yang Qi thought. ‘Yes, that’s exactly what he has. An immortal-slayer’s body! He was remolded with immortal-slaying power. So Young Master Leaf really has helped him. At least now I know for sure that he's a mole.’

“Master, I know exactly where that godrelic is. If you want, we could go together to investigate it. What do you say? If you got more of the pieces of the Aeonic God Psalter, you would be even more invincible!” Confucian Daoless was doing his very best to lure Yang Qi out into the open.

“That would definitely be great,” Yang Qi said. But then he frowned. “Unfortunately, I'm currently working on a very profound energy art and can’t leave. Besides, you might not know that I'm currently at odds with the villains from the Immortal-Slayer’s Sect. They’re definitely keeping an eye on me, so if I go out into the open they would notice. If they descended on me when I was outside of the protection of the Nine Yangs God Sect, I would definitely get killed.”

Lamenting inwardly, Confucian Daoless said, “Er, well, couldn’t you just sneak out, Master? Eventually, it will be too late. Remember, the future world invasion is changing heaven and earth, but the dao of heaven will repair itself, sooner or later. Now is the time to seize destiny for yourself. If you don’t get your hands on those treasure maps, someone else will. And if that happens, no amount of regret will do anything!”

“Oh? Well since you put it that way, I guess you’re right.” Yang Qi nodded. “The damage caused by the invasion of the future world will eventually repair itself. In other words, a lot of new opportunities are going to open up in our immortal dao civilization. And whoever takes advantage of them will rise to incredible heights. How about this—tell me where you think the other treasure maps are, and I’ll pass the information along to the Dragonfolk elders. They can go look into it for me. Alright?”

“Uh….” Confucian Daoless scrambled to decide what to do. “Master, you know the saying. A secret should not be shared by more than two people. The location of the Aeonic God Psalter is very sensitive, I'm really worried about letting word spread.”

“It’ll be fine. This is one of my seniors we’re talking about. He absolutely, positively won’t let the secret out.”

“Alright, Master!” Confucian Daoless said. “In that case, I’ll tell you.” During this whole time, Confucian Daoless had been reaching out to Young Master Leaf via divine will. Around this time, he got a response. “Tell him that you got the Aeonic God Psalter in some ancient ruins. There are countless warding magics there that can trap even Dragonfolk elders. This will work fine. I’ve been wanting to kill some Dragonfolk anyway, to keep them in check. And I’ll wipe them all out eventually anyway.”

Without any hesitation, Confucian Daoless passed on the location to Yang Qi.

“It's in a very dangerous immortal world, a thirty-third ranked place called the Heaven Beyond Heaven. It’s a legendary place created by an almighty, invincible old-timer who originated in primal-chaos. It’s a heaven that exists beyond heaven, a world that is not a world! The truth is that the Heaven Beyond Heaven is actually impossible for people to enter. It has no cultivators in it! Apparently, the immortal world is waiting for someone who it approves of to come along and take control of its immortal world essence.

“Unfortunately, it's located in the depths of the universe, and is a high-level place surrounded by intense spatial tempests. Not even extremely powerful Godmyths could get there without incredible defensive magical treasures to protect themselves. That’s where I got the Aeonic God Psalter.”

“What? The Heaven Beyond Heaven?!” When Yang Qi heard the name, he felt like he was being struck by lightning. He was very, very familiar with that name, and actually knew a lot about it.

That was the immortal world that Chancellor Demi-Immortal had been destined to take over!

Originally, Chancellor Demi-Immortal was supposed to rise to the immortal worlds, undergo years of training and improvement, and eventually become ruler of a very powerful immortal world. The young man in yellow had developed a relationship with him, in the hopes of taking advantage of the fact that he was the successor of the Heaven Beyond Heaven. Of course, the young man in yellow had also worried that Chancellor Demi-Immortal would betray him and try to take King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions, so he had never told him all of the details.

In fact, Chancellor Demi-Immortal never found out the truth, and died wondering about the name of the immortal world that was his supposed destiny.

Yang Qi knew the truth from the memories of the young man in yellow. He had also absorbed Chancellor Demi-Immortal’s power and destiny and incorporated it into his Wheel of Fate. Now the Wheel of Fate could perfectly imitate the man’s constitution, quintessence, destiny, and nascent divinity. Yang Qi had essentially become him.

Poor Chancellor Demi-Immortal had supported the Crown Prince and opposed Yang Qi, which got his daughter killed and lost him his own life.

‘So, heaven is really helping me! The Aeonic God Psalter comes from the Heaven Beyond Heaven, a thirty-third ranked immortal world, just like the Tusita Heaven. Chancellor Demi-Immortal was the intended successor, but I killed him and took his destiny. In other words, I'm now the successor of the Heaven Beyond Heaven. Going there will benefit me greatly! Ah, Young Master Leaf. As it turns out, you’re doing things more fairly than you realize. You picked a place like this for our showdown? Maybe you’re just feeling a bit suicidal!’

Yang Qi was convinced that this was the place to make his stand, and that win or lose, it would all end there.

That said, he still needed to plan things out well. If Young Master Leaf was choosing the Heaven Beyond Heaven as the location of his trap, there was definitely a good reason.

After a bit more thought, Yang Qi slapped his hand onto the table. “Alright! The Heaven Beyond Heaven. Thirty-third ranked immortal world. Considering how remote it is, I definitely need to be fully prepared before going there.”

Chapter 712: Confusing the Enemy

“Wait, hold on, Master,” Confucian Daoless said, looking surprised. “Didn’t you just say that you would have one of your Dragonfolk seniors go in your stead? Now you’re saying you’re going to go personally?”

“I did say that. But you made me realize that holing up in here isn’t going to help me deal with the Immortal-Slayer’s Sect. I'm a child of the Dragonfolk! I should be out roaming the highest heavens, not stuck in here like a turtle who refuses to come out of its shell!”

Laughing heartily, Yang Qi rose to his feet. “Take your leave for now. I need to make some preparations. We leave in a month. I'm going to go into seclusion for that time to work on a secret Dragonfolk magic that will let me make millions upon millions of clones. That way, if the Immortal-Slayer’s Sect ends up coming after me, they’ll never be able to find my true self. I’ll also have one of the elders from the Eight Tribes Heaven create a god lamp for me. Once my god lamp is lit, then even if I get killed they can restore my nascent divinity and fleshly body. You see, my Nine Deaths Profound Art ensures that every time I die, whatever bad luck I encountered will turn into good luck, and after I'm born again I’ll be even stronger than before! Why do you think I haven’t proceeded past Dao-Demolishing? It's because the more bad luck I encounter with my Nine Deaths Profound Art, the less I have to fear! As a Dao-Demolisher, I lose nothing upon dying. Unfortunately, once I'm a Godmyth, not even the Dragonfolk elders can restore my virtual godhood if I die. That’s why I don’t want to break through to the Godmyth level for the moment.”

Of course, this was all a huge feint on Yang Qi’s part. He was actually describing an energy art from the legion of gods that he had learned about in the photonic computers of the Cruiser of Civilization. Upon hearing the information, Confucian Daoless was completely taken aback.

“I can’t believe a technique like that even exists!”

“Well, it does,” Yang Qi said. “The more Young Master Leaf wants to kill me, and the more he hates me, the worse luck that is for me. But I can turn all that bad luck into good luck, and benefit from it. The only reason I'm telling you all this is because I trust you so much. Would I tell such important secrets to anyone else? Come on, did you really think that some ordinary person in Dao-Demolishing would possibly be so favored by the elders of the Dragonfolk? What, you thought it was just by chance? Truth be told, I'm the only person among the Dragonfolk who actually cultivates the Nine Deaths Profound Art. And once I fully master it, my prospects will be limitless. Okay, you’re dismissed. Carry on!”

“Yes, yes of course. I’ll go get everything ready!”

Confucian Daoless immediately went to report the matter to Young Master Leaf.

Yang Qi smiled faintly as he watched him leave. ‘Ah, Young Master Leaf. Let’s see how you deal with this new development. The Nine Deaths Profound Art really is a profound technique, but unfortunately it's long disappeared from use. And I don't actually cultivate it. But mixing truth with falsehood is going to put you under a lot of pressure!’

Yang Qi was really setting things up to confuse his enemy!

And his month of seclusion wasn’t to be spent just on cultivation. He started by researching information about the Heaven Beyond Heaven, and how to get there. Thirty-third ranked immortal worlds were high-level planes of existence in the universe, and were not the kind of places that immortals could just casually travel to. The higher one got, the more violent and destructive the spatial tempests became. They often contained enormous, ancient beasts, or patches of primal-chaos. In fact, the void between thirty-third ranked immortal worlds was almost entirely primal-chaos that hadn’t yet given birth to new worlds.

It was easy to perish in such places.

Such patches were often the size of hundreds of thousands of immortal worlds, and once a person entered them they would rarely come out. There were even stories of fourth or fifth division Godmyths who entered paths of primal-chaos, only to be devoured by the entities which lurked therein.

Of course, there was also all sorts of good fortune to be had inside, which was why they were such tempting places.

After his research, Yang Qi decided that he was ready to face Young Master Leaf. He wanted to see what the man was capable of, and hoped that by powering the Cruiser of Civilization with god crystals, he would be able to come out on top. Furthermore, he had Chancellor Demi-Immortal’s destiny, which should give him an advantage in the Heaven Beyond Heaven. Besides, long delays usually lead to trouble, and he knew that he would eventually have to fight Young Master Leaf. And considering the dramatic changes to heaven and earth, it was impossible to say how long Chancellor Demi-Immortal’s destiny would remain linked to the legacy of the Heaven Beyond Heaven.

It was always possible that some other person might seize that destiny.

There were all sorts of old-timers in existence with profound information, people who sought the Deathless Throne and knew all about things like karma. For all he knew, there were people who could assess matters of destiny and take advantage of the coming changes. If the Heaven Beyond Heaven came to belong to someone else, it would be a big loss for Yang Qi.

After all, how useful would a thirty-third ranked immortal world be? If he got it, it would allow for indescribable advancement of the Sage Monarch Heaven. His people would definitely be able to reach the Godmyth level, and he would most likely be able to break through to the Deathless Throne.

It was hard to imagine the resources that would be available in a place like that.

It would probably be equivalent to a billion trillion of the Sage Monarch Heaven put together. Perhaps even a hundred billion trillion. The power of such worlds bordered on god worlds, so Yang Qi was confident that he could use it, and the Cruiser of Civilization, to cut down Young Master Leaf.

Even if Young Master Leaf was an invincible ninth division Godmyth, once Yang Qi could tap into the essence of the Heaven Beyond Heaven he would be as strong as the legion of gods, and would definitely be able to win.

After all, according to legends, the essences of other thirty-third ranked immortal worlds like the Tusita Heaven, Unrestrained Heaven, Eight Tribes Heaven, and Mourn-Parting Heaven were all under the control of various patriarchs in those locations. And not under the control of a single person, but rather multiple people.

If Yang Qi got the approval of the Heaven Beyond Heaven, the destructive force on his hands would be indescribable.

He was willing to take risks to get that.

In the worst case scenario, if he couldn't eke out a victory, he could go into hiding, keep his eye on Young Master Leaf, and find an opportunity to steal King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions from him. With six of the medallions, he could mask his God Legion Seal and go to the future world. Once in the future world, he could reach out to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, which wasn't constrained by space-time. As long as one commanded the true power of King Immortal-Slayer, it could be reached in the past, present, and future.

‘I'm going to kill you eventually, Young Master Leaf, one way or another. I killed the Crown Prince, and I killed that buzz cut kid. You’re not going to be any exception.’

Smiling, Yang Qi settled deep into the Cruiser of Civilization, where he began feeding one god crystal after another into the reactors, hoping to fill the power reserves as much as possible during the course of the month.

Right now, the power reserves had reached the level of one one-hundred-millionth, and if he could push them to the level of one ten-thousandth, the spacecraft would become even more powerful. And if he could push them two levels higher, that would be even better.

That was especially true considering that if he upgraded the genetic systems enough, his own genes could be improved, which would make his command over the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth even more profound.

Almost as soon as he began feeding the god crystals into the reactors, the photonic computers began speaking.

[Power systems upgraded. Weapons systems upgraded. Genetic systems upgraded….]

Whirrr… RUUUUMBLE….

A burst of vital energy surged out as the genetic systems sent out blinding light over Yang Qi, bathing him in golden splendor. Within the light, his body collapsed and became countless particles, all of which were like embryos of primal-chaos that resembled the porcelain godspore of Empress Jadefall. They were also like primal-chaos protomammoths. The sleeping protomammoths were like the preheaven progenitors of mammoths. Preheaven mammoths. They represented the most ancient of essences, the holy aura of the Sovereign Lord, as well as the power of countless hells.

“Endless hells, eternal sands!”

Yang Qi’s voice seemed to drift into the depths of the universe, causing countless hells to appear beneath the countless embryos.

Each and every hell had a corresponding embryo.

In that moment, Yang Qi’s thoughts seemed to reach the most profound depths of the universe, the darkest and gloomiest hyperdimensions, and the deepest areas, which gave him insight into the true number of hells.

The Hell of Scorching Flame. The Hell of Yellow Gold. The Hell of Nagas. The Hell of Bleached Bones. The Hell of Fresh Blood. The Hell of Gloom and Darkness. The Hell of Mahānata. The Hell of Never-Ending. The Hell of Misery. The Hell of Black Steel. The Hell of Suras.

He knew how many hells there were, and although he didn't know everything about every single one of them, they all passed through his heart and mind.

In the shortest of moments, his soul became connected to all of the hells and they became sources of power for him.

“Eternal sands of hell, enter my body, make me hell, suppress evil for all eternity!”

RUMBLE!

As he said ‘suppress evil for all eternity’, the primal-chaos embryos merged into the void. Yang Qi disappeared and the embryos became one with the hells. As of that moment, Yang Qi was no more.

All of his cells, all of his particles, became hells. All hells were his body.

Chapter 713: Hells like Eternal Sands

Yang Qi had entered into one of the most profound levels of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth; eternal hell-crushing.

His body transformed into innumerable cells and particles that entered into all the hells, which were as numerous as the eternal sands of the universe. They became like primal embryos which joined the essence of those hells, making them like their rulers. Not even the suzerains of those hells detected what was happening.

The Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth was the most ultimate martial path or energy art possible, and because of it, Yang Qi was fundamentally the sovereign of all hells.

“Return!”

Eventually, his will issued a cold call into the various essences and martial paths and all of the primal embryos came back, releasing the various hells. However, he had acquired boundless power from them, as well as a deep understanding of their essences.

At this point, Yang Qi uttered a single word. “Die.”

In the depths of countless hells, devil-gods howled at the tops of their lungs as they were suddenly slaughtered by Yang Qi’s will. Billions upon billions of them instantly died, and their souls appeared behind Yang Qi in the form of a Soul-Summoning Banner. Within the banner were numerous fiend-devils, accompanied by millions upon millions of hells, still and unmoving. However, with the slightest wave of that flag, those myriads of worlds would collapse and a world of devils would appear among men.

“Question Heaven; Summon Souls!”

Yang Qi had unlocked another aspect of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, which was the Heaven-Questioning Soul-Summoning Banner.

Call upon all life to question the great heaven.Summon the souls of the great heaven to inspect the foundations of the earth!

It was a consummate and unparalleled technique. With the Heaven-Questioning Soul-Summoning Banner flying behind him, the pressure that roiled out would be enough to cover and crush an entire immortal world.

“In the name of all the living things in the many heavens, I hereby query the great heaven; the souls of the great heaven are the foundation of the earth; return ye souls, dappled by the evening clouds that obscure the sun and moon;darkness and light invert, and the taiji proliferates;heaven and earth intertwine; the two symbols are perennial; the four divisions combine; the eight wilds flow….” Yang Qi drew on his true energy, causing streams of black light to fill the area, which poured into the Heaven-Questioning Soul-Summoning Banner—and the devils therein—where they formed the souls of the great heaven. Those black streams of light came from the hells that numbered as many as the eternal sands.

Yang Qi was connected to those countless hells, and he could absorb their vital energy with the slightest inhalation.

Having summoned the Heaven-Questioning Soul-Summoning Banner, Yang Qi’s cultivation base rose another level. He could now break through the fetters of numerous hells, accessing their power to make himself many times stronger than before.

CRACK!

Three lineaments appeared on his fateless dao fruit, deep striations that made it seem like the thing might crack apart at any moment. He had a dao heart that was virtually impossible to demolish, yet he already had three lineaments on it. He was now strong enough that he felt at least confident enough to face Young Master Leaf in combat.

Another heavenly tribulation descended, but to Yang Qi it was a joke. Using the Heaven-Questioning Soul-Summoning Banner, he simply absorbed it.

“Future power!”

The primal-chaos elder-snake appeared, which immediately began belching the power of the future world. Although it couldn’t produce god crystals, it was enough to replenish the Cruiser of Civilization.

He had handed over two hundred of the talismans, which had been placed in the region of the passageway to the future world. Because of that, he could draw on the power of the future at any time he wished. And that ability had increased with the aid of the Heaven-Questioning Soul-Summoning Banner. In fact, as of now, he could use the talismans to establish something of a connection to Brahma’s heart.

“Excellent. All I need to do now is continue getting stronger, and then we’ll see what Young Master Leaf is really capable of a month from now. How will he deal with me then?”

Having three lineaments was a far cry from having nine. He was still far, far away from being able to reach the Godmyth level. But as long as he could reach the requisite enlightenment, he could push toward the peak, and at the same time, build up power. When the time came, he should be able to achieve his breakthrough.

**

Back in the Immortal-Slayer’s Sect, Young Master Leaf was once again meeting with Confucian Daoless.

“What? You’re telling me that Dragon Proudheaven cultivates the legendary Nine Deaths Profound Art? He can die nine times, and each time he dies he gets stronger?” Young Master Leaf’s face flickered with shock. “According to what I've heard, the Nine Deaths Profound Art originated in primeval times, and was created by some boundless infernal deity who had a deep understanding of the dao of life and death. It really can be used to turn the darkest of fortune into good luck. Unfortunately, it's just too heaven-defying. And eventually, the deity who created it ended up dying nine times, whereupon the Nine Deaths Profound Art vanished into the dust of history. But now it's back. How, though? The only way to get it would be to travel back into primeval times.”

“I'm not sure, Master. But this information was so shocking that I had to come report it immediately.” Confucian Daoless couldn’t have been more loyal to Young Master Leaf and was reporting every bit of credible information he came across.

“Master, there is definitely more to this guy than meets the eye. Logically speaking, he must be an ordinary immortal in ninth stage Dao-Demolishing. He’s definitely not a Godmyth. However, he’s many times more knowledgeable and experienced than the average person. A lot of people assume that he’s relying on the power of a talisman from the Dragonfolk to accomplish everything he does, but after following him all this time I'm fairly certain he's doing everything on his own. He’s also hiding his true strength, and is no weaker than a fifth division Nirvanic God. That makes sense if you consider that he cultivates the Nine Deaths Profound Art.”

Truth be told, Confucian Daoless’s analysis was just making things more confusing for Young Master Leaf.

Young Master Leaf sat there thinking for a long moment, trying to decide how to deal with Yang Qi. He had to defeat him utterly and thoroughly, but at the same time, capture him alive to study him. He couldn’t afford to miss this opportunity.

At a certain point, he looked up, a vicious smile on his face. “It doesn’t matter. The Nine Deaths Profound Art isn’t really that special. He gets stronger each time he dies, but that just means that as long as I don’t kill him, I’ll be fine. I’ll capture him, then make him wish he could die. While he's working on his cultivation for the next month, I’ll set up a big spell formation to trap him. Once I lure him in there, he won’t even be able to die even if he tries to kill himself.”

Confucian Daoless quickly kowtowed. “You’re without equal, Master. Your majesty will survive throughout all the ages and you’ll be eternally invincible in the world!”

“Go!” Young Master Leaf said, turning to start working on the spell formation.

Time seemed to pass very quickly. The fighting between the future world and the Dao Defense League was intense and bitter. Casualties were immense, with many future warriors falling in combat. But the future world was a massive place. It was impossible to say how many experts existed in the future world. Their warriors were like ants; kill one, and more would pop out in replacement. And every immortal world that was destroyed meant more resources for the future world’s use.

On the other hand, more and more people were joining the Dao Defense League. Thus, the future world’s forces were struggling to advance the front line. The fighting only continued growing more intense.

The month passed and Yang Qi emerged from seclusion, having sent all of the god crystals he possessed into the Cruiser of Civilization to fill its power reserves. It was now at the level of one ten-thousandth, which had pushed the genetic systems, weapons, power systems, and photonic computers to an even higher level. Although Yang Qi wasn’t certain of what the difference was, once he was out of seclusion he felt as though he were being inundated by words of praise from gods and buddhas of all types.

“Confucian Daoless!” he said.

“I'm waiting right here for you, Master!” Of course, Confucian Daoless also sent a notification to Young Master Leaf in the Immortal-Slayer’s Sect, informing him of the development. Kneeling in front of Yang Qi, he said, “Oh exalted Master, are we finally going to set out?”

Although he was the picture of respect and piety, in his mind he was cursing Yang Qi with ultimate venom. ‘This is going to be your last day of freedom, you goon. Soon, you’re going to be wishing for death. You’ll be stripped of everything and turned into an ordinary person, living out your days in torment that will rival the worst of the hells.’

Yang Qi could sense the rancorous energy in him, but didn’t react to it. “Yes, I’m finished cultivating that profound technique of mine. The time has come for the two of us to go to the Heaven Beyond Heaven. It's going to be a dangerous journey.”

“Master, allow me to lead the way!” Confucian Daoless said quickly, hoping to use the opportunity to lead Yang Qi right into the spell formation trap that was waiting for him.

“There’s no need to waste time on that,” Yang Qi replied. “I happen to have a map created by the Dragonfolk elders, so we shouldn’t have any problems getting there. And I can clear all obstacles along the way, plus avoid the primal-chaos pitfalls. There’s no way that anyone from the Immortal-Slayer’s Sect will be able to follow me! You see, it's a given than they’ll try to catch me, but there’s no way any of them could be fast enough.”

Swish!

Suddenly, Yang Qi moved with the lightning-like speed of a goshawk grabbing a rabbit, taking Confucian Daoless and blurring into motion.

Confucian Daoless was grabbed so thoroughly that he couldn’t move; he felt limp and numb as Yang Qi just dragged him along.

In the blink of an eye, Yang Qi disappeared into the spatial tempests of the universe, making it impossible for anyone to track his movements.

Some of the old-timers in the Nine Yangs God Sect sensed what was happening and sent some divine will to scan the area. But even they could hardly pick up traces of his passage.

All of them were shocked. “So fast! I can’t believe anyone is even capable of such speed!”

Chapter 714: Heading Toward the Godrelic

Because of how famous and important Yang Qi was in the Nine Yangs God Sect, it was only natural that there would be top experts keeping an eye on him at all times with divine will. That was especially true considering he had the Aeonic God Psalter.

That said, Yang Qi usually handled matters with a power double, while his true self remained in the Cruiser of Civilization. Because of that, it was difficult for the almighty experts to keep track of him all the time. When they assumed he was simply sitting quietly in meditation and contemplation, he might be doing something completely different.

This time, as soon as Yang Qi went out, the almighty entities sent divine will out to follow, yet they quickly came up short.

He moved so quickly that it surpassed the limits of heaven and earth, and the bounds of common sense.

Some of those who were watching him were so stunned they nearly passed out.

In their minds, Dragon Proudheaven was just a child. Perhaps he was special, but no matter how miraculous he was, it didn’t make him capable of surpassing the limits set in place by cultivation bases. Those were rules and principles that were iron-clad in the immortal worlds.

High cultivation bases were stronger, lower cultivation bases were weaker. It was an unbreakable truth.

In the Immortal-Slayer’s Sect, Young Master Leaf had just received the update from Confucian Daoless and sent his own will over to observe the Nine Yangs God Sect. Yet, in that moment, he saw Yang Qi blasting off toward the Heaven Beyond Heaven.

‘Dammit, how could he be so fast?’

Young Master Leaf had already set up a big spell formation to trap Yang Qi, thus bypassing the need to call on the Warriors of the Great Dance from the future world.

But then he saw Dragon Proudheaven blurring into motion, to the point that his own divine will was incapable of keeping up with him. In fact, in the following moment, Young Master Leaf couldn’t even locate his specific position.

Yang Qi sped along, combining the powers of a Heaven Moving One with his Angel Wings. It made him capable of surpassing the speed of anything in existence, and that was even without using the flight systems of the Cruiser of Civilization. If he did that, he would be even faster.

‘How could this be happening?!’ Confucian Daoless thought. ‘I can’t even get in touch with Young Master Leaf now!’

Although he was inwardly howling, he didn’t let loose a peep as he watched immortal worlds and spatial tempests speeding by. They traveled for what must have been millions upon millions of light-years, and what was most terrifying was that it didn't seem to take any effort at all on the part of Yang Qi.

At a certain point, Confucian Daoless finally drew on his immortal-slaying powers to say, “Master, Master! We're going too fast! I can’t take it! I never could have guessed you would be able to move this quickly. Why don't we slow down for a moment? It looks like we're already in a high-level area of the universe. These are all twentieth ranked immortal worlds or higher, which means that if we go beyond this we’ll reach the thirtieth ranked immortal worlds. Once we’re there, we’ll run into primal-chaos debris left behind by ancient primal-chaos worlds! If you keep going this fast, we might end up falling into a place like that and getting stuck forever!”

Of course, Confucian Daoless’s true intent was to get them to slow down for long enough to send a message to Young Master Leaf.

“You know what, you’re right, Confucian Daoless,” Yang Qi said. Yet he didn’t show any signs of slowing down. In fact, his wings began beating faster and the immortal worlds began whizzing by even more quickly. “The fact that your immortal-slaying powers allow you to speak at speeds like this is pretty incredible!”

RUUUUUUMBLE!

Confucian Daoless felt like he had just been struck by lightning, and shivered down to his core. “Immortal-slaying power? What’s immortal-slaying power? What do you mean, Master? I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

Yang Qi laughed. “I mean the gift Young Master Leaf from the Immortal-Slayer’s Sect gave you. You might be able to hide it from other people, but not me. You see, I have immortal-slaying power, too. I've known from day one that you were a mole sent by Young Master Leaf. Instead of outing you right then and there, I decided to beat Young Master Leaf at his own game. I used you to lure him out so that I can take his legacy medallions. And now you’re going to pay the price for betraying me.”

A vortex popped into being above Confucian Daoless, which penetrated his head and began tugging at his brain matter. In the blink of an eye, the immortal-slaying power within him began flowing out. This power wasn’t exactly the same as the type possessed by Yang Qi’s immortal-slaying clone, but had the same origin.

“Clone, take this immortal-slaying power from some of the other legacy medallions. It should help you reach a more perfect level. It comes from different legacy medallions.”

Inside the Cruiser of Civilization, the clone sat there as the immortal-slaying power flowed into him. Slowly but surely, he began advancing to a higher level. It formed a resonance with the three of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions that were in the clone's possession and caused his dao heart to begin to crack. Tribulation formed as, in the shortest of moments, a full nine lineaments appeared on it!

It wouldn’t be long before the immortal-slaying clone reached the Godmyth level!

It seemed like the clone’s cultivation would actually advance a bit more quickly than Yang Qi’s. And of course, when he had power from all nine of the legacy medallions, his immortal-slaying power would reach the ultimate level, making him virtually invincible.

Even with only six, who could possibly beat him?

“Master, stop! My immortal-slaying power! It was difficult to mold my body with that power!” Despite the despair on the face of Confucian Daoless, Yang Qi didn’t slow down the process at all. He continued extracting the power, causing Confucian Daoless to grow weaker and weaker, until he was weakened to the point where he could hardly lift a finger.

“I didn’t betray you, Master! I would never! I performed some services in the Immortal-Slayer’s Sect, but after you saved me I renounced my past misdeeds. I've been spying on the Immortal-Slayer’s Sect to try to figure out their master plan!”

In his moment of despair, Confucian Daoless’s tongue turned quite glib.

“Enough quibbling. I know exactly what you and Young Master Leaf have been up to. Guess what? Everything I told you about the Nine Deaths Profound Art was a complete fabrication. I intentionally fed you misinformation! Did you really think I would let a power-hungry bastard like Young Master Leaf just do as he pleases? Just wait. Once my plan comes to fruition, I’ll kill Young Master Leaf, take his legacy medallions, kill your parents and your clan, then take over the Sagely Confucian Institute.” The killing intent Yang Qi bristled with caused Confucian Daoless’s sanity to begin crumbling.

“No!”

His faith in Young Master Leaf was waning into nothing. Before, he had believed Young Master Leaf to be completely omnipotent, only to find that he had completely fallen for Dragon Proudheaven’s plan.

“By the way, my name isn't Dragon Proudheaven. I also have some of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions, and I’ve been plotting against Young Master Leaf for a long time to get at his. Thankfully, a moron like you came along and made my scheme come to fruition a lot faster.”

RUUUUUUMBLE!

Confucian Daoless was completely and utterly crushed, and was at such a loss for words that he began babbling the most ridiculous words. “No… what do you mean I'm a moron? You just used me? But I'm so smart! I usually call other people morons!”

“Nope, you’re definitely a moron. You should have devoted yourself to me. Exercise faith in me, and you can be truly intelligent. You can have true wisdom.” Yang Qi sent an enticing stream of sagelight into Confucian Daoless’s heart. “Do it. Have faith in me, and I’ll give you endless power. Sacrifice yourself to help me get close to Young Master Leaf and strike a fatal blow. Go into my fragment of the Cruiser of Civilization and study my special self-detonation technique. Blow yourself up in Young Master Leaf’s presence, when he least expects it.”

After Yang Qi dismantled Confucian Daoless’s confidence, it was easy to convince him to turn into a living bomb, aimed directly at Young Master Leaf.

Just as he had said, the Cruiser of Civilization contained a genetic technology that could result in self-detonation. Of course, Young Master Leaf would obviously be on guard and wouldn't let just anyone get close to him. But he might not be on guard against Confucian Daoless.

Power seeds filled Confucian Daoless, filling his genes with explosive potential. Most terrifying of all, his soul and destiny would also detonate, and since they were linked to Young Master Leaf, that would be an additional source of damage.

Eventually, Confucian Daoless’s face grew clear and cold. It was almost as if, after being brainwashed by Yang Qi, he had reached a higher level of existence, transforming himself with faith that would make Young Master Leaf incapable of seeing through his ruse.

“Yes, Master. I’ll do anything for you. Even sacrifice myself….”

RUUUUUUMBLE!

Around that time, intense spatial fluctuations filled the area.

“We’re in the area of the thirty-third ranked immortal worlds.”

Chapter 715: Intense Self-Detonation

Yang Qi had never been to a location with thirtieth ranked immortal worlds.

Such planes of existence were usually surrounded by tempests so severe that they could even cause problems for Godmyths. And there were many hazardous areas, natural convergences of empyrean and baleful energies that could destroy anyone weaker than—and including—fourth division Shattered Gods.

Normally speaking, only fifth division Godmyths or higher traveled between thirtieth level universal planes.

Yang Qi could already feel the difference at this high-level location within the universe. He was moving slower, and at the same time felt as if he existed in a state between corporeal and illusory. That was because of the primal-chaos debris that floated within the tempests. They were like icebergs in an ocean, except they were so destructive that they would put an end to anyone they touched.

WHOOSH!

All of a sudden, Yang Qi released Confucian Daoless and vanished without a trace. He had entered one of the chunks of primal-chaos debris, a place that pulsed with the auras of ancient beasts. That was where he would lie in wait.

“Dammit! Finally! There’s Confucian Daoless’s aura!”

Young Master Leaf had been rushing toward the Heaven Beyond Heaven, where he had set up his spell formation to trap Yang Qi.

During the entire time, he hadn’t even caught sight of Yang Qi’s shadow. And much to his fury, he had lost track of Confucian Daoless as well. It made him so angry he was in the mood to kill his own follower.

However, as soon as he reached the level of the thirtieth ranked universal planes, it was to his delight that he caught Confucian Daoless’s aura. Blurring into motion, he arrived in the location of his ‘apprentice’.

SMACK!

Seeing that Dragon Proudheaven was nowhere in sight, he slapped Confucian Daoless right across the side of the face, causing him to spin around several times in a row, blood spraying out of his mouth as his cheek swelled up.

“Why did you take so long to contact me?!” he shouted. “Feeling suicidal or something? And where did Dragon Proudheaven go off to?”

“I deserve to die!” Confucian Daoless wailed, kowtowing immediately. “I never could have guessed that Dragon Proudheaven would be so cunning! Spare me, Master! He was moving too fast for me to actually send a message! It was only just now that he left me behind and ran off to look for the Heaven Beyond Heaven!”

“You scum. You worthless piece of trash! Even after all I did to help you, you simply let him get away? Why did he leave you behind anyway?” Killing intent immediately began to fill Young Master Leaf’s eyes.

“No! Don’t kill me, Master!” He kowtowed again, then crawled forward and attached himself to Young Master Leaf’s leg, begging and pleading the entire time. It did no good. As far as Young Master Leaf was concerned, he was a piece of trash who deserved to have his immortal-slaying power taken away.

“Stop. Begging won’t do you any good.” With that, Young Master Leaf sent a stream of true energy toward him.

And in almost the exact same instant…. BOOM!

Confucian Daoless exploded.

An enormous mushroom cloud rose up as immense energy shook the entire area. The nearby primal-chaos tempests were wiped out of existence, and at the same time hundreds of thousands of beams of sagelight slashed into Young Master Leaf. Instantly, heaven and earth became a sea of flames, and the entire area was transformed into hell itself.

The Cannon of Civilization, powered by god crystals, pierced through Young Master Leaf’s body, instantly inflicting severe injuries.

Yang Qi wasn’t holding back at all. He used Confucian Daoless as a bomb, and added in the Cannon of Civilization as well as godpower from his God Legion Seal. And for good measure, he added in the Heaven-Questioning Soul-Summoning Banner.

Back when he had first met the Mechfolk in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, he wasn’t even close to being a match for Young Master Leaf. But he was a lot stronger now. Although he wasn’t a Godmyth, he had pushed the power reserves of the Cruiser of Civilization to one ten-thousandth, and that alone was too much for Young Master Leaf to deal with.

Yang Qi had planned this out very carefully. To Young Master Leaf, Confucian Daoless was scum, a person who couldn’t harm him no matter what kind of attack he unleashed. Never in his wildest dreams could he have guessed that he had been packed with such heaven-destroying, earth-extinguishing power, and that he would self-detonate to release it.

“Aggghhh!” In the blink of an eye, Young Master Leaf’s skin was shredded into mincemeat; no amount of defensive empyrean energy could block the force of the blow, and in fact, everything below his waist was simply wiped out of existence.

His power immediately drained out of him, and flesh and blood splashed out everywhere, twitching and wriggling as it stained the space in the area.

Of course, the initial force of the detonation wasn’t the most destructive aspect. The detonation of Confucian Daoless’s soul targeted Young Master Leaf’s soul, making it feel like it had been struck by an enormous hammer. At the same time, it was wrapped with blood red destiny power, as if it was hitting him with a curse he wouldn’t be able to escape no matter how many lives or lifetimes passed.

Young Master Leaf regained his senses almost immediately. He looked down to find himself physically injured, and also damaged on the level of his soul. Thankfully, his thinking faculties were still working. ‘What’s going on here?! How could that detonation have been so powerful? His soul was catalyzed by science and technology from the future?! It was a soul attack that already lost me half of my animadestiny power? Dammit! That wasn’t Confucian Daoless! He was a mere puppet! And he was transformed by some sort of high-level god item created by future science and technology!’

He immediately realized that he had fallen into a trap.

“King Immortal-Slayer’s medallions are invincible! Heal me! I'm eternally undying, blessed with unparalleled good fortune! I'm a Fortuned One! No one can fight me, nor can anyone plot against me. And those who try will only help me!”

Three of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions appeared above Young Master Leaf’s head as he began healing himself. Boundless immortal-slaying power flowed into him as he simultaneously drew on his own numerous divine abilities, causing a kingdom of his own to spread out in the area to protect him during the process.

However, it was in that same moment that a bright beam of light shot out of nowhere and slammed into the legacy medallions! Yang Qi was drawing on his fragment of the Cruiser of Civilization to unleash another attack.

There was no way Yang Qi would pass up this opportunity to put an end to Young Master Leaf’s life while he was wounded. Thus, he launched his attack from within the primal-chaos debris.

Of course, there was more to Yang Qi’s plan. Even as he unleashed the attack, he sent out a stream of divine will with even more information to throw Young Master Leaf off his trail.

All of a sudden, a voice echoed out. “You’ve had this day coming for a long time, Young Master Leaf! Do you know how many of us Mechfolk you killed? That's why we’ve allied with the future world to take you down! We recruited your own apprentice, then laced him with destructive power to use against you! What do you think? Next, the Warriors of the Great Dance will come to deliver the final blow. But before then, we Mechfolk are going to take your three legacy medallions!”

If all went well, Young Master Leaf would believe that it really was the Mechfolk, colluding with the future world, who had attacked him.

Normally speaking, Young Master Leaf wouldn’t be so easily taken in. But right now, he was still stunned from the attack on his soul and was so overwhelmed with rage that he wasn’t thinking clearly.

Hopefully, the next time he saw the Warriors of the Great Dance he would be so angry he would just attack them. If both parties got hurt, it might be possible for Yang Qi to slip in at the last moment and benefit.

Gong!

The Cruiser of Civilization’s attack hit home, causing the legacy medallions to violently vibrate, and Young Master Leaf to cough up a mouthful of blood. Right now, the only whole part of him left was his head, as his body was slowly stitching itself back together.

Yang Qi had hoped to snatch the legacy medallions. But as soon as his attack landed, a tremor passed through him and spatial tempests sprang up in the depths of the Cruiser of Civilization. Obviously, Young Master Leaf was just too strong. Yang Qi needed to reach the Godmyth level before he could truly fight him, even drawing on the powers of the Cruiser of Civilization.

Young Master Leaf recognized the attack that had just hit him as coming from a fragment of the Cruiser of Civilization. Shaken, he shouted, “Damn you evil Mechfolk! I'm not going to let you off the hook for this! You want my legacy medallions? What are you, crazy? I’ve already completely fused with them. Trying to take them by force will just get you killed!”

Then he slashed his two hands out in front of them. One hand represented a sword that could kill immortals, the other a saber that could slaughter humans.

“Slay Immortals; Slay Humans!” he said.

RUMBLE!

As the attack hit the Cruiser of Civilization, Young Master Leaf seemed to be heading back to full power, making him like a god from heaven descended into the mortal world, an entity who could end the heavens and crush the earth with a single attack.

Once again, Yang Qi was violently shaken, and the photonic computers on the Cruiser of Civilization flickered as the power reserves dropped.

‘Is he really this strong?’ Yang Qi was really starting to feel some doubts, and was now uncertain that he could actually win over Young Master Leaf. In fact, it seemed like it might be impossible to kill him, or even just take King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions from him.

Yang Qi gave a cold harrumph. ‘Of the thirty-six stratagems of war, retreat is often the best option! This guy is crazy! He’s hurt now, but he’ll be back to full power soon. I need to get to the Heaven Beyond Heaven!’

Now was not the time to fight to the death. Besides, what would happen if both of them ended up so badly hurt that someone swooped in and took advantage of the situation? Then he would be the moron.

WHOOSH!

With no time for thought or contemplation, he activated the hyperdrive systems and prepared to flee.

“Trying to run? You think you can plot against me and then just flee? Rat bastard!” Young Master Leaf had suffered a grievous injury, as well as extraordinary shame and humiliation. He had lost a lot of power, and the vital energy of his soul had been injured. Not even ten thousand years of secluded meditation would make up for that, and therefore he had no intention at all of letting his attacker escape.

Chapter 716: A Successful Framing

Young Master Leaf was so angry that his head nearly exploded.

Never before had he suffered such a heavy loss. Never had he been ambushed like this. Worse, his ambusher had issued infuriating taunts right before fleeing.

In that moment he vowed to capture this ambusher and torture them with the most painful techniques in order to excise the heart-devil that had formed inside of him. He absolutely had to vent his anger.

“I call on immortal-slaying godmight to surpass the void; sacrifice my blood to space-time; displace any and all obstacles in my way!”

He immediately began performing a sacrifice, using his own quintessence blood and vital energy to shoot after Yang Qi. Considering he had just recovered from a deadly attack, he shouldn’t actually be doing something like that, but in his fury, he didn’t hesitate.

After all, if his quarry escaped, how could he possibly vent his anger?

Thus, they sped off into the universe. This was an area of thirtieth ranked immortal worlds, a location of extreme danger. But these two were freaks among freaks, the type who could ignore such threats and who were constantly rising to higher levels.

Time passed.

The power levels in the Cruiser of Civilization were dropping. In fact, they had already descended to the level of one one-millionth. Unfortunately, despite having struck a heavy blow to Young Master Leaf, Yang Qi hadn’t benefited at all. In fact, the only thing that seemed to be happening was that he was wasting energy. Thankfully, they were soon approaching the Heaven Beyond Heaven; once they arrived, he would draw on the destiny of Chancellor Demi-Immortal to try to make a connection and power up again.

Although the power from the Heaven Beyond Heaven wasn’t as pure as that from the future world, it was still more than enough for his current purposes.

Three days and nights passed, during which Young Master Leaf remained hot on Yang Qi’s trail. Any primal-chaos debris that got too close to him was melted in the blink of an eye. Young Master Leaf was now so furious that he wasn’t holding anything back in his effort to kill his ambusher.

Yang Qi now realized more than ever that if he didn’t have the Cruiser of Civilization, he wouldn’t have any hope at all of even fleeing Young Master Leaf, let alone fighting him.

At a certain point, he felt something stirring within him.

He pierced through a mass of primal-chaos debris and saw an immortal world up ahead that was larger than anything he had ever seen before.

In fact, only a corner of it was visible within the primal-chaos, yet that was larger than any immortal world Yang Qi had encountered before. At the moment, it was impossible to see exactly how large it was.

After all, thirtieth ranked immortal worlds and higher were so high within the universe that they nestled in the depths of primal-chaos that bordered on the kingdom of the gods.

Unfortunately, only ninth division Chaos Gods—those who understood the dao of primordial chaos—would dare to venture in search of thirty-third ranked immortal worlds. The primordial chaos beasts that lurked in those parts were extremely dangerous, as well as the spell formations. All of them were powerful enough to harm actual gods.

Yes, Yang Qi was now high enough that he was reaching the limits of the universal planes of existence and was approaching a world of pure primal-chaos.

The Heaven Beyond Heaven was ancient, desolate, and completely lacking the fluctuations of living things. It looked like an open mouth that was just waiting to consume anyone who got too close to it.

A smile appeared on Yang Qi’s face as he flew directly toward that mouth.

As for Young Master Leaf, the sight caused a cruel gleam to flicker in his eyes. ‘Go ahead. You think you’re going to find some treasure hidden there? Little do you know that I’ve been here before. Considering the spell formations there, and the vital energy expulsion power at play, you’ll never get inside. Catching you now is going to be as easy as trapping a turtle in a jar.’

Yang Qi became a streak of white light that pierced into the ‘mouth’ of the Heaven Beyond Heaven. Instantly, he was surrounded by an aura that was vaguely familiar.

He had never been to the Heaven Beyond Heaven, or even seen it, yet it was almost like home to him. That, of course, was because of the destiny and memories of Chancellor Demi-Immortal.

‘There really is plenty of power here,’ Yang Qi thought. He quickly hid his own destiny and aura and put Chancellor Demi-Immortal’s onto display. Within moments, a projection of Chancellor Demi-Immortal appeared within the Cruiser of Civilization. Instantly, the power of the Heaven Beyond Heaven began flowing toward Yang Qi. It was roughly as pure as the power of the Tusita Heaven, and Yang Qi quickly channeled it into the Cruiser of Civilization around him.

[Power compatibility, ninety percent.] Compatibility numbers of ninety percent were very high and would lead to rapid recovery.

‘If Chancellor Demi-Immortal had survived, he really would have been able to take over the Heaven Beyond Heaven. He might have even been able to reach the Deathless Throne.’

He was just on the verge of actually entering the Heaven Beyond Heaven. Once he did, he would definitely be able to refill all the power reserves. And perhaps there would even be god crystals for the taking, power similar to that of the future world, with one hundred percent compatibility.

At that point, Yang Qi’s fighting prowess would definitely put him on a level high enough to kill Young Master Leaf. After all, Young Master Leaf was focusing so much on the chase that his recovery had been hindered.

But that was when laughter rang out. “Hello, distant traveler. We've been waiting for you here.”

Suddenly, something like a huge net spread out to cover the entrance of the Heaven Beyond Heaven and six spell formations suddenly popped into existence in front of him.

Six figures stepped out, who were none other than future warriors.

Light Dancer.

Flame Dancer.

Gloom Dancer.

Lightning Dancer.

Sand Dancer.

And last, the leader, Void Dancer.

They were the Warriors of the Great Dance, whose auras were like mountains, seas, or even black holes.

Yang Qi immediately responded with a powerful burst of divine will that carried his words out in all directions. “You got here just in time! I successfully lured Young Master Leaf here with the technology you gave me. He’s hurt, so now's the perfect opportunity to take his life. I’ll leave it all up to you. Kill him and take his legacy medallions, then we Mechfolk and you people from the future world can share the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart!”

Everyone could hear him clearly, even Young Master Leaf.

The Warriors of the Great Dance were stunned and had no idea what was going on. But as for Young Master Leaf, he saw the six warriors and the spell formations they had set up, and smiled viciously. “So, the future world and the Mechfolk have teamed up. And you set up a trap for me here? You even detonated one of my own followers to injure me ahead of time! Let me tell you something. I'm Leaf Dao-Denier, and I'm a god who can never be killed! Immortal-Slaying God Lightning! Tusita Multitudinous Flower Blossoming!”

Holding none of his power back, he summoned a huge, blood-colored volcano behind him, which belched forth countless glittering lotuses. Each lotus was a world of its own, pulsing with rage and fury as they shot toward the Warriors of the Great Dance and Yang Qi.

RUUUUUMBLE!

Young Master Leaf attacked with vicious decisiveness, burning his own quintessence blood and vital energy.

In the blink of an eye, the spell formations that had been set up by the Warriors of the Great Dance shattered into pieces.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi let the momentum of the explosion catch up to him, then directed the Cruiser of Civilization to slip into the Heaven Beyond Heaven.

Behind him, the six Warriors of the Great Dance clashed with Young Master Leaf.

“This is a misunderstanding, Young Master Leaf! We’re being manipulated into hurting each other. We're being taken advantage of!” Void Dancer, the leader, was a strapping man equipped with a pure white mecha that almost looked like it was made from silk. It was so thin that it seemed like a robe, and as he flitted about in it he emanated a profound majesty.

“Hurt each other? Manipulated? No, you’re all going to die!” Not only was Young Master Leaf a skeptical person to begin with, and his soul was so influenced by his rage that he was hardly in a position to be making rational decisions. Furthermore, his previous cooperation with the future world had been a matter of pure practicality. Therefore, he immediately resorted to deadly attacks to try to kill the people blocking his path.

‘That Dragon Proudheaven is a fool to enter the Heaven Beyond Heaven. Maybe he thinks he can escape me by doing that, but he obviously doesn’t know how the place is filled with deadly vital energy vortexes. I’ll kill these people first, absorb their power and vital energy to heal myself, then go after Dragon Proudheaven!’

Howling, Young Master Leaf said, “Shatter the Many Heavens!”

Instantly, the heaven above him shattered into dust that spread out to cover the six Warriors of the Great Dance.

“Damnation!” Void Dancer spat. “This guy is crazy. Does he really think he’s invincible!?”

He and the other warriors had no desire to fight with Young Master Leaf, but right now it seemed that they had no choice.

However, it was in that moment that a bloodcurdling scream rang out from within the Heaven Beyond Heaven. It was Yang Qi. “Don’t any of you come in here! Kill Young Master Leaf out there and get his legacy medallions! Then come here and save me! I never could have guessed the vital energy vortexes in the Heaven Beyond Heaven would be so strong. I'm stuck!”

Hearing this, Young Master Leaf’s arrogance grew and he laughed heartily. “You’re trapped in a thirty-third ranked immortal world and you think you’re going to escape? The Heaven Beyond Heaven is one of the most mysterious of all immortal worlds! Even ninth division Chaos Gods wouldn’t dare to enter that place!”

Chapter 717: The Mysteries of ‘Beyond Heaven&#039;

Yang Qi really was in the midst of an enormous vortex. But his calls for help were a ruse. He was actually absorbing the pure power of the vortex, including power stones filled with godliness, and even liquid power.

As soon as he entered the Heaven Beyond Heaven, he felt resistance, similar to how a person might feel when stepping into a massive waterfall.

It was such an intense level of power that he wasn’t able to adapt at first. Looking around, he saw dazzling lights and colors. However, as he focused his senses, he realized that there were numerous spell formations in the area.

It was obviously a deadly location that most people would never be able to survive in.

However, as the spell formations recognized Chancellor Demi-Immortal’s destiny, the power flows around him softened and the formations didn't assail him. Despite that, moving was still difficult, and felt almost like trying to walk through gelatin.

[Beep-beep-beep. Beep-beep-beep.]

The photonic computers immediately began providing more information.

[Unknown power detected. Godliness detected. Power conversion degree ninety-eight percent. Power compatibility ninety-nine percent.]

As things became clearer, Yang Qi realized that he was in an ancient spell formation filled with bleached bones that were apparently the remains of people who had tried to enter this world, only to be killed. There wasn’t even any spirit energy left in them.

There were also power crystals floating here and there that looked like they were made of nephrite.

Normally speaking, he wouldn’t be able to take such power crystals. They contained a heterogeneous type of energy that would cause a deadly reaction like the attack of an entire army. But thanks to Chancellor Demi-Immortal’s aura, the energy calmed and allowed Yang Qi to simply harvest it.

Thus he began restoring his power reserves.

Gradually, he was able to send his senses back out to see how the battle was faring outside between Young Master Leaf and the six Warriors of the Great Dance.

Young Master Leaf was dead set on cutting down the Warriors of the Great Dance and getting inside the Heaven Beyond Heaven. Obviously, he was aware that the vital energy in that heaven was vastly beyond what ordinary experts could handle.

The Warriors of the Great Dance knew that as well, so they had no intention of going inside. However, Yang Qi’s cries from inside left them furious. They were all thinking roughly the same thing. ‘It doesn’t matter what that brat says, we're not just going to run inside. Once we deal with Young Master Leaf, we’ll have plenty of time to decide what to do next!’

As they continued fighting with Young Master Leaf, both sides were draining their power and inflicting injuries on each other.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi was inside the Heaven Beyond Heaven, absorbing power from the spell formation and slowly working on his cultivation. As he did, and as the power of the Cruiser of Civilization built back up, the Sage Monarch Heaven also received blessings of power and began growing larger as a result.

Everyone there sank into a state of deep dao enlightenment and cultivation.

Crack!

Another lineament appeared on Yang Qi’s dao heart, causing his energy arts to reach an even higher state. His vision was also able to pierce deeper into the Heaven Beyond Heaven, although he was still currently in the border region and had no idea how far it stretched. At the very least, it was no smaller than the Hell of Mahānata. Yang Qi felt like a speck of dust inside of it, looking at the endless cloudy mists, which rippled occasionally and emanated roars that seemed to indicate enormous beasts were inside, hunting prey. There were also numerous spell formations that crunched and cracked with killing intent.

These were god formations of immense scale and size.

A gust of wind rose up, which Yang Qi had the photonic computers analyze.

[Beep-beep-beep. Primal-chaos flame wind detected; can damage virtual godhood. Only true gods can remain unaffected by it.]

‘Incredible. Although it’s no threat to me, I can’t help but wonder how strong Chancellor Demi-Immortal would have become if he found his way here. He would have become invincible, eventually.’

It was a place that was naturally suitable for cultivation, but at the same time it was a deadly place for most people. Chancellor Demi-Immortal would have fit right in, and as he unlocked the secrets and the treasures of the place he would have advanced by leaps and bounds. Eventually, he would have formed a resonance with the immortal world’s essence and power and gained control of the ancient god formations. Then he would have been able to beat nearly any enemy who came at him.

Unfortunately, despite having taken Chancellor Demi-Immortal’s power, Yang Qi couldn’t just directly take control of the place. There were secrets here to be uncovered, and he needed to find its ultimate core. He also needed a much higher cultivation base.

In that respect, it was similar to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

The main difference was that the medallions connected to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart were scattered, and needed to be collected before they could be used to enter the place. In contrast, Yang Qi himself had all the qualifications to enter the Heaven Beyond Heaven with the greatest of ease.

‘In that case, I might as well just stay here, work on my cultivation, and see how things turn out between Young Master Leaf and the Warriors of the Great Dance. Considering how much I hurt Young Master Leaf with that explosion, and how much energy he wasted on the chase, I wonder if the Warriors of the Great Dance will be able to defeat him.’

Outside, the battle was raging.

Young Master Leaf was releasing a consummate divine ability; unbeknownst to his opponents, he was drawing on his powers as a Fortuned One. All sorts of signs suddenly appeared around him; mountains and rivers arose, the cosmos inverted, snow and wind screamed, and yin and yang transposed.

“One Thought Brings Good Fortune; Thought after Thought Create the Macrocosm!”

All of a sudden he thrust his hand out, fingers splayed, unleashing his Fortuned powers and causing immense pressure to weigh down. Of the three thousand special constitutions, the Fortuned Ones possessed one of the top three, allowing them to stand alongside Fateless Ones and Eternal Ones. When they truly unleashed their powers, they were incredibly terrifying.

One palm, one thought. All it took was a single thought for the world to transform to conform to the workings of his mind. In that moment, he was the creator of good fortune; he was the creator of all things.

“Create Fortune; Create the Corporeal!”

He chopped his hand down and Sand Dancer had no time to get out of the way. The blow struck him, and his mecha shattered. A scream rang out, and he transformed into nothing more than a clump of yellow sand that fell into Young Master Leaf’s palm.

“Sand Dancer?” Young Master Leaf smiled viciously. “So that’s your power? You can control sand? Child’s play. You’re strong, but you’re no match for me.”

“Stay your hand!” Void Dancer blurted. He suddenly seemed to flow into the void itself, and when he reappeared he was right above Young Master Leaf, his hand stretching down toward his head.

Young Master Leaf didn’t even look up. “Heavenly Cauldron of Good Fortune!”

True energy erupted from the top of his head in the shape of an enormous cauldron, which Void Dancer’s attack slammed into, causing a sonorous boom to ring out.

‘That attack contains the boundless strength to rip open immortal worlds! But it’s not strong enough to get through that cauldron?’ Void Dancer immediately shot away from Young Master Leaf.

“Too slow!” Young Master Leaf said, his eyes glittering with malice, his lips twisted like those of a ravenous fiend-devil. “Void Dancer, you scum. I can’t believe you challenged me to a fight with such weak power. You really want to fight a Fortuned One? I know that you have a special constitution type. You’re one of the Void Ones!”

Launching another palm strike, he said, “Good Fortune at Heaven’s Peak!Hate Heaven; Never Return!”

The void kingdom around Void Dancer collapsed and his mecha shattered. Blood sprayed out of his mouth and his eyes went wide with disbelief at how vicious Young Master Leaf was. Void Dancer was an important person in the future world, with a high cultivation base, but in the end he wasn’t a match at all for Young Master Leaf.

Now that Young Master Leaf was going all out, the Warriors of the Great Dance were on the verge of being wiped out.

“Six Warriors Combined; God Dancer Transformation!”

Void Dancer immediately burst into flames, as did the other warriors. Even the life force of Sand Dancer flowed out of Young Master Leaf’s hand as all of them combined into one.

The God Dancer had arrived.

This God Dancer glowed with golden light and was surrounded by countless bolts of electricity. Everything else in the area seemed to vanish except for that one enormous warrior, who carried a cudgel that seemed capable of propping up heaven and destroying everything in existence.

“So this is the power of your so-called God Dancer? Young Master Leaf said with a disdainful smile. “I guess the abilities from your future world really are shallow and weak. Well, I’ll just destroy you and take your power for myself.”

He burst into flames and thunder, making him seem almost like a volcano surrounded by drums of war.

“King of Good Fortune!”

A projection of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart appeared, causing the power of monarchs to flow into him as he launched an attack directly at God Dancer’s cudgel.

Gong!

A massive boom rang out as they clashed. The primal-chaos debris outside the Heaven Beyond Heaven was shoved away violently in all directions, and many of the beasts that lurked in the area were wiped out of existence.

Cracks spread out over the surface of God Dancer’s mecha, the golden light of which was already starting to fade. Young Master Leaf looked as majestic as ever, but Yang Qi could sense that he was short on breath and his heart was beating irregularly. Obviously, he couldn’t sustain this level of power forever.

Young Master Leaf didn’t seem to notice. “Prepare to die, Warriors of the Great Dance! Monarch of Myriad Monarchs!”

Chapter 718: Finally Profiting

The fight between Young Master Leaf, whose name was Leaf Dao-Denier, and the six Warriors of the Great Dance, had reached a fever pitch.

Leaf Dao-Denier had lost patience and was unleashing his most powerful attack, Monarch of Myriad Monarchs. As the attack rumbled out, the power of monarchs shot out from the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart and filled the entire battlefield.

As the power of the deadly move converged, it turned into a glowing ball of energy that slammed into God Dancer. God Dancer collapsed, and Void Dancer, along with the other five Warriors of the Great Dance, all tumbled out with expressions of profound shock on their face as they turned to look at Young Master Leaf.

Striding toward them, Leaf Dao-Denier said, “I wanted to work with you people to uncover some of the secrets of the Dragonfolk elders. But instead you joined the Mechfolk to oppose me? And you thought I would just let that slide?”

“Back in formation!” Void Dancer shouted, alarm flickering across his face. Unfortunately, before they could, Leaf Dao-Denier flicked his hands out and caused a host of chains to pop into being, which slammed down onto them.

Clenching his hand into a fist, he said, “First, I’ll dig your hearts out of your chests. From what I've heard, all of you people from the future have your hearts replaced with reactors to ensure you have constant sources of power. And of course, without them, you’ll die.”

Leaf Dao-Denier’s hand shot toward the six Warriors of the Great Dance with such speed and ferocity that it seemed impossible to evade. All they could do was watch as death approached.

“Six Dances Reincarnation; Six Glowing God Planets; Link to the Future!”

In that moment of crisis, the six warriors finally drew on the deadly power of the future world, causing them to suddenly melt.

“Bodily Destruction; Space-Time Rebirth; Mutual Destruction; Shared Extirpation!”

Bam!

Void Dancer was the first of the group to transform into a power double. It was a nirvanic rebirth in which the physical body burst into flames then became an enormous planet.

All six of the Warriors of the Great Dance became planets, which settled into a spell formation that opened a wormhole linking directly to the future world. All of a sudden, an indescribably powerful godpower appeared that shot forth and slammed into Young Master Leaf.

“A summoning ability? You’re calling power from the future world? You scum! I'm going to slaughter my way to the future world and force everyone there to grovel beneath my feet!”

Young Master Leaf didn’t seem worried at all about the power they were summoning. Drawing on King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions, he said, “The Immortal-Slaying King, Great Monarch Conqueror; Second Stance: Myriad Worlds, Myriad Monarchs!”

RUUUUUUMBLE!

A myriad of worlds popped into being around him, within each of which was a monarch. They flew forward and met the summoned godpower of the six Warriors of the Great Dance. Apparently, Young Master Leaf’s madness infuriated the godpower from the future. All of a sudden, the trumpeting of a megamammoth erupted from the wormhole and the image of millions upon millions of hells appeared above Young Master Leaf.

Crunch!

Young Master Leaf’s move of Myriad Worlds, Myriad Monarchs was crushed out of existence.

In the blink of an eye, Young Master Leaf was smashed into a bloody pulp. After screaming in agony, he let out a furious roar.

“What energy art is that? Is that really something from the future world?” A tremor passed through Yang Qi as he wondered if he could trust his own ears. He was convinced that, along with the appearance of the sand-like mass of hells, he had heard the trumpet of a megamammoth. In fact, he was absolutely certain that it came from the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.

There could only be one explanation; this attack originated from whatever almighty entity of the future that possessed the God Legion Seal. That person had released some of the power of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, and that tiny fraction completely surpassed anything Yang Qi was capable of.

However, after crushing Young Master Leaf into a mass of gore, the connection to the future world faded away.

Suddenly, the weakened voice of Void Dancer could be heard. “It took all of our power to summon just a tiny fluctuation of the great leader’s power. Now that Young Master Leaf is injured, let’s make our escape!”

“No, we need to take advantage of the moment to kill him!”

“This is impossible! He’s not dead? Incredible. The great leader struck him from the future, but he survived?”

“Let’s go!”

“This Young Master Leaf is too terrifying! Summoning that scrap of power completely drained us. We definitely aren’t strong enough to fight now. We have to flee!”

The six planets turned and began flying off into the distance.

All of a sudden, Yang Qi burst out into the open.

“Running away!? You Warriors of the Great Dance have terrifying fighting prowess, and I can’t possibly let that go to waste! I'm going to transform you into dharmic guard puppets! This is perfect! If you’ve really run out of energy, I’ll just fill you back up!” He had been waiting for the moment to make his move, and now he reached out, grabbed the six planets, and pulled them into the Cruiser of Civilization, where he sealed them tight.

Then the enormous main cannon of the cruiser opened up.

[Power reserves emptied. Cannon of Civilization primed. Primary attack charge prepared… secondary attack charge prepared… fire!]

BOOOOOOOM!

Yang Qi was drawing on the most powerful attack possible. Right now, his cultivation base was insufficient to strike a fatal blow on his own. He wasn’t a Godmyth, so even his best personal effort couldn't possibly match up to Leaf Dao-Denier.

But the Cannon of Civilization could. Powering it up to the greatest degree possible, he unleashed a point-blank blast at Leaf Dao-Denier.

“AGGGHHHHHHH! What’s the level of your cultivation base!? You damaged my essence! That’s a lordly energy art!? Dammit!” Young Master Leaf had just been reduced to a bloody paste by an attack from a future world-version of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, then struck by a blow from Yang Qi that might as well have been an attack by the legion of gods.

“That's the power of the God Legion Seal! It vanquished the true energy of my legacy medallions! The future world is truly terrifying! Fine, I’ll go recover and come back later to take that God Legion Seal. Time to restore my Fortuned One body: Monarch Rebirth Magic; Good Fortune Energy!”

The godpower of good fortune suddenly rushed out of nowhere, and the pile of blood and gore turned back into Young Master Leaf.

However, as soon as he opened his eyes, he realized that he was looking right down the barrel of the Cannon of Civilization.

“No!” he shouted, and all of a sudden the power of his legacy medallions roared to life. “The Monarch Immortal-Slayer and the Seventy-Two Souls!”

This was the last move he had at his disposal, in which he summoned seventy-two souls from within the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart that spread around him in a defensive pattern. It happened just in time to meet the blast of the Cannon of Civilization.

Crack. Crunch.

The firepower slammed into the seventy-two souls, destroying them one by one until the three composite legacy medallions of King Immortal-Slayer appeared, which then collapsed into separate sections. One of the sections began speeding off in a random direction.

Delighted, Yang Qi reached out, grabbed the errant medallion, and immediately fused with it.

He now had four of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions!

The power of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart coursed through him as he finally surpassed the level of three medallions.

Back when King Immortal-Slayer was destroyed, his legacy medallion split into nine parts, creating nine unique legacy medallions that were scattered in all directions. Originally, it was intended for three individuals to collect three each, then fight to the death to join them all together. But now Yang Qi had collected four, breaking the intended equilibrium.

“I didn't want four, though. I want five. Or six!”

Unsatisfied, Yang Qi prepared to press the attack.

However, the ancient souls were gone and Leaf Dao-Denier was nowhere to be seen. Left behind were two legacy medallions, floating there in space. Yang Qi reached out to grab them, but they exploded; they had been mere illusions.

In the moment that Leaf Dao-Denier lost one of the legacy medallions, he knew that he was in a losing position in the fight and had used a secret magic to make a quick getaway.

‘He’s really strong, that's for sure,’ Yang Qi thought, and couldn’t help but admire Leaf Dao-Denier a bit. Even after pulling out all the stops, he had still failed to kill him. He had fought with the Warriors of the Great Dance, suffered a blow from an almighty future world entity, and sustained direct blasts from the Cannon of Civilization. Despite all of that, he lived, and had only ended up losing a single legacy medallion.

It was a level of strength and power that Yang Qi knew he was far inferior to.

Obviously, there were more secrets to Leaf Dao-Denier than Yang Qi was aware of.

‘It's too bad I didn't get those two pieces of the Aeonic God Psalter from him. Otherwise I would have been able to improve my Aeonic Heaven-Dao Life-Destruction Zen Art, and maybe chase him down to get more of the legacy medallions. Well, at least he can’t get back into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, but I can. I have to figure out a way to kill him. If he recovers, he’ll be a mortal malady to me. Thankfully, he doesn’t know who I really am, and hopefully he still suspects the Mechfolk as the true culprits. Now to combine these legacy medallions.’

BUZZ!

The four legacy medallions clicked together and unleashed immense immortal-slaying power.

The immortal-slaying clone appeared and power poured into him, almost instantly causing tribulation clouds to appear above him. Lightning flashed, and the godpower of metal, wood, water, fire, and earth created five phases warriors and god-generals, who then assailed him.

The immortal-slaying clone was breaking into the Godmyth level!

Chapter 719: Chasing Young Master Leaf

With the fourth of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions, the immortal-slaying clone was breaking through the restraints that held him and bounding forward into the Godmyth level.

Before, the clone’s level had been tied to the level of his true self. Without his true self having reached the Godmyth level first, the clone couldn’t do so. But things had changed. Because of how unique King Immortal-Slayer had been, the immortal-slaying clone was also profoundly unique and could actually surpass his true self.

Yang Qi wasn’t surprised by this.

“Clone, you work on your tribulation here—I'm sure you’ll pass it. Afterward, head into the Heaven Beyond Heaven to further your cultivation.” With a thought, Yang Qi collected some of Chancellor Demi-Immortal’s aura and passed it to the clone. Then he turned and vanished without a trace, taking the fourth legacy medallion with him.

That medallion still had Leaf Dao-Denier’s aura on it, and it made the other two medallions which had been part of a set with it shine like torches on a moonless night. Tracking them down would be a simple thing for Yang Qi.

Besides, he now had more of the legacy medallions than anyone else in existence, thus sensing the other medallions was even easier.

He now knew for certain that Young Master Leaf had two, and that the other three were in the future, in the hands of some almighty entity. Clearly, that figure would hope to eventually travel through the passageway to the present time and try to collect the other medallions.

Swish!

The Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart opened and Yang Qi entered as easily as a fish sliding through water.

It was much easier to open the chart with four medallions than three, and it was also easier to call on the power of the chart to unleash attacks.

Right now, the power he could unleash from the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart could rival the Cannon of Civilization, which went to show the vast difference that one of the legacy medallions could make.

Meanwhile, Young Master Leaf was speeding through the void as fast as he possibly could.

Unfortunately for him, that did him little good. Even as he moved along, his two legacy medallions twitched and Yang Qi dropped out of nowhere to block his path.

“Why run, Young Master Leaf? I have four of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions now, and can completely dominate you.”

“King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions?” Young Master Leaf replied, sounding very cool and collected. “Who are you? Are you really one of the Mechfolk?” Although he was severely injured and somewhat muddle-headed, he was still a supremely powerful individual. Furthermore, he knew that he was the kind of person who, even in his dying moment, could take the most powerful adversaries out with him.

Yang Qi knew that too, and didn’t let his guard down in the least bit.

“It’s not important who I am. What’s important is that you’ve lost to me.” Yang Qi slowly began walking forward. “You can’t escape, Young Master Leaf. Hand over those other two legacy medallions. I'm willing to negotiate here, maybe even spare your life. I know you’re a top genius, and you might even be able to help me accomplish unprecedented deeds. What do you say?”

The truth was that Yang Qi was dead set on killing Young Master Leaf. He knew what type of person he was: the kind who would never acknowledge allegiance to another. Young Master Leaf even wanted to eradicate the will of King Immortal-Slayer and eventually surpass him. People like that would never willingly work for another person, and would eventually rebel and fight any who tried to control them.

“Is that so?” Young Master Leaf said with a grim smile. “So you want me to work for you? To be used by you? You think that your plots have given you the upper hand? You think you qualify to fight me now? Let me tell you something: victory and defeat have not been decided. And in fact, I want those four medallions of yours for my own.”

As the words left his mouth, he suddenly attacked.

A thousand projections and ten thousand streams of light appeared. Within them could be seen a pitch-black palm that viciously slammed into Yang Qi’s kingdom and lunged toward the four legacy medallions.

Thud! Wham! Whiz!

Unexpectedly, the four legacy medallions suddenly lurched out of Yang Qi’s grasp.

Shocked, Yang Qi said, “Where did you get an energy art like that?!”

At the same time, he unleashed the power of the God Legion Seal to lock the medallions in place and unleashed a palm strike of his own. The Heaven-Questioning Soul-Summoning Banner appeared, wiping out the light of Young Master Leaf’s attack, who let out an astonished shriek as he staggered backward.

“You have something that surpasses King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions in terms of strength? You can fully suppress them, can’t you? Otherwise I would have taken them already! How could this be happening? I used the blood of King Immortal-Slayer to fuel that attack! How could you suppress it?”

“You have some of King Immortal-Slayer’s blood?” Now Yang Qi knew why the medallions had reacted the way they did. They would only respond in such a way if they were provoked by the blood of their original owner.

Yet that didn’t bother Yang Qi. Speaking in a voice that would strike fear into the heart of any enemy, he said, “Even if you have the blood of King Immortal-Slayer and all seventy-one of his brethren, Young Master Leaf, I'm still going to kill you.”

“Go ahead and try!” A drop of blood appeared behind Young Master Leaf, which spread out into a sinister projection of King Immortal-Slayer himself. It was deep red, making him seem like a blood-devil emerged from the darkest and most mysterious of hells, or a god-king from the kingdom of gods. The specter reached out a hand toward Yang Qi, clearly intent on grabbing the legacy medallions.

As the blood-colored projection reached out, Leaf Dao-Denier reached into his garment and pulled out a bottle with a god pill in it. The bottle itself was covered with numerous sealing marks, making it clear how important it was. A host of paper talismans appeared in Leaf Dao-Denier’s hand, which he used to open the bottle. Instantly, a strong medicinal aroma spread out and everything in the area went dim. As for Yang Qi, he could instantly sense a powerful deathless godliness inside the bottle.

“You’re really forcing my hand, brat,” Leaf Dao-Denier said. “I didn’t want to use this Tusita God Pill, the product of a paramount god-spirit that I found in a godrelic I explored. But you've given me no other choice. Thanks to you, I'm only going to be able to use ten percent of the full medicinal effect. But even that little bit will be enough to kill you and restore me to full strength!”

Smiling viciously, he inhaled deeply, causing the god pill to slowly rise up from the bottom of the bottle.

A resonance formed with heaven and earth. The universe twitched, and a chiliocosm of worlds rejoiced, all at the mere appearance of this god pill. There was no doubt about it; if Leaf Dao-Denier used this pill, the consequences would be too horrible to contemplate.

However, it was almost as if the god pill were so incredibly weighty that Leaf Dao-Denier was having trouble removing it from the bottle, which itself was a powerful god item.

Instead, he had to send true energy into the bottle to acquire the approval of the pill itself. And that was why he could only use some of its power.

‘My god. Leaf Dao-Denier has something like that?’ It was a serious inner blow to Yang Qi, who knew that if his opponent completely restored his cultivation base to normal, it would lead to a complete and utter defeat on his own part. That was something he absolutely, positively could not allow to happen!

“Hey, Young Master Leaf!” he cried. “You want to see what I have that can dominate King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions? Since you’re about to die, I’m happy to reveal the truth!”

Without any hesitation, he burned the one hundred percent bit of the Blood of the One God that he had.

The golden imp flew out into the open, blurring toward the blood-red soul projection of King Immortal-Slayer. The imp’s hands flew out and slammed into King Immortal-Slayer’s soul, which let out a miserable howl before dissipating into nothing.

‘God Legion Seal: take that god pill!’

Yang Qi spat out a mouthful of blood, which ignited as the God Legion Seal stirred into motion, sending a stream of golden light out to cover Leaf Dao-Denier.

“What?” When Leaf Dao-Denier saw the golden imp, his eyes nearly popped out of their sockets and his heart was suddenly overcome with immense terror. “The God Legion Seal! It’s that thing! Who are you? How do you have something so terrifying?”

Leaf Dao-Denier was the kind of person who generally didn’t fear anything in heaven or earth. But when the God Legion Seal appeared, he felt overwhelmed with terror.

It was a power and majesty that he couldn't possibly fight against. The Sovereign Lord existed above the legion of gods, and it was only the most pious devotion and prayer to him that could produce the God Legion Seal. Although Yang Qi only had one third of it, it was still vastly beyond anything Leaf Dao-Denier could handle. Not even being a Fortuned One would help him.

‘Time to go for broke!’ Leaf Dao-Denier thought. In a sudden burst of inspiration, he hurled the pill bottle at the God Legion Seal’s attack, then turned and became a blood-colored light that blurred off into the distance.

Worried that the pill bottle might be destroyed, Yang Qi negated the attack and grabbed it. “Got it!”

His Blood of the One God having burned away, he reigned in the God Legion Seal.

‘What a pity. My Blood of the One God has dropped far too low!’

He sighed. Unfortunately, without burning that blood and activating the God Legion Seal, he would definitely have been killed by Leaf Dao-Denier.

The only upside was that he had acquired a god pill.

Looking at the pill bottle with the Lord's Eye, he caught sight of a boundless world of gods.

Chapter 720: God Pill

Looking inside the pill bottle he saw, not just a mere pill, but rather an entire world. It was filled with apsaras, yakshas, medicine kings, medicine spirits, and they seemed to come into existence and be extinguished moment by moment. They were as numerous as ants, and from what Yang Qi could sense, they were all actual living beings with their own life forces, short though they may be.

As he inhaled, roiling medicinal energy poured into him, completely replenishing his power and provoking a response from the Cruiser of Civilization.

[Deathless godpower: power compatibility one hundred percent… unique power signature, insert for increased strength….]

‘Forget it,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘This is too valuable to waste on the Cruiser of Civilization. I'm going to take it.’

He opened his mouth and inhaled deeply, absorbing the medicinal energy into himself. Immediately, his depleted Blood of the One God began building back up, and before long, it was completely back to normal. That alone went to show how powerful this god pill was.

Unfortunately, Yang Qi faced the same problem that Leaf Dao-Denier had faced; trying to take full advantage of the god pill was impossible. He might as well have tried to inhale a mountain.

He just wasn’t strong enough for the whole thing.

That said, even a bit of the medicinal power was enough to help him advance by leaps and bounds, pushing him closer and closer toward a breakthrough into the Godmyth level.

‘Who could have guessed that Leaf Dao-Denier would have something like this on him? I have to track him down and get those other legacy medallions. Once I get the fifth and sixth pieces, collecting the others will be much easier.’

At the moment, he wasn't feeling greedy. He just wanted to get one more medallion. If he did, he would have a total of five, which meant that the most any other person could collect would be four. And such a person would have a hard time taking his away. Conversely, if he only collected four, while another person collected five, that person would quickly become the bane of his existence.

That was why chasing down Young Master Leaf was an absolute necessity.

Drawing on the powers of the four medallions, he yet again summoned an image of Young Master Leaf, who was currently flying in the direction of an enormous violet immortal world. Yang Qi’s face fell. ‘Not good! He’s trying to get back into the Tusita Heaven. If he succeeds, I’ll never be able to get him, and worse, I’ll be in great danger. I hurt him a bit, but didn’t damage his destiny, which means that if he recovers, the consequences will be too horrible to contemplate.’

Eyes blazing, he opened the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, performed a teleportation, and popped out right in front of Leaf Dao-Denier.

He was determined not to let Leaf Dao-Denier escape this time. Throwing his hand out, he unleashed a host of godwarding spells, and also drew on the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, the Cannon of Civilization, immortal-slaying power, and other deadly moves, forming all of them into a combined attack of devastating proportions.

“You really want to kill me, don’t you?” Leaf Dao-Denier said. That much was obvious from how Yang Qi didn’t waste time with words and simply launched a furious attack.

“Not necessarily. Give me the command medallion and maybe I won’t kill you.” Despite giving utterance to such words, Yang Qi unleashed the most deadly of moves. Each attack was backed with full power and he didn’t pay attention at all to how much true energy it was draining. After all, he still had the god pill, which could replenish him with a mere inhalation.

“Die!” he shouted, devastating all of Leaf Dao-Denier’s defensive measures, and then activating the God Legion Seal in what he hoped would be a mortal blow.

“Even if you defeat me today, I’ll still come back later for revenge! I’ll get the essence of the Tusita Heaven, and once I'm its ruler I’ll be able to kill you as easily as turning over my hand!”

Seemingly resolved in his next course of action, Leaf Dao-Denier exhaled a stream of violet light, which was none other than a paper talisman inscribed with violet energy from the east that pierced all the way through the void to attack the God Legion Seal.

Bam!

The God Legion Seal ripped it to shreds, but by the time that happened, Leaf Dao-Denier had vanished. He reappeared a moment later, even closer to the Tusita Heaven.

“What the fuck!” Yang Qi blurted. “How does this guy have so many magical treasures?! None of them are a match for my God Legion Seal, but each one buys him a bit of time. Don’t tell me he’s really going to get away from me?! Damnation! His cultivation level is too high for me to use the Glad Tidings of the Lord on him. Maybe the Wheel of Fate will be able to distort his fate enough for me to kill him.”

Yang Qi activated the Wheel of Fate and immediately locked onto Leaf Dao-Denier’s fate. It was long, complex, and abundant. It had been damaged by Yang Qi, but the closer he got to the Tusita Heaven, the more that immortal world blessed him. It seemed clear that there was no way to truly harm or kill him now.

‘So that’s how it is. He has the approval and legacy of the immortal world essence of the Tusita Heaven.’ Shocked, Yang Qi pooled all the power he could muster to fling a fist strike at his opponent’s back.

Even as the fist-wind bore down on Young Master Leaf, a mighty expression of will erupted from the Tusita Heaven.

“Who dares to attack Dao-Denier?”

Numerous bolts of lightning appeared, forming into a long spear that stabbed toward Yang Qi just as aggressively as he would normally attack with his Infernal Deity Spear.

‘Not good. Some almighty enemy has appeared!’

The Tusita Heaven was an enormous place that not even Yang Qi would dare to try to defy. And the power that was now on display made it clear that he had to give up his pursuit of Leaf Dao-Denier. If he didn’t, he would end up dead.

‘I have to get out of here!’ Without the slightest hesitation, he turned in place and then vanished.

The lightning spear continued to shoot forward, transforming an entire swath of the void into a sea of lightning before fading away. When it was over, Leaf Dao-Denier finally stopped moving. Panting for breath, he glared hatefully in the direction Yang Qi had vanished but didn't give chase.

“This grudge will never go away. I'm going to get revenge by killing him. Sooner or later.” It was an oath sworn to heaven by Leaf Dao-Denier.

WHOOSH!

An old man appeared behind him, surrounded by a crackling world of lightning. “What happened here, Leaf Dao-Denier? I can’t believe that person beat you up this badly! You've lost a lot of face for the Leaf Clan here!”

Leaf Dao-Denier gave an angry snort. “What right do you have to criticize me, Leaf Lightning? What if I told you that he has a God Legion Seal? That would be a pretty monumental secret, don’t you agree?”

Upon hearing the news, Leaf Lightning staggered backward in shock. “What? God Legion Seal? That young man you were fighting has a God Legion Seal?”

“Thanks to the fight with him, I learned a lot. I did lose, but not to him. I was defeated by the God Legion Seal. That seal was created by the faith of all the living things in the many heavens, directed to the Sovereign Lord. That person must have an incredible destiny to have acquired it, but sadly for him, I'm going to kill him and take it. The God Legion Seal is going to be mine soon.

“Don’t worry, his cultivation base is pathetically weak. I’ll capture him alive and force the God Legion Seal out of him. With it, we can quell the unrest in the Tusita Heaven, then go on to make the countless other immortal worlds our personal territory. Soon, I’ll be just like the leader of the future world!” Leaf Dao-Denier burst out laughing. “It's time to go back and take the Essence Trial of the Tusita Heaven.”

“What?” Leaf Lightning said. “You’re going to take the Essence Trial? If you pass that test, you’ll become the true ruler of the Tusita Heaven. But no one has passed that test for billions of years! And if you fail, you die. Aren’t you worried you might get killed?”

“Someone with a God Legion Seal just chased me down and tried to kill me. I could sense the immense destiny on him, and to be honest, it frightened me. But I survived, and in the process, gained enlightenment. I'm definitely going to take control of the essence of the Tusita Heaven, gain its legacy, and become the ruler of this immortal world. Later, I’ll reach the Deathless Throne and rival the glory of the legion of gods.” A profoundly ruthless smile appeared on Leaf Dao-Denier’s face.

As for Leaf Lightning, he broke out into a cold sweat. ‘Leaf Dao-Denier is the most powerful genius in our Leaf Clan, but I can’t believe he’s this confident. If a child of the Leaf Clan really becomes the ultimate lord of the Tusita Heaven and is approved by its essence… then that means all of creation will become the property of the Leaf Clan! We’re truly going to become like an imperial house!’

Leaf Dao-Denier blurred into motion, heading into the gloriously violet Tusita Heaven. Almost as soon as the immortal energy there touched him, he became even stronger than before.

**

Some distance away, Yang Qi was looking at a photonic computer screen that depicted Young Master Leaf entering the Tusita Heaven.

‘What a pity he slipped through my fingers.’

Unfortunately, the photonic computers couldn’t see inside the Tusita Heaven itself. It was a thirty-third ranked immortal world, with an essence that not even the immense power of the Cruiser of Civilization could pierce through.

However, Yang Qi had been able to eavesdrop on the conversation between Leaf Dao-Denier and Leaf Lightning.

When he heard that Leaf Dao-Denier was going to take the Essence Trial, he knew that it could prove to be a bit problematic. At the very least, it signaled the pending need to abandon the identity of Dragon Proudheaven. However, the fact that Leaf Dao-Denier was going into hiding to take the trial meant that Yang Qi had a bit of time to work with. He could still act as the god-doctor and, for the time being, didn’t need to worry about the Immortal-Slayer’s Sect.

‘For now, I’ll focus on my own matters. Now that my immortal-slaying clone has Chancellor Demi-Immortal’s aura, he can work on his cultivation in the Heaven Beyond Heaven. And he can send power from there to me via the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Meanwhile, I can focus on my own cultivation for a time.’

With the four legacy medallions, his ability to use the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart had improved and he could easily sense the vital energy of the Heaven Beyond Heaven through it. And it was an easy task to establish a connection and move power between there and any other location.

Chapter 721: The Dragonfolk Arrive

The Heaven Beyond Heaven was huge, and at the moment, he couldn’t fully draw on it. He needed to improve his cultivation base before he could explore its depths. When the time came, he would search its spell formations and nexus points, find its core, assimilate its essence, and gain full control of the place.

It was a process that couldn’t be hurried, but only accomplished one step at a time.

Besides, he was fairly certain the chaotic vital energy depths of the Heaven Beyond Heaven contained fierce, gigantic entities that would need to be cleared out. And that would be a dangerous task.

All Chancellor Demi-Immortal’s aura did was ensure that the defensive spell formations protecting the place wouldn’t oppose him. It wouldn’t do anything about the other ravenous dangers inside.

Thus, his immortal-slaying clone remained in place, working on his cultivation, absorbing vital energy to improve his own cultivation base and channeling power out for Yang Qi to use.

As Yang Qi received that power, he sent it into the Cruiser of Civilization, gradually replacing the power reserves that had been so severely drained during his fierce battle with Leaf Dao-Denier.

Thankfully, the extra legacy medallion and the god pill provided a big boost.

Yang Qi was currently on his way back to the Dao Defense League to continue his cultivation. He obviously didn’t want to just abandon the business he had set up there. As the war heated up between the future world and the immortal worlds, the demand for morphblight treatment increased, and the resulting profit was a huge benefit to the Sage Monarch Heaven.

WHOOOOOSH!

Descending from the higher levels of the universe, he neared the area where numerous fortified locations had been set up by both sides, between which fierce fighting played out.

Along the way, he saw future warriors pillaging and looting various areas, and fighting with immortals. The flames of war burned high. Bizarre morphlings could be seen here and there, taking every opportunity to ambush immortals and devour them.

The future world was a cancer that was slowly spreading and infecting the immortal worlds, and even seeping into the primal-chaos void.

Yang Qi paid little attention to it all, though he did slaughter the future warriors and morphlings that he encountered.

It was an easy thing for him. None of these future warriors were even close to being on the same level as the Warriors of the Great Dance, and of course, the morphlings were even less of a threat.

The Warriors of the Great Dance were crack troops from the future world, with terrifying fighting prowess at the level of sixth division Revisionist Gods. As for Void Dancer, he was at the peak of the Revisionist God level, putting him very close to a breakthrough to the Measureless God level.

The fact that Young Master Leaf had been able to hurt them so badly indicated that he was probably around the Measureless God level himself.

Right now, Yang Qi needed to use his newly acquired god pill, and whatever other means necessary, to break through to the Godmyth level. Otherwise, an eighth division Buddha God or a ninth division Chaos God could theoretically come along and cause huge problems for him.

Eventually, he arrived in the territory of the Nine Yangs God Sect.

There were a lot of disciples gathered at the main entrance, and as soon as they saw him they clustered around him. “Young Sir Dragon Proudheaven, you’re back! Sir, there are a lot of patients waiting to be treated by you. Even some of your own people! And the medicine you left is losing effectiveness! A lot of patients are about to die! They’re furious!”

“My own people?” Yang Qi said, stunned. It took a moment for him to realize that, since he had assumed the identity of one of the Dragonfolk, that must be who they were talking about.

‘Some of the Dragonfolk came? I thought they didn’t participate in the affairs of the world, including wars? They’re unusually independent and look out for their own interests, so why would they send experts here to fight? And some of them contracted the morphblight virus? Don’t tell me they’ve seen through my disguise. There’s no way. The Dragonfolk are a huge group, and they surely have plenty of mysterious figures. Besides, after assimilating August Patriarch Fire Dragon I got some pure dragon energy. I cultivated the Eight Tribes Godfist to a very high level, and the Cruiser of Civilization can replicate the aura of the Dragonfolk. I should be fine. I can just pretend to be an expert from some obscure subsidiary branch, and they’ll never know the difference.’

After contemplating these things for a moment, he said, “The medicine I left behind is losing effectiveness? What's going on?”

Yang Qi had been at this work for about a year, and had prepared a lot of medicine for his disciples to use if he left. It should have been more than enough to deal with the morphblight, but now it seemed the virus had mutated.

“Apparently, the future world created a new strain of morphblight,” one of the disciples replied. “It’s so strong that it's virtually impossible to save anyone who contracts it. The upside is that the medicine you left can at least slow the effects. But given enough time, all of the infected victims will die. Thankfully, you’re back now, sir. Maybe you can do something about it.”

“Oh? Take me to them immediately.” Yang Qi strode into the Heaven-Dragon Medicine Sect. The first sound that met his ears was a crash as the main plaque above the secondary entrance was smashed, and someone shouted, “Is that god-doctor Dragon Proudheaven of yours back yet? Is he looking to get killed? If something happens to the young sir of our clan, I’ll make the entire Nine Yangs God Sect pay for it!”

Frowning, Yang Qi looked into the spacious main hall and saw quite a few people laying in the various beds, most of them with low-level cultivation bases. However, there was one group of burly men, all of them clad in armor, with cruel, arrogant expressions on their faces. Some were older, some were younger, but all of them were clustered around one particular youth who was clearly afflicted with morphblight.

The young man lay on an enormous wooden bed that was itself a god item, festooned with a host of stars and planets, with a group of leaderless dragons drifting among them. It was a very stern and awe-inspiring sight.

‘Dragonfolk?’ Yang Qi thought.

Unexpectedly, they really were Dragonfolk, and from the aura and power they thrummed with, they came from a thirty-third ranked immortal world. Their mere breathing caused magical symbols resembling dragon scales to fill the area, transforming everything around them into a kingdom of dragons.

In fact, at a certain point, the effects spread to include one of the nearby patients, an old man who suddenly screamed as scales spread out over him and he began to be dragonized.

The patient's wounds suddenly became far worse, and blood oozed out of him as he grew fangs like a morphling.

“Hmph! Another patient turning into a morphling? Just kill him!” One of the burly Dragonfolk walked over and extended his palm, causing the roar of millions upon millions of dragons to fill the air as he launched a blow at the patient’s chest.

A young woman stood next to the old patient and rushed forward to try to defend him, but the mere force of the blow sent her flying off to the side.

“Stay your hand!” Yang Qi said, striding forward to block the attack.

The burly Dragonfolk’s expression turned vicious. “Who are you, brat? Looking to die? Fine, the two of you can die together! Swimming Dragon Flits through Heaven!”

The burly man suddenly became like a loach, flitting through space to launch a vicious blow toward Yang Qi’s acupoints. It was an attack filled with such numerous variations that, although it seemed like a superficial martial technique, it actually contained a very profound spatial divine ability.

“Trying to show off in my presence? Sadly, you’re not at that level.” Hardly seeming to pay attention, Yang Qi threw his hand out, fingers splayed as if he were about to grab the universe itself. Space coagulated, and before the burly Dragonfolk could do anything, Yang Qi’s palm slapped his chest.

The burly man was flung backward violently, blood spraying out of his mouth until he slammed into the wall, where he was embedded so deeply he looked like a bas relief carving.

“How dare you, villain!”

“Kill him!”

In the blink of an eye, a host of Dragonfolk experts all attacked with deadly force. Meanwhile, the disciples of the Nine Yangs God Sect shouted, “Stay your hands! This is Young Sir Dragon Proudheaven! If you hurt him, how can your own young sir get healed?”

The experts quickly ceased attacking.

“What? You’re Dragon Proudheaven?

“Hurry up and heal our young sir!”

Despite not attacking them, they still strode forward as if they planned to take Yang Qi captive.

Ignoring them, Yang Qi sent some gentle force into the old patient behind him, causing the scales to fade away. After a moment, the man opened his eyes.

“Father!” the young woman said.

“Many thanks, God-Doctor. I'm sorry for the trouble I caused you. Please, accept this gift.” The old man quickly handed over the gift he had prepared. “I'm from the twentieth ranked immortal world, the Rising Flood Heaven. I'm a prime elder from the Martial Rising Sect, so if you ever need any help, please, seek me out, we won’t refuse you.”

With that, the old man hurried away, leaving behind a few words echoing behind him. “Those dragons nearly took my life and I'm not going to forget it. I’ll get revenge sooner or later.”

“Are you feeling suicidal or something?” the Dragonfolk experts shouted, but then Yang Qi snorted coldly, and the pressure weighed down heavily on the hall, much to the shock of the Dragonfolk.

At this point, Yang Qi looked around at all the patients. “I'm sorry to have kept you all waiting. Please be patient while I heal all of you.”

Chapter 722: Dragon Everlasting

“Hold on!”

One of the older ones from the Dragonfolk walked over to where the burly fellow had been smashed into the wall by Yang Qi and dug him out. After pouring some true energy into him, the burly man recovered.

Dragonfolk had particularly doughty constitutions and recovered quickly from injuries. The burly man glared over at Yang Qi and said, “I can’t believe how rude you were just now, brat. I heard you were Dragonfolk, and when you attacked me now, I sensed the aura of a fire dragon. Well, fire dragons are the lowliest and most despicable of the bloodlines. They don’t even come close to comparing to the Eight Tribes. How dare you strike me, a member of the noblest of all the tribes, the God Dragon Tribe! Get on your knees this instant and acknowledge allegiance to me. Show some respect and courtesy!”

The Eight Tribes of the Dragonfolk were the Heaven, True, God, Infernal, Bone, Netherworld, Devil, and Buddha Dragon Tribes.

The most revered of them all, and also the most mysterious, was the Buddha Dragon Tribe. Ranking directly under them were the God, Heaven, and True Dragon Tribes. After them came the tribes of Infernal, Devil, Netherworld, and Bone.

The Bone Dragon Tribe ranked absolute last.

The fire dragons didn’t even rank within the Eight Tribes and didn't count as royal or noble in any way. There were many other types of dragons. For example, golden dragons, red dragons, silver dragons, fire dragons, black dragons, and more. All of them comprised small tribes that were scattered throughout creation. But the culmination of all Dragonfolk were those from the thirty-third ranked immortal world known as the Eight Tribes Heaven. And there were only eight tribes of dragons from there.

The other types of dragons were essentially slaves among other dragons and were considered the lowest of the low.

Because this burly Dragonfolk had sensed the aura of a fire dragon on Yang Qi, he felt free to act brazen. After all, in his eyes, fire dragons were like slaves that could be bossed around without a second thought.

“God Dragon Tribe?” Yang Qi scoffed. “You’re the noblest? From what I recall, the Buddha Dragon Tribe is actually the most highborn and mysterious, ranking first among the tribes. Since when did the God Dragon Tribe defeat the Buddha Dragon Tribe to take the number one spot? I think I need to look into this situation a bit.”

“Watch your mouth, brat! How dare you talk to me like that. When lesser Dragonfolk disrespect greater Dragonfolk, they have their muscles and tendons severed, and get skinned alive!” Grinning viciously, the burly man advanced on Yang Qi and prepared to attack him again.

“Back down, Dragon Fierce!” the older man shouted. “Have you no sense? Don’t cause a big scene here!”

Glaring fiercely at Yang Qi, Dragon Fierce stopped in his tracks. He was not happy at all about having been hit so hard. And he’d heard rumors that this doctor was actually very weak, relying on talismans and nascent divinity blessings from higher-ranking Dragonfolk experts to get along.

“Young Sir Dragon Proudheaven, we can sense the fire dragon aura on you. Are you a member of the Fire Dragon Clan? I am Dragon Nine-Weapons from the God Dragon Tribe.”

Yang Qi waved his hand dismissively. “I couldn’t care less what your deal is, just don’t get in my way while I see my patients.”

“You!” Dragon Nine-Weapons growled, his expression flickering wildly for a moment before turning ice cold. “There’s a patient right here, a young sir of the Dragonfolk. He’s Dragon Everlasting, and he fought a desperate battle with a future warrior called Heaven Dancer. That was when he got hit with morphblight. Can you cure him? If the other patients die, they die. Not even ten thousand of them could be worth the same as one of our young sir's fingers. There’s no need for you to waste your true energy on them. Help our young sir, and you’ll earn endless benefits.”

In addition to all the patients in the hall, there were plenty of family members, as well as experts from the various sects they hailed from. When they heard Dragon Nine-Weapons’ words, their eyes went wide with fury and hatred, yet none dared to say a word in opposition.

A young woman stepped forward from among the Dragonfolk and said, “What are you people looking at, you worthless vermin? If you have any problems, I can just kill the lot of you. I don’t care what twentieth or thirtieth ranked immortal worlds you come from. As far as we’re concerned, you’re all the same as slaves. We Dragonfolk are the noblest of races, and you humans might as well be bugs compared to us!”

Everyone present trembled like cicadas in winter, and didn’t dare to open their mouths.

Frowning, Yang Qi said, “Oh? Well as far as I'm concerned, all of the patients here are equal. It doesn’t matter if you’re a noble or a commoner, once you’re sick, you’re the same.”

All of a sudden, he blurred into motion, slapping his hand out over and over again to cause numerous black holes to spring into being above all the patients. Instantly, the morphblight and its effects were dragged out of them.

Some of them immediately leapt to their feet.

Now that they were healed, they didn’t dare to stay inside the hall for any longer and quickly exited, leaving behind valuable magical treasures as payment. Of course, all of them resolved to exact vengeance on the Dragonfolk experts sometime later.

“What incredible gall!” Dragon Nine-Weapons shouted. The sight of Yang Qi healing everyone else before their young sir was so infuriating that he thrust his hands out in Yang Qi’s direction. Instantly, scales rippled out over his wrinkled skin, turning his hands into dragon claws.

“Grand Dragon Consumes the Sun!”

A blur of attacks closed in on Yang Qi.

Yang Qi’s fingers became swords that slashed through the incoming attacks, sending sword energy straight toward Dragon Nine-Weapons’ heart. In response, Dragon Nine-Weapons snorted coldly, shattering the sword energy. Inwardly, he was shocked; his Grand Dragon Consumes the Sun attack was unrivaled, yet this mere ninth stage Dao-Demolisher had vanquished it? Dragon Nine-Weapons was a fifth division Nirvanic God!

Of course, a Nirvanic God from the Dragonfolk would surpass a human by many times. They could compare to Infernalfolk in that if they faced a human with a similar cultivation level, they would absolutely dominate them. In fact, slaughtering seven or eight such humans would be as easy for a Nirvanic God dragon as it would be to drink some water.

That was just what came with the constitution of the Dragonfolk.

“Calm down, all of you,” Yang Qi said. “I never said I wouldn’t heal him. But it’s not as if you’ve been particularly polite customers. Look, you broke my sign! What's your explanation for that?” Truth be told, Yang Qi had just been testing out these Dragonfolk to see what they were capable of. After all, it seemed as though they were now stepping in to join the fight against the future world. That just went to show how powerful the future world was, and how much of a threat they were. After all, not even the Dragonfolk could tolerate them.

“You’re a fire dragon, from the lowliest of tribes,” the female Dragonfolk said coldly. “What gives you the right to hang up a sign that has the words ‘heaven dragon’ on it? And even if you really were a heaven dragon, you would still be below us god dragons. What. You think you’re going to charge us for treatment or something?”

“That’s exactly right,” Yang Qi replied with a decisiveness that could sever nails and chop iron. “I'm definitely going to charge you. A lot. And if you don’t pay, you can take your young sir and just leave without treatment.”

“You!” the female Dragonfolk shouted. “Heaven curse you, you puny little fire dragon! Are you really going to defy our orders? Tell whatever fire dragon expert you have backing you to show his face! I don’t care if he’s a Fire Dragon Tribe chieftain! Not even he would dare to talk to us like this.”

“Forget about this fire dragon business,” Yang Qi said coldly. “Are you going to pay, or not? Considering you broke my sign, you owe me a Revisionist God dragonpearl at the very minimum! If you don’t pay up, you’re not welcome, and can kindly scram. Do you really think I'm going to jump through hoops to help some impolite customers like you? You've got to be kidding me!”

“Quite the defiant one!” the female Dragonfolk said, stamping her foot and curling her finger into vicious claws.

However, at this point, a weak voice floated out. “Give… give him… the compensation. All of it….”

All of the Dragonfolk experts shivered as they looked over at the god item that was the wooden bed, where Dragon Everlasting had managed to look up and speak.

“Those are the young sir’s orders,” Dragon Nine-Weapons said. “We have to follow them!” The other experts were furious, but had no choice but to simply look on as Dragon Nine-Weapons produced a dragonpearl and handed it to Yang Qi.

Yang Qi looked at it and confirmed that it contained an impressive amount of power. It would be a big help to those subordinates of his who cultivated the Eight Tribes Godfist. “This is compensation for my sign. But you still need to pay in advance to have your young sir healed.”

“You want more!?” Dragon Nine-Weapons shouted furiously. “This is outrageous! Boy, we’re giving an inch and you’re asking for a mile!”

“It’s all up to you,” Yang Qi said, clasping his hands behind his back indifferently.

“Fine, what do you want?”

“Simple. I want that wooden bed he's lying on. I happen to like it. If it’s worth your young sir’s life, then hand it over. What's the thing called anyway?”

All of the Dragonfolk erupted into howls of rage and fury. “Kill him! This blasphemer can’t be forgiven!”

“Cut him down if he won’t heal the young sir!”

“Grab him and torture him! I refuse to believe that he can take the pain!”

Yang Qi snorted coldly. “Go ahead and make a move if you want,” he said. “I have a thousand and one ways to spread toxins in the air that will make your young sir’s morphblight even worse. He’ll turn into a morphling in the blink of an eye.”

The Dragonfolk all froze, hesitating to shoot the rat for fear of breaking the vases.

Once again, the weak Dragon Everlasting lifted his head and said, “Do it. The Star Emperor Dragon Bed isn’t worth my life.”

With that, the female Dragonfolk slowly took Dragon Everlasting up into her arms and kicked the bed over to Yang Qi. Chuckling, Yang Qi waved his sleeve to collect the bed and begin fusing with it.

“Now you have to save our young sir,” Dragon Nine-Weapons said, his cheek twitching.

“Very well, that’s much better.” Yang Qi waved his hand, sending a stream of true energy into Dragon Everlasting.

Crack! Snap!

Black lightning bolts shot out of Dragon Everlasting, writhing like snakes toward Yang Qi as if to burrow into him. ‘How could this morphblight be so virulent?’ he thought. ‘It’s a hundred times stronger than anything from before!’

The Dragonfolk were so stunned that they nearly passed out. “If you don’t heal him properly, brat, we’ll take your life in compensation!” They all knew that if they didn’t see this Dragon Everlasting healed, they would never be able to return to the Eight Tribes Heaven alive.

Chapter 723: Join Me

Upon seeing the Dragonfolk reacting with such strong emotion, Yang Qi’s tone of voice suddenly turned even colder. “What are you people in such a rush for? I can cure anything under heaven, even a virus left behind by the legion of gods! Back down immediately, otherwise you’re going to cause delays. And you’ll have only yourselves to blame for the consequences.”

“Back down, everyone,” hissed Dragon Nine-Weapons. “Now!”

He was still burning with anger, but at the same time, didn’t dare to cause any problems.

The Dragonfolk edged away, and in fact, even some of the remaining patients hurried away, not wanting to be too close to any potential conflict. Even the disciples of the Nine Yangs God Sect left, aware that the Dragonfolk were too fierce for them to handle if fighting broke out.

Even if the Nine Yangs God Sect fought as a united sect, they would still be crushed by the God Dragon Tribe of the Dragonfolk. In fact, only one one-thousandth of the forces of the God Dragon Tribe would be enough to destroy them.

Obviously, this Young Sir Dragon Everlasting was an important person to the God Dragon Tribe, and thus, his retainers had no choice but to put his interests first. It was for this reason that not even the almighty leaders of the Nine Yangs God Sect dared to make an appearance. Under any other circumstances, they would have already stepped in to defuse the situation. But not with the God Dragon Tribe of the Dragonfolk.

Yang Qi was well aware of what was going on. He’d started out on very good terms with the Nine Yangs God Sect, but that was only because he needed protection from the Immortal-Slayer’s Sect. He had also needed a foundation upon which to build his own enterprise. But things were different now. His plot against Leaf Dao-Denier had worked perfectly, and he had eroded the strength of the Immortal-Slayer’s Sect. He didn’t really need the Nine Yangs God Sect any longer, and truth be told, one of his main goals upon returning was to declare his own independence and join the Dao Defense League as his own sect. Then he would continue gathering power and building resources as a top member of the league.

The business of treating morphblight was more profitable than any other type of business right now, and those profits only continued to rise. It was easier to make money that way than searching for treasure, by far.

The black lightning coursing in Yang Qi’s direction was the morphblight virus itself, trying to infect him. If he were an ordinary person, he would have been finished. Thankfully, he wasn’t an ordinary person. Plus, he had just acquired another of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions. Even as he began suppressing the black lightning, he inwardly marveled.

‘This Dragon Everlasting is amazing. I can’t believe he held out against the virus for so long. This thing is a void-based primal-chaos virus built with godliness and virtual godhood. It’s violently infectious and contains elements of insane devil beasts. Once it infects someone, they will be doomed to turn into a high-level morphling that not even the future world can control.’

Yang Qi used the Cruiser of Civilization to analyze the virus and found that it was definitely far stronger than any version to date.

Thankfully, the cruiser’s power levels were back to normal now, which would make it easy for him to destroy the virus. Soon, a flame appeared in his palm, within which were all sorts of medicinal auras. He sent the flame streaming into Dragon Everlasting through the lightning; one by one, the black lightning bolts transformed into green smoke that faded away into nothing.

Surging quintessence vitality began flowing through Dragon Everlasting, almost as if some sort of sealing mark had been released. He opened his eyes, and they crackled as if with lightning as he stared at Yang Qi. Then he waved his hand, sending a profound stream of true energy right into Yang Qi to take his soul, true energy, and any other treasures he had.

Even an immortal world would have been emptied by that true energy.

Thankfully, Yang Qi had been on guard and knew that this Dragon Everlasting was a top expert. He immediately drew on the power of the Heaven Beyond Heaven through the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart and sent it coursing into Dragon Everlasting.

In the blink of an eye, Dragon Everlasting was filled with such incredible energy that cracks started spreading out on his skin as though he might explode. Dragon Everlasting shivered and sent a furious stream of energy into Yang Qi in the form of an attack. However, Yang Qi neutralized it, then took a tiny sliver of the black electricity that was the morphblight virus, and sent it back into Dragon Everlasting. It was hidden in a latent form, but it would grow, and once it erupted, Dragon Everlasting’s previous injuries would reappear, becoming far more severe in the process.

Crack!

Yang Qi’s actions forced Dragon Everlasting’s arm to drop to his side. Then Yang Qi floated backward a few paces and said, “So, Dragon Everlasting, you’re the type who returns evil for good? I just cured your morphblight, and you immediately drew on a profound absorption art of the Dragonfolk to try to devour my true energy?”

Laughing cruelly, Dragon Everlasting rose to his feet. Robes rippling and eyes flashing with vicious madness, he said, “So, you’re something of a genius, eh? I was testing you just now, to see how strong your techniques are. As it turns out, you’re only a Dao-Demolisher with four lineaments. You're not really very strong at all; you just use some sort of sealing mark power given to you by some almighty backer.”

Dragon Everlasting had a profoundly strong cultivation base, so as soon as he had recovered he revealed how utterly arrogant and domineering he was. Without any hesitation, the other Dragonfolk quickly fell into rank behind him.

“Hand it over!” Dragon Nine-Weapons said, stepping forward and extending his hand.

“Hand what over?” Yang Qi asked calmly.

“The Star Emperor Dragon Bed. And that dragonpearl. Those are powerful magical treasures belonging to the Dragonfolk. They’re not meant for the likes of you.” He smiled coldly. “Did you really think we would let you profane god items like that? Steal our treasures?”

“That was your payment for treatment,” Yang Qi said with a derisive grin. “Now you're asking for them back? It seems the God Dragon Tribe really is the most unprincipled and shameless tribe among the Dragonfolk. If word about this spreads, are you really ready to accept the ridicule and humiliation? Who would ever dare to do business with you again?”

The female Dragonfolk stepped forward. “Don’t even think about trying to threaten us. We're the Dragonfolk. And not just that, we're nobility among the Dragonfolk. Lowborn bloodlines such as yourselves have to follow Dragonfolk rules. We run things. If we ask for your life, you have no choice but to freely give it to us. What, are you saying you refuse to give those things back? In that case, you can’t accuse us of being rude.”

“Enough!” Dragon Everlasting said. He waved his hand and the Star Emperor Dragon Bed trembled as though it might fly out of Yang Qi’s grasp. Clearly, Dragon Everlasting had placed a warding spell on it that couldn’t be dissolved in a short time.

‘Time to beat them at their own game!’ Yang Qi thought, struck with sudden inspiration.

Pretending to have been overcome, he trembled and allowed the Star Emperor Dragon Bed to fly out and land in front of Dragon Everlasting.

Dragon Everlasting sat down on the bed and looked at Yang Qi with a cold smile. “Excellent. You know, I’ve never run into anyone who dared to extort me, so now I'm at a bit of a loss about what to do. Look, I’ll give you one chance. Join me. Work for me. Or die!”

At this point, Yang Qi wailed, “Oh, almighty leaders of the Nine Yangs God Sect! Where are you?! We had an agreement! I set up this medicine sect as part of the Nine Yangs God Sect, and you were supposed to protect me! Now the God Dragon Tribe experts are threatening me. Aren’t you going to stop them?”

He made sure to raise his voice very loud so that everyone present could hear exactly what he was saying.

There wasn’t even a peep of a response.

“Cut the racket!” Dragon Nine-Weapons said with a vicious grin. “The paltry Nine Yangs God Sect would never dare to cross the God Dragon Tribe. If they did, we would turn them into dust in the blink of an eye. Now I think I'm going to break every bone in your body, just to see how tough they are. Even if they’re made of steel, you’re still going to die!”

“Nine Yangs God Sect!” Yang Qi cried. “We split all the profits from this medicine sect, and now, in my moment of need, you’re just ignoring me?!”

Obviously, Yang Qi knew that there was no way the Nine Yangs God Sect would do anything. But considering he wanted to establish his own independent sect within the Dao Defense League, he needed a good reason to break out on his own. Otherwise, he would face resistance. In fact, unless he played things right, they might even forget favors and violate justice. But in this situation, in which he asked for help to deal with Dragon Everlasting, if they refused to do a thing, then it would prove that they couldn't protect him. In that case, him going out on his own would make perfect sense.

The female Dragonfolk burst out laughing. “You can scream for help until your throat goes hoarse. Nobody’s going to save you!”

Of course, the almighty leaders in the Nine Yangs God Sect were watching everything and even discussing the matter via divine will.

“Should we say something?”

“Like what? It's not as if our Nine Yangs God Sect could possibly stand up to the God Dragon Tribe. In fact, maybe we should curry favor with them. That might help us in the future. The God Dragon Tribe has already joined the Dao Defense League, and they’ll soon officially found a God Dragon Sect here. So why not get on their good side now? Besides, all of this is really Dragonfolk business.”

“Dragon Proudheaven is backed by a Dragonfolk elder. Let’s see if that elder steps in.”

“There’s no way that elder will do anything. Do you know how important the God Dragon Tribe is? They’re basically above all the other dragon tribes.”

“I still think we should at least say a word or two.”

RUMBLE!

Even as Yang Qi and Dragon Everlasting stared each other down, the voice of one of the almighty leaders of the Nine Yangs God Sect echoed out.

“Young Sir Dragon Proudheaven, it's not that we don't want to offer help, but we know that this is a matter between your Dragonfolk tribes. As humans, it would be inappropriate for us to meddle. Please, forgive us.”

Of course, there was no written rule backing up this claim.

“Well, since that's the case,” Yang Qi said, “I hereby renounce any affiliation with the Nine Yangs God Sect! All previous gratitude and grudges are written off!”

“Enough with the jibber-jabber!” Dragon Everlasting said, tapping his finger impatiently. “What’s your decision? Are you going to work for me? Or do you just want to die? We’re going to set up a God Dragon Sect here in the Dao Defense League to help fight the wretch-devils from the future world. If you join us, and continue to treat patients, you can profit a lot. We’ll even give an official title to whatever Dragonfolk elder is backing you. Your clan can become high counselors to the God Dragon Tribe and serve us for generations to come. You’ll have few superiors, and endless subordinates.”

“This is an earnest and well-meaning offer, brat!” Dragon Nine-Weapons said. “Understand? Keep being pigheaded and I’ll crush your skull! By that point, it will be too late to say yes, and too late for regrets!”

The other Dragonfolk experts all began to say, “On your knees, now!”

“Ai!” Yang Qi sighed. “Since you all clearly want to die, I’ll accommodate you.”

Chapter 724: God Dragon Tribe

Without any warning, Yang Qi made his move.

In the blink of an eye, he turned into a crackling stream of light that was as fine as a thread of silk, but backed by enough power to shake the universe. This was all his own cultivation base, Dao-Demolishing with four lineaments, without any help from the Cruiser of Civilization.

Considering his cultivation level, his Angel Wings, and the Heaven Moving constitution he had, he was capable of speeds so incredible that even the most almighty of experts wouldn't be able to keep up with him.

And he had just recently gained a lot of experience by tangling with Leaf Dao-Denier.

Because of that, Dragon Nine-Weapons, who was a fifth division Nirvanic God, didn’t stand a chance of evading the attack.

Swish!

A red line appeared on Dragon Nine-Weapons’ neck, and then his head toppled off his shoulders, his eyes shining with disbelief and shock.

“Die!” Yang Qi thrust his palm out, hitting Dragon Nine-Weapons’ torso and sealing him in place. Having lost his head, the rest of Dragon Nine-Weapons’ body transformed into an enormous golden-scaled dragon, thrashing and writhing in a way that sent blood spraying all over the hall. Despite losing his head, he was still alive, but was completely and utterly locked in place by the Devil-God Seal.

“Get over here,” Yang Qi said. He beckoned, and the shrieking head flew into his hand, then burst into flames. Agonized shrieks rang out as Dragon Nine-Weapons’ human head returned to its original form, that of a dragon with golden whiskers and bright red eyes.

Crick. Crack.

Yang Qi attached the dragon head back to the dragon body. Then, he produced a crystal vessel thrumming with spatial magical laws, into which he tossed the trembling Dragon Nine-Weapons. In the blink of an eye, one of Dragon Everlasting’s top experts was trapped as surely as a fly in amber.

“Who the hell do you think you are to cause such a ruckus in my presence?” Shaking his head, Yang Qi put away the sealed crystal.

“Are you looking to die!?” Dragon Everlasting shouted. Never could he have guessed that this person would dare to actually launch an attack. It was an outright insult and challenge, therefore, he leaped off the bed and unleashed draconic might that instantly caused the entire hall around them to collapse.

“Endless River of Myriad Dragons; Crush a Thousand Mountains!”

It was the Eight Tribes Godfist.

Dragon Everlasting was using the top fist technique of the God Dragon Tribe, and clearly, he had mastered it to a level that made him vastly superior to Dragon Nine-Weapons. After all, Dragon Everlasting was a sixth division Revisionist God, a level that would make him an elder king in the Dao Defense League, and one of its most powerful members.

However, despite being a ferocious fighter, he actually couldn’t match up to Leaf Dao-Denier. Yang Qi hadn’t hesitated to tangle with Leaf Dao-Denier, so there was little need to mention this young sir of the Dragonfolk.

The reason the Nine Yangs God Sect feared Dragon Everlasting, but not Leaf Dao-Denier, was that the former was backed by the might of the God Dragon Tribe. The Eight Tribes Heaven was more domineering than the Tusita Heaven, and furthermore, Leaf Dao-Denier had never brought his own weight to bear on the situation.

If Leaf Dao-Denier had actually shown up in person, it was hard to say whether or not the Nine Yangs God Sect would have intervened to help Yang Qi.

“Is that supposed to be the Eight Tribes Godfist?” Yang Qi said, a strange expression in his eyes. “Your mastery is superficial at best. Let me show you what it’s supposed to look like. Pay attention….” With that, he unleashed his own Eight Tribes Godfist, with each blow causing myriads of dragons to scream out in attack. He used all eight tribes, including the heaven dragons, the true dragons, the god dragons, the buddha dragons…. He combined all eight tribes into one, creating the perfect manifestation of the technique. In fact, it caused a golden figure that resembled an actual buddha to appear.

It was a dragon and a buddha at the same time.

Whizz!

When the two fist strikes collided, Dragon Everlasting’s robes billowed out and exploded. Then Yang Qi’s fist slammed into his torso, forcing him back into a seated position on the Star Emperor Dragon Bed, where he coughed up mouthful after mouthful of black blood.

“You… have the consummate version of the Eight Tribes Godfist? How is that possible?”  Dragon Everlasting couldn’t have looked more shocked. “And you didn’t actually remove the morphblight virus from me? You villain! This is outrageous!”

Yang Qi laughed. “I got the full Eight Tribes Godfist from a talisman left behind by the ancient Dragon God.” Of course, that was a complete fabrication, but Yang Qi didn’t want to reveal too much true information, so he claimed he was able to unleash the consummate power of the fist strike by means of a talisman.

“And you’re right, I left some of the virus behind. So if I were you, I wouldn’t push things too far. Otherwise, the virus might flare up, and I won't help you get rid of it.”

“You lowlife!” Dragon Everlasting growled. Yet no matter how much he refused to accept the situation, he now realized that it was taking about ninety percent of his effort to keep his injuries in check. If the virus flared up in circumstances like that, how could he possibly fight a duel with Yang Qi?

“Kill him!” shouted the female Dragonfolk. She, the burly fellow from earlier, and a handful of other young Dragonfolk experts suddenly rushed at Yang Qi from behind, unleashing their energy arts to lock down space in the area.

“Dragon-Trapping God Formation!” Using both fist techniques and magical treasures, they tried manipulating their complex magical laws in an effort to trap Yang Qi in place.

Unfortunately, even as their Dragon-Trapping God Formation took shape, Yang Qi vanished.

The powers they had all unleashed slammed into each other in what was equivalent to an attack on each other, which caused them all to stagger backward.

“Impossible!”

“How did he disappear?”

“What’s going on?”

Even as their blood roiled, they heard Dragon Everlasting speaking into their ears. “Be careful!”

Then Dragon Everlasting shouted, “How dare you attack my followers, villain!”

Despite his words, he was scrambling backward.

Meanwhile, the vicious female Dragonfolk suddenly lurched up into the air, grabbed by Yang Qi and thrown into an amber-like crystal.

The burly man was sliced in half and a bloodcurdling scream rang out as Yang Qi flicked the sleeve of his God Legion Battle Robe to suck him in. When his screams were cut short, even the world’s most stupid person would realize that the man was finished.

One by one, more screams rang out as all of Dragon Everlasting’s subordinates were cut down by Yang Qi and sealed in crystal. In the end, they became a beaded bracelet on his wrist.

Within the beads were actual dragons, all of them very lifelike—but lacking any aura—and wreathed in flames. Their souls twitched in horrific torment, and any Dragonfolk who laid eyes on them would know that they were dragon souls.

“How dare you cruelly defile the experts of the God Dragon Tribe!” Dragon Everlasting shouted, pointing accusingly at Yang Qi yet not daring to make a single move out of fear of the virus flaring up.

“Leave,” Yang Qi said. “The remaining virus won’t be a problem for you as long as you spend time every day keeping it suppressed. It will take a lot of effort, but remember, if you piss me off, the virus will explode and not even I will be able to save you. By the way, you can keep that Star Emperor Dragon Bed. Think of it as a token of my mercy. I’m going to be founding a new sect in the Dao Defense League, the Sage Panacea Sect. If you really want to be fully cured, then come back with the right payment and I’ll be happy to help.”

With that, Yang Qi flew away, and not even the divine will of the almighty beings in the area could do anything to stop him.

The experts of the Nine Yangs God Sect were starting to lose their heads out of fear, fully aware that they had just done something monumentally stupid.

Yang Qi hadn’t been worried at all about offending the God Dragon Tribe. He had been an elder in the Dao Defense League for some time now, and had used the powers of an Inspiring One and a Fraudulent One to earn the loyalty of many of the other elders. It would take a lot of formalities to strip him of that position now.

He had enough power and clout to start his own sect at any time. When he left, many of his most loyal disciples left with him, even some of the elders of the Nine Yangs God Sect.

He quickly identified a suitable location within the Dao Defense League, which soon echoed with thunderous rumbling sounds as he created palaces, pagodas, minor worlds, and other aspects of his new sect. Killing intent boiled as he created warding magics and other mysterious defenses.

Word was already spreading of his conflict with the God Dragon Tribe and falling out with the Nine Yangs God Sect, and quite a few experts were watching to see what his new sect would be like.

Everyone was amazed at the results; it surpassed anything that even a sixth division Revisionist God should be capable of.

Revisionist Gods were elder kings, and as for the seventh division Measureless Gods, they were old-timers who usually withdrew from worldly affairs and didn't show their faces in public.

“Warriors of the Great Dance, come out,” Yang Qi said, summoning Light Dancer, Gloom Dancer, Sand Dancer, Flame Dancer, Lightning Dancer, and the leader, Void Dancer.

Although these six hadn’t been a match for Young Master Leaf, they were still sixth division Revisionist Gods who most people in the immortal worlds would tremble in dread at.

They had even killed elder kings.

Yang Qi had infused them with more power from the future world and used the Cruiser of Civilization to transform their genes, making them puppets who were stronger than they had been before.

Chapter 725: An Independent Sect

The shocking killing intent emanating from the Warriors of the Great Dance immediately cowed numerous unscrupulous individuals who’d been considering trying to take advantage of the situation.

Not only did they possess incredible fighting prowess, they also had the terrifying morphblight virus to work with. No immortal could avoid the effects of that virus, and Yang Qi was the only one who could cure it.

“Those are the legendary Warriors of the Great Dance from the future world. They’re all Revisionist Gods, and their leader is none other than Void Dancer!”

“That really is Void Dancer. I heard that about half a year ago, he and the Warriors of the Great Dance assassinated One Lord Great Joy from the Great Joy Heaven, who was a seventh division Measureless God. Although they didn't outright kill him, they infected him with morphblight and got away without being hurt at all.”

“You’re right, everybody was talking about that a while ago.”

“So this Dragon Proudheaven actually got them all to surrender to him? Don't tell me…?”

“Those Warriors of the Great Dance are all puppets now! He actually turned them into puppets! How could he possibly be strong enough to do that?”

“The Nine Yangs God Sect really miscalculated here. Dragon Proudheaven was obviously testing them to see how loyal they would be. Now he knows that they only put on a pretense of strength, but are actually weak inside. Not a single one of them had dared to take a stand for him when the God Dragon Tribe caused problems. It makes perfect sense that Dragon Proudheaven would go out on his own. Obviously, the Dao Defense League as a whole will still support him; without him to treat the morphblight, it would cause widespread panic.”

“The Nine Yangs God Sect really screwed themselves over here. Well, they deserve it. They earned a lot of treasure, thanks to Dragon Proudheaven, but now their days of profit are over. How much do you think he’ll charge them when they send their disciples to him for healing?”

“Dragon Proudheaven’s new business is going to be booming. With the Warriors of the Great Dance as puppets to protect him, he won’t even be worried about the God Dragon Tribe. No one will dare to pick a fight with him; everyone will be stumbling over themselves to get on his good side.”

“Hey, didn’t he have some problems with the Immortal-Slayer’s Sect? You’d think that if he went out to start his own sect, they could show up and cause problems. So where are they?”

“Forget about the Immortal-Slayer’s Sect. I heard that someone beat Young Master Leaf in a fight, and afterward, he went back to the Tusita Heaven to work on his cultivation. The other seventy-one patriarchs left too.”

“I wonder if Dragon Proudheaven’s backer was the one who beat him. I guess we’ll find out eventually.”

There were quite a few immense streams of divine will inspecting the new Sage Panacea Sect. Those that tried to probe inside to learn some of its secrets suddenly found themselves facing some immense divine ability that sought to devour them, as though some ancient beast lurked within the sect. Terrified, they fled.

The Warriors of the Great Dance patrolled the area outside the sect, and they were already famous enough among the immortal worlds that none dared to cross them.

At a certain point, Yang Qi sat in a main hall in the sect and sent his voice echoing out for all to hear. “I hereby announce the creation of the Sage Panacea Sect, which will treat injuries of all sorts. Not only can we expunge the morphblight virus, we can cure cultivation deviation, restore vital energy reversions, neutralize heterogeneous true energy, and more. Before, I worked for the Nine Yangs God Sect, who ratcheted prices to an incredible level. But now I serve the Dao Defense League as a whole, all for the purpose of defeating the scourge of the future world. And thus, I'm cutting all prices in half.

“I’ve also performed a great service for the Dao Defense League by cutting down the Warriors of the Great Dance and asking my almighty backer to turn them into puppets. They are now like nascent divinity clones of mine, so you have nothing to fear from them. As long as no one makes a move on my Sage Panacea Sect, I'm no threat. But if someone does make a move, I’ll be forced to kill them.”

RUUUUUUMBLE!

Golden light flashed and an enormous mountain rose up, which was the entrance of the Sage Panacea Sect. At the bottom of the mountain were hosts of teleportation portals, which would make it very convenient for people to enter the sect.

Yang Qi wanted to make things easy for himself—and everyone else—so he threw out something of a bombshell.

He could cure the ill effects of heterogeneous true energy!

Among those who cultivated the dao of immortals, heterogeneous true energy was more feared than anything else. There were many experts who came across godly-class energy arts, but didn't dare to cultivate them because of that reason. Conflicts with the energy arts they already cultivated could lead to cultivation deviation, and eventually complete destruction.

In situations like that, it felt like being in front of a mountain of gold but being unable to touch it.

The lines that would form to have heterogeneous true energy neutralized would definitely surpass the lines of people who needed healing from morphblight.

“What?”

Yang Qi’s bombshell immediately caused a huge commotion. Countless almighty experts began communicating via divine will, scarcely able to believe the news. However, after they thought about it for a moment, most of them came to the same conclusion.

‘He’s backed by some old-timer who completely mastered the Eight Tribes Godfist. Whoever it is, he surpasses all of the experts of the Dragonfolk that we know about. Does he really have a way to neutralize heterogeneous true energy?'

RUUUUUUMBLE!

As Yang Qi opened the massive golden entrance to the sect, an almighty figure appeared.

It was a sixth division Revisionist God, a majestic elder king.

He landed on the grand staircase, looked at the disciples who stood in ranks lining the way upward, and shook his head. After all, the disciples were all mere Demolishers, the type whose cultivation base was completely insignificant to him.

In truth, they were all children of the Yang Clan. Yang Qi’s plan going forward was to bring such disciples out to serve in the Sage Panacea Sect. After all, having them cultivate and train in the Sage Monarch Heaven was somewhat restrictive, and would deprive them of the benefits of truly deadly combat. And that in turn would inhibit their growth.

Once he had a strong enough foundation in the Dao Defense League, he would bring all of his followers out into the open.

At the moment, Eldest Brother, Elder Second Brother, Yang Zhan, Sword Seventeen, and other key figures were assigned to important positions within the Sage Panacea Sect.

The minor world that contained the sect was filled with countless smaller halls and structures that had been made using spatial folding techniques he had learned from the Cruiser of Civilization. Not even the top experts in the Dao Defense League would understand what they were looking at, and would assume it was all thanks to Yang Qi’s supposed backer.

‘These disciples are far too weak,’ thought the visiting elder. ‘They're definitely not the top members of the sect.’ Then he looked at the six Warriors of the Great Dance. 'Those six were already incredibly famous, but now they're puppets. If I tried to fight them, I doubt I would be able to come out on top.’

Making sure his energy arts were ready, he called out in a loud voice, “I am Daoist Xie Wusuan from the twenty-eighth ranked immortal world the Evil-Suppressing Heaven, currently an elder king in the Dao Defense League. I have some heterogeneous true energy in me that I was hoping you could neutralize. I'd be willing to swear brotherhood with you if you treat me, as well as offer a handsome reward. What do you think?”

“Please, come in, Elder King,” Yang Qi said to his first big customer.

A golden beam of light appeared that led Elder King Xie Wusuan inside. The divine will of numerous other almighty beings was focused on what was happening, curious to see if Xie Wusuan’s case of heterogeneous true energy could truly be resolved.

“People say that this Xie Wusuan has a pair of god eyes that let him see into the depths of numerous spell formations and primal-chaos debris fields. He can use them to seek out relics left behind by the legion of gods, which is how he collected five godly-class energy arts. Unfortunately, he got greedy, and although his cultivation base rose, the true energy conflicts cause him incredible pain.”

“I remember hearing about that. I wonder if he can actually be cured?”

“Let’s see what happens. If this Dragon Proudheaven can actually perform the healing, his services are going to be in high demand. We’ll all have to go to him for treatment.”

Xie Wusuan entered the Sage Panacea Sect to find Yang Qi waiting there for him, performing some complex hand incantations the likes of which he had never seen before. Nodding in greeting, he sat down and said, “I’ve heard a lot about you, Young Sir Dragon Proudheaven. Now that I'm finally able to meet you in person, I can see that you’re clearly an extraordinary person.”

“There’s no need for such politeness, Elder King,” Yang Qi replied coolly. “As you well know, I'm not even a Godmyth yet, which earns me quite a bit of public ridicule. The truth is that the reason I'm not a Godmyth is that I cultivate a very unique, invincible energy art. If I push the technique to completion, the dao of heaven won’t tolerate it. That said, I’ll still complete it, sooner or later.” Yang Qi could see that Xie Wusuan actually had more to say. “Elder King, you already explained the purpose of your visit. I can see that you cultivate five godly-class energy arts, and the true energy from those arts has created a conflict within you. I have a way to resolve the issue.”

“Young Sir, don’t tell me your method is to remove four of the types of true energy, leaving me with only one.” Xie Wusuan smiled wryly. “You have no idea how long I've cultivated these five godly-class energy arts, nor how much I've benefited from them. I really can’t bear to think about losing them.”

Yang Qi burst out laughing. “If I was that stupid, I would never have been able to found the Sage Panacea Sect. I would never treat people in such a way. I promise that I can create harmony between your five energy arts. Going forward, you won’t have any conflicts, and will be able to use them all as smoothly as if they were the same art. In fact, not only will your energy arts improve, you will personally benefit as well. You might even be able to reach a higher cultivation level.”

“What?” Xie Wusuan said, leaping to his feet. “If you're serious, then I would be in your debt for the rest of my life! How could I possibly thank you enough?”

“All I ask is that you offer me your protection, Elder King,” Yang Qi replied with a faint smile. “As the first customer ever in my new sect, I’m going to treat you free of charge. Let’s hope the rest of the people in the Dao Defense League realize that they should avoid following the example of the spineless Nine Yangs God Sect, who backed down at the slightest hint of adversity.”

“Heal me, and we can be sworn siblings! We’ll live and die together! If anyone causes problems for you, they’ll be causing problems for me too!”

Chapter 726: A Huge Stir

“Alright!” Yang Qi said. “If you put it that way, then I'm not worried at all.” He had tossed out the bombshell about being able to cure heterogeneous true energy in the hopes of quickly winning the hearts of the people. If he could win over fifteen or twenty elder kings as sworn siblings, then even if the God Dragon Tribe really did try to make a move against him it wouldn’t be a sure thing. The Dao Defense League was gradually turning into an immense organization of its own, filled with powerful old-timers; some of them supported the unification, but some secretly denounced it.

“In that case, I’ll swear an oath right now,” Xie Wusuan said. “If you successfully heal me, I’ll do everything in my power to keep you safe. If I go back on my word, let me die by heavenly tribulation.”

“Very well. Please, sit back and relax.” Yang Qi flew over to him, gathered some true energy in his palm, and turned it into the shape of a needle which he then plunged into Xie Wusuan.

The man instantly felt the streams of heterogeneous true energy within him going wild the way they usually did when they flared up and caused him intense pain. Beads of sweat popped out all over him.

“Fear not!” Yang Qi said. Then he drew on Heaven-Devouring True Energy, imbued with the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. It was a mixture that would make it impossible for anyone to analyze. After all, the combination of those two specific things conformed to the ancient saying that snakes devour mammoths. As such, the Heaven-Devouring True Energy could do things that the ancient King Heaven-Devourer could never have succeeded at.

The true energy transformed into a host of draconic spirit snakes that burrowed into Xie Wusuan. Of course, Xie Wusuan assumed it was some sort of energy art from the Dragonfolk, which only served to increase his trust in Yang Qi.

Heaven-Devouring True Energy could neutralize the effects of heterogeneous true energy, otherwise there was no way that Yang Qi could simultaneously successfully use his five phases energy arts, the Eight Tribes Godfist, and all of the other godly-class energy arts he had collected.

The God Legion Seal had something else to do with it as well, as it enabled him to tolerate all types of godliness. After all, the Sovereign Lord was the Monarch of Divinities and the father of the legion of gods.

“Where water flows, a canal is formed! Five energies combine! Five energies flow to the origin!”

After a long moment, a tremor passed through Yang Qi and he slapped his palm down on the middle of Xie Wusuan’s back. In the blink of an eye, Xie Wusuan felt closed meridians opening and previous blockages unraveling. In that moment, he suddenly felt like he could become a god.

Five waves of energy appeared above his head, ceaselessly flowing back and forth. All obstacles had been removed.

Xie Wusuan burst out into hearty laughter. “It worked! My true energy flows perfectly now. The five energies were combined, and now they can flow to the origin. For years I’ve dreamed day and night about reaching this level! It finally worked! I've been given a new lease on life!” Turning to Yang Qi, he said, “Let’s swear brotherhood right here and now.”

Seeing Xie Wusuan’s eager expression, Yang Qi coolly said, “I can tell that you're a kind person, Elder King. Otherwise you would’ve just left upon being healed. If you had, then the effects of my healing would have ceased and you would’ve been stuck in your cultivation. In fact, the heterogeneous true energy conflicts would have eventually returned and you’d have ended up right back where you started. You see, I merely treated the symptoms, but not the root cause. If you want to continue your cultivation, you’re going to need to take these medicinal tablets of mine.”

Yang Qi waved his hand, and a bottle of medicinal tablets appeared in Xie Wusuan’s hands. “They were created by a secret magic of the Dragonfolk that I know, and are specifically designed to combat the effects of heterogeneous true energy. You need to take one every time you enter a session of cultivation. If you run out, just come back for more. Incidentally, with those tablets, you won’t be limited to five energy arts. You could cultivate five hundred without any problem.”

The tablets were actually Heaven-Devouring śarīras that he had altered with the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, and were perfect to deal with heterogeneous powers. Without something like that, a person couldn’t cultivate conflicting true energies without King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans.

“I see,” Xie Wusuan said, cold sweat dripping down his neck. He suddenly realized that acting in good faith had definitely been a good choice. If he had simply accepted the treatment and tried to make excuses to get out of making a payment, the future consequences would have been horrifying.

Instead, he and Yang Qi became sworn brothers, uttering oaths to the god-spirits that they would never forsake each other.

As soon as Xie Wusuan walked out of the Sage Panacea Sect, an uproar ensued. Countless almighty experts scanned him with divine will to find that his five godly-class energy arts had been combined in some mysterious fashion. He was many times stronger than before, and it looked like he would rapidly make progress to reach the Measureless God level.

In the Godmyth level, each breakthrough was immeasurably more difficult than the last.

That was especially true of the final five levels, in which success could not be had without the most fortuitous developments. Some people never made progress for the rest of their life.

The sight of Xie Wusuan having been healed and pushed onto the road of further progress was profoundly shocking to the almighty onlookers, and all of them immediately resolved to go and seek out Yang Qi for treatment.

As soon as he was out in the open, Xie Wusuan raised his voice and said, “I, Xie Wusuan, am indebted to Young Sir Dragon Proudheaven for his treatment. Henceforth, he and I are sworn brothers who will live and die together. Any matter of interest to him is also a matter of interest to me.”

Of course, the fact that someone as important as him had sworn such an oath ensured that Yang Qi was even safer from threats than before.

Whoosh. Whoosh. Whoosh.

Three patriarchs appeared in front of Xie Wusuan. “Xie, old pal, were you really completely healed? You didn’t need to get rid of any of your godly-class energy arts?”

“Well, if it isn’t the Fyre Watre Patriarchs.”

These three elder kings were indeed from the twenty-ninth ranked Fyre Watre Heaven, and all of them had cultivation bases equal to Xie Wusuan’s. They cultivated a special technique from the Fyre Watre Heaven that was a composite of three godly-class energy arts. It was called the Fyre-Watre Positive-Negative Great-Compassion Energy-Dao. Unfortunately, despite having mastered the art, the three patriarchs couldn’t negate the effects of the heterogeneous true energy and were wracked by constant pain as a result.

“My heterogeneous true energy really was neutralized. If the three of you don’t believe me, take a look for yourself.”

With that, Xie Wusuan unleashed three palm attacks, one at each of the three patriarchs from the Fyre Watre Heaven. The three patriarchs met the palm attacks with their own palms, which resulted in several successive booms.

When it was over, Xie Wusuan stood there looking unfazed while the three patriarchs had staggered backward a few paces, astonishment written on their faces. The point had been proven. Xie Wusuan really had negated the ill effects and even made progress in his energy arts.

“Come on, let's go find Dragon Proudheaven! He’s the only one who can fix us!” Even as the three patriarchs prepared to hurry into the sect, Xie Wusuan reached out to block their paths. “Patriarchs, considering we're friends, let me give you a quick word of advice. Be respectful. If you don’t, my new sworn brother won’t treat you.”

“Right, of course,” the three patriarchs said. Glancing at the patrolling Warriors of the Great Dance, they turned and headed into the Sage Panacea Sect.

Before long, they were back out in the open, laughing loudly. “Our cultivation bases are finally free! We can finally reach a higher level!”

Suddenly noticing some of the Sage Panacea Sect disciples standing attentively off to the side, the patriarchs sent out beams of light, causing them to rise into the air and experience a transformative baptism. Heavenly tribulation appeared as the disciples experienced breakthroughs.

“As new sworn brothers of Young Sir Dragon Proudheaven, allow us to baptize these disciples and help them rise to a higher level. After all, we’re going to need more medicinal tablets from the Sage Panacea Sect if we want to further our cultivation, so the stronger the sect is, the better!”

All of the disciples who had received the baptism were core elites from the Yang Clan, and they were clearly delighted at the transformations they were experiencing.

The sight of Xie Wusuan and the Fyre Watre Patriarchs being healed caused numerous other patriarchs to gather at the entrance of the sect and ask to be seen for healing. None of them dared to act rudely; all of them knew exactly what had occurred to the Immortal-Slayer’s Sect and the God Dragon Tribe when they came and arrogantly demanded help. Everything was very orderly.

Yang Qi seemed to be getting more and more powerful. Now he had Xie Wusuan and the Fyre Watre Patriarchs as sworn siblings, therefore, no one dared to cause problems. After all, they all wondered what other mysterious and almighty people might be backing him.

Hoping to curry favor with the Sage Panacea Sect, many of the patriarchs imitated the Fyre Watre Patriarchs by blessing the disciples of the sect. As a result, those disciples’ cultivation bases rose rapidly, quickly bringing more glory and honor to the sect as a whole.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi smiled, aware that his sect was already growing in power and influence, just as planned.

At the same time, not only did treating the various patriarchs allow him to spy a bit on their cultivation base and energy arts, it also provided him with a huge influx of riches and treasure.

Furthermore, they would need to rely on the medicinal tablets he provided in order to further their cultivation.

The patriarchs were fully aware of what that meant, but there was no other option. Without Yang Qi’s help, most of them would have been forever stuck in their cultivation.

His Eldest Brother and Elder Second Brother from the Invincible Society were already key members of the Sage Panacea Sect, as were his blood brothers Yang Yunchong and Yang Hualong. All of them were delighted to see the magical treasures and god items flowing in, as well as medicinal pills, daoist texts, power stones, and other strange treasures.

How many patriarchs were there in the Dao Defense League? Too many to count. So it was only possible to imagine how many people were lining up for treatment, and all of them brought gifts they had dug up from their treasure storehouses.

Most of the patriarchs would have given all of their prosperity to be healed, even their own wives. After all, they all had to deal with constant pain and frustration thanks to the heterogeneous true energy they had in them.

After the day passed, Yang Qi said he needed to take a break and would resume treatments the following day. The patriarchs simply waited outside in line, with more and more arriving to join them every day. During that one day, Yang Qi gained several dozen high-level patriarchs as sworn siblings, all of whom promised to protect the Sage Panacea Sect with their lives.

As word spread through the Dao Defense League, Yang Qi’s sect grew more and more firmly established.

Chapter 727: Flabbergasted

“This is preposterous! A shame! A complete humiliation!”

Far, far away, white clouds that not even spatial tempests could dispel swirled around an immortal world. Beautiful scenery stretched out everywhere, including majestic mountains and rivers that seemed like something out of a painting. Immense god dragons lurked in the clouds, millions upon millions of kilometers long, looking down at the scenery that seemed like something from a mythological story.

This was the Eight Tribes Heaven, and specifically, one corner of that thirty-third ranked immortal world, where the God Dragon Tribe resided.

Dragon Everlasting had returned home.

Black energy pulsed in his face as he sat atop a huge cliff, struggling to suppress the morphblight virus within him. He was surrounded by a group of elders with flowing beards who were transmitting energy arts into him. Obviously, these elders had very high cultivation bases.

Suddenly, all of the elders drew deeply on their cultivation bases, spitting out mouthfuls of blood that became magical symbols which then burrowed into Dragon Everlasting.

“All Things Become Dragons; Anything and Everything Succeeds!”

Countless streams of black energy within Dragon Everlasting screeched as they were extracted out of him.

SNICK!

The elders all trembled violently as the black energy entered them, instantly transforming them into morphlings. In response, Dragon Everlasting unleashed a huge palm attack which killed them all on the spot, then burned them with dragonfire, transforming them into nothing but dust.

“Whew!” Dragon Everlasting said, breathing a sigh of relief. “So I had to sacrifice all of these elders’ lives, and even use a teleportation secret magic, all to get rid of that virus. This version of morphblight is really strong!”

“Dragon Everlasting!” a voice rang out.

A massive dragon’s head dropped out of the clouds and came to a stop in front of the cliff. Sitting on the dragon’s head was a middle-aged man who was a powerful person among the God Dragon Tribe. He was Dragon Everlasting’s father, King God Dragon, one of the highest-ranking leaders in the entire tribe.

“Father!” Dragon Everlasting said, bowing his head respectfully.

“You just ruined the lives of all those elders!? You unfilial bastard! Not only that, you lost a huge amount of face for our God Dragon Tribe. We’re going to be a laughingstock from here on out! You’d better well earn that face back, do you hear me?”

“Yes sir!” Dragon Everlasting said, his hands clenching into fists. “I'm going to kill you, Dragon Proudheaven! You’ll find out the consequences of crossing me!”

“That Dragon Proudheaven is a genius from one of the subsidiary branches. Don’t let him off the hook for this, otherwise the other dragon clans will get involved, and they might turn him into a weapon against us. You have to capture and enslave him, then crush every bit of value out of him that you can, understand? If you come out on the losing end again, then don't come back. You’ll be expelled and turned into nothing more than a roving dragon.”

“Yes, Father. I’ll definitely keep a cool head. I need to figure out who exactly is backing this Dragon Proudheaven. What kind of an expert is it? Which old-timer from the Dragonfolk is he relying on?” Dragon Everlasting grinned cruelly. “I've already sent people to get information from the fire dragons. I’ll wipe out their entire tribe if I have to! How dare lesser dragons like them defy us great dragons. It's a crime punishable by death!”

“Good. I'm assigning my top generals to help you. Go back down to the lower worlds and formally join the Dao Defense League. The plan was approved by the old-timers from the thirty-third ranked immortal worlds and will eventually become very profitable for us. Right now is the perfect chance to both fight the future world and unite the immortal worlds under our command. Eventually, the Dao Defense League will become the cornerstone of all of the countless immortal worlds. You need to go down there and train! Gather the support of the various immortals and build a power structure. It’s imperative to reestablish the ancient Heavenly Court. The immortal worlds are currently weak and divided, but thankfully the future world invaded, which provides the perfect impetus to bring them together. Don’t let Dragon Proudheaven ruin all of our plans.”

King God Dragon was bubbling with anger by this point. “Whoever his backer is, get him under your control. Get to the bottom of this. If I have to, I’ll kill that person myself!”

“Yes sir!”

“Dragon Raver! Dragon Screamer! Dragon Shaker! Dragon Rocker! You’re all assigned to follow the young lord here on his campaign. If anyone gets in your way, kill them without hesitation.”

Four hulking generals appeared, all of them clad in armor and pulsing with incredible fighting prowess.

“In that case, father, I’ll head down immediately to capture Dragon Proudheaven!” Flying out at top speed, Dragon Everlasting left the Eight Tribes Heaven and headed down.

Upon nearing the Dao Defense League, he saw hundreds of billions of immortal worlds all strung together to create a line of defense. Dragon Everlasting knew that the Dao Defense League had already united many of the immortal worlds, creating something like an imperial court. As that trend continued, the immortal world would eventually cease to be the dish of loose sand it had been in the past.

He issued a draconic roar, and a host of young Dragonfolk appeared. Bowing, they said, “We offer respectful greetings on your return, Young Sir!”

Dragon Everlasting looked them over, and could tell that these were definitely the most skilled geniuses the Dragonfolk possessed. “As protectors of the interests of the God Dragon Tribe, you were assigned the task of recruiting elder kings from the various big sects. Have you finished the job yet? Also, now that Dragon Proudheaven left the Nine Yangs God Sect, what has he been up to? Did he really try to continue the operations of his sect? I want to take care of him immediately!”

The young Dragonfolk exchanged glances. “Uh… Young Sir,” one of them said, “we suggest you don't act rashly. Dragon Proudheaven founded something called the Sage Panacea Sect. All sorts of powerful people have been going there to get treatment. He even took a whole bunch of elders as his sworn siblings.”

“What? How ridiculously presumptuous! He knew he offended the God Dragon Tribe, and still he went and did something as arrogant as that? How detestable! I'm going to go kill him right now!” Dragon Everlasting immediately flew up into the air.

“Wait, Young Sir! This could cause a big problem!” All of the young Dragonfolk were clamoring similar things.

Dragon Everlasting simply snorted coldly. “You scum. What happened to the valor of the Dragonfolk? Dragon Proudheaven is a lesser dragon, but he’s got you this scared? It might seem like he's won some hearts over, but that's all superficial. Of course people beg and plead when they need healing. They’ll say almost anything in moments like that. But when all is said and done, do you really think they’ll stick to their word? If we go in there to kill him, who will possibly dare to stand in our way. We’re the God Dragon Tribe!”

Unleashing another draconic howl of rage, he burst into the interior area of the Dao Defense League and immediately caught sight of the Sage Panacea Sect, with a large group of elders outside lining up to seek treatment.

Raising his voice, he shouted, “The God Dragon Tribe has come to handle tribe matters with Dragon Proudheaven! This is Dragonfolk business, so would everyone please kindly step aside. Unless you want to sow enmity with the Dragonfolk, don’t interfere in our internal affairs!”

Dragon Everlasting had assumed that shouting in this manner would immediately result in all of the elders deferring to the face of the God Dragon Tribe. In fact, he hoped to see some of them try to kick Dragon Proudheaven while he was down, and help apprehend him.

But instead, most of them simply cast frosty looks in his direction. To Dragon Everlasting’s shock, one of those elders was from the thirtieth ranked Without Expectation Heaven, who was in the peak Revisionist God level and had already stepped halfway into the Measureless God level. Supposedly, he had miraculously acquired dozens of godly-class energy arts, all of which he cultivated at the same time using something called a Hundred-Gods Cauldron Furnace. Because of that, he was called Daoist Hundred-Gods.

A buzz of conversation had already begun.

“I can’t believe the God Dragon Tribe is back to cause problems for Young Sir Dragon Proudheaven! How annoying! If he pisses off the young sir so much that we don’t get healing for our heterogeneous true energy, we're all finished!”

“Kick him out! How dare these scumbags act so boorishly here at the Sage Panacea Sect!”

“Who cares if they’re from the God Dragon Tribe? Drive them out! Anyone who displeases the young sir should be killed!”

“Come on, let’s just kill these earthworms from the God Dragon Tribe. If we offer a dragon head as payment, the young sir will definitely negate our heterogeneous true energy!”

“Brothers! Elders! The God Dragon Tribe is here to cause trouble. They probably want to kidnap Young Sir Dragon Proudheaven to blackmail the rest of us. I’ve already started taking Dragon Proudheaven’s medicinal tablets; if they capture him, then who knows what the God Dragon Tribe will do? We need to side with the young sir. We definitely can’t let him fall victim to their scheme! Attack!”

RUMBLE!

The numerous voices turned into a big sound wave that rolled out in thunderous fashion.

Then a host of elders, grand elders, prime elders, paragon elders, prime paragon elders, and even elder kings flew out. These were the top experts from the top sects in the Dao Defense League and they were all joining forces to rush aggressively toward Dragon Everlasting.

“How dare you people!”

The four dragon generals, Dragon Raver, Dragon Screamer, Dragon Shaker, and Dragon Rocker smiled grimly and took positions to defend Dragon Everlasting. “This is a young sir of the God Dragon Tribe! Do you really dare to offend the Eight Tribes Heaven? Aren’t you worried that your clans will be wiped out and looted?”

“Attack!” howled Daoist Hundred-Gods, who summoned an enormous cauldron filled with nearly a hundred godly-class energy arts.

With him taking the lead, the other elder kings didn't hesitate and unleashed deadly moves of their own.

“Slaughter these God Dragon Tribe members! The young sir will definitely reward us!”

WHIZZZ!

Intense rumbling filled heaven and earth as a host of daoist techniques, immortal skills, god skills, and magical treasures became a flood that rushed forth with such intensity that few people could ever hope to stand up to it. There were even some powerful old-timers who preferred to remain in hiding, but still lent their power to the attack.

The massive, combined attack hit, and Dragon Raver, Dragon Screamer, Dragon Shaker, and Dragon Rocker exploded, with even their skeletons being shredded to pieces. Not even their souls remained behind. They hadn’t even had a chance to change their expressions from that of ferocity to terror.

Four generals had perished, just like that.

“My god!” Dragon Everlasting screamed.

Chapter 728: The Boy, Promoter

“My god!” Dragon Everlasting let loose a bloodcurdling and miserable shriek. He had brought four generals of the Dragonfolk to help put Dragon Proudheaven in his place. Never could he have imagined that things would turn out like this.

The elders, grand elders, and all of the leaders up to the elder kings were completely united in their deadly attack, hurling forth daoist techniques and magical treasures of all types. In the end, the four generals exploded so thoroughly that they didn't leave behind even a sliver of bone to mark their passage.

Those four generals were savage fighters who, when they combined their might, could unleash might comparable to the Warriors of the Great Dance. They were consummate, invincible experts who were veterans of numerous battles. In the heights of the universe, they could slaughter the wild beasts that existed in the primal-chaos around thirty-third ranked heavenly worlds. And in the depths of the universe, they could travel to the darkest hells to hunt fiend-devils.

Dragon Everlasting’s father, King God Dragon, had personally appointed them as generals, and they were on the very brink of becoming seventh division Measureless Gods.

Reaching the seventh division put one in an entirely different position, even within the Dragonfolk. Such Measureless Gods were true hegemons, invincible fighters who often founded their own sects or organizations. Originally, King God Dragon had assigned them to his son to let them get more experience and, hopefully, become a bit stronger. If they had become Measureless Gods, they would have been huge assets to the God Dragon Tribe, but now they weren’t even lifeless corpses.

Dragon Everlasting knew that if his father, King God Dragon, learned of this, forgiveness would not be an option.

Sadly, there was nothing he could do in the face of millions upon millions of elders. Maybe he could fight back and kill one or two, but that would only ensure that he would die sooner.

“Are you people crazy?!” Dragon Everlasting shouted. “You’re willing to fight the God Dragon Tribe just to protect one low-down dragon from a pitiful tribe? If our tribe sends down an army, then even if you all work together you’ll still be wiped out!”

However, at the same time, he turned and fled.

The elders weren’t willing to let him escape, though.

“Kill him! Slaughter everyone from the God Dragon Tribe! Take their dragonpearls and dragon vitality!”

“Yeah, we might as well crush them!”

“That’s right! While our Dao Defense League led the fighting, the God Dragon Tribe went into hiding and refused to fight the future world! And now they show up trying to act high and mighty, and even trying to extort us? There’s no way we can stand for this. These people have to die!”

“Exactly! Kill all these god dragons!”

A host of elders descended like swarms of bees toward the God Dragon Tribe’s camp. Instantly, the place was put into a position of incredible danger. The young Dragonfolk flew out to see Young Sir Dragon Everlasting scrambling back in their direction, anxiously shouting, “Go, go, go! Get back to the Eight Tribes Heaven and mobilize the armies! Wipe these people out of existence!”

“What? He wants to go back to the Eight Tribes Heaven and marshal their armies? No way! Kill him!”

Many of the elders were so angered they could hardly control themselves. Instead of trying to play games, they just wanted to put an end to these Dragonfolk and wipe them out of existence. In the blink of an eye, a combined attack descended that shook the highest heavens like a tribulation from the primeval past.

RUMBLE!

Dazzling light flared as explosive energy ripped through the area. The Dragonfolk who had been first to fly out were slashed to pieces and some of the nearby elder kings absorbed their souls, blood, and energy, leading to immediate benefits.

Dragon Everlasting was instantly surrounded, and obviously had no chance of escaping.

Seeing his fellow Dragonfolk being cut down, though, caused his heart to surge with anger. “I'm not going to rest until you’re dead, Dragon Proudheaven!” he shrieked. “You might have bewitched these elders into killing my generals and my people, but my superiors in the God Dragon Tribe will never believe it! The Dragon Emperor is probably going to skin me alive!”

Seeing that Dragon Everlasting was surrounded, many of the elders began shouting in triumph.

“Kill this Dragon Everlasting! He has royal blood of the God Dragon Tribe! Refine him into some spirit medicine and the benefits will be astounding. Young Sir Dragon Proudheaven can do it for us. We’ll all get much stronger, and maybe even achieve breakthroughs!”

It seemed a foregone conclusion that Dragon Everlasting was doomed.

Meanwhile, the dramatic events had attracted the attention of a group of powerful old-timers who had gathered in a secret location. They were none other than the founders of the Dao Defense League.

“What do we do? Should we step in and save Dragon Everlasting?”

“Stop the situation? Well, if the God Dragon Tribe attacks the Dao Defense League, we're done for.”

“Hmph! Those lizards have no sense of propriety. It took a lot of work for us to unite the immortal worlds and make the Dao Defense League work. When we initially went to the Dragonfolk to ask for help against the future world, they refused to send anyone. They said they wanted to ‘maintain their integrity’. Now that we’re prospering, they want to jump in and take all the profit? It only makes sense that we should teach them a harsh lesson.”

“They offered a good reason, though.”

“That doesn’t matter. Their ‘reason’ was completely contrived. So what if Dragon Proudheaven is one of the Dragonfolk? Saying that it was ‘Dragonfolk business’ was just an excuse to prevent us from interfering.”

“Who is Dragon Proudheaven, anyway? He's so strong! Not only can he cure morphblight, he can also negate heterogeneous true energy? With his help, people can easily cultivate multiple godly-class energy arts! We have to keep him safe. After all, we’ll need his help going forward. The God Dragon Tribe obviously has some villainous ambitions, so maybe we should keep Dragon Everlasting hostage to use as a bargaining chip.”

“I studied one of those medicinal tablets, and it seems to be based on a Heaven-Devouring śarīra, the handiwork of the ancient King Heaven-Devourer. However, they should only be able to negate a bit of heterogeneous true energy, not godly-class energy arts.”

The lowest-level old-timers in this group were Measureless Gods, but there were also Buddha Gods and Chaos Gods.

Of course, all of the old-timers had only sent clones to the meeting, keeping their true selves hidden in unknown locations. People at this level could easily create numerous incarnations of themselves and wouldn’t easily show their true faces. It was entirely likely that some of them had true bodies located in or around thirty-third ranked immortal worlds. They could easily be people who found godrelics nestled in the primal-chaos, where they would secretly work on their cultivation in the hopes of reaching the Deathless Throne.

All of them were very curious about Yang Qi, yet couldn’t unravel his secrets.

However, the fact that he could negate the harmful effects of heterogeneous true energy meant that they would all seek his help eventually.

“Let’s step in. If Dragon Everlasting actually gets killed, it’ll be hard to explain it to the God Dragon Tribe. Why don’t we smooth things out right now?” One of the old-timer’s clones suddenly vanished.

RUMBLE!

In the middle of the Dao Defense League, a host of high-level elders were about to slam Dragon Everlasting with such deadly attacks that he would surely perish. Dragon Everlasting was using a god item to fight it out to the end, but he knew he couldn’t hold out for much longer. He was throwing spirit pills into his mouth like mad to recover his true energy, but it was like throwing a cup of water on a burning cart of firewood. Within a few breaths of time, he would join the four generals in their complete and utter destruction.

However, in that very moment, a shining figure descended and intercepted all of the attacks. A hale and hearty young boy, who was apparently a patriarch of some sort, appeared.

With the merest grasp, he took all of the vital energy and magical power and crushed it into nothing.

Immense, majestic energy flowed out in all directions, calming all auras and forcing everyone to settle into a peaceful state. Everyone from the elders to the elder kings looked over at the boyish patriarch, then dropped to their knees and joined their voices to cry out, “Our respects, August Patriarch! Greetings, Patriarch Promoter!”

This ‘young boy’ was a Buddha God patriarch from the thirty-second ranked Promoter Heaven, simply known as Promoter. He was one of the original founders of the Dao Defense League.

When Dragon Everlasting saw Patriarch Promoter, and realized that he was out of danger, he burst out in raucous laughter. “Great timing, Patriarch Promoter. Really, you picked the perfect moment. These people are all plotting against me and the God Dragon Tribe, and they already killed a host of Dragonfolk experts. As a patriarch, surely you’ll enforce justice by arresting all of them and handing them over to the Dragonfolk for trial and execution!”

“Shut your mouth!” Patriarch Promoter said. “This matter has nothing to do with the Dao Defense League. You and Dragon Proudheaven might both be elders of the Dao Defense League, but any conflict between you is an internal affair of the Dragonfolk. You said it yourself! We patriarchs would never interfere with Dragonfolk business. If you have a problem, take care of it on your own!”

Dragon Everlasting immediately realized that Patriarch Promoter was protecting Dragon Proudheaven, which caused venomous hatred to bubble up in his heart. “You… you aren’t worried about reprisal from the Dragonfolk?”

Patriarch Promoter let loose a furious slap onto the side of Dragon Everlasting’s face. “How dare you threaten me! Even your father had better well treat me with respect! If your God Dragon Tribe dares to cause mischief, then all of the patriarchs of the Dao Defense League will join forces to wipe you out of existence! The Dao Defense League was formed to resist the future world and defend the dao of heaven. We’ve already gained the favor of the dao of heaven and will restore the ancient Heavenly Court to unite all immortal worlds! If you Dragonfolk don’t fall in line and take orders, then you’ll be setting yourselves against the Heavenly Court and end up dead and buried. For the sake of your father’s face, I saved you just now. Otherwise, you’d be dead already. I'm done here. Everyone here is dismissed. Let’s just pretend none of this happened. Let Dragon Everlasting go back home, and see how the Dragonfolk handle their ‘internal affairs’.”

He flicked his sleeve to emphasize his words.

In response, the various elders cheered. “Long live the Dao Defense League! Defend the dao of heaven, unify all creation!”

Then they turned and rushed back to the Sage Panacea Sect to see what Dragon Proudheaven had to say.

Chapter 729: Helping Hundred-Gods

‘Patriarch Promoter, huh,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘He’s very strong.’

He had been paying close attention to everything since the arrival of Dragon Everlasting. Although he never actually made a move, in the end, he was really in control of everything. After all, he had essentially incited most of the elders into action.

Yang Qi knew that, Dragon Everlasting would definitely try to get revenge, given his personality. Therefore, he needed to meet with the elder kings who were his strongest allies and discuss the matter. After all, even if the God Dragon Tribe reacted with fury, the law cannot be enforced when everyone is an offender. With a unified alliance, not even all of the Eight Tribes working together would be too much of a threat to handle.

The Dao Defense League had become such a powerful force nowadays that no one would dare to offend it.

It stood in for heaven to promulgate the dao.

It stood in for heaven to defend the dao.

It had justice on its side as it fought back against the future world, and as such, was tasked with defending and restoring the destiny of the dao of heaven. Yang Qi had even heard rumors that the old-timers who founded the Dao Defense League were out in primal-chaos working on their cultivation. Supposedly, some of them had suddenly achieved cultivation breakthroughs, broken through bottlenecks, encountered good fortune, or received legacies from the ancient legion of gods.

For them to receive such blessings and rewards indicated that the dao of heaven approved of them and their Dao Defense League.

Yang Qi felt that he had already benefited greatly simply by being in the Dao Defense League. It was like being an important government official in a mortal dynasty, and everyone would back down at the slightest lift of his chin. Already, the Dao Defense League was starting to resemble the ancient Heavenly Court, whose destiny vastly surpassed anything from the mortal world by many times over.

It even seemed like it could create fate itself.

In the mortal world, emperors were sometimes given the title Lord Master of Fate. That begged the question of what title would be held by the lord of billions of immortal worlds.

‘If I'm going to continue to operate here in the Dao Defense League,’ Yang Qi thought, ‘I need to reach the same level as those old-timers. I need to take control of destiny, and not just rely on the blessings of the dao of heaven. That's the only way I’ll be able to handle Proud Heaven. Unfortunately, my cultivation level is too low. I need to reach the Godmyth level as quickly as possible. Only then will I be able to stand on equal footing with the old-timers. Unfortunately, that breakthrough is going to be very, very difficult!’

After Patriarch Promoter calmed the situation down, he looked over at Yang Qi sitting in the Sage Panacea Sect, then suddenly vanished without a trace.

Before long, all of the elders had returned to their previous positions.

Before any of them could say a thing, Yang Qi rose to his feet and said, “Many thanks to all of you for helping me drive out the God Dragon Tribe. I won’t let any of you down. Please, line up and allow me to heal your sicknesses and negate the effects of any heterogeneous true energy you have.”

A resounding cheer rose up.

Up in front of the group was an elder king that Yang Qi recognized.

“Daoist Hundred-Gods, please, step forward!”

“Alright!” He was the man who had led the charge, the same one who supposedly cultivated nearly a hundred different godly-class energy arts. Without hesitation, he stepped forward.

“Daoist Hundred-Gods, I can see that you cultivate a total of ninety-three godly-class energy arts, something that no ordinary individual could ever do. Even people with unique constitutions would end up exploding as a result. Obviously, there’s something special about you. Presumably, your search of various primal-chaos debris netted you a God-Smelting Shrub, which you used to fuse the godliness of those different arts. That’s how you summon that immensely powerful Hundred-Gods Cauldron Furnace of yours.”

“Yes, that’s common knowledge,” Daoist Hundred-Gods replied. “Young Sir Dragon Proudheaven, please heal my maladies. I managed to combine all of my godly-class energy arts, but my practice of cultivation has become very difficult as a result. I'm worried that if I try to advance to the next step, I’ll experience cultivation deviation. My cauldron might even shatter, leading to my death.”

“No problem. Considering your natural talents, I should be able to heal you easily.” Yang Qi threw both of his hands out, sending out streams of true energy that took the shape of dragons. The dragons swirled around Daoist Hundred-Gods for a moment before plunging into his acupoints. He shivered, and a booming sound like thunder echoed out as he began glowing with blinding light.

Gong!

A sonorous boom rang out, then everything went silent.

As Daoist Hundred-Gods clasped his palms together in front of his chest, ninety-three godflowers appeared above his head, creating something like a beautiful cloud. Atop the cloud was a huge cauldron that had no color to it whatsoever, but was instead the picture of purity. A moment later, the cloud and the flower shrank back down into Daoist Hundred-Gods’ head.

Crack. Rattle.

Dazzling light shone in all directions and auspicious blessings proliferated as a host of finger-sized immortals appeared.

Daoist Hundred-Gods burst out into contented laughter. “I finally combined the hundred gods! Merge the gods and transcend; gain enlightenment of the ultimate transformations of yin and yang; grasp the truths of godliness; combine gods and energy, combine energy and will… combine truth and the dao!”

He suddenly erupted with a dazzling aura.

“Excellent,” Yang Qi said. “Since you have perfectly combined ninety-three godly-class energy arts, I suppose I might as well offer a bit of additional help. If you reach the Measureless God level, you can become a new, supreme patriarch of the Dao Defense League!” Yang Qi waved his hand and seven dragons suddenly appeared above the head of Daoist Hundred-Gods.

A god dragon! A heaven dragon! A true dragon! And more!

Seven of the godly-class energy arts that made up the Eight Tribes Godfist descended into Daoist Hundred-Gods. The only one Yang Qi held back was the art belonging to the buddha dragons.

Many of the other elder kings reacted with outright shock.

“Is that…?”

“That’s the Eight Tribes Godfist! Seven of the arts combined! Now Daoist Hundred-Gods actually has a total of a hundred!”

“Daoist Hundred-Gods was already the strongest of the Revisionist Gods in the entire Dao Defense League. That made him one of the top figures among us elder kings. Unfortunately, he was doomed to make little further progress. He just had too many random energy arts all crammed together, making the Measureless God level impossible for him. Now that Dragon Proudheaven has helped him, he’s probably going to be able to break through after all. That’s some incredible benevolence from the young sir!”

“Seven godly-class fist arts from the Dragonfolk, and each one contains all sorts of profound truths. Considering that Young Sir Proudheaven can use all eight, I doubt that any Revisionist God could possibly be a match for him.”

“Why is he only a Dao-Demolisher? He can’t even reach the Godmyth level? Is he the legendary type of person who, if he becomes a Godmyth, will overturn heaven and earth?”

“This is big. If Daoist Hundred-Gods becomes a seventh division Measureless God, that will be a huge asset to the Dao Defense League. This is the kind of thing that happens once in ten thousand… no, once in a hundred million years!”

It wasn't just the elder kings who were shocked. Some of the almighty patriarchs who were looking on were suddenly far more attentive than before.

“A hundred gods combined; fused by the legion of gods; convergence of the dao of heaven; the true expression of the dao of gods!” Yang Qi placed his palm onto Daoist Hundred-Gods’ back, sending in a stream of power from the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.

Daoist Hundred-Gods shivered and his eyes shone with a brilliant light. “I'm going to push through to the Measureless God level! If this works, I’ll owe everything to you, Young Sir! I, Daoist Hundred-Gods, hereby swear that I will live and die together with you. Honor or disgrace, I’ll share it all!”

All of a sudden, the magical laws of the dao of heaven produced heavenly tribulation.

An enormous wheel appeared above Daoist Hundred-Gods’ head, covered with sharp spikes that spun rapidly as it descended. Everyone gasped in shock.

“That's the Wheel of the Heaven-Dao! The fury of this heavenly tribulation is completely terrifying!” Many of the elders were shocked and began to back up. But Daoist Hundred-Gods didn’t shrink back. He attacked the Wheel of the Heaven-Dao with full force, ignoring its efforts to crush him to bits.

Space shattered as hosts of illusory heaven-devils appeared, which pounced on Daoist Hundred-Gods in the hopes of draining him of quintessence energy.

“Hmph! Heaven-devils dare to come cause mischief?” Yang Qi was prepared for something like this. All of a sudden, ten thousand swirling dragons appeared above his head, in the midst of which was a buddha dragon, an entity with the head of a dragon and the body of a person. The buddha dragon immediately charged to meet the heaven-devils, who subsequently screamed as they were wiped out of existence.

Next, explosive bursts of vital energy transformed into minor universes around Daoist Hundred-Gods, which then exploded. The majestic wills at play were so intense that even Yang Qi felt pressure. Thankfully, the tribulation wasn’t targeting him; ninety-nine percent of it was focused on Daoist Hundred-Gods, with only a bit being diverted to resist Yang Qi’s efforts.

‘Strong. So strong!’ he thought. Up above, the Wheel of the Heaven-Dao was exerting more pressure than ever. The critical moment of the tribulation had come. Daoist Hundred-Gods would either pass the tribulation, become a Measureless God, and leave the ranks of the elder kings to become a patriarch of the Dao Defense League, or he would die forever.

Yang Qi couldn’t help now, he could only watch.

Daoist Hundred-Gods really was a genius. Despite the pressure he was under, he exhaled some energy which formed an internal pellet bursting with godpower!

POP!

The Wheel of the Heaven-Dao began to crack.

Daoist Hundred Gods furthered the attack, a process which went on for seven days and nights. In the end, the wheel shattered and he rose to the Measureless God level.

“I finally broke through!” he shouted exultingly.

“Young Sir!” he said, dropping to his knees and offering a formal salute.

Chapter 730: Heaven Dancer

“What are you doing, Daoist Hundred-Gods!?” Yang Qi said, quickly pulling him back to his feet. “I just helped out a bit, there’s no need for such politeness.”

“You really gave me a new lease on life,” Daoist Hundred-Gods replied. “A majestic old-timer once told me that I would never have a shot at reaching the Measureless God level. But now I've broken past what was predestined. I've already made my decision. I want to join the Sage Panacea Sect! Even if you won’t have me as an official member, at least let me be a dharmic elder. I can handle random tasks and make sure that anyone who causes problems for the sect is killed immediately!”

By now, Daoist Hundred-Gods was convinced that following Yang Qi would come with many benefits.

If he could become a member, he might have a chance to cultivate more godly-class energy arts, and at the same time, benefit from the sect’s medicinal tablets.

“That would be wonderful!” Yang Qi said, delighted at the prospect. With someone like Daoist Hundred-Gods as a member of the sect, it would be an even more intimidating organization. Daoist Hundred-Gods was now no mere elder king, but would soon have an oversight position within the Dao Defense League as a whole. He wouldn’t be a pawn to manipulate, he would be a person who could manipulate countless other pawns.

Thus, right in the presence of countless witnesses, Daoist Hundred-Gods went through all of the formalities and ceremonies to join the Sage Panacea Sect. Yang Qi threw a huge banquet in which he went about negating the heterogeneous true energy of numerous elders. Of course, the elders were no fools, and provided gifts to both Yang Qi and Daoist Hundred-Gods.

In that one day, the renown of the Sage Panacea Sect rose to incredible heights, and it became the envy of countless individuals. Many people were trying to come up with plans to establish good relations with the new sect. If nothing else, the medicinal tablets that cured heterogeneous true energy would likely become a form of currency that surpassed power stones in value. They would definitely be the most well-known type of pill in all the immortal worlds.

Nothing could be more miraculous than a medicinal pill that could cure the effects of heterogeneous true energy.

By now, the leaders of the Nine Yangs God Sect were starting to feel sick to their stomachs about how things had played out. Yang Qi was becoming so terrifying that they regretted nothing more than failing to come to his defense when the God Dragon Tribe came to cause problems.

Unfortunately, they had no face left in that regard.

Worse, many of their own patriarchs were actually plagued by heterogeneous true energy. Some of them were even thinking of leaving the Nine Yangs God Sect and joining the Sage Panacea Sect.

After the banquet was over, Yang Qi went into seclusion, determined to break into the Godmyth level. Although he’d done a lot to earn a great reputation, it was a bit empty without him being a Godmyth. Besides, he had so many powerful magical treasures that there was no doubt certain old-timers envied him, and would love to rob him. Right now, he was not inclined to abandon everything he had built up in the Dao Defense League, and was also determined to explore what other bountiful benefits might be at hand.

Improving his own cultivation base was the best way to keep any ambitious individuals in check.

Thump!

In the depths of the Nine Yangs God Sect, one of the elders slapped his palm onto a table, shattering it into splinters.

A whole group of elders were sitting there in a meeting, which was presided over by an elder named Yang Wine, a seventh division Measureless God. He was obviously a very important person, with everyone else being in lesser positions as elder kings, or prime paragon elders and the like, most of them in the fifth or sixth divisions.

“Damnation!” he growled. “We lost our shot. If we had known that Dragon Proudheaven could cure heterogeneous true energy, we would never have let him go. That damned God Dragon Tribe caused us to lose everything! He left and we turned into a laughingstock!” Yang Wine looked around with fury, causing all of the others in the room to turn as quiet as cicadas in winter.

A long moment passed, and one of the elder kings sighed. “You’re right. I personally cultivate several godly-class energy arts, and it's got me stuck in my cultivation. Our Nine Yangs God Sect’s signature ability is the Nine Yangs Paragon Preheaven Art, which consists of nine separate godly-class energy arts. By combining the True-Yang with the Lesser-, Supreme-, Pure-, Jade-, Vulcan-, Intense-, Empyrean-, and Profound-Yangs, you can achieve ultimate power. Unfortunately, only the sectlord himself can do that. For the rest of us, it’s impossible. Right now, most of the elder kings are stuck with only six or seven of the various types of yang energy and cannot achieve breakthroughs. If we could negate that heterogeneous true energy, then all of us elder kings could follow in the footsteps of Daoist Hundred-Gods and have a shot at becoming Measureless Gods.”

“What good does it do to talk about that now?” another elder king said. “Our top priority should be mending our relationship with Dragon Proudheaven. If we don't, other sects are going to get stronger and stronger, while we continue growing weaker.”

“I have an idea,” another elder king said. “Quite a few elders were enticed to join the Sage Panacea Sect. What if we ask them to serve as moles?”

“When moronic rebels like that join a new sect, the first thing they try to do is oppose their old sect!” Yang Wine said angrily. “They won’t be able to hold back from striking a blow against us if they can, trying to earn points with their new leader. And you think they’re going to work as moles? Forget about them. You can't rely on unreliable people.”

He was absolutely right. The elders who had already defected to the Sage Panacea Sect were filled with righteous indignation and were already itching to see the Nine Yangs God Sect destroyed. At least, that was what they gave voice to in the hopes of proving their loyalty.

Yang Qi approved, saying it was only natural for converts to stick closely to their new master and long for the destruction of the old. People who switched sides but maintained loyalties to their previous organization were fools. Double-dealing backstabbers who only gave lip service to the spirit of loyalty and self-sacrifice would eventually harm the interests of their new masters. The only thing Yang Qi would do to people like that would be to execute them.

“But what do we do now?” another elder king asked. “Don’t tell me we just suck up the loss?”

A vicious gleam appeared in his eyes. “Why don’t we just see it through to the finish? Have the supreme patriarch kidnap Dragon Proudheaven back here and force him to work for the Nine Yangs God Sect again?”

“That's something we can consider,” Yang Wine said with a nod. “Unfortunately, we can’t strike directly at Dragon Proudheaven right now. Not only does he have the backing of several powerful patriarchs, he also has a very strong cultivation base. And he has the support of a lot of the elder kings. We’d need one of the old-timers to help out. An eighth division patriarch—or even better, one in the ninth division. I’ll send a request up the chain of command to see if our patriarchs will agree to do something.”

“In addition to that, we could also form other alliances.”

Yang Wine thought for a moment. “You, Yang Glory. And you, Yang Frost. Take a trip to the Eight Tribes Heaven and get in touch with the God Dragon Tribe. See if you can get their help to deal with Dragon Proudheaven. You two, Yang Riches and Yang Soul, go to the Tusita Heaven and ask for a meeting with the seventy-two patriarchs of the Immortal-Slayer’s Sect. They hate Dragon Proudheaven down to their very bones.”

Orders flew within the Nine Yangs God Sect, and their forces were soon mobilized.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi was in seclusion, drawing on his divine abilities, including the Wheel of Fate, to work on his dao heart. At the moment, his first goal was to reach the level of nine lineaments.

Once his dao heart had nine lineaments, he would crush it and step into the Godmyth level.

At the moment, he only had four lineaments. Although that put him at the lower end of the overarching level, it meant that with each breakthrough, he would require immense amounts of momentum, more so than was normally required for higher levels.

Reaching the level of five lineaments would be hard enough, and once he headed toward six, he would have to draw heavily on the power of the eternal sands that were the hells of the universe.

“God pill!”

A strange-looking pill bottle appeared in front of him, floating in the air. He inhaled, and immense amounts of medicinal energy flowed into him. His fateless dao fruit appeared, complete with its four deep lineaments. They almost seemed like cracks in the dao of heaven itself, eternally deathless on the surface of the dao heart.

As he gathered true energy and went through his breathing exercises, he could sense the god pill in the bottle slowly rising up.

‘Great. I have no idea where exactly this god pill came from. I wonder if it was concocted by King Immortal-Slayer himself. I've seen god pills with medicinal strength like this, but none that are as effective.’ Although Yang Qi was curious, he didn’t feel like spending the time doing any research for further information. Instead, he just absorbed the medicinal strength.

As he was immersed in trying to elevate his cultivation level, somewhere else in the universe, a flat, shadowy figure approached the border of the Dao Defense League. Shockingly, it was traveling through the Flatverse!

The borders of the Dao Defense League were protected by countless godwarding spells, the kind that made it impossible for future warriors to slip through unnoticed. But this shadowy figure easily made it through undetected. It sped this way and that through the immortal worlds until it reached the Sage Panacea Sect. There, it stopped when it saw the six Warriors of the Great Dance and began pulsing with killing intent. Moments later, it retracted its killing intent and continued onward.

It began searching through the depths of the Sage Panacea Sect, passing countless disciples in the process. None of them noticed the figure. After all, it currently existed in a different universal hyperdimension, making it impossible to detect.

“The disciples of this Sage Panacea Sect are really lax and weak,” the figure murmured. “If I felt like it, I could slaughter them all and raze this place to the ground.”

“Oh really?” another voice rang out. “You must have come from far away, friend. Unfortunately for you, I usually execute rude, uninvited guests.”

Space rippled around the shadowy figure and everything twisted. As things changed, the figure tried to flee, but was incapable. Eventually, everything looked different. Bright light shone everywhere, and the ground appeared to be made of silver. There Yang Qi sat, right in front of the shadowy figure, looking at him.

“Yang Qi…” the shadowy figure said. “You're using high-level science and technology in this place, aren’t you? Something from another civilization. The techniques of the dao of immortals can’t be used to invert the universe like this.”

“Who are you?” Yang Qi said, secretly taken aback that this figure knew so much about him. “And how do you know my name?”

No one knew that his Sage Panacea Sect was actually built by the photonic computers of the Cruiser of Civilization. Because of that, the photonic computers would warn him if any intruders came.

If it weren’t for that, there was no way he could have detected this black-garbed individual.

The man in black was actually dressed in similar attire to the six Warriors of the Great Dance, which made it obvious that he was a future warrior of some sort.

“Who I am isn’t important,” the man said, “but I can tell you my call sign—Heaven Dancer.”

Chapter 731: Your Father Sent Me

“Heaven Dancer?”

As soon as Yang Qi heard the name, his guard went up even more than it had been before. He could tell that this person’s cultivation base was mysterious and unreadable, and he had future science and technology that could likely crush the Cruiser of Civilization. Generally speaking, Future Ones were enemies who couldn’t be trusted. Regardless of what they had to say, the best way to deal with them was to build up enough power, trap them in a spell formation, then kill them.

“What are you doing here? You’re in the middle of the Dao Defense League. All it would take would be a word from me and you would be overwhelmed on all sides.”

“Overwhelmed on all sides?” Heaven Dancer chuckled. “If I get surrounded, I’ll just turn you into the subject of universal hatred. I’ll tell everyone that you’re the son of Proud Heaven, one of the ten magisters of the future world. Would the Dao Defense League just let you keep doing business as usual if they found out who you really are? People think you’re Dragon Proudheaven, backed by Dragonfolk experts and patriarchs. The truth is that you’re really working for the future world, and that you’ve infiltrated the Dao Defense League to weaken it from inside!”

“Oh, so you’re here to blackmail me?” Yang Qi said. “You must have been sent by Proud Heaven himself. Proud Heaven, one of the ten magisters of the future world. My father? That’s a joke, right? I don’t have a thing to do with the man, and even he knows that. I'm a god born out of fatelessness. My mother dreamed of the destruction of primal-chaos before giving birth to me, so my blood isn’t even connected to her. And you think I’m somehow related to Proud Heaven? Come on, cut the crap.”

“I don't know about all that,” Heaven Dancer said. “You can argue it out with Magister Proud Heaven if you want to. I'm just here to relay a message. When everyone finds out that the supposed Dragonfolk elders you rely on are fake, and that you’re using the power of the future world, that little halo around your head is going to shatter. Everyone will turn on you, and I'm sure you realize what will happen then.”

“Very treacherous,” Yang Qi said, his mind furiously racing. It was obviously a very serious situation. He really was using the power of the future world, and he really was the ‘son’ of one of the leaders from there. If word got out, it would cause a huge commotion and was a guarantee that the patriarchs would try to seize him. After all, there were a lot of holes in his current story. He rose to prominence out of nowhere and had a mysterious background that was completely open to speculation and suspicion. Even if he tried to explain the truth, it was doubtful that anyone would believe him.

‘Damnation….’ he thought. Once the rumors started, they would be almost impossible to stop.

“Where is Proud Heaven?” Yang Qi suddenly asked.

“Magister Proud Heaven? Do you know how important he is? There’s no way he would stoop to messing around with a minor force like the Dao Defense League. All he needs to do is deploy a few warriors like me to handle things like this. The really worrisome individuals are the old-timers hidden out there in the primal-chaos.” Heaven Dancer laughed darkly. “August Patriarch Proud Heaven. Magister Proud Heaven. He has all sorts of divine abilities, including ones that can take him to the Primeval Age. You see, he needs the God Legion Seal from there and has been fighting for a long time to get it. Soon he’ll win out over the almighty individuals from there. And once he has that additional God Legion Seal, he’ll return to conquer everything here. Why don’t you just hand over the one-third of the seal that you have? Do it for yourself. Do it for your mother, and your Master, and your aunt. It’s the right thing to do.”

“What?” Yang Qi said, his eyes suddenly flashing with killing intent, making it seem like he might launch an attack at any moment. “Are you saying outright that my mother, my Master the Invincible Dugu, and my Aunt Susu are all in the future world?”

“That's right. They were taken there, and there’s absolutely no way you’ll ever track them down.” Heaven Dancer burst out laughing. “Feeling some killing intent, huh? Go ahead. Kill me. But as soon as you make a move, I’ll reveal the truth about you. Then you’ll die. Oh sure, maybe you’ll escape somehow. But then your mother, your Master, and your aunt will all receive endless torture in the future world. Maybe they’ll even die, too. Forever.”

Yang Qi let out a long hiss of anger before regaining his composure. “What do you want?”

“Just what I would expect of Magister Proud Heaven’s son. Very cool and collected. It's simple. Join the future world. Work for us and do everything we say. You’re in the perfect position here in the Dao Defense League. Oh, and also, you need to hand over your God Legion Seal. Give it to me to take back to the future.”

“What if I don’t agree?” Yang Qi said.

“Then I can't guarantee the safety of your mother, your aunt, and your Master. And I’ll start spreading the word that you’re the son of Magister Proud Heaven from the future world. You’ll have no chance of maintaining your position here. You’ll be dead, along with all your clan. You see, you have to work for us. Don't worry, you’ll be handsomely rewarded. You need to give me your response, right here, right now. Looking at it from your perspective, you really don’t have any alternative but to agree.”

After a moment, Yang Qi burst out laughing. “Sorry. I refuse.”

“You really don't care that your mother is in danger?” Heaven Dancer said, visibly stunned, and scarcely able to believe his own ears.

“Hmph! You moron! Do you really think I can just give you the God Legion Seal? You’re really naive if you do. I can use it to slaughter enemies, to create mountains of corpses, to unleash rivers of blood, and to wipe out cities and nations. But I can’t just hand it over to someone else. Maybe you can kill my mother, my Master, and my aunt. But eventually, I’ll get the other two parts of the God Legion Seal. And then I’ll become the Sovereign Lord who exists above the legion of gods, the creator of the great dao, and the founder of the universe. You think I wouldn’t be able to resurrect them then? Go ahead. Kill them. All three.”

“You!” In that moment, Heaven Dancer realized how dead-set Yang Qi was, and all of a sudden, a trace of panic appeared in his face.

“You want the God Legion Seal?” Yang Qi said. “Fine, try to take it!” The golden imp flew out of his forehead and the Glad Tidings of the Lord erupted out.

The legion of gods could sing powerful blessings to the Lord, but when people profaned the Lord, they could utter incredible curses. In recent days, Yang Qi had gained enlightenment of profound true energy and made significant progress, thanks to the god pill he had benefited from. The God Legion Seal was now even more pure and useful. Although he was still limited to about one one-billionth of its full power, the current limit was even beyond anything from before.

Gold light flowed like water and sagelight streamed like silk. The holy hymns echoed out as billions of trillions of tiny angels appeared, surrounding Heaven Dancer.

“Prepare to enjoy a new power I recently unlocked from the God Legion Seal,” Yang Qi said. “Don’t worry, I won’t kill you. I’ll turn you into a puppet like the other six of your friends. You know, as a Measureless God, I probably couldn’t handle you if we were outside. You could at least escape. But being the fool you are, you came in here, where I can use my fragment of the Cruiser of Civilization on you!”

[Beep-beep-beep. Beep-beep-beep.]

All of a sudden, the photonic computers in the Cruiser of Civilization began flashing with bright light and numerous systems began to report in.

[Foreign object detected! Obliterate it! Obliterate it immediately!]

[Cannon of Civilization: primary attack charge prepared!]

[Foreign invader detected. Weapons systems fully activated!]

[Exits sealed. Hyperdrive systems activated!]

When Heaven Dancer heard all the voices of the computers, his face became a mask of dread.

“This is bad!” he blurted. “We’re in a fragment of the Cruiser of Civilization?! This is the highest level of science and technology from the ancient mechanical civilization! I can’t die here at the hands of the God Legion Seal! I have to escape. Let me out!”

RUMBLE!

All of a sudden, a blinding burst of light shot out from him as he tried to vanquish the power of the God Legion Seal.

Within the light, Yang Qi could make out something like a sphere covered with endless streams of data that pulsed with incredible power.

“Cosmic Quantum Computer!” Heaven Dancer howled. “Destroy my enemy! Use the power of future god crystals!” He knew that he was in a situation of incredible danger, having been completely surprised by the fact that Yang Qi had part of the Cruiser of Civilization.

‘This thing is incredible!’ Yang Qi thought as soon as he saw the Cosmic Quantum Computer, which was apparently strong enough to resist the God Legion Seal. “I want that! Hand of the One God!”

The Hand of the One God shot out with countless variations to grab onto the enormous sphere. The sphere struggled, and even sent out attacks into Yang Qi’s sea of consciousness. However, he simply chuckled coldly and used his divine will and the power of monarchs to seal the sphere.

“Monarch of Myriad Monarchs! King Immortal-Slayer!”

Yang Qi unleashed a deadly move from King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions, a version that surpassed anything that Young Master Leaf had used. After all, Young Master Leaf had only ever possessed three medallions at his height, whereas Yang Qi had four, giving him much deeper enlightenment.

He also drew on the power of the Cruiser of Civilization to add to the sealing effect.

He was now using the God Legion Seal, the Cruiser of Civilization, and King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions to fight Heaven Dancer.

For all intents and purposes, it was as if King Immortal-Slayer and the scientific civilization had joined forces with the Sovereign Lord. No entity or civilization from the past, the present, or the future could possibly fight back against three such powerful wills.

“Arggghhh!”

Heaven Dancer screamed as he exploded into a mass of wriggling, twitching bits of blood and gore.

The mecha he had been equipped with was blasted into streams of mercury-like liquid, but quickly began returning to its original shape.

‘What a powerful mecha! Is that thing a combination of machinery and the flesh and blood of gods?’ Yang Qi grabbed the flowing mercury that was the mecha, then converged the power of the God Legion Seal on the twitching flesh and blood.

Moments later, Heaven Dancer was back in one piece, his mecha once again equipped. But now he seemed different. His gaze was blank as he kneeled in front of Yang Qi. “Heaven Dancer salutes you, my new master. What orders do you have?”

“Tell me who else knows about my relationship to Proud Heaven. Do the other leaders in the future world know?” Yang Qi got right to the most important issue.

“No, master. It’s top secret. Only I and some of the top members of the armed forces in the future know of it. The information was implanted into me and was intended to be destroyed after I accomplished my mission!”

Chapter 732: Special Ops Team

Just like that, Heaven Dancer began revealing deeply kept secrets to Yang Qi.

He couldn’t resort to a psychic projection or a soulsearch, as it went without saying that Heaven Dancer’s soul and memories were protected by defensive measures put in place by the future world. If he tried to force such information out, Heaven Dancer’s mind would explode and Yang Qi would come out completely empty-handed.

The only way to get information was the old question-and-answer method.

When Yang Qi learned that information about his true identity wasn’t public knowledge, he relaxed a bit. It would obviously be useless to kill Heaven Dancer right now if rumors about him being Proud Heaven’s son were still going to spread.

He was convinced that he wasn’t actually Proud Heaven’s son, but had been born when the powers of primal-chaos broke through his mother’s quintessence energy, making him a Fateless One. But in the end, a repeated rumor would be treated as fact, and if enough people suspected him then no amount of protesting on his part would do any good. They would capture him, interrogate him, and drag his secrets out of him. He would be finished.

“Who is the most important military person assigned here from the future world? Who’s in charge? You’re obviously little more than an errand runner, so is there some bigger fish out there?”

“Oh, yes, there’s a bigger fish,” Heaven Dancer replied, sounding like he was under the effects of some sort of truth serum. “The most powerful person assigned here from the future world is actually still on the way. He's a general appointed by August Patriarch Proud Heaven. The man is incredibly famous, and commands countless fleets back home. He’s General Samman, and not even I come close to being as strong as him. If you describe him in terms of the dao of immortals, he’s already an eighth division Buddha God. And he's at the peak of that level, just about to make another breakthrough. Oh, and he has at least one of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions. He’s prepared to come here to capture you and take you back to the future the instant I accomplish my mission.”

“King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions? General Samman?” Yang Qi’s heart was starting to pound. He desperately needed more of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions, even just one. As long as he had a total of five, it would be almost impossible for anyone to come along and use remaining medallions to take his.

But if this General Samman was a Buddha God, then there was no way Yang Qi could openly fight him. Even just running away might be a problem. If the ordinary warriors from the future world were difficult to fight, how hard would it be to deal with a general? All of them were Future Ones, which meant that they gained huge power ups just from the journey alone.

“How did you know that Dragon Proudheaven was an assumed name and that I'm really Yang Qi?”

“My Cosmic Quantum Computer gets information from the military’s highest-level photonic computers. I'm not sure how the information got into them. I just go on missions. General Samman would probably know. He’s put together a special ops team that will be coming through the space-time passageway to strip you of your God Legion Seal and take you back to the future.”

Heaven Dancer twitched a bit, as if he were trying to resist the interrogation.

In response, Yang Qi sent a stream of golden light out to him which caused him to go still. “So you’re telling me that if I wipe out this special ops team and kill General Samman, my secret will be safe?”

“Theoretically, yes. August Patriarch Proud Heaven and the other nine magisters all went to the Primeval Age to get the God Legion Seal there. The highest-ranking members of the army now are the marshals, none of whom know your secret. Only General Samman knows. If he perishes, then no one will be able to reveal your secret until Magister Proud Heaven returns.”

“Do you know exactly where my mother, Master, and aunt are being kept?”

“That’s top secret, so no, I don’t know. Only General Samman knows.”

“Alright, the time has come for you to forget everything you know and serve me without question.” Yang Qi placed his palm on top of Heaven Dancer’s head, sending a stream of true energy into his sea of consciousness and wiping out all of his memories.

[Beep-beep-beep. Beep-beep-beep.]

The Cruiser of Civilization suddenly began to speak. [New information. New information. Outgoing radiation transmission intercepted on hidden channel. Block message?]

“Of course block it!” Yang Qi said, startled. “So, news of Heaven Dancer perishing was supposed to reach General Samman and his special ops team. But now it won’t?” He looked over at the Cosmic Quantum Computer floating off to the side and realized that it must have been the source of the radiation transmission. Smiling coldly, he resolved to destroy the thing.

[Quantum computer detected] one of the photonic computers said curtly. [Technology from the ancient mechanical civilization. Repairs possible. Initiate repairs?]

“Go ahead,” Yang Qi replied. Instantly, the Cosmic Quantum Computer began to glow with bright light as a host of seemingly crystalline magical symbols appeared on its surface. Spatial fragments and minor worlds could be seen inside of it as it began to spin, faster and faster until it finally exploded. Then the photonic computers of the Cruiser of Civilization sucked in all of the power, causing numerous systems in the ship to rise to a higher level.

All of a sudden, the photonic computer began to deliver more information.

[Additional fragment of the Cruiser of Civilization detected. Fragment possesses vivicreation systems. Fragment is piercing through space-time and will arrive in the current time period shortly.]

Trembling, Yang Qi said, “I want to see that ship. Draw on all power reserves if you have to!”

Moments later, the power levels began dropping as the photonic computers produced a detailed image.

A wormhole appeared that was many times larger than any wormhole Yang Qi had ever seen before. And in the middle of it flew an enormous spacecraft.

Within the depths of the wormhole, light was twisted and distorted and time seemed broken. It was as if the magical laws from the other side were spurned by the dao of heaven and couldn’t enter. Either that, or the other location was one of complete rot and desolation.

For some reason, Yang Qi was certain that an enormous head existed on the other side of the wormhole, something that could devour millions upon millions of immortal worlds. In contrast, this side of the wormhole had a heart.

‘Brahma’s head and Brahma’s heart,’ he thought. That wormhole was the passageway to and from the future world. And now a piece of the Cruiser of Civilization was coming through, crewed by a special ops crew and captained by the legendary General Samman.

The photonic computers in Yang Qi’s Cruiser of Civilization suddenly retracted their sensors.

“How long until that ship gets here?” Yang Qi asked.

The photonic computers performed some calculations. [Approximately one month. Travel through the passageway is slow, although the return trip will be slower, approximately three years.]

‘A month,’ he thought. ‘That’s not enough time. There’s no way I’ll be a Godmyth by then.’ He shook his head. ‘General Samman is coming here specifically to deal with me. He’s so strong that there’s no way I could deal with him in a fight. And he has some of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions. But how many, I wonder? As if that wasn't enough, he also has a fragment of the Cruiser of Civilization? I wonder what this General Samman looks like.’

All of a sudden, Yang Qi addressed the photonic computers again. “Perform any calculations necessary to show me General Samman.”

Whirrrr.

An engine roared to life somewhere deep in the Cruiser of Civilization, and moments later the image of a young man appeared on one of the screens.

He had an aquiline nose and wore dark green military garb, including a beret. He had knee-length leather boots and looked like the intelligent, capable type of officer. He even had white gloves that somehow made him seem like both a seasoned killer and a capable leader.

Thump!

Almost as soon as the image of the young man appeared, the photonic computer suddenly crashed.

[Scanning connection detected and jammed] said the emotionless photonic computer. [Enemy spacecraft contains high-level vivicreation systems. If we meet, our systems would likely come under their control. The best method of defense would be the Engine of the One God.]

“The Engine of the One God?” Yang Qi said, his jaw dropping. “What’s that?”

[The most powerful system built into the Cruiser of Civilization. The Lord of Civilization, a Paramount God, received direction from the Sovereign Lord to create the culmination of the scientific and technological civilization. It was a god item called the Engine of the One God. With it, one can control all other fragments of the spacecraft and absorb all other systems. With it, the full Cruiser of Civilization can be restored.]

“Where is this Engine of the One God?”

[Unknown. Perhaps in primal-chaos debris, perhaps in the Primeval Age, perhaps in the present. Most likely, it is not in the future world, otherwise General Samman would have it and our spacecraft would automatically set a course for his location.]

“So, if I want to deal with General Samman, I should find this Engine of the One God first. Otherwise I'm going to be in a very bad situation.” Yang Qi shook his head. “I have to get stronger, but simultaneously search for the Engine of the One God, and also draw the enemy toward me….”

All of a sudden, he thought about Young Master Leaf.

Perhaps Leaf Dao-Denier would be the perfect tool to use against General Samman. Right now, Leaf Dao-Denier was undergoing his Essence Trial in the Tusita Heaven. If he succeeded, his cultivation base would advance by leaps and bounds. He had lost one of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions, but now, more were coming into play.

‘The time has come to use my pawn, Young Lady Green Blaze.’

The thought caused a cold grin to appear on his face. Young Lady Green Blaze was the younger sister of one of the seventy-two brethren, the Berserk One Green Blaze. Perhaps he could use her to alert Young Master Leaf that some of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions were coming from the future.

Chapter 733: General Samman

Space-time rippled and distorted as a strange and mysterious passageway opened up.

As the enormous spacecraft flew along inside, its numerous systems operated, producing a humming sound like that of countless bees. In fact, if one looked closely, it was possible to see a network of defenses surrounding the craft that actually resembled a beehive. Anyone who wanted to reach the ship itself would have to navigate through the complex beehive structure.

And of course, ordinary individuals would find that impossible.

The spatial ‘beehive’ was filled with all sorts of powerful morphlings, who could swarm forth in a sea of fury to overwhelm any intruder. They were virtually invincible by sheer force of numbers alone.

Such was the might of a fragment of the Cruiser of Civilization equipped with vivicreation systems.

Perhaps this was the true origin of morphlings, or perhaps the future world had developed science and technology based on the Cruiser of Civilization. It was hard to say.

The spacecraft was crewed by a small group of warriors who were standing ramrod straight, all of them dressed in military uniforms, their eyes laser-focused in front of them. These incredibly powerful people were the special ops team led by the legendary General Samman, whose eyes seemed completely emotionless as he stared at the photonic computer screen in front of him.

[Beep-beep-beep. Beep-beep-beep.]

The photonic computer began giving new information. [Paramount science and technology detected. Another fragment of the Cruiser of Civilization is scanning us. Should we jam the signal?]

“Jam it!” General Samman said, the hint of a cruel smile turning up the corner of his mouth.

Smiling, one of the other warriors stepped forward. “We’re not only going to accomplish our mission, sir, we’re going to get rich in the process. Who would’ve thought we would acquire another fragment of the Cruiser of Civilization?”

“You’re exactly right,” General Samman said, his voice as emotionless as a photonic computer’s. “Our reason for going to the immortal dao civilization is to conquer it. The Primeval Age is that of the legion of gods. The Middle Age belongs to the immortal dao civilization. And of course, in our age—the Sovereign Lord’s Age—it is foreordained that we will conquer everything. We will break the cycle of karma and the dao of heaven. In one short month, we will reach the Middle Age. In addition to accomplishing the mission given to us by the great magister, we will slaughter and conquer to our heart's content. We will bring the Middle Age’s immortal dao civilization to ruins!”

“Yes, sir!” the other warriors said.

“In the Middle Age, the immortal dao civilization studies matters of destiny and energy circulation,” General Samman continued. “We need to break through the barriers of the dao of immortals to slaughter all of these fools. Bring their civilization to an end. Destroy their destiny. If we do that, the dao of immortals will naturally end. Then our future world can absorb the Middle Age and the Primeval Age. And with the energy released by the destruction of the dao of heaven, we can bring about a new era. A new world. Everything will change and we will usher in a true golden age, the age that he who exists above the legion of gods, the Sovereign Lord, always wished to see. It will be an age with no past and no future, an eternal golden age that will never change. An era in which the concept of time doesn't exist!

“Let it come,” General Samman murmured. “I can't even imagine how wonderful that era will be! And yet, it is my thirst to see it that drives me here to slaughter and conquer. Kill them all. Seize everything from them. Take no captives or slaves. Wipe them out. Understand? Our mission is to slaughter and destroy. To annihilate.”

“Yes sir!”

“What thrilling times,” General Samman murmured with a smile so cruel that even fiend-devils in hell would shiver at the sight of it.

After all, his fate was that of destruction.

**

In the Sage Panacea Sect, Yang Qi was absorbing the power of the god pill, and simultaneously accepting the power being transmitted from the Heaven Beyond Heaven. At the same time, the imperial snakecharms he had installed near the future world passageway were also feeding him power. He had three sources of power pouring into him, cleansing and strengthening him.

His bones began creaking. As he was filled with power, the images of numerous hells appeared within him as though he were transforming into the leader of all the countless hells.

Once he reached the Godmyth level, he could tap into the essences of all the hells, which numbered as many as the eternal sands of the universe. With the true seeds of all those hells blessing him, it would be an easy task to bring the godpower of hell into the world of men.

It was a horrifying prospect, and entailed the possibility of overwhelming the glory of the legion of gods.

But that was only one of the terrifying aspects of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.

Unfortunately, he was currently in a very difficult transition. As he blindly groped for those true seeds of essence from hell, he slowly made his way toward the Godmyth level.

It was the correct method, but it was something that couldn’t be rushed. In one month, General Samman would arrive, bearing the mission of Proud Heaven himself. At that point, Yang Qi would have nowhere to hide, unless he completely abandoned everything he had worked so hard to build. Of course, he had no desire to do that. And it seemed likely that his only chance to truly advance his purposes was to use the destiny and resources of the Dao Defense League.

‘This isn’t going to work. This method is too slow. I had assumed that after building up so many resources, reaching the Godmyth level would be an easy task. Why is it turning out to be so hard? Damn it all! Fine. I guess I need to go with plan B. Time for a trip to the Tusita Heaven.’

All of a sudden, Yang Qi transformed, becoming like an ordinary immortal in the Godmyth level. Thanks to the powers of the Cruiser of Civilization, he could easily make himself seem like a seventh division Measureless God.

However, he didn’t want to stick out in the Tusita Heaven, so disguised himself as a fifth division Nirvanic God, instead.

Then he blurred into motion, vanishing as he headed to the part of the universe inhabited by thirty-third ranked immortal worlds. It was an area filled with deadly tempests and few signs of habitation. The primal-chaos debris fields were filled with lurking ancient beasts, the kind that would be hellish nightmares to any low-level immortals who encountered them. But to high-level immortals, the place would be like a holy land of cultivation, perhaps even an amusement park. Hidden treasures abounded, and killing the primal-chaos beasts could provide incredible crafting materials.

Of course, Yang Qi didn’t care about such things. Using his Lord's Eye, he quickly spotted an enormous, violet immortal world that was close to becoming a god world. Because of the murky nature of the primal-chaos, it was impossible to tell how large this violet world was.

After all, compared to places like the Tusita Heaven, twentieth ranked immortal worlds were like grains of sand compared to the ocean itself.

As Yang Qi neared, he saw that the surface of the Tusita Heaven was covered with numerous castles built from violet-covered crystals, patrolled by endless squads of immortals. There were also countless naturally formed spell formations adding to the defenses.

Yang Qi didn’t need to announce himself. He just walked up to the nearest entrance and pulled out an emerald-green identity plaque that read: Clandestine Operative of the Green Clan.

The soldiers on guard took the medallion, and when they saw what it was they were visibly shaken. “What? You’re from the Green Clan? Go on in. The teleportation portal is right there!”

Thus, Yang Qi passed through the gates without any incident. Stepping onto the teleportation portal, he entered the Tusita Heaven.

Yang Qi inhaled the violet energy and looked around at the city. Everything was made from violet crystal—even the ground, which was particularly tough. It reminded Yang Qi of things he had read in ancient daoist texts regarding the ancient kingdom of the gods.

Yang Qi knew that the Tusita Heaven was a place of incredible power. The violet crystal everywhere ensured that high-level universal power was available in all corners.

Being unfamiliar with his surroundings, and not wanting to make any stupid blunders, he called out to Young Lady Green Blaze. “Come to me immediately!”

Moments later, a nearby teleportation portal blazed with light and a host of soldiers appeared, all of them clad in emerald green armor. Their mere presence caused the faces of many nearby onlookers to flicker with fear.

At a single glance, Yang Qi could see that all of these armored soldiers were Godmyths. In the Tusita Heaven, even the lowliest commoners were Dao-Demolishers with seven, eight, or nine lineaments on their dao heart.

And Godmyths were a common sight.

In lower immortal worlds, Godmyths were patriarchs and leaders, people considered to have incredibly high positions. But in the Tusita Heaven, they were essentially low-level government officials.

In the Tusita Heaven, everything was different. And when high-level individuals appeared, the low-level citizens would immediately back up to the side of the road and stand there with the utmost respect.

The streets were luxurious and filled with shops and stores of all sorts. Yang Qi could sense that the magical laws here were very strong, such that ordinary experts wouldn’t be able to assess the city as a whole. However, by drawing on a bit of power he was able to ascertain that the population of this one city likely surpassed that of the entirety of most twentieth ranked immortal worlds.

Just how big was the Tusita Heaven?

The mere question caused Yang Qi’s heart to begin thumping with fear. If Young Master Leaf truly gained the approval of this place’s essence and became the Lord of Tusita, how terrifying would he be? Yang Qi doubted that anything other than becoming the ruler of the Heaven Beyond Heaven would help him. Unfortunately, that process was incredibly difficult and his immortal-slaying clone needed time.

The green-armored soldiers marched up to Yang Qi, and one of them, an Incarnated God, dropped to his knee. “My respects, Milord. Young Lady Green Blaze can’t come in person for fear of revealing her identity and arousing suspicion. Please, come with us to her mansion. She's already preparing a welcoming dinner.”

“Very well. Seems she’s thought things through already. Rise. Take me to the mansion as quickly as possible. The fewer prying eyes that see me the better.”

Chapter 734: A Grim Situation

Yang Qi didn’t know anything about how the Tusita Heaven worked, therefore, he needed to be particularly careful. Maintaining full vigilance, he followed Young Lady Green Blaze’s men toward the teleportation portal leading to her mansion.

The portal was guarded by a host of soldiers who were obviously retainers of the Green Clan.

As it turned out, this entire city was administered by that clan.

On the other side of the teleportation portal, Yang Qi found himself atop a towering building that provided a panoramic view of the enormous city. He saw mountains, rivers, lakes, oceans, military bases, and hidden spell formations. Young Lady Green Blaze was inside the building, standing behind an altar table arrayed with a variety of sacrificial gifts. Obviously, she was well-prepared for Yang Qi’s arrival.

“I offer respectful greetings, Milord. This is my personal bedchamber, where I’ve prepared this small welcoming gift. Anything more extravagant than this would attract attention within my clan.” With that, she clasped her hands and bowed deeply.

“There’s no need for such formality,” Yang Qi said with a dismissive wave of his hand. He sat down and looked again at the beautiful scenery. White clouds drifted by, filled, not with water vapor, but with immense power in the form of magical laws. Even the clouds in the Tusita Heaven could benefit one’s cultivation base.

A piercing cry rang out as an enormous, seven-colored phoenix dove down into one of the clouds. Further off in the distance, more divine birds flitted about, making the entire scene reminiscent of heavenly palaces.

Yang Qi closed his eyes and took a deep breath. Other immortal worlds really did seem like trash compared to this place. The Tusita Heaven was nothing short of a godrelic of a world.

People from here would be vastly stronger than people with similar cultivation bases from lower worlds. Obviously, the nature of the immortal world one came from could affect one’s constitution.

“Might I ask what brings you here, Milord? Is it because Leaf Dao-Denier is in secluded cultivation?” Young Lady Green Blaze had truly come to exercise faith in Yang Qi. She knew that he was the kind of person who would relentlessly pursue his goals, and was convinced that sticking to him was the best choice for herself. After all, she was also a ruthlessly ambitious person.

“That’s right,” Yang Qi said. “I'm aware that Young Master Leaf is taking the Essence Trial here in the Tusita Heaven. I'm curious as to his progress. Oh, another thing. Your older brother Green Merchant is a Berserk One, and one of the seventy-two brethren that include Young Master Leaf. What has he been up to lately? In seclusion? Or is he out drumming up support for Young Master Leaf?”

“My brother is in seclusion, Milord,” Young Lady Green Blaze said, “trying to become a seventh division Measureless God. I would expect him to succeed within the next few days, which will make him more powerful than ever. As for Young Master Leaf, he traveled to the most mysterious location in all of the Tusita Heaven, the Sea of Despair, to seek the legacy of our immortal world. So far, I haven’t heard any news about his success or failure. But if he succeeds, his cultivation base will advance by leaps and bounds. My guess is that he’ll pull it off. Milord, you have to be very careful about him.”

“If he takes the essence of the Tusita Heaven, will that instantly make him the ruler of this place?” Yang Qi asked.

“No, not instantly. But he’ll become very important and influential, the kind of person no one would dare to offend. To truly take control of the Tusita Heaven, he would need to reach a much higher level of cultivation, the same as the legion of gods. Only then would the essence truly acknowledge him and put the fate of this immortal world in his hands. If he gets the legacy, he’ll become like a crown prince. And a crown prince is not an emperor. It takes years of being the crown prince before one can build the power and authority necessary to take rulership. Of course, a lot of people are keeping a close eye on Young Master Leaf. If he succeeds, plenty of powerful organizations will switch their loyalties to him, which would make him sort of like a nominal leader here. Once he succeeds, it’ll only be a matter of time before he becomes a ninth division Chaos God.”

“Terrifying,” Yang Qi murmured. Young Master Leaf would soon be a Chaos God, while Yang Qi was still only a Dao-Demolisher. Dao-Demolishing had nine sub-levels, as did the Godmyth level. The difference between the two was so vast that it surpassed the difference between ants and dragons.

“Do you have a plan, Milord? Once Leaf Dao-Denier comes out you’ll have to go into hiding, won’t you? And everything you've worked so hard to build will be destroyed.”

“That’s exactly what I'm worried about,” Yang Qi said. “And yes, I do have a plan. First we’re going to pull a fast one on your brother, then once Young Master Leaf is out we’ll use your brother to trick him. The end goal is to get Young Master Leaf to get into a fight with an equally powerful enemy that will soon arrive.”

“So you already have a plan, Milord. Incredible. Whatever you need me to do, just say the word. Although I have to point out that my brother is not the type of person who can easily be fooled. He’s already been appointed as the successor of our clan lord. He’s very important.”

“Don’t worry, I’ll be able to take care of him. He’ll put faith in me one way or another, even if he is a Measureless God. What I need you to do now is to go out and gather information. In the meantime, I’ll stay here to create some necessary items to carry out the master plan. Find out what treasure exists here in the Tusita Heaven and how far it can push one’s cultivation base. Get as much information as you can and put it together into a report.”

With that, he waved his hand dismissively.

“Yes sir!” the young lady replied. “Don’t worry at all, Milord. This is my private bedchamber. My personal world. Even if you do something to attract a bit of attention, no one would dare trespass here.” With that, she left.

“Heaven Dancer. Get out here!”

RUMBLE!

In the blink of an eye, the transformed Heaven Dancer appeared, standing there motionless with a slack expression.

“Cosmic Quantum Computer, re-form!” Drawing on the power of the Cruiser of Civilization, Yang Qi created a virtual version of the Cosmic Quantum Computer, which he then sent directly into Heaven Dancer’s head.

Within moments, Heaven Dancer looked like he had before, bubbling with killing intent, crafty and deceitful, his mecha crackling with power. He seemed like a hunting dog that was ready to rip his prey to shreds as soon as he tracked it down.

‘Excellent. Thanks to my transformations, Heaven Dancer is even stronger than before. And I’ve implanted a device in him that, in the critical moment, will definitely lead General Samman here to the Tusita Heaven.’

Yang Qi’s master plan was slowly coming to fruition. ‘As long as General Samman gets close enough to the Tusita Heaven, Leaf Dao-Denier will notice that he has some of King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy medallions. And then, maybe I can jump in and take advantage of both of them. I've used this plan before, much to Leaf Dao-Denier’s detriment. But at the moment, I can’t think of any other suitable option.’

Waving his hand, he sent a host of talismans into Heaven Dancer, then closed his eyes to work on his own cultivation.

Moments later, Heaven Dancer’s aura grew stronger, and then electrocast messages began pulsing out of him, passing through bizarre aspects of space-time, going through the folds of the universe to reach the Brahman Immortal World, and beyond it, the space-time passageway to the future world.

[Beep-beep-beep. Beep-beep-beep.]

Within the other fragment of the Cruiser of Civilization, the vivicreation systems came to life and General Samman opened his eyes. Looking over, he saw data flowing across the screens of the photonic computers, which resolved into the image of a violet-colored immortal world.

Some of the other officers and members of the special ops team walked over to his side to look at the new information. After a moment, one of the lower-ranking members said, “Is that a distress signal from Heaven Dancer?”

“Yes,” General Samman replied. “That's a thirty-third ranked immortal world with immense reserves of power. Imagine the power reactors from a hundred billion cities in the future world, all combined. That's the kind of power they have. If we can take it, it will be a huge benefit to us and a crucial influx in power. Power will always be a problem. Right now, it requires immense amounts of power to maintain the passageway between worlds using Brahma’s heart and head. Because of the power drain, many worlds where we come from have become dark and desolate. If we drained any more power, it would lead to a very dangerous situation. Perhaps even rebellion.”

“Who cares?” one of the warriors said disdainfully. “If they rebel, we can just slaughter them.”

“True. But rebellions always give birth to heroes, and the last thing we need are ambitious and ruthless people like that. If the ten magisters were around, they could crush any rebellion that might arise. But considering they’re currently in the Primeval Age, we don’t want any rebellions breaking out in our backyard.”

“Then let’s take the initiative and cut them all down,” another warrior said.

“We don’t have the authority to make decisions like that,” General Samman said. “And it would cause a huge headache for the marshals. Once we’re in the Middle Age, we can slaughter the immortal dao civilization and take all of their resources. And we need to find the God Legion Seal, take it, and bring it back for August Patriarch Proud Heaven. Once we’re out of this space-time passageway, we won't waste time reconvening with our forces in the Middle Age. We’ll head directly to the Tusita Heaven. According to the message from Heaven Dancer, both King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions and Yang Qi are there.”

Another warrior nodded and said, “Heaven Dancer is an expert in reconnaissance and intelligence-gathering, but I wonder if he actually made contact with that Yang Qi. We need to find out the details first, lest we fall into a trap.”

“Don’t worry about that. Once we get to the Tusita Heaven, everything will be made clear.” General Samman smiled viciously. “The forces of the Middle Age use the power of the dao of immortals, which gives them a very unique and wonderful flavor. To we who have had our bodies and genes molded by the vivicreation systems, immortals are simply delicious. Especially Godmyths!”

WHOOSH!

The Cruiser of Civilization proceeded along at top speed.

“According to our power analyses,” General Samman said, “the Tusita Heaven has a very high compatibility rating. It’s the perfect place to make morphlings. With a sea of Tusita Heaven morphlings, we can sweep through all of the immortal worlds with ease.”

Chapter 735: God Dao Seeds

Yang Qi worked on his cultivation and waited for General Samman. Thanks to Heaven Dancer, he was absolutely sure Samman would come. And when he arrived, he would attack with full force to get to Yang Qi.

That would be when his big chance came.

Right now, his most pressing concern was to get stronger. To reach the Godmyth level. He had to reach the Godmyth level!

It was hard to say if he really would be able to jump in at the last minute to take advantage of the situation. Maybe he could kill both General Samman and Leaf Dao-Denier, then take the piece of the Cruiser of Civilization with its vivicreation systems and the additional legacy medallions.

Yang Qi had no idea exactly how many medallions General Samman had, but he had to have at least one. And Young Master Leaf currently had two. If Yang Qi could get all of them, that would give him a total of seven, at which point few people in heaven and earth could be a match for him. Even if he encountered someone with the final two medallions, those two would simply fly over to join his larger collection.

‘Win or lose, it all ends soon!’

If he succeeded, the resources at his disposal would put him in the position of being able to dominate the Buddha Gods in the Dao Defense League, and even Chaos God patriarchs.

In fact, he would most likely become the top figure in all the immortal worlds.

Right now, he was nothing more than a pawn of the patriarchs. But success in this endeavor would allow him to finally assert his dominance.

He went about his breathing exercises, using King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans to convert the essence of the Tusita Heaven into Heaven-Devouring śarīras, which he then converted into medicinal tablets of extremely high quality.

Those tablets were extremely popular in the Dao Defense League and were already being used as currency by some people. Because of them, many patriarchs refused to leave Yang Qi’s side, figuratively speaking of course. There were even eighth and ninth division patriarchs who collected the tablets in the hopes of acquiring more godly-class energy arts in the future.

Yang Qi knew how important he was, but at the same time, he was aware of the adage an ordinary man who possesses great treasure makes himself a big target. There was no question that he was already the subject of envious eyes.

Upon leaving for the Tusita Heaven as his true self, he’d left a power double in the Dao Defense League to confuse any enemies. And of course, his power double had plenty of medicinal tablets that he could use to treat the effects of heterogeneous true energy.

Even just the business of selling medicinal tablets was enough to make him the richest person in all of the lower immortal worlds.

The Sage Monarch Heaven was constantly growing, and the disciples from there focused on intense training. Many of them went out to join the Dao Defense League and make names for themselves, participating in battles with the future warriors. Such direct training helped them to grow much more quickly than before. And because everyone was so entranced with Yang Qi, anyone associated with his Sage Panacea Sect was treated with utmost courtesy. Therefore, it was unlikely that any of them would experience unfortunate accidents.

“Milord!”

Even as Yang Qi continued to experience breakthroughs, and was working on his sixth dao lineament, a green flash entered the private bedchamber and Young Lady Green Blaze appeared. Bowing respectfully, she said, “Sir, I have some important information. If you really want to reach the Godmyth level, I think you should consider attending the imperial examination of the reigning dynasty of the Tusita Heaven. Although the exam is brutally difficult, considering what you’re capable of, Milord, I doubt they would be much trouble for you. The top young geniuses will have a shot to be promoted within the dynasty, and the most outstanding will win god dao seeds.”

“God dao seeds?” Yang Qi said. “What are those?”

“Milord, god dao seeds come from one of the largest godrelics we have in the Tusita Heaven, the ancient Live Forever God Tree. Every year, it produces seeds containing immense power, so much so that even one such seed is usually enough to push someone into the Godmyth level. They’re considered top treasures within the Tusita Heaven, so if you’re in a bottleneck, Milord, you could definitely use them. If you agree, I can arrange for you to assume the identity of a Green Clan genius disciple. Perform well, and you can get one of those god dao seeds, and then hopefully reach the Godmyth level.”

Yang Qi nodded. “These god dao seeds sound similar to the virtual godhood produced by the future world. Although Godmyths are common here in the Tusita Heaven, they’re still considered minor nobility, so resources like this are still considered very important. Unfortunately, I’m different. Even if I participated and won a god dao seed or two, that wouldn’t be enough for a breakthrough. I doubt even a hundred thousand would suffice. And I doubt the imperial dynasty will hand over that many to me.”

“Er….” Young Lady Green Blaze immediately felt very awkward.

“That said,” Yang Qi continued, “I appreciate your thoughtfulness. Tell me, where is this Live Forever God Tree? And tell me everything you know about the Tusita imperial dynasty. If it produces those seeds on a yearly basis, then the dynasty must have plenty of them in storage. Maybe I can steal them. If I manage to get a whole bunch at once, perhaps I could reach the Godmyth level.”

Although god dao seeds could indeed push people into the Godmyth level, Yang Qi had a special constitution that made his requirements many billions of times higher than those of ordinary people. Because of that, he would need a huge amount of those seeds to make any significant breakthrough.

Even if he partook in the exam Young Lady Green Blaze was talking about, there was no way he would win enough god dao seeds to be of use. Not unless the leaders of the Tusita dynasty were complete and utter fools.

Besides, there was no guarantee that the dynasty’s storehouses would even have enough of them for his purposes.

Looking quite embarrassed, Young Lady Green Blaze said, “Er, no, you absolutely, positively cannot try to rob god dao seeds from the storehouses. They’re located in the depths of the dynasty and guarded by countless old-timers and god formations. There are even rumors of demigod eccentrics that hide out there. There was one time when a rogue cultivator came along and tried to steal a god item called the Woven Gold Dragon Wings, only to be ruthlessly slaughtered. And he was a Chaos God! Only actual gods could possibly steal things from the Tusita imperial storehouse.”

Yang Qi was shocked at this information. ‘A Chaos God was killed? The defenses of those storehouses must be incredible indeed. Demigod patriarchs surpass the Chaos God level. After all, the reason they’re called demigod patriarchs is that they’re ‘halfway to being a true god’! There are nine sub-levels involved in going from the Demolishing level to the Godmyth level, and they involve the nine lineaments on the dao heart. When it comes to passing the gap from the Chaos God level to the Deathless level, there must be an additional nine sub-levels. And each one will obviously be more difficult than the previous. If that weren’t the case, then considering how common Chaos God patriarchs are in the thirtieth ranked immortal worlds and higher, how come there aren’t any people here who have reached the Deathless Throne?’

There were as many immortal worlds as there were eternal sands in the universe, and among them, there were a lot that were in the thirty-third rank. During his time in the Dao Defense League, he had asked around and confirmed that there were plenty of Chaos Gods there.

However, there were no instances of anyone reaching the ancient level of the legion of gods. In fact, there wasn’t even a single Lesser God.

The only explanation he could think of was that reaching the Deathless Throne was incredibly difficult. Was it just impossible in general? Or was it a limitation of this current era? Was this era incapable of producing real gods?

“If you put it that way,” Yang Qi said to Young Lady Green Blaze, “I guess I have no hope of getting any god dao seeds.” At the moment, though, Yang Qi just wasn't ready to give up on the idea. He still had a month to work with, and if he just practiced normal cultivation he wouldn’t reach the Godmyth level during that time. But if he could get his hands on a whole bunch of god dao seeds, it might be a different story.

“I have an idea,” Young Lady Green Blaze said. “I've heard that the Live Forever God Tree is located within some ancient primal-chaos debris, surrounded by numerous godrelics. It’s a very dangerous location. The exam usually involves going into that primal-chaos debris field, getting close to the tree, and plucking a single seed!

“The Live Forever God Tree is a naturally-occurring god tree, planted in the distant past by some almighty being. Milord, if you can get close to that tree, maybe you can unlock its secrets. Perhaps the tree itself could push you into the Godmyth level. The only downside is that, of the billions of geniuses who take the exam every year, only a few get close to the Live Forever God Tree. And most of those who fail to reach the tree die. That said, Milord, even though you’re only a Dao-Demolisher, you’re still about as strong as a Measureless God. I don’t think you should have any trouble.”

“So that’s how it is,” Yang Qi said. He nodded. “Alright, I’ll go check things out. I'm curious to see this tree. And you never know, maybe I can acquire some of its essence. If I can unlock the secrets of how it produces god dao seeds, maybe I can reach the Godmyth level. Go ahead and make the arrangements.”

“Yes sir!” Young Lady Green Blaze said, turning to leave.

“Wait,” Yang Qi said. He reached out and placed his hand on her head and sent some true energy into her. “You’ve served me well so far, so it would be remiss of me not to reward you. Take some of my animadestiny true energy. It can negate the effects of heterogeneous true energy, strengthen your nascent divinity, and allow you to communicate with ghost-gods of hell. With it, you can combine your godly-class energy arts to much greater effect. Simplify the complex, and turn it into a great dao.”

RUUUUMBLE!

Young Lady Green Blaze felt rumblings as if thunder were coursing through her, as well as the thrum of immortal music. Before long, she began glowing with a green light as her various godly-class energy arts fused together, making her much stronger and pushing her toward the verge of another breakthrough.

“Many thanks, Milord!” she said, dropping to her knees and offering thanks. She knew that, with this help, she would soon have an even higher position in the Green Clan.

“My brother Green Merchant, the Berserk One, will be out of seclusion soon. I wouldn’t be surprised if he plans to take the exam as well. Please feel free to subjugate him the moment he’s out. Then he can get close to Young Master Leaf and stick a blade deep into his back. If he doesn’t kill him, at least he can hurt him!”

Chapter 736: Live Forever God Tree

“That’s exactly what I was thinking,” Yang Qi said, a fierce glimmer passing through his eyes. “I want this Leaf Dao-Denier dead. Once and for all!”

He waved his hand, and a magical treasure bag flew over to Young Lady Green Blaze. “That’s full of medicinal tablets that you can use to further negate any heterogeneous true energy. Sell any that you don’t need, as they’re astronomically valuable. Invest the profits in magical treasures to use as bribes. Eventually, I plan to give you control of the Green Clan, and perhaps even more.”

“Yes, Milord, you’ve thought of everything.” She knelt. “May you, in your might, control all the immortal worlds, and eventually, the past and the future too.”

She hurried out, then returned a few hours later. “Milord, I’ve taken care of everything. You’re now a young genius of the Green Clan. Please hide the traces of any unusual magical treasures, talismans, and other items you might have. And make sure to keep any strange divine will fluctuations under control. You’ll be inspected before beginning the exam, and we wouldn’t want your true identity to be revealed. It’s forbidden to accept aid from any of the old-timers during the exam. That would be considered cheating.”

Yang Qi had assumed those would be the rules. Although it was an exam for Dao-Demolishers, there were still countless participants and it was a very dangerous test. Supposedly, most of the participants would meet their end in death. It was only the spectacular nature of the prizes that were up for grabs that prompted so many geniuses to risk their lives by joining.

If an old-timer were to help someone—for example by bolstering them with a second nascent divinity, or giving them some talismans—it would make the exam unfair. Because of that, strict rules were set in place to avoid such problems.

In the Tusita Heaven, even a billion geniuses were a mere drop of water in the ocean. For example, the Green Clan alone had trillions of members. And the Tusita Heaven had trillions of cities like theirs.

Yang Qi rose to his feet and followed Young Lady Green Blaze from her bedchamber to a teleportation portal, which whisked them away to an enormous public square. There were numerous teams of people arrayed throughout the square, most of them groups of thousands. All of them were members of the Green Clan who were preparing to participate in the exam. These were people who were facing trouble reaching the Godmyth level and needed some sort of good fortune to make any progress. Desperation was another key factor that prompted geniuses to participate in the deadly exam.

One of the Green Clan elders was at the front of the square, offering advice and information.

“You are the cream of the crop in our Green Clan. But if you truly want to rise above the crowd, you need to reach the Godmyth level!” The elder gave a faint smile. “I know that all of you are brave to join this exam. Sadly, most of you will die during the process. Maybe none of you will come back. But if you’re lucky, you’ll come out on top. The power in god dao seeds is incredible. They have virtual godhood that you can definitely use to become Godmyths without any difficulty!

“Those who refuse to participate in the exam, but still somehow reach the Godmyth level, actually put a limit on their own potential. People like that will never make a name for themselves!

“Only by joining the exam and acquiring a god dao seed can you truly reach the highest heights. Any of you who succeeds will automatically become a direct bloodline holy child of the Green Clan, an incredibly high position.”

A buzz of excited conversation swept through the square.

“Be off!”

The teams began entering the teleportation portals, a process which took several hours to complete. Their destination was an even larger square, a place large enough to fit an ocean. In the middle of the square was the Primal-Chaos Gateway which constantly emitted the energies of primal chaos, as well as a vile, fiendish aura.

WHOOOOOSH!

Groups of young ones walked out of teleportation portals into the square, and not a single one of them was a Godmyth. All were Dao-Demolishers.

However, after looking around, Yang Qi could tell that many of them were hiding their true strength. Some could definitely kill Incarnated Gods or Shattered Gods. They were people like him—incredibly strong, but stuck and unable to reach the Godmyth level without acquiring god dao seeds.

The stronger one was, the harder it was to break through. People like that had to hope for special items or good fortune, and sometimes that took an entire lifetime of searching. One thing was for sure; sitting around doing nothing wasn’t the way to succeed.

There were already several billion people in the square, and more were arriving every moment from different cities and different clans.

RUMBLE!

A group of patriarchs appeared and took up places around the Primal-Chaos Gateway. They all wore violet garments and were clearly Measureless God patriarchs. One of them raised his voice and said, “This exam is a common occurrence, so I won’t waste time explaining all the rules. Enter the Primal-Chaos Gateway, which will scan you to make sure you have no divine will hidden on you. If you do, then sorry to say, you’ll be killed instantly. Once cleared, you will receive a primal-chaos talisman that you can use to search the godrelic for the Live Forever God Tree. Climb the tree and pluck a god dao seed, and you will be able to reach the Godmyth level. Afterward, the talisman will automatically teleport you to safety. Your performance inside will be up to your own luck and fortune.”

“Begin!” another patriarch said in a cold voice.

RIIIIP!

It was as if floodgates had been opened as hosts of expert geniuses flew in droves toward the Primal-Chaos Gateway.

Occasionally, an agonized shriek would ring out as someone was ripped into bloody shreds. When that happened, the patriarchs would chuckle grimly. “That is the just punishment fools receive. They thought they could fool the Primal-Chaos Gateway, but not even the patriarchs who back them could do that. The Primal-Chaos Gateway is an ancient god item which can see through to the truth of anything and everything! Whoever the gate destroys is wiped out down to the soul and can never be born again. And whatever patriarchs backed those cheaters will be severely wounded by the backlash from the gateway.”

Yang Qi took note of these occurrences and maintained full vigilance as he became a streak of light that shot toward the gateway.

Upon entering, a bright beam of light passed through him containing a most ancient will. It pierced every fiber of muscle, all of his meridians, and even the depths of his sea of consciousness.

But what kind of person was Yang Qi?

He had the God Legion Seal. He had King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions. He had a fragment of the Cruiser of Civilization. And he had shrunk all of those things down to a single point, which was then concealed in the depths of another universe. Even the most powerful spatial magic would be powerless to detect them.

The Primal-Chaos Gateway did search the numerous universes directly connected to Yang Qi, but came up with nothing suspicious. Eventually, the light created a paper talisman which landed on his hand, a ticket he could use to find, approach—and theoretically climb—the Live Forever God Tree.

Smiling, Yang Qi took the talisman and passed through the gateway.

Experts poured through for three days and nights, after which the gateway closed. When that happened, the Measureless God patriarchs all burst out in contented laughter. “Who would have thought that so many people would participate in the exam this time? There were even some who possess some of the three thousand unique constitutions. There were Freezing Ones, Magesoul Ones, and Bloodgel Ones. They’ll be the perfect food for the Live Forever God Tree!”

“That’s right. All of the geniuses who went in there are powerful Demolishers who can defeat Godmyths in combat. Some might even have the godpower to form virtual god bodies. But they’re not strong enough to become real Godmyths unless they get a god dao seed. It's too bad those seeds aren't exactly easy to get.”

“Exactly. Although a lot of young geniuses join this exam, not very many actually get god dao seeds. There have even been times when all the examinees were wiped out. The unlucky ones get absorbed by the primal-chaos paleo-energy and become food for the Live Forever God Tree, ensuring that it stays strong and healthy for all time, and will continue to produce seeds for the imperial house to harvest. These young fools think that the exam is a chance to be rewarded by the empire, but little do they know that the true goal is to feed the Live Forever God Tree!”

“It’s the perfect arrangement by the Tusita dynasty. These young people would likely become domineering forces of their own, so killing them now ensures the stability of the dynasty.”

“It’s just too bad that Leaf Dao-Denier wasn’t killed when he participated in the exam. He actually got one of the god dao seeds, which led to incredible advancement on his part. Now we have little chance of killing him. I wonder how his Essence Trial is going. If he acquires the essence legacy it could spell doom for the imperial house.”

“I wouldn’t worry about it. Even if he does get the essence legacy, he won’t reach the Deathless Throne. Rulership of the Tusita Heaven will still be up in the air. At most, he’ll end up as one of the top patriarchs. Our imperial house will still have a chance to fight back, and possibly even kill him and take his destiny!”

“Exactly. The Live Forever God Tree has consumed the destiny of quite a few geniuses in recent years, and should be experiencing a transformation soon.”

Chapter 737: Primal-Chaos Ruins

‘The primal-chaos aura here is so strong,’ Yang Qi thought after passing through the Primal-Chaos Gateway. His vision swam, and everything became a gray blur in which the sun, moon, and stars spun wildly. Everything was primal-chaos, and felt profoundly dangerous. He sent his divine will out, only to find himself blocked by primal-chaos of some sort.

Normally speaking, his divine will could pierce through numerous immortal worlds, but now its range was limited to what seemed like only a few dozen meters. Shivering, he thought, ‘What’s going on here? This place seems huge. How am I supposed to find the Live Forever God Tree?’

Wahhhh!Wahhhh!

After taking only a few steps, he heard a piercing cry that resembled both an infant and a crow at the same time. He felt a thump from behind him, and spun to find a tiny snake gnawing through his defensive empyrean energy.

The empyrean energy shield was normally impenetrable, but the venom from the little snake was slowly piercing through it toward Yang Qi.

‘An infant primal-chaos elder-snake?’ Although Yang Qi was initially shocked, he quickly recovered. Reaching out, he grabbed the snake and drew on the power of King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans, sending a stream of true energy into it.

Pop!

The infant primal-chaos elder-snake exploded, and he quickly absorbed the remains.

He quickly assimilated its venom to prevent it from spreading through his body.

The little snake was extremely venomous, enough to easily kill anyone under the level of a seventh division Godmyth. Not even defensive empyrean energy would be of much help, as the snake's venom could quickly erode it. And once the venom touched one’s true energy, death was the only end of things.

Thankfully, Yang Qi had some of King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans, thus the situation wasn’t even remotely a threat.

The beasts that were found in primal-chaos were terrifying, and only those creatures which were native to primal-chaos itself could survive there. Even the tiniest worm could be fatal to interlopers.

Obviously, exploring the primal-chaos of thirty-third ranked immortal worlds was a very dangerous undertaking.

It was almost like an unarmed human venturing into a mountainous forest of demon-devils.

‘No wonder casualties are so high,’ Yang Qi thought, shaking his head. ‘A tiny primal-chaos elder-snake that bit a fifth division Nirvanic God would definitely kill them, much less a ninth stage Dao-Demolisher.’ Yang Qi suddenly heard screams coming from up ahead.

They seemed like they were only about three thousand meters ahead, so he flew into motion, keeping his true energy converged tightly around him to make sure that none of the primal-chaos beasts could harm him.

Before long, he reached the source of the screaming. A group of young men and women were lying on the ground, covered with swarms of venomous insects.

These bugs were different from the kind of creatures one would find in the immortal worlds. They were thumb-sized, and pulsed with primal-chaos energy. At the same time, they were immensely powerful, and even the flick of their wings would send out clouds of venom.

‘Those are primordial chaos mites!’ Yang Qi murmured. He remembered reading about primordial chaos mites before, and knew that they fed on the immortal energy of immortals. Once they bit someone, they would never let go, and were very difficult to get rid of.

Whirrrrr.

As soon as Yang Qi touched down nearby, the primordial chaos mites could sense his immortal energy and a cloud of them flew in his direction. Slamming into his defensive empyrean energy, they began eating their way inside, as if they were specifically designed for that purpose.

“Looking to die, huh?” His empyrean energy shields suddenly began rippling like a meat grinder, instantly crushing the venomous pests. Then he waved his hand, sending out flames that burned their remains into ashes.

As for the young men and women, he did nothing to save them. They were dead, and their souls and bodies were quickly devoured by the primal-chaos ground itself.

That seemed to be the fate of anyone who died, to be eaten by the ground itself. Even anyone who was wounded or weakened, then sat on the ground, might be sucked inside.

‘What’s the deal with the ground?’ he thought. He chopped his hand down, as sharp as the sharpest sword, and it cut a huge furrow in the ground. Inside, he saw a complex network of roots that looked like devilish tentacles sucking up the corpses.

‘What exactly is going on here?’ he thought, an ill premonition rising up within him. The Wheel of Fate spun above his head and he saw several powerful streams of destiny being dragged underground.

‘Even destiny itself is being devoured?’

Destiny was a most illusory and mysterious thing. Usually, when a person died, their destiny would just fade away and become part of heaven and earth again. Yang Qi had seen and experienced many things in life, but he hadn’t come across very many things that could devour destiny. One of the few that he knew of were King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions.

Destiny was one of the most fundamental aspects of a person. In fact, not even one's soul, flesh, or blood could be considered even one one-millionth as important.

Usually, people who came to acquire some of King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy medallions would have a powerful destiny. But after acquiring the legacy medallions, a mysterious power would begin devouring their destiny, and they would eventually die. And the end goal was to build up enough power to resurrect King Immortal-Slayer himself.

What he was seeing here in front of him reminded him a lot of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions.

In other words, the so-called exam, which allowed geniuses with powerful destiny in the Tusita Heaven to have a chance at getting god dao seeds and reach the Godmyth level, was actually a big plot!

The destinies of these geniuses were being devoured by the lands around them!

There was obviously more to this exam than met the eye, and it caused a cold smile to appear on Yang Qi’s face. ‘A clever scheme. Good thing I'm not actually here for the exam, but rather to probe the secrets of the Live Forever God Tree, and maybe get its essence. If this Live Forever God Tree has been absorbing destiny for years upon years, it couldn't be better. How many geniuses did it absorb? Trillions? Tens of trillions? Hundreds of trillions? Quadrillions? If I take all of that, what level could I reach? It’s unimaginable!’

Yang Qi realized more than ever that he needed to find the Live Forever God Tree and see what secrets it held.

Without hesitation, he proceeded along through the primal-chaos.

Before he could get very far, someone called out, “Hold on a moment, please!”

A group of eight young men and women stepped out into the open, all of whom held infant primal-chaos elder-snakes, which were slowly burning as they were assimilated and turned into true energy.

It was another group of examinees.

Yang Qi could tell that they were strong; that much alone was obvious from the fact that they had killed the primal-chaos elder-snakes. They were all as strong as fourth or fifth division Godmyths, and of course, were all Dao-Demolishers with nine lineaments.

“What do you people want?” Yang Qi said, stopping in his tracks.

“Oh, nothing,” one of the young men said, walking forward to block Yang Qi’s path. “We saw you wipe out those primordial chaos mites, so you’re obviously a top genius. Want to join us? There's strength in numbers! As you know, the survival rate for this exam is very low. But it’s a great chance to get stronger, and in fact, probably the only shot we have at becoming Godmyths. Someone as strong as you could benefit a lot by working with us.”

“Sorry, not interested,” Yang Qi said, provoking an unsightly expression on the face of the young man. Yang Qi had a lot of secrets to keep, and if he joined this group it would be hard to keep a low profile, even if it did help him to find the Live Forever God Tree faster.

“What gall!” a young woman said as she stepped forward. “Are you really just going to refuse our offer? Do you know what the consequences of that will be? We’ll enslave you and use you as a meat shield. Think this through. We're impressed by your capabilities and would love to have you with us as we explore. But if you refuse to do things the easy way, we’ll do them the hard way. And in that case, don’t blame us for what happens. Right now, you have two options. The first is to be our scout. The second is to refuse, be captured, and forced to be our scout. It's your choice.”

“Oh really?” Yang Qi said coolly. “I guess you people all want to die, right? Fine, I’ll accommodate you. Watch and learn how stupid it is to threaten me.”

WHOOSH!

He suddenly vanished, and a moment later a bloody hole appeared in the young woman’s face. Then her head exploded and her destiny drifted into Yang Qi’s hand.

However, in the same moment, the ground seemed to sense her death, and it trembled, sending out a massive gravitational force to try to grab the destiny out of Yang Qi’s grasp!

‘Perfect,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘I’ll kill these people and use their destiny as the bait to figure out how exactly the Live Forever God Tree works.’

“He killed Lingzi! Attack! Surround him!” Howling, the surviving members of the group circled out to make a spell formation.

“Paragon of the Dao: Fatal Blow!”

A dao patriarch appeared within the depths of the formation, reaching out aggressively toward Yang Qi.

Yang Qi hardly looked at it. He lashed out with the Hand of the One God, grabbed the dao patriarch, and crushed it into a powder of vital energy.

“Aaaiiiieee!”

The group of young people all screamed and coughed up blood as the backlash of their failed attack slammed into them.

A host of arms suddenly appeared behind Yang Qi, which reached out and grabbed all of his opponents. The hands clenched down and they exploded into powder. A wave of destiny appeared that initially began dropping into the ground. But then Yang Qi’s Wheel of Fate appeared above his head and began dragging the destiny back toward it.

Seven streams of destiny were all vying with each other in terms of glamor and beauty. Of course, ordinary people wouldn’t be able to see it. But Yang Qi could.

Whoosh!

At a certain point, the ground couldn’t withstand the force and split open, allowing a whole host of tentacle-like roots to shoot out toward Yang Qi.

Chapter 738: Devouring Destiny

When Yang Qi took the destiny of those disciples, the ground reacted violently, sending out snake-like roots bursting with killing intent and thrumming with a fiendish will as they tried to wrap around him and strike into his soul. Instantly, Yang Qi felt like he was in a boundless hell, surrounded by mountains of corpses and seas of blood, with armies of asuras fighting in deadly fashion everywhere.

Unfortunately, although that will could easily deal with most people, it was completely ineffective when up against Yang Qi. He really was like a lord of hell, so why would he possibly be afraid of mountains of corpses and seas of blood?

Swish!

A sword nimbus flashed, and one of the roots dropped to the ground and tried to burrow away to safety.

“You’re not going anywhere,” Yang Qi growled, waving his hand. The primal-chaos vital energy in the area suddenly vanished, allowing him to simply reach out and grab the root. It emitted a piercing shriek, causing a pulse of power to roll out from some distance away as if to grab the root.

As the power poured into the root, it transformed, a vicious-looking head growing out of the severed end, making it look like some sort of primeval devil-dragon. Snarling, it lunged at Yang Qi with snapping jaws.

Yang Qi simply squeezed it in his hand and crushed the thing. Then he called on the Flame of Hope to burn it into ash. In response, a roar of rage could be heard deeper within the primal-chaos ahead.

Crick. Crack!

All of a sudden, the countless roots in the area wrapped around Yang Qi’s legs and began dragging him downward.

‘So that's what’s going on!’ He now realized what was going on. The Live Forever God Tree would try to kill any geniuses who came close to it and absorb their destiny as fuel for the god dao seeds, which would subsequently be harvested by the Tusita dynasty.

Apparently, billions of geniuses would participate in the exam, but only a few would get the god dao seeds while the rest were slaughtered. In fact, sometimes the entire group was slaughtered. It seemed like a very profitable venture for those who ran it.

Furthermore, Yang Qi had the feeling that the Live Forever God Tree was more than just a factory for producing god dao seeds. It likely had some other purpose or function.

‘To slaughter so many geniuses and take their destiny and cultivation bases is very much like what the legacy medallions of King Immortal-Slayer do. The purpose of those medallions is to resurrect King Immortal-Slayer, a task which will require a huge amount of destiny.’ With such thoughts on his mind, Yang Qi sent out countless beams of sword light to sever all of the tentacle-like roots, then flew away from their reach.

Apparently, the roots realized how dangerous he was, because instead of pursuing him, they shrank back down into the ground.

He flew on a bit before landing back on the ground.

‘There must be some ancient entity in the Tusita Heaven that’s using the Live Forever God Tree to collect destiny in the hopes of reaching godly ascension. Only the Deathless Throne would require that much destiny.’ Yang Qi had long since come to realize that the levels of Energy Arts, Lifeseizing, Legendary, Great Sage, Demi-Immortal, Demolishing, Godmyth were all essentially the same as far as the dao of heaven was concerned. All such people were like pawns on a game board.

Only the Deathless Throne truly mattered! That was the level in which one escaped the control of the dao of heaven.

‘Now I really want to see what the hell this Live Forever God Tree really is. I wonder if I’ll actually be able to figure out what’s behind it. Maybe I can seize the resources they’ve been hoarding for godly ascension.’

Blurring into motion, Yang Qi drew on the hyperdrive systems in the Cruiser of Civilization to pierce through the primal-chaos in a way that made him almost completely undetectable.

Along the way, he saw young geniuses being ripped to shreds by various creatures. And with his Lord's Eye, he could see countless streams of destiny flowing into the roots in the ground and heading toward some central location.

It was in this fashion that he got a general sense of where the tree was located.

A faint smile appeared on his face as he realized that he’d made the right decision to come to this exam.

As he flew deeper into the primal-chaos, he saw enormous rocs, eagles, dragons, and other terrifying beasts. And not a single of the geniuses who had come into the exam made any headway in fighting them.

RUMBLE!

He sensed some incredible vital energy fluctuations up ahead and soon caught sight of a group of people fighting a nine-winged giant tiger. It was a mighty creature that was reminiscent of one of King Immortal-Slayer’s seventy-one brethren, an individual named King Godmight who had started out his path of cultivation as a nine-winged tiger.

The group fought well, inflicting blow after blow on the tiger. Finally, a young woman leaped out from the group and stabbed the tiger right in the heart, causing it to drop to the ground.

“The Live Forever God Tree is just up ahead,” she said. “We're going to pass the test soon, get those god dao seeds, and reach the Godmyth level!”

One of her companions snorted coldly. “They say that the Primal-Chaos Gateway can identify all sorts of unlawful divine will. But it couldn’t do a thing to Young Master Leaf’s will. Not only are we going to get plenty of god dao seeds for the Immortal-Slayer’s Sect, we’re also going to reach the top of the tree and take that godly treasure hoard. The Tusita dynasty tried to keep the truth from Young Master Leaf, but they failed. He found out that the true purpose of this exam is to kill geniuses and take their destiny. After enough time passes, the godpower in that destiny will turn into true godhood!”

“Exactly. Emperor Tusita wants that true godhood to reach the Deathless Throne and become a god! He would be terrifying as a god, but sadly for him we figured out his plot.”

“Come forth, patriarchs!” All of a sudden, shimmering light appeared on this handful of individuals, which resolved into a larger group, all of whom were members of the seventy-two patriarchs that included Young Master Leaf.

There were a total of thirty-six of them!

From what Yang Qi could tell, all of them were Measureless Gods, people so strong they could easily slaughter the primal-chaos beasts in this place.

One of the young patriarchs snorted coldly. “Young Master Leaf really came up with the perfect plan to deal with these old-timers and their scheme to sacrifice countless geniuses to gather power. I wonder if that true godhood has already started taking the shape of fruit.”

“How could it happen that quickly?” another of the young patriarchs said. “Godhood doesn’t just take shape in an instant. But we can still take the brewing godhood to give to Young Master Leaf. When he becomes a true god, he can take control of the essence of the Tusita Heaven and become its ultimate ruler. Then, in his majesty, he can devour the countless other immortal worlds, defeat the future world, and become the most invincible figure in past, present, and future. And of course, he’ll make sure the rest of us reach godly ascension too.”

“It’s a good plan. Let’s hope it all works out in our favor.”

“Don’t worry, of course it will. Young Master Leaf already controls part of the Tusita Heaven’s essence. He can already subvert some of the heavenly workings, which is how he snuck us past the primal-chaos gateway.”

“Come on, let’s keep going. We need to fight our way to the Live Forever God Tree and harvest those seeds! The useless Tusita Dynasty has already proven to be an enemy of the Immortal-Slayer’s Sect, and Young Master Leaf has long since decided to wipe them out. Unfortunately, they still have a lot of old-timers working with them, and if they work together, they’re simply too strong.”

Continuing their conversation, they flew off in the direction of the tree.

Yang Qi chuckled. ‘You can wear out iron shoes in a fruitless search, then find what you're looking for without even trying. How true that saying is. Here I was wondering about the secrets of the Live Forever God Tree, only to have these fools explain it all. So they want to harvest the fruit from the tree. I guess I’ll have to beat them to the punch! I wonder how strong they are. In any case, I have to get that true godhood. It’s probably not going to be enough to push me to godly ascension, but it should help me progress through the Godmyth level.’

Yang Qi knew that the Godmyth level was not going to be easy. After the initial breakthrough, one became a first division Seer God, then a second division Tempered God, then a third division Incarnated God. And each breakthrough was harder than the previous ones, but true godhood would be a huge help.

“Follow them!” Yang Qi said to the Cruiser of Civilization, which followed his orders immediately.

Before long, a huge, shadowy form took shape ahead. It was an enormous tree, the mere sight of which was a major shock to Yang Qi. It had a massive trunk, with roots that spread far and wide and leaves that glittered like stars, which had skies of their own. Apparently, they were growing planets!

Chapter 739: True Godhood

The Live Forever God Tree was a single tree that contained seemingly endless worlds and planes of existence. It really did have planets growing on it, and when Yang Qi looked closely, he saw that they flourished with civilizations. Not immortal dao civilizations, but rather the kind that existed in the mortal world. There were martial artists, imperial dynasties, and the like, with people living and dying constantly and generations coming and going without end.

‘This thing is miraculous!’ Yang Qi thought, sighing. ‘What exactly is it, though? Some creation of the legion of gods? Incredible. Those leaves are full of massive amounts of power, such that not even I could make use of it or absorb it. However, amidst the leaves are fruits! And those are what I need to get!’

Sure enough, within the sea of leaves of the tree were countless fruits that were many times larger than planets from the mortal world. And they abounded with godpower and destiny. Furthermore, in the water vapor which surrounded them were countless deadly spell formations that protected them.

‘Whatever. I’ll just try to pick some of the fruits and see what happens!’

After all, the thirty-six young patriarchs were already flying toward the tree to start harvesting the ‘god dao seeds’.

Those enormous fruits, which were the god dao seeds, were more than enough to push a ninth stage Dao-Demolisher into the Godmyth level. In fact, most ordinary people—the kind who weren’t considered geniuses—actually wouldn’t be able to absorb the godpower without exploding to death.

Even as the thirty-six patriarchs approached, an ancient voice spoke from within the tree.

“Heretical divine will! You people do not have primal-chaos talismans! You do not qualify to acquire god dao seeds! How dare you come here! Prepare to be exterminated!” Dazzling light erupted from the tree, followed by countless vicious primal-chaos beasts.

“Hmph! The Live Forever God Tree is nothing more than a tool. How dare it try to stop us! We don’t have talismans from the Primal-Chaos Gateway? So what!? We’re here to steal god dao seeds and the brewing true godhood!”

“Attack!”

The thirty-six patriarchs bunched into a tight formation resembling an enormous wheel with thirty-six segments. As it rolled forward, it crushed anything that got in its path.

“Foolish humans!” the will of the tree shouted. “Primal-chaos god-generals! Come forth!”

RUMBLE!

A host of mighty figures appeared. Some had three heads and six arms. Some had four heads and eight arms. Some were all arms, with a thousand heads and a thousand eyes. All of them were at least fifth division Nirvanic Gods, and it was without hesitation that they lunged toward the thirty-six patriarchs.

Booms began ringing out as the god-generals exploded, yet didn’t die. In fact, they arranged themselves into formations that destroyed all of the primal chaos around them from the sheer force of their blows.

Meanwhile, many of the leaves on the Live Forever God Tree twisted into the shapes of huge bows, with arrows formed of primal-chaos itself.

“Primal-Chaos Devil-Exterminating Arrows!”

In conjunction with the voice, the arrows flew forth in a hail of destruction onto the thirty-six-sided wheel.

‘Incredible,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘Without these thirty-six patriarchs taking the brunt of the assault, I doubt I would be able to sneak in and take any of those god dao seeds.’ He was shocked at what those thirty-six patriarchs were capable of. They must have been blessed by the will of Leaf Dao-Denier, who had partial control over the essence of the Tusita Heaven. Now that Yang Qi had a better idea of what the tree was capable of, the time had come to take advantage of a crisis for personal gain.

Keeping off to the side, he slipped closer to the tree, heading toward one of the enormous fruits that was a god dao seed. Combining with King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans, he transformed into a primal-chaos elder-snake. Considering that he had an aura of primal-chaos just like the other beasts that lurked in the tree, he encountered no resistance.

Crack!

Opening his mouth wide, he swallowed up the fruit. However, it was in that exact same moment that something like the power of a wormhole erupted from behind him.

‘Something is trying to teleport me away? Why?! Oh, right. The primal-chaos talisman is designed to take an examinee out as soon as they get a god dao seed. That must be what’s happening. But I don’t want to stop with just one of these things!’

“Be broken!” he growled. The godpower of the wormhole was shattered and he continued onward in his primal-chaos elder-snake form.

For the moment, he didn’t consume any more of the god dao seeds, but rather focused on assimilating the one he had just taken. As he did, pulses of virtual godhood coursed into his dao heart.

Creak. Groan.

With that sudden influx, his fateless dao fruit was suddenly repaired, losing all of the five lineaments that had previously existed on it!

WHIZZZ!

With no warning whatsoever, Yang Qi fell down to the very lowest level within Dao-Demolishing! He didn’t achieve a breakthrough, he experienced a regression!

‘How could this be happening!?’ he thought. Inspecting himself, he realized that although his cultivation level had indeed fallen, he hadn’t grown any weaker. In fact, he was at least thirty percent stronger than he had been with five lineaments.

‘So, that's how it is. God dao seeds make your dao heart stronger, and that process closes up the lineaments. Most ordinary geniuses who consumed one of these god dao seeds would have their dao heart swell up so rapidly it would explode, pushing them right into the Godmyth level. But my fateless dao fruit is just too strong. Adding lineaments isn’t going to work, so I guess what I need to do is consume so many god dao seeds that my dao heart just explodes! Otherwise, I could spend a million years practicing cultivation and never become a Godmyth!’

Yang Qi was actually feeling a bit depressed at the development. However, he continued his effort to devour the god dao seeds.

Moving on to a second one, he opened his mouth wide to chomp it up, but the second one wasn’t as easy to eat as the first. As soon as he got close, a host of primal-chaos beasts flew in his direction and the will of the Live Forever God Tree echoed out, “Greedy human! You already took one god dao seed, so get out of here! If you don't, I’ll punish you severely!”

“Bullcrap!” Yang Qi snapped. There was no way he was just going to give up right now. Opening his mouth wider, he called on the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, combining the godpower of megamammoths with the strength of King Heaven-Devourer. With all of that, he gobbled up the god dao seed.

As he did, power flooded through him, heading directly into his dao heart, which began expanding and growing stronger.

Instead of gaining more lineaments, it grew larger and smoother, but at the same time it was so strong that it didn’t seem possible it would break.

The only thing to do now was continue devouring the god dao seeds.

Before long, he had consumed dozens of them, and his fateless dao fruit was fully three times as strong as it had been before.

Unfortunately, the larger his fateless dao fruit got, the sturdier it seemed. Furthermore, it was possible to see designs on its surface that resembled buddhist vajra curses of incredible toughness.

Chapter 740: Devouring Without Stop

‘More. I need more!’ Yang Qi slid around the enormous tree in the form of a primal-chaos elder-snake, and as he consumed the god dao seeds, power filled every inch of him. At the same time, the particles within him seemed to become more closely connected to hell. In fact, it was almost as if the particles might not end up as godmammoths, but rather as minor hells of their own.

The particles had a path of transformation.

The initial awakening involved unlocking the power of ancient megamammoths. After that they became dracomammoths, then protomammoths, and finally godmammoths. However, after the godmammoth transformation, there was another transformation in which they became embryonic hells.

In the end, Yang Qi would have the might of countless hells within him. And he could use that to connect to the essence of actual hells, thus surpassing the legion of gods and becoming the incarnation of the Sovereign Lord.

The particles within Yang Qi were already showing the initial stages of transforming into hells.

Henceforth, when he launched attacks against his enemies, it would be like countless hells crushing them, like actually bringing hells into the world of men.

To transform the particles into hells, it not only required the absorption of hellish essence, but also immense power in general. In fact, it required a level of power that surpassed anything Yang Qi had ever experienced in his path of cultivation.

Soon, he could devour the god dao seeds with practiced ease. At the same time, down below, the thirty-six patriarchs were fighting in such intense fashion that it drew almost all of the attention away from Yang Qi.

Besides, the god dao seeds actually wouldn’t be of much use to those thirty-six, considering that they were already Godmyths. And only a freak like Yang Qi could consume so many of them without his own dao heart exploding because of it.

RUMBLE!

As the thirty-six patriarchs unleashed increasingly devastating attacks, the Live Forever God Tree swayed back and forth and planet-leaves began to fall. As they did, the planets crumbled, causing the deaths of uncountable living beings.

“Tusita True Law Medallion!”

The thirty-six patriarchs summoned an enormous magical treasure that seemed to open some sort of space-time passageway, which subsequently belched forth a violet energy flow.

“The Live Forever God Tree is a cancer on the Tusita Heaven!” one of the patriarchs roared. “It's been taking the destiny of young disciples for years, building it up for the old fogies of the imperial dynasty to use! Did they really think reaching the Deathless Throne would be so easy? Young Master Leaf used boundless essence power to make the Tusita True Law Medallion! Hurry up and unleash its power!”

Violet energy shot forth, which was none other than the will of the Tusita Heaven’s essence. As it rushed through the tree, any primal-chaos beasts that it encountered exploded, releasing waves of primal-chaos paleo-energy.

‘The perfect opportunity!’ Yang Qi thought, shooting onward to devour even more god dao seeds. In fact, he took so many that he couldn't even digest them, but instead threw them into his fragment of the Cruiser of Civilization. Later, he could give them to his father and brothers to help them reach the Godmyth level. Right now, they were just too weak to be of any importance in the Dao Defense League.

Several hours passed, and Yang Qi had devoured several thousands of the seeds, until it reached the point that he got no feeling at all from taking them.

He was really getting filled with power.

Yet he knew that each one he ate gave him more power and caused his fateless dao fruit to grow tougher. At the same time, the designs on its surface were growing more complex, to the point where it seemed like the thing would be indestructible even to a god.

POP!

As for the thirty-six patriarchs, they continued using all sorts of unknown techniques to make the leaves and god dao seeds of the tree fall down.

The vortex of god dao seeds that was entering Yang Qi was causing many of his protomammoth particles to explode directly into hells. If a Buddha or Chaos God could see him right now, they would see him, not as a person, but as hellish projection, a power double that could destroy hells in a way that surpassed even the ancient Sovereign Lord. After all, hells could normally be crushed, but not wiped out of existence.

‘Excellent. With the power of more than ten thousand god dao seeds, I'm strong enough to kill a seventh division Measureless God with a single unarmed strike.’

In the past, if Yang Qi wanted to deal with Measureless Gods, such as Heaven Dancer, he had to trap them in the Cruiser of Civilization and use the full power of his God Legion Seal.

But now, things were different.

He didn’t need the God Legion Seal, the Cruiser of Civilization, King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions, or King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans. He could devastate someone like Heaven Dancer all with his own might.

From that, it was possible to see how much power could come from devouring god dao seeds.

Yang Qi even got the feeling that if he kept consuming them, he might be able to reach the Godmyth level without shattering his dao heart. Therefore, he continued with his feast, growing more powerful by the moment.

However, despite everything he had collected so far, he hadn’t been able to form any of the true godhood that the tree supposedly contained. To do that would probably require more along the lines of ten billion god dao seeds.

If that true godhood fell into the hands of old-timers who were currently Demigods, they would almost immediately be able to become true gods. And if Young Master Leaf got it, Yang Qi’s days would be numbered.

‘I have to get that true godhood! If I do, I won’t have to wait for a sandpiper, clam, and fisherman situation to develop with Young Master Leaf and General Samman. I could stand up to them as an equal.’

Yang Qi continued to move about as quickly as lightning, consuming one god dao seed after another.

It was impossible to say exactly how tall the Live Forever God Tree was. It seemed to stretch up endlessly. However, Yang Qi was certain of one thing: the god dao seeds at the heights of the tree were larger and filled with purer destiny and godpower. And there was something that seemed to be blocking his path to those levels, like a spatial magical law of some sort.

“Cruiser of Civilization. Activate hyperdrive systems!”

In the blink of an eye, Yang Qi vanished into the Flatverse and began climbing higher and higher, devouring more of the god dao seeds as he went along.

Yang Qi was an enormous snake whose sole purpose was to devour, then devour some more, and after that, devour even more.

Eventually, it was much to his delight that he reached the point where he felt as if his fateless dao fruit really was full. At this point it felt like it was about to burst, which would make him a Godmyth.

‘I've consumed hundreds of thousands of god dao seeds, and stored up even more hundreds of thousands in the Cruiser of Civilization. Once I get back to the Dao Defense League, I wonder how powerful my people will become.’

Right now, he was so strong that even if he faced genius Measureless Gods with unique constitutions that were at the peak level of their cultivation base, he would still be able to stomp them in a fight.

That meant that if he faced a Young Master Leaf that was as strong as he was before going into seclusion, he could beat him.

His trip to the Tusita Heaven really was proving to be worthwhile, and once he returned, the people who knew him would surely be struck speechless.

Down below, he could hear the sounds of combat coming from the thirty-six patriarchs. But none of them had any idea that Yang Qi was up here becoming more and more powerful.

‘A golden version!’ He suddenly spotted a god dao seed amidst the leaves that was golden in color and resembled a seated buddha. It pulsed with immense destiny, and as soon as he devoured it, he felt swept up by the dao of heaven. It was almost as if, going forward, he would constantly run into god items that he could take by simply picking them up. As he proceeded, he realized that all of the god dao seeds here were golden.

After devouring over ten thousand of them, his fateless dao fruit felt so plump that it hurt.

He was now vastly stronger, but his dao heart was trembling as though a detonation were imminent.

‘Alright, it won’t be long now. Once my dao heart cracks, I’ll get even closer to the Godmyth level and probably start forming virtual godhood. Maybe I should kill a few of those thirty-six patriarchs. That would really take Young Master Leaf down a notch.’ Delighted, he continued climbing higher in the tree.

The resistance was getting stronger, but he was getting more powerful at the same time, allowing him to pierce directly through the primal-chaos.

At a certain point, his Lord's Eye glittered as he caught sight of a god dao seed hanging at the very upper limits of the Live Forever God Tree.

Chapter 741: Success at Last

Higher up, beyond all of the countless golden god dao seeds, was an even more superior version.

It wasn’t particularly large. In fact, it resembled an infant. It was crystalline, transparent, and absolutely pure in every way. It didn't emanate any fluctuations to indicate it contained even a lick of power. However, the infant’s eyes were pitch black, making it seem like it could see through all illusions and pierce through all truths in the world. And they contained a vital energy that seemed filled with the profundities of universal life and death.

There were even countless shadowy figures deep within the eyes, figures that were born and died in a constant cycle, as though the destinies of innumerable people were contained therein.

This thing seemed to be, not a fruit containing true godhood, but rather a sage child, very much similar to the one that existed within Yang Qi’s sea of energy.

Delighted, Yang Qi pushed forward. He had consumed so many god dao seeds that his fateless dao fruit had reached the point where it was about to burst. And now he had found a sage child fruit that was nearly on the level of having true godhood. Therefore, he reached out to grab it without hesitation.

Once he acquired it, he would leave his enemies in the dust. Even if Leaf Dao-Denier reached the Chaos God level, it wouldn’t do him any good against Yang Qi.

‘I'm going to combine that thing with my own sage child! It's almost like it was foreordained to be mine. I wonder how much destiny was put into it. Emperor Tusita is in seclusion at the moment, and Leaf Dao-Denier has chosen this time to make his move and try to take advantage of the Live Forever God Tree. But in the end, it's going to benefit me!’

Without the distraction provided by the thirty-six patriarchs, Yang Qi would never have been able to reach this sage child fruit.

Drawing deeply on all of his power, he shot into motion, becoming a streak of light that shot in the direction of the fruit.

WHIZZZ!

As he approached, divine sound waves rolled out to block his path. However, he simply waved his finger and drew on the power of his God Legion Seal.

“Break!”

The sound waves collapsed into nothing, and within moments Yang Qi was right in front of the sage child fruit. Even as he reached out with the Hand of the One God, more sound waves erupted out, filling the entire area like fluttering flower petals.

“What incredible gall!” shouted the voice of an old man. “You took advantage of me being in seclusion to sneak past the Primal-Chaos Gateway?! You really deserve to be killed!”

A fist appeared out of nowhere and smashed into Yang Qi, backed by the power of a Chaos God. Before his recent advancements, that fist blow would have wiped him out of existence, reducing even his bones to nothing. But this time, he simply collapsed into millions upon millions of hells. Black energy swirled everywhere as his voice echoed out with the words, “Hells Slaughter Gods; Godhood Falls from Grace!”

The hells swept forth like the eternal sands of the universe, wrapping around the sage child and causing the entire Live Forever God Tree to suddenly grow dim.

As soon as he acquired the font of godhood, Yang Qi felt another sage child within his sea of energy, which immediately began fusing with the existing one.

He coughed up a mouthful of blood, but at the same time, laughed heartily. He could sense the pure power of godhood flowing through him, repairing his cultivation base and wiping away any injuries from the fist strike.

‘I have to get out of here!’ he thought, as he could sense that powerful old-timer emerging from seclusion and preparing to leap through space-time to launch another attack.

In a snap decision, he drew on King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions to quickly open a passageway to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

As he leaped inside, the shadowy figure of the old-timer appeared and launched a deadly attack. However, the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart closed before the attack could land.

Yang Qi was safe.

Sitting down in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, he quickly began going through breathing exercises to recover from the ordeal. After a short time, he then opened the chart again and stepped out into Young Lady Green Blaze’s bed chamber in the Green Clan.

Normally speaking, the world that the Primal-Chaos Gateway led to was sealed, and was impossible to enter or exit without a talisman from the gateway. But the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart was more powerful than the barriers locking down that world. And with four of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions, it was even easier for Yang Qi to use the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart as a means of escape.

He had succeeded wildly in his endeavor. Now, all he had to do was assimilate all of the godhood and he would easily step into the Godmyth level. He was actually curious to see how far the godhood would push him.

**

“Dammit. Dammit!!!”

Back near the Live Forever God Tree, the thirty-six patriarchs were howling with fury. They had just spotted that pulsing expression of godhood, only to see it snatched by some mysterious figure who then vanished into thin air. A moment later, an old man wearing an imperial crown on his head appeared and subsequently attacked them in vicious fashion. And he pulsed with a most deadly aura!

RUMBLE!

“You bunch of degenerates! How dare you come here and steal what I labored for millions upon millions of years to create! You deserve to be wiped out of existence, all of you!” The old man was virtually insane with rage.

“You’re wrong, Emperor,” one of the patriarchs shouted. “We didn’t take that godhood. We're here to help you figure out who did! And then get it back!”

“I might just be here in clone form,” the emperor said, “but I can still kill you criminals. Then I’ll go slaughter that dirty little swine, Leaf Dao-Denier!”

Without bothering to find out any detailed information, the emperor simply unleashed another deadly attack, forcing the thirty-six patriarchs to stagger backward.

However, that was when a cold snort echoed out and a violet-colored bridge appeared, piercing through space to appear in front of the thirty-six patriarchs, who landed on it without hesitation.

“That’s enough, Emperor,” a voice rang out. It was none other than Leaf Dao-Denier! “I'm currently busy gaining essence enlightenment, so I don’t have time for your nonsense. The person who took that godhood is my greatest enemy, so hurry up and go catch him. He has a clone in the Dao Defense League. He’s the sectlord of the Sage Panacea Sect, Dragon Proudheaven. Go kill him! If you do, you can easily get your godhood back.”

When the emperor’s clone saw the violet-colored bridge, he could instantly tell that it was formed from the highest-level essence of the Tusita Heaven itself. Perhaps if they weren’t in the Tusita Heaven it might have been a different story, but within the immortal world itself, there was nothing that could counter that essence, not even godrelics.

“Hmph! If that's the case, then I’ll send some people to track down this Dragon Proudheaven. If you're not telling me the truth, I’ll exterminate your Leaf Clan! And once you're done with your work on that essence, we’ll see if you have what it takes to deal with me. Maybe I won’t be able to kill you then, but I'm still the ruler of the Tusita Heaven. The imperial house has too many old-timers to count, and if we all work together we can overwhelm you with force!”

“Once I fully take control of the essence, you old codger, you and I can duel. And then you’ll see exactly how strong I am. I'm invincible here in the Tusita Heaven! Other than the legion of gods, nobody could possibly be a match for me.”

“We’ll see about that,” the emperor replied in a voice that echoed like thunder. “You ruined my plans, and there will be an accounting for that. If it wasn't for you, that Dragon Proudheaven would never have been able to take my collection of godhood!”

“That godhood was created by slaughtering waves upon waves of Tusita Heaven geniuses,” Young Master Leaf replied with an arrogant smile. “You’re the biggest criminal there is, Emperor, and you're doomed to die. Maybe you hoped that reaching godly ascension would make it all worth it, but now you’ve lost the godhood so you won't be making any significant progress any time soon. Besides, the Tusita Dynasty isn’t the rightful ruler of this immortal world. I'm going to take over this place, and soon you’ll be a thing of the past. You might as well enjoy your final days while you can.”

Chapter 742: Many Heavens God Seal

The first thing Young Lady Green Blaze told Yang Qi was that the forces of the Tusita Heaven were being marshalled for what appeared to be a major military campaign.

Yang Qi couldn’t help but smile sarcastically. “So the officials of the Tusita Dynasty are meeting? That's fine. I’ll be safe here in hiding.”

With the true godhood he had acquired, he had no need to be afraid of such forces. Soon, the time would come when he would be able to crush the Tusita Heaven. And of course, Young Master Leaf would also be in big trouble once Yang Qi was a Godmyth.

As he channeled the true godhood into his sage child, it became power for his own use. At the same time, he felt himself inching toward a breakthrough. He was benefiting from the destiny of who-knew-how-many trillions of young geniuses. That level of power could be used to resurrect ancient gods, so it could only be imagined how beneficial it was to his cultivation base, his Wheel of Fate, and his fateless dao fruit.

“Green Blaze, I'm going to help you achieve another breakthrough. I'll push you to the peak of the Revisionist God level, then you can continue on your own power to become a Measureless God!” He sent a stream of bright light into Young Lady Green Blaze. The sheer force caused her clothes to rip off of her body, leaving her stark naked. Meanwhile, the brilliant light coursed through her, purifying her until she was nearly transparent. At the same time, heterogeneous vital energy and impurities that had built up during her years of cultivation were expunged.

RUMBLE!

Yang Qi's fingers interlocked into a complex incantation gesture as he guided the immense levels of force, creating a sealing mark that could save an entire world.

‘I can't fully assimilate all of the god dao seeds I took, much less that true godhood. But my dao heart is completely full, which means that I can call on the next ability in the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. Many Heavens God Seal!’

Godliness swirled out of his body and created an enormous sealing mark.

The Many Heavens God Seal could be used to suppress the dao of heaven in a given area, along with its magical laws, making a person like an invincible god.

Back when the power of the future world had erupted into the Brahman Immortal World, the dao of heaven shattered and allowed countless experts to achieve breakthroughs without having to worry about heavenly tribulation. The reason was that the magical laws of the dao of heaven were unable to function under those circumstances. In that moment, the magical laws of the dao of heaven were superseded by the power of the future world, thus, any who wished to improve their cultivation base could do so at will.

With the Many Heavens God Seal, Yang Qi could produce similar circumstances. He could suppress the dao of heaven and change truth and reality. He could also negate the effects of even the most powerful spell formations.

“I am the many heavens. Hells are heavens, heavens are hells. Gods are devils, devils are gods. When devils and gods combine, god-devils exist….” The particles within him erupted and he vanished, transforming instead into a host of wriggling hells resembling a flowing river.

A river of hells.

They were like the eternal sands of the universe, shining with an eternal luster and emanating traces of deathless godliness. As they flowed through the enormous sealing mark, the mark was inscribed with godly vestiges and patterns of deathlessness.

In the blink of an eye, Yang Qi’s energy arts reached an extremely high level. He was an invincible, almighty being who could manipulate the dao of heaven.

His fateless dao fruit appeared, as enormous as a planet—or even an immortal world—swirling with primal-chaos paleo-energy, above the dao of heaven. In fact, the magical laws of the dao of heaven weren’t even aware of the existence of this dao heart, which surpassed truth itself.

Crack. Crunch.

The true godhood he had acquired appeared, pulsing with dazzling light that entered the fateless dao fruit, causing it to grow fuller and larger.

At long last, his dao heart began cracking!

One, two… all the way to nine. Nine loud cracking sounds rang out.

Each crack was like a peal of thunder ripping the universe apart and rising to the highest heavens.

With the nine cracks, Yang Qi reached the absolute peak of the Dao-Demolishing level, placing him just one step away from being a Godmyth.

Unfortunately, he was completely spent and incapable of reaching any higher level.

That final step would require an immense amount of power, so much so that Yang Qi knew he would have to fully tap into the true godhood he had acquired.

His fateless dao fruit and sage child faded from view, leaving behind the enormous sealing mark floating above his head. Of course, considering the major breakthrough he had just achieved, he was now bursting with strength.

His hell particles were larger and clearer, and it was even possible to see fiend-devils within them that were praying, offering worship, and singing hymns to the eternally deathless lord of hell.

“Hell Seals; Essence Blessing!” Yang Qi waved his hand and a host of sealing marks filled with the essence of hell flew out and entered the larger sealing mark.

Holy hymns echoed out and the air vibrated. Flowers began falling like rain, flowers that resembled lotuses, hibiscuses, or plum flowers, yet were none of those. They were god flowers whose petals resembled angels of a very unique nature; they wore golden armor and emanated golden light that could never be destroyed.

The Many Heavens God Seal was complete!

There were many aspects to the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, and the Many Heavens God Seal was one of them, a seal that could transform the magical laws and destiny of the universe itself.

The seal of an emperor represented law and authority. But this seal was a seal that belonged to the hosts of gods that existed in the many heavens, so it was only natural that it could exert such immense control over the universe itself.

‘What is that thing?’ Young Lady Green Blaze thought, stunned. Before she could even react, a sinister cloud appeared above her head, filled with the depraved howls of hosts of monsters and crackling lightning that represented the fury of the dao of heaven.

Heavenly tribulation had arrived.

It was only natural that such a thing would happen as a result of Yang Qi imbuing her with such immense levels of power.

“Dao of heaven, be broken! Many Heavens God Seal: Suppress!” Yang Qi’s voice was as emotionless as that of a photonic computer.

The enormous sealing mark surged forth and the heavenly tribulation shattered, becoming countless streams of destiny that flowed into Young Lady Green Blaze and pushed her cultivation base to a higher level.

“I've put an end to the dao of heaven here in your bedchamber,” Yang Qi said. “Magical laws won’t do anything to you. Focus on your cultivation while I head back to the Sage Panacea Sect. I need to turn as many of my people into Godmyths as possible. With my Many Heavens God Seal and its ability to crush the dao of heaven, I can plunder good fortune from heaven and earth. Continue following me, Young Lady Green Blaze, and I can hand you control, not just of the Green Clan, but of the entire Tusita Heaven.”

With that, Yang Qi vanished.

Going forward, Young Lady Green Blaze would have no obstacles in her path of cultivation and, given some time, would definitely reach the Measureless God level. In fact, she would soon rival her brother, the Berserk One. Once he came out of seclusion, she could theoretically defeat him and take control of her entire clan. If she were strong enough, even the old-timers might cast aside their loyalties to her brother, Green Merchant, and cast their lot in with her.

Soon, Yang Qi was back in the Dao Defense League, looking out over the Sage Panacea Sect. He had only been gone a short time, and nothing of note had taken place in his absence. The sect was flourishing and there were plenty of patients, all of whom were lined up to be admitted in very orderly fashion.

The main disciples of the sect were from the Yang Clan, as well as other loyalists from the old Rich-Lush Continent. And the core individuals among them were all ninth stage Dao-Demolishers.

Now that Yang Qi was back, he planned to see them all become Godmyths!

Chapter 743: A Mass of Breakthroughs

“Father. Big Brother, Little Brother. Eldest Brother, Elder Second Brother. Bring all of the core disciples and family to me. I have an important announcement to make!”

There was an immediate rush as everyone began assembling. Yang Qi had quite a few loyal followers from the old Rich-Lush Continent. Obviously, there was his father and two brothers, as well as other key members of the Yang Clan. He had a whole group of sworn siblings who’d joined him during his days contending with the Crown Prince. There were even members of the old Hanging Mountain, like Father Leviathan, Yan Wubing, and others who had been faithful subordinates of his mother.

Yang Qi had always helped them with their cultivation and they were all ninth stage Dao-Demolishers now, some of whom even had smatterings of the power of special constitutions.

After all, Yang Qi had killed plenty of future warriors and was thus able to impart bits of Future power to them.

These were core loyalists who would never betray Yang Qi, and were all considered founding members of the Sage Monarch Society. If he could push them all into becoming Godmyths, it would be a big increase in face within the Dao Defense League, and the immortal worlds as a whole.

After all, in the Dao Defense League as a whole, Demolishers were considered to be low-level disciples.

It didn’t matter what title or position Yang Qi occupied, if he couldn’t back it up with actual strength then people would still look down on him. To immortals, strength was everything.

A buzz of conversation was heard as everyone gathered in the meeting hall. With the loyalists and all of their subordinates and followers, it was a group tens of thousands strong.

Yang Qi saw many familiar faces, and it caused warmth to fill his heart as he thought back to the Rich-Lush Continent and his days in Yanhaven. Back then, he had been a weakling and a nobody, only to be given the God Legion Seal. From there, everything had become a blur as he slowly climbed the ranks of power.

Maybe if Yun Hailan hadn’t stabbed him in the back, he wouldn’t have acquired the God Legion Seal. But he did. He then went on to slaughter the Crown Prince, and even Chancellor Demi-Immortal. He had turned the Rich-Lush Continent into the Sage Monarch Heaven and reached such a high level of power that, if he wanted to, he could easily revert the place back into being the Rich-Lush Continent.

Not that he would ever do that.

“Qi’er,” Yang Zhan said, “why have you gathered us here? Did something big happen? Did you take advantage of your time in the Tusita Heaven?”

“I absolutely did take advantage of the Tusita Heaven; I got my hands on an incredible treasure. Before long, people from the Tusita Heaven are going to come here to the Dao Defense League to hold me accountable. But I don’t care. None of them are a match for me now. However, I want all of you to be very careful of their plots and schemes. And I brought treasures from the Tusita Heaven to help all of you reach the Godmyth level!”

He waved his hand and the Many Heavens God Seal appeared, instantly shattering the dao of heaven in the area. All of a sudden, everyone felt as though certain restrictions on their souls had been lifted.

Before, all of them were feeling held back in their cultivation, as though a blade were constantly hanging over their heads that could fall at any time. Those were the limitations placed on them by the dao of heaven. But now Yang Qi had destroyed that overhanging blade, allowing them to relax. In fact, many of them were visibly calmer than before.

It was the freedom that came with the removal of the dao of heaven.

‘Now all I need to do is reach the Godmyth level myself,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘Once I do, I’ll benefit from some significant upgrades. For example, my Angel Wings will rise to a higher state.’

Soon, his Angel Wings would transform into their next state, which was that of the Freedom Wings.

Freedom Wings could pierce through primal-chaos and overcome any and all obstacles. No daoist technique or energy art would be able to restrict him then; he would have true and ultimate freedom.

In addition to that, once he reached the Godmyth level, his Infernal Deity Spear, Heaven and Earth Furnace, God Legion Battle Robe, God Legion Paradise, and all of his other energy arts would reach higher levels thanks to the virtual godhood he would develop. He would truly begin to unlock energy arts that were at the level of the Sovereign Lord.

Even his Eight Tribes Godfist and five phases energy arts would be transformed.

The Godmyth level represented a major upgrade. All of one’s energy arts would improve by thousands, if not tens of thousands of times. That was what happened when virtual godhood was thrown into the mix.

Raising his voice, he said, “These are god dao seeds. Consume them, then draw on your energy arts to form virtual godhood. Not only will you reach a higher level of enlightenment, but your destiny will also change on a substructural level!” With a wave of his hand, Yang Qi sent out a whole collection of god dao seeds, which the loyalists all grabbed and consumed without hesitation. Godpower instantly began transforming them.

Eldest Brother from the Invincible Society threw back his head and laughed heartily. “I'm going to break through to the Godmyth level! My dream is finally coming true!”

RUMBLE!

His aura surged, and dazzling, multi-colored light shot out from his head, which was the might of the Godmyth level. The dao of heaven had been crushed, so no heavenly tribulation came. That said, Yang Qi’s Many Heavens God Seal allowed him to sense the dao of heaven’s rage, although it couldn’t do anything.

“I'm going to break through also!”

Elder Second Brother, Sword Seventeen, Yan Wubing, and a whole host of others all began achieving breakthroughs. His father, his two brothers, the Yang Clan disciples, the chancellor of the old Sun Moon Institute… all of them benefited from the god dao seeds.

And thanks to Yang Qi’s protection, none of them experienced any dangers as part of the process. Almost immediately, shock spread through the Dao Defense League.

To have a whole host of disciples suddenly step into the Godmyth level at the same time was something completely unheard of. Even the big sects and clans of thirty-third ranked immortal worlds would never see tens of thousands of breakthroughs like this. After all, the resulting heavenly tribulations would be terrifyingly destructive.

“What? What’s going on? How could something like this be happening? You can clearly sense that tens of thousands of disciples in the Sage Panacea Sect are becoming Godmyths. The virtual godhood and godpower are clear.”

“Incredible. You never see anything like this. We all assumed the Sage Panacea Sect would never have any Godmyths, but now, in the shortest of moments, they gained a whole army of them!”

“Where did those disciples get the power they needed for their breakthroughs? It couldn’t have come through ordinary cultivation. Maybe they used some sort of special medicine. Although, not even the most powerful god pills would be strong enough for this. And pills would also draw significantly on the vital energy and quintessence-blood.”

“The Sage Panacea Sect is going to be very important in the Dao Defense League now. After all, Godmyths are elders with significant power and prestige.”

“They’re getting tens of thousands of elders! Incredible!”

“I wonder how the old-timers are going to react. Look, there are still people breaking through!”

“What a pity that Sectlord Dragon Proudheaven hasn’t broken through. If he did, the Sage Panacea Sect would be really powerful. Although, he’ll probably break through sooner or later.”

Yang Qi could actually sense the heaven-god that he had blocked within his Many Heavens God Seal battering at his dao heart. After all, the dao of heaven still existed outside of the area where he had destroyed it, and it was still furious. And that fury was being directed at Yang Qi himself.

In other words, he was actually experiencing the tribulations of all the tens of thousands of people who were breaking through right now.

Even more relevant was that this group wasn’t breaking through using their own power, but rather external power. And the dao of heaven couldn’t possibly just accept that.

Thankfully, as the tribulation entered him, he was able to negate it easily.

Massive power slammed into his fateless dao fruit, and as it combined with the true godhood in his sea of energy, the sage child began melting.

Yang Qi’s eyes lit up with delight.

As the sage child melted, he absorbed the power, although it was a process that would take a very long time.

Yang Qi could feel that his rise to the Godmyth level would be coming very soon.

As the tens of thousands of disciples achieved their breakthrough, a visitor arrived.

“It’s me, Patriarch Promoter, here to pay a visit!”

Chapter 744: Getting Rid of Hidden Injuries

In the blink of an eye, tens of thousands of the most loyal disciples in the Sage Panacea Sect had become Godmyths. It was a truly shocking development that even caused a stir among the Measureless Gods. And now, a Buddha God had arrived in the form of the boyish Patriarch Promoter.

As soon as he announced himself, Yang Qi flew out and said, “You grace us with your presence, Patriarch! Please forgive me for not coming out to receive you earlier!”

“Stow the jibber-jabber, Dragon Proudheaven. You’re causing a big scene here in the Sage Panacea Sect. You have tens of thousands of disciples all becoming elders, and that's going to require a big redistribution of resources in the Dao Defense League.” He looked at Yang Qi with narrowed eyes as though he could see right into him.

Of course, Yang Qi wasn’t the same person that Patriarch Promoter had dealt with in the past. He now had nine lineaments on his dao heart, and had his Many Heavens God Seal. He was so much stronger than before that it was almost impossible to quantify. He wouldn’t even need to use King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions, the God Legion Seal, or the power of the Cruiser of Civilization to deal with a Buddha God patriarch.

“There won’t be a need for that,” Yang Qi said. “The Sage Panacea Sect hasn’t asked for any resources from the Dao Defense League so far, and I don’t plan to start. Don’t worry, we’re going to continue contributing to the alliance. All I ask is that my disciples formally be named elders. Now that they’re Godmyths, they can help me with the healing services.”

“Well that goes without saying. The main reason I’ve come here today is to ask exactly how you did this. How did you push so many disciples into the Godmyth level at the same time?”

“Oh, that. It's a secret magic of the Dragonfolk. I’m not really at liberty to discuss the details.” Obviously, there was no way Yang Qi was going to reveal the details about what he had done in the Tusita Heaven. Technically, the Tusita Heaven was a member of the Dao Defense League, and although they likely suspected him of being the culprit, they wouldn’t have any way to prove it.

“Is that so?” Patriarch Promoter said coolly. “Secret magic of the Dragonfolk? I doubt that. I’ve never heard of any such technique being used by the Dragonfolk. Look, don’t read too much into this. I'm not here to try to force your secrets out of you. I actually have a very good impression of you. Unfortunately, you’ve put everyone in an awkward position here. Our highest council already met about the subject, and I’ve been sent here to invite you to the Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple to discuss the matter.”

Patriarch Promoter realized that he was unable to assess Yang Qi’s power, and secretly marveled at that. He also wondered how he could have achieved such rapid cultivation progress.

From what Yang Qi could tell, it seemed that Patriarch Promoter really had come with good intentions. And he was obviously being very friendly.

Of course, there was more to the story. With the recent transformations to Yang Qi, his Lord's Eye could now see into Patriarch Promoter and detect the fluctuations of heterogeneous power within him. “If the old-timers want to see me, then it’s only natural that I’ll agree to their request. Besides, I’ll be reaching the higher ranks of the Dao Defense League myself eventually. Patriarch Promoter, I remember how it was you that drove away Dragon Everlasting, and I know that I owe you some help in return. Don’t worry, I won’t be stingy.”

Patriarch Promoter laughed loudly. “You don’t need to do anything for me. How about you just agree to owe me a favor.”

“Are you sure about that?” Yang Qi said with a faint smile. “Patriarch Promoter, your energy fluctuations are very pure, which is a testament to the boundless divine abilities that you cultivate. Unfortunately, there is some heterogeneous godpower in your sea of energy. I know that it's influencing your cultivation base and making it difficult for you to circulate your true energy. If you want, I could provide you with treatment.”

“What?” Patriarch Promoter said, his eyes widening. “How can you see that? I've never told anybody about that, but you know? Have you really gotten that much stronger recently?”

“I have. As for how exactly I can see your problem, I’d prefer to keep that to myself. But I can heal you. You see, everyone has injuries beneath the surface. Be they large or small, I can find them and treat them.”

“Do you have hidden injuries?” Patriarch Promoter couldn’t help but ask.

“No. I'm perfect.”

It was something of a shameless boast, but it was true. Yang Qi had no hidden injuries. The God Legion Seal ensured that he was perfect, beyond the compare of any other individual. Not even Lesser or Common Gods could be as perfect as he was.

“You’re right, I do have hidden injuries,” Patriarch Promoter said. “A while back, I was exploring a primal-chaos godrelic when I found the śarīra of a fallen true god. I assimilated it, and it made me vastly stronger. Unfortunately, a streak of will from the fallen god remained in the śarīra, and it attempted to possess me. It even ate away some of my soul to use as its husk. By maintaining the utmost vigilance and using the power of certain god items, I can keep the will sealed. But I've never been able to root it out. And it occasionally lashes out, inflicting me with severe pain until I manage to suppress it again. If it weren’t for that thing, I would already have become a Chaos God, instead of being stuck at my current cultivation level. Ai….”

“So, that's how it is,” Yang Qi said coolly. “Well, then, let’s get rid of it right here and now.”

“What?” Patriarch Promoter said, looking a bit stunned. “You can really help me to destroy it?”

“You think I would lie to you?” Yang Qi said. With that, he shoved his palm out in Patriarch Promoter’s direction. Patriarch Promoter instinctively tried to fight back, but Yang Qi’s palm moved with countless variations, making it impossible to block. It had the power to shake the universe, and even possessed the slight aura of a true god, causing all the magical laws in the area to freeze up. In the blink of an eye, his hand was at Patriarch Promoter’s dantian region.

“You’re so strong!” Patriarch Promoter blurted in terror. He was one of the old-timers in the Dao Defense League, yet not even he was capable of resisting Yang Qi. Normally speaking, not even someone in his own cultivation level would’ve been able to do something like that.

Even as he was preparing to struggle against Yang Qi, Yang Qi’s voice rang out, “Don’t fight me. Absorb my true energy and send it against the will of that god!”

Patriarch Promoter could sense Yang Qi’s massive true energy rumbling into his sea of energy, where it took the form of a huge primal-chaos elder-snake.

“King Heaven-Devourer!” Patriarch Promoter blurted. “Don’t tell me you’re a successor of King Heaven-Devourer?!”

“King Heaven-Devourer isn’t really that impressive,” Yang Qi said with a smile. “I just use a few of his talismans when I need to.” He next drew on the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, causing millions upon millions of hells to appear in Patriarch Promoter's dantian region.

The seals within him opened and a malicious, discarnate will erupted out, which immediately attacked Yang Qi. However, the primal-chaos elder-snake devoured it. Then Yang Qi sealed it and pulled it into himself. The god's will was full of power that he could likely use to put into a magical treasure.

Patriarch Promoter let loose a long sigh of relief. After so many years, he had finally freed himself.

“You got rid of it. You really got rid of it!” He looked down at his hands in disbelief.

“Yes, I did. Now, let's get going.” Yang Qi was very curious to see why the old-timers wanted to meet him at the Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple.

“Yes, let’s go.” Shaking his head to clear it, Patriarch Promoter clasped Yang Qi on the shoulder. “Dragon Proudheaven, old boy, from here on out, we're buddies. I owe you a lot, and I won’t waste time just offering thanks. You’ll have my full backing when we get to Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple. If those old-timers are even the least bit disrespectful….”

“Disrespectful?” Yang Qi said coldly. “Whose interests have I harmed, exactly?”

“You have enemies in the Tusita Heaven, the Nine Yangs God Sect, and the God Dragon Tribe,” Patriarch Promoter replied. “And that’s especially true of the Nine Yangs God Sect. They’re really out to get you, to the point where some of their top patriarchs have come out of seclusion.”

“The Nine Yangs God Sect?” Yang Qi’s expression flickered with killing intent. “I started out on good terms with them, and earned them a lot of profit with my medicine sect. But in the end, they sold me out to the God Dragon Tribe when I needed them the most. Thankfully, I revealed their true colors. Who could have guessed that they would turn into an actual enemy, and even plot against me? This is preposterous!”

Chapter 745: The Old-Timers

Yang Qi had known all along that there would be some hard feelings after he split from the Nine Yangs God Sect. But he never imagined that they would be so petty as to view him as an enemy because of it.

Not even killing people from the God Dragon Tribe had earned him such ire.

The Nine Yangs God Sect had a lot of connections, and now it seemed that they were making use of them to turn the other old-timers against him.

Yang Qi smiled coldly. ‘They assume I'm as weak as I was back then. They’ll find out soon enough that they can’t afford to offend me. Chaos God patriarchs? Like I care. Once I'm a Godmyth I’ll be able to crush them all.’

Keeping his thoughts to himself, he followed Patriarch Promoter to the Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple in the middle of the Dao Defense League. The temple itself was actually a godrelic that had been brought from afar and set deeply into the void to serve as the heart of the alliance.

The Dao Defense League was huge, made up of billions and billions of immortal worlds that the top experts had organized into a huge spell formation. It was slowly coming to resemble the Heavenly Court of ancient times, and was the focus of all the other immortal worlds in existence.

Lately, more and more worlds were joining. After all, lone immortal worlds could easily fall prey to the future warriors. But for now, the future warriors didn’t dare to enter the territory of the Dao Defense League.

Despite that, the conflict between immortals and future warriors was only continuing to grow more intense, with only the most distant and remote places being safe.

As more and more future warriors arrived, it was reaching a point where not even the farthest corners of the universe were safe. The only way to have a measure of protection was to join the Dao Defense League.

There was no questioning that the alliance was here to stay.

As such, the Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple was destined to be one of the most important locations in existence. It was already a gathering place for old-timers from twentieth, and even thirtieth ranked immortal worlds, almighty beings of extraordinary power.

Even the fiercest future warriors would tremble in fear upon hearing about the old-timers from the Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple.

If the old-timers went into battle, then unless the most powerful of the future warriors appeared—people like generals or marshals—the forces from the Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple would inflict serious casualties.

In the forces of the future world, the generals and marshals were comparable to Buddha Gods and Chaos Gods. Above the marshals were the generalissimos, and above them were the magisters.

No one knew exactly how powerful the magisters were, but it was generally believed that if they joined the fight, the immortal dao civilization would be doomed.

‘I wonder if the Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple will really be as dangerous as a dragon’s pool or a tiger’s den,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘I guess I’ll find out soon enough. What are these old-timers going to try to do? Are they really going to make a move against me? According to Patriarch Promoter, a lot of the old-timers approve of me. If they all had it out for me, I’d probably be dead already.’

Even as he pondered these things, he followed Patriarch Promoter into the temple.

The front steps were covered with complex warding magics that made flight impossible. The only way to go into the Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple was to walk. Not even Patriarch Promoter was an exception.

Inside, Yang Qi chuckled coldly. ‘Very formal. The future world hasn’t really pressed the attack yet, so they have time to set up a little empire. How will they deal with the war when it gets truly fierce?’

That said, he wasn’t interested in challenging the rules of the Dao Defense League.

“He’s here!”

“The kid showed up!”

“There he comes!”

“On your knees! You’re not even a Godmyth, and yet you dare to just walk right in? Give us three sets of three kowtows and hand over all your good fortune. As a member of the Dao Defense League, you’re required to contribute to the cause!”

“Hmph! You people don’t get to make the decisions here. This kid is a top genius in the Dao Defense League! Are you intentionally trying to get him to switch loyalties and work for the enemy?”

“How impudent! This kid is a criminal! You think he’s a genius? Maybe a genius of evil! He should serve as a slave to us for a hundred million years, and even then he might not have paid his debt. If anybody can break the rules, the Dao Defense League will crumble!”

“Your Nine Yangs God Sect is full of treacherous betrayers, Yang Ghostcatcher! He used to be making money for you people, but when the God Dragon Tribe came along you completely ignored him. But now you’re getting angry? What crime did this kid commit?”

“Crime? He offended the God Dragon Tribe, which hurts the interests of the alliance! That’s treason!”

Almost as soon as Yang Qi stepped into the Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple, he was assaulted by a buzz of divine will. Someone with a lesser cultivation base would likely have been killed by the mere fluctuations. However, he simply negated the power.

Within the temple were a host of thrones, upon which sat numerous patriarchs. Some were smiling as though they approved of Yang Qi. Others had more level expressions, while some looked at him with vicious smiles or eyes cold with killing intent.

Yang Qi waved his hand, causing golden light filled with might and power to spread out, illuminating the entire interior of the hall, as well as all of the patriarchs.

His voice ringing loudly so that all could hear, he said, “Patriarchs, I'm in a good mood today, do you really have to sit around here arguing like this? What have I, Dragon Proudheaven, done to deserve being called to a meeting in your presence? Could it be that you wish to promote me to the same position as yourselves? I feel more than qualified to serve as a patriarch.”

He was already putting on a show of both his power and his boldness.

Some of the patriarchs responded with astonishment, and others exchanged awkward glances. The divine will conversations continued to buzz.

“Look at his energy arts and cultivation base! This is incredible! Even I feel the pressure.”

“Yes, his energy arts seem as strong as a Buddha God’s. In fact, he might even be closer to the Chaos God level. How is this even possible? He’s clearly a Dao-Demolisher with nine lineaments. He’s not even a Godmyth!”

“Dammit, how did he suddenly get so much stronger? Could it be that he’s backed by some almighty old-timer? But who? From what I heard, the God Dragon Tribe already wiped out almost all of the fire dragons. In all the interrogations they carried out, no old-timer was revealed to be this kid's backer.”

Considering the display of power on Yang Qi’s part, some of the old-timers were already changing their minds. Some were at least switching to a more neutral opinion of him, while others were considering siding with him. They knew that a person as incredibly strong as him was not the kind that could be easily trifled with. And many of them realized that there must be more to him than met the eye.

“What incredible gall!” one of the patriarchs suddenly shouted. He was a Buddha God, and was flanked by several other Buddha Gods. Eyes burning with fury and killing intent, he said, “Who do you think you are, Dragon Proudheaven? How dare you cause a scene like this in the Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple!”

Instead of responding, Yang Qi looked at Patriarch Promoter and quietly asked, “Who's the loudmouth?”

“That’s Yang Ghostcatcher, one of the old-timers from the Nine Yangs God Sect. His fellows are Yang Mountainpeak, Yang Souldeep, Yang Blessingcloud, and Yang Fortunecloud. They’re top patriarchs from the Nine Yangs God Sect, with equal standing to the sectlord himself. They’re the ones who called this meeting to try to deal with you.

“Don’t worry, old pal. You have a lot of support from other old-timers here. You’ve done a lot for the Dao Defense League, including saving many of the children and other descendants of these patriarchs. Some of them, you prevented from becoming morphlings. Others, you cleansed of heterogeneous true energy. Nobody is going to forget that.”

“Patriarch Promoter!” someone said, his voice oily and sinister. “Are you trying to protect this boy?” A throne appeared which was larger and taller than the other thrones, and was occupied by a patriarch whose eyes were currently closed. However, in response to his words, everyone quieted down.

“Sectlord Nine Yangs!?” Patriarch Promoter said, shivering as if with fear. Sectlord Nine Yangs was a Chaos God with enlightenment of the dao of primordial chaos, making him very close to the level of the legion of gods. The difference between him and a Buddha God was almost too much to put into words. Patriarch Promoter knew that not even ten of himself could stand up to a person like this. In fact, among all the old-timers, only some of the Demigods could deal with him.

“Back down immediately, Patriarch Promoter!” Sectlord Nine Yangs said, smiling at the look of terror he saw on his face. “If you don't, I’ll exterminate both your clan and your sect!”

Chapter 746: Sectlord Nine Yangs

“You….” Patriarch Promoter had been soundly put in his place by Sectlord Nine Yangs. Taking a few steps back, his face drained of blood and he said, “Sectlord Nine Yangs, I'm one of the old-timers in the Dao Defense League too. In fact, you could say I'm one of the founders. There’s no need to be so aggressive. We don’t want to get into a life or death struggle here!”

“Life or death struggle?” Sectlord Nine Yangs said in a menacing tone. “What qualifies you to talk about having a life or death struggle with me? Considering how much higher my cultivation is than yours, if I feel like putting you in your place, I will! Even if you had eighteen copies of yourself working together, you couldn’t do a thing to me. In fact, I would slaughter you as easily as slaughtering a chicken. So back down immediately! If you keep pissing me off like this, I'm going to run out of patience.”

Considering that Sectlord Nine Yangs was a majestic Chaos God, his fury could easily strike fear into the hearts of just about everyone present.

Back when the Immortal-Slayer’s Sect had caused such problems, even the terrifying Leaf Dao-Denier had been forced to think long and hard before causing too many problems for Yang Qi. And that was because he had sought refuge in the Nine Yangs God Sect, who had Sectlord Nine Yangs lurking in the shadows.

But now, things had turned around, and Sectlord Nine Yangs viewed Yang Qi as an enemy.

“Hold on a minute!” Yang Qi said, taking a step forward and placing himself right in front of Sectlord Nine Yangs. “There’s no need to be so aggressive, Sectlord Nine Yangs. Considering all of us have much lower cultivation bases than you, what exactly are you planning to do here? What rule or regulation can you cite to justify your actions? All of the founders of the Dao Defense League are here today, so you can’t just unilaterally make a bunch of decisions.”

“Oh?” Sectlord Nine Yangs looked over at Yang Qi like a viper eyeing its prey. But then he realized that Yang Qi wasn’t flinching or averting his gaze in the least, which caused his anger to flare. “You think you qualify to talk to me? Patriarch Promoter is a Buddha God, and even he hardly qualifies. Who the hell are you? How dare you ask questions of me!”

“You people invited me here, otherwise I wouldn’t step foot in the Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple. I really don’t care what titles or positions any of you have, I’ll talk to whoever I want to. Also, Sectlord Nine Yangs, you need to answer a very important question. How exactly did I offend the Nine Yangs God Sect, and what gives you the right to act like such a bully? I helped your sect to fill your coffers with a lot of magical treasures, and then, instead of protecting me, you let the God Dragon Tribe pick on me. So what's your explanation for that? Did you really expect me to just stick around making money for you after that, like some sort of tool?”

“That’s right,” Sectlord Nine Yangs replied. “You’re a tool to earn profit for the Nine Yangs God Sect, nothing more. Understand? If we want to protect you, we’ll protect you. If we don’t, then we’ll toss you aside. There’s no room for you to complain about that, it's just how things work. You have two choices here. One. Dismantle the Sage Panacea Sect and sever all ties with whatever old-timer you have backing you. Either that, or have that old-timer join the Nine Yangs God Sect as a slave. Two. Accept whatever punishment we choose to give you today. Those are your options. Got it?”

With that, Sectlord Nine Yangs settled back into his throne and looked at Yang Qi, waiting for his response. He spoke without even trying to sound reasonable. He was domineering, arrogant, and outright said that he planned to take things that didn't belong to him. But he was too important and powerful to argue with. Although some of the other old-timers frowned disapprovingly, none of them wanted to risk stirring up trouble.

As for Yang Qi, he was actually glad things were so out in the open. It was obvious that the Nine Yangs God Sect wanted to take advantage of him, and, truth be told, he wasn’t in the mood for arguing. Looking around at the other old-timers, he said, “Patriarchs, what is your stance on this? The Nine Yangs God Sect is acting like it makes the decisions in the Dao Defense League. And if things continue in this way, they will. That wouldn’t be good for the rest of you, would it?”

“Oh?” one of the old-timers said. “Are you really that important, Dragon Proudheaven? Are you the kind of person who can affect the Dao Defense League as a whole? We all know that you can do astonishing things, but in this day and age, the alliance is far more important than most individuals. That’s just how things are. If you can prove that you’re valuable enough, then maybe you’ll get the support you seek. If not, you’ll lose out.”

His face twisted with rage, Sectlord Nine Yangs said, “Patriarch Kingheaven, are you really saying you’re going to oppose the Nine Yangs God Sect?”

“Calm down, Sectlord Nine Yangs,” Patriarch Kingheaven replied calmly. “I'm asking Dragon Proudheaven how important he is. If he has a good enough answer then we can resolve this situation peacefully.”

“Fine,” Sectlord Nine Yangs said coldly. “I'm curious to see how this punk responds.”

Yang Qi laughed. “How important am I? I think you people are really underestimating me. Right before coming here, I helped Patriarch Promoter clear a cultivation blockage, allowing him to take control of the śarīra of a powerful god. And that took almost no effort on my part. I also revealed certain profound mysteries to him, ensuring that he’ll become a Chaos God very soon!”

“He’s telling the truth!” Patriarch Promoter said, allowing his energy to surge as proof of what Yang Qi was saying. Looking at Sectlord Nine Yangs with a cold smile, he said, “You can rely on your higher cultivation base to chide me today, but I’ll soon be a Chaos God. I’ll come to settle things with you then.”

Quite a few gasps could be heard among the patriarchs, many of whom exchanged awkward glances. After all, Patriarch Promoter's hidden injuries weren’t secret, and everyone could tell that he had been healed.

Most of these patriarchs were Buddha Gods with hidden injuries of their own that caused problems for their cultivation. If those problems could be removed, giving them hope to become Chaos Gods, it would change everything.

“Hmph! You talk big, brat. So what if you happened to heal Patriarch Promoter? You just got lucky, that’s all. Do you really expect us to believe that you can help all the Buddha Gods present become Chaos Gods?” Sectlord Nine Yangs was talking in a very sinister tone of voice, but the truth was that he was astonished by this development and scrambling to keep control of the situation.

In response, Yang Qi said, “You might be a Chaos God, Sectlord Nine Yangs, but you have hidden injuries too, don’t you? You forcibly cultivate nine types of immortal energy, including the Profound-Yang, Lesser-Yang, True-Yang, Jade-Yang, and others. You successfully combined nine godly-class energy arts and gathered nine types of preheaven yin energy. By combining the yin and the yang, you achieved a great dao and reached the Chaos God level. But the truth is that you’ve walked an errant path, and will never be able to reach the Deathless Throne. In fact, you can’t even become a demigod.”

Many of the other patriarchs looked over intently to see how Sectlord Nine Yangs would respond.

“That's utter nonsense!” Sectlord Nine Yangs said, his cheek twitching. “If I hear any more sensationalist talk like that from you, I’ll just kill you!”

Yang Qi laughed. “Very bombastic, Sectlord Nine Yangs. Let me ask you a question. When you cultivated the transformations of primal-chaos and created a perfect cycle of yin and yang, it created nine vortexes in your sea of energy, didn’t it? Vortexes that fill you with intense pain. Vortexes that threaten to split apart your soul.”

“What?!” Sectlord Nine Yangs blurted. Yang Qi had hit the nail on the head and perfectly described the problems he experienced in his cultivation. The only thing he could do about it was forcibly keep his soul stable during the outbreaks. Although he hated to admit it, it was very painful. Thankfully, it hadn’t had a negative effect on his fighting prowess. “The only person who could possibly know about that is a taiji master like me, someone who has cultivated nine yangs and nine yins, and combined them into the nine taijis. How could you know about it?”

Yang Qi laughed again. “Are you insane? Have you experienced cultivation deviation? You think that an imbalance of yin and yang makes you a taiji master? No. There is only one taiji, not nine. Your nine yangs and nine yins are unstable and beyond your control. You think that your path of cultivation is correct, but the truth is that those nine vortexes are mutations of your own true energy. They are nine conglomerations of preheaven chaos that constantly eat away at your soul. One day, you’ll lose focus and they’ll succeed. You’ll either die, transform into nine medicinal pills, or become a yin-yang hybrid heaven-devil, the kind that exist in the Unrestrained Heaven. If you don’t believe me, use the power of your own soul to inspect those nine yin-yang vortexes and you’ll see the devilishness yourself.”

“You….” All of a sudden, Sectlord Nine Yangs felt a profound sense of terror rising up within him as he realized the true nature of the nine yin-yang vortexes within him.

He knew that Yang Qi was correct; he couldn’t truly control the deadly vortexes, and really was on the razor's edge. Those who cultivated the dao had to exercise extreme control, otherwise they could easily slip into cultivation deviation.

For example, in the beginning Yang Qi had been unable to control the God Legion Seal. But as his cultivation base grew more powerful, he slowly gained control and could release more of its power.

But Sectlord Nine Yangs had long since lost any bit of control he had. The idea of transforming into a heaven-devil filled him with dread. It was hard to say how many Demigod patriarchs had been transformed into monsters in the moment they tried to reach the Deathless Throne.

Chapter 747: Terror

‘No!’ Sectlord Nine Yangs thought, terror gripping his heart. ‘I experienced countless trials and tribulations to reach the Chaos God level. I'm only one step away from the Deathless Throne! I'm so close to being eternally indestructible! Deathless! Able to survive the destruction of the universe itself! How could a heaven-devil take over my soul?’

His expression distorted so viciously that he almost looked like he was experiencing cultivation deviation right then and there.

Chuckling, Yang Qi said, “I can tell from your expression that you really are in the initial stages of cultivation deviation, and a monster has already started forming within you. That’s why you have such an arrogant and conceited personality. And it's also why you're so overconfident. The stronger that monster gets, the crazier you act.”

As Yang Qi’s words battered Sectlord Nine Yangs, his soul quivered, the insanity within it twitching as though it might erupt at any moment.

POP!

Sectlord Nine Yangs suddenly coughed up a huge mouthful of black blood that radiated such intense devil energy it was obvious that he was deeply in the clutches of cultivation deviation.

Whoosh. Whoosh. Whoosh.

All of a sudden, several shadowy figures appeared behind Sectlord Nine Yangs. One of them was taller than the others and pulsed with powerful dragon energy as he placed a hand on Sectlord Nine Yangs’ back, sending devil-subduing dragon power into him. A moment later, Sectlord Nine Yangs calmed down.

“Many thanks, Dragon King,” Sectlord Nine Yangs said. “I nearly fooled this villainous brat. He thought he could incite a heart-devil within me, but I had it under control the whole time. Of course, that vital energy of yours provided some secondary help.”

“If you had no devil in your heart, how could I incite it?” Yang Qi said, his words echoing out loudly for everyone to hear. “A devil won’t rise up if it doesn’t exist to begin with. How could just a few words from me cause a monster to take over a powerful Chaos God like you?”

A very unsightly expression overtook Sectlord Nine Yangs’ face.

The truth was that although Sectlord Nine Yangs did have some hidden injuries, they weren’t as bad as Yang Qi had made it sound. He had used the Glad Tidings of the Lord to make things a lot more dramatic than they really were. Sectlord Nine Yangs did have nine yin-yang vortexes that created an imbalance of yin and yang. And he really was showing signs of experiencing cultivation deviation and transforming into a yin-yang monster.

But Yang Qi had only made the situation a bit worse.

That said, Yang Qi immediately felt very wary of the shadowy figures who had appeared behind Sectlord Nine Yangs. They were Dragonfolk from the God Dragon Tribe, and one of them had a very high rank.

“Not bad, Dragon Proudheaven,” said Dragon King. “Not bad at all. I underestimated you. All it took were some fanciful words on your part to throw Sectlord Nine Yangs’ heart into chaos. But if you think that's enough to get you off the hook with us, you’re gravely mistaken. The God Dragon Tribe is going to kill you, no matter what. Presumably, you’ve heard that we already wiped out all the fire dragons.”

“Who cares about the fire dragons?” Yang Qi said. “We were just discussing my importance to the alliance. Then I said a few things and caused a mighty sectlord to cough up blood. I'd say that shows how valuable I am. You see, I'm the only person who can rid Sectlord Nine Yangs of his injuries and that monster. If you push things too far here and kill me, then in the future, it won't matter how much he begs heaven and earth, he won’t get any help from anyone.”

Eyes flashing with vicious light, Sectlord Nine Yangs said, “Enough of this talk of hidden injuries, boy! And drop the chatter about cultivation deviation. Even if I did have problems like that, and you were the only one who could help, I would just force you to do it. And if you refused, I would make you live a life in which you only wished you could die!”

At this point, another patriarch stepped out of the shadows. “Sectlord Nine Yangs,” he said, “it’s obvious you have injuries, there’s no need for such talk.” Looking at Yang Qi, he continued, “Well done, Dragon Proudheaven. You’ve proven how valuable you are and thus, have earned a spot among us. You are a holy, august patriarch of medicine, with a rank much higher than the elder kings. You’re equal to us now.”

Glaring, Sectlord Nine Yangs said, “Winter Bloodless? Don’t tell me you’re going to set yourself against the Nine Yangs God Sect and the God Dragon Tribe!”

With a cold harrumph, Patriarch Kingheaven rose to his feet. “What if Winter Bloodless and I join forces? Do you think the two of us are going to be scared of the God Dragon Tribe and the Nine Yangs God Sect? Dragon Proudheaven is just too important to the alliance. You want to turn him into a puppet to work for you? Sorry, that’s not going to happen.”

“Fine. Then I'm going to kill him! That way, nobody can make use of him!”

Sectlord Nine Yangs began striding toward Yang Qi, as if he intended to attack him.

Before Yang Qi could do anything, Patriarch Winter Bloodless unleashed a beam of godlight that blocked Sectlord Nine Yangs’ path.

“Have a death wish, Winter Bloodless!?” Sectlord Nine Yangs barked angrily.

Snorting coldly, Winter Bloodless replied, “I saw the devilishness in you just now, Sectlord Nine Yangs.”

As everyone else sat there waiting to see exactly how things would play out, Dragon King suddenly unleashed a stream of light shaped like a dragon, which shot toward Yang Qi at top speed. Yet even as it wrapped around Yang Qi, he shrugged, sending an intangible wave of power out that shattered the light and devoured it.

Jaw dropping, Dragon King said, “How did you get this strong? You actually destroyed my Unbounded Dragon Lasso?”

“I'm not particularly strong,” Yang Qi said as his energy surged in eye-catching fashion. “Do you people really think that I'm just some tool that you can use however you wish? You think that I’ll just go along with whatever arrangement you come up with? Dragon King, you’ve forcibly cultivated the Eight Tribes Godfist, which has given rise to toxic dragon particles in your body. You’ve really put yourself in a dangerous situation. If you continue to practice your cultivation in that fashion, you’ll eventually transform from being a god dragon into a toxic dragon. You think that's your ticket to the Deathless Throne?”

“That’s nothing but alarmist talk,” Dragon King said. However, he couldn’t prevent an unsightly expression from appearing on his face. After all, Yang Qi had just openly revealed the weaknesses in his cultivation.

“Fine. Take a look at the real Eight Tribes Godfist!” Yang Qi had come to the realization that if he didn’t show how strong he was, he wouldn’t be able to get any of these people to submit to him. Even Winter Bloodless and Patriarch Kingheaven were only protecting him because they intended to use him.

RUMBLE!

He launched a punch with the full power of the Eight Tribes Heaven, revealing a level of strength that surpassed the imaginations of everyone present.

Dragon King snorted coldly. “You combined all eight energy arts, huh? Unfortunately, your cultivation level is still too low. You might be a genius among the Dragonfolk, but I'm still going to crush you into dust!” Dragon King also had a fist technique, something that wasn’t the Eight Tribes Godfist, but a different secret magic. “Grand Devil-Subduing True-Empyrean Godfist!”

The wailing of ghosts and weeping of gods echoed out as his fist transformed into an enormous dragon claw that could crush anything in its path and vanquish all types of devil-ghosts.

When the two fists collided, Yang Qi staggered backward. Crack! All of a sudden, his entire body collapsed into numerous black streams of light.

“See how weak you are, boy!? You really think you qualify to fight me?” Laughing, Dragon King reached out to grab the black streams of light.

Unfortunately for him, the black streaks subsequently exploded, transforming into a hail of hells that wrapped around him and formed an aegis that sealed him in place.

“An aegis? You think you can trap me in this thing?” Enraged, Dragon King launched another fist strike, the kind that could devastate universes. Yet it did nothing to the aegis.

“I'm taking you to another world, Dragon King!”

RUMBLE!

A black passageway opened and swallowed the aegis, Dragon King, and Yang Qi. In the blink of an eye, they were gone.

“That was….”

“The power of monarchs. That was the power of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart!”

“The Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart!? It wrapped up Dragon Proudheaven and Dragon King and took them away. What's going on here? Don’t tell me that Dragon Proudheaven is just like Leaf Dao-Denier! Does he have some of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions? Can he enter the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart?!”

Some of the old-timers had reached out toward the spot where the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart appeared, hoping to stop the passageway from closing, but unfortunately, they were too slow and their efforts were fruitless.

“They're gone. Really and truly gone. What do we do now?” Sectlord Nine Yangs and Winter Bloodless exchanged confused glances. Nobody was sure exactly what to do now that this completely unexpected turn of events had occurred.

Whirrrrrrr.

All of a sudden, another passageway opened and Yang Qi stepped out. It closed behind him, but Dragon King was still nowhere to be seen.

“Where’s Dragon King, boy?” The other Dragonfolk were gritting their teeth in anger. However, they were merely Buddha Gods, and didn’t dare to make a move on Yang Qi.

Loosening up his shoulders, Yang Qi replied, “Oh, he’s locked up in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Don't worry, he’s not hurt. If I’m ever feeling particularly compassionate, maybe I’ll let him out.”

Chapter 748: Locked Up

Yang Qi had locked up Dragon King in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Unless Yang Qi allowed it, Dragon King had no hope of ever setting foot in the immortal worlds again.

Truth be told, Yang Qi wasn’t currently strong enough to defeat Dragon King. If they fought, Yang Qi might make it out alive, but there was no way he would win.

He just couldn’t beat people like him or Sectlord Nine Yangs. And if they teamed up, he would die for sure.

So he used the more roundabout method of psychological warfare. He started by saying some things to unnerve Sectlord Nine Yangs.

Then he used a function of the Cruiser of Civilization to lock Dragon King in place before drawing on King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions to open a passageway to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart and drag Dragon King through it.

And he’d left Dragon King in a remote and empty part of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, a place where he would never find any good fortune to benefit him. In fact, it was a location that was completely dead and empty, without even vital energy. To survive, Dragon King would have to draw on his own vital energy without any way to replace it. And once he ran out of vital energy, he wouldn’t die, but he would be forced to exist in constant torment. Eventually, Yang Qi would go back in to deal with him. And of course, it would help that he was vastly stronger inside the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart than he was outside.

Unfortunately, this strategy would only work once. He obviously wouldn’t be able to trick Sectlord Nine Yangs in the same way.

Yang Qi still wasn't in a position where he could force anyone he wanted into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. He’d only succeeded because of the Cruiser of Civilization and Dragon King’s carelessness.

One day, when he had all nine of King Immortal-Slayer legacy medallions—and had reached the Godmyth level—he could easily use the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart to imprison people.

Thankfully, his plan had worked, and in this critical moment it struck fear into the hearts of all the old-timers. To them, he was nothing less than an astoundingly powerful freak.

Sectlord Nine Yangs was physically shaking.

“You people can’t do a thing to me,” Yang Qi said to the Dragonfolk. All of the remaining members of the God Dragon Tribe were Buddha Gods, which meant that Yang Qi could easily slaughter them. “If I need to, I’ll just use the power of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart to imprison you. Nobody can enter or exit the chart except me. Not even the legion of gods. What do you think? Are you ready to give me a position of leadership? I want to be a patriarch in the Dao Defense League. A real patriarch, not a puppet. Incidentally, considering how much Dragon King offended me, I think I’ll kill him and assimilate his quintessence energy later. That will be the price your God Dragon Tribe pays for opposing me.”

One of the members of the God Dragon Tribe stepped forward angrily. “What? You’re going to kill Dragon King? If you do that, you’ll be making an enemy of the God Dragon Tribe for all time! We’ll hound you from generation to generation if we have to.”

Yang Qi smiled. “Whether or not I kill him will depend on how well you people behave. If you make it worth my time, I might let him out.”

“Are you threatening us?” one of the younger Dragonfolk growled.

“Yeah, I am. So what? I'm starting to get tired of you witless morons. If you keep jabbering, maybe I’ll kill you all right here and now. Do you really think that trashy Buddha Gods like you can stand up to me? I could kill you as easily as blowing some dust off my shoulder!”

The Dragonfolk glowered back at him, but at the same time, kept their mouths shut.

“Could you be more arrogant, Dragon Proudheaven?” Sectlord Nine Yangs said loudly. He had finally had enough, and couldn’t hold back from jumping into the conversation again. “You’re challenging the majesty of the Dao Defense League as a whole! Let Dragon King go this instant, otherwise I’ll wipe the Sage Panacea Sect out of existence. I’ll even kill the chickens and dogs! Maybe you’ll escape, but what do you think will happen to the rest of your people?”

“Is that your plan?” Yang Qi replied. “You think I didn’t think of that possibility? It wouldn’t take any effort on my part to take the entire Sage Panacea Sect right into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. What’s more, the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart allows me to travel to any location I want, without anyone being the wiser. For example, I could use it to go into the Nine Yangs God Sect and assassinate all the elders! It would take less than a year to turn you into a general with no troops under his command.”

“You!” Sectlord Nine Yangs raged, but in his heart, he was afraid. He could tell that Yang Qi was the kind of person who followed through when he said he would do something. Unfortunately, considering the circumstances, he couldn’t afford to seem weak.

Yang Qi wasn’t inclined to argue further with Sectlord Nine Yangs. He was already considering just leaving, then assimilating Dragon King with the Sagely Sacrifice. If he took his virtual godhood, it would likely be enough to reach the Godmyth level.

“I think we’re done here,” Yang Qi said. “I accept the suggestion of Winter Bloodless and Patriarch Kingheaven. I will become a patriarch, and my disciples will be elders. Winter Bloodless, Patriarch Kingheaven, I won’t forget that you stepped in to help me today. Once things settle down, I’ll heal all of the hidden injuries you have.”

Earlier, he was on the fence about what to do. But after capturing Dragon King, he knew that he’d gained the upper hand, and the two patriarchs now viewed him as an equal.

The two patriarchs exchanged a glance.

“Very well,” Winter Bloodless said. “We look forward to your cure for our hidden injuries, Patriarch Dragon Proudheaven. Can we now put everything from today behind us?”

“Of course. Except for things with Sectlord Nine Yangs. Why don’t we set a date to have a duel to the death?” From the venomous look in Sectlord Nine Yangs’ eyes, Yang Qi knew that he wouldn’t be the type of person who would let matters drop and would be a constant threat going forward.

“Duel to the death?!” Sectlord Nine Yangs said. Never would he have guessed that Yang Qi would suggest something like that in front of all these witnesses. His initial reaction was to smile viciously and agree. But then he suddenly thought about how Dragon King vanished so mysteriously, and was now imprisoned in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. If the same thing happened to Sectlord Nine Yangs, his sect would definitely end up being wiped out and he would be a laughingstock for all eternity.

“What,” Yang Qi said, “too scared to answer? In that case, cut the arrogant act and stick your tail between your legs where it belongs. Either that, or wag it a bit in the hopes that I’ll let you work for me. But if you continue being stubborn, I’ll go wipe out everyone in the Nine Yangs God Sect. Weren’t you just talking about exterminating Patriarch Promoter’s sect and clan? Well, allow me to say the same thing to you.”

Perhaps it was because there were so many people present, but Yang Qi’s words were too much for Sectlord Nine Yangs to take.

“Fine!” he shouted. “I already made the decision to punish you, Dragon Proudheaven, so this is perfect. Bullies like you deserve what they get. You want a duel with me? Three months! In three months, I’ll be waiting right here for you. It’ll be a duel to the death, and all the elders here can bear witness that those are the terms. What do you say?”

“Alright, sounds good,” Yang Qi said with a faint smile. “Although, it seems to me that you picked three months because you’re scared. You know you can’t do anything about my Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, so you’re hoping to buy time. But don’t worry, I’ll give you the three months. After all, I wouldn’t want to come across as unreasonable.”

“Fine. Just don’t get yourself killed before the duel!” Glaring, Sectlord Nine Yangs turned and vanished.

The other patriarchs gave final glances to Yang Qi and started leaving the Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple.

Yang Qi had established his place in the Dao Defense League and ensured that none of the old-timers harbored any further thoughts of controlling him. He’d done the right thing in going to the Tusita Heaven. If he hadn’t gotten stronger during that time, he would likely have been crushed by Sectlord Nine Yangs and Dragon King.

Upon returning to the Sage Panacea Sect, he sent out a message. “Please, you two, come for a visit!”

Almost immediately, two figures approached the sect, both of them Chaos God patriarchs. One was Winter Bloodless and the other was Patriarch Kingheaven. The former came from the thirtieth ranked Loneshadow Heaven, and the latter from the thirty-second ranked War Calamity Heaven. They were both flanked by hordes of disciples and experts from their sects.

“Greetings, Patriarchs,” Yang Qi said with a nod. “You came just at the right time. Allow me to inspect you for hidden cultivation injuries.” A beam of light shot out from his Lord’s Eye and scanned the two patriarchs.

Both patriarchs instinctively tried to protect themselves with magical abilities, only to find to their shock and terror that they did no good. Thankfully, Yang Qi wasn’t attacking them, because if he had, they would have been in a difficult position.

Chapter 749: Becoming a Patriarch

Hissss!

After a long moment of investigation, Yang Qi closed the eye on his forehead. Sighing, he looked at the two patriarchs. “I now understand everything about your hidden injuries. Winter Bloodless, you cultivate a godly-class energy art known as the God-Dao Blood-Spirit Nine-Heavens Grand Art. And you also cultivate the Blood-Sea Reincarnation Paleo-Devil True Energy from the Hell of Fresh Blood. Both of them are blood-type energy arts, with one being righteous and the other evil. Mixing those two types of energy can lead to bizarre results, and in this case you’re suffering from something similar to Sectlord Nine Yangs. You keep the effects under control, although you still suffer from a minor flaw.”

“Oh?” Winter Bloodless was more than a little shocked that Yang Qi could assess his cultivation so clearly. It was little wonder that he’d been able to wind the ruthless and ambitious Sectlord Nine Yangs around his finger and cause him to cough up blood.

Most people didn’t think Yang Qi stood much of a chance in his duel to the death with Sectlord Nine Yangs in Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple in three months. But all of a sudden, Winter Bloodless wasn’t so sure about that. Perhaps Yang Qi would pull off a heaven-defying stunt and slaughter the sectlord.

If someone as important as Sectlord Nine Yangs were to be killed, it would make huge waves in the Dao Defense League.

“Young Sir Dragon Proudheaven, what is the flaw you mentioned?”

“Cultivating the Blood-Sea Reincarnation Paleo-Devil True Energy from the Hell of Fresh Blood involves absorbing the animadestiny quintessence of that hell. Some ancient monster there realized what was happening and began slipping tiny bits of devilishness into the quintessence you've been absorbing. That devilishness infected your true energy in a way that not even you noticed. It’s so minute that, if it flared up, you’d be able to suppress it. At least for now. If you continue to practice this form of cultivation the way you have been, the devilishness will eventually reach your soul. And when that happens, you’ll be beyond any cure. You’ll eventually transform into a blood-devil, a puppet of the suzerains of hell.”

As Winter Bloodless listened, his face first flushed red, then turned as pale as death. When it was all over, he murmured, “I don’t believe it.”

“I'm afraid I'm skeptical too,” Patriarch Kingheaven said. “Young Sir Proud Heaven, aren't you being overly melodramatic here?”

“There’s nothing melodramatic about it,” Yang Qi replied coolly. “Winter Bloodless, deep in your heart, you know the truth. Let me ask you, when you cultivate the Blood-Sea Reincarnation Paleo-Devil True Energy, do you sense the reek of gore?”

“Reek of gore?” He frowned. “Well of course. We’re talking about the essence of the Hell of Fresh Blood. It’s only natural that there would be a reek of gore. You see, whenever I extract blood from the Hell of Fresh Blood, I use a godfire energy art to refine it three hundred and sixty times. By that point, the only thing left behind is that gory smell. It’s exactly what you would expect to happen, right?”

Yang Qi shook his head. “Wrong. You’re falling victim to a monster. Although the Hell of Fresh Blood focuses primarily on blood, don't forget that the name of the place also has the word ‘fresh’ in it. You see, the blood essence from the Hell of Fresh Blood isn’t the blood of devils. It’s fresh blood that was originally shed by the legion of gods, and it’s filled with their righteous indignation. The blood of gods is what forms the essence of the Hell of Fresh Blood, and that blood is fragrant and contains godliness. If you refine that blood properly, it definitely shouldn’t reek of gore.”

Winter Bloodless burst out laughing. Looking at Yang Qi as if he were a child, he said, “Come now, devils are devils. How could they have godliness? Young Sir Dragon Proudheaven, please, there’s no need to try to pull a fast one on us.”

“Don’t believe me? I guess I should explain a different way.” He threw his hands out in front of him, causing a passageway to appear in front of him, which began emanating the bright red color of blood.

“What?” Winter Bloodless said, shooting to his feet. “Is that a passageway to the Hell of Fresh Blood? How are you able to open a path like this? This… it’s—”

“Keep watching,” Yang Qi said. He waved his hand and a stream of fresh blood appeared, pulsing with intense, pungent devil energy. Yang Qi sent a stream of god flame out, burning the devil energy into a green smoke which slowly dissipated around them. The remaining blood now emanated a faint reek of gore.

“See, that's the essence of the Hell of Fresh Blood! That’s what I've been absorbing and turning into paleo-devil energy! What's so wrong with that?” Winter Bloodless frowned.

“A lot,” Yang Qi replied. “You see, there’s still devilishness in there that needs to be removed.” A beam of white light shot into the blood, provoking what sounded like an agonized shriek, as though something had just been killed. Then the blood transformed, turning into something like pure, brightly-shining jade, with a fragrant, godly aroma.

“Righteous blood from the distant past!” Winter Bloodless murmured. “Incredible! So I really have been practicing cultivation incorrectly!”

Only now did he finally believe and trust Yang Qi. Clasping his palms together as if in prayer, he said, “Young Sir Dragon Proudheaven, please rid me of the monster!”

“No problem,” Yang Qi replied. “It won't be difficult at all. By the way, Patriarch Kingheaven, you cultivate the Cosmic-Empyrean Transformative-Illusion God Dao, which was left behind countless years ago by the ancient God of Illusion. It imitates the transformations of the dao of heaven to create illusory god-daos. Although it’s very powerful, your imitation of the transformations of the dao of heaven is slightly incorrect. And as the old saying goes, a slip the width of a single hair can lead you a thousand miles astray.”

“Please, what advice can you give me?” Patriarch Kingheaven didn’t argue at all; he was already thoroughly convinced that Yang Qi knew what he was talking about.

“I can fix the problem,” Yang Qi replied. “However, I'm currently faced with a bit of a problem that I hope the two of you can help me with.”

“You need our help?” The two patriarchs exchanged a glance. “Young Sir Dragon, considering how invincible you are, what could we possibly do to help you? Whatever it is, we’ll do what we can without hesitation.”

“It’s nothing major, and if you don’t feel up to the task, that’s fine.” Yang Qi frowned thoughtfully as if he were considering the matter.

Winter Bloodless and Patriarch Kingheaven were instantly worried. If they didn’t provide the help, it was entirely possible that they might not ever fix their current cultivation problems. And then, not only would they not achieve further progress, they might end up dead.

But with Yang Qi’s help, they would easily reach the Demigod level, start forming true godhood, and finally have a chance to reach the Deathless Throne. The two of them briefly conferred with divine will to make sure they were in agreement.

“Young Sir, whatever issue you’re having problems with, just tell us and we can help.”

“Well, it’s not really a big issue,” Yang Qi said, “but on the other hand, it isn’t small, either. As both of you know, I have something of a blood feud going with the Nine Yangs God Sect and the God Dragon Tribe."

“Young Sir, are you saying you want our help to fight the Nine Yangs God Sect?” Patriarch Kingheaven said. “That’s not a big deal at all. Sectlord Nine Yangs is arrogant and conceited, and putting an end to him would be good for everyone. If you want, I could order some of my disciples to go pick fights with Nine Yangs God Sect disciples. Killing a few of them between now and your duel would definitely cause unrest in their sect.”

“No, no,” Yang Qi said, “that’s not what I mean. We’re all members of the Dao Defense League. Creating large-scale internal conflict would just be helping the wretch-devils from the future world, right? I don’t want anyone doing anything to the Nine Yangs God Sect. I don’t even care if they grow stronger in the next three months. Once I kill Sectlord Nine Yangs, all of the patriarchs will get the message that they can't cause problems for me.”

Confused, Winter Bloodless asked, “Oh. Well, what do you need help with, Young Sir?”

“It’s simple,” Yang Qi said, emphasizing his words with the snap of his finger. “As you two saw, I took Dragon King by surprise during our little fight in the Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple. That was how I got him into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. But that’s only a temporary solution. I'm currently not strong enough to actually kill him, and sadly for him, I can’t quite bring myself to just let him go.”

“Young Sir, are you saying you want us to….” Winter Bloodless let the words hang for a moment, then continued, “The God Dragon Tribe has a lot of experts, including plenty of Chaos Gods, and even some demigods. They're second only to the Buddha Dragon Tribe. Offending them would be a bad idea.”

“I couldn't care less if I offended them. Do you really think that they’d stop causing problems for me if I just let Dragon King go?” Yang Qi’s face flickered with killing intent. “If you’re willing, I’d like the two of you to go into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart with me. We’ll kill Dragon King together, then I’ll assimilate his power and soul. Afterward, I’ll be invincible in all creation.”

“Invincible in all creation?” Both patriarchs reflexively smiled. They knew that Yang Qi was only a Dao-Demolisher, yet here he was casually talking about being invincible in all creation?

“Young Sir, you’re asking for our help to kill Dragon King? That’s… er… that would be making an enemy of the entire God Dragon Tribe. That would be bad for the Dao Defense League, wouldn’t it?”

“The Dragonfolk are all at odds with each other anyway,” Yang Qi replied, “and the God Dragon Tribe already considers me an enemy. For all you know, they might be working out an agreement with the future world as we speak. After all, Leaf Dao-Denier has connections to the God Dragon Tribe, and he’s working with the future warriors. What do you think? Help me take out Dragon King and I’ll heal your injuries. I'd say that’s a fair trade.”

Chapter 750: The Unfathomable Heart

“You’ve got a lot of guts to be talking about assimilating Dragon King.”

Winter Bloodless and Patriarch Kingheaven were both completely taken aback by Yang Qi’s plan. If word got out that he’d assimilated Dragon King, he would make himself a full-blown enemy of the God Dragon Tribe. They wouldn't stop going after him until he was dead. Few immortals would ever even consider such a thing. Even the most powerful old-timers would avoid conflict with the Dragonfolk, and they’d even just suck up any losses they suffered.

Besides, considering he had Dragon King hostage, the Dragonfolk would hesitate to shoot the rat for fear of breaking the vases, providing Yang Qi at least a certain measure of safety.

And it would theoretically be possible to ransom Dragon King to the Dragonfolk, who would definitely pay an incredible price to get one of their important old-timers back.

“Young Sir Dragon Proudheaven, you absolutely, positively shouldn’t try for small gains only to lose big. Why don’t we take some time to think this matter over?”

“I’ve already thought it over,” Yang Qi said. “I understand that you’re worried about retaliation from the God Dragon Tribe. How about this: we can do it in secret and not tell anyone. What do you think?” Even Yang Qi had to admit that offending the God Dragon Tribe would make things difficult for him.

“This….”

The two patriarchs were truly shaken by how things were developing.

And hanging over their heads the entire time was the fact that Yang Qi wouldn't heal them unless they agreed to help.

His expression hardening, Yang Qi said, “You should be aware that I’ll assimilate Dragon King eventually anyway, even if you don’t help me. And I’ll do it before the three-month deadline is up. Your help will just speed things up a bit. I would much prefer to finish assimilating him within ten days, or perhaps a few weeks at most. You see, I have a very important task to attend to in about a month, and I need to reach the Godmyth level beforehand. If you two refuse to help me, I’m going to be facing a very inconvenient delay.”

General Samman would be arriving in about a month, and hopefully he would head right for the Tusita Heaven to try to take out Leaf Dao-Denier. If Yang Qi wanted to take advantage of that crisis for personal gain, he would definitely need to be a Godmyth beforehand.

If Winter Bloodless and Patriarch Kingheaven refused to help Yang Qi, they would quickly lose any value to him.

He wasn’t worried that they might turn on him. After all, they knew that he controlled the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart and could easily make them disappear.

The two patriarchs could tell that Yang Qi was about to lose his temper with them, and although that infuriated them there was little they could do. “If that’s the case,” Winter Bloodless said, “we’ll help you deal with Dragon King. But afterward, you have to heal our injuries. If you don't, we’ll have little choice but to join the Nine Yangs God Sect and oppose you.”

Yang Qi chuckled. “Well, that’s only natural. And of course I’ll heal your injuries. That said, Dragon King is very tough, so before dealing with him I’ll need to set up a spell formation in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart for us to use.”

“Alright.”

The patriarchs were under no illusions about the situation; they knew that Yang Qi was pulling them into a cabal of sorts, yet they had no other options.

As Yang Qi made the initial preparations for the spell formation, the two patriarchs secretly conferred via divine will.

“I never could have imagined that Dragon Proudheaven would be such a schemer!” Winter Bloodless said. “He pulled us into his gang, even though he didn’t say that outright. What happens if we outlive our usefulness and he tells the God Dragon Tribe what we did?”

He was furious. He’d originally hoped to team up with Yang Qi, but at the same time take advantage of him. And his support of him had only been lip service. But now, in order to get the healing he so desperately needed, things were going completely opposite of his original plan.

“You’re right,” Patriarch Kingheaven replied. “If we help him assimilate Dragon King, there’ll be no going back. And if we end up at odds with the God Dragon Tribe, we’ll be in big trouble. Dragon Proudheaven can escape any time he wants into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, but we have clans and sects to worry about. What happens if the Dragonfolk try to wipe us out?”

“Normally I would never agree to his demands, but you can tell from his facial expression that he’ll do something crazy if we refuse to cooperate. Besides, what do we do about our energy art problems if he doesn’t heal us?”

“We have no choice but to be two-faced and simply agree for now.”

“Yes, let’s wait patiently and watch how the situation develops. Maybe after we arrive in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, we can demand that he heal us before we deal with Dragon King. After all, what happens if Dragon King puts up a big fight? We might all end up getting killed.”

“But why wait until we're inside the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart? Why not just bring it up now?”

“No way. Dragon Proudheaven will refuse.”

“But once we’re in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, we’ll be completely under his control. What if… what if he locks us up in there along with Dragon King?”

“There’s no way he would be that vicious and merciless. And it’s not like we’ll be completely powerless to fight back. For example, I have a boundless energy art that I can use to create a power double to send in there instead of my true self. Dragon Proudheaven’s cultivation level is too low to pick up on the truth.”

“That’s too dangerous.” Winter Bloodless frowned. “You can’t underestimate this guy. He easily diagnosed our injuries, so what makes you think he won’t notice if we use out-of-body incarnations?”

“Who cares? We can just tell him we don’t want to go into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart with our true bodies. After all, it could be very dangerous in there. If he insists, then worst case scenario we can just fly off the handle! We’ll team up with the God Dragon Tribe and the Nine Yangs God Sect to wipe him out of existence!”

“That might be our only option. We just refuse to go in with our true bodies, and refuse to help him assimilate Dragon King. In fact, maybe we can even rescue Dragon King! That’ll keep Dragon Proudheaven in check!”

“Good idea! We save Dragon King, which will appease the God Dragon Tribe, possibly even gaining us their friendship. In the end, Dragon Proudheaven will end up the loser, with no choice but to heal our energy art injuries.”

And thus, the two patriarchs hatched a scheme.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi seemed completely oblivious. Opening the passageway, he said, “Patriarchs, you two head in first. I’ll follow right behind you.”

“Alright!” the patriarchs responded. They’d already created their power doubles and converted their true bodies into tiny, barely perceptible particles. With a brief vital energy surge, their power doubles flew into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

Malicious grins appeared on the faces of the patriarchs as they began to revel in the success of their plan.

But then Yang Qi smiled and vanished without a trace.

“Agggghhhhh!”

“What's going on!?’

Inside the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, the two power doubles vanished, and in the space they had just occupied, an enormous spacecraft suddenly appeared. Then, two particles popped out of the spacecraft, which were none other than Winter Bloodless and Patriarch Kingheaven.

Despite having transformed into tiny particles that they thought were hidden from sight, they were now right in the middle of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

They were inside with their true bodies, which meant that they were now stuck. They unleashed some attacks, but were completely powerless to do anything to the greyspace of the chart. At first, looks of stunned shock could be seen on their faces, but their eyes quickly burned with anger.

Meanwhile, the enormous spacecraft shrank down into a disc that dropped onto Yang Qi’s palm.

“You! Are you looking to die!? I can’t believe you brought our true bodies in here!” Both Winter Bloodless and Patriarch Kingheaven seemed like they were about to start fighting immediately.

Yang Qi laughed. “Our original deal was for you to come in as your true selves, not power doubles. How else are you supposed to deal with Dragon King? This isn’t some game, you know. You can’t underestimate Dragon King, otherwise you’ll end up dead. By the way, the place we were meeting in earlier was a product of my fragment of the Cruiser of Civilization. You turned yourselves into particles, but those particles were inside the spacecraft. And the craft easily intercepted your divine will fluctuations, and even created a recording of your conversation. Would you like to hear it?”

Two voices suddenly rang out from the Cruiser of Civilization.

“We just refuse to go in with our true bodies, and refuse to help him assimilate Dragon King….”

“In fact, maybe we can even rescue Dragon King….”

The two patriarchs’ faces turned as pale as death. Trembling, Winter Bloodless pointed accusingly at Yang Qi and said, “Y-y-you! Your sinister treachery and evil machinations know no bounds! This is terrifying! How could we possibly meet a good end in dealing with you?”

Yang Qi snorted coldly. Expression flickering dangerously, he said, “I proposed a very good deal to the two of you. You help me assimilate Dragon King, I heal you. And you two agreed. But afterward, you secretly conspired to plot against me. If it weren’t for my fragment of the Cruiser of Civilization, you would have succeeded.”

Patriarch Kingheaven sighed. He knew that they’d been fooled by Yang Qi, and that they had no justification to get angry.

“It was for your own good!” he said. “If you offend the God Dragon Tribe, no good will come of it. But in the end, you’re right, we plotted against you. When you stand under low eaves, you have no choice but to bow your head. Now that we’re here in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, we might as well help you deal with Dragon King. Why not just heal our injuries first, though? Won’t that make us even better equipped to achieve victory.”

“No,” Yang Qi said with a decisiveness that could sever nails and chop iron. “You already violated my trust, and I don’t give second chances. We crush Dragon King, and I achieve my breakthrough. Only then will I help the two of you. And if you don’t agree, then you can just remain here in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart for all time.”

“You!” Winter Bloodless shouted. “How dare you go back on your word!”

Yang Qi snorted. “You haven’t seen anything yet. I’d better not see any more trickery from you two. The Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart is mine. I control this place. If you two try secretly conferring with divine will, I’ll know about it. So don’t even think of trying to plot against me. It won’t work.”

Chapter 751: Fooling the Patriarchs

‘He really fooled us.’

‘Considering our age, how could we be tricked by a brat like this?’

Winter Bloodless and Patriarch Kingheaven were furious, but couldn’t let it show. They were in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, and that meant capturing or killing Yang Qi was impossible. They were out of options.

They were fully aware that the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart was a god item that even the legion of gods had found difficult to deal with in ancient times.

“Stop overthinking things,” Yang Qi said, “and just help me assimilate Dragon King. All of this happened because the two of you didn’t keep your word. Don’t worry, you’ll benefit handsomely by helping me take out Dragon King. After all, you’ve now thrown your lot in with me to defy the God Dragon Tribe.”

“Yes, we’re all in now,” said Patriarch Kingheaven with a sigh. “And going forward, we’ll support you with full sincerity. Where’s Dragon King? Maybe we can talk things out with him. If he agrees to work for you, you can spare his life and avoid the wrath of the God Dragon Tribe.”

“Prepare to be teleported,” Yang Qi said with a smile. With that, he drew on the boundless power of monarchs, causing everything to tremble. The space around the two patriarchs seemed to twist and fold, then they found themselves in a vacuum, devoid of vital energy, completely empty and deathly.

The stories that circulated said that the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart was full of endless treasures. But this area had nothing, not even a scrap of energy.

Popping out next to them, Yang Qi said, “This void is a deadly part of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart that essentially goes on without end, making it impossible to escape from. Truth be told, not even I’m sure how big this area is. From what I understand, King Immortal-Slayer would use this location to imprison gods. It only opened up to me after I acquired four of his legacy medallions. Dragon King is just ahead, heading in this direction.”

The two patriarchs look off into the distance, and sure enough, they saw Dragon King, using some magical treasures to set up a spell formation as he tried to break free from the void around him. Unfortunately, nothing he did helped.

Upon sensing the auras of some interlopers, Dragon King spun in place and looked over to see Yang Qi. Eyes flaring with anger, he unleashed a mighty dragon claw attack in his direction.

“So you’re back, eh brat? Why don’t you just go and die already!”

As his dragon claw arrived, Yang Qi simply hovered there and let it pass right through. As it turned out, he was just a projection.

“Save your energy,” Yang Qi said. “It won’t do you any good to attack me here. Do you really think your cultivation base is strong enough to defeat King Immortal-Slayer?”

“We’re here to talk things out, Dragon King!” Winter Bloodless said. Both he and Patriarch Kingheaven were shocked at how powerful Yang Qi was within the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, and were even more convinced that they couldn't do anything to him.

“It’s you? Winter Bloodless? Patriarch Kingheaven?” Eyes burning with fury, he said, “So you’ve ganged up with this brat to fight me?”

“Yes,” Winter Bloodless said with a bitter smile. “We were forced into it. Look, Dragon King, you need to listen to us. Offer allegiance to Young Sir Dragon Proudheaven. If you don’t, we’ll be forced to kill you and help him assimilate you.”

“What?” Dragon King roared angrily. “You two patriarchs are flunkies of this brat? Is this supposed to be some sort of joke? Well it’s not funny. If you help him do this, the God Dragon Tribe won’t let it drop. Maybe other people don’t realize how strong the God Dragon Tribe is, but you two are surely aware of it. Not even the Dao Defense League can match up to us!”

“Well…” Patriarch Kingheaven said, still hoping that they wouldn’t actually have to kill Dragon King.

“If we kill him, who would ever know?” Yang Qi said grimly. “Don’t be stubborn, Dragon King. Open your soul and become a believer in me. Give me your faith. If you do, I’ll give you your freedom. Become my spy within the Dragonfolk and work to gain me their faith. If you turn the entire God Dragon Tribe into believers, you’ll rise through the ranks more quickly than you could ever imagine. And of course, the alternative to all this is that you die.”

“This is insanity!” Dragon King shouted. “Preposterous! Who the hell do you think you are? You want faith from me? I don’t even give faith to the Dragon God, much less you, you bug! Are you mentally challenged or something?”

“So, you’re going with the stubborn option?” Yang Qi sighed. “Winter Bloodless. Patriarch Kingheaven. Kill him. Now! I’ll bless you with some of the powers of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart to make sure you succeed. Hurry up, otherwise I’ll leave all three of you trapped here until I’m strong enough to kill all of you myself!”

Yang Qi’s words caused Winter Bloodless and Patriarch Kingheaven to shiver with fear.

“Don’t listen to him!” Dragon King howled. “Word of him imprisoning me has already gotten back to the God Dragon Tribe, and they’ll be coming soon. They’ll wipe out his sect and drive him out of the Dao Defense League. Soon, he’ll be homeless. And besides, Leaf Dao-Denier has some of King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy medallions too. He can get into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, so once the God Dragon Tribe works out a deal with him, it’ll be easy to get out of here. As long as the three of us stand firm, there’s nothing he can do to us. Furthermore, if you help me, you’ll gain the friendship of the God Dragon Tribe. We have spectacular treasures, plus godly-class energy arts. You can either earn incredible rewards, or get chased down and killed. It’s up to you!”

As the two patriarchs hesitated, Yang Qi said, “Leaf Dao-Denier only has two legacy medallions left, which means that he can’t get into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. The other three are in the future world, making them impossible to collect. So you might as well stop it with your delusions. Besides, even if someone came along with three medallions, I have four, which gives me the upper hand.

“Actually, I would love it if someone came along with three medallions and entered the chart. It would only help me build up my own collection. And then I wouldn’t need help to kill Dragon King. Look, you two. Are you going to do this, or not? Do I really need to activate the warding magics to trap you in here? If I were you, I wouldn’t trust Dragon King’s empty promises. Believe me, he’s not going to help you at all. But I will. Think about it. Really think about it deeply. Who do you think will benefit you more—Dragon King, or me?”

At this point, the two patriarchs made up their minds. Dragon King was offering empty promises, and if they didn’t take action to help Yang Qi, they’d end up in a very bad situation. And it was true that Yang Qi could help them much more than Dragon King could. Dragon King couldn’t offer them anything to truly improve their cultivation bases, whereas Yang Qi could heal their hidden injuries and help them reach a higher level of enlightenment.

The two of them nodded, and their eyes shone with glittering light. “Sorry, Dragon King. Blame Dragon Proudheaven for killing you, not us.”

RUMBLE!

The two of them unleashed their most deadly techniques.

“Eternal Heavenly Aria!” Yang Qi immediately blessed the patriarchs with primeval god skills, causing halos to spring up around them. He also augmented them with the natural laws of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

At the same time, he caused countless halos of damnification to surround Dragon King, and locked him in place with the fetters of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

Dragon King was more than a match for these patriarchs, and if they had been fighting outside of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, it was possible that their fight would have ended with mutual destruction. But here, with the augmentations of the chart and Yang Qi’s Eternal Heavenly Aria, the two patriarchs were vastly stronger, while Dragon King was profoundly weaker.

‘What is he using to bless us with so many primeval god skills?!’ thought the two patriarchs, completely shocked by what was happening.

‘I never would have guessed that Dragon Proudheaven would be able to do something like this! This technique would be perfect for large-scale combat. If he blessed the immortals of the Dao Defense League like this, we would have a huge advantage against the future warriors!’

“That’s exactly right!” Yang Qi said, fully aware of what they were thinking. “This is my Eternal Heavenly Aria, which can provide three thousand halos of blessing, and three thousand halos of damnification. In the blink of an eye, they can make someone ten thousand times stronger than before. I've been keeping a lot of secrets and waiting until I reach the Godmyth level before revealing them. If you and your sects stick with me, imagine the benefits I can bless you with. You think the God Dragon Tribe counts for anything? Can they stand against weapons like I have? Just wait until I'm a Godmyth! Our three sects can work together to completely wipe out the God Dragon Tribe!”

The two of them couldn’t have been more shocked, but at the same time it was clear how terrifying the primeval god skills were. Every attack they unleashed sent Dragon King stumbling backward in defeat.

“Seven Stances of the God Dragon!” Dragon King shouted, drawing on his ultimate set of moves.

“Tail Swipe of the God Dragon!

“Smashing Flight of the God Dragon!

“Profound Descent of the God Dragon!

“Earthly Burrowing of the God Dragon!

“Heavenly Battle of the God Dragon!

“Grand Stance of the God Dragon!

“Dao Incarnation of the God Dragon!”

Chapter 752: Assimilating Dragon King

The Seven Stances of the God Dragon was the top technique in the God Dragon Tribe. It had evolved out of the Eight Tribes Godfist, and although it couldn’t match up to its progenitor, it was still very powerful—the perfect technique for a tense situation like this.

The seven stances he unleashed transformed into seven illusory projections of god dragons.

In the blink of an eye, it was as if Dragon King had transformed into seven versions of himself.

“Not good!” Winter Bloodless said. “He’s going all out! The Seven Stances of the God Dragon are profoundly enigmatic. They’re actually designed for a slightly lower cultivation level, but they essentially enable him to make seven copies of himself!”

“Fall back! Fall back!”

“We can’t block this!”

Even as the two patriarchs backed up in terror, Yang Qi said, “What are you scared of? He’s not that strong! Many Heavens God Seal!”

RUMBLE!

An enormous sealing mark appeared above Yang Qi, and in the shortest of moments, all seven of Dragon King’s projected images were crushed out of existence!

A moment later, he appeared alone, blood spraying out of his mouth.

“That works! What energy art was that? It was incredible!” As the two patriarchs reacted with astonishment, Yang Qi remained completely unfazed.

“I have him temporarily sealed, what are you waiting for?”

“Attack!”

The two patriarchs unleashed devastating attacks with their most powerful energy arts.

“Bloodless In All Creation!”

“True Dao of Heaven’s Origin!”

WHIZZZ!

Two fist strikes landed on Dragon King’s chest and he exploded, the resulting mangled blood and flesh transforming into a host of tiny, wriggling god dragons.

“I won’t let you off the hook for this!” he screamed. “Damn you animals! I'm not going to die here! I'm eternally indestructible! I'm a god dragon, and I can use the God Dragon Nirvanic Rebirth to be born again! I’m going to become the new Dragon God!”

“Complete nonsense!” Yang Qi said. “Heaven and Earth Furnace!”

He waved his hand, causing an enormous, fiery furnace to appear, which slammed down and captured all of the tiny god dragons. Once inside the furnace, they instantly began to sizzle and burn.

“The two of you funnel your true energy into my furnace,” Yang Qi said. “Help me assimilate him! Grand Sagely Sacrifice!”

“Alright!” The two patriarchs knew that there was no going back now, so they immediately began pouring their true energy into the furnace. As soon as the connection was established, the true energy was sucked in, where it transformed into sagefire that began melting Dragon King, provoking miserable shrieks.

“The God Dragon Tribe won’t forgive you for this!

“I have a very high position in my tribe. I curse you! I curse you to never achieve your dao. You can all go to hell and experience endless torment!

“DIIIIEEEE! I’m going to defy heaven and get out of here!

“You can’t assimilate me! God Dragon Defense!”

He drew on every energy art he could imagine to try to fight back, but unfortunately for him, Yang Qi negated all of them easily. If Yang Qi were doing this on his own, he would never have succeeded. But with two Chaos Gods providing him with true energy to fuel his sagefire, his Sagely Sacrifice was unstoppable.

The ancient halls of heaven appeared above, and slowly descended into the Heaven and Earth Furnace.

Dragon King’s defenses melted and the sagefire coursed into him.

“Agggghhhhh!” he cried. “You’re actually melting my vital energy and dragon body! Mercy! Mercy! I’ll acknowledge allegiance! I’ll become a believer. Just don’t kill me! If you kill me, the God Dragon Tribe will get revenge!”

His pleas had no effect whatsoever. It was too late. Yang Qi just continued assimilating him with the Sagely Sacrifice. It would’ve been very beneficial to have a believer like Dragon King, but instead, Yang Qi had already begun taking his soul, destiny, and quintessence-blood, converting it into godhood and power for his own use.

“I'm going to destroy the God Dragon Tribe, too. Enjoy your last moments of life!” Yang Qi’s hand flashed through more incantation gestures and more sealing marks descend into the depths of the Heaven and Earth Furnace, transforming into burning sagefire.

‘Time to send this true godhood into my fateless dao fruit!’

His sage child appeared overhead, along with his dao heart, which had nine lineaments on it. As the sagefire broke down the godhood, it entered his dao heart, which slowly began to bulge and expand.

“What's that?”

“That’s partially-formed true godhood!”

Considering that both patriarchs were Chaos Gods, they instantly recognized what Yang Qi was doing.

Their first instinct was to leap forward and try to take it for their own, but the energy of monarchs instantly locked them down and made it impossible to take even a step forward.

“Are you two seriously trying to rob me? I took this stuff from the Live Forever God Tree in the Tusita Heaven. I robbed it from the Tusita Dynasty! And I'm using my Sagely Sacrifice on Dragon King to take his godhood and use it to reach the Godmyth level! I've already taken all of Dragon King’s power, so if you want to suffer the same fate as him I'd be happy to comply!”

“What?”

“You just took them from the Tusita Heaven? You offended the Tusita Heaven?!”

“You’re willing to offend the Eight Tribes Heaven and the Tusita Heaven! Do you not even care about staying alive?”

“This is really, really bad!”

They were inextricably tied with Yang Qi now, only to find out that he had offended another extremely powerful group. It was nothing short of terrifying.

“What are you worried about? I'm the ruler of the Heaven Beyond Heaven, a thirty-third ranked immortal world. You really think they can do anything to me? When the time comes, I can take your sects to the Heaven Beyond Heaven to grow. Nobody would dare cause problems for you there.”

“The Heaven Beyond Heaven? You rule that immortal world? How is that even possible? That place doesn't have a ruler.”

Yang Qi snorted coldly. “Take a look at the power of that immortal world!”

RUMBLE!

Immense power appeared, descending like a pillar from heaven. It was pure, unadulterated power, the likes of which did not come from any known world.

It was power from the Heaven Beyond Heaven.

At this point, the two patriarchs lapsed into dejected silence, somewhat dumbfounded that they had thrown their lot in with someone who was still working on becoming a Godmyth.

To them, it didn’t matter how many amazing things Yang Qi had accomplished, he was still just someone from the younger generation. Even if he reached the Godmyth level, he would still be a junior to them.

As for Yang Qi, he ignored them and focused on using the Sagely Sacrifice to take Dragon King’s godpower, sending it into his fateless dao fruit.

Eventually, the dao fruit couldn’t sustain the influx of power and exploded.

POP!

Primal-chaos erupted everywhere, with primal-chaos projections appearing all around Yang Qi. There were palaces, god-spirits, and powerful experts on thrones, all looming over Yang Qi.

Tribulation had come!

These were no simplistic tribulations. And they weren’t expressions of the rage of the dao of heaven, either. Magical laws from the dao of heaven couldn’t punish Yang Qi, which indicated that these tribulations came from the will of the legion of gods. They couldn’t tolerate an existence similar to their own and would crush anyone who sought to reach the Deathless Throne.

RUMBLE!

One of the heaven-gods mounted a chariot and charged forth with a spear of lightning, causing everything to shake violently.

Gong!

In the blink of an eye, the spear was about to stab right into Yang Qi’s chest.

“That’s… Wrath of the Lightning God!” Winter Bloodless wailed. “This is true godly tribulation! According to the stories, tribulation like this comes for people who are trying to attack the legion of gods. What is it doing here for someone who’s only becoming a Godmyth!? This doesn’t make any sense!”

“Since when does anything about this guy make sense? Everything he does is crazy! It’s useless trying to figure him out. Let’s just watch and see what happens. Now that he has Dragon King’s godpower, he’s no weaker than us. And if he passes this tribulation, he's going to be so strong that we could never do anything to him.”

“But how is he supposed to get past tribulation like this? My Sect Grandfather faced tribulation like this when trying to reach the Deathless Throne and ended up getting wiped out of existence. He nearly took the sect with him!”

“You mean he failed the tribulation?”

“Exactly!”

All of a sudden, the patriarchs’ eyes glittered. “So if he fails the tribulation, we get to divvy up all of his stuff!? We could rule the world! We would have King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions, the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, and some true godhood! I can’t believe we’re going to have a shot at all that treasure!”

“Keep dreaming, you two!” Yang Qi said with a laugh. “You think I'm going to fail this tribulation? Not even tribulation from the legion of gods can do anything to me. These paltry primal-chaos god-spirit projections are like nothing to me. I’ll vanquish them just like I did the fury of the dao of heaven. Be broken!”

Even as his voice echoed out, he lunged forward and attacked like a blue dragon bursting out of the ocean.

And in that moment, his dao fruit shattered and power thrummed into him.

Chapter 753: Becoming a Godmyth

Poor Winter Bloodless and Patriarch Kingheaven had envisioned Yang Qi dying in the middle of his tribulation and looting his corpse. But Yang Qi overheard their conversation and, now more than ever, he realized that he couldn’t trust these two.

They’d started out trying to use him, and ended up killing Dragon King only because they had no other choice. But the entire time, they were constantly scheming and plotting in a way that made them completely untrustworthy.

Back in the altercation in Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple, these two had supposedly spoken out for justice. But the truth was that it was all lies and misdirection; they really just wanted to make Yang Qi their puppet. Thankfully, he was wise to their plot and had manipulated them by means of their cultivation injuries.

For now, he would wait until he was a Godmyth before he decided how to handle them.

Blast after blast of godly tribulation hit him, causing him to tremble from the immense forces at play.

RUMBLE!

A massive god appeared with a golden tower in his hand, which he thrust down, causing everything around it to freeze solid.

“Run!” Patriarch Kingheaven shouted, and he and Winter Bloodless fled as quickly as they could. The heavenly tribulation was already reaching a point where it was threatening even to them.

Yang Qi met it with a fist strike. He currently shone with golden light, making him seem like the picture of an ancient god. And when the Hand of the One God hit the golden tower, the tower collapsed and Yang Qi's hand went on to meet the god.

The god exploded, causing streams of energy to rush into the Heaven and Earth Furnace.

Next, Yang Qi attacked the primal-chaos paleo-energy with even more ferocity, heading directly toward the other gods and palaces that lurked within it.

Yang Qi’s battle cry burned with fury and rage, collapsing the void around him.

Every blow he struck felled a primal-chaos elder-god or destroyed a palace, and caused his Heaven and Earth Furnace to bubble and burn.

He grew more powerful with every moment, striking shock into the hearts of the two observing patriarchs.

“So strong. Too strong! How can a person like him even exist? Are we dreaming?”

“What will he be like as a second or third division Godmyth? And what happens when he’s a Chaos God like us? How fierce will he be then?”

“He's already stronger than a Chaos God!”

“You’re right, he is. There’s no way we could be a match for him. In fact, even back before he assimilated Dragon King, he would’ve been hard for us to fight. And here in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, we would never have beaten him. Now that he's a Godmyth, he could easily wipe the floor with us even if we teamed up against him.”

“So what do we do now? Are we really out of options? Are we really going to be forced to work with him?”

“Ai! Is there anything else we can do at this point? Considering how strong he is already, there’s no question he’ll be a domineering figure in the future.”

“Maybe sticking with him won’t be as bad as we thought it might be.”

“There aren’t any other options. We might as well just wait and see what happens. In any case, we obviously can’t do anything to oppose him. That would be extremely stupid. And I'm very curious to see what happens to Sectlord Nine Yangs.”

“Oh, right. Now that Dragon Proudheaven is a Godmyth, the arrogant and conceited Sectlord Nine Yangs is most likely going to end up dead and buried. There will be a fun show once we get out of here.”

The patriarchs were now fully convinced that they couldn't do anything to Yang Qi. They tried to manipulate him before he was a Godmyth, but failed miserably. Now, they would simply follow orders.

Eventually, Yang Qi’s battle with the tribulation was nearing its end.

He’d vanquished most of the primal-chaos paleo-energy, completely crushing any of the heavenly tribulation that came his way. He himself looked like an ancient god, with the power to end the heavens and crush the earth. He didn’t fear heavenly tribulation, nor could it do a thing to hurt him. He didn’t use magical treasures to face it, just his own energy arts and cultivation base. Chaos Gods could never do anything like that. Only Demigod patriarchs might come close.

“Be devoured!”

In the end, Yang Qi became a primal-chaos elder-snake that devoured everything in his path and used it to strengthen himself.

Everything went still and calm, and it almost seemed as though nothing had occurred.

The two patriarchs remained stunned in shock, and Dragon King was nowhere to be seen.

Yang Qi descended from above, feeling incredible. Every particle within him seemed to be filling up with boundless vital energy and power from hell. He was now so blessed by hell that as long as hells existed, so would he.

All of his energy arts had improved. The Infernal Deity Spear wriggled and twitched as it gained an exterior layer that made it look like a thing of gods.

His sage child had grown, and was now like a power double that resembled a young god, dressed in golden battle armor, and whose merest wave of the hand would send out golden might that could crush any patriarch.

Swish!

Yang Qi’s Angel Wings had transformed into the Freedom Wings. He now had true freedom and independence, a strength that belonged to the legion of gods.

When he used the Hand of the One God, holy hymns and psalms would shower down like spring rain, pushing his cultivation base power to a level hundreds of times what it normally was.

Yang Qi examined the transformations that had occurred within him and quickly realized that there were too many to take in at once. He would need time spent in contemplation before he fully understood everything that it meant to be a Godmyth.

Looking over at the two patriarchs, he smiled. “What do you think, Winter Bloodless? Patriarch Kingheaven? How are my energy arts now? Think you can fight me? If you willingly serve me, I’ll make it worth your while.”

Considering how strong he was now, he didn't feel any need to treat the two patriarchs with any pretense of courtesy.

He’d transformed in the most heaven-shaking, earth-toppling way, having finally reached a level he could only dream of before. As of now, he didn’t fear Leaf Dao-Denier, General Samman, the Tusita Heaven, or the God Dragon Tribe. He was now strong enough to deal with them, and possibly even strong enough to finally live up to his agreement with the god Brahma. He could go to the future, free Brahma’s head, and hopefully find his mother, aunt, and Master.

Winter Bloodless and Patriarch Kingheaven’s expressions turned very unsightly in response to Yang Qi’s less-than-polite tone. “You promised to treat us like equals, Dragon Proudheaven. We're patriarchs in the Dao Defense League, and we helped you assimilate Dragon King. You have to heal our hidden injuries now.”

“Are you trying to act like we’re supposed to be your slaves?” Patriarch Kingheaven said. “Work for you? There’s absolutely, positively no way that's going to happen! We’re equals!”

“Is that so? Why don’t you take a look at some of the things I can do.”

RUMBLE!

He suddenly charged at them with the force of a megamammoth bringing about the end of the world.

The two patriarchs quickly conferred with divine will, then linked their true energy and unleashed attacks of their own.

“Outworking of Countless Illusions!”

“Invincible Blood Sea!”

These were energy arts that could easily pierce a thirtieth ranked immortal world. Two Chaos God patriarchs were joining forces in attack, a level of power that no one other than a Demigod old-timer could possibly deal with.

“Immortality!” Yang Qi said, resorting to the final stance in the Hand of the One God. An image of deathlessness appeared, something that could conquer every obstacle.

Crack!

His attack met the two patriarchs’ energy arts, and it didn’t faze Yang Qi in the least bit. In contrast, the two patriarchs were slammed with a force that instantly shattered all of their defensive empyrean energy.

“Get over here,” Yang Qi said, making a clutching gesture. “Majesty Without Limit; Nine Revolutions of Mahānata!”

Millions of hells surged with power, causing Winter Bloodless and Patriarch Kingheaven to fly toward Yang Qi. As they neared, he slapped each of them across the side of their faces so hard that their souls shook and they saw stars.

“Agggghhhhh!” they screamed.

“You!” Winter Bloodless shouted. “You can’t humiliate us like this! We're majestic patriarchs! Kill us, but don’t humiliate us!”

SMACK!

The two patriarchs were slapped again and a spray of teeth appeared as they were knocked toothless.

“This is punishment for your crafty plots and machinations. And a little demonstration of how strong I am. If I wanted to, I could kill you as easily as baby chickens!”

With that, he threw them off to the side where they trembled in terror.

Then he ripped open a passageway leading out of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Stepping through the passageway, he looked over his shoulder and said, “You can leave now. Those slaps weren’t all bad—I also used them to heal your hidden injuries.”

Chapter 754: The Patriarchs Acknowledge Allegiance

The two patriarchs were filled with such intense pain that their souls trembled. And of course, their anger burned intensely hot, to the point where they were just about ready to go all out in trying to kill Yang Qi.

They were majestic patriarchs, the subject of universal admiration. But he had beaten them like stray dogs, which was a level of humiliation they couldn’t accept.

However, it was at that moment that Yang Qi casually said something that completely stifled their anger.

“What? You healed our hidden injuries?”

They exchanged a glance, then quickly scanned themselves internally.

“Wait, let’s not waste time on this now!” Patriarch Kingheaven said. “Let’s get out of here first. If he closes the passageway, we’ll be stuck forever!”

“Right. Hurry, let’s get out of here.” Winter Bloodless flew out, followed closely by Patriarch Kingheaven, the two of them like rats scuttling off of a sinking ship. Outside, they found Yang Qi sitting on his throne in the Sage Panacea Sect, seemingly completely unconcerned about them.

Of course, they didn’t dare to act out of turn. They knew full well what Yang Qi was like when he was angry, and that if he wanted to, he could wipe them out of existence with hardly a thought.

Patriarch Kingheaven sat down and examined himself. He immediately realized that he was in much better condition than before. His true energy flowed more smoothly, and when he breathed, he could absorb the profundities of the universe. He had no more hidden injuries, and it seemed like reaching the next highest level of cultivation shouldn’t be any problem, as long as he worked hard enough.

Glancing over, he saw that Winter Bloodless was in the same situation as himself.

The two of them looked over at Yang Qi with glittering eyes. Although he’d forced all of this on them, they had benefited in a way that defied imagination in the end.

“You two schemed and plotted against me, and I slapped you around a bit. Then I healed all your hidden injuries. I'd say the slate is clean, and we don’t need to bring up the past again.” The way Yang Qi’s gaze pierced into the two patriarchs was somewhat off-putting, but they had no choice but to accept it. Yang Qi stood. “You’re now in the same boat as me, in opposition to the Eight Tribes Heaven and the God Dragon Tribe. You wouldn’t be so stupid as to accept help from me and then back out of our agreement, would you? Of course, if you do, I’ll just kill you.”

“Young Sir Dragon Proudheaven, your abilities are beyond comprehension. We two will follow you and do anything you ask.” Neither patriarch could possibly muster the gumption to oppose Yang Qi now.

“Fine. The two of you are dismissed. You two are my main representatives in the Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple now. Don’t worry, I’ll make sure nothing bad happens to you. Right now, I want both of you to put pressure on the Nine Yangs God Sect. And try to get other patriarchs to shift loyalties to me. Eventually, I want the Nine Yangs God Sect to be expunged from the Dao Defense League.”

“Young Sir, are you going to go kill Sectlord Nine Yangs right away?”

The two patriarchs knew that Yang Qi had become vastly more powerful. However, it was impossible to say what would happen in the Nine Yangs God Sect in the three month period leading up to the duel.

“That’s exactly what I'm going to do,” Yang Qi replied. “I'm going to assassinate him. He’s currently in secluded cultivation, trying to figure out how to deal with my Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. If I kill him now, it will avoid problems in the months to come. Once I truly establish myself in the Dao Defense League, who will I have to fear?” For all Yang Qi knew, Sectlord Nine Yangs might form alliances with other powerful individuals to take him down before the three-month deadline came. So his plan was to seize the initiative and take him out first.

“In that case, congratulations, Young Sir. If you take out Sectlord Nine Yangs, it will be a big shock to the God Dragon Tribe and the Tusita Heaven!”

“Sectlord Nine Yangs isn’t even in the Dao Defense League at the moment. He’s back in his immortal world. You should head over there immediately.”

The two patriarchs bowed and prepared to leave.

“You can leave,” Yang Qi said coolly, “but just be aware that your information is out of date. Based on my divinations, I can tell you that Sectlord Nine Yangs is in the Tusita Heaven right now. Back when I clashed with him, I placed some tracking energy on him, and I can chase him to the furthest corners of reality if I have to. He's doomed. Nobody could possibly save his life now.”

The two patriarchs’ jaws dropped. “But the Tusita Heaven must be trying to track you down. They might have even sent people here to the Dao Defense League to cause problems. Do you really dare to walk right back into their hands?”

“I’m even stronger than the two of you can imagine. If I want to go somewhere, I’ll go there.” Yang Qi turned and vanished.

The two patriarchs let loose such long sighs that they nearly deflated like balloons.

“See, Sectlord Nine Yangs is done for.”

“Exactly. He went and offended the wrong person.”

“Hiding out in the Tusita Heaven won’t be enough to keep him alive. His cultivation base is about the same as ours! He’s in big trouble, that's for sure.”

“The Nine Yangs God Sect is going to be wiped out. What a pity! Nowadays, you really have to pay attention, otherwise you’ll end up offending the wrong person. We need to be careful ourselves. Although, I have a feeling that Dragon Proudheaven will do right by us.”

“Let’s get going. We need to send down the orders to our disciples to start handling the Nine Yangs God Sect. It's going to be a dead sect soon enough anyway.” With that, the two patriarchs left.

A big storm was about to hit the Dao Defense League.

As for Yang Qi, he was slipping back into the Tusita Heaven. Obviously, he wasn’t going to make a big deal about his return. For one thing, the Tusita Heaven had sealed all entrances and exits, making it impossible for anyone to get in and out.

Of course, things weren’t that simple.

The Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart could bypass any and all greyspaces, thus, Yang Qi easily got right into Young Lady Green Blaze’s bedchamber.

Crack!

Young Lady Green Blaze opened her eyes from meditation. During her latest session of cultivation, she could sense herself hovering just on the brink of a breakthrough to the Measureless God level. Yang Qi reached out and tapped her forehead, causing brilliant light to flare. In the blink of an eye, she was a Measureless God! There wasn’t even any tribulation!

“Milord!” Young Lady Green Blaze said, visibly taken aback. She quickly dropped to her knees. “Did you just push me right into the seventh division? Won’t there be some bad side-effects?”

“Side effects?” Yang Qi chuckled. “No, there won’t be any side effects. Considering I can crush the dao of heaven, it won’t be sending any heavenly tribulation. You can just rise to a higher level, just like that.”

“Many thanks, Milord!”

“No problem. Now, is your brother, Green Merchant, out of seclusion yet?” Yang Qi’s first plan was to force Green Merchant into servitude. He was one of the seventy-two brethren, so with him as an asset it would be much easier to get information about Leaf Dao-Denier and the Tusita Heaven as a whole. Hopefully, he could even tell Yang Qi where Sectlord Nine Yangs was. Of course, Yang Qi still had to be careful. He was a Godmyth now, and would be invincible to all but Demigods. But this was a thirty-third ranked immortal world, and there was no way he could stand up against all of their most powerful experts all at once.

Thus, his plan was to initially rely on assassination, and the terror it would result in.

“He’s out of seclusion and is currently in a meeting with the clan chief. Of course, now that I'm a Measureless God myself, he and I are going to be butting heads soon. Word has already started to spread about me and my recent advancements. The clan leadership has taken notice of me, and I bet that Green Merchant will be coming to me soon to talk things out.”

WHIZZZ!

Before she could even finish speaking, vital energy fluctuations appeared.

“That’s him!” she said. “Milord, why don't you hide?”

“Fine,” Yang Qi said, slowly becoming transparent as he became one with the air around him. Within moments, he wasn't visible, and even his aura was nowhere to be detected. A short while later, a young man appeared on Young Lady Green Blaze’s luxurious bed. It was none other than her brother, Green Merchant, the Berserk One.

“Green Blaze!” he said, slowly rising into a sitting position. “What?! You reached the Measureless God level? How is that possible?”

She chuckled. “Why wouldn’t it be possible? I came across some good fortune, brother. What do you think? It seems I'm now a top genius in the clan, just like you.”

“Top genius?” He laughed heartily. “I'm the most important person in the clan, sister. Not even you come close. I don’t know what good fortune you acquired, but considering your aura, I can tell you that it wouldn’t matter if you were an eighth division Buddha God, you still wouldn’t be a match for me. I'm a Berserk One! Plus, there’s something else you don’t know. We seventy-two patriarchs can practice cultivation in a formation that allows us to share each other’s energy. In other words, I have bits of all seventy-two special constitutions! You really have no idea how strong I am!”

“What? You have seventy two special constitutions?!” A look of alarm appeared on Green Blaze’s face. She knew how powerful the special constitutions were, and the idea of one person having seventy-two of them was completely terrifying.

“What do you think, sister? You see, you have no hope of resisting me. So pack away any ambitions you have. The Green Clan will be mine. In fact, the entire Tusita Heaven will be mine! We seventy-two patriarchs are going to take over all of the many heavens for Young Master Leaf. Sister, I'm going to give you one choice here. Submit to me. Be my woman. Not my sister. My woman. A sister can’t be trusted, but a woman, well, a woman is simply an object. A slave that I can do whatever I want with however I please. If you hand over that good fortune of yours, I won’t make things difficult for you.”

Chapter 755: Planting a Mole

‘This Green Merchant is a real pervert,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘He wants to take his own sister as “his woman”?’ He was taken aback by this Berserk One’s words, but didn’t take action yet. After all, things worked differently in immortal dao civilizations, compared to the mortal world of men.

Relationships like the one Green Merchant was suggesting weren’t necessarily forbidden. After all, cultivators essentially had eternal life, as well as all sorts of unusual powers and abilities. The etiquette and customs that resulted were very different from that of mortals. Besides, cultivators viewed themselves as being as all-important as heaven and earth, and generally did whatever they felt like doing.

“Have you no shame, Green Merchant?!” Green Blaze said angrily. “I'm your sister! How dare you suggest violating family ethics like that! If father or the clan elders found out, do you know what they would do? The Green Clan would become a laughingstock.”

He laughed. “Submit to me and prosper, or oppose me and perish! If the clan elders—or even father—ever dared to lay a finger on me, they’re dead! We seventy-two patriarchs are the most domineering figures in all heaven and earth. And Young Master Leaf controls the essence of the Tusita Heaven! He’s unparalleled in all existence! You think I care at all about what some random people think? I have one way of dealing with people who defy me: I kill them! If it weren’t for the fact that you’re my sister, I wouldn’t be wasting my words here. This is your one chance to agree. If you don’t, I’ll use force!”

As her brother prepared to lunge, Green Blaze said, “Enough. There’s someone here to see you. Young Sir Yang Qi?”

Even as the words left her mouth, an energy fluctuation rippled through her bed chamber and Yang Qi appeared.

“I trust you’ve been well since we last met, Green Merchant,” he said, a faint smile on his face. “So you think Leaf Dao-Denier is unparalleled in all existence? Then how come I've inflicted so many humiliating defeats on him? I even took one of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions from him! I’ll give you a chance to join me, right here, right now. Give me your soul and your faith. Being my follower will give you much better opportunities than following Leaf Dao-Denier. This is your one chance to agree. If you don’t, I’ll use force!”

He had just thrown Green Merchant’s words right back at him.

“Yang Qi!” Green Merchant growled and leaped out of the bed, his energy pulsing. “You’ve really got a death wish, don’t you? Die!”

RUMBLE!

A mighty fist strike bore down on Yang Qi, hard and unyielding to the extreme.

The terrifying aura of the fist contained power from seventy-two unique constitutions, making it seem like both he and his seventy-one brethren were all attacking Yang Qi at the same time.

However, Yang Qi hardly even looked at the incoming attack as he sent his own fist out to meet it.

Crack!

Space shattered as Green Merchant was thrown back into the wall. The wall began crumbling, but a moment later a warding spell activated and kept the wall intact.

It was obvious that, despite being a Berserk One, Green Merchant wasn’t a match for Yang Qi.

“How could this be happening!?” he yelled. Thrusting both hands out in front of him, he said, “Deranged Heaven and Earth!Grand Derangement Godfist!”

A deranged aura erupted out, seemingly transposing hell and the god world, inverting yin and yang, and flipping the cosmos inside out. A host of conflicting auras filled the fist-wind that rushed in Yang Qi’s direction.

“Fuck off!” Yang Qi said, unleashing another fist strike of his own. This one slammed into Green Merchant’s chest, sending him tumbling head over heels in the opposite direction with blood spraying out of his mouth.

“Hmph! If it weren’t for your sister, I would have killed you already. How dare you act crazy with a weak cultivation base like that! Seventy-two patriarchs? Seventy-two special constitutions? More like seventy-two pieces of shit. Get on your knees right now and kowtow and I’ll make this process painless. If you don’t, things are going to get ugly.”

In the past, the seventy-two patriarchs were powerful individuals that Yang Qi couldn’t possibly deal with. But things had changed.

“Bastard!” Green Merchant shouted. “I'm going to go all out, even if that means we both die! You’re going to know what the fury of the seventy-two patriarchs is really like! Brace yourself for the true power of seventy-two constitutions! Fortuned One! Berserk One! Reincarnated One! Warrior One! Courageous One! Resentful One! Fiendish One!”

Projections of all seventy-two patriarchs appeared behind him, blessing Green Merchant with incredible power that he poured into yet another fist strike.

Swish!

Meanwhile, Yang Qi blurred into motion and appeared right in front of Green Merchant, whom he subsequently slapped across the side of the face.

“Aaaiiiieee!” Green Merchant screamed as he was thrown off of his feet, blood spurting out of various wounds. He almost looked like a raw shrimp as the force of the slap shredded his clothes out of existence, leaving him absolutely naked.

“I don’t have time to waste jabbering with you. Be bound!” Yang Qi waved a finger and magical laws descended, creating chains that tied Green Merchant up and completely immobilized him. He struggled, but nothing he did was the least bit effective.

Green Blaze could see that her brother wasn’t a match for Yang Qi and dropped to her knee and said, “Milord, your glory and majesty will last throughout all the ages!”

Although he was bound, Green Merchant still refused to back down. Spitting in contempt, he said, “Very vicious of you, Yang Qi. I never could have guessed that you would become this strong. But if you think I'm going to betray Young Master Leaf, you might as well stop dreaming. By the way, you can’t kill me. If you do, my seventy-one brethren will all know. They’ll instantly rush over here and rip you to pieces!”

“They’ll all know? And they’ll rush over here instantly?” Yang Qi laughed. “Considering how strong I am, do you really think I'm scared of the seventy-two of you? I’ll cut down every last one of you that gets in my way. I have a little whip I want you to take a look at. Let’s see if you can take the pain. If you can, don’t worry, I have other, crueler methods. I control hell, and the tortures of hell are manifold.”

“Hell Scourge!”

All of a sudden, a long, flexible whip appeared in his hand.

It seemed to echo with the howling of hell-born fiend-devils, and the power from dozens of hells. It also seemed to be filled with minor worlds, all of which thrummed with hellish essence.

A loud cracking sound echoed out as Yang Qi struck Green Merchant with the whip. Green Merchant visibly shivered, finally letting out a hoarse scream that bounced back and forth within the bedchamber.

“Wow, you really are useless,” Yang Qi said. “This whip only has the essence of a few dozen hells. For example, the Hell of Tongue-Ripping. That’s why you feel like your tongue is being ripped out when the whip strikes you. And then there’s the Hell of Death by a Thousand Cuts. That’s why you feel like your skin is being slowly flayed off of your body. Then there’s the Hell of Fresh Blood, which is why you have the sensation that your blood is slowly being drained. And the Hell of Suras makes you feel like you’re being chopped apart by countless weapons. Oh, the Hell of Scorching Flame is what gives the sensation of being burned alive in a huge cauldron.”

Yang Qi went on to describe the rest of the hells and the forms of torture that came with them. “Like I said, there are only a few dozen at the moment. But there are as many hells as the eternal sands of the universe. If I use enough of them on you, you might die just from the pain. That said, if you can take the pain, I’ll just keep ratcheting it up more and more.

“Here, Green Blaze. You try out the whip on your brother. Let’s see how long he’ll stay loyal to his Young Master Leaf. Don’t hold anything back!”

He handed the whip over to Green Blaze.

“Yes sir!” She shivered a bit at the terrifying sensation of holding the whip. After all, even immortals would fear the pain and torment of hell, and this whip could combine the torture of numerous hells.

“Don’t blame me for this, brother. It’s important to pick the right leader to serve. You following Young Master Leaf is throwing a bright pearl out into the darkness. Sticking with Young Sir Yang Qi is obviously the right choice. There’s still time to give in, brother. If not, prepare to be lashed.”

“Bitch! The both of you are going to die! Your time is up! Young Master Leaf is coming out of seclusion! Tremble in fear!” He began to twitch and shake as if he were going berserk.

“Going berserk, brother? Let me help you get a bit of clarity!”

SMACK!

She lashed him with the whip, provoking an anguished howl like that of a pig being castrated. It was obviously a level of pain that ordinary people could never take.

SMACK! SMACK! SMACK! SMACK!

Green Blaze began raining blows down upon him, causing more screams to echo out. However, he didn’t pass out. He had a combination of seventy-two unique constitutions, making him particularly tough. Although, now he was starting to regret that.

Swish!

Suddenly, a halo of damnification appeared on Green Merchant, making him vastly more sensitive than before. Now the lashes hurt even more.

“You!” he growled through gritted teeth.

“So, you can take the pain of dozens of hells,” Yang Qi said, his voice ice cold. “Well, now I need to start adding some more hellish essence in there. In the Hell of Bleached Bones, they have the tortures of Bone Flaying and Bone Decay. In the Hell of Rotten Hearts, they have a method that causes your heart to rot away in a very painful fashion. In the Hell of Feasts, you can enjoy the pain of being slowly devoured by ancient beasts….”

Chapter 756: Stripping Young Master Leaf of Followers (1)

“Aaarrrgghh!”

As the essences of various hells were poured into the whip, it eventually reached the point where there were over a hundred, and not even Green Merchant could handle the pain.

He screamed and howled, and although he was generally a tough person who didn’t fear pain, eventually he longed to simply die.

It was a terrifying torment that would strike fear into the hearts of any who heard of it.

“How dare you do this to me, Green Blaze!” Green Merchant shouted frenziedly. “Don’t you remember that I'm the next leader of the clan?! You're going to be punished for this!”

“Punished by the clan?” Green Blaze laughed. “Seems you’re still not thinking clearly, brother. You think I care about our clan? Not even Leaf Dao-Denier could save you from this, let alone the clan. I’ll be running the clan soon, so hurry up and submit. Open up your soul and release your faith. Pray to Young Sir Yang Qi, and your torment will end. Once you do, you’ll be illuminated by his glory.”

“Bah!” Green Merchant growled stubbornly.

“Light of Clarity!” Yang Qi said, causing a halo to appear on Green Merchant that instantly gave him further clarity of thought. And of course, that intensified the pain—and also ensured that he wouldn’t pass out.

“Arrggh! I'm not going to let you off the hook for this, you fiend-devil! Why are you tormenting me like this! Young Master Leaf! Young Master Leaf! Help me! I’m your loyal little bro! Don’t tell me you don’t care about my pain!” Green Merchant was still unwilling to give up. He clearly believed that Young Master Leaf was omniscient and would soon come to rescue him.

“Your Young Master Leaf is in seclusion right now. You think he’s paying attention to you? Besides, even if he wasn’t in seclusion, it’s not like he’s keeping an eye on you at all times. And I can hoodwink the dao of heaven itself! Even here in the Tusita Heaven, Young Master Leaf can’t find me unless I want him to. You’ve really underestimated me. I might be just a Godmyth, but I’m trillions of times stronger than even those of you with special constitutions! Well, since you refuse to give in, I guess I have no choice but to add more hellish essences. This one is from the Hell of Frigid Ice, which will freeze you to the core. And the Hell of Humiliation, which can force you to be reincarnated into the lowliest of individuals and experience horrific humiliation.”

Hundreds more hellish essences were added to the whips.

As Green Blaze continued to lash Green Merchant, he eventually began tensing up, and finally a look of terror appeared on his face as he looked at something only he could see. “No… no… he’s foaming at the mouth. Don’t come over here. Stop! You can’t humiliate me, I'm a man!”

Thanks to the essence of the Hell of Humiliation, he became a weakling that the male fiend-devils could violate with impunity. The humiliation he felt made him feel like he was simply going to die, except he wasn’t allowed to.

He was a Berserk One, one of the lofty seventy-two patriarchs, yet that only made the pain and humiliation worse.

“I… I’ll submit! I’ll betray Young Master Leaf. I’ll give you my faith and my soul. You will be my Sovereign Lord! Just let me go. I can’t take this humiliation!”

“Stop!” Yang Qi said, and Green Blaze took a step back.

In that moment, Green Merchant felt as if he had just ascended to the halls of heaven. Relaxation flowed through him, except when he looked into Yang Qi’s eyes he was struck with the most profound terror at the thought of having to experience further torment.

“Open your soul and take me as your Sovereign Lord,” Yang Qi said coldly. “Give me your faith. I advise you to not try to resist. If you do, the consequences will be brutal. A thousand times more horrific than what you just experienced.”

As the words left his mouth, he sent a stream of sagelight into Green Merchant’s sea of consciousness.

It was a transmission of faith and had to be accepted fully, without the least bit of resistance.

Green Merchant knew that if he fought back, the torment would be horrific. And of course, he didn’t dare to do that. He would do anything to avoid the Hell Scourge.

As Yang Qi’s sagelight flowed through him, his consciousness and soul fully submitted to Yang Qi.

At long last, Yang Qi had gained access to the seventy-two patriarchs. He now had a trump card he could use to set a deadly trap for Young Master Leaf. However, one trump card wasn't going to be enough. Green Merchant could be the foundation, but Yang Qi would need to turn more of the other seventy patriarchs against Young Master Leaf. The ultimate goal was to make sure Young Master Leaf was a general with no troops under his command.

When those who he thought were his most faithful disciples were actually traitors, Yang Qi would launch a surprise attack that would hopefully kill Young Master Leaf.

Having forced Green Merchant to submit, Yang Qi was now confident in dealing with the other patriarchs. By forcing others to submit, he would, by extension, be gaining control of many of the aristocratic clans in the Tusita Heaven.

And that would make the next step of his plan go even more smoothly.

Obviously, the Tusita Dynasty wouldn’t just let him do anything he wanted here. They had plenty of Chaos Gods and demigods, and if they all joined forces against Yang Qi, he would be in big trouble. Right now, the only way he could deal with them would be to take them out one at a time. Back during his big heist, the only reason the old-timers didn’t show up was that they were in seclusion and had been too busy to go down to the Dao Defense League to handle matters. But if Yang Qi started causing bigger problems, they would definitely interfere.

“On your knees, Green Merchant!”

“Yes sir! Milord!”

Green Merchant dropped to the ground, looking just as pious as Green Blaze. His soul now belonged to Yang Qi and he had been converted into a faithful believer. Yang Qi’s immortal-slaying clone in the Heaven Beyond Heaven immediately sensed the influx of faith, and it improved his cultivation speed.

‘What an incredible constitution and sea of consciousness,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘If he’d held strong, it would have been difficult to force him to submit. I would’ve had to kill him. And unfortunately, the seventy-two patriarchs are bound together in spirit and action, so his death would have been immediately noticed by Young Master Leaf. And there’s no way I can beat Young Master Leaf in a single shot right now. But if I slowly force his disciples to turn on him, then when he comes out of seclusion it will be to his doom.’

“Tell me, Green Merchant. What exactly is Young Master Leaf up to right now? And when is he coming out of seclusion?”

Kowtowing, Green Merchant replied, “Milord, Young Master Leaf sent word three days ago that he was entering a state of deep meditation. He wanted us seventy-one patriarchs to work with the Tusita Dynasty to go and enslave everyone from the Dao Defense League. The ultimate goal was to take you out, Milord. However, I myself just came out of meditation, so I'm not sure of all the details. All I know is that you stole the Tusita dynasty’s path to godly ascension, er—”

SMACK!

Green Merchant slapped himself. “I mean took, not stole. I was careless with my wording, Milord, please punish me!”

“It’s fine. Look, I want to force all of the other seventy patriarchs to submit. Can you think of any way to lure them into an ambush? Of course, I can’t face them all at the same time. That would be too dangerous.”

“Your humble servant will think of a way. A few of my companions are currently in seclusion. For instance, there’s the Courageous One, Huang Yunwu, and the Warrior One, Crooked Soul. Also the Devil-Crushing One, Ling Ding. I can send messages to them asking them to meet. You simply wait for them to show up, Milord, then jump out and capture them.”

“Excellent. By the way, I’ll reward you well for your service. As long as I manage to kill Young Master Leaf, I’ll bestow some of his riches on you. Send the word to those friends of yours.”

“Yes, Milord!” Green Merchant immediately sent the messages.

Before long, he shivered. “Milord, they’re all out of seclusion and on their way. There are five of them, and they think I want to discuss an important matter with them before connecting up with the rest of our brethren to head to the Tusita Dynasty. At the moment, there are thirty-six of our brethren in talks with the old-timers there. The rest are all in their various clans, working on their cultivation.”

“That’s fine. We’ll take care of them all one by one.”

Nodding, Yang Qi surreptitiously sent some divine will out.

“They’re here!” Five streaks of light could be seen, all of them Measureless Gods with fighting prowess no lower than Chaos Gods. All of them were pulsing with seventy-two unique auras, giving them such a resonance with the magical laws of the universe that even Chaos Gods would find it hard to kill them.

Yang Qi didn’t go into hiding. He just stood there.

“Milord, they’re almost here,” Green Merchant said anxiously. “Hurry up and hide!”

“There’s no need,” Yang Qi said calmly. “There are only five of them, after all. I’ll take them captive the moment they enter.”

Chapter 757: Stripping Young Master Leaf of Followers (2)

Yang Qi felt no need to hide from five of these patriarchs. He would strike with lightning speed to lock them down, then force them to submit just as he had with Green Merchant. Soon, he would have six puppets at his command. Although that wouldn’t necessarily have a major effect on Young Master Leaf, it would definitely help Yang Qi’s immortal-slaying clone further his cultivation.

After all, his clone was also a Godmyth. And although he was powerful, he wasn’t anywhere close to Yang Qi’s true self, which meant that his cultivation generally progressed much more quickly and easily.

The faith from six Measureless Gods would definitely allow him to advance by leaps and bounds.

Obviously, the stronger the clone was, the more useful he was to Yang Qi as a trump card. As time passed, the immortal-slaying clone was gradually becoming more and more independent from his true self, making him more and more like an individual.

“Young Master Green, you finally finished your session of cultivation? Why did you call us to a meeting? What? Is this your sister’s bedchamber? Did you finally have your way with her?”

“So, Young Master Green, you’re finally a Measureless God too? Excellent. Not a single one of us seventy-two patriarchs could be considered weak. And thanks to the unique magic Young Master Leaf used to help us all combine our constitutions, it’s only a matter of time before we conquer all of the immortal worlds in existence!”

“Young Master Green, it's great that you succeeded in your recent cultivation. After we catch up here, we can head right over to the imperial dynasty. The dynasty isn’t very happy with our group, but now that Young Master Leaf is gaining enlightenment of the essence of the Tusita Heaven, it won't be long before he can take full control. If those old fogies try to do anything to us then, he can just immediately put an end to them.”

“Good job on taking your sister, Young Master Green. Just like they say, keep the goods within the family!”

“We heard that your sister had benefited from some good fortune recently and was threatening your position. You definitely have to put her in her place. Once you get tired of her, you're going to pass her around to us to enjoy too, right?”

“Exactly, we seventy-two patriarchs are completely united in everything. We share everything.”

“This is great. We seventy-two brethren are all going to become like King Immortal-Slayer himself. We’ll rule over everything, completely invincible and free to take anything we want without the slightest scruple!”

“Years ago, King Immortal-Slayer and his seventy-one brethren ended up getting crushed by the ancient legion of gods. But things are different now. The legion of gods is no more. Some are in hiding, some are in slumber, and the Sovereign Lord has vanished. We seventy-two brethren can become the rulers of everything, the ultimate paragons. We’re the new gods of the heavens!”

As the five powerful auras weighed down on the area, five figures appeared. Clearly, these people were monsters, or worse—the kind of people who even literal monsters would grovel in front of. They were true devils among devils.

The first thing they noticed upon arrival was that Green Merchant was groveling in front of Yang Qi, much to their surprise.

“What’s going on here?”

“Why are you kneeling to this guy, Green Merchant?”

“What luck to meet you people here,” Yang Qi said, taking a step forward. “Sorry to tell you this, but Green Merchant exercises faith in me now. He’s a loyal believer in me, and he lured you here into a trap. Soon, the five of you are going to join him. Either submit of your own volition, or prepare for limitless torment.”

“What?”

The five of them quickly fanned out and surrounded Yang Qi, Green Merchant, and Green Blaze.

“Is this true, Green Merchant?” one of them asked. “Did you really join this guy and betray Young Master Leaf? This isn’t a joking matter! It's a capital offense! We seventy-two brethren are bound together in spirit and action, unparalleled under heaven! How could you possibly do something like this?!”

Without batting an eyelid, Green Merchant said, “Brothers, this is my lord Yang Qi, the same one who’s defeated Young Master Leaf over and over again. In fact, he even took one of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions, leaving Young Master Leaf with only two. Get on your knees and kowtow to him, otherwise not even I will be able to spare you what’s to come.”

“I can’t believe this, Green Merchant. From here on out, you’re not one of us. Prepare to die!”

“Activate the Immortal-Slaying Devil-Subduing Ring!”

WHIZZZ!

In the blink of an eye, an enormous ring filled with immortal-slaying power appeared, and it emanated a killing energy that could shake the heavens and topple the earth. It thrummed with what sounded like clashing metal, tens of thousands of arrows, and millions of weapons.

“Slay Immortals. Subdue Devils. Heaven and Earth Resonance!” The five young patriarchs all attacked at the same time, moving along with the spell formation to combine yin and yang, unify the five phases, arrange the six directions, gather the seven stars, rotate the eight elements, and summon the nine palaces of heaven!

This was an attack that even a Chaos God would flee from.

“What insignificant crap,” Yang Qi said. Suddenly, the whir of blades went silent and was replaced by cracking sounds as the ring disappeared, as if it had been sucked into a black hole.

“Creation!Destruction!Reincarnation!Aeon!Immortality!”

Yang Qi launched five fist strikes, causing five booms to ring out as the five patriarchs were sent flying.

Five massive mouthfuls of blood were coughed up.

Five experts had been vanquished with a single attack.

“Be bound!” Yang Qi said, hardly looking at them. Magical laws descended, becoming chains that bound them up like glutinous rice dumplings. As they were trussed up, looks of fear played out on their faces.

“Hell Scourge!” Yang Qi said, then handed a long whip to Green Merchant. “Lash these five until they acknowledge allegiance to me.”

“Yes sir!”

Green Merchant took the whip with a shiver. After all, he’d suffered enough to know exactly how terrifying it was.

“You're going to beat us, Green Merchant? Fine, do it! I'm a Courageous One, so it doesn’t matter how you beat me, I won’t show a lick of fear. You could kill me a hundred times over! A thousand!” He laughed heartily. “Yang Qi, you won’t stop tangling with us and Young Master Leaf, will you? Just because you got this scum Green Merchant to work for you doesn’t mean you can force the rest of us to do the same. I'm a Courageous One. Do you know what that means? I’ll never submit to anyone. Ever!”

“Begin,” Yang Qi said coolly.

Whack-whack-whack! Whack-whack-whack!

In Green Merchant's hands, the whip descended onto the Courageous One like a thunderstorm, who immediately began screaming as a result. At first, he shouted defiantly, but eventually his voice began to wear down until finally, he looked like a limp rooster.

“I submit!” he shrieked like a dying pig. “Stop beating me! I can’t take this. I’ll acknowledge allegiance. I’ll give all of my faith to you. I renounce Young Master Leaf! That whip is just too horrible.”

Only then did Green Merchant withhold the lash.

“I thought you were a Courageous One,” Yang Qi said. “I guess the whip really is too much for you. Now, repeat after me. ‘The bastard Young Master Leaf will soon die at the hands of my lord Yang Qi.’ Say the words and you’ll become my believer.”

“You!” the Courageous One growled, his eyes widening. But then Green Merchant lifted the whip again. “I’ll say it!” he screamed. “I’ll say it. The bastard Young Master Leaf will soon die at the hands of my lord Yang Qi. Yang Qi is my lord, unparalleled under heaven!”

In response, the other four patriarchs began shouting in fury. “You piece of trash! Are you really a Courageous One? You can’t even handle a little whip! What a spineless coward!”

Whack-whack-whack!

Green Blaze took the whip and began lashing them, provoking agonized shrieks. In the blink of an eye, they descended into the torturous depths of hell.

They didn't last long.

“I submit! I acknowledge allegiance!”

“What whip is that? No wonder the Courageous One couldn’t handle it!”

“Milord, I acknowledge allegiance! Please don’t beat me. Release me from this pain!”

“The bastard Young Master Leaf will soon die at the hands of my lord Yang Qi! Forgive me!”

“Stop,” Yang Qi said coldly, and the reprieve from the whip caused the four patriarchs to feel like they had ascended to the halls of heaven.

“This is the Hell Scourge, which the boundless Sovereign Lord would use to punish disgraced gods. Even gods would feel pain from the strike of this whip, let alone you people. Now, open your souls and let me in.”

Soon, Yang Qi had five new believers, giving him access to even more incredible faith power.

In the Heaven Beyond Heaven, his immortal-slaying clone sat in a godrelic spell formation, surrounded by god grass and god fruits that he was refining with true flame. Six streams of faith power flowed around him, causing his power to surge mightily.

Heavenly tribulation formed above him, and golden light began shining out from him.

Crack!

The immortal-slaying clone had risen another level. He was now a second division Tempered God, an even higher level than his true self.

Chapter 758: Stripping Young Master Leaf of Followers (3)

The fact that the immortal-slaying clone had surpassed Yang Qi’s true self in cultivation was something of a danger.

Usually, clones would never surpass the true self. Even if they were stronger for some reason, they shared the thoughts of the true self, and as such, shared the same enlightenment.

But Yang Qi had done something that defied common sense. Now, thanks to King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions and the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, the clone's thoughts were actually starting to separate from his true self’s.

To most ordinary cultivators, losing control of a clone would be very dangerous and could easily lead to cultivation deviation.

Unfortunately, there was more to the situation that Yang Qi had to consider. He knew that, eventually, King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions would try to turn on him. King Immortal-Slayer was a mighty individual who was not completely dead. His hope was to be resurrected, and he used his legacy medallions as part of the plot to make that happen.

Yang Qi actually wanted his immortal-slaying clone to think independently as a precaution against that outcome.

King Immortal-Slayer had been the rare type of genius who could be considered favored by heaven, someone that even the ancient legion of gods feared. Although Yang Qi had a lot of lofty ambitions, he knew that he was far from the level of King Immortal-Slayer.

Therefore, he would make all the preparations he possibly could.

The end goal was to completely break free from the control of King Immortal-Slayer, benefiting handsomely as a result.

The Heaven Beyond Heaven was surrounded by such powerful energy flows that not even Chaos Gods would be able to easily pierce through them. It was normally a very quiet place, but at the same time, it was a location where all sorts of divine medicines naturally grew. As a result, the immortal-slaying clone was making astounding progress in terms of his will and physique. He worked on his cultivation, hunted powerful beasts, and improved his battle prowess. By this point, he could easily defeat people who were in a higher cultivation level than himself, and was always striving for further breakthroughs.

If he was able to break free from being bound to Yang Qi, he would rise to even higher heights.

After all, a kite could only fly as high as the length of string held in the hand of he who flew it. If that string broke, one possibility was that the kite would fall to the ground. But there was a chance the wind would push it even higher than before.

At the moment, the faith provided by six top experts was the wind pushing at the clone, transforming him in profound and mysterious ways.

Yang Qi watched, more convinced than ever that he was doing the right thing.

“Excellent. Now that the five of you have given over all of your faith, your next task is to help me convert more of our associates. We want Young Master Leaf to be a general with no troops under his command, got it?” Green Merchant was now like the leader of this group of five.

“Where are the rest of them?” Yang Qi asked. “Can we lure more of them here? I want to strip Young Master Leaf of as many of his followers as possible.”

“We’ll do our best!” the six new converts said loudly.

“Excellent,” Yang Qi replied.

The six of them pulled out their command medallions, which had been fashioned in imitation of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions. They were used for communication, as well as issuing distress calls.

After working with the medallions for a moment, one of the six said, “Milord, the other patriarchs are all heading to the imperial palace of the Tusita Dynasty with the goal of dealing with you. Milord, you really have to be careful. We should probably head over there now to avoid arousing suspicion, although that’s your decision.”

“Oh? So you don’t think you can lure the rest of them into a trap here? Fine. I'm going to go kill Sectlord Nine Yangs, then take a look around the Tusita Dynasty to get a feel for how strong they really are.”

With that, he laid his hands on all six of his new followers, which caused them to shiver as if with shock as golden true energy spread into them. “Although the six of you started out with incredible martial arts, when you fused with the energy of the other patriarchs it created some nasty side-effects. Are you even fully aware of how miraculous those seventy-two constitutions are? They conflict with each other, and creating a harmony isn’t an easy thing. Young Master Leaf is smart, but he lacks enlightenment regarding the great dao of the legion of gods. I’ll help you negate the negative aspects of the fusion progress, which will unlock some of the potential within you and help you advance your cultivation bases. You’ll become at least ten times stronger than before, which should put you in the position to deal with any of the rest of those patriarchs. I’ll also bless you with some primeval god skills, making you even more powerful.”

Bzzzzzzzz!

Thousands upon thousands of halos appeared, which then shrank down into tiny seeds that entered the Jade Pillow acupuncture point on the backs of the heads of the six patriarchs.

If any of these six ended up having to fight a powerful enemy, those seeds could erupt with thousands upon thousands of halos, boosting their energy arts and making them virtually invincible.

“Go! Meet up with the rest of the patriarchs. I’ll head to the imperial dynasty on my own to find Sectlord Nine Yangs. After killing him, I’ll regroup with you and plan the next move. The best option I can think of is luring them into a teleportation formation that’ll send them into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. When Young Master Leaf comes out, he’ll have no supporters and I’ll be able to ambush him and turn him into a clone!”

“Yeah! Don’t worry, Milord, we won’t let you down. The six of us should easily be able to convince the others to fall into your trap.” Thanks to the help Yang Qi had provided, the impurities within them were cleansed and their energy arts had advanced. With that, they flew in the direction of the imperial dynasty.

Yang Qi had put six more pawns into play, and now he just needed to wait until the right moment to use them.

At the moment, he focused on tracking down Sectlord Nine Yangs’ aura.

The imperial dynasty of the Tusita Heaven maintained an enormous heavenly palace, which consisted of towering buildings that rose out of endless white clouds. Countless suns, moons, and planets filled those clouds, and as they rose and dipped, it almost seemed like someone practicing breathing exercises.

It was a very bustling place, with millions upon millions of teleportations whisking people back and forth every moment. From that, it was possible to guess the immense population of the place.

Yang Qi kept his distance at first. He could sense profound and dangerous auras within the place, making it seem like a dragon’s den that could erupt with deadly force.

Instead of using the teleportation portals, he just directly made his way into the city. The place was made up of numerous spatial manifestations and even entire worlds, some separated and some overlapping, making it something like a labyrinth.

SMACK!

In a mansion located deep in the imperial city, Sectlord Nine Yangs slapped his palm down on the table in front of him. “Preposterous! Outrageous! What ridiculous gall! I can’t believe he had the guts to steal godhood from the Live Forever God Tree here in the Tusita Heaven! Is he looking to get killed? What’s the Tusita Dynasty going to do? They’re going to send some troops down into the Dao Defense League to find him, obviously!”

“You can't afford to underestimate this guy, Sectlord Nine Yangs.”

A handful of older and middle-aged men sat in front of Sectlord Nine Yangs. They were very important people, and the violet-gold crowns they wore revealed them to be grand and vice princes from the dynasty, people who ranked second only to the emperor himself.

Obviously, they were so much more powerful than the grand princes of the Titan Emperor Heaven that the two couldn’t even compare.

The Titan Emperor Heaven was a first ranked immortal world, whereas the Tusita Heaven ranked thirty-third, making it as appropriate to compare the two of them as it was to compare an ant with a dragon.

“I'm not underestimating him,” Sectlord Nine Yangs replied. “He has some of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions and can go hide in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart at any time. But his plot against Dragon King offended the God Dragon Tribe, putting him in mortal peril. And when the time comes for our duel, I’ll kill him. I won't give him a chance to survive.” Although Sectlord Nine Yangs was putting on a very calm front for the royalty of the Tusita Dynasty, deep inside, he was thinking very different thoughts. ‘I can’t believe this kid is so strong. He actually stole their nearly-complete godhood. If he continues his cultivation much further, I won’t be a match for him! What am I supposed to do now? He's definitely not from the Dragonfolk. If I can get the people from the Tusita Heaven to kill him, it would save me a lot of effort. And it would make the Nine Yangs God Sect virtually invincible!’

One of the main reasons Sectlord Nine Yangs had come to the Tusita Heaven to begin with was because of Yang Qi. He knew that Young Master Leaf had some of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions, and had wanted to ask him for help. Although he and Young Master Leaf had had their differences in the past, they were now bound together in spirit and action by a common enemy.

He’d even hoped that Young Master Leaf would be able to control the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

However upon arriving in the Tusita Heaven, the news he heard had deeply stunned him.

The dynasty’s godhood had been stolen, which meant that Sectlord Nine Yang's opponent would likely get a lot stronger before their appointed duel.

Maybe Sectlord Nine Yangs could still come out alive, but if he lost, he would become a major laughingstock.

Chapter 759: Assassinating Sectlord Nine Yangs (1)

As Sectlord Nine Yangs furiously tried to come up with a way to ensure Yang Qi’s death, one of the old-timers said, “In the Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple, that punk Dragon Proudheaven actually captured Dragon King. It was a real shock, and it scared some of the old-timers so badly that they didn’t want to do anything to him. They don't want to risk the humiliation of a defeat.”

“True. But if we don't get rid of this kid, it’s only going to lead to more problems.

“Hold on, don’t get rid of him. Just imprison him. That’s how we should handle things in the Dao Defense League. After all, he’s so strong that it defies comprehension.”

“Hmph! Patriarch Kingheaven and Winter Bloodless are actually protecting him! It makes it really hard to decide what to do.”

“Don’t worry, those two are crafty old foxes. They know that Dragon Proudheaven is a tricky fellow and that he has the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. They’re just trying to get on his good side, in the hopes of taking whatever good fortune he has. Believe you me, those two are more ruthless than any of you can imagine!”

“That’s right. Haven’t you heard the stories about Winter Bloodless? He resorted to all sorts of sinister schemes to win the spot of sect leader. He sent his Master, his Elder Brothers and Sisters, and even some of his own relatives into the Hell of Fresh Blood, where he transformed them into blood-god paleo-devils. He has eighteen of them now! In fact, I wouldn’t be surprised if he plans to turn Dragon Proudheaven into the nineteenth.”

“Patriarch Kingheaven is no angel, either. Years ago, he raped one of his Junior Sisters, then covered it up by murdering the witnesses. When the matter came to light, he framed some of his fellow disciples. If Dragon Proudheaven is working with him, it's really asking a tiger for its skin!”

The old-timers meeting with Sectlord Nine Yangs were all top experts from other sects that hadn’t been present in the Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple, but had heard the news.

All of them knew how important Yang Qi was, and they all generally agreed that he should be imprisoned.

Unfortunately, not only had he kidnapped Dragon King, but he’d also stolen the god dao seeds and the true godhood from the Tusita Heaven. He was obviously the rare, talented kind of person that almost never appeared in the world. Although everyone wanted to create a sandpiper, clam, and fisherman situation, they were still wary of taking any overt action.

“Well said, all of you,” Sectlord Nine Yangs said. Inside, he was thinking, ‘These crafty foxes don’t want to do anything. They just want to benefit. I wouldn’t be surprised if they end up trying to curry favor with Dragon Proudheaven.’

At this point, one of the grand princes of the Tusita Dynasty spoke up. “Calm down, everyone. You’re worrying way too much about this brat. The only reason he managed to steal those god dao seeds is because he took advantage of a distraction created by Young Master Leaf’s people. Otherwise he would never have pulled it off. Besides, even though he got that true godhood, there’s no way he can assimilate it. Not even Demigod patriarchs can do that, much less him. If he tries, the godpower will kill him instantly.”

“You don’t know that for sure,” Sectlord Nine Yangs said. “That little punk has a lot of tricks up his sleeve. Regardless, the Nine Yangs God Sect and the Tusita Dynasty are on the same side here. You people need to provide us with some reinforcements, so we can go back down to the Dao Defense League to arrest Dragon Proudheaven and all the people he has working for him! Then you can get that true godhood back!”

“We need to avoid being unduly hasty,” another grand prince said. “He has the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, which will make him very difficult to deal with. The slightest mistake on our part, and he’ll just run away into that chart. Then we’ll never get our hands on him. On the other hand, we don't want any delays. That's why the Tusita Dynasty has already secretly begun operations to deal with him. The first thing we need to do is get King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions away from him. Or at least make sure they don’t function properly.”

“What?” Sectlord Nine Yangs said. “You can do that? If you could, you would be tying his feet together. We could kill him as easily as turning over our hands! Or better yet, make him live a life so horrible that he can only wish that he’ll die.”

“Well, that goes without saying. Right now, we’re putting together something called the Tusita True-Heaven God-Palace Calamity Formation, which the great god Tusita used to deal with other god-spirits in the ancient era. It will definitely be strong enough to suppress the powers of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions. However, we know that the brat is very quick-witted, and if he suspects he’s in danger, he’ll vanish. So we think the best opportunity to use the formation on him will be during your duel in the Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple. We can set it up there ahead of time, then spring it on him when he’s not expecting it. Kill him.”

“Grand Prince Honor-Glory is correct,” said another of the grand princes. “Unfortunately, there are old-timers in the Dao Defense League who support him, so making an open move like that is going to be difficult. That’s why we want Sectlord Nine Yangs to reach out to some of them. Convince them to shift their loyalties away from that brat, even if it's in secret.”

A smile broke out on Sectlord Nine Yangs’ face. “Rest your minds at ease! I can definitely handle that. That brat thinks everything is going his way, but his paltry skills aren’t enough to truly win the loyalties of the old-timers. They're just humoring him! How could anyone have any degree of closeness with someone who isn’t even a Godmyth?”

“Exactly,” said one of the old-timers from the Dao Defense League, a treacherous man with a long face who was called Daoist Myriad Meteors. He spoke with a sinister chill that made even the grand princes somewhat uncomfortable. “I bet Winter Bloodless and Patriarch Kingheaven are both secretly furious. They might seem like they’re protecting that brat, but considering how treacherous the two of them are, they’re definitely aiming to benefit from the whole thing. And considering that the brat acquired some true godhood, they’ll turn on him at a moment's notice. Now might be the perfect time to make a move.”

“That’s true, but we still need to be careful,” another grand prince said. “If he figures out what’s going on, our plan will fail. His Majesty wants that true godhood back, otherwise his godly ascension is going to be a problem. What’s more, the Tusita Dynasty is now facing a situation with Young Master Leaf and his seventy-one patriarchs. If conflict breaks out, who will you people support?”

“Well, it’s only natural that we’ll help the Tusita Dynasty!” Sectlord Nine Yangs said quickly. “We heard that the emperor has already stepped halfway into the level of the true gods. Soon, he’ll be on the same level as the legion of gods, and if we could have someone like that backing us, the Dao Defense League would never have any problems again!”

“Excellent. Truly excellent. Now, why don’t you all relax here for a moment? We’ll have some god dao seeds brought in that you can use as gifts to earn the support of the other sects, and maybe even some of the almighty old-timers who spend most of their time practicing cultivation out in primal-chaos.”

After certain pleasantries and formalities were tended to, the time came to leave. Rising to his feet, Sectlord Nine Yangs offered his farewells and led the other old-timers from the Dao Defense League out.

When they were all gone, the grand princes exchanged glances.

“The old-timers from the Dao Defense League are all treacherous and murderous. Unfortunately, we need them in our fight against Young Master Leaf. For now, the best thing is to pit those two groups against each other.”

“You’re right!”

“Some of the old-timers from the Dao Defense League are truly strong. But they’re still not as strong as those mysterious figures who hide out in the primal-chaos debris, most of whom hope to climb the Deathly Heavenly Stairway. We really need to get them under control. For all we know, they might have their eye on that true godhood.”

“The Dao Defense League won’t be easy to deal with. They obviously want to unite all of the immortal worlds, and at the moment we aren’t in a place to oppose them.”

“What about the God Dragon Tribe? What if they go cause problems with the brat and get his guard up?”

“The God Dragon Tribe is in contact with Sectlord Nine Yangs, so we don’t need to worry about that. Soon enough, Young Master Leaf’s brethren will be here to negotiate. We should be able to find out from them just how much of the essence of the Tusita Heaven Young Master Leaf has control over.”

**

Sectlord Nine Yangs and the others from the Dao Defense League were in a private room discussing the developments.

“These people from the Tusita Heaven can’t be trusted. We need to split up and start talking to all the old-timers who are on good terms with Dragon Proudheaven. Most importantly, someone needs to convince the God Dragon Tribe to join us.”

“Alright, let's get to work. When the time for the duel comes, that brat will be ours! In the end, we have to make sure that we get the true godhood. We can’t allow ourselves to be lackeys of the Tusita Heaven. And we need to get King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions, too. In fact, why don’t we decide ahead of time how to split our profits? It wouldn’t be good to get in an argument after we win.”

“That's fine,” Sectlord Nine Yangs said coldly. “First, let’s get in touch with all the various patriarchs. Then we can discuss how to split everything up. Regardless of how it turns out, we have to screw over Young Master Leaf and the Tusita Heaven. In fact, the best outcome would be to use the brat Dragon Proudheaven to kill them!”

“You’ve really thought everything through. Come on, let’s get going!”

The patriarchs departed, leaving Sectlord Nine Yangs behind alone. Smiling viciously, he murmured, “Dragon Bone-Dao, king of the Bone Dragons. Dragon Devil-Killer, king of the Devil Dragons. You can come out now.”

RUMBLE!

Two immense draconic auras rolled out as experts from the Bone and Devil Dragon Tribe appeared. It was impossible to say when, but they had begun working with Sectlord Nine Yangs!

One of them looked to have a body made completely of bone, and the other pulsed with profound devil qi.

“Very treacherous of you to side with us, Sectlord Nine Yangs! Are you really planning to use those people to deal with the God Dragon Tribe?” King Bone Dragon asked, a sinister smile playing out across his face.

Sectlord Nine Yangs smiled. “Oh, no, nothing like that. I’ll be helping you deal with them myself. In the end, we can split the profits of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions and the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.”

Before any further discussion could play out, a voice reached their ears.

“So, you want the medallions and the chart? I have them right here.”

Chapter 760: Assassinating Sectlord Nine Yangs (2)

The mere voice itself caused pressure to weigh down on the three individuals present.

King Devil Dragon, King Bone Dragon, and Sectlord Nine Yangs looked around to try to find the speaker, but saw no one in the area.

“Who’s trying to pull some hocus pocus? Show your face!”

King Devil Dragon reached out and made a grasping gesture, causing everything to tremble as countless claw projections appeared. However, as the claws ripped at the space in the area, nothing was revealed.

Snarling, he unleashed a consummate technique that caused another wave of claws to speed out in all directions. “Three Claws of the Devil Dragon!First Claw: Tear the Heart and Rip the Lungs!”

Sadly for him, the result was the same as before.

“Second Claw: Incomparable Trampling!Third Claw: Overturn Macrocosms!”

Each claw attack surpassed the previous one, causing everything to shake so violently that it seemed as if the entire void would explode.

King Devil Dragon suddenly smiled coldly. “Damned mischief-maker! Did you really think you could evade these consummate devil dragon arts? That’s a joke if I’ve ever heard one! I'm going to slowly crush you to death, so that you truly understand what terror is!”

All of a sudden, his hand clenched into a fist as though he had grabbed something. But then….

“Aaaiiiieee!” A bloodcurdling scream echoed out as a beam of sword light appeared and cut his hand off of his arm! It lay there in midair in front of him, twitching as though it wished to fly back to him. However, before it could, it burst into flames, dissolving into greenish smoke that faded away into nothing.

The agonizing pain caused King Devil Dragon to bellow at the top of his lungs. Apparently, in all the hundreds of millions of years he’d lived, nothing like this had ever happened to him.

“Brother Devil Dragon, what just happened?” Shocked, King Bone Dragon stepped forward and looked at the stump of his arm. Then he raised his voice and said, “Friend, who exactly are you? Enough with the parlor tricks. Reveal yourself!”

“Oh, I’ll reveal myself,” Yang Qi said coolly as he stepped out of the shadows.

Sectlord Nine Yangs recognized him immediately, and it caused fear to flicker in his eyes. “It’s you… you brat! Dragon Proudheaven! I can’t believe you dared to come to the Tusita Heaven!”

“Why wouldn’t I?” Yang Qi replied. “I go where I please. By the way, I need to tell you something. My name isn’t really Dragon Proudheaven. That’s just an alias. My real name is Yang Qi.”

An expression of surprise flickered across Sectlord Nine Yangs’ face, only to be replaced a moment later by a sinister smile. “Oh? Your name isn't Dragon Proudheaven? Yang Qi, huh. I've never heard of anyone who goes by that name. Seems your alias is a bit more popular. Well, it doesn’t matter. What are you doing here? Don’t tell me you want to have our duel ahead of schedule. If so, fine. After all, I have King Devil Dragon and King Bone Dragon here to assist me.”

It was no surprise that Sectlord Nine Yangs had never heard of Yang Qi.

Yang Qi was quite famous in the Brahman Immortal World, but that was considered a very small place when compared to the Dao Defense League as a whole. It was like a village compared to a city. There was no way someone like Sectlord Nine Yangs would be familiar with people from such a place.

“Is there anything you two have to say about all this?” Yang Qi said, looking at King Devil Dragon and King Bone Dragon.

“You used some special technique to injure me, boy,” King Devil Dragon said in a dark tone of voice, “and that’s enough to earn you a death sentence for both you and your entire clan. Don’t you know that the Devil Dragon Tribe lives for revenge?”

“You offended the God Dragon Tribe, boy,” King Bone Dragon said, “so even if you were stronger than you are, it wouldn’t do any good. Hand over King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy medallions and the Bone Dragon Tribe will offer you sanctuary.”

“And here I thought you might be interested in joining me,” Yang Qi said, shaking his head. “In that case, don’t waste your breath. You see, I already sent Dragon King from the God Dragon Tribe to hell. Er, wait, no… he actually didn’t make it to hell. I assimilated his quintessence energy and devoured his destiny. And now you two can join him.”

Yang Qi’s aura flared and a pure land appeared around him, which was none other than the God Legion Paradise. But instead of being majestic and grand, like before, it was like a gentle breeze or a fine rain, traveling through the void in such a way that no one could detect its presence until it was upon them.

The pure land existed everywhere, and pāramitā was directly underfoot, removing the need to cross the sea of bitterness….

This was Yang Qi’s domain. Where he went, everything would become a pure land, if he wished.

“You killed King God Dragon?” King Devil Dragon said. Both he and King Bone Dragon found it hard to believe, and yet the expression on Yang Qi’s face seemed to indicate he wasn’t lying. “You’d better not just be running your mouth. Aren’t you worried about the God Dragon Tribe coming after you for revenge?”

“I couldn’t care less about the God Dragon Tribe. After today, the Devil Dragon Tribe and the Bone Dragon Tribe are going to have me in their sights, too. But I’ll settle all accounts by killing all of you.” Yang Qi’s eyes swiveled to Sectlord Nine Yangs. “What do you say, Sectlord Nine Yangs? We still have a few weeks until our duel, but I'm honestly not inclined to wait. I want to kill you right here and now.”

“You’ve got a lot of guts, I’ll give you that,” said Sectlord Nine Yangs. “Forgetting about the question of who would kill who, aren’t you worried about the Dao Defense League getting dragged into the issue?” Considering that he was in the Tusita Heaven, and was joined by King Devil Dragon and King Bone Dragon, he wasn’t afraid at all. However, he was worried that if fighting broke out, Yang Qi could escape into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. In fact, he was currently scrambling to come up with a way of locking the area down to prevent that from happening.

“The Dao Defense League? I'm not worried about them. Even if your Nine Yangs God Sect gets wiped out, the Dao Defense League as a whole will still stand. Besides, I can just absorb the main forces of the Nine Yangs God Sect into my own sect. The sight of your severed head will ensure that the elders will quickly side with me. Of course, I’ll have to exterminate your clan to remove the possibility of future trouble. Fairly soon, your bloodline won’t exist in this world.”

A ninth division Chaos God who had lived for so many countless years would obviously have a huge number of descendants. Perhaps a billion. Perhaps tens of billions. Perhaps trillions.

There could be enough to populate an entire immortal world.

After all, if a Chaos God patriarch lived for a hundred million years, and gave birth to a child every year, that would give him a hundred million children. And what if each of those children gave birth to children of their own?

For Yang Qi to claim that he was going to wipe out Sectlord Nine Yangs’ entire bloodline was quite a ruthless thing to say.

“There’s no need for such aggressive talk, young one,” King Bone Dragon said, taking a step forward. “Do you really think that you’re just going to suck us all into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart? King God Dragon underestimated you and you took him by surprise. But you won’t be taking us by surprise. Why don’t we exchange three blows and see which of us is better? Bring it on!”

Even as the words left his mouth, ghostfire blazed in his eyes as he stared intently at Yang Qi, making it seem very much like he wanted to duel but was waiting for his opponent to strike first.

WHOOSH!

Meanwhile, King Devil Dragon suddenly vanished, then reappeared behind Yang Qi. Cackling madly, he unleashed a fist strike. “Fooled you, boy! You actually trusted King Bone Dragon? He’s the most treacherous dragon there is! I'm going to take King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions… and your life!”

RUMBLE!

King Devil Dragon’s fist strike was imbued with a spirit that could conquer mountains and rivers, and caused everything to shake violently. This was a sneak attack by a Chaos God, and it was so powerful that it could likely kill someone in the same cultivation level as him.

Even worse, King Bone Dragon launched an attack of his own from the other direction. Speeding forward, his finger transformed into a bone saber that slashed out in front of him. As it did, chains and cages made of bones sprang up everywhere!

“This bone saber was crafted from the bone of a god! The blade is named Descender, and this move is named Grievance Descends to the Seafloor! When I kill you, any grievances you have will sink to the depths of the sea!” This was obviously a killing move!

The two dragon kings had resorted to crafty plots and machinations, almost as if they didn't care about their own reputation. The way they were attacking Yang Qi together seemed devoid of any of the majesty of the Dragonfolk. It made sense, considering that devil dragons and bone dragons were considered to be the most treacherous of all the dragons. They were quite a contrast to the noble and mysterious buddha dragons, the domineering and haughty god dragons, the aloof heaven dragons, or the calm and peaceful true dragons.

Sectlord Nine Yangs was also prepared to make a move, crouching down in order to spring into action. However, he didn’t make his move yet. Apparently, he was waiting for just the right moment to launch his ultimate attack.

Unfortunately for him, that perfect moment never came.

Yang Qi didn’t dodge out of the way. He didn’t make an attack, nor did he receive an injury.

Crack!

The bone saber called Descender hit his arm and shattered! At the same time, an immense backlash attack hit King Bone Dragon, who staggered backward.

As King Devil Dragon’s fist approached, Yang Qi glanced back and met it with a palm. A deafening smack rang out, and King Devil Dragon’s armor was ripped to shreds, the scales covering his arm exploding.

“Aggghhhh!”

A look of both terror and fury appeared on his face as he stumbled backward, cradling his mangled flesh.

Unfortunately for him, Yang Qi was faster than he was.

Whoosh!

In the blink of an eye, Yang Qi was behind him, causing him to look over his shoulder in shock.

POP!

Yang Qi thrust out his palm, hitting King Devil Dragon square in the middle of his back. A cracking sound rang out and King Devil Dragon’s energy began draining out of him like water falling down a ten-thousand-meter tall cliff. As it drained away, Yang Qi reached out and grabbed the dragon’s head.

Crack!

He ripped King Devil Dragon’s head off of his shoulders, and the headless body flopped down on the ground in front of him.

Chapter 761: Assassinating Sectlord Nine Yang (3)

C-C-CRACK!

The ground shook as King Devil Dragon’s body slammed into it, completely drained of spirit energy. Normally speaking, if someone like him died, his flesh and blood would explode into countless tiny devil dragons that would then pierce through space and quickly form back into a new, whole body. That was what happened when one was only a step away from deathlessness.

Unfortunately, despite how strong King Devil Dragon was, he was like tofu when compared to Yang Qi.

In fact, he was weaker than tofu.

Yang Qi had quickly and easily killed him, then ripped his head off of his shoulders.

However, his eyes remained open and a bit of will still stirred in them, not quite ready to die. “Why? How could I be dead? Are you a god? Only a god could kill me so easily.”

“I'm not really a god. But almost.” Yang Qi waved his hand and a primal-chaos elder-snake appeared and devoured King Devil Dragon’s body. As the snake chewed on the scaly flesh, terrifying grating sounds echoed out.

“Enjoy your last moments, King Devil Dragon. Before long, you’ll be nothing but fecal matter.”

With that, Yang Qi turned and started walking toward King Bone Dragon.

King Bone Dragon’s teeth were already chattering from fear. He could tell that he wasn’t a match for Yang Qi, and couldn't wrap his mind around how Yang Qi could be so strong. Of course, now wasn’t the time to contemplate the matter. His top priority was staying alive.

Shrieking, he turned and fled. After all, if fighting wasn’t an option, one could always try escaping.

POP!

Almost as soon as he’d started moving, he slammed into what appeared to be a glowing membrane of sorts. It was like a barrier created by the glory of the legion of gods, and he was completely shocked to find that it made it impossible for him to flee. Normally speaking, even the strongest warding magics couldn’t block his path.

Even worse, slamming into it had struck confusion into his mind and caused some of his bony exoskeleton to crack and crumble.

“Time to go for broke! Preheaven Bleached-Bone God-Dao!Fall of the Bone Dragon!”

King Bone Dragon suddenly transformed into an actual bone dragon, which whipped about as he attempted to flee again.

In response, Yang Qi reached out his hand.

His five fingers unleashed an energy field that instantly surrounded King Bone Dragon almost like a bubble. No matter how he flailed or struggled, he couldn’t break free, and he even felt like he was starting to suffocate. Of course, he didn’t actually need to breathe. He could survive in a complete vacuum for a hundred million years without taking a breath. Yet, inside this bubble, he felt like he was asphyxiating.

“You’re in my God Legion Paradise, where no one can hear you scream, and your attacks are useless. You're a Chaos God, just a step away from the Deathless Throne, yet you’re still quite the fool. Did you really think you could attack me and just run away?” Yang Qi sighed, and although it seemed like he was bemoaning the state of the universe and pitying the fate of mankind, it sounded like the vicious laughter of a devil-ghost to Sectlord Nine Yangs.

“No!” shouted King Bone Dragon. “Spare me! I’ll serve you faithfully! You’ve proven your point. We bone dragons only respect strength, and you’ve shown me how strong you are! I’ll even be a mount for you! Please, take me in!”

As of this moment, humiliation wasn’t even on the mind of King Bone Dragon. He was a ninth division Chaos God and an important patriarch, but right now he looked like little more than a clown. However, he was no human. He was a bone dragon who knew very well that the only way to live was to accept reality when someone else was stronger than you. You couldn't be strong if you were dead.

“Fine. Open your soul and become a believer!” Yang Qi wouldn’t mind having King Bone Dragon’s faith; it would only further help his immortal-slaying clone to advance.

“Yes, yes of course….” King Bone Dragon blubbered from inside the bubble as he stared at death looming over him. He knew that plots and schemes wouldn’t work in this moment, so he opened his soul and let Yang Qi’s Light of Faith into him. Moments later, he had become a believer.

The bubble vanished and he once again took the form of a human with a bone exoskeleton. Kneeling, he said, “Greetings, Milord! Your remarkable abilities encompass the world and your might and glory shall remain invincible for all eternity!”

Now, Yang Qi only had Sectlord Nine Yangs left to deal with. The man was currently backing away in shock. He’d been waiting to jump in at the right time with a deadly attack, but that moment had never materialized.

Thump!

Eventually, he ran into a barrier and couldn’t back up any further.

“Stay away from me!” he said in a shrill voice that came across as relatively comical. Normally speaking, a top master like himself would never speak like this. But things had changed very quickly and he’d realized that there was no way he could possibly be a match for Yang Qi. Now, he could only hope to buy time by acting as weak as possible.

“Come on, Sectlord Nine Yangs,” Yang Qi said. “Someone like you shouldn’t be putting on a cheap show like this.”

“Yang Qi….” Sectlord Nine Yangs suddenly stood up straighter. “You've got guts, I’ll give you that. Three months. That's the time limit we originally agreed to. Give me that time, and if I can’t beat you I’ll accept my fate and just die. But I can’t accept death now. Besides, you’re not living up to your end of the agreement.”

“Living up to my end of the agreement?” Yang Qi laughed. “I usually stick to my word, but not when it comes to enemies like you. You hate me down to your bones, and you’ve been plotting and scheming against me this entire time. And for what? Profit for the Nine Yangs God Sect? Your pettiness has been fully revealed by your hatred. Look, I'm done wasting my words. Get on your knees. Give me your faith and become a believer in me. If you do, I’ll let you off the hook.”

The more faith his clone got—and the higher quality it was—the better. And Chaos Gods were incredibly powerful people. In fact, King Bone Dragon’s faith was just now reaching the immortal-slaying clone in the Heaven Beyond Heaven and provoking a most astonishing transformation.

The clone immediately unleashed a wave of power that devoured the faith, and even some destiny that came along with it. It was common for a bit of destiny to come alongside the faith of top experts.

That was one of the detriments of becoming a believer. Everything pertaining to a believer belonged to his lord. Not even their souls were their own, so it was only natural that their destiny could be taken. It was for that reason that top experts didn’t wish to be believers.

Dramatic transformations were occurring within the immortal-slaying clone, and Yang Qi was very pleased by what he was seeing.

He could even sense faint traces that pointed to the awakening of King Immortal-Slayer himself.

Power. Power. More power. Even more power! Deep within the clone, a mighty will was assailing his soul.

“You want my faith, Yang Qi?” Sectlord Nine Yangs said in a shrill voice. “Impossible. I'm not a bone dragon. You think you have what it takes to beat me? To kill me? I'm not like King Bone Dragon or King Devil Dragon. Don’t push me too far here! I have the backing of other old-timers, Chaos Gods in the Dao Defense League! They’re people that are just a step away from the Deathless Throne and already have their own god kingdoms. You know, there’s more in the primal-chaos above the thirty-third ranked immortal worlds! The eternal sands of the immortal worlds are just a foil to that which is beyond, where living gods exist!”

“What’s the point of all this jabbering?” Yang Qi said, striding forward. “You think I care about whoever backs you? Exercise faith in me, or die.”

“Don’t push things too far, Yang Qi! I can swear an oath to heaven to never cause any problems for you again. I and the Nine Yangs God Sect will mind our business, and you can mind yours. We can turn weapons of war into gifts of jade and silk!”

“On your knees!” Yang Qi said, reaching out and placing the Hand of the One God on top of Sectlord Nine Yangs’ head.

“Just too stubborn.” King Bone Dragon said from off to the side. “All my lord wishes is for you to give him your faith, but you’re too stubborn. You’re looking to get killed, that's what you're doing. No one can save you.”

POP!

Sectlord Nine Yangs coughed up a mouthful of blood, which turned into a crimson shield. Simultaneously, he reached up and tried to grab Yang Qi’s arm. “Either the fish dies or the net splits, Yang Qi. Do you really want to do this? I'm telling you, if I die, things won’t go well for you. You’re not strong enough to deal with the real old-timers! You’re nowhere near that level.”

“Oh? Why not ask those old-timers to come out? Mind giving me a look?” Yang Qi drew on his strength and everything began trembling. Then, the blood shield shattered and Yang Qi hoisted Sectlord Nine Yangs off his feet. At the same time, the Hell Scourge appeared.

An agonized scream rang out that was far more chilling than any that had been heard up to this point.

Chapter 762: The Backer

Sectlord Nine Yangs was completely powerless to fight back and could only tremble as the agony of the Hell Scourge washed through him.

King Bone Dragon didn’t think the whip looked particularly special, but when it hit Sectlord Nine Yangs, he lost all sense of face and squealed like a dying pig. It was enough to cause one’s blood to turn as cold as ice.

However, Sectlord Nine Yangs did seem to have some more mettle than the young patriarchs from earlier. Although he let loose countless bloodcurdling screams, he was still holding strong internally. It was a shocking sight, even to Yang Qi. Despite being assaulted by countless hells, his will held strong.

Yang Qi snorted coldly. “Alright, let’s see exactly how much you can take. I'm going past a thousand hells!” The essence of even more hells poured into the whip, which instantly became much thicker and longer than before. Sectlord Nine Yangs sagged as if from exhaustion, but then went crazy, spittle flying from his mouth as he shouted, “Just let me die! Don’t torment me, Yang Qi. I’ll die, but I won’t give you my faith!”

“You want to die? Sorry, it’s not that easy.”

Thus, the torment continued, one lash at a time. The sight of it caused King Bone Dragon to shiver. He was a very experienced and knowledgeable person, and could tell how much hellish pain was being inflicted with each blow.

‘Is that the same whip the Sovereign Lord would use to punish disgraced gods? But how did this guy get it? And how is he so skilled in using it? Who exactly is he?’

“Aggghhhh!” Sectlord Nine Yangs unleashed a final scream and collapsed into unconsciousness. Of course, Yang Qi wouldn’t let him stay unconscious. A moment later, a halo of light appeared behind Sectlord Nine Yangs’ head. Now he was more awake than ever, and even more sensitive to pain.

“No! Don’t push me, Yang Qi, or I’ll never let you off the hook for this. I’ll never give you my faith. It belongs to an ancient god! If you try to strip away my faith in that god, you’ll have a hard time staying alive!” Face twitching, Sectlord Nine Yangs said, “I'm going to break the seal! The power of a true god is about to flow through me to wipe you out of existence, blasphemer!”

Even as the words left his mouth, something inside of him seemed to break, allowing mighty power to surge through him. Then Yang Qi sensed another mighty and boundless power rushing in his direction. It smashed through the borders of the God Legion Paradise and entered Sectlord Nine Yangs, who instantly grew larger, transforming into an enormous god-spirit who stared coldly at Yang Qi.

“You forced me to use my godpower, Yang Qi! I’d planned to use this to eventually become a demigod. I'm paying a huge price here, therefore, you’re definitely going to die!”

Howling with rage, he lunged toward Yang Qi.

King Bone Dragon was caught completely unprepared and was knocked out of the way by Sectlord Nine Yangs, which nearly rendered him unconscious. Eyes filling with terror, he said, “That’s the power of a god! Milord! Get out of here! He’s been building up that godpower for a long time, now!”

“Leave?” Yang Qi laughed coldly. Golden light flickered in his forehead as the golden imp suddenly appeared, stretching out a finger to meet Sectlord Nine Yangs’ palm.

All of a sudden, an explosive aura appeared on Sectlord Nine Yangs as his godpower was completely put under the control of the golden imp. It ebbed, shrinking down inside him until it was like a seed that then flew out of him and vanished.

Still recovering from his surprise over what had just happened, Yang Qi reached out and grabbed it.

‘It’s godpower! From a real, living god! I can’t believe there are still actual living gods in existence!’ He’d always thought that the gods had vanished in ancient times. After all, he’d heard it said that after the gods experience nirvanic rebirth, a new civilization would gradually be born. But apparently, Sectlord Nine Yangs had somehow become connected to a god, and he’d even given faith to that god. That meant there were living gods, which was a terrifying thought.

Of course, Yang Qi hadn’t forgotten about his conversation with the god, Brahma. Although Brahma’s body was chopped up into pieces, he could eventually be resurrected, at which point he would be a true living god again.

‘Don’t tell me that the Dao Defense League doesn’t just have demigod old-timers, but also gods as backers?’ A serious expression appeared on his face. ‘That’s a scary thought. If they really have a god, even just a Lesser God, there’s no way I could match up to it. Gods of the Deathless Throne surpass anything and everything.’

Yang Qi knew full well that not even a hundred million Chaos Gods working together would be able to do anything to a Lesser God.

It was similar to how not even a hundred million mortal foot soldiers could beat a Legendary cultivator in battle.

Right now, Yang Qi simply couldn’t imagine how difficult it must be for a Chaos God to rise to the Deathless Throne and become a true god. It was a major threshold that had yet to be crossed; in all the billions of years that made up the modern era, there had never been a single expert who’d done so.

It was terrifying to even contemplate the idea of Sectlord Nine Yangs being backed by an actual god. However, in the end, that god wasn’t present at the scene. The seed of godpower had been taken by the God Legion Seal, and now Sectlord Nine Yangs slumped like a limp rag.

Backing away, he said, “I can’t believe you took that godpower, Yang Qi. But you’d better not forget that I'm backed by a god! A real god, not a demigod. Do you really dare to kill me? Let me go, otherwise that god will come after you for revenge!”

Snorting coldly, Yang Qi cracked his whip. “Become a believer in me, or die. Your choice!”

The whip lashed Sectlord Nine Yangs and he finally broke. He’d lost his godpower and couldn’t hold out any longer. “I'll acknowledge allegiance. I'm willing! I’ll open my soul to you!”

“Excellent! That’s more like it. Besides, I need your help to handle Leaf Dao-Denier. He’ll be out of seclusion soon, and he’ll likely be a Chaos God, which will make him more terrifying than ever. I’m not going to rest until he’s dead! The only question is when it will happen. It should be soon, from what I can tell. His seventy-one patriarchs are all meeting, and I'm going to turn them all into my believers. Then I can surround Young Master Leaf and deliver a fatal blow! Oh, and then there’s General Samman. I need to deal with him, too. Once I take away his fragment of the Cruiser of Civilization, I’ll have vivicreation systems! Plus, he has at least one of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions, which I also need. As long as I can get a total of five, there’s no way Young Master Leaf will ever be a match for me.” Already, Yang Qi’s plans had started changing.

A beam of sagelight entered Sectlord Nine Yangs, and a moment later his soul and thoughts had changed, making him a puppet of faith. Kneeling in front of Yang Qi with a blank face, he kowtowed and said, “I salute you, Milord!”

The old Sectlord Nine Yangs was essentially dead, replaced by this puppet.

“I have a mission for you, my newest believers,” Yang Qi said. “Sectlord Nine Yangs, go to the God Dragon Tribe and sow dissension among them. King Bone Dragon, go into hiding in the Sage Panacea Sect. Protect my disciples, and kill anyone who causes problems or plots against them. Report back to me about what the other old-timers are doing back there.”

“Yes sir!”

The two experts flew away.

Only a few moments had passed, but Yang Qi had immensely benefited. His immortal-slaying clone had reached a higher level and was now facing Incarnated God tribulation.

As for King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions, they seemed more alive than ever.

‘It’s time to go take a look at this meeting of the seventy-one patriarchs. Before long, I’ll be able to break through to the second division and become a Tempered God. I need a lot of power… but I did just get that true godhood. It should be enough to propel me all the way to the seventh or eighth division, and if I'm lucky, the ninth.’

Unfortunately, it definitely wouldn’t be enough for him to reach godly ascension.

After putting some more thought into his plans, Yang Qi flew off toward a hidden plane of existence within the Tusita Dynasty. There, in an ancient castle, the seventy-one patriarchs had gathered.

Young Master Leaf was their leader, but he wasn’t present, so the group was leaderless and not particularly well organized.

However, Green Merchant and the other five patriarchs he led were sticking together and looking around with glittering eyes. The larger group was currently discussing how to lure Yang Qi into a big spell formation and kill him.

“We all know what Young Master Leaf wants,” one of the patriarchs said loudly. “Before long, he’s going to come out of seclusion, stronger than ever. With the essence of the Tusita Heaven at his command, he’ll be invincible. Before that, we need to work with the Tusita Dynasty to try to get that true godhood back from Yang Qi. Any ideas? Let’s come up with a plan.”

Chapter 763: Join Me

The seventy-one patriarchs looked around at each other as they tried to come up with a way to get the true godhood from Yang Qi.

“His cultivation level isn’t particularly impressive, but he's got a lot of tricks up his sleeve. You always have to be on guard against him. He used some dirty trick to steal one of the exalted Young Master Leaf’s legacy medallions, and I even heard that he used a shifty ploy to get King God Dragon into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. The God Dragon Tribe is going all out preparing to fight him because of that.”

“So, what are we supposed to do? We definitely have to get to him before the God Dragon Tribe does! We must get that true godhood and those legacy medallions for Young Master Leaf!”

“The brat has ordinary energy arts. His only advantage is his wile and deceit. If he wanted to, he could disappear into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart and we would have no way to chase him.”

“I heard that the Tusita Dynasty has a spell formation that can temporarily negate the powers of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions. Why don’t we ask them if we can borrow it?”

“Borrow it? There’s no way they’ll agree to that unless we work with them. But with Young Master Leaf in seclusion, working with the Tusita Dynasty would be like asking a tiger for its skin.”

“All seventy-one of us are constantly advancing our energy arts, and we’re virtually invincible. What if we worked together to make our own spell formation? The only problem is that I'm not sure we have the god items and magical treasures we would need to actually kill Yang Qi.”

All sorts of opinions and suggestions were being thrown out.

However, no conclusions were made.

At a certain point, Green Merchant rose to his feet. “We’re talking about dealing with one punk, right? I have an idea, if you’re interested in listening.”

“What idea?” people said, looking over at him.

“This Yang Qi has enemies left and right. There are the people from the Nine Yangs God Sect, the Tusita Dynasty, the God Dragon Tribe, and more. All of them want him dead. It’s only a question of who will get to him first. But I got some information recently.”

“Oh, what information?”

“Spit it out, Green Merchant. Don’t tell me you’re intentionally hyping up your story. That’s just what I would expect of a Berserk One.”

“It’s like this,” Green Merchant said, pausing dramatically. “Sectlord Nine Yangs and that brat have a duel set in a little less than three months, right? The Tusita Dynasty is already cooperating with Sectlord Nine Yangs. When the time comes for the duel in the Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple, they’ll have that spell formation set up to prevent the brat from escaping into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. With him locked down, it should be easy to kill him. It seems like the perfect plan, and under ordinary circumstances we would never have been able to find out about it. However, Sectlord Nine Yangs is hoping to curry favor with Young Master Leaf, so he secretly contacted me and told me he's interested in allying with us. He wants to benefit from killing the little punk, and wants to make sure the Tusita Dynasty doesn’t profit at all.”

“So that’s how it is. Sectlord Nine Yangs really is a crafty and murderous fellow.”

“Quiet down, everyone. Let Young Master Green finish explaining.”

Smiling, Green Merchant continued, “Sectlord Nine Yangs has agreed to help us set up our own formation within the larger formation provided by the Tusita Heaven. When the time comes, we break the larger formation, capture Yang Qi, and make our getaway. After we're free, we can deal with Yang Qi. What do you say?”

“It’s not a bad idea. Did Sectlord Nine Yangs come up with that all on his own? A formation within a formation?”

“Considering how crafty and murderous he is, we can’t allow ourselves to fall for any of his tricks. How do we know he’s not actually working with someone else to try harming us?”

“He wouldn’t dare. If he did, Young Master Leaf would wipe out his entire clan! In the past, Young Master Leaf feared him to some extent. But not anymore. In fact, if he wanted to, he could wipe out the Nine Yangs God Sect all the way down to the chickens and dogs!”

“So what do we do right now? Go talk to Sectlord Nine Yangs and make the agreement formal?”

“Yes,” Green Merchant said, his smile broadening. “We met Sectlord Nine Yangs earlier in his secret lair just outside of the Tusita Heaven. Our Courageous One here can bear witness to that fact. Right?”

“Right, exactly,” the Courageous One said, nodding. “We’d just gone to pay a visit to Young Master Green when he asked us to hide. We were able to listen to the whole discussion with Sectlord Nine Yangs. He also claimed to have the backing of some powerful old-timer. As for whether he can really make a formation within a formation, that remains to be seen. We need to go take a look, and if necessary we can just kill him and take the thing for ourselves!”

“Yeah,” Green Merchant said, “I was thinking exactly the same thing. Sectlord Nine Yangs is not one to look down on. I definitely can’t take him on alone. But if we all went, it shouldn’t be a problem. We could hide some of you in a magical treasure I have. Then you pop out, surround Sectlord Nine Yangs, and kill him.”

“Great idea, Young Master Green. Very treacherous of you!”

“It’s true that the seventy-one of us have all recently advanced our energy arts. If we were to join forces, we can make very deadly spell formations. It shouldn’t be difficult at all to trap Sectlord Nine Yangs, then force him to tell us how to make that formation within a formation. Afterward, we can force him to acknowledge allegiance to Young Master Leaf. Think about it; it wasn’t very long ago that he was sheltering that brat Yang Qi. He’s had a death sentence on him for a while now. Let’s go teach him a lesson!”

“Good job, Young Master Green. This is a truly heroic service for Young Master Leaf, so allow me to offer congratulations in advance.”

“Cut the crap. Bring out that treasure of yours for us to hide in, Young Master Green.”

“Hurry up, there’s no time to lose! We seventy-two patriarchs will strike like the wind, and slaughter everyone that gets in our way!”

“Come on, brothers. Let’s take action immediately!”

Thrum.

A glowing bracelet appeared in Green Merchant’s hand, within which could be seen millions upon millions of worlds constantly being born and exterminated. It seemed like a magical treasure, yet it wasn’t. It seemed to contain power, yet it didn’t. It was endlessly profound and mysterious.

“What is that thing?”

“That’s an incredible level of pure power. It’s almost on the level of deathless godliness!”

“When did your cultivation base get so strong, Young Master Green? What good fortune did you come across?”

Everyone in the crowd was breathing sighs of admiration at the sight of the bracelet.

“It's a powerful magical treasure one of the patriarchs of the Green Clan acquired. It's called the Many-Heavens God Bracelet. According to the stories, it has the potential to pull countless heavens inside of it. Of course, I'm not strong enough to use it like that. But I'm definitely strong enough to help you all inside. Then we can leave the Tusita Heaven and meet Sect Lord Nine Yangs in his lair!”

“Excellent. Excellent.”

“Let's go!”

“What a treasure!”

The young patriarchs flew without hesitation into the Many-Heavens God Bracelet, after which a sinister smile appeared on Green Merchant’s face. The plan had worked.

The Many-Heavens God Bracelet was actually a variation on Yang Qi’s Many-Heavens God Seal. It was such a profound and powerful thing that not even Young Master Leaf would have been able to pierce through to see its secrets.

Those who entered it would feel safe, but the truth was that they were tightly bound inside. After leaving the Tusita Heaven, and thus separating from its essence, Yang Qi could cut off the seventy-one patriarchs from the senses of Young Master Leaf.

WHOOSH!

Green Merchant flew out of the Tusita Heaven and into the boundless universe beyond. Before long, he reached a section of primal-chaos debris where an enormous primal-chaos elder-snake lurked.

“I'm here, Milord!”

He could immediately sense Yang Qi.

Yang Qi had come here earlier to set up an enormous spell formation. Using King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans, he transformed the primal-chaos paleo-energy using his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, turning it into something as hard as diamonds, but at the same time as soft as water.

“Come in!” he said.

Green Merchant entered and instantly felt as though the sun and moon were being inverted, the cosmos overturned, and the universe upended.

“Place the Many-Heavens God Bracelet in the spell formation eye!” Yang Qi said, pointing at the spot he was referring to.

RUMBLE!

Green Merchant tossed the Many-Heavens God Bracelet into the primal-chaos eye, causing a host of worlds to shoot out in a dazzling display. The young patriarchs immediately sensed that something strange was going on. Attempting to charge forth, they shouted, “What are you doing, Green Merchant!?”

“Is this a spell formation?”

“Where’s Sectlord Nine Yangs?”

“Open!” Yang Qi said, and thunderous rumbling erupted from his palm as an ancient palace appeared, mighty and imposing. In the blink of an eye, all seventy-one patriarchs, including Green Merchant, were within that primal-chaos palace, bound tightly and unable to move. Looking over, they saw Yang Qi sitting on an ancient throne of primal-chaos, looking down at them. They almost felt like they were staring at some ancient heaven-god, and it gave them the urge to drop to their knees.

Thump. Swish. Rustle.

Six figures strode out and knelt piously in front of the throne. “Greetings, Milord. We brought Young Master Leaf’s other subordinates here, just like you asked. Please, take a look.”

“You did well, and will be handsomely rewarded for your efforts. I think I might just make all of you Buddha Gods. And after I kill Young Master Leaf, I’ll reward you all with even more Fortuned power. Right now, you only have a surface-level command of the powers of the seventy-two constitutions.”

“Many thanks, Milord!” the six of them said, rising to their feet. “That dirty little swine Young Master Leaf is definitely going to die at your hands.”

Never in their wildest dreams could these sixty-five other patriarchs have guessed that something like this would happen.

Looking over at them, Yang Qi said, “Join me, all sixty-five of you. Refuse, and I’ll make you wish you could die!”

“Arggggh!” one of the patriarchs bellowed. “Green Merchant, you actually betrayed Young Master Leaf? You joined Yang Qi? And you called Young Master Leaf a dirty little swine?! This is outright rebellion! How dare you lure us in here. Aren't you worried about us killing you?!”

“Kill him!”

“Diiieeee, you traitor scum!”

“Quick, send a soul message to Young Master Leaf! Tell him six of us brethren turned traitor. Wait, they’re no brethren of ours! Bah! They’re scum, worse than pigs or dogs!”

Chapter 764: Just Too Stubborn

“You all are just too stubborn!”

The sixty-five young patriarchs had erupted like a hornet’s nest, unleashing a bevy of god skills, energy arts, immortal skills, great daos, magical laws and the like, all in a desperate attempt to kill Yang Qi. He simply shook his head as their attacks smashed into the barrier he’d thrown up, causing dazzling light to flicker in all directions.

Crack! Snap!

Not a single one of the attacks made it through.

“Many-Heavens God Seal!”

An enormous sealing mark appeared and quickly wrapped up the various patriarchs until they looked like enormous cocoons. They struggled, but not a single one could break free.

“Everyone join forces!” one of them howled. An energy flow appeared and swept between them, creating three pure-white lotuses that grew larger and larger in what was clearly an attempt to break free.

Under normal circumstances, this group would have been very difficult to deal with. Some of them would’ve escaped already, and they would have been able to send messages to other experts to come help. After all, they all came from the Tusita Heaven to begin with, and their clans had old-timers that would quickly come to their aid.

But Yang Qi lured them into a spell formation, and that changed everything. They couldn’t escape, and were, in fact, being suppressed by the Many-Heavens God Seal. Furthermore, Yang Qi was drawing on the essences of the Heaven Beyond Heaven and the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

Despite that, they were quick on their feet and pooled their powers to create the three white lotuses. Space cracked and ripped as the lotuses grew larger, thrumming with power that, unexpectedly, surpassed anything from King Devil Dragon, King Bone Dragon, or Sectlord Nine Yangs.

Thankfully, this wasn't the full group of seventy-two patriarchs. Young Master Leaf wasn’t present, and Yang Qi had already converted six of them to his cause.

All of them combining the powers of their special constitutions into a huge spell formation would have been a very deadly and formidable situation.

But Yang Qi had ensured that they were in a very weak position.

“Three Flower Convergence!” the sixty-five patriarchs howled in their attempt to break free.

Yang Qi stepped off of his throne, unleashing a palm strike with one hand and performing an incantation gesture with the other, causing a stream of sword light to streak out. “When life turns to death and the void is destroyed, a myriad of long nights stretch out before you. Be broken!”

RUMBLE!

A streak of godlightning appeared, filled with the force of a host of giant gods striking out with axes to split apart heaven and earth, and establish the paths of reincarnation.

This was another energy art state from the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. The Life-Death Void-Destruction God-Lightning. It was something that Yang Qi could use to destroy any immortal world under the twentieth level.

In fact, if he powered it with enough quintessence-blood, it was possible to use it to strike a hole in the greyspace of a thirtieth ranked immortal world. It started out as a tiny spark, but rapidly grew into a deadly conflagration.

POP!

Lightning poured down like rain onto the three white lotuses. The flowers instantly exploded, revealing a host of howling, vicious faces. All sixty-five of the patriarchs coughed up blood, and dropped back down, numb and weak from the blow.

Unfortunately, using the lightning was a big drain on Yang Qi.

The full name of this magic was the Life-Death Void-Destruction Many-Heavens God-Lightning, which supposedly had been created by the supreme Sovereign Lord to destroy god kingdoms, and strike fear into the hearts of all living things. Because of that, it required such an incredible drain of power that even the fabled Lightning God couldn’t use it.

In that one moment, Yang Qi’s true energy drained by roughly thirty percent.

However, the result was that the entire group of patriarchs were so weak they could hardly move. All of them clearly had vital energy injuries.

Yang Qi wasn't done. “Halos of damnification!”

Waving his hand, he caused a whole host of halos to pop up around the patriarchs, making them even weaker.

“Fiend-devil!” one of the patriarchs shouted. “He’s a fiend-devil! He’s actually using halos of damnification! Those are primeval god skills!”

“Very perceptive. You’re the Devouring One, right? With two hundred of King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans? Give them to me!” Yang Qi made a grasping motion and two hundred talismans shot out toward him. Primal-chaos energy flows exploded behind him as an enormous primal-chaos elder-snake appeared, vastly more realistic than before, to the point where it had blood pumping through its body.

Yang Qi previously had two thousand of the talismans, but now he had two thousand two hundred, making him stronger than ever.

After one acquired two thousand, additional talismans would cause substructural changes. Now each talisman bore an image of a hulking figure in a cloak—King Heaven-Devourer himself—who looked down on all existence and fought against the legion of gods.

The power of devouring in Yang Qi grew greater, causing the void around him to crumble. At the same time, he saw information playing out in front of his eyes that was previously locked within the talismans.

As of this moment, he knew where all of the other talismans were. Unexpectedly, most of them were in the Eight Tribes Heaven, the territory of the Dragonfolk, in the hands of one of the old-timers there. As for the rest, they were scattered in random locations within the primal-chaos debris.

After he handled the current matters at hand, he would take the time to finalize his collection. Right now, there was no one who could stop him. He would get all three thousand talismans and fully accept the legacy of King Heaven-Devourer. Long ago, King Heaven-Devourer had been second only to King Immortal-Slayer. He was a Paramount God who savagely devoured numerous members of the legion of gods. Even Consummate Gods had shivered in terror at the mention of his name. As for Yang Qi, he could only dream of having a cultivation base that powerful.

‘Incredible…’ he thought as he noticed the changes to himself. Next, he waved his hand and a host of magical treasures flew out of the possession of the sixty-five patriarchs, including palaces, swords, suits of armor, blades and the like.

They were all items possessed by the original group of seventy-two brethren.

“Mourn-Parting Heaven-Palace halls. Horned King Armor….” All of them were very precious items that would normally be very difficult to collect. However, Young Master Leaf had been very conscientious in his efforts. In his attempt to continue the core teachings and doctrines of King Immortal-Slayer, and even surpass him, he’d hoped to turn all seventy-one of his brethren into god-spirits. Thus, he helped them collect the various treasures they needed.

Now Yang Qi had them, and they would make his people an even more domineering force in the immortal worlds.

The sixty-five patriarchs were now incapable of fighting back, and could only hang their heads in crestfallen disappointment or glare angrily at Yang Qi.

Of course, their hatred toward Green Merchant and the other five patriarchs burned hot and intense. “Green Merchant, you traitor! And the other five of you, too. I can’t believe you would do something like this. Why? Why did you do it?”

Snorting coldly, Green Merchant stepped forward and said, “You bunch of pig-headed bastards! Our lord took a liking to you, and wanted you to work for him. He already forced Sectlord Nine Yangs and King Bone Dragon to submit. And he’ll soon dominate all the other experts in the Dao Defense League, even the old-timers. Young Master Leaf is doomed to die! Join us, and help take down Young Master Leaf. Do you know what amazing rewards you’ll receive? Our lord will refine your energy arts and make you ten times as strong as before!”

“You shameless bitch!” one of the patriarchs spat. “If you think we’re going to betray Young Master Leaf, you might as well stop dreaming!”

“Ai,” Yang Qi sighed. “Green Merchant, it seems to me that these people won’t shed a tear even with the coffin right in front of them. Take these Hell Scourges and beat them!” Six Hell Scourges appeared in the hands of his six followers.

Without hesitation, they fanned out, and soon, screams of agony rose up. It was as if hell had come to the world of men. It didn’t matter how strong these sixty-five patriarchs were, there was no way they could handle this level of pain.

Soon, people began submitting, offering their faith to Yang Qi. Others claimed they would die before giving in and cursed the others for being weak. But as the whips lashed them, they eventually screamed like slaughtered pigs and acknowledged allegiance.

Those who had never experienced the agony of the Hell Scourge could never imagine what it was like. And none could imagine the heaven that people would experience when the lashing stopped.

Eventually, sixty-four of the patriarchs had submitted. There was only one who held strong. As the Hell Scourge lashed him, he suddenly began chanting some sort of ancient mantra, causing his entire body to flicker with golden light that protected him against the whip.

“The śarīra is empty, and is the color of change. Color is the change of emptiness….” It seemed very much like some sort of buddhist mantra designed to weaken the power of hell and reduce hellish pain.

“Hmm?” Yang Qi walked over from his throne of primal-chaos.

The young patriarch looked up at him and shouted, “Bring it on! Beat me! I will sacrifice myself and go to hell before I let anyone else do so! The hellish pain you can provide is a blessing to me! It tempers my Lokapāla Prajñā Safeguard Technique! I'm a Golden Lokapāla One, and my constitution was a blessing from an almighty member of one of the buddhist schools! It's specifically designed to defy hells!”

“Oh really?” Yang Qi knew that the buddhist schools were among the most powerful organizations there were. They’d even contended with the legion of gods, and although they had never gained the upper hand, they were still mighty. They had also never been seen in the immortal worlds, but some of their techniques had been circulated.

Chapter 765: Clone Transformations

“So, a Golden Lokapāla One,” Yang Qi said. “That’s quite a powerful constitution. I had no idea there were buddhist disciples among you seventy-two brethren.” After looking for a moment at this young patriarch who could stand up to the torment of hell, Yang Qi reached out and tapped his forehead.

Crack! Snap!

The patriarch’s energy arts were wiped out of existence and the golden glow which had surrounded him vanished. A moment later, he was squealing in pain.

“You destroyed my energy arts?! You took away my Lokapāla Prajñā Safeguard Technique? Mercy! Please, don’t beat me. Spare me!”

The Golden Lokapāla One couldn’t handle the pain now, and immediately began begging Yang Qi for mercy. He was completely and utterly subdued.

Yang Qi sent sagelight into him, making him the last of the group to convert and become a believer.

RUMBLE!

All seventy-one of the patriarchs now exercised faith in Yang Qi. As a result, a vortex of faith appeared around Yang Qi’s immortal-slaying clone, invincible flows of energy and destiny that poured endlessly into him.

“Defy heaven. Slay immortals….”

Crack. Crunch.

Energy surged in the clone, whose cultivation base began climbing in shocking fashion.

‘What exactly is happening?’ Yang Qi thought. Within his mind, he could see everything that was happening with his clone in the Heaven Beyond Heaven. And even he was completely taken aback.

The clone howled as an immense tempest built up around him, the power levels surging in such an incredible fashion that not even he could absorb them easily.

WHOOSH!

All of a sudden, Yang Qi sensed the four of King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy medallions that he had flying out of his control. They entered the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, then popped out in the vicinity of his clone, where they began belching massive amounts of energy onto him.

‘Such majestic power. Such incredible destiny!’ Yang Qi was completely shocked.

He was aware that the medallions had immense destiny in them; after all, their main function was to store the destiny of those who died with the medallions in their possession. Now that the destiny was coming out into the open, it almost seemed like something that had belonged to a god.

The destiny of gods was completely different from the destiny of humans, and surpassed it in just about every way imaginable. In fact, it even surpassed the level of the true godhood Yang Qi had acquired by many times over.

“Incarnated God level!”

POP!

The destiny from the medallions flowed into the immortal-slaying clone, causing his power to increase rapidly as he broke into a higher cultivation level.

Shockingly, after that, he still had momentum for further breakthroughs. There was energy flowing through him that Yang Qi’s true self couldn’t benefit from; it was godpower from King Immortal-Slayer himself.

‘So incredible!’ Yang Qi thought. After breaking through to the third division, the clone continued, and before long he was a fourth division Shattered God. Even still, Yang Qi wasn’t sure what exactly was happening, or why the faith of the seventy-one patriarchs would produce a result like this.

But then something clicked in his mind, and he realized what was happening.

‘That’s right! The seventy-two patriarchs themselves have immense destiny. Young Master Leaf wanted to emulate the original seventy-two brethren, including King Immortal-Slayer himself. That’s why he gathered these seventy-one patriarchs to begin with. And he helped them develop incredible abilities and collect special magical treasures that were connected to them by destiny. Eventually, he would have demanded faith from them and taken their destiny for his own use. After forcing the seventy-one of them to be believers in him, he could have awoken the true majestic power of King Immortal-Slayer. Now, all of his work is pushing my immortal-slaying clone to an incredibly high level.’

All of a sudden, he realized what precious treasures these seventy-one individuals were.

Before, the immortal-slaying clone had been unsure of how many months or years it might take to achieve any significant progress. But now he was advancing by leaps and bounds. Normally speaking, increases like this would involve thousands, or even millions of years of cultivation for ordinary people.

At the current rate, it seemed like reaching the Chaos God level might even soon be possible.

Yang Qi burst out into hearty laughter. ‘Now all I need to do is add Young Master Leaf to the mix. With his destiny, my immortal-slaying clone will likely be able to reach the Deathless Throne. And at that point, I can easily build the full collection of all nine of King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy medallions. That, in turn, would unlock the full potential of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. I have a feeling that there’s immense power lurking in the profound depths of the chart. I can’t get to it right now, but I could if I recover the full will of King Immortal-Slayer.’

At the moment, not even true godhood would be enough for Yang Qi to become a true god. Stepping from the Chaos God level to the Deathless Throne required unimaginable levels of power.

His requirements were so incredible that not even a thousand bits of true godhood like he had would be enough. Probably not even the god Brahma’s godhood would suffice.

However, if he could recover the power of King Immortal-Slayer, things might be different. That could be the foundation he needed for godly ascension. After all, King Immortal-Slayer had been a Paramount God, second only to the Sovereign Lord.

Yang Qi’s Wheel of Fate seemed to thrum with delight, as though it were cheering for his thought process. Of course, he also knew that it would be a dangerous undertaking. After all, King Immortal-Slayer was an invincible and mighty entity, and his will would do everything possible to absorb Yang Qi.

The more Yang Qi learned about King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions, the more he was convinced that King Immortal-Slayer wasn’t actually dead. He was most likely laying at rest in some aspect of space-time, waiting for the right moment, the right convergence of fate, and the right dao to come along. If that happened, he would awaken, shatter the great heaven above, proclaim himself the ruler of the universe, and become the new Sovereign Lord.

Seeing the thoughtful look on Yang Qi’s face, Green Merchant said, “Milord, Milord! The seventy-one of us are ready to take any orders. Whatever you ask us to do, we’ll do!”

“Good,” Yang Qi replied coolly. “For now, stay in the Tusita Heaven and maintain contact with Young Master Leaf. Keep him off guard, and notify me as soon as he's out of seclusion. He’s my greatest enemy at the moment, and for all intents and purposes he’s like a weaker version of King Immortal-Slayer. I need to kill him to awaken the power of King Immortal-Slayer. Under no circumstances are you to allow him to realize what’s happened here. We need to lure him out of the Tusita Heaven. In here, he’s too strong and will be virtually impossible to kill. Oh, another thing. Try to stir up as much trouble as you can between the Tusita Dynasty and the God Dragon Tribe. I want the God Dragon Tribe destroyed!

“Now, brace yourselves as I cleanse all seventy-one of you and heal any hidden cultivation injuries you have. Don’t worry, before long, all of you will be Buddha Gods, and together you will probably be a match for even Young Master Leaf.”

“Many thanks, Milord!”

All seventy-one of the patriarchs dropped to their knees and kowtowed. In the past, this group would only do such a thing for Young Master Leaf. But Yang Qi had turned everything around. Young Master Leaf was now a general with no troops under his command, and it would only be a matter of time before he came out of seclusion and found, to his utter shock, that his own brethren were conspiring against him.

Young Master Leaf believed himself to be invincible and unparalleled under heaven, and a person who maintained control of all situations. But now, Yang Qi was truly proving to be his archenemy.

As Yang Qi healed and cleansed the seventy-one patriarchs, their energy arts advanced and their hidden potential was unlocked.

“Give me fresh blood!” he said. He flicked his finger, and a drop of blood appeared from the foreheads of all seventy-one patriarchs. The blood flew over to his hand, filled with all sorts of unique energies. He combined the drops into a single blood śarīra, which he then absorbed into himself.

That blood contained the special constitutions of all seventy-one of the patriarchs. At first, their energies were in conflict, but Yang Qi was able to neutralize those effects with the God Legion Seal. Before long, the power of all those constitution types was flowing through him.

Yang Qi had long since cultivated the Physique of the Sovereign Lord, a body type connected to the actual Sovereign Lord that could accommodate all types of constitutions. In fact, to cultivate the Physique of the Sovereign Lord to the ultimate level, he would need to combine all three thousand of the unique constitutions.

‘General Samman is going to be arriving through that passageway soon. I definitely need to set a trap to kill him. Having vivicreation systems in my fragment of the Cruiser of Civilization will be a huge benefit. With enough power, I can use them to do all sorts of incredible things—for example, analyze the seventy-one constitutions I just acquired and produce more unique constitution blood.’

Supposedly, the Lord of Civilization, who was a Paramount God, built the Cruiser of Civilization with science and technology from many planes of existence. With even a single drop of blood, it could completely replicate any type of constitution!

Chapter 766: The Buddha Dragon Tribe

Yang Qi was waiting for Young Master Leaf to come out of seclusion, and the arrival of General Samman.

However, his plans had changed.

Some time ago, he had been too weak to take on General Samman, who had vivicreation systems on his fragment of the Cruiser of Civilization. Originally, Yang Qi had hoped to get General Samman into a fight with Young Master Leaf. Then, when they were both wounded and running low on energy, he could jump in to launch a fatal blow. But now he was thinking of just directly attacking General Samman and taking away his piece of the Cruiser of Civilization, as well as any legacy medallions he possessed.

After all, there was always the remote possibility that General Samman and Young Master Leaf would end up joining forces, and that would be a big problem.

Of course, there was also the chance that General Samman had three of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions. Since Young Master Leaf had only two, General Samman could easily take them. Then Yang Qi would lose any control he had over the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. As the saying went, long delays usually lead to trouble, therefore, Yang Qi felt that his best bet was to try to get more of the legacy medallions as quickly as possible. General Samman had at least one, so that meant that Yang Qi could, at a minimum, reach a total of five. Of course, that would also benefit his immortal-slaying clone.

POP!

Even as he was considering these matters, his clone was heading toward another breakthrough. He was now in the peak of the Shattered God level and was still absorbing energy. It seemed a foregone conclusion that he would soon become a fifth division Nirvanic God.

‘I wonder how close General Samman is. I suppose I can use King Heaven-Devourer’s talisman to check.’

Yang Qi currently commanded a total of two thousand two hundred of the talismans. However, he’d placed two hundred of them near Brahma’s heart, which he could easily use to gather vital energy from the future.

Because of that, it was an easy task to peer into the depths of the space-time wormhole that served as the passage between the present and the future.

He sent out a stream of divine will, and before long he was inside the passageway. Of course, he wasn’t there physically, so what he was doing wasn’t particularly taxing. Almost immediately, Brahma noticed his presence, and despite being somewhat surprised, gave him a small portion of godpower to help his current effort. Pleased at Brahma’s friendly reaction, Yang Qi nodded and continued on.

Soon, he saw an enormous spacecraft flying along at incredible speed. Based on what he could tell, it would arrive in the present world fairly soon.

‘I only have about three days before he gets here. That should be enough time to head to the Eight Tribes Heaven and try to get those imperial snakecharms. Getting a few hundred more would be a nice boost.’

Considering what he was capable of doing with two thousand two hundred of the talismans, he could hardly imagine what would happen if he had all three thousand. Just getting the additional two hundred that he had recently, he could sense that there were at least three hundred in the hands of the old-timer in the Eight Tribes Heaven. If he got them, he would have close to two thousand five hundred, and would definitely reach a much higher cultivation level.

Swish!

Just like that, he vanished from in front of the seventy-one patriarchs.

Now that his Angel Wings had transformed into Freedom Wings, it was like he had the same freedom as the ancient legion of gods. With no effort at all, he could fly past thousands upon thousands of worlds, and even see into parallel universes. Before long, he was high above the heavens within primal-chaos.

Soon, he was nearing the home of the Dragonfolk, the Eight Tribes Heaven, which was nestled within primal-chaos so boundless that only gods could use it to create new worlds. According to certain stories, when doomsday came, boundless tribulations of earth, water, fire, and wind would spring forth and destroy everything, after which a new world would be ushered in.

‘This is just what I would expect from the Eight Tribes Heaven, a place ruled by the Dragonfolk!’

This place seemed even bigger than the Tusita Heaven and was more on par with the Heaven Beyond Heaven.

It was filled with mists that resembled dragon scales, which could turn ordinary people who breathed it into dragons.

As the mists became particularly dense, they formed entire continents, upon which both humans and animals that were half-dragon could be seen, mixing together to create a very unique cultivation society. A closer look revealed that there were many such continents floating here and there, like satellites orbiting a larger world.

Yang Qi realized exactly what he was looking at. The outer continents were inhabited by half-dragon servants, who resulted from couplings between Dragonfolk and outsiders. Their blood obviously couldn’t compare to true Dragonfolk, and they were considered bastards who didn’t deserve to work on their cultivation in the Eight Tribes Heaven itself.

In the Eight Tribes Heaven, there were the actual eight tribes, which included buddha, god, heaven, and true dragons. But there were many other minor clans, such as silver, gold, jade, fire, and black dragons, as well as many others.

The latter weren’t considered very powerful or influential.

Immortals who weren’t native to the Eight Tribes Heaven, but wanted to enter it, had to travel through the Continents of Scales, which were sort of like a defensive barrier.

Of course, the half-dragons there were very strong, and although they were looked down upon as bastards by the Dragonfolk, when compared to human cultivators, they were still very imperious. In fact, they considered themselves to have very mighty blood that made humans naturally inferior. It was even a common thing for them to capture and enslave human cultivators.

Yang Qi wasn’t in a mood to deal with them, so he simply flew straight through the misty continents and pierced right through the greyspace of the immortal world.

The vital energy of the Eight Tribes Heaven immediately enveloped him, and as he breathed, it attempted to transform him into a half-dragon hybrid.

He quickly drew on the Eight Tribes Godfist and the vital energy melted and collapsed, transforming into a unique type of Heaven-Devouring śarīra.

The śarīras from the Heaven Beyond Heaven were mysterious and energetic. They almost didn’t seem to belong to this universe, but rather some other civilization. The śarīras from the Tusita Heaven were violet and glittering, almost like nobility, filled with the energy of kings and emperors.

As for śarīras that formed in the Eight Tribes Heaven, they resembled dragonpearls filled with millions upon millions of dragons. They were marvelous, and pulsed with a very domineering aura.

‘So, where exactly are these talismans?’ Looking around this world of dragons, Yang Qi saw towering trees and lush vegetation, all of it strange and bizarre. At one point, he squatted to look at a tiny plant that was pulsing with an aura of dragons. As soon as he got close, it shot out a hail of seeds that resembled dragon teeth, which plinked against his defensive empyrean energy. Any other Godmyth other than himself would have been pierced through.

‘Dragon Tooth Grass?’

He dug the plant out of the soil and could sense from its spirit power that it could be used to make immortal pills like Dragon Power Pills. And the science and technology of the future could use it as a main ingredient for a high-level medicinal brew.

Of course, now was not the time to go around harvesting plants. He needed to find King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans as quickly as possible.

The Eight Tribes Heaven was a strange and marvelous place, like a heaven for anyone who practiced cultivation. Demolishers who came here and somehow managed to stave off the effects of the vital energy would benefit immensely. For that reason, it was a common thing for immortals from other locations to try to sneak in and harvest materials. Unfortunately, most such individuals ended up being discovered and killed.

‘Let’s see if I can sense them!’ Yang Qi transformed into a primal-chaos elder-snake and swirled through the air, trying to lock onto the location of the talismans.

The Eight Tribes Heaven was a huge place, filled with complex terrain features including oceans, mountains, and wastelands. There were actually few cities. The Dragonfolk preferred a more rustic way of life, building nests and lairs in the oceans and mountains. Sometimes various dragon tribes would have dealings with each other, trading things like medicinal ingredients and cultivation equipment, but they wouldn’t form long-term associations. They didn’t build large sects, like humans did.

Humans preferred gathering together in large groups, but the Dragonfolk opted for a more solitary existence. That was just one of the big differences between people and dragons.

Thanks to all of his recent advancements, Yang Qi was able to speed through the Eight Tribes Heaven in a blur. And thanks to the Heaven-Devouring śarīras he was able to form here—and the addition of bits from the true godhood he had—not even the most elite cultivators among the Dragonfolk could match him for speed.

Although there were dangers in this place, he was able to avoid them all.

Gong!

At a certain point, he finally sensed the aura of the imperial snakecharms. Almost at the same time, he heard the ringing of a bell.

The bell continued ringing, booming like thunder or the voice of a buddha.

‘That’s the lokapāla zen music of a buddhist school. Who among the Dragonfolk would be playing music like that?’ To Yang Qi’s surprise, an enormous temple appeared up ahead, nestled in the peaks of the mountains.

It was nearly as large as an ordinary immortal world and shone with dazzling golden light that resembled burning suns.

‘This must be where the Buddha Dragon Tribe is! The most mysterious of all the Dragonfolk! So, my search for King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans have led me to the buddha dragons!’ Yang Qi said in shock.

Chapter 767: The Remaining Talismans

‘These buddha dragons seem different from the other Dragonfolk. That sprawling temple is amazing, almost like one of the buddhist schools. I wonder how strong they are. I definitely can’t do anything rash, but I do need to check the situation out.’

Yang Qi knew that, just like the Tusita Heaven, the Eight Tribes Heaven had mysterious and unpredictable old-timers, experts with consummate and invincible divine abilities who could easily destroy him if they joined forces. Right now, he was about as strong as a demigod patriarch, perhaps even a bit stronger. But if a whole group of demigods set up a spell formation to use against him, he would be in big trouble.

He’d seen the clone of the emperor of the Tusita Heaven, and knew that he wasn’t prepared to deal with the might of demigods.

If he could rise one more level and become a Tempered God, he would have much less to fear. And of course, further breakthroughs would eventually make it so that no old-timer could handle him, even if they used god items. By the time he was a Chaos God, he would probably only fear other people with God Legion Seals.

Yang Qi had never really viewed Young Master Leaf or General Samman as true rivals. Not even Proud Heaven deserved that. Only those with God Legion Seals were his true enemies.

He flew a bit nearer to the temple and landed on a mountain peak to get a closer look. He saw people coming and going, male and female, all of them wearing kāṣāyas, softly chanting words of prayer with their palms together.

They looked human, but naturally, they were not. They were Dragonfolk in human form, and they all had pious expressions on their faces. To Yang Qi’s surprise, not a single one of them were in the Demolishing level. They were all Godmyths, and quite a few were fifth division Nirvanic Gods.

These Dragonfolk were profound and noble, with paragonic auras that made it obvious that the buddha dragons were the most powerful of the dragons.

‘What incredible faith,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘I would say that a single buddha dragon has faith purer than a hundred million experts from any other immortal world. I wonder what I could create with even a drop of faith like that. It’s so pure, completely without spot.’

Glowing light swirled above his palm as he used the imperial snakecharms to reach out to their three hundred companions, which he now realized were in the temple up ahead. There was some invincible power locking them down, making it impossible for them to move. It was a completely enigmatic power that seemed to originate in ancient times, like the origin of all faith.

‘Hold on,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘Why does it seem like something from the past? It is! It's the aura of the past. Has a Past One been here?’

It was a stunning development.

The Brahman Immortal World had been created by Future Ones to facilitate passage from the future. That was the starting point to their invasion, and it was the reason the virtually never-ending amount of immortal worlds were in such a stir.

All in all, the two sides were evenly matched.

But now, Yang Qi’s imperial snakecharms had led him deep into the Eight Tribes Heaven, where he’d encountered the aura of the past. It seemed clear to Yang Qi what was going on.

The Buddha Dragon Tribe had a spell formation set up that was very similar to the one in the Brahman Immortal World. The only difference was that this passageway was to allow Past Ones passage into the present.

Of course, if Yang Qi traveled through the space-time passageway into the future world, he would gain the constitution of a Past One. Such constitutions were dependent on the direction of travel and little else.

Immediately, Yang Qi was on guard, aware that important secrets pertaining to a past age were now in play. His cultivation base probably wasn’t at a high enough level to tangle openly with such forces, so he had to be very careful.

A moment later, he was sneaking into the temple.

The buddha dragons inside had all assumed human form and maintained silence as they bustled about. It almost seemed like they were preparing for some important event.

As he got closer to the location of King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans, the temple surroundings grew larger and more majestic. There were numerous divine likenesses of buddhas, their fingers shaped into a host of different incantation seals as though they were practicing consummate energy arts.

At a certain point, he heard two people talking.

“Li'er, do you think the summoning will be successful?” a young man said. “Will we really link the present with the past, and bring an almighty entity into our world? Once we do, our Eight Tribes Heaven will control the cosmos, and our Buddha Dragon Tribe will definitely be powerful enough to crush both the Dao Defense League and the future world!”

“I’d say it’s highly likely!” replied the voice of a young woman. “Hmph! The immortal worlds are like the eternal sands of the universe, and they’re virtually all inhabited by humans. We Dragonfolk deserve to be the true rulers of the many heavens! Even the Dao Defense League was set up by humans in the hopes of creating a new Heavenly Court to rule over the cultivation world. They’ve set up an unprecedented system, and if we don’t do something about it, they’ll eventually force us Dragonfolk to work for them as servants.”

“That’s never going to happen. How could the noble Dragonfolk ever act as servants? You think we’re going to kowtow like human slaves and run around with our tails between our legs? No way.”

“Well, you’re right about that! We Dragonfolk are true nobility, especially us buddha dragons. We’re the ones who founded the buddhist sects that eventually rivaled the legion of gods. Those buddhist schools eventually faded out of existence, but their spirit lives on. Who the hell do these immortal humans think they are? They think they have what it takes to defy us? We should just enslave all of them!”

“Hold on. Don’t put the cart before the horse. Wait until the warrior buddhas and dragon rājas from the past arrive. Then, the structure of the immortal worlds will change. We’ll become the true rulers, and the humans will be our slaves. Just imagine how wonderful it would be if all buddha dragons had a human cultivator as a slave!”

Yang Qi looked in the direction of the voices and saw a young man and woman in a temple hall, training in sword techniques.

They were obviously very skilled at swordplay, and their weapons shone with golden, buddhist light. Within the light were tiny golden battle rājas who were chanting zen sayings as they unleashed destructive energy, which was in fact godpower that could devastate devils!

The young man and woman were both second division Tempered Gods, but Yang Qi could tell from the force of their attacks that they could easily cut down a Nirvanic God from an immortal sect.

The buddha dragon constitution was obviously no less incredible than the three thousand special constitutions. Even newborn baby dragons had the power to move mountains, fill in seas, pluck stars, and snatch moons. And adult dragons could easily crush immortal worlds.

To buddha dragons, the cultivation levels below Godmyth were like nothing. They could literally sleep through the entire process of reaching the Godmyth level.

It was only after becoming Godmyths that they had to work on their own cultivation.

‘So, that's what’s going on,’ Yang Qi thought after overhearing their conversation. The buddha dragons had some big ambitions; they wanted to conquer the immortal worlds and set themselves up as the ultimate rulers.

They were correct in that the Dao Defense League had been set up by humans, and that they hoped to turn it into the Heavenly Court. If they managed to defeat the future world, they would definitely benefit from the destiny of the dao of heaven and unite all of the countless immortal worlds. If that happened, it was entirely possible the Dragonfolk could end up acting as government servants.

However, no matter how tough the Dragonfolk were, they weren’t strong enough to take on the entire Dao Defense League, thus they were summoning powerful allies to help them.

The past, the present, and the future were coming together, and it was sure to usher in a new age. Perhaps the culmination of this conflict would cause a new world to gradually be born. It was impossible to say what type of era it would be. One thing was for sure, the civilization would not be that of the past, present, or future.

It was a mysterious and confusing topic that seemed to defy logic, and Yang Qi couldn’t quite wrap his mind around it. It was very confusing to think about the future, but what he did know was that, regardless of exactly how things played out, he needed to get stronger. And then, even stronger.

That was something that would never change.

“Lokapāla Rāja God Sword!” the young woman shouted, and she unleashed a devastating attack that would surely slaughter even a sixth division Revisionist God.

Expression flickering, the young man slashed out with his own sword. “Prajñā Buddha Rāja Sword!”

The swords clashed and an explosion of pāraka godflowers appeared, within which were entire kingdoms of dragons. The progenitors of the buddha dragons had been the ones who founded the buddhist schools, which ultimately rivaled the legion of gods before being put to an end by them.

In the middle of their practice session, an ancient voice rang out, “Are you two still practicing sword techniques? Stand at attention! The time has come for you to take your turn controlling King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans! There are one hundred and eight thousand missions associated with our master plan, and this particular mission is very important among them. Furthermore, the blessing of power from the past will likely increase your cultivation by five levels!”

Chapter 768: Passageway to the Past

An ancient divine will of immense power filled the area, the kind of will that could seep through the crevices that separated universes.

There were rifts that existed between universes, and it was in just such a location that Yang Qi was hiding, making him completely invisible. Yet despite being hidden in that way, the divine will of this old-timer could apparently seep into all sorts of hyperdimensions, which was a real shock to Yang Qi.

As the divine will swept toward him, he shrank himself down and slipped past it like a slippery loach.

A moment later, the divine will was gone.

Yang Qi let loose a shaky breath as he returned to his normal state.

‘So strong! There are old-timers everywhere among the buddha dragons. That must have been a Chaos God, just a step away from the Deathless Throne. I wonder how many minor stairs he’s ascended.’

Yang Qi knew more about the Chaos God level now, and was aware that it featured nine minor stairs that one had to scale to actually reach the Deathless level. It was very similar to how Dao-Demolishing involved nine lineaments on the dao heart.

Being on those nine minor stairs would make a Chaos God a demigod. It was a very mysterious period—often referred to as the Deathless Heavenly Stairway—which of course led to the Deathless Throne. Yang Qi didn’t truly understand it all, he’d just read descriptions of the minor stairs in certain daoist texts he’d come across.

However, based on how things were progressing, Yang Qi felt confident that he would reach the Chaos God level soon. Then he would gain further insights into the minor stairs and begin his own process of gaining enlightenment.

Meanwhile, the words the old man had just spoken were nothing short of astonishing.

Apparently, they had one hundred and eight thousand missions as part of their master plan, and one of the most important had to do with the three hundred imperial snakecharms.

These two young buddha dragons were Tempered Gods who were being told to take advantage of the link between the past and present to experience an increase of five cultivation levels.

That would make them Measureless Gods.

It was completely unprecedented. If a human cultivator, even the emperor of the Tusita Heaven, was told that they could go from the second division to the seventh division in a short moment, they’d probably slap whoever had told them and curse them for being a lunatic.

It was simply impossible.

That was especially true of buddha dragons, who faced more difficulty than average dragons when it came to progressing through the Godmyth level. Increasing one’s level usually required enlightenment, cultivation, power, wisdom, perseverance, and plenty of destiny. In fact, it required astronomical amounts of all those things.

There was no way that this old man was just making up stories. Apparently, when the passageway to the Primeval Age was opened, the power unleashed would be enough to cause just about anyone to experience cultivation breakthroughs.

‘Is the power from the Primeval Age that incredible? I guess it must be. I wonder how soon this is going to happen. Should I just wait around and hope to use some of that power for myself? Somehow, I have the feeling that that's not the best idea. After all, the Brahman Immortal World used the power of the god Brahma to establish the connection with the future world. The buddha dragons obviously have to be using something similar; how else could they establish the connection? I wonder, do they have something similar to Brahma?’

The buddha dragons were ruthlessly ambitious. It seemed obvious that allowing them to open a passageway to the past and summon lokapāla warriors and dharmic rājas would lead to a big disaster. The fight between the future world and the Dao Defense League was still raging, with heavy casualties on both sides.

“The Dragonfolk want to conquer humankind, but it's not going to be that easy. I need to foil their plans and get my hands on those imperial snakecharms. Then we’ll see how things lie. That said, I don’t think I should actually take the talismans. I should leave them in place just like I did with the ones back in the Brahman Immortal World. That way I can use them to keep an eye on the passageway!”

With that, he put thought into the matter, coming up with a host of plans and backup plans.

Considering how strong he was, he could always throw the Eight Tribes Heaven into chaos. But the god dragons wouldn’t be easy to fight, let alone the buddha dragons, who were supreme among the Dragonfolk.

And for all he knew, they might call on the help of the other seven tribes to deal with him.

Even worse, Yang Qi was fairly certain that this temple's warding magics protected universal power nodes. In other words, the palace was likely something that had originally been built by the legion of gods and could not be easily destroyed.

The young man and woman sheathed their swords and hurried into the depths of the palace as instructed by the old man. They walked through a doorway and into a wide square full of altars, atop each of which was a banner that was a god item, embroidered with the image of a heaven-god holding a devil-suppressing wand. As the banners waved in the wind, the images of those gods seemed very realistic, as though they might walk out into the open at any time.

In the middle of all the altars and banners were three hundred talismans. They were enormous, and pulsed with the aura of King Heaven-Devourer, which gave them the form of a primal-chaos elder-snake as they devoured the energy pulsing off of what appeared to be some sort of pearl!

It was small, only the size of a human head, but it pulsed with immense godly might.

‘What incredible faith and godliness! And… the power of the past world!’ Yang Qi was stunned.

Suddenly, he heard the photonic computers of the Cruiser of Civilization speaking to him.

[Beep-beep-beep. Beep-beep-beep. Heterogeneous power discovered. Power source is the past civilization! Extremely pure and strong!  Compatibility level one hundred and twenty percent. This power can be used to travel through space-time.]

‘What's that supposed to mean? One hundred and twenty percent? I thought one hundred percent was the highest possible.’ He sent out some divine will to check the photonic computers and confirmed that they were really saying the compatibility level was one hundred and twenty percent.

That meant this power surpassed that of the future world.

If he could get that power into his fragment of the Cruiser of Civilization, it would definitely replenish the reserves and push the cruiser to a higher level. Right now, the power he’d fed into it had only reached the level of one ten-thousandth. The next major watersheds were one thousandth, one hundredth, and one tenth. Afterward, the fragment of the cruiser would reach its ultimate potential.

“Junior Sister, let’s begin our cultivation,” the young man said. “With King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans to control the ancient passageway, we can draw on the power here to achieve progress vastly superior to anything outside. I’d say we can achieve a hundredfold speed at the minimum.”

“Ah, what a pity. There just aren’t enough of the talismans. If we had three thousand to stand guard over, we could probably be Chaos Gods in the blink of an eye.”

“Hmph. There’s no way we would ever get the chance to stand guard over three thousand of them. They would only give that privilege to the son of the clan chief. From what I’ve heard, the son of the chief is guarding a powerful artifact from the scientific and technological civilization, something called the Engine of the One God. It provides an even faster cultivation speed. With that, he's almost guaranteed to become a demigod, and by extension, one of the most powerful people in the clan—just like the old-timers.”

‘What did he just say?’ Yang Qi thought, his jaw dropping. He’d heard of the Engine of the One God before, and knew that it was one of the most powerful systems available to the Cruiser of Civilization. It made it much easier to locate and take other fragments of the cruiser, even against the will of those who possessed them. With that, it would make the task of piecing together the full cruiser far easier.

“You can wear out iron shoes in a fruitless search, then find what you're looking for without even trying!” Yang Qi looked on as the two young buddha dragons began their session of cultivation and simultaneously stood guard over King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans.

Being very careful, he sent some of his true energy into both of them.

They suddenly shivered and opened their eyes.

“Junior Sister, did you just feel something? It was almost like the aura of some powerful person just entered us, causing our cultivation bases to improve.”

She nodded. “Yes, I felt exactly the same thing. Where did that energy come from? It's so pure! It’s consummate energy from the Eight Tribes Godfist!”

“What? Did someone combine all eight forms? No one among the Dragonfolk has ever done that! People are saying that the clan chief’s son might be able to, with the help of the Engine of the One God.”

“Where did the energy come from?”

“Maybe one of the ancient ancestors is about to come through the space-time passageway and is showing favor to us.”

“I'd say that's highly likely!”

“Well, let’s see how far we can push our cultivation now!”

Of course, they had no idea that it was Yang Qi trifling with them. He had used some of the pure power of the Eight Tribes Godfist to push their energy arts to a higher level. But the truth was that he did that to mask the fact that he had inserted some of his nascent divinity into them. Now he could possess them at will and make them do anything he wanted.

As the two sank deeper into trances, circulating the energy of the Eight Tribes Godfist, they began absorbing the power provided by King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi’s nascent divinity was seeping into the power pearl.

POP!

Slowly but surely, he was fusing with these three hundred talismans!

In that moment, the power coming from the past world surged to thousands of times the previous level!

Chapter 769: Plundering

These two young buddha dragon experts had no idea that they were already essentially puppets. They still thought they were benefiting from heavenly blessings as they worked on their cultivation.

RUMBLE!

Breaking through to become Incarnated Gods, they devoured the power in front of them with increased voracity. This ancient energy from the Primeval Age was vastly superior to what Yang Qi had seen from the future, and it didn’t even come with heavenly tribulation.

These two felt like there must be some powerful god watching over them, thus they focused even more deeply on their work.

Little did they know that they were actually only getting about one percent of the power and quintessence. The other ninety-nine percent was going to Yang Qi.

After all, the three hundred talismans were already forming a resonance with the two thousand other talismans inside Yang Qi.

Yang Qi did have two thousand, but two hundred were actually back in the passageway leading to the future world. They still belonged to him, they just weren’t in his direct possession.

The two thousand he currently had, plus the three hundred amidst the altars, was a total of two thousand three hundred.

With their powers combined, they were able to gobble up the power from the past at a rate that vastly surpassed anything from before. After all, adding new talismans to an existing collection didn’t lead to a mere linear addition of power. The curve just seemed to go up and up.

The power of countless hells twitched inside of Yang Qi, wriggling and growing as his cultivation base improved. He could sense that he was now very close to the second division Tempered God level, and a breakthrough was imminent.

Of course, he couldn't attempt the breakthrough right here and now. Although he had the ability to dismantle the dao of heaven in a certain area, that was only useful when other people were facing heavenly tribulation. It didn’t work on himself, owing to the fact that he cultivated an energy art of the Sovereign Lord and was a Fateless One. When he advanced his cultivation, he didn't anger the dao of heaven, but rather was punished by ancient god tribulation, which was the wrath of the legion of gods.

God tribulation could easily destroy massive sections of space-time, and even universes.

Therefore, he sealed his cultivation base and just continued to absorb the power. He had three days until General Samman reached the Tusita Heaven. Three days to hone himself and prepare to catch the man completely off guard and take his fragment of the Cruiser of Civilization.

That said, he also knew that the Engine of the One God was nearby, and that was something he absolutely had to get his hands on. Although he wasn’t sure what all of the specific benefits it would bring to the Cruiser of Civilization were, he knew that he needed it.

[Power transformation. Reserves at one thousandth.]

[Power transformation. Reserves at one hundredth.]

[Beep-beep-beep-beep. Beep-beep-beep. Power reserves have surpassed one hundredth. Systems upgrading. Prepare for transformations.]

RUMBLE!

Two days passed, in which the Cruiser of Civilization absorbed massive amounts of power from the ancient world. At one point, a massive transformation occurred as the photonic computers suddenly spat out numerous glowing humanoid figures.

These glowing figures were made of light particles from ancient times, pieced together in some miraculous fashion until they were similar to paper talismans, except that they had human forms, complete with blood vessels, organs, and limbs. Upon being fully put together, they were actual living beings.

[Angels of Light successfully formed.]

In the blink of an eye, a host of these Angels of Light were created, who then flew out into different positions and stations within the Cruiser of Civilization to put things into order, initiate repairs, and perform systems maintenance. In the end, it gave Yang Qi greater control over the spacecraft.

Eventually, the photonic computers spoke again.

[Converting power reserves, initiating manufacturing….]

Yang Qi could sense that the massive influx of power was causing this fragment of the Cruiser of Civilization to become more complete, and thus, stronger.

There were many secrets being unlocked, while others, such as the genetic systems, were growing much more powerful.

[Beep-beep-beep. Genetic systems augmented. It is now possible to manufacture Angels of Light by means of photochemical alteration of human genes.]

Photochemical alteration involved transforming a human into an expression of light, which would make them faster, and much more dangerous in combat. It would also allow a person to absorb any type of light and convert it into true energy, leading to incomprehensible possibilities.

‘Great. The power reserves have finally received a major upgrade. And there were many minor areas of damage that have now been repaired. However, now's not the time to examine the cruiser in detail. I need to get out of here. This young man and woman are already puppets; I can take over their wills at any time. I’ll come back later to take away the imperial snakecharms and get the Engine of the One God!’

In the blink of an eye, he was out of the Eight Tribes Heaven. Heading through numerous universes, he reached the entrance of the Heaven Beyond Heaven, which he entered without incident.

Instantly, massive amounts of power assailed him.

‘It's time for the supreme magical laws of the Tempered God level!’

There was no time for thought or contemplation, so Yang Qi extended one hand toward heaven and one hand toward earth and directly summoned the god tribulation. Instantly, a host of godly palaces appeared, filled with dharmic guards tasked with protecting the legion of gods. There were even golden buddhas present.

RUMBLE!

One of the buddhas reached down with an enormous hand that pulsed with vital energy as tough as diamonds. Yang Qi’s defensive empyrean energy began crumbling, but then he opened his mouth, flew up in the air, and devoured the buddha.

He was like an ancient god dragon who whipped back and forth, merely inhaling to suck one ancient god after another directly into him. It was as though he were going through simple breathing exercises! As he inhaled and exhaled, it was as if all heaven and earth conformed to his breathing.

More and more manifestations of god tribulation appeared, until Yang Qi felt like he was in direct communication with the great will of the legion of gods.

Crack! Snap!

Yang Qi’s body collapsed into countless particles that were hells in and of themselves. The power of hell surged forth, streaks of light that represented his rising cultivation base.

The bit of true godhood he’d acquired trembled and sent its power into the countless hell particles, causing numerous infernal deities to appear.

Millions upon millions of infernal deities began chanting and singing to the greatness of the Sovereign Lord.

This was what it looked like as Yang Qi began forming his own virtual godhood. The infernal deities were the virtual godhood, and as they grew clearer, Yang Qi entered the Tempered God level.

When he reached the Incarnated God level, those infernal deities would grow even more clear, and of course, stronger.

Before long, Yang Qi had absorbed all the tribulation, and was in the Tempered God level.

He rose to his feet and loud cracking sounds rang out, detonations with enough force to destroy immortal worlds. The primal-chaos beasts that existed in the Heaven Beyond Heaven all shrank back in fear as their genetic memories told them a god was coming.

Yang Qi threw his head back and laughed heartily. He knew that it wouldn’t be long before he could stand amidst the legion of gods, and reach his own Deathless Throne. Now that he’d risen another level, his understanding of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth had grown more precise and he had a much better idea of what path he needed to take to reach godly ascension.

While in the Seer God level, he had easily subjugated Chaos Gods, killed King Devil Dragon, and approached levels of strength similar to Demigod patriarchs. Now, he was stronger than ever. He had nothing to fear from even the most elite old-timers. In fact, if two such individuals attacked him at the same time, he would still have a chance of coming out on top.

Meanwhile, his immortal-slaying clone sat in an ancient god formation, working on his own cultivation. The destiny from the seventy-one patriarchs had rapidly pushed his cultivation base forward. He was already a fifth division Nirvanic God, just on the verge of becoming a sixth division Revisionist God. It seemed likely that it wouldn’t take much time at all for him to become a ninth division Chaos God.

It was a speed of cultivation that geniuses throughout history could never match. And it was likely no one would ever progress so quickly again.

Yang Qi let him be and left the Heaven Beyond Heaven.

The place was an immortal world full of immense secrets and mysteries. It was originally supposed to belong to Chancellor Demi-Immortal, but now Yang Qi had it. Unfortunately, he had yet to fully explore it, as he needed to be a Chaos God before he could fully take control of the essence of the place. When he did, he would have a thirty-third ranked immortal world to call home, and wouldn’t need to hide out in other places.

Thirty-third ranked immortal worlds existed at the ultimate peak of all immortal worlds and were virtually indestructible. Unless an actual god came along, there was nothing that could possibly pose a threat to places like those.

The only thing that existed beyond the immortal worlds was endless primal-chaos, which was why the thirty-third ranked immortal worlds were nestled into primal-chaos.

‘It’s time. General Samman is coming. I’m going to get another fragment of the Cruiser of Civilization, and some more of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions. I can’t let this opportunity slip through my hands.’

From his vantage point within the primal-chaos debris, Yang Qi could look down and see the Brahman Immortal World and the passageway leading to the future world. Suddenly, light flickered there and an enormous spacecraft appeared, which immediately headed in the direction of the Tusita Heaven.

‘So fast,’ Yang Qi thought. It was moving so quickly that, if he hadn’t just stepped into the Tempered God level he would never have been able to track its movements, much less catch up to it.

His own part of the Cruiser of Civilization had power reserves at the level of one hundredth, but this other version was clearly completely full!

Chapter 770: Samman Arrives

‘I don’t care if your fragment of the Cruiser of Civilization is fully powered, I'm still going to defeat you today!’

Yang Qi could already sense the faint aura of King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy medallions and couldn’t have been more pleased. If he succeeded in his effort today, he would definitely be one step closer to crushing Leaf Dao-Denier. His path of cultivation would also be made clearer.

General Samman’s Cruiser of Civilization was so fast that Yang Qi’s fragment couldn’t catch it in a chase. But thankfully Yang Qi was a Tempered God now, making him vastly superior to his previous self.

His Angel Wings were now Freedom Wings, and despite the fact that General Samman’s Cruiser of Civilization had vivicreation systems, it didn’t have complete propulsion systems.

If it had the Engine of the One God, then even if Yang Qi’s Freedom Wings were capable of ten times their normal speed, he still wouldn’t be able to catch up.

Relying on the incredible speed of his Freedom Wings, Yang Qi flew to some primal-chaos debris some distance outside of the Tusita Heaven.

The primal-chaos around thirty-third ranked immortal worlds was very dangerous, with tempests that could be deadly even to ninth division Chaos Gods. Legend had it that there was one specific kind of primal-chaos tempest called the Godgrave Hurricane, which was capable of putting an end to even gods.

Even experts from the Tusita Heaven rarely traversed primal-chaos tempests; most of the time they preferred using teleportation portals to travel about.

Yang Qi could predict the path General Samman would take to the Tusita Heaven. Thus, he went out into the primal chaos and organized some of the debris into a huge formation. Each piece of primal-chaos debris was huge, equivalent to a twentieth-ranked immortal world. But even things like that were easy for Yang Qi to manipulate now.

And he had an innate connection to the powers of primal-chaos.

WHOOSH!

The spacecraft appeared, but apparently sensed something and stopped outside of the primal-chaos formation Yang Qi had put together.

[Beep-beep-beep. Beep-beep-beep.]

The future warriors in the spacecraft were bustling about anxiously, checking the readouts on the photonic computers.

[Danger ahead. Extreme Danger. Halting momentum and scanning for unknown entities. Unable to measure rank… unable to measure power, unable to measure battle prowess….]

General Samman rose from his throne on the bridge. “What’s going on?” he asked coolly.

One of the future warriors hurried over. “General, there appears to be some primal-chaos debris that’s formed into a natural spell formation. It’s right in our path. Our hyperdrive systems are saying there’s something dangerous about it and we shouldn’t go in. There might be some dangerous entity lurking inside.”

This man pulsed with the special constitution of a Future One, thanks to his journey through the passageway. At the same time, he possessed an aura of someone who killed gods and slaughtered buddhas.

All of these future warriors were now Future Ones, which boosted their cultivation bases, remolded their bodies, and cut them off from the dao of heaven. Their destiny burned bright, and they couldn’t wait to pillage and destroy everything in the immortal dao civilization.

“An unknown entity of great power?” General Samman said coldly. “Perfect. I’ll go see what exactly it is we're dealing with. Who would dare to block our path?”

A shadowy figure suddenly shot out from General Samman, a clone covered with a membrane of white light. With lightning-like speed, it shot toward the primal-chaos debris.

The primal-chaos debris trembled, as if to resist him, but the light membrane that surrounded him cut through its power.

As soon as the clone was inside the debris, he saw what looked to be an enormous snake that lunged toward him. Before the clone could react, he was gobbled up by the snake. A few crunching and cracking sounds could be heard, and then the clone was gone.

General Samman shivered, and his aquiline nose and fierce eyes made him seem particularly intimidating.

One of the future warriors looked at the photonic computer in front of him and said, “General Samman, the unknown entity is a primal-chaos elder-snake! From the look of it, it's approaching adulthood!”

“Primal-chaos elder-snake? And it’s approaching adulthood? Incredible. Those things can rival the legion of gods. King Heaven-Devourer of ancient times was an incarnation of a primal-chaos elder-snake. We wasted a lot of power on our journey, so we need to replenish the vivicreation systems and the power reserves. Whatever unknown entities we encounter, we should just immediately attack them. We’re going to capture this primal-chaos elder-snake! It’ll be very useful to our vivicreation systems, especially considering that they don’t exist in our time! All ahead!”

“Yes, General!”

“Power grade increase! Systems upgrade!”

Swish!

The spacecraft began growing larger, and in the blink of an eye it was as large as a thirtieth-ranked immortal world. Then an enormous aperture opened on the bottom of the craft, which began sucking in the nearby primal-chaos debris.

As the energy flowed into the spacecraft like a river, the future warriors excitedly talked amongst themselves.

“Once we clear out this primal-chaos debris, we can force that primal-chaos elder-snake out of hiding.”

“Excellent. Our spatial fabrication technology has reached an indescribable level. Now that our power reserves are full, we should be able to create thirtieth-ranked immortal worlds. From what I understand, the Cruiser of Civilization’s systems were all designed by a boundless god-spirit of ancient times, the Lord of Civilization.”

“When the power reserves are full, the possibilities are incredible. It took some very rare primordial chaos god crystals to fill up our power reserves before. Without fuel like that, how can we do the same thing again?”

The primal-chaos debris was rapidly being sucked away, which was a shocking thing. If a Chaos God came along and tried to use primal-chaos debris to craft magical treasures, it would probably take tens upon tens of thousands of years. But this piece of the Cruiser of Civilization did it in almost an instant.

That was the terrifying reality of having absolutely full power reserves.

At the moment, Yang Qi’s power reserves were at the level of one hundredth, a far cry from being absolutely full.

Before long, the primal-chaos debris was completely gone, leaving behind absolutely nothing, not even a trace of the primal-chaos snake.

General Samman’s eyes glittered sharply, and he let loose a cold harrumph. “A very crafty primal-chaos elder-snake. It must have shrunk itself down and followed the primal-chaos debris into our holding tanks. But why didn’t the photonic computers issue a warning? Even if it shrank down to the size of a single particle, the moment it entered the holding tanks the photonic computer should have noticed. Perform a full system scan immediately!”

“Yes sir!”

The future warriors immediately hustled to comply.

[Beep-beep-beep. Beep-beep-beep.]

All of a sudden, one of the photonic computers issued a warning.

[Intruder on board! Suggest activating defenses and powering up shields!]

“Hmm?” General Samman’s eyes flashed with cold light. “Activate the general defenses and the internal defense systems. We have an intruder!”

“Someone got inside the ship? Who is it?”

“Check immediately to see where this thing is. General lockdown!”

“Go, go, go!”

Although it was an emergency situation, the future warriors remained calm. They were veterans of numerous battles and had faced all sorts of violent and deadly situations. A minor crisis like this was little more than a drill for them.

Light flared and vital energy surged as a host of morphlings appeared, which began prowling through the Cruiser of Civilization looking for the intruder.

Of course, the interior of this fragment of the Cruiser of Civilization was immense, large enough to hold numerous immortal worlds. It was almost impossible to describe how big it was. But with full power reserves and defense systems activated, the photonic computers’ scans eventually found what they were looking for.

[Intruder alert! Intruder alert! Intruder is approaching the main bridge. Extreme danger! Extreme danger!]

The voices of the photonic computers almost seemed flustered, which finally caused a bit of nervousness among the future warriors. If they had an enemy they could see and attack, it would be one thing. But an unseen and unknown enemy was a terrifying thing.

“Stop the scans!” General Samman said, a cold smile playing out on his face. “Open the bridge up. I'm going to welcome this guest personally!”

“General!” some of the future warriors objected.

“That's an order!” General Samman said, and the future warriors said no more. Nodding in subservience, they began opening the portals that lead to the bridge.

A moment later, Yang Qi appeared. “So, General Samman, you realized that this piece of the Cruiser of Civilization can’t do anything to me and opened the doors to welcome me? Unfortunately, no matter what you do, you won’t escape the destruction that will shortly be raining on you.”

Chapter 771: The Will of Proud Heaven

The intruder was Yang Qi.

This fragment of the Cruiser of Civilization had full power reserves, plus vivicreation systems, but unfortunately for them, Yang Qi was a Tempered God now, making him vastly stronger than before.

He had allowed himself to be sucked into the spacecraft, but then he used the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions, and the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart to skip through space until he was right outside the main bridge. Just as he had been preparing to launch a sneak attack, General Samman actually opened the hatches and let him walk right inside, presumably with the intention of springing his own trap.

Of course, Yang Qi believed that true confidence stems from superb skill, and didn’t hesitate to enter the main bridge. Extending his hand expectantly, he said, “General Samman, please hand over King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions. And give me control of this piece of the Cruiser of Civilization. You don’t stand a chance against me if we start fighting.”

General Samman and the future warriors sized Yang Qi up, furious at his outrageous words. One of the future warriors even walked up to him and said, “Very arrogant of you. Now die!”

POP!

He slammed his fist into Yang Qi’s chest, only to find that it had no effect whatsoever. Suddenly aware that this person obviously had some powerful energy arts, he resorted to a killing move.

“Consummate Fist of the Army’s Path, First Stance: Behead the General Guarded by Ten Thousand Troops!”

He formed a knifehand and sliced it through the air, creating an image of what looked like an enormous heaven-god slashing a saber through the neck of his enemy. It really was like killing a general surrounded by ten thousand troops.

Gong!

The knifehand landed on Yang Qi, but most certainly did not take his head. Instead, it hit his forearm.

Crack!

Yang Qi grabbed the future warrior’s arm. “So, a real fighter, huh? Well, go fight to your heart's content in hell!”

RUMBLE!

Boundless power swept out of Yang Qi and into the future warrior, who rapidly inflated like a balloon until he exploded into a rain of blood and gore. A scream echoed out, and the blood and gore struggled to form back into a body, but before it could, the shadow projection of a hell appeared and gobbled it up. Not even General Samman could do anything to stop it from happening.

“How dare you kill one of my men in front of me!” General Samman said, taking a step forward and glaring viciously at Yang Qi. “Who exactly are you?”

“I'm the person you’re looking for,” Yang Qi replied. “Tell me where Proud Heaven is. Did he really go to the Primeval Age, or is he still attending to matters in the future? I know that you're in the top military council, so before I kill you I want you to tell me everything you know.”

“Are you telling me you’re Yang Qi?” General Samman said, a grim, mysterious smile appearing on his face. “Magister Proud Heaven’s son? In that case, we can forget about how you just killed that warrior of mine. Magister Proud Heaven wants me to bring you back so that you can eventually accept the legacy of the future world. What do you think? Are you really going to refuse an offer as incredible as that?”

“That's a pack of lies,” Yang Qi replied, clasping his hands behind his back. “Even if Proud Heaven came here in person and made that offer, I wouldn’t fall for it. Much less when it comes from you.” With his divine will, Yang Qi could sense the photonic computers around him thrumming, trying to suppress the power of the spacecraft fragment he possessed. The vivicreation systems really were quite powerful.

Thankfully, Yang Qi hadn’t been too aggressive moments ago. The future warrior had approached and attacked him with deadly intent, and he had defended himself. Otherwise, it was hard to say what a fully charged fragment of the Cruiser of Civilization would have done.

Furthermore, Yang Qi was getting the sense that there was more to this General Samman than he had assumed. Although he was about as strong as an eighth division Buddha God, there was a power and will within him that Yang Qi could tell was very dangerous. Although he hadn’t unleashed it, it was definitely there, waiting. For some reason Yang Qi felt like Samman was actually toying with him.

“I'm going to destroy the future world,” Yang Qi continued. “Personally. Don’t babble some crap about me not being able to do it. You’re not a match for me, Samman. So hand over the things I want. Also, I want information about my mother, my Aunt Susu, and my Master. Where are they? Tell me, or suffer a dismal fate.”

“So that’s what you want,” General Samman said. “Young Master Yang Qi, you really should change your surname to Proud. You are Magister Proud Heaven’s son, after all. Although he actually has many sons—probably a few trillion—you’re definitely in the top three thousand in terms of importance. Magister Proud Heaven gave me explicit orders to find you and bring you and your God Legion Seal back to the future world. I can’t just abandon my mission. So what do we do now?”

“So you really do want to die, eh?” Yang Qi replied. He sighed. “And here I thought you were some sort of genius. Instead, you’re nothing but a rude idiot. Did you really think I wouldn’t notice you’d been blessed and conferred with power by some top expert? It will take only a moment for you to unleash power to defy a demigod! Sadly for you, that won’t be enough to deal with me.”

In that moment when General Samman realized that Yang Qi could see inside of him to his most deeply-kept secret, he realized that this was an opponent he couldn’t take lightly. He was vastly stronger than he had previously assumed.

“Photonic computers, activate!” he shouted. “Slice and segment the infinite universes. Stack them and combine! Die!”

In the blink of an eye, heaven-rending, earth-crushing power surged out as numerous beams of light formed a host of parallel universes and space-time hyperdimensions. Then the hyperdimensions combined and the main bridge vanished, leaving behind a sprawling plane of existence filled with dense mist.

As the mist swirled around Yang Qi, he suddenly felt like he was spinning. Reaching out, he grabbed a strand of mist, which caused him to feel vaguely intoxicated.

Yang Qi’s own fragment of the Cruiser of Civilization quickly analyzed it.

[God-Intoxicating Vapor. High-level science and technology, designed to pierce through spatial dimensions and intoxicate the enemy. Powerful enough to intoxicate even Chaos Gods.]

Roar!

An enormous morphling appeared that looked like a tiger, but was as large as an elephant, with leathery black wings that seemed like an evolved version of Yang Qi’s old Fiend-Devil Wings. The morphling opened its mouth and roared, sending out a bevy of power spheres in an attack.

Yang Qi killed the thing with a single blow. However, looking out into the God-Intoxicating Vapor, he saw even more morphlings, too many to count. They were organized into teams as they rushed toward him in attack. Some of them were even in formation.

“You’re attacking me with a sea of beasts? That’s fine. If you want to play it this way, I guess I’ll call my fiend-devils out. When I became a Tempered God, my ability to summon hell-born fiend-devils improved. I can now summon sixth division Revisionist Gods. But first, let me deal with this annoying mist. Otherwise my fiend-devils are going to get massacred.”

Looking around, Yang Qi inhaled deeply.

RIIIIP!

The mist flowed into him, along with some of the morphlings, until the area was much clearer.

Then rumbling sounds echoed out as seemingly endless Hell Portals appeared. From the look of it, there were probably about ten thousand of them. Armies began pouring out, seemingly as numerous as the eternal sands of the sea, bursting forth from all sorts of hells.

There were asuras, infernals, bleachbone fiend-devils, bronzeblaze fiend-devils, giant nagas, freshblood paleo-devils, stone devils, steel fiend-devils, and more. They swept out of the portals and immediately unleashed carnage on the morphlings.

Yang Qi stood by and watched, using the Eternal Heavenly Aria to bless his troops. Of course, in the end, the forces of hell were virtually without limit. Even if you took the population of all the immortal worlds and multiplied it many times over, it would only be equivalent to one one-billionth of the forces in hell. That was one of the reasons why the forces of hell could resist the legion of gods.

Rumor had it that the vivicreation systems of the Cruiser of Civilization could produce endless waves of morphlings. One powerful battle tactic was to create waves of beasts to overwhelm the enemy. Unfortunately, compared to the forces of hell, the “sea” of beasts was pathetically small.

Even if it were the ancient Lord of Civilization who had encountered the armies of hell, he would have fled.

Only the Sovereign Lord and his armies of angels could possibly directly contend with the forces of hell.

“Hell Portals?” General Samman murmured. He’d shifted the main bridge to another location and was now in hiding, hoping that Yang Qi would be overwhelmed by the sea of beasts.

But now he saw a host of Hell Portals, and the armies of hell rushing out to devastate his morphlings. Instead of his enemy slowly starting to run out of energy, it was his own fragment of the Cruiser of Civilization that was starting to suffer.

Chapter 772: Same as the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth

Voice trembling with concern, one of the future warriors said, “General, we can't keep this up. Our army of morphlings is getting completely wiped out! This guy’s army from hell completely outnumbers ours!”

“Although we can always make more morphlings to replace the ones that die, the power expenditure is incredible. Also, even though this fragment of the Cruiser of Civilization has spatial sealing technology, which allows us to create passageways to other dimensions, who would have thought that this guy would be able to do almost the same thing? He can create passages to hell and summon fiend-devils!? What kind of energy art is that?”

General Samman snorted coldly. He wasn’t pleased at all to see his morphlings being slaughtered. He’d often used the strategy of overwhelming opponents with seas of morphlings, and had seen even the most powerful of experts flee in the face of it. But now someone was using the same tactic to keep him in check! To top it off, it was obvious that the hellish armies would completely destroy his sea of morphlings before long.

Then his fragment of the Cruiser of Civilization would be filled with armies from hell, which would be a very bad situation.

He couldn't allow things to go on like this.

“Cease morphling production and head to the Battle God Deck.”

WHIZZZ!

The virtual space Yang Qi had been fighting in suddenly transformed into an enormous fighting platform. Along with the change in setting, the power in the area surged even more mightily.

The armies of hell still surrounded Yang Qi as he looked around.

WHOOSH!

Just as General Samman had feared, Yang Qi planned to continue summoning fiend-devils and sending them out to wreak havoc in the Cruiser of Civilization.

However, before anything else could happen, a spear appeared, stabbing down into the ground and releasing a boundless aura of hell and infernal soil. Black light instantly began spreading out and locking down any of the fiend-devils it touched. Those fiend-devils would scream and howl, then their bodies would ripple and distort as they were cast back to whichever hell they’d come from.

The light from the spear quickly reached Yang Qi’s Hell Portals, which exploded violently as a result.

Yang Qi grunted in pain and staggered backward, eyes flickering as he looked at the spear stabbed into the ground. It actually resembled his Infernal Deity Spear, and had a similar aura. Unexpectedly, it was an energy art manifestation of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth and contained a boundless power that was the perfect counter to hell-born fiend-devils!

All of a sudden, General Samman appeared, clad in soft armor that was the purest of white and shone with boundless radiance and light. Striding forward, he grabbed the spear.

“You summon fiend-devils? Well, August Patriarch Proud Heaven gave me a bit of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, a lordly-class energy art of the most profound nature. What better way to keep you in check? You see, I've had a seed of truth inside me all along! That seed contains some of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, as well as this armor, which is called the Radiant Armor of the Bright God Saint. As for the spear, it’s the Spear of Judgement. I'm aware that you’re wearing the God Legion Battle Robe, and that you can summon the Infernal Deity Spear. And you have Angel Wings, right? Well, I have wings too, except they’re called the God Sage Wings.”

A pair of wings unfurled behind General Samman, making him seem like the ancient legendary king of the angels. His power levels immediately began to climb rapidly.

Godliness flowed through him as though some profound and mysterious god-spirit were supporting him, causing his energy arts to rise to an even higher level. Radiating boundless might, he said, “What do you think? Hand over your God Legion Seal and enter our custody. If you don’t, we can fight it out. In the end, I’ll defeat you and take the God Legion Seal by force. This place is the Battle God Deck, a special arena of fighting in which my fighting power will be boosted spectacularly, but yours will be severely reduced. It will be an easy thing for me to achieve victory here. So what’s the point of being stubborn? Surrender. I won’t go hard on you. You’re Magister Proud Heaven’s son, after all. If you be a good boy and hand yourself over, everything will be fine. But if you prove to be disobedient, I’ll use my seed of truth to absolutely crush you. Killing you is also acceptable in Magister Proud Heaven’s plan. However we do this, you won’t be escaping.”

“Excellent!” Yang Qi said, not looking the least bit surprised. In fact, he even nodded his head in approval. “It seems Proud Heaven has treated you well. You have a seed of truth with powers from the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, powers that surpass even me. You actually seem to border on the Deathless Throne. Well, that just means my Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth will significantly advance once I take it. You're essentially delivering treasures right into my hand!”

Yang Qi had long since assumed that he would run into other opponents with the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. Back when he’d tried to get Leaf Dao-Denier and the Warriors of the Great Dance to fight outside the Tusita Heaven, those six warriors had summoned a powerful will that unleashed some of the energy arts of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. As a result, Young Master Leaf was wounded and Yang Qi had been able to take one of his legacy medallions.

However, in this case, General Samman wasn’t drawing on the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth from afar, but actually had it in his seed of truth.

In some ways, this was disconcerting. Yang Qi had always suspected that, although there was a God Legion Seal in the future world, it wasn’t actually in the control of Proud Heaven. After all, there were ten great magisters in the future and it was obvious that Proud Heaven didn’t rank highest among them. It had to be the highest-ranking magister who had the God Legion Seal, and by extension, the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.

But now it seemed that Proud Heaven really had given General Samman this seed of truth. So did that mean that Proud Heaven did have the God Legion Seal? Had there been some shakeup in the future world? Some conflict?

Only someone with an incomparable destiny could have a God Legion Seal. For example, not even King Immortal-Slayer had possessed one. Despite how people always tried to get them, they couldn’t be casually seized by means of plots and schemes. And they provided immense protection. Up to this point in his life, Yang Qi hadn’t really suffered any major setbacks. Even when great danger loomed, he always managed to find a way out. From that, it could be seen just how powerful the God Legion Seal was.

If Proud Heaven had somehow managed to take the God Legion Seal from the highest-ranking magister, that indicated that he must be harboring other mysteries.

Did this mean that Proud Heaven really was in a position to be a problem for Yang Qi?

Of course, it was all speculation. And even if Proud Heaven didn’t have the seal, he was still a deadly opponent who had experience in countless conflicts. Maybe he had some other way to craft such a powerful seed of truth.

Despite what General Samman had said, Yang Qi was convinced that Proud Heaven was not his father. Yang Qi knew that he was a Fateless One who’d been born out of a dream of primal-chaos. Proud Heaven could go around calling him his son, but he had nothing to do with the man. And he would kill him one day!

“In a moment,” Yang Qi continued, “I'm going to show you why a common ant like yourself has no idea how to use something as incredible as the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. You taking that seed of truth from Proud Heaven just ensured that you’ll die an early death. You’ve profaned the legion of gods and sullied the name of the Sovereign Lord. Those who do not possess the God Legion Seal, but still try to use the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, will meet only one end: death. That is what comes to any who commit such heinous crimes.”

“How impudent!” General Samman growled, a fiery rage burning in his heart. He reached out with his hand, and a god kingdom sprang up around him as he unleashed a deadly attack.

‘The Hand of the One God?’ Yang Qi thought. It looked very similar to his own Fist of the Halls of Heaven and Hand of the One God. It didn’t quite seem as majestic as his own, however, there were certain aspects that were more refined. Both were unique, in different ways.

“I heard you use something called Hand of the One God,” General Samman said. “Well this is called the Creator’s Godfist! Let’s compare and see which of us is stronger!”

As General Samman's hand approached, everything trembled and bizarre astrological phenomena could be seen. God items appeared and vital energy surged.

“Creator!”

Yang Qi watched as his defensive empyrean energy crumbled. Obviously, the seed of truth that Proud Heaven had given to General Samman was filled with immense power.

RUMBLE!

Yang Qi unleashed his own attack and the two hands hit each other, causing a massive detonation that crushed everything around them. Yang Qi’s energy and blood were thrown into chaos as a stream of true energy entered him and sought to destroy his animadestiny vital energy.

At the last moment, the God Legion Seal activated and neutralized the invading true energy.

General Samman also staggered backward, but it was to Yang Qi’s surprise that the effects of the Hand of the One God had been negated. From what Yang Qi could tell, he might need to resort to trickery to win this fight. Considering that this seed of truth was involved, it was almost as though he were fighting with Proud Heaven himself.

Whoosh!

Even as Yang Qi contemplated his next move, a spear appeared behind him.

The General Samman that had been backing up was actually a power double! The real General Samman had remained in place! As he’d said, here on the Battle God Deck, his powers were amplified while Yang Qi’s were weakened. But Yang Qi wasn’t worried about that.

With the God Legion Seal to protect him, no wickedness could encroach on him.

Chapter 773: Battle Between Two Gods

Two top experts were engaged in a shocking battle.

As a result, the Cruiser of Civilization shook back and forth violently. Normally speaking, General Samman couldn’t possibly have been a match for Yang Qi. But he had a seed of truth with the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth in it, giving him indescribable might. It was almost as if Proud Heaven had sent a nascent divinity clone of himself to fight Yang Qi.

Although Yang Qi wasn’t sure how Proud Heaven had acquired the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, there was no question that it was a pure version.

In fact, it even seemed somewhat purer than Yang Qi’s version.

Snorting coldly, Yang Qi transformed into a beam of dazzling light that stabbed toward General Samman with lightning-like speed. He was using Life-Death Void-Destruction Lightning, which was strong enough to rip an immortal world to shreds, and it began breaking the Battle God Deck apart to the point where the world beyond was once again visible.

“Life-Death Void-Destruction Many-Heavens God-Lightning!” General Samman gasped. “Sorry, not impressed. Check this out: Primal-Chaos Archaean Many-Heavens God-Lightning!”

RUMBLE!

He threw his hands out and numerous globes of primal-chaos vital energy appeared, which battered Yang Qi. As they exploded, they started out as a great dao that then split into the duality of yin and yang. Yin and yang became the four constellations, and the four constellations became the eight trigrams. The eight trigrams produced the sixty-four hexagrams. Each of the sixty-four hexagrams was broken into six lines, and those six lines formed the yin and the yang. It was an enormous, perfect cycle that went on and on.

The attacks slammed into Yang Qi’s Life-Death Void-Destruction God-Lightning and completely smashed through it.

“Many-Heavens God Seal!” Yang Qi suddenly unleashed a huge sealing mark, which looked like an imperial seal, the kind that could establish law and order. It contained a boundless will that instantly vanquished the lightning magic, then closed in directly on General Samman’s head.

A grave expression appeared on General Samman’s face. Taking a deep breath, he said, “So you’ve cultivated the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth to the point of unlocking the Many-Heavens God Seal. Sadly, Magister Proud Heaven’s cultivation base is far more profound than yours, and he’s made much more progress with the technique. God Legion Monarch Crown!”

A crown of what appeared to be thorns and thistles appeared on General Samman’s head, filled with valor, wisdom, strength, endurance, vitality, light, beauty, and hope.

As soon as the crown appeared, Yang Qi’s Many Heavens God Seal was rendered completely immobile.

“Be broken!” General Samman said. All of a sudden, the Spear of Judgement transformed into a bow and an arrow. He nocked the arrow to the bow, then shot it at the Many Heavens God Seal.

Swish!

The seal shattered! The force of the arrow defied imagination, and clearly surpassed anything Yang Qi was currently capable of with his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.

“Bow of Chastisement!God-Wrath Arrow!”

General Samman nocked another arrow and took aim at Yang Qi.

Godly vortexes sprang up everywhere around the arrow, accompanied by the howling of souls. All of the energy in heaven and earth seemed to flow into the arrow, which locked onto Yang Qi and made it impossible for him to move.

“Prepare to be shot through! The Bow of Chastisement and the God-Wrath Arrows express the rage of the legion of gods and the punishment of the Lord. Let’s see how you get out of this situation alive!”

WHIZZZ!

In the blink of an eye, the arrow was right in front of Yang Qi. He met it with his finger, and the resulting detonation ripped his God Legion Battle Robe to shreds and damaged his true energy so badly that he was left with only one percent.

‘So strong!’ Yang Qi thought, his eyes flashing. He knew that his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth wasn’t strong enough to outdo Proud Heaven’s. There was simply no way for him to block the Bow of Chastisement and the God-Wrath Arrows.

“Prepare for punishment, Yang Qi,” General Samman said. Laughing heartily, he continued, “I got these energy arts directly from August Patriarch Proud Heaven’s seed of truth. Not even ten of you combined would be a match for me. Get ready to see how truly mighty I am. Since you’re being so stubborn, I'm going to kill you and drain you of all your power!”

Zip. Zip. Zip. Zip. Zip.

He unleashed a storm of arrows that closed in on Yang Qi with incredible speed.

“Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart!”

Without any hesitation, he drew on his four King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions, opening a passageway inside his own body that led to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Thus, as the arrows hit him, they actually entered the chart and began aimlessly sailing on.

A moment later, Yang Qi was able to use the power of the monarch chart to stop the arrows in mid-flight. A shadowy projection of King Immortal-Slayer appeared, who subsequently began hacking away at them.

POP!

An arrow exploded, turning into power that Yang Qi quickly absorbed and used to push his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth to a higher level.

One by one, the rest of the arrows exploded, and as he absorbed the true energy, he felt himself improving and growing stronger. In fact, it seemed like he might be reaching the point of another breakthrough.

This true energy was of the same origin and type as his own version of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. However, it was slightly different, and as such was profoundly helpful.

Although Yang Qi had been at a disadvantage during the fight moments ago, he’d been building up strength and absorbing true energy. It had been his plan all along. Considering what had happened with the six Warriors of the Great Dance, once General Samman revealed that he had the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, Yang Qi had known exactly how things would play out.

Apparently, General Samman had no idea that the thousands upon thousands of arrows he launched had actually been taken by Yang Qi. He saw Yang Qi staggering backward, his face pale, looking like he might collapse at any moment. Of course, it was a trick. Yang Qi was feeling stronger than ever.

A vicious smile appeared on General Samman’s face. “Admit defeat, boy. It won’t be a dishonor to die by my hands! I'm going to devour your cultivation base and take that God Legion Seal. Prepare yourself for death!”

RUMBLE!

Suddenly, General Samman unleashed another God-Wrath Arrow with the Bow of Chastisement, and this one was even more powerful than anything before. It was fully a hundred times stronger, and thrummed with might as it closed in on Yang Qi’s chest.

Yet again, Yang Qi opened a passageway to suck in the arrow. However, in that very moment, the arrow stopped moving.

A smile appeared on General Samman’s face. “Block all effects of King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy medallions! God-Wrath Arrow!”

The power of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions suddenly rose up from deep within the fragment of the Cruiser of Civilization, sending out spatial fluctuations that interfered with the passageway inside Yang Qi and caused it to completely vanish.

Then, the arrow suddenly sped back into motion and slammed into Yang Qi’s chest.

POP!

In the blink of an eye, Yang Qi was impaled on the ground, grievously injured!

Seeing this, General Samman smiled viciously and said, “Yang Qi, did you really think I was unaware that you were secretly absorbing the power of those God-Wrath Arrows? I let you open a path to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Then, in your moment of greatest complacency, I struck with all the power I possess! I was manipulating you the entire time! And now my God-Wrath Arrow is right in your sea of energy, destroying you from the inside out. You can’t use any of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth now! Everything so far is going according to Magister Proud Heaven’s plan. He's aware of your vile ambitions to destroy the future world. You can run, and you can hide, but you can never escape Magister Proud Heaven’s control. Now, it’s time for you to die.”

The bow and arrows once again transformed back into the Spear of Judgement, which General Samman launched viciously toward Yang Qi.

“Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth!Sovereign Lord Hurls the Mammoth!”

As the Spear of Judgement shot forth, an image appeared that seemed to be the Sovereign Lord himself lifting a godmammoth high over his head and smashing it to the ground.

Godmammoths were supremely powerful, and designed to crush hells. But sometimes, their inherent nature would be changed by prolonged contact with hells. They could become rebellious, damaging the palaces of the gods and forcing them to flee into primal-chaos. If that happened, the Sovereign Lord would appear, hoist that godmammoth into the air, and crush it. It was called Sovereign Lord Hurls the Mammoth.

Now, General Samman was using that move to hurl his spear directly at Yang Qi, aiming to pierce through his soul and kill him.

SNICK!

The spear stabbed into Yang Qi, causing blood to splatter everywhere as he flopped to the ground.

General Samman burst out laughing, then flew over to Yang Qi’s side. Reaching down, he prepared to detonate Yang Qi’s head and take the God Legion Seal out of him.

A momentous event was just about to occur.

However, even as he reached down, Yang Qi’s body suddenly vanished, leaving behind only the spear.

“What’s going on here?” General Samman said, visibly shocked.

“Did you really think you could trick me?” Yang Qi said as he appeared in the air above General Samman. “I have a piece of the Cruiser of Civilization too. Proud Heaven didn’t plan for that, did he?”

Then the Hand of the One God smashed down onto Samman’s head.

Chapter 774: Endless Killing Intent

“You!” General Samman was so startled he nearly lost his mind. He’d assumed that his whole series of tricks and schemes had been pulled off perfectly, and never could have possibly guessed that he had fallen for Yang Qi’s even more vicious plot.

He had struck a truly vicious blow to Yang Qi’s sea of energy with the Bow of Chastisement and a God-Wrath Arrow. Then he stabbed him with the Spear of Judgement.

Even a Demigod expert who was struck in such a fashion would be severely injured, and might possibly even die. It seemed completely impossible to him that Yang Qi could survive such treatment.

After all, he wasn’t fighting with his own power, but rather godpower provided by Magister Proud Heaven via proxy. If Magister Proud Heaven were here, he could slaughter a demigod without exerting the slightest effort.

In the end, Yang Qi had used his fragment of the Cruiser of Civilization to escape. That act had almost completely drained it of power, reverting it to its original state. On the upside, he had seized the upper hand in the fight, and perhaps even secured victory.

POP!

His palm slammed savagely onto the top of General Samman’s head, sending a blast of true energy into him that shattered his sea of consciousness and his will. Yang Qi wasn’t holding anything back; he was using all the abilities he could think of to try to take out this opponent with one blow.

The fact that Samman had used King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions and the vivicreation systems in the Cruiser of Civilization to completely block Yang Qi’s access to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart was something he hadn’t planned for, and it had put him in a very dangerous situation.

“Don’t blame me for being vicious and merciless, Samman. You came here with the will of Proud Heaven, and as far as I'm concerned, his people all deserve the death sentence! Now, give me his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth and that seed of truth!” Yang Qi could benefit greatly from the seed of truth, which would advance his own energy arts and give him a huge advantage in fighting the future world. And it was without mercy that he dug into Samman’s sea of consciousness to find it.

It was a dark golden color, holy and pure, yet also thrumming with the darkness and gloom of hell. It was a combination of something godly and something wicked, capable of destroying the heavens and extinguishing the earth, of throwing the universe into chaos. Immediately, Yang Qi could sense that it perfectly conformed to his own true energy.

If he acquired the divine ability from another God Legion Seal, his energy arts would advance and transform, providing him with benefits that would vastly surpass those which would come from acquiring more of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions.

‘There it is. Get over here!’

Even as he formed his true energy into a hand and reached out to grab the seed, the seed suddenly transformed.

RUMBLE!

Ten streams of energy shot out of it into Yang Qi, energy that could subvert the past, present, and future, throwing them all into chaos.

Creak. Crunch. Crack.

Yang Qi’s true energy began to crumble and melt as surely as ice in the hot sun. For some reason, there was nothing he could do to block those ten streams of power.

‘What are these things? Did I fall into a trap?’

A wave of terror swept through him, but a moment later he forced himself into a state of calm. Yes. He had fallen into a trap. And he knew that this was probably the most dangerous situation he’d ever been in during his entire life. It was a critical moment in which, if he didn’t play his cards absolutely perfectly, these ten streams of power would smash into his heart and soul.

He absolutely, positively could not let his guard down now.

Bursts of laughter rang out.

“The God Legion Seal!”

“It’s another piece of the God Legion Seal!”

“We finally found one of them! If we get that piece, we can conquer all of existence! We can combine the past, present, and future, break through all barriers of space and time, attack the god legion plane, trample the legion of gods, and crush all hells!”

“Your plan worked perfectly, Proud Heaven! And now our grand wills shall possess this husk and take the God Legion Seal!”

“Our true bodies are in the Primeval Age, but even these scraps of will could take down a Lesser God. With our powers combined, no one could possibly resist our possession!”

The ten streams of power were ten expressions of will, and one of them clearly belonged to Proud Heaven. They were mightier by far than anything Yang Qi had ever encountered, and that included the god Brahma, and whatever god-spirit backed Sectlord Nine Yangs and his sect.

Ten streams of will were trying to possess Yang Qi and it instantly caused him to be locked in place, immobile.

In the blink of an eye, they were battering at his sea of consciousness, placing him in extremely critical danger. If Yang Qi were to be possessed, he would essentially cease to exist and his energy arts would come to belong to the ten magisters of the future world.

The ten magisters were clearly not willing to let someone like Yang Qi continue growing into his full potential and had planned this trap very well to stop him.

“God Legion Seal, crush them!”

Without hesitation, he prepared to unleash the full and complete might of the God Legion Seal!

Yet, in a very bizarre turn of events, the God Legion Seal didn’t respond at all. It seemed to be ignoring his commands, and even seemed willing to accept the ten streams of power.

Things were turning very, very bad. Terrible even!

The God Legion Seal was Yang Qi’s last resort, his ultimate trump card, yet for some reason it didn’t seem to be working. Although Yang Qi was flabbergasted, he forced himself to remain calm. Obviously, the God Legion Seal was willing to accept the aura of his enemies. The seed of truth had been created by the God Legion Seal, and now it seemed as though the two seals were trying to combine.

Apparently, the ten magisters had known all along that this would happen.

Yang Qi forced himself into an even deeper state of calm and drew on the rest of the power he had. Godpower sprang up, filled with infinite variations which he used to create a host of gates to block the path of the ten streams of will.

“How could this boy's will be so strong? How many gates is he going to make? How do we get past this?”

“Calm down. He has a very weak cultivation base. Even if his will were stronger, he would need the help of a powerful cultivation base to hold out for very long.”

“With no foundation to stand on, one cannot endure!”

“We have to possess him and take control of his God Legion Seal!”

“Normally, no one would be able to enter his sea of consciousness without being attacked by the God Legion Seal, and not even a god would survive that. But sadly for him, we also have a God Legion Seal, and won't suffer any backlash!”

“Exactly. When two forces who have God Legion Seals clash, it all comes down to who has the higher cultivation level and who is stronger. Our will and power are obviously superior to this brat’s. There’s no way he's going to escape calamity today!”

The ten powerful expressions of will battered at the hundreds and hundreds of gates that blocked the way to Yang Qi’s sea of consciousness. If they broke through all of them, Yang Qi’s will and soul would be destroyed.

“A thought brings life; with many thoughts, no life; lifeless and destructionless; a subversion of dreams….” Yang Qi’s heart continued descending into calm. The more dangerous the situation was, the less flustered he was, until he entered a state of mind that could be considered lifeless and destructionless. Not even the ancient legion of gods could easily enter a state like this; it was the kind of thing that could be encountered by chance, but never searched for and found. With life came destruction. But at the same time, with lifelessness came a lack of destruction.

Life and destruction comprised the rhythm of existence.

“Attack!” The ten streams of power blasted their way into Yang Qi’s sea of consciousness, only to find that it was absolutely empty. There was no soul there, no will, no true energy, and no physical matter. It was as if Yang Qi didn’t exist at all. It wasn’t that he had died, but rather as though he’d never existed at all.

He had entered a majestic state of being that was attainable only by Fateless Ones. Lifeless and destructionless. Endless nirvanic rebirth. It had nothing to do with King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions, the God Legion Seal, or the Cruiser of Civilization. This was Yang Qi’s power and constitution.

“Why can’t we find the brat’s soul?”

“He has no will?”

“He's a Fateless One! I can’t believe he actually entered the level of being lifeless and destructionless! Without our true selves to provide power, we won’t be able to possess him. But we should be able to find the God Legion Seal and take it away from him.”

RUMBLE!

The ten streams of will burst out of Yang Qi’s sea of consciousness and headed toward his forehead, where they saw the golden imp sitting cross-legged on a field of countless golden godflowers, smiling faintly.

“Surround it!”

“Assimilate it!”

“If we can get this part of the God Legion Seal, we can take it back to primeval times and combine it with the one we already have. We can subvert space and time, slaughter the almighty entities of the past, and get the final piece of the seal. When we combine three into one, we will change the face of heaven and earth! When the gods experience nirvanic rebirth, a new civilization will come, and we will control it!”

The ten streams of will began to surround the God Legion Seal.

However, the seal began emitting a glowing light that blocked the ten expressions of will. At the same time, the ten streams of will also began glowing as they tried to force their way to the seal.

All of a sudden, a face appeared in the God Legion Seal, and it was none other than Yang Qi!

Instantly, the glowing light grew more intense and became an attack that slammed into the ten streams of will.

“What?”

“How could this be happening? His will is lifeless and destructionless, and it combined with the God Legion Seal!? Not even we could cultivate the God Legion Seal to that level. How did he do it?”

“Don't worry, he only has initial enlightenment of this level. He won’t be able to sustain this state for long. Being lifeless and destructionless is a temporary condition. If we keep attacking him, he’ll eventually break. Once he’s back to normal, we can take the God Legion Seal and kill him!”

“Right. We can transform him into a puppet! Then he’ll be working for us!”

Chapter 775: A Sudden Blow

Yang Qi was still in a very dangerous position.

Although he was in a lifeless and destructionless state, he couldn’t stay there forever. And once he was back to normal, the ten magisters would easily possess him.

However, he had no other choice than to hold on and wait for the right opportunity to present itself.

General Samman was incapable of doing anything, because of the presence of the ten wills. In fact, because of the powerful wills—and the two God Legion Seals—the surrounding fragment of the Cruiser of Civilization was rendered absolutely motionless.

[Beep-beep-beep. Beep-beep-beep. Warning. Warning. Power surge has created a lockdown effect. Photonic computers… cannot function.]

There were other future warriors on board, but they were also rendered immobile by the conflict between the ten streams of will and the God Legion Seal.

Everything was still.

At the moment, Yang Qi appeared to be in extreme danger. The ten streams of will were getting stronger and stronger, relentlessly gaining the advantage in the conflict.

Another factor was that the wills of the ten magisters had come via the seed of truth. If they were defeated, the magisters wouldn’t be hurt at all. In contrast, Yang Qi was putting his true body on the line. If he perished, he would cease to exist. He didn’t have the luxury of repeated attempts at victory; he only had one chance.

The ten magisters continued forcing their way forward and Yang Qi continued suffering setback after setback. The golden glow of the God Legion Seal was slowly shrinking down as the glow of attack from the ten magisters grew stronger. Yang Qi’s face on the golden imp was also beginning to fade away, indicating that he was losing control.

Suddenly, mad cackling filled the entire Cruiser of Civilization and someone new appeared. It was Young Master Leaf! And he was flanked by the other seventy-one patriarchs!

They were in some sort of ancient and powerful formation that had allowed them to break into the Cruiser of Civilization.

Young Master Leaf stood tall and straight like an emperor, and he had seventy-two halos shining behind his head, each of which contained a tiny person. In the centermost halo was his own animadestiny nascent divinity, and in the other seventy-one were those belonging to the other seventy-one patriarchs.

Apparently, he had turned the other seventy-one patriarchs into a defensive barrier of halos. In addition, there was an umbrella-shaped cloud of violet that rose above his head, thrumming with explosive power that could conquer everything.

It was the Tusita Heaven Treasured Parasol, formed from the essence of the Tusita Heaven itself, which could ward off all energy arts and all enemies.

Young Master Leaf’s cultivation base had reached a mysterious and unpredictable level, and he now looked just as majestic as the old King Immortal-Slayer had when he trampled countless immortal worlds. He was completely beyond the compare of any ordinary cultivator, even majestic demigod old-timers.

Leaf Dao-Denier looked down at Yang Qi and Samman and could see that they were locked in a deadly stalemate. “You two are taking each other down! I bet you never thought you would get your comeuppance like this, did you, Yang Qi!?”

“The future world actually used the seed of truth from the ten magisters to try to take on a God Legion Seal. Sadly for you people, the person who’s going to benefit here is me! I'm going to assimilate all of you! Immortal-slaying legacy medallions!” Two legacy medallions appeared, which he shoved into a central spell formation of the Cruiser of Civilization. Then he simply walked over to Yang Qi and grabbed the other four legacy medallions.

In the blink of an eye, he became the owner of seven of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions.

The moment they touched each other, a projection of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart appeared amidst sweeping winds and tempests. Next, Young Master Leaf exhaled a stream of flame onto the medallions as he tried to fuse them. At first, Yang Qi’s four medallions trembled as though they would refuse, but as the flames grew in intensity, they eventually submitted.

Crack!

As the seven medallions combined, Leaf Dao-Denier seemed to grow larger and stronger, as if he were approaching a peak limit of power. His aura even began thrumming with eternal deathlessness, as though he might soon reach the level of the legion of gods.

“The God Legion Seal will be mine, too! And I’ll kill and assimilate all ten of you magisters! As for you, Yang Qi, you defeated me over and over with all of your crafty plots and machinations, but you’re going to be mine. I bet you thought that would never happen!”

RUMBLE!

Pulsing with the might of seven of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions, Leaf Dao-Denier loomed over Yang Qi and General Samman. Fire erupted from both of his hands as he prepared to assimilate both of them.

“I can’t believe you would dare try to screw us over, boy!”

“We're the ten magisters of the future world! How could you possibly take advantage of us?”

“Kill him! This brat is trying to assimilate us! Fight back!”

“Turn a portion of our power on him! Slaughter him!”

“Hit him with some divine will, even if we have to waste some vital energy. This brat has invincible destiny, and the legacy of a thirty-third ranked immortal world! He’s going to be the ruler of an entire immortal world and is clearly only a step away from being on the same level as the legion of gods!”

“Don’t let him succeed! He’ll ruin all of our plans!”

The wills of the ten magisters seemed just on the verge of breaking into Yang Qi’s sea of consciousness. Right in that moment, Leaf Dao-Denier arrived and was trying to scoop all of them up into the same net. Considering he had seven of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions, he could draw unimaginable levels of power from the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart to help him do it.

The magisters knew that they were now in a very dangerous situation.

If they lost, and their scraps of will were destroyed, it wouldn’t be any significant loss on their part. But then Leaf Dao-Denier would get the God Legion Seal and all of those legacy medallions. Overall, it would be a catastrophe for the future world. He was obviously no less of a threat than Yang Qi. He was a ninth division Chaos God, and a demigod at that. It was entirely likely that he would achieve godly ascension, assuming he came across the right opportunity.

“Attack!” Five of the ten streams of will shifted to deal with Young Master Leaf, heading straight toward his sea of consciousness.

“King Immortal-Slayer!”

A projection of the mighty King Immortal-Slayer appeared behind Young Master Leaf. Simultaneously, the seventy-one patriarchs were deep in meditation, causing seventy-one projections of themselves to appear. It was very reminiscent of the scene from years past when King Immortal-Slayer fought the Sovereign Lord himself.

The wills of the five magisters were instantly shoved backward.

“Die! All of you, just die!” Leaf Dao-Denier shouted exultantly. He knew he had the upper hand here. In moments, he would have the seed of truth with the wills of ten magisters, seven legacy medallions, the God Legion Seal, Yang Qi’s cultivation base, and two fragments of the Cruiser of Civilization.

His session of seclusion had not been seen out to completion.

He’d received messages from the seventy-one patriarchs that a fragment of the Cruiser of Civilization had been spotted in the primal-chaos debris outside of the Tusita Heaven. He hurried over in formation with the other seventy-one patriarchs, and when he saw what was playing out, he knew his big chance had arrived.

It was the kind of opportunity that, once missed, might never reappear.

As for the ten magisters, they had worked hard on their plan to get the God Legion Seal, so there was no way they would just give up at this point.

Thankfully, some of the pressure was now off of Yang Qi.

“Die!” Young Master Leaf howled madly. “Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, open up. Legacy medallions, give me power!”

The Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart swallowed up the Cruiser of Civilization. At the same time, Leaf Dao-Denier’s power grew as he was blessed by the power of monarchs. Simultaneously, the seventy-one patriarchs grew stronger, to the point where they were approaching new breakthroughs.

“Legacy medallions… reach out to the other weapons in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Bring them here to bolster my seventy-one brethren! Make us stronger!”

The seven legacy medallions began shining with blinding light.

Instantly, countless streaks of light could be seen flying out of the depths of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. There were sage swords, heavenly palaces, suits of armor, spears…. All sorts of things flew into the hands of the seventy-one patriarchs.

They were items left behind by King Immortal-Slayer and his seventy-one brethren, and existed in sets. Now that Young Master Leaf had seven of King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy medallions, he could call out to these items much easier.

Ordinary search methods would have taken millions upon millions of years to find all of the items, but now they could be summoned with a breath.

The seventy-one patriarchs instantly began growing stronger, and as they added their might to Leaf Dao-Denier’s, the five wills were crushed even further.

The ten magisters were now furious beyond belief. How could they ever have guessed that Leaf Dao-Denier would come along and ruin their plans?

RUMBLE!

With no warning whatsoever, a grand will arrived, pierced through the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, and blessed the wills of the magisters. In the blink of an eye, they began glowing like millions upon millions of suns, illuminating the universe as they launched a counterattack on Young Master Leaf.

Chapter 776: The Plan Works

Crack!

The wills of the ten magisters were nothing to take lightly. Combined, they could destroy anything under the level of a thirtieth-ranked immortal world. As they slammed into Leaf Dao-Denier’s energy, they caused a massive tempest to spring up in the middle of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart that was so strong and deadly that it even shredded nearby godrelics to bits.

Leaf Dao-Denier shivered at how unexpectedly powerful the wills of these magisters were. Thankfully they had not come as their true selves, otherwise he really would be in a no-win situation.

Universal magical law was such that it was very difficult to send powerful entities from one part of space-time to another.

The ten magisters could open passageways, but traveling through them would be incomparably difficult.

“I have seven of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions. Plus, we're in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart! I have no reason to be afraid of you! You’re all turtles in a jar! Let’s see how long you can last!”

As he adjusted his outflow of power, Leaf Dao-Denier thought, ‘If I had nine of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions, I would be invincible. Magisters? Yang Qi? I'm going to assimilate all of you. Unless the God Legion Seal becomes whole, nothing could possibly deal with nine of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions. But where are the other two? Apparently these people from the future world didn't bring any with them. Useless fools!’

“Prepare to die, boy!” As some of the expressions of will continued crushing Yang Qi, the others transformed into something with an elephantine head and a human body and faced Leaf Dao-Denier. Apparently, they were using their most powerful move to try to end the fight.

“Be broken!” Leaf Dao-Denier growled, and the enormous projection of King Immortal-Slayer lunged forward to fight the magisters. Then Leaf Dao-Denier went all out with his power. “Monarch power, permeate me!”

Seventy-two streams of immense power coursed through him, unlocking even more of his potential. The seven legacy medallions drew on the power of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, which was so heaven-shaking and earth-shattering that it surpassed even the essence of the Tusita Heaven.

Although the Tusita Heaven was indeed a thirty-third ranked immortal world, it couldn’t possibly compare to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

There was a reason the chart had the words ‘myriad worlds’ in its name. It was like a collection of myriads of immortal worlds. Perhaps even myriads of god worlds.

The fighting continued for a period of time with little change.

At a certain point, Leaf Dao-Denier heard a voice being transmitted into his mind. “Leaf Dao-Denier, why don’t we call things even? End our enmity. I was just about to be possessed by those ten magisters, which would’ve completely wiped me out of existence. If we join forces, we could definitely take them out. Want to turn weapons of war into gifts of jade and silk?”

It was Yang Qi’s voice that was being projected into Young Master Leaf’s mind.

“Bastard!” Leaf Dao-Denier replied. “Swine! How dare you try to negotiate with me. Turn weapons of war into gifts of jade and silk? That would be suicide. I'm going to kill those ten magisters, and then you. I’ll kill all of you, and eventually take the kingdom of the gods as well. I’ll be supreme! Besides, you’re almost out of energy and there's no way I’ll just let you go free. The God Legion Seal will be mine!”

Leaf Dao-Denier would never agree to patch things up with Yang Qi. He had a vicious and merciless personality, and was the kind of person who would slaughter enemies like scything wheat. Furthermore, he’d repeatedly lost out to Yang Qi, including the time Yang Qi took the true godhood. His hatred for Yang Qi surpassed any ill thoughts he had of the ten magisters.

Next, he drew on another boundless and mysterious technique.

“Use my true energy to create the incarnation of the lord of Tusita. A boundless will to possess the enemy. Tusita Nine-Heavens True Spirit!”

A mighty, violet figure appeared, who shot into Yang Qi to try to possess him. It was going to compete with the magisters to wrest away control of the God Legion Seal!

The power of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions also shot into Yang Qi in the hopes of suppressing the power of the God Legion Seal.

Using the Tusita Nine-Heavens True Spirit drained a lot of power from Leaf Dao-Denier. After all, he’d used his animadestiny true energy to fuel the technique and it would take a long time to restore what had been lost. He was throwing caution to the wind. Thankfully, he had the seven legacy medallions to draw power from the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, which would keep him going in the fight.

The magisters were starting to get nervous.

“Not good! This brat is trying to destroy Yang Qi’s soul. If he succeeds, the God Legion Seal will come out of him, masterless! And we’re in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, which is impossible to escape from!”

“Keep attacking, and intensify the efforts to possess Yang Qi!”

They were holding nothing back in their blows against Leaf Dao-Denier, with each attack draining more of their energy. The shockwaves were ripping such vast tears into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart that it was almost possible to see the outside world.

These ten magisters were so strong that only gods could stand up to them.

“Die!” Leaf Dao-Denier bellowed as he unleashed another powerful attack on the magisters. Even as they fought back and forth, they continued unleashing force on Yang Qi, ratcheting up the pressure with every moment that passed.

Leaf Dao-Denier resorted to another deadly move. “Immortal-Slayer’s Soul Detonation!Soul Attack!” A powerful expression of will shot toward the magisters.

In response, they unleashed an attack of their own. “Sovereign Lord’s True Will!God Legion Kowtow!”

It was another type of soul attack, this one aimed at Young Master Leaf. When the two powers slammed into each other, it sent out another destructive shock wave.

‘Now’s my chance!’

All of a sudden, Yang Qi’s eyes opened. Taking advantage of the heat of the moment, he sent out a secret message. “Seventy-one patriarchs! Immortal-slaying clone! Make your move. Attack! Take King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions!”

RUMBLE!

The seventy-one patriarchs were right behind Leaf Dao-Denier, all of them holding various treasures. For example, there was the Resentful One, who had just acquired more than four thousand halls from the Mourn-Parting Heaven-Palace. All of them had offered pious faith to Yang Qi, and had intentionally lured Young Master Leaf here and helped him get the legacy medallions for the purpose of fighting the magisters. All of it was part of Yang Qi’s plan.

Now, when both of his opponents were going all out trying to win, Yang Qi decided his moment had come.

He issued the orders for the seventy-one patriarchs to launch an attack.

As for his immortal-slaying clone, he had been waiting nearby in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Now he became a streak of light and joined the seventy-one patriarchs to strike Leaf Dao-Denier right in the back.

Whack!

Leaf Dao-Denier staggered, blood spraying out of his mouth as his energy arts rapidly deteriorated. As soon as he looked back at the seventy-one patriarchs, he realized what was happening. “You cutthroat! You schemer! Yang Qi, I'm going to destroy you or die in the attempt!”

“Get those talismans!” the immortal-slaying clone said. He and the seventy-one patriarchs had already severely wounded Leaf Dao-Denier, and now wasn’t the time to hold back. They sent massive power into King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions to take control of them.

Crack. Crunch.

The will that Leaf Dao-Denier had placed into the medallions was crushed.

‘Not good!’ In that moment, Leaf Dao-Denier knew he was beaten. He was well and truly beaten. Barely able to maintain focus of his thoughts, he blurted, “I can’t get stuck in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart! I have to get out of here! Legacy medallions, open a passageway.”

Two expressions of will began fighting within King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions!

An eruption of power then opened a hole, which Leaf Dao-Denier scurried into. A moment later, he was gone. Escaped.

If he’d stayed behind in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, he would’ve died. With the legacy medallions in the hands of Yang Qi and his clone, there was no way he would even stand a chance. His seventy-one brethren had betrayed him and he was seriously injured. Right now, his only hope was to retreat to the Tusita Heaven.

Although the seven medallions had already been taken by Yang Qi’s clone, Leaf Dao-Denier had just barely managed to take advantage of the last scraps of will and used them to escape.

“And now, Magisters, your seed of truth, and your wills, are stuck!”

Yang Qi walked forward and took hold of the seven legacy medallions, which caused the entire Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart to shiver. Yang Qi’s level of control and power vastly surpassed anything Leaf Dao-Denier had been capable of, and the ten magisters were in a state of retreat within moments, howling in rage and defiance.

“I can’t believe you’re so treacherous, boy! Leaf Dao-Denier doesn’t count as anything compared to you. You played him like a fiddle. How vicious! Completely and utterly vicious!”

The next voice that spoke was none other than Proud Heaven’s. “I thought I had everything planned out perfectly, Yang Qi. I thought you were done for! I could never have guessed that you would be this incredible. Not only did you fight back, but you also ended up getting seven of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions. Impressive. Very impressive! You just wait until we defeat the almighty entities of the past. Then we’ll return, and war will break out in the primal-chaos kingdom of the legion of gods. That’s where the final battle will take place. The immortal worlds are too puny….”

“Begin the detonation! We can’t let him take the seed of truth. The aspects of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth it contains would advance his cultivation base by leaps and bounds!”

“Yes. The time has come for self-destruction. These slivers of will aren’t worth anything at all to us.”

POP!

All of a sudden, the seed inside General Samman exploded, causing his body to begin dissolving.

“Myriad Worlds Consolidation! Divine King Immortal-Slayer! Seventy-Two Brethren!”

All of a sudden, seventy-two enormous hands appeared, reaching out toward the exploding vital energy and forcing it back into the shape of the seed. The wills of the ten magisters rapidly faded into nothing.

Yang Qi snorted coldly. “You think I'm going to just let you destroy this seed of truth? I was ready for that possibility. We're in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart now, and this is my territory. I have seven of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions, and soon enough, I’ll come to the future world to take the two you have there.”

Yang Qi looked at the legacy medallions and the seed of truth, then began laughing uproariously. His plan had worked. He’d manipulated everyone and achieved a stunning victory!

Chapter 777: Big Success

‘I finally did it! From here on out, Young Master Leaf and the future world alike will become rubble beneath my feet.’

A broad smile could be seen on Yang Qi’s face as he looked down at the seed of truth and the legacy medallions. He’d resolved a major catastrophe, gaining immense benefits in the process. His efforts had not been in vain.

‘Maybe your cultivation base puts you on the level of the legion of gods, Proud Heaven. But one of these days, we’ll meet on the field of battle and I'll cut you down. I'm going to get the God Legion Seal that you people from the future world have, earning the right to become the paramount Sovereign Lord! You people will serve as nothing but foils to my majesty!”

He looked at the seed of truth, with its collection of power from the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, then crushed and swallowed it. Warmth flowed through him, reaching every part of him and causing his energy arts to erupt. Areas that he’d never cultivated became free, and the God Legion Seal trembled as if with excitement.

“Bow of Chastisement, God-Wrath Arrow!” An enormous bow appeared in his hand, along with an arrow that seemed capable of piercing through the entire Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

It was another manifestation of his energy arts.

Cracking and ringing sounds could be heard, and clouds began to form over his head as his cultivation base rose to a higher level. He was now about to become a third division Incarnated God.

The name of the third division came because one could use virtual godhood to create mind incarnations. It was a watershed level that would lead to major advancements and incredible transformations in one’s energy arts.

For example, the five phases energy arts that Yang Qi cultivated would now be able to produce an incarnation called the Five Phases True Spirit Diagram as well as a Five Phases God Kingdom. The Eight Tribes Godfist could produce a Myriad Dragons Battle Painting, as well as the Myriad Dragons Conjoined Howl. A single fist strike from that technique would be enough to slice through mountains and shatter the dome of heaven.

Furious tribulations descended, filled with projections of the legion of gods and other dazzling images. God items slashed into Yang Qi, trying to kill him. There were even god mountains that crushed down onto his shoulders.

“Be annihilated!”

Without hesitation, Yang Qi unleashed a fist strike backed by the power of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. A projection of myriads of worlds appeared and the rage of the gods was shattered into dust.

At the same time, the true godhood within him continued melting, transforming into pure godpower that advanced his energy arts. The Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth was becoming something very different than before.

However, at that moment Yang Qi realized, to his shock, that the true godhood was being melted away much more quickly than he had anticipated. He previously assumed he could use it to get all the way to the ninth division, but it seemed like it wouldn’t get him past the fifth. If he wanted to achieve breakthroughs after that, he would need to find another source of power.

‘So, that’s how it is.’ Taking a closer look at himself, he confirmed that, after consuming the seed of truth, the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth seemed to be developing in a different direction from before. It was somehow more complete, and he was already about twice as powerful as he had been before. That was one reason why the true godhood was being drained away so quickly.

That said, it confirmed that the body of knowledge in his God Legion Seal was incomplete. He was light years away from having access to the complete Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.

It would require all three parts to do that.

The tribulations continued descending, and he continued vanquishing them. As they collapsed, they turned into true energy that poured into him, filling him. Inside of his body, he could sense chain-like pillars of magical laws that supported his skeleton, within which were ensconced the powers of hell.

His body was the cornerstone of truth, with his flesh and blood being hells that were more numerous than the eternal sands. Combined with his skeleton, they shaped the perfect body.

Yang Qi threw his head back and laughed uproariously. The Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart thrummed as he absorbed more of the power of monarchs, until there was no more left for him to take. The rage of the tribulation faded away, and he was a third division Incarnated God. He could now crush the Dao Defense League with ease, unless the old-timers all came out to stop him.

“I bet you never guessed that I would defeat those magisters, did you Samman?!” Yang Qi said as he forced Samman back into shape. Although Samman had been hurt by the explosion of the seed of truth, he hadn’t been killed.

“Mercy! Spare me! I’ll work for you. I'm an important person! I even know some big secrets. Don't you want to go to the future world? I can help you a lot! Status is important in the future world. If you don’t have a proper identity, you won’t last long. But I can help you get an identity!”

“Fine,” Yang Qi said with a nod. “If that's what you want to do, be my follower. I can even help you advance your energy arts. Open your soul to me and give me your faith!”

Before long, Yang Qi had gained another believer.

Waving his hand, he caused both of the fragments of the Cruiser of Civilization to appear in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. The photonic computers immediately began reporting in.

[Beep-beep-beep. Beep-beep-beep. Second fragment found. Begin fusion process?]

“Of course,” Yang Qi said. ‘I’ll use this treasure to travel through the passageway to the future. I’ll traverse space-time, save the god Brahma, and get all of the items I need from there. However, there's always the possibility that saving Brahma will involve destroying the passageway. Before I go through with that part of the plan, I should get the Engine of the One God.’

He thought back to the buddha dragon temple in the Eight Tribes Heaven, and how the Engine of the One God was apparently hidden in its depths. That place also thrummed with power from the primeval world; if he could get that, it would definitely make him a lot stronger.

“I'm going to break through!” his immortal-slaying clone announced. With seven of the legacy medallions, it was hard to say exactly how strong the clone was going to become.

Yang Qi watched as the clone became a Nirvanic God, then a Revisionist God, then a Measureless God, then a Buddha God.

Finally, the clone shivered as he climbed into the ninth division, making him a Chaos God! In the Dao Defense League, he would even surpass Sectlord Nine Yangs and the other old-timers!

Meanwhile, the Cruiser of Civilization was also upgrading.

As the two fragments connected into a unified spacecraft, the photonic computers were wildly flickering.

Yang Qi could sense that there was a lot of potential within the new spacecraft, but unfortunately its power levels were far too low. The stronger the ship became, the more power he needed to run it.

‘I wonder how many fragments there are of the Cruiser of Civilization,’ he thought, shaking his head. ‘If I could get them all and restore the Cruiser of Civilization to what it was like in the Primeval Age, I bet it would be on par with the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.’

Other photonic computers began speaking now.

[Beep-beep-beep. Beep-beep-beep…. Vivicreation and genetic systems… combined. Power reserves at one quadrillionth…. Power reserves are in the red. Request power boost. Currently, we are too weak to move.]

[The thirteen fragments of the Cruiser of Civilization are scattered all over… they exist in the past, present, and future. Now that two of the thirteen primary systems are combined, we can search for the others.]

“Forget it,” Yang Qi said. “This thing devours power like mad. How am I supposed to find that much power?” Waving his hand, he sent General Samman and his men into the cruiser, then shrank it down and absorbed it into his body. Once he got to the future world, he could use the ship and its crew to find and rescue his mother, aunt, and Master.

With the immortal-slaying clone working together with the seventy-one patriarchs, they advanced by leaps and bounds, and soon all of them were Buddha Gods. Eventually, they would step into the Chaos God level.

Yang Qi knew that he’d become so much stronger that there was no way Leaf Dao-Denier would be so much of a thorn in his side. That said, considering he had control of the essence of the Tusita Heaven, if he eventually joined forces with Emperor Tusita they might be able to cause some problems.

The Tusita Heaven was a thirty-third ranked immortal world, and Yang Qi wasn’t quite in a position to devastate a place like that. Besides, the place had existed for who knew how many millions upon millions of years. There were definitely demigods from there who were currently hiding out in primal-chaos, looking for godrelics and trying to attain godly ascension. If those people came back to fight, they would be a powerful force.

‘It’s a waiting game now,’ he thought. ‘When the buddha dragons fully open the passageway to the past, hopefully I can take advantage of the chaos to get the Engine of the One God. I also still need to find a proper source of power.’

With a whoosh, he left the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart and headed back toward the Dao Defense League to strengthen the Sage Panacea Sect and the Sage Monarch Society.

Meanwhile, in the Tusita Heaven, atop an enormous mountain, a howl of rage echoed out.

It was Leaf Dao-Denier, and his rage caused the essence of the Tusita Heaven to tremble. He’d reached a level of strength that was many times higher than before, but it still hadn’t done him any good.

He had suffered another humiliating defeat.

“Why?! Why did the seventy-one patriarchs betray me!?”

Chapter 778: Emergency Meeting

“The seventy-one of them lost all sense of shame! I can’t believe they betrayed me. After I came out of seclusion, there didn’t seem to be any problem with them at all. But as it turned out, that punk Yang Qi somehow manipulated them to turn on me. Now I have nothing left! My plan to restore King Immortal-Slayer and the seventy-one brethren is destroyed! It's all because of those bastard double-crossers. And Yang Qi even took my legacy medallions! I hate him! I hate heaven! I hate earth!”

Leaf Dao-Denier threw his head back and howled in rage.

“If I had known this was what was going on, I would have pushed my energy arts to the ultimate level before going to take him on. I could have waited until Yang Qi and the ten magisters were on their last legs. Or I could have just destroyed the seventy-one patriarchs and assimilated them. Instead, my soft-heartedness led to a huge catastrophe!

“Damnation! I'm going to defy heaven and turn all of this back around! I'm going to kill all ten magisters from the future world! I’ll destroy them!”

Unfortunately, no amount of howling to heaven and earth had any effect.

Suddenly, laughter rang out. “So, Leaf Dao-Denier, you’ve finally come to understand first-hand how much of a clever fox that boy is.”

An old man appeared, clad in an imperial robe, with an imperial crown on his head. This was the owner of the Live Forever God Tree, the emperor of the Tusita Heaven, who Young Master Leaf had only just recently been in conflict with.

Of course, Young Master Leaf was gradually gaining the approval of the core essence of the Tusita Heaven, which meant that eventually he would control the entire place. And unless the immortal world was completely destroyed, he would be impossible to kill.

Young Master Leaf looked up. “Well, if it isn’t Emperor Tusita. So you know about the battle I just lost? Are you here to mock me?”

The emperor snorted coldly. “I sensed the agitation of the essence of our Tusita heaven, so I came to investigate. And thanks to your little monologue, I know exactly what happened. You were blinded by greed. You lost big to that brat, and were betrayed by your seventy-one patriarchs. If you hadn’t been so rapacious, you could’ve worked with the Tusita Dynasty. With us, victory would have been assured. And you most surely wouldn’t be in this miserable state.”

“You’re right,” Young Master Leaf said. Of course, inwardly, he was thinking different thoughts. ‘If I’d asked for help from the emperor and the other old-timers from the imperial house, I definitely could have defeated Yang Qi and the wills of the ten magisters. But how could I stoop to such a level? It’s not like they’re any friends of mine, and eventually, they all have to die. I need to get back to the Sea of Despair and take full control of the essence. Then I’ll set up a huge spell formation to trap all of them and take their energy arts. I’ll kill them all one by one. For now, though, I’ll just pretend to want to work with them.’

“Emperor Tusita, that Yang Qi is too much for us to handle right now. He has seven of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions, which makes him just as terrifying as a demigod patriarch. And he can come and go with no warning whatsoever. How do you think you can deal with that?”

Emperor Tusita chuckled coldly. “Leaf Dao-Denier, ah, Leaf Dao-Denier. You should really stop underestimating us. Do you really think you’re invincible? Do you really think your destiny is superior to everyone else’s? It's true, you're a top genius. You have one of the most coveted of the three thousand special constitutions. You're a Fortuned One, but unfortunately there are still a lot of people out there who surpass you. I've known for a long time that this brat was going to be tough to deal with. We have to have an ironclad plan in place before trying to take him down. Right now, the biggest difficulty is that any attempt to kill him could be foiled by him just jumping into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Thankfully, we already have a plan to stop that.”

“What plan?” Leaf Dao-Denier asked.

“In about two months, he has a duel scheduled with Sectlord Nine Yangs in the Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple of the Dao Defense League. It's a formal thing, and word has already spread far and wide. Lots of old-timers will be going to watch, including demigods. It’s going to be quite the affair. We have a god formation that can temporarily suppress the power of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions. In other words, he won't be able to escape into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Once we have him in that formation, we can easily kill him. So. What do you think, Leaf Dao-Denier? Work with us and you can have your revenge.”

“Alright. I’ll work with you!” Right now, Leaf Dao-Denier was definitely a general with no troops under his command, therefore, he didn’t hesitate to agree to the offer.

“Excellent,” replied Emperor Tusita. “Working together, we can definitely create a new heaven and earth. What we need to do now is get in touch with all the most powerful old-timers and lure them into our plan. We can just tell them about Yang Qi’s legacy medallions, and claim that he's working with the future world. Make the old-timers fearful of him. When the time comes to make our move, the entire Dao Defense League will be out for him.” He chuckled darkly. “And in the end, we can use our spell formation to win big. By the way, I want the true godhood back that he took, and half of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions. Everything else will go to you.”

“Fine. It's a deal.” Leaf Dao-Denier chuckled inwardly. ‘This guy has no idea that the true godhood and the legacy medallions aren’t even really that important. What’s most important is the God Legion Seal. With that seal, I can rule this entire era. Perhaps being free of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions is a good thing, considering how they absorb the user's destiny.’

“Another thing we need to do,” said Leaf Dao-Denier, “is make sure Sectlord Nine Yangs gets a bit stronger….”

“There’s no need,” Emperor Tusita said. “Don’t underestimate him. Do you know how difficult it is to become a Chaos God in a twenty-sixth ranked immortal world? Normally speaking, you can only reach the Chaos God in a thirtieth-ranked world or higher.”

“He must have some powerful old-timer backing him. But who?”

“I'm not sure of that. But whoever it is, they’re very, very strong. It's probably someone close to the level of a god.”

“We need to put more thought into the plan in general. We can’t let Sectlord Nine Yangs take advantage of us.”

As they schemed, Yang Qi returned to the Dao Defense League, and it was with much fanfare. The moment he arrived, an enormous immortal world appeared.

“I am hereby establishing a new immortal world,” he said, his voice rumbling out. “This is the Sage Monarch Heaven, and it is run by the Sage Monarch Society. Henceforth, there is no Sage Panacea Sect. Any ambitious individuals out there are welcome to join the Sage Monarch Society. Swear oaths to piously give your faith and protect the society with your lives. If you do, you’ll receive unimaginable benefits. I’ll personally baptize you, healing you of any hidden energy arts injuries.”

The Sage Monarch Heaven was making its debut and would soon be a twentieth ranked immortal world, pulsing with incredible energy.

Yang Qi was now stronger than any of the old-timers, to the point where he could create immortal worlds. Unfortunately, his limit was currently twentieth ranked worlds. Anything beyond that would have to wait until he was stronger.

Of course, among immortal worlds in general, that was still a very high rank. Generally speaking, not even Chaos Gods could create worlds like that. Usually, it was the field of demigods.

Already, the Sage Monarch Heaven swarmed with Godmyths, thanks to all of the god dao seeds Yang Qi had provided.

There were even some people, such as Eldest Brother and Empress Jadefall, who were already second division Tempered Gods.

No longer was the Sage Monarch Heaven a small and pitifully weak force. It was slowly rising into glory.

Obviously, it was the rogue cultivators who were happiest when a new sect was founded or a new immortal world appeared. Normally, they were errand-runners and cannon fodder, but now they would have a chance to have a real home.

“What? The Sage Panacea Sect is an immortal world now? And they’re recruiting? We should go take a look.”

“Nobody cares at all about rogue cultivators like us here in the Dao Defense League. We get assigned all the most dangerous missions and are basically nothing more than cannon fodder. We can’t just keep going on like this. We have to join some sort of big sect.”

“The person who created this Sage Monarch Heaven is no ordinary person. I've heard his name is Dragon Proudheaven and he’s strong enough to fight Chaos Gods.”

“Let’s go see if we can curry some favor and get in.”

Rejoicing abounded in the Dao Defense League as rogue cultivators came from all over. Initially, there was quite a bit of chaos. After all, even the strongest disciples from the Sage Monarch Heaven were no stronger than Tempered Gods, whereas most of the rogue cultivators were Shattered or Nirvanic Gods.

In the end, the seventy-one patriarchs came and established their authority. As soon as their aura appeared, everyone calmed down.

It was with cold, grim voices that they issued a host of chilling proclamations.

“Anyone who joins the Sage Monarch Society but isn't faithful will be executed!”

“Anyone who dares to cause trouble will be executed!”

“Anyone who betrays us will be executed!”

“Anyone who slanders us… will be executed!”

Quite a few people recognized the seventy-one patriarchs as being the famous brethren of Leaf Dao-Denier, but in a shocking turn of events, they now worked for Yang Qi.

“Seventy-one patriarchs, where is your brother Leaf Dao-Denier? Is he working for Dragon Proudheaven now too?”

“He’s not Dragon Proudheaven. He’s Yang Qi! He said so himself!”

The old-timers in the Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple were particularly shocked.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi looked on, nodding in approval.

Three days later, the population of the Sage Monarch Heaven was much larger. With the seventy-one patriarchs there to keep order, Yang Qi decided that the time had come to focus on his cultivation again. But before he could, bells tolled in the Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple. A meeting was being called.

Chapter 779: Ancient Experts

Somehow, the tolling of the bells seemed particularly urgent as they spread to all of the various immortal worlds in the Dao Defense League.

The Dao Defense League was expanding faster than ever. All sorts of immortal worlds were joining, and as would be expected, the organization was becoming a hodgepodge of good and bad people. Because of that, the elders of many of the organizations were being somewhat isolationist and exercising special care not to interfere in the affairs of others.

In contrast, the truly strong organizations were able to call the wind and summon the rain in the league as a whole.

Overall, the league was growing larger, but less stable, although it wasn’t necessarily obvious from an outsider’s perspective. The resistance to the future world was as fierce as ever.

Only one thing was certain: the situation was very different from before, and no one knew exactly how things would turn out. History was being written, or, depending on the perspective, re-written.

‘They’re sounding the bells to summon the top patriarchs to the Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘But why? Is there some sort of emergency? Maybe an influx of warriors from the future world?’

After some thought, he decided to just go find out for himself. For the moment, he wasn’t worried about the safety of the Sage Monarch Heaven. His immortal-slaying clone was a Chaos God, and had seven of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions. He was currently in the position to tangle with demigods.

At the same time, the seventy-one patriarchs had been given plenty of treasures from the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. That and the blessings from Yang Qi had helped them to advance by leaps and bounds, to the point that most of them were at the peak of the Buddha God level. They trained constantly with the immortal-slaying clone, thus they would soon be breaking into the Chaos God level as well. When that happened, the Sage Monarch Heaven would become one of the top ten strongest forces within the Dao Defense League.

Yang Qi had other hidden trump cards as well, such as Sectlord Nine Yangs, King Bone Dragon, General Samman, and random future warriors he had captured and forced to work for him. No one knew about them, and they would be a major force to contend with if they were released in a surprise attack.

If anyone attacked the Sage Monarch Heaven, they would quickly find themselves in a quagmire of death.

With affairs settled in the Sage Monarch Heaven and the Sage Monarch Society, Yang Qi headed to the Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple. Upon arrival, he saw that the teleportation portals were active and countless important people were arriving. Many of them were people he had never seen before.

Some were Chaos God patriarchs, some were demigod old-timers who were half a step into the Deathless level. They were all mysterious and powerful figures, and there were so many of them streaming into the temple that it was almost impossible to count them.

Yang Qi even saw Dragonfolk! There were numerous top experts from the Eight Tribes, including some with the enigmatic aura of buddha dragons. The God, Heaven, True, and Devil Dragon Tribes had also sent old-timers. They weren’t the only thirty-third ranked immortal world to send people; there were also violet-robed experts from the Tusita Heaven.

Yang Qi frowned slightly at the sight of it all. A new dimension had been set up in the middle of the Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple, with numerous thrones filling it. Yang Qi sat down quietly on one of the thrones, then looked around at the buzz of activity as the temple filled up.

Of course, he was only a third division Incarnated God, which caused quite a few of the old-timers to look over at him curiously. After all, the general requirement to attend meetings in the Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple was to be a seventh division Measureless God.

There were some people who recognized him, so word quickly spread that he was the ‘Medicine Sage’ who could neutralize the morphblight virus and cure hidden cultivation injuries even in Chaos God patriarchs.

It led to quite a bit of shock among the patriarchs who had been in seclusion recently and hadn’t been updated on current events. It was a common thing for the patriarchs to operate from behind the scenes. They would focus on their own cultivation and have lower-ranking disciples handle day-to-day affairs. Because of that, they usually weren’t aware of the dramatic daily affairs in the Dao Defense League.

People were showing up who were rarely seen in public.

A beam of golden sword light pierced into the temple, accompanied by a powerful aura. A sword crypt appeared, within which a young man sat cross-legged, pulsing with sword energy. He carried no sword, but seemed like the embodiment of a sword at the same time. At a single glance, everyone could tell that he was some grandmaster of the dao of the sword.

There was already a buzz of conversation.

“Hey, that’s August Patriarch Sword-Burier! I heard he disappeared into the primal-chaos a hundred million years ago to pursue the dao of the sword and seek enlightenment of the Deathless Throne. He’s basically the top expert from the Sword Crypt Heaven. I wonder how close he is to the Deathless Throne.”

“I have no idea. As we all know, after you reach the Chaos God level, there are nine stairs to climb, which comprise the half-Deathless level. Most people call it the Deathless Heavenly Stairway. I wonder how many stairs he’s climbed.”

“He’s definitely an august patriarch that surpasses all the other old-timers.”

“Not necessarily. Look, that’s August Patriarch Great River. People say that he’s actually the incarnation of a heavenly river from the depths of primal-chaos. He got famous a hundred million years ago.”

Yang Qi watched as a heavenly river flowed into the temple and resolved into a humanoid shape.

Top patriarchs like this were arriving left and right. And everyone was talking about what happened after reaching the Chaos God level. Of course, it was only at that time that a cultivator would be able to sense the Deathless Heavenly Stairway and its nine stairs. At the top of the stairs was the Deathless Throne, and when one sat on that, one became a god, unafraid of ever dying.

For seven days and nights, patriarchs of all sorts streamed into the Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple. Thankfully, the dimension which had been set up was huge, otherwise there wouldn’t have been enough room.

In the middle of it all was a stage where people could stand to address the audience or engage in contests of martial ability.

Ding. Ding. Ding.

Yet again, bells tolled nine times in a row, causing everyone’s hearts to pound and their blood to rush. Afterward, everything went silent.

At this point, one of the patriarchs raised his voice and said, “I am Daoist Great Void. Presumably, most of you have heard of me. We called this urgent meeting because we acquired intelligence indicating that the future world will soon deploy a large number of troops, led by both generals and marshals. Apparently, there may even be some generalissimos present. They wish to batter our defensive lines until they completely break. Our Dao Defense League is the only bastion of defense that exists for the immortal worlds. If we fall, the consequences would be too horrible to contemplate. After all, there is no immortal world strong enough to single-handedly stand against the armies of the future. Perhaps some of you are unaware of what the generalissimos of the future world are. They all stand on the ninth stair of the Deathless Heavenly Stairway, their hands brushing the Deathless Throne.”

The audience erupted with shock. “The ninth stair on the Deathless Heavenly Stairway? How strong would a person like that be? They’re just on the verge of godly ascension. From what I've heard, each stair on the Deathless Heavenly Stairway comes with new skills and abilities. And each stair is as separated from the next as earth is from heaven.”

“That’s right. According to what I’ve read in the ancient texts, there are nine stairs in total. The first is the Stair of Valor, in which you acquire boundless Valor. That’s not the normal kind of valor you would think of, but the preheaven Valor of the gods. It’s incredibly strong, and with it, your cultivation base can advance immeasurably. Someone who’s stepped onto the Stair of Valor is virtually beyond the compare of anyone beneath them.”

“What? How do you know about the secrets of the nine minor stairs? Tell me more!”

“Sure. First is the Stair of Valor, followed by the Stair of Strength. Next are the Stairs of Wisdom, Endurance, Fearlessness, Awareness, the Heaven-Fate, and Forgetfulness. The last, the ninth, is the Stair of the True Void.”

“Nine stairs. That's a lot of names.”

“Yes, those are the stairs you have to climb to reach godly ascension. You must have incredible Valor, Wisdom, Strength, Endurance, Fearlessness, and Awareness. You have to gather Heaven-Fate and acquire Forgetfulness. Then you can enter the True Void and become truly deathless.”

Yang Qi listened carefully to the discussions going on around him, which were like a bright light dispelling the darkness of ignorance. Soon, he had an idea of the path that lay ahead of him.

‘So, it’s about Valor, Wisdom, Strength, Endurance, Fearlessness, Awareness, Heaven-Fate, Forgetfulness, and True Void. Nine stairs to become deathless. It makes sense. How could you be deathless if you don’t have those qualities?’

When it came to the True Void, the ‘true’ aspect came from the expression ‘to cultivate truth’. There were some corporeal objects which were false and needed to be dispensed with. Only by embracing absolute truth could one truly practice cultivation.

As Yang Qi was contemplating these things, Daoist Great Void raised his voice again. “Because of the urgency of the situation, the Dao Defense League cannot afford to be lax. We’ve called you patriarchs here today because, at the moment, our alliance is like a headless dragon, incapable of moving. There is no commanding officer to give orders. Everyone is doing their own thing, and because of that we lack stability. We need a ‘dragon head’, a league-lord to take charge of things. That’s the only way that we can be united.”

‘What? They’re going to select a league-lord?’ Yang Qi was stunned, and immediately realized how important of a moment this was. Whoever became the league-lord of the Dao Defense League would essentially be the leader of countless immortal worlds. An emperor of the Heavenly Court.

Obviously, all of the patriarchs present would want a title like that.

Chapter 780: Selecting the League-Lord

“We’re going to select a league-lord….”

Everyone was surprised by Daoist Great Void’s announcement; people had been expecting something like this to happen, just not so soon.

The Dao Defense League had been around for several years now, and so far it had no official rules, hierarchy, or structure. It was simply a loose collection of sects and worlds that had banded together to fight the future world. Without them, the immortal worlds would have long since been crushed out of existence.

However, if there was a league-lord with official authority, everything would be different. The Dao Defense League would become stable and united, and of course, the league-lord would become an extremely powerful person.

Many of the Measureless, Buddha, and Chaos Gods present didn’t look very happy at all, as they knew that they had absolutely no chance of becoming the league-lord.

It was only the half-Deathless old-timers who had a chance, people who’d begun climbing the Deathless Heavenly Stairway. All such experts were already itching to become the new league-lord, fully aware of the immense power they would have: the ability to command the host of immortals.

Yang Qi looked around at the packed temple, and it was impossible for him to determine how many people qualified to compete for the position.

No one had any idea where this expert among experts would come from, so he simply sat back and waited to see how things would play out.

He had no interest in becoming the new league-lord. Although he was definitely strong enough to crush any of the old-timers present, it would take a lot of time and effort to exert authority and maintain power. As far as he was concerned, it would be wisest to not show the mountain and not reveal the water, to keep his true strength hidden and remain an ordinary but powerful patriarch.

The tallest tree attracts the most wind, and despite how strong he was, he wasn’t in the position to dominate all creation. He needed to further his cultivation, continue assimilating the true godhood within him, and advance through the divisions of the Godmyth level. He wanted to climb the Deathless Heavenly Stairway and become a Lesser God, the kind of person no one could ever boss around.

Keeping a low profile was the best thing to do for now.

“Everyone quiet down!” Daoist Great Void said. “The first part of the process is to nominate candidates. We need someone with invincible, top-rate energy arts, a person of virtue and prestige who can convince everyone of their authority. Of course, we won’t just be selecting a league-lord. There are other positions to fill. We old-timers have already decided that we’ll structure the Dao Defense League according to the ancient ways. Therefore, serving under the league-lord will be two emissaries, one for radiance and light, the other for darkness and gloom. Beneath them will be nine dharmarajas. Further down will be twenty-four god-generals, and of course, plenty of ordinary patriarchs.”

‘So that's how they’re going to do it,’ thought Yang Qi. ‘A league-lord, two emissaries, nine dharmarajas, and twenty-four god-generals. A very military structure. Presumably, they’re going to appoint people based on how strong they are. If I throw my hat in the ring, I should be able to get a spot as a god-general. The competition's definitely going to be fierce, though.’

Counting the league-lord, the emissaries, the dharmarajas, and the god-generals, there were a total of thirty-six people who would make up the core power structure.

At the moment, there were hundreds of millions of patriarchs present, and the fact that many of them would be competing for only thirty-six positions meant there would definitely be a blood-soaked struggle.

Although not everyone was thinking of aiming for the position of league-lord, quite a few people were hoping to at least snag a spot as a god-general. Yang Qi was convinced that if he didn’t get one of the positions, he would quickly be lost in the crowd and his opportunities for growth and advancement would be significantly hindered.

Almost as soon as the words left Daoist Great Void’s mouth, destiny began gathering in the Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple.

It was the destiny of the countless immortal worlds, and whoever took control of it would become an individual of immense power. They would be able to execute anyone they wanted, any clan, any people. Their orders would be strictly enforced and they would gain immense benefits in their cultivation.

‘No wonder all of the old-timers want this position. As the league-lord, one could benefit from all the destiny in heaven and earth, and would probably achieve a whole succession of breakthroughs. In fact, it might even lead directly to the Deathless Throne.’ Yang Qi was stunned. ‘Being the league-lord of the Dao Defense League would provide much more true godhood than the Live Forever God Tree from the Tusita Heaven could. The Tusita Heaven is only one heaven, whereas the Dao Defense League is filled with as many heavens as the eternal sands. Just look at how many patriarchs there are here. Together, they could easily wipe a thirty-third ranked immortal world out of existence.’

Yang Qi had never seen so many powerful experts gathered in one place.

With such thoughts on his mind, he suddenly realized that he was actually inclined to compete for the position, even though he wasn’t really interested in being the league-lord. Daoist Great Void had just said they wanted someone with invincible, top-rate energy arts who was also a person of virtue and prestige.

When it came to having invincible, top-rate energy arts, Yang Qi knew that he met the qualifications, and he could definitely defeat any of the old-timers here. As for being a person of virtue and prestige, well, that was another story….

WHIZZZ!

All of a sudden, a beam of sword light appeared and shot toward the central area in the middle of the temple. A young man appeared who was bursting with energy and was clearly an expert with sword techniques. He was none other than the famous August Patriarch Sword-Burier who had made a grand entrance earlier.

“There’s no need for you to waste your breath, Daoist Great Void,” he said. “We all know that we have to elect a leader for our Dao Defense League. But let’s be frank here. The purpose of our alliance is to fight the future world. Who cares if the leader is a person of virtue and prestige? We need a genius who can shed rivers of blood. We need someone with unbeatable energy arts. And as it happens, your humble servant happens to know a few sword techniques that I would like to demonstrate right here and now. If any patriarch here can stand up to them, I’d be happy to name them league-lord! But if no one here can do so, then I will take the title. Presumably, no one has any objections, right? It’s a given that our ‘election’ process will involve a big martial contest. Whoever has the best cultivation base, and is strongest, will become our leader. We don’t need to bother discussing anything else. I'm nominating myself for the position of league-lord. Does anyone else dare to step forward and fight me for it?”

August Patriarch Sword-Burier held no sword in his hand, yet he seemed capable of slicing apart the dome of heaven and carving up primal-chaos itself. He had a seemingly invincible cultivation base, and even the other Chaos Gods present flinched when looking at him. His gaze was so sharp that no one could meet it without feeling like their eyes were being sliced apart.

Although many of the patriarchs were eyeing the empty platform, none of them said a single word in response to his challenge.

The truth was that everyone knew full well how this meeting was going to play out. The ‘election’ of the league-lord would come down to a martial contest. Whoever lasted until the end, proving that their energy arts and cultivation level were invincible, would be the league-lord.

Discussions and debates were pointless.

August Patriarch Sword-Burier had a reputation for being very fierce and tough. He’d made his name a hundred million years in the past by slaughtering countless fiend-devils, then disappearing to wander in primal-chaos. The patriarchs who were in the know were all convinced that he must have picked up countless godrelics during his wanderings and was clearly the best choice for a leader. In fact, it seemed like—at the moment, at least—nobody was willing to go up against him.

“Nobody’s willing to challenge me?” August Patriarch Sword-Burier chuckled. “Well then, I guess I'm the league-lord.”

However, that was when another voice echoed out. “I'm not convinced you’re the one who should take the lead, August Patriarch Sword-Burier! I'm a sword cultivator too, so why don’t the two of us exchange some pointers and see whose technique is superior?”

A shadowy blur flew over to the open area, resolving into the form of a tall man in a black sackcloth garment. He had a long sword strapped to his back, and even without unsheathing it he emanated a sense of boundless might.

“That’s Patriarch Grand Darkness, another top-level august patriarch. I heard that he's one of the founders of the Grand Darkness Heaven, and that in his journeys in primal-chaos, he came across a god item called the Abyssal Sword. It's impossible to say how many people he’s killed with that sword over the years.”

Patriarch Grand Darkness was another deadly and fiendish old-timer who would be welcomed with the utmost respect even in thirty-third ranked immortal worlds.

“Cut the crap and show me a move!” August Patriarch Sword-Burier said, flicking his sleeve as he prepared for combat.

“As a cultivator of the dao of the sword, are you going to draw your weapon or not?” Patriarch Grand Darkness said coolly.

August Patriarch Sword-Burier laughed heartily. “You think I need a sword to deal with you? If I did, how could I qualify to be the league-lord?” He stood there, shining with a golden light that made him look like a heaven-god, surrounded by an illusory sword crypt. In fact, because of it all, he looked like a god of swords standing in a tomb of weapons.

“What incredible gall!” Patriarch Grand Darkness shouted angrily. “If you don’t want to use your sword, then don’t blame me for killing you. You really think you can become the league-lord just by standing up here? Since you've chosen to stick your head out first, I’m more than happy to slice it off!”

A black sword appeared, a glow of godliness surrounding it that made it seem like an abyss of darkness. It was the Abyssal Sword, and it was clear that Patriarch Grand Darkness’ mastery of it had reached the point of perfection.

In response, August Patriarch Sword-Burier flicked his finger, sending a stream of sword energy out that hit the dark blade, resulting in a booming sound like a bell.

Gong!

The Abyssal Sword trembled and Patriarch Grand Darkness staggered backward a few steps. In contrast, August Patriarch Sword-Burier didn’t move an inch. It was instantly clear who was in the superior position.

“You're obviously no match for me,” August Patriarch Sword-Burier said. “Back down. Otherwise, I’ll be forced to take your life.”

Chapter 781: Patriarchs Fight

All it took was a single flick of August Patriarch Sword-Burier’s finger to vanquish Patriarch Great Darkness’ sword attack.

It was immediately obvious how vast their separation was in terms of levels. But Patriarch Great Darkness couldn’t just accept such a huge loss of face. Without hesitation, he drew on another sword technique to launch an even stronger attack on August Patriarch Sword-Burier.

“The Abyss Debuts!”

An abyss of darkness appeared, streaking toward August Patriarch Sword-Burier like a black dragon. It moved with lightning-like speed and contained numerous variations, to the point where many of the patriarchs present could hardly even see it. From the look of shocks that appeared on their faces, it was obvious that if they’d faced an attack like that it would be difficult to survive it.

August Patriarch Sword-Burier immediately backed up.

“Falling back, huh? Then take some more of my Abyssal Chain Reaction Slaughter!

“Second stance: Sins of the King!

“Third stance: Original Sin Cometh!

“Fourth stance: Source of All Evils!

“Fifth stance: Sword Will of All Darkness and Gloom!”

Each of the five stances were deadly and seemed to pulse like evil abysses. Clearly, the Abyssal Sword was something a wretch-god had once used, or it had been blessed by the godpower of one, at the very least.

The sword was inscribed with a variety of sword techniques, all of them evil and from the path of sin, the kind of techniques that could invert magical laws. Each move of the sword seemed capable of dragging the target into an abyss of wickedness, a place from which they could never return to righteousness.

As the flurry of sword blows surrounded August Patriarch Sword-Burier, he eventually disappeared into a swath of absolute darkness. Patriarch Great Darkness was left standing there alone, looking around with a vicious, triumphant grin.

“Dead already, August Patriarch Sword-Burier?” he said with a cruel chuckle. “Once you get caught up in the darkness of my Abyssal Sword, the only thing left for you is despair.”

A moment later, August Patriarch Sword-Burier’s voice echoed out from the darkness. “Is that so? Considering you use a wicked and evil technique, I suppose I’ll have to use the righteous dao of the great heaven to cut you down!”

Suddenly, boundless golden light appeared, awe-inspiring and righteous like a convergence of magical laws that could lead to prosperity and peace.

Swish!

A sword appeared and knocked the Abyssal Sword down to the ground!

Then August Patriarch Sword-Burier appeared, stepping forward and smashing his palm onto Patriarch Great Darkness’ chest.

Patriarch Great Darkness shrieked as he was flung backward, blood spraying out of his mouth before he slammed onto the ground, completely unconscious.

“Piece of trash,” August Patriarch Sword-Burier said. “Considering that the Abyssal Sword is a god item, I suppose I’ll keep it in my sword crypt as a keepsake. Obviously, Patriarch Great Darkness has lost any qualification to be the league-lord.” August Patriarch Sword-Burier sent a streak of sword energy into Patriarch Great Darkness and woke him up.

After looking around and realizing he’d lost, his face turned as ashen as death. “I admit I’ve been beaten. Fine. I'm leaving the Dao Defense League! I’ll go back and work on my cultivation until I'm good enough to get revenge for today. Farewell!”

With that, he turned to leave.

Before he could, nine streams of true energy appeared as nine old-timers joined forces to prevent him from leaving.

“Patriarch Great Darkness,” said Daoist Great Void, “you need to accept your defeat. If the members of the Dao Defense League could renounce membership just because of losing a fight, we’d be a laughingstock and people would end up quitting in droves.  Anyone who loses a fight today will be removed from consideration for office, but no more. Did you really think the competition for the position of league-lord would be fun and games?”

“That's right,” another patriarch said, nodding. “Anyone who loses must definitely endorse the new league-lord. Whoever doesn’t will be executed!”

“People need to learn to accept defeat. Otherwise our Dao Defense League is never going to be united.”

Almost immediately, there were cold snorts of disagreement from some of the other patriarchs.

“I come and go as I please,” Patriarch Great Darkness said. “You really think you can forbid us from quitting the Dao Defense League? Even in an imperial dynasty in the mortal world, it's possible to resign from an official position. So why is the Dao Defense League being so restrictive? Seems to me this is no alliance, but a tool for people to gain power! We’re supposed to be fighting the future world, not fueling personal ambition. Sorry, I'm not on board with that sort of thing. I'm leaving, and I’d love to see who would dare to stop me!”

Even as the words left his mouth, he began to fly up into the air.

Before he could get very far, though, nine shadowy figures blurred out and blocked his path, resolving into nine figures wearing yellow clothing and masks.

Quite a few people recognized them right away. They were none other than the Nine Uncanny Eccentrics.

They’d been famous as a group for a hundred million years and were usually in a godrelic in primal-chaos, working on their cultivation. Patriarchs from various sects would sometimes visit them to pay respects and ask for advice. All nine of them were very close to reaching the Deathless Throne. And because of their strange personalities, they were completely unpredictable.

Now, all nine of them were standing together to oppose Patriarch Great Darkness.

“You come and go as you please?” one of the masked figures said. “What do you think this is, a marketplace? We Nine Uncanny Eccentrics have been entrusted with maintaining order in this meeting today, and that's exactly what we’re going to do!”

Another of the Nine Uncanny Eccentrics said, “The nine of us act as one, and despite being on the path to the Deathless Throne, not even we qualify to be the league-lord. But that doesn’t mean we’ll let people cause a scene here. Now here you are, Patriarch Great Darkness, saying bad things about the league just because you lost a fight.”

“That's deserving of death!” one of the other eccentrics said.

“You’re right. Killing him is the ethical thing to do!”

RUMBLE!

The Nine Uncanny Eccentrics unleashed streams of energy and created an enormous spell formation that froze Patriarch Great Darkness in place. He roared in rage, but was powerless to do anything and completely incapable of escaping. Yang Qi could tell that these nine eccentrics were extremely powerful, especially when working together. Yet they still claimed to lack the qualifications to be league-lord. They even said that they had been ‘entrusted with’ keeping the peace, which seemed to indicate that they were working for some other, vastly more powerful figure.

Whoever it was, he or she was no one to take lightly.

“Let me out of here!” Patriarch Great Darkness shouted. Shoving his palm out, he sent a black sun to try to destroy the spell formation around him. It was none other than the Great Black Sun Palm, one of his specialty moves.

Unfortunately, the Nine Uncanny Eccentrics shifted tactics, summoning their own Great Black Sun Palm that seemed like a duplicate of Patriarch Great Darkness’ version.

RUMBLE!

It was almost as if Patriarch Great Darkness were being simultaneously attacked by nine of himself. In the blink of an eye, he was slashed into countless chunks of blood and gore.

A bloodcurdling scream rang out as the Nine Uncanny Eccentrics said, “Be absorbed!” They waved their hands and nine vortexes appeared, sucking up the blood and gore. “Free me!” Patriarch Great Darkness’s voice echoed out. “I’ll acknowledge allegiance to the new league-lord. Just don’t kill me! I’ll— AGGHHHH!”

His words trailed off into another agonized shriek.

Everyone looked on in shock as a domineering and boundless august patriarch died, just like that.

One of the Nine Uncanny Eccentrics said, “Now that this ambitious wolf is dead, we can continue. We nine won’t be competing for the position of league-lord. That being said, we won’t let things get out of order.”

Virtually everyone present was trembling like cicadas in winter, and were wondering who it was that had invited the eccentrics to oversee the event. They looked over at Daoist Great Void and the other old-timers who were gathered near him, such as Heaven-King Sage-Hand, Old Man Mahākaruṇā, Squire Farcorners and the like. They all seemed to be working together, which begged the question of just who they were working for.

That said, there were other factions present besides them, including some who didn’t seem inclined to go along with the crowd.

All of a sudden, a cold chuckle rang out. “Well played, Nine Uncanny Eccentrics. But who gave you the authority to execute anyone here today?”

Many jaws dropped. Who could ever have guessed that, right after the Nine Uncanny Eccentrics had put on such an impressive and threatening display, someone would still dare to stir up trouble? Even Yang Qi was curious about who it was that had just spoken. A moment later, it became obvious: Dragonfolk.

All of the Eight Tribes were present, apparently having come as a united group. They were clustered around a young man who seemed to have no aura whatsoever, as though he were empty inside. Yet it was possible to see destiny swirling about in the form of ten thousand dragons above his head. Clearly, this young man was a consummate expert.

The person who had just spoken was a patriarch from the God Dragon Tribe, who was standing right next to the young man, and from the words he spoke it was obvious that the Dragonfolk weren’t afraid of the Nine Uncanny Eccentrics.

“No one gave us the authority,” one of the eccentrics replied. “We’re just trying to keep things orderly. If you Dragonfolk are interested in the position of league-lord, please step forward! All you have to do is accept challenges from any Fellow Daoist here today and prove that you're invincible. If you do, then we Nine Uncanny Eccentrics will follow your orders to the letter.”

“Alright!” said a burly fellow who stood with the Buddha Dragon Tribe. “I'm curious to see who present could land an attack on me. August Patriarch Sword-Burier, your sword technique is middling at best. If you’re not convinced, try it out on me.”

“Who are you?”

“Dragon King Buddhiya!”

August Patriarch Sword-Burier chuckled. “The famous Dragon King Buddhiya from the Buddha Dragon Tribe? Fine. Step forward!”

RUMBLE!

Dragon King Buddhiya flew to the fighting platform and immediately launched a fist attack at August Patriarch Sword-Burier. The fist-wind contained the auras of numerous dragon tribes and pulsed with immense power. It was the Eight Tribes Godfist, and he had unexpectedly cultivated seven of the different aspects of the technique. He was only one step away from reaching the perfect level.

Bang. Bam. Boom!

August Patriarch Sword-Burier and Dragon King Buddhiya fought back and forth, fist and sword energy clashing. In the blink of an eye, they had exchanged thousands of moves. As they did, it became obvious that August Patriarch Sword-Burier was starting to run low on energy! Soon, a true energy projection of a cloudy sword crypt appeared above his head.

Meanwhile, blood clouds had formed above Dragon King Buddhiya’s head as he burned his life force power. The two of them were drawing on the full power of their respective techniques, and if it weren’t for the fact that the Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple was specifically designed to withstand such force, entire immortal worlds would likely have been destroyed by the shockwaves.

In the end, Dragon King Buddhiya let out a shout and released a succession of complex moves that pierced through the defenses of his opponent.

But then, in an even more shocking twist, August Patriarch Sword-Burier suddenly vanished, to appear in the air above Dragon King Buddhiya, his sword pointed right at his head.

Dragon King Buddhiya was about to suffer a stunning defeat!

Chapter 782: All Sorts of Divine Abilities

Whack!

Dragon King Buddhiya slammed into the ground, the raging sword energy within him causing him to twitch and spasm. August Patriarch Sword-Burier had won another victory! Of course, August Patriarch Sword-Burier wasn’t about to let his guard down. Calming down and reigning in his momentum, he began focusing on replenishing his true energy.

Meanwhile, three figures blurred onto the platform. Unexpectedly, three patriarchs had all decided to challenge August Patriarch Sword-Burier at the same time. It was no collusion, they just all happened to step forward at the same time.

“August Patriarch Sword-Burier, I am Heaven-Patriarch North Pole. I would like to learn a few tips from you and your sword technique. Make your move!”

“I am Arhat Red-Cloud, and I would also like to test out your sword technique.”

“I'm Fist-Patriarch Evil-Dao, and I hope to test my skill against you.”

Apparently, all three of them hoped to take advantage of a moment in which August Patriarch Sword-Burier was weak and running low on energy. Boos and hisses began filling the temple.

“Patriarchs are supposed to act like heroes!” someone called out. “But you three are trying to take advantage of him when he’s running low on energy?”

Heaven-Patriarch North Pole gave a cold harrumph. “Taking advantage? Whoever wants to be our league-lord should have an unending supply of true energy. What, we’re supposed to just sit around while he rests and recovers? A person like that doesn’t qualify to be our league-lord! If he’s not willing to stand his ground, he can screw the hell off!”

“That’s exactly right!” Fist-Patriarch Evil-Dao said. “But considering there are three of us up here, how do we decide who fights who after August Patriarch Sword-Burier gives up?”

“Simple. Rock-paper-scissors!” Arhat Red-Cloud said calmly.

Before anything else could happen though, August Patriarch Sword-Burier said, “You three are obviously the type who like to take advantage of others. But did you really think I would be scared of you? Which of you wants to take a shot at me first?” Before, August Patriarch Sword-Burier had been quite arrogant and would have loved to fight all three of the patriarchs together. But his victory over Dragon King Buddhiya had cost him a huge amount of true energy, and he knew that he would be in a very bad position when fighting three on one.

“I’ll go first,” Fist-Patriarch Evil-Dao said. “I’ll kill you and absorb your quintessence, making me stronger than ever.”

With that he began to walk forward aggressively.

“Hold on!” someone said, and before anyone else could do anything, a young man appeared on the stage.

Yang Qi’s eyes glittered as he realized he had no idea how the young man had made his entrance. Of course, his Lord's Eye was currently closed. Even still, it was a big shock, and something Yang Qi had never imagined could happen. Whoever this person was, he was strong enough that Yang Qi wasn’t even confident in being able to beat him.

As it turned out, he was the young man who had been standing with the Buddha Dragon Tribe.

The young man waved his finger and a stream of energy shot out into Dragon King Buddhiya, who struggled to his feet then walked over and knelt.

“My respects, Young Lord,” Dragon King Buddhiya said. “I deserve to be executed for losing to August Patriarch Sword-Burier.”

“It’s fine. It’s not your fault. August Patriarch Sword-Burier’s energy arts are profound. People say that he inherited the legacy of the ancient Sword God, and even acquired a seed of truth filled with energy arts from his tomb. The fact that you handled yourself as you did is good enough. Now begone, and let me deal with August Patriarch Sword-Burier myself.”

“Yes, Young Lord!” Dragon King Buddhiya hurried off.

“What, you’re also here to try taking advantage of me?” August Patriarch Sword-Burier said, his expression flickering. Obviously, this young lord of the Dragonfolk was no one to take lightly. He had just healed Dragon King Buddhiya with a very profound and mysterious method, after all.

“Why would I possibly want to take advantage of anyone?” the young lord replied. With a flourish, he produced a medicinal pill. “This is a secret legacy of the Buddha Dragon Tribe, the Myriad Dragons Latent God Pill. It’s a medicinal pill from the dao of gods and can negate internal heat, settle the nascent divinity, extrude postheaven impurities, and replenish preheaven essence. It will also heal your injuries, improve your cultivation base, and restore your true energy. And it will do all of that within only three breaths of time. While you benefit from the effects, I’ll defeat all three of these despicable losers. Then, you and I can have a match.”

It was such shocking news that the other patriarchs in the room immediately devolved into an uproar.

“What? A Myriad Dragons Latent God Pill?”

“That’s one of the top two god pills from the Dragonfolk! They’re profoundly rare and precious and can lead to incredible improvements to the cultivation base. They can even produce nascent divinities out of the True Void, allowing one to return to life after death. This young lord of the Dragonfolk is just going to give one out!?”

“He's trying to win hearts, that's what he’s doing. He wants to make himself as impressive as the league-lord should be!”

“You’re right. That's definitely one way to win hearts!”

The old-timers here were perceptive people, and it was obvious to them that this young lord was trying to earn points and impress everyone. He really did seem like a league-lord, and people could already imagine how nice it would be to have him in charge.

“You can wait your turn, Young Lord,” Arhat Red-Cloud said. “Don’t you know the rules here? Back up and wait for us to finish fighting August Patriarch Sword-Burier!”

Swish!

He waved his finger and, not wanting to give him a chance to consume the Myriad Dragons Latent God Pill, sent a deadly attack toward August Patriarch Sword-Burier.

“Screw the hell off!” the young lord said, his expression turning ice-cold. His energy surged as he lashed out with his fist, unleashing an expression of the martial path that was a combination of righteous and wicked. This was no martial art of the Dragonfolk, but rather some other strange godly-class energy art, something so powerful that the entire universe seemed to list wildly because of it.

POP!

Arhat Red-Cloud was sent flying off the stage. As he tumbled through the air, his body collapsed into pieces, then his soul, leaving behind nothing but an echoing scream. Just like that, another patriarch was killed.

And the young lord didn’t stop there. Blurring into motion before the other two patriarchs could react, he struck them so efficiently that they died without their corpses even moving. Their souls, nascent divinities, magical laws, and quintessence energy were all sucked away, leaving behind nothing but empty husks.

This was a truly domineering and vicious fist technique! Gasps rang out. Arhat Red-Cloud, Fist-Patriarch Evil-Dao, and Heaven-Patriarch North Pole were all considered elite patriarchs who were vastly more powerful than ordinary Chaos Gods. Yet all of them had been struck dead with a single blow, without even a chance to flee.

It was unquestionable that this young lord of the Dragonfolk had an impeccable cultivation base.

August Patriarch Sword-Burier slowly shook his head as he realized that even if he were back to full power, he was no match for this young lord. He consumed the Myriad Dragons Latent God Pill and performed a few breathing exercises while his injuries healed. “Young Lord, your fist technique is marvelous, and clearly strong enough to shatter universes. You have my sincere respect. There’s no need for us to compete. I humbly concede.”

He clearly didn't want to set himself up for humiliation, so instead, he simply accepted the benevolence which had been shown him. Turning, he left the stage.

“August Patriarch Sword-Burier, you have a very advanced cultivation base and should definitely be one of the core figures in the Dao Defense League. If I end up serving as the league-lord, I hope you’ll agree to be one of the dharmarajas.” Yet again, the young lord was trying to win hearts.

“Many thanks,” August Patriarch Sword-Burier said. Obviously, this young lord would be a powerful ally and benefactor. “In that case, as long as you stand strong, I’ll support you as league-lord.”

“Excellent!” the young lord said. Then he looked around. “So, who out there will challenge me?”

He’d made an impressive debut by slaughtering three patriarchs and forcing August Patriarch Sword-Burier to back down without a fight. Everyone could tell that his energy arts were profound, and of course, they realized his fist technique was incredibly domineering.

‘What fist technique was that?’ Yang Qi thought. From what he could tell, it must be some extremely powerful martial art from the ancient past. There was something primeval about this young lord that made Yang Qi certain that he must have been blessed directly by an expert from the ancient world.

Yang Qi almost had an inclination to go down and test him out. Although the young lord’s technique was very impressive, Yang Qi was confident that his Hand of the One God was more impressive.

As he considered whether or not to go up to the stage, the rest of the patriarchs suddenly began buzzing with quiet conversation.

Looking over, Yang Qi noticed that the expressions on the faces of the Nine Uncanny Eccentrics had turned very respectful, and from the look of anticipation on the face of Daoist Great Void, someone important was about to arrive.

Moments later, a group of patriarchs appeared, clustered around a mysterious-looking individual. He was a hulking figure with arms that seemed capable of propping up the universe itself. His aura was that of primal-chaos, and he seemed very close to the level of the legion of gods.

‘So, things aren’t as simple as they seemed before,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘Another powerful entity has appeared.’

There was something suffocating about this newcomer, and when Yang Qi drew on his Wheel of Fate, he could see destiny above his head like a fiery conflagration that was fated to engulf the universe itself. If this person wasn’t a god, he was very close.

“So, Young Lord of the Dragonfolk, you want to be the league-lord? If so, I’d like to test your cultivation base a bit. Incidentally, why hasn’t your father, a powerful elder in the Buddha Dragon Tribe, not come forth? Why did he ask a youngster like you to try taking the position of league-lord? Did he really think that none of us would realize that he had opened a passageway to the primeval times and asked an expert from there to bless you with energy arts?”

The mysterious individual's words struck deeply into the hearts of everyone present.

Cries of astonishment began ringing out from the crowd.

“Is that…?”

“That's the legendary Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven! A Grand Emperor from ancient times!”

Chapter 783: Young Lord of the Dragonfolk

There was already a buzz of discussion amongst the countless old-timers.

“He’s one of the Grand Emperors from ancient times, Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven! The others were Grand Emperors Myriadmagic Heavenspan, Ninelimits Paragon, and Heavenearth Vastocean. Collectively, they were called the Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court.”

“Yes, those four were the ones who originally founded the ancient Heavenly Court!”

“I've heard of this Grand Emperor. But didn’t he vanish years and years ago? I thought he became a god or something.”

“Become a god? Not in our era. The legion of gods existed in a previous era, but they vanished. It was only afterward that our immortal dao civilization took hold. Immediately after the vanishing of the legion of gods, there was a period in which the many heavens were in an era of chaos. Later, certain powerful and ambitious individuals rose up, eventually founding the Heavenly Court and unifying the world.”

“Later, friction arose between the four emperors, and eventually the court was dissolved. Ever since then, the countless immortal worlds have been disunited.”

“I can’t believe it’s Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven! Although, it makes sense. He’s a very ambitious person, so maybe he's the one who actually came up with the idea of the Dao Defense League! He’s definitely on the nine stairs leading to the Deathless Throne. I wonder exactly how strong he is.”

“I can’t believe one of the Grand Emperors showed up. Incredible! In the ancient legends, the Grand Emperors were said to be invincible. I even heard that this guy was the apprentice of an actual god!”

“Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven! Dear lord! Who would’ve thought that someone like him would appear?”

“He’s close to being a god, so it’s almost like a Lesser God has appeared! Terrifying!”

“That young lord of the Dragonfolk was impressive before, but not now that Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven is around. He could probably kill him with his aura alone!”

The appearance of Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven was causing a huge stir in the Dao Defense League. He was obviously a truly powerful person, and Yang Qi knew just by looking at him that he couldn’t possibly beat him in a fight. At best, he might be able to defend himself, and at worst, he’d be forced to flee to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

‘Well, I plan to stay out of the limelight anyway,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘Considering how many top experts are here, and how these old-timers are all profound schemers, it was pretty much a given that some consummate master would eventually show up. Unless some other old-timers appear, it seems this Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven is going to be the league-lord. Although, I'm still convinced that Sectlord Nine Yangs had a god backing him. If he does, why hasn’t that god made an appearance? Is it because he can’t actually descend into our immortal dao world?”

The young lord from the Dragonfolk initially looked frightened, but then his expression turned hard. “Well, if it isn’t Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven. What an honor. That said, this is a contest to pick the new league-lord, and I'm the one on the stage. If you want to be league-lord, you need to defeat me first. So, are we going to duel?”

Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven burst out into laughter that boomed painfully in the ears of all the assembled old-timers. “Your father might qualify to fight me, boy, but you’re far, far from that level. You think that just because you acquired the legacy of some primeval expert you can duel me? Of course, I do need to follow the rules. How about this: I won't use my true body, only a clone. If you can beat my clone, you can take the position and I won’t bicker with you. What do you say?”

“Alright!” the young lord replied instantly. It was obvious that he wasn’t a match for Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven, so he leaped at the chance to only fight a clone.

Everyone looked on with bated breath, wondering exactly what Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven was going to do.

“I'm going to use a godly-class energy art of mine to make my clone, the Heavenrage Godfire. Come forth, clone!”

The clone was a humanoid expression of fire, burly and without any clothes whatsoever, his hands clenched tightly into fists. Although he was wreathed in flames, no one in the audience could sense even a bit of heat, as though the fire was illusory.

RUMBLE!

As the fire clone walked onto the stage, Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven said, “Go ahead and begin, boy. I think you’ll find that your level is more appropriate for a dharmaraja.”

Snarling, the young lord of the Dragonfolk attacked with countless deadly moves, causing a sea of dragons to swirl around him.

“Buddha Dragon Prajñā!”

He thrust his palm out, causing a host of chanting buddhas to appear everywhere. A buddha king hovered above his head, gazing coldly at Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven’s clone.

Gong!

The clone thrust his own palm out in a consummate and deadly move. “Flame Ignites the World!”

The two palms collided and the young lord teetered backward several steps. However, the fire clone only pressed the attack with more fire magic.

“Watch closely, boy,” Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven said. “My clone is using the Tribulation Fire God Fingers, invented by the ancient Fire God. He can only unleash about one tenth of what I'm capable, but it’s still nothing to underestimate.”

As the words left his mouth, the clone leaped forward and transformed into an enormous hand whose fingers shot directly toward the young lord of the Dragonfolk.

At the same time, clouds of fire appeared above and giant-spirits of fire descended, turning the entire stage into a mass of flames that prevented the young lord from using any of his energy arts.

Not a single person in the audience wasn’t shocked at how strong Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven’s clone was.

That included Yang Qi, who had to admit that the man’s abilities were incredibly powerful. Even a mere clone of his was on the same level as this young lord from the Dragonfolk.

Although this young lord was young, he had profound energy arts that surpassed just about all of the old-timers present. He really did qualify to be the league-lord, at least before Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven showed up.

RUMBLE!

The young lord suddenly unleashed a host of incomparably mighty and devastating palm strikes, the kind that could even shake god worlds.

As he did, the Tribulation Fire God Fingers were shaken.

Apparently, Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven recognized the technique and it caused his eyes to flicker. “Hm. You're using a lost art from the buddhist schools, the Indignant Palm of Buddha. Supposedly, there was a buddha who could rival the legion of gods, and he created this consummate martial discipline in his anger. How did you learn it?”

Fiery wings sprouted out of the back of the fire clone, making him look like a phoenix reborn. He began attacking with renewed vigor, causing promenades, palaces, and temples of flame to spring up everywhere on the stage.

“Sacrifice to the Fire God!

“Civilization of Flame!

“Primal-Chaos Fire Spark!

“Sagefire Flame Tenement!”

The clone unleashed a new set of palm strikes that clashed with the young lord’s attacks, causing deafening booms to ring out. A moment later, the young lord staggered back, his face pale and his vital energy running dangerously low.

Simultaneously, the clone seemed to be running low on energy thanks to the repeated clashes.

“Very impressive, young man,” Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven said. “However, this will be my clone's final attack. Heavenflame God Seal!”

All of a sudden, the clone threw two palms out, causing two fiery sealing marks to appear that radiated the sensation of a god.

“Buddha’s True Ego!” the young lord shouted, throwing everything he had into his final move.

The two enemies collided and the entire Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple shook. The young lord was thrown off the stage, and the clone faded out of existence a moment later.

But Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven had maintained the upper hand in the end, as his clone had remained visible for a few short moments after the young lord was off the stage.

At the same time, a shadowy figure emerged to support the young lord, then used a mysterious energy art to revitalize and heal him. This newcomer was a middle-aged man from the Dragonfolk.

Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven looked at him and said, “So, Buddha Shakya-Karma, you choose this moment to step out and help your son. But did you really think I wouldn’t be aware that one of the top elders of the Dragonfolk was hiding in the shadows?”

The middle-aged man slowly looked up, and as he did, the boundless might of dragons rippled out, giving everyone the urge to drop down in worship.

This was the chief of the Buddha Dragons, an expert from the legendary Eight Tribes Heaven and one of the top figures among all the Dragonfolk. His name was Buddha Shakya-Karma.

“You said you were only using one-tenth of your strength, Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven,” he said, “but the truth is that you used thirty percent! And my son hasn’t even cultivated his energy arts to the perfect level. Give him another year and a half and he would be at that point.”

“Is that so, Buddha Shakya-Karma?” Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven said coolly. “I know that you opened a passageway to primeval times to summon a god-spirit of the Dragonfolk, as well as a boundless buddha from one of the buddhist schools. You’re essentially involved in the same business as the future world. It was with the blessing of power from primeval times that your son advanced by leaps and bounds. Unfortunately, he needs more training before he can be considered a truly consummate expert. Considering both you and I were born in the Primeval Age, we both know things aren’t as simple as that.”

“Well, that's only natural. But as ages come and go, fate transforms. Look, enough chit-chat. You beat my son, but not me. Since you want to be the league-lord, I think the two of us ought to have a little competition.”

Chapter 784: Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven

“Wow! Two major experts are going to fight it out!”

“These two are truly invincible masters. One’s the chief of the buddha dragons from the Dragonfolk, and the other is one of the Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court. This is going to be like a war between dragons and tigers. I wonder who will win.”

“I'd say it will be Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven. That Dragonfolk chief might be strong, but the Grand Emperors were the ones who founded the ancient Heavenly Court!”

“I wouldn’t be surprised if it ends in a draw with both of them hurt and drained of vital energy. Then maybe the rest of us will have a shot at winning the title of league-lord. How lucky would that be?”

“It won’t be as simple as that. People like this understand mysteries known only to heaven, and are essentially invincible. They carefully plan everything out before taking action, so there’s no way they’ll both end up hurt. Besides, the fact that Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven is here implies that the other three Grand Emperors might show up. Grand Emperors Myriadmagic Heavenspan, Ninelimits Paragon, and Heavenearth Vastocean. Do you really think you would be able to take the position of league-lord with them around? None of us old-timers are going to become league-lord, mark my words.”

“Forget the position of league-lord. But there are still the two emissaries, nine dharmarajas, and twenty-four god-generals. They’re all going to be positions of incredible power.”

“There will be fierce fighting for those positions too. The Dao Defense League is in such disorder that I originally assumed it wouldn’t be possible for a league-lord to unite everything. But now that we’re dealing with Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven, things are different. Not even the leaders of the thirty-third ranked immortal worlds would be a problem for him. They’ll have no choice but to listen to his orders. He's going to be a person so powerful it's hard to imagine. He was without equal back in the ancient Heavenly Court, so just imagine how things are going to be now.”

Everyone was very excited to see how this fight would play out between Buddha Shakya-Karma and Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven.

It was a contest the likes of which would occur once every few hundred million years or so.

Furthermore, there was no way they would reach a compromise. Obviously, Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven was not going to back down from the challenge.

Without any warning, Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven blurred into motion, appearing a moment later on the stage. “I accept your challenge, Buddha Shakya-Karma,” he said. “Let’s see which of us has a better cultivation base nowadays. I'm honestly surprised that you would issue a challenge directly. Have the Dragonfolk started to gain back some of their courage of yesteryear?”

“Fine, Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven. Please, give me a few tips.”

Buddha Shakya-Karma didn’t beat around the bush. Without hesitation, he launched a palm strike, his fingers curled like dragon claws, and glowing with golden light.

“I, Buddha, Interrogate Heaven!”

Everything trembled and creaked, as though the pillars holding up heaven were about to crumble. It was already clear that Buddha Shakya-Karma’s divine abilities vastly surpassed those of his son's.

As for Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven, he simply looked at the incoming palm strike and thrust out his own palm. There didn’t seem to be anything special about his move, but when the two palms collided, Buddha Shakya-Karma staggered backward, while Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven simply stood there unmoving.

Everyone marveled at the strength on display. Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven had won the initial clash, but Buddha Shakya-Karma obviously wasn’t ready to back down yet. In fact, he advanced. Truth be told, Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven was somewhat shocked. Although his move moments ago had seemed unimpressive, the truth was that he had secretly imbued it with first-class magical laws and godpower related to fire. It was a blow that would have turned almost any other opponent into ashes.

Yet Buddha Shakya-Karma not only negated its effects, but immediately went back on the offensive. He was really unimaginably strong.

Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven knew that he couldn't afford any slipups, so he decided to go all out. He immediately let loose a whole string of palm strikes that were filled with the fury of gods and strong enough to shake the dome of heaven.

Buddha Shakya-Karma was also holding nothing back. He used palm techniques, claw attacks, fist strikes, and more. He slapped, shoved, and stabbed. He seemed to slip in and out of countless universal dimensions, with each small step capable of moving millions upon millions of light-years.

He moved so swiftly that it was almost impossible to track his movements.

However, Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven was able to lock on to him and launch palm strike after palm strike, causing bursts of flame to fill the area.

This wasn’t the same fire as that of the five phases. It was a fire that represented civilization. After all, of all the countless civilizations that existed, none could exist without fire. The core meaning of that fire indicated that Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven would eventually join the legion of gods, as only the gods could create new civilizations.

“Buddha and I Combine!” Buddha Shakya-Karma said. He could see that he was losing ground, and he most likely wouldn’t be able to defeat Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven. Yet how could he just give up? He had planned for this moment for a long time, and wasn’t willing to cast aside all that work. Drawing more deeply on his ferocious nature, he tapped into the power of the primeval past.

The will of a buddha appeared, almost like the blessing of the legion of gods. It was a dao from the most primeval of times.

He swept his hand out in front of him and a host of universes appeared! It was like the duel had turned into a universal clash of the most epic proportions.

A fist strike that could connect parallel universes was definitely something that seemed like the work of the legion of gods.

“Hmm?” Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven’s expression flickered and he unleashed a furious combination of palm techniques that contained the power of creation itself. Every step he took could melt universes, and his blows all caused something akin to lava to splash out.

Abilities that could refine universal primal-chaos and turn it into a physical object were extremely rare. As Yang Qi watched the fight play out, he couldn’t help admiring the two combatants. And by observing with his Lord's Eye, he could see energy arts operations and magical laws much more clearly. As a result, he gained new levels of understanding in areas that had previously been unclear.

Right now he was only a third division Incarnated God, with plenty of room for improvement when it came to enlightenment. Thankfully, this fight was proving to be a huge help. He had the feeling that by the time it was over, he might reach the enlightenment level of the Shattered God level, or possibly even the Nirvanic God level.

Given some time, he would definitely achieve another breakthrough.

‘What’s that?’ At a certain point, Yang Qi realized that Buddha Shakya-Karma had something inside of him that was reminiscent of Empress Jadefall’s godspore. There was a mighty will in him and it caused every ounce of him to glow with a golden light.

It was almost as if he had been possessed by a god-spirit, or had at least been directly blessed with power by one. It was something explosive that seemed capable of bursting out into the open at any time.

A few breaths of time passed, then Buddha Shakya-Karma smiled viciously. All of a sudden a mighty will appeared, causing his energy arts to grow more powerful and allowing him to break free from Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven’s control. “Unless you have some other trick up your sleeve, Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven, you’ve lost. Did you really think I’d already gone all out? You’re looking at my consummate discipline, the Three World Karma. Past. Present. Future. Three worlds, tied together by the cause and effect of karma! By combining the godpower of the three worlds, I will devastate your soul!”

RUMBLE!

His true energy surged and all the old-timers present felt their vision was growing dim. They were filled with the sensation that they were wrapped up by the karma of three worlds, making it hard to determine if they were currently in the past, the present, or the future.

This was not a technique for immortals, nor was it Buddha Shakya-Karma’s personal power. This was something from the legion of gods. Either that, or it was something from a buddha who was on the same level as the legion of gods.

Three Worlds Karma!

The vital energy around Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven exploded, and in the blink of an eye he was in a very bad position.

Although no one could clearly see what was happening, everyone was shocked.

“Buddha Shakya-Karma is ruthlessly ambitious. He’s really trying to take out Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven!”

“Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven has lost, badly.”

“He's finished!”

“This is bad. Don’t tell me that the Humanfolk are going to be surpassed by the Dragonfolk! If that happens, they’re going to defecate all over us!”

“Contemptible!”

Meanwhile, Yang Qi knew full well that the Three Worlds Karma was so strong that not even he could stand up to it. It seemed like Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven was in a really bad predicament. However, in that moment, three streams of power erupted from Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven, combining with his own true energy and advancing it instantly to a much higher level.

It was almost like when Yang Qi’s immortal-slaying clone had joined forces with the seventy-one patriarchs.

“I knew all along what you were up to, Buddha Shakya-Karma. Not only will I not allow you to take away my power within the Dao Defense League, but I'm also going to thoroughly defeat you Dragonfolk! Come forth, ancient Heavenly Court!”

He thrust his palm out and a projection of the Heavenly Court appeared, spreading out to fill the stage. It absolutely crushed the Three Worlds Karma, then slammed directly into Buddha Shakya-Karma’s chest.

“Aggghhhh!” he howled as he was flung off the stage in a blast of wind that caught up all the other Dragonfolk and flung them out of the Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple.

“I’ll pay you back a hundredfold for this, Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven!” he shouted, and then he was gone.

Chapter 785: League-Lord Inauguration

Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven had won a very clear victory, inflicting a devastating defeat on Buddha Shakya-Karma.

Unfortunately, Buddha Shakya-Karma had left with his people, a clear indication that they were going to refuse to accept the authority of the Dao Defense League. In other words, they were now enemies.

Furthermore, Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven had come close to losing the shocking battle moments ago. In the end, he won with a move that obviously involved him borrowing quintessence energy from the other three Grand Emperors. Together, the four of them really were invincible.

Injured, and aware that he couldn’t stand up to that level of force, Buddha Shakya-Karma had simply fled. Better that than end up getting killed.

There had long been stories about how Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven was at odds with the other Grand Emperors, including Myriadmagic Heavenspan, Ninelimits Paragon, and Heavenearth Vastocean. But apparently they had worked out their issues and were now allied again.

Yang Qi had absolutely no intention of throwing his own hat into the ring. It wouldn’t be an easy task becoming the league-lord. He couldn’t defeat Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven by himself, let alone all four Grand Emperors working together.

If he rose to a higher level, perhaps a fifth order Nirvanic God, then he might be in a position to fight with them. But even then, he probably wouldn’t be able to come out victorious against one of them, much less all four.

When the Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court worked together, not even a Lesser God could kill them, or even force them into retreat.

“Those Dragonfolk were just too stubborn,” Daoist Great Void said. “I can’t believe they’re going to oppose our Dao Defense League. We have to wipe them out!” Raising his voice, he said, “Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven has won a victory over the chief of the buddha dragons. If anyone else out there wants to be league-lord, they’ll need to step forward and fight the Grand Emperor. Defeat him, and the title will be yours.”

Not a single person said anything in response.

None of the patriarchs present were capable of holding their own against him in a fight. Not even the rulers of the thirty-third ranked immortal worlds could do so. After all, the Eight Tribes Heaven was a thirty-third ranked world, and Buddha Shakya-Karma was a clan chief who had already gained enlightenment of the dao of heaven. He had also been blessed by an ancient buddha, but even he had been unable to deal with the Grand Emperors.

In another corner of the temple, Leaf Dao-Denier and Emperor Tusita were seated next to each other. The former was currently staring intently at Yang Qi. He had originally considered fighting for the spot of league-lord and had been confident in being able to defeat any of the old-timers present. But after Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven’s grand entrance, it was obvious that wasn’t going to happen.

“Are you going to go up there, Young Master Leaf?” the emperor asked.

“No,” Leaf Dao-Denier replied coldly. “Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven is too much to deal with right now. Maybe if I assimilated the entire Tusita Heaven and turned it into a nascent divinity—and at the same time got back King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions—I might stand a chance. But I could see in the fighting just now that he’s working with the other three emperors of the Heavenly Court. That said, I'm still Young Master Leaf, so one of these days, I’ll take over everything! It seems I now have no other choice than to become a dharmaraja, or perhaps a god-general.”

“You don’t want to be one of the emissaries? Those are even more powerful positions.”

Grinding his teeth, Leaf Dao-Denier said, “It’s obvious that Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven will only give those positions to people he trusts. Besides, considering how many other top experts there are, and how that punk Yang Qi has been plotting against me, it's not worth the risk.”

Back on the stage, Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven looked around at the silent crowd and then said, “Does anyone else present wish to issue a challenge?” He actually looked a bit disappointed. “Don’t tell me that the dao of immortals has truly sunken to such a dismal state? Back when I and the other Grand Emperors founded the Heavenly Court, there were endless wars. True, the casualties were immense, but at the same time, invincible experts rose up everywhere. It’s a real pity to see things like this….”

Soon, the patriarchs began to speak up.

“Grand Emperor, your might is world-encompassing. We're all absolutely convinced that you should be the league-lord.”

“As one of the rulers of the ancient Heavenly Court, you’re the perfect person to lead the Dao Defense League. None of us could possibly match up to you.”

“We have no interest in fighting with you, Grand Emperor. You’re the perfect person to be the league-lord.”

“That's right. A Grand Emperor is the perfect person to act as league-lord.” The representatives of many of the various groups and factions of patriarchs began making similar statements.

As more declarations were made, other old-timer’s expressions were flickering with shock. Previously, many of the people present were prepared to carry out plots and schemes in the hopes of coming out on top. But now it was obvious that none of them could possibly become the league-lord. Not even the secret trump cards they had could rival Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven.

Crafty plots, clever machinations, god items, magical treasures… none of them could be anything other than jokes, compared to the power of this Grand Emperor.

“Well, if that’s the case,” Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven said, “I guess I have no choice but to accept the position of league-lord. After we select the two emissaries, nine dharmarajas, and twenty-four god-generals, we can finally have a unified dao of immortals and an undivided alliance. Henceforth, there will be no more squabbling between different sects and factions. And all resources will be distributed fairly.”

The other old-timers were clearly not very pleased, but knew that when you stand under low eaves, you have no choice but to bow your head. The Dao Defense League had a league-lord now, and it meant that they would no longer consist of scattered organizations struggling for power. Everyone was part of one group now, and the previous leaders would no longer be able to be as sanctimonious as before.

If they truly wanted to safeguard or even grow their existing organizations, they would have to secure a slot as one of the god-generals or dharmarajas.

Obviously, the twenty-four god-generals would not be mere figureheads. They would have millions upon trillions of subordinates to lead.

And the nine dharmarajas would lead millions upon millions of the top masters, creating very elite fighting forces. People like that would be able to safeguard their own people, essentially becoming more important than even the leaders of the thirty-third ranked immortal worlds.

In terms of how many immortal worlds were now part of the Dao Defense League, it had to number in the hundreds of billions. In terms of how many immortal worlds existed, the total couldn’t be expressed in billions or trillions, but rather quadrillions. Compared to that, the Dao Defense League was like one hair from nine oxen, although it was continuing to grow larger at an astounding rate.

Of course, to truly benefit required one to have a position of immense power. Those beneath them, even elders, would be little more than cannon fodder and servants.

“Congratulations, League-Lord! Sincere congratulations! The Dao Defense League is no longer leaderless!” Words such as these began to echo out everywhere in the temple, causing destiny to swirl. In fact, Yang Qi could actually see the destiny rushing toward Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven, which the man absorbed without hesitation.

‘He’s taking that destiny to use as the foundation of godly ascension,’ Yang Qi thought with a cold smile. He was very curious to see what would happen next.

Looking around, Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven said, “The time has come to select the two emissaries. The competition will be right here! First up is the Emissary of Darkness and Gloom. Are there any patriarchs out there who would like to nominate themselves for the spot? Whoever wins will lead the Army of Darkness and Gloom and will be one of the most powerful persons in our organization.”

He wasn’t exaggerating. All of the patriarchs knew that the two emissaries would be like prime ministers from an imperial dynasty in the mortal world.

Quite a few people were itching to nominate themselves.

Even as a hubbub of voices rose up, a shadowy figure flew over to the stage. It was a devastatingly beautiful woman in black garments, with the fairest of skin, and a flirtatious smile on her face.

Many of the patriarchs were virtually drooling with desire; this woman really was shockingly beautiful. However, when she revealed who she was, many of them nearly jumped from shock and terror.

Black lotuses raining down around her, she said, “I am Devil Empress Wave Charm from the Unrestrained Heaven. Does anyone have a problem with me being the Emissary of Darkness and Gloom for the Dao Defense League? What do you think, Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven?”

Looking completely calm, he replied, “So, it’s Miss Wave Charm from the Unrestrained Heaven, a majestic heaven-devil. I think you would be the perfect Emissary of Darkness and Gloom for us. However, there are rules here. If anyone wishes to challenge you, you’ll have to fight them. By the way, how has your father been lately? Considering he sent you here today, I assume he’s going to agree to my request? The Unrestrained Heaven is going to join the Dao Defense League?”

“That’s right. Father is currently in the Hell of Mahānata discussing an important matter with some of the suzerains of hell. He’s given me full command of the armies of the Unrestrained Heaven and I'm here to formally join the Dao Defense League.”

Chapter 786: Unrestrained Heaven

The sudden appearance of a devil empress from the Unrestrained Heaven had really thrown the old-timers for a loop, and a lot of discussions were underway.

“She’s a devil empress from the Unrestrained Heaven!?”

“The Unrestrained Heaven is going to join the Dao Defense League?”

“Aren’t they all monsters? Vicious monsters from hell?”

“No, the Unrestrained Heaven is half hell and half immortal world. And they’re not pure monsters. However, when we cultivators achieve breakthroughs, it spawns monsters in the Unrestrained Heaven who take part in our tribulations and try to devilize us. They’re truly terrifying.”

“It looks to me like Devil Empress Wave Charm and Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven already came to some sort of agreement ahead of time. From what I've heard, the lord of the Unrestrained Heaven has a cultivation base no inferior to Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven himself. I wonder why he wants to join our Dao Defense League.”

“They represent the forces of hell, not the forces of immortals.”

“I'm not sure what’s going on, but Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven has his reasons for doing things this way. If the Unrestrained Heaven is in the Dao Defense League, maybe we won’t get attacked by heaven-devils in future breakthroughs. That alone will be a blessing.”

From the look of things, the mysterious Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven had a master plan at work, and the people who had previously been thinking of stepping forward to challenge the devil empress were now having second thoughts.

That said, there were still those who were curious to see exactly how strong she was.

Suddenly, the weeping of ghosts and wailing of gods rose up, along with a powerful aura. An old man appeared, holding a string of prayer beads that appeared to be made from tiny skulls with sharp fangs. It was a terrifying sight. There were a hundred skulls in total, and each of them seemed to contain an entire world of bleached bones.

When this newcomer spoke, it was in the most sinister of voices. “Wave Charm, do you really think a young woman like you should be an emissary of the Dao Defense League, with only one superior and countless subordinates? I think I'm a lot more qualified.”

“Well, if it isn’t Patriarch Hundred-Bones,” Wave Charm replied with a smile. “You, a wretch-devil of a cultivator, want to be the Emissary of Darkness and Gloom? Well, the rules do say that anyone can challenge anyone here, and the winner becomes the emissary. So let’s cut the jibber-jabber and just start fighting.”

Chuckling, she vanished, leaving nothing behind but a rain of black lotus leaves falling down onto the stage.

Patriarch Hundred-Bones hissed and swept his prayer beads out in front of him. The hundred skulls immediately transformed, growing to a huge size. They opened their mouths and unleashed intense, burning flames that contained deathless godliness, instantly melting all of the black lotuses.

Yet Wave Charm was nowhere to be seen.

“Up to some tricks, are we?” he said. Flicking his finger, he unleashed a stream of green flame. “Godly Phosphorescence Pierces the Universe!”

The phosphorescent flame that shot out was something he’d harvested from the corpses of countless devil-gods that were slain by him. Each stream contained the will of such a being that could easily pierce through multiple parallel universes and was virtually impossible to evade. Whether the target was a god or a devil, it would be impossible to flee from such a flame.

As the godly phosphorescent flame shot out, soft laughter rang out and a fair, slender hand appeared, as delicate as a butterfly’s wing. The hand grabbed the flame and crushed it down into an emerald-color ball of fire.

Wave Charm appeared again, the aura of an ancient devil-god erupting from her as a host of heaven-devils appeared behind her, seemingly prepared to exterminate the world of men.

“Grand Heaven-Devil Unrestrained God Destruction!”

She thrust her palm out, and although it was a seemingly casual move it caused the entire Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple to tremble violently. All vital energy was suppressed as the power of heaven-devils weighed down everywhere.

POP!

Patriarch Hundred-Bones quickly fought back with a fist technique, but it wasn’t enough. True energy began spurting out of him and his body began to crack and crumble. “Y-you… you have the legacy of the Unrestrained Heaven’s essence…?”

Suddenly, he collapsed into a heap of bones. The bones flew off the stage, then formed back into his previous form. “I concede! I concede! I'm done fighting!”

The other old-timers were visibly shocked. Patriarch Hundred-Bones was widely known to be a very fierce individual and was the founder of the evil Hundred-Bones Basilica, whose faith he benefited from. Many old-timers considered him a mortal enemy, and there had even been a situation in which several thirtieth-ranked immortal worlds joined forces to try to hunt him down and kill him. Obviously, that effort had failed.

The fact that he had been defeated by Wave Charm only went to show how strong she was.

After Patriarch Hundred-Bones, a handful of other old-timers took to the stage to challenge Wave Charm, but she defeated all of them in a single move.

A few hours later, there were no more challengers.

At that point, Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven raised his voice and said, “Miss Wave Charm has crushed all contenders and is now the Emissary of Darkness and Gloom. She will lead the Army of Darkness and Gloom, and has the authority to recruit any evil cultivator in the Dao Defense League to fill its ranks. She has the power to execute anyone under the level of an elder. For elders, the proper protocols must still be followed. Furthermore, it is prohibited for her, or anyone under her command, to cultivate any nefarious arts for the purposes of harming members of the league. After all of our officers have been selected, we’ll formalize the rules and laws so that everyone is aware of how to properly behave. Including myself.”

“Here, here!” many of the old-timers said in obvious approval. None of them were interested in having a monster in charge with no rules in place to protect everyone else.

Wave Charm smiled broadly as she returned to her place and began thinking about what she would do with the Army of Darkness and Gloom.

“Next,” Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven said, “we will select the Emissary of Radiance and Light. This cultivator must be one who pursues a dao of righteousness. Who wishes to step forward?”

Immediately, Daoist Great Void stepped forward. Up to this point he had just been making announcements, but now he was taking things a step further. “The Great Void Heaven is the source of the true dao of righteousness. We use Great Void True Energy to summon the Gate of the Great Void, so it’s only natural that I would compete for the title of Emissary of Radiance and Light!”

Some of the people in the audience seemed surprised. It seemed highly likely that Daoist Great Void was actually a loyal confidante of Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven.

Because Wave Charm was so incredibly strong, and the Unrestrained Heaven was so mysterious, there hadn’t been many people who dared to compete for the position of Emissary of Darkness and Gloom. That was even more the case considering that leading an Army of Darkness and Gloom filled with evil cultivators would be a very complicated, and likely frustrating, task. In contrast, the Emissary of Radiance and Light would be very different. It was obviously an awe-inspiring and righteous position to hold. Cultivators who followed a righteous dao would be much more likely to follow orders and listen to a leader.

WHOOSH!

Almost instantly, a whole host of figures rushed to the stage, righteous patriarchs whose mere auras could rip apart heaven and earth. All of them were itching to fight Daoist Great Void.

“Your energy arts are average at best, Daoist Great Void,” one of the patriarchs said. “Whoever becomes the Emissary of Radiance and Light needs to be respected by everyone who follows a righteous dao. Songs are sung of the noble spirit of the Righteous Noble Heaven! We follow the truest righteous dao!”

Snorting coldly, another patriarch said, “The Righteous Noble Heaven? No, our Pure Glory Heaven is where true radiance and light exist!”

“The Righteous Noble Heaven and Pure Glory Heaven are both thirty-third ranked immortal worlds. Our Porcelain Gem Heaven is a thirty-second ranked immortal world, just on the verge of upgrading to the thirty-third rank. Do you two really dare to fight with me? The Porcelain Gem Heaven is the picture of purity and cleanliness. Our radiance and light flows freely to fill all heaven and earth.”

Obviously, whoever led the Army of Radiance and Light would be in a position of unmatchable glory, so all of these patriarchs were willing to pull out all the stops to win the position of emissary.

“Oh?” Daoist Great Void said. “So, you three are patriarchs from the Righteous Noble, Pure Glory, and Porcelain Gem Heavens? And you want to fight me to become the Emissary of Radiance and Light? Well, I won’t waste words with talk. I’ll just send you along your way. After all, the Emissary of Radiance and Light needs to be strong enough to earn the respect of all.”

Sighing, he thrust out his hand.

RUMBLE!

Boundless radiance and light appeared behind him, a pure white sagelight that seemed like a poem or a psalm that was filled with glory and brilliance.

“What? Is that the legendary fist technique of the God of Radiance and Light? The Grand Radiance and Light Godfist of the Sunlight Glory!?” As the fist strike was released, boundless radiance and light appeared, making Daoist Great Void seem like the most holy of figures, almost like the incarnation of the God of Radiance and Light himself.

Whack. Whack. Whack!

The three patriarchs were hurled off of the stage, blood spraying out of their mouths. After slamming onto the ground, they struggled to their feet, their expressions ashen and their auras in disarray. One move had defeated all of them!

Chuckling, Daoist Great Void said, “Who else would like to compete for the position? I carry on the core teachings and practices of the God of Radiance and Light, and by chance, happen to have the Grand Radiance and Light Godfist of the Sunlight Glory. If I'm not the perfect choice for the Emissary of Radiance and Light, who is? After I take my position, I will restructure the dao of righteousness and ensure that righteous energy fills all of heaven and earth.”

Many of the old-timers were visibly taken aback at how strong Daoist Great Void was, and most present were now thoroughly convinced that he had accepted help from Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven. There were even some people who had known Daoist Great Void for some time and were shocked by what they were seeing.

At the moment, it seemed like both the Emissary of Radiance and Light and the Emissary of Darkness and Gloom had been selected.

“I would really like to face some worthy challengers,” Daoist Great Void said with a smile. Sounding very pleased with himself, he continued, “Anyone? If not, then I suppose I'm the Emissary of Radiance and Light.”

Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven looked around for a long moment, and when he saw no one stepping forward, he said, “Since that’s the case, we—”

“Hold on!” someone said. Yang Qi slowly rose to his feet.

Chapter 787: Competition for Emissary of Radiance and Light

Yang Qi rose to his feet, making it clear he intended to compete for the spot of Emissary of Radiance and Light. Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven was the league-lord, and there was no way Yang Qi could challenge him. But he definitely didn’t want the position of emissary to fall into someone else’s hands.

Evil could never truly defeat righteousness in the Dao Defense League. When it came to the relationship between the two emissaries, it was a given that the Emissary of Radiance and Light would eventually gain superiority over the Emissary of Darkness and Gloom. After all, cultivators who followed righteous daos comprised ninety percent of the population of the Dao Defense League. Cultivating an evil dao would always involve massacring countless living beings; furthermore, there was always brutal infighting amongst such cultivators. In contrast, cultivators who followed a righteous dao could advance by absorbing vital energy of heaven and earth.

They were as different as carnivores and herbivores. Polar opposites.

If Yang Qi became the Emissary of Radiance and Light, and led the Army of Radiance and Light, then as his cultivation base rose and he won the hearts of the people, he could eventually force Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven to abdicate and take over as the league-lord.

Besides, upon becoming the emissary, he would be blessed by a huge influx of destiny. It was a position that was clearly superior to the dharmarajas or god-generals.

It was obvious that Daoist Great Void was already a loyal confidante of Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven, and that the latter had given him an advantage by blessing him with a powerful energy art. However, if Daoist Great Void wanted the spot, he still had to win the position according to the rules. Anyone present who wanted to make a challenge could do so. Therefore, Yang Qi decided to give it a shot. If he could defeat Daoist Great Void, and any other challengers, then he would become the emissary.

Daoist Great Void, Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven, and many of the other old-timers present were actually surprised that, in a moment when the emperor wanted silence, and not even the horses were neighing, someone would outright challenge Daoist Great Void.

As Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven frowned, one of the old-timers near him leaned over and whispered, “This guy has two names. Dragon Proudheaven and Yang Qi. He acquired some sort of incredible good fortune and has used it to make quite a name for himself in the Dao Defense League. He can heal true energy injuries even in Chaos Gods, and can also cure morphblight.”

He went on to provide a few more details about Yang Qi and it caused Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven’s frown to deepen.

Seeing his look of displeasure, another of the old-timers said, “Grand Emperor, considering that you haven’t consolidated your power, there are presumably a lot of old-timers out there who are only pretending to accept your authority. It probably wouldn’t be a good idea to absolutely crush this kid—why not see what he’s capable of?”

“I'm obviously aware of that,” Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven coolly replied. “Let’s see how this plays out. I personally blessed Daoist Great Void with the Grand Radiance and Light Godfist of the Sunlight Glory, which I personally cultivated for a hundred million years. If he loses to a third division Incarnated God punk, he doesn't qualify to be the Emissary of Radiance and Light.”

WHOOSH!

Yang Qi walked onto the stage with his hands clasped behind his back. Facing Daoist Great Void, he said, “Daoist Great Void, I'm here to take the position of Emissary of Radiance and Light.”

“Well, if it isn’t you,” Daoist Great Void said with a smile. “We’re not playing games here, young friend. You might have established your Sage Panacea Sect here in the Dao Defense League, but you only managed to recruit some low-level elders. Right now, you’re in the presence of the top leaders of the league. So back down. You’ll never become one of the emissaries. In fact, you don't even qualify to be one of the dharmarajas or god-generals. Maybe you can serve as an elder, and sometime in the future when you’re half-Deathless, you might be able to seek a promotion.”

“What matters here is cultivation base; whoever’s strongest will become the emissary. So why run your mouth? I'm also a patriarch, therefore I qualify to challenge you. And whoever comes out on top will be the Emissary of Radiance and Light.”

“Oh?” Daoist Great Void chuckled sarcastically. “Whoever comes out on top will be the emissary. You’re really being stubborn here, aren’t you? You know, if I hurt you badly enough, it will damage your dao heart and energy arts and you’ll have a hard time achieving cultivation progress in the future. But since you don’t know the height of the heavens and the breadth of the earth, I suppose I’ll teach you a little lesson. Now screw off and quit causing a scene!”

Daoist Great Void swished his sleeve and a bright beam of light shot out, accompanied by a rushing wind. It was a move from the Grand Radiance and Light Godfist of the Sunlight Glory called Bright Wind Clear Moon, and it was designed to use soft and gentle methods to absolutely devastate an opponent.

Even another old-timer who was on the same level as Daoist Great Void wouldn’t have been able to withstand this blow.

Yet Yang Qi hardly looked at it. He flicked his own sleeve and a tempest of radiance and light appeared, slammed into Daoist Great Void’s attack, and caused a massive explosion. As the shock wave rolled out, the other old-timers present backed away.

Thump, thump, thump!

Daoist Great Void staggered back three steps before stabilizing himself! Meanwhile, Yang Qi just stood there with a calm smile on his face. “Now who’s causing a scene? Considering how old you are, Daoist Great Void, how could you possibly serve as the Emissary of Radiance and Light? Wouldn’t you say that this energy art of mine has been cultivated to perfection? And it’s far purer than yours. When you get as old as you, it's better to spend time resting and relaxing, not fighting duels. Leave the fighting to younger people, like myself.”

The crowd burst out into an uproar. Everyone could see from this one exchange that Daoist Great Void was in an inferior position. He had been forced backward across the stage while Yang Qi simply stood there unmoving. In fact, everyone was now wondering exactly how strong Yang Qi’s energy arts were.

Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven leaned forward. ‘This kid is really strong! With a cultivation base like that, I don’t think that even I could defeat him without a protracted fight. He’s about the same level as a demigod. And he surely has some trump cards that could unleash even greater power.’

“Dammit!” Daoist Great Void growled. He had just lost a lot of face. His plan had been to act like a lofty member of the senior generation and simply defeat his opponent with the wave of a sleeve. Instead, he was the one who was shoved backward. In fact, if it weren’t for the fact that he had many years of cultivation under his belt, plus some hidden treasures, he might have been knocked off the stage.

“So, you really want the position of emissary, do you boy? Fine. Don’t blame me for what comes next. God Trove of Radiance and Light!” A host of glowing weapons appeared behind him, including sabers, swords, bows, arrows, spears, lances and the like. And there were generals, like the guardians of a kingdom of radiance and light, warriors that would attack anyone who didn’t honor the glory of the legion of gods.

RUMBLE!

Without any hesitation, Daoist Great Void attacked.

“Radiance and Light Bathes All Things! Mountains, rivers, lands, the void. Light shall touch it all, and where light exists, so does life!” The script of the Godfolk appeared, swirling like a tornado of bright holiness and giving everyone the urge to drop down in worship.

But then Yang Qi made his move.

He threw his hands out, causing even more impressive radiance and light to erupt from him. This was true godly light, like a prayer from the legion of gods. In fact, it was even possible to see an enormous figure within the light, a holy god toward whom the rest of the legion of gods would offer supplication to.

If Daoist Great Void’s radiance and light caused a sensation of reverence, then Yang Qi’s radiance and light was the source of all brightness, to the point that all other types of radiance and light would crumble in the face of it.

“Halls of Heaven!”

He thrust his fist out to meet Daoist Great Void’s attack and another massive explosion rocked the temple.

RUMBLE!

Daoist Great Void was flung back like a bullet, shooting through the temple and out the doors.

The radiance and light that Yang Qi had summoned was virtually liquid, and as it converged on itself it took the shape of an enormous angel hovering in the air, surrounded by godrelics. Yang Qi was using his energy arts to prove to everyone present that his strength was no illusion, and that he did qualify to be the Emissary of Radiance and Light.

‘I can’t believe he’s gotten this strong!’ Leaf Dao-Denier thought, trembling. All of a sudden, he realized that Yang Qi was too powerful for him to defeat. In fact, he wouldn’t even be able to handle him inside the Tusita Heaven.

Emperor Tusita was also trembling. ‘He’s s-s-so strong! He's stronger than the Emissary of Darkness and Gloom, or even that Buddha Shakya-Karma!’

Many of the other old-timers were visibly stunned.

The new Emissary of Darkness and Gloom, Devil Empress Wave Charm, was among them. ‘How could he be that strong? Not even I could match up to him. The two emissaries are destined to clash, but right now it seems that I'm doomed to lose! What can I do to prevent him from taking the position? Probably nothing! Considering how strong he is, I bet he could challenge Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven for the league-lord’s throne. Instead, he chose to go for Emissary of Radiance and Light.’

Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven was clearly unsure of what to do. Waving his finger, he sent a stream of light to pick up Daoist Great Void, who was gasping for breath and clearly shaken. It was very telling that Yang Qi had easily defeated the energy art that he had bestowed on Daoist Great Void. His shock was quickly turning into fiery rage, although he didn’t let it show on his face.

Chapter 788: Obstacles

Yang Qi was very pleased with how things had played out. Not only had he defeated Daoist Great Void with a single fist strike, he had also used King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans to secretly devour some of his opponent’s true energy. Because of that, he knew that the God Trove of Radiance and Light was not something that Daoist Great Void had personally cultivated, but rather something that another top expert had instilled into him.

Obviously, the only person present who might have done that was Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven. That confirmed that Daoist Great Void was working for the Grand Emperor. Therefore, the fact that Yang Qi had injured him was like a slap in the face to Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven.

Obviously, this new league-lord was a very greedy individual. It wasn’t enough for him to just be the league-lord, he wanted to have direct control over the two emissaries.

Yang Qi knew he couldn’t afford to underestimate him.

The instant the energy of the God Trove of Radiance and Light entered him, Yang Qi felt his own true energy bursting on the verge of a breakthrough. Once that happened, he would be a fourth division Shattered God. He’d benefited a lot from using the Fist of the Halls of Heaven on Daoist Great Void.

Furthermore, watching the fight between Buddha Shakya-Karma and Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven had also provided him with a lot of enlightenment.

Although he was fairly certain that he could break through to the fourth division right here on the stage, he decided to wait until he was appointed as the Emissary of Radiance and Light before doing so.

“Very ruthless, boy,” Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven said coldly. “You actually took the God Trove of Radiance and Light from Daoist Great Void.”

Everyone could tell that the man was bubbling with rage. After all, his nickname was Ragefire Broilheaven, and among the other ancient Grand Emperors he had been known as both insufferably arrogant and incredibly unyielding. In fact, the rage in his voice made everyone shiver like cicadas in winter.

“Well, you never know what can happen when fists fly,” Yang Qi calmly replied. Once he advanced his cultivation base again, Yang Qi knew that Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven wouldn’t be able to easily do anything to him. Besides, Yang Qi also had trump cards to call on. He was dead set on becoming the Emissary of Radiance and Light and was convinced that Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven wouldn’t do anything to risk widespread condemnation. “League-Lord, there’s really no need to be so surprised. Besides, it wouldn’t be appropriate for Daoist Great Void to cultivate a technique of radiance and light with me as the emissary. The radiance and light of the world should really be focused on only one person.”

“Well said, boy. But do you really think that someone so vicious and merciless should be the Emissary of Radiance and Light? The emissary should have inner radiance and light as well. But your actions make you seem more like a wretch-devil who cultivates a heretical dao.”

His words made it obvious that he was going to oppose Yang Qi.

Before Yang Qi could respond, a stream of laughter rang out in the temple. Then someone said, “Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven, are you really going to interfere with the selection of the Emissary of Radiance and Light? We all endorsed you to serve as the league-lord because we heard that you do things fairly. And the selection process is a contest of martial skill in which people have already been killed. Nobody complained then, but now you’re talking about being vicious and merciless? Do you really think that you being the league-lord means you can treat the rest of us patriarchs like servants?”

“Who are you?” Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven said, looking around angrily. “Show yourself!”

“Of course.” A swirl of mist parted to reveal an old-timer wearing luxurious yellow clothing, with a golden crown on his head. He had the bearing of a ruler, but at the same time, a scholarly, erudite aura.

Quite a few people immediately recognized him.

“Oh, it’s Pontifex Scour Cloud. He’s been around for a hundred million years, just like Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven. He lurked in the shadows of numerous immortal worlds, forging alliances to create the Scour Cloud Church. Apparently he wasn't interested in challenging Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven for the seat of league-lord, but at the same time he doesn’t want his power to go unchecked.”

“So that's what’s going on. Unfortunately, I don’t think Pontifex Scour Cloud is a match for Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven.”

“That's not the point. It’s one thing for Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven to take charge of the Dao Defense League. But he can’t simply take control of both of the two emissaries. There have to be other people with responsibilities, otherwise, he’ll be in complete control.”

Glowering, Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven said, “What do you want, Pontifex Scour Cloud? Are you going to challenge me?”

“No, I wouldn’t dare. I'm just trying to stand up for what’s right. We’re supposed to select the Emissary of Radiance and Light based on skill and ability. Whoever wins becomes the emissary. Not even you can interfere, League-Lord. Didn’t you just tell us that even you will comply by all the rules and regulations of the Dao Defense League? Don’t tell me you’re going to go back on your word.”

“That’s right,” another of the old-timers said. “After the emissaries, we have to pick the dharmarajas and the god-generals. We're all here to bear witness, and things need to be done fairly across the board. We can’t have internal conflicts—or under-the-table manipulations.”

Some of the other old-timers recognized who had just spoken, and knew he was a person that was not to be trifled with. “That’s Patriarch Golden Calamity from the Golden Cauldron Heaven. He cultivates an energy art focused on natural and man-made catastrophes. Everywhere he goes, he brings calamity.”

Now that these two had spoken out, more old-timers gave voice to similar sentiments. Obviously, they weren’t too pleased about the idea of Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven being able to have so much power over them. Now that Yang Qi had stuck his neck out, there were plenty of people willing to jump in and give opposing opinions. After all, if Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven truly devolved into a rage, he would vent his fury on Yang Qi instead of them.

Of course, there was no way that the Grand Emperor would resort to outright killing people. That would subvert the entire Dao Defense League and put them all in danger. Yang Qi was aware of this, and it was for that exact reason that he had taken advantage of the moment to defeat Daoist Great Void and seize the position of Emissary of Radiance and Light.

Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven let loose a long sigh. “Fine. You have some good points. We do need to establish a strong foundation for the Dao Defense League, by means of law and order. And you’re right. Not even I, the league-lord, should have direct control over all of the emissaries, dharmarajas, and god-generals. That said, are all of you really sure you want this young man to be the Emissary of Radiance and Light? If not, step forward to challenge him. Remember, whoever gets the position will have a lot of power and will lead the majority of the armed forces.”

Obviously, the Grand Emperor was playing politics. There were plenty of old-timers in the Dao Defense League, and considering how many ambitious old-timers there were there was no way the new league-lord would be able to exercise ultimate power right away. It was really a win-win situation for him to pit them against each other. If the old-timers challenged Yang Qi and lost, they would still hate him. If they won, there would be less unity, making it much easier for the Grand Emperor to achieve his broader goals.

Some of the old-timers who were already on Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven’s side began quietly offering him their opinions.

“Grand Emperor, there are far too many patriarchs who are downright obstinate and unruly. I honestly can’t believe they would dare to ignore your orders! You really need to put them in their place.”

“It’s only natural for you to have to resort to a bit of trickery to maintain power. The Dao Defense League is like a dish of loose sand right now. These patriarchs really need to be brought under control.”

“That’s what I'm trying to do. Don’t worry, I’m still in control here. I have a feeling that none of these old-timers will be able to take the position of Emissary of Radiance and Light from this kid.” Apparently, Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven still had more tricks up his sleeve. “Let’s see how the fighting goes.”

WHOOSH!

Yang Qi looked around and could see that there were still some of the old-timers itching to have at him. And he was trying to decide exactly how to deal with them.

Suddenly, one of them blurred into motion to appear in front of him. It was none other than Pontifex Scour Cloud, whose cultivation base he couldn’t assess.

“You’re impressive, boy,” he said. “But the Emissary of Radiance and Light will have only one superior and many subordinates. I somehow doubt that you qualify to have power like that.”

“Go ahead and make the first move, Pontifex Scour Cloud,” Yang Qi said with a faint smile.

CRASH!

Pontifex Scour Cloud thrust his finger out in an attack, causing everything around him to shrink down into a single point.

SNICK!

In the blink of an eye, the finger attack was at Yang Qi’s chest, but he didn’t move a muscle. He just let the attack hit him. As a result, boundless power flowed into his body.

“What?” Pontifex Scour Cloud’s eyes widened in shock. ‘The power of that finger attack can pierce an immortal world! How could he possibly just take the blow? Did he lose so much vital energy in the fight with Daoist Great Void that he can't move? Well fine, I’ll just completely and utterly defeat him!’

With that, he poured more true energy into the attack. He attacked with complete viciousness, hoping to pierce Yang Qi through. Yet it was like his true energy was just pouring into a bottomless pit, and he suddenly realized that he was about to be completely drained!

“You! What energy art is that?”

“Don’t look so surprised, Pontifex Scour Cloud,” Yang Qi replied. “I can see that this finger attack of yours is backed by the faith of the common people. However, dealing with faith is no simple task. You’re not in the legion of gods, so exercising control is difficult. Your true energy isn’t pure, therefore you’ll have a hard time reaching the next level. So I've taken the risk to accept your true energy, which I will now purify and give back to you. Henceforth, your cultivation will progress much more smoothly.”

As Yang Qi was speaking, Pontifex Scour Cloud felt true energy flowing back into his body. And it was none other than the true energy he had just released. But it was far purer than before, and seemed to contain the quintessence of the common people. As it returned to his sea of energy, he backed up and said, “Thank you for your kindness, Young Sir! You have my admiration! Considering you have abilities like this, you have my complete support to be the Emissary of Radiance and Light! I look forward to your rule!”

All of the other old-timers were quite surprised to have events turn out in such an unexpected way. But some were not so quick to be convinced.

“What trick was that? I refuse to believe it! You’re not a shill, are you Pontifex Scour Cloud? If this brat can convince you to support him so easily, why would he want to be a mere emissary? He could fight Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven to be the league-lord!”

Chapter 789: Convincing the Masses

Pontifex Scour Cloud was considered to be one of the top experts among the old-timers. He had plenty of experience, and was on the track to becoming an actual god. Despite that, he seemed completely convinced that he should support Yang Qi.

Unconvinced, some of the old-timers headed up to the stage to check things out more closely.

The first one to reach Yang Qi looked him up and down and said, “Do you really have some miraculous ability boy? Why not challenge Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven?”

“I do have an ability, but I'm still working on it,” Yang Qi replied. “And I'm definitely not a match for Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven. That’s why I decided to settle for the position of emissary. Please look favorably on my humble efforts. Senior, what is your honored surname and distinguished given name?”

“I'm Patriarch Heaven Casualty, a good friend of Pontifex Scour Cloud. And I'm not convinced that you won him over to your side so easily. You said you have an ability, but you’re still working on it? Is that supposed to mean that once you finish cultivating it, you’ll be able to challenge Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven for the position of league-lord?” Patriarch Heaven Casualty spoke in a very casual tone, but his words were as sharp as a blade and were forcing Yang Qi into a very dangerous position.

However, Yang Qi simply smiled and declined to say anything in response.

The old-timers with Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven were very angry. “Patriarch Heaven Casualty,” one of them said angrily, “you've got a lot of guts to ridicule the league-lord that way. That was very disrespectful!”

“Oh, I wouldn't dare to be disrespectful,” Patriarch Heaven Casualty said with a coy smile. “I meant no offense, Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven. Please forgive me.” Although it was worded like an apology, his smile made it clear that there was no sincerity in it.

His voice icy, Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven said, “It’s good we can handle so many important things today. Enough melodrama! Start fighting! Once we get matters all straightened out, I’m going to reorganize the Dao Defense League and make things much more orderly. We’re going to be an example for all the other immortal worlds out there.”

The meaning behind his words was clear; he wasn’t going to allow people to cause trouble the way that Patriarch Heaven Casualty was right now.

Many of the old-timers suddenly started wondering what things would be like in the days to come.

Uninterested in causing further problems for Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven, Patriarch Heaven Casualty turned to Yang Qi and said, “Come, boy. Let’s see what your energy arts are like. Are you going to make the first move?”

“Senior, everyone knows that you cultivate the legendary energy art known as the Heaven-Earth Mass-Casualty Grand Technique, an ancient practice that focuses on sorrow and death. The word ‘casualty’ refers to death in war, and the sorrow and grief that come with it. According to the stories, in the Primeval Age, when the kingdom of heaven crumbled, the legion of gods sang elegies of death. The truth is that in cultivating this technique to a high level, you’ve circulated your true energy improperly, thus developing a heart full of sorrow. In order to combat that sorrow, you’re always smiling in the hopes that it will relieve your negative emotions. Sadly, that’s like throwing a cup of water on a burning cart of firewood. You've really struck it lucky to meet me. I can take away all your pain.”

Patriarch Heaven Casualty burst out into raucous laughter. “Quite the sensationalist talk, boy. But I'm not so easily fooled by—”

Before he even finished speaking, he launched a palm strike at Yang Qi.

RIIIIP!

Numerous streaks of light shot out everywhere, surrounding every avenue of escape so that Yang Qi couldn’t go anywhere.

POP!

There was little for Yang Qi to do other than send his own palm out to meet the incoming attack. The two palms touched and true energy started pouring out of Yang Qi.

His hair whipped wildly about him and bright light shone off of his head. He poured so much power into Patriarch Heaven Casualty so quickly that the man inflated almost like a balloon. Terror filled his face as he said, “Your true energy is so strong! I concede! I admit defeat. Just let me go!”

The observing old-timers could never have guessed that Yang Qi would be so strong that he could defeat one patriarch after another.

POP!

Patriarch Heaven Casualty suddenly exploded, transforming into streams of sorrowful true energy that shot out in all directions.

“What are you waiting for?” Yang Qi said. “Form back up! I've already used my true energy to remove the impurities within you. Your cultivation will progress much more smoothly now.”

A chill wind swept through the temple, and a moment later Patriarch Heaven Casualty reappeared in a new form. Instantly, he dropped to his knees. “I'm convinced, Young Sir. Your cultivation base is enigmatically high, and you definitely deserve to be the Emissary of Radiance and Light. I, Patriarch Heaven Casualty, swear to devote myself fully to you for the rest of my life.”

“That's good. You're dismissed.”

Patriarch Heaven Casualty immediately flew back to his place.

Unfortunately, there were still some of the old-timers who weren’t convinced. ‘There's something odd about this kid. Is he really that strong?’

Leaf Dao-Denier was looking increasingly devastated as he realized that Yang Qi was truly starting to win the hearts of the old-timers. Before long it would be impossible to do anything about him.

The patriarchs who were already on Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven’s side could also tell what was happening.

“Grand Emperor, he’s trying to win people over to his side.”

“We can’t let this go on, otherwise he’ll be a threat to your glory.”

Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven snorted coldly. “You think a mighty emperor like myself should care about a brat like that? Just let him show off what he can do. After things calm down, I’ll force him to submit. If I can’t get a mere Emissary of Radiance and Light to listen to me, how could I be the league-lord of the entire Dao Defense League?”

Whoooooosh!

Meanwhile, more old-timers were flying out to challenge Yang Qi. Obviously, none of them believed that he had really defeated Pontifex Scour Cloud and Patriarch Heaven Casualty and wanted to see for themselves how strong he was.

However, each and every one of them met with failure. Yang Qi would identify their hidden injuries, then heal them. Slowly but surely, the old-timers were coming to admire Yang Qi and be convinced of the profundity of his cultivation base.

Eventually, the old-timers were lining up to get on the stage with him.

At a certain point, Yang Qi raised his voice and said, “Ladies and gentlemen, this is supposed to be a competition, not a healing session. Once I'm the Emissary of Radiance and Light, all of you can just come to the Sage Monarch Society to receive treatment. For now, I'm going to stop with the healings. Do you approve of me being the Emissary of Radiance and Light? If not, step forward so we can fight.”

“We approve, Young Sir!”

“Young Sir, your cultivation is profound and enigmatic and you can heal all sorts of conditions. Your energy arts are filled with boundless radiance and light, and that makes you the best candidate to be the emissary. None of us could possibly beat you in a fight, so I doubt anyone present would want to challenge you.”

“Exactly! The matter is settled. None of us will challenge you. However, we still have to decide about the nine dharmarajas and the twenty-four god-generals.”

“You’re the best person for the job of Emissary of Radiance and Light. No one will deny that. We’re all convinced.”

One old-timer after another was speaking out to voice their support for Yang Qi.

Not only had Yang Qi proven himself, it was also obvious to him that no one wanted Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven to have such an overabundance of power. Truth be told, Yang Qi was already contemplating how to take the position of league-lord for himself. He wasn’t afraid of the legion of gods, much less a grand emperor, even one who had founded the Heavenly Court of the past.

As the Emissary of Radiance and Light, he would definitely be in a position to eventually compete with Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven.

With so many old-timers supporting Yang Qi, and no one stepping forward to challenge him, he finally turned to Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven and said, “League-Lord, are you ready to accept me as being qualified to serve as the Emissary of Radiance and Light?”

Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven gave Yang Qi a piercing look that caused the entire scene to quiet down. Many of the old-timers suddenly wondered what exactly the grand emperor was thinking.

In the moment, Yang Qi suddenly felt like he had fallen into the deepest, burning depths of hell, a place from which his soul could never climb out and would be eternally tormented by endless heat.

Instantly, his heart turned cold. ‘If this Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven wanted to beat me in a fight, it would take him a while. And he thinks he's going to hurt me with a gaze? Yeah right. What does he think I am, an ignorant child?’

A tremor passed through him, along with a formless ripple. Sparks suddenly showered out from all of the pores in his body, raining down onto the stage like meteorites. He had simply shoved the flame of Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven’s gaze out of him!

The sparks melted the parts of the stage they hit, and the nearby old-timers scrambled to get out of their way. Those who were too slow burst into flames and let loose agonized screams as the other old-timers batted out the fire. All of them realized that Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven had been testing Yang Qi.

‘He’s so strong he’s not even afraid of Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven!’ That was what many people were thinking.

At the same time, Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven came to the realization that although he could probably defeat Yang Qi in a fight, it would be a costly battle. And if it dragged out for too long, he might not succeed in the end. ‘Where did this freak come from? I’ve dominated the world from ancient times until now, but I've never come across someone this young who’s so strong.’

Retracting his gaze, he said, “In that case, Yang Qi, you will lead the Army of Radiance and Light. You will carry out my orders, command the dao of righteousness, and fight the future world!”

“Yes sir!” Yang Qi said, clasping his hands in salute. He could already feel a convergence of destiny within him as he took some of the power that had previously belonged solely to the league-lord.

Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven could apparently sense what was happening, and his face flickered with anger. However, he didn’t say anything about it. “Next, we will have contests to select the dharmarajas who will be leaders within the army.”

Moments later, fierce fighting was underway.

Chapter 790: Organizing the Armed Forces

Yang Qi had won the title of Emissary of Radiance and Light, a position that came with much power. He would lead the Army of Radiance and Light, with only one superior giving him orders and many subordinates who followed his. He knew that Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven wasn’t going to just let him do his own thing. The man wanted to have everyone under his control—including Yang Qi.

Of course, Yang Qi had his own plans for Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven. Usually, power struggles like this ended in the death of one party.

It was like that with emperors in the mortal world, and it was even more so the case when it came to control of the Dao Defense League. After all, the league-lord was the top individual among countless immortal worlds, a position of power that vastly surpassed the emperors of mortals.

For now, Yang Qi wasn’t in the position to compete.

But he had two fragments of the Cruiser of Civilization, including the vivicreation systems and the genetic systems. The next thing he planned to do was go to the Dragonfolk temple and get the Engine of the One God. Once he had that, he would be in a much better position to face off with Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven.

As he sat on his throne, he watched the competitions play out for the dharmarajas and god-generals. He wished that disciples from the Sage Monarch Heaven could compete, but unfortunately they were currently too weak.

At a minimum, the old-timers present were Chaos Gods, and some of them were half-Deathless and already on the Deathless Heavenly Stairway.

After seven days and nights, the positions were filled. Leaf Dao-Denier got a spot as a dharmaraja and was given the title of True Raja Dao-Denier. The emperor of the Tusita Heaven also snagged a spot and was named Violet Raja Tusita. August Patriarch Sword-Burier took a spot and was named Sword Raja Immortal-Burier. The rest of the spots went to other mysterious and powerful old-timers: Asura Raja Devil Smasher, Saber Raja Rising Sun, Formation Raja Worldwide, Specter Raja Austerity, Assassin Raja Formless, and Knight Raja Righteous Energy. The nine of them formed a very powerful group.

All of them were people who won their spots through impressive sessions of combat and had fully won over the crowd.

Yang Qi was frankly shocked at how strong they all were. He could tell that if he wasn’t careful, it would be easy to fall into a deadly trap at the hands of these obstinate and unruly people, many of whom envied his position.

Few of them could be considered loyalists to Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven.

Even if Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven were stronger than he was, it would be difficult for him to fully control so many old-timers. Other than Leaf Dao-Denier, most of them were people who were actually contemporaries of Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven and had known him in years past. Although none of them matched up in terms of cultivation base, they were all backed by powerful organizations, and all of them longed to be the league-lord. For now, though, they had no choice but to settle for being dharmarajas or god-generals.

And if Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven had tried to insert one of his own confidantes into the running, it would have led to widespread anger, especially after Yang Qi vanquished Daoist Great Void.

For example, one of the nine dharmarajas was Assassin Raja Formless, who came from a thirty-second ranked immortal world named the Formless Heaven. He was known to be a consummate assassin, and was widely feared for the way he killed people in mysterious ways. As a king of assassins, how could he possibly agree to be a lackey of Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven?

Yang Qi could already tell that, although the Dao Defense League now had a semblance of order, the competition going forward would be fierce. There was going to be a redistribution of wealth, with many sects being disbanded, and new sects formed. Medicinal pills, spirit stones, power stockpiles, magical treasures, and daoist texts and the like would all be shuffled around. Unless he played his cards just right, it would be difficult to form the army he needed to.

With the nine dharmarajas set, it was time for the competition for the twenty-four god-generals. Many experts took to the stage, and a huge variety of magical treasures, god items, and godly-class energy arts were put on display.

Some of the old-timers came from thirty-first ranked immortal worlds, such as God-General Heart-Smasher and God-General Nine-Peaks, who came from the Heart-Smashing Heaven and the Nine-Peaks Heaven, respectively. They were true patriarchs who were around even back when Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven previously held power.

One of them was a woman, God-General Ying Ning. She had a special constitution, making her a Tranquil One. Supposedly, Tranquil Ones were perpetually in a state of deep tranquility that would ensure that their energy arts contained no impurities. They could cultivate any energy art they came across and push it to a higher level, just like the saying indigo blue is extracted from the indigo plant, but is bluer than the plant itself. They usually had higher levels of enlightenment than experts of the same level.

The god-generals weren’t easy people to deal with, either. They were elites who rose to the top from the billions of trillions of old-timers that existed as a whole. They would serve as the backbone of the bureaucracy and would be among the most powerful officials in existence.

And they wouldn’t stand for constantly being told what to do.

In the end, the big meeting was like a grand banquet. Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven got the biggest chunk of meat as the league-lord. Next was Yang Qi, who, as the Emissary of Radiance and Light, got the largest bone. Everyone lower was still important, but had to struggle for whatever scraps they could come across to stabilize their foundation, or perhaps win the loyalty of other, even smaller organizations.

Soon, some old-timers were visibly in despair as they realized they were unable to secure positions of power. Some of them even wished they could leave the Dao Defense League, but none dared to follow through. The group of thirty-six leaders had been established, and although there would surely be fierce competition between them, they would still advance the interests of the Dao Defense League as a whole.

And they wouldn't tolerate rebellions.

Gong!

A bell tolled, quieting down the temple. Then Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven raised his voice and said, “The general power structure of the Dao Defense League has been set. The top patriarchs have revealed themselves, and we now have emissaries, dharmarajas, and god-generals. Soon, we will organize the armed forces. That said, there will be no draft. The leaders must recruit the normal way. And now, the time has come to establish some of the base rules.

“First. Once you join the Dao Defense League, you can’t leave it. Those who try will be executed. Second. Everyone must respect the chain of command and follow orders from superiors. That’s assuming the orders fall within the realm of reason. Obviously, superiors should not be giving random orders for personal gain. I will soon erect a Dao Bell here in Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple. If a subordinate has a complaint about a superior, along with evidence, they can ring the bell to give voice to their grievances. Then we will hold a formal meeting to investigate the matter. If guilt is proven, punishment will follow! It goes without saying that the bell should only be rung for important reasons.

“Third. If personal grudges arise in the Dao Defense League, it is prohibited to solve them with private duels. Any who attempt to do so will be punished! We will erect God-Dueling Arenas in various locations where public duels can be fought to resolve issues, with specific rules governing the combat. Fourth. Now that leadership has been established, resources need to be distributed. Underneath the god-generals will be many types of elders, including elder kings, prime paragon elders, paragon elders, prime elders, grand elders, and of course, ordinary elders.

“No one is permitted to recruit personal armies or create private power structures. Everyone present is required to attend any military councils that are held. Furthermore, you must all disband your previous sects and organizations. Disperse all of your core disciples! They’ll be members of the armed forces going forward, understand? It is not permitted to foster personal power in the Dao Defense League!”

His words were spoken with deadly determination, especially the final stipulation, which was the harshest. No one was allowed to keep their previous sects in place, and were required to have their disciples join the armed forces.

Although many of the old-timers had known that this was coming, it was a bit different to have it actually happen. And many balked; however, Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven spoke with a decisiveness that could sever nails and chop iron, making it clear that everyone had to follow the rules whether they wanted to or not. Of course, there was some leeway. Although the sects had to be disbanded, they could still remain loyal to whichever emissary, dharmaraja, or god-general they had originally clung to.

For example, if an old-timer was the leader of a twentieth-ranked immortal world, it would be impossible to ‘disband’ that world. He could simply have the disciples of that world join the army of whatever god-general came from there.

Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven was no fool, and he knew that it would be impossible to stop such things from happening. However, his main goal now was to just get the Dao Defense League unified and set it against the future world. Later, he would slowly but surely purge any dissenters, gradually consolidating his power to a further degree.

It was a slow process that couldn’t happen overnight.

“The Dao Defense League will hold court just like the emperors in the mortal world. It will be held once per month, and any patriarchs who are particularly busy can send a clone to attend in their place.” Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven went on to elaborate more about the rules, which were being recorded by some of the other old-timers to be kept in the temple for reference.

In this fashion, the Dao Defense League became a formally united body.

The next phase would be to redistribute resources and recruit subordinates.

“I have one final announcement. The army that I will directly command will be called the Deathless Corps, and I encourage all elders to apply immediately. This branch of the armed forces will be tasked with enforcing the law.” His announcement caused many of the old-timers to perk up. Obviously, working directly for the league-lord would be much better than siding with a god-general or dharmaraja.

‘Very clever,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘That said, this guy seems somewhat unpredictable. I bet many of the old-timers won’t want to get too close to him.’ As for Yang Qi, he didn’t need to rely on any other person to staff his army. All he had to do was open the way to hell and summon endless fiend-devils, then convert them into angels.

They would form the core of the Army of Radiance and Light.

Chapter 791: Distributing Resources

Yet again, Yang Qi returned to the twentieth-ranked immortal world that was his Sage Monarch Heaven, where his immortal-slaying clone currently presided over matters. As soon as he arrived he unleashed boundless radiance and light, like a shining psalm that parted the clouds and shot out into the depths of primal-chaos.

Yang Qi wasn’t worried at all about causing a scene.

He was now the second-most powerful person in the Dao Defense League, the Emissary of Radiance and Light, and second only to Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven. Even if the league-lord himself wanted to cause problems, according to the law, he would have to do so formally. And that would require a lot of politicking.

Truth be told, there were many old-timers who wanted to do things their own way. Yang Qi was just the first person to buck the authority of Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven.

In fact, the old-timers were all itching to see sparks fly between Yang Qi and the league-lord. Without such conflict, it would essentially mean that the league-lord was an outright dictator, which no one wanted. Everyone was looking forward to what would happen in the days to come.

“Clone, you keep watch over things here while I go to the Heaven Beyond Heaven to face some tribulation. I plan to reach the fourth division Shattered God level, or possibly even become a fifth division Nirvanic God. At that point, I’ll be able to summon ninth division Chaos God fiend-devils, purify them, and have an incredible army of angels to work with. I won’t need help from any of the other old-timers to make myself the top force in the Dao Defense League. And it’s also time to start taking control of the immortal world essence of the Heaven Beyond Heaven.”

After handling some minor affairs, he left his clone in charge and departed.

Recently, his immortal-slaying clone had been advancing on almost a daily basis. As he worked with the seventy-one patriarchs, he pushed his way toward the peak of the Chaos God level and was preparing to ascend the Deathless Heavenly Stairway.

And now that he had seven of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions, he was strong enough to keep the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart completely sealed up. In other words, it wouldn’t open automatically after ten thousand years, like it used to.

And the power he could summon from the chart would make him almost invincible in a fight. That said, he was still far from having full control over the thing.

There were still godrelics and daoist texts to be found inside. The more power he gained, the more resources he could discover, like treasure troves left behind by ancient gods, or perhaps even their actual corpses. He had to get his hands on the final two legacy medallions before he could do that, though.

Swish!

Yang Qi entered the Heaven Beyond Heaven and found the power tempests to be as intense as ever. Endless mists floated everywhere, so thick he could hardly see his hand in front of his face. Even Chaos God entities that came here would likely get stuck and perish.

He was convinced that Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven would eventually make a move on him, so he needed to push his cultivation base to a higher level. He also needed to probe the essence of the Heaven Beyond Heaven and hopefully take control of the entire place. It was a thirty-third ranked immortal world, a mysterious place that made the Tusita Heaven seem weak by comparison. The resources, treasures, and power available in it surpassed imagination.

And he could probably use it to power the Cruiser of Civilization to a much higher level.

RUMBLE!

Thanks to his improved cultivation base—and of course, Chancellor Demi-Immortal’s aura—he could sense the aura of the Heaven Beyond Heaven flowing toward him like liquid jade.

He laughed heartily as power coursed into him like a myriad of dragons. As he trembled, god tribulation formed above him in the shape of palaces from the kingdom of gods.

“Bless me, essence!”

The essence of the Heaven Beyond Heaven descended to crush him, but he simply devoured it, growing stronger as he did. God formations appeared, sending millions upon millions of swords down to kill him.

Crack!

His virtual godhood shattered, becoming true energy that flowed to all parts of his body. Then the vital energy of the god tribulation caused the virtual godhood to form anew, which was the sign of the Shattered and Nirvanic God levels.

The moment it formed together, he was in the fourth division, and as it became more solid he stepped into the fifth.

The fifth division was a watershed point. After all, the Nirvanic God level was named after nirvanic rebirth. As one’s virtual godhood was born and reborn again and again it became more true and real, edging ever closer to becoming true godhood.

On the downside, the moment his virtual godhood shattered and was born again, his true energy was almost completely drained.

“True godhood, shatter!”

RUMBLE!

The true godhood he had stolen from the Tusita Heaven erupted, filling him with new power that coursed through all parts of his body, causing them to grow stronger, until they began to emanate a sensation of deathlessness.

Then the true godhood vanished, completely absorbed by his own power.

He had originally hoped that true godhood would get him all the way to the ninth division. However, after acquiring the seed of truth with other aspects of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth in it, he acquired a much broader foundation, thus required more power to make advancement. In the end, the true godhood only got him to the fifth division.

Unfortunately, fifth division Nirvanic Gods weren’t considered impressive in the Dao Defense League. But this upgrade would make Yang Qi even more terrifying than before. Right now, Yang Qi was so much more powerful than when he had become the Emissary of Radiance and Light that, if he actually did fight with Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven, it might be possible to gain an advantage. Taking a deep breath, he inhaled all of the tribulation, as well as much of the mist in the area. There were even some god formations that got caught up and absorbed.

The Heaven Beyond Heaven was a very dangerous place. Its climate gave birth to tornadoes of raw power, tempests of power crystals, violent volcanoes and surging oceans that weren’t filled with water and fire respectively, but rather universal magical laws.

Yet Yang Qi consumed them.

He was now a fifth division Nirvanic God, and one of the first things he did was go a bit further into the depths of the Heaven Beyond Heaven.

Now that his true godhood was gone, if he wanted to rise to the sixth division he would have to get a new source of power.

Perhaps if he could harvest the core essence of the Heaven Beyond Heaven, it would be enough. In fact, maybe it would get him all the way to the ninth division.

If he became a ninth division Chaos God, then not even the Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court would be a match for him. He would be invincible in the Dao Defense League and could strip Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven of his title of league-lord.

And eventually, he would break through to the Deathless Throne.

The Heaven Beyond Heaven was an uninhabited place that had always been sealed and never given birth to cultivation geniuses. In other words, it had no loss of destiny. It was very different than the Tusita Heaven, in which countless geniuses shared connection to its essence.

The essence of the Tusita Heaven was nowhere near as vigorous as that of the Heaven Beyond Heaven. It probably wasn’t even half as strong. If all of its resources and destiny went to a single person, how powerful would they be?

As he proceeded into the depths of the immortal world, he would occasionally encounter god formations that would futilely attack him, or primal-chaos beasts that couldn’t escape him. He devoured all of them to help replenish himself.

At a certain point deep inside, a map suddenly flew out from his belongings.

It was a piece of the Aeonic God Psalter, taken from Leaf Dao-Denier, who claimed he had found it in or near the Heaven Beyond Heaven. Leaf Dao-Denier still had two pieces, and there were seven in total. When combined, they would provide the complete Aeonic Heaven-Dao Life-Destruction Zen Art, as well as the full legacy of the map.

‘Did the Aeonic God Psalter really come from the Heaven Beyond Heaven?’ Yang Qi thought as he continued to absorb the essence and learn about the vital energy of the world around him. Following the directions on the map, he headed to a location where a boundless sea spread out in all directions, covered with rolling waves and a blanket of water vapor. Far out in that sea was an island with an immense temple on it, just barely visible to Yang Qi.

‘Is this really seawater?’

He reached out and scooped up some of the water, only to find that it was made of pure primal-chaos quintessence vitality. A single drop would ordinarily be enough to melt the flesh of a sixth division cultivator. And even the water vapor would be enough to kill such Godmyths.

‘The temple on that island must have information about the Aeonic God Psalter.’ Just as he was preparing to start the search, he suddenly sensed the energy fluctuations of powerful divine abilities.

Sinking into the shadows, he waited to see who it might be.

Soon, a group of powerful old-timers appeared, people whom Yang Qi had never seen before. Landing on the ground, one of them said, “So, is that really the Aeonic God Temple? You’re absolutely certain?”

Chapter 792: Seven Pieces of the God Psalter

‘Who are these people? They’re obviously not from the Dao Defense League.’ It only took a short moment for Yang Qi to assess the group.

Although there were as many people in the Dao Defense League as there were eternal sands, they were all branded with a certain type of destiny that would make them easily identifiable. It was the same as how, in the mortal world, government officials had a certain air to them that commoners might not see but would be sensed by peers. Besides, Yang Qi also had an unusual command of fate.

There were seven of these old-timers, and the leader wore a five-colored robe and had a long, flowing beard. A brightly shining vortex was visible on his forehead, which constantly absorbed the surrounding power and vital energy. He was so strong that not even the water vapor from the sea affected him.

‘This guy is really powerful, probably on the same level as the Emissary of Darkness and Gloom, Wave Charm. If he joined the Dao Defense League, he could probably win a spot as a dharmaraja. I wonder where he's from and if he knows where the other pieces of the Aeonic God Psalter are. I’ll wait a moment before stepping in and taking them captive.’

By this point, Yang Qi was so strong that he could defeat just about anyone who would possibly get in his path, perhaps with the exception of an actual god, or the Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court.

“That's right,” said the man in the five-colored robe. “The Aeonic God Temple is right here in the Heaven Beyond Heaven. In fact, it’s out there on that island. You see, after the legion of gods created the Aeonic God Temple, they made the psalter as a map to lead to the various treasures that were meant to be stored here. It’s designed as a repository of tools for when the most drastic of transformations occur in heaven and earth. There are seven pieces of the psalter and we have four of them, which in turn gives us four aspects of the Aeonic Heaven-Dao Life-Destruction Zen Art. All we have to do is set up our altar and call out to the other pieces. Our boss has already determined that three of them are somewhere in the Dao Defense League.”

One of the other men present had white skin that made him look almost like a zombie. “Dao Defense League?” he said. “It's very strong nowadays. I heard that Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven recently took control and finally started fighting back against the future world. He wants to acquire the immense destiny of the immortal worlds and win the approval of the dao of heaven. I wonder what the boss is planning. You’d think he’d just join the Dao Defense League and directly challenge Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven. Then he could win the approval of the dao of heaven in the fight against the future world. That would be a big help in his effort to reach the deathless throne.”

“The boss has a plan,” replied the man in the five-colored robe. “Besides, if Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven is working with the other three grand emperors, they make a very powerful force. The boss might be able to win in a fight against two of them, but not all four together. It makes sense to avoid open conflict and just wait in the shadows to see how the situation develops.”

Another in the group was a beautiful woman with a cold, no-nonsense expression on her face. “What happens if the four emperors actually lead the heroes of modern times to defeat the future world?” she said. “If they win the universal fortune of heaven and earth, they’ll definitely become gods.”

“You make it sound simple. Don’t forget, the ten magisters of the future world are virtually invincible. Even worse, it's said that they have a God Legion Seal. Right now, they’re wrapped up fighting a war in the Primeval Era, but once they return they could easily wipe out the immortal dao civilization. You see, there's a God Legion Seal in the Primeval Age as well. If they get it and combine it with the one from the future, they’ll be incomprehensibly powerful. What’s worse, the God Legion Seal in the present age hasn't yet appeared. Nobody knows who has it.

“Besides, do you really think Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven will be able to ‘lead the heroes’ nowadays? If so, you’re delusional. The experts from the past and the future are eventually going to converge in the present. There’s going to be a huge war, and a lot of killing. Nobody can stop that from happening, with the possible exception of whoever has the God Legion Seal. The boss is currently remaining hidden in primal-chaos, gathering experts to his side, building power, and waiting. If the holder of the God Legion Seal appears, he’ll snatch him up and assimilate him. Then he’ll be able to take control of the Dao Defense League, defeat the experts from the future and past, and unite the universe. His ambitions are the kind that short-sighted individuals can’t even comprehend.”

“Look, enough chit chat. Bring out the pieces of the Aeonic God Psalter. It’s only because we have the pieces in our possession that we can see the Aeonic God Temple. Even if someone as powerful as Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven came here without the psalter, they would never be able to find the temple.”

With that, the three of them pulled out a map that was comprised of four pieces stitched together, which bore the depiction of a holy temple that looked exactly like the temple on the island.

As soon as the map appeared, the piece that Yang Qi had began to wriggle, then flew out into the open. Obviously, that alerted the seven others to his presence.

“Who's that?”

“Surround him! Don’t let him get away. He has another piece of the map!”

“I knew it! I knew that if we pulled out our four pieces, we would hook a big fish!”

As the group of seven fanned out and surrounded Yang Qi, the man in the five-colored robe looked at him and said, “Are you from the Dao Defense League, boy? Considering you’re here in the Heaven Beyond Heaven, you obviously have a pretty strong cultivation base. Did you really think you would get into the Aeonic God Temple with that one piece of the map? Not likely. Who sent you? It wasn’t Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven, was it? He wouldn't have gotten involved if he wasn’t absolutely certain of coming out on top.”

One of the group of seven, a burly man with nasty scars all over his face, said, “Thanks for bringing us a fifth piece of the map, brat. Now hand it over. You don’t stand a chance against us. When our boss finds out we found another piece, he’s going to be very happy. He’ll probably even reward us.”

Smiling faintly, Yang Qi looked around at the group of seven. “If you give me your four pieces, I won’t kill you. What do you say? By the way, who’s your boss, and what makes him think he has what it takes to take over the Dao Defense League? You know I'm going to have to report this to Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven. When he finds out there are people out there plotting against him, he’ll definitely root them out and kill them. We’re out there working ourselves to the bone fighting the future world, and you people are sneaking around in the shadows, hoping to personally profit? Who could possibly tolerate such behavior?”

“You really think you’re going to live through this, brat?” said the man with the scars. “Actually, we can make sure you wish you were dead. Considering everything you just said, there’s no way we’ll let you go.”

The beautiful woman seemed the least patient of all. “What’s the point of listening to this fool’s chatter? Just grab him!”

“That’s true. There really isn’t any point in talking with him.” The scarred man strode forward using a very miraculous movement technique. He moved with the speed of god lightning, causing intense rumbling sounds to echo out everywhere.

The thunderous aura that weighed down on Yang Qi made him feel like he was suffocating.

‘This guy is strong. Definitely no weaker than August Patriarch Sword-Burier.’ From what Yang Qi could sense, the man had likely ascended to the fourth or fifth stair on the Deathless Heavenly Stairway. Of course, Yang Qi wouldn’t possibly be frightened of someone like that.

As the burly man closed in, Yang Qi stood his ground and thrust his hand out. In the blink of an eye, he had the burly man by the throat. Lifting him up into the air, he used the Devil-God Seal to completely lock him down to the point where he couldn’t even talk.

After holding him there for a tense moment, he loosened his grip so the man could speak.

“Let me go!” he croaked. “Who are you? How could you possibly be so strong! Release me!”

Crack!

Yang Qi sent an explosive stream of true energy into him, shattering all of his meridians. Then he quickly assimilated his power, energy arts, quintessence-blood, and vital energy, rapidly transforming him into an empty husk which he then dropped onto the ground.

He was utterly and completely dead.

“What?”

“Brother, what happened?”

“Dammit! Our bro is dead? Slaughtered by this brat?”

“What divine ability was that? How could he be so strong?”

“Group up!” said the man in the five-colored robe, who was obviously the leader of the group. “This guy is up to no good!” The remaining six of the group quickly formed ranks, whereupon the leader glared at Yang Qi and said, “Who exactly are you?”

“Ai!” Yang Qi sighed. “You people really are ignorant and ill-informed. You don’t even recognize the Emissary of Radiance and Light from the Dao Defense League? And you think you're in the position to oppose our league?” Although Yang Qi was at odds with Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven, and hoped to take the position of league-lord away from him, there was no way he would just allow people to plot and scheme against the Dao Defense League as a whole. It was important to maintain a delineation between internal and external conflicts.

“Emissary of Radiance and Light?” the leader said. “Oh, you’re that kid who just became emissary. Just hold on a minute here. Our boss knows all about you, and is aware that you have an extraordinary cultivation base. Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven is surely envious of you and will likely make a move against you soon. Are you aware of that? Our boss can help you deal with the emperor. There’s no way you can do it on your own, that’s for sure. Especially not if all four of the emperors are working together. They’ll definitely kill you if you try to make a move.”

“Who exactly is this ‘boss’ of yours?” Yang Qi asked.

“If you want to know,” the beautiful woman said, “you’ll have to come with us. We can take you out into the depths of primal-chaos to his cultivation facilities. Then you’ll understand. You see, he’s on the level of a god.”

“We can definitely work together,” the leader said. “It's true you killed our brother, but we can forget that if you join us. After all, our boss has long since expressed his desire to meet you in person.”

“Sadly, I'm not interested in meeting your ‘boss’,” Yang Qi coldly replied. “And I'm not worried about the Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court, either. I'm going to take them out myself, sooner or later, and turn them into out-of-body incarnations for me. And I’ll do the same to your boss. Don’t any of you even think of trying to leave here today. I'm going to soulsearch you and figure out exactly who this boss of yours is.”

Chapter 793: The Boss Behind the Scenes

There was no way Yang Qi was going to let these people off the hook. He was the Emissary of Radiance and Light, with only one superior and many subordinates. And this was the perfect opportunity to find out who might be out to harm the Dao Defense League.

Whoever this ‘boss’ was, it was obvious he was a very dangerous person. That much was obvious, if he thought he could take on the Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court. Apparently, he wanted to remain in hiding until the Dao Defense League and the future world’s fighting had reached a fever pitch. Perhaps he would even wait until Primeval Age figures joined the fray before swooping in and taking advantage of the situation.

Yang Qi obviously couldn’t allow people like that to stick around as threats. Each one that popped up, he would kill. And that was especially true in the Heaven Beyond Heaven. This place was Yang Qi’s world, where he controlled the vital energy and magical laws. He had already killed one member of this group of seven, and he would wipe out the rest and find this eldest brother of theirs, if he had to.

And in the end, that person would die too.

His killing intent was pulsing with such intensity that all of them could sense it clearly.

“We have to go all out!” the leader said to his fellows. “Set up the Preheaven Adjudication Formation and trap him.”

“Yes sir!”

The other experts burst into motion, spinning this way and that around Yang Qi as they set up a huge spell formation, but he wasn’t worried. Ignoring their efforts, he simply took a step forward and reached out with his hand. Streams of energy flowed out of his fingers like dragons as he used the Hand of the One God to directly attack the formation.

Crack! Snap!

The formation shattered and his six opponents staggered backward. He took another step forward and unleashed an even more devastating attack. Explosive streams of true energy snaked forward directly toward the beautiful woman.

“Watch out, Junior Sister Mei!” the leader said. He exhaled sharply, sending out an internal pellet that glowed with the color of fire. As soon as it was out in the open, it exploded with power, becoming a huge, burning sun. “Green Sun Internal Pellet! Detonate the Void, Attack to Save!”

This man in five-colored robes had spent many years of bitter cultivation to create this extremely powerful internal pellet of true energy. It was a powerful weapon that most people would be incapable of defending against.

But Yang Qi hardly even spared it a passing glance. He reached out, grabbed the pellet, and crushed it, turning it into a stream of green smoke that he quickly assimilated.

Next, he reached out to grab the beautiful woman, smashing through all the defensive barriers in the way. The woman gritted her teeth in desperation and prepared to call upon a magical escape ability. However, a dimensional barrier rose up in front of her as she turned to flee, which she slammed into, causing her to fall to the ground. Before she could react any further, Yang Qi grabbed her.

He quickly sent streams of true energy into her, filling her with a sensation of tingling weakness. Within moments, she was completely incapable of moving.

As she glared at him in rage, he smiled and said, “Scum like you want to compete with me using spell formations? I'm the top dog in the Heaven Beyond Heaven! Take a look at these primeval god formations!”

RUMBLE!

The seawater in the area began to bubble and boil as numerous god formations rose up, sending out chains of magical law that locked everything down.

Keeping his grip on the beautiful woman, Yang Qi vanished into the swirling chains.

As for the other five members of the group, they were already trapped inside the formations.

Moments later, Yang Qi and the woman were floating above the swirling vital energy. Holding her up in front of him, he glanced down at her five companions, who were buzzing around like flies trying to escape.

“So you’re Junior Sister Mei?” he asked. “Because you're a woman, I’ll refrain from killing you. But you need to tell me who this eldest brother of yours is. And where is he?”

Snorting coldly, she said, “I refuse to surrender to you, you dirty little swine. Just go ahead and kill me. I've already devoted my life to Eldest Brother. Even if you kill all of us, it won’t do you any good.”

“Ai!” Yang Qi sighed, shaking his head. “How come people nowadays always refuse to do things the easy way? Fine, the hard way it is. Let’s see if you’re still stubborn after taking a bit of a beating.” Looking her up and down, he said, “You have a nice body. Aren’t you worried that I might rip your clothes off and take your yin vitality? I control the boundless power of hell, and I can think of ten thousand ways to do that. Trust me, the humiliation would be far, far worse than death.”

“Let me go, you beast!”

Suddenly, she gasped as he sent some true energy rippling across her skin, filling her with a sensation of both pleasure and pain. In that moment, she knew he was using some sort of devil art on her.

He shook his head. “If you really want to do it, I can show you what misery is.”

The truth was that Yang Qi had just probed her with his Wheel of Fate, hoping to get a lock onto the location of her so-called eldest brother. Unfortunately, he wasn’t able to pick up on the slightest aura or fluctuation.

The other members of the group were stuck down below in the numerous god formations Yang Qi had called on. Exhaling, he sent out a stream of energy that turned into a primal-chaos elder-snake that began gobbling up the vital energy they were expending to attack the formations.

Time passed.

Soon, the rest of the group was gasping for breath and running low on energy. They tried to call for help, but Yang Qi intercepted the messages with his divine will, ensuring that they never got out of the formations.

In the Heaven Beyond Heaven, he was a god, making him far more powerful than even Young Master Leaf was in the Tusita Heaven.

Although Young Master Leaf had taken the legacy of the Tusita Heaven, there were many other old-timers there who could draw on the place’s destiny. In contrast, Yang Qi was the one and only ruler of the Heaven Beyond Heaven.

“Be broken!” Yang Qi said, and as soon as the words left his mouth, they became like a sea of lightning that descended onto the heads of his opponents. It was none other than the Life-Death Void-Destruction God-Lightning.

Agonized shrieks rang out as the entire group dropped, lightning smashing into them and wrapping them up like chains.

As Yang Qi dropped down in front of them, the leader looked up and spat, “Swine! Dirty pig! We’re eventually going to destroy your Dao Defense League! How dare you provoke us! You have no idea who our eldest brother is. If you knew, you would be terrified!”

“Even if your eldest brother is a god, I’ll still kill him.” Suddenly, the Hell Scourge appeared in Yang Qi’s hand.

Screams immediately began to ring out from the leader. “What’s going on?” he shrieked. “This pain! It’s intolerable!” The torment that the Hell Scourge could unleash was the kind that no person could endure. “Stop! I surrender! I’ll tell you anything you want to know.”

“You!” the beautiful woman shouted. “You useless weakling, Ren Wuyi!”

SMACK!

This time, Yang Qi struck the woman.

At first her eyes just went wide, but then she unleashed a scream so bloodcurdling it could rip open the greyspaces of immortal worlds. After experiencing the torment of innumerable hells, she sagged in relief when he held back the lash. Dripping with sweat and looking quite listless, she said, “I’ll talk! I’ll tell you everything. Our eldest brother is a Past One, an invincible expert from the Primeval Age. The buddha dragons opened a passageway to the past in the hopes of summoning primeval buddhas. But they made a mistake in the construction of the passageway and eldest brother managed to slip through. He arrived in our age over a hundred years ago and has been hiding out here in the primal-chaos, working on his master plan. In the Primeval Age, he wasn’t able to reach the level of the legion of gods. But here in the Immortal Dao Age, everything is different. Fate is different. He will change everything, and succeed in becoming a god.”

“What’s his name?” Yang Qi asked.

Taking a gasping breath, she answered, “His name is Secundus. That’s all. In the Primeval Age, people usually only have a single name. Just don’t touch me with that whip and I promise to do anything you ask.”

“Fine. Open your heart and soul. Become a believer in me.” She and all the others complied. As they did, he waved his hand and the four-part map flew out and into his palm. As soon as its energy entered him, an Aeon Portal opened behind him.

Now, he only needed two final elements to complete the Aeonic Heaven-Dao Life-Destruction Zen Art.

Upon adding his current piece to the four-piece map, they created a large composite image that had two empty spots. Those pieces were with Young Master Leaf. Once he had them, he would be able to open the Aeonic God Temple and find what mysteries and treasures lay therein.

‘You’re going to bleed, Young Master Leaf. I'm definitely going to get those treasure maps from you.’

Now that he had turned these six enemies into believers, he was able to get more information about this Eldest Brother Secundus, but unfortunately none of them had ever seen him with their own eyes. He remained completely hidden in primal-chaos, using magical techniques to communicate and issue orders.

Chapter 794: Sowing Seeds of Disaster

Yang Qi asked more questions about this Eldest Brother Secundus, and the explanations caused his shock to mount. Apparently, he really was strong enough to beat Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven in a fight, even if he joined forces with one of the other Grand Emperors. He wasn’t truly a god, but he was definitely as strong as a Lesser God.

It really was true that there is always a heaven beyond heaven, and there are always people more important than you.

Already, Yang Qi was starting to form a new plan. “You people go back to Eldest Brother Secundus and tell him that Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven found out that you have the pieces of the map. He sent some people who ambushed you and took your pieces. Convince him that Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven knows about him and is planning to come with all the emperors of the Heavenly Court to take his life.”

“Yes, Milord!”

Henceforth, this group of six would never hesitate to do anything Yang Qi asked of them, nor would they ever be able to consciously betray him. Turning, they flew out into the Heaven Beyond Heaven, then passed through its greyspace and disappeared.

Yang Qi was sowing seeds of disaster; right now, this Eldest Brother Secundus was too much for him to deal with, so he was hoping to spark a conflict between him and the Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court. A fight like that could be just the opportunity he needed to seize more power in the Dao Defense League.

‘It seems to me that the Heaven Beyond Heaven isn’t that dangerous after all. Ordinary Chaos Gods can’t get inside, but old-timers who’ve started to climb the Deathless Heavenly Stairway can. And people like that evidently do come here looking for treasure. I need to speed things up and take control of this place’s essence.’

With five pieces of the Aeonic God Psalter, it was even easier for Yang Qi to see the Aeonic God Temple in the depths of the ocean.

Thanks to what he had overheard, he now realized that the temple wasn't visible to the eyes of anyone except those who held pieces of the Aeonic God Psalter.

Apparently, the temple housed the essence of the Heaven Beyond Heaven, which could lead to the control of the entire immortal world. In fact, that level of control could allow one to shrink the Heaven Beyond Heaven down by thousands upon thousands of times, turning it into a bastion of defense that not even the legion of gods could break into.

WHOOSH!

Yang Qi went on to further his cultivation of the Aeonic Heaven-Dao Life-Destruction Zen Art with the new pieces of the psalter. It was more evident than ever that Chancellor Demi-Immortal had been the intended recipient of the psalter and the Heaven Beyond Heaven. He had been blessed by heaven in a way that few experts ever were. Sadly, he would never be able to live up to his potential.

Yang Qi flew out over the sea and toward the distant island. He could sense enormous primal-chaos beasts in the water below, but when they scanned him and sensed Chancellor Demi-Immortal’s destiny and aura, as well as the power of the psalter, they shrank away.

Without those assets, they would have attacked him. And considering the level of his cultivation, it would have been difficult to extricate himself from a situation like that.

He soon landed on the island, which wasn't very large, only about fifty kilometers from end to end. The temple was in the middle, an exquisite structure that was the color of ancient copper. In fact, it actually did seem to be constructed from pure copper, although it wasn’t the copper of the mortal world, but the copper of the gods.

The entire place was tightly sealed.

Yang Qi tossed the incomplete psalter toward the main gate of the temple. When it hit the gate, it sank inside amidst loud creaking and groaning noises. Then an incredibly ancient aura erupted out, accompanied by a dazzling light.

[Beep-beep-beep. Beep-beep-beep.]

Reports immediately began pouring in from the two main systems on the Cruiser of Civilization.

[Power from the god world detected. Compatibility rate one hundred and fifty percent. Request permission to absorb.]

“Of course you can absorb it,” Yang Qi replied. He had come to find that with both vivicreation systems and genetic systems, the Cruiser of Civilization needed much more power than he could provide. Unfortunately, the power he had acquired from the ancient past and the future world was no help. In fact, because of that, the cruiser had recently been mostly dormant.

Therefore, the fact that sending the psalter into this temple had unlocked power from the god world was a welcome surprise. If he could power up the Cruiser of Civilization to the right level, he wouldn’t need to be afraid of Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven at all.

As power flowed into the spacecraft, Yang Qi noticed that the temple was transforming and the main gate was rippling and distorting. Soon, it looked like a passageway of some sort. Sending some divine will inside, he sensed something that resembled the constant cycle of life and death. There was also the aura of multiple god items. If he could get inside that temple, he would definitely have access to a huge stash of god pills and other paraphernalia from the legion of gods.

Unfortunately, he was still missing two pieces of the psalter. Without them, it didn’t matter how strong he was, he would never be able to get into the temple.

Thankfully, the five pieces he did have were giving him access to power, as well as secrets of the temple that would help him to improve his cultivation base and gain a greater control of the Heaven Beyond Heaven.

This immortal world was so immense that not even Yang Qi could fully probe its depths. But he was currently at its core, and if he could seize this temple, he would have access to even greater amounts of the vital energy of the place.

SNICK!

He exhaled, sending out a stream of true energy that glowed with godlight as it swept around the temple. ‘Maybe Chancellor Demi-Immortal’s destiny will be of some help here.’

As Chancellor Demi-Immortal’s destiny touched the temple, the place erupted with a dazzling light that pierced into Yang Qi’s mind and will, causing him to be even more closely connected to the structure of the Heaven Beyond Heaven.

Creak. Crunch.

The temple suddenly began to lurch, and with each heave, immense god world energy would spill out, which Yang Qi’s fragments of the Cruiser of Civilization would then absorb.

Drastic changes were occurring to the Heaven Beyond Heaven. Its primal-chaos vital energy was shrinking, and every aspect of it was growing smaller. Cracking sounds rang out as the greyspace became smaller and the magical laws knitted more closely together.

Before long, it had shrunk down to roughly one-tenth of its previous size. Of course, because of shrinkage, the effects of the magical laws and vital energy were ten times as strong. Before, a high-level Chaos God might have been able to enter, but now it would be impossible.

Not even the six surviving adherents of Eldest Brother Secundus would be able to get back inside, even if they possessed pieces of the god psalter.

‘Excellent. As I refine this temple, I gain more and more control over the vital energy of the Heaven Beyond Heaven. Once I get the final two pieces of the psalter, the gate of the temple will open.’

Considering the changes that had just occurred, Yang Qi was confident that if he could lure Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven into the Heaven Beyond Heaven, it wouldn’t be impossible to beat him in a fight.

Unfortunately, it was highly likely that the man would be able to see through such a ruse. He was a profound schemer and wouldn’t be easily led into a trap.

Yang Qi continued working on his cultivation. The more control he gained over the vital energy of the Heaven Beyond Heaven, the more clearly he could see the structure of the world around him. He realized that there were actually no real primal-chaos beasts in this place; nor were there mountains, rivers, planets, vegetation, or seas. They were all manifestations of primeval god formations. The god formations even rose high into the sky, where they emanated might and power of the most enigmatic nature.

The more Yang Qi learned, the more he realized that this place was less like an immortal world and more like an enormous spacecraft! It was almost like the Cruiser of Civilization. It was something the ancient legion of gods created to travel through primal-chaos, and it could gather the past, present, and future together. It was definitely different from other immortal worlds, although Yang Qi couldn’t explain the specific details.

Back before he had started opening the Aeonic God Temple, he was unable to see the true substructure of the Heaven Beyond Heaven. But things were different now. Meanwhile, his cultivation was advancing, allowing him to creep closer and closer to the sixth division Revisionist God level.

It would be a very difficult breakthrough. In fact, Yang Qi could sense that, although he was gaining more control over the Heaven Beyond Heaven, he wasn’t receiving anything that would help him with that upcoming breakthrough. The power here was just too limited.

Now more than ever he needed to open that temple. And that meant that his most pressing goal was to get the final two pieces from Young Master Leaf.

‘I'm far, far stronger than him now. Let’s see what happens when I push him into a corner. He’s now the so-called True Raja Dao-Denier, with an army of his own to command. But can that army compare to mine? I guess I should start summoning fiend-devils and transforming them into angels. It's time to build the Army of Radiance and Light.’

Chapter 795: The Army of Radiance and Light

“Boundless Hell Portals, come forth!”

A tremor passed through Yang Qi as countless Hell Portals sprang up all around him in layer after layer. They seemed to go on without end, and a hell was visible in the depths of each portal. They were all different. Some were filled with bleached bones, some were scorching hot, some oozed with blood, and some were filled with destruction and darkness.

There seemed to be as many portals as the number of hells, like the eternal sands of the universe.

Yang Qi was planning to summon countless experts from hell and transform them into angels. In turn, those angels would be his Army of Radiance and Light. Right now, there was a major redistribution of resources in the Dao Defense League and everyone was scrambling to look out for their own interests. That included Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven, the Emissary of Darkness and Gloom, the nine dharmarajas, and the twenty-four god-generals. All of them were trying to recruit elders into their forces, thus building their own power and influence.

Yang Qi was different. He didn’t need to recruit a single elder to build his army.

Now that he was in the fifth division, his true energy was strong enough to shatter just about anything in existence, and his summoning power had improved as well. He could now call out to fiend-devils that were ninth division Chaos Gods.

In other words, his Army of Radiance and Light would be made entirely of Chaos Gods.

Although Chaos Gods had not yet begun to climb the Deathless Heavenly Stairway, they were still completely domineering figures. In the Dao Defense League, such people would be figures of incredible influence and power, the kind that no one would dare to underestimate.

Even the dharmarajas would have trouble getting tens of thousands of Chaos Gods to work for them. After all, each Chaos God would be an old-timer with a very powerful organization backing them. Besides, any old-timer who would consider joining a single person would definitely have requirements and demands of their own.

It was not an easy task to recruit forces for an army, and would usually require a lot of hard work. But not for Yang Qi. The fiend-devils he could summon would be completely and utterly loyal, no matter what. Their fighting prowess was top notch, they offered faithful service, and they made no demands.

He decided to start out with a force of about a million. That many Chaos Gods could shake the entire Dao Defense League, and if they joined forces in a spell formation they would be virtually unstoppable and impossible to injure.

Although there were far more than a million Chaos Gods within the Dao Defense League as a whole, there was no way that any single person could command their loyalty.

RUMBLE!

As the Hell Portals burned with power, wild howls echoed out from inside of them as Infernalfolk appeared. These were not the dark golden type of infernals, but something higher than that. They were pale white, with skin covered by complex, vein-like patterns. They also emanated something of a holy aura, as if they were starting to revert to their most primitive, original state.

They were clearly on their way to becoming angels, with traces of platinum sageblood running in their veins.

“Infernalfolk, you were originally angels who were corrupted and degraded by hell. Now, you will return to the glory of the Lord. I will thoroughly cleanse you, and make you stronger. After all, you are currently far beneath the compare of the ancient angels.”

Halos suddenly appeared as Yang Qi began singing the Eternal Heavenly Aria.

Now that he was a fifth division Nirvanic God, all of his energy arts had risen to a higher level, including the Eternal Heavenly Aria. As soon as its power entered the infernals, black blood began steaming out of their pores as their devilishness was expunged. That steam would in turn be sucked into the God Legion Seal, where it was transformed into pure true energy.

Soon, Yang Qi realized that every time he purified an infernal, it would improve his own cultivation base and help him build his power. In fact, it was helping him progress even faster than if he were practicing his own cultivation, pushing him closer and closer to the level of a Revisionist God.

‘What’s going on here?’ he thought. ‘When I did this before, it would drain my true energy. But this time it’s improving it? Did my God Legion Seal change on a fundamental level?’ Looking more closely, he realized that the God Legion Seal now had markings on it that seemed to be manifestations of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.

‘That must be it!’ he thought, shaken. ‘Yes, it is. The Sovereign Lord created godmammoths to crush hells. However, they were also designed to save fallen gods! And the Infernalfolk are just that—fallen ‘gods’, the descendants of corrupted angels. As I save them, their devilishness comes to me and I acquire some of their previous foundation. It’s accomplishing a mission assigned by the Sovereign Lord, and it advances my energy arts.’

All of a sudden, Yang Qi had a new understanding of both the God Legion Seal and deathless devilishness.

Devilishness and godliness were essentially the same, except inverted. One could be converted into the other, a process which would release incredible power. When godliness became devilishness, it would absorb the essence of universal primal-chaos. And the greater the original level of power, the greater the hellish power that would result. The reverse was also true. The higher the level of devilishness, the greater power would be released when it was converted into godliness.

Having come to this realization, he focused more fully on saving the infernals.

After some time passed, he had a throng of angels standing in ranks in front of him. There were more than a million, each of them former Infernalfolk who were Chaos God experts. There were even a few who were just on the verge of stepping onto the Deathless Heavenly Stairway. Those were already at about the same level of strength as some of the top old-timers in the Dao Defense League. After all, infernals had constitutions that surpassed ordinary humans in every way.

The army of angels pulsed with purity, cleanliness, radiance, light, and holiness. As they prayed and sang hymns, boundless faith power surged forth to reach the immortal-slaying clone, who was currently far away in the Dao Defense League.

The clone had been in the middle of conferring with some old-timers who had come seeking treatment. The old-timers saw him shiver, then sensed the aura of heavenly tribulation forming above him, indicating that he was about to step onto the Stair of Valor.

“What’s going on here? His cultivation base is rising so rapidly! He wasn’t even a Godmyth back in the Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple. He was only a third division Incarnated God. Now he's a Chaos God? And he’s stepping onto the first stair of the Deathless Heavenly Stairway?”

Being unaware that Yang Qi had a clone like this, these old-timers could only marvel at how enigmatic he was.

“Don’t worry, ladies and gentlemen,” the clone said. “This heavenly tribulation won’t be any trouble for me.” A vortex appeared above him, which sucked in the power of the tribulation. Then he shivered and rose to his feet, pulsing with the most domineering and powerful of auras. As he stepped onto the Stair of Valor, he felt boundless preheaven Valor flowing through him, entering his soul and filling him with boldness and ferocity. This Valor was like the boundless will of the ancient god world, a most wonderful of qualities. Reaching this first of the minor stairs didn’t just provide an increase in cultivation base, but would also help resolve many previously problematic areas in certain daoist techniques.

“Emissary of Radiance and Light, when do you plan to form your Army of Radiance and Light? Those of us who’ve been graced by your benevolence wish to stick closely to you. The Emissary of Darkness and Gloom, the nine dharmarajas, and the twenty-four god-generals are all vying for resources and trying to recruit as many elders as possible to form their own armies. And that’s especially true of the league-lord, Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven. He already has thirty thousand elders in his Deathless Corps and he doesn't seem to be slowing down recruitment at all. And Devil Empress Wave Charm has recruited a lot of cultivators from the dao of evil. It’s likely that she’ll soon have a force of ten thousand, all of them extremely strong.”

“Sir, as Emissary of Radiance and Light, you have only one superior and should have many subordinates. You can’t just wield power by yourself. You’ll have to deal with Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven and the other important people, so you really shouldn’t just sit around on your laurels.”

“Oh, the army? It’s actually been formed already. Take a look!”

RUMBLE!

The clone rose to his feet and pointed up at the sky.

The old-timers also stood and looked up. Suddenly, boundless, blinding sagelight spilled down, becoming like a path made of radiance and light. Marching along the path were countless angels, formed into well-ordered ranks.

They were obviously top experts, with weapons in their hands and wings swaying behind them. Their skin almost looked like porcelain, causing them to appear as if they were gods.

Looking at the shocked old-timers, the clone smiled and said, “This is my Army of Radiance and Light. Each soldier is a Chaos God with fighting prowess equivalent to someone on the Deathless Heavenly Stairway. And there are more than a million of them. Can the league-lord compare to that?”

Chapter 796: Supreme Position

“That’s….”

One of the old-timers, Arhat Goldsaber Cloudlayer, nearly passed out. He stood on the Stair of Valor and cultivated two godly-class energy arts, the Goldsaber Mystifying Unification God Dao and the Cloudlayer Godwind Empyrean Flow. Unfortunately, the two arts would sometimes explosively clash within him.

His cultivation base was high enough to keep the effects under control, but unfortunately it made further cultivation progress impossible. That was why he had come to seek treatment from Yang Qi, and he had definitely not expected to see a scene like this play out.

An army of angels like this could crush anything in its path. The rumbling of its passage, its terrifying aura, and the dazzling radiance and light it cast spread in all directions, causing countless top experts to open their eyes and look over.

“An army with a million soldiers? They’re so strong! Each and every one of them. Why does it seem like there’s some boundless will and power backing them. It’s like the might and thoughts of gods! And those halos… those are primeval god skills! Look at the density of them! Just one of those halos must increase their power by many times over, and they have too many to count!”

“Primeval god skills! And they’re all Chaos Gods! This army is invincible! It could crush any opponent and any target!”

“Where did he get that army?”

“Who is this Yang Qi character? I can’t believe he got an army like this. Radiance and light? Yes, that is boundless radiance and light, enough to compete with the league-lord himself.”

“It’s actually kind of funny. Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven has been trying to think of a way to get his own agents into the forces of the Emissary of Radiance and Light. But now the emissary shows up with an army of a million Chaos Gods! There couldn’t possibly be anyone with more fighting prowess than him now.”

“Oh, that's right. I heard that this Yang Qi could summon halos of blessing and damnification. If he got in a fight with another army, he would bless his own troops and damn the troops of the other. It would turn into a massacre, wouldn’t it?”

As word spread, more and more old-timers came out to see what was happening.

Even as they looked on, an immense palace appeared, which was the God Palace of Radiance and Light. As the angels took their place inside, it began thrumming with a holy aura and psalms of praise.

Vortexes sprang up as god formations appeared in the palace. Then Yang Qi’s voice could be heard.

“Elders, I am the Emissary of Radiance and Light, leader of the Army of Radiance and Light. I am now considering applicants for elders in my newly constructed God Palace of Radiance and Light. Those who join me will receive handsome compensation, as well as talismans filled with the power of primeval god skills. Such talismans will be of immense help in any instance of combat with the wretch-devils from the future world.”

As more and more old-timers gathered in the area, one of them raised his voice and said, “Oh exalted Emissary of Radiance and Light, would it be possible to see a demonstration of how powerful your primeval god skills are?”

Yang Qi’s eyes glittered as he looked over at the man who had spoken, who was known as Penta Ghost-God and who cultivated an ancient ghost-god technique called the Ghost-God Ennea-Life Battle Magic. He was so strong that he had even fought Leaf Dao-Denier in the competition for dharmaraja spots. Although he lost in the end, his incredible performance had made him somewhat famous.

He was only an ordinary elder king, but he was definitely on the same level as the god-generals in terms of fighting prowess. He was the subject of many recruitment efforts, but was a haughty individual and refused to acknowledge allegiance to anyone who ranked less than Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven. Obviously, he was curious to see the miracles Yang Qi had up his sleeve.

“That's a good question, Elder King Penta Ghost-God,” Yang Qi said, flying out into the open. Waving his hand, he summoned a future warrior he had captured some time ago, a fourth division Shattered God.

“Yang Zhong!”

“Yes, Patriarch!” A disciple of the Yang Clan emerged, a genius who had just recently reached the Godmyth level.

“What do you think of this Yang Clan disciple, Elder King Penta Ghost-God?” Yang Qi asked.

“Average,” he replied, shaking his head. “Mediocre at best.”

“I see. What if I told you that, after being blessed by my primeval god skills, he could easily defeat this fourth division Shattered God?” Yang Qi asked.

“That’s completely impossible,” Penta Ghost-God said. “It doesn't matter what the god skills are, they couldn’t make someone capable of fighting that high above their level. Who do you think you are, an actual god?”

“I see. Yang Zhong, take these two talismans with primeval god skill blessings in them. I want you to use them to fight this future warrior. Do you dare accept the challenge?”

“Of course!” Yang Zhong replied. “I live and die for the glory of the Yang Clan! And when it comes to fighting, not a single disciple of the Yang Clan will show an ounce of fear.”

Yang Qi sent the talismans over to Yang Zhong, then waved his hand to create a radiant fighting platform. “Very well, begin fighting.”

As everyone watched, the future warrior hopped onto the platform. Laughing madly, he said, “Bring it on, people of the Dao Defense League. I’m not afraid of you fools! We future warriors will soon take over your immortal dao civilization. To a higher civilization like ours, you people are nothing more than wild savages. We’re going to conquer every last one of you! DIE!”

Leaping forward, he unleashed his most deadly and powerful move, a consummate fist technique from the future world.

“Myriad Army Shattering!”

The deadly fist strike rumbled forth like the advance of a magnificent army with thousands of men and horses. There were also hosts of spacecraft that flew out from behind him, their cannons primed to destroy entire worlds.

Whoosh!

Completely unflustered, Yang Zhong flew up into the air and activated the first talisman, causing primeval god skills to surround him. Instantly, he was capable of incredible speeds, and at the same time, he became perfectly in sync with the spatial magical laws around him. Next, he activated the second talisman, causing halos of damnification to surround the future warrior.

“Aaaiiiieee!” the warrior screamed as he suddenly slowed down and became ten thousand times weaker than before.

The primeval god skills Yang Qi could now use were very different than from before. Even top experts like Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven could be weakened by them, much less a fourth division Shattered God.

RUMBLE!

The fighters clashed, and Yang Zhong attacked relentlessly. As for the future warrior, each blow he struck was weaker than the previous one and took longer to prepare. It was obvious that he was no match whatsoever for Yang Zhong.

POP!

Yang Zhong surged with godly might as he said, “Eight Tribes Godfist: Buddha Dragon Prajñā Lokapāla Fist!”

The fist strike contained a host of countless golden buddha dragons that swirled into the shape of an enormous buddha.

The blow slammed into the future warrior, who began coughing up gobs of blood, making it obvious how one-sided this fight was.

“Prepare to die!” Yang Zhong said, unleashing a series of dozens of moves from godly-class energy arts, which formed a cauldron that slammed down onto the future warrior. Screams rang out, but soon faded away, whereupon Yang Zhong flew off of the fighting platform. “Patriarch, I’ve accomplished the mission.”

“Excellent. As a reward, I will personally impart a profound technique to you.” With that, he waved his finger and sent the Aeonic Heaven-Dao Life-Destruction Zen Art into Yang Zhong. Afterward, he turned to the gathered old-timers and said, “Well, what do you think?”

“Incredible! Completely incredible!” Penta Ghost-God cried. “Your god skills are virtually invincible. If you blessed your Army of Radiance and Light with them, one can only imagine how powerful they would be.”

Yang Qi laughed. “That’s right, my Army of Radiance and Light is clearly the top force in the Dao Defense League. And any of you who join my army will be guaranteed to be blessed by primeval god skills as well. It will make you almost impossible to beat in combat.”

“I’ll join!” Penta Ghost-God said. “Emissary of Radiance and Light, only you follow the true path. Instead of ruling by force, you use pure radiance and light to bring a better tomorrow to the Dao Defense League.”

“I’ll join too!” another patriarch said. “I might have missed out at becoming a god-general, but now I don't care. There’s no way any of the god-generals could come close to being as amazing as the exalted Emissary of Radiance and Light.”

This old-timer was Hegemon Rampager, a leader from a thirty-second ranked immortal world. More and more people like him were lining up.

In the blink of an eye, Yang Qi’s Army of Radiance and Light grew in size and might. At the same time, word began spreading throughout the Dao Defense League.

The benefits were simply staggering. Not only could people who joined the Army of Radiance and Light have their cultivation injuries healed, they would also be blessed by primeval god skills. Considering how difficult and deadly it was to fight against the future warriors, even the stupidest person could tell which army was the better one to follow.

‘All the heroes in heaven and earth are coming under my authority!’ Yang Qi thought, feeling very pleased with how things were turning out. In fact, he was already wondering if he should challenge Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven at the next session of court.

Either way, considering all of Yang Qi’s successes, it was a given that the league-lord was plotting to bring him down.

Chapter 797: The Rage of the Grand Emperor

Shortly before Yang Qi debuted his army, Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven was in the depths of the Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple, conferring with a group of about a thousand old-timers.

Flanking him were his close confidants, including the Emissary of Darkness and Gloom, Devil Empress Wave Charm.

“Why haven’t you joined my Deathless Corps?” he asked the old-timers. “Are you thinking of haggling about compensation? Or asking for more power? You're all members of the Dao Defense League. Don’t tell me you’re not willing to make contributions to the greater good.”

“It’s not that, League-Lord,” one of the old-timers said with a cold smile. “These are times of chaos, and although we all joined the Dao Defense League to seek safety, things have changed too quickly. The Dao Defense League is growing, and now you're asking us to join your Deathless Corps, except there’s no upside for us. It doesn't seem reasonable at all.”

Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven gave a cold harrumph. “Well, what’s the upside for me? The mere fact that I asked you to disband your previous organizations? I don’t want cliques and factions among my subordinates. Everything needs to go according to my will.”

“We want God Pills of Fate!” one of the old-timers said. “The same ones that you used to have in the ancient Heavenly Court!”

“How impudent!” shouted one of the confidants. It was none other than Daoist Great Void. “I can’t believe you would dare speak to the league-lord like that. Not interested in staying alive, are we?”

“There’s no need to raise your voice, Daoist Great Void,” another of the old-timers said. “We're all the same cultivation level here. Are you trying to convince us that the Grand Emperor would really execute us or something? The Dao Defense League was established with rules and regulations, and the league-lord isn’t allowed to just go around killing people. There would need to be a trial before anything like that happened. Furthermore, we’ve done nothing to disrespect the league-lord. We just want compensation for our services. In the mortal world, emperors provide salaries to government officials for the services they provide. It’s the same in the armed forces. Without such arrangements, revolt would be a foregone conclusion. Did the league-lord really think it would be a good idea to set up another Heavenly Court that only made demands and never offered reciprocation? Didn’t he learn anything from how the first Heavenly Court fell apart?”

“That’s right!” another old-timer said. “Back when the four Grand Emperors ran the Heavenly Court, they arrested experts with strong destiny and threw them into furnaces to create the God Pills of Fate. They succeeded in that, but it caused such dissension and discord that rebellion eventually broke out and the Heavenly Court collapsed. The God Pills of Fate can be used for the purposes of godly ascension, and if we join the league-lord we want to benefit from some of their profundity.”

“You people have a lot of gall,” Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven said with a cold, grim smile. “In fact, you have too much gall. I can’t believe you’re asking for God Pills of Fate. They were vitally important back in the Heavenly Court and were only given as rewards to the most loyal of individuals. If you want them, fine. Get on your knees and swear an oath to stick with me no matter what. Give me your faith and pray to me on a daily basis for three years. At that point, I’ll consider giving you God Pills of Fate. Agreed?”

“Uh….” The old-timers exchanged awkward glances; giving their faith to another person was something they would never consider doing. However, the league-lord seemed very dead set on the matter, and apparently, if they refused to go along then things could turn deadly.

Years ago, during the days of the Heavenly Court, Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven had been known to be a decisive killer. It was impossible to say how many famous figures had died at his hands, so although these old-timers were supposedly only here to talk, they were still feeling nervous.

“What, not willing to go along?” Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven rose to his feet. “Don’t tell me you really planned to hoodwink me! Well, fine. Since you want to haggle, I’ll give you a chance to think. Just remember that, as the league-lord, I won’t tolerate being disrespected. For now, the lot of you will stay here and think things through. After you’ve reached the right conclusion, you can leave.”

The old-timers’ expressions flickered. “Grand Emperor, are you saying you’re arresting us?”

“Oh no, I’m just giving you some time to cool your heads. The league-lord doesn’t tolerate disrespect. And since you disrespected me, I have the authority to keep you on lockdown! The next time we have a session of court, there will be plenty of witnesses to see how the law treats people like you.”

Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven was truly furious at their veiled threats and was planning to kill a chicken to frighten the monkey, making sure people realized he wasn’t weak. In fact, the moment this group had dared to start haggling, he decided that they needed to be executed.

RUMBLE!

It was in that moment that boundless radiance and light seeped into the Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple, accompanied by holy hymns. In fact, as soon as the light touched the Emissary of Darkness and Gloom, she shivered and began emanating black smoke.

Leaping to her feet, she blurted, “What’s that?”

A moment later, Yang Qi’s voice could be heard as he made his announcement.

Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven shivered and stalked out of the Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple to see the God Palace of Radiance and Light off in the distance, and the army of angels streaming into it.

He watched as Yang Qi demonstrated his primeval god skills, and saw the stunned reaction of the old-timers. At that point, his rage truly began boiling.

As for the old-timers in the Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple, they knew that things were going south for them, so as soon as they saw an opportunity to escape, they rushed outside.

“Let’s go! The Emissary of Radiance and Light is so powerful! We need to join him!”

“We want to join you, Emissary of Radiance and Light! Please, take us in!”

Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven was trembling as he fought the urge to unleash a deadly attack on Yang Qi right then and there. Meanwhile, the Emissary of Darkness and Gloom flew over and said, “Grand Emperor, you can’t just start killing people. If you do, the Dao Defense League would collapse into rebellion. Although this Yang Qi is obviously setting himself in opposition to you, and we have no idea where he got that Army of Radiance and Light, we can still continue playing the game. You're the league-lord! You have the official authority and power! But don’t do anything to erode your own authority.”

Only then did Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven grow a bit calmer. “I will kill this boy!”

Yang Qi was quite surprised to see so many old-timers streaming out of the Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple and loudly crying out that they wanted to join him. However, he quickly deduced that they must have offended Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven in some way and were hoping that he would offer them a measure of protection.

In the blink of an eye, even more old-timers joined Yang Qi.

Destiny swirled around him, forming something like a shining beacon above his head.

That said, Yang Qi could see the murderous look in Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven’s eyes. The man was one of the ultimate founders of the Dao Defense League and had worked very hard to bring it to its current state. It was little wonder that he hated Yang Qi, who had quickly come to be a thorn in his side, even threatening his position as league-lord.

Yang Qi stared right into the league-lord’s burning eyes, showing no hint of weakness. In fact, his expression made his attitude very clear: Bring it on, Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven. I accept your challenge! It won’t be long now before I take the title of league-lord from you. You might be a Grand Emperor who arose in ancient times, but that doesn’t mean I’m scared of you. Things change, and the time has come for me to rise to glory. I suggest you simply retire….

Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven stalked back into Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple where he angrily struck one of the thrones, reducing it to dust.

“I'm gonna kill him!” he roared. “That boy must die. I won’t let him off the hook. Can any of you think of a way to deal with him?”

“Calm yourself, League-Lord,” Daoist Great Void said. “It won't be long now before Grand Emperors Myriadmagic Heavenspan, Heavenearth Vastocean, and Ninelimits Paragon all come out of their sessions of cultivation. When the four of you pool your power, you can easily kill him. In the meantime, you could try luring him into a trap in some remote area, then blaming the future world.”

“That does seem to be the only option,” said the Emissary of Darkness and Gloom. “The only thing is that he’s not going to be easy to kill. Wait. Isn’t there supposed to be a duel between him and Sectlord Nine Yangs? The fact that Sectlord Nine Yangs has disappeared seems to indicate he's no match for the brat. But whoever was backing Sectlord Nine Yangs must be incredibly strong. Maybe you can recruit him. And of course, my father, the devil lord of the Unrestrained Heaven, will soon be back. Maybe he can help you.”

“That would work too!” Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven said. “Okay, first see if you can find Sectlord Nine Yangs. Bring him in for an audience with me!”

“Yes sir!”

Already, a plot was unfolding.

Meanwhile, Leaf Dao-Denier and Emperor Tusita were hidden in a far corner of the Dao Defense League, watching things play out. And they were very pleased.

Smiling viciously, Leaf Dao-Denier said, “Come on and start fighting. If they hurt each other badly enough, we can swoop in and take control. Yang Qi is really suicidal to be picking a fight with Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven.”

“I don’t think so,” said Emperor Tusita. “We can't afford to underestimate how strong that brat is. He's a schemer, and he’s come out on top against you several times. Haven’t you learned your lesson? I wouldn’t be surprised if he eventually forces Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven to abdicate. It might be smart to smooth things out with him.”

Young Master Leaf shook his head. “Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven is obstinate, self-opinionated, and tyrannical. I don’t think we should be currying favor with him. Besides, once my cultivation base is high enough, I’ll be able to contend for the spot of league-lord.”

Chapter 798: More Map Pieces

When Yang Qi showed up with an Army of Radiance and Light made up of a million Chaos God angels, it caused a huge stir. Many of the old-timers were suddenly struck with the sensation that he was a profound and enigmatic type of individual who definitely qualified to vie with the league-lord.

Many people wanted to join him, thus it was in the shortest of moments that he suddenly grew vastly more powerful. And everyone knew that his power and influence would only continue growing.

Even some of the god-generals and dharmarajas began currying favor with him. They had armies, but they didn’t have access to the blessings of primeval god skills, which meant that future battles would definitely involve heavy casualties for them. Obviously, getting on Yang Qi’s good side would be a major benefit.

The old-timers were no fools, and they knew that the war with the future world would only get more and more bitter as time passed. Rumors had begun spreading that generalissimos from the future were coming—people on the same level as Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven. And their arrival would be preceded by numerous generals and marshals.

What that meant was that a tempest of carnage and fighting was coming, a situation in which everyone would be in great danger.

That said, if they could get the support of Yang Qi’s primeval god skills, they would have a huge advantage in the fighting and could possibly even crush the enemy. Considering the circumstances, it was only natural that people wanted to side with Yang Qi.

Yang Qi was building his power structure, and when the time came he hoped to simply force Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven to abdicate, perhaps killing him if necessary.

And he was convinced that that time would come soon.

For now, he needed to focus on getting as strong as he could, as quickly as possible. He had two options in that regard. The first was to go to the Eight Tribes Heaven and try taking the Engine of the One God. The downside to that option was that it would involve the mysteries of the passageway into primeval times. Furthermore, the Eight Tribes Heaven had as many experts as the sky has clouds. It was also likely that primeval experts were present there. If things went bad, it could easily turn into a major disaster that might affect the Dao Defense League as a whole. If they had to deal with armies from both the past and the present, it could lead to destruction many times greater than anything up to this point.

Yang Qi definitely didn’t want that.

Therefore, the second option seemed the best. He would track down Young Master Leaf and force him to hand over the remaining two pieces of the Aeonic God Psalter. With the whole map, he would have a shot at fusing fully with the core of the Heaven Beyond Heaven. The power and treasures that would be available to him when that happened would make him vastly stronger.

In fact, he hoped it would help him reach the Measureless God level.

At that point, he would be able to summon fiend-devils who had stepped onto the Deathless Heavenly Stairway. When he turned such Infernalfolk into angels, they would easily be able to compare to the god-generals and dharmarajas.

‘So, Young Master Leaf. Leaf Dao-Denier. I have no other option than to force your hand. I want those map pieces. We’re already enemies, and our grudge will get even worse after this. You're always plotting against me, so surely you’re hoping to take advantage of my situation with Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven to strike a deadly blow against me. But did you really think I would allow something like that?’

Swish!

He vanished into thin air, appearing shortly thereafter in the Tusita Heaven.

Thanks to the faith provided by the six junior siblings of the mysterious Eldest Brother Secundus, his immortal-slaying clone had already stepped onto the Stair of Valor and would likely continue making progress. Now that Yang Qi had seven of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions, he was able to use the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart to keep an even closer eye on the clone’s progress. He could see his cultivation base rising, pushing him to levels of indescribable power.

Already, the clone was so strong that he would shock many old-timers if they knew his true level of power.

As for Yang Qi’s true self, he could sense that Young Master Leaf was back in the Tusita Heaven. After all, that was definitely the safest place for him, considering he was so closely connected to its essence.

Leaf Dao-Denier’s cultivation base was steadily continuing to rise, and although he couldn’t compare to Yang Qi, he was definitely able to stand shoulder to shoulder with the dharmarajas. His formal title was True Raja Dao-Denier, making him famous within the Dao Defense League and a nightmarish figure to the warriors of the future world.

However, the time had come for Yang Qi to put some pressure on this True Raja Dao-Denier.

RUMBLE!

Yang Qi made no effort to mask his presence. He headed directly toward the Sea of Despair in the middle of the Tusita Heaven, where he opened his Lord's Eye to identify a pagoda in the middle of it, surrounded by violet mists. It was a luxurious structure surrounded by dao trees, ancient plants, godlings, and the like. There were numerous doorways leading into it, all of them pulsing with an ancient aura that made it obvious that this was the very center of the Tusita Heaven. It was none other than the Tower of Tusita, which the ancient legion of gods had left behind to control the vital energy of the Tusita Heaven. Every year, countless ambitious young ones would come here in the hopes of becoming successors, only to die in the process.

Only Leaf Dao-Denier had ever had the fortune necessary to take control of the essence.

Sadly for him, the power of that essence wasn’t enough to stop Yang Qi.

Ever since Leaf Dao-Denier had taken control, the place had been so tightly locked down that not even Emperor Tusita could have entered uninvited. As of now, Leaf Dao-Denier was the true leader of the Tusita Heaven.

But even when Yang Qi was only a third division Incarnated God, he was still considered a threat by Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven. And now that he was a fifth division Nirvanic God, he was even more of a rival to the grand emperor. Although he might not be as shrewd and ruthless, in terms of raw power, he was more than a match.

For now, Yang Qi was mostly worried about what would happen if the other three grand emperors joined forces. There was no way that he could fight them all at the same time.

Even worse, it seemed like the lord of the Unrestrained Heaven was going to side with Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven as well.

“Lord's Eye Scan!”

A beam of godlight pierced through the violet mists and revealed Young Master Leaf, who was in the middle of a session of cultivation.

“I have to reach a higher level of enlightenment,” he murmured to himself. “I have to reach the ninth stair as quickly as possible, then I can completely fuse with the essence of the Tusita Heaven itself and completely take charge. Then all of you are going to die! Everyone else who lives in my Tusita Heaven are parasites. I’ll definitely take back all the destiny and quintessence vitality. They’re mine!”

Swirling tempests of violent magical laws swirled around him like screaming winds.

RUMBLE!

Yang Qi simply stepped through them, right into the Tower of Tusita, until he was standing right in front of Leaf Dao-Denier.

“Y-y-y-you…” Leaf Dao-Denier blurted, shooting to his feet, his eyes flashing with terror. “How did you get in here? I have this whole place locked tight! You shouldn’t be able to get inside!”

Yang Qi chuckled. “You’re pretty naive, did you know that, Young Master Leaf? You know that I have a God Legion Seal, don’t you? What is there in heaven and earth that could possibly block my path? I'm not here to kill you, so you can just calm down. You're a dharmaraja of the Dao Defense League, and I'm the Emissary of Radiance and Light. I might outrank you, but I still want to do things by the book.”

“That’s right! I'm True Raja Dao-Denier!” Leaf Dao-Denier’s voice suddenly turned very cold. “I admit you’re strong, Yang Qi. But even you have to follow the rules. Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven is in charge, and if you do something stupid here I’ll definitely tell him. Everyone can tell that you and he are at odds, and he’ll seize any excuse he can to kill you. All it would take would be one word from me and he would wipe you out! And don’t forget that I could easily spread rumors about your God Legion Seal. If people found out, you would be public enemy number one! Any of the old-timers would go crazy to lay hands on you and kill you.”

“I honestly couldn’t care less if word spread about my God Legion Seal,” Yang Qi replied. “Other than actual gods, nobody can possibly be a threat to me. I have seven of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions. Surely you understand what that means. I can go into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart any time I want, and nobody could ever catch me. Not even gods. I’ve already stopped the chart from opening automatically every ten thousand years. That place is like my backyard now. So do you really think that I'm afraid of Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven? Just wait until my cultivation base advances a bit more and I’ll kill him too, if I have to. You might even be around to see it happen.”

The mention of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions caused Young Master Leaf’s face to twist with rage. “I was supposed to be King Immortal-Slayer’s successor, you bastard! I can’t believe you took them from me. And you turned the other seventy-one patriarchs against me, too!”

Yang Qi snorted coldly. “Cut the crap. I didn’t come here to argue about our grudges. I want the other two pieces of the Aeonic God Psalter. Hand them over.”

“The Aeonic God Psalter!?” Leaf Dao-Denier shivered. “Forget it! I'm True Raja Dao-Denier now! How dare you talk about stealing my things. I’ll sue you in the Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple!”

“Sue me?” Yang Qi laughed. “Let me explain more clearly. I already have all the other pieces of the Aeonic God Psalter. And I control the essence of the Heaven Beyond Heaven. I could easily kill you, take them by force, and instantly become thousands of times stronger than before. At that point, not even all four of those grand emperors working together would be a match for me. I could kill them all in a single move. Do you know what energy art I cultivate? It’s the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth! I can summon armies of fiend-devils, and every time my cultivation base gets stronger I can summon even stronger versions. Considering that, do you think I care about the power of the Dao Defense League? I control all of the hells that exist! So I’m giving you two options. One: hand over those maps, get on your knees, and give me your faith. Two: die. Think it over. My patience has limits, so if you take too long, you’ll lose your chance to pick option one.”

“You….” Leaf Dao-Denier stood there for a moment, then suddenly spun and shot toward the nearest door. At the same time, countless streams of violet energy shot inside toward Yang Qi.

“Begone!” Yang Qi said, and the mist shattered. Leaf Dao-Denier dropped to the ground.

Chapter 799: Young Master Leaf Goes All Out

“Yang Qi, you bastard! I'm going to go for broke!” Young Master Leaf’s attempt to escape had been thoroughly vanquished and he knew he was facing a major catastrophe. Yang Qi would kill people without batting an eye, and in many ways, was more ruthless than Leaf Dao-Denier himself.

‘I can’t allow it!’ he thought. ‘I can’t allow him to get the other parts of the map. If he opens the Aeonic God Temple, not even Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven will be able to keep him in check! If I don’t make my move now, I’ll never have a chance!”

Leaf Dao-Denier knew that his pieces of the Aeonic God Psalter were the only things keeping him alive right now. If Yang Qi acquired them, he would become so powerful that he would be virtually impossible to fight.

“Tusita True Zodiac!” He quickly drew on the true power of the Tusita Heaven to try to attack Yang Qi, throwing his hands out to summon violet god lightning that caused all of heaven and earth to tremble.

“Be suppressed!” Yang Qi said, performing a sealing gesture. Instantly, a stream of godlight weighed down on Leaf Dao-Denier, clamping down on his vital energy with steel-like force.

The violet god lightning hit Yang Qi, but simply dissolved into sparks.

“What?” Leaf Dao-Denier said, visibly surprised. Never could he have guessed that Yang Qi would have become this strong. All it took was a casual act on his part to completely crush the essence of the Tusita Heaven.

Of course, he had no idea how long Yang Qi had actually been connected to that essence. Yang Qi had begun gaining enlightenment of it way back in the days of the Sage Monarch Continent.

BUZZ!

Suddenly, numerous streams of light appeared above Yang Qi and converged into King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans, of which he now possessed a total of two thousand three hundred. As for the remaining seven hundred, they were somewhere out in primal-chaos, in the hands of certain unknown old-timers. Hopefully, he could use his upcoming duel with Sectlord Nine Yangs to get his hands on them.

Of course, he had complete control of Sectlord Nine Yangs, but no one else knew that. And it was a given that people would try to use the man to try causing problems for Yang Qi.

So he would take advantage of that.

In fact, he had already received word that Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven wanted to meet with Sectlord Nine Yangs. That made it seem likely that the Grand Emperor wanted to use the duel to make a move on Yang Qi, perhaps by setting up a spell formation in the Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple. After all, Yang Qi was the only thing standing in Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven’s way of taking ultimate control of the Dao Defense League.

Sadly for him, Yang Qi was one step ahead of him.

“You’re not much use to me anymore, Young Master Leaf,” Yang Qi said. “I can already sense the aura of the two remaining pieces of the map on you. So hand them over!” Keeping the surrounding essence suppressed, he unleashed a primal-chaos elder-snake to devour the magical laws of the Tusita Heaven. Unexpectedly, a duplicate of the Tower of Tusita then appeared inside him.

It came because of how he had been sapping the magical laws of the place for so many years. That alone made him like the second lord of the place.

He reached out with the Hand of the One God, causing majestic true energy to swirl out toward Leaf Dao-Denier.

Leaf Dao-Denier could only watch in astonishment as his own energy was shattered; he was completely incapable of defending against Yang Qi’s attack. The gap between him and Yang Qi was now more obvious than ever, yet he still wasn’t ready to give up. “I'm a Fortuned One! What could you possibly do to me? Eternal True Blood; Fortuned True King!Shield of Fortune!”

An enormous shield appeared in front of him, dripping with blood that was apparently Leaf Dao-Denier’s own quintessence-blood. It pulsed with the power of good fortune, creating a powerful defense right in front of Yang Qi’s incoming attack.

When Yang Qi’s hand hit the shield, it was to his surprise that it actually stopped moving. Nodding in approval, he said, “Not bad at all, Young Master Leaf. Your energy arts and cultivation base are truly amazing. But how long will your Fortuned constitution really be able to hold out against me? You sacrificed a lot of blood just now to defend yourself. And unfortunately for you, I'm a Fateless One. In the end, I'm still your superior.”

“I’ll die before I help you, Yang Qi. I’ll self-detonate! I’ll destroy the essence of the Tusita Heaven, and the fragments of the Aeonic God Psalter as well. I’ll never let you succeed! If you dare to attack me again, you’ll never, ever get into the Aeonic God Temple!”

With great effort, Leaf Dao-Denier reached out again to the essence of the Tusita Heaven, which caused a mad inrush of vital energy to fill him, pushing his energy arts and Fortuned constitution to the ultimate limit.

“Fortuned Dao of Gods!” He threw his hands out, and the blood shield exploded into countless streams of magical laws formed of blood. In a shocking twist, he was actually attacking Yang Qi!

Yang Qi smiled coldly, dodging and defending himself with numerous fist techniques. “I can see that your attacks are a combination of your Fortuned vital energy and the power of the Tusita Heaven. Sadly, I'm not very impressed. Even the Tusita Heaven as a whole can’t do anything to me. I could destroy the entire place if I wanted to. And by the way, do you really think I would believe that you could destroy the Aeonic God Psalter? If it was so easy to get rid of, why would it be called ‘aeonic’. That implies that it will survive for aeons. So go ahead and blow yourself up. I can use the force of the explosion to devour the Tusita Heaven and get even stronger than before!”

“Blood of the One God!” He shivered as a drop of the Blood of the One God appeared on his palm. It rapidly spread out, becoming blood clouds that dispelled the essence of the Tusita Heaven, and caused the surrounding Tower of Tusita to violently tremble.

Yang Qi reached out again, and his hand became like a heavenly net that completely surrounded Leaf Dao-Denier. Then an Aeon Portal opened up, unleashing a gravitational force that caused the final two pieces of the Aeonic God Psalter to tremble as if they were preparing to fly out of Leaf Dao-Denier’s control.

‘No! No! I can’t let him get those two map pieces!’

Spitting out some blood that wrapped around the two pieces of the map, Leaf Dao-Denier spoke in a trembling voice, “Blood of Fortune; Sovereign of the Cosmos; Great Daos of Heaven and Earth; Heed my Command!”

The great daos of heaven and earth in the boundless Tusita Heaven began stirring, causing violet energy to swirl around Leaf Dao-Denier. As it transformed him into something like a violet devil-god, he unleashed a fist strike on Yang Qi.

“You’re bringing about your own destruction!” Yang Qi said, casually thrusting his fist out to meet the incoming attack.

Crack. Rattle.

Young Master Leaf was flung back, smashing into the wall of the Tower of Tusita. At the same time, the blood binding the map pieces to him collapsed and Yang Qi grabbed them.

Leaf Dao-Denier wasn’t even close to being a match for Yang Qi now. He could struggle, he could put everything on the line, but in the end, Yang Qi was just too strong.

Before, when Leaf Dao-Denier had King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions and his seventy-one brethren, he might have stood a chance.

However, it was at this moment that something completely unexpected happened.

A shining, seemingly eternal energy descended and filled Leaf Dao-Denier, who suddenly looked completely reinvigorated. Then, the light transformed into magical laws that began wrapping around the two map pieces, as if to take them.

‘Who’s this?’ Yang Qi thought. Looking up into the boundless primal-chaos above, he saw a powerful expert who looked like a god, emanating the eternal energy that was benefitting Leaf Dao-Denier.

This was obviously someone who could match up to Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven.

“Be broken!” Yang Qi bellowed. “Hand of the One God. Life-Death Void-Destruction God-Lightning!” God lightning snaked out, and at the same time, profound light shot out of his Lord's Eye, piercing the primal-chaos in a deadly attack on the interloper.

Meanwhile, he used the power of the God Legion Seal to keep a tight hold on the map pieces.

The newcomer burst out laughing. “So, there’s someone with a God Legion Seal in this age as well. Not bad. Not bad at all. Unfortunately, I'm not going to just sit back and do nothing. You killed one of my subordinates and forced the other six to give their faith to you. You thought I wouldn’t notice, but I did. Remember my name: Secundus! I'm from the Primeval Age, and I am an Eternal One!”

It was certainly a surprise for Eldest Brother Secundus to have shown up right here and now.

All of a sudden, Yang Qi realized that he was missing six streams of faith. Eldest Brother Secundus must have realized what was going on and somehow removed Yang Qi’s psychic branding mark. It was a terrifying thing, and it went to prove that this was an opponent that would be very difficult to handle.

“Don’t worry. I'm currently in seclusion working on a very important technique. You see, since I traveled from the Primeval Age to here, I'm also a Past One. Once I fully combine my Eternal and Past constitutions, it will be time for you to die and give me that God Legion Seal. I'm taking this Young Master Leaf with me for some training. Soon, the time will come for us to have our final clash!”

More eternal light swept down, wrapping up Leaf Dao-Denier and whisking him away into the primal-chaos. A moment later, neither he nor Eldest Brother Secundus were anywhere to be seen.

Thankfully, Yang Qi still had the two map pieces.

‘Eldest Brother Secundus! So, you’re biding your time to get stronger before attacking me outright? Well, at least I got the rest of the Aeonic God Psalter; no technique you can come up with will be a problem for me. I'm going to open the Aeonic God Temple, and soon enough it’ll be your time to die!’

Chapter 800: Unlocking the Temple

In the boundless void, primal-chaos vital energy abounded, so dense and strong that it was nearly impossible to penetrate.

Only someone with a very high cultivation base could survive here. Otherwise, the paleo-energy would seep into one’s body like mercury, dissolving the skin, meridians, and sea of consciousness, turning a person into primal-chaos itself. It was a terrifying area above the thirty-third ranked immortal worlds, a place where no heaven or earth existed.

Even a fifth division Godmyth who casually entered this area would be destroyed. Only ninth division Chaos Gods qualified to search for the godrelics that existed in the area.

That said, such efforts were akin to normal humans who entered the sea. Even particularly skilled swimmers could only stay submerged for a short time. Primal-chaos paleo-energy, by nature, could permeate and melt anything it touched. Even deathless god bones would be eaten away if they were exposed to it for too long.

Ordinary Chaos Gods who came to this area would have to swath themselves in deathless godliness or use god items that could stave off the energy with godhood. With such protections, they could search for treasure for a time, but they would eventually have to leave.

As for the people who had stepped onto the sixth or seventh stairs on the Deathless Heavenly Stairway and had a profound understanding of heaven, earth, life, and destruction, they would be able to go deep into the primal-chaos for extended periods of time. People like that might even be able to use primal-chaos paleo-energy for cultivation purposes.

That said, the depths of primal-chaos were often a very violent place, with deadly tempests that sprang up out of nowhere. There were primal-chaos hurricanes, primal-chaos tribulations, and even primal-chaos god lightning. Even the strongest of old-timers who were struck by such things would be incapable of making it out alive.

Even someone like Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven could end up losing his life in a place like this. According to the legends, the destructive power of primal-chaos could eradicate universes and crush gods.

Even the legion of gods was insignificant when it came to the endless primal-chaos. Whether it was in ancient times or the modern age, no one knew how far the primal-chaos stretched. They only knew that worlds were birthed out of it, and it was the source of tribulations that could overwhelm both mortal and immortal worlds alike.

Supposedly, everything would eventually end in a return to primal-chaos.

It was like the ocean, filled with islands that were immortal worlds, hells, mortal worlds, the past, the present, and the future.

Time. Fate. Karma. All of them would come to nothing within primal-chaos. It was within that eternal energy that the legion of gods built their kingdom.

As for the immortal worlds, they were like a speck of nothing compared to it.

The thirty-third ranked immortal worlds existed close to that primal-chaos. And according to legends from the ancient era, there had been occasions when enormous beasts emerged from it to attack the immortal worlds. In the end, the beasts had been suppressed.

However, the current incursions of the past and the future were tribulations that surpassed anything that could come from primal-chaos. After all, they threatened to actually influence the development of the primal-chaos.

At the moment, Leaf Dao-Denier was in the depths of primal-chaos, in the presence of a person who was profoundly ancient, yet looked like a young man. He wore beast hides, and there was a bone cudgel leaning up against his side, carved with complex designs that appeared to be the totems of some ancient tribe.

He was none other than Eldest Brother Secundus, a paragonic individual from the Primeval Age.

“Greetings, Senior!” Leaf Dao-Denier said. He could sense the extremely profound energy on Eldest Brother Secundus and couldn’t help but continue, “Many thanks to you for the kindness of saving my life. Unfortunately, that dirty swine Yang Qi still managed to get my pieces of the Aeonic God Psalter.”

“There’s nothing that can be done about it,” said Elder Brother Secundus. “He has a God Legion Seal, King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions, and the legacy of the Heaven Beyond Heaven. It would be impossible to randomly kill someone with a cultivation like that. It would require altering the dao of heaven and leading him into a trap in some deadly location. That said, Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven is plotting against him, and there are plenty of other people keeping tabs on him. He won’t last forever against so many enemies. He seems impressive, but the truth is that he stands where the wind and the waves are fiercest. People from the past, the present, and the future are all out to get him, hoping for him to perish, which would leave the God Legion Seal unbonded and masterless. I can help you get those seven of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions, but I get the God Legion Seal. Agreed?”

“Of course I agree!” Leaf Dao-Denier said, fully aware that he was in no position to negotiate.

Eldest Brother Secundus nodded, a faint smile on his face. “Excellent. You obviously have a clear view of things. I have the constitution of an Eternal One. Of course, you’re no less special than me considering you’re a Fortuned One. From what I've heard, that Yang Qi is a Fateless One, which makes him even more mysterious and profound than either of us. At its core, being fateless means to have ‘empty fate’. Technically speaking, it's a combination of two different types of constitutions, both related to the mysteries of the legion of gods. That said, I cultivate a boundless technique from primeval times, a magic above magics, something that can fuse one's blood and special constitution in a very unique way. The reason I saved you is because of your special constitution. Fortuned Ones are hard to find, and if Yang Qi had killed you it might have been impossible to find another like you.”

“Senior, are you saying you want to absorb some of my blood?” Leaf Dao-Denier said. “I tried that before with seventy-one different types of blood. Unfortunately, I only had passable success. I do know that Yang Qi succeeded, although I'm not sure how he did it.”

“Simple. All three thousand of the special constitutions come from the legion of gods, and Yang Qi has a God Legion Seal, which allows him to combine all types of godliness. It's a heaven-defying thing, that seal. With it, he can do all sorts of unbelievable things that defy common sense.”

Inwardly, Leaf Dao-Denier was both angry and envious. ‘I can’t believe this. I should be the one with the God Legion Seal. And I’ll get it eventually. Not even this savior of mine deserves it. For now, I’ll just play along. But in the end, I’m going to kill everyone who’s crossed me!’

“Alright, enough idle talk,” Elder Brother Secundus said. “In a moment I’ll give you a blood talisman formed by means of my Bloodphase God Dao. It will enable both of us to combine the Eternal and Fortuned constitutions, making us strong enough to vanquish a Fateless One. Once the process is over in a few months, we can go attack Yang Qi, take over the Dao Defense League, and kill Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven. Incidentally, the Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court have incredible destiny from the past, and I plan to take it and use it to reach the Deathless Throne. With that and the God Legion Seal, I will definitely reach the level of the legion of gods.”

“Please, go ahead, Senior,” Leaf Dao-Denier said. “I’ll do anything it takes to see Yang Qi dead, no matter how despicable people might think it. And I’ll endure any level of pain.”

“Fine. Now, pay attention to the details of the technique!” Eldest Brother Secundus went on to transmit the technique directly into Leaf Dao-Denier’s mind, and a moment later, they set to work.

A tremor passed through Leaf Dao-Denier, and his energy and blood soon began surging. Within moments, all of the injuries he had sustained at the hands of Yang Qi were healed, and he felt himself growing stronger.

‘I can’t believe this energy art is this effective!’ he thought, delighted.

“This is a boundless dao of blood originally cultivated by the Blood God,” Eldest Brother Secundus explained. “He eventually forsook the glory of the legion of gods and became corrupted. He lived out his days in the Hell of Fresh Blood, where he eventually perished. Later, that hell fell into ruin and his boundless divine abilities faded from existence. Fortuitously, I came across a secret manual in the Primeval Age, the Bloodphase Canon, that contained his writings. So I revived the technique. It makes the cultivation of special constitutions even easier. You see, it's normally very difficult to draw on the full powers of a constitution like that. For example, you’re a Fortuned One, but you are only drawing on about one one-hundredth of the potential of your blood. Even Yang Qi is likely only unleashing about ten percent. But with my Bloodphase God Dao, you can unleash one hundred percent of the potential in your blood!”

RUMBLE!

Eldest Brother Secundus’ hand locked onto Leaf Dao-Denier’s back, sending surging energy arts into him that slowly unlocked all of his potential. His energy arts rose to a higher level, and he suddenly threw his head back and let loose a long howl as heavenly tribulation formed above him. He was breaking through to a higher level!

**

Meanwhile, Yang Qi was already in the depths of the Heaven Beyond Heaven, landing on the island that contained the copper Aeonic God Temple. It was as if the temple could already sense the final two pieces of the psalter, and it was starting to tremble and vibrate.

“Go!” Yang Qi said, releasing the two fragments, which flew over to the temple. Instantly, immense power surges rolled out.

The photonic computers began speaking.

[Beep-beep-beep. Beep-beep-beep.]

[Power index rising. Purity upgrade. One hundred and fifty-six percent. One hundred and sixty. One hundred and eighty. Two hundred…. Absorb immediately!]

The vivicreation systems and genetic systems were growing stronger at a rapid rate.

WHOOSH!

The spacecraft flew out until it was hovering above the temple, and began sucking in all of the vital energy it could.

Chapter 801: Secrets of the God Psalter

The seven pieces of the map had finally been combined.

The Aeonic God Temple could now open. The legion of gods had left behind a stash of treasure that had remained hidden through the aeons, but now it was starting to come into view. And the first manifestation was an incredible amount of power.

Power entered the Cruiser of Civilization, causing instant upgrades and prompting surges in the genetic and vivicreation systems.

The photonic computers began speaking again.

[Scanning. Scanning. Unique constitution detected. Paramount blood. A legendary Fateless One. Blood levels have only been unlocked to a level of one one-hundredth. Request permission to stimulate blood for further development.]

“What?” Yang Qi said, visibly surprised. “Further development? Go ahead!”

The combination of the genetic and vivicreation systems could provide incredible and shocking functions. Yang Qi had been operating under the assumption that his Fateless constitution was already fully developed. However, now he was being told it wasn’t even at the level of ten percent!

Blinding light shot out from the Cruiser of Civilization and into Yang Qi, which immediately began stimulating his blood. It felt almost like a warm bath. However, the light vanished after a moment, leaving him feeling like he was just on the verge of making major progress.

[Warning. Warning. Power insufficient. Unable to stimulate blood. Further development impossible.]

He couldn’t help but wonder what it would be like to unlock one hundred percent of his Fateless constitution.

‘First, I need to build up more power. Then I can get into the Aeonic God Temple and see what's inside. There’s power there that should be able to push my own true energy to a greater level of purity.’

He now had all seven pieces of the psalter, each of which contained a boundless energy art. By combining them, he could unleash the full Aeonic Heaven-Dao Life-Destruction Zen Art.

“Aeonic Heaven-Dao Life-Destruction Zen Art!”

An Aeon Portal opened up behind him, causing an ancient and profound energy to rush toward the temple in front of him. A moment later, the main entrance of the temple opened.

RUMBLE!

Primeval godpower erupted, becoming almost a physical attack on Yang Qi that slammed into him and caused his defensive true energy to creak loudly.

“Incredible!” he murmured. That level of power was more than enough to slaughter a god-general from the Dao Defense League—possibly even a dharmaraja. Even Leaf Dao-Denier would’ve probably been slaughtered by it.

It was so incredibly large and moved so quickly that once it locked onto a person’s soul, there was no way that person could possibly escape.

The truth was that once someone opened the door of the temple, it would be impossible to leave. The temple itself would exert a gravitational force that would drag in whoever opened the door.

Beam after beam of light slammed into Yang Qi’s chest, but he stood strong until they faded away. At that point, an ancient will spoke to Yang Qi from inside the temple. “We are connected by destiny, young one. You actually withstood my onslaught of god light. However, your true strength comes from your boundless constitution. You have earned the legacy of the Aeonic God Temple. Hopefully, you can protect the interests of the legacy and not be corrupted by the power of hell.”

With that, Yang Qi flew into the copper temple. Inside was an enormous dimension filled with numerous altars, atop which were magical treasures, god items, medicinal pills, and other items. Looking around, he realized that the ancient will from moments ago was completely gone, and all of the warding magics that were originally in place had been removed. He had passed the test and now had full access to the stash of treasure.

‘Is that a god pill?’

He reached out to grab a gourd bottle from one of the altars. It was the size of a mountain, but upon leaving its enshrined spot it shrank down until it fit in the palm of his hand.

Opening his Lord's Eye, he looked in and saw a god pill hovering in the middle of the bottle. Even just sensing its aura caused his bones and muscles to creak.

‘This thing is even stronger than the god pill I got from Leaf Dao-Denier.’ Yang Qi had put that god pill to good use, but it was almost not worth mentioning compared to this one.

All of a sudden, Yang Qi noticed a line of text on the altar that was written in god script, which of course he could read. It was a description of the pill.

Aeonic Heaven-Changing God Pill. Concocted from several billion types of god herbs from the kingdom of gods in primal-chaos. Consume it to change the face of heaven and earth. With a demigod body, one’s self becomes heaven; transform the dao of heaven and replace it. This god medicine can provide the strength of a hundred million years of cultivation. However, it must not be consumed until the appropriate time.

‘Forget it. I already have the Physique of the Sovereign Lord, so this thing won't benefit me at all. However, it could definitely make my people stronger. Perhaps I can transform it into a serum for them to drink. That would work.’ Yang Qi put the bottle gourd away and continued on, inspecting the treasures on the other altars.

Thankfully, all of the altars had lines of text describing the treasures and what they did. It was a real treasure trove, and it almost seemed like something the legion of gods had set up specifically for when the future world invaded.

On another altar, there was a wolf tooth club, crafted not from the finest steel, but from bone.

When Yang Qi picked it up, he found it to be incredibly weighty, almost as heavy as an entire immortal world. And it contained violently powerful deathless godliness.

He read the inscription on the altar. The Club of the God Wolf, forged from the remains of a heaven-wolf that I killed. It is a god item with violent energy just waiting to destroy anything it touches.

‘This is the kind of weapon a fierce person should wield. Not my style, but I can definitely give it to one of my subordinates.’

Looking around at the countless altars, Yang Qi saw god items, god pills, sabers, spears, swords, halberds, jewels, magical treasures, flags, banners, parasols, canopies, chariots, and sundry other items. They radiated intense godliness, and there were so many that they seemed enough to equip an entire army.

‘If I took this treasure hoard and used it to arm my Army of Radiance and Light, they would be even more formidable! It seems to me that whoever created this place knew that a great tribulation was coming and wanted to save all of heaven and earth.’

Yang Qi caught sight of a sword formation made of tens of thousands of god swords. It was called the Myriad-Sands Aeonic-Lightflow God Sword Formation. With enough old-timers powering it, it would be strong enough to keep someone like Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven in check.

There was one god item composed of numerous pearls, which could break through any barrier, and could defeat even the strongest opponents, if used in a formation.

‘What’s this…?’ Yang Qi stopped in front of an altar, upon which was a five-colored mountain. Upon closer inspection, it appeared to be made from a combination of gold, silver, copper, iron, and lead. It pulsed with metallic godliness that could only come from the god world and was so heavy that Yang Qi had trouble lifting it.

Mountain of the Exalted Celestial. The description indicated that it was a precious treasure that, if placed in an immortal world, would make the place's vital energy ten times stronger and its magical laws ten times more dense. Any newly forged weapon which was placed on the mountain for a period of time would develop godly striations that could vanquish evil, suppress devils, cleanse the heart, extrude impurities, and make one stronger and wiser.

Yang Qi soon realized that there were tens upon tens of thousands of altars, all of them with god items the likes of which would even be considered extremely rare in the Tusita Heaven or the Eight Tribes Heaven. Adding their value together, the trove made him the richest person in existence.

‘Unfortunately, none of these things are going to be of much help to me personally. I wonder if there's something deeper in that can help my cultivation base.’

He flew onward, until he had passed a million altars. Eventually, he caught sight of what appeared to be an ancient door. It wasn’t a manifestation of power, but rather an actual god item.

Inscribed on the head doorjamb were the words “Aeon Portal”.

There were seven very lifelike humanoid figures sitting in front of the door, wearing ancient clothing and headgear. They weren’t cultivators. They radiated godliness that reminded Yang Qi of the god Brahma, except they were clearly dead.

These seven seated figures were guarding the Aeon Portal, and they were dead gods!

Chapter 802: The Aeon Portal

Yang Qi had never laid eyes on the intact corpse of even a single god, but now he was looking at seven.

Although they were clearly not alive, they still emanated a faint deathless aura that caused Yang Qi’s heart to go chill. He hurried forward and respectfully saluted them, not daring to do anything they might find profane. Another person might have tried to greedily assimilate them, but Yang Qi knew not even the successor of the Aeonic God Temple would be allowed to treat them blasphemously.

It was true that assimilating them would provide a massive boost to his energy arts, making him a Revisionist or Measureless God at the very least. Even though that would put him in the position to be able to absolutely crush Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven, he wouldn’t do it. There were other benefits that he would be receiving.

The energy pulsing within the Aeon Portal seemed like the kind that could destroy the dao of heaven, and Yang Qi knew that there must be something inside that could rival the Cruiser of Civilization.

“Seniors,” Yang Qi said, addressing the seven corpses in Godtongue, “I bear the legacy of the God Legion Seal. The past world is about to invade our immortal dao civilization, and bring immense tribulation. The future world has already done so, and their forces are virtually unstoppable. We are in a truly terrible situation. It's hard to say how this will affect the future. Perhaps they wish to destroy both past, present, and future. Perhaps they wish to make an eternal civilization that exists outside of time. In any case, I have to stop them. And the fact that you left behind this Aeonic God Temple seems to be evidence that you will support my efforts.”

As he spoke, Yang Qi allowed some of the aura of the God Legion Seal to seep out.

Whizz!

As soon as the fluctuations of the God Legion Seal touched the corpses, they opened their eyes, which shone with killing intent. Then, a voice spoke into Yang Qi’s mind.

“God Legion Seal? So, you bear the God Legion Seal. As a true successor, you must have wisdom, valor, perseverance, and tenacity; only the strongest individual can take the Aeonic God Temple. We’ll give you one chance, boy. Use the Aeon Portal to take complete control of the Heaven Beyond Heaven. This place is not an immortal world, but rather a magical treasure in the form of a spacecraft, created long ago by the Lord of Aeons. It’s called the Aeonic God Destroyer, and is equally as famous as the Cruiser of Civilization.

“But there is a test. The seven of us perished long ago, but we left behind scraps of will in our corpses. If you can assimilate those expressions of will, you will reach an unimaginable level. We will send our wills into your sea of consciousness to take control of your soul, and possess your physical husk. If you are unable to survive the process, you will die, and your power will remain here for some other destined individual, along with the God Legion Seal. If you survive, then all of our power will become yours.

“The decision is yours. If you choose not to take the test, you may leave. However, if you leave, you will never control the Heaven Beyond Heaven and another destined successor will be located.”

Yang Qi shivered.

If he wanted to control the Aeon Portal, and by extension the Heaven Beyond Heaven, he had to allow the wills of these seven dead gods to possess him. Then he had to subjugate them, lest he perish. If he succeeded, he would acquire their godliness, but if he failed, he would be destroyed.

It was obviously a very dangerous situation.

However, as the bearer of the God Legion Seal, he knew that he couldn’t be indecisive. He needed to act with bravery and valor, and use his own will to conquer anything and everything.

After a moment of thought, he said, “Fine. This seems to be the only way I can eventually reach the Deathless Throne. Bring it on. This little test of yours is just going to be another session of cultivation for me.”

And that it was. A session of cultivation in which life and death were on the line.

The corpses nodded, and another voice echoed into his mind. “You’re quite bold, young man. Just be aware that we will not hold back. Show no fear, and don’t be merciful. This will be a life or death battle in which you must remain strong of will, and have a deathless spirit. Only then will you be able to destroy us. If you don’t vanquish us, we will vanquish you. It’s war. A war for your life.”

The seven corpses dissolved into seven beams of godlight that shot into Yang Qi, causing him to shiver as seven streams of god will appeared in his sea of consciousness. At the same time, his body collapsed into countless hells and he became nothing but a swath of darkness filled with glittering, fiery light.

Without any hesitation, the seven shining expressions of will rushed to attack Yang Qi’s will.

RIP!

These expressions of will were from fallen gods, so they weren’t even one ten-thousandth as strong as they had been in life. But that still made them incredibly strong, compared to Yang Qi, who was only a fifth division Godmyth.

The initial blow nearly wiped Yang Qi’s will out of existence, causing it to flicker as dimly as a firefly compared to a host of burning suns. It almost seemed like a foregone conclusion that he would lose the fight.

But he wasn’t discouraged, and forced his will into action. With every barrage, he grew stronger and more determined, and the tide of battle soon began shifting. His soul was in great danger of falling apart, making this fight much more deadly than any contest of energy arts.

The fight itself was beneficial. As Yang Qi’s will clashed with the seven gods’ will, he could sense their experiences and their killing intent. And it only served to strengthen his own will.

The mind and the body were very different. When engaging in physical training, one needed time to recover. But one’s mind and will could be strengthened in a moment. As a Fateless One, Yang Qi was much more in tune with such matters.

All of a sudden, the will of one of the gods flared like a burning torch, assailing Yang Qi with more force than ever before. Sparks flew from the impact, and Yang Qi felt as though an actual god were battering him. The pain was severe.

He shouted in agony as he returned to his original state and sat down in front of the Aeon Portal. At the same time, he shone with bright, flame-like light from the seven god-spirits. His face twisted and distorted almost as if with madness, making it seem like he was in the middle of cultivation deviation.

“This is our chance! Batter his mind away!”

The seven god-spirits could sense that he was about to crumble and redoubled their efforts.

“Deadly Twisted Snake Art!”

“Great-Earth Despairing-Mother Origin-Destruction Technique!”

“Nine-Troubles Three-Calamities World Breaking!”

“Despotic Tyranny Three Thousand Transformations!”

“Netherstalking Eight-Extremities-Fist Paragon Barrage!”

“Ten Directions Tripitaka Dhāraṇī Touch!”

“God-Death Grief-Joy True-Void Crushing!”

Seven godly-class energy arts hit Yang Qi with the force to topple mountains and drain seas. Even someone like Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven who faced a series of attacks like this would be completely overwhelmed. The wills of seven god-spirits were something that few people could contend with. Anyone below the level of the legion of gods would likely be wiped out.

However, as the seven gods continued attacking him and Yang Qi’s own will began crumbling, the power of fate rose up within him and his Wheel of Fate appeared overhead, emanating the aura of the Sovereign Lord.

And visible on the wheel was a sutra that was related to the nirvanic rebirth of gods.

“Like the millions upon millions of worlds that exist… the true-spirits are eternal. A new civilization, born from the void, the nirvanic rebirth of the gods. The past never changes, the present is eternal, the future is unfathomable…. For me, every moment is like the present. Three worlds. Three lives. My fate….” In that moment, grand wills from the past, the present, and the future appeared within Yang Qi’s mind, and the Wheel of Fate transformed, moving closer toward its ultimate core.

In that moment, Yang Qi’s mind and will were tempered and the energy arts of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth rose to a higher level. His will suddenly became dozens of times stronger and entered a state that could exist within all three worlds of past, present, and future.

His eyes snapped open and, looking at the seven gods, he said, “Sorry about this.”

Chapter 803: Seven Gods Combined

At the most critical moment, Yang Qi clinched a victory.

The enlightenment provided by the sutra on the Wheel of Fate filled him with power, allowing the past, present, and future to exist within him. Three nascent divinity seeds formed within him—one deathless, one solitary, and one unfathomable. His soul suddenly had three distinct qualities, and it caused the psychic flame of his will to burn more brightly than ever. As a result, the wills of the seven gods immediately began crumbling.

“Well done,” a voice spoke into his mind. “So you managed to stand up to the assault of our divine will. Your will, strength, and temperament are clearly profoundly strong. You deserve to bear the legacy of the Aeonic God Temple. We seven gods perished long ago, yet we do not bemoan the fact that our final remaining scraps of will are being wiped out by the God Legion Seal.”

“Power be to the legacy, and glory be to the Lord….”

“Oh paramount Lord, we will finally return to your embrace….”

The wills of the gods seemed to rejoice, and they felt no fear as they faded away. After all, in the vocabulary of the legion of gods, there was no exact word for ‘fear’.

The seven gods’ spirits became pure power within Yang Qi, pushing him to a higher level. In the blink of an eye, he was a sixth division Revisionist God, an entity of inimitable strength.

Heavenly tribulation came, the fury of the gods, the might of primal-chaos in the form of an enormous spell formation. However, Yang Qi’s mere glance turned it into nothing more than a sweet rain that bolstered his mind and his cultivation base.

‘I'm finally a Revisionist God. However, there’s still more power available from those seven gods. I received enough enlightenment during the conflict that I’m now enlightened regarding the entire Godmyth level. Nothing can hold me back. I’ll break through everything like a hammer crushing an ice cube! Next up, the seventh division Measureless God level!”

As his aura reached an even more majestic level, thunderous rumblings filled the air. His blood flowed through his veins as if the gods were beating war drums and marching into battle in all of his acupoints.

More tribulation rose up, with even greater intensity. Yang Qi stood and stretched his hands out to the sky, breaking through the greyspace to reveal primal-chaos itself, which he grabbed. This violent primal-chaos could devastate even Chaos Gods who were climbing the Deathless Heavenly Stairway, but he grabbed it nonetheless, crushing it out of existence and ending the tribulation.

He was now a Measureless God.

Instantly, his energy arts climbed even higher and his cultivation base advanced by leaps and bounds.

‘Well, Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven, you won’t find it easy to deal with me now, will you? I'm absolutely your equal!’ Although Yang Qi was certain that he could stand shoulder to shoulder with Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven, there was still no way he would take the man lightly. After all, there were three more Grand Emperors on his side.

He surpassed Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven even in his psychic level, but in the end, there was still a huge cultivation base gap between the two of them. Yang Qi really needed to reach the Chaos God level and step onto the Deathless Heavenly Stairway. Only then could he wipe out the Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court, as well as Eldest Brother Secundus, the Eight Tribes of the Dragonfolk, and the generalissimos of the future world. The time had come to take control of the essence of the Heaven Beyond Heaven. The corpses of the seven gods were gone, and he was left alone.

“Aeon Portal!”

As he stepped toward the portal, he was bombarded by information in the form of raw power. An image of the Heaven Beyond Heaven appeared in his mind, and his view rapidly expanded until he could see the entire immortal world.

Now he could tell that it really did resemble an enormous warship nestled within primal-chaos, roughly elliptical in shape. Its magical laws were different from any other type of magical laws, and it was filled with endless power. In that respect, it was unlike the Cruiser of Civilization, which could easily run out of power.

That said, it was still a magical treasure, so it required immense strength to control and operate. That was another way in which it differed from the Cruiser of Civilization, which could be controlled by non-immortals.

“Alright! I have control of the entire Heaven Beyond Heaven now!” Yang Qi’s will spread out to fill all heaven and earth, seizing control of everything from mountains, to rivers, to plants and vegetation.

Using the Aeon Portal, he then caused the Heaven Beyond Heaven to begin shrinking down, growing smaller and smaller.

A few hours later, it was millions upon millions of times smaller, until it finally faded from view. A mysterious and famous thirty-third ranked immortal world had disappeared without a trace, as if it had been nothing but a mirage.

Around then, Yang Qi appeared within the primal-chaos paleo-energy, the Aeonic God Destroyer floating in front of him, roughly the same size as his hand.

KABAM!

The ship flew into his forehead, and the golden imp from the God Legion Seal settled down onto its deck. At the same time, immense power surged through all of Yang Qi’s body.

In the instant that he fused with the Aeonic God Destroyer, Yang Qi reached the ultimate peak of the Measureless God level, putting him just on the verge of the eighth division Buddha God level.

And this was what happened upon just having taken the Heaven Beyond Heaven. There were still many of its secrets to unlock. Once he spent some time cultivating and seeking enlightenment of it, he could use the remaining power from the seven gods to hopefully push forward to the level of a ninth division Chaos God.

‘The time has come to collect all of King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans! There are still seven hundred out there in primal-chaos, and now I can sense them. What old-timer has them? It's definitely not someone ordinary. It’s likely someone similar to Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven. Not that I'm worried.’

The first thing he wanted to do, having taken the Heaven Beyond Heaven, was to complete his collection of talismans and go to the Eight Tribes Heaven to take the Engine of the One God. With that engine, his Cruiser of Civilization would become even more powerful.

WHOOSH!

Without hesitation, he flew off into the primal-chaos paleo-energy.

Most old-timers wouldn't dare to travel so quickly, but with the Aeonic God Destroyer he could easily absorb the primal-chaos and convert it into power.

And although it was very easy to lose one’s way in primal-chaos, Yang Qi was being guided by King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans and knew exactly where the remaining seven hundred were.

Eventually, he reached a point where the primal-chaos paleo-energy was clumped together like an enormous mountain, surrounded by violent tempests that could easily destroy immortal worlds.

Even Chaos Gods who were struck with force like this would be killed.

Of course, they were not an obstacle for Yang Qi.

He flew on for a few more hours until the primal-chaos began to thin, as if it were being repelled by some incredible magical force. More mountains could be seen, along with buildings, making it seem like some sort of sect created by some old-timer.

It was rumored that there were indeed powerful entities who created places like this out in primal-chaos. They would even occasionally descend to the lower immortal worlds as clones to recruit disciples.

Such old-timers would be stronger than the dharmarajas in the Dao Defense League, and on the same level as Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven.

Chapter 804: The Final Talismans

Normal structures that existed in primal-chaos would eventually be corroded into nothing. Even god items with deathless godliness were no exception and would eventually be destroyed.

That said, there were always ways to stave off the primal-chaos to create safe enclaves.

From what Yang Qi could tell, this was a sect set up by some powerful old-timer. In the very middle of all the mountains and buildings, there was a huge spell formation created with seven hundred imperial snakecharms, which constantly devoured the primal-chaos paleo-energy and transformed it into usable power.

Those talismans were what had turned this place into a habitable zone.

‘There they are,’ Yang Qi thought, and prepared to take them. He knew that it would result in the destruction of the formation, but there was nothing he could do about that. Before he could take action, however, a wave of power rose up behind him that was no weaker than anything Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven could produce.

Someone was coming.

‘Who’s this? The owner of this place? Whoever set up a sect in the middle of all this primal-chaos would obviously be anything but common. Maybe I should take a look around before making a move.’

Drawing on his energy arts to conceal his presence, Yang Qi cast his gaze around until he located the new arrival, an immensely powerful figure who was apparently a Grand Emperor. He radiated an aura that seemed to contain a myriad of magics, and had a will that could span the heavens.

From what Yang Qi could tell, he was on the ninth stair of the Deathless Heavenly Stairway, the Stair of the True Void. He was very close to reaching the Deathless level.

‘Grand Emperor Myriadmagic Heavenspan?’ Although Yang Qi had never seen the other three emperors of the Heavenly Court, he was fairly certain that this was who he was looking at. ‘Is this place a rite center set up by Grand Emperor Myriadmagic Heavenspan? If so, I don’t need to worry about any negative consequences of taking the talismans. After all, the Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court have already set themselves up as my enemy.’

Just as Yang Qi was about to make his move, Grand Emperor Myriadmagic Heavenspan suddenly spoke. “Patriarch Annalist, considering we're old friends, why aren’t you coming out to meet me?”

In response, a middle-aged man clad in a green garment appeared in front of Grand Emperor Myriadmagic Heavenspan. From his energy fluctuations, it was obvious that he was no weaker than Grand Emperor Myriadmagic Heavenspan. “What are you doing here, Grand Emperor Myriadmagic Heavenspan? Didn’t you Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court set up the Dao Defense League to try seizing universal fortune? I know about the invasion of the future world, but I'm in no position to help right now. Please leave.”

“Patriarch Annalist, we four emperors are working together again to set up a new Heavenly Court. Why not join us as the fifth emperor? The Dao Defense League is now fully established, and we are already gathering universal fortune. Otherwise I wouldn't have sent this clone of mine to visit you. Once we control the universal fortune, we can definitely shatter the forces of the future world, then reach the Deathless Throne, the level of the legion of gods. You won't be able to do that working on your cultivation alone out here in primal-chaos.”

Patriarch Annalist chuckled darkly. “When you four set up the Heavenly Court in ancient times, you harbored evil intentions. You lured numerous old-timers into traps to kill them and steal their destiny, all to make your God Pills of Fate. Working with you would be like asking a tiger for its skin. I'm not interested in being fuel for your advancement. Again, I’ll ask you to leave. Even if the Dao Defense League were bigger and stronger than it is, I'm not interested in being a part of it. I don’t want to become mere cannon fodder.”

“Oh really?” Grand Emperor Myriadmagic Heavenspan laughed. Pointing at King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans, he said, “You used those seven hundred amulets to set up your base out here, but over the years, your cultivation base has only slightly improved. You've actually fallen behind us. And that's not to mention the fact that we Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court are all in unison again. If you refuse to do things the easy way, we’ll do them the hard way. So I'm going to give you an ultimatum: join us, whether you like it or not. The only other option comes in the form of a single word. Death!”

“You Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court are as aggressive as ever,” Patriarch Annalist said angrily. “But I refuse to believe you’re that strong!”

“You're overthinking things, Patriarch Annalist. Your cultivation base will definitely improve if you come to the Dao Defense League. By the way, I happen to know about that new technique you started cultivating a while back—the All-Eternity Spring-Autumn Annalist God-Dao Scripture. You collect fragments of lost civilizations and use them to create Annalist True Energy that you hope will make you invincible. Unfortunately, you experienced cultivation deviation and are now a paraplegic. You only come out as an expression of incarnated will. Although this isn’t public knowledge, I'm fully aware of it.

“The All-Eternity Spring-Autumn Annalist God-Dao Scripture is truly powerful, a godly-class energy art, created in ancient times by drawing on the histories of countless civilizations. In fact, it contains countless minor aspects of a variety of other godly-class energy arts. Sadly, if you refuse to join us, you’re going to end up dead and your energy arts will fall into our hands.”

BOOM!

Grand Emperor Myriadmagic Heavenspan suddenly unleashed a palm strike without any warning. In the blink of an eye, a myriad of godly-class energy arts flared to life behind him. Shocking as it was, there were literally ten thousand such arts, fused together in what appeared to be ultimate harmony.

Yang Qi was deeply shocked. ‘I can’t believe someone exists who combined ten thousand godly-class energy arts! Even Daoist Hundred-Gods only has a hundred, and he's considered an elite among the elder kings. I guess Grand Emperor Myriadmagic Heavenspan really does live up to his name.’

BOOM!

The palm strike caused a tempest to spring up that ripped all the nearby mountains to shreds. In addition to the intense rumbling sounds, there were also screams as the numerous disciples inhabiting the mountains were killed.

It was exactly what one would expect to happen when a colony of ants faced a fire-breathing dragon.

Patriarch Annalist’s incarnation immediately launched a counter-attack, like a river of destructive power from the depths of history. His move collided with the Grand Emperor’s palm and a huge shock wave of true energy rolled out, shoving the primal-chaos away and creating a temporary vacuum.

Also revealed was the personal kingdom created by King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans, within which sat the real Patriarch Annalist, who looked like little more than a shriveled-up corpse.

Grand Emperor Myriadmagic Heavenspan burst out laughing. “So, you really did experience cultivation deviation with the All-Eternity Spring-Autumn Annalist God-Dao Scripture. I guessed correctly, Patriarch Annalist. Or should I call you Grand Emperor Annalist, former temporary member of the Heavenly Court of ancient times. Well, it's good that I can finally execute you, traitor!”

“You evil villain!” Patriarch Annalist shouted. “Your Dao Defense League is no tool for good. I know that it’s all about growing your personal power. You want the cultivators of the immortal world to give their faith to you, then gather destiny to become god-spirits. As far as you’re concerned, all other living beings are livestock! I don’t care if I die, I’ll never lower myself to that level!”

“Fine then, prepare to die!” said Grand Emperor Myriadmagic Heavenspan as he prepared to deliver the coup de grâce. “You’re right, we Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court are more than willing to sacrifice all other living beings to achieve our goals. And now you can hear a bit of the death dirge we will soon sing!”

All of a sudden, a deeply melancholic dirge filled the air, which would fill any enemy of Grand Emperor Myriadmagic Heavenspan with ultimate misery.

“You!” Patriarch Annalist blurted, his face falling. Unfortunately, having experienced cultivation deviation and become a cripple, there was nothing he could do and nowhere he could go. The kingdom around him began crumbling.

“Die,” Grand Emperor Myriadmagic Heavenspan said, unleashing an attack that could devastate all creation. He was going to destroy everything in sight!

POP!

Blood sprayed out of Patriarch Annalist’s mouth as his incarnation was wiped out of existence and his kingdom was destroyed.

However, it was in that very moment of despair that a bright beam of light shot out, wrapped him up along with the seven hundred talismans, then vanished. It happened so quickly that Grand Emperor Myriadmagic Heavenspan was left looking around in confusion.

A few breaths of time passed before he regained his composure. Then he realized that the person he had been trying to kill had been rescued and he howled with rage. “Who did it? Who saved him? I'm gonna kill you! Even if you run to the edges of reality, I’ll still track you down!”

Chapter 805: Rescue

Never could Grand Emperor Myriadmagic Heavenspan have guessed that someone would swoop in and save his quarry, right when he was in complete control of the situation. His energy arts already bordered on the Deathless Throne, and it was no exaggeration to say that he had a myriad of magics that could span the heavens.

Therefore, it could only be imagined how powerful a person would have to be to whisk his enemy out of the fight right under his nose.

Not only was he shocked, he was outraged.

The streak of light was still visible out in primal-chaos, so he quickly blurred into motion to chase it, vowing that he would kill whoever had just saved Patriarch Annalist.

The All-Eternity Spring-Autumn Annalist God-Dao Scripture that he cultivated was very profound and mysterious, containing some of the most abstruse secrets of civilization. Grand Emperor Myriadmagic Heavenspan knew that it would benefit him greatly, and might even help him achieve his next breakthrough. There was no way he would let something like that slip through his fingers.

However, as he gave chase through the violent and dangerous primal-chaos tempests, his shock mounted. Soon, they were in a place where the tempests were tinged with godliness, which meant that they could even kill members of the legion of gods.

Even the most elite of the old-timers would hesitate to go too far into areas like this. After all, it would eventually lead to the Ancient Road to the Gods, which was an extremely dangerous place. It was a road that led to the kingdom of the gods, and was supposedly set aside only for the gods themselves. It was a place of death for immortals. In fact, there had been occasions in the past in which Grand Emperor Myriadmagic Heavenspan had sought to travel the Ancient Road to the Gods, but had nearly died in the process. When he realized where he was, he got even angrier.

‘Is this guy not afraid of dying? Is he actually going to enter the Ancient Road to the Gods? That's suicide!’

BOOM!

Eventually, the primal-chaos tempests were so intense that they were filled with god lightning as large as immortal worlds, making every inch of progress painfully difficult.

At a certain point, Grand Emperor Myriadmagic Heavenspan stopped in place. This was only a clone, not his true body, and although it was extremely powerful, it wouldn’t last long in circumstances like this. In fact, it was already covered with a mass of bloody wounds.

Of course, considering it was only a clone, he wasn't particularly worried about it perishing.

‘I’ll unleash one final attack. Let’s see if he can handle it!’

The clone burst into intense flames, burning up until he was nothing but a streak of light that shot forward thousands of times faster than before. In the blink of an eye, it was closing in on Yang Qi.

As it neared, the beam of light that was Yang Qi transformed into an enormous hand. “Grand Emperor Myriadmagic Heavenspan,” he said haughtily, “I can’t believe that you’re coming after me with a puny clone like that. I have important matters at hand and don't feel like messing around with you. If you Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court want me to kill you, then please wash your necks so my ax remains clean when I take your heads!”

He thrust his palm out, and Grand Emperor Myriadmagic Heavenspan’s clone screamed like a dying animal as he faded away into nothing.

Moments later, a kingdom of existence appeared in Yang Qi’s hand, within which was Patriarch Annalist. When the patriarch looked around at their surroundings, he said, “You can't go any further. The Ancient Road to the Gods is up ahead, and only gods can walk it. Sir, I offer you profound thanks for saving me.”

“Don’t mention it. Grand Emperor Myriadmagic Heavenspan is my enemy, and saving you will be a big blow to him.”

“Ai! I don’t have much life left in me. I experienced cultivation deviation thanks to failing with the All-Eternity Spring-Autumn Annalist God-Dao Scripture. My true energy flows reversed and my nascent divinity was nearly destroyed. Otherwise I wouldn't have been so easily defeated by him. Your energy arts are incredible, but they seem to be newly developed. I’m honestly shocked that an expert like you has risen up among the younger generation. Excuse me for being ill-informed, but might I ask your name?”

“I'm the Emissary of Radiance and Light from the Dao Defense League.” When he saw Patriarch Annalist react with sudden alarm, he quickly continued, “Don’t worry, I'm vying for power with Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven. I'm fully aware that the Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court want to take over all of existence, and although I'm currently strong enough to take them on one at a time, I'm not ready to handle all four simultaneously. Patriarch, if you're willing to work for me, I can ensure that you gain incredible power and earn boundless destiny.”

“So, that’s how it is,” Patriarch Annalist said, sighing with relief. “Unfortunately, I really am struggling at death’s door. How could I be of any help to you?”

“Well, first of all, I can heal your injuries,” Yang Qi said. “Whatever godly-class energy art conflicts you have, I’ll smooth them out. You’ll return to full health, and who knows, maybe you’ll even advance your cultivation.”

Patriarch Annalist looked both shocked and excited. “R-really? You’re serious? If you can heal me, I’ll follow you no matter what!”

“Of course I'm serious. However, as payment, I want those seven hundred imperial snakecharms.”

“Fine! Take them all. My life is in your hands, so what would be the point of trying to haggle? Although, you really need all three thousand of those talismans to do anything. Having only seven hundred won’t help you very much.” He sighed. “They definitely won’t be enough to deal with the four emperors.”

“I already have two thousand three hundred,” Yang Qi replied, “otherwise I wouldn’t ask for your collection. And I insist on providing you compensation in the form of some magical treasures.” With that, Yang Qi waved his hand to collect the talismans, then immediately sent out his energy to fuse with them.

Crack. Crunch.

Transformations immediately began occurring.

As the aura of three thousand of King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans surged out, an enormous primal-chaos elder-snake appeared behind Yang Qi. It was clearly superior to the primal-chaos tempests in the area as it opened its mouth and devoured all of it. Then it shrank down into a strange-looking figure with the head of a person and the body of a snake.

It was actually King Heaven-Devourer!

Looking at Yang Qi with cold, emotionless eyes, the creature said, “Who called forth my will!? Who summoned my soul from the void? I am a monarch who devoured heavenly worlds! I shall devour the kingdom of the gods and create a new world! After the gods experience nirvanic rebirth, a brand new civilization will be born again….”

“King Heaven-Devourer has been resurrected?!” Patriarch Annalist said, trembling. Even the legion of gods would tremble at the sight of King Heaven-Devourer. After all, together with King Immortal-Slayer, he shook all creation, devouring numerous gods before ultimately being defeated by the Sovereign Lord and his godmammoths.

Now his will had been revived, and even a person like Patriarch Annalist was ant-like in comparison.

Yang Qi felt transfixed as the humanoid snake stared at him. He knew that this was a very important moment. Obviously, he had to conquer King Heaven-Devourer’s will, otherwise he himself would be forever lost.

“God Legion Seal!”

Even as Patriarch Annalist trembled in fear, the golden imp flew out, surrounded by boundless golden radiance. As the pressure weighed down on King Heaven-Devourer, the two of them began fighting.

At the same time, Yang Qi let out a bellow of rage as he unleashed the Hand of the One God.

Patriarch Annalist stared on in complete and utter shock.

Eventually, Yang Qi combined with the God Legion Seal, unleashing his ultimate attack, using the Blood of the One God. King Heaven-Devourer’s will was crushed and began fading away.

Yang Qi now had full control of all three thousand talismans, the original property of he who ranked second among the seventy-two brethren that included King Immortal-Slayer.

At that point, a voice spoke, “It is by means of the Ancient Road to the Gods that one can reach the Deathless Throne. That is the location of the god ruins, of the perished gods, of the mighty god world. Go… find my treasures….”

The voice was that of King Heaven-Devourer. His true treasures had been left behind in the god world, and his talismans were merely a key to get there. Finding his corpse was the only way to acquire his true legacy, something far beyond anything in the Aeonic God Temple.

‘Incredible. Considering how strong King Heaven-Devourer’s will was, I wonder what will happen when I collect all of King Immortal-Slayer’s medallions and resurrect his will. For now, I should refrain from putting together the full collection. If his will manages to suppress the God Legion Seal, I would end up possessed.’

His heart pounded with residual fear; during the fight just now, his nascent divinity had very nearly been destroyed, and it was only because of the God Legion Seal that he came out on top and suppressed the will of King Heaven-Devourer. In the future, if he were ever weakened enough, King Heaven-Devourer might awaken again, take over his body, and return to the world.

Chapter 806: Meeting with Sectlord Nine Yangs

Things were going exactly according to plan.

Yang Qi first took the legacy in the Aeonic God Temple, making him an expert on the same level as Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven. And that was without the God Legion Seal, the Aeonic God Destroyer, or the Cruiser of Civilization.

He was now strong enough to be able to fight it out with Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven without relying on any magical treasures.

Of course, killing him would be another matter, and that wasn’t to mention the fact that he had three other Grand Emperors to back him up. Taking the position of league-lord still wouldn’t be an easy task.

As for his collection of three thousand imperial snakecharms, they were probably his most powerful asset, other than the God Legion Seal. Only the full collection of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions would eventually surpass their power. With the primal-chaos elder-snake he could now summon, no amount of primal-chaos paleo-energy could possibly cause a problem for him.

Of course, there were still four hundred talismans that were not on his person. Two hundred were near the passageway to the future world, and two hundred were in the spell formation connecting to the past world. But the spirit of the talismans was fully in Yang Qi’s possession, so all it would take would be a thought on his part to summon them to him.

“I can’t believe you collected all of King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans!” Patriarch Annalist said, his face a mask of fear. “It's terrifying! Upon being resurrected, King Heaven-Devourer must have tried to take control of your destiny. But you suppressed him!? You’re the true Lord of our times! Grand Emperors Ragefire Broilheaven and Myriadmagic Heavenspan are like jokes compared to you, and it would be absurd for them to oppose you. In fact, with those three thousand talismans, you could travel the Ancient Road to the Gods and search for a foundation for godly ascension.”

“The Ancient Road to the Gods?” Yang Qi shook his head. “No one knows how long that road stretches on for, and it’s a very dangerous place. Although I can take care of myself, I'm not sure I could handle that level of difficulty. Besides, I've heard that once you begin to travel the Ancient Road to the Gods, you can’t turn back until you reach godly ascension. I have too many other important matters to handle right now.”

“True,” Patriarch Annalist said, recovering his composure. “So, you said you can heal my cultivation deviation injuries?”

“Yes. I’ll do it right now.” He circulated his energy arts, and a medicinal aroma instantly filled the area.

A strange expression appeared on Patriarch Annalist’s face. “You’re really going to heal me, just like that? Aren’t you worried I might just leave afterward and not help you deal with the Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court?”

“No, I'm not worried,” Yang Qi replied, looking quite indifferent. “My main goal here was to get the rest of King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans. You were merely an added perk. After this, you’re free to do whatever you feel like. You’re an enemy of Grand Emperor Myriadmagic Heavenspan, and that means you’re useful no matter what you do. Just keep in mind that, with the full collection of talismans, I could kill one of those Grand Emperors. And that makes me the top figure beneath the legion of gods. In fact, I could probably compete with the gods now. In any case, healing you will be a simple matter.”

Patriarch Annalist was silent for a long moment, before finally sighing. “You truly understand what righteousness is, Young Sir. You truly do deserve to be the ultimate Lord of our age. I have no choice but to stick closely to you. I owe you my life, and I’ll help you exact vengeance on Grand Emperor Myriadmagic Heavenspan.”

Thump!

Yang Qi’s hand landed on Patriarch Annalist’s head. He called on the true energy of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth and the energy of his Blood of the One God, sending it coursing into Patriarch Annalist’s sea of energy.

There, he saw that Patriarch Annalist had a huge reserve of true energy that contained deathless godliness. It seemed to contain traces of the ancient history of countless civilizations, and it was powerful beyond belief.

It was an energy art that was no less powerful than the Aeonic Heaven-Dao Life-Destruction Zen Art.

A moment later, Yang Qi struck at the true energy with his Life-Death Void-Destruction God-Lightning.

C-C-CRACK!

Patriarch Annalist’s reserves of true energy were suddenly opened, and he felt as light as a feather. Then his limbs began twitching as his previously cracked and wrinkled skin turned smooth and glossy.

“Great Dao Reconvergence; Shatter the True Empyrean!” Yang Qi poured more true energy into Patriarch Annalist, stabilizing him, purifying him, and revealing hidden injuries. It was all thanks to the marvelous capabilities of the Heaven and Earth Furnace.

Yang Qi reigned in his energy arts, looking as calm as if nothing had just happened.

“Alright, Patriarch Annalist, I've healed you and filled you back up with true energy. All of the various aspects of history and civilization that filled you were combined in my Heaven and Earth Furnace. Now you should be stronger than ever, and before long you’ll experience another breakthrough, too. At that point, you should be strong enough to hold your own against Grand Emperor Myriadmagic Heavenspan!”

Patriarch Annalist leaped to his feet, his face full of joy. As he circulated his energy arts and formed his personal kingdom around him, scenes from history flashed by. It was as if he were the patriarch of all the epic sagas of the past, or the annalist that recorded all civilizations.

After a moment, he settled his energy arts, clasped his hands, and bowed deeply to Yang Qi.

“Many thanks to you, Young Sir.” He was utterly and thoroughly convinced that he had made the right decision. During the healing process, he had sensed the incredible power of Yang Qi’s true energy, and he knew that trying to oppose him would lead only to death.

“Rise,” Yang Qi said, sending out a gentle stream of true energy to pull Patriarch Annalist to his feet. “Unfortunately, if you join the Dao Defense League, the only open position available would be elder king. Given the level of your cultivation base, you should be able to compete for the position of league-lord, but for now that wouldn’t be wise. Don’t worry. I’ll be the league-lord soon, and I’ll give you a high rank. After all, many of the other leaders will perish in the struggles to come.”

“Many thanks, Young Sir,” Patriarch Annalist said. “Where will we go now?”

“The Eight Tribes Heaven. There’s another treasure that I need to get my hands on. Once I have it, not even the Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court will be able to cause problems for me.”

With that, he turned and flew off into the primal-chaos with a speed the likes of which few people had ever seen.

However, he suddenly stopped in place a moment later.

“What, Young Sir?” Patriarch Annalist said anxiously. “Why did you stop?”

“I just sensed something. I think I'm about to hook a very big fish.” He smiled faintly. “Excellent. Perfect. A very big fish indeed.”

He had just sensed the aura of Sectlord Nine Yangs.

Sectlord Nine Yangs hadn’t been seen in the Dao Defense League for some time now. He didn't even show up for the big contest to select the league-lord and other leaders. Many people assumed that, because of how strong Yang Qi had become lately, he had simply fled before the appointed duel.

And of course, no one had any idea that he had actually acknowledged allegiance to Yang Qi and was now loyal to him.

Within the Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple, Sectlord Nine Yangs faced the grim stares of numerous old-timers, including the Emissary of Darkness and Gloom, Wave Charm. And of course, Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven was the most intimidating of all.

“Sectlord Nine Yangs,” he said, “do you really want to end up dead, with your entire clan wiped out?”

“No, League-Lord!” he said, his eyes wide as if with fear. “I still have some time before my duel with Yang Qi. But his cultivation base is invincible, and he’s the Emissary of Radiance and Light! I'm no match for him now. League-Lord, please, you have to take charge here!”

Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven chuckled loudly. “Take charge? Of course I’ll take charge! Yang Qi is throwing his weight around as the Emissary of Radiance and Light and is disrespecting me, the league-lord. He has no sense of propriety. Don’t worry, I won’t let you die at his hands. However, you really do need to advance your cultivation, otherwise you won’t be a match for him.”

Sectlord Nine Yangs dropped down onto one knee. “League-Lord, please, help me improve my cultivation base. As long as you can help me defeat Yang Qi, I’ll go through hell and high water for you. I’ll serve you faithfully. I’ll do anything! Take on any task! I can even offer all of the former disciples of the Nine Yangs God Sect to you for use as an army.”

“Yeah right,” Wave Charm said. “You think the league-lord cares about your paltry forces? If you really provide faithful service to him, he’ll reward you. Right now, Yang Qi is the biggest threat to his authority. Get rid of him, and the Dao Defense League will truly be united.”

Chapter 807: Hooking the Fish

Sectlord Nine Yangs was surrounded by top experts.

He was a Chaos God, and had once been the type of figure who wouldn’t even have backed down to Young Master Leaf. But confronted with so many people like this, he was obviously a minor figure who didn’t dare to do anything other than babble obsequiously.

“I hate Yang Qi down to my bones!” he wailed. “League-Lord, if you can help me kill him, I’ll do anything. If I fight him as I am now, he’ll definitely kill me. I plead with you to help me improve my cultivation base, League-Lord. Then I can handle him.”

“You understand the situation perfectly,” Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven said. “Of course I’ll help you with your cultivation base. Meet the lord of the Unrestrained Heaven, Wave Wind.”

A burst of devil energy rose up in the area as a figure appeared in a black cloak, complete with a black hood that completely hid his face. He pulsed with a faint holiness, but at the same time, abounded with wretch energy. He was obviously a person who was a combination of wretched evil and holy righteousness. He was mysterious, enigmatic, and of course, indescribably powerful.

He was the devil emperor of the Unrestrained Heaven, Wave Wind, whose cultivation base was no weaker than Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven.

“Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven, could it be that you want me to boost this man’s cultivation base? Well, I happened to concoct this bottle of Myriad-Sages Devil-Tempering Necrosius Truth Pills recently. Is that what you’re after?”

Lord Wave Wind didn’t seem to be exercising any effort at all to respect Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven as the league-lord. Instead, he seemed more like he was talking to an equal. Although Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven didn’t seem very pleased about that, he said, “That's right. Your divine abilities from the dao of devils can provide a lot of benefits to someone who wants to improve their cultivation base. Besides, Sectlord Nine Yangs is a Chaos God, which means reaching a higher level of enlightenment isn’t going to be easy for him. What if the two of us join forces to help him? I’ll provide a God Pill of Fate, and you use one of your Myriad-Sages Devil-Tempering Necrosius Truth Pills. The combination will be extremely domineering, and should help him to shed his current husk and transform on a fundamental level. The two of us can also use the power of our cultivation bases to modify his true energy. What do you say? Afterward, he can kill Yang Qi, and the two of us can split the loot evenly.”

Lord Wave Wind smiled. “Fine. From what I can tell, that Yang Qi made his Army of Radiance and Light by converting a bunch of hell-born fiend-devils into angels. If I can learn his secrets, I could challenge numerous suzerains of hell, defeat them, and take their place. I definitely need to get my hands on him.”

“Let's begin!” With a flourish, Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven produced a large pill that was wreathed in flames and pulsing with such destiny that the entire Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple was covered with a red glow.

They were flames of destiny, the type that might appear when an imperial dynasty reached the height of glory. Flowers would bloom, and fire would burn hot. Rivers would flow with the redness of flame. It wasn't an ordinary fire, but rather something that bordered on the deathless.

This was a God Pill of Fate, which had been created by the ancient Heavenly Court after slaughtering countless geniuses and harvesting their destiny.

These pills were one of the reasons the old Heavenly Court had eventually crumbled. Despite that, the Grand Emperors who founded that court had still benefited greatly.

“Now that is a medicinal pill!” Lord Wave Wind said. “It’s little wonder you and your group killed so many experts in the ancient era. And it's also little wonder that everyone rose up and crushed the court you’d established. I guess it was all worth it, if you ended up with pills like that. But are you really willing to waste a God Pill of Fate on a piece of trash like this? I guess it’s Sectlord Nine Yangs’ lucky day to have made himself an enemy of Yang Qi.”

With that, he produced his own pill, which sizzled with sickly green light and emanated the chanting of devils. Anyone who listened closely to that music would likely lose their minds, even immortals. It was a Myriad-Sages Devil-Tempering Necrosius Truth Pill.

“That’s also quite a pill,” Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven said. “I'm not sure how you went about concocting it, but it seems to be on the same level as my God Pill of Fate. Amidst the horde of devils, you managed to birth yang out of yin, and used devilishness to produce deathless godliness. Amazing! Let’s get to it!”

He crushed the pill in his hand, then flicked his finger. The medicinal strength instantly began flowing into Sectlord Nine Yangs.

At the same time, Lord Wave Wind transformed his pill into a green stream of fire that also shot into Sectlord Nine Yangs.

Instantly, Sectlord Nine Yangs turned as stiff as a corpse and floated slightly up into the air.

Next, the two experts drew on their energy arts and sent streams of energy into him. Suddenly, Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven shouted, “Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court: Myriadmagic Heavenspan, Ninelimits Paragon, Heavenearth Vastocean. Come together! Set up the grand formation to control the dao of heaven and lock down this entire area!”

In response, three streams of power shot into the Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple, quickly forming a huge god formation that locked everything down.

“Father!” Wave Charm blurted, her face falling as she suddenly came to suspect that the Grand Emperor was trying to trap her father.

Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven was vicious, merciless, and would do literally anything to accomplish his goals. Whether it was sworn brothers and sisters, or even his own children, he would sacrifice them all to come out on top. He was more of a devil than anyone who followed the dao of devils, which was exactly why the old Heavenly Court had fallen.

In response, Lord Wave Wind simply chuckled coldly. “Mahānata! Misery! Never-Ending! Suzerains three, come to my aid!”

Three streams of devilishness descended that were in no way weaker than the Grand Emperors’ power streams. They, too, formed a spell formation in the middle of the Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple, creating a complete opposition to Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven’s formation. The two of them were like yin and yang.

Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven shivered with surprise. Never could he have possibly ever guessed that Lord Wave Wind would call on the help of suzerains from thirty-third ranked locations like the Hells of Mahānata, Misery, and Never-Ending.

All of a sudden, Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven felt like he was facing a true rival.

‘Dammit!’ he growled inwardly. ‘So, these hell-born fiend-devils are trying to take a slice of my pie. How despicable. I'm not going to let them off the hook for this. Unfortunately, I have no other option than to cooperate with them for now. Perhaps I’ll lend someone a knife and have them do my dirty work… yes. Yes, I can use Yang Qi to kill the fiend-devils. And maybe he’ll get so hurt in the process that I can easily finish him off in the end.’

Meanwhile, Sectlord Nine Yangs’ cultivation base was increasing rapidly.

At a certain point, Lord Wave Wind reigned in his energy and said, “Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven, with these two god formations we set up, we should have no trouble locking down the space in this area. Once Yang Qi and Sectlord Nine Yangs start their duel, Yang Qi won’t be able to use King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions to escape into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Then we can make our move, and not even a god would be able to stop us.”

“Well, that goes without saying. I and the Grand Emperors Myriadmagic Heavenspan, Ninelimits Paragon, and Heavenearth Vastocean, as well as you and your suzerains of hell, could easily take on a god, much less Yang Qi. Now we need to decide how to split up the spoils. I want all of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions.”

“No. We split them half and half!”

“But there are only seven in total. How do we split up seven?”

Soon, a heated argument was underway.

Out on the edges of primal-chaos, Yang Qi was able to watch the scene by using Sectlord Nine Yangs’ eyes and ears. Although he couldn’t help but chuckle coldly at how all of these people were plotting against him, he was also surprised at how strong they were. If he hadn’t managed to turn Sectlord Nine Yangs to his side and use him as a pawn, it was likely he would perish during the upcoming duel.

In fact, even now, he was worried that if he went to Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple, he would end up captured. Even if he were a Measureless God, there was no way he would stand a chance against the Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court, plus four suzerains of hell.

‘I have to come up with a plan,’ he thought. ‘I know what they’re going to do to me, so I should be able to come up with something. Unfortunately, I can’t just choose to not show up. That would be a huge blow to my reputation. How can I foil this conspiracy of theirs? Trick the tiger into attacking the wolf? Or perhaps I could use the strategy of sowing distrust and discord. Maybe I can get that devil lord to betray the Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court. Although, I should probably go get the Engine of the One God before I worry about that.’

If he could get the Engine of the One God and sufficiently power it up, then not even these eight powerful opponents would be able to easily deal with him.

Before long, Yang Qi and Patriarch Annalist were outside the Eight Tribes Heaven.

“What an ancient aura,” Patriarch Annalist murmured, visibly taken aback. The entire immortal world was surrounded by a primeval mist that was grey in color, and clearly impossible to pass through.

There were enormous dragons flying to and fro in the mist, with incredibly powerful energy arts. It looked like the Eight Tribes Heaven was now starting to expand in the same way that the Brahman Immortal World had, earlier. And the killing intent of the Primeval Age was now fully detectable.

“Well, this is nothing to take lightly,” Yang Qi said. “It seems they really are following the example of the Brahman Immortal World by summoning experts from the Primeval Age.”

He shook his head slowly. It seemed that the Dao Defense League was heading for major trouble. The attack by the future world was bad enough, but now the past world was coming. And during the middle of it all, people like Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven were trying to benefit themselves. The path ahead was blocked, there were enemy soldiers in pursuit, and there seemed to be no options. Yang Qi was truly unsure of what to do.

Even if he killed the Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court and took power, he wasn’t confident that he would successfully be able to lead the Dao Defense League in the fight against the other two worlds. In fact, he was certain that, if he tried, the end result would be the future and past worlds allying to destroy the present.

Soon enough, the other two bearers of the God Legion Seal would come.

Then he would have no choice but to fight.

Chapter 808: Primeval Experts

Outside of the Eight Tribes Heaven, there were countless mountains formed from pure vital energy, all of which were similar to twentieth-ranked immortal worlds. And of course, they were all occupied by the Dragonfolk.

Right now, there were members of the Dragonfolk pouring out of the mountains to patrol the area and keep watch. One of them was a burly fellow who shouted, “Listen up, boys. Pay attention on your patrols, and don’t let anyone into our Eight Tribes Heaven. The higher-ups have passed down orders to keep everything sealed tight. No slipups! If you make any mistakes, you’ll lose your head. Got it? We’ve summoned some top experts to our side, and if the master plan succeeds our Eight Tribes Heaven will rise to a higher level. All of us will benefit, too. Our cultivation will increase by three levels, at a minimum. That’s the equivalent of a hundred million years of bitter cultivation. Understood? Put your hearts into it!”

“Pillage and plunder! No one can stop us!”

“The wealth, women, and treasures of the other immortal worlds will be ours! Countless immortals will become our slaves!”

“There are too many immortal worlds to even count. How could we Dragonfolk be limited to just the tiny Eight Tribes Heaven!? We're going to take over all of the immortal worlds! Before long, we Dragonfolk are going to rule everything, and the immortals will all be our slaves. Once they’re trembling at our feet, we can take their wives and daughters for our own pleasure!”

“How detestable that the immortals sometimes capture us and force us to serve as mounts. That’s a humiliation that we simply can’t tolerate! An insult to our blood! The time has finally come to turn the tables and hold our heads high!”

As the Dragonfolk surged forth, their murderous auras surging, it was obvious that the other immortal worlds were in for a disaster.

“Tribulation. Major tribulation,” Patriarch Annalist said, shaking his head. “The Dragonfolk have always been villains in the making. Not only did they refuse to help in the fight against the future world, they’re actually making things worse. If the dao of heaven completely shatters in our immortal dao civilization and destiny vanishes, then none of us will have any hope of reaching godly ascension. And the lack of a foundation will outright kill many of us. Don’t the Dragonfolk understand that? Ai….”

“These Dragonfolk are unable to accomplish anything but liable to spoil everything!” Yang Qi said, his eyes glittering with killing intent. “The Dao Defense League is holding off the future world. If we get hit from behind right now, all the immortal worlds could fall. This is intolerable.”

“The Dragonfolk really do need to be purged,” Patriarch Annalist said. “Is there any way we can get in there and prevent them from summoning experts from the past? Considering that shield of ancient power covering the entire place, I'd say it’s likely that those experts are already here. We have to be very careful.”

“Don’t worry, I have a way.”

Yang Qi had not yet shown Patriarch Annalist what he could do with the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

WHOOSH!

The two of them flew like lightning into the Eight Tribes Heaven, piercing through its greyspace with the help of Yang Qi’s Freedom Wings, as well as King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans in the form of a primal-chaos elder-snake.

The power from the past that he was absorbing was already benefiting his Cruiser of Civilization.

That said, he had his fragments of the cruiser sealed in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart to avoid creating a resonance with the Engine of the One God. The last thing he wanted was the engine taking control of them.

The Eight Tribes Heaven looked very different from before.

Before, it was a place of incredible grandeur, with endless mountains and countless towering trees. It had seemed like an ancient and wild place. But now there were numerous temples rising up here and there, within which could be seen golden buddhas. They weren't corporeal, but rather power doubles, and they were chanting enchantments that turned into talismans and seeped into the greyspace above. In turn, the greyspace wriggled and twitched as it slowly expanded. Obviously, it wouldn’t be long before the Eight Tribes Heaven rose to a higher level.

But the Eight Tribes Heaven was already a thirty-third ranked immortal world. If it transformed, what would happen? Would it reach the thirty-fourth rank?

Based on what Yang Qi understood, thirty-three was the highest rank possible for immortal worlds. Anything beyond that was the domain of the gods, which meant that the place would basically be like a kingdom of gods.

If that happened, the Dragonfolk here would all definitely reach a higher level.

Patriarch Annalist was shocked by what he was seeing. “That’s the power of ancient buddhas, but where exactly is it coming from? How did the Dragonfolk reach this state? Their ambition knows no bounds! The Eight Tribes Heaven was never like this before.”

“The situation is indeed grim,” Yang Qi said. “I can sense a gathering of primeval experts in one of their central temples. It's not going to be easy for me to get the Engine of the One God.”

Relying primarily on King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans, he headed back to the temple he had visited on his original trip. However, upon arriving, he found himself rebuffed by some sort of gentle power, making it impossible for him to enter the temple.

“That’s a primeval Lokapāla Ten-Directions Tripitaka Aegis!” Patriarch Annalist said. “This is bad. That thing can keep out all sorts of wretch-devils, and can rebuff any type of magic.”

Yang Qi snorted coldly. “Keep out all sorts of wretch-devils? I'm not convinced. Besides, I'm not a wretch-devil—I'm the successor of the Sovereign Lord!”

Drawing on his wheel of fate, he transformed himself into something of the same nature as the Lokapāla Ten-Directions Tripitaka Aegis and passed right through it.

“This… your energy arts!” Patriarch Annalist couldn’t have been more shocked.

“I've reached a level of cultivation where imitating other energy arts is a simple thing,” Yang Qi explained. “All I did was absorb a bit of the true energy of that Lokapāla Ten-Directions Tripitaka Aegis. Then I copied it, which allowed us to pass right through.”

Patriarch Annalist gave a heartfelt sigh. “Incredible. Truly incredible. Young Sir, it seems to me that the task of saving the immortal worlds is going to fall to you.”

“Let's go,” Yang Qi said, and they became a shadowy blur that flew into the depths of the temple. Eventually, they reached the location with the same young man and woman from before, who were still standing guard over King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans, furthering their cultivation at the same time. Before, they were second division Tempered Gods. But now they were eighth division Buddha Gods. It was a level of cultivation advancement that was on par with Yang Qi’s immortal-slaying clone. He couldn’t help but marvel.

Sitting down nearby, Yang Qi looked over at Patriarch Annalist and nodded.

In response, the patriarch exhaled a stream of righteous true energy that quickly entered the two Dragonfolk.

They shivered as their cultivation level suddenly advanced by leaps and bounds, causing popping and cracking noises within their meridians.

“What’s going on here?” the young man said, sounding quite delighted. “How come our cultivation bases are improving so rapidly!?”

Ignoring them, Yang Qi flicked his finger and sent his imperial snakecharms right into the middle of the formation, where they began rapidly absorbing the primeval power.

**

An enormous beam of power descended into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, so large that it rivaled the breadth of a twentieth-ranked immortal world. It was a power that could kill a low-level Chaos God, or seriously injure higher-level old-timers.

In the depths of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, the Cruiser of Civilization twitched and vibrated as if it wished to fly up into the air. But Yang Qi had tightly bound it to make sure it couldn’t leave the chart.

Even outside the Eight Tribes Heaven, Yang Qi had been able to sense the power of the Engine of the One God, and realized that it superseded the individual pieces of the Cruiser of Civilization. Thankfully, the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart could suppress those pieces. This sensation differed from his previous trip here, which went to show what the power of primeval times could do to the Engine of the One God.

As the power descended, it entered the Cruiser of Civilization, causing it to vibrate even more violently.

As he channeled all the power, Yang Qi carefully sent his divine will out, eventually identifying a spell formation further inside the temple where numerous altars had been set up to harvest the pure power from the past.

Eventually, he used his Wheel of Fate to confirm that there was something profoundly strange within the formation, something that emanated supreme godpower. It was something that surpassed Brahma’s heart or head, and could easily create channels of power through space-time.

There were numerous experts gathered around it.

The strange object was enormous, metallic, and elliptical. It was covered with countless protrusions that were twitching, almost as if they were made of flesh and blood.

Thump, thump. Thump, thump.

Godpower pulsed from it, throwing space, time, and the workings of heaven into absolute chaos. In fact, because it drove away the dao of heaven, cultivation advancement could be made without heavenly tribulations.

‘Is that the Engine of the One God? The power is incredible; not even my divine will can see inside of it.’

Looking around, he realized that in addition to the chief of the Buddha Dragon Tribe, there were seven other experts present. Of course, they corresponded to the God Dragon Tribe, the Heaven Dragon Tribe, and the others.

In addition to the eight tribal chiefs, there were five other powerful entities who seemed to be on the same level as the Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court. Based on their primeval auras, they had to be Past Ones.

There was no doubt about it now; the Primeval Age had sent experts here through time.

Chapter 809: Vying Over the Engine

‘I have to get my hands on this Engine of the One God!’

Yang Qi could immediately see how important it was, and how much it would benefit him. With the Engine of the One God in play, his pieces of the Cruiser of Civilization would be virtually useless.

Unfortunately, there were leaders from all of the Eight Tribes present, as well as five experts who were on the same level as the Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court. It was a terrifying force.

Yang Qi decided to take a closer look at the five experts from the past.

Tall and rugged, they had shaved heads, and bulged with muscle. It was obvious that their flesh and blood were made from pure magical laws, and in fact, they were the rare and secretive lokapālas of ancient times. They seemed fierce enough to conquer every obstacle in their path. According to the stories, the lokapālas were guardians of the ancient buddhas, and would use preheaven power with explosive effectiveness.

“Exalted Lokapālas Milā, Sudhā, Hebu, Hasā, and Kushe, it is a profound honor for us Dragonfolk to welcome you, the Five Great Lokapāla god-kings, here to our world. Unfortunately, we have little to entertain you with. I hope you can forgive us.”

“It's fine,” one of the ruddy-faced lokapālas replied, his voice rumbling like a thunder. “We are the god-kings, arhats of the Vajrayāna, they who enshrine joss flame for the many heavens. Any living being who wishes to make offerings to the buddhas must first offer sacrifices to us. How could we possibly be interested in personal pleasure? We have only come here to promote our teachings and save an era that is without the dharma.”

“Exactly,” said another of the lokapālas. “We didn’t come here for pleasure. This is clearly an era devoid of religion and lacking in the dharma, a place of grief and bitterness that needs to be cleansed of heretics and blasphemers. The faith of all people must be directed to us.”

Pulsing with enough killing aura to make himself seem like a god of death, another of the lokapālas said, “Establish faith, execute the blasphemers. That is our goal. Heretics do not deserve to live in any age, this one included. That is our creed. Kill. Kill. And keep killing!”

“Five Great Lokapālas, please, just take the lead,” said Chief Buddha Dragon. “There’s no need for explanations. Our first task at hand is to activate the Engine of the One God to its fullest level. The engine can unleash the might of the One God and gather together the fragments of the Cruiser of Civilization. With an intact cruiser, the Eight Tribes Heaven will definitely be able to rise to a higher level.”

“That’s fine,” another lokapāla said, his voice booming so loudly that it could kill ordinary people who listened to it. “That said, the Cruiser of Civilization was created by the ancient Lord of Civilization, and he was a heretical god who was sentenced to die. We can use the products of his hands, but only temporarily. Once we have enough faith, we will craft our own magical devices based on true religion and never again rely on the work of heretical hands.”

“Yes, sir!” the other Dragonfolk chiefs said. Truth be told, they didn’t look particularly pleased, but they knew they couldn’t afford to offend the lokapālas.

The lokapālas were very stubborn and inflexible, and their only interests were slaughtering wretch-devils, establishing faith, and executing anyone who didn’t believe in their religion. They were the incarnation of the rage of the multitude of buddhas. Their cultivation made them weapons of war who were widely feared in the Primeval Age. For all intents and purposes, they were now weapons in the hands of the Dragonfolk, although they were like double-edged swords that could harm the wielder as much as the enemy.

Around this time, Chief God Dragon sent a message to Chief Buddha Dragon via divine will.

“Chief Buddha Dragon, the Five Great Lokapālas are completely terrifying! Summoning them here is basically inviting the wolf into one’s house.”

“Don’t worry,” Chief Buddha Dragon replied. “I already have everything planned out. The lokapālas have incomparable fighting prowess, but one-track minds. They’ll never reach godly ascension and will always be tools of their Vajrayāna. Even their bodies are simply manifestations of rage. So we’ll use them like the tools they are. They’re roughly as strong as the Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court, and they can summon armies of lesser lokapālas. That army alone should be more than enough to bring the fight to the Dao Defense League and the future world. Then we Dragonfolk will just hide in the shadows and wait for everyone to wear each other down. That’s when we’ll rise to prominence. If we can't control mindless fools like these, we’re nothing but big jokes.”

“Fine. The Eight Tribes have always viewed you as our leader, so do you mind telling us exactly how strong you are now? Could you take out Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven?”

“Don’t worry, I made a breakthrough recently. With the power of these foolish lokapālas, I’ll soon reach the next cultivation level. And once we have the Engine of the One God under our control, defeating Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven will be a simple task. Our top priority is to use the lokapālas to activate the Engine of the One God. For the moment, we’re currently only capable of opening a passageway to transmit power, not corporeal objects. The Five Great Lokapālas are only here because the experts of the Primeval Age made great sacrifices to send them through. The Primeval Age is under a lot of pressure, thanks to the ferocious incursions made there by the future world.”

“It’s no wonder. The future world has countless experts in their forces. And although the Primeval Age does, too, the difference is that the forces of the past aren’t united. In contrast, the fighters from the future world are highly disciplined.”

The discussion continued among the chiefs of the Dragonfolk, who were using a secret channel of communication that the Five Great Lokapālas weren’t even aware of.

Yang Qi was already getting a sense that these lokapālas were powerful, but not particularly bright. They didn’t seem capable of complex planning and were slow to react. They were expressions of rage, focused solely on faith. In the end, they would be terrifying opponents to fight.

As far as Yang Qi was concerned, they seemed like an opportunity for him to take advantage of.

“Enough!” one of the lokapālas said. “The five of us can draw on the remarkable abilities that we have as dharmic guards of the Vajrayāna. We can use the karma of myriad buddhas to activate the Engine of the One God, then use it to open a passageway to the past and summon our Vajrayāna Army. For now, you will stand guard for us. Understand? Once the passageway is open, immense power will flood out and the Eight Tribes Heaven will be transformed into a pure land, a place of porcelain, radiance, and light, free from all blemish!”

BOOM!

When the Five Great Lokapālas said they would do something, they did it. Flames erupted from all of them, entering the Engine of the One God. At the same time, power from primeval times poured into the engine.

The engine trembled, then began pulsing with an aura that could transform the dao of heaven. Slowly, that energy began to seep out into the Eight Tribes Heaven.

Yang Qi sent his divine will out, and soon saw that all of the Dragonfolk in the Eight Tribes Heaven were pushing toward breakthroughs, and there wasn’t a trace of a sign of heavenly tribulation. At the same time, the greyspace of the Eight Tribes Heaven began expanding, pushing out into the primal-chaos paleo-energy. Yang Qi even felt himself being blessed with power.

“This is incredible!” Patriarch Annalist exclaimed. “This power is from gods, not humans! Even an immortal who practiced the most incredible cultivation could never have godpower like this.”

[Beep-beep-beep. Beep-beep-beep.]

Deep in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, the photonic computers of the Cruiser of Civilization whirred to life.

[Power reserves at one ten-thousandth. One one-thousandth…. Power reserves full. Systems coming online. Receiving summons from Engine of the One—]

‘Be suppressed!’ Yang Qi said urgently, and pushed down on the Cruiser of Civilization with incredible force. At the same time, he prepared to make a move.

Swish!

Joining forces with Patriarch Annalist, he suddenly shot forward through numerous aspects of space-time.

In the blink of an eye, he was above the Engine of the One God.

‘Aeon Portal. Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Aeonic God Destroyer. Heaven Beyond Heaven. Come to me!’ Drawing on all the power he could muster, including the God Legion Seal, he launched an assault on the Five Great Lokapālas, cutting them off from their source of power. Then he used the Aeon Portal to control the power of the Heaven Beyond Heaven, plus the godpower of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

‘Imperial snakecharms, devour the Engine of the One God!’

The talismans flew out. In fact, even the talismans connected to the passageway to the future world shivered, then passed through the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart to Yang Qi.

In the blink of an eye, all three thousand of the talismans were fully connected.

In that moment, his power reached a peak level and the will of King Heaven-Devourer appeared again. It was a level of power that could devour the entire Eight Tribes Heaven, and it combined with the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart and the Aeon Portal to tug at the Engine of the One God.

‘It’s so heavy!’ Yang Qi struggled, much like a mortal human would struggle to move a mountain.

The Five Great Lokapālas quickly realized what was happening.

“Bastard!”

“Ha!”

“Who’s that!? What gall! How dare you try to steal the Engine of the One God. Are you looking to die?”

“Heretic! Blasphemer!”

“Die!”

Furious, they joined forces to unleash a devastating palm strike.

“Great Lokapāla God-King Fist!” Golden light shone out like zen chants in the form of dragons, a primeval will that filled the entire area.

“First Palm: Rock Heaven and Earth. Second Palm: Crush the Cosmos. Third Palm: Destroy the Three Worlds. Fourth Palm: Assimilate Primal-Chaos. Fifth Palm: Eradicate the Legion of Gods!”

Each of the five palm strikes they unleashed was a killing move meant to wipe Yang Qi out of existence.

Chapter 810: Fleeing Again

Five palm strikes closed in on Yang Qi, detonating his defensive true energy and shattering his God Legion Paradise.

A moment later, the five palms slammed onto Yang Qi himself.

There was simply no way to dodge out of the way; it was taking all of his concentration just to keep the Engine of the One God in check, so there was no way he could spare attention for fighting.

POP!

The Five Great Lokapālas all landed palm strikes on Yang Qi.

It was a combined attack that would reduce just about anything to dust, even an actual god. However, even as the Five Great Lokapālas’ attack struck the target, they felt as though they had struck nothing, as though their attacks were landing in a different world.

Yang Qi burst out laughing. “Many thanks to you, Five Great Lokapālas! I couldn't have activated the Engine of the One God without those five palm strikes of yours!”

Even as the words left his mouth, he vanished.

As he had done in the past, he diverted the power of the lokapālas’ attack into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Although their move was devastating, when compared to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, it was like nothing. Not even five god-spirits could damage the chart.

Originally, he hadn’t been able to fully suppress the engine after it was in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. But with the power of the lokapālas aiding him, it quickly went still.

Considering that the lokapālas were roughly as strong as Yang Qi, it was like having five additional versions of himself helping control the engine.

Having accomplished that, Yang Qi felt a lot more confident about the situation. In the blink of an eye, he flew out of the Eight Tribes Heaven and into the primal-chaos outside of it.

The last thing he wanted to do was get involved in a fight or a chase with the lokapālas.

“Who was that? Who dared to take our Engine of the One God!?”

“Dammit! That was our only way to open the passageway to the Primeval Age! Now what are we supposed to do? Who exactly was that?”

“Was it one of the Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court?”

“Whose voice was it? I didn’t recognize it.”

As the eight chiefs of the Dragonfolk tribes howled in rage, the five lokapālas scrambled to leave the Eight Tribes Heaven and chase down Yang Qi. The five of them were capable of incredible speeds, and it didn’t take long for them to lock down onto Yang Qi’s aura and start after him.

The eight chiefs of the Dragonfolk were far inferior. Even working together, they quickly lost track of Yang Qi and the lokapālas.

All they could do now was return to their immortal world in fury. They had been thoroughly defeated. Having lost the Engine of the One God, there was no way for them to truly open a passageway to the Primeval Age. Their wild ambitions were burst as surely as a bubble.

“These Five Great Lokapālas are so fast!” Patriarch Annalist said. “Young Sir, what do you say we split up, and I try leading them away from you? I don’t think these mindless dolts will be able to do anything to me.”

“That’s not necessary,” Yang Qi replied coolly. “I'm going to lead them to the Ancient Road to the Gods. I doubt they’ll chase me there. After I shake them, I can use the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart to return.”

“That should work,” Patriarch Annalist said. “Young Sir, have you thought of fighting with those lokapālas to test out your energy arts?”

“Great minds think alike!” Yang Qi said with a laugh. “They're about as strong as the Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court, but they’re nowhere near as smart. For the moment, I'm not strong enough to fully fuse with the Engine of the One God, but I might be able to borrow the force of their attacks to do just that.

At a certain point within the primal-chaos, Yang Qi stopped and waited for the five lokapālas behind him to catch up.

“Who are you, heretic?” one of the lokapālas said, speaking in a voice that ripped through the primal-chaos with enough force to kill Chaos Gods. “Hand over the Engine of the One God and convert to our religion. Otherwise, you can die!”

Yang Qi smiled faintly. “You must be very tired after your journey here from the Primeval Age. Why go to all the hard work of fusing with the Engine of the One God after that? You should really rest. Look, join my side. Give me your faith. I’ll baptize you and free you from your religion. You’ll be free!”

“You blaspheme against Vajrayāna, heretic! For that, you’ll die!”

“We might have let you convert before, but not now. Your soul will be placed in fire for eternal torment!”

“Excise devils and defend traditional values! Unleash incomparable slaughter!”

Not wanting to waste any more words, the lokapālas unleashed five more palm strikes.

RIP!

Yang Qi didn't dodge the incoming attacks, nor did he try to use any energy arts to block them. These were attacks that could pierce through a thirty-third ranked immortal world, yet he let them strike him directly. Unfortunately for the Five Great Lokapālas, the effect was the same as before.

The power of their attacks just seemed to vanish, which was something the five of them had never experienced before. Almost instantly, they were driven into madness.

“Die!”

“Attack with full force! Devastate his body!”

“Heaven-Earth Frenzy; Lokapāla Vajrayāna Fist of Kings!”

The Five Great Lokapālas unleashed another devastatingly powerful attack, but it was like punching a sandbag. Yang Qi shivered a bit, but didn't even stumble back. He just accepted the blow.

The Five Great Lokapālas were just too simple-minded to realize what was happening. If the fight had been with the Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court, things would have been much different. They would have quickly realized that something fishy was going on and set up a spell formation to lock the area down and make sure Yang Qi wasn’t connected to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

Yang Qi was really pulling a cheap trick on the lokapālas.

As the blows continued raining down on him, the Engine of the One God absorbed the force. And seeing as it was suppressed, Yang Qi was able to begin fusing with it and combining it with the pieces of the Cruiser of Civilization.

Slowly but surely, he was using the photonic computers in the engine to find and remove the sealing marks that were placed there by the Dragonfolk and the Vajrayāna buddhist school.

Only by acquiring the approval of the photonic computers in the engine could the sealing marks be removed, and the power of the attacks the lokapālas were sending Yang Qi’s way were helping him do just that.

Soon, the lokapālas attacked with even more force, and Yang Qi continued letting them hit him. Eventually, the Engine of the One God was shining with bright light, and its photonic computers were starting to turn on.

[Beep-beep-beep. Beep-beep-beep. Master recognized. Will identified. The successor of the legion of gods detected. Blood of the godmammoths. The glory of the Sovereign Lord….]

Thus, Yang Qi sent his will into the engine. He immediately saw that it resembled a beating heart and was filled with immense power. As it fused with the Cruiser of Civilization, it became part of Yang Qi, something he could control at any time.

A whirring sound was heard as the engine began powering up.

Yang Qi now had power at his disposal the likes of which only ancient gods could normally unleash. Without any hesitation, he struck out with the Hand of the One God, using five moves to deal with the five lokapālas.

Bam! Bam! Bam! Bam! Bam!

The lokapālas staggered back, coughing up blood, and lacerations covered their porcelain-like flesh.

One attack had seriously injured all of them!

What kind of divine ability could do that?!

The lokapālas reacted with utter shock. “Impossible! Only a Lesser God could possibly force us into retreat! Nothing weaker could ever hurt us!”

Yang Qi burst out laughing. “My apologies, but I fear I have to depart. I think it was a mistake for you to come to this age. We don’t need your religion here. You’re only going to end up dead and buried. I suggest you leave as quickly as possible!”

With that, Yang Qi turned and sped off.

They chased him for some time, until they realized that up ahead of him was something that looked like an ancient road.

“He’s going to the Ancient Road to the Gods! We can't follow him there. Who is this man? I can’t believe he would dare step onto the Ancient Road to the Gods!”

All of them knew that, once one stepped onto the Ancient Road to the Gods, they couldn’t turn back.

“Let’s go!” one of the lokapālas said. “We can head back and establish communication with the buddha-lord. There has to be a way to open the passageway even without the Engine of the One God. We don’t need that heretic!”

“Exactly!”

The lokapālas turned and vanished.

The truth of the matter was that Yang Qi actually hadn’t stepped onto the Ancient Road to the Gods. He stopped right in front of it, and looked into its depths to see innumerable expressions of will, souls, ghost-gods, and all sorts of entities struggling and fighting. He also felt a power tugging at him, urging him not to look back, not to turn around, not to take a step backward. At that moment, he quickly opened the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart and stepped inside.

Moments later, he was back in the God Palace of Radiance and Light in the Dao Defense League, where the Sage Monarch Heaven was.

He was safe.

During the heist of the Engine of the One God, he had not revealed that he was the Emissary of Radiance and Light, thus the Dragonfolk had no way to identify him.

“You played the Five Great Lokapālas perfectly, Young Sir,” Patriarch Annalist said. “But why didn’t you just finish them off? They could end up being quite a disaster.”

“I could’ve done it with the Engine of the One God,” Yang Qi replied, “but it would’ve wasted too much power. The engine wastes power at a rate tens of thousands of times greater than the two fragments of the Cruiser of Civilization combined. I probably could only have squeezed off one shot. Right now, I need to continue powering it up to deal with the Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court!”

Chapter 811: Meeting Suzerains of Hell

It took a huge amount of power to start the Engine of the One God. True, Yang Qi had picked up quite a bit of power from the Aeonic God Temple, as well as the passageway to the Primeval Age. Unfortunately, even just the initial clash with the Five Great Lokapālas was quite draining, and Yang Qi wasn’t inclined to continue that trend. Even if he completely drained himself, he didn’t think he would be able to kill them.

Instead, he would conserve as much power as possible to use on the Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court.

Thanks to Sectlord Nine Yangs, he knew that the four emperors were conniving against him with the lord of the Unrestrained Heaven. They had set up deadly spell formations in the Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple that would prevent him from escaping into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Then, when he was stuck, eight top experts would all attack him at the same time. It would be a dangerous, tricky situation, that was for sure.

That said, he had strategies of his own to rely on.

For one thing, it seemed unlikely that the lord of the Unrestrained Heaven and his four suzerains of hell were completely in line with the Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court. They had their own goals and motivations, including the ultimate desire to take down the four emperors, gain more power in the Dao Defense League, and harvest universal fortune.

That said, universal fortune wasn’t an easy thing to seize, especially for those who followed the dao of devils. As such, Yang Qi just needed to find the right weak spot to strike at.

Back in the Sage Monarch Heaven, Yang Qi reached out to Patriarch Annalist with divine will and asked, “How is your cultivation base? Have you fully recovered?”

Patriarch Annalist was on the same level as Grand Emperor Myriadmagic Heavenspan; both of them were apex-level cultivators. He had been around since ancient times, and his enlightenment regarding daoist magic and energy arts surpassed Yang Qi’s by a significant margin.

Thankfully, Yang Qi had more experience than the average person, and had encountered much good fortune. He had absorbed the seven gods from the Aeonic God Temple, and although he had not fully assimilated all of their magic and power, he had definitely pushed his energy arts to roughly the same level as Patriarch Annalist.

Right now, he understood things far more clearly than before and had resolved all of his previous issues and areas of ignorance.

“I'm fully recovered,” Patriarch Annalist said, “and have even progressed a bit. Given some time, I’ll definitely be able to defeat Grand Emperor Myriadmagic Heavenspan in a fight.” He sighed. “There’s an old poem from the mortal world that says, each generation will produce talented individuals; their dissertations will be passed down for centuries. We outdated old-timers need to step aside for the next generation. In each new age, new elites will rise up.”

Yang Qi shook his head. “I appreciate the kind words, but you're mistaken. Other than me, there’s no one worthy in the current generation. Leaf Dao-Denier is strong, but he doesn't come close to matching up to Grand Emperor Myriadmagic Heavenspan. And the Dao Defense League itself is the idea of the Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court. In any case, Patriarch, if you’re fully recovered, I want to take you to see someone.”

“Oh? Who?”

“The devil lord of the Unrestrained Heaven, Wave Wind. We're going to go to the Unrestrained Heaven and see if we can make a deal with him.”

“What? Wave Wind? Unrestrained Heaven? That place is very dangerous, and those people are working with the four emperors. It’s a place filled with so many heaven-devils that not even all the immortals working together would dare to go there. It’s definitely as dangerous as a dragon’s pool or a tiger’s den. The power of the Unrestrained Heaven is so incredible and mysterious that it can cripple the dao of immortals. Heaven-devils are almost impossible to kill, and even worse, they can be born from heart-devils or the mere will of heaven. This is going to be a very dangerous trip.”

“Don’t worry, I control the power of hell. And the Unrestrained Heaven has hellish characteristics that I can manipulate. I want to see for myself just why this Wave Wind is working in opposition to me. If he doesn’t agree to acknowledge allegiance, I’ll just destroy his Unrestrained Heaven. Dealing with monsters will be a lot easier for me than handling the Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court. After all, my energy arts are specifically designed to be the bane of hell-born fiend-devils.”

“In that case, my life is in your hands, sir. Where you go, I go.” Patriarch Annalist really didn't seem very worried, and as they flew along he actually spent most of his time pondering the mysteries of his All-Eternity Spring-Autumn Annalist God-Dao Scripture.

It was an art left behind by ancient gods, after all. If he could cultivate it to completion, he would be extremely awe-inspiring and righteous, and would have extraordinary advantages when dealing with wretch-devils.

They flew along for some time before catching sight of an area up ahead that was filled with devilish clouds and sinister winds.

“Young Sir, that's the Unrestrained Heaven right there,” Patriarch Annalist said. “It exists between the realm of hells and immortal worlds, here on the very edges of primal-chaos paleo-energy. That barrier of devilish clouds is called the Immortal-Melting Miasma, and it lives up to its name in every way. Any immortal who touches it will be melted, and ultimately transformed into a heaven-devil. It’s hard to say how many immortals have become part of the Unrestrained Heaven over the years because of that miasma. In ancient times, there were even gods who perished and became part of it.”

“Let’s head inside.” Yang Qi seemed completely unimpressed by the miasma and simply flew right into it. As he went along, nothing that lurked within even noticed him.

There were countless heaven-devils everywhere, all of whom were bizarre to say the least. Some had numerous wings, some were three-headed and six armed, and some existed in the forms of books or cauldrons. When it came to heaven-devils, sometimes the offspring didn’t resemble the parents in any way. In that respect, they were like the nine sons of the dragon.

Because there were absolutely no restraints on such heaven-devils, and they could end up in just about any possible form, they were known as unrestrained heaven-devils. They were free and independent, unfettered and able to act in any way they wished.

One characteristic they all shared was incredible strength. They lived within the devilish miasma, sometimes fighting each other and sometimes leading armies in campaigns of war. They cultivated wretch-devil energy arts and followed the law of the jungle in every way. There was no larger society controlling things, nor was there a royal dynasty issuing orders.

The Unrestrained Heaven was definitely no smaller than the Hell of Mahānata. And truth be told, it had no official lord or ruler. It was so mysterious and unpredictable that no one knew exactly what was lurking in its deepest depths.

Wave Wind wasn’t truly the lord of the entire Unrestrained Heaven, he was just the leader of one of the most powerful and active factions. To date, no one had risen up to completely seize the legacy of the place’s essence.

It was like the Tusita Heaven, in that regard—ultimately lordless. Although the Tusita Dynasty was powerful, its emperor didn’t truly control the immortal world. Even Leaf Dao-Denier, who had passed the Essence Trial, was only partly its ruler.

As Yang Qi proceeded through the mists and past the countless battling heaven-devils, he started to understand how the Unrestrained Heaven was shaped. The portion that was visible from the outside was only the tip of the iceberg, while the rest of it stretched into primal-chaos like the roots of a tree. It almost seemed alive, twitching and wriggling as it expanded into various universes around it.

‘This place is enormous,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘Just what I would expect of a place where ancient gods died.’ As for the devilishness that was so destructive and dangerous, his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth easily protected him from it.

That said, the place was so enormous, and filled with such power, that Yang Qi could tell he would need to reach the Deathless Heavenly Stairway before he could go very far inside.

Normally speaking, tracking down one individual here would be like fishing a needle from the sea. Thankfully, he had planned how to find Wave Wind in advance. By means of Sectlord Nine Yangs, he had managed to plant an energy art seed on him, which he could use to track him down no matter where he went.

The Unrestrained Heaven seemed like a place of endless fighting and battle, whether in the sky, on the land, or in the sea. The entire place was a battlefield. Some of the leaders of the heaven-devils had built fortifications; however, such places could easily be overrun if other, stronger heaven-devils came along.

Because of the constant influx of universal power, new heaven-devils were born with every moment that passed. As they breathed in the vital energy of the Unrestrained Heaven and used it for cultivation, they were naturally imbued with its fundamental nature. They lived for slaughter, fighting, devouring, and destruction.

Each and every heaven-devil was, by nature, vicious and bloodthirsty.

However, as they furthered their cultivation, they would develop more human characteristics, and would become more intelligent and wise. As they learned to manipulate the dao of heaven, they could seek luck and avoid calamity.

“The only rule here is that you have to kill,” Patriarch Annalist said, shaking his head. “Everywhere you look, battles are being waged. It's worse than the Hell of Suras! Even old-timers who come here will end up getting killed. Anyone who ended up besieged by these heaven-devils and suppressed by the essence of this place would have no hope of escaping. I doubt even Lesser Gods could last. There are far more hells in existence than immortal worlds, and hells are a scourge on existence. A cancer. One of these days, they’ll surely devour the many heavens in existence.”

Yang Qi nodded. “That’s exactly why the paramount Sovereign Lord created the godmammoths, to crush hells. But now the godmammoths are gone, and for some reason the hells seem much weaker than in the past. It makes you wonder why.”

Chapter 812: Not Gonna Cooperate?

“You see,” Patriarch Annalist said, “something monumental happened between the legion of gods, the hells, the godmammoths, and the Sovereign Lord. It was an immense war that led to the legion of gods perishing. Nowadays, the Ancient Road to the Gods is in ruins, and based on my understanding, it contains the corpses of gods, as well as god items and various other ruined treasures of the gods.

“Even the God Legion Seal was broken during that war. I was alive during that time and witnessed much of what occurred. After the gods perished, heroes arose and the dao of immortals rose to prominence. It was also during that chaotic time that the Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court appeared. Hmph! There were other top-tier individuals who existed back then that were even more powerful than the four emperors, but sadly they chose to walk to the Ancient Road to the Gods. And when the tiger is away from the mountain, the monkey becomes king.”

‘So that's how it is,’ Yang Qi thought, stunned. ‘I'm definitely going to go to the Ancient Road to the Gods sooner or later. That’s the place to search for godly ascension. Except, despite how many countless people have made the attempt, it seems no one has succeeded in becoming a god lately. Of course, I've seen a true god, albeit in pieces.’

After all, he had met Brahma, who despite being severely injured and even chopped up into pieces, was still a god.

As they conversed, Yang Qi and Patriarch Annalist ventured further into the depths of the Unrestrained Heaven. The heaven-devils grew stronger and the fighting became more intense. Eventually, they could see Godmyth heaven-devils fighting and dying, including some who were ninth division Chaos Gods.

The fighting was so intense that the vital energy in the area was in complete disorder and the heavenly bodies weren’t visible. Thankfully, the Unrestrained Heaven had a very tough greyspace, otherwise it might have been destroyed.

‘Considering the constant fighting,’ Yang Qi thought, ‘it makes sense that the Unrestrained Heaven produces such top experts. Those who survive are veterans of numerous battles. No wonder human cultivators are no match for monsters like this.’

“Alright, that’s Wave Wind’s palace just ahead. Look, it’s surrounded by devil light that makes it impossible for any other heaven-devils to enter it.” The castle was indeed surrounded by dark green light, which made the place look particularly beautiful, although filled with profound devil energy.

And the fact that none of the other heaven-devils wanted to get near it made it seem like the lair of some dangerous beast that no other animals would approach.

“That profound light will detect anyone who tries to approach,” Patriarch Annalist said. “What do we do now?”

“When you visit someone, you knock on the door,” Yang Qi said, stepping out into the open to reveal himself.

BOOM!

A massive eruption of power rolled out from Yang Qi.

Crack. Rattle.

The light instantly shredded countless nearby heaven-devils into smoke, including some of the Chaos and Buddha Gods.

“I am Yang Qi,” he said loudly, “the Emissary of Radiance and Light from the Dao Defense League, here to pay a formal visit to Devil Lord Wave Wind!”

RIP!

Yang Qi waved his hand, sending out such a burst of radiance and light that everything around him was evaporated into nothing. Then he unleashed the Hand of the One God, sending it directly toward the dark green shield of light.

The green light trembled, then shattered, creating a deadly shock wave. However, the shock wave collapsed when it touched Yang Qi. Not even the essence of the Unrestrained Heaven could do anything to his sagelight.

Yang Qi’s sudden move caused Patriarch Annalist’s heart to pound with fear. “Is this how you negotiate, Young Sir?”

“Hmph! These wretch-devils are plotting to kill me, so I need to make a show of strength. They think me weak, but they need to realize I'm not the same person I was before!” Only a month before, in the Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple, Yang Qi had been a fifth division Nirvanic God, and hadn’t been nearly on a level where he could beat Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven in a fight. But now he was a seventh division Measureless God, and had the legacy of seven gods, the bounty of the Aeonic God Temple, and all three thousand of King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans. That wasn’t to mention the Engine of the One God. Although he wasn’t able to draw on the full power of everything he had acquired, he was still a thousand times stronger than before.

Not even the Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court working together could kill him now.

Given some time, he would gain full enlightenment of everything that the Aeonic God Temple, King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans, and the Engine of the One God had to offer. Then he would become a Chaos God, and no one would be able to stand in his way.

As soon as the shield shattered, Wave Wind himself shot out into the open.

To hear and then see Yang Qi here caused an expression of surprise to appear on his face. “Y-you… you really are the Emissary of Radiance and Light! How did you get this strong? You're not even afraid of the Unrestrained Heaven? Immortals who dare to come into the depths of hell are like moths flying into flame!”

Snorting coldly, Yang Qi retracted the shining light he had sent out. “Cut the crap, Devil Lord Wave Wind. I know that you and the Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court are working together against me. You set up spell formations in the Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple so that I won’t be able to get to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart during my duel with Sectlord Nine Yangs. Did you really think I would just fall right into your trap? Well I won’t. And I've come here today to kill you!”

“What? How did you find out about our plan? Who told you? That was a top-secret matter known only to the Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court and my most trusted advisors! Was it the emperors? Did they tell you? That must be the case. They’re hoping the two of us will start fighting!”

From the way Wave Wind spoke, it was obvious that he was a viciously treacherous person, completely different from the feeble-minded lokapālas.

“Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court? No, they didn’t tell me. It was Sectlord Nine Yangs. He’s a believer of mine and has been acting as my agent. I bet you never would have dreamed that would be the case. Sorry to say, Devil Lord, the time has come for you to die.”

RUMBLE!

Without any further fanfare, Yang Qi launched a fist strike.

The essence of the Unrestrained Heaven became a huge vortex as he sent the Hand of the One God directly toward Wave Wind.

“Unrestrained Godfist!” Wave Wind shouted in rage.

Devil energy converged in his hand, turning into an enormous mountain that he thrust out to meet the incoming attack. The two fists slammed into each other and a massive shock wave of vital energy spread out, destroying everything it touched.

Suddenly, Yang Qi blurred and became a host of projections that fanned out to surround Wave Wind like an enormous army.

‘Such profound energy arts!’ Wave Wind thought. ‘How did he get this strong? My daughter said that, thanks to King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions, he’s about as strong as Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven. But he’s obviously stronger than that! His energy is so strong I feel like I'm suffocating!’

Wave Wind used another technique, the Grand Unrestrained Gentleman’s Heaven-Devil Fist. Unfortunately, it was virtually useless. His opponent was battering him with numerous attacks, all of which sent true energy of radiance and light into his meridians and sea of consciousness. If it weren’t for his profound cultivation base, and the fact that he had the advantage of being in the Unrestrained Heaven, he would definitely be dead already.

He simply couldn’t wrap his mind around the fact that Yang Qi had energy arts this strong.

He himself was on par with Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven, which meant that if the two of them fought head to head, the battle could likely go on for a thousand years with no resolution. But here in the Unrestrained Heaven, with its essence under his control, he would definitely have an advantage against Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi was thinking, ‘This guy is really strong; I don’t think I can kill him quickly.’

Redoubling his speed, he drew on two attacks at the same time, one with the Fist of the Halls of Heaven and the other with the Hand of the One God. Countless projections of the ancient halls of heaven appeared, transforming the devilish world around him into something pure.

“Devil Weapon: Evil Sin!” Fully aware of the desperate position he was in, Wave Wind finally pulled out a cudgel made of bone. Covered with inscriptions that described the death of the legion of gods, it was a god item from hell, an extremely high-level weapon that Wave Wind had acquired a hundred million years ago. Waving it back and forth with immense skill, he fended off the godpower of the Fist of the Halls of Heaven.

“You think a devil weapon left behind by some dead gods is going to stop me? You’re crazy!” Yang Qi thrust his hand out again, this time drawing on the power of the Engine of the One God.

POP!

His hand hit Evil Sin, smacking it several times before he finally managed to grab onto it.

Crack. Crunch.

Evil Sin shattered, transforming into nothing but dust.

Chapter 813: Submission by Beatdown

The heart-shaped Engine of the One God could provide immense power. Therefore, anyone who controlled the engine and its power would be immensely strong. The truth was that the engine hadn’t been crafted from metallic machinery. Instead, it was built from the flesh and blood of gods and devils. The ancient Lord of Civilization himself had a body made of pure quintessence vitality, and was originally born out of the countless magical laws and expressions of power that existed in the god world.

Yang Qi had the Engine of the One God in his own heart, so in some ways it was as if he had the heart of the One God. With such power coursing through him, he could easily rip the Five Great Lokapālas to shreds.

And now, in a situation in which he wanted to conserve as much power as possible, he used the engine to back his deadly attack.

Lord Wave Wind couldn’t have been more shocked to see his weapon, Evil Sin, shatter. After all, it was an incredibly powerful god item that had become a part of him over the years. In fact, he had even felt safe in assuming that it would be strong enough to vanquish Yang Qi and his energy arts, only to have such expectations completely subverted.

All of a sudden, Wave Wind shouted, “Mahānata. Never-Ending. Misery. Get out here, the three of you! Don’t tell me you want to see me dead! If I get killed, you’ll be the next ones to die.”

Yang Qi pulled his hand back and laughed heartily. “So, you’re summoning suzerains of other hells to help you? Let’s see what it's like when the four of you work together. I wonder if any of you will manage to survive.”

Wave Wind wasn’t sure why his opponent had suddenly seemed to cease attacking, but that didn’t stop him from proceeding with his summoning.

A moment later, three powerful waves of power descended as three newcomers arrived. One of them wore a dark golden robe, making it obvious that he was the suzerain of the Hell of Mahānata. Another, in black and red, was from the Hell of Misery, and the third wore robes of black and white, and was from the Hell of Never-Ending.

In the past, Never-Ending Suffering had been a pair. Suffering was Never-Ending. Never-ending Suffering. Once upon a time, they had been twin gods, but they eventually perished, and their quintessence-blood became a pair of hells.

RUMBLE!

When the three suzerains arrived and saw Lord Wave Wind in such a bedraggled state, they laughed.

“You’re not in very good shape, Devil Lord Wave Wind! It’s been millions upon millions of years since I’ve seen you like this.”

“I remember you were in a bad situation years ago when you had that run-in with King Attu. Unfortunately, King Attu long since stepped onto the Ancient Road to the Gods. He's either in the god world now, or dead.”

“Did this boy really beat you into such a sorry state?”

The three suzerains shifted their gaze to Yang Qi.

“I didn’t call you three here to ridicule me,” Devil Lord Wave Wind said. “This is the Emissary of Radiance and Light we've discussed. Somehow, he found out about our plan with the Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court and has come to kill us. He already destroyed my cudgel, Evil Sin.”

“What?”

“He destroyed Evil Sin?”

“That’s not possible! Evil Sin was created from the bones of a god! It's indestructible. No force in existence could possibly be strong enough to destroy bones left behind by a god.”

The golden-robed Suzerain Mahānata stepped forward. “Boy, are you the Emissary of Radiance and Light? Do you really think you can kill a suzerain of hell? You don’t have divine abilities strong enough to do that. I don’t know how you learned our secrets, but you must know that if we join forces with the Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court, there’s no way you can escape our wrath. Why don’t you be a good boy and just accept death?”

“Young Sir, these four are about to join forces,” Patriarch Annalist said, stepping out into the open. “Shall I handle one of them for you, sir?”

Suzerains Misery and Never-Ending both recognized the illustrious Patriarch Annalist, who they knew was no weaker than they were.

“So it’s you, Patriarch Annalist!” Suzerain Misery said. “What are you calling him Young Sir for? Don’t tell me you’ve willingly become his lackey?”

“The young sir is mysterious and unpredictable,” Patriarch Annalist said, “and I'm only here today thanks to his kindness and mercy. I had experienced cultivation deviation, but he saved me, returned me to health, and even helped me reach a higher level of enlightenment. Now I have a chance to reach godly ascension. You four should surrender immediately. Truth be told, the young sir doesn’t really want to kill you, just prove to you how strong he is. Join him in bolstering the Dao Defense League and ending the rapacious scheming of the Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court. Help bring stability to heaven and earth, and join the fight against the future world.”

“Oh?” Suzerain Never-Ending said. “So, boy, you really do have some high ambitions. You want to conquer the universe. Unfortunately, we here are hell-born fiend-devils. The future world might take over the immortal dao civilization, but they won’t invade hell. Not even they could survive the devil energy. So what do we have to be afraid of? As hell-born fiend-devils, people from the immortal worlds are our enemies too!”

“I don’t care who is, or isn’t, an enemy,” Yang Qi said with a dramatic wave of his finger. “I have one reason for coming here to the Unrestrained Heaven, and that’s to accept your allegiance. Either you give it to me, or you die. Those are your two options. The fact that you’ve been working with the Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court against me is enough to earn you a death sentence.”

“You talk big, boy,” Suzerain Mahānata said. “You think you’re going to kill us? If we join forces, we're no weaker than the four emperors. And that means that if you can kill us, you could kill them. But there’s no way you're that strong. And in a moment, you’re going to pay the price for your arrogance!”

“Arrogance?” Yang Qi said, not backing up by even a single step. “I'm not being arrogant at all. It might be difficult for me to deal with the Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court, because they follow the dao of immortals. But you people are from hell, and my energy arts are the bane of your existence. It's definitely within the realm of possibility for me to kill you.”

“Are you kidding me? The bane of our existence? I've never seen anything like that. Besides, did you really think that we only use devil arts? The only way to achieve a cultivation base like ours is to cultivate the dao of devils and immortals together. When you combine righteous and evil, you acquire the strength of both. We have the hearts of immortal-devils, and I’d very much like to see what could possibly be the bane of that! Grand Formation: Hellish Essence, Four Extremities!”

Four heavenly pillars appeared, expressions of pure power that were being controlled by the four suzerains.

As the spell formation activated, Yang Qi could sense his connection to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart being interfered with. Thankfully, there was no way any of these people could truly block him as long as he had the power of the Engine of the One God.

Years ago, the Lord of Civilization, the ultimate creator of the Cruiser of Civilization, had been nearly on the same level as King Immortal-Slayer.

“You people are very ignorant and ill-informed,” Yang Qi said. “You think there’s nothing that can be the bane of your existence? I suppose I need to show you something called the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. With the power of godmammoths, I can conquer devils and gods and control all hells!”

True energy, radiance, and light erupted, creating a projected godmammoth whose trunk could draw on the essences of endless hells.

“That’s….”

“The Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth?! How is this even possible? How did you get that?!”

“The boundless Sovereign Lord left that behind. The Monarch of myriad gods!”

In the blink of an eye, Yang Qi proved he was the bane of their existence as he cut them off from the essences of their various hells. Inwardly, Yang Qi nodded in satisfaction, having proved that his energy arts had advanced and he was now even more fully connected to the essences of countless hells.

Of course, it begged the question of what the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth would be like when he became a Chaos God.

BOOM!

Yang Qi thrust both of his fists out, causing both light and darkness to swirl together into a taiji symbol of the gods that expanded, creating an immense aegis. This was a new energy art state, the Mandala Vajra Aegis, which was so immensely powerful it could confine gods.

RIP!

Then Yang Qi struck out with the force of a godmammoth, adding in power from the Engine of the One God that made him move so quickly he couldn’t be described in terms of speed. Instantly, his fist was right in front of Suzerain Mahānata.

Suzerain Mahānata had only just begun to make his attack when he was hit with the force of a mountain, knocking him down and causing blood to spray out of his mouth.

He was defeated with one blow!

Then Yang Qi spun and launched another fist attack, moving so quickly that it was almost impossible to track his movement.

BAM!

BAM!

Suzerains Never-Ending and Misery were sent flying.

Clasping his hands behind his back, Yang Qi walked up to Wave Wind.

“Well, what do you think?” he said.

Wave Wind opened his mouth, but only a gurgling sound came out as he dropped down to a sitting position. Normally speaking, he was the kind of person who wouldn’t tremble even in the face of death. How could he possibly be threatened by anyone when he had already surpassed the limitations of life and death?

But he was a person born in hell, and was instinctively terrified of godmammoths, who could innately reduce the effectiveness of his energy arts by thirty percent.

Whoosh. Whoosh. Whoosh.

The three other suzerains flew back to sit at Wave Wind’s side, but all they could do was stare at Yang Qi without daring to make another move.

“You scum call yourselves suzerains of hell? I'm not sure what’s going on, but the true suzerains are obviously gone. Presumably, they went to the Ancient Road to the Gods and left you pieces of trash behind. Alright, enough of this. Give me your faith. Acknowledge allegiance.”

“Fine!” Wave Wind said, finally regaining his composure. “You have a God Legion Seal, so it’s no wonder you know the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. You really are the bane of our existence.”

Chapter 814: You Must Acknowledge Allegiance

“So do you finally realize how strong I am?” Yang Qi said, brushing his hands off. He had used the power of the Engine of the One God just now, making it more than easy to defeat this group. Unfortunately, the engine was now running very low on power, so hopefully the threat he had created would be enough. “Killing you would be as easy for me as flipping my hand over.”

Trembling, Wave Wind said, “If you're so strong, why didn’t you fight the Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court for control of the Dao Defense League?”

Yang Qi snorted coldly. “At that time, I hadn’t reached this level. But now I'm not afraid of the emperors. So acknowledge allegiance. Don’t make the mistake of thinking I won’t devour you.” Even as the words left his mouth, an enormous primal-chaos elder-snake appeared behind him, its mouth gaping like billions of trillions of black holes put together.

The essence of the Unrestrained Heaven immediately began streaming into the snake’s mouth.

RUMBLE!

The entire immortal world began trembling as countless expressions of will burst into activity.

Heaven-devils everywhere began howling in defiance, but that did no good. King Heaven-Devourer gobbled them up, which in turn caused his snake form to transform, the head turning human.

“King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans! All three thousand of them! The will of King Heaven-Devourer’s talisman is back! My god! All of the seventy-two brethren of ancient times had powerful magical treasures, and if you combine them they’ll bring ultimate disaster. They’re inauspicious! But you collected all three thousand of those talismans and kept King Heaven-Devourer’s will under your control?”

The four suzerains of hell were deeply astonished and longed to be able to flee for their lives. Unfortunately, Yang Qi had impressed them so deeply that they didn’t dare to make a single move. Perhaps it would have been effective to flee from an incomplete set of King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans, but the complete collection was a different story.

King Heaven-Devourer was second only to King Immortal-Slayer, a Paramount God who was completely and utterly famous in the ancient god world. People would blanch with terror at the mention of his name, and it was impossible to even say how many ancient gods he had devoured.

These suzerains of hell were little more than gang leaders in modern-day hells, and couldn't compare at all to King Heaven-Devourer. The ancient leaders of the hells were either dead now, or on the Ancient Road to the Gods.

Eyes wide, Devil Lord Wave Wind said, “Emissary of Radiance and Light. Yang Qi. What exactly do you want? Why don’t we make a deal? There’s no need for you to rob us by force. What do you say?”

“That’s right!” Suzerain Mahānata said. “We’ll cooperate with you, Yang Qi. We’ll help you kill the Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court and become the new league-lord. We're not your enemy.”

“You’re not my enemy?” Yang Qi burst out laughing. “That’ll be the day. You were planning to help the Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court to kill me! You even included a Myriad-Sages Devil-Tempering Necrosius Truth Pill in your plan. Did you think I didn’t know that?”

“That was then, this is now,” said Suzerain Misery. “We’re not interested in being your enemy. Why don’t we just sit down and talk things out? We can figure out how to deal with the Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court, and split the profits afterward.”

“What?” Yang Qi said, frowning as if in confusion. “Split the profits? What's that supposed to mean?”

“What, don’t tell me you’re not going to give us our fair share!” All four of the suzerains were completely taken aback.

Snorting coldly, Yang Qi said, “I'm not giving you the tiniest scrap of profit. I want your complete and utter allegiance. And by that, I mean, if you show the slightest bit of disloyalty or duplicity, then you immediately die. Got it? If you want to live, then you serve me like slaves from now on.”

“You!” the suzerains all blurted, leaping to their feet.

“Don't push things too far, Yang Qi,” said Wave Wind. “Otherwise we’ll switch our loyalties back to the Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court and join forces to kill you. You couldn’t match up to all of us at the same time!”

“Oh? You’re getting angry, just like that?” Yang Qi chuckled. “Fine, go ahead. I won’t stop you. Go to the emperors and see how things turn out for you. But remember, you don’t have unkillable bodies. I can take your lives as easily as killing a baby chicken.”

Yang Qi was truly feeling some killing intent. It would be difficult to kill one of these suzerains right now, but if he drained the Engine of the One God, it might be possible. But if he did that, he wouldn’t be able to rely on the engine when it came time to face the Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court, which would make things difficult.

The four emperors were about as strong as the four suzerains, but the difference was that Yang Qi’s energy arts were specifically designed to target the latter, and not the former. He could probably defeat one of the emperors in a fight, but not kill him. And if all four emperors worked together, they might not be able to defeat Yang Qi, but he wouldn’t be able to defeat them, either.

At least he was stronger than before. Before, he would have lost in a fight to even one of them, and all four together would have killed him beyond a shadow of a doubt.

“Don’t press your luck, Yang Qi,” Wave Wind said coldly. “Even a rabbit will bite if you back it into a corner. Besides, we really are suzerains of hell. We have all sorts of ways to deal with you, including ones in which we all die together.”

“Die together?” Yang Qi laughed as though he had just heard the funniest joke in the world. “You four think you’re going to take me down with you in death? Even if you destroyed your own hells to do it, I wouldn’t die. You know full well I have the God Legion Seal, which means I have the blessing of the gods. And you talk of dying together?”

“Well…” Suzerain Mahānata began, but even he knew that talking about mutual destruction with Yang Qi was pointless.

“I'm done wasting my breath on you,” Yang Qi said. “If you don’t acknowledge allegiance, I’ll kill you. I've been holding back up to this point because I wanted to see how you would react. Help me kill the Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court, and I’ll reward you. Fight back, and you can die right here and now. I’ll give you ten breaths of time to make your decision. Keep being pigheaded and I’ll make my move. And if any of you think of trying to run, you’ll be the first to be destroyed.”

His killing intent boiled as he finally resorted to outright threats.

For millions upon millions of years, it had been the suzerains of hell who issued threats. They were never the ones who were threatened. But right now, these four suzerains were so threatened that they felt cold all the way down to their toes.

Just now, Yang Qi had seemed like an enraged god whose every individual strike was like the majesty of the One God. And then he had pulled out King Heaven-Devourer’s Talismans. On top of that, they also knew that he had some of King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy medallions and access to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

“One,” Yang Qi said, seemingly unconcerned with whatever the four suzerains might be thinking.

“Two. Three. Four…. Five. Six…. Seven….”

The suzerains trembled, as if in torment. They wanted to flee, but didn't dare to make the attempt. The Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth was just too dangerous, and all of them feared godmammoths deep in their hearts.

“Eight…. Nine….”

Upon reaching nine, Yang Qi’s killing intent reached a boiling point. If he had to, he would completely drain the Engine of the One God to kill them. If he assimilated the quintessence-blood and vital energy of the four suzerains, he might be in a position to take on the four emperors. At that point, the Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court would be trying to clap with one hand in dealing with him.

“We submit!” Devil Lord Wave Wind said. “We’ll acknowledge allegiance! Just tell us your rules. We only have one stipulation of our own, which is that we won’t open our souls and give faith to you. If we did that, you would have complete life-or-death control over us. We simply can’t accept that.”

“Fine,” Yang Qi said. “A wise man submits to the circumstances. If you hadn’t spoken up just now, you would all be dead already. For now, I won’t demand your faith. But I do require you swear an oath of loyalty.”

He wanted to take things slowly, and knew that he couldn’t force the issue of faith right now. Although that huge influx of faith would be immensely beneficial to his immortal-slaying clone, and even the seventy-one patriarchs, he couldn’t just force the four suzerains to give him their faith. For people with cultivation bases like them, giving faith to someone like him could result in an eternal loss of power that could never be recovered from.

Later, after he had recharged the Engine of the One God and gained full enlightenment of the Aeonic God Temple, perhaps he could take their faith.

For now, everything was going according to plan.

“I, Wave Wind, lord of the Unrestrained Heaven, swear loyalty to the young sir. If my heart sways, I will never reach the Deathless Throne, and will be executed by the young sir. This is my solemn oath.”

The other suzerains quickly made similar oaths.

Of course, Yang Qi knew that promises like this weren’t worth very much. Perhaps they would work on ordinary monsters, but not on devils among devils like this.

But for now, they would suffice. And if they broke their oath, he would just personally kill them.

Chapter 815: The Four Emperors Together

Yang Qi had subdued four deadly monsters.

However, their oaths would only temporarily bind them. There was no way creatures like them would ever willingly serve a human, thus it was only a matter of time before they went back on their word. Monsters in general couldn’t be trusted, at least, not unless he summoned them via his Hell Portals.

Unfortunately, Yang Qi could not yet summon nightmarish experts such as them.

His current limit was Chaos God fiend-devils. And even with the Chaos Gods, he couldn’t summon any fiend-devil that had progressed past the third or fourth minor stair. The four suzerains were so far beyond that level that their auras already resembled that of the Deathless Heavenly Stairway. So it was obvious that Yang Qi couldn’t summon them through his Hell Portals.

He would have to wait until he reached a higher level for that.

Perhaps when he reached the next level, he would even be able to summon fallen wretch gods. Unfortunately, the wretch gods likely didn’t even exist anymore. After the tribulation had struck in the Primeval Age, all of the gods either died, entered nirvana, or vanished.

Although the god Brahma still existed, his godhood was shattered and he was gasping on death’s door like a candle flickering in the wind.

Having sworn his oath, Devil Lord Wave Wind was much more respectful. “Young Sir, what orders do you have for us? Should we just go take out the Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court right away?”

Of course, in his heart he was already plotting and scheming against Yang Qi. Not that Yang Qi didn’t realize that.

“We don’t do anything for now. Wait until the day comes for me to duel Sectlord Nine Yangs. Then, in front of all the important people in the Dao Defense League, we’ll crush the four emperors. That’s when I’ll seize ultimate control.

“I don’t want to take out the emperors in the dead of night when no one knows what's going on. What would be the point of that? I want to make a big impression. Put on a show! Utterly defeating them will make sure no one dares to set themselves against me going forward.”

“Your machinations are beyond comprehension, Young Sir,” the suzerains said in what was obvious flattery. They were fiend-devils who had climbed mountains of corpses and swum through seas of blood to reach their current level of power. They knew how to be flexible, and how to focus fully on their own benefit.

“What do we do now, Young Sir?” Patriarch Annalist said, not bothering to even look at the fiend-devils.

“We leave,” Yang Qi replied coolly. “There’s not much time, and we need to further our cultivation. I have a very important technique that I haven’t pushed to the consummate level. Once I do, I’ll be strong enough to think about walking the Ancient Road to the Gods.”

“What about the four suzerains?”

“Leave them here for now. But keep an eye on them and report to me if they do anything noteworthy. If they try anything funny, I’ll kill them all, even if they run to the Ancient Road to the Gods to try to escape me.”

With that, Yang Qi and Patriarch Annalist vanished.

After they were gone, the four suzerains exchanged wry glances and began transmitting a conversation.

“What do we do?” Suzerain Mahānata said hatefully. “Do we really have to follow his orders like slaves? Or do we just figure out a way to take him out?”

“No, he’s too strong,” Devil Lord Wave Wind said, frowning. “Even if we were to join forces with the Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court, we wouldn’t be able to deal with him. And working with the emperors would be too dangerous. Besides, it’s not as if we really like them anyway. We were planning to kill them sooner or later.”

“But at least when we were still working with the Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court, we had the option of serving our own interests. Right now we’re like slaves! We’ve never been in this position before! It’s a total shame and humiliation!”

“When you stand under low eaves, you have no choice but to bow your head. But we’ll have a chance to make a comeback. For now, we go along with Yang Qi. Follow his orders. Who knows, maybe when he fights the Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court, we can strike a blow on all of them and turn the situation to our advantage.”

“I doubt that. Yang Qi is too clever. He’ll definitely make us take the lead in the fighting.”

“Well, we can still turn on him at any time. So let’s just wait and see what happens. Go through the motions and hold back any true aid.”

“I agree. Go through the motions, nothing more. Then, in the critical moment, we stab him in the back!”

Outside of the Unrestrained Heaven, Patriarch Annalist said, “Young Sir, why didn’t you just kill those four monsters? I refuse to believe we can trust them. Turning traitor is part of their nature.”

“Of course I want to kill them. Just not now. My Engine of the One God is running low on power, which means that I could probably only have taken down one of them, leaving the other three alive to cause problems. At least for now I have their nominal support, which puts the Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court at a disadvantage. After I handle the emperors, I can put an end to the suzerains.”

Yang Qi chuckled coldly. “It's the four emperors I'm most worried about, considering that my energy arts are less effective against them. Plus, I know that they’re all working on an important energy art, and if they succeed in cultivating it to completion they’ll be extremely powerful. In fact, I might not be able to beat them in a fight at that point. Of course, neither would they be able to do anything to me. At least I would then be viewed as the top expert in the Dao Defense League. That would earn me the loyalty of more of the top factions, making me even more powerful overall. With loyalty comes destiny, and destiny is the greatest power there is. Win the hearts of men, and you can be unparalleled under heaven. Right now, Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven is the league-lord, but he hasn’t won the hearts of the people. As for me, I could already feel destiny inching toward me when I created the Army of Radiance and Light.”

“Ah, no wonder I can sense your destiny burning so hotly, Young Sir,” Patriarch Annalist said. “My All-Eternity Spring-Autumn Annalist God-Dao Scripture makes me particularly sensitive to such matters.”

Destiny came from the hearts of men, and the hearts of men mirrored the heart of heaven.

“Come, we need to go back and prepare for whatever the Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court are planning.”

“By the way, Young Sir, do you want me to spy a bit on the four emperors? I know the location of their lair out in primal-chaos. If you want, I can go get some information. You know the saying: if you know yourself and know your enemy, you’ll always be victorious.”

“Oh?” Yang Qi nodded. “Yes, I would be interested in that. However, I have to go into seclusion right now to combine the might of the Engine of the One God, the Aeonic God Temple, and King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans. Otherwise, I'm going to have problems drawing on the full power of my cultivation base.”

With that, he headed into the depths of the Sage Monarch Heaven and went into seclusion.

As for Patriarch Annalist, he began gathering disciples in the Sage Monarch Heaven and teaching them about his great dao. Obviously, people would flock to learn from him, considering he was essentially on the same level as the Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court.

Although Patriarch Annalist was doing his best to keep his identity secret, word quickly spread that Yang Qi had recruited a powerful old-timer. The aura of the Army of Radiance and Light weighed down with mountainous force, and people quickly came to the conclusion that this new recruit was someone as powerful as the four emperors.

There were even other old-timers who joined the Army of Radiance and Light.

Meanwhile, out in primal-chaos, the Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court had gathered together. Despite being the league-lord, Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven wasn’t able to keep on top of everything that went on in the Dao Defense League and had no idea about the latest developments.

The other three Grand Emperors were also there working on their cultivation: Grand Emperor Myriadmagic Heavenspan, Grand Emperor Ninelimits Paragon, and Grand Emperor Heavenearth Vastocean.

The four Grand Emperors sat in spots corresponding to the four cardinal directions, and in the middle of them was a corpse!

It looked both human and beastlike, yet was neither human nor beast. And although it was dead, it emanated a powerful energy field. The primal-chaos around it continued to be absorbed by the corpse, as though it were some innate function of the creature.

The four emperors’ hands flashed with magical signs, and red energy constantly flowed above their heads, pouring into the beast-like corpse.

“Keep going!” Grand Emperor Myriadmagic Heavenspan said, “Pour all of the universal fortune you can into this beast king corpse that tumbled out of the Ancient Road to the Gods. Once he awakens, we’ll strike like lightning and take control of him. With the power of a Lesser God at our disposal, we can dominate all the immortal worlds! We’ll be invincible! It's taken us years to reach this point, and now thanks to you, Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven, we have much more destiny to work with!”

Chapter 816: Beast King Corpse

The Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court had acquired the corpse of a beast king, which clearly originated in the god world. Somehow, it ended up on the Ancient Road to the Gods, then drifted out into primal-chaos, where the emperors stumbled across it.

Despite being a corpse, it still contained boundless power and beastliness. Even ordinary objects from the god world would be considered godly, and all treasures from there were god items. Even the weakest of animals were godlings.

If they could awaken this beast king by means of universal fortune, it wouldn’t be a true god-spirit, but it would give them such a boost that they would double, triple, or even quadruple their overall power output, putting them in a position where they could crush anything and everything.

Scintillating, burning destiny flowed into the beast king’s corpse, causing it to twitch and wriggle.

At a certain point, its chest lifted.

It inhaled….

Then exhaled…

As it breathed, boundless primal-chaos vital energy flowed into it, which was converted into raw, pure power. Godpower. It was clearly something foreign to the immortal worlds. Not even the Tusita Heaven or the Eight Tribes Heaven had anything like it, nor did the future world or the Primeval Age.

“It finally produced the pure power of the god world!” Grand Emperor Myriadmagic Heavenspan exclaimed. “Excellent! This beast king really does have a bit of life force left in it. None of the other god corpses we’ve encountered over the past millions upon millions of years have been like this. This is the only one. We had to sacrifice a lot of quintessence-blood to finally reap something of benefit, but it was worth it!”

“Exactly, don’t hold back now!” Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven said. “Pour more destiny into it. The more god world power we can get, the better. When it breathes in primal-chaos, it connects to the god world and produces deathless god power. And that is our ticket to becoming truly invincible. We’ll finally be able to slaughter that brat!”

“Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven, you were the one in charge of starting the Dao Defense League and becoming the league-lord,” said Grand Emperor Heavenearth Vastocean. “How could you have screwed up this badly? You just let that brat become the Emissary of Radiance and Light and establish a huge power base! Now hosts of experts are siding with him, reducing the destiny and universal fortune we can acquire!”

“Exactly!” Grand Emperor Ninelimits Paragon said. “If the hearts of the people were united, the universal fortune and destiny would be vastly superior. In fact, we would’ve already completed our work with this beast king corpse and advanced our cultivation bases. Instead, we’re stuck here working just as hard as ever. We have to kill that brat and take back the destiny that rightly belongs to us. Kill him down to his very soul!”

“You don’t understand how incredibly strong he is,” Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven growled. “He came across some good fortune or another that let him instantly create an army of a million Chaos Gods. That’s how he’s won over the hearts of so many people. He really is our greatest enemy. That said, he has a lot of treasures and destiny. If we can kill him, the benefits will be astounding. Unfortunately, he has several of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions, which he can use to get into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart any time he wishes. That will make him even more difficult to kill. Thankfully I’ve already planned out a way to deal with that, as I explained earlier. Do any of you have any further thoughts on the matter?”

“If we work together with those four suzerains of hell, we’ll definitely be able to kill him. Of course, the suzerains need to be put to death as well. Perhaps we can manipulate them into directly fighting Yang Qi, then we’ll come out as the ultimate victors.”

“Yes, those suzerains of hell follow the dao of devils, so it’s a given that they need to die.”

“Enough chatting. Draw as deeply as you possibly can on destiny. Hold nothing back. Once we complete our work with this beast king corpse, Yang Qi and the suzerains of hell will both be destroyed.”

As the destiny flowed, the beast king began breathing more deeply.

However, at a certain point, the burning destiny flow suddenly decreased significantly, much to the shock of the Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court.

“What?”

“Just what exactly is going on here?”

“Why did we suddenly lose so much destiny!?”

“What? Why is this happening? Did something go wrong in the Dao Defense League? Did Yang Qi seize power in my absence?”

Enraged, Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven immediately sent some divine will out to communicate with some of his confidantes in the Dao Defense League.

“Damnation! That brat’s been talking to the elders and elder kings and winning even more hearts! That’s why our supply of destiny is being reduced. People are even saying that he won the legacy of the Heaven Beyond Heaven, a thirty-third ranked immortal world! And he got all of the god items from the Aeonic God Temple!? More and more disciples are flocking to join him!”

“So what do we do now?”

“We don’t have enough destiny to resurrect this beast king now!”

“Damn it all! Should we just go kill the brat right now?”

“No, we can’t do that. He has the support of someone on the same level as us. But who? Considering that, and the fact that he took the Aeonic God Temple, he probably has a plan to deal with us. There’s no way we can just kill him!”

In their rage, the four emperors were all scrambling to come up with an idea of how to kill Yang Qi.

All of a sudden, laughter rang out, followed by a voice. “You four can’t kill Yang Qi on your own. But we can help you do it!”

“Who’s there?”

“That’s an ancient aura!”

“Someone from the Primeval Age is here. Show yourself!” Grand Emperor Myriadmagic Heavenspan thrust his palm out, splitting the primal-chaos to reveal a young man clad in beast hide with a bone cudgel in his hands. Next to him was Leaf Dao-Denier. Of course, it was none other than Eldest Brother Secundus.

“True Raja Dao-Denier?” Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven growled. “You, a lowly dharmaraja, dares to spy on us emperors?”

“That's right, League-Lord.” Leaf Dao-Denier’s cultivation base had reached an astounding level and he radiated both Eternal and Fortuned power. In addition, he pulsed with the energy of the Tusita Heaven. Apparently, Eldest Brother Secundus had helped him gain full control of that immortal world’s essence.

“We have a common enemy in Yang Qi,” Leaf Dao-Denier continued. “I know about everything that’s been happening in the Dao Defense League, and I know that Yang Qi acquired the legacy of the Aeonic God Temple. If we don't work together, he’ll kill all of us sooner or later. Are you having trouble assimilating that beast king corpse? Eldest Brother Secundus and I can help you.”

“What? How could you assimilate it?”

“What makes you think I can’t?” Eldest Brother Secundus said, looking over at the beast king, which seemed dead yet was breathing slowly. “In the Primeval Age, we know how to do things that surpass imagination. You four really got lucky to find something from the god world that has a bit of life force in it. If you can awaken it and make out-of-body incarnations with it, it wouldn’t necessarily help you reach the Deathless Throne, but it would definitely provide a tenfold boost in power.”

Grand Emperor Myriadmagic Heavenspan exchanged a glance with the other emperors, then said, “Cut the crap. If you can really deal with this corpse, we’re willing to share. With our Profound Body-Splitting God-Clone Technique, we can divide the beast king into twelve different parts, each of which will be roughly as strong as any single one of us. In other words, we could each get two clones. An increase in power like that would be nothing to look down on. There are four of us and two of you. If we all had two clones, we would make a group of eighteen Grand Emperors. That should be more than enough to kill Yang Qi. What do you think?

Leaf Dao-Denier chuckled coldly. “Absolutely not. Eldest Brother Secundus wants an additional beast king clone for each of us. Half and half. We get six, you get six. That’s only fair.”

“Are you kidding?!” Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven said. “How’s that supposed to be fair? There are six of us. Two each is the only way that makes sense.”

“No,” Leaf Dao-Denier said. “This isn’t a deal between six people, it’s a deal between two groups. Us and you. Besides, how are we to know you wouldn’t betray us with your vastly superior numbers?”

“We’ll swear oaths to bind us all together in spirit and action,” Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven said. “Furthermore, once we kill Yang Qi, you can have the position of Emissary of Radiance and Light.”

Leaf Dao-Denier laughed. “Neither of us wants to be the Emissary of Radiance and Light. And we have no reason to believe you’ll live up to any oath. This is our final offer. We get six clones, you get six. Your only other option is to keep working at it on your own while Yang Qi continues to win more hearts and take more destiny from you. Eventually, he’ll take full control of the treasures in the Aeonic God Temple, and you’ll all be dead.”

Chapter 817: A Cabal of Six

Gaze sharpening, Leaf Dao-Denier said, “Are you in or out? If it’s the latter, Eldest Brother Secundus will just leave. If you’re in, we can get to work right away. By the way, I'm a Fortuned One and Eldest Brother Secundus is an Eternal One. Those are two of the rarest constitutions in heaven and earth, and what's more, we’ve combined our blood to make our cultivation bases even more powerful. It will be a simple task for us to deal with that beast king corpse.”

Having fully fused their two special constitutions, they were both Eternal Fortuned Ones, making them boundlessly powerful.

Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven snorted coldly, killing intent stirring within him. “Bold words, boy. Are you trying to scare us or something? I don’t care what you’ve done with your blood, you’re still not a match for us. Do you really want to give up your spot as True Raja Dao-Denier?”

“Touch him, and I’ll cut you down where you stand,” Eldest Brother Secundus said, taking a step forward, his aura savage to the extreme.

In response, Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven held his tongue, aware that he was in the weaker position.

As for Eldest Brother Secundus, he was actually very pleased by how Leaf Dao-Denier had handled the situation up to this point, and was happier than ever that he had taken him in as a disciple.

“Look, we can work all of this out,” Grand Emperor Myriadmagic Heavenspan said. He was the craftiest of the four Grand Emperors, and seeing that things had become very awkward he decided to take over the conversation. “We’ll do things your way, alright? Fifty-fifty. There’s no need to have a falling out over minor matters. Besides, even if we split things fifty-fifty between our two groups, we four will still be stronger than you two, so that's fine. Enough blathering. Let’s all swear oaths not to fight amongst ourselves until after Yang Qi is dead.”

Leaf Dao-Denier laughed. “Fine. I’ve been at odds with Yang Qi for long enough to know how dangerous he is. If we aren’t united, we’ll just be making it easier for him to kill us.”

With that, all of them swore oaths and then set to work.

As they sat down, Leaf Dao-Denier thought, ‘My cultivation base is currently far too low to deal with Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven and the others. But once we’re finished with this beast king, I’ll become vastly stronger! Ah, Yang Qi, I refuse to believe that you’ll survive against so many people. Eldest Brother Secundus. Me. The Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court. And four suzerains of hell. With ten of us working together, joined by a host of beast king clones, you’ll definitely meet your end. Now all I need to do is figure out a way to come out on top. I have to get your God Legion Seal. It belongs to me, and no one else. I'm eventually going to kill all of these other supposed allies and become the ruler of the Dao Defense League!’

As the group of six harvested the power from the beast king’s corpse, Leaf Dao-Denier’s cultivation base slowly climbed higher and higher. At a certain point, heavenly tribulation appeared, but Eldest Brother Secundus easily dispelled it, transforming it into beneficial power. Leaf Dao-Denier’s level was rising like a rocket. Within moments he was climbing from one stair on the Deathless Heavenly Stairway to the next.

The Stair of Valor. The Stair of Wisdom. He ascended them easily. He wasn’t like Yang Qi, so he only had to deal with ordinary tribulation from the dao of heaven. And that meant that Eldest Brother Secundus had no problem helping him.

**

Meanwhile, Yang Qi was working on his own cultivation in the Sage Monarch Heaven, which proceeded in a very different fashion.

A passageway to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart hovered above his head, and King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans were absorbing immortal energy and turning it into Heaven-Devouring True Energy. That in turn became śarīras, which he poured into his God Legion Paradise.

He was also drawing on the powers of the Aeonic God Destroyer and the Engine of the One God, probing into their secrets. He was now much more able to use the Aeonic God Destroyer to absorb primal-chaos and universal power.

To Yang Qi, it felt almost like he was connected to some mighty world that abounded with power. He suddenly saw the Ancient Road to the Gods, stretching on and on until it reached that mighty world, which existed outside of the river of time itself. Whether one stepped onto the Ancient Road to the Gods in the past, the present, or the future, it was the same.

The chiliocosm of worlds in the universe could transform. The dao of heaven could live or die. But that had nothing to do with the god world. The god world was eternally unchangeable. Slowly, but surely, Yang Qi was gaining profound levels of enlightenment and coming to understand some of the secrets of that world.

At a certain point, he burst out laughing. “The power of the god world! Aeon Portal!”

The Aeon Portal appeared and power began flowing through it from the Ancient Road to the Gods, filled with deathless godliness.

[Beep-beep-beep. Beep-beep-beep.]

The photonic computers in the Cruiser of Civilization began going wild. At the same time, Yang Qi felt as though his heart was starting to resemble the heart of Brahma. Power surged through him, and the Engine of the One God began filling up at the same time.

Thanks to his profound enlightenment, he was now starting to combine the Aeonic God Destroyer, the Cruiser of Civilization, the Engine of the One God, King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans, the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, and King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions with the power of his God Legion Seal. After all, the God Legion Seal could absorb all kinds of godliness, even that which was deathless.

With the Engine of the One God powering up, Yang Qi felt as though he had the strength to pierce through even a thirty-third ranked immortal world with hardly any effort. If he could fully utilize the Aeon Portal, he wouldn’t have to worry about the power drain any longer. He could tap into the Ancient Road to the Gods and gain access to power reserves of the highest level, which were perfect for the engine.

At that point, he wouldn’t need to worry about running out of power in the middle of a fight, which would make it a lot easier to deal with the emperors and the suzerains of hell.

Unfortunately, as a mere Measureless God, Yang Qi still wasn’t able to fully utilize the Aeon Portal. He would need to further his cultivation before he could use it to fully power the Engine of the One God.

He could only imagine what he would be capable of if his cultivation base were at the level of Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven. At that point, not even Lesser Gods would be able to do anything to him.

Yang Qi took a deep breath, then burst into hearty laughter as heavenly tribulation formed above him. He was becoming an eighth division Buddha God! He quickly stepped into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, and the tribulation followed him.

The fury of the gods poured onto him, but it was really just a blessing. All of a sudden, he gained further insight into the god world, although there were still plenty of questions to be answered. Why did the god world surpass time itself and exist eternally? Why did the god world end up in ruins? Why was it almost destroyed? What did ‘after the nirvanic rebirth of the gods, a new civilization would be born’ mean?

Yang Qi knew that, eventually, he would go to the god world to seek answers to such questions and learn of the profundities of the Sovereign Lord. Unfortunately, reaching the Deathless Throne and the level of the legion of gods was not an easy task.

BOOM!

With a decisive fist strike, he vanquished the wrath of the gods and stepped into the Buddha God level. At that point, the power flow finally filled the Engine of the One God to the level of one percent.

Chapter 818: Surging Destiny

The Buddha God level was extraordinary, and was so named because it was typified by the broad, profound wisdom of a buddha. Upon reaching the level, Yang Qi continued drawing on the power of the god world until the Engine of the One God reached the level of one percent.

Unfortunately, if he wanted to reach two percent, he would need to raise his cultivation to another level.

In other words, he still wasn’t able to fully utilize the Engine of the One God.

It was little surprise; the Engine of the One God had been left behind by ancient members of the legion of gods, just like the Aeon Portal, King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans, King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions, and the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. All of them were items that had been the property, not of ordinary gods, but of Perfect Gods, at the very least, or more likely, Consummate or Paramount Gods.

Of course, even at only one percent power, the Engine of the One God could still deliver a strike on par with the Hand of the One God.

WHOOSH!

Yang Qi emerged from seclusion, and the first thing he did was raise his voice and announce, “Children of the Yang Clan and core members of the Sage Monarch Society, come to me. I have treasure to distribute. Invite the elders, elder kings, and other top elites to attend the ceremony!”

The entire Dao Defense League immediately began to buzz with activity.

The time had come to distribute the loot from the Aeonic God Temple to people such as Eldest Brother, Elder Second Brother, Yang Zhan, and others like them. As usual, Yang Qi took special care of everyone who remained loyal to him. That was one reason why his Army of Radiance and Light was so powerful—and why he could turn the hearts of so many people—taking destiny away from the Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court.

The Sage Monarch Heaven had a public square that was filled with radiance and light and was so magnificent that it even rivaled the Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple. Soon, teleportation portals in all sorts of immortal worlds began activating as people heard Yang Qi’s call and returned to get their share of the treasures. And some people came just to observe the proceedings.

“The Emissary of Radiance and Light is distributing treasure? What exactly did he come across in the Aeonic God Temple? Let’s hurry over and see what happens. Maybe we should join his army; I’ve heard that he’s very generous.”

“But we already work for one of the dharmarajas.”

“Ah, what are you afraid of? The Emissary of Radiance and Light is far more powerful than any of the dharmarajas. Supposedly, he's on the same level as the Grand Emperors. He might even become league-lord one day.”

“The Army of Radiance and Light is already far more powerful than the Deathless Corps.”

“Exactly. Plus, the Army of Radiance and Light has primeval god skills. I bet they could easily wipe out the league-lord and his Deathless Corps. As long as the Emissary of Radiance and Light can take on Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven, he’ll easily become the new league-lord.”

“Not necessarily. Remember, Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven has three other Grand Emperors on his side. If they all work together, the Emissary of Radiance and Light couldn’t possibly take them on.”

“We’ll have to see about that. The fact that the Emissary of Radiance and Light is making such a big scene right now seems to indicate that his cultivation base has reached an even higher level than before. I've heard that there are all sorts of powerful items in the Aeonic God Temple. He might already be in the position to deal with the four emperors.”

“Let’s go observe the ceremony. Even if we don't get anything, it’ll be really interesting to see what type of treasures he got from that temple.”

A stream of experts headed to the Sage Monarch Heaven and the enormous public square, which, to the shock of the newcomers, was as large as a thirty-third ranked immortal world.

Yang Qi was there, observing as his people formed ranks. Next to him sat Patriarch Annalist, who many of the old-timers recognized.

“That’s Patriarch Annalist! According to the stories, he's on the ninth stair of the Deathless Heavenly Stairway. He should be strong enough to defeat any of the grand emperors. And he’s been recruited by the Emissary of Radiance and Light? This is incredible. Doesn’t that mean… that Yang Qi is now stronger than Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven?”

Many of the dharmarajas and other old-timers were very curious to see what was going to happen.

Looking out at the crowds, Patriarch Annalist said, “It's about time to begin, Young Sir.” Then he rose to his feet and raised his voice. “Ladies and gentlemen, I am Patriarch Annalist. Presumably, some of you recognize me. Years ago during the days of the ancient Heavenly Court, I was to join as the fifth emperor. Yes, I was to be named Grand Emperor Annalist Daoscripture. Sadly, the Heavenly Court turned bad. The four emperors slaughtered many geniuses from the immortal worlds, seizing their destiny to make God Pills of Fate. As a result, the court collapsed. In my sorrow, I went into hiding. Until now. Unexpectedly, the Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court have come to power again, having established the Dao Defense League. All of us need to be very much on guard to make sure that history does not repeat itself.

“And now, Young Sir Yang Qi will distribute the treasures he acquired from the Aeonic God Temple. Please feel free to observe. Also, note that any of you who wish to join the Young Sir will be rewarded in kind. He will not hold back.”

Those words caused something of a minor stir in the crowd.

Patriarch Annalist was actually speaking disparagingly of the four emperors, which seemed to indicate that Yang Qi was on the verge of seizing power for himself!

The close followers of Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven exchanged awkward glances, then some of them scrambled to send divine will messages to him, reporting the development.

“Mage Cloudwalker!” Yang Qi said.

Eldest Brother rose to his feet and approached Yang Qi. “Emissary, what are your orders?”

“You’ve campaigned with me for many years, starting in the mortal world. Now here we are in the immortal worlds. For all of your outstanding services, I hereby reward you with a god pill from the Aeonic God Temple, the Meditative-Trance Without-Sorrow Grand-Happiness God Pill. After consuming this pill, you can sink into a meditative trance free of sorrow and filled with happiness. In that state, your cultivation base will improve by thousands of times over. I am also giving you this god saber, the name of which is Mage-Ancestor Slaughters Generals and Plunders Gods. It is a primeval god item, forged by a mage god from the god world, and matches your constitution perfectly.”

The two items flew over to Eldest Brother, radiating godly might.

However, before they reached him, a cackle rang out and a shadowy figure blurred into the square. It looked like a huge bat, and it moved with shocking speed as it headed toward the two god items.

Shocked exclamations rose up from within the crowd.

“Is that…? It is! Someone from a demonic heavenly world! It’s Grand Emperor Bloodsworn Bat!”

“I heard that quite a few immortal worlds of demons joined forces in an alliance to fight the future world. But they’re in another far corner of the universe, so what’s this guy doing here?”

Grand Emperor Bloodsworn Bat was no weaker than Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven, being on the seventh or eighth stair of the Deathless Heavenly Stairway. As he flew out, he was surrounded by demonlight that indicated he had been blessed by a host of Demonfolk old-timers. And he moved with incomprehensible speed.

Before anyone could react, he grabbed the two treasures and spun to face Yang Qi. “The Dao Defense League is nothing! Our Demon League is the rightful owner of the universal fortune of heaven and earth. We’re the ones who’ll drive away the forces of the future. Don’t forget that you humans used to be part of us Demonfolk! I'm going to kill this supposed Emissary of Radiance and Light and take the treasures of the Aeonic God Temple. Do any of you dare stand in my way?”

Cackling shrilly, he began advancing on Yang Qi.

Patriarch Annalist shouted in rage, but before he could do anything, Yang Qi reached out to hold him back.

“I’ll be fine,” Yang Qi said. “This Grand Emperor Bloodsworn Bat is just looking to get killed.”

Suddenly, time seemed to slow down to a crawl, to the point where Grand Emperor Bloodsworn Bat’s attack hardly appeared to be moving at all.

Yang Qi reached out and an enormous hand made of radiance and light appeared, which clamped down onto Grand Emperor Bloodsworn Bat and provoked a shrill scream.

A moment later, a small, blood-colored bat could be seen in Yang Qi’s hand, struggling mightily but powerless to escape the porcelain-colored light that had it restrained. “How dare you hurt me, boy! Aren’t you afraid of your Dao Defense League being destroyed by our Demon League!?”

Chapter 819: Demon League

People were so impressed by what Yang Qi had just done that they felt like prostrating themselves in admiration. After all, his quick victory seemed to indicate that he was actually stronger than Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven, which by implication meant that he would soon be the new league-lord.

“Demon League?” Yang Qi said, staring down at Grand Emperor Bloodsworn Bat. “Since when was that a thing?”

In response to Yang Qi’s question, one of the old-timers stepped forward and said, “Emissary of Radiance and Light, the Demon League is an alliance of immortal worlds inhabited by demons. They didn't want to join the Dao Defense League, so they set up their own alliance. While our members are mostly human, theirs are mostly demons.”

“Ah, so that’s how it is.” Looking coldly at Grand Emperor Bloodsworn Bat, Yang Qi said, “Well, the Dao Defense League is responsible for the universal fortune of the immortal worlds. And what right do you demons have to declare independence? I’m going to give you an order right here and now, Grand Emperor Bloodsworn Bat. Bring your demons back into the fold. Got it? The only other option for you is death. If I have to, I’ll take my Army of Radiance and Light over there and completely exterminate all of you.”

“Bah!” Grand Emperor Bloodsworn Bat spat. “We Demonfolk are going to conquer everything! I’ll never follow orders from you!”

“Pigheaded heretic. What a waste!” Yang Qi closed his hand into a fist.

CRACK!

A shriek rang out as Grand Emperor Bloodsworn Bat was crushed out of existence down to his soul.

Yang Qi grabbed the resulting blood mist and quickly refined it into a magical treasure, a blood-colored cloak made of pure power.

“This is the Bloodsworn Cloak, created from the quintessence of a Grand Emperor and containing his divine abilities and speed. I hereby bequeath the cloak to Sword Seventeen. Step forward!”

“Yes sir!” Sword Seventeen said, accepting the cloak and throwing it over his shoulders. Just like that, Yang Qi acquired an expert almost like Grand Emperor Bloodsworn Bat himself. Although Sword Seventeen’s cultivation base wasn’t at a high level, his fighting prowess had just dramatically increased.

Swooosh!

Sword Seventeen drew his sword and performed a few flourishes, causing sword light to arc about that seemed like it could take the lives of actual gods.

“He actually killed Grand Emperor Bloodsworn Bat?! That level of strength… it definitely surpasses the league-lord’s!”

“We definitely have to switch loyalties!”

“What do we do?”

“Should we join him?”

“The Emissary of Radiance and Light is going to take over the alliance soon. And he's not afraid of the Demon League. He even said he’ll crush them with the Army of Radiance and Light, if he has to. Besides, Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven is cruel and brutal. He and those other Grand Emperors killed a lot of heroes in ancient times just to get their destiny. Sticking with him would be very risky.”

“You’re right. Siding with the Emissary of Radiance and Light is definitely the best bet.”

Meanwhile, Yang Qi realized that his Wheel of Fate was spinning much faster than usual as increasing amounts of universal fortune rushed toward him. Looking over, he saw that the league-lord’s throne in the Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple had much less destiny than before.

As for Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven’s confidants, they looked completely crestfallen. Obviously, Yang Qi had established his power and position, earning respect that would not easily be lost.

Having killed Grand Emperor Bloodsworn Bat, he began distributing treasures again. They seemed endless, and many of the observing elders were growing visibly jealous. The god-generals and dharmarajas were trembling, but didn’t dare to say a word. Considering how many powerful items Yang Qi was doling out, it was obvious that the Army of Radiance and Light was going to be incredibly strong.

He was winning over more and more hearts, to the point where he was already the true leader of the Dao Defense League, albeit not in name. Because he didn’t have a scrap of wretch-devil in him, only radiance and light, people were easily drawn to him. It was very different from the Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court, who claimed to follow a righteous dao but actually mixed righteousness and evil. In contrast, Yang Qi did everything above board. He could be extremely ruthless, but always treated his own people well and didn’t rely on underhanded tactics.

Eventually, when he was mostly out of treasure from the Aeonic God Temple, Yang Qi said, “Every elder present will be given two primeval god skills.”

He waved his finger, using the Eternal Heavenly Aria to fill the entire area with profound music. The music transformed into paper talismans, which floated down into the hands of everyone present. One was a talisman of blessing, the other, of damnification.

Everyone was overjoyed. Thanks to Yang Qi’s gift, all of them were now capable of fighting someone higher than their own level. Although the primeval god skills were only temporary boosts, they were still incredible.

Cheering erupted as everyone praised the Emissary of Radiance and Light, extolling his virtues and wishing him long life. Of course, much of it was being egged on by people who had already been won over to his side, including some of the god-generals.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi simply stood there as destiny began rolling in. In the immortal worlds, there were now two primary flows of destiny, one increasingly fiery and intense, the other growing weaker by the moment. The former belonged to Yang Qi, and the latter to Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven.

There was roughly a seventy-thirty split. Previously, Yang Qi had been on the weaker side, but now it was exactly the opposite. Soon, there would be no need at all for Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven to be the league-lord.

Truth be told, were he not the league-lord, the man wouldn’t be benefiting from any destiny at all.

‘Just wait until my supposed duel with Sectlord Nine Yangs. I'm going to slaughter Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven and the other emperors, seizing complete control of all the destiny available. I’ll wipe out the Demon League, slaughter the armies of the future world, and take complete control of everything.’ He was now much more confident in taking on the future world. After all, even if they increased their forces many times over, they would never be able to have more troops than he could get from hell to turn into angels.

After distributing the treasure, the influx of destiny caused Yang Qi’s cultivation base to thrum, and unlocked more profundities in King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans, the Aeonic God Destroyer, and the Engine of the One God.

For now, there was no need for him to go into seclusion. His cultivation base would continue steadily rising regardless of what he did. He was in a very stable position, with power from the god world constantly trickling down into the Engine of the One God, automatically strengthening him and advancing his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.

In fact, once he used Sectlord Nine Yangs to defeat the conspiracies targeting him, it was likely that he would become a ninth division Chaos God.

After the day of treasure distribution passed, Yang Qi called a meeting with Patriarch Annalist, as well as certain god-generals and dharmarajas. It was not one of the normal meetings designed to keep up morale, but rather a meeting to discuss how they should deal with the Demon League.

He was very pleased to see who was in attendance, and was taking note of who had refused to come. The latter were people who weren’t necessarily loyal to Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven, but were hoping to take advantage of whatever conflicts might erupt. Those were not the kind of trustworthy people he wanted working for him.

“The Demon League already tried to make a move on me,” he said. “What do you think we should do about them? If anyone has any information, please, elaborate. Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven is gone, having given no indication of what he is doing. It’s a real travesty. Once he returns, I’ll call a meeting of the elders to formally accuse him of misconduct.”

“Emissary of Radiance and Light,” said one of the old-timers, God-General Goldsource. “The Demon League’s headquarters is in a far corner of the universe, and to be frank, they’re all crazy. They kill anyone from the Dao Defense League that they come across and are a real threat. They have some powerful Demonfolk old-timers, such as the famous Patriarch Redmoon, who cultivates all sorts of demon arts, and acquired the legacy of one of the Demonfolk in the legion of gods. There’s also Patriarch Buddhabhadra, who is in fact a fierce bear born out of pure primal-chaos. Then there’s Patriarch Hell-Crusher, who’s the most mysterious of them all.”

“Hold on a moment,” Yang Qi said. “Patriarch Hell-Crusher? What type of animal is he?”

“An ancient megamammoth. Supposedly, he even has the blood of godmammoths in him. Everyone knows about the myth that godmammoths were created to crush hells, and that's the origin of his name. Years and years ago, he was one of the people who led the Demonfolk to join the fight to crush the Heavenly Court. Afterward, he vanished into primal-chaos and was never seen again. At least, not until nowadays. According to our agents in the Demon League, he’s one of their founders.”

“That’s interesting,” Yang Qi said. “Well, he needs to die, that's for sure. If the future world launches an offensive, and the Demon League joins the Dragonfolk to oppose us at the same time, we’ll meet a dismal end.”

Chapter 820: Campaign of Radiance and Light

Yang Qi had called a meeting with about half of the dharmarajas, and quite a few of the god-generals, to discuss the issue of dealing with the Demon League.

The war between the future world and the Dao Defense League was still ongoing. However, the Dao Defense League had managed to gain the upper hand, pushing the future world inexorably back to the Brahman Immortal World.

One purpose of the meeting was to foster internal cohesion and trust. The second was to resolve any disagreements or conflicts that might be bubbling underneath the surface. In war, it was important to have an atmosphere of confidence in one's forces.

“We can’t afford to sit around and wait for the Demon League to make the first move,” Yang Qi said, looking around with a gaze that caused immense weight to fall on the shoulders of all present. “Therefore, I've decided to lead the Army of Radiance and Light on an immediate campaign. We’ll bring the fight to the Demonfolk and slaughter every last one of them that resists! All of you mobilize your various forces and prepare to depart. Let it be known that I’ll be distributing primeval god skill talismans to everyone. Let’s see if they can stand up to even a single charge of my Army of Radiance and Light, the strongest military force in all of heaven and earth!”

Quite a few exclamations of surprise could be heard. Then one of the dharmarajas said, “Oh exalted Emissary of Radiance and Light, are you sure you want to start a campaign right now? The Dao Defense League is unstable and there's a lot of infighting. We’re still under pressure from the future world, and besides, the Demon League is no one to take lightly. You won’t be able to influence the alliance as a whole while you’re on the campaign trail, and for all you know, everything could fall apart!”

“Everything will be fine. Besides, the Demon League already made a move on me during my meeting of treasure distribution. They’ve already declared war, and for that provocation, they must pay the price. They’ve earned a death sentence and we can’t give them any breathing room. The decision has already been made; I’ll be opening up a passageway that leads right to the border of their territory.

“If you don’t wish to join my Army of Radiance and Light on the campaign, I won’t force you. But if you don’t come….” He let the words hang. “Soon, I’ll be seizing complete power, and there will surely be some changeup in ranks and positions. I suppose I might as well tell you that when Sectlord Nine Yangs and I have our duel at the Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple, I’ll use the opportunity to take the position of league-lord from Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven. Even if all Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court stand together against me, they’ll fail.”

“What?” The expressions of many present flickered to hear such outright threats coming out of Yang Qi’s mouth. And they looked even more surprised when he said that he could deal with all four emperors at the same time.

Looking around, Patriarch Annalist snorted coldly and said, “What, you people don’t believe the young sir? Perhaps you should know that in the Eight Tribes Heaven, the Dragonfolk have created a passageway to the Primeval Age. They summoned the Five Great Lokapālas of yesteryear, yet the young sir defeated them quite handily. Presumably, you understand what defeating such top experts from ancient times means. If he can deal with the five lokapālas, handling the four emperors and seizing overall power will be even easier. So, it’s up to you which side to bet on.”

He worded things even more directly than Yang Qi had, causing the people present at the meeting to exchange flabbergasted looks. It was obvious to them what was happening; Yang Qi was putting all his cards on the table!

“Remember,” Patriarch Annalist continued, “we won’t tolerate any doublecrossing or backstabbing. Make your choice and stick with it. Pick the young sir, or pick Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven. This is going to be a situation where either the fish dies, or the net splits. One of them is going to end up dead. You all know what kind of person I am; not even Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven would be able to take me out. So why am I siding with the young sir? Because he’s unparalleled under heaven!”

“Very well, make your decision,” Yang Qi said, sitting there calmly on his throne. He began tapping the arm of the throne, and the sound wormed its way into the hearts of everyone present, filling them with a sensation of deep anxiety. They knew that there was no way to escape making a decision.

“I’ll side with the exalted Emissary of Radiance and Light!” one of the god-generals said. “Let’s vanquish the Demonfolk and force Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven off the throne! In ancient times, Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven established the Heavenly Court for the sole purpose of slaughtering his fellow daoists. He aroused the fury of heaven and men alike!”

“That’s right. None of those four emperors are good people. With them in control of the Dao Defense League, we might all end up dead.”

“I’ll follow whatever orders the Emissary of Radiance and Light gives us! Let's give this thing a shot!” Quite a few of the god-generals were all giving voice to the same sentiment.

“Give it a shot?” Yang Qi chuckled and rose to his feet. “Don't worry, I’ll definitely come out on top. The Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court are doomed to be assimilated by me. I’ll soon be the league-lord, of that, there is no doubt.”

One by one, everyone present stood and voiced their approval, as well as their decision to follow him.

“May the exalted Emissary live for ten thousand autumns, undying and deathless!”

RUMBLE!

This group comprised more than half of the top leadership in the alliance, and the moment they threw their lot in with Yang Qi, he sensed that he now controlled ninety percent of the overall destiny. That left Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven with only about ten percent, which was a pitifully weak amount.

And of course, it would push Yang Qi’s cultivation speeds to new heights.

“Fine. Get your armies in order and sound the call to battle. Watch closely as I open the passageway to Demon League territory.”

Boundless flames of radiance and light filled the area, filling all the skies of the Dao Defense League, causing heaven and earth to tremble and primal-chaos to crumble.

The light was so powerful that lower-level disciples felt as though they were being suffocated, and could do nothing other than lay motionless on the ground. As for the old-timers, they were profoundly shocked and wondered what exactly the Emissary of Radiance and Light was doing.

But none of them dared to utter a single word.

Next, an immense projection of radiance and light appeared, which was none other than Yang Qi. He seemed large enough to prop up heaven and earth, and as he thrust his hands out, fiery light shot out and opened up a passageway that seemed to pierce into the depths of the universe itself. Spatial tempests were suppressed left and right as the pathway stretched far out into the distance.

Everyone felt as though the magical laws of heaven and earth were being transformed. Countless tribulations began descending, expressions of the fury of the dao of heaven, almost as though the essence of the universe itself were angry at Yang Qi. However, when the tribulations touched him, they simply vanished. It was as if he were some sort of god-spirit.

“Dear lord. He really is opening a pathway that pierces through the universe!”

“He's so powerful! He’s definitely stronger than Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven. Considering he's openly showing off his fantastic abilities, does that mean he’s actually going to fight for the position of league-lord?”

Many of the old-timers were convinced that the Dao Defense League really was going to have a new ruler soon.

The power to connect two separate parts of the universe—or essentially, two universes—was something that defied imagination and belonged to the realm of gods.

As soon as the passageway opened, boundless demon energy began flowing out, making it obvious that there was some Demonfolk kingdom at the other end, a place vastly different than the immortal worlds. It was obviously the territory of the Demon League.

Speaking in a voice that rumbled like thunder, Yang Qi said, “Grand Emperor Bloodsworn Bat from the Demon League dared to sow chaos in the Dao Defense League, and even tried to assassinate me. We cannot tolerate the existence of these Demonfolk. I opened this passageway so that the Army of Radiance and Light can take the fight to the Demonfolk alliance, and we won't stop until we absolutely crush them!”

The god-generals and dharmarajas all joined their voices together and said, “We will stand by the side of the Emissary of Radiance and Light in this campaign!”

As Yang Qi felt the flows of destiny growing stronger, he let out a hearty laugh. “In that case, the time has come for war. Come forth, Army of Radiance and Light!”

RUMBLE!

The army appeared, ranks of angels with shining weapons, whose mere presence drove away the demonic atmosphere as they began marching through the passageway.

Thanks to Yang Qi’s constant rise in cultivation base, he had access to even more fiend-devils to turn into angels. Within the current group were Nirvanic, Revisionist, Measureless, Buddha, and Chaos Gods. There were even some who had reached the Stair of Valor. And they streamed out in seemingly endless numbers.

“My god! How could the army be that large? Where did he get them from? Look, those are fifth division Nirvanic Gods! There must be several billion of them. And there are billions of Revisionist, Measureless, and Buddha Gods. Plus tens of millions of Chaos Gods.”

“Last time he had a few million Chaos Gods, and that was enough to shake all heaven and earth. But now he has tens of millions? How did he get them? It’s like they're as common as carrots or cabbage to him. What do we count for, compared to that? We're basically cannon fodder!”

“My god. That army could crush all of our forces without suffering any casualties!”

“Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven’s forces are like nothing compared to that. This is definitely an army that can take care of the Demonfolk alliance.”

“The Emissary of Radiance and Light is invincible! How did we not realize this before? Let’s hurry up and try to get on his good side!”

“Strong. So strong!”

“Does Sectlord Nine Yangs have any hope of surviving their duel?”

Some of the old-timers who had been on the fence about what to do were now completely bowled over, and no longer cared about Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven at all.

Soon, the sounds of fighting and the reek of blood began drifting through the passageway; the war with the Demon League had begun.

Back in the Dao Defense League, Yang Qi waved his hand, summoning a mirror the size of a thirtieth-ranked immortal world that projected images of the fighting.

Chapter 821: Flames of War Rage

“Kill them!”

“I can’t believe these people from the Dao Defense League would dare crusade against us! They’re dead! We Demonfolk are naturally fiercer than they are, and can defeat human cultivators several cultivation levels higher than us! Our constitutions make us virtually invincible!”

“Kill them all! Burn them alive! Loot them! How dare these human cultivators attack us. Are they looking to get killed? Well, we’ll fulfill their wishes. Hahahahaha!”

The demon soldiers on guard when the Army of Radiance and Light arrived were obviously taken completely by surprise. However, they weren’t the type who would be thrown into chaos and confusion by an enemy attack. In fact, they were actually excited. Demonfolk genes were filled with bloodlust, ruthlessness, violence, and the desire to slaughter. Once such desires were tapped into, they became like wild beasts.

Swarms of demons appeared, seemingly without end, and the flames of war began to burn brightly.

The Demon League was composed of as many immortal worlds as the eternal sands, strung together in a way that resembled the planetary systems of the mortal world. There were enormous planets that created vortexes of wretch energy and demon energy, the kinds that could easily demonize any human cultivators it touched and turn them into freakish half-demons.

The Demon League had been put together on very short notice and was backed by certain powerful old-timers who normally remained hidden in primal-chaos. Because of that, Yang Qi had been completely unaware of its existence.

But now it was obvious that those old-timers sought to seize the universal fortune in heaven and earth, making them a big threat to the Dao Defense League. Leaving them untouched would be allowing a dangerous enemy to lurk right behind one’s back, ready to launch a sneak attack at any time.

RUMBLE!

Thus, he struck like lightning with the Army of Radiance and Light.

Primeval god skills descended like rain as the two armies clashed, blessing the Army of Radiance and Light and making them thousands of times stronger than the moments before. Meanwhile, the Demonfolk forces were weakened by thousands of times.

From the outside, the fighting was very one-sided.

The Demon League’s armies immediately crumbled.

“AGHHHH!”

Screams rang out as the Demonfolk soldiers were slashed to bits, becoming a bloody rain that fell down in front of the Dao Defense League’s onslaught.

Meanwhile, the souls of the demons, as well as their resources, power, weapons, armor, medicinal pills, and magical treasures, were sent back through the passageway, piling up in mountainous form in the public square in the Sage Monarch Heaven.

Many of the observing old-timers were so terrified they grew weak at the knees. Never could they have guessed that Yang Qi’s forces would be so devastatingly powerful.

The Army of Radiance and Light was like a sword stabbing right into the heart of the Demon League, devastating all spell formations and greyspaces with impunity.

“You are all hereby judged guilty by radiance and light itself!” shouted the angels.

A towering shield of demon energy rose up to block the path of the Army of Radiance and Light. Sadly, it was completely incapable of blocking millions upon millions of Chaos God angels.

In the blink of an eye, the shield fell and the Demonfolk on the other side died.

“They’re so strong! Nothing can stand up to this!”

“It’s a massacre. The Demon League is done for! This is terrifying. Who could possibly defend against millions upon millions of Chaos Gods, all working together?” With each moment that passed, the old-timers grew more and more fearful.

Next, a group of angels swept forth who were all on the first stair of the Deathless Heavenly Stairway, and a twentieth-ranked demon-immortal world was dragged back through the passageway.

An entire immortal world had been taken as a spoil of war!

Yang Qi reached out and grabbed it, causing it to shrink down rapidly. In front of the shocked eyes of all present, it quickly turned into a śarīra, floating there in his palm.

“The Demon League foolishly attempted to oppose us. Those who put on airs will be killed beyond the shadow of a doubt. My armies will wipe out the Demon League and ensure that their foundation ceases to exist. The demon-immortal worlds will fall, and will be added to the essence of the Dao Defense League!”

“This….”

Everyone present knew that Yang Qi was a ruthless individual. And here he was, attempting to cut the weeds and eliminate the roots. Without immortal worlds to call home, it was obvious that the Demonfolk would have nowhere to stand. Eventually, they would cease to exist within the countless immortal worlds of the Dao Defense League.

Of course, there was no way the Emissary of Radiance and Light was going to share the spoils of war with anyone else. The only way to benefit from this victory would be to declare allegiance to him.

People began looking at the piles of treasure and licking their lips. Everything present, including weapons, medicinal pills, demon souls, and other cultivation resources, were particularly powerful, and would be of incredible use to any disciple who acquired them. After all, many powerful energy arts required demonic energy as a foundational element.

As countless demon-immortal worlds fell and innumerable Demonfolk lost their souls, their quintessence was cleansed by burning radiance and light, and the Sage Monarch Heaven benefited from a massive influx of vital energy.

The Demonfolk suffered setback after setback on the field of battle and were inflicted with heavy casualties until, finally, their top experts appeared to join the fight.

“What incredible gall!” A shadowy figure appeared in front of the Army of Radiance and Light, apparently a projection from a thirty-third ranked immortal world. It looked like an enormous bear created from primal-chaos itself, and as it reached out with its paw it completely locked down space-time. The Army of Radiance and Light ground to a halt as dense mists of raw demon energy appeared and spread out to cover the Demon League.

Yang Qi looked over and could instantly tell that this was one of the consummate experts of the Demonfolk. It had to be, otherwise he wouldn’t have been able to block the progress of the Army of Radiance and Light.

‘A primal-chaos bear-giant? It must be Patriarch Buddhabhadra, who’s roughly on the same level as Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven! Well, it’s good he’s out in the open. I'm curious to see if he has what it takes to protect the Demon League. Killing him would really cement my reputation.’

Rising to his feet from his spot in the Dao Defense League, he threw both hands out in front of him and unleashed a deadly technique. “Life, Death, and Illusory Destruction; Three Worlds of Froth and Shadows; Glory of the Sun and Moon; Radiance and Light Bathe all Things; Human Existence Leads to the Halls of Heaven; Many Heavens God Seal!”

RIP!

Explosive force erupted from within him, so much so that the entire Dao Defense League trembled as a result. Everyone watched as an enormous sealing mark shot out from Yang Qi’s hand, heading directly toward Patriarch Buddhabhadra.

Roaring with fury, the bear-giant that was Patriarch Buddhabhadra launched a fist at the incoming sealing mark.

Yang Qi ignored it and threw a fist strike of his own. Within his heart, the Engine of the One God erupted with power, and radiance and light swirled as the fist headed right toward Patriarch Buddhabhadra’s chest.

“Damn you, Emissary of Radiance and Light!” the bear-giant growled. “I'm going to wipe you out along with all your children and grandchildren. However many Demonfolk you killed today, that’s how many people from the Dao Defense League I’ll wipe out! Just you wait!”

A magical mirror of defense sprang up in front of Patriarch Buddhabhadra’s chest, and was destroyed as soon as Yang Qi’s fist smashed into it. However, the fist attack also dissipated as a result.

“Hmph! You think you're going to kill people from the Dao Defense League? Today, you’re the one who’s going to die.”

Crack! Snap!

Everyone watched as Yang Qi lunged forward, piercing through numerous universal rifts until he was right in front of Patriarch Buddhabhadra. It was a shocking display of strength, making him seem like nothing less than a god-spirit.

Patriarch Buddhabhadra could never have expected that Yang Qi would leap right into the forefront of the battle. However, he was a decisive person, therefore he didn’t hesitate at all to launch another deadly fist strike at Yang Qi.

“If you want to fight, fine! I want to see how many of my fist strikes you can take, Emissary of Radiance and Light! Bhadra Mountain Godfist; Let the Buddha God Come!” The power of primal-chaos bear-giants was supreme among ancient godlings. In fact, they surpassed the Dragonfolk and were second only to the godmammoths.

The fist strike itself caused the projection of an enormous god-spirit to appear behind him, which unleashed boundless power into the attack.

Yang Qi didn’t seem worried. He met the punch with his own fist, backed by the Engine of the One God, causing power to flow through him that shoved aside all of the surrounding primal-chaos.

As it parted, the Ancient Road to the Gods could be seen, along with the shadowy form of the god world itself.

This was the final stance of the Hand of the One God: Eternity.

RIP!

The two fists collided and Patriarch Buddhabhadra stumbled back, a look of terror overcoming his face.

Meanwhile, back in the Dao Defense League, all of the patriarchs and old-timers in the square in the Sage Monarch Heaven were watching the fight play out.

They could see that each move and stance utilized by Yang Qi was at a peak level of strength. After he seized the upper hand with his fist strike, the primal-chaos paleo-energy swirled behind him to take the shape of sabers, spears, swords, halberds, lances, pikes, hooks, tridents, and numerous other god items, all of which took aim at Patriarch Buddhbhadra.

Patriarch Buddhabhadra could only howl in rage; there was nothing he could do to fight back. Everyone could clearly see that this Demonfolk expert who had existed since the Primeval Age was no match for Yang Qi. There was no questioning Yang Qi’s strength now. As of this moment, every person who had been acting wishy-washy wanted to side with him and remove Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven as the league-lord.

RUMBLE!

As of that moment, virtually all of the destiny switched from Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven to Yang Qi!

Chapter 822: Defeating the Demonfolk

The fight between Yang Qi and Patriarch Buddhabhadra was the kind that could destroy the heavens and crush the earth. They flitted back and forth between different universal dimensions, laying waste to the primal-chaos around them.

And the entire fight was playing out on the mirror Yang Qi had summoned.

The onlookers were stupefied. It was a high-level fight that involved the use of the soul, magical laws, and psychic powers. Even the slightest slip-up with one’s vital energy could lead to instant death.

Their attacks were such that, as they split the primal-chaos paleo-energy, they forced it into the form of entire continents which would then crash down below them.

The ability to use raw power to convert primal-chaos into planes of existence was close to the realm of god-spirits.

Suddenly, Patriarch Buddhabhadra unleashed a string of devastatingly powerful attacks.

“Heaven-Cleaving Blow!”

“Soul-Cleaving Destruction!”

“Immortal-Cleaving Decapitation!”

“God-Cleaving Dirge!”

“World-Cleaving Laceration!”

“Life-Cleaving Pummeling!”

Each of the six moves was the kind that could cleave magical laws, and when they were combined, they could devastate just about everything in existence.

To have them all unleashed in one short moment was something that almost defied imagination, and went to show how incredibly powerful Patriarch Buddhabhadra was. Obviously, he had been biding his time and hoping to unleash this attack at a perfectly inopportune moment for Yang Qi.

In response, Yang Qi smiled faintly and unleashed six fist strikes of his own, each of which contained a different fundamental basis. Trial and Indictment. Punishment and Penalty. Radiance and Light. Deathless and Undying. Profound and Mysterious. Obscure and Enigmatic. Sovereign Lord. It was a fist attack that didn’t rely on stances, but rather was the ultimate expression of his skill and ability with the fist.

The ultimate expression of the martial path!

Crack! Snap!

Yang Qi’s six fist strikes vanquished those of Patriarch Buddhabhadra, then slammed into the bear-giant, provoking anguished screams as blood sprayed everywhere and his body began collapsing.

Of course, Yang Qi didn’t hold back, but pressed the attack instead. Every move he made was lethal, as he clearly wanted to put an end to this powerful demon who originated in the Primeval Age. However, in what seemed like the final moment of his attack, demon energy surged, and demon light swept out toward Yang Qi. Another enemy was stepping in, someone on the same level as a grand emperor!

Yang Qi quickly backed up, allowing the demon light to wrap up Patriarch Buddhabhadra and whisk him to safety. The mist was filled with demonic curses and augmentations originally created by demon-gods from the Primeval Age, making it a powerful line of defense.

Yang Qi was confident that he could break them in short order. But at the same time, it was an indication that he had thoroughly defeated Patriarch Buddhabhadra. In turn, that meant he was now definitely strong enough to deal with Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven.

It was in this way that the first battle concluded. Yang Qi had destroyed dozens of demon-immortal worlds, slaughtered countless demon soldiers, and plundered numerous resources. And in the end, he even defeated Patriarch Buddhabhadra.

The Demonfolk were going into retreat, hiding in their proverbial shells, and wouldn't dare to come out any time soon.

Yang Qi knew it wasn’t realistic to expect to wipe out all the old-timers of the Demonfolk in one shot. Besides, he now had virtually all of the destiny power of the Dao Defense League at his disposal, which meant that no one there would be able to fight him. For now, he would bide his time and advance his energy arts some, then he would come back to deal with the Demonfolk and their powerful curses.

After all, he still needed to reach the Chaos God level.

After returning to the Dao Defense League, he went into seclusion and let Patriarch Annalist handle the matters at hand.

More people than ever were rushing to join the Army of Radiance and Light, even god-generals and dharmarajas. But for now, Yang Qi’s main goal was to make use of all the destiny to further his cultivation, and hopefully become a Chaos God.

The truth was that the stunning victory against the Demonfolk had actually affected the hearts and minds of many of the experts there. They had originally been bursting with morale as they envisioned defeating and destroying the Dao Defense League.

But then they were routed by the Army of Radiance and Light.

Because of that, morale dropped.

Furthermore, changes in one’s heart could affect universal fortune. Right now, the destiny of the Dao Defense League burned like a rising sun that would never weaken. At the same time, the universal fortune of the Demon League had grown weak, further strengthening Yang Qi. The destiny of the Dao Defense League was being naturally bolstered.

It was similar to how, in the mortal world, when two nations went to war, the defeat of one of the nations would be a devastating blow to its people. In contrast, the people of the victorious nation would be profoundly excited, which would lead to numerous untold benefits.

Thus, the boost in destiny, combined with the power he was drawing from the god world, pushed him through the barriers toward the next breakthrough.

He was about to enter the Chaos God level.

He had the Aeonic God Destroyer, King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans, King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions, the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, the Engine of the One God, the Cruiser of Civilization, and a host of other magical treasures. Summoning his Heaven and Earth Furnace, he began combining all of the various elements he had gathered up to now, and pooling them into unmitigated power.

The impurities that had come with his various energy arts were extruded, making his body completely anew. Every inch of flesh within him was transformed by the power of the god world and bolstered by the quintessence vitality of the seven gods he had assimilated.

Universal fortune was a kind of destiny that could melt anything in existence. Not even gods were an exception. And when it was gathered for use by one person, it would give them incredible advantages over other people. Right now, anyone who tried to get in Yang Qi’s way would be like a mantis trying to stop a war chariot.

With that power of destiny, Yang Qi could tap into the most powerful of magical treasures. He could suppress things like King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions, and derive immense benefits from the God Legion Seal.

Over the years, Yang Qi had acquired many magical treasures that had been created in ancient times by actual gods. However, he couldn’t fully assimilate them or unlock all of their secrets. But with universal fortune, he could eat through even the most profound sealing marks.

The most dramatic transformations were to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

Seals were broken and ancient godrelics were revealed. Yang Qi’s psychic tempest now surpassed primal-chaos itself, or the storms on the Ancient Road to the Gods. Countless godrelics within the chart were swept up and carried into the Heaven and Earth Furnace.

His immortal-slaying clone also benefited; in the blink of an eye, he reached the third minor stair, and while that didn't put him in a position to be able to defeat Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven, neither would he be easily killed by him.

As the days passed, Yang Qi grew stronger and stronger. Meanwhile, on the outside, things were quiet and peaceful. The Army of Radiance and Light had gained the support of more old-timers and for some reason, the future world was relatively passive. The Demon League was like a turtle with its head pulled into its shell, and Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven was nowhere to be seen.

Of course, everyone was convinced that the grand emperor would soon emerge from primal-chaos.

And they were further convinced that he must have been out there mastering some high-level technique alongside the rest of the Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court.

If the four of them succeeded, then they would return like gods from heaven descending upon the mortal world to viciously crush Yang Qi. They obviously had little choice in the matter; if they didn't crush him, they would be in deadly trouble.

Everyone anxiously awaited the coming conflict.

**

In the passageway connected to the future world, a host of battleships could be seen floating along. One of them was larger than all the others and bore the flag of the generalissimos. In the future world, the generalissimos were extremely domineering figures that were roughly equivalent to Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven.

There were over a dozen generalissimos on the flagship, and they were currently holding council.

None of them revealed their true facial features, and each of them had slightly different uniforms, which featured voluminous cloaks. Some were blue, with embroidery that resembled the sky. Some had designs reminiscent of the earth, the sea, the throngs of living humans, or the host of animals and beasts.

One of the generalissimos, whose uniform was embroidered with suns, moons, and heavenly bodies, raised his voice and said, “The magisters are not present, but they’ve given us a very important task. As the highest-ranking officer present, I’ll preside in today’s meeting. We’ll soon reach the ancient immortal dao civilization, which was a turning point among all civilizations. We are traveling back in time to conquer and destroy every corner of this place, putting an end to the dao of heaven.”

Chapter 823: A Major Invasion

The future world had come to the Middle Age, the era of the dao of immortals, with one goal: to destroy the dao of heaven.

What was the dao of heaven?

Part of it involved the hearts of the people, and part of it was made up by the mysterious and unexplainable magical laws that existed. Destroy all of the magical laws of all the immortal worlds, and the dao of heaven would cease to exist.

If the dao of heaven were destroyed in the Middle Age, then the past, present, and future would undergo violent transformations, although no one could say for sure what they would be.

However, there was clearly a motivation behind the goal.

“Generalissimo Worldking,” one of the other generalissimos said, “as the overseer of the vault of the sky, I will follow your orders to the letter.” He was Generalissimo Skyvault, and he and everyone else present were people who were at least as strong as Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven—perhaps even stronger.

“Presumably, some of you are unclear as to why we’ve been tasked with destroying the dao of heaven in the Middle Age. It all comes down to the legion of gods and their god world. We come from a civilization of the future, which ended up taking a divergent path. The founder of our world changed the course of history and led us into an alternate timeline. Unfortunately, the current path of our society will eventually reach a dead end. And the reason for that is that the Ancient Road to the Gods does not exist in the future world! There is no way to reach the god world in the future!”

Generalissimo Worldking sounded gravely serious as he provided his detailed explanation. “This information is top secret, and was previously known only to the ten magisters. Even I was only recently made aware of the truth. According to longstanding truth, the god world transcends time and all other existences. It shouldn’t matter what age one is in, it should be possible to travel the Ancient Road to the Gods and reach the god world. Unfortunately, something changed. The Ancient Road to the Gods doesn’t even exist in the Primeval Age now. The legion of gods perished in ancient times, thanks to a traumatic tribulation. For some unknown reason, the Ancient Road to the Gods only exists in the Middle Age, within the immortal dao civilization. Although not all matters are clear, we do know that the only path to success lies in destroying the dao of heaven, and taking everything from this age through the river of time and space to the future world. In other words, we will remove history and send its power to the future world.”

“We understand,” replied the other generalissimos.

One of them, Generalissimo Seabrine, said, “There is no need for the immortal dao civilization to exist. Destroy the dao of heaven here, and the massive power surge will reach the future world and reopen the Ancient Road to the Gods.”

“Now we need to discuss the campaign to come,” Generalissimo Worldking said. “We’ve encountered resistance in the immortal worlds, primarily from the Dao Defense League. They named a league-lord, someone called Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven. Beneath him is the Emissary of Radiance and Light and the Emissary of Darkness and Gloom. The former is Yang Qi, who Magister Proud Heaven has ordered that we capture and return to the future world. We’ll keep him captive there, and when the ten magisters return, they’ll extract something important from within him. Understand?”

“Yes sir!”

“Once we arrive, we need to gather as much information as we can about Yang Qi and his cultivation base. We absolutely mustn't let him slip through our fingers. As we dismantle the Dao Defense League, he is at the top of our list of people to pay attention to.”

“This Yang Qi definitely has a very high cultivation base. Not too long ago, we sent a covert ops team led by General Samman. They even had a fragment of the Cruiser of Civilization and one of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions. Unfortunately, they failed in their mission to capture Yang Qi. Samman sacrificed his life to summon the power of the magisters, but in the end, it did him no good. We can’t take Yang Qi lightly. In fact, maybe it would be better to attack from a different angle. We can use the infighting among the immortal worlds to target him, possibly forcing him to bring about his own end. What do you think?”

“That sounds like a good idea. If we really plan to destroy everyone in the immortal dao civilization, we need to have a good plan. And getting them to wipe each other out would definitely make things easy.”

Terrifying forces were at play. The top experts of the future world were coming, and it presaged drastic transformations to the dao of heaven.

As for Yang Qi, he was in the middle of his cultivation when the Wheel of Fate suddenly began spinning thousands of times faster than usual, producing a thrum that began pulling his divine will inside.

‘Hmm?’ he thought, opening his eyes. ‘The dao of heaven is giving me a warning? A big threat is coming? Something that could harm the essence of our age? I can just barely sense some deathlessness out there. Well, in that case… good! It’s either someone from the Primeval Age or the Future Age. And apparently, they’re here to destroy the dao of heaven.’

Yang Qi sent out a voiceless message into the void. “Hear me, dao of heaven with your magical laws. If you want my help then you shouldn’t be trying to hold me back. How about we make a deal? I’ll stop these invaders if you help me push my cultivation base to a higher level. Stop holding back your will, your essence, and your magical laws. Allow me to peer into your most profound secrets.”

As his divine will was somehow communicating with the dao of heaven, he felt as if he could sense some immense entity out there, something he couldn’t possibly even budge if he tried. It was like a photonic computer that could control everything in creation, something that made his own will seem monumentally insignificant.

In the mortal world, an emperor was so glorious and majestic that the common people would instinctively drop to their knees in obeisance to him. But if all of the subjects in the empire died, then that emperor would be left powerless and a fool. The dao of heaven was the same.

All of a sudden, Yang Qi could sense the restrictive nature of the dao of heaven, but at the same time, could now make use of its will.

As he reached out and communicated, his enlightenment of cultivation levels soared and he suddenly rose to a higher level. A smile broke out on his face. ‘I don't care what level you’re at now, Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven. You have no hope of keeping the spot of league-lord. The Dao Defense League is going to belong to me.’

He slowly slipped into a trance.

Magical laws from the dao of heaven streamed into him, entering his flesh and blood, connecting to him like great chains of true energy.

Slowly but surely, Yang Qi was becoming like an incarnation of this age’s dao of heaven. His blows were becoming like the blows of the age itself, causing space and time to tremble. At a certain point, they could not be blocked or defended against by any person who came from the same age as him.

As his Wheel of Fate communicated with the dao of heaven, he couldn't quite reach the level of being a full incarnation, but he made significant progress and his cultivation base grew stronger, purer, and more resilient.

The process continued for days upon days, until the course of events shifted dramatically.

Within the depths of boundless primal-chaos, a majestic power erupted, followed by a fiery rage that shot from the heights of heaven down to the Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple.

The league-lord’s throne suddenly began to emit the pounding sound of drums and bells.

To everyone’s shock, they realized that the moment they had been waiting for was finally here.

Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven was back.

Yang Qi had been subverting him and taking the destiny that officially belonged to him. Even if Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven were as dense as a clay bodhisattva, he would have still been enraged. But of course, he was much more than that. He was one of the Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court, and the most explosively violent of that group. Anyone who crossed him died!

“I, Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven, have returned! And I hereby call a meeting of all elders, god-generals, dharmarajas, and emissaries of the Dao Defense League.”

His words echoed out with a calm that was somehow filled with rage, leaving everyone certain that a big tempest was coming.

BOOM!

Old-timers began streaming into the Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple, far more than had been present when the position of league-lord was settled. After all, many more old-timers had emerged from primal-chaos to join the alliance. Most of them were already loyal to Yang Qi, while there were still a few who were waiting to see how things would play out.

Obviously, a critical juncture had arrived in which Yang Qi and Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven would lay all their cards on the table.

Bugles echoed for a full day and night as the old-timers slowly filled up the Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple. This was a true meeting of the host of immortals. Countless Godmyths from the never-ending immortal worlds were here; if they were killed, the destiny of this age would suffer a major blow and the dao of heaven itself would likely collapse.

If the dao of heaven was the emperor of this age, these old-timers were the civil and military officials. And without those officials, the emperor couldn’t remain in power.

Yang Qi was the last to arrive.

After stepping into the Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple, he saw Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven glaring at him with a gaze as sharp as a sword.

Yang Qi merely smiled and took his seat on his throne of radiance and light.

Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven looked at him for a moment, then said, “You’ve done well, Emissary of Radiance and Light. I heard that you’ve accomplished a lot while I was in seclusion. You declared war on the Demon League, although I'm curious who gave you the authority to make decisions like that. The Demon League is a vast alliance that we should be working with to fight the future world. I can’t believe that you would lead the fight against one enemy while another was ready to stab us in the gut. Furthermore, as the league-lord, I should be making decisions about when to launch attacks. Who gave you that right?”

The man was obviously going on the offensive with his words.

Many of the old-timers present looked somewhat faint. Never could they have imagined that Yang Qi and Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven would have an altercation this quickly. The grand emperor was essentially accusing Yang Qi of treason.

Everyone looked over at Yang Qi, waiting to see how he would respond, wondering if he would stand up for himself or resort to guile.

Seeing that he had the attention of all eyes present, he slowly stood. “Very good questions, Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven. You see, I’ve invited all of the elders, god-generals, and dharmarajas here today to accuse you of gross misconduct! The Demon League seeks to completely destroy our Dao Defense League, which means that they should be viewed as a major enemy. In such dire circumstances, you decided to go off into seclusion and do nothing? You might as well have handed the Dao Defense League over to the enemy to be exterminated! If you don’t care for the lives of our people, then we don't want you to be our league-lord!”

Chapter 824: Seizing Power

A buzz of hushed conversation instantly arose in the Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple.

No one in the crowd could have expected that Yang Qi would be so aggressive and dauntless. He was really going tit for tat, turning Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven’s accusation around on him and accusing him of being unfit to serve as the league-lord.

It was an out and out insult!

As of this moment, it was obvious that these two wouldn’t be able to reconcile their differences.

POP!

Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven really was burning with rage. His grip on his throne tightened so much that it suddenly exploded, which was when he shot to his feet, killing intent bubbling. Staring at Yang Qi, he spoke in the coldest of voices, “Well-played, Yang Qi, Emissary of Radiance and Light. Considering you’re willing to speak to your league-lord in that way, what other rules are you willing to break? Don’t you have any inclination to follow your ruler like a good official?”

“What was that?” Yang Qi said, barking a laugh. “Rules? Be a good official? You think that as the league-lord of the Dao Defense League, you’re the ruler and we're your officials? And that if the ruler wants an official killed, that official will simply drop dead? This is an alliance, not an empire. I'm the Emissary of Radiance and Light, and I absolutely have the authority to accuse the league-lord of misconduct. You’d best not think this is the Heavenly Court where you control everything.”

It was at this point that someone chimed in to support the Grand Emperor.

“What gall! How dare you accuse the Grand Emperor of misconduct!” It was none other than True Raja Dao-Denier, Young Master Leaf, who had been lurking in the shadows like a viper, just ready to strike with deadly force. Rising to his feet, he pointed accusingly at Yang Qi and said, “This is completely outrageous, Yang Qi. Whatever decisions you make, they have to be reported to and approved by the league-lord. Instead, you went off on your own, which is a clear violation of the rules of the Dao Defense League. If the league-lord wishes, he can expel you from the alliance for that. You’ll be branded a wretch-devil who supports the future world, someone that anyone has the right to punish.”

Looking over, Yang Qi snorted coldly and said, “Since when did you get so gutsy, Leaf Dao-Denier? I nearly killed you last time we met. You managed to escape, but do you really qualify to say a thing to me? I know that your Eldest Brother Secundus taught you some new techniques, and that the two of you are working with the Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court. But are you sure that your schemes are enough to handle me? Kindly back the hell down. I’ll deal with you after I kill Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven.”

“You really have gone insane, haven’t you?” said a new voice, as three figures emerged from behind Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven.

They were invincible beings whose incredible auras filled the entire Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple.

“The Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court!”

“Grand Emperors Myriadmagic Heavenspan, Ninelimits Paragon, and Heavenearth Vastocean!”

“So, the Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court finally showed up together.” Many of the old-timers were already trembling in fear. Although they all had confidence in Yang Qi, the Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court were still strong enough to strike terror into their hearts.

“Oh? The Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court? What about those four hell-born devils you’re working with? I thought you had some big trap ready to deal with me here in the Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple. I was supposed to duel with Sectlord Nine Yangs today, which was when you planned to trap and kill me. Am I right?”

“Sectlord Nine Yangs, come out and face your opponent,” Grand Emperor Myriadmagic Heavenspan said. Instantly, Sectlord Nine Yangs stepped out into the open.

“Go ahead and kill him instantly.”

However, much to the wide-eyed shock of everyone present, Sectlord Nine Yangs simply walked over to Yang Qi and kneeled in front of him. “Milord, I did just as you ordered. They fell for my deception, and even gave me a God Pill of Fate as a reward, as well as a Myriad-Sages Devil-Tempering Necrosius Truth Pill, making me much stronger than before.”

The entire temple devolved into a huge uproar.

Now, everyone realized that the Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court had been trying to use Sectlord Nine Yangs to deal with Yang Qi. Except, that it had all been a big manipulation by Yang Qi. No one could have been more shocked.

“What, Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven,” Yang Qi said, smiling. “You see, I wasn’t just making blind accusations. You’ve been conspiring against me for quite a while now, haven’t you? Is that how the league-lord is supposed to behave? Ladies and gentlemen, I urge you to make your own judgement about who is in the right and who is in the wrong here. We are the Dao Defense League, an alliance of numerous individuals seeking to fight the invasion of the future world. We shouldn’t be tools to be manipulated by a single person, nor can we allow the mistakes of the ancient Heavenly Court to be repeated, lest we all end up dead. I say we should drive out all overly-ambitious schemers!”

Snorting coldly, Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven looked at Sectlord Nine Yangs and flicked his finger, sending a beam of light shooting directly toward his forehead.

It was none other than his Rage Finger, a godly-class energy art that was supposedly handed down by the Rage God. Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven had carried on that god’s core teachings and doctrines, cultivating the Rage Fist, Rage Finger, Rage Palm, Rage Energy, Rage Kick, and so on. They were a suite of techniques that could overcome just about anything with pure rage.

“What's that supposed to be?” Yang Qi said, hardly even looking at the incoming attack. Reaching out, he tapped the Rage Finger attack, which instantly vanished without a trace. In response, a tremor ran through Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven as he realized that he didn’t even know how Yang Qi had negated the attack. All of a sudden, he was struck with the realization that Yang Qi was vastly more powerful than him.

“Trying to kill the witnesses to keep them quiet?” Yang Qi chuckled. “Sorry, you won't be killing anyone while I'm around. I decide when my subordinates live and die, not you.”

“You really are insane,” said Grand Emperor Heavenearth Vastocean, taking a step forward. “If you’re convinced that we've been plotting against you, and also know that we’re working with four suzerains of hell, then why did you show up today? Do you really think we’re incapable of killing you? We Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court are reestablishing our might. We’re building the Heavenly Court again. Submit to us and prosper, or oppose us and perish.”

“Come forth, suzerains of hell!” Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven said, waving his hand.

Cackling laughter could be heard as four massive influxes of devil energy filled Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple, causing many of the old-timers to back up with ashen looks on their faces.

All of them were convinced that if there really were four suzerains of hell working with the four grand emperors, then unless a god showed up they were all in great danger. There was no way Yang Qi could stand up to a force like this.

However, that was when something very unexpected happened.

To the utter astonishment of everyone present, the four suzerains approached Yang Qi and offered him respectful salutes. “Young Sir, we’ll follow any orders you give. Say the word, and armies of fiend-devils will swarm into the Dao Defense League to eradicate the Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court. The four emperors tried recruiting us, but had no idea that we've been on your side all along. You are the true ruler of all the countless hells, and any who are so pigheaded as to oppose you will make enemies of us as well!”

Although the four suzerains weren’t particularly pleased to be saluting Yang Qi like this, they could sense an immense, brewing power in him, and realized that he could kill all of them if he wanted. They quickly suppressed any wild ambitions that had previously existed in their hearts and didn’t dare to do anything against him.

Truth be told, Yang Qi’s current cultivation base was actually vastly higher than on the day when he forced them to submit.

After accepting their salutes, Yang Qi spoke directly into their minds. “The four of you were hoping to take advantage of this situation for personal gain, weren’t you? You wanted me and the four emperors to fight, allowing you to swoop in at the last minute to be the ultimate victors. Well, I knew about that all along. Back then, I still had a lot of work to do with my cultivation base. But I’ve achieved major progress since then. With a mere thought, I could strip you of your connection to the hells you come from, remove your power over their essences, and leave you powerless!”

“What?” All four of the suzerains trembled as they suddenly sensed their connections to their respective hells trembling as though they might be severed.

In that moment, they finally realized how strong Yang Qi was, and knew that plotting against him wasn't an option. Instantly, their expressions grew even more respectful than before. In fact, Suzerain Mahānata stepped forward and loudly said, “How dare you plot against the young sir, Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court! That’s a high crime! Get on your knees and become believers in him. Give him your faith. If you do, he might forgive you. But if you refuse, then we four will kill you and any descendants you might have.”

The other suzerains went on to make further declarations of righteous indignation, each one fiercer than the last.

“My flesh and blood belongs to the young sir. If you want to kill him, you’ll have to do it over my corpse!”

“I've completely converted! The armies of my hell belong to the young sir. He controls the darkness and gloom of hell, and the radiance and light of the halls of heaven. He is the only true lord in heaven and earth, and any who oppose him are seeking death.”

The Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court continued to look more and more taken aback. None of them could ever have guessed that Yang Qi would be so fierce, to the point where he even won over the four suzerains of hell.

As of this moment, they were facing the four suzerains, Patriarch Annalist, and Yang Qi. That was a total of six top experts, leaving them completely outnumbered. As for all of the old-timers present who had chosen to side with Yang Qi, they were breathing sighs of relief at the realization of how terrifyingly powerful Yang Qi was. And they knew that he had won a complete and utter victory here.

“What’s going on here, you four? You’re switching sides?” Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven said. “Are you really going to turn traitor at the last minute, completely disregarding our previous agreement?”

“Agreement? What agreement? We were working for the young sir the whole time. How dare you shamelessly talk of agreements with us.”

“I'm gonna slaughter all of you!” Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven shouted, finally losing control of his emotions. However, Grand Emperor Myriadmagic Heavenspan quickly reached out and held him back.

Looking dead at Yang Qi, Myriadmagic Heavenspan said, “So it was you who saved Patriarch Annalist. Well played. Very clever. We assumed you were a naive kid, but it turns out you’re a wily old fox. But do you really think you can completely defeat us?”

“Yes,” Yang Qi said, “although it will only be after a bitter fight.”

Chapter 825: Show Yourself!

Upon hearing Yang Qi brazenly state his intent to kill them, Grand Emperor Myriadmagic Heavenspan chuckled coldly and said, “You really are completely insane, Yang Qi. Maybe you did turn the four suzerains, and maybe you did recruit Patriarch Annalist. But you’re still at a disadvantage. Why don’t we just talk this situation out? Negotiate. There’s no need to get into a life-or-death battle.”

“No negotiation,” Yang Qi said, shaking his head firmly. “I’ll give you a few choices. One. Leave the Dao Defense League and never come back. Two. Willingly hand over the position of league-lord to me, then offer me your full allegiance. Three. Die. Now pick.”

“Damn you!” Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven growled. “If you want to die, I can make that happen. It seems you really don’t know about our ace in the hole. Did you really think you could gain the upper ground with a measly little force like that?”

The way he spoke with complete and utter confidence caused many of the old-timers to perk up. They knew that Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven was a prodigy of cultivation, and if he claimed to have a trump card that would give him the advantage in this situation there was no reason to disbelieve him. But what exactly was this secret weapon?

“Don’t try to wow me with your supposed trump card, Grand Emperor,” Yang Qi said coolly. “I know all about it. You see, I've already discussed things with the dao of heaven, which told me everything about the age in which we live, and provided me with its own inherent enlightenment. And soon, when I reach godly ascension, I’ll surpass the dao of heaven. Anyway, I know that you're working with Eldest Brother Secundus, and you’ve been assimilating a beast king that you acquired from the Ancient Road to the Gods. That beast king originally came from the god world, and still has scraps of life force on it, which you’ve been assimilating and turning into raw power. Because of how I seized destiny, you started having trouble, but with Eldest Brother Secundus, an Eternal One, and Leaf Dao-Denier, a Fortuned One, you finally succeeded. You created a dozen minor beast kings, each of which is roughly as strong as your true self. You four emperors got six total, while Leaf Dao-Denier and Eldest Brother Secundus each got three. At the end of the day, that puts my force of six up against your force of seventeen.”

“No, eighteen!” Leaf Dao-Denier said coldly.

“Wrong. You don’t count. As far as I'm concerned, you’re nothing but an ant.”

“You!” Leaf Dao-Denier exclaimed, so angry and astonished he nearly vomited blood. Moments ago, he had been completely and utterly confident in his position, only to have Yang Qi blurt out all of their secrets without a hint of fear in his eyes.

He was far too familiar with Yang Qi, and knew that he liked to plan things out to the last detail before making his move. And whatever plans he did make, they were designed to push his opponent into the most hopeless and helpless situation possible.

Leaf Dao-Denier feared virtually no one in existence. But having suffered at Yang Qi’s hands so many times, he couldn’t help but be terrified of him.

When the Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court heard Yang Qi describe their secret weapon in every detail, their faces drained of blood and they began to sweat. They had previously assumed that when they unexpectedly brought out their trump card, Yang Qi would have no choice but to die. Instead, he revealed their secrets before they could.

There were few things more terrifying than to have one's enemy see through one’s plans so easily.

At this point, Yang Qi looked to the side and shouted, “Stop with the spying, Eldest Brother Secundus! Show yourself! I'm going to get rid of all my enemies today and establish my power once and for all. Do you clowns really think that you can do anything to me? I said, show yourself!”

RIP!

Eldest Brother Secundus stepped through a rift, clad in beast hide, his bone cudgel in hand.

“I never would have guessed that you would become this strong, Yang Qi. You actually communicated with the dao of heaven and learned everything about us?” He brandished his cudgel, and booming sounds rumbled out, almost as if he intended to destroy the dao of heaven himself. He sighed. “Sadly, you’ve overlooked something. Strength is strength. Once you reach a certain level, even the dao of heaven will be forced to submit to someone strong enough. But so what if you know about our work with the beast king and the twelve clones of the emperors? Knowing about that doesn’t mean you can fight back. We have so many people on our side that nothing in the world could be stronger. Not even a Lesser God could hurt us. So what exactly are you going to do? Where are you going to get the power to deal with us?”

“That’s right!” Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven shouted. “This brat is just blowing hot air! You think that seventeen people as strong as us can't deal with you? So what if you know about our plan? You’re still going to die!”

BOOM!

Two beast king clones appeared above his head, howling with rage. At the same time, Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven unleashed the power of his own cultivation base.

Everyone else in the temple backed up warily.

In the blink of an eye, Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven had become a force of three, with fighting prowess that virtually no one under heaven could oppose.

“You’re dead, Yang Qi!” Leaf Dao-Denier shouted. “Just as Eldest Brother Secundus said, you seem tough on the outside, but you're really weak. There’s no way you can stand up to us.” Three beast king clones popped into existence around Leaf Dao-Denier, all of them pulsing with power equivalent to the Grand Emperors.

The other Grand Emperors followed suit, as did Eldest Brother Secundus, and it caused immense pressure to weigh down on the Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple.

The old-timers were so rooted in place that they couldn’t leave even if they wanted to.

Everyone present was visibly terrified, with the exception of Yang Qi, who simply stood there, looking like a reef that could withstand thousands of years of pounding waves.

“You people really are pig-headed. Did you really think that, considering I knew about your beast king clones, I would just stand around waiting to be killed? Ai. If you’d just acknowledged allegiance to me, you could’ve achieved an incredible cultivation base, along with many other benefits. You might even have become true gods. Instead… well, you’re going to die and become puppets for me to command.”

Looking around with a sigh, he continued, “Elders, dharmarajas, and anyone else who is loyal to me, please leave the Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple. I'm going to put an end to these people, and I’ll be the new league-lord when it’s over. The Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court are going to be nothing but history soon. I hereby summon Chaos God tribulation! The rage of the legion of gods, straight from the Ancient Road to the Gods. The fire of the god world, the punishment of the gods!”

BOOM!

A projection of the Ancient Road to the Gods suddenly appeared in the Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple, surging with lava, fire, and bolts of lightning the size of immortal worlds.

Deathless godliness and the power of the god world formed heavenly palaces, weapons, hulking gods, and other personifications of fury.

The old-timers present sensed the immense powers at play, which in fact pushed them away and forced them to leave the battlefield. Within moments, the only people left behind were Yang Qi, Patriarch Annalist, the four suzerains of hell, the four Grand Emperors, Eldest Brother Secundus and Leaf Dao-Denier.

“Aaaiiiieee!”

A shrill scream ripped through the air as one of the dharmarajas was ripped to shreds during the process. It was none other than Emperor Tusita.

He had been working with Leaf Dao-Denier to plot against Yang Qi, but unfortunately, Yang Qi found out. And in the moment that the heavenly tribulation appeared, Yang Qi ensured that its rage was directed at him, killing him in an instant.

An old-timer from a thirty-third ranked immortal world who had lived for a hundred million years perished, just like that. Now there were no longer nine dharmarajas, but eight.

“Heavenly tribulation. God tribulation! The wrath of gods! That’s from the Ancient Road to the Gods! Supposedly, this tribulation would only come when the most consummate experts in the Primeval Age would subjugate the dao of heaven and step onto the Ancient Road to the Gods!”

“How could god tribulation like this be here?!”

“Also, how did he lock down the Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple?”

“Damnation. I can’t get out? Don’t tell me we’re being forced to face this tribulation with him!”

“Dammit. I can’t believe those four fiend-devils turned traitor. It's their fault we’re in this position. We were supposed to have Yang Qi locked down with our spell formation. But their betrayal has turned everything around.”

Raising his voice above everyone else, Eldest Brother Secundus said, “Calm down, everyone. That god tribulation isn't going to harm us. Stick together and take advantage of the tribulation to kill him.” In response, the four emperors and Leaf Dao-Denier all stuck closely together.

“You’re right,” Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven said. “The god tribulation is here for Yang Qi, and it will be the perfect chance to strike at him. As long as we stick together, we won’t be harmed, not even by an actual god.”

Yet again, a projection of the Rage God appeared behind him.

“Oh really?” Yang Qi said, walking slowly toward them through the frenzy of the god tribulation, inexorably absorbing it into himself.

There was no god tribulation that could truly cause problems for him. Everyone present could sense him growing stronger by the moment. Being immersed in scorching, hellish fire was like a refreshing bath to Yang Qi, and the process was pushing his cultivation base into the ninth division.

RUMBLE!

He reached out, and before Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven knew what was happening, it was as if an ancient godmammoth was bearing down on him. To everyone else, it looked as though time shattered, and the past, future, and fate itself had turned into a deadly waterfall that smashed into him.

RIP!

A single blow sent Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven flying backward.

Chapter 826: The Dao of Heaven Fights Fiercely

Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven had assimilated the power of a beast king, significantly advancing his energy arts. But unexpectedly, that did him no good. A single blow from Yang Qi sent him flying.

It begged the question of exactly how advanced Yang Qi’s cultivation base was. After all, he hadn’t fully passed the tribulation, yet was already strong enough to kill the Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court, Eldest Brother Secundus, and Leaf Dao-Denier.

Most experts would be trembling in terror when facing a tribulation like this, which was an expression of the fury of ancient gods. It was so powerful that it could negate the power of the beast king clones. But Yang Qi wasn't being weakened at all. Instead, his cultivation base was rapidly rising.

POP!

Blood sprayed out of Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven’s mouth as he landed on his feet and staggered backward. He had previously been protected by millions upon millions of defensive shields, but all of them had shattered. His beast king clones were severely injured, and he himself had a huge wound on his chest. All of a sudden, he felt as if he were battling the dao of heaven itself.

It was as if the dao of heaven had fully and completely rejected him and didn't want him to use any of his energy arts.

“This bastard is terrifying!” Eldest Brother Secundus said. “Everyone, attack together! Use your beast kings. Eternal Good Fortune: Boundless and Limitless!” Eldest Brother Secundus could see how strong Yang Qi was, and he knew that delays weren’t an option. He leaped into motion, summoning three beast kings of immense power. At the same time, he threw both of his hands out, summoning a sealing mark that resembled a growing embryo.

“Embryonic-Growth Boundless Vajrayāna Lokapāla Mother Fist!”

It was a fist technique that thrummed with a preheaven sensation, like something from nature itself, yet boundlessly fierce. It was gentle, but filled with killing intent, seemingly one with the universe itself.

It was an energy art that seemed to surpass something that humans could successfully cultivate, bordering instead on the mysteries of the gods. From his position within the tribulation, Yang Qi saw the fist heading toward him and could tell that it would be impossible to evade. There was no doubt that Eldest Brother Secundus was the deadliest opponent of this bunch, and dealing with him would make the rest of the fight a simple task.

“Nice. Seems like a really deadly move. I guess I should use a deadly move too. King Heaven-Devourer’s Fist!”

It was a consummate technique he had gained enlightenment of upon collecting all three thousand of the imperial snakecharms. With the power of the talismans, and the Engine of the One God within his heart, he could unleash it with shocking effect.

The two fist strikes collided and Eldest Brother Secundus staggered back several steps. His beast king clones exploded one by one and his beast hide clothing was ripped to shreds, leaving him standing there muscular and naked.

“Very strong,” he said, calling on his true energy to negate the effects of King Heaven-Devourer’s Fist. At the same time, a very serious expression overtook his face as he realized that he really was in a deadly struggle. “Very, very strong. You have a Chaos God cultivation base, and if you ever reach the ninth minor stair of the Deathless Heavenly Stairway like me, you might be considered exceptional. But nobody other than a Lesser God could possibly cause problems for me.”

“Could you please just die?” Yang Qi said, and then he released the full set of martial arts that was King Heaven-Devourer’s Fist.

“Devour all under Heaven!”

“Gobble Mountains and Rivers!”

“Scoop up Primal-Chaos!”

“Pester the Universe!”

“Chew down God-Spirits!”

They were all moves that King Heaven-Devourer had invented to fight the ancient legion of gods. They were unimaginably mighty, so much so that ordinary people couldn’t even use them. But considering that Yang Qi had collected all three thousand of King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans, he could unleash them in their full capacity. Each move thrummed with the power to devour all types of vital energy, even godliness.

Even if the Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court all made a move on him at once, the true energy of that fist technique would simply devour their attacks.

Normally speaking, it would have been dangerous for Yang Qi to simply consume the true energy of the four emperors and Eldest Brother Secundus. Thankfully, he had the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart and the Aeonic God Destroyer. With those assets, he could not only deal with seventeen opponents on the level of these Grand Emperors, he could deal with seventeen god-spirits. In the end, they were just helping him to power up the Cruiser of Civilization and the Engine of the One God.

“Great Dao Projection!”

Yang Qi thrust out another fist, and it was as if the embodiment of a great dao had appeared. It seemed round and flat at the same time, but was neither. And this time, instead of targeting Eldest Brother Secundus, he targeted the much weaker Leaf Dao-Denier.

True energy surged and space shattered, causing a look of profound terror to appear on Leaf Dao-Denier’s face. Before all of this had started, he had smugly looked forward to defeating Yang Qi with the beast king clones. However, in a complete subversion of his expectations, he wasn’t even close to being a match for Yang Qi.

“We’ve got to save him! Four Emperors Combine: Soul of Antiquity!”

The Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court joined forces and tried to extricate Leaf Dao-Denier from his dangerous situation, along with simultaneously hitting Yang Qi with their Soul of Antiquity.

An enormous soul appeared, with the body of a snake and the head of a human, its hair disheveled. Pulsing with ancient power, it lunged toward Yang Qi from behind as if to latch on to him with its mouth.

Yang Qi simply waved his hand behind him and the Soul of Antiquity shattered into dust.

Striding forward, Eldest Brother Secundus grabbed Leaf Dao-Denier. “You still can’t use the full power of the beast king clones. Let’s join forces. Combine our true energy, Eternal and Fortuned together!”

A stream of divine will entered Leaf Dao-Denier, then both he and Eldest Brother Secundus drew on their true energy and summoned two doorways. One was the Eternal Gate, and the other was the Fortuned Gate.

By combining their power, Eldest Brother Secundus and Leaf Dao-Denier were instantly three times stronger than before! And they didn’t hesitate to unleash a fist strike.

“Eternal Fortuned Fist!” they shouted.

Then Leaf Dao-Denier said, “I refuse to believe you’re on the level of the legion of gods, Yang Qi! You can’t compare to our combined might!”

“True Dao of the Heavenly Court; Strategies of the Grand Nation!”

As of this moment, Yang Qi had two top experts attacking him from left and right. Plus, the four emperors were attacking from four other directions, completely surrounding him. And the beast king clones were letting loose howls that contained traces of deathless godliness.

Despite all of that, Yang Qi remained completely unfazed. He inhaled, sucking in all of the vital energy of the tribulation around him, causing power to surge through his meridians. In the blink of an eye, all of his flesh, muscles, life force, genes, and energy arts experienced a huge transformation.

Snap! Crack!

He grew larger, and a full head taller. At the same time, he began pulsing with the most majestic of energy.

With his left hand he drew on the Hand of the One God, and the right, King Heaven-Devourer’s Fist, sending his own true energy to slam directly into that of Eldest Brother Secundus and Leaf Dao-Denier.

BOOM!

The four emperors suddenly felt their own fist attack disappearing into nothing, as surely as if they had experienced the four tribulations of Success, Steadiness, Destruction, and the Void. Then, somehow, the attacks reappeared, heading directly toward their sources!

The Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court were scared out of their minds and quickly fell back in retreat. The attacks missed them, but hit the Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple, causing it to tremble and begin collapsing.

Meanwhile, Eldest Brother Secundus and Leaf Dao-Denier were also hit by the power of their own Eternal Fortuned Fist, causing both of them to cough up mouthfuls of blood.

“What’s going on?”

At first, none of them had any idea what was happening.

“Watch out!” Grand Emperor Myriadmagic Heavenspan shouted. “He’s using the mysterious powers of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart! He’s absorbing the powers of my attack, sending them into the chart and converting them into power for his own use. From what I remember, the reason King Immortal-Slayer created the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart to begin with was that he wanted to fill it with the destructive power of myriad worlds, then use that to make himself unbeatable in a fight.”

Grand Emperor Myriadmagic Heavenspan was truly incredible. In the blink of an eye, he noticed the trick that the Five Great Lokapālas had been completely oblivious to.

Yang Qi also couldn’t help but marvel. The ability he had just used was actually different from before. After much hard work and contemplation, he had finally unlocked the secret method to absorb attacks, seal the power, then convert it into something he could use.

He hadn’t been able to do that even when fighting the lokapālas. But Grand Emperor Myriadmagic Heavenspan had instantly deduced the truth.

Unfortunately, being aware of the trick didn’t mean he knew how to deal with it. There was no way this group was in a position to surpass the powers of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Not even gods could do that.

After all, King Immortal-Slayer had used the chart to kill plenty of gods in his time.

Yang Qi had no plans to give any of these six enemies any breathing room. “Since you know what I'm doing, you should also know that I can absorb and seal any type of power. You people have no hope of overcoming the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. If you keep attacking me, I won’t have to do a single thing to defeat you. Therefore, the time has come for you to die.”

Chapter 827: Mysteries of the Monarch Chart

The Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart was full of mysteries, and right now Yang Qi was only privy to a tiny, tiny fraction of them. However, he had recently come to understand how to absorb, convert, and re-release power. As for the many other mysteries it contained, he would have to wait until he reached godly ascension for that.

In any case, the power conversion trick definitely put him in a position to deal with these six experts.

By this point, the heavenly tribulation was long gone.

Yang Qi had completely devoured it and turned it into magical laws which coursed through his body, creating a preheaven godly path. This was the Chaos God level. It was like the beginnings of primordial chaos, the start of the universe itself. Yang Qi could now form primordial chaos magical laws.

They were magical laws that could connect to the energy of the dao of heaven that existed in ancient primordial chaos. In turn, being able to unite with the dao of heaven made it possible for him to sense the god world, and the Deathless Heavenly Stairway, of course.

Next came the nine stairs, those of Valor, Wisdom, Endurance, and Fearlessness and the like. Each was harder to climb than the previous, and those who reached the end would become like the legion of gods. Those who failed would remain in the world of mortals, unable to transcend the river of time and pierce through the past and the future.

Yang Qi suddenly erupted with killing intent as he viciously attacked his six opponents. With his left hand he launched the Hand of the One God, and with the right, King Heaven-Devourer’s Fist. He combined their functions and added in Fateless power. Although his opponents didn’t have to worry about the tribulation anymore, Yang Qi was vastly stronger than before. It was like he had turned from one person into ten thousand. Furthermore, his opponents were scrambling so desperately to defend themselves that they couldn’t join forces.

Bam. Bam. Bam!

He landed a blow on all six opponents, and whatever power they and their beast king clones used to defend themselves, he would suck into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart and add to his collection there.

As he locked down the power, it became a blood-colored taiji symbol, spinning endlessly.

In turn, that taiji symbol affected the spatial power in the chart and began unlocking certain sealing marks that Yang Qi hadn’t even been aware existed. All of a sudden, he could see fragmented images of a scene from ancient times.

He saw seventy-two mighty monarchs waging war on the legion of gods in the god world. Godrelics shattered left and right, and gods fell in death. However, the gods were also united as they fought viciously against the seventy-two brethren. The seventy-two brethren managed to evade each blow, yet Yang Qi could see all of those magical abilities in his mind's eye, and his God Legion Seal gobbled them up.

Yang Qi was reaching a peak level of power.

At the same time, his immortal-slaying clone was experiencing a dramatic rise in his cultivation base. He was also able to witness the battle between the seventy-two brethren and the legion of gods, and power from the monarch chart was flowing into him.

The clone blurred into action and headed deep into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, where he settled down into a meditative trance. Yang Qi could see that his cultivation base was rising rapidly, and his fleshly body was being re-formed. From the look of it, when he emerged from his trance he would be roughly on the same level as Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven.

Yang Qi wasn’t sure of the full ramifications of this new development, but he did know that as he became more proficient in the use of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, it was making it easier to deal with these six opponents. Without the chart, he would never have come out on top in this conflict.

His hands blurred as he launched attack after attack, each of which forced the Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court, Eldest Brother Secundus, and Leaf Dao-Denier back across the battlefield.

In fact, the four suzerains of hell and Patriarch Annalist hadn’t even had to make a move so far, and were just looking on in shock. At a certain point, they flew out of the Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple to set up a spell formation. Yang Qi had given Patriarch Annalist a god item from the Aeonic God Temple, something called the God-Sealing Command Banner. Once it was set up, not even the ancient gods would be able to escape from it. The suzerains of hell helped to power it, along with the Army of Radiance and Light, and the temple was soon completely locked down, making it impossible for anyone to get in or out of it.

‘Yang Qi is so strong!’ thought Patriarch Annalist. ‘He’s fighting seventeen opponents who are all on the level of Grand Emperors. His cultivation base is like that of a god! Even if this fight ends in a draw, he would still fully deserve to be the league-lord. Going forward, the Dao Defense League is definitely going to be the top alliance, with full command of universal fortune. The future world, the Primeval Age, the Demon League… none of them will be able to stand up to the alliance!’

The four suzerains of hell were thinking similar thoughts as they looked on and shivered. They were now happier than ever that they hadn’t betrayed Yang Qi. From what they could tell, even if they had joined the opposing force, making it twenty-one strong, they would still have ended up dead at Yang Qi’s hands.

Right now, the six experts and their twelve beast king clones weren’t even leaving a scratch on Yang Qi when they attacked him. Their power was all being sucked into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart without even touching him.

The suzerains were now truly loyal to him in their hearts and weren’t willing to even entertain thoughts of betraying him. Of course, monsters were fickle, so if some stronger person came along that could crush Yang Qi, they would obviously change loyalties to that person.

For that reason, Yang Qi would willingly make use of them, but never trust them.

Eldest Brother Secundus had already resorted to a whole host of consummate techniques, but none of them did anything to Yang Qi. His attacks disappeared like a statue of an ox tossed into the sea. At a certain point, he shouted, “This is bad! With him using the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, we’ll never really be able to hurt him. Retreat! We can’t fight him now!”

Of the thirty-six stratagems of war, retreat was often the best option.

Eldest Brother Secundus shot up into the air, heading toward the top of the Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple. However, an enormous banner appeared as he approached, pulsing with the power of the Army of Radiance and Light, the four suzerains, and Patriarch Annalist. The banner wrapped around Eldest Brother Secundus and flung him back down, and in that moment he realized that he was trapped. It was going to be difficult to escape death.

Mind racing, Eldest Brother Secundus suddenly came up with a vicious plan, which he relayed to the others via divine sense. “We have to get out of here. Let’s combine our beast king clones and use the resulting true energy to break open the spell formation. That’s our only hope of escaping.”

Meanwhile, Yang Qi began singing the Eternal Heavenly Aria, causing numerous halos to appear that blessed himself and damned his opponents, causing their energy arts to weaken and their power to slowly drain.

“Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court! It’s time for you to die!” Yang Qi wasn’t about to show any mercy. As the Eternal Heavenly Aria weakened his opponents, he summoned his Freedom Wings and the Infernal Deity Spear. Now that he was a Chaos God, the spear looked different from before. It was made from the infinitude of hells, and as soon as it was out in the open, the Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple transformed into a hell of hells, an abyss of pain, darkness, and brutality.

Not even the legion of gods would want to go into a place like that.

Whoosh!

In the blink of an eye, his spear was right in front of Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven. The Grand Emperor was currently clad in something called the Armor of the Rage God, but all it took was a wave of Yang Qi’s hand to strip it off of him. Then the spear stabbed out three times to prevent the other three emperors from interfering before piercing right into Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven’s forehead.

Considering the spear contained the quintessence of numerous hells, there was no way anyone could possibly block its path.

Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven bellowed in rage. “Will of the Rage God, come forth! Rage of Heaven-Gods!”

At that moment, the śarīra of the Rage God emerged from his forehead.

Chapter 828: Subduing a Grand Emperor

Yang Qi’s attack with the Infernal Deity Spear seemed to be a deadly blow designed to kill Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven. In fact, he spun the spear in a way that ensured it filled all parallel universes, and thrummed with the ultimate dao of universal destruction.

In that moment, Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven felt the shadow of death looming over him. The power of hell seeped into his head and forced out his most powerful magical treasure, the śarīra of the Rage God.

The tip of the Infernal Deity Spear stabbed into the śarīra, which immediately began belching burning ragefire. The spear began trembling, but Yang Qi was ready, and sent the power of the God Legion Seal coursing through it. The śarīra then dropped into Yang Qi’s hand, and the spear continued onward, stabbing into Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven’s head and filling his sea of consciousness with the deadly power of hell.

The Grand Emperor was instantly wracked with intense pain, his soul assailed with intense force that would turn him into nothing but a zombie-like puppet within moments.

When the Grand Emperor realized he had no hope of surviving, he shouted, “Take revenge for me! The rest of you sacrifice your beast kings and get out of here!”

BOOM!

His two beast king clones appeared and began thrumming with power.

“Hurry!” Eldest Brother Secundus shouted anxiously, his hands flashing an incantation as he summoned his three beast king clones and sent them to join the two from Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven.

By this point, everyone was convinced that retreat was their only option, so they threw their own clones into the mix. Even Leaf Dao-Denier sacrificed his remaining clones.

Eleven clones merged together to form an enormous, roaring beast king that thrummed with the wild nature of the ancient god world as it unleashed a devastating attack toward the spell formation locking down the temple.

Upon seeing this, Yang Qi summoned a primal-chaos elder-snake to deal with the beast king.

With the formation having been broken, Eldest Brother Secundus led the others to become a blur of light that shot out through the resulting gap. Patriarch Annalist and the four suzerains could do nothing to stop them.

Meanwhile, Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven was left behind, with no hope whatsoever of defeating Yang Qi.

“What a pity,” Yang Qi murmured. He was too wrapped up in dealing with the beast king and Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven to do anything to interfere.

“Be crushed, beast king!” Yang Qi said, summoning the Many Heavens God Seal, which handily sealed the beast king and sucked it into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

The beast king was as strong as numerous Grand Emperors, and also had some of the blood of an Eternal One and a Fortuned One. Assimilating it would be of immense benefit to Yang Qi. In fact, it might provide enough power to get Yang Qi onto the first minor stair of the Deathless Heavenly Stairway.

Crack!

Yang Qi pushed the Infernal Deity Spear deeper into Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven, causing the grand emperor to slowly start stiffening up.

“Infernal Deity Spear: Imprison the Sea of Consciousness!”

The Devil-God Seal flowed out of the Infernal Deity Spear and into Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven’s mind, locking it down. For now, Yang Qi didn’t want to kill him. After all, he was still the official league-lord that had been accepted by all the old-timers.

Deng! Dong! Ding!

Yang Qi sat down on the league-lord’s throne and rang the bells, summoning everyone back to the temple.

Raising his voice, he said, “Elders, god-generals, and dharmarajas of the Dao Defense League, I have quelled the rebellion. Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven is no longer fit to serve as league-lord, and as you can see, I have taken him captive. The time has come to restructure our alliance to ensure that we remain the strongest organization in existence, with complete control over the age in which we live.”

The old-timers present all trembled in fear. The battle that had just been fought would be considered rare even in the Primeval Age. How could one person fight against so many top experts? But Yang Qi had done it, and had defeated them all. It was something the likes of which you would expect from gods, not immortals.

Some of the more treacherous old-timers, and those who had been simply waiting on the sidelines to see which way the wind blew, were completely won over. There was definitely no one who would ever challenge Yang Qi for his spot now.

That was especially true considering that he had Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven captive at his side.

“Oh exalted Emissary of Radiance and Light,” one of the god-generals said, stepping forward, “we can now clearly see how stubborn Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven was. He actually wanted to revive the core teachings and doctrines of the Heavenly Court and slaughter us immortals like livestock. There’s no way we can forgive such behavior. And now, I would like to be the first to suggest you step in as the new league-lord!”

Other old-timers immediately joined the god-general in supporting Yang Qi, and some even began kowtowing.

“I agree. I also nominate the emissary to be the new league-lord.”

“Let’s kowtow to the new league-lord! May he live for ten thousand autumns and rule for all eternity!”

Some of them were secretly cursing themselves for not voicing support for Yang Qi earlier. Obviously, those who were on his good side would receive plenty of benefits.

“Excellent!” Yang Qi said. “Now bring forth all of Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven’s henchmen, as well as the Deathless Corps, to be executed. Suzerains of hell, you take the lead in this!”

“Yes sir!” the four suzerains said, leaping into motion. Soon, shouting and yelling could be heard as people such as Daoist Great Void were dragged into the middle of the Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple.

The suzerains executed them all, burning them with devilfire. Their dying screams only went to further reinforce how brutal the league-lord was, and how crossing him was a very bad idea.

After it was done, Yang Qi said, “If you wish me to serve as league-lord, then I will. Henceforth, the new Emissary of Radiance and Light will be Patriarch Annalist. There will no longer be an Emissary of Darkness and Gloom. The Dao Defense League is an alliance of righteousness, and we will not tolerate pure evil. Starting today, the Emissary of Darkness and Gloom will become the Emissary of Righteousness. Obviously, the devilwitch Wave Charm cannot serve in that capacity, so I will appoint someone to replace her. From now on, cultivators of the dao of devils will be required to train with the Emissary of Righteousness.”

Suddenly, Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven burst out into maniacal laughter. “See? All of you, look! Your new league-lord is nothing short of a dictator! When I was in charge, I followed the normal process to select the emissaries, but he's going to make arbitrary rulings! Dictatorships are always brutal affairs! Your end days have come! A vicious and merciless person like this will only bring you persecution and misery.”

SMACK!

Yang Qi slapped him across his face, which immediately began swelling up. Of course, because he was sealed, he couldn’t use even a scrap of his energy arts.

“On your knees!” Yang Qi said.

Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven had no choice but to comply, although he was so angry he was about to pass out. “You dirty little swine! How dare you torment me! I'm one of the Grand Emperors of the Heavenly Court! Kill me if you want, but how dare you insult me!”

“You’re the one being insulting!” one of the god-generals shouted, stepping forward. “This Grand Emperor needs to be executed on the spot! Only that will ease the hatred in our hearts. Oh exalted League-Lord, we implore you to put him to death immediately; under no circumstances can he be left alive.”

Everyone was shocked to see the previously high and mighty Grand Emperor being so easily pushed around by Yang Qi, and it only served to further reinforce his majesty.

CRACK!

The Hell Scourge appeared in Yang Qi’s hands, and he waved the god-general away. “It’s only natural that I’ll beat Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven to death. However, before I do, I want to make it very clear what will happen going forward. Those who follow me without resistance will receive untold benefits, and might even have a chance at godly ascension. But those like Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven who defy and rebel against me will suffer a dismal fate.  This is the Hell Scourge, each lash of which brings the torment of countless hells. Perhaps if you can endure the lashings of this whip, Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven, I’ll allow you to experience a quick death afterward.”

“Bring it on, you swine!” Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven shouted. “Bring it on!”

SMACK!

As soon as the whip hit him, Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven’s face twitched, and it looked like he was about to scream. Instead, he bit his tongue so hard it began bleeding.

One lash turned into two. Then three. Then ten. Eventually, Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven couldn’t take it any longer, and started squealing like a dying pig. “Stop! I can’t take this anymore. Just kill me. Let it end!”

He was now twitching and writhing so much that he didn’t look anything at all like a Grand Emperor.

Those in the audience exchanged awkward glances. The sight of Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven acting in this way caused goosebumps to crawl up their spines.

However, Yang Qi didn’t stop. “You have no choice but to endure, Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven. No choice at all.”

After a few dozen more lashes, the Grand Emperor finally began begging. “Yang Qi… League-Lord… mercy! Spare me! I’ll work for you like an animal. I’ll be your slave. Just stop the lashing! I’ll give you my faith. I’ll become a believer!”

Chapter 829: A Position of Power

Bloodcurdling screams filled the Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple.

Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven begged and pleaded, offering to open his heart and soul to Yang Qi, to give him faith, to become a believer. The power of faith provided by a Grand Emperor like him would be incredible, far beyond any other Chaos God.

At a certain point, Yang Qi held back his hand. Voice cool, he said, “I’d originally planned to whip you to death. However, if you’re really willing to open your soul, then perhaps I can show some leniency. Fine. Allow my Light of Faith to enter you. And do nothing to resist, otherwise, I won’t show you any mercy.”

“Yes, yes of course….”

After the agony of the Hell Scourge, the mere absence of pain made Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven feel like he was in the halls of heaven. As of now, he would rather die than ever suffer those lashings again.

Even losing face in front of a whole crowd of people was preferable.

Yang Qi waved his hand and a beam of sagelight shot into the Grand Emperor’s head, filled with numerous majestic magical laws as well as the doctrines of radiance and light that Yang Qi had created upon founding the Sage Monarch Society. Normally speaking, Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven could crush such things easily. But once he accepted them into him, his destiny, his fortune, his mind, his soul, and his very substructure would all belong to Yang Qi.

Soon, the light faded away and he was a pious believer. Getting on his knees, he said, “Milord, I, Ragefire Broilheaven, your staunchest believer, hereby kowtow to you!”

He had even stopped calling himself a Grand Emperor.

RUMBLE!

As he kowtowed, Yang Qi felt immense destiny flowing into him, like a raging fire.

Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven was a very important person when it came to the dao of heaven. Now, Yang Qi had forced him into submission, providing him with a very valuable and also powerful minion. It was the kind of good fortune that could be encountered by chance, but never searched for and found.

It was just like the old saying, it is simpler by far to raise a thousand troops than to find a single general to lead them. This man’s destiny reached back to the days of the ancient Heavenly Court, and he was now a loyal servant who couldn’t possibly rebel.

At that moment, everyone present was convinced of Yang Qi’s position of superiority and power, and none of them dared to oppose him. The Dao Defense League’s power structure was stabilized, and it would soon lead the immortal dao civilization into a golden age.

Of course, even though the Dao Defense League was the biggest alliance, there were simply too many immortal worlds to count. There were even some who were unaware of the invasion of the future world and remained aloof to the larger affairs around them. And that wasn’t to mention the endless primal-chaos that existed, which still contained many old-timers, as well as the experts who had long since focused their efforts on reaching the Ancient Road to the Gods.

All things considered, the population of the Dao Defense League was probably only one percent of the immortal dao civilization as a whole. That said, it was still an incredibly large and powerful alliance. And right now, Yang Qi was the leader of that alliance, making him like an emperor in a mortal empire.

He had consolidated his power, prepared defenses against outside incursions, and could now ponder his next step: reaching the Deathless Throne.

“Very well, Ragefire Broilheaven,” Yang Qi said. “You’ve seen the error in your ways, and made a change for the better. I hereby appoint you as the Emissary of Righteousness. You will bear my creeds and doctrines, and use them to completely and utterly transform any and all wretch-devils. Attend well to your tasks, understand? Henceforth, you have no need for your previous term of address, Ragefire Broilheaven. You will now join the Yang Clan and bear the name Yang Righteousness.”

“Thank you for blessing me with this name, Milord,” the newly renamed Yang Righteousness said, repeatedly knocking his forehead to the ground like a faithful servant should. The onlookers all sighed and inwardly shook their heads. For all intents and purposes, the famous Grand Emperor of the past was now dead, replaced by a mindless zealot.

“You four suzerains, step forward,” Yang Qi said. Up to this point, he hadn’t truly forced the suzerains into submission. But now that he had them in his clutches, there was no way he would just let them go.

“Y-Young… Young Sir… what are you doing?”

“We didn’t do anything to betray you! We served you well. Don’t tell me you’re going to take our destiny and force us to exercise faith in you!”

“I am,” Yang Qi said. “Monsters like you don’t exercise faith in anyone. You only care about who’s strongest. Furthermore, if you get the chance, you’ll hit anyone when they’re down. If I hadn’t been able to hold my own here, you would’ve definitely turned on me and tried to seize my good fortune. Am I right?”

“We would never dare! Never ever!” The four suzerains were all shaking their heads vigorously, although, they were already sure of what Yang Qi was planning to do next.

“Enough blathering. Open your souls and become believers, just like Yang Righteousness. I’ll even transform you into angels, giving you energy arts far more powerful than you currently have.” He flicked his sleeve. “You can refuse, but if you do, then you’ll either die, or face the pain of my Hell Scourge. And I doubt any of you four could last long under that torment.”

All of a sudden, the previous Emissary of Darkness and Gloom, Wave Charm, stepped forward and said, “League-Lord, let my father go and I’ll do anything you want.”

“Stow your impudence!” Patriarch Annalist barked. “These four monsters will convert. If they don’t, they’ll only sit around plotting ways to cause trouble. League-Lord, although we’ve consolidated power here in the alliance, that Eldest Brother Secundus managed to escape with the other three Grand Emperors and Leaf Dao-Denier. These are extraordinary times, therefore, extraordinary measures are required. The generalissimos of the future world will be arriving soon, and the war will truly begin to rage. We absolutely can’t allow these four suzerains to cause problems.”

“I agree,” Yang Qi said with a nod. Truth be told, he had long since decided that he would force the four suzerains into submission, giving him the faith of five experts, all of whom were at the Grand Emperor level.

Not only would that faith benefit his immortal-slaying clone, it would be of much help in probing the mysteries of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, the Engine of the One God, King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans, and the beast king clones he had devoured. Thanks to the warnings provided by the dao of heaven, he knew that a grave crisis was coming. The experts of the Primeval and Future Ages would be very difficult to deal with, and that wasn’t to mention whatever powerful beings might be lurking on the Ancient Road to the Gods.

It was said that once someone stepped onto the Ancient Road to the Gods, it was impossible to turn back. However, it wouldn’t surprise Yang Qi if there actually were people who could descend from there. Besides, there was already some sort of god-spirit who had been backing Sectlord Nine Yangs, someone with a cultivation base far beyond the level of the Grand Emperors.

Considering Yang Qi currently had no way to track that person down, he wanted to be prepared for the worst.

“My time is limited. Are you going to give me your faith? If not, I’ll kill you.” He flicked his finger, and four streams of the Light of Faith shot toward the suzerains. “Don’t even think of fighting back and hoping to get in a lucky shot that wins you a victory. You saw me deal with Eldest Brother Secundus and the others, so you know that killing you lot would be as easy for me as flipping over my hand. And don’t forget that my energy arts are specially designed to be the bane of your existence.”

The trembling suzerains finally acknowledged allegiance. “We accept your Light of Faith, League-Lord.” In the blink of an eye, they became believers who dropped to their knees and kowtowed to Yang Qi.

He sent more light streaming into them, which extruded their devil energy and released the radiance and light that had been eternally sealed within their genes. White wings of pure power sprouted out of their backs and holy hymns echoed around them.

“Lord, thy divine might is immeasurable, and your majesty consummate and perfect….”

The four suzerains of hell were now four angels of untold beauty and might, with incredible fighting prowess and no fear of death.

“I hereby bequeath you with the surname Yang. You will be named Yang Unrestrained, Yang Mahānata, Yang Misery, and Yang Never-Ending. Understand? You will lead the Army of Radiance and Light, er, wait. No. Considering that I'm the league-lord now, the Army of Radiance and Light will have a new name. It will be the Army of Holy Sages.” One by one, the old-timers present began kneeling in submission.

It seemed like only yesterday that Yang Qi had arrived at the Dao Defense League and joined the Nine Yangs God Sect. Now he was the league-lord, with more power than the previous leader had ever dreamed of having.

Chapter 830: The Big Picture

Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven had become Yang Righteousness.

And the four suzerains of hell became Yang Mahānata, Yang Misery, Yang Unrestrained, and Yang Never-Ending. The Dao Defense League had shot to new heights of glory, and all of the old-timers and patriarchs could sense that they were entering a golden age in which destiny burned like fire. Everyone was going to benefit as a result.

The leadership of the league had been purged, and the next thing Yang Qi did was make changes to the ranking system.

Under the league-lord were the two emissaries, one of radiance and light, the other of righteousness. Beneath them were four heavenly kings, who were the former suzerains of hell. Next were eighteen dharmarajas and thirty-six god-generals. Further down were the numerous elders, and of course, the common members of the alliance.

Yang Qi also instituted a system of contributions in which elders were required to make monthly donations to the alliance storehouses. Any who failed to meet their quota would be stripped of their title and possibly face other punishments.

Of course, the system of law enforcement wasn’t brutal and rigid; it was actually designed to encourage participation. Those who properly contributed would acquire cultivation techniques, medicinal pills, secret texts, or even energy arts.

The Dao Defense League was already becoming more united, instead of being a dish of loose sand like before. Yang Qi was the center of it all, and he commanded full loyalty from all of his subordinates.

After all, the Emissary of Radiance and Light was Patriarch Annalist, who had supported him from the very beginning. And the Emissary of Righteousness was the former Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven, who was now Yang Righteousness, a believer in Yang Qi who would climb mountains of blades and swim through seas of fire for him.

As for the four heavenly kings, they were former devil lords who were just as strong as the Grand Emperors, but had become even stronger thanks to the angelic transformation they had undergone. All of the dharmarajas and god-generals also supported Yang Qi, and as for those they commanded, they couldn’t act out of line even if they wanted to.

If Yang Qi had simply appointed the four suzerains of hell as the new heavenly kings, there definitely would have been misgivings on the part of the elders. But everyone knew that they weren’t monsters any longer. Yang Qi had used a holy technique of some sort to cleanse them and turn them into angels.

The old-timers who were particularly knowledgeable were all convinced that Yang Qi was the true lord who would bring salvation to the world.

“Ladies and gentlemen, the various rules and regulations of the Dao Defense League are now fully established. Our forces are championed by my Army of Holy Sages, which is made of holy angels free of greed or corruption, who will follow any and all orders. The rest of you do not need to fear becoming cannon fodder; I can call upon the endless hells to summon hell-born fiend-devils to help defend the dao of heaven and save our age from the future world.”

People were already feeling less nervous. After all, the angels in Yang Qi’s army had such incredible fighting prowess that even multiple cultivators of the same level would have difficulty fighting them.

“For now, the main responsibility of all members of the alliance is to further your cultivation. Gather and store power. And of course, I know that most of you are people who control entire immortal worlds of your own, filled with countless cultivators. Make use of them. I need faith. Incredible amounts of faith. For the purpose of growing my Sage Monarch Society, I require that all of you erect Sage Monarch Temples on the worlds you come from.”

Truth be told, it wasn’t the old-timers that Yang Qi valued, but rather the immortal worlds they came from, and the innumerable cultivators therein.

By this point, the Dao Defense League had somewhere around a hundred trillion immortal worlds in it, and the combined faith of all of those cultivators would provide almost incalculable benefit to him.

“The more faith I have, the more hell-born fiend-devils I can summon to become angels. And that will make us even more well-equipped to fight the future world, the Demonfolk, and the armies from ancient times. Therefore, return to your worlds, erect the temples I need, and begin making the required contributions.”

RUMBLE!

The old-timers exchanged awkward glances, but knew that there was nothing else they could do but comply.

Yang Qi had all the power. Besides, it wasn’t as if he were asking them to sacrifice their lives. To people as strong as these old-timers, the ordinary cultivators of the immortal worlds were like crops; harvest some, and they would grow back.

Soon, a buzz of activity spread through the hundred trillion immortal worlds as temples were erected everywhere. The idea of a hundred trillion immortal worlds was hard to even think about. For example, the Titan Emperor Heaven was only a first ranked immortal world, and even its population had been enormous.

And the Dao Defense League already had dozens of thirty-third ranked immortal worlds.

Even the number of twentieth ranked worlds was impossible to count, with those tenth ranked and below being like the eternal sands of the universe. Of course, the stronger the Dao Defense League became, the more immortal worlds would flock to join it.

Eventually, Yang Qi went into seclusion, drawing on the new influx of faith to push his own destiny to an even higher level. He needed to get a lot stronger before he could advance his cultivation base.

**

Somewhere out in the primal-chaos paleo-energy, five fierce figures could be seen deep in a hidden lair, emerging from meditative trances. This was the group of five who had escaped the showdown with Yang Qi, namely, Grand Emperors Myriadmagic Heavenspan, Ninelimits Paragon, and Heavenearth Vastocean, plus Eldest Brother Secundus and Leaf Dao-Denier.

Having escaped by the skin of their teeth, they found a hideout in primal-chaos where they could settle down and recover.

By this point, they were roughly back to normal. Sadly, there seemed little hope for them in the overall scheme of things. The beast king clones that they had hoped would give them the ultimate upper hand had ended up being taken by Yang Qi. Now more than ever, they knew they weren’t a match for him.

“We have to steal those beast king clones back,” Leaf Dao-Denier said. “Otherwise Yang Qi’s going to assimilate them. Then we’ll be even worse off.” Of course, he had the weakest cultivation base out of the entire group, so it was little wonder he was so focused on the clones. Without them, he had little hope of holding his own.

The Tusita Heaven was now in Yang Qi’s hands, and there seemed little chance of taking it back. Leaf Dao-Denier could sense Yang Qi devouring the Tusita Heaven’s essence, and could also tell that he was erecting Sage Monarch Temples there to harvest the faith of the people.

“The beast king clones won’t be easy to assimilate,” said Eldest Brother Secundus. “After all, they were created with Eternal Fortuned blood. Unfortunately, Yang Qi is a Fateless One, so if he does manage to assimilate them, he’ll gain the constitution of an Eternal Fortuned One, which will make him even more difficult to deal with. Let’s see how things play out. There’s still a lot of internal conflict in the Dao Defense League and we might as well see how Yang Qi deals with it all.”

“That’s true,” Grand Emperor Myriadmagic Heavenspan said. “If you know yourself and know your enemy, you’ll always be victorious. Unfortunately, we have no way of finding out how Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven is doing. He knows a lot of our secrets, and if someone captured him and forced that information out of him, the consequences would be too horrible to contemplate.”

The Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court had previously been working with each other out of interests of mutual profit. The fact that Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven had met with such misfortune didn’t cause the other Grand Emperors to worry about his safety, but rather their own self-interest.

Meanwhile, Eldest Brother Secundus couldn’t help but inwardly sneer at how superficial Grand Emperor Myriadmagic Heavenspan was being. Normally speaking, he would never truly ally with people like this, but right now, he had no other choice when it came to trying to handle Yang Qi.

“Why don’t we just pool our powers and techniques to see what's going on in the Dao Defense League?” Grand Emperor Heavenearth Vastocean said.

“That’s fine.”

They did so, summoning an enormous mirror which revealed the Dao Defense League as a whole. Instantly, they saw that the hundred trillion immortal worlds were like a huge vortex of stars surrounding an area of boundless radiance and light that was almost impossible to peer into.

Meanwhile, they could all see tiny, glowing seeds in all of the immortal worlds, causing that radiance and light to expand and grow.

At the same time, the power of faith was growing larger and larger, flowing in great rivers to the central region.

The sight of so much faith power caused the hearts of the grand emperors to grow cold.

“Dammit! That damned Yang Qi is already gathering faith!? With so many immortal worlds powering him, who knows how high he’ll climb?”

Chapter 831: Demonfolk Experts

Everyone was completely shocked by the burgeoning destiny of the Dao Defense League. A hundred trillion immortal worlds all had temples erected in Yang Qi’s name, allowing the faith to flow directly to him and bolster his cultivation base.

Faith was not an ordinary power; it was a kind of destiny that superseded anything and everything, something that surpassed any individual person.

Faith that was offered fully and willingly was pure and without spot. Brothers, sisters, mothers, fathers… none of them could compare to someone who was the subject of complete faith. Because of faith, a believer would follow the instructions of a god to destroy anything in existence, or even revile their own clan. It was both crazed and unadulterated, and it could not be stopped or reversed.

Furthermore, faith was tied to godly ascension and the Deathless Throne.

Throughout the years, many experts had studied the power of faith, but few people had ever truly come to understand it. It was very difficult to control, and required countless humans and other living beings to get it. Furthermore, faith was connected deeply to karma.

Whatever karma existed in the believers would be part of their faith, including impurities that could ultimately lead to cultivation deviation and death.

There were many old-timers throughout history who had founded religions or sects to gather faith, only to meet a grisly end. Because of that, the practice of using faith for cultivation purposes gradually became less and less popular, until it very nearly died out. At the most, it would be seen among relatively weak cultivators in the mortal world. Among higher-level experts, the preferred method of cultivation was to absorb primal-chaos and convert it into essence power.

Now Yang Qi was ignoring that trend, establishing a network of faith that was both unbelievable and terrifying.

“So he's established a system of faith,” Leaf Dao-Denier said. “But faith is tied to karma, which means he's accepting the karma of all his believers. This Yang Qi is going to meet a horrible end, that's for sure.”

“It’s not that simple,” Eldest Brother Secundus said gravely. “His cultivation base is far beyond ours, and he knows a lot more about this than we do. There’s no way he's unaware of the side effects of using faith for cultivation. Even the legion of gods would have difficulty dealing with karma and avoiding corruption. There is truth in the two sayings when things reach an extreme, they can only move in the opposite direction and all things start to crumble after reaching the zenith. No one can defy such truths, not even the dao of heaven or the legion of gods. However, Yang Qi seems to be doing just that! What’s his secret?”

“He's terrifying,” Grand Emperor Myriadmagic Heavenspan said. “He seized the destiny of the Dao Defense League from us, and now he’s built a system of faith. Not even we would dare to do that. Destiny is the basis of imperial power among mortals, whereas faith is the basis of godly power. They’re completely different. No one but a true god-spirit could do what he’s doing. He’ll definitely suffer retribution for his brazen actions.”

Destiny was the basis of imperial power. In the mortal world, the emperor was said to command the destiny of the commoners. He had a golden mouth and jade words, meaning that his pronouncements could decide the fate of anyone he commanded.

However, the emperor wasn’t a god who the people would worship, and he couldn’t benefit from their faith. If he did, he would accept their karma. Eventually, either he, or his descendants, would suffer.

“Let’s just wait and see what happens,” Grand Emperor Heavenearth Vastocean said. “He’ll definitely meet a horrific end. Those who are anxious for quick results will always meet death in the end.”

“But what do we do right now?” Grand Emperor Ninelimits Paragon asked. “Matters of karma will take years to resolve, and right now we aren’t a match for him. He’ll eventually try to track us down and kill us. Don’t tell me we'll be forced to hide out here in primal-chaos for the rest of our lives.”

“Well, hello there,” a voice suddenly said, much to the shock of everyone present.

“Who was that?” Eldest Brother Secundus said. “The only person who could possibly sneak up on us would have to be at a higher level than us. But we’re already on the ninth stair of the Deathless Heavenly Stairway, the Stair of the True Void. Don’t tell me this person is stronger than that!”

“Who—”

“Over here,” the voice said, and an old man appeared, clad in bizarre, primitive clothing and a tall hat. He seemed to thrum with power, and had eyes as deep as the ocean that seemed to radiate the feeling of the Ancient Road to the Gods. As for his aura, it seemed both righteous and evil, yet was neither. It was actually a combination of both, making him like a god-devil incarnate.

“Who are you?” Eldest Brother Secundus said, taking a step forward.

The old man flicked his sleeve, and Eldest Brother Secundus suddenly felt immense power weighing down on him, the kind he couldn’t possibly sustain. It forced him to take two steps backward, causing an unsightly expression to appear on his face.

“I'm Patriarch Hell-Crusher,” the old man said.

“The top patriarch among the Demonfolk?” Grand Emperor Myriadmagic Heavenspan said. “What are you doing here?”

“To join forces with you, of course,” Patriarch Hell-Crusher said. “Don’t worry, we have a common enemy in Yang Qi. With his Army of Radiance and Light and the Aeonic God Temple, he waged war on our Demon League and destroyed dozens of demon-immortal worlds. It was a big blow for us. I heard that about a month ago he drove you lot out and imprisoned Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven. Well, that won’t do, will it? So why don’t you work with us Demonfolk? We’ve already worked out an agreement with the Dragonfolk from the Eight Tribes Heaven to open a passageway to the ancient past. It won’t be long before we have ancient experts here to help us wipe out the Dao Defense League. Then we can control the dao of heaven and no one will be a match for us. What do you think?”

“I'm in,” Leaf Dao-Denier said coolly. “I want Yang Qi dead, and I’ll do anything to make that happen, even sink to the darkest depths.”

“I'm in, too,” Eldest Brother Secundus said, “especially if experts from the past are coming.”

After all, Eldest Brother Secundus was from the Primeval Age himself.

The other three emperors of the Heavenly Court exchanged glances. Considering their background, joining the Demonfolk didn’t seem very appropriate. But Leaf Dao-Denier and Eldest Brother Secundus had already done so, leaving them in an even weaker position than before. But when you stand under low eaves, you have no choice but to bow your head.

“Fine, we’re in.”

“Excellent,” Patriarch Hell-Crusher said. “You won’t be disappointed. And when the power from ancient times is delivered, you’ll get your share. The top experts from the Primeval Age are already under a lot of pressure from the future world and anxious to come here. Once they arrive, the influx of power will definitely push your cultivation bases to higher levels.”

“I'm already aware of that,” Eldest Brother Secundus said. “It’ll take a lot of top experts working together to open the passageway, and that power will spill out into the current age. Those experts will be much stronger than I am.”

“Fine. I’ll take my leave now. Remember, we’re working together on this. And by that, I mean you are working with me personally, Patriarch Hell-Crusher. If any other old-timers from the Demonfolk come to you, tell them that you're close friends with me. Sworn brothers, got it?”

His words made it abundantly clear that there were intense power struggles going on in the Demon League, and Patriarch Hell-Crusher was attempting to seize control.

Of course, that meant that this was the perfect time to take advantage of a crisis for personal gain, which was something Leaf Dao-Denier was very adept at.

‘You just wait, Yang Qi,’ he thought. 'Considering that I'm working with the Primeval Age, I'm going to get incredible benefits sooner or later. And now that you’re wrapped up with karma, you’ll definitely be dragged down into death eventually.’

The five experts joined Patriarch Hell-Crusher and vanished into primal-chaos.

There were now several clearly-defined camps. The Demonfolk were working with the Dragonfolk and the ancient world. The future world was on its own, and the Dao Defense League was leading the charge for the immortal dao civilization.

Three major forces were competing to try to get onto the Ancient Road to the Gods.

**

Meanwhile, Yang Qi was working on his cultivation, unaware of the situation within the Demon League. That said, all of them were already defeated opponents of his, so he wasn’t particularly worried. Right now, he was focused on gathering faith and helping his immortal-slaying clone with his cultivation. After all, the influx of faith was primarily beneficial to the clone right now.

As the clone grew stronger, his control over the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart increased and he could unlock more of its secrets.

Yang Qi could see his clone sitting cross-legged in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, surrounded by the sweet dew that was the influx of faith. As the faith flowed into him, his cultivation base pulsed with a heaven-shaking, earth-shattering aura.

Unfortunately, Yang Qi was able to detect the streams of karmic power within the faith, karma that existed in all living beings.

When accepting the faith of living beings, one accepted their karma. And karma was very powerful. As the faith flowed into the immortal-slaying clone, Yang Qi used his Lord's Eye to examine it closely. He soon realized that it was impossible to strip away, seal, or destroy that karma.

It was like a time bomb, slowly building up and waiting to explode. When it did, it could kill even gods.

However, Yang Qi knew what he was doing. He was stockpiling the karma and waiting for King Immortal-Slayer to be resurrected. Once he was, that karma would be the ticket to destroying him. At least, that was Yang Qi’s plan.

‘When I get all of your legacy medallions, King Immortal-Slayer, in the moment you’re resurrected, you’ll be assailed by the karma of all living beings. Will you be able to take it?’ Yang Qi chuckled coldly. ‘Tackling you is going to be quite interesting. Other than you, I don’t think anyone else is even close to being a match for me.’

Chapter 832: Power Index

Yang Qi was using the destiny of the Dao Defense League for his own personal cultivation, but wasn't touching any of the faith. In fact, all of the faith he had previously collected was being poured into his immortal-slaying clone.

His clone took that power, as well as the faith of all the living beings in the Dao Defense League, and used it to rise to incredible heights of power. During the month that passed, the clone broke through all cultivation obstacles and continuously made progress.

Yang Qi’s cultivation base was already at the peak of the Chaos God level, which meant that he would soon be able to perceive some of the mysteries of the Deathless Heavenly Stairway. He would rise to the first stair, the Stair of Valor, which would instantly make him vastly more powerful than any other Godmyth.

Of course, the process would be much more difficult for Yang Qi than an ordinary person.

Normally speaking, he would have had to build up huge stockpiles of power to try to break through the bottleneck, reach enlightenment, and step onto the Deathless Heavenly Stairway.

But now, he had the Dao Defense League, and the destiny of a hundred trillion immortal worlds. Because of that, his cultivation base was advancing rapidly. It reminded him of when he had taken the true godhood from the Tusita Heaven, except this time it was destiny from immortal worlds.

‘Right. The Tusita Heaven!’

Now that his clone was making progress in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, Yang Qi turned his attention to other matters. He reached out into the depths of the Dao Defense League, causing magical fluctuations to roll out that no other old-timer could come close to matching.

Everyone looked over to see an enormous hand flying out of the Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple. It reached high to the thirty-third ranked immortal worlds until it finally arrived at the Tusita Heaven.

The Tusita Heaven had no true ruler now. Although Leaf Dao-Denier had taken its legacy, he had subsequently fled, and of course, could not take the place with him.

Yang Qi had killed the old emperor and given his spot of dharmaraja to another person.

It was an incredibly wealthy immortal world, and rulerless; there was no way Yang Qi was going to let it go to waste. Besides, it still had the Live Forever God Tree, along with its incredible collection of destiny.

It was definitely an important spoil of war, and he didn’t want it to fall into the hands of anyone else. Therefore, he would take it for his own in front of the eyes of all, and assimilate it, cementing his glory even further and intimidating any disloyal hearts.

It would take an incredible level of strength to assimilate an entire thirty-third ranked immortal world, especially one with such an ancient history as the Tusita Heaven. He was announcing to the world that he was essentially the god of the immortal world, and that no one should ever dare to attack him.

The immense hand of radiance and light shot through primal-chaos, wrapped around the Tusita Heaven, and ripped it out of its foundations in primal-chaos.

“What’s going on?”

“Is the league-lord going to assimilate the Tusita Heaven? It’s a thirty-third ranked immortal world! How is that even possible?”

“Impossible. That would take the power of a god!”

“The league-lord really must be capable of doing it. Otherwise, why would he let so many people watch what he’s doing?” Everything shook violently, and the shockwaves that spread out through primal-chaos caused numerous beasts to die. As a result, a rain of corpses descended, much to the delight of many ordinary disciples in the Dao Defense League. After all, such corpses were treasure troves to many people.

“King Heaven-Devourer!”

An enormous primal-chaos elder-snake appeared, which wrapped around the greyspace of the Tusita Heaven and opened its mouth wide, making it look very much like a snake devouring a mammoth.

There were countless living beings and immortals within the Tusita Heaven, but Yang Qi’s divine will reached out to them and whisked them away to other parts of the Dao Defense League, where arrangements had been made for them. All of the riches and wealth that were left behind fell to Yang Qi.

Those who could see were able to watch something incredibly rare playing out. King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans and Yang Qi’s enormous hand of radiance and light were working together to deal with the Tusita Heaven. The hand provided the foundation, and the snake devoured the immortal world. Almost immediately, the place lost its violet color.

As the process continued, the hand dragged the Tusita Heaven down into the Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple, where it disappeared.

As easily as that, a thirty-third ranked immortal world was disposed of.

At this point, everyone was convinced that Yang Qi really was strong enough to match up to the legion of gods. Not even the Grand Emperors could possibly hope to fight against him.

Before, he definitely wasn't strong enough to assimilate a thirty-third ranked immortal world. But his cultivation base had advanced significantly. Furthermore, he had the beast king clones, each of which was as strong as a Grand Emperor. As such, his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth was stronger than ever, and even more relevant, he had some of the power of a Fortuned One and an Eternal One.

He was transforming on a most fundamental level.

As of yet, he was still using the genetic systems in the Cruiser of Civilization to analyze the Eternal and Fortuned blood. When he learned all of the secrets the blood had to offer, he would reach an even higher level.

Having taken the Tusita Heaven, he began working on his cultivation again.

**

Deep in the Brahman Immortal World, a host of battleships was flying out of the passageway to join the forces of the future worlds.

Dozens of generalissimos had arrived. All of them were on the level of the Grand Emperors, or even stronger. As soon as they arrived, the generalissimos saw the primal-chaos elder-snake and the enormous hand of radiance and light drag a thirty-third ranked immortal world down and send deadly shockwaves out into primal-chaos. It was a completely astonishing act, like an ordinary mortal ripping a huge tree out of the ground.

“Such mighty power! Incredible! That's on the level of a Lesser God! I wonder what power index that is. Quick, perform a scan!”

“That’s so terrifying! I can’t believe this is the first thing we're seeing. How can the immortal dao civilization be unleashing power like this?! I'm not sure that even our magisters could crush that type of power!”

“Is it an expert from the Primeval Age?”

“No, it's coming from the Dao Defense League.”

All of the generalissimos were profoundly shaken by what they were seeing.

One of the lower-ranking marshals stepped forward and offered a respectful salute. “Generalissimos, we can’t get a reading on the power index. When our scanners locked on to the power, they exploded! All we know is that this power surpasses the ninth minor stair of the Deathless Heavenly Stairway! It’s close to the level of a Lesser God. It's true godpower and true godliness!”

“What are the latest developments in the war with the Dao Defense League?” one of the generalissimos asked. “Is there any news? What power indexes have we identified?”

“Sir, Yang Qi deposed Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven and took over as league-lord. He’s united the league into something very much like an empire. He’s already completely diverged from the path of history that we remember. He's obviously created his own errant timeline.

“Based on the information you provided, Generalissimos, we know that Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven should have a power index of nine. You generalissimos all have a power index of more than ten. Although we can’t get a reading on League-Lord Yang Qi, we do know that there are six individuals who have power indexes like Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven. In other words, they have six experts roughly as strong as you generalissimos.”

“Our power indexes are all above ten,” said Generalissimo Worldking, whose military uniform was embroidered with countless planes of existence and worlds. “If we pool our power, we should definitely be able to destroy the Dao Defense League. But it’s too bad we can’t assess the power index of the league-lord. If he's that much stronger than us, it won't do any good for us to make a move until the magisters come. Perhaps we should wait and see how the situation develops.”

“Have any top experts risen up in the Demon League?” Generalissimo Skyvault asked.

“There’s someone called Patriarch Hell-Crusher who has a power index of thirteen,” the marshal respectfully replied. “And they have around a dozen leaders who are at about nine.”

Chapter 833: Changes to the Ancient Road

The abilities of the future world had reached an incredible level. They already knew exactly how many top experts existed in the Dao Defense League and the Demon League.

It wasn’t that Yang Qi hadn’t considered destroying the Brahman Immortal World. However, it still contained Brahma’s heart. Furthermore, he didn’t want to remove his only passage to the future world itself. For now, he had to allow the future world to maintain their foothold.

“What other progress has been made recently?” one of the generalissimos asked.

“We identified a location in primal-chaos where a group of Mechfolk experts built a base,” the marshal replied. “Apparently they’re researching the Ancient Road to the Gods. The Mechfolk are a powerful element of the immortal dao civilization, nearly on the same level of the Demonfolk, denizens of hell, and humans. They inherited elements of the ancient scientific and technological civilization, and in fact, their science and technology resemble ours. If we could take their knowledge, it would be a big boost, and would fill in a lot of the holes we have.”

“So you’re saying we should conquer these people?”

“Of course. While the Dao Defense League and the Demon League are embroiled in conflict, these Mechfolk are apparently trying to unlock certain secrets of the Ancient Road to the Gods.”

“In that case, we should make them our first target. At the same time, we need to bolster the defenses of the Brahman Immortal World and make sure this Yang Qi doesn’t somehow get inside. Thankfully, the magisters passed us a god item from the Primeval Age. If we activate it, it will create an enormous spell formation that can project a shield of protection.”

With that, the generalissimos headed into different parts of the Brahman Immortal World, where they began to erect enormous gateways.

They all looked different, and many resembled gateways Yang Qi had seen in the past, such as the Gate of the Great Void, the Primal-Chaos Gateway, or the Aeon Portal. There were thirty-six in total, each one obviously being an incomparably powerful god item of unknown origins. One thing was certain: they all rippled with deathless godliness.

RUMBLE!

As the gateways grew larger and larger, power began flowing out of them and taking the shape of an enormous shield that soon covered the entire Brahman Immortal World. At the same time, the world itself began expanding, its foundations wriggling like living flesh and blood.

At that moment, Yang Qi awoke from his meditative trance and opened his Lord's Eye, which revealed to him the thirty-six gateways, the huge shield, and the expanding Brahman Immortal World. It was clear just how much of a threat the place was now.

“What are those god items? The shield they're creating is huge! They’re obviously part of a set of items no weaker than King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans.”

Even as Yang Qi analyzed the new development, Patriarch Annalist hurried in. “This is bad, League-Lord. Have you seen what's happening with the future world? It seems the generalissimos have arrived.”

“I know.”

Yang Qi waved his hand and a projected image of the various gates appeared in front of them.

They were surrounded by a dense mist that enveloped everything other than the gates themselves. Not even the generalissimos were visible, which meant that Yang Qi had no way to assess their cultivation bases. The future world was finally beginning its full-scale invasion.

Upon seeing the thirty-six gateways, Patriarch Annalist’s face was overtaken by a look of disbelieving shock. “Don’t tell me… could it be true?”

“Do you know what those gateways are? All I can tell is that they’re god items.”

“It’s a god item set from the Primeval Age called the Deathless Call,” Patriarch Annalist explained. “I happened to hear some legends about it. Supposedly, it can summon power from the god world, and if used to the fullest extent, it could even call forth souls of immense and deadly power.”

“The Deathless Call?” Yang Qi said. “It can summon deathless god souls from the god world? That’s incredible. From what I can tell, it’s now impossible for me to enter the Brahman Immortal World without destroying the entire place. And that wouldn’t be an easy task now.”

“That’s too bad, League-Lord. Now that you've united the Dao Defense League, it would be wonderful if you could destroy the foundation of the future world here and return heaven and earth to a state of peace and tranquility. Right now seems like the best opportunity to do that.”

“You’re right,” Yang Qi said, but then shook his head. “Even if we destroy their current foothold, they would just make another. With the Dao Defense League just having been stabilized, my goal isn't to just destroy one foothold after another. We need to wage a true war and destroy their entire age. When two ages come into conflict, only complete destruction of one will solve the problem of the other. Incidentally, the future world’s passageway was created by drawing on the power of the god Brahma. And I've gained Brahma’s trust. With his help, I can truly strike a devastating blow on the future world.”

“That's incredible, League-Lord!” Patriarch Annalist exclaimed. “You worked out a deal with Brahma? In that case, we don’t need to be worried. You obviously have a master plan at work here, and we’ll follow whatever orders you give.”

“Take a seat,” Yang Qi said, waving his hand, and Patriarch Annalist complied. “Thanks to one of the boundless techniques I cultivate, I've begun assimilating the beast king clones I recently acquired. Because of that, I’ve begun gaining enlightenment of the blood of both Eternal Ones and Fortuned Ones. Patriarch Annalist, you have ordinary blood, which just goes to emphasize how amazing it is that you've reached this level of cultivation. If you could acquire Fortuned Eternal blood, you would reach an even higher level of invincibility.”

He waved his finger, and a drop of blood flew out from the Cruiser of Civilization, pulsing with a Fortuned Eternal aura. It was the product of none other than the Engine of the One God, and Yang Qi was directing it right into Patriarch Annalist.

Patriarch Annalist shivered and his face first flushed, then turned greenish. At the same time, the unstable auras of both yin and yang pulsed out of the top of his head.

Shortly thereafter, the unstable auras vanished and Patriarch Annalist sighed. “Beyond incredible. I can already tell I’m going to benefit greatly from that blood. It'll take me a while to properly fuse with it, but once I do, I’ll conform to the preheaven dao of gods and be immeasurably close to the Deathless Throne.”

“Exactly,” Yang Qi said. With that, he dismissed Patriarch Annalist and closed his eyes to focus on his own cultivation again. His cultivation base was now at the highest of levels, and as the preheaven vital energy swirled through him, the magical laws of primordial chaos were like shackles from the god world.

He closed his eyes and focused his divine will on the Ancient Road to the Gods.

At his current level, there was no vital energy in existence that could advance his cultivation base. He had to gain enlightenment of the Ancient Road to the Gods, the god world that existed at its end, and the boundless mysteries therein.

**

Meanwhile, deep in boundless primal-chaos, an enormous base could be seen, filled with gigantic metallic castles and battleships. They were crafted from god metal, something passed down from the god world, mysterious and profound, inscribed with ancient spell formations that constantly absorbed primal-chaos paleo-energy and converted it into raw power.

Although the Mechfolk didn’t have impressive cultivation bases, their technology made them extremely powerful. Supposedly, one of King Immortal-Slayer’s seventy-one brethren was an expert named King Destructor, a Mechfolk old-timer with incredible fighting prowess.

Mechfolk were neither human, nor fiend-devil, nor demon. They were guests who had come from beyond the heavens, extremely mysterious nomads who roamed to and fro doing business.

After the establishment of the Dao Defense League, the Mechfolk had essentially vanished. But here they were, hiding in their base within primal-chaos. Their base swarmed with experts, no fewer than the forces of the Demon League.

And shockingly, this base of theirs was actually close to the Ancient Road to the Gods. In fact, the road was just visible up ahead, wider than a thirty-third ranked immortal world.

No expert would dare to get too close to the Ancient Road to the Gods, as it exerted a powerful gravitational force that could suck anyone inside. And once on the road, it was impossible to turn back.

However, despite being so close to the Ancient Road to the Gods, the Mechfolk base didn’t seem to be affected at all by the gravitational force. The reason for that was, in the very middle of the base, there was an altar that the Mechfolk old-timers were offering sacrifices to. As a result, it emanated a black smoke that interfered with the gravitational force, and turned it into power for the Mechfolk.

“We Mechfolk will control this age,” one of the old-timers said. “And a critical moment has arrived. Our venerable ancestor has reached out to us from the god world and told us that we will usher in a new age, an age belonging to the Mechfolk, in which all other people serve us. The golden age of the Mechfolk is coming! Thanks to this altar crafted by our venerable ancestor, and the will he left behind, we know of the dramatic events in the god world, and how something incredibly important is about to appear on the Ancient Road to the Gods.”

Chapter 834: Something Comes (1)

These Mechfolk old-timers were extremely powerful, roughly in the Grand Emperor level. One of them looked like a particularly wizened king who wore a long, golden robe and carried a scepter in his hand. He had a beard that was so long it touched the ground.

Speaking in a sonorous, booming voice, he said, “Our venerable ancestor in the god world spoke of an ancient prophecy, something that could shake the entire god world itself. Supposedly, the most ancient and mysterious of treasures troves is set to appear on the Ancient Road to the Gods. And that is why we are here. We have set up this base in preparation for the arrival of that treasure trove.”

The other Mechfolk were already starting to get very excited.

“A prophecy about a treasure trove on the Ancient Road to the Gods?”

“Has our research revealed what the treasure trove contains?”

“I've heard it's something that could change the face of heaven and earth. Perhaps it can even save this age from destruction.”

“If we Mechfolk get the treasure trove, we could really become the ultimate rulers of all other people, right?”

“It seems to me we would become even more powerful than before, strong enough to pierce the dome of heaven. We would definitely be able to take over this age and make all other peoples our servants.”

“You’re right. The Dao Defense League, the Demon League, the future world, the experts from the past… we’ll crush them all. We Mechfolk will create an empire that rules over the dao of immortals and the dao of devils. We’ll finally be able to enslave those high-and-mighty immortals.”

The Mechfolk were an ambitious lot, and considering they had the technology to manipulate genes and life force, and create mechas, their fighting prowess was no weaker than humans or demons. Their base was so large it couldn’t be taken in with a single glance, and it was impossible to tell exactly how many Mechfolk were present there. They had been working nonstop recently to expand the base and set up all the spell formations. They were such expert craftsmen that they never made mistakes in their work, leading to incredible results. And now that they could tap into the gravitational force from the Ancient Road to the Gods, converting it into power, they were able to boost themselves to even higher levels.

“The spell formations are complete!” one of the Mechfolk leaders announced. “Our base is finished! Now we can all benefit from the grace of the gods. The power from the Ancient Road to the Gods is ours to use. Look! Look at the magical laws and godliness it contains. It even has hints of deathlessness!”

He extended his hand and tiny streams of power swirled around it, vital energy that thrummed with deathlessness. He quickly inhaled it, pushing his cultivation level higher and higher.

Now that their base was complete, their energy arts were advancing across the board. There were many wise ones, leaders, and nobility among them who were now trying to draw deathless energy out from the Ancient Road to the Gods.

Around that time, intense rumblings rolled out from the depths of that ancient road that shook the many heavens. Nothing had even appeared, yet all dimensions, all universes, and all primal-chaos began to tremble.

Crack! Snap!

Objects appeared like floating bits of trash, drifting down from the Ancient Road to the Gods. Corpses, tools, weapons, beasts, minerals… they flowed without end. They fell like rain down onto the Mechfolk base, as numerous as the eternal sands of the universe.

The Ancient Road to the Gods was the most mysterious location within primal-chaos. Supposedly, it led to the god world, and contained innumerable miraculous things on it. Starting in the Primeval Age, epochs and epochs had passed in which countless experts entered the road. Some perished, some reached the god world, and some ended up creating armed encampments on the road as they continued searching for clues leading to the god world.

Every so often, the road would be struck with drastic transformations, and would purge large amounts of items, weapons, medicinal pills, minerals, treasures, corpses and the like. Any ordinary person who acquired such items would benefit greatly in their cultivation base.

But things were different this time. Apparently, some enormous object was coming along the Ancient Road to the Gods from the god world, causing everything to shake violently.

“God items! A set of three hundred and sixty thousand Overflowing Sabers of Slaughter!”

One of the wise ones among the Mechfolk could see that within the falling ‘rain’ were three hundred and sixty thousand streams of light.

It was obviously a powerful set of god items that had been forged by some expert who surpassed the Grand Emperor level, but had eventually vanished from the Ancient Road to the Gods. No one had ever been able to determine whether that being ultimately reached the level of the legion of gods, or simply perished. But considering what was happening with these sabers, it seemed very likely that he had indeed died.

Even as that Mechfolk expert reached out to try to grab the Overflowing Sabers of Slaughter, some other force swept onto the scene, wrapped them up, and vanished! Unexpectedly, some other expert had arrived on the scene.

“Was that an invincible fighter from the Dao Defense League? Was it their league-lord? This is bad.”

“My god, what item is it that we’re waiting for? Didn’t the message say that whatever was coming out of the ancient road belonged to us Mechfolk?”

RUMBLE!

More intense vibrations could be sensed from the depths of the Ancient Road to the Gods.

This wise one of the Mechfolk knew that the other magical treasures and godrelic falling down were of little note. The thing to watch for was whatever immense item was still on the way.

But what was it? What could cause such incredible rumblings? The wise one could only imagine that it had something to do with a true god.

Swish!

In the Dao Defense League, Yang Qi opened his eyes and looked down to see three hundred and sixty thousand motes of light in his hand, swirling in a vortex. Upon closer inspection, they were actually god sabers of immense power. They could shake entire universes, and when arranged into a formation could easily be used to kill a Grand Emperor.

Of course, they were none other than the Overflowing Sabers of Slaughter that had just come out of the Ancient Road to the Gods.

Upon becoming aware of what was happening with the Ancient Road to the Gods, he had cast his senses over and noticed the particularly powerful aura of the sabers.

Even as he examined the sabers, a group of god-generals and dharmarajas appeared in the Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple.

“This is bad, League-Lord! Something is happening out in primal-chaos with the Ancient Road to the Gods! Some enormous item is coming, and is being heralded by a rain of numerous god items and magical treasures. Many experts from our Dao Defense League have already headed in that direction to fight for treasures. There are also future warriors there, as well as hellish monsters and Demonfolk. Just about everyone imaginable is gathering near the Ancient Road to the Gods.”

“I'm aware of the situation. Pass down orders forbidding anyone from trying to take any of the items. I’ll send the Holy Sage Army over to take care of the situation. Everyone else needs to be prepared for attacks by the future world and the ancient experts. And be particularly careful about the Demon League.”

When momentous events like this occurred, they provided the perfect circumstances for enemies to launch sneak attacks. And the last thing Yang Qi wanted was for his people to be disunited and fighting amongst themselves.

That could easily lead to the downfall of the league.

“Yes sir!” replied the dharmarajas and god-generals. Considering the looks on their faces, they could sense how serious Yang Qi was, and knew that they would likely have to execute some people who refused to follow orders.

There were still plenty of people in the Dao Defense League who were only feigning compliance and were still more than willing to viciously fight for their own self-interest.

Chapter 835: Something Comes (2)

Yang Qi had just sent down orders that no one was permitted to fight for the magical treasures coming down from the Ancient Road to the Gods. Instantly, one of the god-generals stepped forward, held out a magical treasure with both hands, and said, “League-Lord, I just took this magical treasure a moment ago. Please remove it from my hands. I should really lead by example.”

Yang Qi took the shining treasure and looked it over. He could immediately tell that it had eight streams of godlight that were very similar to his own primeval god skills.

Nodding at the god-general, he said, “Excellent, God-General Blazeflame. I'm going to put this god item into storage for now. Although you won’t be able to use it personally, I'm going to give you a reward for your actions. Take this flame spark of true energy from the godly-class Cardinal Grand Brahman Five Phases Energy Arts, which I transformed using the mysteriousness of past civilizations. It is now called the Spark of Civilization. Considering you have one of the three thousand unique constitutions, that of a Blazeflame One, the Spark of Civilization will be a huge benefit to your cultivation base. I'd say you won’t have any problems reaching the sixth minor stair of the Deathless Heavenly Stairway with it.”

God-General Blazeflame was one of the old-timers in the league and was originally an emperor in the thirtieth-ranked immortal world, the Raging Flame Heaven. After proving his loyalty to Yang Qi, he became one of the god-generals and established the Army of Fire. Obviously, he was just as loyal to Yang Qi now as he had ever been.

When the Spark of Civilization entered him, he immediately sensed his energy transforming in a heaven-shaking, earth-toppling fashion.

Truth be told, he would have sacrificed countless god items to get the Spark of Civilization. And the other god-generals, dharmarajas, old-timers, and elders could see what Yang Qi was doing. He was proving that as long as his followers were loyal and followed orders, they would be greatly rewarded.

“We’ll definitely follow your orders, League-Lord. We’ll keep the Dao Defense League under control and use this opportunity to improve discipline.”

Almost immediately, a tempest of orders began flowing out, passing Yang Qi’s instructions along to all of the numerous immortal worlds in the Dao Defense League.

“The league-lord has ordered that no one attempt to seize the treasures falling from the Ancient Road to the Gods. Anyone who acquires any treasures shall hand them over immediately.”

“Hand over any treasure you come across, and you’ll be greatly rewarded. Any who disobey the league-lord’s orders will be executed immediately! Everyone, stay in position and be prepared for possible enemy invasion!”

The Dao Defense League was huge, with over a hundred trillion immortal worlds making it up, organized into enormous formations. In fact, it was so huge that if an ordinary Godmyth tried to fly from one end to the other by normal means, he would probably die of old age before reaching the other side.

Of course, whether it was during the rule of Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven or after Yang Qi took over, there was an emphasis on connecting the various immortal worlds using “roads” of teleportation portals. Because of that, travel was much easier.

Meanwhile, the rain of items from the Ancient Road to the Gods was causing quite a bit of chaos throughout the immortal worlds. Numerous forces had already begun fighting fiercely to get the resources, and as a result, there was quite a bloodbath going on.

In a distant location, the twentieth ranked Lone Soul Heaven was locked in deadly combat with another twentieth ranked immortal world, the Seaquell Heaven. Immortals were falling left and right, even some of the powerful patriarchs.

That was when Yang Qi’s orders arrived.

The old-timers from the two respective immortal worlds were visibly taken aback.

“What the fuck!?” one of them spat. “We're supposed to hand over all the magical treasures? This stuff is raining down from heaven. It should be first come first served! What gives the league-lord the right to interfere? Out here on the frontier, nobody cares about the league-lord! Brothers, to me! This is a gift from heaven, and whoever acquires a god item gets to keep it! Whoever gets it might even be able to surpass that dick of a league-lord! Attack!”

“That’s right. Attack! Rise up against the league-lord! Who cares about the Dao Defense League, anyway? We won’t quit until we’re in charge! Attack!”

They all instantly began going crazy—it was an open revolt!

And that was only what was happening in one small location. Similar occurrences were playing out among the hundred trillion immortal worlds of the Dao Defense League.

WHOOSH!

However, even as the revolt began spreading, the emperor of the Lone Soul Heaven suddenly looked down to see a spear protruding from his chest.

His aura began fading away, and he died with no idea what killed him. Meanwhile, a glowing, radiant angel appeared behind him, backed by an entire army of fellow angels.

“That was too clean a death for a traitor like this!” Raising his voice, the angel said, “Kill all the rebels. Don’t leave any alive! Destroy any immortal world that revolts!”

“Yes sir!”

As they marched into battle, the angels sang hymns and praises. “Our Lord commands all, our Lord controls the legion of gods. Our Lord’s will is everywhere….”

Majestic and mighty, their voices echoed out for all to hear.

Meanwhile, screams could be heard and blood was flowing as the rebels were executed. Some of the angels stayed behind as the army moved on, sending sagefire to rain down onto the Lone Soul Heaven and reducing it to molten liquid. Eventually, the liquid turned into ash, which then collapsed down into the form of a śarīra.

A twentieth ranked immortal world had been completely wiped out of existence.

Rebellion was breaking out everywhere. However, wherever rebellion rose up, the armies of angels would appear. As the rebels were crushed, a voice would ring out.

“The league-lord has decreed that all rebels are to be executed and the disloyal put to death.”

The truth was that Yang Qi had been prepared for something like this from the outset. He had originally set up armed forces in various parallel universes throughout the Dao Defense League that were prepared to defend against enemy incursions. That said, they could just as easily be used to crush rebellion.

In another border region, an old-timer shouted, “Kill them! Kill them all. Ignore those orders. Take whatever god items you can get your hands on. They’ll make us invincible! Then we can destroy the Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple and take all the treasures there!”

Thanks to his inciting words, many people began to fight fiercely to acquire the magical treasures. Meanwhile, the old-timer who had spoken the words was off in the shadows, transforming back into the demon that he was.

Chuckling darkly, he thought, ‘Leave it up to me, good old Patriarch Spirit Rat. If there’s one thing I'm good at, it’s stealing and inciting riots. I've been in hiding for so long that I was beginning to wonder when I would have a chance to make a move. Now that chaos has struck the Dao Defense League, I’ll just go back into hiding and secretly collect the fallen souls.’

Transforming into a spirit rat, he scuttled into the depths of a nearby twenty-ninth ranked immortal world.

RUMBLE!

However, almost as soon as he incited the rebellion, the angels appeared on the scene. Then, only moments later, the rebels were all dead. No one could stand up to the angels.

‘What’s going on here? How could an army get here so quickly?’ Patriarch Spirit Rat looked out from his hiding space and saw hordes of angels preparing enchantments and sagefire to destroy the immortal world he was in. And he had no way to escape!

“AGGH! You monsters! How could you destroy an entire immortal world!?”

His pleas fell on deaf ears as the angels completely ignored him and went about their destructive work.

Even a god who faced an army of angels like this would be ripped to shreds!

“I'm an emissary from the Demon League!” he shrieked. “You can’t do this to me! It’s against the rules to execute enemy ambassadors!”

Crack!

His voice eventually faded away as the immortal world around him was thoroughly destroyed. All rebel worlds were being destroyed, with no exceptions.

Other members of the Dao Defense League could see what was happening, and watched as one rebel world after another was completely destroyed. Yang Qi’s armies of angels didn’t show any mercy.

The brutal display drove all ambitious thoughts of rebellion from the hearts and minds of the people.

Chapter 836: Something Comes (3)

The lord of the thirtieth-ranked Ancient Joy Heaven stood on a high mountain at the highest point of his immortal world. His name was Ancient Dirge, and he was a powerful old-timer, but he had not competed for a spot as one of the god-generals or dharmarajas. Mostly because he wasn't the type of person who liked following rules set by others.

Behind him were a host of experts who were all stronger than Chaos Gods.

One of them was a young woman. “Father,” she said, “why aren’t you doing anything? Look, there are so many other immortal worlds rising up in rebellion and trying to take the god items. Why not us? Are you really going to follow the orders of that supposed league-lord, Yang Qi? Hmph!  What's so special about him anyway? He's still wet behind the ears! Maybe he stumbled across some good fortune, but his cultivation base is still completely lacking. All of us here have stronger cultivation bases than him. And now god items are literally raining down out of the sky. This is the perfect chance for our Ancient Joy Heaven to wipe out our competition among the other immortal worlds!”

This young woman was Ancient Dirge’s daughter, a princess of the Ancient Joy Heaven who was named Ancient Mercy. She also had a profound cultivation base, supposedly because of some good fortune she found out in primal-chaos. The look of disdain in her eyes when she mentioned Yang Qi’s name made it clear that she was itching to rebel against him.

“Just be patient a bit longer,” Ancient Dirge said, looking around at the chaos of the rebellion. Then he shook his head. “That Yang Qi might be young, but he’s quite tyrannical. I don't want to have a child telling me what to do, which is why I didn’t try to seize a spot as a dharmaraja or a god-general. In fact, I wasn't even interested in being one of the emissaries. In any case, this rain of god items indicates that something big is happening with the Ancient Road to the Gods. And that means we have a good opportunity on our hands. Let the rebels pave the way while we bide our time, getting stronger the entire time. Then, when both sides have been worn down a bit, we can make our move. Daughter, did you really think I was planning to just sit around and watch the show? Truth be told, I’ll be able to absorb the chaotic energy released by the death of the rebels, which will only help me grow stronger.”

A young man stepped forward. “Congratulations, father. You’re finally going to finish cultivating the consummate technique of the Paramount God, the Lord of Chaos.”

Chuckling coldly, Ancient Mercy said, “Let’s see how this Yang Qi tries to quell the rebellion. The truth is that he’s actually not very impressive at all. He relies on tricks using King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions and the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Apparently, he doesn't know about the deadly side-effects of those medallions. Once they absorb enough destiny, King Immortal-Slayer himself will be resurrected. It’s a classic case of the fox exploiting the tiger’s might. He doesn’t have what it actually takes to keep the Dao Defense League united.”

“For all we know, his current actions might be the doing of King Immortal-Slayer,” Ancient Dirge said. “In any case, it doesn’t matter. There are a hundred trillion worlds in the Dao Defense League now, and with god items raining down, plenty of them are going to rebel. Even if Yang Qi manages to crush all the rebellions, it’s going to weaken him overall. And that will be the perfect time for us to vie for supremacy!”

“But father,” Ancient Mercy said anxiously, “if we don’t take action now, it might be too late. Look at how many god items are falling down!”

BOOM!

Even as the words left her mouth, radiance and light exploded around them and a host of angels appeared.

“Our Lord resides among men, our Lord triumphs in every battle, our Lord’s will and glory will shine throughout the universe….”

As they sang, the angels laid waste to the rebel immortal worlds in the area, reducing them to ashes.

“This is bad!” murmured Ancient Dirge, his face falling. “Where did these armies of angels come from? They’re crushing the rebels! This brat Yang Qi is even stronger than I realized!”

“Oh my god!” Ancient Mercy shrieked. “Look, the army of angels just destroyed that entire immortal world! It's completely gone! The rebels are all dead!”

“Brutal. So brutal!” Ancient Dirge said. “Send down orders immediately. The Ancient Joy Heaven is going to follow the league-lord’s orders!”

“Father, don’t tell me that we're just going to forget about all our ambitions?!” Ancient Mercy said begrudgingly.

“We have no choice,” Ancient Dirge said coolly. “I could never have guessed that this Yang Qi would be so strong! We're definitely not a match for him. Our only option now is to bide our time and see how things play out. Thankfully, we’d planned to wait a while before making our move, otherwise the consequences would have been unthinkable.”

“Father, look,” another of his daughters said. “The angels are heading in our direction!”

“I see. Everyone, prepare yourself to welcome the angels!” Ancient Dirge watched as the hosts of angels swarmed toward his immortal world.

“Oh exalted Angels, I am the lord of the Ancient Joy Heaven. I've received the orders from the league-lord and have refrained from rebelling by trying to seize the falling treasures.”

“Indeed,” one of the generals among the angels said. “You have not rebelled, and have not tried to seize the treasures. Because of that, you and your immortal world might have been spared. That said, we cannot tolerate the evil intentions you harbor in your heart. Did you really think that you could secretly plan to revolt and we wouldn't find out about it? Our Lord heard every word you said just now. After all, the Lord's Eye can see through anything and everything!”

All of a sudden an eye appeared in midair, right in front of Ancient Dirge, Ancient Mercy, and the others. There was no doubt that the words uttered by Ancient Mercy moments ago were extremely disrespectful and even downright sinful.

Ancient Dirge’s face fell. Never in his wildest dreams would he have guessed that Yang Qi would be able to spy on his confidential conversations.

“This is a misunderstanding!” he said. “A big misunderstanding. I would never rebel against the league-lord!”

“The evidence is conclusive,” the angel replied. “How can you deny it? You besmirched our Lord, which is the gravest crime imaginable. Arrest him!” Hosts of angels immediately fanned out and began sending sagefire out to destroy the immortal world.

‘Time to go for broke!’ Ancient Mercy thought. She suddenly flew up into the air, glowing rings that resembled saber light rising up around her. Shockingly, it was an attack that actually felled several of the angels!

“We’ve been found out. Let’s get out of here!” Unexpectedly, she had a god item that made her roughly as strong as one of the dharmarajas.

“Kill our way out!” Ancient Dirge shouted. The mountain peak beneath his feet exploded, revealing a huge banner that was so powerful that its every sweep cut down any angels who got too close to him.

With that banner, he led the charge to freedom.

However, in that same moment….

RUMBLE!

Two Grand Emperors had appeared, namely Patriarch Annalist and the Emissary of Righteousness, Yang Righteousness, who was now even far more ferocious than he had been as Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven. A chakram suddenly appeared in his hands, which he used to strike Ancient Mercy in the chest. Blood sprayed out of her mouth, and she began falling. However, before she could get too far, he grabbed her.

Meanwhile, Patriarch Annalist seized Ancient Dirge’s banner and used it to beat him until he vomited blood.

In the following moments, the rest of the Ancient Clan were captured and sent to the Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple.

There, Yang Qi sat on his throne, watching as the armies of angels quelled all the rebellions. Matters proceeded smoothly. Wherever issues cropped up, Grand Emperors would be sent to take care of things.

“League-Lord,” Patriarch Annalist said, “a total of thirty-nine billion revolts occurred. It took roughly six hours to put them all down. We arrested quite a few spies who were found to be instigating the uprisings. All of them have been gathered in the Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple to await sentencing by you.”

There were quite a few old-timers who had been captured, and virtually all of them were trying to look as regretful as possible and not the least bit ambitious. Among the last to be brought in were Ancient Dirge and Ancient Mercy. Seeing them, Yang Qi nodded.

“I never would’ve thought that this father and daughter team would be among the ambitious rebels. To think that she has the legacy of the ancient Cold-Jade Saber God, and Ancient Dirge has the legacy of the Lord of Chaos, the mighty Chaos Banner. It’s said that the Lord of Chaos was a Paramount God of similar reputation to the Lord of Civilization. There are thirteen of those banners, each of which is filled with the power to destroy heaven and extinguish the earth. Combine them and you can throw all heaven and earth into chaos, inflicting heavy casualties on our armies. You truly are ambitious and ruthless, but I saw through your plot.”

“Yang Qi, there’s no need for you to be so domineering!” Ancient Mercy said. “Just release us! You’re relying on King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions, and they won’t keep you going forever.”

“League-Lord, I can be very useful to you!” Ancient Dirge said, taking a much different approach. “Daughter, enough with your nonsense! There’s still time to show loyalty to the League-Lord.”

“Still time?” Yang Qi said. He could tell that these were people who would change their minds at the drop of a hat. Without any warning, he shoved both of his palms out, and the two of them exploded into ash. Before it could dissipate, Yang Qi absorbed it.

Then he waved his hand, and screams rang out as all the disloyal old-timers in Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple were also reduced to ash.

The rebellions in the Dao Defense League had been put down, and complete unity had been attained. Going forward, Yang Qi was now much more confident that the quality of the destiny he could acquire would improve dramatically.

Chapter 837: Something Comes (4)

Now there were no impurities in the destiny, and he could simply absorb it directly, pure and unadulterated.

The Dao Defense League was huge, with a hundred trillion immortal worlds. Matters of destiny pertaining to a place so large vastly surpassed anything that a mortal emperor would have to deal with. That said, once it was under control it would provide power that vastly surpassed anything from the mortal world. Right now, even if Yang Qi actually lost all of his energy arts and resources, as long as no one found out about it he would still be able to maintain complete power.

The brutal and bloody end to the rebellions had completely cemented Yang Qi’s prestige and power. No one had had any idea that the league-lord had secretly hidden armies of angels in all corners of the universe, ready to jump out and fight at a moment's notice. Not even the old Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven could have done something like that.

When the Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court had experienced a similar upheaval, it ended with the collapse of the Heavenly Court. If they had prepared the way Yang Qi had, the Heavenly Court would likely still be around.

The other old-timers present could sense the change in destiny. They also saw the angels in the Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple setting up teleportation portals to funnel the falling treasure there. Countless experts throughout the Dao Defense League were following orders. Instead of chaotically fighting for the falling treasures, they took them and sent them through the spell formations.

This was the benefit of strictly enforced rules and laws. Yang Qi had established a mystical network of laws of immense proportions, and it was like a net of heaven that hung over the heads of all the heroes in existence.

Right now, the Dao Defense League was virtually invulnerable on all fronts.

Yang Qi looked over in the direction of the Demon League and saw that the place was in utter chaos, with rivers of blood flowing as everyone fought for the falling treasures. In contrast, the Brahman Immortal World, with its army from the future world, was just as orderly as the Dao Defense League. Several streams of immense energy would occasionally rise up from it and take some of the most powerful god items.

The Ancient Road to the Gods was pulsing violently now, to the point where enormous chunks of pure primal-chaos debris were falling down. They were like enormous continents that dropped through the primal-chaos with incredibly destructive power. It was almost as if the sky were literally falling and the end of the world had come.

C-C-CRACK!

One huge chunk of primal-chaos debris fell down toward the middle of the Dao Defense League, larger than dozens of immortal worlds put together. A large group of immortals flew out and set up a defensive spell formation that ground away at the debris for a full two hours before it was reduced to rubble.

The success just went to show how beneficial Yang Qi’s strict laws were. In a state of chaos, there would never have been a spell formation set up so quickly to protect against the falling primal-chaos debris, which meant that the end result would have been the destruction of numerous immortal worlds.

People were already starting to admire Yang Qi’s foresight, and feeling much better about following his orders.

“What do we do now, League-Lord?” Patriarch Annalist asked as he stood there in the Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple, flanked by numerous god-generals, dharmarajas, and other old-timers.

Soon, discussions broke out.

“League-Lord, the destruction of the primal-chaos is growing more intense. There must be some immense object about to appear. Whatever it is, it will surely be the source of immense good fortune and will likely enable us to seize control of all the immortal worlds that exist.”

“I agree, League-Lord. Although, we should plan things out well and do everything possible to ensure no one else acquires this item. The Dao Defense League is on the brink of imminent crisis, so something with a power that surpasses the gods will be incredibly valuable. What if it’s a true god that’s descending?”

“A true god? Then wouldn’t we all have to follow their orders? There’s no way our age could sustain the presence of a god! If a god appeared, we would all be reduced to slavery.”

Chuckling coldly, Yang Qi said, “There’s no need to be so panicky. I have ways to deal with even gods. Calm down, we’ll be fine. Worst case scenario, I can always take us into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart to avoid any catastrophes. I always make sure that my followers are safe, one way or another.”

His words effectively calmed the hearts of everyone present.

“Now we just have to wait and prepare for combat,” he continued. “I have a feeling that this activity from the god world has nothing to do with an actual god descending. However, there is something coming which will change everything in this age. And whoever gains control of it will be able to control the larger picture. It's definitely some sort of treasure.”

Even as he spoke, he opened his Lord's Eye and peered into the depths of primal-chaos, and beyond it, to the Ancient Road to the Gods. On the road, he saw godliness, god souls, perishing gods, death, and slaughter. Those were the things coming to this age.

However, he couldn’t catch a clear glimpse of whatever enormous item was about to emerge. All he saw was a huge shadowy shape, slowly proceeding down the Ancient Road to the Gods, shaking everything it passed—including god items, magical treasures, and medicinal pills and the like.

‘Whatever this thing is, it's incredible,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘It’s likely equivalent to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. In fact, it might even surpass the chart.’ Shaken, he realized that even if he were ten times stronger than he currently was, he wouldn’t be in any position to deal with something like this.

There was no way he could simply take it for his own.

Meanwhile, the fluctuations rolling through primal-chaos made everyone feel like the end of the world really had come. In fact, if the hundred trillion immortal worlds of the Dao Defense League weren’t fully united by this point, it really would have been a dramatically destructive event.

Finally, something appeared on the Ancient Road to the Gods. It shoved aside all of the primal-chaos near it, crushing countless primal-chaos beasts and any old-timers who were near it. It was almost like what one would expect if a planet fell into an ocean. In front of the mighty godpower of nature, humans were very insignificant.

Finally able to see it clearly, Patriarch Annalist exclaimed, “It's a tomb! An enormous necropolis!”

It was made of pitch black stone, and seemed profoundly ancient. And it was so large that it could easily contain countless thirty-third ranked immortal worlds. In fact, it was so large that it seemed to stretch on without end.

“Not good!” Yang Qi said, rising to his feet. “If that necropolis flies down here, our spell formations will have no way to stop it. It could destroy the entire Dao Defense League!”

It was obvious at first sight that there would be no way to stop this necropolis.

Crash! Boom!

Numerous parallel universes were destroyed. Upon reaching the entrance of the Ancient Road to the Gods, the huge necropolis entered the primal-chaos paleo-energy, crushing everything in its path. The many heavens were shaken, and even the fiend-devil suzerains in numerous hells looked up and realized what was happening.

The necropolis flew out into the open.

However, as the primal-chaos paleo-energy was driven away, Yang Qi suddenly realized that the necropolis had stopped moving and he breathed a sigh of relief.

“Keep on guard over the immortal worlds as a whole. I’ll go investigate this necropolis. It seems highly likely it’s full of treasures!”

Swish!

He vanished, reappearing in the primal-chaos, where he headed directly toward the Ancient Road to the Gods and the huge necropolis. There were other experts doing the same thing.

Soon, they found that the gravitational force of the Ancient Road to the Gods had weakened, but the entrance was blocked by the huge necropolis at the same time. In other words, if one wanted to enter the Ancient Road to the Gods, they would have to pass through the necropolis first.

‘It’s huge!’ Yang Qi thought, being one of the first to arrive in front of the necropolis. Standing in front of it, he was like a grain of sand in front of the ocean. And the energy fluctuations coming off of it were so intense that he couldn’t get any closer than a few tens of thousands of kilometers.

Whoosh. Whoosh. Whoosh. Whoosh.

A host of experts arrived nearby, and Yang Qi immediately realized that they were from the Demon League. There were dozens of them, all at the level of Grand Emperors. And unexpectedly, Grand Emperor Myriadmagic Heavenspan and the other Grand Emperors Yang Qi knew were among them!

Chapter 838: God Finger

Eldest Brother Secundus, Grand Emperors Myriadmagic Heavenspan, Heavenearth Vastocean, and Ninelimits Paragon had all appeared, along with Leaf Dao-Denier and experts of the Demonfolk.

Clearly, they were allies.

Yang Qi spotted an old man among the Demonfolk who was obviously the legendary Patriarch Hell-Crusher, the incarnation of an ancient megamammoth. His aura caused Yang Qi’s Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth to stir wildly; obviously, assimilating this person’s blood would provide a huge boost.

There were many others present as well, including eight powerful Demonfolk leaders and the Five Great Lokapālas.

Further back were a host of experts from the Primeval Age, all of them clad in beast hides just like Eldest Brother Secundus. They were clearly an obstinate and unruly lot and were somewhat reluctant to be working with such allies. That said, some of their number were actually demons.

After all, in the Primeval Age, there was no distinction between humans and demons.

‘I can’t believe they managed to get the passageway to the Primeval Age working after I stole the Engine of the One God,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘It must have been accomplished with the help of the Demonfolk experts. Now that they’re working together, they’re going to be even more difficult to deal with.’

There were quite a few enemies present, while the only representative of the Dao Defense League was Yang Qi. The disparity in numbers was obvious, and there were surely other powerful entities who were lurking in the shadows.

However, Yang Qi still burst out into laughter. Maybe he was outnumbered, but in terms of overall strength he still had the advantage.

“Grand Emperors Myriadmagic Heavenspan, Ninelimits Paragon, and Heavenearth Vastocean, you’re all human! What are you doing working with the Demonfolk? How disgraceful!”

Grand Emperor Myriadmagic Heavenspan snorted coldly. “You’d best not run your mouth in our presence, Yang Qi. You might control the Dao Defense League for now, but you’d better hand over Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven immediately, otherwise you’ll die today!”

“That’s right,” Grand Emperor Heavenearth Vastocean said. “Look at all the experts present, including those of the Demonfolk, and ones from the Primeval Age. Do you really think you can single-handedly take us all on? Do you really think you can take the good fortune in the Great Necropolis? I doubt you have any clue how much treasure is inside it. Regardless, it belongs to us. The Dao Defense League isn't going to get even a tiny fraction!”

“Useless pieces of trash,” Yang Qi said. Then he unleashed a string of even more biting insults. “You scum are nothing more than stray dogs, sucking up to the Demonfolk in the hope of regaining some lost ground. But with them, you’re nothing more than cannon fodder. Why not side with me? I’ll even give you a high position. Sticking with Patriarch Hell-Crusher isn’t going to work out in the long run. He’s a crafty, vile person who will eventually see you dead.”

“How impudent!” Patriarch Hell-Crusher said, glaring at Yang Qi. “You’re just trying to sow dissension, boy. I have an agreement with these Grand Emperors, and we’ve been cultivating a special technique that has benefited all of us. Also, don’t think I’ve forgotten about how you attacked our Demon League and destroyed numerous immortal worlds. You’d better offer a good explanation for that, otherwise don’t even think of leaving here alive.”

“Explanation?” Yang Qi laughed. “Your Grand Emperor Bloodsworn Bat tried to assassinate me! It was only natural I take a tooth for a tooth. Anyone who dares to offend me will have their entire clan wiped out without any offer of mercy. Understood?”

“What incredible gall!” shouted other members of the Demon League, who clearly hated Yang Qi down to their bones. As for the experts from the Primeval Age, they were simply looking on coldly, clearly having decided to sit on the mountaintop and watch the tigers fight, then reap the spoils when they tire out. Obviously, the alliance wasn’t particularly strong, which was good for Yang Qi. Otherwise, he might have been overwhelmed by the sheer force of numbers.

There were just too many enemies. Although the Demon League didn't count for much, the passageway to the past had obviously been opened, allowing numerous Grand Emperors to come through. There were even some people present that Yang Qi couldn’t assess.

To do that, he would need to improve his cultivation base, and also use the Engine of the One God to find other fragments of the Cruiser of Civilization. With the power assessment systems working, he could scan enemies to gain valuable information about them. Unfortunately, these Primeval Age experts were currently Past Ones, and were shrouded in mystery to him.

“So, you’re the leader of the Dao Defense League?” one of the experts said. He was clad in beast hides and had numerous tattoos, including one on his chest that depicted a host of world planes surrounding a bright sun and moon.

“That’s right,” Yang Qi replied, maintaining full vigilance. “I’m the league-lord. Who are you? Someone from the Primeval Age? What exactly do you want from our age?”

“Nothing,” the man replied. “We just want to get onto the Ancient Road to the Gods. And also see what your immortal dao civilization is all about. So far, you’ve been quite the disappointment. It’s really true that when there are no heroes, the incompetent rise to fame.”

“The Ancient Road to the Gods vanished from the Primeval Age, right?” Yang Qi laughed. “You know, your age won’t necessarily develop into an immortal dao civilization. The passage of time can contain many possibilities. In fact, it’s possible that your Primeval Age will simply cease to exist. Similarly, our immortal dao civilization won’t necessarily become like the future world. For all we know, the dao of immortals will continue existing for all eternity.”

“Quite the sharp tongue you have, boy,” the man replied, raising an eyebrow. “I'm Bright Tideflow from the Bright King World in the Primeval Age. I brought the entire Bright King World through time to see the immortal dao world. And considering you're the top figure in the dao of immortals, I'm very interested to know how strong you are.”

“The Bright King World?” Yang Qi wasn't very familiar with the history of the Primeval Age, and had never even heard of this Bright King World. However, this Bright Tideflow was clearly an aggressive individual, otherwise he wouldn’t be the first to step forward and issue a challenge to fight.

“Why waste words? Try out this move!” Bright Tideflow was the type of person who followed up words with actions, thus, he blurred into motion with an opening attack. Parallel universes flashed as he moved, making it seem like he didn’t even exist within reality.

Swish!

In an instant, he was in front of Yang Qi and stretched out his finger, causing a vortex of power to appear that seemed strong enough to transform the dao of heaven. In fact, countless heavenly tribulations were born.

The other experts from the Primeval Age immediately began discussing what was happening.

“What? It’s the legendary World Tribulation Finger of Lamenting Gods! Supposedly, that finger technique comes from the ancient age of the gods. It has ten levels, the first of which is equivalent to the tribulation that a Lesser God would face. The final level is equivalent to the tribulation of Paramount Gods. The attacks of this finger technique would cause even gods to lament.”

“Incredible. This expert from the Bright King World is really strong. He could shake all creation with that finger attack. What a pity. This immortal dao civilization really is in decline. I doubt this league-lord will come out of this exchange alive.”

POP!

Yang Qi didn’t do anything to evade the incoming attack. Instead, he actually used a finger technique of his own.

Thump, thump, thump!

Bright Tideflow staggered back three paces before managing to stand firm. “What finger technique was that? It seems very similar to King Mourn-Parting’s famous Endless Mourning Finger Technique!”

“Good guess,” Yang Qi replied coolly. “You see, I know the techniques of all seventy-two brethren. Your World Tribulation Finger of Lamenting Gods might be strong, but it can’t do anything to me.” Yang Qi could tell that although Bright Tideflow was strong, fighting him wouldn’t be a problem. With the secrets of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, and the numerous magical devices of the ancient seventy-two brethren, his cultivation base was almost as strong as the legion of gods.

For all intents and purposes, he had combined the energy arts of the seventy-two ancient monarchs. When he faced King Immortal-Slayer himself, he would be well-prepared and would surely come out on top.

Chapter 839: Energy Arts of the Seventy-Two Monarchs

“Hmph! Who cares about the Endless Mourning Finger Technique? My World Tribulation Finger of Lamenting Gods will still crush you!” Bright Tideflow suddenly split into a host of projections that blurred forth to attack Yang Qi again.

“Azure Dragon Devours the Sun!”

“White Tiger Eyes the Moon!”

“Vermillion Bird Bathes in Fire!”

“Black Turtle Splashes in the Sea!”

Four finger attacks bore down on Yang Qi from four directions, as four spirit beasts from the god world appeared.

Yang Qi was surrounded, making flight impossible. Of course, he had no intention of fleeing. Instead, he swept his own finger out to meet the four attacks.

“Part in Life; Separate in Death!”

A mournful dirge echoed out, like commemorating the parting of death, causing everyone who heard it to feel grief in their hearts. “What joy be there in life?What bitterness be there in death….”

This move of Part in Life; Separate in Death seemed to contain all of the vicissitudes under heaven and the ultimate meaning of mourning. As Yang Qi’s finger attack sent vital energy surging out, it smashed into Bright Tideflow’s attack, destroying all four of the spirit creatures.

“Endless Mourning, Uninterrupted and Perpetual!” Yang Qi wasn’t showing any mercy as he threw out another attack from the Endless Mourning Finger Technique, sending an endless stream of mournful energy straight at Bright Tideflow.

Howling, Bright Tideflow threw caution to the wind and sent his palm flying toward Yang Qi’s chest, unexpectedly resorting to a technique of mutual injury.

Everyone else looked on, anxious to see how things would play out. For one thing, it was quite a shock that Yang Qi might actually kill Bright Tideflow. But on the other hand, it seemed highly likely that Bright Tideflow’s palm strike would seriously injure Yang Qi. And if that happened, the Demonfolk experts would definitely pounce on him. They had no intention of letting him escape with his life.

“Hmph!” Yang Qi didn’t alter his Endless Mourning, Uninterrupted and Perpetual move at all. However, a profound glow suddenly sprang up around him almost like a shell, which completely stopped the momentum of the incoming palm.

POP!

Yang Qi’s finger reached Bright Tideflow’s forehead and the man’s head exploded. Meanwhile, the palm smashed into Yang Qi’s defensive shell, shattering it, but not actually touching Yang Qi.

“That was the Battle Armor Energy Art of King Wilds-Horn!”

Almost everyone present realized what they were looking at: the suit of armor that had originally been utilized by King Wilds-Horn, one of the famous seventy-two brethren.

As for Bright Tideflow, after his head exploded, his body flopped backward over and over until it finally ceased moving further out in the primal-chaos paleo-energy. There, it twitched and wriggled a bit as a new head sprouted out from the stump of his neck. Although he was alive, he had clearly suffered grievous injuries to his vital energy.

“You have my respect,” Bright Tideflow said. “In fact, you’re the first person I’ve ever respected. Thankfully, I cultivate the Nine Deaths Profound Art, which means that I can actually survive a death blow from the Endless Mourning Finger Technique. How could I ever have guessed that my effort to kill you would end with me being so badly hurt? And I didn't even injure you. Years ago, King Wilds-Horn devastated the god world with his energy arts, and was so strong that not even Lord Greatpower, a Consummate God, could defeat him. The fact that you've cultivated his energy arts to this level is nothing less than astonishing.”

Yang Qi nodded. “Well said, sir. Your finger technique is also unparalleled in heaven and earth. I have to say that this little exchange taught me a thing or two.”

“In that case, I won't cause any more problems for you,” Bright Tideflow said. “In fact, perhaps the two of us should work together to get into the Great Necropolis. It seems to me that even true gods would have difficulty inside. And it also begs the question of what has occurred in the Ancient Road to the Gods that the necropolis would be used to block the entrance.” Raising his voice, he said, “Everyone else from the Bright King World, I hereby order you to stay neutral. Don’t cause any problems for people from the Dao Defense League, got it?”

“Yes sir!” replied his followers.

At least one faction from the Primeval Age was no longer going to be a problem for Yang Qi. Yang Qi nodded, glad to have rid himself of a formidable opponent.

Meanwhile, Grand Emperor Myriadmagic Heavenspan and the others were all gnashing their teeth in frustration. Earlier, they had been very pleased to see Yang Qi already clashing with the experts from the past. Unfortunately, it had ended with weapons of war turning into gifts of jade and silk, and perhaps, even friendship. It was definitely not the desired outcome for Yang Qi’s enemies.

They had hoped to launch a sneak attack in the middle of the fight, but had never even been given the chance.

Expression flickering, Patriarch Hell-Crusher thought, ‘This Yang Qi has very high energy arts and cultivation base. He’s definitely head and shoulders above the rest, and he’s just a mere ninth division Chaos God. Yet he’s as strong as a consummate patriarch on the ninth stair of the Deathless Heavenly Stairway. I don’t think even I could beat him. As long as he stays alive, the Dao Defense League is going to be impossible to take down. And why do I get the sensation that he has something I need?’

The atmosphere was very tense.

The fact that Yang Qi had easily defeated Bright Tideflow caused fear to rise up in the hearts of many members of the Demon League and the ancient experts. Many of the latter group were starting to think that their time would be better spent exploring the Great Necropolis than trying to kill him.

Unfortunately, the people from the Demon League were too much at odds with him.

And considering that he was here all by himself, it seemed like the perfect situation to gang up on him.

In fact, one of the demon experts stepped forward, snorted coldly, and said, “Hmph! Look, he’s all on his own! Let’s just kill him! With him gone, we’ll have nothing to fear from the Dao Defense League. Ladies and gentlemen from the Primeval Age, remember, as long as we work together, we can definitely kill him. If we do, we can take King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions and the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. With the chart, we can teleport anywhere we want with ease, which should make it much easier to explore the Great Necropolis and also get on the Ancient Road to the Gods. If we can reach the god world, there will surely be endless legacies of deathlessness to take.”

This person seemed particularly adept with words. He was extremely slim, with a sharp face, and there was a faint projection of a huge snake behind him. Obviously, he was one of the Snakefolk. And from his energy fluctuations, he was on at least the sixth or seventh stair of the Deathless Heavenly Stairway.

Only people who were on the ninth stair were considered to be in the Grand Emperor level, and this man’s cultivation base was very close to that. However, he stood toward the back, apparently under the assumption that Yang Qi couldn’t reach him.

In his hand was a sword that was a powerful god item. Its tip was as forked as his own snake tongue, and his name was Patriarch Ninecurves Snakeking. He was famous among the Demonfolk for his sinister nature.

“Why don’t you come out and say those things to my face?” Yang Qi said. “Do you really think you’ll get other people to fight for you, allowing you to jump in at the end to take advantage of the situation? Come on, Patriarch Ninecurves Snakeking, show me how good you are with that sword.”

“Who would possibly agree to fight you one on one?” Ninecurves Snakeking said with a sinister chuckle. “You have King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions, and everybody wants those. Fighting you en masse is our best chance at winning.”

“I guess you’re under the impression that hiding in the back will keep you safe from me,” Yang Qi said. Suddenly, he extended his palm and sent a blast of sword energy shooting out.

In response, two experts at the Grand Emperor level stepped out to protect Patriarch Ninecurves Snakeking. These two were particularly adept at defensive measures, considering that they were Turtlefolk. One of them was named Turtle Emperor Azure Sky and the other was Turtle God Yellow Sky, and the true energy they unleashed resembled a turtle shell that flew forth to stop the sword energy.

However, Yang Qi waved his hand, causing the sword energy to spiral, and said, “The lifekilling spirit, the ashen heaven; cut down gods, the dense earth; my dao of destruction, shattering primal-chaos; gather the monarchs, dispel primordial chaos….”

An enormous figure appeared within the sword energy, seven thousand seven hundred and seventy-seven swords at his side. It was none other than a projection of King Life-Killer, one of the seventy-two monarchs. He had been a deadly killer, and now Yang Qi was using his sword technique, every move of which was filled with heaven-shaking, earth-toppling power.

RUUUUUUUUMBLE!

The sword energy slashed through the turtle shell, much to the shock of the two turtle emperors, who couldn’t even react before the attack was right in front of Patriarch Ninecurves Snakeking.

The snake patriarch threw his sword out to block the attack, but it did no good. His sword shattered and the sword light cast out by Yang Qi stabbed into him, provoking an agonized shriek.

As everyone looked on, blood oozed out of his eyes, ears, nose, and mouth, and he keeled over, completely dead.

The group couldn’t have been more shocked at this result. Despite being safe in his group from the Demon League and having powerful experts to shield him, he was still killed by Yang Qi, who hadn’t even taken a step forward.

‘What incredible energy arts! He used King Mourn-Parting’s finger technique, King Wilds-Horn’s defensive energy arts, and King Life-Killer’s sword skill. Does he really have the energy arts of all seventy-two of the ancient monarchs? All seventy-two of those arts put together would be enough to kill a Paramount God!’

Already, many of the experts from the Primeval Age were thinking about the legends from the god world regarding the power of the seventy-two monarchs.

Chapter 840: Three Worlds Together

It was with casual ease that Yang Qi revealed one godly-class energy art after another from the seventy-two monarchs, striking shock into the hearts of the experts of the Demonfolk and the Primeval Age. As of now, no one present had any desire to fight with Yang Qi. Considering what he had done so far, they could hardly imagine what it would be like to fight him when he was truly going all out. Right now, their top priority was the Great Necropolis, and the treasures it purportedly contained.

Everyone was convinced that the necropolis had an item, or items, in it that could completely change the structure of the Immortal Dao Age. And it was highly likely to contain secrets that could lead to godly ascension. Only by reaching godly ascension could one truly transcend, surpassing the river of time and becoming deathless.

The word deathless was reserved for the gods.

When King Life-Killer’s sword energy put an end to Patriarch Ninecurves Snakeking, it was a huge blow to the morale of the Demon League. Yang Qi was exactly like one man guarding a mountain pass, preventing ten thousand men from breaking through.

But then, as everyone stood there trying to decide what to do, rumbling sounds echoed out as a huge fleet of battleships appeared, slicing through the primal-chaos and emanating the aura of the future. Everyone looked over in shock, including the experts from the past and the members of the Demon League.

Obviously, these battleships were from the future world.

Furthermore, interspersed among them were what appeared to be flying castles that were clearly the work of the Mechfolk.

In the immortal worlds, the Mechfolk were known as being particularly united as a species. And they were also very powerful considering how effective their mechas were. Now, it seemed they were working with the future world, which was a very terrifying prospect.

The experts from the Primeval Age seemed particularly shaken.

After all, they already had first-hand experience, and knew how formidable the future world was. That was even more the case, considering that the ten magisters of the future world were leading the fight in the Primeval Age, and had brought countless generalissimos with them.

In fact, the forces of the Primeval Age had suffered defeat after defeat! It was only by traveling through time that they now had a hope of stepping onto the Ancient Road to the Gods. Their hope was to reach the god world, become vastly stronger, then return to eke out a victory.

For unknown reasons, the Ancient Road to the Gods was no longer present in the Primeval Age or the Future Age. The people from those two worlds could only come to the Immortal Dao Age to find it. But now the Great Necropolis had come to block the entrance to the road, which meant that conflict was sure to explode.

Hearty laughter rang out from the battleships of the future world as numerous experts appeared, including Grand Emperor generalissimos and Mechfolk experts. The latter were equipped with enormous mechas that made them look like huge robots. There were now essentially three factions facing off. Yang Qi. The Demonfolk and the experts from the Primeval Age. The future world.

Looking around, one of the generalissimos said, “I never would have guessed that so many weaklings from the Primeval Age would be here. And there are also Demonfolk from the Immortal Dao Age. Yet even with all of you, you can’t handle this boy? I can hardly believe it!”

His words left the experts from the past looking quite awkward, yet none of them seemed willing to respond.

At this point, Yang Qi raised his voice and said, “The future world is currently waging war on the Primeval Age, and I personally have no beef with you experts from the past. Why don't we join forces and wipe out the future world? The timing couldn’t be more perfect. As long as you agree to fight, I’ll join you.”

The experts from the past and the members of the Demon League all frowned. Yang Qi was really trying to stir up trouble in a moment when no one seemed inclined to actually start fighting.

“How dare you act so unfilial, Yang Qi!” one of the generalissimos said. “Magister Proud Heaven is your father, which means that you’re on the side of the future world! Our mission here is to take you back home, so we hereby demand that you dissolve the Dao Defense League and turn yourself over. Either that, or bring the Dao Defense League with you to the future world. Join us, and you’ll earn huge rewards.”

“What? He's the son of one of the magisters from the future world!?”

“Is this true?! Don’t tell me that the league-lord of the Dao Defense League is actually an agent of the future world!”

“This is good news! Once word spreads, the Dao Defense League will fall apart! Even their leader is working for the future world!”

“Quick, start spreading the news. The faster it spreads, the sooner the Dao Defense League will fall!”

The experts from the past were quite pleased at the news, as were the experts of the Demonfolk.

As for Yang Qi, he didn’t seem worried at all. He had expected the future world to eventually do something like this and had already established absolute power within the Dao Defense League. No one would dare to rebel against him, even if he was Proud Heaven’s son.

Considering that everyone was still digesting this news, it was a surprise when Yang Qi suddenly said, “You pieces of shit are just as bad as Proud Heaven. No wonder you work for him. You know full well that I'm a Fateless One, with the most powerful of the three thousand special constitutions. And considering that you people are no idiots, you know that I was born from the void itself. I don’t have a real father. Not even a god could claim to be my parent, much less that fool Proud Heaven.”

As he spoke, he allowed his Fateless aura to spread, causing a vortex of energy to fill the area. Behind him, a mysterious void appeared, invincible and without fate, its future eternally unknowable.

People like Yang Qi almost never came to exist within the river of history, but when they did it was always because of rare hetupratyaya. That was how Fateless Ones came to be.

RUMBLE!

Yang Qi’s Fateless aura instantly provoked a reaction in the energy fields surrounding the Great Necropolis. It was almost as if a host of doorways began trembling, with some flying open. That, in turn, caused everyone to feel as if the eyes of ancient souls were inside, looking at them. It was a hair-raising sensation, and it convinced many of the experts that the interior of the necropolis must be an extremely dangerous place.

“He’s right,” Bright Tideflow said. “He is a Fateless One. I met a Fateless One in the Primeval Age, once, and he didn't have a father either. Fateless Ones are definitely stronger than Eternal or Fortuned Ones, making them supreme among the three thousand constitutions. And they’re born out of the void itself. No wonder he beat me so easily.”

The experts present were knowledgeable enough to know that Fateless Ones didn’t have fathers. Even their mothers wouldn’t be related to them by blood. It was similar to how fungus would grow on a tree. By way of analogy, a Fateless One’s mother was like the tree, and the Fateless One was like a spore that drifted along and eventually landed on the tree. Although it would grow on the tree—adhering closely to it in the process—that didn’t mean that it actually came from the tree itself.

The Demonfolk experts were quite taken aback. They had hoped to harm Yang Qi by spreading word that he was Proud Heaven’s son. However, now he had openly revealed that he was a Fateless One and had no true father or mother. He was a person who was completely unequalled, with an empty past and an empty future. Fate could not determine his course.

“Damnation!”

The generalissimos were now looking at him with icy expressions, clearly wishing they could kill him on the spot, but knowing they wouldn’t be able to.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi was laughing inside. The future world was his greatest enemy, and Magister Proud Heaven had been trying to kill him for a long time now. But not only was that not going to happen, Yang Qi was also going to have a chance to kill some of his generalissimos.

“Generalissimos, there’s no need to take action now,” one of the Mechfolk wise ones said. “Let’s head into the Great Necropolis first. According to legend, a great tribulation hit the god world, and there are many gods buried inside this necropolis as a result. Of course, they are deathless, so despite having been killed, their godhood remains in soul form. Furthermore, there’s plenty of treasure in the Great Necropolis as well. Imagine how strong we’ll be if we can capture one of those souls! We could most likely use it to reach godly ascension and develop true godhood!”

RUMBLE!

The wise one’s words caused a bit of a stir among the experts from the Primeval Age and the Demonfolk. Furthermore, there were fluctuations from further out in primal-chaos.

With Yang Qi’s Lord's Eye, he could see that there were other old-timers from other immortal worlds gathering in the area, people who were not members of the Dao Defense League. Although the Dao Defense League had a hundred trillion worlds in it and was the most powerful alliance in existence, they still only made up one percent of the total immortal worlds.

And now some of the old-timers from outside the alliance were here, in the hopes of benefiting from the Great Necropolis.

If what the Mechfolk wise one had said was true, and it was possible to get true godhood in the enormous necropolis, then there was no way these people could resist the urge to go inside.

Chapter 841: God Soul Godhood

The godhood in the soul of a god would be very much like the true godhood that had been gathered in the Live Forever God Tree. The power in it would be unimaginable, to the point where most people couldn’t even assimilate it. Instead, they would use it to craft an out-of-body incarnation that would be vastly stronger than anyone else in the immortal worlds. It would be like a hundred Grand Emperors, or even a thousand!

After all, the beast king corpse that had fallen from the god world had only been around as strong as twenty Grand Emperors. But a true god would be many, many times stronger than that. In terms of the mortal world, it would be like the difference between a bunny and a martial arts expert.

The god world was ruled by the gods, who viewed godlings as little more than food.

The godhood of even a Lesser God would be a source of almost complete invincibility in the immortal worlds. Over the course of the many millions upon millions of years, quite a few god items had appeared, but not very many corpses of gods. As a result, godhood was also not very common. Normally speaking, it would fade away after the death of the god and return to the essence of the surrounding god world.

If there really was godhood in the Great Necropolis, it would be of incredible use.

The surrounding crowd was already starting to get very excited. God items, godliness, and god corpses were like rubble cleared from a mine, whereas true godhood was like pure gold! It was the ultimate core of any god, and as long as it survived, that god could be born again.

Everyone present was already dreaming of what it would be like to get some godhood. As for Leaf Dao-Denier, he looked at Yang Qi through narrowed eyes, then glanced at the Great Necropolis. ‘This is my chance. If I can get the godhood of a god soul, I’ll be as strong as hundreds of Grand Emperors. Then what will Yang Qi count for? I’ll definitely be able to kill him. He’s strong, but only as strong as a few dozen Grand Emperors.'

“Why exactly did you feel the need to say that out loud?” one of the generalissimos said to the Mechfolk wise one, clearly somewhat angry that his ally had revealed such sensitive information. Of course, he kept his voice down so that their conversation was not audible to any of the others present.

The wise one chuckled. “It's fine, I'm just providing them with a bit of stimulation. Besides, what I said is only half true. Although there really are god souls and godhood in there, the truth is that such souls are evil and vicious. Anybody here that tries to go in there and take them will be killed. You see, the Great Necropolis is an opportunity, but also a curse. The distant god world realized that the Immortal Dao Age is about to be destroyed, so it sent the necropolis to block the entrance of the Ancient Road to the Gods. The whole point is to allow the long-perished god-spirits to return to life.”

The generalissimos nodded in understanding.

“So that’s how it is,” one of them said. “The godhood in there is really just bait to lure people inside. Once they start getting killed, their destiny will be used to resurrect the god souls.”

“Just what I would expect of you famous generalissimos,” the Mechfolk wise one said. “Rumors have been spreading that in the old Tusita Heaven, there was a similar exam designed to harvest destiny from those who died during the process, using it to create true godhood. Of course, the resulting godhood was weak. How could lowly individuals from the thirty-third ranked Tusita Heaven possibly compare to top experts of the Immortal Dao Age? Besides, we also have experts from the Future Age and the Primeval Age here. Experts from three ages, all ready to kill each other and send their destiny into the necropolis to resurrect the ancient souls of the gods. Of course, we’ll definitely manage to snag one of the god souls and take the godhood from it!”

At this point, one of the generalissimos turned to a marshal and said, “On another topic, the magisters sent word that they’ll be delivering us a new fragment of the Cruiser of Civilization, one with high-level power assessment systems. Our current systems aren’t strong enough to get a reading on Yang Qi. Has the delivery been made yet?”

“Yes, Generalissimo Skyvault, it’s been delivered!” The marshal handed over a paper talisman, which the generalissimo opened to reveal a device that resembled a geomantic compass. Although its original size was that of a twentieth ranked immortal world, it had been shrunken down to the size of a palm. The rotating pointers on the surface of the device would provide a readout explaining exactly how powerful a person was in terms of fighting prowess.

As soon as the device was activated, the voice of a photonic computer could be heard.

[Beep-beep-beep. Beep-beep-beep. Please provide input regarding readout standards. Shall we use the standard of true gods or the standard of Grand Emperor cultivators on the Stair of the True Void?]

“The Stair of the True Void, of course,” Generalissimo Skyvault said. “The standard of Grand Emperors. That’s how we calibrate our scanners in the future world.”

[Understood. Calibrating now. Please wait…. Calibrations complete. You may select a target to scan.]

The voice of the photonic computer was completely emotionless, yet it somehow thrummed with a feeling of profound civilization.

“Him. League-Lord Yang Qi of the Dao Defense League. The Fateless One!”

[Beep-beep-beep…. Power index of three hundred! He is currently as strong as thirty Grand Emperors on the Stair of the True Void. With your current index of fifteen, you are clearly no match for him.]

“What? His index is three hundred!?” The other generalissimos were visibly shocked.

In the future world, anyone whose power index reached the level of ten would be a generalissimo, or in other words, a Grand Emperor. People like that were considered invincible to all others, the cream of the crop in terms of cultivation base. Even people who broke past the limit of ten would rarely go beyond twenty, thirty, or forty. There was one generalissimo who had supposedly reached the level of two hundred, but he eventually lost control of the power and exploded. Currently, the top generalissimo in the future world was Generalissimo Order, who was second only to the magisters. Even he only had a power index of one hundred and ninety, which indicated that he was as powerful as nineteen ordinary Grand Emperors working together.

But now they were being told that Yang Qi’s index was three hundred! It almost defied their comprehension.

One of the generalissimos snorted grimly and said, “So what if his power index is at three hundred? That’s nothing compared to the magisters. Their indexes are over a thousand! And Lesser Gods will reach ten thousand. The path from being a Grand Emperor to the level of the legion of gods is a long and arduous one.”

Meanwhile, Yang Qi was eyeing the huddled group of generalissimos.

‘What is that thing?’ he thought. As soon as they had brought out their fragment of the Cruiser of Civilization, Yang Qi could sense the Engine of the One God thrumming. In fact, he was fairly certain that if he unleashed the power of the engine, he could take whatever it was they were looking at.

That alone was enough to confirm to him that it was a piece of the Cruiser of Civilization. If he acquired it, it would surely come with countless benefits. However, now wasn’t the appropriate time for that. Infuriating the future world right now would only upset the current balance. It would be better to wait until he was inside the Great Necropolis, then steal the item in secret.

There was quite a buzz in the area outside of the Great Necropolis.

The temptation of true godhood was just too much for anyone to resist. After all, even Grand Emperors had to consider how to further their cultivation. Being on the ninth minor stair meant that the only possible future upgrade was godly ascension. And the only way to do that was to enter the Ancient Road to the Gods.

Even Lesser Gods were a thousand times more powerful than a Grand Emperor. That much could be confirmed with the power index system used by the future world, in which the magisters were categorized as a thousand, and Lesser Gods as ten thousand.

As for the power indexes of Common, Greater, Consummate, Perfect, and Paramount Gods, it was impossible to say.

BOOM!

All of a sudden, the people from the Demon League and Primeval Age alliance unleashed a powerful daoist technique. The target wasn't Yang Qi, but rather the Great Necropolis itself. Normally speaking, it would take some sort of special technique to get into the enormous necropolis. But there were plenty of experts from the Demon League and the Primeval Age who were adept at the use of spell formations that could pierce through heaven and earth. In the blink of an eye, a pathway leading into the Great Necropolis appeared.

Swish. Swoosh!

Numerous old-timers began flying into the necropolis.

There were plenty of human old-timers that had been hiding in the surrounding primal-chaos who also drew on various god items and other techniques to open their own way inside.

Meanwhile, the future world did nothing but simply wait for everyone else to enter. As for Yang Qi, he also held back. The last thing he wanted was to end up stuck inside the necropolis while the future world attacked the Dao Defense League.

There were other people who similarly held back as they tried to consider whether or not to face the danger inside. But then a voice rang out from one of the experts from the past, who had just entered the necropolis.

“A god item! I got a god item. This thing is amazing!”

“I got one too! There are so many of them!”

At this point, not even the people from the future world could hold back.

Chapter 842: Power Assessment Systems

Everyone was stunned.

People had assumed that those who entered the Great Necropolis might be attacked immediately by the forces inside, but instead they were harvesting god items from the get go.

The triumphant shouts of those inside caused the generalissimos’ faces to fall.

Snorting coldly, one of them said, “What’s going on, Mechfolk!? I thought you said this place was extremely dangerous! It doesn’t seem dangerous at all! Everyone in there is getting god items! Can you hear that? They’re literally cheering. They’re getting stronger while we're sitting out here falling behind. God items have godliness in them, and every single one could be a big benefit to our forces. Who knows how many powerful mechas they could be used to make.”

“Er….” The Mechfolk wise one's expression flickered, and he was temporarily at a loss for words. “Well, our revered ancestor from the god world told us not to casually go into the Great Necropolis. He said it would be very dangerous. Uh… I don’t know what’s going on.”

“Damnation!” another generalissimo shouted. “Come on, let’s go. Follow the experts from the Primeval Age and start searching that necropolis.”

“I don’t think that's appropriate,” said another of the generalissimos. “Why should we follow the experts from the Primeval Age? Wouldn’t they already have cleared out all the god items? We need to head to the middle of the necropolis. Look, do you see all the entrances at the base of the thing? Why don't we use our power assessment systems to scan them and make sure they’re safe? If we see anything dangerous, we can retreat.”

“Yes, I was thinking the same thing,” a different generalissimo said, his eyes shining. “The power assessment systems can detect powerful life forms. And unfortunately, one of the functions of the Great Necropolis is to resist divine will.”

“I agree. Let’s get moving!” The generalissimos powered up their battleships and flew into the Great Necropolis along with the Mechfolk.

Compared to the enormous necropolis, the fleet was like a bunch of ants. Yang Qi watched them enter, then glanced around at the vital energy pathways that had been set up to get into the place.

‘This is my chance. I have to get that new fragment of the Cruiser of Civilization.’

Swish!

As the last battleship entered the necropolis, he flew after it. Upon entering the Great Necropolis, he got the feeling that it contained millions upon millions of planes of existence. It pulsed with all sorts of vital energy, some still and dead, some pure, and some burning with the aura of the god world. Some were so violent that even Grand Emperors who absorbed them would die. But others were suitable for use.

It was such a chaotic mix that it seemed obvious this place had been formed after an immense war.

Yang Qi quickly used his daoist techniques to create a shield around him, almost like a porcelain eggshell that kept out the vital energy. He also summoned his primal-chaos elder-snake to deal with any vital energy left inside the shell.

Next, he sent out his divine will to check his surroundings, but unfortunately, it didn’t reveal a single thing. Apparently, divine will couldn’t pierce through that which was of the god world.

RIP!

Yang Qi turned and struck the nearby wall of the necropolis with his palm to see if he could damage it. However, to his dismay, he didn’t even leave the tiniest mark. Worse, there was a backlash that surged through him, causing creaking and cracking sounds, and was powerful enough that it would likely have injured most other experts.

‘Incredible. This thing obviously wasn’t made with ordinary building materials from the god world. But what exactly is it? That Mechfolk wise one said that there would be godhood from god souls, but how come I can’t sense any?’

Stretched out in front of him was a winding path as wide as a thirtieth ranked immortal world. It had walls that were decorated with ancient designs that Yang Qi couldn’t decipher. He also saw some god script that seemed to describe the history of an ancient civilization. Other bits of text contained godly-class energy arts or cultivation descriptions.

Yang Qi ignored them and kept his attention focused on the fleet of the future world up ahead. As it floated along, it would shatter any warding spells it passed, causing god items to fly out, things so powerful that they surpassed anything he had taken from the Aeonic God Temple.

Yang Qi didn’t take anything.

At a certain point, he flew up onto one of the walls lining the path and saw an enclave the size of a continent up ahead, filled with all sorts of spirit plants and medicinal objects. Unfortunately, the future world and the Mechfolk plundered it all.

He saw another section of a wall with another plane of existence filled with veins of god gold. It also fell to the advancing fleet.

Crack!

Yang Qi suddenly realized that he had stepped on a weathered skeleton that had to be millions upon millions of years old. It was completely devoid of any spirit energy, and had clearly been gripping a god item recently. Unfortunately, the god item was now gone.

‘The Great Necropolis has so many treasures that they’re even growing in the walls! But how did those planes of existence come to be? Are they a natural growth of the necropolis?’

Peering ahead of the fleet, he saw that there were endless planes of existences, worlds, and ruins. Some were filled with ores, some with medicinal items, and others were even packed with the corpses and skeletons of godlings. There were others that seemed to be nothing but collections of weapons and god items.

The Great Necropolis seemed like it was a temple built for the gods.

A few hours passed in which the enormous fleet from the future world benefited quite a bit.

The generalissimos were laughing with delight at all of their gains. Right now, it was impossible to determine what cultivation benefits they would achieve, what mechas and battleships they would be able to craft, and what medicines they would be able to concoct.

“Generalissimos, the power assessment systems have detected fluctuations that seem to be on the level of a Grand Emperor. They’re coming from the wall up ahead, and appear to be from something either sleeping or lying in ambush.”

A moment later, the voice of a photonic computer rang out.

[Beep-beep-beep. Beep-beep-beep. Primeval godworm detected. Power index eighteen! It is currently hibernating.]

“What? A primeval godworm as strong as a Grand Emperor?!” One of the generalissimos waved his hand to stop the fleet from advancing. Then, a moment later, a destructive beam of light shot out from one of the battleships. After the rubble cleared, a pure white cocoon that was as large as an immortal world could be seen.

Within the cocoon was a sleeping godworm who pulsed with incredible spatial godpower. In fact, the power was so strong that it made the cocoon much tougher than the greyspace of an immortal world.

The generalissimos were thrilled.

“That’s it!” one of them exclaimed. “A Grand Emperor godworm! Just imagine what kind of god items you could make with that. Considering the future world doesn’t have things like this, imagine how rich we would be if we took it home and sold it. Prepare to capture it. We absolutely, positively must not let it get away!”

When Yang Qi saw them setting up spell formations to try capturing the godworm, he knew that the moment of truth had arrived. Suddenly, the Engine of the One God flared with power.

WHOOSH!

In the blink of an eye, the power assessment systems flew out of the hand of the marshal who had been holding it!

Chapter 843: Grand Emperor Godworm

Normally speaking, a godworm at the Grand Emperor level would be impossible for any individual to take. They had very mysterious cultivation bases and were generally impossible to predict or control. After all, primeval godworms were the original creators of space-time wormholes.

Yang Qi had acquired quite a few godworms in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, but few that were in the Godmyth level. He had encountered some that were ninth division Chaos Gods, but none that were at the Grand Emperor level. But here one was in the Great Necropolis.

There was no way he would just allow the forces of the future world to take it. If he got it, the Dao Defense League would have yet another powerful Grand Emperor. And no ordinary one at that, but one that surpassed even Patriarch Annalist.

There was no level higher than Grand Emperor at the moment, so the overall strength of any alliance would be determined by its fighting prowess, and ultimately its Grand Emperors.

Those individuals who were on the ninth stair of the Deathless Heavenly Stairway, the Stair of the True Void, were essentially invincible. They were qualified to not only walk the Ancient Road to the Gods, but also to defend and protect all of their subordinates.

However, Yang Qi didn’t immediately attempt to take the godworm. Instead, he chose the moment in which the battleships closed in on the thing to snatch the fragment of the Cruiser of Civilization that had the power assessment systems.

One of the most powerful features of the Engine of the One God was that, when it encountered other fragments of the cruiser, it could pull them toward it.

The new fragment shot toward Yang Qi in a stream of light, and he lunged forward to grab it. Then, with no fanfare at all, he absorbed it, sending it straight to the Engine of the One God in his heart.

He immediately realized that the new fragment was protected by warding magics put in place by a mighty magister from the future. Of course, even the mightiest of wills were paltry in comparison to the God Legion Seal. The gold imp flared with golden light, sending it straight into the new fragment. Then, the voice of a photonic computer could be heard.

[Beep-beep-beep. Beep-beep-beep. A true possessor of the Sovereign Lord's legacy talisman has been detected. Ejecting previous master. Bonding new master for all eternity!]

Crack!

The previous will shattered, and Yang Qi could now sense that he now had three major systems under the control of the Engine of the One God. The genetic systems, vivicreation systems, and power assessment systems. Soon, all of his previous fragments had united into a single, snow-white spacecraft.

The Cruiser of Civilization was returning to a state of completion at last.

‘Finally!’ Yang Qi murmured to himself. ‘Other people who try stealing a fragment of the Cruiser of Civilization from someone else will have trouble fusing with it. In fact, they might even suffer a dangerous backlash. But with the Engine of the One God, I have no such problems. All it takes is a single command and the new piece will be mine. The future world has really suffered a big loss here. Now, let’s see how these power assessment systems work! Activate!’

[Beep-beep-beep. Beep-beep-beep.]

The power assessment systems immediately got to work.

[Scanning. Scanning. Powerful enemy detected ahead. Power index above one thousand.]

“Hmm?”

Looking closely, Yang Qi realized that the power assessment systems were calibrated to assign an ordinary Grand Emperor with an index of ten.

In other words, a power index of several thousand was equivalent to several hundred individual Grand Emperors. Obviously, the combined forces of the future world and the Mechfolk were equivalent to several hundred Grand Emperors.

“Recalibrate the power index. Assign the power of one Grand Emperor to the number one!” As far as Yang Qi was concerned, people who were weaker than Grand Emperors weren’t even worth thinking about. Therefore, he decided to simply assign the lowest number to a single Grand Emperor.

A moment later, the power assessment systems were recalibrated.

“Now scan me,” he said. He was very interested to know how strong he was. This would be ignoring King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions, the God Legion Seal, or any magical treasures he had. It would simply assess his cultivation base, quintessence energy, nascent divinity, soul, blood, and the like.

[Beep-beep-beep. Beep-beep-beep…. Scan complete. Power level very high. Thirty-five. You are as strong as thirty-five Grand Emperors!]

“Excellent!” Yang Qi exclaimed. In his recent session of secluded meditation, he had assimilated the beast king clones, learned more of the mysteries of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, accepted heaps of destiny and faith, and learned more of the energy arts of the seventy-two monarchs. Although he still had a lot of work to do with all of them, he had definitely made huge progress. As for his cultivation base, he had pushed it as far as he could with the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. He was on the first stair of the Deathless Heavenly Stairway, but didn’t want to waste the effects of the tribulation that would come with progressing. For instance, back in the Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple, he had used his final Chaos God tribulation to help defeat the Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court, Eldest Brother Secundus, and Leaf Dao-Denier. And he hoped that his next session of tribulation could be used in similar fashion. Perhaps he could use it to strike a heavy blow on the future world, the Primeval Age, or the Demon League.

“Scan that battleship,” Yang Qi said.

[Power index ten.]

The Grand Emperors from the future all had power indexes of only one, two, or three. But their battleships were extremely powerful, as much as ten Grand Emperors combined.

If you added all of the numbers together, they would reach into the hundreds.

The group as a whole would be almost impossible to take on, which made things frustrating for Yang Qi. Even worse, the future warriors were veterans of numerous battles and could work together with extreme efficiency.

Furthermore, there was some mysterious way that the battleships all linked their power together. Of course, Yang Qi’s Cruiser of Civilization was the pinnacle of science and technology, and was beyond anything the future world could produce. That said, it would still take time for him to understand exactly how they linked their ships together.

“Damn you!” The Grand Emperors in the future world’s fleet were going crazy with anger as they realized they had been robbed. “Who was that? Who robbed us of our fragment of the Cruiser of Civilization!? Once you bond with one of those fragments, it should be impossible to take them by force. Unless someone has the legendary Engine of the One God!”

Suddenly, one of the intelligence officers hurried forward and said, “It was Yang Qi, the league-lord of the Dao Defense League! According to our reports, he took the Engine of the One God from the experts of the Primeval Age! We meant to provide this information earlier, but then the Great Necropolis appeared and we got distracted!”

“Fool!” the generalissimos shouted in fury. A moment later, all of the intelligence personnel on the bridge were dead, leaving the entire place soaked with blood. “Dammit. He's been following us! Start scanning the area immediately. Look through all parallel universes! Find him!”

“Yes sir!”

The fleet grouped back together tightly and sent out a pulse that rolled through the Great Necropolis as they tried to pinpoint Yang Qi’s location.

Unfortunately, there weren’t many places that Yang Qi could hide, and the fleet was just too large and powerful. Outside, he could have slipped into a parallel universe and evaded their searches. But space was limited in the Great Necropolis, and the walls were so tough that he couldn’t easily pierce through them.

A moment later, a beam of light locked onto Yang Qi, and the fleet opened fire, sending blazing cannon light slamming into him.

Before he could react, he was hit, and sent tumbling backward like an autumn leaf in a brisk breeze.

As the cannons continued blasting away, he drew on one of the most powerful items he had, King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans.

The talismans began gobbling up the power of the cannon fire and converting it into Heaven-Devouring True Energy in his meridians and sea of energy. Essentially, the cannon fire was powering him back up!

Swish!

Yang Qi shot forward and began battering the nearest battleship with his fists. It was none other than the flagship of the fleet. As he smashed through its shields and hull, cracking and crunching sounds rang out.

“Not good!” one of the generalissimos said. “This guy is very strong. Remember how easily he beat Bright Tideflow earlier? We’re losing a lot of power thanks to his attacks, and it looks like our cannon fire doesn’t affect him at all.”

“It's fine. We have virtually unlimited power. Just focus all of the cannons on him. How long could he possibly last?” Generalissimo Worldking chuckled coldly. “Activate the Reticulated God-Executing Cannon! Power it with the Eternal Propulsion Reactor!”

“Yes sir!”

RUUUUUUUUMBLE!

The fleet began changing formation until it looked like one huge ship. Then an enormous cannon emerged and aimed directly at Yang Qi. The cannon fired and the fury of the gods was unleashed, with power to destroy universes.

Bam. Bam. Bam. Bam! Bam!!

Cannon fire slammed into Yang Qi’s chest, and there was no way he could possibly negate it.

Chapter 844: Vital Energy Crumbles

RUMBLE!

Cannon fire rained down onto Yang Qi from the fleet, and to deal with it, he yet again drew on King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans and the consummate abilities of the seventy-two monarchs, breaking up the incoming power and redistributing it throughout his body. Surprisingly, the power assessment systems also helped in this regard.

Those observing could see that the cannon fire wasn’t hurting him; however, it also had him locked down and apparently incapable of advancing. But the mere fact that he could sustain such incredible power levels was still a big shock to the marshals and generalissimos from the future world.

‘I can’t believe the power assessment systems have this function as well. They can actually process the power of the cannon fire and turn it into vital energy!’

At the moment, Yang Qi wasn’t even trying to fight back. He was just soaking in the cannon fire, gaining enlightenment and other benefits. The combined firepower of all the cannons in the fleet was equivalent to something along the lines of two to three hundred Grand Emperors. There was no way Yang Qi could fight his way through that to reach the actual cannons. Thankfully, the fleet was not capable of quick movements or adjustments. If he had been dealing with this many living Grand Emperors, it would have been a very different situation.

In fact, it would have been difficult to escape alive.

“Feels great!” Yang Qi murmured with a sigh. As the power of the cannons coursed into him, he cast his senses inward and could see dramatic transformations playing out. All sorts of vital energy inside of him was being broken apart and purified.

The power assessment systems weren’t just useful in analyzing the details of his own power, but could also be used outwardly, including affecting the various types of power within the Great Necropolis. He inhaled, and the surrounding vital energy entered him. Now, he could see which types of vital energy were harmful, which were true spirit energy, which contained the power of the god world, and which contained killing intent left behind by the legion of gods.

In general, the vital energy in the Great Necropolis was mixed together to create something more primal and chaotic than actual primal-chaos. Inhaling it could be very harmful, which was why most experts who entered the place would never use the vital energy there for breathing exercises. Instead, they would summon a personal kingdom around them for safety purposes.

The top figures from the future world essentially did the same thing with their battleships.

For most people, inhaling the power of the Great Necropolis was pure death. Of course, Yang Qi was different. With all of the detailed information he could get from the power assessment systems, he could easily identify which types of vital energy he could use, and which he could not.

RUMBLE!

Using the functions of the Cruiser of Civilization, he sent different types of power to different locations. Within the depths of the spacecraft, there were tens of thousands of visible minor planes. Upon initial creation, they were absolutely empty and desolate, but now he was filling them with vital energy.

Some of them were filling up with streams of porcelain colored energy, dazzling and beautiful. That was pure power from the god world, which could be used to create god herbs, among other things. Any knowledgeable concocter of pills could use the vital energy in those ingredients to create powerful god pills.

Some of the planes were filled with powerful platinum-colored energy that pulsed with preheaven five phases power, the kind that could be used to create incomparably sharp weapons. Unfortunately, even an eighth or ninth division Godmyth who absorbed such energy would be wiped out of existence by it.

These were flows of energy that would never appear out in the mortal world and would be avoided even by ordinary Grand Emperors if they saw them. It was only because Yang Qi had the power assessment systems that he could break them apart into useful elements.

Yang Qi also saw one particularly marvelous plane of existence, where the vital energy seemed filled with howling voices. As they roared, their words transformed into a single word in god script: “Kill!”

It was killing energy that, if absorbed, would conjure mental images of armies ravaging the lands and burning everything. It was the killing intent of the legion of gods, which would never dissipate for all eternity.

It contained the ultimate and core meaning of killing and death, and would be profoundly harmful to any Grand Emperor who absorbed it. However, it could be used to create very powerful magical treasures, or even god items. With the power assessment systems in operation, Yang Qi now realized that, although the objects contained in the surrounding walls were definitely useful, the vital energy of the Great Necropolis was actually far more precious. Later, when he was able to take these vital energy collections back to the Dao Defense League, they would definitely make the organization even more powerful.

At a certain point, one of the marshals said, “Generalissimos, our combined cannon fire doesn’t seem to be hurting him. What do we do? I can’t believe he's actually able to neutralize the power of the cannons.”

Generalissimo Skyvault chuckled coldly and said, “We still have more to throw at him. Use our strongest cannon formation, the Heavenly Oversight Prospectus! I refuse to believe that he’ll survive this!”

RUMBLE!

As the orders were sent out, the fleet began roaring like a pack of wild beasts. Their power shields transformed yet again, and a huge magnetic field spread out.

Another cannon formation was unleashed, and this time Yang Qi wasn’t being targeted with beams of light, but rather power spheres. They were like enormous planets, upon the surfaces of which, terrifying faces could be seen. There were hundreds of thousands of them, locking down the entire area.

Then, a massive explosion destroyed everything around Yang Qi. In fact, when the smoke cleared, he was nowhere to be seen.

“What?” one of the marshals shouted. “Where did he go? Don’t tell me that even the Heavenly Oversight Prospectus didn’t hurt him? Impossible! That doesn’t make sense!”

“He’s hurt,” one of the generalissimos said. “He’s just hiding, that’s all. Scan for him again!” Apparently having sensed something that told him Yang Qi was hurt, his eyes darted back and forth as he tried to spot him.

“He’s right there on top of the Grand Emperor godworm cocoon!”

Everyone looked over as an enormous primal-chaos elder-snake opened its mouth above the cocoon, then gobbled it up.

Yet again, King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans were proving their worth. Just like an actual snake, they were capable of devouring anything in existence.

Having taken the godworm, Yang Qi chuckled and raised his voice. “Generalissimos of the future world, I know that I can’t take you all on together right now. But I'm only going to be getting stronger and stronger here in the Great Necropolis. And you people are going to get weaker and weaker. Maybe if I bury you all here, your Magister Proud Heaven will finally show up.”

With that, he blurred into motion and vanished. Obviously, he had no desire to continue fighting with them right now.

“After him!” one of the generalissimos shouted. Unfortunately, he was nowhere to be seen. The further one went into the Great Necropolis, the more space opened up and the stronger the vital energy became, until it became almost liquid. Soon, the battleships’ shields were under incredible pressure and they were finding it harder and harder to proceed along. And considering the environment, they knew they had to be particularly careful.

‘That was close!’ Yang Qi thought. He was currently hiding out in one of the planes of existence in the walls of the larger path. It was a world full of ores and minerals from the god world, which he didn’t hesitate to gather up. The truth was that he really had been injured by the Heavenly Oversight Prospectus, and now needed some time to recover.

The blow had felt like something from an ancient god and had nearly caused him to cough up a mouthful of blood. Many of his meridians had shattered, and they wouldn’t recover in a short time.

At least now he knew how terrifying the combined might of the fleet could be. For now, he didn't stand a chance of taking on the entire force from the future world. He definitely needed to be a lot stronger before he could try.

So he sat there performing some breathing exercises and slowly recovering.

Thankfully, he could make use of the vital energy of the Great Necropolis now. It was actually very beneficial, making his meridians even stronger than they had been before. He had actually benefited quite a bit from the fight, and now he understood the future world much better than before.

‘Now let’s see what this Grand Emperor godworm is like,’ he thought, taking the cocoon out of his God Legion Paradise.

Chapter 845: People in the Necropolis

Any godworm in the Grand Emperor level would be considered a precious treasure. However, after examining the godworm cocoon with his divine will, Yang Qi could tell that it would be difficult to fully make use of it. After all, it contained billions of trillions of spatial magical laws.

King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans were powerful, but Yang Qi’s overall cultivation level was still too low to draw on their full capabilities. If he could climb to the ninth stair of the Deathless Heavenly Stairway, he would be a Grand Emperor, and able to draw on the full and complete fighting prowess and devouring strength of the talismans. But he wasn’t in that position, for now.

‘Don’t fight me, godworm. You might be strong, but only as strong as two Grand Emperors. And I'm as strong as thirty-five.’

He waved his hand, and King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans yet again turned into a primal-chaos elder-snake. Then, using the power of the talismans, Yang Qi began pulling apart the spatial threads that made up the cocoon.

Before long, he had quite a collection of the threads.

They thrummed with power, and were too valuable to simply discard. He could give them to subordinates to make powerful magical treasures, such as banners, flags, clothing, nets, and the like, god items that could cause big trouble even for Grand Emperors.

As the threads built up, the cocoon grew thinner and thinner, spinning like a top as it unraveled.

Eventually, the godworm began to awaken, twitching a bit as its compound eyes flashed. As its power rose, it let loose a long cry.

At the same time, the power assessment systems immediately began providing a report.

[Beep-beep-beep. Beep-beep-beep. Power index two… three… five… seven….]

‘Excellent,’ Yang Qi thought as he watched the godworm growing stronger and stronger. The more powerful it became, the better it was for him, because after he forced it into submission it would be one of the strongest assets he had in the Dao Defense League.

The godworms that he had taken from the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart were still in his God Legion Paradise, constantly feeding and growing stronger. The spatial spell formations they could create were without rival, and made the God Legion Paradise a huge asset. After all, those spell formations were so strong that not even cultivators many levels higher than Yang Qi would be able to break them.

With the addition of a Grand Emperor godworm, the defenses his army could create would put the Dao Defense League in a position to defend against all sorts of catastrophes.

It was certain that the situation in heaven and earth would only continue getting more complicated. New and more powerful entities would be appearing on the scene, and it was imperative to prepare to deal with them.

“Stop struggling, godworm. The sooner you submit, the sooner I can help you. Considering you're only as strong as seven Grand Emperors, you're clearly not a match for me.” Yang Qi thrust out his palm, unleashing the power of the God Legion Seal.

He was convinced that this godworm must have consumed some item that pushed it to this extremely high level of power. Then it had gone into hibernation to digest it.

Unfortunately, it didn’t matter how strong it was, it definitely couldn’t deal with the power of thirty-five Grand Emperors.

However, it continued to struggle and resist, unleashing pulses of will that seemed to be a cry of help to some distant entity.

‘Why is this so difficult!?’ Yang Qi frowned and redoubled his efforts. It was in that moment that, all of a sudden, a faint voice echoed out far in the distance. When it reached the cocoon, the godworm began to reach even higher levels of power.

[Power index nine… ten… eleven!]

The godworm was now as powerful as eleven Grand Emperors, which was quite a shocking level.

‘Some voice is blessing the godworm with power?’ Yang Qi thought, shocked. ‘Don’t tell me this godworm actually belongs to someone already. There’s no way!’  Yang Qi suddenly opened his mouth and began singing the Eternal Heavenly Aria, which negated the effects of the voice. Then he reached out, summoning a sealing mark into his palm and slamming it onto the cocoon.

The godworm let loose an agonized shriek, then grew calm. Then it shrank down into something that looked like a tiny silkworm, wriggling on Yang Qi’s hand.

Waving his hand, Yang Qi entered his God Legion Paradise and looked at the work that was underway there. Numerous godworms were producing spatial threads of magical law that were being woven together into an enormous throne, which was where the Grand Emperor godworm would sit.

The God Legion Paradise shuddered, and Yang Qi sensed his power levels rising.

His power index was now at thirty-six, thanks to the addition of the new godworm. Furthermore, his pure land was even sturdier, and as he gained even more complete understanding of the magical laws of the god world, his cultivation base would rise even further.

However, it was in that very moment that an explosive voice echoed into Yang Qi’s ears.

“I can’t believe you would dare to take the godworm I was raising! This is a crime worthy of death!” Then a rumbling flood of vital energy roared toward him, clumping together into something like a hail of asteroids. As the plane around him crumbled, an enormous hand reached out to grab him, white as if crafted from jade, and pulsing with a godly might that seemed unrivaled.

[Warning. Warning. Powerful enemy detected. Power index forty.]

‘Impossible! Something that surpasses me?’ Yang Qi was currently as strong as thirty-six Grand Emperors, but that was without King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions, the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, the God Legion Seal, or any of the other assets he had. Truth be told, his total level of strength was actually closer to forty, meaning that not even forty Grand Emperors could hurt him.

“Fist of King Fierce-Savage!” he growled. As he threw both hands out, veins bulged on his arms, almost like god dragons howling in fierce and savage fashion. This was a consummate technique from one of the ancient seventy-two monarchs, King Fierce-Savage.

“Fierce Howl!” His two fists almost seemed to inhale and then cry out, a sound like the fierce howl of ancient barbaric giants.

Crack!

Yang Qi staggered backward, but managed to shatter the incoming hand.

He quickly called on the power of the Engine of the One God to calm himself and recover as he looked off into the distance.

“Eee?” the voice said. Apparently, the owner of that voice was surprised that Yang Qi could withstand the blow just now.

Meanwhile, to Yang Qi’s shock, he realized that whoever had launched the attack was probably not from the group that had just entered the Great Necropolis. The experts from the Primeval Age and the Demon League, and even some of the old-timers who had remained in hiding up to this point, were none of them a match for Yang Qi. Maybe if they all joined forces, they could tangle with him, but one-on-one, there was no way. That indicated that whoever had just attacked him was not from the past, the future, or the immortal dao civilization. It must be a person who already resided in the Great Necropolis.

It was a momentous realization. After all, if people could reside in the Great Necropolis, then it seemed highly likely there would be many such individuals. And they would surely all be extremely dangerous individuals.

“So, you actually managed to stand up to my palm strike. I didn’t realize there were people like that from the mortal world. Hasn’t the Immortal Dao Age begun declining yet? I've already been on the Ancient Road to the Gods for several hundred million years, but have yet to reach the god world. Considering how much I’ve progressed in that time, I assumed I would be completely without parallel in the Immortal Dao Age. But here you came along and actually stood up to me? Friend, please come over for a chat!”

The voice actually seemed welcoming, and not the least bit hostile.

As for Yang Qi, he was shocked to find that this was apparently an expert who had walked the Ancient Road to the Gods. Of course, that begged the question of what this person was doing in the Great Necropolis.

Focusing on the direction the voice came from, he flapped his wings and flew forward until he saw a world up ahead at the end of the path. It had ten thousand burning suns in the sky, causing fiery light to fill the world. As for the vital energy, it was chaotic, but filled by more than half with the aura of the true flame of the god world.

It was a world of fire. A plane of existence devoted solely to flame.

He saw enormous giant-spirits roving about, pulsing with fighting prowess that was no weaker than old-timers on the Deathless Heavenly Stairway.

Yang Qi was completely taken aback. Suddenly, a voice spoke from behind Yang Qi. He turned to find a young woman floating behind him.

“What, you think this is strange?” she said. “You see, this necropolis originated in the god world, and has been drifting along the Ancient Road to the Gods for tens upon tens of thousands of years. I entered it to further my cultivation and explore a bit, only to find that it recently returned to the immortal dao civilization.”

Chapter 846: Experts from the Ancient Road to the Gods

As Yang Qi faced the woman, the photonic computers spoke to him.

[Beep-beep-beep. Beep-beep-beep. Preliminary assessment suggests a power index of roughly forty. However, fluctuations indicate this individual has hidden power reserves not related to magical treasures or personal cultivation base. Given these additions, her composite power index likely exceeds forty. Correlative assessment indicates this person is not a major threat. Although defeating her is out of the question, she should not be able to injure you.]

‘So she’s stronger than me, but can’t beat me. In that case, I guess I have nothing to be afraid of. If what she just said is true, she comes from the Ancient Road to the Gods, huh….’

She stood there arrogantly in the kingdom of flames, and as the fire burned around her, it didn’t enter her body, but rather seemed to be purified by the energy field surrounding her. She had an icy and frigid aura around her that seemed to repel the fire and completely protect her.

“Are you someone from the Primeval Age who ended up on the Ancient Road to the Gods, and is using the Great Necropolis to try to get to the immortal dao civilization?” Yang Qi asked. “Might I ask for your honored surname and distinguished given name?”

“I'm Holy Daughter Joyflower,” she said coldly. “I doubt you've heard of me. Like I said, I stepped on the Ancient Road to the Gods hundreds of millions of years ago.”

Yang Qi knew that people who could enter the Ancient Road to the Gods were the type who stood head and shoulders above their contemporaries. Not even the Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court had ever entered the ancient road. In fact, it was only after their stronger contemporaries had left that they ended up founding the Heavenly Court.

This Holy Daughter Joyflower had to be someone who entered the road before the Heavenly Court was set up, which meant that, to her, the four emperors were nobodies.

Long, long ago, there was a period of time after the legion of gods vanished in which new experts rose to prominence. And many of those experts ended up on the Ancient Road to the Gods, where they were still striving to reach the god world. In the Primeval Era, it was shortly after the legion of gods perished that the Ancient Road to the Gods disappeared.

That was the time period to which the Dragonfolk had opened a passageway, the era in which the buddhist schools thrived.

The primeval past. The medieval past. The present. The future.

Eldest Brother Secundus was from the Primeval Age, as were the Five Great Lokapālas. As for this Holy Daughter Joyflower, she had to have come from the medieval past.

“What exactly did you want to talk to me about?” Yang Qi asked. “Don’t tell me you want that godworm back.” It was a given that she wouldn't be happy about having her godworm taken, but now that he had it, there was no way he would just give it up. If she tried to pick a fight, he could always just leave. He didn’t want to waste any true energy fighting her.

“You’re strong, I’ll give you that,” she said. “I can tell that, although you’re a bit weaker than me, if we ended up fighting we’d probably both get hurt. And what would be the point of that? On the Ancient Road to the Gods, there’s no point in making archenemies. Why don't we join forces? Explore the inexhaustible secrets of the Great Necropolis together?”

When she spoke, her voice didn’t seem to contain a scrap of emotion, as if she really didn't care at all that Yang Qi had taken the godworm she was raising. It was strange, considering that he knew she must have spent a lot of time and resources on the thing.

“What do you mean inexhaustible secrets? Didn’t you just say the Great Necropolis floated down the Ancient Road to the Gods for tens upon tens of thousands of years? Considering how much time has passed, haven’t you already thoroughly explored this place? What would be the point of working together?”

Yang Qi was very curious why the Great Necropolis had appeared to begin with, and what exactly it contained.

“Not even I'm sure of exactly what the Great Necropolis is. After all, I’ve never been to the god world. My cultivation base just isn’t high enough, and I can only go so far along the road. However, I do know that the Great Necropolis contains deathless godhood, left behind by dead gods who ended up buried here. Due to the nature of the necropolis, that godhood will never fade away. There are a lot of other experts from the Ancient Road to the Gods here in the Great Necropolis, searching for it. Anyone who finds it will rapidly advance toward godly ascension, becoming so powerful that everyone else inside will be like bugs who can be reduced to ashes in the blink of an eye.”

‘A lot of other experts?’ Yang Qi thought, shocked.

No one knew just how far the Ancient Road to the Gods stretched, but it got wider as it went along. According to the rumors, the god world was at its end, and those who reached it could reach the same level as the legion of gods. It went without saying that any expert on the road would be an incredibly powerful individual who would make the Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court seem like children.

This Holy Daughter Joyflower went to prove that point.

Of course, once Yang Qi was an actual Grand Emperor, he would definitely be able to crush her.

“I can tell you’re extremely strong,” she said, “so if we worked together, we would definitely have a shot at finding some deathless godhood. If you don't want to, that's fine. Just remember, there’s plenty of danger in the Great Necropolis, and I'm not the strongest person here. I’d say I'm somewhere in the middle. There are some experts around who are ten times as strong as me. Furthermore, there are undying expressions of will from perished gods in the depths of the necropolis. Things like that could easily destroy people like you and me. The only chance to get any godhood is to team up. In fact, the two of us might not be enough. We may need to recruit more people to help.”

“Alright. If you want to team up, then fine.” It could be very dangerous to form alliances with strangers. After all, you never knew when they might try to stab you in the back. But he could always escape to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, if needed. Besides, he had been a part of enough temporary alliances in life to know to be on guard against backstabbers. If anything, he might be the one to suddenly turn on his ally.

“Didn’t you say you’ve been exploring the Great Necropolis for ten thousand years already?” he asked. “You must have a pretty good idea of the general state of things in here. Mind explaining? Incidentally, there’s a fleet of battleships from the future world some distance behind me. If we work together, we might be able to take them out.”

“I saw that fleet,” she said. “And I watched you fighting them, too. It won’t be easy to handle them. Besides, I don’t have any beef with them. And if you try to kill them, it could provoke a response from one of their magisters. The magisters all have unfathomable cultivation bases and are vastly beyond anything I could handle. It’s only a matter of time until they come here to the Great Necropolis. Long story short, they’re your enemy, not mine. Look, as long as you join me, I’ll explain everything I know about this place to you. For example, this kingdom of fire we're in is actually built on the bones of a god of fire from the god world.”

“A god of fire?” he said in surprise. He opened his Lord's Eye and saw an enormous plane of existence stretching out, with fire so hot that it would kill even Grand Emperors. “What if there’s deathless godhood hidden in here?”

“There’s no way,” Holy Daughter Joyflower said. “That god of fire was a mere Lesser God, and was a mere sacrificial burial item. That said, there should be a deathless god soul in the depths of this place. If you get that, you could probably refine it into an out-of-body incarnation, which would definitely give you a big boost in power.”

“Oh really?” Yang Qi said. He activated the power assessment systems and used them to scan the depths of the kingdom of flames.

[Beep-beep-beep. Beep-beep-beep. Danger! Extreme danger! Unknown entity detected. The soul of a god. Power index one hundred and five.]

‘Incredible,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘That god soul has a power index of one hundred and five? That's completely heaven-defying.’ All of a sudden, Yang Qi realized that, before coming into the Great Necropolis, he had been completely ignorant regarding what an ‘expert’ really was.

The combined forces of the future world and the Mechfolk only had a power index in the hundreds, and that was like nothing. Even an army with ten thousand soldiers would be easily destroyed in the face of someone with superhuman powers. But if he could get the power of that god soul, he would be strong enough to defeat this Holy Daughter Joyflower and the future world’s fleet.

“Unfortunately, that god soul has a power index of well over a hundred. Even working together, could we really take it?” He shook his head. “It seems too risky.”

“What do you mean power index of over a hundred?” Holy Daughter Joyflower asked, clearly confused.

“I have a way to analyze power levels. A Grand Emperor on the Stair of the True Void has a power index of one. Your power index is forty, and I can tell that you have some hidden power reserves. As for me, I can reach about the level of forty as well. But this god soul is over a hundred. Do you see the problem?”

Chapter 847: Fire God Soul

Holy Daughter Joyflower looked increasingly shocked as Yang Qi explained the matters of power indexes to her. “Your way of analyzing power seems very much like the ancient scientific and technological civilization. Don’t tell me you have the power assessment systems of the Cruiser of Civilization!”

“I do,” he replied, his eyes glittering. “I just stole it from the future world’s fleet. It has other functions, too. For instance, it can analyze the power flows in the Great Necropolis and split them apart to be used separately.”

“The Cruiser of Civilization can do that?” She was clearly taken aback by his revelation.

“Yes. Actually, I'm curious about that. It seems to me that anyone who absorbed the raw vital energy of this place would be injured or killed. So how do you stay alive here?”

From what he could tell, this Holy Daughter Joyflower seemed to be breathing in the vital energy and storing it within her. If she could really just assimilate it, that would be terrifying.

“I can absorb the vital energy, but it takes a lot of effort. Every breath I take needs to be refined in a pill furnace to extrude its impurities before I can absorb the power within. And the conversion rate is terrible!”

By way of comparison, they were like two mine owners, one of whom extracted only soil from their mine, the other of whom extracted gold. The two simply couldn’t be compared. Yang Qi was able to split apart the various types of vital energy, and set aside the dangerous ones to forge weapons and treasures. It was something that ordinary breathing exercises couldn’t do.

In contrast, Holy Daughter Joyflower’s method involved a lot of hard work, and wasn't very efficient. Now more than ever, she realized the benefits that would come from partnering with Yang Qi.

“I can give you a device that will produce similar results, helping you absorb vital energy much more quickly. Want it? If we’re going to work together, it's only natural that I would do my best to help you out.” He extended his hand and several streams of light converged there, creating something that looked like a disc, swirling with magical laws and the profundities of the legion of gods.

He handed the disc to Holy Daughter Joyflower, who examined it for a moment before sending some true energy into it. It immediately began drawing in the surrounding vital energy and extracting the pure essence power of the gods.

Almost immediately, the vital energy began flowing rapidly through Holy Daughter Joyflower. She took a deep breath, and clearly, it was as if a huge burden had been lifted from her shoulders. Now it didn’t take such effort for her to assimilate the surrounding vital energy.

“This is amazing,” she said. “It certainly takes a lot of pressure off of me. I think now we really have a shot at taking that god soul. The main thing I’d been worried about was how to deal with the flaming god energy down there. If even a tiny bit of it got into us, we could be burned alive. But with this device, we should have no trouble at all.”

Yang Qi frowned. “Are you saying you’re dead set on getting that soul? Maybe we could get down there and take it, but are you sure we could assimilate it? It would come with benefits, true, but it would also be very dangerous.”

“Presumably, you’ve noticed that I cultivate a frigid ice energy art. It’s called the Grand-Frigid Profound-Netherworld Ultimate-Yin God Energy. It was left behind by the Ultimate-Yin God of ancient times. Right now, I’ve reached the point where the only way I can make progress is with that god soul.

“Of course, I’ll make sure you benefit as well. After I get it, we can work on our cultivation together, and you’ll definitely make progress. Agreed? By combining my Grand-Frigid Profound-Netherworld Ultimate-Yin God Energy with the god energy in that fiery god soul, I'd say our power indexes would probably surpass the level of one hundred.

“And that will make it much easier for us to get some godhood. You should know that the Great Necropolis is huge, and there are paths everywhere. Finding the location of the godhood we seek is not going to be easy. However, I already know of some locations where Lesser Gods were buried, and we could definitely benefit from their godhood. I was just too weak to do that on my own before. But with this god soul, we shouldn’t have any problems.”

Yang Qi considered the proposal and decided that it was a good idea. He could also benefit a lot from the godhood of a Lesser God. After all, his progress on the Deathless Heavenly Stairway would be many, many times more difficult than other old-timers, and would take much more power. No other power in the world would help him reach the Grand Emperor level as quickly as godhood.

“Then let’s start conquering this kingdom of fire,” Holy Daughter Joyflower said. “It’s all built around the foundation of the god soul of the fire god and has given birth to a veritable army of flame-based giant-spirits, which we can't afford to take lightly.”

“That shouldn’t be a problem,” Yang Qi said. He waved his hand and a primal-chaos elder-snake popped into being. “I’ll absorb the quintessence energy of the fire while you lead the way to the god soul.”

“What?” Holy Daughter Joyflower said. “Those are King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans! You collected all three thousand? That means you can create a true projection of King Heaven-Devourer. But doesn’t that mean you awoke his will? Throughout history, a lot of people have collected his talismans, but each additional talisman contains more of his will, and most people end up getting possessed and turned into monsters. Those talismans are from the dao of devils!”

Yang Qi didn’t offer an explanation. After all, if he hadn’t used the God Legion Seal to suppress the will of King Heaven-Devourer, he would likely have been devilized.

“I have my ways,” he said. “In any case, don’t worry. Just watch as I absorb this fire.” With a thought, he sent the primal-chaos elder-snake out to begin devouring the flames.

Howls of rage erupted from the giant-spirits as they rushed forward to defend the kingdom of fire. However, Yang Qi simply poured some more true energy into the primal-chaos elder-snake, allowing it to devour them. A huge vortex of flame sprang up as the giant-spirits tumbled into the snake’s maw.

Soon, the giant snake didn’t bear the colors of primal-chaos, but was as red as flame instead. Obviously, the power of the flames was so intense that the snake couldn’t break it down.

The overall strength of the snake was linked to the user's cultivation base, so until Yang Qi reached a higher level, what he could do was relatively limited. And if he pushed them too far, it was possible that the talismans could collapse from the force, and possibly even be destroyed.

The talismans were already starting to buckle under the strain of what Yang Qi was using them for.

Seeing what was happening, Yang Qi’s expression flickered, and a stream of quintessence vitality shot out of him, along with some of the Blood of the One God.

BOOM!

A shock wave rolled out that caused Holy Daughter Joyflower to tremble. At the same time, a howl of rage erupted from within the talismans, seemingly originating in the god world itself. Then the mighty will of King Heaven-Devourer surged, a will that could devour the legion of gods. The primal-chaos elder-snake suddenly grew a hundred times larger than before. Its fangs were long and glistening, and when it opened its mouth it was like a black hole that could suck in anything and everything.

As King Heaven-Devourer’s howl of rage continued echoing out, an enormous vortex of Heaven-Devouring True Energy appeared. Yang Qi had unlocked another ability of King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans, the Heaven-Devouring Tempest.

The first function of the talismans was to produce Heaven-Devouring True Energy. The second was to take that true energy and turn it into Heaven-Devouring śarīras. The third was to take those śarīras, crush them, and create the Heaven-Devouring Tempest, which could crush everything in its path and be a major tribulation even to the legion of gods.

When King Heaven-Devourer had been in the god world, it was impossible to say how many kingdoms he had devoured with the help of the Heaven-Devouring Tempest. Lesser, Common, Greater, Consummate, and Perfect Gods had all fallen to it. Only Paramount Gods had stood a chance of defending themselves.

As soon as the Heaven-Devouring Tempest swept forth, the kingdom of flames was devastated, and streams of fire energy began flowing toward Yang Qi.

A short time later, Holy Daughter Joyflower saw that the fire was merging together into the shape of a ring on Yang Qi’s finger, a ring of fire that was clearly a god item.

Chapter 848: Secrets Upon Secrets

‘Astounding. This guy is single-handedly absorbing this entire kingdom of fire. He's even taking the fiery godpower and using it to make a ring. And that ring is clearly a god item many times more powerful than any ordinary god item. Well, I can’t sit around doing nothing here. Profound-Netherworld Ultimate-Yin Palm!’

Holy Daughter Joyflower sent out streams of frigid energy that resembled a frigid dragon, which parted the flames and allowed her to proceed deeper into the fire.

RIP!

The dragon-shaped palm suddenly slammed into something very large within the flames, causing a roar of rage to echo out.

“Who are you? Who dares to awaken a god soul!? Who dares to profane a sleeping monarch!? Who dares to attack the legion of gods?”

An enormous, fiery devil-god appeared, fully three thousand meters tall, seated on a throne of fire. The wave of his hand sent out millions upon millions of fire dragons which smashed into Holy Daughter Joyflower’s frigid dragon, shattering it and transforming it into nothing but water vapor.

Holy Daughter Joyflower’s cultivation base was far above Yang Qi’s. She had long since traveled the Ancient Road to the Gods, and cultivated the Grand-Frigid Profound-Netherworld Ultimate-Yin God Energy. Even a casual exhalation of hers could freeze an entire thirty-third ranked immortal world or transform primal-chaos into a kingdom of frigid ice. In fact, she could draw on her essence to directly create a thirty-third ranked immortal world if she wanted.

But this fiery giant had destroyed her frigid dragon with a single move, which begged the question of what kind of cultivation base it had.

“Puny mortal! I might have perished, but I'm the spirit and soul of a god! How dare you awaken me from my slumber! How dare you interrupt my thoughts! You should both die a thousand deaths, and be thrown into hell to suffer endless torment and punishment!”

The enormous giant shrank down until he was the size of an ordinary person, a crown of fiery thorns on his head. In his fury, he looked like someone whose rage was like a fire that could broil the heavens. Obviously, this giant was vastly more powerful than Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven had ever been.

“Chaotic Dance of the Fire God!”

Furious at how Yang Qi was absorbing the power of the fire, the giant lunged forward in an attack, sending corridors of flame rushing forward. They were corridors that originated in the kingdom of gods, and moved so quickly that not even Yang Qi’s Freedom Wings could match them in terms of speed.

POP!

Before Yang Qi could react, he was struck and sent flying back to the path outside, wreathed in flames. His skin sizzled and his hair was scorched away, turning into smoke that drifted around him. He had just been struck with a blow that was nearly strong enough to rip him to pieces, leaving his meridians filled with intense flames that threatened to quickly burn him to nothing but a husk.

In the briefest of moments, he was pushed to the very brink of death.

‘Damn. Genetic systems, heal me!’ He immediately drew on the power of the Cruiser of Civilization, which sent a burst of power into him that healed him and restored his meridians. His skin turned crystalline and translucent as his hair regrew, becoming like a black waterfall behind him.

“Er, what?” the fiery god soul murmured. He had just been preparing to attack Holy Daughter Joyflower when, to his complete surprise, Yang Qi rose back to his feet, his aura completely intact. Despite the stunning blow he had just sustained, he was still thrumming with life force.

“You’re not dead, blasphemer? But I hit you with my Chaotic Dance of the Fire God! How could you have escaped death?” The god soul couldn't believe it, and once again blurred into motion. He moved so quickly that nothing could match its speed, extending his hand to summon a fiery net that encompassed all heaven and earth as it bore down on Yang Qi.

“Raging Flames fill the Vast Sky!”

It was a palm attack that could turn primal-chaos into raging flame, and was strong enough to devastate twentieth ranked immortal worlds in the blink of an eye. In fact, it was only because they were fighting in the Great Necropolis that he could utilize this palm technique. Outside, it would create a catastrophic reaction within primal-chaos, transforming everything into dust.

Unfazed, Yang Qi drew on the Engine of the One God and the massive amount of power he had built up inside. Then he thrust his hand out, drawing on an energy art from one of the seventy-two monarchs, King Hell-Freezer, whose profoundly powerful yin and frigid arts could freeze hells.

It was an art that contained the ultimate meaning of frigid yin, and to cultivate it required a scorching hot counterpart to be able to reach the highest levels of enlightenment. It was only by drawing on the ultimate yang true energy that one could produce the ultimate yin true energy.

“Freeze and Seal the Macrocosms!”

Yin and yang slammed into each other, and Yang Qi continued drawing on the might of the Engine of the One God, filling every blow with the power of the ancient Lord of Civilization, who was a paramount king among the hosts of gods. It was the Sovereign Lord himself who was the origin of this heart, and that was how he was capable of imitating the One God.

The Blood of the One God and the Engine of the One God worked perfectly in unison, and in the blink of an eye, the attack of the fiery god soul was halted in its tracks.

Flames raged around Yang Qi, yet he suppressed them and prevented the god soul from pressing the attack.

“Holy Daughter Joyflower,” he shouted, “this thing is really strong! If you have anything you're holding back, now's the time to use it. Otherwise, my true energy is going to run out and our plan will fail.” He was convinced that Holy Daughter Joyflower wouldn’t have agreed to this venture if she didn’t have some trump cards to rely on.

‘This guy is incredible! I can’t believe he’s able to exchange blows with the god soul like that. If he went all out, he would probably surpass me, wouldn’t he?’ Gritting her teeth, she produced a hexagramic ice crystal roughly the size of a hand. It was essentially a beautiful snowflake that pulsed with endless frigid energy, within which was the projection of a snow-white young woman surrounded by gentle snow flurries.

Yang Qi’s teeth began chattering and a tremor ran through him as he was surrounded by frigid energy.

‘What’s that?’ he thought, shocked as he saw his limbs suddenly slowing down significantly. Thankfully, the effects were worse for the fiery god soul. No matter how he flailed or moved about, the frigid ice continued building up on him, stabbing into him and slowly sealing his deathless godliness.

‘This guy is resisting the sealing?!’ Holy Daughter Joyflower thought in shock. The magical treasure she had just used was something she picked up on the Ancient Road to the Gods, a fragment of quintessence vitality from the ancient Profound-Netherworld Ultimate-Yin Goddess. The snowflake didn't contain godhood, but it was close to that level. And the temporary burst of frigid energy it could release was enough to seal the fiery god soul. However, she had to act quickly, and seal the god soul before it realized what was happening. If she failed, the results could be fatal.

Yang Qi’s clash with the god soul was the perfect opportunity for her to act, which was exactly what she did. Her plan was to seal Yang Qi along with the god soul, only to find that, to her utter confusion, he was staving off the effects.

Swish!

As the effects of the snowflake froze and sealed the god soul, Yang Qi flicked his sleeve and sucked the soul inside. In the blink of an eye, it was nowhere to be seen.

The god soul had been completely suppressed.

He looked over at Holy Daughter Joyflower.

“What are you doing?!” she exclaimed. “You’re taking it all for yourself?! Listen, that quintessence vitality from the Profound-Netherworld Ultimate-Yin Goddess can only suppress the fiery god soul for a few hours. Once the effects run out, the god soul will break free and burn everything it encounters. Trying to control it on your own is very dangerous. Not even King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans are enough to deal with it, especially considering your low cultivation base. Not even Lesser Gods could fully utilize those talismans.”

“I can suppress the will of King Heaven-Devourer,” Yang Qi said, a grim expression flickering in his eyes. “Do you really think I couldn’t handle a puny god soul like this? When you used the quintessence vitality just now, were you really trying to seal me along with the god soul? Trying to stab me in the back? It seems to me that you have some killing intent lurking in your heart. I agreed to cooperate with you in good faith, but now it seems you had ill intentions all along, and hoped to seal and assimilate me. Steal my magical treasures.”

“Er….” Holy Daughter Joyflower suddenly looked very awkward.

Before she could say anything in response, lewd, cackling laughter filled the area. “So, this is where you're hiding, Holy Daughter Joyflower! Trying to subjugate that god soul? What, you think assimilating it would let you combine yin and yang, and thus advance your energy arts? Is that your plan to escape from me? From the first time I saw you on the Ancient Road to the Gods, I knew that I would make you mine one day.”

Chapter 849: Forces on the Ancient Road

In response to the piercing voice that had just spoken, Holy Daughter Joyflower’s face fell. Although the man’s voice seemed to be speaking right into her ear, he was actually quite a distance away. From what Yang Qi could tell, this man was no weaker than the fiery god soul they were dealing with.

[Beep-beep-beep. Beep-beep-beep.]

Suddenly, the power assessment systems began speaking.

[Warning. Warning. Immensely powerful life form detected. Power index one hundred thirty… one hundred thirty-five… one hundred forty….]

Shockingly, the power continued to rise until it was over one hundred and fifty.

“Quick, run!” Holy Daughter Joyflower said, her expression one of terror. “We can worry about gratitude and grudges after we're out of here! This guy is a young chaplain from one of the strongest forces on the Ancient Road to the Gods, the Ancestral Wilds Basilica. He's been chasing me for a long time. He’s cruel and ruthless, and will definitely kill you along with me. The whole reason I need that god soul is to defend myself against him!”

Yang Qi nodded. “In that case, sure, let's get out of here.”

Things were different now that Yang Qi knew some of the experts in the Great Necropolis had come from the Ancient Road to the Gods. Obviously, they were terrifying experts who had been practicing cultivation for millions and millions of years, and were nearly as strong as the legion of gods.

Described by power index, a Lesser God would be about ten thousand. In other words, once someone had an index of ten thousand or higher, one would be at the level of the gods. Only someone as strong as ten thousand Grand Emperors put together would be able to reach out and touch the Deathless Throne.

In the immortal worlds, people with power indexes above ten were so rare as to be unheard of. Yang Qi was at thirty-six, which put him in the position to crush anything under heaven, lead the Dao Defense League, and take all of its destiny without any competition.

But the experts on the Ancient Road to the Gods were a completely different story. They had been working on their cultivation for much, much longer, and were strong enough to shake heaven and earth. In fact, people around the level of Holy Daughter Joyflower were not uncommon at all.

It was said that some people on the Ancient Road to the Gods had power indexes in the hundreds, or even thousands. Although such people weren’t actually gods, they were very close to that level.

Rising from the level of a human to that of a god was difficult beyond description. That said, Yang Qi was convinced that once he stood on the ninth stair of the Deathless Heavenly Stairway, his own power index would probably be close to ten thousand.

WHOOSH!

Not pausing for a moment, Yang Qi grabbed Holy Daughter Joyflower and sped down a nearby pathway.

In the depths of the Great Necropolis, pathways went this way and that, making the place a massive labyrinth. It definitely seemed like a place that one could get lost in and never escape. Sometimes Yang Qi even got the sensation that the layout changed as time went on. There were also spell formations that confused the five phases and inverted space and the elements, making it even less possible to find one’s way.

The danger was obvious.

However, Yang Qi had the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, so he wasn’t worried. The chart could surpass any and all mazes, so he could use it to return to the Dao Defense League any time he wanted. At the moment, he was still connected to his immortal-slaying clone, so if anything happened back home, he could return instantly. And any treasures he found here in the Great Necropolis could similarly be sent back to strengthen the league.

In addition to his clone, he had Patriarch Annalist, Yang Righteousness, Yang Mahānata, Yang Misery, Yang Never-Ending, and Yang Unrestrained to run things, all of whom were Grand Emperors.

Of course, his clone held the ultimate seat of responsibility, and was now on the seventh minor stair of the Deathless Heavenly Stairway. Furthermore, he was continuously benefiting from the faith and destiny that rushed into him. He currently had a massive, glowing halo around his head because of it, evidence of his constant increase in strength.

It wouldn’t be long before the clone was also a Grand Emperor.

In terms of strength, he was already stronger than the Grand Emperors; his power index was at roughly four or five.

“The appearance of the Great Necropolis is going to completely change the immortal worlds,” Patriarch Annalist said, frowning. “Before, it seemed likely that the Dao Defense League was going to be dominant. More and more people were flocking to us, and we were creating a new Immortal Dao Age. But now… the Great Necropolis is going to bring plenty of unexpected changes. We're going to enter an era of new heroes, and for all we know, there will be experts from the Ancient Road to the Gods that return. And who knows what they’ll do. I wonder how the god world will react. Will action be taken? At least we have an advantage in that the league-lord is in there investigating things himself.”

Almost as soon as he was finished speaking, the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart opened above the immortal-slaying clone and countless streams of power rushed down, filling the Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple in the form of sturdy pillars. The pillars of power were immense, and all of them vibrated with godly might.

“These are various types of vital energy that I've collected here in the Great Necropolis. Use them to make weapons, medicinal pills, and spell formations for the purpose of heading toward godly ascension and turning the Dao Defense League into a place like the kingdom of the gods. Understand? I’ll continue sending vital energy like this to you, and will also forward you any treasures I find as I explore the Great Necropolis. For now, lock down the Dao Defense League and have everyone focus on cultivating and getting stronger!”

“Yes sir!” replied the dharmarajas, god-generals, and the other old-timers who were gathered in the Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple. All of them were beaming with delight at the sight of the power pillars, as well as the prospect of the forthcoming treasures. It was impossible to say how many of them would soon become Grand Emperors thanks to the influx of resources.

After all, one of the greatest benefits to those who practiced cultivation on the Ancient Road to the Gods was that they could benefit from the power of the god world. Becoming a Grand Emperor was such a slow and painful task that, to many people, it was essentially impossible. But with power from the god world, it was like increasing one’s pool of resources from a tiny pond to a sprawling lake and would unlock vast amounts of potential.

The Dao Defense League was flourishing more now than ever.

That was especially true of the ultimate core of the Dao Defense League, which was the Yang Clan. Thanks to the god dao seeds that Yang Qi had provided them some time back, many disciples had become Godmyths. Later, he had assimilated the Tusita Heaven, which furthered their cultivation even more.

Already, Eldest Brother and Elder Second Brother were very close to being Chaos Gods, and Empress Jadefall was on the first stair of the Deathless Heavenly Stairway. Yang Qi’s father Yang Zhan, his brothers Yang Yunchong and Yang Hualong, and his seventeen sworn siblings from the old Rich-Lush Continent were all close to being on the same level as the top old-timers in the league.

At the same time, the influx of god world power caused seventy-one halos to spring up behind the immortal-slaying clone, as well as seventy-one heavenly tribulations. The seventy-one patriarchs were all rising to a higher level. Not only were they becoming Chaos Gods, but considering that they had special constitutions, they were tens of thousands of times stronger than average cultivators.

All of the experts in the Dao Defense League were working hard on their cultivation and advancing by leaps and bounds. On all of the immortal worlds in the alliance, experts were setting up spell formations, concocting medicinal pills, and making other preparations. The hundred trillion worlds that made up the league were almost like an enormous living being, pulsing with life force and growing on a daily basis.

As the Dao Defense League grew stronger, Yang Qi was running for his life.

Cackling laughter rang out behind him and Holy Daughter Joyflower as they sped through the pathways, passing the countless planes of existence that existed in the walls. All of those planes were filled with incredible items, and whenever possible Yang Qi would grab some and throw them into the Dao Defense League via the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

Compared to this, the treasure trove in the Aeonic God Temple was like nothing.

However, no matter how they fled, that laughter continued following them. It was almost as if it were stuck to them like glue.

At a certain point, Yang Qi said, “What the fuck!? How come we can’t lose this guy!?”

It felt like, if they stopped for even a moment, their pursuer would catch up. It was a terrifying sensation.

“We have to find a place to hide and assimilate that fiery god soul,” Holy Daughter Joyflower said. “Then maybe we’ll be strong enough to fight him. Trust me. Stick together, and we’ll be able to deal with him.”

Yang Qi snorted coldly. “Fine, I’ll trust you this one time.”

Suddenly, a vortex appeared above him and they leaped into it, vanishing without a trace.

BOOM!

Only a few breaths later, a massive explosion rocked the pathway they had just occupied and a blue blur descended.

Chapter 850: The Ancestral Wilds Basilica

As soon as the figure in blue arrived, the power tempests went calm and the passageway went still and quiet. The man seemed to pulse with the mysteries of universal destruction, as if he himself could reach out and grab countless parallel universes. To infuse one’s true energy with universal power, and one’s every movement with the transformations of numerous parallel universes, was something that ordinary Grand Emperors couldn’t do.

“What just happened?” the figure in blue murmured. He was clearly some sort of royalty or nobility, with an aquiline nose and a crafty, ruthless glint in his eyes. From the grim expression on his face, it seemed he was furious at some miscalculation on his part.

Snorting angrily, he thought, ‘My skill in soul-locking is unparalleled. No one under heaven should be able to escape me, except perhaps a god. How could Holy Daughter Joyflower have suddenly vanished like this? Did she learn some new concealment technique? My thoughts can penetrate countless universes, yet I can't sense her cultivation base anywhere. Where could she be?

‘Damn it all! I've been chasing this woman for so long, only to have her disappear now? Although, at least the Great Necropolis has reached the Immortal Dao Age. The dao of immortals has truly fallen into decline. What a bunch of ants. I really have to get out of here and conquer the many heavens that exist. Although, my time would probably be better spent getting godhood here in the Great Necropolis. Conquering the god world would be a lot more meaningful.

‘I'm going to find you eventually, Holy Daughter Joyflower, and make you my slave girl. And once I'm tired of you, I’ll kill you!’ The young sir in blue suddenly opened his mouth and unleashed a roar that echoed down the pathway, awakening countless entities, and even provoking screams as some of them died.

There were many powerful creatures here, yet this man was strong even compared to them.

‘Such incredible power!’ Yang Qi thought as he watched the scene play out on a mirror within the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. The young man in blue was as strong as one hundred fifty Grand Emperors, making him vastly stronger than anyone in the immortal worlds, or even the Primeval Age or future world.

Considering that the Ancient Road to the Gods was a place of convergence for people from all worlds and times, this young man wasn’t anything rare. That said, it was Yang Qi’s first time seeing someone like him, and right now he had no idea whether getting involved with him was going to be a blessing or a curse. If such people emerged into the immortal worlds, there would be no one who could possibly stand up to them.

Normally speaking, people who entered the Ancient Road to the Gods couldn’t go back, but now that the Great Necropolis had appeared, things were different.

That was why Yang Qi was trying to be careful, and also make sure the Dao Defense League was as strong as possible.

“So this is the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart?” Holy Daughter Joyflower said. “I never would’ve guessed that you also have King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions. So, you really can get in and out of the Great Necropolis whenever you want. Well, that should make it a lot easier to seize godhood.”

“Seize godhood?” Yang Qi said. “If we seize any godhood, it’ll be going to me. I just helped you escape a very dangerous situation. Besides, you tried to use the quintessence vitality of the Profound-Netherworld Ultimate-Yin Goddess to plot against me. I'm repaying evil with good here, and putting myself in a very dangerous situation. Why should I possibly put any trust in you?”

“I admit that I was plotting against you,” she replied. “And yes, you saved me from the junior chaplain of the Ancestral Wilds Basilica. For that, I owe you profound thanks, and also, sincerely desire to cooperate with you. I really need to combine my quintessence vitality with that god soul. That’s the only way I can make some significant advancement with my energy arts. How about we split that soul sixty-forty? Before, the deal was fifty-fifty, but I’ll give you an extra ten percent as a show of good faith.”

Yang Qi shook his head. “Sixty-forty? How about ninety-ten, instead! Considering what you just did, I should kill you, not help you make progress. Besides, we’re in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, which means that your life is in my hands. That’s my offer. I get ninety percent, you get ten. Even that offer is me being particularly benevolent.”

“Ninety-ten!? Are you kidding!?”

“Don’t waste your words,” Yang Qi said. “There’s a truth in life that you should be aware of.”

“Truth? What truth?” she asked angrily.

“When you stand under low eaves, you have no choice but to bow your head! Similarly, a wise man submits to the circumstances. Or should I say woman?”

“You!” she barked furiously. However, a moment later, her eyes flickered as though she had just thought of something, and she smiled sweetly. “Fine. I agree. Ninety-ten it is. Considering how strong you are, you've won me over. Alright?”

“That’s better. Here, take it and assimilate it.” Yang Qi knew full well that this woman was full of craft and cunning. He didn’t trust her at all, and knew that she would likely cause trouble later on. But at the moment, they were in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, so no matter what she might try to do, he was safe.

He threw his hands out in front of him and the fiery god soul appeared. The icy seal on its surface was already beginning to melt, and the soul inside had its arms stretched above its head as though it were struggling to break free. And from the anger in the soul’s eyes, it was obvious it wanted to burn Yang Qi and Holy Daughter Joyflower to death.

However, all Yang Qi had to do was draw on the power of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart to create a host of thick chains that fortified the warding magics and made any efforts at escape meaningless.

“Profound-Netherworld Ultimate-Yin Goddess Frigid Energy!” Holy Daughter Joyflower reached out and tapped the icy seal, sending frigid true energy into the god soul. At the same time, a plethora of icy godspheres appeared in the area, all of them pulsing with godpower. The entire area became a kingdom of ice, filled with icy thrones, giant-spirits, and the like. Soon, the god soul began to twitch and howl with anguish.

“Die!” it screamed. “For profaning the soul of a god, you will be cursed by the legion of gods!”

Holy Daughter Joyflower ignored all that, and focused all of her energy arts on the god soul. Slowly but surely, the soul began to fuse with her true energy, creating a taiji symbol that was half fire and half ice that pulsed with both coldness and warmth, creating a vital energy that was difficult to describe.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi inhaled deeply, pulling the two types of god energy into himself. It instantly caused his own true energy and energy arts to transform in various ways. In the blink of an eye, he gained the power of another Grand Emperor. His power index was now at thirty-seven!

‘Awesome! Another increase in power. With these two kinds of power, I should be able to get past the first stair on the Deathless Heavenly Stairway!’ Yang Qi could never have guessed that the god soul and the frigid energy would have such an impressive effect.

BOOM!

Explosions seemed to echo out within him as the true energy caused transformations of all sorts. For example, the Engine of the One God’s power level was rising.

The power assessment systems began providing a report.

[Power index has reached thirty-eight. Thirty-nine. Forty….]

Normally speaking, increasing one’s power by the level of an entire Grand Emperor was no easy task. Not even killing another Grand Emperor and assimilating them would necessarily bring that result. If that were the case, Yang Qi could have just gone around killing Grand Emperors to power up. However, things didn’t work like that, any more than a person who wanted to gain a hundred pounds could do so by just eating a hundred pounds of food. In fact, eating that much food could be detrimental.

But the combination of these two kinds of energy was pushing his power index to incredible heights. His meridians were expanding and his sea of energy was growing stronger. And the particles within him were growing more closely connected to the universe around him. As a result, his cultivation base was advancing.

Soon, he was passing a power index of eighty! It was an increase of over double! Only after having absorbed fifty percent did he stop, leaving forty percent to give to family and friends.

The other ten percent was for Holy Daughter Joyflower, whose own power index was now at about sixty. The entire time, he kept a very close eye on her to make sure she didn’t try anything funny. Of course, from her perspective, she knew that he could probably kill her easily, therefore, she didn’t dare to do anything out of line.

At a certain point, she said, “Alright, the god soul is completely assimilated. And I can tell you’re strong enough now that I can’t fight you. That said, there are other stashes of godhood in the Great Necropolis. If you can help me deal with the young chaplain of the Ancestral Wilds Basilica, I don’t mind sharing the wealth.”

Chapter 851: Location of Godhood

A fiery god soul had been assimilated, and a perished god finally disappeared from existence.

Truth be told, Yang Qi had only taken advantage of fifty percent of the quintessence energy, leaving forty percent to give to family and friends. With such incredible energy, some of them would likely be able to reach the Grand Emperor level.

That was especially true of Empress Jadefall, who had yet to fully awaken the porcelain godspore within her and release the ultimate powers of a Reincarnated One. Who knew how strong she would be as a Grand Emperor?

Forty percent of the quintessence energy of a perished god would put the Dao Defense League in a much better position.

BAM!

Tribulation struck Yang Qi, and a halo appeared around his head, filled with the boundless power of Valor. It was an expression of the rage of the god world, and it poured down into Yang Qi like liquid.

As the tribulation coursed through every inch of his flesh and blood, it felt like a wonderful massage. The many types of energy that filled him swirled into a huge vortex, especially the types from the seventy-two monarchs. Thanks to the current tribulation, they were advancing to a higher level.

King Heaven-Devourer. King Mourn-Parting. King Wilds-Horn. King Fierce-Savage. King Life-Killer. King Hell-Freezer. King Death-Stillness. King Lone-Fall. King Eon-Void. King Ultimate-Beginning. King Pāla-Warden. And many more.

Before, he had assumed he would have to wait until he reached the god world before making any significant progress with them. He had doubted he could master them even on the Ancient Road to the Gods. But thanks to the tribulation he was facing, and the power of the god world that was pouring into him, he was now able to give those seventy-two energy arts a solid foundation.

Suddenly, a host of magical treasures popped into being behind Yang Qi, including King Life-Killer’s swords, King Mourn-Parting’s palace buildings, King Wilds-Horn’s armor, and others. Normally, most of those items were in the hands of the seventy-one patriarchs, but Yang Qi could summon them at will if necessary.

Unfortunately, other than King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans, none of the magical treasures were complete, otherwise they would have pushed the energy arts of the seventy-two monarchs to a much higher level.

RUMBLE!

Seventy-two vortexes appeared behind Yang Qi. It almost felt like the wills of the original seventy-two monarchs were present and ready to fight the will of the Sovereign Lord. Even the God Legion Seal in his forehead was creaking under the pressure.

According to the stories, the original seventy-two brethren were so strong as a group that no one in the god world could stand up to them. Other than the Sovereign Lord, all others were helpless against them. Even Paramount Gods would die at their hands. In the end, the Sovereign Lord crushed them, only to vanish himself.

In other words, the combined godly-class energy arts of those seventy-two monarchs were definitely enough to counter the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.

‘So strong!’ Yang Qi thought. He threw a punch, and the wills of the seventy-two monarchs created a tempest in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, a level of might that Yang Qi could tell was on par with the Hand of the One God.

Considering he only had one-third of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, it was obviously not on the same level as the combined might of those seventy-two brethren. All of a sudden, Yang Qi realized that combining all of those energy arts actually led to an even more incredible energy art.

‘Combine left and right!’ Yang Qi unleashed the Hand of the One God with his left hand and the Seventy-Two Monarchs Energy Art with the other. It tore through the space in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, causing the chart to tremble. Then, with no warning whatsoever, Yang Qi pushed the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart to a higher state!

As it turned out, the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart was similar to the mortal world, immortal world, and god world. It was comprised of multiple states! Every ten thousand years, the chart would open and people from the mortal world would enter it to further their cultivation. That was the first state.

When immortals entered it, that was the second state.

And when Godmyths entered it, that was the third state, where Yang Qi currently was.

Thanks to his increase in energy arts, Yang Qi could now see that the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart had many, many states. And there were still states above that he couldn’t reach until his cultivation base was higher.

The current state had a different type of power, and was filled with the pure energy of monarchs. Absorbing that energy would advance the energy arts of the seventy-two brethren to an even more ferocious and mighty level.

RUMBLE!

Yang Qi retracted his fists, and the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart went still and quiet again. He was now at the level of a hundred Grand Emperors, and having finished with the tribulation, was fully on the first stair of the Deathless Heavenly Stairway, the Stair of Valor.

Fear flooded Holy Daughter Joyflower’s face as she realized how strong he was. With the combination of the Seventy-Two Monarchs Energy Art and the Hand of the One God, he was incredibly mighty, despite having a relatively low cultivation base.

If he was this powerful while he was this low on the Deathless Heavenly Stairway, it meant that as he climbed even higher, he would surpass her to an even greater extent. For all intents and purposes, there was no level after Grand Emperor. One had to rely on one's luck and wits to improve their power and unlock their potential.

After all, becoming a god was essentially impossible. For Yang Qi to be so strong at such a low level filled Holy Daughter Joyflower with quite a bit of envy.

[Beep-beep-beep. Beep-beep-beep. Tribulation passed. You are now on the first stair of the Deathless Heavenly Stairway. Power index one hundred and three!]

As Yang Qi reined in his energy arts, cracking sounds echoed out within him like thunderbolts. Shockingly, his power index had just risen by over twenty.

Yang Qi’s cultivation base had replaced hunting rifles with cannons, and he had transformed on a most fundamental level. Now he wouldn’t need to be afraid of even the young chaplain of the Ancestral Wilds Basilica; his power index was about fifty higher than Yang Qi’s, but that was within the range of what he could fight.

“Alright, now we can leave,” he said. He put aside the matters of the tribulation, power transformations, Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, and the Seventy-Two Monarchs Energy Art, clearing his mind and focusing on matters at hand.

Waving his hand, he opened a passage and leapt through it with Holy Daughter Joyflower. At the same time, he slapped a sealing mark onto her.

“You!” she said, looking over in anger. However, after circulating her true energy she realized that the sealing mark wasn’t restricting her in any way. “What's that for?”

“It's for your own good,” he replied coolly. “It’s my Devil-God Seal. That young chaplain obviously has a lock on your energy, which is why he can always track you down. But with that seal in place, you’ll be invisible to him. And by extension, we can ambush him. Besides, having your aura sealed will also provide you some protection against whatever ancient entities lurk in the Great Necropolis.”

“Many thanks!” she said.

“There’s no need for thanks. Now, tell me about these places where you say godhood exists. We can go seize some right away. The Great Necropolis is a huge maze; without the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, I would never have been able to find my way out. By the way, do you know where we are?”

Looking around, she realized that they had emerged into a different location within the Great Necropolis. Apparently, the spatial nexuses within the necropolis actually shifted location.

Things were changing constantly in the Great Necropolis, although the people inside wouldn’t be able to tell that. It was much the same as how, in the mortal world, people living on a planet would never be able to sense the planet rotating beneath their feet.

It was something quite marvelous, and Yang Qi couldn’t help but be surprised. Thanks to his current cultivation base, he was now able to sense the orbits of suns and moons, and other profound movements of the universe. And because of how he was now connected to the countless parallel universes, he could sense the movements of the Great Necropolis.

It would be like someone in the mortal world suddenly being able to sense the rotation of the planet upon which they stood. He was also able to sense how huge the Great Necropolis was, and it made him feel incredibly tiny. He didn’t like the feeling.

Shaking his head to try to clear the unwanted sensation, he looked over at Holy Daughter Joyflower.

Looking both awkward and a bit panicky, she said, “I actually have no idea where we are. As long as I stay in the Great Necropolis, I move along with it and can keep a sense of direction. But because we left for a period of time, I'm completely turned around.”

“Damn,” Yang Qi said. He could tell from the look in her eye that she was telling the truth. They were now on a completely different pathway than before. Instead of the ground being pitch black, it was yellowish, almost as if it were made from gold.

Chapter 852: A New Overall Structure

The walls weren’t black, either, but as golden as the ground, almost like they contained the mineral itself. Yang Qi flew over and touched the wall, trying to figure out if he could perhaps extract the gold.

Unfortunately, the wall was incredibly tough; no amount of power seemed to do anything to it. He got a strange sensation from the wall, as though it were created from the preheaven blood of a god of gold. If someone who cultivated sword energy were able to make a weapon from this stuff, it would definitely help them to advance by leaps and bounds. However, considering he had no way to extract the material, it was pointless to waste time.

“Where exactly are we?” he murmured. The golden path seemed to thrum with preheaven sword energy, and he could just barely make out sounds which resembled screaming, fighting, and dying.

As for the air, it seemed to weigh down with an oppressive energy. Yang Qi inhaled, and it felt like breathing in countless tiny, metallic swords. Thankfully, he was able to suppress their sharpness.

The power assessment systems immediately began providing an analysis.

[Beep-beep-beep. Beep-beep-beep. Vital energy detected. Source: the perished Gold God, from the god world. Such vital energy is harmful to the human body, but can be profoundly helpful when cultivating the dao of the sword. It can improve the energy, make one's attacks stronger, break through barriers, create sword energy out of thin air, and so on.]

As Yang Qi’s cultivation base increased, the functions of the Cruiser of Civilization grew more impressive. That was especially true of the power assessment systems, whose analytic capabilities continued to grow vastly more precise.

“Seems there’s some treasure ahead,” Holy Daughter Joyflower said. “Don’t tell me it’s the soul of the ancient Gold God. This aura seems no weaker than the fiery god soul from earlier.”

“Let’s keep going. If we run into something like the god soul from earlier, we can easily handle it.” He clenched his hands into fists. “It seems there's treasure everywhere in this Great Necropolis, let’s just take it all.”

The two of them continued onward, and as they flew, the metallic, golden energy continued growing stronger.

Eventually, Yang Qi sent the God Legion Paradise out to form a greyspace around them, which the golden light would scrape against, leaving deep gouges.

Crack!

Holy Daughter Joyflower had a shield of her own, but the golden light smashed through it as though it were designed to slice defensive empyrean energy. Thankfully, she was no novice. She quickly gathered her frigid energy and summoned a kingdom of frigid ice that the golden light was incapable of penetrating.

Eventually, the golden light grew even more intense and a humanoid figure made of pure gold appeared. He held a sharp sword in his hand and pulsed with the preheaven energy of a sword-spirit.

The sword spirit flourished its sword, and razor-sharp sword light flew out like a song filled with wailing lyrics of death.

“Sing a Song of Wailing….”

The wild sword energy slashed through Holy Daughter Joyflower’s kingdom of frigid ice, forcing her to dodge to the side with a look of shock on her face. Meanwhile, Yang Qi stepped forward, lashing two fingers out like a sword. It was none other than the Life-Killing Sword Dao, in which the sword was used to defeat the sword. An aura of slaughter appeared as the opponent’s song rang out like thunder.

Whoosh!

The sword-spirit’s sword energy instantly shattered, and the pieces swirled around to form a golden talisman that dropped down onto Yang Qi’s palm. It was inscribed with god script, apparently, text from an ancient sword scripture.

RIP!

Holy Daughter Joyflower thrust her palm out in an attack against another sword-spirit. They went back and forth for about ten moves before she identified an opportunity. Her attack turned into solid ice and shattered the golden light. However, in contrast to Yang Qi, no script appeared.

Meanwhile, the text in Yang Qi’s hand wriggled as it transformed into an expression of sword will that flowed into his body.

“How come you produce that script when you kill the sword-spirits, but not me?” Holy Daughter Joyflower asked.

Yang Qi thought about it, but before he could respond, a voice echoed out from further down the pathway.

“Use swords to defeat swords; the sword scripture exists of its own accord, the dao of the sword is mighty and imposing; any who wish to inherit my legacy shall pass the tests, become consecrated, and stand in front of me….”

The voice was magnificent, powerful, and seemed to thrum with the vibrancy of metal. It seemed as if some ancient god-spirit had really arrived to utter prophecies and portents. The power within the voice surpassed that of the fiery god soul by many times over. And it seemed like this soul was seeking a successor.

It was at that point that Yang Qi realized that there were other people in the vicinity, and from the sounds of fighting that were ringing out, they were also fighting sword-spirits.

‘So, it really is a treasure trove,’ he thought. ‘It's a test set up by some ancient god soul, and those sword-spirits are the guards. Kill them to get the sword scripture. And with enough of the scriptures, you can get far enough into the kingdom of swords to gain the approval of the god soul. If you do, you’ll win his legacy. This metallic god soul is clearly many times more powerful than the fiery god soul. I’d say its power index is going to be several hundred.’

Yang Qi had already realized that there were many god souls in this Great Necropolis. Some were violent, attacking anyone that got near them. But others were looking for successors, and there were certainly others who were peaceful. Regardless, they were all treasures that could be used to spectacular effect.

It really begged the question of what exactly the Great Necropolis was, and how it had come to contain so many god souls.

Ding dong. Ding dong.

Now wasn't the time to sit around wondering, though. Yang Qi continued forward through the golden energy flows, slashing at the sword-spirits with King Life-Killer’s sword techniques, of which there were many. Stab. Poke. Slice. Chop. Swish. Crush. Cleave.

He held nothing back.

The sword-spirits were complete experts of the sword, and their every attack could shatter the sky and pierce through time. As such, fighting with them was excellent practice. Furthermore, it was helping his cultivation in general. After all, the dao of the sword was about advancing courageously across the battlefield and conquering every obstacle.

Yang Qi’s sword skill was growing more and more advanced. It was based on King Life-Killer’s dao of the sword, which was the best in all of heaven and earth. Light streamed about as he slaughtered the sword-spirits, all of which were converted into motes of light that contained god script. Slowly but surely, the sword scripture was taking form.

He was cutting down the sword-spirits with incredible speed, almost like a farmer harvesting wheat in the mortal world. As for Holy Daughter Joyflower, she had produced a sword of frigid ice to fight the sword-spirits, but was nowhere near as effective as Yang Qi.

As he progressed, the sword-spirits grew more numerous and Yang Qi’s understanding of the god world’s sword scripture grew deeper. At the same time, his cultivation base, will, and psychic powers grew more proficient in attacking.

C-C-CRACK!

After slaughtering a whole group of sword-spirits, Yang Qi suddenly saw a huge golden cloud rise up in front of him, filled with what looked to be lightning made of swords. As it neared, the cloud shattered into a host of enormous planets, which flew toward them.

“It's a Planetary River Projection!” Holy Daughter Joyflower blurted as she realized what they were up against. “Only the Star River Sword Sect would use something like that. They’re one of the biggest organizations on the Ancient Road to the Gods.”

Yang Qi didn’t care who it was. He sent out a stream of sword energy from the fifth stance of King Life-Killer's dao of the sword. It was called Lightless, because as the sword energy pierced forth, night spread and black clouds proliferated, ensuring that all light faded from visibility.

All of the sword light in the area shattered and a roar of rage could be heard from deep within the golden cloud. Apparently, Yang Qi’s sword attack had hit its intended target.

“The legacy of God-Noble Goldensword belongs to me!” someone shouted. “Only we from the Star River Sword Sect can take it. Anyone else who comes here will be slaughtered! You just wait, punk. You’ll get what's coming to you!”

Yang Qi chuckled. ‘God-Noble Goldensword? I think I’ll be taking that legacy. This seems way more powerful than that fiery god soul, and that means good fortune for me. I wonder if Leaf Dao-Denier and the others are still around, or if they’ve been killed already. With the arrival of the Great Necropolis, the overall structure of things is really changing.'

Yang Qi was certain that great changes were coming to the Immortal Dao Age. Powerful new forces were descending, and it was hard to say if the Dao Defense League would be able to keep its grip on power.

Chapter 853: The Legacy of God-Noble Goldensword

Chuckling coldly, Yang Qi said, “Come on, let’s get going. There are a lot of people in that kingdom of gold. Seems quite a few of them want to get the legacy of this God-Noble Goldensword. Incidentally, how many people do you think have come into the Great Necropolis from the Ancient Road to the Gods?”

“The Ancient Road to the Gods stretches on, seemingly without end,” Holy Daughter Joyflower said. “There are as many factions as the eternal sands, all of them indescribably powerful. In terms of overall scale, the road is vastly larger than all of the immortal worlds. Regardless of which age a person comes from, compared to the Ancient Road to the Gods they're all frogs in a well. It’s only when you step onto the Ancient Road to the Gods that you become a true expert.”

‘If the Ancient Road to the Gods is like that, then what’s the god world like?’ Yang Qi thought. He sighed. “So if the Great Necropolis drifted along the road from the god world, and the road is as you described, then there are likely countless experts in here. If they escape out into the immortal dao civilization, it's going to be a big problem for my Dao Defense League.”

“Considering how strong you are right now, you should be able to keep your people safe,” she replied. “But if you keep getting stronger, you’re definitely going to be a domineering force. After all, now that you’ve mastered the Seventy-Two Monarchs Energy Art, your power index must be over a hundred. That makes you one of the top figures on the Ancient Road to the Gods.”

When they first met, Holy Daughter Joyflower’s power index had only been at the level of forty, which was enough for her to survive for many years on the Ancient Road to the Gods. With Yang Qi’s level currently being at over a hundred, and his fighting prowess even stronger than that, he was definitely not in a poor position.

Furthermore, his sword energy and dao of the sword were growing stronger and stronger, and as he fought his way through the golden clouds, leaving a trail of blood behind him, he eventually reached an enormous stone arena.

It was roughly the size of the old Rich-Lush Continent from the mortal world, but instead of being constructed of what appeared to be pure gold, it was apparently made of limestone. There were numerous altars in it, each of which featured a golden sword stabbed into its depths, shining with golden light.

In the middle of all the altars was an even larger altar, atop which sat an old man in a golden robe, who also shone with golden light and pulsed with something like godhood.

The power assessment systems immediately barked a warning.

[Beep-beep-beep. Beep-beep-beep. The soul of a god has been detected. It is complete, but lacks godhood. Power index over three hundred!]

“What? He has a power index of over three hundred!?” Yang Qi took a few steps back, shock visible on his face. If this golden-robed god soul had a power of index of three hundred, it meant it was three times as strong as him and could likely kill him with a single casual blow. Even worse, the dao of the sword focused on speed and ruthlessness, so even trying to rely on escaping into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart seemed dangerous. This old man could likely decapitate any enemy he faced before they even knew what was happening.

“It’s fine,” Holy Daughter Joyflower said. “You just have to pass the trial, enter that stone arena, and accept the legacy. I just wonder how exactly to do it. Regardless, make sure to watch out for people from the Star River Sword Sect.”

Almost as soon as she was done talking, a host of golden streams of light flew toward them from a nearby location, all of them vastly stronger than the Grand Emperors from outside. Each of them resolved into cultivators wearing different outfits, indicating that they were from different powerful organizations on the Ancient Road to the Gods.

[Numerous hostiles detected. Power index thirty. Fifty. Seventy. Sixty.]

The Cruiser of Civilization identified each of the enemies it scanned, and all of them had power indexes in the dozens. Not a single one of them was as weak as Eldest Brother Secundus, the Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court, or Patriarch Hell-Crusher.

Yang Qi really felt like he was a frog in a well.

As the Cruiser of Civilization continued scanning the newcomers, it suddenly locked onto one of them in particular.

[Caution. Caution. Expert detected. A Chaos God with a power index of one hundred and one.]

Yang Qi looked over and saw what appeared to be a young man of no more than fifteen or sixteen years old. He still seemed to have baby fat, and he had a bracelet on his wrist that was made of interlocking swords. He was apparently weaker than Yang Qi, being only a ninth division Chaos God.

Of course, out in the Dao Defense League, a person like that wouldn’t even be an elder king, much less a god-general or a dharmaraja.

Apparently, the young man sensed Yang Qi looking at him and looked back. When their gazes locked, Yang Qi didn’t feel even a scrap of emotion. It was as if the young man were completely focused on the dao of the sword, and lived for the sword alone.

“That’s the junior sectlord from the Star River Sword Sect,” Holy Daughter Joyflower explained. “He was actually born on the Ancient Road to the Gods. Rumor has it his mother dreamed of a universe of swords, which led to him being born. He’s very formidable, and no one can match him in terms of the sword. He’s definitely going to be dead set on inheriting the sword dao legacy of God-Noble Goldensword. Those people with him are others from the Star River Sword Sect, sent along more as moral support than to help protect him.”

‘Another expert born out of a dream?’ Yang Qi thought, shocked. ‘Yet he doesn’t seem to have one of the three thousand special constitutions. He’s obviously very strong, though.’

With that, he retracted his gaze, not wanting to cause any problems at this early stage.

In addition to the people from the Star River Sword Sect, there were other organizations present who Holy Daughter Joyflower went on to introduce. “See those people in the multi-colored robes? They’re from the Cipher-Devil Sword Sect, and are very formidable with their Cipher-Devil Sword Technique. They’re considered a top force on the Ancient Road to the Gods. Other than them, I can see people from the Gåma Basilica, Fallen Heroes School, Peach Void Mountain, Cloudsea Hall, and Blacktree Cavern.”

All of the experts who were flying toward the stone altars were Grand Emperors from the Ancient Road to the Gods, and Holy Daughter Joyflower seemed to know who all of them were. That was the knowledge that came from spending hundreds of millions of years on the road.

In the mortal world, countless civilizations would come and go in that length of time.

“What organization are you from, Holy Daughter Joyflower?” Yang Qi asked. “I doubt you could single-handedly hold your own against numerous experts from the Ancestral Wilds Basilica.”

“I work for one of the top organizations, the Joyflower Palace. Unfortunately, I offended one of the elders there and was forced to take a dangerous mission. Until I finish that mission, I'm not welcome back. The other members of the Joyflower Palace are in the Great Necropolis as well, although the place is so big that I haven’t run into any of them recently.”

“The Joyflower Palace.” In all of the ancient records Yang Qi had read, he had never heard of the Joyflower Palace, which led him to believe that it hadn’t existed in the Primeval Age. That said, the world of the Ancient Road to the Gods was immense, and who knew what kind of organizations had risen up over the course of the past hundreds of millions of years.

‘If I could subjugate all of these experts and send them to the Dao Defense League, it would definitely be the most domineering organization in existence,’ Yang Qi thought. They would definitely be his top secret weapon if he could do that. At that point, who other than he would be able to control the Immortal Dao Age? Earlier, he never would have been able to do it, but considering his recent breakthroughs, defeating experts like this was definitely within the realm of possibility. On the other hand, dealing with the organizations they came from would be a different story. And if he caused the wrong kind of trouble, it might be impossible to keep the Dao Defense League safe.

Although it was developing rapidly, compared to the Ancient Road to the Gods it was still nothing. And unfortunately, he wasn’t yet strong enough to take the entire Dao Defense League into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

Meanwhile, some of the people had noticed Holy Daughter Joyflower; from her clothing, they could tell who she was, and it caused fear to flicker in their eyes. Apparently, the Joyflower Palace had a reputation for being quite fierce.

After everyone entered the area with the altars, golden light suddenly sprang up from the borders. At the same time, the old man in the middle suddenly rose to his feet, thrumming with an immense aura. “I am the soul of the perished God-Noble Goldensword. I gained enlightenment of countless abstrusities of the dao of the sword, and I seek a successor. Perhaps one of you here today is connected to me by destiny, and will get my legacy. All you have to do is gain understanding of my sword techniques, and you will gain my power. Unfortunately, I have locked this area down. I will either find my successor among you, or you will all die!”

This was God-Noble Goldensword, a fallen god from the ancient era. Although he had no godhood left, his god soul was still unimaginably powerful.

Chapter 854: Sword Duels

As God-Noble Goldensword stood there, the pressure he radiated was so shocking and intense that it seemed impossible for anyone present to best him in combat. Furthermore, considering how refined and deadly his sword technique was, even someone who could compare to him in raw power wouldn’t necessarily be able to defeat him.

Furthermore, because he had once possessed godhood, he was able to do certain things that only the legion of gods could do. The methods of the legion of gods were so interlaced with magical laws that even a cultivator with an incredibly high power index wouldn’t be able to match up to them.

That was just the difference between humans and gods.

In response to God-Noble Goldensword’s words, everyone felt deeply shaken. Apparently, they were all going to die if a successor wasn’t found. But how could any of them possibly defeat God-Noble Goldensword in a sword duel?

After a long pause, someone stepped forward and said, “Senior, how exactly are we supposed to gain understanding of your sword technique? Are we supposed to fight you? You’re so strong that none of us here could possibly be a match for you! If none of us succeed, are you really going to kill us all?”

“That’s right,” said the soul of God-Noble Goldensword. “If none of you succeed, you will all die. Your nascent divinities and quintessence energy will become part of my sword formation, and help boost my cultivation base. Then I will continue waiting for my successor to arrive. That said, coming to understand my sword technique won’t involve fighting me. You will simply have to deal with the will of my sword, and my various sword stances. Enter the sword formation and vanquish it. You see, it took a lot of blood, sweat, and tears to make this formation, and it’s filled, not with true energy, but with sword will! And it contains the essence of my sword stances. Exercise caution, for it is a dangerous formation, and if you make the slightest mistake, you’ll either die, or have your mind wiped out of existence.”

“Are we free to leave right now, before we start?” another of the experts said. “We from the Blacktree Cavern were under the impression this area was simply a treasure trove. Our Pontifex Blacktree has a cultivation base roughly on the same level as you.”

“Leave?” said God-Noble Goldensword. “Of course not! If you try to leave, you die. There are no alternatives. The dao of the sword is about walking the most deadly of paths, using your own valor to slash your way through death itself. As long as your sword exists, you exist. If your sword expires, you expire. Walk forward, and never retreat.”

Quite a few people could be seen flinching or frowning in response to his words.

“Let’s go!” one of the experts said. “If we work together, not even this God-Noble Goldensword will be a problem to deal with. We can just break free, call more experts from our organization, then come back and assimilate him!”

“Let’s do it!” There were over a dozen experts from the Blacktree Cavern, all of them clad in pitch black garments embroidered with some sort of divine tree. And in one move, they flew up and unleashed an attack on the shield of light that separated them from the outside. All of these experts had power indexes of between twenty and forty, and when they were added together, it was a total of over two hundred. By math alone, it was obvious they weren’t a match for God-Noble Goldensword, but it would make sense that they should at least be able to break free.

But before they could, God-Noble Goldensword made his move.

He extended his hand, and a sword appeared, golden in color and pulsing with a holy aura. As he swept it out in front of him, it sounded like millions of bells tolling at the same time, enough to cause anyone to cough up blood.

“One sword to record spring and autumn. Two swords to divide yin and yang. Three swords to stabilize all under heaven. Four swords to stir the cosmos. Five swords to birth the five phases. Six swords to sweep the six directions. Seven swords to slash the fleeting clouds. Eight swords to seize the fate of heaven. Nine swords to indulge mighty heroes. Ten swords to seek the future!”

SWISH!

Ten sword moves were unleashed. Sword energy swept through the entire stone arena and sword light shone in epic fashion, making it seem like an ancient god was striding forward with sword in hand, unleashing the most devastating sword technique possible, seeking to fabricate its own ideal future. The future could be considered a very profound and enigmatic thing, filled with endless possibilities. Even the tiniest factors could change it, but somehow this sword technique seemed to slash through the clouds and fog to create a solid path leading to it.

This dao of the sword was boundless and majestic, the type in which one's sword could be used to seek the future.

“Agggh!”

The sword light slashed into the experts from the Blacktree Cavern and they all lurched to a halt and spun in place, looks of disbelief on their faces.

Pointing at God-Noble Goldensword, one of the experts said, “We have life essence divinity lamps back in the Blacktree Cavern that will allow us to be reborn if we die. But you extinguished them!? How!? Your sword pierced through the void and wiped out our seeds of truth?!”

Crack!

His forehead suddenly split open, and blood sprayed out. Then his body collapsed, and all of his blood was absorbed into the surrounding sword formation. Afterward, the other experts from the Blacktree Cavern similarly exploded, and were absorbed.

Everyone present was deeply shaken.

‘So deadly and destructive!’ Yang Qi thought. ‘I almost can’t believe the dao of the sword could reach such a level. My Life-Killing Sword Technique is exquisite, but in terms of true energy requirements, profound variations, and the will of the sword, it’s like nothing compared to this.’

Forgetting everything else, this sword technique could pierce the fog of the future, lay a clear path ahead, and allow one to exercise one's will to the fullest. After all, climbing the Deathless Heavenly Stairway involved converging the will and psychic powers, shrinking them down and simultaneously pushing them beyond all limits.

Suddenly, the power assessment systems provided new information.

[Beep-beep-beep. Beep-beep-beep. Power index of three hundred, with burst capacity of over five hundred! Will convergence is at the Destabilizing level!]

“What?” Yang Qi said. “Will convergence? What’s that?”

[Will convergence level is about explosiveness. The more an expert converges their will, the more explosive their attacks can be, thus, the higher their overall fighting prowess. In other words, it describes the limits of one’s power when pushed beyond the ordinary. You have a power index of one hundred and three. However, if you focus everything in one powerful attack, you could reach the level of one hundred fifty.]

“You said will convergence at the Destabilizing level? What’s that mean?”

The photonic computer quickly provided a detailed explanation.

[Both will and power are vital in fighting. Thus, the power index is not the be-all and end-all. Only by combining the power index with the will convergence level can one’s true fighting prowess be determined. Will convergence levels are as such: Normal. Stupendous. Destabilizing. Terrifying. Paramount. Unbounded. And lastly, Annulled. Upon reaching the Deathless Throne, the will of a god will be at the Terrifying level. However, God-Noble Goldensword has perished, so his soul is only at the Destabilizing level. Of course, a will convergence level like this still surpasses everyone present. Whoever takes the legacy of his dao of the sword will not benefit from an increase in power. However, the Destabilizing will convergence can enable that person to advance by leaps and bounds.]

Yang Qi understood what the photonic computers were telling him. Obviously, power was not the only thing that determined victory. Examples abounded of the weak defeating the strong. One’s will could surpass matters of power, bracing the mind in a way that could secure victory.

“What’s my will convergence level?”

The photonic computer performed some scans and analyses.

[Your cultivation level is low, as you only just reached the Stair of Valor. If you continue to rise on the Deathless Heavenly Stairway, eventually reaching the stairs of Wisdom, Strength, and Endurance, then you will eventually reach the Destabilizing level. At the moment, you are only at the Stupendous level. The other experts present are either Normal or Stupendous. However, the young man from the Star River Sword Sect is on the verge of breaking through to the Destabilizing level. His power index is currently slightly over one hundred, but if he draws fully on the might of the dao of the sword and unleashes an explosive attack, he would reach the level of two hundred. In that respect, he surpasses you.]

Power indexes were mysterious things, but will convergence levels were even more so. And they were crucial in determining how two people would fare in a fight.

“As you can see, no one will be allowed to leave this trial,” God-Noble Goldensword’s soul said. “If you wish to leave, you must forge ahead.”

“Fine. I’ll start!” A young man stepped forward, clad in white garments. He also wore a ring that seemed to be made from numerous interlocking swords. He waved his hand, and a sword appeared in it.

[Power index one hundred thirty!]

“That’s a young lord of the Cipher-Devil Sword Sect,” Holy Daughter Joyflower said. “His name is Cipher Rite-Heaven, and his dao of the sword is nothing to take lightly.”

“Let’s see how he does in the trial,” Yang Qi said. “Taking on God-Noble Goldensword via will is something no one here has ever done.”

As soon as Cipher Rite-Heaven stepped into the sword formation, it spun to life. The golden sword appeared, sending streams of sword light racing toward him. It was not sword energy, but rather sword will. The true battle was to take place in his sea of consciousness!

Chapter 855: Destabilizing Level

The instant Cipher Rite-Heaven from the Cipher-Devil Sword Sect entered the sword formation, he was assailed with sword will. Countless sword techniques bombarded him, all of them entering his sea of consciousness to combat his very will.

This had nothing to do with his true energy or power index, but was a competition of wills instead.

Although it wasn’t visually impressive, it was an extremely dangerous situation. A loss would involve the destruction of his soul, turning him into an empty husk. However, this young lord was particularly strong-willed.

“Die!” he shouted as he stood there, tall and straight, looking like a consummate divine sword, ready to pierce through the void. Around him swirled the will of the Cipher-Devil Sword, causing thunderous rumblings to echo out and making him seem like all heaven and earth was under his control.

“Supreme Cipher-Devil Sword!”

“Grand Prestige Suppresses Devils!”

“Black Moon Rising!”

“The Devil Cometh!”

“Devil King Exterminates Worlds!”

“Devilized With a Thought!”

“Cipher-Devil Sacrifices Heaven!”

“Hidden Devil Shatters the Sword!”

Black mists rose up as the two wills clashed, and within it, the young lord seemed to be going mad. He went through one sword stance after another, howling as he seemingly fought an invisible opponent.

“This is going bad,” one of the other experts from the Cipher-Devil Sword Sect said. “We have to get him out of there before he experiences cultivation deviation!”

“God-Noble Goldensword,” another of them called out, “our young lord wants to retract his claim on your legacy!”

“Retract his claim? That’s not how things work. If his will fails, he will die. In the dao of the sword, there is no such thing as retreat! No legacy in the world gets handed out for free. Those who wish to gain a powerful legacy must understand the meaning of death.”

“Die!”

“Many-Heavens Cipher-Devil; God Lightning Without Limit!”

Several of the elders attacked, howling with rage. God lightning appeared, striking everywhere and ripping apart space, accompanied by dancing devils and monsters.

God-Noble Goldensword snorted coldly, and streams of sword energy swept forth, shattering the lightning and sword strikes, and heading directly toward the elders. This was sword energy that could slaughter devils, end life, and destroy energy.

Plop. Plop. Plop. Plop.

Even as the elders dropped dead, another person made a move, sending out a stream of sword light like a river of stars. As the light shot forth, it turned into numerous stars, surrounded by endless hosts of sword masters. Each of those masters was a soul, pulsing with life force and energy.

Shockingly, this wasn’t a sword attack designed to kill, but rather to save.

BOOM!

Shockingly, when this move met God-Noble Goldensword’s sword, it was the latter who was forced back. The sword light faded away, and another young man appeared in front of God-Noble Goldensword. It was none other than the Chaos God from the Star River Sword Sect, who looked to be only fifteen or sixteen years old. He was the very same one who had been born after his mother dreamed of a universe of swords, and was said to both live for the sword and always be ready to die for it.

‘What’s this?’ Yang Qi thought. He never would have guessed that this young man would leap forward and bear the brunt of God-Noble Goldensword’s attack. Not even Yang Qi’s Life-Killing Sword Technique could have blocked that move, unless perhaps he backed it with the Seventy-Two Monarchs Energy Art and the Hand of the One God.

“Nice sword technique,” God-Noble Goldensword said, taking a step back. “Perhaps you qualify to carry on my legacy.”

“I don’t want your legacy,” the young man replied. “Besides, your sword is designed to kill and destroy, whereas my sword is designed to save lives. You see, my dao of the sword is about preserving life, not taking it. Your aim is to kill everyone here, but my aim is to save them. My name is Star Swordlife. Swords are life. Made to create. Made to save. God-Noble Goldensword, although you claim to be seeking a successor, the truth is that you want to kill all comers, absorb their destiny, and use it to resurrect yourself. Am I right?”

“Made to create? Made to save?” God-Noble Goldensword burst out laughing. “You’re a genius with the sword, but if you don’t want my legacy, then you’ll have to die too.”

“Everyone, we need to join forces and crush this wretch-devil,” Star Swordlife said. “He’s just another soul here in the Great Necropolis. Defeat him and we can gain our freedom!”

He waved his sword again and more stars appeared, all of them surrounded by endless expert sword cultivators. It was like a civilization of pure swords, brimming with life, truth, magical laws, and gods, all of them completely at one with the sword. It rumbled toward God-Noble Goldensword with relentless power.

‘This kid is strong!’ Yang Qi thought. ‘He’s actually trying to take out God-Noble Goldensword! Well, I can’t let him outdo me!’ Yang Qi could tell that Star Swordlife was strong, but not strong enough to beat God-Noble Goldensword on his own. Not even the strongest genius could take on the legion of gods, and even though this was just a god soul, he was still strong enough to crush anyone present. Yang Qi was already getting the sense that God-Noble Goldensword didn’t have good intentions.

“Seventy-Two Monarchs!” Yang Qi blurred into motion, appearing behind God-Noble Goldensword and unleashing a fist strike right at his back. The seventy-two monarchs all appeared, their will shaking the entire stone arena. At the same time, he unleashed the Hand of the One God with his other hand. And he backed both of them with the Engine of the One God and the martial essence of the God Legion Seal.

‘Puny god-noble! How dare you defy the God Legion Seal. Are you looking to die?! On your knees!’ When Yang Qi attacked, he didn’t hold back. Dazzling light shone everywhere as his will viciously pierced into God-Noble Goldensword’s soul.

Normally speaking, God-Noble Goldensword wouldn’t be worried about an attack from Star Swordlife and the other experts, and would be able to easily vanquish them with a single sword move.

After all, these people may have been strong, but they were as disunited as a dish of loose sand.

He never would have imagined that someone like Yang Qi would be lurking in their midst. Not only was Yang Qi attacking with two powerful fist strikes, but he was using his will as well. Then, God-Noble Goldensword trembled in shock as he felt himself being shoved from the Destabilizing level down to the Stupendous level. After all, any god who faced the God Legion Seal would find it impossible to resist, and that was especially true of god souls. No type of will convergence could truly resist the power of the God Legion Seal.

BOOM!

Yang Qi’s fists slammed into God-Noble Goldensword’s back, causing a massive shockwave to roll out. At the same time, Star Swordlife’s sword energy slammed into him from the front. Two top experts were using their energy arts to explosive effect.

“AGGGH!” God-Noble Goldensword screamed, and yet he wasn’t destroyed. Instead, he transformed into a golden sphere that began expanding with incredible rapidity. “Primal Origin Golden Sword; Extinguish All Under Heaven!”

Whiz. Whiz. Whiz. Whiz.

The golden sphere shattered into a host of tiny swords that shot out in all directions. Screams rang out as many of the nearby experts were hit and fell out of the sky, their nascent divinities and meridians grievously injured.

“You contemptible rabble!” God-Noble Goldensword growled, transforming into a holy, golden sword. However, instead of targeting Star Swordlife, he faced Yang Qi, convinced that he had some particularly marvelous asset that enabled him to inflict such injurious blows.

SNICK!

The golden sword shot forward with indescribable speed, and Yang Qi couldn’t even react before the sword was right at the pit of the stomach.

“Watch out!” Star Swordlife shouted, but he was too late to interfere.

He dropped to the ground, assuming that Yang Qi was about to die. However, a shriek rang out and God-Noble Goldensword suddenly vanished. To the onlookers, it seemed as though Yang Qi had somehow sealed and assimilated him.

‘He sealed God-Noble Goldensword with a single move? Incredible! Yet his cultivation base isn’t very high.’

Little did he know that God-Noble Goldensword had fallen for a trap. Yang Qi had intentionally attacked him from behind knowing that he would turn and attack him in reprisal. However, Yang Qi simply opened the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart and let God-Noble Goldensword fly straight inside. Once inside the chart, there was no way for him to escape.

It was a risky move, for if God-Noble Goldensword had realized what was happening and avoided the chart, Yang Qi would have been in great danger.

Chapter 856: Philosophy

‘I did it. I snagged the terrifying God-Noble Goldensword. Unfortunately, he’s still beyond my ability to fully subjugate, even in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.’

Sending some divine will into the chart, he saw a golden streak slashing back and forth. “Who did this?! Who sealed me? I can’t believe you fooled me, boy. So, you’re using King Immortal-Slayer’s Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart? Do you really think this will be enough to deal with me? Show your face so I can cut you down! Dammit, you may have fooled me, but you still can’t defeat me. Even in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, I'm still invincible!”

Yang Qi ignored his words. He knew that he would have to wait until he was a lot stronger before daring to enter the chart to deal with the god soul. Right now, he was more concerned with how to profit from his current situation.

After all, a whole host of experts had just been struck with God-Noble Goldensword’s sword energy. There were around fifty or sixty people who still had sword will raging in their meridians and souls.

For example, there was Cipher Rite-Heaven of the Cipher-Devil Sword Sect, who had a profound cultivation base. Most of the people present had power indexes at roughly twenty, with the highest being a bit over a hundred. And considering they were all gasping for breath, Yang Qi hoped to gain their faith and have a whole new host of experts to protect the Dao Defense League.

Considering how everything was changing, the current experts in the Dao Defense League were little more than ants. If Yang Qi wanted to protect them all, he definitely needed some stronger defenders.

“Brother, are you alright?” Star Swordlife said, taking a step forward. “Did you use some powerful magical treasure to seal God-Noble Goldensword? If so, you still need to be careful. The dao of the sword from the ancient god soul is perfectly designed to vanquish magical treasures and god items.”

“I’ll be fine,” Yang Qi said, waving his hand dismissively. “The device I used has him completely locked down.” Looking around, he continued, “All of these people were hit with God-Noble Goldensword's sword will, and they're all going to die as a result, from the look of it. Thankfully, I can take them away and neutralize that energy.”

“Help! Save me!” cried Cipher Rite-Heaven. “I have sword will in my sea of consciousness, and it’s going to kill me. Help!”

Swish!

Yang Qi flew over, examined him, and could see the immensely powerful sword will within him. Going to work, he quickly extracted the sword will, which came out of him in a bright, golden glow. Afterward, Cipher Rite-Heaven sagged a bit. Clearly, he had been injured, but now that the sword will was gone, he was naturally recovering.

After a moment passed, Cipher Rite-Heaven suddenly turned into a ghostly blur that shot toward Yang Qi in a completely unexpected attack. Who would have guessed that, right after being rescued, Cipher Rite-Heaven would do something like this? Without Yang Qi to help him, he would have soon been dead.

However, he didn’t seem to care about that at all, and sword light flashed as he summoned a huge net of swords to attack Yang Qi.

“Your energy arts are formidable, brat, but there’s no way you're strong enough to take out God-Noble Goldensword on your own. You used some sort of magical treasure, didn’t you? Hand it over immediately!”

However, even as he unleashed his attack, Star Swordlife shouted, “Stop!” Unfortunately, he was too busy dealing with the sword will inside himself to do anything.

Yang Qi’s pupils constricted as he saw Cipher Rite-Heaven flying toward him with deadly intent. However, he didn’t hesitate to exhale a stream of Life-Killing Sword Energy, simultaneously unleashing fist strike after fist strike. Booms rang out, and the incoming sword energy shattered.

“Myriad Aeons Heaven-Devouring!”

A primal-chaos elder-snake appeared and devoured the sword energy. Then he looked over at his opponent, his eyes flickering with the profundities of universal life and destruction. Obviously, his observations and interactions with God-Noble Goldensword had already provided him with immense benefits.

POP!

His fists crushed the sword light and sent Cipher Rite-Heaven staggering back. Yang Qi could tell that Cipher Rite-Heaven’s will wasn’t properly converged. Before, he had been at the Stupendous level, but now he had dropped to the Normal level. Obviously, his clash with God-Noble Goldensword’s will had been very damaging, and he hadn’t yet fully recovered. Yang Qi could see that he had a good opportunity.

“Life-Death Void-Destruction!” he said, throwing his hands out and causing Life-Death Void-Destruction God-Lightning to spring out. The Infernal Deity Spear also appeared, stabbing forth with infinite variations.

Cipher Rite-Heaven wasn’t just going to stand there and let himself be hit, though. Black light flared as he drew on the full might of the Cipher-Devil Sword Technique. A long black sword appeared, almost like a sinister black dragon pulsing with viciousness and evil.

However, Yang Qi simply laughed. The Infernal Deity Spear slammed into the pitch-black sword and Cipher Rite-Heaven staggered back again. Then Yang Qi vanished, reappearing above Cipher Rite-Heaven and sending the power of the God Legion Seal crushing down.

RIP!

His hand landed on Cipher Rite-Heaven’s back, digging his fingers into the flesh as he prepared to destroy his meridians and then assimilate him.

“Stay your hand!” Star Swordlife suddenly shouted, having just vanquished God-Noble Goldensword’s sword will. “Brother, stay your hand! Whenever possible, you should spare your enemy. Don’t kill him.”

“What?” Yang Qi said, his eyes flickering with cold light. “Didn’t you see what just happened? I saved this guy, and he turned right around and attacked me. If I hadn’t been on guard, I would’ve died. There couldn't be more justification to get revenge, so why are you trying to stop me?”

“You misunderstand me, Brother,” Star Swordlife replied. “You see, I save people. Maybe Cipher Rite-Heaven was plotting against you, but he didn’t actually hurt you. So for you to kill him is improper. How about this: free him, and I’ll compensate you on his behalf as an apology.”

“Are you kidding me?” Holy Daughter Joyflower said. “Star Swordlife, I understand that you cultivate a dao of the sword that’s focused on saving lives. But this matter has nothing to do with you. Have you already forgotten that Yang Qi just helped you out of a difficult situation? If he hadn’t taken the risk to seal God-Noble Goldensword, how could you possibly have won that fight?”

“Yes, I'm very grateful for that,” Star Swordlife said. “And it’s truly a joy to be alive. That’s what I'm trying to emphasize here, Brother. Your name is Yang Qi, right? Please, refrain from killing. If you do, you can also feel the joy of life. The less you kill and more you save, the more of the universal fortune of heaven and earth will come to you.”

Yang Qi immediately understood what was going on. Obviously, Star Swordlife’s ideal dao of the sword was very different from his own.

“It was only moments ago that God-Noble Goldensword killed several people,” he said. “Why didn’t you stop that from happening?”

An expression of regret immediately overtook Star Swordlife’s face. “Because my sword technique is lacking, and I didn’t act fast enough. But the current situation is different. No matter what you say, I won’t permit you to kill Cipher Rite-Heaven.”

“This guy is innately evil,” Yang Qi said, not willing to let the issue drop. “Considering how he ambushed me just now, it's obvious that, if I let him go, he’ll go on to kill many others.”

“It's because he’s evil that I need to save him. That's the only way for me to gain true enlightenment of the ultimate meaning of life and life force. Then I can eventually convert that which is evil into that which is good.”

“Fine. I can see that we have very different outlooks on life. And I'm not interested in debating. Farewell.” Keeping a firm hold on Cipher Rite-Heaven, he flew up into the air. However, before he could get very far, a gentle stream of sword light appeared. Unexpectedly, Star Swordlife had made a move! However, this sword light didn’t contain any killing power. It spread out through numerous layers of magical law, creating a web-like net that made it impossible for anyone in the area to move. Yang Qi suddenly felt himself growing much heavier, and was slowly forced back down to the ground.

“Sorry, Brother. You saved me, and I will save him. My Taiji Restraining-Silk Sword Dao won’t hurt you, but neither will it let you leave.”

Yang Qi burst out laughing. “Nice sword technique!”

He waved his hand, and a vortex appeared leading to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, into which he threw the sealed Cipher Rite-Heaven. Then he reached out, grabbed the net, and tried to rip it up. However, nothing he did had any effect. Although this sword technique wasn’t particularly deadly, it was incredibly strong.

“Thanks for giving me a chance to study your sword technique,” Yang Qi said. Suddenly, he shrank down in size and unleashed the power of his Life-Killing Sword Technique.

“Perfect Slash!”

The sword slashed out and the Taiji Restraining-Silk Sword Dao was cut clean through, allowing Yang Qi to leap out. Then he shot directly toward Star Swordlife.

“Excellent sword technique,” Star Swordlife said. “A very stern and awe-inspiring killing energy. Unfortunately, the power of killing does not surpass the power of life. How about we have a little duel; if you lose, you agree to free Cipher Rite-Heaven?”

“Fine,” Yang Qi replied. “And if you lose, I’ll take your life!” With a shout, he pressed the attack.

Chapter 857: Collecting Them All

Yang Qi had just managed to get his hands on someone who had ambushed him, only to have a ‘kind-hearted’ individual interfere. It was no exaggeration to say that Yang Qi was feeling very irritated. That said, this Star Swordlife was not as bad as some of the vicious and merciless people Yang Qi had encountered in the past, nor was he a true threat at the moment. Considering there was no mortal threat, Yang Qi was more than happy to compare sword techniques with him.

Star Swordlife’s technique overflowed with life force and opportunity, and almost seemed to connect with the dao of heaven.

“Even if I lose, there’s no way I’ll let you have all these people!” he said. Suddenly, his sword technique grew even more complex, becoming like a spring rain of silk that filled the area. Exquisite flows of power caused Yang Qi’s attacks to crumble instantly, making it very clear that Star Swordlife’s sword technique had really reached the ultimate height.

Swish. Rustle. Slice.

Unleashing three sword moves, Yang Qi said, “Swords of life and swords of salvation are nice. Sadly, you’ve picked the wrong path. It’ll be hard, but if you can turn things around, you might reach a higher level.”

“Where exactly have I gone wrong?” Star Swordlife said, eyebrows rising in anticipation. “Please, give me some advice.”

“Alright, listen up. In life, there is suffering. In fact, life is suffering. The only way to free yourself from pain is to lack life itself. So-called lifelessness is nirvanic extermination, and the death of nirvanic extermination is to become destructionless. Lifeless. Destructionless. That is the true path. The only way to transcend the eternal is to reach the other shore of pāramitā.”

He was echoing the words of King Life-Killer’s dao of the sword, which contained the fundamental nature of the sword.

King Life-Killer’s name was very specific. He wasn’t King Killer, but rather, King Life-Killer. He believed that all living entities experienced the bitterness of suffering. In fact, he believed that on a person’s face, the eyebrows and eyes were the character 艹 and the nose and mouth were 古. Put them together, and it created the character for suffering 苦. The only way to be free from suffering was to exterminate life. Ending life resulted in that which was lifeless and destructionless. Only then would the world not give birth to suffering. Return everything to the starting point, cause all heaven and earth to go silent, prevent all growth, and send the universe back to a single point. That was life-killing. Lifeless and destructionless.

Lacking in any suffering.

That was the fundamental core of King Life-Killer’s dao. However, it wasn’t the kind of slaughter that one would initially think of. Instead, it was filled with the compassion and mercy of putting an end to suffering.

As Yang Qi slashed his sword about, the character for suffering 苦 popped up everywhere, becoming numerous human faces, all of whom were scowling and on the verge of tears. The more they sensed the life force in the opponent’s sword, the more vexed and distressed they became. After all, with more life came more suffering.

It was a sword technique that would shock heaven and earth, and cause ghosts and gods alike to weep.

This duel had already surpassed a contest of simple sword technique, and was instead a battle of the will of the sword technique.

“You're wrong,” Star Swordlife said. “Heaven and earth are filled with life, and that is what brings joy. Life isn’t about suffering! Life is about happiness. Any life that can exist in the world is a blessing, and every person is an expression of life. If life is suffering, as you say, then why don't you enter that state of being lifeless and destructionless?”

It was a clash of wills, and this time Star Swordlife’s will fought back, stabbing into Yang Qi’s will to attack the ideals of his dao of the sword.

Yang Qi wasn’t fazed. Instead, he attacked with even more might than before.

“All other living things would have to be lifeless and destructionless before I enter that state,” he said. Then he unleashed more core techniques from King Life-Killer’s dao of the sword. “Star Swordlife, your dao of the sword has already been crushed. Your ideals are flawed. The more life that exists, the more hatred will come to the world, and the more revenge killings will occur. The world is too big for you to save everyone in it. The only proper path is to return to when there was neither life nor destruction.”

“Impossible! The more life that exists, the more happiness there will be. People in the world grieve at death and rejoice at birth. Whether it's the mortal world, the immortal world, or the god world, whenever someone dies, people mourn. But when someone is born, everyone rejoices. Those are the natural reactions to life and death. You can’t change that.” Yet again, Star Swordlife was countering Yang Qi’s logic regarding life and death.

Their swords met, and… crack!

Yang Qi’s sword will began crumbling. Unexpectedly, Star Swordlife had struck a stunning blow. “Brother, enough with the killing. Let Cipher Rite-Heaven go. Whenever possible, you should spare your enemy.”

Laughing, Yang Qi suddenly vanished, then reappeared behind Star Swordlife. At the same time, he unleashed the power of the Devil-God Seal and the Many Heavens God Seal, causing a huge vortex of godpower to spring up over his opponent's head. As a result, Star Swordlife’s sword technique was impeded.

“Brother Star, you fell for my trap.”

Up to this point, Yang Qi had been craftily putting on a show to make it seem like Star Swordlife’s techniques were too much for him. But the reality was that he had just been waiting for the right moment to crush him with his Many Heavens God Seal.

Although it would only slow Star Swordlife for a moment, a moment was all he needed.

Swish!

Yang Qi became like a rushing wind sweeping through the stone arena, collecting up everything therein, including the people present and the holy, golden sword.

Of course, he left a few people behind, such as the elders of the Star River Sword Sect.

When he was done, he opened a vortex and jumped inside. As he did, a piercing cry rang out, shattering the Many Heavens God Seal and sending a stream of sword energy into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart with lightning-like speed. Of course, it contained no killing intent, only the pulsing power of life.

Unfortunately, even a more powerful stream of sword energy wouldn’t have done anything to Yang Qi in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. He grabbed it, converting it into a soft stream of power that he quickly assimilated, giving him deeper insight into Star Swordlife’s dao of the sword. As he did, Star Swordlife's voice echoed into his ears.

“Brother, that’s quite a miraculous magical treasure you have. Where’s it from? I truly hope that you refrain from killing, and that we can meet again someday in the future.”

“Don’t worry, I'm not going to kill any of these people,” Yang Qi replied. “In fact, I'm going to improve and purify them, enabling them to live with neither joy nor grief.” With that, Yang Qi closed the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

Considering that Star Swordlife had been born on the Ancient Road to the Gods, he had never heard of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

“Congratulations, Young Sir,” Holy Daughter Joyflower said. “Really, congratulations! You won a big victory back there. You got the god soul of God-Noble Goldensword, Cipher Rite-Heaven from the Cipher-Devil Sword Sect, and plenty of other people. If you assimilate them, your energy arts will definitely advance by leaps and bounds.”

“Of course,” Yang Qi said with a smile. “I can’t assimilate the god soul yet, but I will once I subjugate all of these experts I captured and use them to create a spell formation.”

Although the people he had taken looked like corpses as they floated there in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, they were still alive. They had been struck by God-Noble Goldensword’s sword will, and were currently gasping for life as they struggled to save themselves.

These people came from places like the Gåma Basilica, Fallen Heroes School, Peach Void Mountain, Cloudsea Hall, and Blacktree Cavern. They were all stronger than ordinary Grand Emperors, especially the experts from the Cipher-Devil Sword Sect, one of whom had a power index of eighty.

After taking count, Yang Qi found that he had fifty captives, which was a nice round number.

Instead of giving his captives treatment right away, Yang Qi reached out and grabbed Cipher Rite-Heaven, who he had no trouble controlling now that they were in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Cipher Rite-Heaven glared at him and, through gritted teeth, said, “Is this the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart? So, you got some of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions, huh. That brat Star Swordlife might not know what this place is, but I do. And once the other experts on the Ancient Road to the Gods find out, they’ll come to you like flies to honey. When that happens, you’re dead!”

“Oh really. And who, exactly, is going to be able to get in here?” Without any further ceremony, Yang Qi sent true energy streaming into him. Screams rang out one after another, becoming more and more hysterical. Now that Yang Qi’s cultivation base put his power index at over a hundred, he was no weaker than Cipher Rite-Heaven. And he had an even further advantage, being in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. As a result, Cipher Rite-Heaven wasn’t even capable of fighting back.

Then, Yang Qi pulled out the Hell Scourge. There was no need for words. Cipher Rite-Heaven had cruelly ambushed him, ensuring that not even death could earn him recompense.

Cipher Rite-Heaven squealed like a pig as he experienced the boundless torments of hell.

As for Yang Qi, he was starting to get very nervous overall; he wanted to get as strong as he could, as quickly as possible. With experts from the Ancient Road to the Gods in the Great Necropolis, the Dao Defense League had become a very weak organization. And he had no desire to see it taken over by some powerful expert.

His previous plan had been to consolidate power, then strike a blow at the future world and the experts from the Primeval Age. Never could he have guessed that the Great Necropolis would show up. Now, all of his plans had been thrown into chaos. However, adversity often brought opportunity, and thus, he continued vigorously forging ahead, using every trick he had at his disposal.

“Open your soul and become my servant, and I will remove your pain and suffering. Exercise faith in me.” Yang Qi's voice thundered into Cipher Rite-Heaven’s soul and sea of consciousness, forcing him to give over his faith.

As long as there was even the slightest chink in his faith, the burning Light of Faith could convert him.

Chapter 858: Firmament-Blood Lightning-Origin

Cipher Rite-Heaven, young lord of the Cipher-Devil Sword Sect, a consummate expert whose power index surpassed one hundred, had been brought to the brink of death by Yang Qi.

Not only was Yang Qi’s Light of Faith incredibly domineering, but he had also gained enlightenment of some of the profound mysteries of the Sovereign Lord. He knew how to weaken someone’s mind, then slip into their soul and force them to exercise faith in him.

However, Cipher Rite-Heaven was still holding strong under the lashing of the Hell Scourge. “The Cipher-Devil Sword Sect won’t let you get away with this!”

“The Cipher-Devil Sword Sect won’t know what’s happened,” Yang Qi replied. “It doesn’t matter what you say they’ll do, we’re in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart right now and they have no way to find us. Not even a true god could do such a thing.” Now that Yang Qi had seven of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions, not even the most powerful experts on the Ancient Road to the Gods would be able to get into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

It was an iron-clad truth.

“Stop struggling, alright? The more you fight, the more it will hurt. Just acknowledge allegiance. Give me your faith, and enter a state of profound bliss!” Yang Qi’s voice boomed louder and louder, and the power of the Hell Scourge continued growing in intensity.

Eventually, Cipher Rite-Heaven was twitching and writhing in such a state that he wasn’t even sure if he was alive or dead. Normally speaking, it would be difficult to do this to someone as mighty as him. He could have kept a tight guard on his consciousness, possibly even casting it out of his body, leaving behind nothing but an empty husk. But after his sea of consciousness was damaged by the sword will of God-Noble Goldensword, everything had changed.

Yang Qi’s Light of Faith pierced into him, and a moment later, his eyes went wide and he began shining with holy light. He rose to his feet and his injuries faded away. Then he knelt. “Oh, omnipotent Lord, I Cipher Rite-Heaven shall henceforth be your pious follower. Please accept my sincere and heartfelt respects.”

“Dear god!” Holy Daughter Joyflower exclaimed. “Y-you… you actually turned him into a believer!? True, that faith power will improve your cultivation base beyond comprehension, but don’t you know that it also involves accepting his karma? And that will bring profound trouble in the future. That’s why cultivators can’t use faith directly, but usually imbue it into magical treasures or god items. Accepting it directly into your body is very dangerous!”

“I’ll be fine,” Yang Qi replied. “There’s a reason why I did this. Using warding spells or sealing magics wouldn’t let me truly control him.”

“But the higher the cultivation base, the greater the karma. People say that the god world’s most paramount monarch, the king of myriads of gods, the god of deities, the Sovereign Lord himself, accepted the faith of the gods, and thus their karma, which led to his disappearance. Some people even say he perished. Gods can bring forth countless living beings, so their karma is immense. Following this line of reasoning, you can see how vastly powerful Cipher Rite-Heaven’s karma is. It’s definitely enough to kill you.”

“An impure mind is easier to sully,” Yang Qi said. “I understand that. Look, let’s stop debating the matter. As far as I'm concerned, the stronger the karma, the better.” Yang Qi wanted to take the strongest people possible, force them to submit, then activate their karma, all in preparation to defeat King Immortal-Slayer when his will returned.

His current stockpile definitely wouldn’t be enough. He needed a lot more karma, possibly even from the faith of gods. After all, King Immortal-Slayer was no ordinary individual; he had been second only to the Sovereign Lord himself.

‘I’ll force all of these captives to become my followers. Then I can use them to create a grand spell formation to assimilate the god soul of God-Noble Goldensword. That will definitely help me reach a higher level of enlightenment.’

Waving his finger, he sent sword energy into all of them to wake them up. As they opened their eyes, they realized that they had been sealed tight, and Yang Qi was there smiling at them.

“We’re elders from the Gåma Basilica!” said one of them. “Who are you? And how dare you imprison us here. Don’t tell me you’re not afraid of the Gåma Basilica wiping out your entire clan!”

Yang Qi didn’t reply. He simply took out the Hell Scourge, walked over, and inflicted endless torment on them before finally sending his Light of Faith into their minds and souls.

One by one, he used these domineering tactics to force all of them to become believers.

It took around two hours.

After it was all over, they knelt in front of him, a whole host of powerful Grand Emperors who were now faithful believers in him.

“Oh mighty Lord, what orders do you have, sir?”

Cipher Rite-Heaven acted as their leader, and the massive influx of destiny from them caused Yang Qi’s true energy to burn like fire. In fact, it was almost enough for him to rise one more stair on the Deathless Heavenly Stairway. However, he refrained from taking that step and continued stabilizing his cultivation base instead.

Only when he had unlocked the full potential of his current stair would he attempt to rise to the next. In some ways, it was a blessing to have cultivation levels to progress through. Eventually, one would reach the point of not being able to make any progress at all. That was the position Holy Daughter Joyflower was in now. All she could do was continue building up power in the hopes that, one day, she would have the opportunity to reach godly ascension.

“The time has come to set up a grand spell formation. With you and my Army of Holy Sages to power it, I’ll assimilate God-Noble Goldensword!” He waved his hand, opening up a passage that the Army of Holy Sages marched through, then began getting in formation.

With Cipher Rite-Heaven and the other Grand Emperors, there was a combined power index of roughly six or seven hundred. With the added strength of the Army of Radiance and Light, and the fact that they were in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, Yang Qi was fairly certain it would be enough to deal with God-Noble Goldensword.

As he was working on his cultivation in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, his immortal-slaying clone was deep in the Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple, approaching another breakthrough. It was nothing to take lightly, as countless tribulations were forming around him.

And the boundless flows of faith left Patriarch Annalist and the others present feeling like they were suffocating.

Everyone looked over at the clone seated on the league-lord’s throne, their faces masks of terror. “How could this be happening?”

“What immensely powerful faith! That’s more than the faith of the entire Dao Defense League combined!”

“That must be the faith of a group of Grand Emperors! But where is it coming from?”

“Compared to faith like that, we're like fireflies in front of the full moon!”

The combined strength of fifty Grand Emperors, with a power index of roughly seven hundred,  was more than enough to shake the entire Dao Defense League. In fact, it could probably wipe out the hundred trillion immortal worlds that made it up.

It was hard to imagine the kind of faith they could provide.

All of the faith provided to Yang Qi from the Dao Defense League came from immortals; there were few Godmyths. After all, the old-timers may have followed Yang Qi’s orders, but didn’t give him faith.

Obviously, the faith of fifty Grand Emperors was beyond anything the immortals of the Dao Defense League could provide.

Cracking and popping sounds echoed out from inside the clone as the seven legacy medallions swirled out. Then, tiny motes flowed out from the medallions, like god worlds that entered the clone. It was as if the will of King Immortal-Slayer himself was blessing the clone.

As power surged through the clone, he burst through numerous barriers until he finally reached the level of Grand Emperor.

Whirr. Whirrrr.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi was working with an enormous spell formation in the depths of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, but he took a moment to open a passage and look down to inspect his clone.

“That power,” he murmured. The power he could sense defied imagination, and apparently, was a stockpile that King Immortal-Slayer had created to be accessed only when someone with his legacy medallions reached a certain level of strength. Now it was forming into something that resembled viscous blood, except filled with lightning.

“That’s firmament-blood lightning-origin from the god world!” Holy Daughter Joyflower exclaimed. “I can’t believe you have firmament-blood lightning-origin! On the Ancient Road to the Gods, countless experts would fight to the death to get even a drop of that!”

“What is it?” Yang Qi asked, surprised.

“It's a type of vital energy from the god world. According to rumor, it's a type of blood that randomly occurs in god lightning. A single drop can lead to spectacular advancement, and it’s vital for Grand Emperors who are aiming for the Deathless Throne.”

Chapter 859: Breakthrough of Will

The firmament-blood lightning-origin, thrumming with immense power, entered the immortal-slaying clone, causing his energy arts to erupt and his cultivation level to skyrocket. Cracking and creaking sounds could be heard inside of him as he reached the Grand Emperor level and his power index began to climb.

Five… six… eight… ten….

It didn’t stop until it reached twenty. In that very short time, the immortal-slaying clone’s cultivation base became as strong as twenty Grand Emperors, and his entire body was transformed on a fundamental level.

Meanwhile, the nearby seventy-one patriarchs were also affected, their cultivation bases rising to higher levels. Soon, all of them were on the third stair of the Deathless Heavenly Stairway, and their energy arts had become vastly more powerful. It was almost as if those seventy-one monarchs of ancient times were back.

The immortal-slaying clone’s fighting prowess was domineering to the extreme. Furthermore, he could tell that as he furthered his cultivation, the mysterious power streaming into him from the depths of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart would provoke even more transformations.

‘Just as I expected,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘Now that the immortal-slaying clone has become this strong, the will of King Immortal-Slayer is stirring in anticipation of waking up. King Immortal-Slayer prepared for this long ago, leaving behind certain resources and aids to ensure that the process is a success. For the moment, he’s actually helping the immortal-slaying clone reach the ultimate level. I wonder if my clone will become an actual god before I do.’

Things were still going according to plan for Yang Qi. Unfortunately, it wasn’t possible for him to use that firmament-blood lightning-origin for himself. If he could, he would definitely rise to a much higher level.

Right now, his power index was at one hundred five. After he assimilated the god soul of God-Noble Goldensword, it would climb even higher, definitely surpassing the young chaplain of the Ancestral Wilds Basilica, or anyone else like him.

Within the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, the grand spell formation operated endlessly, and Yang Qi sang the Eternal Heavenly Aria, blessing everything in the area.

After the breakthrough, the clone realized that his true self was about to subjugate a god. He waved his hand, causing rifts to open up in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, out of which poured blessings of magical laws that gave power to the Army of Holy Sages and Yang Qi’s new Grand Emperor subordinates.

With the combined blessings of the Eternal Heavenly Aria and the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, Yang Qi’s army was more domineering than ever. If all of this wasn't enough to deal with God-Noble Goldensword’s god soul, then nothing would be.

Drawing on his new powers, the immortal-slaying clone reached out to take control of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. The chart shuddered and twitched, and then, out in the darkness and gloom, a stream of golden light became visible.

It was none other than God-Noble Goldensword, who had been trapped in the chart this entire time. The chart was immense, and even a god who was placed inside could fly this way and that forever without running into anything. In fact, throughout the years, it had been used in exactly that fashion to trap countless gods. And God-Noble Goldensword was only a god soul, with no godhood. Although he was immensely strong, compared to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart he was like nothing.

Now Yang Qi was using the power of the chart, his army, and fifty Grand Emperors to trap the god soul in place.

“Seal of Radiance and Light! Suppress!” he said coldly.

The Grand Emperors and the billions upon billions of angels in the army, all of them blessed by the Eternal Heavenly Aria, clenched their hands into fists and thrust them out to create an immense sealing mark of radiance and light. It was something that could suppress any and all wretch-devils, and had been used in the past by the Sovereign Lord to issue commands to the legion of gods. Explosive cracking sounds rang out, and massive energy flows erupted as the sealing mark slammed into God-Noble Goldensword.

“You despicable insect!” God-Noble Goldensword howled. “You filthy human! How dare you set up a formation to try destroying me? I won’t let you do this! I'm going to destroy your entire army. Golden Sword Fills Heaven; Sumeru Sword-King! One Sword to Vanquish Myriad Laws!One Sword to Execute Myriad Spirits!”

His sword shot out, becoming a river that was millions upon millions of kilometers in length that swept about in all directions, surrounding the Army of Holy Sages. In the blink of an eye, hundreds of thousands of angels were completely wiped out of existence.

“Incredible,” Yang Qi breathed, shocked at the force God-Noble Goldensword was unleashing. Not daring to hesitate, he blurred into motion, becoming a streak of light that shot directly toward God-Noble Goldensword.

The Hand of the One God and the Seventy-Two Monarchs Energy Art blazed with intense, holy light as they smashed through the sword energy and pierced deep into God-Noble Goldensword’s god soul.

Outside the formation, the fifty Grand Emperors and the billions of angels were all chanting a boundless god curse, a new element of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth that Yang Qi had unlocked with his most recent breakthrough. It was a curse that represented the holiness and perfection of the Sovereign Lord himself, and could wrest control of anything in existence. It was the Sovereign Lord’s Holy and Far-Reaching Consummate Omnicurse.

Anyone who was touched by this curse would lose all control of their own faculties and functions.

As they chanted, talismans emerged from their mouths and swirled forward to wrap and bind God-Noble Goldensword, preventing him from unleashing the most powerful aspects of his dao of the sword.

God-Noble Goldensword couldn’t have struck it more unlucky. Being trapped in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, he was vastly weaker than normal. And now Yang Qi had him trapped in a spell formation and bound with a curse. His energy arts were ninety percent weaker than normal, and he was clearly starting to lose the fight.

“Kingdom of Gold!” he growled, unleashing his sword kingdom, which lent more power and sharpness to his sword technique. Now, the stabs of his sword were capable of slicing apart Yang Qi’s fist attacks.

“Great Art of the Golden Slash!” A golden streak of light appeared as God-Noble Goldensword slashed apart everything coming his way.

‘This god soul’s sword technique can shake heaven and earth to the point where ghosts and gods weep,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘Unfortunately, he's an arrow that's reached the end of its flight. I can use this opportunity to push King Life-Killer’s dao of the sword to the consummate level. When I combine the ultimate techniques of the ancient seventy-two monarchs, it creates something that can rival the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. They’re like a positive and a negative, which, when combined, will let me devastate the god world!’

Rumbling sounds echoed out as Yang Qi’s fingers became a sword. Glittering with bright light, he met the Great Art of the Golden Slash, and when the two swords collided, a massive shock wave rolled out.

“Golden Bell of Forsaken Destruction!”

God-Noble Goldensword’s sword energy became like an enormous bell that surrounded him. Then he chuckled coldly as he slashed his sword out, sending tiny streams of sword light flying out like spring rain or coiling dragons. In the blink of an eye, all of heaven and earth filled with dramatic transformations, making it seem like God-Noble Goldensword was in no way at a disadvantage in the fight.

As the two of them fought back and forth, Yang Qi's forces continued chanting the curse, devastating God-Noble Goldensword’s techniques and weakening him further and further.

The instant he stopped using his true energy to fight back against the binding fetters, he would instantly be sealed tight and incapable of moving.

This battle with a god soul was pushing Yang Qi’s energy arts to new heights.

Normally speaking, no amount of deep thought or enlightenment would have provided insight into sword techniques, but sometimes experience could be the best teacher. As long as he didn’t die in the process, facing a god soul with perfect techniques and moves was the best way to learn.

At the same time, Yang Qi’s Stupendous will convergence was already at its peak.

At a certain point during the fight, the photonic computers of the Cruiser of Civilization suddenly spoke up.

[Beep-beep-beep. Beep-beep-beep. Will convergence breakthrough imminent. Next level: Destabilizing.]

However, Yang Qi hardly paid attention to the voice, as he was completely immersed in the dao of the sword. It was almost as if he were at one with the sword. Every slash of his sword was like a combination of his soul, nascent divinity, enlightenment, flesh and blood. Every slash of his sword pierced into the future to search for a great dao, parting the mists of confusion and enabling his will to seek perfection.

RIP!

Suddenly, something within his sea of consciousness broke, and his will surged with strength.

[Breakthrough successful. Destabilizing level reached. Power increasing….]

Thanks to this consummate battle of the dao of the sword, Yang Qi had broken through to the Destabilizing level.

Normal. Stupendous. Destabilizing. Terrifying. Paramount. Unbounded. Annulled.

Those were the levels of will convergence, and Destabilizing was essentially the strongest beneath the legion of gods, providing immense and explosive fighting prowess. Water was soft and gentle, but if it was propelled with enough pressure and speed, it could slice through diamonds. And will could be used to propel power.

Chapter 860: Transformations

Yang Qi had broken through to the Destabilizing level of will convergence.

Ordinary cultivators were usually at the Normal level, with top geniuses reaching the Stupendous level. An example of the latter was Leaf Dao-Denier. People like him were far above average, and had deadly trump cards that could let them turn defeats into victories, or defeat opponents much stronger than themselves.

Of course, there were different varieties of Stupendous will convergence. Some were stronger than others, and some people would reach limits that could not be surpassed. But in the end, even top geniuses almost never surpassed the Stupendous. Only the most consummate of geniuses, the freakish hellions, could possibly do that.

The Destabilizing level was vastly different than the Stupendous level. For instance, it contained traces of godhood, which meant that even top geniuses of cultivation couldn’t possibly reach it. No one could compare to the gods, who were the most almighty beings in heaven and earth, who had surpassed the dao of heaven to become deathless. Normally speaking, Destabilizing will was something from the legion of gods, and according to rumor, those who cultivated to that level were within reach of the Deathless Throne.

In the ancient legends, only individuals with power indexes in the thousands could possibly have Destabilizing will. As for God-Noble Goldensword’s god soul, his power index was only around three hundred, which would normally indicate that he didn’t have Destabilizing will. However, he was a fallen god, and the Destabilizing will that had once existed in his godhood wouldn’t just disappear, even though the godhood had.

Now that Yang Qi had Destabilizing will convergence, his every sword slash and fist strike would contain incomparable levels of true energy.

“Shatter All Earthly Phenomena!”

As he unleashed his most explosive attack possible, his power index of over one hundred spiked to its ultimate level, provoking an exclamation from the Cruiser of Civilization.

[Power eruption. Power index five hundred!]

The effects of Destabilizing will convergence on his most explosive attacks was shocking to the extreme. He had obviously reached a most enigmatic and mysterious level.

His attack smashed through the golden sword light and hit God-Noble Goldensword square on the chest. The golden bell around him shattered and he was flung back, slamming into the ground and going dark.

“You broke through to the Destabilizing level?” God-Noble Goldensword said, his voice trembling with terror.

Gods could feel terror, just like people. They feared the idea of perishing and ceasing to exist. Even a deathless god who faced a power and will vastly stronger than their own could indeed be wiped out of existence.

Ignoring the terror of his opponent, Yang Qi pressed the attack, unleashing the power of the God Legion Seal and causing golden light to slam into God-Noble Goldensword.

POP!

Fist strike after fist strike slammed into the god soul until he finally collapsed, transforming into a mass of gore that exploded out in all directions. Of course, there was no way Yang Qi would let him escape in this fashion. The combination of King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans, the grand spell formation, and the curse being chanted ensured that the remains of the god soul were completely trapped.

‘This god soul is incredible. Without breaking through to the Destabilizing level, I doubt I would’ve been a match for it. But now it's completely in my control.’

“No!” God-Noble Goldensword shouted, trembling. “I don’t want to fade from existence. You can't assimilate me! I'm God-Noble Goldensword! I'm a god! Maybe I'm just a Lesser God, but I'm still a god. Mortals are supposed to look up to me and respect me!”

“Quit your prattling and just die!” Yang Qi said. He thrust out a palm that burned with sagefire, and at long last, God-Noble Goldensword’s god soul began to truly perish. Golden light flowed through Yang Qi, transforming him on a fundamental level, until he felt like a sage sword was forming in his sea of energy. At the same time, his true energy began transforming again.

[Power index rising. One hundred ten, one hundred twenty… one hundred fifty… one hundred eighty… two hundred….]

The Cruiser of Civilization seemed to be sighing in admiration.

Under normal circumstances, assimilating God-Noble Goldensword shouldn’t have caused Yang Qi’s power to rise, mostly because his body had limits and couldn’t take in so much power. But now that he had Destabilizing will, his tolerance for power had risen, and in turn, his cultivation base was rising.

In the end, his power index stopped at two hundred twenty, making him a solitary powerhouse.

Even on the Ancient Road to the Gods, he would be a terrifying entity who could go where he wished without any need for fear.

‘Astounding!’ Holy Daughter Joyflower thought. ‘I can’t believe he's reached this level. If he continues advancing like this, maybe he really can help me. Unfortunately, he's still not strong enough. The empress of Joyflower Palace has a power index in the thousands, and her will is likely at the peak of the Destabilizing level.’

Meanwhile, Yang Qi reined his power in, his eyes glittering as he pulsed with unprecedented energy. In the past, he might have been considered a remarkable genius, someone who could surpass the limitations of his current level. But now he was beyond being a genius.

The will convergence he had could be encountered by chance, but never searched for and found. Now he was fairly certain that he could reach the ninth stair of the Deathless Heavenly Stairway any time he wanted. The Stair of the True Void.

Then he would truly be a Grand Emperor.

For the moment, he refrained from making the breakthrough. He would stay on the first stair and make sure he had complete and utter control of it before moving on.

He was like a ruthless and ambitious individual in the mortal world who, if he wanted, could proclaim himself king, or even emperor. Instead, he would build high walls and stock up rations, patiently waiting for the appropriate time to seize rulership.

For now, his view was that keeping his cultivation level low was actually a benefit.

In fact, if he had been able, he might have regressed in his cultivation. That said, at least he could clearly assess his sea of consciousness, finding and repairing areas where his previously rapid rise through the cultivation levels had created deficiencies and defects.

“Alright, everything is settled now,” Yang Qi said. “We can return to our search for treasure in the Great Necropolis. There’s plenty to be had. And now that I have Destabilizing will, even if we run into an enemy with a power index around eight hundred, we should be fine. I might even be able to handle a thousand. So, where are these other locations with godhood?”

Yang Qi knew that Holy Daughter Joyflower had her own plans and schemes, and was only following him for her own benefit. That said, he had every intention of making use of her.

Of course, if he wanted to, he could use his Hell Scourge to force her to exercise faith in him, and learn all of her secrets. But he wasn’t interested in that right now.

Ordinary cultivators, even those old-timers who cultivated a righteous dao, would go to any lengths to get information about godhood, creating mountains of corpses and rivers of blood. To get godhood, even the most righteous of patriarchs could easily turn evil. In front of the Deathless Throne, there was essentially no such thing as righteousness or evil.

Yang Qi and Holy Daughter Joyflower returned to the Great Necropolis, while Cipher Rite-Heaven and the other Grand Emperors headed to the Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple.

Of course, their existence was kept top secret.

The first thing they did was set up a spell formation, and when the old-timers in the Dao Defense League sensed the immense godpower, they were shocked. The formation sent out power, strengthening the defensive formations and greyspaces throughout the alliance. In the blink of an eye, the entire league was sealed to outsiders and its vital energy grew stronger.

“What exactly is going on here? Did the league-lord come across something amazing in the Great Necropolis?”

“These transformations are incredible. The power is unbelievable!”

“Compared to this, the Four Emperors of the Heavenly Court are complete trash!”

“That’s right. There are only three emperors left, and now they’ll never have a chance of making a comeback.

The old-timers were all shocked, and of course, none of them dared to violate Yang Qi’s orders to stay away from the Great Necropolis. Word was already starting to spread about how extremely dangerous the necropolis was, and how only Grand Emperors could safely enter it. People were even saying that there were Godmyths from the Demonfolk and the future world who had absorbed vital energy from the place and exploded as a result.

The Demonfolk and the future world were suffering heavy casualties, thanks to exploring the necropolis.

That said, some of the Grand Emperors were coming across good fortune.

Whispered rumors were spreading that experts from the Ancient Road to the Gods had come to the Great Necropolis, and that it could completely change the world. Amidst the chaos, the Dao Defense League hunkered down like a turtle in its shell, keeping its interior a pure land of cultivation.

Chapter 861: Joyflower Palace (1)

Fifty Grand Emperors had appeared in the middle of the Dao Defense League, including one whose power index surpassed a hundred, Cipher Rite-Heaven. And all of them were completely and utterly loyal to Yang Qi.

The hundred trillion immortal worlds that made up the Dao Defense League were now in a defensive formation. But unlike before, they were not incredibly vulnerable to attack. In fact, they could strike back with devastating force against any enemy.

Of course, the Grand Emperors had to remain hidden. They came from important organizations on the Ancient Road to the Gods, especially Cipher Rite-Heaven and the other elders from the Cipher-Devil Sword Sect. If their existence was revealed now, it could lead to the swift destruction of the Dao Defense League.

In the past, the Dao Defense League hadn’t had anyone to fear, and was able to forcibly take roughly two-thirds of the universal fortune that existed in heaven and earth. But now things were different.

Because of the appearance of the Great Necropolis, the universal fortune of heaven and earth was in chaos and the Dao Defense League had lost control of much of it. The league was now in a dangerously unstable position, and if forces from the ancient road established themselves on the scene, the league would be relegated to a third-rate role. Therefore, Yang Qi had to work hard to keep the league safe.

Thankfully, his cultivation base was rising and he was able to continuously siphon god world power from the Great Necropolis to give to his immortal-slaying clone.

After assimilating the god soul of God-Noble Goldensword, his power index had risen to two hundred twenty. And after emerging from the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart into the Great Necropolis, he immediately started using King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans to absorb the surrounding vital energy. Furthermore, as he began moving through the pathways of the necropolis, the talismans devoured entire planes of existence. They were truly starting to resemble King Heaven-Devourer himself.

The pathways of the Great Necropolis were immense, like entire starry skies or universes. The current path he was on was glittering and resplendent, reminding him of an immortal world, as opposed to a place of darkness.

The primal-chaos elder-snake inhaled, and a plane of existence equivalent to a twentieth ranked immortal world was sucked into its belly. The plane featured numerous primal-chaos beasts and spirits, as well as a host of minerals and ores.

As such planes of existence were devoured and digested, they were cleansed by the power assessment systems and passed through the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart to the Dao Defense League.

More power pillars appeared there, which the Grand Emperors fed into the spell formations.

“So many god items!”

Patriarch Annalist, Eldest Brother, Elder Second Brother, and numerous disciples of the Yang Clan saw an influx of power coming from a nearby vortex, and moments later, a plane of existence equivalent to a tenth ranked immortal world appeared and began raining god items.

Yang Qi had just devoured a plane of existence that was an ancient battlefield filled with god items. They were very low-level god items, the kind that belonged to Lesser Gods, but to Godmyth cultivators they could provide a huge boost in fighting prowess, especially if they were used in conjunction with spell formations.

The Great Necropolis was essentially a massive treasure trove, something that completely and utterly surpassed the Aeonic God Temple from the thirty-third ranked immortal world that was the Heaven Beyond Heaven.

With his Destabilizing will, Yang Qi was in a very different position than before. He could completely suppress the lingering will of King Heaven-Devourer and use the talismans much more effectively than before. As of now, he could easily use them to suck in people like the young chaplain of the Ancestral Wilds Basilica or Star Swordlife, thus inflicting a heavy blow to their fighting prowess.

So far, Yang Qi had not found any more god souls.

He was simply taking planes of existence, stripping them of anything beneficial, and sending it to the Dao Defense League.

At a certain point, Holy Daughter Joyflower frowned, looked around, and seemed to be making some calculations.

Given the expression on her face, Yang Qi could see that she really was lost, and had no way to lead him to the godhood she had mentioned.

Suddenly stopping in place, she looked at a flowered bracelet she kept on her wrist. A moment later, a voice spoke from the bracelet, calm and relaxed, like an ancient goddess scattering beautiful flowers on the path in front of her.

“Flowers Bloom; Flowers Fall….”

“It’s a message from the Joyflower Palace,” Holy Daughter Joyflower said. “Something’s happening there, and everyone is being recalled.”

“Your headquarters itself is in the Great Necropolis?” Yang Qi asked.

“Yes. The headquarters is built on an ancient flower called the Passionless God Flower. People say that it was left behind by the Passionless God-King from the immortal world. The flower is so huge that even a thirty-third ranked immortal world could fit inside of it. In fact, if you categorized it according to the rankings of immortal worlds, it would probably be fiftieth ranked. The flower is itself a god item, and the entire Joyflower Palace exists atop it. We brought it into the Great Necropolis as our base of operations, both to absorb the vital energy of this place and to store any treasures we found. It’s already advanced to the point of surpassing any organization from any age. And based on the message here, I’d say it’s highly likely… that the plan is to make a move on the immortal dao civilization. Seize the universal fortune of heaven and earth.”

“Make a move on the immortal dao civilization?” Yang Qi shivered. Although he had known all along that this would happen, it was certainly happening a lot sooner than he’d expected. The experts who had been on the Ancient Road to the Gods, but could now return via the Great Necropolis, would obviously want to seize the universal fortune of heaven and earth. Although there were Grand Emperors in the Immortal Dao Age, none of them could be considered top experts. That said, there were literally too many experts to count, and in fact, no one was even fully sure how many immortal worlds there were. Not even Yang Qi knew where the border of the immortal worlds was, or what old-timers still lurked out in the primal-chaos.

If someone could unify all of the immortal worlds and old-timers, and gather all of the universal fortune of heaven and earth, it would obviously be a huge benefit in terms of godly ascension.

“Let's go,” Yang Qi said. “I need to get back to my Dao Defense League. Things are developing too dramatically, and I need it to get stronger now.”

He immediately leaped into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, and through it, to the Dao Defense League.

A tremor passed through his immortal-slaying clone, and he quickly shrank down to the size of an imp and settled on Yang Qi’s shoulder. Then Yang Qi sat down on his throne and sent his divine will into the master spell formation of the alliance.

Shortly after, the hundred trillion immortal worlds began moving and shrinking, creating a very tight border that ordinary immortals wouldn’t be able to pass.

From the vantage point of the surrounding primal-chaos, the Dao Defense League looked like a huge, starry vortex, shrinking down until it was a tenth of its original size. Of course, even still, it was enormous.

The process caused enormous shockwaves to roll out, making it seem almost as if some gargantuan god had come and was forcing the Dao Defense League to shrink.

“League-Lord, what’s going on?” Patriarch Annalist asked, clearly surprised at what was happening. “You’re tightening and strengthening the magical laws of the hundred trillion worlds that make up the league. But doing this could make it impossible for ordinary immortals to use their divine abilities.”

Although Yang Qi’s actions were improving the quality of all the immortal worlds, it was just as Patriarch Annalist had said. Lower-level immortals would have trouble traveling about and using their abilities.

In fact, not even early-division Godmyths would be able to pierce through space easily. It would be like a situation in which ocean water suddenly transformed into mercury; obviously, no fish would be able to survive within it, much less travel through it.

“Big changes are happening in the Great Necropolis,” Yang Qi explained. “It’s highly likely that experts from the Ancient Road to the Gods will be coming out. If they do, they’ll likely pressure us to help them, or even try to conquer us. In other words, war is coming. Therefore, I'm shrinking the Dao Defense League down in the hopes of taking it into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.”

Considering all the work he had put into the Dao Defense League, there was no way Yang Qi would just stand by while it was destroyed.

After shrinking it down to a tenth of its original size, he stopped. He knew it couldn’t be shrunk down any further, not with the limitations of his current cultivation base.

‘What a pity,’ he thought. ‘I need to be a lot stronger before I can send the immortal worlds into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. I probably need a power index of over a thousand.’ Yang Qi frowned and looked out at all of the immortal worlds stretching out in all directions, looking very much like an emperor from the mortal world who was incapable of properly administering his territory.

Chapter 862: Joyflower Palace (2)

Despite having assimilated God-Noble Goldensword, and experiencing a huge boost in strength, Yang Qi still wasn’t strong enough to condense the hundred trillion worlds of the Dao Defense League and put them into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

The league was now much firmer and tougher thanks to his actions, but if experts from the Ancient Road to the Gods came along, the current defenses would be as useful as a cup of water thrown on a burning cart of firewood.

Of course, Yang Qi wasn’t exactly trembling in his boots. His cultivation base was high enough now that he was confident he could hold his own on the Ancient Road to the Gods. Unfortunately, he wouldn’t be as invincible as he had been for so long in the immortal worlds. He would be a second- or third-rate power who could, at best, fight to the death with some of the larger factions.

If worse came to worst, the best he could do now would be to take his key people and worlds into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. However, that would definitely not be the ideal scenario.

Calming himself, he cast his vision through primal-chaos to the Great Necropolis, which was fully blocking the entrance to the Ancient Road to the Gods. All sorts of experts had entered in the hopes of earning glory. Some had died, some had vanished, and some were making a big scene.

Occasionally, the vital energy of the Great Necropolis would tremble, and god items, god medicine, or even entire planes of existence filled with godstones would emerge. That, of course, would lead to fierce fighting on the part of the people who lurked in the area but didn't want to enter the necropolis.

There were severe casualties among the fighting forces, all thanks to the Great Necropolis.

Thankfully, he had quickly exercised authority over the Dao Defense League, ensuring that it wasn’t a dish of loose sand. If he hadn’t done that, the consequences would have been too horrible to contemplate.

Although the Dao Defense League wasn’t directly competing for treasure, it was still growing stronger, as were the experts from the Primeval Age, the future world, the Demon League, and the Dragonfolk.

After all, Yang Qi was in the Great Necropolis acquiring all sorts of resources to send down, including power, medicinal pills, magical treasures, and even planes of existence. And he could purify all of them with his power assessment systems, making it an easy task to use them.

Yang Qi’s method was orderly and streamlined, and it ensured that everything advanced with efficiency.

“Eldest Brother, Elder Second Brother, Father, and everyone else, please step forward. I subjugated a fiery god soul and assimilated his quintessence energy. I have about forty percent of the energy left, which I will now give to you. It will advance your cultivation base, transforming you on a fundamental level.” The quintessence energy of the fiery god soul flew out in the form of fiery sigils that merged into the foreheads of everyone in the Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple. Instantly, all of their foreheads gained a mark resembling a tongue of flame.

Yang Qi left out Patriarch Annalist and the others who were already Grand Emperors, as the flame sigil wouldn’t be of much benefit to them. But everyone else could use the godliness of the god soul to strive toward becoming Grand Emperors.

Yang Qi exhaled, and more quintessence energy swept forth to further aid those who were advancing their cultivation bases.

When the process was done, he vanished into thin air and headed back to the Great Necropolis. Hopefully, he could come across some good fortune or another that would help him reach an even higher level.

Soon, he was speeding through the Great Necropolis again, absorbing power, cleansing it, and sending it down into the Dao Defense League as he went along.

Days passed. Soon, three months had gone by, during which time Yang Qi had focused all his efforts on cultivation and advancing his cultivation base. Thanks to all the resources he was sending down to the Dao Defense League, it was experiencing rapid growth and advancement. Most noteworthy of all was that Empress Jadefall had unlocked more of her powers as a Reincarnated One. Her porcelain godspore seemed close to hatching, and she herself was already on the first stair of the Deathless Heavenly Stairway. As for her power index, it indicated that she was about as strong as a Grand Emperor already.

There were other old-timers in the league who were reaching the Stair of the True Void, making them actual Grand Emperors.

Another task that Yang Qi tackled was taking the low-level, relatively useless immortal worlds, and combining them. Eventually, it reached the point where all of the immortal worlds in the Dao Defense League were at the twentieth rank or higher.

Within all the worlds, pill furnaces were constantly in operation, ensuring that no one needed to search far and wide for ways to advance their cultivation base. They could simply use medicinal pills.

Yang Qi also planted the Live Forever God Tree in the middle of the Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple, using it to gather destiny and convert it into god dao seeds for cultivation purposes.

Months flew by. Countless immortals reached the Godmyth level, and too many geniuses rose up to count. In the Tusita Heaven, the Live Forever God Tree had been considered something huge, but compared to the Dao Defense League, it was small, and hardly made a dent in the destiny of the league as a whole.

How large was the Dao Defense League now?

At the very least, it was the same size as a million of the old Tusita Heaven.

Yang Qi continued combining the immortal worlds in the alliance. The process was helped by the planes and greyspaces he sent down from the Great Necropolis. Eventually, the middle-ranked immortal worlds were disappearing and being replaced with high-level worlds. By this point, there were only about ten billion immortal worlds in the league, but all of them were incredibly powerful.

From a distance, the numerous worlds that made up the Dao Defense League looked like an enormous spell formation, floating there within the universe and pulsing with immense power. As for the specific shape of that formation, it resembled an animal.

Specifically, a mammoth, and even more specifically, a godmammoth.

Because of his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, Yang Qi was very familiar with the internal structure of godmammoths. It was the most perfect structure possible, even within the god world, and contained profound secrets that even top experts couldn’t begin to unravel.

With the league in the structure of a godmammoth, it was possible for Yang Qi to have all the living beings within it unite their breathing and converge their destinies. That, in turn, would help his breathing exercises, allowing him to absorb power at a much higher rate.

The biggest downside to how things were progressing was that Yang Qi and Holy Daughter Joyflower hadn’t found any more god souls. They encountered other explorers, but would usually avoid them, or pass by them as quickly as possible. They weren’t interested in getting in fights, only in finding ways to grow stronger.

On one particular day, Yang Qi was in the Great Necropolis, absorbing planes of existence with King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans, and absorbing the surrounding vital energy.

It seemed like any other day, but it most definitely was not.

Within the immortal dao civilization, several enormous rifts opened within primal-chaos, on the other side of which was the Great Necropolis. Flower petals appeared, falling in droves, creating a kingdom of flowers within which were dozens of experts. They were all women with cold, bossy expressions on their faces, as if they were the most important people in existence.

The Joyflower Palace, one of the most powerful organizations in existence, had finally made an appearance.

“Elder Sister, has the time finally come to conquer the immortal worlds? Are we finally going to enslave everyone and create a new grand kingdom?”

The person to respond was a young woman who wore a golden garment embroidered with thousands of flowers. She was as beautiful as the full moon and wore a crown that seemed like it was crafted from a myriad of flowers. Obviously, she was an important person in the Joyflower Palace.

“That's right,” she said. “There aren’t many top experts in the Immortal Dao Age, but apparently the Primeval Age and the Future Age have both opened passageways leading here, all in the hopes of seizing control of the Ancient Road to the Gods. The Great Necropolis fell from the god world to block the path to the road, but at the same time, provide a basis for godly ascension. The fighting is obviously going to be fierce going forward. Our esteemed empress has discovered the location of a collection of godhood, and is currently competing with other top organizations to get it. We are on a different mission. The immortal worlds are as numerous as the eternal sands, and soon they will become part of the Joyflower Palace. Their souls, flesh, blood, and destiny will become a trump card for the empress. Once she reaches godly ascension, we’ll crush everyone else on the ancient road and force them all to submit to us.”

Chapter 863: Coercion

There were dozens of young women from the Joyflower Palace present, and one of the first things that attracted their attention was the Dao Defense League, hanging there strong and solid in primal-chaos.

The young woman with the crown of flowers frowned. “Hmm. There’s more to this Dao Defense League than meets the eye. For one thing, it's quite large. All of you, take a look. Its borders are protected by numerous god formations, creating a very solid barrier. It almost looks like some primeval beast of some sort. Very mysterious. And you can sense that there are powerful experts lurking in its depths.”

“What? When did that happen? Let’s take a look.”

All of the young women looked surprised as they peered into the Dao Defense League with its ten billion immortal worlds. They were all linked together in a shape that resembled an ancient megamammoth, just waiting to aggressively lunge forward. In fact, this megamammoth of immortal worlds almost seemed to be breathing, as if it were at one with the universe itself.

Those who could perceive the megamammoth would realize that it could unleash devastating force if it were attacked. And if it somehow faced a force stronger than itself, it could slip away and escape. It was not just strong, but also wise and quick-witted. In a word, it was difficult to assess.

There were numerous wormholes in the depths of the alliance, connecting all of the immortal worlds that made it up and making it a place of peace and tranquility.

Of course, because of all of the items erupting from the Great Necropolis, the immortal worlds in general were a place of extreme violence and bloodshed. In fact, most people lived in a state of constant fear.

Because of that, the immortals who weren’t interested in ruthlessly competing for resources were highly inclined to join the Dao Defense League, where resources were plentiful.

In times of gory conflict, locations of peace and tranquility were highly attractive to many people. Yang Qi had long since established law and order in the Dao Defense League, to the point where even a blind person could see what it was like. There were even extremely powerful old-timers who, tired of the constant fighting and threat of death, sought refuge there.

The Dao Defense League was now so famous for its orderliness and riches that its name had reached even the most distant immortal worlds. In fact, in recent months, billions of powerful individuals had joined the Dao Defense League, which was in itself shocking.

Of course, the people from the Joyflower Palace viewed the situation somewhat differently. What they focused on was the destiny from so many countless immortal worlds flowing into the depths of the Dao Defense League.

“This place looks perfect,” said one of the women from the Joyflower Palace. “It will make a very stable foundation and save us a lot of time and effort. Usually, it's difficult to establish a foothold in a new area, but the Dao Defense League has essentially done all the hard work for us. We can just take it over, then immediately focus on expanding.”

“That’s right,” said the young woman with the crown. “The Dao Defense League will make the perfect foundation. With it, we can focus on immediate expansion. Before long, all of the immortal worlds will be ours. We really will save a lot of time this way.”

One of the young women frowned. “But Elder Sister Purity… what about the league-lord of this place? What’s his name? Yang Qi. Will he willingly become our puppet? Right now he's the sole ruler of this so-called Dao Defense League.”

Another woman snorted coldly, her eyes flickering with killing intent. “Would he dare refuse us? Doubtful, unless he wants to end up dead. That’s the fate of anyone who defies the Joyflower Palace. Death. Painful, horrific death. Especially for men.”

“That’s what I was implying,” replied the woman who had frowned. “Men don’t deserve quick deaths. Unfortunately, if we did kill this Yang Qi, his people would take it badly and it could lead to the Dao Defense League collapsing. And that would just make our overall goals harder to achieve. After all, we really need the universal fortune of heaven and earth, right? In the end, what we fundamentally require is his allegiance, and the allegiance of everyone else in the Immortal Dao Age. I’ve heard that Yang Qi’s people are all fanatically devoted to him, as if he brainwashed them or something. They wouldn’t hesitate to die for him, and if that happened, it would definitely be counter-productive for us.”

“You’re right, this isn’t going to be easy,” Elder Sister Purity said. She thought for a moment. “How about this: we start out with the carrot-and-stick approach. If he thinks there’ll be a benefit for him, he’ll definitely agree to go along with our demands. If he refuses, we can always resort to harsher tactics. Make him suffer. As long as we don’t do it in front of his subordinates, we should be fine. For example, if we can get him to join the Joyflower Palace, we’ll have plenty of options at hand, right?”

“You're absolutely right, Elder Sister Purity. Very clever. Come on, let’s get started! Before we know it, our mission will be accomplished and we’ll have control of the universal fortune of heaven and earth.”

“What a pity that this Yang Qi only uses the universal fortune for personal cultivation. He can’t compare at all to our boundless empress, who can use it to drive away the dao of heaven or take control of it to use in combat. What a huge waste.”

The dozens of young women quickly carved out a pathway through the primal-chaos, converting the surrounding vital energy into colorful flowers and immortal energy. Obviously, these women were very powerful, especially the one called Elder Sister Purity.

Clearly, only Yang Qi's true self would be able to deal with people whose cultivation bases were as terrifying as this. Their ability to convert primal-chaos into usable power was something that, up to this point, he thought that only the power assessment systems of the Cruiser of Civilization could do. Yet these young women did so with almost no effort at all.

Soon, they reached the god formations that formed the borders of the Dao Defense League, whereupon Elder Sister Purity said, “Junior Sister Fragrant, head down there and tell the league-lord that we've come from the Joyflower Palace to pay a formal visit. Make it clear that if we’re not treated with respect, we’ll attack with deadly force.”

“Yes ma’am!” One of the young women flew a bit closer, but when she reached the god formations she was only able to proceed a short distance before being forced to stop. She frowned. ‘I can’t believe this measly Dao Defense League has god formations of this level. And there are multiple layers of defense? It would be very dangerous to try forcing my way through. Well, Elder Sister Purity should be able to handle it.’

Junior Sister Fragrant’s cultivation base actually wasn’t very far below that of Holy Daughter Joyflower. She was a Grand Emperor with a power index of roughly forty. Although she wasn’t at Yang Qi’s level, she was still strong enough to be able to destroy the entire Dao Defense League, if she wanted, were it not for the fact that fifty Grand Emperors lurked within it, including Cipher Rite-Heaven, whose power index was over a hundred.

‘How dare these people from the Immortal Dao Age create spell formations like this! They really do deserve to die. Eventually we’ll get the chance to torment that Yang Qi and make him our slave. Then we’ll make sure he lives a life worse than death!’

Raising her voice, she said, “People of the Dao Defense League, listen up. We’re from the strongest faction on the Ancient Road to the Gods, the Joyflower Palace. Tell your league-lord to get out here and offer greetings, otherwise, he’s dead! And afterward, we’ll destroy your little alliance!”

Almost immediately, the god formation began activating, revealing countless experts within them. One of the experts called out, “We’ll notify the league-lord immediately. Please wait, and forgive us for any inconvenience.”

Surprisingly, the people of the Dao Defense League were being neither servile nor overbearing.

Chapter 864: Countermeasures

Even as the god formations thrummed, those who were inside operating them began discussing how events were playing out.

“So strong….”

“These women are all from the Ancient Road to the Gods. You have to be a Grand Emperor, at a minimum, to step onto that road, which means that everyone from there is an invincible expert.”

“We've been waiting for this day. The league-lord has spent day and night making preparations, having us cultivate daoist techniques and build spell formations. It looks like the god formations we set up are actually working! That woman can’t break through them, only make tiny incursions.”

“People say that experts from the Ancient Road to the Gods are all terrifying. And it looks like we’re facing just such a person today.”

“Bah! Don’t take the situation lightly. With all of us powering these god formations, we should be able to easily kill a Grand Emperor. But this woman still managed to penetrate the outer defenses. Isn’t that fear-inspiring?”

Originally, the sight of Ancient Road experts had caused all of them to tremble with fear at the thought of the disasters to come. After all, rumors stretched back to ancient times regarding how powerful the people from the Ancient Road to the Gods were. Even the most casual action on their part could devastate everything under heaven.

But now, their god formations were rebuffing these ancient experts, and it caused Yang Qi to seem even more powerful and mysterious to them. Of course, their confidence in him surged.

As followers of Yang Qi, they felt more secure than ever.

“League-Lord! What do we do now?”

In the Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple, the dharmarajas, god-generals, Emissary of Radiance and Light, and four heavenly kings had all assembled, along with millions and millions of other old-timers and elder kings. These were the highest leaders in the Dao Defense League, and their attention was all focused on Yang Qi and the young woman standing next to him, who was none other than Holy Daughter Joyflower.

Truth be told, Yang Qi had been paying very close attention to the primal-chaos around the Great Necropolis.

As soon as the women from the Joyflower Palace showed up, he called a meeting of his top leaders to discuss what to do. And of course, he included Holy Daughter Joyflower. She was from the Joyflower Palace and knew exactly what the organization was capable of. It was clear that they wanted to take over the Dao Defense League, and they were not a force to be taken lightly.

“So, who exactly are all these Joyflower Palace people?” Yang Qi asked. “Do you recognize any of them? The one surrounded by the endless streams of flower petals has a cultivation level so high I can’t assess it. I’m not even sure I could defeat her in battle.”

“She’s one of our ten flower goddesses,” Holy Daughter Joyflower replied. “Her name is Orchid Purity, and her cultivation base is extremely high. You see, I'm only a holy daughter, whereas she's a flower goddess. The two ranks are completely different. Considering that she's taking the lead here, it's going to be difficult to keep control of the situation.”

“What’s your name?” Yang Qi asked. “It can’t be Holy Daughter Joyflower.”

“We holy daughters all use the same sobriquet when we go on missions. In other words, we all call ourselves ‘Holy Daughter Joyflower’. My real name is Flower Mildcloud. Anyway, Orchid Purity’s cultivation base is truly incredible. The ten flower goddesses are similar to the dharmarajas of your Dao Defense League in terms of rank, with us holy daughters being akin to your elder kings. As for Orchid Purity, she cultivates an energy art in which one thought can cause boundless will to blossom. She can form a resonance with heaven and earth wherever she goes and is one of a select few of the most powerful experts in the Joyflower Palace.”

“I get the point,” Yang Qi said. “Besides, I’ve already confirmed that her power index is over four hundred.” He frowned. ‘If she gets violent, not even the god formations I've set up will hold against her. That said, her will convergence level is only at the Stupendous level, which evens the playing field to a certain extent. Unfortunately, if I got in a fight with her, and the other flower goddesses showed up, I would definitely end up dead.’

A moment later, the power assessment systems provided a more detailed explanation of Orchid Purity’s cultivation level.

[Beep-beep-beep. Beep-beep-beep. Cultivation level: third stair of the Deathless Heavenly Stairway.]

She wasn’t even a Grand Emperor, yet her incredible potential only made her more terrifying. She was obviously on the path to becoming an indescribably powerful person, the kind that no one would ever dare to trifle with. And it was clear that she would be more difficult to tangle with than God-Noble Goldensword’s god soul.

That wasn't to mention that she was flanked by dozens of other experts from the Joyflower Palace, and if fighting broke out, they could call for even more reinforcements from within the Great Necropolis. If a force like that wanted, they could easily wipe out the ten billion immortal worlds of the Dao Defense League without expending any effort.

Obviously, the current situation required a long-term plan. So Yang Qi’s first inclination was to exercise patience.

“How strong is the Joyflower Palace overall?” Yang Qi asked. “From what I learned from Cipher Rite-Heaven and the others, I only know that it’s a very big organization with an incredibly powerful leader. Can you give me any more details?”

“Of course. It is indeed one of the largest organizations on the Ancient Road to the Gods. However, the further you go along on the road, the more mysterious and enigmatic it becomes. Nobody really knows for sure what other powerful organizations might exist in its deepest depths. And that’s not to mention certain superpower sects who are rumored to have long since begun exploring the true depths of the Great Necropolis. In any case, our empress is close to being a god. I suppose that if you described her according to that power index you use, she would be in the thousands. If she could acquire godhood, she would be like a tiger that had grown wings and would most likely reach godly ascension.”

“Oh really?” Yang Qi was truly shocked; after all, someone with a power index in the thousands could easily kill him. He had a power index of two hundred twenty, and although it might make sense to assume that someone with a power index of two thousand two hundred was ten times stronger than him, that actually wasn’t the case. It would be more like thousands of times stronger.

Someone like that could kill Yang Qi and slaughter the entire Dao Defense League as easily as taking a sip of water. His only hope would be to hide in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart for the rest of his life and never come out. Unfortunately, he didn’t have all nine of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions, which meant that if Empress Joyflower succeeded in reaching godly ascension, then perhaps she would eventually manage to break into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

Without the full collection of legacy medallions, it was always possible that a god could find a chink in its defenses and somehow get inside.

Thankfully, Yang Qi had considered that possibility ahead of time, and because of that, he knew he couldn’t just blithely defy top experts from the Ancient Road to the Gods. On the other hand, he also couldn’t allow himself to seem weak. Instead, he needed to be clever. Manipulative, even. Then, when he got strong enough, he could make a comeback. It was a strategy he had used many times in life, and he was therefore very familiar with the process.

For the time being, he told Holy Daughter Joyflower to stay hidden while he flew through the god formations to speak directly with Orchid Purity and the other women from the Joyflower Palace.

When they saw him out in the open, they were visibly shocked at how strong he seemed. Instantly, they sent flower petals swirling out to form a huge spell formation around him.

This was only to be expected from elite entities from the Ancient Road to the Gods. They were always incomparably vicious, the kind of people who had survived up to this point by slaughtering countless enemies.

‘Interesting,’ Orchid Purity thought. ‘This guy’s aura is so strong! He’s hundreds of times stronger than an ordinary Grand Emperor. There’s obviously more to his cultivation base than meets the eye.’ Eyes flickering, she stood up a bit taller, looking down her nose at him as she said, “So you’re the league-lord of this Dao Defense League?”

He nodded. “That’s right. I'm League-Lord Yang Qi.” Of course, he was maintaining absolute vigilance, fully aware that these women were the most powerful adversaries he had encountered to date. Obviously, he couldn’t just resort to fighting and killing. “Ladies, thank you so much for coming to pay a visit, and please forgive me for not receiving you properly from the moment you arrived.”

Even as the words left his mouth, he clasped hands and bowed.

“Cut the crap,” said Junior Sister Fragrant. “We come from the Joyflower Palace, the most powerful organization on the Ancient Road to the Gods. We've come to collect universal fortune here, and subjugate all of the immortal worlds. The puny Dao Defense League that you've established has a lot of potential, and we've come here to recruit you. Acknowledge allegiance to the Joyflower Palace and serve us well as slaves, and you’ll profit greatly. Refuse to cooperate, and you will die.”

Yang Qi frowned, then suddenly twitched. Cracking sounds rang out as he subsequently grew several times larger than before, simultaneously flicking his sleeve to send a gentle wind out toward Junior Sister Fragrant.

Face falling, she thrust her hands out in front of her, sending out streams of flower petals toward the wind. However, they all shattered, and she was struck, causing her to stagger back several paces.

In the blink of an eye, she was defeated, causing her face to flicker with indescribable rage and viciousness.

“Looking to get killed!?” she shouted, her killing intent surging. Suddenly, an incomparably powerful rose-colored sword appeared above her head, surrounded by thistles and thorns.

“I built the Dao Defense League, and will not allow it to be a slave for anyone,” Yang Qi said. “You Joyflower Palace people are really pushing things too far. It wasn’t long ago that Cipher Rite-Heaven from the Cipher-Devil Sword Sect came here and treated me rudely, but after I showed him a thing or two, he joined me. Lately, I’ve been thinking of throwing my lot in with a powerful faction, and considering how rudely you people have treated me, it seems the right decision will be to pick the Cipher-Devil Sword Sect.”

“What?” Orchid Purity said. “Back down this instant, Junior Sister Fragrant!”

Junior Sister Fragrant begrudgingly retracted her holy sword of roses, although the hatred in her eyes didn't diminish at all. Yang Qi could tell that she was a narrow-minded and petty individual who would stop at nothing to kill him.

Of course, he wouldn’t let her live. He hadn’t survived his years of brutal campaigning by chance, and had long since realized that, when it came to enemies, it was vitally important to cut the weeds and eliminate the roots. The alternative was to end up dead.

“The Cipher-Devil Sword Sect tried to recruit you?” Orchid Purity said.

“That’s right,” Yang Qi replied. “Look, I have a Cipher-Devil Sword Sect command medallion right here!” He pulled out a pitch-black command medallion, which Orchid Purity instantly recognized as belonging to the Cipher-Devil Sword Sect. Of course, the truth was that Yang Qi had taken it from Cipher Rite-Heaven, and was using the two classic ruses of making a feint to the east and attacking in the west, and getting the tiger and the wolf to kill each other.

Chapter 865: Getting the Tiger and the Wolf to Kill Each Other

Yang Qi had known all along that the Joyflower Palace would be difficult to deal with. Therefore, he had immediately decided to use the Cipher-Devil Sword Sect as a scapegoat. Either he could directly foster conflict between the two sects, or at least frighten the Joyflower Palace to some degree. After all, he knew that the Cipher-Devil Sword Sect was a major faction. Although they weren’t necessarily as big as the Joyflower Palace, they were powerful enough that a fight between the two would be a deadly affair that wouldn’t easily be resolved.

As expected, as soon as he pulled out the command medallion, the women from the Joyflower Palace all reacted with shock.

They had shown up very aggressively, planning to force Yang Qi and the Dao Defense League to submit to them, and were prepared to use the most ruthless methods necessary to succeed.

But now that they realized experts from the Cipher-Devil Sword Sect might be involved, things were different.

Junior Sister Fragrant snorted coldly. “You despicable brat. You think we’re scared of a little command medallion from the Cipher-Devil Sword Sect? If so, you’re gravely mistaken. The Joyflower Palace is far larger than the Cipher-Devil Sword Sect, and they’re in no position to get in our way.”

“I know that your sect is larger and stronger than theirs,” Yang Qi said, looking perfectly meek and humble. “But the Cipher-Devil Sword Sect didn’t act so aggressive and overbearing when they tried to recruit me. I understand that powerful people from the Ancient Road to the Gods like you are expected to be domineering. To people like you, we from the immortal dao civilization are little more than ants.”

“Well, that’s a given,” Junior Sister Fragrant said grimly. “And ants don’t have the power of choice. Destroy that command medallion immediately and swear allegiance to the Joyflower Palace. If you do, we’ll pardon your crimes. That's the only way you’ll get out of this alive.”

Yang Qi completely ignored Junior Sister Fragrant and instead looked at Orchid Purity, who he knew to be one of the ten flower goddesses of the sect. “Ma’am, you’re the leader of this group, correct? Have you really made the decision to destroy the Dao Defense League?”

Orchid Purity thought for a moment, then said, “It’s simple. If you renounce the Cipher-Devil Sword Sect and join the Joyflower Palace, you’ll profit greatly. Considering the level of your cultivation base, I’ll even make you a god-general. Presumably, the Cipher-Devil Sword Sect offered you some other rewards?”

“That's right,” Yang Qi replied, not batting an eye. “One of their top experts offered me a powerful collection of destiny to bolster my lair here and begin conquering the surrounding areas. He personally blessed me with his will, pushing my cultivation base to an even higher level. By the way, let’s say I do join the Joyflower Palace. What happens if the Cipher-Devil Sword Sect sends people to attack me? I'm obviously too weak to defend myself against them.”

“We can match the Cipher-Devil Sword Sect’s offer,” Orchid Purity replied. “As for them coming after you for revenge, there’s no reason for you to worry about that. We can set up some spell formations in your Dao Defense League that will ensure you can defend against any such aggression. In fact, you should be able to easily slaughter them. Then it will be very obvious who is stronger, the Cipher-Devil Sword Sect or the Joyflower Palace.”

Upon hearing this, a greedy grin appeared on Yang Qi’s face. Of course, it was nothing but an act. “I see. And what other benefits might you be able to give me? I obviously want to advance my cultivation base to a higher level of enlightenment.”

In response to his greedy expression, Orchid Purity frowned. Although she was getting the impression that Yang Qi was easily manipulated, she also was careful to keep her guard up. “Once I appoint you as a god-general of the Joyflower Palace, you can come to our headquarters to further your cultivation. With the techniques we’ll impart to you, you can accomplish missions for the sect and rise to even higher heights.”

When the other women heard Orchid Purity’s words, they marveled inwardly.

‘Eldest Sister really knows what she's doing,’ they thought. They all knew that in the Joyflower Palace, god-generals were essentially slaves. Cannon fodder. They did all the grunt work, for example, exploring the most dangerous locations in the Great Necropolis. However many were killed, that many more would be appointed to replace them. Although Orchid Purity made it seem like becoming a god-general meant that the sect would be grooming Yang Qi for higher levels of authority, the truth was that she just wanted to enslave him. Then the Dao Defense League would be like a headless snake, easily controlled and manipulated.

Doing things this way would be like killing two birds with one stone. They would get the Dao Defense League, plus a powerful pawn to sacrifice.

Of course, Yang Qi was no fool and could guess exactly what was happening here. Thanks to information he had gleaned from Flower Mildcloud, he knew what god-generals in the Joyflower Palace were like. The god-generals were always men, and they were little more than lackeys to the powerful women.

That said, his primary goal right now was to get into the Joyflower Palace. If he needed to make a quick exit, he could always use the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, so it didn’t seem likely that he would be in any true danger. Thanks to Flower Mildcloud, he knew that there were plenty of treasures in the Joyflower Palace. They had been exploring the Great Necropolis for thousands upon thousands of years, and had acquired all sorts of things during that time. If he could find his way into the treasure storehouse of the Joyflower Palace, he was confident he could rise to an even higher cultivation level!

Why spend time painstakingly excavating a gold mine when one could get into a stocked treasury?

‘These people from the Joyflower Palace are really aggressive, so I’ll just give them what they want for now. They can take control of the Dao Defense League for the moment. I’ll suck it up and join them, hopefully to my benefit. As the saying goes, you can’t catch tiger cubs without entering the tiger’s lair. Eventually, I’ll clean them out and leave them with nothing. Whatever treasures they’ve accumulated from the Great Necropolis, I’ll take them all and add them to my own storehouses in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart!’

Yang Qi already had a very vicious plan in place.

For now, he would be slipping out of a predicament like a cicada sloughing its skin.

After seemingly putting a lot of thought into the matter, Yang Qi said, “So that’s your offer? Sounds incredible. Well… fine. I agree. But, is there any way you can give me a reward up front? The Cipher-Devil Sword Sect did.”

Junior Sister Fragrant smiled coldly. “You want more rewards? How about I kill you!”

“Enough, Junior Sister Fragrant,” said Orchid Purity, smiling faintly and holding out a hand to prevent her from lunging forward. “He's going to be a god-general in the Joyflower Palace from now on. As one of our subordinates, we certainly need to treat him well.” Waving her hand, she sent a stream of light over to Yang Qi, which resolved into a pearl that landed onto his palm. “That’s a pearl from the god world,” she continued, “a consummate treasure called the Myriad Transformations Energy Pearl, which can negate the effects of heterogeneous true energy. Whatever blessings the Cipher-Devil Sword Sect gave you, it surely left you with some discordant energy and power. Consume that pearl, and your cultivation base will be able to produce Myriad Flowers True Energy. It's one of the signature treasures of our Joyflower Palace, and using it in your cultivation will provide immense benefits.”

“Alright!” Yang Qi said, immediately consuming the Myriad Transformations Energy Pearl. As soon as he did, he could sense an influx in power that could easily combine and refine various types of true energy.

The other women from the Joyflower Palace all looked at him with sly grins on their faces.

The truth was that they were all thinking the same thing. ‘Ha! The truth is that now that he’s consumed that Myriad Transformations Energy Pearl, it will convert all of the true energy inside him into Myriad Flowers True Energy, which will eventually wipe away his distinguishing male features, transforming him into a genderless eunuch. Only people like that can loyally serve the women of the Joyflower Palace.’

Of course, Yang Qi realized the truth from the moment he laid eyes on the pearl, and as soon as he consumed it, he used his Heaven-Devouring True Energy to negate any of its effects. Furthermore, studying the power of the Myriad Transformations Energy Pearl would surely give him further insights into the mysteries of the Joyflower Palace.

“Excellent,” Orchid Purity said. “Now that you’ve consumed the Myriad Transformations Energy Pearl, you're one of us. Do you have any further objections, Junior Sister Fragrant?”

A condescending smile appeared on Junior Sister Fragrant’s face. “No, of course not. He’s definitely one of us now. After he’s been in the Joyflower Palace for a while as a god-general, if his cultivation base gets high enough, maybe he can come work for me.”

“Alright,” Orchid Purity said. “Deactivate the god formations and hand over the Dao Defense League!”

Although Yang Qi was acting very obedient, inwardly, he was chuckling coldly. His plan was already set; he would pretend to hand over control of the Dao Defense League, even letting them absorb the universal fortune of heaven and earth. As long as he kept a tiny bit of control, he could easily turn the tables on them.

And because he had consumed the Myriad Transformations Energy Pearl, they weren’t even the least bit worried about him. So he sent all of his most trusted people into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, leaving behind the ordinary old-timers.

Without hesitation, the people from the Joyflower Palace descended to the Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple. In the blink of an eye, the entire temple became an endless world of flowers.

The old-timers reacted with looks of dread, but thankfully they had already been secretly warned by Yang Qi about what was to come. Quickly dropping to their knees, they raised their voices and said, “Oh goddesses of the Joyflower Palace, let your reign last for all time, and may you be eternally deathless! Your arrival in the Dao Defense League has brought a blossom of flowers to the void! Your mere presence brings the most profound honor!”

Words of praise flowed out ceaselessly.

The women had been prepared to carry out a large scale slaughter of any who resisted them, but considering how things were playing out, they quickly changed their mind. After all, their goal was to take universal fortune, therefore, keeping the destiny of the Dao Defense League stable was key. Terrifying the populace would cause instability and loss, so avoiding it was the best thing, if it were possible.

“Excellent, you understand the situation!” Orchid Purity said. “Henceforth, you are not the Dao Defense League. Your league-lord has joined our forces as a god-general, so from now on, you are members of the Joyflower Palace. Understand?”

Instantly, Yang Qi could sense a shift in universal fortune as it left him and flowed toward the Joyflower Palace in the Great Necropolis.

So far, things were going just as expected.

Chapter 866: Concealing Malice

Yang Qi had known that he wouldn’t be able to maintain full control of the universal fortune forever, and had long since warned the old-timers about this. The overall plan was to infiltrate the Joyflower Palace, steal their treasure, and destroy them. Then, afterward, he would retake the Dao Defense League.

As for the women from the Joyflower Palace, all they cared about was the universal fortune, not the minor power struggles within the league.

“Very well,” said Orchid Purity with a nod. Pleased with the attitude of the leaders of the Dao Defense League, and the shift in universal fortune, she continued, “Henceforth, all former members of the Dao Defense League will take orders from the Joyflower Palace. You are all loyal members of the Joyflower Palace, with no affiliation whatsoever with the old alliance. Understand?”

“We will follow all of your orders, Flower Goddess,” said Yang Righteousness, the former Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven. “From here on out, we belong to the Joyflower Palace.”

Yang Unrestrained, Yang Mahānata, Yang Misery, and Yang Never-Ending provided further assurances, as did the dharmarajas and god-generals. It was all very pleasing to Orchid Purity and the others.

“We heard that you control a powerful army,” Orchid Purity said, looking over at Yang Qi. “Now that you've joined the Joyflower Palace, why not call them out?”

“That goes without saying,” Yang Qi replied. Waving his hand, he sent a white paper talisman flying over to Orchid Purity. “I acquired an army of holy angels from an ancient godrelic. You can use that commander’s tally to control them.”

“Oh?” Orchid Purity said, looking at the commander’s tally, which resembled a white feather. After taking control of it, she felt the faith of hundreds of billions of angels suddenly flowing toward her.

Face falling, she quickly rejected the faith, not daring to be stained by the karma that would come with it. That said, her cultivation base was still strong enough to control the talismans. She exerted a thought, and countless angels appeared, filling the temple hall, their wings fluttering as they knelt in front of her and said, “Greetings, oh boundless Lord!”

“These angels are nice, but their cultivation level is too low. That said… they should prove useful in the overall conquest. And their faith is very pure.” Smiling, she suddenly pointed at Yang Qi and said, “Kill him!”

“Yes ma’am!” the angels shouted, and immediately launched a host of deadly attacks at Yang Qi.

Looking very shocked, Yang Qi drew on the power of his cultivation base to defend himself.

“What are you doing!” he shouted, visibly stunned. Of course, inside he was laughing coldly at how obvious Orchid Purity and her people were in their attempt to test him. The truth was, they were slowly but surely placing themselves firmly within his control.

“Cease the attack!” Orchid Purity commanded, and the angels immediately complied. Smiling even more broadly, she said, “Excellent. It’s good to know this wasn't some sort of trick. You really did hand over your power!”

“You were testing me?!” Yang Qi exclaimed, looking shocked, but relieved at the same time. Thanks to his excellent performance, Orchid Purity and the other women were finally starting to let their guard down.

“That's right. It was a test.” Flicking her finger, Orchid Purity said, “If that talisman had failed to work, or had been some sort of trap, I would have killed you instantly.”

“Yes, yes of course,” Yang Qi said, nodding obsequiously. “I can only hope that I've proven my sincerity. That said, I fear my actions will provoke a response from the Cipher-Devil Sword Sect….”

“That doesn’t matter. With us here, what is there to fear from the Cipher-Devil Sword Sect? For now, you shall go to the Joyflower Palace headquarters to begin your service as a god-general. Before long, you’ll rise to the rank of court… er, court officer.” To those in the know, it would be obvious that she had been about to say “court eunuch” instead of “court officer”.

Yang Qi nodded. “Great!”

“Incidentally, these god formations of yours are far too weak, and the immortal worlds you have are spread out too far. I’ll reorganize things and redo the formations, but first I need your spell formation charts. Shrinking everything down will make it much easier to defend against invasion. After I'm done, not even a large-scale attack by the Cipher-Devil Sword Sect will do anything.”

The truth was that she was actually impressed by Yang Qi’s spell formations and wanted to see the spell formation charts to learn more about them. That would not only give her deeper understanding of the Dao Defense League, but would also help her investigate Yang Qi’s secrets.

“Alright,” Yang Qi replied. He knew that when you stand under low eaves, you have no choice but to bow your head, so he quickly handed over some spell formation charts.

Glancing at them, Orchid Purity could see that they contained profundities of heaven and earth, and truths of the god world. Expression flickering, she said, “Don’t mention any of this when you get to the Joyflower Palace, alright? After I accomplish my goals here, I’ll return and reward you well. Don’t worry, I’ll make the people there take care of you.”

“Yes ma’am,” Yang Qi said, nodding thankfully. “Many thanks for your patronage!”

“Junior Sister Graceful. Junior Sister Mist. Take him back to headquarters. While you’re there, get some magical treasures to help shrink the Dao Defense League down. There’s no question that the Cipher-Devil Sword Sect will attack us sooner or later. The universal fortune from here is absolutely crucial to us, so we can’t let anyone interfere.”

Yang Qi couldn’t help but inwardly laugh at how perfectly his plan was working so far.

He was temporarily abandoning the Dao Defense League, mostly because maintaining and growing it would be very difficult right now. Even if he somehow managed to rebuff the Joyflower Palace, there were plenty of other powerful organizations on the Ancient Road to the Gods who would come along to cause problems. It seemed a lot easier to just give in to the Joyflower Palace temporarily and allow them to focus on defending the league and slowly conquering the immortal worlds. Besides, shrinking and consolidating the Dao Defense League would have been very difficult for him to do on his own. Once they had done all the hard work, and the Dao Defense League was in a good position, he would just use the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart to take it back.

In the end, he would take out the Joyflower Palace in one fell swoop.

Right now, he was laying the foundation of his trap and secretly preparing to take down these arrogant women, trapping them like turtles in a jar. When it came to scheming, they simply couldn’t compare to him.

“Let’s go! Follow us to the Joyflower Palace.”

The two young women flanked him on either side, almost as if they were keeping him under arrest. And he did nothing to resist them as they flew off into the distance.

When they were gone, Junior Sister Fragrant said, “Elder Sister Purity, it seems to me there’s more to that Yang Qi than meets the eye. Why are you going so easy on him? We should’ve pushed him much harder and forced him to give us everything in his possession. I refuse to believe he's being honest about everything.”

“Going easy on him? How is that even possible? Just wait until he's at the Joyflower Palace. It will be a lot easier then. He’ll be a dragon in the shallows or a tiger on the plain. Did you really think we would just let him do as he pleases in the Joyflower Palace? God-generals have no choice but to follow orders, and he’ll eventually become a court eunuch. At that point, he’ll have no choice but to loyally serve the Joyflower Palace.”

“Eldest Sister,” one of the other young women said, “you definitely know what you’re doing. Once he's a god-general, he’ll be tortured, brainwashed, and will eventually be a completely loyal slave.”

“Exactly. And now the time has come to take control of everyone else in the Dao Defense League. They too will become loyal servants of the Joyflower Palace. Then we can send the armies out to expand our territory and conquer everything around us! At the same time, we’ll continue strengthening the spell formations to make sure that we soundly vanquish the Cipher-Devil Sword Sect when they come.”

“Yes ma’am,” the young women said, and they immediately got busy. Instantly, drastic transformations occurred within the Dao Defense League.

For now, the Dao Defense League was part of the Joyflower Palace and had nothing to do with Yang Qi.

Just like that, the work of Yang Qi’s own hand was taken. Even as he headed into the Great Necropolis, he shivered as he could see the drastic transformations with his mind’s eye, and could sense the flower-like vital energy spreading about, changing both the atmosphere and the hearts of the people.

It was all part of the price he needed to pay. However, it would only be a matter of time before he returned and took everything back.

Apparently, the two women escorting him noticed the look on his face.

Smiling coldly, one of them said, “Let’s go, God-General! Remember, you’re part of the Joyflower Palace now. The Dao Defense League has nothing to do with you anymore.”

“Your flesh, blood, and soul all belong to the Joyflower Palace,” the other one said. “You serve us, understand? With everything!”

Yang Qi simply nodded as he followed them into the Great Necropolis.

They followed a complex route for some time, heading through numerous pathways and planes of existence. Eventually, a new universe appeared in front of them, seemingly endless and filled with the fragrance of flowers. Within its depths were entire planets made of flowers, and in the center of all of them was a huge palace of similar construction.

It was none other than the Joyflower Palace.

Chapter 867: Joining the Joyflower Palace

‘So, this is the universe the Joyflower Palace created here in the Great Necropolis?’ Yang Qi was shocked by the endless universe of flowers and petals. When he inhaled, he sensed the fragrance of seemingly infinite flowers and could feel surging vital energy flowing through him.

The Cruiser of Civilization immediately reacted.

[Beep-beep-beep. Beep-beep-beep. Heterogeneous power detected. Soft and feminine power from the god world, perfect for use by female cultivators but unsuitable for males. Males who absorb this vital energy long-term will transform physically and on the level of their soul. They will become neither male nor female, and will likely never be able to recover.]

‘Oh? This Myriad Flowers True Energy is pretty incredible. Thankfully, King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans can refine any type of true energy into something I can use. So this stuff shouldn’t affect me at all.’ He immediately called on the talismans to devour the incoming true energy and transform it into Heaven-Devouring śarīras, each of which seemed to contain a myriad of flowers. Yang Qi then used the fire of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth to melt the śarīras, causing an immensely powerful type of true energy to fill him.

A moment later the power assessment systems chimed in.

[Having been converted, this true energy is now mild and peaceful, and can be used to neutralize even the most powerful yang-type true energy.]

‘Perfect. It seems I’ll really be able to flex my muscles in the Joyflower Palace. Do these women really think they can outdo me?’ He chuckled coldly in his heart, now more confident than ever that few people in the Joyflower Palace would actually be a threat to his life. Of course, the legendary empress was obviously high on that list.

Carefully sending out some of his will, he could tell from the fluctuations emanating out of the palace of flowers that there were many experts with power indexes of five hundred or greater, perhaps even above a thousand. Unless he planned to make a getaway with the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, it would be dangerous to directly search for the palace's treasure storehouse.

“We’ve arrived,” one of his escorts said. “This is the Joyflower Palace, located in the very center of the Universe of Flowers. That’s the central palace up ahead, but of course you don’t qualify to enter it. Understand? Men aren’t allowed there, and any found inside are executed!”

Yang Qi nodded to show that he had heard, and even plastered a look of terror on his face that seemed to please the two women.

“After you’ve officially been appointed as a god-general,” the second escort said, “you can’t just go wherever you like in the Universe of Flowers. In fact, you can’t go anywhere until you receive orders. For now, we’ll take you to the planet of flowers occupied by the god-generals. Someone there will tell you what to do going forward.”

She pulled out a spirit talisman that directed them to a thrumming teleportation portal. After stepping onto it, they were whisked away to one of the many flower planets.

It was enormous, at least as large as a twentieth ranked immortal world. It had rivers, oceans, and other beautiful scenery. However, what was most noteworthy was how the surface of the planet featured numerous enormous prisons, all of them filled with men.

The men were clearly incarcerated, but somehow didn’t look like prisoners. Most of them sat around chatting, clad in suits of armor. However, when they saw the two women approaching, expressions of fear flitted across their faces.

“These are the god-generals,” one of his escorts said. “They handle minor affairs here in the Joyflower Palace.”

“Uh…” Yang Qi said, looking surprised. “Are they prisoners?”

“You could say that. The god-generals are all men who refused to follow the commands of the Joyflower Palace out on the Ancient Road to the Gods, or even fought against us. Technically, it’s a barracks, not a prison. Anyway, this is where you’ll live from now on, got it?”

Apparently, the women expected him to get angry, but instead he cringed and said, “But why? Why do you do things this way?”

The two young women exchanged glances, and they were both thinking the same thing. ‘This guy is such a weakling! He's never been on the Ancient Road to the Gods, so upon seeing truly powerful people, he's scared out of his mind. How did he ever become the league-lord of that so-called Dao Defense League? Well, his true energy is impressive. Although, why did the Cipher-Devil Sword Sect ever agree to work with him? In any case, it will only be a matter of time before we get the chance to suck his true energy dry.’

“It doesn’t matter,” one of the escorts said. “You’re a god-general now, and you rank higher than most of the people here. In fact, your quarters are a bit larger.” Smiling coldly, the two women led him to a rather large building just in front of the main barracks.

There were other men there, all of them with power indexes of fifty or higher, and a few who were over a hundred. All of them were famous people on the Ancient Road to the Gods, but now they were essentially prisoners of the Joyflower Palace. As for the men in the other ‘barracks’, they all had power indexes of less than fifty.

When the two women landed in front of the building, a host of men flew out from inside, all of them pulsing with incredible auras. They wore brightly-colored robes, and not a single one of them had any facial hair. In fact, they emanated strange auras that smacked of both yin and yang, indicating that they were probably eunuchs. For some reason, Yang Qi got the impression that they were all twisted individuals.

The eunuchs approached, and as Yang Qi looked over them, he identified one of the higher-ranking ones who had a power index of over two hundred, which was roughly the same level as himself.

The high-ranking eunuch stepped forward and offered a respectful salute. Obviously, his high power index hadn’t done anything to change the fact that he had a very low ranking compared to the two young women. “Young Ladies, are you here on the orders of Her Majesty, Flower Goddess Purity?”

“That’s right, Eunuch Tian,” one of the women said. “This is the league-lord of the Dao Defense League from the mortal world, who received a blessing from the Cipher-Devil Sword Sect. He has incredible true energy and fighting prowess. Elder Sister Purity ordered us to escort him here for you to instruct and teach. He’s a god-general, and will soon be promoted to the position of court eunuch. Got it?”

“Yes ma’am,” Eunuch Tian replied. “Your humble servant will follow all of your orders down to the last detail, Young Ladies. Incidentally, here are a few gifts that I hope you can pass along to Miss Purity. Of course, we’ve included gifts to you two as well, to thank you for all your hard work.”

Eunuch Tian waved his hand and two of the lower-ranking eunuchs rushed forward with arms full of boxes, all of which pulsed with such immense godliness that it was obvious they contained a host of valuable items.

The two escorts nodded. “Since you understand how to be tactful, we won’t nitpick. Just don't forget that, with a single word from us, you’ll suffer the misery of soul absorption.”

“We know full well that when you lead the god-generals out into the Great Necropolis, you always find plenty of valuable loot. In the future, you need to share more with us. Elder Sister Purity is working on an important task, and when she’s finished she’ll definitely earn a lot of favor in the eyes of the empress. In fact, she’ll likely be promoted. The more you curry favor with her, the better things will turn out for you. Understand?”

“Yes, yes of course!” Eunuch Tian said. “We’ll do our best to curry even more favor!”

Suddenly, a silver key appeared in his hand, which he used to open the gate of the main barracks. Smiling viciously at Yang Qi, he said, “Since Miss Purity has ordered me to take care of you, I’ll do just that, boy. As a god-general, make sure you work hard and fight well on your missions, understand? Eventually, you’ll become a court eunuch working for me. If you stick close to me, we can rise through the ranks of the Joyflower Palace and eventually earn a high position in the god world.”

As the words left his mouth, he flicked his sleeve, causing a stream of energy to sweep out and send Yang Qi into the prison barracks. Then the door slammed shut.

“Stay put and follow orders,” one of the escorts said to Yang Qi. “You’ll get a mission soon enough. In the meantime, use that Myriad Transformations Energy Pearl to absorb the Myriad Flowers True Energy of this universe. If you don't, you’ll end up in immense pain and will be unable to expel the energy.”

“If you serve the Joyflower Palace loyally,” the other escort said, “you’ll benefit greatly.”

Yang Qi made himself look crestfallen and completely at a loss for words.

Chuckling, the two women flew away.

Afterward, Eunuch Tian looked back at Yang Qi and simultaneously addressed one of the lower-ranking eunuchs. “Little Wang, it seems to me this punk is being a bit defiant. Have some of the other god-generals teach him a good lesson! Make sure he fully acknowledges allegiance! Just make sure not to kill him. Furthermore, he looks like he might be a good ‘cultivation vessel,’ so it's entirely possible he might catch the eye of some of the other flower goddesses. That’s only further reason to be careful with him.”

“Understood,” the lower-ranking eunuch said. “Don’t worry, this isn’t my first time handling situations like this.” Long ago, this lower-ranking eunuch had been a Grand Emperor on the Ancient Road to the Gods, but after being captured and dealt with by the Joyflower Palace, he was now quite servile.

Yang Qi immediately understood the situation.

Obviously, the empress and her people were freaks, and were using practices common in the mortal world to deal with mighty Grand Emperors. It was clear that they must hate men in general, otherwise they wouldn’t use these methods.

However, as the saying went, if you can’t do anything about the situation, you might as well sit back and enjoy it. And in the end, he could always escape with the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart if he absolutely had to. He could also use the Cruiser of Civilization to create a power double to remain behind as a decoy.

The prison was huge, a veritable continent, and there were a lot of men populating it, all of them Grand Emperors who had been captured on the Ancient Road to the Gods.

After all, the population of the Ancient Road to the Gods surpassed that of the Present Age, the Future Age, and the Primeval Age all put together. It was a true battlefield, a complete hodgepodge of good and bad people.

As soon as the gate closed behind Yang Qi, plenty of people looked over at him. Some of them simply glanced at him and then went back to meditation and breathing exercises. Some glared at him malevolently, as though they already wished to give him a vicious beating. Others were clearly interested in killing him and absorbing his cultivation base. Some seemed genuinely interested in befriending him.

Just about every attitude possible was present.

These were the god-generals, each and every one of them a prisoner.

He found a place to sit down, whereupon a group of people approached. “Brother, how did you end up here? The prisons of the Joyflower Palace are very dangerous places!”

Chapter 868: Slaves

“Brother, how did you get captured? From your power fluctuations, it seems you’re no weakling!”

There were five burly men, all of whom had power indexes from as weak as seventy to well over a hundred. Their cultivation bases were powerful, and they were obviously the kind of individuals who wouldn’t hesitate to slaughter their enemies.

That said, Yang Qi could sense that they didn’t have ill intentions. Nodding, he said, “I founded a large organization that the Joyflower Palace wanted. They said that if I joined them, it would be to my benefit and I would become an important god-general. Obviously, they lied. How could I ever have guessed that I would end up a prisoner?”

The strongest among the group of five said, “Sorry, Brother, but you really were a bit foolish. You see, you can’t trust anyone from the Joyflower Palace. Those damned women are better than anyone at lying and cheating. And no one could be more despicable and contemptible. Even worse, they’re all complete perverts!”

“Eldest Brother, keep your voice down,” one of the other men said. “If word spreads that we’re insulting the Joyflower Palace, we’ll definitely suffer because of it.”

“If we suffer, we suffer,” the leader said, shaking his head grimly. However, he did lower his voice. “We're the Five Hegemons of the Heavenly Kingdom,” he continued. “The women from the Joyflower Palace invaded our headquarters, killed our wives and children, and enslaved us. Trust me, we would have fled already if we could have. There are only two possible fates in store for us: either we die, or we become court eunuchs. And we’d rather die than become genderless freaks like them. On the Ancient Road to the Gods, we were domineering hegemons who ruled for a hundred million years. Now here we are.”

Yang Qi nodded. The hatred emanating from these five men was nearly palpable. ‘So these five are called the Five Hegemons of the Heavenly Kingdom, and they hate the Joyflower Palace down to their bones.’

The five of them obviously longed to see the Joyflower Palace destroyed, but were so powerless that they didn’t dare to say anything about it out loud.

‘They were once powerful figures on the Ancient Road to the Gods,’ he thought. ‘I wonder if there are any others like them here in the prison. If so, I might be able to manipulate them into rising up in revolt.’ All of a sudden, an idea occurred to him. ‘The main way the Joyflower Palace controls them is with those Myriad Transformations Energy Pearls. But if I negate the heterogeneous true energy for them…. Well, in any case, I can’t cause too much of a scene right now.’

Yang Qi knew that he had to be very careful, and that the best course of action would be to lay low, find their treasure storehouses, and learn more about the secrets of their organization.

“Brother, why don't we work together?” one of the five said. “It’s dangerous being a slave of the Joyflower Palace, but you seem pretty strong. Next time we get assigned a mission out in the Great Necropolis, we can stick together and watch each other’s backs. A lot of our old friends have already died, so sticking together is more important than ever.”

Yang Qi nodded, but gave a rather noncommittal response. “Sure. Next time there’s a mission, we should think about working together.”

Crash!

All of a sudden, the main gates of the prison slammed open and a wave of power surged inside. Several god-generals entered, and the mere sight of them caused everyone present to edge backward. Some even shrank down into the shadows. Obviously, these new arrivals were famous people.

“The Three Ruthless Fiends!” murmured one of the Five Hegemons of the Heavenly Kingdom. He and the rest of his brethren were all visibly fearful.

‘Such incredible power!’ Yang Qi thought. From what he could tell, all three of these individuals had power indexes over two hundred, as well as vicious, evil auras that could shake heaven and earth, and strike fear into the hearts of ordinary Grand Emperors. Almost immediately, all three of them noticed Yang Qi.

“Who's the new god-general?” one of them said, a skinny, emaciated fellow who looked almost like a terrifying skeleton. “Are you that guy named Yang Qi?”

Leaning over quietly, the leader of the five hegemons said, “Brother, these are the Three Ruthless Fiends, deputy wardens among the god-generals in this prison. They’re unusually cruel and ruthless, so be careful. That skin-and-bones fellow is called Ruthless Heaven-Fiend, and the other two are Ruthless Earth-Fiend and Ruthless Man-Fiend. They were famous back on the Ancient Road to the Gods, where they were known as spectacular villains. Nobody has any idea how they ended up getting captured by the Joyflower Palace.”

“Thanks for the information!” Yang Qi replied. From the way the Five Hegemons of the Heavenly Kingdom were clustering around him, it seemed they were trying to get on his good side by resolving the situation for him.

Meanwhile, the emaciated Ruthless Heaven-Fiend said, “Get the hell out of the way, you five. What do you think you’re going to do, fight us? If you want to recruit allies, do it somewhere else. Everybody already knows everybody else in this prison, didn’t you know that? Everyone here follows our rules, that’s how things have always worked. If you get in our way, we won't hesitate to use our Ruthless Vein-Shattering Palm.”

“Do we really need to do things this way, Big Bro Ruthless Heaven-Fiend?” one of the five hegemons said. “We’re all down on our luck here, and should be working together. The Joyflower Palace will eventually pay for tricking all of us, so why should we fight amongst ourselves?”

“You should mind your own business!” Ruthless Earth-Fiend growled, taking a step forward. He was a tall, burly man with bulging muscles, who thrummed with explosive power. “You five pieces of trash ought to just drop dead. We three are about to become cultivation vessels for one of the holy daughters. After we practice yin-yang dual cultivation, we’ll become far more important than those damned eunuchs. As consorts of one of the holy daughters, we're going to advance the interests of the Joyflower Palace!”

BOOM!

Before Ruthless Earth-Fiend even finished speaking, he unleashed a fist strike, causing ruthless energy to flow out like a river, instantly splitting into five parts that headed toward each of the Five Hegemons of the Heavenly Kingdom.

Without any hesitation, the five hegemons unleashed counter attacks.

Bam. Bam. Bam. Bam. Bam.

All five of them were sent flying backward, blood spraying out of their mouths. They had been defeated with a single move!

They slammed into the ground, looks of shock filling their faces. “You… Ruthless Earth-Fiend, how did your energy arts advance so much!? You beat us with one move?”

Ruthless Earth-Fiend burst out laughing. “You scummy slaves think you're our equals? You’re god-general prisoners! We’ve already been selected by Flower Goddess Lotus Shadow to be consorts, to serve at her beck and call as cultivation vessels, helping harmonize her yin and yang energies! There’s no way we’ll ever be eunuchs, and in fact, we’ll have more future prospects than ever!”

Laughing heartily, he continued, “Slaves. Eunuchs. Consorts. We outrank you so much that we could kill you, if we wanted. So do you really dare to compare yourself to us, much less defy us?”

“Myriad Ruthless Savage Bone Claws!” he thrust his palm out, and it became a savage claw that multiplied into the thousands, all of which headed directly toward Yang Qi.

“Agggghhhhh!” Yang Qi screamed as if in agony.

The truth was that his true self had already slipped into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, leaving behind a power double created by the Cruiser of Civilization. However, it was an extremely realistic power double that even had veins filled with real power.

The power double not only absorbed all of the torment from the Three Ruthless Fiends, but it was also able to probe at their true energy to learn about them. In fact, he could brand them with some of Yang Qi’s true energy and nascent divinity, using a new ability from the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, something called the Heaven-God Hell-Exterminating Devil Embryo.

During the months leading up to joining the Joyflower Palace, Yang Qi had worked very hard on his cultivation and had gained a lot of enlightenment into the transformations of the dao of heaven. And he had pushed his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth to new heights, gaining enlightenment of quite a few new energy arts, the Heaven-God Hell-Exterminating Devil Embryo among them.

It involved taking his own vital energy and using it to create a devil embryo, which he would then insert into his enemy’s true energy. Although his enemy would have no idea it was present, it would absorb that person’s animadestiny quintessence vitality, doing so so slowly and surreptitiously that they would be completely drained before they realized what was happening.

It could be likened to a tree planted in the middle of a fertile field, which would eventually drain the field of all nutrients.

Although the Three Ruthless Fiends thought that they were inflicting torturous punishment on Yang Qi, the truth was that it was just a power double, and their every move was actually further infecting them.

RIP!

A final fist strike from Ruthless Earth-Fiend caused Yang Qi’s power double to cough up blood, his meridians apparently shattered. Ruthless Earth-Fiend grinned viciously and finally let his fist drop to his side. Looking at Yang Qi gasping for breath, he felt quite pleased. “Don’t blame us, boy. We're just following orders. Newcomers all need to get a beat-down. Just remember that you need to be completely loyal to the Joyflower Palace. If you do, you might end up getting picked to be a consort.”

With that, the three fiends turned and left.

Back in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, Yang Qi glanced out at his power double, then turned to Flower Mildcloud and said, “Where is the Joyflower Palace’s treasure storehouse located?”

“What?” she replied. “You want to rob the Joyflower Palace’s storehouse? Is that even possible? Hey, I'm from the Joyflower Palace, too. Are you really going to betray my sect?”

Yang Qi smiled coldly. “Sorry to say that, yes, I am going to destroy that sect of yours, or die in the attempt. Your Joyflower Palace lied to me, telling me some story about becoming a god-general. But I'm really nothing more than a slave. They stole from me and harmed me, and you still expect me to treat them kindly? No. In the end, the Joyflower Palace is going to be razed to the ground.”

Chapter 869: Hunting for Treasure

“You’re not yet strong enough to destroy the Joyflower Palace,” Flower Mildcloud replied. “That said, considering how they treated you, it makes sense to seek revenge. Just don’t drag me into it. If you end up getting strong enough to take them down, then you truly deserve to be called a great hero. But involving me is just going to get me killed. After all, it is my sect we're talking about.”

Yang Qi laughed. “Great hero? I don’t think so. In this world, heroes don’t end up living very long. In any case, don’t worry, I won’t force you to do anything you don’t wish to do. But mark my words, I will destroy the Joyflower Palace sooner or later. With the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, I can go anywhere I want in the Joyflower Palace. The empresses’ palace is built on the Passionless God Flower, a magical treasure that rivals the Aeonic God Temple. And that flower is going to be mine soon.”

“I look forward to seeing that happen,” she replied. “Does this mean that you’re going to imprison me here in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart? Am I to have no freedom?”

“I want you to stay here for now and work on your cultivation. You know too many of my secrets, and it would be problematic if they leaked to the Joyflower Palace. Obviously, I can’t let you out, and I'm not going to negotiate on that point. Don’t waste your words. You know what kind of person I am; I'm not stirred easily by arguments or pleas.”

Although Yang Qi had not learned anything useful from Flower Mildcloud during their conversation, he still wasn’t inclined to use force on her. Obviously, she could still be of help in dealing with the Joyflower Palace.

“Are you alright, brother?” the Five Hegemons of the Heavenly Kingdom said as they hurried over to Yang Qi and set up a spell formation to heal him and replenish his energy.

A moment later, he opened his eyes as his true self returned and replaced the power double. “I offer my thanks to the five of you,” he said. “From now on, the six of us definitely have to work together on any missions we get.”

“Excellent, Brother. It's good to see you know how things work around here. We should be getting a new mission in a few days. When the time comes, we’ll definitely need your help.”

All of a sudden, sinister laughter reached their ears from several different directions, followed by equally sinister voices. “Five Hegemons of the Heavenly Kingdom, don’t you know that in a few days we’ll be heading out to the Exquisite Desert, one of the most dangerous locations in the Great Necropolis? Supposedly, the place is full of dangerous god souls, and we need to find the ones that have godhood. Few people have ever returned from missions like this, so do you really think recruiting some new cannon fodder will bring you the luck you need? Save your lives?”

“That’s right, not many of us will come out of the Exquisite Desert alive. It never hurts to have a little extra cannon fodder.”

“So, you five hegemons really are trying to become consorts of the exalted flower goddesses, eh?”

“Anyone who accomplishes the mission in the Exquisite Desert will be considered quite valuable, and will likely be rewarded directly by the flower goddess. Who knows, maybe there’s a chance to become a consort.”

“Yeah, but none of the open spots will go to the Five Hegemons of the Heavenly Kingdom, that’s for sure.”

From the words Yang Qi heard, he could tell that the Five Hegemons of the Heavenly Kingdom were definitely not good people. They wanted him as part of their team in the hopes that it would improve their chances of accomplishing their next mission. However, instead of commenting on that, Yang Qi just said, “As long as we stick together, we should be able to accomplish the mission no matter how dangerous it is. Remember, if we don’t immediately succeed, we have to avoid infighting. Otherwise we’ll definitely end up dead.”

“Excellent, Brother, you really can see the bigger picture! If we can just accomplish this mission, it will count as a huge service, and maybe we really can become consorts to one of the flower goddesses. Then we’ll completely outrank the other prisoners, and we also won’t be in danger of becoming eunuchs. We have to succeed!”

“I understand,” Yang Qi said. Closing his eyes, he pretended to focus on healing his injuries. However, what he really did was send his true body back into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, leaving behind another power double.

The prison was built on primeval god formations, so without the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, he would definitely have been stuck. It was for that reason that even top figures from the Ancient Road to the Gods would end up stranded there.

Thankfully, Yang Qi could get in and out easily, leaving him free to sneak into the central palace that was the Passionless God Flower. Once he was able to find the ultimate treasure storehouse, he would plan how to clean it out in one fell swoop before anyone from the Joyflower Palace realized what was happening.

Yang Qi’s control of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart had reached the point of almost complete perfection, especially after the most recent three-month period of cultivation. His immortal-slaying clone had also advanced rapidly.

The chart currently contained all of his long-time supporters, including everyone from the old Rich-Lush Continent. The Invincible Society was also there, along with Empress Jadefall. He didn’t want to leave those people behind in the Dao Defense League, where they might attract the wrong kind of attention.

As for Cipher Rite-Heaven and the others, he kept them near the immortal-slaying clone. The more deeply he was able to draw on his King Immortal-Slayer legacy medallions, the more skills and abilities they seemed to unlock. The godpower of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart only continued to benefit the clone and the seventy-one patriarchs.

Given some time, and assuming he could get another of the legacy medallions, the clones and the patriarchs’ cultivation bases would reach the level of those experts who traveled the Ancient Road to the Gods.

‘Time to open a pathway to the palace!’

Moments later, he saw a panoramic view of the universe that contained the Passionless God Flower. It hung there in one of the pathways in the Great Necropolis, specifically, in what was some sort of empty stone chamber, the walls of which were laced with god crystals.

Clearly, this place had once been the lair of some enormous god soul.

“Zoom in!” Yang Qi commanded, and his view of the Universe of Flowers began to magnify, closing in on the palace itself. It was huge, obviously too large to explore bit by bit. And most likely, overt surveillance of the place would be noticed, which would cause a lot of problems.

‘The Joyflower Palace really is incredibly powerful. In fact, I don’t even think experts with power indexes over a thousand could do anything to it. If I sneak inside, I need to be very, very careful, otherwise I’ll find destruction raining down on my head. Worst case scenario, I can flee through the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart and hope they didn’t notice there was a god-general where he shouldn’t be.’ The first step would be to enter the palace in a safe place.

Obviously, if he entered in a dangerous location, he could easily end up dead, and that wasn’t an option.

He continued to observe the palace, utilizing various energy arts to analyze the movements of the place. After a while, he hadn’t been able to find any suitable location to enter it, but at least he had a better idea of its general configuration and movement.

RUMBLE!

All of a sudden, the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart identified a secret location in the depths of the Passionless God Flower that provoked intense trembling in the chart.

The immortal-slaying clone opened his eyes and looked up to see the legacy medallions vibrating.

‘What? Another of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions? My god!’ Yang Qi nearly leaped to his feet in excitement. ‘There are only two pieces left out there, and I thought they were in the future world! Are they really here? Wait, it looks like only one piece is here, not two.’

It was to his complete and utter shock that he had sensed another legacy medallion right in the Joyflower Palace. If he could acquire that piece, he would have eight in total, and his immortal-slaying clone would instantly become hundreds or thousands of times stronger. Furthermore, he would be able to access even more items and abilities in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

‘And here I thought I wasn’t strong enough to deal with the Joyflower Palace. But if there’s one of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions in there, and I can get to it, maybe it will lead me right to the treasure storehouse. Where else would they store them? God Legion Seal!”

Golden script suddenly flowed out of Yang Qi’s forehead, connecting to his seven legacy medallions and ensuring that no one would be able to detect them.

‘It looks like heaven is really on my side in this. If the Joyflower Palace has one of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions, their destruction will come sooner rather than later!’ He shrank down to the size of a mote of dust and drew upon a consummate art from the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. It put him into something like a state of hibernation in hell, drawing on the boundless devils of the yellow springs to turn him into something like a lifeless and destructionless god.

It was another aspect of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth called the Lifeless-Destructionless Nirvanic-Destruction Kalpa Body Magic, which would make him almost impossible to detect.

Having no other options in the Great Necropolis, Yang Qi was drawing on all sorts of abilities from the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.

WHOOSH!

With that, he slipped into the Joyflower Palace, heading to a distant garden filled with mountains, rivers, and plenty of flowers. At first, he did nothing, hoping to avoid causing vital energy fluctuations or activating deadly spell formations.

In the middle of the garden was a temple, and within the temple, two people were talking.

Also in the temple was one of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions.

Chapter 870: Eight Legacy Medallions

The eighth of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions had appeared, and Yang Qi had absolutely no reason not to try snatching it. After all, it would come with immense benefits. Unfortunately, the central palace in the Passionless God Flower was an incredibly dangerous place, and it would be easy to instigate mountain-crushing, sea-shattering catastrophes.

Yang Qi could sense that the garden he was in abounded with warding magics. The ornamental rocks, streams, flowers, stone benches and tables all contained enigmatically powerful spell formations. Obviously, such things would completely ignore authorized personnel. However, if outsiders intruded they would react with terrifying power, attracting a lot of attention.

He suddenly extended his hand, and back in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, Flower Mildcloud suddenly felt a very odd sensation, as if she had just lost something. Looking around, she shrugged, assuming it was some strange transformation of the chart around her. The truth was that Yang Qi had just taken a bit of her aura and destiny.

It was similar to how, after killing Chancellor Demi-Immortal, he had taken his soul destiny, which later enabled him to travel into the Heaven Beyond Heaven and the Aeonic God Temple.

With her destiny, Yang Qi could immediately sense that the surrounding vital energy wasn’t trying to expel him, leaving him able to move much more freely. Drawing on the full abilities of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, he headed toward the sound of conversation up ahead. Eventually, he was able to see inside the structure, where several people were seated around a table having a discussion.

One of the nearby pillars was protected with powerful warding magics, but using Heaven-Devouring True Energy, he quickly acquired the approval of the spell formations, and slipped into their protection, making it seem like he was part of the pillar.

The first person at the table that drew his attention was a graceful woman dressed in elegant garments. She wore a crown of myriad flowers, all of which were as green as emerald. In fact, she herself seemed to be sculpted from jade, and she emanated a profound aura that indicated her cultivation base was vastly superior to that of Elder Sister Purity.

There were also some men sitting at the table, all of them dignified and imposing, wearing military uniforms. Unexpectedly, they weren’t from the Joyflower Palace, but from the future world!

The highest-ranking among them was a young man with sword-like eyebrows and a profound smile. Most shocking of all, he bore a striking resemblance to Proud Heaven.

He was flanked by several generalissimos, all of them equipped with strange, organic mechas. In the future world, these mechas were legendary, and were supposedly crafted from the bones, flesh, and blood of gods and devils. Obviously, such mechas were incredibly powerful, and came with all sorts of mysterious functions.

‘Is that one of Proud Heaven’s sons? And why exactly do the people of the future world want to work with Joyflower Palace?’ Yang Qi’s eyes drifted to a white jade box that lay on the table, within which was an object wrapped in cloths embroidered with powerful scriptures. That object emanated the aura of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions. Yang Qi had to resist the urge to instantly jump out and grab it; obviously, getting his hands on it wasn’t going to be easy. And if he failed, the consequences could well be death.

Instead, he stayed in place and listened to the conversation.

“Young Sir Proud Ethics,” said the woman in the crown of emerald flowers, “we heard that the ten magisters of your future world have extremely profound cultivation bases. Supposedly, they’re almost at the level of the legion of gods. I'm very curious as to their exact level.

“It is upon the request of your magisters that you brought a precious gift in the form of one of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions. But why, exactly? What type of cooperation do you want with our Joyflower Palace?”

The young man named Proud Ethics chuckled. “You flatter the magisters. A Grand Emperor on the ninth stair of the Heavenly Stairway would have a power index of a few dozen. Perhaps the ten magisters have power indexes in the tens of thousands, but your empress is roughly at the same level. The reason we’re offering you this gift of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallion is that we want to acquire godhood. It's that simple. It's wonderful that the Great Necropolis has come, but the ten magisters are currently in the Primeval Age, working hard to unravel a warding spell that will give them a God Legion Seal. Obviously, they have no time to come to the Ancient Road to the Gods right now. However, once they get that God Legion Seal, the Great Necropolis will belong to the future world, and then they will proceed to the god world!”

“God Legion Seal…?” she said, her face falling. “The legendary God Legion Seal is a boundless treasure from the god world. In fact, it shouldn’t even exist in the god world itself. It was split into three parts, which were sent to the past, present and future. You expended all of the incredible resources and effort to go to the Primeval Age to add another piece to your collection? Does that mean your purpose in the Immortal Dao Age is to find the third piece of the God Legion Seal? Do you already know where it is?”

Yang Qi was shaken by what he was hearing.

Of course, he was aware that Proud Heaven knew he possessed the God Legion Seal. But it was a surprise that he had told his son any detail about it. After all, it was a monumental secret, and it was impossible to predict what chaos could ensue, if word spread.

“We have no idea where the third God Legion Seal is,” Proud Ethics said. “Of course, we’ll do our best to find out. The main reason we've come here today is to ask the Joyflower Palace where we can acquire godhood of our own. The future world needs large amounts of it!”

“We need large amounts of godhood too,” was the response. “So why should we work with you? Don’t forget, here at the Joyflower Palace, we hate men more than anything. The fact that we're sitting down talking with people like you is kindness enough as it is.”

“Miss Jade Nightqueen, whether or not you hate men is your personal affair. But matters of profit transcend everything. In this world, principles are principles, and profit is profit. Truly ambitious and ruthless people can abandon principles for profit and become truly invincible.”

As it turned out, this young woman’s name was Jade Nightqueen. Obviously, it was a reference to the night queen flower, which would blossom in an instant, then quickly fade into nirvanic extermination. It also represented incredible power.

“Why would we abandon our principles?” Jade Nightqueen said. “What kind of profit can you bring us? One of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions? What are we supposed to do with only one? If you were offering nine, it might be tempting.”

Proud Ethics laughed. “Nine of them would provoke drastic transformations in heaven and earth. King Immortal-Slayer would be resurrected, and his will would descend upon myriads of worlds, putting an end to countless entities. Is your Joyflower Palace really so arrogant as to think you could deal with that? You can directly stand up to the will of King Immortal-Slayer? Fight it? Even if your empress were a Lesser God, it would be impossible for her. There is only one thing in existence that could control the wills of King Immortal-Slayer and the other seventy-two monarchs.”

“The God Legion Seal,” Jade Nightqueen said.

“Exactly. The God Legion Seal. You see, in the grand scheme of things, your Joyflower Palace is actually quite weak compared to the future world. It won’t be long before the magisters return, and with two pieces of the God Legion Seal in our possession, do you really think you could resist us?” Proud Ethics’s aura was particularly oppressive, as if he were drawing on some sort of powerful divine ability.

“You've got a lot of guts to come in here and talk to me like that!” Jade Nightqueen said, waves of killing intent pulsing from her. “Aren’t you worried I might take you captive?”

“Take us captive?” Proud Ethics chuckled. “That's fine with me. You want us to be consorts? Clearly you didn’t notice that we're not here as our true selves. These are all projections, the product of the science and technology of the future world. Only a god would be able to pierce through the illusion.”

“Projections? All of you are projections?” Jade Nightqueen’s cheek twitched. “I see. Very powerful projections. The future world truly is amazing. Well, I suppose we should carefully consider your offer of cooperation.”

“I think it’s safe to assume, Miss Jade Nightqueen, that you can’t make a decision about that on your own. But still, please accept this legacy medallion as a show of good faith, and take it to your empress. Incidentally, there’s a letter in the box, written by my father, Magister Proud Heaven, and addressed to your empress. In the past, one of my father’s incarnations got to know your empress on the Ancient Road to the Gods. Hopefully their previous acquaintance can dispel some of her suspicions and convince her that the future world truly does want to work with her.”

“Oh? I wasn’t aware of that.” Jade Nightqueen knew that her empress had been a powerful force on the Ancient Road to the Gods for hundreds of millions of years. She had killed countless enemies, subjugated numerous rulers, taken a host of god items, and eventually founded the sprawling Joyflower Palace. But all of that played out before Jade Nightqueen had come along.

After a moment of thought, she said, “If it’s true that your Magister Proud Heaven is an acquaintance of our empress, that’s a matter we should keep secret. At the moment, the empress is in a dangerous location in the Great Necropolis, trying to acquire some godhood. Not even we can get in there to pass along information. Until she returns, I’ll take the legacy medallion and the letter, and seal them in the treasure storehouse. Once she’s back, she can make the decision about what to do.”

“Of course,” Proud Ethics replied. “We can wait until she returns. Thanks for your hard work, Miss Jade Nightqueen. After the future world and the Joyflower Palace finalize our alliance, I hope you’ll accept my invitation to go to the future world with me. I’d love to show you around!”

Chapter 871: Treasure Storehouse

As Proud Ethics and his men left, Jade Nightqueen let out an angry hiss.

‘The future world really is truly powerful,’ she thought. ‘Those ten magisters are like god-spirits in human form. They actually have one of the God Legion Seals? Damnation! Even the legion of gods would fight viciously for something like that, and they have one? Just think of the powers it could provide. According to the rumors, it contains a boundless energy art known as the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, which contains the majestic power of ancient godmammoths. The quintessence of that energy art is to crush hells, and if you cultivate it, your every move will be filled with endless strength. Someone with an energy art like that could easily crush anyone in their path on the Ancient Road to the Gods….’

At this point, a young woman who looked as pure and fair as a snow lotus walked into the room. She seemed completely untainted by the imperfections of the world, and was surrounded by the same sea of misty white clouds that would wreath a snow-capped peak.

Anyone who looked at her would likely recall the line of poetry: The bright moon rises above the Heavenly Mountain, from amidst the vast ocean of clouds. It made her seem elegant, transcendent, and holy, separate from the world in all ways.

She was another of the ten flower goddesses.

“What do you think the future world is up to here, Serene Snowlotus?” Jade Nightqueen asked. “If they weren’t projections, I would’ve detained them and forced them into slavery. Maybe even made them all eunuchs!”

“Don’t get too hasty, Junior Sister Jade Nightqueen,” replied Serene Snowlotus. “The future world is trying to get their hands on some godhood from the Great Necropolis. Unfortunately, they’re not strong enough at the moment. The only thing they have going for them are those ten magisters that are currently caught up fighting the experts from the Primeval Age for the God Legion Seal. In any case, they won’t be coming here any time soon. If they were able to come here, their minions wouldn’t be wasting time trying to get our help.”

“So what should we do? Don’t tell me you think we should hand some godhood over to them?”

“Calm down,” Serene Snowlotus said coolly. “First we need to get the empress’ opinion. And we also need to see if the future world has any other plans or goals. For now, things haven’t even begun to take shape. By the way, I heard that Orchid Purity went to the Immortal Dao Age and has already started to build a strong foundation there! The fact that she's building up universal fortune has earned the admiration of many of the elders. The destiny she's sending to the empress will allow the dao of heaven to give birth to an intense dao of slaughter. With that, our attempts to acquire godhood will reach an even higher level, and we’ll soon be the dominant force both in the Great Necropolis and the Ancient Road to the Gods! Of course, all of this is going to make Orchid Purity both more important and more dangerous.”

“I think we need to subvert Orchid Purity’s efforts, although not too obviously. Do you have any good ideas, Elder Sister?”

“From what I've heard, they’re able to gather the universal fortune mainly because they took over something called the Dao Defense League. They also arrested the league-lord, someone named Yang Qi, and imprisoned him as a god-general. Perhaps we can cause problems for the Dao Defense League to advance our own position. Either way, we definitely can’t let Orchid Purity gain any traction.”

“Agreed.”

“Let's find an appropriate opportunity to summon Yang Qi and assess his temperament and skills. Maybe we can recruit him to our side. Orchid Purity and her people use trickery to enslave people, which always leaves them angry and thirsting for revenge. People like that make the perfect pawns….”

With that, they continued discussing Yang Qi.

Of course, he heard everything they were saying and couldn’t help but laugh coldly as a result. ‘So, even in the Joyflower Palace, there’s scheming and infighting. It’s just as bad as the palace intrigue in the mortal world. I guess it's just human nature. The only way to avoid this would be to have forces made up only of fanatically loyal angels. Well, at least I can use this to my advantage.’

At a certain point, Flower Goddess Jade Nightqueen said, “Let’s not rush into anything, Elder Sister Snowlotus. We can always finalize the plan later. For now, let’s take this gift from the future world and seal it in the treasure storehouse. When the empress returns, she can unseal it herself, and we won't be responsible for it. Of course, if we end up making a good deal with the future world, I want my share of the credit.” With that, she picked up the box with King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallion and rose to her feet.

“Agreed,” said Serene Snowlotus, also standing up. “Only the empress herself should have anything to do with this gift. If we touch it, she would likely become suspicious of us, and the last thing we need is to have the empress angry at us. If it weren’t for that, though, I would be very curious what King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy medallions are like. Think about it. King Immortal-Slayer! According to legend, he devastated the god world, killing countless gods in the process. Even Paramount Gods fled from him! His legacy medallions are virtually mythological.”

“King Immortal-Slayer is an inauspicious figure, and so are his legacy medallions. In fact, it seems to me this gift might be some sort of plot. I guess we’ll have to wait for the empress to return and make a decision about it. We can only warn her to be careful.” The two flower goddesses continued their conversation as they walked through the garden toward the exit.

Yang Qi crept along behind them, unseen. Thankfully he had Flower Mildcloud’s aura, otherwise he wouldn’t have been able to do that even with the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, and the Cruiser of Civilization combined.

As he walked along, he continued absorbing the vital energies of the Joyflower Palace and using the genetic systems to fuse with them even further. With those systems, he could be like a parasite, becoming one with the vital energy of his surroundings wherever he was.

The longer he remained in the Joyflower Palace, the more he became intertwined with it, until the warding spells didn’t even notice him, much less harm him. As long as he didn't pose too much of a threat, that is.

‘They’re leading me right to the treasure storehouses. You really can wear out iron shoes in a fruitless search, then find what you're looking for without even trying. There couldn’t be a better opportunity for me. Is this really a gift from heaven?’ He almost wanted to personally thank the people from the future world for choosing to make their visit now.

Soon, it seemed he would have a chance, not only to get one of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions, but also to clear out the Joyflower Palace as a whole.

He unhesitatingly followed the two flower goddesses through the corridors, which twisted and turned into the depths of the Joyflower Palace. They walked along for a long time, passing through countless warding spells with Yang Qi trailing them the entire time.

For true members of the Joyflower Palace, it would be just an ordinary path. But for an infiltrator like Yang Qi, it would be like passing through mountains of daggers and seas of flames. It was only by pushing his energy arts to the limits, and calling deeply on the parasitic powers of the genetic systems, that he was able to proceed safely.

Every step he took was one that risked death itself. Of course, as part of the process, he was learning a lot about the vital energy and spell formations of the palace, which meant that things got easier as he went along.

Eventually, the two women reached an enormous pagoda that was guarded by several old women, all of whom radiated power. They sat there cross-legged and unmoving, seemingly bereft of any life force or aura. However, with a mere glance, Yang Qi could tell that they cultivated something which gave them boundless psychic powers and immense true energy.

After the two flower goddesses stopped in front of them, the old women opened their eyes.

“Why might you two flower goddesses have come to the treasure storehouse?” one of them asked.

“We wish to deposit an item,” Jade Nightqueen said. “The future world brought a gift for the empress, and now is not the time to unseal it. We would like you ladies to bear witness to the fact that we are depositing this item unopened.”

“We understand,” another of the old women said. Looking at the box, she assessed its vital energy and said, “That’s a very powerful aura. What exactly is it?”

“The future world gifted us with one of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions,” Jade Nightqueen explained. “It also includes a letter from Magister Proud Heaven to the empress. We wouldn't dare to open either. We want to deposit the gift as soon as possible to avoid any problems!”

“Very well.” The old women produced a host of silver objects, which they pieced together to form a key. Moments later, light shone from the key and caused the door to open.

As they entered, Yang Qi carefully followed.

The inside was filled with a mist of vital energy so thick it was almost liquid, seemingly designed for the express purpose of storing powerful objects.

There were bookcases, racks of weapons, shelves of medicinal pills, and even enormous kingdoms of crystals with god souls sealed within. There were altars, banners, terracotta armies, and other treasures. Everything here was vastly stronger than the treasures in the Aeonic God Temple, and were clearly items that the Joyflower Palace had collected from the Ancient Road to the Gods and the Great Necropolis. It was impossible to tell how many millions upon millions of years it would take to build up a collection like this, or how much it would be worth. Not even Yang Qi had any clue.

Chapter 872: A Mouse in the Granary

There were mountains of treasure, stretching on seemingly without end. One could only imagine how much treasure a single Godmyth could accumulate after a few hundred million years, much less the powerful entities in the Joyflower Palace. Of course, ordinary Godmyths’ longevity was too limited to live for hundreds of millions of years.

Even Grand Emperors who lived for hundreds of millions of years would begin to run low on life force. Only people with power indexes in the dozens, hundreds, or thousands could live for tens of billions of years. Those who were not gods could not be truly deathless.

The cycle of life and death was a natural thing in the universe, and could not be undone. For those cultivators who could not become deathless, the inevitable result was to die. The most beautiful women would turn into bleached bones and the mightiest heroes would turn into dust.

‘So many powerful treasures,’ Yang Qi marveled as he looked around. ‘If I really took all of this, I could strengthen the Dao Defense League by millions upon millions of times over. It would probably become one of the top organizations on the Ancient Road to the Gods, instead of the third-rate force it's been up to now.’ Despite how enticing all of the treasures were, there were warding magics everywhere, so Yang Qi knew that he couldn’t do anything rash. If he did the wrong thing, it would provoke a destructive avalanche of a response. Obviously, he needed to avoid attracting the attention of the Joyflower Palace.

At one point, he caught sight of an enormous crystal bottle filled with crackling, blood-colored lightning. ‘That’s firmament-blood lightning-origin! They actually have firmament-blood lightning-origin?’

Opening that bottle would cause an entire kingdom of blood and lightning to spread out. It would provide a boost of power to any Grand Emperor, drawing out the immense potential within them.

For example, after acquiring firmament-blood lightning-origin, his immortal-slaying clone had risen from a power index of two to above twenty. And right now, Yang Qi was looking at an entire bottle of the stuff. It begged the question of why the Joyflower Palace wasn’t actually using it. The only thing Yang Qi could think of was that they were saving it to bequeath as a reward to someone who performed an amazing service. Most organizations would store treasures for such reasons.

‘I have to get that bottle,’ Yang Qi thought.

He was already as entranced as a mouse that had been dropped into a granary. That said, he managed to keep a clear head. Right now, none of the treasures present were as important as King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallion. If he acquired it, he would be able to power the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart to an even higher level. Then perhaps he could clear out the rest of the storehouse.

Before long, the old women had led the two flower goddesses to a certain bookshelf which was protected with powerful sealing marks. It was impossible to see what other things lay beyond the flickering lights, but they were clearly very important.

“This is the Paramount Repository,” one of the old women said, “which contains a collection of treasures left behind by Paramount Gods. In other words, it contains items from the seventy-two monarchs. Unfortunately, we don’t have any of King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans, although we do have some scripture books written by him. There are also halls from the Mourn-Parting Heaven-Palace, King Life-Killer’s swords, pieces of King Wilds-Horn’s armor, and other objects we've come across on the Ancient Road to the Gods. With the addition of this legacy medallion from King Immortal-Slayer, our collection will grow even more complete.”

Another of the old women produced a magic of unsealing and sent it toward the bookshelf, causing an opening to appear on one of the shelves. King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallion was placed inside, then the opening was sealed tight.

“We must go now,” another old woman said. “Neither we guards nor you flower goddesses are permitted to stay in here for too long, or to come in very often. We’ll make a record of the newly deposited treasure.”

“Of course,” replied Jade Nightqueen. “The rules are strict for a reason, and we have no desire to break them.”

Although both flower goddesses itched to acquire some of the treasures they saw around them, neither of them dared to take them without the blessing of the empress.

With that, the group of women turned and left.

The door slammed shut, and oppressive power weighed down on the entire storehouse. Everything went completely and utterly silent.

Not a single person could be seen.

Of course, Yang Qi had remained behind when the others left. After some time passed, vital energy fluctuations could be seen as his parasitic powers finally reached the point where he could step out into the open.

‘The abilities of the Cruiser of Civilization are incredible,’ he thought. ‘I'm like a parasite here in this treasure storehouse. As long as I don’t cause too much of a stir, the warding magics won’t notice me at all.’

At the moment, the vital energy around him was completely still, but as soon as he moved, numerous spell formations activated and scanned him. However, the scanning powers would pass right through him, as though he were part of the vital energy in the area.

Normally speaking, any living being that entered the treasure storehouse would be scanned. In fact, even the tiniest mote of dust would receive the same treatment. Thankfully, Yang Qi had a profound cultivation base and the Cruiser of Civilization, ensuring his ultimate safety.

After assessing the situation, he looked over at the tightly sealed Paramount Repository and his heart immediately started pounding. After all, that rack was filled with all sorts of treasures from the seventy-two monarchs.

King Immortal-Slayer. King Heaven-Devourer. King Mourn-Parting. King Life-Killer. King Wilds-Horn. King Hell-Freezer. They and the rest of the seventy-two monarchs all had signature magical treasures, and to date Yang Qi had only fully collected those belonging to King Heaven-Devourer. As for the other treasures, he essentially had no idea where to look for them. For all he knew, they could be in the god world, on the Ancient Road to the Gods, in the Primeval Age, or even in the future world.

To find them all by manually searching would take an inordinate amount of time.

At the moment, his total collection included only about ten, or perhaps twenty percent of the items, giving him only a very partial understanding of the various consummate energy arts of the seventy-two monarchs. Even that was still enough to make him incredibly powerful.

Obviously, acquiring a complete collection of any one of the seventy-two monarchs’ magical treasures would lead to an incredible boost in his energy arts. Complete collections of such magical treasures could rival the God Legion Seal, to the point where they were part of Yang Qi’s strategy to acquire the God Legion Seal that was in the hands of the future world.

He almost couldn't wait to see how much stronger he would grow with the addition of the treasures in the Paramount Repository.

After examining the sealing magics on the Paramount Repository, he exhaled, sending out a stream of energy that encompassed the bookshelf like a spring rain. Dazzling light shone out as he very carefully sent his energy into one of the seals protecting it. Then a faint cracking sound could be heard as the sealing magic unraveled a moment later.

He immediately breathed a sigh of relief. The vital energy he had just expended actually surpassed what he would normally be drained of in a life-or-death battle. The first shelf he had unlocked was not the one containing one of King Immortal-Slayer’s medallions; he wanted to get familiar with the process before attempting to acquire that one.

He had started with the one containing King Heaven-Devourer’s items.

Reaching out carefully, he took a scripture book and what appeared to be a handful of bone pellets.

The pellets emanated a powerful aura that corresponded perfectly with King Heaven-Devourer’s energy. Instantly, Yang Qi thought, ‘Are these actual bones belonging to King Heaven-Devourer?’

The scripture book was bound in snakeskin, and the text was written in god script. According to what the old women had said, the book was penned by King Heaven-Devourer himself, although they hadn’t mentioned anything about the contents.

The title was “Heaven-Devouring Truths”, and upon flipping through the book, Yang Qi found that it contained various insights into cultivation and enlightenment.

‘Awesome!’ he thought. Although he had succeeded in cultivating King Heaven-Devourer’s true energy and energy arts, they contained many profundities that he had not gained enlightenment of yet. With this book of scriptures, he would definitely be able to dispel some of his confusion.

His primal-chaos elder-snake instantly grew even more realistic, detailed, and lifelike, and his Heaven-Devouring True Energy became more refined and effective.

Although his power index didn’t increase, his will convergence increased until it thrummed with the fluctuations of the middle of the Destabilizing level.

With his will convergence having increased, Yang Qi was even more certain that he could move about undetected.

Chapter 873: Unraveling the Warding Magic

‘If these bone pellets really are the remains of King Heaven-Devourer, then presumably I can reap even greater benefits from them in the future.’ He tried using Heaven-Devouring True Energy to refine or assimilate them, but it had no effect whatsoever. Items that could resist Heaven-Devouring True Energy were definitely few and far between.

From what he could tell, it was probably his own deficiency in terms of cultivation level.

Putting them away to worry about later, he focused again on the warding spells on the Paramount Repository.

Some of the warding spells were stronger or sturdier than others, but all of them would weaken as time passed. Considering King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallion had just been sealed, it was obviously the strongest and would also be the most difficult to open. Not feeling particularly confident about that, Yang Qi focused on the weaker ones first. Considering he was all alone, he wasn’t under any pressure to hurry.

“Open!”

Of course, having acquired King Heaven-Devourer’s book of scriptures, he was now in an even better position to deal with the warding spells. Focusing on the weakest one he could find, he went to work. Before long, it opened, revealing a host of swords.

‘King Life-Killer’s swords.’

Delighted, he waved his finger to collect them up, instantly pushing his Life-Killing Sword Technique to a higher level.

Another hour passed, and he finally unraveled another warding spell. This time, he revealed numerous wheels made of frigid ice. Some were small, some large, but all of them were serrated, making them resemble snowflakes. They were the signature weapons of King Hell-Freezer, the Hell-Freezing God Wheels.

Wailing winds echoed out as the wheels spun, causing freezing energy to roil out that immediately improved the techniques of King Hell-Freezer that Yang Qi had previously picked up.

Thus, Yang Qi started with the weakest warding spells and worked his way up. Before long, he had opened dozens of shelves, acquiring weapons, scriptures, items, and new energy arts and enlightenment from all of the associated monarchs. The Joyflower Palace had spent billions of years collecting these items, braving who knew how many dangers to do so. But now Yang Qi was just collecting them up with hardly any resistance.

Eventually, he opened seventy-one of the shelves. Having taken seventy-one separate streams of true energy, and all sorts of other items, his ultimate collection had reached the level of about thirty or forty percent.

After the major influx, his will convergence was now at the peak of the Destabilizing level.

His collection was nearly half complete, something that had never been done throughout history. After all, he had the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart; without it, such a task would have been virtually impossible.

Seventy-two streams of true energy flowed through seventy-two particular acupoints as Yang Qi finally focused on his ultimate goal: King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallion.

The warding spell protecting it was the strongest and most powerful of them all by far. Expression very serious, he settled his cultivation base and closed his eyes in concentration. Instead of immediately taking action, he took time to think carefully about what he was planning to do.

He used the power assessment systems, the God Legion Seal, and the powers of the Aeonic God Temple. After several hours passed, he opened his eyes, his gaze stabbing toward the shelf. At the same time, holy hymns echoed out around him as he tried piercing through the warding spell.

Soon, the warding spell was affected by the holy hymn and began to twitch and writhe along with the rhythm. Then Yang Qi sent some of his will into the spell, along with a devil embryo, moving as slowly and carefully, as if he were reeling silk from a cocoon.

Crack!

At a certain point, the warding spell opened slightly, revealing the box from before, which Yang Qi reached out toward.

However, before opening it he opened his Lord's Eye to assess the situation further. He knew what kind of person Proud Heaven was, and that it was highly likely he had placed another warding spell inside the box. Sure enough, a moment later he saw evidence of a sealing mark from the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.

It was almost like a spider web covering the box, ensuring that if the warding magic was broken, it would explode.

Yang Qi snorted coldly. Remaining calm, he used his own Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth and the God Legion Seal to very carefully open the box.

Suddenly, a flow of energy appeared that seemed to contain the trumpeting of countless ancient megamammoths. It was the true energy of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, and it was different than the kind that Yang Qi had. Obviously, this came from another of the God Legion Seals.

Of course, Yang Qi simply absorbed it, which purified his own Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth and gave rise to dramatic transformations.

After fully absorbing it, Yang Qi still didn't open the box. Instead, he drew on the seven legacy medallions he already had to create a resonance with the new one, suppressing its power. In the blink of an eye, the eighth legacy medallion slipped through time and space to appear within the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

In other words, Yang Qi had taken it without even opening the box!

Whizz!

The eighth legacy medallion flew toward the group of seven like a fly speeding toward a pool of blood.

Yang Qi snorted coldly. ‘You’re clever, Proud Heaven, but I'm not going to fall for your tricks. As long as I don’t open the box or touch your message, you’ll have no way of knowing what’s happened. Just wait until the empress opens the box and the letter, only to find no legacy medallion inside!’ Leaving behind no trace of what he had done, Yang Qi drew on the power of the eight legacy medallions and slipped right into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

WHOOSH!

A moment later, he was gone.

Crack! Snap!

Immense lightning bolts began streaking out into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart from the immortal-slaying clone. In their passage, they left mountains, rivers, vital energy, magical laws, suns, moons, and heavenly bodies behind. Everything inside the chart was changing, and it was no longer desolate and dark. Unfortunately, the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart was just too big, and the transformations were going very slowly when taking into account the chart as a whole. In fact, at their current rate, they would probably take hundreds of millions of years to complete.

However, Yang Qi could see that certain seals were being opened, and vital energy was pouring into the immortal-slaying clone. As a result, the clone was also transforming, his power climbing as energy flowed through his meridians in perfect cycles.

The seventy-one patriarchs appeared behind him, and they, too, grew stronger. They were now beyond the level of simple Grand Emperors, and their power indexes were climbing rapidly.

Looking up to the heights of the chart, Yang Qi saw something that was as mysterious and divine as something from the god world. It was something that he could obviously not take by himself, but could only carefully siphon from.

It wasn’t firmament-blood lightning-origin, but rather something holy and profound.

“That’s Hegemonic Dao Vitality!” Flower Mildcloud said. “According to the stories, it’s the quintessence vitality created by Paramount Gods from the god world when they go through breathing exercises. It completely surpasses firmament-blood lightning-origin. On the Ancient Road to the Gods, there was once a faction called the House of True-Heaven Extermination, whose houselord got just a scrap of it and ended up pushing his cultivation base to unheard-of heights. In fact, he disappeared into the depths of the Ancient Road to the Gods. Some people say he might have already reached the god world.”

“Hegemonic Dao Vitality?” Yang Qi reached out, but was unable to take it. Apparently, the Hegemonic Dao Vitality had been prepared for the immortal-slaying clone alone, making it impossible for his true self to acquire. More and more, the immortal-slaying clone was becoming a unique and independent entity, which was entirely according to the master plan. Unfortunately, that made it impossible for them to share vital energy like they had in the past, including this Hegemonic Dao Vitality. However, it would all be worth it when King Immortal-Slayer’s will truly awakened.

[Beep-beep-beep. Beep-beep-beep.]

The power assessment systems began describing the immortal-slaying clone’s rise in power.

[One hundred… one hundred fifty… two hundred… three hundred… five hundred.]

It was only at that point that it stopped.

Yang Qi shook his head. “My index is at two hundred twenty, and my clone is at five hundred, making his fighting prowess well beyond mine. He’s beyond even the flower goddesses. So what will happen when we get the ninth of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions? When King Immortal-Slayer’s will awakens, then what? Not even I would dare to personally combine all nine of them, unless I wanted to end up dead.”

In the moment that the clone fused with the eighth legacy medallion, Yang Qi could sense that his control over the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart had reached an even higher level. The clone waved his hand a moment later, causing an image to appear in front of them that depicted the entirety of the Joyflower Palace.

There were some areas with surges of power, where shadowy figures could be seen lurking. They were old-timers out in hiding, who Yang Qi could now ambush at will!

Chapter 874: Secrets of the Storehouse

Having eight of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions provided an even greater level of control of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. More specifically, Yang Qi was now free to go into the treasure storehouse whenever he wanted, and in fact, he could travel freely throughout the Passionless God Flower.

Neither his energy arts nor his cultivation base had advanced, and his power index was still at two hundred twenty. In fact, he was now weaker than his clone. But thanks to reaching the Destabilizing will convergence level, his fighting prowess was greater than ever, and in that respect he was actually superior to his clone.

That was especially true if he used the Seventy-Two Monarchs Energy Art together with the Hand of the One God. They were like a combination of righteous and evil, an amalgamation of yin and yang, the ultimate expression of the taiji.

BOOM!

Yang Qi’s true self was still in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, working on his divine abilities, remolding himself, and taking control of the various weapons and items of the seventy-two monarchs. Thanks to the difficult work, his cultivation base was slowly starting to climb.

As the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart rose to a higher level, dazzling shafts of light shot out in every direction. Within it existed worlds pulsing with the mighty aura of the Primeval Age. The immortal-slaying clone rose to his feet, his eyes flashing like lightning and his black hair swirling around him, making him seem like some god-king from the ancient past. Suddenly, a sphere appeared above his head, like an ocean world covered by rolling waves. However, the water seemed more like power than anything else, and as it surged, the clone spoke in a clear, ringing voice.

“Virtual god world!”

The oceanic sphere exploded, causing rain to fall in all directions. A world was birthed out of space-time itself, filled with god trees, god minerals, and all sorts of other things.

It was a virtual god world, which was similar to a true god world. Although it was only virtual in nature, it still had its own magical laws, power, and vital energy. In fact, it was thirty percent as real as a true god world, and was more suitable for cultivation than anywhere on the Ancient Road to the Gods. Not a single immortal world in existence could compare to it.

Yang Qi escorted his family, friends, and sworn siblings into the virtual god world, all of whom were completely shocked by the sight of it. In fact, they couldn't even wrap their minds around how much better their cultivation would advance here compared to the outside world.

After all, random animals from the god world could devastate even Grand Emperors.

“A virtual god world!?” Flower Mildcloud exclaimed, her expression flickering with fear. “Completely and utterly heaven-defying! It’s like a copy of the true god world! It's hard to even predict what benefits will come from practicing cultivation in there!”

“Well, what do you think?” Yang Qi said. “Like I said, I don’t need any help from you to find the treasure storehouse of the Joyflower Palace. I’ve already looted plenty of treasure, and in the following days I’ll continue doing so until the place is empty! Sadly, because you refused to give me any information, I don't think it’s proper to give you a share.”

“You!” Flower Mildcloud said, her expression flickering. There was no way she could ever have guessed that not only would Yang Qi find the treasure storehouse, but he would be able to get inside and freely take things. The treasure storehouse was a divine location in the Joyflower Palace, and the items inside were usually bestowed as gifts by the elders and the flower goddesses.

Flower Mildcloud couldn’t help but be shaken by the sight of the magical treasures from there.

“Now do you see the benefits of siding with me? You could have had your pick of anything from the storehouse. You claimed that it was because of your loyalty to the Joyflower Palace, but I bet it was actually your fear of the warding spells, wasn’t it? What about now? Feeling a bit different?” He smiled enigmatically.

“Stop toying with me,” Flower Mildcloud said. “Fine. If you agree to give me something from the treasure storehouse, I’ll tell you a secret.”

“What secret?” Yang Qi asked quietly.

“A rumor about the treasure storehouse itself,” she replied. “It's said that there’s an item in the storehouse that can give you ultimate control over the Joyflower Palace. In fact, it could give you the Passionless God Flower itself, allowing you to destroy the palace. Would you be interested in a secret like that?”

“What? What kind of item are we talking about here? Are you saying you want to turn your back on the Joyflower Palace? Now that you’ve seen what I'm capable of, have you finally come to the realization that I’ll destroy the palace whether or not you’re helping me?”

“That’s exactly right,” she replied. “I can see now how strong you are, and I can tell that nobody will be able to stop you. One way or another, you’ll eventually reach the item I'm talking about and use it to destroy the sect. A wise woman submits to the circumstances, and now I see that I should throw my lot in with you. In fact, who knows, maybe you’ll even let me take the place over.”

“Well, aren’t you ambitious,” Yang Qi said. “Alright. You can have your pick of the treasures. Tell me what you want, and I’ll get it. But first, I want to know the details of this secret of yours. It had better be worth it.”

“Alright. It's said that even in the distant past, the Joyflower Palace and the Passionless God Flower have always been one and the same. Together, they form a boundless god item that, although not quite on the level of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, is still spectacularly amazing. Unfortunately, it requires an immense power source to operate. Can you guess what that power source is?”

“What?” Yang Qi replied, his curiosity piqued.

“A tear from the Passionless God-King. The tears of god-kings contain the power of cosmic nirvanic extermination. Normally speaking, gods don't shed tears. But they will if they’re hurt deeply enough. Such tears contain their ultimate quintessence, gathered over an entire lifetime. In other words, godhood. Not the ordinary kind, but rather aberrant godhood. That said, such godhood would contain such immense power that ordinary people could never assimilate it. Because such tears are aberrations, they signify that whichever god shed them did so upon falling into corruption.”

“A tear from the Passionless God-King?” Yang Qi felt truly shaken. Entities who reached the Deathless Throne and became gods were pinnacle beings, and it seemed impossible that one of them could possibly shed tears. Tears represented weakness, and would only be shed in a moment of ultimate vulnerability.

In fact, during Yang Qi’s entire path of cultivation, he had never once shed a single tear.

For a god-king to shed tears would imply that he had lost his godhood and magical laws. Such tears would be aberrations, as would the godhood they contained. It was something that would happen so rarely that it would be considered a legend even in the god world. But now, here was talk of such a thing in the Joyflower Palace.

Yang Qi had read hints of such legends in ancient daoist texts, but had assumed that they were fanciful fairy tales.

How could the gods, who had ultimate freedom and power, ever shed tears?

“That god-king’s tear is stored in the depths of the treasure storehouse,” she replied, “and is considered the ultimate foundation of the Joyflower Palace. If you can get it, it would be of immense help in your efforts to deal with the sect as a whole.”

“The tear of a god-king….” Yang Qi smiled. “Seems quite terrifying. What circumstances would possibly lead to a god-king crying? I somehow doubt that I'm strong enough to control something like that. But considering you’ve brought it up, I might as well go take a look and see what would be involved in taking it.”

Even as this dialogue was playing out, Yang Qi was manipulating his vital energy to completely assimilate the eighth of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions. When the process was complete, his power increased dramatically, as did his speed, making him stealthier than ever. Not even someone ten times as strong as him would have an easy time killing him. And of course, being able to retreat into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart was his ultimate safety net.

Thus prepared, he headed back into the treasure storehouse.

His return trip was much easier, thanks to the increased power of the chart. He waved his hand, sending out magical laws that looked like swimming fishes that unraveled the warding spells and placed the entire storehouse within his reach.

Whoosh.

The bottle of firmament-blood lightning-origin flew into his hand. Opening it, he absorbed the lightning-like blood-colored liquid, which caused his true energy to surge rapidly.

[Beep-beep-beep. Beep-beep-beep. Power index two hundred thirty. Two hundred forty. Two hundred fifty. Two hundred sixty….]

It eventually stopped rising at two hundred eighty. At that point, he gave the rest of the firmament-blood lightning-origin to Flower Mildcloud.

“Drink that,” he said, “and push your energy arts to a higher level. But leave some leftover for my friends and family. I want their cultivation to improve even more quickly than it is now.”

Flower Mildcloud smiled. “They’re in that virtual god world working on their cultivation! How could they possibly practice cultivation any faster?”

“With firmament-blood lightning-origin, their speed will definitely increase. Are you really trying to haggle with me at this point? There will only be further benefits to come, such that you couldn't possibly even take advantage of all of them.”

He waved his hand, shivering as a stream of power flowed out of him. At the same time, he began singing a holy song. “Truth is falsehood, thus, falsehood is truth. True and false. False and true. Life and death; void and destruction. Everything is a dream and a void, an illusion. A chiliocosm of worlds brings about all dreams….”

Suddenly, a virtual bottle of firmament-blood lightning-origin took the place of the old one on the shelf.

At the same time, other virtual weapons and items appeared on the Paramount Shelf, emanating the same energy and aura that the previous items had. Even someone who picked up such an item, looked at it, and scanned it with true energy would be unable to detect that it was false.

As for the firmament-blood lightning-origin, only someone who actually attempted to drink it would realize that it wasn’t real. All other evidence would point to it being an actual item from the god world.

Yang Qi had cultivated his Life-Death Void-Destruction God-Lightning to the point where he could create virtual projections that were like dreams within dreams. Of course, he had yet to reach the ultimate level of this power, in which he could create things as real as reality. If he had reached that level, there would be no reason to go around stealing magical treasures.

Chapter 875: Three-Headed God-Origin Grass

Yang Qi was now quite proficient at taking a magical treasure, then producing a virtual version. It was a product of both his Life-Death Void-Destruction God-Lightning energy art and the powers of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

After all, if the chart could already make a virtual god world, then how much more simple would it be to make virtual treasures?

Furthermore, the replicas were so realistic that even if the storehouse guards came in to inspect the items, they would have no way to identify any fakes unless they actually used them. And who would actually go to the length of using an item when merely performing an inspection?

In other words, it would likely be a long time before anyone realized that any of the treasures had been stolen. That was a major aspect of Yang Qi’s plan. After all, his current power index was only at the level of two hundred eighty. Usually, people who reached the peak of the Destabilizing will convergence level would have incredible fighting prowess, but would be far from being able to fight people like the empress of the Joyflower Palace, whose power index was definitely far beyond a thousand.

Thankfully, there were a lot of treasures to be had, which would benefit both Yang Qi and his core loyalists in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. His father, family, and friends were all furthering their cultivation in the virtual god world, and he was doing everything to make sure they experienced stable growth. Before long, the entire group would advance to the Grand Emperor level.

Even as Yang Qi took the firmament-blood lightning-origin and began making a fake version of it, Flower Mildcloud, who was able to observe from within the chart, noticed one particular shelf filled with medicinal items.

“So many god pills,” she murmured. The pills almost seemed alive, as if they were actual gods performing breathing exercises and demonstrating energy arts.

“That’s a Dragon-Tiger Life-Snatching Pill!” she exclaimed, looking at one particular crystal vessel which contained a fist-sized medicinal pill. It seemed to be a murky world of its own, in which two gods were locked in combat, one a humanoid figure with the head of a dragon, the other a humanoid figure with the head of a tiger.

They fought back and forth using martial stances of all sorts, and their energy arts were filled with innumerable variations and complex profundities of their martial arts. There were even powerful magical laws on display. In fact, their interactions were so amazing that one could actually gain significant enlightenment just by observing them, without even consuming the pill.

This medicinal pill came from the dao of gods, and contained the energy of true dragons and true tigers. It was definitely something very rare. On one occasion in the past, Flower Mildcloud had seen a pill like this given out as a reward to one of the flower goddesses, who used its power to achieve heaven-shaking, earth-toppling advancement in her energy arts.

Yang Qi waved his hand, and the crystal vessel disappeared, to be replaced a moment later by an exact duplicate. Meanwhile, the real Dragon-Tiger Life-Snatching Pill appeared on his palm, whereupon he shrank it down until it was the size of a longan fruit. Now that the pill was out in the open, it emitted pulsing, godly music that would eternally enchant anyone who listened to it too closely.

A stream of sword energy flew out and cut the pill in two. Yang Qi took the larger portion and assimilated it, which instantly caused the projections of a dragon and tiger to appear behind him. They weren’t the kind of dragon or tiger one would see in the mortal world, but rather those that existed in the god world. After all, even maggots from the mortal world who later reached the god world would become godworms.

“You assimilate this smaller portion,” Yang Qi said, cutting the remaining section in half again. “The rest, I’ll send into the virtual god world for my people to use. The more followers I have who are on the Deathless Heavenly Stairway, the better.” With that he distributed the rest of the pill to Flower Mildcloud and his people in the virtual god world.

Next, his attention was drawn to an enormous, emerald-green slab, within which was sealed some sort of god grass. It resembled a ginseng root, a magical mushroom, or a licorice root, yet was none of those things. It looked like a humanoid entity floating within the green slab, an odd-looking creature with three heads.

“Three-headed god-origin grass!” Flower Mildcloud exclaimed loudly. “That’s a holy medicine that can heal all sorts of injuries. In fact, even someone who has died, with their spiritual souls gone and physical souls dissipated, can be restored by sending the vital energy of that herb out into heaven and earth. It will restore the soul and reform the flesh and bones. Anyone who isn’t a god can be brought back to life with it!”

“It's really that miraculous?” Yang Qi said, reaching out and taking it. He quickly realized that the grass had three kinds of magical laws from the dao of gods in it. One pertained to yin, yang, life and death. Another conformed to the transformations of the five phases, and the third contained the myriad profundities of the past, present, and future. The three heads were the embodiments of those three magical laws.

Even just looking at it, Yang Qi gained new enlightenment of the quintessence of humans and their transformations. There were countless worlds and places, but in all of them, the pinnacle of magical law and evolution were humans. Humans would form the ultimate foundation of a thriving world; as for the gods, they were simply a higher type of human.

“Incredible,” Yang Qi murmured. “Three origins combined in one. Three lives to encompass all creation. This grass contains the profundities of both life and death, and is something that could only come to exist in the god world. If it can truly save any life, then I need it. It will definitely be helpful at some point in the future.”

“It really is a treasure,” Flower Mildcloud said. Obviously, she would love to have it, but wouldn’t go to the length of struggling with Yang Qi over its ownership.

With the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth and the Seventy-Two Monarchs Energy Art, Yang Qi was just too powerful and unpredictable. Even if she fought him to the death and somehow won, she would be nearly dead afterward. And what good would it do to win a life-saving treasure, only to be forced to use it immediately to save her own life?

“That’s a Great Dao Dissemination Pill,” she said as the two of them proceeded along. Thankfully, she was familiar with many of the items in the storehouse and was able to provide clear descriptions of most of them.

Yang Qi was quite surprised. “How do you know so much about these treasures?” he asked. “You've never been inside, have you?”

Flower Mildcloud shrugged. “Disciples in the Joyflower Palace are given textbooks describing treasures of all sorts. That makes it easy for us to identify objects both in the Great Necropolis and on the Ancient Road to the Gods, and by extension, save time. And it also means that most of the items in the storehouse are things I’ve read about in the past.”

“Well, that makes sense,” Yang Qi said. As they went along, they picked up speed. Some of the medicinal pills they came across seemed particularly useful, some didn’t. Some were designed to improve the cultivation base, while others were actually deadly poisons. There was a huge variety.

Thankfully Flower Mildcloud was there, otherwise he would have been quite befuddled by so many unidentifiable objects.

As they picked up speed, Yang Qi’s skill with manufacturing virtual replacements improved as well. It eventually reached the point where not even Flower Mildcloud could visually track what treasures he was taking and replacing.

He was so skilled that, even if the guard were present, they might not realize what was happening. It was like how, in the mortal world, so-called magicians would use sleight of hand to confuse audiences and make it impossible to see what they were really doing.

‘This is incredible,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘My God Legion Battle Robe, my Life-Death Void-Destruction God-Lightning, my virtual god world… all of them are benefiting immensely. And with these skills I’m perfecting, I could probably rob opponents of their magical treasures and replace them with virtual fakes without them even realizing it.’

Eventually, Yang Qi had so many medicinal pills, magical treasures, and god items that he could probably raise an army of millions to the level of Grand Emperors. And not ordinary versions like the old Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven, but rather experts with power indexes of twenty or more.

Eventually, they reached a point where there were no longer medicinal pills and magical treasures to be taken, but rather spell formations.

Flower Mildcloud’s expression flickered. “We need to be careful here. We’re reaching the very depths of the treasure storehouse. See those banners? There are seven hundred and twenty of them, and they form the Windflame Circumvolution God Formation. The banners are named Windflame God Banners. They’re created from the feathers of windburst god falcons and flameking god hawks. The formation itself is filled with magical laws from the dao of gods, and is particularly deadly. Even if you’re fighting someone far more powerful than yourself, as long as you can trick them into that formation they’ll die beyond the shadow of a doubt. It can actually be considered the signature defense item for an entire sect.”

“So these things form a spell formation, huh?” Yang Qi waved his sleeve, and a moment later, a host of tiny banners were in his hand, as well as two pearls which were spell formation eyes.

Chapter 876: A Billion Spell Formations

Yang Qi acquired another spell formation, this one filled with the power of fire and wind from the god world. It was domineering to the extreme, filled with both offensive and defensive power, and just what one would expect of a god formation. Everything in this treasure storehouse was something from the god world that could never be produced in the mortal world. The Joyflower Palace had worked long and hard to collect these items, but now Yang Qi was taking all of them.

“I could never produce something like this,” Yang Qi said. “It’s definitely what I would expect the gods to produce. With a few tens of thousands of formations like this, I won’t have to suffer the humiliation of having people like Orchid Purity and her people occupying my territory ever again. There’s no way she could break through formations like this.”

Shaking his head, he looked at the numerous formations stretching out in front of him.

“A few tens of thousands?” Flower Mildcloud said. She couldn’t help but chuckle. “You're really underestimating the Joyflower Palace. According to the records I've studied, there are a billion god formations here. Even if thousands of gods simultaneously came to besiege the palace, they would have a hard time getting through such defenses. That’s one reason why we're such a dominating force on the Ancient Road to the Gods. Without defenses like this, how do you think we could have survived for so long? There are definitely fiendish and deadly forces that would have long since ripped us to shreds otherwise.”

“A billion god formations?” Yang Qi said, visibly stunned as he looked out at the countless formations. There were even formations within formations, a seemingly endless hoard that was impossible to visually take in.

He had to wonder how long it would take to collect a billion spell formations, if there really were that many.

And creating virtual duplicates of them would be a huge drain on his power reserves. Thankfully, there was plenty of vital energy from the god world in the treasure storehouse. Using that to power the Engine of the One God would probably ensure that he wouldn’t run out.

“Supposedly, that god-king’s tear is located beyond the billion formations,” Flower Mildcloud said. “Aren’t you interested in seeing what that god-king’s tear is like, and whether or not it can power your Cruiser of Civilization?”

Although she didn't know about Yang Qi’s God Legion Seal, she knew about many of his other treasures. He had intentionally provided that information to her, hoping that an understanding of his true level of strength would forestall any attempts to resist or escape him.

“That’s right,” he said.

The god-king’s tear was apparently made from a strange variety of godhood, the kind that most people would never be able to use. Anyone who tried to would be assailed by the boundless and incomprehensible grief of a god, and would be killed and transformed into something neither human nor ghost.

However, the Engine of the One God was different. The engine needed pure power, and it could absorb huge amounts of vital energy. In fact, it could take the power of the god world that existed in the Great Necropolis and split it into its various component parts. But unfortunately, even that power was of little help to the engine overall.

It would be like trying to fill an ocean by adding water one cup at a time. It was an effort doomed to failure from the beginning.

Right now, the power reserves of the engine were only at the level of one one-hundred-millionth. It seemed likely that the only way for Yang Qi to fill them to capacity would be for him to reach the level of the legion of gods himself. That said, every time the Engine of the One God reached a higher level of power, it made Yang Qi that much stronger.

It had nothing to do with his own cultivation base, and everything to do with raw power.

One of the main strengths of both the Cruiser of Civilization and the Engine of the One God was that they weren’t connected to the cultivation base of the person using them. In that way, they were similar to the powerful mechas used by the future world. Even the weakest of humans could use them to devastating effect.

The greater the power reserves of the engine were, the greater Yang Qi’s fighting prowess would be.

If he could get that god-king’s tear to fill the reserves of the Engine of the One God, it would probably save him millions upon millions of years of work.

And it would ensure that he could easily devastate opponents such as the Joyflower Palace, the future world, or experts from the Ancient Road to the Gods. They would be virtually powerless to do anything to him.

It was definitely worth taking a risk to become that strong.

Yang Qi quickly made his decision. There wasn’t any time to lose; he needed to get stronger as quickly as possible. Proud Heaven and the other magisters would be coming soon, and if they had the God Legion Seal from the Primeval Age, it would change everything and he would end up fleeing like a stray dog. That was something he couldn’t tolerate the thought of.

Right now, the most important things were furthering his cultivation, acquiring godhood, and reaching godly ascension. If he was a god when he faced Proud Heaven and the others, then he could likely use his God Legion Seal to take the other two. At that point, he would be the most powerful entity in all creation.

With such thoughts on his mind, he set to work.

He started with the spell formation of wind and fire, sending it right into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart to his sworn siblings. If he could really acquire a billion new spell formations, he would definitely be in the position to go back and retake the Dao Defense League.

With the chart, he was able to look back and inspect the Dao Defense League, which had shrunk down significantly. However, that process made the existing god formations even stronger. More immortal worlds were joining it, and more old-timers from out in primal-chaos were submitting. The entire league was transforming almost on a daily basis. Just like the old saying went, things change, people stay the same. The dharmarajas, god-generals, and emissaries were all still there, and even stronger than before.

Apparently, Orchid Purity was a really skilled administrator. Destiny flowed with incredible intensity, and Yang Qi was even able to spot destiny from the Primeval Age and the Demon League. The Dao Defense League was already about two thirds more powerful than it had been when Yang Qi left it.

That level of growth was astonishing.

Thanks to Yang Qi’s ability to discern flows of destiny, he was able to spot both the larger flows, and also the smaller ones belonging to experts hiding out in primal-chaos.

‘Just wait,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘I’ll eventually be back, and then I’ll take control over this entire age.’ Focusing back on the present situation, he went on to the second spell formation.

This formation seemed filled with hazy mists, within which rose up spectacular and mysterious mountain peaks.

“That’s the Preheaven Cloud-Mist Mountain-Concealing Grand Formation,” Flower Mildcloud said. “Those mountains were created in the god world by a mountain god, and when they’re arranged in a formation, they can suppress godpower. Anyone who enters the formation will be surrounded by the mists and crushed into dust by the mountains. It's very powerful. I once saw an elder use that formation to kill a monster on the Ancient Road to the Gods. It was actually a mystoseal paleo-devil, but it didn’t stand a chance of escaping once it was in the formation.”

“Incredible,” Yang Qi said, nodding. He flew into the formation, and immediately, the mists rose up and the mountains began rotating. In response, he uttered a single word.

“Stop!”

It was the Glad Tidings of the Lord, and it immediately caused the formation to cease moving. He sat down and the pure white robes of the God Legion Battle Robe flowed out, surrounding the formation, shrinking it down, and depositing it into his hand. Mountains and mists alike appeared on his palm, which he absorbed into his acupoints.

Examining the mountain peaks, Yang Qi saw that they were made from unique rocks and soil from the god world. They even had their own acupoints that resembled those in the human body, enabling them to constantly absorb the good fortune of heaven and earth, and the quintessence of the sun and moon.

Yet again, his enlightenment regarding spell formations reached a higher level.

Everything Yang Qi took from the treasure storehouse would be subjected to scanning by the Cruiser of Civilization, which would in turn reveal more information to him. The entire time, his knowledge-base was increasing.

It was something only he could do; not even ordinary Grand Emperors could gain enlightenment from the legion of gods in such a way.

Chapter 877: God-King&#039;s Tear

The fact that Yang Qi could use the Cruiser of Civilization to so quickly assimilate and learn from these items was almost like having an actual god impart knowledge directly into him. Thankfully, the God Legion Seal sent golden light to fill him, ensuring that his sea of consciousness wasn’t harmed during the process.

The complex experiences of the gods were like mysterious godly laws that surrounded Yang Qi’s mind. Entering them was no easy task. It required that he take firm hold of them, shrink them down into magical symbols, and make them part of him.

If he took in too much, it would be dangerous, and could even lead to his sea of consciousness exploding. The sea of consciousness needed to remain pure and untainted by even a speck of dust, whereas Yang Qi’s sea of consciousness was essentially filled with a horde of writhing devils. However, he was slowly but surely assimilating them and using them to bolster his nascent divinity.

In other words, every god item and treasure he took gave him the experiences of another god, which in turn turned into something called a knowledge-devil that could pose a dangerous obstacle in his cultivation. They were devils that could easily lead a person astray without them having any idea what was happening.

Knowledge could be considered a type of monster, and in life, one had to constantly win victory over such monsters to truly understand oneself and achieve true freedom. Right now, Yang Qi could see the experiences of the gods transforming into knowledge-devils. Using his own willpower to defeat them was a process by which he strengthened and improved his will.

In fact, he could sense his will growing tougher as he defeated the knowledge-devils, pushing his will convergence level to the peak of Destabilizing.

In fact, he was just on the verge of reaching the Terrifying level.

Normal. Stupendous. Destabilizing. Terrifying. Paramount. Unbounded. Annulled. Those were the various levels of will convergence. The Terrifying level was the level of the gods, while Paramount and Unbounded belonged to Consummate and Paramount Gods, respectively. Such wills could control all kinds of power and physical matter, giving birth to life and destruction, illusion and truth.

As for the Annulled level, that was supposedly something only the Sovereign Lord could achieve.

In fact, it was even possible that the Sovereign Lord had never reached the Annulled level, which would supposedly usher in a new age. But no such new age had ever appeared.

Once Yang Qi reached the Terrifying level, he would have ultimate control over his true energy and any magical treasures he possessed. It was definitely important that he reach the Terrifying, or possibly even the Paramount level, that way not even the will of King Immortal-Slayer would be able to do anything to his nascent divinity.

Furthermore, having a will at that level would ensure that, even if he physically perished, he could be resurrected, just like King Immortal-Slayer and other Paramount Gods.

Yang Qi was already planning many moves ahead. Sometimes, perishing was the best way to evade certain tribulation.

He began picking up speed as he conquered the knowledge-devils, which flooded him with the experience of the gods and pushed his will convergence toward new heights.

Simply taking in knowledge was nothing to be proud of. Only by assimilating the knowledge and defeating the knowledge-devils could one truly benefit. Empty, but not empty; not empty, but empty. Great intelligence could take the guise of stupidity. Acquiring knowledge but not putting it to use made one empty. But using it could push one to a much higher and profound level.

As his will convergence improved, his speed increased.

Behind him, Flower Mildcloud watched as he blurred into motion, heading forward to take spell formation after spell formation. At a certain point, she didn’t even need to offer explanations of the names.

A new formation appeared in front of him, formed from numerous concentric rings, each of which contained shadowy worlds. Although it seemed to lack power, anyone with insight would be able to tell that it surpassed any of the formations up to this point.

“Be careful!” Flower Mildcloud said. “That's a Consummate—”

Before she could even give voice to her warning, Yang Qi entered the formation and absorbed it.

“It's a Consummate Dao Lineament True Self God Formation, right?” he said. “It was created by Exalted Celestial Millifluent from the god world. Each of the rings contains a polarity that interacts with the other polarities to create a godly magnetic field. I know all of that. In fact, I understand everything about Exalted Celestial Millifluent’s cultivation base as well.”

Yang Qi’s will was now so powerful that all he had to do was send it into a spell formation and he could communicate with the will of its creator, absorb all of that experience and knowledge, and gain an understanding of exactly how the formation worked.

Like this, his work went more and more quickly.

‘This is incredible,’ Flower Mildcloud thought. ‘How can he be doing all of this single-handedly?’

Yang Qi was improving so rapidly it was almost as if she didn’t know him anymore.

‘A billion spell formations. At this rate, I'm definitely going to clear them all out. And then the Joyflower Palace will be nothing but an empty shell.’

He entered another god formation, which was made from numerous pillars of preheaven wood from the god world. Once the formation activated, it would give rise to a green-colored god soul that was no weaker than that of God-Noble Goldensword’s.

‘So, there are god souls locked in some of these formations. Amazing. Thankfully, none of them can stand up to me.’ The green god soul let out a howl of fury, but was crushed by Yang Qi’s will, forcing it down into the shape of a green pearl that he easily grabbed.

Flower Mildcloud was completely bowled over, and couldn’t help but think of how much effort it had taken to defeat God-Noble Goldensword’s god soul. Yang Qi was now doing the same thing with almost no effort.

On the Ancient Road to the Gods, she had seen many experts encounter good fortune, but be unable to benefit from it in a short time. Yang Qi was completely different. He flew back and forth, taking spell formations wherever he went and leaving behind virtual substitutes that only the most elite experts would be able to identify.

Knowledge-devils multiplied within his sea of consciousness, but he continued destroying them.

As he proceeded along, he looked deeper into the collection of spell formations and suddenly caught sight of an expression of grieving will that seemed like something not even the god world could stop. In fact, as soon as he saw it, Yang Qi suddenly felt as though he were descending into grief.

Thankfully, the God Legion Seal had his sea of consciousness tightly under control, ensuring that he wasn’t fully affected.

BOOM!

He opened his Lord's Eye and saw a sea up ahead, a sea made of pure sorrow. It was so large that he couldn’t pierce its depths, but he could tell it was filled with godhood. Instantly, the Engine of the One God began thrumming, and the power assessment systems began transforming in dramatic fashion.

[Beep-beep-beep. Beep-beep-beep. Deviant godhood detected. The sorrow of a god-king. This godhood can be transformed into useful power. Refrain from assimilating. Only the Engine of the One God can accept godhood like this.]

The sea was surrounded by countless spell formations, and looking around, Yang Qi realized that he had no idea how long it would take to assimilate them all.

There were apparently a billion, and he had only conquered a few thousand so far. The power and knowledge he had absorbed was like one hair from nine oxen.

‘The god-king’s tear. I can’t use this godhood, nor can anyone else, even other gods. But the Engine of the One God can absorb it.’ Just as Yang Qi was about to head toward the sea that was the god-king’s tear, his heart thumped.

‘What? Something's going on with my power double. It’s almost time for that mission….’

Chapter 878: The Exquisite Desert

It would take time to acquire a billion spell formations. Even though Yang Qi could do things much quicker than the average person, he still couldn’t accomplish something like that in a few short breaths of time.

Unfortunately, he didn’t have a lot of spare time.

In fact, his power double was currently back in the prison on the planet of flowers, just about to go on the mission he had been waiting for.

It was something he needed to go back and handle personally. Thankfully, he could continue dealing with the knowledge-devils as he did, pushing his will to a higher level. If he simply left the knowledge-devils in place, it was entirely possible they could flare up during the middle of fighting.

Swish!

Leaving the treasure storehouse, he headed back to the prison.

With eight of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions, he had even better control of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. And considering he knew the exact coordinates of his destination in the Joyflower Palace, it was an easy task to get back.

As soon as he returned, he heard the high-pitched voices of the court eunuchs.

“Hurry up, you swine! The time has come to leave for your latest mission. You pack of useless bastards! Hurry up! If you go any slower, I’ll make sure you die a painful death!”

The eunuchs were already spreading out through the prison area, blades drawn, ready to hack and slash anyone who was too slow.

The prisoners didn’t dare to resist as they were corralled by the eunuchs.

They knew that fighting back would result in horrific consequences. God-generals were essentially slaves with no power, and the court eunuchs were not only more important, but had higher cultivation bases as well.

Yang Qi was being very careful not to cause problems. And he was also trying to decide what exact course of action to take. For example, what if he self-detonated while out on the mission?  If he faked his own death, he could slip back into the treasure storehouse and work without worrying about being interrupted.

But he didn't want to sacrifice his power double, as he could still see various uses for it. For example, he might be able to infiltrate the Joyflower Palace with the power double, and have dealings with the flower goddesses. Perhaps he could manipulate them to deal with the future world. He knew that the Flower Goddesses Snowlotus and Jade Nightqueen were interested in making contact with him, and perhaps his power double was the way to do that.

He had already reached the level where he could create a power double that could imitate aspects of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, as well as the Seventy-Two Monarchs Energy Art. Although the power double only had about fifty percent of his cultivation base, he doubted that the flower goddesses would be able to see through him to the truth.

The flower goddesses had power indexes over five hundred, whereas Yang Qi was currently at two hundred eighty. In other words, each of them were roughly double his level. That said, in terms of fighting prowess, he could easily handle them without even using the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart or his various magical treasures, as long as he relied on his Destabilizing will convergence. The flower goddesses had high cultivation bases, but they only had Stupendous will convergence. Furthermore, they lacked the extensive training Yang Qi had benefited from over the years.

At a certain point, the Five Hegemons of the Heavenly Kingdom hurried over to Yang Qi. They looked very nervous. “Brother, we’re going to be heading into the Exquisite Desert. We're still working together, right?”

“Of course,” Yang Qi replied calmly. “Is the Exquisite Desert supposed to be particularly dangerous or something? The five of you look quite anxious.”

“We’re fine. It’s not that dangerous of a place. However, we definitely need to stick together to stay alive.”

Off to the side, a whip cracked as one of the eunuchs said, “Hurry up and get into formation. Anyone going too slowly will be executed!”

The lashes of the whips caused searing pain, and Yang Qi couldn’t help but hate the eunuchs. In the future, when he destroyed the Joyflower Palace, they would definitely be the first to die. And he would be sure to make sure it was a torturous, painful death.

Soon, all of the god-generals were out in the open and were gathering into squads that headed to the nearest teleportation portals.

Considering all of the prisons on this planet, there were definitely millions and millions of god-generals in total. All of them were Grand Emperors with power indexes between four and six hundred, with some who were even stronger, but concealing their true strength.

Glancing over, Yang Qi caught sight of the highest-ranking of the eunuchs, a stooped old man whose robe dragged along the ground as he walked. He had long eyebrows, and contained immense, sinister power.

‘Well, look at him,’ Yang Qi thought. From what he could tell, this eunuch probably had a power index beyond a thousand, putting him on a similar level as the flower goddesses. But why would someone with a cultivation base like that be willing to serve as a eunuch? Was he a masochist? Or was the empress just so ridiculously strong that not even people like this could defy her?

“That’s one of the three eunuch-kings of the Joyflower Palace,” Flower Mildcloud explained. “Eunuch Sunflower. He's a very mysterious figure, to the point where not even I'm sure about his background. He's been following the empress for years, and was one of the ones who helped her build the Joyflower Palace into what it is today. She truly trusts him, making him very different from the other eunuchs or the male consorts. There are billions of eunuchs in the Joyflower Palace, but he’s one of the three most powerful!”

“Quite the eunuch,” Yang Qi nodded.

Eunuch Sunflower looked around for a moment, then said, “You god-generals are all slaves of the Joyflower Palace, and will either accomplish the mission given to you or die trying. Your current assignment is to enter a mysterious location in the Great Necropolis known as the Exquisite Desert. It is a desert left behind by the great Exquisite God of ancient times, and contains boundless godhood somewhere inside. Unfortunately, exploring it will be no easy task. If you find the location of the godhood, report it immediately! He who does so will no longer be a god-general or slave, and will instead become a consort of either one of the ten flower goddesses, or one of the sect’s eldresses. Either way, it will be a significant advancement for you.”

Eunuch Sunflower flicked his sleeve, and something like music drifted out, settling onto the heads of everyone present in the form of a halo that made them feel restricted and constantly watched.

‘It’s a primeval god skill!’ Yang Qi thought. ‘A halo of restriction!’

Yang Qi’s Eternal Heavenly Aria could provide blessings of primeval god skills. However, this eunuch’s god skill was obviously something he had stumbled across, and wasn't anything close to what Yang Qi was capable of.

“You may now enter the teleportation portal and go to the Exquisite Desert to begin your search. Once you find the object of your search, use the halo of restriction to lock it down, understand? You should also be aware that there are plenty of treasures in the depths of the Exquisite Desert. If you find them, you absolutely, positively must not take them for your own. You must hand them over. Any that violate this stipulation will be executed without fail!”

Cracking whips, the other eunuchs shouted, “Did all of you hear that? Answer now, unless you want to die!”

None of the god-generals dared to act defiantly, and quickly voiced their affirmation.

At that point, the teleportation portals activated, and they swarmed into them.

It took about two hours for everyone to pass through the portals, whereupon Eunuch Tian turned to Eunuch Sunflower and bowed formally. “Exalted Eunuch Sunflower, the Exquisite Desert is a very dangerous place. I wouldn’t be surprised if everyone we sent there ends up getting killed. I doubt they’ll actually find the location of the godhood.”

Eunuch Sunflower dismissively waved his hand. “It's hard to say. The Exquisite Desert is a strange place in which the level of one’s cultivation base isn’t necessarily important. It’s more about destiny and fate. Those with the proper fate, even if they have a low cultivation base, will be given the right opportunities. Those without the proper fate, even if they have a spectacular cultivation base, might end up trapped and dead. That’s why we're throwing all of this cannon fodder out first. Who knows how we might benefit as a result. Listen well. Strength isn’t the most important thing in the world; sometimes it can be a detriment. Only those with the proper fate can truly come out on top.”

Another eunuch asked, “Then what if one of those damned slaves actually does have the proper fate, but then slips out of our control?”

Eunuch Sunflower snorted coldly. “I've already placed a halo of restriction on all of them, giving them no choice but to follow orders. Besides, all of them have Myriad Transformations Energy Pearls in them as well. If they leave the Joyflower Palace, they’ll lose access to the Myriad Flowers True Energy, at which point their meridians will explode and their souls will slip into death!

“Very well, you all have your assignments. Go to your posts and report to me as soon as you get updates. The empress is currently still in that danger zone trying to get some godhood. If she succeeds, she’ll definitely have hope of reaching the Deathless Throne. And once that happens, we all have the chance of getting into the god world. Understand? Keep your spirits high! You're all lowly eunuchs, but if you prove your worth, the Joyflower Palace will never abandon you!”

Chapter 879: Another Danger Zone

Yang Qi and his companions entered the teleportation portal and were whisked through space-time to a location deep in the Great Necropolis, a pathway as broad and spacious as any other, except filled with endless sand. It was impossible to say how many planes of existence filled those sands, or what they contained.

Those who entered the desert fearfully looked around. After all, the first thing that met their senses were violent tempests and the weeping of ghosts and wailing of gods. An aura of malignancy, death, despair, terror, and suffocation immediately weighed down on all of them, giving them the urge to flee immediately.

Of course, no one fled.

Most of the people present were veterans of many missions, and knew that they had no choice but to try to finish the assigned task once they had reached their destination. If they tried to escape, they would lose any chance at life.

“Let’s go. This is the Exquisite Desert!”

“Don’t even think of trying to run away. No one has ever succeeded at that. Besides, you never know what good fortune we might come across in the desert. If we get the right destiny, we can turn it in for a reward, and maybe even earn the favor of the higher-ups. If we could become consorts, we would have lives of endless blessings, including incredible energy arts. Best of all, we wouldn’t have to become damned eunuchs.”

“That’s right. Once you’re in the Joyflower Palace, you can never escape. However, you can rise through the ranks.”

“Let’s head out. You know, I used to be an important person on the Ancient Road to the Gods, and I've been in the Great Necropolis for hundreds of thousands of years. I've heard of this Exquisite Desert before. It’s a dangerous place, but the upside is that strength doesn’t matter here, only destiny and fate. That’s all you need to get the good fortune that exists here.”

“Exactly. Even a strong person who lacked the proper destiny wouldn’t be able to do squat here in the Exquisite Desert.”

Most of the god-generals kept together in groups of three to five, although some formed teams of dozens. Shouting battle cries, they scattered into the depths of the Exquisite Desert.

Some of the teams simply vanished, while others screamed in misery as they were apparently killed. Unfortunately, the desert was so immense and clouded with sand that not even Yang Qi’s Lord's Eye could penetrate it fully.

“Brother, let’s head in. Make sure to stick together! Keep a fix on each other’s auras and make sure not to get separated!”

“Got it,” Yang Qi said, sending out a stream of energy that connected with those of the Five Hegemons of the Heavenly Kingdom. Then, they flew into the desert.

Almost immediately, they were assailed by screaming winds, causing trouble for the Five Hegemons. These godly winds and sands were virtually impossible to defend against personally. In response, the Five Hegemons howled, causing a god pearl to rise up above them that sent out a shimmering shield of light. Almost immediately, the sand and wind were blocked, and they dropped down to the ground and looked around to gain their bearings. They were in the middle of the desert, with a burning sun overhead that was so hot it seemed as if it might bake them to death where they stood. In fact, they were already steaming as a result.

Yang Qi sent out some divine will, but it couldn’t reach the sun or block its heat. It was definitely strange. His cultivation base was so powerful that he could control an entire universe, and even the countless god formations in the treasure storehouse, yet he was now having trouble with a tiny desert?

That said, he wasn’t worried. He always had the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart to rely on if necessary.

Squatting down, he picked up a handful of sand, and as it flowed through his fingers he could tell that it was definitely not ordinary in nature. It was more solid than ordinary sand and contained tiny magical symbols filled with immense power in each grain.

A sudden gust of sandy wind obscured the sun overhead, but did nothing to lessen the incredible heat.

Clang. Clank!

Within the screaming of the winds, they suddenly heard a sound that resembled swords hitting defensive empyrean energy, as though a group of nearby Grand Emperors were engaged in combat.

Yang Qi tried to fly high into the air, but there was a powerful gravitational force that made it impossible. He also unleashed a fist strike to try to pierce through space, but all it did was cause some ripples to spread out in the air.

‘This place really is a danger zone,’ he thought. ‘I can’t even pierce through space here, and it seems to be suppressing my cultivation base. I feel like a mortal in a real desert in the mortal world. I can almost sense death hovering over us.’ It was quite a shock. He never could have guessed that the Exquisite Desert would be so terrifying and freakish.

“Brother,” one of the five hegemons said, “The only way to explore the desert is on foot. The power here is such that our true energy and magical laws are being harshly suppressed. Do you mind taking the lead? We’ll follow right behind you.”

“Do you really think I’ll just waltz ahead as cannon fodder?” Yang Qi replied. He smiled coyly. “Unfortunately, I'm not so easily manipulated.”

The Five Hegemons reacted with open shock. However, they quickly recovered. Then their leader viciously smiled and said, “It's good you know the situation, boy, although you shouldn’t have said that out loud. It's only going to make things more difficult for you.”

“Exactly,” another of them said. “We're the Five Hegemons of the Heavenly Kingdom! Why do you think we recruited you instead of someone else? The truth is that we knew all along how incredibly dangerous the Exquisite Desert is. We also know that only people with the proper destiny and fate can turn misfortune into a blessing here. Thankfully, we cultivate a godly class energy art called the Son of Heaven’s Horoscopy, which allows us to assess a person’s overall luck, destiny, and fate. From the moment you entered the prison, we could see that you have immense fate, and could therefore be of good use.”

“And how exactly do you plan to ‘use’ me?” Yang Qi said with a grin.

“That depends on how smart you are. If you follow our orders and lead us to our goal, then we’re willing to let you share some of the glory with us. However, if you go off on your own, you’ll definitely end up dead. We already have a general sense of how strong you are, and you aren’t even close to being a match for us. Furthermore, during the past days of healing, we actually inserted true energy seeds into you, which put your life directly in our hands.”

“Oh, you mean these five seeds?” Yang Qi said. He extended his hand to reveal five glistening seeds that twitched and trembled as if they might fly away at any moment. Unfortunately for them, the magical laws of the surrounding desert made that impossible.

“You!” The Five Hegemons of the Heavenly Kingdom were all completely taken aback.

Face flickering with fury, the leader suddenly lunged forward and tried to strike Yang Qi with his fist.

“Survey of the Hegemon!”

Outside this desert, a fist strike like this would have been completely devastating. However, inside the desert, it was almost like an ordinary martial arts move. Everyone in the desert was restrained and could only unleash a smattering of their full potential.

The other four hegemons quickly fanned out to surround Yang Qi, then unleashed the most devastating attacks they could think of.

“Five Hegemons United!”

“Hegemons Reign True!”

“Hegemons Crush Space!”

“Hegemons Found a Dynasty!”

Completely unfazed, Yang Qi simply murmured, “Destabilize!”

A mighty sound wave rolled out, causing dramatic transformations to fill the desert in all directions. Water flowed, vegetation flourished, and mountains rose up. Magical laws flowed out from Yang Qi, causing thunderous rumblings as they slammed into the magical laws of the desert.

Yang Qi’s cultivation base was already so strong that he could last for a short time in a conflict with a god. Although he was still only on the Stair of Valor, which was the first stair on the Deathless Heavenly Stairway, he was intentionally keeping himself there. Later, after he couldn’t build up any more power at all, he would attempt to rise to a higher level. Considering he was at the Destabilizing level, once he began pushing his cultivation base higher, nothing would be able to stand in its way.

He knew that cultivation level wasn’t everything. Even with a low cultivation level, one could have high levels of power, incredible fighting prowess, and a strong will convergence.

Bam. Bam. Bam. Bam. Bam.

The five hegemons were sent stumbling back. Meanwhile, Yang Qi’s surroundings continued transforming, giving him ultimate command over life and death.

The Five Hegemons’ eyes nearly popped out of their skulls. “You… you can unleash magical laws within the Exquisite Desert? You can transform the surroundings here? My god, with a cultivation base like that, why are you a god-general in the Joyflower Palace?”

“You’ve been concealing your true level? We… we really screwed up! We’re obviously inferior to you. Please, spare us, and we’ll be cannon fodder for you!”

Yang Qi snorted coldly. “The last thing I want is for you to have free will. Give me your faith. All of it. Become my believers, and I’ll spare you.”

“What? You want our faith?” The hegemons’ faces fell. They knew the implications of giving their faith, and would rather die than hand over their souls.

“You think refusing my offer will cause problems for me? Watch and see what a real energy art can do!” He splayed his fingers, causing five streams of energy to shoot out and bore into the five of them, piercing all the way into their seas of consciousness. As the holy light filled them, it forced them to give their faith to Yang Qi!

Chapter 880: A Mysterious Consort

Yang Qi was forcefully taking the faith of his opponents, a result of his majestic will. After conquering the knowledge-devils in his sea of consciousness, he was slowly developing the true will of a god-king.

It didn’t take long to completely subjugate the Five Hegemons, making them loyal believers who prostrated in front of him. “Oh mighty master, majestic and omnipotent Lord, what commands do you have for us? We are your most loyal servants, sir, and will carry out your wishes with the utmost reverence.”

“You will go into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart to join my army of Grand Emperors. Once there, send the power of your faith to my immortal-slaying clone.” He waved his sleeve and the God Legion Battle Robe sent out a stream of energy that wrapped around the five hegemons, who subsequently vanished.

The army of Grand Emperors in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart now numbered fifty in total, including Cipher Rite-Heaven. The combined faith of fifty such individuals was terrifying, especially considering that they were all people with power indexes in the dozens. The only downside was that their destiny was somewhat weaker than their faith.

Destiny and faith were different.

Faith was a pure convergence of psychic elements, the fullness of the heart, and the expression of the nascent divinity. It was all about the individual. As for destiny, that was about one’s connection to the dao of heaven.

The stronger someone was, the greater faith they could provide. But destiny wasn’t necessarily connected to strength. Even weak people with no martial arts at all could still provide immense destiny. And there were some top experts who were consummate hegemons, but had weak destiny and would eventually simply perish.

It was a very critical variable.

As the leader of the Dao Defense League, Yang Qi had been able to take the universal fortune of heaven and earth, which was the combination of the destiny of countless individuals.

Unfortunately, he had abandoned the Dao Defense League, albeit not very willingly. Eventually, he hoped to take it back. For now, though, the cultivation of his immortal-slaying clone would benefit greatly from this influx of five powerful experts, and in fact, it was the only way he could continue to achieve advancement. If the Joyflower Palace could force an army of experts to work for them, then Yang Qi could do the same thing to help his immortal-slaying clone. An army of Grand Emperors would have immense destiny; after all, the destiny on the Ancient Road to the Gods was vastly superior to that from the mortal world.

‘I may have had to abandon the Dao Defense League in the mortal world, but at least I'm starting to gather faith from the Ancient Road to the Gods and the Great Necropolis. Of course, on the Ancient Road to the Gods, there is no dao of heaven, but rather the dao of gods. And instead of ordinary destiny, what’s available from there is god destiny.’

Yang Qi had already dissolved the halos of restriction that the five hegemons had been affixed with. His Eternal Heavenly Aria had easily destroyed them. Outside, Eunuch Sunflower would simply assume that the five of them had been killed.

Given that they were mere god-general prisoners, no one would think twice about their loss.

At this point, Yang Qi quickly altered his physical appearance to make himself unrecognizable. Then, he began venturing further into the desert, simultaneously working on assimilating the knowledge-devils in his sea of consciousness.

The energy field which surrounded him continued expanding, transforming from several dozen meters to a few hundred, then a few thousand. Obviously, his own magical laws and will were able to subjugate the magical laws of the Exquisite Desert and create a pure land around him that conformed to the legion of gods.

RUMBLE!

At a certain point, he had vanquished all of the knowledge-devils, and his sea of consciousness became a mass of radiance and light, completely clear of anything other than his own majestic will. Now that the process was complete, his thinking felt clearer than ever and he could even get a vague sense of the overall structure of the Exquisite Desert. He suddenly realized that it was a lair of sandworms, almost like a labyrinth of sorts. It was connected to the power of the Great Necropolis, causing the labyrinth to constantly change and making it almost impossible to find its center.

That said, Yang Qi could sense that there was some convergence of incredible power in the middle of the lair, a high-level conglomeration of pure godliness.

‘Is that the godhood we’ve been sent after?’ Yang Qi thought.

He was about to continue onward when he suddenly sensed imminent danger. He quickly reined in the energy field, slipped into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, and continued monitoring the situation in the desert.

RUMBLE!

At that exact moment, immense energy appeared, blazing with furious light that melted the nearby sand from its intensity.

At the same time, several beams of light descended.

Shockingly, these people were capable of flying within the Exquisite Desert! They could break the magical laws of the gods, and seemed completely unrestrained. Clearly, their cultivation bases were far beyond Yang Qi’s.

“Who are these people?” Yang Qi was fairly certain that whoever these newcomers were, they hadn’t been sent by Eunuch Sunflower. And he didn’t even need to use the power assessment systems to come to the conclusion that their indexes were over a thousand.

There were five of them, all exceedingly handsome young men. In fact, their leader was so extraordinarily good-looking that he defied description. He held a folding fan, and his delicate beauty would put anyone in his presence to shame. Yang Qi couldn’t even come close to comparing to his beauty.

“What was that just now?” the beautiful young man said. His voice was soft and gentle; it wasn’t feminine, but rather magnetically attractive. “I just sensed a particularly powerful aura fighting against the magical laws of the Exquisite Desert. Then it vanished. But how? Could some other powerful sect have sent experts here as well, hoping to probe its secrets and find that godhood? This is Joyflower Palace territory, and anyone who dares to intrude should die beyond the shadow of a doubt.”

“There’s no way top experts from other organizations could be here,” another of the beautiful young men said. “Perhaps it was some entity native to the desert. Eldest Brother Zilin, our Joyflower Palace sent a lot of god-generals to explore this place. There should at least be a few with the proper destiny to uncover the secrets of the desert. The godhood of the Exquisite Cathedral will definitely be found eventually, don’t you think? The best thing we can do is act quickly and beat them to it.”

“That’s right, Eldest Brother Zilin,” another of the young men said. “You’re the consort of the empress herself, whereas the rest of us are consorts to mere eldresses. In terms of both energy arts and position, you surpass us by thousands of times. Although, I heard a rumor that the empress recently acquired a new consort that she’s been heavily doting on. She keeps him by her side day and night! If you don’t find that godhood, you might lose her favor, then all of us will be in for tough times.”

“Yeah. Who would’ve thought that the empress would actually take a liking to some punk from the immortal dao civilization? His cultivation base is so low that he might as well be an ant!”

“We just need to think of a good way to get rid of that brat.”

“Enough,” Zilin said. “Quiet down, all of you. Killing Leaf Dao-Denier is not an option. For one thing, she keeps a close eye on him. Second, even if we somehow conceal the matter from her, she’d definitely still find out the truth, eventually, and then we’d be in big trouble. She’s seen plenty of power struggles within the harem, and is no fool. Don’t forget that there are hundreds of thousands of consorts, with only a few top favorites. I'm foremost among them, and there’s good reason for that. You see, my main goal is to work hard and accomplish everything I can for the empress. And she understands that. If I spent my time competing with the other consorts, I would definitely lose favor eventually. The only reason the empress is doting on Leaf Dao-Denier is because he has a unique constitution. Believe it or not, he's an Eternal Fortuned One, meaning he has a combination of two powerful and unique constitutions. The empress wants to see how far he can develop, and determine whether or not she can absorb his blood into her own. Remember, the ancient King Immortal-Slayer was also a Fortuned One.”

“Fine. We’ll follow your lead, Eldest Brother. In any case, there doesn’t seem to be anything helpful here. We need to find the Exquisite Cathedral, take that godhood, and get it back to the empress. Then she’ll be able to defeat the other powerful organizations like the Cipher-Devil Sword Sect, the Gåma Basilica, and the Ancestral Wilds Basilica. If we can help her achieve her goals, then all of us will definitely become favored consorts.”

“Ai. Come on, let’s go.” Zilin shook his head and flew up into the air, becoming a beam of light that shot further into the depths of the Exquisite Desert.

Yang Qi had been privy to their entire conversation and was too surprised to even react, at first.

These developments were almost completely unbelievable.

Leaf Dao-Denier was a consort of the empress of the Joyflower Palace? Yang Qi could already tell that the consorts of the flower goddesses were completely arrogant and stuck up. How much worse would the consorts of the empress be?

Leaf Dao-Denier had obviously experienced a huge reversal in fortunes. Yang Qi almost laughed. The Joyflower Palace was an empire run by women, and its empress was like an emperor from the mortal world. In the mortal world, the harems were usually filled with beautiful women who viciously competed for the favor of the emperor. Here, it was the male consorts competing for the empress’ favor. Yet again the saying in the chiliocosm of worlds, there is no lack of strange things was proved true.

At first, Yang Qi shivered at the thought of hordes of beautiful men in the palace, all scheming and fighting against each other. But then he smiled.

“That Zilin is a rare beauty of a man,” Flower Mildcloud said, “and he’s the most favored consort of the empress. In fact, he might as well be her official husband. There are three other favored consorts who are just as good-looking as him, but he doesn’t compete with them. He focuses solely on working hard for the empress, which is why she trusts him so much. He’s obviously a top figure in the Joyflower Palace, someone I’ve heard about but have never laid eyes on personally. In fact, I don't even qualify to meet him in person. I have to say, he’s just as good looking as people say.”

From the way her eyes glistened, it was clear she was somewhat smitten.

Chapter 881: Putting More Pawns in Place

When Yang Qi saw the look in Flower Mildcloud’s eyes, he couldn’t help but blurt, “Idiot!”

“You!” she said, glaring at him. Then she looked away coolly. “You’re not nearly as attractive as Zilin. The empress definitely won’t be asking you to be a consort anytime soon.”

Yang Qi laughed. “You think I want to be a consort? Even if Empress Joyflower herself offered to be my handmaiden, I would refuse. Eventually, I'm going to turn all the women from the Joyflower Palace into slaves. Including you.”

“Uh....” Flower Mildcloud shivered as she suddenly recalled her current situation. Although Yang Qi was helping her advance her cultivation, she was still completely under his control. And he was advancing ten times faster than she was. If things continued progressing as they were right now, it would eventually reach the point where her cultivation base couldn’t possibly compare with his.

A moment passed, and she simply sat down quietly and closed her eyes to work on cultivation.

Eyeing her, Yang Qi sent out a canopy to cover her and make sure she didn’t go around causing problems in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. She was very valuable to him right now. The fact that her aura conformed to the Joyflower Palace meant that he had easy access to the treasure storehouse, among other places. Of course, now that he had eight of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions, her usefulness was diminishing rapidly. But Yang Qi wasn’t the kind to forget her earlier service.

After handling some matters in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, he returned to the Exquisite Desert.

Having defeated all of the knowledge-devils, he had the option of returning to get more god formations. However, after hearing that there was true godhood in the Exquisite Desert, he decided that he would be best served by staying behind and making sure Empress Joyflower didn’t get it.

The empress was currently one of his biggest enemies. Forgetting the fact that she treated all men like pigs or dogs, there was still the fact that she had somehow taken Leaf Dao-Denier as a consort. That was a big development that had come as a complete surprise.

Leaf Dao-Denier knew a lot of Yang Qi’s secrets, including the fact that he had a God Legion Seal. Although he had never spread that information, it was a given that he was trying to find an opportunity to kill Yang Qi. And if he finally ran out of options, it was always possible that he would finally reveal the information about the God Legion Seal to harm Yang Qi.

Yang Qi absolutely had to be on guard against any desperate moves.

Thankfully, it would be easy to discard his current identity and fake his own death in the Exquisite Desert. That would relieve a lot of pressure.

For the time being, he was virtually free of any care or worry.

The Dao Defense League was currently in the hands of Orchid Purity, who was actually strengthening it with every moment that passed.

If he ‘died’ in the Exquisite Desert, then no one would possibly be able to track him down, not even Proud Heaven. That said, perhaps this would be a good opportunity to toy with Leaf Dao-Denier a bit. Maybe he could even lay some bait and turn the entire situation to his advantage.

WHOOSH!

With that, he headed deeper into the Exquisite Desert, using his Destabilizing will to probe into the natural laws and structure of the place. Apparently, the legendary Exquisite Cathedral was the ultimate destination, the location of the godhood that he so needed to challenge the Joyflower Palace. It would also help him take the countless god formations much faster.

The desert only got more hot and dry as he went along. There were a few creatures present, things native to the desert who were used to its nature that were so incredibly powerful they could easily devour Grand Emperors.

Yang Qi ran across the occasional god-general or two. With the flick of his sleeve, he would dismantle their energy arts and force them to become believers. Most of them were Grand Emperors with power indexes of about twenty, although some had indexes as high as forty, fifty, or even eighty.

After capturing about thirty such individuals, his army of Grand Emperors in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart reached a total of around ninety. The immortal-slaying clone was in the virtual god world, flanked by the seventy-one patriarchs, and the influx of faith continued to grow more beneficial.

After losing the Dao Defense League, the clone’s cultivation speed had slowed down significantly, and might have even crawled to a halt if it weren’t for finding the eighth legacy medallion.

But now he was once again advancing by leaps and bounds. Not only was his power index increasing, but Yang Qi could also sense that the clone's sea of consciousness was developing magical laws. Of course, they weren’t pure, but had black spots from the karma of the people who gave the faith. Eventually, that karma would cause major problems.

Yang Qi shook his head, aware that the problem of karma would cause difficulties in dealing with the resurrected King Immortal-Slayer.

‘Once I take down the Joyflower Palace, I’ll kill all the bad seeds and take the faith from everyone else for my immortal-slaying clone.’ With such matters on his mind, Yang Qi continued along in the desert until he came across three familiar faces.

One of them looked nearly skeletal, the other was tall and burly, and the third was a sinister-looking young man.

They were none other than the Three Ruthless Fiends, who were now consorts to a flower goddess. As such, they weren’t in the Exquisite Desert as god-general prisoners. Apparently, they were using some sort of magical treasure or god item to fly along without impediment.

“Brothers, let’s hope we get truly lucky and find the legendary Exquisite Cathedral!” said the burly Ruthless Earth-Fiend. “Once we do, we’ll solidify our place amongst the consorts, and even achieve spectacular advancement.”

“Ai!” said the sinister-looking young man. “It's too bad we're only consorts to a flower goddess. You can only be so important in that position. Wouldn’t it be great if we were consorts to the empress? Even her low-ranking consorts command incredible might and authority on the outside.”

“Are you kidding me? It’s not that easy to become consorts to the empress. For one thing, our cultivation bases are too low.”

“Yeah, but what about that punk named... what was it? Leaf Dao-Denier! He has a pitifully low cultivation base, not even at the Grand Emperor level! But after he got captured, the empress immediately started doting on him. Apparently, he’s one of the top consorts now.”

Even as the Three Ruthless Fiends were discussing Leaf Dao-Denier, a beam of light appeared in front of them, out of which stepped Yang Qi. Before they could react, an energy field sprang out from him, blocking their path.

“Who are you?” Ruthless Earth-Fiend said. “How dare you block our path!”

“I trust the three of you have been well since we last met?” Yang Qi said with a broad smile. “You beat up a power double of mine, and seemed to have quite an enjoyable time doing so. Of course, it was only a measly power double.”

“Oh, it’s you.” Ruthless Earth-Fiend immediately prepared to attack Yang Qi, but before he could, the skeletal Ruthless Heaven-Fiend reached out to hold him back.

Eyes flickering shrewdly, Ruthless Heaven-Fiend said, “Well, who would’ve thought that a top expert like you would be hiding within the forces of the Joyflower Palace. Not even Eunuch Sunflower noticed you, did he? What exactly is your plan here?”

Yang Qi’s eyes narrowed as he smiled. “Plan? There’s no plan. However, you three offended me, and that means the only fate in store for you is death.”

“I don’t see the need for us to fight, Your Majesty,” Ruthless Heaven-Fiend said calmly. “Whatever your plan is, why not let us help you? We're consorts to a flower goddess, so we have access to a lot of top-secret information.”

“You’re just trying to buy time,” Yang Qi said. “By the way, look at what I have here. Your communication medallions.” With a flourish, he produced three communication medallions, which were already covered with shimmering, porcelain-colored shields, rendering them completely inoperable.

Snorting coldly, he continued, “I'd suggest you not waste your time trying to play games with me. You see, I've already spread my tendrils throughout the Joyflower Palace. Leaf Dao-Denier works for me, which means that I have your empress completely under my control! Do you really think a few pieces of trash like you have the right to act tough to me?”

“What?” The Three Ruthless Fiends suddenly realized that this was going to be a difficult situation to escape from alive.

Swish!

Suddenly, Yang Qi blurred into motion, appearing in front of the skeletal Ruthless Heaven-Fiend, who dodged to the side with spectacular quickness.

“Nine Ghostshadow Transformations!”

Unfortunately, no matter what he did, he wasn’t able to escape from Yang Qi.

Suddenly, Yang Qi’s hand latched onto his head, crushing it to a pulp, destroying his nascent divinity, and transforming him into nothing more than a corpse that flopped down onto the sand.

“Let’s go!” the other two fiends said, not even bothering to try to get revenge for their slain fellow.

Yang Qi flicked his finger, sending out a burst of energy that slammed into Ruthless Earth-Fiend, ripping him to shreds.

“Agggghhhh!”

The only survivor was Ruthless Man-Fiend, who desperately burrowed down into the earth beneath him. Smiling coldly, Yang Qi launched another palm strike at the earth. However, Ruthless Man-Fiend was nowhere to be found, apparently having teleported away to parts unknown after burrowing underground.

Of course, Yang Qi had allowed him to escape, all in the hopes that he would spread the word that Leaf Dao-Denier was on Yang Qi’s payroll.

Yang Qi was planning two moves ahead. First, he was sowing distrust between Leaf Dao-Denier and the empress. After that, when word spread about the treasure storehouse having been robbed, he would make sure Leaf Dao-Denier was implicated, and the empress would be even more furious.

Of course, Yang Qi needed to clear out all of the other god formations before that happened.

Chapter 882: The Cathedral is Found

Yang Qi had plans nested within plans, and was very curious to see if Leaf Dao-Denier could manage to hold on to his status as a consort after all of this.

It had been more than a year since the Great Necropolis appeared, and it was hard to say what bloody battles Leaf Dao-Denier had fought, or what secrets he had become privy to. One thing was for sure: he had been a consort for long enough to increase his cultivation base and reach a higher level. In fact, it was entirely possible that he was already a Grand Emperor.

He was an Eternal Fortuned One, the combination of two special constitutions, which made him no less spectacular than Yang Qi, who was a Fateless One. Furthermore, Yang Qi had the nagging suspicion that Leaf Dao-Denier had killed and assimilated Eldest Brother Secundus. Otherwise, how could his blood be so pure?

In entering a partnership with Leaf Dao-Denier, Eldest Brother Secundus had invited the wolf into one’s house, ensuring that it was only a matter of time before he died.

‘You’re such a loser, Leaf Dao-Denier,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘You used to be an important person who could call the wind and summon the rain. But now you’re a consort to a woman. I have to say, I'm very disappointed, and I'm starting to wonder if it’s even worth it to leave you alive. Perhaps the next time we meet I’ll just kill you to forestall future frustration. Then again, a lot of Grand Emperors have gone into the Great Necropolis, only to be killed. But you somehow struck it lucky and got even stronger than before. I wonder if you’re doing it with the help of some sort of magical treasure or god item.”

At that point, Yang Qi made his decision: he would capture Leaf Dao-Denier and unravel his secrets before killing him.

Of course, it was highly likely that Empress Joyflower had helped Leaf Dao-Denier push his cultivation base to a higher level, and Yang Qi needed to know the details before he did anything else. From what he understood, the consorts favored by Empress Joyflower would participate in yin-yang dual cultivation. Not only would it provide immense delight, it would also further the cultivation bases of both parties, including the male. That was another reason why men would viciously fight to earn the favor of the empress. Eventually, such men would be completely hooked on the process. It was almost like being addicted to a powerful drug.

Even more noteworthy, furthering one's cultivation in this manner didn’t carry the danger of cultivation deviation. In the end, it was highly likely that Leaf Dao-Denier was much stronger than before, and the empress had probably also greatly benefited.

She had acquired some of the blood of an Eternal Fortuned One, and he had received some of her incredibly powerful vital energy. For someone with as low of a cultivation base as his to be blessed by someone as powerful as her was almost like a mortal being blessed by a god.

Despite how strong Leaf Dao-Denier probably was, Yang Qi still hadn’t elevated him to the position of enemy in his heart. That was reserved for Proud Heaven, the other magisters, and Empress Joyflower herself.

‘I need to find the Exquisite Cathedral and get my hands on that godhood.’

He waved his hand, sending out the godpower of monarchs from the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. An enormous disc appeared in front of him, which depicted the Great Necropolis as a whole. Then it began zooming in, rushing forward until it was focused on the Exquisite Desert.

This was a recently unlocked power from the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, called the Godly Positioning System. However, as he drew on it, Yang Qi was shocked to find that something within the Great Necropolis was actually interfering with the effects. Because of it, he wasn’t able to make out very many specific details. That alone made it obvious that the Great Necropolis was an item on the same level as the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

It seemed impossible that any human could have created such a thing, begging the question of whether or not it had been crafted by the Sovereign Lord himself. But if it was something from the Sovereign Lord, then it should have provoked a resonance from the God Legion Seal. Yang Qi had sensed no such resonance, which seemed to indicate that the necropolis had been created by a Paramount God.

Obviously, it wasn’t King Immortal-Slayer. But what other entity existed on that same level? After all, not even the Cruiser of Civilization, created by the preeminent Lord of Civilization, could compare to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. But the power of the Great Necropolis definitely did.

At the moment, it didn't seem that anyone was in control of the Great Necropolis, which meant that its power was wild and disorderly. For now, it was possible for Yang Qi to come and go in the Great Necropolis by drawing on the power of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. But if the Great Necropolis opposed him, that obviously wouldn’t work.

‘This Great Necropolis is an immensely powerful god item that rivals the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Maybe it even surpasses the chart. It can’t be a coincidence that it showed up here all of a sudden. Perhaps it’s searching for a new owner, and whoever gets the proper destiny will be that person.’

Yang Qi’s intuition was telling him that the Great Necropolis would have a new owner sooner or later. But who would it be? It was impossible to say right now.

For now, he focused on the Godly Positioning System until he finally caught sight of the shimmering image of a cathedral in the depths of the desert, almost like a mirage. It seemed to be moving here and there, as if it weren’t in a fixed position. He focused on its current position and a vortex suddenly sprang into existence and swallowed him up.

A moment later, he was in the depths of a sandstorm so powerful that it would likely destroy even Grand Emperors with a power index of fifty or so. The screaming sands scraped across his defensive empyrean energy, leaving it pitted and torn, but he quickly poured more true energy into it and ensured he was safe from harm.

Although it was a drain on his true energy, his reserves were so deep that he could keep this up for years without needing to be worried.

He let out an enraged roar, shooting forward through the sand and turning into something like a yellow dragon that quickly reached the stairs leading up to the cathedral. He knew he had to move as fast as possible to catch the cathedral.

The cathedral was actually alive, and it moved around in such a way that it was almost impossible to track. It would likewise be impossible to chase, and locking onto its position would require a huge amount of power.

A bang rang out as his feet landed on the staircase, and he looked inside to find that it was completely devoid of sand. It was almost as if someone had swept it out with a broom, or the surrounding sandstorm refused to encroach on the cathedral because of the godpower it contained.

As soon as Yang Qi reached the cathedral, he noticed other individuals approaching through the sandy tempests. It was none other than Zilin and his fellow consorts.

They had obviously exerted tremendous effort to reach this location.

Zilin was the first to step onto the staircase, and immediately caught sight of Yang Qi.

“Who's this?” he murmured. Yang Qi, clad in his God Legion Battle Robe, had long since dissolved the halo of restriction that had been forced on him. Instead, he pulsed with sage energy that caused everything around him to tremble.

“Who are you?” one of the other consorts asked. “And what are you doing here?”

“Who am I?” Yang Qi smiled. “The Exquisite Desert is a part of the Great Necropolis, so anyone can come explore it. It took me a lot of effort to locate the Exquisite Cathedral, and I'm just about to go in and clear it out.”

“So you're an outsider, then,” Zilin said, flicking his fan out to prevent the other consorts from doing anything. “Are you from the Ancient Road to the Gods? Considering the level of your cultivation base, it's quite miraculous that you were able to locate the Exquisite Cathedral. In fact, I don’t think I've encountered anyone quite like you on the Ancient Road to the Gods before. What is your honored surname and distinguished given name?”

“No comment,” Yang Qi replied. “Besides, from ancient times until now, the number of experts on the Ancient Road to the Gods are as many as the carp crossing the river. It’s only natural that you wouldn’t know my name. By the way, I'm aware that the Joyflower Palace thinks the Exquisite Desert belongs to them. Your entire goal is to get the godhood here, right? Well, I'm very curious to see if you’ll succeed.”

“Eldest Brother Zilin, enough chit-chat,” one of the other consorts said. “This guy is obviously an enemy. It took us a lot of work to locate the Exquisite Cathedral, and we had to waste a lot of god items to lock down its position. There’s no way we can just let him block our path.”

“Kill him. If he manages to get the godhood, we’ll definitely lose favor with the empress and end up worse off than the eunuchs.”

The other consorts began fanning out to surround Yang Qi. Meanwhile, Yang Qi just looked at them with a smile. For the moment, the only person in this group that he was even slightly worried about was Zilin himself.

“Hold on!” Zilin said as he began to pulse with killing intent. “Your Majesty, you truly seem like an elegant and majestic individual. A man of striking appearance and talent. Why don’t you join us? Considering what you’re capable of, if you come to the Joyflower Palace, it’s likely the empress will take you on as a consort. You would have a very high position, as opposed to losing out by making yourself our enemy.”

Unexpectedly, he was trying to get Yang Qi to simply surrender to them.

Laughing, Yang Qi flicked his sleeve. “You also seem like an elegant and majestic individual, Your Majesty. A man of striking appearance and talent, and a delicate beauty. Why would someone like you deign to join the Joyflower Palace as a male consort? Don’t you know you're a laughingstock among the heroes of heaven and earth? Why don’t you join me? We can definitely accomplish great things. Men should be masculine, but here you are taking orders from a woman. It’s really laughable.”

“You obviously have no idea what you’re talking about,” Zilin replied coolly. “Even heroes have to submit to beautiful people like me. It's a simple truth, although you obviously don’t understand it. In fact, I don’t think you understand anything about what I want or need. So get out of my way. I won’t kill you, as I never stain my hands with blood.”

Yang Qi burst out laughing. “You're really stubborn aren’t you? Well, considering you cower behind the skirts of women, I guess I have nothing left to say to you. I'm going to take that godhood, then turn that empress of yours into a maidservant. I'm curious to see the look on your face when that happens. Will you be as cool and collected as you are now?”

Without waiting for a response, Yang Qi turned and shot into the cathedral.

“Are you looking to die?” Zilin blurted angrily. “You can insult me, and I won’t get mad. But insult the empress, and you earn the death penalty!”

Chapter 883: The Beautiful Zilin

Beautiful men who get angry are nothing to take lightly.

And once Zilin heard Yang Qi insult Empress Joyflower, he flew into a rage. That said, despite his fury, he still looked cool and collected, and not the least bit vicious. In fact, he was more like a fluttering butterfly, his garments rippling as he flew after Yang Qi and struck toward him with his fan.

“Lively Dance of the Butterfly,” he said casually, yet his moves were filled with the ultimate power of both yin and yang, causing Yang Qi’s defensive empyrean energy to tremble violently before shattering like actual porcelain.

Yang Qi’s eyes went wide with shock; he had never expected his opponent to be so fast and ferocious. And his move, despite being as beautiful as a butterfly, was exceedingly dangerous.

“Endless Mourning Finger Technique!” he said, spinning in place as he relied on the Seventy-Two Monarchs Energy Art, specifically, a finger attack from King Mourn-Parting. A will of mournful hatred sped out, heading directly toward his opponent’s fan.

Crack!

The finger hit the fan, and Zilin’s clothing rippled as his true energy spread around him, causing him to collapse into a host of what appeared to be butterflies.

“What ability is that?” Yang Qi murmured in surprise. Contrary to any expectation, his Endless Mourning Finger Technique had no opportunity to enter his opponent’s meridians before he collapsed into a host of butterflies.

“Endless Mourning Finger Technique?” Zilin said as he pursued Yang Qi into the depths of the Exquisite Cathedral. A host of divine likenesses could be seen on either side of the hall they flew through.

They were ancient stone carvings, meticulously detailed, all of them holding weapons and treading on ghosts and gods. Auspicious clouds surrounded them, and they were so lifelike that they almost seemed to be truly alive. At first glance, it was impossible to see what sect or organization might have carved them.

“So you have the Endless Mourning Finger Technique from the Seventy-Two Monarchs Energy Art,” Zilin said. “Unfortunately, I can tell that it's not complete, and doesn’t have enough of a will of mourning. There’s no way you can push it to the point of eternal parting, let alone true endless mourning for all aeons. Look, I’ll give you another chance to join the Joyflower Palace. We have one of King Mourn-Parting’s weapons in our treasure storehouse, as well as halls of the Mourn-Parting Heaven-Palace. If you get them, your cultivation base will improve and your Endless Mourning Finger Technique will reach an even higher level. What do you say?”

Obviously he still hadn’t given up on trying to recruit Yang Qi.

Inside, Yang Qi was laughing. ‘Never in your wildest dreams could you guess that I’ve already started clearing out your treasure storehouse.’ It was only natural that Yang Qi couldn’t unleash the Seventy-Two Monarchs Energy Art to the same level as the old seventy-two monarchs. The old King Mourn-Parting had mourned so deeply that he hated everything in heaven and earth, including all living things. That was how he had developed the vicious Endless Mourning Finger Technique. As such, it needed a boundless spirit of mourning and hatred to unleash its full power, which Yang Qi was incapable of.

However, as long as he pushed his will to a high enough level, he could be like the gods of old, who had many faces, including those that expressed happiness, anger, sorrow, and joy.

After all, the ancient gods had often had three heads and six arms, four heads and eight arms, or even ten thousand heads, arms, eyes, and mouths. The faces of each of those heads would display a different emotion, and real ones at that; they weren’t just designed to strike fear into the hearts of humans. According to rumor, the buddhas of ancient times had rivaled the legion of gods and could use the emotion of rage as a defense mechanism.

Meanwhile, the resistance from Zilin’s cultivation base was incredible, forcing Yang Qi to stagger back several paces. Then, cracking sounds were heard as he expelled butterflies from his meridians, which briefly shot out into the open before fading away.

“Incredible,” Zilin said. “You were hit by my Lively Dance of the Butterfly, yet easily dispelled the Dream Butterfly True Energy. You’re definitely as strong as multiple Grand Emperors.”

Zilin took a few steps forward and streams of beautiful dancing butterflies flew out, manifestations of true energy that were each the size of a palm.

Yang Qi immediately realized that all of the butterflies were packed with magical laws, and, in their flight, they were creating a spell formation that would confuse and befuddle anyone caught in it.

“Think this over,” Zilin said. “I'm going to give you a bit more time. Now, more than ever, you qualify to join the Joyflower Palace and become a consort. Consider carefully!”

“Just what kind of true energy is that?” Yang Qi said coldly. “It's very miraculous. Like nothing I've ever seen before.”

“It’s a consummate art from Dream Butterfly from the god world, the Lord of Dreams. Even if I explained more details, you wouldn’t understand. Your cultivation is just too low. I’m going to repeat myself: I'm not going to kill you. But you’re not strong enough to escape here, I’ll capture you, take you back to the empress, and force you to apologize to her!”

‘Dream Butterfly?’ Yang Qi thought. He had never heard of this supposed Lord of Dreams, but anyone with a title like that was likely to be a Paramount God.

Regardless, this energy art was definitely at the level of a Paramount God, and was no inferior to any of the individual energy arts of the seventy-two monarchs. That alone showed how profound Zilin’s cultivation was. Yang Qi had a feeling that his will convergence was actually in the Destabilizing level, far above the Stupendous level.

It was a terrifying thought.

As for his power index, it was over a thousand, whereas Yang Qi’s was only at two hundred eighty. With Destabilizing will, that meant that Zilin was about evenly matched with Yang Qi.

It was no wonder this guy was a favored consort of Empress Joyflower and held sway over the harem. He was almost like the official husband of the empress.

“You really think I can’t escape this formation?” Yang Qi said. He smiled, then was suddenly surrounded by a blur of black light as he stepped out of the formation of butterflies. “Well, I'm off. Feel like a bit of hide-and-seek in this cathedral?”

Without another word, he vanished.

“After him!” Zilin said, visibly taken aback. ‘What did he just do? I honestly can’t believe he escaped from my Dream Butterfly Formation. That formation turns reality into a dream state, and uses the magical laws of the Lord of Dreams to invert the world. Most who practice cultivation seek to cultivate truth, but I actually cultivate that which is a dream. By inserting dreams into my dao, I can break truth with dreams. At high levels, I can use dreams to create a kingdom of the true self.’

Despite being unsure of what he was dealing with, he didn’t hesitate to speed forth at top speed in his search for Yang Qi. By now, he realized that this opponent was definitely highly skilled. Although Yang Qi didn’t have a very high power index, he was definitely someone to view as an equal. And he had a variety of techniques at his disposal that made him difficult to assess. It seemed that the only way to try to unravel his secrets was to clash with him further.

The cathedral was filled with a maze of corridors, all of them lined with divine likenesses. It was such a confusing place that even top experts would likely get lost there.

Yang Qi was using the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart to travel about, going between different parallel universes to make it even harder to track him. After all, he wasn’t here to fight with Zilin, he was here to acquire the reward of godhood. That said, his interactions with Zilin were giving him an initial look at what Empress Joyflower was capable of. After all, the two of them had definitely practiced dual cultivation together.

‘This guy’s power index is over a thousand, and he definitely has an advantage over me with his Destabilizing will. But once I get that godhood, I should be able to increase my power index to close the gap. Then he definitely won’t be a match for me.’

He continued using the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart to plot a course to his destination, heading deeper and deeper into the cathedral.

The strangest thing about the cathedral was that it didn’t have any treasures in it, only the divine likenesses. And those statues didn’t emanate any fluctuations, making them seem like they were made of ordinary materials that had later become deathless.

Yang Qi could sense traces of energy arts on them, but he wasn’t interested in them at the moment. After all, what energy art could possibly surpass the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth?

‘There it is! The godhood!’ When the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart finally revealed the location of the godhood, he drew on his Freedom Wings and flew toward it at top speed.

It was the very center of the Exquisite Cathedral, and by extension, the very center of the Exquisite Desert.

Yang Qi vanished into a vortex, then reappeared in front of a huge altar covered with black magical symbols. Deep within the symbols, energy flowed almost like water, creating stalactites that were also covered with liquid.

Yang Qi reached out and allowed some of the liquid to touch his hand. Instantly, the energy wrapped tightly around him, exerting such force that blood began oozing out of all of his pores.

Before he could do anything else, the power assessment systems unleashed a screaming warning.

[Beep-beep-beep. Beep-beep-beep. Fragmented godhood. Immense power. DO NOT ABSORB. Danger. Danger. Extreme danger!]

Despite the voice speaking to him, Yang Qi’s heart swelled with excitement. ‘Fragmented godhood? So, it really is a piece of godhood. No wonder it’s filled with so much power. It nearly destroyed my meridians!’

Godhood was actually the quintessence energy of the will of a god. The flesh and blood of a god was almost like trash compared to it. Even after a powerful god perished, their flesh and blood might rot away, but their godhood was truly undying.

Chapter 884: A Piece of Godhood

Yang Qi was shocked at the power flowing through his blood and meridians. In some ways, the godhood was like the turtledove occupying the magpie’s nest, and was attempting to destroy his soul and his true energy, which would turn him into a completely different person.

However, Yang Qi wasn’t afraid. As his true energy repaired itself, and his flesh and blood reformed, the fragmented godhood shone with scintillating light, transforming into something like a crystal shard on his palm.

Yang Qi knew full well that he couldn’t assimilate the shard. The moment it had entered him, it assailed him like the sharpest of blades. Obviously, it would be of no benefit to his fighting prowess, and would require more research before he could use it.

‘Wait, what about the Engine of the One God?’ he thought. Focusing his attention on the engine, he asked, “Can you disassemble this shard and absorb the power?”

The photonic computer immediately offered a response. [This fragment of pure godhood has an index of one, and is from a Lesser God. It can be converted into power.]

“Begin the conversion!”

A pounding sound echoed out from his heart, the location of the Engine of the One God, as it began breaking down the fragment of godhood. The engine began to vibrate and pulse with godpower. Almost immediately, Yang Qi was filled with power that vastly surpassed his own current levels.

If he started fighting Zilin now, the power of the Engine of the One God would ensure that he couldn’t possibly lose. After all, some of the most powerful aspects of the engine were now coming online, including the strength god systems.

[Assimilating godhood fragment. Filling power reserves. Strength god systems online.]

Yang Qi watched as the Engine of the One God began transforming in the depths of his heart. It was as if a juvenile dragon existed in the engine now, an ancient heaven-god whose every breath caused power to flow through Yang Qi. It was a power that, when combined with his true energy, could end the heavens and crush the earth, even pushing him to the level of the god world.

The strength god systems of the Engine of the One God truly provided immense and boundless power.

‘Unfortunately, it’s not my own power,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘My fighting prowess is definitely more incredible, but my overall cultivation level hasn’t improved.’ He shook his head. After all, even the weakest of persons could use the power of a huge battleship to slaughter immortals or devils. But that didn’t make the person any stronger than before.

It would only benefit him personally if he assimilated the godhood on his own, except he couldn’t do that right now.

‘Well, this is only a fragment of godhood. I guess I should absorb all of it into the Engine of the One God and improve my fighting prowess. Then I can open the seal and get the full portion of godhood. If nothing else, at least Zilin won’t get it.’

With the strength god systems activated, he was now strong enough to fight opponents with a power index of seven or eight hundred. Of course, it would drain a lot of power if he did that. The piece of godhood he had taken would only keep the greater divine ability systems going for so long before it was exhausted.

He took a breath, and a god of strength appeared behind him as a projection. It was a manifestation of pure power, without any flaws whatsoever. Power was the foundation of everything in existence, and without it, nothing could function.

All of a sudden, Yang Qi got the sensation that heaven and earth was filled, not with vital energy, but by connections of power. Power itself was what made the universe function. The movement of the sun and the moon. The functions of the dao of heaven. The birth and destruction of the universe. The grip of friction. Even the movement of flesh and blood, down to the tiniest particles, all required power. Without it, there could be no life, no dao of heaven, no primal-chaos, and no existence.

In that moment, Yang Qi realized that power itself was the most majestic thing in all existence.

At the same time, he gained a new understanding of the grandeur of godmammoths. Godmammoths were the ultimate expression of power, the embodiment of its core meaning.

With the strength god systems activated, his cultivation of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth would significantly improve.

He didn’t even realize it, but the particles within him were all stirring, extruding impurities that emerged from his pores and fell to the ground beneath him. Those impurities had come to exist within him as he absorbed the quintessence of heaven and earth during his practice of cultivation.

Truth be told, people would accumulate impurities whether they practiced cultivation or not. After all, everyone breathed, and as a result, would bring spirit energy into them. As for those who practiced cultivation, as they reached higher levels, the spirit energy would bring more and more impurities.

Whether it was in the mortal world, or during his time in the immortal worlds, Yang Qi had consumed many immortal pills. After he became a Godmyth, he removed all of the impurities that had come with them and began consuming god pills instead. Unfortunately, even god pills contained impurities.

When people practiced cultivation, they rose to new heights and left behind the things of the past. With the enlightenment that came with acquiring godhood, and also upon activating the strength god systems, Yang Qi was now taking past impurities and removing them, pushing himself closer to the level of the legion of gods, and closer to godliness and godhood.

As he continued absorbing the piece of godhood, the strength god systems worked furiously and a power structure appeared within his mind. Then, thanks to the godhood, his physical body began conforming to that power structure.

It was as if his physical form were porcelain in the midst of flame, soft and malleable, but slowly becoming something more pure.

In the end, he experienced a deep transformation in which the potential of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth exploded out, making him more pure and natural. He looked elegant and calm, as if even his most casual movements conformed perfectly to the dao of heaven.

There were more fragments of godhood floating around the altar, which he pulled into the Engine of the One God, pushing the strength god systems to higher levels. At the same time, he gained new enlightenment, aiding his cultivation base. Although his power index remained at two hundred eighty, the structure of his body now pulsed with more power than ever.

In fact, he was at least three times stronger than he was when he initially clashed with Zilin. As of now, there was no way he would be hurt by the effects of the man’s butterfly attack.

After Yang Qi took all the pieces of godhood, the altar went completely dark.

At the same time, a halo appeared behind his head, filled with black magical symbols that seemed to pulse, not with the power of the legion of gods, but rather, that of hell.

Shocked, Yang Qi thought, ‘Did some hellish entity seal or kill a god here? Are there really such fierce beings in hell?’

The magical symbols seemed filled with a fiendish energy that desired to possess Yang Qi’s body, allowing some sort of bane-devil to be born again.

Of course, Yang Qi wasn’t afraid of baleful energy, especially considering his transformation from moments ago. The Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth was designed to counter baleful energy, and could easily dispel it. As such, he refrained from absorbing them, knowing that they were essentially impurities, as far as he was concerned.

He only wanted pure godpower in him.

‘Obviously, some hellish fiend-devil created these symbols. But who, exactly?’ He shook his head. ‘Thankfully I have the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, otherwise I wouldn’t be able to undo the sealing marks on this altar.’

Just as he was about to unleash some energy arts to undo the seals, several streams of light appeared. It is always on a narrow, cramped road that enemies meet, and sure enough, it was Zilin. Looking surprised, Zilin said, “You again?! How did you get here before me? Is this where the godhood is sealed?”

The other consorts who had accompanied Zilin spread out to surround Yang Qi.

“Let’s see you try escaping from us this time!” one of the consorts said. “We have the entrance to this altar blocked, trapping you like a turtle in a jar!”

“Surrender,” Zilin said. “There’s no way you can undo that sealing mark. It was put in place by a hell-born fiend-devil who killed a true god. The godhood is sealed there so that the god could never be resurrected. And even if you undo the seal, you’ll never be able to assimilate the godhood.”

‘Dammit,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘Just when I was about to undo the seal, these guys had to show up. If I’d known, I wouldn’t have wasted time on the strength god systems. I would have just gone right on to the godhood and worried about enlightenment later.’

Even as those thoughts ran through his head, he said, “Are you saying you can undo the sealing mark?”

“Of course,” Zilin said. “The Joyflower Palace has done a lot of research into the Exquisite Cathedral over the last hundred million years. For all intents and purposes, that godhood already belongs to us. We just need to take it away. Didn’t you notice that this fan of mine is a god item? Look at the picture on it. It’s none other than the God-King Devil-Quelling Painting, which is specifically designed to suppress all forms of wretched evil. So, of course it can deal with that sealing mark.”

“Stop being stubborn, boy,” one of the other consorts said. “On your knees!”

Chapter 885: Fighting Over the Altar

When Yang Qi heard the words “on your knees”, he very nearly laughed. After all, people who told him to get on his knees always ended up dead. In some ways, those words were like a curse.

“Are you going to submit, or am I going to have to force you?” Zilin said. “I won’t go as easy on you this time. Trust me, you’ll really end up suffering. When I used my Dream Butterfly Energy Art on you last time, I only drew on about ten percent of my full power. Considering the current circumstances, though, I'm more than willing to use a sledgehammer to smash a nut. You won’t even have a chance to fight back.”

He flicked open his fan, revealing the scene he had just mentioned a moment ago. It depicted a god-king crushing devils beneath his feet. He had devils gripped in his hands and in his mouth, and the other devils were all being burned alive.

Obviously, it was not an image created by men, but rather by a god. From the power fluctuations coming off of it, Yang Qi could tell that it would easily be able to open the sealing mark on the altar, but would be destroyed in the process.

“Actually, I'm very curious to see how strong you people are,” Yang Qi said. Considering his improvements thanks to the strength god systems, and his personal transformations, he was actually curious to see what Zilin and his fellows were capable of.

Even as the words left Yang Qi’s mouth, he sent three swords flying out, all of them backed by the sword dao of King Life-Killer.

“What? You really want us to kill you?” Zilin was visibly taken aback to see Yang Qi attacking them. He was also angry, though he wasn’t the kind of person to let it show on his face.

He flicked his fan, sending out a stream of butterflies to slam into the incoming sword energy, and subsequently wipe it out of existence.

Zilin’s fighting seemed almost like dancing, yet it was filled with intense energy and powerful killing intent. His energy was like strands of silk that spread out to completely lock Yang Qi down.

As for Yang Qi, being able to back his sword technique with the strength god systems made them vastly more powerful than before. Every slash of his sword would destroy the effects of the Dream Butterfly Energy Art, and cause powerful shockwaves to spread out in all directions.

The other consorts present were visibly stunned, having never even considered that Yang Qi could be this strong. It wasn't necessarily that his attacks were exquisitely complex, but rather that they were filled with indescribable power. In fact, most people wouldn’t even be able to block his attacks without being cut to pieces.

A slight frown could be seen on Zilin’s face, as he was somewhat confused by how much power was flowing from Yang Qi’s heart. It was almost as if he had the body of a human, but the heart of a god.

‘There’s something fishy about this guy’s heart,’ he thought. ‘That's the source of all this power, so what exactly is going on?’

His arms swished through the air in front of him, and butterflies swirled out to cover him. Then the butterflies dispersed, and he was nowhere to be seen, as if he himself had turned into one of them.

‘Did he actually just turn into a butterfly?’ Yang Qi thought. He had no idea where Zilin was. Obviously, the man’s energy arts had reached the point of perfection, surpassing Yang Qi’s in every way. A moment later, Zilin reappeared, having been revealed by the God Legion Paradise as he closed in for another attack.

“Your heart is the key, isn’t it!” he said. “That's the source of your power. Thankfully, I happen to cultivate a consummate technique called the God-King’s Heart-Devastating Palm, which is perfectly suited to deal with you. Let’s see if you can survive the complete destruction of your heart!”

Even as his words rang out, Zilin’s palm reached out toward Yang Qi’s chest. Instantly, a powerful resonance was created that made Yang Qi feel like his heart was about to explode.

Yang Qi didn’t panic, but instead called on the Hand of the One God to protect himself. The two palms met, and...

POP!

Yang Qi remained in place while Zilin staggered back several paces, his energy and blood trembling and his face a bit flushed.

“Such power!” he exclaimed. “Unfortunately, it’s not your power. If I'm not mistaken, you have a god item in you that absorbs external power and converts it into something you can use. Sadly for you, that power will eventually run out. So let’s see how long you can last before you revert to your previous state.”

Zilin was obviously a very perceptive and astute fighter.

‘Very cunning,’ Yang Qi thought, and he couldn’t help but admire how quickly Zilin had picked up on his weaknesses. After all, if the Engine of the One God really did run out of power, then he would have only his own true energy to rely on.

Technically speaking, Yang Qi could probably last for months on what he had taken so far. However, it was always possible that Zilin could call more experts from the Joyflower Palace, for example, Eunuch Sunflower.

They fought back and forth for a considerable time, going from palm techniques to swords, then finger strikes, fists, and legs. All sorts of magical laws and daoist techniques were used.

With the power from the Engine of the One God, Yang Qi was evenly matched with Zilin, and the ferocity of their fighting made it impossible for the other consorts to interfere. They actually huddled by the altar, doing their best to stand up to the shockwaves and power fluctuations.

As the battle went on, Yang Qi felt more and more comfortable wielding such immense power.

Considering how strong this opponent was, it was the perfect chance to utilize certain abilities that he wasn’t perfectly familiar with, gaining real experience with them. He could correct errors and misunderstandings, pushing his energy arts to new levels of perfection.

BOOM!

At a certain point, he unleashed a fist strike that caused immense pressure to weigh down from above, causing everything to sink down.

However, Zilin didn’t seem worried, and continued his dance-like combat, looking just as much a delicate beauty as he always had. Waving his hand, he unleashed a move that almost looked like calligraphy.

In fact, a magical symbol appeared, which was none other than the word for ‘dream’!

Something like a flowing tide rushed forth, and Yang Qi suddenly felt slightly dizzy and confused, as if he were in a dream. Even his true energy turned sluggish.

‘What ability is this?’ he thought, drawing deeply on the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth to try to gain some clarity. It was as if he were completely surrounded by mist, to the point where he couldn’t even see Zilin. Not even the Lord's Eye could pierce it, which was quite a shock.

“You should be proud,” Zilin said in his gentle voice. “You actually forced me to use my Magnificent Dream Heart-Sutra.” Yang Qi almost felt like he was about to fall asleep, and the godliness inside him began slowing down as well.

“Magnificent Dream Heart-Sutra. One dream that lasts a thousand years. The world is a dream, and life is as cold as autumn.” Zilin’s Magnificent Dream Heart-Sutra had nothing to do with energy arts, but rather was all about will. It could reach out and take control of the psychic aspects of any physical entity.

In the blink of an eye, Yang Qi’s nascent divinity was caught up in the dream of a god, a dream that would last a thousand years.

‘Quite a freakish technique!’ Yang Qi thought. ‘Is it really time to call on my ultimate trump card? But if I do, not only will it not kill Zilin, but he’ll also realize that I have a God Legion Seal. And if he tells the empress, my cover will be blown and chaos will result!’

At the moment, Zilin still had no idea that Yang Qi was a god-general prisoner, but had assumed he was from some outside organization. And the effect was enhanced by how Yang Qi had changed his appearance. If he had simply taken the godhood and made his escape, he could continue trying to rise through the ranks of the god-generals without anyone being the wiser.

But if his God Legion Seal were revealed, there was no doubt that he would be investigated. And Leaf Dao-Denier would definitely reveal more information about him. The Dao Defense League would be in trouble, and his subordinates would be in great danger. Obviously, that was not an ideal situation.

‘What do I do? How do I break free from this Magnificent Dream Heart-Sutra?’

After all, he had already drawn on the power of his God Legion Paradise and the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

Chapter 886: Seizing the Moment

The moment the Magnificent Dream Heart-Sutra came into play, Yang Qi was at a serious disadvantage.

It was a very powerful technique that placed one in a dream state, making it almost impossible to tell the difference between illusion and reality. As for Zilin, he was like a god of the dream, an entity with boundless power and control.

As the lord and creator of the dream, he could use it to do anything that he wanted.

Thankfully, Yang Qi wasn’t at a complete disadvantage. After all, he had just defeated a host of knowledge-devils, and had incredible force of will. Obviously, he wasn’t going to be completely entranced by a mere dream state.

Ordinary Grand Emperors who faced the Magnificent Dream Heart-Sutra would likely unleash their personal domain, only to be confused into thinking that they actually hadn’t done so. That would in turn lead to a chain reaction of confusion and misunderstanding, subverting their will and making them easy to attack.

The Magnificent Dream Heart-Sutra was an extremely powerful magic created by the Lord of Dreams, who had used it to defeat even other Paramount Gods. As such, how much more vulnerable would Yang Qi be to it?

Without using his God Legion Seal to break free of the dream, the best he could do was try to defend himself, which would lead to wasting time and, eventually, running out of power. The danger only increased the longer he remained trapped.

‘If I could open the sealing mark on the altar, it might do the trick. But the baleful energy inside will definitely attempt to overwhelm me. Whatever hell-born fiend-devil created the sealing mark was definitely on the same level as the legion of gods. If that energy gets inside me, it will take time to suppress. If I wasn’t in a tight situation, it wouldn’t be a problem, but with Zilin attacking me like this, tampering with the sealing mark would be courting death.’

His mind spun as he tried to come up with a plan to escape the Magnificent Dream Heart-Sutra.

Swish. Swoosh!

All of a sudden, Zilin’s hand appeared from within the mist, slamming onto the God Legion Paradise, and causing Yang Qi to shudder within it.

“Why are you struggling, Your Majesty,” Zilin said. “If I keep attacking you like this, you’re definitely going to run out of power. And you know what happens then.”

Although he clearly viewed Yang Qi as an enemy, he wasn’t resorting to arrogant speech or curses. Instead, he continued speaking in a very calm, even respectful manner.

In some ways, he was the worst kind of enemy to face.

Snorting coldly, Yang Qi said, “It’s just as much of a drain for you to have all your attacks blocked, whether they’re real or illusory. Did you really think your Magnificent Dream Heart-Sutra is completely unparalleled under heaven? If you want to play around with illusions, fine. Let’s play!”

All of a sudden, a host of spell formations appeared around Yang Qi, powered by thousands upon thousands of varieties of vital energy. At first glance, it was impossible to tell which were real and which were illusions. Then, with no warning whatsoever, Yang Qi vanished.

The formations had been little more than a diversion, giving him time to create a power double. It was none other than his Life-Death Void-Destruction Lightning, which he had honed to further perfection in the treasure storehouse, and could be used to create perfect copies of just about anything.

“You’re obviously very skilled with powers of illusion, Your Majesty,” Zilin said calmly. “Unfortunately, this doesn't match up to my Magnificent Dream Heart-Sutra.”

BOOM!

The spell formations collapsed.

Although Zilin seemed as calm as ever, his attacks were growing fiercer by the moment. In fact, the blow he had just launched caused Yang Qi’s power double to collapse along with the spell formations.

“What?!” Zilin murmured as he realized that Yang Qi was nowhere to be seen. The other consorts had the entire area around the altar locked down, making escape impossible, yet Yang Qi’s true self was apparently gone.

“What’s going on, Eldest Brother? Where’d he go?”

“I'm not sure,” Zilin said, a serious expression on his face. “He vanished, except I have a feeling he's actually hiding in the area. If only I could force him out into the open. I'm not sure where he came from, but he's obviously very strong. I wish I knew what god item he was relying on. Whatever it is, it's obviously very powerful and has immense powers of concealment. I wouldn’t be surprised if he’s watching us right now.”

“So what do we do?” another consort asked. “Just undo the sealing mark and take the godhood? That brat obviously can’t beat you in a fight, Eldest Brother.”

“No, this guy is too crafty. I bet that once the godhood comes out in the open, he’ll have a way to steal it. And if we lose it, we’ll be in huge trouble. Our top priority should be simply standing guard here. You send word back to Eunuch Sunflower and tell him to come in person. Meanwhile, I’ll do my best to flush our opponent out into the open.”

“We can’t do that, Eldest Brother! We worked extremely hard to get to this point, and even wasted a host of god items! And you drained so much of your quintessence-blood and vital energy to locate this place. If we notify Eunuch Sunflower, we won’t get full credit, and all our efforts will have been in vain! Are we really going to share the credit with someone else?”

“You're thinking about it the wrong way,” Zilin said. “We're doing this for the empress, and she’ll definitely understand our decision. This opponent of ours is extremely powerful, and although he isn’t quite a match for me, he has all sorts of tricks up his sleeve. If we fall to his schemes just because we want to earn some merit points, we would fail the empress and completely deserve death.

“Now hurry up and send that message while I keep guard on the altar. As long as we don’t touch the sealing mark, there’s no way this guy will be able to steal the godhood.”

From the stern gleam in Zilin’s eyes, it was obvious he wasn’t in the mood to discuss the issue.

‘What the fuck!?’ Yang Qi thought as he spied on them from within the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. ‘This guy is really loyal to the empress!’ The truth was that if Zilin had used his God-King Devil-Quelling Painting to undo the sealing mark, Yang Qi really would have made a move. Instead, Zilin was ignoring any possible credit he might receive and was actually calling Eunuch Sunflower to the scene. If his ploy worked, Yang Qi definitely wouldn't stand a chance of ever getting the godhood.

Yang Qi felt like he was a mouse trying to pull a turtle, that he was completely ineffective in all his efforts.

Zilin wasn’t greedy, didn’t get angry, was impossible to defeat in combat, and wasn’t impulsive... in short, he had no weaknesses. How could Yang Qi possibly deal with him? If he was up against Leaf Dao-Denier, he would be able to think of a hundred methods to get what he wanted.

‘I can’t let him take complete control of the situation. I have to do something!’

Without any hesitation, he flew out of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart and launched an attack straight at the consort who was about to send the message. Zilin tried to interfere, but was too slow.

Bam. Bam. Bam!

All of the palm strikes hit home, and the consort tumbled back, his message completely interrupted.

“Hold on,” Zilin murmured. “What was that energy I just sensed? Why did I just sense the power of monarchs? Do you have the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart?!”

“Yeah, I do,” Yang Qi replied. “Now you see why you can't trap me. I can leave any time I want with the chart. I can come and go as I please. Even if Empress Joyflower herself came here, she wouldn’t be able to do anything about me.”

Zilin’s cheek twitched. “The Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. So, you have some of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions? The Joyflower Palace has many artifacts from the seventy-two monarchs, but nothing from King Immortal-Slayer. How many of them do you have? You obviously have enough to access the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Considering the level of control, you must have more than three or four of the medallions, right?”

“I don’t have very many,” Yang Qi replied. “Only seven or eight.” Of course, Yang Qi knew that one of the legacy medallions had recently been put in the treasure storehouse, but Zilin didn’t. Obviously, revealing that information now wouldn’t be of any help in his effort to keep quiet the fact that he had looted the storehouse.

“So many!” Zilin exclaimed. “You’ll soon have the full collection. But that puts you in a very dangerous situation. Once all the medallions are together, you’ll awaken the will of King Immortal-Slayer. Even a god would end up possessed by him, much less you!”

“I wouldn’t worry about that, if I were you,” Yang Qi replied. “I have my ways of dealing with that. Look, I’ve revealed my secret weapon, and now you understand why you’re really no threat to me. I can escape any time I want, or launch a sneak attack at you at any moment. What do you think? Are you willing to work with me now?”

“Work with you? You actually want to join forces?” Zilin frowned, although he still looked as calm and collected as ever.

“I do,” Yang Qi said. “Let’s work together to undo the sealing mark. Then we split the godhood fifty-fifty. What do you say? You can accomplish your mission for the empress, and I can get what I want as well. It’s the best of both worlds, and we won’t have to fight any longer.”

One of the other consorts snorted coldly. “That’s some very wishful thinking. Our Eldest Brother is far stronger than you, and we’ll have even stronger experts here to back us up soon enough. If you know what's good for you, you’ll just leave. Incidentally, there’s no way you could remove the sealing mark, even if we just left you here alone. So why would we possibly work with you?”

“I can’t remove the sealing mark?” Yang Qi said. Turning, he thrust his palm out toward the altar.

Chapter 887: Feinting to the East, Attacking from the West

Yang Qi really was impossible to predict. With no warning whatsoever, he launched an attack at the altar with its surging devil energy. As soon as his palm touched the altar, the devil energy went wild, making it seem like the entire area had become a sea of corpses and blood.

He was using the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, which was the bane of any hell-born fiend-devils, even those at the level of gods. Of course, it was a feint to the east to be followed by an attack from the west; this was all a trick!

Zilin’s face fell as he realized what Yang Qi was doing, and saw the wretch energy on the altar reacting to him. If Yang Qi actually unsealed the altar, the godhood would erupt out, and everyone present would begin fighting to take it. And if Yang Qi took it, he would easily be able to escape into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. All of a sudden, Zilin was in a very bad position.

“Don’t let him undo that seal!” he shouted, simultaneously wondering how his energy arts were affecting the sealing mark in such a way. At the same time, he snapped open his fan and launched an attack at Yang Qi.

“Crane Cries to the Nine Heavens!” Zilin blurred into motion, like an elegant crane that shot forth with claws bared. At the same time, the God-King Devil-Quelling Painting on his fan stirred, causing immense killing power to begin building up in it. Yin and yang intermixed, part freezing cold and part scorching hot, creating an intense mix of polarities.

However, in that very moment, Yang Qi’s other hand shot out and slammed onto the fan itself. Zilin grinned as he prepared to unleash the killing power of the fan, only to suddenly realize that Yang Qi was channeling the devil energy from the altar into the fan.

Instantly, the God-King Devil-Quelling Painting began working to suppress that devil energy.

‘This is bad!’ Zilin thought. ‘I fell right into his trap. He attacked the sealing mark, knowing full well that he wouldn’t be able to handle the devil energy. Instead, he tricked me into using my God-King Devil-Quelling Painting to neutralize the energy, simultaneously making it impossible for me to do anything!’

Yang Qi had one hand on the altar and the other on the fan, making himself a sort of conduit that sent massive amounts of devil energy into the God-King Devil-Quelling Painting.

Zilin had lost control of the situation, and although he quickly realized what was going on, it was too late to change anything. The altar and the God-King Devil-Quelling Painting were now linked, like two enormous mountains, and even when Zilin sent his own true energy into the fan, he couldn’t do anything to break the connection. Worse, the clash of power between the God-King Devil-Quelling Painting and the altar was causing a backlash that slowly headed toward Zilin himself.

‘This villain really is a profound schemer. Who could possibly predict what he's going to do?!’ Shouting, Zilin drew on all of his true energy, summoning a host of millions upon millions of butterflies that surrounded him, then exploded.

As he flew away from the fan, he looked at Yang Qi, who was standing there being assailed by the devil energy and the power of the God-King Devil-Quelling Painting.

“Capture him!” he cried, fully aware that if Yang Qi successfully opened the seal, he would definitely get the godhood. And the consequences of that would be too horrible to contemplate.

Zilin’s energy suddenly transformed, creating a brightly shining sword in his hand that he thrust toward Yang Qi’s forehead, backed by the full power of his cultivation base.

“Ālayavijñāna Sword!” It was impossible to say where this sword originated, but any who sensed it would feel that it would succeed in any endeavor.

A sword technique this incredible was something that Yang Qi obviously couldn’t block. However, even as the sword closed in, he chuckled. “Fooled you, consort!”

BOOM!

Yang Qi suddenly exploded, causing a blast containing two opposing powers that ripped the entire chamber to shreds. Even the Exquisite Cathedral as a whole was violently shaken.

With the exception of Zilin, all of the consorts present were hit by the force and screamed as their defensive empyrean energy, magical treasures, and armor were destroyed, and their flesh, blood, meridians, nascent divinities, and seas of consciousness were completely wiped out of existence.

Yang Qi had allowed the power of the altar and the God-King Devil-Quelling Painting to detonate, simultaneously planting a power double on the scene while he himself slipped into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. It was a deception that, for the moment, had completely fooled Zilin.

Of course, the force of the explosion sent Zilin tumbling backward, his sword crumbling into ashes and his mind filling with a sensation of deadly crisis. It was only because he was an elite expert that he managed to send out a bright stream of magical symbols that formed a powerful defensive shield to block most of the detonation from reaching him.

He was using a legendary god talisman known as the God-King’s Asylum, and the energy field it created could defend against the most deadly forces. It had been personally created by a god-king from the god world, and considering that Zilin only had one of them, it went to show just how deadly the situation was.

Unfortunately, one of the side effects of the talisman was that he was rendered completely immobile. He was safe, but couldn't do a single thing other than drift along with whatever forces touched the shield.

Meanwhile, the violent force of the explosion devastated the chamber and the altar, and actually opened the sealing mark.

As the God-King Devil-Quelling Painting and the power of the seal faded away, something like a bright moon appeared in the depths of the altar. As it rose up, its light suppressed all the fluctuations in the area until nothing remained but a bright, shining glow.

“The godhood! The true godhood has appeared!” A smile broke out on Zilin’s face. The God-King’s Asylum was already beginning to crumble, allowing him to move. Without any hesitation, he performed a double-handed incantation gesture, sending out streams of magical symbols that formed a net, which he sent toward the moon-like godhood. This was a divine ability of his called the Megaplexus Tusita True-Pagoda God-Net, which was a combination of true energy, god items, godliness, magical treasure, and energy arts.

Unfortunately for Zilin, Yang Qi was faster. A vortex popped into being, which immediately began gobbling up the moon of godhood.

“No!” Zilin shouted as he sensed the aura of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Obviously, once Yang Qi took the godhood into the chart, it would be gone forever.

In that very moment, however, a rift opened and a stooped old man appeared, pulsing with sinister energy. The man extended his hand and a stream of energy shot out, wrapped around the godhood, and pushed it out of Yang Qi’s grasp.

‘Who’s this?!’ Yang Qi thought, having been caught completely by surprise. After all of his plotting and scheming, he was just about to take the godhood, only to have it snatched away.

The stooped figure moved so quickly that not even Yang Qi’s Lord's Eye could track him, making it impossible to see his features. Then an attack suddenly hit Yang Qi like a rain of needles, piercing through his defensive true energy and entering his meridians, filling him with indescribable pain.

“Dammit!” he roared.

He placed his palms together and drew on the Hand of the One God. Spinning rapidly, he sent out tens upon tens of thousands of palm attacks, filled with such hellish power that they seemed capable of bringing hell to the world of men.

Pop. Pop. Pop. Pop.

Numerous explosions could be heard as Yang Qi exchanged countless blows with the newcomer, until he finally grunted and tumbled off to the side, completely empty-handed. All he could do was look up at the moon-like godhood shining with bright light.

A moment later, the stooped figure dropped down next to Zilin. Now, it was possible to see that he was a eunuch, so old that he seemed to be on the verge of dropping dead. In fact, anyone who looked at him would scarcely be able to believe that he had just prevented Yang Qi from taking the godhood.

“You arrived just at the right time, Eunuch Sunflower,” Zilin said. Breathing a sigh of relief, he said, “I understand that talented individuals abound, especially on the Ancient Road to the Gods. But even I feel ignorant and ill-informed to have run into an opponent like this.”

“Nor could I have guessed that things would play out in this way,” Eunuch Sunflower replied. “Thankfully, I sensed the vital energy fluctuations coming from the Exquisite Desert and hurried over as quickly as possible. It was a big drain on my life force and quintessence-blood, but it seems it was all worth it. If I hadn’t come, the godhood would have fallen into the wrong hands.”

He looked up at the moonlike godhood and the light shining down onto Yang Qi, his gaze as sharp as a needle.

If Zilin was a slab of perfect jade, this old eunuch was definitely a silver needle.

Chapter 888: A Needle and Jade

Eunuch Sunflower had made his debut and prevented Yang Qi from acquiring the godhood.

That said, the godhood was still there for the taking, meaning that Yang Qi theoretically still had a chance to get it. Right now, his feelings could be summed perfectly up by the old saying the plans of men are superseded by the plans of heaven. Eunuch Sunflower had completely frustrated all of his complicated plans to win the godhood from the hand of Zilin.

It was just the way his luck had played out.

Unfortunately, he had been having enough trouble just dealing with Zilin, let alone Eunuch Sunflower. Eunuch Sunflower was roughly as strong as Zilin, therefore, fighting both of them together would obviously be a huge challenge.

Zilin was like fine jade, beautiful and carefree, a person who never got flustered or exasperated, and didn’t fly into rages. He was not the kind of person who dominated an opponent in a fight, nor did he resort to crafty plots and machinations. In fact, he was the kind of person who others would plot and scheme against.

Eunuch Sunflower was different. He was like a needle, sharp and incisive, even malicious, the kind that could kill someone before they realized what was happening.

Zilin looked like the type of person who would be a majestic, righteous administrator in the imperial harem of the mortal world, whereas Eunuch Sunflower seemed like a deadly, villainous schemer who would control the court from behind the scenes.

In the end, a needle was much more deadly than a piece of jade.

The fact that Eunuch Sunflower was now a factor left Yang Qi feeling very frustrated, especially considering all the work that had already gone into trying to deal with Zilin.

However, he wasn’t ready to give up yet.

Even if things got more difficult, he would still do everything possible to succeed. And deep in his heart, he truly believed that he was the true Sovereign Lord, and that in the end, victory belonged to him.

Thus, the face-off continued.

Eunuch Sunflower’s gaze swept over Yang Qi from head to toe, then focused on his eyes. “I've seen quite a few people on the Ancient Road to the Gods,” he said, “but never anyone like you. Who exactly are you? And why, pray, did you choose to set yourself in opposition to the Joyflower Palace?”

“This kid is nothing short of amazing, Eunuch Sunflower,” Zilin said. “Once the fighting resumes, make sure not to kill him. I want him alive. The empress will definitely find him delightful, and I plan to give him to her as a gift.”

“Ah, Zilin,” Eunuch Sunflower replied, “as always, your thoughts are completely focused on the empress. From what I can tell, this boy is both crafty and treacherous. Look at how badly you're hurt already! He definitely can’t be left alive. If you capture him and hand him over to the empress, then considering how cunning he is, he would definitely curry favor with her and end up harming both of us afterward. After all, it's not as though he’ll simply forget the events of today. He’ll try to pit the two of us against each other, and possibly even strike at us secretly. Trust me, I know all about this kind of thing. In fact, the same thing is already starting to play out with that Leaf Dao-Denier, don’t you agree? It was Eunuch Floodwater who captured Leaf Dao-Denier and offered him to the empress. Now he's a favored consort and has started using his influence against Eunuch Floodwater. For instance, in past years, Eunuch Floodwater was never punished for mistakes. But now, thanks to the slanderous advice of Leaf Dao-Denier, he's been imprisoned in the torture chambers, experiencing endless torment. Sadly for him, I don’t think he’ll ever make a comeback.”

“I'm not worried about that sort of thing,” Zilin said. “As long as I faithfully offer service to the empress, she’ll definitely take care of me. Besides, perhaps this kid could be used against Leaf Dao-Denier. From what I can tell, Leaf Dao-Denier has high ambitions, and although it's impossible to say why the empress dotes on him so much, it’s only a matter of time before he defies her or does something to harm her interests. Right now, I have no freedom to speak on the subject, and can only do my best to earn more favor in her eyes.”

At this point, Zilin raised his voice and said to Yang Qi, “Has Your Majesty heard everything we've been saying? Unfortunately, we can’t split this godhood with you. It’s ours now, and you have no choice but to abandon any thought of taking it. If you agree to stop fighting, I can give you a chance to earn great honor and glory. If you can earn the favor of the empress, then perhaps it would be possible to give you some godhood. What do you say?”

Eunuch Sunflower nodded. “I agree. The empress has entrusted Zilin with leadership over the six imperial harem palaces, and even I have to follow his orders. What he says, I do, so if he tells me to leave you be, I will. Of course, the premise is that you stand down.”

Yang Qi chuckled involuntarily. As far as he was concerned, Zilin might as well have experienced cultivation deviation. He was only a consort, yet he seemed to think of himself as the empress’s husband, to the point where she was the only person he cared about.

“I'm going to take that godhood today,” he said, “and there's nothing you can do to stop me!”

Even as the words left his mouth, he blurred into motion and reached out toward the godhood.

WHOOSH!

Eunuch Sunflower shot forward with such impossible speed that he seemed to rival Yang Qi’s Freedom Wings. Before Yang Qi even realized what was happening, Eunuch Sunflower was right in front of him, fingers stabbing toward his eyes.

“Two Dragons Snatching Pearls!”

Yang Qi was completely shaken. Eunuch Sunflower had moved so quickly that it was almost certain he was using a godly-class energy art associated with speed. His attack was so swift it seemed impossible to block.

Yang Qi jerked his head back so that Eunuch Sunflower’s hands snatched nothing but air. However, it wasn't like Eunuch Sunflower would just give up after that. He stretched his fingers out and curled them into claws, which he shoved toward Yang Qi’s head as if to crush it into pulp. As the energy flowed through him, he emanated the air of a demon; shockingly, he was using a Demonfolk energy art that was created by a greater demon god.

Yang Qi quickly shoved his own hand forward to meet the incoming attack, using his own claw move, a consummate technique of one of the seventy-two monarchs. It was none other than King Hookslaughter’s famous Thirty-Six Soul-Hooking Claws.

It was consummate among claw techniques and was designed to snatch souls from hell and send them to the god world, where they would be used to sow chaos and disorder.

The sight of this technique caused Eunuch Sunflower to stop his own move halfway through.

“Well, well,” Eunuch Sunflower said. “The Thirty-Six Soul-Hooking Claws, a consummate technique created by King Hookslaughter.” Eunuch Sunflower was obviously quite experienced and knowledgeable, as he immediately recognized what was being used against him. Instantly, his clawed fingers transformed and he attacked with a variety of different techniques, including flicks, pokes, direct strikes, jabs, stabs, pulls, and pushes. They were all hand techniques filled with countless variations, and they made Yang Qi feel as if he were being attacked by millions upon millions of needles.

Eunuch Sunflower's every move was like a rain of needles made of true energy, that could pierce through all obstacles, even Yang Qi’s defensive empyrean energy.

Luckily for him, after the needles entered his meridians, they would be melted by his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. Any other person would have been pierced through with countless holes, and already incapable of fighting. But thankfully, Yang Qi’s energy arts could negate all sorts of baleful and sinister energy, making it impossible for them to truly harm him.

Eunuch Sunflower was inwardly marveling. The energy art he was using really was from the Demonfolk, called the Heaven-Demon Sinister-Baleful Bone-Piercing Needles, and had been created by a demon-god in the ancient past. It featured a unique convergence of demon energy that could be focused into tiny points like needles that most people would be incapable of blocking. And they would inflict devastating injuries.

He had used the technique to kill so many powerful opponents that he had long since lost track of how many he had defeated.

Yet even though his needles were piercing his opponent’s defenses and entering his body, they didn’t seem to be having any other effect. ‘Don’t tell me this brat has some technique that perfectly counters my own. Hardly anyone can deal with my Heaven-Demon Sinister-Baleful Bone-Piercing Needles.’

Raising his voice, he shrieked, “Zilin, hurry up and take that godhood! I’ll keep this brat locked down for you.”

“Good idea!” Zilin said, throwing his arms out to once again unleash his Megaplexus Tusita True-Pagoda God-Net.

‘Damnation,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘This eunuch is really proving hard to deal with. And thanks to all the distractions, I can’t grab the godhood.’

After all, taking the godhood wouldn’t be just a simple matter of laying hands on it. Even a flower goddess with a power index of five or six hundred wouldn’t be able to exert enough force to do that.

As Zilin flew toward the godhood, a ferocious expression overtook Yang Qi’s face. “Fine!” he said. “If that's how you want to do things, then don’t blame me for being vicious and merciless!  Grief of Heaven and Earth; the Final Elegy; End in Mutual Destruction!”

BOOM!

Energy from the seventy-two monarchs erupted within Yang Qi, causing him to rapidly grow larger. The combined techniques of all seventy-two monarchs could shake the god world and be used to fight the Sovereign Lord. And he was now using a suicidal attack, damaging his own nascent divinity to unleash a mutually destructive power.

WHIZZZ!

As his divine will shot out, projections of the seventy-two monarchs appeared, joining forces to unleash a deadly god curse.

Immediately, unsightly expressions were seen on the faces of Eunuch Sunflower and Zilin and they were slammed backward with the force of a sledgehammer, their faces turning ashen and blood oozing out of their mouths and noses. Obviously, they had been seriously injured!

“Not good!” Eunuch Sunflower said. “He’s putting everything on the line. He’s damaging his own nascent divinity to end this fight in mutual destruction! By damaging his own mind, he’s unleashing one of the most powerful attacks of the seventy-two monarchs of yesteryear! Why are you killing yourself just to acquire some godhood, boy? Are you stupid?! Or just crazy?!”

Eunuch Sunflower really couldn’t understand why Yang Qi would do something so drastic. Godhood was a very valuable and important thing, but as long as the green mountains are there, one should not worry about firewood. If someone was dead, it wouldn’t matter how much godhood they had, it wouldn’t help them.

Even as Yang Qi’s soul seemed to be fading away, leaving behind nothing but an empty husk of a body, a tuft of god grass appeared. The magical laws of three separate gods appeared, which then combined and caused the grass to vanish without a trace.

It was the three-headed god-origin grass!

Eunuch Sunflower and Zilin couldn’t have been more shocked to see a tuft of grass that came from the god world and had been raised to maturity by the legion of gods. Any person who was under the level of a god, and died, could use that god grass to return to their previous peak state. It was a life-saving treasure that was extremely rare, yet Yang Qi had it.

Once used, the grass would vanish, but the magical laws of the three gods were completely domineering! In the blink of an eye, Yang Qi recovered. Then he reached out and a primal-chaos elder-snake appeared, which gobbled up the dazzling, shiny godhood.

Chapter 889: Godhood in Hand

Yang Qi was staking everything on one move, and used the most powerful tactic he could think of. He had exchanged life for life, something that he couldn’t even do with the God Legion Seal. Injuring Eunuch Sunflower and Zilin, he pushed himself to his ultimate limit and took the godhood. Powering the snake that was King Heaven-Devourer with everything he could muster, he sent it to simply gobble it up.

The power of the godhood was immense, but Yang Qi had been confident all along that he would be able to take it. However, as soon as it was devoured by the snake, he suddenly sensed a powerful expression of will bursting out of it. It was the will of a god that could shake heaven and earth, and it instantly caused King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans to begin to crack and crumble.

“Damnation!” Yang Qi cursed. Extending his hand, he sent a drop of blood into the talismans, godmammoth blood that, as soon as it reached the snake, unleashed a might that corresponded to the saying snakes devour mammoths.

As a result, the snake stopped crumbling and actually grew dozens of times more powerful than before. Swallowing the godhood, it then turned and headed toward the vortex leading to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

“You’re not going anywhere!” Eunuch Sunflower shouted. He and Zilin, filled with grief and anger at the sight of Yang Qi taking the godhood, ignored their injuries and rushed forward to try stopping him, unleashing their most boundless energy arts. Earlier, Zilin had just waited as Eunuch Sunflower attacked Yang Qi with deadly force, but now everything had changed.

Chuckling, Yang Qi said, “I already know all of your moves, and although I can’t kill you now, after I assimilate that godhood, my energy arts will be far more powerful than before and I’ll definitely be able to take you on. I sure hope you don’t let me down when the time comes; if you simply kowtow to me next time, I might spare you. Otherwise, you’ll end up dead!”

Allowing himself to be hit by their attacks, he used their force to propel himself back into the vortex, where he vanished from sight.

Neither Eunuch Sunflower nor Zilin dared to follow him. They knew that if they ended up in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, where Yang Qi could exercise complete control, they would definitely be killed.

Frowning, Eunuch Sunflower said, “Rumor has it that when the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart is used to the fullest degree, it can send its power into the outside world and drag people inside. Thankfully, he hasn’t reached that point yet, otherwise we would be in incredible danger. Getting stuck in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart would be a sure death sentence.”

“There’s no way he has full control,” Zilin replied. “He would have to possess all nine of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions and be as strong as the legion of gods. At that point, he would be able to shrink the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart down to the size of a painting that would fit in the palm of his hand. Right now, he only has the ability to go in and out himself, not force others to do the same. That said, we need to take precautionary measures. He could theoretically use the chart to make an illusory aspect of space-time, then lure us into a trap inside.”

Eunuch Sunflower and Zilin exchanged awkward glances. Obviously, they had lost badly in the encounter and had no way to turn the situation around.

“What do we do now?” Eunuch Sunflower said. “We've been researching the Exquisite Cathedral for years, and finally learned some of its secrets only to be screwed over by that damned bastard. We're going to be branded as criminals for losing that godhood. What's worse, these are extraordinary times, with powerful sects of all sorts starting to openly fight each other. And Leaf Dao-Denier is gaining power as the favored consort of the empress. What if he uses this as an excuse to wreak catastrophe on our heads? We’ll be completely at his mercy, or perhaps even completely subverted by him.”

“I’ll take responsibility for everything,” Zilin said. “I’ll make my confession to the empress and accept any punishment she deems fit.”

“Absolutely not!” Eunuch Sunflower said. “I'm at fault here and will take the blame accordingly. Zilin, if you lose favor with the empress, Leaf Dao-Denier will become far too powerful. It won't matter if I'm punished. As long as you still have the empress’ favor, you should be able to keep me safe. But if you get punished, who can save you?”

“That won’t happen,” Zilin replied. “Once the empress understands the situation, she won't punish me. Think about it. How long has Leaf Dao-Denier been in her favor? Hardly any time at all. She’s having fun with him, that’s all. The more arrogant and despotic he gets, the sooner he’ll lose her favor. And when that happens, the consequences will be devastating for him. The empress is a skilled strategist; she definitely won’t be hoodwinked by a person like him. We failed our mission, so right now our most important task is to investigate the culprit and find out who exactly he is.”

“We’ll find out all the details,” Eunuch Sunflower said. “He really screwed us over, so there’s no way we can let him off the hook now. That said, we have to be very careful, and more on guard than ever. You can tell that whoever this person is, he’s the type who will seek revenge at all costs. And if he really assimilates that godhood, he’ll be more of a threat than ever. The only way to truly ensure our safety is to kill him.”

“I agree. For now, the first matter at hand is to report back to the empress and get new orders. Considering her boundless cultivation base, she might be able to track down the culprit herself. If she steps in and attacks him, there’s no way he’ll make it out alive.”

“Let’s go!”

Eunuch Sunflower and Zilin flew away. They had been defeated, yet, the entire time, Zilin didn’t look even the least bit dejected. He was as calm and elegant as ever, despite the blows he had endured.

Meanwhile, in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, Yang Qi was laughing heartily. He had successfully acquired the godhood, and although it was only from a Lesser God, it was still godhood nonetheless. In fact, the partial godhood he had acquired from the Live Forever God Tree was like nothing compared to it.

The primal-chaos elder-snake had already regurgitated it, leaving it hanging there within the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, where it sent out light to illuminate everything around it.

“You actually got the godhood!” Flower Mildcloud exclaimed. “Not even Eunuch Sunflower or Zilin could stop you?” She was still under lockdown, able to work on her cultivation, but nothing else. Yang Qi was still on guard against her.

“That’s right,” he answered. “If I can assimilate the immense power of this godhood, my power index will definitely surpass a thousand. At that point, not even Empress Joyflower would be able to cause problems for me.”

Right now, his power index was only two hundred eighty, and that was enough for him to at least survive the attacks of Eunuch Sunflower and Zilin. And both of those opponents had power indexes of over a thousand.

Considering that, if Yang Qi’s power index was more than a thousand, then defeating the two of them would be as simple for him as taking a drink of water.

“You really have some godhood, Yang Qi?” Empress Jadefall said, approaching from the side. She was already at the Grand Emperor level, with a power index of about thirty. That put her on the level of at least some of the weaker Grand Emperors from the Ancient Road to the Gods. That was what resulted from calling on her powers as a Reincarnated One, as well as the porcelain godspore she had in her dantian region. After all, ancient gods had fought fiercely to take that godspore.

Yang Qi wasn’t sure what power was contained in the glowing light the godspore emitted, but his power assessment systems told him that it was something from the god world.

Neither Yang Qi nor Empress Jadefall were sure about her true origin. However, there was definitely someone who had a clue, and that was Proud Heaven. Otherwise he wouldn’t have spent so much time in the inconsequential Titan Emperor Heaven.

Yang Qi had been to places such as thirty-third ranked immortal worlds, the Great Necropolis, and the depths of primal-chaos. He also knew something about the Ancient Road to the Gods. Considering all that, along with the fact that he had built the Dao Defense League into a powerful force in the immortal worlds, he was fully aware of how tiny the Titan Emperor Heaven really was.

For Proud Heaven to send one of his clones to the Titan Emperor Heaven was like a powerful emperor in the mortal world choosing to spend his time in a pigsty, eating and sleeping with the hogs. Even Yang Qi wouldn’t waste his time going to a first ranked immortal world nowadays.

To him, immortals who were mere Demolishers were like children.

In response to Empress Jadefall’s exclamation, Yang Qi said, “Yes, I did get some godhood. And not just a fragmented piece. It’s completely intact. It’s only from a Lesser God, but even Lesser Gods are immensely powerful beings.” Just looking at the godhood, Yang Qi could tell that it wouldn’t be possible for him to personally assimilate it any time soon. And he wasn’t interested in just feeding it into the Engine of the One God.

“Complete godhood!?” Empress Jadefall said. “It must be impossible to assimilate. It would be like a human from the mortal world trying to pluck down the sun and turn it into a lamp.”

“You’re exactly right. But I have an idea. It might be incredibly tough, but as the saying goes, a rope can cut through a log, and dripping water can wear through a rock.” Yang Qi exhaled a stream of intensely hot flame, which shot toward the godhood. However, when the flame struck, the godhood simply burned brighter, seemingly even tougher than before. It seemed that nothing short of the Engine of the One God would be able to do anything to it. Unfortunately, using the Engine of the One God wouldn’t directly benefit Yang Qi.

“It’s definitely tough,” he said. “Well, I can just leave it here safely in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, and work at it slowly but surely. I’ll eventually succeed.”

He waved his hand, causing a wind to kick up that carried Flower Mildcloud off to a distant location where she couldn’t see what was happening. Then Yang Qi unleashed his God Legion Seal, sending the golden imp flying out to sit directly atop the godhood.

The godhood trembled, but unfortunately, none of its quintessence energy appeared in the open.

Yang Qi frowned. On the upside, at least the godhood was reacting, which indicated that if he kept up the pressure it might eventually start crumbling.

‘I'm in no hurry,’ he thought. ‘I can send a power double to the prison while my true body returns to the treasure storehouse. I’ll gather more knowledge-devils, then return here to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart to assimilate them. Perhaps after I take all billion of the spell formations, then use the Engine of the One God to take the god-king’s tear, I’ll be strong enough to crack open the godhood.’

Chapter 890: Taking God Formations

He had the godhood, but couldn’t assimilate it at the moment. In other words, it wasn't going to help his fighting prowess at all. For now, the best way to get stronger was to go to the Joyflower Palace’s treasure storehouse and continue taking the god formations. Of course, the more he acquired, the more knowledge-devils he would have to conquer.

With a wave of his finger, he locked down the godhood in the depths of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. At the same time, he created an incarnation beneath the godhood and affixed the God Legion Seal to it, which constantly sent out a burning light.

Given the level of his cultivation base, it was now possible for him to make millions upon millions of incarnations if he wanted to. Furthermore, his command of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth was such that he could actually remove the God Legion Seal from his forehead if he wished.

A moment later, he was in the storehouse, once again preparing to loot god formations.

The storehouse was still filled with countless dazzling treasures, with a small portion of them being virtual versions that he had placed there after having taken the originals. Most of them would last for several thousand years before it became obvious that they were mere illusions. However, by that point, his cultivation base would be so vastly superior to what it was now that it wouldn’t matter. Most likely, he would already have destroyed the Joyflower Palace by that time.

He wasn't literally clearing out the entire storehouse, but rather taking what he could use and leaving behind the lesser items. The first reason was that the storehouse was so large that it would take too much time to remove everything. The second was for safety’s sake. Eventually, people would come to the storehouse to take items out, and if they took one of the virtual items, the game would be up. Therefore, Yang Qi only took the most valuable and important items, things that wouldn’t normally be given out blithely, and would generally remain in storage for long periods of time.

Whoosh. Whoosh. Whoosh.

Arriving at the god formations, he waved his sleeve, causing one formation after another to fly toward him, and replacing them with virtual versions. Thanks to his fight with Eunuch Sunflower and Zilin, and the other things he had experienced in the Exquisite Desert, his cultivation base had improved.

And that made it even easier for him to go about his work with the formations without anyone noticing.

His speed began increasing, until he was taking tens of thousands of god formations at the same time.

RIP!

All of a sudden, an enormous and incredibly powerful formation appeared in front of him, its perimeter filled with vajra scepters that radiated the most pure and intense power imaginable.

In the middle of the vajra formation was a projection of an enormous lokapāla, burly and broad-shouldered. Upon realizing that the formation was being approached, the lokapāla opened his eyes and lunged forward aggressively.

‘Such strength!’ Yang Qi thought. ‘So this god formation comes from a buddhist school. What’s it doing here?’ He quickly threw his hands out to activate the strength god systems, then launched a palm strike that sent the lokapāla staggering back several paces. Obviously, the lokapāla was completely stunned by this. However, his astonishment quickly turned into rage and he attacked with even more mad ferocity than before.

As for Yang Qi, he decided to vanquish might with even greater might. In a short breath of time, he unleashed thousands upon thousands of moves, battering the lokapāla this way and that.

Crack!

His final palm strike hit the lokapāla so hard that he fell down on the ground. But then, the lokapāla burst into flames that took the form of a single character. Strength.

It wasn’t written in god script, but rather the writing of the ancient buddhist schools, an indication of how much the buddhists valued and recognized strength.

Meanwhile, the formation of vajra scepters shone with brilliant golden light that also turned into the character for strength and slowly flowed into Yang Qi’s palm.

Looking down, he saw that he held strength right in his hand. At the same time, the cultivation method for a boundless palm technique from a buddhist school filled his mind. The Lokapāla God Fist.

‘This is an incredible formation, filled with power. It seems like it’s on par with a Grand Emperor whose power index surpasses a hundred. That said, I don’t really have a use for it. I can benefit from some of its power structure, but as for the technique itself, I’ll just give it to father.’ With a thought, he sent the vajra scepter formation down into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart to Yang Zhan. Instantly, the character for strength appeared on Yang Zhan’s palm and he began shining with golden light.

RUMBLE!

Yang Zhan unleashed a palm strike as a test, and it caused projections of powerful lokapālas to sweep forth, powerful enough to destroy immortal worlds.

The eye of the spell formation was formed by the buddhist character for strength, and although it was impossible to tell exactly which god from which buddhist school had penned it, one thing was clear: gaining enlightenment of it would give one a deep understanding into the essence of strength. For example, after just making initial contact, Yang Qi realized how it conformed to the strength god systems, and how it could push his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth to incredible heights.

With a new understanding of the strength god systems, he was able to extrude more impurities. As a result, even though his power index was still only at two hundred eighty, he was even stronger than before.

With that, Yang Qi continued with his work, taking more and more god formations. Some of them were focused on poisons, filled with toxic energy that could render Grand Emperors unconscious. Others provided medicinal benefits, and some even improved one’s intelligence. There were even some that created dream-like illusions. Thankfully, after having to deal with the Magnificent Dream Heart-Sutra, Yang Qi had nothing to fear from such effects.

His speed increased, as did his enlightenment regarding the dao of spell formations. From what he could tell, if he really did get enlightenment from the entire collection of a billion spell formations, he wouldn’t necessarily increase his power index but his will convergence would become incredible.

After about two hours had gone by, Yang Qi had taken several hundreds of thousands of spell formations. His speed was already far beyond what it had been in the past.

And the replacements he put in their place were so realistic they almost weren’t even virtual.

‘I'm getting such incredible enlightenment that by the time this is over I'll be a king of formations!’ Smiling, he continued with his work. Soon, the formations were stronger than ever, and were becoming even more difficult to break down and take. Eventually, he had to sit there cross-legged to go about the work, dealing with the knowledge-devils at the same time.

For now, he didn’t need to pay attention at all to any external matters; his power double was still a god general in the prison on the planet of flowers.

Days began passing. Eventually, three months had gone by.

During that time, Yang Qi broke down and took about ten million formations. In other words, he had only acquired about one percent of the total one billion. And unfortunately, his speed eventually declined as the spell formations grew more powerful. Each formation was something from the legion of gods, filled with profound and deadly killing intent. Given his own wisdom and strength, it was exhausting to deal with them, and required significant time.

Because Yang Qi no longer had the God Legion Seal weighing down on his sea of consciousness, he felt freer and stronger. He was filled with a holy light, without even a scrap of darkness or gloom. In fact, his nascent divinity was becoming like a new God Legion Seal, sending golden radiance out in all directions.

It was almost as if his will could create a second God Legion Seal for himself. Of course, the original God Legion Seal wasn’t his, but rather came from the boundless Sovereign Lord. The fact that he had acquired it was a huge opportunity, but unfortunately, he lacked control regarding that opportunity. Therefore, if he could turn his own nascent divinity into something as mighty as the God Legion Seal, he could break through the fetters that were prescribed by heaven and earth. He could make his own opportunities and nothing would be able to hold him back.

It was an incredible level to have reached, and a very unique way to approach cultivation.

No one could ever have predicted that Yang Qi would use the God Legion Seal like a blueprint with which to mold his own nascent divinity.

Before, he would never have been able to do this.

But now that he was taking so many god formations, he was getting information that had once belonged only to the legion of gods. He had experiences that contained the will of the gods, and as such it was almost like he was receiving instructions from them. As he conquered the knowledge-devils, he applied what he was learning and slowly began making his nascent divinity like the God Legion Seal, mighty and strong.

During the three months that passed, his cultivation base went through heaven-shaking, earth-toppling transformations. Bit by tiny bit, he was making progress assimilating the godhood he had taken, and had already used it to reach a power index of three hundred sixty.

Of course, his fighting prowess was also rapidly advancing. As of this point, he wouldn’t even need to use the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart to deal with Eunuch Sunflower and Zilin.

His power double, meanwhile, had managed to accomplish some important missions and was gradually attracting some attention.

In fact, on more than one occasion, female members of the Joyflower Palace came down to inspect him, as if they were considering taking him as a consort.

Yang Qi was curious to see who would finally do so. In fact, having his power double become a consort was one of the first steps in his master plan. Hopefully, succeeding in that regard would get him information about what exactly Leaf Dao-Denier was up to.

As Yang Qi’s true self continued taking god formations, gaining experience, and furthering his cultivation, his nascent divinity was becoming more and more like the God Legion Seal. And he was getting the feeling that by the time he finished his work, his will convergence would likely reach the Terrifying level.

Once he had Terrifying will, then no Grand Emperor would be able to defy him and he would be able to dominate the Ancient Road to the Gods. After all, not even Empress Joyflower was close to reaching the Terrifying level.

Another month flew by.

Around the time that he had taken twenty million spell formations, he suddenly felt an immense wave of power filling the Joyflower Palace that caused the entire place to tremble.

The power assessment systems immediately spoke up.

[Danger. Danger. Extreme Danger.... Power index surpassing three thousand. A colossal and deadly entity is approaching....]

Chapter 891: The Empress Returns

‘What is it? What’s coming to Joyflower Palace? Something with a power index of over three thousand?’ Yang Qi shivered. ‘I can hardly imagine how terrifying that level of power would be. Someone like that could slaughter Eunuch Sunflower and Zilin as easily as drinking a cup of water. In fact, they could probably slaughter a hundred such people with no effort at all.’

He immediately ceased his work with the god formations and slipped back into hiding in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Obviously, the last thing he wanted was for some extremely powerful entity to trap him there in the treasure storehouse.

Once he was sure he was safe, he used the powers of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart to establish a view of Joyflower Palace as a whole.

The palace was located on a planet of flowers on one of the pathways of the Great Necropolis. And as soon as Yang Qi got a larger view, he saw countless flowers blooming as a figure appeared.

It was a woman surrounded by boundless glory, who seemed to resonate with the Passionless God Flower itself. She even emanated deathless godliness from within her.

‘It must be Empress Joyflower!’ he thought. It couldn’t be anyone else. Any other force so powerful that came to Joyflower Palace would be an enemy, and wouldn’t be received in grand fashion.

Yang Qi watched as a host of figures emerged from the depths of Joyflower Palace, pulsing with powerful auras as they said things such as, “Congratulations Empress! Your divine abilities are even more spectacular than before. With the godhood you've assimilated, you’ll be invincible among all the many heavens!”

Nodding, Yang Qi assessed the power indexes on display. ‘Joyflower Palace is so powerful! They have so many people with power indexes over a thousand that I can't even count them. People like that could be considered true old-timers and patriarchs. I wonder where Leaf Dao-Denier is, and what he’s doing right now.

‘Unfortunately, I can’t peer too closely at what’s happening, lest I be noticed. Did they just say that the empress has assimilated some godhood? If so, her senses are going to be even more acute and it will be that much easier for her to locate me. I need to take things slowly and carefully from here on out. As long as the empress is around, I can only do things via power double, and can’t go into the treasure storehouse. What a pity. I only got twenty million god formations, nowhere near close to the billion that were there. I wonder if I’ll ever reach that god-king’s tear.’

Yang Qi was a bit disappointed, but at least he had acquired enough treasures to shave a thousand years off of his cultivation requirements. For now, he would have to focus all of his effort on trying to assimilate the godhood he had acquired.

It currently floated above the God Legion Seal, trembling as the seal relentlessly leached away at it.

It was a very gradual process, but it was working.

He was certain that this godhood would eventually push his power index past a thousand, perhaps even to fifteen hundred or two thousand. Although he would still be beneath the empress, at least he would be qualified to brush shoulders with top experts around her level.

Considering the developments, he stopped worrying about matters in the Joyflower Palace and kept his efforts focused on the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. As the godhood was being converted into liquid, it entered him drop by miniscule drop, each of which was filled with immense power.

With the nutrient of godhood, the God Legion Seal became more closely connected with Yang Qi’s nascent divinity, giving him access to even more secrets that he had previously been unaware of.

**

An atmosphere of celebration had filled Joyflower Palace because of the return of the empress. In fact, a huge banquet was thrown.

Afterward, things quieted down. However, those who were perceptive would see that there was a major shift in loyalties and power, with one person in particular benefiting.

That person was none other than Leaf Dao-Denier.

In the depths of the harem, there was a private plane of existence filled with mountains, rivers, and copious amounts of flowers. And they weren’t ordinary flowers, but rather godflowers from the god world.

Strolling through the flowers, Leaf Dao-Denier laughed heartily and said, “I finally succeeded. I've finally seized true power within Joyflower Palace. Soon, I’ll control everything under heaven!”

Flanking him were none other than Grand Emperors Myriadmagic Heavenspan, Heavenearth Vastocean, and Ninelimits Paragon.

“Yes you will, Young Master Leaf,” said Myriadmagic Heavenspan. “You really did step into some good fortune. And we’ve benefited a lot by sticking with you. I hope that, in the future, you continue caring for us.”

The three Grand Emperors were very nearly fawning over Leaf Dao-Denier, as if they were his servants. There was something mysterious and powerful about him now, as though he contained a convergence of both yin and yang that caused a taiji symbol to appear on his forehead, and in fact, throughout the rest of his body. Because of Yang Qi’s cultivation, he appeared to be composed of the power of godmammoths. But as for Leaf Dao-Denier, he was filled with particles resembling taiji symbols.

Whatever great dao or divine ability it was a result of, it was profoundly mysterious and provided immense power.

“Well, that goes without saying,” Leaf Dao-Denier said. “It’s just too bad that you Grand Emperors didn’t side with me much earlier. If you’d joined me back in the mortal world, and offered me protection, you wouldn't be in your current sorry state. You see, as a consort of the empress, I’m able to practice dual cultivation with her. And recently, the empress achieved major progress with her cultivation base. She achieved the consummate level of the yin-yang taiji, and acquired a full collection of godhood, a portion of which she gave to me. I'm already powerful enough to dominate many figures from the Ancient Road to the Gods, and I’ll soon be the most powerful entity in the Joyflower Palace.”

Suddenly, an expression of vicious hatred flickered across his face. “Eldest Brother Secundus didn’t know how to appreciate favors, so I devoured him. Now I’m truly an Eternal Fortuned One, and when you add in the yin-yang taiji powers I have... I'm definitely going to give Yang Qi what’s coming to him! In fact, I want you to investigate him. Figure out where he is and what he's doing. Once I find out, he’s dead. At this point, I could kill him as easily as exhaling!”

“Young Sir, congratulations on making progress with the Taiji Indestructible Chaos-Magic World-Terrorizing Profound Art! We’ve already been doing some investigating, and as it turns out, the Dao Defense League has been taken over by the Joyflower Palace. One of the flower goddesses, Orchid Purity, is running the place. Because of it, she’s earned quite the reputation and has even received rewards from the empress. As a result, she's acquired much of the destiny of the immortal worlds.”

“What?!” Leaf Dao-Denier exclaimed. “All of that happened while I was in seclusion for only a year? What about Yang Qi? What is he up to now?”

“People are saying that he was taken captive and is now a low-ranking god-general. Unfortunately, we aren’t sure exactly which prison he was put in. Of course, we’ll continue investigating, Young Sir, and we’ll inform you as soon as we have more information. When the time comes, he’ll definitely end up dead at your hands!”

“Exactly,” Leaf Dao-Denier said, chuckling arrogantly. “Ah, Yang Qi. At long last, you’ve become my inferior. You were nothing but a lucky upstart from the beginning. How could you compare to me in the long run? In the end, I’ll make you live a life worse than death!” Looking at the Grand Emperors, he said, “Go. Run the investigation. Find out—” All of a sudden, he stopped talking and seemed to calm down. “Wait a moment. Yang Qi can't be such a simpleton. Based on what I know of him, there’s no way he would allow himself to simply be arrested by Joyflower Palace. He must have had some reason for coming here. He’s up to something! After all, he could escape that prison any time he wanted simply by using the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Look into it! Start in the Dao Defense League, with his family. Kill them one by one until you find out the information we seek. If no one from the Yang Clan is present in the Dao Defense League, then it means that he really has intentionally infiltrated Joyflower Palace. The only question is what plot he’s working on.”

“This....”

The Grand Emperors were clearly taken aback, and not very happy. “Young Sir, how could we pull that off? Flower Goddess Orchid Purity runs the Dao Defense League now. We can’t just go in and start killing people. We're not you, with consummate godly arts and the favor of the empress. We're your lackeys, but that won't stop us from getting killed if we offend the wrong people. Virtually every female disciple from the Joyflower Palace outranks us.”

“Right, I forgot about that,” Leaf Dao-Denier said. “Although I have a lot of power as a favored consort, there are a lot of people who aren’t happy with me. Many of the old-timers and eunuchs hate me, as well as many of the other consorts. There are even some flower goddesses who dislike me. I need more time to build power and gain loyalties before I can truly act without restraint. Just imagine what it will be like when I have full authority! After all, the Joyflower Palace vastly surpasses the Dao Defense League.”

“It's an amazing thought!” Grand Emperor Heavenearth Vastocean said obsequiously. “In any case, Young Sir, we’ll do our best to follow your orders.”

“Yes. Find out everything you can regarding Yang Qi. Perhaps we can’t meddle with the Dao Defense League, for now, but you can definitely look into the god-generals. I refuse to believe my authority doesn’t extend that far!”

“Yes sir!”

“Good. As my loyal servants, it's only appropriate that I reward you for your service. Thankfully, the empress gifted me with three god pills that I can give you. They’re Heaven-God Heart-Nourishing Meridian-Strengthening Pills. They contain the power of ten Grand Emperors, and you’ll be vastly stronger if you consume them. Unfortunately, I can’t trust anyone in this palace except you three. You’re the only ones who can help me, so don’t disappoint me!”

The three pills flew out, and when the Grand Emperors consumed them, they immediately burst with immense power, prompting them to drop down and prostrate themselves before Leaf Dao-Denier.

Two hours later, they had assimilated all of the medicinal strength and their eyes shone with dazzling light.

Rising to their feet, they left.

Alone, Leaf Dao-Denier suddenly shivered, causing thousands upon thousands of taiji symbols within him to rotate as he began absorbing the surrounding vital energy and building up even higher levels of power.

Chapter 892: Summons from a Flower Goddess

Back on one of the planets of flowers, a group of god-generals had been gathered by Grand Eunuch Tian.

“Excellent,” he said, “Those of you who accomplished your missions have done remarkable work. In fact, some of the flower goddesses want to see you!”

Over the course of the past few months, there had been a variety of missions handed out. Some of the god-generals ended up dead or wounded, but there were always newcomers to replace them. There was a constant influx of forces from the Ancient Road to the Gods who entered the Great Necropolis, especially experts from smaller sects and organizations that were easy pickings for Joyflower Palace.

After all, there were now more people in the Great Necropolis than there were planets among the immortal worlds. And many of those people were domineering figures, even on the Ancient Road to the Gods.

As a result, Joyflower Palace was only growing stronger and more powerful. When Yang Qi had first arrived, most of the god-generals had power indexes of twenty or thirty, with only a few reaching the level of eighty or ninety.

However, over the course of the past several months, the quality of the prisoners had increased. Yang Qi had seen quite a few with power indexes of over two hundred, and even a few who were as high as five or six hundred.

Obviously, as Joyflower Palace grew more powerful, they were able to capture even more powerful prisoners, to the point where the forces of the god-generals were proliferating like grass after a spring rain.

As Yang Qi furthered his cultivation in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, his power index rose and he grew stronger and tougher. He was now so strong that not even experts much more powerful than him would be able to see through his true abilities. Even his power double had meridians and true energy that gave him a power index of over a hundred.

Even as Grand Eunuch Tian was making his speech, a group of eunuchs appeared off in the distance with a new group of prisoners.

“Go! Get inside, you obstinate and unruly lot! If you piss us off, we’ll execute you immediately!”

The prisoners were bound and gagged, but their eyes burned with fury. Although they seemed to glow with golden light, they were tightly sealed and couldn’t access their true energy. Even so, the boundless baleful energy and murderous auras they possessed were shocking to the extreme.

‘Such incredible power indexes!’ Yang Qi thought. Even the weakest member of this group had a power index of four hundred, and one of them, a young man, was over eight hundred.

Despite that, they had been captured, turned into god-generals, and were now being thrown into the prison.

“Those are experts from the House of a Hundred Battles. According to the rumors, that’s an organization no weaker than the Joyflower Palace! How did those people end up in a situation like this? Look, that’s one of their junior houselords, the Hundred-Battles Monk! He has a reputation as being not only beautiful, but also highly skilled.”

“Ah, what a pity. From what I heard, Houselord Hundred-Battles fought with Empress Joyflower over some godhood and ended up being thoroughly defeated. In fact, she killed him! Afterward, she marshaled armies from the Joyflower Palace to attack the House of a Hundred Battles, and even took their signature god item, the Hundred-Battles Heaven Dome. And now these people from the old House of a Hundred Battles are nothing more than prisoners. That said, I suggest we don’t make fun of the Hundred-Battles Monk. He's definitely going to end up as a consort, which means that he’ll soon outrank us.”

“The Hundred-Battles Monk is a very proud person, how could he possibly agree to become a consort? Well, when you stand under low eaves, you have no choice but to bow your head. Whatever honor and glory he enjoyed before are nothing but a thing of the past.”

“Let’s wait and see who the flower goddesses pick to become new consorts.”

“There are women other than the flower goddesses who can pick consorts, you know. Eldresses, emissaries, and even their holy daughters. Being a consort to any of them would be better than being a god-general prisoner, and definitely superior to becoming genderless eunuchs. Ai.”

“That’s true. Make one mistake, and snip, you’re a eunuch. I’d rather die than have that happen to me.”

After overhearing the surrounding conversations, Yang Qi learned that the new prisoners were from the House of a Hundred Battles. Obviously, the Joyflower Palace’s luck and destiny was on the rise.

Yang Qi quickly used the Son of Heaven’s Horoscopy, which he had picked up from the Five Hegemons of the Heavenly Kingdom, to assess the situation. He immediately caught sight of the invisible, auspicious cloud that existed above the heads of the members of Joyflower Palace. In fact, all of them had such incredible destiny that they would obviously benefit wherever they went.

It was similar to how government officials in the mortal world were protected by their position and power. Even bandits would think twice before making a move on someone with a powerful position.

BOOM!

As the new prisoners from the House of a Hundred Battles were arriving, flowers erupted in the sky as a host of holy daughters appeared, as well as some flower goddesses.

“Respectful greetings, Flower Goddesses!” the eunuchs said, bowing low.

The holy daughters and flower goddesses landed and looked over the group of god-generals as if they were shopping at the supermarket. To Yang Qi’s surprise, he saw Flower Goddesses Jade Nightqueen and Snowlotus in the group, the very same two he had spied on as they met with Proud Ethics.

‘Oh, right. I wonder if the empress will check on King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallion and that message. If she does, she’ll realize what’s happened in the treasure storehouse! Hopefully she thinks to blame Leaf Dao-Denier.’ Yang Qi was still disappointed that he hadn’t managed to take fuller advantage of the treasure storehouse.

Turning to Grand Eunuch Tian, the spectacularly beautiful Jade Nightqueen said, “Have the people we arrested from the House of a Hundred Battles arrived yet?”

“Yes, oh exalted Flower Goddess,” he replied. “The prisoners from the House of a Hundred Battles have just come, shall we bring them out?”

“Yes.”

He waved his hand and some of the lower-ranking eunuchs led the newly arrived prisoners over, forcing them to their knees in front of the flower goddesses. Upon looking them over, Jade Nightqueen dragged the Hundred-Battles Monk over and ran her fingers down his cheek.

“So, we meet again, Hundred-Battles Monk,” she said. “Back on the Ancient Road to the Gods, you were quite famous and domineering. A real elite among the young experts. But didn’t I say back then that you would eventually end up in the harem of Joyflower Palace? And now here you are, a lowly prisoner.”  She chuckled. “I think I’ll have you as my consort. A male bitch, of sorts. What do you think? A pleasing fate, wouldn’t you say?”

“Bah! You women are all evil villains!” The Hundred-Battles Monk was virtually twitching with hatred, but unfortunately for him, his power was completely sealed, making it impossible for him to do anything. “I’d rather die than submit to you. Don’t worry, I’ll eventually get my revenge, and wipe out your entire sect!”

Laughter erupted from the holy daughters, as well as Snowlotus, who said, “Not bad! Not bad at all. He hates you, that's for sure. But a bit of torture will fix that. If they don’t struggle, what's the fun, right?”

“Grand Eunuch Tian,” Jade Nightqueen said, “have this fellow bound up and sent to my mansion. I’ll personally teach him a lesson or two.”

“Yes, ma’am,” Grand Eunuch Tian replied. “How else can I serve the two of you?”

“We heard there’s someone in the prison named Yang Qi. Bring him out and have him sent to my palace too, got it?” Flying up into the air, Jade Nightqueen turned to the holy daughters and said, “Take your time picking whatever consorts you want. Remember, the right consort can be of immense benefit to you.” Looking back to the prisoners, she said, “Follow orders and acknowledge allegiance, and things will go well for you. The alternative is death!”

The delicate and beautiful holy daughters beamed with delight as they began pointing out the various god-generals they were interested in.

Meanwhile, some of the eunuchs tracked down Yang Qi, tossed him into a black sack, and had him taken away. Some time later, the bag was opened and he tumbled out to find himself on the stone slabs of one of the interior palaces.

In front of him were two thrones, upon which sat the flower goddesses Jade Nightqueen and Snowlotus. The eunuchs who had carried him here were bowing to them.

“Flower Goddesses, here is the person you requested. Do you have any other orders for us?”

“Nothing. You’re dismissed.”

“Yes, ma’am!” the eunuchs chorused, then quickly hurried away.

As Yang Qi crawled to his feet, Flower Goddess Jade Nightqueen walked over and looked him up and down. “So, you’re Yang Qi? From the Dao Defense League?”

Normally speaking, any man would tremble fearfully in her presence, but Yang Qi didn’t.

“Yes, that's me,” he said with a faint smile.

“You've got a lot of gall to look straight at me!” she said icily. “Get on your knees! Do you know who I am, you despicable prisoner? I'm a flower goddess! With a mere thought, I could have you thrown into a bottomless abyss of suffering!”

“Oh, really?” Yang Qi said, examining her just as thoroughly as she had looked at him. “Two flower goddesses, huh. Well, I'm going to assume you called me here for a reason, right? And I doubt you’ll get what you want if you throw me into a bottomless abyss.”

“What was that?” Jade Nightqueen blurted. Killing intent flaring, she said, “How dare you talk to me like that! What backing do you have to give you such gall? Aren’t you worried I might execute you? I could kill you as easily as stepping on an ant!”

“Come on, Flower Goddess Jade Nightqueen,” he said, smiling even more broadly. “Don’t tell me you haven’t noticed that I'm just a power double. Why would I care if you killed one of my power doubles?”

“What? A power double!?” Flower Goddess Snowlotus blurted in shock. She rose from her throne and walked over to look at Yang Qi, her eyes flashing like sabers.

“You want a demonstration?” he asked. Snapping his finger, he summoned a throne, upon which he sat. Then he snapped his finger again, summoning a table, upon which sat a brewing pot of tea whose fragrance stirred the spirit.

“Come, Flower Goddesses. Let’s have some tea. It’s illusory, but I doubt you’ll be able to taste the difference.”

Chapter 893: Sowing Dissension

The two flower goddesses, Jade Nightqueen and Snowlotus, were both glaring sharply at Yang Qi, scarcely able to believe that a measly god-general prisoner would dare to behave so impudently. He had even gone so far as to summon a virtual table and tea set, complete with a little clay heating furnace to warm the tea. It was almost as though he thought himself to be the ruler of the entire Joyflower Palace.

“You!” Jade Nightqueen barked and prepared to attack, but Snowlotus held out a hand to block her path.

“Wait,” she said quietly. “Let’s see what he’s up to.”

“There’s no need for alarm,” he said. “You see, I’ve come here today to help you. Maybe we can even work together. Please, have a seat and try some of my tea.” He waved his hand again, and two chairs appeared. Meanwhile, wisps of steam rose from the furnace as the tea boiled and a fragrant aroma soon filled the area.

Snowlotus sat down in one of the chairs, waving her finger to send a stream of white energy toward the furnace.

“Hmm?” Yang Qi waved his own finger, sending out an opposing stream of energy. When the two energies collided, Snowlotus simply sat there unmoving, whereas Yang Qi shivered a bit and seemed to turn slightly transparent.

“The tea’s not done yet,” he said. “Please, wait another moment.” Although he was obviously in the inferior position, he didn’t seem worried at all, and even acted as though nothing had just happened. A moment later, he placed a teacup in front of Snowlotus and poured her some tea.

The steam from the tea swirled up in the shape of immortal cranes, phoenixes, and butterflies, creating a very pleasing image.

Almost at the same time, Jade Nightqueen and Snowlotus uttered exclamations of shock.

“You really are a power double!”

“That’s the Dream Butterfly Energy Art! Are you connected to Zilin somehow?”

Snowlotus could tell from the slight transparency of Yang Qi’s body that he really was a power double. However, it was only because of their clash moments ago that the transparency had become apparent. Normally speaking, there would have been no way to tell. And that indicated that his true self must surpass her, which meant that she was in a very tricky situation.

As for Jade Nightqueen, she could see from the shape of the tea’s steam that Yang Qi was using the godly-class energy art that was the signature ability of Zilin.

Both flower goddesses were shocked, although for slightly different reasons. The fact that they were dealing with a power double meant that any threats they might try using on him would be completely useless. Even worse, if he was allied with Zilin, they would have to be even more careful. All of the top leaders in the Joyflower Palace knew that Zilin was the most powerful of the consorts. Although Leaf Dao-Denier was currently rising in both power and favor, the difference between him and Zilin was like the difference between an imperial spouse and a mere concubine.

Although the power of a concubine might temporarily eclipse the imperial spouse, the latter occupied a profoundly significant position that could not be changed.

Seeing their reaction, Yang Qi chuckled and said, “Well, now that you can both see I'm a power double, we can get on to more important business. Don’t forget, killing this power double won’t affect me at all. As for whether or not I work for Zilin, that doesn’t really matter. What matters is that I can help both of you improve your standing in Joyflower Palace. If you don’t, it’s entirely likely that Leaf Dao-Denier will eventually have you killed. He's a very ambitious person, and to be honest, I'm not sure why your empress favors him so much. That said, if he gets powerful enough, he’s going to lord it over all of you.”

“Leaf Dao-Denier....” Upon hearing his name, Snowlotus and Jade Nightqueen reacted with visible disdain and, at the same time, fury. To them, he was like a pig or dog who had somehow elevated himself to a high position in the court.

After all, to the women of the Joyflower Palace, men were animals who couldn't compare at all to women.

As for Yang Qi, he knew what kind of person Leaf Dao-Denier was. He was arrogant, conceited, sinister, treacherous, distrusting, and supremely ambitious. Unfortunately for him, he would never be popular in the Joyflower Palace, considering he was a male consort.

“So you’re saying you want to ally with us against Leaf Dao-Denier?” Jade Nightqueen said. She chuckled darkly. “Ah, Yang Qi. How could we ever have guessed that you would be up to business such as this? You're the measly ex-leader of the Dao Defense League, which can’t even compare to a third-rate sect from the Ancient Road to the Gods. And yet, the fact that you’ve infiltrated the Joyflower Palace like this indicates that Orchid Purity isn’t even close to your level. So why did you back down to her?”

“Because I have important plans of my own,” he replied, not bothering to mince words. “And for the time being, I'm not strong enough to handle your Empress Joyflower, although it's not as if she could kill me, either. Aren’t you going to try my tea?”

“Fine,” Jade Nightqueen replied. “Let’s see how skilled you are at manipulating virtual power.” Without further ado, she drank the tea. As she did, warmth flowed through her, as if the tea itself had come from the god world. If she didn’t know any better, she would have guessed it was real tea, not a product of virtual power.

There was no way for her to prevent shock from gripping her heart. Yang Qi had obviously perfected the skill to create something that seemed real out of nothing, which was a skill, not from the dao of immortals, but rather the dao of gods.

It caused a grim expression to appear on her face as she realized that this man was obviously not slave material, but was instead an enemy she needed to be very careful around.

“Well, what do you think? Now do you have an inkling of how powerful I am?” Yang Qi’s months of cultivation hadn’t just involved slowly drawing on the godhood to increase his power, he had also gained enlightenment from the virtual god world in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, as well as the Life-Death Void-Destruction God-Lightning.

“I have to admit that you’re very strong,” Snowlotus said. Exchanging a glance with Jade Nightqueen, she continued, “But what exactly is your plan? Are you really trying to take down Leaf Dao-Denier?”

“Exactly. And it seems to me that you two would like to do the same. The only reason you haven’t already is because he’s the most favored consort of the empress. You see, Leaf Dao-Denier is keeping a big secret, and that secret is the key to gaining the upper hand.”

“A secret?” Jade Nightqueen said. “Considering he’s the favored consort, knowing a secret about him isn’t going to be enough. What game are you playing at here? It’s not revenge. Any grudge in the world can be dispelled one way or another. But profit. Profit will always motivate action.”

“Why don’t you wait until I tell you the details of this secret,” Yang Qi said with a faint smile. “Presumably, the two of you are aware of a certain item from the god world, blessed by the legion of gods and gifted by the Sovereign Lord. It represents the devotion of the legion of gods, and at a certain point in history, was broken into three parts....”

“What?”

“The God Legion Seal?”

“Impossible!”

“Don’t tell me that Leaf Dao-Denier has one of the God Legion Seals!”

Both Snowlotus and Jade Nightqueen completely lost their composure.

“I never said he has a God Legion Seal,” Yang Qi said, doing his best to keep the two flower goddesses in suspense for dramatic purposes. “But in my dealings with him in years past in the Dao Defense League, I came to the realization that he has information about it. And I bet your empress also realizes this, which is why she’s been doting on him.”

“So that's what’s going on....” The two flower goddesses exchanged another meaningful look. Neither of them had been able to deduce why an ant-like cultivator like Leaf Dao-Denier, a person who wasn't even a Grand Emperor, had experienced such a meteoric rise in barely a year’s time. During that short period, he had reached a status nearly equal to Zilin and had even benefited from bits of godhood given to him by the empress. They had believed all along that something fishy was going on.

Of course, Yang Qi was like the thief crying “stop thief!”, and was using the craftiest plots and machinations he could think of to throw suspicion off of himself. Yang Qi was quite adept at turning the tables, making black into white and vice versa.

“That’s quite the monumental secret,” Snowlotus said. Her main inclination was to seize Yang Qi and interrogate him by force, but she knew that doing so would be useless considering he was a power double. Furthermore, it would make any cooperation between them impossible and would turn him into a true enemy, which wouldn’t help at all in dealing with Leaf Dao-Denier.

Projecting a message via divine will, Jade Nightqueen said, “What do we do, Snowlotus? Don’t tell me we’re really going to have to work with this despicable man.”

“I don’t see any other option,” Snowlotus replied. “Don’t forget that Leaf Dao-Denier has the full favor of the empress. Although he isn’t an immediate threat to us, we obviously can’t have him killed. Right now, the only thing we can do is work with this Yang Qi. When the time is right, we can take advantage of the situation to come out on top, and, after the dust settles, have Yang Qi eliminated. No one will be the wiser, and we’ll have the best of both worlds.”

“Yes, but given the fact that this version of Yang Qi is only a power double, it’s obvious that he’s not one to take lightly. He won’t be a weak opponent.”

“We’ll be fine,” Snowlotus said. “It’s not like it’s just the two of us. For now, we’ll pretend to work with him, all the while running an investigation to locate his true self. When we find him, we can gather a whole host of experts to go kill him.”

“The God Legion Seal. If we can get the God Legion Seal, who would we possibly need to fear? The treasures and secrets it contains defy imagination. It can absorb godliness, and even be used to summon hordes of fiend-devils from hell.”

With a brief interchange of divine will, the two flower goddesses hatched a vicious plot.

Of course, Yang Qi didn’t even need to eavesdrop to come to the conclusion that they were going to help him get rid of Leaf Dao-Denier, then turn on him. It was a classic case of one con artist trying to con another. He himself had done the same thing in the past, so there was no way he would be so easily fooled.

In fact, he was planning to push all of the blame for Leaf Dao-Denier’s death onto these two. Few people could match Yang Qi when it came to recognizing a situation of the mantis stalking the cicada, unaware of the oriole behind.

Before any further conversation could play out, a young woman rushed into their presence. “Exalted Flower Goddesses, some of Leaf Dao-Denier’s servants are here requesting a meeting.”

Chapter 894: The Fury of the Flower Goddesses

Leaf Dao-Denier’s servants had arrived, and the news caused a smile to spread out on Yang Qi’s face. He had guessed that something like this would happen. Once Leaf Dao-Denier had come out of seclusion and learned what had occurred with the Dao Defense League, and Yang Qi being taken captive, he wouldn’t be able to hold back from trying to make a move.

That was one of the reasons he had chosen to sow dissension between the flower goddesses and Leaf Dao-Denier.

Presumably, Leaf Dao-Denier’s servants had caught wind that Yang Qi was meeting the flower goddesses, and they were operating on the assumption that their master’s reputation would ensure their safety. Little did they know that Yang Qi had already set the flower goddesses fully against Leaf Dao-Denier by tantalizing them with ‘news’ of the God Legion Seal. Considering that they planned to benefit from Leaf Dao-Denier, there was no way they would let him off the hook now.

Looking as cold as ice, Jade Nightqueen said, “What? Leaf Dao-Denier’s servants? And they want to meet with us? Forget it. Send them away!”

“Slow down,” Yang Qi said. “There won’t be any harm in meeting with them. I knew all along that Leaf Dao-Denier would come after me. You see, he's actually terrified that I might reveal his big secret, and hopes to kill me before I can. Actually, it’s part of my plan to lure him into a vulnerable state.”

“I see,” Jade Nightqueen said. “In that case, fine. Send the servants in.”

“Yes ma’am,” the young woman said, hurrying out. A moment later, three individuals entered. They were none other than Grand Emperors Heavenearth Vastocean, Myriadmagic Heavenspan, and Ninelimits Paragon. Eldest Brother Secundus was nowhere to be seen.

Considering how much of a fool Eldest Brother Secundus had been, Yang Qi was fairly certain that Leaf Dao-Denier had assimilated him. After all, how could Leaf Dao-Denier just let an Eternal One walk free?

“So, you’re here, Yang Qi!” Grand Emperor Myriadmagic Heavenspan said, a vicious grin playing out on his face, as well as the faces of the other Grand Emperors. “Ah, Yang Qi. The day you forced us out of the Dao Defense League, did you ever imagine this day would come? We spent years building the foundation of the league, only to have you snatch it away at the last minute. And now it belongs to someone else entirely. You’ve become nothing more than a slave and a consort. Where is your fame and your power now?”

At this point, both of the flower goddesses snorted coldly.

“What are you three slaves doing causing a scene here in our palace?” Jade Nightqueen said. “Why aren’t you on your knees? You think you can do whatever you please because you have the backing of Leaf Dao-Denier?”

The three Grand Emperors bowed their heads respectfully, but didn’t get on their knees. And their eyes contained deadly venom when they glanced at Yang Qi.

“Salutations, Flower Goddesses. We're here on the orders of Young Master Leaf. He wants to get his hands on this consort named Yang Qi, who’s an old enemy of his from the Dao Defense League. Young Master Leaf intends to punish him for his crimes, thus laying to rest their grudge.”

“What incredible gall!” Jade Nightqueen shouted. “Yang Qi is our consort. How dare you make demands of him. Do you actually want to get yourselves killed?”

Sounding somewhat choked, Grand Emperor Ninelimits Paragon said, “Flower Goddesses, it's Young Master Leaf who wants him, not us. Hopefully you can agree to give us some face here.”

“Young Master Leaf does want him,” Grand Emperor Myriadmagic Heavenspan said. “He even mentioned it to the empress himself, and said that he intends to punish him severely.”

“You damned animal!”

SMACK!

Jade Nightqueen viciously slapped Grand Emperor Myriadmagic Heavenspan, sending him flying to the side, where he smashed into the wall and then slid to the ground. Blood gushed out of his mouth and his eyes glazed. Apparently he had been knocked unconscious.

Shocked, the other two Grand Emperors rushed over, pulled him to his feet, and sent some true energy into him to revive him. Then they looked back at Jade Nightqueen with expressions of vicious hatred.

“What was that for, Flower Goddess?” Grand Emperor Ninelimits Paragon said. “We need an explanation so we can report this matter to Young Master Leaf!”

“Explanation?” Jade Nightqueen said, her eyes flashing with killing intent. “What do you mean explanation? You barged in here, caused a big scene, then threatened us. Who the hell do you think you are? You’re not even worth as much as a dog! The only reason I haven’t killed you already is because I don’t want to stain my hands. Now get the hell back to Leaf Dao-Denier and tell him that he'd do well to remember his place as a mere consort. He might think he has a lot of power and authority, but he’s delusional if he thinks he can compare to the women of the Joyflower Palace.”

“That’s right,” Snowlotus said with a cold smile. “Screw off, all of you. Remember: Yang Qi is our consort, and he isn’t going anywhere. Know your place. If you don’t, we’ll deal with you using harsher methods.”

“Yes, yes of course,” said Grand Emperor Ninelimits Paragon. Casting a venomous glance at Yang Qi, he said, “We’ll report all of this in detail to Young Master Leaf. You just wait, Yang Qi. This isn’t over yet. If you think you can avoid punishment by hiding out with the flower goddesses, you’re delusional.”

“Screw off,” Yang Qi said. He waved his hand, sending out a rushing wind that knocked the three Grand Emperors off their feet and sent them tumbling head over heels all the way out of the palace. They were three famous Grand Emperors from the immortal dao civilization, and had founded the Heavenly Court, but now they were little more than servants with no face whatsoever.

Meanwhile, Jade Nightqueen and Snowlotus were shocked at how Yang Qi had just driven them out using a power filled with softness. That level of skill required immense levels of enlightenment and was completely beyond the ordinary.

‘His cultivation base is unfathomable,’ Jade Nightqueen thought. ‘He really is the best option for dealing with Leaf Dao-Denier.’

Snowlotus was thinking similar thoughts.

Outside, the three Grand Emperors struggled to their feet. Their loss of face was immense, as hosts of palace maids were present and openly laughing at their predicament.

Ever since they had begun following Leaf Dao-Denier, they had enjoyed quite a measure of prestige, just like the fox exploiting the tiger’s might. But now they were like clowns or stray dogs.

Gnashing their teeth, they hurried off.

“Damn that Yang Qi. We’ll see you dead for this!”

“It was Yang Qi who actually drove us out,” Grand Emperor Myriadmagic Heavenspan said. “Since when did that dirty little swine get so strong? We can't afford to underestimate him, and we need to inform Leaf Dao-Denier about all of this.”

“That pig actually beat six of us in a fight before,” Grand Emperor Heavenearth Vastocean said, “back when he took the beast king clones from us. Even then, he was as strong as a third-rate expert from the Ancient Road to the Gods. He’s getting stronger incredibly quickly, and now he's a consort to the flower goddesses. There’s no doubt that he’ll hold nothing back in his efforts to continue his rise.”

“Come on, let’s check in with Young Master Leaf.”

It didn’t take long for them to reach Leaf Dao-Denier’s palace. Leaf Dao-Denier was currently in a session of cultivation, surrounded by swarms of taiji symbols.

When he sensed their arrival, he opened his eyes. Face flashing with anger, he retracted all the taiji symbols and said, “What?! Why don’t you have Yang Qi with you? You scum. How useless could you be!?”

Upon seeing Leaf Dao-Denier’s killing intent, Grand Emperor Myriadmagic Heavenspan grew cold at heart and said, “Young Master Leaf, the thing is that our status is just too low. We’re not as important as you. There are two powerful flower goddesses who seem to be acting in opposition to you. Furthermore, that swine Yang Qi is much, much stronger than before.”

With that, he went on to recount what had occurred, making sure to embellish a few of the details. As Leaf Dao-Denier listened, his expression grew increasingly vicious, until he looked like a fiend-ghost risen from hell.

Snorting coldly, he said, “I can’t believe they refused to give me any face. It seems I need to take action personally. I absolutely must get my hands on Yang Qi! If he wants to hide behind the skirts of those women, well, I’ll just drag him out myself. Considering how strong I am now, not even the flower goddesses are a match for me. Getting my hands on a consort will be an easy task.” Leaf Dao-Denier’s heart pounded as he thought of everything Yang Qi possessed: King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions, the God Legion Seal, the Aeonic God Psalter, King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans, and the Cruiser of Civilization. The more Leaf Dao-Denier’s cultivation base increased, the more his desire for such objects grew. If he could get them without anyone realizing it, he would become so strong that he could directly assimilate Empress Joyflower herself.

Therefore, not only would he not give up in his efforts to kill Yang Qi, but he would also never tell anyone the truth about what treasures he possessed.

He wanted them all for himself.

Leaf Dao-Denier was one of the most arrogant people imaginable, and the truth was that being a consort filled him with extraordinary shame and humiliation. Only the blood of the Joyflower Palace as a whole would cleanse that humiliation. He didn’t feel an ounce of gratitude toward Empress Joyflower for his recent advances, only hatred. In fact, he hated her more than he hated Yang Qi. Once he was strong enough, killing her would be the first thing he would do.

Unfortunately, he wasn’t quite ready to do that yet.

For now, he would focus on killing Yang Qi and taking his treasures, then using them to rise to further levels of power.

“Let’s go. I'm going to confront Jade Nightqueen and Snowlotus. Let’s see whether or not they refuse to give me face in person. After all, I'm an important person in the Joyflower Palace.” Expression turning sinister and icy, he continued, “I refuse to believe that they aren’t scared of me. I’m definitely more powerful than them now.”

Flicking his sleeve, he headed directly toward the flower goddesses’ palace. If everything went well, he would increase his reputation and prove that they still needed to take him seriously, even though he was merely a consort.

Chapter 895: Butting Heads

After the three Grand Emperors had left, Yang Qi settled comfortably back into his chair. “Well, Flower Goddesses, we just drove away three of Young Master Leaf’s lackeys. But all that means is that he’ll probably come in person to try getting what he wants. Then what?”

Yang Qi knew there was no way Leaf Dao-Denier would give up so easily.

And he knew exactly what Leaf Dao-Denier was after. Yang Qi’s God Legion Seal, legacy medallions, and other treasures. If he got them, he would definitely use them to destroy Joyflower Palace to get revenge.

It was for that very reason that Yang Qi had brought up the God Legion Seal himself. He knew that Leaf Dao-Denier wouldn’t spread rumors about it, otherwise he would likely lose out on the opportunity to get it for himself.

Yang Qi was taking full advantage of that in his overall strategy. As for now, he was fully aware that, having driven away the three Grand Emperors, Leaf Dao-Denier would likely come in person. And Yang Qi would use the opportunity to see what Leaf Dao-Denier’s cultivation base was like nowadays.

If he was as strong as Zilin, it would be something of a surprise, although Yang Qi wouldn’t need to worry that much. After all, he was already beyond Zilin’s level, with only the empress herself being a match for him in Joyflower Palace.

Of course, his power double was completely expendable, leaving him free to use it in any way he wished.

“If he comes in person, we’ll make sure he loses any face he has,” replied Jade Nightflower. “There are a lot of people who don't like him, so if he dares to act out of line around us, we’ll show him a thing or two. Does he really think he's as important as Zilin? Throughout the long history of Joyflower Palace, there have been a lot of people who earned favor the way Leaf Dao-Denier has. And every single one of them ended up losing favor and either being killed, or crippled and forced to live out their days in ignominy. Zilin is the only one who’s flourished long-term. Compared to him, Leaf Dao-Denier is just a flash in the pan, and will burn out eventually.”

“You have a respectable cultivation base, Yang Qi,” Jade Nightqueen said. “Why are you fooling around with all this nonsense? Why don’t you try earning the favor of the empress? Considering what you’re capable of, she would definitely take a liking to you. You might even be able to directly dispose of Leaf Dao-Denier that way. If you were to actually kill him right now, you’ll only earn her wrath.”

“I don’t think the two of you understand what kind of person I am,” Yang Qi replied with a smile. “How could someone like me truly join Joyflower Palace and become a low-down consort? After all, you women obviously hate men. Unfortunately for you, in this heaven and earth, it’s men who prop up heaven and earth. For example, King Immortal-Slayer. He was a man, wasn’t he? And what about the Sovereign Lord. Isn’t he male? About ninety percent of the legion of gods were male as well. And in hell, it’s even more pronounced. Ninety-nine percent of all fiend-devils are male. So what do you think that means?”

Jade Nightqueen’s expression was as cold as ice. “Our Joyflower Palace is going to change all of that. We're going to make sure that women rule the god world, and everything else under heaven.”

“You’re crazy if you really believe that,” Yang Qi replied. “Even if Joyflower Palace were stronger than it already is, could it really compare to King Immortal-Slayer?”

“There’s no need to debate this now,” Snowlotus said. “One day you’ll have your proof that we're right, when all men in creation are enslaved by us. Incidentally, you’ve never met the empress, so you don’t really know what kind of person she is. Once you meet her, you’ll understand how much of a genius she is when it comes to strategy and tactics. You’ll be convinced, and you’ll definitely join her willingly.”

“Oh? In that case, I very much look forward to seeing what this empress of yours is like.” Yang Qi prepared to continue with a different conversation topic that would sow further discord between the flower goddesses and Leaf Dao-Denier. After all, the more chaotic Joyflower Palace became, the easier it would be to determine what the empress herself was up to at the moment.

He needed more information about her before he dared to enter the treasure storehouse again. He wanted more god formations, and that god-king’s tear, which would improve his Engine of the One God. And the more chaos he could create in the Great Necropolis and on the Ancient Road to the Gods, the sooner he could strike a fatal blow to the future world, and also kill Proud Heaven.

However, that was when Leaf Dao-Denier’s voice suddenly reached their ears from outside.

“Leaf Dao-Denier is here to see Flower Goddess Jade Nightqueen and Flower Goddess Snowlotus!” Without waiting for a response, he strode in.

“Leaf Dao-Denier? What are you doing here?” The two flower goddesses were clearly furious that he would be so impudent.

He wore a garment as pure as white snow, and a headband with a taiji symbol on it. He carried no weapon and kept his hands clasped behind his back, making him seem quite dignified. Of course, he was as wildly arrogant as ever, and made no attempt to hide that fact.

In that regard, he couldn’t have been more different from Zilin. If Zilin was a piece of jade, and Eunuch Sunflower was a needle, then Leaf Dao-Denier was a razor-sharp dagger, or perhaps a vicious dog with a mouthful of glistening fangs.

For one person to be so domineering, forceful, and savage was terrifying indeed, and it made him the kind of person that few people would ever dare to provoke.

“Fancy meeting you here, Yang Qi,” he said as he strode into the hall. Waving his hand, he summoned a taiji symbol that spread out to lock down the space-time in the palace and prevent Yang Qi from leaving.

It was truly an act of arrogance, considering that he was in the presence of two flower goddesses. There was no doubt that he was dead set on taking Yang Qi away.

“This is outrageous, Leaf Dao-Denier,” Jade Nightqueen said. “How dare you do something like that here in our palace. This isn’t the harem! As a mere consort, you have no right to behave this way.”

She waved her hand, sending a stream of sword energy slicing toward the taiji symbol. Unfortunately, as soon as the sword energy touched the symbol, a burst of power erupted out and shredded it to pieces.

Jade Nightqueen shivered, her energy and blood quivering. Obviously, she wasn’t a match for Leaf Dao-Denier.

“Don't waste your breath, Flower Goddess Jade Nightqueen,” Leaf Dao-Denier said, his voice dripping with arrogance. “You’re no match for me. I've already successfully cultivated the Taiji Indestructible Chaos-Magic World-Terrorizing Profound Art. That means I could even fight Zilin, if I wanted to. In fact, I've already surpassed him and will wipe him out of existence, one of these days. As for you two, you couldn’t fight me even if you joined forces.”

“What?” Jade Nightqueen said through gritted teeth. “The empress actually taught you a consummate technique like that? The Taiji Indestructible Chaos-Magic World-Terrorizing Profound Art was only acquired after expending countless blood, sweat, and tears on the Ancient Road to the Gods. The empress gave something like that to a despicable slave like you?”

‘Bitch!’ Leaf Dao-Denier thought, killing intent surging within him. However, he kept control of himself. No matter how much he wanted to kill them, he was in enemy territory. If he attacked them, not even the empress would be able to protect him. He would have to wait until his position was more stable before doing anything like that. “Look, Flower Goddesses, I’m not interested in arguing with you two. I'm taking Yang Qi with me. He’s my greatest archenemy, and he belongs to me.” Grinning viciously, he continued, “After I’ve finished with him, I’ll come back and offer a formal apology to the two of you. Agreed? Don’t tell me you’re going to refuse a small request like this. Besides, I have the perfect compensation in mind for you. The empress gifted me with two Great-Dao Heaven-Origin God Pills the other day.”

“Great-Dao Heaven-Origin God Pills?” Both flower goddesses were surprised and moved. However, that was when Yang Qi cleared his throat and said, “Flower Goddesses, although god pills are nice, the item we spoke of earlier is worth millions upon trillions more.”

The flower goddesses’ eyes glittered as they both thought about the God Legion Seal. A moment later, Jade Nightqueen said, “Leaf Dao-Denier, you, a consort, have left the harem without official permission, which is a major crime. And if you dare to make a move on the two of us, you’ll never be let off the hook. Get back to the harem and forget about everything that happened here today. You’re not taking Yang Qi with you. We intend to give him to the empress as a gift. Considering all of his mysteries, she’ll definitely take a liking to him.”

“No, you can’t!” he blurted. Never in his wildest dreams could he have guessed that the flower goddesses intended to give Yang Qi to the empress. Now, more than ever, he hated Yang Qi down to his bones. And he couldn’t help but suspect that all of this was part of Yang Qi’s plan.

If he ended up with the empress, he would definitely impress her and gain her favor. And that would be the day that Leaf Dao-Denier headed to an early grave.

Sadly for Leaf Dao-Denier, he was no match for Yang Qi when it came to crafty plots and machinations. There was no way he could beat him if they were competing for the empress’ favor.

“Get over here, Yang Qi!” he growled. “If you’ve got what it takes, then stop hiding behind these women. You might’ve beaten me a handful of times in the past, but now you’re nothing but a pitiful bug. I honestly can't believe you’re so cowardly that you won’t face me directly!”

Yang Qi burst out laughing. “You really have no sense of shame, do you Leaf Dao-Denier? I never thought I would see you as a consort, a despicable piece of trash who’s neither man nor woman. Incidentally, I'm not here as a consort. I'm here as a guest. Did you really think that I was going to join Joyflower Palace? If so, you couldn’t have been more mistaken. You’re the one relying on a woman to try to get revenge. It seems you really have lost your previous dashing nature and have turned into nothing more than a diseased dog.”

“You!” Leaf Dao-Denier shouted, trembling with fury. Then he howled a battle cry and lunged forward in an attack.

Chapter 896: Split Second Decisions

Leaf Dao-Denier had actually gone on the offensive.

Yang Qi had pushed the insults too far, and Leaf Dao-Denier couldn’t take it any longer. For some reason, he always ended up getting furious whenever he dealt with Yang Qi, yet he also always paid a heavy price because of it.

For example, he had worked himself to the bone to recruit the seventy-one patriarchs, who he had intended to eventually assimilate. But in the end, those seventy-one patriarchs became believers in Yang Qi. And before Leaf Dao-Denier had realized what was happening, Yang Qi stole all of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions and devoured the essence of the Tusita Heaven, removing it forever from its place in the universe.

Everything that Leaf Dao-Denier had considered his foundation had been taken away as surely as a bubble that was popped. How could he not hate Yang Qi? How could he not devolve into a rage? In the end, he really did feel humiliated to have been turned into a consort. Therefore, to have his greatest enemy throw that in his face was just too much to take.

In response, Yang Qi didn’t even move a muscle.

He just smiled as Leaf Dao-Denier bore down with murderous intentions, almost as if the entire thing were some sort of joke.

Before Leaf Dao-Denier could reach him, two emaciated fingers shot out to meet his outstretched palm.

Swish. Rustle.

A shadowy figure appeared in front of Yang Qi, which resolved into an old eunuch. He looked very different from Eunuch Sunflower. His face was a mass of wrinkles, and he was so old that he emanated an aura of rot and death. In fact, he almost looked like a rotting corpse. That said, his martial arts were no weaker than Eunuch Sunflower’s, as only two fingers were enough to completely stop Leaf Dao-Denier.

Thump thump thump.

The black-garbed eunuch took three steps backward, while Leaf Dao-Denier merely stood in place, shivering a bit.

From that alone it was possible to see that Leaf Dao-Denier’s energy arts were actually superior. Of course, that didn’t mean the eunuch would be an easy opponent if they were to actually start fighting.

Clasping his hands behind his back, Leaf Dao-Denier looked at the eunuch and said, “Eunuch Blackheart! Are you really prepared to get in my way? Considering my status, I have every right to take some measly god-general. Don’t forget that you're nothing but a servant!”

Meanwhile, Yang Qi drifted over and stood near the two flower goddesses.

Obviously, this eunuch worked for them.

Eunuch Blackheart was clearly a high-ranking eunuch, similar to Eunuch Sunflower, and was a black-hearted and cruel individual. He obviously cultivated a devilish energy art, yet there was something about it that seemed good and proper. It was as if it took the most wretched, evil elements and converted them into righteous energy.

“Are you insane, Leaf Dao-Denier?” Eunuch Blackheart said coolly. “How dare you start openly fighting in the palace of the flower goddesses. Do you really think being favored by the empress means you can do anything you want? You’d do well to remember that there are rules regarding ranks and status in Joyflower Palace. The slaves are the lowest of the low, but as for the eunuchs and the consorts, well, we rank the same. And above all of us are the women. Not even the highest-ranking man can do anything but bow his head to the women, and that’s even more the case when dealing with flower goddesses. Attacking flower goddesses is a crime that can be punished by having your clan wiped out to the ninth generation, while you get thrown into the Blood Cistern. Understand?”

“Submit to me and prosper, or oppose me and perish!” Leaf Dao-Denier shouted. “If you get in my way, Eunuch Blackheart, then you’ll soon find out the consequences for opposing me. All it would take would be one word from me to the empress, and you’ll end up just like Eunuch Floodwater, living a life worse than death!”

Eunuch Floodwater was the very same eunuch Leaf Dao-Denier had arranged to be thrown into the Blood Cistern, where he wallowed in putrid blood and was perpetually tortured by the gnawing of blood maggots, which slowly bored their way deep into his flesh and bones. The pain of it all was unimaginable.

In response to Leaf Dao-Denier’s words, Eunuch Blackheart shivered. However, he kept his cool. “Arrogant and despotic people like you will always get what's coming to them, Leaf Dao-Denier. A lot of people like you have popped up throughout the hundred-million-year history of the Joyflower Palace. They earn the favor of the empress and start trying to throw their weight around. But in the end, they always lose favor and end up living out their days in misery. Why don’t you try doing something good for a change?”

“Do something good?” Leaf Dao-Denier shouted furiously. “I'm going to kill Yang Qi, that’s what I'm going to do. And if you try to stop me, you’ll be making yourself my enemy, too. Just like him. Then I’ll do everything in my power to put you to death. You just wait and see. All of you. You all care about your future, but not me. That’s how vicious I am!”

Leaf Dao-Denier’s words truly were ferocious. Apparently, he was willing to die as long as it meant taking them all with him.

At this point, Yang Qi chuckled. “Your threats are meaningless, Leaf Dao-Denier. You came here today to try establishing your dominance, in the hopes that word would spread through the Joyflower Palace that not even the flower goddesses dare to oppose you. But considering you can’t lay a finger on me, the exact opposite is going to happen. Everyone will know that consorts like you have no way to establish true power.”

His words struck Eunuch Blackheart and the two flower goddesses like blows to the pits of their stomach, and they immediately knew that they couldn’t allow Leaf Dao-Denier to achieve his goals.

If he did, the consequences would be too horrible to contemplate.

“Enough with your lunatic ravings, Leaf Dao-Denier,” Eunuch Blackheart said. “There’s no point. If you keep causing problems here in the flower goddesses’ palace, I’ll call on the eldresses to officially accuse you of misconduct. The Joyflower Palace has strict rules and laws, and not even the favored consort of the empress can break them.”

When Leaf Dao-Denier heard the word ‘misconduct’, he frowned. Truth be told, he wasn’t completely confident in his guess as to how the empress would view the matter. If she withdrew her favor from him, an accusation of misconduct could end up with him dead or worse. However, he still couldn’t bring himself to admit defeat and was dead set on getting his hands on Yang Qi.

His eyes darted this way and that, like those of a wolf, and although it was impossible to tell what he was thinking, anyone who could see him would be able to tell that he was coming up with a plan.

Swish!

Suddenly, he blurred into motion and launched another attack on Yang Qi! He moved with indescribable quickness, using the ultimate manifestation of the taiji to travel between that which was illusory and that which was real. In the blink of an eye, he was right in front of Yang Qi, reaching out toward him with his fingers splayed.

Yang Qi could see that Leaf Dao-Denier was really putting everything on the line.

Without hesitation, he thrust his palm out, filling it with a combination of numerous types of power: flexible power, rigid power, reactive power, tensile power, and even the power of the dao.

The seemingly casual palm hit Leaf Dao-Denier, then Yang Qi floated backward like a leaf in the wind. As for the power of Leaf Dao-Denier’s palm attack, it had been completely negated, making it impossible for him to grab hold of Yang Qi.

Snorting coldly, Leaf Dao-Denier threw both hands out in front of him and summoned an enormous taiji symbol.

“Taiji Spreads in all Creation; Void Seizing!”

Yang Qi seemed like a fish stuck in a net. Leaf Dao-Denier grabbed him, then spun to meet an incoming attack from Eunuch Blackheart, which sent him staggering backward.

However, at the same time, he burst out laughing. “Sorry to say I just got Yang Qi! And before long, I'll be the most powerful person in existence! You just wait, Eunuch Blackheart! You’re going to end up just like Eunuch Floodwater, living a life worse than death. People who oppose me always end up dead!”

Even as his words echoed out in the palace, Leaf Dao-Denier vanished into thin air.

“Repulsive!” Eunuch Blackheart said, and prepared to give chase. However, Jade Nightqueen stopped him. “Don’t. He might think he won a victory, but he didn’t.”

“But he captured Yang Qi!” Eunuch Blackheart said, visibly confused.

“I'm right here. Did you really think I would let him capture me?” Yang Qi strolled out into the palace hall, a mysterious smile on his face.

“You….” Eunuch Blackheart couldn’t have been more shocked. “You’re a power double!?”

It was only at this point that he noticed the tell-tale signs.

Eunuch Blackheart was no ordinary individual, so he quickly regained his composure. “So you’re even more of an expert than I realized. What exactly are you doing here in Joyflower Palace?”

“I'm here for Leaf Dao-Denier,” Yang Qi replied bluntly. “Eunuch Blackheart, I know how important you are, so please have a seat so we can talk this matter over. I have something very important to tell you. You see, Leaf Dao-Denier is keeping a big secret….”

Just as he had done with the flower goddesses, Yang Qi wove a tantalizing tale that left Eunuch Blackheart completely stunned.

Meanwhile, Leaf Dao-Denier had returned to his own palace.

Laughing maniacally, he looked over at Yang Qi, who was completely bound by the taiji symbol. “Yang Qi, I bet you never would have guessed that I cultivate a divine ability that is the bane of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. My Taiji Indestructible Chaos-Magic World-Terrorizing Profound Art provides incredible speed and spectacular fist strikes. And in the blink of an eye, it can disrupt all sorts of magical and natural laws. Because of it, you have no way to open the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, which means that you’re completely at my mercy.”

Waving his hand, he allowed the taiji symbol to open up.

Yang Qi’s power double stepped out, and sure enough, found that the area was locked down with ironclad power. He really couldn’t open a way to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, at least not without spending quite a bit of time and effort to do so.

‘Who could have guessed that a technique like this existed,’ he thought. ‘No matter how powerful a technique is, there’s always something out there that counters it. Everything must abide by the principles of mutual augmentation and suppression. Thankfully, I was clever enough to leave the treasure storehouse when the empress came back, otherwise she might have been able to trap me there.’

The Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart could be considered invincible, but if he couldn’t get into it, it would be no help.

Right now, his cultivation base was too low, which meant that if he faced people vastly more powerful than him, who could close his path to the chart, he would be in deadly danger.

Chapter 897: Toying With You

Leaf Dao-Denier was completely confident that Yang Qi couldn’t escape, and it prompted a hearty chuckle on his part as he contemplated how wonderful it was to be toying with him this way. He was already thinking about what it would be like to get Yang Qi’s God Legion Seal and other treasures, then kill him. Of course, before killing him, he would make sure to vent his fury as much as possible.

“Ah, Yang Qi. I bet you never could have guessed that a day like this would come.”

Leaf Dao-Denier waved his finger, causing the main door of his palace to slam shut. Meanwhile, the three Grand Emperors were present, and when they saw Yang Qi they couldn’t help but react with delight.

“Back when you dominated Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven and forced us to flee, we had no choice but to start working with the Demonfolk. But did you ever think you would meet a fate like this?”

In the face of this seemingly deadly situation, Yang Qi didn’t seem worried at all. Instead, he seemed perfectly calm and collected. “You people really think you’ve won?”

To see Yang Qi acting this way caused Leaf Dao-Denier to frown. He knew that Yang Qi was full of secrets, but had been convinced that he had nothing left to rely on. Yet he still didn’t seem the least bit afraid. In fact, he seemed like he was having fun. All of a sudden, Leaf Dao-Denier’s confidence began draining away.

But then he reminded himself of all the amazing gains he had made recently, and how he was superior to everyone else in the world. There was also the fact that there was no way Yang Qi could possibly have kept up with him recently in terms of cultivation. Therefore, he couldn’t allow Yang Qi to pull some sort of trick.

Waving his hand, he sealed the senses of the Grand Emperors and used an ability to lock down the area so that no one would enter. Having taken these precautions, he looked at Yang Qi and said, “Give me the God Legion Seal.”

“Is that what you want, Leaf Dao-Denier?” Yang Qi said, settling down into a seated position. “I know that you’re not happy about being a consort. Your cultivation base has improved, but at the same time, Empress Joyflower has placed warding spells on you that make it impossible for you to flee. Am I right?”

“So you know about that, huh? Well, who cares? Those warding spells can’t keep me locked down forever.” Leaf Dao-Denier walked forward aggressively and extended his finger, which began glittering with scintillating light. “This is my Thousand Poisons Torture Finger. It wasn’t easy to cultivate it; it involved assimilating countless painful types of residual energy that resulted from the most horrific torture methods in the prisons here. But I can use it to make you wish you could die. Trust me, once I start tormenting you, you’ll tell me everything I want to know.”

“Hold on a second,” Yang Qi said, waving his hand dismissively. “What if I told you I could undo those warding spells? Look, the two of us have had our differences, but it's not as if there’s any major grudge between us. Did one of us kill the other’s father? Or take the other’s wife? No. The way things are, you’re going to be Empress Joyflower's prisoner for the rest of your life. So why don’t the two of us join forces? I can remove your restrictions, then we can work together to take down the empress. What do you say?”

Leaf Dao-Denier stopped moving, and his eyes glittered brightly as he considered Yang Qi’s words. Everything Yang Qi had said was true. Empress Joyflower had indeed placed warding spells on him. Although she had also helped him with his cultivation, in the end, she had him completely under her control. He had fantasized about somehow removing the warding spells without her realizing it, then getting strong enough that, one day, during their dual cultivation, he would catch her off guard and kill her. Then he would take over and rule everything under heaven.

But even he realized that that was simply wishful thinking. So Yang Qi’s offer hit very close to home. What if he did join forces with Yang Qi?

Suddenly, he shook his head. In his mind, Yang Qi was the kind of person who was full of all sorts of plots and schemes, loving nothing better than to lay traps for his enemies at every turn.

“You’re scared, aren’t you Yang Qi?” he said, smiling casually. “You’re saying all of this because you’re scared. Of me!” He burst out laughing for a moment, then continued, “Fine, let’s work together. But first, you need to undo the warding spells.”

“What?” Yang Qi said, feigning surprise. “Are you sure, Leaf Dao-Denier? We haven’t even negotiated at all, and you're asking me to undo the warding spells? Are you joking or something? You’re not going to make any other demands of me? You’re just going to trust me?”

“Trust you?” He chuckled again. “I trust that I’m going to torture you. That’s what I trust. I don't care what crafty tricks you have planned, Yang Qi, I'm going to torture you until you’re on the verge of death. Then, when you beg me to be my slave, I’ll let you undo the warding spells and we can talk about working together.”

Yang Qi snorted. “Aren’t you worried I might blow myself up? Either kill you as a result, or make sure you end up with nothing?”

“Self-detonation? Go ahead! Do it! Blow yourself up! Afterward, I’ll just take the God Legion Seal, King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions, and everything else you have. Besides, I know that the only way you could undo the warding spells on me is to use the God Legion Seal. Once I get the God Legion Seal, I can just do it myself.”

He extended his finger again and began reaching it toward Yang Qi.

“Wait,” Yang Qi said. “You think you’re going to get my God Legion Seal? If I self-detonate, the force from the seal will not only destroy Joyflower Palace, it will shake the entire Great Necropolis. Experts from all over will converge on this spot to investigate the cause, and will you be able to fight them all? Did you really think that little taiji seal of yours could lock down the God Legion Seal?”

Leaf Dao-Denier’s finger stopped moving, and he looked at Yang Qi with an expression of surprise. He knew full well that Yang Qi wasn’t exaggerating. And although Leaf Dao-Denier was mad with arrogance, not even he was confident in forcibly keeping the God Legion Seal under control.

There were myths from the god world which said that, if the God Legion Seal got out of control and exploded, the results would be unthinkable. The Joyflower Palace wouldn’t be able to contain the force of such a detonation, and once word leaked about what was going on, and the aura of the gods spread, it would cause a disaster of the most epic proportions.

Never in his wildest dreams could Leaf Dao-Denier have guessed that Yang Qi would threaten something like this.

His confidence draining even further, he tried to decide what to do. It was an incredibly vicious move on Yang Qi’s part, and if he did it, there was no way Leaf Dao-Denier would end up with the God Legion Seal.

“Very savage,” Leaf Dao-Denier said. He smiled and pulled his hand back. “Is all of this really necessary, Yang Qi? Considering how far you’ve pushed your cultivation base, it would be a real pity if you self-detonated. After all, the worst that would happen to me is that I simply wouldn’t get the God Legion Seal. In contrast, you would be dead.”

Yang Qi burst out laughing. “So, Leaf Dao-Denier, you’re hesitating to shoot the rat for fear of breaking the vases. Fine. I guess I need to change tactics. I’m going to undo those warding spells, then we can work together to take down Empress Joyflower. What do you say?”

“What?” Leaf Dao-Denier said, his eyes flashing. “Are you serious?”

“Of course not!” Yang Qi laughed.

“Damn you!” Leaf Dao-Denier shouted, furious at being toyed with. “I don’t care what you say, Yang Qi, I won’t ever believe a word that comes out of your mouth. You animal! You think you can play games with me? Fine. The torture is going to start now, so go ahead and self-detonate if that's what you want to do. Except I don’t believe you will. A person like you would never resort to suicide. You want to live more than anyone I’ve ever known!”

Without any hesitation, he shoved his finger toward Yang Qi to begin the torment.

However, as soon as the finger touched Yang Qi, he suddenly exploded, as if he were a balloon filled with gunpowder. Empyrean energy buffeted Leaf Dao-Denier, energy that contained the full power of the Seventy-Two Monarchs Energy Art.

Whack!

Leaf Dao-Denier was caught completely off guard and was sent staggering back, blood spraying out of his mouth.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi’s voice echoed in the area, “I was just toying with you, Leaf Dao-Denier. You see, I'm just a power double. Didn’t you notice? Ah, what a pity. The real reason I wasted so much time here was that I wanted to make sure you understand that it doesn’t matter what good fortune you come across, you’ll never be a match for me. You’ll never be anything other than my defeated opponent. Incidentally, I have another power double back with the two flower goddesses. Think well about the proposal I just made. If you’re willing to work with me, then I really can undo those warding spells, and we really can strike a deadly blow on Empress Joyflower. The Joyflower Palace took the Dao Defense League from me. Therefore, it's doomed to be destroyed. Remember, Leaf Dao-Denier… you’ll never be a match for me. Even a power double of mine can play you like a fiddle.”

Leaf Dao-Denier watched as the power double faded out of existence, and knew that he had been completely fooled. He had taken a monumental risk, all just to get a power double. And then, that power double had toyed with him to his extreme detriment.

Meanwhile, the explosion removed the warding spells that had been keeping the Grand Emperors in the dark. When they looked around and saw the destruction, and Leaf Dao-Denier coughing up blood, they were shocked to the core. Rushing forward, Grand Emperor Myriadmagic Heavenspan said, “Young Sir, what just happened? What’s going on?”

However, his brown-nosing tone only got him a slap in the face, which knocked him to the ground. Before he and the other Grand Emperors realized what was happening, Leaf Dao-Denier had knocked them all down and was trampling them with a rain of kicks and stomps.

“Aiya! Spare us, Young Sir!”

“What did we do wrong?”

“Don’t treat us like this, we’re your loyal servants!”

Of course, despite the venomous hatred they felt in their hearts, they didn’t dare to fight back, lest they end up dead.

“I’ll never rest until you’re dead, Yang Qi!” Leaf Dao-Denier howled. “How dare you trick me! How dare you!”

But then he thought about Yang Qi’s offer….

Chapter 898: Double-Dealing and Back-Stabbing

The three Grand Emperors screamed as Leaf Dao-Denier trampled them viciously, breaking their bones and severing their tendons. Of course, they could heal themselves with simple energy arts, but Leaf Dao-Denier ensured that they experienced intense pain as his true energy stabbed into them. Although it couldn’t come close to the methods of torment Yang Qi was capable of, it was still nothing to scoff at.

Eventually, Leaf Dao-Denier grew tired of beating them, and landed a mighty kick on each of their bodies, sending them flying out of the door to flop on the ground like dead dogs. Only after a long moment had passed did they finally manage to circulate their true energy, heal themselves, then struggle to their feet, exchanging glances filled with both hopelessness and deadly venom. Then they scurried back to their quarters, where they began discussing the situation in hushed tones.

“Damnation. We’re the Grand Emperors who founded the illustrious Heavenly Court hundreds of millions of years ago. I can't believe we’re in such a sorry state now.”

“Ai. The situation is truly out of hand. Ever since Yang Qi stole the position of league-lord, our luck has been abysmal. I can’t believe we’re little more than pageboys now. Punching bags that can be beaten with impunity.”

“How did we end up in such a bad situation?”

“Did you see how pissed off Leaf Dao-Denier was? He must have fallen for another of Yang Qi’s schemes. All he can do with Yang Qi is end up being humiliated over and over again, with no hope of ever coming out on top.”

“From the look of it, that was only a power double of Yang Qi. He was intentionally messing with Leaf Dao-Denier! And that just goes to show that Yang Qi is far, far stronger.”

“Is Yang Qi really that incredible?” Grand Emperor Myriadmagic Heavenspan gasped. “Is he even human? Leaf Dao-Denier was remolded by Empress Joyflower, and even received a godly-class energy art. Furthermore, he was given a portion of godhood! Even with all that, he still couldn’t deal with Yang Qi. Doesn't that mean that if we keep working for Leaf Dao-Denier, we’ll eventually end up getting killed by Yang Qi?”

“So what do we do?”

“We’ve started down this path, so we have to walk it to the end.” Grand Emperor Myriadmagic Heavenspan’s eyes suddenly glittered. “It's simple. We have to betray Leaf Dao-Denier and shift loyalties to Yang Qi.”

“It would be dangerous,” said Grand Emperor Heavenearth Vastocean, whose heart was beginning to pound a bit. “Once Leaf Dao-Denier realized the truth, he would definitely try to kill us.”

“He’s going to try to kill us eventually anyway,” replied Grand Emperor Myriadmagic Heavenspan. “You know how cruel and merciless he is, and furthermore, he treats us like dogs. Look at what happened to Eldest Brother Secundus, who helped Leaf Dao-Denier, and even saved his life. But as soon as the balance of power shifted, he ended up devoured and assimilated. There’s no question that Leaf Dao-Denier will kill us eventually. Yang Qi is different, though. True, he’s also vicious and merciless, but as long as we don’t plot against him, he’ll tolerate us. Look at what happened with the Dao Defense League. When he left, he made sure all of his most loyal followers were safe in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. And although Joyflower Palace technically did take over the Dao Defense League, Yang Qi hasn’t just abandoned it. It’s a given that he'll eventually take down Joyflower Palace.”

“But…” said Grand Emperor Ninelimits Paragon hesitantly, “there’s no guarantee that Yang Qi will take us in. What if he refuses, and Leaf Dao-Denier finds out? In that case, we’ll definitely end up dead.”

“That’s why we need to bring a blood tribute,” Grand Emperor Myriadmagic Heavenspan said, a sinister smile playing out on his face. “Let’s dig up some of Leaf Dao-Denier’s secrets. Perhaps some information about Empress Joyflower. Then we can make our case to Yang Qi. Remember, Yang Qi has a good reputation and keeps his word. He’s not a shameless backstabber like Leaf Dao-Denier. Once we get on Yang Qi’s good side, he won’t cause problems for us.”

“Fine. Let’s go forward with this plan.”

All three of the Grand Emperors were now smiling treacherously.

Back in the meeting hall with Jade Nightqueen and Snowlotus, Yang Qi was discussing matters.

‘I really screwed Leaf Dao-Denier over this time,’ he thought. One thing was for certain: it didn’t matter if Leaf Dao-Denier improved his cultivation base in the future, he definitely wouldn’t be a threat.

In terms of raw cultivation base power, Leaf Dao-Denier truly was terrifying. Although Yang Qi might be able to keep the upper hand in a fight with him, he couldn’t kill him. And if Empress Joyflower got involved, it would be a losing battle. With the Taiji Indestructible Chaos-Magic World-Terrorizing Profound Art in play, he couldn’t even rely on being able to escape to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

In other words, he couldn’t allow his true self to participate, at least not without first improving his cultivation.

Thankfully, he was slowly but surely drawing on that fragment of godhood. The main thing he wanted to do now was increase the speed with which he could use it to improve his cultivation base.

Furthermore, after Leaf Dao-Denier had some time to digest their encounter, it was highly likely he would agree to cooperate in the effort to oppose Empress Joyflower. Of course, it was a given that Leaf Dao-Denier’s ultimate intentions were evil. He would do everything in his power to assure that Yang Qi was hurt just as badly as Empress Joyflower, giving him a chance to swoop in at the last minute and be the ultimate victor.

Yang Qi could easily see through Leaf Dao-Denier’s deceptions.

As they continued discussing matters, Eunuch Blackheart kept a close eye on Yang Qi and continued planning a way to assess his true self.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi did his best to learn a bit about the Joyflower Palace from them.

In the depths of the Joyflower Palace, Leaf Dao-Denier was walking through flowery corridors guarded by a host of genderless warriors. They wielded long sabers and emanated terrifying auras. However, from the look in their eyes, they were either corpses or puppets, and simply stood there unmoving.

As he walked along, Leaf Dao-Denier didn’t dare to act bossy or arrogant. These genderless guards were the most secret weapon of the Joyflower Palace, the yin yang warriors. Over the countless years spent on the Ancient Road to the Gods, Empress Joyflower had captured numerous experts, then used the cyclical dao of yin and yang to infuse them with the baleful energy of the god world. The result was an astonishing fighting prowess, especially when they worked together in formation. In fact, they were strong enough that they could kill Leaf Dao-Denier in the blink of an eye, right down to the level of his soul.

Of course, he was in a restricted area of the palace.

This was the location where the empress herself spent time in seclusion. Anyone who tried to enter this location without permission would be killed on the spot, but of course, Leaf Dao-Denier had a talisman given him by the empress, which ensured that the yin yang warriors would allow him free passage.

That said, the baleful energy from the god world that they pulsed with caused Leaf Dao-Denier to shiver deeply.

Some of the oldest of the yin yang warriors had been stockpiling power within them for upwards of three billion six hundred million years, to the point where it terrified Leaf Dao-Denier to even be in their presence. Thankfully, they had no minds of their own, thus, no psychic abilities. Otherwise, mere contact with them would have destroyed him.

Raw power and psychic abilities were connected, insofar as one’s capacity for power was linked to one's psyche. If one didn’t have the will to control large quantities of power, their mind could end up overloaded and destroyed. One’s will was a dam keeping a river of power in check. Obviously, if the dam wasn’t strong enough to hold back the water, it would break. Thus, the leveling system of Normal, Stupendous, Destabilizing and so forth appeared. The stronger one's will, the more power they could handle.

The corridors twisted and turned, heading through countless folds of space-time. There were intersections that would lead to deadly locations out in the Great Necropolis; if one made a single wrong turn, they would end up in extreme crisis.

Thankfully, Leaf Dao-Denier’s talisman also served as a directional device, leading him safely through the corridors.

Eventually, he reached a place that was a complete void. There was no primal-chaos, no space, and no vital energy. There was nothing. It was a completely empty area that made Leaf Dao-Denier feel as if he didn’t exist at all.

Kneeling, he said, “My respects, Empress.”

“Leaf Dao-Denier? It's you…. Why have you come? Didn’t I instruct you to stay in seclusion and assimilate that godhood?”

“Something extremely important came up that I need to report, Empress,” he replied, trying to look as pitiful as possible, just like one would expect of a consort who had been wronged in some way.

“Oh? What happened? Don’t tell me others in Joyflower Palace have been bullying you. I already sent down orders to leave you alone. Nobody should be causing any problems for you.” When the empress spoke, it was obvious she was a woman, yet her voice thrummed with something that didn't seem to come from the dao of immortals, but rather from the god world.

“An arch-enemy of mine has joined the Joyflower Palace and is working with some of the flower goddesses to cause major problems. I think he wants to kill me! Although you gave me an incredible energy art, Empress, it’s not enough to deal with this arch-enemy. He has some mysterious magical treasures that let him defeat me at every turn.”

Leaf Dao-Denier went on to weave a story that was only about a third true.

When he was done, the empress said, “I gave you the Taiji Indestructible Chaos-Magic World-Terrorizing Profound Art, and even blessed you with a fifth of the power in that godhood. You’re already strong enough to be the sect leader of a first-rate organization on the Ancient Road to the Gods. Few people should be a match for you. This arch-enemy of yours is a Grand Emperor, but is that much stronger than you? How is that possible?”

Bowing his head, Leaf Dao-Denier spoke in a voice so absent of arrogance that he almost sounded like a woman. “Empress, the truth is that he has a fragment of the Cruiser of Civilization and access to the Aeonic God Temple….”

“The Cruiser of Civilization?! Don’t tell me he has the Engine of the One God! If he does, and he's powered up the engine, then he would definitely be a match for you. And the Aeonic God Temple is formidable, too, although one would need to be a god to unlock its secrets.

“I'd say it’s highly likely he has other powerful magical treasures. I remember you asking me what to do if you faced an enemy with a god item that you couldn’t handle. That was why I gave you my Taiji Indestructible Chaos-Magic World-Terrorizing Profound Art to begin with! It’s to prevent this enemy’s god item from allowing him to pierce through space and escape. And now you’re coming to me with this problem? Could it be that he also has some of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions?”

“Yes, that’s exactly it,” Leaf Dao-Denier said, sweat dripping down his back. Never could he have guessed that Empress Joyflower would immediately guess the truth. “Empress, I used to have those legacy medallions. Three of them. But then Yang Qi took them, added them to his collection, and then he even got a piece or two from some people from the future world. At the moment, I think he has seven in total.”

Chapter 899: Bestowing Magic

Leaf Dao-Denier knew how powerful Empress Joyflower was.

But how could he have guessed that she would be capable of this? She seemed as perceptive as a god! He had barely revealed any information, yet she was able to extrapolate deep secrets from it.

It begged the question of what her level of will convergence was.

“Empress, you are truly able to distinguish the tiniest details of matters. You're absolutely right. With seven of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions, Yang Qi can easily enter the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Furthermore, he can use the chart to create incredibly realistic power doubles. It’s a daoist technique on the level of the gods. Empress, is there any way you can give me the ability to identify such power doubles?”

That was Leaf Dao-Denier’s top priority right now. Without being able to tell whether or not he was dealing with a power double, how could he possibly deal with Yang Qi?

But if he could tell the difference, he could create a foolproof plan to catch Yang Qi completely unawares and hopefully take him captive. He would just bide his time until Yang Qi showed up as his true self, under the assumption that Leaf Dao-Denier thought him to be a power double.

In his heart, he chuckled darkly at the cleverness of his plan.

“He can create power doubles that you can’t identify?” The Empress’ curiosity was piqued. “Even with your eyes? How is that possible? I gifted you with the Taiji God Eye, which can pierce through countless magics. The only way this person could possibly surpass it would be if he had eight of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions, and had created a virtual god world in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. That’s the only way he could possibly pull the wool over your eyes.”

“Eight legacy medallions?!” Leaf Dao-Denier blurted in shock. As someone who had once possessed some of the legacy medallions, he was familiar with how they worked, and knew that with each additional piece that one acquired one would unlock even more unfathomable abilities.

To hear talk of eight of the medallions producing a virtual god world filled his heart with envy. He couldn’t help but ask why it was Yang Qi who had done this, and not himself.

It was completely outrageous!

“There are only nine of King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy medallions, and Proud Heaven used to have three….” Upon mentioning Proud Heaven’s name, the empress’ voice seemed to tremble a bit. “That means that, somehow, this Yang Qi managed to take two of Proud Heaven’s medallions? If so, it means that Proud Heaven has turned the unwitting Yang Qi into a pawn.”

“Proud Heaven? One of the ten magisters of the future world? You know of him, Empress?”

“I don’t just know of him,” the empress replied coolly. “Years ago, I had dealings with him on the Ancient Road to the Gods. He’s sinister, treacherous, vicious, and a profound tactician and strategist. If there’s anyone outside the god world that I fear, it’s definitely him. If you ever encounter him, back down immediately. Hear me? You’re absolutely not a match for him. The entire reason I’ve worked so hard to improve my techniques and get my hands on true godhood is so that I can deal with him.”

“Yes, ma’am,” Leaf Dao-Denier said, bowing his head further. Of course, he had a very different attitude in his heart. ‘Proud Heaven? Yang Qi? You think I care about them? I'm eventually going to trample them all beneath my feet. Only I deserve to be the ultimate monarch, the ultimate lord! Anyone who gets in my path will be a mere stepping stone to dominance!’

Keeping such thoughts completely hidden, he said, “Empress, please, can you give me some way to deal with Yang Qi?”

She maintained silence for a long moment, then said, “If he has eight of those legacy medallions, it’s possible his will is on the same level as mine, the peak of Destabilizing. What a pity, Leaf Dao-Denier. You should be at Destabilizing too, but instead you're only at Stupendous, which means that you can’t unleash the quintessence of the power within you. Fine. How about this. I’ll give you a legendary secret magic created by the boundless King of Mage-Gods. Cultivate it, and your will should reach the Destabilizing level. Once that happens, you’ll truly be able to pursue the dao of gods. After you achieve that breakthrough of will, you’ll be on your own. Not even blessings of power from me will help you then.”

Even as the words left her mouth, a seed floated down onto Leaf Dao-Denier’s palm.

His hand instantly began sinking down, as the seed weighed more than a mountain. Obviously, it contained a boundless and majestic psychic power that would allow him to create psychic tempests that could rip apart universes.

Meanwhile, a profound and mysterious will of magic entered him.

“I need to remain in seclusion to continue assimilating this godhood power,” the empress said. “That's the only way for me to further my energy arts. Going forward, don’t interrupt me for any reason, understand?”

“Yes, yes of course. I’ll work on this breakthrough, then go deal with Yang Qi. Once I get the Aeonic God Temple and King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions, I’ll hand them over to you, Empress.”

“I'm very pleased with your devotion. Don’t worry, if you get your hands on those items, I’ll be sure to share them with you.” With that, she sent a stream of soft power out to remove Leaf Dao-Denier from her presence.

With him gone, the area returned to its state of seemingly complete emptiness.

‘Yang Qi… Proud Heaven…. How exactly are you using this pawn of yours, Proud Heaven? I need to look into this further. I have a feeling Leaf Dao-Denier isn’t capable of handling this situation. However, I have a plan to deal with this pawn of yours. In fact, perhaps I can even convert this Yang Qi into a pawn of my own.

‘All I need to do is use my will to suppress the will of the true god in this godhood, vanquish the knowledge-devils, then break through to the Terrifying level of will. At that point, Proud Heaven, you and the other magisters will fall to my hand! Terrifying will is that of the gods, and not even your ten magisters have reached that level. You fooled me last time, Proud Heaven, but this time I'm going to wipe out your future world and take your God Legion Seal.’

**

Elsewhere in the palace, Leaf Dao-Denier sealed himself into seclusion, then burst out into hearty laughter. ‘A psychic seed from the King of Mage-Gods! Destabilizing will!’

He popped the seed into his mouth and began assimilating it. ‘I, Leaf Dao-Denier, am truly a lucky person. Otherwise, I wouldn’t have been born a Fortuned One, then devoured Eldest Brother Secundus to become an Eternal One as well. I've had some setbacks along the way, but I never lost confidence. I'm going to kill you, Yang Qi! You just wait. Once I have Destabilizing will, you’re dead! Of course, before that, I’ll use you to help bring down the Joyflower Palace.’

As usual, Leaf Dao-Denier was ruthless, arrogant, and egotistical.

But his will was strong, vastly beyond Grand Emperor Myriadmagic Heavenspan and his companions. After all, the Grand Emperors were already considering giving in to Yang Qi, whereas Leaf Dao-Denier refused to stop fighting him. He had been beaten repeatedly by Yang Qi, but would not give up. In fact, his hatred only grew.

That was what came with an extreme will like his.

His hatred only continued to reach new levels of extremity.

‘I hate you, Yang Qi! I'm going to rip you to pieces. My life won’t have any meaning until you’re dead at my hands. That is my most pressing and vital goal. Destroy you! Then I can move on to handling other matters. With the help of the King of Mage-Gods, I'm going to achieve a breakthrough in will!’ Deep within his sea of consciousness was his nascent divinity, which was being assaulted by an explosive wave of devastating will.

The psychic seed he had taken was cracking and crumbling, allowing a will to seep out that should have completely erased his mind.

However, because of his hatred, jealousy, madness, and arrogance, he was able to dominate it.

In the blink of an eye, he sagged, turning into little more than skin and bones. But then, a moment later, he reverted to his previous state.

He had subjugated the will of the King of Mage-Gods and was using it to bolster his nascent divinity.

It was as if he had opened a pathway to the god world, which caused the ruthless emotions of the gods to fill him. In the blink of an eye, he became even more merciless and sinister than before.

He floated up into the air and began rotating faster and faster, until, all of a sudden, a tremor passed through him and his clothes were ripped to shreds, leaving him stark naked, his muscles and skin perfect, yet shining with a vicious, wicked luster. He seemed wretched and righteous at the same time, yet neither of those, as if he were a devil-god from some unknown plane of existence in the god world.

It was as if a hell-born fiend-devil had ascended to the god world and combined the bodies of both a god and a devil.

His will had risen to the Destabilizing level, giving him even greater control over his power. In terms of strength, nascent divinity, and cultivation level, he was higher than ever, and was definitely at the point of being able to tell the difference between Yang Qi’s true self and power doubles.

‘Not that I’ll tell you that, Yang Qi! You’ll have no idea that I've reached the Destabilizing level once I use my Taiji Concealment Magic!’ His aura trembled, and a moment later he seemed like he was before, with Stupendous will.

‘And now, Yang Qi, the time has come to start working together. I’ll simply wait for the right moment to lure your true self out of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. And then you’ll be mine!’

Smiling arrogantly, he strolled out into the open to find Yang Qi.

Chapter 900: Plotting Together

In the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, the virtual god world continued growing more and more profound under the direction and control of the immortal-slaying clone.

Thanks to the magical treasures and medicinal pills that had been provided from the Joyflower Palace’s storehouse, Yang Qi’s followers were achieving spectacular progress. One after another reached the Godmyth level, and many had stepped onto the Deathless Heavenly Stairway.

Some of the most elite among them were already Grand Emperors, and many who were not yet Grand Emperors were already at that level of strength.

For example, Eldest Brother, Elder Second Brother, and the rest of the seventeen members of the Invincible Society, despite having started out in the mortal world, were now vastly superior even to people who had been born in the immortal worlds. They had gone through a lot with Yang Qi, and now they were climbing the Deathless Heavenly Stairway, with all of them already being superior to Grand Emperors.

That was especially true of Eldest Brother, who had received some amazing treasures from the Joyflower Palace storehouse, including fifty god souls.

Back when Yang Qi had acquired the god soul of God-Noble Goldensword, it had given him a huge boost. To think that the Joyflower Palace had thousands upon thousands of god souls like that. They were the souls of perished gods, whose godhood had faded away, but whose quintessence energy remained.

Eldest Brother's will had already reached the peak of the Stupendous level.

There was no better place for Yang Qi’s people to achieve progress than in the virtual god world. Not even the Joyflower Palace could compare to it.

The only place that could be superior to a virtual god world would be the true and real god world.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi’s true self was working hard on his cultivation, seeking enlightenment of the essence of godpower, and on the assimilation of godhood. His will was now at the peak of the Destabilizing level, which meant he wouldn’t be at a disadvantage in that regard if he faced Empress Joyflower.

Unfortunately, his power index was just too far beneath hers.

Her power index was at least three thousand or more. Perhaps it was even at four thousand, which was a terrifying thought. Meanwhile, Yang Qi was only at a bit over three hundred. That meant that she wasn’t ten times stronger than him, but rather millions upon millions of times stronger. After all, an increase in power index involved an exponential increase in strength.

Right now, Leaf Dao-Denier’s power index was over a thousand, but because he only had Stupendous will, Yang Qi would still have an advantage if they fought.

The difference between Stupendous and Destabilizing will was like the difference between commoners and nobility in the mortal world. Commoners had no power at all, which was quite the contrast to the nobility, who had the authority to execute people if they wanted.

Someone with a power index of ten, but who had a Destabilizing will, could easily devastate a hundred opponents with Stupendous will.

Of course, Yang Qi wasn’t satisfied with the status quo. He wanted to achieve another will breakthrough. It was only when he had Terrifying will that he could truly surpass all limitations. By reaching the edges of the god world, he would finally begin unlocking its secrets.

As he assimilated the godhood, and his will defeated its will, he slowly drew closer and closer to the Terrifying level.

Converging his will into the shape of a long spear, he sent it stabbing into the godhood with deadly force. Each time he did this, the power within the godhood would shatter the spear, yet he didn't care. That spear was made, not from true energy, but from pure will, so he would form it anew and stab it into the godhood again. He did it thousands upon thousands of times, until a liquid stream appeared, which he then grabbed with true energy and sent into his Heaven and Earth Furnace. There, it was converted into raw power, some of which he sent into his heart, where the Engine of the One God resided, and the rest of which flowed into the particles that made him up.

By now, the particles within him were like hells unto themselves, the darkness of which contained motes of sagelight.

His Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth was designed to take hells and convert them into radiant kingdoms of heavenly holiness.

The particles started out as megamammoths, and then became dracomammoths and, eventually, protomammoths. Eventually, they were godmammoths that existed within hells. Later, the godmammoths would emanate radiance and light to transform the hells around them into the halls of heaven. That was when the technique would reach its most perfect level.

After stabbing the godhood billions of times, Yang Qi felt his power and will rising to a higher level. And that was only after having assimilated one-tenth of the godhood.

His cultivation base was reaching another peak, at which point his power index would surpass four hundred. At that point, killing Leaf Dao-Denier wouldn’t necessarily be an impossibility.

Meanwhile, his power double, who, as a consort to the flower goddesses, was far more important than the god-generals or eunuchs, was in Jade Nightqueen’s palace, benefiting from the improvements to his true self.

As his true self’s will and power increased, the power double circulated his true energy, causing energy art fluctuations to flow through his meridians and his sea of energy to grow stronger, until he was just as strong as a flesh and blood being.

Days passed.

The power double was now twice as strong as he had been when he clashed with Leaf Dao-Denier. And anyone who looked closely would be able to tell that there was some sort of godpower at work within the power double, causing his cultivation base to slowly improve.

Of course, those ‘slow’ improvements actually surpassed the speed capable by ordinary individuals by many times over.

The power double also spent time with Eunuch Blackheart and the two flower goddesses, learning of the Joyflower Palace’s magical laws and even acquiring some new martial disciplines. And he imparted some secret techniques of his own to them, to further earn their trust.

On one particular day, Eunuch Blackheart and the two flower goddesses were both out on business. Apparently, some new ruins or treasures had appeared out in the Great Necropolis, and they had gone to join the fight for them. As for Yang Qi, he was no longer interested in ordinary treasures, so he stayed in the palace.

At one point, a eunuch entered and offered a respectful salute.

“Exalted, Yang Qi,” he said, “someone is here to see you.”

Yang Qi couldn’t help but smile a bit at the eunuch’s attitude. When Yang Qi had been a god-general, even the lowest-ranking eunuch could have caused major problems for him. But now that his power double was a consort, the eunuchs didn’t dare to treat him with anything but the utmost respect.

Those were the rules in the Joyflower Palace, and they were strictly enforced.

The ranking system went from god-general prisoners, to eunuchs, then consorts, and the women were on top. Not even Leaf Dao-Denier, in all his power, would dare to act inappropriately to the flower goddesses.

Of course, Yang Qi didn't approve of the arrangement at all, so he smiled sarcastically and said, “Oh? Who’s here to see me?”

“It’s the exalted Leaf Dao-Denier, here to pay a formal visit.”

“Leaf Dao-Denier?” Yang Qi’s smile suddenly turned crafty. ‘He really doesn’t have any patience, does he? I assumed it would be many more days before he came looking for me. Empress Joyflower must have given him some help. Perhaps she boosted his energy arts? It seems like I've attracted the attention of the empress. But considering I haven't sensed anyone spying on me, it's safe to assume she’s in seclusion working on some sort of technique. If I were to make a bet, I’d say she’s trying to achieve Terrifying will.’

Before he could send the eunuch back with a reply and was still contemplating the matter, Leaf Dao-Denier strolled into his presence. “I trust you’ve been well since we last met, Brother Yang Qi? It's been a few days, but it seems this power double of yours has improved already. Presumably, your true self is in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, similarly getting stronger?”

Leaf Dao-Denier seemed very different from before. From what Yang Qi could tell, he didn’t seem to have improved in power or will. However, that was only with a cursory glance. Yang Qi was convinced that he must have made advancements and was simply keeping them hidden.

‘Lord's Eye.Myriad Worlds Speculative Analysis.’

Back in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, his true self drew on the power of the godhood he had assimilated, and before he even used it, he could tell that there was something profound and mysterious surrounding Leaf Dao-Denier.

‘Such incredible strength!’ he thought, and he didn’t dare to probe deeper, lest Leaf Dao-Denier detect what was happening. However, he did know that Leaf Dao-Denier was as different from his previous self as heaven was from earth. Obviously, he had achieved a major cultivation base breakthrough and experienced a huge psychic transformation.

‘Could it be that he’s reached Destabilizing will?’ he speculated. ‘If so, he won’t be easy to deal with.’

“What, Yang Qi,” Leaf Dao-Denier said, frowning, “are you probing my cultivation base? Yes, I did make some progress with my cultivation base, although it's only thanks to a magical treasure I acquired. Anyway, the reason I'm here today is to continue our previous discussion.”

“Is that so. The palace is empty today, so I’ll just set up a shield to give us some privacy, and we can discuss things openly. I assume you’re itching to take on Empress Joyflower.”

Leaf Dao-Denier’s eyes flickered with a crafty gleam. “You’re as frank and straightforward as ever, I see. Yes. Let’s get this cooperation of ours going immediately.”

Chapter 901: Sectlord Cipher-Devil

“Honest people do not resort to insinuation, Leaf Dao-Denier, so let’s be honest. You’re a favored consort of Empress Joyflower, and have even practiced dual cultivation with her. Your energy arts have reached the point of perfection, making you completely different than when you were in the Dao Defense League. Even back when you fused with the essence of the Tusita Heaven, you were only at a tenth of your current level.

“Given all that, you must know the level of Empress Joyflower’s cultivation base, right? And what magical treasures she has? Her levels of power and will? I need to know all that information. Otherwise I can only make plans blindly and in the dark.”

“Of course I’ll tell you all those things,” Leaf Dao-Denier said, a crafty smile appearing on his face. “But not here and not now. There are warding spells and detection magics everywhere in the Joyflower Palace, and you can never be sure if someone is eavesdropping on you. We need to leave the palace and find somewhere safe to talk. Besides, I know how crafty and treacherous you are; you could very well betray me to the Joyflower Palace leaders in the hopes of getting me killed.”

Yang Qi initially looked surprised, but then he chuckled. “You seem much more clever than before, Leaf Dao-Denier. You saw right through my plan. You’re right, I actually did intend to reveal your intention to plot against Empress Joyflower.”

“Hmph! If you try something like that, I’d be more than happy to end matters in mutual destruction. I’ll just reveal that you have a God Legion Seal, and say that I was doing all this in an attempt to learn your secrets. Who do you think she’ll believe, you or me?”

‘He's definitely a lot smarter than before,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘It seems entirely certain that he’s reached the Destabilizing will level. Even if I had come here as my true self, I would have a hard time beating him in a fight. At best, it would end in a draw.’

Even as he sat there thinking, he noticed a look of impatience developing on Leaf Dao-Denier's face, so he said, “Fine. Since you’ve brought everything out into the open, I agree not to reveal any of your secrets. And you have to make sure that no one from the Ancient Road to the Gods knows about my God Legion Seal.”

Leaf Dao-Denier nodded firmly. “As long as you don’t plot and scheme against me, I’ll offer you the same courtesy. The fewer people who know about the God Legion Seal, the better. In fact, to show my good faith, I’ll tell you a secret I recently learned. Empress Joyflower has had past dealings with Magister Proud Heaven from the future world. Apparently, they fought together on the Ancient Road to the Gods, and it’s even possible that they were lovers. Furthermore, Proud Heaven definitely has one of the other pieces of the God Legion Seal. I’d say it's even possible we could get that second piece from him.”

Yang Qi laughed. “You worded that very cleverly. I think what you meant to say is that you hope you can get both God Legion Seals. Right?”

“Well, that goes without saying,” Leaf Dao-Denier said with a cold smile. “Besides, if you get the chance, you’ll definitely try to kill me. We're only using each other for practical reasons, and in the end it will come down to who is stronger and more skilled.”

“Well said. However, even if I were to come as my true self, the two of us wouldn’t be a match for Empress Joyflower. And no amount of scheming can overcome such a disparity in strength. We’d be dreaming if we thought that. Surely we’re in agreement on that.”

“Exactly. The two of us won’t be enough. We definitely need some cannon fodder to work with. Thankfully, there are plenty of experts out in the Great Necropolis who the Joyflower Palace has left without clan or sect, people who wish to achieve revenge above all else. In fact, I've already been in touch with some experts who would make the perfect cannon fodder for us.”

“Oh?”

This actually came as a surprise to Yang Qi, who never would have guessed that Leaf Dao-Denier would have accomplished such things. In addition to improving his cultivation base so much in the past year, he had also made contact with enemies of the Joyflower Palace that would definitely prove to be very useful.

It begged the question of what other secret weapons he had at his disposal.

“Alright, I'm curious to see who these people are.”

Yang Qi and Leaf Dao-Denier turned into bright beams of light, and shot out of the Joyflower Palace without a single person blocking their path. After all, both of them had standing that was high enough to give them the freedom to come and go as they pleased.

At a certain point along the way, Leaf Dao-Denier coolly said, “By the way, these potential allies are fiendish monsters. Are you sure you want to see them as you are? If you show up looking this weak, it could have a negative effect on the negotiations. Why not come as your true self? Then you’ll really be able to impress these fiends.”

Yang Qi realized that Leaf Dao-Denier was trying to lure his true self out into the open, and was obviously not going to fall for that. There was no way Yang Qi would put his true self at risk, especially considering that Leaf Dao-Denier could block his passage back to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

“Oh, don’t you worry about that,” Yang Qi said. “I have my ways of making sure fiendish villains don’t underestimate me.” He watched closely to see how Leaf Dao-Denier would react to this, only to find that his expression remained as cold as ever.

‘The fact that you’re too scared to reveal your true self and the full level of your strength indicates that you’re most likely weaker than me, Yang Qi. Now I'm more confident than ever in my ability to deal with you. If it weren’t for the fact that you have the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart and the God Legion Seal, you would be nothing!’

Thus, the two of them headed into the depths of the Great Necropolis and its pathways.

They passed world after world, some of which were larger than thirty-third ranked immortal worlds. They passed through forests filled with living spirit creatures, enormous sects, and huge creatures.

Yang Qi still had no idea how big the Great Necropolis actually was, and in fact, he wondered if it was even possible to reach its core.

“Considering you’ve been in the Great Necropolis for over a year, Leaf Dao-Denier, have you learned much about it? Presumably Empress Joyflower knows many of its secrets. For instance, do you know anything about its origin?”

“I have no idea,” Leaf Dao-Denier said coldly. “It’s larger than the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, and likely is wrapped up in secret matters related to the god world. Who do you think Empress Joyflower is, anyway? She's powerful, but she's not a god. How would she know anything truly profound about the Great Necropolis? Besides, although the Joyflower Palace is a top-tier organization on the Ancient Road to the Gods, it’s not considered a superpower. None of the true superpowers have shown up here yet, although it's also possible that they’re deeper in the Great Necropolis and uninterested in the fighting on the outskirts. I’d say that, out here, we’ve only touched on one ten-thousandth of the secrets of the Great Necropolis. And even that is enough to reach the level of the gods.”

They continued conversing as they flew deeper into the Great Necropolis. The next day, a plane of existence appeared in front of them, in the depths of which hovered numerous enormous bubbles of energy that resembled worlds. It was a forest of nascent worlds!

If one of those energy bubbles transformed into a world, it would release a huge amount of power.

In fact, there were some energy convergences that were transforming into worlds, then shooting off through the pathways.

“A world forest,” Yang Qi murmured. “I can sense some incredible godpower coming from here. Incredible.”

“This is one of the locations in the Great Necropolis where worlds and planes of existence are spawned. Afterward, they fly out and embed themselves into the walls of the pathways, where they grow larger and stronger. Considering how the pathways make an immense labyrinth, it’s not easy to find this place. Thankfully, I know how to get here.”

Unexpectedly, Leaf Dao-Denier had actually brought Yang Qi to a truly marvelous and intriguing place.

Leaf Dao-Denier led the way into the forest of energy bubbles, until they found one particular one and sat down to wait.

It was as large as a thirtieth ranked immortal world, and filled with countless mountains and rivers. Precious materials abounded, and the magical laws seemed to be in a state of complete chaos.

After some time had passed, Yang Qi caught ear of strange sounds that resembled the murmuring of ghosts. As they entered his sea of consciousness, a region of illusions appeared in front of him.

“Be broken!” he said, and the illusion shattered, revealing that there was an additional person in the presence of Leaf Dao-Denier and himself.

He was tall and thin, and clad in a long robe embroidered with devil-ghosts. His face was as pale as death, and although his hands were tucked into the sleeves of his robes, it was obvious that his nails were as long and sharp as swords.

Even worse, they glistened with deadly poisons.

“Mister Cipher Ever-Heaven,” Leaf Dao-Denier said, “Sectlord of the Cipher-Devil Sword Sect. Greetings.”

“You haven’t let me down, Leaf Dao-Denier. You’re right on time. What about the other fellow daoists?” Looking over at Yang Qi, he continued, “And who's this pipsqueak? Considering how weak he is, why did you bring him along?”

Chapter 902: Sectlords

Unexpectedly, it was the sectlord of the Cipher-Devil Sword Sect.

Yang Qi wasn’t completely unfamiliar with the man. After all, his son Cipher Rite-Heaven was currently a faithful believer in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

Suddenly, the photonic computers spoke up.

[Beep-beep-beep. Beep-beep-beep. Power index over fifteen hundred. Will convergence in the early Destabilizing level.]

‘He’s strong,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘Leaf Dao-Denier’s power index is over a thousand, and his will convergence is in the early Destabilizing level. Even though I'm at the peak of Destabilizing, my power index is just far too low.’

There was something about the way that Cipher Ever-Heaven directly revealed the level of his cultivation base that made him particularly awe-inspiring, and made Yang Qi more wary of him than of Leaf Dao-Denier.

Glaring at Yang Qi, Cipher Ever-heaven said, “Screw off before you mess up our plan, pissant!”

He was obviously a sectlord, as he spoke with utter arrogance. Of course, that was how powerful leaders usually acted, treating the common people as though they were ants. In the cultivation world, there were few cultivators who treated the common people with compassion, like sheep who needed to be taken care of.

“Mister Cipher Ever-Heaven, please, calm down. This is a friend and ally who also has a deep hatred of Empress Joyflower. He's not from the Ancient Road to the Gods, but rather the immortal dao civilization. He’s a top ruler there, the league-lord of the Dao Defense League, Yang Qi. The Joyflower Palace stole the Dao Defense League from him, and he wants to work with us to oppose her.”

Although Leaf Dao-Denier was offering a logical explanation, his tone of voice made it seem like he wanted Cipher Ever-Heaven to do something to Yang Qi.

Cipher Ever-Heaven looked at Yang Qi coldly and said, “So, you’re some scum from the immortal dao civilization. What could someone as weak as you possibly be capable of? You call yourself a top ruler? Die!”

He waved his sleeve, sending out a violent stream of vital energy headed directly toward Yang Qi.

Any cultivator with a power index of less than a thousand would be completely incapable of defending themselves against something like this.

Leaf Dao-Denier quickly backed up. Obviously, he wasn’t afraid of Cipher Ever-Heaven, and was hoping to see Yang Qi suffer a setback. In fact, he was convinced that Cipher Ever-Heaven would shred Yang Qi’s power double to bits.

But Yang Qi reacted by waving his two fingers through the air, sending out a stream of godpower that became sword energy. The sword energy slashed the energy tempest in half, causing numerous world energy bubbles in the area to explode as a result.

Having completely negated Cipher Ever-Heaven’s move, Yang Qi rose to his feet, having revealed no clues whatsoever that he was actually a power double. “I recognize that move, Cipher Ever-Heaven. It’s the Netherworld Ghost-Dao Vortex Wind. But you haven’t cultivated it to the point of summoning multiple vortexes, or the ghost-gods that come with them.”

Cipher Ever-Heaven had been just about to make another move, but Yang Qi’s words caused his jaw to drop. “How do you know about the Netherworld Ghost-Dao Vortex Wind? It’s a consummate technique of the Cipher-Devil Sword Sect! It's top-secret! And you know about the highest levels within the technique? Who exactly are you?”

The fact that the wind he had summoned hadn’t killed Yang Qi was quite a loss of face and had stoked his killing intent. But now he realized that, although this opponent didn’t have a lot of power, he was still enigmatic and impossible to predict.

Back in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, a bit of liquid in front of Yang Qi’s true self was evaporating into steam.

The truth was that he had just taken some liquid godhood and sent it into the Engine of the One God, then used it to strengthen his power double. That was the only way he had managed to negate the Netherworld Ghost-Dao Vortex Wind.

It had been a big waste of power, but it had successfully cowed Cipher Ever-Heaven.

“I'm Yang Qi, league-lord of the Dao Defense League. I happen to know a lot about the top techniques of your sect. Sectlord Cipher-Devil, I advise you against trying to fight me. I'm feeling lazy nowadays, and I'm not interested in wasting effort on anyone but Empress Joyflower.”

“Come,” Leaf Dao-Denier said, “we’re all locusts tied to the same rope. Infighting won’t help us.” Secretly, he was marveling at what Yang Qi had just accomplished. Although he had no idea what kind of power had just erupted from Yang Qi, it had been enough to completely vanquish Cipher Ever-Heaven’s technique. And Yang Qi had hardly seemed to expend any effort at all to do so. Immediately, Leaf Dao-Denier discarded his old plots and schemes and began devising new ones.

Thus, he hypocritically stepped forward to try to keep the peace.

However, Cipher Ever-Heaven wasn’t inclined to take his advice. Eyes blazing with malicious light, he prepared to attack Yang Qi and crush him out of existence. However, Yang Qi simply settled down cross-legged and closed his eyes, completely ignoring the other two.

The atmosphere was getting tenser by the moment.

However, that was when a stream of raucous laughter reached them, along with a valiant aura. A beam of light descended, within which was a burly young man who didn’t appear to be older than twenty. He wore a pitch-black suit of armor and wielded an enormous saber, making him seem very much like an executioner.

“The Hundred-Battles God Saber, in the hands of Hundred-Battles Blade!” Cipher Ever-Heaven edged backward as if he were somewhat afraid of this newcomer.

“I was watching just now, Cipher Ever-Heaven, and I almost couldn’t believe how weak and feeble you are. You can't even stand up to a featherweight like this?” Hundred-Battles Blade turned to Yang Qi and clicked his tongue admiringly. “Not bad, boy. Your power level makes you a featherweight, but you're capable of miracles. Obviously you’re hiding your true strength and won’t give us a single clue about your true limitations.”

Apparently ‘featherweight’ was some sort of stock phrase Hundred-Battles Blade used.

Snarling, Cipher Ever-Heaven said, “If I'm such a bad leader, Hundred-Battles Blade, then how come the Cipher-Devil Sword Sect is still around, unlike your House of a Hundred Battles? Your houselord Hundred-Battles Heaven-Dome was taken captive by that cunt, Empress Joyflower, and just about everyone else from the House of a Hundred Battles became consorts. Is a mere prime elder like yourself going to keep your house going?”

Hundred-Battles Blade snorted coldly. “Hundred-Battles Heaven-Dome didn’t listen to my advice, which is why he got caught. He insisted on leading the sect into that danger zone, which turned out to be a trap. I've been saving my vital energy for the chance to kill Empress Joyflower and free all the captives. Then I’ll be the new houselord. Besides, I've already succeeded in cultivating the ultimate energy art of the House of a Hundred Battles, the Hundred-Battles Saber-Energy Reincarnation Laceration!”

“Sadly, that doesn’t make you a match for Empress Joyflower,” Cipher Ever-Heaven said, his voice dripping with ridicule.

All of a sudden, a middle-aged scholar appeared, clad in green garments. His expression was placid, and he held a jade flute inscribed with musical symbols of a magical nature that seemed to stir the magical laws around him. Obviously, this was another consummate expert.

“Enough, Cipher Ever-Heaven, Hundred-Battles Blade. There’s no need for fighting between the two of you. We’re holding this meeting to discuss good faith cooperation to deal with Empress Joyflower. The Joyflower Palace is getting too powerful here in the Great Necropolis, putting all other major organizations in danger. If Empress Joyflower actually assimilates the godhood she took, she’ll devastate us. We’ll all end up dead. Either that, or we’ll become eunuchs or consorts. And which of us could endure that torment?”

Whether it was Cipher Ever-Heaven, Hundred-Battles Blade, or this scholar, all of them had power indexes above a thousand.

“Houselord Three Sounds!” Leaf Dao-Denier said by way of greeting. “Your sect was nearly destroyed, so it's no wonder you want to exact revenge on the Joyflower Palace.”

“You’re exactly right. They almost wiped us out! Sorrow. Sorrow. Sorrow!” As the houselord of the House of Three Sounds said the word ‘sorrow’ three times, his voice seemed to enter the minds of everyone present and fill them with sorrow.

At this point, more powerful figures appeared.

“Pontifex Chief Battle!”

“Cadre Lord Peach Sky!”

“Dao Lord Cloud Severing!”

“Assembly Chief Unipeace!”

Over a dozen experts appeared, and Leaf Dao-Denier greeted all of them. Obviously, all of these people had power indexes of over a thousand, with some in excess of fifteen, or even eighteen hundred.

As Yang Qi looked around, he frowned slightly. ‘Where did all these people come from? And since when did Leaf Dao-Denier get so good at making connections? How did he recruit a group of people like this?’

All of these people had led powerful, top-tier organizations from the Ancient Road to the Gods. Right now, they were down-and-out, with cultivation bases too low to personally take on Empress Joyflower, whose power index was over three thousand. However, if they joined forces, they would make an incredibly powerful force.

Each newcomer would glance over at Yang Qi and wonder why a weak cultivator like him was in attendance. Of course, both Hundred-Battles Blade and Houselord Three Sounds were quick to tell everyone that he was simply hiding his true strength, and that he had vanquished Sectlord Cipher-Devil’s Netherworld Ghost-Dao Vortex Wind. In fact, Hundred-Battles Blade actually began to exaggerate the story to ensure maximum humiliation for Cipher Ever-Heaven.

That caused Cipher Ever-Heaven to stare at Yang Qi with such vicious animosity that it was obvious he would try to kill him at the earliest opportunity.

Quite a few of the leaders present were aware of just how powerful Sectlord Cipher-Devil was. They knew he kept the nature of his cultivation base secret, and was completely vicious and merciless. Therefore, the fact that this young man had stood up to him spoke volumes.

At a certain point, Leaf Dao-Denier looked around and said, “And where is Battle Resister, houselord of the Profound House of Battle Energy? Isn’t he the strongest of us all? Don’t tell me he's scared of Empress Joyflower!”

Chapter 903: Leaf Dao-Denier&#039;s Vicious Plan

In almost the same moment that Leaf Dao-Denier spoke, someone suddenly appeared out of nowhere. He was lanky and muscular, young in appearance, and the kind of person who fairly radiated a sensation of valor, intensity, and invincible fighting spirit.

‘He has the aura of a warrior,’ Yang Qi thought, ‘and incredible fighting prowess. It’s almost like he was born to go to battle. And his power index is over two thousand. He’s definitely the top expert here.’ Even more telling, Yang Qi had no idea how he had approached undetected.

“I'm right here, aren’t I, Leaf Dao-Denier?” the young man said, and though his words were spoken softly, they caused everything in the area to tremble. Although there were several arrogant and despotic sectlords present, not a single one of them uttered a peep in response. Instead, they simply stood there looking nervous.

This newcomer had a special constitution; he was a Warrior One.

Warrior Ones were among the most powerful of constitutions, ranking just below Fateless, Eternal, and Fortuned Ones. The top three were related to enlightenment of the dao of heaven, and came with a profound understanding of fate. But Warrior Ones were killing machines who excelled at fighting and battle.

They were born for combat, and inherently understood everything related to it. In their hands, even the most common energy art could be turned into something completely extraordinary.

This was Battle Resister, the houselord of the Profound House of Battle Energy, and there was something very unique about him, although Yang Qi couldn’t quite put his finger on what that was.

Chuckling, Leaf Dao-Denier said, “As long as you’re here, Houselord Battle Resister, that’s all that matters. With you on our side, the plan to deal with Empress Joyflower is already halfway to success.”

“The Joyflower Palace put a lot of pressure on my Profound House of Battle Energy. In fact, if we hadn’t retreated at the right time, we would’ve been completely wiped out of existence. Back before Empress Joyflower acquired that godhood, her energy arts were only slightly above mine. But then, she suddenly acquired destiny from the lower worlds, and was able to unleash a divine ability of a very deadly nature. It was some secret magic from the legion of gods, and although I’m unsure of where she acquired it, I'm fairly certain that it’s one of the most powerful techniques of the ancient gods, the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.

“That energy art is something that humans cannot fully cultivate. Only gods can. But even with only half of a move from it, one could collect the universal fortune of heaven and earth, and use it in an extremely lethal fashion. When I fought her, I was forced to fall back over and over again, lest I be killed.”

‘The Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth?!’ Yang Qi thought, shocked. ‘Can Empress Joyflower really use the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth? It makes sense. The Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth should provide the ability to command universal fortune. Unfortunately, that ability isn’t in the part of the technique that I possess, and therefore, I can’t do that. It must have come from Proud Heaven. That means it's going to be even more difficult to deal with Empress Joyflower than I had originally estimated.’

He wasn't exactly sure what the other two fragments of the God Legion Seal contained, but he knew that they would be different from what he had, and extremely profound at the same time.

He had to be completely on his guard.

Meanwhile, upon hearing the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth mentioned, Leaf Dao-Denier glanced at Yang Qi, his eyes glittering but his expression completely unreadable.

“Your cultivation level is improving rapidly, Leaf Dao-Denier,” said Battle Resister. “You've already risen from the Stupendous level to the early Destabilizing level, and still have the potential to improve. Furthermore, your vital energy stirs with explosive force. Not bad. Not bad at all. You’ve really benefited a lot from Empress Joyflower, haven’t you? Considering she gave you the Taiji Indestructible Chaos-Magic World-Terrorizing Profound Art, could it be possible that you’re actually on her side and just setting up a big trap to get all of us here killed?”

“How could you even think that!?” Leaf Dao-Denier said loudly. Inside, he was furious that Battle Resister had just openly revealed that he had Destabilizing will. He had been planning to keep that secret, then use it as a surprise move on Yang Qi.

Now, any element of surprise had been ruined.

Looking around, Leaf Dao-Denier could see many of the experts eyeing him, so he continued, “I can swear an oath to heaven: my hatred for Empress Joyflower runs so deep that it can never be removed. I vow to take her life, and if I don’t, may I be sent to the deepest hell to experience eternal retribution, and never be reincarnated. Furthermore....”

He went on to utter all sorts of hair-raising oaths, to the point where even someone who completely distrusted him in general would believe what he was saying. After all, he was uttering promises that would connect his spirit to karma, ensuring he would suffer a grisly fate if he didn’t live up to them.

The higher one’s cultivation base, the more profoundly karma would affect an oath.

“Fine, Leaf Dao-Denier,” Battle Resister said. “Considering you dare to utter oaths like that, I believe you. However, it seems to me this young friend of yours hasn't come with good intentions. Otherwise, why would he be attending the meeting with a power double? How do you know he won’t just fade out of existence when we actually make our move against Empress Joyflower?”

Swish!

All eyes shifted to Yang Qi. As for Sectlord Cipher-Devil, he couldn’t hide the shame in his expression. After all, he had exchanged blows with Yang Qi, and lost. But not only had he not been able to do anything to him, he hadn’t even noticed that he was a power double.

“What? He’s a power double? This is outrageous! How could none of us have noticed this! A mere power double stood up to Cipher Ever-Heaven’s Netherworld Ghost-Dao Vortex Wind?! Just how strong is he?”

“A power double!? How could a power double that strong even exist? And none of us noticed? Preposterous! Is he even human?”

“I heard that it was only about a year ago that the Joyflower Palace captured the league-lord of the Dao Defense League down in the mortal world. Now he's here, out for revenge? There’s no way he could’ve achieved progress like this so quickly, so how exactly did the Joyflower Palace manage to capture him to begin with?”

“Maybe he was trying to infiltrate the place.”

Seeing the stunned reactions, Yang Qi chuckled and rose to his feet, causing a rushing wind to sweep through the area as everything trembled. “You have very sharp eyes, Houselord Battle Resister. I’m surprised you actually noticed that I'm just a power double. Apparently, I still have room for improvement in my cultivation. I've been operating in the Joyflower Palace for quite some time now, and nobody there has any clue that I'm a power double. I very much hope that you can keep the secret.”

“Of course,” Battle Resister replied, his eyes flashing. “Your true self must be in the middle of cultivating a very profound technique, requiring you to remain in seclusion. Therefore, you used some sort of god item with spatial powers to send this power double out to handle matters. In the end, that could be a big advantage for our cause.”

“Enough chit-chat, Battle Resister,” said Sectlord Cipher-Devil. “Let’s get down to business. How are we going to deal with Empress Joyflower? We don’t have any time to lose, here. She’s assimilating that godhood, and, once she succeeds, her cultivation base will surpass ours so much that even if we combine our strength, she’ll be able to destroy us as easily as blowing some dust off her shoulder. She’ll surpass all of the superpower sects!”

“You’re right,” Battle Resister said. “We absolutely cannot let her assimilate all of that godhood. If she does, her energy arts will advance by leaps and bounds, and she’ll be completely invincible. Leaf Dao-Denier, do you have any suggestions? This meeting was your idea, so you must have something in mind.”

“It's simple,” Leaf Dao-Denier said, a treacherous gleam in his eyes. “You see, we’ve been practicing dual cultivation together, all in the attempt to further a profound energy art she cultivates. She needs my Eternal and Fortuned constitutions to keep the godpower in her under control. If she loses control, she’ll experience cultivation deviation. Her defenses will be at the lowest during dual cultivation, and furthermore, she won't suspect anything from me. Next time we're practicing dual cultivation, I’ll notify all of you, and you can channel your power into me, which will instantaneously boost my energy arts. I’ll use that boost to injure her, which is when you can make your move and destroy the Joyflower Palace.”

In response, the gathered sect leaders pondered his words.

It definitely was a vicious plan, and it seemed like it could succeed.

After a moment, Battle Resister said, “If we join forces to boost your energy arts, you could definitely hurt her. But would you be able to withstand the influx of power without detonating?”

“I've been cultivating a secret technique that will make it possible. However, I need your help to complete it, which is another reason why I've called all of you here today. Perhaps you’ve heard of this technique. It’s called the Secret-Ensconcing All-World Anything-Everything Fundamental-Law Magic.”

“What?” said Battle Resister, visibly stunned. “You... you actually cultivate that technique? How is that even possible? According to the stories, it’s an ability created by one of the buddhist schools from the god world, and is more powerful than a paramount godly-class energy art. It actually borders on the level of the Sovereign Lord. Not even gods should be able to cultivate it, so how are you doing it? And what do you need our help for? Why don’t you just go kill Empress Joyflower directly? After all, the ancient buddhist schools used those techniques to directly challenge the Sovereign Lord.”

“Because my version of the Secret-Ensconcing All-World Anything-Everything Fundamental-Law Magic is incomplete. And even the parts I have are very difficult to work with. That said, I recently gained enlightenment of an aspect that can safely and quickly increase my power capacity by thousands of times over. Unfortunately, I’m not strong enough to cultivate it personally, which is why I need your help.”

Yang Qi had no idea where Leaf Dao-Denier had acquired something like this, and was now starting to wonder if he really had him under control.

Chapter 904: Secret-Ensconcing All-World Anything-Everything Fundamental-Law Magic

Yang Qi had never heard of this Secret-Ensconcing All-World Anything-Everything Fundamental-Law Magic. But according to Battle Resister, it came from the fabled buddhist schools and was on par with the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. In other words, it was something that ordinary humans couldn’t truly cultivate.

Yang Qi was a Fateless One, which made him innately talented in many regards. However, without the God Legion Seal, he could never have successfully cultivated the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. The Secret-Ensconcing All-World Anything-Everything Fundamental-Law Magic was likely similar, which meant that even if Leaf Dao-Denier had acquired scattered bits of it, he should still have had a very difficult time cultivating it.

Furthermore, there was no way that the technique was as simple as Leaf Dao-Denier described, and did nothing more than increase one’s power capacity. There were definitely other benefits it would give.

Of course, it would be foolish for Leaf Dao-Denier not to try taking advantage of this opportunity to get stronger. And Yang Qi had no desire to see him succeed in that. Unfortunately, Leaf Dao-Denier had seemingly created the perfect scenario, although it remained to be seen how the sect leaders would react. Obviously, they were no fools.

Cipher Ever-Heaven chuckled darkly and said, “In other words, Leaf Dao-Denier, you want us to waste our own energy to help you get stronger? And how would that benefit us? Perhaps if you explain the Secret-Ensconcing All-World Anything-Everything Fundamental-Law Magic to us, it might be worth it. What do you say?”

“That’s not going to happen,” Leaf Dao-Denier replied with a cold smile. “If even a few words from this technique leaked to the public, it would cause corpses to pile up and oceans of blood to flow. Even the legion of gods would fight for it, so there’s no way you’re going to get it just by asking. Come on, if I asked you to offer your sect’s Cipher-Devil Chronicles as a reward, would you agree?”

“If you give me your technique, then of course I’ll hand over all of my sect’s energy arts to you. It's not as if the Cipher-Devil Chronicles are some sort of incredible energy art.” Cipher Ever-Heaven was virtually licking his lips with desire. After all, he cultivated a boundless dao of wretch-devils, and had extremely profound wretch energy and will. But according to the stories, the Secret-Ensconcing All-World Anything-Everything Fundamental-Law Magic could extrude the wretched and wicked, converting it into something righteous. In other words, it could lead to that which was deathless.

“That’s enough, Cipher Ever-Heaven,” said Battle Resister. “Do you really think Leaf Dao-Denier is just going to hand over a technique like that? Cut the crap, otherwise it's going to negatively affect our alliance.”

Cipher Ever-Heaven didn’t say anything further, but from the look in his eye, he clearly hadn’t given up on his ambitions. Yang Qi noticed this, and decided to consider using him against Leaf Dao-Denier later. Besides, he was also interested to see what a boundless secret magic from a buddhist school was like. Leaf Dao-Denier was keeping many secrets, and there was obviously much more to him than met the eye. He had clearly benefited greatly during his short time in the Great Necropolis.

“Well said, Houselord Battle Resister,” Leaf Dao-Denier said with a smile. Looking around, he continued, “Help me cultivate this ability, and of course I’ll compensate you. Empress Joyflower has bestowed plenty of gifts on me, and I'd be happy to pass some of them on to you.”

“In other words, you’re getting something for nothing,” Hundred-Battles Blade said.

“Look, who cares about some random technique,” Battle Resister said. “I can seek enlightenment from the dao of heaven and create my own divine abilities. That is the true dao to pursue. However, I have one more question, Leaf Dao-Denier. There’s no doubt that Empress Joyflower placed warding spells on you to ensure that, if you rebel against her, you’ll die. So even if we help you cultivate this technique of yours, and you succeed, you’ll still be unable to fight her. And doesn’t that mean you’ll eventually turn on us? What then?”

He had just asked the most relevant question of all.

From what Yang Qi could tell, this Battle Resister was very perceptive, and was not the type to let anything slip through the cracks. Furthermore, he didn’t seem greedy, and preferred to rely on his own skills and abilities. How had he gotten so strong in that way?

What kind of a sect was the Profound House of Battle Energy? It was definitely first-rate, on a similar level to the Joyflower Palace.

“Houselord Battle Resister is right,” said one of the other sect leaders. “Those warding spells are the most salient issue here. If you can free yourself from them, we have a hope of success. But if you can't, there’s no way we can trust you.”

“I currently have no power over the warding spells,” Leaf Dao-Denier said coolly. “But I'm confident that I will, once I succeed in this session of cultivation. Besides, even if I can't, I know someone else who can.”

“What? Who can negate the warding spells of Empress Joyflower?”

“That’s impossible. The warding spells of the Joyflower Palace are unique under heaven. Supposedly, the toxins of the Passionless God Flower are impossible to negate, even by gods.”

“That’s why the Joyflower Palace is so powerful, and also why they can keep so many god-general prisoners in check. They simply infect them with the poison of the Passionless God Flower, which can’t be removed except upon death.”

“Who exactly can deal with the Passionless God Flower’s poison? That would be a pure miracle!”

The sect leaders were all visibly shocked. They had cultivation bases that could shake heaven and earth, and could destroy immortal worlds with the snap of a finger. However, not a single one of them could deal with the poison of the Passionless God Flower.

It was at this point that Leaf Dao-Denier pointed at Yang Qi. “Him. He can negate the poison of the Passionless God Flower.”

His words caused a minor uproar, and many of the sect leaders were inclined to grab him and force him to reveal the secret to negating the poison. But then they remembered that he was a power double, so nothing they could do would be a true threat to him. A few of them began formulating plans to force his true self out into the open, but other than that, none of them did anything.

As they stared at Yang Qi and even scanned him with divine will, he chuckled coldly and said, “He's right. I can negate the warding spells and poisons of the Passionless God Flower. All without any harmful side effects.”

“Are you serious?” Cipher Ever-Heaven said. “There have been quite a few of my people captured by the Joyflower Palace, even some of my sons, and thanks to the poison of that flower they have no choice but to accept whatever missions are given them. Sometimes, they even directly oppose us, and we're powerless to do anything about it. But if you can negate the poison... then we could save them!”

“That's exactly right!” the other sect leaders exclaimed.

“You’re right, you could save them,” Yang Qi said coldly. “But not right now. Think about it. Do you really want to beat the grass to startle the snake? The moment Empress Joyflower realized what was going on, our plan would be ruined. In fact, I can’t even negate Leaf Dao-Denier’s warding spells right now.”

“What? Why?” Leaf Dao-Denier blurted. He had been hoping to use the situation to force Yang Qi to do that very thing, only to have Yang Qi refuse up front.

“Because Empress Joyflower is no fool. Do you think she wouldn’t notice the warding spells were gone the next time you practiced dual cultivation? What would you do then? That said, I have an idea. Why not choose the most intense moment of your dual cultivation to undo the warding spells. That would be the perfect opportunity to make a move against her.”

It was a very reasonable suggestion, and no one present could think of any retort to make. Even Leaf Dao-Denier was left completely speechless, although his hatred for Yang Qi mounted.

“That does seem like our best bet,” Battle Resister said with a nod. “Daoist Brother Yang Qi, it really is a surprise that you can negate the warding spells of the Passionless God Flower. This will significantly improve our chances of victory.”

“Unfortunately, negating such warding spells requires a huge amount of effort,” Yang Qi continued, a smile spreading on his face that struck fear into the heart of Leaf Dao-Denier. “If you experts could help my true self to cultivate a certain technique to completion, maybe it would be different. What do you say?”

If Yang Qi could make use of this group to assimilate the godhood he had, it would be a huge help. Perhaps he could even push his power index past the level of one thousand.

‘Someone else is trying to take advantage of us?’ the sect leaders thought, and many an angry expression could be seen on their faces.

“If you help me, you’ll all benefit,” Yang Qi said, fully aware of what they were thinking. Obviously, if he didn’t play his cards right here, the negotiations would completely fall apart.

Turning to Battle Resister, he said, “Houselord Battle Resister, would you mind helping me out for a moment? Please, place your hand on me and send some true energy into me. A lot of true energy.” So far, Battle Resister was the sect leader Yang Qi had the most favorable impression of, as he didn’t seem to be motivated by greed or avarice. He had no wretch energy, nor was he a schemer. He seemed completely focused on the spirit of battle, and as such would be the easiest to deal with.

“Fine. I’m curious to see what other miracles you’re capable of.” Battle Resister didn’t seem to have an ounce of fear in him. Drawing on all of his energy arts, he struck Yang Qi’s chest and sent a vicious stream of true energy into him. The energy coursed through the meridians of his power double body toward his sea of energy, where a vortex appeared that, to Battle Resister’s visible surprise, sucked up all of his energy.

Meanwhile, in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, Yang Qi directed the incoming power to the godhood he was working with, which instantly forced ten liquid drops out of it.

Taking one of the drops, he fused it with Battle Resister’s true energy, then sent it back out to him.

A very strange expression appeared on Battle Resister's face as he accepted the energy. In fact, he staggered back two steps, his hair and clothes wildly whipping about.

Chapter 905: Borrowed Power

“Amazing!” Battle Resister said. Suddenly, he began to float up into the air, not because he was drawing on any sort of power, but simply because of his cultivation base. It was as if he were connected to heaven and earth in a mysterious fashion, and could slip through the various magical laws to their very source.

The dao was not merciful, yet, from his perspective, it suddenly did seem to have mercy.

“That’s the Merciful level!” one of the other sect leaders exclaimed. “Battle Resister, who could ever have guessed that you would break through to the Merciful level? Rumor has it that only people who have mastered consummate techniques that abound in mercy can create a mental dharma like this. You've done it. This matches your personality perfectly!”

‘The Merciful level?!’ Leaf Dao-Denier thought. ‘I've never heard of it before, but it's obviously incredible.’ Furthermore, he had no idea how Yang Qi had done it.

After a long moment passed, Battle Resister dropped back down to the ground, looked at Yang Qi, and said, “Many thanks to you, Daoist Brother. You just provided me with incredible insight and godpower, which allowed me to break through to the Merciful level. With my energy arts having advanced like this, I'm now much more confident in being able to handle Empress Joyflower.”

“No problem. In fact, I should thank you, Fellow Daoist. You helped me to significantly refine my cultivation base.”

After all, Yang Qi had just unlocked ten drops of godhood, but only one of them was given back to Battle Resister. That alone had been enough for the man to break through to the Merciful level, whatever that was. Although Yang Qi couldn’t be certain, his guess was that the reason it had provoked such a shocking result was that it had been touched by the godpower of monarchs from the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, as well as the aura of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. For Battle Resister, it was like sticking a willow branch into the mud, only to have it grow into a shade tree.

Battle Resister was visibly appreciative, and it was a given that he would be a helpful ally in the future.

Furthermore, Yang Qi now had nine more drops of liquid godhood, which would normally have taken him several months of work to produce. And the stronger he got, the easier it would be for him to handle the remaining godhood on his own.

After he assimilated those nine drops, his true self’s power index would surpass four hundred.

“Would any of the rest of you like to help me with my cultivation?” Yang Qi asked. “If so, just send some true energy into me. Any type will do. I’ll take it for just a moment, then return it to you with interest. You all saw how Battle Resister benefited just now.”

“Alright!” one of the sect leaders said. Considering that Battle Resister had just reached the Merciful level, thanks to Yang Qi, there seemed to be no reason not to help him. “I’ll give it a shot.”

He stepped forward and was about to unleash his true energy when Yang Qi held out his hand to stop him.

“I was just performing a little test with Battle Resister,” Yang Qi said. “The full process isn’t a simple task. We should set up a spell formation first, to make sure that no one tries to take advantage of the moment to launch a sneak attack on us.”

“Good idea,” Battle Resister said. “This world forest is a mysterious place, and you never know what powerful enemies might be lurking about. I’ll set up some spell formations right now. Merciful to All Beings; Escalations Everywhere; Way of Battle Victory.”

He flicked his finger, sending out a stream of true energy that created numerous overlapping worlds around them.

Yang Qi silently nodded in approval. Obviously, Battle Resister was roughly on the same level as Empress Joyflower in terms of strength. It was good to have gained his trust as an ally, or at least, to have laid the foundations of trust.

Yang Qi also threw his hands out and began setting up spell formations, including ones from the buddhist schools, daoist schools, devil schools, and more. There were all types, including those which were wretched and righteous.

In the treasure storehouse of the Joyflower Palace, he had acquired twenty million god formations, giving him enlightenment that made him worthy of being a king of formations. In that regard, not even Battle Resister could match up to him.

The other experts could only watch as Yang Qi casually set up formation after formation, revealing his deep understanding of heaven and earth. There were many formations that they didn’t understand, and the ways he could use the natural laws and power of the Great Necropolis left them filled with awe. Now more than ever, they took him to be a very mysterious entity that they needed to be very careful of.

Everyone present was capable of setting up spell formations, even Leaf Dao-Denier. In fact, it was a good way to put on a show of power. However, in terms of spell formation enlightenment, none of them even came close to Yang Qi. Compared to him, they were like children playing house and couldn’t help but feel a sense of shame.

Soon enough, their corner of the world forest was locked down so tightly that even if Empress Joyflower herself came, it would be impossible for her to force her way inside their sealed area.

After all the work was done, everyone sat down cross-legged with Yang Qi in the middle. Even Leaf Dao-Denier joined in, although, from the glint in his eye, it seemed he was going to try taking advantage of the situation, perhaps by trying to get a better understanding of Yang Qi’s cultivation base. Or perhaps he could somehow infect Yang Qi with a poisonous seed that he could later use to turn him into a puppet.

Leaf Dao-Denier had truly benefited during his time in the Great Necropolis, and after joining the Joyflower Palace, he had learned plenty of new, vicious techniques.

“And now, everyone,” Yang Qi said, “send your power into me. Don’t hold anything back....”

Leaf Dao-Denier couldn’t help but notice the smile on Yang Qi’s face, a smile he was very familiar with. After all, whenever that smile appeared, Leaf Dao-Denier usually ended up in a very bad position.

‘Let’s see him try to pull a fast one on me this time!’ he thought, a vicious expression overtaking his face.

RUMBLE!

Ten sect leaders, all with power indexes of over a thousand, took action at the same time, sending power coursing into Yang Qi. Although their combined force couldn’t actually rival that of a god, it was still many, many times beyond Yang Qi.

As the power entered him, a tempest sprang up in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart which resolved into a host of shadowy figures. They were none other than manifestations of will sent by the sect leaders as they attempted to pry at the details of Yang Qi’s cultivation base, and possibly even possess him.

However, a bright gleam could be seen in the eye of Yang Qi’s true self, and his immortal-slaying clone performed a complex hand incantation, causing the entire Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart to ripple and distort, sending all of the incoming power to the godhood.

As a result, the sect leaders were all incapable of seeing anything clearly. When the borrowed power reached the godhood, the wills of the sect leaders collapsed. Meanwhile, the godhood began to emit creaking and cracking sounds as it started to crumble.

The God Legion Seal flew out to cover the godhood, which was slowly being converted into liquid. One drop. Two. Three. Four....

In the shortest of moments, a total of fifty drops appeared, which represented many years of cultivation on Yang Qi’s part.

Immediately, his eyes shone with dazzling light as the drops turned into raging true energy that, after being converted by the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, turned into Blood of the One God.

Yet again, Yang Qi was making major progress in turning his blood and body into that of the ancient Sovereign Lord. At the same time, the countless particles within him were being converted from hells into heavens.

RUMBLE!

In that short time, his power index reached five hundred! He was now on roughly the same level as his immortal-slaying clone, although he was three times as strong in terms of fighting prowess.

He also sent some of the power into the Engine of the One God, which began thumping just like a heart.

Next, Yang Qi threw his hands out, causing huge rumbling sounds as he put some of the power of the godhood back into the true energy. Just as he had said, he would make sure all of the sect leaders benefited. However, when it came to those who bore him ill intentions, he placed seeds alongside them.

The seeds were from the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, and were called Heaven-God Hell-Exterminating Devil Embryos.

With them, he could easily place his own vital energy into an enemy’s true energy cycle without their knowledge. The devil embryos would then draw on their quintessence vitality and put it under his control.

Now that his cultivation base was reaching new heights, it was even easier than before for him to use this ability.

Chapter 906: Heaven-God Hell-Exterminating Devil Embryo

During this major session of cultivation, Yang Qi took pains to identify which malicious sect leaders had inserted vicious curses into the true energy they provided him.

Such curses had been expertly hidden, and were designed to bind his nascent divinity before he realized what was happening. Considering they came from domineering figures from the Ancient Road to the Gods, they definitely surpassed anything Grand Emperors from the immortal dao civilization could come up with.

Unfortunately for them, no matter how powerful the curse, once it was inside the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart it could easily be dispelled by the power there.

Even someone as strong as Empress Joyflower would end up completely stymied by the power of the chart. Of course, even if he trapped her in the chart, it still didn’t ensure that he could completely subjugate her. She had a cultivation base that conformed to both yin and yang, as well as fire and water. She could command the dao of heaven and shred fate to pieces. Her profound levels of insight would definitely enable her to resist the powers of the chart that he could command. In fact, she could possibly even block the exit and trap him inside with her.

Yang Qi had managed to insert a devil embryo into Leaf Dao-Denier, who had no idea what was happening. It would remain there in his sea of energy, becoming a part of his true energy as he performed his breathing exercises, to the point where he eventually would think the embryo had come about as a result of his own cultivation.

The Sovereign Lord had created the Heaven-God Hell-Exterminating Devil Embryo technique to help eliminate hells. By using devils to control devils, it was possible to achieve the most enigmatic of results.

Of the dozen or so sect leaders who were present, Yang Qi made sure to infect nine of them with the devil embryos.

Of course, there were requirements to be met, specifically, his will must be stronger than the will of his target. Thankfully, Yang Qi’s will was now at the peak of the Destabilizing level, surpassing everyone present, including Battle Resister, who was only in the middle of the Destabilizing level. And even if they were at the same level of will, thanks to the tempering Yang Qi had experienced by conquering the knowledge-devils, he would still be superior.

That said, Yang Qi wasn’t inclined to place one of the devil embryos into Battle Resister. He was a straightforward and upright man, and the two of them were on the way to becoming friends. It was only with people who plotted against him that Yang Qi would demand a tooth for a tooth, and fight poison with poison.

As his ability to assimilate the godhood increased rapidly, his power index shot past five hundred and headed toward six hundred. At this point, he had pushed the godhood to the point where he didn't need outside help, and could continue assimilating it on his own.

Everyone else accepted their returned power and closed their eyes to study it. Upon finding nothing wrong with it, they sent it to their seas of energy to begin furthering their energy arts.

The sect leaders who had maliciously tried to learn of Yang Qi’s secrets looked disappointed. To them, it had felt like their true energy entered an area of darkness then slammed into a firm wall.

Of course, they had no idea that Yang Qi knew of their plotting, and had struck back viciously. Leaf Dao-Denier was among this group, and he was convinced it was the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart that had vanquished his curses.

‘This guy is really being careful,’ he thought, wishing he could just go over, kill Yang Qi, and take all of his treasures. Of course, he knew that was just wishful thinking.

Leaf Dao-Denier had no idea he had been infected with a devil embryo. Although he had recently grown much stronger, gaining some powerful abilities, his will convergence had only just reached the Destabilizing level and wasn’t anywhere near to Yang Qi's. He had been completely and utterly hoodwinked by the Heaven-God Hell-Exterminating Devil Embryo.

“Very well, all of you have improved your energy arts significantly,” Yang Qi said, rising to his feet. “And I made use of your true energy to refine certain aspects of myself. We're now in a much better position to deal with Empress Joyflower. And at this point, we can help Leaf Dao-Denier with his Secret-Ensconcing All-World Anything-Everything Fundamental-Law Magic.”

“Marvelous,” Cipher Ever-Heaven murmured, opening his eyes. His true energy creaked and cracked explosively within him, provoking a delighted expression. “Helping you has increased my own energy arts by an entire realm. My understanding of the Netherworld Ghost-Dao Prime-Intelligence Sutra has reached the twenty-seventh level!”

One of the other sect leaders said, “Cipher Ever-Heaven, do I remember correctly that your sutra has a total of thirty-three levels, and that once you reach the thirty-third, you can become a god?”

“That’s right,” Cipher Ever-Heaven said. Then he looked over at Yang Qi’s power double, and his eyes went wide. “If I'm not mistaken, your energy arts have significantly improved as well.”

During the process that had just played out, Yang Qi’s true energy capacity in his power double had increased twofold. Furthermore, he glowed with a godlight that contained magical laws, making it obvious that he had reached a higher level.

The other sect leaders all nodded in amazement, more convinced than ever of Yang Qi’s power. In fact, most of them actually viewed him as something of an enemy. After all, their alliance was not permanently binding, and had been formed only to deal with Empress Joyflower. In other words, it was eventually doomed to collapse.

In fact, if they did conquer the Joyflower Palace, there would definitely be fighting when it came time to split the loot.

Therefore, now was the perfect time to not only assess the strengths and weaknesses of the other members, but also grow as strong as possible. Then, when the time came, they would hopefully benefit greatly from defeating Empress Joyflower.

“We can help Leaf Dao-Denier with his technique,” Cipher Ever-Heaven said. “But if we do, it had better benefit us. We all significantly improved our energy arts, thanks to Yang Qi, so there's no way we’re going to just offer up our help for free.”

“That's exactly right, Leaf Dao-Denier,” said another of the sect leaders. “There needs to be a mutual exchange here. If we help you with your energy arts, you have to help us get stronger. Besides, it will only serve to help in our fight against Empress Joyflower. Our Chief Battle Sect is in this for profit, and don’t even think about trying to convince us that the spoils of taking down the Joyflower Palace will count toward that.”

“That’s right,” said Daolord Cloud Severing. “The fight against the Joyflower Palace definitely doesn’t count. Don’t even think of conflating them.” He looked like a typical daoist priest, with a daoist robe decorated with clouds. He resembled a transcendent being, although it was impossible to determine his age.

‘Damn them...’ Leaf Dao-Denier thought. Although he was furious, he didn’t dare to show it. ‘If Yang Qi hadn’t compensated them, they wouldn’t be forcing the issue now. It’s all his fault, that damned bastard. Well, once I get strong enough, I'm going to pay him all back for this!”

Although his heart was filled with viciousness, he said, “I would never allow any of you to suffer losses. Of course I’ll provide compensation.” Even as the words left his mouth, a bottle gourd appeared in his hand. Despite being closed, it emanated a medicinal aroma that everyone present could instantly detect.

All of them suddenly felt like they were floating in an ocean of flowers.

“What’s that?” Battle Resister said. “Are those Myriad-Flowers Honeydew-Jade Pills, which are refined from the quintessence of ten thousand god flowers?”

“That’s exactly what they are,” Leaf Dao-Denier said, his heart veritably dripping with blood. They were pills designed to strengthen the meridians and nascent divinity, even pushing one's cultivation base to a higher level. And they weren’t the type of thing that ordinary cultivators could use. Only something truly remarkable could impress these sect leaders.

As for the Secret-Ensconcing All-World Anything-Everything Fundamental-Law Magic, he had come across that on his own, and Empress Joyflower didn’t even know about it. He had been secretly cultivating it for the purpose of eventually using it on her.

“Fine,” Cipher Ever-Heaven said, his eyes gleaming. “Give us all one of those pills, and we’ll help you with your cultivation. The fact that you’re offering a godly-grade medicinal pill like that at least shows you have good intentions.”

“Hold on!” Leaf Dao-Denier said. “How do I know you won’t just take the pills and then refuse to help me?”

“Hmph! Don’t you realize the reputation we have?” Cipher Ever-Heaven said angrily.

Leaf Dao-Denier chuckled darkly. “I don’t care about reputations.”

“How about this,” Yang Qi said. “By this point, you all trust me, right? So why not give the medicinal pills to me and Battle Resister for safekeeping. We’ll keep them safe for everyone.”

Chapter 907: Cosmic Upheaval

Everyone looked in surprise at Yang Qi and Battle Resister.

After the dramatic turn of events from moments before, many of these sect leaders viewed Yang Qi as a mysterious and unpredictable figure, and definitely not someone to look down on. For him to suggest himself and Battle Resister to fill such a role was essentially a way of telling everyone that his status in the alliance was on the same level as Battle Resister.

It was essentially psychological warfare.

“Alright!” Battle Resister said. “Yang Qi and I will watch over the medicinal pills. We can even set up a spell formation to keep them safe. Agreed?”

After a moment, the sect leaders began nodding in agreement.

With that, Yang Qi and Battle Resister quickly set up a spell formation, then took the bottle and put it inside. Then everyone sat down cross-legged again, the only difference being that it was Leaf Dao-Denier in the middle instead of Yang Qi.

Yang Qi was curious to see how this Secret-Ensconcing All-World Anything-Everything Fundamental-Law Magic worked, which would be easy to do now that he had inserted a devil embryo into him.

Never in Leaf Dao-Denier’s wildest dreams could he have imagined that something like this would be happening. Leaf Dao-Denier had his many secrets, but when it came to schemes and plots, he was completely surpassed by Yang Qi.

As Leaf Dao-Denier sat there in the middle of the group, he twisted his legs around into a very strange position that made him look almost like a pretzel.

He looked quite comical, but at the same time, there was something very profound about the posture. After getting into position, he began to writhe and wriggle in a very strange fashion, causing a high-level universal power to begin to converge within him, something that was clearly from the god world.

Soon, strange things began happening. Specifically, nine of his acupoints each sprang up into a vortex.

“Everyone, pour your true energy into the vortexes. When you do so, follow this mental dharma: Empty, but not empty. Let the heart be as long as the night, let the will be transmitted through the aeons. Move, but don’t move. Be still, but not still. Simply wait for movement. Be like the hibernating dragon in the earth. Be like the floodwyrm lurking in the yellow springs. Be like the dragon hiding in a cave of eels....”

Everyone listened carefully to the mental dharma being spoken by Leaf Dao-Denier, which was none other than the mnemonic for the Secret-Ensconcing All-World Anything-Everything Fundamental-Law Magic. Following the prescribed methods, they sent their true energy into him.

Yang Qi followed along as well, and could sense something strange building up within his true energy, something powerful and indecipherable. He sent the true energy into the vortexes, and it quickly disappeared into Leaf Dao-Denier.

However, by means of the devil embryo, Yang Qi was able to see what was happening on the other side. The true energy from the sect leaders flowed into Leaf Dao-Denier’s sea of energy, where it formed a character that resembled the very posture he had assumed. It was none other than the character for “mother”, and it radiated strength and the feeling of ancestry.

At first, it was small and weak, but as the power flowed in, the character grew larger and more solid. Eventually, a portal opened within Leaf Dao-Denier, which connected to a secret location of immense power in the ancient godworld.

Leaf Dao-Denier nearly burst out laughing.

‘These pieces of trash have no idea that I acquired a mysterious magical symbol from the Secret-Ensconcing All-World Anything-Everything Fundamental-Law Magic. With it, I can connect to the god world, to the temple of the queen mother of all buddhas. I can acquire the pure power of the Vajra Māyādevī, gathered from the great heaven of the god world, filled with qualities of all types of gods, buddhas, and devils. Even a scrap of that power will make me vastly stronger, boosting my cultivation base in ways that these foolish people from the mortal world could never comprehend.’

In yesteryear, the ancient buddhist schools had very nearly established a different line of gods in the god world. Although they were eventually destroyed by the Sovereign Lord, a centipede does not stop wriggling even after being stomped on. Remnants of their schools survived down to this day, and their methods could still be used to reach godly ascension.

‘The Vajra Māyādevī Portal... the basis of all portals... the portal of utility, open....’

Thanks to the blessing of power from the surrounding experts, the tiny portal began opening.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi was shocked as he realized that the surrounding experts just continued to pour true energy into Leaf Dao-Denier, and seemed completely focused on deciphering the meaning of the mental dharma at the same time. It was almost as if they weren’t in control of their own energy output.

‘Incredible,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘I almost can’t believe Leaf Dao-Denier is capable of this. It's a good thing I put that devil embryo in him, otherwise I might have been sucked into the trap as well. Well, if he's going to use all these people to cultivate the Vajra Māyādevī art, or whatever it is, I might as well take the chance to harvest some benefits myself as well!’

The devil embryo stirred and began absorbing the Vajra Māyādevī power, then sending it into Yang Qi. He quickly realized that the principles of mutual augmentation and suppression applied between this power and his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. Soon, the wisdom and knowledge of countless buddhas and buddha-kings began to gather within him.

For now, he wouldn’t assimilate the power, but he could at least research it, and perhaps even learn some of the secrets of the buddhas of the god world. As Leaf Dao-Denier continued working with his technique, vajra-like power swirled around him, gathering into the mysterious and enigmatic character that existed in his sea of energy. It was something marvelous that could crush all wretch-devils, and it could even suppress devil embryos. Thankfully, Yang Qi’s will surpassed Leaf Dao-Denier’s, therefore the devil embryo wasn't affected. If Leaf Dao-Denier’s will had been on the same level as Yang Qi’s, then the devil embryo wouldn’t have been strong enough to remain hidden from him and he might even have been able to assimilate it.

The process continued.

As Leaf Dao-Denier continued working, he began growing stronger, as did Yang Qi. In fact, Yang Qi was actually improving more quickly in terms of his will, cultivation base, and enlightenment.

Slowly but surely, a portal was becoming visible within this power double, which was none other than the Vajra Māyādevī portal.

The Vajra Māyādevī power that flowed out of it was nearly liquid, incredibly firm, powerful, and eternally deathless. It was filled with countless bizarre transformations from the god world, and seemed to border on godhood. At the same time, it moved incredibly slowly and was as delicate as a strand of silk as it gathered in the sea of energy.

RUMBLE!

Sensing that he was nearing a point of completion, Leaf Dao-Denier sent the streams of true energy back to those who had provided them. At the same time, Yang Qi severed his connection to the devil embryo, and smiled faintly at the fact that Leaf Dao-Denier still didn’t realize what he had done.

“I succeeded!” Leaf Dao-Denier declared, laughing heartily. All of a sudden, the projection of a heaven-god appeared behind him, clasping a vajra scepter in one hand and a vajra sword in the other, with lotuses beneath its feet and apsaras scattering flower petals down onto it.

And the energy it radiated was impossible to assess.

Cipher Ever-Heaven’s expression flickered as he realized that, in this short period of time, Leaf Dao-Denier’s cultivation base had come to surpass his own. Although his true energy reserves weren’t greater, the strength of his power was definitely superior.

In fact, if they both used the same level of power, Cipher Ever-Heaven knew that he would be beaten, like how ten pounds of flowers would instantly be crushed by ten pounds of steel.

‘His cultivation base is progressing so rapidly!’ the other sect rulers thought. All of them were now starting to wonder if helping Leaf Dao-Denier had been a good idea after all. In fact, some of them were already secretly communicating with each other and making agreements to kill him after dealing with the Joyflower Palace.

As Leaf Dao-Denier reined in his energy arts, Battle Resister and Yang Qi distributed the god pills. They were multi-colored, a reminder that they had been made from countless flowers. The sect rulers all popped the pills into their mouths, apparently anxious to make as much progress as they possibly could in a short period of time.

Soon, fragrant aromas emanated out from all of them, and they nodded, their energy arts having significantly advanced thanks to the pills.

Yang Qi had his power double assimilate it. By this point, his power double was almost the same as his true self, to the point where not even Battle Resister could tell the difference.

The full session of cultivation in the world forest lasted for over a month. Everyone had greatly benefited, and they were just about to start work on the main task of dealing with Empress Joyflower when the entire Great Necropolis suddenly trembled. Even the bubbles in the world forest were affected, with many of them flying out of the forest.

‘What’s happening?’ Yang Qi thought, shocked.

Chapter 908: Cosmic Upheaval (2)

A cosmic upheaval was underway!

Yang Qi could sense the entire Great Necropolis trembling. The vital energy around him surged like the tide, causing many of the bubbles in the world forest to fly out into the open.

He quickly opened the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart to get a better view of what was happening, and caught sight of a primal-chaos energy flow rushing through a beehive-like opening in the Great Necropolis.

Thanks to that energy flow, numerous worlds were being ejected into the immortal dao civilization.

As the worlds flew out, they dropped into the spatial tempests and set down roots.

Shockingly, the Great Necropolis was giving birth to a host of new immortal worlds!

It was a truly stupendous event. Even Grand Emperors would require an extensive period of time to create an immortal world with all of the magical laws associated with it. But now the Great Necropolis was literally erupting with them. They were essentially planets, and not low-ranking ones either, but rather thirtieth through thirty-third ranked versions.

And then Yang Qi realized that some of the bubbles contained worlds that were actually beyond the thirty-third rank.

The previous structure was being completely changed.

Originally, the highest rank for immortal worlds in the Immortal Dao Age was thirty-three. But he could already see thirty-sixth ranked worlds, and even fortieth-ranked. Of course, that indicated that the Grand Emperor level was no longer the ultimate limit. Whatever beings were born in such higher-ranking worlds would obviously be completely extraordinary.

Yang Qi watched it all in something of a daze, wondering what it meant. For one thing, the immortal dao civilization was obviously going to experience incredible growth, pushing it far beyond what it was before. A new age of experts and heroes was unfolding.

Plenty of other experts also saw what was happening. In fact, Yang Qi noticed people flying up from within the Dao Defense League, gasping in amazement at the sight of all the new worlds.

There were already living beings in these new worlds, as well as humans. In fact, there were already Grand Emperors, including some experts that had power indexes in the hundreds! It was truly terrifying. And it was only in this moment that Yang Qi finally realized that the Great Necropolis didn’t just contain people from the Ancient Road to the Gods; it also had native denizens.

When the necropolis had initially descended from the god world, it was completely empty. But as it traveled along the Ancient Road to the Gods, the worlds inside of it spawned living creatures, including humans.

And considering it had been drifting along the Ancient Road to the Gods for hundreds of millions of years, one could only imagine how powerful such humans could have become. Truth be told, some of the sect leaders that Yang Qi was dealing with were actually natives of the Great Necropolis, not people from the Ancient Road to the Gods.

“The Great Necropolis is ejecting immortal worlds?” Battle Resister murmured. “But why? Is it intentionally changing the greater structure of the dao of heaven?” The living beings in the ejected worlds had no idea what was happening; their homes were simply thrust out into the Immortal Dao Age.

In the shortest of moments, there were billions of trillions of new immortal worlds.

The destiny and structure of the Immortal Dao Age was changing in chaotic fashion, and Yang Qi couldn’t help but wonder if it would soon reach the level of being able to crush the Primeval Age or the Future Age.

‘Don’t tell me that the dao of heaven here has actually summoned the Great Necropolis from the god world,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘Is it changing the overall structure to ensure that the Immortal Dao Age doesn’t get destroyed? But is the dao of heaven really that powerful? Or is it that some almighty being from the god world saw that the dao of heaven was about to be destroyed, and did this to save it?’ Given his current level of wisdom and cultivation base, it was impossible for Yang Qi to tell for sure.

There were actually numerous locations in the Great Necropolis that had world forests, which constantly grew new worlds. And looking deeper into the world forest he was currently occupying, Yang Qi could see some bubbles that were so huge they surely contained worlds that were ranked a hundred or higher. It was really a terrifying situation. If such worlds entered the immortal dao civilization, the overall structure would be completely transformed.

Such immense worlds would almost be like suns, radiating light and glory on the other worlds that already existed.

A new age was clearly unfolding.

Yang Qi suddenly felt very small. Watching the countless immortal worlds flowing out into the universe, he realized that even if he became a god, he probably couldn’t do something like this. The Great Necropolis seemed to be a machine designed to create immortal worlds.

Even after several hours had passed, the process still was not over.

By that point, the immortal dao civilization was nothing like it had been before, to the point where Yang Qi could hardly recognize it. There were now immortal worlds with a rank surpassing a hundred. And the inhabitants of the worlds were already beginning to spread out, explore their surroundings, and fight for the god items that were also being ejected from the necropolis.

In the past, the dominant organizations present in the Immortal Dao Age had been the Dao Defense League, the forces of the future world, the Demon League, and the Primeval Age. But now, such forces counted for almost nothing. The Great Necropolis was sending out waves of immortal worlds that completely changed the balance of power.

It was impossible to determine what immensely powerful factions were on those worlds. In fact, Yang Qi could already sense that there were at least a thousand experts on the new worlds whose power indexes were close to a thousand.

And it was impossible to tell how many new god items, godrelics, ancient ruins, and even god souls appeared during the same time.

At the same time, the universal fortune in the Immortal Dao Age completely transformed. The dao of heaven grew stronger, and Yang Qi could sense that while the so-called ‘river of fate’ in the past was more like a trickling stream, the current version was truly a mighty river.

“This really is a powerful age of heroes,” Yang Qi murmured.

He wasn’t the only one that reacted with stunned shock. Leaf Dao-Denier, Battle Resister, and the other sect leaders all realized that dramatic transformations were underway. And no one knew exactly why it was happening.

After some time had passed, Yang Qi composed himself. “Although we have no idea why this is happening,” he said, “it’s clear that the Immortal Dao Age is changing dramatically. There's even godhood being ejected. That said, our top priority right now is still our alliance. We need to take on the Joyflower Palace and kill Empress Joyflower. Afterward, we can decide what to do about these dramatic transformations.”

“Yes,” Battle Resister said. “In the mortal world, it’s impossible to truly prepare for things like earthquakes or volcanoes, and these transformations are the same. Don't forget our main task at hand. If we don't take down Empress Joyflower, she’ll continue conquering one immortal world after another. And as she gathers more and more of the destiny of the dao of heaven, she’ll get stronger and we’ll get weaker.”

Everyone nodded in agreement, then turned and looked at Leaf Dao-Denier.

“Leaf Dao-Denier, it’s time for you to return to Joyflower Palace,” Cipher Ever-Heaven said. “We’ve already wasted enough time here. If the empress achieves her cultivation progress too soon, we’ll lose any chance we have. And if that happens, we’re all going to end up dead.”

“She won’t easily achieve that progress,” Leaf Dao-Denier said with a faint smile. “It will take her at least three years to assimilate that godhood, which means we’ll have plenty of opportunities. Besides, she hasn’t summoned me for dual cultivation, and I can’t just barge in and suggest it. Beating the grass and startling the snake will ruin everything.”

“Fine,” Battle Resister said. “The rest of us will establish a base of operations outside of the Joyflower Palace. We’ll wait there for news from you. Once our opportunity arrives, we’ll take action together.”

“Agreed,” Leaf Dao-Denier said. “I’ll return to the Joyflower Palace and send word once there's a development.” With a final glance at Yang Qi, he rose to his feet and vanished.

Just as everyone else was about to leave, Yang Qi said, “Hold on a moment....”

“What, you have something to add?” asked Cipher Ever-Heaven.

“Waiting outside the Joyflower Palace will be very dangerous,” he replied. “Why not come with me into the palace? You can disguise yourselves as my servants, and I can say that I personally picked you from the god-general prisoners. I can also disguise your power signatures so that not even Empress Joyflower will be able to detect your true level. I'm currently a consort in the palace, which is a very high position, so I’ll definitely be able to keep you safe. Furthermore, it’s a good way to keep an eye on Leaf Dao-Denier. He and I have been enemies since our days in the mortal world, and working closely with him is as dangerous as asking a tiger for its skin. For all we know, now that he's succeeded with his Secret-Ensconcing All-World Anything-Everything Fundamental-Law Magic, he could very well rat us out to the empress and try to have us all killed.”

Battle Resister nodded. “I think that’s a good idea. You can’t catch tiger cubs without entering the tiger’s lair. But are you sure we won’t be found out, Yang Qi? It would be bad for us to end up trapped in the Joyflower Palace.”

“I’ll keep you safe,” Yang Qi replied. “Besides, what better place to seek information about your children and people than right inside the Joyflower Palace?”

His suggestion hit home for all of the sect leaders. Nodding, they agreed to his suggestion.

Chapter 909: Arrogance

Yang Qi had sweet-talked roughly a dozen top sect leaders into his cabal.

With a wave of his hand, he sent out magical symbols that completely covered up their power signatures, making it seem like they were sealed with the warding spells of the Joyflower Palace. In the blink of an eye, they all seemed exactly like any other god-general prisoner.

When he took them back to the palace, he didn’t immediately reveal them. Instead, he headed to one of the prisons and selected an equal number of existing god-general prisoners, who he said he wanted as servants. Upon returning to his quarters, he actually sent those prisoners into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart and forced them to give him their faith. Afterward, he disguised the sect leaders with the features of the original group.

In the end, no one was the wiser.

Generally speaking, the god-general prisoners were strictly monitored. But Yang Qi was currently working closely with Flower Goddesses Jade Nightqueen and Snowlotus, so it was no problem at all for him to select servants from the god-generals.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi offered well-worded reports to Jade Nightqueen and Snowlotus regarding Leaf Dao-Denier and his supposed activities, claiming to be laying a trap to get his supposed information about the God Legion Seal.

Of course, the flower goddesses didn’t trust Yang Qi, and were keeping him under constant surveillance. Unfortunately for them, their schemes against his power double were completely useless.

Despite constant consideration, the flower goddesses were unable to think of any way to lure Yang Qi’s true self out into the open. They knew he had some sort of god item that let him come and go as he pleased, but they had no idea how to do anything about that god item.

After getting settled, Yang Qi spent time trying to gather information from the eunuchs or taking his sect leader allies to find out more about the general situation in the Joyflower Palace.

The sect leaders didn’t dare to cause a scene in any way. Either they carefully observed their surroundings and gathered information in a roundabout fashion, or they stayed in Yang Qi’s residence working on their cultivation and waiting for news from Leaf Dao-Denier.

As for Leaf Dao-Denier, he would occasionally secretly come to provide updates.

So far, the temporary alliance was working very smoothly. Every time Yang Qi was in Leaf Dao-Denier’s presence, he could sense that he was transforming in a very profound way. It was obvious that he was succeeding spectacularly in his cultivation of the Secret-Ensconcing All-World Anything-Everything Fundamental-Law Magic.

As for the devil embryo Yang QI had placed in him, it was still there in his sea of energy. However, he didn’t dare to activate it. If he did, it was highly like Leaf Dao-Denier would sense it and destroy it.

That said, when in his presence, Yang Qi was able to use the devil embryo to observe Leaf Dao-Denier from the inside, which in turn helped Yang Qi to further his own cultivation of the Secret-Ensconcing All-World Anything-Everything Fundamental-Law Magic.

A month passed.

During that time, Yang Qi could clearly sense the chaos in the immortal worlds. The Joyflower Palace had allocated plenty of resources in their attempt to expand and grow the Dao Defense League. Unfortunately, the league suffered constant attacks and was dangerously unstable.

It had once been considered a colossal monster of an organization, but now it was like a bug.

After the Great Necropolis had ejected billions of trillions of new immortal worlds, many of them ranked a hundred or higher, what could the Dao Defense League possibly count for? Those new immortal worlds were home to plenty of powerful and ambitious people, and it took almost no time at all for war and chaos to spread.

It was a new age of chaos, and opportunities abounded for everyone.

In some ways, Yang Qi was glad that he was no longer responsible for the Dao Defense League, as it would have been a very tiring task to constantly be worried about defending it. Instead, now the Joyflower Palace had that responsibility. At least, for now. Eventually, when things settled down, he would kill Empress Joyflower and take back control.

In the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, his true self was completely focused on cultivation. And his assimilation of the godhood was proceeding more and more quickly, thanks to the help provided to him by the sect leaders.

His power index was now close to seven hundred, although, with peak Destabilizing will and the help of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, it was more like fifteen hundred, or maybe even two thousand.

Of course, matters of power indexes were secondary. His true self was now cultivating the Secret-Ensconcing All-World Anything-Everything Fundamental-Law Magic, causing the magical symbols of the Vajra Māyādevī to float above his head and feed him power.

After analyzing that power with the power assessment systems of the Cruiser of Civilization, he found that it was incredibly pure. And upon assimilating it, it combined perfectly with his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, pushing all of his energy arts to a much higher level.

He had the core meaning of the Secret-Ensconcing All-World Anything-Everything Fundamental-Law Magic in his mind, but had not linked it to his nascent divinity or consciousness yet. Instead, he was treating it like a knowledge-devil to be conquered.

Of course, that would be no easy task. Not even ancient gods had done such a thing. Furthermore, the technique didn’t just idly sit there, but fought back viciously. Every attempt he made to subjugate it resulted in his mind filling with a blinding light that literally caused smoke to seep out of his orifices.

However, he wasn’t discouraged. He continued his efforts, healing any resulting injuries as necessary, which in turn strengthened his nascent divinity.

Every time he made an attempt, a voice would echo out of the portal and say, “Such arrogance!”

It was a voice so powerful that it would slam into his sea of consciousness and nascent divinity, causing cracking sounds to ring out. In fact, it was something so intense that it would have killed just about any other person. Thankfully, the God Legion Seal was there to protect his sea of consciousness, and he had all of his other defenses fully prepared.

Despite his physical body nearly shattering as a result, he would just smile coldly. ‘So, I've attracted the attention of the will of a supreme buddhist school from the god world? This battle will strengthen my own will and help me reach a higher level of enlightenment. In fact, it's the only way I can make progress, and eventually reach the Terrifying level. At that point, my power index of seven hundred will be enough to decimate opponents with indexes of three thousand. I should be able to crush Empress Joyflower then!’

After healing himself, he continued with his efforts.

“Such arrogance!” the voice howled again, nearly causing his sea of consciousness and physical body to shatter. Forming them back together, he continued. There was no way that he would allow his will to conform to the core meaning of the Vajra Māyādevī. He would subjugate it. After all, his dao was to crush the dao of heaven, buddhas, and all other daos, such as those of immortals, devils, and gods....

Attempt after attempt was made, but he recovered from each assault and used the process to grow stronger. Although he was like an ant fighting a dragon, he was actually benefiting from the repeated cries of “such arrogance!”

He was inching closer and closer to the Terrifying level.

As his will grew stronger, so did his power double on the outside. Thanks to being blessed by the power of the Vajra Māyādevī, his power double was actually so advanced that it almost wasn’t like a projected clone at all.

Of course, not even his allies, the sect leaders, had any idea this was happening. As they continued working on their cultivation and gathering information, they waited for the opportunity they sought.

Meanwhile, Snowlotus and Jade Nightqueen were outside of the Great Necropolis, in a strange, hundredth ranked immortal world, having a secret discussion with a group of experts from the future world. The leader of this group was not a generalissimo, but rather Proud Heaven’s son, Proud Ethics.

Chapter 910: Hundredth Ranked Immortal World

The future world was a mysterious and unfathomable place. Of course, the generalissimos and other top experts from there were enigmatic to the extreme, but they were like nothing, compared to the sons of the magisters.

For example, Proud Ethics, whose energy abounded and who had a power index of well over a thousand. It was impossible to tell whether he was present as his true self, or just as a holographic projection. Regardless, he stood there looking both elegant and confident, clad in a crisp military uniform and emanating a heroic sense of manliness.

Any woman who caught sight of a man like this would feel her heart pounding in her chest.

If Zilin was beautiful, then Proud Ethics was handsome.

Both Jade Nightqueen and Snowlotus sensed that there was something different about Proud Ethics, compared to the last time they had met with him.

Could it be that he was actually present as his true self this time? It was impossible to say.

“Flower Goddesses, the eruption of immortal worlds from the Great Necropolis has completely changed the situation between your Dao Defense League, our future world, and the alliance of the Primeval Age and the Demon League. The dao of heaven has transformed, becoming more powerful and enigmatic. Unfortunately, not even those of us from the future world have been able to determine why this has happened. The Immortal Dao Age has completely veered from the course of history, to the point where it's current track ensures that it will never end up like our Future Age.”

They were currently standing at the peak of a mountain on the hundredth ranked immortal world, with sprawling lands stretching out endlessly beneath them, creating a very beautiful and soul-stirring scene.

“That said,” Proud Ethics continued, “the magisters of our future world are nearing the end of their quest to acquire the God Legion Seal. They’ll return within a matter of months to take control of matters and conquer the Immortal Dao Age.”

Flower Goddess Snowlotus snorted coldly. “Your future world is as wildly ambitious as ever. Unfortunately, you don’t quite measure up to the Ancient Road to the Gods. There are plenty of top experts emerging from the Great Necropolis now, seeking to acquire universal fortune, conquer this age, and reach godly ascension. You'd best prepare yourself to be attacked. There are plenty of boundless experts who would just love to acquire that God Legion Seal of yours.”

Proud Ethics burst out laughing. “Anyone who tries to take our God Legion Seal will end up dead. The ten magisters are strong enough to keep the god Brahma under control, much less weaker individuals. Look, enough of such talk. I want to know if you delivered my message to Empress Joyflower, and if any decision has been made regarding my proposal.”

“When the empress returned, she went directly into secluded meditation,” Flower Goddess Jade Nightqueen replied. “When we reported the matter to her, she said one thing in response: ‘I understand.’ Afterward, she didn’t ask for the message or for King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallion. Both items are still in the treasure storehouse. Apparently, she’s suspicious of Magister Proud Heaven’s motives and wants to improve her energy arts before looking at whatever gifts he's sent.”

Proud Ethics frowned. “I have no idea what the message says, so if your Empress Joyflower doesn’t want to look at it, then it has nothing to do with me. Fine, I’ll return and update my father. With that matter out of the way, there’s something else I wish to discuss with the two of you.”

“Oh? What’s that?” Jade Nightqueen asked.

“Something pertaining to this hundredth ranked immortal world. The scenery here is beautiful, and the magical laws are perfect. There are treasures everywhere. Wouldn’t it make an incredible addition to your Dao Defense League?”

“This place is infested with local savages!” Snowlotus said. “They have a big organization called the Profound Killing Dao Sect, led by someone named Profound Valor. He used to be on the same level as Empress Joyflower, but recently began cultivating a new divine ability that makes him even stronger. Do you really think someone like him will be easy to defeat? It's actually quite a risk for us to be meeting here in this world. If the Profound Killing Dao Sect found out we were here, we’d be forced to flee.”

“You make them sound very domineering,” Proud Ethics said with a smile. “I didn’t realize your Joyflower Palace was such a useless organization. You see, the reason I picked this location for the meeting is that I was hoping you could destroy the Profound Killing Dao Sect, so that we could take their place on this hundredth ranked world. Immortal worlds like this are rare even in the Great Necropolis, and are vastly superior to the Brahman Immortal World that we’re currently using as our base. With a world like this, we could expand our passageway to the future and make it much easier to transport plundered goods back home. The Immortal Dao Age is virtually bursting with treasure to be had.”

“What's that supposed to mean?” Flower Goddess Snowlotus said. “You think we would agree to work with you? Even if we wanted to, there’s no way we could possibly kill Profound Valor.”

“I think you’re overestimating him,” Proud Ethics replied. “Your Joyflower Palace has certain eunuchs with immense fighting prowess. Why not call four or five of them out to handle this situation with you? That should be more than enough to assassinate Profound Valor. With him dead, the Profound Killing Dao Sect will crumble. Although they have plenty of other experts, none are like Profound Valor himself, and with him gone, they’ll be as disunited as a dish of loose sand. Then we can split this hundredth ranked immortal world as the prize. What do you say?”

After some consideration, Snowlotus said, “Well, the more universal fortune we can get for the empress to use in her cultivation, the better. Fine. We agree. We’re very experienced when it comes to destroying enemy sects. We’ll head back immediately to recruit the people we need.”

“Hold on a moment,” Proud Ethics said. “I heard that you have someone working for you that could definitely help in dealing with Profound Valor. Why not invite him as well?”

“Who are you talking about?” Jade Nightqueen asked.

“His name is Yang Qi, league-lord of the Dao Defense League.” As the words left his mouth, his eyes flickered with an unusual light. “A few years ago he handed his organization over to you, and you imprisoned him. If you look into him, you’ll find that he's quite competent.”

“Yang Qi?”

Snowlotus and Jade Nightqueen exchanged a glance. Yet again they were struck with the sensation that Yang Qi was a very mysterious person, and definitely not the insect they had taken him to be. Even the future world knew about him.

“He’s a consort now, so it won't be difficult at all to bring him along. His cultivation has been progressing rapidly, although it’s questionable whether he’s strong enough to fight Profound Valor.”

“Oh? He's a consort?” Proud Ethics was visibly surprised. “In that case, yes, bring him with you. How about we agree to meet back here in three days? I’ve already sent people to infiltrate the Profound Killing Dao Sect, and according to their reports, in three days Profound Valor will be going to an unknown location to try to acquire a god item. That would be the perfect opportunity to kill him.”

After discussing a few more details, the two flower goddesses left.

At this point, one of the generalissimos stepped forward respectfully and said, “Young Sir, do you think Yang Qi is really a consort to those flower goddesses? Magister Proud Heaven said that he’s extremely cunning and dangerous. We definitely don’t want to fall into a trap laid by him. There must be some nefarious reason he's in the Joyflower Palace.”

“It's a given that we need to be very careful. Don’t forget, the main reason we came to this age is because of him. One of the ten magisters recently received a very grievous injury that will be very difficult to recover from. In fact, it’s most likely he’ll abdicate his position. Because of that, various sons of the magisters are viciously competing to take his spot.”

“Young Sir, considering the profound energy art you recently succeeded in cultivating, you should be able to take the spot without any problem.” The generalissimo then bowed his head, aware that he shouldn’t probe too deeply into matters such as this.

“True. Unfortunately, there’s a lot of competition. For instance, Hua Rongma, the son of Magister Hua. His cultivation base is no weaker than mine, and he has enlightenment of some of the most profound treasures from the future world. I think that the only way I could be completely confident in beating him would be using Yang Qi.”

“Yang Qi? But why? What about him would make you so confident?”

“According to father, he has some very powerful treasures. And if I can get them, I’ll be strong enough to completely dominate this age, earning my rightful spot as a magister. Since Yang Qi has those items, I need to get my hands on him. Unfortunately, he's very wily. I sent people after him, but he killed them all. He even took the treasures they had, including a fragment of the Cruiser of Civilization and one of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions. Well, the time has come for me to take all those things back, and along with them, his life!”

“Young Sir, are you saying that the matter of killing Profound Valor is just a trap to snare Yang Qi?”

“To some extent, yes. Although, I really do need to destroy the Profound Killing Dao Sect. The riches of a world like this defy imagination. Then afterward, we can raze the Joyflower Palace to the ground! I’ll enslave every last one of the women from there and take them back to the future world with me, making me stronger than ever!”

Chapter 911: Joining Forces for a Big Fight

“What did you just say? You want me to go kill the sectlord of this Profound Killing Dao Sect? On a hundredth ranked immortal world? With people from the future world?” Yang Qi had just been given the news by Flower Goddesses Snowlotus and Jade Nightqueen.

The two flower goddesses knew that Leaf Dao-Denier’s cultivation base was advancing rapidly, and in their nervousness, were actually coming to view Yang Qi as an important ally.

“Yes!” Jade Nightqueen said. “We met with the son of Magister Proud Heaven today, Proud Ethics. It's a very important task, and would benefit us quite well. Kill Profound Valor, and you can take his soul and nascent divinity and convert it into an out-of-body incarnation. A second nascent divinity. Your fighting prowess would soar, and your cultivation base would benefit as well. In fact, maybe you could even convert him into a full-on puppet, which would make you even more capable of taking out Leaf Dao-Denier.”

“Oh?” Yang Qi said. “Perhaps we can make a feint to the east and attack in the west. Use Proud Ethics to deal with Leaf Dao-Denier.”

“That’s a definite possibility,” replied Snowlotus. “But time is limited, and neither of us have been able to come up with a specific plan in that regard. Besides, neither of those two are fools, and they won’t just fight each other to the death for no reason. For now, our first priority should be to take down Profound Valor. After all, there will be more opportunities to work with Proud Ethics. He wants our help to ultimately change the face of the entire immortal dao civilization.”

“Incidentally, Yang Qi,” Jade Nightqueen said, “who are you, really? Proud Ethics requested you by name!”

“What? He mentioned my name?” Yang Qi was actually surprised by this. Inside, he was thinking, ‘So that’s what’s going on. Proud Heaven knows that I have the God Legion Seal, and apparently, he told his son about it. And his son is clearly drooling over the possibility of getting it. This thing is all a big trap. Well, two can play at that game. I’ll just kidnap him and hold him hostage as a bargaining chip to get back mother, Master, and Aunt Susu.’

Of course, Proud Ethics had profound and enigmatic energy arts, and likely knew secrets about Proud Heaven. He would not be as easy to deal with as Leaf Dao-Denier, and Yang Qi was actually curious to see what he was capable of. All in all, it seemed he had a good opportunity on his hands.

“Sure, I’ll go along,” Yang Qi said. “Although, considering how ruthlessly ambitious the people from the future world are, if he does anything insulting to the Joyflower Palace....”

Suddenly, the voice of Eunuch Blackheart rang out. “There’s no need to even bring that up. We’ll use Proud Ethics for everything he’s worth, and eventually find a way to eliminate him. If the future world thinks they have what it takes to vie for power with the Joyflower Palace, they’re delusional!”

Behind him were four other eunuchs, one of whom seemed as deadly as a needle. That one was Eunuch Sunflower. The other three appeared to be brothers. They were all diminutive and profoundly elderly, with long white beards and drooping eyebrows. However, their eyes shone with incomparable killing intent, and when they looked at Yang Qi, he got the sensation that he was being stared at by three vipers.

‘They all have power indexes over fifteen hundred,’ Yang Qi thought, shocked.

Of course, he had over a dozen sect leaders on his side, all with similar power indexes.

Besides, Yang Qi was much more worldly-wise now, and had seen many experts with incredibly high levels of power. As for these eunuchs, they usually remained out of sight, thus it was something of a surprise to learn that they would be joining the effort to kill the sectlord of the Profound Killing Dao Sect.

After all, they were like the personal weapons of Empress Joyflower.

For the benefit of Yang Qi, Snowlotus went on to introduce them. “These are Eunuchs Loveflower, Lovemusk, and Lovejade, all of them brothers and longtime loyalists in the Joyflower Palace.”

Eyeing Yang Qi, Eunuch Loveflower snorted coldly and said, “Who is this brat, a consort? He looks average at best. Low energy arts, low power levels. Are we expected to work with him to kill Profound Valor?”

“You’re underestimating him,” Jade Nightqueen said. “Yang Qi, do you mind demonstrating what you’re capable of? Prove that you’re capable of standing shoulder to shoulder with us? What do you say? These three eunuchs aren’t weak by any means, and if they’re not convinced, you’ll be expelled from the group or even killed.”

“Yes.” Eunuch Loveflower said, a sinister smile spreading across his face. “It’s just as the flower goddess said. If you can’t prove your worth to us, we’ll simply kill you. Although consorts technically outrank eunuchs, we’re not just ordinary eunuchs. Even the empress’ personal consorts treat us with utmost courtesy.”

“Is that so?” Yang Qi said. He suddenly flicked his finger, causing a vajra-like will to shoot out. It was none other than a true energy manifestation of the Secret-Ensconcing All-World Anything-Everything Fundamental-Law Magic, and although it didn’t seem particularly impressive, it contained the will of a supreme buddhist school and the profundities of the mother of a myriad buddhas.

“Screw the hell off!” Eunuch Loveflower said dismissively. He waved his sleeve and sent out a blast of wind that was one of his most deadly moves, the Flower-Burying Palm. It was a very sinister energy art, the kind that could destroy the foundation of everything beautiful and wonderful. To bury a person in the ground was one of the most tragic and grievous things imaginable, and flowers were one of the most beautiful things in nature. In other words, his technique could be described as burying one of the most beautiful things.

As soon as he waved his sleeve, a soft and feminine power rushed forth as if to bury all of the many heavens that existed.

POP!

Yang Qi’s finger attack, simple and unadorned, met the Flower-Burying Palm.

Everyone else present shook their heads, convinced that Yang Qi was going to come out the loser. The Flower-Burying Palm was very dangerous, and there was no way that a simple finger strike could vanquish it.

However, in the moment that they connected, golden godlight shone from Yang Qi’s finger, illuminating the highest clouds like the sun parting an overcast sky, and bathing the world in brilliance.

“Aaaiiiieee!”

Eunuch Loveflower staggered backward, a gaping hole on his hand and his entire body wreathed in a golden light that filled him with agonizing pain.

“What?” It was as plain as day that Eunuch Loveflower was the loser of the fight. Eunuchs Lovemusk and Lovejade instantly hurried forward to help drive the golden light away from him.

“What technique was that?” Eunuch Lovejade growled. “A vajra skill from a buddhist school?! One of the top energy arts from the god world? How can you have cultivated that?”

The three eunuchs glared threateningly at Yang Qi, but he just stood there looking completely unconcerned. “The number of energy arts in existence are like the eternal sands. It’s no rarity to have a smattering of ability with arts from the buddhist schools.”

“Enough,” said Jade Nightqueen. “At least the three of you now understand that Yang Qi is qualified to participate in this operation. Furthermore, the two of us acquired a god item that will be particularly useful against Profound Valor. Come. Let’s head to our meeting with the forces of the future world.”

“Let’s go!”

During the entire exchange, Eunuch Sunflower hadn’t said anything, but couldn’t shake the feeling that he recognized Yang Qi. But he never made the connection that he had actually clashed with him back in the Exquisite Cathedral. After all, back in the Exquisite Cathedral, Yang Qi’s power index had only been around two hundred, whereas now it was seven hundred. And when one’s will convergence changed, the manifestation of their energy arts would do the same.

The truth was that Yang Qi was actually surprised at how powerful the Secret-Ensconcing All-World Anything-Everything Fundamental-Law Magic was. Of course, part of it was that Eunuch Loveflower had been careless and arrogant, and had completely refrained from putting up any defenses.

Furthermore, his Flower-Burying Palm was even more dangerous than Yang Qi had anticipated, and some of his power double’s meridians had been broken as a result.

His true self quickly sent a stream of energy to the power double, repairing all of the damaged meridians and making them even stronger than before. He really wanted to avoid having this power double destroyed. After all the work he had put into it, it would be very difficult to create one that rivaled it.

Whooosh!

Five eunuchs, two flower goddesses, and Yang Qi all flew out of the Joyflower Palace. Around that time, Leaf Dao-Denier also happened to step out and see the eight streaks of light. He had been keeping a close eye on Yang Qi’s whereabouts, intent on following him if he went anywhere.

‘What are they poking their noses into? Perhaps this is the opportunity I’ve been waiting for. The mantis stalks the cicada, unaware of the oriole behind. I don't care what you’re up to, I'm going to find a chance to strike a blow, Yang Qi! As soon as your true self appears in the open, I'm going to capture you. Now that I have both the Secret-Ensconcing All-World Anything-Everything Fundamental-Law Magic and the Taiji Indestructible Chaos-Magic World-Terrorizing Profound Art, you won’t be able to benefit at all from the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.”

Before long, Yang Qi and his group were at the hundredth ranked immortal world, which was indescribably larger than thirty-third ranked immortal worlds like the Tusita Heaven. Yang Qi wondered again what it meant that the Great Necropolis could produce places like this. What exactly was the necropolis?

There were people waiting on a high mountain, all of them clad in military uniforms, the handsome Proud Ethics in the lead position. Of course, Yang Qi had seen Proud Ethics before, but this was Proud Ethics’ first time catching sight of him.

Yang Qi’s true self sent some power secretly to his double, causing golden light from both the Secret-Ensconcing All-World Anything-Everything Fundamental-Law Magic and the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth to surround him. It was as though he were pulsing with the dignity of the Sovereign Lord, as well as the profundity of the buddhist schools. It was a combination that not even Leaf Dao-Denier would have been able to identify.

“You must be Yang Qi,” Proud Ethics said with a slight nod. “I’ve heard a lot about you. You inflicted some heavy losses on the forces of the future world, and even took a fragment of the Cruiser of Civilization. I'm afraid you’re going to have to return them to their rightful owner. Now.”

Chapter 912: Faceoff

Right off the bat, Proud Ethics had put on a very aggressive front, demanding that Yang Qi return the pieces of the Cruiser of Civilization he had taken. In fact, the implication was that if Yang Qi didn’t, Proud Ethics would attack him. Furthermore, the generalissimos who flanked him were equipped with mechas that glowed with golden light and emanated the aura of godmammoths.

Most likely, they were secret weapons created by Proud Heaven himself, using the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, or maybe even actual megamammoths from the past. Perhaps after becoming a Grand Emperor, Proud Heaven had managed to track down the corpse of a mammoth that bordered on the level of being a god, then used its power to create such mechas.

Yang Qi was stunned by what he was seeing, and knew that he couldn’t do this. He only had a third of the full Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, and it was highly likely that the part Proud Heaven possessed contained energy arts that could be used to create mechas.

That said, Yang Qi’s cultivation base made him confident enough to not be worried about the situation. Smiling, he said, “Did you catch a mental illness, Proud Ethics? Do you really think I'm just going to hand over the Cruiser of Civilization? Those fragments don’t belong to the future world anymore. I’ve fully fused with them, and no threats from you will convince me to give them to you.”

“So, you really do feel like dying,” Proud Ethics said, his cheek twitching. “No one has ever dared to speak to me in that tone of voice. Even the magisters in the future world are more polite.”

“This is the immortal dao civilization, not the future world,” Yang Qi replied. “If you throw a temper tantrum here, it's going to end up with you dead.”

Swish!

Even as the words left his mouth, a beam of light was shooting toward his forehead with lightning-like speed. It moved so quickly that everyone present was caught completely off guard.

Proud Ethics hadn’t moved an inch, and it was impossible to see where exactly the light originated. And although it seemed weak, it abounded with killing intent, making it obvious that if it pierced someone’s sea of consciousness, they would die.

The five eunuchs were all stunned. Although Yang Qi and Proud Ethics had been exchanging harsh words, none of them would have guessed that it would result in fighting. Furthermore, Proud Ethics hadn’t given any indication that he would launch an attack, and also hadn’t moved. That fact alone was terrifying.

Yang Qi’s hand flew up toward his forehead, golden light flaring as his fingers latched on to what appeared to be a black, seven-inch-long object that resembled a centipede. As soon as he grabbed it, it began to twist and writhe, emitting clicking sounds and a biting coldness.

“A heaven-centipede!” Eunuch Blackheart exclaimed. “How vicious! They’re venomous creatures from the god world, and even a god who is bitten by one will experience intense pain. Anyone under the level of a god will die! I have to say that I'm impressed, Proud Ethics.”

“A heaven-centipede from the god world?” Yang Qi said. “Definitely impressive. It reaches its target almost as soon as it’s launched, and I was very nearly struck.” He sent a stream of true energy into the centipede, wreathing it in flames. A moment later, the centipede was gone.

Proud Ethics chuckled. “Calm down. That wasn’t even a real heaven-centipede. It was only a projection. I’ve long since mastered a projection skill created by the legion of gods, allowing me to create things that are both real and illusory. In any case, if you were frightened by a mere projection like that, you’re even weaker than I imagined.”

“Projection?” Yang Qi’s expression turned grimmer. He had just used the Secret-Ensconcing All-World Anything-Everything Fundamental-Law Magic on that centipede, but hadn’t sensed any clue that it was a projection. If that was true, it meant that Proud Ethics’ abilities with illusory projections really were incredible. However, he suspected that it actually wasn’t an ability, but a magical treasure or a talisman of some sort.

Regardless, it indicated that Proud Ethics probably knew that he was a power double, but was keeping that information to himself in the hopes of catching his true self unawares. Proud Ethics was obviously a treacherous schemer, and the only way for Yang Qi to deal with him now was to keep his true self in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, only dealing with outside situations using his power double.

“Proud Ethics,” said Jade Nightqueen, “we’re here to do a job. Can’t you resolve your personal issues with Yang Qi at another time? Why don’t we concentrate on killing Profound Valor first? Didn’t you say he’ll be leaving his sect soon on a mission? We don’t want to let this opportunity slip by. If we do, we might never be able to take him out.”

“You’re right,” Proud Ethics said. Grinning at Yang Qi as though he were in complete control of the situation, he continued, “We’ll drop the matter of our grudge for now. But I'm eventually going to get back those fragments of the Cruiser of Civilization. They belong to me.”

“Fine,” Yang Qi replied, smiling. “If that’s how you want to play it, I won’t pull any punches either. I know that you people have more fragments of the Cruiser of Civilization, and eventually I'm going to get all of them.”

Each fragment came with more systems, and would be extremely beneficial, whether in terms of cultivation, fighting, enlightenment, or growth. He already had the most powerful part of the cruiser, the Engine of the One God, but knew that he probably only had about one tenth of the full ship. If he could piece together the entire thing, it would make it much easier to strike a fatal blow on Empress Joyflower, and the Joyflower Palace in general. And he could probably use it to travel directly to the future world.

That level of power would be akin to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

“Just wait until this mission is over,” Proud Ethics said, “and we can have a good and proper fight. If you accept my challenge.”

“A fight?” Yang Qi laughed. “I'm not interested. I prefer to lure people into traps in which they have the ultimate disadvantage. In fact, you’d do best to prepare for a sneak attack at any time. You’re an enemy of mine. Just like your father, Proud Heaven. In fact, I'm much more interested in taking Proud Heaven’s life than I am this Profound Valor.”

“What gall!” some of the generalissimos growled. Magister Proud Heaven was their ultimate leader, and was like a deity to the experts of the future world. To have Yang Qi openly insulting him made them want to go all out to try killing him.

“Enough!” Jade Nightqueen barked. “Are you people interested in bickering, or working together? Yang Qi, you’re not permitted to lay a hand on Proud Ethics before the mission of killing Profound Valor is accomplished. Understand?”

“In other words, I can kill him after we’re finished with Profound Valor? Alright, fine. Just remember, Flower Goddesses, the people from the future world are endlessly ambitious, and it's only a matter of time before they make a move on the Joyflower Palace.”

“We can worry about such matters later,” Jade Nightqueen said coolly. “For now, we need to cooperate in good faith. Alright, Young Sir Proud Ethics. Where exactly are we going to take down Profound Valor?”

‘Once this mission is over, you’re dead!’ Proud Ethics thought with a mysterious smile on his face. Yang Qi saw his expression, and resolved to stay completely on guard.

Meanwhile, Proud Ethics took out a mirror that projected a map of the hundredth ranked immortal world they were on.

In one part of the world was a labyrinth of space-time in which existed a huge sect. It looked like a castle that abounded with both killing energy and dao energy alike. It was none other than the Profound Killing Dao Sect, and the magical laws that emanated out of it filled the entire hundredth ranked immortal world around it.

This was a world so enormous that, although Empress Joyflower might have been able to take control of it, she would have been forced to take a long time to do so. Its essence could sustain experts with power indexes of two or three thousand, and it was a given that top organizations from a place like this would be extremely wealthy.

It was just like how, in the mortal world, a thriving empire would have both a powerful army, and an abundance of fish and grain.

A moment later, a flash of light appeared on the projection of the planet.

Then the planet faded away into the mirror, and Proud Ethics looked over with a vicious expression. “Let’s go. Profound Valor is out in the open, so all we need to do is intercept him.”

In almost the same moment that he spoke, the generalissimos all vanished.

At the same time, the space around Yang Qi rippled, and he dissolved into innumerable particles which then vanished as they became one with the universe.

Jade Nightqueen and Snowlotus were both startled, and had no idea what techniques had just been used. However, Eunuch Blackheart said, “Proud Ethics isn’t the kind of person we should be working with long term. If we can use Yang Qi to deal with him, the empress will be very pleased. She wants us to capture Proud Ethics and use him to lure Proud Heaven out into the open, and hopefully, destroy him. You see, her greatest ambition isn’t to become a god, but to capture Proud Heaven and inflict the ultimate humiliation on him before ending his life. If we can capture Proud Ethics to help her reach her goal, she’ll reward us well.”

“Fine. Let’s get going!”

The five eunuchs and two flower goddesses used their own spatial leaping technique to vanish.

Meanwhile, in another location, a figure blurred through the primal-chaos paleo-energy. The energy took many forms, from walls, to tempests, to boulders, but this person was able to easily move within it.

He was none other than the sectlord of the Profound Killing Dao Sect, Profound Valor.

He was tall and burly, and appeared to be in his forties. He had a long beard and slender, arched eyebrows, and looked very much like a scholar-general from the ancient past, the kind who had led countless troops in successful campaigns.

He stopped at a certain point in the primal-chaos, stood tall and straight, and said, “Guests from the future world, I'm aware of the ambush you’re planning. I know you want to kill me, then loot and take over this immortal world.”

Chapter 913: Profound Valor

Profound Valor was an actual native of the Great Necropolis, a true elite who had accomplished in a few million years what most old-timers would take billions of years to do. Apparently, he had fantastic senses to detect danger, and already knew that people were trying to surround him.

“Oh?” Proud Ethics suddenly appeared within the primal-chaos. He had fewer generalissimos with him; the missing ones were apparently powering a spell formation somewhere nearby. Looking surprised, Proud Ethics said, “You live up to your reputation as sectlord and native of the Great Necropolis. Your senses are truly astounding. Considering the level of your cultivation, if I recruited you into the forces of the future world, you would be a generalissimo. Interested in working for me?”

“What kind of person do you think I am?” Sectlord Profound Valor replied. “Do you really think I give a crap about the future world? Why would I want to be a so-called generalissimo? I don’t even care about your magisters, let alone a pampered playboy like yourself. I’ve dominated everyone in my path for the past hundred million years, and killed more people than you can imagine. Yet you think you qualify to block my path? To recruit me?”

“If you refuse to do things the easy way, we’ll do them the hard way,” Proud Ethics said. He snapped his fingers and Eunuch Blackheart and the other eunuchs spread out to surround Profound Valor.

Yang Qi also appeared overhead, sealing the path above.

His first impression was that Profound Valor was extraordinarily poised, with a towering aura and a heroic air about him.

Suddenly, the Cruiser of Civilization began speaking to Yang Qi.

[Beep-beep-beep. Beep-beep-beep. Analyzing. Analyzing. Power index of two thousand. Will convergence at the peak of the Destabilizing level. This person is dangerous. Extremely dangerous.]

‘So strong,’ Yang Qi thought. This Profound Valor was basically on the same level as Battle Resister. Now it made sense why Proud Ethics had gathered such a group to besiege him. It would obviously be necessary to pay a heavy price to deal with this person and reap the spoils of a hundredth ranked immortal world.

Furthermore, Yang Qi was now convinced that there must be some other reason Proud Ethics wanted to kill him. For example, maybe he knew secrets about the future world.

“So, people from the Joyflower Palace are here too?” Profound Valor said. His expression turned serious. “Where’s your empress? Upon taking that godhood, she achieved a cultivation boost and went on to slaughter numerous heroes from the House of a Hundred Battles, the Cipher-Devil Sword Sect, the Cloud-Severing Dao Society, and experts from numerous native sects of the Great Necropolis. Could it be that she’s now turning her attention to the Profound Killing Dao Sect?”

“That’s exactly right,” said Flower Goddess Jade Nightqueen. She and Snowlotus each held a flower with tens of thousands of petals, each of which was a magical talisman that was a world unto itself. The talismans contained godly daos and magical laws, and looked like things passed down by ancient god-kings. In fact, they seemed to contain the tears of gods, pulsing with such infinite grief that they could cast anyone into endless sorrow.

They were powerful magical treasures that the flower goddesses could use to temporarily double their power index. Yang Qi could sense that the treasures linked them to the Passionless God Flower, and perhaps even the god-king’s tear. Obviously, they weren’t ordinary god items, but rather objects of terrifying deadliness.

“We’ll give you one option here, Profound Valor,” Snowlotus said. “Join the Joyflower Palace and become a consort or a eunuch. Or perhaps a god-general prisoner. Join our fight to conquer everything in existence.”

“Like hell I will,” Profound Valor spat. “The future world. The Joyflower Palace. I seem to remember there being quite a grudge between the two of you. I heard that Empress Joyflower was once scammed by Magister Proud Heaven, suffering grievous losses as a result. But now here you are working together? I really don’t understand it.”

“Attack!” Eunuch Sunflower shouted, apparently hoping to shut down any conversation that might embarrass the Joyflower Palace. Lunging forward, he sent a shining needle flying toward Profound Valor. “Baleful Yin Needle!”

It was a needle that could pierce all types of defensive empyrean energy, and contained a convergence of baleful yin energy from the god world. Yet Profound Valor didn’t even move as the needle approached him. Unleashing some unknown technique, he caused the energy in the area to sweep into an empyrean wind, which instantly crushed the Baleful Yin Needle attack.

However, that was the same moment that Proud Ethics chose to make his move.

He blurred into motion, a suit of armor springing up to cover him. It wasn’t a power-based mecha, but rather something ancient and organic, which rippled out to cover him from head to toe, hiding even his eyes. At the same time, he began pulsing with a sensation of primal-chaos and boundless godpower.

‘What’s that?’ Yang Qi thought. He sensed that the armor was crafted from the remains of an ancient megamammoth that had eventually reached the level of the legion of gods, then perished. Its skin had been left behind, and the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth had been used to craft it into armor.

And it served to dramatically increase the power index of whoever wore it.

[Beep-beep-beep. Beep-beep-beep. Power index rising rapidly. One thousand five hundred. One thousand eight hundred. One thousand nine hundred. Two thousand. Two thousand one hundred. Two thousand two hundred!]

That was where it finally stopped.

‘Armor made from godmammoth skin, crafted by Proud Heaven by means of a technique from another aspect of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. What better treasure could I hope to get? It would give me a much deeper insight into the secrets of the godmammoths, and help me understand further profundities of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.’

Among the Godfolk, godmammoths were unique. They were incredibly strong, and surpassed many other types of gods. And the ultimate ancestor of the godmammoths, their king, was so powerful that only the Sovereign Lord could possibly be his rival.

Godmammoth hide was the stuff of dreams to Yang Qi. After all, he hadn’t found any godmammoth relics or artifacts, even in the Joyflower Palace’s treasure storehouse.

But here was Proud Ethics with just such an item.

Although the top priority at the moment was Profound Valor, everyone present was technically an enemy to Yang Qi. Therefore, watching out for his own best interest was the best course of action.

BOOOOM!

Power thrummed from the godmammoth armor as Proud Ethics strode forward and thrust his palm out in front of him. It wasn’t the Hand of the One God, but it similarly caused holy, godly light to flash. As it slammed into Profound Valor, he managed to maintain his footing, but his garments flapped violently.

Profound Valor’s eyes narrowed and he thrust his fist out, causing his sea of energy to erupt. The surrounding primal-chaos paleo-energy instantly became thousands of times denser than before, until it was virtually liquid, threatening to drown everyone present.

“Grand Primal-Chaos Heaven-Fortune Paleo-Fist!”

His fist smashed into Proud Ethics’s palm, countering its momentum and allowing Profound Valor to continue standing in place.

At the same time, the five eunuchs and two flower goddesses all shouted, “Five Phases; Two Polarities. Combine!” A huge spell formation sprang into being that combined the seven auras to project the image of a god-king.

He had flowers beneath his feet and carried the Passionless God Flower in his hand, causing him to radiate a sensation of sorrow and grief.

This god-king was the combination of the power indexes of seven top experts. The five eunuchs all had power indexes of over a thousand. With their indexes combined with those of the two flower goddesses, it technically created a total of well over six thousand.

Of course, it wasn’t literally that much power. The combined power of six thousand top experts would be enough to conquer all of the many heavens that existed. Yang Qi had never even heard of anyone with an index of five thousand. Even Empress Joyflower was only at about the level of three thousand. The truth was that, thanks to the spell formation, the battle prowess of the seven experts from the Joyflower Palace could create a projection of over two thousand.

“The Passionless God-King?” Profound Valor said. Clenching his fist, he launched an attack directly on the seven experts and their spell formation.

The Passionless God-King let loose a long sigh, then waved the Passionless God Flower out to meet Profound Valor’s fist. Instantly, Profound Valor was surrounded by true energy in the form of flower petals, sealing him where he stood.

“Grand Maṇḍala-Flower Sealing-Aegis!” the Passionless God-King said, sending true energy pouring forth.

However, Profound Valor, despite being sealed in the enormous aegis, suddenly thrummed with energy as mighty as mountains and seas. The flower aegis shattered and an aura like that of a god dragon suddenly rose into the air. Unexpectedly, it was a fist strike aimed directly at Yang Qi.

‘What’s he doing?’ Yang Qi thought, suddenly under incredible pressure. In the blink of an eye, all of his surroundings disappeared, and all he could see was the fist of an ancient devil-god, rumbling toward him with unstoppable force. Even his true self in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart was shaken as he realized that Profound Valor’s will convergence apparently surpassed his own.

‘How is this even possible? Obviously, in terms of psychic ability and fighting prowess, this guy isn’t just at the level of two thousand!’ Ever since Yang Qi’s own will had made such spectacular progress, he had never been in a situation like this. Not even Empress Joyflower had psychic abilities on the level of Profound Valor.

There was no way he was just some random sect leader. He was definitely keeping some profoundly shocking secret!

Chapter 914: The Big Secret

Yang Qi analyzed the incoming fist strike, and was certain that, if struck, his power double that he had painstakingly molded into its current level of strength would be wiped out of existence. And that wasn’t all. The fist technique contained a mysterious expression of will convergence that would follow the power double’s will all the way through to Yang Qi’s actual nascent divinity, inflicting a grievous injury.

Once Yang Qi’s will convergence had reached the peak of the Destabilizing level, only enemies at the Terrifying level could possibly hurt him or his power double. And normally speaking, if his power double were to be destroyed, the will within it would simply return to Yang Qi’s primary nascent divinity.

But for some reason, that wasn’t the case here. As of this moment, he was in a very dangerous situation.

He had no time to draw on the powers of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart to pull his power double back inside. Nor could he allow the power double to open a pathway into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart from the outside; that would only be making it easier for his enemy's fist strike to find its way to his true self.

This was definitely the most terrifying fist attack Yang Qi had ever faced.

How could Profound Valor, who had a power index of only two thousand, unleash an attack like this?

Making a snap decision, Yang Qi had his power double shoot backward and simultaneously shove his hand out in front of him, releasing a palm move from the Secret-Ensconcing All-World Anything-Everything Fundamental-Law Magic, an attack that thrummed with the energy of the Vajra Māyādevī.

Profound Valor simply snorted coldly and unleashed a second fist strike.

This second attack was far more powerful than the first, and when the fist winds combined, they emitted mountain-toppling, sea-draining force.

WHIZZZ!

The power of the Vajra Māyādevī and the Secret-Ensconcing All-World Anything-Everything Fundamental-Law Magic were vanquished and energy surged into Yang Qi’s power double, accompanied by a will that sought out the essence of his will. If it succeeded, and his power double was destroyed, his primary nascent divinity would definitely suffer severe injury.

‘This guy is incredible! Alright, time to go all out!’

A black hole sprang up inside of Yang Qi that began gobbling up the enemy’s power and will.

“So that’s how you want to play it? Fine!” Thrumming with awe-inspiring power, Profound Valor launched another fist strike, even more impressive and devastating than the previous two combined, seemingly filled with the quintessence of the universe itself. From Yang Qi’s perspective, it appeared as though Profound Valor had suddenly opened all of his pores to absorb the power and quintessence of heaven and earth, the god world, all planes of existence, all space-time, and even the past and future. Combining it all, he created an amalgamation of power the likes of which no one present had ever seen before.

In that moment, Profound Valor became like a boundless god of all creation, a force who could match up to the sect leader of any top-tier organization. From what Yang Qi could tell, not even Battle Resister would be a match for him at this moment.

As the third fist strike slammed into Yang Qi’s power double, it flew through the black hole toward Yang Qi’s true self, ignoring all magical laws of space and time, an expression of power and will that could crush anything in its way.

However, it was at that very moment that a voice rang out from within Yang Qi.

“Such arrogance!” It wasn’t Yang Qi’s voice. Upon cultivating the Vajra Māyādevī and the Secret-Ensconcing All-World Anything-Everything Fundamental-Law Magic, he had become connected to the will of a mighty buddhist school from the god world. The mere words spoken by the will of that school could shake his true self and will into dust. Or at least it would have, if he wasn't protected by the God Legion Seal.

In this moment of danger, Yang Qi once again provoked that voice. However, things were different this time: he had a place to vent the destruction.

And the target was none other than Profound Valor!

Even as Profound Valor’s will and power coursed through Yang Qi, it slammed into the counterattack from the words ‘such arrogance!’

BOOM!

Cracking sounds rang out inside of Profound Valor and his clothing was shredded to pieces, revealing his powerful body, which looked like an ancient stone statue, majestic and awe-inspiring. At the same time, he coughed up a gob of blood.

The spoken words of ‘such arrogance’ sent all the energy of the three fist strikes back toward their source, and as a result, Profound Valor was devastated. Yet apart from coughing up some blood, nothing much else happened, much to Yang Qi’s shock. What kind of cultivation base did this Profound Valor actually have?

For one thing, it confirmed that, at the least, he had to have Terrifying will.

C-C-CRACK!

As Profound Valor coughed up more blood and staggered backward, he ran right into attacks from Proud Ethics, the five eunuchs, and the two flower goddesses.

Profound Valor coughed up another mouthful of blood, yet he still seemed to have infinite reserves of power to draw on. He let loose a thunderous battle cry, causing everything to shake, and ripping apart the space in the area.

Despite having been hit with two tremendous blows, he was still able to fly up into the air and throw his hand out in front of him.

It caused Yang Qi to feel as if some immense heavenly net were rumbling toward him. Even if his true self opened up the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart and sent power outside, it wouldn’t be able to get close to this. More than ever, he sensed how profoundly ferocious this Profound Valor was. Despite all of the powerful attacks that had hit him, he merely coughed up blood, then went on the offensive, heading right back toward Yang Qi’s power double.

In fact, even if Yang Qi were present as his true self, and was working with his power double, he would have to use the God Legion Seal to pull off any successful attacks.

There was no question about it: Profound Valor could definitely beat Empress Joyflower in a fight.

In the blink of an eye, Profound Valor’s hand had latched onto Yang Qi’s power double. He moved with such amazing and heroic momentum that Yang Qi couldn’t help but be impressed.

“I’d planned to take you down one by one today,” Profound Valor said, “but in the end, I was caught off guard by this fellow’s scheming! I might have lost this fight, but I’ll be back. And it will be doomsday for the future world and the Joyflower Palace!”

RUMBLE!

With that, he turned and became a dragon-like streak of light that vanished into thin air before Proud Ethics could chase after him.

It took a long moment for the five eunuchs and two flower goddesses to regain their composure. When they did, they looked over at Proud Ethics.

“How could things have played out this way?” Eunuch Sunflower asked

“Why is Profound Valor so incredibly strong, Proud Ethics?” Snowlotus said. “You should have told us about this beforehand. It's obvious there’s no way we could have killed him. If it weren't for Yang Qi making the perfect move at the right time, delivering a vicious blow, we would all be dead now.”

Everyone present looked like they were still feeling frightened, and even Proud Ethics took a long moment before he could drive the glazed look from his eyes.

“So, it seems the stories are true after all. Profound Valor really is one of the Inheritors of the Great Necropolis.” The fact that he spoke the truth so openly was initially so shocking that no one knew how to react.

Finally, Jade Nightqueen said, “Inheritors of the Great Necropolis?”

Proud Ethics sighed. “Yes. That's what I said. The Inheritors. Remember how the Great Necropolis recently ejected a host of worlds, transforming the face of the Immortal Dao Age? At the same time, strange sealing marks were sent out, and those who can acquire them become Inheritors, blessed with immense power and fighting prowess. Not even I am sure of the details of what the sealing marks do. I was hoping to take down Profound Valor and seize his sealing mark, but had no idea that his cultivation base had become so much stronger. We really aren’t a match for him.”

“Great Necropolis Inheritors?” said Eunuch Blackheart. “So they can acquire the legacy of the Great Necropolis? If so, these successors are people of incredible standing. Just how strong are they, exactly?” The two flower goddesses and five eunuchs were all trembling at the thought of the immense power of the Great Necropolis. After all, they had all resided in the Great Necropolis for millions upon millions of years, and they knew what it would mean to inherit its power.

Whether it was the Joyflower Palace or any other sect, they would likely be as weak as chickens or dogs compared to such a person.

“There’s no need to get so excited,” Proud Ethics continued. “The Inheritors get sealing marks, that's all. To actually gain control of the Great Necropolis is a process that will take a very long time. There’s still plenty of time to fight over the sealing marks. Kill Profound Valor, and you can take the mark and become an Inheritor yourself. Thanks to the God Legion Seal that the magisters of the future control, they’re aware that many people have such sealing marks. Obviously, there will be bitter fighting between them. Just like the process of producing an apex-level poisonous beast, they’ll fight each other to the death until only the ultimate, true Inheritor is left standing. And with access to the godpower of the Great Necropolis, godly ascension will become much more possible.” He smiled. “You see, the fight just now was only the beginning.”

**

Meanwhile, Profound Valor was flying through the primal-chaos paleo-energy with Yang Qi, traveling to some unknown location. All Yang Qi knew was that the energy kept getting stronger, and that space-time was being distorted even more profoundly.

Eventually, they reached a place where primal-chaos lightning fell constantly, strong enough to kill even Grand Emperors.

Yang Qi still wasn’t incredibly worried. He was only here as a power double, and although losing that double would be a big loss, it wouldn’t be a fatal one.

He was very interested in seeing what this Profound Valor was all about, and wanted to know how he could be strong enough to defeat so many enemies while only having a power index of two thousand.

Chapter 915: The Inheritors

At a certain point, Profound Valor stopped, formed a cage out of primal-chaos, and threw Yang Qi’s power double into it. The cage was so secure and tight that Yang Qi immediately realized that not even detonating his power double would do him any good. Profound Valor’s enlightenment of magical power and natural law was just too advanced.

After throwing Yang Qi into the cage, Profound Valor devolved into a fit of coughing that ended with him vomiting up several mouthfuls of blood. Then he sat down cross-legged and began to meditate. Moments later, streams of white vital energy began to rise up from the top of his head and then vanish into the void.

After working with the powerful, mysterious technique for some time, Profound Valor looked much better. He radiated a healthy light, and seemed just as mighty as before. As he rose to his feet, cracking sounds rang out from within him; he was now completely and utterly recovered.

Yang Qi was dumbstruck.

Profound Valor had clearly been very seriously injured, yet he had recovered in almost no time at all. Not even Yang Qi’s true self could compare to an opponent like this. It seemed to him that he would need to push his own power index to the level of two thousand before he could even consider fighting someone this strong. Yang Qi was at only about seven hundred, which meant that Profound Valor was about three times beyond him.

At this point, Profound Valor looked at Yang Qi stuck in his cage. With Profound Valor’s flowing beard and fierce expression, he looked like some sort of mighty general, ready to pronounce a sentence of execution on a captive enemy.

“I'm impressed,” he said. “You’re the first person that’s ever hurt me like this. If it weren’t for that will convergence attack of yours, and the despicable backstabbing attack of the people from the future world and the Joyflower Palace, I would’ve come out of that fight on top. Not many people in existence can possibly hurt me. Talk. What’s the nature of your cultivation base? What exactly was that will convergence attack? If you don’t tell me, I’ll make you wish you could die!”

“You’re going to make me wish I could die?” Yang Qi laughed. Calmly brushing some dust off his shoulders, he said, “Presumably you already know that I'm just a power double, so threats of death don't really mean much to me. No magical treasure or medicinal pill of yours could destroy my true self, and if you do anything to my power double, you’ll make a very big enemy.”

Profound Valor looked at the power double with an unreadable expression and then asked a seemingly unrelated question, “You're not with the Joyflower Palace?”

“How could you tell?” Yang Qi replied.

Profound Valor continued looking at him for a long, silent moment. Then he said, “You look like a consort from there. But with a cultivation base like that, how could the Joyflower Palace possibly keep you captive? I'm going to guess you infiltrated them with secret goals of your own. Am I right? There’s no real enmity between us, so why did you join the ambush?”

“It’s funny you should ask that,” Yang Qi answered. “You’re right. I infiltrated the Joyflower Palace with the goal of killing Empress Joyflower. I used to lead the Dao Defense League, which is an alliance of a hundred trillion immortal worlds. But the Joyflower Palace stole it from me. It was a grievous blow, and the only way I can vent my anger is to kill her.”

“Oh really?” Profound Valor said, although he seemed skeptical. “Empress Joyflower is no one to take lightly. She’s extremely skilled and powerful, and what’s more, she’s vicious and merciless. Her ultimate goal is to rule everything in existence. I'm afraid not even my Profound Killing Dao Sect can stand up to her, which is why I've tried to keep my distance. Despite that, she still sent people to try to kill me. Well, I can’t just sit around and let her do that. I need to strike back.”

“You seem unusually strong,” Yang Qi said. “My guess is that you recently came across some sort of good fortune that significantly boosted your energy arts. But what, exactly? It couldn’t be some ordinary god item or medicinal pill. And even if you got some godhood, you shouldn’t have power and will as terrifyingly strong as yours.”

“Very clever, boy,” Profound Valor said, his expression flickering. “You guessed all that after having just met me? I’d say that is terrifying. I bet I could make use of you to accomplish some amazing things.”

“Make use of me? Your energy arts are strong and your will is incredible, but whatever good fortune you came across, it wasn’t enough for you to reach the Terrifying level. That’s not going to be enough to force me to do anything for you.” In response to his words, an angry gleam appeared in Profound Valor’s eyes, so Yang Qi quickly changed the direction of the conversation. “However, we could join forces. What do you say? We can work together to take down the Joyflower Palace and kill the empress. By the way, I have a very deep grudge with the future world. They kidnapped some people that are very important to me, and one of these days I'm going to put an end to that Magister Proud Heaven.”

“You want to join forces? Have you forgotten that you’re my prisoner? Although I might not be able to harm your true self, I can tell that you’ve put a lot of work into this power double. If I kill it, my prison will make it impossible for the will inside to leave. I could then take that will and use one of my divine abilities to learn your deepest secrets.”

It was a very vicious threat.

And he had hit directly at a very sore point for Yang Qi. As long as he was on guard, it would generally be impossible to strike at his true form through the power double. But if the will that was contained in the power double were captured, it could definitely reveal secrets of his true self.

For example, it could reveal information about the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, King Immortal-Slayer, and other such things. It was similar to how the science and technology of the future world could take a single cell belonging to an individual and create an exact duplicate or clone, which would resemble the original in all aspects.

Worst-case scenario, it was possible that Profound Valor could learn about Yang Qi’s God Legion Seal, or even techniques from the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. Even if it was just the techniques of the seventy-two monarchs, or the Secret-Ensconcing All-World Anything-Everything Fundamental-Law Magic, it would still be a devastating blow to Yang Qi.

There was no way he could allow something like that to happen.

At the moment, it was hard to tell what Yang Qi’s true self was thinking. Had he really made the decision to abandon his power double? In the face of the terrifying Profound Valor, would he sacrifice a chariot to defend the general? Although it didn’t seem possible to even destroy the power double in full, at the moment.

At this point, Profound Valor broke out into laughter laced with killing energy. “You listen to me, boy, and you’ll be fine. Agreed?”

“So you’re relying on threats to get me to be your follower? Sorry, that’s not going to work. As far as I'm concerned, it's better to be a broken piece of jade than an intact clay tile.” Yang Qi had made his decision. If Profound Valor really did make a move, he would come as his true self and use the God Legion Seal to free his power double.

Perhaps it meant that his secret of the God Legion Seal would be revealed, but that was bound to happen eventually anyway.

“It's better to be a broken piece of jade than an intact clay tile? So, you’re the ambitious type. In that case, let’s see what secrets your little power double can tell me.”

He strode over and entered the cage; considering he had created it, he could go in and come out as he pleased. In the blink of an eye, he was right in front of Yang Qi, where he flicked his sleeve and sent out raging waters containing powerful magical laws. Yang Qi was instantly tightly bound, unable to move, his will and thoughts locked down by the godpower and magical laws.

Profound Valor’s eyes glittered as he stared at the power double and wondered what marvelous secrets he was about to learn. Reaching out, he clamped his hand down onto the power double’s head and prepared to extract the will from within it.

However, it was in that same moment that a vortex appeared in the primal-chaos paleo-energy beyond, and a figure appeared and launched an attack on the cage. It was none other than Yang Qi’s true self.

Meanwhile, a strange smile appeared on Profound Valor’s face. “I did it! I lured your true self out into the open. The fish has been hooked! Let’s see you escape now! You could have just abandoned your power double and lost a few secrets. Instead, you offered up your true self to be captured. Fool!”

Profound Valor vanished from within the cage, then reappeared right above Yang Qi’s true self.

“Grand God-Dao Highest-Heaven Sealing Mark!”

He threw his hands out, and an enormous net appeared which began to drop down toward Yang Qi.

In response, Yang Qi’s eyes glittered, and he chopped his hand out like a sharp blade, slicing through the net and heading directly toward Profound Valor.

His true self had a power index of seven hundred and was far stronger than his power double. Furthermore, thanks to the tempering of the “such arrogance” will convergence attack, he had reached an extremely high level of strength.

A cruel smile appeared on Profound Valor’s face as he said, “You’re pretty strong, aren't you? But you’re still a far cry from being at my level. Watch and learn; this is the power of an Inheritor of the Great Necropolis!”

POP!

He thrust his palm out in an attack that was both hard and soft, like twisting dragons and leaping tigers. It was something that seemed to contain the quintessence of the universe, the god world, the immortal dao, the future, and the primeval past.

It was an attack that seemed impossible to evade or block.

Profound Valor had planned long and hard for this moment, first luring Yang Qi’s true self into the open, then holding back this devastating attack in the hopes of killing or capturing him.

Yang Qi was just too tempting a target to pass up.

Chapter 916: Profound Danger

Profound Valor immediately unleashed a move onto Yang Qi that seemed completely impossible to evade.

Of course, Yang Qi had no intention of trying to evade it. Throwing his own hands out, he met the incoming attack with full force.

“Such arrogance!”

Explosive power erupted from the mysterious Vajra Māyādevī of the god world, a mighty will that Yang Qi directed straight toward Profound Valor and his attack.

Of course, Profound Valor knew how powerful Yang Qi’s moves were, and having been hit directly once, there was no way he would allow for a second time. He was a master of martial disciplines and energy arts, a top fighter and domineering figure of the age. Thus, he was prepared for the interchange. As their palms met, energy fluctuations spread out across him that sought to counter the attack of the voice.

Explosive rumbling sounds echoed out as the incoming will shattered.

However, Yang Qi took advantage of that moment to spin in place and strike out toward the cage, hoping to break it open and free his power double. If he succeeded, the two of them should be able to easily escape the situation.

“Trying to break open that cage? You think I’d let you do that? I went to all the trouble of luring your true self here, trust me, I'm going to bury both you and your power double!”

Having negated the most recent attack, Profound Valor went back on the offensive.

He moved as stealthily as a ghost, suddenly appearing right behind Yang Qi and unleashing an explosive attack.

Thrusting his fingers out into knifehands, he let loose a chopping attack that could cut through space itself. It was filled with such terrifying power and blade light that Yang Qi could tell it would cut him in half if it landed.

RUMBLE!

Yang Qi spun, and he looked like a devil-god from hell, or the boundless Sovereign Lord. A golden magical symbol appeared on his forehead, which turned into a golden imp. And when the imp spoke, its voice boomed like a bell, causing all of the surrounding primal-chaos to turn golden.

A massive tempest of destruction instantly sprang up.

In that moment, all of Yang Qi’s will was converged around the God Legion Seal. As he drew on the seal, he backed it with the Blood of the One God, rapidly draining his power but allowing him to unleash the most powerful attack he could manage.

SNICK!

He punched out with his fist, and although it wasn’t a special move, when it hit Profound Valor’s knifehand, it stopped it in its tracks.

Then a shock wave of power swept out through the primal-chaos.

Whack!

Yang Qi and Profound Valor flew away from each other, both of them injured and coughing up blood. The latter was worse off; he never could possibly have guessed that Yang Qi would have something as wildly powerful as a God Legion Seal. Plus, the will of the Vajra Māyādevī ensured that even when he was nearly destroyed, he could quickly and easily heal himself.

Even more relevant, his speed at assimilating godhood had increased, which further improved his healing abilities. In a single breath of time, Yang Qi recovered back to his peak state. Then he unleashed another punch, shattering the cage. A whooshing sound was then heard as his power double flew back into his true self.

Meanwhile, Profound Valor’s eyes glittered with peculiar light as he realized how marvelous Yang Qi’s God Legion Seal was. He also realized that Yang Qi was the type of enemy who, if he wasn’t destroyed now, would prove to be extremely troublesome later. After all, a major enmity had been sown today. Furthermore, Yang Qi had some spectacular treasures that Profound Valor was now dying to get his hands on.

“I can’t believe you have treasures like that. So that explains why you’re so important to the Immortal Dao Age. I'm not going to let you go, you know. Get on your knees and hand over your treasures!”

With a wave of his hand, he healed his own injuries and sent palm projections out in every direction, giving Yang Qi no avenue of escape.

“Six-Directions Heaven-Dao Paragon-Operation Azure-Dome Secret Magic!”

His technique surrounded Yang Qi so effectively that he couldn’t even escape to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

Eyes flashing, Yang Qi drew on the godhood within him, forcing out a hundred drops of liquid that he sent into the Engine of the One God. He was now drawing on an extremely powerful, last-resort killing move, filled with an explosive power that defied imagination.

As the Engine of the One God used the godhood to power up, his effective power index rose, causing explosive cracking sounds to fill him. From seven hundred, it rose to a thousand. Two thousand. Two thousand five hundred. Three thousand!

His power index now surpassed Profound Valor’s!

C-C-CRACK!

Profound Valor and Yang Qi exchanged another round of palm strikes, and this time Profound Valor’s face fell, turning as ashen as death as the godhood-backed Engine of the One God sent power coursing into him that shattered the meridians it passed through. This was a power that completely surpassed his level.

“Legacy of the Great Necropolis: Godpower Seed!Burial Ground of the Legions of Gods!” He drew mighty godpower out from his sea of energy, then exhaled it in the same way the Great Necropolis exhaled immortal worlds, causing everything to shake violently.

‘So did this guy get some godpower seed that turned out to be the legacy of the Great Necropolis?’ Yang Qi thought. ‘What's going on here? I need to find out more about this!’ As his opponent unleashed another mighty attack, Yang Qi borrowed the momentum to fly backward, where he vanished into a vortex.

Although he had used the might of the Engine of the One God to be able to temporarily fight Profound Valor, he knew that he had to escape before he ran out of momentum.

And once he was gone, there was no way Profound Valor would be able to follow him.

When Profound Valor’s hand clamped down onto nothing but air, he retracted his power, then coughed up another huge mouthful of blood. He had just been injured by Yang Qi’s God Legion Seal, then drawn deeply on the godpower seed that he had as an Inheritor. It wouldn’t be possible for him to recover quickly. Even though Yang Qi only had a third of the full God Legion Seal, it wasn’t any weaker than the godpower seed that Profound Valor had as an Inheritor of the Great Necropolis. If Yang Qi had all three pieces combined, he definitely would have been able to kill Profound Valor.

‘I can’t believe the brat has something like that,’ Profound Valor thought, settling down cross-legged to once again begin the process of healing and recovery. Within the depths of his sea of energy, there was a shadowy image that resembled the Great Necropolis in every way. That was the seed that gave him access to the essence of the Great Necropolis, and it was also what he used to heal himself.

‘God-Burying Monarch-Entombing Energy....’ After the energy flowed through him and healed him, he rose to his feet, fully recovered and with his energy arts even a bit better than they were before.

‘How amazing to be an Inheritor of the Great Necropolis. By tapping into that seed, I can draw on the mysterious power of the necropolis and cultivate the God-Burying Monarch-Entombing Energy Art. Once I fully master it, no one will be a match for me. Unfortunately, to do so, I have to kill all of the other Inheritors and take their godpower seeds. That's the only way to gain the true legacy.’

Becoming the true Inheritor of the Great Necropolis was the path to true invincibility.

‘I also need to get my hands on that Yang Qi and take all of his treasures.’ With that, he blurred into motion and vanished.

**

A short time later, a beam of light appeared, which resolved into the form of Leaf Dao-Denier. After examining the residual energy traces, he said, ‘I can’t believe someone as strong as him has appeared. Sectlord of the Profound Killing Dao Sect. Profound Valor. He used to be just an ordinary native of the Great Necropolis, but after getting a godpower seed, he actually managed to thrash that swine Yang Qi. How come I didn't get one of those godpower seeds when the Great Necropolis erupted? I’m the true Son of Heaven, the destined ruler of the Great Necropolis. I can’t let the situation go on like this. I'm going to report the matter to Empress Joyflower. She’ll definitely be able to kill this Profound Valor and get that godpower seed for me. Yes. Lend someone a knife and have them do my dirty work. Then I’ll betray Yang Qi and the others to the empress and have her kill them. As for that cursed oath I took, who cares about it. As long as I get strong enough, not even the dao of heaven will be able to oppose me. Eventually, I’ll conquer it!’

Flying up, Leaf Dao-Denier headed back toward the Joyflower Palace.

**

‘That was incredible,’ Yang Qi’s true self thought as he settled down in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart to focus on recovering from the fight. He had lost a lot of godhood liquid, and in the end he hadn’t even won the fight. That said, he was fairly sure he had enough godhood left to push his power index past a thousand.

His constitution made him different from other people. Others might be able to use the same amount of godhood to reach the level of three thousand. Unfortunately, his requirements were much higher. Such were the limitations placed on him, with regular power, and with godhood.

Thanks to the fight with Profound Valor, Yang Qi now understood more about the profound changes that were taking place to this age. Obviously, things were much more dangerous, and he couldn’t just rely on his God Legion Seal for protection anymore. If he wasn’t careful, someone might take it from him, killing him in the process. After all, even when the seal had been whole, there was still some almighty entity who destroyed its owner, broke it up into three pieces, and scattered them in the past, present, and future.

Chapter 917: Assimilating Godhood

Yang Qi didn’t think that further delays were a good idea.

The situation was developing rapidly, for instance, the debut of the Inheritors and their godpower seeds. The dao of heaven was changing, and it was impossible to say what powerful entities might appear on the scene. And if he wasn’t strong enough, there was always the threat of being picked on.

Although he had been rapidly growing stronger, as far as he was concerned, it wasn’t enough to keep up with the recent developments. After all, there were people who were rising to higher levels of cultivation faster than him now. It was an age of heroes, and it conformed perfectly to that oft-repeated saying that after the gods experience nirvanic rebirth, a new civilization would once again be born. After the arrival of the Great Necropolis, the face of the immortal dao civilization was changing completely.

‘The upside is that I'm forced to improve my cultivation base, and my overall level. The time has come to rise to new heights! Delaying isn’t an option! I'm going to completely assimilate this fragment of godhood!’

He rose to his feet in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart and drew on his energy arts to open a passageway to provoke the wrath of the gods.

Innumerable flaming expressions of god rage instantly descended, thrumming with explosive power as they enveloped him from head to toe.

The Deathless Heavenly Stairway appeared behind him, and he turned and stepped onto it. He had prepared long and hard for this moment; at long last, he was stepping past the first minor stair, and although it was a major accomplishment, it still left him very far from being a Grand Emperor.

That said, he had prepared so extensively for this moment that he was sure he would rapidly rise to extreme heights. There were nine mysterious stairs on the stairway: the Stairs of Valor, Strength, Wisdom, Endurance, Fearlessness, Awareness, Heaven-Fate, Forgetfulness, and finally, the Stair of the True Void.

The process involved understanding oneself, cleansing one's will, refining one’s body, and circulating one’s energy in a perfect cycle to absorb the quintessence of the god world. Only in that manner could one begin rising to deathlessness.

Yang Qi was already heading toward the second stair, the Stair of Strength.

The rage of the god world assailed him in the form of flame, but as his cultivation base fought through the tribulation, he not only achieved incredible progress, but was also able to perceive even deeper secrets regarding the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

‘All of this godhood will become power for me!’

He clenched his fist around the godhood, forcing it to melt into liquid true energy that he then instantly assimilated.

Throwing his head back and howling, he stepped fully onto the Stair of Strength. Afterward, he began to step forward yet again, prompting an influx of Wisdom as he reached the third stair. As for his will convergence, it surpassed even that which the “such arrogance” of the Vajra Māyādevī found untouchable.

In other words, he was on his way from Destabilizing will to the Terrifying level.

The difference between the two was so vast that it actually couldn’t be considered just going from one level to another. It was more like the difference between the sky and the land, or an emperor and a beggar. In fact, thinking back to his fight with Profound Valor, he realized that, despite being incredibly mighty, the man didn’t actually have Terrifying will. If he had, it would have been a simple matter for him to lock Yang Qi in place and prevent him from even moving.

The only reason he had such a powerful will was because he was an Inheritor with a godpower seed.

‘I'm not done yet!’

Stepping onto the third stair flooded him with Wisdom. Of course, it was not ordinary wisdom, but True Wisdom, something that surpassed the mundane. Ordinary wisdom related to intelligence, and perhaps to crafty plots and machinations. But this Wisdom pertained to enlightenment of the dao of heaven, the god world, the legion of gods, and universal power.

In the blink of an eye, he was on the Stair of Wisdom.

As he did, his will reached a higher level and his nascent divinity began emanating such pressure that even the magical symbol of the Secret-Ensconcing All-World Anything-Everything Fundamental-Law Magic was suppressed.

The words “such arrogance!” echoed out nonstop, yet they weren’t even the slightest threat to him. Unfortunately, he hadn’t yet reached a point where he could completely master the magical symbol.

‘Onward!’

Instantly, the godly knowledge-devils from all of the countless god items and god formations that he had assimilated flew out into the open, swirling around him as they chanted scriptures.

They were like members of the legion of gods, and as they converged upon each other, they formed a tiny golden person who looked exactly like the imp from the God Legion Seal. At that moment, Yang Qi took another step.

He was on the fourth stair, the Stair of Endurance.

Simultaneously, the godhood completely shattered, unable to stand up to the God Legion Seal and the force of Yang Qi’s will. It melted into an endless stream of liquid that flowed into him, burning with the fire of the gods and pulsing with a boundless and never-ending force.

[Beep-beep-beep. Beep-beep-beep. Power index eight hundred... eight hundred fifty... eight hundred ninety... nine hundred....]

The Cruiser of Civilization continued listing out the numbers before ultimately stopping at one thousand two hundred.

‘What a pity...’ Yang Qi thought. Sadly, although his will convergence now had nothing to fear from the “such arrogance” assault, he still wasn’t strong enough to completely subjugate the magical symbol that made up the technique. He would have to continue rising through the levels.

That was also when he would truly reach the level of Terrifying will.

Truth be told, his journey through the Godmyth level, going from Seer, Tempered, Incarnated God and the like, and progressing all the way to the Revisionist, Buddha, and Chaos God levels was all about improving his nascent divinity. In contrast, the nine stairs of the Deathless Heavenly Stairway were about forming one’s will and reaching the levels of Valor, Strength, Wisdom, Endurance, Fearlessness, Awareness, Heaven-Fate, Forgetfulness, and True Void.

In the end, it made one a Grand Emperor, and involved pure and raw power. Most people who became Grand Emperors would have a power index of one, whereas even the weakest Lesser God would have a power index of ten thousand. The rise from “one” to “ten thousand” could definitely be described as an increase of pure power. Whether it was the Godmyth level or the Deathless Heavenly Stairway, both were about tempering the inner self.

The stronger and more refined one's heart was, the further one could progress. And the more one gained mastery of the Godmyth level, the more likely they were to eventually become truly Deathless.

‘So I’m on the fourth minor stair, the Stair of Endurance. It's too bad that I don’t have power for more than that. I definitely have to get my hands on more godhood. That’s the only way to power further breakthroughs.’ He shook his head. ‘The requirements are insane. I don’t think that even the godhood of a Lesser God would be enough for my Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. It seems that the best option for getting stronger is to kill Empress Joyflower. I need to go back and find Leaf Dao-Denier, then force him to tell me what his plans are for the Joyflower Palace. Worst case scenario, I can kill him too. It’s not like he’s a match for me now.’

As of now, he didn’t need to rely on his power double any longer. He was now strong enough to face Profound Valor in his true body without fear. With a power index of one thousand two hundred, he was actually superior to even people with indexes of two or three thousand.

Swish!

He left the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart as his true self and headed toward the Joyflower Palace. Once inside, he slipped undetected into a palace deep in its depths.

Instead of going to Flower Goddesses Jade Nightqueen and Snowlotus, he headed toward Leaf Dao-Denier, intent on forcing him to reveal his true plans, and at the same time, adding power to his Heaven-God Hell-Exterminating Devil Embryo.

Now that Yang Qi was so much stronger, it was an easy task for him to use that devil embryo to track down Leaf Dao-Denier, who was in a session of secluded meditation at the moment.

Swish!

Once inside the palace, he waved his hand and set up a shield of power. Considering the level of his cultivation base, no one other than Empress Joyflower herself could possibly pierce the warding spells that he set up with the Life-Death Void-Destruction Lightning.

Leaf Dao-Denier was engaged in breathing exercises, absorbing the mysterious powers of the buddhist school of the god world and combining it with the Taiji Indestructible Chaos-Magic World-Terrorizing Profound Art he had.

All of a sudden, he opened his eyes and thrust his palms out, sending out two energy flows, one a pure expression of the great dao of taiji, and the other an expression of the vajra emptiness of buddhism.

The two opposites combined into a palm strike of immense power.

“What is the empress still doing in meditation?” he murmured. “It's a critical moment, and even now she isn’t showing her face. Damnation, I need to tell her about how the Inheritors have appeared!

“What is that brat Yang Qi up to right now, I wonder? Well, it's not like Profound Valor will kill him. He faced him as a power double, so, worst-case scenario, he’ll sacrifice a chariot to defend the general. Maybe he’ll end up weakened, which would be the perfect opportunity to stomp him into the ground and torment him to death.” He chuckled coldly.

However, that was when a new voice echoed out in his private meditation chamber.

“Wow, you really do hate me, don’t you, Leaf Dao-Denier. Can’t we just be allies for once?” Yang Qi strolled out into the open.

Swish!

Leaf Dao-Denier shot to his feet, his hackles rising. “You... Yang Qi! How did you get in here?”

“Simple. I walked in.” He looked around. “You have some nice warding magics, but they're weak. Nothing amazing as far as I'm concerned, and full of way too many holes. Here, I’ll fix them for you. But afterward, you’ll have to learn a thing or two from me, otherwise you’ll end up stuck inside.”

Chapter 918: Plotting Against the Empress

Looking absolutely terrified, Leaf Dao-Denier immediately launched an attack with his left hand using the Taiji Indestructible Chaos-Magic World-Terrorizing Profound Art, and with his right hand using the Secret-Ensconcing All-World Anything-Everything Fundamental-Law Magic. As a result, two powerful streams of energy shot out as he attempted to break through the seals and escape.

Unfortunately, he was too weak and slow.

Yang Qi murmured an enchantment and a glittering wall of mist appeared, which the attacks sank into without any effect.

Unwilling to give in, Leaf Dao-Denier burst into motion, looking almost like a fly trapped in a bottle as he scurried this way and that in his attempts to break free. However, any force he unleashed was absorbed by the warding magics, making it obvious that he was completely and utterly trapped.

“No!” Eventually, he stopped moving and looked over viciously at Yang Qi. Clenching his hands into claws, he lunged forward like a tiger.

Yang Qi hardly looked at him or his two consummate energy arts. He threw a palm out using the Hand of the One God, causing dazzling sagelight to flare. At the same time, bright light shone as he summoned a sealing mark from the Secret-Ensconcing All-World Anything-Everything Fundamental-Law Magic.

It was a simple move, but backed by power that could change something rotten into something magical. As soon as it hit Leaf Dao-Denier, he staggered backward, vomiting up a mouthful of blood and falling into a sitting position.

Yang Qi didn’t press the attack. Although he did plan to eventually kill Leaf Dao-Denier, he was still connected to Empress Joyflower for now. If he killed him, she would show up almost immediately. Besides, Leaf Dao-Denier was already deeply infected by his Heaven-God Hell-Exterminating Devil Embryo, which meant that Yang Qi could control him without him even knowing about it.

However, he didn't want to do that right now. If he did, Leaf Dao-Denier would surely try to destroy the devil embryo.

“You!” Leaf Dao-Denier blurted, then coughed up another mouthful of blood as he realized that he had been completely drained of power and couldn’t muster a single energy art. It would definitely take him at least two to three days to recover. “Since when did your energy arts advance so dramatically? I thought you ended up defeated by Profound Valor!”

“Oh? So you were watching my fight with Profound Valor?” Yang Qi chuckled. “I figured all along you were up to no good. You never had any intention of actually working with me, did you?”

“That's not true!” he replied, struggling to his feet. “I really do want to work with you to deal with Empress Joyflower. Yang Qi, your energy arts improve too quickly. Every time I think I can finally beat you, you advance by leaps and bounds and leave me in the dust. Why? Why does this always happen? Does heaven have something against me? Am I just not talented enough? Are my energy arts not good enough? Is it really heaven wanting to kill me despite my success in battle?!”

“Enough whining,” Yang Qi said coolly. “I assimilated some godhood and boosted my cultivation base, that’s all. You have one choice here: be a good boy and do what I say. If you do, I won’t kill you. After all, you have incredible prospects for the future.”

A moment passed, and Leaf Dao-Denier’s expression softened. “What are you trying to do here, Yang Qi?”

Of course, his meekness was an act; as soon as he heard that Yang Qi had assimilated some godhood, his heart burned with malice and hatred, although he hid it well.

On the other hand, Yang Qi was no fool.

Once the devil embryo grew to an appropriate size, he would use it to simply possess Leaf Dao-Denier. In fact, he was even thinking of taking advantage of a moment when Leaf Dao-Denier and Empress Joyflower were involved in dual cultivation to also infect the empress.

Unfortunately, given the level of her cultivation base, that wasn’t likely to happen.

“You need to hurry up and get into dual cultivation with the empress,” Yang Qi said. “We’re running out of time, and need to kill her as soon as possible. Her abilities are terrifying, to say the least, and she’ll be difficult to keep under control.”

“But I have no way to get in touch with her,” Leaf Dao-Denier replied with a sigh. “She's in seclusion in a very dangerous session of meditation. I’d hoped to let her know about the Inheritors of the Great Necropolis, but I really don’t have any way to reach her.”

“Oh? Well in that case, I have an idea.” It seemed to Yang Qi that now might be the perfect time to head back into the Joyflower Palace’s treasure storehouse and clear out more god formations.

Now that his energy arts had advanced so much, he was capable of much greater speed than before. And with the Secret-Ensconcing All-World Anything-Everything Fundamental-Law Magic, as well as his higher level of will, dealing with the knowledge-devils would be much easier.

“How about this. I might as well help you out a bit by giving you an amazing energy art. Cultivate it, and it will help you immensely during your next session of dual cultivation with Empress Joyflower. Because you have her warding spell inside you, once you cultivate this technique, she’ll sense it and will want to practice dual cultivation as soon as possible.”

Yang Qi’s main plan was to get through all of the remaining god formations in the storehouse and take that god-king’s tear. If he used it to power up the Engine of the One God, he wouldn't need to fear anyone, even the other Inheritors. In fact, he could take them all down one by one.

The godhood contained in the tear of the Passionless God-King was too much for him to personally absorb, being more than a hundred times stronger than the godhood he had acquired in the Exquisite Cathedral.

But it would be perfect for the Engine of the One God and its systems.

“You’re going to impart a consummate energy art to me?” Leaf Dao-Denier said, sounding surprised. “Don’t tell me... don’t tell me it’s the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth?!”

“That’s right. I'm going to give you some of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. But listen well. You can't actually cultivate the technique on your own. That requires the God Legion Seal. Anyone who tries to cultivate it without the seal will eventually experience cultivation deviation and explode. I'm going to imbue you with some of the true energy of the technique, which you can circulate to make it seem like you’re cultivating the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. That will definitely attract the attention of Empress Joyflower.”

“Alright!” Leaf Dao-Denier said. However, deep within his eyes was an imperceptible, sinister glimmer. ‘Ah, Yang Qi. You’re really not holding anything back against Empress Joyflower. You’re even going to give me some of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. Hmph! You think you can scare me by saying that without the God Legion Seal I’ll experience cultivation deviation? Yeah, right. I, Leaf Dao-Denier, am both an Eternal One and a Fortuned One. I can cultivate any technique I come across. The Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth is the top energy art from the godmammoths, and you think I'm not going to cultivate it?’

With that, Yang Qi imbued Leaf Dao-Denier with some of the cultivation techniques of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. Afterward, he said, “If the empress asks where you got this, you tell her you learned it from someone who looks like this....”

He went on to describe Proud Heaven as he had looked back in the Titan Emperor Collegium.

Of course, Leaf Dao-Denier went along with everything.

After it was all over, Yang Qi faded away, then reappeared moments later in the treasure storehouse. Thankfully, none of his previous activity had been discovered. Furthermore, the box that had been delivered to the empress remained unopened. Perhaps it was because Empress Joyflower was busy with cultivation, or perhaps she was just being careful; it was hard to say.

Yang Qi was tempted to open the message and see what it said, but resisted the urge. Instead, he headed back to the area with the god formations and resumed his previous work. He had previously stopped after taking twenty million formations, all of which he had sent into his virtual god world. As a result, his followers and disciples there were all masters of spell formations, and many of them had experienced multiple breakthroughs. Once they emerged back in the immortal worlds, they would be a very powerful force. Of course, the Immortal Dao Age was changing dramatically, so it was a given that Yang Qi wanted to once again establish his own territory and begin expanding it.

Crack! Snap!

As he stood there within the spell formations, he didn’t need to do so much as flick his sleeve. Godpower erupted from his eyes, causing every formation he looked at to transform into dust, which he absorbed with his Lord's Eye. Then his two mundane eyes would recreate an identical projection of every formation that was taken.

Within less than two hours, he had taken an additional hundred million formations. Of course, that caused the same amount of knowledge-devils to appear within his mind, which he vanquished.

As he proceeded forward, he moved more and more quickly, until he had taken fully six hundred million formations. That, in turn, caused dramatic transformations and developments in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart as the countless formations popped into being, creating a profound tempest for the betterment of the disciples there.

“Be broken!”

At this point, his progress began slowing. He had to admit that the Passionless God-King was worthy of praise for setting up so many spell formations. What had his aim been, though?

The further Yang Qi went into the area of the spell formations, and the closer he got to the center, the more sure he was that there was grief-tinged godhood there. However, as the Engine of the One God absorbed the surrounding energy, it was gradually powering up.

The strength god systems were coming more fully online, and as a result, they were sending waves of strength into Yang Qi.

His mind was now thrumming with the same resonance as the God Legion Seal.

Chapter 919: Plotting Against the Empress (2)

Lifting his consciousness to a higher level had drawn him even closer to the God Legion Seal.

His current grand ambition was to eventually abandon the old God Legion Seal, and instead forge his own nascent divinity and mind into an exact replica. After all, the God Legion Seal technically didn’t belong to him, which would eventually cause problems for him in terms of controlling it.

He needed to develop his own nascent divinity and consciousness, and focus on his true ego. After all, there was nothing more true and real than one’s self. Everything else was merely an illusion.

He vanquished all of the knowledge-devils, whereupon godliness and the will of gods flooded into him, strengthening the God Legion Seal and producing more transformations.

As Yang Qi examined his nascent divinity, he saw that it already looked like a golden imp, covered with complex designs and shining with a golden light that pierced into the depths of the universe.

His Wisdom was now as deep as the sea itself.

A smile appeared on his face, and at the same time, his nascent divinity opened its mouth, causing numerous spell formations to collapse into particles. Roiling vital energy from the god-king’s tear was now streaming into Yang Qi’s heart.

After passing into what was beyond the level of six hundred million god formations, Yang Qi reached an area filled with bleak mists and rushing winds.

The mists were filled with an aura of grief, and Yang Qi wouldn’t have been able to proceed easily without the Engine of the One God to absorb them. Even an expert like Profound Valor would have been adversely affected by the mists, and would have either been reduced to ash, or transformed into a puppet who would haunt the mists henceforth. They came from the tears filled with godhood, something that no one under the level of the legion of gods could resist. They were the kind of thing that could only be used as a source of power, not assimilated.

Thankfully, Yang Qi had the Engine of the One God, which could absorb any of these types of power and add it to its reserves.

Yang Qi suddenly inhaled deeply, causing mist to rush toward his palm, where it took the form of a drop of water that actually resembled a teardrop. He immediately sent it into the Engine of the One God.

Thump thump.... Thump thump....

The black and bronze, heart-shaped Engine of the One God was moving, emitting a sound that was almost like the beating of a drum.

[Beep-beep-beep. Beep-beep-beep.... Second state of the strength god systems activated....]

Yang Qi scanned the engine with divine will and it seemed to him almost as if some ancient god were waking up. It was a higher state than the strength god systems, although in some ways it was softer than before. However, it was still strong, just as soft water could be strong enough to bore a hole into rock.

RUMBLE!

Burning godlight appeared inside of him as his heart was transformed. As it pulsed, it connected to the power of the Engine of the One God and made it more a part of him.

His heart began beating more quickly, then more slowly, the speed variable. Sometimes it seemed like the pounding of war drums, and other times it was like the march of an army. And sometimes it was like the whispered fall of spring rain.

As he breathed and his blood flowed, it was as if a melody drifted within him that contained enlightenment of the profundities of heaven and earth. Somehow, he was drawing closer to the god world, and his cultivation base was reaching a higher peak of perfection.

“Come forth!” he said, thrusting his palm out in the final move of the Hand of the One God, Immortality. Energy surged out, and fully ten million spell formations flowed toward him.

His speed had increased yet again.

These were spell formations whose central nexuses were filled with corporeal god items and souls, not the illusory type that were usually featured in lower-level formations.

There were plenty of very powerful items, but nothing that Yang Qi could really use. However, to people with power indexes of less than a thousand, they would be extremely helpful. Soon, when his followers finally went out into the outside world again, they would definitely shake the immortal worlds.

This was the absolute quintessence of the Joyflower Palace, and if Yang Qi’s guesses were right, they were probably items that had been stored here nearly since the founding of the organization. Apparently, not even Empress Joyflower had even been able to touch them, which further reinforced his guess that no one had ever pierced through the mists to the god-king’s tear.

RUUUUUMBLE!

After several days passed, Yang Qi finally broke through all barriers and had taken nine hundred ninety-nine million, nine hundred ninty-nine thousand, nine hundred and ninety-nine of the total one billion spell formations. There was only one left, and its function was to contain the ocean that was the tear of godhood.

It was the last god formation, and it was the largest by far.

There were nine pillars that could prop up heaven, covered with countless magical symbols, flowers, and images of both men and women. The men and women all seemed to be couples, and they all seemed to be deeply in love with each other.

Creaking and crunching sounds could be heard as the pillars rotated, and as they spun, the images on them changed. The previously loving men and women changed, and began violently tearing at each other until blood flowed. It was brutal and bitter, with women digging out the hearts of the men, and men decapitating the women. Some bit and clawed at each other, making the entire thing seem like an image from hell. Positive emotions drained away into nothing, and then nothingness became despair.

Love turned into hatred, and affection to enmity.

The intensity of it all caused Yang Qi to flinch. He shook his head. This type of god formation was such a masterpiece of emotion that he was already convinced he couldn’t break it. It seemed to be connected so deeply to the Joyflower Palace that if he touched it, the entire place would shake violently.

‘This thing is so powerful that not even I can touch it. With something like this, it’s no wonder the Joyflower Palace lasted for hundreds of millions of years on the Ancient Road to the Gods without anyone defeating them. Not even the superpowers can do anything to the Joyflower Palace. Intense emotion. Intense lack of emotion. If there’s any power that could be considered transcendent in the mortal world, it’s emotion....’

Compared to this god formation, the rest he had taken seemed like little more than laughable toys.

‘Forget it. I’ll just sit here and absorb as much godhood as I can for the Engine of the One God.’ Looking around at the mists, he sat down cross-legged and got to work.

Within the depths of the Engine of the One God, there was a crystalline area that served as the location of the power reserves. And with every clump of mist that he absorbed, an expression of godhood formed, looking very much like a teardrop.

Before hardly any time had passed, there were over a thousand of them.

Now that the strength god systems had reached their second state, the Engine of the One God could convert these teardrops into expressions of power equivalent to experts with power indexes of two thousand.

In other words, if Yang Qi burned them all at once, it would allow him to strike a blow like that of an expert with a power index of three or four thousand.

That would definitely be suitable for fighting Empress Joyflower.

He continued with his work, bringing in tens of thousands of the teardrop expressions of godhood. Eventually, the mists around him were virtually gone.

At that point, he stopped absorbing the mist and went on to deal with the knowledge-devils in his sea of consciousness.

‘I could easily beat you now, Profound Valor,’ he thought. Looking around, he saw that the final remaining spell formation was causing more mist to spill out and refill the area, to the point where it looked just like before.

At this point, he had cleared out about a third of the storehouse. As for the rest of the items, he decided to leave them in place for the time being to avoid attracting attention.

After returning to his quarters, he didn’t see Flower Goddesses Jade Nightqueen or Snowlotus.

As for the sect leaders he had working for him, they were practicing cultivation or contemplating ways to deal with Empress Joyflower.

Yang Qi considered what he should do next. Should he go try to kill Profound Valor and take the Inheritor seed from him? Then deal with Empress Joyflower afterward? That seemed like the safest bet.

However, although he was fairly certain he could kill Profound Valor, if the man ended up trying to flee, it could end up being a big waste of time. A chase like that could end up dragging on for years.

Even as he was contemplating his next move, he received a message from Leaf Dao-Denier.

Chapter 920: Plotting Against the Empress (3)

“Get over here!” Leaf Dao-Denier said. “Empress Joyflower just summoned me for dual cultivation. This is our best chance to kill her! Get to my palace immediately!”

Heart pounding, Yang Qi called the sect leaders to him, then became a rushing breeze that raced over to Leaf Dao-Denier’s residence.

Leaf Dao-Denier stood there looking as calm as could be, with an unreadable expression on his face. Almost immediately, Yang Qi detected power fluctuations from him that resembled the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. Examining him through the devil seed, Yang Qi could see that he had been forcibly cultivating the technique, despite the warning not to do so. Truth be told, it was no surprise. If Leaf Dao-Denier wanted to do something suicidal, Yang Qi would let him, and wouldn’t provide any help when the deadly moment of truth arrived.

“Just what exactly is going on?” Yang Qi asked. “Where will the dual cultivation be happening? There will definitely be defensive measures in place. How are we supposed to get inside?”

Remaining as calm as ever, Leaf Dao-Denier produced a command medallion and said, “Once I’ve arrived at my destination, I’ll set up a spatial nexus connected this command medallion. Then, when I'm in place, you can use the medallion to teleport to my location.”

“That works,” Yang Qi said, taking the medallion he was offered. Glancing at the sect leaders, he saw a variety of expressions on their faces. Obviously, some of them were less than happy with him, but considering he had infected them with devil embryos, there was no way they could plot or scheme against him.

Everything seemed to be going smoothly.

“We’ll wait for your call, then,” said Cipher Ever-Heaven. “Remember the oath you swore, Leaf Dao-Denier, and how we helped you with your Secret-Ensconcing All-World Anything-Everything Fundamental-Law Magic. If you reveal our plan to the empress, all of us will end up dead.”

“Don’t worry, I won’t let that happen,” Leaf Dao-Denier said. “You think I want to be a consort for the rest of my life? I'm relying on all of you to help make sure Empress Joyflower ends up dead. I would be a complete fool to let this opportunity pass me by. If she continues making progress in her cultivation, it will become increasingly difficult to do anything. Remember, I face the prospect of immense humiliation if you fail.”

“Focusing on doubts won’t do any good,” said Battle Resister. “Don’t forget the oath you swore. If you do anything to betray us, and we don’t kill her today, you’ll definitely be a consort for the rest of your life.

“He's right,” Daolord Cloud Severing said. “If we fail, you’ll remain as a consort, but she’ll pick someone else to be her favorite. Your ultimate fate will be dismal.”

“I'm fully aware of all the potential consequences,” Leaf Dao-Denier said. “Wait here for my next update.”

“We will,” Yang Qi said, still refraining from activating the devil embryo. Not only did he not want to alert Leaf Dao-Denier to its presence, but he could also sense something Empress Joyflower had left in Leaf Dao-Denier, sealed, calling to him. Activating the devil embryo now would most likely warn her as well.

Unfortunately, without proactively using the devil embryo, Yang Qi couldn't get a read on Leaf Dao-Denier’s thoughts and feelings, thus he had no way to know what he was really thinking.

A moment later, Leaf Dao-Denier vanished without a trace. However, in the moment he left, they sensed profound killing intent coming from the passageway he took.

“Such incredible viciousness!” Battle Resister said. Looking over at Yang Qi and the medallion he held, he said, “What do you think, Brother Yang Qi? Will Leaf Dao-Denier betray us? Fight us?”

“It’s hard to say,” Yang Qi replied. “We’ll just have to wait and see. Considering the recent advancement in your energy arts, Brother Battle Resister, I have a feeling we can hold our own even if he does turn on us. Either way, it seems to me that he's a bit nervous.”

Battle Resister chuckled. “You’re very perceptive, Brother Yang Qi. Meanwhile, I can’t get a read on your cultivation base. Could it be that you’re here as your true self?”

Yang Qi nodded. “That’s right, I'm here as my true self. How else would I fight Empress Joyflower? I'm putting everything on the line today.”

Even as the words left his mouth, his expression suddenly turned very serious as he realized that Leaf Dao-Denier had entered some secret aspect of space-time, a place filled with immense will and power. Almost immediately, the devil embryo inside him was forced into a state of complete inactivity, much like hibernation.

He was now completely in the dark about what Leaf Dao-Denier was doing, which definitely threw all of his plans for a major loop. However, the only thing he could do was remain patient.

Meanwhile, in a certain alternate dimension, Leaf Dao-Denier was in the presence of a young woman. She wore crimson garments that glowed with such a bright red light that it was difficult to make out her facial features.

From the look of her, if she were to be killed, she would definitely become the most consummate of ghosts.

“My respects, Empress!” Leaf Dao-Denier said, dropping down to one knee. Already, his heart felt cold, as he knew that Empress Joyflower only wore the color of blood when she planned to kill someone. And when she planned to kill, she never revealed her true facial features.

Her color always matched her mood, and her current getup meant that she was ready for slaughter.

“Has someone been threatening you, Leaf Dao-Denier?” she asked in a very serious tone of voice. “I can sense that you acquired a boundless godly-class energy art, the same as that person. Did he use threats to force you to work for him?”

“Er....” Leaf Dao-Denier knew full well that the person she was referring to was none other than the Proud Heaven that Yang Qi had mentioned. Earlier, he had been committed to following Yang Qi’s instructions about what to do in this situation, but all of a sudden he was starting to have doubts. He was inclined to defy Yang Qi, but on the other hand, he was also worried that Yang Qi had infected him with something that could harm him. He knew how vicious Yang Qi was, and that he had profound and deadly energy arts.

“There’s no need to be afraid,” she continued coolly. “I sensed it as soon as you began using the energy art, which is why I emerged from seclusion and called you to me. I created this dimension we're in, and it can suppress anything from powerful energy arts to warding spells. Whatever that person placed in you, it will be suppressed. Fear not. Tell me the truth about everything.”

“Yes, Empress,” he said. Then, a vicious grin appeared on his face as he said, “It was Yang Qi, not Proud Heaven. He's a bastard son of Proud Heaven, and I don’t know what he's really up to. For all I know, he's working on Proud Heaven’s orders. All I know is that he has the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. I originally met him in the immortal worlds, where he founded the Dao Defense League. Now the Dao Defense League belongs to the Joyflower Palace, and he's come for revenge. He's even working with Battle Resister and some other sect leaders.

“He forced me to work for him, so I honestly don’t know what's going on. His energy arts have been advancing by leaps and bounds, which is why I suspect he's actually one of Proud Heaven’s tools. It must be Proud Heaven who helped him with them....” He continued blathering on for quite a bit, holding nothing back as he betrayed Yang Qi and the others.

That said, he didn't tell the full and complete truth. For example, Leaf Dao-Denier knew full well that Yang Qi had a God Legion Seal, and that it had nothing whatsoever to do with Proud Heaven. How could a God Legion Seal be freely gifted from one person to another?

However, he didn’t mention anything about that, hoping that if he convinced her that Yang Qi cultivated the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth because of Proud Heaven, he might be able to take the God Legion Seal in the end.

“Proud Heaven’s son? Yang Qi?” She sank into thoughtfulness for a long moment, until a mysterious smile appeared on her face, although Leaf Dao-Denier was barely able to make it out thanks to the bright red glow that surrounded her. “Well, that's fine. He must be an important son to Proud Heaven. I wonder what fool of a woman gave birth to him. Whoever it was, she deserves to die. So, Battle Resister and Cipher Ever-Heaven are allied against me too? I guess I’ll just have to bury them all. Unfortunately, I still haven’t finished cultivating my new energy art. Once I do, and my will goes from the Destabilizing level to the Terrifying level, killing all of those people will be an easy task.”

“Empress, if you want, I can easily just lure them right here into this dimension. I've already made all the arrangements.”

“Oh?” Empress Joyflower smiled. “I appreciate your loyalty, Leaf Dao-Denier, and the fact that you chose not to plot with them against me. I’ll reward you well for this. Just tell me what you want. Anything.”

Bowing his head to hide the sinister gleam in his eyes, he said, “Empress, as a consort, it’s my duty to serve you. I only hope that, after you capture Yang Qi, you don’t kill him. Please, just capture him. Oh, one other thing, Empress. A new force has arisen called the Inheritors of the Great Necropolis. I also hope you can get the godpower seed of an Inheritor for me.”

Chapter 921: Snitch

“What? Inheritors of the Great Necropolis? Who are they?” Empress Joyflower had been in seclusion recently and had no idea of this development.

“Some dramatic events unfolded in the Great Necropolis,” Leaf Dao-Denier said. “Profound Valor from the Profound Killing Dao Sect experienced a dramatic improvement in energy arts. He even fought a big battle with people from the future world and our Joyflower Palace.”

He went on to explain all the details.

“The immortal worlds changed that dramatically?” She silently drew on her nascent divinity as if to observe certain matters, then said, “I see. Everything is changing. What exactly is this Great Necropolis doing? Despite hundreds of millions of years of research, I had no idea something like this would happen. I do know that some of the superpower sects have gone extremely deep into the Great Necropolis and acquired certain benefits. Perhaps they unlocked something. And perhaps I need to go kill the leaders of those sects.”

“Empress, you are invincible and shall succeed in everything you do. You’ll definitely achieve Terrifying will and dominate everything under heaven.”

“Leaf Dao-Denier, do you know why I picked you as my favored consort?” she asked. “Because you’re sensible. You might be ambitious, but you can see the bigger picture. You know that I’ll always be stronger than you, and that it would be foolish to rebel against me. Of course, I know about your minor plots and schemes to gain power, but I can tolerate such things.”

“Empress, all I want to do is get a bit stronger. And I don’t hate anyone in life more than I hate Yang Qi. I used to have some of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions, but he stole them from me. I also had a fragment of the Cruiser of Civilization, but he robbed me of that as well. There are other things he took from me, too. He’s my archenemy, and that's something I’ll never be able to forget. I won’t rest until I personally kill him!”

“I understand. Very well, let’s see what this Yang Qi placed inside of you.” She waved her hand, causing Leaf Dao-Denier to fly over and land on the palm of her hand. Then she sent immense force pouring into him, which immediately locked onto the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. In the blink of an eye, she extracted it, causing it to transform into the shape of a godmammoth that was standing on a roiling black cloud of hells.

“So, this is the top technique of the god world,” she said with a smile. “The Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. Ah, Proud Heaven. I can only imagine how much true energy you wasted giving this to your son. Is he really that important to you? I'm curious to see what he looks like.”

With that, her eyes flashed and she continued probing Leaf Dao-Denier.

A moment later, her expression became serious, and something else flew out of Leaf Dao-Denier, which emitted a piercing shriek as soon as it was in the open.

Leaf Dao-Denier’s jaw dropped, as he had been completely unaware there was anything else in him.

Looking over, he saw the empress holding what looked like a fist-sized, unborn child. Half of it was pitch black, the other half was glowing with light, as if it were a cross between a heaven-god and a fiend-devil. Of course, it was none other than Yang Qi’s Heaven-God Hell-Exterminating Devil Embryo.

“Is this some sort of devil embryo? Does it have the energy of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth? No, it doesn’t seem so....” The empress frowned. “Proud Heaven explained the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth to me once, including all of its various energy arts states, and I don’t remember anything like this. Don’t tell me he finally succeeded in defeating the successor in the Primeval Age. Could he possibly have acquired a second God Legion Seal? Did he finally acquire more of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth? What a terrifying thought.”

Meanwhile, Leaf Dao-Denier clenched his hands into fists and shouted, “Arrrgh! How? How did he put something like that in me? And how could I not have been aware of it? What is it? A devil embryo? I can’t believe he put a devil embryo inside me! Disgusting!”

“Yes, it’s a devil embryo. And it was put in you without your knowledge. It allowed him to absorb any energy arts you used while it was in you, and also spy on your every word and action. Thankfully, you told me the truth, otherwise he could have used this to exercise complete control over you for the rest of your life. Later, when you ceased being valuable, he could activate the full power of the thing to devour your soul, quintessence energy, flesh, and blood. You would have become part of Yang Qi. Very powerful. This kid gets more and more interesting the more I learn about him.”

**

‘Not good!’ Yang Qi thought.

He was just now getting the sense of what was happening. Thankfully, he had recently conquered over nine hundred million knowledge-devils, pushing his nascent divinity to a much higher level. “She knows about my devil embryo. Thankfully, I still have a way to reach out to it! Devil Embryo Connection; Eternal Path!”

RUMBLE!

He flicked his sleeve, gathering up all of the sect leaders. “We have a problem, everyone. Leaf Dao-Denier has betrayed us. We're all in grave danger, but as you know, rewards come only with risk. I’ve created a new spatial nexus that we can go through right now. Let's launch the attack on Empress Joyflower immediately!”

Yang Qi would never trust anything Leaf Dao-Denier had laid his hands on, including the command medallion. Therefore, he was using the devil embryo as the nexus, and was drawing on the powers of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart to lock on to the empress’ position.

There was no way Leaf Dao-Denier could have predicted that he would do this.

Even if Leaf Dao-Denier went all out, there was no way he could catch up to Yang Qi when it came to plots and schemes.

Although some of the sect leaders resisted, they all suddenly felt their vision grow dark for a moment. Then, they found themselves facing Leaf Dao-Denier and a young woman in bright red clothing.

Everyone knew who she was. Empress Joyflower. And the location they were in was the most secure dimension in the Joyflower Palace, a place she normally reserved for her private sessions of cultivation.

At that moment, the sect leaders realized that Yang Qi had not deceived them. Considering that all of them had been rivals of Empress Joyflower for hundreds of millions of years, they were all very familiar with her aura.

Thump. Swish. Rustle.

The sect leaders instantly unleashed the spell formations they had planned for this moment, which swept out to cover the empress and Leaf Dao-Denier.

At the same time, a weapon appeared in Battle Resister’s hand, an enormous, pitch-black cudgel, covered with protrusions made from magical symbols.

“Heaven-Quaking God Cudgel!”

Moments before, Leaf Dao-Denier had been cursing Yang Qi and his devil embryo, and in his desire to kill him, he had been trying to convince Empress Joyflower to move against him.

But then the devil embryo had suddenly trembled and Yang Qi and all of his allies popped out into the open.

It was almost like a nightmare.

“You! Yang Qi! What are you doing here!? That medallion was supposed to trap you in a deadly dimension!” Although Leaf Dao-Denier was nearly hysterical, when he looked over and saw how calm Empress Joyflower was, he regained control of himself.

“So, you really did betray us, Leaf Dao-Denier,” Battle Resister said. “In the end, you’re nothing but a snitch. Aren’t you worried about the ramifications of your oath?”

Leaf Dao-Denier burst into maniacal laughter. “That oath was a complete sham. I never swear oaths. By the way, it's good you’re here. Empress Joyflower is going to slaughter all of you! I can’t believe you infected me with a devil embryo, Yang Qi! How vicious and wicked!”

Ignoring Leaf Dao-Denier’s ravings, Yang Qi looked at the empress in her bright red clothing that made her look like an evil ghost. Unexpectedly, she radiated the sorrowful aura of the Passionless God-King, making it seem like she was his reincarnation. “Greetings, Empress Joyflower. So, we meet at last. I'm quite impressed by your Joyflower Palace. You really dominate the Ancient Road to the Gods, winning victories at every turn as you seek to conquer all existence.”

“You’re Proud Heaven’s son?” the empress said, her eyes as cold as ice. “Apparently you inherited some of his vicious nature. You’ll stoop to anything to achieve your goals, won’t you, you—”

“Shut it,” Yang Qi interrupted. “I'm no son of Proud Heaven. He doesn’t deserve to be my father. I'm a Fateless One, Empress Joyflower. Didn’t you realize that? Proud Heaven is after me, hoping to get something that I possess. But in the end, I’m going to kill him.”

“What?” Empress Joyflower blurted in fury. Then, a moment later, the term Fateless One registered and her expression slightly softened. Examining Yang Qi, she said, “So, you're a Fateless One. In that case, I suppose you actually aren’t Proud Heaven’s son. Fateless Ones have no true parents and reign supreme among the three thousand special constitutions. So does that mean... your ‘energy arts’ are yours alone? Do you have... that thing on you?”

She nearly spoke the words ‘Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth’ and ‘God Legion Seal’, but managed to hold her tongue. When she finished speaking, she looked at Yang Qi with glittering eyes. Clearly, she intended to take those things if he had them.

‘Dammit!’ Leaf Dao-Denier cursed inwardly. Unfortunately, the situation had already developed beyond his control. All he could do now was sit back and watch Empress Joyflower fight her enemies.

“For now, let's forget about what I have or don’t have,” Yang Qi said. From Empress Joyflower’s tone of voice when she mentioned Proud Heaven’s name, it was obvious that she deeply hated him. “We’ve come here today to kill you. Your people stole my Dao Defense League, and tricked me into becoming a mere prisoner. The time has come to settle accounts.”

Chapter 922: Prelude to a Huge Battle

[Beep-beep-beep. Beep-beep-beep. Unable to assess power index. Power fluctuations distorted and masked. Incapable of gathering information. Your current level is insufficient. Power assessment systems must be upgraded.]

Yang Qi knew that this would be a desperate battle.

Empress Joyflower was so strong that he couldn’t get a read on her, which meant he had no idea of the true limits of her power. It was the first time someone had energy arts capable of blocking his power assessment systems. Not even Profound Valor had been able to do such a thing.

“Yang Qi,” Empress Joyflower said, “considering that you’re a Fateless One, and you oppose Proud Heaven, why not join me? Be my consort and practice dual cultivation with me. Your daoist techniques and energy arts will advance to a higher level, and besides, no one knows Proud Heaven’s weak spots like I do. What do you say?”

“Practice dual cultivation with you? Be your consort?” Yang Qi burst out laughing. “How about instead, you be my slave girl? Incidentally, what makes you think I need information from you about Proud Heaven’s weaknesses? You think that when I attack him I'm going to focus on his weaknesses? That’s a joke if I ever heard one. No, I'm going to crush him with overwhelming force.”

Although Yang Qi was casually bantering, he was simultaneously keeping a close eye on Empress Joyflower’s every move. Both of them knew that, despite their seemingly nonchalant conversation, they were each ready to start fighting at a moment's notice.

“Ignoramus,” Empress Joyflower said, shaking her head. “Given the level of your cultivation base, Yang Qi, it’s madness for you to even think about fighting Proud Heaven. If he comes to our world looking for you, your best option is to simply vanish, don’t you know that?”

“Empress,” Leaf Dao-Denier shrieked, “what's the point of even talking with him? Hurry and kill him! Or better yet, capture him and hand him over to me! He plotted against me and even infected me with that devil embryo! I won’t rest at ease until I personally put him to death and—”

SMACK!

In the middle of his little speech, Leaf Dao-Denier suddenly shrieked and toppled head over heels, having been smacked right across the side of the face. Not by Yang Qi, but by Empress Joyflower!

Slamming onto the ground, he placed his hand onto his cheek and looked over at the empress, confusion in his eyes. “This... Empress, what are you doing? Why did you just hit me?”

“Because you’re scum, Leaf Dao-Denier,” she replied in a voice that was both cold, and at the same time, seemingly amused. “I only favored you because you have the constitutions of an Eternal One and a Fortuned One. Did you really think I was unaware of your hidden agenda? And you’re still trying to manipulate me even now? I dominated the Ancient Road to the Gods for hundreds of millions of years, and you think I would be fooled by someone like you? I pampered you because I was sick of all the other consorts, and you were different. You were ambitious, and even dared to plot against me. Although it was refreshing at first, I've already moved on. I’ve found a more interesting person to be my consort. Yang Qi. And that means, Leaf Dao-Denier, that you’re out. Expelled.”

Empress Joyflower hardly seemed to think of Leaf Dao-Denier as being a person, treating him like a toy instead. Now that Yang Qi had piqued her interest, Leaf Dao-Denier had lost any value to her.

“You’re not worth anything to me anymore, except perhaps for your flesh and blood.” Empress Joyflower’s hand suddenly shot out from within the blood-red sleeve of her garment. Her fingernails were seven inches long and covered with flowing magical symbols, making her hand seem like the claw of a ghost.

SNICK!

Red and green blood began spurting out of Leaf Dao-Denier. Red represented the part of him that was an Eternal One, whereas the green, which represented nature, came from the part that was a Fortuned One.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi flicked his finger, and an energy stream filled with pure grief shot out. Unexpectedly, he was drawing on the godhood in the Engine of the One God, the energy that came from the liquid god-king’s tear. Using that energy to power the Endless Mourning Finger Technique, plus the innate qualities of the Engine of the One God, led to spectacular results.

SNICK!

In the blink of an eye, the finger technique closed in on Empress Joyflower’s forehead, locking on to her soul and making it impossible for her nascent divinity to evade the blow.

“Hmm?” Empress Joyflower was visibly stunned. Never would she have guessed that Yang Qi was this strong. Furthermore, not even she, in her entire lifetime of cultivation, had succeeded at assimilating the energy of the Passionless God-King, yet here it was right in front of her.

“All-Embracing; All-Inclusive!”

A sigil appeared on her palm, bearing the shape of the petal of a peach flower. It floated up, seemingly transient and illusory, and shot to meet the finger attack. They collided, and the flower petal began dissolving into rain.

“Strength God Ability!”

POP!

Yang Qi unleashed a palm attack. This time, it was something from the Secret-Ensconcing All-World Anything-Everything Fundamental-Law Magic.

A hundred drops of liquid within the Engine of the One God evaporated, transforming into a massive burst of power that backed the move. The palm thrummed with dhāraṇī incantations and countless golden vajras, like the eternal sands of the universe. Clearly, this palm contained power that was equivalent to someone with an index of three thousand or higher.

It caused Empress Joyflower’s garments to violently ripple, revealing more of her facial features. She was pure but seductive, capable but apathetic, elegant but fashionable, and almost like a mixture of both past and future. In fact, upon catching sight of her face, Yang Qi was nearly struck senseless, never having imagined that a woman as beautiful as this could exist.

Thankfully, he had a very strong mind. After all, he had subjugated nearly a billion knowledge-devils and sustained repeated assaults by the will of the Vajra Māyādevī.

Drawing even more deeply on his energy arts, he pressed the attack with full ferocity.

In response, Empress Joyflower was forced to extend her own palm in an attack filled with innumerable soft and gentle transformations.

“Myriad Flowers Tribulation!”

The two palms met, and the force of Yang Qi’s attack was vanquished. An ordinary expert with a power index of three thousand who was struck by Empress Joyflower’s palm like this would have been defeated. Thankfully, Yang Qi had the Engine of the One God, filled with tens of thousands of drops of liquid from the god-king’s tear. By burning a hundred of those drops to power his palm, he could withstand the force of two or three hundred palm strikes like the one he had just received.

If he were able to burn two hundred drops of liquid into his palm, he would have been strong enough to fight back and instantly crush Empress Joyflower to a pulp. Unfortunately, neither his meridians nor his fleshly body were strong enough to sustain that level of power.

Not even an ordinary god could do that.

“Die!” he shouted, drawing on all of the power of his fleshly body to unleash an attack. At the same time, he used the Engine of the One God to burn three separate batches of a hundred drops of liquid. In other words, he was preparing three palm stances. He started with the Secret-Ensconcing All-World Anything-Everything Fundamental-Law Magic in his left palm and the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth in his right. It was a combination of hard and soft that led to majestic, devastating godpower.

He unleashed a dozen or so blows all in a row, causing Empress Joyflower to grow more and more shocked. It really was completely unexpected to her that Yang Qi would be this powerful. Not only could he stand up to her, but he was also capable of fighting evenly with her.

After the succession of roughly ten palm strikes, Yang Qi let out a shout, switching from the Secret-Ensconcing All-World Anything-Everything Fundamental-Law Magic to the Seventy-Two Monarchs Energy Art, which he combined with the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. This had been his plan all along. He had hoped to get his opponent used to one technique, then switch to something even more powerful, a mix of techniques that could end the heavens and crush the earth.

In that moment, Empress Joyflower was suddenly forced backward a pace, and had no choice but to rein her energy in.

Breathing a sigh of relief, Yang Qi’s hand formed a claw and launched another art from the seventy-two monarchs, King Hell-Freezer’s deadly Hell-Freezing God Claw. Reaching out, he grabbed Leaf Dao-Denier and suddenly shot backward like a spinning top.

Unexpectedly, he was actually rescuing Leaf Dao-Denier from Empress Joyflower.

Swissshhhhh!

The more than ten sect leaders all unleashed their magical treasures and secret techniques to power the spell formation they had set up to trap Empress Joyflower.

Of course, they were blown away by the fighting prowess Yang Qi displayed in his clash with her. He had even managed to single-handedly snatch Leaf Dao-Denier. However, despite having exchanged a few dozen blows and managing to remain unscathed, they could tell that Yang Qi was like a hare evading a hawk. He was a luminary of the martial path, but at the same time, was in extreme danger.

As of this moment, Yang Qi was in retreat. Truth be told, he was completely taken aback by how things were playing out. The truth was that he had not been fighting to his full potential. If he wanted, he could unleash the Hand of the One God three hundred and fifty times at this level of power. Up to this point, he had only unleashed about thirty palm strikes. After all, if the power of the god-king’s tear that he had collected ran out, he definitely wouldn’t be a match for Empress Joyflower.

Yet she hardly seemed to be spending any effort at all to block the blows backed by the Engine of the One God, which was spine-tinglingly terrifying to Yang Qi. Perhaps if he had a lot more godhood, he could press the fight, but right now he was limited to only a few hundred blows. And that wouldn't be enough to win.

In fact, he stood a good chance of ending up dead.

Yang Qi had lost confidence in the trap he had set, and was convinced that he and his allies couldn't kill Empress Joyflower. At least not this time.

“Not a bad palm technique,” Empress Joyflower said. “You have the Seventy-Two Monarchs Energy Art. You know, I have many god items from the seventy-two monarchs, and if you become my consort I’ll give them to you as a reward.”

Chapter 923: Completely Horrifying

Shivering within his constraints, Leaf Dao-Denier said, “I can’t believe you saved me, Yang Qi. Okay, this time I'm really going to work for you. I can’t believe she tried to kill me, even after I did everything she asked. I’ll definitely toil wholeheartedly for you now, and never even think of betraying you!”

From the tone of his voice, Leaf Dao-Denier seemed to be rejoicing at having a new lease on life. Inside, though, his heart burned with hatred for both Yang Qi and Empress Joyflower. The hatred that existed within him couldn’t be extinguished even by all of the water in the universe.

Empress Joyflower had decided to discard him because she found a better consort in the form of Yang Qi. In other words, everything was Yang Qi’s fault! There was no way Leaf Dao-Denier would ever truly submit to him.

Snorting coldly in his heart, he thought, ‘I’ll just pretend to acknowledge allegiance to Yang Qi. Then, the moment he shows the slightest weakness, I’ll kill him and take his God Legion Seal. He might have a powerful cultivation base, but he'll definitely get hurt fighting Empress Joyflower. And that’s when I’ll take everything from him!’

Even still, he was counting his chickens before they hatched.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi ignored him. Waving his hand, he summoned a vortex that he threw Leaf Dao-Denier into, sending him to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

Once the immortal-slaying clone got his hands on Leaf Dao-Denier, he would obviously be able to make use of him. Yang Qi had another plan for this captive; there was no way he would benevolently rescue a rapacious wolf like him.

Yang Qi knew full well what type of person Leaf Dao-Denier really was. Even rescuing him ten thousand times wouldn’t earn any thanks or loyalty from him. He was a viper and would bite Yang Qi as soon as he got the chance. The best way to deal with him would be to kill him to make sure he didn’t cause future problems

“Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart?” Empress Joyflower said. “You must have at least eight of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions. Did you know that, in addition to god items from the seventy-two monarchs, Proud Heaven also sent me one of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions? With that medallion, you’ll have all nine, and you’ll have even more impressive abilities than before. Can you imagine what secrets of the chart you’ll unlock? What do you say? Join me as a consort, and together, we can fight Proud Heaven and grow the might of the Joyflower Palace. You’ll benefit greatly!”

She was obviously doing everything she could to entice Yang Qi.

Closing the chart behind Leaf Dao-Denier, Yang Qi laughed loudly. “Still trying to tempt me? Perhaps now is a good time to let you know that I snuck into your treasure storehouse and took all of the seventy-two monarchs’ god items, as well as plenty of other treasures. As for that legacy medallion that Proud Heaven sent you, I already have it. Your storehouse is essentially empty now.”

“What?” Empress Joyflower blurted, her face falling. A stream of true energy appeared above her head and spread out, then vanished. It returned a moment later, and she glared at Yang Qi. “Well played. Very well played. So, you cleared out my treasure storehouse and left behind virtual replicas. It seems my subordinates really are useless pieces of trash. It looks like you took all the spell formations as well, except sadly for you, you weren’t a match for the Passionate-Passionless Formation. How were you able to stand up to the true energy mist expelled by the god-king’s tear?”

“That’s for me to know and you not to know. By the way, if you really want to work together against Proud Heaven, I could consider it.”

The truth was that he was trying to buy time.

He had sent Leaf Dao-Denier into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart as part of a larger plan. If his immortal-slaying clone could get stronger very quickly, gaining even more control of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, then he might be able to stand a chance against the empress.

Inside the chart, Leaf Dao-Denier had broken free of the seals Yang Qi placed on him and was back to full power. Drawing on his true energy, he flew into motion. “The Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart is huge, Yang Qi. Once I go into hiding in here, you’ll never find me!”

“Oh really?”

Even as the words battered Leaf Dao-Denier’s ears, the void in front of him split apart, revealing an enormous world. It seemed as large as a hundredth ranked immortal world, and was filled with god formations and other defenses. Countless angels patrolled it, and the world itself drew energy from the surrounding chart to be used for cultivation purposes.

The energy flows created by the spell formations seemed enough to topple the past, present, and future.

Yang Qi had already bolstered many of the nearly one billion god formations he had taken, creating an even more suitable environment for cultivation. The Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart had boundless vital energy. Normally speaking, if the highest state of the chart were unlocked, the godpower available would have been enough for the cultivation purposes of ten thousand gods, much less some ordinary humans.

Unfortunately, his immortal-slaying clone was still not strong enough to unlock that state. He would have to wait until godly ascension before he could fully use the power of the legacy medallions.

Considering how strong the immortal-slaying clone was already, and adding in the power of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, a billion god formations, and numerous other powerful experts, putting Leaf Dao-Denier in check was no problem.

Even as Leaf Dao-Denier was assessing the power of the formations, Yang Qi appeared.

Or at least, a version of Yang Qi. He was flanked by seventy-one halos, within which were Leaf Dao-Denier’s former seventy-one brethren. All of them had significantly advanced their energy arts and were Grand Emperors with power indexes in the dozens, with a few who had already broken past a hundred.

That was what had resulted from Yang Qi sending countless god souls, god pills, and god items from the Joyflower Palace’s treasure storehouse.

In the past, the Joyflower Palace had used its resources to develop consorts and eunuchs with power indexes over a thousand, flower goddesses with indexes from five to eight hundred, and countless holy daughters and elders.

But now, Yang Qi was using those resources to help his people advance by leaps and bounds.

Looking at the incoming experts, Leaf Dao-Denier suddenly realized what was going on. “You’re a clone of Yang Qi! An immortal-slaying clone! No wonder he can use the God Legion Seal and King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions without any conflicts cropping up. He has you, an out-of-body incarnation!”

“That’s right. I'm Yang Qi, but at the same time, I'm not. That said, our minds are united. I will defeat King Immortal-Slayer’s resurrected will, and Yang Qi will become the Sovereign Lord. But for now, we’re one. Leaf Dao-Denier, you have the blood of an Eternal One, which you took by devouring Eldest Brother Secundus. King Immortal-Slayer was also an Eternal One. Unfortunately, I currently lack Eternal blood, but I’ll have some from you in a moment. Then my constitution will match that of King Immortal-Slayer, and my control of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart and its power will reach a new level of perfection. My virtual god world will be solidified, and I’ll be able to further harness the power of the billion god formations I have here. Then I’ll send all of that power out through the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart to fight Empress Joyflower.”

“What? You villain!” Only now did Leaf Dao-Denier fully realize why Yang Qi had sent him into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. It was only with Eternal blood that his immortal-slaying clone could fully conform to King Immortal-Slayer and unleash the true potential of the legacy medallions. Right now, his level of command was like one hair from nine oxen.

But with Eternal blood, everything would be different and he would transform in the same way a mortal prince would upon becoming the emperor. He would have true power and authority.

Of course, there was no way Leaf Dao-Denier could simply allow Yang Qi to succeed.

“No!” he shouted. “I won’t let you do this, Yang Qi! You villain! If you get Eternal blood, then everything under heaven will fall to you.”

He suddenly flew up and attacked the immortal-slaying clone. “Empress Joyflower! Hurry up and kill him! If he gets my blood, the consequences will shake heaven and earth!”

Eternal Ones were very rare. In fact, of all the people with special constitutions that Yang Qi had encountered, only Eldest Brother Secundus had such blood. Of course, now Leaf Dao-Denier had it, as well as Fortuned blood, which made him as rare as phoenix feathers or qilin horns.

“Be crushed!” the immortal-slaying clone roared, and the power of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart created a gale force wind. At the same time, a billion god formations flared with power within the virtual god world.

And all of it slammed into Leaf Dao-Denier.

“Agggghhhhh!” Trembling, Leaf Dao-Denier fell from the sky, unable to stand up against the power the immortal-slaying clone was using on him. First he was infected by Yang Qi’s devil embryo, then he was struck by Empress Joyflower. Finally, Yang Qi had viciously grabbed him and sealed him, resulting in even more serious injuries to his meridians.

The Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart and the power of the god formations formed chains, which the immortal-slaying clone wrapped around Leaf Dao-Denier, pulling his arms and legs apart until he resembled the character 大. It was a truly humiliating position.

“Agggghhhhh!”

There was nothing Leaf Dao-Denier could do to alleviate the humiliation as the chains bored into his meridians.

Without hesitation, the immortal-slaying clone stabbed his fingers into Leaf Dao-Denier’s chest. In the blink of an eye, blood-red lines shot through Leaf Dao-Denier as the immortal-slaying clone began extracting his Fortuned blood.

Thanks to Leaf Dao-Denier’s recent cultivation advancements, his blood essence was even many times stronger than Eldest Brother Secundus’ had been!

Chapter 924: Extracting Blood

Leaf Dao-Denier contained a combination of Fortuned and Eternal blood. However, each drop of his blood also resembled a taiji symbol. Fortune was Fortune; Eternal was Eternal. They were like a black fish and a white fish forever intertwined.

It was an expression of the Taiji Indestructible Chaos-Magic World-Terrorizing Profound Art, which Leaf Dao-Denier had used to rapidly advance his energy arts, making him capable of crushing even top-tier experts from the Ancient Road to the Gods.

Empress Joyflower had chosen to teach him that profound technique because of the effect it would have on his Fortuned and Eternal blood. It would make them clearly distinguishable, and at the same time, would make them complement each other even more.

No one had ever combined Eternal powers and Fortuned powers in imitation of the taiji, and it surpassed the original creator of the technique in terms of strength. The original creator had been a god-king, but all he had ever absorbed were yin and yang energies, not the blood of Eternal and Fortuned Ones.

Ultimately, Eternal power and Fortuned power were like yin and yang.

Eternal power was the yang, and Fortuned power was the yin.

Eternal power relied on what was strong and masculine to exist forever. Fortuned power relied on what was soft and feminine to create mountains and rivers within the eternal stream of time, using natural charm to create immortal worlds.

Because of the yin-yang combination of Eternal and Fortuned power, Leaf Dao-Denier’s energy arts had reached an unfathomable level. They could pierce the ancient past, crush macrocosms, and reach unheard-of peaks.

Unfortunately, none of that did much to help against the immortal-slaying clone.

Spurt-spurt. Spurt-spurt.

One drop of blood after another flew out into the clone’s hand until he was holding a fist-sized conglomeration that looked like a taiji sphere of green and red.

“Assimilate the blood, and the power of a myriad of worlds will come to heaven and earth....” Streams of blood began flowing from the sphere into the immortal-slaying clone, who immediately began assimilating it.

RUMBLE!

Flames burst out all over the clone, expressions of pure immortal-slaying power that rose into the dome of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart’s heaven. High above, something like an eye opened up and godly power descended, power left behind by King Immortal-Slayer himself that only an immortal-slaying clone with enough legacy medallions could use. Not even Yang Qi’s true self would have been able to take it.

Outside, his true self began to glow with dazzling light, making him seem like someone in the midst of attaining dao enlightenment.

Leaf Dao-Denier howled with rage, and was fully prepared to put his life on the line to fight back against what was happening.

Unfortunately for him, as his Eternal and Fortuned blood was extracted, the immortal-slaying clone only grew stronger and stronger, making it even less possible for Leaf Dao-Denier to struggle. As the moments ticked by and he continued to be crushed by all the various powers, he grew weaker and weaker.

Meanwhile, the clone flew high into the sky like a divine dragon that was ready to part the heavens.

“Be opened, Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart! Let the eight medallions come!” Upon spattering his eight medallions with Eternal blood, they shone with bright light that caused something to open up in the sky above.

“Open!”

As power coursed through the clone, he felt like he was in the presence of multiple versions of King Immortal-Slayer. The clone was transforming. He no longer physically resembled Yang Qi, but instead seemed like an ancient statue with an expressionless face.

It was not the face of a beautiful man, but rather someone ancient and mighty, with chiseled features tinged with the vestiges of history.

If Zilin was jade, then this man was an ancient divine likeness from primeval times. His face reflected a long, hard life, weathered by age, his temples white in a way that made him seem particularly manly.

After all, without experiencing the hardships of life, how could one truly grow up?

He seemed like a person whose most casual movement could subvert the cosmos, who commanded ultimate authority, and who had won his position through deadly struggle.

This was the kind of person who truly looked mighty.

Compared to Yang Qi’s immortal-slaying clone, Zilin would seem too delicate, almost like he wasn’t a true man. In fact, if Empress Joyflower were to lay eyes on him, she would likely disdain any other man she saw from then on.

These were the facial features of King Immortal-Slayer himself.

King Immortal-Slayer’s mighty will could shake anything and everything. It was invincible in the dome of heaven, and was the kind of thing that would never acknowledge allegiance to anyone else. With the influx of new blood, the clone had unlocked another mysterious aspect of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

“Oh mighty chart, show me your mysterious power!” the clone said, throwing his hands up over his head.

An immense ripple descended from above, providing Leaf Dao-Denier with a sight the likes of which he would never possibly be able to forget.

The clouds parted, revealing stars in the black sky above. Countless, densely packed stars, similar to what people in the mortal world would see when they looked up and saw a river of silver above them.

Of course, they weren’t literal stars, but motes of godhood!

They were remnants of gods that King Immortal-Slayer had slain, kept sealed in the deepest parts of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

“Look at all that godhood!” Leaf Dao-Denier breathed. “It’s spectacular!” Considering the level of his cultivation base, it was only natural that he knew exactly what he was looking at. Never in his wildest fantasies could he have imagined acquiring a collection of godhood like this, yet here was Yang Qi doing it right in front of him.

The most precious thing stored within the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart was none other than this collection.

‘All of that is godhood...’ the clone thought, deeply shaken. It begged the question of just how many gods King Immortal-Slayer had slain. What kind of havoc had someone as terrifying as him wrought on the god world?

And what level of power had been required to take their godhood and store it in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart? Whether it was the Joyflower Palace, the Primeval Age, the future world, or the experts from the Ancient Road to the Gods, they could all be dissolved into dust by a mere exhalation of King Immortal-Slayer.

Obviously, the war that had been fought in the god world had been a brutal one.

In the past, Yang Qi had relied on the god items he acquired, or smatterings of the knowledge of various gods, to try to get an idea of what the god world was like. But now he realized he was more clueless than ever.

Not even the gods could truly understand the god world. Even they were like frogs in a well, staring up at the sky.

For example, a human living on a planet wouldn’t necessarily know everything about that planet. Likewise, not even the legion of gods could fully describe the god world.

The immortal-slaying clone extended his finger upward, and one of the ‘stars’ descended in a streak of light, shooting into him and causing his power index to climb.

Five hundred fifty. Five hundred sixty. Five hundred seventy.... Six hundred. Seven hundred.... Eight hundred. It was only at that point that the starlight faded away.

It was power that had descended from a ‘star’ of godhood. Unfortunately, given the level of the clone’s cultivation base, he couldn't actually assimilate the star itself.

He simply wasn't strong enough to break through the barrier yet.That barrier could only be opened when the true successor of King Immortal-Slayer eventually reached the level of the gods.

Right now, the immortal-slaying clone was essentially like an ordinary energy warrior on a continent of mortals, who could sense the powers of the star above and absorb some of their power. However, it would be lunacy to think that he could pluck those stars down for himself.

That said, the clone’s cultivation base was still advancing by leaps and bounds.

As he assimilated the power, he grew a bit taller. Then, numerous filthy impurities were extruded from his flesh and blood, and burned away by true flame, after which he shrank back down, stronger and mightier than ever.

He looked like translucent crystal, with his meridians, sea of energy, five viscera and six bowels all visible. Meanwhile, his power index climbed again, going from eight hundred to nine hundred, then finally, to a thousand.

Now that Yang Qi’s clone had absorbed Leaf Dao-Denier’s Eternal Fortuned blood, Leaf Dao-Denier looked shriveled and weak, like little more than a bag of bones. Ninety-nine percent of his quintessence had been taken away, and he was still tightly sealed.

“Why don’t you kill me?” he growled. “Kill me! Quick and clean!”

“Nah, I'm not going to kill you,” the clone replied. “I’ll help you recover, and when you’re back to normal I’ll extract all of your blood again. Understand? My army of followers needs that blood, and although it will get weaker and weaker, it's still better than nothing. Only when I have absolutely no use left for you will I actually kill you. Now, give me the Taiji Indestructible Chaos-Magic World-Terrorizing Profound Art, as well as the rest of the Secret-Ensconcing All-World Anything-Everything Fundamental-Law Magic.”

Chapter 925: Godhood Stars

Thanks to the godhood stars, the immortal-slaying clone grew rapidly stronger, reaching a power index of over a thousand. That made his energy arts even more capable of sensing the depths of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart and understanding the profound secrets of the stars overhead, making it possible for him to draw on their quintessence energy to bolster himself.

Unfortunately, only he could benefit in this way. There were warding spells protecting the godhood stars to ensure that fact. It wasn’t even possible for him to redirect their power to another person, or even the Engine of the One God.

King Immortal-Slayer had prepared well, ensuring that if his legacy were to be passed on that it would ultimately go to only one successor.

Thankfully, as the immortal-slaying clone’s energy arts advanced, he had unlocked the powers and spell formations of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

“Be expelled!” the clone said in a ringing voice, and it sent a ripple out through the entire Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, seeking out the countless cultivators who had taken up residence in the crooks and crannies of the place. There were experts who had been there since ancient times, but now they were expelled, ensuring that the chart was only for the use of the immortal-slaying clone and Yang Qi’s direct subordinates in his virtual god world.

No one knew just how many states the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart had in total.

In the past, it had opened every ten thousand years, during which time people from the mortal world could enter it. That included people from the Primeval and Future Ages. Such individuals had spread through the chart, searching for magical treasure, god items, and the like.

Now all of those people were being forced to leave by the immortal-slaying clone.

The clone wasn't exactly sure how the process worked, as his cultivation base wasn’t strong enough to truly fill the entire chart. He just had a vague idea of how to do it. However, it left him feeling very content.

“Virtual god world, be strengthened!”

Using the power he had thanks to the godhood stars, he opened the virtual god world and caused mountain peaks to rise up, flowers and plants to blossom, water to flow, and clouds to proliferate. Soon, it was a place that, in terms of cultivation potential, had surpassed the immortal worlds in every way.

In the blink of an eye, the virtual god world glowed brighter than ever.

The billion god formations were all active and releasing immense power, and at the same time, there were spell formations that were part of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart which were doing the same thing. Creaking and crunching sounds could be heard as the immortal-slaying clone gathered that power and sent it through a portal to his true self.

As of now, the eight legacy medallions were unlocked and active in a way that vastly surpassed anything from before. When combined with his true self’s energy arts, it meant the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart could unleash much greater attack power than before.

“Myriad Worlds Power; Monarch of Myriad Monarchs!” Power that surpassed anything from the Engine of the One God coursed into his true self’s sea of energy, where it began churning and roiling. If it were unleashed, it could smash mountains, drain seas, destroy moons, crush stars, and shatter immortal worlds.

At long last, thanks to improving the attack power of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, Yang Qi’s true self was now in a position to be able to fight Empress Joyflower.

Of course, all of these developments occurred in only one short moment.

The immortal-slaying clone could obviously control the flow of time in the virtual god world. If he couldn't, then how could it be called a god world?

Without all the preparations King Immortal-Slayer had made, and the way the immortal-slaying clone had benefited from them, it was likely that Yang Qi would have been completely destroyed by Empress Joyflower.

But now, that was not a foregone conclusion.

Victory was still up for grabs.

Gong!

All of a sudden, a dramatic transformation occurred within his sea of energy as the consummate arts of the seventy-two monarchs all reached their complete and ultimate level.

RUMBLE!

Behind him, the Seventy-Two Monarchs Energy Art produced a projection of a monarch whose every palm strike, fist strike, or leg attack could unleash the ultimate level of power.

It was a might that could pierce the dome of heaven, sweep through the aeons of history, and topple three thousand chiliocosms of worlds.

Of course, Yang Qi wasn’t going to reveal that he had just experienced a massive transformation to his energy arts. He would wait for just the right moment to spring it on Empress Joyflower and leave her completely flabbergasted.

“You’re offering to work with me?” she said. “Hold on, you’re trying to buy time, aren’t you? But for what? You just threw Leaf Dao-Denier into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, presumably to use his Eternal blood to stimulate King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy medallions. But even if you succeed, will you be able to use them? You can’t rely on a mere magical treasure to beat an opponent as strong as me. In this world, you need to rely on your own power, not on power from treasures. Just look at Proud Heaven. If he weren’t so heaven-defying, then how could he be conquering everything in his path?”

“Don’t waste words on her, Brother Yang Qi!” Battle Resister said. “Just kill her!” With that, he hefted his enormous cudgel, causing shockwaves of battle energy to roll out. Battle energy was the manifestation of an energy art that was unique to the Profound House of Battle Energy. Supposedly, the ancient Battle God had been a domineering warrior whose every move could destroy the heavens and crush the earth. His energy arts were different from other energy arts. He used strength to defeat strength, and weakness to defeat weakness. When battle energy was unleashed, it could destroy any other energy arts in its path.

“If you want to die, Battle Resister, I’ll accommodate you!” Her eyes remaining locked on Yang Qi, she moved her hand in a movement as graceful as a dream of flowers and leaves, thrusting it directly toward Battle Resister.

Suddenly, a host of palm projections appeared, within which were numerous energy rings that resembled dragon pearls. It was a consummate technique from the Joyflower Palace, the Rings of Desperation. They actually resembled hearts filled with despondency and devoid of passion, and they looked strong enough to crush even energy arts much stronger than they were.

Pop. Pop. Pop!

Battle Resister’s cudgel swept back and forth and up and down, bolstered with incredible momentum as it smashed the rings to bits.

Then he continued on with an attack on Empress Joyflower, his cudgel whirling like a top.

“Vast Sky of Battle Killing!

“Star-Shifting Constellation-Swapping!

“Astral Redirection!

“Let the Battle God Cometh!

“Battle Without Cease!

“Zen Dragon Battles to the Death!”

Battle Resister unleashed a host of consummate techniques, making him seem like a consummate hero that had come to save all humanity, and was surrounded by the living beings who he viewed with mercy.

“Empress Joyflower! In order to deal with you, I’ve created a world of mercy. Brother Yang Qi and I are the bane of your passionless, merciless moves. Do you really think you have what it takes to stand up to us?” In the blink of an eye, Battle Resister’s killing moves grew even stronger.

“You’re an ant trying to shake a tree, and you’ve bitten off a bit more than you can chew!” Blurring into motion, Empress Joyflower twitched her fingers like she was playing a zither. Her movements were sometimes slow and sometimes quick, as though she played to a rhythm that conformed to heaven and earth, and at the same time, gave rise to the most austere of atmospheres.

Ding!Deng! Dong! Ding!

Twangs rang out as she sent blasts of wind toward Battle Resister’s cudgel, negating all of his energy arts and quickly proving who was in the superior position.

SNICK!

As the final blast landed on the cudgel, Empress Joyflower’s eyes blazed with killing intent and she reached out with fingers splayed into a claw. In the blink of an eye, a whole string of the Rings of Desperation appeared, then immediately latched on to the cudgel.

RIP!

The cudgel shivered, then shattered, becoming countless motes of dust that drifted away on the wind. Just like that, a god item had been completely and utterly destroyed.

Battle Resister staggered backward, coughing up blood the entire time.

“Die!” Empress Joyflower growled, reaching forward again, the energy of her claw locking down every avenue of escape for Battle Resister and ensuring that he had no way to flee, but could only close his eyes and die.

However, that was when Yang Qi made his move. He took three steps forward, and as he did, he unleashed three palm strikes. First, the Hand of the One God. Second, the Secret-Ensconcing All-World Anything-Everything Fundamental-Law Magic. And third, the Seventy-Two Monarchs Energy Art.

Each of them contained mountain-toppling, sea-draining force, yet Empress Joyflower hardly paid any attention to them. She sent her own palm out to meet them, blocking the first and second strike and completely destroying them.

But then the third palm was blasted apart, and it was like the divine dragon hiding in a pool of eels. In the blink of an eye, Yang Qi’s energy soared to the highest heavens!

“Monarch among Monarchs!”

King Immortal-Slayer appeared, tall and mighty, emanating the power of a monarch who ruled all other monarchs. He thrummed with such intense godpower that everything shook violently, even places outside in the Great Necropolis.

‘Not good!’ Empress Joyflower thought, suddenly aware that she was in a very bad position that she could never have predicted. That third fist strike was so savage and powerful that the power of her own attack was completely dismantled.

Chapter 926: Relying on Oneself

‘This Battle Resister is a genius who I can’t let perish in this fight,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘His daoist techniques and energy arts make him vastly stronger than any other experts from ancient times. He actually created a zone of mercy around us. It might be a fledgling version, but it shows how talented he is. It seems people with Destabilizing will definitely can’t be looked down on.’

By forcing Empress Joyflower backward across the battlefield, Yang Qi managed to save Battle Resister.

As she floated backward as gracefully as a kite, she thrust out her palm again, unleashing another profound technique that seemed to have nothing to do with the Passionless God-King. It was resolute, austere, unsophisticated, and dauntless.

And Yang Qi had no idea what it was.

As soon as the fist hit Yang Qi’s attack, an elliptical energy field sprang up and the two attacks collapsed.

“You actually assimilated Leaf Dao-Denier’s blood, didn’t you?” Empress Joyflower said, her eyes blazing. “You used it to unlock more powers from the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart! That palm just now wasn’t your power, it contained the mighty power of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart! You really are quite the genius, and you’re definitely much more troublesome than that damned father of yours, Proud Heaven. It’s a horror to think what you’ll be like once you grow to your full potential. Yet that just makes me more interested in having you as a consort.”

“I already told you that I'm a Fateless One, and that Proud Heaven isn’t my father. But you keep bringing it up? It seems that your entire Joyflower Palace needs to die. What’s between you and Proud Heaven, anyway? Are you two a pair of fornicators?” Truth be told, Yang Qi hated few things more than being called the son of Proud Heaven.

Meanwhile, in response to being called a fornicator, Empress Joyflower’s face distorted with killing intent. “You know what? In the Joyflower Palace, it's forbidden to mention Proud Heaven and me in the same conversation! You’re not leaving this palace today!”

WHOOSH!

The fragrance of flowers filled the area as Empress Joyflower shot toward him with deadly intent, releasing a series of more than ten palm strikes, each of which came from a different energy art, yet all of which were obviously consummate skills from the god world.

Yang Qi spotted the Taiji Indestructible Chaos-Magic World-Terrorizing Profound Art, except it was used with indescribable speed. Before he could even react, a taiji symbol was viciously boring into his meridians.

He saw the Sunflower Palm, the Passionless Palm, the Heaven-Pressing Palm, and other techniques. There were so many of them that it almost seemed like Empress Joyflower had grown several extra pairs of arms.

Gong!

The sound of bells rang out as Yang Qi drew on the powers of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart to give himself an edge. The empress was able to move so quickly that not even his Freedom Wings were enough to match her.

Right now, he was relying on the godpower of the seventy-two monarchs’ composite abilities.

“Monarch Battles in Heaven!”

“The King from the Mortal World!”

“Monarch of Myriad Monarchs!”

“Mountains and Rivers of Monarch Energy!”

“Sage Inside, Monarch Outside!”

“Dao of Monarchs; Dao of Hegemony!”

The consummate arts of the seventy-two brethren who were led by King Immortal-Slayer were so powerful that they could rival the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. And Yang Qi was currently linking with the godpower of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart to unleash these profound divine abilities in the composite form of the Seventy-Two Monarchs Energy Art.

In other words, he wasn’t the one actually using them; it was the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

Within the chart, his immortal-slaying clone stood there with a beam of light connecting him to the godhood stars above. As he absorbed the godhood, he combined it with the power of the chart and sent the resulting power out through Yang Qi’s sea of energy.

Unfortunately, Yang Qi’s collection of the seventy-two monarchs’ god items was incomplete and his cultivation base was weak, making it impossible for him to unleash the true expression of the set of techniques. He could only use a few dozen of the stances it contained.

That said, they were still nothing to look down on. They could part primal-chaos and cause worlds to appear, and at the same time, destroy the dao of heaven.

To create and destroy the dao of heaven was a true cycle of creation.

The empress and Yang Qi clashed, and he had only himself to rely on. Although the other sect leaders were still present, they could only exchange awkward glances and wonder what to do.

Battle Resister had already caught his breath and his eyes were brightly shining as his battle energy surged, causing a destructive halo to appear around his head. “What are you all standing around for? Are you just waiting to die? If Brother Yang Qi is defeated, we’re all done for. You’ve seen how cruel and vicious Empress Joyflower is; she definitely won’t let us go. Let’s join forces and attack!”

“Attack! Everyone together!” shouted a few of the sect leaders. Suddenly, magical treasures appeared, the most powerful god items that the sect leaders had, some of which had been kept in reserve for hundreds of millions of years.

BOOM!

A burst of energy appeared as the combined forces of the sect leaders bore down on Empress Joyflower, which seemed like it might succeed in locking her down.

None of the sect leaders were close to being a match for Empress Joyflower. But all of them were throwing caution to the wind, and also joining forces. Couple that with the power of the god items they were using, and it made their attacks terrifying to say the least. Obviously, if Yang Qi hadn’t been there, she wouldn’t have been hurt at all. But considering she was in such a difficult situation, there was no way she would just slip away unharmed. In fact, she had no choice but to allow the power of the combined attacks to smash into her defensive empyrean energy.

Whump!

Her defensive energy rippled as she was forced backward several paces. Meanwhile, Yang Qi howled a thunderous howl and clenched his hand into a fist. Then he smashed his fist down, following it up with a chop, a slash, and a kick, creating a combination of all kinds of ancient power.

“Nine Heavens True Monarch!

“True Monarch Carves a Path!

“Great Dao like Heaven!

“Cutting Through Thorns and Thistles!”

His successive attacks made him seem like a warrior who was trapped and about to die, but was cutting a path for himself to reach the other shore of pāramitā, where he would be free from all worries.

Whizz!

Yang Qi was operating at his ultimate peak level.

Meanwhile, Empress Joyflower’s eyes grew even more fiery. “If you really want to die, Yang Qi, then don’t blame me for making it happen. It's time for you to see a secret magic that I've cultivated for hundreds of millions of years. Prepare for Terrifying will!”

Zzzzzap. Zzzzzap.

A stream of lightning shot out from her. It was no ordinary lightning, but lightning filled with godpower. It swirled around her as she stood there, shaking the heavens and causing the earth to quake, until the air itself began melting into liquid magical law.

As for Yang Qi, the temperature around him began rising by thousands of degrees, and the spatial magical laws were cast into chaos. Not even the godpower at his command could fight back, and the psychic tempest of lightning started to push him backward.

POP!

A god item shattered.

At the same time, Empress Joyflower attacked, her hand a bright red blur that slammed into Cavelord Blackwater, who exploded into nothing. Not even his bones were left behind, nor his nascent divinity or quintessence energy.

“Not good!” Battle Resister said, backing up toward Yang Qi. “Brother Yang Qi, we have to get out of here! She's going crazy, and there’s no way we can fight her. She’s using a secret magic and burning her quintessence vitality to temporarily reach the Terrifying level of will. We're simply not a match for her!”

‘She has a secret magic that can give her Terrifying will?!’ Upon hearing Battle Resister’s assessment, Yang Qi agreed that this was a losing battle. Furthermore, he was here as his true self. Terrifying will would end up wiping them all out, including his true nascent divinity and the God Legion Seal.

Empress Joyflower was continuously drawing on all of the power within her, sending out a psychic tempest in the Terrifying level.

One by one, the sect leaders’ god items began to explode; she was giving them no room to maneuver and no opportunities to take advantage of. In fact, as she took a step forward, another sect leader exploded.

“Let’s go!” Yang Qi barked. Knowing that he couldn't do anything about the other sect leaders, he grabbed Battle Resister, opened a vortex, and prepared to leap into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

“Where are you going? You think you can escape that easily!?” Considering that Empress Joyflower had employed a secret magic to temporarily reach the Terrifying level, there was no way she would just stand by while Yang Qi left. She waved her hand, sending out a burst of power that locked down the entire area.

Crack!

The passageway to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart closed. It was like Yang Qi had opened a door leading into his own house, only to have it slammed shut and locked right in his face. Even worse, not only was he cut off from access to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, but he was also incapable of communicating with his immortal-slaying clone.

‘Terrifying will truly deserves to be described as terrifying!’ he thought. And indeed, it was to his terror that he realized that he was in a situation he couldn’t escape from.

“You’re all going to die!” Empress Joyflower screamed, throwing her hands out to send countless silver threads shooting out. Yang Qi summoned his God Legion Paradise to protect himself and Battle Resister, but from the way the threads slammed into its defenses, it was obvious that it wouldn’t last very much longer.

The other sect leaders were in even worse positions.

When the silver strings slammed into them, they were rapidly drained of everything until they became nothing but desiccated corpses. Cipher Ever-Heaven struggled mightily when it came to him, but he only lasted a moment before exploding!

Chapter 927: Terrifying Will

When Empress Joyflower unleashed her Terrifying will, Yang Qi and his allies were completely incapable of standing up to her. With a will convergence that powerful, she could crush any lower level of will. Nothing could survive, not even people at the peak of the Destabilizing level.

These sect leaders were all invincible entities who had roamed the Ancient Road to the Gods for hundreds of millions of years. Yet in the face of Empress Joyflower’s assault, they exploded one after the next, becoming nothing more than drifting ash.

Their magical powers, wills, god items, and magical treasures were all destroyed and absorbed by the empress.

Soon, only Yang Qi and Battle Resister were left. Looking coolly at Yang Qi, the empress said, “You can't do anything to stop me. Not even the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart will help you now. So surrender. Let go of all your energy and techniques, submit to me, and become my consort. I’ll bless you with invincible divine abilities to help you slaughter Proud Heaven. As you can see, my will skyrocketed to the Terrifying level, and I can teach you the secret magic that let me do it.”

Swish!

She retracted her secret magic, but her will convergence continued shaking everything in the area, making it obvious that resistance was pointless.

Yang Qi could even sense that the devil embryos he had infected the sect leaders with had been destroyed and absorbed by her.

“You can surrender as well, Battle Resister,” the empress continued. “You’re no match for me now, and I could kill you along with Yang Qi with a single blow. Except, I've taken a liking to you and can accept you as a consort too. Remember, working with Yang Qi is like asking a tiger for its skin. He’ll definitely plot against you. Did you notice that all the sect leaders I just killed had been infected with devil embryos? I’d say it's highly likely you have one inside you as well.”

Snorting coldly, Yang Qi smiled and said, “The reason I put devil embryos in them was because they were all plotting against me. My Brother Battle Resister is straightforward and upright, and harbored no such thoughts. By the way, I know that your Terrifying will convergence won’t last for very long. Soon enough, your cultivation base will drop, maybe even to a lower point than before. At that point, we’ll have a chance to turn defeat into victory.”

“Turn defeat into victory?” She laughed. “You’ll never get such an opportunity, not even if Proud Heaven suddenly showed up. Apparently you don’t truly understand what it means to have Terrifying will. Terrifying will is impossible to defeat, impossible to crush, and impossible to resist. The only thing you can do when faced with it is to acknowledge allegiance.”

“I think you need to die!” Yang Qi suddenly said, and a burst of power erupted from the depths of his heart as he burned two hundred drops of godpower to fuel a palm strike. His meridians popped and shattered as a result, but he simply endured the pain.

Earlier, he couldn’t have done this, but his cultivation base had transformed, and when his immortal-slaying clone had delivered power to him earlier, he acquired some of the Eternal Fortuned blood. And exchanging blows with Empress Joyflower had allowed him to absorb some of the quintessence vitality of the universe around him, which he used to fuse the three major types of blood within him: Fateless, Eternal, and Fortuned.

The result was a major power-up.

And it was exactly that major power-up that gave him the confidence to try to fight back against Empress Joyflower one last time.

KABOOM!

Waves of energy erupted from his palm. This time, he was unleashing an attack that was equivalent to a cultivator with a power index of four thousand, and it crushed everything in its path as it headed straight toward Empress Joyflower.

“You're really looking to get yourself killed,” she said with a faint, unconcerned smile. Casually extending her hand, she met Yang Qi’s palm and used her powerful will convergence to completely dismantle it.

However, Yang Qi followed up with another palm strike, then another, and each one was stronger than the previous. He was burning more and more godhood liquid to use all nine stances of the Hand of the One God, complete with infinite variations. At this point, he was unleashing strength equivalent to a power index of five thousand.

Empress Joyflower’s expression flickered. This was an attack delivered with a power index that surpassed anything she had predicted would happen. After reaching three thousand, every additional thousand provided exponentially greater power. It wasn’t a simple matter of a linear improvement to fighting prowess.

Yang Qi was coming at her with the explosive force of a power index of five thousand, plus a consummate palm technique birthed from the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. The empress had no choice but to evade the blow.

Thump-thump. Thump-thump! Thump-thump!!

Yang Qi was attacking with devastating power, but Empress Joyflower was evading each and every move. Finally, she laughed and said, “I can hear your meridians shattering, Yang Qi. Are you forcibly using some sort of secret magic? There’s no way that your body can sustain the force of a power index of five thousand. Will you be able to keep it up after that set of moves? Or do you have more power stored in your meridians and sea of energy?”

Ignoring her, Yang Qi went into his last stance and shot toward her with complete abandon.

Obviously, the empress couldn’t simply accept the blow, so she dodged out of the way, putting as much distance as possible between herself and him.

However, at the very last moment, Yang Qi’s hand closed into a fist and he struck at the air in front of him, causing a vortex to pop open. Grabbing Battle Resister, he disappeared into the vortex. Then, before she could react, the vortex snapped shut and he was gone.

“Damn you!” she shouted, but she was too late. As it turned out, Yang Qi hadn’t been putting his life on the line to beat her in a fight, but rather, he was just building up power to open a way to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

She realized her mistake too late. Yang Qi’s final move had been ferocious, but considering she had Terrifying will, if she had met it, she would have been injured, but nothing worse. And if she had met the attack, Yang Qi would have run out of power. She would then have been able to take his God Legion Seal and other magical treasures.

Unfortunately, he had slipped into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart and she had no way to catch up to him.

“Very clever, you damned brat. I can’t believe you’re so crafty. Damn you!” She reached out with all her power, in the hopes of locating the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, but of course that was an impossibility.

After this encounter, it wouldn’t be easy for her to get her hands on Yang Qi. And although she had technically won this fight, for all intents and purposes Yang Qi had come out the victor. First of all, he had snatched Leaf Dao-Denier and taken his Eternal Fortuned blood, boosting his own power as a result.

Second, he had cleaned out her storehouse of treasure, which was a loss the empress wouldn’t easily be able to make up for.

Third, he had forced her to rely on a secret magic which, although it had temporarily pushed her to the Terrifying level, had resulted in serious injuries that would take quite some time to recover from.

Considering those three aspects, Yang Qi could definitely say that he came out victorious.

POP!

Yang Qi staggered out into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart with blood spraying out of his mouth, his face as ashen as death.

Battle Resister quickly placed his hands on Yang Qi’s back and used a secret magic of healing on him.

“Medical-Dao Spirit-Communication Recover-From-Death Grand Energy Art!”

True energy poured into Yang Qi and his injuries began to heal. Breathing raggedly, he opened his eyes and said, “Incredible.... That secret magic she used actually pushed her will convergence to the Terrifying level. If I could master that magic, my own fighting prowess would be incredible.”

“Brother Yang Qi,” Battle Resister said, “we escaped with our lives, but sadly, all of the other sect leaders died. Going forward, the Joyflower Palace will be the most powerful organization out there. And the two of us are in even less of a position to deal with the empress. I need to head back to the Profound House of Battle Energy and make preparations. She’ll definitely try exterminating us. Unfortunately, I'm not sure where I can take the sect to ensure its safety.”

Yang Qi thought for a moment. “I have a way. If you trust me, why not bring your Profound House of Battle Energy here into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart? If we join forces, I think we can accomplish a lot. Empress Joyflower is strong, but she can’t break into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. There are big changes going on out there, and they can’t be stopped. War is going to rage, but thankfully the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart will remain safe.”

Battle Resister considered his offer. “Alright. But the Profound House of Battle Energy is huge, and there are old-timers there who will need convincing. And for all I know, they might refuse to work with you.”

“That’s fine,” Yang Qi said, sitting down cross-legged. “For now, I’ll be focusing on recovery. I sustained severe damage to my meridians and vital energy. But don’t worry, I control the flow of time in here, so I can make sure we have plenty of time to go handle matters with your sect. Besides, Empress Joyflower is also injured, and will need time to recover.”

The truth was that Yang Qi’s injuries were very severe. He had been punched full of holes, and worse, the strength god systems of the Engine of the One God were now out of power. He had no way to power up using the engine unless he acquired some more godhood.

And unfortunately, godhood wasn’t exactly easy to get. Even though there was a huge amount in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, it wasn't within his capability to take it.

Chapter 928: Another Seal

As Yang Qi set about healing himself, he found that the power streams inside him were in complete chaos. His injuries really were quite severe. Luckily, he had acquired many holy medicines in the Joyflower Palace’s treasure storehouse, and he didn’t hold back at all in using them. As he did, the streams of power slowly began growing more orderly, and his meridians were repaired.

His immortal-slaying clone assisted. Although his main body couldn’t take advantage of the godhood stars, the clone could use the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart itself to help. The power within the chart could be converted to god vitality, which took the form of long needles that were then inserted into Yang Qi’s various acupoints.

Eventually, Yang Qi was covered with needles. At that point, the needles began sinking deeply into his acupoints, becoming a liquid that coursed through him, making him feel weak and limp, but at the same time revitalizing him.

White steam began to rise up from him.

Off to the side, Battle Resister looked on in shock as he realized that there was also a sinister devil light within the white steam. As the steam gathered above like clouds, scenes from hell could be seen, with devil-gods everywhere. However, above them were the godmammoths, who crushed them and caused radiance and light to abound. The combination of the two forces made a taiji symbol that contained both radiance and darkness.

The radiance and darkness fought and struggled, creating a marvelous cycle that gave Yang Qi the ability to transform between devil and god with a mere thought.

Whizz!

Both of Yang Qi’s hands began flashing incantation gestures, each of them more profound and enigmatic than the one before, causing enigmatic and profound rumbling sounds to fill the area. By this point, the needles were all gone and he rose to his feet, a bit taller than before and his injuries healed. Meanwhile, the golden imp that was his own nascent divinity flew out of his forehead and began devouring the magical symbol that was the Secret-Ensconcing All-World Anything-Everything Fundamental-Law Magic.

“Such arrogance!” the symbol screamed as it was devoured. However, Yang Qi had been baptized by Terrifying will, and as such, was completely different than he had been before. His nascent divinity ripped the symbol to shreds as it devoured it, until it was completely gone.

“Such arrogance!”

As the voice faded away for the last time, Yang Qi vanquished the knowledge-devils, whereupon golden light shone out from him in all directions. Battle Resister was visibly shocked.

‘Such a strong will convergence!’ he thought. ‘How did he cultivate it? He’s definitely at the peak of the Destabilizing level, and I can even sense traces of the true meaning of that which is Terrifying. I bet he has a chance of eventually reaching the Terrifying level.’ People like that were considered true geniuses on the Ancient Road to the Gods. Few people could even rise from the middle of the Destabilizing level to its peak. In fact, there were even many people who could never go past Stupendous.

Even the Stupendous level was considered impressive. People like that were like dragons amongst men.

Those in the Destabilizing level were considered hegemons and luminaries, sages and mahātmās.

As for the Terrifying level, they were gods, and weren’t even considered human.

After devouring the magical symbol, Yang Qi realized that his nascent divinity had acquired some vajra characteristics, things that could pierce through anything and everything, devastate ancient history, and shake the world of mortals. And they belonged to him and him alone. They weren’t an inheritance of buddhist characteristics, because that would have put him under the control of mysterious and powerful figures from above.

After sensing those scraps of vajra characteristics, Yang Qi realized that he really needed to go find the other scriptures that belonged to the Secret-Ensconcing All-World Anything-Everything Fundamental-Law Magic. Upon cultivating them and vanquishing the knowledge-devils contained therein, his nascent divinity would grow even more stable and strong.

Perhaps that would be his ticket to reaching the Terrifying level.

“Leaf Dao-Denier,” Yang Qi said, looking down at his withered and emaciated form. Sending some true energy into him, he said, “I'm going to heal you, then you’re going to tell me where to find the rest of the Secret-Ensconcing All-World Anything-Everything Fundamental-Law Magic. You must have some clues!”

“You might as well quit dreaming!” Leaf Dao-Denier said, his eyes overflowing with venom as he was healed. “You dirty little swine, Yang Qi! I'm not going to let you get away with this. And I’ll never help you find those secret scriptures. You may have unlocked the secrets of part of that technique, but I’ll never help you finish the job. If I did, what hope would I ever have of winning my freedom?”

“You’re still thinking of getting away?” Yang Qi said calmly and without anger. “The reality is that I should be thanking you. If I hadn’t rescued you, I would already have been killed by Empress Joyflower. Considering I'm alive because of you, I'm going to allow you to continue living.”

“Continue living?” Leaf Dao-Denier laughed bitterly. “It would be better to be dead than to live like this. If you’ve really got the guts, Yang Qi, then let me go. Let’s have a fair fight to the finish. If you beat me, I’ll accept my loss and stop opposing you. In all fairness, I realize that you’re favored by the heavens. The fact that you escaped from Empress Joyflower and mastered the Secret-Ensconcing All-World Anything-Everything Fundamental-Law Magic goes to prove that. But I still want to settle things with a fight.”

“Enough with your posturing, Leaf Dao-Denier. Besides, I don’t trust you a bit. I have you captive, and your life is mine to experiment with as I see fit. I'm going to use my vivicreation and genetic systems to analyze your body, then make some scientific clones of you to serve me.”

“You evil villain!” Leaf Dao-Denier blurted, his face turning as white as a sheet. He knew full well what it would be like to have scientific clones made of him; he would essentially be a living experiment, residing in a terrifying hell of Yang Qi’s making.

“Fine, Yang Qi, I’ll talk. I’ll tell you everything. Just let me live. We can work everything out, alright? Better a bad life than a good death, right? In fact, I don’t mind if you just turn me into an ordinary person.”

“That's better,” Yang Qi said. “So. Spit it out. Where can I find the rest of the Secret-Ensconcing All-World Anything-Everything Fundamental-Law Magic?”

“There’s a buddhist land deep in the Great Necropolis, a place called the Cave Temple of the Vajra Māyādevī. It’s a deadly location that most people never return from alive. But I managed to acquire some good fortune there in the form of a seed from the Secret-Ensconcing All-World Anything-Everything Fundamental-Law Magic. Based on my speculations, there are a total of eighteen such seeds, representing the eighteen most powerful guardians of the buddhist schools, the eighteen boundless vajra gods of the primeval era. Those eighteen gods became the eighteen seeds. Get them all, and you can cultivate the full energy art. I’d say this art is roughly on the same level as the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. After all, in the ancient god world, the buddhist schools were able to compete with both King Immortal-Slayer and the Sovereign Lord. And this is their most powerful energy art.”

Yang Qi nodded. However, there was no way he would ever fully trust Leaf Dao-Denier, and was convinced that his explanation wasn't fully truthful.

“What do you think, Brother Battle Resister?” Yang Qi asked quietly.

“Hmm...” Battle Resister said. After thinking for a moment, he said, “I've heard of this Cave Temple of the Vajra Māyādevī, and it's definitely a dangerous place. A lot of people have gone missing there, and presumably lay dead inside. The buddhist guardians there will kill intruders on the spot, and they’re experts in devil-subduing spell formations. I even have a friend who was killed there. However, those who are lucky, or connected by destiny to the buddhist schools, can acquire precious treasures there. There was one sect called the Blood-Death Zen Sect, whose cultivation focused on the Zen of Blood. Their Sectlord was named Blood Maitreya, and he acquired some Spritefolk Blood Sarīras from there, as well as other buddhist treasures. Because of that, he became even stronger than me.”

“The Cave Temple of the Vajra Māyādevī,” Yang Qi said. “I see. Brother Battle Resister, let’s bring your sect here into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, and I’ll go search for the rest of the seeds of the Secret-Ensconcing All-World Anything-Everything Fundamental-Law Magic after that. I suspect they’ll be very helpful in reaching the Terrifying level.”

Yang Qi had already made full use of what the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart had to offer, and if he wanted to reach a higher level of enlightenment, it would take years of ordinary cultivation. Therefore, finding a stash of god relics in the Great Necropolis seemed like a great strategy. ‘I wonder if my search for the Cave Temple of the Vajra Māyādevī will involve another encounter with Profound Valor,’ he thought. ‘If I can kill him, I’ll get the godpower seed of an Inheritor. That would definitely make it much easier to travel around the supposedly dangerous parts of the Great Necropolis.’

Profound Valor was the first person to cause major problems for Yang Qi since he had achieved his recent major cultivation advancement, and the enmity between them could only be alleviated with the death of one party.

As of now, he was certain he was strong enough to kill Profound Valor in a fight. In fact, he would also have defeated Empress Joyflower if she weren’t able to unleash Terrifying will convergence through her secret technique.

WHOOSH!

Yang Qi and Battle Resister flew out into the Great Necropolis again and headed toward the Profound House of Battle Energy, hoping to save it before the Joyflower Palace came to destroy it.

**

Far, far away in the immortal dao civilization, where so many things were changing so rapidly, there was a location deep within primal-chaos where it was said that fallen gods had once resided. The primal-chaos vital energy there was particularly strong.

In fact, it was so strong that it was difficult to fly through it. Even Grand Emperors with power indexes in the hundreds and extremely strong energy arts would have trouble traversing this area.

The truth was that the millions upon trillions of streams of primal-chaos paleo-energy had been crushed down with such might that they had crystallized, becoming the perfect ingredient to forge god items.

In that area of crystallized primal-chaos, there was a cavern that shone with golden light. And it thrummed with such power that everything in the area trembled. At a certain point, a golden imp flew out from the cavern.

Chapter 929: People from the Primeval Age

The golden imp resembled Yang Qi’s God Legion Seal in every way.

In fact, that was exactly what it was. A second God Legion Seal, finally appearing within the modern age. The God Legion Seal as a whole had three parts, one in the Future Age, one in the Immortal Dao Age, and one in the Primeval Age. The Future Age had traveled into the past to fight the Primeval Age for the seal that existed there.

Yet that seal from the Primeval Age had apparently traveled through time and emerged into the primal-chaos paleo-energy of the immortal dao civilization.

The ancient aura of the Primeval Age spread out, but not very far. Next to the golden imp was an individual wearing golden clothing. He looked like a young man, with sword-like eyebrows and a vortex swirling on his forehead.

The God Legion Seal flew into the vortex, and then the primeval aura and golden aura faded away, leaving the young man looking very ordinary in nature. That said, there was still something mighty about him, something domineering that seemed to suggest the dao of monarchs and the dao of sages. He seemed indomitable, but at the same time sentimental, like an amalgamation of war and peace. Anyone who caught sight of him would be able to tell that he was someone important.

As for his energy arts level, it was impossible to tell.

His golden garment was, in fact, a god item filled with incredible magical powers. Its name was the Yellow Gold Battle Robe, and it was very similar to Yang Qi’s God Legion Battle Robe, being an energy art state from the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.

Obviously, this person was an expert who had traveled through time from the Primeval Age.

He commanded a God Legion Seal, and was clearly a preeminent and illustrious leader from the Primeval Age. And he had come to this age to walk the Ancient Road to the Gods. However, from his demeanor, it seemed he had come in a rush.

Whoosh. Whoosh. Whoosh.

The way he retracted his aura even suggested that he was worried about being noticed. Looking around at the primal-chaos paleo-energy, he nodded. ‘Perfect. It’s a good thing I ended up in this location, as opposed to another, otherwise, the fluctuations might’ve attracted notice.’

RUMBLE!

A host of individuals began popping out into the primal-chaos paleo-energy behind him, all of them clad in golden garments. They were his followers, and all of them were incredibly powerful.

In fact, their combined strength seemed like enough to topple the dao of heaven.

“Milord...” they murmured as they hurried over and kneeled.

One of them inched forward and said, “Oh mighty Lord, despite the disastrous losses we suffered in the Primeval Age, we've finally made it to the Immortal Dao Age. But why do I get the sensation that dramatic transformations are underway here? There seems to be some aura spreading that surpasses even our grand Primeval Age.”

“Look there,” said the young man, pointing. They sent their vision through the primal-chaos until they saw the Ancient Road to the Gods, except there was an enormous necropolis blocking its entrance.

If the Ancient Road to the Gods was blocked, it meant that no one stood a chance to reach godly ascension.

“The Ancient Road to the Gods! We've finally laid eyes on the Ancient Road to the Gods!” These people all had eyes brimming with tears of excitement. “The road vanished from the Primeval Age, but here it is in the Immortal Dao Age. But Milord, what’s that huge necropolis blocking the entrance? My god, look at how big it is! It's definitely larger than a thirty-third ranked immortal world.”

“Looks like it’s higher than the hundredth rank,” the young man said, sighing. “The Great Necropolis is a powerful and mysterious item from the god world, a place where gods are buried. I'm not sure of the details, as my God Legion Seal doesn’t contain any further information about it. But one thing is certain: this age is changing, and is full of possibility. And now that we’ve escaped the future world, the God Legion Seal is safe.”

“Oh mighty Lord,” another of his attendants said, “I've heard that there's a God Legion Seal in this age as well. We should probably go into hiding and work on getting stronger. At the same time, we can search for information about whoever owns the other part of the God Legion Seal. Getting that third piece is the only way we’ll be able to fight back against the future world.”

“You're right. I have the feeling that whoever owns the God Legion Seal in this age hasn’t grown to his full potential yet, which means we might have a chance to take him out! Yes, we need to get information. Thankfully, I don't think any of the sects from the Primeval Age exist in this time period. Therefore, when we make our debut, we can do so as representatives of a buddhist school. We can just say that we opened up a path from the Primeval Age and came here to spread our faith and religion. There were many buddhist schools, such as the Zen Sect, Vajrayāna Sect, Permeation Sect, Sūrya Sect, Vidyā Sect, Kā Sect, Question Sect, and so on. It shouldn’t be hard for us to come up with our own version. You take charge, Eye. I’ll remain behind the scenes!”

“Yes, Milord!” said the man named Eye.

It was an incredibly simple name, only one word. In the Primeval age, it was common to only have one word for a name, as had been made clear by Eldest Brother Secundus.

“We’ll start by changing our appearance,” Eye said. “Take this secret magic I once acquired from one of the buddhist schools. It's as famous as the Secret-Ensconcing All-World Anything-Everything Fundamental-Law Magic, called the Success-Steadiness Destruction-Void Myriad-Tribulations Doom-Law Hand Seal. We need to come up with a name for this new buddhist school as well. How about the Doom Sect? Yes. This is a period of doom to the law, so the Doom Sect is fitting. The time has come for us to end all of this chaos.”

With that, Eye began uttering some zen chants, causing a golden buddha to appear behind him. The buddha exploded after a moment, becoming countless golden magical symbols that rained down on everyone present and soaked into their bodies. Moments later, sauvastika symbols appeared on all of their foreheads and they vanished.

Left behind was only a voice. “I have come to the Immortal Dao Age and will soon make my move. As for the holder of the God Legion Seal, know that I used the prognostication techniques of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth to seek information about you. I know that you haven’t yet reached your full potential, and are very weak. I will find you, and I will kill you. With the second part of the God Legion Seal, my cultivation base will advance by leaps and bounds, and I will be able to step into the god world. And once I get there, I will rip everything to shreds.”

Another extremely powerful entity had arrived in the current age.

**

As Yang Qi flew along, he suddenly shivered.

“What’s wrong?” Battle Resister asked. “Brother Yang Qi, could it be that your cultivation base hasn't fully recovered?”

“No, it’s not that,” Yang Qi replied. “I just got a strange sensation that leads me to believe something important is about to happen. Perhaps it’s that something very, very important to me has suddenly appeared. Except I’m not sure what it is. I feel like there’s a very heavy weight inside me now, so heavy it's almost painful.”

“Oh?” Battle Resister said, a serious expression overtaking his face. “Brother Yang Qi, your cultivation base has reached a peak level, especially your spirit and will. Yet all of a sudden, you’re feeling an ill premonition? What exactly happened? And what should we do about it? Perhaps we should hold back from taking action? Or perform some divinations?”

People who had reached the level of cultivation of Battle Resister and Yang Qi knew that when they were prompted by a sudden impulse, it often meant that something important was about to happen. Such feelings shouldn't be ignored. Oftentimes, they related to life-or-death matters.

Yang Qi shook his head. “Divinations won’t help. I already have a divine ability that can instantly assess the river of fate and the dao of heaven. Just now, I sensed a ripple that vanished with an unnatural quickness. It seems to me that some powerful expert arrived and immediately went into hiding from the dao of heaven.”

“What if this person does something unexpected?”

“I doubt they will, or at least, not yet,” Yang Qi replied. “Let’s take advantage of the time we have right now to get your Profound House of Battle Energy to safety. Then I can look for the location of the rest of the Secret-Ensconcing All-World Anything-Everything Fundamental-Law Magic. Once my will convergence reaches the Terrifying level, we won’t have so much to worry about.”

If Yang Qi wanted to get stronger, he needed to get godhood to convert into power. But more important than that was his will convergence and nascent divinity. His fight with Empress Joyflower had fully impressed upon him exactly how powerful Terrifying will was, and he knew that he had to reach that level himself. It was hard to imagine what the result would be, otherwise.

Soon enough, he and Battle Resister reached the Profound House of Battle Energy in the Great Necropolis.

It was a sect of similar stature to the Joyflower Palace, and it had a similarly long history. In other words, it vastly surpassed the old Dao Defense League in terms of strength, although possibly not in overall numbers. Although the sect had recently experienced bad luck, many of its disciples were domineering figures, with the weakest among them being Grand Emperors.

“This is the Profound House of Battle Energy, Brother Yang Qi,” Battle Resister said. “The front entrance is called the Gate of the Battle God, which was created by the Battle God himself, and forms the original foundation of the sect. The patriarchs and masters of the sect eventually left for the depths of the Ancient Road to the Gods, and apparently perished. That was when I accepted leadership of the sect and led them here in the Great Necropolis. We flourished at first, and acquired many god items. Unfortunately, we eventually attracted the attention of the Joyflower Palace and came out on the losing end of the conflict. Much of that had to do with Empress Joyflower, and the fact that she always seems to come across good fortune. Her cultivation base has only climbed higher and higher, to the point where she can be considered invincible even on the Ancient Road to the Gods.”

Chapter 930: Profound House of Battle Energy

Yang Qi looked at the Profound House of Battle Energy off in the distance, and nodded inwardly. A raging aura of battle rose up from it, and he could see sect disciples flying here and there, or training. It was an entire world unto itself, protected by countless god formations.

Of course, such god formations weren’t particularly impressive to Yang Qi. In fact, he could destroy them as easily as exhaling.

Their arrival in front of the main gate provoked a reaction from quite a few disciples.

Swish. Swish. Swish.

Suddenly a few dozen beams of light appeared and flew forth to block the path of Battle Resister.

“Houselord, you’re back?”

As the individuals within the beams of light took shape, it became obvious that they were looking at Battle Resister with expressions of open vigilance. It definitely didn't seem like the reception a returning houselord would receive, in which the disciples would welcome him with cheers and delight. Yang Qi immediately got the sense that something strange was going on.

“You’re wearing the uniforms of inner society disciples. Presumably, you belong to factions run by prime elders who are currently in seclusion. What are you doing here?” When Battle Resister saw how serious their expressions were, he continued, “Tell me what's going on here. Was there a disturbance in the sect?”

“Houselord, the prime elders you mentioned are already out of seclusion. They’re entertaining the emissaries of the Immortal House of Supreme Preeminence. You’ve been gone for several months, and the emissaries were getting impatient. As a superpower sect from the Ancient Road to the Gods, they would make a perfect ally to take down the Joyflower Palace.”

“Bullcrap!” Battle Resister shouted. “Who the hell do the people from the Immortal House of Supreme Preeminence think they are? They’re all rapacious wolves! They might have been a superpower sect once, but they vanished after entering the Great Necropolis. Now they’re back wanting to drag the Profound House of Battle Energy into whatever they’re wrapped up in. I bet they just want some cannon fodder. Bring out those two emissaries. There’s no way I’ll let them take advantage of our sect.”

“Houselord, we absolutely cannot afford to offend the Immortal House of Supreme Preeminence!” one of the disciples declared. “At the moment, they’re ten times larger than our Profound House of Battle Energy. If fighting broke out, I doubt any of us would survive. Besides, the Joyflower Palace is going around destroying one sect after another. Don’t tell me we’re just going to wait around to be eradicated.”

“What impudence! Who the hell are you? How dare you go around talking to the houselord like that!” Battle Resister suddenly blurred into motion.

The disciple in question had a power index of three hundred, so considering that Battle Resister was at the level of two thousand, there was simply no way the two could be compared.

Shink. Clink. Swish.

Even as the first disciple was sent tumbling backward, the rest of the disciples suddenly drew their weapons, including sabers, swords, and even some crossbows, all of which were god items. Clearly, these were reserve weapons from the Profound House of Battle Energy.

“What do you people think you’re doing?” Battle Resister shouted. “How dare you draw weapons on me, the houselord. You've earned yourself the death sentence.”

One of the disciples chuckled darkly. “I'm sorry to tell you that, starting today, you’re not the houselord. The prime elders have already made the decision to expel you. They’ve made an agreement with the Immortal House of Supreme Preeminence, and have elected a new houselord. Going forward, the Profound House of Battle Energy is going to be a subsidiary faction of the Immortal House of Supreme Preeminence. They brought some incredible gifts for us, including god pills, god items, and even some fragments of godhood. Could we really refuse an offer like that?”

“That’s right,” another disciple said. “The Profound House of Battle Energy is going to join the Immortal House of Supreme Preeminence and help them conquer all of existence. And of course we're going to destroy the Joyflower Palace. Brothers, I heard that the women from the Joyflower Palace are quite lovely! I can’t wait to try them out. Supposedly they keep men as consorts, so it’s only appropriate we turn them all into slave girls!” With that, he burst out into laughter.

“This is shockingly outrageous!” Battle Resister said, nearly in a rage. Ignoring the disciples, he threw his head back and let loose a booming roar.

RUMBLE!

An explosive wave of energy rolled out, and before the nearby disciples could react, they were ripped to shreds, their god items crushed, and even their flesh and blood wiped out of existence.

“Everyone get out here, right now! You bastards want to ruin the hundreds of millions of years of history of the Profound House of Battle Energy? Never! Immortal House of Supreme Preeminence? Don’t you people know that sticking to them is like asking a tiger for its skin?”

Yang Qi was a bit taken aback by how ruthless Battle Resister was being, using a mere shout to kill the nearby disciples. It had happened so quickly that none of them had even had a chance to react.

It just went to show how enigmatically strong Battle Resister was.

After going all out in the fight with Empress Joyflower, he had spent time healing in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, which had also helped him to reach an even higher level of enlightenment.

“How dare you, Battle Resister!” someone shouted angrily. A moment later, a tall young man appeared in front of Battle Resister, as if by teleportation.

He had his hands clasped behind his back, and wore a long robe. He pulsed with battle energy, and was flanked by several of the prime elders, as well as a man and woman who were clearly not wearing the uniform of the Profound House of Battle Energy. Obviously, these were the emissaries from the Immortal House of Supreme Preeminence.

Yang Qi wasn’t very familiar with all the superpower sects from the Ancient Road to the Gods. But he did know that the Joyflower Palace, Profound House of Battle Energy, and Cipher-Devil Sword Sect were actually not considered superpowers. The superpower sects had long since entered the depths of the Great Necropolis to probe its most mysterious secrets.

Contrary to expectation, one such sect was making its debut here and now.

Of course, by this point, Empress Joyflower was strong enough to brush shoulders with the superpowers, especially considering she was capable of unleashing Terrifying will. And she was apparently still making progress with whatever remarkable ability she was working on. Who knew what she would be like upon finishing her endeavors.

Yang Qi surreptitiously activated the power assessment systems and found that the man and woman had power indexes beyond two thousand five hundred, and very close to three thousand. And they surely had hidden trump cards that would make them even more powerful. The prime elders had power indexes of about two thousand, and as for the tall young man, he seemed roughly on the same level as Battle Resister.

“Battle Kilomountain! Are you leading this rebellion against me?” Battle Resister shouted. “You’re my Junior Brother! I helped train and raise you, I can’t believe you would betray me!”

Battle Kilomountain burst out laughing. “You fool, Battle Resister. Why even mention having trained me. You think that makes you superior to me or something? I can’t believe Master made you the houselord. It's your fault the sect is in the sorry state it's in. The prime elders all agreed to oust you, so I suggest you fall in line and agree to work for me as an elder. If you refuse to submit, we’ll expel you from the sect and cripple your energy arts!”

“That's right, Battle Resister,” one of the prime elders said. “You made a huge mistake, and deserve to have this happen to you. We’re going to take back all of the energy arts you acquired from the sect.”

Instead of reacting with anger, Battle Resister laughed. “And what mistake did I make, Elder Serpent? Mind explaining it clearly?” Despite his laughter, he was furious at these unexpected developments.

“Your mistake?” another prime elder said. “Not allying with the Immortal House of Supreme Preeminence! They sent emissaries over and over again, but you refused all of their offers. Were you just trying to piss them off? Were you trying to get the Profound House of Battle Energy destroyed? Don’t you know that the Immortal House of Supreme Preeminence is a superpower sect!?”

Meanwhile, the man from the Immortal House of Supreme Preeminence took a few steps forward and, with a sinister smile, said, “Exactly, Battle Resister. You refused our Immortal House of Supreme Preeminence over and over again, which was a complete and utter humiliation! The best thing to do is to cripple you. Now that you're back, nobody can save you.”

“I agree,” said the female emissary. “All of the disciples of the Profound House of Battle Energy are here today, and there are plenty who are loyal to him. Why not simply kill him and turn him into a puppet, or even a magical treasure?” It was only at this point that she noticed Yang Qi. “Who are you? Don’t tell me you’re here to help him. Not that I'm worried. It doesn’t matter who Battle Resister has to help him, he's going to die. That’s the only outcome for people who defy the Immortal House of Supreme Preeminence!”

“My apologies, Brother Yang Qi,” Battle Resister said. “I didn’t intend to drag you into this.”

“It’s fine,” Yang Qi replied. “From what I can tell, this sect is full of traitors. How dare they try to expel you, the rightful houselord. Rebels and scoundrels like these are the kind of people that anyone has the right to punish. Besides, I couldn’t care less about the Immortal House of Supreme Preeminence. Superpower sect? Every ten steps I kill an enemy, and walk a thousand miles unimpeded. What do I have to be scared of? I'm here to help you, and that includes quelling this uprising in your sect.”

“Brother Yang Qi, please, don’t trouble yourself,” Battle Resister said. “I'm curious to see why these people think they qualify to expel and cripple me. I’ve accomplished a lot as the houselord, and won many victories. The Profound House of Battle Energy used to be unstable, but my campaigns on the Ancient Road to the Gods led to countless victories, and brought about the deaths of endless fiend-devils. Step forward, Battle Kilomountain. If you want to be the houselord, then why don’t we just have a duel? Whoever wins gets the position!”

Chapter 931: Immortal House of Supreme Preeminence

Battle Resister and Battle Kilomountain were about to fight each other.

They were fellow disciples who were now heading into a life-or-death struggle, and although one might think it would provoke an emotional sigh, Battle Kilomountain didn’t seem to be reacting that way at all. Bubbling with killing intent, he said, “If you want to die, Battle Resister, then don’t blame me for fulfilling your wish! Did you really think that you would always outdo me here? It’s true that you were stronger than me, in the past. But after throwing in my lot with the Immortal House of Supreme Preeminence, one of their top experts bestowed an energy art upon me. I’ve already successfully cultivated the Supreme Preeminence Exalted Celestial Energy! You should be honored to die by a divine art like this. Although, I definitely won’t make it a quick death. You're going to experience endless pain before I let you pass.”

BOOM!

After finishing his little speech, Battle Kilomountain immediately launched an attack.

The air vibrated as he sped forward, twisting and writhing through the air like a big snake.

“Time Rides upon Six Dragons!”

Six palms, six stances. Each palm resembled a divine dragon, pulling a chariot of time. Everyone watching was struck with the sensation that this palm attack could control the momentum of time itself.

Snorting coldly, Battle Resister said, “That’s the Battle Dragon God Palm from our Profound House of Battle Energy. Why not use this supposed Supreme Preeminence Exalted Celestial Energy you talked about? Could it be that you actually haven’t cultivated it to completion? The consummate arts of our Profound House of Battle Energy were passed down from the majestic Battle God himself. And they’re on exactly the same level as the arts of the Immortal House of Supreme Preeminence. Beginning of all Living Things!”

His words led right into a palm attack that rocketed right toward the Time Rides upon Six Dragons attack.

When the two palms met, Battle Kilomountain shivered and began emanating a blood-colored energy. “Grand Brightness From Start to Finish!”

It was a move that radiated strength and discipline, causing the grand brightness of a sun and a moon to transform everything it touched.

Battle Resister flipped backward, then shouted at the top of his lungs as he launched a fist strike. “The Safeguard of Supreme Harmony!”

Instantly, yin and yang were inverted, and the power of supreme harmony negated Battle Kilomountain’s attack. The most marvelous moves of the Profound House of Battle Energy were on display here, and the result was that a domain was spreading out to cover the area. Yang Qi couldn’t help but nod in admiration; these two were truly top experts, their each and every action revealing a profound understanding of battle. Although the power they unleashed couldn’t compare to his Hand of the One God, their raw skill was something to marvel at.

Even just watching them, Yang Qi was starting to gain enlightenment into the consummate arts of their sect.

“The Chief Emerges from Commoners!”

“Let Peace Fill the Nation!”

Battle Resister and Battle Kilomountain were using the deadliest moves from the Profound House of Battle Energy, a collection of secret arts relating to battle energy. Back and forth they fought, exchanging blow after blow.

Battle Resister actually hovered in midair, but solid ground appeared beneath his feet as he moved, forming with each step he took. The ground almost resembled a turtle shell, as though an actual turtle were lending him aid.

It was an extremely marvelous footwork technique.

As for Battle Kilomountain, each step he took caused an enormous mountain to appear beneath his feet, making his energy arts seem like a heavenly wind blowing through the most majestic of mountain peaks.

Unexpectedly, the two of them seemed evenly matched!

At a certain point during the fighting, Battle Resister nodded. “So, Battle Kilomountain, you really have put a lot of effort into today’s attempt to seize power. Unfortunately, you don’t understand the true meaning of battle. Today, in front of all the disciples present, I’ll show you the most consummate technique of the Profound House of Battle Energy. This is what the true will of battle looks like. Charge to Battle and Defeat the Dharma!”

RUMBLE!

Cracks spread out and covered Battle Resister, whose will of battle began to rise rapidly, making it seem almost like he was being possessed by the Battle God. Suddenly, an enormous cudgel of true energy appeared in his hands, which he raised over his head to deliver a massive downward blow.

“I know Charge to battle and Defeat the Dharma too! What’s the big deal about that?” A true energy cudgel appeared in Battle Kilomountain’s hands as well, which he thrust toward Battle Resister.

However, Battle Resister suddenly flitted through the air, his cudgel transforming into a long, sharp saber, creating a streak of golden light as it sliced through the air.

RIP!

The sabre slashed through Battle Kilomountain’s cudgel, then continued onward.

Battle Kilomountain was clearly shocked, and had been completely unaware that Charge to Battle and Defeat the Dharma could do something like that. Shouting at the top of his lungs, he drew even more deeply on his true energy to power the move and try to fight back.

Unfortunately for him, Battle Resister had seized the upper hand. He was a Warrior One, and every move he unleashed was fierce and filled with infinite variations. The surging true energy weapons he unleashed shifted from a saber, to a spear, to an axe. Then a warhammer, a whip, a noose, and a trident.

The weapons endlessly shifted from one to another.

Fundamentally speaking, it wasn’t anything unusual, as just about anyone could use true energy to create a variety of weapons. For example, in the mortal world, the sixth phase of cultivation was the Energy Weapon level, which was all about converging energy into the shape of a weapon.

However, there was something about Battle Resister’s true energy that was different from normal. Every different weapon he created was a god item, profound and mysterious to the extreme. They were real weapons that could shake the enemy to no end. Each of them was filled with mysterious transformations that could incite reactions from the dao of heaven, and they were all completely unpredictable.

The weapons almost seemed like something from a textbook, as if they had been forged by the ultimate ancestor of all weapons.

And they could only unleash their potential in the hands of Battle Resister; in the hands of anyone else, they would be pieces of scrap.

This was what happened when the battle will of Charge to Battle and Defeat the Dharma was pushed to the ultimate limit.

Battle Kilomountain was being relentlessly shoved backward across the battlefield.

When he was finally pushed into a corner, he shouted, “Supreme Harmony Exalted Celestial Fist!”

A brilliant stream of godlight shot up, scattering the effects of Charge to Battle and Defeat the Dharma, and raging toward Battle Resister.

In response, Yang Qi’s pupils constricted.

As for Battle Resister, he suddenly vanished, as though he had long since anticipated that Battle Kilomountain would use this move. Apparently, he never did this sort of thing, because the move was totally unexpected. Not even a moment passed before he was on the left side of Battle Kilomountain, his energy arts surging with the power of the Merciful level as he clenched his hand into a fist.

“Battle God Shatters Hell!”

POP!

Battle Kilomountain was sent flying, a waterfall of blood erupting from his mouth.

He had been completely and utterly defeated!

“What a piece of trash!” said the male emissary from the Immortal House of Supreme Preeminence. Reaching out, he grabbed Battle Kilomountain and sent some true energy into him to stabilize him. From the look on his ashen face, Battle Kilomountain was now convinced that he still wasn’t a match for Battle Resister.

Striding forward, the young emissary said, “So, you’re a Warrior One. That’s in the top ten of the three thousand constitutions. Very rare. I'm Preeminence Boost from the Immortal House of Supreme Preeminence. And I’m very curious to see how much battle prowess you have yet to unleash.”

Making a beckoning gesture with his index finger, he continued, “Why not ask that brat friend of yours to join you. Two against one!”

“There’s no need for that,” Yang Qi said, strolling forward lazily. “You take a rest, Battle Resister. I’ll take care of things now. After this fight is over, we can take your Profound House of Battle Energy away like we were originally planning.” Looking at Preeminence Boost, he said, “Two against one is fine. You two emissaries against me. In fact, if you want those prime elders to help you as well, that's fine. It’ll just save me some time.”

“You’re quite young to have such a big mouth, boy,” Preeminence Boost said, shivering with rage. “Apparently, you want to die right here, have your soul wiped out from the cycle of reincarnation, and—”

POP!

Before he could even finish speaking, Yang Qi suddenly appeared right in front of him and struck him viciously in the abdomen.

“Aaaiiiieee!” he screamed, tears leaking out of his eyes as he staggered backward. Although Yang Qi’s palm strike had seemed simple in nature, he had actually backed it with the energy of the Hell Scourge. In the blink of an eye, waves of hellish torture spread through his enemy’s entire body.

Although he had a high cultivation base, how could he possibly compare to Yang Qi? Yang Qi had fought with Empress Joyflower and had taken Eternal Fortuned blood. Furthermore, his immortal-slaying clone could pour the power of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart into his attacks, enabling him to at least try to stand on his own against Terrifying will for a short time. During his session of healing in the chart, he had gained profound enlightenment regarding the magical symbol of the Secret-Ensconcing All-World Anything-Everything Fundamental-Law Magic, and added vajra characteristics to his nascent divinity. His will convergence was already at an inconceivable level, and his true energy was at such a high level that he could easily brush shoulders with enemies whose power indexes were three thousand.

As for Preeminence Boost, he wasn’t at the level of three thousand. Although he was close, it wasn’t enough to enable him to defend against Yang Qi.

Thus, this single palm strike of Yang Qi’s had completely vanquished him.

It had been many hundreds of millions of years since Preeminence Boost had last shed tears, but right now, they flowed down his cheeks and he very nearly shouted, “Mommy!”

It was almost as if he had been beaten back into a state of childhood!

WHOOSH!

Yang Qi’s palm continued on, creating an enormous black hole which violently sucked Preeminence Boost into it. It didn’t matter how mighty he was, he was powerless to do anything to fight it. Eventually, when the Sage Monarch Society made a reappearance in the world, he would be a ‘hired thug’ working at their side.

As for everyone else present, they watched as Preeminence Boost was smacked off his feet like a shrimp, then visibly wept before vanishing into a black hole. They couldn’t have been more shocked.

After all, most top experts would readily shed blood, but never tears. In fact, they wouldn’t weep at all, even if they died.

It would take a truly terrifying torture to provoke a reaction like that.

Chapter 932: Complete Defeat

A flurry of palm strikes had smashed Preeminence Boost into capitulation, until tears streamed down his face. In the end, he was forced into servitude. In the Great Necropolis, it was rare to see servants of his level. In fact, they would only appear in the top superpower sects.

In the blink of an eye, Preeminence Boost was inside the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, facing Yang Qi’s immortal-slaying clone, who lashed him with the Hell Scourge and caused him to rapidly descend into a haze of despair.

“Myriad worlds god-king; one billion god formations; deliver all beings from suffering; suppress all opposition; give your faith to me; give your faith to me....” A conglomeration of glowing sagelight entered into Preeminence Boost’s sea of consciousness, causing him to tremble visibly.

After the haze of despair caused by the Hell Scourge, he could do only one thing in response to the appearance of that sagelight.

“Save me. Save me!”

“Exercise faith in me,” the clone said, “and your torment will end. Refuse, and sink into eternal oblivion....”

Just when it seemed that Preeminence Boost would give in and become a believer, a surge of quintessence energy appeared in his sea of consciousness and destroyed the sagelight.

“Who dares to forcibly convert my disciple!” someone shouted, causing Preeminence Boost to suddenly regain his lucidity.

“What?” Both the clone and Yang Qi’s true self were caught completely by surprise by the fact that some sort of guardian was lurking in Preeminence Boost's sea of consciousness. Apparently, it was a defensive mechanism put in place by the Immortal House of Supreme Preeminence.

“Secret-Ensconcing All-World Anything-Everything Fundamental-Law Magic!” Yang Qi waved his hand, sending a stream of true energy out from his true self, as well as the golden imp of his nascent divinity. As they entered Preeminence Boost’s sea of consciousness, he caught sight of an old man there, sitting on a throne, surrounded by primordial chaos. From the way the old man’s eyes stabbed into Yang Qi, he could tell that the old man was a projection of Terrifying will.

Despite being just a projection, his mere voice alone would have been enough to shatter most people.

But not Yang Qi.

Approaching, he laughed and said, “So, you’re some leader from the Immortal House of Supreme Preeminence, here to protect this disciple. Nice. Sadly, I'm going to devour you to bolster my own nascent divinity. For all intents and purposes, you might as well be a knowledge-devil! Prepare to submit!”

Yang Qi was very familiar with this process and quickly drew upon the arts of King Heaven-Devourer. Meanwhile, the old man’s eyebrows shot up in fury. “How dare you! Supreme-Preeminence Paragon-Dao Preheaven Nine Conversions!”

Countless vortexes sprang into being and shot toward Yang Qi.

This was a direct competition between nascent divinities, which, despite not involving true energy, was actually even fiercer than an ordinary fight.

Yang Qi was proficient in all sorts of daoist techniques, and furthermore, he commanded the battlefield itself, giving him a huge advantage. However, the old man was incredibly tough, leaving Yang Qi completely convinced that he was a scrap left behind by an elite Terrifying-level opponent. In fact, it was highly likely that he was the houselord of the Immortal House of Supreme Preeminence. Obviously, conquering someone like him would bring incredible benefits, helping his own nascent divinity to push onward toward the Terrifying level.

Yang Qi’s nascent divinity unleashed countless divine abilities as they fought back and forth in terms of will. At a certain point in the fight, the will of the clone joined Yang Qi’s will in the fierce fighting.

By now, Yang Qi and his immortal-slaying clone were no longer the same person. In other words, this was like a fight in which the God Legion Seal and King Immortal-Slayer himself joined forces.

Thanks to the combination of power, the old man’s throne finally crumbled, provoking a bitter scream from him. “The Immortal House of Supreme Preeminence won’t let this go!”

Yang Qi snorted coldly and unceremoniously devoured the enemy nascent divinity. A moment later, a wave of magical power surged through him, including scattered bits of dao enlightenment, energy arts, spell formations, and other fragments of knowledge. Because of that, his psychic scale began rising.

Unfortunately, Yang Qi had not yet acquired the psychic scaling systems for his Cruiser of Civilization, otherwise he could directly assess matters relating to psychic scales.

Based on what he already knew, simply using the designations of Normal, Stupendous, Destabilizing, and Terrifying were too vague.

For example, he already knew firsthand that the Destabilizing level was broken up into early, mid, late, and peak phases. Each of them were as different from the other as heaven was from the earth, and the difference between early Destabilizing and peak Destabilizing was about the same as that between an ordinary Godmyth and a Grand Emperor. It definitely wasn’t just a matter of increasing by a level here or there. The psychic scale was really the best way to assess an opponent's true fighting prowess.

After assimilating the nascent divinity sealing mark, Yang Qi sent his will into Preeminence Boost, who was now too weak to fight back. The man limply dropped to his knees and sent his faith to the immortal-slaying clone, who absorbed it and used it to further his energy arts.

The faith of an expert with a power index of two thousand six hundred was nothing to scoff at.

Although the conflict had actually taken an extended time, Yang Qi controlled the flow of time in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, so it only lasted for a moment from an outside perspective.

After defeating Preeminence Boost, Yang Qi shimmered with golden light, making him look even more impressive than before, and striking fear into the hearts of those who looked upon him.

“What?” the female emissary blurted, her eyes nearly popping out of her skull. “What did you just do? What happened to Preeminence Boost? If you hurt him, it won’t matter where you hide, you’ll end up paying with your life!”

As for the prime elders, they looked shocked to death and were clearly wondering who this ally was that Battle Resister had brought with him. Preeminence Boost had been such a terrifying entity that no one in the Profound House of Battle Energy held any hope of finding someone who could fight him.

Yet here he was, dispatched with a single move.

“This is Brother Yang Qi,” Battle Resister said. “Not only does he have a profound cultivation base, but he also inherited the daoist teachings and doctrines of King Immortal-Slayer, giving him access to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. In this time of chaos, he can provide a safe haven, and has no interest in plots or schemes. The time has come for us to go to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.” Glaring at the prime elders, he said, “Don’t tell me you’re going to stubbornly insist on going through with your previous plan.”

Snorting coldly, the female emissary said, “I'm leaving. But you just wait. I’ll be back eventually, and I’ll completely destroy the Profound House of Battle Energy!” Turning, she turned into a colorful beam of fiery light that shot off into the distance. However, there was no way Yang Qi was going to let her simply leave. At the last second, he unleashed a powerful palm strike.

However, that was when the woman's voice suddenly rang out from a different direction. “Fooled you, brat! I’ll be back soon enough to destroy you all!

Apparently, she had been using a diversionary tactic earlier to lay the path for escape.

Yet Yang Qi reacted just as quickly, popping into being and thrusting both hands out. Something like a huge net instantly appeared overhead, filled with numerous magical laws. As the saying goes, the guilty can never escape justice from heaven, and the woman was tightly wrapped up.

No matter how she scurried this way and that, she couldn’t escape.

BOOM!

Yang Qi appeared within the net, where he unleashed yet another devastating palm strike.

The woman’s eyes flashed with bright light as she waved her hands out, summoning a treasured sword, the kind that could slaughter dragons and immortals, and put an end to all living things.

“Preeminent-Chaos Exalted-Celestial Sword Dao!”

Sword energy swept out in all directions. Each slash of the sword was an incomprehensible divine ability that could cut down cultivators with power indexes of three thousand or more. Obviously, this female emissary was putting everything on the line.

However, Yang Qi didn’t hold back either. His palms sent out streams of power that hit the sword energy, grinding it away into powder.

POP!

Yang Qi took a step forward, then reached out and grabbed her sword. Wrenching it out of her grasp, he snapped it in half. As it shattered like glass, he absorbed the resulting quintessence energy.

Then his hand shot out and slapped the top of her head. Although she didn’t shatter like the sword, everyone could see streams of white light pouring into her sea of consciousness.

Then she began trembling, as though a deadly fight was playing out in her sea of consciousness.

A moment later, a cracking sound could be heard, like an egg being crushed. That was the nascent divinity sealing mark inside of her being defeated and absorbed by Yang Qi.

Yang Qi sighed contentedly, and mused that he really needed to find more disciples from the Immortal House of Supreme Preeminence. Absorbing the sealing marks inside of them seemed to be a great way to push himself to the next level.

In fact, maybe he could use this method to reach the Terrifying level.

“Milord!”

“I sincerely offer my faith to you!”

Everyone watched in shock as the woman dropped to her knees and offered her full and utter allegiance to Yang Qi. Then, a vortex appeared and she flew directly into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

Chapter 933: Another Increase in Destiny

Just like that, Yang Qi had forced two emissaries to submit, and taken their faith. And thanks to absorbing the nascent divinity sealing marks in them, his psychic scale rose higher, making it more and more likely that he would soon reach the Terrifying level.

Whoever had placed the nascent divinity sealing marks on them obviously possessed Terrifying will. However, thanks to the power of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, Yang Qi was able to conceal the effects of what had just occurred.

If he hadn’t, then that Terrifying expert would have realized what happened and come to destroy Yang Qi. And this expert was truly in the Terrifying level, unlike Empress Joyflower, who was merely on the cusp of it.

Dead silence reigned after Yang Qi took out two top experts with seemingly no effort. Even as the shockwaves continued rolling out, a huge vortex popped into being and prepared to swallow the Profound House of Battle Energy.

When Yang Qi said he was going to do something, he did it. After all, he could take the Profound House of Battle Energy into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart on his own. Considering he now had two top experts working for him, that task would be even easier. He immediately set the two emissaries to work powering certain god formations in the chart.

Even in the Joyflower Palace, there were few people as strong as these two emissaries. In fact, other than the empress herself, there were none.

Considering the advances Yang Qi had made with his cultivation base, he had a feeling that it would soon be time to go back and tangle with Empress Joyflower again. Of course, he wasn’t confident that he could defeat her right now.

He needed to get just a bit stronger. Then, unless she had somehow broken through to the Terrifying level, there would be no way she could beat him.

“So, Battle Kilomountain, what do you think of my friend here?” Battle Resister said. Considering that he and Yang Qi had fought so bitterly together against Empress Joyflower, and that Yang Qi had rescued him, the two of them now had a strong friendship born from battle.

“Y-y-you.... Where did you find someone this strong? He actually defeated the emissaries of the Immortal House of Supreme Preeminence and forced them to work for him? I can’t believe this! Do you know how dangerous it is to offend them?”

Considering that Battle Kilomountain couldn’t even fight one of those two emissaries, it was obvious he couldn’t do a thing to Yang Qi. If he tried, he would only end up destroyed.

“Battle Resister, old pal, it seems this Junior Brother of yours is a real scoundrel. Very treacherous. You definitely can’t keep people like this around. Shall I take care of him for you? Things are only going to get more complicated going forward, and considering how untrustworthy he is, I don’t want him in my Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart causing trouble. Obviously, he has to be executed before he causes problems.”

“Hold on,” Battle Resister said. “After all, he is my Junior Brother. However, he did defy authority, and if I don’t punish him it’ll be difficult to maintain control of the disciples in the Profound House of Battle Energy. I’ll be the one to administer justice!”

RUMBLE!

Battle Resister thrust his hand out in a devastating palm move.

Gong!

Shocked, Battle Kilomountain began fighting back. However, it had already been proven that he wasn’t a match for Battle Resister. And he had been injured in their previous clash. Although Preeminence Boost had healed him to some extent, his true energy was still in chaos. Furthermore, he was mentally shaken after seeing Yang Qi in action.

RIP!

A palm hit him and his meridians exploded, causing blood to spray out of him.

“First palm: You Defy Rules!”

RIP!

The palm slammed into Battle Kilomountain's stomach.

“Second palm: You Incite Rebellion!”

“Third Palm: You Resort to Demagoguery!”

“Fourth Palm: You....”

One after another, Battle Resister let loose a torrent of attacks that slammed into Battle Kilomountain and sent blood spraying everywhere. Previously, the prime elders had been Battle Kilomountain’s diehard followers, but thanks to the threat provided by Yang Qi, none of them dared to do anything other than look on and tremble.

Yang Qi had his eye on them, and all of them knew that if they made a move, he could strike like lightning and put an end to them.

Battle Kilomountain was struck by eighteen palm attacks, forcing him to his knees, his martial arts leaking out of him. True energy spread out, leaving him forever and making him a complete cripple.

“My... my energy arts!” he wailed. “I worked so hard on them. Now they’re gone? I hate you, Battle Resister! How could you treat me like this?!”

“I’ll spare your life,” Battle Resister roared, “but you’re going to remain in prison. Disciples!”

“Here!” Upon seeing the leader of the sect putting on such an impressive display of might, numerous disciples hurried forward and grabbed Battle Kilomountain. Binding him in chains, they dragged him away.

Yang Qi gave an inward nod of satisfaction at the way Battle Resister handled Battle Kilomountain. Battle Resister was clearly not blindly merciful. When the time came to kill, he could do so without hesitation. Of course, it was little wonder. On the Ancient Road to the Gods, those who showed mercy would inevitably be devoured by others.

The only exception could possibly be Star Swordlife, who cultivated a dao of life. That said, not even Star Swordlife would simply let an enemy kill him.

‘That Star Swordlife is a real genius,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘I wonder when I’ll finally subdue his sect and force him to work for me. He could be useful.’

Back when they had first met, Star Swordlife’s power index had been around a hundred. Although it had seemed powerful at the time, it was actually quite weak. That being said, he had a lot of potential, and if he continued to cultivate his sword technique it was entirely possible he could reach godly ascension. After all, he followed his own dao with unswerving determination.

“And now, what to do with you prime elders?” Yang Qi asked.

“We were in the wrong!” one of the prime elders said, dropping to his knees. “Houselord, we understand the error of our ways. Please, show us lenience! Don’t cripple our energy arts!”

“Perhaps I can spare your energy arts,” Battle Resister said, “but you need to truly repent. In your hearts! At the moment, you’re just weaklings who fear being punished. Therefore, I'm going to demote you from the position of prime elder and place warding spells in your nascent divinities. Henceforth, you will all work as conduit teachers, got it? Your main job is to train warriors for the sect!”

In large sects, there were often people called conduit teachers, or thralls. They would work hard on their cultivation, then, when certain crack disciples came along who had earned a reward, they would be forced to transfer their energy arts to that student. It was a miserable existence, similar to fishing cormorants who could catch fish but not actually eat them.

When the prime elders heard that they were to be thralls, their faces turned ashen. However, they didn’t dare to argue. If they did, they knew they would end up with crippled energy arts, and virtually no hope of ever recovering.

“Disciples, take the conduit teachers away,” Battle Resister said. “Brother Yang Qi, could I prevail on you to place warding magics on these criminals? My energy arts probably aren’t enough to keep them in check, should they decide to fight back.”

“No problem. They might as well be baby chickens, as far as I'm concerned.” Yang Qi flicked his finger, and several streams of sagelight flew out, entering the entire group before they could react. In the blink of an eye, they were secured.

RUMBLE!

The disciples of the Profound House of Battle Energy looked up as the enormous vortex began to swallow their entire sect, making it almost seem like the end of the world had come.

Yang Qi used both the power of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart and King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans. If anyone had been watching from a distance, it would have looked like an enormous primal-chaos elder-snake was slowly swallowing up the entire Profound House of Battle Energy.

In the blink of an eye, the entire sect was gone.

“Brother Battle Resister, please take some time to restore order to your Profound House of Battle Energy. I’ll give you plenty of cultivation resources to work with, and you’re free to interact with my followers. Just remember that fighting is prohibited.” Truth be told, Yang Qi was feeling a bit winded. The Profound House of Battle Energy was enormous. Perhaps it wasn’t as large as the Passionless God Flower, but if Yang Qi hadn’t recently improved his immortal-slaying clone and acquired the two emissaries, it would have been a difficult task to deal with it.

In the end, he was almost completely drained of true energy, to the point where it was probably going to take a few days to recover.

“Of course,” Battle Resister said. “And don’t worry, Brother Yang Qi. Considering I'm relying on your help, there’s no way my disciples will cause any problems. Besides, after the show you just put on, they view you like a heaven-god! There’s no way they’ll insult your people!”

Yang Qi could sense that, now that Battle Resister was truly relying on him, a burning flow of destiny that surpassed anything from the Dao Defense League was now his.

The Profound House of Battle Energy was truly one of the top sects from the Ancient Road to the Gods. It had numerous disciples, and now he was benefitting from their destiny. Perhaps that universal fortune was what he could use to reach a higher level.

Unfortunately, his version of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth did not have any technique suitable for manipulating universal fortune.

Chapter 934: Another Fight with Profound Valor

As Battle Resister was putting the Profound House of Battle Energy in order, Yang Qi headed back to the outside world. He was now much more familiar with the Great Necropolis, and although the ultimate nature of the thing was still a mystery, he could at least travel within it more easily.

For now, he had no intention of following through on Leaf Dao-Denier’s information and looking for the so-called Cave Temple of Vajra Māyādevī. Instead, he wanted to track down Profound Valor and strip him of his identity as an Inheritor of the Great Necropolis.

Profound Valor had tried his best to assimilate Yang Qi’s power double, imprisoning and even trying to force information out of him. Although he had failed in the end, it was a humiliation that Yang Qi wasn’t just going to forget about.

After achieving major advancement in his energy arts, the first major threat he had faced was Profound Valor, and the second was Empress Joyflower. Thanks to his fight with the empress, the Engine of the One God was now in a dormant state, with the strength god systems completely offline. However, given his enlightenment of the essence of power, he would be fine.

Besides, upon unlocking King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions, he had made the godhood stars of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart available to his immortal-slaying clone, which meant that his attacks could be packed with so much power that he shouldn’t even need the Engine of the One God this time.

In the end, he was confident that he could seize victory in a fight with Profound Valor.

He had been on his way to the Profound House of Battle Energy when he had experienced a sudden thought. For some reason, he had a feeling that something really big was about to happen, and because of that, he needed to get much, much stronger. If he could acquire the status of an Inheritor, and conquer any knowledge-devils that came with it, then perhaps he could subjugate some of the will of the Great Necropolis and reach the Terrifying level.

The Great Necropolis was vastly more mysterious than the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, and was definitely not the work of ordinary hands. In fact, it was highly likely that the will convergence of the Great Necropolis’ creator had surpassed the Terrifying level and was in the Unbounded level, or even beyond it.

If an entity like that was the one who had created the godpower seeds of the Inheritors, then it was highly likely that they were like the God Legion Seal, and contained powerful and mysterious techniques.

Yang Qi had recently come up with another idea as well. If he could treat the God Legion Seal like a knowledge-devil, and completely conquer it, then maybe he could absorb it into his nascent divinity.

Although he obviously couldn’t do that right now, it was something to consider for the future.

At that point, he would have Unbounded, or possibly even Annulled will convergence, and would be able to devastate anything in his path even without the God Legion Seal.

‘Just you wait, Profound Valor. I’m coming for you, and that godpower seed!’ With that, he left the Great Necropolis and began flying among the immortal worlds. Great changes were underway. Thirty-third ranked immortal worlds were visible everywhere, and it wasn’t uncommon to see worlds in the fiftieth, sixtieth, seventieth, and even hundredth rank. In fact, he even saw a few that were so far beyond the hundredth rank they were approaching two hundred.

Yang Qi couldn’t possibly move worlds such as that around. He had no idea what existed in them, and when he got close to some of them, he realized that they were gobbling up the primal-chaos paleo-energy from around them as though they were growing.

He also got the sensation that the Great Necropolis had more worlds to expel, worlds that would surpass the two-hundredth rank and reach the three-hundredth, or even the thousandth rank.

Looking down into the primal-chaos, Yang Qi saw that the immortal worlds really were like eternal sands, filled with countless streams of destiny and shaped like dragons, rainbows, clouds, and vortexes.

Compared to the larger picture, the Dao Defense League was obviously third-rate. It was like a nouveau riche lord from the mortal world with a few thousand soldiers. Obviously, a person like that wasn’t going to go around conquering the world, but would instead need to find some more powerful feudal minister to adhere to.

‘The Great Necropolis changed the face of reality with almost no effort. It's hard to even wrap my mind around. It can produce clouds with one turn of the hand, and rain with another. Truly terrifying.’

Even as he sighed inwardly, he suddenly noticed that, off in the distance, several thousand streams of destiny had risen up, and within them was the golden glow unique to the buddhist schools. Either a buddhist school was making an appearance, or some top buddhist expert from the Ancient Road to the Gods was about to arrive.

The dao of immortals was changing, almost in the way that someone in the Energy Arts level would transform upon reaching the Lifeseizing level, and then again upon becoming a Legendary!

‘It is a buddhist school?’ he thought. Although its destiny seemed weak, the golden color within it was powerful, and the type that could never be destroyed. From the look of it, it was a fiftieth ranked immortal world, or perhaps even sixtieth.

And the place was continuing to grow stronger and more invincible.

Yang Qi’s interest was piqued, as this world was obviously no ordinary location.

For now, though, his eyes were fixed on the hundredth ranked immortal world that contained the Profound Killing Dao Sect. It already looked different from before, as it pulsed with killing energy and was now surrounded by numerous auxiliary immortal worlds. Apparently, the Profound Killing Dao Sect had been expanding in recent days.

The flames of war seemed to flicker everywhere within the world, as though countless powerful experts were unleashing death and destruction in immense wars. In the past, small-scale conflict had been common here, but things were completely different now.

‘The Profound Killing Dao Sect is expanding. But that won’t stop me from taking down Profound Valor and absorbing his sect!’ Drawing on his abilities of disguise and concealment, Yang Qi slipped into the hundredth ranked immortal world with ease.

RUMBLE!

Using the Son of Heaven's Horoscopy, he peered into the Profound Killing Dao Sect until he located a spot pulsing with power that indicated that someone was practicing cultivation there. Slowly but surely, his vision pierced through the layers of concealment until he saw a person sitting there doing breathing exercises, causing their will to slowly rise to a higher level. Although this person didn’t have Terrifying will, it was close.

‘How did Profound Valor get this much stronger so quickly?’ Yang Qi thought in surprise. ‘Can the Inheritors’ godpower seeds really lead to cultivation speeds that surpass the God Legion Seal? Perhaps it's because we’re in the Great Necropolis. Well, that’s fine. I’ll just launch a sneak attack. Maybe I won't kill him, but at least I can still seriously injure him. The fight will definitely be much easier than last time.’

Drawing on the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart and its Godly Positioning System, Yang Qi locked down on his target aura, then drew on his Wheel of Fate to subvert the workings of heaven. This time, the visage of Profound Valor became even clearer as he sat there cross-legged in meditation. As he breathed, he seemed to grow larger when he inhaled, then shrink back to normal upon exhaling. Apparently, each time he expanded, so did the surrounding plane of existence.

“Operate the dao of heaven. Absorb power. King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans. King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions. Consummate monarch arts!”

As Yang Qi drew on his many energy arts, all three thousand of King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans appeared, making a huge primal-chaos elder-snake that slowly shrank down amidst loud cracking sounds. Soon, it was wrapped around his arms, causing them to thrum with godpower.

Meanwhile, his photonic computers were calculating all the necessary elements of the best attack.

[Assessing. Calculating. Measuring. Precise computations underway. Devising the most powerful attack!]

Swish!

A moment later, Yang Qi vanished without a trace.

When he reappeared, he was in an empty chamber of stone the same color as the Great Necropolis. It was also incredibly tough, so much so that not even gods could break the material. In fact, without the Godly Positioning System of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, there was no way Yang Qi would have ever been able to find and enter it.

After all, Profound Valor had created this place with the godpower of the Great Necropolis! Unfortunately for him, Yang Qi had his photonic computers and the Wheel of Fate, which made it possible for him to find just about anything he sought.

Even as Profound Valor sat there meditating, Yang Qi launched a vicious attack right at his back.

BOOM!

A vortex sprang up in Yang Qi as his hand stabbed into Profound Valor’s sea of energy. Grabbing Profound Valor’s god vitality, Yang Qi threw it into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. That god vitality was Profound Valor’s own true energy, and it was so strong that, even after having been absorbed by King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans, it couldn’t normally be assimilated. All Profound Valor would have to do would be to exercise a thought, and it would explode.

However, King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans and the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart were very mysterious things. Upon taking the god vitality, they instantly suppressed it and cut off its connection to Profound Valor.

“Aggghhhh!”

Before Profound Valor could even react, he was hit by Yang Qi’s sneak attack. Normally speaking, he should have sensed the imminent danger. But thanks to Yang Qi’s profound cultivation base, as well as the profundities of the Wheel of Fate, and his Fateless powers that put him outside of the river of fate, there was no way that Profound Valor could detect his presence.

In the blink of an eye, he used King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans to take around half of Profound Valor’s god vitality. That was when an enraged roar echoed out, and a palm headed right in his direction.

POP!

Yang Qi blocked the palm strike and dismissed King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans from his arms. His opponent was on to him. However, considering he had already taken half of his true energy, it was going to be a much easier fight.

Chapter 935: A Successful Sneak Attack

It definitely counted as a successful sneak attack. Using the Wheel of Fate and his Fateless powers, he had struck like an assassin. In some ways, it was just like back in the days of the Rich-Lush Continent, when, as a youth, he had gone hunting black floodwyrms and mastered the dao of the quick strike. By pouring all of his heart and mind into one single blow, he could unleash the most consummate of attacks, reaping life with ease.

If he had been like a world-class assassin back then, how much better was he now?

Furthermore, one of the seventy-two monarchs was known as King Heaven-Assassinator, who had also mastered the dao of the quick strike and had led a sect of assassins. Considering that Yang Qi had mastered the Seventy-Two Monarchs Energy Art, he obviously had the quintessence of King Heaven-Assassinator as well. Thus, when he unleashed a blow, it was very difficult for anyone to evade.

That said, Profound Valor was a very formidable opponent, and just at the right moment, he unleashed an art of his own and successfully threw Yang Qi’s hands off of him.

That move saved his life.

If he had waited a moment longer, his god vitality would have been completely drained away. God vitality wasn’t ordinary true energy, but rather animadestiny quintessence that connected Profound Valor to the god power of the Great Necropolis. In that sense, it vastly surpassed the true energy of ordinary cultivators.

Unfortunately, he had lost half of it, and that was something that he couldn’t easily recover from. Furthermore, Yang Qi had just laid both hands on him. With his left hand he had been absorbing the god vitality, but with his right, he had unleashed a very deadly stream of will, which smashed into Profound Valor’s meridians and battered at his nascent divinity and sea of consciousness.

It was a very dangerous situation, and blood was already oozing out of his eyes, ears, nose, and mouth.

“What a pity,” Yang Qi murmured, obviously not very happy at how unfortunately mighty Profound Valor was. He must be twice as powerful as the last time they had fought. In fact, if they faced off in an ordinary duel, there was no telling whether or not Yang Qi would even be able to gain the upper hand, let alone kill him.

Even worse, although he had managed to take half of Profound Valor’s god vitality and seal it up in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, he didn't get his hands on the godpower seed. And that was the entire focus of this endeavor.

If he had acquired the godpower seed, he could have called his sneak attack a complete and utter success. But now he was going to have to get involved in a protracted fight, and there was no way to be certain of the outcome.

That said, there was no question about who had the upper hand. Yang Qi had it, and was currently at his strongest state possible, with even more power to come as he assimilated the god vitality in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. And there was no way that Profound Valor was going to make up for his losses as Yang Qi relentlessly attacked him.

Keeping his eyes on Profound Valor, Yang Qi locked down the area so that escape wouldn’t be possible. At the same time, two battle puppets emerged, who were none other than Preeminence Boost and Preeminence Swan, the two emissaries from the Immortal House of Supreme Preeminence. They had not been weakened after being subjugated by Yang Qi, but were actually a lot stronger than before.

Both of them had already had power indexes over two thousand five hundred. Plus, the immortal-slaying clone was also able to provide assistance from the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Yang Qi had everything tightly locked down, including the spatial nexuses, ensuring that even if Profound Valor somehow found a way to leave this location, he would only end up in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

“What? People from the Immortal House of Supreme Preeminence!?” Profound Valor's eyes went wide with shock. He knew that the Immortal House of Supreme Preeminence was a superpower sect with countless experts. They were so important and large that they were almost like the leader of the superpower sects.

In short, they represented a frightful level of power.

Even though Profound Valor was an Inheritor, he still feared the Immortal House of Supreme Preeminence, who he knew could crush him like an egg if they came after him with full force.

“That's right, they're from the Immortal House of Supreme Preeminence. After they found out you’re an Inheritor, they joined forces with me to kill you!” Of course, Yang Qi was intentionally trying to frighten Profound Valor. “You’re going to get what you deserve, Profound Valor. It wasn’t long ago that you captured my power double and tried wringing information out of him. I'm going to destroy your true self, and take your godpower seed. If you want, you can go ahead and start begging for mercy.”

In response, Profound Valor burst into maniacal laughter. “You think I care that you brought the Immortal House of Supreme Preeminence with you, Yang Qi? I'm an Inheritor of the Great Necropolis! Compared to the Great Necropolis, the Immortal House of Supreme Preeminence isn’t even worth mentioning. Eventually, when I get control of the legacy of the necropolis, I’ll destroy the Immortal House of Supreme Preeminence.”

“What must come will come,” Yang Qi replied. He could sense that Profound Valor’s power index was slowly recovering even as they spoke, but there was no way it would return to its peak level any time soon. Profound Valor’s attempts to buy time were clearly useless. That said, it would at least give Yang Qi more time to probe him for information about the godpower seed. For instance, its specific location, which he had been unable to determine in the earlier exchange.

Once he knew more about it, he would launch another deadly attack.

“There are more Inheritors. You’re not the only one.” Meanwhile, profound power was flowing through Yang Qi, causing his black hair to rise up into the air around him, making him look like a devil-god risen from hell. His pores opened, allowing universal quintessence to flow into him, where it bubbled and popped like lava in the Heaven and Earth Furnace.

Meanwhile, in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, there was a collection of god vitality as large as a fiftieth ranked immortal world, tightly bound and sealed. It looked almost like an enormous rock made from the same material as the Great Necropolis. As the fires of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart burned it, it slowly turned into a liquid that began raining down.

Of course, it was Profound Valor’s god vitality. It was being refined by the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, then sent to Yang Qi and his Heaven and Earth Furnace, where he turned it into animadestiny true vitality for his own use. Of course, the quintessence of the Great Necropolis contained the auras and wills of buried gods. Therefore, as Yang Qi took it, his energy arts grew more powerful and he slowly began to gain a deeper understanding of the necropolis.

[Beep-beep-beep. Beep-beep-beep. Power index rising. Pure god vitality similar to godhood. One thousand three hundred. One thousand four hundred. One thousand five hundred....]

Slowly but surely, an image of the Great Necropolis was taking form in his mind, which was none other than a knowledge-devil that he needed to subdue. Unfortunately, no matter how he assailed it, the will of the Great Necropolis wouldn’t budge. However, that didn’t surprise him, and in fact, he was glad. After all, the more difficult it was to assimilate the power of the Great Necropolis, the more incredible it would be.

As he assimilated the god vitality, his power index rose from one thousand seven hundred until it reached two thousand. From that, it was obvious to see just how terrifying Profound Valor’s god vitality was.

Profound Valor himself only had a power index of three thousand, apparently because of the boundless technique that he cultivated. And he hadn’t mastered the technique. If he did, he would be just as terrifying as Empress Joyflower.

Obviously, leaving him alive wasn’t an option.

Of course, Profound Valor could sense Yang Qi’s energy rising with heaven-shaking, earth-toppling force, and knew that it boded ill for him. If he let things continue on like this, Yang Qi would definitely be able to crush him.

Clenching his hand into a fist, he punched out, causing powerful shockwaves to ripple out beneath him like the waves of a sea.

“Raging Waves Smash the Shore!”

His attack was like raging waves from the sea smashing endlessly into the shore.

As it closed in on Yang Qi, it was met by a palm that completely quelled the incoming vital energy. Then he took a step forward, launching a fist strike that contained the mysteries of heaven and earth, and had power to dry up rivers and drain seas.

BOOM!

Vital energy erupted as Profound Valor met the fist and staggered backward several paces, the waves beneath his feet fading out of existence. Those waves were the manifestation of something called the Strength of the Sea God’s Rage, and their power originated with the essence of the sea itself. In fact, it was a consummate art created by the Sea God from the god world.

Unfortunately, the Strength of the Sea God’s Rage had shattered, and what little remained was no threat to Yang Qi.

“Your life ends now!” Yang Qi said. After using his God Legion Seal to suppress Profound Valor’s god vitality, and the godpower of the Great Necropolis that it contained, he was much stronger than before. Of course, he still needed to vanquish the knowledge-devil, but that could wait until later.

Without hesitation, he unleashed a rain of attacks, including palm strikes, finger blows, punches, and kicks. And every single attack contained a berserk power that flowed out to fill heaven and earth.

The Seventy-Two Monarchs Energy Art. The Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. The Secret-Ensconcing All-World Anything-Everything Fundamental-Law Magic. Those three abilities were combined, and each of them were no weaker than the divine abilities of the Great Necropolis that Profound Valor had access to.

Profound Valor was shoved farther and farther back, and clearly had nothing left to stand on.

Chapter 936: Another Inheritor

Profound Valor staggered backward over and over, making it abundantly clear that he wasn’t a match for Yang Qi. In fact, Preeminence Boost and Preeminence Swan hadn’t even had to make a move yet. They were just standing off to the side looking threatening, their eyes locked onto Profound Valor as they analyzed his every weakness.

Profound Valor could also sense the looming threat of the immortal-slaying clone. Obviously, the clone was no minor figure, but rather a domineering figure even among entities who were considered particularly domineering. His power index had reached a thousand, and he was continuing to make progress on a daily basis. As he drew upon the godhood stars from the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, his cultivation base climbed and climbed, and he was becoming more like the core of the chart.

At the moment, he was using the powers of the chart to lock down all avenues of escape available to Profound Valor. As a result, Profound Valor felt completely trapped, and at the same time, forced to use extreme caution as he retreated from Yang Qi’s attacks.

Yang Qi was using extremely bold fist and palm techniques, imbuing them with the vajra characteristics of the buddhist schools. Waiting at the ready were all of the powers of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, and the two emissaries from the Immortal House of Supreme Preeminence.

With all of this combined, it was such a mortal threat to Profound Valor that he had no choice but to throw caution to the wind.

“Cold Snakes of Light!”

He threw his hands out, causing a host of snakes to appear, with glittering light pulsing out of their mouths, making them seem almost like dragons spitting out pearls. And each pulse of light seemed to contain a projection of the Great Necropolis itself as it bore down on Yang Qi.

Yang Qi launched a thousand palm strikes to shatter the deadly Cold Snakes of Light.

From what he could tell, the attacks that Profound Valor was using must be draining his vitality at a rapid rate.

“Heavenly-Empyrean General-Beheading God-Ordaining Grand Technique!” Profound Valor shouted, and all of his energy arts shattered as he lunged forward, making him completely empty. At the same time, his energy transformed, becoming extremely strange and bizarre.

Bellowing with rage, he unleashed a most mysterious and unfathomable force. “Heaven and Earth Ordain Gods; God-Ordaining Dais; Necropolis to Bury Gods!”

In the blink of an eye, an enormous dais rose up, banners flapping on its four corners and a person standing right in the middle. Then, that person was tapped on the forehead, and was thus ordained as a god-spirit.

‘What daoist technique is this?’ Yang Qi thought, having never seen anything like it. Apparently, the tap of this technique could turn a person into a god, which was something that completely surpassed the magical laws of the god world. Clearly, the entity on the dais was not the Sovereign Lord, but was someone who qualified to contend with the Sovereign Lord.

Apparently, this dais could elevate a normal human into the legion of gods? What was it? If something like this existed in the world, wouldn’t it lead to complete chaos? And who was this person? The creator of the Great Necropolis?

Although Yang Qi was managing to keep his composure, he was filled with endless questions and speculations. Obviously, this was just a projection, and although it contained psychic fluctuations and powerful energy, it wasn’t real. If it were real, then it would be the kind of entity who could conquer all humanity, unless someone like the Sovereign Lord or King Immortal-Slayer interfered. It was almost impossible to wrap one’s mind around the idea of simply being able to ordain a mortal as a god. How much power and universal fortune would that require?

Even if one were to combine the universal fortune of an entire age, then add in the universal fortune and power from countless parallel universes and planes of existence, it would still hardly be enough to create even a Lesser God.

Yet Yang Qi was sure of what he was looking at, and it caused fear to fill his heart. He definitely couldn’t allow Profound Valor to push his energy arts to the ultimate limit. If he didn’t kill or subdue him now, then it would become impossible in the future.

Thus, he pressed the attack, launching palm strikes like those of the gods, holding nothing back.

Howling madly, Profound Valor shrieked, “Heaven and Earth Ordain Gods, Summoning of Grand Destiny!” The God-Ordaining Dais descended, pulsing with the power of the god world, causing cracks to spread out over Yang Qi’s skin.

However, his heart remained as firm as steel, and the vajra characteristics within him erupted as he spun forward.

“Godliness Vortex!”

Yet again, he was drawing on an energy art state from the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, a variation on his old hell vortexes. Instead, this was a godliness vortex. An enormous god-spirit appeared, which began spinning like a top, until it was a huge whirlwind that could suppress and even destroy godpower.

Crack!

The God-Ordaining Dais split apart under the force of the attack, yet, at the same time, Yang Qi felt like his own meridians were being destroyed as well.

Thankfully, vanquishing this latest move of Profound Valor’s had truly left the man like an arrow that had reached the end of its flight. It seemed he was finally running out of options.

BOOM!

Yang Qi struck the already blood-spattered Profound Valor with the most powerful blow he could muster. Truth be told, Yang Qi could never have guessed that his opponent would still be this strong. Even after being ambushed and drained of half of his power, he still managed to unleash the consummate art that was the God-Ordaining Dais, which, even upon being defeated, had still severely injured Yang Qi's meridians.

Now more than ever, Yang Qi knew it would be a huge mistake to allow Profound Valor to escape.

His palms were brimming with power as he combined the Hand of the One God, the Seventy-Two Monarchs Energy Art, and the Secret-Ensconcing All-World Anything-Everything Fundamental-Law Magic, creating a cycle of three energy arts. This was his first time unleashing the full power of this combination, and it was the most destructive attack he could manage.

Profound Valor fought back valiantly, summoning an energy field around him that was a projection of the Great Necropolis. Unfortunately for him, Yang Qi threw a fist strike that had already caused it to start crumbling. And with the second fist strike, it shattered, provoking a shout from Profound Valor as he prepared to resort to his final move.

However, in that critical moment, a voice reached both of their ears.

“I've come to offer greetings to Houselord Profound Valor of the Profound Killing Dao Sect. It is I, Star Swordlife from the Star River Sword Sect.”

The voice was calm and gentle, thrumming with a sensation of life. And of course, Yang Qi was very familiar with it. Shockingly, the strength that backed the voice was no weaker than Profound Valor himself.

‘Star Swordlife?’ Yang Qi thought. ‘Since when did that brat get so strong? He must have come across some good fortune. But how? He had a power index of barely over a hundred last time I saw him. Even if a heaven-god personally blessed him with godly abilities, his cultivation base shouldn't have advanced this rapidly.’

Opening his Lord's Eye, he looked outside of the Profound Killing Dao Sect and saw a young man with a sword in hand, pulsing with such power that none of the disciples of the sect could even get close to him.

Of course, that young man was none other than Star Swordlife, who was devoted to researching sword techniques filled with life force.

“Another Inheritor!?” Profound Valor blurted. “Yes, another Inheritor is here! I'm saved! Greetings, fellow Inheritor! I'm in a deadly situation here, please, come to my rescue!” He bolstered his message with divine will, which allowed it to shoot out and connect to Star Swordlife.

“Dammit!” Yang Qi growled. “How could this be happening? I thought I had the entire area locked down tight!”

Although Yang Qi had indeed sealed the entire area, Profound Valor could still use his powers as an Inheritor to directly communicate with other Inheritors.

Not even Yang Qi’s powerful sealing magics could surpass the profundities of the Great Necropolis.

Now he realized how Star Swordlife had achieved such dramatic progress. Obviously, during the Great Necropolis’ eruption, he had acquired a godpower seed and become an Inheritor.

Considering that his main goal in life was to save people, all of Yang Qi’s hopes of killing Profound Valor were now dashed. And if Profound Valor escaped, then not only would Yang Qi’s efforts be wasted, but it could lead to incredible misfortune in the future.

Furthermore, Yang Qi’s hope of creating a powerful organization seemed at risk. After all, with an enemy like Profound Valor running around slaughtering his disciples, how could his organization survive?

And that wasn't even mentioning the fact that it seemed highly likely these Inheritors could eventually become gods.

Yang Qi was certain that the Great Necropolis was powerful enough to fuel such rises.

“Die!” he shouted, drawing on all the power he could muster as he threw his hands out and battered at the crumbled projection of the Great Necropolis that protected Profound Valor. Meanwhile, Profound Valor was hollering at the top of his lungs in an attempt to attract the attention of Star Swordlife.

His efforts were not in vain.

Star Swordlife heard his cries, and could also sense the fluctuations coming from the battle. He gripped his sword and blurred into motion, his eyes flashing. He moved with incredible quickness, and as he brandished his sword of rescue and life, worlds came into being around him that abounded with life force and were filled with lush vegetation and rejoicing life forms.

Of course, Yang Qi wasn’t happy at all about that. To him, this life force was actually fatal and deadly.

“Immortal-slaying clone!”

Both the immortal-slaying clone and the emissaries from the Immortal House of Supreme Preeminence took action. The emissaries blocked the incoming sword strike, while the clone launched a devastating palm strike toward Star Swordlife’s head.

However, even as the two emissaries’ moves touched the sword, the sword collapsed into countless raindrops that pulsed with life force as they continued on toward Yang Qi.

Yang Qi could sense that, if this technique hit him, it wouldn’t kill him, but it would definitely render him immobile. That was the only upside of fighting Star Swordlife: he didn’t kill people. That said, if Yang Qi were suddenly rendered immobile, it was obvious that Profound Valor would make a move on him.

It was a moment of imminent peril.

Never could the clone or the emissaries have guessed that this sword technique would be so profound, or that it would transform into a rain that easily bypassed them.

As for the clone, when his fist reached Star Swordlife, a soft and gentle power met it, then traveled up his arm, turning it numb to the point where he couldn’t move it.

Then, the clone was forced to watch as the rain of sword light enveloped Yang Qi.

Chapter 937: Sword Dao of Life

Yang Qi was exasperated, but helpless to do anything about it.

Star Swordlife was now an Inheritor of the Great Necropolis, which changed everything. Even without that status, his cultivation base had been extraordinary, and his cultivation of the sword would have eventually led him to stupendous heights.

Now that he was an Inheritor, though, everything was different.

Yang Qi was actually inclined to try acquiring him as a subordinate. After all, his dao of the sword was extremely powerful, and would only continue to grow stronger. However, he knew it would be very difficult to recruit him. Star Swordlife embraced a philosophy of peace, and would interfere whenever he saw someone about to kill another person.

The Sage Monarch Society controlled an entire immortal world, but considering the day and age, it was only a matter of time before it would be forced to get involved in bloodshed and fighting. So it obviously wasn’t a suitable place for Star Swordlife.

In any case, Star Swordlife couldn’t have shown up at a worse time. He came to pay a formal visit to the Profound Killing Dao Sect right when Yang Qi was about to kill Profound Valor. Obviously, that meant the two of them were now enemies.

And Yang Qi never showed mercy to enemies.

Unfortunately, Star Swordlife was fantastically skilled with the sword, which he only used to save people, instead of harm them. The mighty will of that kind of sword technique was deeply connected to the life force that existed in heaven and earth, making it exceedingly powerful.

Life force existed in all the nooks and crannies of the universe, even within the dust itself. And the power of life could suppress the power of death, otherwise nothing would exist in heaven and earth. Heaven and earth only existed because of life force. Truth be told, the universe was fundamentally like a living being, as were immortal worlds, and even vital energy.

Existence was predicated on life.

The rain of sword light continued toward Yang Qi, filled with the energy of life. When one fused with the life force that existed within all heaven and earth, it created a virtually unstoppable natural force. After all, upon being born, living beings would breathe in and out, which was one reason why life force proliferated endlessly. How could something like that be blotted out?

The sword was fundamentally a tool for killing, yet in this case it had become an instrument of life.

Star Swordlife’s sword was the antithesis of King Life-Killer’s sword, which was lifeless and destructionless.

In fact, Yang Qi quickly drew on King Life-Killer’s sword technique, causing another rain of swords to appear, the kind that could bring nirvanic extermination to all living things, and summon that which was lifeless and destructionless from the void, neither touching nor stirring the chains of cause and effect.

“Stand on the Bridge of Futility and forget the past; be consigned to eternal tribulation that defies reincarnation; arrive at pāramitā lifeless and destructionless; what joy be in life, what suffering in death?”

That was the ultimate meaning of King Life-Killer’s dao of the sword.

Being put up against Star Swordlife’s technique, King Life-Killer’s sword erupted with power. It was almost as if the will of the sword itself had been awakened, conforming to the old saying: seeing others hunting, one is excited by memories of the thrill of the hunt.

According to King Life-Killer, there was no true joy to be had in life, nor was there true suffering to be found in death. Lifeless and destructionless. A void lacking even the void, completely annulled and without form.

This dao of the sword was what the ancient King Life-Killer had used to push his cultivation to the Unbounded level, and begin gaining enlightenment of the Annulled level.

When it came to the sword, King Life-Killer’s techniques reigned supreme among the seventy-two monarchs. Not even King Immortal-Slayer or King Heaven-Devourer would serve as assisting forces. When the boundless secrets of the joy of life and the suffering of death were unleashed, they were unparalleled under heaven.

When the two sword techniques met, Yang Qi himself was like a sword, cleverly redirecting the two streams of sword rain to land on the shell of the Great Necropolis that was protecting Profound Valor.

BOOM!

The shell exploded, and Profound Valor was caught up in the combined effects of both Star Swordlife and Yang Qi’s techniques. Countless streams of sword energy stabbed into him, filling him with intense pain.

He had become the battlefield within which the two powerful sword techniques clashed!

“Aaaiiiieee!” he screamed, drawing on the seed of power within his sea of energy in an attempt to defend himself.

RIP!

The godpower seed appeared on his forehead. It was like a fledgling version of the Great Necropolis, powerful and tough to the extreme. As he poured his quintessence-blood into it, the true energy inside of him became rock hard, and the color of the Great Necropolis itself. As a result, the two sword techniques were forcibly ejected from within him.

Yang Qi knew he had to take advantage of the moment, so he unleashed another palm strike, slapping Profound Valor as hard as possible with the Hand of the One God, hoping to rip him to shreds.

‘Not good!’ Star Swordlife thought. Sending out a stream of powerful sword energy, he said, “From Within the Dao of Life, Slash of Nature!Save and Redeem!”

Sword energy filled with life force poured into Profound Valor’s meridians and instantly healed him. Meanwhile, Star Swordlife turned to Yang Qi and said, “So, we meet again. Your cultivation base has increased quite a bit. Please refrain from trying to kill people in my presence. Last time, you killed Cipher Rite-Heaven, and now you’re trying to kill Profound Valor? There’s simply no way I’ll let you do that.”

The sword energy pouring into Profound Valor was none other than Star Swordlife’s animadestiny quintessence vitality, and Yang Qi could see that it was rapidly healing Profound Valor and restoring his power as well. Obviously, it would be impossible to kill him once he recovered.

“Do you realize what you're doing, Star Swordlife?” he said angrily. “Profound Valor is an Inheritor, just like you. Eventually, the two of you will have to fight to the death, just like venomous insects tossed into a jar. Only the strongest will survive, yet you’re saving him?”

“I don’t know about any such matters. I only know that I will do everything possible to save his life. I’d do the same for you as well, if anyone tried to kill you.”

“Like hell you would,” Yang Qi growled angrily. “Life and death are common occurrences in heaven and earth. With every breath of time that passes, countless people come into the world, and countless people leave it. What about all the other people who die? Why don’t you save them? Furthermore, blood is falling from the sky like rain nowadays, with everybody fighting each other to the death. Why aren’t you out there saving everyone else?”

“I’ll do my best to save everyone possible, but I obviously can’t save everyone. Those who I encounter that need saving will be saved, as long as I can make it happen. And once my cultivation base is high enough, I’ll see to it that there is no longer any such thing as killing.” Star Swordlife was obviously firmly set in his ways, and would not be convinced or swayed by words. He had his faith, and it could not be toppled.

“What a lunatic,” Yang Qi muttered, sending the two emissaries from the Immortal House of Supreme Preeminence to continue attacking Star Swordlife. Unfortunately, Star Swordlife’s sword energy was so profound that it exuded from his every pore. No matter how the emissaries attacked him, the sword rain he could summon was too much for them.

As for the immortal-slaying clone, he drew on his energy arts to escape from the sword rain, then threw his head back and shouted at the top of his lungs. Winds screamed and everything trembled as power dripped from the godhood stars in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Then, he clenched his hand into a fist and struck out with all his might.

Star Swordlife summoned another sword rain, but this time it was crushed by the clone's fist attack, which went on to grab Star Swordlife’s head and crush it out of existence.

Star Swordlife shot backward, another head growing out of his shoulders. At the same time, he swept his sword out in front of him, summoning millions upon millions of raindrops to block Yang Qi and his immortal-slaying clone.

BOOM!

Yang Qi responded by unleashing a torrent of daoist techniques.

At the same time, the immortal-slaying clone drew deeply on the power of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart and the godhood stars, sending palm after palm out to vanquish all of the sword energy he encountered.

How could the godhood of the myriads of gods killed by King Immortal-Slayer possibly be blocked?

Yet, somehow, Star Swordlife managed to defend himself. Constant streams of sword energy shot out, preventing the immortal-slaying clone from advancing. Although his sword technique was not designed to kill or injure, it was still immensely tough and seemingly without fault.

Those who kill often end up being killed. It was an eternal truth. Star Swordlife wouldn’t kill, but neither could he be killed.

Meanwhile, Profound Valor burst out laughing. “I bet you never would have guessed that someone would rescue me, did you, Yang Qi? And not only is he restoring my godpower seed, but he’s helping me reach a higher level of enlightenment!”

Profound Valor could already tell that, thanks to Star Swordlife, his godpower was nearly back to normal. Some of that was thanks to Star Swordlife’s life force, and some was his status as an Inheritor, which caused his true energy to be filled with the godpower of the Great Necropolis.

Right now, nobody knew how many Inheritors there were out there, but one thing was certain: if they wanted to truly advance their cultivation, they needed to kill the other Inheritors and take their godpower seeds. Only the one who survived to the very end would unlock the true secrets of the Great Necropolis.

But here was Star Swordlife, freely handing over some of his Inheritor power to Profound Valor, which was not only healing him, but also advancing his cultivation. In fact, it seemed likely that he would soon be able to defeat Yang Qi with a single move. Soon, Yang Qi would have no choice but to flee.

Yang Qi knew that. However, he also knew that the more he pressed the attack, the more Star Swordlife would have to drain himself. And considering how crazy Star Swordlife was, it seemed likely that he would gladly give away his own life to keep to his ideals.

‘Damn it all! Profound Valor is getting stronger and stronger. Am I really going to completely lose the fight here?’ Raising his voice, he said, “Fine, Star Swordlife. If you want to fight dirty, then so be it. In fact, let’s see who can fight dirtiest. If you want to risk your life to save people, then I’ll risk my life to kill you!”

BOOM!

The God Legion Seal suddenly flew out of his forehead, causing everything to rumble as it shot forth and entered Profound Valor.

Chapter 938: Killing. Saving.

One sought to kill. One sought to save. And neither seemed superior or inferior.

Yang Qi was dead set on his course of action, just as much as Star Swordlife was. Yang Qi wouldn’t let anything stop him from killing Profound Valor, no matter what arguments or attacks were thrown his way.

In the end, it would come down to who was willing to fight the hardest.

So Yang Qi drew on his most powerful killing move. He used the God Legion Seal, which had been accompanying him from the very beginning of his journey. For all intents and purposes, the seal was his life, and he could not part with it. But now he was sending it directly into Profound Valor through his forehead.

Obviously, there was no way that Profound Valor would be able to take control of something like the God Legion Seal.

Yang Qi’s plan was to use this most profound of divine abilities to crush the will of the Great Necropolis, then use his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth to take Profound Valor’s life.

He was going to kill him right in front of Star Swordlife, which would hopefully serve as a severe blow to Star Swordlife’s faith.

BOOOOM!

The God Legion Seal carried with it golden lightning filled with endless worlds, and as it entered Profound Valor, he went completely stiff, to the point where he couldn’t talk. All he saw was golden light that filled his sea of consciousness and threatened to inundate his nascent divinity.

But then the Inheritor godpower seed transformed into the Great Necropolis, covering his nascent divinity and protecting it from harm.

Fortunately, Yang Qi had cultivated the power of the God Legion Seal to the point of perfection over the years, and knew exactly how to work with it. He had even created a duplicate of the seal with his own nascent divinity. It was almost as if he were completely at one with it.

“Transform my true self into the legion of gods; a myriad of gods flow toward truth, the true and real self....” Yang Qi himself shone with golden light as he used a profound art of possession to enter Profound Valor’s meridians.

“You didn’t know about my God Legion Seal, did you, Profound Valor?” he said. “Well, take a look at the seal and its might. It doesn’t matter how you stumbled across that godpower seed. Not even that can save you.”

RUUUMBLE!

Yang Qi’s true body became a stream of will that flowed into Profound Valor’s sea of consciousness, backed by the power of the God Legion Seal, and heading directly toward the godpower seed.

Profound Valor’s sea of consciousness instantly began to tremble and shake as though something incredible was about to happen.

“Aggghhhh!”

Star Swordlife watched as Yang Qi became a stream of golden light and shot into Profound Valor, who began emitting golden light from every pore on his body. At the same time, Star Swordlife’s sword energy was forced out of him.

BOOOOM!

Without warning, Profound Valor launched a fist strike at Star Swordlife that was filled with both Yang Qi’s God Legion Seal power, and godpower of the Great Necropolis from Profound Valor. What existence could possibly fight against that directly?

Not even Star Swordlife could. Instead, he flitted back and forth like a leaf dropping down from the sky, evading the force of the attack so that it wasn’t a threat at all. Then he swept his sword out, sending seven beams of sword light flying into Profound Valor’s seven orifices, where they continued through to his sea of consciousness.

“Seven Orifices Reality-Returning Sword!”

This sword technique involved making streams of sword energy as fine as silk, so narrow that they were invisible. Yet, when they entered the seven orifices and struck at the nascent divinity, they could lock it down so tightly that it would never be able to escape.

Yang Qi could instantly sense what seemed like seven huge ropes rumbling toward him.

‘What the fuck? This Star Swordlife is really tough to deal with! If I don’t end up killing him, this will all be a big waste. He's always going around ruining my plans!’

Yang Qi was staking everything on this one move, and knew he couldn’t give Star Swordlife any opportunity to come out on top.

“Come Forth, God Legion!” Yang Qi summoned all of the knowledge-devils he had vanquished, which bore the semblance of a legion of gods. At the same time, he heard chanting of “Such arrogance! Such arrogance!” The surrounding sea of consciousness was instantly thrown into chaos, and the attack was so powerful that the godpower seed began dissipating.

“Will of King Immortal-Slayer!”

The immortal-slaying clone used that opportunity to further attack Profound Valor, who was now breaking apart as though he might explode at any moment.

“I won’t let you get away with this, Yang Qi! Godpower seed, explode with power! Crush all wretch-devils and make me invincible. Bury Gods, Ordain Gods!”

Yet again, the God-Ordaining Dais appeared.

But this time, Yang Qi’s God Legion Seal flew over to it, causing the dais to crumble and shatter. In the blink of an eye, the paragonic figure atop the dais vanished.

Yang Qi reached out and grabbed the seed, simultaneously muttering a dhāraṇī incantation that sent golden light to dispel the Seven Orifices Reality-Returning Sword energy.

Star Swordlife fell back several paces, watching as Yang Qi emerged from within Profound Valor. As for Profound Valor, he remained standing in place, unmoving and completely covered with boundless golden light.

Profound Valor was cursing inwardly, but couldn’t move a muscle. Yang Qi held him in place with one hand, while his other hand held the godpower seed of the Great Necropolis, which resembled a pearl. Although it trembled as though it wished to fly out of his hand, he kept it locked in place with golden light. That seed contained the status of an Inheritor, as well as boundless martial paths and energy arts, as well as the essence of the Great Necropolis.

It contained Profound Valor’s will, and the basis of all of his cultivation advancement. Without it, he would revert to being just as weak as Battle Resister. In short, he would hardly count as a top expert anymore.

His energy arts had already regressed, and he no longer had the power of an Inheritor, which meant that he wasn’t even close to being a match for Yang Qi.

A vortex sprang up in Yang Qi’s palm, which sucked in the godpower seed and transported it to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, where it would be incapable of escaping.

“A Great Necropolis godpower seed,” Star Swordlife said coolly. “I acquired one as well, which helped my sword dao advance by leaps and bounds. However, I did it by subduing the power within it by my own will. Yang Qi, now that you have that godpower seed, release Profound Valor. Killing him would be meaningless.”

“That’s not going to happen,” Yang Qi said with a smile. “What, you still want to save him? He nearly killed me, so there’s no way I’ll just let him go for no reason. If you want me to free him, you have to agree to one stipulation.”

“What stipulation?” Star Swordlife said.

“You have to give me your godpower seed. If you do, I’ll spare his life. What do you say?” Yang Qi was treacherously setting a person’s own spear against his own shield. If Star Swordlife refused the offer, then Yang Qi would throw his own words back against him and accuse him of violating his own dao of the sword by not rescuing someone.

“I don’t agree,” Star Swordlife said without the slightest bit of hesitation.

Yang Qi laughed. “In other words, what you’re really after is power. You always go around talking about saving people, yet here you have the chance to do just that, but you refuse. Doesn’t that make you a hypocrite?”

“I save people, but not blindly,” Star Swordlife replied. “In this age of violence and bloodshed, one can’t survive unless they’re strong enough. Power is the only way to achieve my ultimate goal, to save as many people as possible and bring about peace. I obviously can't abandon my larger ambition for a single person. And no clever words on your part are going to change my mind.”

He spoke with a decisiveness that could sever nails and chop iron, to the point where Yang Qi instantly realized that he would never, ever be convinced to change his mind.

And considering that Yang Qi had similar determination, he knew there was no way he could ‘defeat’ Star Swordlife with words.

“In that case, I’ll be leaving now,” he said coldly. “And I'm taking Profound Valor and his sect with me. You’re not in a position to fight me, Star Swordlife. Unfortunately, I'm not strong enough to beat you either. Combat would be pointless, so I’ll attend to my affairs, and you’d do best to leave me alone. If you keep interfering, then don’t blame me for being vicious and merciless. If I have to, I’ll make sure your Star River Sword Sect drowns in a sea of blood. I’ll destroy it down to the chickens and dogs. Got it?”

“You!” Star Swordlife said angrily. “You're an outright wretch-devil!”

“I'm not a wretch-devil. But you follow the dao of life, and I follow the dao of killing. If you don’t get in my way, I won’t kill you. It’s really up to you.” He shook his head. “You’re mistaken if you think I enjoy killing. The truth is that I want to take complete control of the dao of heaven and universal fortune. When I do, I’ll be the exact same savior you want to be.”

“You force people to follow you, so that’s different. Don’t try to debate this with me, Yang Qi. I want to save everyone in heaven and earth, and let them thrive. I don’t want to interfere with their path, I want to give them freedom. You follow the dao of wretched evil, and I follow the dao of righteousness and justice.”

“You’re really long-winded, did you know that? I can see that you’re really set in your ways. However, don’t think that I'm just going to change my mind either. It all comes down to this: are you going to leave me alone, or not? If not, then mark my words, I'll put an end to your Star River Sword Sect.”

“Fine. Let’s see you try.” Star Swordlife’s sword suddenly flicked out, sending a stream of sword will flying out to surround him. A moment later, the sword will vanished, along with him.

Chapter 939: Thralls

The hundredth ranked immortal world around them was devolving into chaos.

The world contained innumerable “commoners” who were in the Demolishing level, organized into hosts of nations that made up a thriving civilization. And ruling over that civilization was the Profound Killing Dao Sect.

That sect would be considered a superpower on the Ancient Road to the Gods, and they had built up resources over many years, to an incredible level. In fact, they were strong enough to stand up to ten thousand Dao Defense Leagues put together.

Unfortunately, Yang Qi was now taking control of it.

The fighting between Yang Qi, Profound Valor and Star Swordlife had sent out such incredible shockwaves that none of the other experts in the sect had been able to get close to them. Then, when the fighting was over, the immortal-slaying clone blocked all paths, completely locking down the sect.

Next, he went about seizing what needed to be seized, and forced the experts in the sect to submit and be taken to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. There were some experts in the sect who were strong enough to fight the clone, but he also had the emissaries from the Immortal House of Supreme Preeminence to back him up.

Considering they had power indexes of over two thousand, their attacks would cause anyone to cough up blood and suffer severe injuries. As a result, even the top experts of the sect were subdued.

Star Swordlife had fled, and the Profound Killing Dao Sect was already starting to crumble. In fact, many disciples were prostrating themselves on the ground and waiting to learn what fate awaited them.

First of all, the mere fact that two people from the Immortal House of Supreme Preeminence were there was enough to strike fear into the hearts of everyone present. That sect was a superpower on the Ancient Road to the Gods, a force that no one would dare to defy.

Second, the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart had everything locked down so tightly that no one could possibly escape or enter the sect.

Looking around, Yang Qi realized that the sect headquarters had particularly good feng shui and was obviously a place of hidden dragons and crouching tigers. The spirit energy created immortal cranes, phoenixes, dragons, and qilins everywhere, as well as other types of godlings.

It was just what one would expect of a hundredth ranked immortal world.

The headquarters itself was built to resemble the character for “kill”, and was filled with marvelous temples and palaces that were themselves god items. It was all very impressive, except for the fact that the sect leader had just been completely and utterly vanquished. Morale had already plummeted to rock bottom.

Without hesitation, Yang Qi drew on certain teleportation techniques to move the entire headquarters of the Profound Killing Dao Sect into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, along with all of its elite disciples.

As for the common people, Yang Qi let them continue their lives peacefully on their hundredth ranked immortal world. Although he had benefited spectacularly in this whole incident, now was not the time to create a foothold among the immortal worlds.

Before doing something like that, he wanted to be absolutely certain that he could defend it. In other words, he wanted Terrifying will convergence at the very minimum. After all, he couldn’t even fully defeat Star Swordlife in a fight, so what would happen if even stronger experts from the Ancient Road to the Gods showed up?

For example, the Immortal House of Supreme Preeminence alone had Terrifying old-timers that Yang Qi knew he wasn’t a match for. He wasn’t even confident that the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart could keep him safe from people like that, unless he just hid inside for the rest of his life.

Truth be told, if he set up the proper spell formations, and kept them going for several years, he could eventually transport the entire immortal world around him into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. But that would be a waste of time.

Hundredth ranked immortal worlds were simply too colossal to move around easily.

After all, it was vastly, vastly larger than his Dao Defense League, and he wasn’t even able to move the Dao Defense League without incredible effort.

Using his Lord's Eye, he was able to keep tabs on the Dao Defense League and what was happening there. It was still a third-rate organization, but there were plenty of experts rising up within it. The Joyflower Palace was working hard to develop the place, although it had not yet reached its full potential.

Thanks to the dramatic transformations to the immortal dao civilizations, the dao of heaven and universal fortune had expanded. Now, conquering it would involve contending with billions of trillions of organizations, along with innumerable experts from the Ancient Road to the Gods. When all of that destiny was added together, it would definitely be enough to reach the level of the legion of gods.

Obviously, the Joyflower Palace was going to work as hard as possible to make sure that happened.

In the end, though, Yang Qi would be the one to benefit when he ended up killing Empress Joyflower.

He was very clear what his path of cultivation was to involve, and wouldn't hesitate to pursue it. Although unexpected things would pop up, he would resolve them and continue onward.

He had already reached his goal of taking a godpower seed, which would soon allow him to become an Inheritor. First, he would do his research, then subdue the seed and use it to advance his energy arts. Next, he would look for the mysterious Cave Temple of the Vajra Māyādevī, where he would hopefully find the other seven parts of the Secret-Ensconcing All-World Anything-Everything Fundamental-Law Magic. At that point, his nascent divinity and cultivation base would climb higher, and he would break through to the Terrifying level.

Although he was currently at the peak of the Destabilizing level, the gap between his current position and the Terrifying level might as well have been a gully as wide as heaven itself. It was only by coming across the right circumstances, and engaging in deadly tempering, that anyone could bridge that gap.

For Yang Qi, the Secret-Ensconcing All-World Anything-Everything Fundamental-Law Magic was that good fortune.

After taking over the Profound Killing Dao Sect, Yang Qi nodded in satisfaction and entered the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. His inflow of destiny had already changed; in terms of the number of disciples, this sect was roughly the same as the Profound House of Battle Energy. However, there was a big difference between the two. The people of the Profound House of Battle Energy were guests in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, whereas those from the Profound Killing Dao Sect were servants. Therefore, Yang Qi didn’t waste time on courtesy, and simply had them organized into ranks, with many of them becoming thralls to help his own subordinates advance their cultivation.

Thralls were unique to the Ancient Road to the Gods, and for all intents and purposes, they were like livestock. However, the difference was that livestock was raised for its meat, whereas the thralls were there to provide energy arts, true vitality, and quintessence.

Most sects would have complicated practices to raise thralls, giving them medicinal pills to help them improve their energy arts. After their cultivation bases rose to a high enough level, elite disciples from the sect or clan would take their energy arts. It was a way to reduce the time disciples had to spend on cultivation, and help them reach new heights at an incredible speed.

Of course, the particulars were complicated, so Yang Qi assigned the responsibility to his immortal-slaying clone. Besides, it was the clone who would benefit from the flows of destiny.

With thralls from the Profound Killing Dao Sect, Yang Qi knew that the Yang Clan would definitely become stronger and stronger in the coming years.

Nodding in satisfaction, he approached Profound Valor.

Just like Leaf Dao-Denier, he had Profound Valor locked up in a secret dimension in the chart, where he was chained with magical laws.

Slowly but surely, the power within him was being extracted, flowing into Yang Qi.

“I bet you never thought a day like this would come, did you, Profound Valor?” Yang Qi asked. “You wanted my God Legion Seal, but now you’re imprisoned here, completely helpless. If you had known things would turn out like this, I bet you would have surrendered to me from the outset.”

“Bah!” Profound Valor said. “You want to kill me, Yang Qi? Torture me? Fine, just do it. But there’s no need to insult me!”

Yang Qi waved his hand dismissively. “Tell me how you got your godpower seed.”

“Why should I tell you? It was good fortune on my part to acquire it. Do you really think you’ll be able to assimilate it? There are only so many of those seeds, and they can only be assimilated by Inheritors.” With that, Profound Valor burst out laughing.

“Is that what you think?” Tightening his hand around the seed, he sent burning fire from the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth into it, provoking loud cracking sounds. Unfortunately, the seed remained whole, and not a scrap of power emerged from it. Yang Qi frowned.

“What were you just saying?” Profound Valor scoffed. “I'm telling you, you can’t assimilate it. If you could, wouldn’t that imply that your will had surpassed that of the Great Necropolis? That godpower seed doesn't belong to you!” Yet again, he dissolved into laughter, which was apparently the only way he could give vent to his frustration and anger.

Unfortunately, Yang Qi hadn’t uncovered any clues about how to deal with the godpower seed, and nothing he did had any effect on it. It might as well have just been a rock.

BOOM!

He unleashed an even greater wave of power right onto the seed. In response, it glowed with a protective light and remained as tightly sealed as before.

Despite continuing with such efforts for quite a bit of time, he couldn’t uncover any further secrets. Finally, he shook his head and looked up to face Profound Valor, who was howling with laughter. Eyes flashing, he thought, ‘Thrall. You’re going to be a thrall. Maybe I can’t assimilate the seed itself, but I can at least assimilate the godpower of the Great Necropolis. That should be perfect to power up my Engine of the One God again! And if I can subjugate the will of the Great Necropolis, I’ll eventually be able to assimilate the seed!’

With a wave of his hand, he sent the godpower seed back into Profound Valor.

Chapter 940: The Will of the Great Necropolis

With a wave of his hand, Yang Qi sent the godpower seed into Profound Valor, who shivered in response. The seed was already one hundred percent compatible with Profound Valor’s soul, and in the blink of an eye, the godpower seed of the Great Necropolis had pierced through the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart to reach him.

That alone went to show that the Great Necropolis was on a higher level than the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

And that begged the question of whether or not the creator of the necropolis was actually stronger than King Immortal-Slayer. Even in the myths and legends of the god world, there was only one entity who was stronger than King Immortal-Slayer, and that was the monarch of the myriads of gods, the being who possessed the God Legion Seal, the boundless Sovereign Lord.

But considering that the Sovereign Lord was not the creator of the Great Necropolis, it seemed to indicate that there was indeed another entity that strong. Why had this immensely powerful being created the necropolis, then sent it drifting down the Ancient Road to the Gods for hundreds of millions of years until it finally reached the Immortal Dao Age?

“Why are you giving the Inheritor seed back to me, Yang Qi?” Profound Valor asked. “Conscience getting the better of you? Don’t think this makes us even, though.” When Profound Valor felt the seed enter him, he immediately perked up. And then power began flowing into him, forming god vitality in his sea of energy. At first, that god vitality was weak, but as it accumulated, the Inheritor seed rotated faster and faster, and his power grew. At a certain point, he flexed his muscles, and the chains of magical law around him shattered.

However, that was when Yang Qi made his move, slapping his hands onto Profound Valor over and over again. Each time he did, he activated a sealing mark from the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. It was none other than the old Devil-God Seal, which was the ultimate origin of all sealing marks in heaven and earth. Upon being hit with those seals, Profound Valor was incapable of moving.

“Heaven-God Hell-Exterminating Devil Embryo!” Yang Qi bellowed, and a devil embryo appeared in the palm of his hand, which he inserted into Profound Valor’s sea of energy. Although Profound Valor had regained his godpower seed, he hadn’t yet fully recovered. Besides, even at his peak, he wasn’t a match for Yang Qi, and now things were even more one-sided, considering they were in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Profound Valor had no other choice but to watch as the devil embryo entered him and slowly began drawing on his god vitality.

It was almost as if Profound Valor was practicing cultivation in Yang Qi’s stead. His true energy was going to Yang Qi, as was the god vitality, thanks to the devil embryo.

The Heaven and Earth Furnace appeared within Yang Qi, into which he funneled the god vitality, where it was subsequently melted and refined. Thus, the will of the Great Necropolis began to form within his sea of energy.

However, Yang Qi kept it suppressed and under his control. When the time came to unleash it, he would definitely reach a higher level of enlightenment, and entering the Terrifying level would no longer be a mere dream.

As his tendons and bones creaked, Yang Qi activated the Engine of the One God and eagerly waited to turn on the strength god systems.

The god vitality in the Heaven and Earth Furnace was slowly becoming a thick, viscous liquid the color of stone.

RUMBLE!

As Yang Qi worked, Profound Valor shivered and then screamed. “You vicious villain, Yang Qi! You’ve turned me into a thrall!?”

Yang Qi ignored him. Before long, a liquid fleck of godhood could be seen in the Engine of the One God. The strength god systems were just on the verge of turning on again.

At this point, Yang Qi realized that the power of the Great Necropolis inside Profound Valor was very weak. Profound Valor’s cultivation base hadn’t reached the proper level, and he didn’t have Terrifying will. If he had, then the god vitality of the Great Necropolis would turn into true liquid godhood.

After all, the immortal-slaying clone could absorb power from the godhood stars of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. If the creator of the Great Necropolis was actually stronger than King Immortal-Slayer, then how could the necropolis not have its own reserves of godhood?

Actually, after Yang Qi had seen Profound Valor unleash the God-Ordaining Dais, and the paragonic entity on it who could turn mortals into gods with the tap of a finger, he was convinced that the necropolis could create godhood. He just didn’t know where such godhood was located.

“Very good, Profound Valor,” Yang Qi said coolly. “At least you know what you are now. A thrall. So stop struggling. The more you struggle, the more it will hurt. Just settle down and be a good thrall. If you do, your cultivation base might improve, and I might let you keep a little of that true energy and god vitality for your own. After I reach the Terrifying level, I might even allow you to improve your cultivation level.

“Remember, we’re in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, and there’s no way you can ever escape. I advise you to put away all thoughts of rebellion and just acknowledge allegiance to me. Agreed?”

“Dream on!” Profound Valor spat. Obviously, people who had reached this level of cultivation were no longer mortal, and possessed incredible willpower. Although he wasn't quite on the same level as Star Swordlife, he wouldn’t submit to ordinary methods of torment. However, Yang Qi didn’t feel a pressing need to turn him into a believer. Instead, he would continue to use him to harvest god vitality. For all he knew, forcibly converting him might make it impossible to take his godpower seed later.

The godpower of the Great Necropolis continued flowing into him, with scattered bits of the necropolis’ will inside of it. As a result, Yang Qi’s energy arts and cultivation base slowly but surely continued to rise.

Chapter 941: Another Glimpse of Godhood

The Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart was changing substantively. For instance, the addition of the Profound Killing Dao Sect had brought tens of trillions of top experts, including hundreds of thousands of Grand Emperors.

Many of those Grand Emperors had power indexes in the dozens, but there were some in the hundreds, and even some in the thousands. And all of them had been subjugated and turned into thralls to improve the cultivation and true energy of Yang Qi’s people. One could only imagine what the result would be. Yang Qi’s father, Yang Zhan, had long since reached the Grand Emperor level. He was given a thrall in the form of a prime elder from the Profound Killing Dao Sect, a Sect Uncle of Profound Valor.

The man was a burly warrior with a power index of one thousand eight hundred. Initially, he refused to cooperate, but then the Hell Scourge came into play. Eventually, he submitted, and Yang Zhan acquired a font of true energy to use in cultivation.

Of course, the energy was passed through a special god formation first, which cleansed and purified it so that Yang Zhan didn’t need to fear any heterogeneity.

Empress Jadefall was also sitting in the middle of a god formation, performing breathing exercises and absorbing true energy from a prime elder with a power index of roughly a thousand.

Thanks to the influx of quintessence vitality, Empress Jadefall’s porcelain godspore seemed ready to open up, with cracks already spreading out on its surface.

Considering that numerous powerful gods had fought to take that porcelain godspore, it was obviously something incredibly precious, although not even Empress Jadefall knew exactly what it was. However, once it hatched, it was sure to push her cultivation base to a terrifyingly high level.

Yang Qi was keeping a close eye on the situation, but he didn’t have any idea what the godspore was, either. ‘That thing is surprisingly tough. Although it does leak a bit of power that Jadefall can use for her cultivation, it seems that getting it to hatch will be no easy task. It must take a huge amount of power. I suspect it won’t happen until Jadefall reaches the Terrifying level. Right now, she’s only at Stupendous, which means the next major step will be to rise to Destabilizing.’

He looked around and found that everyone was rapidly advancing. Eldest Brother and the others from the Invincible Society were all at the Destabilizing level, which was very pleasing to Yang Qi. Eventually, the time would come to struggle for control of the dao of heaven, and they would be a huge asset.

With everything settled, the time had come for Yang Qi to search for the Cave Temple of the Vajra Māyādevī. That was his best shot to improve his own will convergence so that he could defeat the will of the Great Necropolis.

Otherwise, that will would remain in his sea of consciousness like a fish bone stuck in his throat.

Yang Qi and Battle Resister headed into the depths of the Great Necropolis in a blur. By now, the necropolis could be considered fully open and there were people everywhere, engaged in exploring, searching, and of course, fighting. Considering the god items that were to be had, everyone was willing to fight to the death for them.

Yang Qi ignored all of it. The time had not yet come for him to exert dominance in the Immortal Dao Age, so he didn’t want to become stained with the karma that would result from fighting. Instead, he quietly made his way through the Great Necropolis toward its deeper parts.

By now, the main parts of the necropolis weren’t really dangerous for Yang Qi, although they were most certainly hazardous even for Grand Emperors with power indexes in the hundreds.

The depths of the necropolis were where things became dangerous and the locations were only appropriate for people with power indexes over a thousand.

As Yang Qi flew along, Battle Resister said, “Brother Yang Qi, the cave temple of the Vajra Māyādevī is definitely going to be a dangerous place. Not even I would normally go there. However, I'm fairly certain I know the path that leads to it.”

As they continued along, looking left and right, Yang Qi drew on some of the Great Necropolis godpower he had assimilated to try to help determine which direction to travel in.

There were some locations in these depths that were being explored by other top experts, but Yang Qi avoided them. Again, his goal was not to engage in fighting, but rather to improve his Secret-Ensconcing All-World Anything-Everything Fundamental-Law Magic. Besides, some of them were so strong that they seemed like they were on the same level as his immortal-slaying clone.

RUMBLE!

It took a lot of effort to travel about here, but it was made easier by the necropolis godpower that he already possessed.

The only downside was that, after assimilating that godpower, the will of the Great Necropolis began to take more and more space within his sea of consciousness, until his nascent divinity began to feel pressured. It was almost like a situation of the turtledove occupying the magpie’s nest.

Yang Qi wasn’t worried, but did find the situation troublesome. He needed to find a way to negate this side-effect as soon as possible before it became a serious problem.

When Yang Qi gave Battle Resister some of the godpower, he didn’t suffer from such effects, because Yang Qi made sure to remove the will of the necropolis from it.

It was in this manner that the two of them slipped through the Great Necropolis like fish through water, going deeper and deeper until there were virtually no signs of human life. Occasionally, they reached a point where immense tempests swirled, the kind that were so savage they could rip people to shreds.

The lightning bolts within these tempests were the result of friction between different types of vital energy and godpower, and they could even instantly kill experts with power indexes of a thousand.

There were also tribulations of water, fire and even sand. The entire place was like a deadly labyrinth that few people would ever dare to enter.

The two of them proceeded through it all unfazed.

At a certain point, they heard a strange noise from ahead, which prompted Yang Qi to open his Lord's Eye. His vision pierced through the godpower of the necropolis until he eventually saw some ruins that glowed with godlight as bright as the sun.

Within that light, he could see the shadows of several people.

“Godhood!” Yang Qi said, startled. It was godhood that completely surpassed what he had acquired in the Exquisite Cathedral, obviously left behind by an incredibly powerful god. It didn't seem tainted in any way, which meant that it would be possible for Yang Qi to assimilate, unlike the godhood stars in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

‘It seems today is my lucky day,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘If I can assimilate that goodhood, it should fully reactivate the Engine of the One God. Once the strength god systems are back online, it’ll be a big help when I deal with the will of the Great Necropolis.’

Reaching out, he grabbed the burning godhood, which caused his skin to sizzle and pop painfully.

However, the power contained in it caused his face to flicker with delight. Sending the power of the Great Necropolis pouring into the godhood to keep it under control, he summoned a vortex and threw it into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

Without any hesitation, he began refining it, causing flaming drops of liquid to appear, which he sent into his heart, and the Engine of the One God.

[Beep-beep-beep-beep. Beep-beep-beep. Strength god systems fully activated. Upgrading to second state. Imperial-heaven pre-beginning systems... coming online!]

BOOM!

The imperial-heaven pre-beginning systems were the upgraded version of the strength god systems. Almost immediately, Yang Qi could sense them pulsing with godpower. The will of the imperial-heaven pre-beginning systems then connected with his own will, then flowed into his sea of consciousness to assault the will of the Great Necropolis.

The will of the Great Necropolis trembled under the attack, and stone-colored light shone throughout Yang Qi. Slowly but surely, that will began to melt away, turning into golden vital energy that entered his nascent divinity.

With his nascent divinity and the God Legion Seal working together, they filled the larger portion of his sea of consciousness and were beginning to reject the will of the Great Necropolis.

Of course, although some of that will had been shaved away, more was coming through via Profound Valor.

But in the end, Yang Qi was very happy. Now he had confirmed that, as long as he had enough godhood to fuel the Engine of the One God, he would definitely be able to break down the will of the Great Necropolis and turn it into something he could use.

And considering he had long since conquered a billion knowledge-devils, any resulting knowledge-devils would be easy to handle.

‘It’s too bad I only have a third of the full God Legion Seal. If I had two-thirds, I’d definitely be able to crush the will of the Great Necropolis. And that would push me to the Terrifying level much more quickly.’

He couldn’t help but think about how, after Terrifying will came Paramount will. Once he was at that level, he could definitely handle an attack by a god.

Meanwhile, light flickered around them as Battle Resister looked around uneasily and said, “Yang Qi, old pal, I think we have company.”

Chapter 942: Superpower Sects

Yang Qi seized the burning godhood, activated the Engine of the One God, upgraded the strength god systems into the imperial-heaven pre-beginning systems, and broke through the first layer of the will of the Great Necropolis.

And all of it only took a breath of time.

Thanks to the inheritor seed, he was able to easily slip through the Great Necropolis and acquire things that even experts much more powerful than him would have been powerless to acquire.

The strength god systems were incredible enough, but now he had upgraded them to the imperial-heaven pre-beginning systems. Of course, the only downside was that those systems required much more power.

Thankfully, the burning godhood was still being assimilated in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. It was godhood from a Lesser God, but one who was at the peak of that level. However, despite being so strong, it wasn’t so robust that the immortal-slaying clone couldn’t deal with it.

As drop after drop of liquid entered the Engine of the One God, the imperial-heaven pre-beginning systems’ power reserves grew, and Yang Qi’s heart pounded, sending power flowing through him.

As the imperial-heaven pre-beginning will entered his sea of consciousness, it continued battering away at the will of the Great Necropolis.

[Beep-beep-beep. Beep-beep-beep.]

The photonic computers associated with the imperial-heaven pre-beginning systems suddenly provided a report.

[Heterogeneous will has been detected in your sea of consciousness. Activating systems to crush it.]

As the Engine of the One God sent power to crush the will of the Great Necropolis, the will fought back, sending out black light to try to turn the Engine of the One God to stone.

Yang Qi stood back and watched the fighting play out. Slowly but surely, the will of the Great Necropolis was being crushed and destroyed, turned into fuel that caused his nascent divinity to grow stronger.

Yang Qi was feeling extremely pleased with how the imperial-heaven pre-beginning systems worked.

For the most part, he didn’t even have to monitor the fighting. Meanwhile, the depths of his mind were like glowing crystals, a physical manifestation of his psychic power. As that psychic power became physical, it was very much like liquid godhood, which was the initial state that would eventually lead to the production of true godhood.

Normally speaking, when people reached the Godmyth level, they would form virtual godhood. Yet Yang Qi’s virtual godhood had already reached the point of becoming liquid, which meant that he was well on his way along the path of godly ascension.

His psychic abilities and energy arts were advancing yet again.

After Yang Qi was certain that everything was going smoothly, he returned his attention to what was going on around him, only to find that he and Battle Resister were indeed surrounded. In fact, these were obviously extremely powerful people from the Ancient Road to the Gods, whose power indexes were at two thousand! There were even some at the level of three thousand!

Some were even beyond that and impossible to assess!

Yang Qi saw a handful who wore the uniforms of the Immortal House of Supreme Preeminence, and were obviously far stronger than Preeminence Boost and Preeminence Swan. They were at the peak of Destabilizing will, and clearly wielded god items that made them terrifyingly strong.

These were definitely people from superpower sects.

“Hello, friend,” one of the experts said, a man who looked very much like a monk. “We've been fighting for our lives here in the hopes of getting that godhood, but then you just came along and took it. Unfortunately, that godhood comes from a peak Lesser God, the Burning Sun God. There’s no way you could possibly assimilate it, so please hand it over.”

The man was wrapped up in a kāṣāya, and he wielded a monk’s staff. He was very tall, with long eyebrows and a white beard. Even more shocking, his head glowed with a buddhist light that Yang Qi recognized as containing primeval god skills. There was the Light of Power, the Light of Wisdom, the Light of the Vajra, and more.

His power index was around three thousand, but it fluctuated. When he breathed out, it would drop, and when he breathed in, it would rise dramatically. Obviously, it was the result of some energy art he cultivated.

“What sect do you come from, Grandmaster?” Yang Qi said, clasping his hands behind his back and making sure that he was at a peak state of readiness. “When godhood appears in the world, it's first come first serve. Only the virtuous can acquire it, so why exactly are you saying that I don’t qualify?”

“I’m an arhat sent by the Amoghasiddhi Buddhist Sect,” the monk replied. “I am unskilled in conversation, so please answer the question. Will you hand over the godhood, or not? If you won’t, then I’ll release you from your suffering.”

“The Amoghasiddhi Buddhist Sect?!” Battle Resister exclaimed. “That’s one of the superpower sects from the Ancient Road to the Gods. People say that hundreds of millions of years ago, there were ten other superpower sects who offended them. So, they sent an expert named Arhat Bhadrika who wiped all the other sects out. Not even the weakest disciples were spared. This sect is brutal and domineering, and they cultivate a profound art of immense power, something called the Amoghasiddhi Permanence-Seal Grand Energy Art.”

After finishing with his introduction, Battle Resister slipped into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, fully aware that he would be useless if fighting broke out. In fact, he might even get in Yang Qi’s way.

Snorting coldly, one of the daoist priests from the Immortal House of Supreme Preeminence stepped forward and said, “Get out of my way, arhat.” Glaring at Yang Qi, he continued, “You aren’t in the running to get that godhood, boy. Hand it over and we’ll spare you the sentence of death. I can see that you have a good cultivation base, and you clearly have enlightenment of the godpower of the Great Necropolis. If I'm not mistaken, you must’ve acquired one of the Inheritor seeds the necropolis spat out. How about you join the Immortal House of Supreme Preeminence? We can help you grow to your full potential.”

This man had the demeanor of a transcendent being, and eyes that seemed to look down disdainfully on all of heaven and earth. He was the picture of someone from a superpower sect.

Before anything else could happen, a burly man stepped forward, who wore a very eye-catching, wide golden belt. “The Immortal House of Supreme Preeminence is nothing! Our Martial Tyrant Cadre is the strongest sect on the Ancient Road to the Gods. We crush anything and everything that gets in our way. You might be an Inheritor, but your power levels are low. The fact that you actually managed to take that godhood is very telling. Not bad. Not bad at all. Someone like you would make a great addition to the Martial Tyrant Cadre.”

Apparently, all three of these people were interested in recruiting Yang Qi.

Despite having extremely high power indexes, none of them had been able to successfully lay hands on the godhood he had just taken so easily. And the fact that he had, coupled with his use of the godpower of the Great Necropolis, revealed to them that he was an Inheritor. Not a single one of them treated him with an ounce of courtesy, but were acting like ravenous wolves, instead. And if he showed any weakness, it was entirely possible that they would rip him to pieces.

Truth be told, an Inheritor could be very valuable to any sect, as they would make it much easier to get godhood from the Great Necropolis.

“Sorry everyone,” he said, “But I'm not joining any of your sects. And as for this godhood, it's mine.” Before defeating Profound Valor, he might have been in big trouble if he had found himself surrounded by experts like this. After all, he could have ended up stuck outside the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. But after his victory, his command of the godpower of the Great Necropolis was completely different, and he knew that he had the upper hand. Even if these people joined forces, they wouldn’t be able to hurt him.

He was even thinking about somehow turning them into thralls. Considering their power indexes, they would obviously be huge assets.

“Well that depends on what you’re capable of!” the burly man said. Without warning, he slashed out with a saber that hadn’t been in his hand a moment before, but had appeared just like magic.

He took a step forward, and space seemed to compress as he was suddenly right in front of Yang Qi, his saber slashing toward him.

Yang Qi didn't move, making it seem almost like he was paralyzed by fear. As the saber closed in, he suddenly lifted his arm to block the blow.

Gong!

The saber shattered, and the godpower of the Great Necropolis poured into the burly man. Almost immediately, he began petrifying, and the power of the necropolis gathered around him as if to expel him.

Roaring with rage, he flexed his muscles to shatter the newly-formed stone, then spun in place as an enormous pillar of vital energy appeared behind him, seemingly tall enough to prop up heaven and earth.

“What?” said the daoist priest. “That’s a consummate energy art of the Martial Tyrant Cadre! The Martial-God Hegemon-King Heaven-Propping Pillar! He actually succeeded in cultivating it. It’s a pillar of power that can connect to heaven, earth, the universe, the god world, hell, the green void, the yellow springs, the blue underworld, and the great void. Whoever completes the Martial-God Hegemon-King Heaven-Propping Pillar will be the most boundless and unstoppable martial god imaginable!”

As soon as that pillar appeared, all of Yang Qi’s attacks were negated.

‘Incredible!’ Yang Qi thought, suddenly struck with the impression that he had underestimated these people. The energy field emanating from this incredible pillar seemed too much for even him to break through.

However, that just served to stoke his fighting spirit, and he immediately unleashed a secret magic that he had bitterly cultivated, a consummate divine ability that included the Great Necropolis God Art. He threw out both hands, causing numerous palm strikes to fly toward the burly man and his energy field.

Chapter 943: Capturing Super-Experts

Yang Qi attacked with a combination of energy arts that he had spent a lot of time working on. The Seventy-Two Monarchs Energy Art, the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, and the Secret-Ensconcing All-World Anything-Everything Fundamental-Law Magic. All of that, boosted by the godpower of the Great Necropolis, could create a host of palm strikes that combined strength and softness, and could seize the good fortune of heaven and earth.

The people from the Immortal House of Supreme Preeminence and the Amoghasiddhi Buddhist Sect were eyeing him like tigers eyed prey, and were clearly waiting to see if he and the burly man from the Martial Tyrant Cadre would end up hurting each other, whereupon they could swoop in to benefit. Of course, there was no way Yang Qi was going to let on to his true plan. So he simply attacked the burly man with full, deadly force.

Pop. Pop. Pop. Pop.

His palm struck over and over again, provoking an expression of complete shock from the burly man, who suddenly realized that the Martial-God Hegemon-King Heaven-Propping Pillar behind him was starting to crack and crumble.

He had every reason to be shocked. After having successfully completed the cultivation of that pillar, he should have been able to conquer every obstacle, and be impossible to defeat. But Yang Qi was striking blows that seemed capable of destabilizing the universe and shaking the god world. Not only did the burly man not have any time to breathe, but he was actually starting to cough up blood.

BOOM!

Yang Qi shattered the pillar and unleashed a bevy of moves that locked down east, west, south and north.

By that point, the man from the Martial Tyrant Cadre realized how strong Yang Qi was, and didn’t dare to continue fighting him. Instead, he fell back.

However, even as he did so, a vortex sprang up right behind him and he fell into it with a muffled shriek. Afterward, silence reigned.

The man had fallen for Yang Qi’s trick.

The truth was that if the man had truly tried, he could have defended himself against Yang Qi’s onslaught. All he had to do was hold on long enough, and eventually start fighting back. Perhaps, in the very end, Yang Qi might have secured victory, but it would likely have taken many days of back and forth. Furthermore, it would have ended with both of them being wounded. Instead, Yang Qi had attacked so relentlessly that the man didn’t dare to fight back, and instead decided to back down. Then Yang Qi was able to trick him into falling into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

Unfortunately, that meant that the secret of the chart had now been laid bare to the arhat from the Amoghasiddhi Buddhist Sect and the daoist priest from the Immortal House of Supreme Preeminence.

Seeing that the expert from the Martial Tyrant Cadre had been captured in one move, the arhat and the daoist priest immediately joined forces, unleashing two powerful attacks.

Yang Qi thrust his palms out to meet them and felt a massive force coursing through him, so intense that it felt like he might shatter.

There was no doubt that these two experts were not to be taken lightly, and commanded consummate techniques. Although he might be able to beat them in a fight, it definitely wouldn’t be easy. And things were worse, considering that they had now joined forces.

Another thing Yang Qi was worried about was the possibility of more people showing up from the Martial Tyrant Cadre. They were a superpower sect with Terrifying experts, and if a person like that came, the situation would turn very dangerous.

At that moment, he made a decision. Summoning a vortex, he leaped toward it.

“See you again next time!” he said, and then he was gone. The arhat and the daoist priest leaped forward, but were too late. The two of them exchanged surprised glances.

“If I'm not mistaken,” the daoist priest said, “I’d say he must have the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Apparently, he’s not only the successor of King Immortal-Slayer, but also an Inheritor of the Great Necropolis! We have to go back and report this to our sects.”

“Let’s go!” the arhat said. With that, he summoned a halo of buddhist light that spread out to surround him. Then he vanished. Obviously, it was a high-level magic from a buddhist school. As for the daoist priest, he also turned and vanished.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi was in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, where he was back to fighting the burly man from the Martial Tyrant Cadre.

At a certain point, Yang Qi lashed out and hit him on the back with a sealing mark. Even as the man was coughing up blood, the immortal-slaying clone leaped in to crush him with the powers of the Great Necropolis and the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Then the God Legion Seal appeared.

At that point, the burly man couldn't do anything. Yang Qi quickly reached into his sea of energy and pulled out a violently explosive true energy seed that resembled an enormous pillar. It pulsed with the energy of the martial path and was apparently something left behind by a god of martial arts.

Yang Qi grabbed it and assimilated it, adding yet another godly-class energy art to his repertoire, the Martial-God Hegemon-King Heaven-Propping Pillar.

“Who exactly are you?” the burly man howled. “And why are you so set on fighting the Martial Tyrant Cadre? My sect won’t let you get away with this!”

Yang Qi didn’t reply. Instead, he inserted several devil embryos into the burly man and hit him with the Devil-God Seal. Next, hundreds of thousands of god formations appeared, which poured vital energy into the man, forcibly advancing his energy arts. However, all advancement was absorbed by the devil embryos, and was then passed on to Yang Qi. Yang Qi hadn’t even said a word to him, but had directly turned him into a thrall.

The man’s cultivation base was far more terrifying than Profound Valor’s, to the point where Yang Qi almost couldn’t handle the energy that was flowing into him.

Meanwhile, the sun-like godhood he had taken earlier was shining brilliantly within the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Flying up, Yang Qi chopped at it with a knifehand, cutting it into two parts. One part was thrown into his Heaven and Earth Furnace to boost his power and energy arts, and the other was tossed into the Engine of the One God.

The imperial-heaven pre-beginning systems immediately roared with more life than ever.

Sitting down cross-legged, he circulated his energy arts and watched his power index began rising with explosive speed. From one thousand, it jumped to two thousand, then two thousand five hundred, then finally reached three thousand.

In the shortest of moments, he became like someone from one of the superpower sects.

Yang Qi was now completely confident in being able to crush Empress Joyflower. The only possible reason he might not stand a chance was if she had broken through to Terrifying will convergence.

Thanks to the imperial-heaven pre-beginning systems, the will of the Great Necropolis within him was constantly being worn down. Of course, it was simultaneously building up, but all that meant was that his cultivation speed was rapidly increasing.

For now, it seemed like it wouldn’t be a major challenge to reach Terrifying will.

Of course, he needed a lot of godhood to sustain it all and keep the imperial-heaven pre-beginning systems going. Furthermore, if he didn’t keep adding godhood, then the will of the Great Necropolis would continue growing within him, causing problems for his nascent divinity.

If his nascent divinity were to be ejected from his sea of consciousness, he wouldn’t be himself anymore.

Obviously, the problem of how he was going to get more godhood was extremely relevant.

Yang Qi now had a power index of three thousand and a will convergence at the peak of the Destabilizing level. As of now, he didn’t need to rely on any magical treasures at all to dominate virtually any enemy.

Once he could fully subdue the will of the Great Necropolis, establish his own powerful organization, and command universal fortune, he would reach the Terrifying level and have even less to fear.

Leaving the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, he once again began searching through the depths of the Great Necropolis, and this time, no experts appeared to block his path.

Unfortunately, he didn’t see any godhood either.

However, he eventually caught sight of an enormous world that radiated an air of buddhism, and shone with brilliant golden light. It was like an ancient buddhist temple that echoed with the weeping of ghosts and wailing of gods, and in its depths were stone statues covered with dust.

Yang Qi immediately realized that this was the Cave Temple of the Vajra Māyādevī, built by some ancient buddhist school from the god world. This was where Leaf Dao-Denier had come to acquire a seed of the Secret-Ensconcing All-World Anything-Everything Fundamental-Law Magic, which was second only to the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.

Without hesitation, Yang Qi entered the temple.

As soon as his feet touched the ground, he felt a sense of incredible pressure. Jumping into the air, he tried to fly, but failed, which was quite a surprise considering how strong he was.

Obviously, this buddhist temple contained elements of the god world in it.

It was said in legend that only gods were capable of flying in the god world.

Yang Qi had a virtual god world in his Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, and even there, Godmyths were incapable of flying. Only Grand Emperor cultivators could do so.

Arrangements like that were very beneficial for cultivation.

It would be like a situation in which an ordinary person carried heavy weights on their shoulders. Later, upon removing the weights, they would achieve great boosts to agility and speed.

Here, in the cave temple of the Vajra Māyādevī, there was an immense pressure that made it seem like the true god world.

Whoosh!

Yang Qi unleashed a stream of sword energy, but it only traveled about thirty meters before vanishing. That sword energy would have been enough to slice a thirty-third ranked immortal world apart, but here it couldn’t even leave a scratch on the stone floor.

Chapter 944: The Cave Temple

To unleash a sword slash that could devastate an immortal world, but find that it hardly scratched the floor, left Yang Qi feeling almost like his martial arts had been crippled.

Of course, he knew it was because this buddhist kingdom contained characteristics of the god world, so it inherently suppressed the fluctuations of magical power.

He almost felt like he was back in the mortal world, when he had just stepped into the Energy Eruption level and had hardly been capable of hurting a fly. And considering how weak his cultivation base seemed now, he could only imagine what it would be like to actually enter the god world.

‘This cave is exerting a lot of pressure on me, which makes it a great place for cultivation. However, I have to wonder how Leaf Dao-Denier dealt with this. You would think he would’ve been so thoroughly suppressed he couldn’t even move, or possibly even crushed to death like those people....'

There were corpses visible here and there. Some of them remained upright, as though they had died the moment they stepped inside. Others had clearly been knocked to the ground, expressions of shock on their faces. Still others lay on their back, and a few appeared to have died trying to crawl out.

They were all top-tier experts with power indexes in the hundreds. Yet upon entering this cave temple, it was to their complete shock that they found it to be very different from the outside world. Those who came in were trapped, and eventually killed.

From what Yang Qi could tell, a power index of over a thousand was the very minimum to enter this place safely. Even then, it would be as difficult to move around as a mortal trying to wade through a swamp.

He even caught sight of the corpse of someone with a power index of a thousand. They were gripping a pillar, as if they had been trying to uproot it, but they had ultimately failed and died.

The pillar was made of some sort of metal that Yang Qi didn’t recognize, and glowed with a buddhist light. It was covered with carvings depicting buddhist teachings of morality, as well as other buddhist decorations.

Yang Qi ran his fingers down the pillar and instantly felt a sensation of complete peace and tranquility. His nascent divinity felt as if it were being blessed and strengthened in a way that would defend against all intrusive devils.

There was even text written in the script of the buddhist schools.

“Pillar of God-Transformation...” Yang Qi murmured. He drew on the power of the Secret-Ensconcing All-World Anything-Everything Fundamental-Law Magic and touched the pillar again. This time he could tell that it was a magical treasure made from god world metal. If one sat cross-legged beneath it and practiced cultivation, it would provide immense benefits to their nascent divinity.

Opening the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, he prepared to place the Pillar of God-Transformation inside. However, his expression flickered as he realized that the vortex leading inside was only as small as a sesame seed. Exerting some effort, he opened it wider, but still couldn’t get it past the size of a coin. Obviously, an opening like that was too small to fit the pillar through. In other words, he couldn’t bring people from the chart to him, nor could he escape into the chart.

He called on his God Legion Paradise, but found that it was also severely limited and would only spread out for about one-third of a meter around him. Normally speaking, it was a pure land that could encompass boundless immortal worlds, but here in this buddhist land it was like ordinary defensive empyrean energy.

Yang Qi gave up on the idea of taking the pillar. Perhaps he might be able to figure out a way to do it, but it would be too much of a waste of time.

Walking on, he felt very much like a tourist as he looked around at the buddhist iconography around him. Some of the statues seemed merciful, others seemed vicious. All of their hands were contorted into various hand seals representing martial disciplines of buddhism. To ordinary cultivators, such hand seals would be useless, but Yang Qi had the Secret-Ensconcing All-World Anything-Everything Fundamental-Law Magic and could understand some of their mysteries.

Ordinarily it would have been very dangerous for him to be in this situation, considering he couldn’t open the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Furthermore, the pressure grew greater and greater as he continued along, making it even harder to draw on his energy arts. Even with the godpower of the Great Necropolis, he could only jump about thirty meters into the air before falling back down.

It really was like being an Energy Eruption expert in the mortal world.

He completely focused his mind, focusing all of his power on resisting the magical laws of the surrounding cave. As a result, he felt his cultivation base slowly advancing. Cultivation circumstances such as this were truly rare. Thankfully, he still had about half of that bit of godhood left to work with.

‘So where are those Secret-Ensconcing All-World Anything-Everything Fundamental-Law Magic seeds? Are they deeper inside the cave temple?’

Thankfully, his search was aided by the part of the technique that he already knew. That part of the Secret-Ensconcing All-World Anything-Everything Fundamental-Law Magic was his greatest asset.

Before long, he saw a mountain up ahead, out of which a buddhist statue had been carved. It depicted a woman whose face was full of compassion, her palms together, as if in prayer, and a vertical eye on her forehead that glittered with bright light.

‘Don’t tell me this is a likeness of the Vajra Māyādevī?' he thought. ‘Why is my Secret-Ensconcing All-World Anything-Everything Fundamental-Law Magic seemingly connecting with that eye? Is that the location of the seed? But it's three thousand meters tall! How am I supposed to get up there?’

It was a vertical climb to the top of the statue, and he could only jump about thirty meters. He obviously couldn’t fly up to the top, and climbing it didn’t seem realistic either.

He stepped forward and touched the statue, finding it to be incredibly tough. In fact, he couldn’t even leave a scratch on its surface, leading him to believe that the statue had definitely been left here by a Paramount God from the buddhist schools. After being buried in the Great Necropolis for so long, its godpower had dispersed, but it was still as fundamentally tough as it had ever been.

He smiled faintly as he came to a realization. ‘I, Yang Qi, who have dominated millions upon millions of planes of existence and innumerable worlds, a person who can come and go as I please, have essentially been turned back into a mortal here in this buddhist cave temple. I can’t even get to the top of this statue. It goes to show that the world really is full of endless mysteries.’

With that, he sat down cross-legged and drew on the Secret-Ensconcing All-World Anything-Everything Fundamental-Law Magic.

Soon, true energy began converging within him, and he became aware of fluctuations in the cave. It seemed that some great buddha from the god world had left godpower behind here in the form of godhood, although he wasn’t sure exactly where.

As that godpower seeped into him, the seed of the Secret-Ensconcing All-World Anything-Everything Fundamental-Law Magic grew larger. Obviously, working on cultivation here was a really good idea.

Whoosh. Whoosh. Whoosh.

All of a sudden, he heard the sound of flapping clothing behind him. Rising to his feet, he saw a figure in white floating toward him. It was a woman.

‘How strong must this woman be to glide about in this cave? Her energy arts must be far above mine.’ He was surprised, but not too much. Only incredibly marvelous individuals could possibly be in this cave.

Eventually, the woman in white noticed Yang Qi.

She wore a butterfly mask that concealed most of her features, but it was possible to tell from her lips and chin that she was spectacularly beautiful.

“Oh?” she said. “I didn’t realize anyone else had come to the statue of the Vajra Māyādevī. Who might you be, sire? And what sect do you come from?”

“I'm just a rogue cultivator,” Yang Qi replied, rising to his feet and clasping his hands behind his back, “a traveler in the Great Necropolis. I came across this cave temple by chance, and entered it in the hopes of learning an ability or two. Miss, might I ask what noble errand brings you here?”

“I'm here to pick up a certain item,” she replied. “If there’s nothing important you have to discuss with me, you can be on your way.”

“Oh?” Yang Qi smiled. “No one owns this cave, which means that anyone is free to come here. And considering that I'm not interfering with you, why can’t I stay to see what item you might be here to take?”

“What did you just say?” she replied grimly. “Sire, are you saying that you want to fight with me over that object?”

“I'm not sure what object you’re referring to,” he replied with a frown. Although he was fairly certain that this woman was after the seed in the statue’s forehead, he didn't see a need to take action yet.

Chapter 945: Seed of Truth

The fact that this masked woman could glide through the air in the cave temple indicated that she had an incredibly profound cultivation base. Not even Yang Qi could do what she was doing. Either she was an important person from one of the superpower sects, or she was an Inheritor. After all, she definitely wasn’t a cultivator from a buddhist school.

“Screw the hell off!” the woman snapped, clearly irritated at the way Yang Qi seemed to be blithely chatting with her. All of a sudden, a whip made of pure energy appeared and snaked out like a lightning bolt to wrap around Yang Qi.

It was fully thirty meters long, and from the loud cracking sounds it made, it was obvious that it would seriously injure anyone it hit.

Either that, or kill them.

Yang Qi was fairly certain that if they were outside of this temple, it wouldn’t just be thirty meters long. No, it would likely be able to stretch from the top of the heavens to the bottom of the earth. In fact, it could likely reach the depths of hell. Despite the limitations of the temple around them, it was obviously something he couldn’t afford to take lightly.

Dodging to the side, he avoided the first lash of the whip.

However, the masked woman continued waving it around, causing it to swirl into numerous concentric circles that contained deadly and mysterious energy flows.

In fact, the circles were like blades that represented the center of heaven, life and death, the essence of slicing, the six supernatural signs, the nourishment of nature, and the stillness of death. Obviously, it was some boundless energy art from the martial path.

RUMBLE!

Yang Qi couldn’t move quickly enough, and the whip encircled him. In response, he lashed out with a fist strike. More cracking sounds were heard as a flow of energy swept out of his hand, turning into jug-sized conglomerations of energy.

Then the energy conglomerations slammed into the whip and exploded, turning the whip into dust.

The woman fell back a few paces and looked at Yang Qi with open surprise. “What fist technique was that?” she asked. “I can’t believe it vanquished my Myriad-Wheels Myriad-Magics Will-Manifestation God-Whip Energy Art!”

Yang Qi nodded to himself, having completely confirmed that practicing cultivation in this place could push his energy arts to new heights, thanks to the oppressive weight of the magical laws.

Just now, his fist strike had contained Life-Death Void-Destruction Lightning condensed into the form of true energy. Thanks to the constraints of the cave temple, he could only make the energy the size of a jug, but its explosions could hurt anyone with a power index less than three thousand. As of now, he was fairly certain that, if he had to fight Star Swordlife again, he could subdue him with hardly any effort at all.

“It’s just a little energy art I recently gained enlightenment of,” Yang Qi said. “Your Myriad-Wheels Myriad-Magics Will-Manifestation God-Whip Energy Art is really impressive, to be honest. What sect are you from?”

“The Will Manifestation Heaven Sect, one of the top forces from the Ancient Road to the Gods. If you were from the Ancient Road to the Gods, you’d have heard of us.”

Apparently, this woman was quick to realize that her whip hadn’t hurt Yang Qi at all. And given the ease with which he had dispelled it, he was obviously a very strong individual that she couldn’t easily beat in a fight. Fighting in the cave temple was a taxing affair that involved rapid draining of one’s true energy. With no easy way to replenish oneself, it could be very deadly to engage in fighting in a place like this.

“The reputation of your sect rings like thunder in my ears,” Yang Qi replied formally. Of course, he had never heard of any Will Manifestation Heaven Sect, but considering the level of this woman’s cultivation base, it was likely to be as powerful as the Immortal House of Supreme Preeminence, if not more powerful.

“If you're a rogue cultivator with no allegiances, then why not join our sect?” she said. “I'm one of the sect’s chief disciples, which gives me a lot of authority. I could provide the formal introduction.”

“Join your sect?” Yang Qi smiled. “I'm not really interested. I prefer to be free and unfettered.”

“Free and unfettered?” She chuckled. “With the appearance of the Great Necropolis and the dramatic transformations to the dao of immortals, it's only a matter of time before the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect conquers everything. Join us now, and you can gain power as the sect grows. If you wait until later, it’ll be different. You don’t really think you can survive forever as a loner, do you? Only by joining a powerful force like ours can you benefit from universal fortune.”

“How does your Will Manifestation Heaven Sect measure up to the Immortal House of Supreme Preeminence?” Yang Qi asked. “Are you really strong enough to conquer the entire Immortal Dao Age? What happens if I join your sect, then some powerful force rises up and destroys it? Wouldn’t I be destroyed along with you?”

She snorted angrily. “Who could possibly destroy the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect? Not the Immortal House of Supreme Preeminence, that’s for sure. Their sectlord is in the early Terrifying level and has a psychic scale of three. But my Master has a psychic scale of four! That alone is enough to keep the Immortal House of Supreme Preeminence in check. The only reason they’re so powerful in the first place is because they have a god item called the Preeminent Chaos Gate.”

“Oh?” Yang Qi was learning quite a bit from this conversation. “What do you mean by psychic scale?”

“You must have heard of the psychic scale. It's a precise measure of one’s will using the power of the ancient Cruiser of Civilization. People who have just stepped into the Terrifying level have a psychic scale of one. From what I can tell, your psychic scale is probably at only five or six tenths. Even just attaining a psychic scale of one is no easy task.” It seemed this masked woman was actually interested in recruiting Yang Qi.

“The Cruiser of Civilization, huh. That thing is incredible.” From what he was hearing, it seemed that this Will Manifestation Heaven Sect had the fragment of the Cruiser of Civilization with psychic scaling systems. They were similar to the power assessment systems in that they didn’t just provide a measurement. For example, the power assessment systems could analyze, break down, and mix different types of power, providing new and more suitable versions. Without them, there was no way that Yang Qi would be able to absorb power so quickly. Nor could he have taken all of those god formations as easily as eating food or drinking water.

As for the psychic scaling systems, they could be used to stimulate the psyche and will, and provide deep understanding of psychic matters. Yang Qi was convinced that if he could get them, and use them in concert with the Engine of the One God and the imperial-heaven pre-beginning systems, the will of the Great Necropolis would be of great use to him.

One thing was certain: he had to get those systems.

It seemed very likely that the reason the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect was so powerful was because they had those systems to improve the will convergence of its members.

Considering that Yang Qi had the Engine of the One God, as well as the vivicreation, genetic, and power assessment systems, he was already well-equipped to found a formidable organization. Unfortunately, he didn’t have the power required to do that. The Engine of the One God was always operating at very low levels, but if he could provide a huge influx of godhood, he could upgrade it significantly and replace hunting rifles with cannons.

“So you’re stronger than the Immortal House of Supreme Preeminence,” Yang Qi said. “That’s the most powerful sect I'm familiar with. I heard they’re the number one immortal sect on the Ancient Road to the Gods. But if you're stronger than them, well, it’s actually somewhat difficult to believe.”

“You have eyes but don't recognize gold-inlaid jade,” the masked woman said. “If you don’t believe me, go find someone from the Immortal House of Supreme Preeminence and ask them what they do when they run into people from the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect. Ask them if they don’t act reverent and respectful.”

Yang Qi was slowly being convinced that the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect really was stronger than the Immortal House of Supreme Preeminence. And if he really wanted to get the psychic scaling systems, it seemed that joining the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect was the best strategy. Besides, it seemed like he wasn’t going to be able to get his hands on the seed in this cave temple.

He nodded. “Well, if you put it that way, then I guess I am interested in joining your sect. I was considering joining the Immortal House of Supreme Preeminence, but got into a row with a few of their disciples. In the end, not only did they refuse to let me join them, but they tried to kill me instead. What a pity....”

Upon hearing this, the masked woman burst out laughing. “So, that’s how it is. Well, I guarantee that if you join the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect, those people won’t dare to cause problems for you. On the Ancient Road to the Gods, there are a lot of superpower sects, but even they have ranks. And to occupy the top rank, a sect has to have someone with Terrifying will convergence. Even a small sect with a Terrifying expert can be considered a superpower. In contrast, a huge sect without a Terrifying expert will always be considered substandard. It’s only with Terrifying will that one can truly manipulate one’s true energy into becoming god vitality. In other words, converting virtual godhood into true godhood.”

“I get it now,” Yang Qi said, pleased to be learning so much from this masked woman. “Miss, might I ask for your surname and given name?”

“I'm An Yiru,” she replied. “Well, if you’re going to be joining our sect, then you should probably prepare a tribute beforehand. Why not help me get the item that I’m after?”

“What exactly is it?” he asked, already convinced that it was none other than the Secret-Ensconcing All-World Anything-Everything Fundamental-Law Magic seed.

“I'm looking for a seed of truth related to a special cultivation technique. According to the rumors, this cave temple contains a divine art from an extremely powerful buddhist school. It’s called the Secret-Ensconcing All-World Anything-Everything Fundamental-Law Magic, which is contained in eighteen unique seeds of truth. If you get them all, you can use the full technique. I've explored this cave before, but always went home with my tail between my legs. However, after doing some further research, I'm pretty sure that the seed of truth is hidden in the forehead of this Vajra Māyādevī statue. I just have to get it somehow.”

“So, that’s how it is,” Yang Qi said, nodding. “I also noticed that this divine likeness of the Vajra Māyādevī seemed different and assumed there was probably some treasure in it. Unfortunately, that eye is too high, and my cultivation base is too low. How could I possibly reach the top of a three-thousand-meter-tall statue without flying? And even if I did get up there, how would I extract the item from the eye? It looks far too tough to open with force.”

“I already came up with a plan,” An Yiru replied coolly. “Although I'm not completely certain it’ll work, considering the level of your cultivation base, maybe you can help me.”

Chapter 946: Will Manifestation Heaven Sect

“How can I help?” Yang Qi said, looking up at the statue looming over them. In the brief clash with An Yiru moments ago, he knew that, although her energy arts were impressive, defeating her wasn’t out of the realm of possibility. In other words, things that were impossible for him weren’t automatically possible for her.

“I've cultivated my Myriad-Wheels Myriad-Magics Will-Manifestation God-Whip Energy Art to the point where my whip can adhere to anything it touches, including the surface of the statue. In other words, I should be able to use it to climb to the head of the statue. However, doing so alone would be dangerous. For example, what would happen if someone came along and attacked me? How would I defend myself? I'm thinking that I should teach you the technique. Given the level of your energy arts, divine abilities, and will, it shouldn’t take you very long to master. Then we can climb the statue together. Our combined strength should be enough to get into the forehead of the statue and take the seed of truth.”

“Hmm.” Yang Qi thought about the plan for a moment. “Why don’t you try using your whip on the statue, first? See if you can really climb it. From what I've experienced, the statue is extremely slippery. None of my energy arts had any effect on it, and in fact, the statue has the ability to push you away if you get close.”

By way of demonstration, he sent a stream of sword energy toward the statue, but it vanished into nothing as soon as it touched the surface, as if it had been either destroyed or devoured by the statue.

In the past, Yang Qi had used certain energy arts to climb walls and other such surfaces, but from what he could sense, it wouldn’t be possible for this statue.

“You’re right,” An Yiru said. “The godpower of the statue makes it difficult to approach. However, my Myriad-Wheels Myriad-Magics Will-Manifestation God-Whip Energy Art is different. You see, the whip itself is not actually an energy art, but rather a combination of power and a corporeal object. Without the Will Manifestation Tendon I have, it's actually impossible to successfully cultivate.”

Swish!

Something that looked like a tendon appeared in her hand and she threw it over to Yang Qi, who caught it out of the air. It appeared to have been taken from some sort of animal, and was incredibly tough. Furthermore, it stuck to his hand as though it were glued onto it.

He sent some energy into the tendon, whereupon it flipped back and forth.

Seeing that, An Yiru’s eyes widened with surprise. “You really are extraordinary. Alright, I'm going to tell you how to transform the tendon into a whip. Here’s the technique....”

She went on to explain the secret art, which entered his sea of consciousness. Almost immediately, he understood what an amazing technique it was. Although it wasn’t necessarily overwhelming in terms of power, it was filled with seemingly infinite variations. It was like a twisting snake, a loach burrowing into the mud, or a ghost floating through sinister winds.

RUMBLE!

From within those seemingly infinite variations, a divine ability emerged that Yang Qi immediately understood. He breathed in, then exhaled onto the tendon, which extended into the shape of a long whip. He flicked the whip, and when it landed on the statue, he pulled hard, propelling himself forward until he was on the statue’s foot.

Considering how enormous the foot was, it was obvious that ordinary energy arts wouldn’t allow cultivators to climb it.

‘He mastered the infinite variations of the technique that fast?’ An Yiru thought. ‘This guy is a real genius. Well, it's a good thing he's joining our sect.’

Swish!

She summoned her own whip, which she used to lash the statue and climb up to the same position as Yang Qi.

“Good,” she said. “You’ve mastered the whip, so now let’s work together to climb to the top. Going forward, the climb will be so difficult that we’ll need to combine the powers of our two whips. Alright?”

“I’ll follow your lead,” Yang Qi said with a faint smile.

She flicked her whip, causing it to combine with his. As the true energy of the two whips mixed, the combined version became as thick as an arm. Furthermore, it extended an additional one hundred and fifty meters.

When Yang Qi connected with An Yiru’s true energy, he was impressed by how it seemed to surge without end. Obviously, her cultivation was at a very high and profound level. Meanwhile, she was just as impressed by his true energy.

When the two of them worked together, they could unleash a shocking level of power.

WHIZZZ!

Using their combined whips and power, the two of them began ascending the statue. Sure enough, the whip would stick to the statue wherever it hit, and it negated the backlash attack of the statue, as well as any attempts it made to devour them.

RUMBLE!

The statue emitted terrifying sounds like booming thunder, but in the end, the psychic fluctuations didn't have any effect on the two of them.

“Be careful!” An Yiru said. “Now that we’ve reached the head, the psychic fluctuations are going to get even more intense. They’re designed to affect your nascent divinity, and they're one of the main reasons no one has ever successfully reached the forehead and acquired the treasure. We have to work together and be very careful.”

Yang Qi nodded. Secretly, he was actually redirecting the intruding psychic fluctuations to eat away at the will of the Great Necropolis inside his sea of consciousness. He was essentially working on his cultivation, in contrast to An Yiru, who was obviously working hard to defend herself.

In fact, after a moment, he sent out some of his own psychic fluctuations to assist her. When she realized what he had done, her eyes lit up with shock. “It seems I really misjudged you. Your psychic scale is incredible! You must be right on the verge of reaching the Terrifying level! As a member of the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect, once you reach the Terrifying level you’ll become a very important person!”

“I’m not anything special,” Yang Qi said humbly. Uninterested in revealing his secrets, he continued, “I just happen to cultivate a secret magic that focuses specifically on psychic powers.”

“I see,” An Yiru replied. “Alright, let’s push a bit harder. We’re almost to the eye on the forehead.”

“Alright!” Yang Qi poured more true energy into the whip, and the two of them sped up as they climbed the statue.

Eventually, they made it to the forehead, where they realized there was a wide platform with a closed door at its end.

That door was none other than the third eye.

Looking back, Yang Qi realized that he was looking down on the cave temple as a whole, providing a view that resembled a mountain range. Those mountains were all buddhist statues, although none of them were as tall as the Vajra Māyādevī. And the Vajra Māyādevī was the only one who seemed to have an eye that contained a treasure trove.

Winds buffeted the two of them as they stood atop the statue; obviously, if the winds knocked them off, then considering that the magical laws made flight impossible, the fall would kill them.

Without hesitation, they headed toward the door.

As the psychic power assailed them, Yang Qi continued using the fluctuations to wear away at the will of the Great Necropolis.

At a certain point, An Yiru was forced into a seated position to recalibrate her breathing. A short time later, she began glowing with a bright light that spread out to form a protective shield. Rising to her feet again, she looked over at Yang Qi, who was studying the entrance door, and wryly said, “You need a key to open the door. Thankfully, I happened to come across that key in my travels.”

An exquisitely crafted stone key appeared in her hands, which was only three inches long. However, she sent a stream of energy into it, causing it to grow into a pillar nearly thirty meters in length.

Normally speaking, the properties of the cave temple would shrink magical treasures down to a very small size. But this key grew larger in the presence of the door, then entered the keyhole and disappeared.

From a distance, it looked like the Vajra Māyādevī was opening the eye on her forehead.

Yang Qi immediately drew on his most powerful energy arts, just in case the opened door released a blast of power. The last thing he wanted was to be blown over the edge.

However, the door opened silently and quietly, which only served to make it more mysterious than before. Furthermore, as soon as it opened, the psychic fluctuations and the heavenly winds faded away and the entire cave temple went completely still.

Even An Yiru seemed surprised by this, as if she had expected something else to happen.

“Come on, let’s get inside,” she said.

She snapped her fingers, creating a bright light that illuminated their path as they walked forward.

Yang Qi cautiously followed, ready to react to any unexpected developments.

Chapter 947: Joining the Sect

The dilapidated interior chamber was choked with dust, and marks from sabers and swords could be seen everywhere. Obviously, an intense battle had been fought here in times past.

BUZZ!

Yang Qi felt a psychic resonance of some sort and noticed a host of palm prints embedded in the floor, right there in front of him.

From the spider web of cracks that snaked out from each palm print, it was obvious they were the result of palm attacks backed by immense godpower. In fact, they had damaged the depths of the chamber so badly that it seemed like it was hovering on the brink of collapse.

“Hai!” Yang Qi launched his own experimental palm strike right next to one of the palm prints.

However, nothing happened except that his arm tingled painfully.

Shocked, he said, “I can’t believe the stone of this chamber is so tough. It's exponentially stronger than the stone on the outside. Definitely nothing to be taken lightly.”

“You wanted to leave a mark on the chamber floor? Don’t even think about it. Even someone with Terrifying will wouldn’t be able to do anything to the Vajra Māyādevī’s secret chamber. It would take an actual god to cause any damage. In fact, the only reason we got in here is because this temple has been in the mortal world for so long that ninety-nine percent of its godpower has dissipated. Alright, enough wasting time. Let’s find that godpower seed. It should be in here somewhere.”

Yang Qi nodded and drew on the seed of the Secret-Ensconcing All-World Anything-Everything Fundamental-Law Magic he already possessed to aid in the search. The chamber was enormous, and was completely battered and crumbling. Broken stalagmites and stalactites were interspersed with shattered stone tables, bookshelves, columns and the like. It almost looked like a war had been fought in here.

The walls were all marred by palm prints, sword slashes, saber marks, and even damage from finger strikes. It was very shocking, and made it clear how bitter the fighting had been.

Yang Qi closed his eyes and focused on all of the battle damage, and slowly but surely, he felt something like a soft breeze of will coming from them, giving him clues as to what happened in that ancient battle. Each stance and move that had been unleashed here contained its own philosophies and theories, and when he touched them with his own will, it caused his true energy to stir, and suddenly, energy arts within him activated that he hadn’t even known existed.

His Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth was filled with all sorts of incredible things that even he wasn't sure how to unleash. It was a weakness, of sorts, but for all intents and purposes it only counted as a weakness when it came to gods.

In terms of common immortals, Yang Qi’s abilities had reached a point of perfection, and were so perfect that no one could possibly match up to him. That said, reaching higher levels of enlightenment was no easy task. After all, he only had a third of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, which meant that there were other consummate techniques out there that he had no way to access.

Thankfully, though, that also meant that the power flowing through him had reached an extreme level and could be unleashed with explosive destruction. As a result, contemplating the vestiges of battle left here by heaven-gods was extremely beneficial.

“Bow of Chastisement! God-Wrath Arrow!”

All of a sudden, a bow and an arrow made of true energy appeared in his hands. The bow was curved like the moon, and the arrow was like a meteor as it shot forth, a streak of light shooting through the chamber toward the wall.

As soon as the arrow hit the wall, it vanished, but then an explosion rocked the chamber. Afterward, a small white scratch could be seen on the wall. Although the effects were as dramatic as throwing a cup of water on a burning cart of firewood, it was still clear that Yang Qi had somehow damaged the wall.

“What?” An Yiru exclaimed, her eyes wide with shock. “How did you do that? That technique you just used, it’s... it’s not something humans should be able to do!”

“I got a bit of enlightenment from looking at the vestiges of battle here, so I decided to do a little test. It seems I really did master a bit of the way that heaven-gods can alter the rotation of true energy, which can push certain energy arts to extreme limits.” Of course, Yang Qi was completely fabricating all of that.

“Marvelous. I can tell already that you’re going to be an important person in the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect. You’re going to shake heaven and earth, that's for sure. By the way, are you one of the Inheritors?”

“Of course not,” Yang Qi replied. He knew how closely the Inheritors were watched by everyone who knew them, and had no desire to draw such scrutiny. “I'm not sure how many Inheritors there are, but I’ve fought a few of them and they were incredibly strong. They can easily draw on the godpower of the Great Necropolis to do all sorts of things that I can’t quite deal with. Besides, it's impossible to take their godpower seeds and do anything with them. I personally saw a battle in which one of the Inheritors was killed, and his opponent extracted his godpower seed. Upon trying to assimilate it, the man was turned to stone.”

“What? That actually happened? Where? What expert actually had the audacity to try to assimilate a godpower seed from one of the Inheritors? And he actually turned into a statue? You have to take me there! For all we know, we could learn a lot from that statue. I could hand it over to the sect, and possibly even extract the godpower seed from inside it.”

“It was a top expert from the Immortal House of Supreme Preeminence,” he replied blithely, not even bothering to think about the tale he was spinning. “And people from his sect took him away already. I was just watching from the sidelines with some people from the Martial Tyrant Cadre and the, what was it? Right, the Amoghasiddhi Buddhist Sect.”

“Martial Tyrant Cadre? That’s a pretty powerful organization. Their leader is an extremely domineering figure with a divine grasp on the martial path. Definitely not someone to underestimate. Well, I suppose we should just focus on exploring this chamber.”

The two of them continued onward, but even after some time passed, they still hadn’t discovered any treasures. Eventually, An Yiru cracked her whip, parting the dust ahead and revealing an unbroken stone table. A stone box lay on the table, atop which was a huge incense burner, making it impossible to take the box. As for the box, it was sealed with a paper talisman that was so old it was already disintegrating, allowing a golden buddhist glow to seep out of the lid of the box.

“Is that the godpower seed?” An Yiru said, sounding excited. She lashed out with her whip, which wrapped around the incense burner as she attempted to pull it off the table and gain access to the box.

Unfortunately, no matter how she tugged on the whip, the incense burner wouldn’t budge. At the moment, it seemed impossible to get the box.

“Let me try,” Yang Qi said. Although his power index wasn’t very high, he had just gained a bit of enlightenment, not to mention the marvelous abilities he already had access to.

Stepping forward, he reached out, wrapped his arms around the incense burner, and tried to lift it off the box. Rumbling sounds echoed out from the incense burner, and although it didn’t actually move, he got the sense that he had at least made a bit of progress.

Roaring with effort, he threw more magical power into his next attempt, causing the incense burner to rumble with even more intensity. However, it didn’t move. Looking inside the incense burner, he saw some ash that had congealed into clumps almost like charcoal. Unfortunately, he wasn’t even able to clear out any of the trash. Frowning, he tried to lift the burner again, only to fail once more.

‘This guy is definitely strong,’ An Yiru thought, ‘but not strong enough to move that incense burner. It's just too heavy. After all, it is from the god world.’ She shook her head.

“I guess we’re going to leave emptyhanded.”

“Miss An Yiru,” Yang Qi said, “do you happen to have any godhood on you? I have a secret magic that might be able to help. It can burn godhood and convert it into incredible power.”

“What? Burn godhood?” An Yiru only continued to grow more and more shocked by Yang Qi and his abilities. Usually, people would assimilate any godhood they acquired. However, the process of converting it into power could take years upon years. To simply burn it up was something completely unheard of, at least to her.

“I actually do have some godhood,” she said. “If you can really do what you just claimed, I’ll give you some. But, godhood is extremely precious....”

He shrugged. “If you don’t want to give it up, I guess we have no way of moving the incense burner. Perhaps you should go call some stronger experts from your sect to help.”

“Call people from the sect?” She chuckled. “And share the spoils with them? I don’t think so. Competition within the sect is fierce, and if anyone else found out about this place we’d definitely be cut out. Fine. If you’re really confident that you can pull this off, I’ll give you some godhood. My Master gave it to me as a gift, and although I’ve already assimilated some of it, I still have about half left.”

She produced a thumb-sized piece of godhood from her sleeve. It was a tiny sphere that looked like it was made from cold jade, and seemingly contained countless immortal worlds within it. From what Yang Qi could tell, it must have come from a god devoted to frigid coldness.

“This is some frigid godhood from the Ice-Snow God,” she said. “Just be careful not to end up freezing yourself to death.”

“I won’t,” he said. “All godhood is the same to me.” He took the godhood and devoured it, then used the Engine of the One God and the imperial-heaven pre-beginning systems to break it down and turn it into raw power.

As the liquid coursed through him, Yang Qi took the offensive powers of the Great Necropolis’ will and poured them into the incense burner.

RUMBLE!

The incense burner suddenly rose up into the air. Without hesitation, An Yiru lashed out with her whip, grabbing the stone box and pulling it over to her hand. Unlike the incense burner, the box wasn’t actually very heavy at all!

Chapter 948: Joining the Sect (2)

Even as An Yiru took the stone box, Yang Qi quickly scanned it.

[Beep-beep-beep. Beep-beep-beep. Systems scanning. Sealing mark incredibly strong. Power index beyond five thousand and Terrifying will convergence required to open....]

At the moment, Yang Qi wasn’t close to a power index of five thousand, nor did he have Terrifying will. Other than using the Engine of the One God to gain temporary bursts, there was no way he could reach that level. And if he did burn his reserves of godhood, then the imperial-heaven pre-beginning systems would even have to shut down afterward.

The imperial-heaven pre-beginning systems were definitely superior to the strength god systems. Back when he used the strength god systems, he always had to consider whether or not his meridians could sustain the power flows.

But after reaching a certain point, the imperial-heaven pre-beginning systems could directly release power to the outside. If he did that, he could use the Engine of the One God as a powerful weapon. However, it would also reveal his abilities.

After taking the frigid godhood, he was able to push the abilities of the imperial-heaven pre-beginning systems to a higher level. And he had also taken some of the power to help his nascent divinity further its assault on the will of the Great Necropolis.

Eventually, that will completely crumbled, turning into a host of fragments that were swept up with golden light and made part of his own will.

‘Not bad,’ he thought, ‘not bad at all. My psychic scale is increasing. I wonder how long it will be before I finally reach the Terrifying level. Now that I've completely broken down the will of the Great Necropolis, my mind is empty of it. However, as long as I keep absorbing external power, I can definitely acquire more of that will.’

Yang Qi took a few breaths, reveling in the sensation of his consciousness being completely free of any outside will.

Meanwhile, An Yiru looked very pleased with herself now that she had the box. In contrast, Yang Qi didn’t really care at all, aware that it was currently impossible to open. He would simply let her take it back to the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect for the experts there to open. Once he had joined the sect, he would come up with some way to get it.

He really wanted to get those psychic scaling systems, therefore, he would bide his time. He would join the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect and slowly form a new plan. For all he knew, that sect would be the best place to push his will convergence to the Terrifying level.

Seeing Yang Qi’s unconcerned expression, An Yiru inwardly shook her head and thought, ‘This guy really does live up to his word. He took that godhood, converted it to power, and lifted the incense burner. Afterward, he didn’t even so much as glance at the stone box. He really does seem like a potential asset to the sect. I guess I’ll take him back and have Master look into him. See what his story is. He could be a really big boost to our faction and give us an advantage in our struggles against the other factions.’

With such thoughts on her mind, she said, “It looks like I’ll have to ask for Master’s help to open the box. We can worry about it after we get back.”

“In that case, Miss, I’ll go with you. I'm curious to see what the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect is like. Perhaps your sect really will take control of universal fortune and conquer the Immortal Dao Age. Maybe that really is my path to becoming a heaven-god.”

“That’s exactly the right way to look at it,” An Yiru said. “Right now, the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect is focused on building power. However, we’ll soon begin expanding within the Great Necropolis. We’ll conquer our enemies left and right, eventually uniting the universe and creating a sect and kingdom the likes of which has never been seen before. And with the destiny and fortune we will accumulate, godly ascension is definitely a possibility. Back before the Great Necropolis appeared, the Immortal Dao Age was scattered and disunited. The destiny it held was like nothing. But now, things are changing. Even people from the Primeval Age and the Future world have come here in the hopes of conquering it.”

“You lead the way, Miss. I’ll follow.”

They left the chamber and used their whip technique to climb back down the statue. Overall, Yang Qi had benefited quite a bit from this short adventure.

There were obviously other secrets to be had in the cave temple at large, but considering what they had in the form of the stone box, there seemed little need to fool around with such trifles.

Just before leaving, Yang Qi looked back and considered what it would be like if he had enough godpower to clear out the entire temple. If he were able to send everything to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, his people would definitely benefit immensely.

Once he was out of the cave temple, true energy poured into him, along with surging universal power. His energy arts seemed to advance to a higher level, and although his power index remained the same, the quality of his true energy made him feel much stronger than before.

With his current power index of three thousand, he could defeat enemies at the level of four thousand. And that wasn’t with the Engine of the One God or any magical treasures, it was all his own power.

As soon as he was out of the cave temple, he sent all of his resources into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart for safekeeping, including the Engine of the One God, his pieces of the Cruiser of Civilization, King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans, and all of the other magical treasures he had collected. Even the God Legion Seal. The only things he kept were his own true energy and constitution. He even used a profound, hellish technique from the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth to completely transform himself.

It was a necessary step to ensure that his identity remained a secret even from Terrifying experts.

Meanwhile, he followed An Yiru as she flew along for an indeterminable period of time, passing through numerous planes of existence and enormous pathways, until they finally reached a glowing, resplendent world, a mighty, domineering place that abounded with sagelight and porcelain radiance. The outside resembled crystalline sections that reflected everything around them, making the place seem as amazing as a kingdom of gods.

Countless experts flew about, all of them wearing robes that were clearly the uniform of the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect. There was obviously a strict ranking system, with even the weakest members of the sect being Grand Emperors that had power indexes in the hundreds. Yang Qi couldn’t even spot a single person with an index below one hundred.

“Take him away,” someone said. “Another thrall! Excellent!”

Upon hearing these words, Yang Qi looked over and saw a group of people gathered around a cage that held an expert with a power index of over two thousand. Despite his strength, and his visible anger, he was tightly sealed and could do nothing to escape.

There were other cages nearby with top experts imprisoned as thralls being lugged into the sect.

At a certain point, some of the people in the area noticed An Yiru’s arrival and hurried over to formally receive her. “Greetings, Eldest Sister An Yiru! What were you doing out of the sect this time?”

From the respectful way they treated her, Yang Qi could see that she had a very high standing in the sect as a chief disciple. Not only did no one ask why she was bringing him into the sect, but instead, they all offered her formal greetings.

“That’s on a need-to-know basis,” An Yiru said coldly. “Where did all these prisoners come from?”

“That one over there is the sectlord of the Profound Void Energy Sect,” one of the disciples said. “And the others are geniuses that worked for them. We defeated their sect and took them all captive to serve as thralls. Elder Brother Gu Yue is going to test them to see if they’re fit to be sent to his branch of the sect.”

An Yiru snorted angrily. “What a splendid idea on the part of Gu Yue,” she said sarcastically. “His branch already has plenty of new recruits. They just took in an Inheritor, didn’t they? What do they need even more reinforcements for? It almost seems like they’re trying to build an army or something.”

The other disciples didn’t dare to comment on her words. Obviously, they didn’t rank very high, and knew it would be foolish to try to get involved in a struggle between two chief disciples. One wrong word could lead to a swift death.

Looking over at the sectlord of the Profound Void Energy Sect, An Yiru shook her head and said, “What a piece of trash. Why would I even want a thrall like that? You're all dismissed.”

“Yes, yes,” the disciples said, breathing sighs of relief as they hurried away.

Yang Qi was already getting a sense of how powerful the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect was. Although he had dealt with the Martial Tyrant Cadre and the Immortal House of Supreme Preeminence, they definitely hadn't been as impressive as this.

After passing through the crystal barrier that formed the outer defenses of the sect, Yang Qi immediately felt godly might weighing down on him. Although it couldn't compare to what he had felt in the cave temple earlier, it was obvious that ordinary Grand Emperors couldn't easily fly around. It actually reminded him of his virtual god world in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

“Mysterious, eh?” An Yiru said. “You see, the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect was built on a Will Manifestation Heaven Crystal that was originally crafted by a Paramount God known as the Lord of Will Manifestation. It’s a virtual god world, meaning that practicing cultivation here is one one-thousandth as beneficial as being in the true god world. It's obviously far beyond any so-called ‘blessed land’ that exists anywhere else. Now, I'm going to go take you to see my Master. If you get accepted as a disciple, you'll become very important very quickly.

“Er...” Yang Qi said. “And what happens if your Master doesn’t like me. I become a thrall?”

An Yiru laughed. “We aren’t a heretical sect of wretch-devils. Of course we wage war and take prisoners, but we never treat invited guests with treachery. If Master doesn’t take a liking to you, you can still be a part of the sect. You’ll just have to start as an outer sect disciple. Worst case scenario, you’ll be sent out into the Immortal Dao Age to recruit followers and build the glory of the sect.”

“Oh, so that’s how it works,” Yang Qi said. He nodded. “Just what I would expect of a famous orthodox sect.”

Chapter 949: Joining the Sect (3)

The sects Yang Qi had encountered in the past were the type who recruited at the tip of a sword. Either you joined them, or you were enslaved or killed.

Most immortal worlds were like that as well.

That was simply the law of the jungle that governed the dao of immortals. The weak were the prey of the strong, and the sects were beastly and vicious. Although such behavior didn’t quite reach the level of the dao of devils, those organizations clearly weren’t righteous and orthodox. Truth be told, Yang Qi had never seen a righteous, orthodox sect, or even people who could be considered mild and peaceful.

It was an age of blood and carnage, and those who weren’t aggressive enough wouldn’t survive.

In the grand scheme of things, the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect actually seemed relatively orderly. At the least, they weren’t a barbaric sect who slaughtered anyone who didn’t meet up to their recruitment standards.

By way of contrast, the Joyflower Palace had lied to him, taken away his Dao Defense League, and turned him into a prisoner. Additionally, the threat of becoming a eunuch had always hung over his head. He still planned to get revenge for that some day, by wiping the Joyflower Palace out of existence.

As Yang Qi followed An Yiru into the depths of the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect, he saw that the place really was like a virtual god world. There were psychic fluctuations that rolled out from its depths to assess everything that entered it, even dust. Thanks to being with An Yiru, though, there were no warding spells that opposed him, and he was able to just proceed along.

In the depths of the sect were crystalline mountain peaks that rose up to heights of thirty thousand meters. Dragons, phoenixes, qilins, and other godlings glided amidst them, and their surfaces were lush with god herbs and plants. Even the clouds and mists seemed incomprehensibly marvelous.

“These fifty mountain peaks represent the fifty branches of the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect. I'm the chief disciple of Memory Peak. You see, there are only fifty chief disciples in the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect, which should give you an idea of the level of power I command.” Although An Yiru kept her voice cool, it was impossible for her to mask her sense of pride.

“You are very important,” Yang Qi said. Considering how large and strong the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect was, it was obvious that these chief disciples must be very influential and powerful.

WHOOSH!

All of a sudden, a burst of sword energy shot out from one of the nearby mountain peaks, as dazzling as a rainbow on a clear day. It seemed like it was preparing to leave the sect, but then it noticed An Yiru and turned in her direction. Then the area around them became a kingdom of sword energy as a young man appeared.

His aura was very intimidating, and he had a power index of at least three thousand. Although Yang Qi couldn’t be sure because he currently didn’t have his power assessment systems, given the level of his cultivation base, he could at least get a general idea.

Retracting his sword light, the young man smiled and said, “Junior Sister An Yiru, what are you doing back? Did you finally get your hands on that treasure from the Cave Temple of the Vajra Māyādevī? Mind giving your Elder Brother a look?”

“That’s right, I did get the treasure,” An Yiru said with a profoundly cold smile. “That said, what does it have to do with you? I'm just about to head into a session of cultivation, after which I’ll make sure your Spiritwall Peak gets put in place. You have a problem with that?”

“No problem,” the young man said as calm as could be. “No problem at all. Junior Sister, if you really want to beat Spiritwall Peak, then I can just throw my match during the next competition.”

“Very funny,” An Yiru said, her eyes flashing with anger. “I'm not stupid. If you didn’t think your Spiritwall Peak is superior to Memory Peak, you wouldn’t be talking about throwing your match.”

The young man shrugged. “Junior Sister, are you really trying to tell me that you acquired a magical treasure that will make you strong enough to beat me? Your psychic scale is a mere forty percent, whereas mine is at about sixty percent. Pretty soon, I’ll break through to the single digits. And when I have Terrifying will, I’ll be like the legion of gods.”

“I guess we’ll just have to wait and see then, won't we?” Looking at Yang Qi, she said, “Let’s go!”

“Hold on a moment,” the young man said. “Who’s this? An outsider? I can’t believe you brought someone like this into the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect!”

“So what. I'm taking him to meet Master. Are you telling me you’re in charge of matters like that?”

“Meet your Master? So, this is some genius you recruited while you were out? Apparently Memory Peak is trying to build up its forces, huh?”

WHOOSH!

In the exact same moment that he said ‘huh’, he sent a stream of sword light surging out. Although it made no noise, its silence made it seem even more deadly, and in the blink of an eye it was right in front of Yang Qi. Unexpectedly, this young man was launching a deadly sneak attack, and had instantly resorted to a killing move. It was obviously backed with such psychic power and will convergence that it could pierce through any ordinary soul or sea of consciousness, eradicating the nascent divinity of its target.

Yang Qi dodged to the side, yet the sword energy followed him like his own shadow, clearly intent on stabbing into him and wiping him out of existence.

It all happened so quickly that not even An Yiru could do anything to interfere.

The young man appeared to be very pleased with himself as his sword attack closed in on Yang Qi. However, Yang Qi simply smiled mockingly and threw his hands out in front of him, unleashing a sword energy that pulsed with life force. It was an energy art he had come up with himself, an imitation of Star Swordlife’s sword dao of life, and it was perfectly suited for defensive purposes.

The sword energies clashed, then the young man went on to use dozens of moves to try to pierce Yang Qi’s defenses. Of course, none of them worked.

“Looking to die?!” That was when An Yiru made a move, sending her whip out to wrap around the young man. However, he simply laughed, flipping backward and breaking up into a host of projections that dashed out of the way of the whip.

“Why so angry, Junior Sister An Yiru? I was just testing out his cultivation base, that’s all. There’s no need for such an extreme reaction!”

Expression grim, An Yiru said, “You were trying to kill him!”

“Exactly,” the young man said. “If I had succeeded, it would’ve proven that he doesn't deserve to be a disciple of the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect. He passed this test, although there will be more to come. What’s wrong, Junior Sister An Yiru? Mad at me or something? Remember, I didn’t break any rules. Sect regulations say that any non-disciples who enter the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect can be killed on the spot.”

“True,” An Yiru said, and although she managed to keep her cool, she was clearly infuriated. “You’d better watch your back around me, Xie Spiritwall.”

“I always watch my back, Junior Sister. Especially around you.” Laughing, he turned into a colorful beam of sword light and vanished in the blink of an eye.

“Don’t worry,” Yang Qi said, retracting his own sword energy. “Given the level of his sword technique, he can’t hurt me.” He seemed so calm and unmoved that even An Yiru was impressed by his composure.

“Let’s go see Master,” she said. “Considering that clash, you’ve already proven the level of your cultivation base. Xie Spiritwall is the chief disciple from Spiritwall Peak. He’s very strong, and has defeated many enemies with his sword technique. The fact that you defended yourself against an unexpected attack by him shows how strong you are, proving that you deserve to be a disciple here.”

With that, she led him toward one particular mountain peak.

Meanwhile, off in the distance, Xie Spiritwall hovered in the air bristling with killing intent. Inside, he was truly shocked that his sneak attack had completely failed.

A few other young men appeared around him, led by one particularly tall and burly fellow. Laughing, he said, “What’s wrong, Xie Spiritwall? It seems that Spiritwall Peak’s sword technique isn’t really up to snuff! You ambushed an outsider, but still failed to kill him?”

“Don’t act so pleased with yourself, Sorrow Might. Just because I didn't kill him with a sneak attack doesn’t mean I can’t kill him in general. Your Grand Might Peak’s days of glory are about to end. I don't know where An Yiru recruited that expert, but with him on their side, will you really be able to keep Memory Peak under control?”

“I'm not worried about it,” replied the burly Sorrow Might. “After all, I'm about to reach the Terrifying will level. Furthermore, I earned a lot of credit during that fight I had with the Executors of the Ancient Road. In three months, I’m going to get twenty pieces of godhood to activate the psychic scaling systems of the Cruiser of Civilization, and finally achieve my breakthrough of will. It will only take a short moment for me to reach the Terrifying level, after which you and I won’t even be on the same level anymore.”

Xie Spiritwall snorted. “Twenty pieces of godhood? That’s a small fortune you’re talking about. Maybe the sect can afford it, but it would be a waste to spend it on you. By the way, the psychic scaling systems are no joke. Ninety-nine percent of the time, they end up killing whoever uses them, so be careful.”

“You think I'm going to get myself killed? That’s a joke if I've ever heard one. I’ve been a domineering force for years, and even took out one of the executors in an ambush. Heaven itself has foreordained me to be a god!”

“Good luck with that. By the way, the only reason you took out that executor was because he was already injured and on his last legs. You just took advantage of the situation to slip in a final killing blow. If he’d been at full power, you would’ve been killed in the blink of an eye! Furthermore, the fact that you dragged his corpse back here to the sect just means that trouble is coming our way. You mark my words.”

It was Sorrow Might’s turn to snort coldly. “The Executors of the Ancient Road are scary, but they’re not invincible. They may have been the most terrifying force on the ancient road in the past, but now that the Great Necropolis has appeared, all of us have grown a lot stronger. And the Inheritors are a factor, too. Soon enough, they’ll be the biggest enemies of the executors. So what do we have to be afraid of? We already have a few Inheritors in the sect, which means that we’re only going to grow stronger and stronger. Furthermore, the sectlord and other old-timers have been unraveling the secrets of the executors. Once they find out all the details, I'm going to benefit even more greatly than before!”

Chapter 950: The Executors of the Ancient Road

As Yang Qi followed An Yiru into Memory Peak, an entirely new heaven and earth opened up before him. It was like a brand new world, filled with vital energy and power of incomparable abundance. Every breath he took caused liquid power to flow through him, and although it wasn’t quite on the level of godhood, it was still a clear reflection of it.

Upon seeing An Yiru, the disciples present would bow their heads and call out greetings, making sure not to block her path.

Soon, they reached a palace at the top of a mountain, where strong godliness pulsed, making it seem as if a god might be there working on cultivation. Almost immediately, a powerful expression of will appeared and enveloped Yang Qi.

Yang Qi could tell that this was real Terrifying will, and as it covered him, he found himself completely incapable of moving. He almost felt like he was suffocating as the will swept through him from sea of energy to sea of consciousness.

Sensing the Terrifying will convergence, An Yiru said, “Master, this is someone I brought to join Memory Peak. Please, don’t hurt him.”

“Don’t worry,” replied a voice that seemed to thrum like the speaking of gods. “I’m just assessing his cultivation base to see what unique characteristics are present. Not bad. You really did bring back a genius. He cultivates a unique technique, and his psychic scale is already at about eighty percent. That’s even higher than you! I saw the clash with Xie Spiritwall, and was very impressed by how he won glory for Memory Peak. Not bad at all. Bring him into the temple to speak with my true self.”

“Yes sir!”

Now that Yang Qi had been assessed with her Master’s Terrifying will, An Yiru was convinced that he wasn’t trying to infiltrate the sect to harm it.

After all, weaker wills were like nothing in the face of that which was Terrifying.

Yang Qi was shocked by what he had just experienced, and was very glad that he had left all of his belongings back in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Otherwise, they might have been discovered. He could already tell that true Terrifying will was many, many times more powerful than the quasi-Terrifying will of Empress Joyflower.

If he hadn’t made advance preparations, he might even have revealed the secret of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. Right now, he cultivated enough techniques that it was easy to create a false impression of his cultivation to get through situations like this. Of course, his cultivation was so advanced that he had already begun devising his own system of techniques, which lent a mysterious air to him. That, of course, was his dao, something different from any other dao. Deep within his nascent divinity and sea of consciousness, magical symbols were forming together, creating an actual manifestation of that dao. The Terrifying will had seen that, and as such, had not held any suspicions about his level of strength.

The palace door opened, and Yang Qi followed An Yiru inside. He was very curious as to what this person who had Terrifying will looked like. Other than the god Brahma, this was the most powerful entity he had ever personally encountered.

And of course, Brahma was very different in that he was an actual god.

Thoughts of Brahma reminded him that, at some point, he needed to go back to confer with that god. He had promised to go to the future world to try to help him, but hadn’t yet followed through on that. Not that it was his fault. Things had developed so strangely and rapidly that he simply hadn’t had the time to make the trip.

Besides, releasing Brahma now might not be a good idea. And that was compounded by the fact that Yang Qi had no real reason to trust Brahma very much.

The depths of the hall were dark, but at the same time, very calm and peaceful. After they were inside, a soft and gentle voice could be heard. “What treasures did you come across out there, An Yiru?”

Along with the voice, brilliant white light flashed in the palace, revealing an interior resembling pure crystal. At the far end, seated on a throne, was what appeared to be a young girl of only seven or eight years of age. She looked pure and dainty, yet there was something extremely dignified about her. Especially her eyes, which seemed like they could pierce into the depths of anything and everything.

‘Don’t tell me this is An Yiru’s Master!’ Yang Qi thought. It seemed to defy logic that the person who had scoured his very soul was a little girl. Perhaps she was some top expert who cultivated a technique that caused her to age in reverse.

An Yiru immediately saluted the little girl in greeting. “Master, let you be my witness. It is thanks to this young man that I acquired this stone box. Unfortunately, it is sealed beyond my ability to open. Please, can you assist?”

“Take it out,” the girl said quietly.

“Yes!” An Yiru said, respectfully offering the stone box.

The girl took it with seemingly no effort at all, causing goosebumps to rise up on Yang Qi’s neck as he realized that her dainty little hand pulsed with what had to be a power index of over five thousand. Combined with her Terrifying will convergence, that made her a truly invincible potentate!

Obviously, her strength and physical appearance had nothing to do with each other.

Crack!

All of a sudden, buddhist light pulsed out of the stone box as the little girl casually broke the seal.

As soon as the seal was broken, what appeared to be an enormous buddhist god shot out from the fragments, seemingly enraged.

However, the girl easily grabbed it, crushing it down into a śarīra that she then burned away into nothing but ashes.

Then she opened the box.

Yang Qi immediately caught sight of nine motes of light that floated up into the air, almost like glowing cotton balls. They were none other than seeds of the Secret-Ensconcing All-World Anything-Everything Fundamental-Law Magic.

The little girl sighed. “What a pity. There are a total of eighteen seeds that make up the Secret-Ensconcing All-World Anything-Everything Fundamental-Law Magic. Get all of them, and you can cultivate the technique to the full, vastly improving your cultivation base and psychic scale. Unfortunately, it seems that someone else got into that cave temple ahead of you and took nine of the other seeds away. Getting the full collection will be difficult.”

When she spoke, her voice seemed young, but her will seemed ancient, as though she had lived through millions upon millions of years, and passed through countless tribulations. “It might not help you to cultivate with these seeds. For now, I’ll keep them.”

“Yes, Master,” An Yiru said, without the slightest hint of frustration or anger in her voice. She trusted that her Master had her own interests at heart.

“That said, you performed a great service. You’re already my chief disciple, and will eventually succeed me here on Memory Peak. Therefore, I will take these seeds to the council of chief elders and exchange them for some medicinal pills concocted by the Executors of the Ancient Road. They should help you improve your psychic scale. Sorrow Might from Grand Might Peak got lucky recently. He ran into a severely injured executor, who he killed and brought back, earning him the reward of twenty pieces of godhood. If he succeeds in improving his psychic scale and reaches the Terrifying level, Memory Peak will be in a very tight situation. You need to work hard to improve, understand?”

“Yes ma’am,” An Yiru said, offering another salute.

At this point, the girl looked at Yang Qi and said, “Boy, you’re quite impressive. Do you want to be one of my disciples?”

Trying to sound as humble as possible, he said, “It would be a huge honor, Senior.”

“Fine, let it be done,” she replied. “Starting today, you’re my disciple. As a member of Memory Peak, I require no oath or promise from you. Only loyalty. As long as you protect the interests of Memory Peak, as well as the interests of the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect as a whole, then you will receive protection in return. You will receive resources from the sect, and you will provide contributions as well. Take this Memory Peak identity medallion, as well as this energy art unique to Memory Peak, the Unconstrained Sorrow-Forgetting Magic.

A new technique and mnemonic flooded into Yang Qi’s mind, pushing him to a higher state than before, thanks to the psychic power it contained.

‘Unconstrained Sorrow-Forgetting Magic?’ As Yang Qi examined it, he felt completely unconstrained, as though his mind were floating in a state of complete ease, allowing him to forget about all past sorrows.

This was an energy art focused on psychic powers and will, and was definitely first class. However, compared to the will of the Great Necropolis that he had contended with, or the knowledge-devils he had fought, it was extremely weak. In fact, cultivating with this technique alone, one would probably need billions of years to reach the Terrifying level. That said, it would be a good reference point for use in cultivation. And for all he knew, it might come in handy one day.

“You're now a Junior Brother of An Yiru,” the girl said. “She’ll take care of everything for you. I’m usually here in seclusion, leaving daily affairs of Memory Peak in the hands of you disciples. An Yiru, remember that the prosperity or decline of our faction is all in your hands. That is the responsibility of the chief disciple.”

“I know,” An Yiru said. “I’ll do everything I can to make sure Memory Peak is number one among the fifty peaks.” Turning to Yang Qi, she continued. “Let’s go, Junior Brother. I need to tell you all about the other mountain peaks, as well as the general situation in the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect. I wouldn't want you stumbling into some dangerous situation or location that I couldn't save you from.”

“Alright,” Yang Qi said. He knew that things were not as simple as they seemed. Obviously, the little girl recognized how strong he was and was essentially assigning him to be An Yiru’s assistant in handling the affairs of their faction. Of course, he hadn’t lost sight of his true motive for joining this sect: to acquire the psychic scaling systems.

Chapter 951: Memory Peak

Yang Qi was now an official member of the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect. For some reason, he felt relaxed to be part of an organization as powerful as this. He was bursting with vital energy, and was ready to face the new challenges ahead of him.

“It seems simple to join the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect, doesn’t it?” An Yiru said jovially as they left the mountain peak.

“Yes. Very. There wasn't even a test. Aren’t you people worried I might be an infiltrator? With such a simple entrance ceremony, how do you prevent spies from coming in and causing trouble?”

“Only people who are tired of living would dare to sneak into the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect to cause trouble. We have people that could crush any troublemakers without any effort at all. Besides, Master looked deep inside you and confirmed you aren’t keeping any secrets. Although, I should point out that Memory Peak is a bit different from the other mountain peaks. Master doesn’t have any wild ambitions, and cultivates a godly dao focused on being unconstrained and forgetting sorrows. In other words, the core teachings and doctrines of Exalted Celestial Unconstrained, who had a profoundly high cultivation base. The other mountain peaks tend to have very strict recruitment rules. And most people can't just immediately come to the mountains to work on their cultivation. They have to start by tempering themselves in the outer and inner sects.”

“So you’re saying I skipped right to the front of the line?” Yang Qi said with a smile.

“That’s exactly right,” she replied. “You're definitely qualified to skip ahead. Of course, if you were an Inheritor, you would’ve advanced to an even higher position. You might have immediately been appointed as an elder.”

“So, what do we do now?” he asked.

“We do our best to advance the interests of Memory Peak. Our goal is to be the top faction in the sect. And since Master is too busy to handle daily affairs, all of that is resting on our shoulders. You see, right now, Memory Peak is one of the weakest of the fifty mountain peaks. But with you as a disciple, it’s almost like we have a second chief disciple. Things will definitely be different going forward. We can now go out on more missions, plunder more opponents, and even get some thralls. We finally have some hope to turn our situation around.”

“What happens if I reach Terrifying will convergence?”

“Then you would become invincible,” she replied. Giving him a piercing look, she continued, “But you don’t really think you can do that, do you? There’s no way it's possible. Do you know how hard it is to reach the Terrifying level? The only way you might get such a chance would be to do something like Sorrow Might, and kill one of the Executors of the Ancient Road. If you brought the corpse back for a reward, the elders would give you their approval and let you use the psychic scaling systems to make your breakthrough.”

“Psychic scaling systems? Where are they?”

“Not even I know for sure. They’re somewhere in the depths of the sect, in an extremely dangerous location kept under constant guard by the elders. You see, the reason why our sect has so many Terrifying experts is all because of the psychic scaling systems. That, and the fact that, thanks to the appearance of the Great Necropolis several hundred million years ago, there’s much more godhood to go around. If it weren’t for that, we’d have only one or two Terrifying experts at most. The only downside is that people who reach the Terrifying level using the psychic scaling systems are actually weaker than those who do so the usual way. Thankfully, Master is one of the older generation. Because of that, even though Memory Peak is weak, we’re still able to intimidate the experts from the other peaks. Hardly anyone out there is a match for Master.

“Unfortunately, Master isn’t the absolute top expert among the fifty mountain peaks. That spot is claimed by Peaklord Celestial, another one of the older generation. In order to deal with him, Master began cultivating the Sage-Embryo Perfect-Complete God-Child Vitality-Soul energy art, which is the reason she looks the way she does. If it weren’t for that, she would definitely be an incredible beauty.”

Yang Qi’s eyes widened with surprise. He had never heard of the Sage-Embryo Perfect-Complete God-Child Vitality-Soul, and had no idea where it came from. Could it possibly be something as strong as the Secret-Ensconcing All-World Anything-Everything Fundamental-Law Magic? Even if it was, it didn't seem like the type of technique suited for him.

“Do all fifty peaklords have Terrifying will?” he asked. That was probably the most important and relevant question at the moment. If that were the case, then this sect really could be considered supremely powerful.

“How could that possibly be?” An Yiru said. “Of the fifty peaklords, only eight have Terrifying will convergence. The rest are on the cusp, but not completely there. Even still, people like that are vastly stronger than the two of us. We couldn’t possibly fight such a person. And unfortunately, we have no real way to improve our power index. We’re both at our limit. At the most, we can improve our skills and abilities.”

With that, An Yiru went on to introduce all of the fifty peaks to Yang Qi, as well as the top experts from each one, including information about their cultivation bases, magical treasures, and so on. She also pointed out the main complex in the middle of the sect, which was like the imperial palace of a mortal empire. That was where the ‘emperor’ resided, or in other words, the sectlord, in addition to other elders and important people.

The sectlord was a very mysterious and unpredictable entity who was always in seclusion, seeking enlightenment of who knew what. In fact, An Yiru had only laid eyes on the sectlord three times, and in all of those situations it had actually been a clone. Because of that, it was the council of chief elders that made the decisions in the sect, for all intents and purposes.

An Yiru explained where all the restricted areas were, as well as the prison, which housed various old-timers that the sectlord had captured on the Ancient Road to the Gods. Most of them refused to fully surrender but were impossible to kill, so they were kept imprisoned.

It took quite a few hours to explain everything. Although she could have saved time by simply imparting the information directly into his mind, she seemed interested in establishing a good relationship with him, so she stuck to verbal explanations.

“By the way, who are these Executors of the Ancient Road that I heard mentioned?” Yang Qi asked.

“They’re the strongest people on the Ancient Road to the Gods, and they enforce the general laws, making them sort of like the feudal officials of the mortal world. The thing is that they simply have too many rules. For example, if a cultivator comes across some godhood, they’re prohibited from keeping it, and are required to hand it over to the executors. If anyone finds a treasure trove, they have to officially report it. Any cultivators who want to start a sect have to register with the executors. Furthermore, personal duels are actually prohibited on the Ancient Road to the Gods. It's almost like the executors are trying to turn the road into their own empire.

“But in the end, do you know how large the road is? Do you know how many sects there are? From ancient times until now, there have been simply too many to count. And everyone wants to progress toward the dao of gods. There are countless people favored by the heavens, all of whom are the obstinate and unruly type that hate following orders. Throughout the millions upon millions of years that’ve passed, you can only imagine what bloody conflicts have erupted.

“At a certain point, a host of experts rose up and waged war on the executors, nearly wiping them out. Although they made a comeback, they were never able to oppress the Ancient Road to the Gods as they did in the past. But that was long, long ago, before the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect was even founded. Nowadays, cultivators on the ancient road view the executors as the most vicious and wicked people there are, all of them deserving of death. In other words, they’re essentially the top public enemy that everyone wants to kill. Whenever a lone executor appears, all of the nearby sects will join together and try to take them out.

“Unfortunately, the executors’ power only continues to grow, to the point where they’re on the verge of restoring their former glory. In fact, the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect has already held quite a few meetings to try to decide how to deal with them.” An Yiru frowned in thought. “If you and I ran into an executor, our first priority would be to try to escape, lest we lose our lives.

Yang Qi digested her words, then asked, “What kind of cultivation bases do these executors have?”

“Every single one of them has Terrifying will, and power indexes of five thousand or higher. Some of them are even on the verge of becoming gods! If they all joined forces to do something, it would definitely bring about devastation and destruction. After all, their main goal is to bring complete law and order to the Ancient Road to the Gods, with them in control of everything.”

“So that’s how it is.” Yang Qi understood. Essentially, they claimed to enforce the law, but they really just wanted to maintain their own power. Suddenly, a thought occurred to him. “Do these executors have special constitutions?”

“Yes. Their constitutions are uniquely linked to the Ancient Road to the Gods itself, although the details are unclear. One thing we do know is that the profound secrets of the road are wrapped up in it. You know, some people suspect that the ancient legends are true, and that the legion of gods left this road behind for the purposes of godly ascension. By now, the road is inaccessible in the Primeval Age and the Future Age. It only exists in the Present Age. Unfortunately, now the Great Necropolis is blocking the entrance. And not even we who are in the necropolis can get onto the road. No one has been able to find the way. Maybe it's because the legion of gods has decided not to allow mortals to become gods.”

She shook her head. “Even people whose cultivation base reaches the level of the gods are still not able to achieve godly ascension and go to the god world.”

“It's scary,” Yang Qi said, “but I have the feeling that sooner or later, someone is going to take control of the Great Necropolis. Maybe it’ll even be me!”

An Yiru burst out laughing. “You’ve got a lot of confidence! Well, if you want to take control of the necropolis, you’ll need to become one of the Inheritors.”

Right in the middle of their conversation, a disciple flew over and whispered something in An Yiru’s ear, causing her face to fall.

“Something's happened, Yang Qi.”

Chapter 952: A Huge Collection of Godhood?

“Eldest Sister, a huge collection of godhood has appeared deep in the Land of God Extermination. There’s quite a few disciples heading in that direction, hoping to get it.”

Although the disciple spoke inaudibly to Yang Qi, Yang Qi could sense his psychic fluctuations, so he knew exactly what was said. And of course, the words “a huge collection of godhood” immediately caught his attention.

With a huge collection of godhood, he could take in more of the will of the Great Necropolis, then use the imperial-heaven pre-beginning systems to break it down and improve his psychic scale. In other words, he could reach the Terrifying level. That would be the most surefire way to improve his cultivation without suffering any side-effects. But it was all predicated on having enough godhood to work with. Of course, if anyone realized how much godhood he would need to do such a thing, their jaw would drop.

“Understood,” An Yiru said, then waved her hand to dismiss the disciple. “Did you hear that, Yang Qi? There’s a treasure trove in the depths of the Land of God Extermination, and apparently a huge collection of godhood appeared there. We need to get over there immediately to take advantage of the situation. This could be a big opportunity for our sect, and especially our faction. We don't want to lose out to the other mountain peaks, and there’s no greater treasure to be had than godhood.”

“I completely agree,” Yang Qi said. “There’s no one who doesn’t want to get some godhood. Even Lesser Gods would be excited by the prospect. Although, what's this Land of God Extermination?”

“It’s a mysterious location deep within the Great Necropolis, an ancient godrelic of unknown origin. It appears to be a battleground where ancient gods fought to the death, which is why it came to be known as the Land of God Extermination. It’s a very dangerous place, where wild beasts from the god world roam, as well as fiend-devils from hell.”

‘Fiend-devils from hell?’ Yang Qi thought. There were as many hells as the eternal sands, and even though he had the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, it would be silly to claim that he could literally control all hells in existence. Furthermore, fiend-devils were just like cultivators, in that they sought to enter the Ancient Road to the Gods to further their cultivation and ultimately reach the god world, becoming devil-gods. Because of that, it was only natural that powerful, hell-born fiend-devils would be present on the road.

As for Yang Qi’s Hell Portals, they weren't strong enough to summon anything that he would consider particularly powerful. The current limit was fiend-devils with power indexes in the dozens. Essentially, Grand Emperors.

The hells that existed nowadays were very different from the hells in common mythology. Those ancient hells were the kind that had waged war on the legion of gods, but they had diminished significantly in later years.

As for the fiend-devils on the Ancient Road to the Gods, they were nothing to take lightly. And Yang Qi had no doubt that there were some with Terrifying will convergence.

Even in the god world, there were hell-born fiend-devils who had reached godly ascension and thirsted for the glory of being able to fight the legion of gods.

That said, Yang Qi had been in the Great Necropolis for some time now, but had yet to encounter any fiend-devils, which was somewhat strange. For some reason, hearing about them now left him feeling a bit nostalgic. The fact that they were in the same location as the godhood was immaterial; he had to get more godhood!

“We need to go fight for that godhood right away!” he said. “I'm itching to make a name for myself in the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect, and this battlefield seems like the perfect place to do that.”

An Yiru chuckled. “If that’s what you want, fine.”

With that, she flew up into the air, then blurred into motion and vanished, Yang Qi following close behind.

Soon, they were outside of the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect on one of the pathways of the Great Necropolis. Yang Qi quickly realized that this pathway was different from most of the others he had seen. Instead of being dreary and depressing, bits of vital energy from the god world floated here and there, giving birth to the most beautiful, enchanting planes of existence imaginable.

“This area isn’t filled with the aura of death like the rest of the Great Necropolis,” An Yiru said. “It's one of the places that’s abundant with life force, which is why our sectlord decided to place our headquarters here. As for the Land of God Extermination, it’s close enough that it’s considered to be in our territory. Over the years, it's become a holy land of training and cultivation for our disciples.”

“Got it,” Yang Qi said. It made him think of the Heavencorpse Dimension back in the Rich-Lush Continent, a land of zombies and ghosts that students from the Demi-Immortal Institute had used as a training zone. That was where he killed one of his first rivals, Chu Tiange, who had fought him with the Cosmic Sunflare Sword.

An Yiru and Yang Qi flew at lightning-like speed until they reached a certain plane of existence battered by evil winds and filled with the smell of steel and blood. As they approached, it was even possible to catch sounds like the wailing of ghosts and gods.

Crack!

Yang Qi landed and looked around to see corpses scattered all around. The ground was a mass of blood and gore, and devil energy swirled everywhere.

It really was a huge battleground. Yang Qi immediately sensed immense pressure weighing down on him, restricting his cultivation, although not as dramatically as the Cave Temple of the Vajra Māyādevī.

‘No wonder the people from the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect don’t care much about that cave temple,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘This place is almost the same. Come here, and it's almost like being in part of the god world. Even despite the progress I’ve made with my energy arts, in this place I can only cover a bit over a hundred meters with a single leap, and can only get about thirty meters into the air.’

His feet didn't even leave footprints in the ground, which just went to show how tough the surface of the battlefield was.

That said, it was the perfect place to further one's cultivation.

Far off in the distance, Yang Qi spotted mountain ranges and crumbling temples. There were huge war banners that protruded from the ground, and war drums the size of mountains. Swords and spears that were thousands of meters in length could be seen, making Yang Qi feel like a tiny human standing on a battlefield of giants.

This was the kind of place that, if you remained there for long periods of time, could gain you enlightenment of all sorts of mysterious things.

Some distance away, Yang Qi saw what appeared to be a long, straight furrow in the ground, filled with water. At first, he wasn’t sure what it was, but upon looking closer, he saw vestiges of sword energy. Apparently, it had been created by the slash of a sword. As he stared at it, the image of a sword-wielding god appeared in his mind.

Immediately, the power assessment systems began to replicate the image.

[Beep-beep-beep. Godrelic detected. Beginning power replication....]

The will of that sword-wielding god was being replicated, and Yang Qi was benefiting greatly as a result.

‘Incredible. The fighting that played out here surpasses anything from the Cave Temple of the Vajra Māyādevī. Meditating here can bring enlightenment of the techniques the legion of gods used in battle. It will make my true energy flow more quickly, and push my skills to a higher level. And it should help my Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth to transform dramatically, too.’

He couldn’t have been happier to find a place that would benefit his cultivation more than the virtual godhood from the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

‘The Will Manifestation Heaven Sect is definitely a great place to further my cultivation. Once I've spent enough time here, and acquired the psychic scaling systems, I’ll bring some of my strongest people here. It shouldn’t be hard to get them accepted as disciples in Memory Peak, although, now is not the time for that.’

He was specifically thinking of people like Battle Resister and Jadefall. All of them had been progressing well, but the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart wasn’t an ideal place for cultivation for people like that.

“Welcome to the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect’s Land of God Extermination!” An Yiru said. “You can come here at any time to contemplate enlightenment. For now, let’s head further in and find that godhood. This is really a rare opportunity.”

As they sped along, they saw many disciples from the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect working on their cultivation. Some sought enlightenment from the battle scars left behind by the gods, while others trained by fighting the vital energy tempests that swept across the battlefield. Yang Qi saw many flows of vital energy that manifested as tempests, fields of quicksand, flash floods, and more.

Eventually, he caught sight of disciples locked in combat with fiend-devils. Some of the fiend-devils had power indexes in the hundreds, but some were close to two thousand.

Obviously, this plane of existence was vastly larger than the cave temple.

And the further one went inside, the greater the pressure one felt.

Thankfully, Yang Qi had been constantly improving his cultivation recently, thus he was able to deal with it.

Eventually, he and An Yiru reached a place of ruined temples, each of which was larger than the statue of Vajra Māyādevī. In other words, they were too big to climb. A huge river of blood snaked its way between the temples, which was spanned by broken stone bridges that almost looked like rainbows. The blood river was too wide to leap over, and based on its intense energy, Yang Qi was fairly certain it was blood left behind by gods who had fallen in battle. After all the time that had passed, the blood had absorbed the baleful energy of the god world and converted it into a fiendish liquid that could provoke cultivation deviation.

People had gathered on the bank of the river, and were looking at one particular temple on the other side that glittered with light that could only come from godhood.

Unfortunately the bridges leading across the river of blood were broken, and it was impossible to fly here.

And the blood river was too wide to jump across.

It begged the question of whether or not Terrifying will was required to cross this river.

All of the disciples on the riverbank were from the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect. However, the ruyi scepters on their uniforms were of different colors, indicating they came from different mountain peaks.

And they were already fighting each other bitterly!

BAM!

Suddenly, one of the disciples sent another disciple flying off toward the river of blood.

A cry of alarm rose up from among the other disciples.

It was at that moment that Yang Qi realized the disciple who was about to fall into the river of blood was from Memory Peak.

Chapter 953: Land of God Extermination

“This is bad!” An Yiru exclaimed, a very unsightly expression on her face as she saw a female disciple from her own Memory Peak falling into the river of blood.

Anyone who looked at the river would get the sensation that it was filled with countless vengeful souls, ready to grab anyone who got too close. Upon leaving the river, such souls would become blood-devils that the disciples would be eager to either fight, for the purpose of increasing their psychic power, or capture the things to be turned into puppets. They were truly horrifying.

Yang Qi immediately sprang into motion, moving with blinding speed to the edge of the river. Without any hesitation, he jumped out over the surface and wrapped his arm around the waist of the terrified disciple.

This provoked another round of alarmed cries from the onlookers.

After all, the vengeful souls and grasping hands of baleful energy in the blood river would even be dangerous to someone in the Terrifying level. Once they latched on to you, you would find it impossible to climb free. After all, this blood had been shed by the legion of gods, so there was no way that mere mortals could possibly deal with it.

Unfortunately, Yang Qi was now in midair over the river, and the magical laws of this place were so weighty that it was impossible to simply spin in place and fly back to the bank. From the look of it, the only thing left to do was fall downward.

However, that was when his eyes glittered and he sent out a stream of true energy in the shape of a whip, which moved with lightning-like speed to wrap around the neck of the enemy disciple who had shoved the girl to begin with.

When the man realized that he was about to be pulled into the river of blood, he shrieked and pulled backward in the opposite direction. As for Yang Qi, he took advantage of the force of the pull to fly through the air back toward the bank as gracefully as a swan.

“How dare you save her, are you looking to die?!”

Suddenly, another of the nearby experts lunged forward and thrust his fist out, sending a deadly tempest of fist energy straight toward Yang Qi. Unexpectedly, he was still trying to shove them into the river of blood to meet their ultimate doom.

Smiling coldly, Yang Qi simply flicked his whip of true energy, which caused him to spin, avoiding the fist energy and landing surefootedly off to the side.

The vengeful souls reached up and tried to grab him as he passed, but he simply exhaled sagefire, causing hissing and popping sounds to ring out as the hands were wiped out of existence, leaving nothing behind but green smoke and bloodcurdling screams.

Afterward, none of the vengeful souls dared to do anything.

Meanwhile, An Yiru flew over toward Yang Qi, as well as roughly a hundred other disciples from Memory Peak. At the same time, Yang Qi released the young female disciple he had just saved, whose face was a bit flush after having just been rescued.

“This is your new Elder Brother,” An Yiru said. “Master just accepted him as a disciple. From now on, you follow his orders as if they're my own. Got it?”

The disciples all saluted and chorused a respectful greeting.

“Thank you.” Yang Qi nodded.

It was at this point that he realized that most of the disciples from Memory Peak were women, and the men were so good-looking that they were almost effeminate. Apparently, that was how Memory Peak liked to recruit people.

Turning toward the disciple whose neck was still red from having Yang Qi’s whip wrapped around it, An Yiru angrily said, “What were you thinking, Bright Nāropa!? You were obviously trying to push disciples from Memory Peak into the blood river. I know that you people from Nāropa Peak have always been defiant law-breakers, but are you really willing to violate sect rules so flagrantly?”

Bright Nāropa was a sinister-looking man with merciless eyes. The way that Yang Qi had used him to escape the river of blood had obviously been a huge loss of face, and he was the type who would want to get revenge.

In response to An Yiru’s accusation, he cleared his throat and said, “Nobody died, did they? I didn’t break any rules. There’s nothing unusual about disciples fighting each other.”

“You’re right, it’s not unusual,” An Yiru said. “So get over here and fight! You and me, right now!”

Bright Nāropa chuckled. “You’re the chief disciple of Memory Peak, and I'm nothing but a normal disciple from Nāropa Peak. I would be stupid if I agreed to fight you. However, I’d be happy to fight any other disciple from Memory Peak.” Almost as soon as the words left his mouth, he realized he had made a mistake, then quickly pointed at Yang Qi and blurted, “But obviously not him, either!”

“You’re really full of crap,” An Yiru said with a dark chuckle. “In fact, I think I’ll throw you in the blood river now, so you can get an idea what it’s like.” Swish! Her whip snaked out toward Bright Nāropa like a ghost, who tried to dodge to the side but was wrapped up nonetheless.

As it turned out, Bright Nāropa wasn’t a match for even a single move from An Yiru.

From what Yang Qi could tell, Bright Nāropa’s power index was at one thousand five hundred, roughly the same as Cipher Ever-Heaven. Yet he was virtually powerless when up against An Yiru. That made sense, considering her power index was three thousand.

“What incredible gall!” someone shouted in a thunderous voice that caused waves to roll out on the blood river. Someone shot toward them in a blur, and at thirty meters out, loosed two palm strikes that sent mountain-toppling, sea-draining blasts of air toward An Yiru.

An Yiru’s eyes widened as she realized that, if she didn’t drop Bright Nāropa and get out of the way, she would probably be knocked into the river. Dropping him, she jerked her whip toward the incoming palm strike, causing it to transform into something like a coiling snake.

POP!

The fist transformed into a palm, which slammed into the whip and shattered it. At the same time, the newcomer sent out a stream of powerful true energy to grab Bright Nāropa and pull him away from the river.

The newcomer was a tall, burly man with arms as muscular as an ape’s, who seemed to pulse with explosive power. In fact, he looked like the kind of person who would never run out of strength. He seemed at one with the universe and the god world, as if he could reach the Terrifying level at any moment. Obviously, his psychic scale was well beyond Yang Qi’s.

“Well, if it isn’t Bright Fatality, the chief disciple of Nāropa Peak!” An Yiru said. “What exactly do you think you’re doing? Encouraging your disciples to harm those from Memory Peak? How arrogant could you possibly be?”

Bright Fatality smiled coldly. “Arrogant? Hmph! Where are these supposedly injured disciples from Memory Peak? All I saw was you grabbing a Nāropa Peak disciple with your whip to throw him in the blood river. Is that what happened, Bright Nāropa?”

“Yes, exactly, Eldest Brother. You see, some godhood just appeared, but the bridges leading over the blood river are all broken. We were all just sitting here trying to figure out what to do, when the disciples from Memory Peak said that they were the ones who discovered the godhood, so it belonged to them. Fighting broke out, and An Yiru flew over and tried to toss me in the river.”

“Well, what do you have to say for yourself?” Bright Fatality said, clasping his hands behind his back. “Considering what you did, perhaps we should go talk things out in the presence of the council of chief elders.”

“I'm done with this discussion,” An Yiru growled. “Everyone knows who's in the right and who’s in the wrong here. It seems to me that whatever energy art you’ve cultivated really has caused you to grow insufferably arrogant, Bright Fatality. Look, we’re going to figure out a way to cross this river, eventually. Before we do, how about the two of us have a little duel. Whoever wins can explore the temple and take the godhood. Whoever loses can screw the hell off!”

“Very well spoken!” someone said, and a new group of people appeared, led by a tall, imposing man.

Looking over, An Yiru said, “So it’s you, Sorrow Might. Don’t tell me you’re here to fight for that godhood as well? You stumbled across a corpse of one of the Executors of the Ancient Road, then used it to get access to the Cruiser of Civilization and the psychic scaling systems. What possible reason could you have to try to get godhood from the Land of God Extermination?”

Sorrow Might burst out into hearty laughter. “Godhood? The more the better! Look, the Land of God Extermination has been part of the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect for a long time, and the rules for training have been set in stone. Anybody can come in here, and whatever items pop up are taken first come first served. At the moment, Grand Might Peak is actually low on godhood.”

Bright Fatality snorted coldly. “So, you want to poke your nose in here as well, Sorrow Might? Fine. Once I put An Yiru in her place, I’ll do the same to you. You may’ve found that executor’s corpse, but you were just a blind cat bumping into a dead rat. That had nothing to do with any skill or ability on your part, so don’t go around thinking you’re really a Terrifying expert.”

“Why don’t we duel it out then?” Sorrow Might said. “All three of us. We’re all chief disciples, so let’s see which of us is the last one standing. Whichever mountain peak comes out on top gets the right to explore that temple and take whatever’s inside. You were already about to have a duel between the two of you, right? By the way, Bright Fatality, I know that energy art you cultivate makes you extremely arrogant, but that doesn’t ensure that you’ll defeat An Yiru.”

“Are you kidding me?” Bright Fatality said, laughing uproariously. “You think I can’t take her out? That’s a joke if I've ever heard one. Bring it on, An Yiru!”

Chapter 954: Chief Disciples

Bright Fatality shouted his challenge in such a booming voice that waves rolled out across the blood river. That alone made it obvious just how profound his energy arts were. This was not the kind of person that an ordinary cultivator could possibly contend with.

Taking a step forward, he said, “I'm going to beat you until you have no face left, then Memory Peak will never again dare to compete with Nāropa Peak.”

Chuckling coldly, An Yiru prepared to walk forward and accept the challenge. But before she could, Yang Qi reached out to block her path.

“Don’t bother,” he said. “I’ll handle this.”

She nodded. Bright Fatality's energy arts were advanced enough that she wasn’t completely confident in being able to win a fight against him. However, Yang Qi was much stronger than her, so having him take the lead in the fight was a smart idea.

“Just be careful,” she said quietly.

“I’ll be fine,” he replied. Stepping forward, he said, “What’s all this hooting and hollering? I'm here to critique those ‘energy arts’ of yours. I can see that you’re pretty arrogant, but do you really think that you’re unparalleled under heaven?”

“What gall you have! Who are you?” Bright Fatality was virtually steaming with killing energy, making it more than obvious exactly what he wanted to do to Yang Qi. “Are you a disciple from Memory Peak? How dare you speak like that to me. I'm a chief disciple! Are you just tired of living or something?”

“There’s no need to raise your voice, Bright Fatality,” An Yiru said. “This is a new disciple my Master just took in. His cultivation base is very profound and enigmatic, and he’s definitely going to be the next chief disciple. In a moment, you’ll lose to him, and I just hope you don’t get so angry that you commit suicide afterward.” Continuing in this scathing fashion, she said, “Don’t worry, this Junior Brother of mine won't kill you. He’ll just cripple your energy arts and make sure you live a life of horrific torment. Perhaps if you grovel in front of him, he’ll spare you.”

“Damn you!” Bright Fatality shot back. “Well I am going to kill this Junior Brother of yours. And I'm not going to let you off the hook, either. You’ll be punished so badly today you’ll wish you could die.”

Of course, Yang Qi understood the hidden message with her taunts. Obviously, she didn’t want him to show any mercy, and was in fact telling him to use deadly force.

The matter had escalated to the point where it was an open conflict between mountain peaks. Of course, the sect rules prohibited the brutal killing of fellow disciples, and any who violated those rules would be punished. However, it wasn’t unheard of for severe injuries to occur in fights like this, and that was a different matter entirely. He wouldn’t be held responsible for something like that.

‘Who would’ve thought that the friction between mountain peaks in the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect would be this intense? And I'm right in the middle of it all. What should I do? I guess I shouldn’t worry too much. The main priority is to make a name for myself, so the peaklord realizes how valuable I am....’ That little girl who led Memory Peak had a very profound cultivation base, and he knew that the more valuable he was to her, the more thoroughly she would protect him.

Therefore, his eyes began to flicker with killing intent.

Whoosh!

All of a sudden, Bright Fatality attacked, his hand taking a strange arcing path through the air, moving with speed that could break through the shackles of magical laws.

Yang Qi dipped to the side, then lunged forward, keeping his eyes on the dangerous knifehand. He knew he had to be very careful in this fight. His opponent had a power index of three thousand, whereas he himself had no tricks up his sleeve. He had no magical treasures, so he could only rely on his own energy arts to seize victory.

Of course, he was doing this intentionally to temper himself. He wanted to see exactly what he could accomplish without the Engine of the One God, the God Legion Seal, the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, the Aeonic God Destroyer, and other such treasures.

This was tough training.

Furthermore, the magical laws in the Land of God Extermination made it an even better place for training. And there could be no better opponent for such tempering than a chief disciple.

Bright Fatality’s knifehand descended with ruthless speed, filled with countless transformations. In fact, his hands were so much like a blade that they erupted with blade energy, the kind that could easily destroy countless immortal worlds, if it were unleashed outside of this place.

At the last moment, he shifted to a double-handed attack, making him seem like a mantis.

“That’s his unique energy art,” An Yiru said, “the Twin-Extremities Cultivation-Origin God-Slashing Saber!”

Gong!

Yang Qi threw his arms out to defend himself, and he and Bright Fatality clashed. Afterward, Bright Fatality staggered backward, whereas Yang Qi remained in place, unmoving.

It was obvious how different their techniques were. Plus, Yang Qi’s cultivation base had advanced by leaps and bounds recently, and his true energy had gained numerous transformations. His nascent divinity had gained even further control of the transformations of godmammoths, making him more unpredictable and dangerous than ever.

Whoosh!

They fought back and forth in front of the blood river, looking like two energy arts masters in the mortal world. After all, if they weren’t in this special location, the shockwaves from their fighting would be enough to shatter numerous immortal worlds.

Yang Qi unleashed the Endless Mourning Finger Technique, sending out a river of hatred and mourning, and booms rang out when it clashed with his opponent's saber energy.

The surrounding disciples were shocked. How could any of them ever have guessed that this new disciple from Memory Peak would be so impressive? Of course, they had all been surprised by how he rescued that female student, but that was totally different than fighting toe to toe with one of the chief disciples. In fact, he actually seemed superior to this chief disciple!

The two of them went back and forth for over a hundred rounds of combat.

Eventually, Bright Fatality was starting to get both angry and anxious. ‘I cultivate a consummate energy art, and was just on the verge of declaring myself invincible! How could I ever have guessed that this punk would randomly come along and put me in such a bad position? At this rate, how will I ever reach the Terrifying level? Alright, fine. I'll just show him my nascent divinity secret magic!’

Howling with rage, he clenched his fists, causing his upper garments to explode, leaving him bare-chested and pulsing with energy. All of a sudden, tattoos became visible all over him. They depicted gods of all sorts, some with three heads and six arms, and some with dozens of heads and three legs. All of them carried weapons in their hands, and looked completely vicious. He even had tattoos on his face, as if these heaven-gods existed within his very blood, and he was now summoning them into the open.

The heaven-gods flowed across his skin and converged on his fist, where they seemed to offer worship to some entity out in the void. The faith power of these gods was apparently opening a passageway that reached out into the distant god world itself.

Even Sorrow Might was shocked by the terrifying energy pulsing from within Bright Fatality. In fact, he even suddenly blurted, “What? Is that the Myriad Gods Holy Pilgrimage Energy Art?! I heard that to cultivate that energy art, you have to find the skeleton, flesh, and blood of ten thousand gods. You also need plenty of godliness. It’s a brutal technique to cultivate, as you have to subdue each and every one of those gods, enduring their wrath during the process. However, after you’ve succeeded, those myriad gods will go on a holy pilgrimage through the void, giving you access to godpower from the ancient past!”

Apparently, he finally realized how much of a threat Bright Fatality was, and it made him nervous.

“That’s right, Sorrow Might!” Bright Fatality shouted. “You recognize this energy art, don’t you? Normally I wouldn’t resort to this move, but considering that so much godhood has appeared in the Land of God Extermination, I have to get it for Nāropa Peak. Anyone who tries to block my path will end up dead and buried right here on the shores of this river of blood!”

Bright Fatality suddenly let loose a howl, and moved with such incredible agility that it almost looked like a teleportation.

Pop!

He was suddenly right behind Yang Qi, where he let loose a palm strike.

Yang Qi spun to meet the attack, and was sent staggering two steps backward. Inwardly, he was shocked by how much stronger his opponent had become so quickly. Furthermore, the attack he had unleashed was now pouring into Yang Qi, causing a myriad of wretch-gods to appear within his mind, where they assailed him with a curse of wretched, evil power.

RUMBLE!

Without pausing for a moment, Bright Fatality threw out a fist strike.

Exhaling sharply, Yang Qi drew on all the godpower he had to counterattack with both hands.

RIP!

Two fists met, and Yang Qi staggered back. Meanwhile, Bright Fatality flipped backward, then landed on his feet and jumped forward, fist flying with vicious ferocity.

Yang Qi was using one of the consummate techniques of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, the Fist of the Halls of Heaven. This was a contest of strength and skill, and Yang Qi was very curious to see how he would fare against his opponent’s wretched energy art.

As they exchanged blows, the wide-eyed audience looked on, completely taken aback by how ferociously Yang Qi was fighting. Obviously, Bright Fatality’s technique was based on power and speed, and to counter that, one needed something that offset strength with softness. Instead, Yang Qi seemed to be meeting strength with strength. How could that possibly defeat the Myriad Gods Holy Pilgrimage Energy Art?

Even after hundreds of exchanges, Yang Qi hadn’t made any progress, whereas Bright Fatality seemed to be moving faster and faster, circling around Yang Qi and attacking him from all angles. Any other person who faced an onslaught like this would have surely been reduced to rubble already.

An Yiru was actually starting to get worried for Yang Qi.

‘I can’t believe Bright Fatality is this strong,’ she thought. ‘He’s definitely beyond me. It's too bad Master said I can’t cultivate the Secret-Ensconcing All-World Anything-Everything Fundamental-Law Magic. Otherwise, I’d be a lot stronger. That said, it would probably hinder my progress toward the Terrifying level. Master is always looking out for my best interests. If I were in the same position as Yang Qi right now, my meridians would’ve already been destroyed. Of course, I wouldn’t try to compete with him in terms of strength. I would have made it a bit harder for him to hit me instead.’

Meanwhile, Sorrow Might looked at Yang Qi and thought, ‘Where did this brat come from? And how come he isn’t dead yet?’

Chapter 955: Round after Round of Fighting

“Hai!” Yang Qi shouted, thrusting both fists out to meet Bright Fatality, sending him spinning backward like a top. Yang Qi had already begun assimilating the true energy that had been sent into him. After all, the Myriad Gods Holy Pilgrimage Energy Art was cultivated by absorbing the power of myriad gods. And of course, the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth was the pure bane of such techniques.

Every time Bright Fatality hit him, he was able to simply assimilate the force of the blows that coursed through his meridians.

His Heaven and Earth Furnace was working overtime as it began melting the influx of true energy. As a result, his power index was climbing, and his fist strikes were already becoming more powerful than before.

‘This punk seems to be getting stronger as we fight. Isn't he ever going to run out of power? Why is each fist strike more devastating than the previous?’ Bright Fatality had already wasted a lot of true energy, and despite launching one attack after another, he didn’t seem to be making headway. In fact, he had a feeling that if things kept going this way, he would have a hard time achieving victory.

Without hesitation, he resorted to a deadly move that caused both of his fists to be wrapped in a soft, but mighty power that was like a vortex spreading out in all directions.

They were almost like small-scale tornadoes!

Thanks to the constraints of the Land of God Extermination, the tornadoes were only about the height of an average person, but were still terrifyingly strong. On the outside, even an expert with a power index of three thousand would have been ripped to shreds by them.

“That's the Nightmare Godwind Palm!” An Yiru shouted. “Don’t get sucked into those tornadoes, otherwise you’ll never escape.”

Yang Qi snorted coldly. “Godwind? We’ll see about that!”

Determined to vanquish power with greater power, he strode forward and launched a palm toward the tornadoes. During the course of the fight, Yang Qi was melding his various abilities together into a martial arts system of his own. Of course, it wasn’t anything that would surpass the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, King Immortal-Slayer’s techniques, or similar things, but it was perfectly suited to his own style of fighting.

It was something that most experts would do after they reached a certain point in their martial path. Although Yang Qi was making a lot of progress, this martial discipline of his wasn’t yet fully developed. Even so, the move he was unleashing right now was profound and difficult to counter.

WHOOOOOSH!

Rumbling sounds echoed out as the tornadoes collapsed under the might of Yang Qi’s attack. Then, his palm was right in front of Bright Fatality.

Bright Fatality could never have guessed that Yang Qi’s cultivation base was so strong that it could destroy his Nightmare Godwind Palm. Leaping to the side, he just barely dodged the incoming attack, landing hard on the ground with a very unsightly expression on his face.

Of course, Yang Qi wasn’t going to give him any breathing room, and pressed the attack. He attacked in a blur, almost like the sun rising in the east, causing a boundless radiance full of warmth and life force to drive away all wretched evil and wicked power.

He was now building up to his strongest attack. Moments ago, when vanquishing the tornadoes of the godwind, he had absorbed the godpower and sent it into his sea of energy to bolster his virtual godhood, which was now becoming so close to corporeal that it almost looked like crystal.

It was very nearly true godhood!

At the same time, he had his will spread out over the surrounding Land of God Extermination, where he observed the battlefield and what remained of the carnage. Thanks to the scars of battle left by the gods, he was picking up all sorts of techniques, experiences, and thoughts. He was even able to gain some enlightenment from the river of blood.

His moves came naturally and with ease, which indicated that he had reached a profoundly enigmatic point on the martial path, almost as if he were a god of battle.

BOOM!

The vital energy in the area trembled as Yang Qi yet again thrust his hands out, causing an energy field to surge out that instantly knocked Bright Fatality off balance.

“Little punk! You really have a death wish!” Furious, Bright Fatality stamped both feet down, causing them to sink into the ground and giving him a very solid foundation to stand on. “I've been waiting for this moment. Watch my final, killing move. Myriad Gods Total Destruction!”

All of a sudden, the numerous tattoos on him sprang to life again and swirled around his arms, which he shoved out to meet the incoming energy field.

Grabbing the energy field, he twisted it on its side, then sent his deadly attack continuing on toward Yang Qi, the double fist strike that was Myriad Gods Total Destruction.

“Don’t let it touch you!” An Yiru blurted anxiously.

Yang Qi snorted coldly. “That’s exactly what I'm going to do. I’ll use it to completely destroy his confidence!”

He lunged forward in majestic fashion, unleashing an explosion of mysterious and profound techniques with two fists.

RIP!

Four fists met each other, and Yang Qi staggered backward three paces. As for Bright Fatality, he let out an agonized shriek and flew backward, blood spurting out of numerous wounds. Shockingly, he was heading directly toward the river of blood, and had been hit so badly that it didn’t seem like he would be able to stop himself from falling in.

Unexpectedly, Yang Qi had struck a blow that was about to end his opponent’s life!

WHOOSH!

Sorrow Might suddenly burst into motion, becoming a streak of white that ran to the edge of the river. There, he grabbed Bright Fatality, who had so much blood splashed on him he looked like he was a statue of blood. Furthermore, his meridians were shattered and his sea of energy was in complete disarray. It looked like he might even have sustained injuries to his nascent divinity.

Sorrow Might quickly sent some true energy into him to heal him a bit. A moment later, Bright Fatality came to his senses and said, “Many thanks, Brother Sorrow Might. I won’t forget how you saved me just now. This brat really is too vicious.”

“Don’t mention it, Brother Bright Fatality. You lost, and I saved you. From here on out, you should really follow my lead in things. It won’t be long before I have Terrifying will, so if you stick with me, you won’t end up in bad situations like this anymore.”

“If you manage to beat him in a fight, Brother Sorrow Might, I might consider that. But if you can’t, I'm afraid Memory Peak will be taking the lead from now on.”

Even in their current situation, the two of them were still trying to one-up each other.

Meanwhile, laughter erupted as more powerful disciples from the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect flew over at top speed and landed on the bank of the blood river.

One of them was Xie Spiritwall, the very same one who had launched a surprise attack on Yang Qi some time earlier. In addition to him, there were several groups from other mountain peaks who were obviously being led by their chief disciples.

When they arrived, and realized that Yang Qi had defeated Bright Fatality, all of them looked surprised. That was especially true of Xie Spiritwall, whose face fell as he thought, ‘When I ambushed this little punk, he used some sort of consummate technique to come out on top. And now he's joined Memory Peak? There must be more to this story than meets the eye. Where the hell did he come from?’

Meanwhile, a man strode out and said, “I have to say, I'm surprised that Memory Peak managed to recruit a top expert like this!” He pulsed with immense pressure, and from the way the disciples he had brought with him looked at him in awe, he was obviously their leader.

In fact, even Sorrow Might shivered. “Emperor Heart-Celestial? So, Celestial Peak wants to join this brouhaha?”

‘People from Celestial Peak?!’ Yang Qi thought. As An Yiru had explained to him, there were fifty mountain peaks that made up the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect. Celestial Peak was the strongest of them, and the peaklord from there was even stronger than the peaklord of Memory Peak. They had major influence over the council of chief elders, the most plentiful resources, and the strongest disciples. When disciples from other mountain peaks met them, they always held back from doing anything inappropriate, and did everything to avoid causing a fight, as well.

Obviously, this Emperor Heart-Celestial was the chief disciple from there, as was evidenced by his very domineering name.

Without the power assessment systems, Yang Qi couldn’t be sure of the level of his cultivation base, but his guess was that it was over three thousand.

Worse, if Yang Qi could have sensed the pressure coming from him, it would have at least confirmed that his power was limited. But Yang Qi couldn’t sense anything, which was even more terrifying. That meant that his power and will surpassed Yang Qi so much that he couldn’t even get a sense of what it was.

“Exactly,” Emperor Heart-Celestial said. “Godhood has appeared in the Land of God Extermination, and none of you can fly over this river of blood to get it. Therefore, all of the godhood is going to Celestial Peak. I’d say that's reasonable, wouldn’t you? What, don’t agree, Sorrow Might? Are you really going to lead your people to challenge Celestial Peak, the top force among the fifty mountain peaks?”

Sorrow Might gave a forced laugh and pushed Bright Fatality aside. “This new treasure trove is a public discovery, so if you can fly us all over, then let’s just share the godhood. What do you say?”

“There’s not enough godhood for all of us to share,” Emperor Heart-Celestial said. “Didn’t you just suggest having a competition, then giving the godhood to whichever mountain peak comes out on top? I rather like that idea.”

“That? You want to participate in a competition like that?” Sorrow Might said. “Well, fine. In that case, you can be the next to challenge this kid from Memory Peak.”

“That won’t be necessary,” Emperor Heart-Celestial said. “Normally speaking, we follow the prescribed order. Your three factions were the first to arrive here, and you haven’t finished your little competition. Therefore, I won’t participate. I’ll just have one of my subordinates step in.”

Chapter 956: Round after Round of Fighting (2)

As Emperor Heart-Celestial spoke, he looked at Yang Qi with a piercing gaze, as if he hoped to see through all of his secrets. Yang Qi simply stood there quietly, looking like he didn’t notice what was happening. Inside, his will stirred, making himself look like nothing but a mass of primal-chaos and making it impossible for anyone looking at him to learn a single thing about him.

Although Emperor Heart-Celestial didn’t have Terrifying will convergence, he was extremely close to it. However, because of that, Yang Qi knew that, not only could he fight him, he could use him to grow stronger and stronger.

“Fine,” Yang Qi said, proudly clasping his hands behind his back. “If that's how things are going to play out, then I'm very curious to see what the disciples from Celestial Peak are like. Do they really have any skills worth talking about?”

Everyone was stunned by his words, including An Yiru. Even she would act obsequiously around people from Celestial Peak, and wouldn’t dare to do anything to offend them. In contrast, Yang Qi had outright provoked them, and had done so in a way that made him seem completely confident in his own invincibility.

The people from Celestial Peak immediately burst into an uproar.

“Oh?”

“What gall! How dare you talk like that, boy! Don’t you know the vast difference in rank between Memory Peak and Celestial Peak?! Do you have a death wish or something?”

“Bah! Let me be the one to teach this brat the height of the heavens and the breadth of the earth.”

However, Emperor Heart-Celestial still had an unreadable expression on his face that might have been admiration. Looking at Yang Qi, he said, “Excellent. Wonderful! It seems Memory Peak has really recruited a top talent. Perhaps the time has finally come for them to rise to the top. Go, Junior Brother Emperor Rain, you test out his cultivation base.”

“Yes sir!” said a tall, slender cultivator. Walking forward to face Yang Qi, he reached out and flicked his wrist, causing a long sword to appear. “What weapon are you going to use?”

“None. Just my fists.” Yang Qi was in the mood for fighting, and was ready to take on every student from the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect who would face him. He would use their techniques to catalyze his own advancement, and he was convinced that experts close to the Terrifying level were the best grindstone to do that. He obviously couldn’t stand up to actual Terrifying experts, but those who were not there yet were definitely within the realm of what he could handle.

“That’s not appropriate,” the man said. “If you refuse to use a weapon, I’d rather not fight you! Here, take this.” He pulled out a sword and tossed it over. “That’s my Garuda Sword, which is a sage sword from a buddhist school. It’s very strong, strong enough to match up to my Emperor’s Dao Sword. This way, no one will be able to claim that I took advantage of you.”

Yang Qi grabbed the sword and sent some true energy into it. Immediately, buddhist script began flowing over its surface, and buddha power began thrumming within it. It really was a powerful god item. Yang Qi immediately had a good impression of this Emperor Rain. Apparently, not all the disciples in the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect were vicious, underhanded fighters. Some were straightforward and upright.

“You needn’t inspect it,” Emperor Rain said. “I would never rig it to hurt you. You can wield it without any such worries. However, if you're not pleased with the sword, you’re more than welcome to switch it for another.”

“That's not necessary,” Yang Qi said. “A buddhist sword like this is the perfect match for my mental state.” He flicked the sword, and godlight erupted from the blade, accompanied by zen chants proclaiming the grand virtues of the buddhist schools. In the blink of an eye, a lokapāla dragon could be seen.

“Excellent sword technique! Excellent true energy! Please, prepare to counter my first move!”

Emperor Rain thrust his sword forward, sword light spilling out noiselessly and with no fanfare whatsoever. It was like a cool breeze that appeared right in front of Yang Qi, who countered by sending his own sword light forward.

However, Emperor Rain was like an expert strumming a zither, sending out a tune of sublime musical composition.

His sword light enveloped Yang Qi, piercing through his defenses in accord with the orbit of the sun and moon. Yang Qi immediately felt like he was either going to die or be seriously injured; this was not an attack that could be vanquished as easily as a palm strike, and it was filled with true energy that couldn’t be easily dispelled.

Yang Qi shifted between a variety of stances and techniques to block the incoming sword, then suddenly unleashed a move that caused abundant life force to flow through his sword. It was none other than the sword technique of Star Swordlife, which was astonishing in its defensive capabilities. Emperor Rain’s advance was halted, leaving him incapable of piercing Yang Qi’s defenses.

Everyone in the audience who had just watched Yang Qi vanquish Bright Fatality’s Myriad Gods Holy Pilgrimage Energy Art by using strength against strength were completely taken aback to see this exquisite sword technique. In fact, quite a few exclamations of surprise were heard.

“I can’t believe that he has this superb level of skill. How truly exceptional! I wonder where this sword technique is from. It seems to take life force from heaven and earth to make one completely unbeatable. Who could possibly pierce defenses like that?”

“How incredible for Memory Peak to have an expert like this on their side.”

“No wonder Memory Peak is on the rise now. Their peaklord is always in seclusion, and doesn’t pay attention to outside affairs. But with an expert like this to take the lead, they’ll definitely be able to make a name for themselves.”

“Well, you never know. You have to wait and see if he’ll actually defeat Emperor Rain. After all, Emperor Rain’s sword skill is nothing to take lightly.”

“Excellent sword technique!” Emperor Rain said. “Emperor's Dao Sword!” An imperial energy surged out of his sword, like the Son of Heaven out for an inspection tour, prompting all living beings to bend the knee in deference. It was a mighty sword technique, each slash of which could shake heaven and earth, and provoke intense rumblings like that of thunder. In fact, the entire Land of God Extermination was trembling, which just went to show how amazing the technique was.

However, Yang Qi wasn’t backing down at all. He continued unleashing a torrent of sword moves, defending against every attack his opponent sent his way.

In terms of enlightenment of the life force in heaven and earth, there was nothing superior to Star Swordlife’s technique. It was something an ordinary dao of the sword couldn’t compare to, and Yang Qi had clashed with Star Swordlife enough to have come to a deep understanding of it. And considering he was backing it with the true energy of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, his version was even more formidable than the original, just like how indigo blue is extracted from the indigo plant, but is bluer than the plant itself.

“Cavalcade of Myriad Emperors!” Emperor Rain shouted. Seeing that he was incapable of piercing the net of swords that Yang Qi had created, he finally resorted to a killing move, slashing out in a way that summoned a projection of a myriad of emperors.

Bam. Bam. Bam.

This technique was finally enough to pierce through the net of swords Yang Qi had created.

However, that was when Yang Qi suddenly shrank back, transforming into the most deadly type of sword, the kind that emanated the sternest and most awe-inspiring killing energy possible, as if he wanted to kill heaven, kill earth, kill man, and kill life.

He wanted to destroy anything and everything!

BOOM!

The deadly move of Cavalcade of Myriad Emperors was vanquished by Yang Qi.

Emperor Rain’s face turned ashen as he stumbled backward, Yang Qi’s sword at his throat. However, Yang Qi didn’t press the attack. Flipping the sword around, he handed it hilt-first to Emperor Rain.

“You let me win, Brother Emperor Rain,” he said.

It took a moment for Emperor Rain to regain his composure. When he did, he nodded and said, “Extremely impressive. Your sword technique abounds with life force, except for that last move, which was clearly from a consummate dao of killing. Don’t tell me you know King Life-Killer’s sword technique.”

“That's right. It was none other than that King Life-Killer’s technique. I just so happened to come across it, and luckily, it was just what I needed in that moment. Again, thank you for letting me win.” You respect me an inch, I’ll respect you a mile. That was how Yang Qi did things.

“In the future, I hope you can teach me a thing about sword technique, Brother,” Emperor Rain said. Returning to the Celestial Peak group, he faced Emperor Heart-Celestial and said, “Elder Brother, I failed. Please punish me accordingly.”

“It just wasn’t fated to be,” Emperor Heart-Celestial said. “His sword technique is too strong, making him nearly invincible. However, I don’t think I've ever heard of anyone like this on the Ancient Road to the Gods. I wonder where he might hail from. Sorrow Might. It's your turn. Someone from Celestial Peak already lost, and I'm not the kind of person who tries to take advantage of situations.”

WHOOSH!

Looking at Yang Qi, he snapped his finger and a god pill appeared in front of him. “This is one of Celestial Peak’s famous Emperor-Heart Exalted-Celestial Pellets, which can completely restore your true energy. You must have wasted a lot of energy fighting Emperor Rain just now, so we’ll wait until you’ve recovered before commencing the match with Sorrow Might. If you defeat him, and there are no other challengers, then the two of us will fight.”

From the immense godly might and strong medicinal aroma the Emperor-Heart Exalted-Celestial Pellet emanated, it was obvious that it wasn’t poison. Nor was it laced with warding spells.

However, Yang Qi didn’t accept it. Instead, he flicked his finger and sent it back toward Emperor Heart-Celestial. “I appreciate your kindness, but regrettably, must decline your offer. My true energy flows without end, as I've long since reached the point of being able to draw on the boundless vitality of the god world.”

“In that case, perhaps I've underestimated you,” Emperor Heart-Celestial said, his expression flickering. Putting away the pill, he said, “You’re up, Sorrow Might. Let’s see the same impressive might you used on that Executor of the Ancient Road.”

Sorrow Might snorted coldly. Not even attempting to match the magnanimity of Emperor Heart-Celestial, he said, “Since you people from Celestial Peak have already lost, it means that beating this brat will prove I'm stronger than you people. Soon enough, Celestial Peak will be taking orders from Grand Might Peak!”

“You’re really a shameless boaster, aren’t you?” Yang Qi said. “In fact, you don’t seem anything like a chief disciple. And you’re definitely not as honest and dependable as the people from Celestial Peak.” Yang Qi could now see more than ever that there was a lot of variety in the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect. Some mountain peaks were arrogant and despotic, others were elegant and graceful. Some were enigmatic and impossible to predict, others were sinister and vicious, almost like heretical wretch-devils. Apparently, the sect was like a melting pot of good and evil.

Even as the words left Yang Qi’s mouth, he attacked Sorrow Might.

He lunged forward, leading with his left hand and following up with his right as he unleashed a bevy of palm strikes from the Seventy-Two Monarchs Energy Art.

BOOM!

Not only were the techniques in the Seventy-Two Monarchs Energy Arts consummate techniques that had devastated the god world, but Yang Qi had gained a lot of enlightenment on this battlefield. In fact, his previous enlightenment was like nothing compared to the profundities he now understood.

He attacked relentlessly, with mountain-toppling, sea-draining force that sounded like a myriad of beasts howling, or the god world devolving into chaos. Almost instantly, Sorrow Might was gasping for breath as he staggered backward.

He spun back and forth trying to defend himself, but eventually lost control, and was squarely hit, sending him flying backward to slam into the ground, where he coughed up a few mouthfuls of blood and collapsed into unconsciousness.

Yang Qi had won a clean victory.

Chapter 957: Emperor Heart-Celestial

Who could ever have guessed that Sorrow Might, the chief disciple of Grand Might Peak, would be defeated so quickly? Yang Qi hit him so hard that he coughed up massive amounts of blood and then simply passed out. It was an extraordinary shame and humiliation for him.

The onlookers were already having whispered conversations about it, and the disciples from Grand Might Peak were clearly livid. In fact, if it weren’t for the fact that they had all just witnessed how vicious Yang Qi was, they might have rushed out and tried to beat him to death. But they knew that would be suicide. This was the Land of God Extermination, and if they ended up tossed into the blood river, they would be wiped out of existence.

“He couldn’t even stand up to a single blow!” Yang Qi said. Clasping his hands behind his back, he smiled faintly. Inside, he harmonized his energy flows and was back to his peak state within moments. Truth be told, it had been a big drain of energy to strike that blow against Sorrow Might. Being in the Land of God Extermination made it very difficult to absorb power. Thankfully, he had gained enlightenment during the fight, and knew that once he left this place, his will convergence would definitely reach a higher level.

“Get up, Sorrow Might,” Emperor Heart-Celestial said. Pulling Sorrow Might up, he put a medicinal pill in his mouth and sent some true energy into him. A moment later, Sorrow Might had recovered his senses, whereupon he shouted, “How dare you attack me without warning, brat!”

“Attack without warning?” Emperor Heart-Celestial said. “There’s no such thing. I believe in being ready at all times. People who cultivate energy arts to our level should never be caught off guard. The truth, Sorrow Might, is that you’re just not as good as him. And sadly, your mental state makes you unfit to use the psychic scaling systems of the Cruiser of Civilization. The godhood here would be wasted on you.”

“Fine!” Sorrow Might spat. “Grand Might Peak admits defeat today. Disciples, follow me, we’re leaving!”

They left in shame, forfeiting any claim to the godhood.

Yang Qi had defeated three famous experts in a row: Bright Fatality, Emperor Rain, and Sorrow Might. Many people present were now looking at Yang Qi in either admiration or fear.

As for An Yiru, she was inwardly delighted. ‘Yang Qi might be a bit brash, but he's boosting the reputation of Memory Peak. Going forward, we’ll definitely have enough renown to do as we please. I almost can’t believe that some random person I recruited turned out to be this incredible!’

Yang Qi really was just a random recruit. And considering she had originally hoped that he would develop into a powerful person later on, it was obviously a surprise that he was already so strong.

“Does anyone else want to challenge Memory Peak for that godhood?” Yang Qi said loudly. His gaze fell onto Xie Spiritwall from Spiritwall Peak. “What about you, Xie Spiritwall? Want to have a go? I remember how you took a cheap shot on me when I joined the sect. Why don’t we have a little duel right here and now? We can finally decide who is superior, Spiritwall Peak or Memory Peak! If you’re too scared to fight, then kindly screw the hell off.”

Yang Qi’s words were so insulting that Xie Spiritwall’s face first turned bright red, then pale white. Back when he attacked Yang Qi without warning, he had hoped to drop him with one shot. How could he possibly have imagined that Yang Qi would be this strong?

“Come on, let’s go!” Yang Qi said, pointing at him. “If you don’t, then from now on, I'm not going to call you Xie Spiritwall, I'm going to call you Xie Turtle! Because that's what you are, a turtle who hides in his shell!”

Xie Spiritwall couldn’t just stand there in the face of such merciless insults. Snorting coldly, he stepped forward. “You really think I'm scared of you, brat? You beat Sorrow Might by catching him off guard in a dishonorable attack, but I’m not Sorrow Might. How dare you raise your voice to me! Fine, I’ll fight you. After all, you've got to be on the verge of running out of true energy.”

Swish!

Suddenly, he moved with indescribable speed, appearing behind Yang Qi with a sword in hand, which he stabbed directly toward his back.

Yang Qi spun, his five fingers becoming hooks that flew toward the sword. Apparently, he wasn’t even the least bit afraid of how sharp the sword was. However, before anything else could happen, Xie Spiritwall blurred into motion, appearing yet again behind Yang Qi and attacking again in the same manner.

Yang Qi once again tried to grab the sword, but Xie Spiritwall was too fast, and in the blink of an eye, was behind him again. Whatever technique he was using, it was extremely enigmatic.

Nodding, Emperor Heart-Celestial said, “So, Xie Spiritwall, you finally mastered the Heaven-Roaming Paramount-Revolution God Ability. You really came prepared today. The next time our fifty mountain peaks gather together for a tournament, you’ll definitely dominate the other competitors. Perhaps you’ll end up being the one baptized by the psychic scaling systems.”

Xie Spiritwall chuckled coldly. “You’re right, I did master the Heaven-Roaming Paramount-Revolution God Ability. I’d hoped to keep it as a trump card, but considering how viciously this brat has been bullying people, I have no choice but to use it on him. He’ll soon learn that there is always a heaven beyond heaven, and there are always people more important than you. Soon enough, that arrogance of his will be wiped out for all eternity!”

Even as the words left his mouth, Xie Spiritwall’s sword moved with increasing speed and ferocity, always stabbing toward Yang Qi’s back no matter how he turned or spun.

Suddenly, Yang Qi stopped moving and let loose a thunderous roar as he sent a burst of empyrean energy out roughly a meter around him, creating a boundless land of purity. It was none other than his God Legion Paradise.

He did this in the exact same moment that Xie Spiritwall tried to stab him with his sword. Unexpectedly, the sword was incapable of piercing the empyrean energy, and in fact, shattered as soon as contact was made! Just like that, Yang Qi vanquished his Heaven-Roaming Paramount-Revolution God Ability.

Crash!

Yang Qi’s palm shot out, sending streams of energy out that locked the area down, making it impossible for Xie Spiritwall to escape. If they were fighting outside, he would have been able to escape by burrowing down through the soil. But they were in the Land of God Extermination, where it was difficult to even leave footprints, much less dig through the ground.

Xie Spiritwall threw both hands out to clash with Yang Qi. Unfortunately, Yang Qi’s moves were as weighty as a mountain, and cracking sounds rang out as both of Xie Spiritwall’s arms were broken. As they fell limply to his side, Yang Qi’s palm landed on the top of his head.

POP!

Xie Spiritwall suddenly went limp and dropped to the ground, a stupefied expression appearing on his face, including a dopey smile. Obviously, Yang Qi hadn’t harmed his head, but rather his nascent divinity.

Frowning, Emperor Heart-Celestial hurried over and pulled Xie Spiritwall to his feet. After examining him, he looked at Yang Qi and said, “Very merciless. You intentionally damaged his nascent divinity. Even if he recovers, he’ll have no hope of ever reaching the Terrifying level. Was there really a need to be so merciless when simply sparring with a fellow disciple?”

“Vicious? He was trying to kill me. This was just tit for tat.” With each fight, Yang Qi was benefiting greatly from the enlightenment and was getting stronger.

He was fighting completely with his own energy arts, without any magical treasures at all. It was his first time doing something like this. In any other location he would have been hard pressed to find suitable opponents, and wouldn’t have been able to fight under the pressure of the Land of God Extermination. The circumstances really couldn’t have been better.

Yang Qi had defeated four top experts in a row, and refined his cultivation base significantly. His energy arts were advancing, and he was gaining valuable experience.

By now, Yang Qi realized that using magical treasures in battle was actually an impediment to his cultivation base. Fighting with one’s own two hands was the best training, to the point where he now had no desire to use magical treasures at all. In fact, he was even thinking of trying to get rid of the God Legion Seal, thereby transcending his previous limitations.

As soon as the thought took hold, his nascent divinity suddenly began to burn as though it were on fire, extruding a black smoke that represented impurities and weakness.

Yang Qi’s will had previously been extremely tenacious, but he had been using the God Legion Seal for so long that it had become something of a crutch, holding him back. He had developed weaknesses in his emotions that not even he was aware existed. But thanks to the fighting in the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect and his desire to abandon the use of magical treasures, including the God Legion Seal, he suddenly revealed his true ego. His main weakness, his reliance on the God Legion Seal, was now removed, allowing his nascent divinity to grow vastly stronger.

At that moment, his sea of consciousness filled with radiance and light, and his psychic scale rose. He didn’t have the psychic scaling systems, but nevertheless, he felt like he was closer to the Terrifying level than ever before. The decision to abandon the God Legion Seal made him like someone from the buddhist schools who had finally achieved buddhist ascension.

This type of baptism was a huge milestone. He now had a firm foundation upon which to strive toward a breakthrough to the Terrifying level. If he had tried to do so by relying on the God Legion Seal, he would never have succeeded.

Before, the God Legion Seal had been like his life force, something he absolutely couldn’t live without. But now that it wasn't as important to him, he suddenly realized that his new state of mind would make it much easier to control, if he wanted to.

Emperor Heart-Celestial had people from Spiritwall Peak take Xie Spiritwall away, then looked back at Yang Qi. “You need to watch your back. The leader of Spiritwall Peak might very well try to cause problems for you after this. He's usually in seclusion, but expected to emerge soon. In any case, it seems none of the other mountain peaks are in the position to fight with Memory Peak now. If you can at least fight me to a draw, I’ll allow Memory Peak to go in and take that godhood.”

Chapter 958: Two Luminaries Clash

Yang Qi had quickly and casually taken down four top masters, and hadn’t received even the tiniest injury in the process. Everyone looking on was completely stunned, and knew that they were looking at a new consummate expert.

All of the disciples present had power indexes of at least two thousand. And they all had magical treasures that would push their fighting prowess so high that they could rival the leaders of the top sects. People like Battle Resister would be considered average compared to these disciples, and that wasn’t even to mention what the chief disciples were like. They had power indexes over three thousand. The fact that Yang Qi had defeated four such enemies was completely unprecedented and impossible to duplicate.

Furthermore, he had greatly benefited from the experience, having tempered his nascent divinity and rid himself of his dependence on the God Legion Seal.

The truth was that the worst type of obstacle was over-reliance on something. In fact, there was a name for such obstacles: dependency-devils.

Cultivators who had powerful magical treasures could definitely be considered strong, and could benefit greatly from them in their progress. However, long-term use would negatively affect their nascent divinity, and at a certain point, they would have to rid themselves of that obstacle before their nascent divinity could rise to a higher level.

It was a balancing factor of the dao of heaven.

It was true that Yang Qi had used the God Legion Seal to quickly and smoothly progress through his cultivation. But if he didn't defeat the dependency-devils that had formed, he would have eventually sunk into oblivion. Dependency-devils were dangerous monsters that couldn’t be taken lightly, and if left unchecked, they could eventually take over.

Thankfully, now that Yang Qi understood how dependency-devils worked, he would be able to safely use the God Legion Seal again in the future. That said, he wouldn’t do so long-term. Instead, he would rely on himself.

And eventually, he would truly abandon the God Legion Seal. That was the wisest decision possible. Unfortunately, he couldn't completely abandon it right now. Perhaps he could avoid using it, but he couldn’t simply give it to someone else.

In fact, maybe he would even destroy it. Perhaps he could revise the ultimate meaning of the legion of gods and remake the world.

Although his nascent divinity was shining with more brilliance than ever, it wasn’t something people could see from the outside. In fact, many people assumed from the way that he seemed to be inwardly focused that he was working hard to recover his energy and return to his peak state.

In fact, Emperor Heart-Celestial even held back from making a move until he was sure Yang Qi was ready.

“Take your time,” he said. “I’ll wait until you’re at your peak state.” He simply stood there with a calm smile on his face, not looking the least bit anxious. In fact, he seemed like the kind of person who would never have any negative emotions, as if his heart and soul were completely under control.

RUMBLE!

Yang Qi suddenly began thrumming with true energy. “I'm always at my peak state, Emperor Heart-Celestial, my friend. I'm ready. We can begin fighting whenever you’re ready.”

“Alright!”

Crash!

Emperor Heart-Celestial attacked without hesitation, moving so quickly that the onlookers couldn’t track his motion. Yang Qi instantly felt pressure on his nascent divinity. His will and senses felt like they were locked down, as though his opponent’s palm attack was impossible to defend against.

Whatever energy art it was, it was remarkable to the point of almost being unbelievable.

Thankfully, Yang Qi had just expunged his dependency-devils, making his nascent divinity more glorious than ever. His cultivation base and energy arts had advanced, and there was nothing holding him back. Power surged through him as the immense palm bore down on him, filling his ears with thunderous rumbling sounds. To those observing the fight, that palm looked as gentle and calm as if it were designed to whisk flowers off the shoulder.

But Yang Qi knew that it was a deadly combination of yin and yang, an amalgamation of hard and soft. It could transform at any moment, as though it used the will to incarnate gods, used gods to incarnate immortals, and then converted immortals back into gods to reach a state of complete invincibility.

The transformations in this attack were truly enigmatic and profound.

However, Yang Qi perceived them down to their core meaning. He threw his hands out in front of his chest and drew on all of his energy arts to meet the incoming attack.

POP!

Yang Qi staggered backward, very nearly falling into the river of blood.

As for Emperor Heart-Celestial, he didn’t seem affected by the clash, but there was a flicker on his face that seemed to indicate he was activating internal energy arts to neutralize the force of Yang Qi’s blow. Although it seemed like he had knocked Yang Qi backward toward the river, the truth was that he had sent his force into Yang Qi’s body. In response, Yang Qi had moved backward to redirect the force of the blow into the ground.

All of the onlookers were top masters in their own right, so many of them were able to pick up on these minute details.

It was a complete shock to see Emperor Heart-Celestial, who normally defeated opponents in a single move, do nothing but force Yang Qi back a few steps. Apparently, Yang Qi wasn’t even hurt!

“Nice!” Emperor Heart-Celestial said. Fully circulating the energy in his body three times, he said, “You’re definitely skilled. I can’t believe you negated my palm attack. It was only after gaining enlightenment of an imperial heart, balancing countless streams of godpower, and conquering knowledge-devils of the legion of gods that I was able to create my Deathless Emperor’s Dao Fist. You just tasted the first stance, Unprecedented and Unduplicated. However, I have a few more stances to show you. If I can't use them to defeat you, then that godhood will belong to you.”

Not only did Emperor Heart-Celestial seem to have complete confidence in this Deathless Emperor’s Dao Fist of his, it was also obvious that it was an unusually amazing technique that he had honed to perfection.

“Bring it on!” Yang Qi said, standing fearlessly at the very edge of the blood river. Hands stretched out from the river toward him, apparently drawn by the sensation of his blood and energy, yet they were destroyed by his defensive empyrean energy.

Everyone who could see him standing there was deeply impressed, and knew that Memory Peak obviously occupied a higher standing in the sect now. In fact, even if Yang Qi lost the fight with Emperor Heart-Celestial, the entire Will Manifestation Heaven Sect was still going to hear about what he had done today, even the elders.

Instead of pressing the attack, Emperor Heart-Celestial waited until he was sure that Yang Qi was ready, then said, “Alright! The next move is called Great Heights Reached! After that, there are a whole series of moves that flow from one to the next. If you think you can't defend yourself, you can always concede.”

“I'm very interested in seeing these moves of yours, Brother,” Yang Qi said. There was no way he would pass up the chance to learn from the indomitable Emperor Heart-Celestial. Each of his attacks were the kind that could crush virtually any enemy, and perhaps if Yang Qi hadn’t vanquished his dependency-devils, he might not have been able to deal with them. But things were different now.

As Emperor Heart-Celestial circulated his energy and prepared to attack, Yang Qi took a deep breath. He had no magical treasures on him. No Engine of the One God, no God Legion Seal, none of King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans, and no Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

All he had were his energy arts.

Emperor Heart-Celestial let out a savage howl that shredded the spatial magical laws in the area, then became a prismatic beam of light that shot directly toward Yang Qi.

Yang Qi could see that this was an incredibly advanced fist technique, and it definitely lived up to the name Great Heights Reached.

“Excellent fist technique!” Yang Qi’s spirits soared as if he were fighting the gods themselves. All of a sudden, he thrust his palms out using moves that defied imagination. Thanks to the pressure provided by Emperor Heart-Celestial, Yang Qi was actually spontaneously creating his own martial discipline!

POP!

The attacks met, and although a tremor passed through Yang Qi, he didn’t fall back. If he did, he would tumble right into the blood river.

“Well done,” Emperor Heart-Celestial said, then unleashed a whole host of moves. “Beyond All Compare. Without Parallel in History. No Successor Ever. Unheard-Of and Unprecedented. Never Seen in History!”

His attacks were hard and unyielding, and every one seemed unprecedented and impossible to duplicate. Even their names reflected their uniqueness. It was certainly befitting for a chief disciple in the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect to have supreme moves such as these.

Yang Qi immediately slipped into a state of complete calm. It was as though a starry sky stretched above him, each star pulsing with the sensation of the Deathless Throne. It was as if the god world was above him, and hell below. Hell and heaven appeared, making him half darkness and gloom, half radiance and light. Half wretched evil, and half righteous justice.

His left hand suddenly flared with brilliant godpower, and his right hand became a rushing river of darkness, and as they combined, they seemed to rip open the air around him. Of course, they were still in the Land of God Extermination, in the middle of a bloody battlefield, so for him to devastate the area around him like this made everyone wonder just what level of will he possessed.

Obviously, it was a very dangerous situation.

Emperor Heart-Celestial pressed his attack in full, while Yang Qi waited at the edge of the blood river. They clashed, and a huge boom rang out, as well as a massive shock wave. Yang Qi would die if he fell back, yet he stood there as if his legs were rooted to the ground.

The audience all edged backward.

They knew that if an attack like this had hit any one of them, they would die. Not a single one could do what Yang Qi was doing.

An Yiru felt like her heart was in her throat. After all, if Yang Qi could actually stand up to Emperor Heart-Celestial, didn’t that mean he was the number one disciple in the entire Will Manifestation Heaven Sect?

Chapter 959: Crossing the Blood River

The fight between Yang Qi and Emperor Heart-Celestial was like a contest between a dragon and a tiger. One of them was the number one chief disciple among the fifty mountain peaks, illustrious among the younger generation. The other was a unique prodigy with an amazing legacy, who had conquered his dependency-devils and become boundlessly invincible.

Their moves seemed to contain unending variations, and the shockwaves from their clashes had thrown the river of blood into chaos. The hands that stretched out of the river were ripped to pieces and couldn’t reform. They were expressions of the resentful will of the blood, which itself was comprised of remnants of members of the legion of gods. It could only be imagined how powerful that resentful will was, yet the fight between these two experts had destroyed it.

Emperor Heart-Celestial had no expression on his face whatsoever as his energy flowed like a river, his every move seemingly connected to the extremities of heaven and earth.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi was majestic, towering, and unmoving, evoking a sense of utter dignity.

One of them was like a sprawling continent, and that was Emperor Heart-Celestial. The other was like a towering mountain, and that was Yang Qi.

Although a continent could be vast and impressive, it couldn’t reach the impressive heights of a mountain.

As for a mountain, although it could touch the clouds, it had to rest on the surface of a continent. In some ways, they were interdependent and could not truly compete with each other.

“Monarch Hegemony!” Emperor Heart-Celestial said, reaching his last move. He threw his arms out in a circular motion, causing energy to ripple out. He was like a consummate god-emperor that could encompass all of creation and cow all living beings.

It was the deadliest move from the Deathless Emperor’s Dao Fist, which was intended to only be unleashed after the other moves like Great Heights Reached, Unprecedented and Unduplicated, and Without Parallel in History. In fact, those moves were intended to pave the way for the final, ultimate move.

It was something that could force the many heavens to acknowledge allegiance to it, the ultimate monarch whose hegemony could conquer universes.

At long last, Yang Qi was incapable of holding strong and was thrown back over the blood river.

Cries of shock and alarm rose up from the crowd. After such a spectacular fight, it was sad to see Yang Qi be forced into a situation where he likely wouldn’t escape with his life.

However, that was when something spectacularly amazing happened. When Yang Qi landed on the surface of the river, he didn’t sink down into it! Nor did any of the swirling whirlpools affect him in any way. Hands reached out to pull him down, but the golden light that shone from him crushed the blood energy. Then he simply walked back to shore.

Emperor Heart-Celestial looked on, completely stunned. Then he chuckled. “Your energy arts are truly formidable. You can walk on the blood river, and you sustained a blow from my Deathless Emperor’s Dao Fist without being hurt in the least. We really did fight to a draw. Perhaps one day in the future we can have a more thorough match.”

“Emperor Heart-Celestial, my friend, your techniques were also completely amazing,” Yang Qi said. It was only thanks to his enlightenment of the waxing and waning of yin and yang that he understood how to float in the air. He had actually made himself as light as air, then grasped on certain spatial magical laws to propel himself forward, and prevent the whirlpools from dragging him down at the same time.

That blood river was an extremely dangerous thing; even just being close to it could be deadly, let alone standing on its surface.

Everyone present was bowled over, as they knew that only people with Terrifying will could possibly walk on the surface of the river without sinking down into it. However, there was no way Yang Qi had Terrifying will, otherwise he would definitely have defeated Emperor Heart-Celestial. No matter how impressive Emperor Heart-Celestial was, he couldn’t possibly fight with a Terrifying expert.

Most of them assumed that Yang Qi must have some powerful god item. Little did they know it was actually because Yang Qi had managed to grasp the magical laws of the Land of God Extermination.

“It seems neither of us lost,” Yang Qi continued, “and yet neither of us won. But I do have to offer my sincere thanks for your offer to give me the godhood.”

Emperor Heart-Celestial nodded in response, then turned to the disciples from Celestial Peak and said, “Come, let us go.”

Then he flicked his sleeve and led them away. As for the disciples from the other mountain peaks, they knew they had no chance to participate in events now, and dispersed.

As for the chief disciples, they offered words of congratulations and promised to pay formal visits to Yang Qi later. They also relinquished any claim to the godhood.

Even some of the ordinary disciples came over to offer their well-wishes, fully aware that it would be good for them to establish a healthy relationship with the new top figure from Memory Peak.

Clearly delighted, An Yiru saw all of the well-wishers away, then turned to Yang Qi and said, “I never imagined that you were secretly so strong, Yang Qi. You really earned some fame for yourself here today.”

“Famous or not famous, it doesn’t matter. What I'm mainly worried about is how to get across this river and get that godhood.” Yang Qi desperately needed that godhood, but the blood river was very wide. Although he had managed to use the local magical laws to walk across it moments before, it was impossible to say what lurked in the true depths of the river. The place he had walked was only a few meters from the bank, whereas the river itself was dozens of kilometers across.

“Good point,” An Yiru said. “I wonder if Emperor Heart-Celestial left because he knew there was no way to get across. Perhaps I should go and ask Master for help.”

Yang Qi shook his head. “That's not necessary. Don’t bother the old-timers with minor issues among us juniors. It's an unwritten rule that people like us should figure things out on our own. Furthermore, I just gained some significant enlightenment, so now is the perfect opportunity to test out the limits of my energy arts.”

“Don’t tell me you can just walk across the river?”

“Well, I can try.” He looked out at the vast river, but wasn’t feeling particularly confident. However, he wanted to challenge himself. Of course, he always had the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart to rely on, but truth be told, he wouldn’t consider it in this situation. First of all, he wanted to challenge himself by facing whatever threats rose up to block his path.

Second, this was the territory of the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect, and he was surely being monitored. The last thing he wanted was to draw unwanted attention. And that wasn’t to mention that he didn’t want to depend on anything but himself.

“Well, be careful,” An Yiru said. She knew that the enigmatic Yang Qi wouldn’t blithely throw himself into a deadly situation. Considering he had fought Emperor Heart-Celestial to a draw, he was already superior to her among the forces of Memory Peak. That was just how things worked in the cultivation world. Only those who proved their strength and rose above the rest would be considered the top experts.

“Alright! Here I go!”

As the disciples of Memory Peak gasped in surprise, he walked out onto the surface of the blood river, destroying the hands of blood that reached toward him.

At the same time, a blood-colored fog suddenly began to rise up from the water, covering Yang Qi so completely that he could hardly see his hand if he held it in front of his face.

“Disciples,” An Yiru said, “use whatever power you have to protect yourselves from the fog. Be careful. Blood-fiend devil energy exists within it, and if it infects you, you’ll experience cultivation deviation.” She and the other disciples from Memory Peak joined forces, using their energy arts to create shields to protect themselves.

However, the fog was roiling out so rapidly that it caused cracking sounds to ring out from the shields, as though they might collapse at any moment.

“Yang Qi, are you all right out there!?” An Yiru called, simultaneously shrinking her shield of light down to be as small as possible, thus making it as strong as she could.

“I'm fine. You be careful back there.”

Nodding, An Yiru called out, “Disciples, back away from the mists!”

They backed away until the fog cleared a bit. Unfortunately, their view of the temple on the other side of the river was now obscured, and they had no idea where Yang Qi was.

‘This fog is so strong!’ Yang Qi thought as he proceeded along. Unfortunately, he still couldn’t fly, thanks to the immense pressure. And if it weren’t for his constant concentration, that pressure would have pushed him down into the blood river.

For some reason, he felt like he was crossing the legendary sea of bitterness that existed in buddhist teachings.

At a certain point, he ran into a whirlpool that spun him around several times, leaving him completely uncertain of what direction he was walking in. He couldn’t see the shore or the temple, just the endless blood-colored fog that was constantly trying to bore into his body.

The circumstances were dire. However, Yang Qi also realized that this was proving to be an important session of cultivation.

Chapter 960: Blood-Colored Fog

The more dangerous the situation, the more calm and focused Yang Qi was. Without hesitation, he summoned his God Legion Paradise to keep the fog at bay.

Unfortunately, when he did that, he began sinking down into the blood river. In the blink of an eye, he was down to his ankles. In response, he focused his will and reached out more fully to the magical laws around him, which caused him to rise back up.

There could hardly be any more effective method for tempering the will, as if he was weak, he would immediately die.

He had no idea what entities might lurk in the depths of this river, but he was sure that they were horrifying. If he ended up sinking into the river, no one would be able to save him. And because of the immense pressure of the river, he wouldn’t be able to open a passage to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. After all, the pressure in the depths of the river would vastly surpass the cave temple of the Vajra Māyādevī.

That said, he wasn’t even thinking of trying to rely on the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

Throwing his hands out, he drew on his psychic power and reached deep into his sea of consciousness, where his nascent divinity and will existed. His nascent divinity was currently pulsing, not because of martial disciplines, but in imitation of the magical laws. He was very close to breaking through his limitations. Thanks to the danger he was in, his nascent divinity and will were transforming in unheard-of ways.

At the moment, the temple and godhood weren’t even important. Right now, he had to remain absolutely focused on not sinking down into the blood river.

Suddenly, Yang Qi felt profoundly weak, like an oil lamp on the verge of flickering out. He cleared his mind, emptying himself of everything and relaxing.

A moment later, his psychic power returned to normal and he proceeded forward again.

Because of the blood-colored fog, anyone else in Yang Qi’s position would easily get lost. However, deep in his heart, Yang Qi knew where the opposite bank was.

The fog was so thick it was almost liquid, and there was a bloody wind blowing, causing the surface of his God Legion Paradise to be splattered with blood. Eventually, the blood began flowing down, turning into wriggling worms that tried to eat their way inside to devour Yang Qi.

“Cleansing Flame,” he said, and fire shot out from him, burning the blood into nothing but ash.

Step by step, he continued onward.

BOOM!

At a certain point, a whirlpool suddenly sprang up directly in front of him, causing waves to roll out on the blood river.

Yang Qi’s heart pounded as he moved up and down along with the waves. He was riding the tide, and it wasn’t anything to do with energy arts, but rather his mental state. And as the waves grew wilder, he had to work harder to keep that state stable.

Suddenly, a wave rolled toward him that was dozens of meters tall, and pulsing with the might of blood-devils. However, Yang Qi simply continued on, going up and down with it like a leaf drifting on the wind.

After several hours of extreme danger, the waves ceased. Yang Qi now stood in the middle of the blood river, surrounded by incredibly thick fog. Despite being unable to see the temple up ahead, he could sense it.

He almost felt like collapsing from the intensity of this session of cultivation, but he knew he had to keep focused, forget about the God Legion Seal and the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, and focus completely on himself.

Although the rolling waves had ceased, something else had appeared: a swirling vortex, within which was a blood-colored devil-god of some sort. He wore a blood-colored mask and a matching suit of armor. He had a long spear in his hand, and was mounted on a blood-colored steed. And it was without hesitation that he charged toward Yang Qi.

“What? Is this a product of the baleful energy here?” When it came to the waves and fog, Yang Qi wasn’t afraid at all. But here was a blood-devil knight that was directly attacking him. Considering the threat posed by sinking into the river, it seemed almost impossible to get involved in a fight with something like this.

However, he knew that dealing with difficult situations was exactly what would benefit him.

As the blood-devil knight approached, he clenched his hand into a fist and struck out, completely destroying it. However, he sank down into the blood sea almost to his knees in the process.

He almost felt like he had lost his legs, and no matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t pull himself back out.

However, after a long moment, he succeeded.

Unfortunately, even more blood-devil knights were now appearing off in the distance, all of them charging toward him with full force. Having no other choice, Yang Qi began to run. The blood-devil knights were fast, but so was Yang Qi. And he had gained significant enlightenment during the ordeal of riding the blood waves. Unfortunately, he still had not grasped enough understanding of the magical laws of this place to achieve flight.

He was almost like a seabird, flitting across the water at top speed. All he had to do was get to the opposite shore.

Unfortunately, more and more blood-devil knights appeared, no matter how many he dodged.

Swish. Swoosh.

The nearby blood-devil knights threw their spears, which were themselves formed from blood, and pierced toward him with incredible force.

He instantly summoned the God Legion Paradise, and marvelously, it actually destroyed the blood spears and then converted them into backlash attacks that destroyed every blood-devil knight they encountered. Laughing heartily, Yang Qi sped up.

As he blasted through the blood-devil knights, he eventually reached a point where the fog began to thin enough that he caught sight of the temple up ahead. When he did, he breathed a sigh of relief.

Yet that was when an intense rumbling sound erupted from the depths of the river, and Yang Qi suddenly experienced a sensation of deadly crisis. The knights all sank down into the blood, and taking their place was a huge blood hand. It rose three hundred meters above him, and its five fingers were all dozens of meters from end to end. And there was a black hole in the palm that threatened to devour Yang Qi.

‘Not good,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘Something's coming up from the depths of the river.’ Howling, he pushed forward with as much speed as he could muster, heading straight toward the opposite shore. However, the hand moved with even greater speed and was soon on the verge of grabbing him.

At the last second, Yang Qi leaped forward.

POP!

The hand smashed down onto the river, causing a huge splash. Then it snaked forward again, this time angling to cut off Yang Qi’s path forward.

Yang Qi lunged in a different direction, and this time he barely managed to slip through the cracks between the fingers.

Seemingly enraged, the hand continued relentlessly toward Yang Qi, causing a wall-like wave to rise up in front of him.

Yang Qi waved his hand, sending out a sword of energy that sliced a hole open in the wall.

Somersaulting through the hole, he leaped forward again and was on the shore.

Exhaustion washed through him as he turned to face the hand of blood, which, surprisingly, was actually trying to pursue him.

Snorting coldly, he said, “You think I'm afraid of you now that I'm on the shore?” With his feet on solid ground, he quickly drew on his true energy to unleash a stream of King Life-Killer’s sword technique, which could kill life and slaughter blood.

Crack!

The sword energy lashed into the hand, cutting off one of the fingers, which dropped down to the ground and splashed into a pool of blood that then drained back into the river.

The hand faded away.

As it did, a wild and arrogant will communicated with him. “Just wait until you try to get back. I’ll be waiting for you....”

Turning, Yang Qi looked at the temple, which was actually a huge island in the middle of the river.

‘That devil will try to kill me when I head back. I definitely can't afford to underestimate it. However, all of this training is great for me. Perhaps by the time I head back, my enlightenment will reach the point where I can kill that thing.’

Feeling weary to his bones, he sat down cross-legged and meditated for a bit. Eventually, he was filling up with energy again, his nascent divinity and sea of consciousness shimmering with bright light. He rose to his feet, filled with so much confidence that he felt like he could do anything. Crossing the river had improved his cultivation base significantly and pushed his psychic scale to an even more complete level.

‘I wonder how much godhood is in this temple. Should I take it all for myself, or should I save some for the sect?’

Chapter 961: Exploring the Temple

The huge temple covered nearly the entire island it stood on, and was surrounded by the river of blood. Yang Qi got the sense that this temple had a very long history, and that the slaughter that led to the creation of the river happened after it had been constructed.

As he walked up the entrance stairs, the blood-colored fog faded away. Apparently, there was a power within the temple that kept the fog at bay. There were pillars lining the staircase that were scarred by the slashes of swords and sabers, as well as enormous palm and foot marks.

And there was a huge furrow running right down the middle, cut by what must have been an enormous stream of sword energy, separating the temple into two halves.

Overall, the staircase was completely dilapidated, although it only served to emphasize the ancient nature of the place. At one point, Yang Qi reached out and struck one of the pillars to see if he could leave a mark on it, only to fail. In that respect, this place was very much like the cave temple of the Vajra Māyādevī.

Yang Qi continued up the stairs, wondering what exactly this place was made from that was so tough he couldn’t leave the tiniest mark on it. Considering he didn’t have Terrifying will, if the godpower of the temple were to be unleashed on him, the consequences would be too horrible to contemplate.

‘Once I find the godhood, I’ll definitely need to assimilate at least one or two pieces. Otherwise, getting back across the blood river will be too nerve-wracking.’ Each of the steps leading up the staircase were as tall as a person, imparting the sense that this place hadn’t been built for humans, but for gods.

Yang Qi ascended several hundred stairs before reaching the temple proper. The inside was illuminated by bright light emanating from pearls inset in the walls and ceiling. They pulsed with faint godpower, indicating that they were actually magical treasures, although no one could possibly extract them from their spots.

‘Where’s the godhood?’

When he was on the outside, he had been able to sense the general direction of the godhood. But now that he was in the temple itself, he had no such sensation. It was really a case of not knowing the true shape of Mount Lushan because of being on the mountain itself. From a distance, one could easily identify the silhouette of a mountain. But on the mountain itself, it would be impossible to specify its shape.

That said, he could still catch the faint aura of godhood.

Looking around, he got a sense that this temple was like a world unto itself, and hunting down the godhood wouldn’t be easy.

Whoosh!

All of a sudden, a stream of devil light appeared, which Yang Qi blocked. After it dissipated, he caught sight of a devilish specter off in the distance, which was apparently some sort of hell-born fiend-devil with a power index of about two thousand.

‘There are fiend-devils here in the temple? How?’ Curious, he sent a stream of true energy toward the thing. It was slow to react, and quickly wrapped up. It struggled, but Yang Qi sent some of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth into it, completely immobilizing it.

“What are you doing in here?” he asked.

“Let me go immediately!” the fiend devil screeched. “We're subordinates of Lord Blood River! He sent us in here to get some godhood. If you don’t free me, then when Lord Blood River breaks free, he’ll destroy the temple, and you along with it!”

Yang Qi shook his head.

Crack!

The fiend-devil screamed as Yang Qi converted it into a black pearl, which he locked with the Devil-God Seal. The thing was as strong as a sect leader, so he decided to keep it as a magical treasure and decide its ultimate fate later.

At the same time, he sent some divine will into the creature’s mind to learn its secrets. As it turned out, there was an ancient devil king wasting away in the depths of the blood river, which had been sealed there using the power of this temple. He was called Lord Blood River, and he had summoned these fiend-devils to search the temple, break the seals, and free him. This was the activity that had led everyone to believe that some godhood had appeared.

Of course, once the seals were broken, the godhood really would appear.

‘So that’s what’s going on.’ There were plenty of fiend-devils in the Great Necropolis, some of which were Terrifying experts. Apparently, this Lord Blood River had issued a call of summoning, hoping to use them to free himself. Although Lord Blood River wasn’t on the level of a god, it was likely that he could match up to the little girl from Memory Peak.

If an entity like him were to be freed, it could be a disaster.

That said, there were definitely powerful entities in the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect that could deal with such a situation. Therefore, the best course of action seemed to be to get the godhood first.

Having dealt with the fiend-devil, he proceeded on, eventually reaching an enormous hall filled with ornamental rocks, garden features, courtyards, winding corridors, ponds, flowing rivers, and so on.

Suddenly, cackling laughter rang out as a group of fiend-devils appeared from within one of the garden courtyards, bristling with devil energy. One of them had a body made entirely of bones and a power index of two thousand five hundred. It was obviously an expert from the Hell of Bleached Bones. Another of the monsters was covered with bulging muscles and had a proportionally tiny head. It was a strength devil from the Hell of Strength, and had a power index of over three thousand. The final monster had bronze skin. It was a bronzeblaze fiend-devil with a power index of two thousand eight hundred.

Yang Qi didn’t need the power assessment systems to know this. Thanks to the level of his cultivation base and will, and his understanding of how those systems worked, he could now perform similar visual inspections.

The three vicious fiend-devils didn't waste any time at all, but immediately fanned out and unleashed attacks on him.

Yang Qi leaped up into the air to avoid the attacks, then dropped back down and unleashed three fist strikes of incredible power.

He was using Emperor Heart-Celestial’s signature Deathless Emperor’s Dao Fist, specifically, the three deadly moves of Unprecedented and Unduplicated, Great Heights Reached, and Without Parallel in History. He had gained enlightenment of them during the fight on the shore of the blood river, and was now unleashing them to practice a bit.

Plop!

The three fiend-devils were sent flying into a nearby pond, whereupon Yang Qi pressed the attack. Stretching both hands out, he summoned a gravitational force that pulled them into his hands. Then popping sounds rang out as he sealed them, transforming them into devil pearls, of which he now possessed four.

These three fiend-devils were elite experts that were famous on the Ancient Road to the Gods. They had drifted to and fro within the Great Necropolis for years, but had now been neatly sealed and imprisoned by Yang Qi. His energy arts had just advanced dramatically, especially thanks to the fight with the chief disciples and the hours spent on the blood river.

Yang Qi walked through the garden courtyard into a wide square, which had likely once been a place for martial arts training, but was now a lair of fiend-devils.

There were roughly a dozen of them, all with power indexes over two thousand. They were huddled in discussion when they realized that someone was approaching.

“So, the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect has sent disciples here, huh?” one of them said. The others cackled.

“You couldn’t have come at a better time. We need a soul to sacrifice to break down the sealing magics. Grab him! Once we unseal Lord Blood River, he can lead us to form a top tier sect!”

“Why don’t we half-free Lord Blood River and figure out a way to control his power? Then he can work for us!”

“We need to talk the matter through, first. Thanks to all the cultivators we’ve killed on the Ancient Road to the Gods, the executors are after us. Lord Blood River might be just the assistance we need to deal with them.”

“The Executors of the Ancient Road are a race of people left on the road by the legion of gods. Supposedly, their job is to protect the road itself. That's why they always hunt down fiend-devils like us, to keep us out of the god world. Those bastards!”

Even as they continued their discussion, the fiend-devils fanned out in formation and surrounded Yang Qi.

Chapter 962: Fiend-Devil Assembly

There were roughly a dozen fiend-devils here, and considering that ordinary fiend-devils couldn’t even enter this location, it was obvious they were all top experts. It only took them a brief moment to fan out and create a spell formation around Yang Qi.

Yet Yang Qi simply clasped his hands behind his back and casually said, “Are you all fiend-devils from the Ancient Road to the Gods? Aren’t you the least bit worried that causing problems for me will bring reprisals from the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect? We’re one of the top sects from the Ancient Road to the Gods, and everyone knows us. I suggest you don’t bring trouble down on yourselves.”

One of the fiend-devils cackled and said, “The Will Manifestation Heaven Sect does have an impressive reputation, but we couldn't care less about that. Besides, you people hunt and kill fiend-devils regardless of whether we kill you or let you go free. This is the Land of God Extermination! You people kill fiend-devils here for training purposes, and even use our corpses to forge magical treasures. The enmity between you and us is as deep as a sea!”

“There’s no point in wasting words on this brat.”

“Yeah, just activate the formation and kill him.”

“Be careful, everyone. This punk obviously has a high cultivation base. The fact that he made it through the blood river proves that he’s definitely strong. Stay united and kill him as quickly as possible. Who knows how many useful treasures we might be able to get from him. Remember, our main goal here is to unravel those sealing marks. And considering how many other fiend-devils have been assigned to this task, we need to take advantage of every possible opportunity, here. In fact, why don’t we turn this guy into a zombie puppet?”

“That’s a good idea! Come on, kill him!”

After communicating via divine will, the fiend-devils reached an agreement and began pulsing with devil energy. Because of the intensity of the magical laws in the area, even the combined might of these fiend-devils was only enough to create a spell formation that was roughly ten thousand square meters in diameter. However, the formation was filled with a fog of pure devil energy.

“Constrict!”

The leader of the fiend-devils was an asura, who pulsed with an aura of battle and whose skin was covered with a multitude of scars that bore witness to his ample experience. Not only was he physically imposing, but he also had a power index of over three thousand, and the energy flows he released with his attacks were no weaker than any of the chief disciples.

RUMBLE!

The attack he sent toward Yang Qi seemed like one of the most deadly killing moves from the Hell of Suras, the fabled Asura Devil-Crushing Fist.

Purplish-blue light shot from his fingernails, filled with toxicity so deadly it could kill the most elite experts. In fact, even a tiny scratch from it could be fatal.

However, Yang Qi hardly even looked at it. Thrusting his hand out, he used the most powerful move that he had picked up from Emperor Heart-Celestial’s suite of attacks, the Monarch Hegemony. It was a devastating move that resembled a monarch campaigning throughout the lands, and it contained millions of different types of forces, all of which interlocked and spread out like an army, conquering anything in its path.

The attack hit the asura, who was sent flying backward to slam into a wall before dropping to the ground, where he tried to struggle to his feet, but failed. Clearly, he had suffered severe internal injuries.

“You think a bit too much of yourself,” Yang Qi said in a cool voice. He took a step forward, and the vibration of his footfalls completely shattered the devil formation and sent the fiend-devils flying.

Some of the fiend-devils immediately turned to flee, but Yang Qi was too fast. He grabbed them and slapped the Devil-God Seal on them, then shrank them down into tiny pearls.

Before long, all of the fiend-devils had been converted into pearls, the largest of which was that of the asura leader. The fiend-devil energy pulsing from the pearls pierced into Yang Qi with deadly intent, but he easily neutralized it, then used it to strengthen the sealing marks he had created.

He now had a bracelet of roughly twenty pearls that used to be fiend-devils, the weakest of which had a power index of about two thousand. Together, they formed a magical treasure of such terrifying power that it could easily destroy a top-tier sect in the Great Necropolis. That said, if the fiend-devils were released, the first thing they would try to do would be to kill whoever controlled the pearls. Therefore, Yang Qi planned to keep them around and eventually convert them into angels. Then, when the pearls were holy in nature, this thing would be a truly formidable magical treasure.

After handling the fiend-devils, Yang Qi passed through the square to a temple beyond it, within which was a huge altar. Approaching the altar, he saw that it was covered with sealing marks formed from god talismans. He also sensed the energy of godhood.

However, even as he walked toward the altar, he suddenly shivered in shock as he realized that there were hordes of fiend-devils in the temple. Most were gathered in groups of three to five, and it almost looked like they were having a meeting of some sort.

Many of the fiend-devils were locked in conversation, causing a buzz to fill the air. Yang Qi’s mind nearly spun from the chaotic convergence of voices and divine wills.

Without hesitation, he backed up and left the temple hall.

Yang Qi was generally brave and fierce, but the sight of such a host of fiend-devils caused even him to shiver. After all, even he had his limits.

Besides, based on what he could sense, there were a few of the fiend-devils who warped the magical laws around them so intensely that he suspected they were at the Terrifying level. And if they weren’t, they were so close to that level that they definitely surpassed Empress Joyflower by several times over.

Although Yang Qi had nothing to fear from Empress Joyflower, and could even defend himself against her, killing her wouldn’t be an easy task.

Besides, some of these fiend-devils were definitely stronger than her. And if they joined forces, then even if he were a bit stronger, he would still meet a grisly end. The only way to even think about facing a group like this would be to have Terrifying will.

Sadly, his attempt to back out of the temple hall came too late. The cold, wretched gazes of several of the fiend-devils immediately locked on to him, whereupon those fiend-devils rose to their feet.

WHOOSH!

Before Yang Qi could get out, the door slammed shut and a clanking sound could be heard as it locked. As of this moment, Yang Qi was stuck between a rock and a hard place.

All of a sudden, the voice of a woman echoed out. “If you can’t do anything about the situation, you might as well sit back and enjoy it. There’s really no reason for you to run.”

The owner of the voice was both elegant and bewitchingly charming. In fact, she was so enticing that an average man who looked at her would be hard-pressed to suppress his desire. That said, her voice caused many of the surrounding fiend-devils to shrink back in fear. Obviously, she was considered one of their top experts.

‘She's a devil of dreams from the Hell of Nightmares.’ Yang Qi thought. Back in the mortal world, he had once subjugated a dream-devil, so he knew something about the kinds of monsters that came from the Hell of Nightmares.

The only upside to being surrounded by so many fiend-devils was that the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth was the bane of such creatures, and that would obviously be of some help to him.

Interestingly, the fiend-devils didn’t immediately attack him. Clearly, there were different factions and alliances present, each with different motives and goals.

If they had all pounced on him, he wouldn’t even have a chance to open the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart and try to get to the God Legion Seal.

As for the dream-devil, Yang Qi ignored her incredible good looks and tried to get a sense of her power index, but failed. It was almost as if she were a spirit body with no power at all. Of course, that just went to indicate that she was someone of incredible power, connected to heaven, earth, and the essence of all things.

Even if he had the Cruiser of Civilization with him, he still wouldn’t be able to get a sense of her power index, much less her psychic scale.

“Miss, I’m just a common disciple from the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect. I really had no intention of interrupting your meeting here. Please, I hope you can accept my apology. What say we simply keep out of each other’s affairs?” He kept his tone light and frivolous, but the truth was that, inside, he was ready to strike with deadly force at a moment's notice.

The dream-devil laughed. “How quaint, boy. I have to say, I'm really surprised that a lowly disciple like you would dare to run your mouth like that in front of me. Even a Terrifying expert from the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect would be completely on guard in a situation like this. But instead, you’re trying to seize the initiative. When did the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect get a disciple like you?”

“I'm not quite sure what you mean, Miss. Carry on with your meeting, I’ll take my leave.”

“You won’t find it that easy to just leave,” another fiend-devil said. “You might as well have stumbled right into hell, boy. Even if the legion of gods showed up here, they would probably still end up dead.”

This particular fiend-devil was so old that he almost seemed covered with the dust of history. He had a long white beard and a stooped frame, and looked like he was on death’s door. However, from the way the surrounding fiend-devils prostrated themselves before him, it made him seem almost like a revered sage.

‘A fiend-devil from the Hell of Sages and Mahātmās!?’ Yang Qi thought, shocked. Never in his wildest imaginations could he have guessed that he would run into a fiend-devil like this. According to the stories, the Hell of Sages and Mahātmās was actually stronger than the Hell of Mahānata, and was a place that was literally inhabited by sages and mahātmās who espoused the saying I will sacrifice myself and go to hell before I let anyone else do so. It had once been the foremost leader among all the other hells, but had later vanished, to the point where even Yang Qi’s Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth couldn’t sense its existence.

Of course, considering that he only had one third of the full Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, that meant he could only sense one third of the hells that existed. And some of those hells were immense places that existed in the very depths of the universe.

Chapter 963: The Hell of Sages and Mahatmas

Yang Qi was truly taken aback to see a fiend-devil from the Hell of Sages and Mahātmās.

The fiend-devil’s aura seemed less like that of a devil and more like that of a sage or mahātmā, although it was still a far cry from that of the legion of gods. In ancient times, there were actual sages and mahātmās who, in the hopes of gaining a deeper understanding of hell-born fiend-devils, had left the legion of gods. After all, the legion of gods believed that hells should be wiped out of existence. In contrast, the sages and mahātmās felt that there was a method to the madness of the hells, and they should be preserved. They felt that light and darkness were antithetical, but created and required balance. According to them, if all of the hells were destroyed, then the great daos of the universe would be destabilized and the magical laws of the god world would be thrown into chaos.

Unfortunately, even the righteous entities who lived in the Hell of Sages and Mahātmās were hunted and killed by the legion of gods. Some survived and sired offspring, but those later generations were eventually overtaken with wretched and evil energy. That said, they still bore the blood of their ancestors, and their combination of righteous and evil cultivation made them extremely terrifying. In fact, they were roughly on the same level as the Infernalfolk in terms of strength.

Thankfully, the fiend-devils of the Hell of Sages and Mahātmās only existed in that specific hell, as opposed to Infernalfolk, who spawned fiend-devils in virtually all of the other hells.

The effects of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth on the fiend-devils present was minimal, and that was especially true of this old man from the Hell of Sages and Mahātmās, who was like royalty. He had one eye that seemed to thrum with the aura of ancient mahātmās, and one that was profoundly wretched and evil. And as he stared at Yang Qi, it was impossible to miss the brutal nature of his gaze.

There was no doubt that he had Terrifying will, and at the same time, a split personality. On the one hand, he wanted to save all living beings in existence by transforming them into devils. On the other hand, he made light of murder and was viciously evil. He really did seem like an embodiment of universal balance.

“I’ve taken a liking to this boy, Mahātmā,” the dream-devil said. “Don’t even think of trying to take him from me.”

“There’s something unique about him,” the mahātmā fiend-devil said. “Didn’t you notice the scuffle between him and the other disciples of the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect? It happened just now on the other side of the blood river. He defeated one opponent after another, even Emperor Heart-Celestial. Then he walked across the river, and even escaped Lord Blood River himself. I'm afraid it won’t be easy to force him to be a male consort that you can extract quintessence energy from. Killing him would be the best option.”

“Absolutely not,” the dream devil replied. “He’s clearly a genius, and I'm going to groom him to his full potential.” Beckoning to Yang Qi, she continued, “Come to me, boy. You can’t escape, so why not become my man? With my protection, none of the other monsters here will harm you. What do you say?”

One of the other fiend-devil’s chuckled darkly. “Whoever becomes Dream Mintdance’s man won’t last for long. Why don’t we just take him and devilize him? Considering how powerful his cultivation base is, he would make a great fiend-devil. He’s obviously going to reach the Terrifying level soon, so what better disciple could we have?”

This particular fiend-devil looked like a middle-aged scholar, and even had a scroll tucked under his arm. In fact, he hardly looked like a fiend-devil at all. However, Yang Qi could sense the profound evil within him, and knew that he was the kind of person who could casually carry out all types of slaughter.

Yang Qi immediately recognized what he was. ‘A fiend-devil from the Hell of Books and Civilization. I've heard that fiend-devils from there all seem scholarly and educated. There are even powerful book-devils. All of them are very learned regarding history, and will absorb all the knowledge of a civilization before completely destroying it.’

Most fiend-devils, upon conquering a kingdom or world, would absorb the quintessence energy of the people they killed, and leave behind nothing but destruction. But fiend-devils from the Hell of Books and Civilization would absorb the power of those places’ history. In the mortal world, the Rich-Lush Continent had been considered a very small location. But even it had a host of countries and dynasties, as well as important historical figures whose deeds were recorded in books. When one considered all of the mortal worlds in existence, it could only be wondered how many civilizations existed there. Unfortunately, this was another hell that seemed to belong to one of the other two aspects of the God Legion Seal, because Yang Qi couldn’t sense it.

“Regardless of what you think, this man is mine,” Dream Mintdance said. Gliding forward, she reached out toward Yang Qi, her hand becoming like a dream with a million variations that spread out to cover him. Almost immediately, Yang Qi began physically shrinking down from the effects of the palm.

‘What a powerful palm move,’ he thought, shivering. He had no idea if Dream Mintdance was using her full strength, but he did know that he was locked down and couldn’t move. She was obviously vastly stronger than Emperor Heart-Celestial, and far beyond his own ability to deal with. She was definitely in the Terrifying level.

Although she wasn’t at the same level as the little girl from Memory Peak, as long as she was at the Terrifying level, it meant that she would be too much for Yang Qi to handle.

That said, he could tell that this palm strike was actually a test of some sort. Furthermore, there was an obvious weakness in it. Taking a step forward, he used the Glad Tidings of the Lord to dispel the dream qualities, then jabbed his finger right into Dream Mintdance’s palm and sent a stream of energy right into her.

Dream Mintdance shivered in disbelief at how his energy had entered her and started melting away her own true energy. Thankfully for her, Yang Qi had left the God Legion Seal in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, otherwise she would have been in a very bad position.

Furthermore, because he had hidden the God Legion Seal, he was able to conceal his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth and make it seem like he had devised his own method to vanquish wretched and evil techniques. After all, if the fiend-devils knew that he commanded the God Legion Seal, they would have instantly gone mad.

Crack!

A loud popping sound could be heard in Dream Mintdance’s arm, as though one of her bones had just broken. Just as quickly, more cracking sounds were heard as the bone mended itself. At the same time, she shoved Yang Qi’s true energy out of her, causing him to take three steps backward. Thanks to the exchange, he was now fairly certain that her power index was at about five thousand. Astonishingly, they were roughly evenly matched in that short interchange.

Dream Mintdance’s face flickered with anger, and she was clearly preparing to launch another attack. Before she could, Yang Qi held his hand up and said, “Slow down, Miss Dream Mintdance. Do you, a Terrifying cultivator, really plan to bully a low-level disciple like me? What glory is there in that?”

Dream Mintdance chuckled. “Still sparring words with me, boy? I’m a fiend-devil! Don’t you know what that means? Although, I have to say you are proving to be quite amusing.” Even as the words left her mouth, she extended her hand again. “I’ll only use thirty percent of my full strength; let’s see if you can handle it. Come on, let’s play!”

All of a sudden, a kingdom of dreams and fantasy appeared. Although energy arts in general were suppressed by the magical laws in the area, she was skilled enough to find the proper loopholes. Energy as fine as spider webs flowed out, interlocking and creating an enormous net that slowly began to settle down over Yang Qi.

Seeing that he was about to be bound and sealed, Yang Qi waved his hand and began to sever the threads of true energy. However, as the threads wrapped around the sword energy he sent out, it was weighed down, making it difficult to even move his arm.

Whoosh!

As Dream Mintdance’s hand closed in, she shrugged her shoulder, causing her robe to fall to the side, revealing much of her beautiful figure and skin to Yang Qi.

Yang Qi was no longer wearing his God Legion Battle Robe, but instead, the uniform of Memory Peak. It was a tough garment that was imbued with godliness, the type that not even a powerful god item could pierce. However, it was as tough as tofu compared to Dream Mintdance’s claw-like hands.

“Prepare to be stripped!” she chuckled, smiling like a female hoodlum. Before Yang Qi could even think of dodging to the side, she ripped the clothing from his upper torso.

Snorting coldly, Yang Qi shivered and sent out an expression of will designed to subdue devils. It was like a long sword, shining as white as the sun, that stabbed directly toward Dream Mintdance. As her true energy crumbled, more clothing rippled out to cover him, and this time it was the God Legion Battle Robe, brimming with the power to vanquish the wretched. Instantly, almost all of the fiend-devil energy around him was crushed.

Some of the nearby fiend-devils even felt like they were suffocating.

RIP!

In response to this unexpected move, Dream Mintdance backed away from him, simultaneously thrusting both of her hands out and spinning them to unleash a consummate energy art.

“Great Waves of the Dream!”

Ripples flowed out from her palm to block Yang Qi’s path, then shove him backward.

Meanwhile, the scholarly-looking fiend-devil shouted, “That wasn’t thirty percent strength, Dream Mintdance! That was more like forty percent!”

“Damnation!” Dream Mintdance growled, killing intent filling her face.

At the same time, Yang Qi thought, ‘Not good! The last thing I need is for this deviless to actually try to kill me. I guess the upside is that I can see what her energy arts are really like. There’s no way I'm going to die here!”

He stood straighter, his God Legion Battle Robe rippling, making him look like some ancient god-king clad in white, emanating an aura that terrified the other fiend-devils to the point that they didn't dare to approach him.

“What energy art is that?” Dream Mintdance asked. “And why does it seem to target me specifically? Not even the zen arts of the monks from the buddhist schools can affect me in this way.”

Yang Qi simply stood there, absorbing as much of Dream Mintdance’s hellish true energy as he could, storing it inside himself for later use. And of course, he didn't answer her question.

Chapter 964: The Sealing Mark Transforms

“Tell me what energy art that was, boy!” Dream Mintdance repeated. She took a step forward, her energy arts surging until a vortex formed behind her. Inwardly, Yang Qi was shocked by what he was seeing, and scrambled to think of a way to deal with the situation. He knew that if he didn’t answer the question, this monstress would attack even more viciously than before.

The surrounding horde of devils simply looked on, none of them daring to interfere with Dream Mintdance.

“I made this energy art,” Yang Qi said, "based on enlightenment I acquired from a variety of godrelics. It doesn’t really have a name. As for why I seem to be the bane of you fiend-devils, it actually has nothing to do with my energy art. You see, I'm backed by someone so strong you can’t even imagine who it is. If you kill me, you’ll be hunted down and killed no matter where you are! Run to the edges of reality, and you’ll still be wiped out of existence.”

“This backer of yours is that impressive?” Dream Mintdance said, stopping in place. She didn't care much about Yang Qi, but had to admit that he seemed to be perfectly equipped to counter her moves. As such, she had to find out exactly who this backer of his was.

“Hold on a moment, Dream Mintdance,” said the mahātmā fiend-devil. “Boy, could it be that you’re not really a disciple of the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect? I'm very familiar with the techniques of that sect, and I happen to know that not even the sectlord has power and will strong enough to vanquish devilish godpower like ours. If the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect were that strong, we would long since have been wiped out.”

“Tell us where you're really from, boy,” said the scholarly fiend-devil. “Who’s your backer? Who gave you the power to vanquish wretch-gods?”

“I'm not at liberty to say,” Yang Qi replied. “All I can say is that, if I die, my powerful backer will cross any planes of existence necessary to come find my murderer. Not even the Great Necropolis would pose an obstacle for him. And once he’s here, he’ll destroy all of you. Incidentally, considering the devil-vanquishing powers I have in me, I could always self-detonate if I wanted to.” Yang Qi was trying to buy time, and also trying to get his enemies to hesitate to shoot the rat for fear of breaking the vases.

“Is there really someone that powerful?” Dream Mintdance said, clearly unconvinced. She took a step forward. “Fine. I’ll kill you and find out. I was amused by you at first, but you’re turning out to be too pig-headed.”

“Slow down.” A stream of devil light shot out from the mahātmā fiend-devil, blocking Dream Mintdance’s path. “Let’s get to the bottom of this before we make a decision. This boy might be of some value to us. The devil-vanquishing godpower he has might be just what we need to break open the sealing mark and subdue Lord Blood River.”

“Right...” Dream Mintdance said. “Fine, good idea. I forgot about that for a moment. Even if we do break the sealing mark, it'll be difficult to deal with the obstinate and unruly Lord Blood River. Maybe this boy really can solve the problem of how to subdue Lord Blood River and turn him into a battle puppet.”

“Boy, tell us where you’re really from,” the scholarly fiend-devil said. “You have some very impressive energy arts, but considering there are so many of us, and only one of you, it would be an easy thing for us to crush you. Besides, it seems like you haven’t pushed those energy arts to their ultimate potential.”

“I accepted the legacy of an extraordinary person from the future,” Yang Qi said. Yet again, he was making a feint, hoping to manipulate his enemies into hurting each other. “Someone from the future world chose me as an apprentice, baptizing me and imparting new energy arts to me.” He was weaving lies so adeptly that there was no way the fiend-devils would catch on to his falsehoods.

Obviously, he was trying to shift blame to Proud Heaven. After all, it was highly likely that the fiend-devils here knew that Proud Heaven had one of the God Legion Seals.

“What? Someone from the future world, with devil-vanquishing godpower?” The mahātmā fiend-devil was visibly taken aback. “Don’t tell me Magister Proud Heaven from the future world has come to this era!? He led a reign of terror on the Ancient Road to the Gods, even running circles around the executors. It would be terrifying to have him in our time period. That said, he was injured badly enough that I doubt he's recovered. I wonder if we could capture him, too....”

The mahātmā’s eyes were virtually glittering with vicious schemes and plots.

“It’s definitely Proud Heaven,” said the scholarly fiend-devil. “He’s the only one who has that thing. That’s what he used to rob and plunder countless individuals on the Ancient Road to the Gods, and elude the executors. He even stole the head and heart of the god Brahma. I wonder if we could—”

“That’s right!” Dream Mintdance interjected. “If we could get that thing, then we could finally shed our fiend-devil identities!”

“Might I ask what the three of you are talking about?” Yang Qi said. “Considering that you seem to personally know my backer, you must know that he can’t be defied.”

Dream Mintdance snorted coldly. “It's not as though he’s completely invincible. Incidentally, do you know how full of craft and cunning he is? Do you really think he gave you those energy arts out of good will? If so, you’re wrong. You can't trust Proud Heaven. Did you know that he once had a son with a woman on the Ancient Road to the Gods? Later, he used that son to accomplish great deeds, only to kill him afterward. The boy's mother sought revenge, so he tried to kill her too, only to fail in the end. The only reason she escaped with her life was that someone rescued her. In any case, do you really think it's a good thing to have energy arts from a person like that?”

“I'm fully aware that he’s using me as a pawn,” Yang Qi said with a cold sneer. “But do you really think I would just let him manipulate me forever? I’ve already devised a way to free myself from his control, and even take his magical treasures in the process. In fact, I plan to kill and assimilate him. Then all of his energy arts will be mine!”

“Excellent,” the mahātmā said, nodding. “In that case, boy, are you interested in working with us? We won’t harm you, and in fact, we can help you get stronger. With our help, you might even be able to reach the Terrifying level. Once you’re strong enough, we can use your status as Proud Heaven’s pawn to lure him out into the open and kill him!”

“Seriously?” Yang Qi said, narrowing his eyes suspiciously. “I don’t trust him, so what makes you think I would trust you people? Working with you would be like asking a tiger for its skin! How would that be worth it for me?”

“You don’t have a choice, boy,” the mahātmā fiend-devil replied. “Besides, we want Proud Heaven, not you. You don’t even have Terrifying will, so it’s a foregone conclusion that he’ll kill you. Your only shot is to reach the Terrifying level. Well, boy? Do you agree, or not? If you have what it takes, we could push you to the Terrifying level right here and now.”

“Really? How?” Yang Qi intentionally plastered an excited expression on his face. “If I could reach the Terrifying level, I’d definitely be in the position to free myself from Proud Heaven.”

“How? Well, first tell us if you agree to our proposal or not. You're surely aware that this sealing mark is imprisoning Lord Blood River. He was a domineering figure long ago on the Ancient Road to the Gods, and was so strong that not even the Executors of the Ancient Road could kill him. Eventually, they sealed him here, where he has remained ever since, his cultivation base slowly weakening. The whole reason we came here today is to take control of him. And the best way to do that will be to use your devil-vanquishing godpower. In the moment that we unravel the seal, we can transfer both Lord Blood River and the god talismans from the Executors of the Ancient Road into you. You will act as the furnace, and our devil art will be the flame that assimilates Lord Blood River. What do you think?”

It was obviously a very dangerous plan.

“You want me to act as a furnace for you to assimilate a fiend-devil?” Yang Qi smiled coldly. “Do you take me for a complete fool? Wouldn’t you just assimilate me along with the fiend-devil?”

“Why would we do that?” the scholarly fiend-devil said. “What would be the point? If we wanted to assimilate you, we could do it right now. Look, we have a devil art called the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body, which will allow you to accommodate anything inside of you. Given the level of your cultivation base, it would normally take a hundred million years to cultivate the technique to perfection, but considering how many of us fiend-devils are here to help, we can impart it to you right now. Once we do, it’ll be an easy matter to seal Lord Blood River inside of you. While you use your devil-vanquishing godpower to suppress him, we can use our devil arts from the outside to offer support. Cultivating the Unspoiled Body in this way will be a torment, but if you can handle the pain until the end, it’ll be worth it. It’s not as if people like you come around all the time.”

“True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body?” Yang Qi said. “You people have mastered an energy art like that?”

Considering how many hell-born fiend-devils Yang Qi had slaughtered throughout the years, he knew a lot about the techniques of hell, and had heard of this Unspoiled Body.

Supposedly, back in the era of the legion of gods, there was a powerful monster who had risen up and fought the gods. He gained enlightenment of the essence of darkness and gloom, and of wretchedness and evil. He eventually sowed major chaos in the god world, killing multiple Paramount Gods before being defeated. He was the one who had created the boundless energy art known as the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body.

Supposedly, it could allow one to remain unspoiled and perfect through both a myriad of kalpas, and a myriad of tribulations.

Unfortunately, it was an impossible energy art to master. Even considering all of the fiend-devils Yang Qi had killed or captured, he had never heard any whispers of anyone cultivating it successfully.

In fact, he had eventually come to the conclusion it was just a myth.

“That's right,” the mahātmā fiend-devil said. “The technique has floated around in the Hell of Sages and Mahātmās for years. Few people have ever cultivated it, and none mastered it. However, you seem to meet all the prerequisites. First, you have a body molded by Proud Heaven himself, designed to be the bane of devil energy. We cultivators of devil arts could never do such a thing. Second, the Executors of the Ancient Road created the sealing mark to begin with, so that also helps. Third, once Lord Blood River is sealed inside of you, you’ll have access to the internal pressure you need. It’ll obviously be very dangerous to attempt this, but if you succeed, do you know how powerful your will convergence would be? The only question is whether you dare to make the attempt.”

Chapter 965: True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body

Cultivating the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body was a very difficult task. Apparently, there had never been a single fiend-devil who succeeded with it.

A kalpa was the time from when a world was born until it was destroyed. To say that one would remain unspoiled even after a myriad of kalpas had passed essentially meant that one would remain eternally indestructible. When interpreting the meaning of the character as “kalpa”, myriad carried the sense, not of ten thousand, but of a number so high it was incalculable.

Of course, cultivators had to experience numerous tribulations as part of their cultivation, experiencing both internal and external torment. Those who couldn't endure such torment would be destroyed forever.

Yang Qi’s initial reaction was that he wouldn’t ever cultivate something so dangerous while being threatened by so many deadly monsters. In fact, he probably wouldn’t agree to cultivate it under the eye of people he trusted, such as close friends and family members. The presence of friends or foes had no bearing on how deadly it could potentially be.

Unfortunately, it was obvious that the fiend-devils weren’t going to take “no” for an answer. And how could he defy so many monsters?

The more he thought about it, the more he realized that, if he survived, his cultivation base would receive incredible benefits and his psychic scale would skyrocket. Unfortunately, if he failed, he would definitely be finished.

As he stood there thoughtfully, the devils all eyed him with glittering eyes, and he could tell that if he refused their offer, he would instantly meet a grisly end. The three most powerful fiend-devils, the scholar, the mahātmā, and the dream-devil, were all shockingly powerful. They definitely wouldn’t give him any chance to make a move. Even worse, the increased pressure of the magical laws here made it harder to open the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. On the outside, he might have stood a chance. But inside, he didn’t even harbor a ten percent chance of escaping.

In fact, he was one hundred percent certain that he would die.

For now, he put thoughts of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart on the back burner. After defeating the dependency-devils and casting aside his reliance on magical treasures, his cultivation had improved and he had become even better at seeking viable opportunities and coming out on top.

“What do you say?” the mahātmā fiend-devil asked. “This is the kind of opportunity that will only come about once in a blue moon, boy. With the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body, you’ll have an honest shot at standing up to Proud Heaven. It's a technique that none of us here can cultivate. Once you have it, we can join forces to deal with any enemy, and hopefully make Lord Blood River a puppet under our control”

“You make a good case,” Yang Qi said. “But how do I know you won’t turn me into a puppet?”

“I’d be willing to swear a Heart-Devil Vow on it!” Dream Mintdance said.

Yang Qi shook his head. “What good is a Heart-Devil Vow? To people as strong as us, vows are bullshit. If the dao of heaven can't do anything to us, what could a mere vow do?” Unfortunately, Yang Qi realized that the more he said, the grimmer the expressions grew on these fiend-devils’ faces. So he quickly said, “Fine, I agree. However, the precondition is that you promise not to turn me into a puppet.”

The mahātmā fiend-devil’s face had been filling with killing intent, and he had clearly been preparing to strike with deadly force as soon as Yang Qi refused the offer. However, as soon as Yang Qi agreed, he smiled and nodded. “We won’t. Under no circumstances will we turn you into a puppet. Of that much, you can rest at ease. If we did, Proud Heaven would sense it, and that would spoil the entire plan.”

“That’s right,” the scholarly fiend-devil said. “If our suppositions are correct, he placed a seed deep in your nascent divinity. If anything happened to it, we would lose any advantage we have. Obviously we won’t even consider puppetizing you.” Truth be told, this scholar was just as glib of tongue as Yang Qi, and was essentially making things up off the top of his head.

“We’re not going to hurt you,” Dream Mintdance said tenderly. “How could we ever find another young man like you? How boring would it be to turn you into a puppet?” There was no way Yang Qi would be tricked by a dream-devil. He knew that dream-devils were infinitely devious and almost impossible to fully understand. They were like dreams that fluctuated between illusory and real.

“How about this, boy. First, use this to master the Unspoiled Body, which you won’t be able to do without our help.” In order to win Yang Qi’s trust, the mahātmā fiend-devil pulled something out of his robe that appeared to be a roll of sheepskin.

It fairly exuded a sensation of age, and the script on it was neither from the dao of immortals nor that of humankind. Instead, it was the bizarre script of the Devilfolk.

There were many civilizations in the countless hells that existed, and many types of scripts. After all, the civilizations of hell weren’t necessarily savage; some contained wise people, countries, kings, and clans, all with their own customs and ways of writing.

Yang Qi was familiar with many such scripts of hell, and as soon as he saw this script, he could read it.

Upon taking the sheepskin scroll, he realized that the text actually seemed to be moving in a very dizzying fashion. Thankfully, he had the devil-vanquishing abilities of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, which allowed him to make sense of it. Upon scanning it, he realized that it described an astonishing cultivation technique that was diametrically opposed to the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. But at the same time, it also seemed possible that it could perfectly correspond to the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, if cultivated properly.

Before seeing the details of the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body, Yang Qi hadn’t been particularly interested in it. There were many godly-class energy arts, all of which were very formidable and could be used all the way from the mortal world to the god world.

For example, upon being completed, the Seventy-Two Monarchs Energy Arts would likely rival the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. And the Secret-Ensconcing All-World Anything-Everything Fundamental-Law Magic would also be particularly powerful, making it possible to traverse the sea of time, and the countless worlds that existed, as if one were contained within the will of a sleeping buddha. And that wasn’t to mention the Martial-God Hegemon-King Heaven-Propping Pillar he had acquired. From what Yang Qi could tell, it might be able to rival the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, assuming he reached the god world with it.

Now, Yang Qi realized that the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body truly was the product of some powerful devil from hell, and it could be considered the bane of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. But at the same time, they were like two different paths that led to the same place.

‘I can already see the value of cultivating this technique,’ he thought. ‘Unfortunately, it’s very much like the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth in that it’s extremely difficult to properly cultivate. It must require something like the God Legion Seal. Otherwise, that mahātmā fiend-devil would have long since taken advantage of it. Before I even think about cultivating it, I need to study the technique in detail to find out what it's missing.’

And that was just what he did.

All elements of the script seemed to contain fluctuations of the birth and destruction of entire universes. They also abounded with the energy of hell. Normally, the cultivation of the technique would involve the creation of countless kalpas within the body, imitating the birth and destruction of universes. And each instance of destruction, each tribulation, would be difficult to survive. That was one reason why the technique was called Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations.

The unwritten implications of the text were profound and mysterious, and contained countless enigmatic aspects. After reading through them, Yang Qi realized the difficulties the technique could cause for the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. And eventually, he had a flash of insight.

Considering he had cultivated the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth to such a high level, if he encountered another of the God Legion Seals, it would be difficult to use it to achieve further breakthroughs. But things would be different if he had the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body. After all, it was a technique that had been specifically designed to defy the godmammoths.

It contained the wisdom of countless devil-gods, wisdom that surpassed Yang Qi’s in every way. And obviously, the fact that it contained so much information used to counter the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth meant that it was already giving him a deeper understanding of his own techniques.

It even contained information from devil-gods who had personally fought the king of godmammoths, and thus taken bits of godmammoth true energy.

As Yang Qi continued reading, he circulated his energy arts and saw that, deep in his sea of energy, the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth was transforming dramatically. The true energy of the technique was crystalizing, dispersing, and recrystallizing over and over again. As it did, he shivered, and his head began shining with a brilliant light.

The fiend-devils saw that something was happening, and assumed that he had already begun to cultivate the new technique. However, when the mahātmā fiend-devil noticed that Yang Qi was simply scanning the sheepskin scroll, he nodded. ‘It seems he’s just laying the foundation to cultivate the technique. Unfortunately, he doesn't have the Three Lives Stone passed down by the king of all true-devils. Without that, he’ll never fully succeed. But even if he achieves some minor success, we should still be able to use him to deal with Lord Blood River. With Lord Blood River as a puppet, we’ll have the perfect weapon to fight the Executors of the Ancient Road. The fact that Lord Blood River previously fought them means that his energy arts and substructure are perfect for dealing with them. He’ll definitely be a huge asset.’

The ultimate reason these fiend-devils had gathered was to try finding a way to fight the Executors of the Ancient Road. And they thought that Lord Blood River was their best option in that regard.

The executors had been tasked by the legion of gods with maintaining law and order on the Ancient Road to the Gods. And of course, a big part of that involved killing fiend-devils. In fact, they had no greater enemies than the fiend-devils.

Chapter 966: A Tribulation per Character

The sheepskin scroll was several dozens of meters long, and when rolled up, it looked like an ordinary scroll containing text and images that most people would find completely incomprehensible. However, thanks to the deep understanding of hell given to Yang Qi by the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, he could easily read it and learn of secrets that would normally take years of contemplation.

After his first read-through, he had a basic understanding of the general meaning and knew that he absolutely had to cultivate this technique.

Even if he didn’t succeed in mastering it, he had to unlock some of its mysteries. The benefit to his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth would be immense. Furthermore, considering that he had no teacher to help him once he acquired the other two parts of the God Legion Seal, this energy art would definitely give him an advantage.

Truth be told the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body was the most dramatically important thing he had acquired so far. Even godhood was unimportant compared to it. Godhood would appear here and there in the Great Necropolis, but the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body wasn’t something that could randomly be encountered.

As Yang Qi continued to pore over the information in the sheepskin scroll, he forced himself to memorize it, until his nascent divinity slowly began to feel exhausted.

Within his nascent divinity, countless peoples and civilizations appeared. He gained understanding of millions upon millions of energy arts, and conquered billions of knowledge-devils. Yet the technique was just too profound. Each and every character in every line of text contained a tribulation.

There was civilization tribulation, martial tribulation, dao tribulation, heavenly tribulation, earthly tribulation, human tribulation, doomsday tribulation, middle tribulation, early tribulation, grand tribulation, minor tribulation, devil tribulation, immortal tribulation, god tribulation, baneful tribulation, empyrean tribulation, flame tribulation, energy tribulation, ash tribulation....

There were countless types of tribulations, and their ultimate core meaning was wrapped up in the text written on the sheepskin scroll.

A person lived only by passing through a cycle of endless tribulations.

Sometimes there were even tribulations within tribulations. In that sense, the tribulations were like the endless waves on the surface of a sea. When one wave passed, another wave would come along after it.

That was the ultimate meaning of tribulations.

Both tribulations and kalpas were devils. And devils formed the bonds of transmigration. Having vanquished numerous knowledge-devils, Yang Qi could also have been said to have vanquished numerous knowledge tribulations. And his victory over the dependency-devils were victories over dependency tribulations.

In the end, tribulations could be called kalpas, and vice versa.

Tribulations could never be done away with, and were tantamount to fate, being a motivating force for the entire universe.

The sheepskin scroll elevated devils to the same status as tribulations or kalpas. Within the midst of tribulation, one could strive for that which was Deathless. And even heaven-gods could perish eternally within tribulation.

Even the Sovereign Lord.

‘So, that’s how it is. That’s how it is. I would never have been able to guess this myself. Who would’ve explained devils in this fashion? It seems my understanding of devils has been seriously lacking.... I used to think that devils represented darkness and gloom. Wretched evil. And I thought radiance and light were the opposition to that. Yin and yang. I assumed that devils are yin, and gods are yang, and that they exist in opposition to create the universe.

‘But now I see that devils are like tribulations and kalpas. This changes everything. Life is full of all sorts of tribulations, and in fact, every twist and turn you experience could be called that. And even if you successfully pass through all of them, the arrogance you develop as a result could be considered a tribulation of success. Being too successful is a tribulation just as much as being a failure is. Tribulations are everywhere, and so are devils. If this is the true meaning of devils, then what are gods about? If devils are tribulations, what are gods?’

He had no idea how to even begin answering that question. However, he had the feeling that if he did, his cultivation base would advance by leaps and bounds, and he would easily break through to the Terrifying level.

The more he thought about it, the more he felt like the answer was within him, just on the verge of being revealed. In fact, thanks to all of this new understanding, he already felt like his will convergence was just about to become Terrifying.

If the Terrifying level was “one”, then his current psychic scale was at ninety-nine percent. He was just a tiny hair away from that breakthrough. Unfortunately, many valiant and heroic individuals had remained stuck at that level and never been able to progress past it.

Several hours passed before Yang Qi digested the final character in the script. Countless kalpas and tribulations swirled within his nascent divinity, and his head ached. Sitting down cross-legged, he focused on vanquishing the new knowledge-devils.

The process took several days.

The monsters present were all very patient and didn’t interfere with him. As the mahātmā fiend-devil, the scholarly fiend-devil, and Dream Mintdance looked on, their eyes glittered with shock.

Eventually, the mahātmā fiend-devil said, “This kid is incredible. Far more impressive than I’d imagined. Not even I would dare to read the entire sheepskin scroll. Every single character that makes up the text contains a tribulation that the ancient True Devil Great Sage gained enlightenment of. Reading that scroll isn’t like reading an ordinary book; every character you read involves experiencing a tribulation. Most fiend-devils who read even one character would end up dead.”

“Is the scroll really that powerful?” one of the nearby Infernalfolk asked. “Mahātmā, I’m also on the very cusp of breaking through to the Terrifying level. Although that final step is daunting, I've always held hope that I would succeed. Considering that the sheepskin scroll is Devilfolk property, do you think I could take a look at it? I really can’t believe that even one character from the script could be all that dangerous.”

This particular infernal had a power index of three thousand and was considered very formidable. Although he wasn’t on the level of the mahātmā, the scholar, or Dream Mintdance, he was still one of the top experts. He was surrounded by a rather large group of other fiend-devils that formed a powerful faction in the temple.

“Go ahead and take a look,” the mahātmā said. Waving his hand, he sent the sheepskin scroll flying over to the infernal, who opened it and began to read.

However, after reading only the first character, he shivered. It was as if he were experiencing intense pain. After reading the second character, cracks spread out across his skin, which began to ooze with blood.

After reading the third character, popping and cracking sounds were heard as his meridians began to explode.

SNICK!

He finished the fourth character, but upon reaching the fifth character, he couldn’t hold on any longer. Blood and chunks of organs began bursting out from inside of him, and he even began to smoke as though he might explode at any moment.

WHOOSH!

The mahātmā quickly thrust his palm out, sending vital energy into the infernal, stabilizing him. It took a moment, but the infernal finally trembled and recovered his composure, yet a look of terror could be seen in his eyes. “One tribulation per character. I can't believe it. I read five characters and experienced five tribulations. Wind tribulation. Water tribulation. Doom tribulation. Early tribulation. Knowledge tribulation! And I couldn’t last any longer. Forget cultivating this energy art, it’s impossible to even read it!

“Hold on! That kid already read the entire text? What exactly is he? There must be more than ten thousand tribulations within that text. If he read the whole thing, does that mean he's going to master the ultimate energy art of the Devilfolk?”

“Not even I could’ve guessed that this would happen,” the mahātmā said. “He actually read the whole thing. Truth be told, my original intention was just to test him and see how many characters he could get through. Turns out, he read the entire thing through in one sitting. He obviously has some of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, otherwise he’d already be dead.” He chuckled darkly. “One tribulation per character. It’s not as simple as it sounds. I can only get through about a hundred characters, and even a god would find it hard to read the whole thing.”

“Don’t end up outsmarting yourself, Mahātmā,” the scholarly fiend-devil said. “What happens if reading the sheepskin scroll makes this kid so strong we can't fight him? What then? That scroll is the signature treasure of the Hell of Sages and Mahātmās.”

“Don’t worry. Anyone who isn’t Devilfolk that reads the entire sheepskin scroll will end up suffering an immense calamity. It's all part of my plan to deal with Proud Heaven. After the kid finishes reading the scroll, it will wipe out the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth within him. After all, the two techniques conform to the principles of mutual augmentation and suppression. The kid doesn’t have a God Legion Seal, so it’s obvious that he doesn’t actually cultivate the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. Proud Heaven just gave him a bit of it, that’s all.

“Furthermore, now that he's sunken into a trance of cultivation, he can’t hear us talking. As he seeks enlightenment of the initial aspects of the sheepskin scroll, the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth will slowly fade away.”

“So that's how it is,” Dream Mintdance said. “You really live up to your reputation, Mahātmā. I used to doubt that the Hell of Sages and Mahātmās really was the leader of all hells in the ancient past. But considering the show you’re putting on here, I have to hand it to you. I'm impressed.”

“Sadly, we’re all still mortals, not gods,” the mahātmā fiend-devil said. “Given that we’re not Deathless, we're fated to disappear from heaven and earth. My longevity will run out in a few hundred million years, so unless I reach the Deathless Throne before then, I’ll become dust. The sad thing is that, even though I have Terrifying will convergence, I still can’t gain enlightenment of the god world. It’s all the fault of the Executors of the Ancient Road. They block our path to the god world, which is why we need to wipe them out. That's our only path to progress!”

Chapter 967: Working with the Seal

‘There’s really a tribulation with every character!’ Yang Qi thought. A seemingly endless stream of characters were flowing through his sea of consciousness, each of them a tribulation. Despite how they assailed his nascent divinity, his will was strong and he was skilled at fighting knowledge-devils. Then the Devil-God Seal appeared, and he used it to shape the tribulations into the form of a spherical devil embryo.

Unfortunately, the devil embryo was not something he could assimilate, as it was something akin to the will of the Great Necropolis.

Although he had laid eyes on all of the characters that made up the sheepskin scroll, he didn’t have full enlightenment of them, and thus couldn’t assimilate them. Even just trying to assimilate a few, he found that the true energy of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth within him began dissipating. Apparently, if he fully assimilated the new technique, his old energy art would vanish.

Unfortunately, it would be troublesome to have knowledge-devils in his sea of consciousness that he couldn’t get rid of.

‘I get it. Merely looking at the sheepskin scroll will cause you to automatically begin cultivating the technique. And even if you somehow don't cultivate it, you’ll begin gaining enlightenment, which will cause damage to your quintessence-blood, and possibly even kill you. That mahātmā is a real schemer, isn’t he? He just watched me read the entire sheepskin scroll, with its one tribulation per character. He knew that every character I read would damage my Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, eventually dispelling it completely. For all intents and purposes, my energy arts would be crippled and I would be completely at the fiend-devils’ mercy. Well, it's not like I’ll just let that happen. I can use my Devil-God Seal to seal the knowledge-devils. Even though I won’t be able to assimilate them, I can at least save them for later. That said, I still need to put on a bit of an act....’

He was already coming up with a counter-plot, and was forcing his complexion to alternate between bright red and pale white, as if he were hovering on the brink of death. At the same time, he was carefully sealing away all traces of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth in his sea of energy, to make it seem like he had lost it.

Of course, the truth was that his powers were actually growing more refined because of the process.

The Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth spun smaller and smaller until it was in a tiny, pulsing dot.

If someone were to closely inspect his sea of energy, that pulsing dot would shift to his Chest Center acupoint. In turn, if someone shifted the focus of inspection to the Chest Center acupoint, the pulsing dot would move to the Life Gate.

And if someone tried to assess his true energy in general, that pulsing dot could fly out of his body, which was something he couldn’t do in the past.

After perusing the sheepskin scroll, he could make his true energy a part of the void. He could connect his vital energy to the universe itself, becoming one with all creation.

“The kid’s energy arts are dissipating,” the mahātmā said. “The side-effects of the sheepskin scroll are kicking in.” He exchanged a glance with the scholarly fiend-devil and Dream Mintdance, and they were all pleased that the plan was working.

“Once the effects are complete, he’ll be no threat to us,” the mahātmā continued. “Did he really think the sheepskin scroll would be so simple to study? Even if Proud Heaven were here with his one-third of the God Legion Seal, he would have to pay a heavy price to study the scroll. And it would be a very difficult task to gain enlightenment of it. This boy only has a bit of Proud Heaven’s true energy, so what could he possibly accomplish?”

How could he have any idea that Yang Qi had spun a completely fabricated tale about Proud Heaven, and that he actually had the God Legion Seal and the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth?

Yang Qi had beaten them at their own game.

All of a sudden, he opened his eyes. Face ashen and filled with an expression of astonishment, he said, “My techniques! My energy arts! They’re all gone!”

Laughing heartily, the mahātmā stroked his beard and said, “Congratulations, boy! You've lost the true energy of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth and gained the techniques from the sheepskin scroll. The time has come to accept a boundless devil body!”

“You...” Yang Qi said, plastering grief and indignation onto his face. “You tricked me! How crafty and murderous, Mahātmā! Before, I had a chance to stand up to you, but now that you’ve taken away my true energy, I'm no threat to you at all!”

“I'm helping you, boy,” the mahātmā said, not making any attempt to be courteous now that he thought his plan had worked. “With that true energy in you, Proud Heaven could have taken control of you at any time. After all, it wasn’t yours to begin with. Furthermore, Proud Heaven could have taken it away at any time he wished. What use is true energy like that? Once you cultivate an Unspoiled Body, you can simply imitate the true energy of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. That should make it much easier to strike Proud Heaven when he’s not expecting it. Even if you don’t kill him, you’ll seriously injure him, at the very least. Furthermore, the true energy isn’t completely gone, it’s just been converted into fuel for your Unspoiled Body. What, did you really think you could cultivate both of those techniques at the same time? Who do you think you are? King Immortal-Slayer? A godmammoth? The Sovereign Lord? The exalted True Devil?”

Yang Qi sighed deeply. “Oh well. Whatever. A wise man submits to the circumstances, right? Considering the genius I am, I was well aware of how unideal the previous situation was. And in the end, better a bad life than a good death. What orders do you have for me now, Mahātmā?”

The scholarly fiend-devil laughed heartily, clearly happy to have taught Yang Qi a lesson. ‘This kid is smart,’ he thought. ‘And flexible. He could definitely be useful to us. Considering he’s a pawn of Proud Heaven, we can definitely use him as our pawn against Proud Heaven.’

Clearing his throat, he said, “That’s exactly how you should think about it, boy. Do exactly as we say, and things will turn out well for you. You think you’ve lost your energy arts? Just wait until you finish cultivating the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body. Then your bitterness will turn to joy, and you’ll be thanking us from the bottom of your heart.”

“Fine,” Yang Qi said. “I’ll do things your way. As long as I can live through this without becoming a puppet, I’ll help you any way I can. I won’t even ask for any further benefits. I just want to kill Proud Heaven and win my freedom.” He was really laying it on thick.

“You’re quite the genius, boy,” the mahātmā said. “How could we possibly consider killing or puppetizing you? As a puppet, you wouldn’t have any thoughts of your own, which wouldn’t benefit us at all. We need you to make progress and advance our agenda of dealing with the Executors of the Ancient Road. Very well. Go stand by that sealing mark. We’ll pour power into you and help you absorb the devil formation and the devil vitality. Once you reach a higher level of enlightenment, you’ll be vastly stronger than you are now.”

Not bothering with words, Yang Qi leaped up onto the altar and sat down in the middle of the enormous magical symbol inscribed on it.

The other fiend-devils present were all thinking roughly the same thing. ‘So, he still has some other energy arts left. And he’s still fairly strong. He really isn’t an ordinary person. Thankfully, his other energy arts don't seem to be specifically designed to deal with fiend-devils. Now we don't have to be so afraid of him.’

Crash!

All of a sudden, an enormous pillar appeared behind Yang Qi, which thrummed with domineering might and protective powers. It was none other than the Martial-God Hegemon-King Heaven-Propping Pillar.

‘What?! He knows the consummate arts of the Martial Tyrant Cadre? Their leader has an incredible cultivation base! Is this guy somehow connected to him?’ More so than ever, the mahātmā suddenly realized that Yang Qi was a very mysterious figure.

“Boy,” he said, “you can’t use other energy arts when cultivating the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body. Don’t worry, I’ll set up a devil formation to keep you safe.”

“Alright!” Yang Qi said, dispelling the pillar. He had only revealed that energy art to reinforce to the fiend-devils that he still had some fighting prowess.

Closing his eyes, he sent his divine will into the sealing mark, and instantly sensed as though he were sitting on an enormous sea of blood amidst a vicious conglomeration of devil energy.

Furthermore, the sealing mark really did contain enormous godhood.

The sealing mark was like a huge curtain made of blood, burning endlessly, causing anyone who sat atop it to feel intense heat. It was actually very uncomfortable. However, Yang Qi was able to use a certain art to send the energy flowing through his meridians to be assimilated, boosting his own power.

He nodded as he finally got a sense of what the Executors of the Ancient Road were capable of. After all, this sealing mark was their work. Apparently, their handiwork was compatible with the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth!

Meanwhile, the mahātmā was leading the other fiend-devils to pool their energy arts. The fiend-devils present had power indexes anywhere from two to four thousand, yet they all knew that the mahātmā was the strongest of them all. Thus, they followed his directions without question.

BOOM!

At a certain point, the mahātmā waved his hand, causing the sheepskin scroll to fly up into the air and unfurl.

Then, he spoke directly into their seas of consciousness. “Use your various techniques and magics to power the devil formation. And follow my orders down to the last detail. If you don’t, you know what the consequences will be.”

“Yes,” the scholarly fiend-devil said. “Allow the mahātmā to control the formation. Anyone who doesn't follow orders will be punished immediately. Understand?”

“Hurry up, everyone!” Dream Mintdance growled.

Under the urgings of the three most powerful fiend-devils, the devil formation quickly took shape, making it seem like a devil from the distant past was being summoned.

Chapter 968: Working with the Seal (2)

A horde of devils was powering a devil formation of immense size and intensity. The formation’s eye was the sheepskin scroll, and as they poured devil vitality into it, the formation took shape. A short time later, it was fully activated, and boundless devil light shone from it to cover Yang Qi, who was seated in the middle.

He had already steadied his energy flows and was ready when the devil vitality poured into him. Normally speaking, the devil vitality from so many different top experts, being so mixed and varied, would have instantly devilized any human. Either that, or killed them. But having been converted by the formation and the sheepskin scroll, it became gentle and mild, and actually conformed to new, unique characteristics.

“Hurry and begin forming your Unspoiled Body,” the mahātmā said. “Adjust your energy to its optimal state and do not resist in any way, lest you be destroyed, understand? Remember, don’t use any energy arts while the devil vitality is activating the Unspoiled Body. This energy art is one of true devils, and is beyond anything ordinary in nature. Compared to it, other energy arts are empty and absurd. The most important thing to focus on is pushing your will to the Terrifying level. After that, things should go smoothly. Got it?”

In response, Yang Qi summoned a vortex in his sea of energy, which led to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Into it, he threw the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, the Seventy-Two Monarchs Energy Art, the Martial-God Hegemon-King Heaven-Propping Pillar, and everything else from his collection.

Soon, he was like an empty husk, void of any energy arts whatsoever. The only things left behind were his fleshly body and near-Terrifying will.

The devil vitality could now flow through him without facing any obstacles.

‘Such incredible devil vitality!’ he thought. Preparing his meridians, he opened his mind and unleashed the myriad tribulation characters inside of it.

BOOM!

The first to fly out was the very first character to appear on the sheepskin scroll, that of ‘flame’. Of course, it didn't represent ordinary flame, but rather the most ultimate of flame tribulations.

As soon as it appeared, Yang Qi felt like he was engulfed by flame. That single character contained all sorts of flames. The flame of desire, the flame of truth, the flame of cultivation, the flame of gods.... A huge variety of fiery tribulations filled him. And if he had possessed any energy arts in that moment, they would have all been burned away.

He quickly took control of the devil vitality within him and sent it into the flame tribulation. The devil vitality burned, but slowly transformed into the ultimate meaning of scorching fire, and the character for fire was imprinted onto his heart.

That flame character was the first level of the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body, and it was something mysterious and profound. Upon assimilating it, Yang Qi could command the fires of millions upon millions of tribulations, and would be like a god of flame descended upon the world.

Seeing what Yang Qi had accomplished, the mahātmā said, “Well done. I never would’ve guessed that you could succeed with the first character so quickly. Remember, there are over ten thousand characters in the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body, and each one is a tribulation that contains a myriad of subsidiary tribulations. With our help, you should be able to finish the first verse of the scroll, which contains sixteen characters. Let's get to it!”

‘This is more difficult than I’d imagined,’ Yang Qi thought. With the help of the devil vitality, he had cultivated the first character, the flame tribulation. Even just that had come with spectacular results. In fact, he could now tell that it was stronger than the one third of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth that he had. After all, thanks to the sheepskin scroll, he was dealing with the full cultivation method of this True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body.

Without the scroll, Yang Qi was certain that he could never cultivate this technique without dying in the process.

‘This mahātmā is really playing games, isn't he?’ Yang Qi thought. ‘Well, it's not like I'm easily taken advantage of!’ He knew that getting his hands on the sheepskin scroll was an absolute necessity, and was already coming up with a plan to do so.

After succeeding with the flame character, he proceeded on to the second character, which was ‘doom’. It was the same ‘doom’ from the word ‘doomsday’, and contained countless tribulations of doom. Almost immediately, he was filled with such intense rumbling sounds that he instinctively wanted to abandon this session of cultivation. It felt like his skin was pulsing, and his meridians were about to experience the destruction of doomsday. The pain was almost unbearable.

But Yang Qi was not the type of person who gave up easily. He had immense willpower, and had experienced all sorts of deadly situations in life.

He sent the devil vitality slamming into the doom tribulation, and tribulations like that from the end of the world surged within Yang Qi as they clashed. They formed concentric circles which rapidly rotated, then eventually headed toward his left hand.

He extended his hand and the concentric circles began shrinking, eventually settling onto his ring finger in the form of a ring.

As of this moment, the ring finger of his left hand represented the tribulations of doomsday.

Next came the third character, whereupon Yang Qi sensed a major decline in the devil vitality pouring into him from the formation.

Looking over, he saw that some of the weaker fiend-devils were trembling, and their faces were ashen. Some began crying out in loud voices.

“Mahātmā, our energy arts and quintessence vitality are running out! Please, dispel the formation before we're completely drained!”

“Once the spell formation is activated, there’s no reason to stop it!” the mahātmā replied coldly. “As hell-born fiend-devils, you should understand what it means to sacrifice yourself to the True Devil....”

“Aaaiiiieee!”

One of the fiend-devils with a power index of two thousand screamed as he transformed into a skeleton, which subsequently clattered to the ground.

The other fiend-devils were visibly shocked as they realized that they had been fooled by the mahātmā. Now that they were part of the formation, they were stuck, and were slowly being drained of power by the sheepskin scroll.

These fiend-devils were all important people on the Ancient Road to the Gods, each of them invincible in their own right, and wielders of immensely powerful energy arts. But now they were being sacrificed by the profoundly sinister mahātmā fiend-devil.

One of the fiend-devils suddenly howled in rage and tried to attack the formation itself, but as soon as he did, devil light shot out from the sheepskin scroll and enveloped him. An agonized shriek rang out, and a moment later he was nothing but a skeleton.

Another of the fiend-devils contemptuously spat. “I thought you people from the Hell of Sages and Mahātmās were wise and virtuous! You're supposed to be sages and mahātmās among fiend-devils! How could you possibly come up with a scheme as vicious as this? You’re really going to sacrifice us?”

“You’ll eventually die a horrible death, Mahātmā!”

“I admired you, Mahātmā, and was always there at your every beck and call. I was your most loyal servant and believer! Please, spare me!”

“Mahātmā, you know who my backer is! I'm from the Extreme Dao Devil Sect!”

Some of the fiend-devils were weeping, some were shouting threats, some were cursing, and some were begging. But none of it did any good. The mahātmā completely ignored them and focused on the operation of the spell formation. Slowly but surely, more of the surrounding fiend-devils crumbled into ash, their devil vitality flowing directly into Yang Qi, who continued to face the waves of tribulation.

Each new character that Yang Qi assimilated required even more devil vitality. And when he realized that the devil vitality was coming from the dying fiend-devils, he was struck with how merciless the mahātmā was. Although fiend-devils in general were usually merciless, this mahātmā was really pushing things to a higher level. Although he seemed dignified and honorable, he was really the most vicious and cruel kind of creature imaginable.

That begged the question of what other vicious tactics he might try using on Yang Qi.

In fact, Yang Qi’s first guess was that the plan was to use him as a cultivation furnace. The mahātmā couldn’t personally cultivate the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body, so he hoped to have Yang Qi cultivate it, then steal it from him.

Sadly for him, Yang Qi would ensure that he tried to steal a chicken only to end up losing the rice he used to lure it.

“Aaagghhh!”

More screams rang out as fiend-devils continued collapsing into dust. Each of these creatures was powerful enough to found a sect as strong as the Profound Killing Dao Sect or the Profound House of Battle Energy. But now they were dropping like flies, with even their nascent divinities being wiped out.

At this point, the mahātmā’s expression flickered, and he said, “Hurry up and cultivate the next character, boy. Once you finish with the first line, you’ll be vastly stronger, and will be able to keep Lord Blood River in check. Understand?”

Declining to comment, Yang Qi continued with his cultivation. He had just come to realize that some strange fluctuations were emanating from the sealing mark beneath him, fluctuations that contained traces of blood energy.

Chapter 969: Mutual Scheming

The first line contained sixteen characters.

Flame Doom Yearly Beginning, Heavenly Truth Glorious Splendor, Successful Achievement Never Failing, Defeating Ruin Floating Adrift!

It was impossible to determine what exactly the characters meant, as they didn’t seem to form an actual sentence. However, each character contained a different core meaning, and as they entered Yang Qi, they gave birth to immense power and made his fleshly body vastly tougher.

The characters Yang Qi saw were different from the characters seen by the infernal who had looked at the sheepskin scroll earlier. The reason was that the text on the scroll was constantly changing, creating new texts with every moment that passed. All of the different possible text combinations contained different truths and aspects, but they were all profoundly mighty.

The first line of text that Yang Qi had perused was making his fleshly body vastly stronger. However, there were other changes going on. For instance, his understanding of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth was improving. Although the technique was sealed away, it was such a fundamental part of his fleshly body that, as he cultivated the Unspoiled Body, it automatically improved.

C-C-CRACK!

Countless daoist techniques from the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body flooded through him, causing the particles within him to tremble. As the devil vitality continued flowing through him, his body was destroyed and born again millions of times over.

If he let things progress naturally, he would probably become the most powerful devil in all history. However, his will was strong, and as he developed the new technique, he secretly began to draw on some of the abilities of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth to develop the constitution of a godmammoth. He was cultivating godly and devilish techniques at the same time!

When gods and devils combined, they were unparalleled under heaven!

Two immense forces flowed through him like water, although the mahātmā fiend-devil had no clue as to what was happening. All he knew was that Yang Qi’s aura was growing stronger. After all, the mahātmā had never successfully cultivated the energy art on the sheepskin scroll. That scroll was one of the most precious treasures from the Hell of Sages and Mahātmās, and it was hard to say how this fiend-devil had gotten his hands on it. He had tried to cultivate it in the past, but whenever he did, he nearly slipped into cultivation deviation. His true energy would reverse its flow, and the deadly side-effects would loom. Thus was born his current plan to help Yang Qi cultivate it, then assimilate him and take the technique that way.

The sheepskin scroll was required to cultivate the technique, but there was more to it than that. To properly cultivate the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body required the Three Lives Stone, which was an item similar to the God Legion Seal. It contained the wisdom of the horde of devils, and was inscribed with knowledge of all kalpas, tribulations, fates, destinies, and the like. It was what could lead to one being invincible to all sorts of tribulations.

All of a sudden, Yang Qi erupted with godly might.

He had reached a critical juncture and needed more devil vitality than ever. The fiend-devils in the spell formation were dropping left and right, no matter how they screamed, struggled, or tried to flee.

And as the devil vitality flowed into Yang Qi, his cultivation base transformed. He carefully combined aspects of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth with the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body, leading him down a most mysterious and unorthodox path.

His constitution improved and his psychic scale increased, and as he experienced the tribulation of each character from the scroll, it really was like passing through kalpa after kalpa.

Transcending tribulation was like reaching the other shore of pāramitā.

It was the sea of suffering that gave birth to kalpas, and right now his sea of energy had become that sea of suffering. Tribulations blossomed in the sea of suffering, to the point where every move and stance contained the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body.

Truth be told, the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body was not a technique designed for combat. However, when it was mastered, any move made with it would contain the power of a myriad tribulations. Even the slightest move of one's finger would contain boundless, majestic power. And all of one's divine abilities, even those of the most common sort, would become the most dangerous and deadly moves imaginable.

Even a breath could give birth to tribulation.

Although Yang Qi had only cultivated the first line from the scroll, it had already surpassed the one-third of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth that he possessed. Because the two techniques were governed by the principles of mutual augmentation and suppression, Yang Qi developed even greater wisdom from both of them.

Upon seeing that Yang Qi was pulsing with energy flows filled with tribulations, the mahātmā fiend-devil said, “Alright, his fleshly body is now sturdy enough to accept the sealed Lord Blood River! I'm going to start devouring the sealing mark now. Once it's gone, Lord Blood River will appear, and the next step will be to re-seal him. Then, with pressure from both outside and in, we can force Lord Blood River to submit.”

With that, he chopped his hand out toward the sealing mark. Instantly, a voice could be heard that sounded like it was made of countless other voices, bubbling like boiling water. The voice laughed, then said, “So, Mahātmā, you’ve sacrificed your fellows to create an entity to serve as a furnace to seal me. Unfortunately, I’ve been manipulating you the whole time! Many thanks for creating this furnace for me!

“The despicable villains from the Executors of the Ancient Road sealed me here, but my chance to be free again came once the sealing mark began to loosen. Now, I have the perfect fleshly body waiting for me, and all I have to do is possess it! Then, the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body will be mine!”

An intense blood energy flowed out from the sealing mark and resolved into a blood dragon, complete with fangs and claws. It swirled above Yang Qi’s head for a moment, then dove right down into his sea of consciousness.

Yang Qi’s pores instantly erupted with blood-colored light that swirled out, wrapped around the sheepskin scroll, and began dragging it down.

Screams rang out as the spell formation whirred even faster than before, and the fiend-devils were all dragged toward Yang Qi, including the mahātmā, the scholarly fiend-devil, and Dream Mintdance. From the look of things, Yang Qi was now fully under the control of Lord Blood River.

From within his mind, Yang Qi’s nascent divinity cried, “Mahātmā, hurry... hurry... save me! Lord Blood River is taking me over. He’s possessing me!”

“Ultimate Life Destruction!” the mahātmā spat, and all of the fiend-devils began to wither. Popping sounds rang out as they transformed into skeletons, their nascent divinities and quintessence energy flowing into the sheepskin scroll to help Yang Qi fight Lord Blood River.

Meanwhile, Lord Blood River howled in rage.

“Die, all of you! You tried to plot against me, Mahātmā, but in the end, you fell for my tricks. Once I have this new fleshly body, we can fight things out. As for you, boy, why aren’t you dead yet? Your nascent divinity is really tough!”

Blood-colored waves raged on the surface of Yang Qi’s sea of consciousness, and on top of it all was an old man in a blood-colored robe, with sunken eyes, a high-bridged nose, and fangs that made him look like a vampire. Reaching out, he grabbed Yang Qi’s nascent divinity and sent raging, blood-colored fire to engulf it.

However, that was when three mighty nascent divinities appeared in Yang Qi’s sea of consciousness. They were none other than the mahātmā, the scholarly fiend-devil, and Dream Mintdance, all of whom had Terrifying will convergence.

“I'm surprised you’re doing this, Lord Blood River, but sadly, it’s not going to help.” A sagely glow sprang up around the mahātmā, driving away the blood-colored light as he attacked Lord Blood River.

It all happened in the same moment that Lord Blood River grabbed Yang Qi’s nascent divinity to assimilate it.

Intense booming sounds filled Yang Qi’s sea of consciousness.

Outside in the temple, all of the other fiend-devils were skeletons, with the mahātmā, the scholar, and Dream Mintdance sitting cross-legged, their wills sent into Yang Qi. Bright, blood-colored light would occasionally flare up within Yang Qi, then die down.

“Aren’t you three worried that this fight will kill the brat?” Lord Blood River said.

“No, Lord Blood River! He’s already begun cultivating the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body. Although he hasn’t fully mastered it, he’s succeeded enough that our fight won’t hurt him at all.”

Chapter 970: Taking the Sheepskin Scroll

Yang Qi’s sea of consciousness had transformed into a shocking battlefield, upon which heaven-shaking, earth-toppling events were playing out. Thankfully, he had cultivated the first line of the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body, making him tougher than ever. And every time destruction loomed, tribulation energy would roll out and protect his sea of consciousness and fleshly body.

Were it not for that, to have the wills of four Terrifying experts battling within him would have caused his mind to explode and his body to collapse into dust.

With massive amounts of devil vitality flowing into him, he was able to fully cultivate the first sixteen characters of the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body.

One could only imagine the dramatic changes to his constitution if he cultivated the entire thing. As of this moment, the structure of his body conformed to kalpas and tribulations, and every single particle within him was like a tribulation.

Unfortunately, the dramatic changes were also something of an attack on his nascent divinity, which was slowly being pushed to the boundaries of his sea of consciousness. It was like a rowboat in the middle of a huge storm, just on the verge of sinking.

However, Yang Qi was only putting on a front of being very anxious and nervous about the situation. It was all a sham, and he was simply waiting for the right opportunity to come along. The opportunity to ensnare these Terrifying experts.

Given the level of his cultivation base, he obviously wasn’t a match for Terrifying opponents. Perhaps, if he used a host of magical treasures, he might have a chance. Right now, he needed to get his hands on the sheepskin scroll and further cultivate the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body. It was the perfect match for the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, and would put him in a position where he could face Terrifying opponents while he himself was still in the Destabilizing level.

That said, he could still take advantage of the situation if he found the right opportunity. The fighting going on was fierce, and he could sense the psychic power of the four opponents slowly draining away. Therefore, all he had to do was launch an attack at the right time.

Oftentimes, victory didn’t go to the strongest, but the most patient.

As the battle raged, his nascent divinity drifted on the edges of his sea of consciousness. Lord Blood River was by no means at a disadvantage against the three fiend-devils, which just went to show how powerful he was. In fact, Yang Qi wondered what his psychic scale was, and exactly who he was.

The battle went on.

All of a sudden, more blood energy erupted from the seal below, as if the battle itself were unraveling it even faster.

Apparently, Lord Blood River was about to emerge.

“Boy, hurry up and assimilate the seal!” the mahātmā urged. “Absorb it into your Unspoiled Body. That’s the only way to keep Lord Blood River in check and suppress his psychic power!”

Trying to sound as weak as possible, Yang Qi said, “But Mahātmā, that Lord Blood River just absorbed part of my nascent divinity! I can’t even control my own body!”

Of course, it was a complete fabrication.

However, the mahātmā had no reason to doubt him. He knew how powerful Lord Blood River was, and it only made sense that Yang Qi’s nascent divinity might have been damaged just now.

“It’s fine, I’ll help you!”

Despite everything that was going on, the mahātmā sent out some will into Yang Qi’s nascent divinity, causing it to swell and grow. Yang Qi couldn’t have been more delighted to have fooled the mahātmā, and used it to strengthen himself.

In order to make sure the mahātmā had no idea of the truth, he quickly drew on a secret magic.

‘God Flame!’

He quickly sent flames to engulf his nascent divinity, making it seem like there was blood energy inside of it that was being burned away.

Yang Qi sent the flames coursing through his meridians, then rose to his feet. Reaching down, he ripped open the sealing mark on the altar, causing a host of egg-sized motes of light to rise up into the air, shining like dazzling pearls.

It was none other than godhood!

Beneath the sealing mark, Yang Qi saw a circular basin that had obviously once contained hundreds of pieces of godhood. However, over the years, they had been slowly worn away by the process of keeping Lord Blood River sealed. Now there were only a few left.

“Come on out, Lord Blood River!” Yang Qi said. “I'm taking this godhood!” He waved his hand, sucking in all of the godhood, which instantly caused his nascent divinity to surge with power. “Now, get the hell out of my sea of consciousness!”

A vortex appeared within his dantian region, and the Engine of the One God flew out of it and landed in his heart. Without any hesitation, he threw the godhood into the engine.

Crick. Crack.

Almost immediately, the cold voice of the Engine of the One God’s photonic computers spoke.

[Activating imperial-heaven pre-beginning systems, stage one. Activating stage two. Activating stage three. Activating stage four. Activating stage five. Activating stage six.]

It stopped at the seventh stage, and the process caused boundless and majestic power to surge from his heart and fill his body.

Before, he wouldn’t have been able to sustain it, but with an Unspoiled Body he could.

Instantly, the blood energy within him was shaken violently. Meanwhile, another vortex opened behind him, out of which flew his God Legion Seal.

Crack! Snap!

His power index began to climb until it was at the level of six or even seven thousand. The God Legion Seal flickered within his mind, and before anyone else realized what was happening, their wills were ejected from within Yang Qi.

Even Lord Blood River was forcibly removed.

Yang Qi suddenly burst out into odd, maniacal laughter. “Good riddance, fools! Did you really think you could fight me, Proud Heaven? How could I possibly let that happen? This pawn of mine was under my control the entire time! Now, I’ll be taking this sheepskin scroll, and if you want revenge for it, come and find me in the future world!”

Then Yang Qi simply flew up into the sky like a bird.

Grabbing the sheepskin scroll, he vanished into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, making it completely impossible for anyone to do anything to him. Obviously, his major powerup had finally allowed him to access the chart.

He had laid a very clever trap, declaring that he was Proud Heaven in an attempt to shift focus away from himself. And it obviously wouldn’t hurt to create some powerful adversaries for Proud Heaven.

“What?”

The sudden developments were completely beyond anything the mahātmā fiend-devil had predicted or planned for.

“This is bad...” the mahātmā blurted. He wanted to give chase, but quickly realized that there was no quarry to pursue. Meanwhile, an old man in a blood-colored robe was floating up into the middle of the temple. It was none other than Lord Blood River.

All three of the fiend-devils were visibly stunned.

“Run!” the mahātmā said.

“To where?” Lord Blood River said, sending out a wall of brilliant light that blocked their path. Cackling viciously, he said, “You're going to pay a high price for your cunning. You really got played by Proud Heaven. He has a lot of pawns, you know. They’re everywhere.”

“We were all fooled by Proud Heaven,” the mahātmā said, “even you, Lord Blood River. What’s the point in making things hard for us now? You’re strong, but not necessarily strong enough to take all three of us out at the same time. We all have Terrifying will, you know.”

“That’s right, Lord Blood River,” the scholarly fiend-devil said. “In the end, we did nothing to actually hurt you. It would be pointless to get involved in a fight that would hurt all of us. If the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect found out, they would send an army in here to capture us.”

Lord Blood River chuckled. “Fine, I won’t kill you. From now on, you work for me. We’re going to make the most invincible devil sect that’s ever existed!”

Chapter 971: Complete Victory

“We’ll follow your orders, Lord Blood River,” the mahātmā said, exchanging a glance with the other two fiend-devils. All of them were in agreement. Their original plan had been to use Lord Blood River to deal with the deadly Executors of the Ancient Road, so as long as their end goal would be met, they were fine with this change of plans. After all, Lord Blood River had fought the executors’ most senior experts and come out alive. In the end, he would be a great leader.

Lord Blood River cackled. “Well, you certainly changed your minds quickly. But that's good. A wise man submits to the circumstances. With Terrifying will, the three of you are elites among elites, so it would be a shame to destroy you. What a pity that the talisman sealing me was taken by Proud Heaven, along with all the remaining godhood.”

“There could be no more powerful enemy than Proud Heaven,” the mahātmā said. "He controls the future world, and stirs up trouble wherever he goes. He has a God Legion Seal, and even declared war on the Primeval Age. No one knows exactly how he got this strong. It’s going to be difficult to fight him.”

“He led a reign of terror on the Ancient Road to the Gods years ago,” Lord Blood River said, looking very serious. “Not even the executors could really do anything about him. His ultimate goal was to reach the god world, but he was always foiled. Now that he's back, he’s surely more dangerous than ever.”

Not even Lord Blood River, in all his might, was confident in being able to fight Proud Heaven.

“We definitely have to get that sheepskin scroll back,” the mahātmā said. “It’s the legacy of the most powerful leader from the Hell of Sages and Mahātmās, and contains secrets that will allow the devil world to devastate the god world.”

“We’ll get the sheepskin scroll back eventually,” Lord Blood River said. “After all, I still have to cultivate the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body.... For now, we need to leave this place before the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect shows up and causes trouble. Although, I doubt they would dare to openly fight me. The only people who could have any hope of killing me would be gods!”

WHOOSH!

He became a streak of blood-colored light and shot off into the distance, followed by the three fiend-devils.

Although the Land of God Extermination prevented anyone under the Terrifying level from flying, for those in that level, it was an easy task.

As they left, their energy fluctuations were noticed by some of the old-timers in the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect, and a dozen or so streams of powerful will immediately shot out to intercept them. When they reached the blood-colored streak of light, Lord Blood River’s will spoke. “Experts from the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect, I am Lord Blood River, and I have earned my freedom today. Do not cause any problems for me. I have no desire to fight you, lest we both end up injured.”

“Fear not,” replied one of the old-timers. “There are other, more important matters. For righteous and evil cultivators alike, the greatest mutual enemies are the Executors of the Ancient Road....”

Lord Blood River sped off, and the divine will projections from the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect returned to where they came from. Obviously, a fight between Lord Blood River and the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect would have led to massive amounts of destruction.

Just like that, a potentially massive conflict died down.

Of course, the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect had no idea how much Yang Qi had profited during the incident. The events that played out in the temple had been obscured from the beginning by the powers of the three fiend-devils.

Back in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, Yang Qi clutched the sheepskin scroll in his hands and laughed heartily.

He had profited greatly.

‘This sheepskin scroll truly is a great treasure. The mysteries it contains are unfathomable right now. Although I’ve read through the entire thing, I obviously haven’t gained full enlightenment. I doubt even perusing it a thousand, or even ten thousand times will be enough.’ Already, the sheepskin scroll had become something of utmost importance to Yang Qi. Truth be told, although it appeared to be made from sheepskin, it was actually impossible to tell what kind of skin it was.

For all Yang Qi knew, it might even have come from the skin of a mahātmā fiend-devil.

And then there was the godhood. He had acquired thirty-two pieces, and although they were all weak and drained, they were still godhood.

With that much godhood to power the Engine of the One God, he had been able to expel the fiend-devils and Lord Blood River. That taste of the true power of the Engine of the One God was obviously just a tantalizing preview of what it would be like if it were fully powered. It would likely be strong enough to kill a god.

‘This godhood is vastly stronger than the devil vitality, and will definitely be a big help in furthering my cultivation of the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body. But I don’t want to get ahead of myself. For one thing, I'm not going to just abandon the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth and cultivate this new technique. The best plan would be to advance them both at the same time.’

Sitting down cross-legged, he circulated his true energy and summoned the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth into himself yet again.

Almost immediately, it clashed with the Unspoiled Body and caused a massive explosion of true energy.

Frowning, Yang Qi sealed the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth to prevent any conflicts. After things had settled down, he sent out the tiniest flow of energy from the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, and very carefully connected it to the Unspoiled Body.

Then he paid close attention to the results. From what he could tell, the two energy arts really were mutually opposed, similar to water and fire. Of course, while water could extinguish fire, fire could also evaporate water.

It was similar to the mysterious flow of yin and yang.

With that, he focused more on the enlightenment aspects. He had already read the full text of the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body, and thus had plenty of knowledge-devils in his mind. That alone was a big threat to his nascent divinity.

After some contemplation, Yang Qi suddenly came to the realization that he needed a third type of power to achieve a balance.

“Great Necropolis godpower!”

Drawing on the devil embryo, he extracted some of the godpower from Profound Valor and sent it streaming toward the other two powers.

The Great Necropolis was a relic of the god world, left behind by some unknown entity. But one thing was for sure: it was an item similar to the God Legion Seal, and it vastly surpassed the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. The Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart obviously couldn’t spew out countless brand new immortal worlds to completely change an era.

The godpower of the Great Necropolis was one of its most mysterious aspects. Soon, the will of the Great Necropolis in his nascent divinity was growing larger, and before long, it began pushing away the wills of the two opposing energy arts.

Eventually, a three-way balance of power was created.

Yang Qi nodded. Masking the presence of his nascent divinity, he provided more godpower, allowing the three separate wills to begin competing with each other.

Then, he drew on the godhood again.

He sent five pieces into the imperial-heaven pre-beginning systems of the Engine of the One God, allowing a massive force to flow into his sea of consciousness.

All of a sudden, he felt like his mind was about to be torn apart. Blood began oozing out of his eyes, ears, nose, and mouth, and he was wracked with pain.

Despite that, he smiled, as he could sense the will of the Great Necropolis crumbling. A moment later, his nascent divinity was back in its previous state, rotating in place and absorbing all of the various types of power. The blood on his face evaporated, transforming into beautiful, porcelain fire.

His sea of consciousness was now empty of everything; even the God Legion Seal was gone.

At the same time, his sea of energy now had two flows of energy that were like a yin-yang taiji symbol.

Yang Qi knew that his energy arts had progressed once again. As of now, he could either use the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body, or the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, any time he wished. Although he hadn’t completely fused the two, at least they weren’t in open conflict.

‘What a pity I still haven't reached the Terrifying level. Obviously, it’s much more difficult for me to do that than the average person.’ He sighed.

He stood, causing cracking sounds to ring out. Then he thrust one palm out to release the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, and the other palm out with the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body. The combination was amazingly powerful.

‘Now, the time has come to be sealed again, God Legion Seal, Engine of the One God. I don’t need you. I rely on myself for cultivation, and only use tools like you when necessary....’

With that, he sealed them up tightly again.

Chapter 972: Perfectly Matched

Yang Qi had managed to take two incredible techniques and match them together perfectly. By properly adjusting his true energy, he could unleash the power of the Unspoiled Body with one hand, and the Hand of the One God with the other. And he could summon a projected arm of true energy to simultaneously draw on the Seventy-Two Monarchs Energy Art.

Of course, considering that he couldn’t combine the two major types of energy yet, it was obvious that he couldn’t add in a third type, like the Seventy-Two Monarchs Energy Art. Having three types of energy interlocked in his sea of energy would be too much for his constitution.

However, if he did do that, it would make his cultivation base beyond terrifying. He would likely be able to vanquish the legion of gods with those three techniques combined. Unfortunately, that combination was not something that humans could sustain without exploding from the force.

That said, even just having those three types of energy within him, uncombined, was a big drain on his energy, and it required the help of numerous magical treasures to sustain. In any case, releasing two of the techniques, one with each hand, perfectly matched, didn’t necessarily make him unparalleled under heaven, but in combination with Terrifying will, it would make him virtually invincible.

Even now, he was fairly certain he could fight a Terrifying expert without being at such a disadvantage. Before, he would likely have met a grisly end in a fight like that, unless he escaped to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. But now things were different.

Unfortunately, there would be some major side-effects to cultivating the two techniques simultaneously. The stronger he became, and the tougher his nascent divinity grew, the more difficult it would be to break through to the Terrifying level.

The level of difficulty was already sky high.

Thankfully, he had roughly thirty pieces of godhood, so if he could get his hands on the psychic scaling systems, it wouldn’t necessarily be impossible to achieve a breakthrough.

After all, those systems were incredible on their own, so one could only imagine how spectacular they would be in combination with the engine.

The Cruiser of Civilization resembled King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans insofar as every additional part that was added would provide immediate and obvious improvements. Once he had the psychic scaling systems working with the vivicreation systems, genetic systems, power assessment systems, strength god systems, and imperial-heaven pre-beginning systems, the immense boost in power would be unimaginable.

In fact, that combination would definitely prove to be even more useful than the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. In the end, the chart would surpass the cruiser, but the chart required that he improve his own cultivation level to access its abilities, as opposed to the cruiser, which operated on pure power. Even the weakest person in the world could operate the Cruiser of Civilization.

Yang Qi could tell that, with his recent advancements, he would not be making sudden cultivation progress any time soon. Ceasing his cultivation, he pulled out an object that almost looked like an enormous sheet. ‘Let’s see what this talisman is all about. If it was designed to seal Lord Blood River, it must be incredible.’

One of the Executors of the Ancient Road had created this sealing talisman to restrain Lord Blood River, and according to what Yang Qi had heard from the fiend-devils, it was a vastly powerful treasure.

When he sent some divine will into it, he sensed some sort of magical aura inside. There were clearly magical techniques, magical powers, magical laws, as well as magical and natural rules that were all designed to bind and restrict nascent divinities, kill the physical form, and wear down the mind.

“True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations!”

Drawing on his newest devil-based energy art, Yang Qi tried to assimilate the talisman. Immediately, it began trembling, and sparks began showering out of it.

As the sparks landed onto Yang Qi, they stung like fire, which was quite a surprise, considering his foundation. His cultivation base was beyond the compare of virtually all other people, so the fact that little sparks like this could cause him pain indicated that they were profoundly incredible.

“Imprison!”

Yang Qi moved his hands out in a circular motion, sending a stream of true energy out to confine the sparks. The energy wrapped around the sparks, but shockingly, it only held for a moment before the sparks exploded out again. When the sparks hit his pearl bracelet, one of the pearls exploded, and a scream rang out as a fiend-devil with a power index of two thousand five hundred died instantly.

Then another spark caused another pearl to explode, and then another. Monsters were dying one after another, and Yang Qi couldn’t have been more shocked.

Soon, it became obvious that these sparks could destroy fiftieth ranked immortal worlds, and were stronger than any imaginable magical treasure. It was no wonder they hurt when they hit him.

Next, Yang Qi amped things up by adding in the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, and the sparks stopped as a result. The talisman began trembling, then shrank down until it was a yellow paper talisman about one inch wide and seven inches long, which Yang Qi absorbed.

Whizz!

Within his sea of energy, there was a sphere of true energy that was the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, and within that, the paper talisman looked like a little fish that had just been released into the ocean, happily swimming back and forth.

From what Yang Qi could tell, the talisman was some sort of treasure that actually conformed to the true energy of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. In other words, his true energy could stimulate the talisman, and the talisman could benefit his true energy.

‘What exactly is this thing? All I know is that it comes from the Executors of the Ancient Road. It’s incredible! Considering what it can do, I’d say it’s highly likely that it was created along with the quintessence and blood of godmammoths from the god world.’

Even better, keeping the talisman in the true energy of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth wouldn’t cause any conflicts, and wouldn’t result in any dependency-devils.

As for the Engine of the One God, he left it sealed in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart in order to avoid any dependency on it.

Having handled all the important matters at hand, and also having improved his energy arts, Yang Qi finally flew back to the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect.

None of the disciples dared to get in his way, and in fact, most of them looked at him with open veneration and respect.

“Hey, look. That’s Elder Brother Yang Qi from Memory Peak. I heard his cultivation base is enigmatically high. In the Land of God Extermination, he defeated the experts from Nāropa Peak and Spiritwall Peak. He also defeated Emperor Rain, then fought to a draw with Emperor Heart-Celestial, the chief disciple from Celestial Peak.”

“He even defeated the insufferably arrogant Sorrow Might from Grand Might Peak. I heard that Sorrow Might was to receive a baptism that would push him into the Terrifying level. But now that he was beaten so badly in a fight, I doubt that’s going to happen.”

“A lot of important people hate him now. In fact, I’ve heard that some of the peaklords have passed down orders to teach him a very hard lesson if possible.”

“But Peaklord Memory is no one to take lightly. Normally speaking, conflicts between disciples are ignored, but if the elders and peaklords get involved, it's a totally different story.”

“You’re right. But I bet Yang Qi isn't worried about that. Didn’t you notice that big disturbance in the temple on the blood river? Even some of the old-timers were surprised by it. It was probably some sort of devil tribulation.”

“Oh yeah, that’s right! What happened? Did he actually pass a devil tribulation?”

“He’s so strong!”

Yang Qi had earned a name so quickly that none of the disciples dared to be disrespectful to him, and even some of the higher-ups in the sect were leery of him.

Ignoring it all, Yang Qi headed to Memory Peak.

An Yiru was waiting for him there, and when she saw him, exclaimed, “When did you get back, Yang Qi? Are you alright? Considering the disturbance in that temple, did you get any godhood?”

“No, I stumbled onto a bunch of fiend-devils in the middle of some sort of meeting. There were even some Terrifying experts.” Even if Yang Qi told the truth, there was no way anyone would believe him. And if they did, it would involve revealing some of his most important secrets. “They hatched a plot to release Lord Blood River, and it succeeded. They all started fighting, and I took advantage of the chaos to sneak away. In the end, I have no idea where the godhood was. Ai, I'm just lucky to have escaped with my life.”

“So that's what happened. How horrifying.” An Yiru completely believed him. After all, she had received some behind-the-scenes information, and given the circumstances, it made sense that Yang Qi would have failed to get any godhood. With Terrifying experts on the scene, he would have been completely focused on just trying to stay alive. “Well, you might not have gotten any godhood, but the entire sect is already talking about your fights on the shore of the blood river. And that includes the disciples in the outer courtyards, such as the Courtyard of Monastic Discipline, Courtyard of the Martial Dao, Courtyard of True Energy, Courtyard of Empty Light, and so on. Furthermore, the council of chief elders has taken note, and they want to meet you.”

The courtyards she had mentioned were subsidiary organizations of the mountain peaks. There were fifty mountain peaks and eight thousand courtyards, all of them like sects of their own. And although none of them had Terrifying experts, many had people with power indexes over three thousand.

Chapter 973: One Word to Reach the Heart

Yang Qi was already relatively familiar with the overall structure of the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect. The central palace was like the capital city, filled with its civil and military officials. The prime elders, elder kings, council of chief elders, and the empress formed the core leadership.

It was almost like a country.

Then came the fifty mountain peaks, which were like feudal government officials. Beneath them were the courtyards, which were like prefectures or armies. Even further down in the rankings were the countless other organizations that existed, filled with the outer sect disciples, who were like the common people.

It was like a pyramid, and in the grand scheme of things, Yang Qi was already like one of the leaders. Although Memory Peak wasn’t part of the capital city, it was actually much more powerful than some of the minor figures who were in the capital city.

And Yang Qi was currently famous enough that even low-ranking elders in the palace knew who he was and viewed him as an important person.

He currently had a good position in the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect, and had no desire to abandon it. The world in general was a chaotic place, and this seemed like the perfect place to remain hidden. Until he reached the Terrifying level, it would be difficult to stay safe on his own merits alone.

Besides, just about everyone was after the God Legion Seal, and he couldn’t very well hide out in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart for the rest of his life. Everything was changing nowadays; destiny was expanding and the dao of heaven was growing stronger. Without seizing control of his path now, it would be hard to reach the level of the legion of gods. And that was especially true considering that he bore the God Legion Seal. It was a big responsibility, so if he closed himself off to the outside world, he would never make significant progress.

Therefore, his hope was to stay in the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect for as long as possible.

“Hey, what does Master think about everything that happened?” Yang Qi asked.

“After I returned, I asked her about you and inquired whether she would take steps to ensure your safety. After all, you’re a top genius of Memory Peak, and we can't have anything happen to you. You’re the main reason our mountain peak is rising to new heights. Anyway, Master said that virtuous people will naturally receive the help of heaven, so there was no need to worry about you. Seems to me she knew you were safe.”

“I see,” Yang Qi said with a nod. The more he learned about the peaklord, the more he found her to be enigmatic and impossible to predict.

However, he was convinced that although she knew he harbored secrets, she didn't know the specifics of his various energy arts, or that he could now hold his own against a Terrifying expert.

Normally speaking, it didn’t matter how high one’s power index got, someone weaker than the Terrifying level would be smashed to bits by an opponent who was in that level. In fact, they wouldn’t even have a chance to use any energy arts or daoist techniques. Yang Qi was a bit different, though. Not even the four powerful enemies he had just recently fought were able to harm his sea of consciousness.

“Now that you're back on Memory Peak, Junior Brother, I have a few questions I’d like to ask you about some daoist techniques,” An Yiru said. “The fact that you fought to a draw with Emperor Heart-Celestial shows that you’re far, far above my level.”

“That’s fine,” Yang Qi said. Actually, he was very impressed with An Yiru’s cultivation base. She had been born into this enormous sect, and had risen her way through the ranks, experiencing all sorts of cultivation systems in the process. It was a very different path from his. His had involved random chance, bitter training, fortunate acquisitions, and deadly slaughter.

Disciples from huge sects like this could build very solid foundations, as opposed to him, who had experienced deadly crises and killed many opponents.

Yang Qi and An Yiru went to one of the daoist rite centers in Memory Peak to do some training. As they did, other disciples gathered to watch and compare notes.

She demonstrated a whole host of energy arts, while he merely sat there and waved his finger a bit to defend against whatever she threw at him. Afterward, he would explain the weaknesses he had noticed. Not only did this help An Yiru to dramatically improve herself, but it also gave him a good idea of the ultimate meaning of the energy arts cultivated in the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect.

The cultivation system in the sect was derived from the name of the sect, and the words “will manifestation.” In other words, they involved causing one’s will to be made manifest, and were unconstrained, fluid, and natural. They could be hard or soft, rigid or flexible. But at the same time, they could deliver piercing blows, and when cultivated to the ultimate level, were like a reflection of nature.

They would provoke dramatic transformations to true energy, making one both agile and powerful.

One breath of true energy from those energy arts could go a long way. In fact, many enemies who fought disciples from the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect would be flummoxed by how long their true energy would last. At the same time, Will Manifestation Heaven Sect disciples were adept at biding their time until they found a weakness, whereupon they would strike like lightning.

The true energy operations were very eye-opening to Yang Qi. The Will Manifestation Heaven Sect really lived up to its reputation of having been a superpower sect for hundreds of millions or even billions of years. They had obviously refined their energy arts to the ultimate level. Those who cultivated such techniques could, by their mere breathing, absorb the quintessence of the dao of gods and make their own bodies reflections of the god world.

Right now, Yang Qi’s cultivation was based on treasures that had been passed down by the legion of gods and the horde of devils. Although he hadn’t cultivated them to the absolute peak of perfection, he was still able to use them to seek enlightenment of the secrets of gods and devils.

The disciples of Memory Peak watched An Yiru training with her energy arts, and they benefited greatly as a result. The chief disciples of the various mountain peaks were responsible for instructing the other disciples, but in this case, the chief disciple actually didn’t match up to Yang Qi, who had recently advanced by leaps and bounds.

When Emperor Heart-Celestial and Yang Qi fought, they had ended in a draw. But if they had a rematch now, Emperor Heart-Celestial would only last for three moves before being defeated.

Furthermore, he now had a much deeper understanding of his daoist techniques and energy arts. Thanks to perusing the sheepskin scroll, and cultivating his Unspoiled Body, he had experienced countless tribulations, refining his techniques and constitution. That experience had been a big wakeup call, focusing his enlightenment and pushing him closer to godly ascension.

Normally speaking, he wouldn’t have been able to reach this state even with direct instruction from the peaklord.

Several months passed, during which more and more disciples of Memory Peak were learning from the training sessions held by An Yiru and Yang Qi. Of course, in the mortal world, several months could be considered a long time, but to people who pursued the dao of immortals, it was like the snap of a finger. After all, many experts would think nothing about spending millions, or even hundreds of millions of years in seclusion.

There were even stories of some experts who spent billions of years in meditation before running out of longevity, having failed to achieve a breakthrough.

Therefore, the disciples of Memory Peak were more than happy to spend months learning from Yang Qi. And all of them had experienced advancement in their energy arts as a result.

Most of the disciples in the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect would have resources and energy built up for use when they found an opportunity for a breakthrough. For some, it would only happen when some monster began causing problems, and they had no option other than to deal with it. But in this case, their help came from Yang Qi.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi’s cultivation was going well. Helping others to pass their own tribulations was like doing so himself, and his energy arts benefited as a result.

He was slowly making progress with the Unspoiled Body. And in order to make sure that it didn’t end up being overwhelmed by the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, he was doing his best to further both techniques at the same rate.

The way the two techniques were always at odds with each other was actually a benefit to his cultivation base.

From what he could tell, his power index was now beyond four thousand, although he was suppressing it to seem like it was three thousand lest he attract unwanted attention.

Because of Yang Qi’s instruction, and because of their solid foundations, the disciples of Memory Peak were all improving and growing stronger. Soon, word began spreading through the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect.

“Did you hear about what’s going on? Yang Qi has been giving sermons to the disciples on Memory Peak and helping them train in their energy arts. Everything he says provides major benefits, and all the disciples from there are improving.”

“Yeah, I know. You know that female disciple Qiu Muhua? Not long ago, she couldn't possibly have been a match for me. But we had a duel a few days ago, and her energy arts have advanced beyond belief. She used our sect’s signature Megaplexus-Heaven Thirty-Six God-Thread Enwrapping Energy Art, and I could hardly keep up. Her progress is unbelievable.”

“Same here. It seems like all the disciples from Memory Peak are progressing, and can beat their opponents in only three or so moves.”

“Who is this Yang Qi? Not even the peaklords can do what he’s doing. With one word, he reaches the hearts of his audience and enlightens them with perfect wisdom!”

“It’s too bad we can’t go to Memory Peak ourselves. Otherwise, our cultivation and energy arts would also improve.”

“Well, there’s nothing you can do about it. The rules are clear. Only people from Memory Peak can study there.”

Chapter 974: Enemies Approach

Of the fifty mountain peaks in the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect, the most powerful was Celestial Peak.

There were often top experts who gathered there to train, attend classes, spar, improve their daoist techniques, and get more combat experience. And the chief disciple, Emperor Heart-Celestial, would provide feedback and instruction to help them.

If a thousand people cultivated the same energy arts, those individuals’ fundamental differences would mean that they would each experience different pros and cons. Therefore, individual and customized instruction was the best way to achieve good results. It was a massive undertaking to perfect every aspect of one’s energy arts and reach the ultimate peak of one’s potential.

It was thanks to Emperor Heart-Celestial that there were so many talented individuals on Celestial Peak. A hardworking chief disciple could lead a mountain peak to honor and glory, especially if the other disciples had been building solid foundations for millions upon millions of years.

The teaching methods on Celestial Peak had not changed for the past hundred million years. At the moment, the disciples there weren’t sparring or dueling, but were instead focused on a single match between two female disciples, one from Memory Peak and the other from Celestial Peak.

Both of them had similar power indexes of roughly two thousand five hundred. Generally speaking, they were evenly matched, although the disciple from Celestial Peak had a somewhat deeper understanding of energy arts.

Despite that, the disciple from Memory Peak had the upper hand in the fight. She wielded her sword with fluid ease as she fought with one of the signature techniques of the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect: the Sentimental Sword Technique, a suite of profound first-class sword moves that was built on sentiment.

The other disciple was also using the Sentimental Sword Technique, thus it was really a contest to see who was more skilled with it.

Both disciples were using the exact same moves on each other as they fought back and forth.

Sword light shimmered as they clashed, and shockwaves of sword energy rolled out as their blades touched each other.

After one particular clash, the disciple from Celestial Peak shivered, and her eyes glittered. Suddenly, she shifted her tactics, becoming one with her sword as she lunged to take advantage of a weakness she had spotted in the other disciple’s techniques.

“Good job, Junior Sister! Your command of the move Glance Back and Smile couldn’t be more refined!”

“Incredible. A sneak attack with Glance Back and Smile is perfect for this situation.”

Everyone in the audience began to cheer loudly.

However, even as the sword light closed in on the disciple from Memory Peak, she also shifted tactics, almost as if she had anticipated this development. Her sword flashed, and it was with spectacular skill that she attacked her opponent's sword, chopping it in half.

Letting out a shout of surprise, the disciple from Celestial Peak staggered backward, her face ashen.

“Stop fighting!” Emperor Heart-Celestial said.

The disciple from Memory Peak quickly sheathed her sword. “Elder Brother Emperor, I was instructed to come here to Celestial Peak to compare sword techniques with you. Elder Brother Yang Qi said that the methods of Celestial Peak are incredible, and that we have a lot to learn from you. I didn’t come here to cause problems.”

“I know,” Emperor Heart-Celestial replied, nodding. “Brother Yang Qi is truly incredible. When he and I sparred by the blood river, neither of us came out on top. Later, he walked across the river to the temple, and although he didn’t get any godhood, the mere fact that he made it out alive after Lord Blood River and those Terrifying fiend-devils started fighting just goes to show how resilient he is. Everyone in the sect has been shocked by the effects of his teachings over the last few months on Memory Peak. I've heard that even a single word from him can provide enlightenment and perfect wisdom. At first, I found it hard to believe, but now I can see that it's true. When you used the move Broken-Hearted and Despondent, you revealed that your will is perfectly attuned to your sword technique. Presumably you achieved that with the help of Brother Yang Qi?”

“That’s exactly right, Elder Brother Emperor,” the disciple replied, a melancholic look on her face. Some time ago, she had a boyfriend whom she loved dearly. Sadly, he died on a mission, after which she sank into a deep depression and even contemplated suicide. As a result, her energy arts had regressed to the point where she was almost useless.

When Yang Qi found out about her situation, he provided her with a bit of advice. “Only powerful emotions can drive a powerful sword,” he had said. His simple advice opened her mind and heart.

After that, her energy arts advanced rapidly, as she used her deep love for her lost boyfriend to improve her Sentimental Sword Technique. Soon her skill reached a new peak, and her psychic scale also improved.

Just now, she had used a move from the Sentimental Sword Technique called Broken-Hearted and Despondent. In the past, that move had meant little to her, but when she used it now, she was nearly invincible.

It was all thanks to Yang Qi, who encouraged everyone to imbue their energy arts with their own personal experiences, with spectacular results.

Even Emperor Heart-Celestial was secretly shocked at this young woman’s progress. Furthermore, he could tell that his own mastery of energy arts couldn't match up to Yang Qi’s. ‘Although he was strong back when we fought by the blood river,’ he thought, ‘he wasn't at this level. Did he come across some good fortune in that temple? Or did he unlock some hidden potential within himself? Whatever happened, it's a blessing for the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect to have someone like him in it. I should go to Memory Peak and see if I can learn a thing or two from him.’

Emperor Heart-Celestial was an open-minded person, and not the type to get overly competitive. Furthermore, he knew that Yang Qi had a similar personality, and was truly happy to have him as an asset to the sect.

It was an age of chaos, in which wretch-devils abounded and the Executors of the Ancient Road were on the rise again. To cultivators of both righteous and wretched daos, the executors were the greatest enemy of all. After all, no one knew how to reach the end of the Ancient Road to the Gods. In times like these, there was no guarantee that even a superpower like the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect was safe from the other forces at play.

Because of that, the more experts a sect had, the better.

Nodding, he said, “You’re doing very well in your cultivation, Junior Sister. Given some time, you’ll achieve incredible things. And it's good that Brother Yang Qi sent you here today. It was a timely reminder. Disciples of Celestial Peak, prepare to head to Memory Peak to pay a formal visit!”

WHOOSH!

In response to his orders, all of the disciples from Celestial Peak flew toward Memory Peak, attracting quite a bit of attention along the way.

“Don’t tell me Celestial Peak is going to go pick a fight with Memory Peak!”

“Why is everyone from Celestial Peak on the move?”

“What exactly is Emperor Heart-Celestial planning to do?”

Upon arriving at Memory Peak, Emperor Heart-Celestial laughed heartily and said, “Brother Yang Qi, I’ve come to ask for some advice. Little did I know that a single word from you could provide perfect wisdom, or that you could spur your audience to such impressive progress. Your disciples have made incredible advancement recently. I've brought my own disciples here to see if we can have an exchange of ideas, and perhaps help each other to progress even further.”

“You came at just the right time, my friend. Celestial Peak is the top mountain peak, with countless expert disciples. It's a real honor for Memory Peak to have you come for a visit.” Yang Qi sent out a stream of golden light which opened the way for the disciples from Celestial Peak to enter Memory Peak.

It was at this point that everyone realized Emperor Heart-Celestial wasn’t out to cause trouble, but rather to have a sincere exchange of friendship.

The main square on Memory Peak was large enough to fit a million people. And although there were a lot of disciples on both mountain peaks, their combined number didn’t surpass ten thousand. All of the disciples on the mountain peaks were considered elite experts. After all, only the best of the best from the lower courtyards could ascend to the mountain peaks.

Of course, even the disciples in the courtyards were widely considered to be invincible fighters. And each courtyard contained trillions of members.

From that it could be seen how much of an honor it was to practice cultivation on the mountain peaks.

It was a rare thing for someone to join the sect and immediately become one of the most important people on one of the mountain peaks, which went to show how valuable Yang Qi was to the sect.

Even if someone on the level of the mahātmā fiend-devil from earlier had joined the sect, they would only be promoted to the position of elder, which didn't count for anything compared to the mountain peaks.

The disciples from both mountain peaks settled down opposite each other in the square, and Emperor Heart-Celestial looked at Yang Qi with admiring eyes.

“Brother Emperor Heart-Celestial, since you've brought all of your disciples here today, why don't we exchange tips? Whatever problems or weaknesses we perceive in the other, we can offer advice to correct.”

Normally speaking, the fifty mountain peaks were at each other's throats, so for Emperor Heart-Celestial to come in good faith like this was a real rarity.

However, Yang Qi suspected that there was more to his open-mindedness than met the eye.

Even as the disciples from the two peaks prepared to exchange pointers, there was a buzz of activity deep in the main palace. Then, a voice spoke, filling the entire sect.

“All peaklords and chief disciples are to select three top subordinates and come to the receiving hall to welcome visiting Executors of the Ancient Road.”

The voice was accompanied by tolling bells. Furthermore, from the tone of the voice, it was obvious that the speaker was not happy, and was actually warning the disciples of the sect that enemies were approaching.

Swish!

Rising to his feet in shock, Emperor Heart-Celestial said, “This is big. Are the Executors of the Ancient Road here? I'm afraid our impromptu gathering will need to be postponed, Brother Yang Qi. We need to head to the main palace immediately!”

Chapter 975: Enemies Arrive

The Executors of the Ancient Road had finally come.

Yang Qi had only learned of them after joining the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect. But he had heard a lot, and knew that they were all Terrifying experts who killed people like scything wheat. They sought to keep order on the Ancient Road to the Gods, and their attitude was submit to me and prosper, or oppose me and perish. Everyone feared them, both righteous and evil cultivators alike. And no matter how much everyone opposed them and wanted them destroyed, no one had ever succeeded.

At a certain point in the past, resistance to them had grown so fierce that they had suffered severe losses and disappeared for a time. But now they were back.

Actually, Yang Qi was curious to see exactly what these executors were like. Were they really as superhuman as the rumors implied? Why exactly did they dare to try to enforce laws on the Ancient Road to the Gods?

And what laws did they enforce?

‘For my whole life I’ve always hated people who go around waving flags, enforcing laws, and doling out punishments. The mere fact that they call themselves ‘executors’ is already a big turnoff for me.’

In all the stories he remembered, those who enforced the law were usually notorious for their misdeeds. They were often murderers who were worse than actual wretch-devils, and if he were to guess, these executors were probably like that. Otherwise, there wouldn’t be such stiff opposition to them on the ancient road.

Furthermore, he had to wonder if his own progress toward the god world would be hindered by them.

Expression turning cold, Emperor Heart-Celestial raised his voice and said, “Disciples, our priority now is to defend our respective mountain peaks. Get in position and stay ready for anything! According to the oldest stories, the Executors of the Ancient Road are the kind who don’t go to the temple for no reason. When they visit sects, they often wipe them out. However, they’ll find that taking down the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect won’t be an easy task. All of you need to be ready for brutal fighting!”

“Yes sir!” the disciples replied. Sword energy surged and heroic passions ran wild.

“Kill any executors we find!”

“If they dare to invade the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect, they’ll all die!”

“We’ll risk life and limb to defend our sect!”

“Slaughter the executors, and the Ancient Road to the Gods will finally be free and clear!”

The disciples from both Memory Peak and Celestial Peak all flew into position, manning spell formations that began glittering with shining light.

As it turned out, the mountains themselves were formed from magical treasures. They had been formed hundreds of millions of years in the past, and were filled with god formations that could unleash immense power.

RUMBLE!

Looking out, Yang Qi saw that the entire Will Manifestation Heaven Sect was astir thanks to the warning bells that were sounding out. Spell formations were being activated everywhere, and bright light shone up from all corners of the sect. And the magical fluctuations coming from the central palace were particularly impressive.

At the same time, the magical laws became vastly stronger, reminding Yang Qi of the Cave Temple of the Vajra Māyādevī. Almost instantly, there were numerous disciples who found that they couldn’t fly at all.

By that point, though, it didn’t matter, as the disciples had generally already reached their assigned places in the formations and were ready for any invasion.

Meanwhile, the chief disciples from the various mountain peaks were all tasked with bringing three of their top subordinates to the meeting in the palace.

Obviously, An Yiru and Yang Qi were to represent Memory Peak. They were joined by a female disciple who had recently made amazing progress. Her name was Mo Yunlian, and she cultivated a very difficult energy art called the Merciless Heaven Tome. Thanks to Yang Qi’s tutelage, she had become the third-most powerful disciple on Memory Peak.

As for Celestial Peak, they sent Emperor Heart-Celestial and Emperor Rain, plus someone named Emperor Swallowking, who cultivated something called the Dark-Cloud Nine-Transformations Will-Manifestation Giant-Spirit God-Dao. Although it couldn’t measure up to Yang Qi’s True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body, it still made him a top expert outside the sect. In fact, he could slaughter sect leaders from other top sects as easily as drinking water.

All of the various representatives flew toward the central palace.

Swish!

There was a staircase leading up to the central palace that had at least ten thousand stairs. At the top was the receiving hall, where guests would be received. It was already packed.

Hosts of chairs had been set up, at the head of which was a throne, upon which sat an old man wearing a tall crown. He was powerfully built, beardless, and had piercing eyes. The psychic fluctuations rolling off of him were terrifying to the extreme, making it obvious that he was the sectlord.

Seated on either side of the sectlord were a dozen or so Terrifying experts, who could only be the old-timers that made up the council of chief elders.

After them were the fifty peaklords, including the little girl from Memory Peak, who was sitting on her throne with her eyes closed, seemingly indifferent to everything around her.

As the top disciples from the fifty mountain peaks entered the reception hall in ranks, Yang Qi could immediately sense many gazes locking onto him. That included the sectlord himself, although the man didn’t attempt to pierce through to any of his secrets, but only assessed his substructure.

‘What’s this?’ Yang Qi thought. ‘This sectlord is interesting. You’d think that he would try to analyze me inside and out.’ His heart thumped a bit, but in the end, the sectlord truly hadn’t sought to dig down into his secrets.

There were some people who were openly glaring at him, and he had no need to guess who they were. They were Peaklords Nāropa, Spiritwall, and Grand Might.

As for the peaklord from Celestial Peak, he didn’t even open his eyes.

‘I need to be careful,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘Those three peaklords obviously hate me for beating up their chief disciples, and will probably try to retaliate at some point.’ Considering that the peaklords were all consummate Terrifying experts, he knew he couldn’t afford to take them lightly.

His original reason for coming to the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect was to find the psychic scaling systems. Unfortunately, it was in the central palace and too well guarded.

Now that his energy arts had advanced so much, he was a lot more confident in trying to achieve his original goal.

Soon, everyone was present.

Yang Qi, An Yiru and Mo Yunlian stood behind their peaklord, the little girl. Interestingly, as soon as Yang Qi took his place, he suddenly felt all of the gazes that had been locked onto him suddenly shift away. Apparently, the psychic field surrounding the little girl was offering him a measure of protection.

“Ladies and gentlemen...” the sectlord said, his voice resonating like the booming of a bell. Everyone present was shaken, and Yang Qi felt something warm stirring in his sea of consciousness after hearing the man's voice, causing his nascent divinity to climb to the highest state possible.

It was obviously a secret magic, some primeval god skill designed to bolster the psyche.

In fact, Yang Qi recognized it from the Eternal Heavenly Aria. It was called the Light of Wisdom, designed to bless one’s psychic power.

Unfortunately, Yang Qi’s cultivation level wasn’t high enough to do what the sectlord was doing, and give out the blessing in a way that no one could see.

‘Right. It’s been a long time since I used the godskills of the Eternal Heavenly Aria. Now that I've made so much progress, I wonder what they’ll be like. With enlightenment of the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body, all of my energy arts should have reached a much higher level.’

Even as he considered such things, the sectlord continued speaking and interrupted his train of thought.

“You're all aware of why this important meeting has been called. Six hours ago, this notice appeared in my sealed meditation facility.” He held up a slip of paper. “It is none other than an Executors’ Notice, something that can strike dread into the hearts of any of the trillions upon trillions of organizations on the Ancient Road to the Gods. This is the notice that is sent down when the Executors of the Ancient Road announce that they plan to exterminate a sect. From the distant past until now, there has never been a sect that survived after the executors issue a notice like this. So, what do you think we should do?”

Snorting coldly, Peaklord Celestial opened his eyes and said, “Elder Brother, I don’t think the matter is as simple as that. The current Executors of the Ancient Road are not like the executors from long ago. In the past, they were more powerful than any other organization, but nowadays, not so much. They would have to pay a huge price in blood to wipe out our Will Manifestation Heaven Sect.” When Peaklord Celestial spoke, everyone remained silent and waited to see his opinion before forming their own.

“That goes without saying,” the sectlord said. “However, the fact that they could deliver the Executors’ Notice right into my secure facility without me detecting it goes to show that they are astonishingly powerful.”

“That’s true,” one of the chief elders said. “Sectlord, your secure meditation facility is in the very core of the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect. How could they possibly deliver a notice there without anyone noticing? It's very worrisome. The Executors of the Ancient Road come and go like ghosts. Are we really going to have to fight them openly?”

“The executors are obviously after the corpse of their fellow executor,” another of the chief elders said. “Why not just hand it over to them. What reason would they have to wipe us out then?”

“We can’t do that!” Peaklord Celestial said. “Wouldn’t that just give them the evidence they need to condemn us? In other words, it would be handing them the perfect excuse to wipe us out. Elder Brother Sect Leader, I say we vehemently deny any of their accusations. Better to deny than to beg forgiveness.”

“Good point,” the sectlord said. “I agree that we should deny any and all accusations. Otherwise, the executors will have a perfect reason to act without the slightest restraint.”

Almost as soon as the words left his mouth, a cackle rang out, followed by a voice from afar. “Deny accusations? You really think the situation can be resolved so simply? Your Will Manifestation Heaven Sect has offended the Executors of the Ancient Road so deeply that the only way to atone for your crime is to be executed!”

Everyone in the reception hall looked around in shock.

How could they have ever guessed that someone would be able to listen in on the secret conversation playing out in the tightly-sealed receiving hall? Didn’t that imply that there were no secrets the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect could keep from the Executors of the Ancient Road?

Chapter 976: Extremely Aggressive and Arrogant

“Everyone, prepare to receive the guests!” the sectlord said, sitting up straight in his throne, causing him to radiate a sense of majesty and willpower. Raising his voice, he said, “Who would’ve thought that the Executors of the Ancient Road would be so unexpectedly underhanded? You actually used spies to listen in on our conversations?”

Everyone else in the hall looked around in surprise.

After all, what other explanation could there be for how the Executors of the Ancient Road would be privy to the private conversations in the receiving hall?

Many people present were looking specifically at Yang Qi, who was obviously the most suspicious person present. He had only just joined the sect, yet had already made a huge name for himself. His cultivation base was profound, and he could inspire enlightenment with a single word. Yet no one knew much about him.

“So, bastard, you’re the spy!”

RUMBLE!

Thunderous rumbling erupted as Peaklord Grand Might shot to his feet and thrust his palm out, causing energy flows to roll toward Yang Qi that could conquer mountains and devour rivers.

C-C-CRACK!

Yang Qi didn’t move a muscle. Even as the palm strike closed in, Peaklord Memory opened her eyes and intercepted the attack, resulting in Peaklord Grand Might staggering backward.

During the exchange, Yang Qi was able to see that Peaklord Grand Might had unleashed a consummate art known as the God-Might Heaven-Enshrouding Palm, whereas Peaklord Memory had used the Silk-Cloud Gentle-Dao Palm. In other words, she had countered hardness with softness and had come out of the exchange without even being hurt.

“How dare you shield him, Peaklord Memory!” Peaklord Grand Might Peak shouted angrily. “He’s been hiding in our Will Manifestation Heaven Sect as a spy! Don’t you know that we're in deadly peril right now?”

“We need to see some evidence before we pronounce a verdict,” the little girl said. “Besides, how could I possibly just sit back and allow you to kill my disciple? What if he's innocent? Will you take responsibility for that?”

“If he's innocent and I kill him, of course I’ll take responsibility,” Peaklord Grand Might growled.

“You will? You’ll go and kill all of your own children in compensation? It wasn’t easy to recruit a genius like him to Memory Peak. He spent the past few months helping all of the disciples to improve their energy arts. At this rate, it’ll only be a few thousand years before Memory Peak reaches unprecedented levels of glory. Do you really think your trashy disciples could possibly compare to him?”

When Sorrow Might heard that, his face turned green with rage, but he obviously had no room to interject.

“Enough bickering,” the sectlord said. Looking at Yang Qi, he said, “The spy isn’t this one. The executors aren’t that stupid. Do you really think they would use someone as obvious as him? Besides, he ranks too low to enter the central palace on his own, so how exactly could he have delivered the notice? No, it was one of the old-timers, and they’re keeping themselves well-hidden.”

A minor uproar resulted in response to the sectlord, who had just personally cleared Yang Qi of any suspicion. At the same time, everyone’s attention shifted to the old-timers in the council of chief elders as they tried to figure out which of them was a spy for the executors.

However, down to the last one, the old-timers looked around with righteous indignation, making it impossible to determine which one might be the spy.

In fact, from their expressions, it seemed like none of them could possibly be the guilty party.

An atmosphere of confusion was rapidly forming in the reception hall. Not even Peaklord Grand Might could say anything. He knew that he had made an error in judgement, and considering that the sectlord himself had proclaimed Yang Qi innocent, there was no way that he was the spy.

Even worse, he had deeply offended Peaklord Memory.

Finally, Peaklord Celestial couldn’t hold back and asked, “Elder Brother Sect Lord, who is the spy? From the look on your face, it seems you know who it is. Please, reveal the truth. I’ll be the first to exact punishment!”

“There’s no need to get anxious, Junior Brother,” the sectlord replied coolly. “We’ll clean house later, if necessary. I just hope this person will turn over a new leaf by helping the sect to drive away the executors. If they do, then perhaps some lenience can be shown. After all, they’ve served the sect for many years, and in many dangerous circumstances. But if this person insists on being stubborn, I’ll have no other alternative than to personally eliminate them.”

At this point, everyone realized that whoever the spy was, they were an important person in the sect, and likely one of the chief elders.

‘Very impressive,’ Yang Qi thought. The sectlord was obviously a very shrewd schemer. Whoever the spy was, they must be very alarmed at the prospect of being outed. But now they were being given a chance to renounce the darkness and seek the light, possibly earning forgiveness.

It was some high-level psychological warfare on the part of the sectlord.

“Well, I'm glad you’re not the spy,” An Yiru said. If he had been, she would have borne some of the responsibility. Furthermore, all of the advancement Memory Peak had made because of him would have been completely in vain.

“Executors of the Ancient Road, please show yourselves!”

BUZZ!

Fluctuations rolled out from the sectlord as he continued, “In honor of your visit, I've gathered all of the outstanding disciples of the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect here in our receiving hall. Obviously, we have no desire to be impolite.”

“Your reputation is well deserved, Sectlord,” echoed a piercing voice that made everyone feel distraught with anxiety. There were even a few disciples who involuntarily vomited. Clearly, this executor was using some sort of energy art, although it was impossible to say which one.

A moment later, a swish was heard as five people appeared right in the middle of the hall.

Everyone present was deeply shaken, and even felt like they were being suffocated on the level of their nascent divinity. These were the Executors of the Ancient Road, and they pulsed with a killing intent that seemed strong enough to transform the entire area into a land of death.

Yang Qi quickly let loose an energy art to protect himself, and at the same time, noticed that other disciples were turning pale in the face; even Emperor Heart-Celestial was physically trembling. The peaklords were forced to resort to measures to protect their disciples.

All of the executors were tall and godlike, and radiated valiant auras. They looked like domineering emperors, including their garments. Four of them were strong enough that Yang Qi didn’t even need to check with his divine will to be certain they had Terrifying will. They were such killers that, if they joined forces, they would definitely surpass Lord Blood River or the three fiend-devil experts he had faced.

‘So, these are the Executors of the Ancient Road, huh?’ he thought. He obviously didn’t dare to assess them with divine will. However, he could sense that they had extremely frightening constitutions, to the point that they were neither humans nor devils. Instead, they were more like gods. There was no question that they had heaven-defying fighting prowess. In fact, their blood seemed to thrum with characteristics of all three thousand of the special constitutions. No wonder the executors had long since been declared the most domineering figures on the Ancient Road to the Gods.

The fifth in the group was a young man without Terrifying will. Instead, he was in the Destabilizing level. Obviously, he was a lesser figure among them, which begged the question of what exactly he was doing here.

“You’re finally here, Executors,” the sectlord said. Waving his hand, he caused a gentle wind to spring up. It was obviously a consummate ability, and it immediately settled the aura in the hall.

When everyone else in the hall realized that there were only four Terrifying executors, they breathed sighs of relief. However, there were many more executors in existence, most of them holed up in their headquarters. The ones present here were obviously just emissaries.

“Why, might I ask, did you deliver an Executors’ Notice to our Will Manifestation Heaven Sect?” the sectlord asked.

“Oh, no reason!” one of the executors said, taking a few steps forward. Everyone who looked at him felt themselves going as numb as if they had been struck by lightning, and realized that this person’s cultivation base was extremely profound.

“It’s just that we heard about you killing an executor and keeping the corpse for research. Did you think that wasn’t a big deal? If so, you’re wrong. It’s a major crime. And we're here to wipe you all out of existence, down to the chickens and dogs.” This particular executor was a man who wore a Crown of the Peaceful Heaven and carried an iron ruler in his hand, which appeared to be inscribed with magical rules.

“That’s rubbish,” the sectlord said. “Nothing like that ever happened.”

Yang Qi couldn’t help but marvel at how brazen the sectlord was to just lie like this.

The sectlord continued, “Where did you hear that story, anyway? Matters like this require evidence! The Executors of the Ancient Road can’t just come and randomly enforce laws!”

The executor threw his head back and laughed uproariously. “What an outstanding lack of shame! Really. I heard everything you said a moment ago in your ‘private’ meeting when you talked of vehemently denying accusations. Let’s put aside these children’s games.”

“Then show us your evidence,” the sectlord said. “Furthermore, what reason did you have to place spies in our sect?”

“No reason,” the youngest of the executors suddenly said. “Look, it doesn’t matter if you admit your guilt or not. We Executors of the Ancient Road have never needed to rely on outside evidence. Our words are evidence enough. If we say you killed someone, then you killed them. If we say you didn’t, then you didn't. As for matters of spies, well of course we need to keep an eye on you. How else would you expect us to treat dogs? We can’t have you going around doing whatever you want. Understand? Did all of that get into your thick skulls?”

In response to his words, some of the elders reacted with open anger.

“How dare you, boy!” Peaklord Grand Might shouted. “Who do you think you are? What gall you have to talk like that!”

“You’re the one with gall!” said the first of the executors to have spoken, his eyes shining with killing intent. “This here is the son of one of our superintendents! Talking to him like that will earn you the death sentence! Get on your knees! Otherwise, everyone here is going to die right here and now!”

“What?” Peaklord Grand Might blurted, his face falling. Considering that the young man didn’t have Terrifying will, he had assumed he was some low-ranking disciple. And low-ranking disciples didn’t have the right to run their mouths in front of Terrifying experts. It was a well-known rule.

Unfortunately, Peaklord Grand Might had completely misjudged the situation.

Chapter 977: Junior Superintendent from the Ancient Road

Everyone present was shaken to the core at the realization that Peaklord Grand Might had made a grave error.

The Executors of the Ancient Road were fundamentally dangerous to trifle with. And here he had provoked the ire of the son of one of its superintendents. In other words, this young man was a junior superintendent. A few rude words to the wrong person could provoke catastrophic results.

As the saying goes, a loose tongue can cause a lot of trouble.

Peaklord Grand Might’s face was ashen, and his lips moved up and down as if he were about to speak, yet no words came out. For one thing, he was scrambling to think of a way to get out of the situation, but on the other hand, he was trying to avoid causing even more trouble.

“Peaklord Grand Might, apologize immediately to the junior superintendent,” the sectlord said. “We don’t tolerate arrogant claptrap here in the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect.”

Peaklord Grand Might had been given a chance to extricate himself, so he quickly clasped his hands and said, “Junior Superintendent, even an important peaklord like myself can fumble with his words sometimes.”

Considering his status, it was a big loss of face for him to formally clasp hands to someone of lower rank. And in the end, Peaklord Grand Might was simply unwilling to suffer such humiliation. Thus, he slipped in the fact that he was a peaklord to try to at least keep some face.

“You’re an important peaklord, huh?” the junior superintendent said, his eyes glittering coldly. “Seems you aren’t really convinced you made a mistake. On your knees, now. Kowtow. If you do, I’ll forgive you. If you don’t, I’ll be forced to retaliate.”

Peaklord Grand Might was so stunned he just stood there with a blank look in his eye.

“Junior Superintendent,” the sectlord said, “when the enemy yields, you should spare his life. I think you might be pushing things a bit too far here. You’re guests, so we welcomed you with open arms. If you’d rather be enemies, we’ll be more than happy to fight you to the death. Either way, we of the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect will not wag our tails and beg for pity from the Executors of the Ancient Road.”

“Fight to the death?” the junior superintendent said, his voice dripping with menace, making him seem very much like an emperor. “Do you really qualify to do that? We Executors of the Ancient Road have been resting and recuperating for long enough. Our time of inaction is over. We’re back. Presumably, you people think that after being betrayed and ambushed in the Primeval Age, we executors had become a thing of the past, so you dare to treat us with such overwhelming arrogance. In the past, whenever the Executors of the Ancient Road visited a sect, even the sect leader himself would kneel to meet them. It was a rule. So why, pray tell, are you not kneeling!?”

“Junior Superintendent, like it or not, the Executors of the Ancient Road are just another sect,” the sectlord replied calmly. “As for kneeling, I’d be happy to do that as soon as you produce a true god. The instant I see a god, I’ll gladly kneel.”

The junior superintendent snorted coldly, his face flickering with killing intent. “Are you making fun of the Executors of the Ancient Road for not producing a god? You think all we can do is enforce the law?”

“That’s not what I said,” the sectlord replied. “But if that’s what you think, junior superintendent, then I have an idea. Let’s not beat around the bush here, shall we? If you Executors of the Ancient Road are strong enough to exterminate our Will Manifestation Heaven Sect, then you would have shown up with your war banners unfurled. But you didn’t. So tell us. What do you want?”

The sectlord was essentially saying outright that the Executors of the Ancient Road weren’t strong enough to wipe out his sect.

Lip curling, the junior superintendent said, “First, return that executor’s corpse you have. Second, hand over the killer, as well as everyone in his clan, down to the ninth generation. Anyone related to him must die. Third, starting today, the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect will be an auxiliary branch of the Executors of the Ancient Road. You’ll give us godhood as a tribute on a regular basis, and provide us your most beautiful women as slaves. Fourth, we demand an immediate tribute of a hundred pieces of godhood. Fifth, this person who was just disrespectful to me will also face the death penalty, and we demand you give us his entire clan, too.”

The junior superintendent’s demands could hardly have been more overbearing. With the exception of the first, they were all as vicious as a sentence of sect extermination.

Peaklord Grand Might's face was as white as death. Two of the stipulations pertained directly to his own death. Furthermore, all of this was happening because his son had hoped to benefit by taking the life of a dying executor. And then, Peaklord Grand Might had made things worse by insulting one of the executors.

For a brief moment, he considered attacking unexpectedly and killing the executors.

However, he knew that although he might be able to take out the junior superintendent, the other four executors were vastly superior to him. They were all Terrifying experts, so if they joined forces, they could probably fight their way out of the sect.

Besides, that wasn't to mention the possibility that they had reinforcements waiting outside.

The sectlord thought for a moment, then said, “We refuse all five of your demands. First of all, we didn't kill that executor, so how could we hand over both corpse and killer, much less give you compensation for it? As for being an auxiliary branch, well, that’s tantamount to slavery. And if you take all of our godhood and beautiful women, you might as well just destroy our sect. Besides, we don’t have any godhood.”

“So, you're saying you choose to just be destroyed outright?” the junior superintendent said.

“If that’s what you want to do, go ahead and try,” Peaklord Celestial interjected. “Except, I don’t think you have the authority to make the decision, do you, Junior Superintendent? Did you really come here at the behest of the Executors of the Ancient Road? Or did you come here on your own? Does your father the superintendent know about all this?”

Looking at Peaklord Celestial, the junior superintendent snorted coldly and said, “Who the hell are you? How dare you meddle in the affairs of the Executors of the Ancient Road!”

Lifting his chin up, Peaklord Celestial replied, “I’ll tell you who the hell I am. A Terrifying expert!”

The junior superintendent burst out laughing, although his laughter was clearly tinged with rage. “Are you making fun of me for not having Terrifying will convergence? Fine. I know the rules on the Ancient Road to the Gods. Terrifying will convergence is the hallmark of the true luminaries. Anyone without Terrifying will is a nobody.”

“I'm glad you understand how things work, Junior Superintendent,” Peaklord Celestial said in a cool voice. “It’s an unwritten rule that was originally established by you Executors of the Ancient Road.”

“So, you people really aren’t willing to shed a tear until you see the coffin. I can accept that. For now, I won’t fight any of your Terrifying experts. The reason I came here today was to show you how strong we executors are. So whether you surrender or not, this is going to happen. You see, it's said that there is virtue in sparing animal life, so I'm going to give you a chance to survive this. If any disciple in your sect who is beneath the Terrifying level can beat me in a fight, we’ll call everything even. How about that?”

“So that’s what’s going on here...” was what many of the outstanding disciples in the sect began whispering to each other. Plenty of disciples had already developed a strong dislike of this junior superintendent, a Destabilizing junior who dared to glibly talk back to the sectlord himself. Considering that level of disrespect, many of the lower-level disciples who weren’t aware of how powerful the Executors of the Ancient Road were already hoped they could go teach this junior superintendent a lesson.

The sectlord thought for another moment. “That’s fine. It wouldn’t be appropriate for us in the Terrifying level to spar with you. But it would be fine for some of the lower-ranking disciples to compare notes with you. Do any of the other executors present have any input on the matter?”

“We support any decision the junior superintendent makes,” said one of the four true executors. “If he asks us to kill everyone in the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect, we will. We won’t even spare the chickens or the dogs. On the other hand, if he orders us to stand down, we won’t harm a single person.”

“Alright!” the sectlord said, glancing over at the disciples present. “If any of you here today can defeat this junior superintendent, it will count as a huge service to the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect and you’ll be handsomely rewarded.” It was definitely not going to be an ordinary reward, as the sectlord went on to say, “This service will count as saving the entire sect from destruction!”

RUMBLE!

A buzz spread through the sect. Obviously, the level of the reward would be based on the level of service provided.

And there could be no greater service to the sect than saving it from destruction. A person who did that could ask for just about any reward they want, even the right to succeed as the next sectlord. The junior sectlord in any sect would be able to call the wind and summon the rain! The Will Manifestation Heaven Sect was one of the superpower sects from the Ancient Road to the Gods, and it had massive amounts of resources and power. Whoever became the junior sectlord of a sect like that would have immense honor and power.

When it came to experts that were qualified to throw their hat in the ring, there were the top disciples in that group of a hundred and fifty elites from the fifty mountain peaks. There were also the apprentices and children of the chief elders and elder kings.

Altogether, it was a group of over a thousand people, all of them extremely powerful fighters. After all, some of them could be considered royalty who had received training and resources that surpassed what the disciples of the fifty peaks had access to. They were people who were very, very close to the Terrifying level.

The mountain peaks were like feudal vassals, whereas the children of the chief elders were like royalty from the imperial court.

Almost immediately, some of the children of the chief elders flew out into the open, hoping to snag the first chance to win such an incredible reward.

“Back up, all of you,” the junior superintendent said to the four executors.

They nodded in compliance and backed up a bit, leaving plenty of open space for the fighting. Apparently, they weren’t worried at all about their junior superintendent, and in fact, were completely confident in how strong he was.

“This reward belongs to me, Meng Ao!”

In addition to this Meng Ao, there were already four other sons of chief elders who had also flown out to compete for the reward.

“Absolutely not, I'm going first,” one of them said. “How could I let anyone else have the chance to save the sect?”

Chuckling, one of the other disciples said, “How about we play rock-paper-scissors for it? Whoever wins gets to go first?”

“Rock-paper-scissors?” another disciple said, eyes flickering with treacherous light. “How about we first have a fight amongst ourselves, and whoever wins gets to go first?”

Even as the disciples were bickering, the junior superintendent shouted “Morons!” and blurred into motion.

The five disciples looked up and saw darkness spreading above them, as energy arts and psychic power were unleashed that seemed strong enough to spell the end of the world. A hand appeared, filling the sky, growing wider with every moment before crushing down on them with such pressure that they couldn’t even scream.

Pop. Pop. Pop! POP! POP!!!

Five screams rang out, and five heads exploded. Five nascent divinities flew out into the open, whereupon the junior superintendent inhaled, sucking them toward him to assimilate them.

“Stay your hand!” people from the council of chief elders shouted.

Chapter 978: Savior of the Sect

In the shortest of moments, five elite disciples related to the council of chief elders, top experts of the sect, had their heads exploded by a palm strike from this junior superintendent. Then, he didn't hesitate to try to assimilate their nascent divinities.

At that point, the five chief elders who had been observing quietly from behind the scenes, had no choice but to spring into action. With the nascent divinities of the five disciples intact, they could be resurrected and given new fleshly bodies. But with their nascent divinities destroyed, it would be impossible for them to ever live again.

The higher one's cultivation base, and the stronger one's divine will, the less likely it would be that a damaged or incomplete sliver of will could be used as the basis for resurrection.

Five chief elders flew out at top speed to grab the nascent divinities of their respective sons.

However, that was when one of the four executors made a move.

No one could even see what exactly happened. Five palms flashed out in ingenious fashion, slamming into the five chief elders and shoving them away.

Those five palm moves were like the blossoming of plum flowers, or the falling of snowflakes. They corresponded to the cycle of the five phases, and grew stronger and stronger with each moment that passed.

Whack!

The five chief elders were slammed back into the thrones they had been sitting in, with such force that the thrones cracked and crumbled.

Looks of open astonishment could be seen on the faces of the five chief elders. Never could they have guessed that the Executors of the Ancient Road would be so strong that one of them could use a single palm strike to force the five of them into retreat. Even worse, the force of the blow ran through their meridians like destructive fire.

These five elders were all Terrifying experts. They had spent a lot of godhood power to reach their current level, as well as the psychic scaling systems. Of course, that meant that they were slightly weaker than if they had reached the Terrifying level on their own, but in the end, they were still Terrifying experts! It seemed completely impossible that someone could just shove them back into their seats!

“What,” the executor said. “We agreed that any of your disciples under the Terrifying level could fight the junior superintendent to see who is stronger. I can’t believe you people would actually try to interfere! Your Will Manifestation Heaven Sect might be a superpower sect, but I never imagined you would be this arrogant and conceited. You actually look down on the Executors of the Ancient Road this much? I won’t let this happen again. For the honor of the junior superintendent, I let the five of you live. Otherwise, considering you scum used the Cruiser of Civilization’s psychic scaling systems to reach the Terrifying level, there’s no way you’re a match for me.”

‘This guy is so strong!’ was what many of the chief elders were thinking. He had used just a single move to vanquish five of the chief elders, effectively crushing the fighting spirit of the entire council. After all, if all five of these executors took action at the same time, what exactly would they be capable of?

It seemed doubtful that anyone present could stand in their way, not even the sectlord.

Meanwhile, the five disciples were wailing piteously.

“Mercy! Spare me!”

“Save me, Father! Save me! I don’t wanna die!”

“After all my years of cultivation, I don’t want to die now! Father, save me! Don’t let me die!”

However, it was with a vicious grin that the junior superintendent inhaled deeply, sucking all five of them into his mouth and swallowing them down.

Their voices were cut off as they all died, having become little more than food for the junior superintendent. From that one act, it was possible to get a glimpse at how incredibly powerful he was.

“I was just having some fun. Meanwhile, these five fools were talking about performing some sort of service? What a joke! Your sect is about to be wiped out, and you think someone’s going to save you?” The junior superintendent clasped his hands behind his back and looked around imperiously. “Does anyone out there really think they can defeat someone as powerful as me?”

“Chief elders, remain calm!” the sectlord ordered. “Same for all disciples. Nobody do anything.”

Truth be told, there was no need for such orders from the sectlord. The disciples in the sect were so scared that none of them dared to do a thing. The five disciples that the junior superintendent had just so easily destroyed were the kind of people who normally abused the other disciples with impunity. They were viewed as extremely powerful figures, yet they had been wiped out in one move. It only begged the question of just how strong this junior superintendent’s energy arts were. Even worse, five Terrifying chief elders had just made a move on him, only to completely fail.

The disciples present were no fools. They all realized that trying to get involved in the situation would just lead to a quick death.

“Is anyone else going to step forward?” the junior superintendent said. “Are the disciples of the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect really such useless pieces of trash? Not even one of you can fight me? Well, that’s fine. How about this. I’ll make things even easier. If any of you disciples can last for ten moves against me, I’ll remove one of our five demands from the list. Last for twenty moves and I’ll remove two. And if you can last for fifty, I’ll let the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect completely off the hook for now. How about that?”

With that, he burst out laughing. Although everyone present was inwardly furious, they knew there was nothing they could do. No disciple under the Terrifying level could possibly fight this young man.

That said, when he mentioned being able to last for only ten moves, the eyes of some of the disciples and chief elders began to shine brightly.

“Fine. I’ll start!”

A young man who had been standing behind one of the chief elders moments before was suddenly right out in the open. Clearly, he had used some sort of high-level teleportation energy art.

“Criss-Crossed Major Teleportation?” the junior superintendent said. “Not bad. Not bad at all. You must be the apprentice of Winter Bladedark, who refused to use the psychic scaling systems to reach the Terrifying level. Your technique is the Infernal King's Lamentation Sword, right? I'm very interested to see it in action. In fact, I’ll let you take the first nine moves.”

His words threw the chief elders into even deeper panic.

Obviously, the only way for the junior superintendent to know so much about the sect was by means of a mole or spy. It was clearer now more than ever that Yang Qi wasn’t the spy, as he didn’t have access to behind-the-scenes information like that. It had to be one of the chief elders, and it was a terrifying thought that he had remained undercover for so long without his identity being revealed.

What was worse, the junior superintendent offered to let his opponent take nine moves, which showed how completely confident he was in being able to clinch the victory.

“Don’t get flustered, Chang Rong!” one of the chief elders shouted. “Remain calm and composed. He’s just trying to get under your skin. Remember, the Infernal King's Lamentation Sword commands both life and death. With this sword, you become an infernal deity who controls life and death. Enter the state of Sword Lamentation, and you’ll be fine.”

The chief elder who had just spoken had a particularly mighty aura, making it obvious he was far stronger than the five chief elders from moments ago. His words, laced with his will, reached the young Chang Rong, who immediately stood a bit taller, as if he had sloughed off the junior superintendent’s influence.

Yang Qi inwardly nodded as he looked on. The fighting so far had been very illuminating, and had already given him a much better idea of how strong the Executors of the Ancient Road were, and what the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect was capable of.

It seemed the chief disciples of the fifty mountain peaks only represented about one third of the overall strength of the sect’s disciples as a whole.

There were obviously other formidable people present.

After freeing himself from any influence, this Chang Rong became one with his sword, causing rumbling vital energy to roll out around him. Then he lunged forward in an attack, causing grief, sadness, and a blindingly sharp sword to fill the area.

In response, the junior superintendent floated this way and that like a leaf in the wind.

“Nice. The first stance, Between Life and Death.” He laughed cheerfully. “But even if you work on it for another hundred million years, it still won’t hurt me. What a pity.”

Chang Rong quickly began to reveal more of his sword technique, drawing on everything he had learned in his life to attack the junior superintendent with full force. As he used one move after another from the Infernal King’s Lamentation Sword, the junior superintendent kept track and listed out the moves.

“Second stance, Infernal King Sheds Tears.... Third stance, Riddle of the Sage Domain. Fourth stance, Escaping Alive from Mortal Danger. Fifth stance, Debut of the Ghost-God.”

In fact, the junior superintendent didn’t even fight back. He just let his opponent go all the way to the ninth stance.

“Here it is. Ninth stance, Lamentation of Hell.” Suddenly, the junior superintendent let out a shout, causing a sound wave to roll out that disintegrated all of the sword light. Then he reached forward and grabbed the sword, causing it to collapse into dust. Chang Rong tumbled backward with an agonized shriek, then flopped unmoving onto the ground.

“Chang Rong!” Chief Elder Winter Bladedark shouted, flying down to his apprentice, who lay gasping for his breath on the ground. Although the junior superintendent’s palm strike hadn’t ended his life, it had wiped his mind and nascent divinity out of existence. Henceforth, he would be a simpleton who might as well not be alive.

“I could have killed him, if I wanted to,” the junior superintendent said. “But for a genius like him to be turned into a simpleton is just about as bad as being killed, so I decided to do that instead. Don’t even think of trying to save him. Nobody in the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect can do it, not even your sectlord.”

“So,” the sectlord said, his voice tinged with grief, “you've mastered the Soul-Seizing Psyche-Exterminating Grand Palm, a consummate martial discipline among the Executors of the Ancient Road. It certainly lives up to its reputation. That was a very vicious and merciless move. You’ve actually crippled one of the elite young ones of the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect.”

“Crippled?” The junior superintendent chuckled. “Who asked him to be so useless? Look, I'm being merciful enough as it is. Didn’t you see how I let him use nine moves on me? Did I have to do that? Don’t tell me you think I should have given him ten moves?”

The sectlord shook his head. It had been a fair fight, and the junior superintendent really had let Chang Rong use nine moves against him. No one could accuse the Executors of the Ancient Road of doing anything underhanded in this situation.

“Chang Rong!” Chief Elder Winter Bladedark sent some true energy into his apprentice, unleashing a secret magic related to nascent divinities. However, it did no good. The junior superintendent’s energy arts were clearly stronger than even an ordinary Terrifying expert, which was obviously why he had been so confident in issuing his challenge.

Chapter 979: Savior of the Sect (2)

The mighty apprentice of a chief elder, who had cultivated the art of the sword to an extremely high level, couldn’t even last for ten moves. In fact, people were starting to suspect that perhaps the junior superintendent, despite not being in the Terrifying level, actually had Terrifying fighting prowess. What was even more telling was that he hadn’t even used any magical treasures in combat. He only used his own true energy and martial disciplines to win in short order.

Although Chang Rong wasn’t the best of the best among the disciples, he was definitely top tier. If he couldn’t last for ten moves, then few other people would dare to try.

Furthermore, it wasn’t as if Chang Rong had defended against nine moves and lost with the tenth move. No, he had launched nine moves of his own, then was defeated by a single blow.

Many of the disciples were looking around in the hopes that someone was going to step forward, but no one did.

Obviously, there were lots of people who would love to get the reward for saving the sect, but no one wanted to just throw their life away. Five disciples had been killed, and one had become feebleminded, which was just about as bad as death.

It seemed that only someone who was suicidal would possibly accept the challenge of the junior superintendent.

The junior superintendent roared with laughter. “What a bunch of useless chickens and dogs. As it turns out, the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect doesn’t have a single genius at all! Maybe we should just disband it. Or put it under my command, so I can use the sect resources to make some good cultivation advancement. Sectlord, if not a single person in your sect can stand up to me, what do you suggest we do? Are you going to concede to our five demands? If not, that's fine. Since you took the life of one of our executors, I’ll just wipe you people out. Your existence, or lack thereof, won't really change anything in the Great Necropolis. And if your Will Manifestation Heaven Sect claims to be a superpower sect, then that means there are hundreds of thousands of superpower sects here.”

“Hold on!” someone said. It was none other than Emperor Heart-Celestial. “Do you honor your word, Junior Superintendent?”

“Oh? Another disciple who seems to be up to snuff. You’re Emperor Heart-Celestial, right? I heard you’re the strongest disciple from Celestial Peak. Are you saying you want to compete with me? Yeah. I keep my word.”

Aggressively striding forward, Emperor Heart-Celestial continued, “You said that if someone can last for fifty moves against you, then you’ll temporarily call things even and not cause any more trouble for the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect. You’ll really honor your word in that regard?”

“Are you kidding me? Do you really think I would go back on my word?” He looked over at the four executors and said, “Do you four hear? I said that if anyone can last for fifty moves, I’ll temporarily let the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect off the hook. You have to abide by that as well. Got it?”

“Understood, sir!” the four executors said, saluting respectfully.

Everyone who looked on felt their hearts going cold.

In any sect in existence, Terrifying experts were considered extremely powerful and important. For experts such as this to be bowing and scraping was very telling. In the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect, not even a sectlord’s son would treat Terrifying elders with anything other than reverential respect.

Anything other than that would be considered rebellious behavior.

Strength was the one and only most important thing. With strength, one earned respect. A title or position based on anything else wasn’t important. And it was meaningless to give an important title or position to a weak person.

Yet, right here and now, these executors were virtually fawning over the junior superintendent. Although some of it had to do with the fact that he was stronger than the average person, there was clearly more to the story; this junior superintendent must be backed by someone whose strength defied imagination.

Obviously, killing the junior superintendent wasn't an option. Cutting him down would enrage his backer, and they were clearly not the kind of person who could be underestimated. Of course, even if the sectlord unleashed all the power at his disposal, and mustered the entire sect, there was no way they could wipe out this group of five. Maybe they could kill a few, but the four executors would definitely do everything to ensure that the junior superintendent got away with his life.

And that wasn't to mention the spy, or spies, in the sect.

If they weren’t completely rooted out, it would only lead to further disasters. So obviously, killing the junior superintendent and his bodyguards was out of the question.

Right now, all eyes were locked onto Emperor Heart-Celestial as he stepped forward and accepted the challenge.

Most people thought of Emperor Heart-Celestial as the top disciple in the sect. Although some disciples would compete with him, the truth was that people would only come out on top if he let them. He always seemed to be holding something back. Truth be told, he was stepping forward, not because he sought some reward, but because he couldn’t stand the humiliation to the sect.

“In that case, I’ll trust your word, Junior Superintendent,” he said. “Let’s see if I can stand up to fifty moves from you.” Respectfully clasping his hands, he said, “Please, begin.”

“Fifty moves? You really know how to run your mouth.” The junior superintendent chuckled. “I’d say it would be impressive if you could last for ten moves. As for fifty, not even those pieces of trash”— he pointed at the five chief elders he had knocked back into their seats— “could possibly last that long.”

The five chief elders were so angry their faces went white, and they were about to start shouting when the sectlord glared at them. “Chief elders, please maintain silence. There’s no need to add fuel to the fire.”

The five chief elders struggled to regain their composure. To be spoken to in such a way by someone from the junior generation was so infuriating they felt like coughing up blood. Unfortunately for them, it was true that they had reached the Terrifying level with the psychic scaling systems, which meant that further breakthroughs would be incredibly difficult for them.

One of the main reasons the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect had been able to grow so quickly was because of the psychic scaling systems. In fact, shortly after they began their rise, the Great Necropolis appeared, filled with godhood. It was thanks to all the godhood they had acquired in their campaigns that they now had so many chief elders with powerful cultivation bases. Without the psychic scaling systems, they wouldn’t have had more than ten Terrifying experts.

But even the weakest of the Terrifying old-timers, no matter how inferior their cultivation bases, still looked down on the junior superintendent. To have someone like him speaking so disrespectfully to them was virtually intolerable, and if it weren’t for the interference of the sectlord, they would have immediately taken deadly action.

POP!

Emperor Heart-Celestial suddenly burst into motion, unleashing the very same Deathless Emperor’s Dao Fist that he had used against Yang Qi. It was the move Unprecedented and Unduplicated. He threw one hand out in front of the other, then separated them as he sped in a circle around the junior superintendent. Obviously, he had pushed this move to its ultimate limit beneath the Terrifying level.

Quite a few disciples, and even some of the elders, were so impressed that they began to cheer and say things like, “Amazing!”

Yang Qi also nodded. Obviously, Emperor Heart-Celestial had been holding something back in their previous clash, otherwise their fight might have ended much differently. Of course, Yang Qi had plenty of his own magical treasures in reserve, such as the Engine of the One God.

“What’s so amazing about that?” the junior superintendent said disdainfully. “I’d say it’s sloppy at best, Emperor Heart-Celestial. Are you randomly running around in the hopes that I won’t be able to touch you?”

Suddenly, his palm shot out, seemingly casually, and yet in accord with the dao of heaven. In the blink of an eye, his palm collided with Emperor Heart-Celestial’s fist, backed by the power to exterminate everything in existence.

KABAM!

The junior superintendent held his footing, but Emperor Heart-Celestial staggered three paces backward, his face flush. Obviously, he had sustained an internal injury thanks to the clash.

Who could possibly have guessed that this junior superintendent would be so strong?

‘This is bad,’ Yang Qi thought. He could sense the deadly fluctuations in the palm strike Emperor Heart-Celestial had just sustained. Worse, he could tell that the junior superintendent wasn’t even close to running out of energy.

“Be careful, Emperor Heart-Celestial,” the sectlord said. “He's using the Soul-Seizing Psyche-Exterminating Grand Palm. It's a really top rate energy art. Combine your nascent divinity, blood, and soul!”

“Yes sir!” Emperor Heart-Celestial said. He thrust his hands out again and his vital energy surged, healing all of the injuries he had just sustained and returning him to full health.

Hands clasped behind his back, the junior superintendent said, “Very good. Move one is out of the way, leaving nine more to go. Go ahead, your turn. I actually don’t need to take the initiative to deal with you. Just go ahead and show me everything you’re capable of.”

His tone of voice couldn’t have been more arrogant and conceited, yet everyone present knew that what he was saying was true.

Emperor Heart-Celestial didn’t react. He remained calm as he smoothly led with a fist strike that turned into three palm strikes as he dashed back and forth with dazzling speed. It was the move Beyond All Compare, which was one of the best in his arsenal. Its combination of one fist strike that turned into three palm strikes conformed to the profound truth of: One begets two. Two begets three. Three begets all things. The one fist was a fist of primordial chaos, whereas the three palms represented all living beings. As soon as it was unleashed, the entire area filled with palm projections that then exploded and released devastating shockwaves.

This grand hall was locked down with spatial warding magics that were even sturdier than those in the Cave Temple of the Vajra Māyādevī. It was difficult to unleash power here, yet Emperor Heart-Celestial’s every strike still seemed strong enough to devastate everything around it.

“This move has some redeeming qualities after all!” the junior superintendent said. “What do you say I forget about the Soul-Seizing Psyche-Exterminating Grand Palm for now, and show you something else instead? Do you know what this is?” He struck out with a single finger.

Whoosh!

As his finger moved forward, all of the energy flows in the area began converging at its tip.

Even Emperor Heart-Celestial’s palm projections flew toward it. It vanquished all opposing energy arts, then touched Emperor Heart-Celestial’s actual palm. He reacted as though he had been struck by lightning, flipping backward through the air with blood spraying out of his mouth.

This time, he suffered even worse than he had during the first exchange.

Everyone was shocked.

“That was the Finger of Adjudication!” the sectlord exclaimed.

“Exactly. The Finger of Adjudication!” The junior superintendent laughed. “I could have taken your life if I wanted to, Emperor Heart-Celestial. But I’m having too much fun. Come on, keep going. I’ll wait until the tenth move before I kill you.”

Emperor Heart-Celestial calmly stood there, trying to recover from his injuries.

Meanwhile, a new voice rang out, and it belonged to none other than Yang Qi. “Chief Elder Winter Bladedark, do you mind if I take a look at Chang Rong? I can treat him, if you’d like.”

Chapter 980: Savior of the Sect (3)

Yang Qi’s voice rang out loud and clear for everyone to hear.

Many of the chief elders immediately looked over at him, and even the junior superintendent stopped in his tracks and looked over his shoulder in incredulity.

“What did you just say?” said Chief Elder Winter Bladedark. “You can treat Chang Rong’s symptoms? Not even I can do that, how exactly are you supposed to be able to?” Many of the chief elders were shaking their heads, clearly in disapproval of how Yang Qi was disrupting the situation.

Strolling out into the open, Yang Qi replied, “I said I can treat him. I wouldn't say that unless I could.”

“Bah!” spat Peaklord Grand Might. “This is a critical moment of life or death for the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect, boy! How dare you cause a scene! Men, arrest him immediately!”

“How impudent!” Yang Qi shot back with a glare. “Peaklord Grand Might, is it possible that you are the spy? Why else would you want to stop me from helping a fellow disciple? Now shut the hell up and get out of my way!”

He flicked his sleeve, sending out two strange blasts of winds that instantly transformed into two huge dragons. The dragons shot directly toward Peaklord Grand Might, who of course was a Terrifying expert. Like many of the other chief elders, he had reached that level thanks to the psychic scaling systems, but that didn’t mean his cultivation base was weak.

Yet when these two blasts of wind reached him, his eyes widened as he realized that, to his complete and utter surprise, if he didn’t do anything, he would quickly be sucked into Yang Qi’s sleeves.

It was a critical moment, so he chopped out with a knifehand, slicing the two gusts of wind in half and redirecting them toward the nearby wall. The wall creaked and cracks spread out on its surface, although they were instantly repaired by the spell formation inside.

Peaklord Grand Might shivered, then looked at Yang Qi with astonishment in his eyes. “Y-your... your energy arts and cultivation. When did they reach this level? What magical treasure were you using?”

“Magical treasure? You think I need a magical treasure?” Yang Qi had his Unspoiled Body, and could control the flow of time in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, allowing him to carry out a hundred years of cultivation in only a few hours.

During his recent extended period of cultivation in the chart, he had partially combined three of his major energy arts, which were currently split into three sections in his sea of energy. To some extent, they were like three nations involved in a tripartite balance of power. When one nation grew stronger than the others, the remaining two would work hard to catch up and even gain dominance. It was because of that principle that the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth and the Seventy-Two Monarchs Energy Art were constantly developing.

As for the Secret-Ensconcing All-World Anything-Everything Fundamental-Law Magic, he kept it tightly sealed, so it didn’t disturb the balance of the other three. Perhaps, if his cultivation base were higher and he had reached the Terrifying level, he would have been able to create an ever more complicated amalgamation of energy arts.

A ‘hundred schools of thought’ so to speak.

Right now, that wasn't possible, so he had to stick with the tripartite balance of power and work hard to achieve that so-called hundred schools of thought.

Everyone present was completely taken aback that a deadly expert had appeared at this stage in the game. Furthermore, Yang Qi was so strong that he actually made a move on Peaklord Grand Might. He obviously wasn’t a Terrifying expert, yet he clearly had fighting prowess that placed him on the same level as someone who was in the early stage of that level.

Fighting prowess of that sort was nothing less than stupefying.

Winter Bladedark was the first to recover from his shock. At first, he had been completely unconvinced that Yang Qi could treat his apprentice’s condition. But after what he had just seen, he had hope. Holding Chang Rong out in his arms, he said, “Go ahead. If you can save his life, I’ll pay you back in any way I can.”

“I'm not asking for a reward,” Yang Qi said. “He’s a fellow disciple, so it's my duty to help him.” Reaching out, he accepted Chang Rong and sent a stream of energy into him.

“Infernal Deities of Heaven and Earth; Guide and Lead the Soul.... Summon the Soul from Hell, Receive Elucidations from Earth and Heaven....”

A mysterious energy began pulsing from the depths of Chang Rong’s soul, and at the same time, streams of will began to converge on his body.

The junior superintendent’s expression flickered as he saw what was happening. ‘That’s a long-lost consummate technique from hell, a dao of gods from the primeval infernal deities, used to summon souls.’ For some reason, he didn’t seem interested at all in fighting Emperor Heart-Celestial anymore. Of course, given his status and prestige, he couldn’t launch an unexpected attack on Yang Qi right now.

“Come Forth, Infernal Deities!”

One shadowy figure after another appeared, surrounding Chang Rong and chanting the Great Compassion Mantra. Meanwhile, everyone looked on as a mysterious hellish vortex appeared, within which a soul began to take form. The sectlord’s eyes glittered. At first, he could hardly believe what he was seeing, but then his heart suddenly surged with courage and the desire to defy this junior superintendent.

A long moment passed, then Yang Qi put Chang Rong down. Chang Rong let loose a long, seemingly pained sigh, but there couldn’t have been a greater cause for rejoicing for the onlookers. Obviously, he was recovering!

Hardly able to contain himself, Winter Bladedark hurried over and said, “Chang Rong, are you better?” He sent some true energy into his apprentice, who opened his eyes. Almost immediately, Winter Bladedark could sense that his apprentice’s mind was there, and his nascent divinity was clear. Although he was still badly hurt, he was on his way to a full recovery.

“He’ll be fine,” Yang Qi said. “However, he needs to rest well. And he should avoid any kind of fighting for the next thousand years. Have him stay relaxed and focused on restoring his nascent divinity. In the end, he should be able to reach a higher level of enlightenment because of all this.” Yang Qi knew that having his soul summoned back from hell would actually provide him with significant enlightenment. In the end, he would benefit from this catastrophe.

“Many thanks, many thanks,” Winter Bladedark said. “Who could ever have guessed that a disciple like you would appear in Memory Peak? You’re a real blessing to the entire sect.” From the way he addressed Yang Qi, it was almost like he viewed him as an equal. Some of that was because of how Yang Qi had saved his apprentice, and the other was because of the strength he had shown with his sleeve attack earlier. It was obvious that Yang Qi was at least as strong as someone in the early Terrifying level.

“I could never have guessed that the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect would have a disciple like this,” the junior superintendent said loudly. “Why don’t you come over here and spar a bit? You’re dismissed, Emperor Heart-Celestial. You’re no match for me, but you get to leave with your life.”

“That's fine, I’ll let Brother Yang Qi handle you,” Emperor Heart-Celestial said. He was both the optimistic type, and someone who didn't care about matters of victory or defeat. He knew that he wasn’t a match for the junior superintendent, and at the same time, had perceived moments ago that Yang Qi’s cultivation base was vastly beyond his.

Walking over to Yang Qi, he said, “Brother, the sect is in grave peril right now, and we’re all relying on you.”

“Don’t worry,” Yang Qi said. Flicking his finger, he sent some gentle true energy into Emperor Heart-Celestial, healing him and restoring him to his peak. In fact, some black smoke rose up from him, which was heterogeneous true energy that the junior superintendent had infected him with.

Clicking his tongue in admiration, Peaklord Celestial thought, ‘It seems Memory Peak’s fortunes have changed. They really picked up a treasure of a disciple. Is this kid even human? How could humans have potential like this?’

“Many thanks, Brother Yang Qi,” Emperor Heart-Celestial said. “I couldn’t be more in admiration of your cultivation base. You saved my life, and now you’re responsible for the sect as a whole. Please be careful, that junior superintendent is a real expert.”

“Fear not,” Yang Qi said. “I should be able to last for fifty moves against him.”

Walking out in front of the junior superintendent, he smiled and said, “Did you just say something about our sect having nobody that could be a match for you? Well I'm right here. And you can forget about fifty moves. You might as well prepare for five hundred. Oh, one other thing: I'm going to beat you.”

“Beat me?” Killing intent flashed in the junior superintendent’s eyes. “You’ve got a big mouth, I’ll give you that. And you're stronger than Emperor Heart-Celestial. But you definitely can’t defend against fifty moves from me, yet you go to the length of saying you’ll beat me?”

“You heard me right,” Yang Qi said. “I'm going to beat you. If you think I can’t, then what do you say we make a bet?”

“What kind of bet?” The junior superintendent looked at Yang Qi through narrowed eyes, almost as if he were preparing to attack at any moment. Obviously, he had been playing around earlier, but now he was ready to do some actual fighting.

“Oh, nothing special,” Yang Qi said coolly. “You just made five demands of us, right? How about if I lose, presumably in death, then the sect will guarantee that at least one of your demands is met. And afterward, you can continue to do whatever you deem necessary to get the sect to meet the rest of your demands. But if I win, you retract your five demands. Furthermore, you Executors of the Ancient Road will give a hundred pieces of godhood to the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect as tribute every year. And you’ll also promise to not cause any further trouble for us.”

“What incredible gall!” one of the four executors said, his eyes flashing viciously. “If you think the Executors of the Ancient Road will give tribute to anyone, you’re definitely crazy, boy.”

“No, that’s fine,” the junior superintendent said. “I agree. I don’t mind making a promise with someone doomed to die. Besides, in the end, I'm going to assimilate you and see what your special powers are. The fact that you healed someone I hit with the Soul-Seizing Psyche-Exterminating Grand Palm shows that you definitely have some unique abilities.”

“So, you agree to the bet? Great.” Yang Qi chuckled. “In that case, let’s begin.”

Truth be told, this junior superintendent was so strong that, without drawing on his magical treasures, Yang Qi wasn’t sure he could defeat him. However, it was a good opportunity to push his energy arts to the limit and see what they were really capable of.

Regardless of what happened, this was going to be a spectacular battle.

Chapter 981: Savior of the Sect (4)

Two top masters were facing off.

And Yang Qi was going to try to win the fight without using any magical treasures. Truth be told, he couldn’t publicly use any of his really powerful treasures, even if he wanted to. It would cause too much of a stir. Even if he became the savior of the sect, there was no way that the sect’s leadership would simply ignore the fact that he had objects from the legion of gods. And that wasn’t to mention how the Executors of the Ancient Road would react.

The Engine of the One God and the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart were consummate god items, but at the same time, they were so attractive that they could prove deadly. Considering so many people were present and watching his every move, he had to rely on only himself in this situation.

There was no question about it: this junior superintendent was going to be an extremely formidable opponent, and fighting him was going to be very dangerous. However, it would also be a chance for Yang Qi to improve himself. Hopefully, he could gain further enlightenment of the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body, and figure out more ways to combine it with the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.

Although the junior superintendent didn’t have Terrifying will convergence, his fighting prowess was on the level of a Terrifying expert. Therefore, Yang Qi couldn't afford to take him lightly.

As they faced off and looked each other in the eyes, the junior superintendent stood there with his hands clasped behind his back. He seemed calm, but his eyes pulsed with killing intent. Meanwhile, Yang Qi’s battle robe rippled, and he kept his true energy hidden, making it seem like he was ready to move at any moment.

Although fighting had yet to break out, everyone could sense the atmosphere growing extremely tense. This was like a fight between a dragon and a tiger, and on top of that, the disciples present knew that, regardless of what happened, they would be able to learn a lot.

After all, this was almost the same as two Terrifying experts clashing in battle.

“Die,” the junior superintendent suddenly said. Although he was somewhat shaken by Yang Qi’s show of strength, he was tired of the face-off, so he shot forward, curled his hand into a claw, and reached out toward Yang Qi, his fingers pitch black and pulsing with an aura like that of a wretch-god.

“That’s the Black Sun Wretch God Claw!” the sectlord hissed, as if to offer a warning to Yang Qi.

However, Yang Qi wasn’t listening. Instead, he met the claw attack with his own. In the blink of an eye, an icy and cold aura erupted from within him as he drew on King Hell-Freezer’s deadly Hell-Freezing God Claw. He added in elements from his own constitution, as well as power from the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body.

The two claws met and both parties trembled as the space around them cracked and crumbled. Clearly, the two attacks were evenly matched.

‘I can’t believe this guy is so strong!’ the junior superintendent thought as his arm began to grow numb. Of course, there was no way he could know that his opponent was using both the Unspoiled Body and the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.

The former technique was all about having a body that could withstand numerous tribulations, and the latter provided power that could conquer every obstacle. Together, they were virtually invincible.

That said, the Executors of the Ancient Road had strong bodies as well, and the clash caused Yang Qi’s energy and blood to tremble. Now that he had a taste of how strong the junior superintendent was, he realized more than ever that he had to unleash all of his abilities to the utmost level if he wanted to keep the upper hand in the fight.

Strike first, achieve lethality. Strike second, meet calamity.

He rushed forward, looking almost like a drunk flailing about. Of course, he wasn't drunk, but using a unique tactic called the True-Devil Kalpa-Projection God-Dao.

Instantly, it was as if the winds of doomsday had sprung up in all directions, seeking to seep into the eyes, ears, nose, and mouth of everyone they touched to turn them into ash.

Simultaneously, his left hand drew on the Hand of the One God, sending out such countless variations that the junior superintendent couldn’t possibly evade them all. The Executors of the Ancient Road were physically tougher than all other types of immortals, but not even they could stand up directly to the combination of the Unspoiled Body and the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.

The power of kalpas and tribulations mixed with the force of hell, as well as the fundamental truth encompassed in the saying common among the Devilfolk sages and mahātmās, I will sacrifice myself and go to hell before I let anyone else do so.

From the very first clash, there were chief elders and other astute individuals who realized that, although Yang Qi might not win this fight, there was a very distinct possibility that he wouldn't lose it. But then Yang Qi unleashed his second move, and looks of shock appeared everywhere as they realized how unprecedentedly strong it was.

Peaklord Grand Might’s face was ashen as he realized that, if he were standing in the place of the junior superintendent, he might not have been able to throw up a defense in time.

‘This is horrible!’ he thought venomously. ‘I have to figure out a way to get rid of him!’

Meanwhile, a look of surprise was on the face of Peaklord Memory, who was also shocked by what she was seeing. She had personally scanned Yang Qi, but hadn’t noticed anything about him that would indicate he was this strong.

Truth be told, without his advances thanks to the Unspoiled Body, Yang Qi wouldn’t have been a match for the junior superintendent. That said, he might have been able to last for fifty moves.

For the first time up to this point, a serious expression was seen on the junior superintendent’s face. Then, he spoke in a voice that was so piercing and grating it seemed to pierce all the way to the nascent divinities of everyone who heard it, “Die!”

‘That’s the Wretch God Needle-Prick Devil-Voice!’ the sectlord thought. Apparently, he could almost immediately identify just about any energy art or daoist technique.

The devil voice technique immediately threw Yang Qi off his rhythm. In response, the junior superintendent’s five fingers clenched into a fist that glowed with golden vajra light. Rushing forward with unstoppable momentum, the junior superintendent launched a deadly fist strike.

‘It’s the Hidden-Child Great-Wheel Ultimate-Brightness Fist!’ Yet again, the sectlord immediately identified the technique, which was a consummate divine ability from one of the buddhist schools. Although it wasn’t on the same level as the Secret-Ensconcing All-World Anything-Everything Fundamental-Law Magic, it still contained majestic attack power. With it, the junior superintendent would have been able to destroy the meridians of virtually any opponent he faced.

Even a Terrifying expert would have been forced to concede in the face of it.

Expression flickering, Yang Qi quickly switched to forceful palm techniques from the Unspoiled Body. Palms slammed into palms as Yang Qi fought almost without thinking, drawing on the powers of tribulations within him.

Explosions and shockwaves rippled out, and the junior superintendent was starting to look very nervous as it was obvious that, after several dozen exchanges, the two of them were roughly evenly matched.

“Well done,” he said. “You’re the first person beneath the Terrifying level who has ever been a match for me. I guess I’ll have to show you a consummate technique I bitterly cultivated for a hundred million years! Wretch God Ultimate’s Legendary Sutra!”

A black flow of energy appeared behind him, then swirled into the shape of a black sun, in the middle of which sat a wretch-god formed from countless magical symbols.

“Is that really the Wretch God Ultimate’s Legendary Sutra from the god world?!” the sectlord said, his face falling. “Junior Superintendent, you’re one of the Executors of the Ancient Road! How could you cultivate an evil scripture like that?”

According to legends, there were many wretch-gods in the god world, but their leader was named Ultimate. He had united the countless wretch-gods, and penned the scripture which later came to be known as Wretch God Ultimate’s Legendary Sutra. In fact, he was so powerful that he could even fight King Immortal-Slayer.

When that ability was unleashed, a myriad of worlds could be turned into dust.

Black light burned like the hottest fire, and black fire appeared in the junior superintendent’s hand, flames so hot they could burn gods, and represented an ultimate dao.

Wretch God Ultimate's Obsidian Flame.

“Don’t let it touch you!” the sectlord said. “Rely on your agility to avoid it. Nobody can possibly withstand a blow from Wretch God Ultimate's Obsidian Flame!”

“Oh really?” Yang Qi said. “There’s no need for you to worry, Sectlord. Not only can I accept this Wretch God Ultimate's Obsidian Flame, but I can even use it to temper my body.”

To the wide-eyed shock of everyone present, Yang Qi rose up straight and tall, making him seem like the perfect representation of a man. Then he clenched his hand into a fist and punched out toward the black flame.

He was instantly engulfed with black fire, causing astonishing popping and hissing noises to fill the area.

“So, the brat’s finally going to die,” Peaklord Grand Might said. “He underestimated the power of Wretch God Ultimate's Obsidian Flame. Either that, or he was just looking to get killed.”

When the sectlord noticed how Peaklord Grand Might was gloating in Yang Qi’s misfortune, he shook his head. Even when the sect was in dire trouble, Peaklord Grand Might couldn’t keep his mind on the big picture or refrain from infighting. The sectlord resolved to give him a stern warning when all of this was over, lest he bring about even greater catastrophe.

Meanwhile, as the black flame engulfed Yang Qi, it inflicted immense pain onto his skin, prompting him to draw on the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. Thus, he used the fire to benefit himself, cleansing himself of certain side-effects caused by the Unspoiled Body. And the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth also benefited from the influx of wretch-god vital energy.

Even engulfed as he was in black fire, he prepared to sustain another blow from the junior superintendent.

“Ultimate Wretch God!” the junior superintendent said, releasing another fist strike.

His eyes shone with wretched light as he pushed the evil sutra to its limits, causing wretch energy to abound and turning the surrounding area into a kingdom of wretched evil.

Looking at Yang Qi, he was convinced that the roiling black flames were eating away at him. Perhaps he could hold out for a short time, but his meridians would eventually be so badly damaged that he would collapse into ash.

Thus, the two of them fought back and forth. Everyone looking on could detect something like the aura of a Terrifying expert coming from the black flames, and knew that if they raged out of control, their own nascent divinities would be seriously injured.

Wretch God Ultimate's Obsidian Flame was hot enough to burn anything and everything.

Even the Terrifying chief elders were covered in goosebumps; they couldn’t even imagine what it would be like to be covered in a fire like that. Yet Yang Qi was able to keep fighting under these conditions? Was he even human?

Chapter 982: Wretch God Ultimate&#039;s Obsidian Flame

Hissing and popping sounds could be heard as the fire surrounded Yang Qi, making him look almost like a burning scarecrow. Everyone was shaken to the core, yet Yang Qi almost seemed like he didn’t notice what was happening as he fiercely fought back against the junior superintendent.

One of the combatants was an outstanding figure from the Executors of the Ancient Road, the other a beneficiary of unusually marvelous good fortune. Both were at the very peak of the Destabilizing level, with cultivation bases that seemed capable of devastating anything that got in their path. Even the Terrifying experts were learning a thing or two from watching them fight, much less the disciples of the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect.

They exchanged ten moves in a very short period of time, with Yang Qi being just as lively and energetic as before, and by no means at a disadvantage. However, Wretch God Ultimate's Obsidian Flame was like a host of black dragons trying to burrow into his skin and get inside him.

Many of the onlookers were very worried that the varied transformations of the fire would eventually allow it to burn its way into Yang Qi’s meridians and wipe him out of existence.

Truth be told, that was exactly what the junior superintendent was banking on. By constantly varying the transformations of the fire, he was hoping to get it inside Yang Qi to force him to surrender.

“I can’t believe you’ve lasted for ten moves!” the junior superintendent said. “From ancient times until now, you’re the only cultivator under the Terrifying level who’s done that. You should be proud.” After the tenth move, the junior superintendent’s moves grew even fiercer, and he began to reveal his true strength. At the same time, Wretch God Ultimate's Obsidian Flame grew even more intense.

Whoosh!

Behind the junior superintendent, the ground and air alike split apart and sent a blast of flame out in all directions.

Flop!

One of the disciples in the audience couldn’t hold out and flopped dead to the ground, black flames already beginning to eat him up.

“Everyone, back up!” the sectlord ordered, “especially disciples who aren’t in the Terrifying level!” Even as the orders left his mouth, the sectlord waved his hands out, causing the magical laws in the receiving hall to grow stronger and ensuring that the shockwaves from the fighting wouldn't spread far.

Everyone was visibly astonished at how intense Wretch God Ultimate's Obsidian Flame was, and concern for Yang Qi grew. Even the Terrifying chief elders weren’t confident that they could deal with that fire the way Yang Qi was. Despite being engulfed in flame, it didn’t seem like his fighting prowess had been affected at all.

“Obsidian Flame Ten Weapons Transformation!”

The junior superintendent was pushing the technique to its limits. Black fire extended from his hand, turning into a long spear whose blade emitted tiny cold sparks that fell down like rain.

Yang Qi spun in place, writhing like a snake as he clenched his hand into a fist and launched a punch directly at the incoming spear.

The junior superintendent chuckled coldly and backed up. As he did, the black spear of fire transformed into a snake that wrapped around Yang Qi.

CRACK!

Yang Qi shouted in pain as the snake began to expand, exerting immense amounts of strength as it bound him tightly in place and made it impossible to free himself.

Wretch God Ultimate's Obsidian Flame was so powerful that, if it got inside someone, they would definitely die. So was there even a need to mention how strong it would be in the form of a huge snake?

“Six-Daos Sealing! Heaven-Earth God-Devil!”

The junior superintendent suddenly blurred into position behind Yang Qi, where he launched a palm strike with countless variations in it, causing a host of sealing marks to fly out.

Crick. Crack!

The sealing marks quickly began to envelop Yang Qi.

“Prepare to die!” the junior superintendent growled, beginning to add palm strikes to the sealing marks. Gasps could be heard as the onlookers assumed that Yang Qi was about to die.

“Master!” An Yiru said to her Master, Peaklord Memory.

“Don’t worry. Victory and defeat won't be determined right now. Yang Qi won’t be that easy to beat, considering he cultivates such an extremely powerful divine ability. He has a body that's virtually indestructible; even I would be hard-pressed to deal with Wretch God Ultimate's Obsidian Flame, but he’s actually absorbing it and using it to further his cultivation.”

She was right.

Yang Qi was sucking Wretch God Ultimate's Obsidian Flame into him, where it streaked through his meridians without harming them at all. Not even a fire created by a wretch-god from the distant past could possibly harm his True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body.

And although the power of the tribulations that rolled out of him weren’t enough to vanquish the black fire on their own, Yang Qi also had the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. In combination with the Seventy-Two Monarchs Energy Art, there were three major forces that Yang Qi could draw upon to defend against the invading flame, which was soon gobbled up as surely as if by a gobblewock.

The snakes of true energy shattered and crumbled. Then Yang Qi drew on another energy art from the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body to form a new character within himself. It was the character for ‘righteous’, and it was uniquely capable of crushing wretch-devils.

That ‘righteous’ character was actually a grand tribulation designed to crush wretch-devils. Within Yang Qi, that character began proliferating, giving birth to more and more characters that then slammed into Wretch God Ultimate's Obsidian Flame, crushing it. As part of the process, another tribulation and another kalpa appeared within his Unspoiled Body.

Yang Qi was getting stronger again.

RIP!

He threw out a punch and the sealing marks exploded, allowing him to leap out into the open. Grabbing the black snake of fire, he squeezed it in his hands, causing it to rapidly shrink and be absorbed into his body.

Black smoke began pouring out of him, impurities that the Unspoiled Body was extruding upon making contact with the quintessence-blood and vital energy of wretch-devils.

“Many thanks, Junior Superintendent! Wretch God Ultimate's Obsidian Flame is really helping to push my energy arts to a new peak! And the tempering to my body is helping my cultivation base rise to higher heights!”

Laughing, Yang Qi threw a punch that sent the junior superintendent staggering backward.

“Hold on!” the junior superintendent shouted. “You’re using the ultimate energy art from the Hell of Sages and Mahātmās! The True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body! How did you start cultivating that? To get that, you would have to find a scroll made of sheepskin, personally penned by the True Devil, plus the Three Lives Stone. In the past ten thousand generations, there were countless people who tried to cultivate it, but died as a result. It’s simply impossible to fully master. How many characters have you succeeded at? Hand that sheepskin scroll over!”

RUMBLE!

A minor uproar ensued among the onlookers as they realized that Yang Qi had cultivated what could only be considered a supreme energy art. Yet that energy art was essentially a death sentence, causing many of the onlookers to look at Yang Qi sadly, as though they expected him to die as well.

Many profound and enigmatic individuals had cultivated that art, only to experience profound cultivation deviation.

In fact, there had once been a wretch-devil on the Ancient Road to the Gods who had cultivated a few dozen of the tribulations, only to end up shattering into dust.

“What,” Yang Qi said, sounding completely unruffled. “Just because other people fail at it, does that mean I can’t succeed?” The truth was that it was much better for this secret to be revealed than the secret of his God Legion Seal. After all, this was an energy art that fewer people would be interested in trying to seize.

“Hand it over!” the junior superintendent shouted. “Something as evil as that should not be allowed to exist in the world. We Executors of the Ancient Road are tasked with destroying such abominations!”

“What's going on here, Junior Superintendent?” the sectlord said. “Are you really planning on going back on your word? You said that if a disciple from the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect could beat you in a fight, you would immediately leave and stop causing problems for our sect.”

The junior superintendent snorted coldly. “I'm not going to go back on my word. I'm going to kill him and get that sheepskin scroll!”

As the words left his mouth, the junior superintendent launched a very simple and direct attack, his five fingers curving into deadly hooks that were clearly some new energy art he hadn’t used up to this point.

Yang Qi laughed coldly. “Oh, so now you’re trying to kill me? Are you crazy? I'm about to crush you, so why not just be a good boy and pull out the hundred pieces of godhood you owe as tribute!”

At the moment, Yang Qi was cultivating more and more tribulation characters, causing his cultivation base to rise. And each move he unleashed was like an invincible tribulation that could devour all living things.

They fought back and forth, unleashing move after move in a seemingly endless cycle. The junior superintendent was pushing his energy arts higher and higher, and the shockwaves from their clashes caused everything to tremble violently.

Eventually, they had passed a thousand moves. At that point, Yang Qi laughed heartily and said, “That’s a thousand moves, Junior Superintendent. Wasn’t the limit supposed to be fifty? You can’t do a thing to me, can you? I guess it’s my turn!”

“Bastard!” the junior superintendent said, so furious that he was actually smiling. He could never have predicted that this opponent would be so strong. Even if he had known beforehand that Yang Qi was cultivating an Unspoiled Body, he wouldn’t have been very worried. After all, that technique was full of fatal flaws. But right now, it didn't seem that there was anything wrong with it at all.

Even worse, it was devouring his true energy without cease.

Of course, what he had said earlier was mostly correct. Without the Three Lives Stone, it should have been impossible to overcome the inherent flaws of cultivating the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body. But he had no idea that Yang Qi could use the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth to do the same thing.

“Fine. It's time for you to try out another boundless divine ability, a consummate technique that we Executors of the Ancient Road use. It’s called the Myriad-Worlds Adjudicating-Honor-and-Glory Grand Energy Art!” He was finally using some of the energy arts unique to the executors.

All of a sudden, an enormous rod of adjudication appeared behind him, like a pillar made to support the heavens.

Chapter 983: Defeating the Junior Superintendent

This junior superintendent seemed to have an unending supply of powerful secret magics, each of which could be completely deadly in nature.

This staff of adjudication was far, far stronger than the Martial-God Hegemon-King Heaven-Propping Pillar. Once erected, it could not be toppled, and in fact, it was not really a pillar, but rather a dao of gods, a type of faith, or a path of martyrs.

This divine ability of the Executors of the Ancient Road represented magical rules, natural laws, and the dao of adjudication. Once it was unleashed, anyone who faced it would be suppressed and find it impossible to fight back. Anyone who was under the level of the legion of gods would be forced to be docile and obedient. After all, the Executors of the Ancient Road had been given their power by the legion of gods.

However, Yang Qi wasn’t feeling any pressure at all. He was the owner of the God Legion Seal, and had cultivated the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body. What was more, he was the successor of the seventy-two monarchs, all of whom were invincible entities that had existed above the ordinary members of the legion of gods.

The legion of gods could not suppress Yang Qi. No. He would suppress the legion of gods!

“So you're relying on a technique like that to attack me?” Yang Qi said. “Very funny. Prepare to taste defeat, Junior Superintendent. It's time for you to realize that the era of the Executors of the Ancient Road is a thing of the past. Permanently.”

He thrust his left hand out with the tribulations of the Unspoiled Body. And with his right hand, he drew on the Seventy-Two Monarchs Energy Art. He slipped some of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth into that combination, making sure it was in a way that no one would be able to detect.

“The Seventy-Two Monarchs Energy Art!?” the junior superintendent blurted in shock. Never would he have guessed that Yang Qi would suddenly switch to such a ferocious move. This was a killing tactic, and it was unleashed with such incredible speed that Yang Qi almost immediately had the upper hand. His left hand was hard and unyielding, filled with myriad kalpas and tribulations. His right hand was piercing and filled with killing intent, inner strength, and undefeatable true energy.

This was the first time in all history that three energy arts such as this had been combined in battle.

The extended time Yang Qi had spent in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart working on his cultivation had pushed his energy arts to a peak level. However, the process had left behind flaws. Furthermore, he had been unable to unleash the new abilities with casual ease. However, thanks to the pressure of this fight with the junior superintendent, and the tempering provided by Wretch God Ultimate's Obsidian Flame, the impurities within him had been extruded. And fighting back and forth over a thousand rounds of combat had given him extremely important experience. Now he was at an almost perfect state, able to release his combination of three powerful energy arts in a way that conformed to the dao of heaven and was virtually matchless in nature.

Everyone present was now able to see how mighty Yang Qi’s cultivation base and fighting prowess were. He seemed like the kind of person who could fight forever without getting tired, as though he were connected to the power of the god world, giving him inexhaustible true energy.

POP!

He attacked again with both hands, causing a profound and enigmatic stream of energy to flow out and hit the enormous pillar, resulting in masses of black smoke pouring out.

The junior superintendent staggered backward several paces. It was his first time actually retreating!

“Damn you!” he said, his face turning scarlet. “I can’t believe you forced me back. Fine. You’re going to die now! Anybody in the world who does something like this to me will BE KILLED!”

All of a sudden, his energy started to skyrocket.

RIP!

It was as though an egg had cracked open inside of him, releasing streams of god fire, not to use as an attack on an enemy, but purely to shatter a high-level power within him. That power was godhood, and he was using some sort of secret magic to break it down. In turn, burning quintessence energy and fire raged through him.

In the blink of an eye, his power and cultivation base climbed to a peak level, and his energy arts improved by at least double. Each palm he unleashed would now be filled with boundless, godly might, the kind that could shake lands and rock mountains, and cause stars to fall from the sky.

Yang Qi exhaled sharply as he blocked the incoming attacks. He could tell that his opponent was burning godhood with a secret magic, a tactic that he could emulate with the Engine of the One God. However, he was determined not to do so in this fight.

He wanted to rely only on his energy arts.

Now that the junior superintendent had boosted his energy arts, it was impossible for Yang Qi to defend himself like before. The force from the blows entered him, bringing with them some of the quintessence energy of the godhood that hadn’t been fully assimilated by the junior superintendent. And that, Yang Qi was able to take with King Heaven-Devourer’s true energy.

He currently had King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans sealed in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. However, he didn’t need them to use certain heaven-devouring techniques, such as this one, to absorb true energy sent in by an opponent.

A normal person who was hit by the junior superintendent’s true energy in this way would have had their meridians and sea of energy explode. But Yang Qi could take any type of true energy and turn it into kalpas and tribulations.

And the more tribulations he experienced, the stronger he got.

Just like that, the junior superintendent unleashed a bevy of palm strikes that put Yang Qi at a disadvantage. However, he didn’t collapse. Furthermore, as the junior superintendent burned through the godhood energy, Yang Qi’s counterstrikes grew more and more intense.

The sectlord nodded inwardly. ‘This Yang Qi is really incredible. It seems to me that there’s no way he can be beaten. But I wonder what other tricks the junior superintendent has up his sleeves. He seems to have an unending supply of divine abilities, plus, he hasn’t used any magical treasures yet. Will he?’

RIP!

The junior superintendent burned through a piece of godhood, then immediately detonated a second piece, causing burning quintessence energy to pour through him. Yet again, he pressed the attack, keeping the upper hand against Yang Qi.

“How much godhood do you have?” Yang Qi said.

“An endless amount! Running low on true energy, huh? Let’s see you keep fighting after you run out!” Seeing that Yang Qi was gasping for breath, the junior superintendent was convinced that burning his godhood had been the right choice. Obviously, his opponent was starting to run out of energy, which meant that, after over a thousand moves, victory was in sight.

Sadly for him, it was just a ploy on Yang Qi’s part, who was actually benefiting greatly from the situation. The junior superintendent was not thoroughly breaking down the godhood, which meant that, as it entered Yang Qi, he was able to absorb it. What was more, it was pure godhood power that had already been thoroughly refined, leaving it free of impurities.

For all intents and purposes, the junior superintendent was acting like a kind benefactor for Yang Qi, helping him boost his cultivation and true energy.

It almost wasn't a fight, but rather a one-way transfer of energy.

Thump!

The junior superintendent burned a third piece of godhood. Meanwhile, in the hopes of keeping the ruse up for as long as possible, Yang Qi was putting on a big show of being in a bad position. He even let himself get hit in the shoulder, then let blood spray out of his mouth as a result.

Many in the audience cried out in alarm, and An Yiru screamed.

However, Peaklord Memory’s face remained a motionless mask.

Meanwhile, the junior superintendent seemed enlivened by what was happening, and unleashed more attacks. He drew on all sorts of godly-class energy arts, sending one deadly move after another right at Yang Qi.

After the junior superintendent burned through the sixth piece of godhood, he clearly had the advantage, but still hadn’t seized victory. By this point, reason dictated that Yang Qi should have lost. Yet he seemed to slip out of every deadly situation, to the point where people were now starting to suspect that something strange was going on.

Even the junior superintendent was starting to wonder what was happening. However, he wasn't ready to throw in the towel quite yet, because it still seemed like he was just on the verge of defeating Yang Qi.

Thus, he fought with increased intensity and began burning his godhood at an even faster rate. Thankfully, he had a huge amount to work with, which meant that he could fight for a long time without really worrying about it.

BOOM!

He hit Yang Qi square in the chest with a fist, causing him to stagger backward. However, instead of coughing up blood, white steam began rising from the top of his head.

‘Yes!’ the junior superintendent thought, delighted. ‘I finally damaged his nascent divinity!’ To see white steam rising up meant that the nascent divinity in the sea of consciousness had been damaged, and that was a much worse situation than losing some blood.

“I refuse to give up!” Yang Qi shouted valiantly, making it seem like he was going to fight to the death. “I can tell you’re burning godhood with a secret magic, Junior Superintendent. But you're obviously not taking time to dissolve the impurities that are building up. All I have to do is wait until they build up to a level that’s too high for you to handle. That's when I’ll achieve victory!”

“You complete and utter moron!” the junior superintendent said, laughing. “I’m inherently able to extrude such impurities. And the godhood I have has already been purified by an almighty entity from the Ancient Road to the Gods. You guessed completely wrong. So that's what's been keeping you going this whole time? Sorry to say, you have no chance of coming out of this alive.”

Burning another huge piece of godhood, he continued attacking with mountain-toppling, sea-draining force. However, he still wasn't able to defeat Yang Qi.

At a certain point, he frowned, wondering why Yang Qi was able to take so much punishment. Would he never die? How was his final bit of dying energy able to keep him going this long?

Little did he know that dramatic transformations were occurring within Yang Qi.

Chapter 984: Defeating the Junior Superintendent (2)

Within Yang Qi, three streams of true energy had formed a large circle. The junior superintendent was fueling his attacks with burned godhood, but wasn’t fully refining that power. Therefore, it was causing different transformations within Yang Qi, who was ravenously devouring every bit of godhood power that he could.

The True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body required huge amounts of power. For example, in order to cultivate the first line, the mahātmā fiend-devil had sacrificed over ten thousand powerful fiend-devil sect leaders and given their devil vitality to Yang Qi by means of the sheepskin scroll.

Yet how could devil vitality compare to godhood?

Yang Qi had taken a collection of godhood that had been used to seal Lord Blood River, but that collection was difficult to assimilate, thanks to the godliness left behind in it by the legion of gods. And the impurities it left behind when he had assimilated it were difficult to get rid of. In fact, it had only been with Wretch God Ultimate's Obsidian Flame that he managed to extrude them. So he obviously had no desire to get himself in the same bad situation again.

Thankfully, his enemy was now funneling pure godhood power right into him.

After using it to boost his own true energy, he realized that it was too much for him to contain, so he sent the remainder into the depths of his heart.

The imperial-heaven pre-beginning systems were one of the most mysterious systems of the Engine of the One God. But he wasn’t actually using the Engine of the One God. Instead, he was using his enlightenment of the engine to create a model of those systems. In essence, he was cultivating a new energy art.

The Engine of the One God was the most powerful ‘furnace’ the Lord of Civilization had ever created. As for the imperial-heaven pre-beginning systems, they were the manifestation of his lifetime of understanding of quintessence and energy arts.

Yang Qi had contemplated the systems long enough to have a deep understanding of them, and now he was trying to create a copy. If he could even form just the first, weakest aspect of those systems within his heart, it would lead to major advancements in his energy arts.

“Imperial-heaven pre-beginning systems. First state!”

Countless magical symbols formed together to create something corporeal, an imperial design with no beginning that pulsed with power.

The power of godhood was fundamentally deathless, and it was the only thing that could truly fuel the imperial-heaven pre-beginning systems. Even having just completed the first state of those systems, he could assimilate a huge assortment of power. Furthermore, it would be a big stabilizing force, allowing him to make much better adjustments to his three major energy arts, and truly begin combining three into one.

As the fight continued, more godhood power entered him and the first state of the imperial-heaven pre-beginning systems began to take shape. And as he grew stronger, he reached the point where he could easily strike a stunning blow that would send the junior superintendent flying.

However, he didn’t make a move yet. He just continued pretending to be struck over and over again, prompting the junior superintendent to continue burning his godhood.

If possible, Yang Qi wanted to push his new imperial-heaven pre-beginning systems to the second state.

By this point, the two of them had fought for several thousand rounds, and the junior superintendent was starting to go a bit crazy. Every time he thought that Yang Qi was going to fall for sure, the exact opposite would happen.

It happened once, then twice. Then ten, and twenty times. Then a hundred times. Then two hundred.

Even if the junior superintendent were a complete and utter idiot, he would still have realized that something odd was going on. Yet he couldn't figure out exactly what it was.

He wasn’t the only one. Others in the audience were starting to pick up on the clues, and were wondering how it was possible that Yang Qi was in such a bad position for so long, yet hadn’t been defeated.

Even Peaklord Grand Might, who hated Yang Qi and wanted him to die, was finally starting to realize that there was more to him than met the eyes. ‘What’s this brat up to?’

Finally, one of the Executors of the Ancient Road realized what was going on and said, “Junior Superintendent, this guy is absorbing your godhood! Be careful! He’s definitely hiding his true capabilities!”

The game was up!

“Damn you, bastard!” he shrieked. “I can’t believe that you would secretly steal my power. You’re cultivating some energy art with it, aren’t you? Time to use a magical treasure. Sword of Reincarnation!”

A beam of sword light shot out from his palm as he prepared to use a magical treasure. Normally, he would never have used something as precious as this, mostly because it would be a big loss of face. But now he had no other options. If his opponent was getting stronger in the middle of their fight, the ultimate consequences would be too horrible to contemplate.

However, the instant the sword light appeared, Yang Qi burst out laughing. “Too late, Junior Superintendent. I'm about to test out something new on you that I just mastered!”

Within his heart, the first state of the imperial-heaven pre-beginning systems surged with power, and three streams of energy within him converged into something like a huge dragon. When it shot out and met the sword light, the light shattered, revealing an ancient, pitch-black sword.

Yang Qi shot forward like a tornado, reaching out with his hand and waving it at the sword.

Whizz!

A sound like vibrating metal was heard as the Sword of Reincarnation flew out of the junior superintendent’s hand and into Yang Qi’s. Then Yang Qi poured true energy into it, causing loud cracking sounds to ring out.

“Arrghhh!” the junior superintendent blurted, and blood sprayed out of his mouth as he suffered serious injuries. His animadestiny sword had just been wrenched away by Yang Qi, so it was little wonder he had ended up getting hurt.

Swish!

Yang Qi shot forward and extended the sword until it was touching the junior superintendent’s throat. Meanwhile, the sword will that filled the area made it impossible for the junior superintendent to move.

“What do you think, Junior Superintendent? You've lost. I've completely and utterly defeated you, and I could kill you if I wanted to.”

“Vile bastard!” the junior superintendent said, yet he couldn’t move. He was completely enveloped by sword energy. His Sword of Reincarnation had been taken over by Yang Qi, and considering it had once belonged to the junior superintendent, he knew that he wouldn't be able to escape it.

The situation had completely turned around.

The sectlord breathed a sigh of relief and started laughing. A true battle between giants had been fought, and everyone present had learned something by watching it. And regardless of anything else, a major crisis had been momentarily averted.

“Don’t hurt the junior superintendent,” one of the Terrifying executors said. “If you harm him, the entire Will Manifestation Heaven Sect will end up dead!”

“Are you looking to die, boy!? Get on your knees and apologize to the junior superintendent! Otherwise all hell is going to break loose!”

“You despicable asshole! Do you know how important the junior superintendent is? He’s like a king among the Executors of the Ancient Road. Pointing that sword at him is a major crime!”

The executors were all furious, and obviously wanted to kill Yang Qi. However, in fear of hurting the junior superintendent, they were hesitating to shoot the rat for fear of breaking the vases.

Yang Qi had him locked down with sword energy, ensuring that if he even twitched, Yang Qi could end his life in a splash of blood before anyone could do a thing. It was now obvious that Yang Qi’s cultivation was on par with that of a Terrifying expert, which only begged the question of what he would be like when he really did reach the Terrifying level. No one could even guess.

“Well done,” the sectlord said. “Yang Qi, this junior superintendent of the Executors of the Ancient Road has lost the duel, and you have won. Why not turn weapons of war into gifts of jade and silk with the executors? After all, the knot of enmity should be untied, not tightened. Return his sword to him, and forget about the previous stakes of the wager. It’s more than enough that the executors will refrain from causing trouble for us.”

His words gave the junior superintendent and the other executors plenty of leeway to make a graceful retreat.

Yang Qi sensed a powerful force settling down around him from the sectlord. First, it was to ensure that the junior superintendent didn’t try to stab him in the back. Second, it was to make sure the other four executors didn’t suddenly attack him.

Yang Qi could only sigh in admiration at how careful the sectlord was.

He nodded.

He could tell that trying to force the junior superintendent to pay compensation wasn’t the best course. There was obviously no way that he would simply hand over one hundred pieces of godhood. It was hard to say if even the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect as a whole had that much godhood in reserve.

“That’s fine,” Yang Qi said. “Are you going to stick to your word, Junior Superintendent?”

The junior superintendent snorted. “When an important person like me makes a promise, he keeps it. As for the matter of the godhood, it was your sectlord who decided to change the agreement, not me. For the time being, we won’t cause any problems for your Will Manifestation Heaven Sect. But you just wait. The humiliation of today can only be washed away with blood. And it will be washed away, eventually.”

“I'm always happy to have a fair fight,” Yang Qi replied. “As long as you have the guts. But if you try teaming up against me, then sorry to say, I’ll just vanish right in front of your nose.”

Flipping the Sword of Reincarnation around, he tossed it, not to the junior superintendent, but to the sectlord.

The sectlord inwardly nodded. ‘The kid really thinks things through.’ Handing the sword right back to the junior superintendent would have only been asking for him to do something with it. Keeping it had put them in a much better position.

The sectlord quickly cleansed it of any remaining true energy and handed it back to the junior superintendent. “Junior Superintendent, the fact that you’ve kept your word will be remembered here in the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect. We’ll be sure to spread word among the other superpower sects.”

“Hmph!” The junior superintendent took his Sword of Reincarnation, then rejoined the other four executors.

Meanwhile, the four executors exchanged glances, then shouted as they suddenly blurred into action. Three of them headed directly toward the sectlord, and one of them reached toward Yang Qi with outstretched hands.

Chapter 985: A Shameless Ambush

In the shortest of moments, the situation changed dramatically.

Who could have predicted that the Executors of the Ancient Road would be so shameless as to launch an ambush like this? Three of the executors were attacking the sectlord, and one was attacking Yang Qi. These four were Terrifying experts whose energy arts were far beyond those of the junior superintendent.

Each and every executor was a heaven-shaking, earth-shattering force. In ancient times, they had essentially ruled the Ancient Road to the Gods, and although their power had waned since then, they were still a force to be reckoned with. And this group had unleashed their attack with such suddenness that it was virtually impossible to defend against.

“How shameless!” the sectlord growled. He prepared to use his energy arts to protect Yang Qi, but how could the three executors simply let him? They blocked his move, then howled as they attacked him from three directions, each attack a killing move pushed to the ultimate level.

“River of Gods; Setting Sun!”

“Heaven-God Adjudication!”

“Vast Net of Law!”

The three attacks were all targeting different weak spots on the sectlord. One was a punch, the other a palm strike, the third a kick. And they were all manifestations of consummate energy arts unique to the Executors of the Ancient Road. When these three attacked in unison, even a god would have difficulty mounting a defense.

Bam!

The sectlord’s connection to Yang Qi was severed, removing the protections he had set in place moments before; Yang Qi was instantly in a very dangerous situation. With the sectlord wrapped up in fighting three executors at the same time, it was obvious that he couldn’t provide assistance.

“Will-Convergence Nirābhāsa!”

The sectlord thrust his palm out three times to meet the incoming fist, palm, and leg. Upon contact, three streams of power entered him, but he quickly sent them flowing in different directions. The leg strike, he sent slamming into the executor who had unleashed the palm attack. The palm attack, he sent back to the executor who had struck with his fist. And the fist strike was redirected to the executor who had attacked with his leg.

The three executors were sent staggering backward under the force of their own blows, their expressions that of deep surprise.

“So, it’s the Will-Convergence Nirābhāsa Motionless-True-Ego Divine Art,” one of the executors said. “Well played, Sectlord. You've cultivated that energy art to the ultimate peak. But it's not going to be enough to save your disciple!”

Thump. Swish. Rustle.

The three executors attacked again, using a string of complex and varied moves that left all onlookers dazzled. As for the sectlord, he managed to negate their attacks and shove them back. However, he barely had time to catch his breath before they were upon him again. Although he wasn’t hurt, he had no way to help Yang Qi.

Truth be told, the three executors were starting to get nervous. Virtually any other Terrifying expert would be almost instantly killed if these three joined forces against them. After all, the Executors of the Ancient Road were the bane of ordinary cultivators, just as the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth was the bane of hell-born fiend-devils.

However, not even their combined might was enough to injure the sectlord, and in fact, the counterblows were causing them to reel. Apparently, the sectlord was nearly at the mid Terrifying level.

As the three executors kept the sectlord pinned down, the remaining executor was attacking Yang Qi. Considering the level of his cultivation base, the executor was like a hawk pouncing on a hare. Yang Qi had no way to escape, and was under such pressure from his Terrifying will that he could hardly use any of his energy arts.

The onlookers could only watch as the executor grabbed Yang Qi, lifted him over his head, and sealed his energy arts.

“Got him!” he shouted.

The other three executors immediately turned and shot backward, rejoining the fourth. Then, all four of them joined forces to release a palm attack on the sectlord.

The sectlord spun in place as he negated the attack power of the palm. However, in the time it took him to do that, the four executors and the junior superintendent opened a spatial rift and jumped inside. In the blink of an eye, they were gone. The sudden turn of events happened so quickly that no one could react. Some of the elders had been preparing to rush forward, but by the time they did, Yang Qi was apprehended.

“Damnation,” the sectlord said, his expression one of grief. “The Executors of the Ancient Road have become even less trustworthy than they were in the past. Back then, they were fierce and violent, but at least they kept their word. Now, they’ve become profoundly treacherous.”

Peaklord Memory, the little girl, floated down next to the sectlord. “Sectlord,” she said, “Yang Qi saved our entire sect. We have to rescue him.”

“Rescue him? How?” said a rumbling voice. It was none other than Peaklord Grand Might, who was actually feeling quite pleased. “He's been taken captive by the Executors of the Ancient Road, and will definitely be executed. If we try to wage war on the executors, we’ll be like an egg thrown against a boulder. Do you really want to put the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect on the path to destruction? Besides, for all we know, this entire thing might be a ploy. What if this Yang Qi was working with the junior superintendent all along, just to gain our confidence and make us think he saved us? Then, he could come back and seize power. I say that if he returns, we should kill him and take all of his magical treasures and energy arts!”

“He couldn't be more right,” said Peaklord Spiritwall. His son had been killed just now, so it was little wonder he hated Yang Qi.

Peaklord Nāropa nodded. “It does make sense. Not only should we hold back from trying to rescue him, if he suddenly returns, we should immediately put him to death. He’s nothing less than a mortal malady for the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect!”

Many of the other peaklords and chief elders were wrapped up in similar thoughts. Yang Qi had truly put on an impressive show and provided a huge service to the sect. If he did come back, Memory Peak would become incredibly important, which wasn't necessarily a good thing for them. In fact, in some ways, it was good that the executors had taken him away to be executed.

However, there were others who were sighing over the fact that the sect had lost an important genius. Yang Qi was like a shooting star who had blazed to glory in the sect, only to disappear shortly after. It was obvious that he was going to be a legend going forward.

In response to the suggestions of Peaklord Grand Might and those on his side, the sectlord’s face turned icy.

“Shut your mouths,” he said.

The peaklords had never seen the sectlord look this angry, and it caused their faces to first flush, then drain of blood.

“Elder Brother Sectlord... what’s going on? We're only talking about one little disciple, right? Is he really worth making such a big fuss over?”

“You really are quite petty and narrow-minded, aren’t you, Peaklord Grand Might?” the sectlord replied in a harsh tone. “You see, I know full well who the spy is. And although you aren’t him, your aspirations are far more sinister. Let me ask you something. If it had been your son who, gasping on his deathbed, had been ambushed and taken away by the executors, would you still be hatching such plots? I think not. Peaklord Grand Might, you will take responsibility for everything that happened here today. And I'm hereby revoking Sorrow Might’s qualifications to be baptized by the psychic scaling systems.”

Eyes burning with venom, Peaklord Grand Might said, “Sectlord, you—”

“What,” the sectlord interrupted, his own eyes flickering with killing intent. “Are you going to defy my orders?”

When Peaklord Grand Might sensed the killing intent, he shivered inwardly. Bowing his head, he reined in his venomous anger and said, “I would never, sir.”

“Leave. Return to Grand Might Peak and go into seclusion to think about your mistakes. Work on your cultivation for the next thousand years, and don’t you dare leave your mountain peak before then. Got it? If you do, then don’t blame me for being vicious and merciless.” Returning to his throne, the sectlord sat down. “As for you, Peaklord Nāropa, and you, Peaklord Spiritwall, you two will also go into seclusion to contemplate the error of your ways.”

In the face of the sectlord’s wrath, the three peaklords shivered like cicadas in winter. They were fully aware of what kind of person the sectlord was. Although he was usually calm and collected, if riled, he would kill without hesitation, and without showing the least bit of mercy.

Hundreds of millions of years ago, when the Great Necropolis had first appeared and the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect had entered to explore it, they had encountered amazing treasures that significantly boosted the energy arts of some of the chief elders. Because of that, things in the sect changed rapidly, and eventually, rebellion broke out, with some of the chief elders banding together to try to overthrow the sectlord and install a usurper in his place.

However, the sectlord didn't stand idly by. In the end, eighteen chief elders were executed, and the usurper was imprisoned and sealed for all eternity.

Now that everyone had finally realized how angry the sectlord was, no one dared to utter a peep.

“Now, let’s discuss the matter in detail,” the sectlord said. “We absolutely have to rescue Yang Qi. It’s a rare thing for the sect to get a genius like him, so there’s no way we can allow him to perish. Furthermore, we also have to address the issue of the spy.”

Suddenly, the sectlord slapped the arm of his throne, startling everyone present. At the same time, the greyspace of the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect shrank down, growing much stronger in the process.

It was something done when there was the threat of a great enemy on the outside. It would also prevent anyone from leaving. Clearly, the sectlord was preparing to deal with whatever spy or spies lurked in the council of chief elders.

**

On an enormous pathway out in the depths of the Great Necropolis, the four executors and the junior superintendent finally stopped to rest, dropping down onto an enormous plane of existence. It was a huge place, roughly on the level of a hundred and twentieth ranked immortal world.

Only the superpower sects could operate in these depths; ordinary people would never come here. No one in the Great Necropolis knew how big the place really was, to the point where it seemed endless. Looking out, Yang Qi saw that all of the immortal worlds in this area were at least at the hundredth rank, if not higher. And they were all thriving, with living beings, sects, nations, societies, and the like.

In fact, the hundred and twentieth ranked world they were on was actually rather small. He could even see a two hundredth ranked world off in the distance.

Chapter 986: No Way Out

In the depths of the Great Necropolis, the pathways were filled with enormous immortal worlds. In fact, stretching out ahead, it was possible to see some that were ranked three hundred, four hundred, and five hundred. Even thousandth ranked worlds existed.

The pathways of the Great Necropolis were like a universe of their own. In fact, only people from there who reached the Grand Emperor level would ever have any clue that the universe in which they lived was actually a huge, endless necropolis filled with countless divine abilities, god items, and treasure troves.

The four executors and the junior superintendent had landed on a hundred and twentieth ranked immortal world, a place that abounded with sects and nations. Of course, there was constant struggle and friction between the various forces on the world. Most of the sects were first- or second-tier, with the largest being no smaller than the Profound Killing Dao Sect.

The sectlords of such places were consummate experts with power indexes of over two thousand, but of course they couldn’t come close to comparing to the junior superintendent and the executors. To the executors, this place was just a rest stop. They didn't even bother going to any of the sects, but just rested on a mountaintop and looked out at the scenery.

A world this large had all sorts of terrain features, and even spatial variances, which would make exploring it fully a rather troublesome task.

But the junior superintendent and the other executors weren’t here for anything like that. The affairs of this world were of little note to them. It was like how humans who rested beneath a tree on a journey might encounter some ants. If they were in a good mood, they might watch them go about their work, or if they were in a bad mood, they might trample them.

Little did the people of this world know that their lives were now in the hands of some mighty entities who had just arrived. Such was the sorrowful plight of puny humans like them. They wouldn't even know if truly powerful entities came along and took their lives.

Yang Qi saw the people of this world and couldn’t help but sigh. Although they were virtually ants, couldn’t he be considered the same thing?

There were definitely powerful beings out there with such immense power that they could end his life with hardly a thought.

The only thing he could do about it was to get stronger and more powerful. To make sure that he controlled the life and death of others, not the other way around. To gain control of the dao of heaven and magical laws, and make himself invincible.

That was the only proper path.

The sun shone down on the mountaintop, far beneath which was a sprawling grassy plain. It was beautiful scenery to be sure, and definitely resembled a realm of immortals.

However, the junior superintendent was in no mood to enjoy the scenery.

Grabbing the sealed Yang Qi from the other executors, he inspected him to make sure he was tightly locked down. Sure enough, he couldn't use any of his true energy, which left the junior superintendent feeling a bit more at ease. “I bet you never guessed you would fall into my hands, did you, brat?”

“Well, I never guessed that you executors would be so shameless and despicable,” Yang Qi replied, as calm as could be. It was almost as if he didn't fear this junior superintendent at all. “I beat you fair and square, and you used a dirty trick to grab me. What exactly do you want?”

“I don’t want anything. Just the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body. Hand it over. I searched you thoroughly, but didn’t see any trace of the sheepskin scroll. Where are you hiding it? Tell me! Don’t force me to use a soulsearching grand magic to force my way into your sea of consciousness! That would cause irreparable damage to your nascent divinity, preventing you from ever reaching the Terrifying level.”

Eyes flashing, Yang Qi said, “You couldn’t even cultivate the technique if you had it. So why do you want it?”

“You think I couldn’t cultivate it?” the junior superintendent hissed. “Who do you think the Executors of the Ancient Road are? Impoverished beggars? I’ll have you know that our storehouse just so happens to have the Three Lives Stone. Well, a small part of it. But there’s definitely enough to cultivate an Unspoiled Body. With that technique, plus Wretch God Ultimate's Obsidian Flame, I’ll be invincible! Everything in all creation would be mine for the taking. And I would kill everyone else who dares vie for the spot of emperor of the executors. I’ll kill them all, do you hear me! All of them!”

“You think cultivating the technique is that easy?” Yang Qi laughed. “If it was, that would just be one more reason not to give you the sheepskin scroll.”

“Is that so? Fine. Prepare to experience a method of torture that will leave you incapable of pleading for life, and unable to plead for death!” The junior superintendent tapped Yang Qi’s forehead, sending black energy swirling into him. “This is only one of my torture methods. It's called the Heart-Eroding Finger. Once it’s inside you, it will slowly eat away at your heart, wracking you with intense pain that will make you wish you weren’t alive!”

The junior superintendent stabbed his finger into one of Yang Qi’s acupoints after another, sending the energy of the Heart-Eroding Finger surging into him. Then he stood back and waited for Yang Qi’s face to start contorting with pain.

However, he was left somewhat disappointed, as nothing happened. Yang Qi even laughed and said, “That's all? Your Heart-Eroding finger is a bit disappointing, I have to say. What a pity. If you think forcing things out of me is going to be that easy, you’re definitely mentally insane.”

“What’s going on?” the junior superintendent blurted, astonishment written on his face. Even just with his naked eye, he could tell that his Heart-Eroding Finger was having some very harmful effects on Yang Qi. In fact, it was slowly but surely causing his heart to melt.

Yet Yang Qi was just smiling at him, almost as if this wasn’t his body at all, and he were watching the torture being inflicted on someone else.

“I've already cultivated an Unspoiled Body,” he said coolly, “a process that involves being tempered by myriad tribulations. This torture of yours is just another tribulation that is actually helping my true energy improve.”

“Hmph! You like to talk big, don’t you? Alright, in that case, I’ll show you my powerful soulsearching technique. I’ll just drag the information right out of your nascent divinity!”

RUMBLE!

A powerful divine will erupted from the junior superintendent and dove into Yang Qi’s sea of consciousness. However, that was when the junior superintendent suddenly realized that Yang Qi’s sea of consciousness was completely empty! It had nothing in it!

It was almost impossible to say how much of a shock it was, and it caused a profoundly strange expression to appear on the face of the junior superintendent.

“What is it, Junior Superintendent?” one of the other executors said.

“This is weird. His sea of consciousness doesn’t have a nascent divinity! It's empty. It's almost like he's a corpse!” The junior superintendent was a vicious fellow, full of crafty and malicious plots. But in the face of this unexpected development, he couldn’t help but be flabbergasted.

“Let me try,” one of the other executors said, striding forward. He locked his hand onto Yang Qi’s head and poured his Terrifying will into him. However, as soon as it reached Yang Qi’s sea of consciousness, he saw the same thing; it was completely and utterly empty.

“If you don’t reveal your nascent divinity, boy,” the executor said, “I'm going to detonate your sea of consciousness!”

However, he received no reply, almost as if Yang Qi wasn’t even present in his body.

BOOM!

Losing patience, the executor attacked Yang Qi’s sea of consciousness with his Terrifying will. Still, there was no reaction at all. No matter how the executor attacked it, it wouldn’t detonate. Logically speaking, it was like an ant resisting the crushing force of a boulder.

“What strangeness is this?” the executor murmured. Looking over, he said, “Junior Superintendent, why don’t you use your Sword of Reincarnation to chop this brat's arm off? Let’s see what that does."

“Okay.”

The junior superintendent summoned the sword and chopped it down with full force.

Gong!

The Sword of Reincarnation landed on Yang Qi and made a booming sound as if it had hit metal. There were even sparks that flew out. However, Yang Qi wasn’t harmed.

“What’s going on?” the junior superintendent said. “How could the Sword of Reincarnation possibly fail to cut through him?”

“Let me have a go, Junior Superintendent,” another of the executors said. “I’ll draw on all my godpower and give this brat a good thrashing!”

Grabbing Yang Qi, he threw him up into the air, then, as he dropped back down, punched him with all his might. It was like a lightning bolt slamming into Yang Qi with the obvious intention of smashing him into a pulp. However, when the blows struck home, it sounded like metal hitting metal.

Ding. Dong. Clang.

With each blow, he added more Terrifying power, yet nothing seemed to happen to Yang Qi. And Yang Qi wasn’t reacting at all, to the point where the executor was raining punches and kicks onto him, yet he just lay there on the ground.

“Beyond strange!” another of the executors said, frowning. “Is this the might of the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body?”

“Try attacking his internal organs,” the junior superintendent ordered. “Just now, my Heart-Eroding Finger didn't do anything to his meridians and heart. The Unspoiled Body only provides external strength, so the insides should still be weak. He’s only cultivated a few of the characters from the scroll, so there’s no way the technique has seeped down into his meridians and sea of energy!”

“Alright!” the executor said, then used an energy art specifically designed to inflict internal injuries. His energy was like a needle that stabbed into Yang Qi, piercing his meridians, sea of energy, and five viscera and six bowels.

That was when something very strange happened. As soon as the true energy reached those locations, they encountered something that just sucked it away. Earlier, Yang Qi had tricked the junior superintendent into believing that his Heart-Eroding Finger had begun to hurt his heart. The truth was that he had absorbed it.

And the beatings from moments ago had only served to further temper his body. It was the same with the piercing true energy attack.

Yang Qi was growing tougher by the moment.

Chapter 987: The Depths of the Great Necropolis

The junior superintendent very nearly coughed up a mouthful of blood. After making the difficult decision to go back on his word, he had ordered the attack on the sectlord of the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect and got his hands on Yang Qi. But now he felt like a mouse trying to pull a turtle, with nowhere to get a good grip. He couldn’t shatter Yang Qi’s heart, couldn’t harm his sea of consciousness, and in fact, was only helping him temper his body with the repeated assaults.

What was he supposed to do now?

He felt completely out of options.

"Stop hitting him,” he said, convinced that further attacks on Yang Qi would only help him get stronger.

“Is this the boundless power of the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body?” the junior superintendent murmured. “If so, it's really far too fear-inspiring.”

“There’s no need to get anxious,” one of the executors said. “He might be too tough to hurt right now, but there are experts back at headquarters who can handle him. Think about it. The stronger he is, the more he’ll benefit your cultivation base, Junior Superintendent. Considering how many magical treasures we have back at headquarters, such as the Adjudication God Furnace, I refuse to believe that we won’t be able to figure out a way to deal with him. Worst case scenario, we could even think about using poison to erode his defenses. We have poisons that not even gods can resist.

“Regardless, we have to figure out a way to get that Unspoiled Body. Sir, you’re a royal, but there are a lot of royals in the Executors of the Ancient Road who are just as important as you. If you eventually want to take the throne, you’ll need to push your cultivation to a much higher level. And that’s not going to be easy.”

“You’re right,” the junior superintendent said. “That's exactly what I was thinking. If I can cultivate an Unspoiled Body, I’ll definitely be able to crush my competition. I’ll kill anyone who defies me! That said, this technique really does surpass my expectations.”

“Agreed,” another of the executors said. “It's horrifying! It absorbs all attacks and turns them into tribulations that temper the body and cultivation base. The more we hit him, the stronger he gets. How did the True Devil of the ancient past even come up with a technique as amazing as this?”

“It doesn’t matter for now. Let's head back and worry about it later. Maybe we can soak him in some god acid. That stuff can melt gods, so I'm curious to see if he can survive that. Make sure to keep your hands on him; don’t let him escape.”

“Don’t worry, Junior Superintendent. This brat has an amazing fleshly body, but he’s actually quite weak. Too weak to fight back. It seems to me that he's entered some sort of zen ‘samādhi’ trance of nirvanic extermination, which is the only reason he's able to act like this.”

“Let’s go....”

“Yes, let’s go. We can unravel his secrets later. One thing is for sure, he has a lot of profound secrets. If you can get them, Junior Superintendent, then our faction will be vastly stronger. With his technique, you’ll definitely reach the Terrifying level, and then you would be able to decimate anything and everything.”

“Our original mission was to destroy the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect, but who would’ve been able to predict that things would play out as they did? And how could we have guessed that the sectlord would be so strong?”

“That’s a good point. That sectlord is mysterious and unpredictable, to the point where we obviously couldn’t have destroyed the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect on our own. In fact, even if we had twice as many men as we did, we probably would have failed.”

“Damn it all. If it weren’t for that sectlord, we definitely could have destroyed the sect and taken the psychic scaling systems.”

With that, the junior superintendent and his men prepared to head deeper into the Great Necropolis. But before leaving, the junior superintendent turned and exhaled out a mass of Wretch God Ultimate's Obsidian Flame.

The black fire instantly engulfed the hundred and twentieth ranked immortal world they had been on. Its greyspace was destroyed and none of the cultivators who had lived there were able to escape.

Screams rang out as cultivators were burned alive. The top tier sect on this world had old-timers with power indexes of two thousand, but not even they were able to escape with their lives.

They were all burned to death.

Soon, the world was nothing more than a black husk, its essence damaged beyond repair. To the junior superintendent, it was nothing, almost like an ordinary child who poured boiling oil into an ant colony, just to see what would happen.

‘He really doesn't value human life at all...’ Yang Qi thought as he observed from within the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

More precisely, his mind was in the chart. His body was tightly sealed, although it had just successfully passed the tribulation of the character “samādhi”.

That tribulation was a marvelous thing. Once passed, it was possible to enter a state of zen ‘samādhi’ meditation that was impossible for an outsider to penetrate. It would make the fleshly body completely impervious to any attacks.

Of course, Yang Qi’s mastery was shallow at the moment, but it was still enough to hold strong against the attacks of Terrifying experts.

His immortal-slaying clone had recently been working hard at absorbing the power of the godhood stars, and his cultivation had been rapidly advancing. His power index was already past three thousand now, and was continuing to improve.

His will convergence was already at the peak of the Terrifying level, which meant that, other than his physical form, he was roughly as strong as Yang Qi’s true self.

More than ever, the clone and Yang Qi were actually two separate people.

The clone's mastery of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions had reached an exquisite level, and thanks to his constant work with the godhood stars, he was getting closer and closer to being just like King Immortal-Slayer himself. The clone knew that he couldn’t allow himself to fall under the control of King Immortal-Slayer, so he constantly drew on the sealing powers of the God Legion Seal to keep the two types of true energy separate. Any other person would have already become a puppet of King Immortal-Slayer, focused on the resurrection of the king, enacting slaughters, carrying out sacrifices, and establishing a power structure for him alone.

But the clone knew all about that.

Furthermore, the clone could use the power of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart to create a tiny god formation within Yang Qi's true self that could easily channel attacks on Yang Qi into the chart.

The junior superintendent and his fellows had no clue about this, which was what led them to believe that everything Yang Qi was doing was because of the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body. But the technique wasn’t that amazing. If it were, it would actually surpass the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.

Under the repeated attacks of the junior superintendent and the executors, Yang Qi succeeded in passing the tribulation of the samādhi character. That meant that he had currently mastered eighteen characters.

The sheepskin scroll had a total of ten thousand characters, all of them different. Each character represented a different tribulation, which meant that cultivating the scroll was about surviving ten thousand tribulations. According to the stories, not even the creator of this boundless energy art had fully cultivated it, the True Devil, sometimes called the Mahātmā True Devil. Supposedly, the reason was that the sheepskin scroll was not the result of his own personal wisdom, but rather the collective wisdom of millions upon millions of sages and mahātmās.

Obviously, the collective wisdom of so many individuals from the god world, people who could rebuke heaven and earth, was nothing ordinary in nature.

Even just cultivating a few of the characters from the scroll would put one in the position to be a domineering force on the Ancient Road to the Gods. And if one could surpass a hundred characters, it would allow them to ascend to the dao of gods. Of course, although Yang Qi was getting stronger by this type of cultivation, it came with side-effects. For example, breaking through to the Terrifying level would be very difficult. In fact, if Yang Qi had focused only on cultivating the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, he would have probably already achieved that breakthrough.

But now that he had two opposing powers within him, he constantly had to focus on maintaining the proper balance.

The upside was that he was getting vastly stronger, and once he did achieve that breakthrough, he would unleash unimaginable power.

Around this time, he began to emerge from the zen samādhi state. He had reached a higher level, but it was all thanks to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. If his enemies knew about that, it could be dangerous.

However, there was nothing they could do to him now, so he wasn’t worried. In fact, he wanted them to just take him right into the heart of the executors’ territory.

He now knew that the Executors of the Ancient Road had a Three Lives Stone, which would be a big benefit to his cultivation of the Unspoiled Body. Obviously, the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth was a big help, but the Three Lives Stone was specifically designed for that purpose. And there were certain aspects of enlightenment that only the stone could help with.

The junior superintendent was obviously dead set on using all of the resources at his disposal to unlock Yang Qi's secrets. Little did he know that Yang Qi could use the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart to absorb any energy arts used on him, then use the absorption process to further his cultivation and head toward the Terrifying level.

‘I'm going to clear out the executors’ storehouse,’ Yang Qi thought. It was very similar to what he had done to the Joyflower Palace, except that the Executors of the Ancient Road definitely had far more treasure than the Joyflower Palace. Even the tiniest fraction of their treasures would be enough to found a top-tier sect. Then there was the possibility of forcing some of the executors into becoming believers.

The executors as a whole had been created by the legion of gods, with the purpose of governing the immortal cultivators on the Ancient Road to the Gods. In that respect, they were very similar to the godmammoths. One had been created to suppress hell, the other to govern immortals.

They clearly had to have some things in common.

Chapter 988: The Executors&#039; Lair

Thus, the junior superintendent led Yang Qi deeper and deeper into the Great Necropolis. The pathways grew wider and wider, with more and more immortal worlds attached to them. Early on, most of the worlds were hundredth ranked. But after flying along for several hours, Yang Qi didn’t see any at that level. All of them were ranked two hundred or more. Then, after a few days passed, they were all in the three hundreds.

As would be expected, the power of the magical laws also grew more intense.

To Yang Qi, it felt like he was back in the Cave Temple of the Vajra Māyādevī. In fact, the pressure even surpassed that, to the point where only Terrifying experts could possibly fly. Thankfully, Yang Qi was being carried by the executors, so he didn’t need to worry about flying.

The immortal worlds that lined the pathways formed innumerable nations and civilizations. Because of the immense pressure within the pathways, the cultivators never left their worlds to explore what lay beyond them. Not even cultivators with power indexes of two thousand could do so.

Yang Qi found it strange. It almost seemed like the Great Necropolis was designed to raise humans like livestock. It stood to reason that three hundredth ranked immortal worlds would produce Terrifying experts, yet he didn't sense a single one. It was like they were being kept in check, and could only grow stronger if they were ejected out of the necropolis.

The deeper he went, the more Yang Qi clicked his tongue in amazement. ‘I guess the magical laws of the Great Necropolis must be keeping the immortal worlds from developing, or producing truly powerful experts. The necropolis is definitely far stronger than the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Before, I used to think that thirty-third ranked immortal worlds were the ultimate limit. Here in the Great Necropolis, I'm like a villager visiting the city for the first time.’

These parts of the Great Necropolis were actually very dangerous. There were occasional power tempests, or dense fog that would take hours to pass through. Sometimes lighting would fall, other times rain. Of course, it was no ordinary rain, but rather god rain. Even the Terrifying executors would pull out god items and magical treasures to protect against it, and even those treasures would eventually collapse into ruin.

Eventually, they had to rely on their energy arts alone to defend against the god rain.

“Dammit, this god rain is falling like mad. What a drain on our true energy! I've never seen anything like this.” The executors were surrounded by endless sheets of falling rain that constantly ate away at the true energy shields they had erected.

All they could do was keep pouring their true energy into their defenses. Every drop of this rain was like an entire world falling on them. It was definitely no picnic. And it was obvious that only cultivators with power indexes of at least three thousand could possibly survive in conditions like this.

At a certain point, one of the executors said, “Junior Superintendent, this god rain represents some of the most deadly power of the Great Necropolis. Maybe we should let this brat experience a bit of the pain it can bring.”

The junior superintendent nodded. “That's a great idea. Let’s see if that body of his can withstand a baptism like this!”

The further one traveled into the Great Necropolis, the more dramatic the meteorological phenomena were, and the more reminiscent it was of the god world. Actually, the god world did have rain like this that people under the Terrifying level couldn’t stand. Weak people who went out during such rainstorms would be dissolved into ashes.

WHOOSH!

Yang Qi suddenly felt himself being tossed out into the open, where he immediately felt the rain drops smacking into him. Sparks flew as they hit, and he could feel the destructive power piercing into him. It felt like a massive tribulation.

‘So this is god rain. Impressive!’

In the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, a god formation rotated, allowing destructive power to flow in through it. At the same time, Yang Qi allowed himself to slip into a zen samādhi trance.

The rain truly was powerful, to the point where not even Yang Qi could easily defend against it. Thankfully, by entering the trance and allowing the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart to absorb some of the power, he could endure.

‘Incredible,’ the immortal-slaying clone thought as he controlled the god formation.

Waving his hand, he summoned one of the raindrops onto his palm, where it weighed down so heavily it felt like an entire world.

Yang Qi observed the raindrops in shock; they clearly contained the power to destroy worlds, like the raving madness of gods.

The rain grew heavier and the explosive power grew more intense, to the point where the god formation was nearly destroyed. The immortal-slaying clone even had to summon the sheepskin scroll and place it in the formation to stabilize the power fluctuations. As the attack power hit the scroll, the characters on it emanated a mighty aura that subjugated it and made it tame.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi’s body was floating in midair, being baptized by a constant fall of god rain. Sparks continued showering off of him as the rain hit, and internally, his energy arts flowed as another tribulation character formed. By this point, he was roughly halfway finished with the nineteenth character.

Suddenly, one of the executors blurted, “This is bad. He's so strong that he can actually use the god rain for cultivation purposes! We have to stop this baptism immediately!”

Just as he was preparing to send out a stream of true energy to grab Yang Qi, thunder crashed, and a lightning bolt descended. Startled, the executor quickly reined in his true energy, aware that lighting such as this was a punishment sent by the gods and would definitely injure him.

Meanwhile, the lightning slammed into Yang Qi, covering him with electricity for a moment before it was absorbed. Creaking sounds rang out, and although at first it was hard to say if he was being hurt or not, after a moment, he suddenly surged with an even more powerful aura than ever.

WHOOSH!

The four executors all sprang to action, dragging Yang Qi back out of the rain. Thanks to the quintessence aura pulsing out of him, they were all convinced that he was in the middle of cultivating some boundlessly powerful divine ability.

“Dammit!” the junior superintendent cursed. “He's using the power of the rain to form more of those tribulation characters!”

“We're just helping him! Although, considering we're going to crush him eventually, I guess it doesn’t matter. As long as he doesn’t develop Terrifying will, it doesn’t matter.”

“Let’s go, Junior Superintendent. Don’t let him do any more cultivation. Let's get back to the headquarters before trying anything else to subjugate him.” Having learned their lesson, the executors didn’t allow for any more delays. They flew deeper into the Great Necropolis at top speed, passing increasingly large immortal worlds. Soon, worlds in the five hundredth rank appeared, but despite how grand and magnificent they were, the magical laws of the necropolis still had them tightly under control and would not allow breakthroughs past a certain point.

Of course, five hundredth ranked immortal worlds were places so huge that not even experts with power indexes of three thousand would be able to explore them. Yang Qi suspected that the experts in these places actually had no idea that there were worlds that existed beyond their own. They probably thought the Great Necropolis itself was the god world, and that they just needed to break through the power of the magical laws to get there.

Occasionally, god rain, god lightning, and god wind would find its way through the greyspaces of such worlds, wreaking havoc in the form of god tribulation.

Yang Qi shook his head. It was almost as if the inhabitants of these worlds were stuck inside some sort of inescapable game.

Eventually, he sensed an immense aura from ahead, as a grand and magnificent kingdom ahead, almost like a mirage. This was the lair of the Executors of the Ancient Road, their headquarters.

Before Yang Qi could react, or even get a sense of what this lair looked like, they landed on a teleportation portal and were whisked into a palace inside.

The palace was richly decorated, but seemed ancient. And there were god items everywhere. The god formations that those items formed surpassed anything from the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect by many times over.

“Milord, you’re back!” said the people who were now kneeling on the ground in front of the junior superintendent and his group. Yang Qi could sense that all of these people were cultivators with power indexes of over three thousand. From the obstinate and unruly aura he sensed from them, it seemed they were former sectlords from first-tier sects, but they had been subjugated and now lived as slaves.

Whack!

The junior superintendent kicked one of the slaves to the ground and said, “Did anything happen while I was gone?”

“Y-y-yes!” said another of the servants, who was apparently the steward in charge. “I heard that Prince Ningxiao destroyed a few superpower sects and brought back plenty of new slaves. He also had a big fight with an expert from a buddhist sect, but ended up losing. Even the Terrifying experts he had backing him up were all severely injured. All of the other princes are talking about it.”

“What? This expert from the buddhist sect is that strong? What sect was he from?”

“It’s a new buddhist sect that’s become very powerful in the immortal dao civilization. It seems they’re thinking about trying to conquer everything in existence. They have a lot of universal fortune, too. It's called the Doom Sect.”

Chapter 989: Trying Everything

“Doom Sect?” the junior superintendent said quizzically. “There was never a buddhist organization with a name like that before. They’ve gained popularity recently? How dare they defy the Executors of the Ancient Road? Prince Ningxiao might be a rival as far as I'm concerned, but he’s still an executor. For this buddhist school to challenge him is an insult worthy of complete extermination.”

“Things aren’t that simple, Junior Superintendent,” the steward said, kowtowing the entire time. “The Doom Sect is extremely strong, so much so that they actually came here to our headquarters and demanded fealty. One of the Doom Sect’s experts is so terrifying that it took nine of the princes working together to finally drive him away. As of now, none of the princes are willing to fight anyone from the Doom Sect.”

“What?” the junior superintendent said, visibly taken aback. “Where did this top expert come from? I can’t believe it took nine princes to expel him. You would think they would’ve killed him, but in the end, all they could do was make him leave? How strong is he? Wait, don’t tell me it’s Proud Heaven.”

“Not even Proud Heaven is that strong,” one of the four executors said. “Junior Superintendent, these slaves aren’t going to be able to tell us anything useful. The Great Necropolis has stirred all sorts of people into action. Although we Executors of the Ancient Road have benefited a lot from the necropolis, we haven’t produced a single Inheritor. It seems it’s only going to be a matter of time before the Inheritors start posing a big threat to us.”

“You’re right,” the junior superintendent said. “But in the end, we’re the strongest force there is, and I'm going to be the most powerful emperor there ever was. I'll lead the Executors of the Ancient Road back to the previous heights of glory, and slaughter any who defy me. I’ll conquer all of heaven and earth, seize universal fortune, and ensure that we become the successors of the gods.”

The Executors of the Ancient Road had once been a very powerful force, but their biggest weakness was that they couldn’t reach godly ascension. After all, they had been created by the legion of gods for the purposes of law enforcement, so how could they possibly become gods? For generations, there had been executors stuck right at the level of godly ascension, but unable to achieve a breakthrough.

That said, they were still the most powerful force on the Ancient Road to the Gods, and there were no immortals who could stand up to them. And anyone else who wished to become a god had to somehow break free from their control.

“You’re right,” another of the four executors said. “We’ll definitely figure out a way to break through the impasse. Perhaps the Great Necropolis is just what we need. Your father is currently exploring a mysterious thousandth ranked immortal world, deeper in the Great Necropolis. Perhaps when he returns, he can exterminate the Doom Sect. Junior Superintendent, let’s crush all of the secrets out of this brat we captured. His True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body contains the wisdom of the sages and mahātmās of hell. It encapsulates the saying, I will sacrifice myself and go to hell before I let anyone else do so. It was designed to fight the legion of gods, so if you can cultivate it, you might finally be able to break the limitations placed on us by the legion of gods. We could become gods ourselves, and finally go to the god world.”

“That's exactly what I was thinking,” the junior superintendent replied. “We need to find a cultivation method that can let us defy the gods. Although Wretch God Ultimate's Obsidian Flame has given me an advantage, it's not enough to overcome the genetic barriers that were placed inside us.”

“The Unspoiled Body can definitely break them,” another executor said, nodding. “Junior Superintendent, I’ll go out and get some more information. Don’t tell anybody about this brat we captured, otherwise your rivals are going to cause more trouble for you. Then all of our effort will have been wasted.”

“I obviously know that already. Go! The rest of you, I want you to come with me to find Ghost Ace, Hill Master, Curve Swallow and Fiend Kṣetra. They’re the strongest among my father’s subordinates, and they’re running things while he’s gone exploring that thousandth ranked immortal world. They’re very experienced, so there couldn’t be anyone better suited to dragging the secrets out of that brat.”

“Yes sir!”

One executor left, and the other three joined the junior superintendent as he headed into the depths of the palace to find the people he had just mentioned. Before long, they were in a huge medicinal pill factory. It was impossible to tell what the structure was constructed from. The floor seemed to be made of fire, and there were countless pill furnaces filled with bubbling ingredients.

The heat was intense. Even the junior superintendent’s green silk clothing seemed too weak to fend off the heat.

“Bring me some manacles and leg-irons!”

“Yes sir!”

The executors quickly bound Yang Qi’s hands and feet with the irons.

Grinning at Yang Qi, the junior superintendent said, “These Godly Fetters were created by us to restrain Terrifying experts. With them on you, you won’t be able to resist at all, got it? And now, I'm going to think of every torture method I can possibly use on you. I refuse to believe that the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body is strong enough to sustain you through all that.”

“I don’t have to do anything except experience tribulations to get stronger,” Yang Qi said coolly. “It really doesn’t matter what you do to me, Junior Superintendent. It's all a waste of effort on your part. If you inflict pain on me, it's just a tribulation. And the more tribulations, the stronger my energy art becomes. I advise you to spare yourself the effort and just let me go back to the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect.”

Yang Qi knew exactly what kind of person this junior superintendent was. The more he was provoked, the angrier he would get and the harder he would try to break Yang Qi.

Yang Qi actually didn’t care at all that his hands and feet were bound. He could sense that if he exerted enough strength, those bonds would break. After all, considering he was keeping his true strength hidden in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, the junior superintendent had no idea how strong he actually was.

Thump. Thump.

Suddenly, the sound of footsteps echoed out, and Yang Qi shivered. He could tell from the sound that four top experts were approaching, people whose footsteps conformed to the dao of heaven.

‘Four powerful executors are coming. I wonder if I can handle them. In the end, it's a tribulation. And the more difficult the tribulation is, the more my cultivation base will advance after overcoming it. And it's not like I’ll be able to clean out the executors’ headquarters the moment I arrive.’

Remaining calm, Yang Qi awaited the new arrivals.

A moment later, four executors entered the pill factory, and their mere presence caused the fire around them to die down.

“Junior Superintendent,” they said, clasping hands in formal greeting.

“There’s no need for such formality, Uncles,” the junior superintendent said. “In fact, I should have been the one to come looking for you. The thing is that this little bastard here is full of craft and cunning, and the slightest mistake with him could lead to big problems. I really need your help controlling him.” The junior superintendent was speaking in a very respectful tone of voice in dealing with these most powerful of his father's subordinates.

His father was apparently royalty among the Executors of the Ancient Road, but unfortunately, Yang Qi had not yet been able to get an overall understanding of how their organization worked.

“I heard,” one of the executors said, a man who wore a pitch-black suit of armor covered with a snake motif. “Congratulations, Junior Superintendent. You actually captured someone who cultivates the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body. From what I understand, this energy art comes from a sheepskin scroll penned by one of the most powerful mahātmā fiend-devils. Did you happen to get that as well?”

“Unfortunately, I couldn’t get any information about the sheepskin scroll out of him at all. We have to think of a way! We can’t hurt him physically, and in fact, any attempts to do so actually further his cultivation! I could never have imagined that the Unspoiled Body would be this strong.”

“Impossible,” said the executor in black armor. “Back on the Ancient Road to the Gods, there were people who cultivated that technique, but they always experienced cultivation deviation and died. How could this boy be so strong that he could actually cultivate the technique successfully?”

RUMBLE!

“Allow me to try some things out, Junior Superintendent. Let’s see if he can endure my Black-Heaven Ghost-Dao God Ability!”

“Please do, Uncle Ghost Ace,” the junior superintendent said. “Just be careful. He can use the power of tribulations to improve his cultivation and divine abilities.”

“We’ll see. I’ve observed fiend-devils who cultivated this technique before, only to be beaten to death by executors. How could he turn force into tribulation? It would require a major level of success with the technique to accomplish. No one weaker than a Paramount God could hope to do that. It would be crazy to think that a weakling like this could push his cultivation that far.”

POP!

Ghost Ace reached out toward Yang Qi’s head, and immediately tried to force his way into his sea of consciousness.

Everyone looking on saw a blackish violet smoke pouring from his palm into Yang Qi. Then they heard something like the sound of tiles shattering inside Yang Qi.

‘Such incredible power,’ Yang Qi thought, shocked by the destructive sensation of the palm attack. However, he quickly slipped into a zen samādhi trance, causing his nascent divinity to vanish from within his sea of consciousness. Then he began absorbing the power flowing through him.

“Let’s see how much of it you can take!” Ghost Ace growled, and more blackish-violet energy began shooting into Yang Qi.

Chapter 990: Trying Everything (2)

In the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, the immortal-slaying clone had a grave expression on his face as he controlled the god formation. The formation was already filled with a blackish violet power so explosive that it seemed like it might destroy the formation at any moment.

“Engine of the One God, come to me. I need the imperial-heaven pre-beginning systems!”

The Engine of the One God flew into the clone's heart, then he drew on the godhood stars, causing boundless godhood power to flow into the engine. Then, the imperial-heaven pre-beginning systems began processing the power, sending out a sealing mark to deal with the blackish violet power.

The immortal-slaying clone was the only one who could possibly use the power of the godhood stars to fuel the Engine of the One God. Even if someone else had acquired the Engine of the One God, they would never have been able to find a reserve of such power to fuel it.

By now, Yang Qi had given up on using the Engine of the One God. He wanted his cultivation to be his own, which was why he had used his enlightenment of the engine to create his own.

Back when he had taken the Engine of the One God, he had always intended to give it to his immortal-slaying clone eventually. The stronger the clone was, the better able he would be to control the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

Actually, the Engine of the One God would be much more formidable in the hands of the clone, considering that he had the godhood stars to draw on.

He waved his hand out, and an image of the imperial-heaven pre-beginning appeared. The imperial-heaven referred to the highest and foremost among all the myriad heavens, and the pre-beginning referred to the mother-like state of primordial nothing that had existed before all things came into existence.

“Imperial-heaven pre-beginning” referred to the mother of the foremost of all heavens, and was an expression of ultimate power. As soon as that power was released, the blackish violet light was grabbed and sucked into the sheepskin scroll.

Of course, the sheepskin scroll was also a very powerful object, and as soon as that influx of power entered it, it began shining with a brilliant light that went on to fill Yang Qi.

With the Engine of the One God in his control, the immortal-slaying clone had a much more precise level of control over the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, and at the same time, was perfectly linked with Yang Qi’s true self. On the outside, everyone present watched as Ghost Ace sent power streaming into Yang Qi. At first, it seemed like Yang Qi was going to explode as a result, but after a bit of time passed, Ghost Ace’s power was obviously being negated.

POP!

Everyone heard the sound coming from inside Yang Qi. Then a shock wave of energy rolled out; Yang Qi had obviously succeeded in cultivating another ‘character’ of tribulation.

With every tribulation that he cultivated, his fleshly body and true energy became stronger. Plus, Yang Qi had the true energy of three major techniques within him. So when his overall true energy increased, it spun like a top, causing those three techniques to become more fully merged.

Yet again, he had reached a higher level of power.

[Beep-beep-beep.]

Back in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, the Engine of the One God’s power assessment systems activated and began to report on Yang Qi’s power index.

[Power index breaking past five thousand. Genes transforming....]

Yang Qi’s previous power index had reached a limit when he broke through to the Destabilizing level. With a level of five thousand, his cultivation base was essentially already as strong as the Terrifying level.

Now, reaching the Terrifying level was the only way to actually improve his cultivation base. Ordinary people who, by means of some incredible good fortune were able to increase their power index to an amazing height before reaching the Terrifying level would still not be able to go past three or four thousand. Pushing beyond such limits could be deadly.

People beyond the level of four thousand were those like the junior superintendent.

However, when it came to people pushing past five thousand, there was only one who had ever done it: Yang Qi.

RIP!

An expression of will rumbled out of Yang Qi, and he said, “Junior Superintendent, I really have to thank you. You helped me cultivate another tribulation. My cultivation base is rising again.”

“Not bad at all, boy,” Ghost Ace said, pulling his hand back, having sensed what just happened inside Yang Qi. “Junior Superintendent,” he continued, “this kid’s body is extremely mysterious. However, the fact that he used my Preheaven Ghost Palm to experience tribulations means that he’ll only die sooner. Every character from the Unspoiled Body brings a tribulation that has to be resolved with the Three Lives Stone. Right now, the fact that he's absorbing all these tribulations is just hastening his own death. Years ago, there was a genius of the Devilfolk from the Hell of Sages and Mahātmās, someone named Mahātmā Compassioncraft. He only managed to cultivate thirty-six of the tribulations before he experienced cultivation deviation!”

Turning his attention back to Yang Qi, he said, “Boy, you have a good cultivation base. Why not join me and the junior superintendent here? Work for us to dominate all creation? It would be a lot better than being part of the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect, don’t you think? In fact, you could basically take over as the sectlord there.”

“Oh?” Yang Qi said. “The thing is, I'm not interested in being the sectlord there. But there is something I’m interested in.”

“What is it?” the junior superintendent said gravely. “Tell us! All you have to do is hand over the sheepskin scroll and work for me, and I’ll let you continue cultivating whatever techniques you want. Furthermore, I’ll even let you take that Three Lives Stone from my family’s storehouse. With that stone, you won’t have to worry about cultivation deviation. What do you say?”

The ‘character’ tribulations that came with the Unspoiled Body would give rise to a type of tribulation energy that would eventually drive the cultivator into cultivation deviation. And the end result of that would be a grisly detonation of whoever suffered from the affliction. However, as it turned out, tribulation energy was perfect for cultivating the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.

It was something Yang Qi had only recently come to realize. The True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body and the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth were diametrically opposed. Therefore, the seemingly deadly byproduct of tribulation energy could actually be very beneficial to the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. Not even the originators of the technique, the countless sages and mahātmās, could ever have anticipated this result.

After all, how could they have guessed that, one day, someone would cultivate those two specific techniques at the same time?

Even without the Three Lives Stone, he could still continue on this path of cultivation without any danger of cultivation deviation. Of course, if he did have the stone, it would be even easier to work with the tribulation energy, and who knew what enlightenment would come with it, or what other things he might unlock.

For now, his plan was to play some games with this junior superintendent.

“I want you to kill someone for me,” Yang Qi said. “Bring me their head. If you do, I’ll hand over the sheepskin scroll and start working for you.”

“Who?” the junior superintendent growled.

“A magister from the future world,” Yang Qi said. “Proud Heaven, who happens to have a God Legion Seal. Kill him and get me the God Legion Seal, and then I’ll give you the sheepskin scroll.”

“What?” the junior superintendent said, his eyes flashing with rage. “Are you suicidal or something? Proud Heaven dominated the Ancient Road to the Gods years ago, and not even the royals of my people could do anything about him. It's been countless years since then, so his cultivation base is no doubt even more profound. If we, the Executors of the Ancient Road, were able to kill him, he would already be dead.”

“Oh, I see. You're actually scared of Proud Heaven!” Yang Qi laughed loudly.

“Scared?” the junior superintendent said. “Oh, I'm going to kill him eventually. But for you to make this demand now just shows that you overestimate yourself. Besides, if I could kill Proud Heaven and take his God Legion Seal, what would I need that sheepskin scroll for? Are you trying to play games or something?”

“Since you can’t do what I want, there’s no point in talking. Go ahead and do whatever you want to me. Kill me. Torture me. Whatever.” With that, Yang Qi closed his eyes and settled down in place.

“This brat is really obstinate, isn't he?” Enraged, the junior superintendent began stomping on Yang Qi over and over again. However, it didn't seem to have any effect at all.

“Bring the acid!”

Before long, they had a huge vat full of bright-green acid, bubbling and popping. As a test, the junior superintendent threw a god item into it, and... hissssss!

The god item dissolved, leaving nothing behind but a wisp of smoke.

“Throw him in!”

Ghost Ace and the other executors complied, tossing Yang Qi into the acid. Instantly, smoke began to rise up, and Yang Qi’s skin wrinkled up.

“This God-Melting Acid comes from the god world! If you keep defying me like this, you’re going to end up dead!” the junior superintendent said.

However, after a moment passed, Yang Qi’s skin returned to normal, and he even began to suck the acid into him.

“Damn you!” the junior superintendent shouted. “Bring fire!”

They threw Yang Qi into a pill furnace and heated it up as high as it would go, to the point where not even the corpse of a god would have been able to last. However, a day later, Yang Qi appeared, completely unharmed, and even smiling. “Many thanks to you, Junior Superintendent. You helped me yet again.”

Over the course of the following months, the junior superintendent tried everything he could think of. Sabers, swords, lightning, medicinal items, poisons, toxins....

The executors’ poisons could kill gods, but they didn't seem to have any effect on Yang Qi. In fact, throughout those months, he reached the point of twenty tribulation characters.

Ghost Ace and the other executors clicked their tongues in amazement at how strong Yang Qi was, and how much he could endure.

Little did they know that he was simply using the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart to take away most of the force being used against him. Without that trick, he would have already been dead.

Chapter 991: Locked Up in Heaven Penitentiary

Nothing the junior superintendent did to Yang Qi had any effect.

He was like a diamond that couldn’t be smashed, cut, dissolved, broken, or anything else. And his sea of consciousness was completely impervious to any assault. Even the Terrifying executors had never seen anyone with a body like this, and were now convinced that the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body was shockingly powerful.

In fact, they were now of the opinion that it could be used to fight someone with a God Legion Seal, and that it could remove the barriers that prevented them from becoming gods.

The truth was that the technique wasn’t as amazing as they thought. But the longer they watched the miraculous things that Yang Qi was doing, the more amazed they were. And instead of discouraging them, it had the opposite effect, as they were convinced that they would eventually get access to the technique.

They all believed that Yang Qi would only be able to resist for so long before finally giving in.

A few months later, as the junior superintendent watched Yang Qi’s energy arts and cultivation base growing higher and higher, he scowled viciously and said, “After all these months of torture, aren’t you the least bit afraid? You still refuse to hand over the sheepskin scroll?”

Smiling, Yang Qi replied, “Nothing you’ve tried over these past few months has done a single thing to harm me. In fact, you’ve only helped me with my ‘character’ tribulations. And I refuse to believe you have anything stronger that could actually hurt me. Do you?”

He had advanced by leaps and bounds in the past months, to the point where his power index was now at five thousand five hundred. Unfortunately, he wouldn’t be able to reach six thousand until he improved his cultivation base.

If it weren’t for all of the various methods the junior superintendent had tried—various poisons, fires, bolts of lightning and whatnot—then Yang Qi’s cultivation wouldn’t have achieved such progress. Although he didn’t have any hope of escape, his life wasn't in danger.

He had reached the fifth state of his version of the imperial-heaven pre-beginning systems, which was nothing to take lightly. He was now many times stronger than he had been when he fought the junior superintendent back in the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect. Even without any magical treasures, he could easily win if he had that fight over again.

In fact, he suspected that even if he were struck by Peaklord Grand Might, he wouldn't really be hurt.

He was now in a position to defend himself against Terrifying experts, and possibly even defeat ones who were lower level. If he were only watched over by a single Terrifying expert, he had a host of ways that he could have escaped. Unfortunately, there were seven of them keeping him locked down. And four of them were particularly strong, being far beyond the level of the average Terrifying expert. They weren’t like the ones from the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect, who had used the psychic scaling systems to achieve their breakthroughs.

For now, Yang Qi was trapped.

That said, he was more than happy to “suffer the hardship” of advancing his cultivation and energy arts because of the torture.

“You!” the junior superintendent shouted. “Maybe I should just hand you over to the emperor! He could definitely deal with you!”

“Absolutely, positively not!” Ghost Ace interjected. “Junior Superintendent, this brat is incredibly strong, and very difficult to injure. Although how he's doing it is a big mystery, if he continues with this kind of cultivation, he’ll eventually experience cultivation deviation. And that will be our opportunity to make a move and take control.”

“That’s right, Junior Superintendent,” another executor said. “What good would it do us if you handed him over to the emperor? Let’s just keep doing our research and wait for him to hit cultivation deviation. Without the Three Lives Stone to absorb the tribulation energy, it's only a matter of time before it happens. We definitely have to keep him alive, and his presence a major secret.”

“Yeah, but to see him so unruffled really disgusts me,” the junior superintendent said. He thought for a moment, then said, “Listen, punk, are you really not worried at all about cultivation deviation?”

“I am,” Yang Qi said. “What makes you think I'm not? But it’s not like I'm going to die. If I do experience cultivation deviation, then you people will just use your Three Lives Stone to save me.”

The junior superintendent nearly choked from frustration. But then he smiled coldly and said, “If that's what you think, you’ve made a major miscalculation. You’ll definitely hit cultivation deviation, and when you do, we won't help you. We’ll just wait for the right moment to take control of your body. But right now, you still have a chance to make the right decision. It’s not too late.”

“Whatever,” Yang Qi replied, waving his hand flippantly, the same faint smile on his face as ever.

“Fine! If you want to die, then so be it. Men, throw him into Heaven Penitentiary. Lock him up in the deepest cell they have, with the Wretch God Apostle!”

“What?” the other executors exclaimed. “Junior Superintendent, what are you trying to do? It took a lot of hard work and planning for the emperor to capture and imprison the Wretch God Apostle. If you put this boy in with him... well, what if the apostle kills him?”

“Ohhh...” someone said. “Junior Superintendent, you’re a genius! We can’t do anything to this guy, but we can have the Wretch God Apostle deal with him. The Wretch God Apostle probably won't be able to kill him, but if he attacks him, it will cause the tribulation energy to build up in him even faster, so he’ll reach cultivation deviation that much sooner!”

“You realized exactly what I was thinking. You see, having all of you expending your true energy on him is a big waste. So far, it hasn’t had any effect. So let’s let the Wretch God Apostle have a go. Not only will it weaken the apostle’s true energy, but it’ll also give us a nice rest. In the meantime, we can research the ancient records and see if we can get any information about how to deal with this situation. At the same time, you can all help me cultivate the Soul and Spirit Greater Teleportation Technique!”

“What? Junior Superintendent, you plan to cultivate the Soul and Spirit Greater Teleportation Technique? That’s a forbidden possession method that you can only use once in a lifetime. And once you use it, you can never reverse the effects! You’ve spent so much effort to mold that body of yours.”

“This body is powerful, but is it as good as that brat’s?” the junior superintendent said. “The moment he experiences cultivation deviation, I’ll possess him, release his fetters, and take control of his mind.”

“That's not a bad idea,” Ghost Ace said, nodding. “You’re really unparalleled under heaven, Junior Superintendent. With that technique in your hands, you’ll definitely become the emperor some day.”

They had sealed Yang Qi’s senses before they carried out this conversation, ensuring that he couldn’t hear what they said. Of course, that didn’t really matter. After all, when soldiers come, send a general to stop them; when flood waters come, use earth to block them.

Moments later, Yang Qi felt himself being lifted up by the seven executors and carried along a twisting and winding path. Soon, a metallic, icy aura surrounded him, and he sensed sinister winds. And the magical laws were still so strong that not even Terrifying experts could fly.

The space in this area was almost as solid as crystal, and it felt very sinister, as though the area was filled with a poisonous miasma. Clearly, many people had died here, although it was impossible to say exactly how many.

‘What is this place?’ he thought. All of a sudden, light filled his eyes as his senses were unsealed. Looking around, he realized he was in a prison. Everything was pitch black and made of metal, and there were clanking sounds that came from the various cells, accompanied by occasional hoarse screams that would chill a person to the bone. Yang Qi could tell that the people screaming were Terrifying experts, which was very telling.

The cells seemed to go on and on without end, as did the screams.

Suddenly, a killing aura swept toward them, prompting Ghost Ace to wave his hand and create a shield to block it. The shield cracked, but held. Spitting onto the ground, Ghost Ace said, “The psychos in the Heaven Penitentiary are only getting crazier and crazier. They should all be executed, as far as I'm concerned. If they managed to stage a revolt, it would be hard to suppress.”

“A revolt?” another of the executors said. “There’s no way they could ever escape from this place. Heaven Penitentiary is the most secure location possible. It was created by the legion of gods in ancient times, and never once has anyone escaped it. Once this brat is locked up in here, he won’t be going anywhere! Look, we’re almost there!”

Eventually, they reached what appeared to be an enormous well.

The mouth of the well was covered with countless sealing talismans, each of which featured an enormous mirror filled with fields of stars. Apparently, the talismans were made from godhood. The paper they were crafted from was as red as cinnabar, and featured writhing snakes and dragons. It could only be guessed what sort of wretch-devil they were intended to seal.

“Be careful. Only open the cell door a little bit. You know that the occupant is sealed, but even the mere energy which will come out can be very dangerous.”

“I know that.”

The seven executors began muttering enchantments, causing one of the talismans to slowly begin peeling back. Instantly, intense rumbling sounds filled the area, like the eruption of a volcano.

“Quick, throw him inside!”

“Alright!”

They quickly tossed him inside, which apparently alerted whatever was sealed therein, as a stream of black fire appeared that roared up in the form of a fire dragon.

Eyes widening as the fire approached, the executors quickly joined forces to suppress it. However, the fiery dragon engulfed them, causing a smell like burning grass to fill the area.

“Aaaiiiieee!” One of the executors was hit by the fire and screamed in pain. Thankfully, he had some medicine, and sprinkling some onto the wound quickly healed the damage. Meanwhile, the other executors shoved the black dragon of fire back into the well and sealed the opening.

Everyone breathed sighs of relief. “Finally. Who would’ve thought that the Wretch God Apostle would be so strong? I wonder if the boy is going to get killed.”

Chapter 992: Wretch God Apostle

BOOM!

To Yang Qi, it felt like being tossed into an immensely deep pit. He fell for tens of thousands of meters, then slammed onto the hard ground with lethal force. It was no exaggeration to say that the fall nearly killed him. If he hadn’t cultivated the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body, then thanks to the extremely rigid magical laws in place, he very well might have died.

And even though he didn’t die, the force of the impact still shattered many of his meridians and damaged his true energy, sea of consciousness, and nascent divinity. Thankfully, he had plenty of energy arts at his disposal, so even as he struggled to his feet, he used the impact force to increase the tribulation energy within him. Although tribulation energy was generally a bad thing, it could be used to catalyze his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.

‘What is this place?’ he thought, looking around at the cavern around him. The walls were made of some sort of rare metal from the god world. He launched an experimental punch, but it didn’t even put a dent into them, and the backlash caused him to stumble backward with a gasp. The ground was obviously just as hard, and no amount of stomping did anything to it.

The cavern was several dozen kilometers across, and the wall emanated a faint glow that confused the eyes.

Despite the fact that the place looked like a cave, Yang Qi knew that it was a prison cell. And the entrance above was so tightly sealed that even if he somehow reached the Terrifying level, he would still be trapped. He closed his eyes and reached out to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, and with some difficulty was able to make a connection. Thankfully, his immortal-slaying clone had the Engine of the One God to make him stronger, and was able to absorb some of the godhood stars to power the imperial-heaven pre-beginning systems. That was the only thing that allowed the connection to exist to begin with. Unfortunately, he wasn’t able to open enough of a passageway to enter the chart.

The magical laws here were ten times as strong as the Cave Temple of the Vajra Māyādevī.

Yang Qi couldn’t help but be shocked.

However, the connection to the chart was stable enough that he could get power from inside it, so at least he had a way to defend himself. And he could also contemplate ways to get out of his predicament.

‘The Executors of the Ancient Road are truly contemptible,’ he thought. ‘I wonder what this ‘emperor’ of theirs is like. And it's too bad I never got a good look at their headquarters as a whole. I might as well forget about trying to get into their treasure storehouse now.’ He sighed. At the moment, it seemed he was well and truly trapped.

At least he had plenty of quiet to contemplate his divine abilities.

With that, he began examining his surroundings more closely to see if there was anything useful around. And that was when a voice suddenly echoed out. “I have to say, boy, I'm surprised the fall didn’t kill you. Very miraculous. And you aren’t in the Terrifying level?”

Yang Qi started in shock. Considering the level of his cultivation base, he could identify the aura of dust motes, let alone people, yet his initial scan hadn’t shown any living person around him. There was only one explanation: the owner of this voice vastly surpassed his own level.

Turning in the direction of the voice, he noticed that there was a huge metal slab in the middle of the prison cell with a person bound atop it. He was blackish violet, including his skin, eyes, hair, and teeth. He had narrow, vicious-looking eyes that seemed like vortexes pulling at the soul.

He was bound by countless metal chains that seemed to be part of the cell itself, so without destroying the entire cell, they would be impossible to break. Clearly, there was no way this person would be able to leave that metal slab.

Backing up, Yang Qi circulated his energy arts and asked, “Are you human?”

The thing laughed maniacally, his voice so powerful that Yang Qi nearly passed out from the sound. He backed away until he ran into the wall, where he stood there gasping for breath.

Then he drew on some of the power within him to negate the effects of the sound, even sending some of its power into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart and the sheepskin scroll.

THUMP!

He had just conquered another tribulation, and as a result, the sound waves now had no harmful effect on him at all.

“Hmm?” The violet figure suddenly stopped laughing. “My Preheaven Wretch Laughter is so strong that even Terrifying experts who hear my voice will have their meridians shattered. But you negated it, boy? Get over here, I want to inspect your constitution!”

The violet figure stirred and, amidst the sound of clanking metal, reached out with splayed fingers. Instantly, Yang Qi felt a gravitational force wrapping around him and pulling him forward.

Fully aware of how horrifyingly powerful this violet entity was, Yang Qi drew on his Unspoiled Body, using the power of wind tribulation to break down the gravitational force and absorb it.

“Well done, boy!” The black violet entity laughed heartily, then flicked his finger to send out a burst of blackish violet flame. It was so intensely hot that, as it approached, it caused his skin to hiss and pop as painful blisters popped up.

“Wretch God Ultimate's Obsidian Flame!?” Yang Qi blurted. This fire was many times stronger than that unleashed earlier by the junior superintendent, to the point where the earlier flame seemed like nothing more than a toy in comparison.

Crack! Snap!

Yang Qi directed the power into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Immediately ceasing his work with the godhood stars, the immortal-slaying clone quickly powered the imperial-heaven pre-beginning systems to the highest level. Only in that way could he prevent the god formations he was using from collapsing as they defended against the fire. Without those defenses, the fire would have pierced into the virtual god world and caused a massive disaster.

Pop. Pop. Pop!

Yang Qi immediately surpassed several more tribulations, causing the tribulation energy of the Unspoiled Body to fill him, which provoked further transformations to the combination of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth and the Seventy-Two Monarchs Energy Art.

Having stabilized himself, he reached out to grab the dragon-like fire that flowed toward him, and as the cracking sounds rang out, further variations of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth appeared within him.

“Not bad, boy. You can even neutralize my Wretch God Ultimate's Obsidian Flame?” Growling, he prepared to further his attack.

Before he could, Yang Qi shouted, “Hold on, Senior! What does your version of Wretch God Ultimate's Obsidian Flame have to do with the junior superintendent who threw me in here?”

“Hmph! You think I have anything to do with that dirty little swine? He stole some of my energy arts, that’s all. And once I get out of here, I'm going to find him and kill him! So, you were thrown in here by him? I wonder why. Are you a spy sent by that pig? Hoping to steal some more of my energy arts, are you?”

“You think I'm a spy? That’s pretty funny. Senior, you’re surely smart enough to see that my cultivation base is higher than that brat’s. And you think I would be working for him? No, he wants to get some of my energy arts, too. But none of his torture methods work, so he decided to lock me up in here.”

“His torture methods don’t work on you? Even Terrifying experts who fall into the hands of the Executors of the Ancient Road either end up dead or in this very prison. There must be at least eight hundred prisoners here, all of them top experts who once stood a good chance of reaching the god world. So if I were you, boy, I wouldn’t use a ridiculous story like that to try to pull a fast one on me. Except... you did just stand up to Wretch God Ultimate's Obsidian Flame. What energy art do you cultivate that even the damned junior superintendent couldn’t deal with you?”

“Well, Senior,” Yang Qi replied with a faint smile, “being the consummate expert that you are, I bet you can guess which energy art I cultivate.”

“Hmm?” Brilliant light suddenly shot out of his eyes and enveloped Yang Qi, making him feel like he was a candle just on the verge of melting. Without hesitation, he drew on tribulation power to negate the effects of the light.

“Impossible! That’s the most powerful energy art from the king of all hells, the Hell of Sages and Mahātmās. It's the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body! But not even the elite mahātmās from that hell could ever cultivate it past the level of a few dozen tribulations. The only way to do so is with the Three Lives Stone and Mahātmā Jade. Heh heh. Even now, you're trying to convince me you’re not a spy? Everybody knows the executors have a chunk of the Three Lives Stone. That's the only way you could have cultivated that technique and absorbed the tribulation energy. But wait. Without the Mahātmā Jade, the Three Lives Stone would be useless. And I haven’t heard of any pieces of the Mahātmā Jade appearing anywhere recently.”

“What?” Yang Qi said. “I’ve heard that the Three Lives Stone is a requirement, but I’ve never heard any mention of this Mahātmā Jade. What is it!?”

Chapter 993: In the Prison

Yang Qi was really surprised. He had known for some time that the Three Lives Stone could help deal with the tribulation energy and ensure that the technique didn’t lead to catastrophic results. But he had never heard of this Mahātmā Jade. Not even the sheepskin scroll bore any mention of it. All of a sudden, he had a sinking feeling, and was worried that he might have been cultivating the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body incorrectly. What if he had unwittingly fallen onto the wretched path?

The blackish violet entity chuckled. “The Mahātmā Jade was created by the boundless mahātmās of the Hell of Sages and Mahātmās. They pooled their power to create a precious piece of jade similar to the God Legion Seal or King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions. When you cultivate the Unspoiled Body, you can unlock the wisdom contained in the Mahātmā Jade. Supposedly, those mahātmās left a boundless psychic power inside of it that can be used to reach the Annulled level.

“You see, as the successor of the Wretch God, I have a basic understanding of such things. Unfortunately, the Mahātmā Jade is similar to the God Legion Seal in that it was broken into numerous parts that were scattered throughout heaven and earth. From ancient times until now, nobody has ever managed to track all of them down. However, times are changing. People from the past and future are gathering in the Great Necropolis. The best of the best from all ages are here, and it’s impossible to say who will ultimately seize the upper hand and reach the god world.”

“The Annulled level?” Yang Qi was shaken yet again. Will convergence was described by the levels of Normal, Stupendous, Destabilizing, Terrifying, Paramount, Unbounded and finally, Annulled.

According to legend, the Sovereign Lord himself had only reached the verge of the Annulled level, but hadn’t been able to break through. Yet apparently, this Mahātmā Jade contained psychic information describing how to fully step into the level.

The Terrifying was the level of the gods. When one’s power index surpassed ten thousand, it was possible to reach the limits of the Ancient Road to the Gods and have a chance to break through to the god world. The god world was the home of the legion of gods, where even the lowest-level Lesser Gods were ten times beyond ordinary immortals.

Up to this point, Yang Qi had only encountered people in the early Terrifying level. Even Ghost Ace and his compatriots weren’t in the mid Terrifying level, although they had extremely formidable psychic scales.

As for this Wretch God Apostle, it was doubtful that he was in the mid Terrifying level. Someone that strong would be able to completely dominate people in the early Terrifying level.

“You know, boy,” the Wretch God Apostle said, “you may very well have fallen onto the wretched path by cultivating that technique wrong. Do you even realize the error you’ve made?”

“What error?” Yang Qi suddenly asked.

“To cultivate the Unspoiled Body, you have to have the Three Lives Stone and the Mahātmā Jade. Do you know why?”

“The Three Lives Stone is used to absorb the tribulation energy that builds up in you,” Yang Qi replied. “If you don’t do that, you’ll experience cultivation deviation and eventually die. But I'm not sure about the Mahātmā Jade. Do you mind providing some insight, Senior?”

“Well, you’re right. The Three Lives Stone can absorb the tribulation energy and convert it into nourishing elements that can make you stronger. However, all of that is connected to body cultivation and has nothing to do with your psychic will. Do you know why the Unspoiled Body was created to begin with?”

“To fight the godmammoths that the legion of gods created. They created the technique in the Hell of Sages and Mahātmās to be the bane of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.”

“Oh? Well, surprise surprise! You actually know about the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth!” The Wretch God Apostle didn’t bother hiding his amazement. “Don’t tell me you cultivate that too? Probably not. You can’t cultivate the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth without the God Legion Seal.”

“I'm an enemy of Magister Proud Heaven from the future world. So of course I know about that energy art.” Yet again, Yang Qi was trying to direct attention to Proud Heaven.

“You talk big, child,” the Wretch God Apostle laughed. “Do you know who Proud Heaven is? In the past, he threw the entire Ancient Road to the Gods into chaos and killed so many powerful entities that everyone lost track. In fact, if it weren’t for the fact the executors’ top emperor ended up injuring him, he might have reached the god world. I'm sure he’ll recover from that blow eventually, though. In any case, do you really think you qualify to call him your enemy?”

“He’s plotting to take my constitution,” Yang Qi said. “You see, I'm a Fateless One.”

“What? Really? A Fateless One? No one like you has ever been seen on the Ancient Road to the Gods! At least, not by me.” All of a sudden, the Wretch God Apostle’s eyes glittered with a strange light, and he sniffed the air. “Well, you really do have an interesting aura. No wonder that junior superintendent wanted to devour you and your constitution.”

Not wanting the conversation to go too far in the wrong direction, Yang Qi said, “Senior, please, can you tell me more about this Mahātmā Jade? Why do you think I’ve fallen onto the wretched path?”

“You think I'm going to just reveal secrets like that?” An enigmatic smile appeared on the Wretch God Apostle’s face. “Maybe if you show me the sheepskin scroll, I’ll consider it. You definitely can’t cultivate the technique without that scroll, which indicates that you definitely have it on you.”

“I don’t have the sheepskin scroll with me,” Yang Qi replied coolly. “You should have been able to tell that when we clashed just now. If you don’t want to answer my question, fine. I guess we can just settle down and try to think of a way out of here.”

Turning, he walked away and found a corner off in the distance, where he sat down and entered a zen samādhi trance.

“Hey. Hey! HEY!” The Wretch God Apostle tried to use the same sound attack as from before, but it had no effect.

Once Yang Qi entered a zen samādhi state, his defenses were significantly boosted. Right now, he was surrounded by pulsing tribulation fluctuations that negated the Wretch God Apostle’s attacks and kept him perfectly safe.

RIP!

The Wretch God Apostle flicked his finger, sending a burst of black flame toward Yang Qi’s head like a swirling dragon that howled with rage.

“You dirty swine!” he shouted. “You think you can haggle with me? Just wait till you see what it’s like to have your nascent divinity consumed by my flame!”

The flames caused hissing and popping sounds to ring out for the following several hours. Eventually, a look of astonishment could be seen on the Wretch God Apostle’s face. Waving his finger, he pulled the black flame away from Yang Qi, who wasn’t hurt in the least bit. In fact, the tribulation fluctuations coming off of him seemed stronger, as though he had successfully cultivated another character from the sheepskin scroll.

“Damnation!” the Wretch God Apostle growled. “If it weren’t for these damned chains holding me down, I wouldn’t have any problem dealing with you, brat. I have all kinds of divine abilities I could use. Listen up, boy, you just wait till I finish assimilating this flame. Then I’ll peel the flesh off your bones!”

However, Yang Qi didn’t respond.

More time passed, until eventually, the Wretch God Apostle couldn’t hold his tongue any longer and said, “Come on, kid. Get over here and chat. What's going on outside in the Great Necropolis? Any big developments?”

However, Yang Qi was deep in his zen samādhi trance, and might as well have been a stone statue.

“Do you really want me to use my Wretch God Bloodbane Consummate Astral Devastation on you? It’s far worse than Wretch God Ultimate's Obsidian Flame.”

Yang Qi just stayed in his trance.

“Little punk! Get over here and talk with me. I’ll tell you how you’ve gone down the wrong path!”

“Oh?” Yang Qi said, opening his eyes. “In that case, go ahead and start talking. Otherwise, I’ll just go back into my trance.” He was actually trying to provoke the Wretch God Apostle into attacking him again, which would allow him to push his Unspoiled Body to a higher level.

He was now at the level of twenty-four characters. And of course, each additional character required more power and more dangerous tribulations.

The Wretch God Apostle snorted coldly. “I never thought the day would come when someone threatened me.”

Seeing that he was beating around the bush, Yang Qi just closed his eyes again.

“You swine!” the Wretch God Apostle shouted angrily. “If you go into a trance again I'm going to kill you! Open your eyes and talk with me! Fine! I’ll tell you what you want to know.” Baring his fangs, he continued, “The True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body is like the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. Both involve apex levels of power, and both are body cultivation techniques that lead to being deathless and undying. However, the stronger one’s fleshly body gets, the more of a restriction it places on the mind and psyche. You, for example, would have long since reached the Terrifying level if you weren’t cultivating the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body. In that sense, the technique is holding you back. And if you keep going down this path, your body will get stronger and stronger, but your sea of consciousness will be further and further locked down. Can you imagine what the end result will be?”

“What will it be?” Yang Qi asked.

“You’ll lose your mind and become an imbecile! Only the Mahātmā Jade can be used to open the psychic door, the door of wisdom. With that jade, you can continue cultivating your psychic elements, achieve balance, and advance by leaps and bounds.”

‘That sounds about right,’ Yang Qi thought. For most of his life, his cultivation had involved advancing his fleshly body and psychic power at the same time. But now, he was facing problems.

“It’s like the saying, the stronger your limbs, the weaker your mind.” The Wretch God Apostle laughed loudly. “If you continue your cultivation the way you are, boy, you’ll end up a mindless dolt! But... I can help you!”

Chapter 994: Mahatma Jade

“What, boy. Afraid now? Did I hit the mark?” The Wretch God Apostle roared with laughter. “If you insist on being stubborn, then fine, I’ll just keep attacking you, forcing your cultivation base to advance. After a certain point, your nascent divinity will be completely sealed and you’ll turn mindless. Your fleshly body will truly remain unspoiled by countless tribulations and kalpas, until the entire world ends.”

“I'm actually not worried,” Yang Qi said. “I’ll just consider this another tribulation to deal with. You see, the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body is all about surpassing tribulations. If I rely on the Mahātmā Jade, I’ll develop a dependency-devil. I’d rather break through all restrictions by relying on myself.”

“You talk big,” the Wretch God Apostle said. “Call it a tribulation if you want, that doesn’t mean you can pass it. You're just like those fancy monks who sound logical with all their prattling, but never actually accomplish anything. In fact, I'd say you're all hype.”

“If that’s how you feel, then go ahead and attack me again,” Yang Qi said. “Let’s see if I lose my mind in the end.”

At the same time, he focused his thoughts on his nascent divinity in his sea of consciousness. As he did, he sensed that there were transformations occurring to the magical laws in his sea of consciousness.

It was similar to how, when mortal worlds transformed into immortal worlds, the magical laws would become stronger and denser. Those were the same kind of restrictions that seemed to have locked onto his nascent divinity.

In the mortal world, Great Sages could pierce through space, traveling from one planetary system to another. An example of that was how Yang Qi had traveled from the Rich-Lush Continent to the Quake-Dawn Continent.

However, if a Great Sage went to an immortal world, even the lowest level like the first ranked Titan Emperor Heaven, they would hardly be able to move. Forget flying, they would actually have difficulty breathing.

That was because of the restrictions binding the world itself.

Similarly, Demolishers who went to a thirty-third ranked immortal world would also be unable to fly. And in hundredth ranked immortal worlds, only Godmyths could deal with the magical laws there without being killed. And an ordinary Grand Emperor who entered the Cave Temple of the Vajra Māyādevī would be killed.

That was what Yang Qi was experiencing right now. Although his will convergence had improved dramatically, the progress had been too quick. For example, if a Legendary from the Rich-Lush Continent were to suddenly go to an immortal world, not only would that incredible leap upward not help them, it would likely lead to their death.

Right now, Yang Qi’s sea of consciousness was growing stronger, and its magical laws tougher, but his nascent divinity wasn’t able to keep up! Thankfully, he wasn’t completely out of options. For now, he would simply stop furthering the cultivation of his fleshly body and focus on his nascent divinity.

Sifting through his collection of energy arts, he tried to find one that focused on improving the will, and it didn’t take long. Peaklord Memory had given him something called the Unconstrained Sorrow-Forgetting Magic, which was specifically designed for cultivating the nascent divinity.

Closing his eyes, he began working with the technique. However, he quickly found that it was a huge drain on his psychic power. In fact, he ran out almost immediately.

‘Incredible,’ Yang Qi thought, struck with the sensation that he had really made a big mistake.

“So, boy, you’re trying to use the Unconstrained Sorrow-Forgetting Magic from the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect? Very smart. Do you finally realize that you can’t continue on this path of cultivation? Unfortunately, it's too late for you to improve your psychic scale now. The Unconstrained Sorrow-Forgetting Magic is powerful, but nowhere near the level of the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body. You see, your sea of consciousness is just too strong and restrictive. It’s similar to weight-lifting. If a mortal lifts a hundred kilograms, they can get a lot stronger. But put five hundred kilograms on their shoulders and they’ll be crushed to death.” The Wretch God Apostle laughed. “But I'm telling you, I have a way to help.”

“Help? How?” Yang Qi asked. Of course, he didn’t trust this Wretch God Apostle at all, and was still trying to think of a way to deal with these side-effects on his own. For example, if he could get the psychic scaling systems, the subsequent enlightenment would likely be very helpful. ‘What a pity I don’t have the full Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. There’s definitely a part that focuses on psychic elements, it’s just not in the third that I have.’

“You really only have two options,” the Wretch God Apostle said. “The first would be to get to the root of the problem and try to find some pieces of the Mahātmā Jade. The second would be to focus on the ‘symptoms’ of the problem. The latter is what I'm offering to do. I can give you some of my boundless wretch-god true energy. Send it into your sea of consciousness to stimulate your nascent divinity, and it’ll improve your will convergence. Meanwhile, you will impart some of the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body to me. In the end, you’ll get stronger, and your problem will be solved.”

“That sounds like a great idea,” Yang Qi said sarcastically. “So I accept your true energy into my body, help you improve your energy arts, and allow you to take control of my nascent divinity?” He laughed. “Come on, Wretch God Apostle, do you think I'm three years old or something? In fact, I don’t think even a child would fall for a trick as obvious as that. Maybe you’ve just been locked up so long here that your brain’s been addled.”

The Wretch God Apostle snorted coldly. “You know what, boy? I think you need to see what the will of a wretch-god like myself can do!”

BUZZ!

Suddenly, a pulse of psychic power erupted from him, shooting right into Yang Qi’s sea of consciousness and piercing toward his nascent divinity like a needle.

Yang Qi nearly shrieked as he was subsequently flung several meters into the air, then slammed back down onto the ground.

“Well, what do you think of my Wretch Spirit Needle? Not a bad wretch-god energy art, eh?” The Wretch God Apostle actually looked a bit pale in the face compared to his previous blackish violet. Apparently, using the technique was quite a drain on his vital energy.

Inside, he was thinking, ‘This brat is a lot stronger than I thought. I can’t believe his sea of consciousness is so tough! Even converging all of my will to power the Wretch Spirit Needle, I could only pierce inside by a tiny bit. And that’s after all of my cultivation improvement during my imprisonment. Back when I was on the outside, the Wretch Spirit Needle was considered one of the top assassination techniques. I used it to kill too many enemies to count, and could injure Terrifying experts with a single attack. I even had a fight with Mahātmā Compassioncraft once, the very same one who cultivated the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body in the past. But not even he was this strong. Does this boy have some other sort of good fortune?'

Meanwhile, Yang Qi was crawling to his feet. The stimulation to his will just now really had improved it a bit, making it a bit more mobile within his sea of consciousness.

Unfortunately, his nascent divinity was still so restricted that he felt like he could hardly even reach out to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Thankfully, his immortal-slaying clone was in the chart, keeping an eye on the situation.

But what would happen if his nascent divinity continued to get more and more restricted, to the point where he couldn’t move?

If he couldn’t move, then he obviously couldn’t use any of his energy arts moves.

Previously, he hadn’t even noticed this problem, but after cultivating to the level of over twenty characters from the sheepskin scroll, it was plainly obvious.

“What do you think, boy?” The Wretch God Apostle laughed again. “Should I roast you with more of Wretch God Ultimate's Obsidian Flame? The higher your cultivation base gets, the more you’ll be bound and restricted. Either give me the Unspoiled Body, or prepare to have your cultivation base forcibly improved. Feeling scared yet?”

Yang Qi slowly sat down and began thinking. Unfortunately, he couldn’t come up with any other plan. Quietly sending some true energy through himself, he confirmed that his fleshly body was very strong, but his will wasn’t as responsive as before.

Right now, a single fist from him would be enough to crush someone in the Terrifying level. Unfortunately, he wouldn't be fast enough to actually hit that person, because his will convergence wasn’t on par.

In terms of overall fighting prowess, he was actually far too weak.

Back in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, the immortal-slaying clone knew what was happening. Rising to his feet from his spot in the god formation he was operating, he looked over thoughtfully at the sheepskin scroll.

Nearby, Empress Jadefall said, “Exalted Immortal-Slayer, did something happen to Yang Qi?”

Chapter 995: A Dragon Trapped in a Shallow Pool of Water

“Did you sense it too, Jadefall?” the immortal-slaying clone asked. Quite a few people had taken to calling the clone ‘Exalted Immortal-Slayer’ recently.

“Yang Qi’s trapped somewhere,” she replied, her eyes flickering with anxiety, “and he's facing some sort of big tribulation.”

“Yes, he's dealing with a disaster,” the clone said, shaking his head. “Unbeknownst to neither him nor me, cultivating the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body and the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth at the same time has led to a big problem. Right now, his will is trapped in his sea of consciousness, and if he continues his cultivation, he’ll end up turning into little more than a statue.” He went on to provide some more details about the situation.

“So what do we do, Exalted Immortal-Slayer?” Jadefall said. “Do you have any ideas at all?”

“He and I started out as exactly the same person. Although I'm an independent entity now, I still have a connection to his will and essence. And in the future, we’ll need to work together to deal with the resurrected King Immortal-Slayer, whose first act will be to try to possess me. Obviously, if Yang Qi experiences cultivation deviation, my future will be a bleak one. Unfortunately, I don’t have any good ideas. The upside is that Yang Qi’s will is very strong, so I'm sure he’ll survive.”

“Why can’t you just bring him here to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, then search for some pieces of this Mahātmā Jade? After all, time isn’t a problem inside the chart.”

“I can’t. The Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart can’t open a passage into that prison. Even if I had the spatial coordinates, which I don’t, the restrictions are too powerful for me to break through. Perhaps I should take a trip to the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect and see if I can get my hands on the psychic scaling systems! Those systems should relieve Yang Qi’s situation and allow his psychic powers to grow again.”

Nodding, the immortal-slaying clone suddenly faded from sight.

The immortal-slaying clone had a very refined cultivation base, as well as the Engine of the One God, King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans, the godhood stars from the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, and numerous other magical treasures. Right now, he was so strong that he might not even lose in a fight against Yang Qi.

**

Back in the prison, Yang Qi sat there quietly, having just received a message from the clone about the current plan.

“Well, boy? You're already having trouble circulating your true energy, aren’t you?” The Wretch God Apostle laughed. “My Wretch Spirit Needle stimulated your nascent divinity a bit, but the effect will fade. You may as well be trying to transcend some tribulation right now. Once it's over, you're going to lose your mind and turn into nothing more than a statue.”

“Transcend tribulation?” All of a sudden, Yang Qi was hit with a bolt of inspiration. ‘How could I have forgotten? My cultivation base actually isn’t at the Grand Emperor level! I'm only on the fourth stair of the Deathless Heavenly Stairway, the Stair of Endurance. There are plenty more stairs for me to climb! Becoming a Grand Emperor should automatically improve my psychic scale. The heavens never truly bar one’s way!’

The Godmyth level involved rising from the first division to the ninth. Then, as a Chaos God, one would face the Deathless Heavenly Stairway. Afterward, everything was a matter of developing the will.

Valor. Wisdom. Strength. They were all expressions of the nascent divinity, will, and psychic power. Afterward came other levels, including Endurance, Fearlessness, and the True Void.

After transcending the tribulation to become a Grand Emperor, everything was about improving the will.

Perhaps an ordinary Grand Emperor in Yang Qi’s situation would be completely stuck. But he wasn’t actually a Grand Emperor. His actual level was still low, and he could still summon the tribulation to improve his level, reach the Stair of the True Void, and become vastly stronger.

Unfortunately, this was also a case of treating the symptoms, but not the root cause. After becoming a Grand Emperor, there were no higher levels to reach without becoming a god. Therefore, if he wanted to continue cultivating his Unspoiled Body, he would eventually have to get some of the Mahātmā Jade.

Once he had the will of a true Grand Emperor, Yang Qi knew that he couldn’t push his mastery of the tribulation characters past a hundred. If he did, he would end up right back where he was now.

Approaching the level of a hundred tribulations would be incredible, and would put him in a position to crush virtually any enemy.

Even now, he had only cultivated twenty-four tribulations, but was still in a very good position. Secretly circulating his true energy, he prepared to attempt a breakthrough, but then paused as he realized the magical laws around him were so tough that he couldn’t sense the dao of heaven.

Frowning, he thought, ‘It seems I can’t work on my breakthrough here. I have to figure a way out, first.’

The Wretch God Apostle had no idea what he was thinking, and assumed that he was having second thoughts. “Well, have you decided, boy? I can help you cultivate a very powerful divine ability focused on psychic power. You don’t even have Terrifying will convergence, but you’ve reached the level of twenty-four tribulations. What if I could improve your psychic scale to the point where you could reach thirty tribulations? What do you think?”

“Alright!” Yang Qi said. “But don’t even think of trying to pull a fast one on me. We’re helping each other out, okay? I know that those chains make it impossible for you to use all of your divine abilities, but I can help you break some of them. Maybe I can even help you get out of here!”

“Break the chains? Leave? You think this is some kind of kid’s game? This place is as dangerous as a dragon’s pool or a tiger’s den! Maybe if I cultivated a bit of the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body, then I might have a shot at breaking us free. Do you know how many hundreds of millions of years I've dreamed of trying to escape?”

“You want the Unspoiled Body?” Yang Qi asked. “Aren’t you worried about the same thing happening to you that’s happened to me?”

“Of course I am! But this is my only hope of escaping. Look, tell the truth. Do you have that sheepskin scroll? If not, then you could at least transmit some of its power to me. Considering you’ve already cultivated the power, I should be able to accept it. And it would reduce the restrictions you’re suffering from. Remember, we’re both locusts tied to the same rope here. We can’t escape, so our only hope is to work together. One thing is for sure, the executors are never just going to let us go.”

“That's a good point,” Yang Qi said. “With your psychic power, you could probably reach the level of fifty tribulations. And then you could easily break us out of here. Okay, how about this. You give me some of your power first, and I’ll use it for my cultivation.”

His plan was to use the power to connect to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, and the sheepskin scroll within it.

The immortal-slaying clone wasn’t in the chart at the moment, but could still exercise control over it. And this would give them a chance to see what the Wretch God Apostle’s true energy was like. That seemed like the safest alternative.

“Alright!” the Wretch God Apostle replied immediately, much to Yang Qi’s surprise. And immediately, Yang Qi got the sense that he had misread the situation.

Narrowing his eyes, he said, “You know where some of the Mahātmā Jade is, don’t you?”

The Wretch God Apostle’s eyes went wide, then he laughed. “You're smart, boy. You can really put two and two together. Yes, I have a clue about the Mahātmā Jade. Finding it won't be easy, but you're obviously no slouch. Why don’t the two of us team up to hunt for it?”

“First tell me about this clue!” Yang Qi said.

“Hmph! That relates to the biggest secrets of the Hell of Sages and Mahātmās! In other words, we would have to travel there to get more information, so telling you now won’t do any good. Look, the Executors of the Ancient Road are just looking for an opportunity to assimilate me. If that happens, you’ll never escape. They’ll eventually destroy your will and turn you into an empty husk. Let me batter you with some powerful tribulations so you can further your cultivation. Once your will convergence improves, you can deal with the magical laws here much easier.”

“Alright,” Yang Qi said, nodding. “Our top priority right now is getting out of here. And I don’t really need to worry about you revealing my secrets considering that you need my sheepskin scroll to cultivate the technique. And I need you to find the Mahātmā Jade. Alright, let’s work together.”

A host of complicated expressions played out on the Wretch God Apostle’s face. Obviously, he wanted to kill Yang Qi, but knew that he couldn’t.

Chapter 996: The Exalted Immortal-Slayer

The Will Manifestation Heaven Sect was under complete lockdown.

The immortal-slaying clone had arrived to find the entire place surrounded by an impervious greyspace. Activating the imperial-heaven pre-beginning systems of the Engine of the One God, he peered into the sect until he located what looked like a fragment of an enormous spacecraft.

Obviously, that fragment housed the psychic scaling systems.

The ability to identify the fragment was something only he could do, thanks to the fact that he had the Engine of the One God.

Those systems were just what he needed to save Yang Qi. The Cruiser of Civilization had been built by the Lord of Civilization from the god world, and the combination of the vivicreation systems, genetic systems, power assessment systems, and psychic scaling systems were enough to create gods. Even an ordinary human could be pushed all the way to the Terrifying level with them.

Of course, the immortal-slaying clone wasn’t the Lord of Civilization, so he couldn’t do that right now. But it went to show how powerful the psychic scaling systems were.

With them, Yang Qi would be like a tiger that had grown wings, and would surely be able to reach the level of a hundred tribulations. Once he reached that level, he would just have to slowly advance, and deal with the incredibly powerful magical laws that would result.

Right now, the idea of reaching the level of ten thousand tribulations was completely out of the question. That would require the Mahātmā Jade and a psychic scale close to the Annulled level.

The clone didn't plan to steal the psychic scaling systems. Instead, he raised his voice and said, “I, the successor of King Immortal-Slayer, have come to pay a formal visit to the sectlord of the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect!”

His voice rumbled into the depths of the sect like thunder, causing the greyspace to creak and crack. Although the clone was not yet at the Terrifying level, with the imperial-heaven pre-beginning systems and the godhood stars, the force he could unleash was no less than that of a Terrifying expert.

Besides, he had the other systems in the Cruiser of Civilization, so as long as he had enough power to fuel them, he could use them to slaughter gods.

“The successor of King Immortal-Slayer? King Immortal-Slayer’s successor!”

A buzz of voices rose up inside the greyspace and a host of people flew up into the air. Disciples arrived from left and right, quickly getting into formation as if to defend against an enemy invader.

Reports flew up the chain of command, and before long the greyspace shivered, sending out a huge beam of golden light that turned into a bridge beneath the clone's feet. Along with it, a voice drifted out. “You grace us with your presence, oh successor of King Immortal-Slayer. Please excuse me for not coming out to receive you. If you will, follow this golden bridge to our receiving hall.”

The clone frowned. Normally speaking, he should have been welcomed with full ceremony. But instead, he faced an empty bridge heading into parts unknown. However, the clone was a believer in the saying that true confidence stems from superb skill, so he simply walked along the bridge to the receiving hall.

The receiving hall had changed a lot in recent months. Many of the chief elders’ thrones were now gone, making it obvious there had been a big purge.

The sectlord wasn’t present, and had obviously gone into seclusion. The only people there were some chief elders and a few disciples. It didn’t look very much at all like a reception for a guest.

Of course, the main reason for that was that the clone wasn’t a Terrifying expert.

In fact, if it weren't for his status as the successor of King Immortal-Slayer, the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect wouldn’t even have let him in. And they definitely wouldn’t have extended a golden bridge to receive him.

“You’re King Immortal-Slayer’s successor?” one of the disciples asked, his voice cold. “Why exactly have you come to the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect?”

“Because I want to borrow something,” the clone replied.

The disciple frowned. “Borrow something? What?”

“Your fragment of the Cruiser of Civilization that has the psychic scaling systems.” The clone was being very blunt, and was obviously not resorting to any sorts of crafty plots or machinations.

“What?” the chief elder blurted. His face flickered with shock for a moment before he managed to regain his composure. “You really don’t know the height of the heavens and the breadth of the earth, young man. Our fragment of the Cruiser of Civilization, and the psychic scaling systems that go with it, are boundless magical treasures that belong to our sect. Why would we possibly lend them to you? Are you literally crazy? Perhaps mentally insane?”

The chief elder was obviously making no attempts to be polite.

“It’s not your decision to make,” the clone replied. “Call your sectlord out.”

“You’re stark raving mad!” two disciples lunged forward as if to grab the clone. They both had power indexes somewhere above three thousand, and they approached with a pincer maneuver that seemed impossible to escape.

However, even as they closed in on him, a field of invisible empyrean energy sprang up, which they slammed into and fell to the ground, where they remained unmoving.

“You’re quite strong, young man,” the chief elder said, impressed that the clone had knocked down two powerful disciples without actually making a move. Obviously, that meant he was no weaker than an ordinary Terrifying expert. Rising to his feet, he said, “We’ll never loan our psychic scaling systems to anyone, boy. Now kindly begone.”

As the words left his mouth, he flicked his sleeve, causing a wild wind to spring up, which wrapped around the clone to forcibly escort him away. The chief elder knew that he was King Immortal-Slayer’s successor; not only was he personally very strong, he was likely to have important backers. Therefore, harming him and trying to take King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions wasn’t an option. Besides, the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect had the reputation of being a righteous sect. Other less scrupulous sects would likely have already tried to kill him for the legacy medallions.

The worlds immortals lived in were generally very chaotic places.

“So you won’t call out the sectlord unless I make a scene, huh?” Completely unfazed, the clone waved his hand, causing the wind around him to vanish without a trace. Then, secretly calling on the imperial-heaven pre-beginning systems, he took a step forward.

RUMBLE!

The power of the godhood stars poured into him, causing the Engine of the One God to roar to life.

Instantly, the chief elder could sense an overwhelming force surging toward him.

RIP!

The elder’s sleeve was ripped into shreds, and he staggered backward several paces before losing his balance and falling onto the ground. This man was a Terrifying expert, but he had reached that level thanks to the psychic scaling systems, which meant that further cultivation progress was mostly an impossibility for him. Even still, for someone who wasn’t even in the Terrifying level to knock him off his feet defied logic.

Not even Yang Qi had been this fierce in his fight with the junior superintendent.

Gong.... Gong....

Bells immediately began tolling at the behest of the chief elder who had just been knocked down. Moments later, whooshing sounds could be heard as more chief elders flew to the scene.

The first one on the scene immediately barked, “What happened?”

Only then did he see the chief elder on the ground, his sleeve in tatters. Then he looked over at the immortal-slaying clone, and his eyes went wide with shock.

During the past few months, Yang Qi had made a lot of cultivation progress, and the clone had benefited significantly as well. He had unlocked many secrets, including aspects of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart that he had been unaware of before. In addition, he had access to all sorts of magical treasures.

“What do you think you’re doing, boy!?” said one of the chief elders. “I don’t care who you have as a backer, you can’t just flip out like this in the middle of the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect!”

The chief elders were clearly still worried about who this person’s backer might be.

“I'm not just any person,” the clone said in a cool voice. “And I'm not flipping out. I'm Yang Qi’s blood brother. He's fallen into a sticky situation with the Executors of the Ancient Road, and I've come to borrow your psychic scaling systems to help free him.”

“What?!”

Various degrees of shock could be seen on the faces of everyone who heard. Obviously, none of them had ever considered that this person would be a relative of Yang Qi.

After Yang Qi had defeated the junior superintendent from the Executors of the Ancient Road, and was subsequently kidnapped by them, the sectlord had flown into a terrible rage. He had demoted Peaklord Grand Might and carried out a purge of the rest of the sect. He had also held a meeting to try to figure out a way to rescue Yang Qi, but even after half a year had passed, not a single plan had been decided upon. Upon realizing what was happening, the chief elders simply stood around looking at each other, unsure of what to say. That said, the atmosphere was already starting to defuse.

Some of the chief elders were even clicking their tongues in amazement at how powerful Yang Qi’s brother was. Of course, none of them had any idea that the true source of his power was the Engine of the One God and the godhood stars of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

And if Yang Qi were here now, he could simply become a Grand Emperor and destroy all of the chief elders with a single blow.

“Is the sectlord here?” the clone said. “I request an audience. I'm sure he’ll believe me. I’ll return the psychic scaling systems as soon as I've rescued Yang Qi. In fact, I probably don’t need to take them away. I should be able to complete the process from within the sect. Agreed?”

“This is a very big matter,” one of the chief elders said, trying to sound as respectful as possible. “Young Hero, please wait a moment while we go inform the sectlord. He’s currently in seclusion.”

“That's fine, I'm a patient person.” The clone sat down.

When the chief elders saw how calm the clone was acting even under what should have been incredible pressure, they were even more impressed. That was something few people within the sect could accomplish.

The truth was that the clone was not as calm as he seemed on the outside.

‘What happened here?’ he thought. ‘What went on in the purge? If there are still spies from the Executors of the Ancient Road here, it could cause big problems.’

Chapter 997: Plotting Against the Wretch God Apostle

After the immortal-slaying clone sat in the receiving hall for a time, a new voice echoed out from the depths of the sect.

“Winter Bladedark, send the young hero into my secluded meditation facilities. And ask Peaklord Memory to come as well.”

“Yes sir!”

One of the chief elders stepped forward. Looking at the clone, he said, “Young Hero, please come with me.” Yang Qi had saved the life of Winter Bladedark’s apprentice, earning the chief elder’s full gratitude. In fact, among all the chief elders in the sect, he was the most fervent in his support of the sect’s efforts to rescue Yang Qi from the executors. Unfortunately, the executors were just too powerful. Although the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect was a superpower sect, compared to the Executors of the Ancient Road, they were pitifully weak. That much was obvious from the humiliation they had suffered at the hands of the junior superintendent.

The immortal-slaying clone nodded, rose to his feet, and followed Winter Bladedark into the sect. They passed through numerous twists and turns, and made use of one teleportation portal after another. Eventually, they were in a very mysterious location deep within the sect.

The magical laws got tougher and stronger, and although they couldn't compare to the executors’ prison, they were still very difficult to traverse through. Of course, the clone wasn’t worried. Putting on a show of utmost confidence, he used the Engine of the One God to proceed without any impediment. After all, the engine was an unsurpassable piece of machinery that could rival countless god items.

Although the clone could have activated the power assessment systems to absorb the energy around him, he chose not to do so. The Will Manifestation Heaven Sect didn’t seem interested in harming him, and were in fact leading him to a very important location in their sect.

Eventually, they reached an enormous altar, atop which hovered a silver object that was none other than a fragment of the Cruiser of Civilization. Within the spacecraft sat the sectlord, and in front of him sat a little girl, who was Peaklord Memory. Peaklord Celestial was also present.

Inwardly, the clone breathed a sigh of relief. Both of these peaklords supported Yang Qi, and the fact that the sectlord had brought them here indicated that this meeting should end with a favorable decision.

As the clone approached, the sectlord opened his eyes. Clicking his tongue in admiration, he said, “You have quite the constitution, Young Hero, and an invincible cultivation base. You actually cultivated an immortal-slaying body, and from what I can tell, you really are the successor of King Immortal-Slayer. That said, I’ve heard that there are some very nasty side-effects to assimilating King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions. You should really be careful with them.”

“I’m aware of the side-effects,” the clone replied. “Sectlord, please allow me to use the psychic scaling systems. I must extract Yang Qi from that prison.”

“If you’re really Yang Qi’s brother, then of course we’ll put our trust in you,” Peaklord Memory said. “But do you have proof that’s who you really are?”

The clone smiled and waved his finger. Instantly, Yang Qi’s voice filled the air. “Sectlord, I'm stuck in Heaven Penitentiary, deep in the headquarters of the Executors of the Ancient Road. Thankfully, I’ve made a deal with the Wretch God Apostle to help him escape. I've cultivated the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body to the level of twenty-four tribulations, but unfortunately it’s put me in something of a bottleneck. If I can use the psychic scaling systems, I should be able to get myself out of this predicament. And perhaps I’ll set the Wretch God Apostle loose in the executors’ headquarters along the way. That will definitely lead to a climactic battle.”

The two peaklords were visibly stunned when they heard Yang Qi’s voice.

“How are you doing that?” Peaklord Memory asked. “How are you communicating with Yang Qi?”

It only took a moment for Peaklord Celestial's face to flicker with understanding. “The Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. If you’re the successor of King Immortal-Slayer, then you obviously have use of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. But if that’s the case, why not use the space-time transmission functions of the chart to free Yang Qi?”

“Because I can’t,” the clone replied. “I can transmit energy in and out of that prison, but nothing corporeal. Although the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart is powerful, my cultivation base isn’t strong enough. Perhaps when I reach the Terrifying level, I’ll be able to.”

The sectlord nodded. “So you want to use our psychic scaling systems to reach the Terrifying level. In that case, I’d like you to be honest with me and tell me who you and Yang Qi really work for. Yang Qi performed a great service in saving our Will Manifestation Heaven Sect, so we won’t let him down. In fact, I'm willing to offer him the position of junior sectlord. But if he has other motives, that might make things difficult.”

“Both of us are people who have stumbled across immense good fortune,” the clone replied. “And we don't work for anyone else. I’d say it's not a bad idea to make Yang Qi your junior sectlord. Your Will Manifestation Heaven Sect is large and powerful, but chaotic times are coming. With his help, it’s possible that your sect could become even stronger, perhaps to the point where you needn’t fear the Executors of the Ancient Road.”

“You two really don't work for anyone else?” The sectlord was clearly surprised. “You’re completely on your own? That’s even more impressive. It seems Peaklord Memory really happened across a true treasure in Yang Qi. Unfortunately, the psychic scaling systems require a huge amount of godhood to operate. I doubt you’re strong enough to actually use them. You’ll need our help.”

“You’re mistaken, Sectlord. As long as you give the go-ahead, I can definitely activate the psychic scaling systems. Is that fine with you?”

“They say the young are fearless, and you’re a perfect example, boy,” Peaklord Celestial said. “We’ve been working with the psychic scaling systems for years, now, and I can tell you that they’re incredibly powerful. There are countless psychic spirits inside that already acknowledge the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect as their owner; there’s simply no way you could directly activate them. The only way would be if you joined our sect and accepted a boundless energy art from the sectlord.”

“That won't be necessary. Yang Qi can join your sect, but I have no desire to do so myself. Of course, we're related by blood, so if he becomes the junior sectlord, I’ll offer him my full support. Sectlord, just give me the approval and I’ll activate the systems. Agreed?”

“You've piqued my curiosity, Young Hero,” the sectlord said with a faint smile. “In that case, I give you approval. Now let’s see if you really can activate the psychic scaling systems.”

“A word once spoken...” the clone said.

“... cannot be taken back even by a team of four horses,” the sectlord finished.

“Begin!” An image sprang into being around the clone, a depiction of the imperial-heaven pre-beginning. Then, a flow of energy swept toward the psychic scaling systems, causing the fragment of the Cruiser of Civilization to visibly tremble. Then, countless photonic computers came online, causing a bright glow to fill the area.

[Beep-beep-beep. Beep-beep-beep. Imperial-heaven pre-beginning systems! Boundlessly paramount!]

Instantly, the psychic scaling systems became a stream of bright light that moved with indescribable speed as it shot into the clone's heart.

“What’s this?!” the sectlord blurted, very nearly leaping to his feet. As for the two peaklords, they were so shocked that they nearly passed out. How could a precious treasure that belonged to the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect simply turn traitor and abandon them?

A moment later, the sectlord regained his composure. “The Engine of the One God! You’re using the Engine of the One God! That’s the only thing that could possibly force the psychic scaling systems into submission.”

The clone nodded and smiled. “You're right, I have the Engine of the One God. What do you think, sectlord? I wasn’t exaggerating, was I?”

“Please return the psychic scaling systems immediately!” Peaklord Celestial said. “They’re the key to our sect's success! For years now, that’s the main way the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect has produced so many Terrifying experts.”

“The Terrifying experts you can produce that way are very limited,” the clone replied coolly. “Such people are weaker than me, and can never achieve further cultivation advancement. In other words, they have no hope of godly ascension. That said, I know that these systems are a treasure of your sect. No matter how much I want to fully assemble the Cruiser of Civilization, a gentleman shouldn't steal from his friends. After I'm finished with the task at hand, I’ll return them to you. In other words, you can calm down, Peaklord Celestial.”

Peaklord Celestial shook his head and seemed like he was about to say something, but in the end, he held his tongue.

“Fine, I believe you,” the sectlord said. “So what do you plan to do now? Do you need our help?”

“I don’t,” the clone replied. “I'm now going to open an entrance to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart and head inside to activate a formation. If you're interested, you can come with me.”

“No thanks,” Peaklord Memory said. “People say that once you go into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, you can never come out again. I think standing guard out here would be much better.”

“That’s fine. After I head into the chart, the three of you can send some true energy inside to help me power the god formation. That will ensure that there are no slip-ups. Furthermore, you can help me deal with the Wretch God Apostle. If you use your boundless secret magics to suppress him, we can turn him into a puppet. Afterward, when Yang Qi becomes your junior sectlord, you’ll also have the Wretch God Apostle working for you.”

As it turned out, the immortal-slaying clone had some high ambitions. He didn’t just want to free Yang Qi, but wanted to turn the Wretch God Apostle into a puppet as well!

Of course, it was something that he and Yang Qi couldn’t do on their own. In fact, they couldn’t have stirred a hair on the Wretch God Apostle’s head.

But with the help of the two peaklords and the sectlord, as well as the psychic scaling systems, things were different. That was especially true considering the sectlord was roughly on the same level as the Wretch God Apostle.

“Turn the Wretch God Apostle into a puppet?” At first, the sectlord was stunned by the seemingly crazy suggestion. But then his eyes glittered. “That might be possible, considering you have the Engine of the One God and the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. You might actually be able to power up the psychic scaling systems to the level we would need. Years ago, the Wretch God Apostle rocked the entire Ancient Road to the Gods. It was only when the princes of the executors worked together that they managed to subdue him. But in the end, not even they could kill him. If we could get him under our control, we would be vastly stronger as a sect. It’s all going to come down to whether or not our ambush works.”

Chapter 998: Plotting Against the Wretch God Apostle (2)

A grand scheme was unfolding.

The two peaklords were both Terrifying experts who had risen to that level on their own merits, without using the psychic scaling systems. And the sectlord had been an apex-level figure even before the arrival of the Great Necropolis.

All three of them were very intrigued by the immortal-slaying clone’s vicious plan; if they pooled their power to turn the Wretch God Apostle into a puppet, and succeeded, it would turn the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect into a more powerful force than it had ever been.

The clone entered the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, leaving behind a vortex for the three Terrifying experts to send their power into. When they caught sight of the god formation inside the chart, they were shocked. How could they have imagined that there would be so many boundless godhood stars sending godhood raining into the clone?

Meanwhile, the clone drew on the Engine of the One God and the imperial-heaven pre-beginning systems to stay in his peak state.

‘So strong!’ That was what all three of the experts from the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect were thinking. Shaken, they sent their true energy pouring into the formation to keep it fully powered.

“Psychic scaling systems!” The clone poured godhood power into the systems to activate them, whereupon brilliant light flared, piercing into his sea of consciousness.

There, his nascent divinity felt like it was being bathed in intense coldness.

Streams of black smoke began rising up, along with strands of karma that came from the faith power the clone had absorbed from countless living beings, which were restrictions on his nascent divinity.

Now that he had the psychic scaling systems, the clone could easily take the karma that had been restricting his nascent divinity and seal it into a clump. Although he couldn’t dissolve it, he could both free his nascent divinity and also store that karma for use later in the fight against King Immortal-Slayer.

Or, it could possibly be a tool or weapon to use against the Wretch God Apostle.

All of a sudden, the psychic scaling systems provided a report based on what was happening in the clone’s sea of consciousness.

[Beep-beep-beep. Psychic scale at zero point nine nine nine nine.]

As the clone well knew, “one” was the level to describe a Terrifying expert.

His cultivation base was now on the very cusp of reaching that level. However, the final breakthrough was going to be extremely difficult. Furthermore, he didn’t want to use the psychic scaling systems to do it. Once he succeeded, he would become incomparably powerful, able to push the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart to such a high level that it would almost become something brand new.

When the clone had Terrifying fighting prowess, he would be even more intimidating, considering he had control of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. At that point, he would be able to surpass Yang Qi in the slaughter he could unleash.

That said, Yang Qi would also be extraordinary in his own way.

The photonic computers also provided reports on the three experts from the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect.

[Beep-beep-beep... Three experts detected with Terrifying psychic power. One is in level five, one in level eight, the other in level six. None of them have unleashed their full potential output.]

Using the god formation, the clone reached out to Yang Qi. “I’m here, Yang Qi. Are you ready?”

Yang Qi was in the middle of his guileful dealings with the Wretch God Apostle when suddenly he heard the clone speaking to him. In his heart, he burst out laughing. ‘So the Wretch God Apostle is going to be my puppet. He’s crafty and murderous, and is already thinking of a way to break our agreement. He’ll never guess that I’m going to beat him to the punch. With the sectlord, the two peaklords, and the psychic scaling systems, I’ll definitely be able to secure a victory!’

Looking at the Wretch God Apostle, Yang Qi said, “Alright, I'm going to pass some of the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body to you. At the same time, you help me temper and strengthen my nascent divinity. If I can break through the restraints on my sea of consciousness and gain better control of the tribulation energy within me, the two of us will definitely be in a position to take on the Executors of the Ancient Road together.”

The Wretch God Apostle cackled. “Of course. Don’t worry, someone like me would never deceive a child like you!”

Yang Qi slowly approached the Wretch God Apostle. Up close, he could see that, underneath all the chains and manacles, the man was probably twice as large as an ordinary human.

‘My fleshly body is so powerful now that it’s actually hard to control, much less fly,’ Yang Qi thought. Using his current will to drive his body felt like being a tiny child trying to wield an enormous sledgehammer.

Thankfully, his immortal-slaying clone and the psychic scaling systems made all the difference. Now all that remained was to see what exactly the Wretch God Apostle planned to do.

As Yang Qi neared, the Wretch God Apostle suddenly burst out in maniacal laughter and thrust his hand out with splayed fingers, causing a burst of gravitational power to shoot toward Yang Qi. Unexpectedly, he was trying to break into Yang Qi’s sea of consciousness and seize his nascent divinity.

“You!”

Obviously, the Wretch God Apostle had no intention of working with Yang Qi, and instead wanted to wipe out his mind, absorb his thoughts, devour his fleshly body, and hopefully get the secrets of the sheepskin scroll as a result.

Yang Qi immediately sent his mind into a zen samādhi trance. At the same time, the immortal-slaying clone used boundless godhood power to activate the psychic scaling systems and the imperial-heaven pre-beginning systems. Then he strengthened Yang Qi’s sea of consciousness, making it impossible for the Wretch God Apostle to harm him.

“Damn you!” The Wretch God Apostle pulled his hand back and prepared to attempt some other crafty move.

“What are you doing, Wretch God Apostle!?” Yang Qi said. “I can’t believe you’re trying to harm me! Luckily, my nascent divinity and will can be protected by a secret magic I have. Did you really think a move like that would be enough to deal with me?”

“You’re really keeping a lot of secrets, boy,” the Wretch God Apostle said with an insincere smile. “I was just testing your will, that’s all. I wanted to see if you could withstand some further stimulation. Now that I know how strong you are, I have to say, I'm impressed. Your will is actually as strong as the Terrifying level, you just can’t achieve the actual breakthrough. Well, with my secret technique, you’ll definitely be able to release your latent potential!”

Snorting coldly, Yang Qi said, “Fine. I’ll trust you just one more time. Okay, send your energy art into me!”

“Fine. Pay attention!” His plot having failed, the Wretch God Apostle knew he needed to just play along for now. Without any hesitation, he sent his energy art surging into Yang Qi’s meridians. “Open your sea of consciousness and let me in. Understand?”

“Of course I understand,” Yang Qi replied coldly. “No tricks, though, alright? I'm prepared for anything.” Despite his tough words, his voice quavered in a way that seemed to say his words were forced and he wasn’t very confident at all.

‘This brat is quite a swindler,’ the Wretch God Apostle thought. ‘But compared to me, he’s an amateur. Soon he’ll find out what it's like to face the secret magic I've been cultivating in this prison for the past several hundred millions of years.’

Even still, he was hatching vicious plans.

As his true energy entered Yang Qi and flowed through his meridians, the Wretch God Apostle finally realized just how incredibly tough Yang Qi’s body was. In fact, it was even difficult for his true energy to navigate to the sea of energy. And once there, all he saw was an immense vortex that began sucking him in.

‘I can’t even tell how deep his sea of energy is!? It seems as if it’s fused with some sort of boundless god item.’ The Wretch God Apostle had originally hoped to probe at the secrets in Yang Qi’s sea of energy, but then the sea of energy shivered and a burst of true energy and will erupted from it.

As soon as it hit the wretch-god true energy, he suddenly realized that it contained some of the magical symbols that were the tribulations of the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body.

‘This thing is incredible! The brat really wasn’t lying!’ Overjoyed, he brought the true energy into himself, whereupon cracking and creaking sounds rang out as his substructure began to transform and get stronger.

Something like an explosion rang out, then, two hours later, another. Of course, those were tribulations.

About four hours later, he had passed two tribulations. That was when Yang Qi closed his sea of energy.

“What are you doing, boy!?” the Wretch God Apostle blurted in anger. “Why did you stop? My will and psyche could easily sustain a full fifty of those tribulations.”

“Because we had a deal, Wretch God Apostle,” Yang Qi said. “Have you forgotten that you're supposed to help me with your energy arts?”

“Very crafty, boy.” With that, he sent his will into Yang Qi and headed toward his nascent divinity. “This is my secret magic, the Wretch God Spirit-Consciousness Immortal-Slaughtering Grand Technique. Memorize it well!”

Chapter 999: The Immortal-Slaying Clone Reaches the Terrifying Level

A stream of black smoke had surrounded Yang Qi’s consciousness.

Within it was the method to cultivate a very secret magic, and Yang Qi didn’t hesitate to take it. And as soon as he began working with it, his psychic power began to improve.

Almost immediately, he sensed that he had improved control over his physical body. The child who had experienced such difficulty lifting the sledgehammer was now a bit older.

As he continued cultivating, he suddenly felt as though he were being forced to rely very heavily on the Wretch God Apostle’s will. Then he heard a voice. “Come. Come.... Enter my embrace. Have faith in the Wretch God, and you will gain even more. The Wretch God is the true lord of the god world....”

As the voice spoke, Yang Qi’s mind began to grow foggy.

In response, the clone quickly made some adjustments to the psychic scaling systems, pulling Yang Qi back to lucidity. “Wretch God Apostle!” he growled angrily. “You’re plotting against me again!? You want me to exercise faith in the Wretch God? To convert? You never had any intention of working with me, did you?”

Of course, his anger was a complete act.

The Wretch God Apostle burst out laughing. “Fooled you, boy! You think you can really cultivate this secret magic of mine? You see, it really can be used to improve one’s psyche. However, as you cultivate it, you’ll create a psychic connection to the boundless Wretch God. And for all intents and purposes, that’s me! I'm his appointed representative in the world! Once you're connected to the Wretch God, you have to follow my orders. Now hand over that sheepskin scroll! And give me all of your energy arts, your soul, and every magical treasure you have while you’re at it!”

“You!” Yang Qi blurted, plastering a look of fury onto his face that was the complete opposite of the delight he felt inside. “I won’t let you get away with this!”

As he began to draw on his psyche and will, back in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, the psychic scaling systems vibrated.

“Now we can finally see what your psychic scale is, Yang Qi!” the clone murmured.

[Beep-beep-beep.... Yang Qi’s psychic scale is one point five.... Unfortunately, the restraints on his body mean that he can only release power equivalent to zero point eight.]

Shockingly, the clone now realized that Yang Qi had already surpassed the level of “one”, except he was unable to release the full potential of his power.

“Alright, you need to break through!” the clone said. “Yang Qi, you’re usually the one helping me out, but now I'm going to provide the assistance. You’re going to reach the Terrifying level right now!”

RUMBLE!

The clone threw all of the godhood power possible into the Engine of the One God and the psychic scaling systems, pushing them to new heights as they stimulated Yang Qi’s nascent divinity.

In response, an immense will erupted from Yang Qi’s nascent divinity, causing the Wretch God Apostle’s will to shudder violently.

“What?! How can the boy be struggling so much? He must have some secret weapons! Unfortunately for him, he’s essentially fighting against the Wretch God! I can handle this. I’m the Wretch God, the Wretch God is me! Wretch God Fusion!”

RUMBLE!

As he reached out into the void, a mighty will descended onto him, something that vastly surpassed his own will.

He was being possessed by the Wretch God, and it was causing his psychic power to skyrocket. Brimming with wretched evil, he smashed into the defenses of Yang Qi’s sea of consciousness. As he did, an image of the Wretch God appeared, his face indescribably wretched and foul. He was obviously treacherous, brutal, and ruthless. He epitomized just about every negative quality that could be imagined, and now he was trying to merge with Yang Qi’s nascent divinity.

Next, the Wretch God’s voice filled Yang Qi’s mind. “Have faith in me, and you can earn immortality. Betray me, and you’ll suffer a myriad of tribulations....”

Both the Wretch God and the Wretch God Apostle were trying to possess Yang Qi at the same time! More precisely, they had combined into one and were trying to turn Yang Qi into an out-of-body incarnation, a second nascent divinity.

The Wretch God Apostle was throwing all his cards on the table to try to win.

Turning to the sectlord and peaklords, the immortal-slaying clone said, “Perfect. Now's my chance, while he's going all in. Begin the transmission. Lock down my sea of consciousness and pull out all of the godhood you have ready!”

The sectlord’s hands danced in front of him as he sent fifty pieces of godhood swirling out. The clone immediately inhaled them and sent them to the Engine of the One God, which allowed the psychic scaling systems to send out an immense blast of psychic power.

At the same time, the energy of countless civilizations surged into Yang Qi’s sea of consciousness.

In the shortest of moments, the four mighty experts became like the embodiment of the mighty Lord of Civilization, standing above the River of Civilization and observing the countless civilizations that had appeared throughout history.

God civilizations, immortal civilizations, devil civilizations, human civilizations, martial arts civilizations, draconic civilizations.... The ‘Lord of Civilization’ looked out at countless civilizations streaming by, and at the same time, the psychic powers of the four experts surpassed their previous limitations.

The sectlord and both peaklords all felt themselves stepping into a much more powerful state as they kept their psychic fluctuations tightly connected. Meanwhile, the immortal-slaying clone was pushing his own psychic fluctuations to the limit. Together, the four of them took hold of the bundle of karma the clone had created and headed into Yang Qi’s sea of consciousness.

As they did, Yang Qi’s sea of consciousness was sealed, making it impossible for the Wretch God Apostle to leave.

As the boundless psychic fluctuations merged with Yang Qi, he regained complete control over his body and pushed his psychic scale to incredible heights. In the blink of an eye, he was at the point of controlling, not twenty tribulations, but more like a hundred.

RUMBLE!

Rising to his feet, he circulated his true energy, and as his Unspoiled Body improved, his sea of consciousness shrank down. At the same time, he launched a vicious fist strike onto the Wretch God Apostle’s physical body, causing blood to spray out of his mouth and deeply weakening his psychic power.

Within Yang Qi’s sea of consciousness, the Wretch God Apostle howled, “What power is that? You tricked me! Don’t harm my physical body! Let me out of here!”

His will battered this way and that, but he was incapable of freeing himself from Yang Qi’s sea of consciousness.

Meanwhile, another voice rang out. “I trust you’ve been well since we last met, Wretch God Apostle. I, Sectlord Will Manifestation, along with Peaklord Memory and Peaklord Celestial, have come to offer respects.”

“So, it’s you people. What are you doing here? You’re using the psychic scaling systems to plot against me, eh? Well, that’s not going to work! The Wretch God’s cultivation base is far beyond the Lord of Civilization’s. Black Sun Wretch God, Consummate Wretched Evil!” The Wretch God Apostle’s will surged, transforming into a black sun that began to drag the River of Civilization down.

The clone snorted. “You think that’s going to work?”

He opened his mouth and exhaled a stream of golden light, within which was a tiny golden imp that shot into Yang Qi’s sea of consciousness. It was the God Legion Seal! With the God Legion Seal at play, intense golden light stabbed into the Wretch God’s will, instantly setting him at a huge disadvantage. “Dear god! What is that doing here? The God Legion Seal? I can’t believe it’s the God Legion Seal!”

He was truly surprised. Never in his wildest dreams could he have ever imagined something like that appearing in Yang Qi’s sea of consciousness.

The immortal-slaying clone burst out laughing. “The God Legion Seal can easily suppress your wretch-god will. Get ready, Wretch God Apostle. You're about to acknowledge allegiance. Prepare to be sealed and turned into a believer! Psychic scaling systems! Imperial-heaven pre-beginning systems! Combine powers!”

RUMBLE!

The immortal-slaying clone’s will was being pushed all the way to its limit to unleash the full power of the various systems, and at the same time, use his collection of karma to bind the Wretch God Apostle’s will in place.

“Begone!” the Wretch God Apostle howled. “Not even the God Legion Seal can do anything to me. I'm going to take it and use it to completely destroy all of you!”

This was a virtually invincible enemy, someone that not even the Executors of the Ancient Road had been able to fully defeat, thus it was no surprise that he began pushing back against the golden light.

“Oh mighty Wretch God, no greater opportunity could there be for you! Your sleeping will can truly come through the River of Time from the ancient past and be fully awakened!” He began muttering some sort of enchantment, causing immense vibrations of will to roll out. It was as if some even greater evil were coming, allowing his nascent divinity and will to begin breaking out from their confines. Obviously, he planned to return to his own body.

“The God Legion Seal...?”

Of course, the three experts from the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect were completely bowled over, and very nearly passed out from shock. How could they have ever imagined that the God Legion Seal would appear? They knew that Proud Heaven had one piece of it, which was how he had sown such chaos on the Ancient Road to the Gods. He had very nearly reached the god world, only to be foiled by the executors at the last moment.

But now, here was another piece of that seal.

Despite being shaken, the sectlord could sense that the Wretch God Apostle was making a big move. “Don’t let him get back to his body!” he shouted. “The consequences will be too horrible to contemplate. Once his will and true energy combine again, they’ll be impossible to separate. Attack together!”

Sadly, it seemed he was just a bit too late.

Crack!

The Wretch God Apostle broke free and shot back toward his body.

However, in that same instant, the immortal-slaying clone’s will also transformed, causing thunderous rumblings to echo out, along with images from the god world. Terrifying fluctuations filled the area, making it seem almost like someone from the god world was present. He had experienced a breakthrough in will convergence!

Instead of using the psychic scaling systems, he had taken advantage of a critical moment of combat to push himself to the next higher peak!

“Terrifying will?!” the sectlord blurted. “You broke through! You're a Terrifying expert!”

Chapter 1000: Incredibly Domineering

Stepping into the Terrifying level was the first major advancement the immortal-slaying clone had experienced since acquiring the eighth legacy medallion and gaining access to the godhood stars.

In the moment of his breakthrough, he focused all of the power of the godhood he had on the psychic scaling systems, using new aspects he had just gained enlightenment of to attack the Wretch God Apostle.

Boundless tribulations swirled about everywhere.

Within the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, it seemed like doomsday had come, which was a signifying mark of Terrifying will. After all, Terrifying will was the will of gods.

It was only when a person reached the Terrifying level that they could reach the end of the Ancient Road to the Gods and enter the god world alive.

Those with weaker will convergences, such as Destabilizing will, would definitely suffer the fate of death. Even the weakest magical laws of the god world would crush them out of existence.

Of course, being in the Terrifying level didn’t necessarily guarantee that someone would survive in the god world. For example, the magical laws there were so strong that such people might be so weighed down that they would be forced to crawl instead of walk.

According to the rumors, the mid Terrifying level was the true hallmark for the god world. It was only in that level that travel was possible, and one could have a chance of staying alive. And the late Terrifying level was when one could finally begin gathering the power necessary for godly ascension.

Majestic psychic fluctuations filled the immortal-slaying clone’s mind, simultaneously causing heaven-shaking, earth-toppling changes to the interior of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Everything inside was dramatically silent, and the godhood stars shone with dazzling light, making them seem like countless tiny suns. Terrain features popped up everywhere, and the virtual god world expanded, slowly beginning to grow even more true and real.

Roiling psychic power broke through all obstacles, becoming a raging flow that swept out in all directions.

‘The Terrifying level! This is the Terrifying level!? So incredibly domineering!’ The clone shivered as countless impurities were expelled from within him. At the same time, numerous magical treasures appeared. For instance, King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans floated up, becoming a majestic entity that could devour heaven, earth, suns, moons and cosmoses.

Unfortunately, Yang Qi had never been able to release the full might of those talismans. Only after reaching a Terrifying cultivation base could their true potential be unlocked. Now that the clone was in the Terrifying level, his psychic power and true energy had finally conformed to the true meaning of King Heaven-Devourer.

Bursting with more strength than ever, the primal-chaos elder-snake burrowed into Yang Qi’s sea of consciousness, where it opened its mouth to devour the Wretch God Apostle.

“Aiiee! Such incredible power!” The Wretch God Apostle's will had been just on the verge of flying back into his body. If that happened, and his will combined with his true energy, then he could use his secret magics to crush everything around him. Neither the secret magic, the peaklords nor anyone else would have been a match for him. With his nascent divinity trapped in Yang Qi’s sea of consciousness, he was only about ten percent as powerful as he would normally have been.

“King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions!”

The Wretch God Apostle struggled, sending out a stream of black flame that resembled a fire dragon to meet King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans. He knew that time was of the essence.

Meanwhile, back in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, eight of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions appeared, hovering above the clone’s head. Clicking together, they created a united command medallion, square, in the middle of which was an empty, heart-shaped void. That was where the final medallion would be placed.

Just the eight medallions combined into one caused the immortal-slaying clone to thrum with even more psychic power. Countless god souls cheered excitedly as an immense expression of will appeared behind him, causing the entire Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart to tremble.

Power flowed down from the godhood stars like a waterfall. When they reached the unified command medallion, the clone let loose a long cry that rumbled like thunder.

Lightning bolts crashed, not literal lightning bolts, but bolts of lightning made from pure psychic power. God lightning stabbed all the way into Yang Qi’s sea of consciousness.

In that moment, Yang Qi’s own psychic power was being pushed to incredible heights with the help of the psychic scaling systems. Restraints shattered, and his nascent divinity suddenly gained enlightenment of the River of Civilization. It was as if he had the same view as the Lord of Civilization and could gaze down at the river, and the waves on its surface, which were in fact countless civilizations.

Using the power of the imperial-heaven pre-beginning in his sea of consciousness and the psychic powers of the Lord of Civilization, he began creating his own version of the psychic scaling systems.

Henceforth, his nascent divinity would have its own living psychic scaling systems.

‘I understand the psychic scaling systems. And the Civilization Founding Grand Magic.’ The Lord of Civilization had used the psychic scaling systems to create his Civilization Founding Grand Magic. And using that grand magic to improve the psychic scaling systems was a true boundless dao of gods.

Civilization was an expression of the psyche, and power was the basis of civilization.

That was the ultimate meaning of the psychic scaling systems. Thanks to Yang Qi’s experience in gaining enlightenment of the imperial-heaven pre-beginning systems, his work with the psychic scaling systems went very quickly. And before long, there was a raging River of Civilization flowing within his own nascent divinity.

BOOM!

As he came to understand the Civilization Founding Grand Magic, nothing about the psychic scaling systems remained a mystery to him. Suddenly, a tremor passed through him. Psychic power flowed through his meridians, limbs, bones, and acupoints.

Instantly, he was vastly stronger than before. Now that he had enlightenment of the psychic scaling systems, he could convert his own true energy into psychic power, which was a terrifying thought. Right now, his cultivation base was at a level where he could definitely control the power of fifty tribulations.

Clenching his hand into a fist, he punched the Wretch God Apostle yet again, causing more blood to spray out of his mouth. Then he hit him with his Devil-God Seal, instantly sealing his meridians, sea of energy, and essence.

“Aaaiiiieee!” the Wretch God Apostle’s will screamed as he struggled. However, no matter how he fought, he couldn’t prevent his body from being sealed. And as his energy faded and his essence was damaged, his will began to weaken.

“No! I surrender, boy! We can work together. Really work together! I won’t plot against you!”

“You want to work together now? Sorry, too late!” Yang Qi had not yet reached the Terrifying level, but it was only a matter of time before he succeeded.

Right now, the God Legion Seal, King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans, the systems of the Cruiser of Civilization, the powers of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, and the wills of the sectlord and two peaklords, were all converged in his sea of consciousness, crushing down on the Wretch God Apostle.

Truth be told, Yang Qi couldn’t help but admire the Wretch God Apostle for managing to hold out under the assault.

Unfortunately, he was doomed to be defeated.

If the immortal-slaying clone hadn’t broken through to the terrifying level, things might have turned out differently. The Wretch God Apostle was so powerful that he might have been able to eke out a victory. But now there was no way he could survive. The clone’s control of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart was greater than ever, giving him even more tools to fight with.

With the stronger version of the chart, he could now break through the magical laws of the prison to either send corporeal items in, or allow Yang Qi to slip out. He was in an incredibly domineering position.

As of this moment, not even the most dangerous location could keep him trapped.

Except perhaps the god world.

“Press the attack!” The sectlord and peaklords were pushing their wills to the highest level they could manage.

“Begin the psychic enslavement!” the sectlord barked. “It’s one of the strongest abilities of the psychic scaling systems! Everyone, join forces to unleash psychic enslavement! Enslave the Wretch God Apostle!”

The immortal-slaying clone had used King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans in an attempt to devour the Wretch God Apostle, but the talismans were already starting to crumble.

Even as they collapsed, the clone opened up a vortex into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, which erupted with power, dragging the Wretch God Apostle’s will inside.

Instantly, Yang Qi’s sea of consciousness was cleared.

In the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, though, rumbling like thunder could be heard as the Wretch God Apostle ripped his way out of the talismans, only to see the boundless godhood stars, which caused a tremor of shock to pass through him.

“What is this place?!”

“Congratulations, and welcome to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart,” the clone said. Behind him were the wills of Yang Qi, the sectlord, and the two peaklords.

Chapter 1001: Subduing the Wretch God Apostle

“Your body is sealed outside, Wretch God Apostle, while your will is trapped in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. There’s no way you can ever escape from this place. What do you think? If you want to avoid being completely wiped out of existence, acknowledge allegiance and become a psychic slave.”

Yang Qi’s will had taken the form of a golden imp, surrounded by the River of Civilization and intense fluctuations of psychic power.

Right now, his psychic scale was at least two, yet he still wasn’t in the Terrifying level. His fleshly body was still too strong, and the constraints on his sea of consciousness meant that he couldn’t actually break through.

With a psychic scale like this, he could easily control the power of twenty-four tribulations without any problems. There was no doubt about it: Yang Qi’s strength was virtually beyond description. And if he could fully subdue the Wretch God Apostle, it would definitely be possible to establish a major force in the immortal worlds. Right now, the universal fortune of the immortal worlds was too intense, so he would need an organization like that to gain full enlightenment of the Great Necropolis.

“Who... who are you? I can’t believe you have so many magical treasures. The Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart? The God Legion Seal? King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans...?” By this point, the Wretch God Apostle knew that it wouldn’t be easy, or even possible, to extract his will from the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

However, he wasn’t ready to just give in. Suddenly, his cold craftiness came into play as he realized that if he could somehow get his body into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart and combine it with his will, he might be able to extract himself from the current dangerous predicament.

“Alright, I’m willing to acknowledge allegiance. Just don’t kill me!”

“I'm the top expert there is in this age,” Yang Qi said, “and that's why I have all of the most powerful items. You’d best not try to pull another fast one on me, not that I trust you in any way. You’re really at a dead end here. Once we unleash our psychic enslavement power, you’ll be crushed and turned into a puppet under my control.”

Suddenly, the sectlord burst out into thunderous laughter. “Well played, Yang Qi. I really underestimated you, boy. As it turns out, you're an extremely important person in the Immortal Dao Age. The holder of the God Legion Seal from the Future Age is Proud Heaven. As for whoever has the seal in the Primeval Age, their identity is a mystery. And everyone assumed that the God Legion Seal just hadn’t appeared in the Immortal Dao Age yet. But as it turns out, you have it. And what's even more fear-inspiring, you have King Immortal-Slayer’s successor on your side. What an incredible combination.”

“The truth is that I'm actually a clone of Yang Qi,” said his clone. “We’ve just split into two separate entities.”

The sectlord and both peaklords gasped from shock.

“And I'm a Fateless One,” Yang Qi continued. “I also have the constitutions of a Fortuned One and an Eternal One. What do you think? I’d say I more than qualify to be the junior sectlord of the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect.”

“Yes, you’re definitely more than qualified.” The sectlord laughed heartily. “Now I really am convinced that you don't work for anyone else. If you agree to be our junior sectlord, it would be a wonderful day for the sect. Once we return, I’ll make the announcement right away. And once you break through to the Terrifying level, you can take over as sectlord and we old fogeys can go into seclusion to work on our cultivation.”

Peaklord Memory laughed and said, “Congratulations, Sectlord. With a new junior sectlord like this, we have days of glory coming.” Peaklord Celestial also expressed similar sentiments.

After joining in their laughter, Yang Qi said, “Our top priority now is to subdue the Wretch God Apostle and force him into servitude. Afterward, I can transmit the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body to him. Given his psychic power, he should be able to cultivate it to the level of fifty tribulations without any problems cropping up. Then, I’ll unleash him on the Executors of the Ancient Road. In the resulting chaos, I’ll raid their treasure storehouse, and bring you along with me if you wish.”

“Excellent plan,” the sectlord said, nodding.

The executors had been filling their treasure storehouse for hundreds of millions of years, to the point where the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect couldn’t compare to them at all. Even a fraction of the treasures therein would help the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect to achieve unheard-of power.

Obviously, clearing out that storehouse would be an incredible windfall. And with the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, it would likely be possible to do it without anyone being the wiser.

All of the experts present were fully convinced that having Yang Qi as their junior sectlord would be a blessing to the sect.

For Yang Qi, it meant the possibility of having his own followers finally emerge from the virtual god world and become disciples in one of the top sects in existence. Then, when it came time, he could definitely conquer the millions upon millions of immortal worlds in existence.

“So you want to make me a psychic slave,” the Wretch God Apostle said, shivering. He was currently an incarnation of will, and looked like a wretch-god of immense power. Unfortunately, compared to the God Legion Seal and the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, he was pitifully weak.

‘I can’t let them do this!’ he thought. Whining and sniveling, he said, “Little Junior Brother, I was wrong. I can repent of my ways. I hereby swear an oath to serve you. Just don’t enslave me! Please!?”

“You think we’ll trust any oath of yours?” the immortal-slaying clone chuckled. “Besides, I’ve attained Terrifying will and am in complete control of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Even if you try to self-detonate, I can force you back into shape. Perhaps if you were a god you could escape from here, but sadly, you’re not....”

“Come, everyone,” Yang Qi said. “Let’s work together. Eternal Heavenly Aria!” He began to sing, blessing his allies and sending halos of damnification to cover the Wretch God Apostle.

“This...” the sectlord murmured, his eyes glittering. Suddenly filled with thoughts of how the Eternal Heavenly Aria would be useful in large-scale battles, he firmly decided that he would support Yang Qi, no matter the cost. Obviously, anyone who tried plotting against him would have to deal with the fact that he could go anywhere with the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. And that wasn’t to mention the countless ways he had to defend himself, or the fact that he was full of craft and cunning.

Yang Qi activated his personal psychic scaling systems and unleashed the psychic enslavement function, backed by the power of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.

“You’re courting death!” the Wretch God Apostle shouted, immediately trying to fight back.

At this point, the immortal-slaying clone activated the real psychic scaling systems, backed by the Engine of the One God and the power of the godhood stars. Now that he was in the Terrifying level, the results were astounding.

And that wasn’t to mention that they had the sectlord and two peaklords to help.

Massive psychic fluctuations rolled toward the will of the Wretch God Apostle, wrapping him up until he was surrounded by something that looked like a crystal ball.

RUMBLE!

The Wretch God Apostle unleashed another attack.

Sadly, it did absolutely no good.

The psychic enslavement abilities were incredibly powerful, and had been designed to work on gods. And considering everything that was powering them now, all the defenses the Wretch God Apostle could throw up were quickly destroyed.

“No! Don't do this to me! Don’t enslave me. I curse you all! I curse you to die horrible deaths! I'm the Wretch God Apostle! I was blessed by the mighty will of the Wretch God himself! I was to reestablish his kingdom of wretched evil and resurrect him! Kingdom of Wretched Evil!” Suddenly, a domain of wretched evil sprang up around him as he tried to protect himself.

“Strike the final blow!” Yang Qi said, and everyone attacked in full force, burning their quintessence-blood and unleashing all the power they could muster.

Slam!

The Wretch God Apostle's will finally collapsed, and his kingdom crumbled. Without hesitation, the clone began the enslavement process.

“Become a believer,” the clone shouted, and psychic fluctuations roared forth, transforming the Wretch God Apostles will, making it loyal and subservient.

A year passed. Two years. Ten years. Twenty years.... A hundred years. That was how long it took before the Wretch God Apostle finally opened his eyes and dropped to his knees. “Oh mighty master, I, Wretch Centipede, hereby kowtow to you. Sir, you are my only master, and I will hereby sacrifice all of my service and loyalty to you.”

Crack. Crunch.

As it turned out, the Wretch God Apostle’s name was actually Wretch Centipede. And the faith he was now providing was so incredible that, if the immortal-slaying clone hadn’t reached the Terrifying level, he might even have been killed by the influx.

Instead, he was growing vastly stronger.

“Very well,” Yang Qi said coldly. “Return the Wretch God Apostle’s will to his body. I’ll improve his cultivation base with the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth and help him push his tribulation energy to the level of fifty tribulations. At that point, we can finally rain chaos onto the Executors of the Ancient Road, then break into their storehouse. You know, there are a lot of other experts in that prison of theirs. If they all revolted at the same time, I wonder what would happen.”

Chapter 1002: The Experts in the Prison

There were many Terrifying experts locked up in Heaven Penitentiary; they were fierce, unreasonable, and even insane, and if there was no doubt that getting them under his control would be very profitable. Furthermore, inciting them to revolt would bring explosive results.

This plan had long since been simmering in the back of his mind, and everyone present was fully on board.

By now, they fully trusted Yang Qi. Besides, he was to be the junior sectlord and would be looking out for the interests of the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect as a whole. The prisoners were all domineering figures from the Ancient Road to the Gods, which meant that if he could force them to submit, one by one, and make them loyal believers, they would become an army that would be his biggest trump card.

“Now that we’ve taken care of the Wretch God Apostle, our biggest task is complete,” the immortal-slaying clone said. Looking at the sectlord and peaklords, he continued, “If you’re interested, you can stay here in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart for a while to work on your cultivation. I’d be happy to provide some tips to help out.” Now that the clone was in the Terrifying level, he was actually far stronger than even the sectlord, and could obviously provide some very helpful cultivation assistance.

Thus, the three of them stayed in the chart to further their cultivation. Time could operate differently in the chart. Ten thousand years inside could be like an hour or two outside, which made the place extremely useful for cultivation purposes.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi returned to the outside, where he put the Wretch God Apostle’s will back into his body. Then he began refining his psychic scaling systems and improving the Civilization Founding Grand Magic that he had gained enlightenment of.

With the Civilization Founding Grand Magic, he would definitely be able to reach the level of fifty tribulations. Unfortunately, the stronger he got in that regard, the more difficult it would be to control his body. Right now, he had the perfect combination of might and agility.

He really needed to get that Mahātmā Jade if he wanted to further his cultivation without worrying about such matters. Right now, he was able to treat the symptoms, but not the root cause.

“Little punk!” the Wretch God Apostle shouted. “You’re plotting against me! I'm gonna kill you!”

Of course, it was an act, as he was now a loyal servant. However, Yang Qi needed to keep up the act in case the junior superintendent was watching.

SPLAT!

A mass of blood erupted from Yang Qi’s mouth. “You want to possess me, Wretch God Apostle?! Well, it’s not going to be that easy. I'm not afraid of you!”

A heated scuffle then broke out.

Meanwhile, in a secret location outside, the junior superintendent and eight other experts were working on their cultivation in a spell formation. The junior superintendent had a magical possession technique at the ready, and as soon as the Wretch God Apostle and Yang Qi wore each other down, he planned to swoop in and use it on Yang Qi.

All of a sudden, Ghost Ace opened his eyes and asked, “Junior Superintendent, what happens if the Wretch God Apostle and Yang Qi actually join forces?”

“You really think those two are going to work together?” the junior superintendent replied with a cold smile. “Don’t you know what kind of person the Wretch God Apostle is? He’s extremely selfish and cares only about power. Furthermore, he’s very distrustful and will take advantage of anyone, as long as he benefits as a result. He would betray his own friends, let alone a juicy prize like the one we've just thrown down to him. How could he possibly pass up the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body? When a man is thirsty enough, he’ll gulp down even poisoned wine.”

“Junior Superintendent, sir!” an executor said from outside. “It’s just as you predicted! The Wretch God Apostle offered to work with Yang Qi, only to use some sort of wretch-god energy art on him at the last minute, to try to possess him. Now the two of them are fighting. At the moment, the Wretch God Apostle has the upper hand, but it doesn't seem like he has what it takes to completely subdue Yang Qi.”

The junior superintendent nodded knowingly. “Things are going exactly as I thought they would. The Wretch God Apostle really is a dog that can't stop himself from eating excrement.”

“You have the foresight of a god, Junior Superintendent!” Ghost Ace said. “However, if the Wretch God Apostle actually manages to defeat Yang Qi, then devours him, his energy arts would reach a terrifying level.”

“Nah,” the junior superintendent said. “Even if he did try to devour Yang Qi, he would definitely experience cultivation deviation. Besides, beating Yang Qi isn't going to be that easy. Is the Three Lives Stone here yet?”

“It’s here, sir. We forged a royal order that got us into the treasure storehouse. Hopefully, you’ll back us up if any trouble results from that.” The executor outside held up a fist-sized stone, irregularly shaped and composed of three different colors. Apparently, that stone could absorb just about anything and convert it into immense power.

“Amazing,” the junior superintendent said, taking the stone. “I won't be able to keep this for long, before I have to return it to the storehouse. But with it, I’ll definitely be able to cultivate the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body. Of course, I have to subdue Yang Qi first. Let him continue fighting with the Wretch God Apostle. Once the two of them weaken each other, I’ll assimilate both of them.”

Laughing heartily, he sent some true energy into the Three Lives Stone.

“Keep watching them, and notify me of any developments. Once I get that technique, I’ll make sure all of you are well-rewarded.”

“Yes sir!”

Meanwhile, none of them had any idea that the “fight” going on between Yang Qi and the Wretch God Apostle was all just an act. In fact, he was actually helping the Wretch God Apostle to cultivate the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body.

At a certain point, when Yang Qi could see that the Wretch God Apostle had entered a state of deep cultivation, he used a powerful illusion technique and slipped into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

The immortal-slaying clone immediately ceased his cultivation and rose to his feet, looking out to see how things were progressing in the prison. The place looked almost like a beehive, with the cells being the countless sections of the hive.

“Look there,” Sectlord Will Manifestation said, pointing at one of the cells. “That's the sectlord of the Magic Saber Sect. Years ago, the sect was destroyed by the executors and he was locked up here.”

The prisoner he indicated looked almost like the embodiment of a saber, and he was chained to the ground in a similar fashion as the Wretch God Apostle. His eyes were fierce and radiated a sensation of the Terrifying level.

“Don’t tell me that he's a friend of yours, Sectlord?” the clone said. “If so, we could rescue him.”

“He’s no friend. In fact, I used to consider him a big enemy. Our two sects had many fights, and he killed a lot of our disciples. But I can’t help but feel bad seeing him like this. As they say, if the rabbit dies, the fox grieves. In any case, definitely don’t free him. Use psychic enslavement to turn him into a servant of the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect instead.”

From his last two statements it was possible to see how ruthless and decisive Sectlord Will Manifestation could be.

Swish!

The moment the words left his mouth, an opening appeared in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, and Yang Qi led him and the two peaklords into the prison. Although the cell was protected by numerous warding spells, Yang Qi’s Life-Death Void-Destruction God-Lightning could easily negate them and make sure that everything looked normal from the outside.

Using the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth and the Unspoiled Body together made it possible to create illusions that could deceive anyone. And the power of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart was something that only gods could possibly detect.

“Who goes there?” The chained Sectlord Magic Saber looked Yang Qi up and down, clearly confused. Then he saw Sectlord Will Manifestation, and his eyes flickered with surprise. He chuckled. “Sectlord Will Manifestation. So, you’ve been captured as well. How very unexpected. The two of us are going to be cellmates, I take it?”

“Like hell we are. Start the psychic enslavement!”

Psychic fluctuations rolled out as Yang Qi walked forward and reached his hand out toward Sectlord Magic Saber’s head.

Instantly realizing that something was off, Sectlord Magic Saber said, “You’re not a prisoner. What are you doing?” He twitched, sending out a blast of saber energy that slammed into Yang Qi’s palm. Shifting tactics, Yang Qi fought back and forth with him for nearly a thousand moves. The saber energy was powerful, and this was Yang Qi’s first time drawing on his newfound abilities. Considering that this was a sectlord from what had once been a very powerful organization, it was a good chance to get some experience.

Plus, he had other powerful experts there to back him up.

Sectlord Magic Saber didn't last for long. The backlash he experienced when trying to attack Yang Qi was strong enough that his meridians were severely damaged. The fight was intense, and Sectlord Magic Saber was soon driven mad with frustration.

In the end, Yang Qi tapped his forehead and sent a psychic pulse into his sea of consciousness.

A moment later, he was sealed and bound.

“How did you people get in here?” he shouted. “Don’t enslave me!”

Chapter 1003: One Psychic Slave After Another

Sectlord Magic Saber had really experienced some incredible bad luck. After being imprisoned, he had worked hard cultivating a special technique in the hopes of using it to escape. But sadly for him, Yang Qi showed up and used the psychic scaling systems to turn him into a servant.

Sectlord Magic Saber was once a very domineering figure. Although he wasn’t quite on the level of the Wretch God Apostle or Sectlord Will Manifestation, he was definitely on par with Peaklords Celestial and Memory, or the old-timers from various superpower sects. But now he was doomed to serve.

Sectlord Magic Saber gradually stopped struggling and went silent, and eventually, his eyes went slack.

“Greetings, Milord!” he said to the immortal-slaying clone. After all, it was the clone who had performed the final act of enslavement, not Yang Qi. That said, there was little difference. Although Yang Qi and his clone were now separate people, they were still connected by blood and always acted in unison.

“Alright!” Sectlord Will Manifestation said. “Now that we have Sectlord Magic Saber in our service, we can move on to the next expert. However, it was quite a drain on our psychic power. First, we need to go back to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart to recuperate.”

“That’s fine,” the clone replied. “Going forward, the process will only go faster and faster. I’ll create a connection to each of the new servants, linking them to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Then, I can draw on their godpower to subdue subsequent victims.”

With that, Yang Qi led the group back into the chart, leaving Sectlord Magic Saber behind to wait for the moment when Yang Qi released everyone, destroyed the prison, and caused a huge scene.

As they rested, the clone continued his work. Waving his hands, he summoned an enormous spell formation that contained two projections, which were none other than the Wretch God Apostle and Sectlord Magic Saber.

The clone waved his finger, and a blackish violet glow rose up from the Wretch God Apostle, while something like a full moon appeared behind Sectlord Magic Saber. The two types of light rose up and began to intertwine, then settled down onto the clone, giving him an added measure of protection equal to one third of the full power of the two experts.

Some time later, the clone activated other formations in the chart, causing a mirror to appear, which revealed another prisoner, this time a rather fat monk.

Peaklord Memory instantly recognized him. “That’s Fiendmonk Phantasea, who wreaked havoc on the Ancient Road to the Gods years ago. He’s the epitome of wretched evil, and specialized in capturing female disciples and draining them of all their power to bolster his own yin and yang. It would be a big injustice to not enslave someone like him.”

Not a single person in this prison was a weakling. All of them had once been domineering people, otherwise the Executors of the Ancient Road wouldn’t have taken an interest in them.

As for weak and unimportant people, they were usually just killed.

“Begin the process!”

WHOOSH!

The clone leaped into action, heading right into the cell and attacking the monk with the two streams of light he had just taken.

RUMBLE!

Before the monk could react, Yang Qi’s hand landed on his back, sending a stream of true energy into him that caused blood to spray out of his mouth.

A moment later, the psychic enslavement was finished and Fiendmonk Phantasea joined the Wretch God Apostle and Sectlord Magic Saber in servitude. Dropping to his knees, he said, “Greetings, Milord.”

This time the process had gone incredibly quickly.

Now, a red buddhist glow appeared behind the immortal-slaying clone as he gained a third of the power of Fiendmonk Phantasea.

WHOOSH!

The clone vanished, then reappeared in yet another cell, this one occupied by a man so burly he almost looked like an ape, and radiated an incredibly mighty and intimidating aura.

“That’s the Ape Hegemon of the Apemen!” Sectlord Will Manifestation said. “He's a very vicious character!”

Despite his warning, the clone didn’t pause for a moment. Before anyone could even take a breath, he was next to the Ape Hegemon, launching a vicious attack.

“What fool is attacking me!?” the Ape Hegemon growled, rising to his feet and causing the chains and fetters to clank loudly. He definitely looked a lot more intimidating than Fiendmonk Phantasea.

However, his intimidating nature did him little good. Three streams of power slammed into him, and he could hardly defend himself. Not even he could stand up to the combined powers of the Wretch God Apostle, Sectlord Magic Saber, and Fiendmonk Phantasea.

“Ape-Devil’s Heaven-Dissolving Fist!” he shouted, going all out. Unfortunately, he didn’t even get halfway through the move before Yang Qi met it with his fist. The Ape Hegemon’s fist energy swept through Yang Qi, yet it actually felt pleasing to him.

Taking advantage of the moment, the clone started the psychic enslavement process, sending a stream of power into the Ape Hegemon’s sea of consciousness. A moment later, the Ape Hegemon was on his knees calling the clone “milord”.

A stream of bright yellow light was added to the halo behind the clone.

In almost no time at all, the clone had the power of the Wretch God Apostle, Sectlord Magic Saber, Fiendmonk Phantasea, and the Ape Hegemon, making him almost completely invincible.

The next goal was to take down the person in the prison whose power index was second only to the Wretch God Apostle. Shockingly, that person wasn’t an ordinary individual, but was actually one of the executors!

He looked insane, with disheveled hair, sitting there with legs spread wide as he muttered to himself. However, as soon as the passageway into his cell opened, he looked up with shining eyes. “The Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart? Interesting. It's hard to believe you can actually pierce through the defenses of the prison to get in here.”

“You have sharp eyes,” the clone replied. “You're an executor, right? What are you doing here?” The clone could sense that this executor had royal blood, which was a rarity. Of course, that would make him an excellent servant.

“I can sense King Immortal-Slayer’s aura on you, young man.” Then he noticed the four-colored halo, and his eyes widened in shock. “You've enslaved the Wretch God Apostle, Sectlord Magic Saber, Fiendmonk Phantasea, and the Ape Hegemon! Oh. So you must be here to do the same to me.”

“Very perceptive. In that case, you must realize that it's useless to fight back. Just accept the enslavement, and you won't feel any pain.”

“Aren’t you worried I might call for help?” the executor said with a smile. “You see, I'm from the royal clan. All I have to do is activate my bloodline ability, and before you could do a thing, the guards outside would be alerted. Then your entire plan would be ruined. Instead, why don’t we make a little deal? You get me out of here, and I’ll keep your secret. There are hundreds of other experts in this prison, you’re not really going to ruin your entire mission just because of me, are you?”

BAM!

Even as the executor chuckled coldly, someone appeared behind him and struck him in the back so quickly he had no chance to react.

Howling with rage, he spun to find Yang Qi behind him, true energy pouring from his fist.

The sneak attack worked!

“You talk a lot of crap,” Yang Qi said as he unleashed his Life-Death Void-Destruction Lightning. “Go ahead and use that bloodline ability. Do it! Come on!”

“You!” the executor growled. Unfortunately, by this point, it was too late, and he was powerless to fight back.

“No! I have royal blood! And I was framed! I'm not supposed to be here. Let me out! You can’t enslave me!”

In the end, his cries weakened, and after a day passed, he was ready to submit.

After it was over, Yang Qi and the immortal-slaying clone were both feeling very tired. Obviously, this executor was almost on the same level as the Wretch God Apostle.

“What’s your name?” Yang Qi asked.

“Milord, your servant is named Yuan Dongqing from the royal clan. I was supposed to become a real prince, but was framed and thrown into prison.”

With that, Yuan Dongqing went on to explain everything about himself.

“Hey, do you know where the treasure storehouse is?” Yang Qi suddenly asked.

Chapter 1004: Treasure Storehouse

Having subjugated a royal executor, the clone found that the glow of the executors was added to his halo, which was platinum in color and imparted a sense of solemnity and incorruptibility.

In terms of strength, it was definitely on the same level as the light from the Wretch God Apostle.

Of course, the Wretch God Apostle was currently cultivating the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body, and getting stronger and stronger as a result. By the time he reached the level of fifty tribulations, he would definitely surpass Yuan Dongqing.

“Of course, sir,” Yuan Dongqing said, kowtowing the entire time. “Your humble servant knows exactly where the treasure storehouse is. However, it’s always kept under guard. They even have a huge network of complicated spell formations set up to guard it, so you have to be very careful. That said, Milord, let me provide you with the exact location and layout.”

With that, he summoned the projection of a map, which showed the layout of the entire palace and its beautiful surroundings. It was nestled in a host of immortal worlds, arranged in a complicated spell formation that was kept under strict watch by countless guards.

Yang Qi looked at it carefully and committed everything to memory. He was actually quite surprised at how organized and well-guarded the executors’ headquarters was. In fact, it seemed like it wouldn’t be very easy to sneak inside. They just paid too close attention to everything. His only shot would be to cause so much chaos that everyone was completely distracted.

“Also, Milord,” Yuan Dongqing said, “there’s a portal in the very depths of the storehouse, which has long since been impossible to open. It’s called the Gate to the Gods. It used to be located at the very end of the Ancient Road to the Gods and was the entrance to the god world. After the Great Necropolis came, the executors took the portal into the Great Necropolis and have been keeping guard over it ever since.

“Oh? The Gate to the Gods?” After some thought, Yang Qi couldn’t shake the feeling that it was all very strange. “Does that mean there’s nothing guarding the end of the Ancient Road to the Gods? In other words, if you can get onto the road, nothing will stop you from entering the god world?”

“There are still some people on the Ancient Road to the Gods who haven't come into the Great Necropolis,” Yuan Dongqing replied. “And when the Great Necropolis came crashing through the Gate to the Gods, there were a few old-timers who went right into the god world. That said, there’s no way they’re still alive; the god world is in tumult right now. Besides, we Executors of the Ancient Road left some of our powerful experts back on the road to stand guard. They won’t let anyone just barge into the god world. After all, our task is to keep order on the road and prevent any fiend-devils from entering the god world.

“Milord, the Ancient Road to the Gods is blocked by the Great Necropolis now. Without moving it, or finding a way out of it, it’s impossible to walk that road now. Sir, if you want to get to the road, it's going to be very difficult. On the upside, the immortal dao civilization is experiencing tremendous changes. Thanks to the immortal worlds, godhood, and other items from the god world that have been ejected, it's much easier to practice cultivation. Perhaps the best thing would be to start stockpiling power and making preparations to enter the god world.”

“I see. Alright, you wait here. I'm going to subjugate some more prisoners. Once I have enough, I’ll make my move. The executors have dominated the Ancient Road to the Gods for so long, they’ll definitely never see this coming. They’re really going to suffer.”

“Milord, you absolutely, positively must not incite a rebellion. You have no idea what the headquarters is capable of. I suggest you simply sneak away. The emperor is very nearly awake, and you won’t stand a chance against him if he makes a move. He’s virtually a god! You’d be killed in one move!”

“Hmm?” Upon hearing that, Yang Qi suddenly frowned. Yuan Dongqing was a completely loyal servant, so there was no way he was trying to fool him. If this emperor he mentioned was that strong, then he definitely needed to be on guard and not do anything rash.

“In that case, we should make sure to keep a low profile,” Sectlord Will Manifestation said, a very serious look on his face. “The emperor is a heaven-shaking, earth-shattering entity. However, he spends most of his time dormant. If he awakens, you definitely have to plan things out very well.”

Yang Qi nodded. “I see. Very well, let’s continue subjugating all the experts in the prison.”

“Heaven Penitentiary has several hundred Terrifying experts,” the clone said, “but I can see now that I'm not going to be able to subjugate them all. I wouldn't be able to withstand that much faith. It would kill me. I'd say my limit is going to be a dozen or so, after which the sectlord and peaklords will have to take some of them.”

“Agreed,” the sectlord said. “Given my psyche and will, I can probably command five. More than that, and the faith and karma would be too much for me to handle.”

“My limit is going to be three,” Peaklord Memory said, and Peaklord Celestial echoed similar sentiments.

“I'm not inclined to take any,” Yang Qi said. “That responsibility would make it hard to achieve any more cultivation base progress. It’s already difficult enough as it is to deal with the combination of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth and the Unspoiled Body, plus the task of dealing with tribulation energy. I really need that Mahātmā Jade to get me past this bottleneck. Even just one piece of the whole would help.”

“You could always just get rid of the technique,” the clone said, frowning. “I’ve always gotten the sense that it's too heaven-defying, and too dangerous. Besides, even the devil that created it never cultivated it to completion.”

“I haven’t reached that point yet,” Yang Qi said. “It’s going to be a big challenge, but it’ll be worth it if I succeed. I need to free myself from the shackles of the God Legion Seal. It seems to me that is the only way to deal with whatever future tribulations will be coming my way.”

“No one has ever simultaneously cultivated those two techniques,” the sectlord said. “If you succeed, you’ll be the first. You have the God Legion Seal, the sheepskin scroll, King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions, and the Cruiser of Civilization. And once we return to the sect, I’ll make you the junior sectlord. Then you can clean house in the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect and get rid of the bad seeds. Let’s see who will dare to defy you then.”

“That sounds good,” Yang Qi replied. “The Will Manifestation Heaven Sect is a superpower sect, but I’m going to make it even stronger. For now, let’s just focus on subjugating as many experts as we can. Let's identify the strongest ones and ignore the weaker ones.”

Subjugating an expert the way they were doing would involve accepting their karma, and that would be a huge load. Obviously, there had to be some downside to acquiring servants that way, otherwise it would be too easy to be literally invincible.

With that, the group continued prowling through the prison, pouncing on the strongest experts and enslaving them. Considering how much power they had built up so far, nobody could possibly stand in their way.

Within two hours, the clone picked up the maximum number of servants. The sectlord got his five, and the two peaklords each got three. All of them now had halos of blessing floating behind their heads, and a host of puppets to command.

Laughing heartily in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, Sectlord Will Manifestation said, “Who would ever have guessed that our sect would become so strong. The Immortal House of Supreme Preeminence, the Martial Tyrant Cadre, the Green Emperor Myriad Aeons Sect, the Midfield Atheneum... we’re going to crush them all. At the next gathering of the superpower sects, we’ll cause quite a stir.”

With that, they remained in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart for a time, consolidating their power and pushing their energy arts as high as possible.

As for Yang Qi, he returned to the Wretch God Apostle’s cell and worked on his own cultivation. While Yang Qi passed energy arts to the Wretch God Apostle, he received some in return. However, none were arts that he felt like developing, although he was able to learn quite a bit from them.

His True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body was at the level of twenty-four tribulations, which was enough for now. Thanks to the imperial-heaven pre-beginning systems in his heart, and the Civilization Founding Grand Magic, he was really making progress in completing his own version of the psychic scaling systems.

RUMBLE!

Eventually, the Wretch God Apostle reached the level of fifty tribulations.

At that point, his body was vastly stronger than before, and he could use Wretch God Ultimate's Obsidian Flame to create exquisite and deadly versions of his Wretch Spirit Needle.

Slowly but surely, he was becoming Yang Qi’s superpowered thug.

Chapter 1005: Super-Powered Thug

The Wretch God Apostle had once been a superpowered individual. But after cultivating the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body, even only to the level of fifty tribulations, he had achieved progress that was in no way minor.

That said, even having roughly double the tribulations, the Wretch God Apostle was only about on the same level as Yang Qi. Although that might seem strange, to Yang Qi, the reason why was obvious. The combination of the technique with his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth led to godpower the likes of which surpassed what ordinary cultivators could achieve.

In fact, not even the creators of those two techniques could have imagined what would happen if they were cultivated together.

Yang Qi was truly treading a path that was completely unique unto himself.

The Wretch God Apostle exhaled, and a stream of fire appeared, wrapping around his body in a complex pattern before turning into a host of thread-like streams that entered his pores.

After the process was complete, black fur slowly grew out to cover his body, each strand of which was made of Wretch God Ultimate's Obsidian Flame.

Wretch God Ultimate's Obsidian Flame was so incredibly powerful that it could burn almost anything in existence into nothing, and anyone who worked with it had to be very careful.

But here it had turned into soft, glossy fur. What kind of level would someone have to reach to cause the flame to do that?

Not even Yang Qi knew the answer to that question.

But he did know that it was a representation of incredible power, and that once it was unleashed, most enemies would find it impossible to evade. With a full set of fur formed of Wretch God Ultimate's Obsidian Flame, the Wretch God Apostle had even stronger defenses than before. And the slightest effort on his part could cause the fur to be used in devastating attacks.

In fact, even a single strand could whip out and strangle an opponent to death.

Yang Qi looked him up and down, and knew that if he had to fight him he would probably lose.

RIP!

The Wretch God Apostle suddenly struck Yang Qi with a palm, sending him flying backward. Glaring, he said, “So, you were using some kind of treasure to try to beat me. Sadly for you, I absorbed a lot of your power, and now my energy arts have advanced. Now I know how to vanquish your True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body. And nobody will possibly jump in to save you!”

Yang Qi forced himself to cough up a mouthful of blood. Then he snorted coldly and said, “You’re a lot weaker than before, Wretch God Apostle! My technique definitely damaged your sea of consciousness, so although you seem strong on the outside, you're actually weak. Come on, let’s join forces and break out of here! Quit trying to devour me!”

They were putting on quite the act.

“Hmph! I have an even more amazing technique I can use. I'm going to restore my energy, and then you’re dead!”

Pop. Pop. Pop!

Even as the two of them put on their show, eight figures suddenly popped into being in the cell. Of course, it was the junior superintendent. Under the impression that the Wretch God Apostle and Yang Qi were both seriously injured, he smiled and said, “So, the two of you are fighting to the death right here in the prison?”

“What are you doing here, Junior Superintendent?” Yang Qi said, a look of shock on his face.

“Oh, nothing. Obviously, the Wretch God Apostle has defeated your energy arts. It seems my scheme is going just as I’d planned. What do you say? Not so arrogant now, are we? That said, I’m impressed that you managed to play the Wretch God Apostle. It seems you benefited from him as well. Don’t worry, I'm going to completely and utterly assimilate you.”

With that, he walked forward and grabbed Yang Qi as if to take him away.

“The rest of you, help out! Now's the time to act, when he's weak. And assimilate the Wretch God Apostle, too. Summon the formations and seal them both!”

“Yes sir!”

Everyone sprang into action, and god items and formations popped into being, surrounding the Wretch God Apostle. At the same time, the chains binding him began glowing with a bright light as the warding spells built into the prison cell were activated.

However, that was when the Wretch God Apostle suddenly threw his head back, laughed maniacally, and shouted, “Fooled ya!”

Bam. Bang. Boom!

The chains all exploded.

In the blink of an eye, the fur of Wretch God Ultimate's Obsidian Flame began glowing with dazzling light, then stabbed into the seven executors. Ghost Ace and his compatriots were all powerful experts, and although couldn’t possibly compare to the Wretch God Apostle, they should have been able to last in a fight for at least a few days. But right now, it didn't matter what defensive magical treasures or empyrean energies they threw up, nothing worked.

Even back when Wretch God Ultimate's Obsidian Flame had been in the form of a black dragon, it had been unstoppable, much less now when it was like a dazzling needle.

Flip. Flop.

The seven powerful executors were instantly slammed to the ground, their energy fading away as all of them were seriously injured. In fact, they were already bereft of their nascent divinities and seas of consciousness. Their wills were fading and their essences were being sucked into King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans.

Moments later, they were dead.

“What...?!” the junior superintendent blurted in shock and fear. In the initial moment, he wondered if he was dreaming, but he recovered quickly. “Not good!”

Keeping his grip on Yang Qi, he turned to flee. Unfortunately for him, the Wretch God Apostle’s hand snaked out and latched onto him. “Unbeknownst to you, I already absorbed all his techniques and energy! And I've already started cultivating the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body!”

The Wretch God Apostle poured energy into the junior superintendent, instantly killing him. Then he quickly searched him and excitedly said, “Milord, he has the Three Lives Stone!”

“Really? Let me see! With this, my fleshly body will be much less difficult to work with!”

He sent the stone into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, along with the corpses of the eight executors.

“Let’s go!” The Wretch God Apostle waved his hand and vanished, along with the more than twenty recently-created puppets in the prison.

Just like that, the junior superintendent was killed and the Wretch God Apostle escaped.

Later, when the other Executors of the Ancient Road realized what had occurred, they would assign all the blame to the Wretch God Apostle and wouldn't even think to check on the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect.

After they were back in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, and everything was confirmed to have been a success, Yang Qi laughed heartily. “Now I don’t have to worry about anything, and can focus on turning the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect into the strongest organization possible. Although, I’d hate to leave that treasure storehouse full. Clone, can you check to see if that Gate to the Gods actually works? If it does... then maybe I should risk going through it.”

“Of course.”

The clone activated some formations in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, and they were connected to the location they had learned of thanks to Yuan Dongqing within moments.

The executors’ headquarters was huge, but at the same time, almost seemed to be in an embryonic stage, and was constantly moving and growing. Yang Qi had no interest in exploring it, but thankfully the clone could easily use the Godly Positioning System to lock down onto the specific location of the storehouse. Inside, there really was an enormous gate, seemingly carved from stone and covered with the markings of age. A faint mist surrounded it, and upon looking inside the portal, it seemed to stretch on forever and ever.

On the steps leading up to the gate sat several old men, whose hair and beards were so long and full that they almost looked like blankets covering their body. The entire group sat with their eyes closed, making it seem like they had passed away in meditation.

Obviously, they were the old-timers that had been tasked with guarding the treasures there.

All of a sudden, a few of the old-timers opened their eyes and looked around, as if they could sense that they were being watched.

“Hmm?” The clone quickly deactivated the spell formation. “They’re no slouches. It doesn’t seem like we’ll be able to get into that storehouse for now. Those guards are extremely formidable experts. I'd say it’s highly likely they’re all in the mid Terrifying level.

“The mid stage?” the sectlord said, visibly surprised. “People like that can survive in the god world. Reaching a will convergence of that level is very difficult. They must have psychic scales of a hundred or more!”

“I'm certain of it,” the clone said. “We can’t break in there for now, that much is obvious. However, if I can push my psychic scale past a hundred, we might stand a chance of sneaking in with the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. For now, the best thing would be to return to the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect.”

“What do we do with the junior superintendent’s corpse?” the sectlord asked. “The executors will eventually realize he’s missing, and if they find out we’re responsible for killing him, it could provoke a major catastrophe. Furthermore, word of Yang Qi’s escape could also cause problems.”

“Don’t worry,” the clone replied. “Word never really spread that the junior superintendent took Yang Qi. Only those seven experts were in the know, and now they're all dead. And we can have the Wretch God Apostle shift blame to some other powerful organization. For example, the Doom Sect. Also, remember that Yang Qi is going to be the junior sectlord, so there’s no way he’ll let down the sect.”

“Right. In fact, I need to make the arrangements for the banquet to announce his appointment....”

Chapter 1006: Junior Sectlord

A thousand years passed within the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, during which time Yang Qi honed his energy arts to an incredible level. He didn’t focus on his cultivation base, but rather his psyche. Eventually, it was at the perfect level, yet he still wasn’t ready to become a Grand Emperor. Earlier, he had considered doing so as a way to deal with the Wretch God Apostle. But after the way things had turned out, he decided to wait, and use the tribulation that would result at a critical moment.

For now, he was certain that even if he ascended the final stairs and became a Grand Emperor, he still wouldn’t be able to break through to the Terrifying level. There was only one way he would succeed at that: by getting the Mahātmā Jade.

Although a thousand years had passed inside the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, only a few days went by in the outside world. After Yang Qi and his companions were all finished with their sessions of cultivation, they finally returned to the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect.

Ding. Dong. Ding. Dong.

As soon as they arrived, bells tolled, calling the chief elders to assemble. The scale of the meeting was much bigger than anything from before, as many entities who were normally in seclusion all arrived.

And that was because something very important was going to happen.

Of course, many people were wondering why exactly the sectlord was calling a meeting like this. However, the most important bells were being sounded, making it clear that everyone had to attend. Even Peaklords Grand Might, Spiritwall, and Nāropa, who had all been told they were confined to their various mountain peaks, were instructed to attend.

As everyone gathered, they saw the sectlord sitting there, and instantly realized that something seemed different about him, as though he had made a breakthrough of some sort.

“Congratulations, Sectlord!” one of the chief elders said. “You finally succeeded in cultivating the ultimate defensive art of our sect, the Will-Manifestation Nine-Cauldrons Alchemy-Dao Grand Energy! You’ve reached the seventh division of that art, haven’t you?”

“That’s right. My recent days of contemplation have allowed me to reach the seventh division. In the days to come, I’ll eventually reach the eighth and ninth division, and begin to walk the path of the gods.”

“Congratulations, Sectlord,” the peaklords all said, rising to their feet in respect.

As Yang Qi had long since come to realize, the sectlord cultivated a technique in which he formed cauldron furnaces within him. In fact, they were very much like his own Heaven and Earth Furnace, the only difference being that, instead of there being only one, there would ultimately be nine. Reaching the level of nine would lead to incredible power and would allow him to concoct a Will Manifestation Golden Pill, which was something very similar to true godhood.

“Everyone, please, be seated,” the sectlord said. “I called this meeting today to announce something very important. The position of junior sectlord has long since been empty in our sect. Although many elite young ones have risen up, and many of them have struggled to win the title, none have been worthy. But today, that problem ends.”

Almost immediately, discussions were breaking out because of his words.

The position of junior sectlord was extremely important, and could be likened to that of a crown prince in the mortal world. Except the junior sectlord was vastly more powerful. The Will Manifestation Heaven Sect was home to countless nations with huge populations, and the junior sectlord would essentially have power over all of them.

“Sir, who exactly have you picked to be the junior sectlord?” one of the chief elders said. “This seems to be something of a hasty decision. Shouldn't we at least have a martial arts competition among the young ones to determine who’s the strongest among them?”

“I’ve already made the decision,” the sectlord said, “and you’ll accept him wholeheartedly. There’s no need for any competition. Yang Qi, please, step forward!”

Yang Qi walked out from behind the sectlord, pulsing with energy.

“Him? Yang Qi? Wasn’t he taken captive? Don’t tell me he escaped from the Executors of the Ancient Road! Or did you rescue him, Sectlord?”

“So, he’s back....”

“Incredible. I can’t believe he actually escaped alive from the Executors of the Ancient Road.”

“His energy arts are so profound that even their junior superintendent lost to him....”

“Well, he’s strong enough to be the junior sectlord. Except....”

There was no doubt that Yang Qi’s return was causing widespread shock.

One of the chief elders, who normally spent his time in seclusion, shook his head and said, “Sectlord, we don’t know much about where this kid is from. I heard about how he defeated that junior superintendent, but how do you know his escape from the Executors of the Ancient Road isn't a part of some larger plot? Remember, the executors had Chief Elder Coolwind as a spy. Although you uncovered the truth and purged the sect, what if you’re mistaken in this decision? It could really lead to a huge disaster.”

Peaklord Grand Might looked around and saw that many of the chief elders seemed to be nodding in agreement. Raising his voice, he said, “That’s right, Sectlord. I know you don’t want to hear it, but I have something that needs to be said.”

After all, Yang Qi had been missing for a year. For him to suddenly show up right now was somewhat suspicious.

“Oh?” the sectlord replied amiably. “What exactly do you have to say?”

“That this kid is definitely working for the Executors of the Ancient Road! He’s just trying to undermine our power!” Giving a meaningful look to the other two peaklords he knew were on his side, he said, “He definitely has some ulterior motives for wanting to be the junior sectlord. Villainous motives! I suggest he be arrested! Crush him, interrogate him about his background, then execute him!”

Peaklord Grand Might had hated Yang Qi for a long time, and obviously wasn't willing to let go of the grudge.

The other two peaklords also rose to their feet with vicious smiles.

“I agree! He absolutely, positively cannot be allowed to be the junior sectlord!”

“I also agree! We can’t allow this brat to run free. He must be arrested and interrogated to reveal the truth. Peaklords, we are in a moment where life and death are on the line, and there’s no way we can allow a shifty character of unknown origin to steal the title of junior sectlord. That position is a fundamentally important part of our sect that cannot be held by the wrong person.”

The other peaklords shifted restlessly.

“So there are people who object to me being the junior sectlord?” Yang Qi said in a voice that was very casual, yet somehow seemed anything but casual. “In that case, I suppose I can only—”

“You can only die, you dirty little swine!” Peaklord Spiritwall shouted. “Get on your knees right now.”

“What I was going to say was that I can only crush my opposition with no mercy!” Yang Qi said, his eyes flashing. “Anyone who stands against me will die!”

RUMBLE!

Yang Qi suddenly vanished, then reappeared right in front of Peaklord Spiritwall, his fist shooting toward him with deadly force!

“How dare you attack me, swine!” Peaklord Spiritwall wasn’t the kind of person who could easily be trifled with, and had been on guard the entire time. Now that he saw Yang Qi making a move, he thrust his hand out, and his five fingers almost looked like mountains. “Spiritwall Mountain-Shifting Grand Magic!”

Vital energy erupted in the shape of a mountain, then descended in crushing fashion toward Yang Qi.

However, Yang Qi simply punched his way through it, then crushed Peaklord Spiritwall’s defensive empyrean energy and landed a blow onto his abdomen.

SPLAT!

Peaklord Spiritwall didn’t even have a chance to scream. A massive conglomeration of blood erupted from his mouth and his face turned as gray as death as he was flung backward through the air. Nearly unconscious, he slammed into the ground in the middle of the square in the shape of the character 大, unable to even crawl to his feet.

Having used only one move to defeat Peaklord Spiritwall, Yang Qi moved with an enigmatic quickness as he went on to deal with Peaklords Grand Might and Nāropa. In the blink of an eye, a massive palm energy locked on to them, and looks of alarm appeared on their faces as they tried to defend themselves.

Unfortunately for them, Yang Qi was simply too fierce, and his moves were impossible to defend against. In the time it takes a spark to fly off of a piece of flint, their true energy was destroyed and they were struck, ripping their tendons to shreds and causing blood to spray from their mouths.

Two more peaklords were tossed in a heap in the middle of the square. It happened with such unimaginable speed that no one had a chance to even react. Three peaklords were defeated in vicious fashion, then tossed into a pile with injuries so bad they were left gasping for breath.

“How dare you commit such a violent crime, you evil creature!”

Several chief elders quickly joined forces to unleash a combined fiery palm strike in retaliation.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi burst into motion, launching a fist strike so powerful that its mere passage through the air caused the entire area to lurch so violently that many people lost their footing.

The fist slammed into the flame and sent it back toward its source. The chief elders were sent staggering backward, looks of shock on their face. How could they ever have guessed that Yang Qi would be this strong? At a minimum, he was obviously thousands of times stronger than when he had fought the junior superintendent.

Even more shocking, he still wasn’t even in the Terrifying level! It was completely heaven-defying for someone in the Destabilizing level to push their cultivation to such heights.

“Surround him! The brat has gone mad!” Some of the chief elders were still planning to press the attack on Yang Qi.

However, that was when the sectlord said, “Stay your hand!”

Looking at Yang Qi, he said, “You’re being a bit too merciless. Those peaklords aren’t spies, after all. They’re just narrow-minded and petty, nothing more.”

“Narrow-minded and petty people inevitably cause big disasters,” Yang Qi said. “Besides, I wasn’t trying to kill them, just teach them a lesson. As long as they agree to accept me wholeheartedly, I can heal them. You’re well aware of what I can do, Sectlord.”

“That’s right,” Peaklord Celestial said, stepping forward and clasping Yang Qi’s shoulder. “Stay your hands, Chief Elders. Yang Qi has performed amazing services for our sect. In fact, the reason the sectlord reached the seventh division is all because of him. Furthermore, he helped Peaklord Memory and myself to advance our energy arts. As you all know, one of the reasons our Will Manifestation Heaven Sect had grown so powerful is because of the psychic scaling systems. But Yang Qi has the Engine of the One God! With enough power to fuel it, we’ll experience even more explosive growth than before!”

“What? The Engine of the One God? The driving force behind the Cruiser of Civilization?” The shocked eyes of everyone present shifted to Yang Qi.

Chapter 1007: Paying Respects

“He has the Engine of the One God? No wonder Peaklords Celestial and Memory seem so much stronger. And that must be how the sectlord reached the level of seven cauldrons, too. In the seventh division, he can absorb thousands of types of vital energy. In fact, he should be able to absorb the true energy of enemies to reach higher levels of power in a fight.”

“People say that our psychic scaling systems are only one part of the ancient Cruiser of Civilization, and that to unlock its true power, you have to use the Engine of the One God. That’s how you can use that secret magic of the psyche, the Civilization Founding Grand Magic. Once you start cultivating that, your psychic power will advance by leaps and bounds. No wonder the sectlord and two peaklords seem to have psychic power that’s so off the charts.”

“If we have the Engine of the One God, doesn’t that mean we’re invincible?”

“Exactly. This is really going to improve our Will Manifestation Heaven Sect.”

“But once word spreads, won’t we become a big target?”

“Who would leak the news? Someone feeling suicidal?”

“The fact that the sectlord is backing this Yang Qi indicates two things. One, Yang Qi has reached incredible heights of cultivation. Two, he helped the sectlord a lot. And if the sectlord approves of him, I don't see what the problem is with him being our junior sectlord.”

“That's right. His cultivation base is obviously incredible. With hardly any effort at all, he beat three peaklords nearly into unconsciousness.”

One stone creates a thousand ripples. All it took was one word from Peaklord Celestial, and everyone realized what was going on. Furthermore, his energy fluctuations made it more than evident that he had reached a very profound level of cultivation.

All of a sudden, the chief elders fell silent.

As for the chief elders who had just joined forces to attack, they already realized that Yang Qi’s level of strength surpassed ordinary Terrifying experts. And his fleshly body was so strong and tough that there was no way they could kill him. If their true energy was the equivalent of streams of water, his was an ocean. And how could streams do anything to an ocean?

The backlash they had sustained from attacking Yang Qi felt like the destruction of the universe itself.

He had obviously reached a completely unimaginable level.

“As many of you already know,” the sectlord said, “Yang Qi’s brother is the successor of King Immortal-Slayer and has the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. We live in chaotic times, and although our Will Manifestation Heaven Sect is strong, it could be wiped out in the blink of an eye if the right opponent came along. But with the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, not even the Executors of the Ancient Road can truly threaten us. We could easily escape into the chart if necessary. Other than gods, no one can truly cause problems for us now.”

Many of the chief elders were already nodding in agreement.

“What’s more, I've already made the decision,” the sectlord continued. “Yang Qi is to be the junior sectlord. So now, the lot of you will all pay your respects. Once Yang Qi reaches the Terrifying level, I’ll retire and go into seclusion to focus on my cultivation, and he’ll succeed me as the sectlord. You all just witnessed how strong he is, so if anyone has an objection to the arrangement, feel free to step forward and settle it by fighting him.”

Everyone could tell that the sectlord had made up his mind, and any disagreement would be pointless. And the fact that Yang Qi had so handily defeated three peaklords made it clear that no one present was a match for him.

Even the strongest old-timers present realized that he was unimaginably strong.

However, after a long moment, one of the old-timers stepped forward, a man whose entire person was the color of jade. “Sectlord Will Manifestation, I would like to try out his fist technique. If he can stand up to my energy arts, then I will support his claim to be junior sectlord.”

Frowning, the sectlord said, “Elder Brother Jade, don’t tell me you’re planning to use your Thirty-Six Jade-Tower Golden-Bell Subjugations?”

“That's exactly right, Junior Brother Sectlord. After years of cultivating in seclusion, I've succeeded in mastering the technique, and am very curious to see how he will stand up to it. If he can handle it, I won’t have a thing to say in opposition.”

“There’s no need to waste words,” Yang Qi said. “I’m happy to accept your challenge. However, please don’t blame me if you end up getting hurt.”

“You think you're going to hurt me?” Elder Brother Jade said with an odd smile. “Quite the boaster, aren’t we, boy? Fine. Brace yourself.”

RUMBLE!

Elder Brother Jade made his move, and in the blink of an eye, an enormous jade axe appeared overhead, which slashed down toward Yang Qi with such might and speed that there was no way he could dodge it.

“First move. Crush Jade!”

Face completely calm, Elder Brother Jade then unleashed another palm strike with infinite variations. Shockingly, he was releasing an attack at Yang Qi’s back!

Yang Qi didn’t even look at either attack. He simply met each incoming attack with a palm strike of his own.

Crack! Snap! The two attacks were completely shattered.

“Hmph!” Elder Brother Jade wasn’t ready to give up yet, and continued unleashing a host of attacks, striking with lightning speed and sending golden-jade energy out to fill the area.

Wham. Bam. Smack. Pop.

Thirty-six banging sounds rang out as he attacked numerous acupoints on Yang Qi’s body.

Afterward, Elder Brother Jade’s momentum seemed to be waning, whereupon Yang Qi looked over and said, “Finished yet, old man? If so, then it's my turn.”

“What?!” Elder Brother Jade blurted. He had distinctly sensed the power of his thirty-six attacks pouring into Yang Qi, which should have severely injured him. But in the end, he didn’t seem hurt at all.

RUMBLE!

Before Elder Brother Jade could decide what to do next, Yang Qi lunged forward like a godling attacking from within primal-chaos. His fist rocketed forth, carrying with it an energy field that instantly enveloped Elder Brother Jade. In fact, from Elder Brother Jade’s perspective, everything in existence faded away, leaving him staring at nothing but the enormous fist.

“Sever Gold!” Smiling viciously, Elder Brother Jade chopped out both of his hands toward Yang Qi’s arms, clearly intending to sever them.

Yang Qi’s arms trembled, and then...

Crack!

Elder Brother Jade's arms snapped and he was thrown backward. Meanwhile, Yang Qi pressed the attack, unleashing a torrent of fist strikes.

“First fist. Crush Jade! Second fist. Sever Gold! Third fist. Split Rock! Fourth fist. Shatter Soil!

You used your Thirty-Six Jade-Tower Golden-Bell Subjugations on me, so I’m going to use the same thirty-six moves on you. That’s only fair, right?”

“ARGGGHHHH!”

Elder Brother Jade was sent flying through the air like a kite with its string cut. Every fist strike caused blood to spray out of his mouth, and the agony he was experiencing was obvious to everyone.

All onlookers were struck with dread by Yang Qi’s viciousness.

RIP!

Eventually, Yang Qi reached the last move, which was Melt Ice. With that move, he slammed Elder Brother Jade onto the pile of three peaklords, then dropped onto him, planting his foot on his chest. “You might be the Elder Brother of the sectlord, but why exactly were you trying to kill me just now?”

“If you’re going to kill me, just kill me,” Elder Brother Jade growled. “There’s no need to jabber.”

“Enough, Yang Qi,” the sectlord said. “Elder Brother Jade used to be very close with Peaklord Grand Might, so it’s only to be expected that he would want to kill you. Since you defeated him, it’s obvious that no one can stand up to you. The position of junior sectlord belongs to you, and now you need to treat your defeated foes.”

“But will they accept me?” Yang Qi said. “If they voice their support for me as junior sectlord, I’ll heal them. But if they refuse... well, what do you say, Sectlord. What should I do then?”

“I appointed you as junior sectlord, so anyone who refuses to accept you will be defying my authority. In that case, they’ll be expelled from the sect.” Although the sectlord spoke casually, his tone of voice was harsh and even severe.

Looking over in surprise, Elder Brother Jade said, “Junior Brother Sectlord, you—”

“Elder Brother Jade,” the sectlord interrupted, sounding even harsher than before, “I suggest you not obstinately persist in going about things the wrong way. With Junior Sectlord Yang Qi on our side, good times are in store for the sect. Don’t tell me you really want to make yourself a criminal and an enemy of the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect?”

At that point, Elder Brother Jade looked down in resignation and said, “Fine. I accept you, Junior Sectlord.”

“Excellent!” Yang Qi said. With that, he sent numerous streams of life force energy into Elder Brother Jade, who subsequently leaped to his feet, looking just as energetic as before.

“What?!” Numerous onlookers uttered exclamations of shock at how Yang Qi could restore Elder Brother Jade to his peak level with such casual ease.

The injuries he had sustained were not the kind that should have been so easy to negate.

“Congratulations, Junior Sectlord,” the sectlord said. “You obviously gained further enlightenment of the genetic systems of the Cruiser of Civilization. Assuming you made similar progress with the vivicreation systems and power assessment systems, your energy arts should be even more unmatchable than before.”

At this point, everyone realized that Yang Qi actually had multiple fragments of the Cruiser of Civilization. And it was now even more obvious why the sectlord was convinced Yang Qi would bring new glory to the sect.

“I’d prefer not to heal these three peaklords for now,” Yang Qi said. “I’d rather lock them up until they’re truly repentant. Then I’ll heal them. Do you have any objections, Sectlord?”

“That’s fine. Men, take away Peaklords Grand Might, Spiritwall, and Nāropa. Lock them up. And go arrest their sons, too. We want to make sure they’re truly repentant!”

“Yes sir!”

Streams of light shot forward and dragged the three peaklords away. It was now abundantly clear to everyone present that the face of heaven and earth were changing.

Sitting back down in his throne, the sectlord said, “And now, everyone, hurry up and pay respects to the junior sectlord. He now acts on my full authority. Of course, Yang Qi, I hope that you continue to act with caution and do everything in your power to advance the interests of the sect.”

Chapter 1008: Destroying Joyflower Palace (1)

No objections were voiced.

Yang Qi had clearly proved himself. He wasn’t even in the Terrifying level, but had easily vanquished a host of Terrifying chief elders. Then he had vanquished old-timers who had reached the Terrifying level without the psychic scaling systems. It left everyone wondering exactly how marvelous his cultivation base was in the end.

And intentionally or otherwise, the sectlord had just revealed that Yang Qi had even more secrets, which only further strengthened his case for protecting him.

The peaklords all stepped forward to pay respects, even Peaklords Celestial and Memory. They all uttered the same formal words. “My respects, Junior Sectlord....”

As respects were given, Yang Qi felt his own flow of destiny shifting and growing stronger. His Wheel of Fate grew larger and more prominent, casting light upon all creation.

Yang Qi had cultivated many devil arts, but with this flow of destiny, any side-effects that came along with them were crushed. The energy of the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect vastly surpassed anything from the Dao Defense League; obviously, the people from the Ancient Road to the Gods were beyond the compare of ordinary mortals.

“Excellent. Wonderful. I’ll definitely ensure that the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect earns more glory with each day that passes.” Yang Qi had established himself as a powerful person in the sect, and no one would dare to oppose him. Soon, he would arrange for his people from the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart to come to the sect for training, and to earn experience in battles in the Great Necropolis. Life in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart was too peaceful; to develop truly powerful experts, real combat experience was vital. Those who failed to live up to the standards would die.

Losing the weaker ones was a loss that Yang Qi could accept.

“Now that this matter has been settled,” the sectlord said, “we need to announce it publicly. The superpower sects from the Ancient Road to the Gods are scheduled to meet to talk about resisting Executors of the Ancient Road, anyway, so send out announcement cards to that effect. For now, the junior sectlord will make all the arrangements for the sect, and assign relevant tasks to qualified individuals. Our focus will be to strengthen the sect, impart boundless energy arts, and identify the top talented people in the sect.”

“We’ll follow the instructions of the junior sectlord!” everyone replied in unison.

Yang Qi nodded.

He had just spent a thousand years in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart working on his cultivation, seeking enlightenment of the Cruiser of Civilization, and learning the Civilization Founding Grand Magic from the psychic scaling systems. He had also picked up something called the Vital-Power Heaven-Filling Lord-God Dao from the power assessment systems, as well as boundless cultivation arts from the genetic systems and the vivicreation systems.

Meanwhile, he had the Three Lives Stone, which helped him deal with the tribulation energy from the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body. By now, his psychic scale was at the level of three.

It was for all of those reasons that he had so easily won in the fighting just now.

Thanks to self-improvement through diligent study, he was able to contend with boundless Terrifying experts.

His own imperial-heaven pre-beginning systems in his heart had advanced to another level; as of now, he could master just about any energy art he encountered, which was how he had used Elder Brother Jade’s Thirty-Six Jade-Tower Golden-Bell Subjugations against him. Although his ability to do that had already been impressive in the past, it was now possible with virtually no effort at all.

Right now, Yang Qi was solely focused on getting the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect in order as the junior sectlord. After coming up with a clear plan, he spent the following months reorganizing things and helping various members of the sect improve their energy arts.

Thanks to his own advancement, it was easier than ever for him to spot ill side-effects that had resulted from cultivation. Yang Qi’s own cultivation base had even improved as a result. Meanwhile, the sectlord had essentially handed him responsibility for all daily affairs, even giving him access to the Will Manifestation Bible, which was a sacred text left behind by Exalted Celestial Will Manifestation from the god world. It contained various cultivation practices created by the exalted celestial, and although Yang Qi didn’t really need any of them, it would be helpful to have them in his arsenal.

Soon, the time would come to meet with the other superpower sects to discuss resisting the Executors of the Ancient Road. If he took the lead, but couldn't use any of the abilities of the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect, it would make him a laughingstock.

He had already brought Empress Jadefall, Eldest Brother, and other key individuals out to occupy important positions, and even sent them out on campaigns to gain valuable experience.

He took great pains to help Emperor Heart-Celestial from Celestial Peak, helping him refine his true energy to the point where he was just on the verge of breaking through to the Terrifying level.

The entire sect was filled with a sensation of activity and progress.

It was similar to how, back when he first arrived on Memory Peak, he had helped many disciples achieve spectacular progress. Now, he was even more knowledgeable than he was then, and could quickly identify the most talented disciples to aid.

The disciples who benefited in such ways already worshiped Yang Qi, and were his staunchest supporters. There were even some of the Terrifying old-timers who came seeking aid. They were people who had used the psychic scaling systems to achieve their breakthroughs, which meant that further cultivation advancement was impossible for them.

By using the Civilization Founding Grand Magic, Yang Qi could identify the various side-effects they were suffering from, and help negate them. Such old-timers suddenly sensed their cultivation improving, and their psychic power growing, something that hadn’t occurred for years for most of them.

About a year passed, during which time the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect flourished. Yang Qi’s cultivation base grew more refined, and his position in the sect had stabilized. Eventually, it reached the point where he needed to go out into the world again and start looking for pieces of the Mahātmā Jade.

Without the Mahātmā Jade, he couldn’t fully cultivate the Unspoiled Body, which would simultaneously limit his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. By now, he was extremely frustrated with his stalled cultivation.

However, there was one final thing to do before embarking on his quest for the Mahātmā Jade, and that was to destroy the Joyflower Palace and kill Empress Joyflower.

Even if Empress Joyflower had finally broken through to the Terrifying level, she still wouldn’t be a match for him.

And he still needed to take the Passionless God-King’s tear and the Passionless God Flower itself. As for the ordinary members of the Joyflower Palace, they would either become servants or thralls.

And there were some people in the old Dao Defense League that he needed to bring into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, people who were longtime loyalists.

Swish!

He left the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect and began to travel through the Great Necropolis.

Both the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect and the headquarters of the Executors of the Ancient Road were located so far into the depths of the Great Necropolis that people under the Terrifying level had to be careful not to be killed by the god rain, god lightning, and god wind.

First-tier sects were too far below the level of superpower sects to have any dealings with them. And the Joyflower Palace was only a first-tier sect, meaning that it couldn’t compare to the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect.

Yang Qi drew on the Godly Positioning System of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart and quickly locked on to the location of the Joyflower Palace.

Unexpectedly, the Joyflower Palace was in the middle of a major expansion! It was much larger than before, and the female disciples’ cultivation bases were in a state of constant improvement. In the central palace, the women all had slaves and thralls to assist them. And of course, there were always men being castrated and turned into eunuchs.

An immense expression of will covered the place, and from the fluctuations, Yang Qi could tell that Empress Joyflower had reached the terrifying level.

Having a Terrifying expert was one of the qualifications to building a superpower sect. Obviously, a newly ascended Terrifying expert would mean the sect was weak, but they would still count.

‘Where is the empress?’ he thought, scanning the palaces. Considering how far his cultivation base had advanced since his time here, it was easy for him to assess the entire place, even the spell formation within the god-king’s tear.

Before, he had been an ant, but now he was like an eagle. And once he reached the Terrifying level himself, he would be like a dragon.

‘Is there some sort of meeting going on in the palace? A banquet of some sort?’

Indeed, his eyes were now fixed on Empress Joyflower, who sat on her throne presiding over a royal banquet of some sort. Everyone else present was the sect leader of a first-tier sect, including some people with power indexes at three thousand or even more. Of course, even people that powerful were still speaking to the empress in very flowery language.

Dropping to his knees, one of the men present held his wine glass aloft and said, “Congratulations on reaching the Terrifying level, Empress. Of course, a great person does not remember a petty person’s trespasses, so we truly hope you’ll forgive us for past slip-ups. Our Yang-Trampling Sect will definitely remain loyal to the Joyflower Palace, and in fact, I'm even willing to become a consort. Hopefully your consort, Empress.”

This man had a power index of over three thousand, putting him roughly on the same level as An Yiru, yet here he was, bowing and scraping. Obviously, Empress Joyflower had already done plenty to convince people to acknowledge allegiance to her.

“Oh? I’m afraid you don’t qualify to be my consort, Sectlord Yang-Trampling. However, I'm sure some of the eldresses will be interested. Eldresses, do any of you wish to take this man?”

Chapter 1009: Destroying Joyflower Palace (2)

The Joyflower Palace was in the middle of hosting a lavish banquet.

Empress Joyflower was feeling very pleased with herself. She had issued orders to thousands of sect leaders from first-tier sects to attend, all with the intention of giving them to various disciples and eldresses, almost like property. To the sect leaders, it was an enormous humiliation.

That said, none of them dared to give voice to a peep of anger.

The eldresses were all laughing amongst themselves as they looked on. At one point, one of them pointed at one of the sect leaders and said, “You’re the leader of the Secret Spectrum Society, right? You almost captured me a while back, remember? Not so cocky now, are we? Now that our empress is in the Terrifying level, she could wipe out a thousand sects like yours in the blink of an eye!”

The sect leader was normally a dignified and imposing man, but right now he was nearly apoplectic with anger. “When the enemy yields, you should spare his life! Can’t you people stick to your word and let my sect off the hook?”

“Stick to our word?” the eldress burst out laughing. “Why would the Joyflower Palace need to do that with people like you? Besides, we already dealt with your sect the moment you arrived at the banquet. The men have already been castrated and turned into eunuchs, and the women have mostly been made into thralls.”

“You!” the sect lord blurted, nearly coughing up a mouthful of blood. “My poor people! How could you people be so ruthless!?”

“Ruthless?” the eldress said. “Get on your knees! Lick my feet to show your allegiance, and maybe I’ll spare your life. I know that you have one of the three thousand special constitutions. You’re a Spectral One! Absorbing your blood will definitely be very helpful to my cultivation!”

“You might as well stop dreaming!” the sect leader shouted back. “I’ll die before I become a consort to you. Bring it on. Go ahead and kill me!”

“I'm afraid we won't respect your wishes,” Empress Joyflower said, “regardless of whether you’re pleading for life, or death. It seems to me I need to make an example of you, to make sure everyone knows what happens when you defy the Joyflower Palace.”

Her eyes blazed, and the sect leader was suddenly wrenched up into the air as if he had been grabbed by an enormous, invisible hand.

But then a cold snort echoed out, and he dropped back down.

“How impressive, Empress Joyflower,” someone said. “You reached the Terrifying level, so you think you can shake all heaven and earth now? You think no one is worthy of you now? The sect leader of the Secret Spectrum Society is a grand and heroic individual, and I've taken a liking to him. In fact, I'm taking him as an apprentice!”

All of a sudden, Yang Qi appeared in the middle of the grand hall.

“What?!”

Countless people leaped to their feet in shock, and numerous members of the Joyflower Palace drew their weapons.

Empress Joyflower was visibly taken aback, but upon catching sight of Yang Qi, she smiled. “Oh, it's you. But why are you being so stupid as to throw yourself right into my hands? You’re obviously not in the Terrifying level yet, so get on your knees and agree to become my consort. Help me deal with Proud Heaven, and also, give me back all those treasures you took.”

“Ai,” Yang Qi sighed, shaking his head. “If you want to talk about stupid people, I’d say the one who takes the cake is you. Even when your sect is about to be destroyed, you still think you have everything under control. Be sealed!”

RUMBLE!

Magical power erupted from Yang Qi, filling the area, enveloping the Joyflower Palace and the Passionless God Flower, wrapping it up like a cocoon. Then that cocoon began to shrink down, pulsing with the power of tribulations.

“Imperial-heaven pre-beginning!” Yang Qi said, and sound waves rolled out, causing the entire palace to violently tremble. Instantly, the magical laws became ten thousand times stronger, causing many people to scream in alarm.

“The magical laws are so much tougher! I can’t fly! I can hardly move!”

“What’s going on? How could this be happening?”

“My true energy! I can’t release it into the open. The magical laws of space are so strong!”

“The spatial magical laws have basically turned me into a mortal! I can hardly even jump off the ground. From what I’ve heard, this is what the god world is like. Don’t tell me this place is turning into the god world?”

All of a sudden, Empress Joyflower’s face fell.

“That’s right,” Yang Qi said, “I've used imperial-heaven pre-beginning powers to take control of the Passionless God Flower. And now I'm going to take the Passionless God-King’s tear!” He extended his hand toward the treasure storehouse in the depths of the palace, and cracking sounds could be heard as he destroyed various warding magics. Then the last god formation flew out and into his hand. Everyone watched as a tear flew out, pulsing with boundless grief. It vanished as soon as it touched Yang Qi’s palm, and he smiled.

In the blink of an eye, all of the functions of the Joyflower Palace ceased to operate.

He could produce clouds with one turn of the hand and rain with another. It was as simple as that. Everyone was terrified of the Joyflower Palace, but in the shortest of moments, everything had changed.

There is always a heaven beyond heaven, and there are always people more important than you.

Empress Joyflower rose from her throne, cold sweat already dripping down her back.

“I've locked down the Joyflower Palace,” Yang Qi continued. “Within the energy field I've created, even Terrifying experts are the same as mortals. Jumping will be difficult for you, much less flying. That said, the only person here worth fighting is you, Empress. So what do you say? Care to have a fair match with me?”

“A fair match?” she replied, her eyes flashing. “How did you get this strong? This is all you, not help from a magical treasure. And where is that thing of yours? I don't sense its presence anywhere.”

She was obviously referring to the God Legion Seal, but wasn’t willing to say the name aloud. She knew that if she did, it could lead to the instant destruction of the entire sect; she was fully aware of how vicious and merciless Yang Qi could be. If he wanted to wipe out a sect, he would do so.

“No comment,” Yang Qi replied. Reaching out toward the empress with splayed fingers, he said, “You were Proud Heaven’s woman, right? I'm interested in getting a better idea of his taste in women.”

Even as the energy spread out from him, Empress Joyflower released her own true energy with explosive force.

“Passionless in All Creation!

“Affection Exterminates!

“Heartless and Asexual!”

She unleashed a host of killing moves that originated from the Passionless God-King, but everyone could see that they were useless. Yang Qi’s five fingers smashed through all of them, then landed on her neck, which he grabbed, lifting her up in front of him like a baby chicken.

“You’re so strong,” she gurgled hopelessly. She had reached the ultimate heights only to have everything crashing down around her. Moments ago, she had been triumphantly humiliating the sect leaders of countless first-tier sects, but now she was the one being humiliated. This was true karmic retribution.

“Well, what do you think? Proud Heaven’s woman?” Yang Qi chuckled as he ran his hand down her smooth cheek. Of course, inside, he was as cold as ice and didn't feel a thing. “What did he write to you in that letter of his? I tried to check for myself just now, but it was nowhere to be found in the storehouse....”

“How… how did you get this strong?” she gasped, truly confused at what Yang Qi had done.

“Enough!” Yang Qi sent some psychic power stabbing into her sea of consciousness, instantly crushing her nascent divinity and will. Her eyes went wild, but soon turned placid; the Terrifying will convergence she had been so proud of was vanquished by a single move.

“You have a strong will,” she said. “Alright, fine. I’ll join you. You won’t refuse an offer like that, will you? Think about it. I'm a Terrifying expert. You have no powerful organization of your own, thus you have no way to fight back against the future world. Besides, I also want to see Proud Heaven dead.”

“No organization of my own?” Yang Qi said coolly. “Actually, I'm the junior sectlord of a superpower sect from the Ancient Road to the Gods. And you think I'm going to be impressed by a mere Terrifying expert? That’s a funny joke if ever I've heard one.

“That said, you could probably be of some use to me. All sects value Terrifying cultivators, so I suppose having you as a servant would be fine. First, though, I'm going to take the Passionless God Flower.”

RUMBLE!

Taking the Joyflower Palace with him, he flew up. Then, under the eyes of the empress herself, he used his imperial-heaven pre-beginning powers to shrink the Passionless God Flower down until it was the size of an ordinary flower that floated down into his palm.

“It's over,” the empress said, tears streaming down her face. “The organization I toiled so hard to create... destroyed, just like that. Nothing but ashes. How will I ever get my revenge on Proud Heaven now?”

“I’ll kill Proud Heaven,” Yang Qi said. “And if you think your sect is strong enough to use as a weapon against Proud Heaven, you’re stark raving mad. He could kill you without hardly lifting a finger. And now, I’ll enslave you and find out exactly what went on between you and Proud Heaven!”

Crack. Rattle.

Massive psychic fluctuations battered at Empress Joyflower’s mind.

Whoosh!

However, at that very moment, something completely unexpected happened! A beam of golden-yellow sword energy suddenly appeared, stabbing right toward Yang Qi’s back before he had any idea what was happening. In the shortest of moments, he was put into incredible danger!

RUMBLE!

The sword energy slashed into him, causing cracks to spread out over his body. Not even the power of twenty-four tribulations was enough to defend him. Blood sprayed out of his mouth as he was sent flying off into the Great Necropolis.

Swish!

Then, the golden sword energy continued on toward him, boring into his body as if to destroy him.

‘A consummate expert!’ Yang Qi thought.

Chapter 1010: An Encounter with a Powerful Expert

Yang Qi had been hit so unexpectedly that he didn’t even have time to throw Empress Joyflower into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. In the blink of an eye, he was on the verge of collapsing.

This was an intensely powerful stream of sword energy that completely smashed the power of twenty-four tribulations and instantly damaged his meridians. Thankfully, he had the support of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, so his energy arts immediately began to recover.

Obviously, this opponent was no one to take lightly. Yang Qi’s physical body was so strong that few people in existence could harm him. Yet this stream of sword energy had already put him in a very bad position. Who could this newcomer possibly be?

As the sword energy continued sweeping toward him, he threw Empress Joyflower out in front of him toward it. In response, the sword energy split apart into numerous strands, becoming a net that wrapped her up. Then she vanished, apparently having been teleported away to some unknown location.

After saving Empress Joyflower, the sword energy once again shot toward Yang Qi. However, at this point, he had landed on his feet and was unleashing his own energy arts. Three streams of energy swirled between his hands as he shifted back and forth between elements of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body, and the Seventy-Two Monarchs Energy Art.

The energy of the three arts combined, smashing into the sword energy with destructive force. Yang Qi peered forward hoping to catch a glimpse of whatever expert had released this sword energy.

However, nobody appeared. Apparently, this expert was so almighty that he could attack across multiple planes of existence without revealing himself.

Not even Yang Qi could do that.

Meanwhile, the sword energy spiraled like a writhing snake, twisting and turning around before slashing toward Yang Qi again.

RIP!

Yang Qi threw up a defensive barrier, but the sword energy bored into it like a drill, slamming into him again and sending him flying.

Ting-ting-ting. Ting-ting-ting.

As he tumbled back, the sword energy split apart into a host of smaller swords which dropped into him like rain, leaving him covered with cuts.

Yang Qi spun like a dragon, unleashing his imperial-heaven pre-beginning powers to wrestle the sword energy under control. He forced out the sword energy that had entered his meridians, then summoned sheets of burning fire around himself to prevent it from piercing him again.

WHOOSH!

A second stream of sword energy shot toward him from beyond the heavens, and before he could react, it was right there trying to burrow through the flames.

This attack was even stronger than the one before, much to Yang Qi’s shock. Launching his two fists out in front of him, he sent streams of blackish violet strands of fur out to wrap around the sword energy.

Of course, this wasn’t his power, but rather, that of the Wretch God Apostle, who could summon the boundless godpower of Wretch God Ultimate's Obsidian Flame.

Popping sounds rang out as the hair was shattered by the sword. However, that brief moment of time was all that Yang Qi needed. Without any hesitation, he shrank down until he was the size of a mote of dust, then vanished completely.

The sword energy slashed into the space he had just occupied, carving out a huge rift in the space there.

“The Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart,” a voice said from within the shimmering sword light. “Well, that chart isn’t completely impossible to deal with. If I can get the last of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions, I could use it to get inside. Then he won't be able to escape from me....”

Empress Joyflower felt like she was dreaming. She had experienced a meteoric rise, only to be crushed by Yang Qi. And right when it seemed that her fate was sealed and she was about to experience psychic enslavement, a stream of sword energy had forced Yang Qi to retreat. When she opened her eyes, she found herself on an enormous mountain overlooking a vast plain, upon which living beings scurried about like ants.

Shocked, she leaped up into the air to fly away, only to find that the magical laws quickly forced her back down. She slammed onto the ground with a thump, then struggled back to her feet.

Fear flickered on her face as the magical laws suddenly reminded her of the god world. Even her energy arts were under immense pressure.

She suddenly felt completely powerless.

“What is this place?” she muttered. “Who saved me? Don’t tell me I'm in the god world? Why are the magical laws so strong? I'm a Terrifying expert!”

“This is an immortal world that ranks three thousand,” a voice answered. “It’s not the god world. The true depths of the Great Necropolis are where the highest-ranked worlds exist. You see, three thousand is truly the highest rank, so of course you’re feeling pressure. The magical laws here are so strong that you won't be able to release your energy outside of your body. You’re like someone from the mortal world who hasn't reached the Energy Eruption phase. If this was the god world, you wouldn’t even be able to move, let alone speak. Your energy would be forced out of your body, drop by drop, until you couldn't breathe, then you would die and eventually rot away into a shiny white skeleton.”

“Who’s there?” Empress Joyflower said, looking back and forth. Suddenly, she realized that up ahead was a cliff, at the edge of which sat a young man in golden clothing, performing breathing exercises. Every breath he took caused gale-force winds to roll toward him, sucking endless amounts of quintessence energy into him. His breathing even caused the land to wither and bodies of water to dry up. Obviously, he was absorbing the essence of this three thousandth ranked immortal world.

Empress Joyflower was dazzled by the mere sight of it. Here she couldn’t fly, and felt almost like a mortal woman, yet this young man was actually absorbing the essence of this place? How vastly separated must she be from him?

“Who are you?” she asked. A sudden gust of wind hit her from behind, and she dropped onto her belly to prevent herself from being knocked off her feet. Terrifying experts could pierce through countless planes of existence, yet she knew that if she fell off that cliff, she would be finished.

“I'm an enemy of Proud Heaven,” the young man said. Turning, he looked at her with blazing eyes and said, “I saved you to strike a blow at him. The two of you had an ill-fated relationship on the Ancient Road to the Gods, and even had a bastard child together, didn't you?”

“No!” Empress Joyflower shrieked. “Nothing like that ever happened!”

“Calm down,” the young man said. He waved his hand, sending a stream of golden light into her that gave her a bit of clarity. “You only just reached the Terrifying level, and you’re acting a bit too arrogantly. Right now, you’re like a baby that’s learning to walk. You have a long path ahead of you. You’re dead set on killing Proud Heaven, aren’t you? Then why not work with me? I’ll help you. You see, that bastard child you and Proud Heaven created is currently in the future world building his power base. In fact, Proud Heaven is even grooming him to take over as one of the ten magisters. And I need your help to foil their plan.”

“Young Sir, might I ask who exactly you are? And what grudge do you have with Proud Heaven?” Having cleared her head, Empress Joyflower was already starting to come up with new plots and schemes, and was starting by making herself seem weak and pitiful.

“I’m the bearer of the God Legion Seal from the Primeval Age!” The young man rose to his feet, and he was so imposing it seemed like his presence filled the entire sky. At the same time, Empress Joyflower looked around to find that the surrounding immortal world was rapidly shrinking.

Hundredth ranked immortal worlds were immensely huge, and could give birth to first-tier sects. Empress Joyflower had never laid eyes on a world with a rank of five hundred, and she had never even heard of places with a rank of a thousand.

Yet this world ranked three thousand, and the young man was actually destroying it by merely breathing?

No wonder he dared to mention that he bore the God Legion Seal.

“What about Yang Qi...?” she asked.

“I know,” the young man said. “Yang Qi is the bearer of the God Legion Seal from the Immortal Dao Age. He and Proud Heaven hate each other to their guts. For now, I'm not going to kill him. Having the God Legion Seal hidden in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart is much safer. And even if I did kill him, I wouldn’t be able to extract the seal. You see, the main reason I attacked him was to save you. Otherwise, he would have had a hard time escaping alive.”

“You’re invincible, Young Sir!” she said, hiding her shock at the fact that this young man was clearly on the border of being a god. “Between you and Proud Heaven, who has the higher cultivation base?”

He chuckled darkly. “We’re on the same level. Unfortunately, he led a campaign of war in the Primeval Age, even leading the other magisters in an ambush against me. Unfortunately for him, I escaped with my life. And considering how strong I am, it’s a given that nobody in this age can kill me. Strangely, though, Yang Qi actually seems to be hiding his God Legion Seal instead of treating it like a true treasure. He’s refusing to use it for his cultivation, and is actually pursuing a different path. It seems to me he wants to free himself from it. Very idealistic, but sadly, cruelly unrealistic. If he does that, the God Legion Seal could eventually just leave him of its own accord and find a new host. And then he would lose his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.”

“What? Can that really happen?”

“Of course. When you get a God Legion Seal, it shows that your fate is tied up with the legion of gods. Do you really think you can just get rid of fate like that? It would be like a man striking it rich, then tossing aside his old wife. How could someone with moral character like that be cared for by the God Legion Seal?” The young man burst into laughter.

Chapter 1011: Retaking the Dao Defense League

“Young Sir, doesn’t that mean you could kill Yang Qi?! Or capture him and force him to give you his God Legion Seal? Then you could give him over to me, so that I could crush him out of existence!”

The mention of Yang Qi caused Empress Joyflower to grind her teeth angrily. After all, he had put an end to her life’s work.

“He has the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, which will make it hard for me to kill him. Plus, he’s extremely crafty and cunning. Worse, now that he's on guard, it’ll be very difficult to catch him off guard. The key to actually taking him down will be to destroy the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart first. And to do that, we need Proud Heaven. You see, he found the last of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions, the one that was supposedly created from King Immortal-Slayer’s heart. And do you want to guess who he gave that legacy medallion to?”

Empress Joyflower nearly gasped. “Don’t tell me... don’t tell me he gave it to my son?”

“Exactly. It’s in the possession of that bastard you and Proud Heaven created. Proud Heaven is really working hard grooming him for power. And there’s only one reason he gave your son that medallion. He wants him to get into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart and kill Yang Qi, then take the other medallions and the God Legion Seal. Unfortunately for him, I'm onto his plan, and I'm going to use it to my advantage. Yang Qi is going to die, but so is Proud Heaven. Then I’ll take both of their God Legion Seals and become the Sovereign Lord who rules all creation!”

Only now was Empress Joyflower being made privy to this young man's ultimate plan. Of course, it was only fitting for someone with a God Legion Seal to have such grand aspirations.

“So what now?” she asked. “Do we go to the future world to look for my son? Proud Heaven took him away as soon as he was born, so I don’t know anything about him. But I do know that Proud Heaven doesn’t do things randomly. It was no accident that I gave birth to such an amazing son, and I’m curious to see where he ended up.”

“Your son may be a bastard, but if my guesses are correct, he’s a god from heaven descended into the mortal world. In other words, he’s from the god world, and actually has no blood relationship with you. You were scammed by Proud Heaven. What's worse, he’s destined to be a calamity for me unless I kill him. Thus, I saved you just now. Henceforth, you’ll follow my rules and my plan. If you do, I’ll help you with your energy arts and make you stronger than you could ever imagine. Got it?”

“Er....” Empress Joyflower’s face flickered with various emotions before she finally smoothed it out. Regardless, watching out for herself was always her top priority. “Fine. Maybe he's my bastard son, but if he has to die, so be it. My main goal in life has always been to cut absolutely all ties with Proud Heaven, so if that bastard is connected to him, then he has to die. But what about Yang Qi? If you don’t do something to deal with him, he’ll continue growing stronger, and he’ll eventually cause big problems for you.”

“Don't worry about that. Just because he's hiding out in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart doesn’t mean I'm completely out of options. Again, it comes down to your son. If I can get the legacy medallion from him, then I’ll have a chance to deal with Yang Qi. You see, everything is interconnected. Meanwhile, now that I've absorbed the power of this three thousandth ranked immortal world, breaking the barriers to the future world shouldn’t be too much of a problem.” He chuckled. “The Great Necropolis really changed the face of the world. Resources were scarce in the Primeval Age, so there was never anything close to a world with a rank of three thousand. It took a huge amount of effort for me to reach the Immortal Dao Age from there. But now that the Great Necropolis is here, resources are abundant. It shouldn't be a problem at all to reach the future.”

Flying up into the air, the young man said, “World-King God-Assimilating Grand Magic!”

He was using aspects of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth that were different from those used by Yang Qi, yet they were no weaker.

He exhaled, and Empress Joyflower felt herself growing lighter as he assimilated the final magical laws of the immortal world.

Meanwhile....

Out in the Great Necropolis were world forests packed with immortal worlds ranked in the hundreds, hanging there in primal-chaos. Occasionally, the Great Necropolis would erupt with such worlds, almost as if it were some colossal monster that was slowly breathing in and out.

To date, no one really knew what the Great Necropolis was. People were continuing to explore it, but its history hadn’t been revealed yet. In fact, even the most erudite individual perusing the ancient records of the god world would never find mention of it.

Logically speaking, if the creator of the necropolis was as strong as, or stronger than, King Immortal-Slayer, then there should have been a record of that person's identity.

Yet no such record existed.

The Joyflower Palace had been working on expanding the Dao Defense League. Unfortunately, when the Great Necropolis erupted with immortal worlds, the big picture changed and the Dao Defense League became little more than a third-tier organization. By now, there were countless other powerful organizations, sects, empires, and the like, all of them struggling to seize universal fortune.

Despite only being a third-tier organization, the Dao Defense League had been in a state of constant expansion. The flames of war raged on its borders, and god formations were constantly active as it attacked, and ultimately absorbed, other, smaller organizations.

With no warning whatsoever, a black hole suddenly popped into being on the border of the Dao Defense League and began gobbling it up. Countless immortal worlds flowed into it like quicksand. Not a single one of the defensive god formations could do anything to stop the process.

The Dao Defense League was instantly thrown into chaos.

“This is bad! Your Majesty Flower Goddess, there's a black hole devouring the Dao Defense League!”

“Aggghhh! The sky is turning dark!”

“We're being eaten by a black hole!”

“Who’s behind this?!”

In the Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple, numerous women from the Joyflower Palace were thrown into a frenzy of terror, and rushed to cluster around Flower Goddess Orchid Purity. Of course, Orchid Purity was the same person who had taken the Dao Defense League from Yang Qi, then ‘tricked’ him into willingly becoming a ‘god-general’ prisoner.

As she watched the Dao Defense League being destroyed around her, her face turned pale white. Looking into the sky above the Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple, she said, “Senior, what are you doing? Is this some sort of practical joke? The Dao Defense League is part of the Joyflower Palace, and Empress Joyflower just reached the Terrifying level! You should think twice before causing problems for us!”

“Oh really?”

Numerous women looked on in shock as Yang Qi appeared, floating down toward the temple.

“Yang Qi?! It’s you!” Orchid Purity was visibly astonished. “What do you think you’re doing? Don’t you know that Empress Joyflower recently—”

“Recently reached the Terrifying level? Sadly, I already defeated her. And destroyed the entire Joyflower Palace.” With a flourish, Yang Qi produced a bright red flower. He threw it out and it grew larger and larger, until it was possible to see the Joyflower Palace itself. Then, familiar voices could be heard, those of various sect disciples, eunuchs, consorts, and the like, all of them begging for mercy.

“I'm gonna kill you!” shouted one of the women in the temple, and a beam of sword light was right in front of Yang Qi in the blink of an eye.

Yang Qi looked over at her and she was suddenly locked in place, incapable of moving. Then, a second later, she exploded, leaving behind nothing but a fragrant aroma.

“What a poor, fragrant soul,” Yang Qi sighed, sounding almost bored.

Orchid Purity’s eyes flashed, and she said, “We’ll meet again!” Then she waved her hand, causing a haze of red powder to fill the temple as she turned to flee.

“The only place you're going is the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart,” Yang Qi said. “And once you’re inside, you’ll never leave.” His hand shot through the red haze and latched onto Orchid Purity’s neck. “That empress of yours couldn’t stand up to a single attack, and you think you’re going to somehow escape? Who do you think you are? That being said, I'm not going to kill you. Instead, I’ll give you an opportunity. Call a meeting here in the Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple, and in front of everyone present, kowtow to me and acknowledge the error of your ways. If you don’t, I’ll kill all the women from the Joyflower Palace.”

“Er... I...” Orchid Purity looked at Yang Qi like he was a devil-god, and being completely at a loss for words, finally just nodded in agreement.

“Junior Sectlord, I can handle all of this for you,” someone said. It was none other than Emperor Heart-Celestial, who was now a Terrifying expert. Of course, he had done it thanks to Yang Qi, who he now virtually worshipped in admiration.

“Very well,” Yang Qi said. “There are some good people in the Dao Defense League that you need to help. For instance, Patriarch Annalist with his All-Eternity Spring-Autumn Annalist God-Dao Scripture. Although he hasn’t fully mastered the technique, he’s quite amazing, and with a bit of help, he should make significant progress. I'm going to head to the Hell of Sages and Mahātmās. Please work with the Exalted Immortal-Slayer to handle everything here and in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. I’ve already taken care of all the warding spells in the Passionless God Flower. It’s now simply a powerful god item you can use. Incidentally, please take special care of my Sage Monarch Society, which is my ultimate foundation here in the Immortal Dao Age.”

“Yes sir!” Emperor Heart-Celestial said.

‘A Terrifying expert!?’ Orchid Purity thought, her eyes filling with dread.

“Hmph! Listen up, slave girl. Don’t even think of trying anything funny. Yang Qi is the junior sectlord of the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect. You've heard of our sect, haven’t you?”

Orchid Purity nearly passed out from fright. Being from the Ancient Road to the Gods, she had obviously heard of the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect, and knew it was a superpower that completely surpassed anything she could imagine.

Chapter 1012: The Hell of Sages and Mahatmas

Yang Qi had given Emperor Heart-Celestial the authority to handle daily affairs, and help groom talented individuals.

Unfortunately, there were still some parts of the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect that weren’t yet under Yang Qi’s complete control. For instance, the sect had some disciples who were Inheritors, who had long since gone into the depths of the necropolis to search for treasure.

When they finally returned, hopefully they would accept the changes to the sect. Besides, Yang Qi was almost an Inheritor himself. After capturing Profound Valor, he had spent a lot of time studying him to learn his secrets. Before long, he would crack his Inheritor’s godseed and learn even more secrets of the Great Necropolis.

The necropolis was a precious treasure that surpassed the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, so it was a given that Yang Qi needed to figure out a way to take control of it. That would be a major asset in his attempt to reach the god world.

The god world was his ultimate destination. As a bearer of the God Legion Seal, he had to eventually go there.

Right now, though, the most pressing issue at hand was how to deal with his greatest enemy, Proud Heaven, as well as whoever had rescued Empress Joyflower from him at the last minute.

From the sword energy that had entered him, he knew that the mysterious savior cultivated the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. Furthermore, his cultivation base was pure, and not the result of him being blessed by another. No, he cultivated the technique himself, which meant he had a God Legion Seal. If Yang Qi didn't cultivate the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations, then he definitely would have been killed during their clash.

Right now, he wasn’t a match for whoever that mysterious person was.

One thing he was sure of was that it wasn’t Proud Heaven, which would seem to indicate that he was likely an expert from the Primeval Age. Although it was unnerving that a person like that was obviously out to get him, there was an upside: it proved that Proud Heaven didn’t have two God Legion Seals. There was still a tripartite balance of power. And although Proud Heaven had the most powerful cultivation base of them all, as long as one person acquired two parts of the God Legion Seal, that person would still be able to come out on top. Adding the pieces of the seal together wouldn’t just provide a linear increase in power, but would instead provide an exponential boost, similar to what Yang Qi had achieved by combining the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth with the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body.

The more Yang Qi thought about it, the more he wondered who this mysterious person was. He must have saved Empress Joyflower to get information about Proud Heaven. For example, Proud Heaven had the final of King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy medallions, and one had to wonder what he planned to do with it. Right now, Yang Qi’s immortal-slaying clone had the other medallions combined into a shape that was missing something in the middle, like a heart. That was obviously where the final medallion was intended to fit into.

It seemed to indicate that the final medallion was made from King Immortal-Slayer’s heart, and it was likely the key to ultimate control over the combined medallion. In that regard, it was sort of like how the Engine of the One God related to the Cruiser of Civilization.

Although Yang Qi and the clone had eight of the medallions, they were still in great danger without that final medallion, as it caused instability in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

On the other hand, even if he had all nine pieces, it would be too dangerous to combine them, lest King Immortal-Slayer’s will be resurrected and try to possess his clone.

Right now, his best option was to use the God Legion Seal to keep the medallions suppressed.

Ever since Yang Qi had successfully vanquished his dependency-devils, he didn’t need to fully rely on the God Legion Seal, and had taken to leaving it in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Unfortunately, because of that, he felt that his connection with the seal was growing weaker. He even sensed that, if things went on this way, it might eventually fly away on its own to find another host. And if that happened, he might lose his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.

The God Legion Seal was like King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions. They were both the remnants of boundless entities from long ago, and would spare no effort to ensure their own survival. They had to be attached to a successor, and would stop at nothing to have one.

It was the same with the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body.

The mysteries of that technique were contained in the sheepskin scroll, which was required to cultivate it.

Thankfully, Yang Qi was able to find balance by means of his imperial-heaven pre-beginning powers, so even if he lost his God Legion Seal, he would hopefully be able to continue cultivating the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.

He was almost like a mortal emperor who would intentionally pit his subordinates against each other with the intention of helping them grow stronger. And in the end, that would help keep him safe.

But he had to exercise perfect control over everything.

In some ways, it was like playing with fire. If he failed, he would lose everything. But if he succeeded, he would break through all possible constraints and truly become a Fateless One.

As he contemplated the matter, he watched the three flows of true energy interacting, competing, and fighting. It was a constant cycle that led to constant improvement.

What kept it all working was Yang Qi’s psychic power and Sovereign Lord True Energy.

‘My psychic power still has major room for growth,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘There are still many more levels to go through. And once I become a Grand Emperor, my power will become even more terrifyingly strong. That said, I can’t rush matters. I need to find the Mahātmā Jade before I can really unleash what I've built up.’

Swish!

He left the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart and headed straight toward the planes of hell.

Eventually, he was in the void that existed around the various hells, with sinister winds touching his face, and darkness and gloom filled with devil energy. If he reached out, his hand would instantly be enveloped in so much darkness that it would become impossible to see it.

If the immortal worlds were the “yang” side of the universe, then the planes of hell were the “yin” side. Thankfully, his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth made it possible for him to see through the darkness. There were hells scattered about almost like stars in a starry sky. Hells could be very large, and in fact, back when he first came to the Hell of Mahānata, it had seemed so large he couldn’t even wrap his mind around it. But now, it wasn’t nearly as impressive. The Hell of Mahānata was about as large as a fiftieth ranked immortal world. Its greyspace was actually riddled with holes and marks that allowed vital energy to seep out of it. Its magical laws were actually incomplete. In the end, there was no way that truly powerful experts could ever come from here.

It looked as though a big battle had played out there.

Looking around, he saw that many of the other hells were similarly damaged, and some had even been reduced to ruins.

In the past, he had been too inexperienced to notice things like this, but now it was obvious. Clearly, many hells had been attacked by the legion of gods, killing innumerable fiend-devils.

Unfortunately, there were still some hells that his vision couldn’t pierce. After all, he only had one-third of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth and twenty-four tribulations from the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body. One of those techniques had been born in hell, and the other had been born to be the bane of hell.

Their combination made him virtually invincible here.

Thankfully, he had learned from the Wretch God Apostle that Mahātmā Jade originally came from the Hell of Sages and Mahātmās. Although it was rare and elusive, he now intended to search that hell for the jade. Of course, the Hell of Sages and Mahātmās was considered a king among hells, and was even stronger than the Hell of Mahānata.

Unfortunately, he didn’t know the exact location of the place.

Therefore, he flew through the darkness and gloom, passing thousands upon thousands of other hells. He saw that there were immortals present who had traveled here to fight the fiend-devils and gain valuable combat experience.

Thanks to the amazing changes to the Immortal Dao Age, the hells were under constant attack, as they were the optimal place for training. Fiend-devils were merciless and brutal, and fighting them was the best way to improve the psyche and will.

Eventually, Yang Qi’s traveling led him to a place where he didn't recognize any of the hells. Looking around at the devil energy, he realized that his understanding of hell was actually somewhat superficial.

After three days of travel, he sensed an aura that, up to this point, he hadn’t sensed.

Stopping, he opened his Lord’s Eye. With that, he could see that there was an area of radiance and light far in the depths of the devil energy, an enormous hell that illuminated everything around it.

It was the Hell of Sages and Mahātmās.

It pulsed with a devil energy that seemed to contain the aura of history, of mythology, of sages and mahātmās.

I will sacrifice myself and go to hell before I let anyone else do so. He remembered those words, and as they echoed in his mind, he looked at the spectacular Hell of Sages and Mahātmās and mused that the devils there would definitely not be ordinary devils.

Chapter 1013: An Expert from a Buddhist Sect

The Hell of Sages and Mahātmās was right in front of him. Normally, hells wouldn’t shine with light, but this hell was different. It actually retained bits of deathless godliness.

Just as Yang Qi was about to drop down into the hell, he suddenly sensed an intense golden light behind him. Startled, and fearful that he was again being attacked with sword energy, he spun and found himself facing a person.

Specifically, it was a bald-headed monk, dressed in a fiery-red kāṣāya embroidered with complex golden designs and pulsing with a holy aura. He looked young, no more than eighteen or nineteen, but Yang Qi could sense that he pulsed with a power that could destroy the heavens and extinguish the earth.

‘This guy is incredible,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘Luckily, I have the Secret-Ensconcing All-World Anything-Everything Fundamental-Law Magic, as well as information about the buddhist schools given to me by Peaklord Memory. I shouldn’t have any reason to fear this guy.’

From what Yang Qi could tell, the monk was roughly on the same level as the Wretch God Apostle, with a psychic scale very close to ten and a power index near seven thousand.

Thanks to Yang Qi’s enlightenment of the Civilization Founding Grand Magic, the imperial-heaven pre-beginning systems, and the power assessment systems, he no longer needed the Cruiser of Civilization to make a general determination of how strong someone was.

“Please hold on a moment,” the young monk said as he approached, an amiable smile on his face. “I never would’ve imagined that I would run into a fellow cultivator in a place like this. Anyone who can travel to the Hell of Sages and Mahātmās is clearly beyond ordinary. Might I dare ask which sect you come from?”

“You flatter me, good sir,” Yang Qi replied with a formal salute. “I'm just a member of the junior generation who hasn’t even reached the Terrifying level yet. How could I possibly compare to a grandmaster like you? Which buddhist sect do you come from? Could it possibly be the recently flourishing Doom Sect?”

“The Doom Sect?” the young monk said, his expression flickering. “So, you’ve heard of them too, Young Hero?”

“According to the rumors circulating in the Great Necropolis, they recently challenged the Executors of the Ancient Road, and even captured one of their junior superintendents. Everything is in chaos because of them, and lots of sects are facing catastrophe.” Of course, Yang Qi was talking complete rubbish. He had handed the junior superintendent over to Sectlord Will Manifestation, then ordered the Wretch God Apostle to go to the vicinity of the Doom Sect to spread rumors, all in the hopes of luring out the Primeval Age expert with the God Legion Seal.

“So that’s how it is,” the monk replied. “I’ve also heard of that situation. However, after asking around, I’ve come to the conclusion that there’s more to the story than meets the eye. In any case, I’m not from the Doom Sect, but rather the Dharma Sect, a superpower sect from the Ancient Road to the Gods. And my buddhist name is Dharma Treasury; the dharma describes the natural laws which strictly govern all things, and a treasury is something that contains all manner of creations.

“You see, my heart contains all kinds of creations, and my physical body strictly enforces all laws. In truth, law enforcement is about training one's personal dharma, not the dharma of others. Do you understand, Young Hero? Please don’t assume that my buddhist name is about magical powers or hoarding treasures.”

“Brilliant, Grandmaster! You have my full respect!” Yang Qi could see that this young monk was both insightful and incredibly powerful, but at the same time, wasn’t the sort of person who went around killing and robbing others.

Virtually ninety-nine percent of cultivators were despicable, shameless, and black-hearted. They lived by the law of the jungle, so when they saw a magical treasure they wanted, they would simply take it with force. And most wouldn’t hesitate to ambush or murder their competition, or even harvest the souls of others.

That was simply how one cultivated the dao of immortals.

Yang Qi was no exception, although he did have his principles. Normally speaking, if someone wasn't threatening his life, he wouldn’t kill them. In that regard, he was actually very different from most cultivators.

That said, even immortal cultivators still weren’t devils. In the laws governing devils, there were literally no rules restricting killing. They carried out slaughter whether there was profit to be made or not. In fact, they would often kill for pleasure. To them, killing someone to rob them, and killing them for no reason at all, were essentially the same thing.

It was one thing to kill people for profit. But only devils killed for amusement.

“Which sect do you come from?” Dharma Treasury asked. “I'm really surprised to see a young one like you here on my journey to the Hell of Sages and Mahātmās. Nowadays, fewer and fewer young elite ones can be seen rising up from the various sects and clans. In fact, I don’t think I've ever seen someone like you.” Putting his palms together as if in prayer, he continued, “Before long, the big sects will be holding a meeting to talk about allying against the Executors of the Ancient Road. You would certainly make a big impression if you attended, Young Hero.”

“I'm from the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect,” Yang Qi said, returning the formal salute. “The Executors of the Ancient Road enslave other cultivators, treating them as little more than pigs or dogs. They’re truly evil, and resort to killing for almost no reason. Not too long ago, they actually came to our sect and demanded that we give them tribute of a hundred pieces of godhood per year. Thankfully, we were able to drive them away.”

“A hundred pieces of godhood?” Dharma Treasury frowned. “The executors are really getting too greedy, those sinners. Young Hero, why exactly have you come to the Hell of Sages and Mahātmās? The fiend-devils here are very, very strong. And they just got reinforcements from the Ancient Road to the Gods. From what I understand, they’re currently discussing how to establish a new kingdom of fiend-devils to seize universal fortune. You really shouldn’t be here, Young Hero. It’s too dangerous.”

“Actually, that's the very reason I've come,” Yang Qi said, although he actually hadn’t even heard of these developments. Obviously, he wasn’t going to reveal the true reason he was here: the Mahātmā Jade. “Not too long ago, a mahātmā fiend-devil joined forces with some other fiend-devils to cause problems in a temple in the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect. They rescued someone named Lord Blood River, and I got severely injured during the incident. The sect sent me here to investigate and try to find out what their larger plan is, and whether or not they’re going to make a move on the Immortal Dao Civilization.”

“I know a bit about Lord Blood River. You're truly bold to come here, Young Hero, even if it's at the behest of your sect. Well, since we've run into each other, I don't mind offering you my protection. You see, it's not for any righteous reason that the devils are gathering in the Hell of Sages and Mahātmās. No, they’re here to select a leader. And my mission here is to steal the command medallion of whoever they select. Without that command medallion, they won’t be able to keep order.”

“What? That’s what they’re doing? They’re going to select a leader? Fiend-devils are usually about as united as a dish of loose sand. But if they got organized and then went on the warpath, the consequences would be too horrible to contemplate.” Yang Qi frowned. “What exactly is this command medallion? Does it really have the power to keep the fiend-devils in order?”

“I'm not really sure. I just know that it’s a legendary piece of treasured jade that not just anyone can use. It came to be an authentication device in the dao of devils, so our sect plans to take it and have one of our senior monks destroy it. It shouldn’t be allowed to exist in the world. Since you have grand ambitions of your own, Young Hero, why not join me in my quest? We can accomplish great good together.”

“I'm duty-bound to fight fiend-devils, so of course I’ll help you, Senior.” Even as the bold words left his mouth, Yang Qi allowed a bit of sword energy to pulse out of him.

It was an imitation of Star Swordlife’s dao of the sword, which was of course filled with boundless life force and the power to save anything and everything.

Dharma Treasury’s eyes glittered. “As it turns out, Young Hero, you’re the epitome of life force and benevolence. Your dao of the sword contains the ultimate meaning of life force, and from that, I can tell that you are a merciful and kind person. The mercy of a buddha is the greatest blessing there is. Ai. It’s sad that you walk the dao of immortals, and thus cannot join our buddhist school....”

“Please forgive me, Senior,” Yang Qi said. “But I’m a member of the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect, and am not the kind of person who will forsake my sect.”

“I understand,” Dharma Treasury said, sighing. “Ai. I'm sure that one day, Young Hero, you’ll be an intrepid leader of others. I hope that when you are, you can continue on your path of life. That is the core essence of the mercy of the buddhist sects. In the end, it doesn’t matter whether you become a monk or not. The end result is what matters. Mercy; that is the dao of buddha. At least, in my humble estimation.”

“Thank you for your instruction, Grandmaster,” Yang Qi said. “Now, considering that there’s a big meeting of fiend-devils in the Hell of Sages and Mahātmās, how exactly are we going to sneak in? Do you have any ideas?”

“It won’t be hard at all,” Dharma Treasury said. “We’ll just disguise ourselves as fiend-devils. You surely have a technique that will let you do that.”

“Unfortunately, I don’t. Do you have something that could help?” Obviously, this was another deception. Yang Qi just wanted to see just what Dharma Treasury was capable of.

“Of course. I’ll teach you a zen art called the Five Rāja Transformations. You see, devils are just another aspect of buddhism. An enraged buddha will become a devil, and rājas are a type of devil. Draw on the zen art and let the devils multiply. Buddhas are devils, devils are buddhas.”

As the words left his mouth, Dharma Treasury transformed. Enormous horns sprouted from his head, and scales rippled out to cover his body. A moment later, he looked like a powerful infernal.

He even pulsed with a devil energy that made him seem like a devil-god from the god world.

“You startled me, Grandmaster!” Yang Qi said in shock.

In the form of an infernal, Dharma Treasury said, “The Similitude of the Self; the Similitude of Men; the Similitude of Living Things. The Similitude of the Dharma is Nothing But a Shell. Commit that to memory, Young Hero, and prepare to receive this zen art!”

Suddenly, a flow of true energy and will connected to Yang Qi, causing him to physically transform. In the blink of an eye, he was exuding devil energy, and also looked like a smaller infernal.

“You truly are a font of wisdom, Young Hero!” Dharma Treasury exclaimed. “You mastered the art in moments!”

Chapter 1014: Fiend-Devil Assembly

Two Infernalfolk, one large and one small, were walking down a street in the Hell of Sages and Mahātmās.

The scenery in this hell was amazing. Normally speaking, fiend-devils were very primitive, and didn’t go about building cities or mansion grottos. They would normally live in caves, or just wander around like nomadic barbarians.

But the Hell of Sages and Mahātmās was different. There most certainly were cities here, filled with exquisitely constructed buildings that rivaled anything from the immortal worlds. There were also numerous centers of learning, filled with students and scholars.

Vehicles and foot traffic filled the streets, which were lined with everything from shops to schools.

There were places that taught the dao of martial arts, the dao of the sword, the dao of the saber, the dao of energy, and more. There were schools for musical instruments, tactics and strategy, calligraphy, and painting. This place seemed more like a scholarly human kingdom than a place full of fiend-devils.

“This is just one city here in the Hell of Sages and Mahātmās,” Dharma Treasury said. “Long ago, the fiend-devils didn’t have any civilization or culture at all. They were completely ignorant and barbaric, and all they did was fight and kill each other. That sort of thing is built into their genes, making them instinctually desire to slaughter and destroy. But later, the sages and mahātmās came and created this hell to teach hell-born fiend-devils about culture and civilization. Unfortunately, the more intelligent and civilized the fiend-devils get, the craftier they are, so it's hard to say whether it’s a good thing or not. In any case, it's not my place to question the sages of the past. All I can do now is work hard to prevent the alliance of fiend-devils from invading the immortal dao civilization.”

“Your wisdom is boundless, Grandmaster. You have my sincere respect and admiration.”

Even as Yang Qi uttered these words of praise, he was in conversation with Sectlord Will Manifestation in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

“Sectlord, have you ever heard of the monk Dharma Treasury from the Dharma Sect?”

“The Dharma Sect? Dharma Treasury?” When the sectlord heard that Yang Qi was in the Hell of Sages and Mahātmās, he was very surprised, but now he looked even more shocked. “You've run into him? He’s no one to look down on. You see, he's no ordinary monk. He’s more properly known as Archmonk Dharma Treasury. He’s one of the most preeminent cultivators from the buddhist schools, and after mastering his Zen of Grand Desire, he became even more powerful. With a mere thought on his part, he can transform the world around him. He’s merciful by nature, and never harbors evil thoughts. He’s a good person to be friends with.”

“Archmonk?” Yang Qi said. It was quite a shock to learn that Dharma Treasury wasn’t just an ordinary monk. There could be as many monks as the eternal sands of the universe, but few could be a leader among them. And despite having a cultivation base far beyond the Wretch God Apostle, Dharma Treasury believed in valuing life and showing mercy whenever he could. In that way, he was very much like Star Swordlife.

Unfortunately, Yang Qi could tell that he and Archmonk Dharma Treasury were going to have some conflicting interests. Obviously, both of them wanted to get the command medallion of the leader of this fiend-devil alliance. And at the moment, Yang Qi wasn’t sure what to do about the situation.

After all, it seemed fairly likely that this command medallion was made from Mahātmā Jade.

“Grandmaster,” Yang Qi said, “are we just walking around aimlessly right now? Or do we have a destination? Our main goal is to find that command medallion, but I don’t think either of us knows where it is.”

“Actually, I'm fairly certain I do know where it is,” Archmonk Dharma Treasury replied. “It's most likely in the capital city of this hell. To avoid attracting attention, I think we should use teleportation portals to get into the capital city. Once there, I have a special technique I can use to track down the jade. It’s in the actual moment of the theft that I’ll need your help the most, Young Hero.”

“But my energy arts are so shallow. How can I be of help to someone like you, Grandmaster? What happens if I just get in your way?” It was true that, in terms of cultivation base, Yang Qi was a bit below Archmonk Dharma Treasury.

“Don’t think that way, Young Hero,” Archmonk Dharma Treasury replied. “You won’t get in my way. I performed some divinations before coming here, and they indicated that I would meet an important person who would help me on my mission. In fact, without the help of that person, I’ll likely fail my mission. And I'm convinced that, according to the workings of heaven, you are that person. You have a very tough physical body, and you also cultivate a profound technique from the dao of devils. If I'm not mistaken, it's the fabled True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body. Am I right?”

“Amazing, Grandmaster!” Yang Qi said in shock.

“There’s no need to get flustered,” Archmonk Dharma Treasury said. “Devil arts and zen arts are essentially one and the same; it's the use that's relevant. Use them for righteousness, and they’re righteous. Use them for evil, and they’re evil. In fact, that technique of yours is very much like one of the highest truths of buddhism. You study tribulations and kalpas, and do not train in killing life. Killing life is banal, whereas if you exist within tribulations and kalpas, the great dao of pāramitā will—”

“Grandmaster, please,” Yang Qi interrupted. “Can you please get to the point and tell me how I’m supposed to help you?” Although this Archmonk Dharma Treasury was clearly very strong, he was also particularly long-winded. Just about everything he said seemed to be something related to scriptures or fundamental truths of the universe, and it was already getting a bit frustrating listening to him.

“Well, to sum up, you’ll benefit a lot by sticking with me, Young Hero,” Archmonk Dharma Treasury said. “It's not that I want to hide the truth from you, it's just that the workings of heaven made it clear that if I speak my plans, the fiend-devil experts might catch wind of it.”

“In that case, I won’t ask again,” Yang Qi said. As they walked along, Yang Qi furtively studied the Hell of Sages and Mahātmās. Already, he could tell that magical laws here were very tough, yet Terrifying experts were rather rare. So far, he hadn’t seen a single one. Everyone was lower than the Terrifying level.

Some of the fiend-devils had power indexes of four thousand, but still couldn’t fly. One had to be in the Terrifying level to do that. Apparently, fiend-devils under that level were like commoners here.

In the schools that lined the sides of the roads, numerous members of the fiend-devil royalty could be seen focusing on their studies. The Hell of Sages and Mahātmās really did live up to its reputation of being a center of learning and culture.

Whatever fiend-devils came here to study would definitely stand head and shoulders above their contemporaries.

There were plenty of fiend-devils walking about, and very few of them were fighting. Most would chat like ordinary humans, which was definitely a very strange sight. Normally, one would expect fiend-devils to carry out slaughter wherever they went.

Quite a few of them were discussing the latest developments.

“I'm very curious to see how the big meeting goes. Are they really going to select some sort of league-lord? All of the most powerful fiend-devils are here.”

“Well, people like you and me obviously don’t qualify. Only Terrifying experts can go to that meeting, and it’s not like Terrifying experts are a common sight. Most hells would be lucky to produce even just a Grand Emperor. In fact, all of the Terrifying fiend-devils here are actually from the Ancient Road to the Gods.”

“Terrifying experts.... I wonder when we’ll be able to reach that level. What an incredible glory and honor.”

“Don’t even waste your time thinking about it. You have to be in the right place at the right time, and have the valor to seize your opportunity. Right now, everything in the world is changing. The Great Necropolis has appeared, and it’s ejecting new immortal worlds all the time. Resources are scarce here in hell, and most of our techniques require the flesh and blood of immortals. This really is the best time to create a new fiend-devil world order. Hopefully, they select this new league-lord and lead us directly to war against the immortal worlds. That way we can finally get the resources we need.”

“You’re right. I heard that there are these people called the Executors of the Ancient Road, and their flesh and blood is particularly useful for us fiend-devils. Eat one of them, and you can surpass the mortal and enter the saintly.”

SWISHHH!

All of a sudden, Archmonk Dharma Treasury grabbed Yang Qi and flew up into the sky, sending out quite a few magical fluctuations.

“Look, do you see that? Someone’s flying! It’s a Terrifying expert!”

The fiend-devils who saw them were shocked, and dropped to their knees to kowtow.

Soon, they reached a teleportation portal that was closely guarded by fiend-devil soldiers. Instead of armor, they wore long cyan robes, had swords strapped to their belts, and were unexpectedly handsome.

They almost looked like evil scholars.

When they saw Yang Qi and Archmonk Dharma Treasury approaching, expressions of shock appeared on their faces, which were quickly replaced with respect. “We offer respectful greetings, exalted devils! We’re tasked with guarding the entrance to the capital city. As Terrifying experts, you definitely qualify to attend the meeting.”

Yang Qi suddenly realized that Archmonk Dharma Treasury was sending devil light into him that made it seem like he was in the Terrifying level.

“That's right,” he said, “we're Terrifying experts!”

“We’re from the Ancient Road to the Gods,” Archmonk Dharma Treasury added. “We heard that there’s a meeting to pick a league-lord, and we want to attend.”

“Please, go right ahead!” one of the cyan-robed fiend-devils activated the teleportation portal. Even as it began powering up, four experts appeared off in the distance, flying toward them. The expert in the lead looked like a streak of blood-colored light, and as he landed, he emanated the stench of gore.

Lord Blood River!

Chapter 1015: The Capital City

Yang Qi was suddenly nervous that Lord Blood River would somehow recognize him. Although he wasn’t afraid of getting in a fight with him, a big melee could damage his chances of finding the Mahātmā Jade. Then again, with Archmonk Dharma Treasury at his side, he didn’t really have anything to be afraid of.

There was no doubt in his mind that the Archmonk was incredibly powerful, or that he had access to boundless buddhist magic. And the fact that he had dared to come here at all indicated that he was confident in his disguise.

Lord Blood River was followed by three other Terrifying experts, all of whom Yang Qi recognized. There was Dream Mintdance, as well as the scholarly and mahātmā fiend-devils.

As soon as they landed, Lord Blood River spoke in a booming voice, “I'm Lord Blood River, on my way to the capital city! Hurry up and activate the teleportation portal!”

“Yes, yes of course,” the guards said. Apparently, they all knew exactly who Lord Blood River was. He had once fought the Executors of the Ancient Road, and although he had been captured and imprisoned, he was too strong for even them to kill. Now he was out, and anyone who caused problems for him would surely suffer from bad luck.

The teleportation portal was now powered up to the point where it was thrumming and vibrating.

As Yang Qi and Archmonk Dharma Treasury stood within it, they refrained from speaking at all. However, that didn’t mean that Lord Blood River didn’t notice them. Glaring at them with a razor-sharp gaze, he said, “Who are you two? I don’t think I’ve ever seen you before. You aren’t from the Ancient Road to the Gods, are you?”

Yang Qi immediately burst out laughing, worried that Archmonk Dharma Treasury would blow their cover by launching into some speech filled with buddhist terms. “There are a lot of experts on the ancient road, and you’ve been imprisoned for quite a few years, Lord Blood River. It’s no wonder you haven’t heard of us.”

“Oh? Then let me see what you're capable of!”

Lord Blood River launched an attack, sending an enormous blood-colored hand shooting toward Yang Qi. In response, Yang Qi did nothing, fully aware that Archmonk Dharma Treasury would step in.

Step in he did, unleashing a pitch-black hand that slammed into Lord Blood River’s attack. When the two palms collided, both parties shivered and the blood-colored light that constantly rose up from Lord Blood River creaked and cracked.

“That was the Buddhist-Rage Rāja-King Fist, a zen art from the buddhist schools. That’s not a divine ability from you Infernalfolk!” From Lord Blood River’s angry reaction, Yang Qi could tell that he must have been slightly injured by the clash. Most likely, he still hadn’t recovered from his years of being sealed.

“I cultivate all sorts of divine abilities!” Archmonk Dharma Treasury said. “As long as they work, why wouldn't I? I even have some energy arts from the dao of immortals! What’s going on here, Lord Blood River? Are you really trying to start a fight before we're even in the meeting?”

Secretly shocked, Lord Blood River snorted coldly. ‘If it weren’t for the fact that I haven’t finished cultivating my Violet-River Blood-Shadow Grand Magic, I wouldn’t think twice about fighting this guy. The fact that someone like him has popped up could be a big problem. Once I get to the capital city, I’ll have to team up with some other experts and figure out a way to kill him. The last thing I need is competition for the position of league-lord.’

The other three fiend-devils were just as shocked, and were all thinking roughly the same thing: ‘How could there be an expert like this? He actually came out on top in a clash with Lord Blood River?!’

There were now six individuals on the teleportation portal, all of whom were wrapped up in their own schemes and plots.

Eventually, the portal was fully activated and they sensed a change in the surrounding energy. They were now in the sprawling capital city, where countless buildings rose high into the clouds. The streets were wide and paved with jewels, and the stores on either side had countless god items for sale. Fiend-devils with incredibly high cultivation bases went about here and there, many of them in the Terrifying level.

Just by glancing around, Yang Qi could tell that about one out of every hundred fiend-devils was a Terrifying expert. Most of them flew, leaving the walking to the ordinary fiend-devils.

Of course, even the “ordinary” fiend-devils were still equivalent to first-tier sectlords from the Ancient Road to the Gods. In other words, they were roughly the same level as Battle Resister.

With the teleportation having completed, Lord Blood River chuckled coldly, cast a venomous glare at Yang Qi and Archmonk Dharma Treasury, then turned into a blood-colored streak that shot off into the distance.

The person waiting to receive them was another of the scholarly fiend-devil soldiers in cyan.

“Accommodations have been set aside for everyone who’s come to attend the meeting. That said, if you have friends in the city, you’re welcome to stay with them instead.”

“We have no friends here,” Yang Qi said. “Lead us to the accommodations.”

“Please, follow me.”

With that, the soldier led Yang Qi and Archmonk Dharma Treasury to an expansive meeting hall that resembled an inn. It was a very well-decorated structure, and even the building materials seemed to be things from the god world.

There were plenty of guards watching over things. Inside, they found that the decorations were elegant, with a stream and a pond filled with colorful flowers in the courtyard.

“Please take these identity medallions,” their escort said. “They’ll identify you as guests in the capital city, and allow you to come and go as you please. Remember that fighting with other visitors to the city is not permitted. Once the general assembly is called, there will be chances for organized fighting.”

With that, the fiend-devil escort left.

Yang Qi looked down at the identity medallion, finding that it was carved from godstone and was covered with inscriptions related to the teachings of the fiend-devil sages and mahātmās.

“Spectacular workmanship,” he said. “I wonder who it is that runs the Hell of Sages and Mahātmās. Grandmaster, is there any way you can provide some information to a lowly and ignorant individual like myself?”

“The most powerful person in the Hell of Sages and Mahātmās is a very mysterious mahātmā who I happened to encounter once on the Ancient Road to the Gods. He wears a black robe that covers him from head to toe, and carries a crooked shepherd’s crook. Supposedly, he views fiend-devils as sheep, and himself as the shepherd who watches over their lives. All I know is that I'm not a match for him. He’s very, very strong, at least on the level of the emperor of the Executors of the Ancient Road.

“Truth be told, I have a very deep interest in fiend-devils. Young friend, do you mind telling me to what level you’ve cultivated your Unspoiled Body? And is it possible that you actually possess that mysterious sheepskin scroll?”

“Yes,” Yang Qi replied. “I did happen to get the sheepskin scroll.”

“Is there any possibility that you’d allow me to take a look at it?” Archmonk Dharma Treasury asked.

“Well, er....” Finally, Yang Qi shook his head. “Grandmaster, we’re strangers who met by chance, like patches of drifting duckweed, a monk and an immortal who walk different paths. One should not blithely show off precious treasures. After all, if I lost that sheepskin scroll, I wouldn’t be able to cultivate the technique.”

“I shouldn’t have been so rude as to ask that,” Archmonk Dharma Treasury said quickly. “That sheepskin scroll is nothing to take lightly, young friend. If you have it in your possession, take good care of it. You know, I suspect you have something impeding your cultivation base. The balance between your will and fleshly body is currently perfect, but if you develop your body much beyond this, you’ll put too much pressure on your will.”

Yang Qi couldn't help but be amazed at how observant and insightful Archmonk Dharma Treasury was.

“Can you think of any way to deal with this problem of mine, Grandmaster?” Yang Qi asked, making sure to keep his tone neutral to avoid revealing the fact that he already had a goal in mind. It seemed unlikely that Archmonk Dharma Treasury would know about the Mahātmā Jade. After all, even that mahātmā fiend-devil had only known about the Three Lives Stone.

Archmonk Dharma Treasury shook his head. “I can’t think of any special way to deal with your problem. Just continue to work on developing your psyche. I have a special technique for that purpose, but to be honest, young friend, it seems that whatever method you use actually surpasses mine, so I won’t insult you by trying to give it to you. Since we seem to have a bit of time right now, though, feel free to ask me any cultivation questions you might have. Perhaps I can provide some good advice.”

“My main problem right now is that I need to reach the Terrifying level. Do you have any advice on that, Grandmaster?”

“There is a technique from the Dharma Sect that I could teach you. However, your own divine abilities seem too powerful for it to be compatible. And from what I can tell, even if I directly imparted all of my psychic power to you, it still wouldn't be enough for you to achieve the breakthrough you’re looking for. I’ve never seen anything like this, to be honest.”

“I just have to keep going ahead, slow and steady,” Yang Qi said. “That’s fine. In life, the greatest challenges usually bring the greatest rewards.”

With that, Yang Qi went on to ask some other questions about cultivation. Archmonk Dharma Treasury would reply eloquently, and to Yang Qi’s surprise, he actually learned a lot and made some significant progress.

Although Archmonk Dharma Treasury couldn’t answer specific questions about the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body, his general knowledge had helped Yang Qi to get a much clearer understanding of tribulation energy, as well as the technique in general.

It also helped him to fuse it more fully with the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, and deal with any resulting imperfections.

Chapter 1016: The Shepherd

Ever since meeting Archmonk Dharma Treasury, Yang Qi had been treated with kindness and grace. The Archmonk was immensely powerful and had an exquisite mastery of buddhist magic. Merely conversing with him provided immense benefit. In only a few hours of conversation, Yang Qi found that his psychic power advanced another step, and many of his divine abilities felt freer and easier to use. In fact, his entire being had entered a unique and improved state.

In the middle of their conversation, a beam of sword light suddenly appeared, slashing through the wall and heading toward them like a writhing snake. Then it shattered into a rain of sword energy that, in the blink of an eye, bore down on their acupoints with deadly force.

“How dare you, ruffians!” Archmonk Dharma Treasury scolded, and his fingers spread out in the manner of a lotus flower, sending eruptions of power out to each of the countless raindrops of sword energy that blocked their path. Then he leaped to his feet and casually reached out, grabbing something out of midair. Instantly, a sound rang out like that of metal striking metal.

Gong!

A sword appeared, clasped between his forefinger and middle finger. Whoever was holding the sword grunted, then twisted the sword, causing the blade to snap and allowing them to blur backward and disappear.

Meanwhile, some of the sword energy managed to reach Yang Qi. Although it stung when it hit his skin, it did little more than scratch him.

“Quite a powerful sword,” said Archmonk Dharma Treasury. “If I'm not mistaken, that was one of the most powerful fiend-devils from the Ancient Road to the Gods, Dugu Space-Maimer, also known as the Fanged Sword-Devil. He was born as a book-devil in the Hell of Sutra Conservation. He shook the ancient road for many years, always evading the executors. Clearly, his cultivation base has reached a very high level.”

“The Hell of Sutra Conservation...?”

This was Yang Qi’s first time hearing of the place, which was obviously a formidable hell. Although he didn’t know it, the Hell of Sutra Conservation was filled with repositories of sutras, ancient records, historical annals, and the like. The book-devils from there were immensely powerful and could innately master any daoist technique or devil art they encountered. They also had such profound cultivation bases that they were always capable of fighting enemies above their own level.

“It seems to me this isn’t a very safe location,” Yang Qi said. “Our best course of action is probably to find the league-lord’s command medallion, then get out of here.”

“I agree. I’ve already used my Buddha’s Eye God Dao to determine the general location of the command medallion. Unfortunately, the capital city is under the direct control of the ruler of the Hell of Sages and Mahātmās, the same Shepherd I mentioned earlier. If he notices us, we’ll both die, so we can’t afford to act rashly.”

Archmonk Dharma Treasury extended his finger and began tracing a line on the table in front of him. The line quickly turned into a map of the city magistrate’s mansion.

“According to my calculations, the league-lord’s command medallion is located in this mansion. Right here.” He pointed to the location on the map. "It seems to me I need to use my Buddha Comes to a Strange World Grand Magic to enter the mansion and steal the medallion. But it’ll be a very dangerous undertaking. Furthermore, I’ll need your help in two regards, young friend. First of all, using my grand magic will cause my fleshly body to enter a state of collapse, so I’ll need your true energy to keep my fleshly body in one piece. Second, there's a warding magic protecting the medallion, something called the Nine-Heavens Ten-Earths Devil-King Herculean-Ability. The best way to break it will be to use your Unspoiled Body. If you succeed, we’ll be able to take the medallion. If not, we won’t be able to budge it an inch.”

“I’ll follow whatever orders you give me, Grandmaster,” Yang Qi said. Considering he had the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, and also had the Archmonk as his ally, he was very confident in the success of the upcoming mission.

“Great,” the Archmonk said. “By the way, there are some more details you need to be aware of, young friend. You see, my entire purpose here is to ensure that this meeting of fiend-devils is a failure. Even if I have to die in the process. Once we take the command medallion, the Shepherd will surely realize what happened. And in that case, I’ll likely lose my life. In the final moment, I’ll use a boundless buddhist energy art to buy some time. That’s when you will abscond with the medallion, young friend. Don’t hesitate. Go into hiding as soon as you can. Based on what I can sense, few people other than you would ever be able to escape from the Shepherd. After all, you have the constitution of a Fateless One.”

“What?!” Yang Qi said, shaken to the core at how Archmonk Dharma Treasury had seen through so many of his secrets. Trying to keep a straight face, he said, “Grandmaster, there’s no need for you to sacrifice yourself. I’m sure I’ll be able to find an opportunity to get both of us out safely.”

The Archmonk chuckled. “Don’t worry, young friend, I'm not trying to force you to reveal any secrets. Besides, secrets are ultimately meaningless, even for gods and buddhas. The only true secrets are your most hidden intentions....” With that, Archmonk Dharma Treasury sank into a motionless trance as he once again performed some divinations.

Yang Qi couldn’t help but click his tongue in admiration.

Unexpectedly, the Archmonk actually intended to sacrifice himself on this mission. Considering that, Yang Qi decided that rescuing him was a top priority. Unfortunately, he really didn't want to reveal that he possessed the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. For all he knew, the Archmonk was merely putting up a pretense of righteousness and justice, but was secretly an evil villain. Yang Qi was no child, and wouldn’t blindly trust anyone. From the moment his path began in the mortal world, he had encountered evil villains, and many of them were the type that pretended to be virtuous but were secretly evildoers.

Sitting down, he began meditating in preparation.

**

Meanwhile, some distance away in a towering building, Lord Blood River sat with his three fiend-devil companions. In front of them was a man in a long black robe, who was circulating his true energy to heal himself. All of a sudden, he coughed up a mouthful of blood, indicating the process was completed.

“That buddhist true energy is incredible,” said the man in black. “Whoever that fiend-devil was, he’s cultivated that buddhist art to the highest level imaginable. Lord Blood River, hurry up and give me one of those Blood-Convergence God Pills. The injuries I just now sustained were severe.”

Lord Blood River chuckled. “As it turns out, Dugu Space-Maimer, the renowned Fanged Sword-Devil, actually failed in his assassination attempt and was even driven away with severe injuries. I paid a premium for your services, but you failed in the end. And now you think I'm going to give you one of my Blood-Convergence God Pills? What makes you think you have the face for demands like that?”

Dugu Space-Maimer snorted coldly. “I don’t know who that devil is, Lord Blood River, but he’s extremely powerful. I’d say it’s highly likely he disguised himself and joined one of the buddhist schools. In any case, I'm no match for him. It’s only natural that I would fail in my mission. I'd say the only possibility of success would be if the two of us joined forces in the attack. If you don’t help me to fully recover from this, then there’s going to be a major grudge between the two of us. And in that case, you’d better watch your back from here on out.”

“Considering your injuries, do you really think you can just walk out of here?” Dream Mintdance said. She along with the mahātmā and scholarly fiend-devils all rose to their feet and fanned out to surround Dugu Space-Maimer.

“Come on, Lord Blood River,” Dugu Space-Maimer said. “You haven’t even crossed the river, but you’re already burning the bridge down? Do you really think I'm that easy to kill? If so, then you’re definitely insane.”

“Cut the crap,” Lord Blood River said. “We might’ve been friends before, but I've been away for too long and my Violet-River Blood-Shadow Grand Magic needs fresh blood. Yours. You see, when I gave you some of my Blood River True Energy years ago, it was all for the purpose of fattening you up for this moment. Kill him!”

SNICK!

Before anything else could happen, a command medallion shot into the room, much to the surprise of everyone present. Carved on the medallion was the image of a man with a shepherd’s crook, leading a flock of sheep. Even just looking at the medallion made them all feel like their souls were about to be pulled out of their bodies.

Suddenly, a voice echoed into their ears through the window. “The Shepherd has commanded that no fighting and killing go on before the general assembly. Any who violate that command will be immediately punished!”

Looking outside, they saw a young man hovering there, clad in a cyan scholar’s robe. He was handsome, without any wretch energy at all, but with such profound energy arts that it was obvious he was no ordinary person.

“Who are you?” Lord Blood River shouted. “How dare you stick your nose into the affairs of a patriarch like me?”

“I’m one of the Shepherd’s Five God-Generals. Specifically, God-General Crystallaine. If you dare to violate the commands of the Shepherd, you’ll die beyond the shadow of a doubt!”

“We haven't selected a league-lord yet,” said the mahātmā fiend-devil, “and although the Shepherd is powerful, he doesn’t command the horde of devils. Besides, he was injured by the executors, then fell victim to the plot of Magister Proud Heaven from the future world. He’s critically injured and virtually on his deathbed, so what makes him think he can tell us what to do?”

“Well, if it isn’t a mahātmā exile of the Sikong Clan,” God-General Crystallaine said. “Back when we purged your clan, you escaped, only to return now. And instead of coming back with greater abilities than before, you've actually regressed. You’ve made a big mistake here. Hand over the sheepskin scroll!”

“I don’t have the sheepskin scroll. It was stolen by Proud Heaven’s son. Don’t tell me the Shepherd isn’t aware of that fact.”

“Of course the Shepherd knows. He's omniscient. For now, I’ll let you live. When the time for the general assembly comes, if you endorse the Shepherd, you can live. Fail to do so, and you’ll be killed beyond the shadow of a doubt. And I’ll say one more time: no fighting and killing. The Shepherd has recovered from his injuries and will soon force all fiend-devils to submit to him. Afterward, he’ll lead the fight against the Executors of the Ancient Road, as well as the humans of the immortal dao civilization. We’ll devour them all, and take control of all the many heavens. That is our path to godly ascension!”

“I refuse to believe that the Shepherd has recovered,” Lord Blood River said. “Get out of here, God-General Crystallaine. Otherwise I’ll kill you! I was dominating the Ancient Road to the Gods before you were even born!”

Chapter 1017: Proud World

Lord Blood River was unimaginably powerful, and right now he was dead-set on killing Dugu Space-Maimer and absorbing his quintessence-blood and vital energy.

In fact, even as the words left his mouth, he sent a stream of blood-colored light toward God-General Crystallaine, and simultaneously reached out to grab Dugu Space-Maimer.

“Hmph! Feeling suicidal, are we?” A host of crystals exploded from God-General Crystallaine, sweeping out and blocking the blood-colored light. However, the light subsequently turned violet, becoming like a river that wrapped around the crystals. Face falling, God-General Crystallaine said, “You actually succeeded in cultivating your Violet-River Blood-Shadow Grand Magic?”

“That’s right. Why else would I come to vie with the Shepherd for the position of league-lord?” Lord Blood River sent out another stream of blood that wrapped up God-General Crystallaine so tightly he couldn’t move. At the same time, he launched a vicious attack at Dugu Space-Maimer.

Howling, Dugu Space-Maimer sent a bevy of sword energy back at Lord Blood River.

Meanwhile, the mahātmā fiend-devil burst into motion, sending a palm directly toward Dugu Space-Maimer’s back. Dugu Space-Maimer flipped his sword and sent it stabbing back toward the palm, except as he did, the scholarly fiend-devil and Dream Mintdance attacked from the left and right.

Dugu Space-Maimer flipped about like a loach to avoid the various attacks, but he was unfortunately unable to dodge the blood-colored light from Lord Blood River, and it slammed into him.

“Blood Detonation!”

“Heart-Devil!”

Lord Blood River had been waiting for this moment, and quickly unleashed a secret magic, causing rumbling explosions to be heard from within Dugu Space-Maimer. As it turned out, Lord Blood River had used a blood-type energy art on Dugu Space-Maimer long ago, and now he was activating it, completely devastating him.

“You... you really were plotting against me from the beginning!” Dugu Space-Maimer shrieked. “I was so careful, but I still fell into your trap!”

“Yes! I fooled you! You used to be so vigilant, but after I was captured and imprisoned, you thought you were free to let your guard down and started cultivating with the energy I gave you. Little did you know that the Blood River True Sutra was created by a powerful blood god, and although you were able to use it to achieve quick breakthroughs, I can still ‘use blood to control blood’. And now, I'm going to use it to kill you!”

BOOOOOOM!

Dugu Space-Maimer screamed as he literally exploded into a cloud of blood and gore that Lord Blood River quickly absorbed. Then, Lord Blood River cackled as countless clouds of blood appeared above his head and his energy fluctuations reached a supreme level.

Obviously, he had just succeeded in mastering a powerful energy art.

Swish!

He flicked his finger and the blood clouds were sucked back into his body. Looking over at God-General Crystallaine, he said, “Screw off. The position of league-lord hasn’t been assigned yet, so the Shepherd can just keep waiting if he wants it.”

“Fine, Lord Blood River,” God-General Crystallaine said, anger visible on his face. “Be obstinate if you want. But your refusal to give a bit of face today has just ensured that, when the general assembly comes, the Shepherd will make sure you’re the first to die!”

“He can go ahead and try if he wants,” Lord Blood River replied. “But I'm fully recovered, and ready to dominate everything under heaven. And I'm curious to see what the Shepherd is actually capable of nowadays.”

“So be it. Just remember that after the assembly starts, you won’t be able to run and hide.” With that, God-General Crystallaine turned and left.

Meanwhile, the mahātmā fiend-devil looked on with a vicious glint in his eyes. Years ago, his clan had been purged and he had been forced to flee the Hell of Sages and Mahātmās. His plan had been to make a comeback using the sheepskin scroll, only to end up having to join Lord Blood River. Now that he had seen Lord Blood River’s energy arts in action, he was even more worried than before. It seemed obvious to him that it was only a matter of time before Lord Blood River would try assimilating him.

“That was odd,” the mahātmā fiend-devil said. “Lord Blood River, did you notice that when you fought God-General Crystallaine, the Shepherd didn’t show up to intervene, even though you clearly defied him? It stands to reason that he should’ve done something. It seems to me this indicates there's something else going on behind the scenes.”

“There’s only one possibility,” Lord Blood River said, “which is that the Shepherd hasn’t recovered yet. If he had, he should be able to dominate everything in existence. Besides, if he was hurt by the emperor of the executors, and also Proud Heaven, then how could he recover in such a short time? The fact that he didn’t show his face only shows how weak he is right now! Besides, if he actually tried to enforce those rules of his, the city would revolt. He’s not the league-lord, so he has no right to act like one.”

“True, true,” said a new voice.

A host of fiend-devils appeared, led by a bronzeblaze fiend-devil in bronze armor. Normally speaking, bronzeblaze fiend-devils were considered low-level devils that others looked down on. But this one was different. He was surrounded by flickering halos that indicated he was the kind of bronzeblaze fiend-devil that came along only once every several millions years.

“Well, if it isn’t Lord Blaze,” Lord Blood River said, smiling. “Sorry you had to witness that.”

“I came to suggest an alliance between the two of us, to counter the Shepherd. Presumably, he’s recovering from his injuries in hiding somewhere, and will only make his move during the assembly. He’ll obviously try to crush any resistance and force everyone to submit to him, and we can’t give him that chance. How are your energy arts, Lord Blood River? Do you think you could beat me in a fight?”

Lord Blood River’s eyes widened. “I’d say the two of us are on almost exactly the same level, Lord Blaze. I definitely couldn’t easily beat you. In fact, it seems to me that you recently mastered some sort of invincible grand magic, leading me to wonder if you might actually come out the winner in a fight.”

“Does that mean you aren’t confident in being able to seize the position of league-lord?” Lord Blaze asked.

Lord Blood River looked at Lord Blaze and the other fiend-devils flanking him, all of them famous experts from the Ancient Road to the Gods. Sounding much less arrogant than before, he said, “There are many experts among us fiend-devils, and although I've made some progress with my energy arts, I can’t say that I'm confident in becoming the league-lord.”

Smiling, Lord Blaze said, “I feel equally unconfident. That's why we need to throw our backing behind someone who can win. If we help that person become the league-lord, we’ll all have very high positions in the future Fiend-Devil League along with a measure of protection against the scheming and plotting of our enemies. For instance, if the Shepherd takes the position, then one of the first people he’ll kill is this mahātmā from the old Sikong Clan.”

“You’re right,” said the mahātmā fiend-devil, “the Shepherd will definitely kill me.”

“So you’ve already decided to back someone? Who?” Lord Blood River knew that although Lord Blaze was a relatively despised type of fiend-devil, he was still an extremely powerful entity who was virtually invincible in battle.

“Come with me and you’ll find out,” Lord Blaze Said. “Don’t worry, it’s not a trap. In fact, he sent a gift with us to show his goodwill.” He waved his hand, and another of the fiend-devils stepped forward with a box. Opening it, he revealed a blood ginseng root that was shaped like a person, and even pulsed as though it had a heartbeat.

“What? That’s a blood infant from the god world, one of the best types of blood ginseng in existence. Supposedly, they were originally grown using the blood of a Paramount God. I searched the Ancient Road to the Gods high and low for such ginseng roots, all to no avail. And this backer of yours is just giving one to me?”

“That’s right. Take it. Now you know how this person operates. Go ahead and inspect the blood infant and you’ll see it doesn't contain any impurities or warding magics. It’s completely safe. Although I could benefit from using it, you could obviously benefit much more. It can turn your blood into the blood of a Paramount God, making you far more deadly than before. After the scuffle earlier, you’re definitely going to be a top target for the Shepherd’s subordinates. But going forward, plotting against you will be like trying to clap with one hand. Join us, and my backer will make sure that you reach the mid Terrifying level.”

“What? The mid Terrifying level?!”

In that moment, Lord Blood River realized that there is always a heaven beyond heaven, and there are always people more important than you.

Curious, he followed Lord Blaze to another room in the same building. Upon entering, he saw a tall, well-built man with his back to him.

The man turned, and Lord Blood River shivered. “Proud Heaven!?”

“Wrong, I'm Proud World,” the man said coolly. “Please, have a seat, Lord Blood River.”

The man’s energy was so intense that Lord Blood River could hardly move.

“I'm sure you’ve heard of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, and how the bearer of the God Legion Seal can crush hells. In hell, the godmammoths’ orders must be followed, with death as the penalty for disobedience.”

**

All of a sudden, Yang Qi opened his eyes, having been struck with a very strange feeling.

He had been in a zen samādhi trance just now, focusing his psychic power and using the Civilization Founding Grand Magic to stand on the River of Civilization and examine the epic sagas of past cultures. With the help of Archmonk Dharma Treasury, he was gaining more enlightenment, and his psychic power was improving. Sooner or later, he would reach the Terrifying level.

A moment after Yang Qi opened his eyes, Archmonk Dharma Treasury did the same. “Is something troubling you, young friend? Were you just struck with a strange feeling? Did you experience a premonition? When Fateless Ones are struck with strange feelings, it usually means something big is about to happen. Considering you’re a Fateless One, we should be able to steal that jade medallion before the Shepherd even senses anything happening.”

Chapter 1018: Jade Medallion

This was another benefit that Yang Qi had gained from being a Fateless One.

When a high-level expert was about to face a dangerous situation, they would often experience a sudden strange feeling, and as a result they would often be able to ascertain the nature of the upcoming event. But with Yang Qi, that didn’t happen. When he plotted against some top expert, the fact that he didn’t exist in the river of fate meant that they wouldn’t be able to sense him.

Archmonk Dharma Treasury knew that, which was one reason why he recruited Yang Qi to help deal with the Shepherd.

Given the level of the Shepherd’s cultivation base, and his deep understanding of the workings of heaven, he should have easily been able to discern what was going on. Archmonk Dharma Treasury should never have been able to secretly plot to take the jade medallion from him.

But now, even if the Shepherd’s cultivation base were stronger, he would still have no idea what was going on.

This was another reason why Fateless Ones were considered much more deadly than any of the other three thousand constitutions. Not even professional assassins could do what Fateless Ones could do.

“Senior, I did just have a strange feeling,” Yang Qi said. “Whenever that happens to me, something big happens. Unfortunately, I don’t have Terrifying will, which makes it impossible for me to divine the details.”

“Sadly, there’s nothing that can be done about that. However, thanks to being in your vicinity, I was able to borrow your aura to hide from the workings of heaven and divine some new information. Thanks to you being a Fateless One, the Shepherd still has no clue of what we’re doing. I’d say we have a very good chance of getting our hands on the jade medallion. However, I do have one request that I hope you can agree to, Young Hero.”

“What is it? Please, just ask, Grandmaster.”

“I hope to have a drop of your blood, Young Hero,” Archmonk Dharma Treasury said. “With it, I can power my buddhist predestination divine abilities to an unprecedented level. I should be able to divine much more information; for instance, the exact location of both the medallion and the Shepherd. That would improve our chances even more. I was able to confirm that the Shepherd is working on his cultivation and is in the middle of working on a very powerful divine ability. If he succeeds, we’ll most likely fail and die. Therefore, we have to identify a weakness in his cultivation and use that to strike at just the right moment, get the medallion, and make our escape.”

Yang Qi thought about it, and it made sense. It was common for people to experience moments of weakness during their cultivation. The lower the cultivation level, the longer those periods of time could last. In the mortal world, some people would end up stuck in such a state for years.

For immortals, it usually wouldn't last for more than a few hours.

For Godmyths, the time would be even shorter. And for those in the Terrifying level, it might last for the blink of an eye, or even a fraction of that amount of time. For someone as incredibly powerful as the Shepherd, a moment like that would pass by so quickly that it would be virtually impossible for anyone to take advantage of it.

Archmonk Dharma Treasury wanted to use a drop of Fateless blood to take advantage of that moment of weakness. It was a very dangerous plan, and they would likely die if it failed.

“In that case, Grandmaster, take a drop of my blood.” Yang Qi waved his finger, sending out a single drop of scintillating blood that thrummed as though it were a universe of its own, pulsing with incredible fluctuations filled with the sound of slaughter, war drums, and thunder and lightning.

“This blood contains the godpower of the True Devil, as well as the power of a Fateless One. I can also sense the constitutions of an Eternal One and a Fortuned One. Don’t tell me you….” Archmonk Dharma Treasury looked over in shock.

“I did. I killed both an Eternal One and a Fortuned One, and assimilated their blood. My blood contains many aspects, Grandmaster, and they should all prove helpful.”

“Sādhu, sādhu! Another rare prodigy has appeared in heaven and earth. Who you kill is your business, young friend, and although it's not my place to offer my opinion, I can’t hold back from reminding you that the less killing you do, the better. When you kill living beings, you accept their karma. The more killing you do, the more karma you accept. And in the end, there will always be a reckoning….”

“You're right, Grandmaster,” Yang Qi said. “However, influxes of karma can also come when taking the faith of others. And if the original Buddha himself could ask for the faith of his followers, doesn’t that mean that he accepted the karma of all living beings?”

“As a representative of the original Buddha, I can accept the karma of living beings,” Archmonk Dharma Treasury said. “Compassion cometh from Buddha. You see, buddhism is an empty void. When the faith of living beings returns to that void, it becomes lifeless and destructionless. Buddhism destroys karma. That said, there are some Seniors of the buddhist schools in the god world who haven’t achieved the true state of the void yet, and end up being destroyed by karma. It’s a true tragedy.”

“So, that’s how it is.” Yang Qi was impressed by how blunt Archmonk Dharma Treasury was being. The fact that he directly stated that there were buddhas in the god world who died as a result of being unable to deal with karma indicated that he had truly engaged in deep study and research of the truths of buddhism. It made sense. Otherwise, how could he claim to be an Archmonk?

“Grandmaster, please, refine that drop of blood,” Yang Qi said.

“Compassion cometh from Buddha. Young friend, the fact that you’ve given your blood to subdue the devils will bring future blessings to you. Your ill fortune shall turn to good luck, and danger will become auspicious for you.” Archmonk Dharma Treasury pushed his palms together in front of him, enclasping the drop of blood, which he quickly absorbed. A moment later, he shivered, and buddhist light sprang out from him.

Within that buddhist light were countless streams of karma that eventually locked on to a certain individual, revealing him and his surroundings.

He was dressed all in black, including a flowing cloak with a hood that hid his facial features. He sat cross-legged with a shepherd’s crook on his knees. He wasn’t moving or emitting any magical fluctuations, yet from what Yang Qi could tell, he obviously had profound devil arts that were in the realm of the Four Devils Combined.

Heaven-devils. Earth-Devils. Man-Devils. Heart-devils.

When those four devils were combined, they created a true devil, one that could dominate the universe and conquer the god world. The ‘sheep’ from the sheepskin scroll was the same sheep from ‘shepherd’, and it represented all living things. And thus, the Shepherd was someone who tended to all living beings.

“This person’s cultivation base is terrifying! If Archmonk Dharma Treasury hadn’t used my Fateless blood, he definitely would’ve noticed us. And killed us! His cultivation base is definitely at or above the level of whatever expert recently tried to kill me with sword energy.”

Up to this point, the strongest expert Yang Qi had ever faced was the mysterious person that rescued Empress Joyflower.

He had almost lost his life in that encounter, and it was his first time since beginning to cultivate the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body that he had been seriously injured.

“Pay attention,” the Archmonk said. “When my physical body starts to crumble, you must infuse me with your true energy. Then I’ll use my Buddha Goes to a Strange World to try to locate the jade medallion.”

More light spilled forth, and the image expanded.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi could hear creaking and cracking sounds coming from inside Archmonk Dharma Treasury. It really did seem like he was using some powerful divine ability that was about to cause his body to crumble.

Thankfully, Yang Qi’s true energy had already surpassed that of an actual Terrifying expert. Quickly drawing on the power of twenty-four tribulations, he bolstered the archmonk's body. As a result, the power causing the crumbling was transferred to him, and cracking sounds rang out from inside him.

Remaining calm, he used the power of tribulations to suppress it.

After getting the Three Lives Stone, he had reached a higher level of enlightenment, and his body had become so strong that it could sustain forces that even Terrifying experts could not. In fact, the force right now was so strong that it definitely would have killed the Wretch God Apostle.

Archmonk Dharma Treasury had recruited the perfect person.

“Your physical body is incredible, Young Hero. It even surpasses the indestructible vajra bodies of the buddhist schools. Once, long ago, I met a devil who cultivated the same body technique as yours, a devil who had joined a buddhist school and cultivated a combination of righteous and evil cultivation methods. However, after reaching the level of thirty tribulations, he died. I have to say, if that devil were here today, not even he would be able to stand up to the destructive force of Buddha Goes to a Strange World. I'm completely astonished.”

“Don’t worry, Grandmaster, I’ll make sure to keep your body intact. Please, just use your divine ability to find that jade, then we can get out of here.”

“Very well. Young Hero, keep your divine will and tribulation energy focused on my nascent divinity, and we can both act together. If necessary, I’ll hold the Shepherd at bay while you take the jade and escape.”

“Er… Grandmaster, there’s no need for you to sacrifice yourself. Really.”

“That’s the only plan that will work. Young friend, I know that you’re from the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect, which is a righteous and orthodox sect. Remember, that jade medallion is not a magical treasure, it’s something extremely dangerous. And it’s a symbol to these wretch-devils that we cannot allow to exist.”

“Alright,” Yang Qi said. “I’ll do what I have to.”

“In that case, the success of this mission will be up to you.” Archmonk Dharma Treasury continued his work, and his body began crumbling even more dramatically.

That was when an altar became visible in front of the Shepherd, upon which was a jade medallion.

Chapter 1019: Buddha Goes to a Strange World

The medallion was incomplete. However, it was surrounded by marks of damage that made it clear that people had tried to take it in the past, but failed. With one look, Yang Qi knew that it was anything but ordinary. In fact, it immediately seemed to latch on to his soul, creating some sort of strange connection to him.

‘That’s definitely a piece of Mahātmā Jade,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘However, it's been sealed by something very powerful. Despite the generations that have passed, no devils have ever realized what it really is. But the Wretch God Apostle got some of the will of the true Wretch God from the god world, thus gaining a bit of information about it. Not even Archmonk Dharma Treasury, with his unfathomable cultivation base, knows what it is. If I can get it, I’ll finally be able to improve my psychic power, without using the psychic scaling systems.’

Yang Qi looked over at the Shepherd, who was performing breathing exercises right in front of the Mahātmā Jade. Every time he inhaled, the jade would tremble as though it were pulsing with immense power.

It stood to reason that the Shepherd was so strong he was invincible. His mere breathing could destroy universes, yet it wasn’t doing anything to the Mahātmā Jade.

If it really was that heavy, it must be very difficult to lift up.

Yang Qi’s first impulse was to try to take it. However, he knew that a slip the width of a single hair can lead you a thousand miles astray, therefore, the best thing to do was rely on Archmonk Dharma Treasury and his cultivation base.

Besides, when the archmonk made his move, it would always be possible for Yang Qi to take action on his own if necessary. And once he got the jade, he should be able to improve his will conversion quickly, even stepping into the Terrifying level.

He had to wonder if he would unlock any new abilities upon reaching that next level. Things were always changing, and he had no idea what would happen next. For years and years, he had always used the God Legion Seal, but after vanquishing his dependency-devils, he had begun relying on himself instead.

Perhaps once he reached the Terrifying level, he would be able to fuse all of the various energy arts he had into something of his very own.

“Buddha Goes to a Strange World!” shouted the Archmonk. At the same time, Yang Qi kept his will focused on the archmonk’s nascent divinity. In the blink of an eye, he felt himself become incredibly tiny, as though he were standing on the shoulder of an immensely gargantuan golden buddha.

That, of course, was the will of Archmonk Dharma Treasury, an expert whose psychic scale was above twenty. Of course, that was still very far from the mid Terrifying level. Only by having a psychic scale of a hundred could one be considered that strong.

‘Wait,’ Yang Qi thought, ‘if the Shepherd is in the mid Terrifying level, that means he has a psychic scale of at least a hundred. That’s simply too heaven-defying! I'm definitely no match for him.’

As Yang Qi watched on, Archmonk Dharma Treasury’s nascent divinity rapidly shrank, as did the manifestation of Yang Qi’s will on his shoulder. Soon, the archmonk was human-sized, and completely transparent.

With that, they stepped into the stone chamber with the Shepherd.

The Shepherd didn’t notice them, and just continued with his breathing exercises.

Buddha Goes to a Strange World was a truly shocking technique, and that was especially so considering it was backed with Fateless blood.

Of course, they were only there as projections of will. If they were there in their true bodies, the Shepherd definitely would have noticed them. The difference between the two states was vast. Meanwhile, Yang Qi sensed the Terrifying fluctuations coming off of the Shepherd, and they made him feel like he was being suffocated.

Luckily, Archmonk Dharma Treasury was there protecting him.

All of a sudden, Archmonk Dharma Treasury went motionless as he focused completely on the jade medallion. At the same time, Yang Qi poured more true energy from his fleshly body into the archmonk’s. From what he could tell, without that aid, the archmonk’s body would already have collapsed, and he would be dead.

‘That divine ability is ridiculously draining. It eats away at the fleshly body so quickly that it's outrageous. Without my help, he would already be completely and utterly dead!’

RUMBLE!

As his true energy circulated into and out of Archmonk Dharma Treasury’s body, he was filled with immense pain. However, he treated the pain as tribulations, and had no problems.

Meanwhile, Archmonk Dharma Treasury was waiting for the perfect moment to act.

All of a sudden, the Shepherd inhaled and exhaled, then did the same again. As a result, two streams of energy appeared, which appeared to Yang Qi to be two serpentine dragons above the Shepherd’s head. Both were immensely fierce, golden in color, and seemed designed to be the bane of devils and monsters.

Unexpectedly, it was a manifestation of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth!

‘That’s Proud Heaven’s version of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth!’ To Yang Qi’s complete and utter shock, the Shepherd had obviously sustained a blow from Proud Heaven! And he now had some of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth inside him, which he couldn’t assimilate and was continuously inflicting damage on him.

There were traces of another energy art inside him, this one green. In fact, it reminded him of the All-Eternity Spring-Autumn Annalist God-Dao Scripture used by Patriarch Annalist, except vastly stronger.

Based on the ferocity, profundity, and power of that energy art, it had to be from the Executors of the Ancient Road. All of a sudden, Yang Qi realized that the Shepherd must have been struck by both Proud Heaven and the emperor of the executors. Although he had survived, he was seriously injured and was still trying to extrude the two types of energy that had remained within him.

All of a sudden, a howl erupted from within the Shepherd. It wasn’t coming from the Shepherd himself, but rather the true energy inside of him. A stream of white energy flowed forth and slammed into the other two energy flows, shoving them toward the top of his head.

If he expelled them, he would recover his true strength and would definitely dominate the general assembly of fiend-devils.

“This is the moment!” Archmonk Dharma Treasury said, suddenly bursting into action and sending all of his will rushing toward the altar. However, when it wrapped around the jade medallion, nothing happened. “Young friend!”

Yang Qi quickly sent his own will out, creating an invisible hand with the power of the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body.

RUMBLE!

As soon as his will contacted the jade, he felt like he was slipping into an endlessly spinning vortex. Even his soul and psyche seemed to be sucked inside. Not only was he failing to pick up the jade, he had made himself absolutely defenseless.

‘Crap! How could this be happening?!’ In the blink of an eye, Yang Qi felt like his own fleshly body was about to crumble to pieces.

One by one, the power of the twenty-four tribulations within him began fading away.

All of his energy arts were being abolished!

“What’s going on?” Archmonk Dharma Treasury said, sensing that something was going wrong.

“Who’s there?” a voice asked, rumbling like thunder. All of a sudden, the Shepherd opened his eyes and detected the wills of Yang Qi and Archmonk Dharma Treasury.

“Get out of here!” Archmonk Dharma Treasury barked. “I’ll buy you some time. Forget about me!”

“I can’t move!” Yang Qi said, even as his fleshly body began withering. “It's the jade. It’s absorbing my power.”

“How dare you people sneak into my home!” the Shepherd said. Suddenly, rumbling sounds could be heard as two streams of energy were shoved out of the top of his head. Instantly, his wounds recovered and he returned to his previous peak.

His psychic scale rose, and at the same time, the two streams of energy shot toward Yang Qi and Archmonk Dharma Treasury.

“Damn, he’s awake!” Archmonk Dharma Treasury said. “I’m afraid we’re both going to lose our lives here....”

An attack from Proud Heaven and an attack from the Executors of the Ancient Road closed in on Yang Qi and Archmonk Dharma Treasury. Acting quickly, Yang Qi pulled his fleshly body into the chamber and used it to block the two streams of true energy.

“Hurry! Run!”

Thrusting his palm out, he sent Archmonk Dharma Treasury’s nascent divinity flying back, leaving himself alone in the chamber.

Back in their assigned accommodations, Archmonk Dharma Treasury opened his eyes and looked around in shock. As of now, he had no idea what was happening back in the chamber. “My new young friend saved me? And I failed. I failed! But what will happen to him?”

Of course, Archmonk Dharma Treasury had no way of knowing that Yang Qi was actually very pleased by the development. ‘You can wear out iron shoes in a fruitless search, then find what you're looking for without even trying. And that’s exactly what's happening here. I won’t be dying anytime soon!’

As soon as the two streams of energy entered him, they provoked dramatic transformations. That was especially true of Proud Heaven’s version of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. After years of trying to refine it, the Shepherd had long since removed virtually all traces of Proud Heaven’s will, leaving behind only pure quintessence energy. That was why he had finally been able to extrude it. Therefore, the instant it entered Yang Qi, it stimulated his own Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, combining with his true energy and pushing his cultivation base to a higher level.

Crack. Rattle.

His True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body instantly recovered, and the power of tribulations flowed through him, shoving the green-colored energy into the jade medallion.

Suddenly, the medallion twitched and Yang Qi picked it up.

Chapter 1020: Receiving Blessings

Yang Qi had truly benefited from this disaster. The Shepherd couldn’t have made more of a critical mistake than sending Proud Heaven’s version of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth into Yang Qi.

After all, Proud Heaven had cultivated the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth to a far, far higher level than Yang Qi. Normally speaking, even a bit of it would have been too much for anyone to defend against. And if Proud Heaven himself had unleashed that energy, it would have been backed by his will, and Yang Qi would have been killed instantly.

However, that energy had been inside the Shepherd for years, during which time he had worked very hard to refine it, and ultimately shed himself of it.

Just as he did, Yang Qi showed up and tried to take the jade medallion. Therefore, he decided to use that energy as a coup de grâce. Unfortunately, the opposite happened and he ended up saving Yang Qi’s life.

The moment Yang Qi’s version of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth combined with Proud Heaven’s, dramatic and unpredictable transformations occurred.

The energy art that Proud Heaven had so meticulously refined with his own will was now flowing through Yang Qi.

Most important of all, Proud Heaven’s version was very different, and contained numerous profound mysteries. For all intents and purposes, Yang Qi may as well have just acquired a second God Legion Seal. The moment it happened, the true energy of his that the jade medallion had been absorbing was returned to him.

Suddenly, Yang Qi felt his psyche reach a more consummate level, and his psychic scale began rising.

Three. Four. Five. Six. Seven.... When it reached eight, it finally stopped. Yang Qi had just risen from three to eight.

Someone with ordinary Terrifying will would have a psychic scale of one. As they practiced their cultivation, they would climb to higher levels. And each level on the scale was double the strength of the previous. As a result, the Terrifying level was broken up into three major sections, with the highest being on the same level as god-spirits.

Most of the Terrifying experts Yang Qi had seen were under the level of ten, and people like that couldn’t even come close to comparing with the Shepherd.

As the Shepherd looked at him, Yang Qi felt like he was going to melt.

Quickly thrusting out the jade medallion, he used it to block the man’s gaze.

The psychic power in those eyes was the kind that would spell doom to anyone they looked at. Even if it was a more powerful person than Yang Qi who was gazed upon by the Shepherd, they would be chopped into mincemeat.

However, the powerful gravitational force exerted by the jade medallion instantly absorbed the Shepherd’s psychic power.

The medallion began to glow brightly, the light entering Yang Qi, flowing to the psychic power in his mind, cleansing and bolstering it.

His psychic scale began skyrocketing yet again.

RUMBLE!

Ten. Eleven. Twelve. Thirteen. Fourteen. Fifteen. Sixteen. Seventeen.... Eighteen! Only then did it stop, and only because the Shepherd had reined in his gaze, having been cowed by the jade medallion.

‘This medallion is a real treasure. The Mahātmā Jade really lives up to its reputation. That said, it's dangerous to work with, as it could theoretically absorb whoever gets too close to it!’ Taking advantage of the moment, he summoned a vortex behind him and jumped into it.

Without that Mahātmā Jade to absorb the psychic power of the Shepherd, he wouldn’t have lasted for a moment, and probably wouldn’t have been able to escape via the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

RIP!

The Shepherd leaped forward and thrust his palm out, but all he managed to do was grab a bit of Yang Qi’s garment. However, that scrap of cloth contained traces of the aura of the gods, provoking a very unsightly look on the Shepherd’s face.

“The Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth?” he growled in a grating voice. “And not the kind that Proud Heaven used....”

SPLAT!

As soon as Yang Qi was in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, he vomited up a huge mouthful of blood, dropped the jade medallion, then flopped onto the ground. On his back was a smoking palm print, the power of which had spread to cover nearly all of Yang Qi’s skin, turning it pitch black.

“What happened!?” the immortal-slaying clone asked, rushing over and pouring some true energy into him. As a result, some of the blackness spread to the clone. Obviously, Yang Qi had been hit with some sort of extremely powerful poison. Without hesitation, the clone severed his own arm, then watched as it was consumed by the darkness and melted into a black liquid.

The clone sent numerous types of fire out to try to refine and absorb the liquid, but none worked. “Such a powerful poison!”

He quickly opened a way out of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart and sent the poison away to parts unknown.

“I'm fine,” Yang Qi said, settling into a seated position. “But don’t get near me. The Shepherd’s poison is far too powerful. He hit me right before I got here, and although I'm not sure what energy art he used, I do know that I can eventually extrude it with the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth and the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body.”

He drew on his energy arts, and after a bit of time, coughed up a conglomeration of toxic energy that turned into a black śarīra. “A toxic śarīra of immense power! Luckily my psychic scale has risen to eighteen, otherwise that poison would have been impossible to get rid of! Now that I have the poison under control, I need to go into seclusion and stabilize my psychic power.”

“Sounds like you came out on top,” the clone said, picking up the jade medallion. He sent some true energy and psychic power into it to examine it, but nothing happened. Inside the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, not even the Mahātmā Jade could absorb the clone’s life or psyche. It was too deeply connected to the chart, to the point where he was one with it.

On the other hand, the clone couldn’t actually do anything to the jade. It was only Yang Qi that could do so with the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body.

Yang Qi went on to focus on his cultivation. Unfortunately, even though he seemed just on the verge of reaching the Terrifying level, he still couldn’t achieve the breakthrough. In terms of psychic scale, he had long since reached the point of being able to break through. But for some reason, he couldn't.

Rumbling sounds echoed out as the power of tribulations coursed through him, and the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth caused the trumpeting of megamammoths to fill the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Proud Heaven had gone all out in his attempt to kill the Shepherd, and the fact that the man had lived through it went to show how profound his cultivation base was.

Conversely, Yang Qi could sense how profound this aspect of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth was. And now it belonged to him and him alone. Even if he lost his God Legion Seal, he wouldn’t lose this.

“Bow of Chastisement. God-Wrath Arrow!” He fired an experimental shot up into the air, which became a streak of golden light pulsing with the quintessence of the will of fighting.

‘Now I understand,’ he thought. In that moment, he came to realize the core meaning of Proud Heaven’s version of the God Legion Seal. It contained the most supreme will of fighting. That was a contrast to his own, which was focused on supreme power. Presumably, the God Legion Seal from the Primeval Age contained the supreme psyche.

When they were combined, the supreme psyche would exercise control over the supreme power and unleash the supreme will of fighting.

Because of that, although Proud Heaven was still very strong, he hadn’t reached godly ascension yet. He had neither power, nor the psyche to strengthen his ultimate essence. He could rock all of creation, transform the greater scene of things, and wage war on the Primeval Age and the Immortal Dao Age.

But he could not reach the level of the legion of gods.

‘Ah, Proud Heaven,’ Yang Qi mused. ‘Just exactly how strong are you when you’re fighting?’ He chuckled. ‘If I continue to use and study your fighting will, combining it with the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body will surely lead to unprecedented fighting quintessence. I have the supreme power, plus fighting will. And now I have some Mahātmā Jade. With all of that, I can guarantee that you're going to end up dead, Proud Heaven.’

“Yang Qi,” his clone said, “that’s definitely Mahātmā Jade. Why aren’t you using it to power up?”

“Because I just nearly died to get it. I don’t want to use it before studying it further. I have the Three Lives Stone and the sheepskin scroll. What I need to do next is capture an enemy and force them to cultivate the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body. Then I can test out what the Mahātmā Jade can do.”

Chapter 1021: Study and Research

‘I have to speed up my cultivation,’ Yang Qi thought. He reached out and grabbed a eunuch from the Joyflower Palace, a vicious fellow who had taken too many lives to count and was constantly encircled by the images of swirling ghosts. Peering into his fate, Yang Qi could see the blood-red color of karma. Obviously, this man had killed and tortured so many individuals that their animosity had laid a curse on his fate.

Although Yang Qi had also killed too many enemies to count, as a Fateless One, he wasn’t affected in the same way, even if people tried to curse him directly.

Right now, Yang Qi was hoping to learn a thing or two from this eunuch. Despite being held captive, the eunuch was just as fiendish as ever and fairly radiated an air of ruthlessness. His vicious eyes darted back and forth, making him look like a viper that might try to bite Yang Qi at any moment.

Yang Qi had no desire to have such a person as one of his subordinates, so he simply slapped him with a palm, forcing the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body into him.

The eunuch shivered as explosive vital energy coursed into him. “You’re using me to do research, boy!? Fine! I’ll cultivate this technique to the point where I can cut you down and possess you!”

Soon, popping sounds rang out inside him, and tribulation energy surged as he reached the level of four tribulations.

Yang Qi let the process go on for a bit, then hit the eunuch with another palm strike. “Circulate your psychic power and send it into this ancient jade!”

THUMP!

The eunuch struggled, but couldn’t resist Yang Qi. Before long, his psychic power was being extracted from his nascent divinity and sent into the Mahātmā Jade.

As soon as the jade was stimulated, it emitted a faint glow, within which was a gravitational force.

Whooooosh!

The eunuch screamed shrilly, and writhed within Yang Qi’s grasp. Within moments, all of his blood had been sucked out of him and he was left as nothing but an empty husk. His sea of consciousness was empty, and he was no more.

Completely gone.

Utterly and thoroughly vanished from within heaven and earth.

Not even his soul remained in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. It had been instantly absorbed by the Mahātmā Jade.

Yang Qi was actually startled, as he realized that if he blithely experimented on his own, with his own psychic power, he would also have been turned into a desiccated corpse by the Mahātmā Jade.

With that, he produced another vicious character from the Joyflower Palace, a burly consort that had slaughtered too many people to count. He was obviously the kind of villainous person who would never turn over a new leaf, no matter what happened.

Yang Qi first had him try to use his true energy to pick up the Mahātmā Jade, but such efforts were useless. It was too heavy. In fact, the only reason the immortal-slaying clone had been able to lift it was because he exercised complete command over everything in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

“Cultivate this,” Yang Qi ordered, and imparted the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body to the burly man with a palm strike. Soon, the man had reached the level of ten tribulations and was getting so strong that it seemed he was getting ready to break free and fight back against Yang Qi. Sadly for him, Yang Qi’s psychic scale was at eighteen, so there was no way he was a match for him.

The man shouted in rage, but had no choice but to follow Yang Qi’s orders.

This time, the jade didn’t absorb his psychic power. Instead, a stream of psychic power flowed back into him, causing him to suddenly rocket toward the Terrifying level.

Looking closer, Yang Qi realized that the burly man had absorbed the psychic power that had been taken from the eunuch, and was using it to reach a higher level.

‘Don’t tell me you have to use it to kill someone before using it for a breakthrough,’ Yang Qi thought. Meanwhile, the burly man already thought he was invincible, and turned to start fighting Yang Qi. However, Yang Qi slapped him off his feet with a palm and said, “Send your psychic power into that jade again!”

The man had no choice but to follow the order.

Instantly, a soft light seeped out of the jade and the burly man sighed in resignation. In the blink of an eye, all of his psychic power, flesh, and blood were sucked into the jade, and he withered into a desiccated husk.

Yang Qi was stunned. Apparently his previous supposition had been correct. Clearly, the Mahātmā Jade would only be useful to someone who cultivated the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body. But the Shepherd didn’t cultivate that technique, so how had he been able to manipulate it?

Meanwhile, the immortal-slaying clone watched as the two corpses slowly collapsed into ashes. Glancing over at Yang Qi, who was simply sitting there in deep thought, he asked, “Well, what do you think? Did your experiments succeed?”

“I'm not sure yet,” Yang Qi replied quietly. “By the way, what does it feel like when you hold that jade?”

The clone shook his head. “It feels like I’m trying to pick up a mountain. It's only with the power of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart that I can even budge it. Now that I've reached the Terrifying level, I have access to more functions of the chart. With that, and the Engine of the One God, I could probably uproot ancient mountains from the god world.”

“I need to do some more experiments. Maybe I’ll even try to use the God Legion Seal or King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions on it. This might even be the key to finally breaking free from the threat of King Immortal-Slayer, as well as the seal.”

Thus, Yang Qi continued with his studying. Not only was he improving his cultivation, but he was also figuring out ways to fully break free from the shackles imposed by the God Legion Seal. Once he pushed his abilities to the highest level, and increased his psychic power, then it would no longer matter who he faced. Fiend-Devil League. Executors of the Ancient Road. Proud Heaven. Or even the person from the Primeval Age with a God Legion Seal. He would definitely be able to keep himself safe.

Although he had a psychic scale of eighteen, he was fully aware that there were experts out there whose scales surpassed a hundred. For example, the emperor of the executors, Proud Heaven, and most likely the Shepherd as well.

Time passed, and he performed experiments on over a hundred vicious captives. The results were very confusing. Sometimes people who used the jade to improve their True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body would experience breakthroughs. Others would get absorbed. Some who used it a second time would actually experience more breakthroughs, while others would die.

Yang Qi couldn’t make heads nor tails of it.

There was only one constant. All of them ended up dying in the end, their psychic power and tribulation energy sucked into the depths of the Mahātmā Jade.

As for the jade, nothing seemed to happen to it. It was almost as if some mysterious entity lurked inside, ravenously devouring everything. So far, Yang Qi wasn’t able to discern any sort of pattern or rule to it all.

His original assumption had been that the jade would absorb someone, then give their power to the next person. But after experimenting with over a hundred villains, he found that his theory was incorrect. Some people would experience two or three breakthroughs and immense increases in energy arts, then ultimately die.

Occasionally, people were able to use the jade four or five times before dying.

Yang Qi had no idea what it all meant, and couldn’t even guess at what the requirements of the jade were. And he had no idea whether or not sending his own psychic power into the jade would end with his death.

Furthermore, there didn’t seem to be any special benefit to the psychic power that the jade would release. After all, Yang Qi himself had plenty of energy arts that could absorb his enemies’ souls, psychic power, and energy arts.

However, as he continued to do his research, he realized that there was something odd going on. There didn’t seem to be any limit to what the jade could provide.

For example, Yang Qi, who had a psychic scale of eighteen, could go around killing all sorts of enemies with immense psychic power, but it wouldn’t help him reach a higher level. That was how things usually worked. The only way to achieve breakthroughs was to practice cultivation, acquire enlightenment of magical laws, and slowly build up psychic power.

But the Mahātmā Jade was different. When it absorbed psychic power, then released it, that power had no limitations. It would be directly added to the psyche of whoever took it.

Yang Qi had previously had a psychic scale of three. Then, thanks to the Shepherd’s psychic power that had been unleashed on him by the Mahātmā Jade, he had instantly jumped to eighteen.

Even if the Shepherd had intentionally attempted to bless Yang Qi, there was no way he could have pushed him even to the level of four. And if he exerted himself too much in that regard, he would have damaged, or even destroyed his nascent divinity.

But the Mahātmā Jade operated completely differently.

It was in defiance of heaven, the dao, gods, immortals, and all creation. There were simply no words to accurately describe how shocking it was.

Yang Qi conducted such research for about a hundred years, using over a thousand evil characters in the process. Some of them started out at extremely low levels, for instance, Grand Emperors with power indexes in the hundreds, and only Stupendous will. Then, in the blink of an eye, they would reach the Destabilizing level, and eventually become Terrifying experts with a psychic power of five.

Such people would often arrogantly try to kill Yang Qi, only to be slapped into submission by him and forced to continue working with the Mahātmā Jade.

Even the luckiest among them would never last more than about five times working with the jade before they were sucked dry.

Even after a thousand experiments, Yang Qi hadn’t made any real progress. It was almost as though the Mahātmā Jade were a naughty child that just liked doing random things. Sometimes it would provide ten boosts in a row, and sometimes it would absorb ten victims in a row.

The only constant was that the psychic power it provided was not limited in any way.

Chapter 1022: Study and Research (2)

Yang Qi shook his head slowly, weary from the hundred years of research and study. Despite using more than a thousand evil characters in his attempts to unlock the secrets of the Mahātmā Jade, he had failed.

That said, none of the fiends he had used in his experiments had particularly impressive psychic power. The highest any of them got was a psychic scale of five, which was nowhere close to the level of the Shepherd.

“At least you learned something,” said the immortal-slaying clone. “First, the Mahātmā Jade cannot produce its own psychic power, but it completely unlocks the limitations of any power it absorbs. That in itself is heaven-defying. The second thing you learned is that only people with the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body can be absorbed by the Mahātmā Jade. Third, there are no specific rules or patterns, which means you have to be extremely careful when using it.

“Right now, the jade contains the psychic power of an expert with a scale of five. Whoever uses it next will definitely reach the Terrifying level. Unfortunately, you have no idea if the next person who uses it will be blessed or killed.”

“You're exactly right,” Yang Qi said with a nod. “Unfortunately, I don’t know what to do now in terms of research and study. What’s worse, if for some reason a test subject reached a psychic scale of twenty or thirty, we wouldn’t be able to control them.”

“I wouldn’t worry about that. As long as we’re in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, I can deal with someone who has a psychic scale of thirty. That said, I don’t think you’re going to learn anything else by continuing this line of research. This definitely isn’t how the Mahātmā Jade is supposed to work, otherwise it wouldn’t be worth much. What if the problem is that this is only one fragment of it? Perhaps you need to collect more pieces before you can properly use them.”

“Maybe. But one thing I still don't understand is how the Shepherd was able to send his psychic power into it even though he doesn't cultivate the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body. That technique is definitely one of the requirements. The fact that his psychic power was inside the jade is the only reason I reached a psychic scale of eighteen.”

“Maybe he does cultivate it and you just couldn't tell. Or maybe he has some other secret abilities you’re not aware of. You just did a hundred years of research, and I helped you with plenty of the powers of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Despite all of that, we have no idea what the jade will do with its next use. It’s almost like the Mahātmā Jade is similar to you, in that it exists outside of fate. It’s almost like it's a Fateless One.”

“True. I even used my Wheel of Fate, but found nothing. It really is a heaven-defying god item. It befuddles yin and yang, surpasses the three realms, and doesn’t conform to the five phases. That said, we still have time on our hands. Might as well continue to do some research.”

“What’s your plan, though?” the clone asked. “Don’t tell me you have some other trick up your sleeve.”

“I do. I'm going to finally try the God Legion Seal and King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions. I want to see what happens if I use the jade on them. This is actually going to be a very important step for us. You're the successor of King Immortal-Slayer, so when he is finally resurrected, you'll be in a very delicate situation. After all, if you ride a tiger, it's hard to get off. Even worse, the final medallion is still in the hands of someone else, probably Proud Heaven. And that means he might be able to break into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. As you know, the chart is our final line of defense, so the fact that it has a vulnerability is very troublesome. We don't want this chart to end up as our tomb.”

“Our top priority right now should be to get that final legacy medallion, although I'm still worried about what will happen when the nine medallions combine. The will of King Immortal-Slayer is definitely going to try to possess me.” The clone sighed. “You're absolutely right that if you ride a tiger, it's hard to get off. We can’t leave the final medallion in the hands of an enemy, and we can’t combine them. So what are we supposed to do?”

“Simple,” Yang Qi said. “Once we get the last medallion, we immediately lock it down and prevent it from fusing with the others. The medallions might be too formidable for us to directly control, but if we can use some powerful item to do it for us, we’ll be set. And nothing could be more powerful than the God Legion Seal and this Mahātmā Jade.”

“There’s something else that’s stronger than the legacy medallions and the Mahātmā Jade,” the clone said with a smile. “And perhaps it’s even on the same level of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. They might even have similar origins.”

Yang Qi nodded. “You mean... the Great Necropolis?”

Considering that the necropolis could erupt with numerous immortal worlds, even some with ranks in the hundreds, it was obvious that it was immensely strong. Maybe it was roughly the same level as the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, or even beyond it.

Unfortunately, it was hard to say who would be the ultimate owner of the necropolis.

“Alright, time to get started!” Yang Qi waved his hand and called upon the power of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. A sealing mark instantly appeared in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, and as it unraveled, golden light shone and the God Legion Seal shot into Yang Qi’s hand.

Yang Qi had previously assumed that, having struck out on his own, the God Legion Seal would feel increasingly distant. But instead, it felt as familiar as ever. In fact, it seemed as eager to reunite with him as a lover would, and it clearly wanted to shoot right into his sea of consciousness.

Yang Qi knew that some of the reaction was because he had absorbed a bit of Proud Heaven’s version of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. For all intents and purposes, it was almost like he had acquired another piece of the God Legion Seal.

Of course, Yang Qi couldn’t just let the seal do what it wanted.

He waved his hand, activating his energy arts and causing the God Legion Seal to float up in front of him. It wasn’t a person, just a sealing mark. And although it contained immense power, it was currently still fragmented, and definitely within the realm of what Yang Qi could control.

“Be suppressed!” the golden imp of the seal landed on the Mahātmā Jade, and rumbling sounds instantly echoed out. In the blink of an eye, the jade began shaking as surely as if it were in the presence of an old archenemy.

At the same time, it looked like the God Legion Seal was about to absorb the Mahātmā Jade.

Perhaps these two god items really had clashed in the past.

All of a sudden, Yang Qi felt like he was back at the beginning of everything, when devils and gods clashed and the Sovereign Lord had fought the True Devil, shaking all creation, shattering the great dao, and plunging the universe into oblivion.

“King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions!”

With the wave of a hand, the clone released the medallions, sending them directly toward the Mahātmā Jade.

The jade was now sustaining attacks by two powerful items, causing it to emit jade-colored light that created a domain of protection around it.

Gong!

The three items clashed, and a deafening boom rang out, causing Yang Qi’s soul and sea of consciousness to tremble.

Yang Qi suddenly felt like an enormous devil of the past was rushing toward him with the power to crush heavens and earths underfoot. It was impossible to evade the blow, and he was sent flying, blood spraying out of his mouth.

The immortal-slaying clone fared little better, and was thrown backward, his body crushed. Thankfully, he had the godhood stars to call upon, and was fully healed in almost the same moment.

Crack. Crunch.

With no one operating them, the three magical treasures simply hung there, motionless.

After a long moment of recovery, Yang Qi and his clone climbed to their feet and exchanged wry smiles. “So,” the clone said, “they can keep each other under control, but unfortunately, we're not strong enough to deal with the resulting fluctuations. Ordinary people who tried to do that would be dead already.”

Another experiment had fizzled out.

“Ai! This Mahātmā Jade is not easy to work with. I guess it’s only to be expected, considering its reputation. If I could win control of the Great Necropolis, it wouldn’t be a problem at all to deal with. But that’s not exactly realistic at this point....”

“The Great Necropolis?” the clone said. “You still haven’t fully assimilated that godpower seed, have you. Profound Valor is imprisoned here in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, but he can still draw on the power of the necropolis to further his cultivation. His energy arts have increased quite a bit through the years, and he’s getting closer and closer to the Terrifying level. In fact, if I hadn’t reached the Terrifying level myself, I wouldn’t have been able to keep him sealed. Incidentally, although Leaf Dao-Denier still looks like little more than skin-and-bones, he’s bursting with power on the inside.”

“The two of them are still trying to cause problems?” Yang Qi said. He chuckled coldly. “Considering how much stronger I am than I was before, they’re courting death! I wouldn’t even be worried if both of them reached the Terrifying level.”

All of a sudden, Yang Qi’s eyes glittered. “Wait a second! Profound Valor is an Inheritor! I could force him to cultivate the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body, then send his psychic power into the Mahātmā Jade. If the jade absorbs it, it should also absorb the godpower seed. This will be like a fight between the Great Necropolis and the Mahātmā Jade; I wonder which one is stronger!”

“That's a good idea!” the clone said, nodding. “Just don’t make a fool of yourself in trying to be clever. What would happen if Profound Valor actually absorbed the power of the jade and used it to stimulate the godpower of the necropolis? That could cause major problems, even here in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.”

“I know. Trust me, I have a lot of experience in this regard. That mahātmā fiend-devil tried to use me for research purposes while they were attempting to seal Lord Blood River. In the end, I was the one who benefited. The Wretch God Apostle tried to do something similar, only to be turned into a psychic slave. I'm fully aware of the ramifications.” He thought for a moment. “Right now, there’s power equivalent to a psychic scale of five inside the jade. Even if Profound Valor did absorb it, he still wouldn’t reach the Terrifying level.”

“A Terrifying Inheritor would be extremely powerful,” the clone said.

Chapter 1023: Study and Research (3)

“Why don’t we take a look at Profound Valor and Leaf Dao-Denier?” Yang Qi said. “See how they’re doing. Given how strong I’ve become, I don’t have anything to fear from them. And if they try anything funny, I’ll instantly be able to tell. Although, it’s just as you said: raising a tiger is inviting calamity. Maybe I can use them to unlock some of the secrets of the Mahātmā Jade, but I can’t allow them to achieve true success in advancing their energy arts. Some advance preparations will be necessary.”

Yang Qi nodded.

The immortal-slaying clone was right that if Profound Valor could somehow successfully cultivate the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body using the Mahātmā Jade, it could lead to untold problems.

In fact, there were two huge unknowns.

The first was what would happen to the Great Necropolis’s godpower seed when Profound Valor reached the Terrifying level. Would he be able to break free from the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart?

Secondly, if Profound Valor managed to forge a deep connection with the Mahātmā Jade, what if he took it away? In that case, Yang Qi would be giving his enemy a wife and losing soldiers to him as well.

Obviously, he had to consider all of these things in whatever plans he made. Plan first, then take action. Consider all strategies. That was how Yang Qi operated.

If he didn't work like that, he wouldn’t have lived to this day. Although he had certainly benefited from luck in his life, much of his success came from well-thought-out plans.

After considering the issues at hand, he came up with a plan for how to deal with Profound Valor. He explained everything to his immortal-slaying clone, who nodded in agreement.

Afterward, the two of them flew through the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart until they were a place of ultimate emptiness and silence. It was a place that thrummed with vital energy fluctuations, almost like a new universe was growing here. It was something the clone had unlocked after reaching the Terrifying level.

He now had access to many more spell formations. Furthermore, the years of cultivation had pushed the clone’s psychic scale to three, and it didn't seem like it would stop there.

Profound Valor and Leaf Dao-Denier were imprisoned in this void, held down with immense shackles that made it impossible for them to actually use their energy arts. Almost as soon as he arrived, Yang Qi could sense that there was an incredibly destructive power brewing deep within Profound Valor, simmering, just ready to explode out.

Off to the side, Leaf Dao-Denier looked skinny and emaciated, but that was only a facade. He was actually cultivating an even more impressive energy art than Profound Valor, and his quintessence-blood and vital energy were stronger than ever. Both of them were hiding these facts well, but neither of them could pull the wool over Yang Qi’s eyes.

‘So strong! Profound Valor’s power index is actually at five thousand, and his psychic scale is just on the verge of breaking through to the Terrifying level. The Great Necropolis’ godpower seed is transforming as well, allowing the godpower of the necropolis to flow into him. Thankfully, these things can’t be hidden from my Wheel of Fate.’

Almost immediately, the two of them caught sight of him approaching. “We're lingering on the verge of death, Yang Qi,” said Leaf Dao-Denier. “Can’t you just let us go? We’re not important to you any longer.”

“Lingering on the verge of death?” Yang Qi said. Chuckling coldly, he snapped his fingers.

Pop!

A beam of light shot out and pierced into Leaf Dao-Denier, causing him to seemingly inflate like a balloon, his muscles quickly filling in until he looked like they were made from granite.

Leaf Dao-Denier’s power index was actually closing in on four thousand, which was significantly better than before. It wasn't all because of him; obviously, Profound Valor had helped him, in the hopes of making an escape.

Yang Qi laughed. “I think when you said ‘lingering on the verge of death’, what you really meant was 'stronger than ever’. Right?”

“You!” Leaf Dao-Denier snarled, straining against the chains that bound him. Unfortunately, they were far too strong for him to break. “Yang Qi, you savage! I worked hard to build up all that power, don’t tell me you’re just going to take it away! I’ll swear an oath to never cross you again!”

Profound Valor snorted coldly. “You spineless coward, Leaf Dao-Denier! I helped you improve your cultivation, but when the critical moment comes you instantly start begging for mercy? If we die, we die. It’s not a big deal.” Looking at Yang Qi, he continued, “What are you up to? Nothing good, I assume.”

“You could say that,” Yang Qi replied. “I'm here to take you away and perform a little experiment. And don’t think that just because you’ve made a bit of cultivation progress, thanks to that godpower seed, you’ll be able to do anything to me. As far as I'm concerned, any progress you've made is pitiful, at best.”

With that he waved his hand.

Crack!

The chains broke, freeing Profound Valor.

“Let’s go,” Yang Qi said.

RUMBLE!

The moment Profound Valor was free, he launched a fist strike directly at Yang Qi. It was an incredibly powerful move that caused a projection of the Great Necropolis to appear behind him. “Bury Gods. Bury Heaven. Bury Immortals. Bury Humans!”

This was a fist strike that could cut down Terrifying experts, and it caused the power of the Great Necropolis to roil out into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Almost instantly, Profound Valor seemed like an exalted god.

However, Yang Qi met the attack with a mundane fist strike of his own, which slammed right into Profound Valor’s chest.

Gong!

Profound Valor bounced up into the air like a rubber ball, blood spraying out of his mouth, then fell back down and slammed into the ground. He struggled to rise, looking like a beaten dog, but Yang Qi kicked him down again. Then Yang Qi reached out, grabbed him by the neck, and carried him away.

Seeing all of this, Leaf Dao-Denier felt like his heart was freezing over. “Do I still have a chance? No. Even if you get stronger, you’re still going to die eventually. I curse you, Yang Qi! I curse you to die a horrible death!”

Around that time, Emperor Heart-Celestial appeared, flanked by Eldest Brother, An Yiru and others.

“Now that you've recovered,” Emperor Heart-Celestial said, “the time has come to extract your Fortuned blood again. This is really going to help our subordinates.”

Grabbing Leaf Dao-Denier, he produced a long needle and stabbed it into him, beginning the extraction process. Leaf Dao-Denier squealed like the fat pig he had become.

Tossing Profound Valor down in front of the Mahātmā Jade, Yang Qi said, “Well, what do you think, Profound Valor? Do you really believe you have what it takes to fight me?”

“Kill me if you want. Torture me, even. But if you think you can use me as an experiment to help you cultivate some devil art, you’re wrong! Come on, torment me! Bring out that Hell Scourge of yours. I don’t care! It’ll just be training for my will! I've already pushed my godpower seed to a higher level and am now at one with the Great Necropolis. As long as it remains, I’ll remain. You can't do anything to me. Even if you seal me as tightly as you can, you can’t stop me from building up more godpower.”

“Oh really?” Yang Qi’s hand clamped onto Profound Valor’s head, and he unleashed a powerful gravitational force.

Instantly, the force locked onto the godpower seed in Profound Valor’s sea of consciousness. However, no matter how he pulled at it, it didn't move.

And just as he prepared to exert further effort, boundless godpower from the Great Necropolis poured into Profound Valor, fusing him even more fully with the godpower seed and making Profound Valor himself turn as hard as stone.

Only after Yang Qi stopped trying to take the seed did Profound Valor’s body return to its flesh and blood state.

No matter what Yang Qi tried, he failed. Every effort to forcibly remove the godpower seed resulted in the power of the Great Necropolis resisting him.

Furthermore, if he struck Profound Valor and injured him, the same power would heal him. It reminded him of the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body. The only attack that could truly harm him would be one that was similarly backed by the power of the Great Necropolis.

Inheritors could kill Inheritors, but unfortunately, Yang Qi was not an Inheritor. Supposedly, there were Inheritor disciples in the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect, but they had all gone out for training and hadn’t been seen for years.

“Well, what do you think, Yang Qi?” Profound Valor said. “You can’t do anything to me! You’ll never be able to kill me!”

“He really doesn’t know what's good for him, does he?” Yang Qi said to the clone. Then he gave the clone a nod. Instantly, the clone grabbed Profound Valor by the top of his head and sent godpower of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart rushing into him to seal the Great Necropolis seed. Instantly, the seed began fighting back. But because they weren’t trying to extract it, the effort worked and the seed was sealed.

That said, the clone was secretly amazed at how much effort it took. Even with the Engine of the One God and the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, it was like wrestling a huge dragon under control.

“You're going to cultivate this technique whether you want to or not!”

Yang Qi thrust his palm out and hit Profound Valor’s abdomen above his dantian region, sending some tribulation energy right into him. He was directly forcing him to cultivate the technique and develop the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body.

Profound Valor’s true energy fought back, but it wasn’t capable of standing up to the technique. Instantly, the power of tribulations began to fill him.

One tribulation. Two tribulations.

Soon, Profound Valor reached the level of ten tribulations, but he still wasn’t anywhere even close to stopping.

Chapter 1024: Study and Research (4)

Almost instantly, Profound Valor had mastered the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body to the level of ten tribulations. As that happened, he suddenly realized that combining the new technique with the godpower of the Great Necropolis was giving him access to all sorts of unbelievable divine abilities.

He suddenly burst out laughing. “So, you really are helping me, Yang Qi! Are you feeling suicidal or something? Not only am I not dying here, I'm actually gaining more enlightenment of the divine abilities of the Great Necropolis. I'm getting stronger! You can beat me, you can torture me, but you can never actually kill me! I'm going to keep getting stronger and stronger, and when I finally reach the Terrifying level, not even the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart will be able to keep me prisoner.”

“Hurry up and send your true energy into the jade,” Yang Qi said, ignoring his bravado. Drawing on the psychic enslavement powers, and taking advantage of the fact that the godpower seed was sealed, he forced Profound Valor to send his energy into the Mahātmā Jade.

Bzzz. Bzzz. Bzzz.

The jade made odd noises, but instead of accepting the influx, it sent psychic power flowing back into Profound Valor, provoking more transformations.

RUMBLE!

His Unspoiled Body improved again, and at the same time, psychic power flowed into his sea of consciousness, instantly shoving him into the Terrifying level! It was as if countless suns and moons rose up in his sea of consciousness, then fell back down. Afterward, his nascent divinity and will began climbing until his psychic scale was one.

Then it continued. Two. Three. Four. Five.

Only then did it begin to slow.

“This is bad, Yang Qi!” his clone barked. “I can’t control him. He’s in the Terrifying level! His psychic scale is climbing too rapidly. With the godpower of the Great Necropolis added in, the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart isn’t enough to keep him in check!”

SNAP!

Suddenly, the boundless godpower of the Great Necropolis slammed into the clone, sending him flying dozens of meters off to the side. If it weren’t for the fact that they were in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, he would have instantly been killed.

Laughing maniacally, Profound Valor said, “I'm in the Terrifying level! My dream has come true! The Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart can’t keep me in check now! And I'm taking this piece of jade too! I’ll never free you, Yang Qi. The next time we meet, you’re dead!”

Intense rumbling sounds could be heard as countless streams of light shot out, all of them the same stone-like color of the Great Necropolis itself. As they whipped around him, it seemed like he really was on the verge of opening a hole in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

The Great Necropolis blocked the entrance to the Ancient Road to the Gods, and was obviously a top god item. It could emit immortal worlds, and had all sorts of other fabulous powers. In fact, no one really knew exactly what it was capable of, and to find out, one would have to explore its true depths, which, to date, no one had ever done. Not even the emperor of the Executors of the Ancient Road.

In response to Profound Valor’s words, Yang Qi noiselessly rose to his feet, and drew on the power of twenty-four tribulations and his psychic scale of eighteen. At the same time, a pearl filled with toxic energy appeared in his hand, which he thrust toward Profound Valor.

Profound Valor had just grabbed the piece of jade, so he used his other hand to meet Yang Qi’s attack with a palm, sending out a torrent of Great Necropolis godpower. When they clashed, Yang Qi shivered, whereas Profound Valor was knocked nine meters backward. After all, despite his recent breakthrough, his psychic scale was only five, whereas Yang Qi’s was at eighteen. Furthermore, Yang Qi had the Unspoiled Body and the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, a combination that had never been seen before. Plus he had a two-thirds combination of the latter that not even Proud Heaven could match. All of that would give him the upper hand against even some of the strongest Inheritors.

That said, even though Profound Valor had been knocked back, he didn’t seem hurt. Clutching the jade, he turned to flee. Reaching out, he began to rip a hole open.

However, at that exact moment, he suddenly shrieked as his hand turned pitch black! Back when Yang Qi had clashed with the Shepherd, the Shepherd tried to kill Yang Qi with poison. Yang Qi managed to take the poison and turn it into a śarīra, and that was exactly what he had just used on Profound Valor.

Upon the initial clash, Profound Valor felt fine. But moments later, the poison was spreading through his body. Crazed, he threw his true energy against it to force it out, but it was only minimally effective. Then, unexpectedly, the godpower of the Great Necropolis began to flow into him, ignoring any limitations of space or distance, to extrude the poison.

That was when Yang Qi struck out again with his palm, sending an attack into Profound Valor’s sea of consciousness, using his psychic scale of eighteen to power the Devil-God Seal, which he placed right onto the godpower seed.

Profound Valor immediately devolved into a state of near-madness.

“What treachery is this, Yang Qi? You barbarian! But this still isn’t enough to kill me. I'm a Terrifying expert now! I'm unparalleled under heaven, eternally indestructible! The Great Necropolis is my soul, so as long as it remains in existence, I can't be destroyed!”

“Imperial-heaven pre-beginning!” Yang Qi said. “Psychic enslavement!” So far, everything was going according to Yang Qi’s plan. Unfortunately, the psychic enslavement technique wouldn’t work on Profound Valor now; he was simply too strong. He continued grappling with the sealing mark, but kept a firm grip on the piece of jade at the same time, which he knew he absolutely could not afford to lose.

Of course, Yang Qi wasn’t actually trying to perform psychic enslavement on him. Instead, he was trying to distract him. ‘Hurry up and send your true energy into the jade!’ he thought. ‘That’s the way to get rid of the poison!’

His thoughts surged through Profound Valor like heart-devils, imparting Yang Qi’s suggestions.

It was something he had picked up from the Shepherd; in the blink of an eye, Profound Valor was filled with the confused urge to do exactly as Yang Qi had suggested.

RUMBLE!

Profound Valor sent more true energy pouring into the jade, which once again sent psychic power back to him. However, considering the jade hadn’t been powered up since he had originally drained it, he didn't receive any big boost to his cultivation base.

Howling, he threw more power into the jade, only to have it sent back.

Expression flickering, he murmured, “Why isn’t the jade trapping the poison!?”

Next, he drew on the godpower of the Great Necropolis, sending it smashing into jade, carrying the poison with it. He did this numerous times, hoping that this was the key to victory.

And it was then that the gravitational force finally appeared within the jade. The jade had no set pattern or rules governing its operation, but if someone sent power into it thousands upon thousands of times, it would eventually trigger.

Bzzzzzzzzz. Bzzzzzzzzz.

The jade finally turned on Profound Valor.

In the blink of an eye, he found himself in a nightmare.

All of his true energy and psychic power began flowing into the jade, and there was nothing he could do to stop it. Even the godpower seed was starting to tremble. Yang Qi had performed numerous tests and had confirmed what happened in these situations.

It would always absorb everything about a person, until they were eventually reduced to ashes. It didn't even spare magical treasures. It would crush everything, suck it inside, and convert it into who-knew-what.

This jade was domineering in an unheard-of way.

At long last, Yang Qi could see what would happen after the jade absorbed the power of one of the Great Necropolis’ godpower seeds.

“Great Necropolis godpower!” Profound Valor shouted, fully aware that he had suddenly found himself in an extremely dangerous situation. Unfortunately, the godpower did no good, and even worse, he couldn’t even drop the jade.

As the godpower seed began to tremble more violently, his shock mounted.

“Invincible Great Necropolis; Newly Ordained God!”

As he drew on the full power of the godpower seed, the entire Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart began shaking. The immortal-slaying clone’s face turned ashen as a stream of godpower descended, breaking through all barriers and penetrating right into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

Obviously, this was a direct challenge of King Immortal-Slayer’s majesty.

Unfortunately, it didn't help Profound Valor. Although it was now clear that the Great Necropolis was a higher-level god item than the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, the problem was that it still wasn’t fully unlocked.

Yang Qi had done everything in his power to extract Profound Valor’s godpower seed, but had failed. In contrast, the force exerted by the jade was too intense for this partial version of the Great Necropolis’ power to fight against. Slowly but surely, the jade was prevailing.

Profound Valor was withering and gasping for breath. Although the power of the necropolis seemed endless, the seed was slowly being pulled down Profound Valor’s arm toward the piece of jade. Profound Valor hovered there, face filled with shock as he watched the seed slowly being gobbled up.

Yang Qi shook his head. Only then did he realize how powerful this jade was.

“Aaaiiiieee!”

At last, Profound Valor let loose a long shriek and crumbled into death.

The godpower seed of the Great Necropolis had been fully absorbed by the jade!

Chapter 1025: Assembly of Sects

Yang Qi had spent over a thousand years doing research, but not even he had any idea what would happen now. The fact that the Mahātmā Jade had absorbed Profound Valor’s psychic power, flesh, and blood was almost inconsequential. What really mattered was that it had taken the godpower seed.

Those seeds were the only way to get Inheritor powers. And if the jade worked like it had in the past, then it should be able to regurgitate the power it had sucked in with no limitations whatsoever.

In other words, taking the power that was inside the seed would make one an Inheritor. And not an ordinary Inheritor, but one who had a complete level of control over their powers.

That said, Yang Qi didn't dare to send his true energy into the Mahātmā Jade. He had no idea what would happen if he did, and didn’t want to risk his life that way.

After all, if the jade could overcome the godpower of the Great Necropolis, then what out there could be strong enough to fight it?

Originally, Yang Qi had actually hoped that the two powers would be equally matched, and he could learn something from the conflict, then suppress both of them.

Unfortunately, that plan had failed.

Yet again, his research and study were thrown for a loop.

He and his clone exchanged a glance; both of them were obviously itching to absorb the psychic power in the jade. Unfortunately, there was only a 50/50 chance of living, which meant that there was the same chance of dying.

And that was far too risky.

“Yang Qi, why don’t you help me to cultivate an Unspoiled Body?” the clone said. “It really does provide a huge boost in strength.”

“Are you sure?” Yang Qi replied, a very serious expression on his face. “Once you start cultivating it, you can’t go back. Also, the stronger your physical body gets, the more pressure it puts on your will. It’s good that we have the Mahātmā Jade, but considering we can't control it, it makes it relatively useless at the moment.”

“It should be fine,” the clone replied. “Since we've already started collecting pieces of the Mahātmā Jade, we’ll surely get answers one day.”

“Well alright then!” With the help of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions, Yang Qi imparted some tribulation energy into the clone, and soon he had cultivated the Unspoiled Body to the level of thirty tribulations.

Thanks to the godhood stars he had access to, he was able to cultivate energy arts much more quickly than the average person. And his will convergence was already at the Terrifying level. In other words, he could reach the level of thirty tribulations without suffering any ill side-effects. Furthermore, with the psychic scaling systems and godpower to fuel them, it was entirely possible for him to rise to the level of a hundred tribulations.

However, it would be supremely stupid to do that now.

Thirty tribulations was strong enough, and although it didn’t put the clone on the same level of Yang Qi, who could combine the Unspoiled Body with the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, it was enough that the clone could dominate most situations on the Ancient Road to the Gods.

The process took a hundred years to complete. At that point, Yang Qi finally left the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. His mission into the Hell of Sages and Mahātmās had been very beneficial. He had acquired incredible loot, and pushed his psychic scale to eighteen. Unfortunately, he had still failed to reach the Terrifying level. Nor had his extensive session of research and study produced any tangible results.

**

The time had come for the big assembly of sects.

A host of superpower sects were talking about joining forces to fight the Executors of the Ancient Road, and just like the fiend-devils, were going to select a league-Lord.

All of a sudden, Yang Qi felt like history was repeating itself.

Back in the early days of the immortal worlds, the Dao Defense League had been leaderless. And during the process to select the league-lord, he had been appointed the Emissary of Radiance and Light. Eventually, he had usurped his superior, forcing Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven to change his name to Yang Righteousness and become his servant. This time, there was no way he would get a high position like the last time. The superpower sects of the Ancient Road to the Gods had as many top experts as the sky had clouds. There was no way Yang Qi could compete with people like Archmonk Dharma Treasury, especially not before he reached the Terrifying level himself.

Right now, his main plan was to continue growing stronger within his current sect, and only then would he try to rise within the alliance.

The leading roles in the alliance would definitely be taken by incredibly powerful old-timers. He was actually looking forward to this assembly, as it would be his first true look at what other kinds of experts existed on the Ancient Road to the Gods. From what he could tell of Sectlord Will Manifestation, Yang Qi knew the man had powerful resources that remained hidden.

Yang Qi couldn’t even assess the sectlord’s cultivation base, but he was fairly certain that he was stronger than he seemed. Of course, it was only to be expected. Without a very strong sectlord, the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect would have long since been destroyed.

‘Ah, what a pity,’ Yang Qi said. ‘That godpower seed is now in the Mahātmā Jade, and I have no idea when I’ll be able to get it out and use it.’ He was done with research for now. The last thing he wanted was to test out the jade on some random person and have them suddenly become a powerful Inheritor. Although he might be able to get them under control in the end, it wouldn’t be worth the vital energy he would have to expend in doing so.

Soon, he was back in the territory of the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect.

The sect was in something of an uproar. Everyone was furiously working on their cultivation, and many people were achieving breakthroughs. Of course, much of that was thanks to Yang Qi and the way he had set the sect in order after becoming the junior sectlord. All of the peaklords were in complete admiration of him.

Of course, Yang Qi hadn't forgotten about the executors’ treasure storehouse.

As for the sectlord, he had taken the corpses of the seven executors and the junior superintendent, and was using them to further some energy art of his.

Those eight were all top experts. It was especially true of Ghost Ace and his three companions, all of whom had royal blood. Yang Qi would have loved to study them a bit, and was now very curious as to what exactly the sectlord was doing with them.

All Yang Qi knew for sure was that when fiend-devils consumed the flesh of executors, it gave them access to incredible divine abilities and significantly boosted their constitutions. It would be no surprise to find out that the sectlord had some sort of devil art, and was using it with some other technique to create a combination of righteous and evil cultivation types. It was rare to find anyone who could combat devil arts without first being able to use them to some extent.

The sectlord even had some Eternal and Fortuned blood, as well as plenty of treasures from within the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart that he was now using in his secluded cultivation session.

Looking into the depths of the sect, Yang Qi saw that the sectlord’s meditation facility was a mass of pitch black, making it impossible to see what he was doing.

The fact that the sectlord was doing things in secret didn't matter. Yang Qi was the junior sectlord, and his authority had long since been established. There were new peaklords on Grand Might Peak, Nāropa Peak, and Spiritwall Peak, and the people truly loyal to the previous peaklords had either been imprisoned or executed. For all intents and purposes, Yang Qi controlled the entire Will Manifestation Heaven Sect.

Upon returning, he called a meeting in the Junior Sectlord Hall, summoning all of the peaklords as well as experts from the lower courtyards of the sect. It was essentially a session of court.

Of course, even emperors had to schedule sessions of court in advance, whereas Yang Qi simply called everyone together without warning; it was clearly a display of power on his part.

Yang Qi had long since felt that meetings like this were important. If a leader spent all of his time in seclusion working on mysterious secrets, his followers would soon forget him.

The bells tolled, and normally speaking, it meant that, within ten breaths of time, all of the experts should have assembled. However, today was an exception. Even after the bells tolled for a full hour, the only people present in Junior Sectlord Hall were his closest subordinates. The rest of the experts were nowhere to be seen.

Could it be that there were still people in the sect who didn’t respect his authority?

Frowning, he looked over at one of the nearby disciples and said, “What’s going on, Laichao Yuan? Where is everyone?”

“Er, I'm not sure...” replied Laichao Yuan, a young man who positively worshipped Yang Qi. He was the chief disciple of the Heaven-Dragon Courtyard, with a power index of two hundred and fifty. Obviously, he had a lot of progress to make, and was far from being in the Terrifying level.

Just then, An Yiru hurried in.

“This is bad, Yang Qi!” she said. Considering that Yang Qi was the junior sectlord now, she should never have called him by his full name, but instead, his title. The fact that she was in such a hurry that she forgot to do so only went to show how anxious she was.

“What happened?” Yang Qi said, keeping his expression calm. “Did the Executors of the Ancient Road show up?”

“It’s not that,” she said, sounding a bit strangled. “Three important disciples came back and gathered a whole group of other disciples to go search a very dangerous location in the Great Necropolis, the Peakfiend Wastelands.”

“What disciples would possibly have the gall to do that?” Yang Qi asked. He had heard of the Peakfiend Wastelands, and knew their reputation for being a dangerous place. Even Terrifying experts who went there had to be very careful. For someone to have taken a large group of disciples there without giving notice to the junior sectlord was nothing short of an open provocation.

“All three disciples are Inheritors. They were out for training for more than a year, then returned. You were in seclusion, so I wasn’t able to inform you. One of those disciples is already in the Terrifying level, and made a big show of how strong he was. He said that he wasn't convinced that you have the authority to do anything to him, and even said some insulting things about you.”

“What?!” Yang Qi said. It was a lucky thing for the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect to have acquired three disciples with Inheritor godpower seeds, and it was only natural that they had instantly become darlings of the sect. And having returned from their training, it meant that the sect should have much more impressive fighting prowess.

Many sects nowadays believed that only the Inheritors were truly worthy to be well-known, and that they were the only hope for sects to survive.

Chapter 1026: Unconvinced

‘I knew something like this would happen,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘Some nobodies happened to get their hands on Inheritor godpower seeds and suddenly advanced by leaps and bounds. They’re strong, not because of their own power, but because they can borrow the godpower of the Great Necropolis, and they suddenly think they’re all-important. These three disciples really are pushing things too far to openly disrespect me, and even say insulting things. It’s extremely disgraceful and borderline rebellious. I need to teach them a lesson. Make sure they know that there is always a heaven beyond heaven, and there are always people more important than you.’

Raising his voice, he called, “Emperor Heart-Celestial!”

“Here!” A vortex appeared, out of which stepped Emperor Heart-Celestial, who saluted with clasped hands. “What are your orders, Junior Sectlord?”

“Take my junior sectlord’s command medallion and go to the Peakfiend Wastelands. Order all of the disciples to return immediately. Anyone who refuses will be removed from the sect and marked for death!”

Producing his command medallion, he threw it over to Emperor Heart-Celestial.

“Yes sir!”

Emperor Heart-Celestial was now a Terrifying expert, and had benefited greatly due to being able to cultivate in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Furthermore, his enlightenment of his own cultivation base had reached such an incredible level that he existed in the most natural of states. In other words, it was impossible to tell just by looking at him exactly how incredible he was. Of course, Yang Qi knew that he was the patient type who didn’t feel the need to show off, and as such he definitely had all sorts of boundless techniques just ready to unleash. Although he obviously couldn’t compete with Yang Qi, he should definitely be able to handle a few Inheritors.

That made him the perfect person to send out with orders for the disciples.

Eyes glittering, Emperor Heart-Celestial smiled faintly and flew out of the sect.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi sat there on his junior sectlord’s throne with his eyes closed.

He looked like he was meditating, or at least thinking about matters, and it caused everyone else to settle down quietly and simply wait. Despite the fact that there were tens of thousands of people present, no one made a peep. Everyone knew that this was simply the calm before the storm, and they were all wondering who would come out on top: the junior sectlord, or the Inheritors.

**

In the depths of the Great Necropolis, where the immortal worlds were in the rank of three to four hundred, and the immortal energy was particularly strong, it would actually be impossible for many people to even fly.

In the middle of all those worlds was a huge plane of existence that abounded with wretched, evil energy. In fact, that energy had infected many of the surrounding immortal worlds, turning countless immortals into wicked creatures that only lived for slaughter and combat.

It was a place where a wretched monster from the god world had fallen in death and was obviously very dangerous, being filled with Terrifying wretch-spirits. Even Terrifying cultivators had to be very careful there. Of course, this place was the Peakfiend Wastelands.

Despite the dangerous nature of the place, there was a group of several tens of thousands of elite disciples who had invaded it. Normally, they would have already been killed, but thankfully they were being led by a group of three particularly powerful disciples who pulsed with the godpower of the Great Necropolis, which enabled them to keep the wretch energy at bay. It also transformed the magical laws around them, which enabled them not only to fly, but also to use their deadly arts much more effectively.

One wretch-spirit after another fell to their techniques, transforming into ash and leaving behind treasures, godstones, and god items that the invading disciples threw into their bags.

“Whoa! There’s a piece of godhood up ahead!”

Staying in formation, the group advanced.

Tens of thousands of swords flew out in the shape of an enormous dragon, which slammed into the vile soil and caused an explosion of dirt. Afterward, a piece of wretched godhood flew out.

It was followed by a host of ten million wretch-spirits, all of them howling with rage. However, three streams of godpower flew out and slaughtered them, then pulled their essence into the hand of one of the three young men leading the group.

He had thin, arching eyebrows, and wore a long, azure robe. He didn’t wield any weapons and his hands were completely empty, except for the wretched godhood he was now holding. Swirling his fingers, he extracted the wretch energy from the godhood, which looked like a dragon. Then he flicked his hand, sending the dragon flying into the depths of the Peakfiend Wastelands, where it devoured countless wretch-spirits before exploding, killing even more in the detonation. Then the young man inhaled, sucking in all of the resulting power.

A cheer rose up from the surrounding disciples.

One of the other three leaders of the group, a young woman, turned to him and said, “Your abilities are incredible, Elder Brother Shi Yuan. After becoming an Inheritor, you really advanced by leaps and bounds, and now you’re even a Terrifying expert.”

The third of the group, a young man, said, “Elder Brother Shi Yuan, the two of us also need to reach the Terrifying level. Do you think we could possibly assimilate that godhood to stimulate our God-Ordaining Flame, thus pushing our cultivation base to the next level?

Despite being Inheritors, these two obviously hadn’t reached the Terrifying level yet. That said, their psyches were clearly just on the verge of a breakthrough. And from the cold gleam in their eyes, it was obvious that they viewed each other as competition, and were jealous of Shi Yuan.

In response to their words, Shi Yuan’s expression flickered hesitantly, and he said, “What would be the point of giving you the godhood? How would the two of you split it? It would be meaningless to get into a conflict over it. We’re all disciples of the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect, and the assembly of superpower sects is coming soon. When the time comes, our sect needs to make a big impression. Although we do have some reserves of godhood, sadly, the new junior sectlord got them all. What was the sectlord thinking? Once he’s out of seclusion, I'm going to demand that the chief elders meet to discuss the situation. I want to see just what's so special about this new junior sectlord.”

“Damn that junior sectlord! As far as I'm concerned, he's not the junior sectlord. He’s nothing but an outsider. How could someone who hasn’t even been in the sect for a year suddenly be appointed the junior sectlord!? The three of us have been in the sect for a hundred million years!”

“He must have a lot of godhood on him. Well, once he's back, we can go and force him to give it all to us. In fact, we’ll make him give us all the godhood in the entire sect. With that much godhood, we can definitely push our God-Ordaining Flame to the level of one hundred percent and finally reach the Terrifying level. As Terrifying experts, we’ll finally be able to show how powerful we Inheritors really are!”

The two of them glanced at Shi Yuan.

Shi Yuan had progressed more quickly than them, and with his Terrifying cultivation base, he was far beyond them. In fact, he could easily kill them if he wanted, and take their Great Necropolis godpower seeds. However, he was hesitant to do so. They were fellow disciples, so if he did something like that, it was highly likely that he would be branded a traitor and expelled from the sect.

However, as Shi Yuan grew stronger and stronger within the Terrifying level, the other two sensed his killing intent growing more intense. Thus, they were itching to reach the Terrifying level, if for no other reason than to make sure they didn’t end up dead.

In the middle of their conversation, a shadowy figure descended into their midst.

Instantly recognizing who it was, Shi Yuan said, “Emperor Heart-Celestial! You’re in the Terrifying level now? What are you doing here?”

Emperor Heart-Celestial looked Shi Yuan up and down, then glanced at the other two Inheritor disciples. Then he coolly said, “I'm here with orders from the junior sectlord. Return to the sect immediately for a meeting. Anyone who ignores the orders will be expelled from the sect and marked for death!”

“Orders from the junior sectlord? He’s returned. We need to go back immediately....”

“You’re absolutely right. If the junior sectlord has returned, we need to head back to the sect.” Instantly, a buzz of conversation rose up from the surrounding disciples, many of whom held Yang Qi in high esteem and didn’t want to get on his bad side by defying his orders.

Yang Qi had a high reputation, as well as the approval of many of the chief elders, and his personal prestige was as mighty as Mount Tai.

Shi Yuan’s expression turned frosty, but before he could say anything, the female Inheritor spoke up, “Dammit, Emperor Heart-Celestial, where did this junior sectlord come from anyway? We were out for training for barely more than a year, and upon our return, there was suddenly a new junior sectlord? And he even took control of the godhood reserves in the sect? We’re Inheritors! Why should we have to get his approval to get godhood? How does any of this make sense?”

“You don't have the authority to get involved with such matters. Now hurry up and get back to the sect.”

“Well aren’t you special, Emperor Heart-Celestial!” she said sarcastically. “We're Inheritors, which would make us favored by the heavens in any sect in existence. Nobody could be more important than us. You think that just because you’re a Terrifying expert now that you can defy us? Let me tell you, when I was out training I actually killed someone in the early Terrifying level. So cut it with the arrogant act. Get back to the sect and tell that sham junior sectlord of yours that he needs to come here and explain who he is. Otherwise, we’ll call for a meeting to expel him from the sect!”

“Zi Qiong,” Emperor Heart-Celestial said forcefully, “are you saying you're defying orders?”

“So what if we don’t?” said the male Inheritor, whose name was Xi Hua. “I might have been afraid of you in the past, Emperor Heart-Celestial, but not anymore. To Inheritors, all other people are ants! Screw the hell off!”

RUMBLE!

Even as the words left his mouth, he shoved his palm out and sent Great Necropolis godpower rumbling forth in a massive flow of fist wind.

Emperor Heart-Celestial responded by merely gliding up to float on top of the torrent of fist wind. “Given that you’re fellow disciples, I’ll give you some advice. Don’t anger the junior sectlord. Otherwise, things won’t turn out well for you.”

“What—” Xi Hua clearly was ready to keep fighting, but Shi Yuan reached out and blocked his way.

“You just used a consummate energy art belonging to King Grace-Glider, one of the seventy-two monarchs. Where did you learn that? No one from our sect should have that energy art!”

Chapter 1027: Shi Yuan

“King Grace-Glider’s arts are nothing,” Emperor Heart-Celestial replied, as composed as ever as he floated atop the fist wind torrent. “One day when we have the chance, Shi Yuan, you and I can have a proper fight, and I’ll show you some really impressive techniques. But right now, the time is approaching for the assembly of sects. Everyone in the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect is working hard to further the interests of the sect. We need to make sure that our interests are upheld in the big meeting to come, and that we earn as much glory as possible. Now is not the time for infighting. I sincerely hope that you follow the junior sectlord’s orders, remain united, and stand up to outside forces.”

“Are you kidding me?” Shi Yuan said. “There’s no way we're going to acknowledge allegiance to a junior sectlord with such a mysterious background. Why did you accept him so easily, Emperor Heart-Celestial? Is he really that strong?”

“You’ll know exactly how strong he is when you meet him, Shi Yuan. It's all thanks to him that I'm in the Terrifying level. Were you under the mistaken assumption that I used the psychic scaling systems? Wrong. Henceforth, all of my cultivation advancement will be made with my own power! Look, there’s no need to waste so many words.”

At this point, Emperor Heart-Celestial’s eyes glittered as he suddenly dropped down and shattered the fist wind. Unexpectedly, he was using another consummate art, something that Yang Qi had created using both the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth and the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body. It was called the Eternity-Suppressing Heaven-World.

Lip curling into a sneer, Shi Yuan snorted coldly and said, “I'm not impressed by these moves of yours, Emperor Heart-Celestial. If you want to be a lackey, fine. I couldn't care less. I'm not in the mood to put you in your place, so let’s go see this junior sectlord of yours. It’s a good thing your Master is Peaklord Celestial, otherwise you’d have already paid a heavy price for being the brownnoser you are. After I kill the junior sectlord and take his position, you’ll either work for me or be purged. And I’ll definitely make sure you’re punished for the impertinence you’ve shown today!”

Anger flickered briefly in Emperor Heart-Celestial’s eyes, but he quickly calmed himself. In the past, Shi Yuan had been an inconsequential figure, only to suddenly become an Inheritor and fall into the typical cliché of the small man intoxicated by success.

However, Emperor Heart-Celestial wasn't going to do anything about it here and now. He was the kind of person who preferred to take the big picture into consideration, and knew that if a disciple died this day, it would lead to big problems. “If that’s your decision, then I’ll go in advance and report the matter to the junior sectlord.”

“There’s no need for you to go in advance,” Shi Yuan said. “We’ll all go back together. I can go anywhere I please in the Great Necropolis, and there’s no way you could possibly keep up with me. I’ll bring you back with me.”

He waved his hand, and boundless stone-colored power swept around them. In the blink of an eye, an enormous stone palace appeared around them, which smashed its way past the surrounding immortal worlds and headed back toward the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect. There, it passed through the sect’s warding magics without provoking even a single fluctuation, then landed on the main square in the sect.

In Junior Sectlord Hall, Yang Qi opened his eyes and looked down to see the Great Necropolis godpower fading away, revealing a host of disciples with the three Inheritors at their head. The leader, who was pulsing with Terrifying power, strode decisively into Yang Qi’s hall.

The events had already drawn the attention of chief elders in the depths of the sect, who now sent their divine will out to observe. Considering this was a matter pertaining to the junior generation, it wouldn’t be appropriate for them to interfere.

Furthermore, it would serve as something of a test for Yang Qi. One could only imagine how many similar situations the sectlord himself had gone through before he had put the sect into a semblance of order.

Flanked by Zi Qiong and Xi Hua, Shi Yuan strode forward and said, “You’re Yang Qi? The so-called junior sectlord?”

All three of them were staring at Yang Qi with cold smiles.

Nodding, Yang Qi said, “The three of you are disciples of the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect? Unfortunately, two of you, despite being Inheritors of the Great Necropolis, haven’t reached the Terrifying level yet. I'm afraid things won’t be easy for you going forward, so you should really be on guard. The fighting between Inheritors is vicious, to say the least, as each one killed by another provides an additional godpower seed. Furthermore, I can tell that you’re on edge, fearful that you’ll even be attacked by your fellow disciples. Of course, considering we're in the sect, I can guarantee your safety. Anyone who violates the rules by causing internal strife will be severely punished.”

In response to his words, Shi Yuan’s expression flickered. Yang Qi had just casually mentioned the topic of killing fellow disciples, which was ironic considering that Shi Yuan would have loved nothing more than to be able to kill Zi Qiong and Xi Hua. It was hard for him to suppress the madness he felt in his heart. He was like a person in the mortal world who was standing in front of a pile of gold and jewels, but unable to reach out and grab it. It was a madness that would continue building up, slowly but surely, until it was impossible to suppress.

Meanwhile, the expressions of the other two Inheritors also flickered.

However, Zi Qiong, the more audacious of the two, stepped forward and said, “Don’t try to turn us on each other. Now that we’re back, our first priority is the sect’s godhood. You control the treasure storehouse, and we know that there’s plenty of godhood inside. Bring it all out so we can reach the Terrifying level. You want to help out the sect, don’t you?”

“I’d be happy to!” Yang Qi said. “What services have you performed to deserve some godhood? That's how the rules have always worked here: perform services, get rewards. It all comes down to merit.”

“Meritorious service?” Xi Hua chuckled coldly. “You think we have to perform services to get rewards? We’re Inheritors of the Great Necropolis! There couldn’t be a greater service than that!”

“That’s right,” Zi Qiong said. “Any sect would treat us Inheritors as favored by the heavens. We don’t need to perform any supposed ‘meritorious service’ to be groomed to power. Hurry up and bring out that godhood. If you do, we might let you act as the junior sectlord for a few more days. But if you refuse, I'm afraid you’ll have trouble lasting the day. I can’t believe you would imply that Elder Brother Shi Yuan wants to kill us. How could that be possible? Elder Brother is supremely honorable and righteous. Besides, he knows full well that with all three of us as Terrifying experts, we can easily kill whatever Inheritors are out there in other sects.”

Of course, Yang Qi picked up on the veiled threat Zi Qiong was giving to Shi Yuan, and it reinforced how much of a schemer she was.

“Perhaps other sects have different rules,” Yang Qi said, “but our ways are set. Everyone here is treated equally, regardless of whether you're favored by the heavens or not. As long as you perform the services required, you can be given some godhood. But if you haven’t performed such services, save your breath. You won’t get a thing. Furthermore, are you aware of the sect rules regarding how to talk to the junior sectlord? Is anyone here from the Law-Enforcement God-Palace?”

“Here, sir!” a disciple responded, stepping forward.

“Do you happen to know the rule I’m referring to?” Yang Qi asked.

“Anyone who speaks disrespectfully to the junior sectlord will have their energy arts crippled and their true energy extracted! Then they’ll be imprisoned and prevented from being reborn.”

All of a sudden, Shi Yuan burst out laughing. “Very impressive. Very scary. And what strict rules! Unfortunately, even if you tried to cripple our energy arts, you would fail. Perhaps you’re unaware, but we're invincible to anyone other than a Terrifying Inheritor.”

“Cut the crap,” Zi Qiong said. “Elder Brother Shi Yuan, let’s just drag him over here and make him kowtow to us. Maybe bark like a dog. After publicly losing that much face, he couldn’t possibly deserve to remain the junior sectlord!”

“Great idea,” Shi Yuan said, smiling cruelly. “Get over here! How could the position of junior sectlord possibly belong to someone like you?”

He reached out, and immense power surged toward Yang Qi, wrapping around him and pulling on him with full force, causing the entire palace to tremble and the throne he sat on to creak ominously.

As for Yang Qi, his eyes flashed and he said, “I see you’re not aware of the value of life. Considering how rude you’re being, I suppose I need to teach you a lesson you won't forget for all eternity. Otherwise, how will you ever understand why I'm the junior sectlord?”

“A person who isn’t in the Terrifying level couldn’t possibly be the junior sectlord! Get on your knees immediately!” Shi Yuan then went on to pull harder, trying to drag Yang Qi toward him.

Looking completely at ease, Yang Qi reached out, causing a ripple to flow out in front of him. As soon as it touched Shi Yuan’s true energy, it exploded, completely dispelling the godpower of the Great Necropolis.

WHOOSH!

Silence reigned in the hall.

Then, Yang Qi moved so quickly it looked like a teleportation; he simply appeared right in front of Shi Yuan and struck him with a punch. After dealing with Profound Valor, Yang Qi had gained a lot of enlightenment regarding the secrets of the godpower seeds. So although Shi Yuan’s cultivation base was indeed mighty, compared to Yang Qi, with Proud Heaven’s version of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth and a psychic scale of eighteen, he was like nothing.

All Shi Yuan could do was watch as the incoming fist shattered all of his defensive empyrean energy and protective energy fields, then slammed directly into his chest.

Of course, he was completely flabbergasted that the godpower of the Great Necropolis could be so easily vanquished, and before he knew what was happening, he was tumbling backward head over heels.

Wham! Bam!

Then Yang Qi launched two palms, one at Zi Qiong and one at Xi Hua, causing blood to spray out of their mouths as they were knocked off their feet and slammed to the ground next to Shi Yuan.

Chapter 1028: You Wouldn&#039;t Dare!

Two forces had just faced off in Junior Sectlord Hall. One of them was the duly appointed junior sectlord, who had rescued the sect from destruction. The other was an Inheritor of the Great Necropolis, favored by the heavens, who any sect would have loved to groom. And the two of them had clashed with countless disciples bearing witness.

Of course, the other two Inheritors, Zi Qiong and Xi Hua, had absolutely no qualifications to join the fight. Yang Qi disposed of them as easily as an eagle dealing with a baby chicken. They weren’t even on a level that could possibly defend against him.

Although Zi Qiong had very nearly passed out, she looked up, face contorted with rage, and said, “How dare you treat us like this! We’re Inheritors! Eternally indestructible! Do you really think you’re in charge here in the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect? If so, it shows that this sect is unfair and unjust. Maybe we’ll just leave and go join another sect, one that will give us the resources we require!”

“That’s right,” Xi Hua said, climbing to his feet. “You can’t kill us, Yang Qi, so you had better back off. Otherwise, we’re quitting this sect! Let me tell you, in our past year of training, even the Executors of the Ancient Road were trying to recruit us. Besides, there are thousands upon thousands of superpower sects that would love to have us. It’s not as if we have nowhere else to go.”

“So, you're saying you want to quit the sect?” Yang Qi said, calmly looking at Zi Qiong and Xi Hua.

Despite having been knocked to the ground, all it took was a moment before the godpower of the Great Necropolis was pouring into them, healing them and putting them back at their peak. That was one of the amazing qualities of the Inheritors. They truly seemed eternally indestructible, as long as they weren’t fighting other Inheritors.

And the effects were especially pronounced within the Great Necropolis itself. They were essentially impossible to kill, which was why everyone was so scared of them.

“That’s right,” Shi Yuan said, taking a step forward. “We're going to quit the sect. Look, enough with the tough talk. Let me put it plainly. Either you die, and I get the spot of junior sectlord, or we quit!” Greed flickered in his eyes as he glanced over at Zi Qiong and Xi Hua. If they were all kicked out of the sect, then there wouldn’t be anything preventing him from killing them.

By this point, he realized why Yang Qi had been appointed the junior sectlord. Obviously, he was very strong, with an unbelievable psychic scale and a boundless cultivation base.

Shi Yuan was now an Inheritor with Terrifying will, making him among the best of the best. Although he obviously couldn’t compare to people in the mid Terrifying level, he was definitely in a position to rival the sect leaders of superpower sects.

His plan all along had been to return to the sect, become the junior sectlord, then wait for a few years before stepping in as the sectlord. Then he would dominate all creation.

How could he have ever guessed that someone like Yang Qi would show up out of the blue, take his spot as the junior sectlord, unify the sect, and dash all of his hopes? Obviously, he was incensed, and immediately considered quitting the sect.

Ordinarily, a disciple would never dream of uttering the words he just had, but now that he was an Inheritor, he could act without the slightest scruple.

Furthermore, he was essentially asking the chief elders of the sect whether they would rather lose an Inheritor, or some random newcomer with an unclear background.

Nowadays, sects would fight bloody battles to get an Inheritor on their side, and wouldn’t just let go of them easily.

Similarly taking a step forward, Yang Qi said, “Just to make this very clear. You want to quit the sect?”

“That’s right!” Xi Hua said. “Unless you submit to us, we're leaving!”

“You wouldn’t dare,” Yang Qi said, ignoring Xi Hua and keeping his eyes fixed on Shi Yuan.

“Of course I would!” Shi Yuan shot back. “I'm an Inheritor of the Great Necropolis, so you can either submit to me and prosper, or oppose me and perish. If you dare to try pushing us around, you’ll end up dead. If the chief elders protect you, we’ll quit the sect. Of course, if the chief elders protect us instead, we’ll help boost the reputation of the sect. And how could they possibly be less interested in having three Inheritors around than some sketchy brat.”

“I imagine the chief elders will be coming out at any moment!” Zi Qiong called loudly.

However, in response to her words, not a single chief elder appeared. They were obviously waiting to see how things played out before making a decision.

“There’s no need to bother the chief elders with a minor matter such as this,” Yang Qi said. “I’ll handle it. Since you people want to bow out of the sect, then we don’t want you. By the way, are you really sure that you can’t have your status as Inheritors taken away? If so, then it’s going to be quite a shock to you when I strip your Inheritor status and give it to more loyal disciples!”

Then, Yang Qi flicked his sleeve.

These three had openly said in front of hundreds of thousands of elite disciples that they wanted to leave the sect. Therefore, Yang Qi had no choice but to punish their excessively rebellious talk with deadly force. Any disciple who spoke such words would be executed.

Yang Qi’s Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth had reached a higher level recently, so his God Legion Battle Robe had improved. Its sleeve was now like a world unto itself, within which lurked deadly killing intent.

That sleeve was now bearing down on Shi Yuan.

In response, Shi Yuan chuckled coldly, grabbed Zi Qiong and Xi Hua, and turned to leave.

However, that was when Yang Qi spread his hand wide, causing immense power to flow out, power that could destroy the heavens and crush the earth, or cause suns and moons to fall out of the sky.

All of a sudden Shi Yuan found, to his utter astonishment, that his Great Necropolis godpower was flowing relentlessly toward Yang Qi’s palm. Tossing Zi Qiong and Xi Hua to the side, he spun in place, launching a fist strike with all his might. At the same time, stone-colored armor spread out to cover his body.

When Yang Qi’s palm hit Shi Yuan’s fist, two energy shockwaves blasted out, passing through the greyspace of the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect and heading out into the Great Necropolis at large, destroying worlds along the way, and even damaging immortal worlds ranked two or three hundred.

“God-Ordaining Nine Transformations. First Transformation: Origin-Beginning Transformation!”

A vicious grin could be seen on Shi Yuan’s face as he unleashed a marvelous ability derived from the Great Necropolis itself. All of a sudden, his body twisted and distorted as he moved with incredible speed, taking three steps and appearing behind Yang Qi, where he stabbed out with his finger.

Yang Qi didn’t even look behind him, but simply met the finger attack with his own finger, which shoved Shi Yuan back three steps.

“Second Transformation: Heavenly-Gentleman Transformation!”

SWISH!

He switched to a knifehand, chopping it out with incredible force and sending a streak of golden light piercing through Yang Qi’s defensive empyrean energy.

The attack slashed across Yang Qi’s skin, but although it left a mark, it didn’t actually cut him. How could an attack like that actually damage his Unspoiled Body?

“Let’s join forces to kill him!” Zi Qiong shouted. She and Xi Hua both lunged forward to attack. As for Xi Hua, he sent a sword stabbing toward Yang Qi, a sword covered with an exterior shell of stone, which was of course created by the godpower of the Great Necropolis.

The sword moved so fast that, in the blink of an eye, it was about to hit Yang Qi.

“Screw the hell off!” Yang Qi said, waving his sleeve. A blast of wind shot out, slamming into the sword. Instantly, Xi Hua was sent tumbling backward through the air, blood spraying out of his mouth before he flopped onto the ground, where the Great Necropolis godpower immediately began healing him.

Rushing forward, Zi Qiong said, “I’ll help you, Elder Brother Xi Hua!”

A moment ago, she had actually hesitated, and hadn’t unleashed an attack, which was why Yang Qi hadn’t hit her.

POP!

All of a sudden, Zi Qiong launched an attack right at Xi Hua’s head!

The vicious expression on Xi Hua’s face suddenly turned to a look of terror. “No! Junior Sister! Why are you attacking me? How could you be so treacherous! We were supposed to work together to take down Shi Yuan! You promised to be mine for all time! Why? Why are you doing this!?”

“Be yours for all time? You're quite the dreamer, aren’t you? In the end, there can only be one Inheritor of the Great Necropolis. I've been on my guard against you and Shi Yuan this entire time, just waiting for the right moment to make my move. Now die!” A triumphant expression appeared on Zi Qiong’s face as she thrummed with the godpower of the Great Necropolis and pushed her attack.

Crack!

Xi Hua exploded like a crushed rock. Then a godpower seed emerged from his head, and Zi Qiong grabbed it and immediately began absorbing it.

Swish!

When Shi Yuan saw this development, his face became a mask of shock and alarm. However, he was quick to react, sending a palm strike flying toward Zi Qiong in the hopes of grabbing the godpower seed.

Unfortunately for him, he was fighting Yang Qi, an opponent one couldn't afford to fight while distracted. Yang Qi blurred into a series of afterimages as he slapped a palm onto Shi Yuan’s back, causing him to vomit blood, which turned into stone as it fell, crashing onto the ground below.

Clearly, he had just sustained a deep injury.

Chapter 1029: Too Much To Take In

The events playing out now were just about too much to take in.

As the fight between Yang Qi and Shi Yuan played out, it was obvious that Yang Qi had the upper hand, causing many of the onlookers to nod inwardly as they were reminded of how impressive the junior sectlord was. He could actually keep a Terrifying Inheritor in check!

As for Zi Qiong and Xi Hua, nobody put much stock in them, as Yang Qi had already defeated them with a single blow each.

However, Yang Qi hadn’t sealed them, giving them free reign to do as they wish after having been defeated.

Therefore, it was to the utter shock of everyone present that Zi Qiong launched a sneak attack on Xi Hua, killing him and taking his godpower seed.

Wham!

Yang Qi blocked Shi Yuan, which gave Zi Qiong the time she needed to consume the godpower seed. Instantly, she began thrumming with Great Necropolis godpower, causing the image of a God-Ordaining Dais to rise up behind her.

RIP!

All of a sudden, her head erupted with intense psychic fluctuations that swept out in all directions.

Whizz!

The fluctuations were filled with terrifying power, indicating that her will convergence had improved. She was now in the Terrifying level! It was a level that countless top experts longed to reach, and she had done it!

Shi Yuan burst out laughing. “You’re quite the vicious schemer, Zi Qiong. Xi Hua really fell for it, didn’t he? You took advantage of the rarest of opportunities, and now you’re in the Terrifying level. Perfect. Now we can join forces and kill this shifty junior sectlord!”

Although Shi Yuan was smiling, it couldn’t have been more insincere and forced. Never would he have guessed that Zi Qiong would do something like this. She had struck with intense force, without any warning whatsoever, and in that moment, Shi Yuan realized that he had misread her. She was truly a dangerous schemer, and worse, now that she had one more godpower seed than he did, she was going to be stronger than him.

Unsurprisingly, he was filled with regret. If he had known how much of a boost an additional godpower seed would give him, he wouldn’t have held back. He would have just immediately killed the other two Inheritors. What did the rules of the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect matter, considering the benefits to be had? Instead, he had always allowed himself to be won over by Zi Qiong’s gentle reminders. Little did he know that she had been playing him all along, doing everything to protect herself and just waiting for the chance to make her move.

That said, there was still time to try allying himself with her. And if she and Yang Qi wore each other out in the fight, perhaps Shi Yuan could stab Zi Qiong in the back, take both of her godpower seeds, and become completely unparalleled under heaven.

It was obvious how malicious he was, considering how quickly he came up with this vicious plan.

However, what happened next caused his jaw to drop in astonishment. Zi Qiong walked up to Yang Qi and gave him a long, respectful salute.

“I, Zi Qiong, offer my respects, Junior Sectlord. I'm fully aware that I said some very disrespectful and arrogant things just now. However, all of that was simply a ruse to lure the traitor Xi Hua into a vulnerable position. Junior Sectlord, I truly hope that you can forgive me for that. Were it not for your help, I would never have been able to slay Xi Hua. It was all because your consummate move injured him, and before he could recover I managed to swoop in and seal the victory. Furthermore, it was your psychic fluctuations that helped me assimilate the godpower seed so quickly. Your strategic skills are beyond compare, Junior Sectlord. Henceforth, you have my heartfelt endorsement.”

All of the onlookers were completely dumbstruck, and were staring at Zi Qiong with their eyes wide. Who could ever have guessed that things would develop in this way? Shi Yuan almost felt like passing out from disbelief that Yang Qi and Zi Qiong had apparently been working together to kill Xi Hua and take his godpower seed, then help Zi Qiong reach the Terrifying level.

Yang Qi nodded, making it clear that he viewed Zi Qiong with favor.

The truth was that in the moment he had struck her and Xi Hua, she had reached out with her will, connecting directly to his sea of consciousness to explain what she wanted to do, even asking for his help. She had said, “Junior Sectlord, I can tell that you’re strong, but I'm worried Shi Yuan will be able to escape. Can you help me kill Xi Hua and take his godpower seed? I’ll be able to achieve a breakthrough, then I’ll join you and we can work together to take down that traitor Shi Yuan!  As you probably know, we Inheritors can’t truly work together, so the only way for me to survive is to acknowledge allegiance to you.”

Yang Qi had replied, “Why should I trust you?”

And she had said, “Junior Sectlord, I'm sure you realize how dangerous we Inheritors are once we reach the Terrifying level. Although Shi Yuan might not be able to kill you, he could easily escape. And then he could become a huge problem for the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect. Besides, considering how amazing you are, are you really worried about a puny little girl like me? Furthermore, I'm willing to give you my pure and chaste body if you agree to my suggestion. I’ll be yours!”

Yang Qi had immediately been impressed by the fact that this was obviously not a woman to take lightly. However, her plan was a good one and what she said was correct; the Inheritors would inevitably have to fight each other to the death. Of course, Yang Qi was already coming up with a whole set of plans in case she turned on him.

After dealing with Profound Valor, he had come up with many ways of dealing with Inheritors. Everyone had weaknesses, even them.

Thus, he and Zi Qiong reached an agreement in the time it took a spark to fly off a piece of flint, which led to the current situation.

“Y-you...” Shi Yuan stammered, “you bitch! I can’t believe you’re siding with him! You malicious villain! I should have killed both of you when we were out training!”

Shi Yuan was grinding his teeth with regret.

Turning to look at him, Zi Qiong said, “I've been fearing for my life since the moment you reached the Terrifying level, Shi Yuan. Worrying every moment that you might kill me. That’s why I seduced Xi Hua, to get him to help me fight you. At the same time, I manipulated your weaknesses to keep myself safe. Did you ever think I would really work with you? This junior sectlord is a man of great talent and bold vision. Everyone can see that the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect has reached new heights of glory after he took charge. With the two of us working together, the sect will be safe, and at the very least, my godpower seed will be safe. After all, he has no use for it. As for working with you, wouldn’t I just be sticking around waiting to die? Now, the junior sectlord and I will work together to crush you. And when I take your godpower seed, I’ll reach a higher level of enlightenment and acquire an unfathomable cultivation base!”

“You think that if you kill me, this junior sectlord is just going to give my godpower seed to you?”  Shi Yuan said, obviously not willing to just give up. “He’s in charge now, and you're already strong enough to be a threat to him. And that means that with my godpower seed, you’d be far stronger than him! Why would he possibly allow you to get strong enough to keep him in check? He’ll definitely put you in your place!”

“Who cares? Once I become his woman, none of that will matter.” She laughed. “After all, I'm still chaste and pure!”

“You bitch!” Shi Yuan growled. “On the path of cultivation, the self is the only important thing. Who cares about lovers? Even parents and children can be discarded! Anything that gets in the way of profit and improving the cultivation base should die. That’s the path to staying around forever, and it's a kind of competition that surpasses anything from the mortal world.”

“As long as our interests align, it doesn’t matter,” she replied. “He and I can work out all the details after we kill you. I don’t even expect him to give me the godpower seed right away. But he will, eventually. I'm the only Inheritor in the sect, so as long as I remain loyal, it makes sense for me to have it. The interests of the sect are our main bond.” Glancing over at Yang Qi, she said, “Am I right, Junior Sectlord? That’s what we originally said. Even if I don’t initially take the godpower seed, it will eventually become mine. And I’ll use it to further the interests of our sect.”

“That’s right,” Yang Qi replied. “What you say makes sense. Furthermore, Shi Yuan just threatened to leave the sect, which is a horrendous crime punishable by death. And it's enough for a sect to have one Inheritor; that way, infighting can be avoided. Obviously, allowing Shi Yuan to live isn't an option. That said, I think we should give him a chance to turn over a new leaf.”

Looking at Shi Yuan he said, “If you get on your knees and swear an oath to acknowledge allegiance to me and serve the sect faithfully, I can place a warding spell on you that will make you a thrall for a thousand years. After you help a hundred disciples reach the Terrifying level, then we can say you've atoned for your sins.”

“What?!” Shi Yuan said, his face falling. The ‘offer’ Yang Qi was making seemed ridiculous and impossible. “You... you savage! How about instead, I go for broke and make sure I cause as much destruction as possible in the sect! You really think it's going to be that easy to stop me!?” Killing energy surged within him as he said in a bone-chilling voice, “You’d better let me go, Yang Qi. Otherwise I’ll take at least half of the elite disciples of the sect with me to the grave!”

It was no empty threat. As a Terrifying Inheritor, he was definitely strong enough to follow through.

In response, Yang Qi looked at him with narrowed eyes.

Chapter 1030: A Profoundly Treacherous Woman

Shi Yuan obviously didn’t have the upper hand in any way. And he had no hope of trying to convince Zi Qiong to join him. Why would she risk following him when she could join Yang Qi and get an additional godpower seed as a result?

However, Shi Yuan was a vicious character, and therefore he decided to gamble by threatening the entire Will Manifestation Heaven Sect.

He obviously didn’t have any sense of belonging to this sect; ever since he became an Inheritor, he had lost touch with reality and come to view the sect as merely a tool for his own advancement. Having begun to tread the dao of devils, there was no way he was going to show mercy now. He would attack the sect itself and take as many people as possible with him on his way down.

“You’ve really gone over the edge, Shi Yuan,” said Zi Qiong, taking a step forward and waving her hand, causing a stone-colored greyspace to spring up around them. “Don’t forget that I'm also a Terrifying expert now, just like you. I have two godpower seeds and you have one, which means that I'm superior to you. Maybe I couldn’t kill you on my own, but with the junior sectlord on my side, there’s no way you’ll come out of this alive. Why are you refusing to come to your senses? You’ll really cast the sect aside and die for your prestige, rather than turn over a new leaf? The junior sectlord just said that as long as you perform some services for the sect, he’ll spare you!”

“Bah!” Shi Yuan spat. “You think I would agree to live life as a thrall? Besides, Zi Qiong, your plots against Xi Hua have already revealed how treacherous and evil you are. I have no doubt that even if I did agree to be sealed for a thousand years, you’d arrange for plenty of ways to have me killed afterward.”

“Don’t be so obstinate, Shi Yuan,” said Yang Qi. “If you sincerely repent and change your ways, I’ll keep you safe from harm.”

“Like hell you will!” Shi Yuan said, laughing. “Die! All of you can just die! Either let me go and drop the grudge between us, or I’ll go all out and make sure the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect suffers a grievous blow!”

“You really think you can hurt the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect?” Yang Qi chuckled. “I don’t think things will play out as you imagine them. Do you think the sectlord and the chief elders are just going to sit idly by? They’ve been watching this scene play out, and have borne witness to my strength. Sectlord, I know that you've already mastered that grand magic you’ve been cultivating. With the corpses of all those executors, you've improved your energy arts, haven’t you?”

A peal of laughter rang out, then rumbling sounds could be heard from above as a host of chief elders descended from the clouds, led by the sectlord and Peaklords Celestial and Memory.

Those three in particular had greatly benefited by watching out for Yang Qi. Furthermore, they had all taken the psychic slaves from the executors’ prison and turned them into out-of-body incarnations. In addition, Yang Qi had given them enlightenment based on the imperial-heaven pre-beginning systems and the Civilization Creating Grand Magic. He had also given them some of the Seventy-Two Monarchs Energy Art, helping them improve their energy arts even more.

As of now, these three experts were more powerful than ever; especially the sectlord, who was absolutely unfathomable. From what Yang Qi could tell, he was now beyond the level of Archmonk Dharma Treasury.

Counting the junior superintendent and his seven followers, plus the original corpse that had been brought to the sect, there were a total of nine cultivation assets the sectlord had been given.

Nine corpses. Nine cauldrons.

It was impossible to say what level he had pushed the sect's signature Nine Cauldrons Grand Magic to.

But Yang Qi could sense that the man’s psychic scale had definitely risen, and was now at least at forty. Furthermore, he now had nine devilish halos behind his head, each of which contained the image of an immense cauldron. Apparently, he had combined the arts of some boundless devil church with the Nine Cauldrons Grand Magic.

“Sectlord,” Zi Qiong said, “I can’t believe you've mastered the Devil-Emperor God-King Heaven-Toppling Radiance! That devil light is a taboo art from a devil church that requires the blood and souls of numerous Executors of the Ancient Road. Once you master it, you’ll have access to all the same divine abilities and vital energies as the executors. It’s a supreme art from the dao of devils, and was specifically created by the devil churches to be the bane of the executors.”

“You're very experienced and knowledgeable, Zi Qiong,” the sectlord said with a nod. “You definitely deserve your reputation as one of the most elite disciples in the sect. I'm pleased that, in the critical moment, you renounced the darkness and sought the light. And yes, you’re right. If it weren’t for the fact that Yang Qi killed eight Executors of the Ancient Road and gave them to me for my cultivation, I never would’ve mastered this art specifically designed for use against the executors. You see, I’ve combined it with my Nine Cauldrons Grand Magic to create something rare and powerful. In the upcoming assembly of sects, I’ll definitely be able to further the interests of our Will Manifestation Heaven Sect. Going forward, I hope that you can help Yang Qi manage things here in the sect. He's capable of things you can’t even imagine, and is actually far more valuable than an Inheritor. See his cultivation base? He’s not even in the Terrifying level, yet he's this strong. Obviously, he’s keeping his cultivation base lower on purpose. In truth, he’s not even a Grand Emperor! He’s only on the third or fourth stair!”

“What?!” Zi Qiong said, looking in horror at Yang Qi. Obviously, she hadn’t noticed that about him.

The stronger someone was at a weaker level, the more it went to show how powerful they would ultimately be. Truth be told, Grand Emperors weren’t very special at all in the superpower sects. Most disciples had power indexes in the hundreds, and only those who surpassed two thousand could be considered even a little bit important.

One had to reach three thousand to truly be noticed, and it was only upon becoming a Terrifying expert that one could actually have any measure of true power.

The fact that Yang Qi was so domineering at such a low level was completely shocking to Zi Qiong. It made her wonder just what remarkable ability he was using to suppress his level. Generally speaking, after reaching a certain point, one would naturally break through whether they wanted to or not.

Earlier, she had been operating under the assumption that she was roughly on the same level as Yang Qi, but now she realized that she definitely couldn’t deal with him.

Thankfully, as long as they didn’t have conflicting interests, he wouldn’t have any reason to kill her.

“I completely agree, Sectlord,” she said, bowing her head. “Henceforth, I’ll support the junior sectlord in all things, and follow his orders without question.”

With that, the sectlord turned his attention to Shi Yuan. “We took care of you for many years, Shi Yuan. But after becoming an Inheritor, you forgot all about that, and even went on about quitting the sect. Did you really think there was no one in the sect that could be your match? Get on your knees and express your remorse to the junior sectlord and accept whatever judgment he pronounces for you. That’s the only outcome I’ll tolerate.”

Looking around, Shi Yuan laughed heartily. “You're not my sectlord. I’ve already quit this sect. I don’t recognize the authority of any of you here. And don’t you dare to threaten me. I’m leaving, but I’ll be back. And when I return, I’ll be at the head of an army of sects. I’ll obliterate the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect and make sure all of you regret what happened here today!”

RUMBLE!

With that, he turned into a shadowy blur that shot directly toward the sectlord. Obviously, he wanted to take him as a hostage! But he had underestimated the sectlord’s strength.

The sectlord hardly blinked and nine streams of devil light appeared behind him, which became nine immense cauldrons, arrayed in a spell formation that instantly trapped Shi Yuan.

Within the depths of those nine cauldrons, sagefire burned bright and hot.

“Sagefire to Immolate Devils; Eradicate the Mortal Dust; Living and Breathing; Deathless Magical Laws....” Sagefire shot out, creating an immense heavenly net that wrapped him up tight.

Shi Yuan howled, “Great Necropolis godpower! Give me the strength to break through anything!”

His godpower seed appeared, rotating rapidly as the godpower of the Great Necropolis poured forth, transforming the fire into stone and making it impossible to hurt him. Then, Shi Yuan began launching wild attacks at the cauldrons, provoking loud booming sounds, yet not hurting them at all. Shi Yuan wasn’t able to break free from the trap, and couldn’t release his destructive force on the sect.

“You came prepared with powerful techniques, Sectlord,” Yang Qi said. “Zi Qiong, join me. We’ll enter the formation and crush him. He's a threat that absolutely must be eliminated. We need to do everything we can to strengthen the sect in preparation for the coming assembly.”

“Yes, Junior Sectlord.” Although Zi Qiong was going along with Yang Qi’s orders, there was no way he would ever believe that a schemer like her would ever truly cooperate with him.

Whooosh!

The two of them entered the formation of cauldrons and sagefire. Of course, it was no ordinary sagefire; it was a combination of the powers of the executors, as well as fiend-devils, a mixture as explosive as a red-hot stone thrown into a vat of ice water.

Yang Qi had to admit that the sectlord was quite a genius to have succeeded at creating something like this.

RUMBLE!

Yang Qi and Zi Qiong launched their deadly attacks. Zi Qiong was particularly ruthless, holding nothing back in her attempts to kill her fellow Inheritor.

Chapter 1031: The Sovereign Lord&#039;s Holy and Far-Reaching Consummate Omnicurse

In the blink of an eye, Shi Yuan was grievously injured.

The sectlord had held back earlier, even when Shi Yuan was shouting about leaving the sect. If he hadn’t, he might have been accused of improperly interfering in the affairs of the lower disciples. Instead, he had left things in Yang Qi’s hands. But when Shi Yuan threatened to kill as many as half of the disciples in the sect, he finally took action.

Now no one could find fault with him cleaning house the way he was.

After all, how could it possibly be tolerated to have someone like Shi Yuan threatening to kill so many disciples in the sect? Even if he were more talented and important than he was, it was more than obvious to everyone present that he was completely deranged. And demented people such as that needed to be put in their place.

This was the moment Yang Qi had been waiting for.

Crack! Snap!

After flying into the formation, he immediately launched vicious attacks on Shi Yuan. Eyes filled with an almost cannibalistic rage, Shi Yuan blocked Zi Qiong’s attack and began building up his energy to launch a counterattack against Yang Qi. By this point, he hated Yang Qi so much that he was more than willing to end his own life, as long as he took Yang Qi with him.

Zi Qiong could tell what was happening, and in order to make sure she continued to make a good impression on Yang Qi, went all out with her attacks. Her hands swirled in front of her, creating millions upon millions of palm projections, all of them seemingly powerful enough to turn the dome of heaven into ash. Rumblings sounds echoed out like an enormous millstone crushing everything in its path. Although her palm strikes seemed gentle and elegant, they were actually as powerful and weighty as mountains.

Her palm technique had long since surpassed the ordinary limitations of true energy, and it caused many onlookers to gasp in amazement, even chief elders. None of them could have ever guessed that her cultivation base would be so advanced, to the point where it actually surpassed many of the chief elders.

Meanwhile, Shi Yuan’s hand had seemingly turned into stone, and his every strike carried the godpower of the Great Necropolis.

“God Tombstone Palms!”

Suddenly, Zi Qiong’s palm technique changed, with each blow causing true energy to form a tombstone so enormous and powerful that it could crush anything and everything that got in its way.

Flowing text could be seen on the tombstone, inscriptions to a buried god. After all, the Great Necropolis had appeared in order to bury gods to begin with.

“God Tombstone Palms!” Shi Yuan unleashed the same technique, but it was completely devastated by Zi Qiong’s version. Both of them were drawing on the essence of the Great Necropolis, but Zi Qiong had an additional godpower seed, which meant that she could absorb the energy faster. Shi Yuan could tell that his true energy was insufficient, and he would eventually be overwhelmed. If he were on the outside, he could have simply fled. But right now, he was trapped by the sectlord’s Nine Cauldrons Grand Magic. Even worse, he was also under threat by Yang Qi.

POP!

Gasping, and with his true energy completely out of control, Shi Yuan was sent staggering back by Zi Qiong’s God Tombstone Palms. Then he was hit from another direction by Yang Qi, sending him flying through the air to slam into one of the nine cauldrons, blood pouring out of his mouth.

“You vicious bastards!” he said as Yang Qi and Zi Qiong stood there in front of him. “I'm the hero of a generation, yet here I am in this dismal situation. If I were fighting you one on one, I would have nothing to fear. Even if I had to fight the sectlord, I could’ve at least escaped with my life. And then there’s you, Junior Sectlord, you narcissistic prick. You’re not a match for me, so instead you resorted to crafty plots and machinations. I only wish I’d killed the bitch Zi Qiong in the very beginning!”

Seeing that Zi Qiong was about to launch another attack with her God Tombstone Palms, Yang Qi said, “Wait a moment.” Smiling coldly, he continued, “So, Shi Yuan, you really think I'm not a match for you? Alright. How about I let you heal up, and then the two of us can have a duel. Then we can prove once and for all whether or not I deserve to be the junior sectlord.”

“Seriously?” Shi Yuan said, a flicker of hope appearing in his eyes. “What if I beat you?”

“Then you can leave,” Yang Qi said.

“No, you can’t do this!” Zi Qiong said. “Junior Sectlord, you absolutely mustn’t do anything like that. Let me fight him. He's very dangerous; furthermore, he’s on the verge of completely mastering the God Tombstone Palms. He has access to boundless godpower from the Great Necropolis, and without me to keep him in check, he’ll be deadly. Plus, you have no way to actually destroy his physical body.”

Yang Qi waved his hand dismissively. “You still believe that you Inheritors are eternally indestructible? I think I need to give you a little demonstration to prove that there is nothing truly impossible to destroy. Zi Qiong, it seems you’ve acknowledged allegiance to me, yet aren’t truly convinced of my superiority. Prepare to see a real energy art in action. Henceforth, do my bidding in the sect, and I’ll leave you alone.”

“In that case, Junior Sectlord, I’ll just step back and see how you kill Shi Yuan.” Although Zi Qiong’s eyes contained a flicker of displeasure, she quickly suppressed it. And just as she said, she fell back and waited to see Yang Qi in action.

“I originally didn’t want to use this energy art, as I was worried it would lead to wide-scale death and destruction. But now that the sectlord has the scene locked down, let’s see whether this is enough to kill you!” Keeping his eyes fixed on Shi Yuan, he continued, “First, hurry up and heal yourself!”

Yang Qi didn't really need to say anything in that regard. Shi Yuan would automatically heal, thanks to the godpower of the Great Necropolis. For all intents and purposes, he really was eternally indestructible.

Sadly for him, he had run into Yang Qi.

A short time later, he was back to his peak. “Bring it on you sham junior sectlord. Let me see just how amazing this supposed energy art of yours is.”

The chief elders were closely watching the situation, curious what Yang Qi would use to defeat an Inheritor. After all, as a superpower sect, they were fully aware that the Inheritors were favored by the heavens and were symbols of the Great Necropolis that simply couldn’t be killed.

Crack. Rattle.

Holy light began to surge out of Yang Qi, emerging from every pore on his body like the glow of a full moon. It wasn’t intense, but rather pure, and as it swirled around him, it pulsed, transforming into a host of curses.

As everything trembled, the sectlord’s expression flickered and he said, “Quick, help me bolster the nine cauldrons, otherwise that godpower is going to spread into the open!”

“Yes sir!” the chief elders responded, and they poured their true energy into the cauldrons, which began to shine brightly.

“Sectlord, what energy art is that?” Peaklord Celestial asked. “How come it's so strong?”

Both he and Peaklord Memory were shocked, and almost felt like they had no idea who Yang Qi was.

“It's an aspect of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth called the Sovereign Lord’s Holy and Far-Reaching Consummate Omnicurse. According to the stories, once the curse is activated, it can topple heaven and earth, invert yin and yang, and overturn the cosmos. In its strongest form, it can overturn the god world and its foundations, obliterate the legion of gods, and bring about doomsday. Years ago, I had the opportunity to watch Proud Heaven fight the emperor of the Executors of the Ancient Road. At one point in the fight, Proud Heaven lamented that he hadn’t mastered this curse, and that if he had, he would’ve been able to kill the emperor. However, he also mentioned that even if someone other than him mastered the curse, they wouldn’t be able to use it, as they wouldn't be able to power it. But obviously....”

The sectlord didn’t need to finish his statement. Peaklords Celestial and Memory both understood.

Not only had Yang Qi mastered the curse, but also, was able to use it.

As soon as it was activated, Yang Qi’s aura changed, and it became obvious that he could crush Shi Yuan. As Shi Yuan realized that, his face fell, and he suddenly realized that he wasn’t going to be able to defend himself.

Before, he had been waiting for Yang Qi to attack him, but now that he saw his momentum building up, he knew that just standing there wasn’t the right thing to do.

“Enough with the parlor tricks! Prepare to die!”

WHOOSH!

Sword energy that glowed with stone-colored light shot directly toward Yang Qi’s throat.

Yang Qi didn’t even attempt to dodge. He extended his left index finger, and the power of the curse reduced the sword energy into dust.

Then he extended the rest of his fingers, opening his hand into a palm and thrusting it forward. Dazzling light shone and curse power flowed out, strong enough to topple both heaven and earth. The halls of heaven appeared, and before Shi Yuan could even react, he was surrounded and incapable of backing up, the godpower of the Great Necropolis crumbling around him.

Already, Yang Qi had the upper hand. His left hand surged with the power of the Sovereign Lord’s Holy and Far-Reaching Consummate Omnicurse, while at the same time, a host of text appeared around his right hand. That text appeared to be a curse of some sort, but closer examination revealed that it was composed of countless tribulations. It was none other than the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body!

It was during his extended period of research and study into the Mahātmā Jade that he had come to understand even more about the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.

In the past, he had unlocked many aspects of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, starting with the Infernal Deity Spear and the Fiend-Devil Wings. Later came the God Legion Paradise, Eternal Heavenly Aria, and Fist of the Halls of Heaven. Much later was the Life-Death Void-Destruction Lightning, Heaven-Questioning Soul-Summoning Banner, and the Many Heavens God Seal.

But lastly was this. The Sovereign Lord’s Holy and Far-Reaching Consummate Omnicurse, which had come based on enlightenment of countless magical laws connected to the dao of heaven, the universe, primal-chaos, and the god world. This curse was similar to the technique on the sheepskin scroll, in which every character was a tribulation.

When cultivated to its ultimate form, the Sovereign Lord’s Holy and Far-Reaching Consummate Omnicurse would be able to produce nine thousand, nine hundred and ninety-nine different characters, each of them a curse.

Right now, Yang Qi was limited to a few dozen. In the past, he wouldn’t have been able to do this, but thanks to acquiring some of Proud Heaven’s true energy, he now had the ability to do so.

The truth was that the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body had actually been created by observing the Sovereign Lord’s Holy and Far-Reaching Consummate Omnicurse. And the reason it had the word “myriad” in it was that it was intended to crush the godmammoths and challenge the might of the legion of gods.

That one extra character was supposed to imply its superiority.

Yang Qi had only cultivated these two techniques to the level of a few dozen characters, but the combination of the two was definitely enough to surpass the godpower of the Great Necropolis.

That was how he planned to kill Shi Yuan.

Chapter 1032: Eradicating an Inheritor

‘Time to go for broke!’ thought Shi Yuan. Howling, he yet again attacked with his God Tombstone Palms, sending an enormous tombstone of true energy rumbling toward Yang Qi.

Yang Qi hardly paid it any attention and destroyed the entire tombstone with a casual swipe of his fist.

Shocked, Shi Yuan waved his arms again, this time sending out streams of stone-colored true energy as he called on a different martial discipline from the Great Necropolis. It was the Tusita God Energy. The streams of energy shot out to form something like a web, then he leaped onto it, making him look like some sort of spider. Each step he took was in accord with some unique and strange rhythm, and it enabled him to evade all of the incoming attacks from Yang Qi. As he circled Yang Qi, he slowly surrounded him with the web.

In her heart, Zi Qiong chuckled coldly. ‘The Tusita God Energy? That’s used to avoid and defeat a more powerful enemy. I'm curious to see how Yang Qi defeats this tactic!’

She was still feeling a bit irritated at having been scolded by Yang Qi moments ago, and was hoping this would cause some trouble for him.

However, Yang Qi simply waved his hand, causing the dome of heaven to crumble and sending blade light shining in all directions. Instantly, the web collapsed and Yang Qi took a step forward, easily catching up with Shi Yuan. Then he thrust his hands out, and flickering characters began to flow out from them.

“Flame tribulation!”

RIP!

The character for “flame” exploded, and intense fire shot out. At the same time, Yang Qi threw a curse character of fire into the mix.

The two characters were perfect complements to each other. When the tribulation of fire from the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body was mixed with the curse of flame from the Sovereign Lord’s Holy and Far-Reaching Consummate Omnicurse, they caused the entire area to ignite. A sea of flames swept forth, reminiscent of the parable of the burning house from buddhism, in which those caught in the house would be incapable of escaping on their own.

“Aaaiiiieee!”

Shi Yuan burst into flames, and even the godpower of the Great Necropolis was afire. He was simply incapable of dealing with an energy art like this that contained two complementary aspects, one righteous and one evil.

As Shi Yuan’s access to the godpower of the Great Necropolis faded more and more rapidly, he realized that if things kept going this way, he really would perish. Faced with that prospect, a wretched thought suddenly formed in his head and he suddenly changed directions, evading Yang Qi and heading toward Zi Qiong.

“Die, you bitch! If I'm going out, I'm taking you with me!”

As he closed in, he summoned an enormous vortex, filled with seemingly endless power. Of course, the truth was that he didn’t actually want to die along with Zi Qiong; he was actually hoping to kill her and take her godpower seeds. That was his only hope, if he wanted to kill Yang Qi and destroy the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect.

Zi Qiong had been prepared for something like this all along, and immediately prepared to meet his attack.

However, before Shi Yuan could even reach her, he suddenly lurched to a halt in midair.

RUUUUUUUUMBLE!

A beam of incomparably fast sword light streaked forth, wrapped around him, and cut him in half!

Then, Yang Qi appeared.

“That speed!” blurted Zi Qiong. “You’re too fast! Too powerful! How are you capable of such things?”

“Aaaiiiieee!” Shi Yuan screamed. His two halves immediately tried to stitch back together, but Yang Qi simply waved his hand, keeping them separate. Then, he stabbed his hand into Shi Yuan’s head, grabbed the wriggling godpower seed there, and wrenched it out into the open.

“Be sealed!” he said, sending a host of sealing marks onto it. Then a vortex appeared, into which he tossed the seed.

Next, he waved his hand again, causing Shi Yuan’s mangled head and body to wriggle and squirm as they formed back into a whole person. However, he was completely bereft of any power. He was back to having Destabilizing will, lacking any fluctuations of the Terrifying level.

Having lost his godpower seed, his cultivation base had reverted to its previous state, making him little more than an ordinary disciple.

Zi Qiong burst out laughing. “I thought you were a hero of the age, Shi Yuan! But now you look the same as you did before. Hero? I think not. Back before you got that godpower seed, you were trash. Scum. A petty and spineless coward. And even after you got the godpower seed, you were still no hero, just an arrogant psycho. So how does it feel to be back to normal? Have any clever things to say? You piece of shit!”

“Sectlord, should I kill him?” Yang Qi said.

“Don’t bother,” the sectlord said coolly. “Killing him won’t do anything. His current cultivation base makes him useless. Just seal him and turn him into a thrall. He can help some of the other disciples improve their vital energy and cultivation base. Maybe later, we can even let him be a normal disciple again.”

“Sectlord, you can’t let him live!” Zi Qiong said. “As long as he’s alive, he’ll harbor hope. Besides, that godpower seed belongs to him. He's still an Inheritor, even if the seed is sealed. What would happen if he somehow got the seed back? Then he would be impossible to stop!”

“Impossible to stop?” the sectlord said. “Didn’t Yang Qi just stop him?”

Yang Qi knew exactly what the sectlord was thinking. Keeping Shi Yuan alive was a way to keep Zi Qiong in check in the future. If Zi Qiong kept getting stronger and stronger, she could eventually cause big problems. That said, Yang Qi wasn’t exactly thrilled about the idea of keeping Shi Yuan alive, either. Yang Qi could sense that he had a simmering true energy inside of him that was constantly trying to reach the godpower seed in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. And it took a lot of effort on his part to keep that power in check.

“I don’t think we should spare him,” Yang Qi said. “He’s constantly trying to call out to his Inheritor powers and summon the godpower seed to him. It takes a lot of effort for me to keep that under control.”

“Oh?” the sectlord said. He thought for a moment. “In that case, you’re right. Kill him. After all, you have the authority to manage daily affairs in the sect.”

“Yes sir!” Yang Qi strode forward until he was looming over Shi Yuan.

Considering how things were developing, Shi Yuan was overwhelmed with despair and fear. Raising his voice to a near shriek, he said, “I recognize the error of my ways, Junior Sectlord! Forgive me! I was overcome by ambition before, but now I understand how terrifying it is to become powerless. I beg you to return my powers. If you do, I’ll swear an oath to work wholeheartedly for you. Remember, this woman Zi Qiong is full of craft and cunning, and is already plotting against you. If you let her live, she’ll definitely cause problems for you. Keeping me alive to keep her in check is your best option for—”

SNICK!

A beam of sword light stabbed into Shi Yuan’s sea of consciousness, and it didn’t come from Yang Qi.

It was Zi Qiong who directly destroyed his nascent divinity.

Shivering, Shi Yuan looked at her and said, “A woman’s mind is the most ferocious.... Zi Qiong, even as a ghost, I’ll never let you off the hook for this....”

“You think you’re going to become a ghost? I don’t think so.” Her sword energy slashed back and forth within his sea of consciousness, destroying his soul and will. “You won’t even survive as a speck of dust. Great Necropolis Energy Disintegration!”

Fire roiled out and enveloped Shi Yuan, transforming him into nothing but steam, which the sword energy then absorbed. Just as she said, not even a speck of dust was left behind.

In this fashion, a mighty Inheritor of the Great Necropolis had died. In the moment of his death, his godpower seed briefly wriggled, then went still. It was now masterless.

Unfortunately, Yang Qi still couldn’t absorb it to become an Inheritor himself. According to common knowledge, only people who were already Inheritors could absorb the godpower seeds. Instead, he would use it to keep Zi Qiong in line. He was already very wary of her, and knew that she was a treacherous, deceitful person, the kind that would break any loyalty if it benefited her.

Yang Qi had learned his lesson with Yun Hailan, and ever since dealing with her, had never trusted women.

If it weren’t for him getting the God Legion Seal and turning the tables, he would never have recovered from that incident.

“Zi Qiong,” he said coolly, “you killed him without getting an order from me.”

“I deserve the death penalty for that,” she said, bowing her head. The displeasure that had appeared in her eyes earlier was nowhere to be seen. The fact that Yang Qi had been able to kill Shi Yuan indicated that he could do the same to her.

“It’s fine, I was planning to kill him anyway. In this case, your meritorious service will balance out your mistake, so I won’t punish you. Just don’t let it become a habit. Now we need to call the meeting I originally intended. We have a very short time to develop as many elite disciples as possible in preparation for the sect assembly.”

“Yes, sir,” she said, keeping her head bowed. “I’ll follow every order you give me.”

“Yang Qi,” the sectlord said. “There will be hundreds of thousands of superpower sects at this meeting. Although our Will Manifestation Heaven Sect is powerful, we aren’t strong enough to vie for the position of league-lord. However, we do need to secure at least some position of power. Some of the sects at the meeting are actually beyond the level of the superpower sects. They’re the paragon sects. One of them is the Woodfern Couple Palace, and another is the Genesis Sanctum. People say that the leaders of those two organizations are all in the mid Terrifying level. I'd say it’s highly likely that one of them will be selected as the league-lord. The leaders of the Woodfern Couple Palace have a daughter, their junior empress, and they’re probably going to try recruiting a son-in-law during this assembly. Why don’t you give it a shot?”

Chapter 1033: Superpower Assembly

“What?!” Yang Qi blurted, his jaw dropping. What the sectlord had just said came completely out of the blue. He hadn’t heard anything about the situation that was just mentioned, although, to be fair, he had been completely focused on his study and research.

Only one word came to mind in regard to the sectlord asking him to consider marrying the junior empress from the Woodfern Couple Palace: absurd. It wasn’t uncommon within the dao of immortals for men and women to marry, and seek godly ascension by means of dual cultivation. And many times, having a partner in life made it easier to deal with difficult situations. But Yang Qi had never even considered such a thing. As far as he was concerned, women in general were not to be trusted. He would much rather put his faith in a sworn brother than rely on a woman.

Of course, Yang Susu and his own mother didn’t count, as they were relatives.

“As for you, Zi Qiong,” the sectlord continued, “to date, the junior pontiff of the Genesis Sanctum is still unmarried. And the pontiff recently issued an announcement saying that he hopes to find an outstanding young woman to be his wife. You definitely stand a chance. If we could form a marriage alliance with them, it would put us in a very good position. Understand?”

“Yes, Sectlord,” Zi Qiong said, nodding her head.

Looking thoughtful, Yang Qi said, “This doesn’t make sense. Maybe we could make a marriage alliance with a colossal monster of an organization like that, but what if we end up just getting swallowed up by them? I definitely couldn't agree to something like that, Sectlord.”

“That’s up to you,” the sectlord said with a smile. “Although, considering what you’re capable of, Yang Qi, I somehow doubt anybody will simply swallow us up. I think you would be the one most likely to swallow them up.”

“If I wanted to do that, I’d just kill them and take their treasure. I lead by strength, not by marriage alliances. Furthermore, I don’t think it's a good idea for Zi Qiong to marry into another sect, either. If that happened, she would become part of the Genesis Sanctum. And it's not as if they’ll just let her stay here with us. Who wouldn’t want to have an Inheritor in their sect?”

The sectlord shrugged. “Well, you make the decision. I'm going to go into seclusion to contemplate the workings of heaven. Chaotic times are coming, and as the sectlord, I need to do everything I can to make sure our sect remains safe. I’ll do anything to achieve that goal, even if it means sacrificing myself in a moment of crisis. Make all the preparations. In three days, we go to the assembly of sects in Destructionless Castle.”

With that, he and the chief elders vanished into thin air.

Obviously, they had a lot to discuss in terms of keeping the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect safe from invasion during the assembly. Considering the sect would be mostly empty, they needed to set up spell formations and alarms just in case.

When they were gone, Yang Qi looked at Zi Qiong and said, “If the Woodfern Couple Palace is looking for a son-in-law, and the Genesis Sanctum is looking for a wife, then why don’t the two of them ally with each other and become completely invincible?”

“It’s not that simple, Junior Sectlord,” she replied. “The Woodfern Couple Palace and the Genesis Sanctum hate each other with a passion. And they’re going to be fighting bitterly to win control of the alliance. I wouldn’t be surprised if blood ends up being spilled over it. There’s simply no way they would ever work together. They’re as opposed to each other as the Executors of the Ancient Road and the fiend-devils, or fire and water.”

“I see,” Yang Qi said. “By the way, what kind of place is this Destructionless Castle?” As an Inheritor, Zi Qiong knew a lot more about the Great Necropolis, therefore, Yang Qi wasn’t holding back in trying to get information.

“It’s widely accepted to be an extremely dangerous place. There used to be a huge treasure trove there, but sadly, it was split up between the Genesis Sanctum and the Woodfern Couple Palace hundreds of millions of years ago. In terms of cultivation, there's something called the Destructionless Formation there. If you practice energy arts in it, your cultivation can speed up by millions upon millions of times, and you can directly enter a state of having a destructionless psyche. However, the question of who owns the formation, and the castle itself, for that matter, has always been an issue. The Woodfern Couple Palace and the Genesis Sanctum both want the castle for themselves and are constantly fighting over it. In some ways, this assembly of superpower sects is going to be the final battle between them. Whoever wins will lead the alliance, and whoever loses will be forever expelled from Destructionless Castle.”

From the very respectful way Zi Qiong offered an explanation to Yang Qi, it was obvious that she had fully and truly acknowledged allegiance to him. She knew that if Yang Qi wanted to, he could easily advance his cultivation base by ten times over, instantly become a Grand Emperor.

In fact, at the moment, keeping his cultivation base suppressed was a harder task than it would have been to improve it.

“So, it’s going to be a real fight between a dragon and a tiger.” He sighed. “Our Will Manifestation Heaven Sect is a superpower sect, but compared to the other superpower sects, we’re only average. We need to come up with a plan. We have three days to take our strongest people and improve them a bit. The more people we have when we go to this assembly, the better. Obviously, I count as one of the elites, as do you. As for An Yiru, Jadefall, and Eldest Brother, we won’t take them with us. They’ll be staying behind to stand guard. That means I have three days to make sure that the three of them reach the Terrifying level. Three days.”

“Who is Jadefall, and who is this Eldest Brother?” Zi Qiong asked.

“My two most trusted aides. They’ve been with me since I was a powerless nobody in the immortal worlds. In fact, perhaps you could say since the mortal world.” Yang Qi’s subordinates had spent years training in the virtual god world in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, and could definitely be considered consummate geniuses.

Jadefall was the best of them all. She had gained enlightenment of many daoist techniques, and Yang Qi had given her countless resources to stimulate the porcelain godspore within her. Right now, she had a power index of around three or four thousand. As for Eldest Brother, he had always made steady progress. He worked extremely hard on his cultivation, and after joining the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect, had often gone out on deadly missions. Of course, that was only to be expected, considering that the Invincible Society only recruited the best of the best.

Now, he was truly starting to reveal his potential. He had successfully reached the Destabilizing level and was cultivating the Civilization Founding Grand Magic to its peak. Unfortunately, he wasn’t able to break through to the Terrifying level yet.

An Yiru, on the other hand, was just on the verge of making that breakthrough.

“Come with me,” Yang Qi said. “There’s a place I want you to see.”

“What place?” she asked, a vigilant expression appearing briefly on her face before fading into something more relaxed. “Oh, you want to bed me, don't you, Junior Sectlord. I couldn’t be more honored!”

“That's not what I meant,” Yang Qi said without cracking the slightest smile. “I don’t trust the average woman, let alone you.” Swish! Without another word, he opened a vortex and stepped inside.

The immense power surging within the vortex caused Zi Qiong to hesitate for a moment, but then she followed him. Inside, she found another world filled with beautiful scenery. The sky overhead was filled with countless stars, all of which were made of godhood. The mere sight actually startled her. Not even top sects from the Ancient Road to the Gods would have godhood stars like this.

“Are we in...” she shivered, “the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart?”

“That’s exactly where we are,” Yang Qi said. “How does it feel? How do the godhood stars compare to the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect?”

“You...” she said, but then trailed off, completely at a loss for words.

“Our respects, Junior Sectlord!” Eldest Brother, An Yiru, Emperor Heart-Celestial and Jadefall all appeared. They were now members of the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect, and they were vastly beyond what they had been in the Dao Defense League.

Actually, the entire Dao Defense League had been absorbed into the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect, and its hundredth ranked immortal worlds had been turned into the greyspace of the sect's “world of mortals”.

The fifty mountain peaks of the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect, as well as the numerous courtyards attached to them, were almost like the god world, with the people living in the greyspace of immortal worlds being like ordinary people. Those who managed to stand head and shoulders above the rest would eventually rise to the truly great heights.

And that was where many people from the Dao Defense League lived.

In the past, the Dao Defense League had been a gargantuan organization. But then the Great Necropolis showed up, bringing with it vastly larger immortal worlds. For instance, a hundredth ranked immortal world was just as large as the entire Dao Defense League.

The immense Dao Defense League had quickly become as insignificant as a speck of dust.

“Everyone sit. Let’s begin our session of cultivation.” He flicked his finger, causing dazzling light to sweep out and form a large spell formation, where everyone sat down and began working.

Combining the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body and the Sovereign Lord’s Holy and Far-Reaching Consummate Omnicurse, Yang Qi created streams of light that entered the foreheads of everyone present, causing them to shiver as their psychic power increased.

“My enlightenment of the Unspoiled Body and the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth has led me to cultivate a boundless energy art capable of drawing on the dao of heaven and the Civilization Founding Grand Magic to push the psyche and cultivation base to a higher level. With that, I can help you unleash your potential. And I can also use the godpower of the Great Necropolis to bless you.”

Extending his palm, he said, “Zi Qiong, hurry up and pour the godpower of the Great Necropolis into me!”

“But...” she said hesitantly. “You shouldn’t casually use that power. If you force it into someone, it could easily destroy their sea of consciousness.”

Yang Qi chuckled coldly. “It's been years since I mastered the powers of the imperial-heaven pre-beginning, and I can use them to vanquish the will of the Great Necropolis. In fact, I know more about the godpower of the necropolis than you do. It’s been a long time since I first killed and sealed one of you Inheritors. Did you really think Shi Yuan was my first?”

“What? Does that mean you have two godpower seeds?” she said, stunned.

“You could say that,” he replied with a nod. “If you serve me faithfully enough, perhaps I’ll give both of them to you.”

“Yes sir!” Although she knew he was merely saying that out of formality, she couldn’t help but be moved by the thought of getting two godpower seeds. With that many seeds, she could easily match up to mid Terrifying experts from the ancient road.

Without any more hesitation, she poured Great Necropolis godpower into Yang Qi. Although she expected some adverse reaction, all that happened was that the godpower shattered and transformed into pure psychic power.

Chapter 1034: Superpower Assembly (2)

The godpower of the Great Necropolis flowed without cease, its will shattering as it was transformed into pure psychic power. To Zi Qiong’s utter shock, Yang Qi was like a machine designed to crush the Great Necropolis. Any kind of foreign power that entered him would be as effective as a snowflake thrown at the sun.

Thus, Yang Qi redirected the power of the necropolis into Emperor Heart-Celestial, An Yiru, Eldest Brother, and Jadefall.

Suddenly, Yang Qi’s finger blurred like the wind, hitting acupoints on all four of them. As he did, he imbued them with godpower that contained the Seventy-Two Monarchs Energy Art, his two most powerful godly class energy arts, the genetic systems, power assessment systems, imperial-heaven pre-beginning systems, vivicreation systems, and psychic scaling systems.

They were becoming like melting pots of the top techniques in existence.

Yang Qi was changing them down to their very genes. Zi Qiong watched as countless streams of blood aura flowed out of him. The blood of Fateless Ones, Fortuned Ones, Eternal Ones, Past Ones, Future Ones, Fraudulent Ones, Inspiring Ones, Enlightened Ones, Reincarnated Ones.... Fully three thousand varieties merged, forming a very unique genetic structure.

Other than the blood of Eternal Ones, Fortuned Ones, and Fateless Ones, the blood of the three thousand special constitutions were actually not particularly difficult to come across either in the Great Necropolis or on the Ancient Road to the Gods. After all, when taking into consideration that immortal worlds in the rank of two hundred, three hundred, five hundred, or even a thousand existed, it could only be imagined how many living beings were present.

And all of them were immortals.

All such locations would give birth to beings with special constitutions. And considering that such worlds were being ejected into the immortal dao age, it was obvious that the special constitutions would become more common.

That said, Fateless Ones essentially didn’t exist. Other than Yang Qi, none had ever been seen. And that was the same for Eternal Ones and Fortuned Ones.

Eldest Brother Secundus had been an Eternal One and had supposedly been a representative of universal fortune. Unfortunately, he ran into Leaf Dao-Denier, who devoured him.

In an age like the present, people had to constantly be on guard, lest they end up dead.

Yang Qi was using every tool he had at his disposal to help these four, assisting them to alter their genes, and using the three thousand special types of blood to unlock their ultimate potential.

Empress Jadefall was the first to open her eyes. Within her, the porcelain godspore was now loudly thrumming and there were cracks all over its surface.

“I need more godpower from the Great Necropolis!” Yang Qi said, as he realized that the godspore was devouring everything he threw at it.

Grinding her teeth, Zi Qiong worked harder, using all of her mental dharmas to ensure that the godpower continued flowing like a massive river into Yang Qi, who converted it and passed it along to Jadefall.

An indeterminable period of time passed.

POP!

The porcelain godspore cracked open, and Zi Qiong sagged with such weakness that she dropped into a sitting position. She had drained herself so much that she couldn’t even lift a finger.

Meanwhile, a pink, furry creature emerged. It looked like a puppy or kitten, or possibly a baby qilin. It was immensely cute, as round and pudgy as a pig, and as it blearily looked around, it made constant purring sounds.

“What is this thing?” Jadefall murmured in confusion.

Yang Qi looked at it in shock, having no idea what it was. The porcelain godspore was immensely powerful, but after hatching, it had produced something like this? It was enough to leave someone right in the middle of laughter and tears.

Furthermore, it seemed completely powerless. Weak, even.

All it did was make purring sounds.

Apparently, it thought Jadefall was its mother, as it was already crawling all over her, tumbling about, and even blowing bubbles out of its mouth.

Jadefall’s expression softened into an expression of fondness as she took the thing in her arms and stroked its pink fur. It almost looked like a toy.

“I’ll call it a purrling,” she said.

“Jadefall, your psychic power has reached the Terrifying level...” Yang Qi said. The moment the pink purrling had appeared, Jadefall’s psychic power had risen dramatically. Yet she didn’t seem to have even noticed.

“Purr. Purr...” the purrling said.

Yang Qi reached out to try to pick it up, but the purrling noticed and shrank back defensively. Then it spat a bubble out of its mouth, roughly the size of a human hand. Before Yang Qi could react, the bubble expanded, sucked him in and sealed him tight.

“What a strong sealing!” he murmured. He struggled, but couldn’t free himself. In fact, his will seemed completely unresponsive. Not even his two major energy arts were enough to break him free.

“Tribulation!” Yang Qi used hosts of energy arts until, finally, a pop rang out and the bubble burst, sending him tumbling out into the open with a look of shock on his face. It had taken a huge amount of power to break free of that seal. Who could have guessed that the bubbles spat out by the purrling would be so incredibly strong. Although they might not be able to do anything to someone in the mid Terrifying level, they would definitely be very effective against people with psychic scales of thirty or forty.

Besides, the purrling seemed to be a juvenile, which begged the question of just how strong it would become when it got older.

“Incredible!” Jadefall said in amazement. Unfortunately, she didn’t even know what this ‘purrling’ actually was. It looked almost like a toy that a child would play with. And all it seemed interested in doing was purring and crawling around. However, when she picked it up, it would settle down in her arms and just sit there, purring.

One strange thing was that it didn’t seem interested in food. Usually, when a godling was born, it would be hungry and try to find sustenance, or power to absorb. But the purrling wasn’t doing that.

‘Very strange,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘That porcelain godspore existed in the primal-chaos of the distant past, where countless gods fought over it. Eventually, it escaped from them. So it stands to reason that it's incredibly powerful, and should get even stronger in the future.’

Although they only had three days on the outside, that could easily be a thousand years in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Unfortunately, the session of cultivation ended with only Jadefall reaching the Terrifying level. Eldest Brother and An Yiru both failed, although they did make progress, strengthening their true energy and getting closer and closer to the point of a breakthrough.

Upon finishing the session of cultivation, Yang Qi consulted with his immortal-slaying clone and made a series of arrangements. Then he returned to the main hall to meet with the sectlord and Peaklords Celestial and Memory, then headed out into the Great Necropolis to Destructionless Castle.

This wasn’t an assembly to which the sects would bring large numbers of people. Only the top experts would attend. That included Peaklords Memory and Celestial, both of whom had used psychic enslavement to turn some top experts into out-of-body incarnations.

In terms of disciples, the attendees were Junior Sectlord Yang Qi, Zi Qiong, Jadefall and Emperor Heart-Celestial.

Neither An Yiru nor Eldest Brother had achieved breakthroughs to the Terrifying level, which meant that if they tagged along and got in trouble, the results could be deadly.

Numerous pathways in the Great Necropolis led to Destructionless Castle. At first, such pathways had immortal worlds in the rank of two hundred. But then, worlds appeared in the rank of three or four hundred. Then five or six hundred. Then seven or eight hundred....

There were plenty of dangers to be found in locations like this, but a group of top experts like them didn’t need to worry about such things. Eventually, they found themselves in front of a thousandth-ranked immortal world. Every living being on that world emanated immensely powerful auras, to the point that if the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect tried to invade it, they might succeed, but only after suffering heavy casualties. If there could ever be an alliance of hundreds of worlds like this, or even just dozens, they would be nearly invincible.

Alternatively, an immortal world with a rank of two thousand would definitely be an even match for the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect.

And one with a rank of three thousand would easily destroy the sect.

However, not even the Executors of the Ancient Road would attempt to invade an immortal world with a rank of three thousand. Besides, no one knew what such worlds were like, as they were too far in the depths of the Great Necropolis.

Destructionless Castle was located within a cluster of thousandth ranked immortal worlds. In fact, there were some that were in the rank of twelve hundred, thirteen hundred, or even fifteen hundred. It was truly an impressive and awe-inspiring sight.

At a certain point, Yang Qi reached out and grasped a stream of energy, which condensed into the form of a crystalline powder. Absorbing it, he suddenly felt like he was eternally indestructible, and in a state of being both lifeless and destructionless. His psyche suddenly felt cleansed, as though all banal longing had been removed from him.

He nodded. “What a great place to practice cultivation. That said, it's not as amazing as the Engine of the One God, nor as profound as the imperial-heaven pre-beginning systems. Once we're inside the castle, I should be able to study the spell formation and then reproduce something like it back in the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect.”

“You really are our lucky star, Yang Qi,” the sectlord said.

“Look, a lot of people are going in,” Peaklord Memory said. “Let's go; we don’t want to be late.”

Yang Qi had never seen so many Terrifying experts in one place.

Chapter 1035: The Amazing Purrling

Whoosh. Whoosh. Whoosh.

Even as the experts from the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect conferred, several beams of scintillating light pierced through the dome of heaven, heading in their direction and pulsing with powerful auras.

Then, a group from another sect appeared in their vicinity.

Cackling laughter rang out, and a voice said, “The Will Manifestation Heaven Sect is joining this assembly? What an utter joke! Aren’t you weaklings worried that you might get expelled for being so useless?”

There were a few dozen of these newcomers, and they quickly arranged themselves in formation around the force from the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect.

Looking around, Yang Qi saw that they were all Terrifying experts. Their leader wore yellow garments and had his hands clasped behind his back, making him look like the kind of arrogant person who looked down on all creation. Furthermore, his energy arts were clearly the type that could shake the heavens, topple the earth, and cause dead stars to rain down from above.

Although they were surrounded, the sectlord didn’t show any sign of looking nervous. Expression placid, he projected a divine will message to Yang Qi that no one else could detect, “These people have been enemies of our sect for hundreds of millions of years. They’re the Void-Trampling Immortal School. Although they call themselves an ‘immortal school’, most of their members follow the dao of devils. They go around killing and plundering, and are extremely vicious and evil. In the past, they’ve kidnapped disciples of our sect to use in experiments for their devil dao energy arts. There’s no need at all to treat them respectfully. In fact, I expect that we’ll finally resolve our grudge here at this assembly.”

Yang Qi nodded coolly.

He could already sense the wretch energy on these people from the Void-Trampling Immortal School, which they did nothing to hide. Obviously they weren’t even attempting to conceal the fact that they were evil people.

A particularly tall man in bright red clothing stepped forward. “Sectlord Will Manifestation, did you really think that you could stay safe by hiding out here like a turtle with its head in its shell? Why not step forward and resolve the enmity between our two sects?”

“Well if it isn’t Li Immortal-Trampler,” Peaklord Celestial said. “What are you so anxious for? Today is the sect assembly. Why not head into Destructionless Castle first, and worry about our issues later? There’s no point in getting involved in deadly combat out here. You’d make both of us a laughingstock. Our Will Manifestation Heaven Sect and your Void-Trampling Immortal School have been at odds for hundreds of millions of years, so don’t think that we're going to just forget about the countless disciples of ours you’ve killed, let alone our chief elders. We’ll avenge them eventually.”

“You’re scared, aren’t you?” said another of the experts from the Void-Trampling Immortal School. “It's a good thing you were waiting right here. Killing you in front of Destructionless Castle will be the perfect way to vent our frustrations.”

“If you’re really interested in dying, Li Immortal-Trampler, I can make your wish come true.” From the look of it, the sectlord was just about to start fighting.

“Slow down,” said the leader in yellow. Looking around at everyone present, he continued, “Sectlord Will Manifestation, we're not going to bully you in front of so many sects. I find it interesting that, of all the people you could have brought here today, you actually brought someone who isn’t even in the Terrifying level. Aren’t you worried about being made fun of?”

Obviously, he was referring to Yang Qi. The fact that he wasn’t in the Terrifying level was very obvious, and it would naturally be something others would laugh at.

“What are you suggesting, Li Void-Trampler?” Sectlord Will Manifestation said, his face remaining an expressionless mask.

“One on one!” replied Li Void-Trampler, who was actually the leader of the entire Void-Trampling Immortal School. “You have seven people, we have seven people. Let’s have a little fight, right here, right now. Those destined to live will live, those doomed to die will die. Do you dare to accept?”

“Why wouldn't I?” the sectlord replied with a smile. “You’re getting more and more arrogant, Li Void-Trampler. But don’t worry. If heaven wants you dead, it will first drive you mad. So. How exactly do you want to run this little competition?”

Li Void-Trampler didn’t say anything in response, but gave a meaningful look to one of his nearby disciples instead, a man clad in a white suit of armor, with a long silver spear in his hands.

At first, the armored man’s eyes locked onto Zi Qiong, but then they went wide when he realized that she was an Inheritor. Obviously, that would make her a very tough opponent. Turning, he pointed at Jadefall with his spear and said, “Hey, hottie. Care to come out and have some fun with me? I won’t hurt you. I’ll just make you my concubine! That’ll be far better than being in a crappy group like the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect.”

Even as the words left his mouth, he sent a stream of energy from his spear toward Jadefall.

Purr, purr....

Jadefall had been just about to step forward. But before she could, the piglet-like purrling she was holding in her arms apparently sensed the hostility of an enemy. Eyes opening, it spat out a bubble.

Although the bubble seemed to drift along slowly, it actually moved with incredible speed. In one one-trillionth of a moment, it surrounded the man with the spear, sealing him tightly.

“Aaaiiiieee!” he screamed, and everyone could tell that his true energy was completely suppressed.

“Not good!” Three of the other disciples immediately lunged forward and attacked the bubble.

However, none of their attacks did a single thing. The bubble simply absorbed their attacks and redirected them to the disciple with the spear.

“ARGGGHHHH!”

In the blink of an eye, he was pierced through by the countless attacks. Then, his head slumped over and he lay still.

Everyone could see that he was completely dead! Utterly and thoroughly without life!

Although he had only been an early Terrifying expert, that was still a force of incredible power. For all intents and purposes, he was eternally indestructible. Of course, that was relatively speaking. Even the mighty Sovereign Lord could be destroyed, much less a puny Terrifying entity.

“Damn you, demoness!”

“Die!”

Disciples rushed toward Jadefall from several angles, yet the result was downright astonishing to all of the onlookers, including disciples from other superpower sects who had stopped to see what was happening.

Purr. Purr....

The pink purrling spat out more bubbles, and in the blink of an eye, all of the incoming disciples were stuck.

They all unleashed extremely powerful energy arts, yet not a single one of them could escape.

They began screaming in fear as they realized how dangerous of a situation they were in.

“Dammit, what is that thing!?” said the sectlord of the Void-Trampling Immortal School. Unable to just sit back any longer, he took action, using one hand to send scorching flames out to hit the bubbles, and the other to grab the purrling.

Simultaneously, he flicked his fingers, causing several powerful streams of energy to shoot out toward the other enemies present. The finger attacks seemed soft and gentle, and in fact, were nearly invisible. But everyone could sense that they contained a boundless power that could inundate one’s soul and sea of consciousness.

“Watch out!” said Sectlord Will Manifestation, shooting to his feet. “That’s a consummate art from the Void-Trampling Immortal School, the Thirteen Soul-Hooking Fingers! Every one of them is powerful enough to snatch souls from heaven, earth, hell, the dao of immortals, and even the god world!”

Instantly, he unleashed a host of palm strikes.

He was profoundly aware that once Li Void-Trampler unleashed an attack, it would be extremely dangerous. Although Yang Qi and Zi Qiong could likely defend themselves from it, Emperor Heart-Celestial and Jadefall definitely couldn’t.

However, this was when something even more shockingly unbelievable happened.

Purr. Purr....

The pink purrling spat out another series of bubbles, which wrapped around all of the incoming finger attacks. The energy of the attacks turned into what appeared to be devils made of true energy, like beings from the depths of hell out to harvest souls of fallen gods from the god world. However, upon being trapped inside the bubbles, they were made completely powerless.

In the following moments, all of the bubbles merged together to create one larger composite bubble. Then the larger bubble suddenly shot toward Li Void-Trampler like lightning. He dodged and evaded, but all such efforts were in vain, as he was ultimately gobbled up by the bubble. Inside, he stared around with furious eyes at the burning ghostfire that surrounded him.

Unfortunately for him, he was completely incapable of extricating himself.

Next, hair-raising screams rang out as the disciples trapped in the other bubbles died. It was impossible to say exactly what sort of power was killing them, but regardless, it left Yang Qi with his hair standing on end. What exactly was this purrling?

The bubble display in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart hadn’t been nearly as formidable as this, yet it had taken the strength of nine bulls and two tigers for him to escape. He had even been forced to use the Sovereign Lord’s Holy and Far-Reaching Consummate Omnicurse and the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body, combined with the external force of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

However, it was now apparent that the purrling knew he was Jadefall’s friend, and perhaps even knew he had funneled power into the original godspore. Perhaps the purrling had used the bubble on him more as a game than anything.

In contrast, the purrling could tell that the threat from the Void-Trampling Immortal School was deadly in nature, and had fought back with bubbles that were ten times stronger than what Yang Qi had experienced.

Meanwhile, Li Void-Trampler unleashed a bevy of palm strikes, fist strikes, and kicks, and also unleashed a host of god items. None of them did any good. Furthermore, his defensive empyrean energy was being worn away by the effects of the bubble.

Not even a top sect leader could deal with these bubbles.

He was a famous individual who could rebuke heaven and earth, but now he was trapped in a bubble. The people watching the scene play out could hardly believe their eyes. They looked over at the pink purrling, but of course, none of them had any idea what it was or where it came from, and all of them were wondering how it could be so amazing.

Finally, Li Void-Trampler began to scream and plead. “Spare me! I don’t want to die! Let me out of this bubble! I admit defeat. We’ll submit to the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect. Hurry and free me.”

To see a top sect leader like him wagging his tail and begging for pity left everyone feeling shocked to the core.

Chapter 1036: Bubbles Unrivaled

“My god! He was a powerful sectlord, but how he’s wagging his tail and begging for pity!”

A nearby leader of a powerful sect shivered. “How could this be happening? What is that bubble beast? How could it be so miraculous? You people have all traveled far and seen a lot. Do you know what it is? Is it some sort of godling?”

Similarly shivering, another of the nearby sect leaders replied, “I read an ancient text from the god world called the God World Bestiary, which has extensive lists of strange creatures, but I don’t remember a single one that spits out bubbles. What could it be?”

“Well one thing’s for sure. The Void-Trampling Immortal School is finished. After getting trapped in that bubble, it’s obvious he can't fight back. If he hadn’t started begging for mercy, he would probably be dead already.”

“That bubble beast is incredible. It makes you wonder... will the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect end up as the champion in this sect assembly?”

“Don’t worry, they still have to worry about the Genesis Sanctum and the Woodfern Couple Palace. Those are the top two organizations. The best that people like us can hope for is to get a tiny piece of the pie. That said, a lot of superpower sects are going to be eliminated in this assembly. The only question is how the rest of us will benefit when they do.”

“What if our sects are among those that get eliminated?!”

“All we can do is fight hard to make sure that doesn’t happen. It’s too bad the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect suddenly found that bubble beast. Originally, they were on the list of sects to be eliminated, but now it seems they’ll be fighting for a share of the pie.”

“Not necessarily. The tallest tree attracts the most wind. That bubble beast might be powerful, but it’s obviously not full grown. It makes you wonder how much stronger it will be later. That means everyone’s going to want to get their hands on it. In fact, the Genesis Sanctum and the Woodfern Couple Palace might even want it.”

“That’s true. The Will Manifestation Heaven Sect might look impressive now, but I have a feeling that it's only temporary.”

The surrounding onlookers discussed the matter for a while, but no one could come up with any solid conclusions about what to make of the situation. And none of them dared to try to step in and save the sectlord of the Void-Trampling Immortal School. After all, nobody had any clue what they would do if they ended up trapped in one of those bubbles.

Purr. Purr....

The purrling stretched a bit, letting loose a soft purr that caused everyone’s hackles to rise. Thankfully, it seemed to have calmed down, and wasn't interested in letting loose any more bubbles.

All of a sudden, Yang Qi realized that he had never seen it eat anything, or even absorb any energy for that matter. In fact, he couldn’t even sense anything like power within it.

What was this thing?

It didn’t eat, nor did it absorb energy, yet it seemed almost infinitely strong.

It almost completely defied the laws of energy conservation, leaving Yang Qi completely flummoxed as to how it worked.

Li Void-Trampler’s cultivation base was strong enough that his fighting prowess was definitely on par with Yang Qi’s, or perhaps even stronger. And if they did fight, and Yang Qi got the upper hand, the man would obviously have been able to flee if he wanted to. But with the purrling’s bubbles in play, the man was completely helpless. Just how terrifying was the thing? And how strong was it?

Yang Qi was very curious to see how it would grow and develop in the future.

“Spare me!” Li Void-Trampler screamed. “Let me out of this bubble and I swear that I’ll be loyal to the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect! All of you, get on your knees and kowtow to them! Hurry up!” Obviously, Li Void-Trampler knew that he was just on the verge of being killed.

When the elders and disciples heard their sect leader’s commands, they exchanged awkward glances. Obviously, they had no desire to get on their knees and kowtow, but on the other hand, they couldn’t just watch as their sectlord was killed right in front of them.

At the same time, some of the elders realized that with the sectlord gone, they had a chance to take over. Finally, one of them raised his voice and said, “Let's get out of here!  We’ll go back to the sect, train hard, and return later for revenge!”

Whoosh. Whoosh. Whoosh.

A handful of the elders fled. As for the remaining disciples, they were now even more embarrassed and confused than before. Finally, one of the disciples dropped to his knees and started kowtowing. “We were in the wrong! Please forgive us. We’ll be loyal to the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect. Just let our sectlord go....”

It was a disciple from the main branch of the sect. He knew that if the sectlord died, his days would be numbered. After all, there were already elders who had fled back to the sect to try to establish their own authority. Obviously, they would purge the sect as soon as they could, and any of Li Void-Trampler’s loyalists along with it.

Sectlord Will Manifestation was visibly taken aback by these unexpected developments. Looking over at Jadefall, he said, “Go ahead and let Li Void-Trampler free. He’s injured badly enough that I can keep him under control. And it will be good to have another top expert in our sect.”

“But I don’t know how to control the purrling,” Jadefall said, sounding a bit alarmed.

“Why don't you just try asking?” Yang Qi said.

Stroking the purrling behind the ears, she said, “Purrling, baby, can you let him go? He won’t run away.”

The purrling stretched, then shook its head. “Purr. Purr....”

It seemed like it wasn’t ready to stop ‘playing’. However, in the end, it spat out another bubble, which floated over to the bubble containing Li Void-Trampler and popped it.

The instant he was in the open. Sectlord Will Manifestation blurred into motion, his finger stabbing into numerous locations on Li Void-Trampler’s body, causing blood to spray out of his mouth. Then, Sectlord Will Manifestation grabbed him and flew back to his original spot.

“You’ve lost, Li Void-Trampler,” he said in a cold voice. “And you’ll never recover. I advise you to simply surrender. If you don’t, you’ll end up becoming an out-of-body incarnation.”

Li Void-Trampler seemed to have aged by dozens of years, and any air of boundless ambition that he had once possessed was gone. “I can't believe that after dominating the world for so many years, I would end up like this. How pitiful. And I didn’t even lose to a human, but to some animal instead. What a joke....”

Sectlord Will Manifestation snorted coldly. “Even at full power, you were still no match for me. You actually got lucky to end up being attacked by the bubble beast.”

“Wait, do you mean you actually finished cultivating the....” Li Void-Trampler looked shocked for a moment before managing to regain his composure. Raising his voice, he said, “All disciples present are to join the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect. After this assembly is over, I’ll return to the sect and execute all of the elders who betrayed me. Big changes are coming for us.”

“Yes, yes of course....” the disciples all replied, kowtowing.

Thus, the disciples of the Void-Trampling Immortal School became members of the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect. Peaklord Memory immediately gave them new uniforms, and placed warding spells on them to ensure that they couldn’t do anything rebellious.

In a brief moment, the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect had become vastly stronger. As they proceeded onward to Destructionless Castle, no one dared to get too close to them, and many a wary glance was cast in the direction of the purrling.

Of course, there were quite a few gazes that seemed filled with greed; obviously, anyone who could get their hands on the purrling would be virtually invincible.

That said, no one present was willing to risk trying to take it by force.

Truth be told, although Yang Qi was amazed by the purrling, he was also a bit disappointed. The conflict with the Void-Trampling Immortal School should have been the perfect chance to show off how strong he was, and make sure that everyone knew the junior sectlord of the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect was someone to avoid causing problems with. But in the end, his thunder had been stolen by the purrling.

Of course, he also knew that even if he had ended up fighting Li Void-Trampler, all he might have done was defeat him in battle. He would never have been able to force him to join the sect.

**

In the depths of Destructionless Castle, a group of people were gathered in a large meeting hall. There were Terrifying elders and other experts all kneeling in front of a young man with a face as beautiful as a jade sculpture. Despite his elegance, he didn’t emanate even a trace of weakness. He was perfect in terms of both looks and strength.

His cultivation base was unfathomable, and from the way the Terrifying experts all prostrated to him, it was obvious that he was very important and powerful.

“That’s what just happened, Junior Pontiff,” one of the elders said. “If it weren’t for how strange the situation was, we wouldn’t have come to report it to you. Sir, considering how experienced and knowledgeable you are, do you know what that thing is?” Obviously, the matter they were referring to was how the purrling had dealt with the Void-Trampling Immortal School.

“So, there's actually a godling such as that? I've never seen any such creature. It really sealed Li Void-Trampler so easily? His cultivation base was nothing to look down on. His psychic scale is over thirty, and his power index is six thousand! He’s definitely in the mid Terrifying level, yet some tiny godling actually sealed him with no effort?”

This young man was the junior pontiff of the Genesis Sanctum.

“You can watch for yourself, Junior Pontiff. One of the sectlords present at the event recorded everything.” A Terrifying elder stepped forward, offered up a mirror, then fell back.

To see a Terrifying expert acting so deferential was actually a scary thing. He was treating this junior pontiff like a commoner would treat an emperor in the mortal world.

The junior pontiff took the mirror and activated it, causing a projected image of the scene to play out. When he saw the purrling in Jadefall’s arms, he nodded. “So this girl is a disciple of the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect?”

“Yes,” another elder said. “She’s apparently the owner of the bubble beast. They called it a purrling.”

“Well, she's good looking,” the junior pontiff said coolly. “And the godling didn’t emanate any sort of power fluctuations? It’s obviously a juvenile, otherwise it would’ve long since gained fame on the Ancient Road to the Gods. Well, it seems I need to take this woman as my wife. That will be the easiest way to get the purrling.”

“Yes, Junior Pontiff! Very clever!”

The other elders kept their heads bowed.

Chapter 1037: An Invitation from the Junior Pontiff

Upon entering Destructionless Castle, Yang Qi looked around and was immediately struck by how marvelous the construction was. It brimmed with a sensation of being lifeless and destructionless, leaving him convinced that its core was made of some sort of immense spell formation that, if he could reach it, would bring him immense benefits, similar to how researching the Engine of the One God had brought him the imperial-heaven pre-beginning powers.

However, there was no need to get anxious. First, he needed to learn more about the organizations like the Genesis Sanctum. The last thing he needed to do was beat the grass and startle the snake. After all, those groups had entities who were as strong as the Shepherd, which meant that, for the moment, Yang Qi couldn’t possibly match up to them. He was still operating under severe limitations, considering that he wasn’t even in the Terrifying level yet.

Numerous streams of divine will swept over the group from the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect. There were people who were envious, scared, jealous, or angry, but Yang Qi simply ignored them. As always, he believed that true confidence stems from superb skill.

Normally speaking, the fact that he wasn’t in the Terrifying level would have made him a big target for people who had grudges with the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect. But after what had happened with the purrling, nobody dared to confront him.

Even the top experts were shivering in their boots at the thought of what the purrling could do.

The guards who were present to greet the visiting guests looked frightened to the core. They were disciples of either the Genesis Sanctum or the Woodfern Couple Palace, and normally acted very high and mighty. Although they were said to be “greeting the visitors”, the truth was that they were there to order everyone around. They were like soldiers in the mortal world who dealt with commoners; there was no need for them to even pretend to be respectful.

The truth was that those two sects were the most powerful among all the sects of the Ancient Road to the Gods. They had mid Terrifying experts with psychic scales of over a hundred and power indexes of eight thousand, or perhaps even nine thousand. Obviously, people like that were the most qualified, and most likely, to eventually enter the god world.

Unfortunately for them, considering that they hadn’t entered the god world, they obviously weren’t gods.

The Ancient Road to the Gods could be likened to the imperial examinations of the mortal world. Even if a scholar studied well and became a master of literature and poetry, if they couldn’t enter the testing facility, they would never receive a position in the bureaucracy.

Yang Qi had once assumed that people would become gods first, and only afterward rise to the god world. That was the way it worked in the immortal worlds. It was only later that he realized his mistake. In order to reach godly ascension, one first had to travel the Ancient Road to the Gods and then enter the god world.

Unfortunately, the Ancient Road to the Gods had disappeared from the Primeval Age and the Future Age.

The road only existed in the Immortal Dao Age, but now it was blocked by the Great Necropolis, much to the frustration of people who were on the verge of becoming gods. Now, leaving the Great Necropolis was a requirement to be able to once again walk the Ancient Road to the Gods.

Of course, there were still the Executors of the Ancient Road to deal with. Without getting rid of them, it would be impossible to travel freely on the road.

Upon entering the castle, Yang Qi and the others were met by a group from the Genesis Sanctum, all of them beautiful young women who, despite not being in the Terrifying level, were obviously very strong. They all had power indexes of four thousand or higher. To Yang Qi, it was something of a relief. If the disciples assigned to receive guests were all in the Terrifying level, it would have been far too heaven-defying.

“Greetings. The Genesis Sanctum has arranged lodgings for you. It will be a few more days before everyone has gathered and the assembly begins.”

‘I wonder how strong the Genesis Sanctum is overall,’ Yang Qi thought as he followed the women. They led them through the castle into a rather quiet area, where their room was waiting for them.

It was a unique plane of existence that resembled a sumptuous mansion, decorated with jewels and spirit stones that seemed to come from the god world. The fact that such things were used as mere decorations only went to show how amazingly elegant the castle was.

“These are your quarters,” one of the young women said. “The vital energy of the god world is abundant here, so feel free to go about your breathing exercises and cultivation. The Will Manifestation Heaven Sect was originally going to be assigned a second-rate room, but the Young Sir ordered that you be upgraded.”

“Please offer our thanks to the Young Sir,” Sectlord Will Manifestation said. “Apparently, our Will Manifestation Heaven Sect is more well-known among the mid-tier superpower sects than before?”

“That’s exactly right,” another young woman said. “Furthermore, the Young Sir would like to meet this young lady in person. The one holding the... bubble beast.”

“Why does he want to meet me?” Jadefall said, her face turning cold.

“The Young Sir is the junior pontiff of the Genesis Sanctum,” the woman said coldly, clearly displeased. “He heard about how you vanquished the Void-Trampling Immortal School and would like to entertain you for dinner. Hopefully, Miss, you’ll give some face to the Genesis Sanctum. If you refuse, I'm not really sure how I’ll explain the matter.”

Jadefall snorted coldly. “Go back and tell this Young Sir of yours that I'm not interested in having dinner with him. However, do offer him thanks for the invitation.”

“This....”

The women were visibly angry, and were clearly convinced that the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect didn’t know what was good for them. Just because they had defeated the Void-Trampling Immortal School didn’t mean that they could take on the Genesis Sanctum. That would be like a mantis trying to stop a war chariot. As for Jadefall refusing to go to dinner, that was a clear slap in the face to the junior pontiff. If word got out about it, how would they maintain their reputation? The only way to eliminate the humiliation would be to wipe the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect out, all the way down to the chickens and dogs.

In the blink of an eye, the situation grew very tense.

There were people from other sects who were in the area that were being escorted to their own quarters, and they looked on silently, wondering why the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect was being so obstinate.

“Very well,” Sectlord Will Manifestation said. “The junior pontiff of the Genesis Sanctum is no one to take lightly, and if we refuse his invitation, he’ll turn into a dangerous enemy. Jadefall, why don’t you accept the invitation, but take Yang Qi with you?”

“Yes sir,” she replied. “If it's with Yang Qi, then of course I’ll go.”

“Er… the Young Sir only extended the invitation to one person. It definitely wasn’t intended for this loafer.”

“Oh?” Jadefall said. “In that case, go ahead and tell the Young Sir that I appreciate his kind invitation, but must refuse it.”

“You!” the young women spat, visibly furious.

At this point, Zi Qiong stepped forward. “How about all three of us go? Considering that I'm an Inheritor of the Great Necropolis, I'm sure the junior pontiff will be happy to have me.

‘An Inheritor?’ The young women appraised her with glittering eyes. At this point, she was coming to the conclusion that sitting around bickering with these people would be a big loss of face for them. Besides, they also knew that the junior pontiff could easily kill this naive Yang Qi if he wanted to.

And it was true that the junior pontiff wouldn’t pass up the chance to entertain an Inheritor. Besides, she was beautiful, and the junior pontiff liked to surround himself with as many beautiful women as possible.

A moment later, one of the young women said, “Fine. Come with us.”

Yang Qi smiled coldly. There was no way this junior pontiff was up to any good, although he was curious to see what his cultivation base was like.

There was no way he was on the level of the Shepherd, and even the Shepherd hadn’t been able to deal with Yang Qi, and had even lost the Mahātmā Jade to him.

They headed to a nearby teleportation portal, which whirred to life and sent them to a location deeper inside Destructionless Castle. The vital energy was particularly strong here, and Yang Qi could sense a destructionless will seeping into his sea of consciousness, causing it to twitch energetically.

Everything in this area glittered with crystalline radiance, making the place seem reminiscent of the god world. There were even places where Yang Qi could spot godhood embedded in the walls!

There were also statues that looked to be the corpses of perished gods!

If the legion of gods knew of this, they would surely seek to wipe the Genesis Sanctum out of existence. They might be impressive, but if a true god arrived, even a weakling Lesser God, they would easily be able to destroy the place.

Eventually, their path led to an enormous dining hall within the palace. There was a long table arrayed with a feast of aromatic food and the finest liquors. Beautiful serving girls stood off to the side, waiting to attend to the diners.

One such serving girl approached them, and shockingly, she was a Terrifying expert. When she caught sight of Yang Qi and Zi Qiong, her expression flickered with displeasure.

When the escorts explained what had led to the current situation, the Terrifying servant girl’s eyes flashed with killing intent. Glaring at Yang Qi, she said, “You will wait here. The Young Sir has no intention of dining with you. As for this Inheritor, well, the Young Sir would love to meet her. Please, come in.”

Even as Yang Qi chuckled coldly and Jadefall was preparing to say something, Zi Qiong cut in: “Purrling, these people want your mommy’s man to stay outside. What do you think we should do?”

Purr. Purr....

The surrounding young women’s faces immediately turned white, making it clear that they knew exactly what this pink, pig-like godling could do.

Chapter 1038: Swords Drawn and Arrows Nocked

“Quiet, Zi Qiong,” Yang Qi said, and she immediately closed her mouth. All of a sudden, everyone present felt an immense aura of majesty filling the area. Before, Yang Qi had kept his aura reined in, which led to everyone assuming he was just some low-level disciple. After all, those who weren’t in the Terrifying level were like children to those who were.

“Yes sir, Junior Sectlord!” Zi Qiong said, taking a step back. From the killing intent she could now sense in Yang Qi, she knew it wasn’t a time to joke around or talk nonsense.

The purrling evidently sensed the same thing, and it began purring even more loudly. However, it didn’t spit out any bubbles, but instead looked around curiously, mostly at Yang Qi.

Yang Qi ignored the purrling, and instead looked into the dining hall.

‘Junior Sectlord?’

Everyone present was shaken, and had obviously been caught completely off guard about Yang Qi’s status as a junior sectlord. Even the Inheritor, Zi Qiong, meekly followed his orders, and it was obviously not because of his title, but because of his own merits. Not even the junior pontiff of the Genesis Sanctum got such treatment. Although he was strong, the truth was that people followed his orders and treated him respectfully because of who supported him from behind the scenes, not because of his own strength.

Obviously, there was more to this junior sectlord than met the eye.

At this point, a languid voice echoed out from the dining hall. “Oh? So the junior sectlord of the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect decided to come along? I seem to remember your sect used to have three Inheritors. Shi Yuan, Xi Hua, and Zi Qiong. How come there’s only one left? You would think that one of them would’ve been chosen as the junior sectlord. Why did some random nobody get picked instead?”

The voice was filled with immense psychic fluctuations that seemed to be targeting Yang Qi.

Yang Qi provided no visible reaction. Instead, he said, “That’s some impressive psychic power, Sire. You’re quite the expert. Would you mind taking us to meet this junior pontiff of yours?”

‘What?! Wasn’t that the junior pontiff talking just now?’ Jadefall and Zi Qiong were both thinking as they exchanged a glance. The voice just now had seemed as majestic as a mountain, and both of them had assumed it was the junior pontiff, not one of his followers.

“Let them in, A’yu,” the voice said. “He can actually stand up to my psychic barrage, and even deduce my identity from it. Quite extraordinary, Junior Sectlord. The junior pontiff does want to meet you, so I’ll let you off the hook this time.”

Swish!

A door opened at the end of the hall, revealing an even more spectacular scene beyond. Within the luxurious and extravagant chamber was an old man dressed in pure white, seemingly untainted by even a speck of dust. This was the person who had just spoken, and while his eyes were initially focused on Yang Qi, they quickly shifted to the purrling.

His cultivation base was immense, clearly no weaker than Sectlord Will Manifestation.

The most eye-catching item in the spread of food was a whole roasted godling. Its fangs and claws were ferociously bared, but its innards had been removed and replaced with all sorts of fragrant spices from the god world.

Zi Qiong shivered at the sight of it. “That’s a cloudgyre from the god world. They’re very formidable, and have killed plenty of Terrifying experts in ambushes on the Ancient Road to the Gods.”

Suddenly, the sound of soft applause reached their ears and they noticed a young man sitting at the other end of the table in a royal throne, looking down at all of them.

Then a suffocating aura weighed down on them.

Purr, purr....

All of sudden, the purrling began making noise again, making it seem like it might start spitting bubbles again.

“So, it’s an Inheritor,” the young man said. “Miss Zi Qiong. It was a mistake not to invite you to this banquet, I offer my apologies for that. Please, I hope you’ll extend me the honor of accepting a belated invitation.”

“Junior Pontiff, it's good to see you treat the worthy with courtesy,” Zi Qiong replied immediately. “You have my sincere admiration, and it's only natural that I accept your invitation.”

Considering what Zi Qiong was like, she instantly recognized the wicked intent flickering in the junior pontiff’s eyes. She was treacherous and sinister herself, so how could she not guess at what he was thinking? He was very strong, and although he was treating the women very courteously, there was no doubt that he wanted Yang Qi dead as soon as possible.

“I offer my greetings, Junior Pontiff,” Yang Qi said. He offered a formal salute with both hands, then casually found a chair and sat down.

“Get up out of that chair,” the junior pontiff said, and although his facial expression didn’t change, his tone of voice became extremely cold. “You might be the junior sectlord of the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect, but that sect isn’t particularly important on the Ancient Road to the Gods. And you dare to act so casually in front of me? How amazing... how oh so very amazing....’

Instantly, the atmosphere became very tense.

However, Yang Qi didn’t move a muscle, much less rise to his feet. “It’s a real pity, Junior Pontiff, to find that you're so narrow-minded. In fact, you clearly don’t have what it takes to contend with the Woodfern Couple Palace. I think perhaps the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect ought to spend more time with them than you.”

“What incredible gall!” said the old man in white. “You’ve got a lot of guts to come here and say things like that. Aren’t you worried about your sect getting wiped out of existence? I noticed that you’re a talented fellow, so I let you in here in the hopes that you might join the junior pontiff’s cause. Instead, you act like someone who doesn’t know the difference between good and bad?”

“How about you shut the hell up, you damned servant!?” Yang Qi barked, slapping his palm down on the table.

CRACK!

The entire table shattered, sending fine alcohol and food splattering everywhere and startling everyone present. How could anyone have imagined that something like this would happen? How could anyone have the audacity to destroy the banquet table of the junior pontiff of the Genesis Sanctum!?

Even the old man was stunned into silence and was simply staring at Yang Qi, wondering how someone could be so aggressive and unreasonable.

Meanwhile, the junior pontiff shot to his feet in astonishment. After staring at Yang Qi for a moment, he waved his hand and said, “Clear the room and prepare the torture chamber!”

“Yes sir!”

RUMBLE!

The beautiful servant girls suddenly backed up as a host of armored soldiers poured into the room. Their armor looked to be leather, but it obviously wasn’t ordinary leather. In fact, it seemed to be made from the skin of dead gods!

The soldiers efficiently removed the wreckage of the table, then hurried to stand in ranks off to the side.

As this happened, Yang Qi remained seated in his chair, with Zi Qiong and Jadefall standing on either side of him. Inside, Zi Qiong was getting very worried. She knew that the Genesis Sanctum was one of the absolute top sects on the Ancient Road to the Gods, so how could she not feel a bit nervous? When Yang Qi had smashed the banquet table, he had pushed things beyond the point of repair and now the swords were drawn and the arrows were nocked.

That said, she and Jadefall both simply stood there waiting to follow Yang Qi’s lead.

“It seems you don’t understand how important I am, Junior Pontiff,” Yang Qi said. “You've really underestimated me. The little formation you’ve set up here is a far cry from anything that could contain me. Unless your pontiff himself shows his face, you won’t be doing anything to me today.”

“You’ve really got some guts,” the junior pontiff said. “Well, that's fine. You're the first person I’ve ever met who’s this gutsy. You even went so far as to destroy my table. In the entire history of the Genesis Sanctum, no one has ever dared to act so presumptuously at our dinner table!”

“Nobody?” Yang Qi replied. “From what I've heard, the Genesis Sanctum has actually been pushed around a lot by the Executors of the Ancient Road. They’ve even killed some of your people.”

“You!” the old man shouted, yet again taken aback at how wildly presumptuous Yang Qi was being. “Do you really think your Will Manifestation Heaven Sect is on the same level as the Executors of the Ancient Road!?”

“I was speaking metaphorically, that’s all,” Yang Qi replied coolly. “Look, there’s no need for this act of yours. Let's all be honest. I'm a junior sectlord, and you're a junior pontiff. We essentially have the same standing. Do we really need to stand here with swords drawn and arrows nocked? Do we really need to have some life-or-death standoff? When you meet someone stronger than you, you get on your knees. It's simple. Why are you acting so high and mighty?”

“Junior sectlord?” the old man said. “In the presence of people like us, you’re nothing but a joke. And the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect is a joke, too. Our junior pontiff could issue a single order and have your sect razed to the ground. He wouldn’t even need to lift a finger; there would be plenty of other sects who would jump to do his bidding. Luckily for you, there is virtue in sparing animal life, so we’ll give you one chance to get out of this alive. Give these two women as concubines to our junior pontiff, and agree to be his servant. In that case, you people can live.”

Looking at Zi Qiong and Jadefall, the junior pontiff said, “This matter doesn’t have anything to do with the two of you, so please step aside. I tend to have tender, protective feelings for the fairer sex, and I would hate to see you two hurt. The criminal here is your junior sectlord, but don’t worry, after I execute him I won’t hold the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect responsible.”

“Who do you think we are, Junior Pontiff?” Zi Qiong said. “Jadefall and I are with the junior sectlord. Do you really think we would just agree to be your concubines? Very funny. Although, it’s not out of the question. For example, if you go and kill a hundred Inheritors and give their godpower seeds to me, then I might join you.”

Meanwhile, Yang Qi just sat there quietly, glad to see that Zi Qiong was following his lead.

“Enough blathering, Junior Pontiff,” Jadefall said. “We're all old hands from the Ancient Road to the Gods, so we know exactly what you’re thinking. The whole reason you invited me here was to get this purrling of mine, right? Why are you beating around the bush? If you think you can get what you want with some clever tricks, you’re wrong. And not even you can pay the price necessary to wipe out the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect. Did you know that the Executors of the Ancient Road came to wipe us out, but failed? We sent them back home with their tails between their legs.”

Chapter 1039: Calm and Unruffled

After Jadefall openly laid bare the junior pontiff’s plan, quite a few people present suddenly looked very awkward. Obviously, everyone knew what the junior pontiff was planning, but they had all been working hard to put on a pretense of propriety. But now, Jadefall’s casually spoken words made them all seem like common hoodlums.

The truth was that the dinner had been set up for exactly the reasons Jadefall had said.

But then Yang Qi went and shattered the banquet table, not only putting an end to the illusion, but also putting on a display of might.

“I’m very disappointed in you two,” the junior pontiff said after a moment. Shaking his head and trying to look sad, he said, “I never would’ve thought that you would be so petty and suspicious. I guess that’s what I should expect from people like you. You’ve really hurt my feelings, you know. Originally I had a good impression of you, but unfortunately, I really can’t let your insults go unanswered. You've openly profaned the dignity of the Genesis Sanctum.”

“Can you stop the jabbering?” Jadefall said coolly. “Other people might fear the Genesis Sanctum, but not us. It was really infantile thinking on your part to assume that this dinner trick would be enough to get you what you want. If people found out about all this, I don't see how the Genesis Sanctum could possibly win popular support. I suggest we just call things even here. Otherwise, news could spread, and the Woodfern Couple Palace will use it as an excuse to make a move on you.”

Tossing aside all concern over face, the junior pontiff growled, “If the Woodfern Couple Palace wants a fight, they can have it. I've been planning to deal with them anyway. As for your trifling little sect, I’ll wipe it out if I have to. If word spreads about what happened today, your Will Manifestation Heaven Sect will be cleansed with blood. Here's what's going to happen. You, and you. You two are going to be my concubines. As for your junior sectlord, he can leave alive if he crawls out on his hands and knees. Think this through well. In the end, you aren’t going to be leaving here. At the moment, you’re in a location as dangerous as a dragon’s pool or a tiger’s den.”

“As dangerous as a dragon’s pool or a tiger’s den?” Yang Qi said, looking completely calm and unruffled as he sat there. “Do you really think you can do anything to me with this pitiful force?”

The junior pontiff burst out laughing. “Pitiful force? Every single person here is a veteran of numerous battles. Unit 1, please introduce yourselves to this junior sectlord.”

“Yes sir!”

RUMBLE!

A burly man stepped forward, clad in god-skin armor that included a helmet. Reaching up and opening the helmet, he revealed a face that was a mass of terrifying scars.

“Listen up, boy,” he said. “Back on the Ancient Road to the Gods, I was known as Patriarch Scarface.”

Leaning over, Zi Qiong explained, “Patriarch Scarface is known as a top expert who once challenged the leaders of several dozen superpower sects to combat. None of them could deal with him. He was considered the most powerful bandit on the Ancient Road to the Gods, until the executors caught up with him. Everyone said he was killed, but apparently he joined the Genesis Sanctum.”

One by one, all of the other soldiers stepped forward, opened their helmets and stated their names. All of them were despotic figures from the Ancient Road to the Gods who had once been considered invincible fighters.

When they were finished with the introductions, Jadefall said, “Thanks for proving that you really are a pitiful force. My purrling could wipe you all out with a single bubble. Don’t believe me?”

Very serious expressions suddenly appeared on the faces of everyone present. By now, word about the pink little purrling had spread to all of the sects, and everyone had heard about how a single bubble had caused the sectlord of the Void-Trampling Immortal School to beg for mercy.

“It's just an infant godling, that’s all,” the junior pontiff said. “Eunuch Chen, go over and take that thing!”

“Yes sir, Junior Pontiff!” said the old man in white. Then he turned into a blur of motion that moved with such speed no one could track his movement.

Swish!

All of a sudden, his hand was closing in on the purrling!

Purr!

The purrling swelled up as if in anger, making it look completely different from moments before. Then an enormous bubble flew out of its mouth.

“Aaaiiiieee!”

The white-garbed Eunuch Chen was now hanging in the middle of the bubble, his energy arts completely useless, a look of horror on his face.

“Be broken!” he shouted, unleashing immense true energy and godpower.

It did nothing.

Purr....

With a purr, the purrling caused the bubble to start shrinking.

“Junior Pontiff,” Eunuch Chen screamed, “help me! Save me! No. Wait. Get out of here, Junior Pontiff! You can’t deal with this thing. It’ll kill you. Hurry and inform the pontiff. You... AIIIEE—”

Purr. Purr....

More bubbles flew out of the purrling’s mouth, instantly capturing the dozens of intimidating warriors who had, just moments ago, revealed that they were despotic, famed figures from the Ancient Road to the Gods.

None of them stood any chance of evading the bubbles. Not even fleeing outside of the three realms or five phases would do them any good. All of them were trapped.

Screams rang out as a scene from hell played out. Within the bubbles, the soldiers’ armor was melted into nothing, and they began writhing as they beat against the bubbles, trying to free themselves. It was all to no avail.

“Save us, Junior Pontiff! Hurry, save us!”

But the junior pontiff did nothing except stare at the purrling and prepare to flee for his life. Before, he had assumed that the story of the purrling vanquishing the leader of the Void-Trampling Immortal School was an exaggeration. Little did he know that the purrling was actually far more terrifying than the stories revealed.

‘Just what exactly is that thing?’

He had spent years building up the forces of his Unit 1, only to have them defeated in the blink of an eye by a handful of bubbles. They were being slaughtered like pigs or dogs! What kind of entity could possibly be strong enough to do that?

Was this thing an infant version of the king of the godmammoths?

Supposedly, the king of the godmammoths was the most powerful godling ever created by the Sovereign Lord. He had been created to suppress hells, but had long since disappeared along with the Sovereign Lord. How could he be present here?

Even more ridiculous, this purrling looked more like a pig than an elephant. And it certainly didn’t have a trunk. It was bright pink, constantly purred, and never ate food.

If it ate, that would be a different matter, as it would prove that it used energy and power. But the fact that it didn’t eat seemed to indicate that it didn't need energy to operate. And that only made it even more terrifying.

One by one, the cultivators in the bubbles died. Although Yang Qi was confident he could have dealt with them on his own, it would have taken some work. And with the junior pontiff in the mix, he would eventually have been forced to retreat. But a few bubbles from the purrling instantly took care of them. What was this thing?

‘Could it handle someone on the level of the Shepherd?’ he thought. ‘Wouldn't something that strong be considered invincible on the Ancient Road to the Gods?’

Purr. Purr....

After spitting out the bubbles, the purrling stretched lazily. No one had any idea what it was thinking, as it didn't seem inclined to make a move on the junior pontiff.

Meanwhile, the junior pontiff was trembling in fear. Eunuch Chen was his personal steward, a man with an incredibly high cultivation base and all sorts of secret weapons at his disposal. He was the kind of person who could evade all sorts of attacks, and had a host of clones he could use to protect himself.

In fact, he had been called “Master of a Thousand Clones”.

Yet a single bubble had been enough to do him in. His final words had been a warning to go and seek help from the pontiff himself. However, the junior pontiff couldn’t quite bring himself to simply flee in terror.

Thankfully for him, Jadefall didn’t attack him, but instead, coldly said, “Well, Junior Pontiff, now you know how terrifying my purrling is; you aren’t even close to being a match for it. Our Will Manifestation Heaven Sect isn’t interested in insulting you, so let’s just pretend that none of today’s events ever happened.”

WHOOSH!

The junior pontiff suddenly vanished, and in the same moment, the entire hall they were in trembled, and black smoke began pouring into it. At the same time, the floor fell away, revealing a bottomless pit.

Maniacal laughter rang out. “Maybe I can’t do anything to you, but I can still use a spell formation to trap you. Please enjoy the Destructionless Nine Revolutions God Formation!”

Purr....

Another bubble emerged. This time, it surrounded Yang Qi, Jadefall, and Zi Qiong, making them impervious to all attacks.

“Your purrling is really strong,” the junior pontiff said. “But how long can it hold out? You can’t just stay trapped in my formation forever, you know!”

However, the purrling seemed to be intentionally making fun of him as it spat out another bubble, which expanded to encompass the entire area. A moment later, the dining room became visible again, and a spell formation could be seen within the second bubble, pulsing with black smoke.

“Damn you!” the junior pontiff howled, then vanished without a trace, obviously terrified at the prospect of being stuck inside a bubble.

Chapter 1040: Shattering the Enemy Ranks

The enemy ranks had been completely shattered.

They were cleanly defeated, and hadn’t posed even the slightest threat. Yang Qi, Zi Qiong, and Jadefall hadn’t even lifted a finger. The purrling had simply used a few bubbles to devastate the enemy forces and destroy the formation. As for the junior pontiff, he just ran away, having no courage to stick around and fight.

The only enemy who might have dared to stand and fight would be a mid Terrifying expert, such as the pontiff himself.

That said, Yang Qi was fairly certain that not even the pontiff could overcome the purrling. He had seen mid Terrifying experts such as the Shepherd, and while he had to admit that they were formidable, at this point he was fairly certain that even he could beat one in a fight.

Now that he had the purrling on his side, there was definitely nobody who could cause problems for him. Although he wasn’t sure what the bubbles were, they were as impossible to escape from as the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart was for ordinary people.

Thankfully, in the moment the purrling was actually born, Yang Qi had imbued it with his true energy, psychic power, and will, ensuring that it was very familiar with him.

In this fight, the purrling had shown what it was truly capable of. Countless experts had been felled, and an incredible spell formation had even ended up destroyed.

The purrling was incredible beyond measure.

It was little wonder that countless gods had once fought fiercely to gain control of it. Although, Yang Qi couldn’t help but wonder where it originally came from. And he wondered if it would grow to maturity. If it was this powerful after only a few days of being alive, what would it be like in a few years?

“Let’s go,” he said. “I'm not interested in bickering with the Genesis Sanctum right now. I doubt the junior pontiff will try to pull a trick like this again. What a complete joke.”

Off to the side, Zi Qiong’s heart was pounding in her chest. Before, she had feared Yang Qi, but now that she had seen what Jadefall’s purrling could do, she was far more fearful of it than of Yang Qi himself.

She knew that if she were to be caught in one of its bubbles, she would be completely helpless to do anything.

‘I wonder how the purrling compares to the Mahātmā Jade,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘Could the jade actually absorb the purrling or its energy? Except, the purrling doesn’t actually have any true energy. Apparently, it has no use for power, which means it definitely can’t cultivate the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body.’

“Seems the junior pontiff is scared out of his mind,” he said. “Purrling, you really did well here. Is there anything I can give you as a reward? You took a lot of Great Necropolis godpower when you were born, but now it seems like you don’t need any other type of power. Is it that you want Great Necropolis godpower seeds?” All of a sudden, a godpower seed appeared in his hand.

However, the purrling didn’t even look at it, simply continuing to wriggle and roll about in Jadefall’s arms.

“The Great Necropolis godpower wasn’t sent into the purrling, we just used it to break open the shell,” Jadefall said. “I don’t think the purrling needs any type of power. I suspect it has its own power inside of it, similar to heaven and earth. It generates everything it needs, so it doesn't require external additions.”

Yang Qi nodded. “Truly spectacular. I wonder if we could use the purrling to defeat both the Genesis Sanctum and the Woodfern Couple Palace.”

“There’s no way our Will Manifestation Heaven Sect could lead the alliance, is there?” Zi Qiong asked.

“Would being the leader actually be a good thing?” Yang Qi said. He shook his head. “Although it would give access to immense universal fortune, it would put us right in the crosshairs of the Executors of the Ancient Road, the Fiend-Devil League, and the Future Age. And I'm not sure we have enough truly powerful experts to deal with a threat of that level.”

“You mean without the purrling?” Zi Qiong replied. “I would say it counts as a truly powerful expert.”

“It is, but I'm not sure we can rely on it. We can’t make all our plans based on the help of a godling, no matter how strong it is. But if I could break through to the Terrifying level and unlock the secrets of the Mahātmā Jade, then I might be in the position to fight the emperor of the executors.”

“Mahātmā Jade? What’s that?” Zi Qiong had never heard of such a thing, and couldn’t help but ask about it. However, worried that she might give the wrong impression by asking about such matters, she quickly added another question. “Junior Sectlord, do you think that if you became a Grand Emperor, it might make it easier to make your breakthrough to the Terrifying level?”

Yang Qi shook his head. “Unfortunately, no. Let’s go. We shouldn’t stay here any longer.”

Yang Qi waved his hand, summoning a vortex that they stepped into. Moments later, they were back with the forces of the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect, who were currently in one of the main halls in Destructionless Castle, drinking tea with some other sect leaders. The other sect leaders sat at tables, flanked by the young ones from their various organizations, who all carried themselves with dignity and splendor.

When the sectlord and the others saw Yang Qi, Zi Qiong, and Jadefall returning, they reacted with visible surprise. Then they noticed the purrling wriggling in Jadefall's arms.

“What happened?” Sectlord Will Manifestation asked, eyes flashing. “Why are you back so early from the dinner with the junior pontiff? Did something happen?” The sectlord was a clever and experienced individual. Because of that, not only did he fear the Genesis Sanctum, but he had also been aware that something fishy was going on with the junior pontiff.

Yang Qi nodded. “Don’t worry, Sectlord. We took care of things.”

The sectlord immediately felt relieved; he had the utmost faith in Yang Qi’s ability to handle matters. After all, he had run circles around the Executors of the Ancient Road, and had even snuck into the Hell of Sages and Mahātmās to steal some treasure. Obviously, there were few people who could match up to him. Although, in this situation, he didn't make the connection that it was actually the purrling who had taken action, and not Yang Qi. If he knew the truth, he would likely have been stunned into silence.

The sectlords seated nearby were all friends of the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect from various superpower sects on the Ancient Road to the Gods. They and the young elite disciples flanking them were visibly taken aback to see someone who wasn’t even in the Terrifying level talking so casually with Sectlord Will Manifestation.

“And this is...?” one of them said.

“This is the junior sectlord of our sect, Yang Qi. Yang Qi, why don’t you offer greetings to the various sectlords?”

“Yes sir!” he replied, and offered polite, formal greetings, being neither servile nor overbearing.

In response, some of the sectlords clicked their tongues in admiration, while others were clearly not convinced that the situation was appropriate.

If the junior sectlord had been Jadefall with her purrling, or Zi Qiong the Inheritor, they might have found it easier to accept. But for someone without Terrifying will to have such an important position seemed inappropriate. On the Ancient Road to the Gods, power reigned supreme, so even if Yang Qi had been the son of Sectlord Will Manifestation, it wouldn’t have been enough to earn him the position of junior sectlord.

Yang Qi could immediately tell what they were thinking.

Before he could do anything, one of the sectlords said, “Sectlord Will Manifestation, although this junior sectlord of yours doesn’t have a very high cultivation base, there must be some reason you appointed him to the position. Although this assembly is primarily being called to select a league-lord, there will surely be some competition amongst the members of the younger generation. Standing behind me is the junior pontifex of our Church of Righteousness. Although he and the younger ones like him are generally inexperienced and immature, I'm still curious to see how they match up to each other. What do you say he and your junior sectlord have a little match-up?”

Standing behind the pontifex of the Church of Righteousness was the junior pontifex, who held himself tall and straight, with his hands clasped behind his back, making him look as imposing as a mountain. At first glance, everyone was struck by the fact that he was the picture of a top expert.

“I agree!” he said. Clasping hands to Yang Qi, he continued, “Junior Sectlord, why don't we compare fighting tips, being careful to hold back and not inflict serious injuries?”

Yang Qi waved his hand dismissively. “Compare fighting tips? There’s no need.”

“What?!” Quite a few looks of contempt appeared on the faces of the sect leaders and junior sect leaders. They might be considered friends, but even they would despise someone who shrank from a fight. The challenger had even openly said he would hold back, yet Yang Qi still was afraid to fight? That seemed to call into question his qualifications to be the junior sectlord. If word of this spread, it would definitely lead to widespread contempt of the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect.

In response, Sectlord Will Manifestation didn’t say a word; obviously, he knew that Yang Qi had a plan in all this. By now, he had come to view Yang Qi, not as someone from the younger generation, but rather as a vicious and merciless figure who could rebuke heaven and earth.

“I said I would hold back,” the junior pontifex said. “Don’t worry, I won’t hurt you, Junior Sectlord. The Church of Righteousness is friends with the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect. Besides, although this sect assembly has been called to select a league lord from among the sect leaders, there will also be plenty of chances for interaction amongst us sect successors. How could we advance the interests of our sects without such interaction?”

“That’s right,” another junior sect leader said in a mocking tone. “What’s the big deal about comparing fighting tips? In fact, I think I’d like to have a little competition with the junior pontifex. I’ll even ask for advice from all the onlookers too.”

“Yeah, we younger ones have to have some fun somehow.”

“I can't believe this guy doesn’t even dare to participate in some play fighting. How could he possibly be qualified to lead a sect?”

Quite a few of the younger ones present were openly laughing.

All of them seemed interested in “comparing fighting tips”, and anyone who refused to do so would be held in contempt.

“My point wasn’t that I didn't want to fight,” Yang Qi said. “I just meant that it’s a foregone conclusion that I’ll win.” Jaws dropped, and everyone looked at Yang Qi as if he were crazy.

“What do you mean?” Zi Qiong said. Not even she was sure of exactly what Yang Qi meant.

“Come on, Junior Sectlord,” the junior pontifex said. “Are you really that deluded?”

In response, Yang Qi extended his hand, within which was a glistening, thumb-sized sphere. “Isn’t this your Righteous Śarīra?”

Chapter 1041: Bowling Over the Heroes

“That is my Righteous Śarīra!” the junior pontifex said in a quavering voice. “I built it with three thousand conglomerations of true energy, and it should be secure in my sea of energy! How did you get it?!”

Everyone present was completely stunned.

Righteous Śarīras were the foundation of the Church of Righteousness. Every member would form one in their sea of energy, based on the functions of the three thousand great daos. In fact, each śarīra could be considered a great dao of its own, and could provide boundless power and might.

Yet the junior pontifex’s śarīra had somehow been taken away from him without him even noticing. It was as shocking as if someone had removed his heart or lungs without his knowledge.

How could this possibly have happened? The stunned junior pontifex simply stared as Yang Qi flicked his finger, sending the śarīra flying back to him. He quickly inhaled it and sent it back into his sea of energy, then circulated his true energy.

“Does that count as me winning?” Yang Qi said coolly.

“Absolutely not!” the junior pontifex said. “You must have used some sort of special magical treasure to do that!” Obviously, the junior pontifex simply refused to believe that Yang Qi could possibly have an ability that profound.

“Ai. Then I guess I need to actually fight.”

Suddenly, he blurred into motion, appearing right in front of the junior pontifex. The junior pontifex chopped his hand out in an attack, but Yang Qi simply grabbed his wrist and wrenched him up into the air.

“My apologies,” he said. Before anything else could happen, Yang Qi shot back to his original position. Meanwhile, the junior pontifex hung there in the air for what seemed a very long moment before slamming down to the ground.

There were a host of top experts present, yet Yang Qi had moved with such supernatural speed that no one could track his movements.

Zi Qiong was even convinced that he had improved his cultivation base recently, as he seemed more terrifying now than he had been in the past, and hadn’t even emitted any energy fluctuations. She even wondered if he had somehow gained enlightenment from the purrling.

The purrling also seemed surprised, and looked at Yang Qi for a moment before shaking its head. From the gleam in its eyes, it also seemed to suspect that Yang Qi had learned something from it.

The truth was that Yang Qi had indeed been studying the purrling, and the knowledge he had gained had been percolating in his mind. He could now see certain things that other people could not, the reason being that he was essentially standing on the shoulders of three different giants. The Sovereign Lord, King Immortal-Slayer, and the boundless True Devil.

Normally speaking, their three energy arts weren’t compatible, but he could fuse them together in shocking fashion.

Thanks to the workings of his Unspoiled Body, combined with the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, he was able to use the purrling’s energy arts as a point of reference to improve himself.

By taking scattered bits of the purrling’s abilities, he was getting to the point of forming his true energy into things like bubbles. And he had decided to call this ability the Purrfect God Art.

Although the Purrfect God Art was only in the initial stages of development, the more enlightenment he gained, the more formidable it would become.

Shivering, the junior pontifex climbed to his feet, his vision swimming. Moments ago, he had felt like little more than a mortal as Yang Qi threw him up into the air. He hadn’t even had a chance to unleash any of his energy arts before Yang Qi was back in his original position. Yang Qi had exhibited a speed and skill that could only be acclaimed as the acme of perfection.

“There’s no way you could be that skilled!” the junior pontifex said. “That was definitely a trick!”

In fact, he was just about to continue fighting when the pontifex of the Church of Righteousness said, “Enough. You’re no match for him. Junior Sectlord Yang Qi, you have my sincere admiration.”

The pontifex could tell that Yang Qi was vastly more powerful than any ordinary person, to the point where not even he was confident in being able to fight him.

“I'm impressed!” someone said, accompanying their words with soft applause. At a nearby table sat a man dressed as a scholar, accompanied by several disciples who were also dressed as scholars. On the table in front of the man was a jug of alcohol so fragrant that everyone was convinced it must have come from the god world.

“They’re from the Heaven and Earth Academy,” Zi Qiong explained. “They’re a huge sect of scholars and confucians, with incredible energy arts. They’re very powerful. They developed ceremonial rites that they originally hoped to spread throughout the immortal worlds, although they never managed to do so. That said, they’re very strong, probably as much as a few dozen ordinary superpower sects put together. I heard that their leader has been in seclusion trying to reach the Terrifying level, although he has yet to succeed.”

Yang Qi nodded. “Might you have any advice for me, Sire?”

“I wouldn’t dare to give advice to you,” the scholar replied. “However, I happen to have this jug of fine alcohol from the god world. Considering how strong you are, would you be interested in drinking with us?”

Another of the scholars laughed heartily. “Exactly. It’s a disgrace for educated people to care only about fighting and killing. Why not have a drinking contest to see who’s more heroic? If you can handle our god world liquor, the Heaven and Earth Academy will definitely consider you a friend.”

“Sure thing,” Yang Qi said. “Is this the fine alcohol you’re talking about?” All of a sudden, the onlookers realized that he was holding a jug of extremely fragrant alcohol. Everyone present gaped in amazement.

The scholar immediately looked back to the table and saw that his jug of alcohol was still there, prompting him to chuckle. “Is this some sort of joke, Younger Brother? This alcohol is—”

However, even as he reached out to grab the jug, his eyes widened as his hand passed right through it. It was nothing but an illusion, which subsequently faded into nothing. Somehow, Yang Qi had taken the real jug and substituted it with a fake.

All of the scholars were flabbergasted.

WHOOSH!

Yang Qi blurred into motion, moving around the table so quickly that nobody could see what he was doing.

“What do you think, ladies and gentlemen? Impressed? Please, let’s drink together.” Everyone looked down at their drinking bowls and saw that they were full of alcohol.

The group of scholars immediately raised their bowls and downed the alcohol in one shot, then burst out laughing.

“Incredible. Truly incredible! Whatever movement technique or energy art you used just now, it was amazing!”

“I’d like to ask all of you to rise!” Yang Qi said, settling back in his chair. All of a sudden, everything trembled violently and the scholars felt some sort of incredible power forcing them to stand. Whatever energy arts they used to try to resist were completely useless, and they were all forced to stand, looks of amazement on their face.

“And now, sit!”

Yang Qi’s energy arts once again surged and the scholars sat back down. It was now obvious that he hadn’t used a movement technique or a magical treasure, but instead, his energy arts.

How could anyone present have guessed that the junior sectlord of the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect would be this powerful?

A moment later, a burly man sitting at another table said, “As the houselord of the House of Martial Buddhas, I'm very interested to see whose fist technique is superior, Junior Sectlord, yours or mine. As before, we will hold back and not inflict serious injuries.”

It was to be a martial competition, but considering that the houselord was a friend, it would obviously be a friendly match with no killing intent. That much was made obvious by his wording.

“I wouldn’t dare to claim any superiority, Houselord,” Yang Qi said, “and can only ask that you show me mercy.” With that, he blurred into motion, appearing right in front of the houselord. Although his movement technique seemed to make him as weightless as a floating willow catkin, it made him seem as heavy and powerful as a mountain at the same time.

Just what kind of power could do that?

The houselord’s expression flickered as he realized how powerful this Yang Qi must be. However, he kept his cool and said, “I have a technique called the Declivity Chain Hammer, that I just recently mastered. It contains a total of eighty-one stances. Be careful, Junior Sectlord!”

This fight was very different from before, as Yang Qi was now tangling with one of the sect leaders. Obviously, all of the other sect leaders were watching very closely to see how things would play out.

RUMBLE!

Houselord Martial Buddha struck out with his fist and the entire area trembled from the onslaught of fist energy. Everyone had expected him to unleash a whole series of moves, but much to their surprise, he only used one. However, that one fist strike instantly split into eighty-one shadowy projections that shot directly toward Yang Qi.

Just what level of fist technique was required to unleash eighty-one stances within a single move?

The entire room was now trembling violently. Thankfully, it was located in the middle of Destructionless Castle, which had unimaginably powerful magical laws, otherwise it would have instantly been reduced to rubble.

In response to this move, Yang Qi unexpectedly remained in place. Then, he swirled his hands out in front of him in a circular arc that conformed to the profundities of the good fortune of heaven and earth. Instantly, the move connected to all of the various fist energies rushing toward him.

Next, eighty-one popping sounds rang out, indicating that Yang Qi was directly meeting the strikes launched by Houselord Martial Buddha.

Bang!

Houselord Martial Buddha shivered and his face turned crimson, but he didn't stagger back.

“Incredible, Junior Sectlord,” he said. “Simply incredible. The Will Manifestation Heaven Sect truly has an incredible asset in you. You have my sincere admiration. And I'm fully aware that you left me some face by not going all out.” With that, Houselord Martial Buddha turned to Sectlord Will Manifestation and said, “Where did you find this freak? From what I can tell, he's stronger than you!”

Sectlord Will Manifestation nodded approvingly at Yang Qi.

However, he was still wondering why Yang Qi seemed so much stronger after coming back early from the banquet.

Chapter 1042: Bowling Over the Heroes (2)

The onlookers were abuzz after watching the match between Yang Qi and Houselord Martial Buddha.

“Brother Wang, what do you think of the boy’s cultivation base?”

“Incredible. Simply incredible. Houselord Martial Buddha’s eighty-one fist stances are all viciously powerful, so much so that they can easily destroy virtually anything in existence. I can’t believe the boy was able to stand up to them.”

“Is he really just the junior sectlord of the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect? What if he’s the child of a god, who was somehow banished down into the mortal world? Look, he’s not even in the Terrifying level yet!”

“You’re right, he's not. And he's this strong? That’s even more terrifying than the actual Terrifying level! Just imagine what he’ll be like after he breaks through! You know, I couldn’t even see his true energy flows when he used that movement technique a moment ago.”

“Houselord Martial Buddha is a fierce fighter, but he backed down from the fight, just like that! And if the junior sectlord really was holding back, doesn’t that mean that he’s actually beyond the level of Houselord Martial Buddha? He’s stronger than a sect leader of a superpower sect from the Ancient Road to the Gods?! This is amazing!”

More and more experts were beginning to gather in the meeting hall. This assembly of sects was to be attended by hundreds of thousands of superpower sects, which gave an idea of just how many top experts would be attending. In fact, although it wasn’t common knowledge, there were also going to be experts from the new immortal worlds, places that ranked a thousand or higher. They were people who had long existed in the Great Necropolis, but had only recently become part of a larger collection of immortal worlds.

The sect assembly was sure to have fierce fighting and plenty of killing intent. Before an alliance was formed, blood would flow as the ultimate league-lord established authority.

In fact, it would be similar to how Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven had seized control of the Dao Defense League, although compared to the people who would be attending this meeting, the Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven of that time would be little more than an ant.

Shortly after Yang Qi achieved his victory over Houselord Martial Buddha, a new voice rang out as a large group of people entered the hall.

“Well done, boy!”

The members of this group were all wearing sackcloth garments and had faces so sallow they seemed like they hadn’t been out in the sun for a very long time.

Apparently, the man who had spoken was the leader of the group and his eyes were fixed on Yang Qi, his gaze as sharp as if it were made of lightning.

Unexpectedly, no one present recognized who these people were.

“Where did this group come from?”

“Who are these people?”

There were so many superpower sects from the Ancient Road to the Gods that it was impossible for most people to instantly identify all of them, much less recognize every single expert. That said, it seemed impossible for a powerful sect to exist that nobody was familiar with.

The man in sackcloth laughed heartily and said, “So, everyone here is an expert from the Ancient Road to the Gods? Sadly, I don’t think any of you can measure up to the natives of the Great Necropolis.”

Someone wearing the uniform of the Woodfern Couple Palace stepped forward and said, “Ladies and gentlemen, this is an expert from a two thousandth ranked immortal world, who we from the Woodfern Couple Palace invited to attend the assembly. He’s from the Sackcloth Cathedral.”

“What? An immortal world with a rank of two thousand? I didn’t even realize there were worlds that ranked that high!”

“The furthest we’ve gone into the Great Necropolis are places where the worlds rank around a thousand, or a little more. I even saw one once that ranked fifteen hundred, but I had no idea there were two thousandth ranked immortal worlds.”

“How deep in the Great Necropolis does he come from? I don’t think any of us could go that far in.”

“These people look strong, but they’re definitely too arrogant. What did he mean when he said we can’t measure up to experts from the Great Necropolis?”

Many of the old-timers present were so angry that they rose to their feet in a fury.

“Sackcloth Cathedral?” one of them said. “And you’re actually wearing sackcloth? Why? Did someone in your family just die? We’ve only just met and you’re already being rude? You people look more like frogs in a well to me.” This particular old-timer wore a flame-colored robe and seemed to be surrounded by projections of fire and smoke. Flying out into the open, he said, “If your Sackcloth Cathedral is really superior to the sects of the Ancient Road to the Gods, then why not give us a demonstration of what you're capable of?”

“He’s the houselord from the Immortal House of Raging Infernos,” Sectlord Will Manifestation said. “His personality is as fiery as the name of his sect, and he’s known for being hard and unyielding. I’d bet he recently mastered that top martial art he was working on. That said, these people from the Great Necropolis really are being too arrogant. If it weren’t for us, they’d still be stuck in their immortal worlds, unaware of the immensity of the Great Necropolis.”

“They're definitely too arrogant,” Peaklord Memory said. “But the rank of their immortal world is incredible. If thousandth ranked immortal worlds can produce Terrifying experts, then what kind of people should you expect from worlds with a rank of two thousand? They must have more experts than the sky has clouds. And it makes you wonder if there are worlds ranked three thousand. What would they be like?”

“Ranked three thousand?” Peaklord Celestial replied nervously. “I’ve never heard of any such place. I would bet they’d have at least a couple of mid Terrifying experts. I wonder if people like that will show up.”

Meanwhile, Houselord Raging Inferno was facing off with the people from the Sackcloth Cathedral, who were apparently also interested in fighting for the spot of league-lord.

One of the men in sackcloth stepped forward and said, “So, you want your head to be the first on the chopping block? Fine!”

“You savages really come up with a lot of arrogant claptrap, don’t you?” Houselord Raging Inferno said. “Do you really think that there are no experts from the Ancient Road to the Gods?”

The man in sackcloth shook his head. “The same lines from before, eh? Look, old man, if you insist on being stubborn, I guess I have no choice but to teach you a lesson. Before coming here today, we formed an alliance with numerous other top experts from two thousandth ranked immortal worlds. We’re interested in seeing what you outsiders from the Ancient Road to the Gods are like. We’re the natives here, and pretty soon we’ll be kicking you out of our home!”

“Is that so? Fine, let's see what you've got.”

Truth be told, Houselord Raging Inferno was actually feeling a bit nervous.

It was the same for many of the other old-timers, as well. None of them had ever even considered that the natives of the Great Necropolis would create some sort of an alliance. And apparently, the people from the Sackcloth Cathedral were only the tip of the iceberg. If more Great Necropolis natives showed up, it meant that the fighting would probably be even more intense than anyone had anticipated.

No one even knew how many two thousandth ranked worlds existed in the depths of the Great Necropolis. However, one thing was for sure: they would surely have just as many experts as existed on the Ancient Road to the Gods.

RUMBLE!

The man from the Sackcloth Cathedral didn’t hesitate for a moment. He immediately launched a fist strike, causing the image of an enormous gravestone to appear, much to the shock of Zi Qiong. ‘That’s the God Tombstone Palms! It's supposed to be the legacy art for the Inheritors! But this guy definitely isn’t an Inheritor, so how does he know it? What’s going on here? Don’t tell me that people from two thousandth ranked immortal worlds are naturally born with godpower seeds! Although, it looks like this version of the God Tombstone Palms is a bit different from mine....’

The two parties clashed, forcing Houselord Raging Inferno back again and again. At a certain point, his fiery robe was shredded to bits, revealing his powerful physique. Clearly, he wasn’t faring well in this fight.

The God Tombstone Palm was the quintessential energy art of the Great Necropolis, a boundless technique that could bury gods, bury immortals, bury humans, bury heaven, and bury earth.

As they fought back and forth, the onlookers could see Houselord Raging Inferno getting more desperate. Eventually, he staggered backward, pale white, blood spraying out of his mouth.

The man in sackcloth snorted coldly. “Piece of trash. I can’t believe you would dare to fight me. Are you looking to die? My God Tombstone Palms are the quintessence of the Great Necropolis! You know, if you had used some strategy to fight, I might’ve had a harder time beating you. Alright, the time has come to end your life.”

Eyes flashing with fierce light, he lunged forward, this time summoning the projections of five tombstones!

Numerous cries of alarm rang out as everyone realized how deadly the tombstones were, yet no one could possibly be fast enough to interfere.

“That’s the Five Tombstones stance from the God Tombstone Palms!” Zi Qiong said, amazed. “I only just started to practice with them, but this guy’s obviously mastered them already. Bury Gods. Bury Heaven. Bury Earth. Bury Immortals. Bury Humans. Five Burials, Five Fists. Fists to Slaughter All!”

WHOOSH!

When Yang Qi saw that Houselord Raging Inferno was about to be killed, he blurred onto the battlefield to meet the incoming five fist strikes. He extended a palm, causing his vital energy to create something like a porcelain bubble that surrounded the five tombstones. Then, the bubble popped, completely negating the incoming attacks.

The man in sackcloth took three steps back, his eyes flashing. Obviously, he had never encountered anyone who could negate his Five Tombstones stance with such ease.

“Are you alright, Senior Raging Inferno?” Yang Qi asked. “Remain still while I expunge the Great Necropolis godpower from within you!”

Yang Qi placed his palm on Houselord Raging Inferno’s back and sent true energy streaming into him. After three breaths of time passed, the Great Necropolis godpower was gone from within him. Not only was Houselord Raging Inferno completely healed by the process, he actually felt that he had somehow reached a higher level of enlightenment.

Clasping hands respectfully, he said, “You’re a truly righteous individual, Junior Sectlord, and you’re vastly stronger than me. You saved my life! From here on out, the Immortal House of Raging Infernos will follow any order given by the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect!”

“You’re too polite,” Yang Qi replied. “And there’s no need for such an offer. Our two sects can work together as allies, that’s more than acceptable. Obviously, these Great Necropolis natives came here with ill intent, and I won’t stand for that!”

Chapter 1043: Great Necropolis Savages

“So you want your head on the chopping block too, boy?” the man in sackcloth said, a sinister smile playing out on his face. “You’re strong, so why not join the forces of the Great Necropolis? You could have a high position when we ultimately conquer this entire place. Eventually, we’ll spread out to the Ancient Road to the Gods and take control of it, too. We’ll even wipe out those supposed executors.”

From his overbearing tone, it seemed clear that this man must have some immense support to rely on.

“The Great Necropolis has been spitting out immortal worlds left and right,” Yang Qi replied. “One of these days, your world will be sent out as well. What will you do when you’re part of the immortal dao civilization?”

The man laughed. “We’ll enslave everyone there, as well. Regardless, all outsiders will be expelled to the Ancient Road to the Gods, and wait for us to come establish order and enslave everyone.”

Another buzz of reactions could be heard.

“Crazy! He’s completely crazy!”

“Why are we even allowing these people in here? Let's drive them out!”

“Younger Brother, if you can teach these people a lesson, we’ll definitely agree to let the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect lead us, at least temporarily.”

“I can't believe these people are so rude. We agreed to seek common ground in this sect assembly, all with the goal of forming an alliance to deal with the executors and the fiend-devils. As it turns out, these Great Necropolis savages are just as bad! They need to be kicked out!”

Some of the sect leaders were so angry it seemed they wanted to kill the people in sackcloth.

“Anyone who says another word will have their sect wiped out!” The man who had just defeated Houselord Raging Inferno glared around, and anyone who felt his gaze on them immediately closed their mouth.

“You scum really do deserve to be slaughtered,” he continued. Looking back at Yang Qi, he said, “Consider what I just said, boy. Look, you might be strong, but there's only so much you can accomplish on your own. You’re from the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect, right? Did you know that, with a mere thought, we of the noble blood of the Great Necropolis could easily wipe out such a sect? Ant-like organizations such as yours are courting death by using the term ‘superpower sect’ to describe themselves. In fact—”

WHACK!

Before he could say another word, Yang Qi appeared right in front of him and smacked him across the side of the face, sending him flying off his feet with blood spraying out of his mouth. In fact, he had been hit so hard that his skull was cracked open.

“I hear a lot of arrogant boasting and conceited drivel from you people,” Yang Qi said. “I suppose if I didn’t put you in your place, you really would think that you’re the strongest force in the Great Necropolis. The Great Necropolis was sent for the benefit of the people from the Ancient Road to the Gods, which means that you’re destined to serve us.” As he stood there with his hands clasped behind his back, he looked completely casual and at ease.

“Get in formation!” the people in sackcloth shouted, rushing to surround Yang Qi. At the same time, their leader rushed over to the man Yang Qi had slapped, pouring true energy into him to heal him.

Then he looked up and coolly said, “Do you understand what you’ve done, boy? You’re about to have your whole sect exterminated. Nobody in the Great Necropolis can save you at this point.”

“Kill him, Pontifex!” shouted the man Yang Qi had struck, his eyes blazing with hatred.

“Do you really think you have what it takes to heal him?” Yang Qi asked, a faint smile in his eyes.

At that moment, the pontifex realized that he had miscalculated.

Unfortunately, he was too late.

RUMBLE!

His subordinate suddenly let loose an agonized shriek, as though he were experiencing countless torture methods from hell. The sound of his agonized screaming was enough to cause goosebumps to pop up on all the onlookers. Even as everyone watched, the screaming man then exploded, splattering the pontifex with blood and sending the other members of the Sackcloth Cathedral staggering backward with new injuries.

Voice thrumming with coldness and brutality, Yang Qi said, “Since your goal is to enslave all of the sects here, it's obviously not an option to leave you alive. You’re enemies just as much as the Executors of the Ancient Road.”

With that, he floated over to one of the men in sackcloth, reached out, and laid a hand on him. Instantly, the man’s head exploded and his body withered up into a corpse, which then plopped onto the ground.

Then Yang Qi unleashed another casual palm strike, causing another expert from the Sackcloth Cathedral to drop dead.

Next, he moved toward the shocked pontifex himself, who backed up and simultaneously thrust his hands out, causing stone-colored beams of light to shoot out and form something like a spider web right in front of him.

All of these developments were happening so quickly that the onlookers had no time to react.

Thankfully, Yang Qi had gained valuable experience fighting Shi Yuan. Furthermore, he had begun to develop his Purrfect God Art. As such, he was easily able to advance, despite the complex blockage created by the stone-colored beams of light. Nothing could block his path as he closed in on the pontifex.

Yang Qi threw out a palm, and the pontifex met it with his God Tombstone Palms. An enormous tombstone appeared, the kind that could suppress souls and express the true power of the Great Necropolis.

In response, Yang Qi’s eyes glittered and he drew on the Sovereign Lord’s Holy and Far-Reaching Consummate Omnicurse and the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body. Two godly abilities, backed by the Purrfect God Art, unleashed what seemed like something eternal and undying. And when the collision occurred, the power of the God Tombstone Palms was reflected back toward its source.

POP!

The pontifex was struck square on the chest, causing blood to spray out of his mouth. It was as if he had struck himself with full force!

As he continued coughing up blood, Yang Qi thrust his hands out again, with mountain-toppling, sea-draining force.

All of the onlookers were completely stunned by what they were seeing.

As Yang Qi’s hands struck the pontifex, he didn’t even have a chance to scream. He was instantly flattened into a smear of gore on the ground, without even a scrap of aura rising up from it.

He had been killed with that one blow.

Not even his psychic fluctuations remained behind.

Based on common understanding, it should be impossible for someone as strong as him to be killed in such a way. Even if he were to be flattened into a pile of gore, that gore should have wriggled back together and formed into human shape again. No one had any idea how Yang Qi had done what he had done.

But one thing was for sure, the pontifex of the Sackcloth Cathedral was completely and utterly dead.

“Zi Qiong, collect this flesh and blood. We can make medicinal pills out of it later, for use by the lower-level subordinates.”

Zi Qiong immediately flew out to comply with his orders. The streak of gore was about three inches thick and contained everything from the man’s clothes, to bones, to his internal organs. It really was a horrifying sight. Even the god items he had possessed were flattened. The surviving members of the Sackcloth Cathedral were visibly terrified, and even the experts from the Ancient Road to the Gods were stunned. None of them could ever have guessed that Yang Qi would turn out to be this domineering.

The pontifex of the Sackcloth Cathedral had obviously not been a weakling that was hoping to impress people with a show of confidence. He had been a truly formidable foe. Therefore, the fact that he had been killed without even a chance to scream only begged the question of just exactly how strong the junior sectlord of the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect really was.

Up to this point, a lot of people had assumed that the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect was formidable only because of the purrling and its bubbles. None of them had even guessed that the junior sectlord would also be so intimidating.

“You people from the Sackcloth Cathedral, get on your knees,” Yang Qi said, clasping his hands behind his back. “Unless you join the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect, you’re going to end up just like that pontifex of yours.”

The remaining dozen or so chief elders from the Sackcloth Cathedral gazed at Yang Qi with blank expressions. They had come here shortly before with wild ambitions, but now those feelings were gone, scraped away along with the smear of gore that was all that remained of their pontifex.

Thump!

All of them dropped to their knees. “Spare us, Young Hero. Please!” They then began knocking their heads on the ground as they kowtowed. “We’ll join your sect. The Sackcloth Cathedral is clearly done for. We want to be part of the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect!”

“Fine. In that case, I’ll place some warding spells in your heads. If you resist, you die.” He flicked his finger, sending a host of warding spells out that burrowed into the minds of the people from the Sackcloth Cathedral. Henceforth, they would be members of the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect, with the warding spells conveying all of the basic information about the sect.

After the warding spells were in place, they walked over to Sectlord Will Manifestation, dropped to their knees again, and said, “We kowtow in salute, Sectlord!”

The sectlord was delighted at how well Yang Qi had performed, and how he had furthered the glory of the sect. ‘Could Yang Qi be using this as an opportunity to remove as many of our rivals as possible?’ he thought.

“Very well, let’s stand to the side and wait for the assembly to begin,” he said. “Yang Qi, don’t make too much of a scene here. Remember, the goal of this assembly is to forge a strong alliance with the other sects.”

“Yes sir, Sectlord!” Yang Qi said. “However, I'm really worried about arrogant psychos like these trying to enslave us. I wonder if it would be a good idea to form a smaller, temporary alliance first, lest more Great Necropolis savages cause problems for us.”

Chapter 1044: The Archmonk Appears Again

It was obvious to the old-timers present that Yang Qi was proposing a small alliance with the people present. Considering how strong this junior sectlord was, he clearly wanted his sect to be the leader of this proposed new faction.

Earlier, it was unlikely that the sect leaders would have agreed to anything like this. But after the show Yang Qi had just put on, that wasn’t necessarily a foregone conclusion anymore.

Furthermore, it was likely that, without such an alliance, many of the sects present wouldn’t last through the assembly. That was especially true if more Great Necropolis savages showed up from worlds ranked two thousand or higher. Things were developing rapidly, and the old-timers knew that the coming days were going to bring countless dangers, as well as plenty of bloody fighting.

That said, it wasn’t going to be easy for them to accept the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect as their leader. There were already two enormous organizations to deal with, the Genesis Sanctum and the Woodfern Couple Palace. If they stuck with the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect, they wouldn’t be officials who followed someone else's rise from a lower rank to that of emperor. Instead, they would be considered rebels that opposed the other two major sects, and would likely end up getting purged.

The old-timers could tell that a new genius had appeared in the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect, but unfortunately, that sect still wasn't strong enough to defy the other two major sects.

In response to Yang Qi’s suggestion, everyone sat there silently.

Looking around, Yang Qi knew what they were thinking.

These old-timers were all wily old foxes, and there was no way they would throw their support behind the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect, considering how much more room for improvement it had.

A very awkward atmosphere immediately developed.

At the same time, Yang Qi’s eyes glittered as he looked around, apparently trying to come up with a way to further establish his might.

Before anything else could happen, though, a new voice filled the hall. “Sādhu, sādhu! Compassion cometh from Buddha! I can’t believe you’re still alive, young friend! Considering the level of your cultivation base, your bravery, and your immense righteousness, you surely deserve to be the league-lord of this alliance. Apparently, the Woodfern Couple Palace and the Genesis Sanctum have invited the locals from the Great Necropolis here, but unfortunately, they’re shortsighted and understand little of the world. In their haughtiness, they think they're invincible, when in fact they’re little more than frogs in a well. Being born in the Great Necropolis, the locals are both mighty and numerous. I've heard that there may be experts from three thousandth ranked immortal worlds coming, one of whom is in the mid Terrifying level. As long as you can stand up to someone like that, young friend, then my Dharma Sect will definitely support your bid to lead the alliance!”

Yang Qi’s jaw dropped as a bald-headed monk appeared at the entrance of the hall, flanked by a host of other monks. All of them had clearly gained enlightenment of the immense compassion of the buddhist schools and possessed immensely powerful divine abilities.

Also entering the hall with them were a scattered group of random cultivators.

Obviously, they were rogue cultivators who had decided to join the buddhist schools. The buddhist schools were a very important force on the Ancient Road to the Gods, and were a loose group that produced incredible experts.

Of course, the person who had just spoken was none other than Archmonk Dharma Treasury, who Yang Qi had dealt with in the past and had a very good impression of. They had worked in good faith with each other during their time together in the Hell of Sages and Mahātmās, and Yang Qi had even saved his life. From all of that, Yang Qi had come to the conclusion that he was definitely not the kind of vicious and sinister person who put on a show of loyalty but harbored evil in his heart.

“Grandmaster Dharma Treasury!” Yang Qi said in delight. “I can’t believe that you're still alive!”

“I should be the one asking how it happened. You are the one who is truly benevolent and righteous. In the moment when I was sure to be killed by the Shepherd, you saved me. After leaving that deadly situation, I assumed you had sacrificed yourself to save me. How could I ever have guessed that you were actually alive? It is truly correct to say that compassion cometh from Buddha....” Hurrying over, Dharma Treasury reached out and clasped Yang Qi’s shoulder. “As long as you're alive, that's what matters. Compassion cometh from Buddha....”

Already, he was starting to repeat himself....

“Compassion cometh from Buddha,” said another of the experts from the buddhist school, a zen master whose eyes shone with mercy and kindness. Saluting Yang Qi, he said, “Many thanks to you, young friend. I heard of how you rescued my Junior Brother in the Hell of Sages and Mahātmās. Had you not, I would’ve been overwhelmed with pain. You truly are benevolent and righteous, to be so willing to sacrifice your own life in the depths of hell. Please, accept the formal greetings of the Dharma Sect.”

With that, all of the other monks clasped hands and offered Yang Qi their formal, respectful greetings.

Yang Qi returned their salute. “I wouldn’t dare to accept such praise. I just happened to slip through the Shepherd’s grasp and escape. To be honest, I had no idea that Grandmaster Dharma Treasury had also escaped. It was all just a big fluke.”

“Young friend,” Dharma Treasury said, “not only did you escape from the Shepherd, but you also succeeded in cultivating an incredible energy art. You’re obviously much stronger than before. That said, the situation today is nothing to take lightly. The allied savages are powerful and overbearing, and already very aggressive to everyone from the Ancient Road to the Gods. I'm afraid blood will fall like rain soon....”

“How are things with the fiend-devils?” Yang Qi asked.

“The fiend-devils split into two major factions, one of them loyal to the Shepherd. The other fell under the leadership of a very mysterious entity, someone incredibly powerful who has cowed too many fiend-devils to count. At first, the two factions were at odds. However, based on my information, the Shepherd and the mysterious entity were unable to resolve their standoff via fighting, so they agreed to join forces and destroy the Executors of the Ancient Road before resuming their quarrel.”

“A mysterious entity?” Yang Qi said, his eyes flickering with surprise. It was definitely unexpected that some extremely powerful and mysterious entity had appeared on the scene to contend with the Shepherd. Yang Qi knew full well that he wasn’t on the same level as the Shepherd right now. He would need to improve his Purrfect God Art, reach the Grand Emperor level, and develop a Terrifying will convergence first. Only then would he be in the position to fight the Shepherd.

As for who that mysterious figure might be, he already had a few possible suspects. One would be the person from the Primeval Age with another part of the God Legion Seal. A second suspect would be Proud Heaven. However, if it wasn’t one of those two, then where could this person have come from?

He shook his head. It was obviously pointless to speculate at this point; he would just need to be flexible. When soldiers come, send a general to stop them. When flood waters come, use earth to block them. Worst case scenario, he could always lead his people to retreat into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

Meanwhile, the conversation that had just played out left the entire audience stunned once again. Archmonk Dharma Treasury was widely famed as being a top expert, but apparently, Yang Qi had saved his life when the two of them were on a mission together in the Hell of Sages and Mahātmās, fighting the Shepherd.

Everyone knew that the Shepherd was a mid Terrifying expert that could defeat all lesser opponents with hardly any effort at all. He could definitely vie with the emperor of the Executors of the Ancient Road, as well as the leaders of the Genesis Sanctum and the Woodfern Couple Palace. Yet a person like that had been unable to kill Yang Qi?

Where had this Yang Qi come from?

Many of the old-timers present would always act pragmatically, and do whatever seemed best based on the circumstances. Although no one had been willing to side with the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect before, now they were starting to wonder if they should change their minds. Apparently, the Dharma Sect was willing to support Yang Qi’s bid for leadership. Perhaps supporting Yang Qi would be a smart thing to do right now.

Yang Qi could see that people were now starting to hesitate about their decision. In fact, he could already sense destiny shifting as their minds changed. However, he wasn’t in any hurry.

Destiny was similar to popularity. As one’s reputation increased, and they affected the hearts of others, destiny would transform. Faith was similar, although it contained karma and could be very harmful, even dragging people onto the dao of devils.

Because of that, destiny was much safer to work with.

“Grandmasters,” Yang Qi said, “please, have a seat. I have a few questions I was hoping to get your opinion on.” The monks from the Dharma Sect accepted his invitation, and as they sat down, they immediately noticed the purrling in Jadefall’s arms. Of course, they were also privy to the rumors that had been spreading about it.

“Grandmasters,” Yang Qi asked, “considering how experienced and knowledgeable you are, do you have any idea what this purrling actually is?”

The grandmaster monks exchanged awkward glances before one of them said, “I'm ashamed to say that our buddhist scriptures and records contain no information to indicate what your purrling is. I'm afraid not even Buddha himself had any knowledge of it.”

Purr. Purr....

The purrling lay in Jadefall’s arms, its legs sticking up into the air and wiggling back and forth. It was very cute, and didn’t seem bothered at all to be in the presence of so many powerful experts. In fact, it almost seemed to view them as mere mortals.

Yang Qi was always keeping an eye on it, watching its every motion and movement, and using what he saw to further his understanding and enlightenment.

The creature was definitely unusual, and Yang Qi had the feeling that even if he observed it for millions upon millions of years, he would never fully understand it. That said, he felt stirred by watching it, and inside of him, his true energy continued swirling into the shape of a bubble.

Meanwhile, word was spreading about Yang Qi making such a scene and gathering such a large group of friends. Deep in the Woodfern Couple Palace, a large group of young women were strolling through a garden, gazing at the flowers. The group seemed to be clustered around one young woman in particular, in the same way women in the mortal world might cluster around the empress.

The woman in question had a countenance like a flower and a face like the moon. She didn’t seem at all like someone from the mortal world, but rather like a goddess from the god world. Her every move seemed to conform to the dao of heaven, making her seem completely pure and unaffected by the energy of the world around her.

The other women present were by no means ordinary. They were the successors of other important sects, all of which were led by females. Considering how important the Woodfern Couple Palace was on the Ancient Road to the Gods, it was only natural that they would recruit other sects to join their cause. Such sects considered their position a huge honor, and would serve the Woodfern Couple Palace with unswerving loyalty.

Suddenly, a young woman rushed over.

“Junior Empress,” she said, kneeling and holding out a jade amulet. “Something big just happened. We invited the pontifex of the Sackcloth Cathedral to the assembly, one of the natives of the Great Necropolis. But a scuffle broke out in the main hall and he was killed!”

Chapter 1045: Luminaries Abound

“Give it to me,” the junior empress said, extending a hand that looked like it belonged to a goddess. In response, the jade amulet became a profound beam of light that flew onto her palm. There, it projected an image of what had occurred in the hall, including Yang Qi flitting about with his movement technique while simultaneously unleashing attacks as powerful as thousands of lightning bolts. It ended with the pontifex of the Sackcloth Cathedral being reduced to a streak of gore.

“This junior sectlord of the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect is incredible!”

“He fights well! Those people from the Sackcloth Cathedral were really boorish. Without beating them down, how else could we from the Ancient Road to the Gods prove that we have talented people in our ranks?”

“Big Sister Mu, why exactly did you invite those savages here anyway? They seem like scoundrels and bastards down to the last one. Isn't bringing them like inviting the wolf into one’s house?”

“The junior sectlord of the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect isn't even in the Terrifying level? I wonder if he’s an Inheritor. Only Inheritors can fight Terrifying cultivators without first being in the Terrifying level. However, for some reason, it doesn't seem like this junior sectlord is an Inheritor.”

“That bubble beast is really cute....”

“The creature is obviously quite a rarity. And it’s even more terrifying than the junior sectlord.”

“You're right. All the bubble beast needs to do is open its mouth, and it can destroy boundless sect leaders. Oh, by the way, didn’t the junior pontiff of the Genesis Sanctum invite the bubble beast’s owner to dinner? What’s her name again? Jadefall? How come nothing ever came of that? The junior pontiff is the kind of person who won’t rest until he gets what he wants.”

After the group of women buzzed with conversation for a moment, the junior empress interrupted them.

“Very well.”

Instantly, the entire group went silent.

“This junior sectlord didn't do anything particularly impressive. I could’ve killed the pontifex of the Sackcloth Cathedral if I felt like it. Perhaps the Shepherd would be a different story; I’d have to flee for my life if he showed up. This Yang Qi must have other items or abilities hidden up his sleeve, so we definitely can’t afford to underestimate him. As for the Great Necropolis savages, we didn’t actually want to invite them here. Apparently, someone has been organizing them behind the scenes. After forming their alliance, they took the initiative to reach out and offer to work together. The first step was to attend our assembly. However, given how things have played out, it seems they’re a lot more ambitious than they let on. They obviously want to seize the position of league-lord and enslave us. It seems to me that they’re taking their cues from the Executors of the Ancient Road.”

“They’re definitely just as bad as the executors,” one of the women said. “It’s only thanks to the protection of the Woodfern Couple Palace that we've managed to survive through the years without falling victim to the treachery of the executors. Unfortunately, we haven’t even driven out the wolf, yet the tiger is already stalking us. It seems we're really being plagued with misfortune.”

“There’s no need for alarm,” the junior empress said. “The more chaos that exists in the world, the more opportunities there are to take advantage of! Periods of chaos are when the heroes emerge. My guess is that the reason the savages want to attend our assembly is that they’ve already started having trouble with the executors. And if the two of them are set on wiping each other out, that might be just the opportunity we need.”

The other women nodded in agreement.

Turning to the young woman who had brought in the jade amulet, the junior empress said, “I asked you to gather some information about what happened at the junior pontiff’s dinner. Did you find anything?”

“I did, Junior Empress,” the woman replied excitedly. “I got all the details. The junior pontiff suffered a huge loss. All of the subordinates he’s recruited over the years were killed. And his steward, the top expert Eunuch Chen, was also cut down. Furthermore, he had a huge formation set up that was also destroyed. And the three people he invited just strolled away. Unfortunately, because of the disturbance with the Great Necropolis savages, I didn't have a chance to bring the report right away.”

“What?!”

Even the junior empress was shocked by the report. “Are you serious? Don’t tell me that the junior pontiff is just going to submit to that humiliation? The Genesis Sanctum has plenty of elite experts. You would think that if the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect brazenly killed some of their people, they’d retaliate and wipe them out.”

“It seems the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect is a lot more powerful than anyone realizes,” replied the young woman. “I have a few spies among the handmaidens of the Genesis Sanctum, and they said that Yang Qi, Jadefall, and the Inheritor Zi Qiong didn’t even make a move. It was all the bubble beast. Once Eunuch Chen got caught in one of its bubbles, he was dead a moment later. Furthermore, the bubble beast destroyed that massive formation. In the end, the junior pontiff was so scared he just ran away, pissing his pants in terror.”

The women present all burst out laughing. However, their mirth was quickly replaced by very serious expressions.

“Is the bubble beast really that powerful?” one of them asked.

“The creature is the key to it all,” the junior empress said. “Yang Qi is only secondary. He’s strong, but there’s no way he could handle a mid Terrifying expert. The creature, though.... I think I need to find some time to talk with the people from the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect.”

“Junior Empress, do you intend to invite Yang Qi over for a meal?”

“Yes.” The junior empress smiled. “The junior pontiff of the Genesis Sanctum is a complete and utter fool. He resorted to force and thievery, which might have worked under normal circumstances. However, he ended up capsizing his rowboat in the channel. The junior pontiff made a big mistake in not anticipating how strong that bubble beast is.”

“It just goes to show how careful one should be,” another woman said. “After all, the channel can also have sharks in it. So, junior empress, are you going to treat the virtuous men courteously and the scholars with respect?”

“Well, that goes without saying,” the junior empress replied. “I’ll invite everyone from the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect to a meal, and recruit them into our Woodfern Couple Palace’s faction. There’s no way they’ll refuse; their junior sectlord offended too many people recently. First, the Shepherd. Second, the Genesis Sanctum. Third, the Great Necropolis savages. Considering all that, there’s no way their sect can remain safe unless they have a mid Terrifying expert on their side. Without one, they’ll only end up destroyed. The inevitable outcome is that they join us.”

At this point, one of the women brought up the most obvious and relevant question. “But considering all of the enemies they’ve made, wouldn’t that put a lot of pressure on the Woodfern Couple Palace if you extend protection to them?”

“There’s no need to worry about that now. First, we need to measure up the junior sectlord. He’s obviously going to be an important person in the future, so it would be wise to get him on our side now.”

**

Meanwhile, in another location in the Great Necropolis, local experts had gathered in alliance. In fact, they already had vast armies prepared to march to battle.

There were immortal worlds in the alliance that surpassed the rank of two thousand, which could provide hordes of experts. In the past, such worlds had been embroiled in infighting, but now that they were working together, they formed an almost invincible force.

Five top luminaries sat in a circle in the middle of the army encampment, holding a short meeting.

All five of these people were very close to the mid Terrifying level, with power indexes over eight thousand. In other words, they were far stronger than the pontifex of the Sackcloth Cathedral. Clearly, they were leaders among the savages.

At the moment, they were listening to a report brought in by an expert with a psychic scale in the dozens. “Something bad just happened! The leader of the vanguard we sent to Destructionless Castle, the pontifex of the Sackcloth Cathedral, was killed! Some of his forces were wiped out with him, and the rest joined one of the sects there!”

“What incredible gall!” one of the leaders growled, shooting to his feet. “How dare the Genesis Sanctum and the Woodfern Couple Palace kill the emissaries we sent! This is an outright defiance of moral code!”

“Explain the details of what happened,” another leader said.

“It's like this....” The Terrifying expert went on to provide a detailed recounting.

Afterward, the five luminaries were lost in thought for a time, then one of them said, “So it wasn’t done by one of the two major sects, but rather some puny newcomer. Where did the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect get the guts to do something like this?”

“We’re in a very delicate situation right now. Our armies have been gathered, and our original intention was to get our share of the action at their sect assembly, and hopefully win the position of league-lord. Unfortunately, the August Patriarch from the three thousandth ranked immortal world hasn’t shown his face yet. We're strong enough to beat just about any opponent, but... if a mid Terrifying expert showed up, we’ll be in big trouble. The pontiff of the Genesis Sanctum and the imperial couple of the Woodfern Couple Palace are both in that position, similar to the emperor of the Executors of the Ancient Road....”

Although these luminaries were boundless individuals, they weren’t in the mid Terrifying level, which was why they hadn’t gone to Destructionless Castle yet. They might have armies, but without the patriarch from the three thousandth ranked immortal world, they just weren’t strong enough.

Whooooooosh!

All of a sudden, a wind swept through the area from above and a man appeared, clad in golden garments. His face was obscured, but his aura was so strong that it exerted immense pressure on everyone present.

“Our respects, Patriarch!”

Everyone dropped to their knees. This newcomer was a person on the same level as the emperor of the executors, or the Shepherd.

“You’ve done well in following your orders and gathering the armies. For now, don’t pick any fights with the people from the Ancient Road to the Gods. I’ll handle the matter personally in a few days. When everything is settled, I’ll have a nice little surprise for you.” With that, the figure in gold waved his hand, sending out five command medallions to the five luminaries. “Those medallions are made from the essence of a three thousandth ranked immortal world that I assimilated. Combine them and you can wield the power of that world, which should be enough to hold your own against someone like me.”

Chapter 1046: Star Swordlife Makes Another Appearance

Undercurrents abounded within the major forces at play.

Back in Destructionless Castle, more and more experts were gathering. Yang Qi had never seen so many powerful people in one place. There were people from the past, present, and future, and one thing was for sure: at such a huge gathering, there was bound to be drama.

Over the course of the few hours that passed, Yang Qi caught sight of quite a few minor scuffles.

Most were between sects that had grudges with each other. Originally, there were quite a few rivals of the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect who might have caused problems. However, after word spread of Yang Qi’s might, no one dared to pick any fights with them.

In turn, Yang Qi didn’t bother bringing the fight to such sects. Slaughtering people like that wouldn’t have helped in any way. Thus, many sects were coming to view the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect as being tolerant and magnanimous.

Because of that, many sects were interested in developing better relationships with them.

Thanks to Yang Qi, the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect was gaining a reputation of being haughty to the proud and fair to the humble. That, in turn, made it much easier to resolve previous grudges, to the point where fighting often wasn’t necessary at all.

Thump. Swish. Rustle.

Flickering light could be seen gathering in Destructionless Castle as one expert after another arrived. It really seemed as though a golden age was building in the immortal dao civilization.

In the past, Yang Qi had thought of Terrifying experts as being relatively rare. But now that all of the sects from the Ancient Road to the Gods were gathering, he realized that they were as numerous as carp crossing the river.

‘It makes me wonder what the god world will be like.’

Yang Qi watched as Sectlord Will Manifestation, high-spirited and full of mettle, had meetings with numerous other sects. The Will Manifestation Heaven Sect was flourishing. Some of the sect leaders of the smaller sects were sticking to the edges of the hall, while others were currying favor with the larger sects. The entire place was abuzz.

And it was now becoming clear who was who.

The powerful organizations were slowly beginning to gather the weaker organizations to their side.

The Will Manifestation Heaven Sect’s social circle was already rather large, with more than a hundred sects gathered around them. And quite a few of the young elites were fawning over Zi Qiong and Jadefall, hoping to earn favor with them.

Yang Qi didn’t care about that and left them to handle their own affairs.

A few more hours passed, and Yang Qi was starting to get bored. Clasping his hands behind his back, he began strolling through Destructionless Castle, glancing here and there at the various meetings taking place between sects. As he strolled, he mulled over matters pertaining to his Purrfect God Art, slowly pushing his psychic power higher and higher.

RUMBLE!

By this point, his psychic scale was close to twenty, all thanks to his new art.

Before, he wouldn't have been able to pass the level of eighteen, even with secret magics and godhood. He had reached his limit, and couldn’t reach higher heights any more than someone who had climbed to the top of a mountain.

However, after cultivating the Purrfect God Art, it was as if a pagoda had appeared at the top of that mountain, allowing him to climb even higher than before.

As his true energy and psychic power flowed, he contemplated his energy arts and felt more at ease with them than ever. His Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth and Unspoiled Body had advanced even further, and he felt even more connected to the universe around him.

The heart of heaven is my heart. The will of heaven is my will. The dao of heaven is my dao. The psyche of heaven is my psyche.

Although Yang Qi’s enlightenment of the Purrfect God Art was improving, he still had no idea exactly what the purrling was. He had the feeling that if he did, if he could come to understand everything about it down to its substructure, he would become even more invincible. He would be able to fully combine the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth with his Unspoiled Body and create something new and marvelous, something never before seen throughout all the aeons.

The sounds of battle reached Yang Qi’s ears, although by this point it was nothing unusual. As the time to begin the assembly approached, fighting was going on everywhere in Destructionless Castle. Some were friendly matches to exchange fighting tips, others were all-out bloodbaths. A few were even deadly ambushes designed to take out key enemies. Magical treasures changed hands as opponents were defeated, and some sects were holding auctions. There were even instances in which two young men would take a liking to a young woman, and fight each other to earn her favor.

To Yang Qi, most of these fights seemed infantile and ridiculous.

In his heart, peace existed, as well as the desire to live a carefree life free of fighting and combat. Unfortunately, he lived in a momentous time, a time in which blood flowed and everyone fought fiercely to better their position. Even if one fled to the deepest depths of the universe, it would be impossible to fully escape the fighting and death.

That much he knew from cultivating the Unspoiled Body. He had faced numerous tribulations during the process of cultivating the technique, including heavenly tribulations, human tribulations, devil tribulations, heart tribulations, as well as tribulations of the past, present, and future.

Swish.... Slice....

All of a sudden, Yang Qi sensed a familiar sword energy, filled with life force and the persistent desire to save lives.

It was Star Swordlife’s sword technique.

Star Swordlife’s sword seemed to be in perfect harmony with the life force of heaven and earth, and capable of rescuing anything and everything. And that begged the question of who he was fighting, and why.

Yang Qi changed directions and sped toward the fight, and before long, found himself in a sprawling square that was actually an entire plane of existence. There were plenty of people gathered around watching the fight play out. One of the combatants was, of course, Star Swordlife, who now was at the Terrifying level.

That was no surprise at all to Yang Qi, who knew that Star Swordlife was a rare genius with incredible willpower. His sword technique was profound, to say the least, and he had his own dao. Furthermore, he was an Inheritor of the Great Necropolis. Because of all that, he was beyond the compare of most ordinary cultivators, even top figures from the Ancient Road to the Gods.

During the times that Yang Qi had clashed with him, he had learned a lot from his sword technique. In fact, of all the people Yang Qi had crossed paths with, none could really measure up to Star Swordlife, not even his original rival, the “Crown Prince”.

The Crown Prince of years past had possessed one of King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy medallions, and in his wild arrogance had tried to kill Yang Qi. Thankfully, Yang Qi had cultivated the God Legion Paradise, thus turning the tables on him. Although that Crown Prince could be considered a genius, he was definitely not on the same level as Star Swordlife.

Fighting Star Swordlife was another Inheritor, a man clad in a flowing black garment. When he attacked, his hands were like dragons, and the way he used the God Tombstone Palms surpassed anything that Shi Yuan or Zi Qiong was capable of.

‘This guy is incredible,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘I’d say he’s a top figure among the Inheritors, and most likely, he had to kill a few other Inheritors to reach this level. I wonder why he’s fighting Star Swordlife. Perhaps he hopes to kill him and take his godpower seed?’ Looking at a nearby expert, he said, “Brother, who's that fellow in black?”

“Where have you been living, under a rock?” the young man replied sarcastically, assuming that he was dealing with a nobody from a tiny sect. When he looked over and saw that it was Yang Qi, he gulped in fear and quickly said, “I had no idea it was you, Junior Sectlord Will Manifestation. My apologies. A great man does not remember a petty person’s trespasses, right...?”

By this point, the story of Yang Qi reducing the pontifex of the Sackcloth Cathedral to a smear of gore had spread so far and wide that everyone knew who he was.

“Don’t worry. He who doesn't know any better shouldn’t be punished for his ignorance. Now, tell me, who is that guy?”

“R-right, of course,” the young man stammered. “He’s a famous bandit from the Ancient Road to the Gods. The Flower-Seizing Marauder, a truly evil villain. He kidnaps women and drains their yin vitality to improve his techniques. Unfortunately, he's very powerful, and no matter how many times the various sects and clans have tried to capture him, they’ve always failed. Later, it seemed heaven wasn’t paying attention, and somehow allowed him to become an Inheritor. His energy arts advanced by leaps and bounds, to the point where he could easily rival the sect leaders of top organizations from the Ancient Road to the Gods. Considering how sinister he is, it’s little surprise that he managed to ambush several of his fellow Inheritors and take their godpower seeds, making him even more unfathomably powerful than before. Nobody in Destructionless Castle is a match for him. A short time ago, he tried to ambush that young swordsman, except he failed, and now the two of them are fighting. The fact that the swordsman can stand up to the Flower-Seizing Marauder shows that he’s incredibly powerful. I wonder who he is.”

“I see,” Yang Qi said. “This Flower-Seizing Marauder seems like a really wicked fellow. Why doesn’t everyone just team up to kill him?”

“Because his energy arts are just too profound. A bunch of people did try to team up against him earlier, and he killed them all. See? Look at those corpses right there.”

He pointed, and Yang Qi noticed a pile of blood-soaked corpses lying off to the side, most of which had been mangled so badly they were hardly recognizable.

Chapter 1047: The Flower-Seizing Marauder

The God Tombstone Palms were an incredibly powerful energy art, being a signature skill from the Great Necropolis itself. Anyone hit by it would have their meridians shattered, and would be crushed into a pulp. It was a truly consummate ability, and although some of the local savages could use it, they couldn’t imbue it with the godpower of the necropolis.

As such, only the Inheritors could unlock its full potential.

Because Yang Qi had the ability to study the godpower seeds, and could also channel some of the godpower of the necropolis, he was able to use the God Tombstone Palms to some degree. However, his mastery wasn’t even close to what he could do with the Sovereign Lord’s Holy and Far-Reaching Consummate Omnicurse or the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body. So for now, he didn’t use it.

However, he knew enough to tell that this Flower-Seizing Marauder was very skilled in its use. Every palm strike he unleashed came with devastating force and pressure, causing mountains to fall from above, or the earth to erupt from below. Considering how superior his version was to Zi Qiong’s, Yang Qi was convinced that he must have at least three godpower seeds.

The Flower-Seizing Marauder’s immense strength and power was fully on display.

That said, Star Swordlife’s technique provided the perfect defense, and he wielded it with incredible skill. Thanks to the life force within its operation, his opponent was unable to land any meaningful blows.

As they fought back and forth, it was obvious that the Flower-Seizing Marauder had a superior cultivation base. Unfortunately for him, Star Swordlife’s sword technique had reached an impossibly terrifying level.

A host of junior sect leaders had gathered near Yang Qi, and all of them looked quite angry. In fact, one of them turned to him and said, “The Flower-Seizing Marauder is a villain that everyone has the right to punish. Sir, why don’t you step in and kill him?”

“He kidnapped my wife and drained her yin vitality until she died. It was horrific! There is no greater evil in heaven and earth than this man. Junior Sectlord, can you please help me get revenge? If you do, then I, Heng Chiyu, will forever be in your debt!”

“Yeah, Junior Sectlord. There are people in all of our sects who have been killed by the Flower-Seizing Marauder.”

“Kill him! Please, Junior Sectlord, join forces with that young hero, and kill him!”

“Cut him down!”

“Get revenge for us!”

“We’ll follow you no matter what, Junior Sectlord Will Manifestation!”

Everyone present knew how incredible Yang Qi’s cultivation base was, making him something of a celebrity. And now they were asking him to take out the Flower-Seizing Marauder.

Almost immediately, Yang Qi realized that if he followed through with their requests, it would definitely boost his reputation by a lot.

Although the Flower-Seizing Marauder was so strong that Yang Qi wasn’t completely confident in being able to defeat him, he was willing to try.

“You think you can kill me?” the Flower-Seizing Marauder growled. Having seized the upper hand in the fighting, he looked over at the group near Yang Qi and laughed coldly. “Do you really believe that scum like you can handle me? I ravaged your women to death, and it was great! I loved the looks of despair in their eyes as they died, and only wish that you could have been there to watch them being raped to death. And my energy arts are only getting stronger and stronger. In the end, all of you can only wallow in despair!”

RIP!

All of a sudden, he sent Star Swordlife staggering backward. Then he flicked his finger, sending out a speck of black light toward the gathered onlookers that rapidly expanded into a huge millstone, on the surface of which was engraved an elegy of death. It was another energy art from the Great Necropolis.

“Stone Emperor’s Tomb Inscription!”

Unexpectedly, he was trying to kill all of the onlookers, to ensure that there were no witnesses left behind. The wickedness and evil of this man would make anyone bristle with anger!

However, Yang Qi merely snorted coldly and unleashed a fist strike imbued with a spirit that could conquer mountains and rivers. It slammed into the Stone Emperor’s Tomb Inscription, shattering it instantly! Then Yang Qi stepped out onto the square, waving his palm in an arc and sending a deadly attack right toward the Flower-Seizing Marauder.

The Flower-Seizing Marauder quickly launched another God Tombstone Palm, thinking that he would kill Yang Qi in one shot. However, when their two palms collided, he shivered and his arm went numb.

‘How could this kid be so fierce?’ he thought.

Meanwhile, Star Swordlife retracted his sword light and ceased fighting. Before, the onlookers had been hoping that he and Yang Qi would work together to rid the world of the Flower-Seizing Marauder. Unexpectedly, though, he had decided to step to the sidelines.

People immediately began to cry out to him. “Young Hero, quickly join forces with Junior Sectlord Will Manifestation to kill this guy! He’s profoundly evil, to the point where everyone wants to see him dead. Only when he ceases to exist can vengeance be had!”

“Young Hero with the sword, hurry up and keep fighting. You can’t stop now!”

“Ai... if the Flower-Seizing Marauder doesn't die today, it's impossible to say how many young men he’ll kill in the future, or how many maidens he’ll murder.”

The Flower-Seizing Marauder was visibly surprised to see Star Swordlife retreating from battle. Looking over at Yang Qi, he said, “So you’re the junior sectlord from the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect? You became pretty famous recently, but are you really willing to pick a fight with me? Could it be that you want to boost your reputation by killing me? If so, you’ve made a mistake. Do you know how many people have tried to kill me? In the end, I cut them all down. It seems to me the young women of the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect should be careful going forward. Sooner or later, I’ll head over to your sect and rape them all to death!”

“So, it’s you, Yang Qi,” Star Swordlife said coolly. “Are you planning to kill this man?”

“You're right, I am, Star Swordlife. Even you can see how evil he is. He deserves to die, and if he doesn't, countless more people will be hurt. Will you join me?”

“I won’t join you, especially not to kill someone. I only save people. Furthermore, plenty of people have died at your hands, Yang Qi. You have no right to condemn the Flower-Seizing Marauder.”

The Flower-Seizing Marauder immediately burst out laughing. “Not bad. Not bad at all. How about instead, you two fight and I can be the referee?”

Glaring at Star Swordlife, Yang Qi said, “You talk about saving people? Look at all the people standing on the sidelines. The Flower-Seizing Marauder very nearly killed them all with his God Tombstone Palms. Why didn’t you save them?”

“I would have, except his cultivation base is too fierce,” Star Swordlife replied coolly. “I wasn’t able to save them, but I wanted to.”

“Alright, cut the crap,” Yang Qi growled. “I'm going to kill this guy, Star Swordlife. If you don't want to help, fine. Just step back and don’t get in my way.”

“Ai...” Star Swordlife sighed. “Why are you always going around trying to kill people, Yang Qi? As long as I'm here, you’re not going to be killing anybody. I won’t allow it.”

When the onlookers heard his words, many of them shouted in anger and began vehemently cursing Star Swordlife.

“What kind of a rat bastard are you?! You’re helping this monster? He’s killed innumerable helpless victims, and raped too many women to count. He deserves the death penalty ten thousand times over! Why the hell aren’t you going to help Junior Sectlord Will Manifestation rid the world of him? Just what are you planning to do instead?”

“This guy was just ambushed by the Flower-Seizing Marauder? Why would he stop the junior sectlord from killing him? Is he insane or something?”

“Get out of way! Let the junior sectlord kill the Flower-Seizing Marauder!”

Star Swordlife seemed completely unruffled by all the yelling and cursing. “The Flower-Seizing Marauder is a killer, and Yang Qi is a killer too. As far as I'm concerned, there’s no difference between them. I don’t discriminate amongst the people I save.”

“Well said, boy!” The Flower-Seizing Marauder burst out into sinister laughter. He had sinister, triangular eyes, a high-bridged nose, and viciously angular lips. He actually looked heartless and unethical, like a cold-blooded, ruthless villain. “It’s good to see that you have principles. How about this: I promise never to kill another person again. Unfortunately, this junior sectlord is obviously not going to make a similar promise. Why don’t the two of us work together to take him down? Make sure he doesn’t kill anyone else, ever again?”

“Did you hear that, Yang Qi?” Star Swordlife said. “The Flower-Seizing Marauder just promised me that he’d never kill again. What about you?”

Now it was Yang Qi’s turn to burst out laughing. “Are you a complete moron, Star Swordlife? You actually believe him? I don’t remember you being such an idiot before. Could it be that the higher your cultivation base gets, the worse your brain works?”

“I have no way to know whether or not you’ll keep killing people,” Star Swordlife replied. “But at least he's willing to make the promise. So what do you think? If you express the same sentiment and promise not to kill anyone in the future, then I won’t make things difficult for you. What do you say?”

Yang Qi’s eyes flashed. Star Swordlife was really acting like a blockhead, and was clearly not willing to budge in his views. Yang Qi sighed. “This guy is a despicable and shameless liar, Star Swordlife. He’s obviously going to go back on his word. I'm telling you, if he doesn’t die right here and now, he's only going to bring more calamity to the dao of immortals.”

“Did you hear that, Star Swordlife?” the Flower-Seizing Marauder said. “He’s being very stubborn. He’ll definitely go on to kill more people in the future; he basically said it outright! I've already said that I won’t, so what are you going to do?”

“I won’t let him kill you,” Star Swordlife said. “Don’t worry.”

When the onlookers heard this interchange, their heads nearly exploded from fury. How could any of them have guessed that something like this would happen? As of this point, they were actually angrier with Star Swordlife than they were with the Flower-Seizing Marauder. After all, it was because of his refusal to kill people that an utter monster was about to go free.

In fact, he was essentially helping the monster.

“In that case, there’s no point in continuing this conversation,” Yang Qi said. “I'm going to punish this villain. If you try to stop me, that means you’re on his side. Listen up, Flower-Seizing Marauder. Whether you run or fight, I'm going to kill you today.”

“Why haven’t you stepped in, Star Swordlife?” the Flower-Seizing Marauder said. “I already promised never to kill another person again. Come on, help me deal with this guy!”

Chapter 1048: One Versus Two

Yang Qi wanted to kill the villainous Flower-Seizing Marauder, only to have the obsessed Star Swordlife interfere.

He had dealt with Star Swordlife many times, and had come to find that he really had a one-track mind. No amount of talking would convince him to change, and all he ever talked about was his refusal to kill. Moments ago, the Flower-Seizing Marauder had threatened to kill a whole group of cultivators with his God Tombstone Palms, a group that included women.

But now Star Swordlife was actually defending him. As far as Yang Qi was concerned, Star Swordlife’s actions had long since surpassed anything that made sense.

In the end, Yang Qi didn't care. He would reveal the truth with his fists if he had to.

He knew that the Flower-Seizing Marauder wouldn’t be easy to take down, and if Star Swordlife got involved, the fight would be even harder. However, knowing that didn’t weaken his resolve or confidence. Oftentimes, his best performances were in tight situations such as this.

“Die!” he shouted, launching a fist right at Star Swordlife.

This caught Star Swordlife completely by surprise. However, he still had a Terrifying will convergence, and that was nothing to take lightly. He slashed out with his sword, sending a beam of light to meet the incoming fist. When the two collided, Star Swordlife felt immense force slamming into him, sending him staggering backward with a look of surprise on his face.

Ever since acquiring the godpower seed, his cultivation base had advanced so rapidly that his dao of the sword had become nearly invincible. In fact, he was actually superior to most of the sect leaders.

As such, he was completely taken aback to find that Yang Qi was so strong.

Yang Qi’s fist strike was a combination of soft and hard. It pulled and pushed at the same time, and seemed like a tribulation of kalpas, unceasing and never-ending.

It was truly an ultimate manifestation of the art of the fist.

Yang Qi’s fist technique had improved tremendously after cultivating the Unspoiled Body with the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. Although the combination was causing problems with his cultivation advancement, it did make him incredibly effective in combat.

Later, the Mahātmā Jade he acquired had helped his psychic power, but unfortunately, it was dangerous to use. He had no idea whether it would suck the user dry, or provide an influx of psychic power. Until his research revealed more of its secrets, he didn't dare to use it.

Thankfully, the newly born purrling had provided a lot of enlightenment, helping him use his three major energy arts together and reach a level that was completely unheard of throughout history.

Of course, there was still a lot of enlightenment to be had regarding his Purrfect God Art. He needed to spend time in secluded meditation in order to answer the many questions he had regarding the connection between his fleshly body and his psyche.

But even though the energy arts he had at his disposal weren’t technically complete, they were still more than Star Swordlife was capable of easily vanquishing.

One of his reasons for taking the fight to the Flower-Seizing Marauder and Star Swordlife at the same time was that he hoped the brutal combat would improve his psychic enlightenment and further his understanding of the Purrfect God Art.

Even gods could gain enlightenment by walking the thin line between life and death.

After forcing Star Swordlife back with a fist strike, Yang Qi followed it up with another blow that contained elements of yin and yang, heaven and earth, and righteousness and evil.

The onlookers watched in amazement as he launched blow after blow. His superb skill in martial and energy arts was such that everyone began sweating with shock. How could any of them have guessed that he was this proficient?

Was he even human? Or was he actually the child of a Paramount God from the god world, descended to the mortal world in human form?

The Flower-Seizing Marauder was also stunned, as he realized that he had no idea what martial discipline Yang Qi was using. It was so powerful that he wasn’t sure he could even fight it, or even escape its momentum once it was unleashed. He preemptively threw out a move from his God Tombstone Palms, creating a defensive perimeter around himself.

Specifically, he was using the Sink into Oblivion style of the palm technique, which created a rippling area around him that would draw in all offensive attacks and negate them. Any palm power that hit it would simply ‘sink down into oblivion’.

Meanwhile, Star Swordlife finally struck back, sending out a tempest of sword energy that manifested as all sorts of meteorological and astronomical phenomenon, including falling rain, snowflakes, lighting and thunder.

It looked like a huge fight was about to take place.

It was one versus two, and Yang Qi wasn’t holding anything back. His attacks all conformed to the dao of heaven, creating a field of energy that completely surrounded both Star Swordlife and the Flower-Seizing Marauder. At the same time, Star Swordlife was fighting back fiercely with his sword, to the point where Yang Qi couldn’t afford any slowness or delays.

Every time his fist connected with the sword, immense force would rip through him, making him feel numb as a result. Thankfully, he had some godpower seeds and access to the vital energy of the Great Necropolis, which helped him stave off the numbness.

Without those, Yang Qi would definitely have been at a huge disadvantage.

Meanwhile, the Flower-Seizing Marauder was having problems similar to Star Swordlife.

Never in his wildest dreams would he have guessed that Junior Sectlord Will Manifestation was this strong. In fact, he seemed equal to some of the most powerful people from the Ancient Road to the Gods, imperial figures with psychic scales of eighty.

Not even his God Tombstone Palms, or other arts from the Great Necropolis, seemed enough to block Yang Qi’s wild attacks.

As for the people on the sidelines, they watched the fighting with such astonishment that they had already begun crying out in shock at what they were seeing. Earlier, few people present had felt very optimistic at Yang Qi’s chances. After all, they had all just seen Star Swordlife and the Flower-Seizing Marauder fighting. But now, Yang Qi’s stellar performance had many of them considering joining the fight to try to slaughter Star Swordlife and the Flower-Seizing Marauder.

Obviously, Yang Qi was winning hearts here. Yet again, destiny was stirring.

“Sword Shattering!”

All of a sudden, he pounced like an eagle descending on a rabbit, heading directly toward Star Swordlife.

Before Star Swordlife could react, Yang Qi’s hand clamped down onto his sword and twisted, shattering the blade. Then, Yang Qi’s hand shot toward Star Swordlife’s head.

Star Swordlife quickly backed up, and with a flourish of both hands, produced another sword. Waving it, he created a massive sword net, not to attack Yang Qi but to defend the Flower-Seizing Marauder.

When the audience saw this, more yelling and cursing could be heard.

“You asshole! You're actually defending the Flower-Seizing Marauder? What are you thinking? You want to save people? Do you know how many people are going to die if the Flower-Seizing Marauder escapes today? You might as well be killing them yourself!”

“The punk has already entered the dao of devils. Junior Sectlord, kill them both!”

“This brat is going to make himself public enemy number one. He definitely can’t be allowed to live. If the Flower-Seizing Marauder survives, we have to kill this accomplice of his!”

The crowd was truly getting very angry at Star Swordlife’s actions.

However, he was set on his dao. It didn’t matter how people cursed him, he would defend the Flower-Seizing Marauder. Of course, the Flower-Seizing Marauder was both surprised and delighted by this. And at a certain point, he intentionally retracted his energy, putting himself in a dangerous situation.

Of course, Yang Qi immediately took advantage of the situation and pressed the attack. And just when it seemed he would pierce the Flower-Seizing Marauder’s defense, Star Swordlife lunged forward, expending a huge amount of vital energy to create a defensive barrier.

When the onlookers saw this, their curses grew even harsher. To see Star Swordlife so openly defending the Flower-Seizing Marauder made them want to eat his flesh and drink his blood.

That was especially true considering how the Flower-Seizing Marauder had plagued the women of so many different sects. The Flower-Seizing Marauder was truly notorious, and really was guilty of countless crimes. If hatred alone could kill, he would have long since been dead.

Unfortunately, Star Swordlife was doing everything he could to prevent Yang Qi from killing him.

Howling, Yang Qi unleashed another devastating attack, causing an aura to spread out that seemed to contain the energy of countless fallen gods.

As Yang Qi’s fist strike approached, the Flower-Seizing Marauder’s face fell and he tried to dodge to the side. Before he could, Yang Qi launched another fist strike to block his path of escape.

The Flower-Seizing Marauder was trapped; if he were struck by either of these blows, he would die, or at least be seriously injured.

However, at that moment, Star Swordlife thrust out his sword, drawing on all of the power of his cultivation base, and all of his sword energy, to block the two fist strikes.

POP!

Blood sprayed out of his mouth, and he said, “Get out of here, Flower-Seizing Marauder! And remember, don’t kill anyone!”

Chuckling coldly, the Flower-Seizing Marauder said, “You actually believed that I wouldn’t kill anyone from here on out? You’re so stupid you don't deserve to live! Give me your godpower seed!”

And he thrust out his hand toward Star Swordlife’s head.

Chapter 1049: Obsessed

In the most critical moment of the fight, the Flower-Seizing Marauder showed his true, brutal colors. He suddenly attacked Star Swordlife, hoping to kill him and take his Great Necropolis godpower seed. He had long since come to the realization that Star Swordlife had amazing sword technique, and had also mastered his Inheritor abilities.

Assimilating Star Swordlife would obviously provide a big boost to the Flower-Seizing Marauder, giving him a big advantage in his fight against the junior sectlord of the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect.

There was no question that Star Swordlife had to die.

It didn't matter that he had saved his life; the Flower-Seizing Marauder couldn't care less about that. He didn’t care about showing gratitude, or living by the traditional virtues of compassion, duty, propriety and integrity. As soon as he saw a chance to profit from a situation, he would take advantage of it. Even if Star Swordlife had saved him a thousand or even ten thousand times, he would still do the same thing. Right now, he was dead set on killing him, taking his treasures, devouring his flesh and blood, and assimilating his soul.

It would be hard to find a person more wicked and vicious than this.

Everything had been a big trick. He had intentionally put himself in a dangerous situation to lure Star Swordlife to his defense. Then he had struck like lightning.

This was the opportunity he had been waiting for.

CRACK!

His hands latched onto Star Swordlife’s head, and he sent his energy arts surging into his sea of consciousness.

In the blink of an eye, he made contact with the Great Necropolis godpower seed.

The Flower-Seizing Marauder was a powerful man. He had a psychic scale of fifty and a power index of over six thousand. On top of that, he was an Inheritor who had cut down multiple fellow Inheritors. That said, he normally wouldn’t have been able to pull off a move like this. It was only because Star Swordlife had already been badly hurt by Yang Qi that he could pull it off.

“Aaaiiiieee!” Star Swordlife screamed, turning to look in disbelief at the Flower-Seizing Marauder. “Why? I thought you said you wouldn’t do any more killing? Why would you ambush me? I saved you, to help guide you back to the right path! Why would you plot against me? Is it really true that monsters can’t be converted to the light by means of life force?”

“I’ll ‘convert’ your mother later tonight!” the Flower-Seizing Marauder shouted. “You stupid idiot! If someone like you could ‘guide me back to the right path’, I would have died long ago on the Ancient Road to the Gods. The scum beneath my shoes is better than you. Now give me that godpower seed. Don't worry, I’ll take good care of your wife, daughter, and mother. In fact, I’ll bang them to death! That's the thanks you’ll get for saving my life!” With that, he erupted into maniacal laughter as he dug his fingers into Star Swordlife’s skull, trying to extract his godpower seed.

“You...” Star Swordlife said, struggling to free himself. He even unleashed an energy field that he hoped would knock the Flower-Seizing Marauder away. Unfortunately, he was fundamentally weaker, and also badly injured. In that state, how could he possibly do anything to the Flower-Seizing Marauder?

He could only watch as his energy arts were drained away. And slowly but surely, the godpower seed was being pulled out.

Seeing this, Yang Qi snorted coldly and launched another palm strike at the Flower-Seizing Marauder. And at the same time, he sent some true energy into Star Swordlife.

The Flower-Seizing Marauder was forced to defend himself with his God Tombstone Palms. At the same time, Yang Qi’s true energy was healing Star Swordlife, allowing him to eject the Flower-Seizing Marauder’s energy.

Yang Qi’s palm slammed into the Flower-Seizing Marauder's palm, and at the same time, the wounds on Star Swordlife’s head closed up. He had been saved by Yang Qi!

Of course, this was a huge surprise; never could he have guessed that Yang Qi would actually save him.

Leaping backward, the Flower-Seizing Marauder pointed angrily at Yang Qi and said, “This guy plotted against you! You should have been happy to see him die. Why would you save him? According to my calculations, you clearly want to kill him!”

Yang Qi snorted again. “You calculated wrong, Flower-Seizing Marauder. Do you really think I'm as despicable as you? Maybe I do want to kill Star Swordlife, but I’ll do it in a fair fight. I wouldn’t stab him in the back the way you would.”

Turning to Star Swordlife he said, “Are you alright? You're always talking about saving people. How does it feel to be the one being saved this time?”

Star Swordlife hesitated. “Well done, Yang Qi. Thanks to my example, you've learned about the dao of life force, and know the delight of rescuing people. Going forward, you can advance the interests of life force, just like me. You’re not going to try to kill the Flower-Seizing Marauder now, are you?”

His words caused looks of blank astonishment to appear on the faces of the onlookers.

Who could ever have guessed that Star Swordlife would say that? Instead of thanking Yang Qi for saving his life, he claimed that he had converted Yang Qi to his own way of thinking. He wasn’t just kicking his benefactor in the teeth, he was being as rapacious as a wolf and as savage as a cur.

As a result, even more people began cursing him than before. Of course, many people were reading into his words and could tell that he was still intent on defending the Flower-Seizing Marauder. People were definitely starting to hate Star Swordlife as much as the Flower-Seizing Marauder. After all, at least the Flower-Seizing Marauder wasn’t a hypocrite.

As for Yang Qi, although he was stunned, he actually didn’t think of Star Swordlife as being a hypocrite. He just had a one-track mind, and at the same time was completely obsessed. Considering that, and considering Yang Qi knew he couldn’t change the situation, he wasn’t angry. He simply smiled and said, “It was my pleasure to save you, Star Swordlife. And the reason I want to kill the Flower-Seizing Marauder is to save all of the people who he would go on to kill in the future. Do you see what I mean?”

“Regardless, I can’t let you kill people in my presence,” Star Swordlife replied. “If you try to kill the Flower-Seizing Marauder, I’ll have to stop you.”

“I knew you were going to say that. In that case, if the Flower-Seizing Marauder tries to kill you a second time, I won’t save you.”

“Sadly, it seems I haven’t converted you to my side after all. You're indecisive, without a dao of your own. And in that aspect, you can’t match up to me. Even if the Flower-Seizing Marauder does plan to kill me, I’ll still save his life. As long as he agrees to stop killing.” Looking over at the Flower-Seizing Marauder, he said, “Promise to do no more killing, and I’ll keep you safe.”

The Flower-Seizing Marauder burst out laughing again, then flew over to his side. “I promise. I’ll never kill anyone ever again. You see, my sneak attack on you just now was actually a misunderstanding. Please don’t hold it against me. I, the Flower-Seizing Marauder, hereby swear an oath to treat you as a benefactor who I owe my life to.”

“Wonderful. It seems you’ve really made a change. That said, don't worry. Even if you ambush me a thousand times, or even ten thousand, I would still save you. That’s my dao. I wouldn’t ever abandon my dao just because you tried to kill me. You’re a natural-born killer, whereas I'm a natural-born lifesaver. I can’t abandon my inborn nature because of the inborn nature of others.” That was how Star Swordlife viewed things.

“What a pity,” Yang Qi said, shaking his head. “What a downright travesty. How did you manage to stay alive this long, Star Swordlife?”

“Because I'm benevolent and generous by nature. By saving the lives of others, I save my own life. Thus, I can turn ill fortune to good luck. For example, just now, when the Flower-Seizing Marauder tried to kill me, you saved me. But the truth is that it wasn’t really you coming to my rescue. No. I was saving the Flower-Seizing Marauder, and therefore, you were inspired in the heat of the moment to save me. And that is how I turned ill fortune to good luck. Understand? In the end, I saved myself. That’s how the life force of heaven and earth works, in its mysterious and enigmatic nature. If you’re enlightened about the eternal nature of life force, you’ll be eternally blessed. Because I gave the Flower-Seizing Marauder a chance at life, heaven and earth saw fit to do the same for me.”

Star Swordlife’s explanation actually did seem to make sense, but at the same time, those listening felt that there was something odd about it, although no one could say exactly what.

They could tell that it was fallacious reasoning, but couldn’t think of any way to refute it.

As for Yang Qi, he thought, ‘Star Swordlife really has begun to tread a path of evil. It's too bad. He wants to seek the way of life, but he's lost his balance and it’s going to lead to more people getting hurt. His mere act of saving a life is going to lead to more people being murdered. If he follows this course, he might reach godly ascension, but in the end, he’ll be a wretch-god.”

Many wretch-gods started out in that way. They wanted to save the world, but to do so, they resorted to evil, to the point where they actually destroyed worlds. Some even attempted to purge all worlds, even ones that were completely innocent.

That was how wretch-gods thought.

There was no doubt that Star Swordlife would eventually turn into such a wretch-god. Yang Qi could already see how it would play out.

That said, within Star Swordlife’s thoughts, Yang Qi could actually see elements of the path he knew he had to walk. All of a sudden, his psychic power stirred and he broke through to the level of twenty-one.

The truth was that although Star Swordlife had a one-track mind, the fighting and debate with him had inspired Yang Qi and given him new enlightenment. There were numerous aspects of himself that he suddenly understood better.

“In that case,” he said, “I'm going to attack the Flower-Seizing Marauder again. Let’s see if you can stop me.”

“Don’t blame me for getting in your way,” Star Swordlife said, and slashed out with his sword.

Chapter 1050: Fighting the Flower-Seizing Marauder

From the fluctuations coming from deep in Star Swordlife’s cultivation base, and the way his face glowed, Yang Qi could see that he had ultimate faith in his own actions. His psychic scale was climbing, and he looked like the famous one man guarding a mountain pass, preventing ten thousand men from breaking through. From what Yang Qi could tell, he was about to achieve some sort of breakthrough.

He would obviously be more than happy to die multiple times as long as he stuck to his beliefs.

In fact, he would have died moments ago if Yang Qi hadn’t saved him. Of course, in his mind, he had temporarily converted Yang Qi to his cause and thus turned ill fortune to good luck, which only went to further his confidence and faith.

And now he was sinking into a frenzy. Without becoming a devil, one could not become a god.

“If you want to block me, go ahead,” Yang Qi said. “Let’s see if you have what it takes. In this world, logic and arguments are meaningless. The only thing that matters in the end is strength. Killing. Saving. You can do whatever you want as long as you’re strong enough. That goes for both me and you. In the end, me killing one person will save countless more, while you saving one person will end up killing countless more. My killing is an act of saving, and your saving is an act of killing. There are many bizarre and marvelous situations like this in life.”

“Hype yourself up however you want,” Star Swordlife said, keeping his sword extended, “I still won’t let you kill the Flower-Seizing Marauder.”

Yang Qi attacked, his palm slipping right past Star Swordlife’s defenses and heading directly toward the Flower-Seizing Marauder.

The Flower-Seizing Marauder was immediately struck with surprise. Moments ago, he had been inwardly gloating, just waiting for Star Swordlife and Yang Qi to start fighting. It was truly fortuitous to have run into a freak like Star Swordlife, who could be manipulated with only a few lies. Not even stabbing him in the back had turned him into an enemy.

Even up to this point, the Flower-Seizing Marauder didn’t have an ounce of gratitude in his heart. He simply thought of Star Swordlife as a fool and buffoon. ‘This brat is pretty funny. I definitely need to find time to rape his wife and daughters to death. And his mother, too. I wonder if he would save me then. I wouldn't be surprised if he did! Fine, it's settled. Once I get out of this situation, I'm going straight for his wife and daughters. Then we’ll see how he reacts.... As for this junior sectlord of the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect, I'm done with him. He’s too strong, and he's not even in the Terrifying level yet. Once he achieves his next breakthrough, it’ll be impossible for me to kill him.’

As he reveled in the idea of raping Star Swordlife’s female family members, then forcing Star Swordlife into saving him, he found a palm rumbling right toward his chest.

“I thought you were going to defend me, Star Swordlife!” he shouted angrily. “You’re just letting him kill me? Was all your talk of saving me just a big lie?!” Only by unleashing all eighty-one stances from his God Tombstone Palms did he just barely manage to fend off Yang Qi’s assault.

“My apologies!” Star Swordlife said, and unleashed an explosive torrent of beautiful sword energy, filled with lovely scenery including rainfalls, flowing rivers, lotus ponds and the like.

“Misty rain!”

The sword was intertwined with the beautiful scenery, and the scenery gave birth to enough emotion to move anyone who looked at it. The sword energy became like a host of splendid scroll paintings that swirled around Yang Qi and made it impossible for him to attack the Flower-Seizing Marauder.

In response, Yang Qi threw out his palm, and his energy arts surged. Stepping forward, he combined his two major energy arts and slammed his hand into Star Swordlife’s sword energy, shattering it. Then he reached his hand toward the Flower-Seizing Marauder and used another move.

“Seizing the Cosmos!”

The Flower-Seizing Marauder felt like everything around him was about to collapse, and he sensed his vital energy seeping out of him. Even his spine began to creak as though it might shatter under the force of Yang Qi’s palm.

Spinning, he fought back with his God Tombstone Palms, causing a projection of the Great Necropolis to appear above him and send out godpower to negate Yang Qi’s assault.

Around this time, Star Swordlife attacked Yang Qi’s back, stabbing through his defensive empyrean energy with his sword. Instantly, sealing marks that resembled the Great Necropolis itself appeared as he attempted to lock Yang Qi into place.

Yang Qi chuckled coldly, sending out a wave of millions of rippling vibrations that destroyed the sealing marks and sent Star Swordlife staggering away. Then Yang Qi waved his sleeve, causing the God Legion Battle Robe to sweep out toward Star Swordlife, giving him no room to wield his sword energy as it threatened to wrap him up.

Visibly taken aback, Star Swordlife lunged backward, slicing back and forth with his sword in an attempt to shred Yang Qi’s sleeve into nothing.

However, at that exact moment, Yang Qi shifted his movement and launched the most vicious attack possible on the Flower-Seizing Marauder.

Crack. Rattle.

Yang Qi’s energy arts erupted, and he launched a lightning-fast fist strike. In the blink of an eye, dozens of arms appeared around him, each of them holding a different weapon, each of which was an expression of will that was filled with countless tribulations.

RUUUUMBLE. RUUUUUUUMBLE!

The attack slammed into the Flower-Seizing Marauder, sweeping him up into a tempest of energy. He tried to use the energy arts of the Great Necropolis to defend against it and was already cursing himself for not fleeing earlier. Instead, he had stuck around to try to kill this junior sectlord, only to find himself on the verge of being killed, with nowhere to run to.

In fact, if he tried to run away now, and made even the slightest mistake, he would end up like the pontifex of the Sackcloth Cathedral, a smear of gore stuck to the ground that would later be turned into a medicinal pill.

Yang Qi pressed the attack, drawing on three of his major energy arts. He was now fighting with full abandon, using punches and kicks that, despite seeming low on power, were actually backed by an invincible great dao. People facing this level of attack would only have one option to choose: death. There was no second option!

“One Sword Seals Devils!” Star Swordlife shouted. Having freed himself from the God Legion Battle Robe, he stabbed his sword toward Yang Qi, sending out a host of sealing marks. Unfortunately for him, Yang Qi thrust his palm out, causing the sword light to shatter and shoving Star Swordlife away yet again.

Having been repeatedly rebuffed by Yang Qi, Star Swordlife was starting to feel overwhelmed with helplessness. “Flower-Seizing Marauder, come stand by my side. I’ll connect to you using my Great Necropolis godpower seed, and then we can join forces. Together, we should be strong enough to stand up to him!”

The Flower-Seizing Marauder’s spirits immediately lifted. ‘Fuck. Is this kid really suicidal or something? He's right, if we join forces, we’ll be much stronger. But he should only do that with someone he deeply trusts. Otherwise, he’s just making himself extremely vulnerable to attack!’

No one in their right mind would join forces with the Flower-Seizing Marauder, thus opening themselves to attack by him. On the Ancient Road to the Gods, there had been some fiend-devils who allied with the Flower-Seizing Marauder, but in the end, he killed them all and devoured their nascent divinities.

And although there was no way Star Swordlife would attempt to take the Flower-Seizing Marauder’s godpower seed, it was a given that the Flower-Seizing Marauder would try taking his.

“You think I'm going to let you join forces?” Yang Qi said, launching two palm strikes, one containing the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, which he sent toward Star Swordlife, and the other containing the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body, which he sent toward the Flower-Seizing Marauder. Obviously, he wasn't going to let them team up against him.

“Life Force of Heaven and Earth; One Sword Revolution; Sacrifice the Mortal Shell; Save and Rescue Living Beings!” All of a sudden, Star Swordlife began burning his life force and soul to unleash a powerful sword move.

With a swoosh, he slashed through Yang Qi’s moves and appeared in front of the Flower-Seizing Marauder.

He was actually sacrificing himself to save the Flower-Seizing Marauder, which went to show the incredible level of his willpower.

Yang Qi couldn’t help but be shaken, and knew how incredibly powerful this sword move must be, considering it was backed by a sacrifice of life force. If Star Swordlife and the Flower-Seizing Marauder joined forces under these conditions, it was highly likely that the latter would take the former’s godpower seed. And when the Flower-Seizing Marauder grew stronger as a result, it would only mean that more female cultivators would be ravaged and killed by him.

In this moment, Yang Qi’s eyes flashed like lightning and his psychic scale rose yet again.

Purr. Purr!

Deep within him, his energy arts suddenly broke through to another level. He had suddenly gained further enlightenment of the Purrfect God Art, which caused purring sounds to fill his sea of energy. Although they couldn’t match up to the actual purring sounds of the purrling, they were still terrifying to hear.

WHOOSH!

He thrust two palms out, and two bubbles suddenly appeared.

Those bubbles surpassed any expression of space or time. They instantly covered Star Swordlife and the Flower-Seizing Marauder, breaking the connection that had just formed between them. Surprised, Star Swordlife slashed his sword out to try bursting the bubble.

Unfortunately for him, there was no way he could do anything to the bubble. Although Yang Qi was not the purrling itself, his cultivation base was incredible, and his mastery of the art ensured that the bubbles he could create were still extremely powerful.

The Flower-Seizing Marauder had just been about to try to take Star Swordlife’s godpower seed, only to be trapped in a bubble and thwarted.

He drew on his God Tombstone Palms, sending attacks left and right. But sadly for him, all efforts were useless. Then, a moment later, Yang Qi appeared inside the bubble with him.

It was time to go for broke!

The Flower-Seizing Marauder unleashed his most powerful techniques, hoping at least to take Yang Qi out with him. Sadly, it was too late.  When Yang Qi had been fighting one versus two, he still had the upper hand, let alone when fighting one on one inside this bubble. Obviously, he was even stronger inside the bubble.

In the briefest of moments, the two of them exchanged three thousand moves, then Yang Qi landed a blow directly on the Flower-Seizing Marauder’s chest.

Blood sprayed out of the Flower-Seizing Marauder’s mouth like a waterfall.

Chapter 1051: Heating Alcohol

“Aaaiiiieee!” screamed the Flower-Seizing Marauder, his face a mask of disbelief. In his mind, he had never even considered the possibility that he might die one day. “I can’t believe this! I'm dying at the hands of some brat who isn’t even in the Terrifying level? I didn’t even have a chance to kill Star Swordlife and get his godpower seed!”

Trembling, he continued, “If I'm going out, I'm taking you with me, boy! Time for a godpower explosion!”

RUMBLE!

Energy shot out of him that could destroy the heavens and extinguish the earth, and as a result, the bubble generated by Yang Qi finally popped.

Yang Qi was not the purrling, and his mastery of these bubbles was superficial at best. Obviously, he still had a lot to learn.

However, if the Flower-Seizing Marauder thought he was going to take Yang Qi out with him, he was sadly mistaken; as soon as he was out in the open, Yang Qi easily got him under control again.

Chuckling coldly, Yang Qi said, “Take me out with you? Who do you think you are? My cultivation base is so high that there’s no way you could ever hope to kill me.”

Yang Qi’s physical body had reached a level of such incredible power that it defied the norms of nature.

He extended his hand, and his five fingers were like immense mountains that crushed all of the divine abilities launched by the Flower-Seizing Marauder.

“Hand of the One God; Nine Stance Combination!”

Yang Qi was resorting to a trump card, hoping to forestall any interference from Star Swordlife. After all, Star Swordlife was willing to sacrifice his own life force to save this despicable villain.

Therefore, he combined all nine of the stances from one of the best killing moves from the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, bolstering it with the energy arts he had picked up from Proud Heaven.

POP!

He closed his fingers into a fist, and the Flower-Seizing Marauder’s head shattered. His godpower seed flew out, pulling his nascent divinity and will along with it, leaving the fleshly body behind.

Yang Qi was ready for that. He flicked his finger, sending out a bubble of true energy that encased the godpower seed and then pulled it over to him. Without any hesitation, he began to burn it with bright fire. The Flower-Seizing Marauder immediately screamed, “Mercy! Show me mercy! I’ll acknowledge allegiance to you! I won’t kill anyone ever again!”

“You might convince Star Swordlife of that, but not me.” There was absolutely no way Yang Qi was going to show mercy in this situation, and he continued to unleash his powerful energy arts. Soon, the Flower-Seizing Marauder’s screams faded away and his body collapsed into ash.

He was dead and gone.

One of the most evil and despicable bandits in existence was no more.

Jubilant cheering immediately broke out.

“Alright!”

“A great kill!”

“He really got rid of a big scourge!”

The Flower-Seizing Marauder had brought harm and suffering to many people, and unfortunately, virtually none of them had been in the position to get the revenge they deserved.

But Yang Qi had done it for them.

Already, word was starting to spread that the vile Flower-Seizing Marauder was finally dead, leading to widespread rejoicing.

Yang Qi immediately felt destiny shifting, flowing toward him rapidly. This battle had boosted the reputation of the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect and made him a subject of even more adoration. Yet again, his prestige was growing.

“No!”

A bubble popped, and Star Swordlife leaped out into the open. The fact that he had been unable to save the Flower-Seizing Marauder was obviously a huge blow to him. And this wasn’t the first time that Yang Qi had left him absolutely powerless. A similar thing had played out with Profound Valor. As of now, he truly loathed Yang Qi.

“Yang Qi! You've killed again!” He pointed his sword at him. “Why do you have to do things like this!?”

“What,” Yang Qi replied coolly. “What are you going to do, kill me to avenge the Flower-Seizing Marauder?”

“No, I don’t kill people. Ever. But I swear that I'm going to capture and seal you. With you free, it's impossible to say how many people you’ll harm.”

“The Flower-Seizing Marauder killed a lot of people. Why didn’t you capture and seal him? Don’t tell me that your goal is to rescue wretch-devils and ignore good people? Or did I hurt your feelings so bad that you’re pretending I'm worse than the Flower-Seizing Marauder? If so, I'd say you’re being a bit too conceited.”

“Kill him, Junior Sectlord!”

“Yeah, cut him down. Not even death can atone for how he helped the Flower-Seizing Marauder. Let’s join together to seal him! Make sure he doesn't escape!”

Everyone was shouting, and quite a few people began setting up a spell formation. Obviously, they all hated Star Swordlife and wanted to see him dead.

“See that?” Yang Qi said. “You’ve aroused public anger. And you think you’re going to take me captive? You’re obviously not strong enough to do that. You’re not even on the same level as the Flower-Seizing Marauder, and the two of you working together weren’t enough to handle me. I could kill you as easily as turning over my hand. And even if I chose not to, you’ve pissed off enough people that there’s no way you’ll get out of here alive. I’ll give you one chance to survive.”

“I don’t care about your glib lies!” Star Swordlife spat. “I'm capturing you right here and right now!”

“There’s one way you’ll survive today,” Yang Qi said, “and that’s to acknowledge allegiance to me. Work for me. Drop your idiotic talk about saving people. I won’t ask you to go around killing innocents or anything like that. But I will require you to root out evil. And you’ll act as my bodyguard. Anyone who tries to kill me will earn the death sentence. Anyone who goes around killing innocent people will be judged as devils and earn a similar death. Furthermore, if I ever ask you to kill someone you think doesn’t deserve it, you can refuse. What do you think?”

“I refuse to kill anyone,” Star Swordlife replied. “And I won’t permit you to kill another person in my presence. Capturing you is the most pressing goal in my path to godly ascension.”

“You’re forcing me to kill you,” Yang Qi said with a sigh. “In this case, it’s an act of self-defense. I have a lot of enemies, and if you took me captive, my friends and family would be slaughtered. In other words, you capturing me would be the same as you killing them.”

“I won’t let anyone kill your friends and family,” Star Swordlife said.

“You think I’m going to believe that? The Flower-Seizing Marauder killed plenty of people. Did you save any of them? Saving people is a good thing, Star Swordlife, but it has to be done properly. Do it improperly, and your so-called saving turns into killing.” Even as he spoke, Yang Qi was pooling his energy and preparing to take Star Swordlife out with a single blow. He didn’t want to give him a chance to pull off any tricks.

Besides, Star Swordlife had aroused enough public anger that even if Yang Qi didn’t do the deed, he would end up getting ripped to shreds by the crowd.

In that tense moment right before fighting broke out again, a beam of godlight appeared, within which were a host of young women. Their leader looked like a goddess, and had a cultivation base that was completely unfathomable. Upon seeing this young woman, many of the onlookers recognized her.

“Junior Sectlord, that’s Her Majesty the junior empress of the Woodfern Couple Palace!”

“The junior empress is here!? What does she want?”

The junior empress of the Woodfern Couple Palace was just as powerful and important as the junior pontiff of the Genesis Sanctum, and was obviously not someone to take lightly.

“Please hold on a moment, Brother Yang Qi,” the junior empress said. “There’s something I'd like to say.”

“Please, speak your mind, Junior Empress,” Yang Qi said, reining in his power. “This person here aided the Flower-Seizing Marauder, and is deserving of ten thousand deaths. Everyone here is calling for his head; is there some reason you want me to show him mercy?”

“First of all, I’d like to point out that many of my Sisters were killed by the Flower-Seizing Marauder. So I’d like to thank you for the service you performed. I’ve often dreamed of killing the Flower-Seizing Marauder, but ever since he got a godpower seed from the Great Necropolis, he’s been invincible. I almost can’t believe that you took him out, Brother Yang Qi. The benevolence and righteousness you’ve shown makes you worthy of universal respect.” She ended her speech by bowing deeply at the waist.

Yang Qi immediately bowed back just as deeply.

“I don’t dare to accept your words of praise,” he said. “It’s my duty to rid the world of evil.”

“Truth be told,” the junior empress continued, “I was watching the whole fight just now. I'd originally considered stepping in to help you, but after realizing how unfathomable your cultivation base is, and watching you take the upper hand, I decided to simply let you have the victory for yourself. That said, in my opinion, Young Sir Star Swordlife is also a good person. He seeks to avoid killing, and tries to save even the wicked. Although his good intentions lead to bad results, he doesn’t have an evil heart, and thus doesn’t deserve death. How about instead, we heat some alcohol and discuss heroism? We can talk things over and turn weapons of war into gifts of jade and silk. What do you think?”

“Er...” Yang Qi said. “I guess that's fine with me. It’s only natural that I would give you some face, Junior Empress. Although, this Star Swordlife keeps jabbering about taking me captive. And considering that he was willing to let the Flower-Seizing Marauder continue with his villainy, I'm worried that he’ll be a threat to me in the future.”

“Don’t worry about that, I’ll handle it.” Turning to look at Star Swordlife, she said, “Young Sir Star Swordlife, it’s obvious that Brother Yang Qi is no evil villain. Instead, he kills villains, so why do you insist on causing problems for him? Don’t you see that your good intentions are leading to bad results? Why not come drink with us? We can laugh our differences away. What do you think?”

Star Swordlife’s cheek twitched. However, he wasn’t a complete moron, and could see what the junior empress was trying to do. She was offering him a way out of the current crisis. It was a classic situation of someone being benevolent and generous by nature and turning ill fortune to good luck. Without her help, it was obvious that he would either die at Yang Qi’s hands, or the crowd’s.

“I accept your invitation, Junior Empress. But I'm still dead set on stopping Yang Qi from killing anyone else.”

“Great,” the junior empress said with a wide smile. “Now, let’s stop arguing. The two of you are valiant heroes of our age and should be allies. Fighting the executors and the fiend-devils is the proper course for all of us. There’s really no need for all this deadly infighting. Please come with me to my palace. I already have the alcohol prepared.”

Chapter 1052: Heating Alcohol (2)

The junior empress led Star Swordlife and Yang Qi into the depths of the Woodfern Couple Palace. For the most part, Destructionless Castle was split into two sections, one controlled by the Woodfern Couple Palace and the other controlled by the Genesis Sanctum. And both factions were constantly holding banquets and feasts in an attempt to recruit people onto their side.

One reason why Yang Qi so readily accepted her invitation was that she hadn’t acted as overbearing as the junior pontiff. Another reason was that although the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect was by no means a tiny and weak organization, they obviously weren’t strong enough to truly throw their weight around. It made sense to form a temporary alliance with the Woodfern Couple Palace, then worry later about how to grow even stronger.

He was truly acting as the junior sectlord should, if for no other reason than to ensure the safety of the members of the Yang Clan and the other experts he had brought out of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart to join the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect. There were plenty of young ones that were flourishing in the sect, to the point where Yang Qi really did think of it as something he couldn’t do without.

A lavish banquet had been prepared in a big hall in the Woodfern Couple Palace.

Among the guests were quite a few young women, all of them incredibly beautiful, and with powerful energy arts as well. The young men present were elegant, handsome, and moved with a natural grace that indicated they had long since gained the most profound of enlightenment. It was obvious that all of these people were far from being ordinary in nature.

Yang Qi even spotted a few Inheritors among them.

When he entered the hall, some of the guests looked over with faint smiles and nodded in greeting. Others didn’t spare him a glance, while some looked at him with open disdain. A few simply looked at him thoughtfully.

Yang Qi immediately got the impression that these were top experts from important sects, unlike the general riffraff he had encountered up to this point.

There was no way the junior empress of the Woodfern Couple Palace would invite nobodies to a fancy banquet like this.

The junior empress nodded in greeting to everyone, then raised her voice and said, “I've invited two more young heroes here to join us in heating alcohol and discussing heroism. This is the junior sectlord of the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect, Yang Qi, who only just now personally killed the Flower-Seizing Marauder. As for the second hero I've brought, he just....”

The junior empress paused in thought for a moment. She was just about to say that Star Swordlife had helped the Flower-Seizing Marauder, but realized that wouldn’t be particularly appropriate. The Flower-Seizing Marauder had been a treacherous rapist who everyone hated to death, so describing Star Swordlife as his ally would obviously be a mistake.

“This second hero has incredible sword technique and is an Inheritor of the Great Necropolis. Please meet Young Hero Star Swordlife.”

She then went on to introduce the other guests to Yang Qi. “This is the junior bishop of the Church of Warfare Champions.... And this is the junior chieftain of Mount Heavensnow....”

No one present dared to interrupt the junior empress as she made the introductions, making it clear that she was in the position of power.

As the introductions were made, Yang Qi noticed that everyone carried themselves with casual grace, and no one seemed particularly shocked that he had just killed the Flower-Seizing Marauder. A few people seemed more interested in Star Swordlife, probably because he was an Inheritor.

“Everyone, please be seated,” the junior empress said. She took the seat of honor at the front of the banquet, then asked Yang Qi and Star Swordlife to sit on either side of her. Gesturing to her side, she drew attention to a burning furnace, atop which sat a simmering cauldron. “This furnace is called Chaos. When chaos arrives, it’s like a fire that can burn anything and everything. The cauldron is called the Deer Cauldron. Of course, the deer represents the world. The alcohol in the cauldron is called Hero. When chaos reigns, and the fires of war rage, whoever seizes control of the deer emerges as the hero. Clearly, this banquet of heating alcohol and discussing heroism is about more than just making friends.”

The valiance and heroism in her voice made it clear that she was in no way inferior to any man, and instantly inspired admiration in the hearts of the listeners.

“The Great Necropolis has come to block the Ancient Road to the Gods, and the only hope to achieve godly ascension is to gain control of it. The Executors of the Ancient Road are acting oppressive and overbearing, while at the same time, the Fiend-Devil League is cooking up evil plans. The native savages of the necropolis are forming alliances and the future world is glaring about like a tiger eyeing its prey. We face many enemies, so we must stick together to stay safe. As heroes of the ancient road, favored by the heavens, you have come to this assembly to select a league-lord, someone to lead all of us. Have any of you given any thought to who you think the leader should be?”

Just like that, she got down to the most important aspect to discuss, seemingly asking who these people supported, the Genesis Sanctum or the Woodfern Couple Palace.

One of the elegant looking young men said, “Whoever leads the alliance needs to be a person of virtue and prestige. Other than the imperial couple of the Woodfern Couple Palace, who else could possibly be qualified? The pontiff of the Genesis Sanctum and his son are both of them sinister schemers, and are by no means straightforward and upright. They definitely can’t come close to the Woodfern Couple Palace.”

This young man was the junior bishop of the Church of Warfare Champions that Yang Qi had been introduced to moments before. Clearly, he was hoping to win some approval from the junior empress.

In response to his words, quite a few people nodded and openly said that they too would support the Woodfern Couple Palace.

Yang Qi decided to add to the discussion and said, “The junior pontiff of the Genesis Sanctum used underhanded means to try to steal two female disciples from my Will Manifestation Heaven Sect. He’s a dirty schemer who can’t be allowed to rise to power.”

In the end, Star Swordlife was the only one who didn't say anything.

“You’ve all gotten the wrong impression,” the junior empress said. “Apparently you thought I invited you to this banquet to get your support, to get you to back the Woodfern Couple Palace. If that’s the case, then you’ve really underestimated my organization.”

Everyone was stunned to hear these words from her, and even Star Swordlife suddenly looked a bit suspicious.

Yang Qi also found it to be a bit strange. The Woodfern Couple Palace had obviously expended a lot of effort to hold this big assembly, which was said to be needed in order to select a league-lord. So why would they suddenly change their mind and not compete to get the position?

One of the junior houseladies couldn’t hold back and said, “Big Sister Mu, I think we're all a bit confused now.” Based on the introductions from moments before, Yang Qi knew that this junior houselady was from the House of Clear Heaven Erudition. It was a famous sect that no one would take lightly, and the houselady from there had a heaven-shaking, earth-shattering cultivation base. Supposedly, her psychic scale was higher than seventy. Because of that, they were actually considered to be bigger and stronger than the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect.

“I understand,” the junior empress said. “However, if you think about it for just a moment, you’ll understand. Both the Woodfern Couple Palace and the Genesis Sanctum have boundless mid Terrifying experts on our side. Neither is in a position to subdue the other, so if one becomes the leader, the other will, of course, refuse to accept the decision. And that will lead to infighting. So what should we do? The imperial couple and the pontiff can’t very well openly fight each other, lest they become laughingstocks. Besides, if we started fighting amongst ourselves and devolve into chaos, our enemies could easily swoop in and destroy us.”

As the gathered experts considered her words, they realized that there was truth to what she was saying.

Everyone knew that the Genesis Sanctum and the Woodfern Couple Palace had been fighting each other for years, with no obvious victor rising up. If they truly went to war, both sides would definitely suffer huge casualties. And to do something like that just to win leadership of the alliance of sects would be profoundly idiotic.

But considering that, why would the leaders of those two groups call for an assembly like this if they didn’t intend to compete with each other?

There could only be one leader, not two. And without a leader, the sects would be as disunited as a dish of loose sand.

“Don’t worry, I’ll explain everything,” the junior empress said. “The truth is that before calling for this assembly, our two great sects had many meetings to discuss this subject. In the end, some of the chief elders proposed a very clever solution.”

“What solution might that be?” Yang Qi asked.

“Simple. The older generation will act as the council of chief elders, while the league-lord will be selected from among the younger generation.”

Everyone present was flabbergasted by this revelation.

“How could this be?” a junior sectlord asked. “Although some of us are indeed spectacular, how could someone as weak as one of us possibly win the support of the masses?”

“Yeah, exactly. It seems to me that something else is going on here.”

“This is really a bit too unusual.”

“Come on, everyone, quiet down and let the junior empress finish explaining.”

After the hall quieted down, the junior empress continued, “Ladies and gentlemen, as you suspect, the matter is not so simple. However, it's the only solution, and the only way to resolve the tension between our two great organizations. Both of us have already sworn oaths to run the sect assembly with this goal in mind. Furthermore, we’ve already decided how to address the issues many of you just mentioned. Once the new league-lord is selected, the council of chief elders, in other words, the top leaders of our two great organizations, will personally bless him or her, providing immense levels of power.”

The awkward glances that people were exchanging quickly changed, and many people present were starting to look excited as they realized that perhaps they had a shot at becoming the league-lord.

“In that case, I throw my support behind you, Junior Empress,” Yang Qi said. “Why don’t you step up to lead the heroes?”

All of a sudden, other people realized that the junior empress must be throwing this banquet to earn support for her own bid for leadership.

More people began giving voice to similar sentiments as Yang Qi, however, the junior empress quickly interrupted them with a wave of her hand. “No, no,” she said. “Our two great organizations already decided that, to keep the peace, neither I nor the junior pontiff will be allowed to become the league-lord. It must be someone from another sect.”

“What?!”

Everyone present was shocked that the two enormous sects would come to an agreement like this. After all, even though this new league-lord would obviously be a puppet, they would still be blessed with immense power, and that was nothing to scoff at.

Chapter 1053: Heating Alcohol (3)

Yang Qi was truly astounded.

It really was an unexpected development that the two most powerful sects would come to an agreement like this. Contrary to expectation, neither of them wanted to lead the alliance, but had instead chosen to pick an outsider that they would personally bless into reaching a higher level of power.

In the end, it did make a lot of sense, and was probably the best way to balance the conflict between the two major sects. Of course, whichever young one was selected would be a complete puppet. And huge blessings of power never came without a price.

That said, many of the young heroes present would still unhesitatingly scramble to get the position.

Some might not even consider the downsides, while others might consider them but be willing to accept them, thinking that they might be able to win their freedom later. After all, in the very end, they would be the league-lord, and would still wield immense power.

Even Yang Qi was thinking about trying to take the position. Even if the ‘blessing’ involved warding spells, he could unravel them, and he was also confident of being able to free himself from the control of the Genesis Sanctum and the Woodfern Couple Palace. The old-timers from those organizations wouldn’t be a true threat to him.

Not too long ago, he might have been too leery to put himself in that position. But after gaining enlightenment of the Purrfect God Art and boosting his cultivation base, he was a lot more confident. He still didn’t have the Mahātmā Jade he needed to balance his fleshly body and psyche, but the Purrfect God Art made up for that.

With the Purrfect God Art, it was possible to negate just about any type of power.

The fleshly body could be considered a unique type of power, controlled by the psyche. When they existed in a perfect balance, it was possible to unleash incredible power. And right now, Yang Qi was capable of doing just that.

Before cultivating the Purrfect God Art, he would never have been able to kill the Flower-Seizing Marauder with Star Swordlife hovering over his shoulder. In fact, he might have even ended up on the losing side of that fight. Instead, he had held them both off and completely devastated the Flower-Seizing Marauder.

Furthermore, he was confident that, before long, his Purrfect God Art would advance another step and his psyche would finally break through to the Terrifying level.

And in that state, he would be able to extricate himself from any deadlock.

“Junior empress,” one of the young elites said, “this new information is completely unexpected. Besides, considering the level of your cultivation base, you would be the perfect league-lord. How could any of us dare to usurp a position that’s rightfully meant for you? Is there anything that can be done to change the decision made by the two sects?”

“Of course it can’t be changed,” the junior empress replied. “I cannot compete for the position of league-lord, and neither can the junior pontiff. This is the only way to achieve balance. Truth be told, I don’t think that any of you understand why I invited you here to heat alcohol and discuss heroism, do you?”

“Why?”

Everyone present was struck by how enigmatic and mysterious the junior empress was. Everything she did seemed to conform to the dao of heaven, and once she broke through to the Terrifying level, she would definitely be a person to be very careful around. Her cultivation base was already beyond the level of some of the old-timers.

“The alcohol being served is a treasured beverage called Exalted-Celestial Ultimate-Profundity’s Jade Dew. It comes from a drop of quintessence energy left behind by Exalted-Celestial Ultimate-Profundity from the distant past. It actually surpasses godhood, as Exalted-Celestial Ultimate-Profundity was a Perfect God. In his attempt to become a Paramount God, he collected various types of quintessence energy from the god world and brewed them into a jade dew that contains profound magical laws from there. At the same time, he refined his own godhood, making it pure and imbuing it with magical laws to surpass gods. In the end, he failed and perished. However, his jug of jade dew remained behind, and we acquired some of it. The alcohol here today has a drop of that jade dew in it, and in a moment, I’ll give you all a chance to acquire it. Whoever does will earn the endorsement of the Woodfern Couple Palace, which will be a big help in the competition for the spot of league-lord.

“As you can imagine, even one drop of the jade dew will provide a huge boost to the psyche and fleshly body. And it won’t cause any side-effects. Anyone under the Terrifying level who uses it will find that the balance between their psychic scale and their fleshly body will be instantly perfected. It will balance yin and yang, and instantly push you into a cycle of perfection. Although it won't actually bolster your power, it will definitely improve your fighting prowess.”

Everyone looked over at the alcohol in response to her words, their eyes brightly glittering with desire and greed.

Anyone that acquired that alcohol would obviously get a huge boost to their cultivation and be that much closer to becoming the league-lord. Truth be told, it was only the first part of the Woodfern Couple Palace’s plan to pick someone to endorse.

“How exactly will we compete to get this alcohol, Junior Empress?” Yang Qi asked.

“It’s simple,” she replied. “Whoever is the most skilled will take the alcohol from within the cauldron. The spatial laws here are very strong, so all you have to do is take the alcohol. Don’t worry, you won’t break the furnace or cauldron. Remember, Chaos and the Deer Cauldron are precious treasures of the Woodfern Couple Palace.”

“Fine, make way!” one of the junior sectlords said, rising to his feet and immediately launching a palm strike in the direction of the furnace and cauldron.

RUMBLE!

However, even as he neared the cauldron, a chaotic energy rumbled out of it and sent the junior sectlord flying backward, howling as he threw his hands out to defend himself against the backlash.

He staggered back until he slammed into the wall, where he then vomited up a mouthful of blood. The disbelief in his eyes was apparent.

He had just used a consummate art called the Truth-Converging God Claw, which used convergences of truth to gain control of any target.

The onlookers were visibly surprised. The young man who was first to act was the junior houselord of the Godly House of Cessation. His cultivation base was profound, and his energy arts formidable. Although there were plenty of other figures present who were on the same level as him, few were in a position to easily surpass him.

To see him coughing up blood after making a single move had obviously made everyone else very leery of making their own attempt.

For a long moment, everyone just looked at the Deer Cauldron and tried to decide what to do next.

Meanwhile, the junior empress smiled broadly and said, “Don’t get nervous, ladies and gentlemen. Take your time. The jade dew in the Deer Cauldron can make you a true hero, so it's obviously not going to be easy to get.”

“Alright, I’ll give it a try!” Star Swordlife said. “The dao of life must exist within chaos. Those who believe in true compassion and mercy wish to save all living beings and create a world of peace and balance. I will take this alcohol, not for myself, but to bring balance to chaos and create peace in the world!”

Swish!

With that, he sent a beam of dazzling sword light gushing out like a river that could cleanse all of the filth and impurities in the world.

When the sword energy hit the Deer Cauldron, the cauldron began to tremble, and unexpectedly, did not launch any sort of counterattack. Apparently, the power of chaos within it was being quelled by Star Swordlife.

It seemed his cultivation base had improved thanks to the clash with Yang Qi.

Yang Qi was shaken, and more than ever, felt that leaving Star Swordlife alive was a huge mistake. His killing intent stirred as he began thinking of a way to get rid of him.

“Why be so impatient, Star Swordlife?” The fact that Star Swordlife’s sword energy wasn't being resisted by the Deer Cauldron was a big shock. But of course, no one wanted him to end up with the alcohol. Therefore, it was no surprise that ten streams of energy shot forth and slammed into his sword energy, dispelling it and sending him staggering backward. He might be strong, but there was no way he could stand up to ten powerful experts.

That said, these experts weren’t trying to kill him, but rather to win the contents of the cauldron for their own. Therefore, the ten streams of power began contending with each other.

Whirring sounds could be heard as the cauldron began to spin, rejecting all of the various streams of power. However, the experts involved were all ready, and began redirecting the backlash power toward its source.

RUMBLE!

Eventually, the cauldron was trembling so hard it seemed like it might open at any moment. People could already see the emerald-green alcohol inside, and were even convinced that they could see a pellet of distiller’s yeast in the depths. That ‘distiller’s yeast’ was actually the jade dew, and whoever acquired it would instantly reach a higher level of enlightenment.

“Peace and Security for all Eras; Never Surrender!” Star Swordlife attacked again, sending a beam of sword light into the cauldron, taking advantage of the moment to try to seize a victory.

However, despite getting his sword light into the cauldron, it couldn’t reach the distiller’s yeast.

“You have to absorb the alcohol before you can get to the distiller’s yeast,” the junior empress said.

Star Swordlife waved his finger and his sword energy transformed, exerting a gravitational force that began to suck away at the alcohol.

All of these developments happened in the briefest of moments. As everyone looked on, he began absorbing the emerald green liquid, which caused his power index to begin skyrocketing. His psychic scale also shot upward. Everyone was shocked. If the alcohol itself was this impressive, what would the distiller’s yeast be like?

Chapter 1054: Deer Cauldron

Although Star Swordlife hadn’t secured the distiller’s yeast, by absorbing the jade dew that was the alcohol, his energy arts were dramatically improving. Yang Qi watched in shock as his psychic scale began rising.

It was really a surprise that a little bit of alcohol would have such a profound effect. How could the alcohol be that terrifying? It begged the question of how miraculous the distiller’s yeast would be.

In fact, Yang Qi had the feeling that, if he could get it, his psychic scale might climb by several dozen. Right now, he was at twenty-two, which was formidable. However, there were plenty of experts present whose psychic scales were beyond fifty.

Even Star Swordlife was above him in this regard, although it was little surprise considering he was an Inheritor. And that meant that if Star Swordlife achieved another major breakthrough, it could be a really bad thing.

Therefore, Yang Qi immediately thrust his palm out, making a direct move to crush his enemy. A cracking sound rang out as Star Swordlife’s sword energy shattered and his attempt to absorb the alcohol failed. Spinning in fury, he launched a sword strike at Yang Qi and simultaneously shouted, “I can’t believe you’re interfering, Yang Qi! That said, I'm not going to kill you, I'm going to capture and seal you!”

There seemed to be little variety to Star Swordlife’s threats. As for the sword strike he used, it caused a huge sealing mark to appear and head right for Yang Qi.

Of course, there was no way a sealing mark like that would do anything to Yang Qi. He responded with his fist, shattering the technique. Then his hand continued onward, not to try to seize the alcohol, but rather to kill Star Swordlife!

When Star Swordlife realized what was happening, he didn’t dare to react too slowly. He immediately retracted his sword energy and converted it into a defensive barrier.

Yang Qi knew that, considering how many top experts were present, there was no point in trying to get the distiller’s yeast right now. At the same time, if he didn’t kill Star Swordlife as soon as possible, it might be difficult to do so later. Therefore, he unleashed his most powerful energy arts, resorting to a deadly and vicious attack to try to cut him down.

They clashed three times, and each time, Star Swordlife was forced backward in retreat. At the same time, purring sounds could be heard inside Yang Qi as he prepared to unleash his Purrfect God Art. Because he didn’t have full enlightenment of the art, he could only use it when he was free to act without any restraint whatsoever.

That was why he had been able to use it against the Flower-Seizing Marauder, and it was the same in this situation.

Whizzzzz!

When the junior empress saw what was happening between Star Swordlife and Yang Qi, she waved her hand, sending out a stream of energy to separate them.

Yang Qi was more than a little surprised. Reaching out, he softly touched the barrier and could sense the immense power in it. In fact, it made him seem completely incapable of doing anything. It even reminded him a bit of the Purrfect God Art, although there were clearly some fundamental differences.

The junior empress clearly had a psychic scale of around eighty or ninety, and a power index of over seven thousand! She was very close to being in the mid Terrifying level.

‘I can’t believe she’s that strong,’ he thought. Obviously, he had no hope of killing Star Swordlife in these circumstances. The two of them were so closely matched that defeating him would involve going back and forth for thousands of rounds. And even then, it was possible Star Swordlife would escape, instead of being killed.

Since the junior empress was clearly intent on preventing any deadly combat, Yang Qi would have to wait for a future chance to kill him.

“Why are you two fighting again?” she asked with a faint smile. “Scuffles over the alcohol are permitted, but uses of deadly force are not. We have powerful enemies to face, and joining forces is our only option for survival.”

Meanwhile, the ‘scuffles’ over the alcohol were getting more intense.

There were now dozens of experts fighting each other as they all tried to get into the Deer Cauldron. Sonorous booms rang out as the cauldron was struck, and occasionally alcohol would spill out, which everyone would eagerly try to absorb. At a certain point, the cauldron erupted into flames that spread out over it like a protective shield.

With that shield to protect it, the attacks being thrown toward it were useless.

Suddenly, one of the experts howled, sending an internal pellet flying out to slam into the shield, which split it open. Eyes shining, the man sent his true energy inside, grabbing a drop of green alcohol and pulling it into his mouth.

In that moment, his psychic scale increased by at least three.

Roaring with laughter, he tried to secure another drop of the alcohol, but before he could, his true energy was slammed into by numerous other experts, shattering it.

When Yang Qi saw this, he immediately made his own move, relying on a host of marvelous techniques to secure himself a drop of the alcohol. After absorbing the seething liquid, he felt it transform into perfect quintessence energy from the god world, which bolstered him and pushed his psychic scale from twenty-two all the way to twenty-four.

‘No wonder the junior empress is so strong,’ he thought, ‘considering she has stuff like this. That said, this stuff can't propel you to the mid Terrifying level. She must have another bit of distiller’s yeast of her own, as well as other marvelous assets. Otherwise, why would she call for a session of heating alcohol and discussing heroism, only to offer something so valuable?”

With such thoughts on his mind, he launched another move in the hopes of getting some more alcohol.

However, his second attempt was not as successful. Having caught the attention of the other competitors, they all targeted him, which meant he was suddenly facing dozens of experts who were all roughly on the same level as the Flower-Seizing Marauder.

The fighting was completely chaotic, with everyone launching attacks on everyone else. Streams of true energy would occasionally hit the cauldron, and people would occasionally get bits of alcohol that improved their energy arts. However, anyone who succeeded was immediately mobbed and shoved away. Afterward, everyone would focus their attacks back on the cauldron.

Yang Qi had profound energy arts, such as the Life-Death Void-Destruction God-Lightning, which gave him a bit of an edge. As the fighting continued, he managed to make a few more gains, pushing his psychic scale to thirty. At that point, he realized that further progress was going to be difficult, even with more of the alcohol.

After all, his psychic scale progressed differently than other people’s.

He didn't stop, though. Every drop of alcohol that he got would be a big help to people like the sectlord, or Peaklords Memory and Celestial.

Star Swordlife managed to get quite a bit of alcohol, and there was nothing Yang Qi could really do to stop him. Soon, Star Swordlife’s face was flushed red as his psychic scale and power index continued rising, and his sword technique seemed to climb to an even higher level.

The junior empress watched it all with a faint smile on her face, occasionally nodding as she noted who seemed stronger and who seemed weaker.

After little more than an hour, the alcohol was almost completely drained. Everyone knew that it would only be moments before the distiller’s yeast flew out.

That was when the competition grew the fiercest, and Yang Qi’s true energy was stirring with more intensity than ever.

The purring coming from within him was so loud that it was terrifying to those who could hear him. Everyone was wondering exactly what technique he cultivated that would cause this.

RUMBLE!

When the last drop of alcohol was gone, the distiller’s yeast was no longer suppressed and it suddenly flew out into the open.

Everyone sensed the massive influx of true energy in the area, which shattered all the other energy arts and true energies, even Yang Qi’s. After all, he wasn’t even in the Terrifying level yet.

Thankfully, he had been prepared for this, and immediately launched a bubble that shot with lightning-like speed toward the distiller’s yeast.

Unfortunately, he had miscalculated.

A figure blurred into motion, moving so fast that no one could make it out clearly. And before anyone could react, it reached the distiller’s yeast and grabbed it.

A moment later, Yang Qi’s bubble reached the location and surrounded the figure.

However, the figure snapped a finger, releasing some unknown energy art that popped the bubble, causing something like a heatwave to roll out.

Then the figure burst out laughing. “Sorry I'm late, Junior Empress. However, it seems like I arrived just in time!”

‘Who’s this?’ Yang Qi thought. At the same time, everyone in the crowd prepared to pounce on the newcomer.

Chapter 1055: An Uninvited Guest

Even Yang Qi was completely surprised by the sudden turn of events.

He had been totally dead set on getting the distiller’s yeast, and had prepared in such a way that he was convinced not even the junior empress would be able to interfere and take it.

It was obvious that the distiller’s yeast would come with miraculous benefits; it had countless bits of psychic power stirring within it, and it was entirely possible that it could push him into the Terrifying level. But then a mysterious expert showed up, someone who could easily contend with mid Terrifying experts. And that meant that Yang Qi was out of options.

How could he ever have guessed that his patience and planning would be thwarted in the critical moment?

Whoosh!

Without any hesitation, he lunged forward to unleash the deadliest attack possible on the newcomer.

Other experts joined him, howling furiously.

However, the newcomer dodged back and forth, easily evading all of the incoming attacks. Then he launched counterattacks, forcing everyone to back up and defend themselves. Who was this person, and how did he have such incredible energy arts?

As for Yang Qi, he allowed himself to be hit by a stream of sword energy, not bothering to defend himself at all. He simply let it shoot into him while he pressed his attack.

The sword energy felt itchy, but did no damage. In fact, it didn’t even damage his garments. After all, he was wearing the God Legion Battle Robe, which was no ordinary clothing.

It was only at this point that he finally laid eyes on the newcomer. It was a young man with sword-like eyebrows and eyes that glittered like stars. He wore garments of yellow and white, and had his hair bound in a topknot with a hairpin. He was handsome and relaxed, and almost looked like a well-studied confucian. However, at the same time, he bore the look of a lone swordsman, perhaps a former government official who had chosen to leave his post and wander the lands like a sage, hoping to bring enlightenment to the masses.

He was so young that, as he stood there with the distiller’s yeast, he looked around at everyone else as if they were old fogeys. His cultivation base didn’t emit any fluctuations of any sort, but it was obvious how strong he was. Although he wasn't quite at the level of the Shepherd, he was very close to reaching that level.

“Who are you?” the junior empress said, her eyes flickering with both shock and anger. “I don’t recall inviting you to this banquet. You’re not a latecomer, you’re an uninvited guest!”

“Oh?” the young man said. Even as everyone watched him, he flicked his wrist and the distiller’s yeast disappeared. Now it was more obvious than ever that taking the distiller’s yeast back from him would be incredibly difficult, if not impossible.

Yang Qi’s expression was very unsightly; he had really wanted that item, only to be beaten to it by this uninvited man. It was quite a blow.

Laughing, the man said, “I'm just an expert from the Ancient Road to the Gods. Don’t I deserve to attend this sect assembly? Besides, Junior Empress, you clearly said just a moment ago that in this session of heating alcohol and discussing heroism, whoever took the distiller’s yeast would be declared a true hero. Well, I took it. Don’t tell me you're going to go back on your word.”

“Who might you be, Sire?” the junior empress said. “I don’t think I’ve ever heard of anyone matching your description on the Ancient Road to the Gods. I'm going to have to ask you to return that distiller’s yeast, otherwise you won’t be leaving here today.”

“Considering I'm here, why would I want to leave?” The man chuckled derisively. “Besides, I heard that you’re planning to select a league-lord. Considering I took the distiller’s yeast, doesn’t that mean I qualify to compete for the position as well? Incidentally, I also heard that your Woodfern Couple Palace has been looking for a son-in-law amongst the young heroes. Considering what I just did, do you think I might fit the bill?”

Everyone was starting to get angry, yet nobody dared to make a move. After all, he had just been the subject of a big attack by numerous experts, yet hadn’t even been hurt. He obviously had some extremely powerful energy arts.

Secretly using the Civilization Founding Grand Magic, Yang Qi checked the man’s psychic scale and was instantly shocked. ‘It’s at ninety-nine,’ he thought. With one more step, this man would be able to reach the god world and survive there.

With a psychic scale of ninety-nine, he was just on the verge of being in the mid Terrifying level.

The junior empress snorted angrily. “You might have strong energy arts, Sire, but sadly, you don't know how to behave civilly. Considering how strong you are, you should be straightforward and upright. Taking the distiller’s yeast in an aboveboard fashion is one thing, but instead, you resorted to a sneak attack. You even crashed this banquet, which makes me wonder. Should I call you an uninvited guest... or a dead guest?”

RIP!

With a cynical smile, the young man waved his sleeve and a head tumbled out onto the ground, splattering blood everywhere. The head’s eyes glared out angrily in death, and the blood was so dense that it almost looked like it was made of metal.

Immediately, expressions of shock filled the room.

“Is that…?”

“That’s one of the Executors of the Ancient Road! It’s Prince Nobledeath! He’s ferocious and vile, and has killed so many cultivators from the Ancient Road to the Gods that it’s impossible to count. And he’s enslaved countless sects. His cultivation is just a bit under their emperor! In fact, he was the most likely candidate to become the next emperor! How could this guy have killed him?”

“So, it's him! He was obviously killed with his eyes open and glaring in hatred.”

“Don’t tell me this kid killed him!”

“How is that even possible? Even if their emperor attacked him, he should have been able to escape.”

Considering that the severed head of Prince Nobledeath was right there in front of them, no one dared to do anything rash.

“The reason I was late,” said the young man, “is that I was dealing with this scoundrel. Presumably you all recognize him. He’s Prince Nobledeath, one of the most fiendish of the executors. No one even knows how many experts he's killed, to the point where numerous sects have been talking about forming an army to go after him. After I discovered his whereabouts, I tracked him down and fought him for three days and three nights before finally killing him. I brought his head here as a gift for your empress. Considering this, do I qualify to participate in this banquet?”

‘He fought him for three days and three nights?’ Everyone was actually quite moved. They were all famous experts from the Ancient Road to the Gods, and weren’t the type who could easily be won over. All of them would have fled in the face of Prince Nobledeath, yet this young man had killed him? It was nothing short of miraculous.

Furthermore, if they fought for three days and three nights, it was highly likely that Prince Nobledeath would have been able to call for help from other executors. This was like killing a general protected by a million troops, which went to even further impress upon everyone how strong this young man was.

Even the junior empress was thunderstruck.

Looking at the angry expression in the dead Prince Nobledeath’s eyes, she nodded and said, “Despite being dead, you can still sense some of the anger in his aura. It seems you’ve been touched by his karma, proving that you’re the one who killed him. You have my admiration for that. This scoundrel really did have a high cultivation base, and was likely to succeed as the next emperor. If that happened, it would have put a lot of pressure on our two major sects. Considering you killed him, Young Sir, you do deserve to attend this banquet. Might I ask where you’re from...?”

“I'm the junior houselord of the House of God Bastards,” he replied. “Bastard Seacliff!”

“The House of God Bastards?” The junior empress shook her head. “I've never heard of this sect of yours. If it existed on the Ancient Road to the Gods, it would definitely be well-known.”

Bastard Seacliff chuckled. “The legion of gods considers the House of God Bastards to be filled with illegitimate children. And because the Executors of the Ancient Road are lackeys to the legion of gods, they’re diametrically opposed to us. The truth is that we've kept in the shadows on the ancient road, and normally don’t dabble in outside affairs. After all, we're called god bastards for a reason. I bet that your parents, the imperial couple, have heard of us.”

“So that's how it is,” the junior empress said. She knew full well that the Ancient Road to the Gods was mysterious and unpredictable. Although she was the junior empress of one of the most powerful sects in existence, and had assumed that she commanded the ultimate level of power, there was always the possibility of some even more powerful organization rising up. The Ancient Road to the Gods was the most expansive thing next to the god world, and as such it would be impossible for anyone to fully explore it, not even this junior empress.

Because Bastard Seacliff had taken the distiller’s yeast, she had lost control of the situation. However, it wasn’t all negative. He had killed Prince Nobledeath to prove how strong he was, and to impart the message that trifling with him would lead to death.

If he could kill Prince Nobledeath, it was obvious that he could kill any of the experts present. Compared to killing Prince Nobledeath, killing the Flower-Seizing Marauder was like playing a child’s game.

Earlier, Yang Qi had hoped to take control of the situation, but considering there was someone on the scene that he definitely couldn’t handle, he knew that such ideas were now pointless. For now, he would have to wait patiently and watch how the situation developed. After all, he had long since learned how to be patient. Planning before acting was the best way to maintain control and gain the upper hand.

Besides, he didn’t even have a specific plan for how to deal with Bastard Seacliff.

After a moment of thought, the junior empress said, “This banquet is about heating alcohol and discussing heroism. Since you’ve taken the distiller’s yeast, Young Sir, then you’re clearly a top hero. And yes, I’ll keep my word. The Woodfern Couple Palace will endorse you as a candidate for league-lord. Why don’t you have a seat so we can discuss matters?”

“That's exactly what I was hoping to do,” Bastard Seacliff said with a smile. “Being able to chat privately with a goddess like you would be nothing more than a blessing from heaven!”

Chapter 1056: The House of God Bastards

The session of heating alcohol and discussing heroism with a group of elite young ones had experienced a sudden change. Just when Yang Qi had thought he was going to get the distiller’s yeast, boost his power index, and push his psychic scale to over fifty, it was to his complete surprise that a consummate expert showed up.

Bastard Seacliff from the House of God Bastards arrived, took the distiller’s yeast, and tossed Prince Nobledeath’s severed head onto the floor in front of the shocked eyes of everyone present. Considering that, there wasn’t a single person present who would dare to pick a fight with him.

The truth was that someone as strong as him wouldn’t need any distiller’s yeast to fight for the position of league-lord.

Who could possibly compete with an expert who was capable of slaughtering someone like Prince Nobledeath? Even an ordinary mid Terrifying expert would have to expend a huge amount of effort fighting Bastard Seacliff, and there was no saying it would result in a victory. Bastard Seacliff might very well escape from such an encounter.

After all, Prince Nobledeath had done that very thing, which was why he had been such a difficult target. If he had just been able to retreat to the executors’ headquarters, he would have been untouchable.

The junior empress began chatting with Bastard Seacliff. As for all the other experts, they soon grew bored and began taking their leave. Obviously, there was no hope for any of them to become the league-lord now.

Eventually, Star Swordlife cast a harsh glare at Yang Qi and prepared to say his farewells.

However, that was when a group of Inheritors approached Yang Qi and said, “Junior Sectlord, considering you killed the Flower-Seizing Marauder, is there any chance you might give us his godpower seed? We’ll pay a good price for it.”

“I’m sorry, friends,” Yang Qi said. “You see, my sect already has an Inheritor disciple, so I obviously need to give that seed to her.” He was referring to Zi Qiong, although considering how crafty and murderous she was, there was no way he was going to actually give the seed to her.

Right now, he had a collection of three seeds. One of them was in the Mahātmā Jade, and one of them was from Shi Yuan, and was under constant guard by his immortal-slaying clone in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. The third, obviously, was from the Flower-Seizing Marauder.

If he gave those seeds to Zi Qiong, even he had no idea how strong she would become. After all, the Flower-Seizing Marauder had himself killed two other Inheritors, which meant that his godpower seed was much stronger than an ordinary one. As for Zi Qiong, she had killed Xi Hua. That meant that if Yang Qi gave her all of his godpower seeds, it would be equivalent to her having killed a total of six other Inheritors. Adding herself in, that would be seven.

That was a level of cultivation base that Yang Qi definitely wouldn’t be able to deal with.

The Inheritors were obviously disappointed. Unfortunately, they had no way of forcing Yang Qi to hand over the seed. Although Yang Qi wasn’t on the level of Bastard Seacliff, he was still vastly superior to them.

Even as Yang Qi refused the Inheritors and turned to leave, Bastard Seacliff suddenly said, “Hold on a moment.”

Surprised, Yang Qi turned and said, “How can I help you, Sire?”

“Simple. Give me that Inheritor godpower seed you have. It’s not going to do any good in the hands of someone like you. We have some Inheritors in the House of God Bastards, and soon, our sect will actually be filled with them.”

His words struck surprise into the hearts of everyone who remained behind. The mere thought of a sect collecting large numbers of Inheritors was shocking. For one thing, Inheritors couldn’t truly form alliances. Everyone knew that in the end, they would fight and kill each other, with only one remaining on top. Whoever that person was, there was no way a sect could actually control him or her. It made many of the people present wonder if everyone from the House of God Bastards was crazy. Who would possibly try to gather a group of Inheritors?

Many people actually assumed that Bastard Seacliff was just bragging or exaggerating.

“What will you give me in exchange?” Yang Qi asked. “Unless it’s that distiller’s yeast, I'm very reluctant to just hand over a godpower seed.” He was actually quite nervous about this Bastard Seacliff. He was obviously not the type of person to just flat-out refuse. If you did, you would likely end up very hurt or even dead.

“You want something in exchange?” Bastard Seacliff laughed. “I already have plans for this distiller’s yeast; I'm going to use it to reach the mid Terrifying level. You think I'm going to give it to you? Besides, I never give people compensation for things I take. Didn’t you just hear that the junior empress here is going to support my bid for the position of league-lord? In a few days, the assembly will officially begin and I’ll take the spot. Then your Will Manifestation Heaven Sect, or whatever it's called, will simply be a subsidiary branch of the alliance. And I’ll demand everyone hand over their godpower seeds immediately.”

“What?!” Yang Qi blurted, his expression one of anger. “You want me to just give you my godpower seed? Did I hear that correctly?”

“Yes, that's right. You can become an official who follows someone's rise from a lower rank to that of emperor. Once I'm the league-lord, I’ll be sure to treat you well. If you wait until later to give me the seed, though, it’ll be too late. Think it through.”

“I’ll worry about it when you’re the league-lord.” The last thing Yang Qi wanted to do was get into an argument with Bastard Seacliff. Turning, he said, “Junior Empress, many thanks for your hospitality today. I’ll take my leave now.”

“You don’t know what’s good for you, do you?” Chuckling coldly, Bastard Seacliff flicked his sleeve, sending out an empyrean wind that could topple mountains and drain seas. In the shortest of moments, Yang Qi’s path was blocked in all directions. The level of power unleashed by that sleeve definitely surpassed Yang Qi’s God Legion Battle Robe.

It only took a moment for Yang Qi to calculate numerous avenues of escape, but in the end, he didn’t think it would do any good. His opponent was just too strong. In fact, he felt just like he had when he faced off against the Shepherd.

Suddenly, a purring sound could be heard, and Yang Qi’s true energy transformed into a bubble that surrounded him and blocked the path of the empyrean wind.

Crack! Snap!

The bubble popped and the wind slammed into him. His sea of consciousness felt like it was being hit by a sledgehammer. Despite having an Unspoiled Body, he felt himself being hurt, with his meridians thrown into chaos and all sorts of assorted energy flows erupting within him.

SPLAT!

He coughed up a mass of blood filled with chunks of internal organs. At the same time, steam rose up from the top of his head and he felt like he was being slashed by millions upon millions of sharp knives.

The force of the blow sent him flying backward until he slammed into the wall, then slid down to the floor, bedraggled and broken-down.

“Hmm?” Bastard Seacliff looked visibly surprised. He had assumed that his attack would actually rip Yang Qi to pieces. But in the end, it had only injured him. Believing a second blow would be beneath him, though, Bastard Seacliff just said, “Screw off. The fact that you stood up to one of my blows without dying shows that you’re a real genius. Therefore, I won’t stoop to hitting you again.”

Moments ago, Star Swordlife had simply stood off to the side when Yang Qi got hit. And instead of stepping in to ‘save’ him, he was actually considering whether or not to take advantage of the moment to capture him.

Before anything else could happen, the junior empress said, “Young Sir Bastard Seacliff, I personally invited Junior Sectlord Yang Qi here as a guest. Can’t you at least give me a bit of face?”

Bastard Seacliff laughed cynically. “Not a problem. Not a problem at all. After all, this brat isn’t capable of anything impressive anyway. Sure, I’ll give you some face, Junior Empress. But remember, when I'm the league-lord, the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect will either give me that godpower seed or face severe consequences.”

Yang Qi didn’t say anything in response. He just circulated his energy to heal himself.

“Attendants,” the junior empress said, “escort the junior sectlord to the pill repository and give him whatever spirit pills he needs for his recovery. I won’t allow guests of mine to leave here injured.” With that, she gave a meaningful look to two nearby handmaidens.

“Yes ma’am.” The two handmaidens helped Yang Qi to his feet and supported him as he hobbled out.

Upon seeing all of this, Star Swordlife kept his sword energy reined in; he could tell that if he tried to make a move on Yang Qi, the junior empress would intervene. In the end, he hurried away, his expression unreadable.

After they were all gone, the junior empress said, “Bastard Seacliff, would you like to join me in my study to chat?”

“How could I refuse an offer like that?” he replied, laughing heartily.

**

The two handmaidens escorted Yang Qi all the way to the pill repository.

“Young Sir,” one of them said, “don’t let yourself get discouraged because of a single loss. The junior empress asked us to bring you here because she plans to finish her discussion with Bastard Seacliff, then come to see you personally. She really does value you highly.”

“Oh?” Yang Qi said, struggling to nod. “Don’t worry, I'm not discouraged. That guy is strong. He killed Prince Nobledeath, so it's a foregone conclusion that I would lose to him in a fight.”

“Good. Just rest here for now, Young Sir. Take whatever medicinal pills you need. The junior empress will come soon to make sure you’re completely recovered.”

With that, the two handmaidens departed, leaving Yang Qi behind in silence.

As he lay there literally steaming, he calmly contemplated his situation. He had spoken the truth; he wasn't discouraged at all. He had participated in many fights throughout the years, and had long since developed the ability to achieve a state of detachment.

A while later, he coughed up not a mass of necrotic blood, but a ball of energy that looked almost like a dark, oddly rippling cloud. It immediately began spreading out to fill the room, but he quickly summoned a bubble to contain it.

It was a stream of energy that Bastard Seacliff had implanted into him to cause further damage, and if he hadn’t extruded it, it would have sliced away at his true energy like a tiny knife. Eventually, it would have damaged his flesh and blood. It was essentially Bastard Seacliff’s effort to kill him without even fighting. Little did the man know that Yang Qi would actually be able to expel it.

Chapter 1057: A Private Discussion

‘This guy is so strong! Definitely far beyond my ability to fight directly. I have to keep my cool and be smart about dealing with him. After all, he probably has even more powerful people backing him. And if he breaks through and becomes as powerful as the Shepherd, he’ll be even more impossible to deal with.’

After all the tempering he had experienced throughout the years, Yang Qi knew how to keep his cool when dealing with powerful opponents.

Back when he was dealing with the Crown Prince years ago, he had experienced an even greater cultivation base discrepancy. By slowly but surely dealing with such dangerous situations, he had built immense confidence, and knew that even bitter defeats could provide valuable help to his nascent divinity and will.

For example, he had just advanced his Purrfect God Art.

Time passed as he studied the true energy he had just expelled from within him. After a while, he chuckled and exhaled his own stream of true energy to wipe the other one out of existence. He had already identified a way to deal with the technique. Although it wouldn’t necessarily put him in the position to fight Bastard Seacliff, it would at least give him a tool to avoid being injured so badly.

Now that he was healed up, he looked around the pill repository more thoroughly. It was huge, and filled with all sorts of medicinal pills. From what he could tell, it was actually a treasure storehouse of some sort.

He didn’t touch any of the pills.

This was the junior empress’ pill repository and it would be rude of him to simply take things, even if she had extended an offer for him to do just that. Besides, although the pills were all supreme-grade, none of them would be much help to him. He had long since reached a level in which such medicinal pills were useless to him.

‘That Bastard Seacliff is definitely going to cause more problems for me. He’s obviously narrow-minded and petty, so I can’t afford to be off guard. He’ll try to do something to the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect eventually, and no one in the sect is strong enough to fight him. If he attacks the sect outright, my only option right now would be to take everyone into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. I have to get stronger, and the only options I have now are to either go ahead with my next breakthrough, or figure out a way to make use of the Mahātmā Jade.’

Yang Qi had long since reached a point where he liked to plan things out well before taking action. Obviously, the easiest way to deal with Bastard Seacliff would be to finally ascend to the Grand Emperor level. But if he did that, it would become exceedingly difficult to enter the mid Terrifying level.

He needed to reach the Terrifying level first. And once he did, all of the preparations he had made up to this point would ensure that he would reach an incredibly high level of power.

Instead of aiming for a breakthrough, he could focus his efforts on the Mahātmā Jade. After all, it had consumed Profound Valor and his godpower seed, which, if Yang Qi could extract, would provide a big boost to his psychic scale. Furthermore, Yang Qi had the feeling that if he managed to assimilate the godpower seed, not only would it help him reach a higher level of enlightenment, but it would also make him an Inheritor.

Although the Inheritors were all very strong, Yang Qi had a sneaking suspicion that they would end up under the control of the Great Necropolis itself, like puppets. He also suspected that there was some sort of wicked entity deep in the necropolis, pulling all of the strings. After all, why would the Great Necropolis eject a host of godpower seeds, then force all the Inheritors to slaughter each other?

Perhaps the Mahātmā Jade could cleanse the wickedness in the seeds, but Yang Qi wasn’t completely confident that he could use the jade safely. In addition to all of this, there was the Purrfect God Art. Although he could use it to some effect, he was nowhere near the level of the purrling.

And he had no idea how to control the purrling, which meant that he couldn’t rely on it to deal with Bastard Seacliff.

The fact that someone like Bastard Seacliff had shown up out of the blue seemed to confirm that there were hidden dragons and crouching tigers deep in the Great Necropolis, people with immensely powerful cultivation bases.

“You did well,” a dainty voice said. The junior empress had finally come to see him. “You already dealt with Bastard Seacliff’s true energy? That's quite a feat. You must have other secrets you’re not letting on about.”

“Greetings, Junior Empress,” he said, rising to his feet and offering a formal salute. “Thank you for stepping in and saving me earlier.”

“You don’t need to thank me,” she replied. “I think you would have been fine even if I didn’t step in. You were just trying to fool your enemy into underestimating you, weren’t you?”

“You flatter me, Junior Empress,” he said with a wry smile. “I really did end up getting hurt pretty badly. That Bastard Seacliff is no one to take lightly. I'm not sure his full story, but it seems to me you just spent quite a bit of time with him. Did you uncover any useful information?”

“You’re right, I just spent a few hours chatting with him in my study, and managed to get a better idea of who he is, and what this House of God Bastards is all about.” Suddenly, her expression turned cold. “Young Sir Yang Qi, the truth is that I want to talk with you about how to deal with him.”

“You mean you and the Woodfern Couple Palace aren’t going to groom him to become the league-lord?” Yang Qi asked doubtfully.

“What do you think?” she replied. “You’re obviously an intelligent person, Young Sir. I'm sure you picked up on the clues. The two big sects don’t just want any old puppet. They want a puppet that can help smooth out relations. Did you really think we would install a person we can’t control? This guy came out of nowhere, completely spoiling all of our plans with the distiller’s yeast. Considering we can’t control him, we have to kill him!”

Her eyes flared with killing intent as she spoke the final words, making it clear that she was absolutely set on killing Bastard Seacliff. It was little surprise, considering that he obviously was a threat to both the Woodfern Couple Palace and the Genesis Sanctum.

But would killing him really be that easy?

“Junior Empress, you still haven’t told me what you know about this so-called House of God Bastards.” Yang Qi wanted to get as many details as he could; that would be the easiest way to find an opportunity to take action. In response to his question, the junior empress nodded in approval. She was now more convinced than ever that there was more to Yang Qi than met the eye, and that he might be the perfect person to use against Bastard Seacliff.

That was especially true considering the two of them were already on their way to becoming enemies. Of course, Bastard Seacliff didn’t think of Yang Qi as being a qualified opponent, which was why he had so arrogantly demanded the godpower seed.

“The House of God Bastards really is made up of the children of gods,” she replied. “Illegitimate children. You see, when gods have offspring, those offspring aren’t gods. And some, being tainted by preexisting sin, can never become gods. Many of them turn out to be particularly vile and are expelled to the Ancient Road to the Gods, to be watched over by the executors. Such offspring are said to be god bastards, and they bear the sins of the god world on their back. Being the children of actual gods, they’re all extremely powerful and are generally only surpassed by the gods themselves. Of course, the god bastards are furious at having been rejected and are usually crafty and murderous. They enjoy sowing chaos, and generally embrace nihilism. They definitely haven’t come to join our alliance with good intentions. Most likely, they want to turn us into cannon fodder they can use to attack the Executors of the Ancient Road. After all, if they can wipe out the executors, then they might have a chance to go back to the ancient road and, eventually, return to the god world. You see, the god world is a place so wonderful that none of us here can even imagine what it's like. By way of analogy, you could say that the god world is like a royal palace in the mortal world. And right now, we might as well be in a filthy alley in a remote village. When you think of it that way, it's little wonder that the god bastards are so angry and resentful.”

“So that’s how it is!” Yang Qi said, inwardly shocked at this new information.

“So how are we supposed to deal with them?” he asked. “If they’re really the children of gods, then we have to put an end to them, otherwise we’ll be in profound danger.”

“It seems highly likely that they’re an organization that could actually take on the executors. Sadly, we are not even close to being on that level. If you were going to rank the current major factions, it would be like this: first, the Executors of the Ancient Road. Second, the House of God Bastards. Third, the future world. Fourth, the Fiend-Devil League. Fifth, the locals from the Great Necropolis. And we superpower sects would come in sixth.

“Do you see, Young Sir Yang Qi? We’re the weakest. Although the Woodfern Couple Palace and the Genesis Sanctum seem powerful, we actually have an extremely treacherous path to tread. We’re already in the crosshairs of the Fiend-Devil League, the Executors of the Ancient Road, and the local savages. And now the god bastards are eyeing us? We’re really in a dangerous position. There are no unbroken eggs beneath an overturned nest. Whatever plan we come up with needs to be perfect.”

“I see. Well, Junior Empress, I'm willing to follow your lead in everything.” Right now, there was no reason not to cooperate.

Seeing his attitude, she nodded. “Not bad. Not bad at all. A wise man submits to the circumstances. Furthermore, cooperating will benefit you, as we’ll personally help you get stronger. I could tell back when you killed the Flower-Seizing Marauder that you’re interested in being the league-lord. And the fact that this Bastard Seacliff took my distiller’s yeast without permission shows that he’s a big threat. There’s no way I'll let this insult go unanswered!”

Chapter 1058: Help

“Are you planning on making a move on the House of God Bastards right away?” Yang Qi said coolly. “That Bastard Seacliff seems too powerful to kill already. Even if the two of us worked together, I don’t think we can handle him yet. And that’s not to mention what he’ll be like if he makes use of the distiller’s yeast. If he reaches the mid Terrifying level and gets a psychic scale of a hundred or more, he’ll be beyond deadly to deal with.”

“You’re right, except for the fact that he won’t be breaking through to the mid Terrifying level. You see, I tweaked the distiller’s yeast so that it will take an unusually long time for him to assimilate it. And if he does, it will put him under my control. That said, he’s smart, so I doubt he’ll try to assimilate it. He’ll just put it into storage. By the way, I've already updated my father and mother about all of this. They have their own important plans and are interested in providing you with help to get stronger. In fact, I can take you to meet them right now.”

“What?!” Yang Qi said, shocked.

The leaders of the Woodfern Couple Palace were mid Terrifying experts, similar to the Shepherd. Why would people like that be interested in helping him? Did they really want him to be the puppet league-lord? Perhaps the sudden appearance of the House of God Bastards had cemented their desire to do just that. And even if becoming the league-lord meant being their puppet, it would still give him access to immense universal fortune, which he could then use to gain enlightenment.

It wouldn’t be like being the league-lord of the Dao Defense League. This was an alliance of superpower sects from the Ancient Road to the Gods! The destiny of even a single superpower sect would surpass that of the Dao Defense League by millions upon millions of times.

Absorbing the Dao Defense League into the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect had been like adding a spoonful of sugar into a river. It wasn’t as if that sugar would make the water taste sweeter.

But if he could become the new league-lord, the destiny he would have access to would definitely push his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth and other energy arts to a much higher level. And perhaps then he wouldn’t be a puppet, but rather the actual league-lord.

“I said I would follow your lead in everything, Junior Empress. If your mother and father want to see me, I’d be more than pleased to accept the invitation. But I have to ask: if you’re intending to make me the league-lord to help fight the House of God Bastards, are you sure the people from the Genesis Sanctum will agree?”

“They won’t,” she replied. “Whoever we choose to back, that person will need to win fair and square in the assembly in a few days. Based on what I've seen, I think you should be able to sweep the competition. If you could kill the Flower-Seizing Marauder at your current level, just imagine how domineering you’ll be in the Terrifying level. Come on, let’s go; there’s no time to lose.”

“Alright!”

With that, he followed the junior empress deeper into the pill repository to a teleportation portal. They stepped inside and were whisked to a hall that was initially pitch black. But even as Yang Qi scanned it, light flared to life and filled the entire place with a brightness like that of the sun.

Within the hall were two ancient woodfern trees. One was withered, and one was vibrantly alive, which was the perfect representation of the cycle of a person’s life.

Two people sat beneath the woodfern trees, one a man, the other a woman. Both seemed middle-aged, and their cultivation bases were unreadable. At a glance, Yang Qi realized that they were the leaders of the sect. After all, it was called the Woodfern Couple Palace.

This was the ‘couple’ referenced in the name of the sect; obviously, they were husband and wife.

Yang Qi immediately offered a formal salute. “Well met, Seniors!”

“There’s no need for formalities!” the woman said. The instant this man and woman looked at Yang Qi, he felt his psychic power suddenly circulating at immense speed. Knowing that this was actually dangerous, he quickly took control and stabilized the power.

“Well done,” the man said. “You really are quite a genius. You actually resisted our Permanence and Impermanence Art. An ordinary young one would have tried to take advantage of that art to improve his psychic power. However, the temporary benefit of such an act would’ve been negated by the overall harm.”

“Many thanks,” Yang Qi said. “The two of you are sitting between twin sal trees, one withered and one robust, which is a direct reference to the permanence and impermanence that exists in the universe. At any moment, one may be struck by either misfortune or blessing. But the so-called misfortune can actually be a blessing, and blessings can sometimes be misfortune. The instant the two of you stimulated my psychic power, I gained new enlightenment and realized that achieving a breakthrough would actually not be a blessing. Furthermore, holding back from a breakthrough would not be misfortune. In fact, maintaining equilibrium is the best choice.”

“Excellent,” the woman said, nodding in admiration. “You really are a prodigy. That Bastard Seacliff might have injured you, but he’s a god bastard who can never join the legion of gods in the god world. He's strong now, but his potential is limited. As for the god bastards in general, not even the legion of gods can tolerate them, so there’s no way we’ll let them steal the position of league-lord. Unfortunately, up to this point, we haven’t found a suitable young one to groom for the position. Considering your strength and potential, we think that, with our help, you would make the perfect league-lord. Are you willing?”

The empress was beautiful, and was clad in a simple and unadorned silk robe. Her expression was placid and devoid of anything like anger, making her seem merciful and kind. As for her cultivation base, it was impossible to detect any clues as to its level.

“As I've already said, I'm willing to follow the junior empress’ lead in everything. If you wish to help me, Emperor, Empress, then I would be profoundly grateful. And of course, I’ll do anything you ask.”

“Aren’t you worried about becoming our puppet?” the emperor asked.

“While many young ones might balk at the idea of becoming a puppet,” Yang Qi replied coolly, “I view it more as good fortune. Furthermore, the junior empress just explained about the six major factions in the Great Necropolis, and how our sects are the weakest. Right now, we're as disunited as a dish of loose sand. As the junior sectlord of the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect, I’m powerless to do anything if disaster strikes. But if I can become the league-lord, even a puppet league-lord, then I’d at least be strong enough to fight back.”

“Well said,” the emperor said. “You can see the bigger picture, but at the same time, you’re optimistic. Star Swordlife had potential, but sadly, he’s too pedantic and refuses to kill anyone. He aims for good, but brings about evil as a result. He definitely isn’t fit to be the league-lord. That’s why we’ve picked you. Of course, you need to be careful. Even if you improve your energy arts with our help, that doesn’t guarantee you the spot.”

Yang Qi nodded. “I'm well aware of that. The first thing I’ll have to do is deal with Bastard Seacliff.”

“Not just Bastard Seacliff,” the emperor said. “You’ll also have to deal with whatever genius the Genesis Sanctum is backing.”

“Will the candidate from the Genesis Sanctum really be a force to reckon with?” Yang Qi asked. “They only have one leader, their pontiff, and while he’s in the mid Terrifying level, there are two of you. Could he really cause problems for you?”

“Before getting into an explanation,” the emperor said, “allow me to introduce myself. I'm Mu Renwang, and this is my wife Su Xin. As for my daughter, she’s Mu Yexi. If you’re really going to join forces with the Woodfern Couple Palace and take orders from us, I can answer your question.”

“Yes sir, I am,” Yang Qi said.

Mu Renwang nodded. “Good. Then allow me to explain. The pontiff of the Genesis Sanctum is named Huangfu Genesis, and although he’s formidable, in a one-on-one fight, he wouldn’t be able to defeat me alone, much less my wife and I together. We would definitely kill him. At least, that’s how things used to be. Unfortunately, he acquired a very powerful god item called the Book of Genesis. Initially, we didn’t know which god from the god world penned the book, but we could tell from the outset that the book is extremely profound. After Huangfu Genesis cultivated it to perfection, he reached a point where he can handle both my wife and I at the same time. That's how the Genesis Sanctum came to be on the same level as our Woodfern Couple Palace.”

“Oh, I see,” Yang Qi murmured. “The Book of Genesis, huh. Sounds very impressive.”

“It is,” Su Xin said. “After years of consideration, I’ve come to the conclusion that the Book of Genesis was actually written years ago by one of the top subordinates of the Sovereign Lord, specifically the Lord of Radiance and Light. Later, the Lord of Radiance and Light was killed by King Immortal-Slayer. During that incident, King Immortal-Slayer used the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart to rip the Book of Genesis to pieces. However, Huangfu Genesis recovered those pieces and restored the book. You see, it really was a case of misfortune turning out to be a blessing. The only reason Huangfu Genesis managed to get the book and master it was because it had been ripped apart.”

“Father, Mother,” Mu Yexi said, “let’s get on with helping Yang Qi. We need to think of a way to deal with Bastard Seacliff.”

“Since when did you become so impatient, child?” Su Xin said with a smile. “Young Sir Yang Qi is obviously the kind of person who likes to analyze a situation fully in the search for enlightenment. There’s no reason to get anxious. By the way, I heard that some new type of powerful godling appeared within the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect recently. Is that true?”

“Yes,” Yang Qi replied. “I'm not really sure where it’s from. If the two of you happen to know, I’d love to get some more information.” If he could get some more information about the purrling, it could very well lead to further enlightenment for himself.

“Unfortunately, we've racked our brains and can’t think of even a single clue to explain the thing.” Both the empress and the emperor shook their heads.

Chapter 1059: Help (2)

‘Just what exactly is the purrling? Does nobody know?’ Yang Qi shook his head. If the imperial couple of the Woodfern Couple Palace didn’t have any idea what it was, how could he possibly uncover any information?

Of course, the ultimate beast in the god world was definitely the King of Godmammoths. Strictly speaking though, he wasn’t an animal. He was second only to the Sovereign Lord. In fact, in terms of power, he actually surpassed the Sovereign Lord, and was only weaker in terms of will.

“Dear Nephew,” Mu Renwang said, “I also heard that you took a trip to the Hell of Sages and Mahātmās?” Instead of addressing Yang Qi as Young Sir, he had switched to calling him Dear Nephew, which was a much more intimate form of address. Obviously, it went to show that their relationship was now much closer.

There were very few young ones from the Ancient Road to the Gods that Mu Renwang would ever address as Dear Nephew.

That said, Yang Qi wasn't very familiar with all the ins and outs of the Ancient Road to the Gods, so this sudden change in the form of address wasn’t as meaningful to him.

“That’s right,” he said, nodding. After Archmonk Dharma Treasury publicly spoke of their mission in the Hell of Sages and Mahātmās, word of the matter had quickly spread, so it was little wonder that the imperial couple had heard.

“I did go to the Hell of Sages and Mahātmās, along with Archmonk Dharma Treasury. We foiled the Shepherd’s plan to unify the fiend-devils under his control, but unfortunately, the fiend-devils ultimately succeeded in forming their alliance. I have to say I'm ashamed at how it all turned out.”

“Ashamed?” Su Xin said. “There’s no reason to be ashamed, Dear Nephew. The Shepherd is an invincible expert among the fiend-devils, so the mere fact that you escaped from him with your life is amazing. I heard that in your clash with the Shepherd, you took a jade amulet that belonged to him. Do you still have it?”

“Of course,” Yang Qi replied. “Unfortunately, I don't know what it is, nor do I know how to use it. No amount of experimentation has produced any result. From what I understand, not even the Shepherd was able to use it.”

Su Xin and Mu Renwang exchanged a glance, then he said, “Would you mind letting us take a look?”

“That goes without saying,” Yang Qi replied, although inside he was chuckling coldly. Without the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body, it was impossible to do anything with the jade. Therefore, he didn’t mind letting them take it temporarily.

They definitely wouldn’t be able to benefit from it.

He offered the piece of jade respectfully to Su Xin and Mu Renwang, who were clearly pleased that he was being so cooperative. It seemed to indicate that he really was going to follow their orders. Truth be told, it was a test, and he had passed.

“Incredible,” Mu Renwang said as he studied the piece of jade. “Dear Nephew, are you saying you haven’t unlocked any of this thing’s secrets? Do you know anything about it at all?”

“I was actually hoping you could tell me something about it,” Yang Qi replied. “I asked Archmonk Dharma Treasury about it, and even though he’s read all sorts of ancient records from the buddhist schools, he doesn’t know anything about it. He just knows that it’s some sort of legacy treasure from the Hell of Sages and Mahātmās.”

Mu Renwang suddenly burst out laughing. “Not even that little monk Dharma Treasury knows about it? I guess his late Master, the famous Dharma Unbounded, never uncovered the truth. Well, since you ask, I suppose I have no choice but to tell you. This jade is actually incredibly famous. It's called Mahātmā Jade, and this is actually just a fragment of it.”

“Mahātmā Jade!?” Yang Qi said, feigning a look of surprise. “Sounds amazing. But why would that be something connected to the Devilfolk?”

“Long ago, some mahātmās from the god world descended into hell in the hopes of bringing salvation to the people there. But in the end, they joined the dao of devils. Later, they took all of their combined wisdom and inscribed it onto a jade amulet, in the hopes of using it to fight the God Legion Seal. In the end, they failed, and the Mahātmā Jade was broken into several pieces. Unfortunately, it's impossible to access any of that ancient wisdom by using only one piece of the jade. According to the stories, you have to collect all of the pieces before they’re useful.”

“Amazing. But what does the jade actually do?”

Mu Renwang took a long moment before saying, “It can be used to greatly improve your psychic scale. As I'm sure you’re aware, Dear Nephew, the psychic scale is broken up into the levels of Normal, Stupendous, Destabilizing, Terrifying, Paramount, Unbounded and finally Annulled. The mid Terrifying level is the hallmark of the god world. The Paramount level is the threshold to be considered in the legion of gods, and can call the wind and summon the rain in the god world. The Mahātmā Jade can actually absorb the psychic power of one person and convert it for use by another. Supposedly, it can even help push someone into the Annulled level.”

“So that’s how it is,” Yang Qi said. “Seniors, could you two possibly activate the jade?”

“We’ll need to study it first,” Mu Renwang replied. “Dear Nephew, would you mind if we keep it for a while?”

“No problem at all. It's not really mine to begin with, so consider it offering borrowed flowers to Buddha.” Yang Qi didn’t hesitate to offer them the Mahātmā Jade. The truth was that the moment he had arrived in their presence, he knew that he was trapped. There was no way he could use the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart to escape, therefore he had no other option than to give them the Mahātmā Jade. Besides, it was always possible that they might learn a thing or two from the jade that could be of help to him.

The two experts yet again nodded in approval.

“Well then, Dear Nephew,” Mu Renwang said, “we accept your generous offer. Now, in the interests of helping you to become the league-lord, we're going to use a special technique to bless you with power. By strengthening your nascent divinity and will, you should be able to reach the Terrifying level.”

“Many thanks for your help,” Yang Qi replied, dropping politely to his knees. “Unfortunately, I cultivate a secret magic that has made it extremely difficult to reach the Terrifying level. Seniors, what exact technique were you planning to use?”

“Don’t worry,” Su Xin said, “the two of us working together shouldn’t have any problems. Incidentally, doesn’t the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect have a part of the Cruiser of Civilization. The psychic scaling systems?”

“Er... don’t tell me that you're planning to use the psychic scaling systems. If I use that, my path of cultivation would end. Besides, it's the sectlord who controls those systems. If you need them, I could always go ask for him to give them as a gift.”

“That won’t be necessary,” Mu Renwang said. “Dear Nephew, don’t tell me you think that we’re the greedy sort. You've already shown how generous you are by giving us that jade amulet, so of course we wouldn’t squabble over something as insignificant as the psychic scaling systems. Besides, we wouldn’t have any use for them without the Engine of the One God.”

Yang Qi shivered inwardly. Thankfully, he had left the Engine of the One God behind in the sect, well-hidden.

If word leaked and the imperial couple found out, it could cause huge problems. Obviously, they would demand it, and if it wasn’t handed over to them, could take it by force. It would be as easy for them to destroy the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect as it would be to flip over a hand.

Yang Qi was under no illusion that these people were somehow benevolent and kind-hearted. If they were, their sect would long since have been exterminated.

“But what other than the psychic scaling systems could actually help me improve my psychic power?” Yang Qi asked curiously.

“Simple,” Mu Renwang said with a faint smile. “You have a godpower seed from the Great Necropolis, right? We’ll just turn you into an Inheritor.”

“What?!” Yang Qi said in shock. “How could you possibly do that? Seniors, based on my understanding, you can only be an Inheritor if you acquired one of those seeds when they first appeared. And it’s common knowledge that only the Inheritors can benefit by killing other Inheritors and taking their godpower seeds.”

“Common knowledge?” Su Xin said. She chuckled. “Common knowledge isn't always correct. We’ve been researching the mysteries of the Great Necropolis for a long time. Furthermore, we’ve killed some of the Inheritors and, after studying their godpower seeds, have learned some of their secrets.”

“Secrets? What secrets?!” Yang Qi asked, shocked. He really was surprised, as he had always been under the impression that he couldn’t assimilate the godpower seeds.

“Even if we explained, Dear Nephew, you wouldn’t understand,” Mu Renwang said. “Suffice it to say that we’ve observed the transformations within the godpower seeds and have a way to use them to turn you into an Inheritor. The process will be dangerous, but thankfully, you have a very strong body. Our method has a fifty percent chance of success. Are you willing to take that risk?”

“Yes, I am,” Yang Qi replied. Of course, even if he had refused, he would still have had no choice but to do what they said. Obviously, they wanted to experiment on him to see if it really was possible to take the power of the godpower seeds. If the process worked, the two of them could also become Inheritors, instantly gaining a huge boost in strength.

But what secret method were they planning to use? Yang Qi was very curious. If you ride a tiger, it's hard to get off, and he was already on the tiger. So it only made sense to go for broke!

Chapter 1060: Help (3)

Mu Renwang and Su Xin were mid Terrifying experts, with psychic scales of over a hundred, putting them on roughly the same level as the Shepherd. There was no way that Yang Qi would be able to flee from them. If he tried, he would only become like a fish on the chopping block.

Therefore, he was pretending to wholeheartedly agree with whatever suggestions they made.

It didn’t matter how much they called him “Dear Nephew”, he wouldn’t trust them at all. They wanted him to be their puppet, and he knew that defying them would bring catastrophic consequences. These two were not some kind-hearted couple who cared about traditional virtues like compassion, duty, propriety, and integrity. If they were, they wouldn’t have survived to this point.

Besides, they might have the Mahātmā Jade now, but he would eventually get it back.

Even if they had demanded the psychic scaling systems, he would have handed them over without hesitation. If he could do without the God Legion Seal, then he could obviously sacrifice any other external object.

Right now, his biggest trump card was his immortal-slaying clone in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, although there was no reason to use that now. After all, it wouldn’t be easy to pull the wool over the eyes of two top experts like this. Instead, he would wait patiently and see how the situation developed.

Besides, he was curious what secrets they had unlocked regarding the godpower seeds. Considering how powerful they were, it was entirely possible that they had learned something important and simply wanted to experiment on him.

It would be dangerous, but he had little choice.

“Dear Nephew,” Mu Renwang said, “you really need to think this through carefully. We’ve done some experiments on other experts, but they ended up dying. Some we were able to resurrect, but afterward, they slowly petrified and became like the Great Necropolis itself, with their nascent divinities stuck inside, unable to move, think, or even absorb energy. In some ways, ending up like that is worse than dying.”

“Um... well, now I'm not so sure,” Yang Qi said with a wry smile.

“You should probably give it a try, Dear Nephew,” Su Xin said. “We’re fairly confident, and think it's worth the risk. That said, if you prefer not to, we won’t force you. But considering you need to face Bastard Seacliff soon, we really hope you’ll live up to our expectations.”

The true meaning of her words were: you’re going to go through with this whether you want to or not.

After all, if he failed to live up to their expectations... he knew exactly what would happen.

“That’s right!” Mu Yexi said. “Young Sir Yang Qi, you should definitely give it a shot. Given your amazing destiny, I'd say you’ll definitely succeed.” Obviously, she was going to side with her parents in everything; to her, Yang Qi was little more than a pawn.

“In that case, I’ll put my life in your hands,” he said. Of course, he had made the decision much earlier and was acting wishy-washy on purpose.

Mu Renwang laughed heartily. “You’re truly frank and straightforward, Dear Nephew,” he said. “Don’t worry, in a short while, you will also be an Inheritor of the Great Necropolis. Now, why don’t you bring out that godpower seed you acquired?”

In his heart, Yang Qi was chuckling coldly.

‘Fuck,’ he thought. ‘This guy really is stingy. If he killed so many Inheritors, why can’t he provide the godpower seed? Instead, he’s making me use my own?’

Mu Renwang took the Flower-Seizing Marauder’s godpower seed and inspected it closely. “An excellent godpower seed. The Flower-Seizing Marauder killed two other Inheritors, making his seed particularly large. Very well, the time has come to begin. This divine ability of ours can exorcise devils, crush wretches, and exterminate evil. By connecting to the legacy, we will expel the vile energy!”

“Let’s start,” Su Xin echoed.

“Dear Nephew, please pour your true energy into the godpower seed,” Mu Renwang said.

“Yes sir!” Yang Qi replied respectfully, and immediately complied. As soon as his true energy entered the seed, it flew up into the air and began pulsing with a stone-colored light. The light immediately flowed back through the true energy into Yang Qi, as if to petrify him.

The godpower seeds were terrifyingly powerful, and anyone who tried to assimilate them incorrectly could easily detonate or be turned to stone.

However, Mu Renwang and Su Xin really did have a special technique to deal with the situation.

RUMBLE!

Yang Qi suddenly felt himself filled with a sound like stone grating on stone, as a stone-like true energy entered him, encasing his body in layer upon layer of rock.

“Dear Nephew, quickly absorb the vital energy of the godpower seed. Send it into your meridians.”

“But...” Yang Qi said, “Seniors, if that energy enters me, I’ll turn into stone! I’ll become nothing more than a statue!”

“Cut the crap!” Su Xin barked. “We can obviously handle the situation. There’s no time for jabbering. Absorb that energy!” Killing intent flickered in her beautiful eyes as she thrust her palm out, using some unknown technique to strike the layers of rock surrounding Yang Qi.

Instantly, the stone shell cracked and became true energy that poured into Yang Qi. However, as a result, it looked as though his skin, flesh, and blood were about to turn into stone.

Face falling, he said, “Seniors... I....”

Because of his throat turning into rock, his voice sounded like stone scraping against stone.

“Your body is strong!” Mu Yexi said. “You can still talk after turning into stone. Excellent constitution! Mother, Father, remember that most of the other people we experimented on all turned to stone almost instantly, with even their souls vanishing. Considering how strong Yang Qi is, we can definitely move onto the next phase.”

“Well that’s only natural,” Mu Renwang said. “If he didn't succeed, he would simply die for the cause. Yang Qi, hurry up and send your true flame into your dantian region. Use it to assimilate the stone power of the Great Necropolis, and at the same time, cling to consciousness. Your level of success will determine how things conclude here. In a moment, Su Xin and I will use our boundless energy arts to cleanse the godpower seed. As long as you can stay awake, you’ll survive!”

Yang Qi needed no urging from them; he was already doing exactly that. Years ago, he had done a lot of research with the imprisoned Profound Valor and had used the imperial-heaven pre-beginning systems to break down the godpower of the Great Necropolis, shattering its will. Although he hadn’t been able to fully succeed, he had gained valuable experience in resisting the Great Necropolis.

Of course, he wouldn’t foolishly reveal what he could do.

Even so, the little he did let on astonished Mu Renwang and Su Xin. Even the most elite experts they had experimented on were almost instantly petrified. That was what happened when someone challenged the majesty of the Great Necropolis.

As Yang Qi broke down the petrifying power of the Great Necropolis and defended himself with his true energy, his enlightenment grew. Suddenly, he gained new understanding of his Purrfect God Art.

When one is focused and works hard, good fortune is sure to follow. All of a sudden, he realized that the Great Necropolis itself was actually structured like a bubble.

Obviously, that meant that it corresponded to the Purrfect God Art!

Great Necropolis godpower built up in him, and his meridians were slowly being turned to stone. However, as he assimilated the godpower, he realized more and more truths about both the Great Necropolis and the Purrfect God Art.

Slowly but surely, the structure of the Great Necropolis became clearer and clearer in his mind, making it more and more obvious that it was like a bubble.

Truth be told, his previous mastery of the Purrfect God Art was so insignificant it was almost like he couldn’t use it. It was only by studying the structure of the bubbles created by the purrling that he had made even the slight progress he had. But right now, he was wondering why it had never occurred to him that the Great Necropolis was like a bubble.

And if it was a bubble, just exactly how strong was it in the end?

The Great Necropolis ejected immortal worlds, and he could eject the Great Necropolis.

The Great Necropolis was more powerful than the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, and had been used to block the Ancient Road to the Gods.

If Yang Qi could combine the Purrfect God Art bubbles with the Great Necropolis, then he could pass this dangerous hurdle.

Of course, he didn’t reveal that openly.

Instead, he made it seem like he was struggling to deal with the invasive power of the godpower seed, and was slowly being turned into the same stone as the Great Necropolis. Soon, his skin was stone, then his hair, and then even his eyes.

Chapter 1061: Great Necropolis Bubble

Purr, purr....

Within Yang Qi’s nascent divinity was a budding framework, slowly developing, and at the moment, so slight that no one would ever be able to detect it. As for Mu Renwang and Su Xin, despite being top experts, they saw Yang Qi being encased in stone. His flesh, blood, meridians, and even his internal organs were all being petrified.

In fact, there were only two parts of him that weren’t already stone: his sea of energy and his sea of consciousness.

If those parts were converted by the godpower of the Great Necropolis, then he truly would become a deathless chunk of rock, bereft of true energy or life force. And at that point, no one would be able to save him.

Seeing what was happening, Mu Yexi said, “Father, Mother, can you save him? We don’t want to stop just short of success, do we?”

“Remain patient,” Mu Renwang said. “He’s actually still conscious, plus, I can sense that he still has a flow of true energy in him. His sea of energy hasn’t been petrified, which is a good sign. We still might be able to make this a success, and if we do, all three of us will have a chance to become Inheritors. And with that level of power, we can make the Woodfern Couple Palace the top sect among all other sects!”

“Yes!” Mu Yexi replied. “Inheritors are truly terrifying. I can already envision us controlling the Great Necropolis and being the ultimate figures in all existence. We’ll even be able to take over the god world! I almost can’t believe this Yang Qi has held out to this point. Father, Mother, you can now proceed to the next step of the plan!”

“Absolutely!”

RUMBLE!

The two mid Terrifying experts called on their immense levels of power, causing an ancient gateway to appear in front of the godpower seed, within which was an intense, burning flame.

As the fire began burning the seed, layers of dust drifted off of it as it was deeply cleansed.

“Fantastic!” It was impossible to say exactly what energy art they were using, but backed by their extraordinary cultivation bases, the sinister and ill-fated majesty of the godpower was slowly being chipped away.

Mu Renwang laughed heartily. “It’s just as we anticipated! The godpower seeds were pure when they first emerged, but quickly became infected with wickedness and misfortune. After being cleansed, the seeds multitude of profundities can be unlocked.”

“Be cleansed!”

They continued sending out their true energy, causing smoke to pour off of the godpower seed as it slowly shrank. It was almost like a piece of jade in the middle of being polished, causing it to slowly glimmer and shine.

“Now his blood vessels need to be reshaped. Either he succeeds, or dies. Now is the critical moment!” The seed was finally returning to its original form.

It was just as Mu Renwang had said. When the godpower seeds had first appeared, they were pure and untainted, but subsequently became so attached to a single person that they were inseparable. Somehow, Mu Renwang and Su Xin had come across a divine ability that could transform them, making them suitable for others.

However, they had never succeeded in using it, and didn’t dare to use it on themselves. Therefore, they were experimenting on Yang Qi, and if the process succeeded, it would lay the groundwork for their ultimate plan. After it succeeded, they would find a way to secretly insert a spell formation into him that would ultimately immolate him, destroying his nascent divinity and leaving behind only the godpower seed.

He would be like a consummate buddha who experienced nirvanic rebirth, leaving behind nothing but a perfect śarīra.

RUMBLE!

The two experts exerted all their strength to send their will into Yang Qi’s nascent divinity. “Hold out just a bit longer. As long as you don’t turn completely into stone, you’ll succeed!”

Yang Qi’s senses really were blocked, meaning he had no idea what was happening on the outside.

He was in a state of complete calm and quiet. Within his sea of consciousness, his nascent divinity was in the midst of contemplation, and the structure of the Great Necropolis was becoming clearer and clearer. Simultaneously, he was coming to a deeper understanding of the Purrfect God Art.

The true energy in his dantian region was becoming like a bubble, which in turn contained countless more bubbles, just like how the Great Necropolis contained countless immortal worlds.

At the same time, he was coming to understand many of the profound aspects of the Great Necropolis, information about the pathways, the danger zones, and other such things that few others would ever be privy to. Truth be told, without the help of Mu Renwang and Su Xin, and their profound energy art, he would never have been able to enter this state.

When he heard them speaking to him, he knew he had reached a critical moment, so he sucked in all of his thoughts and energy arts, entering a zen samādhi trance of complete emotionlessness.

RUMBLE!

Drawing on every scrap of true energy they could muster, the two experts forced the godpower to slowly enter Yang Qi.

As they did, a stone-like energy flow erupted out of Yang Qi, causing the entire hall around them to begin petrifying.

“Watch out!” Su Xin cried, pulling Mu Yexi behind her and simultaneously pulling out a defensive god item to surround all three of them with a protective shield.

Meanwhile, the stone energy continued battering at the hall, even turning the twin woodfern trees and the god item Su Xin had just called on to stone.

The process went on for a while until the entire hall was pure stone. Only then did the energy flow fade, and everything went silent.

Crack. The god item broke open, and the emperor, empress, and junior empress emerged, looking around to find themselves surrounded by lifeless stone.

“Father? Mother?” Mu Yexi said. “The Metroplexus Heaven Net god item was turned into stone?! But... did the process work?”

If Yang Qi lost his life and their plan failed, it would mean they had just wasted an extremely valuable god item.

“Did we succeed?” Mu Renwang said. “Probably not. This Yang Qi was an elite genius, but it looks to me that he’s turned into stone. Is it really true that the godpower seeds can’t be transferred to another person? It can’t be! All of our research indicated that if you cleansed the misfortune and returned a seed to its original state, it would be possible. Is it just that this Yang Qi wasn’t strong enough?”

“Who knows,” Su Xin said. “Let's crush the rock and find out. I have the feeling we failed, and he's completely turned into stone. And we can’t let that godpower seed go to waste after all the effort we spent cleansing it.”

As far as she was concerned, Yang Qi was nothing more than a test subject.

With that, the two of them stepped forward and unleashed palm strikes onto the petrified statue of Yang Qi. Mu Renwang aimed toward his head, and Su Xin aimed toward his dantian region.

Just as they thought the stone was going to shatter, it turned out they had miscalculated.

Their true energy was sucked into the statue, and cracks spread out on its surface.

“What? It's not breaking?” Shaking their heads, they funneled more true energy into the statue.

The cracks spread, yet it soon became obvious that the statue wasn’t actually breaking. Expressions of confusion appeared on the two experts’ faces.

They had experience breaking statues such as this in their previous experiments, and they could tell that things were going differently.

Chapter 1062: It Actually Worked?

“Don’t tell me something different happened this time!”

Both experts were shocked, and were forced to continue unleashing immense amounts of true energy. These two were so powerful that few people from the Ancient Road to the Gods could possibly withstand a barrage of true energy from them. Despite that, it was taking a significant amount of effort to break this stone.

After a moment, the stone collapsed, revealing a perfect body with smooth, sleek skin. It almost looked like the finest of jade, with every pore exuding the most natural and pure energy possible.

Of course, it was none other than Yang Qi.

Then, the God Legion Battle Robe flowed out to cover him and he stepped out from the rubble.

“What? You’re alive?!”

The two experts immediately activated a spell formation to lock down the hall, fearing that Yang Qi might run away.

Then they realized that Yang Qi’s psychic scale and aura didn't seem much different from before, and they breathed sighs of relief. If he was simply an Inheritor now, but hadn’t achieved a major breakthrough in his psychic scale, then they obviously had nothing to fear from him. But the unexpected development from moments before left them unsure of what position he was in now.

“What happened, Yang Qi?” Mu Yexi asked.

“I'm not sure,” he replied, looking down at his hands, a look of confusion on his face. “I guess I'm an Inheritor now.”

Of course, the truth was that he knew exactly what had just occurred.

Just when he entered the zen samādhi trance earlier, the godpower seed unleashed its most powerful assault on him.

As a result, he was shaken out of his trance.

The true energy in his dantian region began to petrify, with some of it even turning into stone. Meanwhile, in his sea of consciousness, his nascent divinity also began petrifying as the will of the Great Necropolis filled him.

However, in that critical moment, his will connected to the will of the Great Necropolis, causing the god arts of the necropolis and the Purrfect God Art to experience strange transformations.

The truth was that the assault of the Great Necropolis had actually had a profound effect on the structure of the necropolis within him.

At that moment, his will became like an incarnation of the necropolis, like a bubble.

Before, his nascent divinity had been transforming to become like the God Legion Seal. But now, it was experiencing even more dramatic transformations, and had become a bubble like the necropolis. It was as if he was the necropolis, and the necropolis was him.

In that brief moment, he felt as if millions upon millions of years passed. Then, his nascent divinity grew clear and he woke up. Meanwhile, his Purrfect God Art grew more marvelous, wrapping up the godpower seed, pulling it into his nascent divinity, and filling it with power.

His nascent divinity was the Great Necropolis, and it was a bubble that contained a seed. And as the seed slowly melted, his will and the Great Necropolis grew ever more connected.

At the moment, the Great Necropolis bubble that was his nascent divinity wasn’t perfectly complete, but it would become so over time. Eventually, his will would become the same as the Great Necropolis’, whereupon he would come to control it. He was different from the other Inheritors, as he had true control over the powers of inheritance. In fact, he was actually creating his own version of those powers.

It was similar to how, when someone succeeded an emperor in the mortal world, they would have many restrictions limiting their actions. In contrast, someone who created a new empire could change the face of the world, slaughter their way to power, and do anything they wanted. That was the difference between a successor and a creator.

The Inheritors were successors, but Yang Qi was a creator.

He was creating his own version of the Great Necropolis godpower. As he breathed in, Great Necropolis godpower rushed into him, filled with martial disciplines like the God Tombstone Palms, God-Ordaining Incantation, God-Burying Finger, and so-on. Although he could tell that his psychic scale and power index hadn’t increased, his compatibility with the Great Necropolis was vastly superior to before.

Given some time, the godpower seed would truly fuse with his own will, whereupon his psychic scale would increase dramatically.

Meanwhile, his fighting prowess was such that he sensed he could now put up a good fight if the imperial couple tried to take him out. However, he didn't intend to let them know that.

He circulated his true energy, and it flowed more freely than ever. As of this moment, if he went back and fought the Flower-Seizing Marauder again, he would beat him with hardly any effort at all.

Of course, at the moment, he couldn't do anything to further his cultivation, lest the imperial couple discover. However, as long as he had enough time to stabilize his cultivation base, he wouldn't be defeated in a fight against Bastard Seacliff.

Defeating the man would be a different story, but that was only in a situation in which Yang Qi didn’t have the time to become fully stabilized. If he could get into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart and spend a thousand years in contemplation, his psychic scale would improve dramatically, and his nascent divinity would become like a reflection of the Great Necropolis.

Then, killing Bastard Seacliff would definitely be within the realm of possibility.

Furthermore, Yang Qi had Shi Yuan’s godpower seed waiting to be used, which would definitely be enough to reach the Terrifying level.

With that level of power, he could kill Bastard Seacliff and also defend himself against the Woodfern Couple Palace. Then he could be a true league-lord, not just a puppet.

But for now, he needed to be patient and wait for the right opportunity.

“Many thanks to you, Seniors,” he said respectfully. “Now that the Great Necropolis godpower seed is in my nascent divinity, the two are combining, and my energy arts are improving.”

“What?!” Mu Renwang said. Sending some true energy into Yang Qi, he examined his nascent divinity and was shocked to find that it was true. The godpower seed was no longer visible, and instead, the will of the Great Necropolis was present, giving Yang Qi constant access to the godpower of the necropolis.

Mu Renwang looked completely shocked at this unexpected development. Usually, Inheritors could have their godpower seeds taken away, but in this case it seemed as though the seed had become a part of Yang Qi’s nascent divinity, making it impossible to remove.

It was just like if a mortal ate a food item; that food item would be digested. At that point, even if you killed the person, the most you could find of that food would be fecal matter in the digestive system.

A variety of expressions flitted across Mu Renwang's face, from killing intent to thoughtfulness. Then he exchanged a look with Su Xin, and both of them were obviously trying to figure out what to do with Yang Qi.

It only took a moment, and they didn't speak out loud, but Yang Qi could obviously tell what they were thinking. “All I need is some time to practice cultivation,” he said to them, “and I can champion your cause and defeat both the House of God Bastards and the Genesis Sanctum.”

“Very good,” Mu Renwang said. Convinced that Yang Qi was still valuable to them, he continued, “This location is secure, so feel free to work on your cultivation here. Mu Yexi will accompany you. You might as well use the time to get to know each other a bit better in the few days before the assembly starts. Meanwhile, the two of us will go into seclusion to study the Mahātmā Jade.”

Obviously, the point was for Mu Yexi to keep an eye on Yang Qi.

“Yexi,” Su Xin said, “send orders to have the experts of the Woodfern Couple Palace keep the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect safe. We don't want anyone using them to threaten Young Sir Yang Qi.”

“Yes, Mother,” Mu Yexi replied. Of course, she knew that her mother was actually doing this to make sure they kept Yang Qi in check. Although she made it seem like they were protecting his sect, they were actually doing the opposite. If he didn’t obediently act as their puppet, his sect would be in grave danger.

Killing intent flared in Yang Qi’s heart, but he kept it covered up.

Thankfully, because they needed to focus on the Mahātmā Jade, they wouldn’t be very focused on him. Later, when he wasn’t as valuable, and after he had secured the position of league-lord, that was when he would truly become their puppet.

Yang Qi had long since come to the realization that Mu Yexi and the imperial couple were definitely not good people.

Everyone was plotting and scheming, and in the end, whoever was the most ruthless would come out on top. Yang Qi had to be patient. Thankfully, the Mahātmā Jade ensured that the imperial couple wouldn’t immediately kill and study him.

WHOOSH!

They disappeared to parts unknown. Thankfully, Yang Qi had a connection built with the Mahātmā Jade, allowing him to sense its general location.

He was now trapped with Mu Yexi watching over him. So the question was, would he be able to create an opportunity to achieve the breakthroughs that he needed?

Chapter 1063: Mu Yexi

Yang Qi and Mu Yexi were now alone in the hall.

A single man and a single woman. Alone together.

Of course, there would be no explosion of passion. Both were on guard against each other, and Mu Yexi had specifically been stationed here by her parents to make sure that Yang Qi didn’t get away.

Yang Qi was an experiment that had succeeded beyond expectation, and they didn’t want to lose him.

The truth was that Mu Yexi actually wasn’t worried that he might attempt to flee.

She was fully aware that, before leaving, Mu Renwang had activated one of the Woodfern Couple Palace’s most powerful warding spells, something called the Heart-Linking Hex. It created a hexing mark within the heart of the target that was completely impossible to detect. With almost no effort at all, Mu Renwang would be able to track Yang Qi wherever he went. He could also use it to corrode the target’s spirit, or even detonate it. If he did that, Yang Qi would be in such incredible pain that he would drop to the ground and be unable to do anything but writhe and twitch.

Obviously, the imperial couple wouldn’t just leave and allow Yang Qi the freedom to do whatever he wanted.

The Heart-Linking Hex was also so powerful that it would keep Mu Renwang informed of whenever Yang Qi worked on his cultivation, and could provide a window to observe that cultivation.

Of course, Yang Qi had sensed the hex falling into place in his sea of consciousness. Thankfully, he could still connect to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart and get help from his immortal-slaying clone.

As Yang Qi gained enlightenment of the Purrfect God Art, he could pass that knowledge to the clone. Although the clone’s mastery wasn’t on the same level as Yang Qi’s, he could still use it to amazing effect. After all, the cultivation speed the clone was capable of in the chart put him in the position to rival Yang Qi himself.

The clone was researching Shi Yuan’s godpower seed and had been paying close attention to how the imperial couple cleansed the seed earlier. When the moment came, it would be an easy task for him to pass Shi Yuan’s godpower seed out to Yang Qi.

In other words, Yang Qi could easily destroy the hexing mark that Mu Renwang had put on him. But right now wasn’t the time.

He would use the imperial couple to get himself into the position of league-lord before freeing himself from their control.

Snorting coldly inside, he thought, ‘They’re just trying to use me, but little do they know that I'm just waiting for my next breakthrough. Eventually, I’ll really be the league-lord, and then I’ll force them to acknowledge allegiance to me.’ The Heart-Linking Hex was a powerful spell, and normally speaking, it would even reveal the thoughts of its target.

But Yang Qi’s cultivation base was far too high.

He was a Fateless One with Life-Death Void-Destruction Lightning. Therefore, it was an easy task to send false thoughts through to Mu Renwang, pulling the wool over his eyes.

Later, he would even be able to use the Heart-Linking Hex to launch a counter-attack on Mu Renwang and give him a taste of his own medicine.

After all, Yang Qi was like the patriarch of all types of sealing marks, thanks to the Devil-God Seal, which was a combination of countless other types of sealing marks. Furthermore, thanks to the true energy of Proud Heaven’s version of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, all of Yang Qi’s energy arts had advanced by leaps and bounds, including that one.

There was another trump card that Yang Qi had at his disposal.

That trump card was the true energy of the emperor of the Executors of the Ancient Road, which he had acquired during his encounter with the Shepherd. He had sent it into the Mahātmā Jade, but it was returned to attack him. Afterward, he had kept it in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart for later use. Since then, the immortal-slaying clone had spent time refining it.

And there were other tools Yang Qi had that made him unworried about his current situation.

“Congratulations, Yang Qi,” Mu Yexi said, looking down at him as he sat there cross-legged circulating his true energy. “You lived through the experiment. A true miracle. You now have a brilliant future ahead of you, something unprecedented. Not even I could match up to you at this point. Do you want to know the truth? I think you’re already in the position to beat Bastard Seacliff.”

“This is all thanks to you, Junior Empress, and your parents, the imperial couple. From here on out, I’ll do everything I can to advance the interests of the Woodfern Couple Palace.” Yang Qi was pouring it on very thick, trying to make himself seem like nothing more than a loyal servant. Keeping a very serious expression on his face, he said, “I’m much stronger now, and I'm now an Inheritor, with all sorts of new abilities. For instance, the God Tombstone Palms. But I'm still not ready to take on Bastard Seacliff. His energy arts have reached the point of perfection, plus, he’s a god bastard. How could I possibly beat him?”

Mu Yexi thought for a moment. “This is a big topic. If you can’t beat him, then all of this effort will have been in vain. Furthermore, him being the league-lord would bring nothing but harm. Considering that the Genesis Sanctum and our Woodfern Couple Palace are at such odds, he would definitely take advantage of the situation to further his own ends. And considering we’ve already publicly announced the matter of selecting a league-lord, we can’t just back out. Let’s hope that my parents can figure out something about the Mahātmā Jade and help you get to the Terrifying level. In any case, my parents will return before the assembly starts to bless you with power.”

“Many thanks for all of your help,” Yang Qi said. “My gratitude knows no bounds.”

“By the way,” Mu Yexi said, “if you really do end up as the league-lord, both the Genesis Sanctum and the Woodfern Couple Palace will provide blessings of power. Everyone will be helping you to get stronger and maintain power as the league-lord. What you're experiencing right now is just an appetizer. Although you’re acting very submissive right now, my bet is that you actually have some big ambitions you’re keeping secret. Am I right?”

“I wouldn’t dare,” Yang Qi replied immediately. “Your humble servant has no ambitions whatsoever. I just hope to please you and your parents, junior empress. Whatever blessings of power I get, I’ll pass them on to you. Then you can surpass that junior pontiff, and hopefully reach the mid Terrifying level.”

She stared sharply at Yang Qi for a long moment, then smiled. “Well said. I know that you’re a smart person, Yang Qi. You might sound subservient, but it could all be an act. Just remember that you’re going to be a puppet of the Woodfern Couple Palace, regardless of your true feelings on the matter.”

“But I—”

“Enough,” she interrupted coolly. “I've asked around and I know what kind of person you are, and I’ve had the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect fully investigated. You have some wild ambitions, and you rule your people with an iron fist. Look, I'm an ambitious person as well, so you don’t need to try explaining yourself. I know that a courageous person like you would never truly agree to be a puppet. But as I said, the circumstances require it. If you want to keep yourself alive, and your sect in one piece, you need to fall in line. Got it?”

Yang Qi didn’t interrupt. He just listened to her speech.

And as it turned out, she wasn’t done talking. “The Woodfern Couple Palace is expending a lot of resources to help you, and there’s no way we want a rebel on our hands. Don’t think us fools, don’t try to find some loophole in our agreement, and definitely don’t try to get help from the Genesis Sanctum; you really don’t want to mess with them. You have one shot at survival, and that’s to become the league-lord. Also, when the two sects bless you with power, you have to pass it to me, as you just promised to do. That point is non-negotiable. The power will come with warding spells, but I know that you can negate them. Then you’ll give me the power and any energy arts that come with them, which I will use to reach the mid Terrifying level. At that point, you’ll have offered true service to us. And we’ll make sure to treat you well because of it.”

“I’ll follow your each and every order, Junior Empress,” Yang Qi said. “Is there anything else you need to tell me? I only hope that when you reach the mid Terrifying level, you don’t cross the river and burn the bridge by killing me.”

She smiled. “Don’t worry. As long as you do what you’re told, why would I want to kill you? You’re going to be the league-lord. Yes, a puppet league-lord, but a league-lord nonetheless. Everyone will follow your orders, although you’ll obviously make decisions that will further the interests of the Woodfern Couple Palace. And as long as our sect grows stronger, the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect will also grow stronger. The stronger you are, the better you can further our interests, so we obviously won’t hold back in helping you.”

Mu Yexi had put everything out in the open.

From that, Yang Qi could tell she was definitely someone that couldn't be taken lightly. Of course, that didn’t mean he would just let her call the shots. Just falling in line and becoming a true puppet wouldn’t lead to anything good. And right now, he couldn't afford to have an enemy that was in the mid Terrifying level.

Obviously, he couldn't allow her to achieve that breakthrough, otherwise she could join hands with her parents, in which case he would be completely outmatched.

Right now, he had to figure out how to defeat Bastard Seacliff, become the league-lord, and maintain his grip on power.

Meanwhile, in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, his immortal-slaying clone was working hard with the imperial-heaven pre-beginning systems and the Purrfect God Art, so he could use them as a trump card at the right moment.

Chapter 1064: All Sorts of Preparations

Yang Qi was being closely watched by Mu Yexi as he circulated his true energy, which now contained the characteristics of the Great Necropolis. However, he was also using his Life-Death Void-Destruction Lightning to bypass the constraints of the Heart-Linking Hex, and was thus able to communicate with his immortal-slaying clone in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

If the clone tried to pass power to him, it would be detected, but it was no problem to share thoughts with each other. Much of this had to do with the immortal-slaying clone’s ever-increasing command over the chart.

The immortal-slaying clone was currently working with a purring bubble of the Purrfect God Art, and Yang Qi was imparting as much knowledge and information to him as possible.

The Purrfect God Art was incredible. It was like a combination of all types of magic, yet also like something that existed outside of all magics. It surpassed all other types of divine abilities and daoist techniques, and was completely mysterious and unfathomable.

By now, Yang Qi had mostly combined the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body with the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, resolving any lingering side effects. He could now push himself to the level of a hundred tribulations without worrying about his body stiffening up and becoming immobile.

As the clone worked with his cultivation and examined his true energy and blood, he could see heterogeneous true energy within it that he would then extrude. He was slowly tempering his own fleshly body in preparation of separating himself from the shackles of King Immortal-Slayer.

King Immortal-Slayer had hoped to use his successor as a pawn, but the clone was forging a different path, much like Yang Qi himself was doing. He was freeing himself from the legacy medallions and the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

Yang Qi had long since come up with the plan to rid himself of the God Legion Seal, but it was easier said than done, as he constantly relied on the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. However, with the Purrfect God Art, the clone was finally in the position to free himself.

The clone began spinning faster and faster, causing impurities to fly away from him as he began glowing with a bright radiance.

He inhaled, and a pure stream of true energy rushed into him, as wild as a dragon or a tiger. It was none other than the true energy from the emperor of the executors, which Yang Qi had acquired from the Shepherd.

The pure power entered him and quickly created a perfect cycle.

The bubble popped and the clone appeared in the open, whereupon he drew on his imperial-heaven pre-beginning powers. The Engine of the One God stirred, and the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart trembled. The clone chuckled coldly. “Excellent, my cultivation base has reached an even higher level, and I’ve made some progress with the Purrfect God Art. I feel more free than ever from King Immortal-Slayer.

“Now, there’s no way I’ll allow this bullying from the Woodfern Couple Palace. Those two think that just because they have mid Terrifying cultivation bases they can do whatever they want. When the time comes, I'm going to bury them!”

He exhaled a stream of fire and began refining the godpower seed, modeling his work after what the imperial couple had done. And thanks to the godhood stars in the chart that were powering the Engine of the One God, he was capable of rivaling what their two cultivation bases could do.

The Engine of the One God could match the cultivation base of gods, much less two mid Terrifying experts.

The godpower seed was slowly but surely refined, releasing all sorts of rancorous and pestilential energy as it reverted to its original state.

All of a sudden, one of the godhood stars up above shrank down and fell like a meteor.

He had completely and utterly exhausted that star.

It was a shock to the clone, as this was the first time something like this had happened. From that, it was obvious how amazing the godpower seeds were. If a tiny seed could do that, then what was the Great Necropolis in general capable of?

Of course, the clone wasn't planning to assimilate the seed for himself. After all, there was some sort of connection that existed between Inheritors that forced them to fight and kill each other. It would be quite ironic if he forced a relationship like that to exist between him and Yang Qi, and one of them ended up killing the other.

Instead, he would give the seed to Yang Qi.

Yang Qi was making all sorts of preparations to deal with the current circumstances.

**

Meanwhile, in another location, Mu Renwang and Su Xin were completely focused on studying the Mahātmā Jade. They were using all sorts of secret magics in an attempt to unlock its power, but unfortunately, nothing they did brought any results.

RUMBLE!

Mu Renwang launched a palm strike at the jade, and although it shifted in place, nothing else happened.

Truth be told, if it weren’t for the fact that he was a mid Terrifying expert, he wouldn’t even have been able to move the jade.

“The stories are true,” Su Xin said. “Unless you cultivate the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body, it's impossible to do anything with Mahātmā Jade. What a pity that nobody knows the location of the sheepskin scroll that contains the cultivation method of the Unspoiled Body. Perhaps the Shepherd has it. If so, I doubt we’ll ever get it.”

“You’re probably right,” Mu Renwang said. “The Shepherd won’t be easy to take down. You know, if we weren’t in the mid Terrifying level, I don’t think we could even move this piece of jade. Hey. Wait a second! I just thought of something. Yang Qi isn’t in the mid Terrifying level, so how could he hold it in his hand so easily?”

“Don’t tell me....” Su Xin thought for a moment, then continued, “do you think he cultivates an Unspoiled Body? That would explain why he's so tough, and how he resisted being petrified by the Great Necropolis godpower. That’s got to be it! The legendary Unspoiled Body is the only explanation. And that means he must have the sheepskin scroll! If that’s the case, then we need to—”

“Hold on!” Mu Renwang interrupted. “Even if that’s the case, it won't do us any good right now. The reason he gave the jade to us in the first place must be because he actually understands the fundamentals of how it works. If we try forcing him to hand over the sheepskin scroll, it's highly likely that he’ll do something desperate. We need him to be obedient and easy to control, so for now, we can’t do anything dramatic. Don’t forget, even a scared rabbit will bite!”

“This brat has too many secrets,” Su Xin said with a cold harrumph. “And he’s far too ambitious. There’s no way he really wants to be a puppet. Maybe we should just kill him and go back to square one. We need someone loyal to us, not some crafty schemer! If he really was loyal, he would’ve already explained all his secrets to us instead of holding them back.”

“Of course we’ll kill him. Eventually. For now, he’s still useful as an experiment. Considering he knows that we can create new Inheritors, we obviously can’t let him live for too long. Besides, he’ll eventually slip out of our control. But if we kill him now, and really go back to square one, how would we find another suitable candidate? Strong people are always ambitious, so what would we do if our next candidate was the same; kill him, too?”

“Well, that’s true,” Su Xin said. “We don’t have time to groom someone else, so I suppose we can only hope this brat really can beat Bastard Seacliff. I guess if he’s hiding some of his true strength, it just means he stands a better chance of winning. You know, that Star Swordlife doesn’t seem too bad. Maybe we should groom him as well, to use as a counter to Yang Qi. Pitting two pawns against each other is always a good strategy.”

“Star Swordlife? He won’t do as the league-lord. He’s far too obstinate. Although, he is profoundly gifted, perhaps no less so than Yang Qi. Furthermore, it might be safer to work with him, as he doesn't seem like the kind of person who would fight back. He claims to follow a dao of life, to the point where he even refused to kill the Flower-Seizing Marauder. Yes, I think setting him up against Yang Qi would be a good idea. Let's bring him in and offer to help him. If things don’t work out, we can just kill him and take his Inheritor’s godpower seed.”

“We’ve killed eighteen Inheritors so far,” Su Xin said, “which means we have eighteen godpower seeds. And we've already refined and cleansed them of any wretch energy on them. What a pity that we can’t absorb them. If we could, we’d have access to the secrets of the Great Necropolis, and possibly even a chance to reach the legion of gods.”

“Don’t worry. We’re already half finished with our uses for Yang Qi. It won’t be long before we can turn him into a pure research subject.” A vicious smile appeared on Mu Renwang’s face. “His fate is in our hands. If he’s loyal, maybe we can give him some of our collection of eighteen godpower seeds. But if he's too ambitious and refuses to be our puppet, we can just kill him.”

Chapter 1065: Eighteen Godpower Seeds

Mu Renwang pulled out a box and opened it, immediately causing the aura of the Great Necropolis to spill out. The box contained eighteen purified godpower seeds, which looked crystalline, beautiful, and without the slightest hint of impurity.

“Eighteen godpower seeds,” he breathed. “Incredible.”

“What do you think would happen if we gave all eighteen of these godpower seeds to Star Swordlife?” Su Xin said.

“The boy would instantly reach the mid Terrifying level,” Mu Renwang replied. “In fact, he would probably reach the ultimate heights of that level, making him capable of killing anyone else who wasn’t in a higher level than himself. But that’s never going to happen. After what happened with the Flower-Seizing Marauder, you can tell that he has a completely one-track mind. And that could lead to some big problems if he interferes when we need to kill someone. We’d be in huge trouble if he could defy us. Alright, that clinches it. If we help him, he won’t be grateful at all. He’ll claim that because he’s benevolent and generous by nature, the dao of heaven is taking care of him.”

“That’s right,” Su Xin growled. “The little bastard is horrible. If I had to choose between him and Yang Qi, I’d definitely go with Yang Qi. Star Swordlife is going to get killed eventually. There’s no way he can live with that attitude.”

“You’re right. Star Swordlife is horrible, and isn’t willing to play by the rules everyone follows. The best thing is to get him and Yang Qi to take each other out. That will get rid of two potential catastrophes. In any case, we definitely can’t waste these godpower seeds on him. We’ll need to use other means to get him ready to fight Yang Qi. Why don’t we invite him over for a chat, and if he’s obstinate, threaten to harm his sect? We can start that way.”

Su Xin nodded. “Good idea. Star Swordlife values life, so if he doesn't go along with us, we can start killing people from his sect. We have to seize the initiative in this situation! It’s imperative that we control the league-lord, and by extension, the Genesis Sanctum. And when our two sects ‘bless’ Yang Qi, we can filter the power through him and into our daughter. That way, she can reach the mid Terrifying level. And with the three of us all at the same level of power, there’s no way the Genesis Sanctum will be able to do anything to us. We’ll be the leader of all the superpower sects!”

“I never thought we would actually pull off this heroic undertaking. But if we can get Huangfu Genesis under control, it’ll all be worth it.” Mu Renwang frowned. “By the way, we need to think about how we're going to deal with the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect. Although no one in the sect is really worth worrying about, that bubble beast isn't anything to take lightly. What do they call it? A purrling.”

“That’s right!” Su Xin said, then thought for a long moment. “I wonder where the thing actually came from. Apparently, it killed the junior pontiff’s steward and all of his other subordinates. Not even his spell formation could stand up to it. I have the feeling that getting rid of the thing won’t be easy.”

“Let’s keep an eye on the beast. It might be strong, but it's just an animal. And it's not as if it’s the King of Godmammoths. If we could get control of it, it would be a huge benefit. The only question is how to do that. Perhaps we could lend someone a knife and have them do our dirty work for us. In other words, damage the Genesis Sanctum, and at the same time, find out how strong the creature really is.”

“Oh, you mean...? Frame the thing for killing people from the Genesis Sanctum? They would definitely seek revenge, and try to kill or take it. A fight like that would only benefit us.” Su Xin chuckled. “Not a bad idea at all. I doubt their junior pontiff wants to get in another fight with the purrling, but maybe if we add some fuel to the fire, we can get him to take action.”

“Yes, perfect. The stage is already set for a big fight, so let's see what the purrling can do. Maybe we can even get more information by getting Bastard Seacliff involved as well.”

“Yes, I agree!”

With that, they continued refining the details of their plot.

Some time before, Yang Qi had summoned his Wheel of Fate, causing an invisible stream of Fateless energy to swirl around him. That, in turn, allowed him to pick up on the fluctuations of the Heart-Linking Hex, which he analyzed with the Civilization Founding Grand Magic.

He had already cultivated the Civilization Founding Grand Magic to its limit, enabling him to pick up on even the slightest of energy fluctuations. Unfortunately, the Civilization Founding Grand Magic wasn’t enough for him to learn anything about two mid Terrifying experts.

However, thanks to the Godly Positioning System of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, he knew their general location.

And although he couldn’t physically observe them, thanks to the fluctuations, he was able to do some spying. This was the same thing he had done with Archmonk Dharma Treasury when he spied on the Shepherd, and it was all thanks to the Heart-Linking Hex.

He almost felt like history was repeating.

It was by means of this that he eavesdropped on the imperial couple’s entire conversation.

‘Eighteen godpower seeds?’ he thought. ‘These two people killed eighteen Inheritors! Wow. This might be the perfect opportunity for me. Back when Archmonk Dharma Treasury and I were dealing with the Shepherd, he used that technique called Buddha Goes to a Strange World, which was how we ended up getting the Mahātmā Jade. My cultivation base is far beyond that now. Maybe I should try to get those seeds. Considering they’re already purified, I could assimilate them immediately.’

All of a sudden, a new plan began forming in his mind.

He was completely convinced that if he could get those eighteen godpower seeds, he would be able to reach the Terrifying level. The only problem was that he wasn't sure if he could withstand the Great Necropolis godpower that would come with them.

‘They want to use Star Swordlife against me, huh, that stubborn ass. Well, hopefully he pisses them off to no end. In the end, it doesn’t matter, I’ll kill him if I have to. And I’ll use those eighteen seeds to get stronger. Now that I know about their existence, there’s no way I’ll let them be used by someone else. Hmm. They want to set the Genesis Sanctum against my sect to figure out more about the purrling? That would take care of two birds with one stone. Not a bad idea, but sadly, I'm on to them. And I'm interested in seeing what the purrling is capable of, too.’

Of course, Yang Qi was keeping some divine will focused on the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect at all times.

Meanwhile, more and more people were gathering for the assembly. Many were forming smaller groups and factions, and there were even groups that were made up of thousands of sects. Most people were sitting around discussing Daoist techniques and cultivation methods while they waited for the assembly to begin.

At the same time, the young elites who had attended Junior Empress Mu Yexi’s banquet had begun spreading word about the news. Soon, everyone was talking about how the two main sects wanted to have a young one become the league-lord, then subsequently bless that person with power.

Although most people had initially found the idea farfetched, as they thought about it in detail, they realized it was actually a very good idea. It would end the friction between the two biggest sects, and give hope to the masses. Everyone was getting excited at the prospects.

Of course, the House of God Bastards had become a big unknown factor. A lot of people were dead set against the idea of Bastard Seacliff becoming the league-lord and having authority over all the sects.

Overall, the mood was one of tense excitement.

It was around this time that a hot rumor began spreading about the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect.

The rumor was about how the junior pontiff of the Genesis Sanctum had invited Jadefall to a banquet, but ended up having all of his men killed by her purrling.

The news was quite explosive. After all, Yang Qi had only just recently killed the Flower-Seizing Marauder. And now another dramatic event related to the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect had occurred. Some people even suspected that the rumor wasn’t true. But regardless, it put the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect even more in the spotlight.

Eventually, Sectlord Will Manifestation set aside an area in the main hall where he set up warding magics to keep people out and allow those on the inside to focus on cultivation.

Zi Qiong and Jadefall were kept inside to avoid any problems.

Of course, there were a lot of people who wanted to have a look at the purrling.

Considering that there were hundreds of thousands of sects already present, and countless experts, it was obvious that there was plenty of spying going on. It was a hodgepodge of good and bad people, and no one knew what unexpected events might play out.

“The Dharma Sect has come for a formal visit!” All of a sudden, a group of monks from the Dharma Sect appeared; considering that they were frequent guests, the sectlord quickly opened a small doorway in the shield he had created.

That was when a cruel voice spoke. “How dare you, Will Manifestation Heaven Sect! You actually set yourself in opposition to the Genesis Sanctum!? Although I personally am not from that sect, I can’t bear to see behavior such as yours. And I don't believe the rumors about how powerful that bullshit creature of yours is. Bring it out for me to see!”

RUMBLE!

In the blink of an eye, an enormous hand was rumbling toward the opening Sectlord Will Manifestation had created, and the monks of the Dharma Sect were forced to scatter to avoid it!

Purr. Purr....

Suddenly, a bubble appeared and completely surrounded the hand.

Then, another bubble appeared in a far corner of the hall, where it surrounded what appeared to be nothing more than a random, low-level disciple. However, as soon as the bubble surrounded him, he suddenly transformed into a hulking devil king.

“That’s Devil King Smeltgold! A top expert of the wretched dao!” People began shouting in shock.

Chapter 1066: Inescapable Bubbles

“Devil King Smeltgold?! According to the stories, he's a hybrid of a hell-born fiend-devil and a human. His cultivation base is incredible, and he's one of the top bandits from the ancient road, someone who specializes in murder. I can’t believe he’s working for the Genesis Sanctum. Maybe he didn’t officially join them, but he's definitely here on their behalf.”

“Well, he’s dead now.”

“I heard that Devil King Smeltgold has a whole bunch of clones, and nobody knows where his true self is.”

“Now he’s stuck in that bubble. And if you look closely, he's not here as a clone. That’s his true self! He’s really going to die!”

Everyone present was shocked by what they were seeing.

Trapped in the bubble, Devil King Smeltgold screamed miserably until he died. Then the bubble faded away and his corpse dropped to the ground. As everyone looked on, they saw what appeared to be golden leaves falling down around the corpse, which were Devil King Smeltgold’s clones.

In other words, the purrling had reached out and summoned all of his clones into the bubble with him.

What kind of divine ability was that?

It was unthinkable!

Swish!

At this point, a speeding beam of sword light appeared, filled with lightning, wind, clouds, and rain. Although it was initially impossible to tell who this sword light belonged to, they were obviously so strong that they surpassed Devil King Smeltgold.

The sword light stabbed into the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect’s warding spell, devastating it so dramatically that it seemed the people inside would soon be under threat of attack.

“A consummate expert!”

“A boundless assassin!”

“It's someone from the Royal Palace of Assassins! I can’t believe they showed up! Everybody says they're a group of extremely mysterious assassins who can be hired to do any job, as long as you pay them enough godhood....”

“I heard that the Royal Palace of Assassins can even kill mid Terrifying experts!”

“No wonder they’re so strong. Did the Genesis Sanctum hire them?”

The sword light danced back and forth so quickly it was impossible to fully track its movement. Furthermore, no one could see who had sent the sword light. Without that person’s true self present, how could the sword light possibly be dealt with?

Yet the purrling still started purring.

Instantly, the sword light converged into the shape of a sword, floating in the middle of a bubble and incapable of moving.

At that point, cruel laughter rang out, accompanied by a voice that seemed to come from nowhere and everywhere. “The Royal Palace of Assassins has already accepted the job of killing everyone from the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect. We won’t stop until you’re all dead. Do you people really think some wild animal is going to save you?”

Purr!

Another bubble shot out. Everyone watched as the bubble disappeared. Then, only a moment later, a scream rang out from off in the distance. The bubble reappeared and within it was an elite assassin, dressed in all black, with the word ‘royal’ embroidered on his chest.

“Impossible!” he shrieked, struggling. “My true self is in the Royal Palace of Assassins! How did you get to me? You’re not a human, you're a god!” His face a mask of disbelief, he continued letting loose screams that caused everyone’s skin to tingle.

Eventually, his screams stopped.

The bubble vanished, and his corpse dropped to the ground. Just like that, a top expert from the Royal Palace of Assassins had been killed. It was true that the Royal Palace of Assassins was a mysterious organization that would assassinate anyone for the right price. However, according to rumor, the King of Assassins, despite being a mid Terrifying expert, had failed to assassinate the emperor of the executors and was eventually killed. Afterward, no one heard anything about the Royal Palace of Assassins again.

But now, here they were, operating out in the open again.

What did that imply? All sorts of dangerous organizations were popping out of the woodwork now that this big sect assembly had been called.

All of a sudden, two streams of killing intent shot out from the void.

“How dare you kill someone from the Royal Palace of Assassins! You’ll all die for that!”

Two streams of sword light appeared, yet all that happened was that two purring sounds could be heard.

Two bubbles appeared, vanished, then reappeared. Inside them were two assassins, already dead. Those bubbles could find people no matter where they were hiding, leaving everyone present completely terrorized. Could people even hide in the god world? Apparently not.

The attacks of the purrling completely disregarded distance, and even the protection of spell formations.

No one could escape those bubbles.

In hardly a single breath of time, three top assassins had been killed, along with Devil King Smeltgold.

Not even having soul lamps or similar things hidden away in one's sect would do any good. Those things were also dragged out by the purrling’s bubbles.

Anyone who tried to harm the purrling would be snatched up by those bubbles, regardless of their status or identity.

That was what the invincible purrling was capable of.

“What the fuck!?” someone blurted. “It’s so strong!”

This purrling was turning out to be more freakish than anyone had imagined. After all, the Royal Palace of Assassins was known for its special abilities to kill people from afar. And they must have had the approval and help of the Genesis Sanctum to be able to carry out assassinations in Destructionless Castle.

But in the end, that approval and help had done them no good, and they were still slaughtered by the purrling.

“You just wait, Will Manifestation Heaven Sect....” The threatening voice seemed to fill the area, as though the words were being spoken by a host of people. Everyone present looked around fearfully. After all, it wasn’t a good thing to have the Royal Palace of Assassins back in business.

Purr. Purr. Purr....

The pink purrling stretched, then exhaled a series of bubbles that almost instantly disappeared.

A moment later a string of screams echoed out. “Don’t target that animal with killing intent!”

Unfortunately, the cry of warning came too late. The bubbles reappeared, filled with people that had targeted the purrling with killing intent. Those people struggled for a bit, but in the end, they all died. The bubbles faded and the corpses dropped to the ground.

Meanwhile, the purrling hardly seemed to be doing anything at all, other than wriggling and stretching in Jadefall’s arms. In fact, it looked quite happy. Everyone nervously edged away, not even daring to look at the purrling.

For all they knew, meeting its gaze could end up with them in a bubble.

When it was all over, there was a pile of corpses, mostly from the Royal Palace of Assassins. Zi Qiong flew out, waved her hand, and collected the corpses to make into puppets later.

At the same time, Sectlord Will Manifestation rose to his feet. Keeping his shock hidden, he said, “I don’t care what orders you received, Royal Palace of Assassins. If you don't learn your lesson, and insist on being stubborn, then all of you are going to end up wiped out of existence.”

His words, backed by the threat of the purrling, caused everyone to have an even higher opinion of the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect than before. And no one from the Royal Palace of Assassins responded to the sectlord, which amplified the fear in the hearts of the onlookers.

Silence reigned.

No one dared to cause any problems for the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect. As far as they were concerned, the purrling might as well have been a mid Terrifying expert.

**

Crack!

Back in the Genesis Sanctum, the junior pontiff’s wine cup shattered in his hand and a vicious expression appeared on his face. “How could this be happening? How could it be so strong? I spent ten pieces of godhood to hire the Royal Palace of Assassins. I can’t believe they failed. And look at how many of them died! I wouldn’t be surprised if they try blackmailing me over this! What do we do? Why is that little animal so unexpectedly fierce?”

Of course, he didn’t dare to make a move, as he was truly frightened by how things were playing out.

He knew that if he targeted the purrling with killing intent, he would be finished. No one would be able to save him. He also viewed it as a mid Terrifying expert, which meant that he wasn’t even sure if his father could deal with it.

“Are you starting to get worried, Junior Pontiff?”

The junior pontiff turned his head to find a young man approaching. Shocked, he said, “Who are you? I didn’t invite you here.”

The man smiled condescendingly. “I'm Bastard Seacliff. Heard of me?”

“So you’re Bastard Seacliff, junior houselord of the House of God Bastards. I thought you were on good terms with Mu Yexi. Didn't you attend her banquet? What, don’t tell me the House of God Bastards wants to oppose our Genesis Sanctum.”

“That’s not it,” Bastard Seacliff casually replied. “Mu Yexi from the Woodfern Couple Palace definitely doesn’t trust me, and is already working on contingency plans to oppose me. In fact, I could tell from the look in her eye that she’s plotting against me. Look, I didn’t come here to quibble. I want one thing: to be the league-lord. Do you have any problems with that?”

“You want to be the league-lord?” The junior pontiff snorted coldly. “Do you really think it's that easy?”

“What if I make it worth your while?” Bastard Seacliff said, smiling. “I’m definitely going to destroy the Woodfern Couple Palace, eventually. Mu Renwang is going to die, and I’ll throw his wife Su Xin and his daughter Mu Yexi in my harem. Considering that your Genesis Sanctum is full of men, I'm not particularly interested in you.”

The junior pontiff burst out laughing. “You’re crazy, Bastard Seacliff! The Woodfern Couple Palace isn’t going to go down that easily. That said, if you want to be the league-lord, I could give you my approval if you handle a matter for me.”

“Oh? What matter?”

“Go get that purrling for me.” The junior pontiff was obviously trying to lend someone a knife and have them do his dirty work.

Bastard Seacliff chuckled cynically. “I have no idea where that animal comes from. The god world doesn’t contain any information about it, and furthermore, it's mysterious and unpredictable. I don’t even know if my father could capture it without suffering a humiliating defeat. Sorry, your plan is too crappy to work.”

Chapter 1067: Plans and Plots

“Oh?”

Bastard Seacliff’s words struck fear into the heart of the junior pontiff. He had been hoping to use the man to do his dirty work for him. But who could have guessed that Bastard Seacliff, who had cut down Prince Nobledeath of the Executors of the Ancient Road, would also be afraid of the purrling? It only went to reinforce how terrifying the thing actually was.

The people from the Royal Palace of Assassins had died as quickly as ants tossed into boiling water, the sight of which still lingered in the junior pontiff’s mind. And here Bastard Seacliff was saying that he wasn’t sure if even his own father could do anything to the purrling. In fact, the junior pontiff suspected he wasn't telling the truth, because wouldn’t that imply that the purrling was completely invincible? And if the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect was going to dominate the sect assembly, then what would everyone else be able to gain?

Looking as cynical as ever, Bastard Seacliff said, “Apparently you’re unaware of the fact that the Woodfern Couple Palace is responsible for spreading rumors about your recent humiliation. They wanted you to try to take the purrling down, hoping that you would reveal more about it in the process. Thankfully, you’re smart, and hired the Royal Palace of Assassins to probe the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect. And now you know the truth. That thing can drag people out no matter where they’re hiding, and kill them.”

“It's strong, that’s true,” the junior pontiff said. “But I'm still not convinced that it's invincible, just uncharacteristically powerful. I want to know what exactly it is.” Although the junior pontiff had finally managed to suppress his normal arrogance and conceit, he couldn’t help but add, “Your House of God Bastards is really patient, eh? Instead of making a move on the purrling, you’re waiting to see how things play out. In the end, the worst loser of all is the Royal Palace of Assassins. They really suffered some horrific casualties.”

“Yes, but the Royal Palace of Assassins won’t just let the issue drop, Junior Pontiff. In fact, that's the reason I came to see you. Considering how many assassins just died, I can tell you that they’re going to be coming to you for compensation.”

The junior pontiff’s face drained of blood, but he still managed to snort coldly. “I paid the godhood they asked for. It's not my fault they weren’t strong enough, and failed the mission as a result. In fact, according to our agreement, they should continue with the assassination attempts. Either that or give me back my godhood. They can’t just bite the hand that feeds them! That's a basic principle of doing business.”

“A basic principle of business?” Bastard Seacliff laughed loudly. “Didn't you know? The Royal Palace of Assassins doesn’t operate on the principles of reason. They're not going to hold the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect responsible for killing their assassins. They’ll hold their client responsible!”

“Yeah, well so what? If they want to be unreasonable like that, I’ll call on the full power of the Genesis Sanctum to wipe them out of existence. Their King of Assassins is already dead, killed by the Executors of the Ancient Road. If the surviving losers think they can cause problems for me, well, they're just courting death!”

“Curse them all you want, it's not going to change the fact that the King of Assassins isn’t dead. In fact, he recently returned to full strength. Nervous now?”

“What?!” the junior pontiff said, a tremor passing through him. “The King of Assassins is alive?! How is that possible? I thought he died a long time ago! If he’s alive, that’s simply—”

“Simply terrifying,” Bastard Seacliff said. He chuckled. “Think about it. The only reason you weren’t afraid of the Royal Palace of Assassins is that you had your father to rely on. But if the King of Assassins takes on your father, then both of you are going to be killed beyond the shadow of a doubt. Meanwhile, the Woodfern Couple Palace is lurking off to the side, just waiting for you to be taken out. Furthermore, the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect obviously knows that you’re the one who hired the assassins, which means that they have it out for you as well. It seems to me the Genesis Sanctum is doomed to be destroyed!”

“You...” the junior pontiff spluttered, and then he sat there for a long moment. Finally, he said, “So what’s the point here? You want to team up with me? You want my support in your bid for the spot of league-lord? If so, there’s got to be some benefit to me. What are you offering?”

“What am I offering? To help you deal with the Royal Palace of Assassins, for one thing. I can keep you safe. All you have to do is support my bid for league-lord.”

“How do you know you can pull it off?” the junior pontiff said suspiciously.

“Simple. I’ll give them enough godhood to ensure they don’t cause any trouble for you. In the end, they operate for profit. By the way, I can also help you deal with the Woodfern Couple Palace.”

“That’s not a bad offer, but I need more. If I support you, it’ll likely involve crossing my father. He's a mid Terrifying expert and no weaker than you. Besides, there are plenty of other powerful old-timers in the Genesis Sanctum, so it's not as if I'm all that important.”

“Okay, take this distiller’s yeast. I'm sure you realize how valuable it is, although I don’t have much use for it.” When Bastard Seacliff produced the very same distiller’s yeast he had taken from the banquet at the Woodfern Couple Palace, the junior pontiff’s eyes suddenly glittered with bright light.

“Fine. I promise to help you become the league-lord.”

“Then swear an oath,” Bastard Seacliff said. “It's not as if I'm going to give you this distiller’s yeast based on your word alone.”

“Alright!” Clearing his throat, the junior pontiff continued, “I hereby swear that if you give me that distiller’s yeast, and I don’t help you become the league-lord, I’ll die and never be properly buried. However, you’re responsible for dealing with any contenders. I've heard that the Woodfern Couple Palace is grooming both the junior sectlord from the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect and Star Swordlife. If they attack you, it won’t have anything to do with me.”

“Are you kidding me?” Bastard Seacliff laughed coldly. Tossing the distiller’s yeast over, he said, “You think I'm worried about ants like them? Remember your oath. I know that some people don’t take their oaths seriously, but I can tell you that if you go back on your word, the oath will come true sooner or later....”

With that, he vanished into thin air.

When the junior pontiff was sure he was gone, he spat, “Motherfucking asshole! You think I care about oaths? You have no idea how many oaths I’ve taken in my life, and I never keep my word. But nobody has ever been able to do a single thing about it. You actually believed me, dickhead?” He burst out laughing. “Considering how easily you’re fooled, it's not going to be hard at all to kill you!”

Looking down at the distiller’s yeast, he continued, “This definitely has some powerful warding spell placed in it. But it's not like I can’t get rid of it. You've underestimated the Genesis Sanctum. With the power of this distiller’s yeast, and the spirit medicines we make here, I’m going to push my cultivation base to the next level! With the right opportunity, I’ll easily be able to step into the mid Terrifying level.”

With that, he vanished into the depths of the Genesis Sanctum.

**

In a secret room in the Woodfern Couple Palace, Mu Renwang and Su Xin were splitting their attention in three directions. First, the eighteen godpower seeds. Second, the Mahātmā Jade. And third, the events playing out with the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect and the purrling.

After watching Devil King Smeltgold and the experts from the Royal Palace of Assassins all get killed by the purrling’s bubbles, they exchanged shocked glances.

“How could this be happening?” Mu Renwang said. “That level of power.... Those assassins pierce through space with their attacks. Their true selves were definitely back in the Royal Palace of Assassins. If they tried to kill us that way, we might have been able to use a spatial interception technique to strike back, but we would never have been able to pull them to our location. That type of power is unimaginable.”

Piercing through space to attack enemies was something that mid Terrifying experts could do with hardly any effort.

But pulling corporeal objects from another location to their own was a higher level of power that was definitely beyond them. In other words, the purrling had powers that could render them completely helpless.

“Is that thing really invincible?” Su Xin said. “This is bad. We need to kill that brat as quickly as possible. If he reunites with the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect, we’ll never be able to pull it off.”

“You're right,” Mu Renwang said, nodding. “Although, I think we're safe for the moment. The kid isn't interested in opposing us, and is even willing to be our pawn. In fact, killing him under the current circumstances wouldn’t be appropriate. Furthermore, we haven’t sensed any errant thoughts as he works on his cultivation. If he were plotting against us, the Heart-Linking Hex would’ve notified us.”

“True,” Su Xin replied. “We shouldn’t discard our pawn so blithely. Besides, the purrling can’t be used as an offensive weapon. It only seems to protect its owner. As long as we don’t do anything threatening to that girl, we’ll be fine. Besides, that beast’s power is so heaven-defying that it's a foregone conclusion the dao of heaven will eventually do something to restrict it.”

“That’s exactly right,” Mu Renwang said. “Right now, our main focus should be getting Mu Yexi into the mid Terrifying level. With the three of us working together, who under heaven could possibly defy us? Let’s try this again, and hope we succeed. We’ll go all out to finish cleansing these eighteen godpower seeds. Afterward, we should have even more enlightenment about the Great Necropolis, which should advance our energy arts and cultivation bases. Hmph! That bastard Huangfu Genesis has no idea how strong we are now. It's going to be a big surprise when he finds out.”

“Huangfu Genesis has been our enemy for so many years. It's definitely time to kill him.”

Meanwhile, Yang Qi opened his eyes. ‘Incredible,’ he thought. ‘The purrling is so strong! It can actually pierce through space to grab opponents. It completely ignored the magical laws and restrictions of space. I wonder if I could pick up some of those abilities as well....’

Chapter 1068: Grabbing from a Distance

Yang Qi had been watching closely as the purrling pierced through space to grab the experts from the Royal Palace of Assassins.

He had been involved with the purrling from the very beginning. After all, he was the one who had helped Jadefall break open the porcelain godspore that contained it, a process that had gone on for years. Obviously, the purrling recognized his aura and treated him like a friend. In fact, the only person it was closer to was Jadefall herself. Because of that, Yang Qi was confident that the purrling wouldn’t hurt or kill him. If anything, it enjoyed playing with him. Furthermore, his connection with the purrling had made it possible for him to gain deep enlightenment of the Purrfect God Art.

He was a Fateless One, and had also acquired Eternal and Fortuned blood. And during his time in the Great Necropolis, he had gathered blood from others among the three thousand constitutions, which he had also refined and added to his own blood. As a result, his blood was becoming more and more like the Blood of the One God.

Because of all of that, he was turning into something unique, something superior to all other beings. Not even King Immortal-Slayer had done anything like that.

Throughout all the years, there had never been a Fateless One like Yang Qi.

Of course, at the moment, it wasn’t known what kind of blood Proud Heaven had, or the bearer of the God Legion Seal from the Primeval Age.

As the power of his blood was awakened, Yang Qi was also gaining enlightenment of the Great Necropolis godpower, and in fact, had become an Inheritor. With the added powers of the Purrfect God Art, it was impossible to say exactly how powerful he was, or would become.

That was especially true if he could pierce through space the way the purrling could.

Yang Qi once again sank into a trance of enlightenment as he sought to improve his Purrfect God Art. Obviously, if he could master that ability, it would be vastly superior to Buddha Goes to a Strange World, or other such divine abilities. With it, and the powers of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, it was entirely possible that he could get his hands on the box with the eighteen godpower seeds in it.

If he consumed those seeds, his cultivation base would definitely reach the Terrifying level, and his psychic scale would reach at least ninety-nine. At that point, his fighting prowess wouldn’t just be equal to that of Bastard Seacliff, he would probably surpass him to the point where he could fight two people like that.

Of course, advancing his Purrfect God Art would also give him access to more of the godpower of the Great Necropolis.

‘I really do need to thank this imperial couple,’ he thought. ‘Without them adding fuel to the fire, the Royal Palace of Assassins wouldn't have gotten involved, and the purrling wouldn’t have used that ability. But now that I know about it, I can seek enlightenment and hopefully reach a higher level.’

Although his true energy was seething in transformation, it wasn’t possible to see that just by looking at him. Mu Yexi looked at him thoughtfully, unsure of exactly what he was doing. That said, she didn't dare to interfere, and simply focused on her own cultivation.

Although her mysterious arts were powerful, if she fought Bastard Seacliff, she would have to struggle to end the fight in a draw.

Of course, she could tell that Yang Qi was working on something profound, but thanks to the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth she had no way to get any more information.

As Yang Qi worked with the Purrfect God Art, he eventually reached a state of emptiness in which he felt completely omnipotent, like a god that had surpassed the god world. At that moment, his cultivation base reached an even more profound and invincible level.

At the same time, bubbles appeared within him.

His mind was filled with such immense power that, before he realized what was happening, his psychic scale climbed by five points. He was now at a total of thirty-five, which in turn allowed him to gain more enlightenment of space-time and its complexities. Instantly, his Civilization Founding Grand Magic and imperial-heaven pre-beginning powers reached a new level.

Five points on the psychic scale was nothing to look down on; some people would never improve their psychic scale by that much in an entire lifetime.

Those who did might spend fifty billion years before succeeding, but Yang Qi did it in the blink of an eye. As he did, the godpower seeds he possessed began melting even faster, and the godpower of the necropolis fused more fully with his true energy, all without impurities or side-effects.

By now, he could inhale the godpower of the Great Necropolis as easily as an ordinary mortal could breathe in the spirit energy of heaven and earth.

He was now stronger than even the other ordinary Inheritors, the reason being that he was founding his own system instead of just inheriting another.

He went through several full cycles of the Purrfect God Art and found that both his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth and Unspoiled Body were benefiting, just as yin and yang would interact.

The Great Necropolis godpower was turning out to be like the building block needed to construct the tower that was the Purrfect God Art.

All of a sudden, Yang Qi felt like the bubbles within him were reaching a state of initial completion. In fact, he realized he could use a bubble on the Heart-Linking Hex to completely destroy it if he wanted to.

He wouldn't, of course, considering that he could use that hex to spy on the imperial couple.

Mu Renwang and Su Xin were continuing their work with the eighteen godpower seeds, which had been almost completely cleansed of misfortune by this point, and were now thrumming with life.

When Yang Qi saw that, he began building up his psychic power.

His plans were now coming to fruition, and he was currently stronger than ever. It reminded him a lot of when he and Archmonk Dharma Treasury had stolen the Mahātmā Jade, except that he was now vastly stronger than before and didn’t need any outside help.

In the moment that he gained the enlightenment he needed from the Purrfect God Art, Yang Qi opened his eyes.

Sensing that something had happened, Mu Yexi looked over at him.

“What are you doing, Yang Qi!” she said in a tone of anger.

However, even as her words hung in the air, Yang Qi exhaled a bubble, which instantly surrounded her, locking her up and making it impossible for her to move.

In the secret chamber, Mu Renwang and Su Xin both shivered. “This is bad,” Su Xin said. “Did something just happen to Yexi!?”

Both of them shot to their feet, angry expressions on their faces as they abandoned their work with the eighteen godpower seeds.

Crash!

The box dropped to the ground.

Swish!

A vortex opened leading to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, and a wild eruption of power slammed into the imperial couple. Given that they were both mid Terrifying experts, they immediately realized what was happening. “Someone is ambushing us? Who is it? Who’s looking to get killed?!”

“It’s the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart!”

They both thrust out their palms and hit the vortex, completely dispelling it. Inside, the immortal-slaying clone was sent flying backward, blood spraying out of his mouth. Thankfully, he had the power of the chart itself backing him, otherwise he would have been crushed out of existence.

Mu Renwang and Su Xin obviously weren’t pulling their punches.

Unfortunately for them, the fight wasn’t over.

Two bubbles appeared, instantly shooting forward to entrap them.

“Purrling bubbles!?”

Their faces masks of fear and shock, they unleashed palm strikes to try to break the bubbles. To their surprise, they succeeded, and the bubbles faded out of existence before reaching them.

However, it was at that moment that they realized there was a third bubble present, and that it had already reached the jade box on the ground. Before they could do anything, the bubble vanished.

“Dammit....”

“How come those bubbles were so weak?”

“What exactly is going on here?”

“Wait, I know. It's that damned brat causing trouble!”

“Die!”

They were both enraged, neither of them having predicted that Yang Qi would have played them like this. And right now, the only thing they wanted to do was chop him to pieces.

They vanished, reappearing in the hall they had left Yang Qi in. There, they saw their daughter Mu Yexi in a bubble, with Yang Qi right next to her, one hand wrapped around her waist, the other holding the box of godpower seeds.

“Stay your hand, brat!” Mu Renwang shouted. “Do you know what you've done?!”

He chopped his hand out, but Yang Qi just shifted Mu Yexi in front of him, forcing Mu Renwang to pull his hand back. Before anything else could happen, Yang Qi popped the godpower seeds into his mouth.

Off to the side, Su Xin tried to activate the Heart-Linking Hex.

However, absolutely nothing happened.

“You think your Heart-Linking Hex is going to do any good?” Yang Qi said, chuckling, and a vortex appeared behind him that pulsed with immense power.

“You have the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart!?” Mu Renwang said.

“Exactly. And I happened to acquire a new ability recently.” Flicking his finger, a bubble appeared, within which was the Heart-Linking Hex. “Considering how you've treated me, did you really think I would let you off the hook? What do you think? I just consumed the eighteen godpower seeds you worked so hard to cleanse. I'm already starting to get stronger, and I'm already at the point where you can’t kill me. And I have your daughter right here. If you want her dead, then go ahead and make a move.”

Chapter 1069: Name Your Price

Yang Qi had finally succeeded, and his carefully laid plans were playing out perfectly.

Mu Renwang and Su Xin were so incredibly powerful that if Yang Qi hadn’t gained valuable experience from stealing the Mahātmā Jade from the Shepherd, he would never have succeeded. Nor would he have succeeded if they hadn’t used the Heart-Linking Hex on him. And were it not for the Royal Palace of Assassins trying to take out the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect, the purrling would never have revealed its ability and Yang Qi would never have gained further enlightenment of the Purrfect God Art. In that case, he would also have failed.

Another factor was that the imperial couple had left Mu Yexi behind to watch over Yang Qi, giving him the perfect hostage.

And if the imperial couple hadn’t revealed their eighteen godpower seeds to him, Yang Qi would have had no choice but to go along with their plan to manipulate him.

There were a host of factors that had all played out perfectly in his favor.

In the end, it was the imperial couple’s conniving and overbearing attitude, and their insistence on turning Yang Qi into a puppet, that ensured everything had turned out this way.

If they had treated him the way the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect had, supporting him and helping him with good intentions, then they might have greatly benefited as a result. Unfortunately, as mid Terrifying experts who could survive in the god world, they believed they were past the point of needing to deal with Yang Qi according to the old expression treat the virtuous men courteously and the scholars with respect.

Sadly for them, they had lost out and were now under Yang Qi’s control.

Their daughter’s life was in his hands, and they knew that they had to be very careful. Now that he had consumed the eighteen godpower seeds, Mu Renwang could see that Yang Qi’s cultivation base was enigmatically high, and he was pulsing with an energy that could shake the heavens and topple the earth. All of a sudden, Mu Renwang wasn't confident in being able to kill him.

“How dare you use our daughter to threaten us, you brute!”

“Lower your blade and become a buddha, Yang Qi,” Su Xin said. “Let our daughter go and get on your knees in repentance. That’s the only way you’ll get out of this situation alive, understand? Do you realize what you've done? We helped you! We even made you into an Inheritor. But as it turns out, you have the ambition of a wild wolf, and as soon as you made some energy arts progress you threatened us with the life of our daughter! Are you trying to get your sect wiped out? There’s no way the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect could possibly stand up to our fury!”

Although Su Xin was trying to appeal to Yang Qi's sense of righteousness, the truth was that she was ready to launch a deadly attack at any moment.

In response, Yang Qi laughed in their faces. “The way you two talk makes it seem like I'm too shameless to show my face in public. I know you’re planning to attack me, Su Xin. And I guarantee that if you do, I’ll tear your daughter into so many pieces you’ll never be able to put her back together. Go ahead and test my resolve, if you feel like it. I don’t care. Worst case scenario, I just hide in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, where you’ll never be able to get to me.”

“You!” Su Xin spat, furious at having her true intentions spoken out so casually. At the same time, it made her realize that Yang Qi was a lot smarter and more experienced than she realized, and not the sort of immature kid who could be easily fooled.

“Do you know how many dangerous situations I’ve found myself in throughout my life?” he asked. “By now, I can see through every kind of crafty plot and machination. The two of you planned to make me the puppet league-lord for only as long as it took to have me killed. You think I didn’t realize that? I know everything that you’ve been planning, thanks to the Heart-Linking Hex!” He chuckled darkly.

“Impossible!” Su Xin shrieked. “The Heart-Linking Hex is too profound! How could you possibly use it to spy on us?”

“Why couldn’t I? By the way, I know it was you who spread the word about what I did to the junior pontiff. And you knew that he would hire the Royal Palace of Assassins to try taking down the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect. You wanted that to happen, so that you could find out more about the purrling. If it turned out to be weak enough, you would’ve been more than happy to see my sect destroyed. You claimed that you would protect me and my sect as well, didn’t you? But not only did you not do that, you actually plotted against me. What kind of people are you? Did you actually want me to be dead-set on killing you?” Truth be told, Yang Qi was monologuing to buy time as he waited for the eighteen godpower seeds within him to be assimilated.

“You're very crafty and treacherous, boy!” Mu Renwang said, taking a step forward. “Sadly for you, you’re too greedy. Now that you’ve consumed those eighteen godpower seeds, your insides are roiling with true energy. And the instability caused by the Great Necropolis godpower is going to cause you to explode in short order. Did you really think we’d feel threatened by you?”

Yang Qi snorted coldly. “Are you sure about that? Are you certain that I can’t assimilate this power? You see, I'm quite experienced with the godpower of the Great Necropolis! I know that if you could somehow manage to deal with the purrling, you could easily wipe out my sect. But believe me, if you make the slightest wrong move, you’ll be sorry.”

Even as he spoke, his energy seemed to completely settle down, causing the imperial couple to again hold back.

They were hesitating to shoot the rat for fear of breaking the vases. After all, their daughter was still in the hands of this new enemy.

“I never could have guessed that you would be this ferocious, Yang Qi!” Mu Yexi said, her eyes flashing with anger. “Maybe you captured me in a moment of surprise, but do you really think that your cultivation base is strong enough to defy the entire Woodfern Couple Palace?” It wasn’t lost on her that she was the one who had invited the wolf into one’s house.

“Are you okay, Daughter?” Su Xin asked.

“He has me completely locked down, Mother. His cultivation base is so strong that I can’t even struggle. He's using some sort of divine ability that links our two souls together. In other words, if you land a blow on him, the damage will be inflicted on me.”

“What energy art is that?” Su Xin asked.

“My imperial-heaven pre-beginning powers,” Yang Qi replied. “I doubt you’ve heard of them, but that’s not important right now. Why don’t we start negotiating? After all, I don’t think we’ve reached the point where we can't reconcile our differences. You still want me to fight the Genesis Sanctum, don’t you? I can still do that, although not as your puppet.”

“Negotiate?” Su Xin said. “You want to negotiate? Fine, then put my daughter down. If you do, then maybe we can talk. If you don’t, you know what the consequences will be.”

“Don’t threaten me,” Yang Qi said. “I’d be happy to let your daughter go on one condition. Give me my Mahātmā Jade back. Without an Unspoiled Body, you can’t unlock its secrets, and in fact, if you try to use it for cultivation, it’ll suck you dry. I studied it for over a thousand years, and I can tell you it’s a complicated thing.”

“So, you do have the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body,” Su Xin growled, “and the sheepskin scroll.” She took out the Mahātmā Jade. “Why didn’t you say that from the beginning? You obviously had ill intentions from the get-go!”

“If I had ill intentions, I would have given you a cultivation method that would end with you being sucked into the jade and killed,” he replied. “You wouldn’t have stood a chance of saving yourselves.”

“How very kind of you,” Su Xin replied angrily.

“It has nothing to do with kindness. If you were to die, how could I deal with the Genesis Sanctum, or become the league-lord? You see, our interests still align, so calm down. It’s not as if I did anything to warrant being your enemy.”

“You obviously want to negotiate, so just tell us what you want,” Mu Renwang said. “There’s no need to go beating around the bush.”

“First, I want my Mahātmā Jade. Second, I want a real partnership, not a puppet arrangement. Third, you’re not allowed to do anything to my sect. We’ll swear blood oaths to advance and retreat together. In addition to those three major stipulations, we agree to discuss matters before making any detailed plans. And I’ll promise to help you fight the Genesis Sanctum.”

“First let our daughter go,” Su Xin replied.

“Do you think I'm an idiot?” Yang Qi said, laughing. “Come on. Swear formal oaths.”

“Fine. If it's an oath you want, we swear to live by your conditions.”

She and Mu Renwang exchanged a glance, then burst into laughter.

“Who could ever have thought that famous people like us would get manipulated by a brat like you,” he said. “Well done. You really pulled the rug right out from underneath us. Just as you said, we will advance and retreat together, mutually suffering any injuries. And whoever violates the agreement will die by the sword. Let men and gods alike bear witness to this oath!”

“Fine,” Yang Qi agreed. “Advance and retreat together, mutually suffer any injuries, and whoever violates the agreement will die by the sword.”

“Take the Mahātmā Jade,” Mu Renwang said, sending it flying over at incredible speed. However, as it neared Yang Qi, it was grabbed by a bubble and sucked into his bag. Mu Renwang and Su Xin exchanged another glance of surprise. They had previously assumed that Yang Qi would show some weakness when he grabbed the Mahātmā Jade, and they could attack him in that moment.

Instead, he left no such openings.

“Incredible,” Yang Qi said. “You two just swore oaths, then immediately prepared to break them. You encased the jade in energy arts that would have hurt me badly if I’d grabbed it with my hand. You two are clearly insincere at heart. If I were you, I’d watch out; that oath you swore might very well soon come true.”

“That was just a test of your strength,” Mu Renwang said dismissively. “Obviously you really are strong enough to be the league-lord. You have your jade, now let our daughter go.”

“Of course. I’ll just pretend I didn't see that little dirty trick of yours just now.” Yang Qi pushed Mu Yexi out, and in the blink of an eye, the imperial couple attacked!

The attack hit, and Yang Qi exploded!

But it was just a power double; his true self was nowhere to be seen. Laughter rang out. “I'm out with my purrling now. If you want to kill me, come and get me. But if you want to work together, you’d better consider those oaths of yours. You don’t want to end up meeting a grisly end! And when you see how I help you deal with the House of God Bastards and the Genesis Sanctum, you’ll realize how truly powerful I am!”

Chapter 1070: Dealing with the Seeds

“Who would’ve thought that we would spend all day hunting geese, capture one, and then be blinded by it?”

Both Mu Renwang and Su Xin were absolutely furious, yet they had no way to vent their anger.

SMACK!

Mu Renwang suddenly slapped Mu Yexi on the side of the face.

She looked back at him, stunned, as her face turned red and swelled up. She was the beautiful and famous junior empress, who had never been hit by another person in her life. To be slapped by her father was almost too much for her to take.

“What are you doing, Mu Renwang!?” Su Xin shouted angrily. “You’re so useless you couldn't do anything about that brat, so you take it out on your daughter? How could she have seen what he really was? He stole those eighteen godpower seeds right out from under our noses! He fooled us! What could our daughter possibly have done?”

Mu Renwang snorted angrily. “If she hadn’t tried to recruit him, he would never have had a chance to do all this. We could’ve killed him early on, but instead we've been completely screwed over. What are we supposed to do now? It’s no loss of face for us to be unable to deal with Bastard Seacliff, who’s backed by the vastly powerful House of God Bastards, but this brat Yang Qi is a nobody! If word gets out that he tricked us, how will we maintain our reputation?”

“I'm actually not worried,” Su Xin said, reaching out to hug her daughter. “The Genesis Sanctum has been screwed over even more than us. The kid is cunning, strong, and actually has the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart to hide in whenever he wants. He fooled us all. Right now, the most pressing matter at hand is how to destroy the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect. I still think the best thing to do is to make sure the Genesis Sanctum and House of God Bastards try to take Yang Qi out.”

At this point, Mu Renwang was finally starting to calm down. “For now, we need to let the brat and his sect stick around. He’ll definitely end up getting killed when he tries to take on the Genesis Sanctum.”

“Mother, Father, it won’t be hard to wipe out the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect. But first, we have to figure out how to deal with that purrling. As long as they have that thing, we won’t be able to touch them. What's worse, Yang Qi has figured out how to replicate some of the beast’s abilities. For now, I think we have to put on a false face and use Yang Qi to deal with the Genesis Sanctum, the House of God Bastards, and whatever other powerful enemies are out there.

“Father, you were right to scold me. I didn’t take the proper precautions to deal with his treachery. I thought he was little more than a turtle in a jar, and thus let my guard down. How could I have ever guessed that his cultivation base would be so strong? Right now, I need to atone for my crime by carrying out good deeds. I’ll do my best to convince Yang Qi of my ‘good intentions’, and hopefully get him back on our side.”

“Excellent,” Mu Renwang said. It looked like he wasn’t angry at all anymore. “Considering what you’re capable of, I'm sure you’ll be able to pull it off handsomely. Lure the kid to our side again, then get him into a life-or-death conflict with the Genesis Sanctum. Then, when he's finally the league-lord, he’ll absolutely have to rely on our support.”

“You should also spend some time with the people from the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect, Daughter,” Su Xin said. “See if you can find out what exactly that purrling is, and where it's from.”

Nodding, Mu Yexi left.

After she was gone, Su Xin snorted coldly. “If you ever lay a hand on our daughter again, Mu Renwang, I’m going to make you very sorry.”

“I know,” Mu Renwang said. “I was just angry in the heat of the moment. Just think of all the work and effort it took to kill those eighteen Inheritors. Then we worked so hard to cleanse the misfortune from the godpower seeds, returning them to their original state. We did all the work, but he gained all the benefits; how could we possibly just accept such humiliation?”

“You’re right. Dammit!” Su Xin was just as angry, so much so that she felt like rushing out and killing Yang Qi right then and there.

“Well, it won’t be easy for him to assimilate all of those seeds. I refuse to believe that he's that strong. There’s no way he could handle all of them without exploding!” Unfortunately, no matter how much the two of them cursed, they didn’t have any other options at hand. They knew that only gods could forcibly break into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, so with that chart, Yang Qi could never really be hurt.

**

Meanwhile, Yang Qi appeared within the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Stone clouds hovered above his head, and his pores emitted what seemed like the quintessence of stone itself. The forces being unleashed were so immense that it seemed like it would be impossible for him to avoid being petrified. Even some of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart around him was being turned to stone.

The immortal-slaying clone opened his eyes from where he sat cross-legged, and quickly called on the godhood stars above. With that godpower, he managed to heal Yang Qi and repair the chart.

‘So he did it,’ he thought, smiling wryly. ‘That was a pretty dangerous situation, and he almost got killed. Two mid Terrifying opponents? Not even I could handle opponents like that. I hope he benefited a lot. I wonder how far his enlightenment went. Eighteen godpower seeds is an immense amount of power, definitely enough to petrify even a mid Terrifying expert. In fact, that's why Mu Renwang and Su Xin didn’t dare to use them. Yang Qi will either succeed, or die. I can only have faith that he’ll pull it off.’

He didn’t offer any help. In this situation, Yang Qi had to seize victory on his own.

Power continued erupting out of Yang Qi, causing the entire area around him to turn into a kingdom of stone. The Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart was able to halt the spread, but it was obvious now that if the Great Necropolis unleashed all of its power, it would definitely be able to damage the chart. After all, if a few little seeds could do this much harm, how much could the entire necropolis do?

However, the chart was powerful enough to keep this kingdom of stone at bay.

RUMBLE!

Yang Qi sat in the middle of it, looking very much like a stone statue. However, he could still move, and he even reached up to part the clouds of stone overhead, which went to show the immense willpower and perseverance he was maintaining.

Then he began opening channels in the kingdom of stone around him, devastating the will of the Great Necropolis and making himself as free as a dragon in the sea or a phoenix flying in the sky.

He threw his head back and howled, shaking the three realms and the six daos. Countless streams of energy erupted from him, along with three massive beams of godlight.

A huge boulder was shaken loose and flew toward the immortal-slaying clone, who immediately unleashed a palm strike to stop it.

However, when his palm hit the stone, nothing happened except for a few cracks snaking out on its surface. Furthermore, energy flowed from the rock to surround the clone, who immediately began petrifying.

The clone quickly fell back with an astonished expression. His palm had been unable to break a mere rock? How strong was that rock? How could it possibly be strong enough to threaten to petrify him? Quickly drawing on the imperial-heaven pre-beginning systems of the Engine of the One God, he used them to attack the rock, which began to evaporate.

RUMBLE!

Yang Qi looked like the King of Godmammoths as he sent chunks of stone flying in every direction as the kingdom around him was devastated. At this point, the immortal-slaying clone checked Yang Qi’s psychic scale.

As expected, it was rising with explosive speed.

From thirty-five, it went to forty, then fifty. Sixty. Seventy. Eighty. Ninety. Only then did it begin to slow. Of course, that represented a heaven-shaking, earth-toppling transformation for Yang Qi.

All of a sudden, a Terrifying expression of will that not even the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart could stop shot out from the god world, heading straight toward Yang Qi’s nascent divinity. In the blink of an eye, it was in the middle of the kingdom of stone, where countless tribulations began descending like a rain of lava, quickly melting the surrounding rock.

“This is… god tribulation from beyond the heavens?!” The clone suddenly started laughing. “So, Yang Qi is really stepping into the Terrifying level! I wonder what he's going to be like. I doubt anyone will be able to get in his way. Not even mid Terrifying experts will be able to stop him! Even Bastard Seacliff will be chopped to pieces!”

Unexpectedly, Yang Qi had provoked tribulation by reaching the Terrifying level. And it was no ordinary tribulation at that, but rather god tribulation.

Yang Qi burst out laughing as powerful fluctuations rolled out from him. He waved his arms, and all of the remnants of the kingdom of stone were wiped out of existence.

A storm of power now raged around Yang Qi that could rip any Terrifying expert to shreds. The immortal-slaying clone could sense the entire Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart trembling from the psychic tempest, and could sense that Yang Qi was already strong enough to walk the Ancient Road to the Gods and step into the god world without fear of dying.

Chapter 1071: The Terrifying Level

At long last, Yang Qi had reached the Terrifying level.

It was considered a major breakthrough, and while most people who reached that level would have a psychic scale of one, Yang Qi had immediately burst through to ninety. That just went to show how much he had prepared for this moment. In fact, he had prepared so well that nothing could stand in his way in the moment of breakthrough. He was even able to assimilate eighteen godpower seeds, pushing all of the martial disciplines of the Great Necropolis to the highest level possible in the process.

Whether it was the God Tombstone Palms, the Stone Necropolis Energy, the God-Ordaining Incantation, or any of the other abilities, he now understood them like the back of his own hand. And none of them were tainted with any sort of misfortune.

Nobody actually knew how many gods had been laid to rest in the Great Necropolis, but there was an astronomical amount of godhood available there. And the vengefulness of the dead gods had been left behind, tainting the godpower.

As the Inheritors cultivated their powers, that misfortune and anger would wear away at them, making them highly likely to experience cultivation deviation. It was actually a major negative side-effect of having Inheritor powers. Now that Yang Qi was in the Terrifying level, though, he didn't have to worry about that.

As his divine will converged, psychic lightning appeared within the psychic tempest that swirled around him. This wasn’t ordinary magical lightning, but the most supreme type that could exist, god lightning formed by the mutual interaction of yin and yang, or of the spiritual and physical souls. Supposedly, this was something that only people in the mid Terrifying level could provoke, yet here Yang Qi was, provoking it right after breaking through. Obviously, he had pushed his imperial-heaven pre-beginning powers and the Civilization Founding Grand Magic to their ultimate extent.

At the same time, his Unspoiled Body reached the level of three hundred tribulations and his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth reached a higher level, causing the energy of the King of Godmammoths to surge within him. With no effort at all, he could cause a bubble to appear around him that represented the Great Necropolis itself, profound, powerful, and impossible to break into.

Right now, it was highly likely that Yang Qi could vanquish someone like the Shepherd in a fight.

Having a Terrifying will convergence really was profoundly terrifying.

“You finally reached the Terrifying level, Yang Qi,” said the immortal-slaying clone. “You're far, far stronger than I was when I first achieved my breakthrough. Very well done. As your psychic scale continues to grow, and you cut down more Inheritors and take their godpower seeds, you’ll eventually become the final Inheritor. And then you can take the Great Necropolis for your own. At that point, I don’t think we’ll need to worry about any ill side-effects from King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions. After all, the necropolis is clearly strong enough to crush the will of King Immortal-Slayer. The necropolis surpasses all ages and times. It doesn’t exist in the three realms, five phases, or six daos. It’s outside of the river of history, very similar to you as a Fateless One. In fact, I suspect that the Great Necropolis came from a very strange part of the god world, which is why it's so unique.”

“The truth about the Great Necropolis is definitely one of the big mysteries of the god world,” Yang Qi said. “And it clearly surpasses the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. That said, I don’t think it’s related to the Sovereign Lord. Probably the only way to find out the details will be to join the legion of gods. Not even assimilating those eighteen godpower seeds has given me sufficient enlightenment to gain any understanding.”

He extended his hand and revealed another godpower seed, which he crushed, cleansed with brilliant light, and then, when it was as clear as crystal, popped into his mouth. That seed had belonged to Shi Yuan, and now that Yang Qi had consumed it, it meant that he had devoured nineteen of them. Yet again, his psychic scale rose, this time to the level of ninety-one.

Right now, the psychic lightning he could produce would easily destroy an immortal world with a rank of a thousand. As of this moment, there was no way that Bastard Seacliff could vie for the position of league-lord.

“Bastard Seacliff, you and your House of God Bastards are the children of gods, banished to the world of us mortals. However, rumor has it that you people have boundless godliness within you. Refining that godliness back into its original state would be like creating a medicinal pill containing the quintessence of the legion of gods. That’s why, when the Executors of the Ancient Road capture you god bastards, they always turn you into pills. And that’s exactly what I'm going to do to you, Bastard Seacliff. Let’s see if that’ll be enough to get my immortal-slaying clone higher into the Terrifying level.” Yang Qi had hated Bastard Seacliff ever since their initial clash at Mu Yexi’s banquet, but now he had no reason to fear him.

He was a hundred times stronger than before, or even more. Of course, his overall cultivation level had not changed; he was still on the fourth stair of the Deathless Heavenly Stairway. No longer would he be forced to suppress his advancement. Becoming an Inheritor had come with some major benefits, which meant that when he finally achieved his next breakthrough, he could very possibly reach the mid Terrifying level at the same time.

Truth be told, he was now qualified to go to the god world.

Unfortunately, the Great Necropolis was blocking the way.

‘Soon, I'm going to fight it out with Proud Heaven, plus whomever from the Primeval Age has the God Legion Seal. The two of you are still reveling in the fact that you have the God Legion Seal, but I’ve already broken free from such shackles. I'm now starting to gain enlightenment of that which belongs solely to me. I’ll definitely surpass both of you, and eventually establish a new heaven and earth of my own.’ Yang Qi was feeling more confident than ever about his path forward.

“And now, clone, I'm going to help you to get even stronger. Prepare to cultivate the Purrfect God Art!” Reaching out, he placed his palm onto his clone’s back.

The clone immediately floated up into the air, the psychic power around him creating a tempest like that from a doomsday. Yang Qi was pouring energy arts into him, including the enlightenment of the Purrfect God Art, Unspoiled Body, and the divine abilities of the Great Necropolis.

Slowly but surely, ten thousand years passed. Of course, the flow of time was different in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

When the process ended, the clone dropped back down to the ground; his psychic scale was at fifty, and he had gained significant enlightenment of new matters. Over the millennia that had passed, hundreds of godhood stars had fallen down from the sky. That said, the sea of stars above was still glittering just as gloriously as before. As for the godpower held within those fallen stars, Yang Qi used it to improve his own psychic systems, such as the imperial-heaven pre-beginning systems.

When it was all over, Yang Qi and his clone threw their heads back and laughed heartily. Both of them were convinced that there was nothing under heaven that could stand in their path. Together, they could crush any obstacle. Yang Qi found it quite marvelous that the clone had started out as an exact copy of himself, but was now a completely independent entity. And they still both helped each other. If it weren’t for the clone, he would likely have become a puppet to the imperial couple.

“It's time to go back out,” Yang Qi said coolly. “During this ten thousand years of cultivation, I fully assimilated the nineteen godpower seeds. I have no impurities within me, and my Purrfect God Art has reached an impeccable state. Now, the time has come to see what crouching tigers and hidden dragons will come out of the woodwork during the sect assembly and the competition for the spot of league-lord. All the superpower sects from the Ancient Road to the Gods will be there. The Royal Palace of Assassins have already made a scene, and Proud Heaven has no reason to stay in hiding.”

His hatred of Proud Heaven hadn’t diminished over time. Nor had he given up thoughts of capturing the bearer of the God Legion Seal from the Primeval Age. Although he had freed himself from the seal, he knew that restoring it to its complete state would give him access to the full Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. In turn, that would allow him to unlock the potential of the Unspoiled Body, and the combination of god and devil would be unparalleled under heaven.

Swoosh....

He left the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart and returned to the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect’s warded area. The situation was just as he had left it, and there were still two days left before the assembly was to start.

Upon seeing Yang Qi, the sectlord rose to his feet with a smile and said, “Yang Qi, you’re back. What happened? Did the Woodfern Couple Palace cause problems for you? Some things happened while you were gone. For instance, the Royal Palace of—”

Yang Qi waved his hand to cut him off. “I'm aware of everything that’s happened. I achieved a major breakthrough, the details of which I’ll explain to you shortly. The fortunes of the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect are about to dramatically change.”

Chapter 1072: The Assembly Begins

Yang Qi waved his hand, strengthening the warding spells around them. As a result, anyone who tried to look at them would see nothing more than roiling fog. Considering his advancements, Yang Qi’s Life-Death Void-Destruction Lightning was now stronger than ever, to the point where no one could possibly pierce through it.

Now that they were in private, Yang Qi explained everything that had happened with the imperial couple. Even the sectlord was sweating with anxiety when he heard about how dangerous things had turned out.

However, when he heard that Yang Qi had taken so many godpower seeds, then used them to break through to the Terrifying level and achieve a psychic scale of ninety-one, his eyes brimmed with tears of excitement. “The Will Manifestation Heaven Sect really is going to achieve great glory and will be able to act with complete freedom. Perhaps we’ll even be able to walk the Ancient Road to the Gods and become deathless in the god world!”

The truth was that although the old-timers in the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect were powerful, they still couldn’t live forever.

Most of them were already billions of years old, and would eventually run out of longevity, then ultimately die. Their only hope of escaping death was to improve their cultivation bases and enter the god world. Unfortunately, breakthroughs were difficult. Generally speaking, the only way to succeed would be to enter the god world and make use of the magical laws there. Once they were members of the legion of gods, they would generally keep on living forever unless some disastrous tribulation hit.

To powerful cultivators, billions of years could pass by very quickly, especially if that time was spent in secluded meditation with the magical laws of time accelerated. In other words, it was possible for one day to pass on the outside for them, while simultaneously losing ten thousand years of longevity or more. Do that a few hundred times, and one could end up dying much sooner.

Nowadays, the old-timers of the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect wouldn't dare to use such time acceleration magic, otherwise they would lose their life force and perish.

“Yang Qi, can you really devastate an opponent in the mid Terrifying level?” Peaklord Memory asked.

“You’ll find out when the assembly starts,” he replied with a smile. “Don't worry, you won’t be disappointed. Thanks to the purrling, I managed to turn ill fortune into good luck. I only wish I knew what kind of food it likes to eat so I could find something to reward it with.”

Yang Qi reached out and scratched the purrling behind the ears. It didn’t spit out a bubble, but it did purr a bit, apparently in pleasure.

The truth was that the purrling didn’t eat; it even looked at godhood with disdain.

Even the godlings described in the most ancient daoist texts were always said to enjoy consuming godhood. For example, King Heaven-Devourer consumed godhood and converted it into Heaven-Devouring śarīras to improve his cultivation base. Unfortunately, the purrling didn’t eat godhood. Perhaps it was like a peerless beauty from the nobility, or an imperial prince who, after sampling the most wonderful delicacies, would look at ordinary food as fare for dogs and pigs.

Yang Qi really was curious to find what it would eat.

Thankfully, it didn’t ever seem to get hungry.

Purr. Purr....

The purrling stretched and wriggled, looking so charming that anyone who looked at it for the first time would have no idea how terrifying it was. After all, if it weren’t for the purrling, the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect would likely have been destroyed by now. Instead, no one dared to trifle with them.

“More and more people are showing up,” Yang Qi said. “I should take advantage of the moment to make all of you a bit stronger. In the future, you’ll be on your own sometimes, and should be able to take care of yourselves.”

RUMBLE!

Suddenly, several true energy arms sprouted from his back, all of which thrummed with the empyrean energy of great daos and were surrounded by countless magical symbols.

The hands locked on to the heads of everyone present, and Yang Qi sent true energy flowing into them.

Peaklords Celestial and Memory, and the sectlord, had pushed their cultivation to the limit, gaining profound enlightenment of their divine abilities and pushing their energy arts to the peak. They were strong enough to fight virtually any powerful expert, yet with a simple movement of his hand, Yang Qi immobilized them. From that, they could tell that he was strong enough to kill them with a mere snap of his finger. They simply couldn't compare. At the same time, they were yet again struck with the realization that their sect had made the right decision. Without Yang Qi, they would have had to curry favor with some other powerful sect in order to survive, and would likely have ended up as little more than slaves or servants.

As the power coursed through their bodies, they felt themselves being purified.

Yang Qi imparted various energy arts and cultivation knowledge directly into them, extruded impurities, and generally baptized them, helping all of them to increase their psychic scales by a few points. That was especially true of Jadefall, whose psychic scale was now over thirty.

The sectlord felt his longevity increasing by at least a million years, which meant that he now had a chance to live a bit longer. Of course, he was very pleased.

At a certain point, a voice from outside reached their ears. “Is Young Sir Yang Qi present?”

Looking out, they saw that Junior Empress Mu Yexi from the Woodfern Couple Palace had come to pay a formal visit. People from other sects who were in the vicinity were shocked, as it was obviously a huge honor for anyone to have a formal visit paid by the junior empress.

“Come in, Junior Empress,” Yang Qi said, keeping a faint smile on his face. Obviously, the imperial couple were acknowledging his strength, and had sent the junior empress to discuss cooperating together, both to win the spot of league-lord and to fight the Genesis Sanctum.

After Mu Yexi entered, the warding spells closed behind her, making it impossible for anyone to determine what they were talking about.

“Have you thought things through, Junior Empress?” Yang Qi said. “Are we finally going to work together to get me the spot of league-lord? It's good to see that Mu Renwang and Su Xin have seen the reality of the situation. They have my admiration for making the right decision.”

“You played your cards well, Young Sir Yang Qi,” Mu Yexi said with a broad smile. It seemed that she had already put the past behind her. “You managed to escape from a seemingly impossible situation. Presumably, you have more than the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart to rely on.”

“You flatter me,” Yang Qi said. “Look, whatever you have to say, just say it.”

“You’ve already assimilated those eighteen godpower seeds, haven’t you, Young Sir?” she asked, watching carefully to see how he would react to the question. “That’s a tremendous accomplishment that not even my father or mother could replicate. It just goes to show how truly invincible you are.”

“It wasn't really a big deal. I also assimilated a godpower seed I took from an Inheritor I killed in the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect. My psychic scale has risen, and I'm in the Terrifying level. Soon enough I’ll find a chance to see how my daoist techniques measure up to your parents’. What do you think?” Yang Qi casually revealed his brash ambitions in a very dignified and imposing manner.

All Mu Yexi could do in response was smile wryly. Obviously, she had already taken note of the fact that Yang Qi’s cultivation base had reached a very enigmatic level, and he had even gone so far as to suggest pitting himself against her parents. She hadn't forgotten that he killed the Flower-Seizing Marauder before he had even reached the Terrifying level, which begged the question of how strong he was now.

“If that’s what you wish for, Young Sir Yang Qi, then I'm sure it will happen eventually. It seems you’re fully confident in being able to kill Bastard Seacliff, but don't forget that a lot of Inheritors are also going to be vying for the position of league-lord. Just make sure not to lower your guard.”

“Why would I lower my guard?” Yang Qi replied. “I'm more than happy to have Inheritors offering themselves up to me. I was just recently worrying about how to reach the mid Terrifying level without more godpower seeds. Considering you’re throwing your support behind me, is it safe to assume that you have a plan for how to do that?”

“I’ve been sent here by my parents to offer the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect thirty pieces of godhood, which should help all of you improve your cultivation bases. We just hope that when you become the league-lord, you’ll pass the blessings of the sect to me.” Even as the words left her mouth, Mu Yexi produced a bag filled with godhood. Although all of the pieces were from Lesser Gods, they would still be very useful.

“I can agree to that,” Yang Qi said, nodding. “That power of blessing won’t be of any help to me; the last thing I want is a bunch of heterogeneous power. As for the Genesis Sanctum, if they agree to back me, I’ll let them off the hook for now. But if they refuse to acknowledge allegiance, they’ll end up dead. Their junior pontiff hired the Royal Palace of Assassins to kill me, which means the two of us are now archenemies whose feud will only end in death.”

“Your heroic spirit knows no bounds, Young Sir, and you have my utmost admiration. Now that matters are settled, I’ll make a formal announcement that the Woodfern Couple Palace is backing your bid for the spot of league-lord. That will definitely boost the reputation of your Will Manifestation Heaven Sect.” Stepping back out into the open, she raised her voice and said, “Ladies and gentlemen, the assembly will begin soon, and I'm sure it will be an occasion of much rejoicing. That said, I would like to take this opportunity to mention that Junior Sectlord Yang Qi of the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect has a very profound and enigmatic cultivation base. As such, the Woodfern Couple Palace backs his bid to be the new league-lord. Of course, if any other young heroes can defeat him, then that person will be the league-lord. It will all come down to who’s strongest!”

Instantly, the crowd was thrown into an uproar.

Many of the sects were aware that the Woodfern Couple Palace had originally intended to support Yang Qi, and as a result, had laid to rest their own ambitions and thrown their lot in with the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect. After all, even if Yang Qi was a puppet league lord, he would still be powerful enough to offer them protection.

Chapter 1073: Heroes Contend for Dominance

The announcement caused a major commotion, but Yang Qi didn't care. In his heart, he remained completely calm and collected, despite the fact that he could sense numerous cold gazes locking on to his general location.

Some of them were experts who had come to attend the assembly, but there were also gazes from outsiders, such as fiend-devils and the Executors of the Ancient Road.

It was no exaggeration to say that he now had enemies everywhere.

In fact, he was inclined to go out, track down such enemies, and kill them. After all, in the jianghu, killing is the foundation of everything. Only by means of slaughter could one cow their adversaries and strive forward. Yang Qi was really looking forward to the sect assembly now, and when the heroes contended for dominance, he would definitely rise to the top and earn plenty of benefits. He couldn't wait to lay eyes on the various magical treasures and techniques that he had never seen before.

And he was very much looking forward to fighting Bastard Seacliff.

‘Where did Star Swordlife get off to?’ he thought. Scanning the area, he couldn’t find any traces or clues. It was as if Star Swordlife had completely vanished into thin air. The Woodfern Couple Palace had been hoping to groom him for use against Yang Qi, but after Yang Qi turned the tables on them, they had obviously abandoned such thoughts.

Yang Qi had hoped to use Star Swordlife as his first test of strength. And killing him would provide another godpower seed. Unfortunately, he had apparently fled, and at the moment, Yang Qi wasn’t in a position to go hunting him down.

Drawing on his Wheel of Fate, he could see a point sometime in the future where an immense expression of life force was trying to seal him, and apparently that was Star Swordlife.

‘He’s going to be a big threat to me later on,’ Yang Qi thought.

That said, he wasn’t particularly worried. Not even Star Swordlife was enough to shake his confidence, and he was sure that he could kill his way out of whatever future predicament he might encounter.

A few hours passed, then the sound of bells could be heard in the depths of Destructionless Castle, after which a new plane of existence appeared in the middle of the castle. It was an enormous taiji sphere, half black, half white. It featured a powerful greyspace, within which was a dimension filled with mountains, rivers, and other terrain features.

“Ladies and gentlemen,” a voice spoke, “as of now, virtually all of the major sects from the Ancient Road to the Gods are here. The Genesis Sanctum and the Woodfern Couple Palace have called this general assembly to tighten the bonds between our organizations and form an alliance to fight the Executors of the Ancient Road! As you all know, we’re currently as disunited as a dish of loose sand, which means that if open conflict erupts, we’ll lose, and be purged by the executors!”

‘That’s the old bastard from the Genesis Sanctum,’ Yang Qi thought. A moment later, an old man appeared, standing so tall and straight that he seemed like a god of creation. Standing alongside him were Mu Renwang and Su Xin.

These three experts could crush anything and everything; they were like a group of dragons and tigers, as invincible as the sun and moon.

No one else dared to utter a single word.

The enormous plane of existence that was the taiji sphere then opened, and everyone realized that the assembly would take place inside.

Yang Qi immediately scanned it to find a suitable location for the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect. The place was large, as big as an immortal world with a rank of two thousand. Its magical laws were strong and mysterious, but it only took a moment for him to find a place where the universal natural rules were most suitable.

Settling down, everyone listened to the introductory remarks being made, and the explanation of how the two major sects were not participating in the competition, but rather wanted one of the young elites to become the league-lord. Everyone had already heard these rumors, but it was a different matter to have the news confirmed by these three top experts.

Yang Qi looked around at all of the experts gathered in the taiji sphere, but many of them remained hidden, making it impossible to determine anything about them. Of course, there were going to be plenty of hidden dragons and crouching tigers, as the experts of the Ancient Road to the Gods were very different from the old Dao Defense League.

He was actually certain that there were multiple mid Terrifying experts present.

That said, such entities wouldn't be participating in the competition either. It had already been established that the competitors would be the ‘young elites’ who were beneath the mid Terrifying level. Of course, truth be told, everyone under the mid Terrifying level was considered a ‘young elite’ no matter how old they were.

“And now, we shall prepare to begin the assembly!”

An enormous platform rose up in the middle of the plane of existence. Flags flapped on it, and countless magical symbols streamed back and forth. At its edge were numerous thrones, which quickly filled with various chief elders from the two major sects.

“Oh my goodness....”

Numerous murmurs of exclamation could be heard as people noticed that the Genesis Sanctum and Woodfern Couple Palace both had over a hundred chief elders with psychic scales of ninety or higher!

If those chief elders were to combine all of their power, it would be enough to make a new heaven and earth, or completely remold the cosmos. Yang Qi was also shocked, and couldn’t help but marvel at seeing the true reserve powers of these major sects. After all, upon reaching a psychic scale of ninety, the next step would be to step into the mid Terrifying level. All of these people were essentially just as impressive as Bastard Seacliff.

Yang Qi quickly counted, and found that the Genesis Sanctum had a hundred and fifty experts with power indexes over ninety, while the Woodfern Couple Palace had a hundred and three. The huge difference in numbers showed how superior the Genesis Sanctum was in that regard. That said, they only had a single mid Terrifying expert, whereas the imperial couple counted as two.

Now Yang Qi could understand why the imperial couple was so dead set on having Mu Yexi benefit from the blessing of the two sects. Just what level of psychic power would she reach then?

“Let the assembly officially begin!” the people of the two sects said, their voices rumbling like thunder. Winds screamed and flows of destiny whipped about. Looking up, Yang Qi saw that the destiny was taking the shape of mountains, enormous wheels, and even thrones.

The destiny on display was remarkable.

And whoever took the position of league-lord would have access to that destiny, which would provide an instant boost to all of their energy arts. In the mortal world, emperors would be imbued with destiny thanks to their position. With a single word, they could end a person’s life, which was why such monarch rulers were known as lords of fate.

It made one wonder how powerful the lord of this newly formed league of sects would be.

The flows of destiny were beyond anything Yang Qi had ever seen; even one scrap would be millions upon millions times stronger than the Dao Defense League had provided in the past.

The destiny of the Dao Defense League could be likened to a drop of water, whereas this was an ocean.

This destiny would be of immense help to all his energy arts, to the point where Yang Qi was convinced that it could solve all of his problems. And while most people couldn't safely use destiny like this, with his Wheel of Fate from the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, he absolutely could.

Destiny could be used to stimulate fate.

That was one of the mysteries of the Wheel of Fate; whoever controlled it could gather destiny and universal fortune, then use them to become invincible.

As of this moment, Yang Qi was completely dead set on taking the spot of league-lord.

Of course, he wasn’t the only one who was thinking that.

Although none of them had the Wheel of Fate, there were plenty of other godly-class energy arts in existence that could be used to deal with destiny. There were even techniques that could use destiny to make medicinal pills, although such heretical techniques weren’t even worth Yang Qi’s notice.

“Ladies and gentlemen,” Huangfu Genesis said, “we will now begin the martial arts competition! Each sect may send forth a young elite to participate! Whichever hero dominates the rest will become the league-lord!”

Whoosh. Whoosh. Whoosh.

Numerous young elites flew forward to stand on the platform, where fighting instantly broke out. In fact, in the blink of an eye, there were people being injured and killed.

Things seemed completely out of control.

However, the people from the two major sects simply looked on coldly and didn’t interfere.

Swish!

Suddenly, a stream of powerful saber energy slashed its way onto the platform.

Screams rang out as several of the competitors were hit. However, the saber was being wielded with incredible skill, so instead of killing those it hit, it merely stopped them from fighting.

A moment later, a young man appeared, a glittering, razor-sharp scimitar in his hand. In fact, it was so sharp that looking at it would make one feel like their eyes were about to bleed.

Recognizing him, someone cried, “That's Young Master Ling Tian, the Saber Hegemon!”

“What? Is it really him? Back before the Great Necropolis came, he was on the Imperial List, but isn’t he supposed to be dead? He cultivated the dao of sabers to a very profound level, but ended up fighting Prince Saber-Slicer from the Executors of the Ancient Road. They both died in that fight, so how could he be here?”

The Imperial List was an outdated ranking method that had once been used on the ancient road, which described people who were close to reaching the mid Terrifying level.

Chapter 1074: Heroes Contend for Dominance (2)

‘It really is an age of outstanding heroes,’ Yang Qi thought, sighing as he looked at this Young Master Ling Tian, the Saber Hegemon. He had originally assumed that everyone else would be too terrified to participate in the competition and it would just be himself and Bastard Seacliff fighting each other. But in the end, there were plenty of hidden dragons and crouching tigers on the Ancient Road to the Gods.

Yang Qi could tell that this Young Master Ling Tian had very powerful energy arts, and that he was at one with his incredibly sharp saber.

Most people assumed that the reason Young Master Ling Tian’s saber made one’s eyes feel like they were about to bleed was because it was so sharp. But the truth was that it all came down to Young Master Ling Tian’s psyche and will. They were what formed the razor-sharp edge of the saber, and that was why it was so painful to look at.

The truth was that this saber wasn’t even really a saber. It was a pure expression of psyche and will, which meant that Young Master Ling Tian could slash apart anything in heaven and earth.

“Do you scum really think you deserve to sit in the league-lord’s throne?” Young Master Ling Tian said. “Screw off. You don't even deserve to look at that throne!”

“Y-yes, of course....” The elites who had just been hit by Young Master Ling Tian's saber, but whose lives had been spared, crawled to their feet and quickly departed, fully convinced that they weren’t qualified to contend with this level of saber technique.

It was a shocking saber that could slash apart civilization, epochs, annals, and history. It could dominate the world, which was why Young Master Ling Tian was called the Saber Hegemon.

Facing the three consummate experts, Young Master Ling Tian said, “Mu Renwang. Empress Su Xin. Pontiff Huangfu Genesis. Now that I'm here, is there anyone else who thinks they’re qualified to be the league-lord?”

“I had no idea you were still alive, Young Master Ling Tian,” Huangfu Genesis said. “It seems your saber technique has reached an even higher level than before. It’s truly worthy of praise. That said, the competition isn’t over yet. If you want to be the league-lord, you have to accept any and all challenges. The people you knocked down with your saber just now were small fries, not top figures.”

“That’s fine. I never thought that a single saber move would be enough to secure the position of league-lord. However, I'm still very curious to see who else out there dares to challenge me and my saber!”

Looking around, he flourished his weapon and shouted, “Well? Does anyone dare?”

“I dare!”

RUMBLE!

A burly fellow who looked very much like an iron tower stepped forward. When he landed on the platform, the entire plane of existence trembled. He had fists like metal, and was covered with rippling muscles that made him seem like a weapon of battle in human form.

“Who are you?” Young Master Ling Tian asked.

Grinning viciously, the man said, “I'm from the two thousandth ranked Nailuo Immortal World. Call me Iron Boxer! How can you people from the Ancient Road to the Gods possibly measure up to the cream of the crop from us locals? We were born here in the Great Necropolis, and our blood is the noblest there could be.”

“Iron Boxer?” Young Master Ling Tian gave a faint smile, then he suddenly moved so quickly that, before anyone could react, his saber was right at Iron Boxer’s neck.

However, Iron Boxer just reached out and grabbed the saber, causing a chiming sound to ring out, after which the weapon stopped in place, incapable of moving.

“I can’t believe a sissy-boy like you calls yourself the Saber Hegemon,” Iron Boxer said. “Now get the hell out of my face! Go back and suck your mother’s teat!” From the black glow coming from his fingers, it was obvious that he was using some sort of magical power that made him impervious to all sorts of weapons.

“Ice can't flow like water!”

Swish!

Young Master Ling Tian suddenly moved like a ghost, twisting around until he was behind Iron Boxer, where he unleashed another saber strike.

Iron Boxer turned and thrust his fist out again. However, just when it was about to hit the saber, the blade changed directions and slashed toward his thigh. The two of them held nothing back as they fought with deadly force.

As Yang Qi watched, he came to the conclusion that Young Master Ling Tian’s saber technique was incredibly refined, but at the same time, Iron Boxer’s fist technique had also reached the acme of perfection.

Both of them had psychic scales over ninety and energy arts that made them as strong as people with power indexes over seven thousand. And as they fought, it became obvious that they were evenly matched.

Yang Qi watched them, nodding in admiration.

Their moves were exquisite, and both of them clearly had extensive fighting experience. Obviously, they were both veterans of countless battles.

The two of them clearly had superior understanding regarding the theory of martial arts and the transformations of martial arts moves. Yang Qi had fighting experience, but that experience couldn’t compare to experts from the Ancient Road to the Gods who had lived for millions upon millions of years.

All of a sudden, Young Master Ling Tian seemed to come to the conclusion that getting involved in a protracted fight wasn't a good idea and resorted to an incredible set of saber moves.

“Withered Tree Revived in Spring!

“Heavenly River in Dire Straits!

“God Looks Up Hopefully!

“The Stars Glitter Radiantly!”

It was hard to say whether he had invented this saber technique, or if it had been created by a god who had long since been lost in the sands of time. As he unleashed the moves, astrological phenomena sprang up everywhere. Divine trees bloomed and withered, spring came and went, freezing winds blew, heaven and earth mourned, the sun, moon, and highest heavens rotated, and great daos engulfed the world, causing the deaths of ghosts and gods.

In the briefest of moments, numerous streams of saber energy surrounded Iron Boxer.

Iron Boxer bellowed in rage as he unleashed his own set of consummate energy arts, yet none of them enabled him to fully free himself from Young Master Ling Tian’s saber.

A saber flashed and a head flew.

Swish!

Blood sprinkled down like rain as the head flew through the air. Shockingly, Young Master Ling Tian had decapitated Iron Boxer!

Everyone could see the look of disbelief on Iron Boxer’s face as his head flew through the air. And truth be told, not even the members of the audience were sure of exactly what move Young Master Ling Tian had used.

With the exception of Yang Qi. From what he could tell, Young Master Ling Tian had pierced through space and drawn on an immense source of power that allowed him to cut through Iron Boxer’s impervious defenses.

Of course, just because he had been decapitated didn’t mean that Iron Boxer was dead. Even without his head, he still unleashed a torrent of fist strikes directed at Young Master Ling Tian, forcing him backward across the platform. Then, Iron Boxer blurred into motion, scooping up his head and shooting off of the platform, whereupon he vanished from sight.

“Little punk! You just wait! I'm not going to forget about this!”

Young Master Ling Ting snorted coldly. “I hit you with my Soul-Severing Saber-Nimbus Art. Even if you don’t die, you’ll be so seriously injured that you’ll never be able to get revenge on me.” He chuckled. “I spent billions of years of cultivation mastering that move so that I could use it on the Executors of the Ancient Road. You Great Necropolis savages may have strong bodies, but you don’t match up to the executors. And you think you can fight me?”

At this point, a sinister, cackling laughter filled the area, and a figure appeared who looked like a king of some sort, clad in a golden robe. “Actually, I’ll be getting revenge on you for cutting down my Brother, Iron Boxer. I'm Iron Falcon, and I'll show you what true skill is really like, you sissy-boy!”

WHOOSH!

The newcomer threw both hands out like iron claws forged in the god world. Then he moved in with an incredible movement technique, using such quickness that it seemed almost like he weighed nothing at all.

It was another Great Necropolis local, apparently an associate of Iron Boxer.

As Yang Qi watched, he saw that Young Master Ling Tian seemed to be moving a bit slower than before. He had obviously wasted a lot of vital energy in his fight with Iron Boxer, and recovering that lost vital energy wasn’t anything that could happen quickly.

As for Iron Falcon, his claw attacks seemed like they could rip apart the canopy of heaven. Most of the onlookers were completely shocked, and knew that if they were to fight him, they would definitely be killed.

After some fighting, Young Master Ling Tian suddenly drew on that mysterious power of his, unleashing a host of moves that finally managed to hit Iron Falcon’s waist. In fact, he was slashed in half, provoking an agonized shriek. A moment later, he flew away. “You just wait, boy. My big bro is going to come to avenge me!”

Even as he vanished, and before Young Master Ling Tian could possibly catch his breath, another person appeared, a young man with massive arms and a narrow waist.

“I'm Iron Monarch!” he growled. “How dare you treat my two younger brothers like that? If I don't kill you, how could I ever hold my head high?”

Swissshhhhh!

A long sword appeared in his hand, and he unleashed a tempest of attacks on Young Master Ling Tian that caused enormous sparks to fall onto the surface of the platform.

Everyone was shocked that these three could be this strong, except for Yang Qi, who suspected that something fishy was going on.

Chapter 1075: Heroes Contend for Dominance (3)

Iron Monarch was taking to the field of battle in very different circumstances than anyone up to this point. Young Master Ling Tian hadn’t had any chance to rest. Furthermore, Iron Monarch’s power index and psychic scale surpassed those of Iron Boxer and Iron Falcon.

In Yang Qi’s estimate, Iron Monarch’s psychic scale was at least ninety-five.

And he was attacking with such ferocity that Young Master Ling Tian hardly had any time to react and was instantly sent stumbling backward.

However, a moment later, saber light flared as Young Master Ling Tian shifted from defense to offense. Burning quintessence-blood and longevity, he thrust his saber out, snapping Iron Monarch’s sword in two. Then he unleashed another devastating saber slash, causing a shining halo to appear around his head.

‘That’s the light of a primeval god skill!’ Yang Qi thought. ‘The Light of the Cutting Edge! I can’t believe this Young Master Ling Tian’s energy arts are at this level. Very formidable. Although, it can’t even come close to my Eternal Heavenly Aria. Can he really turn defeat into victory?’

Gong!

Iron Monarch had clearly not even considered that Young Master Ling Tian would unleash a saber move this exquisite at this point in the fight, so he was too slow to back up. A suit of armor suddenly appeared as the saber closed in, but sadly for him, the armor wasn't strong enough to stop the attack. Saber energy slashed into him, causing him to scream in agony as he was chopped in half. This time, there was no way Young Master Ling Tian was going to let his opponent escape, so he unleashed a stream of shining saber light that filled the area.

In the blink of an eye, Iron Monarch was overwhelmed by the light, and again let loose a horrified scream. Who could ever have guessed that Young Master Ling Tian would be this ferocious?

“I'm very curious to see how many Great Necropolis savages will die by my hand. You can’t even win by tag-teaming me!”

“The tag-teaming isn’t over! I'm Iron Elite!” Explosive laughter rang out as a burly man stepped forward and prepared to launch an attack on Young Master Ling Tian.

“Hold on!” someone said, stepping forward to get in the way of Iron Elite.

It was none other than Yang Qi.

“What, boy. Don’t tell me you’re trying to block my path?” Voice thrumming with fiery rage, he said, “Who are you?”

“Just how many of you ‘Iron’ people are there?” Yang Qi asked. “According to the rules of this assembly, we're supposed to be having one-on-one fights. And each organization has the right to send one young elite into the competition. If you locals from the Great Necropolis want to fight for the position of league-lord, fine. But don’t use underhanded methods like tag-teaming. How faceless could you be?”

“What business is it of yours? Not even the hosts of the assembly are bothering to interfere.” Letting loose an angry shout, Iron Elite launched three fist attacks in Yang Qi’s direction. “Who the hell do you think you are to block my path? Are you suicidal or something?”

Smiling, Yang Qi inhaled, then all of a sudden, Iron Elite’s arms were severed and flopped down onto the ground in front of him, where they continued to twitch and writhe.

“Y-you... what... what energy art was that?” Iron Elite said. At the moment, it felt as though a tiny blade of ice were streaming through his innards, causing such immense pain that he wished he could die.

“Many thanks for the assistance, Daoist Brother,” said Young Master Ling Tian. A scream rang out as he slashed Iron Monarch’s nascent divinity in half, then quickly assimilated his soul, flesh, and blood.

“You’re too kind,” Yang Qi replied coolly. “I just couldn’t bear to see these Great Necropolis savages using contemptible methods like tag-teaming. What would be the point of someone winning the position of league-lord like that? I'm not sure how many of these ‘Iron’ people there are, but none of them seem to be on the same level as you, Young Master Ling Tian. I suspect that, in order to fight you, they accepted a blessing of power offered by some consummate expert. I wonder who it was.”

“You’re quite ferocious yourself, Daoist Brother. After all, you defeated Iron Elite with a single blow. But could it be that you stepped in just now because you want to fight me?”

“Of course not. I just wanted to stop the tag-teaming.” With that, Yang Qi waved his finger, causing Young Master Ling Tian to shiver as he felt warm energy spreading through him, restoring the vital energy he had lost during the fighting. A look of surprise appeared on his face. “Brother, your energy arts are incredible. You have my sincere admiration. I can’t believe you restored me to my peak, just like that.”

“It was a simple thing,” Yang Qi said. “Go ahead and take your stand here on the platform, Daoist Brother. I’ll stand as your dharmic guard. Let’s see if any other shameless locals try to do any tag-teaming.”

Looking over at Iron Elite, he said, “If you have any other ‘Iron’ folk out there, have them all come out at the same time. This assembly is intended to be for people from the Ancient Road to the Gods, and I'm here to make sure you locals don’t cause any trouble.”

Yang Qi had reduced the pontifex of the Sackcloth Cathedral to a streak of gore, which obviously made him a major enemy of the Great Necropolis locals. And seeing that Young Master Ling Tian might be a valuable ally, he had stepped forward to help him.

Not only would that be an opportunity to portray himself as being honorable and righteous, but it would also be a big blow to the locals.

“You people...” Iron Elite said, trembling. “Fine, I concede. Just let me go. But you should know that in our alliance of Great Necropolis locals, there are countless experts. In fact, there are millions of people with the name Iron. We’ll never stop coming. If you think this tag-teaming was bad, just wait until we destroy all of your young elites!”

“Millions? I guess you must count pigs among your so-called experts then.” Yang Qi laughed. “Well, if that's how many you have, then have them step forward. I want to see how strong they are.”

“Hey!” someone shouted from the audience. “Hurry up and fight. Enough with the useless chatter. Junior Sectlord Will Manifestation, why don’t you just fight it out with Young Master Ling Tian for the spot of league-lord? It’s obvious that the two of you will have to deal with each other eventually. Why pretend to help him? Could it be that you just want to use him as cannon fodder?”

‘Who was that?’ Yang Qi thought, looking around. Obviously, it was a no-name from one of the other sects who was acting on orders from someone more powerful. Instead of responding to the person, Yang Qi looked over at Huangfu Genesis, Mu Renwang, and Su Xin. “The competition for league-lord will be fierce. Whoever wins will only do so after expending a huge amount of effort, and I really don’t think tag-teaming should be the basis for victory.”

“It doesn’t matter,” Huangfu Genesis replied coolly. “And tag-teaming isn't the big deal you're making it out to be. You’re just trying to steal the spotlight, aren’t you? The truth is as you said just now: whoever becomes the league-lord will have to expend immense effort to come out victorious. If you can’t handle a few people ganging up on you, then how could anyone be convinced that you're invincible? No, our league-lord needs to be the kind who has dealt with such situations.”

“Oh, I see,” Yang Qi replied, nodded. Obviously, Huangfu Genesis wasn’t particularly pleased with what he was doing.

“What do you say?” barked one of the chief elders from the Genesis Sanctum. “Are you going to compete, Yang Qi? Or not. If you are, then start fighting with Young Master Ling Tian. Show us who the winner is and who the loser is. If you don't plan to compete, then get off the stage and let Young Master Ling Tian keep fighting. Whoever remains on the fighting platform in the end will be the victor.”

“That’s right,” Mu Renwang said. “Considering that you and Young Master Ling Tian are the only ones on the platform right now, if you don’t start fighting, then what kind of an example would it be? Are you really just going to sit there as a dharmic guard to make sure people don't tag-team Young Master Ling Tian? That would basically be the two of you joining forces, which is against the rules.”

“Yeah. That's definitely against the rules!”

Quite a few people nodded and expressed similar sentiments.

“There can only be one person left standing on the fighting platform. It’s clearly against the rules for two people to work together.”

Upon hearing all of the murmuring, Young Master Ling Tian hefted his saber. “Daoist Brother Yang Qi, I'm very thankful for how you helped me. But they’re right. Anyone who can’t handle some tag-teaming doesn’t have the right to be the league-lord. Right now, we're the only ones left standing, so we need to have a fair fight. Regardless of which of us wins, I’ll consider you a friend.”

“Alright!” Yang Qi said, nodding. “If that’s how you feel, then let’s fight!”

“Please hold nothing back, Daoist Brother Yang Qi. I’m at my peak right now, all thanks to you. Here I come, watch out!”

In the shortest of moments, a blaze of saber light closed in on Yang Qi’s head.

Yang Qi didn’t even look at it. He threw a fist out, and the saber light was flung backward, forcing Young Master Ling Tian to retreat several paces, visibly shaken and surprised.

“Your energy arts are incredibly powerful, Daoist Brother. Now let’s see how your movement techniques are.” With that, he moved forward in a blur, his feet not even touching the ground, then unleashed a saber slash of such exquisite precision that it would surely cut through anything in its path.

Yet Yang Qi didn’t do anything other than release another fist strike.

Instantly, the saber light fell apart.

Young Master Ling Tian scampered to the side with shocking speed, trying to flank Yang Qi and hit him with a host of saber moves. As for Yang Qi, he remained in place, using fists, fingers, and palms to block every single attack. There simply wasn’t any way for Young Master Ling Tian to land a blow onto his body.

As for the audience, they watched in shock as this incredible display of first-class martial arts played out in front of them.

At a certain point, Young Master Ling Tian let out a shout, yet again reaching out to draw on that mysterious power and using it to let loose a deadly saber slash. Gasps could be heard as everyone realized that this was the moment in which victory and defeat would be determined.

Chapter 1076: Heroes Converge

Everyone in the audience knew that this particular saber strike from Young Master Ling Tian would determine victory or defeat. And the reason for that was because everyone recognized the move.

It was the very same stance he had used to decapitate Iron Boxer, cut Iron Falcon in half, and cut down Iron Monarch. None of them had been able to survive that particular saber strike, much less block or evade it.

From the look of it, that move was just impossible for anyone to deal with, and could be used to defeat any opponent.

‘I wonder who will win and who will lose.’

That was what everyone was wondering. The truth was that few people had a very good impression of Yang Qi. Although they were impressed by the purrling, and the fact that he had the support of the Woodfern Couple Palace, it was common knowledge that he had been defeated by Bastard Seacliff with a single blow. He had even coughed up blood. And considering that Young Master Ling Tian was on the same tier as Bastard Seacliff, how could they believe that Yang Qi would be able to fight him?

Of course, the fighting so far had changed many minds. The fact that Yang Qi had actually gone back and forth with Young Master Ling Tian seemed to indicate that perhaps he was a lot stronger than everyone realized.

It was a saber strike that seemed to both weep and rejoice at the same time. It was like the rebuke of a lover, the chant of a young woman, or the murmur of a dreaming child. It seemed to surpass the limits of all saber techniques, telling such a perfect story that anyone upon whom the saber light shone would be killed, transcending reality and being freed from worldly worries.

It was a saber strike of extirpation.

Buzzzz.

Saber light shone, creating a host of flickering nimbuses. Then the saber rose up into the air again.

Initially, no one could tell what had just occurred. But as they craned their necks to observe the platform, they realized that Yang Qi had simply lifted his arm to stop the movement of the saber. Then he just pushed the saber away from him.

Various expressions flashed across Young Master Ling Tian’s face as he dispelled the saber, which was a mere manifestation of magical laws. “Brother Yang Qi, many thanks for holding back just now. I'm not even close to being a match for you. The truth is that you could defeat me with a single blow if you wanted to, but instead, you gave me some face by drawing the fight out. If you become the league-lord, I’ll follow you without the slightest hesitation.”

Without another word, he walked off of the platform and sat down off to the side.

He could have left, but was instead waiting to see how the rest of the fighting would play out.

Now that Yang Qi had vanquished Young Master Ling Tian, everyone realized how formidable he was. And many an unsightly expression could be seen on the faces of the people from the Genesis Sanctum.

Everyone knew about the tensions between the two major sects, and the fact that Yang Qi had the support of the Woodfern Couple Palace wasn’t lost on the crowd. If he became the league-lord, then benefited from the blessing of vital energy, it would be a big blow to the Genesis Sanctum.

Even as Yang Qi stood on the platform and prepared to address the crowd, a beam of black sword light suddenly appeared, flashing out from the depths of the crowd accompanied by sinister laughter.

“You killed a lot of experts from our Royal Palace of Assassins, Yang Qi. Now we’re about to see if you can hold your spot on that fighting platform!”

The sword light was as black as the darkest night, and as it reached Yang Qi, it turned into something like a black dragon, pulsing with a noxious aura that seemed filled with poison.

“A hypertoxic god sword!”

“A blade of a poison god!”

“Everyone on the Ancient Road to the Gods would shiver in fear if that sword appears. According to the stories, it’s a god item left behind by the king of poison gods. It can turn any area into a hypertoxic kingdom that can kill even gods.”

Many expressions of surprise could be seen in the audience.

However, Yang Qi didn’t seem the least bit fazed. He curled his fingers into a shape that resembled a lotus, and reached out to meet the toxic sword light. The light slammed into him over and over again, until he was surrounded by a haze of darkness that was a toxic miasma.

However, that was when a boundless energy art took effect.

The toxic energy suddenly burst into flames! How could some god of poisons possibly deal with the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body and the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth?

Yang Qi wasn’t in the mood to show the least bit of mercy. Reaching out with fingers curled into hooks, he latched onto a hidden figure and dragged him out into the open. It was a black-garbed man, who subsequently turned and tried to flee. Before he could, Yang Qi clenched his hand into a fist, and the man’s head exploded. Then Yang Qi shoved his hand out, and the man’s body was crushed into a smear of gore on the platform.

Unfortunately, it was obvious that the man in black had been a mere puppet under the control of some far more powerful entity, a tool of assassination aimed at Yang Qi.

“The Royal Palace of Assassins is full of nothing but trash!” Yang Qi flicked his finger, sending out a stream of true flame that wiped the smear of gore out of existence. “When I have the time, I’ll wipe out every last wretch-devil from the place.”

When everyone saw him easily dispatch the hypertoxic sword without even being hurt, they were shocked to realize that his energy arts were even more profound than they had assumed.

“Mother, Father,” Mu Yexi said quietly, “how strong is this guy? Was he just running his mouth before, or is he really that powerful?”

“He’s powerful,” Mu Renwang said. “In fact, I can’t believe he's reached this level. I can’t even get a read on him. The move he used to beat Young Master Ling Tian was exquisite. And he just used a very vicious daoist technique to cut down the expert from the Royal Palace of Assassins. It looks as though he hasn’t even used his Unspoiled Body yet. His cultivation base is definitely at the level of being able to beat mid Terrifying opponents!”

“If that's the case,” Su Xin said, “doesn’t it mean we won’t be able to control him?”

“It doesn’t matter. Look at the expression on Huangfu Genesis’ face. You can tell how much he hates Yang Qi; he’ll obviously do anything in his power to deal with him. So why should we waste any effort on it?”

“True,” Mu Yexi said. “Although, I can’t help but wonder what the junior pontiff is currently saying to Huangfu Genesis.”

The junior pontiff was indeed whispering into his father’s ear.

“Father, how could this brat be so strong now? Did the Woodfern Couple Palace really help him that much?”

“There’s no way. How could the Woodfern Couple Palace be that incredible? I know exactly how strong that adulterous couple is. If they had the ability to make someone this strong, they would’ve used it on that daughter of theirs, not a stranger. It seems to me this boy is strong enough to fight a mid Terrifying expert. We can’t afford to underestimate him. If he becomes the league-lord, it’s going to be an unmitigated disaster for us. I have other people on my payroll who I thought would be useful, but now I think they’ll be nothing more than cannon fodder. And where is Bastard Seacliff? Why hasn’t he made a move yet? Don’t tell me he’s gone into hiding.”

“He said he needs to fuse with some sort of magical treasure,” the junior pontiff said. “But I wouldn’t be surprised if he’s hiding out and just watching events unfold. He’s the kind of person that’s impossible to predict or control.”

“Let’s wait and see what happens. If Bastard Seacliff joins the fight, it’ll be a battle between a dragon and a tiger. And if they hurt each other badly enough, we can probably swoop in and turn the situation to our advantage. Son, remember that you can’t afford to underestimate all the heroes that exist out there. Don’t assume that just because you have me on your side, you can match up to them. You're strong, but you can't be the league-lord. You're simply not on the same level as the true geniuses from the Ancient Road to the Gods. Even if I tried to bless you with power, you wouldn’t be able to get strong enough for that.”

“I just can’t accept it, Father,” the junior pontiff said with a scowl. “I know that whoever becomes the league-lord will be a puppet that will be under incredible pressure and will have to defend against attacks from all fronts. But I'm not scared! It’s just too bad that there are so many experts out there vying for the spot.”

“Later on, I’ll help you take control from behind the scenes. The struggles of the Ancient Road to the Gods aren’t important in the end. As long as you can reach godly ascension, you’ll have true power.” Huangfu Genesis’ eyes shone with brilliant light as he stared at Yang Qi. “I’ll think of a way to deal with this kid. Eventually, I’ll take everything that belongs to him and give it to you. Even if he does become the league-lord, well, I’ve already planned for what to do when the blessing of power occurs....”

“What do you mean, Father? Did you finally gain enlightenment of the final passage of the Book of Genesis?”

“Of course. Just wait and see what I'm capable of now. Maybe this boy is as strong as a mid Terrifying expert, but he isn’t actually in that level. His will is deficient, so if he tries to stand up to me, he’ll be pulling a myriad of tribulations down onto his head!”

Meanwhile, Yang Qi stood there, having vanquished the expert from the Royal Palace of Assassins. And apparently, no one was willing to step forward and challenge him.

Clasping his hands behind his back, he said, “With all the heroes converged here today, is it really true that no one out there will challenge me? If not, I suppose I'm the league-lord.”

“Very bombastic!” someone said.

A middle-aged man suddenly stepped out of nowhere. He had halos surrounding his head which were none other than primeval god skills, and he wore the clothing of a confucian scholar. He looked like a man of learning, yet his eyes were bright green, making him also look like some sort of fiend-devil.

Chapter 1077: A Mysterious Expert

This newcomer was from the Hell of Books and Civilization, however, he only looked like a fiend-devil. He didn’t actually possess fiend-devil blood, just a hint of the air of a wretch-god. Immediately, there were several old-timers present who recognized him.

“It's Wretch Heaven-Gentleman!”

“Wretch Heaven-Gentleman has actually joined the fray. Isn’t he the houselord of the House of Wretch-Gentlemen? People are saying that not too long ago, he tried to break through to the mid Terrifying level, but failed, experiencing cultivation deviation and exploding into absolutely nothing. So what’s he doing here alive?”

“He obviously didn’t break through to the mid Terrifying level, but he did experience an unimaginable boost to his divine abilities. I’d say he’s very, very close to being as strong as the mid Terrifying level.”

Another extremely famous person had arrived.

“Sire, are you Wretch Heaven-Gentleman?” Yang Qi said.

“Of course I am,” the man replied. Instead of lunging forward in attack, he simply smiled and said, “Who could have guessed that a little group like the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect would produce an expert such as yourself? Very unexpected. If you actually become the league-lord, they’ll have reason to be very proud.”

Crack!

Yang Qi suddenly slapped his hand down on himself, grabbing something that no one could see. Whatever it was, it was twisting and writhing in his hand, and simultaneously emitting piercing screams that were very uncomfortable to anyone who could hear them. In fact, everyone present suddenly felt dizzy and light-headed.

Soon, the object in Yang Qi’s hand became visible. It was a blackish-violet scorpion with a vicious stinger that glowed with mutant, wretched godliness.

This was not some ordinary venomous creature like those that existed in the mortal world. This was a pest from the god world, and a very powerful one at that.

It was impossible to say when, but Wretch Heaven-Gentleman had secretly sent the thing onto Yang Qi in the hopes of poisoning him. However, Yang Qi had detected the creature and grabbed it.

Yang Qi exerted about one-third of the force he was capable of, and cracking sounds rang out along with the piercing screams of the scorpion. However, it didn’t die. Its carapace was incredibly strong, so much so that one-third of Yang Qi’s strength, which would easily kill many top experts in an instant, wasn’t enough to deal with the scorpion.

Upon seeing Yang Qi capture his scorpion, an intimidating expression appeared on Wretch Heaven-Gentleman’s face. “At what point did you steal my scorpion, Junior Sectlord? When we were talking just now?”

Yang Qi laughed. “You certainly live up to your name, Wretch Heaven-Gentleman. How very sinister of you to plant your scorpion on me like that. In all fairness, this creature would be considered difficult to deal with even in the god world. Sadly for you, it’s not enough to cause problems for me. I've come to win the spot of league-lord with real swords and real spears. Do you really think that some silly plots and machinations could be used to defeat me? Did I hear correctly that you tried to reach the mid Terrifying level, but failed? If so, I guess it's true what they say: heaven and earth won’t tolerate a malicious heart! What other explanation could there be for your failure?”

Crack!

Yang Qi exerted a bit more effort and the scorpion exploded. Expression turning even more malicious, Wretch Heaven-Gentleman said, “You just killed a venomous beast from the god world. Do you know how grave of a sin that is?”

BZZZZZZZZ!

All of a sudden, a host of insects flew out, creating streaks of light that shot toward Yang Qi and slammed into his defensive empyrean energy, then began gnawing their way through it.

“Those are godcorpse flies!” Sectlord Will Manifestation blurted, rising to his feet with a look of shock on his face. “According to the legends, they grow on the corpses of gods! And as they feed on such corpses, they develop a powerful poison that can eat through any kind of true energy!”

Wretch Heaven-Gentleman burst out into piercing laughter. “My godcorpse flies come from the corpses of gods in the god world. It took a lot of effort to capture them with my God-Entrancing Song, but after a few hundred million years of work, they’ve become a very powerful tool for me. I hope you enjoy the sensation of being killed by them!”

“Oh really?”

As the flies surrounded him, Yang Qi simply looked on, allowing them to eat through his defensive empyrean energy for a moment. But then, he waved his hand and a pulse rolled out, sending all of the flies tumbling in the opposite direction.

However, they weren’t dead. Instead, they clumped together into a large ball that turned and began rolling back toward Yang Qi.

Unfortunately for them, he went on to murmur an enchantment.

Instantly, the ball of godcorpse flies stopped moving, their psychic connection to Wretch Heaven-Gentleman broken. Then, they began loudly buzzing as they aggressively flew back toward their previous master.

“How is that even possible? My cloud of godcorpse flies is an out-of-body incarnation! A second nascent divinity! How could they be turning on me?” Wretch Heaven-Gentleman very nearly screamed as he drew on a host of magics and incantations to defend himself. Sadly, none of them worked, and the godcorpse flies were soon gnawing their way into his defensive empyrean energy.

Walking up to him, Yang Qi said, “Enjoy yourself. This is called reaping what you've sown.”

Whoosh!

He stabbed his finger out, hitting Wretch Heaven-Gentleman’s defensive energy arts and shattering them. Instantly, the godcorpse flies began burrowing into the man’s body and chewing their way toward his sea of consciousness.

Wretch Heaven-Gentleman let loose a bloodcurdling scream as he fell to the ground, where he writhed violently as his body decayed. Not even his nascent divinity was able to escape. Once godcorpse flies entered a body, their poison would immobilize the nascent divinity, making escape completely impossible.

The screams pouring from Wretch Heaven-Gentleman’s mouth caused chills to run up the spines of the onlookers. Everyone on the Ancient Road to the Gods knew that once someone fell victim to godcorpse flies, there was no escaping them.

Crunch. Crunch....

Everyone present could hear the sound of the bugs eating away at Wretch Heaven-Gentleman until he was nothing more than a skeleton. However, the skeleton suddenly twitched, and a stream of will shot out that said, “Save me! Save me, Yang Qi! I’ll work for you. Just let me live. I've already cultivated to the point of developing a Skeletal Soul! My skeleton is my soul, and my soul is my skeleton! I'm so close to being deathless....”

In response, Yang Qi merely thrust his palm out, causing cracking sounds to ring out as the skeleton crumbled into dust, which the godcorpse flies ravenously devoured.

Wretch Heaven-Gentleman had been devoured by his own godcorpse flies, to the point where not even his bones were left behind.

Next, Yang Qi waved his hand, causing the godcorpse flies to gather into a sphere that floated over to his hand. Looking closely, he saw that they looked like little more than gnats, yet they were obviously incredibly powerful.

Drawing on the Sovereign Lord’s Holy and Far-Reaching Consummate Omnicurse, he forced the godcorpse flies to become his.

A droning sound could be heard as the sphere of flies then shot out into the audience. Everyone nearby jumped out of the way as the flies headed to the area where the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect was sitting, where they stopped and hovered next to the sectlord.

“Sectlord,” Yang Qi said, “you can use your divine will to command those godcorpse flies. They won’t turn on you. With a god item like that, no one will dare cause problems for our sect.”

“Excellent. Excellent!” the sectlord said. Not daring to actually touch the flies, he carefully sent some divine will toward them as a test. Sure enough, the flies were completely docile in response to him and instantly accepted his commands. Chuckling, he said, “They really are listening to me!”

The cloud of flies then flew up his sleeve, to the shock of everyone present. Obviously, nobody would be causing problems for the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect any time soon; not with the threat of the flies.

Having taken care of Wretch Heaven-Gentleman, Yang Qi looked around and said, “Anyone else?”

A long moment of silence unfolded, during which not a single person stepped forward. Normally speaking, it would be a big drain to kill a powerful expert the way Yang Qi just had, which would then lead to people taking advantage of the situation by ‘tag-teaming’. However, Yang Qi had won his victory as easily as blowing some dust off his shoulder. Even cultivators that had only just stepped into the Terrifying level and had a psychic scale of one or two could tell that he wasn’t even close to running low on vital energy. He was still at his peak.

Considering that, nobody was willing to fight him.

“What about Bastard Seacliff? Why isn’t he stepping forward?” A lot of people were wondering why Bastard Seacliff hadn’t stepped in yet.

As for Yang Qi, he continued to look around vigilantly, convinced that his victory couldn’t possibly be won this easily. Winning this smoothly would be unrealistic; there had to be additional powerful experts waiting to make a move. In fact, he was expecting to face people who were actually in the mid Terrifying level, but were pretending to be at a lower level.

And they wouldn’t be easy to fight.

Enough time passed for an incense stick to burn, which was when someone suddenly said in a grating voice, “I wouldn’t mind asking for some fighting tips from you.”

Then, someone shot onto the fighting platform in a blur of motion.

It was a mysterious-looking man wearing a bronze mask, his hands bare of any weapons. “I’d like to test out your most powerful move.”

“Who are you?” Yang Qi asked. He didn't recognize the man, and apparently neither did anyone else in the crowd.

Chapter 1078: A Mysterious Expert (2)

“You don’t need to know who I am,” the masked man replied with open disdain. “You just need to know that I’m about to defeat you. After all, the only thing a loser needs to know is that he’s lost. Nothing more.”

Yang Qi could sense that there was immense power brewing within the man, something that he was obviously prepared to release in a devastating attack. Smiling faintly, Yang Qi said, “You talk big. But the truth is that you’re nervous, otherwise you wouldn’t be hiding your power like this. Go ahead and attack whenever you’re ready. Truth be told, I don’t care what your name is, because you’re right; the only thing a loser needs to know is that he’s been beaten. By me. Nothing more.”

WHOOSH!

Unexpectedly, Yang Qi took the initiative, appearing right in front of the man and reaching out to grab his mask.

Many onlookers gasped in amazement at his display of speed. It was actually a consummate palm technique from the Seventy-Two Monarchs Energy Art, the Shadowful God Claw, which was said to be so effective it could even kill a person by grabbing their shadow.

Furthermore, once the claw had latched onto someone, they would be incapable of moving.

Considering the current level of Yang Qi’s energy arts and cultivation base, there were very few people in existence who could possibly evade this move. In fact, such people would be as rare as phoenix feathers or qilin horns.

Yet, in shocking fashion, the man in the bronze mask managed to slip to the side and lash out with his arm, which almost resembled a whip as it struck Yang Qi’s outstretched hand.

Gong!

A booming sound rang out from Yang Qi’s hand like a bell, along with vibrations that caused many people to turn pale in the face. Some even coughed up blood.

The blow which had just been struck was so mighty that even an ancient god mountain would likely have exploded from it.

Yet it didn't seem to have any effect on Yang Qi, causing the masked man’s eyes to grow wide with astonishment. Taking advantage of his shock, Yang Qi reached out again, this time reaching toward his opponent’s arm.

However, the masked man quickly withdrew his arm, then whipped his other hand out like an axe preparing to cleave a mountain in half. In response, Yang Qi leaped back to avoid the blow. The truth was that although he hadn’t shown any visible reaction to the blow from moments ago it had stung quite badly. In fact, the divine ability backing it was so powerful that if he hadn’t recently cultivated his Unspoiled Body to the level of three hundred tribulations, he wouldn’t have been able to stand up to it.

What was even more shocking was that this man’s attacks reminded him of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. It almost felt as if he were being attacked by the whipping trunk of the King of Godmammoths.

‘Does this guy also cultivate the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth?’ he thought, shocked. As far as he knew, only the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth that could unleash force such as this. Considering the level of his Unspoiled Body, nothing else could cause him such stinging pain.

However, there was something different about this Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, as though the attack didn't contain the pure strength of the technique. It almost seemed like the hard and unyielding aspects of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth had been transformed so that someone without a God Legion Seal could use it.

‘Don’t tell me.... Is this a subordinate of the bearer of the God Legion Seal from the Primeval Age? Or could he be one of Proud Heaven’s men?’ As Yang Qi pressed his own attack, he realized that the movement of his opponent’s arms resembled two mammoth trunks, but at the same time, two whips. And he moved them with such flowing rapidity that the entire fighting platform was filled with reflections and projections of them.

Intense energy flows filled the platform like wind blades that slashed this way and that.

The experts sitting nearest the platform edged away nervously. Everyone was visibly taken aback.

Suddenly, Huangfu Genesis waved his arm and sent a huge energy field out to cover the fighting platform, preventing the gusts of wind generated by the masked man from reaching the audience. As a result, Huangfu Genesis himself felt as though he were being battered by the attack and could tell how immensely powerful the masked man was.

Yang Qi was also shocked; the masked man’s attacks seemed to grow more and more powerful, as though he would never stop.

Having faced a fist technique and an arm technique from this man, he could tell that he had cultivated the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth to a very high level, yet didn’t have a God Legion Seal.

There were only two possibilities. The first was that someone had transferred the true energy of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth into him to empower him. The second was that someone had actually taught the energy arts of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth to him. In that case, he wouldn’t need a God Legion Seal. Of course, it would have required making changes to the technique, which would make it less powerful than normal. From what Yang Qi could tell, the second possibility was the more likely of the two.

As they fought back and forth, Yang Qi was coming to realize that he had never seen any energy art like this before. It was powerful and mysterious in a way that was similar to Proud Heaven’s techniques, yet it contained profound differences. If he had to guess, he would say that it was actually a combination of the God Legion Seal from the Primeval Age and Proud Heaven’s fighting techniques, mixed together to create a brand new divine ability.

RIP!

Yang Qi’s arm was hit by the masked man’s strange arm technique.

Yang Qi flew backward, and at the same time, the masked man shot toward him to press the attack. It looked as though the two of them were very evenly matched.

Unbeknownst to anyone, the masked man was actually deeply astonished. Ever since he mastered his Mammoth King’s God Whip, he had been completely invincible. Even the most powerful opponents had been forced to either flee or be killed.

Yet here he was fighting someone who wasn’t even in the mid Terrifying level. It was force meeting force, and it caused the masked man to be riddled with disbelief.

After all, only he knew how powerful the Mammoth King’s God Whip really was.

“Hold it!” Yang Qi asked. “What energy art is that? How come it’s so powerful?”

The masked man chuckled coldly. “You should know exactly what energy art it is. What do you think? Having trouble putting your finger on it? I'm going to force you to use your ultimate trump card. If you don’t, you’re going to end up dead!”

“Which world do you come from?” Yang Qi asked. He knew that the man was talking about the God Legion Seal. However, it was also obvious that the man had no idea how strong Yang Qi really was. After all, he was an Inheritor with the Purrfect God Art, who had long since sloughed off the shackles of the God Legion Seal and begun working on his own school of thought. “Are you from the future world or the past one?”

“Keep on guessing, because I'm from neither, but at the same time, from both. I'm going to collect all of your quintessences and combine them to become the mightiest entity that’s ever existed.” By this point, the masked man’s voice was trembling with a touch of madness. “All other people are mere foils to my glory, and that includes you!”

RUMBLE!

The masked man unleashed an explosive kick that also resembled a whip. “Just now, I was only using the portion of my whip technique designed for hands. Next, you can see what my legs are capable of!”

He flew through the air with hands and legs that thrummed with immense power, as if he were a battle puppet designed by the ancient legion of gods. Now, both his hands and his legs were snapping about like whips, causing raging power to reach every corner of the fighting platform as he closed in on Yang Qi.

“Perfect. You’re finally using the full extent of your energy arts. I'm curious to see what you're actually able to do.” Yang Qi watched the blows of the whip technique closing in, and could tell that they were capable of detonating anything they touched. He ripped his two hands through the air in front of him, causing halos to bloom behind his head and the godpower of the Great Necropolis to shoot out. Instantly, the area around him transformed into an impenetrable kingdom of stone.

Then he punched out, causing an enormous fist of stone to hurtle forward to meet the masked man’s whip attack.

This was a contest of nothing but brute force!

Crack!

Huangfu Genesis’ face fell as the energy field he had put up suddenly cracked, and immense energy flows erupted out. Everyone backed away as quickly as possible, with some stragglers moving too slow and being ripped to shreds.

Mu Renwang and Su Xin exchanged a glance, then joined Huangfu Genesis to reseal the fighting platform with another energy shield. None of them could possibly have guessed that the fight between Yang Qi and the masked man would become this terrifying.

Everyone present was bowled over with shock, with the exception of the purrling, who was simply playing in Jadefall’s arms as if it wasn’t interested at all in what was happening around it. Jadefall scratched it behind the ears.

“I sure hope Yang Qi wins this fight,” she murmured.

Chapter 1079: The Mammoth King&#039;s God Whip

This was a battle between a dragon and a tiger, and it was shocking everyone present.

It was a conflict of force versus force, power versus power. Each opponent was obviously intent on annihilating the other, ensuring that the forces on display were destructive to the extreme. If they had been fighting out in the open, the explosive side-effects would have been enough to wipe two thousandth ranked immortal worlds out of existence.

At the moment, three top experts had joined forces to keep the conflict under control; if they weren’t there, countless people would already be dead.

Yang Qi was drawing on his most quintessential energy arts, with the exception of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, which he was keeping hidden. Instead, he was using his Unspoiled Body, Seventy-Two Monarchs Energy Art, and the abilities from the Great Necropolis.

None of those three energy arts were in any way inferior to the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, especially the abilities from the Great Necropolis. And the profound combinations of all the moves he was using was enough to seize good fortune from heaven and earth, seize the quintessence of the universe, and snatch the souls of gods.

All of a sudden, Yang Qi thrust his hands out, and an enormous tombstone appeared, accompanied by thunderous rumbling. In the blink of an eye, the tombstone was bearing down on the man in the mask, who slashed at it with a whip-like strike and then fell back.

“Hold it!” the man said. “That's a martial discipline from the Great Necropolis, which only the Inheritors can use. Don’t tell me you’ve become an Inheritor! How is that even possible? I thought you used that thing. Logically speaking, a bearer of that thing shouldn't be able to become an Inheritor.”

The ‘thing’ to which he referred was none other than the God Legion Seal.

Inside, Yang Qi nodded and thought, ‘So, I was right. Bearers of the God Legion Seal can’t become Inheritors. Nor can people with King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions. When the godpower seeds first emerged, they must have avoided such people at all costs.’

Chuckling, he said, “How could you possibly understand what I am? Hurry up and tell me who you are and where you’re from. If you do, I’ll spare you. If not, it will only be a moment before I figure out your whip technique and proceed to the part of the fight where I kill you.”

“How impudent!” the masked man growled. “Not even Proud Heaven or that other guy could figure out my whip technique, but you think you can? I'm going to capture you and drag out all of your secrets. For example, how you became an Inheritor!”

RUMBLE!

The man attacked again, his arms and legs whipping in a strangely fluid motion that made them look exactly like whips. At the same time, they resembled mammoth trunks.

“Dracomammoth Descends the Mountain!”

Shouting, he attacked with devastating force, causing an image of an ancient god to rise up behind him as he used one of the most profound aspects of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.

Instead of evading the blow, Yang Qi took a step forward and threw out two palms, using a move from the Unspoiled Body called Boundless Tribulations and Kalpas. When the two moves hit each other, they unexpectedly caused a black hole to spring up.

The black hole disappeared a moment later, but the short time in which it existed was enough to fill everyone with dread at the power they sensed in it. The black hole was an aspect of Boundless Tribulations and Kalpas that had been specifically designed to deal with the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, and could negate many of its profundities. What better move could he use than that, considering he had finally met someone else using the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth?

“Cosmic Protomammoth!”

The masked man used another move, spinning through the air to create a projected image, in the middle of which was a godmammoth, bursting with power, whose trunk could span the heavens.

Then the man threw out his hands to block Yang Qi’s every path of escape.

However, Yang Qi didn’t even attempt to back up. Instead, he drew deeply on his Unspoiled Body.

“Damned by Myriad Tribulations!” He threw out his hands, causing a spiraling field of energy to appear that negated the incoming attack.

RUMBLE!

After clashing, the two opponents flew in opposite directions, before landing several dozen meters apart. The masked man didn’t seem like he was even close to running out of energy. Surging with power, he said, “Get ready for my next move. God Above Gods!”

Boundless godpower erupted, sending his aura out like wave after wave to overwhelm everything in its path. It really was as if a god above all other gods was closing in with deadly force.

“Tribulation Sea Without Limit!”

Yang Qi flew forward and exchanged a full thirty palm strikes with the masked man. Finally, two bangs rang out as the masked man hit Yang Qi in the shoulder with a whip, but was struck by Yang Qi’s fist in the process. The two of them flew apart, the masked man coughing up blood and Yang Qi’s face draining of blood.

“They’re both hurt!” Quite a few people in the audience rose to their feet; for both competitors to be badly hurt could be a good thing for people who wanted to take advantage of the situation for their own betterment.

“What do you think?” Yang Qi quickly circulated his energy to heal the injuries he had just sustained. Moments ago, it had felt like an ancient godmammoth had been rampaging inside of him.

Thankfully, the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body had been specifically created to deal with the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. Furthermore, he had his own godmammoth true energy. Acting quickly, he used the Purrfect God Art to capture the intruding godmammoth true energy and send it into his dantian region, where he added it to his own, giving him new insight into the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.

Not only had he already recovered from his injuries, he had gained further benefits. However, he continued pretending he was hurt, hoping to see who might try to take advantage of him in a moment of weakness.

“You got me, boy,” the masked man said. Spitting out some more blood, he rose to his feet. Then he shot off the fighting platform, using a profound movement technique to vanish before anyone could see where he was heading.

He left behind only a few words. “You were just hit with my Mammoth King’s God Whip, boy. It will stay inside you and eventually destroy your energy arts. There’s no way you can get rid of it. It wasn’t long ago that the Shepherd was hit with a similar art, and it took him a hundred million years to recover. The only thing that awaits you is death; I’ll just wait until it happens.”

As his voice faded away, everyone stood there looking down at Yang Qi. Although none of them went so far as to try to take advantage of him in the moment, the words spoken by the masked man were ringing in their ears.

“Mother, do you know who that masked man was?” Mu Yexi asked. “I can’t believe all of this is happening. Should we continue throwing our support behind Yang Qi? And what happens if Bastard Seacliff shows up right now? This might be just the moment he was waiting for.”

“It seems to me that Yang Qi has been seriously hurt,” Su Xin said. “However, he still seems like he's hanging in there. Let’s just wait and see what happens next. If he dies, at least he’ll take some more people with him. And if he gets killed, we’ll act quickly, take his body, and extract the power of his godpower seeds. With it, we’ll be unstoppable! And that damned Huangfu Genesis will be the first to die!”

“You’re right, this is going to be a good opportunity for us!” Mu Renwang said.

Meanwhile, laughter rang out as several dozen experts flew down to the fighting platform. As it turned out, they were going to take advantage of the situation and try to take Yang Qi out.

The group all exchanged glances, then one of them stepped out in front of the others. “Which of us should go first, friends? Who will challenge the junior sectlord of the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect to a fight?”

“How about you go first, Zhang Deming!” another of the experts said. “You were the first to land on the platform. According to heaven’s laws and earth’s principles, you should have the first shot. The rest of us will wait here. If you lose, we’ll take turns. Agreed?”

“Hmph. Hu Di? I see you Dog Barbarians are as treacherous as ever. You want me to go first? Sounds more like you want me to waste my energy, then jump in to take advantage of the situation. You think I'm going to let that happen? How about you go first instead?”

At this point, a rather skinny fellow stepped forward. “Look, this guy is injured, but as we all know, a centipede does not stop wriggling even after being stomped on. It’ll definitely be a big drain on true energy for whoever fights him. I have a suggestion. If we wait until he builds his energy back up, then we’ll all lose. So instead, how about we up the ante. Let’s agree that, regardless of who goes in what order, whoever beats him can assimilate his cultivation base. And during that moment, no one can interfere.”

“A wonderful suggestion from the House of God Thieves!” Hu Di from the Dog Barbarians said sarcastically. “Who in their right might would trust you people from the House of God Thieves? You’re duplicitous backstabbers, every last one of you.”

Chapter 1080: Bastard Seacliff Shows Up

“If you pieces of trash are too scared, the House of God Thieves will step in.”

Chuckling, the man from the House of God Thieves strode toward Yang Qi, who was currently sitting cross-legged in the middle of the fighting platform. It seemed a given that Yang Qi would have a lot of treasures on him, and the House of God Thieves was all about stealing treasure. They also stole true energy, power, cultivation bases, and just about everything else.

In fact, there was nothing they wouldn't steal.

That was how the House of God Thieves worked.

They were a very powerful group, and when they faced an enemy, would use their Heaven-Stealing Profound Art to rob them of their life force quintessence and essence. That made them virtually impossible to beat. Even worse, they had the ability to steal whatever magical treasures their enemies used against them in battle.

It was said that the founding patriarch of the House of God Thieves was the Thief God from the god world, who was even known to have stolen godhood from his enemies.

According to the rumors, the Thief God could steal hearts, men, emotions, and plenty of other things that weren’t even corporeal items. He was notorious in the god world, but no one had ever been able to stop him. At least until he stole a magical treasure from the Sovereign Lord himself. The Sovereign Lord then used one of his consummate divine abilities to eventually capture the Thief God and send him to the Abyss, where he became a wretch-god and was ultimately refined in the Heaven and Earth Furnace by the King of Godmammoths.

Because of these stories, everyone feared the House of God Thieves.

The current houselord of the House of God Thieves was supposedly in seclusion, attempting to reach the mid Terrifying level. However, the man currently standing on the fighting platform wasn’t the houselord, but rather one of the top geniuses in the sect, the junior houselord. He had one of the three thousand special constitutions, making him a Thieving One, and although no one was exactly sure of the level of his cultivation base, he was clearly confident in his ability to deal with Yang Qi.

Most of the other organizations on the Ancient Road to the Gods viewed the House of God Thieves as very troublesome, and tried to avoid attracting their attention. Whoever the House of God Thieves took an interest in would be forced to constantly be on guard lest they be robbed blind, even of their wives.

It was as if the House of God Thieves had a devilish power that allowed them to successfully steal anything. The fact that their junior houselord was here taking an active role in the competition caused everyone else to back away nervously.

He stopped about nine meters in front of Yang Qi, then reached out and made a grasping gesture. Then he looked in surprise at his hand, as if he had expected something to appear there.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi remained seated with his eyes closed, apparently ignoring everything that was happening.

The junior houselord snorted. “Let's see what you’re capable of.” Even as the words left his mouth, he drew on all of the power he could muster to launch an attack.

However, before he could make his move, a white blur appeared, landing right next to him on the fighting platform, pulsing with killing intent. The junior houselord tried to retreat, but before he could, a palm technique was unleashed, creating an energy field that completely surrounded him and made it impossible to flee.

POP!

A palm struck the junior houselord and his head exploded. At the same time, his nascent divinity flew out, only to be grabbed and crushed out of existence. His true energy didn’t even have a chance to escape.

Then, a cynical, arrogant voice rang out. “Wonderful. Heh heh. So this is the Heaven-Stealing True Energy of the House of God Thieves. I'm glad I got my hands on some. Now, be assimilated!”

Flames erupted from his palm, and within moments, the junior houselord’s corpse was eaten up and his vital energy was completely absorbed.

If this person wasn’t Bastard Seacliff from the House of God Bastards, then who could he possibly be? His cynically arrogant voice was so distinctive that anyone who heard him speaking would be able to instantly identify him.

And his appearance on the scene caused quite a few experts standing on the fighting platform to suddenly feel like they were suffocating.

One of them looked over and said, “We got here first, Bastard Seacliff. If you want to join in, you’ll have to wait your turn. Don’t tell me you’re just going to ignore the rules.”

“What rules?” Bastard Seacliff said. Looking down at the seemingly meditating Yang Qi, he chuckled coldly and said, “I never would’ve predicted that this brat would get so strong. Very impressive. Unfortunately, it's time for him to call it a day.”

“Are you really going to try to take advantage of us, Bastard Seacliff?” another expert said. “You might be superior to us individually, but considering how many of us there are, you’ll end up dead if you try to stand in our way.”

“Is that so. Well, let’s see what happens.”

Without even seeming to move, Bastard Seacliff was suddenly in front of the expert who had just spoken. The man shouted and threw out a palm, yet it hit nothing. In the same moment, a black hole popped into being right above his head, sucking away his blood, quintessence energy, psyche, and everything else that made him up. A moment later, he was a desiccated corpse floating there for everyone to see.

He had been killed with one simple move.

The other experts all reacted with open shock. “How vicious of you, Bastard Seacliff! We never said we wanted to fight you, did we? You should have waited to deal with Yang Qi first before exchanging fighting tips with anyone else.”

“Come on, let’s get out of here....”

The dozens of experts had been so thoroughly frightened by Bastard Seacliff that they had lost all will to fight.

“You think you can just walk away?” Bastard Seacliff said. “To where, exactly? Once you step onto this fighting platform, stepping off it is no easy task. Besides, I cultivate a certain energy art that requires souls, and I happen to be running very low on them at the moment.”

Swish. Rustle.

Moving with enigmatic quickness, he waved his hand, causing a second expert on the fighting platform to violently explode.

The other experts were already fleeing helter-skelter, but sadly for them, he had already thrown up a field of empyrean energy to block their paths.

One miserable scream after another rang out as a profoundly horrifying scene played out. Some of the audience members, top experts and leaders of powerful sects, couldn't hold back and rushed forward, trying to prevent their sons and apprentices from being killed.

“Bastard Seacliff, you god bastard, how dare you harm my son!”

The houselord of the House of the Ancient Cistern leaped onto the platform to protect his son.

However, as soon as he landed, Bastard Seacliff reached out with both hands, grabbed him, and ripped him into pieces!

Blood and gore sprayed everywhere!

“Whoever dares to step onto this platform will suffer the same fate,” Bastard Seacliff announced, “and will also have their entire sect wiped out!” Suddenly, his eyes blazed, sending two streams of fire toward the other elders of the House of the Ancient Cistern.

They scrambled to flee, but sadly for them, they were too slow. More screams rang out as they were hit with the fire and burned away into nothing. They had been slaughtered by Bastard Seacliff.

Flop. Plop....

The more than a dozen experts on the fighting platform all realized that the situation was hopeless. Instead of joining hands to fight, they dropped to their knees. “Spare us, Bastard Seacliff! We don’t want to fight you. In fact, we can’t fight you. We... we acknowledge allegiance!”

The fact that he had just wiped out every member of a sect with only his gaze was enough to strike fear into the hearts of everyone present. Many experts present had hoped that someone would interfere, but Huangfu Genesis, Mu Renwang, and Su Xin were simply looking on coldly. Obviously, they tacitly approved of what was happening.

That tacit approval caused everyone to grow cold at heart.

But at the same time, many of them inwardly nodded, fully aware that the league-lord needed to be capable of such ruthless tactics. Only someone who could shock and awe his opponents, and use brutal bloodshed to crush his opposition, would be able to convince the masses that he was qualified. And right now, that was exactly what Bastard Seacliff was doing.

“Do you really think that kowtowing can absolve you of your crimes? Unfortunately, you don’t truly respect me in your hearts. Thus, you shall be executed as a warning to others.” Bastard Seacliff leaped into motion, becoming a streak of white. At the same time, screams rose up from the kneeling experts.

Bastard Seacliff harvested lives with brutal efficiency, either decapitating people or cutting them fully in half. Not a single one had any chance to fight back.

“We have to go all out!” one of the experts shouted. However, before he could do anything, he was crushed into a bloody pulp.

Within a few breaths of time, all of the experts on the fighting platform had been transformed into lifeless corpses.

Bastard Seacliff’s tactics were rapidly winning him the approval of the audience. After all, on the Ancient Road to the Gods, compassion, duty, propriety, and integrity would never win admiration. Those were qualities shown only by the weak! When facing a brutal, violent person, the first reaction would usually be to avoid provoking them. That was the best way to stay alive and keep one’s sect intact.

In fact, it was already possible to see the flow of destiny shifting toward Bastard Seacliff, as more and more people became convinced that he had the decisive brutality necessary to be the league-lord.

Meanwhile, Bastard Seacliff was acting like he had just accomplished something trivial and not worth mentioning. Licking his lips, he smiled and looked at the seated Yang Qi. “Back at Miss Mu Yexi’s banquet, I hit you with a single palm that made you cough up blood, boy. In fact, if I remember correctly, you passed out. I see that you've since recovered and gotten a bit stronger. Sadly, fate has decreed that you’ll lose. Therefore, hand me your Great Necropolis godpower seed. If you ignore me, it will be a crime, the punishment for which will be... well, how about you tell me?”

“Sectlord....” Jadefall, believing Yang Qi to truly be injured, was considering going to his aid. However, the sectlord held out his hand to prevent her.

“Calm down. Come, don’t tell me you aren’t used to how Yang Qi does things. Have you ever known him to not have some sort of plan? He’s just lulling his enemy into a false sense of security. Trust me, Bastard Seacliff is finished!”

The sectlord was absolutely correct, and had clearly come to deeply understand Yang Qi’s personality.

As for Jadefall, when she heard the sectlord’s words, she calmed down and fixed her eyes on the fighting platform, ready to take action in case anything went wrong.

Chapter 1081: Bashing Bastard Seacliff

Bastard Seacliff was standing about nine meters away from Yang Qi.

“There’s no need for any histrionics, Yang Qi. Stand up! I'm not going to take advantage of you because you’re injured. In fact, I’ll let you hit me three times before I do anything in response!”

Bastard Seacliff seemed to be holding back, almost as if he were worried about being injured by some desperate attack Yang Qi might unleash.

The truth was that he hadn’t slaughtered the other experts to put on a show of might. He had actually been using that time to form an out-of-body incarnation to use in the final fight against Yang Qi. And the reason he wanted Yang Qi to hit him three times wasn’t because of any sense of magnanimity, but rather because he wanted to see what Yang Qi was really capable of.

All of a sudden, Yang Qi’s eyes snapped open. “You’re really shameless, Bastard Seacliff. You claim you’re giving me the chance to hit you three times out of a sense of magnanimity, but the reality is that you’re actually scared of me.”

“Say what you want,” Bastard Seacliff replied, licking his lips. “The end result is that you're going to die. If you had kowtowed to me on the day we met and admitted the error of your ways, I might have been willing to train you. Make you into a truly formidable expert. Instead, you chose to oppose me. If I don’t kill you today, how could I possibly maintain my authority? How would I keep everyone in line? What right could I claim to be the league-lord?”

“League-lord?” Yang Qi chuckled coldly. “You really think you’re going to become the league-lord?”

“Who could possibly stop me? A mid Terrifying expert? Not even someone like that could stand up to me. My cultivation base is beyond the comprehension of someone like you.”

With that Bastard Seacliff took two steps forward, his true energy pulsing as though he were about to probe Yang Qi’s cultivation base.

As for Yang Qi, he didn’t make any move whatsoever.

However, he did shiver, releasing what appeared to be a chaotic aura that he subsequently suppressed.

Inwardly, Bastard Seacliff was delighted. ‘Great!’ he thought. ‘This guy really was hurt. I guess that mysterious guy in the mask must’ve been at about the same level as me. It’s too bad I couldn’t assimilate him. Well, considering the blow he landed, killing Yang Qi and assimilating him instead will bring similar benefits.’

“Stop playing possum!” he growled. “Get up and hit me three times. Hurry it up!”

Even as the words left his mouth, he reached out to grab Yang Qi. As of now, he didn’t intend to give Yang Qi any chance to hit him, but planned to kill him in a single blow, which would hopefully impress all of the experts present. In fact, some people were inwardly nodding at his display of might, and didn’t care at all that he was saying one thing and doing another. As far as they were concerned, that was how the league-lord should act.

RIP!

His hand landed firmly on the top of Yang Qi’s head. It was almost unbelievable how things were playing out.

Most people had assumed that Yang Qi would leap forward and have a dramatic battle with Bastard Seacliff, possibly even crushing him. But instead, Bastard Seacliff landed a merciless blow on Yang Qi, who didn’t even seem willing to fight back. It was a really big shock to everyone.

After all, the image of Yang Qi defeating three opponents who were virtually mid Terrifying experts was still fresh in their minds. How could someone like that be defeated so easily?

Just when everyone thought that Yang Qi was going to die, a sound echoed out that resembled metal grating on metal. Then, Bastard Seacliff backed up several paces, a look of astonishment on his face.

Meanwhile, a host of blood-colored souls appeared around him, exploding one after another.

“Excellent!” Yang Qi said, slowly rising to his feet. “I just destroyed your Blood Soul Art, completely nullifying what you did just moments ago. You were hoping to use an out-of-body incarnation to figure out my main moves, but unfortunately, that’s not going to work. And now I'm about to show you what a real fist technique looks like.”

Yang Qi had been acting weak in order to destroy Bastard Seacliff’s empyrean energy and make it impossible for him to escape with his life.

Now he was ready to go on the offensive and kill him.

“You...” Bastard Seacliff said, his expression turning into one of terror. “You’re not hurt at all! You were putting on an act, lulling me into confidence in order to destroy my energy art! Very clever. Were you also putting on a show when I struck you at the banquet when we first met?”

“What do you think?” Yang Qi replied. “Regardless, you're going to die today, no matter what. I'm not going to let a crafty and murderous god bastard like you live another day in this world.”

Bastard Seacliff suddenly burst out laughing. “Even if you weren’t hurt earlier, you’re still going to have to fight. And my cultivation base is still higher than yours. If some random person could fight you to a draw, how strong could you possibly be? Even an invincible mid Terrifying expert wouldn't be able to beat me in a fight, much less kill me. Today, in the presence of all these heroes, I'm going to show you a truly consummate art from the House of God Bastards. Even if someone from the legion of gods were to come, I could use this to kill them!”

“I'm not going to waste any more words on you,” Yang Qi said. “Prepare to die. I have other people to deal with besides you, you know.”

It was hard to say what level Yang Qi’s energy arts were at now. He had just absorbed some of the Mammoth King’s God Whip, significantly improving his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. Thanks to his fight with the mysterious masked man, his fighting prowess had improved and his psychic scale had risen.

He was like a mighty tiger descended from the mountains as he unleashed a devastating attack on Bastard Seacliff.

During his fight with the masked man, he hadn’t resorted to using the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, all because he was waiting for a possible clash with Bastard Seacliff. But now he had no reason to hold back, and was prepared to go all out.

“Boundless Tribulations and Kalpas!” he said, thrusting out his left hand in a palm strike. And his right hand clenched into a fist as he launched a devastating strike from the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. “Eternal Suppression of Rivers and Mountains!”

This was a perfect combination of the Unspoiled Body and the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, something that no one in all of history had ever done.

Before, he would never have been able to do this, even with the Mahātmā Jade. But thanks to the purrling and the Great Necropolis, he was able to resolve all of his difficulties. His Purrfect God Art and Inheritor status had made it all possible.

Now, to settle his score with Bastard Seacliff, he was unleashing all of his energy arts and martial disciplines, including a perfect combination of opposites that contained the profundities of both the god world and the devil world.

Buzzzz.

All onlookers felt as though they were suffocating. Huangfu Genesis’ face flickered with various expressions, and both Mu Renwang and Su Xin looked extremely serious as they watched Yang Qi unleash an attack that seemed capable of burying anything and everything.

Millions upon millions of blows rained down onto Bastard Seacliff, giving rise to primal-chaos and unleashing force that could destroy the barriers to the god world.

The sun and moon appeared; his left hand was the sun and his right hand was the moon!

POP!

Bastard Seacliff shot backward like a bullet, slamming down onto the fighting platform, where he coughed up a mouthful of blood. It was actually reminiscent of his initial encounter with Yang Qi, except the roles were reversed.

This was the first time since Yang Qi had become an Inheritor that he had actually used two killing moves as one. It was such a powerful combination that Bastard Seacliff wasn’t even able to defend himself from it.

In fact, if Yang Qi had used this combination against the man in the mask, he wouldn't have been hurt at all. Even Yang Qi was surprised at the power he had unleashed.

“I refuse to believe this,” Bastard Seacliff said. “How could your cultivation base be this powerful? How—” Before he could say anything else, the energy pulsing from Yang Qi became so intense that he couldn’t speak. He felt like he was suffocating, and all of the true energy in him was being suppressed.

Drawing deeply on every ounce of energy he could muster, he tried using a consummate art from the House of God Bastards to fight back. But before he could, Yang Qi kicked him in the chest, sending him flying back with more blood spraying out of his mouth.

Yang Qi had just used a combination of moves, including Mammoth Tramples Hell from the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth and the Five Afflictions of the Deva from the Unspoiled Body, to land another devastating blow on Bastard Seacliff.

Chapter 1082: Beaten to Death

Yang Qi landed blow after blow, causing blood to spray from Bastard Seacliff’s mouth.

He, the junior houselord of the magnificent House of God Bastards, was completely powerless when dealing with Yang Qi. When Yang Qi truly went all out, he was definitely on the same level as a mid Terrifying expert.

However, at a certain point, Bastard Seacliff’s boundlessly vicious nature took over. After all, he was the son of a god, and his energy was steeped in enmity and sin.

As that energy began to surge, Bastard Seacliff said, “You’re forcing my hand, Yang Qi. I won’t let you off the hook for this. In my efforts to become part of the legion of gods, I sealed the energy of enmity and sin within me. I'd hoped to negate my god bastard aura and my destiny of misfortune. But now I'm going to unseal that energy and use it to destroy you! In a moment, you’re going to see that I'm strong enough to destroy anything that gets in my path!”

Swish!

All of a sudden, Bastard Seacliff was thrumming with destructive power the likes of which he had never revealed before, the kind that could destroy everyone in the world....

Suddenly, his clothing was ripped to shreds, revealing a complex sealing mark on his chest that seemed to be composed of numerous images of skulls, gathered together like a cloud of flies. The sealing mark wriggled, seemingly in concert with the beating of his heart, and a boundless energy of enmity and sin suddenly began thrumming within him.

Thump thump. Thump thump.

The skulls exploded, and the energy shot out. At the same time, something like a pillar appeared behind him, filled with countless ghosts and vengeful souls, making it seem like all of the sins from the god world were collected together in Bastard Seacliff.

It was the true aura of a god bastard.

The gods were so incredibly powerful that heaven and earth didn’t approve of them. Because of that, their children would often be cursed by the god world upon birth, and would thus find it impossible to become gods themselves. They were plagued by the misfortunes of the god world and cast down to the Ancient Road to the Gods, where they became outcasts. As a result, the god bastards hated heaven, earth, gods, and men, and sought to bring about the destruction of everything in existence.

Once their true power was unleashed, it would bring about destruction the likes of which the Executors of the Ancient Road couldn’t match up to.

Yet, many god bastards eventually came to the realization that their hatred was of little use. Therefore, they would use powerful methods to seal the energy of sin and enmity from the god world, allowing themselves to enter a state of nominal peacefulness. Although that act would lower their cultivation base, it also meant that they could theoretically reach godly ascension eventually. This was one of the big secrets of the god bastards.

In fact, that was one of the reasons that Bastard Seacliff always acted so cynical.

In the end, though, the god bastards still had that energy of sin and enmity hidden deep within them.

At this moment in which Yang Qi was beating him back with every blow, Bastard Seacliff finally decided to unseal that energy within him and draw upon his true strength. He was becoming so strong that not even mid Terrifying experts would be anything for him to worry about.

RUMBLE!

As the energy of sin and enmity rumbled out, the fighting platform trembled and all the onlookers’ faces flickered with shock. Many of them worried that the energy would seep out and harm them, but thankfully, Yang Qi was able to prevent that from happening.

“Do you know how many unforgivable sins you’ve committed, Yang Qi?” Bastard Seacliff said. As of this moment, he didn't look cynical at all. Instead, he was like a devil king whose every step caused the energy of hell to roil out. Obviously, he was the kind of person who wouldn’t show any mercy at all. “Prepare to die, Yang Qi. Get ready to face the first stance of my Godfist of Sin and Enmity: Myriad Ancient Injustices!”

RUMBLE!

His hand shot forth, pitch black and surrounded by innumerable vengeful souls, all of them pulsing with the enmity and sin of the god world. As he attacked, heaven and earth filled with grief and indignation, closing in with such deadly force that Yang Qi immediately sensed himself coming under immense pressure.

“You think the sin and enmity of the god world can do anything to my energy arts?” Laughing, Yang Qi flew forward, throwing out both of his hands and summoning an enormous sphere that was none other than a bubble from the Purrfect God Art. Instantly, the sin and enmity was sucked inside, along with Bastard Seacliff himself. This was a combination of the divine abilities of the Great Necropolis and the Purrfect God Art!

Stone-like streams of energy flowed out of Yang Qi. The bubble was the Great Necropolis, and the Great Necropolis was the bubble!

Purr. Purr....

Off to the side, the purrling bore a surprised and confused expression as it watched Yang Qi’s performance. Apparently, it didn’t understand how its own consummate technique could possibly be used by someone else. Furthermore, it had been combined with elements of the Great Necropolis. No one really knew what the Great Necropolis was, but one thing was certain: it surpassed the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, and was either on the same level as the God Legion Seal, or even beyond it.

It looked as though the Great Necropolis itself had surrounded Bastard Seacliff, completely suppressing his energy of sin and enmity. Then, even as Bastard Seacliff unleashed his most vicious and brutal reserves, Yang Qi flew into the bubble with him.

RUMBLE!

The two of them began to fight, and while at first they seemed evenly matched, the bubble that was the Great Necropolis soon began spinning, negating the energy of sin and enmity.

“Godfist of Sin and Enmity, second stance. Plagued by Misfortune!”

As Bastard Seacliff howled, it almost looked like hosts of immortal worlds were falling around him and shattering from the force of his voice.

More energy of sin and enmity erupted, turning into a dragon that shot toward Yang Qi and swirled around him.

However, Yang Qi seemed like a god from heaven that had descended to the mortal world. Punching out, he shattered the dragon and destroyed the energy that made it up.

Then he unleashed a palm attack. “Hand of the One God!”

The blow slammed into Bastard Seacliff, who by this point wanted to flee, but was completely trapped by the Great Necropolis bubble. Every time he tried to fight back, Yang Qi would just hit him again. The combination of the Hand of the One God and Unspoiled Body gave birth to a fire the likes of which had never existed before, a fire that could immolate gods and destroy devils. Everyone looking at it knew that they wouldn’t possibly be able to stand up to it.

Feeling trapped, Bastard Seacliff tried to unleash all the potential of his Godfist of Sin and Enmity. After all, the Great Necropolis was a burial place for fallen gods, which meant that the energy of sin and enmity was rife there.

Purr, purr....

A hair-raising noise thrummed out of Yang Qi, provoking another look of surprise on the face of the purrling. In fact, its eyes seemed to be saying, “Don’t tell me this is my brother or something?”

Whack. Whack. Whack. Whack!

A host of bubbles shot out, slamming into Bastard Seacliff, and although he managed to use his Godfist of Sin and Enmity to smash them, he was obviously being rapidly drained of energy.

Dozens of bubbles hit him, and his energy of sin and enmity was already starting to dry up.

Crash!

Yang Qi’s fist was like a god from primal-chaos, slamming into Bastard Seacliff's face. Before, Bastard Seacliff had looked like a condescending and cynical god, but now he looked like a devil.

“How dare you strike my face!” he shouted in furious disbelief. He lunged toward Yang Qi, but before he could do anything, was struck in the chest with a fist.

“Devil-God Seal!” Yang Qi said, quickly sealing the energy of sin and enmity within him, returning him to his previous state.

At that moment, everything changed.

RIP!

Yang Qi kicked Bastard Seacliff, sending him tumbling across the fighting platform with blood spraying out of his mouth. Then, Yang Qi punched him in the chest, causing the cracking sounds of breaking bones to ring out. Of course, people at this level of cultivation didn’t have actual bones, but rather magical laws. So the cracking sound was actually that of magical laws being broken.

POP!

The next sound that rang out caused many of the experts to rise to their feet as they realized that Yang Qi had damaged Bastard Seacliff’s essence, which would make it impossible for him to control true energy. Apparently, Yang Qi was planning on beating him to death!

“Stop! Stop hitting me!” Bastard Seacliff coughed up more blood. “Do you really want to be damned by myriad tribulations, Yang Qi? If you offend the House of God Bastards, not even being the league-lord will do you any good!”

“I don’t care. Prepare to be beaten to death!”

Then Yang Qi unleashed more punches.

Chapter 1083: Houselord God Bastard

Yang Qi had attacked Bastard Seacliff so viciously that the man had been forced to unseal the energy he normally kept hidden, resorting to his Godfist of Sin and Enmity. Yet not even that had been enough to harm Yang Qi, and Bastard Seacliff only ended up having his energy resealed.

And now, he was being beaten into a bloody pulp.

He almost looked like a sandbag being used for a workout by Yang Qi. Yang Qi’s abilities were impossible to beat, to the point where he actually crushed Bastard Seacliff’s essence, provoking an agonized shriek of pain.

No one in the audience could possibly have guessed that someone as strong as a mid Terrifying expert would be beaten so badly.

BAM!

Yang Qi’s fist hit Bastard Seacliff’s head, causing it to explode. However, the man’s god bastard energy surged and his head immediately pulled back into shape, albeit with cracks covering his skin.

Next, Yang Qi pulled back his foot and viciously kicked him right between the legs.

Bastard Seacliff shivered violently, and more cracking sounds could be heard as his essence was further crushed. This time, he wasn’t able to recover.

He lay there on the ground like a bloated toad, his true energy so damaged he couldn’t gather it. Gasping for breath, he said, “I won’t let you get away with this, Yang Qi. I'm a god bastard! I'm the son of two gods! I may have been banished, but I still have their blood. The gods won’t let their children be killed by mortals; if you hurt me, they’ll come and kill you!”

In response, Yang Qi began viciously trampling him, unleashing such humiliation that Bastard Seacliff seemed like he might pass out at any moment. He had lost so much face that, even if he survived this, he would never again be able to hold his head high in public.

Of course, the more pressing question was whether or not he would make it off the fighting platform alive.

With each stomp of his foot, Yang Qi would explode Bastard Seacliff’s head, only to have it restored a moment later. Bastard Seacliff was obviously using a profound energy art to heal himself, but it wouldn’t last forever. He really would end up being beaten to death.

It was terrifying to see someone as frightening as a god bastard being literally trampled to death.

At a certain point, Bastard Seacliff shouted, “Let me go, Yang Qi! If you do, the House of God Bastards will pay you... a thousand pieces of godhood!”

Many jaws dropped in response to his words. A thousand pieces of godhood was an incredible number, to the point where virtually any sect would leap at the chance to get it. Perhaps the only ones who wouldn’t would be the Genesis Sanctum and the Woodfern Couple Palace.

However, Yang Qi didn’t seem moved. “You think I'm low on godhood? I'm going to kill you, and I’m very curious to see if anyone tries to save you. I’m sure you know the old saying, if you release the tiger back into the mountain, it will bring disaster in the future. Do you really think I'm so stupid that I would let you go so you could try taking revenge later?”

As he spoke, he began shining with dazzling light, and he lifted up his foot in what everyone could tell would be deadly for Bastard Seacliff.

However, at that very moment, a voice rang out like the rumbling of thunder.

“Stay your hand! Enough of this! Are you looking to die?!”

RUMBLE!

An enormous hand appeared, filling the sky as it descended toward both Yang Qi and Bastard Seacliff, as if to grab them up.

“A mid Terrifying expert!”

Everyone present felt as though they were being suffocated all the way down to the level of their souls. If this was truly a mid Terrifying expert, how could Yang Qi possibly defend himself?

Even more terrifying, there was a huge eyeball in the middle of the hand’s palm, staring out as if to prevent anyone from taking action.

“That’s the Eye of Sin and Enmity!” Mu Renwang said.

“Whoever the Eye of Sin and Enmity looks at will be inextricably bound by all the sin and enmity in the world!” said Su Xin.

However, neither of them did anything to interfere. In fact, Huangfu Genesis said, “Houselord God Bastard! Save your son if you want, but don’t cause problems for our sect assembly!”

“Fine, I won’t cause problems for your assembly. But I'm taking this boy with me. I'm going to kill him and use his death to cleanse my taint of sin!” Countless streams of energy erupted, as though the wielder of this hand intended to rip the fighting platform up by the roots.

“Even if the ruler of the heavens came today, he wouldn’t be able to save Bastard Seacliff!” Yang Qi said. “Houselord God Bastard? It's good you came. Now you can also see what a real energy art is like!” RUMBLE! Yang Qi shoved his hand up toward the sky, and suddenly, his energy climbed to a higher level as, after such a long time, he rose higher on the Deathless Heavenly Stairway! He was stepping onto the fifth stair, the Stair of Fearlessness!

Considering how much he had prepared for this moment, no one could really have any idea of the true level of his cultivation base. All they could tell was that there was an explosion of energy arts, with vital energy swirling in mythological proportions.

A Fearless aura pulsed off of him, creating a resonance with universal magical laws. Not the magical laws of a universe, but the magical laws of the millions upon millions of universes that existed like the eternal sands. It was almost as if the king of the myriad gods were out inspecting all of the peoples and planes of existence he had created.

The king of the myriad gods was none other than the paramount Sovereign Lord, the originator of all living beings and the source of the countless civilizations that existed. All of the universes that existed were because of his thoughts and will.

His aura existed in all corners of reality.

Upon reaching the Stair of Fearlessness, Yang Qi reached an unheard-of and unfathomable level, whereupon the Wheel of Fate appeared above his head, turning endlessly.

At the same time, immense flows of destiny began rushing toward him, entering the wheel in shocking fashion.

Everyone could sense the aura of Fearlessness and were shaken to their core, their hearts filling with reverence and awe.

Even as Yang Qi stepped onto the Stair of Fearlessness, he threw out his hands to meet the descending attack. Flames burst out everywhere as he launched a palm of equal size to Houselord God Bastard's.

In a moment, it would become very obvious who needed to be afraid of whom.

Crack!

The two enormous palms slammed into each other, and Yang Qi bent under the weight, but managed to direct the force of the houselord’s blow onto Bastard Seacliff.

During the process, Yang Qi came to the realization that this houselord wasn’t the father of Bastard Seacliff, but rather his Master. After all, the god bastards were looked down on by the legion of gods, and had been exiled from the god world. And the god bastards themselves were unable to have children.

In the blink of an eye, Bastard Seacliff was crushed into a bloody pulp, which Yang Qi quickly assimilated. For all intents and purposes, he had just been hit by both Yang Qi and the houselord, so even if he had been vastly stronger than he was, he would still have ended up dead.

That was the end of Bastard Seacliff.

Yang Qi had completely negated the power of the immense hand that Houselord God Bastard had sent against him.

As the hand crumbled, Houselord God Bastard appeared on the fighting platform, black hair whipping about his head as he glared at Yang Qi in fury.

“Houselord God Bastard finally showed up....”

“He’s a mid Terrifying expert, yet he couldn’t even save his own junior houselord?”

“What level is this Yang Qi’s cultivation base at? Even while facing a mid Terrifying expert, he still managed to kill that junior houselord? Bastard Seacliff was the son of two gods! Isn’t Yang Qi worried about the gods coming to cause problems for him?”

“I doubt it. The god bastards have been abandoned by the legion of gods. Besides, considering the dramatic events in the god world, we don’t even know if the legion of gods still exists. Neither do we know if it’s possible to reach godly ascension. Ever since the Great Necropolis blocked the Ancient Road to the Gods, we don’t have any hope of reaching the god world.”

“This Yang Qi is incredible. He stood up to a mid Terrifying expert and killed that junior houselord at the same time. He may as well be a mid Terrifying expert himself.”

“He’s even more terrifying than the actual mid Terrifying level. Did you notice that he just improved his cultivation base? He’s now on the Stair of Fearlessness. That means that he has four more steps before he’s even a Grand Emperor. The Stairs of Awareness, Heaven-Fate, Forgetfulness, and True Void. Just imagine how much stronger he's going to get! The fact that he has such a low cultivation base makes him even scarier!”

“That's right, from ancient times until now, nobody has ever seen someone with such a low cultivation base be so strong!”

Chapter 1084: Everything in Chaos

Houselord God Bastard stood on the fighting platform, pulsing with energy. Everyone could sense his killing intent and knew that it could shake the heavens and topple the earth. Not a single expert in the audience would have dared to get in his way. Furthermore, this event had long since gone from being a contest for the position of league-lord to an uncharacteristically deadly conflict that would change the face of the Ancient Road to the Gods.

No one present had any doubts about how strong Houselord God Bastard was.

His every move and action could cause blood to rain, and it was impossible to say how many of the Executors of the Ancient Road he had killed over the years. Now that his junior houselord had been killed, it would have been inappropriate if he wasn’t thoroughly enraged.

Despite that, Yang Qi just stood there with his hands clasped behind his back. “What exactly are you up to, Houselord God Bastard? On this fighting platform, lives can be lost in the blink of an eye. Your junior houselord wanted to be the league-lord, but got killed in the end. If I hadn’t done the deed, it would’ve been someone else.”

“Very malicious of you, boy,” Houselord God Bastard said coldly. “Are you really not worried about the House of God Bastards coming at you with full force? We could easily wipe out your Will Manifestation Heaven Sect.”

“Wipe us out? You think you’re qualified to do that?” Yang Qi was obviously making no effort to sound polite. “Thanks to our little clash just now, I know exactly how strong you are, and I can tell you that you’re far, far from being in a position to do anything to me. Presumably, you noticed that I'm on the fifth stair of the Deathless Heavenly Stairway. If I have to, I can go all the way to the ninth and become a Grand Emperor. Would you still be able to fight me then?”

Houselord God Bastard smiled coldly. “Is that supposed to be a threat? Do you really think you can scare me out of killing you? I could fight the emperor of the executors, much less a puny Terrifying expert like you from the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect. You're nobody. So go ahead and attack me. I want to see how strong you really are.”

“Attack you?” Yang Qi smiled. “I’d rather not. Today is an important day for all the sects present. Furthermore, I want to be the league-lord. Are you, a mid Terrifying expert, saying that you want to join the competition for that spot? Sadly for you, you don’t qualify. Only people under the mid Terrifying level are allowed to compete.”

Turning to look at Su Xin, Mu Renwang, and Huangfu Genesis, he said, “I’ll defer to the three of you here. There are rules that govern this assembly, and they can't be ignored. Someone is causing a scene here, so what do you suggest we do?”

The three experts exchanged frowning glances, fully aware that they were in a very odd predicament. On the one hand, it wouldn’t be worth it to start fighting because of a conflict between Yang Qi and the House of God Bastards. On the other hand, if Houselord God Bastard didn’t back down, it would ruin their plans.

After a moment, the junior pontiff from the Genesis Sanctum said, “It’s true that mid Terrifying experts aren’t allowed to compete for the position of league-lord. Houselord God Bastard, if you want to join the assembly, you’ll be counted as one of the old-timers and will be able to give orders to the league-lord. You see, our new alliance isn’t about giving power into the hands of a single person; that would be a dictatorship. Instead, the league-lord will follow the lead of the old-timers.”

Everyone looked on with glittering eyes. The junior pontiff had hit the nail on the head. As for Huangfu Genesis, he was quite pleased, being aware that this was the best way to resolve the situation. Besides, if Houselord God Bastard joined their alliance, it would be another measure to ensure their control of Yang Qi.

“He’s exactly right,” Su Xin said.

Mu Renwang nodded. “We’re honored by your presence, Houselord God Bastard, and you bring glory to our humble facilities. All of us are interested in opposing the Executors of the Ancient Road, and that’s what we need to keep in mind here. Houselord, there’s no need for you to squabble with someone of the younger generation. Besides, if this boy becomes the league-lord, we’re still the ones who’ll be calling the shots. Don’t you agree that joining us would be the best way to get the justice you seek?”

Houselord God Bastard could see what was going on, and it caused a fierce expression to appear on his face. Staring murderously at Yang Qi for a moment, he said, “It’s a good suggestion. You see, the whole reason I came here to begin with is because I wanted to be part of this alliance. The third major faction! If you have no objections, I’ll join the fight against the executors. I don’t think anyone has as much experience in that regard as I do.”

“Wonderful, get a throne!” Huangfu Genesis said.

RUMBLE!

Instantly, an enormous throne rose up out of nowhere.

Houselord God Bastard walked over and sat on the throne, then snapped his finger. “Reveal yourselves. Let the rest of these sects see what the House of God Bastards is all about!”

Instantly, two hundred figures flew over and flanked the newly erected throne, all of them with psychic scales of ninety or more, placing them very close to the mid Terrifying level. The members of the two major sects were stunned. It had never even occurred to them that the House of God Bastards would have this many top experts.

After all, the Woodfern Couple Palace had a bit over a hundred chief elders, and they were considered a major faction. The Genesis Sanctum had over a hundred and fifty. But the House of God Bastards had two hundred!?

It was now completely obvious that the House of God Bastards was far and away the leader of the pack. What was even more telling was that everyone got the feeling they weren’t showing their full forces. After all, although it had been years, the House of God Bastards had once directly fought the Executors of the Ancient Road.

Snorting coldly, Houselord God Bastard said, “I heard the plan is to directly bless the new league-lord with power. I approve of this plan, but I have to point out that you people from the Woodfern Couple Palace and the Genesis Sanctum won’t possibly be able to provide as much power as us. That said, with all of us working together, we can definitely create a powerful expert!”

There now seemed little doubt that Yang Qi was going to be the league-lord. He had just killed Bastard Seacliff and even stood up to Houselord God Bastard, so who present could possibly compete with him? There was no way that anyone in the early Terrifying level could possibly fight someone as strong as the mid Terrifying level.

It seemed the competition was over.

Yang Qi stood there on the fighting platform, his face completely expressionless as he looked around and said, “Does anyone else want to challenge me? If not, I guess I'm the league-lord.”

The first people to speak up were those whose disciples had just been killed by Bastard Seacliff.

“Nobody’s going to challenge you.”

“That’s right, Yang Qi. You’re the league-lord, there’s no question about it. Even in the early Terrifying level, you managed to stand up to someone in the mid Terrifying level, which means you’re invincible.”

The fact that Yang Qi had taken revenge for them had earned him their full support. In fact, they were convinced that if he became the league-lord, given his strength and personality, he probably wouldn't be a puppet for long. For one thing, he was obviously a clever schemer. And considering how strong he was, it seemed less likely that there would be three factions controlling him. Instead, there would be four factions contending with each other.

That wasn’t to mention the fact that Yang Qi would likely reach the mid Terrifying level soon.

“What do the rest of you think?” Houselord God Bastard said, his eyes flashing coldly. “Nobody wants to challenge the boy, which seems to indicate he's the new league-lord. If the decision’s been made, we should bless him immediately.”

“I have no objections,” Huangfu Genesis said. He had already come to greatly respect Houselord God Bastard. The man’s top disciple had just been killed, and yet he didn’t seem to care at all. It went to indicate that he was definitely planning something treacherous. Huangfu Genesis immediately decided to be on guard against him at all times.

Earlier, he had assumed that he had everything under control, only to have Yang Qi suddenly disrupt the proceedings and become the league-lord. And now the House of God Bastards was involved. Everything had been thrown into chaos, which meant that his future plans needed to be rethought.

That said, the blessing of the new league-lord had to proceed as planned.

“I have no objection either,” Mu Renwang said. “Let him be the league-lord.”

“Yang Qi is now the league-lord of the superpower sects from the Ancient Road to the Gods,” Su Xin added.

Thus, the decision was made.

A stream of destiny flowed into Yang Qi, pouring into the depths of his Wheel of Fate and causing a host of magical symbols to glow on its surface.

Whooooooosh!

The will of gods appeared within that river of fate, causing new transformations to occur to his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. As the process continued, his psychic scale climbed to ninety-eight, ninety-nine, and finally a hundred!

That said, his rise didn’t involve reaching the mid Terrifying level. For him, that wouldn’t happen until his psychic scale climbed to two or three hundred.

Chapter 1085: Receiving the Blessing

The flow of destiny was intense and bright.

However, there was a large portion that wasn’t moving toward Yang Qi, and he immediately knew why. That had been caused by the interference of Houselord God Bastard. Thanks to him, there were a lot of people who didn’t truly approve of Yang Qi being the league-lord.

Unfortunately, there was nothing he could do about that now, short of killing Houselord God Bastard. At the moment, he was only getting about two-thirds of the total amount of destiny. That said, he was still certain that no one would openly defy him as the league-lord. Whether it was Houselord God Bastard, Huangfu Genesis, Mu Renwang, or Su Xin, none were a match for him, and in fact, he could likely kill them.

There was also no way those three factions would suddenly team up to oppose him. They were all in opposition to each other, which meant that Yang Qi himself had a great opportunity to take advantage of them. There was little doubt that Houselord God Bastard would try messing with him during the process of the blessing. In fact, maybe they all would. In the end, Yang Qi didn’t care.

He would consider it training, perhaps even tempering. And he would make sure he benefited greatly from the process.

In fact, a faintly sinister smile had already appeared on his face.

“Prepare for the blessing,” Huangfu Genesis said. “Yang Qi, you’ve earned the endorsement of our three great organizations, the Genesis Sanctum, the House of God Bastards, and the Woodfern Couple Palace. But just because you’re the league-lord doesn’t mean you get to act on your own and make all the decisions. You have to abide by the conditions set by the three of us. It’s for the good of all of us, got that? We’re now going to provide you with a baptism of blessing. Your energy arts will increase by a level, and at the same time, you’ll receive a sealing mark to indicate that you have the approval of the three major sects to be the league-lord. Henceforth, anyone who wants to cause problems for you will have to deal with our three organizations first. Do you understand all of—”

“Cut the crap,” Yang Qi said. “I know full well that the point of this assembly was to install a puppet league-lord. But if you think I'm going to agree to an arrangement like that, you’re sadly mistaken. I’ll never be a puppet, and as you clearly saw during my run-in with Houselord God Bastard, my cultivation base is no weaker than any of yours. Therefore, I demand an equal position alongside your three organizations. In other words, I’ll be the fourth power in the alliance!”

“You!” Huangfu Genesis blurted angrily, and it seemed like he was about to lose his temper.

Meanwhile, Mu Renwang and Su Xin exchanged a very pleased glance. Huangfu Genesis was their biggest enemy, so they were always glad to see him humiliated.

“Yang Qi is right!” Mu Renwang said. “He’s definitely strong enough that he ought not be a puppet. However, he definitely must agree to receive the blessing. If he doesn’t, then our three sects won’t agree to let him be the league-lord, and he can just go off and manage his own organization. How about that? Remember, Yang Qi, if you don’t accept the blessing, there are plenty other young elites who will.”

“That’s right,” Houselord God Bastard said, nodding. “According to our agreement, Yang Qi, I won’t seek revenge against you, but you have to accept the blessing.”

“Refusing to accept the blessing would be forfeiting your right to the position!” Huangfu Genesis said.

“Well this is odd, isn’t it?” Yang Qi said coolly. “At what point did I ever say I would refuse the blessing? Good grief. All I said was that I don’t agree to be a puppet. I never even mentioned the blessing. The two don’t have anything to do with each other!”

“So you're saying you’ll accept the blessing?” Houselord God Bastard said with a nasty grin.

“Of course. How could I pass up something as amazing as that? No one in existence would neglect their own true energy, and I'm not an exception. Bless me to your heart's content, and please, don’t hold back.”

“Oh, don’t worry,” Huangfu Genesis said with a profound and unreadable smile. “We want to make you into the ultimate enemy of the Executors of the Ancient Road. It’s going to be your job to kill their emperor, so how could we be stingy when it comes to improving your cultivation base?”

“Very well, Yang Qi,” Mu Renwang said coldly. “Sit down on the fighting platform and prepare to receive the blessing. Time is of the essence, so there’s no use in any more rambling. Once you accept the blessing, we’ll begin rearranging all of the sects into a unified organization, with Destructionless Castle as our base of operations. We’ll all be bound together in spirit and action, with the various sects becoming factions that can work together to defend against any tribulation or calamity.”

The moment of truth had come. When the alliance was reorganized, some sects would disappear forever, while others would become stronger. Factions and groups would emerge, but everyone would be formally united. And any who resisted would be wiped out of existence.

“I'm ready,” Yang Qi said, taking a seat and sitting there motionless, looking completely calm, ready to absorb anything that was given to him as part of the blessing.

Everyone in the audience was shocked. None of them could ever have guessed that Yang Qi would be this straightforward, and just accept the blessing. If it were an ordinary blessing, it might not be a big deal. But he had just made a big deal about not wanting to be a puppet, and was now going to just submit to their so-called blessing? Was he crazy? A few of the more crafty individuals in the audience assumed that Yang Qi had prepared for this moment, so it wouldn’t be a risk for him. But even they were amazed at how brazen he was acting. When the three top sects worked together this way, nothing short of a god would be able to resist them in that moment.

“I'm impressed,” Houselord God Bastard said. “You’ve got a lot of guts. In fact, I don't think I’ve ever met anyone on the Ancient Road to the Gods with guts like you!”

“Enough bull,” Yang Qi said, “get on with the blessing. All the heroes under heaven are watching, so don’t try anything funny.”

“Begin!” Huangfu Genesis said, taking the initiative. He gave a meaningful glance to his subordinates, and they immediately began murmuring certain scriptures, causing a body of text to appear in the air above them. No one was sure exactly what the text said, but it seemed to pulse with the ultimate core meaning of that which was the preheaven.

Were they really going to just bless him?

A lot of people had their suspicions, and were convinced that Huangfu Genesis had more plans up his sleeve. Of course, considering all the witnesses, he would have to be very careful if he wanted to do something crafty.

The people from the House of God Bastards had started chanting their scripture as well, causing a black body of text to appear that pulsed with an immense, evil aura containing an energy of sin and enmity.

The Woodfern Couple Palace experts were also at work creating a golden body of text.

The three great sects had hundreds of top masters, plus four mid Terrifying experts, and all of them were working together to bless Yang Qi. Although it seemed unlikely that they would do anything completely underhanded with so many witnesses, it also seemed questionable whether anyone could sustain such levels of power.

“Begin!”

All three groups began working at the same time. Three immense bodies of scriptural text, like three dragons, bored into the top of Yang Qi’s head, causing him to shiver as he shot to his feet, his hair whipping around him as he floated up off the surface of the ground. Although it seemed certain he must be feeling immense pain and suffering, his face was as expressionless as that of a sleeping child.

Crunch. Crack!

Everyone could hear what sounded like Yang Qi’s nascent divinity being crushed to pieces within his sea of consciousness. It was quite a shock; were the three sects really going to force him to become a puppet?

Houselord God Bastard was the first to realize something was amiss. “Strange... where did the boy’s nascent divinity go to?”

As his will entered Yang Qi’s sea of consciousness, it seemed completely empty. And to the houselord, sending his portion of power into Yang Qi felt like directing a tiny stream into an ocean.

The true energy being provided by the blessing simply vanished, devoured by Yang Qi’s sea of consciousness as if it were a black hole.

Houselord God Bastard had truly begun a process of blessing, using a scripture called the Grand Sutra of the God of Sin and Enmity. It was a deadly scripture that should have caused Yang Qi to turn into a Puppet of Sin and Enmity, making him extremely powerful, yet mentally, little more than the walking dead. In fact, all three major sects were unleashing scriptures like that; they obviously had no intention of letting Yang Qi slip out of their control.

If any other person had become the league-lord, they wouldn’t have done this, as it wouldn’t have been necessary. But controlling Yang Qi was of utmost importance, and this moment of blessing was the best chance to make him their puppet.

Unfortunately for them, as soon as their scriptures entered Yang Qi’s sea of consciousness, they vanished.

It was almost as if some power from another world was absorbing theirs. They had hundreds of people on their side, including four mid Terrifying experts, which meant they were strong enough to destroy immortal worlds with a rank of three thousand. But now, their power was vanishing into Yang Qi’s sea of consciousness without causing so much as splash or ripple on its surface.

‘This is bad!’ Mu Renwang said. ‘He’s using the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart!’ Even as he and Su Xin realized what was happening, Yang Qi’s voice spoke to them.

“Don’t tell anyone about the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Don’t worry, I’ll help you to deal with the House of God Bastards and Huangfu Genesis. Didn’t you want me to give some of this power to Mu Yexi? Don’t you want her to reach the mid Terrifying level?”

“What exactly are you planning, Yang Qi?” Su Xin asked.

“You people want to control me, but I'm not going to let that happen,” Yang Qi replied coldly. “I’ll use this power to help unlock the secrets of my Mahātmā Jade, and then I’ll use that jade to suck my enemies dry! Maybe I won't wipe out all of the Genesis Sanctum and the House of God Bastards, but I’ll definitely inflict heavy casualties. So what do the two of you think?”

Chapter 1086: Redirection

Mu Renwang and Su Xin were both wily old foxes, and they were absolutely delighted that Yang Qi was planning to use the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart against the House of God Bastards and the Genesis Sanctum. Of course, it wasn’t as if they would immediately believe everything Yang Qi said.

“You’d better follow through, boy,” Mu Renwang said. “Otherwise we’ll tell everyone about the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, and then you’ll be in a really bad situation.

Yang Qi snorted coldly. “If you want to be as short-sighted as rats, go ahead and tell everyone. Do you still think I’m the kind of person you can easily take advantage of? You know me well enough, don’t you? You know what I'm capable of. I can tell you that as long as you don’t betray me, I’ll make sure nothing happens to you. Remember, I could always switch sides to Huangfu Genesis and make sure the Woodfern Couple Palace is destroyed.”

“You...” Su Xin growled angrily, yet there was nothing she could do.

She knew full well that Yang Qi was right. Not only would revealing Yang Qi’s secret of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart not help them in any way, it would probably hurt them. In contrast, if Yang Qi could strike a big blow against Huangfu Genesis and the House of God Bastards, they would benefit greatly.

“But how can we trust that you’ll actually provide the power of the blessing to our daughter?”

“You have no other choice but to trust me,” Yang Qi replied. “Unless you’d prefer that I include you, and assimilate everyone from the Woodfern Couple Palace.”

“What?!” Mu Renwang said. “You know how to use the Mahātmā Jade?!”

“For the most part. Otherwise why do you think I’d accept a blessing from you people? Do you really think I'm an idiot? Do you really think I would just hand myself over to your control? The Mahātmā Jade was created by the ancient True Devil, and even a tiny fragment of it is more than enough to assimilate the likes of you without any trouble at all.”

The ridicule in Yang Qi’s voice couldn’t have been clearer.

Mu Renwang and Su Xin knew that Yang Qi wasn’t bluffing. Given his level of enlightenment of the Great Necropolis, and his Inheritor status, he was obviously not a person to be underestimated. And if he gained more enlightenment of the Mahātmā Jade, he would be even harder to control.

“You have no choice but to trust me,” Yang Qi repeated. “Hurry up and increase the power of the blessing. I'm going to activate the Mahātmā Jade in a moment, so consider the consequences if you defy me!”

After a very short moment of consideration, Mu Renwang and Su Xin complied.

Whizz!

An even greater stream of power flowed from the Woodfern Couple Palace into Yang Qi, ten times greater than before. At the same time, in keeping with the original agreement, Mu Renwang and Su Xin shouted, “Become a puppet, Yang Qi!”

Seeing what was happening, both Houselord God Bastard and Huangfu Genesis reacted with surprise and dismay. They knew that if the husband and wife team managed to gain control of Yang Qi by means of their blessing, it would be very bad for them.

Everyone watched with keen anticipation as the events played out. Normally speaking, a moment like this would have been the perfect opportunity for someone to launch a sneak attack. However, the scriptures being unleashed by the three great sects made it impossible for anyone to even approach the area.

All of a sudden, Houselord God Bastard spat out a mouthful of pitch-black blood that resounded with the howls of millions upon millions of evil ghosts. The blood entered the Grand Sutra of the God of Sin and Enmity, and instantly caused it to pulse with a highly rancorous energy.

What was sin and enmity? This was sin and enmity!

Meanwhile, a book appeared above Huangfu Genesis’ head, which was none other than the god item that was the Book of Genesis, written by the most powerful of gods in ancient times to describe the creation of the world.

“Everything under heaven!” Huangfu Genesis murmured, and the power of the scripture poured into Yang Qi.

Yang Qi immediately looked like he might crack into pieces; even a god would have trouble accepting the combined power of all these scriptures. Yet, after shivering, Yang Qi seemed fine.

Of course, no one knew it, but dramatic transformations were occurring within the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart as the power he redirected filled the place.

“Be suppressed!” the immortal-slaying clone said, unleashing the strongest godpower of the chart, which caused one of the godhood stars to fall from the sky. Not even the full might of his imperial-heaven pre-beginning powers were enough to suppress this incredible influx.

“Yang Qi, this blessing is so incredible that not even I can keep it under control. If things get out of hand, the explosion might not destroy the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, but it would definitely reveal the fact that we have the chart. And we would then be in a lot of danger. You have to think of a way to get the situation under control.”

“Don't worry, I have an idea. I have multiple methods of redirection that I can use to send the power into the Mahātmā Jade.”

Swoosh....

The clone watched as the Mahātmā Jade flew up and intercepted the immense influx of power.

Then Yang Qi snapped his finger, causing the aura of his Unspoiled Body to also enter the Mahātmā Jade, which then erupted with a massive gravitational force.

“Gravitational force!” Yang Qi murmured. In all of his study of the Mahātmā Jade, he had come to be convinced that the gravitational force the thing could emit was completely and utterly matchless. It could suck in flesh, blood, spirits, and even souls.

Normally speaking, if he activated the jade on his own, he would never be able to escape that gravitational force. But things were different now. With the power of blessing pouring into and becoming a part of him, the Mahātmā Jade had no way of knowing exactly what it was absorbing.

RUUUUMBLE....

It was as if a black hole opened up in the depths of his sea of consciousness, sucking in everything that got close to it.

All of the wild power of the scriptures being used to bless him immediately began flowing inside.

Just how great was the gravitational force exerted by the Mahātmā Jade? From what Yang Qi could tell, as long as his life force aura still existed, the jade would keep trying to gobble him up.

However, there was still plenty more power of blessing.

A cold smile appeared on Yang Qi’s face. “Two Hearts Beat as One; Split the Nascent Divinity; Two Polarities Activated; Invincible in the World....” All of a sudden, his aura expanded, connecting to the nascent divinities of everyone present and tying his life force to theirs. This was one of the spectacular functions of the Wheel of Fate.

“Aaaiiiieee!”

Dozens of experts from the House of God Bastards suddenly let loose agonized shrieks, and looks of disbelief covered their faces. It was as if they had just faced the evilest of fiend-devils, who was trying to suck all the blood out of their bodies.

Their quintessence-blood, vital energy, and even nascent divinities were sucked out of their bodies, vanishing into Yang Qi; the Mahātmā Jade had sucked them up. However, because the jade thought that they were Yang Qi’s soul, it meant that he could use the Wheel of Fate to place his life force within their empty bodies.

“What’s going on?” Houselord God Bastard murmured. Unfortunately, he had no time to react. He could sense his own quintessence vitality beginning to depart from his body, and immediately guessed that Yang Qi had some terrifying item that he was using to protect himself. The houselord instantly drew on a technique to stop the blessing.

However, another scream rang out from the forces of the Genesis Sanctum. Certain old-timers there were howling, as though they had been afflicted with malignant poisons. Unable to struggle or fight, they died almost instantly, causing Huangfu Genesis’ eyes to widen with rage as he coughed up blood.

“What the hell is this kid doing? Stop the blessing!” Huangfu Genesis was already soaked in his own blood, and had clearly been hurt. Sadly for him, his attempts to stop the blessing were completely fruitless.

In only a dozen breaths of time, fully a hundred of the old-timers from the House of God Bastards died, while the Genesis Sanctum lost more than fifty. All aspects of them were sucked into the Mahātmā Jade, and even Houselord God Bastard and Huangfu Genesis found their vital energy being tugged away from them.

Only the Woodfern Couple Palace had no casualties.

Mu Renwang and Su Xin were both thrilled. They were surprised that Yang Qi was this strong, and at the same time, glad to see the House of God Bastards and Genesis Sanctum suffering such heavy losses.

But what exactly was Yang Qi doing? The two of them had no idea.

“Su Xin,” Mu Renwang said privately, “this Yang Qi is incredible, and it's great that he's helping us deal with our enemies. But what happens if he turns on us in the future? What should we do?”

“We need to figure out a way to get rid of him. Once he secures his position, he’ll be impossible to deal with. Let’s wait until he really starts fighting with Houselord God Bastard and Huangfu Genesis, then we can jump in and take advantage of the situation.”

Even as they communicated via divine will, a gravitational force suddenly caused the two of them to lurch in place. Instantly, their vital energy began flowing out of them, and over ten of their old-timers withered into death. Then they heard Yang Qi speaking.

“I control your life, therefore I know the ill intentions you harbor. You think you can wait until I've been injured to swoop in and kill me? It seems I really can’t trust you, Mu Renwang, Su Xin. I don’t see how you two deserve any other fate than destruction. Fine. I'm not going to hold back. Prepare to be assimilated.”

Yang Qi had sensed their killing intent, and knew that they were like a dog that can't stop himself from eating excrement. No matter what, they would plot against him.

The Mahātmā Jade slowly floated up higher in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, sucking in even more of the incoming power, yet it didn't seem to be even close to breaking. It was as if it could continue absorbing power forever and ever.

Chapter 1087: One Stroke

Yang Qi knew that Mu Renwang and Su Xin were profoundly sinister and vicious, and wouldn’t hesitate to take advantage of any situation to their benefit. And that included killing him. Reaching a true compromise with them wasn’t an option; therefore, the best option seemed to be to turn the Mahātmā Jade on them.

In the blink of an eye, over a dozen of their subordinates were killed.

The entire group was made up of people very close to being Terrifying experts, with psychic scales over ninety. Mu Renwang and Su Xin had expended countless resources over hundreds of millions of years to groom this group of people and have them fully under their control. Although they would instantly sacrifice themselves to protect Mu Renwang and Su Xin, it could only be imagined what an immense loss it would be considered to have just one of them die, let alone more than a dozen in the same moment.

Yang Qi didn’t seem anywhere near the point of being ready to stop. More and more people from the three sects were dying, despite the fact that they seemed to be struggling to stop the blessing process.

As the Mahātmā Jade absorbed their souls, it was impossible for them to even rise to their feet, let alone flee.

“How dare you betray us, Yang Qi!” Mu Renwang shouted in rage.

“Betray you? When did I do that?” Yang Qi chuckled. “I'm in charge now, which means that your lives are in my hands. You’ll do as I say, no matter what. And right now, I'm going to assimilate you to establish my authority.”

“You might as well quit dreaming!”

Filled with fury, the imperial couple attacked, joined by Houselord God Bastard and Huangfu Genesis. They hated Yang Qi so much that all the water in the rivers of heaven couldn’t wash it away. He was wiping out their people, and it had already put them at the point of wanting to exterminate his people down to the ninth generation.

The four of them simultaneously attacked, burning their life force power and quintessence-blood in a way that sent burning flames out to fill the area.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi shivered as he unexpectedly realized that the Mahātmā Jade was about to break loose of certain constraints. After all, these people were all roughly on the same level as the Shepherd, and all of them had spectacular energy arts to utilize.

Without hesitation, Yang Qi summoned the God Legion Seal into himself. As he did, the Mahātmā Jade tried to grab ahold of the seal. However, the two items were roughly on the same level, so there was no way that would happen easily.

The two of them quickly began fighting each other.

In turn, heaven-shaking, earth-shattering transformations occurred outside.

RUMBLE!

To the shock of the onlookers, numerous experts on the fighting platform were deeply shaken. As for the four mid Terrifying experts, all of them coughed up mouthfuls of blood, clearly having sustained serious injuries. Meanwhile, Yang Qi slowly rose to his feet and apparently began unleashing some sort of energy art.

In the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, the Mahātmā Jade and the God Legion Seal were struggling, and at the same time, the quintessence of the godpower seed of the Great Necropolis appeared. Yang Qi thrust his hand out, sending the true energy of his Unspoiled Body into the Mahātmā Jade.

The power going into the Mahātmā Jade instantly increased by tenfold until, finally, it stopped trying to absorb the God Legion Seal. Instead, it rejected it, even sending an immense outflux of power rushing outward.

“It finally worked!” Yang Qi exclaimed. Clasping the immortal-slaying clone on the shoulder, he said, “Our blood is the same. You’re my clone, so let’s work together to absorb the backlash from the Mahātmā Jade. We’re really going to benefit this time. The jade absorbed the energy of those four experts, plus more than a hundred people with psychic scales of over ninety. That’s nothing to take lightly. If we absorb it, our psychic scales will probably surpass a hundred! Maybe even two hundred! What will that even be like?”

This had been Yang Qi’s plan all along. Ever since he had gained enlightenment of the Purrfect God Art, his abilities had all reached profoundly higher levels. And considering that he was fully aware of how the so-called ‘blessing’ from the other sects was merely a way to turn him into a puppet, he had decided to use them to help unlock the secrets of the Mahātmā Jade.

Without their power to feed into the jade, how could he receive benefits from it?

Normally speaking, because they didn’t cultivate Unspoiled Bodies, there shouldn’t have been any way for the Mahātmā Jade to absorb their energy. But because they were pouring power into Yang Qi, he could use his Wheel of Fate to fool the Mahātmā Jade into thinking that the power came from him.

It only took a short moment for him to suck a third of the power out of the four mid Terrifying experts.

And that wasn’t to mention the well over one hundred experts with psychic scales over ninety. Regardless of whether it was their energy arts, magical treasures, quintessence-blood, vital energy, psychic power, or souls, it was almost impossible to imagine how much power it involved. It simply defied imagination.

Now that Yang Qi had a greater understanding of the God Legion Seal and the quintessence of the Great Necropolis, he could use those two immense powers to force the Mahātmā Jade to finally begin spitting power back out. Thankfully, he had his immortal-slaying clone here to help share the load.

Almost immediately, Yang Qi could tell that the clone was on the verge of breaking through to the mid Terrifying level and quickly stabilized his soul in preparation, even consolidating his karma.

RUMBLE!

As expected, Yang Qi and his clone sensed that within the eruption of psychic power, there was a godpower seed that the Mahātmā Jade had previously absorbed. Now, it shot out into Yang Qi, completely cleansed and as pure as crystal. It had no sin or enmity, and looked exactly as it did when it had first emerged from the Great Necropolis.

Yang Qi immediately devoured it, pushing himself all the way to a psychic scale of one hundred. Cracking sounds rang out inside him, like magical laws breaking. Unfortunately, he still wasn’t in the mid Terrifying level.

Just as he had guessed, not even pushing his psychic scale to one hundred was enough to achieve his breakthrough. However, his clone was also undergoing heaven-shaking, earth-toppling transformations. His psychic scale went from eighty to ninety, and then, a hundred.

Heavenly tribulations arrived.

They were great tribulations of magical laws from the god world, and within them, godly figures trampled everything in their path. However, none of the tribulations had any effect. They were like dragons that slammed into the clone, bored into him, then were subsequently assimilated, and the karma within them expelled.

The clone was feeling very pleased with himself. The karmic power he was building up would be of much use when it came time to resurrect King Immortal-Slayer himself.

By now, the clone’s soul was shockingly pure.

Psychic flames raged, destroying all impurities and pushing his psychic scale higher and higher, until it reached the point of one hundred fifty. Only then did it cease its climb.

At the same time, Yang Qi’s psychic scale also reached a hundred fifty.

The main difference between the two was that the clone was now in the mid Terrifying level, whereas his true self was not. Of course, in terms of strength and energy arts, he now had absolutely nothing to be terrified about when facing Terrifying experts.

In fact, Yang Qi was fairly certain that if he and the clone worked together, they could probably kill the Shepherd.

As for Houselord God Bastard, the imperial couple, and Huangfu Genesis, they would be easy to take care of.

As Yang Qi stood on the fighting platform, he threw his head back and laughed uproariously. Everyone could sense what was clearly the aura of the mid Terrifying level emanating from the vortex that spun around him. However, the vortex soon winked out, taking that mid Terrifying aura with it.

Everyone assumed that he had achieved his breakthrough, but was hiding his true strength. It wasn’t a rare thing for people to dress up as a pig to kill and eat a tiger.

Thanks to the aura roiling around him, everyone was convinced that he definitely deserved to be the league-lord. After all, he had just thrashed the three major sects, even killing many of their top experts.

It was a major shift in attitude, and as all the heroes present acknowledged him, destiny flowed to him like raging fire. Yang Qi was very pleased with his gains, and was confident that if he encountered Proud Heaven now, he could at least fight him fairly.

“Yang Qi, you scoundrel!” Su Xin cursed. “You killed so many of our people! Betrayal and treachery like this will ensure that you meet a grisly end eventually!”

“Hmph! Betrayal and treachery? You tried to use the pretext of a blessing to take control of me. Sadly, you got a taste of your own medicine. Now I'm the league-lord, and you’re nothing but chief elders who have no choice but to obey my commands. No doubt you can see that my cultivation base has surpassed yours, yet you’re still being disrespectful? Don’t force me to execute you!”

Houselord God Bastard and Huangfu Genesis both looked on with flickering expressions. Although it might not be impossible for them to kill Yang Qi, they knew he was a vicious and merciless person that wouldn’t show any kindness to people who acted against him.

Furthermore, if they got seriously injured and ran, it would be much easier to fall victim to the Executors of the Ancient Road.

Clasping hands and formally bowing at the waist, Houselord God Bastard said, “I, Houselord God Bastard, bow in salute to you, League-Lord. You’re a rare genius in heaven, and with your grand magics, you can bring security and manifold blessings. I hope you can forget about any times I offended you in the past. I'm more than happy to be one of your subordinates, and will follow your every order.”

Chapter 1088: I Run This Alliance

To see Houselord God Bastard being the first to bow his head caused Yang Qi to let loose a hearty burst of laughter. Everyone watching knew that the position of league-lord was now set in stone.

Of course, despite his laughter, Yang Qi was still on full guard against the houselord. The man was obviously adapting to the circumstances, and considering that he was publicly apologizing and acting subservient, it meant that Yang Qi couldn’t openly make a move against him. Unfortunately, it only ensured that there would be plenty of plotting and scheming in the future.

Thankfully, the immortal-slaying clone was now in the mid Terrifying level. Not only were his energy arts improved, but he would have even greater control over the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, making it even easier to keep in control.

With the countless superpower sects that made up the alliance, Yang Qi would have access to immense destiny and so many other resources that he could hardly imagine what was to come. However, one thing was for sure: he had helped the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect to advance dramatically. Going forward, it would be a powerful organization that no one would dare to mess with.

Furthermore, Yang Qi could use his access to the power of destiny to help the energy arts of Jadefall and his other people.

RUMBLE!

He released some energy arts fluctuations to make sure everyone could tell that he had yet again received a boost in strength now that Houselord God Bastard had submitted.

After seeing what Houselord God Bastard had done, Huangfu Genesis, Mu Renwang, and Su Xin exchanged glances. They knew that if they joined forces, they may be able to come out on top, but Yang Qi was a vicious and merciless character. They had no idea what methods he might use, and the process of fighting him could very well involve further casualties. Considering the losses their organizations had already sustained, they might not be able to recover.

Yang Qi had devastated roughly half of the main forces of their sects. Although they hated him to the bones for that, they had to acknowledge allegiance. Perhaps later they could scheme their way into taking away the position of league-lord, but they obviously couldn’t reveal even a hint that they were thinking such things.

Despite the fact that they didn’t speak such things aloud, Yang Qi knew what they were thinking. However, he chose not to discuss it at the moment, and instead, to keep things amicable.

“Your humble servant Huangfu Genesis would like to invite the league-lord to a formal banquet!”

“We would also like to invite you to a banquet, League-Lord!” Mu Renwang said. “We wish you success throughout all the ages. You’ll definitely unify everything under heaven and be invincible against all enemies!”

Upon seeing all of these experts offering allegiance, the rest of the sects present joined their voices together and said, “We wish you success throughout all the ages. You’ll definitely unify everything under heaven and be invincible against all enemies!”

Yang Qi had all three thousand of the special constitutions, making him both an Inspiring One and a Leading One. The powers of those constitutions, coupled with his Wheel of Fate, caused the destiny of all present to burn brightly as he absorbed it.

In fact, as the Wheel of Fate spun rapidly, it finally began transforming, sending the bright light of fate out from the top of his head. Although no one could see it, it allowed him to see much more deeply into the Great Necropolis.

In that moment, he suddenly came to an even deeper understanding of the secrets of the Great Necropolis.

Casually waving his hand, he said, “It’s always best to let things happen naturally. You've selected me to be the leader of this alliance, and I’ll do my best to live up to the immense responsibility. Next, we must combine the power of all the sects in our alliance to forge a new kingdom. Together, we’ll fight the Executors of the Ancient Road, the Great Necropolis Alliance, and the Fiend-Devil League. As long as we work together, we’ll surely succeed. For now, send out messages calling all organizations to gather together. Although the warding spells protecting Destructionless Castle are strong, they won’t hold against mid Terrifying experts. I’ll soon begin working on a god formation based on numerous daoist techniques I'm aware of. Once it's complete, it will keep us safe. However, it will require a huge number of people to complete, so please select the best among you and send them to the depths of Destructionless Castle, where the work will take place. Everyone else can remain here.”

“Yes sir,” everyone responded. At the moment, no one dared to do anything to defy Yang Qi, especially considering that his first act would be shoring up their defenses to keep them safe.

As soon as the orders were given, people burst into activity. Thousands of the most skilled sect leaders were selected to make the arrangements.

Considering he had long since learned how to command people in the Dao Defense League, Yang Qi easily settled into his new role.

There were already thousands of sect leaders who were already on good terms with the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect. With a wave of his hand, Yang Qi sent them primeval god skills in the form of paper talismans.

“Ladies and gentlemen, these talismans contain powerful primeval god skills. Use them, and you can temporarily become thousands of times stronger, and at the same time, weaken your enemy by thousands of times. When used in battle, they can ensure that no one will possibly be able to stand up to you. With my talismans, you can simply cut down anyone who dares to defy you! I hereby give you the right to execute anyone who breaks the law, although you’re prohibited from tyrannical abuse. We’re now part of a larger alliance, so all old grudges are hereby wiped out. The best example is how the grudge between myself and Houselord God Bastard is now a thing of the past. The same goes for all of you, got it?”

Feeling somewhat shaken, the gathered sect leaders accepted the talismans and went out to take the lead.

“Houselord God Bastard, Mu Renwang, Huangfu Genesis, Su Xin, the five of us are the top experts in the alliance now, so let's join forces and set up the main spell formation.”

“Er...” Su Xin said hesitantly, “shouldn't we have a meeting to talk things over first?”

“If you want a meeting, we can do it right here and now,” he replied coolly. “I'm guessing that you aren’t very happy about how things turned out, and aren’t willing to accept it. But in the end, the circumstances should outweigh our personal desires. The Executors of the Ancient Road aren't just going to let us go about our merry way. Therefore, I want your help to create this formation, and I hope you won’t hold anything back in terms of cultivation base or magical treasures.”

“League-Lord, don’t you have the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart?” Su Xin said. “That was how you defeated us moments ago. With the chart under your control, what need is there for spell formations?”

“What? The Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart?”

Houselord God Bastard and Huangfu Genesis were both visibly stunned. Clearly, they had been unaware that Yang Qi had a trump card of that level.

Yang Qi smiled coolly. He knew full well that Su Xin was trying to undermine him by revealing his trump cards. However, he didn't care. Su Xin was beautiful and clever, but he knew that it would only be a matter of time before he killed her. “The Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart is the last line of defense. Besides, would you people willingly enter the chart if I asked you to?”

“Let’s not make use of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart for now,” Houselord God Bastard said. He knew full well the potentially catastrophic consequences of what going into the chart could entail. After all, no one below the level of a god could escape from inside.

“What kind of formation did you want to create, League-Lord?” Huangfu Genesis said. “Don’t tell me you have something stronger than Destructionless Castle itself?”

“Destructionless Castle?” Yang Qi said. He snorted coldly. “You think this thing is impressive? It’s more like a toy. The spell formation I intend to create is modeled after the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body, the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, and a variety of other energy arts. Once activated, no form of evil will be able to penetrate it!”

“What? The Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth?! You know that?”

All of the experts were stunned.

“Don’t tell me that you’re....”

“That’s right, I am,” Yang Qi said proudly. “I'm the bearer of the God Legion Seal, which makes me the mightiest figure in the Immortal Dao Age. I'm on the same level as Proud Heaven. You see, I didn’t even need to resort to using the God Legion Seal to deal with you four. If I had, do you think you would be sitting here talking to me right now?”

“Impossible!” Houselord God Bastard said. “The God Legion Seal and King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions are incompatible. How could you use them both?”

“That’s nothing. I cultivate the Unspoiled Body together with the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, which is something no one else has ever succeeded at. Not even in the god world. Furthermore, I've gained enlightenment of the divine abilities of the Great Necropolis. The Great Necropolis will definitely be mine one day. I couldn’t care less about Proud Heaven, the Executors of the Ancient Road, or even the people from the Primeval Age. Sooner or later, everyone will either submit to me, or die.” In order to further crush their spirits, he said, “Mu Renwang, Su Xin, did you really think that getting those eighteen godpower seeds from you was the only way for me to get stronger? Wrong. I would have gotten stronger regardless.”

“You....” Su Xin’s face drained of blood. All of a sudden, everything made sense to her. She thought back to how no one had been able to beat Yang Qi, then thought about how she had been foiled by him at every turn. Now, he was vastly stronger than before, and had defeated everyone who stood in his way. Not even the Woodfern Couple Palace, Genesis Sanctum, and House of God Bastards working together could outdo him. In the past, she had hoped to use him to get rid of her enemies, but now she didn’t dare to do anything to defy him, and instead had to follow his every order.

“Enough talking,” Yang Qi said. “Prepare to begin work. Here’s the formation chart, and the list of ingredients needed from the god world. I'm sure that you have these items in your storehouses, so bring them out immediately.”

Chapter 1089: The Initial Structure of the Sect

A massive construction effort was underway.

There was a huge buzz of activity as countless organizations mobilized their forces and brought them to the vicinity of Destructionless Castle. Meanwhile, League-Lord Yang Qi, Houselord God Bastard, Su Xin, Mu Renwang, and Huangfu Genesis were working together to create a grand spell formation. The formation looked like an enormous necropolis that covered the entire area. Unexpectedly, there was actually a virtual god world inside, complete with a pulsing greyspace and killing intent. The vital energy that pulsed out of it was nothing ordinary in nature, and was in fact like a power from the god world that transformed everything it touched.

“Immortal World Seizing!”

Suddenly, Yang Qi reached out and made a grasping motion, plucking a thousandth ranked immortal world seemingly out of thin air. Even as it appeared, it shrank down, its greyspace melting away until it was nothing more than a fist-sized śarīra, which he then set into one of the spell formation’s eyes.

That was the power that Yang Qi was now capable of, and he wasn’t done. Next, he reached out and grabbed an immortal world with a rank of two thousand.

It was impossible to say how he was doing it, but one world after another shrank down and became a part of the spell formation. Even more shocking, people began to realize that godrelics were appearing from the depths of the Great Necropolis, many of them from locations just as deadly as Destructionless Castle.

In fact, one of the experts present noticed a volcano flying in their direction and exclaimed, “Is that the Nine Divisions Mountain of Flames!? According to rumors, one of the ancient flame gods perished there. Anyone who tries to explore the place ends up being burned alive. I ventured into the area around it once and found a god item created by a god of flame. But he’s just pulling the entire god item over here?”

“Did you just call him ‘he’?! He's the league-lord, show some respect! He’s as mighty as a god, and his acts are beyond our comprehension!”

“You’re right. The formation that the league-lord is building is incomparably fierce. At the very least, it's going to keep us very safe. There’s no way the Executors of the Ancient Road will be able to hit us with a deadly blow with the league-lord here to stop them.”

“That’s why we need to do our best to stay on the league-lord’s good side. Do our best, work hard, and fight the Executors of the Ancient Road.”

“The grand spell formation is starting to take shape. According to the league-lord’s instructions, we need to organize our sects according to the preheaven designs of the five phases, eight trigrams, and nine palaces. With those elements in the formation, not even a myriad of tribulations can hurt us.”

“I wonder if the House of God Bastards, Woodfern Couple Palace, and Genesis Sanctum will make a move against the league-lord. They obviously detest him!”

“It doesn’t matter. You can tell what’s really going on here: the league-lord has completely put them in their place. Hmph! They’re the kind of people who can only bully the weak and fear the strong, so they’re nothing to worry about. As long as we stick close to each other and the league-lord, they won't do a thing to us.”

Yang Qi was using his control over the power of the Great Necropolis to grab immortal worlds and godrelics and use them however he wished. They were from places that only mid Terrifying experts would normally explore, but it was an easy task for him.

It was like something that only the Creator could do, and it ensured that no one dared to say anything negative about him, lest they end up dead. It also lent further dignity to the situation.

Yang Qi felt the flows of destiny burning more brightly as they flowed into his Wheel of Fate. As for Houselord God Bastard and the others, they were cooperating begrudgingly, and at the same time, were coming to realize that Yang Qi’s cultivation base really was too powerful. That was especially true considering they were in the Great Necropolis. Here, he was essentially invincible. Su Xin and Mu Renwang continued wallowing in remorse, and were convinced that if Yang Qi hadn’t taken those eighteen godpower seeds, things wouldn’t have turned out this way.

Of course, Yang Qi didn’t have just eighteen. He had more than twenty, which meant that the power he could wield vastly surpassed that of any other Inheritor.

He had fully assimilated them, which meant they couldn’t be taken away, and that put him in a position of being able to cut down any other Inheritor he ran into.

There were other Inheritors who were members of the alliance, but Yang Qi didn’t need to do anything about them. He now saw that he actually didn’t need their godpower seeds. There was a location deep in the Great Necropolis where the seeds grew; if he traveled there, he would be able to absorb the essence of the necropolis and learn all of its secrets.

Just now, he had learned something new about the Great Necropolis, namely, something regarding the relationship between it and the Inheritors.

As the spell formation took shape, it grew more and more mighty, filling everyone with a feeling of safety. All they had to do was stay close to the formation.

Everyone from the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect had immense power, especially the sectlord. They took the lead in keeping order amongst the various factions, similar to how, back in the original Dao Defense League, there had been the two emissaries, nine dharmarajas and twenty-four god-generals.

The new power structure emerged so quickly that the other three major sects were unable to interfere. Besides, they all knew that if they dared to challenge Yang Qi, he wouldn’t let the matter rest until they were all dead. Right now, their only hope was to let some time pass, then put together a conspiracy to get rid of Yang Qi. After all, there was no way an alliance this large could be fully united.

‘Without getting some allies,’ thought Houselord God Bastard, ‘it won’t be easy to take down Yang Qi. It's too bad the Woodfern Couple Palace and Genesis Sanctum hate each other so much. I doubt they’ll ever resolve their differences, which means we might never have a chance to make a move. What should we do? Bring in some outsiders?’

**

Ten years passed in which the new alliance consolidated forces and built their power structure.

To cultivators, ten years could be like nothing more than the blink of an eye. In fact, to them, periods of time such as a thousand, ten thousand, or even a hundred million years could be considered trivial.

During the ten years that passed, the grand spell formation reached an embryonic form. Yang Qi added countless immortal worlds to it, and too many godrelics to count. Soon, people realized that the formation resembled the Great Necropolis itself, to the point where Destructionless Castle didn’t even exist anymore.

Numerous factions had been sent out into the Great Necropolis to occupy garrisons, and the destiny available to Yang Qi continually grew stronger. Thanks to his control over the formation, the three other major sects didn’t dare to defy him; for all intents and purposes, he controlled them.

RUMBLE!

Vital energy stirred in the void, even though the grand spell formation was still only in its early stages of construction.

“Excellent,” Yang Qi said, folding his hands in his lap. “The Sage Monarch Grand Formation has finally taken shape. Now it just needs some time to mature and come to completion.” During the ten years that had passed, his cultivation base had become more refined and his understanding of the energy arts of the Great Necropolis had deepened. Meanwhile, the other four experts exchanged awkward glances as they realized that, in contrast, their cultivation bases had done little more than recover in the last ten years.

In other words, Yang Qi was even more unimaginably powerful than before.

He was farther beyond them than ever, which meant that his authority was only increasing. Sadly for them, there was nothing they could do about the situation. It was obvious that the factions within the alliance all worshipped Yang Qi as their leader.

Furthermore, because Yang Qi had just spent ten years working on the spell formation, it was easy to tell how the balance of power was truly distributed. For example, although his immortal-slaying clone usually remained hidden in the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect, word had spread that Yang Qi had an expert there who was in the mid Terrifying level.

How could they possibly show any defiance when Yang Qi had a mid Terrifying expert up his sleeve?

That hidden expert was one reason why the four experts hadn’t tried to make a move on Yang Qi during the past ten years. A second reason was that they had heard that the person who really controlled the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart was another mid Terrifying expert.

With experts like that out there, it would be very easy to fall victim to an assassination attempt, and either get killed or seriously wounded. At the moment, no one dared to take on Yang Qi.

Perhaps if it had been him alone, they might have tried to plot against him. Instead, they had to bide their time. However, they knew that they had to do something eventually, otherwise they would never get a chance.

During the ten years that passed, the person from the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect that progressed the most was Jadefall. Thanks to help from Yang Qi, her psychic scale was already above ninety.

Considering how many organizations Yang Qi controlled now, he had access to virtually any spirit medicine, not to mention the destiny and power at his command.

Thanks to his Wheel of Fate, Yang Qi could easily help his followers improve their psychic scales.

Seeing that the countless superpower sects were well organized and the work with the spell formation was mostly done, Houselord God Bastard said, “League-Lord, we've been working hard for ten years, and really need to get some rest. Su Xin, Mu Renwang, Huangfu Genesis and I would like some time to work on our cultivation bases a bit. Is that possible?”

“Go ahead....”

The four experts exchanged glances, then said their goodbyes.

Yang Qi knew exactly what was going on; they would soon meet secretly to try to figure out a way to keep his power in check.

Chapter 1090: Proud Heaven&#039;s Son

All of the major powers under heaven were currently in Yang Qi’s control, and he was feeling very pleased. He even let his four enemies go plot amongst themselves about how to deal with him. After all, he didn’t think that Mu Renwang and Su Xin would ever truly ally with Huangfu Genesis, and they might even report information about him to Yang Qi.

As he watched them head to their various palaces, he smiled coldly.

Even the House of God Bastards’ headquarters had been brought to the new central location.

It was a huge mountain, covered with grotesquely-shaped jagged rocks and battered by harsh energy winds that screamed like ghosts and were filled with an aura of sin and enmity.

The specific name of the headquarters was ‘Cursed Bastard Mountain’.

It was home to a host of god bastards, and was in fact a preheaven god item created, not in the human world, but in the god world, using a host of energies filled with sin and enmity. It existed on a much higher level than ordinary god items, and the energies of sin and enmity within it could be transformed into chains that would sweep out and lock on to any enemy, making it impossible for them to escape.

But now it was inside the spell formation Yang Qi had created, which was so powerful it would cause dragons to coil up and tigers to crouch down.

Everything was flourishing, causing Yang Qi to nod in satisfaction. After becoming the league-lord, he was struck with the sensation that he was soon going to end up facing Proud Heaven. After all, the more important he became, the more powerful entities he ended up having contact with.

WHOOSH!

Even as he stood in the middle of his grand spell formation thinking about this, a beam of light suddenly appeared noiselessly in front of him.

Yang Qi reached out and grabbed it, and the light resolved into the shape of an enormous godmammoth, trumpeting in rage. Instantly, his arm went numb.

‘The Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth? This reminds me of the God Legion Seal!’

He looked left and right, but didn’t see anyone. Then he peered closer at the golden godmammoth. Suddenly, it surged with golden light, and at the same time, a voice spoke into his ear. “Yang Qi, do you want to destroy Proud Heaven? Then join me. This godmammoth will lead you to me.”

The golden godmammoth then shot off into the distance. Without hesitation, Yang Qi followed, wondering who could possibly have been thinking the same thing as him. Could it be the bearer of the God Legion Seal from the Primeval Age? And that person wanted to join forces with him to kill Proud Heaven?

Or could this be a trick by Proud Heaven himself?

Regardless, Yang Qi felt that true confidence stems from superb skill. Besides, his immortal-slaying clone was now in the mid Terrifying level. Together, there were few people who could possibly cause a problem for them.

After all, the power they could now unleash from the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart was unimaginable.

Even if they did end up facing a deadly situation, they could easily turn ill fortune into good luck. For the moment, he wasn’t worried, and decided that it would be worth it to follow this godmammoth and learn more about what opportunities might be at hand.

Yang Qi followed the godmammoth into the depths of the Great Necropolis, confident that with the purrling back in the alliance, nothing untoward would happen. During the ten years that had passed, the purrling had grown a bit despite its continuing refusal to eat, begging the question of how exactly it was growing.

Deeper and deeper they went, until Yang Qi could see many surrounding immortal worlds with a rank of two thousand, and the pressure building up around him was tremendous. Thankfully, he was stronger than ever, with a psychic scale of a hundred and fifty and a cultivation base beyond the mid Terrifying level.

As he proceeded, the ranks of the worlds around him rose. Two thousand three hundred. Two thousand five hundred. Two thousand eight hundred.

He continued to fly on until, all of a sudden, an enormous immortal world appeared in front of him. It looked like a sphere of jade that was simultaneously made of flesh and blood, and its rank was three thousand!

A boundless and majestic aura pulsed off of it, but given Yang Qi’s level, he wasn’t particularly impressed. This immortal world was powerful, but he could still assimilate it if he had to. People with an ordinary Terrifying will convergence wouldn’t be able to fly in an immortal world like this, much less pierce through space.

But Yang Qi could.

He was so far past the mid Terrifying level that he could even survive in the god world without any problems. Entering the three thousandth ranked immortal world, he took a deep breath and looked around. The clouds almost looked like they were made from liquid jade, and as they flowed into him, he used King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans to transform them into streams of true energy.

Instantly, one Heaven-Devouring śarīra after another appeared.

Unfortunately, such śarīras were of little use to Yang Qi; only god worlds could be of help to him now. Therefore, he would give the śarīras to his subordinates.

Upon entering this enormous immortal world, the golden godmammoth faded away to nothing.

Yang Qi sent his divine will out, and as he did, streams of fog shot toward him.

Whoosh!

A finger attack pierced toward his forehead, the top of his head, his sea of energy... all of which were major acupoints on the body. It was an amazing technique that locked down everything in the area, making it impossible for the target to have any avenue of defense. And it absolutely thrummed with the dignity of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.

Although Yang Qi had never encountered this specific technique before, he knew it had the same origin as his own technique.

Instead of using his own Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth to counter it, he swept his finger out with three moves from the Unspoiled Body.

They were Sea of Tribulations Births Kalpas, I Shall Go to Hell, and Bearing Suffering. All of them were reflections of the mercy of the sages and mahātmās that conformed to the statement I will sacrifice myself and go to hell before I let anyone else do so. In other words, they involved bearing the suffering of the entire world.

The Unspoiled Body was about a single person bearing the suffering of everyone else, and using it as a form of training to reach unfathomable levels of invincibility.

Bam. Bam. Bam.

Three fingers met three fingers.

Then a person appeared, surrounded by crackling sounds like that of thunder. Meanwhile, Yang Qi shivered as though his vital energy had been struck. However, a short moment later, he stabilized it and was back to normal.

The person in front of him became clear. It was a man in a long black robe, with a long, crooked staff in his hand. Yang Qi recognized him immediately; he was none other than the Shepherd of the Fiend-Devil League.

“Shepherd?” Yang Qi said. “How can you use the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth?”

“I trust you’ve been well since we last met, boy?” the Shepherd said in a grating voice. “I can’t believe you’ve actually cultivated the Unspoiled Body to the level of three hundred tribulations. From ancient times until now, not a single expert on the Ancient Road to the Gods has done that, not even with the sheepskin scroll. In fact, no one has even reached the level of a hundred. It seems you’ve really unlocked the secrets of that piece of the Mahātmā Jade you stole from me.”

“What do you want, Shepherd,” Yang Qi said. “To join the Sage Monarch League? Or take back that Mahātmā Jade? It seems to me you don't have what it takes to do the latter. Don’t forget that your Fiend-Devil League is a big thorn in the side of the Executors of the Ancient Road. If we work together against a common enemy, we might survive. But if we start fighting each other, the executors will be the ones who benefit.”

“You’re growing up fast,” the Shepherd replied. “It took you no time at all to become the league-lord of your so-called Sage Monarch League. You even got Houselord God Bastard, Mu Renwang, Su Xin and Huangfu Genesis under control. You have an incredible spell formation, and some sort of bizarre creature from the ancient past that makes you even more domineering. In any case, don’t worry, I didn’t come here today to fight you. No, I want you to meet someone.... Proud World, please come out and meet your brother. Let’s chat.”

Laughter rang out as another person appeared. He was young, and pulsed with a golden aura that reminded Yang Qi of the golden imp of the God Legion Seal.

“Shepherd, it seems that you haven’t yet mastered the bit of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth that I infused into you. Your Dracomammoth Finger is a quintessential aspect of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, but sadly, you haven’t cleansed yourself of that fiend-devil aura of yours. You haven’t become like a true sage or mahātmā of the god world.”

Surprisingly, the young man had no traces of the God Legion Seal on him. It seemed like all of his energy arts had been given to him by another, which meant that he was obviously a pawn of Proud Heaven.

A pawn and a son.

What was amazing was that he was a mid Terrifying expert, with a psychic scale that surpassed a hundred and was actually impossible to read. Obviously, his cultivation of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth had allowed him to break through limitations that ordinary people could never surpass.

As he looked at Yang Qi, he didn't seem to have a trace of hostility in his eyes, and was in fact smiling broadly. “I’m your humble servant, Proud World. Well met, Brother. You’re a son of Proud Heaven, and so am I. The two of us are half-brothers. Same father, different mothers.”

Snorting coldly, Yang Qi flicked his sleeve and said, “There’s no need to go on about that. You might be a son of Proud Heaven, but I'm not. I'm a Fateless One, born without any father or mother. I've come to this world to distort the river of fate, to transform the fate of the gods, and of heaven and earth. The trifling Proud Heaven doesn’t deserve to be my father. In other words, there’s no need for you to call me brother. What exactly do you want?”

“Well, you’ve got quite the personality!” Proud World said. “I like it! I can tell from your tone of voice that you have a big grudge with Proud Heaven, which makes you just the person I want to work with. If you didn’t hate Proud Heaven, I wouldn’t have asked you here today. Instead, I would have considered you an enemy.”

Yang Qi was visibly taken aback by Proud World's words. “Are you saying you hate Proud Heaven too?”

Proud World’s smile suddenly widened, and his shining white teeth somehow became profoundly eerie. “I don’t just hate him. If I had an opportunity, I wouldn’t mind eating him alive. I'm sure his flesh and blood would taste delicious. The mere thought of it causes me to shiver with delight! You see, Proud Heaven performed experiments on me, the kind that should have killed me. In the end, though, I ended up reaching this level because of it. And it was all thanks to him.”

Chapter 1091: Join Forces to Kill Proud Heaven?

Proud World chuckled, his face a picture of brutality and venom, as though he really did look forward to devouring Proud Heaven alive.

“Proud Heaven took me from the Ancient Road to the Gods because he said I had a special constitution and the blood of the gods. Although I don’t have one of the three thousand unique constitutions, he said I was very unusual and special. Thus, he performed all sorts of experiments on me from the time I was very young. He gave me strange things to eat, imbued me with different kinds of energy arts. I really should have died. In the end, he absorbed my essence, taking away my blood of the gods. Sadly for him, it wasn’t the time for me to die, and I managed to absorb some of his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth during the process.

“Now he’s grooming me to become one of the magisters of the future world. However, I can’t stand him, and although I'm enduring the situation silently, the truth is that I'm trying to find a way to kill him. Which is why I want to work with you. You see, I received information that indicates Proud Heaven will be coming to the Great Necropolis soon, which would be the perfect moment for us to strike! You could even take his God Legion Seal. What do you think?”

From the venom in Proud World’s voice, Yang Qi could tell he harbored just as much hatred of Proud Heaven as Yang Qi himself.

Of course, he wouldn’t simply take his words at face value. It was always hard to tell with people like this whether they were being honest or running a scam.

A mysterious smile appeared on Yang Qi’s face. “Proud Heaven really does like to have pawns everywhere, doesn’t he? Once he sees an opportunity, he starts manipulating things. Sort of like me. You see, he figured out early on that I was a Fateless One, and started trying to get at me even in the mortal world. So I'm definitely going to kill him. That said, if you want to form some sort of alliance, you need to provide evidence to prove you're acting in good faith. For instance, where are my mother, my Aunt Susu, and my Master being held captive?”

“They’re in the god world,” Proud World replied.

“What did you just say?” Yang Qi said, a tremor passing through him. “What are you talking about?”

“Proud Heaven had them sent to the god world. You see, he’s not as simple a person as you thought. He actually has a base of operations in the god world already. He went there and worked on his cultivation for a few years before returning to handle other matters. As far as I know, he’s the only person who has ever done such a thing. Nobody knows what happened during his time in the god world, but one thing is clear: his cultivation improved and he gained a greater mastery of fate.”

“Seriously?” Yang Qi said, not quite willing to believe it.

“Whether you believe me or not is immaterial,” Proud World replied grimly. “Facts are facts, and I'm telling you the truth. If you don’t believe me, go ahead and search for your loved ones on your own. In the end, it won’t matter if you go to the future world, or search the Ancient Road to the Gods. You won’t find them. The truth is that because you almost killed my mother, I didn't want to tell you all of this. But in the interests of killing Proud Heaven, I'm telling you now. Is that enough to show you I'm acting in good faith?”

“I almost killed your mother?” Yang Qi said suspiciously. “Don’t tell me your mother is....”

“That’s right,” Proud World replied. “My mother is Empress Joyflower. Back on the Ancient Road to the Gods, she fell victim to Proud Heaven, and now she’s in a very bad situation, considering you destroyed her sect.”

Yang Qi snorted. “She’s made out quite well thanks to that ‘disaster’ of hers. Some other enemy of Proud Heaven ended up rescuing her from my hands. Presumably it was the bearer of the God Legion Seal from the Primeval Age. But you probably already knew that, didn’t you?”

Proud World chuckled coldly. “Of course. If it weren’t for her savior messaging me, how would I have known my mother's fate? In any case, such matters are inconsequential. Proud Heaven is the person we should be worrying about. The bearer of the God Legion Seal from the Primeval Age is named Doom. His entire clan was slaughtered by Proud Heaven, down to the ninth generation. All of his friends were killed, too, leaving him as the sole survivor. He came to the Immortal Dao Age with a deep desire to get revenge on Proud Heaven. In fact, I've already come to an agreement with him. He’ll join the effort to kill Proud Heaven. If two bearers of the God Legion Seal work together, one from the Primeval Age and one from the Immortal Dao Age, then your combined energy arts should be more than enough to kill him.”

After a moment of thought, Yang Qi said, “I doubt that will be enough to kill him. If Proud Heaven is as fierce as you just described, and if he's really been in the god world, then I bet he already knows that we're considering working together.”

Suddenly, a peal of laughter rang out and another person blurred onto the scene. He was surrounded by golden light and created a host of countless projections around him that resolved into the image of a middle-aged man in a golden robe.

Yang Qi could already sense the aura of the God Legion Seal on him.

Yang Qi’s heart immediately began to pound, and he was glad he had already forsaken the God Legion Seal and had it sealed in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Otherwise, he would have immediately formed a resonance with this newcomer.

It was a strange feeling to finally be in the presence of someone else with a God Legion Seal. Nodding slightly, Yang Qi said, “So you’re Doom. Back when I was destroying the Joyflower Palace, you jumped in and saved Empress Joyflower. And you hit me with a very vicious blow, which I survived. Just so you know, I’ve improved a lot. Hitting me like that again won’t be easy.”

“I hit you with that blow as a matter of course, that’s all,” replied Doom. “Where is your God Legion Seal? Hidden somewhere? Could it be that you’ve really abandoned it now that you cultivate the Unspoiled Body?”

Yang Qi laughed. “I just removed myself from the constraints of the seal, that’s all. I'm creating my own dao. In fact, I’d advise you to also forsake the God Legion Seal, otherwise you’ll eventually fall so deeply under its control that you’ll be damned by myriad tribulations. The seal isn’t an auspicious thing.”

“Nonsense,” Doom replied. “The God Legion Seal is the most glorious thing in existence. It makes you a successor of the Sovereign Lord himself. If you cast aside the seal, then you will eventually lose the glory of the legion of gods. In any case, if you don't want your God Legion Seal, then give it to me.” He extended his hand expectantly.

“Fine. Give me something of equal value to trade for it, and I’ll give it to you.”

An awkward expression appeared on Doom’s face. How could he possibly produce any treasure of equal value to the God Legion Seal? Obviously he couldn't, as nothing could compare to the seal.

“Stop bickering, you two,” said Proud World. “We're all here for the same reason, and that’s because we want to kill Proud Heaven. The two of you bear God Legion Seals just like Proud Heaven. And the truth is that the only thing that can counter a God Legion Seal is another God Legion Seal. That’s why I brought the two of you here today. By the way, Doom, what about my mother?”

“Your mother is fine. She's right here. She's become my woman, and is therefore under my protection. Step forth....” A golden halo appeared, and Empress Joyflower stepped out.

A strange expression could be seen on Proud World’s face. “Mother, have you really become his woman?”

“I have,” she replied. “The more I piss off Proud Heaven, the better. Maybe he’ll get mad enough that he’ll make a mistake. Have a lapse in judgment. That could be the perfect opportunity for you. Besides, back in the day of the Joyflower Palace, I had plenty of male consorts. So what’s the big deal?”

“Fine, Mother, you do as you wish. As immortals, we obviously don’t pay much attention to things like that. As long as we end up killing Proud Heaven, anything will be worth it. The pain I endured thanks to his experiments were like the tortures of hell. Unless I eat him alive, how could I possibly put my hatred to rest?”

“What about the Joyflower Palace, Yang Qi?” Empress Joyflower said. “I want it back. I was the one who built it, it’s mine.”

“That’s fine,” Yang Qi replied, waving his hand dismissively. “Considering I'm going to work with your son to kill Proud Heaven, you can have it back. Besides, I'm the league-lord of the Sage Monarch League of the Ancient Road to the Gods, so why would I care about some tiny Joyflower Palace? Of course, you’ll have to join the Sage Monarch League. And getting you back there might be a bit problematic at the moment. I guess it’ll have to wait until I have the time. Agreed?”

“Mother, this isn’t worth bickering about,” Proud World said. “Do you know how strong the Sage Monarch League is? A hair from its proverbial head would be stronger than a million Joyflower Palaces put together. Just wait until we kill Proud Heaven, crush the Executors of the Ancient Road, and vanquish the Great Necropolis savages. Then we can go to the god world and have a fresh start. What’s the point of worrying about the bugs in this world?”

“He's right,” said Doom. “Yang Qi, whatever grudges we had between us aren’t worth mentioning. I've subjugated quite a few of the Great Necropolis locals, and I was originally thinking of using them to destroy your alliance. But after the show you put on slaughtering the agents I sent, I realized that working with you to take down Proud Heaven would be much better. Do you agree? If you want, we can forget about the past and turn weapons of war into gifts of jade and silk.”

“I concur,” Proud World said. “Brother Doom has a lot of the Great Necropolis locals under his control. And his Doom Sect gets stronger every day, to the point where it even rivals the Executors of the Ancient Road. With his help, we should be able to slaughter the forces of the future world.”

Yang Qi frowned. “Aren’t you from the future world? Are you saying you're going to exterminate your own people?”

“That’s right!” Proud World said. “I'm going to kill everyone from the future world; that's my goal. The truth is that Proud Heaven and the other nine magisters are all incredibly powerful. The only reason they haven’t accomplished more is that they’re always fighting amongst themselves. You see, the magisters all have power indexes of nine thousand or more, and psychic scales of two hundred! Do you have any idea what that means? It means they’re all destined to reach the god world sooner or later. Unfortunately, the Great Necropolis came and blocked their path to godly ascension.”

“What? The ten magisters are that fierce? Psychic scales of two hundred? Doesn’t that put them close to the peak of the Terrifying level? If they’re that strong, why haven’t they just conquered everything? What are they doing just sitting around in the future world?” Yang Qi’s heart was pounding at the mere thought of people that strong.

“Because they’re busy dealing with the god Brahma. He's constantly struggling to free himself, and it would spell catastrophe for the future world if he got out.”

Chapter 1092: The Last of King Immortal-Slayer&#039;s Legacy Medallions

“Yes,” said Doom. “The ten magisters of the future world really are that strong. You can hardly imagine their reign of terror when they slaughtered countless experts of the Primeval Age and took all of our resources. If it weren’t for the fact that they’re so preoccupied keeping Brahma in check and can’t travel about with their true selves, I would already be dead, and the God Legion Seal would be in their hands. You see, it’s only by using Brahma’s power that they opened the passageway to the Primeval Age.”

“The god Brahma...?” Yang Qi said. He chuckled darkly. “I almost forgot about him. I guess no matter how weak he is, he's still a god. And gods aren’t the kind of entities that mortals can easily deal with.”

“That’s exactly right,” said Empress Joyflower. “The ten magisters can’t use their true selves, and that includes Proud Heaven. Killing one of his incarnations won’t do any good.”

“Killing one of his incarnations would indeed be pointless,” Doom said. “However, he’s planning to come here as his true self, while leaving an incarnated clone behind to suppress Brahma. Thanks to my God Legion Seal, I can sense his imminent arrival. In fact, he might even be here already.”

Doom’s words chilled everyone to the bone, and Yang Qi almost felt as if Proud Heaven were already right there in their presence.

He was the kind of person who could appear and disappear unpredictably, which made him very difficult to defend against. However, Yang Qi refused to believe that Proud Heaven could defeat two bearers of the God Legion Seal who were working together against him.

“By the way,” Yang Qi said, “when I was fighting for the position of league-lord, a strange man in a bronze mask showed up and used a whip technique from the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. It seemed to me that he had some of the battle will of Proud Heaven’s God Legion Seal, in addition to some of yours, Doom. Who was he? One of the pawns you sent to interfere?”

“Wait, what happened?” Doom asked, looking stunned.

Proud World also looked surprised. “What exactly did he look like?”

Yang Qi described the man and the fight, but that only caused Doom and Proud World to frown more deeply.

“I’d say it's highly likely he’s one of Proud Heaven’s men,” Proud World said.

“No, that’s not possible,” Yang Qi said. “He actually cursed Proud Heaven, unless he did that on purpose to sow confusion.”

“Maybe it was someone groomed by one of the other magisters,” Doom said. “None of them really like Proud Heaven. You see, in the beginning, the ten magisters agreed to share the use of the God Legion Seal. But in the end, Proud Heaven took sole control of it. The only downside for him was that he paid a very heavy price to succeed. If I were to guess, I’d say your mysterious masked man was the son of another magister, which is the only explanation for how he could be so strong. In the past, I personally fought with each and every one of the magisters, and it’s entirely possible that they siphoned some of the energy of my version of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.”

His explanation did seem to make sense, and the atmosphere was already starting to soften. At the very least, they weren’t facing off with swords drawn and arrows nocked.

“So what's the plan to deal with Proud Heaven?” Yang Qi asked.

“He's not going to be easy to fight,” said Doom, “but that doesn’t mean we can't deal with him.” Looking at Proud World, he continued, “If Yang Qi and I work together to seek further enlightenment of our God Legion Seals, I think we’ll find the answer.”

“What would happen if you were to combine your God Legion Seals? I guess the only downside is that the result would be a single seal, and the two of you wouldn’t be able to split it. In other words, one of you would have to kill the other.” Proud World chuckled.

Doom gave a cold harrumph. “It’s a given that there can only be one God Legion Seal in the end. So it's a foregone conclusion that Yang Qi and I will ultimately be enemies. But for now, we’re not. So my suggestion is that, in order to deal with Proud Heaven, we reveal the secrets of our respective versions of the seal. We exchange all of our energy arts, but don’t combine the seals. After all, once fused, they can't be separated.” He looked over at Yang Qi. “Of that, I'm sure you’re aware. However, if we do kill Proud Heaven, I have a way to resolve the situation. Proud Heaven has already created an undying body, and considering he's been to the god world, I wouldn’t be surprised if he’s already joined the legion of gods. He has a deathless will, which means that, generally speaking, he’ll be impossible to kill. Unfortunately for him, I've already figured out a way to do just that!”

“Kill him? How?” Yang asked. He had already come to the conclusion that Proud Heaven had a boundless fate that made him impossible to kill. In fact, he wasn't confident at all that this little alliance would be enough to actually take him down.

“Simple,” Doom said. “We use King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions!”

“What? King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions?”

“He’s right,” Proud World said, a sinister grin appearing on his face. “I know that you have eight of them, Yang Qi, which means you’re missing one. If you were to get all of them together, you would resurrect the will of King Immortal-Slayer. And what would Proud Heaven count for compared to him? We can definitely use King Immortal-Slayer’s will to cut him down, and then we’ll have the third God Legion Seal!”

“Are you saying you have the ninth legacy medallion?” Yang Qi said. “The one that was originally created from King Immortal-Slayer's heart? If so, let me see it. That legacy medallion is only one of Proud Heaven’s many plots to kill me.”

“I do have it,” Proud World replied, “but not on me. It’s in the future world. You see, it’s of critical importance in the effort to suppress Brahma. However, I could probably get into the treasure storehouse and steal it. What do you think?”

“We could kill Proud Heaven that way,” Yang Qi said in a cool voice. “Unfortunately... if King Immortal-Slayer’s will is resurrected, the first thing he’ll do is attack me.”

“Wrong,” Doom said. “The first thing he’ll do is make a move on the God Legion Seal. You see, King Immortal-Slayer’s greatest enemies were always the Sovereign Lord, the godmammoths, and the God Legion Seal. Besides, in the moment of his resurrection, it’s his will that will awaken, not his entire person. So it's not as if he’ll be that fearful. Remember, his legacy medallions only contain a very small and weak portion of his energy and power, not enough for a full resurrection. That said, his resurrected will would still be beyond our ability to deal with, and that goes for Proud Heaven as well.”

“I'm guessing you have a way to control that resurrected will?” Yang Qi said.

“Exactly. What we do is release his will in the main headquarters in the future world. That way, he’ll destroy them. Not even Proud Heaven will be able to escape. We need to do it while Proud Heaven is still there in the future world. We need to strike first! Open the passage, free Brahma, release King Immortal-Slayer, combine the legacy medallions, then return here. With us gone, Proud Heaven will be the only person in the future world with a God Legion Seal, which means that he’ll become the biggest target for King Immortal-Slayer’s will. After he’s dead, we can go back and clean up.”

“Not a bad plan,” Yang Qi said. “Unfortunately, it's easy to invite a god in, but hard to send it away. How are we supposed to get King Immortal-Slayer’s will under control after releasing it? What if his will manages to track us down here? Then we’d end up just like Proud Heaven. Dead. Don’t forget that King Immortal-Slayer was so mighty he threw the god world into turmoil. He might be able to help us, but it won’t be out of kindness.” Yang Qi still didn’t feel very confident in succeeding.

Doom thought for a moment. “We just need to get Proud Heaven into the Great Necropolis. You see, there’s more to my plan than I’ve explained so far, and some of it has to do with some things I’ve learned about the necropolis. You've become an Inheritor, right? I have to say, I was surprised by that, because the necropolis doesn’t have anything to do with the God Legion Seal. And understanding its profundities is the key to crushing and killing, not just someone like Proud Heaven, but also the will of King Immortal-Slayer. You can use it to bury him. To seal him.”

“What exactly is the Great Necropolis?” Yang Qi asked.

At this point, Proud World cut in and said, “I believe it comes from a time before the god world. Before the Sovereign Lord was even born. It's impossible to say why it suddenly showed up to block the Ancient Road to the Gods. The only thing I can think of is that dramatic events unfolded in the god world.

“Besides, we've already explored most of what the Great Necropolis has to offer. The immortal worlds with a rank of three thousand are the core of the necropolis. Of course, there are more mysteries to be uncovered; for example, we don't know exactly how the godpower seeds came to be. That secret lies with the so-called essence of the Great Necropolis. Although, I have the feeling we’ll soon find out the details of such secrets.

“Do you know another reason why we want to work with you, Yang Qi? Because of your immense potential. You’ve become an Inheritor, so as long as you can find where the godpower seeds originate, then we’ll definitely have what it takes to deal with Proud Heaven. In fact, you could probably even imprison King Immortal-Slayer’s will and gain absolute control over the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.”

“Even more amazing, if you think about it,” Doom continued, “is that we can use King Immortal-Slayer’s will to fight the Great Necropolis. Perhaps we can even move it! And if we did that, we could once again walk the Ancient Road to the Gods and go to the god world. There are many things we could accomplish by working together.”

“So that’s your plan,” Yang Qi said. He had to admit that he felt some admiration for this group. Although the plan had yet to be carried out, it was definitely ambitious and worthy of respect.

Use King Immortal-Slayer to deal with Proud Heaven. Use the Great Necropolis to suppress King Immortal-Slayer. Use that to move the Great Necropolis. Then, finally, get a chance at godly ascension.

Everything was connected, and it could theoretically lead to immense benefits. However, Yang Qi was still convinced that it couldn’t possibly play out as smoothly as described. They needed to take things slowly, for instance, by first coming to understand more of the secrets of the Great Necropolis. After all, he was an Inheritor now, so he couldn't very well cause problems for his own foundation.

“Alright,” he said with a nod. Looking at Doom, he continued, “You tell me all of the cultivation methods that came with your God Legion Seal, and I’ll do the same. We’ll do it via divine will.”

“Alright!” Doom said, then took the initiative to send out a stream of divine will.

Chapter 1093: Other Magics

Doom and Yang Qi’s divine wills connected, and they began a session of cultivation. Neither was interested in causing mischief, as neither felt that there was any point in trying to deceive the other. Right now, the most important task at hand was killing Proud Heaven.

Besides, Yang Qi had reached the point where he honestly didn’t care much about the God Legion Seal. It was simply another martial arts asset in his arsenal. Even if he lost it, he would still be profoundly domineering, and would still be able to reach an incredibly high level.

Therefore, he didn’t hold back, and transmitted all of the energy arts and cultivation methods of his version of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth into Doom’s mind. Besides, once Doom took them and started cultivating them, he would form even more profound dependency-devils.

Although they would give him a big boost to his cultivation base, making him much stronger, that was a temporary thing. In the long run, it would make his path of cultivation more difficult.

It was different with Yang Qi. As he acquired new methods from the God Legion Seal, he used his psychic power and Unspoiled Body, coupling strength and gentleness to produce marvelous transformations.

One person was relying completely on the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, and the other was only using it as a reference point. The two of them had different ways of thinking, and they led to different results.

Yang Qi didn’t hold anything back from Doom. He provided his Infernal Deity Spear, Hellfire Crucible, Angel Wings, the Sovereign Lord’s Holy and Far-Reaching Consummate Omnicurse, the Heaven-God Hell-Exterminating Devil Embryo, and everything else.

As for Doom, he started out slowly and didn’t immediately give Yang Qi everything that he knew. But as Yang Qi’s information poured into his mind, a look of shock appeared on his face as he realized that Yang Qi was obviously not holding back at all. At that point, he did the same, and began pouring knowledge from his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth into Yang Qi.

The first technique Yang Qi received was a powerful psychic technique called the Unfeeling Mammoth-Heart Body.

Upon cultivating it, one’s spirit became incredibly tough, like the skin of a mammoth. After all, mammoths could trample the thistles and thorns of the jungle floor without the slightest impediment.

Next came another transformative psychic magic called the Great Dao of the Steel Heart. It involved using a psyche that was backed by a great dao to batter one’s own heart, giving it the power to endure anything.

More techniques came flowing in.

The World-King’s God-Assimilating Grand Magic.

The Surpassing the True-Self Heaven-Melting Dao-Shattering Will.

The Psychic-Creation Many-Heavens Godhood Secret Magic.

The Holy Grand Magic of Illuminating Radiance and Light.

The Grand Reverse-Light-Stream Empty-Spirit Ascension Art.

The Daoist Sutra of the Unbounded-Psychic Void.

The Deathless God-Ordaining True Empyrean.

The Essence-Moulding Psychic Lightning.

Most of the techniques seemed to involve psychic cultivation of some sort, and the highest level of them all was something called the Annulled Grand Magic. Supposedly, it was the quintessence of what the Sovereign Lord had used in his attempt to gain enlightenment of the Annulled level of will convergence.

As Yang Qi pored through the new information with his psyche and will, he came to understand many areas of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth that had once been a mystery to him. His psychic power became like rivers of silver streaming through him, causing his psyche to begin climbing to a higher level.

It was almost like there had been a treasure storehouse in front of him that he had never been able to enter. But then someone came along with a key and opened it up, revealing mountains of gold and silver.

Even Yang Qi’s sea of consciousness began transforming. The magical laws within him collapsed and formed together, then repeated the process millions upon millions of times. His psychic power was receiving a true baptism, and soon, his psychic scale was climbing again. From one hundred fifty, it rose to one hundred sixty, seventy, eighty, until it finally stopped at one hundred ninety-nine, just shy of two hundred.

Unfortunately, he still hadn’t broken through to the mid Terrifying level.

Thanks to all of the new enlightenment of the various daoist magics, his true energy thrummed inside him, condensing and even crystallizing. Nascent divinities began forming, created from vital energy. And at the same time, impurities were extruded from within him.

Suddenly, tribulation characters from the Unspoiled Body appeared, and he rose higher in his level as he passed them.

For cultivators and mortals alike, the psyche was the basis of everything. If your psyche was indestructible, you could cultivate any type of energy art, even the godly-class versions.

Yang Qi sat there unmoving, with golden light swirling around his head. Eventually, that golden light covered his entire body, then he once again transformed in the most fundamental of ways.

The process lasted for seven days and nights.

Doom was experiencing the same thing, and was rapidly rising in strength. With Yang Qi’s version of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth combining with his own, he was experiencing all sorts of transformations. Of course, he wasn’t benefiting nearly as much as Yang Qi was.

Yang Qi’s psychic techniques and Unspoiled Body made it possible for him to gain far more enlightenment. Besides, he was also improving his Purrfect God Art and Great Necropolis abilities. Little did any of these people know that his Purrfect God Art was actually his most powerful technique now.

When they finished, Proud World stepped forward and said, “Excellent. The two of you have both gained further enlightenment. Although, I cultivate the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth too. Even though I don’t have a God Legion Seal, I do have the true energy of the seal within me. Might it be possible for the two of you to help me out a bit?”

“No problem at all!” Yang Qi said, and quickly sent some cultivation techniques into his mind.

In response, Doom’s expression flickered. “Brother Yang Qi, he has a boundless art of battle as well that he could give you in return. After all, Proud Heaven's God Legion Seal focuses on the techniques of fighting and battle. It would be a real pity to not get some of them.”

“Er...” Proud World said, then shook his head. “I got some of his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, but the truth is that I only got a tiny portion of his will of battle. Too little to be of use. I actually rely on another set of techniques for that.” It looked more like Proud World didn’t want to give up his knowledge of the technique.

Yang Qi immediately severed the will connection he had just created, leaving behind only a tiny fraction of the enlightenment he could have. Of course, he already knew the secrets of Proud Heaven’s will of battle, but he wasn't about to reveal that now.

By now, he had acquired at least bits of all of the various cultivation systems from the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, although much of it was the result of piecing things together by instinct as opposed to cultivating the true and orthodox techniques. After all, to truly cultivate the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, one had to have the corresponding God Legion Seal.

Thankfully, all Yang Qi really needed was the mere technique or method; his need for the God Legion Seal only continued dropping as time passed.

“There’s no need to argue,” the Shepherd said. “As long as we stick together, we can fight Proud Heaven. Afterward, there will be plenty of time for negotiation. We’re already much stronger as a group thanks to this exchange of techniques. Next, we need to come up with a step-by-step plan of how exactly we’re going to deal with Proud Heaven.”

“That’s what I was thinking,” Doom said. “Right now, we should find the essence of the Great Necropolis, the origin of the godpower seeds. That should give us more clues about how to fight Proud Heaven and resurrect the will of King Immortal-Slayer.”

“I don’t think that's particularly appropriate,” Yang Qi said. During the past seven days of cultivation, Yang Qi had spent a lot of time thinking. Although it seemed like this group really had sought him out to join forces in dealing with Proud Heaven, it was still entirely possible this entire thing was some crafty plot. Perhaps they wanted to use his status as an Inheritor to search for the essence of the Great Necropolis, then get godpower seeds for themselves. Maybe then they would stab him in the back. After all, there was no way that Doom was simply going to forget about Yang Qi’s God Legion Seal. It made sense to become ‘friends’ with him, then betray him later. After all, bearers of the God Legion Seal were similar to the Inheritors: they were supposed to fight each other like venomous bugs in a jar until only one came out on top in the end.

“Oh?” Proud World said, his eyes glittering. “What about it do you find inappropriate, Brother Yang Qi?”

“For one thing, the depths of the necropolis are very dangerous,” he replied. “I can sense that clearly. If we go there, we need to have a very specific plan first. Furthermore, I think that using King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions to fight Proud Heaven is actually too dangerous. Considering how strong we all are, why don't we just team up and take Proud Heaven on directly?”

“I'm not confident that we could kill him,” Proud World replied. “I'm still his son, and I'm currently plotting behind his back. If we fail, he’s going to find out the truth, and I’ll be in extreme danger. We have to make sure it works the first time around.”

“That’s right, Yang Qi,”  Doom said. “This undertaking is nothing to take lightly. Remember, the God Legion Seal is at stake here. There’s no way the other magisters of the future world will just sit idly by as we kill Proud Heaven and abscond with the God Legion Seal. If we make a move to kill Proud Heaven and fail, we’ll be in profound danger.”

“Then why don’t we make some better plans?” Yang Qi said. “Remember, the Great Necropolis is dangerous as well. If we go deep inside and run into something unexpectedly dangerous, the organizations we lead will be left defenseless. I think I’d like to return to my sect for half a month or so to make certain arrangements for my departure, then meet back up afterward. What do you say?”

Inside, he was smiling coldly; he had already started planning how he would deal with the situation.

After a moment of thought, Proud World said, “I guess that’s fine. I suppose you haven’t fully exercised control over the House of God Bastards, Woodfern Couple Palace, and Genesis Sanctum. They could cause problems at any time. What if we came with you to help? We can crush those three organizations and make them your puppets. Then the Sage Monarch League would be fully stable. What do you think?”

Chapter 1094: Making a Backward Thrust

Doom smiled coldly. “Exactly, Yang Qi. Houselord God Bastard, Mu Renwang, Su Xin and Huangfu Genesis are all extremely powerful experts that are roughly on the same level as us. If they rise up in revolt, you won’t be able to deal with them alone. But with us on your side, things would be different. Look, I know what's going on here. You suspect that we might not be acting in good faith, and need some time to take precautionary measures. So why not let us help you crush and puppetize your enemies? Then we can all go explore the depths of the Great Necropolis.”

“It's a good idea,” the Shepherd said. “Houselord God Bastard and Huangfu Genesis are both clever old bastards who would be very difficult to kill. In fact, I could probably only fight one of them at a time. But with them as puppets” —he chuckled darkly— “it would give us an even better chance of beating Proud Heaven.”

“Puppetize them?” Yang Qi thought about it for a moment. “Do you intend to give them all to me as puppets? Or are you talking about splitting them up? Considering there are four of us and four of them, is your plan for each of us to have one? That doesn’t really seem appropriate to me. They’re mine, so why should I distribute their power if we kill them? That would only weaken my Sage Monarch League and make it much easier for the Executors of the Ancient Road to cause problems. There wouldn't be any truly powerful expert left in the alliance to watch over it.”

The truth was that Yang Qi wasn’t necessarily opposed to having their help. He knew that the status quo wouldn't remain forever, and that he would eventually have to think of a way to deal with Houselord God Bastard and the others. For now, all he could do was pit them against each other and keep control that way.

There was no way he could kill all of them at the same time, not given the level of his cultivation base. In fact, killing just one of them would be difficult.

Of course, now that he had acquired the psychic cultivation aspects of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, and his psychic scale was at a hundred and ninety-nine, he would probably be able to kill one of them. But definitely not all of them simultaneously.

Right now, four mid Terrifying experts working together could definitely cause big problems for him.

It was a disaster waiting to happen.

But if he could get help from this group, it would be a very different situation. With four powerful puppets, he might even have the forces necessary to level the executor's headquarters to the ground.

Yang Qi hadn’t forgotten about their treasure storehouse.

Ever since the immortal-slaying clone had reached the mid Terrifying level, Yang Qi had been thinking about a plan to get inside. After all, the executors had the Gate to the Gods inside their storehouse. Now that Yang Qi had such control over the godpower of the Great Necropolis, he was getting close to being able to do what he had done to the treasure storehouse of the Joyflower Palace.

The truth was that his suggestion to return for half a month to take care of some matters was actually an excuse to try to plunder the executors’ treasure. Not only would he get a big advantage by doing so, but he would also undermine the executors and significantly weaken them.

It would also help his people from the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect, putting them in a much better position to defend themselves. And it would put pressure on Houselord God Bastard and the others.

But now that he thought about it, simply getting rid of them by turning them into puppets actually made a lot more sense.

Except that he wasn’t about to agree to give all those puppets away to other people.

“Of course we would get one puppet each,” Proud World said. “It's not as if we’ll put forth a lot of effort with no expectation of compensation. Besides, if you got all four, it would disrupt the balance of power, which would be bad for the rest of us.”

“He’s right,” the Shepherd said. “It’s a bit too selfish to expect to get all four puppets. Besides, there’s no guarantee that we would come out on top in this little effort. If even one of them escaped, it would severely weaken the Sage Monarch League. The fair thing is to split the puppets one per person. Service should be rewarded.”

“I suppose it would count as a service,” Yang Qi said. Even though it didn’t seem like they were willing to back down, he said, “Don’t forget that I have an expert on my side in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. He’s in the mid Terrifying level, so if we add him into the mix, we would be a group of five. Are you saying that his work wouldn’t count for anything?”

“What?!” the Shepherd said, looking shocked. “You have a mid Terrifying expert as an ally, hidden in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart? In that case, we could definitely help you puppetize those four, without any risk of one of them escaping.

“How about this,” Proud World said. “That bastard Huangfu Genesis has a treasure that he refined into a second nascent divinity. It’s almost the same as a mid Terrifying expert. How about you give that to me for my share?”

“Fine, but I want the Cursed Bastard Mountain!” Yang Qi said. “After all, this fight is likely going to cause some damage to the Sage Monarch League. How about that? You can have Houselord God Bastard, and that will still work out to a puppet for each of you.”

“Done,” Doom said. “Besides, Cursed Bastard Mountain wouldn’t be of much use to us. Then it's set. We’ll go back and handle those four. Of course, the best thing would probably be for you to lure them into our hands.”

“That won’t be a problem at all,” Yang Qi said. “If this works, it’ll be a windfall for us all. Four Terrifying experts; that’s a heaven-shaking, earth-shattering force.”

“It will be a windfall indeed. With four mid Terrifying puppets, dealing with Proud Heaven will be a lot easier.” A vicious smile could be seen on Proud World’s face, as though he could already taste the flavor of Proud Heaven’s blood in his mouth.

With that, Yang Qi and his newfound allies flew back in the direction of the Sage Monarch League, ready to unleash devastating force in an instant.

**

Crash!

In the Sage Monarch League, in the depths of Cursed Bastard Mountain, the shattered remnants of a table lay at the feet of the furious Houselord God Bastard. Everyone else in the room stood there as silent as cicadas in winter. That included Su Xin, Mu Renwang, and Huangfu Genesis.

Glaring viciously at them, Houselord God Bastard said, “Enough with this stupid and cowardly behavior! Ten years. Ten years! We’re like dragons tied up in a pool, completely incapable of flying to the highest heavens! It's all because of how Yang Qi kept us under such tight control. There’s only one thing we can do now: kill him! If we don’t, we’re going to end up dead.”

“You’re right about that,” Su Xin said. “But Yang Qi’s cultivation base is so strong! None of us are a match for him. We would have to team up, and then maybe we could capture him. But don’t forget that he has a mid Terrifying expert hiding in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. How are we supposed to deal with that?”

“It's simple,” Mu Renwang said. “None of us are a match for Yang Qi individually, so the only safe way to deal with him is to team up. Huangfu Genesis, I did a lot of thinking during the past ten years, and although the two of us have a grudge between us as deep as the ocean, if we don’t work together here, Yang Qi will only get stronger and stronger. And in the end, he’ll devour us. Do you really think he’s not aware of the true reason we can't unite? He knows everything, he just doesn’t say it out loud. And he’s just waiting to get strong enough before he makes a move.”

“Before, we could use his sect as a threat against him,” Houselord God Bastard growled. “But then he got that damnable purrling, and now nobody can do anything to him. He's been gone for seven days now. We should’ve taken this chance to take all of his people captive. Then we could definitely destroy him!”

“That purrling really is too terrifying,” Mu Renwang said. “Luckily, Yang Qi can’t actually control it. Otherwise we would be in real trouble. If we don’t kill the kid, he’s going to be our undoing. We need to take back the universal fortune of heaven and earth! I can’t believe he killed so many of our old-timers. We lost more than half of them! We definitely have to make him pay for that.”

“It comes down to this: we have to work together,” Houselord God Bastard said, glaring around icily. “We absolutely, positively must not fight amongst ourselves. Yang Qi will take advantage of that, and it will lead to catastrophe for all of us. In the end, we’ll end up as little more than puppets or slaves.”

“So what do we do?”

“How about this,” Houselord God Bastard continued. “Let’s swear oaths to work together for the purpose of destroying Yang Qi. For the time being, all previous grudges or conflicts are off the table. We’ll swear the oath by mixing our blood together! What do you say?”

“Alright!” Mu Renwang said. Looking at Huangfu Genesis, he said, “What about you, you old bastard? Our two sects have a lot of bad blood, but if we don’t stop fighting each other, we’ll both get killed by Yang Qi eventually. If we’d been working together from the beginning, Yang Qi would never have taken control to begin with.”

Without another word, Mu Renwang sliced open his finger, causing blood to flow out into a sphere hovering in front of him.

Houselord God Bastard did the same, as did Huangfu Genesis and Su Xin. Then, they combined the blood and joined their voices together to say, “We forsake internal conflict until Yang Qi is dead! We’ll work together for a common purpose, that being to slaughter Yang Qi.”

With that blood oath, they resolved their differences and stood united in their effort to kill Yang Qi.

However that was when they suddenly heard a voice saying, “I ran into the Shepherd from the Fiend-Devil League! He and some other mysterious person have me surrounded. Hurry and help me fight them. We can't let the Shepherd escape! I’m going to turn him into a puppet!”

Chapter 1095: Cleaning House

“That’s Yang Qi’s voice!”

“He’s somehow gotten into a big fight with the Shepherd, and now he wants our help! He wants to puppetize the Shepherd!”

“Heaven is really helping us! This Yang Qi isn’t gonna be alive for much longer! We just swore a blood oath to kill him, and then he delivers himself up right to us! It’s like someone handing you a pillow just when you’re about to take a nap. If we don’t kill him right now, how can we get our revenge? First, we’ll take care of the Shepherd, then we’ll take down Yang Qi!”

“Right! First the Shepherd, then Yang Qi. There’s no way Yang Qi can escape this time. He really got unlucky to run into the Shepherd! How can he possibly beat an opponent like that?  There’s no way! What a better way to take care of Yang Qi than to use the help of the Shepherd?”

“The Fiend Devil League has a lot of experts now, and considering the level of the Shepherd’s cultivation base, he won’t be easy to deal with. And didn’t Yang Qi say that the Shepherd has some mysterious expert on his side? It's two against one. That’s fine though. Worst case scenario, we might have to join the Shepherd and his ally to kill Yang Qi.”

“Let’s go. When we arrive, we can initially just wait off to the side and see how things play out. Maybe we can learn a thing or two about Yang Qi’s techniques.”

The four experts were visibly delighted by the fact that they already had an opportunity to take down Yang Qi.

“Go! I’ll bring Cursed Bastard Mountain with us!”

The immense mountain emitted intense rumbling sounds as it flew out of the spell formation and went with the four experts as they flew toward the area where Yang Qi was fighting.

As they headed deeper into the Great Necropolis, they saw immortal worlds with ranks of two thousand, then eventually three thousand.

In fact, there were three such three thousandth ranked immortal words, grouped into a formation that resembled the character 品. The formation caused rippling power distortions that kept Yang Qi trapped in the middle of them. At the same time, Yang Qi was facing two people, one of them the Shepherd, the other a mysterious man. The two of them were battering him with numerous attacks that left him trembling weakly.

When the Shepherd saw the four newcomers, backed by the Cursed Bastard Mountain, he said, “Are you Houselord God Bastard? Don’t tell me you’re here to save this brat? It wasn't easy to use the Three Worlds, Three Thousand Great Daos technique to trap this kid and make sure he can’t flee to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. The punk stole my piece of the Mahātmā Jade, so don’t even think of trying to help him!”

“It doesn’t matter what you say,” Houselord God Bastard said, “he’s still our league-lord. Why not have your Fiend-Devil League team up with the Sage Monarch League to fight the Executors of the Ancient Road? The knot of enmity should be untied, not tightened, right?”

Although Houselord God Bastard spoke words of conciliation, he didn’t actually make any moves to help Yang Qi.

When the Shepherd saw that, he burst into hearty laughter. “I know full well that your House of God Bastards has been put on a short leash by this brat. He stole the position of league-lord and has been lording it over the four of you, forcing you to suffer in silence. We already have him locked down, so why don’t the four of you simply help us kill him, right here and now?”

“Hurry up and help me, Houselord God Bastard!” Yang Qi shouted. “Just kill the Shepherd, and I can escape this trap. We can wipe out the Fiend-Devil League and take their resources. And as the league-lord, I can even turn the Shepherd into a puppet. With that added strength, I can definitely take control of the Great Necropolis and reach the god world!”

Houselord God Bastard gave a cold harrumph. Furious that Yang Qi was still referring to himself as the league-lord, he said, “The league-lord should be a mighty and impressive individual. We’ll just wait off to the side and watch you take care of the Shepherd. You see, we still haven’t recovered from blessing you as the league-lord. Forgive us, League-Lord, but we really aren’t in the position to get in a big fight with the Shepherd.”

“You!” Yang Qi shouted angrily. “I can’t believe you’re disobeying my orders. I'm the league-lord! You're part of the Sage Monarch League! Fine. Just wait until I'm out of this situation, I’ll slaughter all of you and destroy your organizations!”

The Shepherd burst into another round of laughter. “Did you hear that? Did you? Once he gets out, he’s going to kill all of you!”

“I can’t believe that, as the league-lord, you actually want to kill us!” shouted Houselord God Bastard angrily. “You can’t blame us for this, Yang Qi. Alright Shepherd, we’ll help you kill him!”

“I knew that's what you would do,” the Shepherd said. “I’ve long since known that you wanted to kill Yang Qi. I would’ve made contact with you before, but you’ve been under his watch for the past ten years. Hurry up and make your move. Get inside the spell formation and launch your attacks!”

“Hold on, Shepherd,” said Huangfu Genesis. “Joining forces to kill this brat won’t be that easy. What happens if we get hurt while trying to kill him? Then you could swoop in and kill us. There’s no way we’ll just throw ourselves into a trap.”

“Simple. I’ll just explain how our spell formation works.” The Shepherd quickly sent a stream of will into Cursed Bastard Mountain, imparting all of the information about the spell formation. “With only the two of us controlling the three immortal worlds, we weren’t able to actually kill Yang Qi. The slightest slip-up and he would’ve fled to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.”

RUMBLE!

Yang Qi suddenly began to cackle madly within the formation. “You think you can trap me? I'm the league-lord! I know all kinds of profound mysteries. When I break free, I'm going to slaughter every one of you! Cut you down! How dare you betray me, Houselord God Bastard! I’ll give you one chance here to do the right thing. If you don't, I'm going to wipe out your sect down to the chickens and dogs!”

“Damn you!” Houselord God Bastard growled. “I'm going to kill you, Yang Qi! Go ahead and show us what you can do to us. Once we kill you, we’re going to exterminate your sect!”

“Dammit. Be broken!” Yang Qi unleashed a fist strike that could destroy the heavens and crush the earth, and turn everything into nothing but powder! The spell formation trembled, and the Shepherd’s face fell. “Not good! Hurry up and attack. Use the third immortal world, the one with no one controlling it! Send your power into it according to the spell formation chart I just gave you. If you don’t hurry, he’s going to escape. I never would’ve guessed that Yang Qi was this strong!”

The four experts were suddenly struck with a sense of extreme urgency. They knew that if Yang Qi got out into the open, they would be in big trouble. Therefore, it was without hesitation that they joined forces and shot toward the third immortal world.

However, the instant they were inside, intense rumbling sounds could be heard as all three immortal worlds began changing position and a new spell formation popped up, trapping them inside.

Even the Cursed Bastard Mountain was locked in place.

“This is bad! He tricked us!” Houselord God Bastard and the others immediately realized what was happening. “We have to break free. Hold nothing back! What exactly is the Shepherd trying to pull here?”

Even as the words left his mouth, he drew on the powers of the Cursed Bastard Mountain, trying to break free. Unfortunately, his efforts were in vain, as the mountain was stuck in place as surely as if it were sinking into a bog.

“What the hell are you doing, Shepherd!?” Houselord God Bastard shouted. “Don’t tell me you think you’re trying to destroy the Sage Monarch League? I have to admit, you’re very daring to try to trap both Yang Qi and us.”

The Shepherd burst out laughing again. As he did, Yang Qi, Doom, and Proud World all appeared next to him. “Ladies and gentlemen, I have no desire to destroy your Sage Monarch League. In fact, I’ve already reached an agreement with you people. I'm helping League-Lord Yang Qi to clean house a bit and get rid of the traitors. I honestly can’t believe you people would betray your league-lord in open rebellion. The Fiend-Devil League, the Great Necropolis Alliance, and the future world are now working together with Yang Qi.”

Stepping forward, Doom said, “I am the bearer of the God Legion Seal from the Primeval Age. My name is a single word: Doom. As in Doomsday.” When he spoke, he smiled, yet everyone could sense the profound coldness in his voice. “I've seen the four of you before on the Ancient Road to the Gods. You’re very famous. Sadly, you decided to betray your league-lord, which means that the only thing left for you to do now is die.”

Also smiling, Proud World introduced himself. “I am your humble servant Proud World, mid Terrifying expert. I cultivate the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, imparted to me by Proud Heaven himself. I've also chosen to help League-Lord Yang Qi clean house and make the Sage Monarch League stronger than ever. Scum like you needs to be expunged, otherwise, how could the alliance face the Executors of the Ancient Road?”

When Houselord God Bastard saw Yang Qi standing there, his expression turned extremely unsightly. “So that's what’s going on. This was all a ruse; a trap to lure us in!”

“No!” Su Xin cried.

“Yang Qi,” Mu Renwang said, “I can’t believe you would be so treacherous. Don’t tell me you really want to kill us all! We’re all members of the Sage Monarch League! Do you really think you can kill us all and hide the truth from the alliance?”

“Yes, I will hide the truth,” Yang Qi said, clasping his hands behind his back. “From what I can tell, you lot actually swore a blood oath to work together against me. Am I right? Did you think I wouldn’t know? If I didn’t get rid of you people, if I let you just continue to grow more powerful, you would eventually bring the Sage Monarch League to ruin.”

“No!” Su Xin said. “We wouldn’t do anything to hurt the Sage Monarch League. From here on out we’ll be even more loyal to you than ever, Yang Qi. If you kill us, you won’t be able to run the Sage Monarch League. Besides, the four of you together aren't strong enough to actually kill us. We’ll fight back with everything we have, and probably take some of you with us. Shepherd, don’t tell me you’re really going to risk your life for Yang Qi?”

“How impudent!” Doom said. “You think you qualify to talk about fighting to the death with us, Su Xin? You think you’ll ‘take some of us with you’? I command the God Legion Seal! Can you people really handle something like that? Yang Qi, I want this woman for my own. She’s mine. I'm going to puppetize her and show her what true humiliation is!”

Chapter 1096: Begging for Mercy is also Useless

As of this moment, Houselord God Bastard, Mu Renwang, Su Xin and Huangfu Genesis felt their hearts sinking in their chests. All of them realized that they had completely fallen for Yang Qi’s ruse, and there was little hope of them getting out of the situation alive.

If nothing else, Doom from the Primeval Age with his God Legion Seal was enough to strike terror in their hearts. It was bad enough for one bearer of the seal to exist in any particular age; it was a given that a person like that would have an invincible cultivation base and be impossible to fight.

But here they were facing two people with God Legion Seals; just what level of power would they be capable of unleashing? No one knew.

What they did know was that, with a single God Legion Seal, Proud Heaven had shaken the Ancient Road to the Gods to the point where no one had been able to fully defeat him.

In an ice-cold voice, Doom said, “Houselord God Bastard, Mu Renwang, Su Xin, Huangfu Genesis, do you people really think that Yang Qi and I won’t be able to kill you?”

With the help Yang Qi had recently provided, Doom’s cultivation base had grown significantly stronger. And of course, Yang Qi had benefited as well.

Although this was currently a standoff of four against four, it was obvious that Yang Qi’s side had an advantage.

“I concede that you have the upper hand,” said Houselord God Bastard. “Bearers of the God Legion Seal are incredible. However, don’t forget that” —his eyes glimmered with sinister light— “the two of you are fundamentally enemies! Don’t you understand that? In the end, there can only be one person with the full God Legion Seal. Why don’t you work with us to kill Yang Qi? Then you can have his God Legion Seal! With it, you would be the ultimate force under heaven, able to dominate the ancient road. And we could be your subordinates....”

“Yes. Yes! That's right!” Su Xin said. “Compared to the possibility of getting another God Legion Seal, what do we matter? We’re nothing! Nobodies! Sir, if you get the God Legion Seal, I’ll even agree to be your woman! I’ll wait on you hand and foot. Mu Renwang won’t care!”

Obviously, she had taken note of what Doom had said moments ago about taking her as his woman.

“I’ll be a servant too!” Huangfu Genesis said. “With us on your side, it’ll be easy to take down Yang Qi!”

They had already offended Yang Qi past the point where they could possibly be forgiven, so right now, sowing dissent seemed like their best option.

All of a sudden, Proud World burst out laughing. “You people really are idiots. Yang Qi and Doom are both men with outstanding abilities, and grand vision. Do you really think they would be affected by slippery words from nobodies like you? Fools!”

“Sire, are you from the future world?” Su Xin asked. “Don't you know that Yang Qi specializes in killing people from the future? If you follow him, you’ll end up dead sooner or later. He's a contemptible, treacherous bastard! He's killing us today, how do you know he won’t kill you tomorrow? Think about it!”

Yang Qi suddenly laughed involuntarily. “With death at hand, you really have sharp tongues.” He looked at Doom. “Brother Doom, they’re obviously trying to drive a wedge between us. What do you think we should do?”

“Simple,” Doom said. “Kill them.”

His cold tone showed that he wasn't feeling the slightest hesitation at all. In fact, he began thrumming with an explosive killing intent, a golden light so powerful that it spread out and dissipated the rancorous energy of the Cursed Bastard Mountain.

Houselord God Bastard’s face fell. “Your energy arts... they’re so strong! How could you be so powerful?” He had previously assumed that the ancient aura of sin and enmity inherent in Cursed Bastard Mountain would actually protect him. After all, it originated in the god world. Yet a bit of golden light shining from Doom was enough to absolutely destroy that aura.

In fact, everyone the light touched felt like they were on fire, and might melt into liquid at any moment.

Every beam of light was like a needle stabbing into them, making it obvious that Doom’s cultivation base was vastly superior to theirs.

Considering that Doom alone was this strong, what would it be like dealing with him along with Yang Qi, the Shepherd, and Proud World?

They would be invincible.

“Spare us, Yang Qi!” Houselord God Bastard begged. “Don’t kill us. We really understand the error of our ways. We won’t ever betray you again. The four of us are all top experts! It's not easy to reach this level of cultivation. After all the years we spent on the Ancient Road to the Gods, you can’t just let us die for nothing. As long as you spare us, we’ll do anything you ask!”

“That’s right, Yang Qi!” Su Xin said. “We followed you faithfully for ten years! Don’t tell me that doesn't count for anything? Besides, you needed our help to assimilate those godpower seeds. That’s the only way you became an Inheritor!”

Yang Qi snorted coldly. “You’re going to die today, no matter what. If it wasn’t for the fact that I’d mastered my Purrfect God Art, you would’ve killed me long ago. Begging and pleading won't do you any good. You’re going to become puppets today, and nothing will change that.”

Any scrap of hope that had remained in the hearts of Houselord God Bastard and the others was now gone.

Begging for mercy wouldn't help them.

Sowing dissent wasn’t an option.

The only thing left was to die.

“Fine,” Houselord God Bastard said. “There are four of you and four of us. I refuse to believe you’re that strong. Either the fish dies, or the net splits. Maybe you’ll kill us, but we’ll at least take two or three of you into death with us!”

“Very arrogant!” said Doom, thrusting his hand out to summon a golden whip that resembled a dragon emerging from the sea, or the twisting trunk of a mammoth. He cracked the whip, and golden light shone out, further suppressing any aura of sin and enmity from Cursed Bastard Mountain.

The mountain had numerous warding magics in it, and their combined power was formidable. Sadly, in the face of an indestructible whip like this that was powered by the God Legion Seal, they immediately shattered.

And the mountain shook so violently that Houselord God Bastard, Mu Renwang, Su Xin, and Huangfu Genesis all flew off of it involuntarily.

RUMBLE!

Never could any of those four have possibly guessed that Doom’s abilities would be this powerful.

“Everybody pick someone to fight!” Doom said. “Let’s see which of us can be the first to come out victorious. Mammoth King’s God Whip!”

Without hesitation, he sent his whip snaking toward Su Xin.

As for Yang Qi, he headed toward Huangfu Genesis, hoping to get his hands on the Book of Genesis. With his left hand, he drew on the powers of his Unspoiled Body, and with his right hand, he used the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.

“Don’t hold anything back!” Huangfu Genesis shouted, and he began glowing with a dazzling preheaven godlight that could pierce through anything and everything. Then he shot forward to start fighting Yang Qi.

“You think you have what it takes to fight me single-handedly?” Laughing, Yang Qi threw out a punch that slammed into Huangfu Genesis and forced him to cough up several mouthfuls of blood. Huangfu Genesis drew on some sort of movement technique to begin stepping back and forth, with every footfall conforming to a position within the eight trigrams. Then he threw out a fist strike that summoned an enormous eight trigrams image.

The wails of ghosts and gods filled the air as Yang Qi launched another vicious attack in response. He held nothing back, attacking with the ultimate level of domineering strength and cruelty, causing the light of the Book of Genesis to shatter. With one blow, Yang Qi totally demolished Huangfu Genesis’ defensive empyrean energy.

“Genesis Godfist!” Huangfu Genesis shouted, unleashing millions upon millions of fist strikes, all of them strong enough to topple mountains and drain seas. Then, he spun as if to flee.

Sadly for him, Yang Qi’s Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth was now a combination of the versions from the Future Age, the Primeval Age, and the Immortal Dao Age.

There was simply no way anyone could possibly evade his strikes.

When the Genesis Godfist hit Yang Qi’s attack, Huangfu Genesis felt like his nascent divinity and sea of consciousness were being crushed by a mountain. Blood sprayed out of his mouth and he suffered instant internal injuries.

“Dirty little swine! How could you be so strong! I should have killed you the moment I met you! But I bet you have no idea there’s still one more move I have that can save me. I have three hundred and sixty pieces of godhood to power the Book of Genesis! That will be like unleashing the power of a Lesser God, and it’ll definitely be enough for me to escape. Nobody can kill Huangfu Genesis! None of the top experts from the Executors of the Ancient Road could ever kill me, much less you. I'm leaving, and when I come back, I’ll definitely get my revenge. You just wait!”

With that, Huangfu Genesis unleashed his ultimate move.

Burning all of the pieces of godhood, he summoned an ancient tome, whose cover had text written in blood, each character containing an entire world.

Chapter 1097: The Book of Genesis

The Book of Genesis was an ancient text written by some ancient member of the legion of gods.

It was on the same level as the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, except it had actually been damaged by the chart during the wars of ancient times. The fact that it had been damaged was the only reason that Huangfu Genesis had been able to use it.

Now, Huangfu Genesis had thrown three hundred and sixty pieces of godhood into the book, causing it to erupt with boundless godlight.

Text formed from blood appeared on its cover, all of them worlds unto their own. In fact, the way the worlds were shooting out was similar to how the Great Necropolis would erupt with immortal worlds.

Bam. Bam. Bam.

When the Great Necropolis sent immortal worlds shooting out, who could possibly block their path? Even a god would be killed upon being hit by forces as powerful as that.

Not even Yang Qi could stand up to the attack being sent by the Book of Genesis.

That said, it wasn’t as if he would even attempt to do that. Looking coolly at the situation, he summoned a vortex above himself, which sucked in the emerging worlds.

Each character, and each world, vanished inside, making their immensely destructive power completely useless.

And if Huangfu Genesis wasn't careful, it was obvious that he would get sucked into that vortex as well.

“The Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart!?” Huangfu Genesis, who had been just about to flee, was visibly stunned.

“That’s right,” Yang Qi said, “the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart; the very same chart that clashed with your Book of Genesis years ago, damaging it. And now, the same thing is playing out again. The Book of Genesis simply isn't a match for the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Sorry, that's just how it is!” Yang Qi reached out with splayed fingers, sending out brilliant light that bashed through the defenses of the Book of Genesis and hit Huangfu Genesis.

Obviously, Huangfu Genesis couldn’t defend himself and ended up coughing up even more blood.

As Yang Qi flew forward, his fingers curled into hooks, and black light from the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart wrapped around Huangfu Genesis and the Book of Genesis. The book was crafted from bronze, inscribed with all sorts of texts that were deathless in nature and described the magical laws of creation.

As Yang Qi closed in, the characters on the surface of the book twitched, then flew forward into his hand.

“Soul Seizing!”

In the blink of an eye, Yang Qi absorbed the book.

Now, Huangfu Genesis was left standing there alone. Although he was still contemplating trying to flee, his expression was vicious as he said, “I won’t let you puppetize me, Yang Qi. I’ll self-detonate before you do. You’ll never control me!”

“Do you even have the ability to self-detonate?” a voice said from behind Huangfu Genesis.

Before he could react, a hand reached out, stabbing into his skin and sending energy coursing into his meridians. It was a sealing magic, and cracking sounds instantly rang out as his will and nascent divinity were sealed tight in his sea of consciousness. And within his sea of energy, his true energy was completely locked up. It was now impossible for him to use any of his divine abilities.

With one move, the immortal-slaying clone had vanquished Huangfu Genesis.

Around this time, a scream rang out as Doom used the Mammoth King’s God Whip to entangle Su Xin, leaving her completely immobilized. Pulling her toward him, he ran his hand down her cheek and said, “Don’t struggle, my darling. You’re no match for me. If you acknowledge allegiance and become my woman, I won’t turn you into a puppet. I show pity and tender love for women, unlike Yang Qi, who kills without batting an eyelid.”

Yang Qi burst out laughing. “I captured Huangfu Genesis first, Doom!”

“It's true that you’re one step ahead,” Doom replied disdainfully, “but that’s because of your immortal-slaying clone.”

“But Huangfu Genesis was using the Book of Genesis.” Before anything else could happen, Yang Qi reached out and pulled Cursed Bastard Mountain into his bag.

There was no way he was going to let a god item like that go to waste. It was simply too powerful.

“Su Xin....” Mu Renwang cried plaintively. It didn’t matter how strong his willpower was, he just couldn’t bear the sight of his wife being taken into the embrace of another.

He was in the middle of fighting Proud World, but already, was gasping for breath.

Proud World had a very refined cultivation base and plenty of deadly moves, but was still a far cry from being like Doom and Yang Qi. As a result, although he had a slight advantage over Mu Renwang, the sight of Su Xin being captured enraged Mu Renwang so much that he suddenly began forcing Proud World back across the battlefield.

However, that was when Yang Qi and Doom both stepped in.

They unleashed two fist strikes, a combination of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth that no one could possibly measure up to. Rumbling forth like a mountain, the incoming attack was so powerful that Mu Renwang was instantly rendered immobile.

Who could possibly calculate how powerful these two were when acting together? And how could Mu Renwang possibly stand up to that level of force?

RUMBLE!

On another part of the field of battle, Houselord God Bastard and the Shepherd were exchanging blow after blow, with neither coming out as clearly superior. Houselord God Bastard was actually the best among his group of four allies, and was even more difficult to deal with than Huangfu Genesis. At the moment, he and the Shepherd were so evenly matched that they could probably fight each other for another ten thousand years without a clear victor being determined.

But then Yang Qi and Doom closed in, with Proud World right behind. They were like eagles descending on a baby chicken, and it only took a moment to vanquish the houselord and seal him tight.

A look of venomous, begrudging hatred covered Houselord God Bastard’s face. “I refuse to accept this, Yang Qi! There’s no way I can be defeated this easily!”

“Accept it or not,” Yang Qi said coolly, “you've been beaten, and in a moment you’ll be a puppet.”

“Do you know whose son I am?” the houselord shouted. “I'm the child of the Invincible Battle God and the Netherworld Medusa from the god world! They’re both Common Gods, which means that you can’t possibly fight them. Killing me would be committing sacrilege! You’ll end up in the god world one day, so consider the consequences. When that time comes, you’ll be nothing more than a Lesser God, and you have no idea how long it will take to become Common Gods!”

“Gods?” Doom said coldly. “After we kill Proud Heaven and take his God Legion Seal, even the gods will be at our mercy. You think we’re going to worry about some measly Common Gods? Shepherd, allow us to help you puppetize him. We can worry about other things afterward.”

“Alright!” the Shepherd said. “I'm not afraid of the gods either! I'm a fiend-devil, which means that I hate the gods and oppose them at every turn. Puppetizing the bastard son of two gods is going to be wonderful!”

“Cut the crap, you two,” Yang Qi said. “Let’s get to work.” Reaching out, he clamped his hand down on Houselord God Bastard’s head, taking control of his sea of consciousness.

“Don’t do it, Yang Qi!” the houselord screamed. “I refuse to become a puppet. Just kill me instead. Grant me this one wish! If I become a puppet, I’ll sink into eternal depravity. I’ll be like the walking dead!”

“Sorry, I can’t help you with that,” Yang Qi said. Then, thinking about how the junior houselord had tried so hard to kill him, he said, “If your junior houselord hadn’t pissed me off, I might have been willing to spare your life. But the price you pay for pissing me off... is death!”

RUMBLE!

Doom joined, and with three streams of energy arts entering Houselord God Bastard, the man began to tremble violently. After a moment, white froth erupted from his mouth, making it seem like he was going completely insane.

When the process was done, Houselord God Bastard had no control over himself. He stood there at the Shepherd’s side like a zombie, completely puppetized.

“Excellent,” Yang Qi said. “Now I’ll head back and assimilate the Book of Genesis, and puppetize Huangfu Genesis at the same time. We’ll meet back here in three days. The traitors have been dealt with, but now my league is empty of experts. I obviously have to set up some defenses and redistribute the wealth of the three rebel sects.”

“That's fine,” Doom replied. “Remember, there’s no time to lose. In the meantime, I’ll make sure this new bride of mine knows her place. Be good and stick by my side, Su Xin, otherwise you’ll end up like Houselord God Bastard. I’d hate for a beauty like you to end up like that.” He chuckled. “Although I have a lot of women already, you’ll be the first in the mid Terrifying level.”

Shivering, Su Xin said, “I’ll... I’ll submit. I’ll be your woman. Just don’t make me a puppet. I’ll serve you well!”

“Su Xin!” Mu Renwang shouted angrily. He was still scrambling to come up with a way to extricate himself, but in the end, he had offended Yang Qi too deeply, so no matter what plans he came up with, they wouldn't work.

“Let’s finish matters and puppetize Mu Renwang,” Proud World said. “It's hard to believe how much the four of us have benefited from working together. Next, we need to puppetize the emperor of the executors as well.”

“That’s a given,” Doom said. “And it shouldn’t be hard at all.” He snorted coldly. “With the four of us working together, who could possibly stand in our way? As long as we avoid infighting, nobody will be able to stop us!”

Chapter 1098: Plundering the Storehouses

“That’s fine, Yang Qi,” Proud World said. “Go put your league in order. We’ll focus on stabilizing the new puppets. Later, we can continue our search for the essence of the Great Necropolis. It’s true that the depths of the necropolis are particularly dangerous, so we need to be well-prepared. But I refuse to believe that with two pieces of the God Legion Seal, plus the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, we won’t be able to unlock the secrets of the necropolis. So, we meet back here in three days.”

The Shepherd nodded. “Yes, we absolutely have to uncover all the mysteries of the necropolis. You all know the maxim: he who controls the Great Necropolis controls everything under heaven. We know that Proud Heaven has already been venturing into the depths of the necropolis, and I'd say it's highly likely that he has a clone there exploring it even as we speak. If he gains control, we’ll never get a chance to do the same. And that’ll make it much more difficult to kill him. By the way, Yang Qi, did you ever unlock any of the mysteries of that Mahātmā Jade you took from me?”

The Shepherd obviously hadn’t forgotten about the Mahātmā Jade, but considering how powerful Yang Qi was, he didn’t dare harbor thoughts of trying to get it back. Yang Qi was so powerful and ferocious that it didn’t seem like anyone could possibly be a match for him. Although the Shepherd was incredible in his own way, he wasn’t confident in being able to come out on top in a fight against Yang Qi, and in fact, he knew it was likely that he would be killed if he tried.

Furthermore, everyone knew that, until the mysteries of the Great Necropolis were revealed and access to the Ancient Road to the Gods was restored, no one would have a chance to reach godly ascension. In other words, until the Great Necropolis’ secrets were cracked, everyone was doomed to die.

Looking completely calm and unruffled, Yang Qi replied, “The Mahātmā Jade is extremely strange. It can absorb a person’s spirit, soul, blood, flesh, and quintessence energy, then take all of those things and return them. On a few occasions, I was very nearly devoured by it. In the end, I'd say it’s dangerous and deadly. In fact, I’ve given up on studying it until I can get some more pieces of the jade to add to the collection. Once we do, we can look into it further. I guarantee you won't be disappointed.”

“That makes sense. I studied the thing for hundreds of millions of years, but never learned anything of substance. Having it in your care is probably for the best. Who knows, you might even find a use for it eventually.” It wasn't that the Shepherd trusted anything that Yang Qi said about the jade, but he knew that he had no way to confirm or deny any of it. For now, he had no choice but to accept how things were.

Swish!

Yang Qi vanished, without any of them being able to tell how he had done it.

“He’s only getting stronger and stronger,” Proud World said. “And with that immortal-slaying clone and the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, he’s like a tiger that had grown wings. There’s no way we can stand up to him, and for all we know, he could end up being the death of us.”

“That’s not necessarily true,” Doom said.

“Hmm?” Proud World said. “You’re both bearers of the God Legion Seal, shouldn’t that make you diametrically opposed to each other? You’ll have to fight it out in the end. I can turn weapons of war into gifts of jade and silk with Yang Qi because we both want to kill Proud Heaven. But it's not the same with you.”

“Wrong. Yang Qi has already abandoned the God Legion Seal, and uses the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth as a tool for study and research. I wouldn’t be surprised if, after he joins the legion of gods, he completely rejects the God Legion Seal. He has grand ambitions of his own. He wants to forge his own path and use his nascent divinity to create something that surpasses the God Legion Seal.”

“What? He wants to surpass the God Legion Seal? That’s impossible. Lunacy! The stronger our cultivation bases get, the more possible it is for us to sense the might of the legion of gods. How could we dare to think of surpassing them? Only someone who doesn’t understand the gods would attempt something like that.”

“It is lunacy. But I can tell you that nobody understands the legion of gods better than he does. Well, him and Proud Heaven. The only way to surpass the legion of gods would be to understand them, so in that sense, he’s not crazy, he's ambitious. Very ambitious. That said, having ambitions and making them come true are two different things. So ambitions aren’t necessarily a good thing. As the saying goes, ambitions can be as high as heaven, but one’s life is as thin as paper. There are many things in heaven and earth that can hold us back, and it’s hard to control everything. He might be a Fateless One, making him free and unfettered by fate, but does that mean he can change the fate of the legion of gods?” Doom sighed. “I don’t need to kill him. He’s cast aside the God Legion Seal, which means that eventually, the seal will come to be mine. Although I envy that he can forsake the God Legion Seal, I'm not like that. I can only become more and more connected to it.”

After digesting Doom’s words, Proud World nodded. “Is there anything you can tell me about Proud Heaven? Although I'm his son, and I hate him down to my bones, I don’t actually know much about his general plans. Do you know what he’s up to? What is he trying to accomplish? I really can’t figure it out. Considering how you waged war against him in the Primeval Age, you must know a bit about him.”

“For one thing, he’s not human,” Doom said, his eyes flickering with hatred. “Sometimes, he acts awe-inspiring and righteous, other times, he’s profoundly evil and wicked. Sometimes he acts like a treacherous schemer, other times he almost seems slow-witted. It's impossible to pin down his personality. In fact, it almost seems like he has multiple personalities, and randomly changes back and forth between them. Perhaps the version you dealt with is just one of those personalities. In the end, it’s like I just said: he’s not human.”

“Not human? Then what is he?” Proud World was truly confused.

“When the time comes to actually kill him, you’ll understand. With me and Yang Qi working together, I'd say we have a fifty percent chance of killing him. If you really want to kill him, Proud World, then don’t have a falling out with Yang Qi, and don’t plot against him. Does he seem like the kind of person that plots work against? He can produce clouds with one turn of the hand and rain with another. Even Proud Heaven is nervous about him. And as for all the other people who have tried to plot against him, they're all dead. In the past, I'd considered trying to lay a trap for him to get the God Legion Seal. But after I realized he forsook the seal, I abandoned such thoughts. He’s beyond our ability to deal with. Furthermore, once we get to the god world, he might be able to help us a lot. The god world is a dangerous place, and the affairs we deal with here in the mortal world are inconsequential compared to what goes on there. Hmph! Immortal worlds with a rank of three thousand? In the god world those might as well be considered bubbles.”

“Ah, the god world,” Proud World murmured. “The world of worlds. Compared to the god world, everything here is like dust. It’s a place of deathless beauty, of eternal luxury, and anyone who reaches it will never return here, no matter how much difficulty they face. Such people are like caterpillars that have become butterflies. Once a butterfly feels the freedom of being able to fly with wings, they would never dream of changing back into a caterpillar, crawling around one inch at a time....”

“Alright, enough blathering. Remember, don't cause any problems with Yang Qi, and don’t plot against him. He’s no fool, and knows that people at our level are prone to scheming. He’ll be on guard.”

“I know,” Proud World said, nodding.

The Shepherd didn’t say anything. Earlier, he had been considering trying to get the Mahātmā Jade back from Yang Qi, then perhaps joining forces with Doom to take Yang Qi out. But after Doom’s speech just now, he realized that was a foolish idea and dispelled such thoughts.

With their conversation over, the three of them began working on their cultivation.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi was back at the Sage Monarch League.

During the ten years that had passed, the Sage Monarch League had continuously expanded and grown. The Executors of the Ancient Road had attempted a few incursions, but hadn’t been able to penetrate the grand spell formation that Yang Qi had set up. The flows of destiny inside continued growing stronger, and Yang Qi’s Wheel of Fate was growing more powerful.

If it weren’t for the growth of the alliance, and the increase in destiny, Yang Qi would never have achieved the breakthroughs he had, and would definitely not have been as impressive to Doom.

As soon as he returned, bells began tolling.

Ding. Dong. Ding. Dong.

Instantly, the top experts began gathering.

Sect leaders, elders, and other leaders gathered in the Sage Monarch Temple, which was the main area for meetings in the Sage Monarch League, just as the Heaven-Dao Operation God-Temple had been the place of meeting in the Dao Defense League.

Experts from the House of God Bastards, the Woodfern Couple Palace, and the Genesis Sanctum were there, and it was immediately obvious that their leaders were nowhere to be seen.

Yang Qi looked out at the hundreds of thousands of experts, most of whom were leaders of superpower sects.

“I have something very important to announce,” he said. “A time of reformation has come to the Sage Monarch League. All sects will be gathered into a unified body. There will be thirty-six empyrean heavenly societies, seventy-two baleful earthly societies, and three hundred and sixty heavenly zodiac societies.”

The chamber erupted into a commotion. Of course, many of the sects who had joined the alliance had assumed that a day like this would come. However, during the past ten years, the other four experts had obviously been able to keep Yang Qi in check.

But now, Houselord God Bastard, Mu Renwang, Su Xin, and Huangfu Genesis were nowhere to be seen. Obviously, everyone was wondering what was going on.

“League-Lord,” said the junior pontiff of the Genesis Sanctum, “Do you really think it's appropriate to make such a big announcement without my father and the other three experts present? I think you’re being a bit too imperious!”

Chapter 1099: Plundering the Storehouses (2)

The junior pontiff spoke in a loud and piercing voice that instantly caused many people present to go silent. Quite a few people weren’t interested in having a completely unified alliance, as it would mean they would lose their authority. They knew that when you stand under low eaves, you have no choice but to bow your head, and although they had acknowledged allegiance to Yang Qi, they would rather remain generally disunited.

Of course, there were also people who supported the idea of some sort of unification. After all, with the current setup, smaller organizations were prone to being bullied. If everyone were to be united into one official group, there would be a lot of benefits for the smaller factions.

The words spoken by the junior pontiff made it obvious that he would oppose Yang Qi.

Before Yang Qi had a chance to say anything in response, Mu Yexi said, “League-Lord Yang Qi, a complete unification of the alliance is no small matter. We definitely need to talk this over with the other four chief elders. A jointly-created plan is the only option people will accept, not just an order from you. This is the Sage Monarch League, not the Sage Monarch Empire. And even in an empire, the emperor can’t just issue orders. He has to talk matters over with the ministers before making decisions.”

“That's right!” the junior pontiff squawked. “The power of leadership is split between multiple parties on purpose. Giving ultimate power to a single person wouldn't benefit the alliance.”

Both Mu Yexi and the junior pontiff were convinced that if they didn't say something right now, it might be too late.

After they were done talking, Yang Qi looked at them briefly, then just continued addressing the experts at large. “There's something else I need to announce,” he said. “Just now outside the sect, I was ambushed by Houselord God Bastard, Huangfu Genesis, Mu Renwang, and Su Xin. They joined forces to try to kill me, but I fought back and slaughtered them. Starting now, all members of their sects shall be relegated to slavery.”

“What...?”

Numerous expressions of shock could be heard, and truth be told, few people believed that Yang Qi could possibly be telling the truth.

“That’s impossible!” blurted Mu Yexi.

“It’s not true,” the junior pontiff said. “You evil villain, Yang Qi! How dare you spread false rumors like that? Do you really think anyone here would believe you?”

Swooosh!

Three chief elders flew out from the crowd, visibly angry and obviously ready to fight. One of them took an additional step forward and said, “League-Lord Yang Qi, this is not the kind of thing you can joke about.”

He was one of the old-timers from the Genesis Sanctum, and his name was Huangfu Mist. Pointing his sword at Yang Qi, he continued, “You're supposed to act like a league-lord! How dare you try to make laughingstocks of us all!”

“Very impudent!” said Yang Qi. He waved his hand, and numerous streams of vital energy swept forth. Before Huangfu Mist knew what was happening, he was completely wrapped up and incapable of moving. “You think I'm making it up, Huangfu Mist? In that case, take a look at your Huangfu Genesis, who I puppetized after defeating.”

RUMBLE!

A figure stepped out from behind Yang Qi, and it was none other than Huangfu Genesis. Expression blank, he dropped to his knees in front of Yang Qi and said, “Puppet Huangfu Genesis kowtows in salute, Milord. I’ll kill anyone you order me to kill, Milord. I’ll do anything you say!”

“Very well, Huangfu Genesis,” Yang Qi said. “In that case, why don’t you tell everyone what just happened?”

“Yes sir!” Face completely expressionless, Huangfu Genesis slapped himself on the cheek and said, “Moments ago, Houselord God Bastard, Mu Renwang, Su Xin, and I, the damnable Huangfu Genesis, all joined forces to try to kill Yang Qi and three other experts. Unfortunately, we lost and were turned into puppets. However, I view that as a blessing, and will wholeheartedly serve my new lord from here on out! Whoever dares to show him disrespect will be insulting me as well.”

“Very good,” Yang Qi said. “Your son just disrespected me. What do you think should be done about that?”

“He should die!”

WHOOSH!

Huangfu Genesis blurred into motion, appearing right in front of the shocked junior pontiff.

“Father, what are you doing?!” he shrieked. “Snap out of it! How is Yang Qi controlling you!? We have to fight back. Kill him! Dispel the alliance!”

“How dare you speak disrespectfully about my lord! That’s a crime worthy of death, and though you might be my son, I have to execute you nonetheless. You’ll pay for your sins in blood, which is simply what happens to anyone who shows a bit of disrespect.”

Crack!

Huangfu Genesis reached out and snapped his neck.

Everyone stared mutely at the scene. The fact that the puppetized Huangfu Genesis had slaughtered his own son without a bit of hesitation went to show that Yang Qi really did have absolute control. What he had just said about killing Houselord God Bastard and the others was obviously true.

“Sectlord Will Manifestation!” Yang Qi said.

“Here!” the sectlord replied. Obviously he was delighted at how things were playing out, and knew that the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect would only continue getting stronger and stronger. He stopped in front of Yang Qi, who waved his hand and caused an enormous mountain to appear.

Smiling faintly, Yang Qi said, “This is Cursed Bastard Mountain, which I’ve already taken control of. It’s a powerful god item that I'm now giving to you. What do you think?”

“Amazing!” Sectlord Will Manifestation said, following it up with a hearty laugh.

“You...” Mu Yexi said, clearly still in disbelief. “You killed my father and mother? I won’t let you get away with this!”

“What, you’re going to kill me?” Yang Qi’s gaze suddenly locked on to Mu Yexi, and she stepped back several paces, her heart pounding with fear.

Before she could do anything else, some of the chief elders from the Woodfern Couple Palace suddenly grabbed her by the arm.

“League-Lord,” one of the chief elders said, a fawning smile on his face, “I can’t believe this girl just threatened you. Recklessness like that can only be punished by the death penalty!”

Eyes blazing with fury, she said, “You! Mu Renlong, you’re one of my father’s trusted aids! How dare you betray me! You should be putting everything on the line to kill Yang Qi! You should fight him to the death! And you, Mu Xianxi. My father helped you clear your meridians and infused you with true energy. You both owe my parents a debt of gratitude. How dare you forget favors and violate justice!”

Mu Renlong snorted coldly. “A wise man submits to the circumstances. This is for the good of our sect. The mighty league-lord is obviously invincible, and you defying him is going to get our entire sect wiped out to the ninth generation. Hurry up and get on your knees. Beg the league-lord for mercy. Offer to be his woman. If you do, you might survive. But whatever you do, don’t drag us down with you.”

“That’s enough,” Yang Qi said. “You can let her go. She can’t cause any trouble, and I'm not interested in making things difficult for her. Just keep an eye on her. Considering you’re interested in being loyal to me, I'm happy to let bygones be bygones.”

“Many thanks, League-Lord!” they chorused, dropping to their knees.

These were all experts with psychic scales over ninety, and all of them were offering allegiance to Yang Qi. Seeing this, the experts from the other sects all began following suit.

RUMBLE!

Destiny was now flowing to Yang Qi like a mighty river, making him feel like he could enter the god world right then and there.

All of the sect leaders were on their knees now. “May your reign last throughout all the ages, League-Lord! May you be eternally invincible! We definitely support the idea of unifying the alliance. We’ll create an immense power that will lead us into a new golden age!”

“Yeah, that’s right. Our Immortal House of Supreme Preeminence will definitely support League-Lord Yang Qi. Henceforth, we’ll follow his orders. Our flesh, blood, spirits, and souls all belong to him.” People were already trying to curry favor with Yang Qi.

Yang Qi was actually surprised to see people from the Immortal House of Supreme Preeminence. They were considered to have marvelous energy arts, so to have them trying to get in his good favor was a good thing.

“Excellent!” Yang Qi said, waving his hand. “The details of the unification will be handled by Sectlord Will Manifestation and the forces of the Dharma Sect. I'm sure you’ll agree, won’t you, Archmonk Dharma Treasury?”

“The ancient Buddha is boundless and infinite...” Archmonk Dharma Treasury said. “League-Lord Yang Qi, you are kind and merciful. The truth is that the fiend-devil cabal of Houselord God Bastard, Mu Renwang, Su Xin, and Huangfu Genesis have performed many wicked deeds. You are an enlightened sage who is out to save the world, and it only makes sense for you to be the league-lord. Uniting everything under heaven will ensure that there is less fighting and killing in the world.”

Yang Qi nodded. “You understand matters such as these far more than the average person, Grandmaster. Very well, I'm going into seclusion to work on my cultivation. I’ll hand the daily affairs over to you.”

Almost immediately, a buzz of activity overtook the Sage Monarch League. There were quite a few hidden dragons and crouching tigers in the alliance, people who had high ambitions and had considered opposing Yang Qi. But now they knew that they couldn’t do anything like that.

Destiny was flowing without cease into Yang Qi.

The truth was that he wasn’t going into secluded cultivation. Instead, he went to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. He was going to take advantage of the three days of time he had bought to head to the treasure storehouse of the Executors of the Ancient Road, where he hoped to get his hands on even more valuable treasures!

Hopefully, that would make things easier when he went into the depths of the Great Necropolis.

That was the true reason he had stated a need for three days.

Right now, he didn't have any trust at all in Doom and the others. Besides, it wasn’t going to be an easy task to take down Proud Heaven.

In the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, the immortal-slaying clone was already working with the Book of Genesis. When Yang Qi appeared, he opened his eyes and said, “This is a treasure left behind by the Lord of Radiance and Light! Every word contains a world! It's similar to the Unspoiled Body, with its ‘one tribulation per word’. It's too bad for Huangfu Genesis that he was never able to unlock its true mysteries.”

“Gaining enlightenment of the words in the Book of Genesis will definitely bring a boost to my energy arts,” Yang Qi said. “The Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart is made of countless worlds, so that should help. For now, we have a job to do: clear out a treasure storehouse!”

Chapter 1100: Plundering the Storehouses (3)

RIIIIP.

The immortal-slaying clone’s face was bright red as he manipulated the power of worlds. He was becoming more and more adept in this regard. The depths of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart were filled with the power of worlds, and its sky was filled with godhood stars. And those godhood stars seemed to be actually obscuring the sky above.

The truth was that there was another heaven and earth located high above the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. And that, of course, was the god world, the passage to which was only accessible to those who had reached godly ascension. The Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart was truly full of many secrets, but the clone was only privy to some of them, which made him very nervous.

Yang Qi had abandoned the God Legion Seal to make his own path. But the clone was different, and in fact, had an immense fight ahead of him in the future.

If Proud World took the ninth of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions, then forcibly combined all of the medallions, it was possible that the clone could be attacked by King Immortal-Slayer’s will. And the clone had no idea if he would survive such an attempt at forced possession. Therefore, he wanted to take care of the situation as soon as possible. He wanted to resurrect the will of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions, then subjugate it, ensuring that he was free to further his cultivation without worry.

Seeing the clone struggling with the power of worlds, Yang Qi said, “Don’t worry. I have a fully fleshed-out plan to deal with the will of King Immortal-Slayer. We’ll take care of him and get you full control of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. King Immortal-Slayer is strong, but the God Legion Seal and the will of the Great Necropolis will be able to deal with him. Right now, we need to find the essence of the Great Necropolis and figure out how to control it. Then, we’ll deal with Proud Heaven. At that point, if the will of King Immortal-Slayer causes problems, we can use the three combined pieces of the God Legion Seal to crush him.”

“Yes, that seems like a good plan,” the clone said. “Truth be told, I’m weary of all this fighting here in the mortal world. I want to get to the god world. Compared to the god world, the struggles here are meaningless. By the way, considering your recent gains, you’ve gained an immense portion of universal destiny, haven’t you?”

“That's right. I unified the hundreds of thousands of superpower sects and gained immense power over the dao of heaven. Next step, the treasure storehouse. Is the Godly Positioning System ready?”

“Yes.” The clone waved his hand, and the sky split open, revealing an immense image that resembled a mirror. Instantly, the mirror zoomed in, revealing the headquarters of the Executors of the Ancient Road.

Whir. Whirrrr....

A spectacular hall appeared in front of them, within which was the Gate to the Gods. Sitting in front of it were several old-timers, who seemed lost in thought. Obviously, they were top experts from the Executors of the Ancient Road.

They didn't sense the surveillance of the immortal-slaying clone, who was now a mid Terrifying expert just like the experts on guard. Unfortunately, the clone wasn't able to enter the storehouse by bypassing the defenses put up by the Gate to the Gods.

RIP!

Yang Qi placed his hand on the clone’s back and sent true energy streaming into him. The clone's hair began floating up around him, and he felt like his meridians were being slashed by a sword.

Suddenly, the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart broke the fetters created by the Gate to the Gods. Now, it was possible to see mounds of treasure everywhere, and countless spell formations as well.

The spell formations were obviously set up to sound an alert if anything so much as a speck of dust entered the area.

The security here vastly surpassed anything from the old Joyflower Palace. Compared to this, the Joyflower Palace might as well have been a dollhouse.

“What do we do? The warding magics are just too powerful.” The clone exchanged a glance with Yang Qi, and both knew that if they tried to enter the storehouse, the alarms would be sounded and they would be in big trouble.

The Executors of the Ancient Road had more experts than the sky had clouds. Even with Yang Qi’s recent improvement to his energy arts, he wouldn’t dare to start a fight with all of them at once; it would surely lead to his death.

“What do we do?” the clone murmured, frowning as he examined the situation. “I can see inside, but we can't even send a stream of energy in there, let alone go in and take the treasure.”

“We can look at the treasure but can’t take it? We can’t even touch it?” A strange expression appeared on Yang Qi’s face.

“That’s about it,” the clone replied. Drawing on more power of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, he looked closely and said, “Actually, it’s taking a lot of godhood power just to peer inside. If those warding magics catch sight of us, we’ll be in big trouble.”

“Perhaps a bit of observation will give us some clues about what to do next,” Yang Qi said. “Worst case scenario, maybe we can identify something so valuable we could consider just barging in, grabbing it, and fleeing. For example, the executors definitely have big collections of godhood. If we could identify a group of a few thousand pieces, it would be worth taking the risk.”

“I don’t know about that. The Sage Monarch League is growing rapidly. Perhaps we should let a few tens of thousands of years go by until we're stronger. If we broke in there now, the executors would probably retaliate with mass slaughter. And that wouldn't do us any good. To cultivators from the dao of immortals, a few tens of thousands of years will go by like the snap of a finger.” The clone was increasingly turning into a person who liked to think things through and not take risks.

And considering how things were going, a few tens of thousands of years would bring dramatic advances. In fact, even just a few hundred years would be worth mentioning. The flows of destiny that Yang Qi had as the league-lord were much more useful than any kind of energy arts.

And the clone was right. If the executors retaliated in a way that led to slaughter, the losses would be far worse than some godhood could make up for.

In the end, it didn’t seem worth the risk. Right now, the only reason the Executors of the Ancient Road weren’t making a move on the Sage Monarch League was because of everyone else they had to worry about. There was also the future world, the Fiend-Devil League, and the Great Necropolis Alliance. All of them were eyeing each other like tigers eying prey. As a result, there was currently something of a standoff in which everyone could subside in relative peace and safety.

“Fine, let’s just see what happens,”

Yang Qi and the clone continued powering the energy art with their true energy.

Yang Qi’s cultivation base was now at an incredible height. That was especially true, considering that he now cultivated the Annulled Grand Magic, which was apparently the way to eventually gain enlightenment of Annulled will convergence. Considering everything he had working for him, although he wasn’t yet in the mid Terrifying level, it seemed a foregone conclusion that he would eventually achieve the breakthrough.

With his help, the ability the clone was using was even more capable of piercing into the depths of the storehouse.

As they looked around, they saw all sorts of spirit medicines, plus a huge variety of rare items. There were psychic heterofruits, which originally grew on the psychic trees in the god world that were tended to by a Greater God. Obviously, they could provide an immense boost to psychic power.

Furthermore, psychic heterofruits were one of the main ingredients in Terrifying Pills.

From the name alone, it was obvious what Terrifying Pills were for: they could be used to help with progress in the Terrifying level. In the god world, they were usually concocted by Consummate Gods, at the least.

Yang Qi had heard of such pills, but didn't know the formula to concoct them. However, as he was looking around the storehouse, he found that the area filled with the bottles of psychic heterofruit also had a book near it, within which was a list of medicinal ingredients.

The title of the book was Terrifying Medicine King’s Scripture.

That book obviously contained the pill formula for Terrifying Pills! Not even the superpower sects had access to treasures like this. Furthermore, anyone who had the formula for Terrifying Pills would obviously be able to produce experts that surpassed anything the psychic scaling systems were capable of.

After all, the psychic scaling systems produced crippling limitations.

“What a pity,” Yang Qi said. “That's the formula for Terrifying Pills. Just imagine how many Terrifying experts we could produce with that.”

“That formula is pretty much worthless,” the clone replied. “Maybe it would be helpful in the god world, but here in the mortal world, how would you possibly get all the ingredients? Look at the ingredients they have built up here. There aren’t that many. I doubt you could even make a few hundred pills with what they have.”

“That's true,” Yang Qi said. The Sage Monarch League was made up of hundreds of thousands of sects, all of which had at least one or two Terrifying experts. When you added them all together, it would be a staggering number. Adding a few hundred to that mix would be mostly useless.

Chapter 1101: Heavenly Workings Calculations Systems

Regardless, the Terrifying Medicine King’s Scripture and the psychic heterofruit were extremely rare items. With enough ingredients, they could be used to make Terrifying Pills that could in turn be used to create mid Terrifying experts.

The difference between early and mid Terrifying experts was immense. And whether it was on the Ancient Road to the Gods or in the Great Necropolis, it was mid Terrifying experts who determined victory or defeat in major conflicts. They were the leaders of the top organizations and alliances. And if it was ever possible to move the Great Necropolis so that the god world was once again reachable, they were the ones who would have at least a fifty percent chance of reaching godly ascension.

However, if Yang Qi wanted to acquire these treasures, he needed to think of a way of getting into the storehouse undetected.

“Hey, what's that?”

With the psychic power that Yang Qi was providing in assistance, the immortal-slaying clone shifted his view to a part of the storehouse a short distance away from the Terrifying Medicine King’s Scripture.

What he saw was an enormous corpse.

It was gold in color and sitting there cross-legged, almost as if in meditation. A serene expression covered its face, and just looking at it, it seemed eternally deathless. Apparently, this was the corpse of a god. And it was intact, complete with faint godliness flowing through it. Although its godhood was gone, it was still incredibly mighty.

“An intact god corpse!?” Yang Qi was visibly taken aback. Even a god corpse that lacked godhood was still something exceedingly rare. In the depths of the Great Necropolis, it was possible to find the bones of gods, or perhaps even an eyeball or other scattered part. But this was actually the first time Yang Qi had ever seen an intact corpse. He couldn’t help but wonder who exactly this god was.

If someone could convert it into an out-of-body incarnation, it would be incredibly powerful. Definitely beyond any other kind of puppet that one might run across. However, no one had attempted to fuse with the corpse, so it just sat there in the treasure storehouse, collecting dust.

“What an amazing item,” Yang Qi murmured. However, he was still forced to hold back from taking action. Again, the clone shifted the perspective of the mirror, searching through the storehouse for other valuable items. There were so many things inside that it seemed likely it would take a hundred days of searching to inspect the place thoroughly. Yang Qi almost felt like he was in the god world.

It was little wonder. The Ancient Road to the Gods was virtually endless, and the Executors of the Ancient Road were the top organization there. They were tasked with guarding the entrance to the god world, and had first access to whatever things would occasionally spill out from there.

After all of the countless years that had passed, it was hard to say how many treasures the executors had collected. There were so many medicinal pills, magical items, god items, and godliness that it seemed like more than any one person could ever use. It was no wonder the executors were so powerful.

“What incredible spell formations!” Yang Qi exclaimed. There were numerous enormous spell formations, all of which had godhood built into them, which would make it possible to power them almost ceaselessly.

“Look over there, Yang Qi,” the clone suddenly said. “It’s a storage unit for godhood. Should we try to take it?”

“A godhood storage unit?” Yang Qi looked over and saw what appeared to be an enormous kingdom of crystal, a huge sphere simply floating there within the large storehouse. Inside of it was a horde of what appeared to be tens of thousands of pieces of godhood.

“What do they have so much godhood there for?” Yang Qi murmured. “Were there too many gods in the god world? Well, I supposed it makes sense. Immortal worlds with a rank of three thousand are huge, but compared to the god world they're like specks of dust. I wonder how big the god world actually is. Supposedly, the god world is the origin of all of the myriads of immortal worlds, and the ultimate destination for all cultivators.”

If Yang Qi could get tens of thousands of pieces of godhood, then use his abilities to convert them into power, he would make spectacular advances. In fact, he was ninety percent certain that it would be enough to reach the mid Terrifying level.

His heart was already starting to pound from the thought of it.

However, after some thought, he still refrained from taking action, and instead continued inspecting the storehouse. He still hoped to find a way to slip past the defensive spell formations and steal some things undetected. Hopefully, he could make his new organization stronger and stronger, until they could attack and destroy the executors, unify the immortal worlds, and give him access to destiny millions upon millions of times more immense than he currently had.

“What a pity we can’t get that godhood right now,” the clone said. “Considering how many layers of spell formations they have, we would only be able to get a few hundred pieces before we were detected. If we beat the grass and startled the snake, getting into the storehouse a second time would be out of the question.”

The clone could also tell that it would be a waste to give in to temptation right now.

Continuing to search the storehouse, they eventually saw a collection of enormous battleships that were obviously products of the ancient scientific and technological civilization. All of them were powerful enough to be equivalent to someone with a Terrifying cultivation base.

There were also mechas built from the skin and bones of gods, as well as other spectacular building materials from the god world. There were so many mechas that Yang Qi couldn’t even count them.

However, there were nine that were particularly large, making them seem like gods among the other mechas.

“Those nine mechas are the legendary precious treasures known as the Berserk Exomechas!” the immortal-slaying clone said. “With enough power to fuel them, they can unleash the strength of the mid Terrifying level. However, you would need a huge source of power, such as godhood. I doubt anyone would be willing to waste godhood to power them up, so they just sit there, unused.”

“It's a real pity,” Yang Qi said. “These battleships and mechas are basically useless. Even if I had the godhood to power them, I would rather use that godhood for my own cultivation instead.”

Considering that he had the pinnacle item of creation from the scientific and technological civilization, the Cruiser of Civilization with the Engine of the One God, why would he care about random bits of science and technology like this?

Yet again, they continued their search.

They found a set of millions upon millions of swords, organized into something like a flowing river. Yang Qi had never seen anything like it before.

“That looks just like the Unbounded Sword River,” the clone said, “which was created by the Lord of the Sword Dao, who was a Paramount God. There was a description of it in the Book of Genesis.”

Although the swords numbered as many as the eternal sands, Yang Qi spotted a set of particularly large ones that were apparently in control of the river as a whole.

That set of swords pulsed with a particularly powerful killing intent. Unexpectedly, they were King Life-Killer’s swords!

Of the ancient seventy-two monarchs, the biggest killer of them all was King Life-Killer. And here were more of his swords. It was little wonder that they ended up with the Executors of the Ancient Road. There had been a few in the Joyflower Palace’s storehouses, and the executors’ storehouses were far more impressive. So it only went to reason that there would be items that had once belonged to the seventy-two monarchs.

Right now, Yang Qi had collected about thirty or forty percent of those items, with his only nearly-complete collection of any of them being King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans. With those talismans, he and his clone could devour just about anything when they worked together. And once he reached the god world, the talismans would be more impressive, likely being on the same level as the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart itself.

“I really wish I could get those swords,” Yang Qi said, shaking his head. “They’re incredible! But beating the grass and startling the snake won’t do any good. We have to stay focused on the big picture.”

As they continued looking around, Yang Qi and the clone saw more items belonging to the seventy-two monarchs. If they took all of them, Yang Qi’s overall collection would be fifty to sixty percent complete.

Unfortunately, even after a long period of observation, they couldn't find any weaknesses in the defenses. Both the clone and Yang Qi were feeling very down. It was really a torment to see so many treasures right in front of them, but be unable to take them.

Eventually, they sped up their observation to the point where they were merely glancing over the sundry items that were on display.

RUMBLE!

In that moment of seeming hopelessness, the immortal-slaying clone’s Engine of the One God suddenly thrummed to life. His heart began pounding as he realized that they had apparently come across another fragment of the Cruiser of Civilization.

“What is it?” Yang Qi asked. Up ahead was a large spell formation with a disc-like object in it, surrounded by a glowing halo. That was no ordinary halo, but rather, seemed to be something that was analyzing and calculating matters pertaining to the dao of heaven.

“That’s...” the clone said. He suddenly burst out laughing. “That's one of the most mysterious aspects of the Cruiser of Civilization! The heavenly workings calculations systems! They’re as spectacular as the godhood manufacturing systems and are no less useful than the Engine of the One God. In fact, you can even operate them without the engine. They seem to be in control of one of the main hubs of the storehouse. If we can get in there, we could use those systems to spectacular effect!”

Chapter 1102: Immense Benefits

“I can’t believe the heavenly workings calculations systems are here!”

Yang Qi was just as surprised as the clone. Yang Qi had very profound energy arts, but funneling his power into his clone for so long had him quite exhausted. And he had reached the point where, considering they hadn’t made any progress at all, he had been about to simply give up.

But then, just when he had assumed he’d reached the end of the line, he found a gleam of hope in a desperate situation. Here were the heavenly workings calculations systems.

In addition to the Engine of the One God, he had the genetic systems, vivicreation systems, psychic scaling systems, power assessment systems, and of course, the imperial-heaven pre-beginning systems. Although all of those systems were profound in their own way, they couldn't compare to the primary systems of the cruiser, such as the heavenly workings calculations systems and the godhood manufacturing systems.

After all, the heavenly workings calculations systems could make calculations regarding the workings of heaven, and the godhood manufacturing systems could be used to manufacture godhood.

Of course, all of the systems were ultimately overseen by the Engine of the One God. Thankfully, after getting that engine, all other aspects of the Cruiser of Civilization were subservient to him. And that meant that, with the heavenly workings calculations systems in the treasure storehouse, he had found the weakness he had been looking for.

Truth be told, there should have been no weaknesses. But with the Engine of the One God, things were different.

Delight filled Yang Qi’s heart and he smiled broadly. “The heavens will always leave a door open somewhere! Our time wasn’t wasted; we’re finally going to milk these executors dry. We’re going to clean out their storehouse and rob them so badly that, later on, if a mouse gets into their storehouse it’ll cry.”

The clone laughed. “Agreed. It seems to me the executors haven’t even been into their storehouse for years; they have so much treasure they don't need to. Some of these things have been in here for hundreds of millions of years, to the point where many of them have been forgotten. They’ll definitely do much more good in our hands than rotting away in here. However, that doesn't mean we can let our guard down. We still have to be very careful. The warding magics are powerful, plus, we need to do some tests to see how the Engine of the One God and the heavenly workings calculations systems interact.”

“Of course. We’ll start by using the imperial-heaven pre-beginning powers!”

Yang Qi rested a bit and cleared his mind, then unleashed his imperial-heaven pre-beginning powers.

Of course, the clone was no weakling. He unleashed his own true energy, and also sent godhood quintessence energy into the Engine of the One God. Slowly and carefully, he connected the engine to the heavenly workings calculations systems in a way that sent out no fluctuations whatsoever.

“There’s no strange reaction!” Yang Qi said. “It worked. Not only are we about to get a huge amount of loot, but also, the heavenly workings calculations systems are going to go a long way to repairing the Cruiser of Civilization.”

“Excellent!”

The immortal-slaying clone added even more power.

As a result, the heavenly workings calculations systems began shining brightly as the connection became stronger and more stable. Finally, a tremor passed through the immortal-slaying clone, who opened his eyes and said, “It's done, Yang Qi. You should be able to head right into the storehouse. I’ll wait here in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart for word from you on what to do next.”

“Understood,” Yang Qi said. With that, he blurred into motion and headed through the passageway. A moment later, he found himself in front of a spacecraft that was covered with complex spell formation charts. Inside of it were numerous magical treasures and god items, all of them products of the scientific and technological civilization. There were also numerous chaotic streams of will that were manifestations of the workings of heaven.

“This thing is incredible! The calculations it can perform surpass the abilities of anything I have. Now to subjugate it with my imperial-heaven pre-beginning powers!”

Yang Qi yet again called on the powers of the imperial-heaven pre-beginning, causing the spell formation charts on the heavenly workings calculations systems to condense as they were subjugated. The heavenly workings calculations systems had been set up as a hub for the spell formations in the storehouse, which meant that getting control of them would make moving around in the storehouse easy. Even if a fight broke out inside the storehouse, no one on the outside would know.

“Now, shrink down!”

With the help of the immortal-slaying clone, he shrank the spacecraft containing the heavenly workings calculations systems, simultaneously causing the glowing light to spread out. With that, he flew out into the storehouse.

With that light surrounding him, it was almost as if he didn't exist at all to the defensive spell formations.

In the wink of an eye, he reached the Terrifying Medicine King’s Scripture, where he waved the sleeve of his God Legion Battle Robe and grabbed both it and the psychic heterofruits. He also took the intact god corpse.

In his heart, he was laughing madly. ‘I’ve struck it rich! The Will Manifestation Heaven Sect has done well, but our riches are like nothing compared to the Executors of the Ancient Road. It's like the difference between a beggar and the emperor. With these treasures, my trusted subordinates will definitely become a thousand times stronger. Perhaps even ten thousand times stronger. I'm taking everything the executors have saved up!'

Yang Qi made full use of the cosmic space within his robe, sucking in resources and sending them into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

At a certain point, he had the clone bring some of his most trusted followers into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, and when they saw what he was up to their jaws dropped. To see so many priceless items on display initially struck them speechless.

“Oh. My. God!” Sectlord Will Manifestation said. “Every single one of these treasures is more valuable than all of the reserves of the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect.”

“That’s right,” the immortal-slaying clone said as he simultaneously managed the power of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. “This is the treasure storehouse of the Executors of the Ancient Road. We only have three days to work with before Yang Qi has an appointment to explore the depths of the Great Necropolis. Of course, although we only have three days on the outside, that could be thousands of years inside the chart. We’re going to take advantage of all of these resources to help you all achieve incredible advances in cultivation.”

Looking around, Peaklord Memory said, “With resources like this, and three thousand years to work with, I should definitely be able to reach the mid Terrifying level. These things are incredible! I can’t believe the Executors of the Ancient Road have stuff like this hidden away; what a waste of resources!”

“The executors really have too much treasure in storage,” Peaklord Celestial said. “I guess they just have more resources than they can use. Well, it’s going to lead to their own destruction. I can definitely make an attempt at reaching the mid Terrifying level in the next three thousand years. If we had four mid Terrifying experts, that would be more than enough to make up for the loss of Houselord God Bastard and the others.”

Everyone Yang Qi had brought into the storehouse could be considered a trusted follower, and most of them had been following him since his days in the mortal world.

Patriarch Annalist was there. His cultivation base was very close to the Terrifying level, so with the right resources, he could definitely advance by leaps and bounds. With his All-Eternity Spring-Autumn Annalist God-Dao Scripture, it was no wonder that he was so strong. Back in the days when he was at odds with Grand Emperor Myriadmagic Heavenspan, the only reason he hadn’t advanced further was his lack of resources. Obviously, that had changed with the arrival of the Great Necropolis.

“Godhood! There’s godhood here!”

“Those are Body-Shedding Bone-Exchanging God Pills!”

“So many incredible medicinal items!”

As everyone looked around in shock, Yang Qi continued his work. In fact, he had just reached the crystal ball containing all of the godhood. Taking the godhood from it, he found that there were fully thirteen thousand four hundred and fifty-three pieces. Of that number, he kept ten thousand for his own use.

Some of the pieces of godhood were unique, and actually didn’t have the aura of the legion of gods. It was as though they had been created as they were.

The truth was that godhood didn't necessarily have to come from a god who had died.

In the god world, there were certain primeval, almighty entities who would directly create godhood, then distribute it to their subordinates for use in godly ascension. As for the godhood available in the mortal and immortal worlds, it could only be burned to gain power, not used for godly ascension. There just wasn’t enough of it.

As for this collection of godhood, most of it had been directly created. In other words, it didn’t signify that thousands of gods had died to create the collection.

After putting the ten thousand pieces of godhood in his sea of energy, Yang Qi began breaking them down, whereupon he felt immense deathless godliness flowing through him.

That collection would serve as a trump card that he could use in a critical moment. He could use it to break through to the mid Terrifying level unexpectedly, and thus gain an invincible cultivation base. For now, he would simply keep it ready to use. It would be the perfect way to lull enemies into a sense of complacency. And considering that he would soon be exploring the depths of the Great Necropolis and possibly encounter Proud Heaven, he needed to create every advantage possible.

He definitely didn’t want Proud Heaven knowing the truth about his cultivation base.

Furthermore, he wasn’t fully confident that he would succeed with the breakthrough at the moment. He wanted to be one hundred percent sure before he made the attempt. That was how Yang Qi preferred to do things: be absolutely and completely prepared, with no weaknesses and no chances of making mistakes.

Having taken the godhood, his next target was King Life-Killer’s swords in the river of swords.

Chapter 1103: Dramatic Growth

The benefits were rolling in.

Although the river of swords wasn’t the true Unbounded Sword River from the god world, every sword that made it up was a god-weapon, and all of them were moving in a prescribed path that conformed to heaven itself. It begged the question of who had actually created it.

According to rumor, when a disciple of the Executors of the Ancient Road lacked a sword, they would come to this place and find one they were connected to by destiny.

Sadly for them, Yang Qi was about to take the whole thing.

Of course, even with Yang Qi’s cultivation base, taking this entire river of swords wouldn’t be easy. Thankfully, he had the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart to help. A vortex sprang into being, which swept forward and began sucking in all of the countless swords.

They became like a whirlpool flowing into the vortex, and although it caused some amount of noise, it was limited to a small area, ensuring that no one outside could hear what was happening.

The treasure storehouse was made up of numerous smaller worlds and dimensions, so one of them being destroyed wouldn’t attract much attention.

Yang Qi thrust his hands out, using two energy arts, one positive, and one negative. It was his combination of the Unspoiled Body and the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, and it caused the river of swords to flow into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart even quicker.

Before long, the river was gone.

With that, Yang Qi moved on to his next target, as ruthless as a wolf or tiger.

Next up was a collection of palace halls that were part of the Mourn-Parting Heaven-Palace.

Thus, Yang Qi was like a vicious bandit, or a hungry ghost who had just climbed out of hell after millions upon millions of years, ready to devour everything in sight.

He couldn’t flick the sleeve of his God Legion Battle Robe with any greater speed, and his Heaven-Devouring arts were being used to their fullest extent.

A primal-chaos elder-snake suddenly appeared, a creature with the head of a snake and the body of a human, and it began devouring world after world, each of which was filled with treasures.

Back in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, the immortal-slaying clone was receiving all of it, a broad smile on his face. After all, each and every item from the seventy-two monarchs would improve his own energy arts, pushing his psychic scale to a higher level.

On the one hand, the clone was working on his cultivation, but at the same time, he was organizing all the new resources.

Everyone was also scouring through the new objects, looking for those that would help them reach a higher level. During the first thousand years that passed in the chart, many of Yang Qi’s people reached the Terrifying level.

During the second thousand years, Sectlord Will Manifestation reached the absolute peak of the mid Terrifying level, thanks to god pills made from psychic heterofruits. He also mastered the Terrifying Medicine King’s Scripture.

The second person to reach the mid Terrifying level was none other than Jadefall!

As for the purrling, to date, no one had been able to make any logical conclusions about how it grew. It seemed to be making constant advancement, even when it slept. It didn't seem to practice cultivation at all, as though it would eventually reach godly ascension without any effort at all.

When it was awake, it simply played around. And it never grew any larger. Perhaps it was that the time-altering effects of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart didn’t work on it, and the three thousand years that passed were really just like three days to it.

In the third of the three thousand-year periods, Peaklords Memory and Celestial both rose to the peak of the early Terrifying level, pushing their psychic scales to over ninety.

It was impossible to say how many cultivation resources they had all used. And if they had tried to do this back in the Sage Monarch League, they would have cleaned out all of the resources of all the sects combined, and still not achieved any progress.

After all, many of these resources were things that not even the superpower sects would have access to.

The Executors of the Ancient Road really did have things that were rare even in the god world.

Eventually, three thousand years passed within the chart, and both Jadefall and Sectlord Will Manifestation were in the mid Terrifying level. As for the sectlord, he was a mysterious person who never revealed the truth about his cultivation. However, he had supported and helped Yang Qi from the moment he saw him. Although he was obviously keeping some profound secrets, Yang Qi wasn’t inclined to pry about the details.

Going forward, helping more of his people to reach the mid Terrifying level was going to be difficult. Peaklords Celestial and Memory were both stuck in bottlenecks, and seemed completely incapable of achieving any breakthroughs.

There were quite a few people who had psychic scales over ninety, including Yang Zhan, his two brothers Yang Yunchong and Yang Hualong, Eldest Brother from the Invincible Society, and other people from the former Rich-Lush Continent, such as Chancellor Sun Moon.

It really was a case of dramatic growth.

The Sage Monarch League was just getting stronger and stronger, and it was no trifling advancement. In the three thousand years that passed in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, the Sage Monarch League transformed on the most fundamental level.

That in turn would improve the flows of destiny.

During the entire time, Yang Qi kept sending more and more resources inside.

Crack!

By this point, Yang Qi had virtually cleaned out the treasure storehouse. At the moment, he was at a location deep inside, where a host of medicinal ingredients were housed. They were kept on enormous altars, each of which was made from an immortal world with a rank of two thousand. From the strong spirit energy wafting off of the medicinal ingredients, it was obvious how powerful they were.

Of course, Yang Qi took all of them.

Yet those worlds of medicinal ingredients counted as almost nothing as he proceeded and found even more amazing things. He found sealed godlings that were used as mounts in the god world. They were all in the Terrifying level, and included things like thirty-six-winged apsara phoenixes, dragon-subduing white tigers, and god-faced giant owls.

They were all extremely powerful, with incredible fighting prowess, creatures that had originally roamed the god world, but had been captured and sealed tight by the executors. Taming them would obviously require a huge amount of power.

There were thousands upon tens of thousands of them, and Yang Qi knew at a glance that giving them to his subordinates would provide a massive boost to their fighting prowess.

Yang Qi didn’t hesitate for a moment to take them all. His only regret was that none of them were in the mid Terrifying level.

Apparently, the only mount that strong was the one set aside for the emperor of the executors, which was a headless godbeast. When the emperor went into battle on that mount, it was almost like two top experts fighting as a team.

After the mounts, Yang Qi collected building materials for spell formations, as well as complete god formations. Compared to this, the one billion god formations he had taken from the Joyflower Palace were like nothing. There were even formations that were so powerful they could only have been built by Consummate or Paramount Gods.

If he could add them to the Sage Monarch League, it would be a huge improvement to the defenses.

‘It’s too bad I haven’t come across any Great Necropolis godpower seeds,’ he thought. Apparently, the Executors of the Ancient Road didn’t get a single godpower seed, which seemed to indicate that they didn’t qualify to become Inheritors. It was the same with the House of God Bastards.

The junior houselord from the House of God Bastards had boasted that they had some Inheritors, but after Yang Qi took full control, he found that it was nothing but a lie.

There were obviously standards of some sort regarding who could get the seeds.

God weapons, god items, medicinal pills, ingredients, spirit stones, godhood, armor, mechas, magical treasures, spell formations, god souls, god corpses, daoist texts, ancient records, primeval god vegetation, power from the god world....

Yang Qi took all sorts of things.

He didn't bother creating replicas to leave in their place. It didn't seem likely that the executors would discover what had happened any time soon. And by the time they did, it would be too late. The Sage Monarch League would have become so strong that the executors wouldn’t be able to do anything about it.

The resources of world after world were building up in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

If it weren’t for the fact that the chart could inherently divide up the resources of a myriad of worlds, it would have taken hundreds of years just to inventory all of the new items.

As the process went along, Yang Qi decided that he would keep his stores of resources in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, and not the Sage Monarch League. After all, if he could steal these things from someone, it was always possible that people could steal from him.

His clone was getting stronger and stronger, and assuming he could eventually subjugate the will of King Immortal-Slayer and take full control of the chart, then not even full gods would be able to break in.

The three days went by quickly, while three thousand years passed inside the chart.

The Sage Monarch League was rapidly growing stronger, and soon, god formations were being set up there, causing immense power and destiny to swirl in that part of the Great Necropolis.

Chapter 1104: Astonishment

Three days had passed, and the Shepherd, Doom, and Proud World were now waiting to meet back up with Yang Qi. As they did, they kept an eye on what was happening in the Sage Monarch League.

Of course, they were quite taken aback by how it was developing.

God formations were being set up left and right, and Terrifying auras were spreading out everywhere. Obviously, a heaven-shaking, earth-toppling transformation was underway. Even more shocking, something like a pillar that could prop up heaven and earth had appeared, which served as the foundation of the main spell formation of the sect.

“Look at this...” Doom said, his eyes flashing. “Well done, Sage Monarch League. And well done, Yang Qi. He did all of this in only three days? It reminds me of the legendary Preeminent God Pillar of ancient times. With that pillar in place, not even ten thousand evils could get inside. However, it should require millions upon millions of ingredients from the god world. You simply shouldn’t be able to make it in the mortal world. How did he do it!?”

RUMBLE!

As the words left his mouth, mountains began rising up within the Sage Monarch League.

One of them had three peaks, hearkening to the Three Powers, those being heaven, earth, and man. Another looked like a hand, whose five fingers represented the five phases. There were others that had six, seven, eight, or nine peaks.

“Those are... the legendary Nine God Mountains!” the Shepherd said. “Mount One Origin. Mount Two Polarities. Mount Three Powers. Mount Four Divisions. Mount Five Phases. Mount Six Directions. Mount Seven Stars. Mount Eight Trigrams. Mount Nine Palaces. Together they make nine, which is the ultimate number. When the god mountains appear, they can crush anything and everything. The Nine God Mountains are connected to the Paramount Gods, and the method of creating them is long lost. And that’s not to mention the materials required to make them. Only the Executors of the Ancient Road could possibly create something like this. Yet even the ancient executors, despite having the ingredients, never built them. How is Yang Qi doing this? And where did he get the materials? The Preeminent God Pillar and the Nine God Mountains. With them, the Sage Monarch League is going to have the strongest foundation imaginable.”

Breathing a sigh of admiration, Doom continued, “It’s not a simple task to create the Nine God Mountains. Anyone beneath the mid Terrifying level couldn’t possibly succeed. And even with the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, the God Legion Seal, and a host of powerful energy arts, I don't see how it could be possible.”

“One origin, two polarities, three powers, four divisions, five phases, six directions, seven stars, eight trigrams, nine palaces.” The Shepherd also sighed in admiration. “Tremendous. How exactly did Yang Qi manage all of this? Where did he get all the treasures?”

“My guess is that he did this all in the last three days,” Proud World said. “If he had the ability to do this before, he would have.”

“You think he got enough treasure to do all of that in only three days?” the Shepherd said quizzically. “Where in all the many heavens could a treasure trove like that even exist? Even in the Fiend-Devil League, we don’t have anything close to that level.”

Smiling mysteriously, Proud World said, “The only place where that much treasure could be stored up is with the Executors of the Ancient Road. If my speculations are correct, Yang Qi must have used the past three days to somehow sneak into the executors’ treasure storehouse and rob it. Then he used the materials to create the Nine God Mountains, which not even the three of us could do if we worked together. And he also made the Preeminent God Pillar to control the Nine God Mountains. All of it functions together perfectly. One thing is for sure; we couldn’t break into the Sage Monarch League now, even if we wanted to.”

Whizz!

As the words left his mouth, a stream of energy appeared, whereupon Proud World shut his mouth.

Yang Qi was now standing in front of them.

“You’re quite the genius, Proud World,” he said. “You managed to figure out exactly what I did. Not bad. Not bad at all. For now, though, I want to make sure this matter remains a secret known only to us.”

He waved his hand and a dense mist sprang up, covering the Sage Monarch League so that it was impossible to see inside. It was obviously the result of a powerful spell formation.

Doom’s eyes flickered. “That’s a Fate God Barricade, which can completely obstruct even the workings of heaven. How did you manage to build it?”

Yang Qi laughed. “Simple. I'm a Fateless One. It’s easy for me to make spell formations like that. Presumably the three of you noticed what I accomplished in the past three days? Can any of you break through the barriers I’ve set up? I wouldn’t mind having a little test.”

“There’s no need for any test,” Doom said. “None of us could break through that. You have some powerful warding spells in there. Plus, you have a Preeminent God Pillar controlling the Nine God Mountains. You even have more mid Terrifying experts inside keeping things running. Very impressive. And unless I'm mistaken, you also have a god corpse puppet.”

“You have sharp eyes,” Yang Qi said, giving him a thumbs-up. “I placed a god corpse puppet in the Preeminent God Pillar. Anyone who tries to dismantle that pillar will be killed in an instant. In any case, Brother Doom, it seems to me that you’ve gotten a lot stronger in the past three days as well.”

“That’s all thanks to you,” Doom replied coolly. “My energy arts have advanced significantly, although I doubt I've improved as much as you have. You really raided the executors’ treasure storehouse?”

“I did. Since you guessed the truth, I suppose there’s no need to be cryptic. I cleaned out most of the storehouse and used it to strengthen the Sage Monarch League. I’d say my league is now one of the very best there is. And my top subordinates just spent three thousand years working on their cultivation in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. I now have more mid Terrifying experts in my forces.”

“As expected,” Doom said. He, Proud World, and the Shepherd were deeply shaken by the news. The fact that Yang Qi now had even more mid Terrifying experts was definitely no joking matter. On the Ancient Road to the Gods, mid Terrifying experts were considered patriarchs and sect leaders. And the truth was that it wasn’t possible for people to reach the peak of the Terrifying level. Only in the god world would that be possible.

In other words, the mid Terrifying level was the highest possible level.

Right now, Yang Qi and Doom were essentially the strongest and most invincible cultivators there could be. The only people who might be considered worthy enemies for them would be the emperor of the executors and Proud Heaven himself.

Of course, the emperor had been given blood blessed by the legion of gods, and was specifically tasked with policing the other experts on the ancient road.

Despite that, Yang Qi wasn’t particularly worried about him.

The man he feared was Proud Heaven.

It wasn’t possible for people who hadn’t been to the god world to reach the peak Terrifying level. But Proud Heaven had been to the god world, and returned. As for his cultivation base, it was impossible to say. If he had received some sort of blessing in his time in the god world, it was entirely possible that he was at the peak Terrifying level, which would make him capable of slaughtering anything in his path.

Yang Qi couldn’t afford to head into a conflict with him without being prepared.

Either way, Proud Heaven was definitely the strongest entity in the mortal world.

And the fact that he had yet to make a move indicated that he definitely had a master plan at work.

Seeing Yang Qi standing there thoughtfully, Doom said, “Alright, Yang Qi, let’s head into the depths of the Great Necropolis. We need to unlock its secrets and figure out a way to defeat Proud Heaven. That’s our only hope. Besides, if we gain control of the necropolis as a whole, we should be able to get through the Ancient Road to the Gods to the god world.”

“I was just thinking about something,” Yang Qi said calmly. “People who haven’t been to the god world can’t reach the peak of the Terrifying level. But someone who has gone there... could possibly have absorbed the magical laws there and become a peak Terrifying expert. I'm worried that we might be heading down a dead end here.”

The faces of the other three suddenly turned very unsightly. Yang Qi was right.

After a moment of silence, Doom said, “I thought of that as well. But it’s not exactly easy to reach the peak of the Terrifying level. Besides, someone who reached that level would be able to become a god, creating a god body and forming godhood. On the other hand, godly ascension isn’t possible in the mortal world. So why would Proud Heaven give up on the chance to become a god by returning to the mortal world? That’s why I'd say there’s only a fifty percent chance he's at peak Terrifying.”

“Whether he is or isn’t, we need to get the essence of the Great Necropolis,” Proud World said. “Proud Heaven is profoundly mysterious. I've never even been able to assess his cultivation base, although he always makes it seem like he’s in the mid Terrifying level. I would guess he’s actually stronger than that. After all, despite years of conquests, he's never been defeated.”

“That’s true,” Doom said. “Whenever I clashed with the magisters of the future world, I always had the advantage. But when Proud Heaven showed up, I was always forced to flee. Even now, I don’t think I'm a match for him. The only option would be to combine our two God Legion Seals and unleash a devastating attack with it. But if either of us gave up our seal, we would lose out on too much, so that’s not an option.

“Let’s go!”

It was with thoughtful expressions that the group of four began to fly deeper into the Great Necropolis.

The three thousandth ranked immortal worlds were the true end of the Great Necropolis.

Beyond that, the pathways vanished, leaving behind nothing but dense mist, like primal-chaos itself. No one knew what lay within, nor what dangers they would face.

Chapter 1105: Great Necropolis Essence

Four apex experts were leaving everything behind and heading into the depths of the Great Necropolis, where they would face untold dangers and challenges.

Thankfully, the Sage Monarch League was secure.

With the Preeminent God Pillar and the Nine God Mountains defending the league, any enemy that tried to cause problems would be crushed. There was always the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart as well.

The truth was that the spell formation that Yang Qi had set up was profoundly powerful. It contained all of the numbers from one to nine, ensuring that not even the executors would be able to pierce it. Plus, Yang Qi had added elements of the Purrfect God Art and Great Necropolis godpower, among other aspects, to ensure that it was mighty to the extreme.

There were also mid Terrifying experts in place. With all of those defenses, the league would definitely be able to withstand an assault from even six or seven mid Terrifying opponents.

Of course, that wasn't to mention the other deadly god formations that were available, or the god corpse. For example, they had the replica of the Unbounded Sword River, which would easily slaughter early Terrifying experts.

Yang Qi himself was stronger than ever. In his sea of energy, he had ten thousand pieces of godhood sealed with the Devil-God Seal and arranged into a spell formation.

If one was able to look closely at the sealed godhood, it would be obvious that it was under the control of two types of true energy, one of them pitch black and the other shining with radiance and light. The two of them made a perfect taiji symbol.

The black was a representation of wretched evil, and of tribulations and kalpas.

The radiance and light represented righteous justice, and the ultimate level of power.

Of course, it was the dual energy art Yang Qi had created, a combination of the Unspoiled Body and the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. Because of it, the godhood was like a sphere, with an exterior resembling that of the Great Necropolis.

Yang Qi was gradually assimilating the collection of godhood, turning it into his own, and using it to push his cultivation higher and higher, getting closer and closer to the mid Terrifying level.

In fact, he was now about ninety-eight percent confident that he could successfully achieve the breakthrough.

However, he still wanted to wait until he was one hundred percent sure.

That breakthrough was a trump card that he didn't want to use until exactly the right moment. It would also be the same moment in which he finally became a Grand Emperor. He was currently still on the fifth stair of the Deathless Heavenly Stairway, the Stair of Fearlessness.

Given that, he actually had two trump cards. Although Doom, Proud World, and the Shepherd all knew that he would be experiencing more breakthroughs, there was no way that any of them could guess that he was in the middle of assimilating ten thousand pieces of godhood.

RUMBLE!

He had an immense, wild power brewing inside of him, although it wasn’t apparent on the outside.

“The depths of the Great Necropolis have such wild energy flows that it might as well be primal-chaos,” the Shepherd said, sighing.

WHOOSH!

A blade-like stream of energy suddenly appeared, like a scimitar, slashing into the Shepherd’s defensive empyrean energy, creating a long, burning streak.

Face falling, he struck out with two fingers.

“Devil King Curse!” His move blocked the scimitar, but the blade continued slashing at his defensive energy.

The mists around them were growing stronger and denser, making travel much more difficult. It felt like trudging through a quagmire, in which every step was slow and took much effort.

Bam!

Yang Qi struck out with his fist, and the mist ahead of him made a booming sound like metal being struck. The mist collapsed. With that, he proceeded forward, followed by his three companions.

However, the primal-chaos vital energy quickly formed together again, even stronger than before.

“This is incredible,” Doom said, unleashing his own Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth to help Yang Qi carve out a path for them.

As they proceeded, it felt like an ancient god was waking up within the primal-chaos, causing their surroundings to solidify into stone, making advancement impossible.

“It's so hard to travel around in the depths of the necropolis,” Proud World said. “No wonder most other experts never go past the three thousandth ranked immortal worlds. If we go any further, the primal-chaos vital energy is going to petrify into stone. Each step requires immense strength! I wonder if this is what the god world is like.”

“The pressure in the god world is much greater than this,” Doom said. “Ordinary people would have a hard time moving an inch there without being crushed to death. Remember, the deeper we get into this stone-like primal-chaos vital energy, the greater our chances of getting immense benefits. Look! Over there! Isn't that some godhood?”

Even as he spoke, his eyes emitted two golden beams of light that melted some of the vital energy ahead of them, revealing something floating in front of them.

It looked like some sort of fossil set in an enormous boulder.

He deftly reached out and pulled the boulder toward them, revealing that it really was a translucent piece of godhood, bereft of any aura of the legion of gods.

‘Newly formed godhood!’ Yang Qi thought, not saying the words aloud.

“Strange,” Doom said, frowning. “This godhood... doesn’t seem to belong to anyone. It wasn’t left behind by any god. It looks created. It’s too bad we can't get it, and use it to reach godly ascension. After all, godhood is the only way to become a god. Sadly, in the mortal world, it's only possible to use external godhood to create your own.”

Everyone knew that it was impossible to actually reach godly ascension in the mortal world.

It was an ironclad rule.

“Come on, let’s keep going,” Yang Qi said. Looking ahead, he saw that everything in all directions was filled with the stone-like vital energy. It was incredibly difficult to proceed forward, but thankfully he could still sense his connection to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, so he wasn't too worried.

Even a mid Terrifying expert who got lost in a location like this might end up being eternally trapped in stone, and ultimately petrified. And from where they stood, it was impossible to tell how far this stone-like vital energy stretched on for.

However, they felt certain that, if they could get through it, they would reach the ends of the Great Necropolis, and perhaps even emerge onto the Ancient Road to the Gods.

Regardless, there were immense profundities to be discovered here.

With great effort, they sped up.

Most of the work was done by Yang Qi and Doom with their Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. It created a golden light that surrounded them almost like a ship of some sort, allowing them to pierce through the vital energy, causing sounds like a metal drill bit boring into a piece of metal to ring out.

“There’s a corpse up ahead,” Proud World said. The corpse had been infused with so much of the surrounding vital energy that it was now a stone statue, lifelike, with a long saber in its hand.

“I recognize him,” said the Shepherd. “He’s one of the top saber masters from the Ancient Road to the Gods, Saber Gentleman Ghostwar. He was a mid Terrifying expert who once dominated the ancient road, rebuking armies and fighting all opponents. Who would’ve guessed that he actually died here in the Great Necropolis?”

He struck the corpse with a palm, hoping to break what he assumed was a simple exterior stone shell. However, he quickly found that every aspect of the corpse, from the skin to the bones, had been petrified. The statue crumbled into dust.

Even his saber, a god item and second nascent divinity, had been turned into stone and was now crumbling.

The Shepherd had hoped to find at least some treasure on him, but obviously, that was impossible.

The Shepherd was visibly taken aback by that. He was the weakest of the group, and was only now coming to realize the dismal fate he would suffer if he didn’t make it out of this location. In fact, if the four of them split up, he would probably have only a sixty percent chance of making it out alive.

“That was definitely Saber Gentleman Ghostwar,” Proud World said. “I heard that he even fought with the magisters of the future world, although I didn’t personally witness it. What a pity that he died here. I wonder if our expedition here will end with us running out of true energy and ending up like him.”

“Don’t worry,” Doom replied. “With myself and Brother Yang Qi here, we’ll get through this area. After all, Brother Yang Qi is an Inheritor, so he can move through this vital energy like a fish through water. Isn't that the case, Brother Yang Qi?”

After a moment, Yang Qi replied, “My powers as an Inheritor are limited. This vital energy is really strong....”

Suddenly, Doom’s eyes flashed. “Watch out!”

A deadly beam of sword energy shot through the surrounding vital energy, and before anyone could react it was right at Yang Qi’s back. Apparently, this was the sword strike of some consummate assassin!

Chapter 1106: King of Assassins

Doom, the Shepherd, Proud World, and Yang Qi were in the depths of the Great Necropolis, where the vital energy was like stone, making it difficult for even mid Terrifying experts to move about. And yet someone was trying to assassinate Yang Qi? It was a completely astonishing development.

Whoever this person was, they were trying to catch Yang Qi off guard and kill him with a single blow. It might have been a good plan for someone else in the mid Terrifying level.

But it wasn’t that easy to get the drop on Yang Qi.

Before Doom could shout a warning, Yang Qi spun in place and jabbed two fingers out, which locked on to a viper-like stream of sword energy. Upon being grabbed, the sword energy twisted and writhed for a moment before exploding into a powder that enveloped Yang Qi.

However, he simply sent a vibration pulsing through himself, dispelling the sword energy.

Then he curled his fingers, pulling the sword energy back into his palm, where it formed a resplendent sphere of sword light that he sent shooting back into the surrounding mist.

A moment later, a muffled grunt could be heard; apparently, Yang Qi had hit the target and inflicted an injury of some sort.

WHOOSH!

He immediately flew in the direction of the sound, becoming a streak of golden light that shot through the stone-like primal-chaos, shattering everything in his path.

“Let’s go!” Doom said, following Yang Qi. The others did the same. Moments later, they reached something like a cave within the primal-chaos, within which they sensed the warm aura of a human.

There was also blood splattered about, although the cave was completely empty.

Yang Qi was the first to arrive. Reaching out, he wiped some of the blood off the ground, then burned the blood with true energy, causing it to turn into white steam that rose up into the air, where it took the shape of a human, writhing in agony.

“Did you really think it would be so easy to plot against me?” he said. “Considering you left so much blood behind, I guess I’ll just curse you! Myriad Hells!”

He thrust his hand out, and a host of hells appeared, as many as there were stars in the sky. They began swirling, forming a vortex beneath the human figure, who struggled in vain as it was dragged downward.

Within the vortex were countless ghost claws and distorted human faces, as well as the enraged screams of millions upon millions of fiend-devils.

Shaken, Doom thought, ‘That’s… that’s the most wicked, brutal, vicious, and ruthless curse there could be. It seems like it’s from the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, except transformed. Could it be a combination of the Unspoiled Body and the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth? This assassin is in for some pain.’

“Aaaiiiieee!” the human shape screamed. “How ruthless of you, Yang Qi. I didn’t hurt you! And you killed so many people from our Royal Palace of Assassins. I was just trying to get revenge. How could I have guessed you would be so strong, you dirty little swine? This curse can’t do anything to me! Boundless Self-Immolation. Empty Assassination!”

RIP!

The figure exploded and the curse power faded away.

Yang Qi chuckled. “So it was the King of Assassins, leader of the Royal Palace of Assassins, and a mid Terrifying expert. As it turns out, he’s not dead, but has instead been hiding here in the depths of the Great Necropolis. Sadly for him, he’s not a match for me. Thanks to my curse, a third of his vital energy has been destroyed. Considering how weak he is now, it would be an easy matter to track him down and kill him.”

“It's not worth it,” Doom said. “The King of Assassins is too stealthy. Tracking him would be difficult, even more so within the stone-like vital energy of the Great Necropolis. Don’t let your emotions affect your decisions, Yang Qi. If you really want to kill him, wait until we find the essence of the Great Necropolis. You’ll be much stronger then, and perhaps I can join you as an Inheritor. At that point, killing the King of Assassins would be as easy as turning over your hand.”

“But there’s a bigger issue here,” Proud World said. “It’s not as if our group is easy to track, especially here in the depths of the Great Necropolis. So how was this guy following us? And why did he attack us? Furthermore, how can he move around so easily here? Could it be that he's also an Inheritor?”

“I agree that it’s very suspicious,” Yang Qi said. “In terms of strength, the King of Assassins doesn’t measure up to me. But given how easily he moves around, I'd say it would make perfect sense that he’s an Inheritor. And it's also likely he’s working with someone else. Someone very powerful.”

“Someone very powerful?” Doom said. “There aren’t very many people from the ancient road who are as powerful as the King of Assassins. In fact, I'd say there’s only one person….”

“Proud Heaven!” they all said at the same time, and strange expressions appeared on all of their faces as they wondered if their group of four was somehow being manipulated by Proud Heaven.

This shocking level of power was nothing to look down upon.

“Don’t read too much into the situation,” Doom said. “This is probably just a coincidence. There’s no way Proud Heaven is that intelligent! If he was, he would’ve already killed both Yang Qi and me. Why would he go to the trouble of sending the King of Assassins to harass us? No, it’s got to be a coincidence.”

“Agreed,” Yang Qi said. “There’s no need to be looking over our shoulders everywhere we go. Let’s focus on finding the source of the Great Necropolis godpower seeds.” Clearing his thoughts, he led the group onward.

Whooosh!

The four of them pierced through the vital energy like lightning as Yang Qi and Doom finally showed what they were truly capable of.

After they were gone, a handful of tiny paper talismans appeared a short distance away within the stone-like vital energy. They swirled out and created another cave, a few meters in diameter. Within the cave sat an old man in black garments, who was currently gasping for breath. Pulling out a bottle gourd of medicinal pills, he began gobbling pills as if they were popcorn.

After some time passed, he recovered, yet still seemed so listless that he could hardly move.

‘Damnation! That dirty swine was a lot stronger than I anticipated!’ This man in black was of course the King of Assassins. Not only had he failed to kill Yang Qi, he had actually been severely injured in the process. ‘If I hadn’t become an Inheritor, I would’ve been killed by that pig. He really is exceptionally talented. No wonder Proud Heaven hired me to kill him.’

Meanwhile, in another location deep in the Great Necropolis, on an immortal world ranked three thousand, a fierce battle raged.

Eighteen Executors of the Ancient Road had a young man surrounded and were unleashing devastating attacks. All of the executors were princes on the same level as Prince Nobledeath. They were all very, very close to the mid Terrifying level, and had psychic scales of ninety-nine.

They were unleashing a torrent of palm techniques, sword techniques, sword energy, blade light, all of which became a sky-obfuscating, land-enshrouding river that slammed into the young man.

Shockingly, the young man was incredibly tough. Although he was surrounded and had no way to escape, he was by no means defeated. He was surrounded by a rain of swords that allowed him to defend himself against the powerful assault.

The young man was not in the mid Terrifying level, yet was able to stand up to the attack of a group of executors, all of whom had psychic scales of ninety-nine. That in itself was incredible, and in fact, there was only one person in existence who could pull such a feat off.

Star Swordlife.

His cultivation base was far beyond what it had been during the incident with the Flower-Seizing Marauder. However, considering he was facing eighteen executors, it was obvious that he was in extreme danger.

RIP!

All of a sudden, one of the executor princes pierced Star Swordlife’s sword light, landing a palm strike that sent him flying backward.

“Preheaven Sword Energy: Blade of Law!” they shouted in unison.

Joining forces, they sent out a powerful palm attack, yet again sending Star Swordlife tumbling backward.

One of the executors stepped forward, laughing heartily. “So your name is Star Swordlife, boy? You have good sword technique, so why not agree to be our slave? That way you won't die!”

“You might as well quit dreaming!” Star Swordlife said angrily. “You executors kill living beings wherever you go, but I won’t kill you in return. I’ll just seal you!”

The other princes all burst out laughing.

“We’ve never met anyone as arrogant as you; at least, none who lived long. And you’re even going so far as to accuse us of killing innocent people? What a freak! Maybe we should just take him captive.”

One of the other princes lunged forward, eyes flickering with a wicked light as he launched a palm strike at Star Swordlife’s head.

In the face of this attack, Star Swordlife had no choice but to close his eyes and wait to die.

However, that was when he heard a whooshing sound, as though something had just passed by his ear. Then, he opened his eyes, and found that all eighteen of the executor princes had been beheaded.

Expressions of rage could be seen in their eyes, yet they were completely dead and incapable of uttering a single word. Then their corpses exploded, turning into ash, their vital energy wiped out of existence.

Afterward, a young man appeared, clad in an azure robe. He looked like a scholar, but at the same time, an assassin. Even more so, he looked like a wandering hero who bemoaned the state of the universe and pitied the fate of mankind.

He had just beheaded eighteen top experts with a single move!

Star Swordlife was so shocked that he very nearly turned and ran.

Although he wasn't pleased that this young man had just killed eighteen people right in front of him, he obviously didn't dare to say anything about it. He had almost died at the hands of these executors, while this young man had just killed them with hardly any effort.

Star Swordlife wasn’t completely suicidal, so he kept his mouth shut.

Chapter 1107: The Ultimate Conspiracy

The mysterious young man in the azure robe was obviously a consummate expert. In the blink of an eye, he had cut down eighteen executors, all of whom were just on the verge of reaching the mid Terrifying level.

It really had been in the blink of an eye, as Star Swordlife had literally closed his eyes in preparation of death, only to open them a moment later and find all eighteen of his enemies beheaded.

Life really was fragile. Moments ago, those executors had been boundlessly domineering, only to be dead shortly after. It was a tragic thing that would provoke a sigh from anyone who heard the story.

“Why aren’t you criticizing me for killing them, Star Swordlife?” the young man said, a mysterious smile on his face. “You like saving people, and if you could have, you would even have saved those people who were just about to kill you. That is your dao of the sword, and that is your philosophy, something that you’ll never abandon. Even if you lose your life.”

“I won’t criticize you, Senior. After all, you just saved my life. The fact that you killed them in the blink of an eye shows that your cultivation base is unimaginably high. And that means that you could kill me with the snap of a finger. If I criticized you, and then was killed, wouldn’t it be a big waste? I save the lives of others, but I can also watch out for my own. That doesn’t violate any of my ideals.”

As usual, Star Swordlife was using reasoning that most people would consider fallacious.

“Well put,” said the young man in azure. “Except that I just killed those executors to save you. So was it an act of killing, or an act of saving?”

“Killing, of course,” Star Swordlife said. “Considering how strong you are, Senior, you could easily have sealed them to save me. Instead, you chose to kill them. So in the end, it was an act of killing.”

“What if I wasn't strong enough to kill them? What if I was weaker than them, and saw you about to be killed? Should I try to save you, or just leave quietly?”

“Leave quietly. If you weren’t as strong as them, then your act of trying to save me would actually be suicide. And suicide is killing yourself, so obviously, it would also be considered an act of killing.”

“Excellent,” the young man said, smiling. “Wonderful. You really do stick to your ideals, Star Swordlife, and that means that you’re worth helping.”

“Helping?” Star Swordlife said, surprised. “Helped by whom, Senior? Why would you help me? We're neither relatives nor friends.”

“What does being a relative or friend have to do with offering help? I’ve taken a liking to you, and I want to help you. Who would stop me from doing that? No one exists who can stop me from doing what I want, and that includes you. I know that you have incredible skill with the sword, and that you’ve settled into your role as an Inheritor. Unfortunately, you still managed to get yourself surrounded by eighteen executors, and nearly killed as well. How will you manage to seal Yang Qi if you go around acting like that?”

“Yang Qi?” Star Swordlife said, his eyes flickering with malice. “He’s a slaughterer of innocents, whereas I want to save all living beings. I can never let him off the hook. I’ll definitely seal him and never let him out for all eternity.”

All of a sudden, the young man’s expression turned ferocious, and he growled, “If I tried killing Yang Qi, would you attempt to save him?”

THUMP!

Star Swordlife suddenly tumbled backward as if he had been hit in the chest with a hammer. Falling into a sitting position with a look of shock on his face, he coughed up a huge mouthful of blood. This young man was far and away the strongest person Star Swordlife had ever encountered.

A single glance had nearly killed Star Swordlife, which made it obvious that this young man could take his life without any effort at all.

The young man took a few steps forward, aggressively looming over Star Swordlife as he said, “If I go to kill Yang Qi, and you try to save him, you’ll be committing suicide. And you just said that the right thing to do would be to walk away, rather than commit suicide. To not be stained with unnecessary karma. Isn’t that right?”

“Er, yes…” Star Swordlife said, finding it hard to breathe. “I won’t interfere with your affairs, Senior. If you have a grudge with Yang Qi, then obviously you have to end it by killing him.”

“Exactly. Besides, who cares if I kill him? Because of various circumstances in the past, I missed quite a few opportunities to kill him. Thus, I traveled through time specifically to end his life. Unfortunately, he's even stronger than I expected, and has joined forces with another particularly powerful person to oppose me. If I don’t kill him, how can I ever resolve our grudge? What's more, he has something that I need. Otherwise, I would’ve never come back from the god world. You see, I could have become a god long ago. But what good would it do to be a Lesser God? Am I supposed to go around bowing and scraping like a servant to the other, more powerful gods? How could I ever crawl? There’s no way. I want to defy heaven. I want to shake the legion of gods, and force them to acknowledge me as their leader!”

At a certain point, the young man’s voice lowered to the point where he was almost talking to himself, although the psychic pressure radiating off of him didn’t lessen a bit. In fact, it increased, causing Star Swordlife to shiver and wilt until he finally croaked, “Senior, don’t kill me!”

“Kill you? I'm not going to kill you.” The young man reined in his energy flows and psychic pressure, then reached out and pulled Star Swordlife to his feet as casually as if he were a child. “I'm going to help you. In fact, I’m going to push you directly into the mid Terrifying level. Then I’ll send you to seal Yang Qi, and even become the ultimate Inheritor of the Great Necropolis. All of the other Inheritors will be under your command, got it? And if I kill them, you won’t do a thing to stop me.” He burst out laughing.

“Senior, who are you?” Star Swordlife asked, his voice quavering. “I've never seen anyone as powerful as you. Are you a god?”

“A god? No, I’m not a god. But I might as well be one. There’s no one in the mortal world who could possibly be a match for my strength. Well, since I'm going to help you, I guess I might as well tell you who I am. I'm Yang Qi’s father, Proud Heaven!”

Proud Heaven!

At long last, he had appeared. Even Star Swordlife had heard stories about Proud Heaven. Star Swordlife was from the Star River Sword Sect of the Ancient Road to the Gods. Although they were considered a relatively minor sect, even less important than the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect, they were still privy to many secrets. So of course they knew about the famous Proud Heaven, who had killed countless almighty entities and shaken the ancient road.

The question was, did it count as good luck or bad luck to have met him?

“Yang Qi told me that he's a Fateless One, and has no father,” Star Swordlife said.

“Bullcrap!” Proud Heaven said with a cold smile. “Without me, how could he have ever been born, this Fateless One? He can refuse to admit that I'm his father, but he’s still my son. And even if he weren’t, I’ll make sure his blood becomes mine. Hmph! I’ll take that Fateless blood of his and add it to my own. That way, he’ll always be my son. He might take it to be a humiliation, but that’s fine with me.” He burst out in laughter again.

“I suppose that as long as you don’t kill him,” Star Swordlife said, “it should be considered mercy.”

“Well said. As long as I don’t kill him, it should be considered mercy. Very well said. And now, the time for helping you has begun. I have a few dozen godpower seeds that I'm going to give you; that way, you’ll instantly reach the mid Terrifying level.”

As the words left his mouth, he waved his hand, sending out a host of seeds, all of which dripped with blood. Obviously, Proud Heaven had ripped them out of other Inheritors.

The sight of the blood caused Star Swordlife to grumble inwardly, but of course, he didn’t dare to say anything out loud. He simply watched as Proud Heaven inserted the seeds into his sea of consciousness.

He was already an Inheritor, so the seeds went in without any resistance, a marked difference from when Yang Qi had taken his original collection of seeds.

The power of more than forty seeds surged within Star Swordlife’s sea of consciousness, prompting him to throw his head back and let loose a mighty roar as stone-like true energy began erupting from every pore on his body.

“Get back in there!” Proud Heaven growled. Thrusting his hand out, he sent golden light to shove the true energy back inside Star Swordlife. As of this moment, Star Swordlife was experiencing a major baptism as the impurities within him were cleansed by golden fire.

He began to float up, slowly rotating as his true energy grew stronger and his psychic power raged.

“Be broken!” Proud Heaven said with a cold smile. “Magical laws. Natural laws. Shackles. Be broken, all of you! When I want someone to have a breakthrough, they do. If I say someone needs to be in the mid Terrifying level, they will be!”

He struck Star Swordlife with a palm, causing Star Swordlife’s body to roil as though it were boiling water. Then, Proud Heaven clamped his hand down on Star Swordlife’s head. Star Swordlife felt explosive force surging through him, then suddenly gained immense enlightenment of the mid Terrifying level.

As he clenched his hands into fists, an image of an enormous sword appeared behind him. “I refuse to believe that you can beat me now, Yang Qi! As a true Inheritor, I'm going to seal you!”

“Confident you can win?” Proud Heaven asked. “Then go. Head to the depths of the Great Necropolis, where the essence is. That’s where Yang Qi is. If he finds the essence and absorbs the power there, he’ll gain control of the Great Necropolis, and no one will be able to stop him!”

Star Swordlife looked over at Proud Heaven, well aware that the man was using him as a pawn. Now that Proud Heaven had helped him advance his energy arts, it was probably going to be impossible to be free of his control ever again.

And in the end, Proud Heaven’s pawns always died miserable deaths.

“What, don’t tell me that you’re going to turn on me right after I helped you?” Proud Heaven chuckled. “Things in life don’t work that way. There’s no way you could ever stand up to me.”

Chapter 1108: Proud Heaven is Finally Here

Star Swordlife’s heart was already pounding at the realization that Proud Heaven knew exactly what he was thinking.

What exactly was the level of Proud Heaven’s cultivation base? It seemed like he could read the heart and mind of anyone he was dealing with with almost no effort. Of course, that task was made easier in the case of Star Swordlife with his one-track mind.

Swish!

Before he could do anything else, Proud Heaven suddenly reached out with dazzling speed. As Star Swordlife saw Proud Heaven’s hand filling his field of vision, he instinctively unleashed a rain of swords, but Proud Heaven easily suppressed them.

In the blink of an eye, he couldn’t even use his energy arts.

CRACK!

Five fingers latched on to Star Swordlife’s throat.

Proud Heaven unleashed a tiny stream of true energy, and Star Swordlife’s face instantly went as pale as death, and red steam rose up from the top of his head. His eyes filled with fear, but he didn’t move a muscle and didn’t dare to utter a word. As of this moment, he knew that, despite having risen within the Terrifying level, he was still no match for Proud Heaven.

“You are far too naive, Star Swordlife. Did you really think that I would help you get stronger, then let you fight me? That’s a joke if ever I heard one. I know all about your one-track mind. However, I also know that you’re something of a genius with the sword. Furthermore, I know that you’re actually the personification of the life force created by heaven and earth. In the days to come, you’ll reach immense heights and become a god powerful even among gods. Unfortunately, despite all that, you really don’t have what it takes to stand up to me.

“I can make you what you are, but I can also take it all away. So don't try pulling any tricks. If you do, I’ll kill you.”

Star Swordlife’s face was still white as a sheet. He knew that Proud Heaven was telling the truth, leaving him feeling at a complete loss. He had lost control, and if he tried to struggle, he would end up dead.

In front of Proud Heaven, his will of life force was completely restrained, making it impossible for him to even make some grandiose speech.

Shivering, he said, “Senior Proud Heaven, your strength surpasses all limitations. Killing Yang Qi shouldn’t be any problem at all for you. Why did you offer me help and then set me against him? Aren’t you attending to trifles but neglecting essentials?”

Proud Heaven snorted coldly. “The dirty little swine has a God Legion Seal, doesn’t he? Well, so do I. And I'm not sure what exactly will happen if we use those seals against each other in a fight. Just now, I used the martial arts of the God Legion Seal against you, so it’s little wonder you were helpless. But I'm not sure how powerful I’ll be against that pig. And that’s why I gave you the tools to fight him. You want to seal him, right? Well I'm giving you your chance. So go. Use your Inheritor powers to head into the most dangerous parts of the Great Necropolis, the place where the godpower seeds come from.”

“Alright,” Star Swordlife said. In the presence of Proud Heaven, he felt like a toddler that had just learned to walk. Unwilling to spend any more time in his presence than necessary, he offered a respectful salute and flew off into the stony primal-chaos of the deepest parts of the Great Necropolis.

Proud Heaven watched him go, and then smiled coldly. “The boy really has some talent. And he has some incredible destiny as well. He’ll become a Consummate God, at the very least. Who knows, he might actually be able to fight with Yang Qi over the ultimate control of the Great Necropolis. There’s no way I'll let Yang Qi and Doom live. Their two God Legion Seals are definitely going to come under my control. Then my long-cherished wish, held for millions upon millions of years, will finally come true. With the complete God Legion Seal, I can finally go to the god world!

“However, before I do, I need to accomplish the task of moving the Great Necropolis. Ah, Proud World, you’d better not let me down. You must resurrect the scrap of King Immortal-Slayer’s will that I gave you! Once you do, he’ll fight the will of the Great Necropolis, and although he might not completely destroy it, it should be enough to move the thing. Once the necropolis is dealt with and the Ancient Road to the Gods is open again, I can hurry to the god world. The road disappeared from the Primeval Age and the Future Age, and I can sense that it will soon disappear from the Immortal Age as well. If I don’t move the Great Necropolis before then, it will become impossible to reach the god world and achieve godly ascension!”

His mere murmured words affected the immortal world around him, even stirring the stone-like energy flows of the Great Necropolis and causing whirlpools to form. Clearly, he was an apex entity within the mortal world.

In fact, no one truly knew how strong he was, and there were no other experts who had the courage to fight him.

As he faded away, he made one more speech. “You are my direct offspring, Proud World. Although you’ve defied me, you have no idea that I gave you the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth for a very specific reason. I'm waiting for you to accomplish a certain task, and after you do, I’ll kill you. What does the death of a son matter in comparison to the God Legion Seal and the Great Necropolis? You see, I made sure that Yang Qi got all the other legacy medallions, because I want him to fight the will of King Immortal-Slayer. If I controlled the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, then I would be tainted by King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions and would never be able to free myself. This plan has been underway for countless years. In fact, it all started in the Primeval Age. And now… it's finally about to come to fruition.”

All conspiracies. All major events. Proud Heaven was behind them all. In the mortal world, he could produce clouds with one turn of the hand and rain with another.

He manipulated everything.

**

Back in the stone-like primal-chaos vital energy of the Great Necropolis, Yang Qi and his companions were forging their way deeper and deeper, experiencing all kinds of dangers along the way. The vital energy was getting stronger, and they had encountered quite a few more corpses and magical treasures. Sadly, all of them had already been turned into stone, and were completely useless.

However, all four of them had collected significant amounts of godhood, roughly a dozen pieces each. That could be considered quite a haul, except it was relatively useless to them personally.

After all, they were searching for the ultimate source of everything to do with the Great Necropolis.

RUMBLE!

They shot onward, surrounded in the golden light that resembled a spacecraft, piercing into the depths of the vital energy. At a certain point, they reached a place where the vital energy swirled violently, causing rumblings like that of thunder to fill their ears.

The craft slowed to a stop and everyone looked around vigilantly.

“We've reached a very important area,” Doom said. “This part of the Great Necropolis has god lightning that can split heaven and sunder the earth. We have to be very, very careful here.”

“I'm getting the sensation there’s something very wretched and evil up ahead,” Yang Qi said. He waved his hand, summoning a mass of paper talismans that he sent flying into the stone-like vital energy. Instantly, the energy went still.

“Let’s go. I can use my Great Necropolis abilities to quell the energy, but it’s only temporary.”

“Alright!”

They followed the paper talismans, yet they still felt like their souls were being battered by sledgehammers from the thunder.

It was even impossible to circulate their true energy.

Face ashen, Doom said, “How long is this going to last? Considering how strong we are, I’d say that ordinary mid Terrifying experts would die here. There’s no doubt.”

“You’re right,” Yang Qi said. “The god lightning in these parts is strong enough to kill gods. It’s incredible!” He shivered as a stone-colored bolt of lightning struck him, draining some of his true energy.

However, that was when Yang Qi realized that he could use this rare lightning to help assimilate the ten thousand pieces of godhood he had.

It was lightning that would kill most people, but to him it could be used as a tool for tempering.

In fact, all ten thousand pieces of godhood had objects inside them that resembled fetuses, people whose facial features resembled Yang Qi. It went to show that Yang Qi was truly tapping into the quintessence of the godhood.

In the mortal world, people could only use godhood as a source of power, fuel for their psychic flames, or as an aid to their cultivation techniques. And that process would waste most of the quintessence of the godhood. In fact, people in the mortal world could only draw on one ten-thousandth of a piece of godhood. After all, how could mortals possibly draw on the full quintessence and power of a god? If they did, they would be completely and utterly destroyed.

Yang Qi wasn't assimilating the godhood in his sea of energy, but rather growing it. He was using two opposing energy arts, one positive and one negative, to cleanse it. Using his Great Necropolis godpower and the Purrfect God Art, in combination with the god lightning he had just encountered, he was provoking dramatic transformations and causing the godhood to form infant children within them.

There were ten thousand infants, all of them breathing.

Every breath Yang Qi took, they also took a breath. It was like ten thousand of him performing breathing exercises, with every single one of those children being nascent souls that were growing into nascent divinities.

The transformations that were occurring were so profound that not even Yang Qi was completely sure of what was happening.

At the very least, he knew that the lightning strikes weren’t hurting him, but helping him.

Chapter 1109: Coffins

None of Yang Qi’s companions had any idea that the mere journey itself was actually pushing his cultivation base to incomprehensible levels. He had ten thousand pieces of godhood transforming into breathing nascent souls, right there in his sea of energy.

Who could ever have imagined that something like this would happen? Of course, in the past, his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth had created a sage child. Later, he fused that with his Unspoiled Body, causing it to dissolve into numerous streams of preheaven power, altering his substructure and making his true energy incomparably perfect.

Now, as his true energy flowed, his cultivation reached an enigmatically powerful level.

In fact, he was now one hundred percent certain that he could succeed at breaking through to the mid Terrifying level.

When he did that, he would also become a Grand Emperor and his psychic scale would likely climb into the hundreds.

Of course, Yang Qi chose not to achieve that breakthrough now. He would wait until the ideal moment to do so.

Truth be told, it would definitely be his greatest trump card to use against Proud Heaven.

RUUUUMBLE!

Thunder crashed, and the stone-like vital energy erupted into wild fluctuations. In response, Doom quickly unleashed one of his best techniques, sending out a palm that caused a projected image from the god world to appear.

“Eternal God World Suppression!”

This projection of the god world was a consummate ability from the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, which he had cultivated to a very high level. Supposedly, it could be used to produce what was actually a smaller but complete version of the god world.

Not even elite experts like King Immortal-Slayer knew the full extent of the complete god world, so it was little wonder that Doom’s version was somewhat unclear.

Despite that, when the image appeared, it seemed to connect to the actual god world, producing an outflow of power that shattered the surrounding lightning.

Drawing on more of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, Doom reached out to the shattered lightning, causing it to swirl into his palm in the shape of a sphere.

It was a sphere of primal-chaos stone lightning so formidable that, if used in combat against a mid Terrifying expert, it would easily turn them into stone.

Seeing this, the Shepherd and Proud World were both shaken and envious. However, they could do nothing more than stare as it happened.

“Not bad. Not bad at all.” Yang Qi nodded in admiration. “That primal-chaos stone lightning is strong enough to hurt even us. I never imagined that you would be able to assimilate it, Brother Doom. In the interests of not falling behind you, how about we work together to clear out all the lightning here?”

He waved his sleeve, and sucked some more nearby lightning into his sleeve, even faster than Doom had done.

“Very impressive,” said Doom, inwardly shocked at how enigmatic Yang Qi’s cultivation base was. He also wondered how he was making such progress. After all, Doom had been forced to use his God Legion Seal and a projection of the god world to subjugate the lightning, whereas Yang Qi had simply waved his sleeve.

Doom couldn’t even comprehend how that was possible.

‘Maybe it's because he’s an Inheritor,’ he thought. Although Yang Qi didn’t seem to be using the God Legion Seal, Doom knew that unless he truly abandoned it, the two of them were destined to be enemies. Although Doom still didn’t intend to oppose Yang Qi, he knew that after they killed Proud Heaven, they would have to walk different paths. And there was also the question of who would get Proud Heaven’s God Legion Seal. Doom was definitely not inclined to give it up.

**

Meanwhile, back in the Sage Monarch League, Jadefall, Sectlord Will Manifestation, and other loyalists sat beneath the Preeminent God Pillar, working on their cultivation and managing the affairs of the alliance. All of them had very high cultivation bases.

Normally speaking, sects would have disciples go out on missions to gain experience and resources, and further their cultivation. They didn’t just give out resources, but required disciples to earn them via merit. That was the only way to ensure the continued operation of an organization, although it often led to disciples making mistakes and ruining their cultivation.

Truth be told, acquiring all the resources necessary to cultivate a particular daoist technique to completion often took up about ninety percent of the time involved.

Cultivating a godly-class energy art to completion might only take a few years, if one had all the resources. Yang Qi had faced that same challenge during his time in the mortal world. Sometimes, finding the right resources could take thousands or even tens of thousands of years. And some people might never get what they needed.

Yang Qi had just acquired a huge influx of resources from the executors’ storehouses, and they were definitely enough to keep the Sage Monarch League going, as well as help his subordinates further their cultivation.

For now, the Sage Monarch League didn’t operate on a system of merit, but rather a system of loyalty.

Those who were truly loyal to Yang Qi and the alliance, after undergoing a series of tests, would get access to the resources they needed.

As would be expected, the most loyal disciples were flourishing like bamboo after a spring rain.

In fact, new Terrifying experts could be seen on almost a daily basis.

There were also old-timers that were getting very close to the mid Terrifying level.

SWISH!

As Jadefall and Sectlord Will Manifestation sat there, a vortex opened and conglomerations of sealed stone lightning appeared, which they grabbed. From the muffled rumblings within them, it seemed as if this lightning was powerful enough to shatter even the mountains of gods.

“League-Lord, what treasure is this?” the sectlord asked. As a mid Terrifying expert, he could sense that this lightning was powerful enough to destroy just about anything and everything.

“This is stone lightning from the depths of the Great Necropolis,” Yang Qi said via voice projection. “I've locked it up with the Devil-God Seal, allowing it to be used as a trump card. Use it, and you can cause major problems for an ordinary mid Terrifying expert. In fact, you can mow them down. Make them part of the Preeminent God Pillar and the Nine God Mountains, and set them into the grand spell formation. If the Executors of the Ancient Road come and cause problems, don’t hesitate to inflict major casualties on them.”

Jadefall and Sectlord Will Manifestation were delighted, and immediately began following the orders Yang Qi had just given.

“I'm just about to reach the mid Terrifying level!” Such words were heard from the mouths of many people, including Eldest Brother, Second Elder Brother, Sword Seventeen, and the others from the Invincible Society. Yang Qi hadn’t forgotten about them, and thanks to his help, they were all in the early Terrifying level, with psychic scales over ninety.

They were people from the mortal world who Yang Qi had spent a lot of time grooming, and now they were truly becoming forces to be reckoned with.

Time passed as Yang Qi and Doom worked to clear out the god lightning. Eventually, they reached a place where the lightning stopped falling and the stone-like vital energy ceased flowing. There, they saw a cave.

Thump, thump, thump.

Yang Qi raced forward like an arrow loosed from a bow, jumping right into the cave. Inside, he found that it was a few hundreds of kilometers from end to end, and was filled with a very strange aura. As well as coffins. Numerous stone coffins, all of them emanating horrific auras that would cause one's hackles to rise. In fact, Yang Qi felt himself covered with goosebumps.

The Shepherd, Proud World, and Doom all looked around, faces pale from terror. These were people who had been to the most horrific hells and seen just about everything. But right now, the terrifying atmosphere was affecting even them.

As for the Shepherd, he was one of the top suzerains of hell, and the league-lord of the fiend-devils. There was virtually no hellish scene that he hadn’t witnessed, yet these stone coffins caused his hair to stand on end. After all, he knew that, considering they were in the depths of the Great Necropolis, there was no way these coffins were ordinary items.

Looking around, Yang Qi said in a somewhat awkward tone, “You would expect there to be some coffins somewhere in the Great Necropolis. It’s nothing unusual….”

Yet even he felt fearful, and had the sense that he had somehow stepped into an alternate dimension.

“W-why… why does your voice sound different?” the Shepherd said, looking closer at Yang Qi. It was true. To him, Yang Qi sounded more like a woman, perhaps a ghost that was tens of thousands of years old, who hated heaven, earth, men, life, and even other ghosts and gods.

“Don’t speak out loud,” Yang Qi said via divine will. “There’s something very odd about this place. Stick close together.”

They were all wondering what exactly was interred in these coffins, and why they emanated such a terrifying aura. All of them suddenly felt something like a chill breath caressing their necks, almost as if someone were standing next to them getting ready to speak.

“Who—”

They all instinctively placed their hands on their necks, but didn’t feel anything there.

“Look at the Shepherd!” Doom blurted. The Shepherd’s eyes were now bright green, and he was smiling in the most bizarre fashion possible.

Chapter 1110: Secrets

There was an extremely bizarre expression on the Shepherd’s face, as if he had been possessed by some wretched spirit. And that was a terrifying thought.

The Shepherd was in the mid Terrifying level, and impervious to all kinds of assaults by wretched entities. He would likely be able to survive in the god world, yet now he was standing there trembling, his eyes flickering with a strange light. Everyone was shocked.

Yang Qi was just about to send some true energy into him to investigate when the Shepherd suddenly unleashed a terrifying howl.

“Aaaiiiieee!”

All of a sudden, green hair sprouted out all over his body, as if he were turning into a green-furred zombie.

Roaring, he suddenly curled his fingers into claws and rushed toward Yang Qi, Proud World, and Doom.

“What happened?” Yang Qi barked. It looked like the Shepherd’s energy arts were vastly above their previous level, and it forced Yang Qi to scramble to meet his attack.

Gong!

He thrust out a palm, and when they clashed, he knew for certain that he wasn’t dealing with the Shepherd’s energy arts. It was as though he were fighting a boundless wretch-spirit who was using the Shepherd as a conduit, and simultaneously trying to take complete control of him. However, it only took a moment for the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth to vanquish that wretch-spirit’s energy.

“Attack him!” Doom shouted, preparing to attack. “He's been possessed by a wretch-spirit, or possibly a deceased god. He’s not himself, and that’s not his true energy!”

The three of them launched palm strikes, all of which slammed into the Shepherd.

Screaming, the Shepherd suddenly scrambled back toward one of the coffins, threw open the lid, and dove inside, disappearing without a trace.

“What just happened?” Proud World said.

Doom, a serious expression on his face, replied, “That’s what I'm wondering. Yang Qi, it seems like the Shepherd has been possessed. What do you think we should do?”

“I sense a boundlessly wretched and evil power,” Yang Qi replied coolly. “Unlike the three of us, the Shepherd doesn’t cultivate the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, so he can't defend against the wretched, evil power. He has indeed been possessed, and is now turning into a wretch-spirit.”

“I think you’re right,” Proud World said. “Going forward, we need to be very careful. I wonder what all these coffins are here for. Should we continue inside and investigate? Look, they seem to be organized around one specific coffin!”

As they examined the cave further, they saw that Proud World was right. There were countless coffins that were all organized around a larger, red coffin. It almost looked like it was covered with blood, except that they were actually paper talismans. From what they could tell, it must contain a slumbering fiend-devil of some sort.

“Our goal,” Yang Qi said, “is to find the essence of the Great Necropolis, the origin of the godpower seeds. This obviously isn’t the place. My suggestion is that we don't waste time. Let’s leave and continue our search.”

“I don’t think we can,” Doom said dryly.

Yang Qi looked back and found that the entrance was nowhere to be seen. There was only a stone wall so tough that they couldn’t break through it.

“We need to get the Shepherd back and exorcise the wretched evil from him,” Doom said. “I think that’s the only way we’ll figure out what’s going on. Besides, what if this place is actually part of the essence of the Great Necropolis? What if it does have something to do with the godpower seeds?”

“That makes sense,” Proud World replied. “I refuse to believe that this place is really that frightening. You two both have pieces of the God Legion Seal, which the Sovereign Lord himself used to subjugate the many heavens. What do you have to be afraid of? As for me, I have the pure Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth that was given to me by Proud Heaven, so I’ll be fine as well.”

“Alright,” Yang Qi said. “Let’s save the Shepherd. He’s a friend, so we can’t just leave him to die. If he's possessed by a wretch-spirit, Brother Doom and I should be able to work together to exorcise it. It might be strong, but it definitely fears the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.”

“Agreed,” Doom said. “We save the Shepherd. Which of these coffins did he just jump into?”

All of a sudden, they heard someone talking from behind them. “Are you crazy? I'm standing right here! What do you mean I've been possessed by a wretch-spirit?”

They spun in shock, and Yang Qi’s eyes nearly popped out of his skull. Standing right there behind them was a man in a black robe carrying a shepherd’s crook. If he wasn’t the Shepherd, who could he be?

“Who are you?” Proud World nearly shrieked.

“The Shepherd!” he replied, looking surprised. “What are you doing? We walked in here, then the three of you suddenly launched attacks at literally nothing. Then you started jabbering about me being possessed by a wretch-spirit and needing to be saved. What’s going on?”

“Are you really the Shepherd?” Doom said. He exchanged a glance with Yang Qi, then blurred forward and placed his hands on the Shepherd’s shoulders as he sent some true energy into him to inspect him.

“What are you doing, Doom?” the Shepherd shouted, shivering. “We swore oaths not to harm each other before killing Proud Heaven. What are you doing?” He even sent some true energy out to try to defend against Doom.

Doom quickly retracted his own true energy and flew back to stand next to Yang Qi, a look of surprise on his face. “He really is the Shepherd, not a fake. I used the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, and I can guarantee he’s real!”

“He’s really the Shepherd?” Proud World said. “Then who was that before?”

He felt cold sweat dripping down his face as he wondered exactly what kind of terrifying situation they had stumbled into.

If he could, he would have fled this mysterious cave of coffins immediately.

Yang Qi’s heart was also pounding as he tried to make sense of everything that was happening.

After a moment, he forced himself to calm down. He knew that they were in a strange situation, and having a calm heart was important. It seemed to him like there was some sort of powerful defense of illusions in this cave, designed to confuse anyone who entered.

The Great Necropolis had come out of the god world, so it made sense that there were things in it that could mystify even gods.

“Come over here, Shepherd,” Yang Qi said. “None of us are really sure what’s going on, but the safest thing is for you to stay close to us. We have the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, and that should keep you safe from whatever illusions might be occurring here.”

As the Shepherd walked over to them, he angrily said, “It’s obvious that you people are the ones getting confused. What makes you think it’s me? I was standing there the whole time while you three babbled nonsense and—”

Crack!

Yang Qi suddenly moved so quickly it was impossible to see him move. Reaching out, he tapped the Shepherd’s forehead and sent some true energy into him, causing him to float up into the air as a golden sealing mark appeared in his sea of energy. Golden light shone out, which quickly enveloped his person.

“The Many Heavens God Seal!” Doom said in open shock.

He had cultivated the same energy art, but his version wasn’t nearly as powerful as Yang Qi’s. Doom had even been considering killing the Shepherd, but now Yang Qi had taken care of the situation smoothly and with no slipups.

Although the Shepherd sensed his true energy flowing just as briskly as ever, he had a very bad feeling about the situation. Fuming, he said, “Y-you... you planted some sort of seed inside of me? You’re trying to take control of me?”

“I didn’t plant any sort of seed,” Yang Qi replied coolly. “It’s just the Many Heavens God Seal. Consider it like a magical treasure or an energy art that you can cultivate to your benefit. Don’t worry, I'm not plotting against you. As for the details of the Many Heavens God Seal, Brother Doom can explain the details. Suffice it to say, if I had been trying to harm you, I would have used a Heaven-God Hell-Exterminating Devil Embryo instead.”

Doom nodded. “The Many Heavens God Seal is indeed a protection for you, Shepherd. Yang Qi only has good intentions here. And he didn’t leave any of his own will or true energy inside of you. He simply placed the seal in you for your own protection.”

“Oh?” The Shepherd checked himself and found that his true energy was still completely under his own control. Performing a few million circulations and finding no obstructions, he finally said, “Many thanks to you, Brother Yang Qi. Not only did you forget past grudges, but you actually helped me.”

“Consider it compensation for the Mahātmā Jade I took from you. I'm the kind of person who knows who to show gratitude to, and who to feel resentment against. And I don’t like owing things to my friends. What I just gave you was created by the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, and it’s yours now. I can’t take it back. Now, on to more important things. Going forward, I don’t want anything to happen like what happened just now. You say that we were hallucinating, but are we sure it’s not you? Let’s talk this whole thing through. Shepherd, you now have part of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, so if we’re the ones hallucinating, the same should happen to you.”

Of course, while giving the Shepherd the Many Heavens God Seal, he had also done his own check to make sure that he wasn’t possessed by a wretch-spirit.

“Let’s head deeper into this cave of stone coffins,” Proud World said, “and figure out exactly what's going on!”

Yang Qi nodded. However, just when he was about to voice his agreement, Doom, Proud World, and the Shepherd all looked at him with wide eyes. “Brother Yang Qi, what’s happening?!”

Chapter 1111: Illusion

From what the Shepherd had just asked, and from the wide-eyed expression on his face, which was mirrored by Proud World and Doom, it seemed that all of them were worried that Yang Qi had been possessed by a wretch-spirit.

Yet he simply stood there looking completely at ease.

“What are you doing? You three are obviously in an illusion. I’m not possessed.” Yang Qi quickly sent three streams of will into the three of them, hoping to bring them to their senses.

Unfortunately, the result was that all three reacted as though they were seeing something profoundly terrifying. Doom even shouted, “You're attacking us, Yang Qi!? Everybody, watch out! He’s using one of his consummate skills, the Sovereign Lord’s Holy and Far-Reaching Consummate Omnicurse! Quickly, join forces to fight back!”

RUMBLE!

All three joined forces and launched a combined palm strike at Yang Qi, causing wild winds to spring up and giving him no room to evade.

All he could do was meet the attack head-on.

They were treating him like he was their greatest archenemy, someone they were determined to kill, and it begged the question of what illusion they were wrapped up in that would provoke this reaction.

What exactly was going on?

‘This must be a really powerful illusion,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘But where is it coming from? And why can’t I sense its source? Regardless, I can’t keep fighting them like this. It’s a big waste of energy for all of us, and will just weaken us so the wretch-devils can swoop in and take advantage of the situation. Luckily, my cultivation base is high enough that it isn’t too difficult to slip out of their grasp.’

Countless nascent souls within his sea of energy breathed in and out, pushing his cultivation base to the ultimate peak possible. Drawing on his true energy, he negated the incoming attacks, then flicked his finger.

Ding!

The true energy in his meridians formed into three clumps that became three bubbles. Of course, they were manifestations of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth and the Unspoiled Body, combined with the Purrfect God Art. In the past, he had only achieved middling success with the Purrfect God Art, but he had recently made significant progress.

Whoosh. Whoosh. Whoosh.

Three bubbles shot out, instantly enveloping Doom, the Shepherd, and Proud World.

“Wake up!” Yang Qi shouted. “You’re stuck in an illusion!”

“Die!” Doom howled, drawing on his God Legion Seal to unleash a devastating attack that popped the bubble and caused the surrounding primal-chaos to roil violently.

Yang Qi backed up as the others also unleashed explosive attacks to free themselves.

Yang Qi was visibly taken aback. Although he couldn’t unleash the full potential of the Purrfect God Art, it should have been impossible for them to break free so easily. Waving the sleeve of his God Legion Battle Robe, he calmed the violent tempests that had erupted.

Suddenly, all heaven and earth went back to normal, and the cave once again became a mysterious and sinister place.

Doom, the Shepherd, and Proud World stood there staring at Yang Qi with blank astonishment. “What's wrong, Brother Yang Qi?”

“Are you clear-headed?” Yang Qi asked. “You’re not stuck in an illusion?”

“What? We were stuck in an illusion?” said Doom, not sure whether to laugh or cry. “Brother Yang Qi, just a moment ago, you suddenly started yelling something about there being a misunderstanding, that we were stuck in an illusion. Then you went crazy and just started attacking us for no reason. Eventually, the true energy in you exploded out and everything went back to normal.”

“That’s right,” the Shepherd said. “What’s going on here? You launched a spectacular attack on us and forced us to retreat. Thankfully, you didn’t press the attack, and everything went back to normal fairly quickly.”

“Brother Yang Qi, you’re the most perceptive and clear-headed of all of us. I never would have guessed that you would get sucked into an illusion.” Proud World glanced around the cave, shivering.

“I attacked you for no reason?” Yang Qi said. “You didn’t attack me?”

“Definitely not,” the Shepherd said. “Why would we attack you? You were definitely struck by an illusion just now. Your attacks didn’t even hit us! It seems we're stuck in a very bizarre dimension, with seemingly no way out. If we don’t figure out a way to work together, I fear we’ll end up dead.”

From what Yang Qi could tell, the three of them did seem completely sober and uninterested in attacking him at all.

All of a sudden, he felt a chill in his bones, which was none other than fear of this enormous stone cave. The attacks they had just launched on him had seemed completely real, and he simply couldn’t believe that it had never happened at all. His energy arts were at such a high level that if he were to actively observe his surroundings and pour all of the true energy in his cultivation base into the effort, then how could he not be able to perceive what was and wasn’t an illusion?

The attack just now had been extremely powerful, and didn’t seem like it could have been an illusion at all.

If this stone cave could project an illusion that could confuse even him, it meant that it was powerful enough to do the same to actual gods.

‘Are these three lying, or is something else going on?’ he thought. In the end, Yang Qi would never put his full trust in other people. Besides, if he trusted what Proud World, Doom, and the Shepherd said, it would imply that he didn’t trust himself, and that could have immense negative connotations.

‘Might as well just forget about it,’ he thought. ‘If I keep second-guessing everything, I’m going to end up experiencing cultivation deviation. Maybe this is the true power of the illusion, to cause doubts and mistrust that compound on each other, leading to devastating consequences.’

With that, Yang Qi pushed away thoughts about what had just occurred. It didn’t matter whether his companions thought of him as an enemy or a friend. When soldiers come, send a general to stop them. When floodwaters come, use earth to block them. All of a sudden, the cultivation method of the Annulled Grand Magic appeared in his sea of consciousness and his psychic scale climbed by another level.

His eyes blazed with flickering light as he looked out into the cave and realized that previously undetectable fluctuations were rolling out of the crimson coffin in the middle of all the other coffins. Although his companions had no way to detect them, with his newly heightened psychic scale, he could.

“I think the illusion is a function of that crimson coffin!” Yang Qi suddenly said, his voice thrumming with the power to devastate wretch-god magics. Instantly, a bubble appeared, surrounding Doom, Proud World, and the Shepherd, placing them in a field of protection that illusions couldn’t encroach upon.

A look of admiration appeared on Doom’s face. “Brother Yang Qi,” he said, “your energy arts have advanced again, haven’t they? Please accept my sincere congratulations, as well as my utmost admiration. You saw through it all and realized that we were the ones in an illusion.”

“The truth is that everything is an illusion,” Yang Qi said. “You. Me. The Great Necropolis. The God Legion Seal. Reality only exists within the heart and spirit. And yes, I really did reach a higher level of enlightenment. Coming here was worth it after all.”

“Brother Yang Qi, it seems you really did gain some deep enlightenment,” Doom said. “Eventually, you really will free yourself from the fetters of the God Legion Seal and achieve your own boundless dao. Congratulations, Brother. You’re on your way to true freedom and independence. Ai! Proud Heaven returned from the god world, abandoning his chance to reach godly ascension, all in the hopes of getting the God Legion Seal. But you've actually abandoned the seal, which just goes to show how superior you are.”

“Don’t worry,” Yang Qi said coolly. “Although I’m removing myself from the constraints of the God Legion Seal, I still have the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth in me. Eventually, I’ll also be able to abandon the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth and make my own heaven-shaking, earth-shattering technique. When that happens, it won’t matter if the God Legion Seal is destroyed or remains whole. It’ll have nothing to do with me. But regardless of all that, I obviously won’t let Proud Heaven have it. He must die.”

“Congratulations, really,” Doom said, shaking his head and seemingly sighing as he wondered if he would ever be able to free himself from the God Legion Seal. “Brother Yang Qi, do you think that, one day, I might also be able to free myself from the God Legion Seal? How did you do it?”

“The truth is a bit embarrassing,” Yang Qi said, chuckling. “It all started when I was able to observe a unique godling. Presumably you’ve heard of it. It’s the purrling from the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect.”

Doom thought for a moment. “Purrling? The same one that caused a huge stir among the experts from the Ancient Road to the Gods? The one that dragged the people from the Royal Palace of Assassins to you from a distance, that not even the King of Assassins could handle? It must be far beyond the level of a mid Terrifying expert. Truth be told, Brother Yang Qi, that purrling is one of the big reasons that I'm not interested in being your enemy, and also why I asked your help to deal with Proud Heaven.”

“Oh?” Yang Qi said. “Brother Doom, are you saying that you know what the purrling is?”

“Sadly no,” Doom replied with a ghastly smile. “I have no idea what the purrling is. Besides, when you know the origin of something, you’ll also come to know its weakness. Not even the King of Godmammoths is an exception in that regard. And since I don't know anything about the purrling, I obviously don’t know its weaknesses.”

“Brother Yang Qi,” Proud World said, “if we had the purrling, maybe we wouldn’t be in such a passive position. Could the purrling possibly deal with Proud Heaven?”

Chapter 1112: Breaking Open a Coffin

“We can’t put all our hope for defeating Proud Heaven on the purrling,” Yang Qi said. “Besides, just because it’s mysterious and impossible for us to fully understand doesn’t mean that it can handle Proud Heaven. The best option is for us to get as strong as possible, and rely only on ourselves.”

“I agree,” said Doom. “We have to rely on ourselves to defeat Proud Heaven. Besides, only a bearer of the God Legion Seal can kill another bearer and take the other seal. If an ordinary person kills one of the bearers, the God Legion Seal will simply fly away and look for a new host. Besides, we just don’t know if the purrling could actually deal with Proud Heaven.”

“So what do we do now?” the Shepherd said. “Considering the danger of succumbing to the illusions, we can’t explore the coffins. But at the same time, we can’t leave. We’re really in a bind here.”

“We are in a bind,” Proud World said. “If we proceed forward and succumb to more illusions, it's only a matter of time before one of us kills one of the others. And that’s not to mention what will happen if ghosts emerge from those coffins and attack us.”

“Let’s wait for a moment and see what else happens,” Yang Qi said, brow furrowed. “I just gained new enlightenment regarding what is neither false nor void, and what seems both reality and illusion. My Purrfect God Art has reached a high enough level that it should keep you safe for the time being. So let’s see if any more illusions rise up, and if we can unlock any of the secrets of the coffins.”

“Fine,” Doom said. “Considering the level of your cultivation base, we’ll follow your lead.”

While the other three remained within the bubble Yang Qi had created, he gazed out at the numerous coffins with a look of concentration and vigilance on his face.

They were all deeply frightened by the experience of succumbing to the illusion earlier. It would have almost been better if some powerful expert had come along and defeated them all in open combat. But having their perceptions tainted so they didn’t even know who their enemy was, and having their companions fight and kill them, well, that left them feeling helpless.

However, as they remained in the bubble, they saw occasional sinister winds floating toward them from the area of the coffins. However, the winds couldn’t penetrate the bubbles, ensuring that they were completely safe.

“Strange,” Doom murmured. “The Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth is the ultimate martial art, but not even its defensive empyrean energy and god curses are enough to keep me safe. But inside this Purrfect God Art bubble, I feel fine. What exactly is going on? Don’t tell me that the Purrfect God Art is actually superior to the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. I refuse to believe it!”

Normally speaking, everyone in this group had profound energy arts with defensive capabilities that should have made them impervious to any wicked incursions. But once inside this cave of coffins, the terrifying miasma they faced was strong, but it couldn’t extrude the sinister energy that built up in their hearts.

The winds that blew on them were not true winds, but things of the god world that affected their hearts. They were rancorous energy from perished gods, filled with the power of curses, that their defensive empyrean energy simply couldn’t deal with.

But they were safe in the Purrfect God Art bubble.

A few hours passed in which none of them had any problems succumbing to illusions.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi continued to observe their surroundings thoughtfully.

As he kept the bubble active, he could sense streams of wretched will swirling out from the coffins. Although they were invisible, once they reached into the hearts of a victim, they would affect their thoughts and emotions.

In fact, if he didn’t have his Purrfect God Art, he would be in great danger here.

The streams of wretched will couldn’t be killed or expelled, and would essentially replace the thoughts of whoever they infected. And eventually, after someone completely succumbed to the illusions, they would go mad and die.

“It’s been a few hours,” Proud World said, “and we haven't experienced any more illusions. Brother Yang Qi, you’re quite simply a god! I don’t think any of us here could possibly be a match for you. And without you here, we would definitely be trapped in illusions.”

“Don't celebrate yet,” Doom said. “Brother Yang Qi, how long can you keep this up?”

“A few thousand years, if I had to,” Yang Qi said. “Maybe even ten thousand. I have plenty of true energy. But we can’t just sit around like this forever. We have to take the initiative to do something.”

“That’s right,” Doom said. “The status quo isn’t going to work. The way things are now, we might as well be buried in here. Although our cultivation bases are strong enough to keep us alive for a hundred million years, we can't afford any delays in our plan to kill Proud Heaven. Considering we have protection from Brother Yang Qi’s Purrfect God Art, I suggest that we open some of these coffins and kill the wretch-spirits inside. I refuse to believe they can really harm us. Other than their illusion techniques, I doubt they can do much!”

“You’re right!” Yang Qi said, nodding. “Fine, I’ll do it.”

RUMBLE!

He flicked his finger, sending a stream of energy from the Purrfect God Art out toward one of the nearby coffins. There were millions upon millions of coffins here, and Yang Qi got the sense that all of them contained mysterious locations inside. After all, these weren’t the coffins of ordinary humans; they contained massive conglomerations of wretch will and rancorous energy from the god world.

Without opening them and seeing what was inside, how would it be possible to escape from this place?

If some truly dangerous situation arose, and worse came to worst, Yang Qi could always unleash his potential and enter the mid Terrifying level. With his cultivation base that much higher, he was confident he would be able to handle the situation. Truth be told, not even he was sure what unimaginable level of power he would reach when he finally achieved that breakthrough.

Most people wouldn't be able to achieve a breakthrough in a place like this, considering that they couldn’t sense the power of the outside world. But Yang Qi had ten thousand pieces of godhood within him, which he was constantly working on turning into nascent souls. Furthermore, he had the vital energy of the Great Necropolis and the quintessence of the Purrfect God Art. With all of that, he had reached a state that was neither that of gods, nor immortals, nor humans. And when he unleashed all of his explosive potential, he could definitely slaughter even Doom.

In other words, he could take the second God Legion Seal any time he wanted.

However, he had no plans to kill Doom. And when he killed Proud Heaven, he didn’t intend to take his God Legion Seal, either. At most, he would use it to gain some enlightenment regarding the true quintessence of combat.

As was written: The Dharma is like a log raft used to cross the river. Upon reaching the destination, the log should be abandoned. Similarly, the Dharma must eventually be cast aside, much less those false Dharmas which are not the true Dharma.

The God Legion Seal was like the log raft which was to be discarded after crossing the river. Someone who reached the other bank, then hoisted the raft onto their back to continue their journey, would be nothing more than a moron, and would make no further progress.

A human who acquired the God Legion Seal would definitely have acquired a precious treasure. However, if that person couldn’t abandon the seal, they would eventually be unable to make progress. One must be willing to cast aside the now irrelevant. Cast it aside, and benefit.

RIP!

A bubble from the Purrfect God Art quickly surrounded the coffin, then began shrinking it down to crush it. Grating sounds rang out, accompanied by the piercing cry of a ghost, which sought to stab into the Purrfect God Art.

Yang Qi snorted coldly. “Did you think it would be that easy?” Numerous streams of will shot out, bolstering the bubble.

RUMBLE!

The bubble crushed down onto the coffin, making it impossible to escape. At the same time, Yang Qi converged some true energy on the tip of his finger, drawing on his Unspoiled Body and Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.

Then he flicked his finger.

The energy shot out toward the stone coffin, reached the lid, and slowly began to lift it up.

Everyone rose to their feet nervously, craning their necks to see what would happen next. What would come out of the coffin?

A piercing, grating noise could be heard, filling their hearts and spirits with chaotic madness that sought to control them.

“Remain calm!” Doom said, sensing the danger. “Still your minds and use your psychic powers to protect yourselves!”

Then he used one of the psychic techniques from his version of the God Legion Seal, something called the Unbounded God Reverberation.

Chapter 1113: Burial

The Unbounded God Reverberation was a vocal utterance of unbounded power. Considering the level of Doom’s cultivation base, if he used the technique to baptize a Destabilizing expert, that person could easily reach the Terrifying level.

The person who originally invented it had a Terrifying cultivation base, making it one of the most powerful aspects of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, second only to the Annulled Grand Magic.

Although Doom had already mastered the Unbounded God Reverberation, he couldn’t cultivate the Annulled Grand Magic. When he tried, he would feel splitting pain in his sea of consciousness, a result of his cultivation base being too low.

Doom also knew that his aspect of the God Legion Seal was focused on psychic power.

The Annulled Grand Magic was what the Sovereign Lord had used in the Unbounded level to try to break through to the Annulled level. Obviously, it would be impossible to cultivate the technique without first joining the legion of gods.

In fact, Doom technically wasn’t strong enough to be using the Unbounded God Reverberation; he had gained a bit of cursory knowledge but was still far from true mastery.

He had given the Annulled Grand Magic to Yang Qi on purpose, and with ill intent. He knew that without his own God Legion Seal, it would be impossible to cultivate it. Yang Qi’s God Legion Seal focused on strength and power; without the proper psychic cultivation, trying to use the Annulled Grand Magic would lead to cultivation deviation.

Not even Doom himself with his psychic-based God Legion Seal could actually cultivate the Annulled Grand Magic, so it seemed obvious that it would be very dangerous for Yang Qi to do so.

But if Yang Qi died, then maybe Doom would be able to get his God Legion Seal.

However, now it seemed that Yang Qi was cultivating the technique without any negative side effects. Even more frightening for Doom, Yang Qi was cultivating the Unspoiled Body, an energy art that was on the same level as the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. Normally they would be in conflict, but Yang Qi found a balance with the Purrfect God Art, and had even freed himself of the shackles of the seal.

By now, Doom realized that there was no way he would be able to kill Yang Qi and take his seal.

And if he couldn’t kill Yang Qi, there was little chance that he could force him into cultivation deviation. Yang Qi’s cultivation base was so refined that he could defend against the illusion-based wretch energy of the Great Necropolis, which went to show how strong he was.

Slowly but surely, Doom was losing any feelings of antagonism toward Yang Qi. In terms of the God Legion Seal, he knew that if he wanted to get it, he would have to wait until Yang Qi gave it to him.

As soon as Doom unleashed the Unbounded God Reverberation, Proud World and the Shepherd felt their psychic power rising, defending themselves against the sound from the coffin that Yang Qi had just opened.

The piercing sound that emanated from the coffin very nearly pierced through the Purrfect God Art, striking pain into the hearts of everyone present.

They all felt as if they were suddenly in immense danger because of the shrill, despairing call.

It filled them with the certainty that they were all about to meet a grisly end.

Crack!

The lid of the coffin flew back, and wretch energy poured out of it. At the same time, a person was revealed, laying prone in the coffin. They almost looked as if they were alive, just sleeping.

All of a sudden, Doom’s eyes went wide and he shrieked, “How could the person in the coffin be me?!”

“Agggghhhhh!” howled the Shepherd. “It’s me! I'm in the coffin!”

“The person in the coffin is me!” Proud World shrieked. “What’s going on here!? How could I be laying in that coffin? Who is the real me? The one in the coffin, or the one outside the coffin?”

Chaotic emotions could now be sensed within the protection of the Purrfect God Art.

Yang Qi was shocked. However, he knew that if his Purrfect God Art hadn’t contained traces of the Annulled Grand Magic, which gave it the ability to pierce through illusions of all kinds, his companions would likely have already begun trying to kill each other.

Steeling himself, he looked into the coffin at the person quietly lying inside. The person was tall and well-built, with a long battle robe. And he glowed with a holy light. It was none other than Yang Qi himself.

He was lying there in the coffin!

All of a sudden, Yang Qi was struck by a very jarring sensation as he suddenly wondered which version of himself was real, and which was an illusion.

I'm in the coffin.

His eyes suddenly clouded over a bit, and the bubble created by the Purrfect God Art began weakening, as though it might vanish. “I have to find the real me. The version in the coffin is real. That’s who I am. This person outside is fake. I need to find my true ego. The real me. That’s the only way to escape. That's the only way....”

He suddenly felt the urge to go lie down in the coffin.

However, just in the moment when it seemed he would become completely lost, he heard something deep in his sea of consciousness.

Purr. Purr....

The sound seemed immeasurably loud, filling his mind, shaking him deeply.

All of a sudden, he was completely awake.

RUMBLE!

A human face flew out of the coffin, its tongue bright red as it shot toward the Purrfect God Art bubble and began licking it, as though it sought to pierce it in that fashion.

If the bubble were to be pierced through, then everyone inside would definitely be in critical peril. The horrifying face didn’t look like Yang Qi at all now. It was twisted and distorted, and more wicked and wretched than anything Yang Qi had ever seen before in his entire life.

‘Time to use everything the Purrfect God Art can do!’ Sweating coldly, Yang Qi drew on all of his energy arts, causing the Purrfect God Art bubble to suddenly start spinning and emitting thunderous rumblings.

“Die!”

He thrust his palms toward the outside, unleashing mountain-toppling, sea-draining force, which shot toward the horrifying face and surrounded it with a bubble.

The face issued a distorted smile, then crumpled into a seething mist that shot toward the main crimson coffin and disappeared into it.

Only at this point did everyone begin to calm down and slowly wake up from what was like little more than a dream.

“Vile, that was nothing short of vile!” Doom exclaimed, cold sweat pouring down him. Normally speaking, people this powerful wouldn't sweat. However, they weren’t gods; therefore, in circumstances like this, their instincts would take over. As terror filled them, their energy and blood would converge, and their psychic power would dissipate, which would lead to the creation of droplets that would roll down them as sweat.

Thankfully, they were mid Terrifying experts, so despite having been frightened, they recovered quickly. Furthermore, they all consumed medicinal pills that caused the psychic sweat to disappear, and restored them to peak condition.

“Definitely very wretched,” Yang Qi said. Even as the words left his mouth, the coffin crumbled into rubble. Without the face that had occupied it, the coffin turned into an ordinary item that his Purrfect God Art easily crushed out of existence.

“You all saw yourselves in the coffin, didn’t you?” he asked. “And then you started wondering which version of you was real, the one outside, or the one in the coffin. It was an incredible art of illusion that very nearly entranced me. Thankfully, my Purrfect God Art worked in the critical moment and brought me to my senses. If I hadn’t woken up, that face would have broken in here and wreaked disaster on all of us.”

“Many thanks to you, Yang Qi,” Doom said. “You keep saving us over and over again. In the past, we were always on guard against you, but it seems to me there’s no reason for such an attitude. You’ve had plenty of chances to kill us in this place, so it seems plain you’re not plotting against me to get my God Legion Seal. Why don’t we truly join forces to get out of this miserable situation?”

“Yes, I finally understand how superior you are,” Proud World said. He could tell that Yang Qi could have easily killed them all just now, but instead, had saved them.

“I never had any ill intentions,” Yang Qi said. “In any case, let’s not waste words. Just now, the assault of that horrifying face allowed me to push my psychic scale a bit higher. I also gained some more enlightenment. Although these coffins are strange, I think we can proceed forward. Vanquishing these illusions will be very beneficial. Let’s continue opening them one by one, until we finally get to the crimson coffin, which seems to be controlling the others. Then we can find out what’s going on here.”

Chapter 1114: The Coffin

RUMBLE!

With some experience under his belt, Yang Qi was no longer afraid. He quickly unleashed a vicious palm move, causing another coffin to break open and resulting in another bloodcurdling scream as a person was revealed inside. Sure enough, he saw himself.

However, considering this was the second time around, he wasn't startled.

Neither were any of the others. Their calm did a lot to weaken the illusion; another ghostly face appeared and lunged toward the bubble of the Purrfect God Art, but Yang Qi quickly crushed it, provoking another scream as it collapsed and disappeared into the main coffin.

Yang Qi ignored that aspect and went on to crush another coffin.

This time, the coffin wasn’t devoid of corporeal items. Unexpectedly, there was a mask inside!

It was made of bronze and painted with a host of flowery designs. Furthermore, it looked brand new, as opposed to something that had been sealed away for countless years.

Yang Qi flicked his finger, causing a bubble to appear around it. Upon failing to find anything dangerous about it, he pulled it over to him.

When he grabbed it, he was suddenly assailed by countless illusions. He became a ghost, then a god, then found himself struggling within the six daos of reincarnation. He experienced numerous visions before finally saying, “Be sealed.”

Unleashing the Devil-God Seal, he locked the mask down and suppressed the illusions. Now, it just looked like an ordinary copper mask.

“What is this?” Yang Qi asked of Doom. “It seems like a god item, but I don't sense any godliness in it. It’s powerful, though. If it weren’t for my recent advancement in energy arts, I would’ve been pulled into its illusions. Do any of you want to take a look?”

“Let me have a look,” Proud World said. He took the copper mask, whereupon his face fell and he began to tremble and sweat profusely.

Seeing that things were about to take a turn for the worse, Doom reached out and grabbed the mask from Proud World’s hands. After regaining lucidity, Proud World slowly exhaled and said, “That thing is vile. I don’t think we should touch anything from this cave. Be careful, Doom.”

With the mask in hand, Doom was already shaking back and forth, yet managed to keep his mind clear. Howling, he used his God Legion Seal, causing golden light to protect himself until he finally threw the mask back to Yang Qi.

“Do you know what it is, Brother Doom? Coming from the Primeval Age, you’re far more experienced and knowledgeable than us.”

“I'm not sure...” Doom said, shaking his head. “None of us know much about the Great Necropolis. The ancient records from the god world don’t mention anything about it, and it seemingly came out of nowhere. When I touched the mask just now, I did experience an illusion, but unfortunately I couldn’t benefit from it.”

“Whatever it is, it's a treasure,” the Shepherd said. “Why don’t we work together to open more of the coffins and see what we can find?”

“That's exactly what I was thinking,” Yang Qi said with a nod. Having opened two coffins in a row, he had some new ideas. “You three provide assistance by using whatever psychic blessing techniques you have on me. Brother Doom, why not explain your Unbounded God Reverberation technique to Proud World and the Shepherd? Give them a bit of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, which will boost their cultivation bases and psyches. Then, all of you can assist me in subjugating whatever wretch-devils appear.”

“Alright!”

Considering that Yang Qi had saved their lives so many times, they were now convinced that he harbored no ill intentions. Doom immediately took action, giving the requisite techniques to Proud World and the Shepherd, allowing them to make big progress with their psyches.

“Now, all three of us will use the Unbounded God Reverberation together!” Doom unleashed the technique, sending the reverberation of sound into Yang Qi’s mind.

At the same time, the Shepherd and Proud World joined in.

Bolstered by the blessings being poured into him, Yang Qi unleashed another palm strike, smashing open the nearest coffin. This time, another face appeared, wailing in ghostly fashion. However, considering how much Yang Qi’s psychic scale was being boosted, how could something like this be a threat to him? Quickly drawing on the Purrfect God Art, he wrapped the face up and dragged it toward him, hoping to get a better idea of what exactly it was.

The other faces had all been sucked back into the main coffin, so he really had no idea what they were. Perhaps studying this one would give him a better understanding of the nature of its powers of illusion.

Yang Qi, Doom, Proud World, and the Shepherd would be virtually invincible on the Ancient Road to the Gods. But here in this cave of coffins, they had faced deadly peril over and over again, nearly dying as a result. Therefore, there was no way they would pass up the opportunity to identify what was behind it all.

After snatching the face with the Purrfect God Art, it screamed and struggled mightily, causing a huge drain on Yang Qi’s will and true energy. Thankfully, he had his three compatriots to back him up.

With all four of them working together, they slowly managed to drag the face closer to them.

It rippled and distorted constantly, shifting between various ferocious visages, and at the same time, let loose piercing screams. However, none were particularly effective, and everyone felt their psychic power slowly increasing as a result.

RIP!

Something within Proud World’s mind suddenly popped.

“My psychic scale just increased by one!” he exclaimed. “I thought I was completely stuck, but after cultivating the Unbounded God Reverberation I felt it beginning to stir. And with the provocation of this horrific face, I've actually improved! There’s nothing more gratifying than punishing evildoers!”

Peering at the face, Doom said, “It seems to me that this face is the rancorous energy of a perished god from the god world. The vital energy of the god world would normally be a complete mystery to people like us. But we might be able to assimilate this rancorous energy and turn wretched into righteous. There’s a technique from the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth designed to do just that. It can even be used to turn fiend-devils into angels. If we use it on the face, then maybe we can gain a tool to use in the fight against the crimson coffin. We have a big opportunity on our hands here, something we would never have on the outside.”

“I agree on trying to assimilate the face,” Yang Qi said. “I want to see exactly what it is.” Suddenly, the Sovereign Lord’s Holy and Far-Reaching Consummate Omnicurse appeared, causing sagelight to rage toward the Purrfect God Art bubble.

“Continue boosting Yang Qi’s psychic power!” Doom said.

RUMBLE!

As the power of four top experts battered the face, it began screaming with increased ferocity.

“Not good!” Yang Qi said. Unexpectedly, the face was fighting back with screams so intense they could rip one's soul to shreds.

“Don’t let it get out into the open, Yang Qi!” Everyone could sense the danger they were in.

“Keep it suppressed!” Doom shouted. “I’ll channel some true energy from my God Legion Seal into you!” Raging, golden power suddenly erupted out of him, giving Yang Qi access to Doom’s lifetime of cultivation effort.

In the briefest of moments, Yang Qi’s own Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth began experiencing a dramatic advancement.

His will convergence began skyrocketing, climbing to the highest heavens and breaking through barriers to reach a higher level. He suddenly found himself in a realm where everything was real instead of illusory, where deathless godliness abounded.

Unexpectedly, he was immeasurably close to the god world.

He felt like he was the King of Godmammoths. Winds raged in the god world, and wild colors flashed in heaven and earth as all of the gods stared at him in terror.

Back when Yang Qi had taken some of Proud Heaven’s true energy and used it for cultivation, the fact that it contained a different aspect of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth caused dramatic transformations.

Now that Doom was holding nothing back, it was as if Yang Qi were suddenly benefiting from the combined power of the complete God Legion Seal.

Crack. Rattle.

His Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth improved, his energy flows accelerated, and his psychic scale climbed.

RIP!

He broke through from two hundred to two hundred and ten. Two hundred twenty. Two hundred thirty. It continued all the way until he reached two hundred and sixty.

However, his psyche didn’t achieve a breakthrough into the mid Terrifying level.

On the upside, the nascent souls in his sea of energy had become fiercer and stronger. Doom was obviously throwing all caution to the wind and putting absolute trust in Yang Qi. If Yang Qi wanted, he could use that moment to easily snatch Doom’s God Legion Seal.

But how could Yang Qi ever do something like that?

Nodding, he said, “Alright. Brother Doom, I'm going to subjugate this face and see exactly what it is!”

Chapter 1115: Assimilating the Face

Twisting and distorting, the face struggled to escape, but Yang Qi’s cultivation base was too high. It screamed and shrieked within the Purrfect God Art bubble, but the sound waves it sent into the seas of consciousness of everyone present were easily negated.

“Boundless Tribulations and Kalpas!” Yang Qi said.

The face bashed against the bubble this way and that, producing such a display of power that everyone was struck with astonishment.

But Yang Qi didn’t care about that.

Stirring his true energy, he exhaled deeply, and a host of purring bubbles shot out and entered the face’s vital energy.

Crash!

The face immediately expanded because of the bubbles, until it looked almost like a full head.

Shock covered the face as Yang Qi went on to shout, “Detonate!”

All of a sudden, the face exploded into four pieces.

“Four Polarities Shall Not Reconverge!” Yang Qi shoved his palm out, sending four bubbles to surround the four aspects of the face, making it impossible for them to come back together. At the same time, he sent a powerful stream of true energy into Doom.

Doom’s psyche instantly soared as Yang Qi returned the energy arts that he had just been lent. At the same time, Doom’s energy arts began dramatically transforming as the energy of Yang Qi’s Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth rapidly empowered him.

Yang Qi was using his own advancements from moments ago to help Doom. It was as if Doom had lent him a boat to cross a river, and he returned the boat to him after he reached the other side.

“You helped me, so I'm helping you!” Yang Qi said.

Doom burst out laughing as he felt a misty barrier within him crumble into nothing. “You help yourself, and I help myself. If we each focus on the self, karma won’t result!”

“Excellent,” Yang Qi said. Their entire conversation played out mentally, so neither the Shepherd nor Proud World had any idea what they were saying. However, they were both convinced that it was for the good of everyone.

“Now let’s deal with this face,” Yang Qi said, once again drawing on all of the energy he could. “Unbounded God Reverberation!”

The other three followed suit.

Meanwhile, the four separate aspects of the face were screaming shrilly, causing Yang Qi to suddenly feel very cold, as though something mysterious and unknown was heading in his direction. At the same time, the millions upon millions of coffins began rattling, as if the faces inside them were about to emerge.

It was a terrifying prospect; if all of the coffins opened at the same time, there was no way anyone could stand up to all of them. Not even Yang Qi could hope to do so. He needed to finish his process of assimilation as quickly as possible!

RIP!

He spat out some blood, drawing on a divine ability that would rapidly drain his vital energy and Blood of the One God. Sending some blood to the four faces, he baptized them, causing countless streams of vital energy within them to transform into ash.

All of a sudden, Yang Qi began to speak in a very deep voice. “The Blood of the One God can baptize and purify all evil. From the world of men to the god world, all wickedness can be cleansed. The Blood of the One God shall wash them all clean....”

It almost seemed as if the One God, the Sovereign Lord himself, had possessed Yang Qi in order to use his blood to cleanse the world.

In that moment, Yang Qi suddenly gained new enlightenment regarding the profundities of the Blood of the One God.

The blood-splattered faces screamed with more intensity as they were transformed into four manifestations of holy light, like bright white rainbows untainted by even a speck of dust. It was hard to say exactly what they were, but they were obviously profoundly holy.

“Incredible! This thing can definitely improve my cultivation base!” Doom scooped up a white rainbow and sucked it into himself. Instantly, his eyes opened, and they were like bright white lightning flashing on a pitch-black night.

Yang Qi knew that by cleansing the rancorous energy with the Blood of the One God, they would revert to their original essence. And although he couldn’t tell what they had originally been, they were obviously something profoundly holy from the god world. Yang Qi absorbed one of them, and as soon as it entered him, everything he had lost because of spending his Blood of the One God was restored, and his psychic scale advanced by ten.

Of course, although it was only ten, that represented what should normally have been incredibly difficult.

Generally speaking, people at this peak level should only be able to advance after reaching the god world. And that seemed to indicate that this cave could be considered something that was part of the god world.

Bam. Bam. Bam. Bam. Bam.

A host of explosions occurred as countless coffins opened.

Ghostly screams could be heard as more faces appeared, then rushed toward them. Everyone gasped as they realized that Yang Qi’s Purrfect God Art couldn’t possibly be strong enough to deal with this.

There were millions upon millions of coffins here! With millions upon millions of these faces working together, what level of strength was at play? Even if Yang Qi were much stronger than he was now, how could he possibly deal with such a situation? His three companions looked on with ashen faces.

Yang Qi was also shocked, but he quickly tightened up the Purrfect God Art bubble, simultaneously reaching out to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. As long as he could connect to the chart, he could escape, and possibly even lead these vicious entities in with him and have the will of King Immortal-Slayer to handle them.

Unfortunately, he couldn't sense the chart. Apparently, they were so far into the depths of the necropolis that the spatial powers of the chart were restricted. Heart pounding, Yang Qi next considered breaking through to the mid Terrifying level, and even got ready to draw on the power of the nascent souls in this sea of energy to do so.

However, just when he was about to make his move, a sound emerged from the central crimson coffin, deep and sonorous, almost like the sound of breathing.

In the blink of an eye, the countless faces were sucked into the crimson coffin, causing the entire cave to go completely and utterly still.

Although everyone felt relieved, they couldn’t help but wonder what exactly was in that crimson coffin, and what it was doing. If those faces obeyed whatever entity was in that coffin, then how strong must it be?

It seemed unimaginable.

Yang Qi's expression never changed, though. He remained calm, and simply sat there waiting to see what would happen next.

POP!

Another sound rose up from the crimson coffin, almost like the bubbling of boiling water. Everyone looked on anxiously, not daring to approach the coffin for fear that whatever was inside would be far beyond their ability to deal with. Of course, at the same time, they were certain that there must be a great treasure in the coffin.

“What exactly is in there?” Proud World said, swallowing hard.

“Who knows,” Yang Qi said. “Why don’t we go take a look? Oh, by the way, we need to check the empty coffins to see if they have any treasure in them.” With that, he sent out a host of bubbles into the emptied coffins.

Treasures immediately began flying out of the coffins.

Not every coffin contained something, but many did, and every single one of them was a mask.

They were all copper, and all had vicious expressions twisting their faces. The way they were painted made them seem like opera masks from the mortal world, except powerful enough to suck people into illusions.

In the end, Yang Qi collected thirty-four new masks, each one with a different, terrifying design. Obviously, the designs weren’t human, and they almost seemed alive. Furthermore, he didn’t dare to think of them as magical treasures, as he had no way of actually controlling them. Adding them to the original one he had taken, that made thirty-five masks.

‘Thirty-five masks,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘Don’t tell me that there’s an even bigger mask in the crimson coffin. And that together they make thirty-six.... Thirty-six. Seventy-two. Could these masks have belonged to a group of people similar to the seventy-two monarchs, including King Immortal-Slayer? It seems hard to believe that could be the case.’

Even as the thought flitted through his head, the crimson coffin suddenly opened, sending out immense energy that instantly popped Yang Qi’s Purrfect God Art bubble.

The four compatriots flew backward, slamming into the wall of the stone cave, leaving them deeply shaken and their true energy running very low. Thankfully, they weren’t hurt.

However, the fact that they had been sent flying went to show the extraordinary power of whatever was in the coffin.

Even as they bunched together for safety, a red energy floated out of the crimson coffin, which took the form of a masked face. There was no head, just a face and a mask.

And there were open eyes that seemed to pierce deep into Yang Qi and his fellows, causing their throats to turn dry and their bodies to become numb.

“The God Legion Seal?” the masked face said, its voice making Yang Qi feel suffocated. “A bearer of the God Legion Seal, here? And not just one, but two? And why isn’t the third one here? Why have you barged into my tomb, and even assimilated one of my subordinates?”

“What are you?” Proud World asked. “And—”

Reaching out to stop him from talking, Yang Qi said, “Senior, what is an entity like you doing here in the Great Necropolis? I used the Blood of the One God to cleanse your subordinate, which means that you must be one of the holiest spirits from the god world. You're definitely not an ordinary fallen entity, so why cause problems for me?”

Chapter 1116: Mysterious Mask

The mask that had been harrying the four compatriots had finally come out into the open.

Numerous faces had flown into the vile crimson coffin and ended up awakening this larger face of unknown origin. It possessed what seemed to be the might of a god, something that Yang Qi and the others couldn’t possibly fight against. The only upside that Yang Qi could think of was that the thing seemed to be leery of his God Legion Seal. And the fact that it hadn’t immediately attacked them was very telling.

Although Yang Qi made sure to word things politely, he was actually probing the thing in the hopes of learning more of its motives and powers.

He had already fully refined the ten thousand pieces of godhood within him, so he could rise to the mid Terrifying level whenever he wanted. That was thanks to the power he’d received from Doom, which came from the other God Legion Seal. As of this moment, the nascent souls inside him were enormous, and all of them resembled golden imps like the one from the God Legion Seal. At the same time, their fluctuations were highly reminiscent of the Unspoiled Body.

If he broke through, he was certain that heaven-shaking, earth-shattering transformations would result, although he wasn’t certain if he would be able to reach the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

Furthermore, for all he knew, this masked face might have some sort of divine ability that could prevent him from achieving his breakthrough. Being unclear about who this face was, or what it was capable of, he needed more information before he decided what to do. The last thing he wanted to do was end up shooting himself in the foot.

RUUUUMBLE....

“Two bearers of the God Legion Seal,” the face said. “Great. Excellent! There’s no need for you to ask about who I am, boy. Even if I told you, it wouldn’t make any sense to you. You killed one of my subordinates and used him to further your cultivation. For committing a crime like that, I should skin you alive. Instead, I’ll give you a chance to atone for your crime. What do you think?”

“What do you mean atone for our crime?” Doom said. “How, exactly? If you need help from us in some way, we’d be more than happy to comply.”

No one dared to act arrogantly in front of a bizarre entity like this; one wrong step and they could easily be wiped out of existence, with no chance to throw up a defense.

“Simple,” the masked face said. “This coffin here has a seal powered by the Great Necropolis itself, which is keeping me imprisoned. As long as you remove the seal and free me, I won’t kill you. I’ll even give my subordinates to you to assimilate. Do you know how powerful you’ll become if you do that?

“You two bearers of the God Legion Seal are my only hope, so I'm obviously not going to hurt you. The truth is that helping you will be helping yourselves. This stone cave is part of the essence of the Great Necropolis, so I'm guessing your ultimate goal is to move the necropolis and gain access to the Ancient Road to the Gods. Therefore, you have no other choice than to help me. Agreed?”

“Move the necropolis?” Yang Qi said. “Senior, are you saying you know how to do that?”

The masked face cackled strangely. “Of course I know. The Great Necropolis was used to block the Ancient Road to the Gods as part of a larger conspiracy. An evil faction of gods in the god world hoped to prevent anyone in the lower worlds from reaching godly ascension. The road has already been removed from the Primeval Age and the Future Era, but the evil faction of gods has continually failed to remove it from the Immortal Dao Age. Therefore, they sent the Great Necropolis to block access to the road. But eventually, they’ll figure out a way to completely destroy the ancient road. And when that happens, no one will ever be able to become gods again.”

Upon hearing this information, Yang Qi kept his face expressionless, but inside, he was flabbergasted.

Although it was entirely possible that this evil entity was partially or completely lying, one thing was obvious: the thing really was sealed. Otherwise, why wouldn’t it have left long ago?

All of a sudden, Yang Qi’s heart started pounding. “Senior, have you encountered another person with the God Legion Seal?”

“I have,” the face replied. “And he was far, far stronger than you two. He even had the aura of the god world on him, which means that he’s been there. Obviously, he returned, although I’m not sure why or how. In any case, he managed to slip out of the constraints I’ve erected and leave this place. Before leaving, he worked out a deal with me and left some of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth in the sealing mark holding me in place. In other words, as long as you use your Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth on the seal, I’ll be able to break free. Once I'm free, certain items connected to the Great Necropolis Fountainhead will also emerge. You see, not too long ago, the essence of the necropolis erupted with godpower seeds, which allowed people to become Inheritors. Little do they know that the seeds were all infected with some of my wretched evil!” The face burst out into maniacal laughter.

“So this place is the essence of the Great Necropolis!” Doom said. “It seems my intuition was correct.”

“In that case, Senior,” Yang Qi said, “We’ll definitely help unseal you. But considering how strong you are, it would be really easy for you to kill us once you’re free. How can we trust you?” Although the masked face was saying some very enticing things, Yang Qi couldn't just ignore the fact that it had met with Proud Heaven and come up with some sort of deal.

Furthermore, the fact that Proud Heaven had escaped this thing’s clutches only went to prove that escape was possible.

In fact, it was entirely possible that the masked face wasn’t as strong as it seemed. Perhaps it was only putting on a front of strength, but was really weak inside. Already, the gears in Yang Qi’s head were turning.

In response to Yang Qi’s question, the masked face gave a cold harrumph, then angrily said, “If you four ants don’t help me, I’ll just kill you! I could easily wipe you out right now, even in my current state. You’ve already had a taste of my strength, so you know what I'm capable of.”

“Alright, give it a shot,” Yang Qi said, suddenly sounding a lot less humble than before.

“Brother Yang Qi, don’t be rash!” Doom said via will projection. “This thing is far too strong for us to fight. Let’s take things one step at a time. For all we know, we might benefit from this situation.”

“I'm just testing him,” Yang Qi replied. “If this thing has had contact with Proud Heaven, it’s highly likely that its understanding of the outside world is all based on things Proud Heaven told it. And the fact that Proud Heaven escaped proves that the masked face has limits to its power. Another thing to consider: we know that it has powers of illusion. So it’s possible that when we were hit and sent flying just now, we weren’t actually hit. What if we just flew backward of our own accord and it made us think we’d been struck? Perhaps his energy arts are actually mental attacks.”

“Mental attacks?” Doom replied thoughtfully.

“Exactly. Mental attacks! I've done a lot of research into past civilizations. Did you know that on some planets in the mortal world, people don’t practice cultivation? In other words, they have no way to send their true energy outside of their body. However, they developed other abilities. For example, they have the ability to force an enemy into retreat, not by the power of a blow, but by taking control of the opponent's will and mind.

“That’s what I mean by mental attacks. What if this thing's true energy isn’t as strong as we think it is, and he’s relying completely on mental attacks to deal with us? Remember, everything that happened up to this point involved external forces tampering with our minds. In the end, it was as if we were attacking ourselves.”

Even as the words left Yang Qi’s mouth, he had a sudden burst of enlightenment.

Who am I? I'm who? Who is who? Confusing questions like that were often hard to answer. And right now, this masked face seemed to be using exactly those questions to exploit the weaknesses that existed in the hearts and spirits of its enemies. Of course, Yang Qi still had a secret weapon in case he was wrong.

“Could it be that you’re not going to agree to my lovely proposal?” the face said, sounding somewhat angry. All of a sudden, Yang Qi and his companions felt a mountain-crushing, sea-shattering force weighing down on them, as though their doomsday had come.

“Ha!” Yang Qi shouted, binding his psyche to his companions and causing them to suddenly surpass the space-time around them.

Then he threw his hands out, causing an enormous bubble to appear and shoot in the direction of the masked face.

All illusions crumbled as the face was then enveloped by the bubble.

“You were right!” Proud World said. “It's not really that strong at all! It was all an illusion! Now we can finally see what this thing is!”

“Watch out!” Yang Qi said as the bubble exploded.

The masked face chuckled coldly. “Not bad,” it said, surprise in its voice. “Not bad at all. You broke through my illusion very quickly. You’re a genius among geniuses, just like Proud Heaven. It would be hard to find someone like you even in the god world. Very good. Wonderful! But do you really think that everything about me is an illusion? Apparently, you still haven’t realized that in this world, what is false is real and what is real is false. There’s actually no difference between the two.”

Chapter 1117: Seeing Through

“Don't get angry, Senior!” Yang Qi blurted, intentionally making himself look nervous. “You’ve truly reached an invincible level in which reality and illusion mix. The truth is that heaven and earth are nothing but an enormous illusion. There isn’t even a need to distinguish what reality is. We’re not interested in causing problems for you, we really just want to open that seal. However, we have to have insurance that you won’t hurt us afterward.”

This sudden change of tone was obviously a surprise to Doom, who wasn't sure exactly what Yang Qi was up to.

As for the masked face, it seemed to calm down a bit.

“Are you being serious?” the face asked. Obviously, it really did want Yang Qi and the others to help unseal it.

“Of course I’m being serious!” Yang Qi said, nodding vigorously. “We just want to live through this, not cause problems for you. As long as you promise not to hurt us after you’re free, it would be our honor to unseal you, Senior. Besides, you’ll surely reward us handsomely, so there’s no way we would foolishly treat you like an enemy.”

The masked face seemed to calm down even more. “Excellent. I'm already feeling much better about this. Fine, I hereby swear not to harm you, and should I violate this oath, let me be executed by a myriad of gods. Is that better? You see, I just want to get back to the god world, and the truth is that my prison here is actually one of the exits of the Great Necropolis. In other words, it leads to the Ancient Road to the Gods. Enter here, and you can benefit greatly. Of course, there will be dangers, and it will be a big challenge. Are you willing to give it a shot?”

“Danger is exactly what we were looking for!” Doom said. By now, he realized that Yang Qi was conning the masked face, and decided to go along. After all, none of them had any idea what deal the thing had struck with Proud Heaven. And what exactly was sealed within that coffin? Upon being freed, would it attack them? There were many more questions, but unfortunately, the only thing they could do right now was take a bit of a risk. And perhaps they could even figure out a way to free themselves, the same as Proud Heaven had done.

“Very well then,” the masked face said. “Come over here and step into my coffin. The sealing mark is at the bottom.”

Grating sounds rang out as the coffin expanded, and a red whirlpool appeared inside of it, which tugged Yang Qi and his companions into it.

At that point, Yang Qi realized just how terrifying the masked face really was.

It was impossible to see what the mask covered, such as the facial features. However, it was possible to see that there was skin underneath it. It was a very horrifying sight overall.

Soon, they were right over the coffin. Looking down, they could only see a hazy mist that faded into complete darkness. It seemed like a very wretched and evil place, and they could hear the howling of ghosts inside. And the power that pulsed inside left them feeling very uneasy.

Suddenly, a godly wind blew out of the coffin, and as it passed along Yang Qi and his companions, they shivered down to their bones.

“What kind of wind is that?” Proud World said, wrapping his arms around himself to ward off the cold.

“It’s a netherdrift nightgale!” the masked face said, chuckling coldly. “It’s designed to corrode the bodies of gods, and ultimately disperse their spiritual and physical souls. The fact that you, who aren’t even gods, can stand up to it, just goes to show how useful the God Legion Seal and the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth can be. Imagine, I've been imprisoned in this coffin, constantly battered by the netherdrift nightgale. Now you can truly understand the vicious nature of my imprisoner.”

“Senior,” Yang Qi said, “how exactly did you end up here?”

The face chuckled again, causing their skin to crawl. “You want to know how I ended up here? Sadly, not even I know. I only know that when the Great Necropolis appeared in the god world, it caused a huge commotion. A lot of god-spirits went inside to explore, but they died, one after another. That’s where all the godhood inside the necropolis comes from. What did you think? That some archenemy of mine sealed me in here? That I came in here to explore, was plotted against, and ended up stuck? That I want revenge, and want to open up the Ancient Road to the Gods to get back to the god world?”

Although his words were full of lies, Yang Qi had at least picked up some new information. The Great Necropolis had appeared without warning in the god world, and no one knew why. Not even the gods knew what the necropolis was, so who had sent it?

“Boy, those bubbles of yours are really amazing. Definitely on par with the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. Although, I'm curious why, despite being a bearer of the God Legion Seal, you don’t actually have the seal with you.” The masked face exhaled deeply, temporarily suppressing the netherdrift nightgale, and relieving some of the corrosive pressure. “Why not just bring out your God Legion Seal and use it to defend against the wind? If you don’t, you’re going to have a rough time.”

“I'm in no hurry,” he replied calmly. “When the time comes that I need the seal, then I’ll use it.” With the Purrfect God Art bubble surrounding the four of them, they headed into the coffin. "Alright, Senior, we’re going to undo this sealing mark.”

Upon entering the coffin, they instantly felt as though they were in a different heaven and earth. Everything around them was misty and hazy, and the blowing netherdrift nightgale was constantly corroding the bubble. However, Yang Qi wasn’t worried. He simply exhaled some true energy, causing the bubble to build back up around them.

Something was just barely visible up ahead, so Yang Qi opened his Lord's Eye, revealing a wide plain littered with corpses. They were gods, but under the effects of the netherdrift nightgale, they were now little more than patchy skin draped over bleached bones.

CRACK!

One of the corpses finally completely succumbed to the netherdrift nightgale and collapsed into dust.

“Head further in,” echoed the voice of the masked face. “Do you see the sealing mark yet? It’s right in the very middle, atop an altar.”

Yang Qi spotted the altar. It was impossible to tell what it was crafted from, but it seemed completely unaffected by the blowing winds. And it was bright red, just like the coffin itself. It was covered with paper talismans, as well as a golden streak that seemed to have been left behind after someone had struck the altar with a mighty blow that weakened the altar to the point where it was still and silent.

It almost looked like a writhing golden dragon, and it smacked of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.

It must have been left there by Proud Heaven.

“Good, you found the altar,” the masked face said excitedly. “Hurry up and use your Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth on it. Once you break the sealing mark, I’ll be free. Then I can help you reach the Ancient Road to the Gods.”

“What do we do?” Doom asked Yang Qi via will projection. “Do we use our techniques, or not?”

He knew it was a critical moment of life or death. If they broke the sealing mark, it would probably spell disaster for them. But if you ride a tiger, it's hard to get off, and right now they didn’t seem to have many options to pick from. Since Yang Qi was taking the lead, Doom wanted to know what his plan was.

“Simple, we help him unravel the sealing mark,” Yang Qi replied. “Come, Brother Doom. We’ll do it together. When our versions of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth combine with Proud Heaven’s, it will open the sealing mark and free the masked face. We need to make sure to absorb the power of Proud Heaven’s version. Right now, we have our two versions combined, but if we can get more of its quintessence, we’ll definitely get a lot stronger.”

Without any further ado, he launched a palm strike right at the sealing mark.

As his blow closed in, winds screamed around him and the paper talismans tried to fight back. He didn't care. The trumpeting of godmammoths surrounded him as he held nothing back.

When Doom saw Yang Qi going all out with his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, he joined him, using his most powerful attack.

The two versions of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth combined, slamming into the altar and causing golden light to flare. The altar shuddered, then cracked open, causing an ice-cold energy to erupt out that threw the netherdrift nightgale into chaos.

Almost immediately, the altar began tugging at the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, pulling it in. The Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth was the most domineering power in all heaven and earth, thus, Yang Qi could immediately see how strong this altar was. It could suck in any and all kinds of power.

Chapter 1118: Three Combined

The altar was capable of absorbing just about any power that was sent against it, but it couldn’t handle the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. And when three experts combined their versions of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, the results were beyond imagination.

Yang Qi had a very serious expression on his face.

Right now, the three expressions of power were mixing together. The Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth was becoming complete, and it was like something that would cause angst even for three powerful gods.

Of course, Yang Qi already had three expressions of god legion angst, in other words, the three versions of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. His version, which was focused on power; Doom’s version, which emphasized the psyche; and Proud Heaven’s, that focused on fighting. That combination had helped him reach a higher level of enlightenment and push himself to the point of perfection. However, the will of fighting he had acquired was incomplete.

He had only been able to take the scrap of it that had lingered in the Shepherd.

In the beginning, that scrap of true energy had seemed boundless and magnificent. But he had long since ceased to cultivate it. His psychic scale was now a far cry from two hundred, giving him enlightenment of numerous matters. And the scrap of true energy he had acquired contained only a trifling will of fighting. In contrast, what had been left behind on this altar contained countless quintessences of fighting, and experience related to countless battles from the mortal world to the god world.

Even an ordinary person from the mortal world who suddenly gained experience like this would be able to kill immortals.

That was how terrifying it was.

Power and the psyche were foundational elements, whereas fighting experience related to skill and technique.

Someone with abundant fighting experience could often turn defeat into victory. In contrast, an extremely strong person who lacked experience might suffer defeat even at the hands of a much weaker foe.

For example, Yang Qi had a psychic scale of nearly three hundred. But if he lacked fighting experience, it was possible that a mid Terrifying expert with a psychic scale of only a hundred might actually defeat him.

Thankfully, Yang Qi had a lot of fighting experience and was no ignorant child. He had walked a path of blood and gore from the very beginning in the mortal world, slaughtered his way to the thirty-third ranked immortal worlds, then continued his life of combat in the Great Necropolis. He was always the ‘weak’ person who defeated someone stronger.

Now, the three aspects of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth were truly combining.

The energy from Proud Heaven’s version contained fighting experience and countless other bits of information, which streamed into Yang Qi’s mind, significantly bolstering what was already there.

Unexpectedly, his psychic scale yet again climbed!

He was coming very close to pushing the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth to the consummate level.

He had a host of martial arts and disciplines that he had developed, mostly out of speculation and observation, that were now being perfected. Not even Doom could possibly produce results like this.

One reason was that Yang Qi had mastered the Unspoiled Body. Years ago, the creator of the Unspoiled Body, the True Devil, had fought the King of Godmammoths countless times. And every time he did, his energy arts would be imbued with profound methods of countering the King of Godmammoths.

By using that quintessence knowledge to analyze the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, it revealed all sorts of vital information.

Fist of Fighting the Will of Heaven.

Grand-Heaven Yin-Yang Palms.

Strike of Heaven and Earth’s Wisdom.

Five-Phases Transformation Calamity.

The King-Desecrating Dragon-Depredating Transformations.

Black-White Heart-Spirit Agitation.

Countless martial disciplines flowed into his mind from Proud Heaven, filling his sea of consciousness. There were fist techniques, palm techniques, leg techniques, mental attack techniques, and methods for using swords, bows, lances, axes, crossbows, shields, hammers, hooks, tridents, whips, and every other imaginable weapon.

Proud Heaven’s will of battle, the fighting methods of the King of Godmammoths, were designed to suppress hells, crush darkness and gloom, and devastate wretched evil. Every martial discipline contained spectacular transformations, and every daoist technique was perfectly balanced.

With this, it was possible to understand all weapons and techniques in the world, as well as all vital energy, magical laws, and natural laws.

This was fighting.

With fighting experience like this, it would be possible to defy the might of heaven and withstand the attacks of gods. Even with a power index and psychic scale of zero, it would be possible to surpass heaven and earth to reach the god world. Not even the King of Godmammoths had ever reached this level.

Yang Qi watched as the three streams of energy on the altar combined into one, forming what looked like an enormous, golden godmammoth.

As for the altar, it obviously couldn’t withstand the force and began crumbling.

When it finally collapsed, Yang Qi could sense something beneath it, stirring eagerly, an unimaginable entity that was most likely part of the Great Necropolis itself. Apparently, this really was the place where the godpower seeds had emerged from.

No wonder the seeds contained such immense wretch energy.

As it turned out, when the seeds emerged, they were actually tainted by the masked face, who imbued them with wretched energy that caused the Inheritors to slaughter each other without hesitation.

Originally, it was assumed that those urgings had come from the Great Necropolis itself.

All of a sudden, Yang Qi came to the realization that the masked face was neither god, nor human, nor devil, nor demon. Instead, it was a conglomeration of rancorous energy created by numerous fallen gods. That energy had formed a body of its own, and although it was impossible to say exactly what it was, it was completely terrifying.

Although it was unclear how it ended up getting sealed, Yang Qi knew that if it were loosed on the world, it would shed torrents of blood and destroy countless people.

There was no way he could let that happen.

Just when the sealing mark was about to start falling apart, Yang Qi thrust his palm out and simultaneously began singing the Eternal Heavenly Aria. It started out as little more than a jaunty tune, but soon caused countless halos of blessing and damnification to swirl out. Those of blessing surrounded himself, Doom, Proud World and the Shepherd, while those of damnification settled onto the masked face.

Although the masked face had formidable powers of illusion, the Eternal Heavenly Aria had many aspects which focused on that which was true and real, and could pierce through all illusions.

Yang Qi’s cultivation base was constantly climbing. He had made progress with the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, and was now helped by halos of blessing. He had Proud Heaven’s fighting techniques, as well as the Annulled Grand Magic and the Sovereign Lord’s Holy and Far-Reaching Consummate Omnicurse.

After combining all of those things, he added in the Purrfect God Art to ensure that the masked face couldn’t possibly escape.

Blurring into motion, he flew up toward the masked face, converging all of his energy arts onto the tip of his finger. Then his finger hit the mask and a booming sound like a bell rang out within it.

An explosion of energy seemed to be occurring within the mask thanks to Yang Qi’s finger attack. In response, the ferocious voice of the face said, “You were plotting against me, boy!? How dare you! I'm going to kill you! I’ll free myself and use the entire Great Necropolis to—”

“Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth! Be devoured!”

Ignoring the howling masked face, Yang Qi opened his mouth and inhaled the third version of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.

“Are you looking to die!?” the masked face screamed, unleashing the most devastating sound wave attack it could muster, creating something like a sea of blades that swirled into the shape of a spear. It was a sound spear, and was so powerful that it quickly pierced through Yang Qi’s Purrfect God Art.

Yang Qi backed up, simultaneously sending the power of tribulations and kalpas out from every pore on his body.

When the sound spear hit the tribulations and kalpas, some of the spear was wiped out, but the rest continued on toward Yang Qi.

In the blink of an eye, it was right in front of him.

No defensive energy arts could stand up to this attack. And it was no illusion, it was an actual energy art.

“Not good!” Doom shouted, defending himself with his own god legion angst. “Get out of the way!”

However, when it was only a few meters away from Yang Qi, golden light emerged from his pores, flows of energy that created numerous long spears. They were none other than Infernal Deity Spears!

In the past, he had only been able to create one such spear at a time, but right now there were millions upon millions of them.

They crashed into the incoming sound spear, creating a huge explosion.

Chapter 1119: A Critical Juncture

Yang Qi had been playing the masked face all along, wanting to get into the coffin to see what Proud Heaven had left behind.

It was obvious that there was no way he would willingly allow himself to fall victim to the machinations of the masked face. Releasing this wretched and evil entity would only bring calamity to all of heaven and earth.

Therefore, instead of immediately undoing the sealing mark, he first absorbed the third type of power from the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. Then he launched an attack at the masked face using the quintessence of battle and all varieties of martial disciplines. The Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth came from the Sovereign Lord, and inherently contained the martial aspects of the legion of gods.

Who could possibly stand up to something like that?

Normally speaking, Yang Qi shouldn’t have been strong enough to launch a sneak attack on the masked face. But because the sealing mark was crumbling, the face had been distracted. Furthermore, Yang Qi had the formidable Purrfect God Art, which lent strength to his sudden strike.

Because of that, his initial blow did manage to injure the face.

However, the face was nothing to take lightly, and it immediately launched a devastating counter-attack in the form of a sound spear that seemed impossible to block. In response, Yang Qi called forth the wills of countless infernal deities, sending a host of Infernal Deity Spears out to defend himself.

Even so, when the two forces collided, the shock wave sent Yang Qi tumbling backward, spinning as rapidly as a top. Nobody could possibly withstand a blow like that without being hurt.

As he tumbled back, he felt expressions of will shattering within himself as his opponent drew on the power of illusions to injure him.

Thankfully, he had extensive fighting experience, so he quickly drew on his abilities to heal himself. “Annulled Grand Magic! Purrfect God Art!”

Recovering in the middle of a fight was another kind of valuable experience, one that many people failed to develop. However, with the addition of Proud Heaven’s fighting experience, Yang Qi had reached the point of perfection.

Furthermore, with all three aspects of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, his cultivation base was now so profound that he could repurpose the sealing mark and re-seal the masked face.

Yang Qi had already come to the conclusion that the reason the face was so strong right now was because of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth that Proud Heaven had left behind. Without the damage Proud Heaven had done to the sealing mark, the face would never have been able to cause such problems for Yang Qi and his companions.

As the masked face exploded, an enormous character appeared, none other than the one that meant “kill”. It contained the killing intent of perished gods and was like a vortex of destruction as it closed in on Yang Qi.

Everything trembled violently as the character approached, like a mountain of death, or millions upon millions of blades, all focused on destroying his true energy.

This was the ultimate expression of the word “kill”.

It was something very similar to the core teachings and doctrines of King Life-Killer, whose sword techniques Yang Qi had long since cultivated. And thanks to that, he was very familiar with the fundamental nature of the word “kill”.

A long sword suddenly appeared in Yang Qi’s hand, and as he flourished it, a host of talismans appeared around it, almost like golden grains of sand. The talismans shot toward the incoming “kill” character, and unexpectedly began devouring it, allowing Yang Qi to absorb it.

Unfortunately, as he did that, the three-part combined energy of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth began flowing away from him.

He quickly reached out and grabbed it.

But right then, in that most critical juncture, a cascade of sword light suddenly appeared.

Something completely unexpected was happening.

The sword light fell from above, entering the depths of the sealed area in the coffin. It was a dazzling sword light that seemed completely impossible to block. The sword energy, sword will, sword divinity, sword dao, sword heart, sword theory, and sword meaning... they were all completely perfect.

This was not the kind of sword that was meant to kill, but rather to save lives and subjugate devils.

The dazzling sword light swept forth amidst thunderous rumblings, causing plants to sprout as life force filled the area.

It was Star Swordlife’s sword!

This sword could truly vanquish all sorts of monsters, and it easily severed Yang Qi’s connection to the combined energy of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. Then, it sealed that energy!

Crack! Snap!

Star Swordlife snapped up the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, whereupon golden light shone from behind him, making him look like an ancient buddha. Meanwhile, a godmammoth could be seen above his head, trunk flailing.

That combined energy was the result of the cultivation efforts of Yang Qi, Doom, and Proud Heaven, and had provoked profound transformations in them.

Yet Star Swordlife had just taken it!

Previously, Star Swordlife had pushed his sword technique to the highest level, cultivating a sword of life that, once unleashed, would tap into the life force of himself and the universe, creating a divine ability that few could vanquish. But now, his cultivation base had advanced even further. He had the triple combination of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth pushing him to an unheard of peak in the mortal world.

Sword energy swirled around him, as well as holy life force, making him like a living god.

In fact, he seemed like he was just on the verge of godly ascension.

After being blessed by Proud Heaven, his Inheritor status became elevated. And with the triple combination of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, he had access to even more knowledge and wisdom. In the blink of an eye, it was as if all the radiance and light in the universe were poured into him, causing his nascent divinity to advance by leaps and bounds.

Crash!

He landed on the ground, golden energy swirling around him.

“I bet you never guessed I would show up here, Yang Qi! And I took your Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth to make sure you never kill again. Prepare to be captured and sealed!”

When the triple combination of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth was removed, the masked face let loose a piercing scream. With that combination gone, the sealing mark was growing stronger again, which meant the face was now doomed to be sealed forever.

RUUUUMBLE!

A sound like an enormous millstone could be heard as the rancorous energy of the masked face was sucked into the sealing mark. The bronze mask then clattered onto the ground. However, a moment later, a bubble appeared around it and subsequently vanished, along with the mask.

Yang Qi had taken it. Now he had all thirty-six masks, which was just like having all of the legacies of the seventy-two monarchs. The thirty-six masks were filled with wretched energy, as though they were the ultimate manifestation of terrifying horror. And although they seemed to be constantly trying to encroach on Yang Qi’s body and will, he didn’t care, as the process caused his psychic scale to rise.

After snatching them away, he looked over at the re-sealed face and Star Swordlife, who had just taken the triple combined Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. Surprisingly, Yang Qi’s face was completely expressionless. He had already come to the conclusion that the reason Star Swordlife was able to do this was because he had been aided by Proud Heaven.

In other words, he had become a pawn of Proud Heaven and had lost his own core principles.

“That wretch-devil is sealed, Star Swordlife,” he said, “but it wasn’t destroyed. The sealing mark has to be unraveled to get rid of the thing permanently. And that's the only way to access the essence of the Great Necropolis, and by extension, the Ancient Road to the Gods. In turn, that is the only way to reach the god world. You’re putting on a good show of looking haughty and victorious, but the truth is that you’re nothing more than one of Proud Heaven’s pawns now. I actually feel sorry for you.”

Swish!

Star Swordlife pointed his sword at Yang Qi, glanced at Doom, Proud World, and the Shepherd, and smiled coldly.

“The three of you are all villainous wrongdoers, guilty of numerous crimes. But there is virtue in sparing animal life. As long as the three of you confess your sins, promise to never kill again, and follow me, I won’t hurt you. But Yang Qi is different. You three can be saved, but he cannot. Over and over again, he has killed in my presence. If he refuses to be guided back to the light, then he can only be sealed. As for that wretch-devil, it's sealed, and who could possibly undo the sealing mark now? To kill someone who has been sealed is a violation of the heaven above, which has obviously given the creature a chance to live. As for me being a pawn of Proud Heaven, so what? He didn’t force me to violate my dao of life. And he didn’t give me any real training. I was blessed by heaven on high, whereas he is controlled by it. You see, his act was really an act of heaven blessing me. He thinks I'm his pawn, but in reality, he’s just a pawn of heaven on high.

“I've tried to explain this to you many times, Yang Qi, but you still think my successes are random luck. How could I possibly be so lucky? No matter the danger I find myself in, I’m always benevolent and generous by nature, thus I always turn ill fortune into good luck. If you could only learn from me, you’d live a great life. But now, I'm going to seal you up for a few millions of years. Hopefully during that time, you can finally realize the truth of what I've said.”

Chapter 1120: Twisted Words and Forced Logic

Star Swordlife always made speeches that were full of twisted words and forced logic. In other words, they were fallacious. And Yang Qi had no interest in sparring with words with him. In the end, it was clear that Proud Heaven had turned him into a pawn, and used him to get the triple combination of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.

Although, Yang Qi couldn’t be sure if Star Swordlife had just gotten lucky, or if it was because of Proud Heaven’s planning and orchestration.

It seemed unlikely that Star Swordlife would have been able to get the upper hand on Yang Qi. Thankfully, when those three streams of energy had combined, Yang Qi had come to a deep understanding of Proud Heaven’s martial arts and techniques. And that had given him quite an extra boost. As such, he didn’t actually need the combined streams of energy anymore.

RUMBLE!

As Star Swordlife spoke, his voice boomed like thunder and his vital energy surged. Apparently, his power index and psychic scale were both climbing to unheard-of peaks.

Yang Qi could tell that capturing him wouldn’t be an easy task.

Star Swordlife’s ravings of capturing and sealing Yang Qi weren’t realistic at all. However, Yang Qi was still nervous enough that he didn’t immediately attack him. Of course, his anxiety wasn’t because of Star Swordlife, but rather Proud Heaven.

The fact that Star Swordlife had made a move in the open indicated that Proud Heaven must be hiding in the background. In fact, maybe he was just waiting for a fight to break out with Star Swordlife, whereupon he would try to stab Yang Qi in the back.

“Star Swordlife!” Proud World said. “Don’t let yourself be controlled by Proud Heaven. I'm his son, and I can tell you that he's far more ruthless and malevolent than Yang Qi. He’s killed more people than all of us have, combined. Instead of capturing and sealing him, you’ve turned into his lackey? Don’t you realize that everyone Proud Heaven uses eventually end up dead? Dead and buried! You must have heard of some of the things that happened back on the Ancient Road to the Gods. Wherever Proud Heaven goes, he leaves behind blood and carnage. He won’t ever give up on trying to kill us, and he won’t let you off the hook either. Work with us to seal him, and you’ll bring balance to heaven and earth. Furthermore, you can trust us. We can go to the god world and unlock its secrets together.”

“You're Proud World, right?” Star Swordlife said. “I know about you. Yeah, you’re Proud Heaven’s son, but you’ve rebelled against him. That’s a violation of the natural order of heaven. It’s completely disgraceful, and defies the fundamental nature of life force. In fact, I could even accept it if your father killed you. Yang Qi is a Fateless One, so the fact that he wants to kill Proud Heaven actually makes sense. But you’re Proud Heaven’s own blood! Patricide is such an insult to life that I can hardly believe I’m even talking to you. However, given that we both have the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, I won't cause problems for you. I’ll just take away all of your energy arts so that you’re powerless to commit any more evil acts.”

Star Swordlife’s speech nearly caused Proud World to vomit up blood. Expression turning vicious, he said, “You dirty little swine. When I was heroically rebuking heaven and earth, you were in some backwater place eating shit. How dare you lecture me!”

He clenched his fist, as if to unleash an attack.

“Hold on!” Doom said, holding out his hand to block Proud World’s path. “Star Swordlife, there’s no reason you can cite for me to not kill Proud Heaven. He traveled to the Primeval Age and slaughtered all of my people. And it’s impossible to say how many other living beings he killed there. Don’t tell me you’re really just going to ignore all of that.”

“Revenge breeds revenge; will there ever be an end to it?” Star Swordlife replied. “Repaying killing with killing isn’t the path of justice. You need to practice forgiveness, benevolence, and righteousness. Everyone should have a chance to live. That’s the ultimate truth, and the way for life force to truly flourish in heaven and earth.”

“So if Proud Heaven killed your entire clan, you’d forgive him?” Doom asked. “You wouldn’t seek revenge?”

“That's right,” he replied solemnly. “I wouldn’t. If he killed my entire family, I would forgive him. And that would move him so deeply that the seed of kindness I planted in his heart would stop him from further killings. That is the way of righteousness.”

“Why not capture and seal Proud Heaven so that he doesn’t do any more killing? You know full well that he’s more dangerous than us, and far more destructive. Why focus on us instead of him?” Doom wasn’t angry, just curious to see what fallacious logic Star Swordlife would use. And he hoped that he could somehow find a weakness that he could exploit.

“I have no way to influence Proud Heaven. Whether he kills or doesn't kill isn’t up to me. I can only offer him advice, and work hard to convert him. Develop the goodness in his heart. He doesn’t want me to kill you, just seal you. Once I do, it wouldn't be appropriate for him to kill you. So you see, I'm saving you.”

“What if you capture and seal us, but Proud Heaven tries to kill us anyway?” the Shepherd asked. He had never encountered a freak like Star Swordlife, a person who was so illogical, yet clearly believed even his own falsehoods.

“I’ll stop him. And if I can’t stop him, I’ll teach you how to change his heart, and remind him not to kill you. I know that as long as you follow my example and try to change Proud Heaven’s ways, and as long as your heart is devoid of the desire to kill him, then heaven on high will bless you! It will help you turn ill fortune into good luck, and ensure that Proud Heaven doesn’t kill you.”

“Like hell it will,” Doom snapped. “I bear the God Legion Seal. You think I care about some heaven on high? Heaven was created by the legion of gods, and I exist above them. I'm a successor of the Sovereign Lord, so why would I seek the blessing of heaven? I'm superior to it!”

“Grandstander!” Star Swordlife spat. “Considering how arrogant you are, it's impossible to say how much bloody slaughter you’ll unleash in the future. You definitely need to be sealed immediately!”

RUMBLE!

It was Doom who attacked Star Swordlife, using something he had acquired from Yang Qi: the Hand of the One God. The vital energy in the area collapsed as his five fingers stretched out, causing holy light to form the halls of heaven around them.

POP!

In response, Star Swordlife sent out a stream of glowing sword light that intercepted the attack.

At the same time, he smiled coldly. “Using the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth on me? Are you kidding me? The Fist of the Halls of Heaven? The Hand of the One God? I can use those too!”

WHIZZZ!

Energy streamed out as he unleashed the Fist of the Halls of Heaven, which was unparalleled under heaven.

He made his move last, but his attack landed first, smashing through Doom’s attack and closing in on the four companions.

“Doom!” Yang Qi said. Reaching out, he sucked Star Swordlife’s Fist of the Halls of Heaven into himself to save Doom. The truth was that Yang Qi was multitasking. Even as he fought, he was concentrating inwardly on the thirty-six masks that he was trying to assimilate.

Unfortunately, the death energy and power of illusions on them was causing problems for his own psyche. That said, he was convinced that if he could overcome them, it would give him a huge advantage against the sealed face. He had no idea how strong the thing’s true body was, but the exit to the Ancient Road to the Gods was apparently also beneath that sealing mark.

Therefore, while he fought with Star Swordlife, he was also planning how to undo the seal and possibly move the Great Necropolis.

“Everybody stop fighting,” Yang Qi said. “Star Swordlife, I've finally decided to change my mind. I don’t want to fight with you. Let’s turn weapons of war into gifts of jade and silk.”

“Shut your mouth!” Star Swordlife blurted. “I know how strong your daoist techniques are, Yang Qi. The fact that you negated my Fist of the Halls of Heaven shows how mysterious and unpredictable you are. But that doesn't mean I’ll suddenly start trusting you. Turn weapons of war into gifts of jade and silk? You’ll just change your mind a moment later and try to kill me. What makes you possibly think that I would ever believe anything you say?”

“Why did you believe the Flower-Seizing Marauder?” Yang Qi asked coolly. From the look of it, he was ready to get into a long discussion with Star Swordlife.

“Don’t try to buy time, Yang Qi. I'm going to seal you today no matter how glib your tongue is. Your daoist techniques are powerful, but I’m confident I can beat you. I’ll win in the end because you have evil in your heart. You’re far more wretched than Proud Heaven, and I can't tolerate that level of corruption.”

Swish!

He suddenly attacked, sending out a sword strike toward Yang Qi that seemed capable of cleaving through all defenses.

SNICK!

His sword energy plunged into Yang Qi’s chest, right into his heart!

Everyone was completely flabbergasted.

If Yang Qi had unleashed some consummate energy art that instantly defeated Star Swordlife, none of them would have been surprised. Nor would they have been surprised if it was a bit difficult for him to fight Star Swordlife. But for Star Swordlife to pierce his defenses with a single move, and stab him through? That seemed completely outrageous. Since when had Yang Qi become so weak? It seemed completely incongruous with his actions only moments before.

“What?!” Star Swordlife blurted, clearly just as shocked as everyone else. However, he didn’t pause for a moment, and sent sword energy shooting out to seal Yang Qi’s meridians.

However, at that moment, Yang Qi took a step backward. Eyes flashing, he said, “Well? I let you kill me, Star Swordlife. I didn’t even activate my defensive true energy. Now do you believe that I’ll turn weapons of war into gifts of jade and silk?”

The truth was that Yang Qi had simply redirected the sword energy toward the area where he was struggling to deal with the thirty-six masks, then used it to negate some of the death energy on them. No one present had any clue as to what he was really doing.

While Star Swordlife was initially stunned, he recovered, and growled, “Don’t even dream of trying to con me!”

Then he launched another sword attack.

Chapter 1121: Using Swords to Assimilate Treasures

“Inverted Star River!”

Star Swordlife was resorting to a killing move, a sword that could seal devils. Starlight glittered brightly, and if one looked closely into it, they would see countless stars being born, and at the same time, countless stars being destroyed. And all of the stars shot forth with the momentum of immortal worlds.

SNICK!

Yet again, the sword light stabbed into Yang Qi’s heart while Yang Qi simply stood there, not doing a thing to protect himself. A huge, bloody hole opened up in his chest and he let loose a sigh of bemoaning the state of the universe and pitying the fate of mankind.

“Star Swordlife,” he said, obviously not making any move to retaliate, “I’ve let you stab me twice now with your sword. Isn’t that enough to prove that I'm free of sin and enmity? You usually go around talking about how whenever possible, you should spare your enemy. So why aren’t you willing to spare me? I'm making a good faith offer to work together and stand up to Proud Heaven. Even if you don’t want to work together, there’s no need to stab me over and over. Don’t tell me that all your benevolence, righteousness, and mercy all disappear when you’re in my presence.”

“Your words are elegant, but insincere,” Star Swordlife said through gritted teeth. “Nothing you say will convince me to refrain from sealing you.” Yet again, he launched another attack, a torrent of sword energy stabbed toward Yang Qi.

Everyone watched as dozens of deep slash marks appeared all over Yang Qi, exposing bones and even slashing apart some of his meridians.

He didn’t attempt to evade, nor did he fight back.

Meanwhile, Star Swordlife pulsed with a perverse energy as he attacked like a maniac. He was so focused on defeating and sealing Yang Qi that every blow he struck was filled with a most intense sword energy. Normally speaking, he would have been able to seal an enemy without injuring them, but in this case, his sword energy didn’t help at all to control Yang Qi, and in the end, could only hurt him.

As he stabbed Yang Qi over and over again, an opponent who wasn’t even fighting back, Star Swordlife felt the urge to spare him. After all, repeatedly attacking someone who refused to fight back really did violate Star Swordlife’s dao of life. But if you ride a tiger, it's hard to get off. He was too dead set on sealing Yang Qi, who he was convinced would eventually get much stronger and become too much of a threat.

“Profound Heaven God Sword!”

It was a special technique from the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. Instead of sword energy that looked like a river of stars, this seemed like heaven itself, profound and full of mysteries.

Crash!

The attack hit the top of Yang Qi’s head, slashing a gaping wound into him out of which blood poured like a waterfall. It was miserable to say the least.

Yet Yang Qi still didn’t fight back. “The knot of enmity should be untied, not tightened, Star Swordlife. You yourself said the words: Revenge breeds revenge; will there ever be an end to it? I'm not fighting back, and considering you’re using killing moves, that means you’ve already killed me seventy times. And your last attack should’ve cut me in half. Haven't you unleashed enough retribution to resolve our enmity?”

“You!” Star Swordlife spat, his eyebrows rising. “Don’t even think of trying to pull a fast one on me, Yang Qi. I know what you’re doing. You're intentionally letting yourself be hurt to gain my confidence. You're trying to shake my will. Unfortunately for you, my will can never be shaken. I'm going to seal you! Seal you up utterly and thoroughly!”

“Why aren’t you fighting back, Yang Qi?” Proud World called. “Given your cultivation, this brat isn’t a match for you at all!”

“Just hold on,” Doom said to him quietly. “Yang Qi is using other methods to strike directly at Star Swordlife’s ideals. Star Swordlife uses all sorts of fallacious reasoning and claims to espouse a philosophy of benevolence, righteousness, and life force. So when Yang Qi refuses to fight back, he’s setting a person’s own spear against his shield. As Star Swordlife’s ideals crumble, his attacks become more effective, but at the same time, losing his ideals is turning him into something no better than the walking dead. Eventually, he’ll go mad and kill himself.”

“Oh, I see!” the Shepherd said. “A very clever move on the part of Yang Qi. Obviously we can’t interfere, otherwise Star Swordlife will turn on us. But isn’t Yang Qi’s vital energy going to be wasted being hit so many times?”

“I was worried about that as well,” Doom said. “But Brother Yang Qi is enigmatic and impossible to predict. I suspect he has a reason for going through this. So let’s wait and see what happens. In any case, now that the masked face has been sealed, we’re not in any danger here.”

“Sure. Let’s wait and see what happens.”

The three of them backed up a bit and continued watching the fight between Star Swordlife and Yang Qi.

Things had really been turned upside down. Normally, Star Swordlife was the one who helped others, always trying to make sure they had a chance to come out of a situation alive. He would even save the most wicked and evil people, refusing to either kill or seal them. But now he was attacking Yang Qi like a rabid wolf, causing blood to spray everywhere as he used increasingly deadly attacks.

Yet Yang Qi still wasn't fighting back. For him, it was actually serving as a session of cultivation, because although it looked like Star Swordlife was slashing him into bloody ribbons, he was actually redirecting each blow to the masks in his sea of energy.

Star Swordlife’s sword energy was backed by his immense Inheritor powers, as well as the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. Of course, his sword energy was strong to begin with, even before he had been directly blessed by Proud Heaven.

Considering that he had amazing energy arts and was in the mid Terrifying level, he hoped that he would be able to free himself from the control of Proud Heaven. Regardless, his sword technique could be considered to be at the acme of perfection. And Yang Qi was using his own remarkable abilities to redirect those attacks to the masks.

The thirty-six masks were protected by the powers of illusion, but thanks to the way Yang Qi was battering them with Star Swordlife’s power, those illusions were being destroyed and turned into psychic power that poured into Yang Qi’s sea of consciousness.

The thirty-six masks were unique treasures from the god world, and were no less amazing than the items from the seventy-two monarchs. The truth was that no one in existence knew their full story. But one thing was for sure: they were immensely powerful, and anyone who fell victim to the powerful illusions they could create would be forever befuddled and unable to break free.

Slowly but surely, Yang Qi was breaking them down.

RUMBLE!

Suddenly, an explosion rocked his sea of consciousness as one of the smaller masks collapsed, becoming pure psychic will that flowed into his nascent divinity. With that addition, he could create the visage of the mask on top of his face any time he wanted.

Simultaneously, his psychic scale shot upward.

‘Amazing!’ he thought. ‘These bronze masks aren’t actually magical treasures. They’re made of pure emotion! The emotions of numerous almighty entities. It's like how the boundless buddhas of ancient times could reveal their core nature by means of their face, whether that was fury, grief, elation, or worry.’ Yang Qi continued allowing Star Swordlife to hit him with sword energy, which he then used to break down the masks. One by one, they collapsed and became energy that flowed into his nascent divinity. Eventually, thirty-six different streams of emotions came to exist within him.

As for the main mask, it was completely expressionless, almost ordinary in nature, as though it didn't contain anything that could affect emotions.

In other words, the emotions were annulled.

Whatever almighty being had created this mask and led the others, that entity had gained enlightenment of how to annul one’s emotions.

All of a sudden, Yang Qi understood the meaning of the thirty-six masks. They represented the most fundamental, and at the same time most elevated emotions of both humans and gods.

The first mask represented ignorance. After that was foolishness. Then came anger, bitterness, and distress. Last came joy, tranquility, and emptiness. All of the emotions were embodiments of cultivation levels.

If he could completely assimilate all thirty-six masks and experience all thirty-six emotions, he could unleash the psychic cultivation techniques of the boundless entities who had created them.

Snap. Crack.

His psychic scale rose from two hundred and sixty to three hundred, and at that point, he knew he couldn’t hold on very much longer; he had no choice but to break through to the next level.

A psychic tempest raged around him like a thunder-filled tornado, and pestilential energy filled the area around the sealing mark. Meanwhile, all of the wounds Star Swordlife had inflicted on Yang Qi healed and a psychic halo appeared behind his head.

Just like that, he reached the mid Terrifying level.

Never before had he been this strong.

He was still on the fifth stair of the Deathless Heavenly Stairway. He did not become a Grand Emperor; but that was an even more terrifying thing. To have a mid Terrifying will convergence without being a Grand Emperor was something rare even among the elite young ones in the god world.

RUMBLE!

He extended his palm, and Star Swordlife’s latest attack was brushed away, sent tumbling backward with blood spraying out of his mouth.

It took only one move for him to defeat the insufferably arrogant Star Swordlife.

Using Star Swordlife to help improve his cultivation had worked.

And now, it was time for Star Swordlife to finally die.

Chapter 1122: Proud Heaven Arrives

SPLAT!

Star Swordlife coughed up a huge mouthful of blood. His skin was cracked and bleeding as he glared with hateful disbelief at Yang Qi. “You... you just reached the mid Terrifying level? Oh... I get it. You were using my attacks to refine your nascent divinity, or possibly some secret treasure. Now that you’re finished, you’re finally going to start fighting back.”

“That’s right,” Yang Qi said, walking slowly toward him with a look of disdain on his face. All of a sudden, a mask appeared on his face that also bore an expression of disdain, the kind that would infuriate anyone who it was directed at.

Star Swordlife coughed up more blood; obviously, his vital energy had been severely damaged. “I knew you were a rapacious wolf, Yang Qi. You were only pretending to be hurt. Thankfully, I saw through the ruse. But why wasn’t I able to seal you? Don’t tell me that heaven really does want you alive, you beast.”

Clicking his tongue, Yang Qi said, “Cursing like that doesn't seem very benevolent. Considering how many times you stabbed me with your sword, I’d say I earned the right to strike back.” Even as Yang Qi loomed over Star Swordlife, he continuously swept the area with divine will, in order to be fully on guard in case Proud Heaven showed up.

Star Swordlife was Proud Heaven’s pawn and had been personally blessed by him. So if Yang Qi tried to kill him, it seemed entirely likely that Proud Heaven would step in, especially if it interfered with his plans.

“You can't kill me, Yang Qi,” Star Swordlife said, his eyes suddenly shining with the blazing light of hope. His injuries began healing up, perhaps by means of some mysterious medicinal pill. At the same time, his vital energy was restored. Rising to his feet, he said, “Maybe you don’t believe me, but it’s true. It doesn’t matter that you’re in the mid Terrifying level now, and have the Unspoiled Body and the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth combined. That’s still not enough to kill me.”

“Oh really?” Yang Qi said, stopping in his tracks. “In that case, I guess we should have a real fight. You know, true men don’t rely on the help of others to stay alive. It’s obvious that you've received some information from Proud Heaven, and that he's lurking in the shadows, ready to help you. That’s why you think you can kill me. If all you do is get help from others, you’re nothing more than a parasite. Do you really think a parasite is worthy to fight me? I, Yang Qi, can prop up heaven and earth, and pronounce sentences of life or death. I'm far beyond the level of a loser like you who needs the help of others. I'm a man of character, and you're a limp-limbed shrimp. Before, I was actually interested in sparing your life. But if you’re fully invested in being Proud Heaven’s lackey, then even though killing you will dirty my hands, I have no other choice.”

SPLAT!

Yang Qi’s words were so biting that everything he said stabbed directly into Star Swordlife’s heart, causing him to vomit up another mouthful of blood. It helped that Yang Qi was wearing the disdainful mask.

“Coughing up more blood?” he added. “How could a weakling like you possibly fight me? Get on your knees!”

As the words left his mouth, he reached out and used a simple energy art to exert immense pressure on Star Swordlife. However, Star Swordlife maintained his foothold, and even managed to unleash some of his sword technique. Unfortunately for him, he was too slow. Yang Qi was now in the mid Terrifying level, which meant he was invincible to anyone under the level of a god.

Crick! Crack!

Star Swordlife’s sword energy was like a piece of ice facing the burning sun; it instantly cracked and melted away.

Yang Qi's might weighed down on Star Swordlife, who let loose an agonized shriek as his bones creaked. He tried using his defensive empyrean energy to resist, but it did no good and he was quickly forced down onto both knees.

A sensation of deep humiliation instantly filled him.

Inwardly, Yang Qi was clicking his tongue in wonder. The palm move he had used was actually intended to crush Star Swordlife out of existence, not just force him to his knees. It had used his imperial-heaven pre-beginning powers, the ultimate manifestation of the Engine of the One God, which were even more formidable now that he was in the mid Terrifying level.

If Star Swordlife wasn’t able to hold strong, he would be reduced into a smear of bloody gore.

But he did manage to hold strong, although the true energy inside him was being destroyed left and right. It was a testament to the formidability of the triple-combined Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, which had pushed Star Swordlife’s power index to eight thousand and his psychic scale to around two hundred.

Unfortunately, he paled into insignificance compared to Yang Qi. Yang Qi had a psychic scale of over three hundred, which meant he could dominate all of heaven and earth. Even in the god world, there were peak Terrifying experts who wouldn’t be able to match up to him in that regard.

“Heaven-Devouring Talismans!”

As Star Swordlife was forced to his knees beneath the imperial-heaven pre-beginning powers, Yang Qi unleashed another incredible art.

RUMBLE!

A primal-chaos elder-snake appeared behind him, ready to devour anything it encountered. Considering the level of his cultivation base, he could recreate King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans. The actual talismans were in the hands of his immortal-slaying clone. That said, the versions that Yang Qi could create on his own were still profoundly powerful.

Yang Qi was now so skilled in recreating duplicate versions of various magical treasures that no one would be able to tell the difference, even if the real talismans were present.

Star Swordlife had thirsted to seal Yang Qi away for millions upon millions of years. And he had hoped to inflict immense torment on him, to the point where Yang Qi longed for death. But now, Yang Qi had him on his knees, his true energy pouring out of him like a waterfall and his heart filled with intense humiliation.

RUMBLE!

Star Swordlife wanted to fight back, but simply couldn’t.

He was being drained, and could tell death was approaching. However, in that moment, a stream of power entered him, filling him with such might that he managed to struggle to his feet. The primal-chaos elder-snake that was devouring his energy exploded, and his energy flowed back into him.

Yang Qi immediately backed up.

“Well, hello, Proud Heaven,” he said. “You’ve finally decided to step in? Couldn’t bear to see your pawn killed? It seems Star Swordlife has some destiny from the god world, and you need him to get at what you want. Am I right?”

“Proud Heaven…?” Doom, Proud World, and the Shepherd all suddenly felt very nervous as they huddled together behind Yang Qi, worried that Proud Heaven might just attack them outright.

At the moment, Yang Qi’s gaze was fixed on the location of the sealing mark, as though he could see something there that no one else could see.

“Show yourself, Proud Heaven,” Yang Qi said. “Your energy arts are definitely formidable. But I'm in the mid Terrifying level now. I’ve cultivated the energy arts in the thirty-six masks, so I can personally track you down if I have to.”

Sinister, cackling laughter rang out as a young man in an azure robe appeared in the exact spot Yang Qi had been staring, right behind Star Swordlife. He was incomparably good-looking and pulsed with an aura that seemed both righteous and wretched, but at the same time, neither of those things. It was like looking at something that was black and white at the same time.

It was none other than Proud Heaven himself.

Only he could project an aura like this.

No one could tell whether he was righteous or wretched, whether he was black or white. His cultivation base did not belong to the mortal world anymore. And he was the only person to have ever gone to the god world... and returned.

He had finally shown his face.

The Proud Heaven that Yang Qi had encountered in the mortal world had been nothing but a tiny projection of will, but this was his true self, which meant that he couldn’t have been more different than the version Yang Qi had met in the past.

“I never would’ve guessed that we would actually meet in the flesh like this, Yang Qi,” Stepping forward, he clasped Star Swordlife on the shoulder. “It was not in vain that I helped you, Star Swordlife. But even so, you're not a match for Yang Qi. You did well in your mission to get the triple-combined Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. Thus, I saved you and will take you to the god world with me. Together, we’ll find that object that has been decreed to you by fate and forever leave behind these four people.”

“Do you see now, Star Swordlife?” Yang Qi said. “Proud Heaven really does view you as nothing more than a pawn. And you're still willing to serve him?”

“I don’t care about anything other than sealing you!” Star Swordlife said. “Proud Heaven is Proud Heaven. You are you. It doesn’t have anything to do with me. Right now, there’s only one important thing for me to do, and that's seal you. Then my will can reach new heights. You are my heart-devil; without sealing you, I can never rest at ease.”

"Pig-headed fool!” Yang Qi spat.

Meanwhile, Proud Heaven was looking at Proud World. “You're my son, Proud World. I can’t believe that you would betray me after everything I did for you. You’re even conspiring against me with my enemies. I think the time has come to take back everything I blessed you with.”

“Bah!” Proud World said. “You're an evil creature, Proud Heaven. After the way you treated me, I'm not your son. I was nothing more than an experiment to you. You raised me as a prisoner in the future world, making me live a life of torment to reach my current level. I swore an oath long ago to kill you.”

Proud Heaven laughed. “If it weren’t for me, you wouldn’t be as strong as you are. How could anyone truly know the pains I went through to ensure that? You may be strong, but to me, you’re nothing more than trash. Where’s your mother? Call her out.”

Chapter 1123: Talking About Cooperation

Proud Heaven had finally appeared to save Star Swordlife, who was an important pawn in his schemes.

Of course, Yang Qi didn’t care at all whether Star Swordlife lived or died. Now that he was in the mid Terrifying level and had assimilated the thirty-six masks, boosting his psychic scale, he was more than confident enough to fight Proud Heaven. So why would he possibly care or worry about Star Swordlife?

At this point, Star Swordlife couldn’t possibly put up a fight against Yang Qi, not even with all of the dozens of Great Necropolis godpower seeds he had.

Before Yang Qi teamed up with Doom and the others, Star Swordlife might have had a chance to fight him. But after Yang Qi formed his new alliance, he had continued to grow stronger and stronger, unlocking various secrets of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth and gaining deeper insights into matters of reality and illusion.

Yang Qi’s cultivation speed was something that hadn't been seen at any point in history.

Star Swordlife couldn't match speed such as his, even having been directly blessed by Proud Heaven. Besides, considering that Star Swordlife had begun relying on other people to help his cultivation, it was a given that Yang Qi would surpass him by leaps and bounds. Yang Qi had advanced on his own merits and strength, which would always lead to better results.

In fact, even the person who had blessed him, Proud Heaven, was now looking at Yang Qi with a very serious expression on his face.

All of a sudden, Star Swordlife felt even further below Yang Qi than he did before.

For the first time, he also actually felt a spark of jealousy, which quickly grew into a raging fire of hatred as he realized that he hated Yang Qi so much he wanted to kill him.

It was the first time in his life he had ever thought of killing someone.

“Begone, heart-devil,” Proud Heaven said. Placing his hand onto Star Swordlife’s head, he extinguished the flames of jealousy within him. “Yang Qi has already infected you with a heart-devil, and it's proliferating within you. If you don’t get rid of it, your cultivation base is going to suffer.”

As Star Swordlife felt the flames being extinguished, he shivered, and his cultivation base rose a bit higher.

Staring icily at Yang Qi, he said, “All of this is thanks to you, Yang Qi. I'm going to remember this. You’re the one who implanted this heart-devil in me. It's the first one I've ever had. Even when I was a child, I always had strong willpower, and would never waver in my beliefs. Going forward, my mind will only continue getting stronger. You just wait. I’ll seal you eventually.”

“Piece of trash.” Yang Qi said. “For every first, there’s a second. Your heart-devils are going to grow more numerous and powerful, until you’re dead. So screw off. Proud Heaven and I have some things to talk about, and you don't qualify to participate in the conversation.”

“You finally showed your face, Proud Heaven,” Doom said, his voice thrumming with enmity. “You killed my people and threw the Primeval Age into complete and utter chaos. I don't even know if it’s possible to count how many people died at your hands. Today, I'm going to make sure that your malicious ways are ended. Hand over your God Legion Seal!”

“God Legion Seal?” Proud Heaven laughed. “You think I need the God Legion Seal to deal with you? I admit I underestimated you, Yang Qi. You’ve actually forsaken the God Legion Seal, even going so far as to cultivate the Unspoiled Body. You even lucked into getting that purrling, and from its blood, you gained enlightenment of some of its secrets, which enabled you to neutralize the conflict between your two major energy arts. If you hadn’t done that you would have been turned into a zombie eventually. I suppose I really ought to view you as an enemy.”

“You kidnapped my mother, my Aunt Susu, and my Master, taking them from the immortal worlds with one of your incarnations. I actually find it somewhat amusing. Why didn’t you make your move on me back then, when I was so weak? Were you worried that my God Legion Seal would be a threat to you? I can tell that you don’t have your God Legion Seal with you, which means that you have ambitions just as grand as mine. You want to either free yourself from the seal, or combine all three pieces. Either way, you’re not going to use it while fighting us here. If we combine our two pieces of the seal, it would change everything, and you would definitely lose control. In any case, you’ll never actually free yourself from the seal.”

Proud Heaven laughed. “Why would I want to disconnect myself from the God Legion Seal? I'm not as stupid as you. That seal is the purest, most powerful thing in existence, even in the god world. It would probably be impossible to unlock its secrets, even after studying it for an eternity. But that’s only in the mortal world. In the god world, the magical laws at play surpass anything you can imagine, and the true mysteries of the seal can be unlocked.”

“If that’s the case, then just give me your God Legion Seal,” Yang Qi said, extending his hand. “Listen up, Proud Heaven. Either you die today, or I will. I won’t permit you to leave here.”

“That’s the same thing I was going to say to you.” Keeping his hands clasped behind his back, he kicked Star Swordlife off to the side. “Get over there, scum. You’ll just get in my way.”

Star Swordlife had boundless magical power, and had just expelled his heart-devil. But he was powerless to resist Proud Heaven and was kicked to the side, where he slammed into the wall and slumped to the ground. At that point, he finally realized how vastly separated he was from Proud Heaven and Yang Qi.

No wonder Yang Qi had hurt him so badly with a single palm strike.

“You must have your God Legion Seal locked up in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart,” Proud Heaven said. “Am I right? King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy medallions used to be scattered far and wide, but you’ve collected eight of them. Presumably, you already know that I arranged for you to get most of them. The first reason is that I wanted to plunder your destiny. The second is that I wanted you to do the hard work for me in collecting all the medallions. And you didn't disappoint! As planned, all I have to do now is produce the final legacy medallion and complete the collection. At that point, your immortal-slaying clone will lose control of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.”

“What exactly do you want?” Yang Qi said, inwardly shaken.

“Nothing. Yang Qi, the truth is that we don't have any particularly great enmity between the two of us. Although you’re a Fateless One, you were born in the mortal world, so your karma connects you to your mother. And since your mother is my wife, doesn’t that make me your karmic father? Why don’t we work together? We have a grand opportunity here in front of us.”

“What grand opportunity?” Yang Qi said. There was no way he would trust anything Proud Heaven said, but he was at least curious to hear a bit of what he had to say.

“Isn’t it obvious?” Proud Heaven looked at Doom. “This piece of trash has a God Legion Seal too, but isn’t that a big waste? One of my clones sent him running away like the stray dog that he is. So, Yang Qi, if the two of us worked together, we could easily kill him and extract his God Legion Seal. Then we could be allies, with three God Legion Seals between us. We would become more powerful than you could possibly imagine. Afterward, we could open the seal here in the depths of the Great Necropolis, set up plenty of traps, and put all of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions together. Once King Immortal-Slayer’s will awakens, we could use the completed God Legion Seal to trap him here. He would surely fight the will of the Great Necropolis, which we could use to move the necropolis, and likely even take control of it! Haven’t you already decided to cast aside the God Legion Seal anyway? Then why not give yours to me, and I’ll give the Great Necropolis to you? You can even have the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. That way, the two of us would be equals. After all, you must surely already realize that with the Great Necropolis, you could counter the God Legion Seal, and perhaps even surpass it. So what do you think? We can split everything fairly. You can agree to that, can’t you?”

Hearing these words, Doom’s face turned ashen. He knew that if Yang Qi and Proud Heaven turned on him, he would definitely die. Not even the God Legion Seal would keep him safe.

Unfortunately, there was little he could do in this situation. “Yang Qi,” he said, “you know that Proud Heaven is just talking off the cuff here. You can’t trust him.”

Yang Qi laughed heartily. “I know that, Brother Doom. Don’t worry. He’s just trying to sow disharmony between us. We've agreed to face all trials and tribulations together, so there’s no way I’ll fall for his babbling nonsense. No one who has ever cooperated with Proud Heaven has ever lived to tell the tale. I don’t think he even has a reputation left that could be ruined.”

“What?” Proud Heaven said, looking surprised. “Don’t tell me you’re really going to refuse my offer, Yang Qi. The only way to reach godly ascension is for the two of us to work together. Otherwise, you’ll be stuck here. How else will you move the Great Necropolis? Only King Immortal-Slayer’s will and the completed God Legion Seal could possibly pierce the sealed depths of the Great Necropolis. And that’s the only way to move the necropolis. The alternative is to be stuck in here without access to the Ancient Road to the Gods, unable to reach the god world, and godly ascension.”

“Godly ascension?” Yang Qi said. “You still want to reach godly ascension? If it means preventing you from becoming a god, I'm more than happy to do the same. I can tell what you’re doing, Proud Heaven. You’re saying everything possible to entice me into working with you. But you don't seem to understand how much I hate you. Nothing could ever remove that hatred, thus, the only outcome waiting for you is death. Furthermore, your reputation is so bad that no one would ever agree to work with you. Did anyone on the Ancient Road to the Gods who worked with you survive? No. You betrayed them all.”

“Betrayed them?” He shook his head. “You’re a real disappointment, Yang Qi. You’ve let revenge cloud your judgment, making it impossible for you to see things clearly. Working together is the best option for the two of us. Once you reach the god world, you’ll understand this truth. You see, the hatreds and enmities in the mortal world are like nothing more than clouds that eventually vanish, and aren’t even worth thinking about.”

Chapter 1124: Fighting Proud Heaven

There was no way Yang Qi would ever trust anything Proud Heaven said.

It would have been impossible for Proud Heaven to have a worse reputation than he did. That said, he wasn't lying about the difficulties of moving the Great Necropolis. It would definitely need King Immortal-Slayer’s will and the completed God Legion Seal to do it. By using their combined powers, it would be possible to break into the deepest sealed part of the Great Necropolis, suppress its will, and take control of it.

Right now, he definitely couldn’t control the Great Necropolis on his own.

Even worse, part of the process rested on King Immortal-Slayer’s will, which meant that, at the moment, it would only work with two people taking part in the plan.

In the mortal world, there were only two people who qualified: Yang Qi and Proud Heaven. Not even the Executors of the Ancient Road would help; they were eventually going to be defeated anyway.

Of course, it was all predicated on the assumption that Proud Heaven and Yang Qi actually cooperated.

Yang Qi wasn’t confident enough to enter such a cooperation, even if it was with the knowledge that Proud Heaven would eventually betray him. For all he knew, Proud Heaven might take advantage of a critical moment in dealing with King Immortal-Slayer to kill Yang Qi and his clone. Then he would have the God Legion Seal, the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, and the Great Necropolis. He would be the ultimate ruler of the mortal world, and would have access to any resources he wanted to. At that point, he would be able to enter the god world with full confidence in his ability to become a top figure there.

In the end, Yang Qi simply couldn’t work with Proud Heaven. The only way to deal with him was to kill him.

Pointing at Yang Qi, Proud Heaven said, “Well, Yang Qi? Are you really refusing to work with me?”

Yang Qi chuckled. “How about we work together after I kill you and take the God Legion Seal? Come on, Proud Heaven, quit being so naive. There’s no way I’ll ever trust you.”

“In that case, son, I don’t see any reason to keep you around.” He smiled viciously. “No, I'm going to have to kill you and extract your God Legion Seal. I'm here as my true self, so nobody can stop me, not even you.”

“I know you’re here as your true self. That's why I’ve wasted so much time chatting. If you weren’t here as your true self, you’d already be dead. I know you’ve thrown caution to the wind in your attempt to kill me, but that only means that your moment of death has come. For your true self.” Yang Qi was trying to buy as much time as possible to get his powers to their peak level and make sure all of his trump cards were ready to go.

Proud Heaven was definitely the strongest opponent he had ever faced. Not even the sealed head of Brahma had been as strong as Proud Heaven was now. Given how strong Yang Qi was, he could actually suppress Brahma if he had to.

Never had Yang Qi been less confident in his ability to defeat an enemy. This man had been pestering him from before he had even been born, ensuring that the karma connecting them was very troublesome.

If he didn't die, then Yang Qi would have a very hard time severing that karma.

But if he did die, then Yang Qi was certain he could use the momentum of the victory to reach immense heights, even godly ascension.

“If that’s your final word, I guess there’s no reason to keep discussing the matter.” Proud Heaven clasped his hands behind his back and sighed. “Your God Legion Seal was always going to end up in my hands. And I can get into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. The time has come to acquire the rest of the God Legion Seal!”

WHOOSH!

He moved as he spoke the final words, which caught everyone off guard. Doom merely saw a blur as Proud Heaven appeared right in front of him, where he unleashed a palm strike that shook heaven and earth, even rocking the souls of those present.

Shouting, Doom immediately unleashed all nine stances of the Hand of the One God to protect himself.

When those nine stances were used at once, the successful transformations were unrivaled.

However, it wasn't as if Proud Heaven was using a simple move. A brilliant white light flared as his palm descended, and although no one present knew exactly what martial art this was, it was obviously something that could shake all creation.

The terrifying nature of the attack defied description. Anyone who stood in the path of an attack like it would be like an ordinary mortal facing down a falling asteroid. They would definitely be wiped out of existence.

When the Hand of the One God met Proud Heaven’s attack, all of Doom’s projected attacks were crushed and he staggered backward, face ashen as he coughed up blood. He had been defeated in one move! Obviously, he wasn’t close to being a match. Expression filled with terror, he said, “You actually finished cultivating that technique, Proud Heaven?!”

“Get over here!” Proud Heaven growled, making a grasping claw gesture as he attempted to pull Doom’s God Legion Seal right out from inside of him.

However, before anything else could happen, Yang Qi appeared next to Doom and made his move. Thrusting his palm out, he unleashed an empyrean wind that flowed like the tide, instantly negating Proud Heaven’s claw attack.

Backing up three paces, Yang Qi said, “I'm your opponent, Proud Heaven.”

As of this moment, he was convinced that Proud Heaven’s cultivation base surpassed his own. That much was evident from the brief contact moments ago, which had left his nascent divinity feeling profoundly shaken.

“Oh?” Proud Heaven flitted to a position only nine meters away in seemingly weightless fashion. Looking Yang Qi up and down, he said, “Not bad, Yang Qi. But you see, I've successfully cultivated a new technique of my own invention. The Ten Universes. Take a look at what it's like!”

“Ten Universes?” Yang Qi licked his lips. He had known all along that if Proud Heaven had reached this point in his cultivation, he would have identified his own dao. This Ten Universes technique would definitely be able to shake heaven and earth, and would be the result of enlightenment of countless consummate abilities and techniques.

“First stance. Agitation of Nature!”

Proud Heaven appeared right in front of Yang Qi, moving so unpredictably that he was almost like a flickering shadow.

However, Yang Qi wasn’t afraid of such tactics. He quickly called on the Purrfect God Art and the abilities of the thirty-six masks. All of a sudden, a mask appeared on his face, neither joyful nor sorrowful. It had no features, and was in fact completely empty, annulled and pure.

At the same time, a huge bubble popped into being around him, pulsing with the power of tribulations and kalpas.

Proud Heaven vanished almost as soon as he had appeared, but he left behind an enormous manifestation of heaven and earth, crushing down on Yang Qi with immense force. In response, Yang Qi threw out his hand, sending hundreds of tribulations flying out, countless characters which were the ultimate manifestation of the Unspoiled Body.

“Excellent! You actually survived the first stance, Agitation of Nature. Sadly for you, my Ten Universes features ten stances, which all complement each other. Let's see how many you can survive. Second stance. Pulse of the Void!”

A vibration rolled out that was vastly more powerful than the tribulations and kalpas, smashing the hundred characters of tribulation that Yang Qi had just unleashed.

Yang Qi immediately sensed immense danger, so he used the Purrfect God Art to shrink himself down with rapid speed. Even as he was shrinking, the pulsing ripple suddenly transformed into an intense manifestation of sword energy that shot right above his head.

“Nice. You actually lived through the second stance, and the third, Sword of the Cosmos.” Yang Qi looked around and realized that Proud Heaven had complete control over all of heaven and earth around them, including all the magical laws. Right now, he was slowly walking a circle around Yang Qi, his speed seemingly slow, but in reality incredibly fast. Anyone other than Yang Qi who found themselves in this position, even the emperor of the Executors of the Ancient Road, would meet a grisly end.

The only reason he was holding his own was the Unspoiled Body, the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, the Purrfect God Art, the abilities of the masks, and his psychic scale of over three hundred.

At the moment, he wasn't worried about Proud Heaven suddenly launching a surprise attack on Doom and taking his God Legion Seal. The moment Proud Heaven made his first move, Yang Qi used the Annulled Grand Magic to lock on to Proud Heaven’s psyche.

The essence of the Annulled Grand Magic was about creating things out of the void. And the creator of the main mask among the thirty-six masks had gained enlightenment of emotions from the Annulled level. Therefore, despite not having fully fused with all of the masks, they still gave Yang Qi additional details regarding the profundities of the Annulled Grand Magic.

Having locked on to Proud Heaven with the Annulled Grand Magic, it was as if he were deeply connected to him; the man wouldn’t be able to do anything that Yang Qi wasn't aware of.

Proud Heaven realized this and was finally starting to understand how dangerous Yang Qi was; he was even beginning to regret not killing him sooner.

But it didn't do any good to worry about regrets. Therefore, he wasn’t holding back at all, and used his own techniques to duplicate what Yang Qi had done, tightly locking on to him.

Both of them were locked on to each other, and both of them knew it. Right now, both of them were coming to understand each other better than anyone else in existence.

They were almost like twins now, except only one of them would be able to survive the encounter.

This was an apex battle, the likes of which no one else could participate in.

“So, Yang Qi, you've cultivated the Annulled Grand Magic to that level? In that case, allow me to put you to death! Fourth stance. Rot of Nihility! Fifth stance. Sacrifice of Chaos! Sixth stance. Restoration of the Epoch! Seventh stance. Crippling of Civilization! Eighth stance. Enemy of the World! Ninth stance. Destruction of the Macrocosm! Tenth stance. Nirvana of the Universe!”

RUMBLE!

Proud Heaven had unleashed all ten moves of his self-created technique, the Ten Universes!

Chapter 1125: Ten Universes

The Ten Universes ability was the ultimate expression of Proud Heaven’s cultivation base.

It was impossible to say how many consummate abilities he had collected over the years in order to create it. Every stance was closely linked with the others, even more so than the nine stances of the Hand of the One God.

Of course, that wasn’t because Proud Heaven was superior to the Sovereign Lord. It was because of how the consummate Ten Universes was created by him, therefore it was uniquely suited to him.

It was always best to use techniques suited to oneself.

Although the Hand of the One God was mighty when it was unleashed by people such as Yang Qi or Proud Heaven, nothing could be better than a technique one had created based on their personal dao.

The ten stances of the Ten Universes technique could be considered sky-obfuscating and land-enshrouding.

Agitation of Nature. Pulse of the Void. Sword of the Cosmos. Rot of Nihility. Sacrifice of Chaos. Restoration of the Epoch. Crippling of Civilization. Enemy of the World. Destruction of the Macrocosm. Nirvana of the Universe!

Those ten stances each contained boundless divine abilities, and when unleashed, would cause the surrounding vital energy to create projections of Proud Heaven himself. The mere fluctuations of the energy art were enough to destroy heaven and extinguish the earth, and Yang Qi already felt like his soul was about to explode.

It was Proud Heaven’s most deadly and splendid attack; it was brutal and crushing, something that could decide life or death in the briefest of moments.

Yang Qi felt like howling in rage. However, in his sea of energy, a purring sound could be heard ten times in a row. And with each purring sound, a bubble appeared in the palm of his hand, which then shot out to meet one of the deadly moves of the Ten Universes.

Pop. Pop. Pop!

Ten popping sounds rang out as the ten bubbles burst. And as a result, the power of Proud Heaven’s assault was reduced by ninety-nine percent. Yang Qi took advantage of the moment to use the combination of the Hand of the One God and the Unspoiled Body to throw up another layer of defense.

He had long since entered into a state of complete calm in which he wasn't even thinking about victory or defeat. Instead, it was as if he were training, improving himself by constantly focusing on not being killed.

That state was when he fought the best.

The true battle had begun. After Yang Qi had been so violently battered by Proud Heaven, the two of them backed away from each other. So far, neither seemed capable of taking the other out.

As for the Shepherd, Proud World, and Doom, Yang Qi had taken pains to ensure that they weren't hit by any of the shockwaves.

Glaring at Yang Qi with sinister eyes, Proud Heaven said, “I have to say you've earned my admiration, Yang Qi. You can actually stand up to my consummate art, the Ten Universes. And not only did you survive all of the moves, you came out completely unscathed. You’re the only person who could possibly do that. Not even the emperor of the executors could survive up to this point.”

Yang Qi didn’t respond. Instead, he focused on the true energy flows inside him. They were raging so out of control that he couldn’t have talked even if he wanted to. Drawing on the Annulled Grand Magic, he quickly forced the energy to flow correctly back into his sea of energy. It was almost like getting a flood under control. If he hadn’t succeeded, his meridians would have been damaged, and the consequences of that would have been too horrible to contemplate.

After three full cycles of energy circulation, he was in the position to speak again. The truth was that he had been injured. And the fact that Proud Heaven had immediately been able to speak after their clash just showed how much stronger the man was.

After all, he had been to the god world, and returned. He obviously knew many secrets of the place. If Yang Qi had been there, it was obvious that his cultivation base would have benefited.

As Proud Heaven stood there with his energy surging, he seemed like some sort of martial arts giant who couldn’t possibly be defeated. He was a consummate wretch-devil whose eyes were locked onto Yang Qi’s soul, which ensured that even if Yang Qi fled to the edges of reality, he wouldn’t be able to escape him.

“Your Ten Universes weren’t very impressive, Proud Heaven,” Yang Qi said in a casual tone. “Is that really the best you can do? If your own personal energy art can’t do anything to me, and you don’t have anything stronger, perhaps we should come back in a year to have a rematch.”

“Very well.” Proud Heaven said. “I admit that I underestimated you, Yang Qi. Apparently my Ten Universes can’t hurt you. But what happens if I keep attacking you? I could do it all day, and every time I do, I would back it with unbelievable power. In other words, it’ll only get worse and worse for you. At this point, I'm going to ask you one more time: are you willing to work with me? The two of us could benefit a lot from each other. If you disagree, you really will perish here.”

“What do you plan to fight me with?” Yang Qi said, inwardly converging his power and preparing his techniques. Thanks to the fierce fighting, he felt that he was actually hovering on the verge of another breakthrough. If he finished climbing the Deathless Heavenly Stairway, he’d become a Grand Emperor, and would definitely be able to defeat Proud Heaven.

He was already confident that he knew the extent of Proud Heaven’s trump cards.

“As I'm sure you're aware, Proud Heaven, I'm not actually a Grand Emperor. What if I went all out and achieved my breakthrough right here and now? Would you be able to beat me then?”

Skipping the subterfuge, Yang Qi just explained his trump card, hoping it would strike fear into Proud Heaven’s heart.

As expected, Proud Heaven’s eyes turned very sharp. “Very impressive, Yang Qi. But are you really willing to take that risk? What if you fail to become a Grand Emperor? I guarantee you that during the process, when your vital energy is the most chaotic, I’ll strike you with a deadly blow.”

“I refuse to believe you can actually do that,” Yang Qi replied with a broad smile. He knew there was no way Proud Heaven would just let him reach the Grand Emperor level without trying to stop him. But he was also confident that he couldn’t be stopped. “Besides, after reaching the mid Terrifying level, I can open a path to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart at any time. So how exactly do you think you can interfere with my breakthrough?”

He wasn't lying. After pushing his psychic scale past three hundred, he was able to sense the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart again. And his immortal-slaying clone had already made preparations, in case there was a reaction between their eight legacy medallions and the ninth that they didn’t possess.

In the depths of the chart, the clone was drawing on the scintillating power of the godhood stars, funneling it into the Engine of the One God, including the genetic systems, vivicreation systems, power assessment systems, psychic scaling systems, and heavenly workings calculations systems.

Because of the godhood stars, it was only possible to power up those five major systems while in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

Godhood stars fell one after another, yet the sky still looked as dazzling as ever. In fact, it seemed possible that, in the very depths of the chart, godhood stars were actually being created to replace them.

Slowly but surely, the five major systems were powering up.

The clone also had the imperial-heaven pre-beginning systems working at full speed.

With the Cruiser of Civilization operating at this level, it was possible to help the clone improve his psychic scale, power, and physical body.

If the Cruiser of Civilization were whole, it could theoretically transform an ordinary mortal into a god. Of course, that was under the assumption that the Lord of Civilization himself was operating it.

Right now, it wasn't possible for the clone to use it for godly ascension. But he could use it to calculate the workings of heaven, and analyze his weaknesses, making himself more perfect. After Yang Qi had cleaned out the treasure storehouse of the Executors of the Ancient Road, the clone had begun working on his cultivation base, simultaneously using the Engine of the One God to full effect.

His cultivation base was now at an unfathomable level, and his energy arts were as well. The heavenly workings calculations systems were immensely enigmatic. Not even the Executors of the Ancient Road had anything that could consume godhood like they could. Supposedly, they were second only to the Engine of the One God itself, and were key to controlling the Cruiser of Civilization as a whole.

With enough power, one could make calculations about the workings of heaven, and could understand energy arts, divine abilities, and constitutions on the deepest level.

They could even analyze a person and help them push their genes and psychic scale to a more perfect state.

Yang Qi had long since acquired the genetic systems and the psychic scaling systems, but had lacked the larger structure to use them to improve his cultivation base. It was like having some pieces of fish and meat, but not having a skilled chef to turn them into a delectable meal.

The heavenly workings calculations systems were like that chef.

A lesser skilled chef could turn some fish and meat into a mushy mess, whereas an amazing chef could produce gourmet food with it.

Right now, the immortal-slaying clone was like that fish or meat, and the heavenly workings calculations systems were about to turn him into a gourmet dish.

He was slowly heading toward becoming a god.

Chapter 1126: God Body

The immortal-slaying clone was forming a god body.

It was thanks to the heavenly workings calculations systems, the computations of which could extract the workings of heaven and pull them into the clone.

A three-dimensional projection of a perfect god body floated in front of him, complete with crystalline representations of every cell that made him up. It almost looked like the greyspace of a god kingdom or an immortal world.

The body had as many cells as the eternal sands of the universe, all of them like immortal worlds with a rank of three thousand or more.

In other words, this body might as well have been made up of millions upon millions of immortal worlds.

Creating a god body like that would require immense amounts of power, so much so that it was virtually incalculable.

To accommodate it, the clone was drawing deeply on the godhood stars. Doing so without abandon was leading to incredible results.

Tens of thousands of stars fell from the sky as the god body slowly neared a state of completion.

It glittered, sparkling and translucent, filled with immense secrets; having been put together by the heavenly workings calculations systems, there was no better god body that could have been formed for the immortal-slaying clone.

The clone opened his mouth and inhaled, and the glittering body entered him. Afterward, cracking and crunching sounds rang out as filth and impurities were extruded from inside of him.

His physical frame started transforming, becoming like liquid crystal as the systems of the Engine of the One God worked together to change him on a fundamental level.

“Excellent,” he said. “Now, power fusion using god legion angst!”

The God Legion Seal flew into his mouth as he inhaled once more. A moment later, his crystal body became one of pure gold.

Then he slowly forced the golden light out of him, causing him to become like crystal once again.

He inhaled again deeply, starting the process over. As it continued, it was as if his body were being baptized by the legion of gods, causing it to grow stronger and tougher.

“Purr, purr….”

Jadefall and the purrling suddenly appeared behind the clone.

Stroking the purrling, Jadefall said to it, “The Exalted Immortal-Slayer is forming a god body. And you need to help him finish the work. No one else can do it other than you. With a god body, we’ll be in a much better position when we finally have to face Proud Heaven and the ninth of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions. When that time comes, we should finally be able to reach the god world….”

The pink purrling spat out a bubble, a somewhat disdainful look on its face as if it were saying, “You think I need your help to get to the god world? Are you kidding me?”

The bubble quickly spread out and covered the clone. Inside, the clone was already like boiling liquid crystal, making it seem like he wasn’t even human anymore.

The purrling went on to spit out even more bubbles, each of them like an immortal world which sped into the clone’s body.

As all of that happened, the clone finally broke through certain limitations and exclaimed, “I'm finally finishing a perfect god body!”

He had reached a perfect state, making him superior to the tallest mountains and more grandiose than the largest oceans. A boundless aura spread out from him as he became vastly stronger than before.

Countless godhood stars poured their power down into the clone, making it seem like he himself was filled with innumerable heavenly bodies.

Already, he was pulsing with the aura of the god world.

Crick, crack!

He clenched his hands into fists as he was filled with a spirit that could fight heaven, earth, and gods alike. He extended his hand, causing eight of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions to fly out, forming a whole that lacked only its central heart.

“The purrling is amazing!” the clone said. “It can actually pierce the sealing marks of the Engine of the One God and surround me with a bubble that surpasses even the heavenly workings calculations systems. Now Yang Qi doesn’t actually need to fear fighting Proud Heaven. The only fear we need to consider is the instability that could occur with the ninth legacy medallion. If it weren’t for that, we could go out right now and provide backup.”

“I'm aware of that,” Jadefall said. She didn't sound like the mortal royal she had been before, but rather a Terrifying expert from the Ancient Road to the Gods. “However, although Yang Qi seems to be an even match for Proud Heaven, it’s impossible to say what vicious schemes Proud Heaven has up his sleeve. It’s too bad Yang Qi hasn’t seized Doom and taken his god legion angst. With two aspects of god legion angst combined, Yang Qi would definitely be able to slaughter Proud Heaven.”

“Naturally, Yang Qi already has plans in that regard,” the clone replied coolly. “Proud Heaven and Yang Qi are so much more powerful than Doom that he hardly counts for anything. Let’s wait and see what instructions Yang Qi gives us. This could very well be our biggest opportunity ever. It’s entirely possible that, thanks to Proud Heaven, we’ll uncover the secrets of the Great Necropolis and actually head to the god world. We would never be able to find out the truth about the necropolis on our own power, but can only do it with the will of King Immortal-Slayer. And I have the feeling that Yang Qi is holding back his trump cards in the hopes of getting that final legacy medallion off of Proud Heaven.

“It’s all going to come down to Yang Qi. He’s definitely much better at schemes than us.”

**

Meanwhile, Proud Heaven and Yang Qi were still fighting.

Both of them were measured in their attacks, hoping to find an opening to unleash something truly deadly.

Both of them found the other to be unpredictable and hard to read. On the one hand, Yang Qi felt like he understood Proud Heaven a lot, but on the other hand, felt like he was a complete mystery. The part that he understood related to Proud Heaven’s fundamental personality and bearing. The part that he didn’t understand related to what trump cards Proud Heaven had, and how he would use them.

As for Proud Heaven, he completely understood how important Yang Qi was to him, but on the other hand, had no idea of exactly what he was capable of.

Every time he thought Yang Qi had finally reached rock bottom, he would always start fighting back with renewed vigor, and turn ill fortune into good luck.

That was one of the things that made Yang Qi most terrifying.

It seemed almost as if there were some sort of mysterious destiny or fate wrapped around Yang Qi, making it impossible to assess his future. To Proud Heaven, he seemed like some unbeatable freak who was still waiting to start fighting with full force.

In order to beat him, Proud Heaven needed to assess his destiny and then take him out with one clean blow.

“You’re really not going to use the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart against me, Yang Qi?” he asked. “Aren’t you interested in seeing what the ninth legacy medallion is like?”

“I hate you!” Proud World shouted angrily. “If I’d known things would end up like this, Proud Heaven, I would have given that ninth medallion to Yang Qi a long time ago! With that medallion, he would have immense power under his control!”

“Dirty little swine!” Proud Heaven said. “You think I came here unprepared? You might have thought you were laying a trap for me, but I was manipulating things from behind the scenes the entire time. You see, I actually wanted you to steal that medallion and give it to Yang Qi. Sadly, considering how your cultivation base has grown, son, you’ve outgrown your usefulness to me. Ah, what a pity. I wanted you to be a magister, but instead you had to be stubborn and rebel against me. From here on out, you’re no son of mine. Besides, if one of my sons dies, it doesn’t really matter. I have plenty more.”

Gnashing his teeth, Proud World said, “You’re no match for Yang Qi, Proud Heaven.” Looking over, he said, “Doom, I would gladly sacrifice my own life to take out Proud Heaven. You have to give your god legion angst to Yang Qi. I'm sure he’ll give it back to you afterward.”

“Er….” Doom knew that the only way to actually defeat Proud Heaven was for him to give his god legion angst to Yang Qi to provide him a major energy arts boost.

But once Yang Qi combined the two types of god legion angst, it would cause difficulties in the future. How would they separate them later? How would Yang Qi return the god legion angst to him?

Doom was feeling very uncertain about what to do. It was a life or death decision, and if he made the wrong choice, there would be no going back. Despite the fact that he trusted Yang Qi, he still wasn’t sure which choice was the best.

“That god legion angst is your ultimate foundation, Doom,” Proud Heaven said. “Although the two of us have irreconcilable enmity, I have to remind you that god legion angst is a responsibility given by universal fortune. If you forsake the God Legion Seal, the destiny of the legion of gods will leave you. And that will mean your life has come to an end. Leave them, and they will strip you of all glory and honor, leaving you dead.”

As for Yang Qi, he didn't say anything. He just stood there with his hands clasped behind his back, watching and waiting.

Chapter 1127: Life or Death Decision

Doom had reached an extremely critical juncture, and Yang Qi wasn’t doing anything to influence his decision. Although Yang Qi had cast aside the fetters of the God Legion Seal, he knew that gaining a second seal would provoke heaven-shaking, earth-toppling changes.

At the least, it would be enough to defeat Proud Heaven.

In fact, with two pieces together, it might even be possible to force Proud Heaven’s God Legion Seal out of him, which would be such a loss for him that he would become an ordinary person who could be crushed with no effort at all.

But Yang Qi had made a promise to Doom, and he intended to keep it. He wouldn’t use underhanded methods to try to get his God Legion Seal. That would go against his ideals. However, if Doom chose to fuse the two God Legion Seals, it would definitely be an optimal outcome.

Of course, after using two combined aspects of the God Legion Seal, he would still forsake them in the end, similar to the log raft used to cross the river in the classic buddhist analogy.

At the moment, though, he was in the middle of a river as broad as the sea of bitterness, with only his own divine abilities to rely on to get to the other side. If he could use the God Legion Seal as a boat to aid the process, he wouldn’t hesitate to do so.

“The God Legion Seal is your foundation!” Proud Heaven called out, his voice thrumming with wretched evil. “Doom, all you have to do is join forces with me and you can have everything you desire. Yang Qi is treating you well because he wants your God Legion Seal, but once the right moment comes along, he’ll definitely kill you!”

Doom’s eyes suddenly went blank.

As for Proud Heaven, it was possible to see wretched light flickering in his eyes as he used some sort of wretched daoist technique to try to goad Doom into turning on Yang Qi.

However, as Proud Heaven used the technique, a holy aura sprang up around Doom, along with golden light. Then cracking sounds rang out, almost like ice rapidly melting. It seemed as though Doom was experiencing some sort of transformation, like a caterpillar emerging from a chrysalis as a butterfly. “You’re using some devil art to try to enchant me, Proud Heaven? Who do you think you are? I'm a bearer of the God Legion Seal, so what can your little challenge of illusions do to me? My mind is incomparably sharp, and I have complete control over myself! Hmph! Yang Qi’s cultivation base is so high that he has no need to scheme if he wants my God Legion Seal. You’re scared, aren’t you? Scared that we’ll actually combine the two God Legion Seals!”

“How could I have guessed that my enchantment technique would fail, and would actually result in helping you achieve a breakthrough?” Proud Heaven’s expression was cold, but he still managed a faint smile. “But that doesn’t matter. You’re not going to abandon your God Legion Seal and hand your life into the hands of another. That would be foolish beyond measure, even when dealing with the most trustworthy person in existence.”

“You’re right!” Doom replied. “The God Legion Seal is my foundation, and I don’t want to just hand it over to someone else. But I’ll do anything to see you dead. Do you know how many of my people you killed? Every single family member. Every single friend. You slaughtered all of them.”

Proud Heaven sighed. “No soul under heaven lives for all time. Even if I hadn’t killed them, they would have died eventually. That’s the truth, so what difference does it make if I killed them? I killed them to help you sever your mortal karma and remove the fetters holding you back. Only in that way could you truly seek the great dao of the legion of gods. Think about it. If I hadn’t killed them, would you have become so focused on revenge that you pushed your cultivation base to its current limit? There’s no way! You’re ultimately just a nobody from the Primeval Age who happened to come across some good fortune. Besides, think about all the things you accomplished thanks to me invading the Primeval Age, and all the years of warfare that resulted.”

“Bullcrap!” Doom said. “I'm here to fight you to the death, Proud Heaven, not to chat about old times. By the way, thanks to your enchantment attempt right now, I achieved major enlightenment about an ultimate truth. Care to hear the details?”

“What ultimate truth?” Proud Heaven said, not quite sure what he meant.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi was watching the situation develop. Based on his analysis, the dialogue between Doom and Proud Heaven was more complex than it might seem. After all, it seemed highly unlikely that Proud Heaven would engage in such banter for no reason.

As he watched and analyzed, he sent part of his mind into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

Right now, he didn’t fear Proud Heaven at all, but rather, the ninth legacy medallion that he possessed. If he used it, then given the level of Proud Heaven’s cultivation base, he might be able to force his way into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. And if that happened, it was entirely possible he would awaken the will of King Immortal-Slayer, which would then possess the immortal-slaying clone.

Yang Qi absolutely had to avoid that.

Therefore, he needed to have a good plan for what to do without the chart. He had eight pieces, but the ninth piece held by Proud Heaven was the core piece, crafted from King Immortal-Slayer’s heart. Unfortunately, he couldn’t open the chart lest Proud Heaven take advantage of that moment to seize it.

“The ultimate truth I learned is that it's possible to hand anything over to anyone. And the God Legion Seal counts in that.” Staring at Proud Heaven, Doom said, “I’ll give my God Legion Seal to you if you want it. But what will you give me in exchange?”

“What do you want?” Proud Heaven replied. “How about the future world? Or a chance to reach godly ascension?”

“No. The only thing worth it to me would be your life.” Doom burst out laughing. “You see, Proud Heaven, if it means taking your life, I'm more than happy to lose my God Legion Seal. Take it, Yang Qi! I trust you. You just have to promise you’ll use it to kill Proud Heaven!”

WHOOSH!

Doom waved his hand and a golden imp flew out in a streak of gold, arriving in front of Yang Qi before anyone could react. It radiated such might and grandeur that it seemed capable of suppressing the legion of gods in all the glory.

It was, of course, Doom’s God Legion Seal.

He was forsaking it and handing it to Yang Qi, all for him to use as a weapon to kill Proud Heaven. That was how much he desired to put an end to Proud Heaven; he was willing to trade the God Legion Seal for it!

“No!” Proud Heaven howled in a voice so shrill it seemed capable of shredding his heart and lungs to bits. Without hesitation, he thrust out his hand, drawing on his Ten Universes ability to unleash an aeonic aura of eternal destruction.

Unfortunately for him, he was too late.

The seal was already in Yang Qi’s possession, surrounded by a bubble. Cultivation base thrumming, Yang Qi launched a palm strike containing a host of very simple energy arts, backed with immense destructive power. It was a case of changing something rotten into something magical, and the moment it hit Proud Heaven’s Ten Universes, the vital energies of the two moves counteracted each other, and they both faded away.

With seemingly no effort, he had yet again negated Proud Heaven’s consummate technique.

Proud Heaven immediately backed up toward the altar. His attack had failed, but he still managed to keep his composure, although he was visibly surprised that Yang Qi had seized the God Legion Seal from Doom.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi was drawing on the God Legion Seal to further his cultivation. New techniques and abilities were flooding into him, combining with his true energy and pushing his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth to a further state of perfection.

Although he had pushed the Annulled Grand Magic and the other abilities he had acquired from Doom to very high levels, how could they possibly compare to what was capable with that aspect of the God Legion Seal?

All aspects of his body were experiencing marvelous changes, and becoming more complete than before.

At the same time, his psychic scale and power index both experienced explosive advancement.

Three hundred fifty. Three hundred sixty. Three hundred seventy. Three hundred eighty. Three hundred ninety.... Four hundred! It was only at the level of four hundred that his psychic scale stopped rising. He was now virtually at the peak of the Terrifying level and could even rival Lesser Gods!

As for his power index, it instantly broke past nine thousand!

With a power index over nine thousand and a psychic scale of four hundred, he was so strong it was hardly possible for the mortal world to contain him. The top figures in the mortal world were mid Terrifying experts. But right now, Yang Qi was so strong he could kill people like the old Mu Renwang with a single glance.

If Yang Qi went to the god world now, he might not necessarily be instantly killed if he fought a Lesser God.

Besides, the true potential of the God Legion Seal could only be unleashed in the god world itself. In the mortal world, it was like little more than an infant.

Yang Qi was surrounded by a holy, golden light that couldn’t be penetrated by a myriad manifestations of wretched evil. The light was like the buddhist clouds from the buddhist schools, or the auspicious clouds of the daoist sects, and it pulsed with the unknowable majesty of the god world.

Now that Yang Qi had taken Doom’s God Legion Seal, everyone could tell that Proud Heaven’s end was nigh.

“Hurry up and fuse with it, Yang Qi!” Doom said urgently. “With two parts of the God Legion Seal, you can easily suppress the third piece! Even if Proud Heaven flees to the edges of reality, you can still kill him! KILL HIM!”

“What else would I do?” Yang Qi said, and a vortex sprang into being behind him.

Scintillating starlight erupted from within it, power from the godhood stars in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. “If Proud Heaven and I are going to have our final battle, the rest of you go into safety in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart!”

Without any hesitation, he threw Doom, Proud World, and the Shepherd into the chart. Meanwhile, another golden imp appeared within the depths of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

Chapter 1128: Combination of Two Seals

When Doom made the decision to give his God Legion Seal to Yang Qi in exchange for a chance to truly take down Proud Heaven, dramatic transformations occurred in heaven and earth. Proud Heaven instantly realized that the situation had slipped beyond his control, and that Yang Qi now had the best chance of winning.

However, his expression didn’t change to one of anxiety, but rather remained one of anticipation.

After all, he knew that the victor had not yet been determined, and there were still many things that could happen. And he most certainly had a secret weapon to call on.

The vortex opened, revealing the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

Out of it flew the God Legion Seal, which Yang Qi grabbed. He now had two seals, one that belonged to him, and had once been linked to his own blood. The other was Doom's, which Yang Qi had already fused with. In other words, Yang Qi now had two God Legion Seals, and Doom had none, leaving him bereft of his previous status.

SPLAT!

Doom flopped onto the ground in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, soaked with blood, his power draining out of him. It was a terrifying sensation to lose his connection to the God Legion Seal and feel the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth fade away.

Most people would assume that having the God Legion Seal would lead to incredible glory, and meant that one had the support of the legion of gods. Anyone who willingly abandoned the seal would surely be abandoning all hope to live. They would be cursed by the gods and meet a grisly end. Right now, Doom was sinking into that oblivion; never could he have guessed that he would one day throw away the seal. Although he immediately felt regret, he still trusted that Yang Qi would save him in the end.

As for Yang Qi, the reason he hadn’t suffered such an ignominious fall upon abandoning his God Legion Seal was because he had the Unspoiled Body. It was the bane of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, and the mutual push and pull between them helped him keep a tenuous balance. Even when he left the seal behind, the techniques remained within him, and even allowed him to forge his own path of unique divine abilities.

Because of his experience, Yang Qi knew what fate awaited Doom. Therefore, as soon as he arrived in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, the immortal-slaying clone appeared behind him and thrust his palm out, sending his energy into Doom. At the same time, the sheepskin scroll appeared and True Devil tribulation began to smash into him, forcing Doom to cultivate the Unspoiled Body. Within moments, the same equilibrium appeared within him, and the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth ceased flowing out of him. In fact, he even reached a higher level of enlightenment as a result!

Doom’s energy arts began experiencing the mutual complementary aspects of yin and yang, leaving him feeling refreshed and enlivened, just as Yang Qi had when he first cultivated the Unspoiled Body. And with someone to help him cultivate this way, he didn’t experience any slipups. Of course, thanks to Yang Qi having the Purrfect God Art and the divine abilities from the thirty-six masks, he had an even better understanding of the enigmatic way to combine energy arts.

“Brother Doom, considering you’ve decided to abandon the God Legion Seal, I certainly won’t let you down. Going forward, your Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth is actually going to improve significantly. This is a special method I devised, combining the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, the Unspoiled Body, the Seventy-Two Monarchs Energy Art, and the Secret-Ensconcing All-World Anything-Everything Fundamental-Law Magic, Purrfect God Art, imperial-heaven pre-beginning powers, and the arts of the thirty-six masks. Together, they form a consummate art that I call the Sage Monarch Grand Magic.”

The voice actually belonged to the immortal-slaying clone.

The clone had been in communication with Yang Qi, and knew that he had just benefited by getting another God Legion Seal.

With that, they were doing as Proud Heaven had done in creating his own dao.

Proud Heaven had his Ten Universes. They were: Nature, Void, Cosmos, Nihility, Chaos, Epoch, Civilization, World, Macrocosm, Universe. Ultimately, they were focused on space and time being the crux of the world, leading to incredible enlightenment.

Right now, Yang Qi was gaining enlightenment into the dao of the sage monarch, in other words, his Sage Monarch Grand Magic.

Magical laws were swirling within his heart.

Sage, Monarch, Ruler, Emperor, Sovereign, Lord, Hero, Hegemon, God, Nothing.

Ten daos.

They represented that which was perfect and preeminent: the one origin, two polarities, three powers, four divisions, five phases, six directions, seven stars, eight trigrams, nine palaces, and ten preeminences.

The ten great daos of the many heavens.

In that moment, Yang Qi became like a sage, and at the same time, a monarch, a ruler, and a king. He was an emperor, a sovereign, a lord, a hero, a hegemon, and ambitious and ruthless. With one thought, he could shake all heaven and earth, and dominate everything that existed. He could achieve a dao of gods and become the ultimate ruler.

This was the Sage Monarch Grand Magic.

He was the center, and everything relied on him. What better bane could exist for Proud Heaven’s Ten Universes?

Proud Heaven had heaven, earth, yin, yang, time, and space. Yang Qi had sages, emperors, rulers, gods, and the Sovereign Lord. People controlled heaven and earth. Without them, heaven and earth were nothing. Meaningless. Empty.

As soon as the two seals were in his hand, a series of transformations began and Yang Qi burst out laughing. “Many thanks to you, Proud Heaven! Without you, I would never have gained enlightenment of my own dao. But now I understand the dao of humans. The Sage Monarch Grand Magic! The idea actually came from your Ten Universes! Henceforth, I will experience no more confusion, and will be on my way to the godly!”

The Sage Monarch Grand Magic. Ten daos.

In his heart, Yang Qi now understood what humans were fully capable of, whether sages or monarchs, whether that which was grand or that which was domineering. They were all different manifestations of what people were capable of.

Although the Sage Monarch Grand Magic was currently only a basic framework, it was also a foundation. As he gained more knowledge and came to a greater understanding of the workings of heaven, he would eventually piece them together into an invincible and perfect divine ability.

Right now, the Sage Monarch Grand Magic couldn't compare to the exquisite nature of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, nor the ferocity of the Seventy-Two Monarchs Energy Art or the spectacular nature of the Unspoiled Body. However, there was nothing better suited to Yang Qi. Thus, when he used it, he was mighty.

By way of comparison, it was like an infant trying to wield a sledgehammer. Although that sledgehammer might be extremely powerful, in the hands of an infant, it couldn’t live up to its superior nature. Yang Qi was like that infant, and the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth and the other apex techniques were like sledgehammers. Meanwhile, the Sage Monarch Grand Magic was like a finely-crafted needle.

As he grew, that finely-crafted needle would become like a pillar that could prop up the heavens.

This was his technique.

“Yang Qi...” Proud Heaven said in a voice that almost didn’t sound human. “Well done. Very well done. You’re breaking through and coming to understand your own dao. Unfortunately, you have no logical way to assert that your dao is superior to mine.”

“Wrong, Proud Heaven. I have two God Legion Seals now, and you have no way to defend yourself. The time has come for you to die!” Yang Qi thrust his hand out to begin combining the seals.

Earlier, he had been worried about what unstoppable transformations might occur when he combined them. But things were different now. He understood his own dao and no longer had to rely on a mishmash of various martial disciplines. He had already combined everything into a single framework.

Never before had he been so clear about what he needed to do going forward.

“Saber of the Hegemon!”

As the seals combined, an enormous figure appeared overhead, a saber in hand that could cleave primal-chaos and cut apart the many heavens. Anyone who saw that figure would know that it could use that saber to dominate everything under heaven and take control of all creation.

Yang Qi’s Sage Monarch Grand Magic was based on the nature of humanity, and instantly caused his domineering will to spread out in all directions.

“Spear of Heroes!”

RUMBLE!

As the hegemon slashed out with his saber, a hero appeared opposite him, long spear in hand, pulsing with a heroic aura of bravery and daring.

Most people, in their hearts, wanted to be both hero and hegemon. As it was said, heroic hegemons could dominate everything under heaven.

That was what people sought. The Sage Monarch Grand Magic brought to life the dreams of all people, drawing on the ultimate meaning of both hegemons and heroes.

For now, he couldn’t draw on Sage, Monarch, Ruler, Emperor, Sovereign, Lord, God, or Nothing. He only had the most basic framework, and until he reached godly ascension, he wouldn't be able to draw on it fully.

That said, the path to the Ancient Road to the Gods and the legion of gods was now his to walk.

The hegemon had appeared.

The hero was in the world.

The heroic hegemon could dominate everything under heaven.

As the two God Legion Seals combined, heaven and earth shook wildly. The entire area around them crumbled, causing beams of bright light to shine out into the Great Necropolis around them.

Everyone, even those in the immortal worlds, even the Executors of the Ancient Road, could see the light piercing through the primal-chaos.

Chapter 1129: Sage Monarch Grand Magic

The combination of two God Legion Seals was nothing short of heaven-shaking and earth-shattering. Truth be told, ever since the seal was broken into three parts, it had never been re-combined. Now that Yang Qi was combining two portions, what exact level of power would be released?

No one could say for sure.

Even when only a third of the seal appeared in the mortal world, it could be used to call the wind and summon the rain. In the god world, it could draw on the magical and natural laws there to demonstrate even further transformations, and attacks that featured unimaginable levels of power.

The combination of the two seals wasn’t just provoking transformations in Yang Qi himself, but also causing incalculable changes to the past, the present, and the future.

All worlds that were inferior to the god world were experiencing transformations.

And there was one person responsible: Yang Qi.

Yang Qi could grasp the sun and moon, trample heavenly bodies, and affect the rotation of the cosmos. He understood the fundamental nature of humans, and even more so, comprehended what it meant to be a god. He knew full well the difference between Lesser Gods, Common Gods, Greater Gods, Consummate Gods, Perfect Gods, Paramount Gods, and the Sovereign Lord.

The God Legion Seal was blasting through the substructure of the Great Necropolis.

Top experts could perceive all of these developments, but couldn't do anything about them. The most dramatic thing to happen was that the Executors of the Ancient Road quickly evacuated their headquarters and left the Great Necropolis. Looking back, they could see golden light streaking through the depths of the necropolis, causing intense booms to ring out as it slammed into what was apparently a greyspace.

Far in the unknown depths, chaotic banging sounds could be heard, almost as if the walls leading to the god world were being struck.

WOOOOSH!

A group of people could be seen looking at the Great Necropolis off in the distance.

One of them looked like an emperor, and his face was ashen. “This is bad. That's the aura of the God Legion Seal. And not just one piece. Someone is combining two pieces. There’s nothing else in this world that could possibly release might like that.”

This man with an imperial crown was none other than the emperor of the executors.

He was flanked by a few individuals in robes of various colors such as black, white, and green. Despite the various colors of their robes, all of them had the same character embroidered on their chests, in god script: Executor.

In the mortal world, these people were in charge of enforcing the law. No one dared to defy them, because defying them led to death. Yet here they were, clearly afraid. Terrified even. The combination of two pieces of the God Legion Seal would lead to enough power to easily wipe them out.

“Hurry!” the emperor said. “Gather all the experts and return to the headquarters. We have to activate the Gate to the Gods to stop the God Legion Seals from combining. From what I can tell, this isn’t a combination of three, but rather two. That means we still have a chance to stop it!”

With that, he blurred into motion, vanishing.

Meanwhile, in the very depths of the necropolis, Yang Qi was forcing the two seals together, causing the golden light to slowly shrink down. The two of them were in a bubble, and inside, two golden imps could be seen, like yin and yang, swirling around each other until they became one. Combined, they were still an imp, but at the same time, resembled a burly, golden man, in the middle of performing a host of martial arts stances, all of them complementary, and each move of which could reveal the grace of heaven and earth and the profundities of space and time.

Roar!

The golden imp immediately flew into Yang Qi’s forehead.

Yang Qi was reminded of his earliest days in the mortal world, outside Yanhaven, when the city magistrate’s bodyguard Luo Hun had crippled his energy arts. Afterward, he had been struck by lightning, which was what had given him the God Legion Seal and fueled his growth to power.

Of course, he was a very different person now than he was back then. As a youth, he hadn’t understood anything. But now he knew of his own dao, the Sage Monarch Grand Magic. And his dao was not the dao of the God Legion Seal.

The hegemon and the hero were both at his back.

This was the ultimate expression of humans. Humans wrote books. Humans advanced and developed.

With his Sage Monarch Grand Magic, he was able to bring the God Legion Seal under his control, instead of having it control him.

Crick! Crack!

All of a sudden, he was back to his ordinary state.

His forehead went back to normal, and the dramatic transformations caused by the two God Legion Seals faded away, having been completely subjugated and crushed by him. From the look of things, he really did have the power to control the God Legion Seal, and was by no means flustered or frightened.

“I've combined the two parts of the God Legion Seal, Proud Heaven. That means it's time for you to die. Presumably you know that I can already sense the location of the third seal. So bring it out!” He began to walk threateningly toward Proud Heaven.

Proud Heaven just stood there laughing. “It doesn’t matter whether you got that second piece, or I did. Although you combined them, you’ve suppressed the godpower of the seal so that it won’t control you. Instead of being remolded, your cultivation base has been lowered. The light of the God Legion Seal was about to break out of the Great Necropolis, but you stopped it. And that definitely harmed your meridians and damaged your sea of energy. You might be able to hold on for a bit longer, but in the end, you’ll die. Don’t you understand that fact? You've profaned the legion of gods! Do you really think you can suppress their glory?!”

“You really know how to run your mouth!” Yang Qi said with a faint smile. “Do you really claim to understand the level I’ve reached? Get over here!”

It didn’t seem at all like he was suffering from the conditions Proud Heaven had just talked about. Instead, he waved his arm, causing golden light to shoot out from his sleeve that became an enormous palm attack. At the same time, two enormous figures appeared behind him, causing everything to shake violently.

Buzzzz.

Instead of meeting the attack, Proud Heaven slapped his hand out toward the nearby sealing mark.

“Do you know why I wanted to fight it out with you right here, Yang Qi? Because I already control part of the godpower of the Great Necropolis. You might be an Inheritor, but sadly for you, that doesn’t mean anything to me. You see, I'm already the true Inheritor! Little did you know that when the Great Necropolis ejected all those godpower seeds, there was one of them that could be considered the greatest of all. And I took it. Why else do you think I would give so many other seeds to that scum, Star Swordlife?”

His palm attack landed and the sealing mark shattered, causing countless streams of Great Necropolis godpower to shoot out, creating a huge stone tomb that shot forth to meet Yang Qi’s incoming palm.

The enormous face suddenly appeared out in the open again.

“So, Proud Heaven, you actually released me?” Along with the face came the rancorous energy of the legion of gods. However, Proud Heaven quickly grabbed it and threw it into the projection of the Great Necropolis before it could do anything else. Then he spun and launched the God Tombstone Palms at Yang Qi.

“Ten Universes!”

Proud Heaven used his Ten Universes ability combined with the Great Necropolis godpower to defend himself, then launched another strike at the sealing mark.

Suddenly, a heart-shaped medallion appeared in the depths of the sealed area, shining with boundless blood-colored light, as well as the aura of King Immortal-Slayer.

“The ninth legacy medallion?” Yang Qi said. At a glance, he could tell that this medallion was different from the others. Obviously, it wasn’t in the future world; it had been sealed here all along!

He wasn't sure how the sealing mark had come to be. And the dramatic turn of events in which Proud Heaven had subdued the enormous face happened too quickly to process. All Yang Qi knew was that Proud Heaven had set all of this up. He had even predicted that Yang Qi would combine the two pieces of the God Legion Seal. However, there was one thing he hadn’t predicted, and that was that Yang Qi would suppress the boundless power of the God Legion Seal and use it to gain enlightenment of his Sage Monarch Grand Magic.

Normally speaking, no one should have been able to control the power of the combined seal. But Yang Qi could control it with the Sage Monarch Grand Magic.

Now Proud Heaven had only one option: break the seal, release the face, devour it, and activate the ninth legacy medallion.

“Nine Combine: Let King Immortal-Slayer Come!”

RUMBLE!

The face was still struggling against Proud Heaven, but he simply inhaled, causing the face to shoot toward him and into the ninth legacy medallion.

The ninth medallion was a heart. And the face was an expression of the rancorous energy of countless fallen gods, which was now being sacrificed to that legacy medallion to unlock its power.

“Arrggggh!” the face screamed. “So, Proud Heaven, this heart is what it's all about? I thought you were going to help me be born again! You villain! You were plotting against me this whole time!”

Along with its screaming, it unleashed its most powerful sound techniques, but they did no good.

“Go. Go find your essence. Nine combined, in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart!”

Proud Heaven shoved his palm out again, and piercing screams could be heard as the heart vanished into nothing. Turning, Proud Heaven chuckled. “King Immortal-Slayer is going to be resurrected, Yang Qi. His will is awakening. Just wait until your backyard bursts into flames. I have to thank you. Without you, I could never have activated the last of King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy medallions. Isn’t that what you wanted? Well, I just gave it to you.”

RUUUUMBLE....

Deep in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, dramatic things were already underway.

Chapter 1130: A Mighty Will

The last legacy medallion, the heart, had been stirred to action by the enormous face, thus sensing the spatial coordinates of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart and entering it before it could be stopped.

Normally speaking, even if Yang Qi had somehow acquired the ninth medallion, it shouldn’t have been possible to fuse all of the medallions so quickly. Unfortunately, Proud Heaven had used some secret magic to pull off a miracle. As fast as lightning, the ninth medallion was inside the chart.

In other words, the fight had suddenly spilled onto a second front!

Yang Qi had combined two parts of the God Legion Seal, giving him the power to keep Proud Heaven in check, who was fighting back with his piece of the God Legion Seal. At the same time, Proud Heaven was forcing all nine of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions to combine, which would summon the will of King Immortal-Slayer to slaughter the immortal-slaying clone and unleash havoc in the world.

Yang Qi had to keep that will suppressed.

If he didn’t, it would lead to explosive consequences.

Of course, from the moment he had acquired the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, he knew that this moment would come. And he had known all along that Proud Heaven might try something along these lines.

RUMBLE....

As soon as the final legacy medallion appeared in the chart, the other eight medallions slipped away from the clone’s control and flew out into the open.

Crack!

The pieces combined, and the united medallion finally appeared. Instantly, destructive power appeared in the depths of the chart, causing the godhood stars to dim and begin falling, as though they were being devoured by some immense force.

“Get out of here!” the clone shouted, blurring into motion as he threw all caution to the wind to get all of their people and resources out of the chart. Of course, Yang Qi had made plans for this situation, so things went smoothly. As everyone emerged into the Sage Monarch League, the clone, with his newly formed god body, shot toward Proud Heaven.

Within the chart, a mighty will rose up, along with terrifying power that filled it completely. Looking into the primal-chaos, both Yang Qi and Proud Heaven could see an immense image, so large it was impossible to gauge its full dimensions. It filled the world, both past and future, indicating that the chart now surpassed time and could be entered from any era.

In fact, all of the top experts could see this development.

But none dared to step forward to examine or try to take it. The boundless emperor of the executors, a mid Terrifying expert, could sense power within it that could destroy the god world. When King Immortal-Slayer appeared, it meant a reign of terror and gore was about to be unleashed. And that counted in the god world, much less the immortal worlds. And to the immortal worlds, the mortal world might as well have been filled with nothing but pigs, dogs, cows, and sheep.

The Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart was already so different that Yang Qi could hardly recognize it.

The will of King Immortal-Slayer now controlled it, and as a result, it thrummed with hatred of the god world, as though it were prepared to devour any god it encountered.

Yang Qi could sense immense killing intent, first spreading out to fill the Great Necropolis, then converging in its depths on the immortal-slaying clone.

“Karma! Such intense karma intertwined with my will. Trying to plot against me, I see, my successor. How very unfilial. Since you’ve accepted my legacy, your fate is sealed. Your destiny is about to be taken by me!”

All of the experts in the Great Necropolis could sense a mighty will that surpassed that of ordinary gods, something that could actually move the Great Necropolis.

The Great Necropolis could sense the danger it was in, and rumbling soon filled it as numerous sealing marks were broken, unleashing godpower to fight the will of King Immortal-Slayer.

Crack! Snap!

When the two mighty wills collided, immense destructive power was released in the depths of the necropolis, directly destroying numerous worlds in the area.

The will of King Immortal-Slayer had one immediate goal: to kill the immortal-slaying clone and take over his body. However, they were all in the Great Necropolis, which was a mighty and mysterious thing that originated in the god world and actually surpassed the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. It might not care if some tiny ants came inside to explore it, but if a dragon charged in, it wouldn’t just stand idly by.

Humans wouldn’t care if some tiny parasites existed inside them. Perhaps they could even tolerate some flies on their skin. But if a huge snake suddenly tried to wrap them up, they definitely wouldn’t tolerate it.

The will of King Immortal-Slayer was simply too surly and unreasoning.

Thus, it was a foregone conclusion that he would end up clashing with the will of the Great Necropolis.

Although King Immortal-Slayer’s will was under attack, it still moved with incredible speed. It quickly swept over the area containing the sealing mark, and despite its weakened state, was still strong enough to overwhelm gods! In the blink of an eye, the area became filled with a rain of blood, with the weeping of ghosts and wailing of gods, and power so destructive it could destroy the heavens and crush the earth. And all of it was focused on the clone.

King Immortal-Slayer didn’t have a body now, only a will. In that sense, he was much like an intelligent tsunami that could destroy everything in its path.

Despite that, the clone and Yang Qi were both attacking Proud Heaven, and were simply accepting the attack of King Immortal-Slayer’s will.

Obviously, they were willing to fight things out to the bitter end with Proud Heaven.

It came as a complete surprise to Proud Heaven that, even after unleashing King Immortal-Slayer’s full set of legacy medallions and unlocking his will, the immortal-slaying clone would do this! Obviously, Proud Heaven had to defend himself lest he be killed along with the clone.

How could he ever resign himself to being killed?

“Let the sealing marks be unraveled! Use the power not even I can wield, to activate the Great Necropolis. Unleash the power to bury gods, bury King Immortal-Slayer, and bury the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.... I am the Great Necropolis, and the Great Necropolis is me! I am the ultimate Inheritor! And I will seal the will of King Immortal-Slayer!”

RUMBLE!

The Great Necropolis was being fully activated.

The area with the sealing mark was like a huge black hole that began tugging at everyone present, including the will of King Immortal-Slayer, the immortal-slaying clone, and Yang Qi.

And the biggest focus was King Immortal-Slayer’s will.

Laughing heartily, Proud Heaven said, “This place is one of the Great Necropolis’ wind eyes! Do you know what a wind eye is? In the language of the god world, it implies an enormous eye created by a nameless god wind. And once it appears, even gods will be sucked in by it! I originally didn’t want to use it on you, but now that King Immortal-Slayer’s will has appeared, it seems you’re in for a disaster. In the end, I guess it serves my ultimate purpose. After all, I want to control the will of King Immortal-Slayer. With him, I can exercise full control over the Great Necropolis!”

Proud Heaven continued to laugh as the black ‘wind eye’ sucked everything toward it, causing the Great Necropolis to tremble violently as though it might start moving soon. In fact, it was at this point that a seed of truth appeared above his head. It wasn’t the color of ordinary rock, but rather pure white, like jade, or the fat of a sheep.

It was clearly a king among all other types of stone.

Proud Heaven really had taken the ultimate godpower seed from the Great Necropolis, the king of all the others.

No one could possibly imagine what level of control this gave him over the godpower of the necropolis.

Fingers splayed, Yang Qi thrust his hand out toward Proud Heaven.

Proud Heaven responded with his Great Necropolis God Art, using palm techniques that caused numerous enormous tombstones to appear and block Yang Qi’s attacks. The two of them fought back and forth briefly, and neither seemed to have the upper hand.

The Great Necropolis continued to shake violently as its will fought the will of King Immortal-Slayer, although no one could perceive exactly how the fight was playing out.

Proud Heaven’s control over the Great Necropolis godpower was middling at best, and the will of King Immortal-Slayer was the bane of that power.

King Immortal-Slayer’s roars of rage echoed through the necropolis as the two forces fought back and forth. They were like two elephants clashing, while in comparison, the fight between Yang Qi and Proud Heaven was like a competition between ants. The difference was almost too big to describe with words.

However, Yang Qi knew that if he didn't kill Proud Heaven, the man would most likely take advantage of the battle of wills in a sandpiper, clam, and fisherman situation.

Right now was his best chance to kill Proud Heaven.

Therefore, he drew fully on the Sage Monarch Grand Magic and joined his clone in the attack.

Meanwhile, Proud Heaven was drawing on the Great Necropolis godpower to unleash one of its most enigmatic abilities, the God-Ordaining Incantation. One finger to ordain gods, one fist to bury them!

“Interring!”

He threw out his fist, causing numerous projections of the Great Necropolis to fall like a rain of tombstones, each of which had enough destructive power to overwhelm a three thousandth ranked immortal world.

But with two God Legion Seals, what did Yang Qi have to be afraid of? He shot forward, spinning as he vanquished the God-Ordaining Incantation and destroyed all of the projections. Finally, he pushed his palms together in front of his chest, then pulled them apart to reveal a spinning vortex.

“I'm not sure how you got your hands on that king of seeds from the Great Necropolis. But now, your gains are going to turn into losses. I'm taking that God Legion Seal of yours!”

Chapter 1131: Dramatic Upheavals in Heaven and Earth

By just combining the two God Legion Seals, Yang Qi had already instigated dramatic upheavals in heaven and earth. Although he had immediately moved to keep them under control, Proud Heaven hadn’t hesitated to take advantage of the situation.

The Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart instantly went out of control and the will of King Immortal-Slayer appeared, wreaking destructive havoc as it invaded the Great Necropolis and began battling its will.

It seemed to indicate that the Immortal Dao Age was going to undergo a dramatic event, perhaps even an apocalyptic catastrophe. Or maybe it would be born again.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi and Proud Heaven were fighting, with Proud Heaven using Great Necropolis godpower to defend against the power of Yang Qi’s two God Legion Seals. However, Proud Heaven also seemed to be focusing inwardly, as though he were also in the middle of cultivating some strange divine ability. He clasped his palms together, then pulled them apart and unleashed a host of fist techniques from the Ten Universes. Apparently, the mere presence of King Immortal-Slayer’s will in the Great Necropolis had provided new enlightenment and understanding to Proud Heaven regarding his own abilities.

Yang Qi could sense that Proud Heaven’s deep connection to the Great Necropolis was causing his own control of it to wane.

And Proud Heaven was benefiting greatly because of it.

“Many thanks to you, Yang Qi!” Proud Heaven said. “Of course, all of this is going according to plan. The will of King Immortal-Slayer is fighting the Great Necropolis, and thus the essence of the Great Necropolis is growing weaker, which in turn is allowing me to absorb it and gain control! Furthermore, do you know where my God Legion Seal is? I’ll tell you. It’s right here!”

Proud Heaven suddenly launched another consummate Ten Universes technique, and the sealing mark beneath his feet exploded, allowing dazzling shafts of golden godlight to stab upward as a God Legion Seal flew out into the open. However, this God Legion Seal was surrounded by a projection of the Great Necropolis, which apparently protected it and ensured that Yang Qi’s two seals couldn’t touch it.

“If you think you can use your two seals to get the third, Yang Qi, you’re sadly mistaken. After getting control of the Great Necropolis, I used it to seal the third God Legion Seal, making it impossible for you to take. The Great Necropolis is mine. King Immortal-Slayer’s will is mine. Therefore, I'm going to have to ask you to leave!”

Yang Qi’s plan had been to use his two God Legion Seals to gain access to the third seal.

Unfortunately, Proud Heaven had prepared for that possibility and sealed it with the essence of the Great Necropolis. And right now, there was no way Yang Qi was able to do anything with the essence of the Great Necropolis.

“Monarch... monarch....” Proud Heaven said. As he did, a voice spoke within the depths of the necropolis, something that could rip mid Terrifying experts to shreds. It was an expression of will that repeated the word “monarch” over and over again with destructive force. It was none other than King Immortal-Slayer’s will, trying to destroy the Great Necropolis.

A deadly tempest sprang up, rushing through the pathways of the Great Necropolis and picking up treasures, treasure troves, immortal world, sects, ejecting them all and completely clearing out the Great Necropolis.

Yang Qi felt a mighty force pushing against him, almost as if he were a chunk of food that the Great Necropolis was trying to vomit up.

The power behind that force of ‘vomiting’ was too much for anyone to stand up to. Yang Qi couldn’t possibly worry about fighting Proud Heaven at that moment, so he curled up into a ball and used his Purrfect God Art to protect himself as he was hurled away.

As he tumbled through the Great Necropolis, he collided with immortal worlds, sects, treasures troves, and the like, until light filled his eyes and he was outside the Great Necropolis.

Already, he could tell that heaven and earth were very different from before.

It was a much more violent eruption than anything from before, such that the many heavens were all completely transforming.

Immortal worlds with ranks of two or three thousand were ejected, smashing into the primal-chaos. In fact, there were sections of primal-chaos that had existed for millions upon millions of years that were being destroyed by the energy flows. And there were plenty of treasures and collections of vital energy that were like ice hitting water, and immediately melted into nothing.

In the past, the eruptions of the Great Necropolis had provoked mysterious changes among the immortal worlds. But this time was different. After all, there were immortal worlds ranked three thousand that were flying out, which defied the imagination of most immortals.

Crack!

Yang Qi saw the corpses of gods and immense superpower sects being ejected. In the past, they were like parasites in the Great Necropolis, but no longer. And the destructive force of the eruption was bringing about the death of countless experts.

The Sage Monarch League was also ejected.

Thankfully, there were plenty of extremely powerful experts there. And they had a spell formation that was backed by the power of the one origin, two polarities, three powers, four divisions, five phases, six directions, seven stars, eight trigrams, nine palaces, and ten preeminences. With that level of power it was able to summon a huge bubble that surrounded the immortal world protectively. Although the people inside were shocked by what was happening, they were soon able to restore their calm.

Because of the protection, the Sage Monarch League wasn’t damaged at all.

As soon as Yang Qi saw it, he flew over, worried about what could happen if Proud Heaven pursued him.

However, after the Great Necropolis spat out all of the ‘parasites’, Proud Heaven vanished from sight. At this point, Yang Qi realized that Proud Heaven had outmaneuvered him, and that he also understood the Great Necropolis far more deeply. In fact, Yang Qi speculated that Proud Heaven’s trip to the god world had probably involved some sort of contact with the Great Necropolis, which made it that much easier for him to work with it in this situation.

It begged the question of how many other unfathomable assets Proud Heaven had at his disposal.

Jadefall, flanked by others among his subordinates, appeared to meet him.

“What happened? Proud Heaven isn’t dead?” she said.

“He’s not,” Yang Qi replied. “The will of King Immortal-Slayer entered the Great Necropolis, and now I don’t know what's happening. I bet Proud Heaven is still there in the necropolis, trying to take advantage of the situation. Of course, that’s easier said than done. The wills of the Great Necropolis and King Immortal-Slayer aren’t exactly things that can be easily dealt with. For now, let’s stay safe, wait patiently, and see how the situation develops. The Sage Monarch League is strong enough that we aren’t under any threat. Even with the power of the Great Necropolis, Proud Heaven isn’t a match for me; I can take his God Legion Seal away from him if he comes too close.”

Although the surrounding vital energy was in chaos, the numerous powerful spell formations that had been constructed in the Sage Monarch League ensured that the vital energy inside was stable and growing stronger by the moment.

Snap. Crack.

As everyone looked at the crumbling chaos that surrounded them, an immense gravitational force sprang up around Yang Qi.

“Annulled Grand Magic!” Yang Qi said. “All treasures, come to me! All immortal worlds, come under my control. All immortal worlds with a rank of three thousand, shrink down and enter the Sage Monarch League!”

In response to his words, the three thousandth ranked immortal world that had been ejected did just that. Being wrapped up by Yang Qi’s godpower, they shrank down and entered the Sage Monarch League, which was now filling up with more and more worlds.

“Come to me, treasure troves!” Yang Qi said, sending out his divine will into the many heavens, causing countless hoards of treasures to fly toward him, including collections of godhood.

When the people in the Sage Monarch League saw this, they cried out in loud voices, “The league-lord is completely invincible in all of heaven and earth!”

Although godhood was falling down like rain, no one rushed to try to grab it. They were so in awe of Yang Qi that they didn’t dare to violate the various laws that had been set forth in the league. The old way of fighting to the death over valuable items wasn't permitted, and any who violated that law would end up suffering fates in which they suffered torment that made them wish they could die.

Meanwhile, Doom, the Shepherd, and Proud World all stood atop the Preeminent God Pillar. One by one, they spoke out in voices that rumbled like thunder.

“I, Doom, league-lord of the Great Necropolis Alliance, sectlord of the Doom Sect, former wielder of the God Legion Seal, hereby surrender and pay allegiance to League-Lord Yang Qi, and become a member of the Sage Monarch League.”

“I, the Shepherd, leader of the Hell of Sages and Mahātmās, league-lord of the Fiend-Devil League, hereby surrender and pay allegiance to Yang Qi.”

“I, Proud World, son of Proud Heaven, hereby surrender and pay allegiance to Yang Qi.”

The fact that powerful and famous people like these were becoming Yang Qi’s followers was shocking. That was especially true of Doom, who had lost the God Legion Seal, but also began cultivating the Unspoiled Body and Sage Monarch Grand Magic. Because of that, it was entirely possible that he would be able to survive in the god world.

The various members of the sects present were all astonished.

From the moment the Great Necropolis had begun ejecting immortal worlds, and the people from the Ancient Road to the Gods had begun to explore the Immortal Dao Age, everything had been a chaotic hodgepodge of good and bad people.

And all of the other immortal worlds who were still interested in fighting each other were now looking over at the Sage Monarch League.

“Who would’ve guessed that the alliance of savages and the Fiend-Devil League would actually join the Sage Monarch League to follow League-Lord Yang Qi. He’s starting to unify everything....”

“Let’s see if Yang Qi really will unify all of the immortal worlds. With all these treasures out in the open, will we really be cut off from all of them? Will the Sage Monarch League really take all of the treasures and resources?”

“Not necessarily. Yang Qi might be strong, but he still has to deal with the Executors of the Ancient Road. And I heard that the Royal Palace of Assassins still has a major grudge with the Sage Monarch League.”

“Let’s see if the Royal Palace of Assassins gets ejected too!”

Chapter 1132: Unifying the Dao of Immortals

In the Great Necropolis, there were innumerable organizations that were constantly fighting each other. Of course, all the Terrifying experts knew that, of the various top organizations, the Executors of the Ancient Road were the most powerful.

After them came the Sage Monarch League, which had risen to the top as quickly as the rising sun. After them came the Fiend-Devil League, the Great Necropolis Alliance, and the Royal Palace of Assassins.

All of them had mid Terrifying experts who could slaughter anything in their path. In fact, they were so powerful that any of them could have vied for superiority. Yet the leaders of the Fiend-Devil League and the Great Necropolis Alliance were now loyal to Yang Qi and the Sage Monarch League. That meant that the executors no longer occupied the top spot.

It was in that shocking moment that the Royal Palace of Assassins appeared.

They were ejected alongside several immortal worlds ranked two thousand. Their headquarters was a huge palace surrounded by a killing energy of immense proportions. Within it, a host of assassins operated a grand spell formation as they tried to navigate their way through the chaos in their way.

Assassins generally didn’t operate in the open, otherwise, how could they retain their reputation as assassins?

But right now, they were definitely out in the open. And considering that they had tried to assassinate Yang Qi in the past, how could he simply let them off the hook?

He quickly sent streams of golden light flying out of the Sage Monarch League, which pierced through the primal-chaos like boundless godpower. Then, everyone could see Yang Qi appear outside like an ancient heaven-god. The primal-chaos couldn’t do a thing to stop him, and in fact, the golden light that shone around him created a powerful domain.

Extending his hand, he shot toward the Royal Palace of Assassins.

“Looking to die?!” the assassins shouted, and several of them flew out to meet him, including the King of Assassins, who held a long sword in his hand.

“Aeonic Assassination!”

“Complete Extermination!”

The King of Assassins had personally attempted to kill Yang Qi, but failed, and he knew full well that Yang Qi wouldn’t let that go unanswered. But he was still enraged to see Yang Qi so flagrantly attacking the Royal Palace of Assassins as a whole, and simply couldn't allow that.

Sadly for him, he was now far weaker than Yang Qi was.

As the two closed in on each other, Yang Qi sent out a golden hand that flicked out with one finger.

The King of Assassin’s sword light shattered, and he was slashed and hacked into a bloody conglomeration of gore. Coughing up blood, he looked at Yang Qi in astonishment and said, “You... Yang Qi, how could you be so strong? Are you a god already? Aggghhhh!”

Everyone watching had expected this to be a raging battle of top experts. None of them would have anticipated that the King of Assassins would be devastated so easily and quickly.

Yang Qi stepped into the Royal Palace of Assassins, reached out, and grabbed the King of Assassins, holding him up like a bedraggled chicken.

His bloodcurdling screams were all that people needed to hear.

“So strong. How could he be this invincible?”

“The King of Assassins once fought with the emperor of the executors and managed to survive. But Yang Qi just grabbed him like an animal. Exactly how strong is Yang Qi? Is he the top expert in all the immortal worlds?”

“I think so. He beat the King of Assassins with a single move. That means he's definitely the top figure in the immortal dao civilization. But how did he get so strong?”

“So that’s how it is. Now I get it.”

“What do you mean? What do you get?”

“People are saying that Yang Qi is the bearer of the God Legion Seal. And that follower of his, Doom, also used to bear a God Legion Seal, but handed it to Yang Qi. That means Yang Qi has two God Legion Seals. As long as he can get the final piece, he’ll be truly invincible.”

“If he already has two pieces, the third piece shouldn’t be that hard to take.”

The countless gathered experts were so impressed that none of them considered defying him; in fact, all of them wanted to join him and ask for protection.

As soon as Yang Qi grabbed the King of Assassins, countless experts poured out of the Royal Palace of Assassins in an attempt to save him. Drawing on the power of the palace itself, they sent a dragon of death shooting toward Yang Qi.

“If you people have a death wish, then I guess that means there won’t be a Royal Palace of Assassins going forward!”

Yang Qi waved his sleeve, unleashing a torrent of daoist techniques that exploded every person it touched, transforming them into streams of vital energy that were sucked into the palace itself.

Then Yang Qi waved his hand, and the Royal Palace of Assassins shrank down to a size so small it fit right on his palm. The famous organization of assassins that had dominated the Ancient Road to the Gods for billions of years, striking fear into countless hearts, had been exterminated just like that.

“And now the King of Assassins will become a puppet!” Yang Qi stood there in the middle of the primal-chaos, not making any attempt to hide as he clamped his other hand onto the King of Assassins’ head. Instantly, a halo blossomed out as he completely took control of the man's thoughts.

The King of Assassins fought back, but it didn’t do him any good. A moment later, he dropped to his knees.

“Milord!”

Everyone could see that he was now a puppet.

RUMBLE!

Right then, something gargantuan emerged from the Great Necropolis. It was a huge gate that led to the end of the Ancient Road to the Gods, a doorway that could reach godly ascension. It was the Gate to the Gods. And there were countless top experts surrounding it, as well as a host of palaces.

The Executors of the Ancient Road had been ejected from the necropolis.

‘The Gate to the Gods? How immensely powerful.’ As Yang Qi finished taking the Royal Palace of Assassins, he looked over at the Gate to the Gods and marveled in his heart. However, he wasn't afraid. In fact, he was one hundred percent confident that he could take the gate and simultaneously wipe out the Executors of the Ancient Road.

He was without a doubt the top expert under heaven, and the most powerful fighter outside of the god world. Not even Proud Heaven was a match for him without the Great Necropolis and its secrets to draw on. And if the emperor of the executors and his followers weren’t a match for Proud Heaven, then how could they possibly cause problems for Yang Qi?

Just when Yang Qi was about to make his move on the executors and their Gate to the Gods, intense rumbling sounds could be heard from the Great Necropolis.

RUMBLE!

The necropolis shook violently as it began to move within the primal-chaos.

All of a sudden, the Ancient Road to the Gods was once again revealed.

Unexpectedly, the majestic aura of godly ascension could be sensed.

‘The Ancient Road to the Gods is out in the open again. Godly ascension is possible again!’ The road stretched far off into the distance, reaching the heaven above, where a perilous plane of existence existed, filled with boundless destiny and fate.

It was the god world!

Compared to the god world, the immortal worlds were like trash, or specks of dust. Even the three thousandth ranked worlds may as well have been pebbles. The god world was the ultimate goal. It was also the ultimate origin of all other worlds.

‘Godly ascension....’

Yang Qi knew that with his invincible cultivation base, he could definitely reach the god world in short order. He could even take his people with him.

Many other people suddenly felt hope. Back when the road had disappeared, their opportunity to reach godly ascension had gone with it. But now that the road was back, everyone brimmed with joy.

The battle between the wills of King Immortal-Slayer and the Great Necropolis had resulted in the necropolis moving. Afterward, another upheaval took place as an enormous chart appeared, like a painting that seemed about to suck in the Great Necropolis.

The painting featured beautiful scenery including mountains, rivers, palaces of jade, and other images from the god world. It was none other than the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. And it was vastly stronger than it had been when Yang Qi controlled it.

The chart enveloped the Great Necropolis, but the necropolis immediately began fighting back.

Whooooosh!

The necropolis shrank down, and the fighting climbed toward a fever pitch.

Meanwhile, someone stepped out of the Great Necropolis, and it was none other than Proud Heaven. Looking exultant, he said, “The will of King Immortal-Slayer, backed by the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, invaded the Great Necropolis, only to be sealed. However, the necropolis’ powers have been significantly reduced. They’re wearing each other down, to the point that the Ancient Road to the Gods has appeared again. Soon, I'm going to get the Great Necropolis, the will of King Immortal-Slayer, and the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart!” He burst out laughing. “Even that extra God Legion Seal won’t do you any good, Yang Qi. Your combined seal can’t do anything to the Great Necropolis. You don’t even know where the necropolis is from, but I do. The Great Necropolis can dominate anything and everything! It will even bring an end to the god world!”

Whoosh. Whoosh. Whoosh.

The Great Necropolis rapidly shrank down until it was small enough to drop onto Proud Heaven’s palm, where it twitched and struggled.

However, Proud Heaven simply closed his fingers around it, sealing his control of it. “I'm not going to fight you now, Yang Qi. I'm heading into the god world to assimilate the Great Necropolis, then use its power to deal with King Immortal-Slayer. When I'm finished, you’re dead! And your two God Legion Seals will be crushed like a chicken or a dog!”

Turning, he shot onto the Ancient Road to the Gods.

“I'm going to chase Proud Heaven!” Yang Qi quickly said. “You deal with the Executors of the Ancient Road!” The people of the Sage Monarch League were so strong that they could wage war on the executors without Yang Qi, and still have the upper hand.

Even the immortal-slaying clone alone could deal with their emperor. A fight like this would be good training for all of them.

Chapter 1133: Chasing Proud Heaven

The Immortal Dao Age was changing, and Yang Qi was the top expert in it. Unfortunately, Proud Heaven took control of the wills of the Great Necropolis and King Immortal-Slayer, then disappeared onto the Ancient Road to the Gods.

Yang Qi immediately gave chase with deadly determination.

He simply couldn’t allow Proud Heaven to truly control the Great Necropolis. Yang Qi knew that his plans had clearly come to fruition in a resounding success. With the help of the Great Necropolis, he managed to get King Immortal-Slayer’s will under control, and then used that will to shrink the Great Necropolis down to a manageable size.

If Proud Heaven took the Great Necropolis to the god world and continued to assimilate it, then it was highly likely that he would end up combining it with the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart and becoming a new Wretch God. And if that happened, Yang Qi would definitely die at his hands.

Another reason he was chasing Proud Heaven with such determination was that, despite having taken the Great Necropolis, there was no way he could take full advantage of its powers. He might have shrunk it down, but the will of King Immortal-Slayer was still inside, struggling defiantly. Otherwise, even if Proud Heaven were a god, he wouldn’t have been able to dominate the necropolis.

In other words, Yang Qi still had a chance to take it from him.

Yang Qi shot after Proud Heaven like a meteor catching up to the moon, and before long, could see him just ahead. Normally speaking, it was said that once you walked the ancient road, you could never go back. But Yang Qi wasn't an ordinary person. He could look down on the power of the ancient road now; after all, he had two God Legion Seals.

And if Proud Heaven could go to the god world and return, why couldn't Yang Qi?

‘You think that just because you took the Great Necropolis, Proud Heaven, you control everything now? Nobody owns the Great Necropolis. I'm the only one who qualifies. So you’re going to give it back, along with your God Legion Seal!'

As he sped after Proud Heaven, Yang Qi smiled coldly. ‘Be absorbed!’

A golden figure emerged from his forehead, quickly transforming into a golden vortex that began to spin wildly. Proud Heaven suddenly stopped in his tracks as he felt something pulling at him; specifically, the Great Necropolis was now twitching as though it might fly out of his hand.

Although he currently possessed the Great Necropolis, he didn’t actually own it, which meant that it could fly away at any moment.

Furthermore, Proud Heaven had inserted his God Legion Seal into the necropolis as a further way to erode its essence and force it to acknowledge him. If he became its ultimate successor, the other Inheritors would never have any chance of taking control of it. Unfortunately for him, the power of the Great Necropolis was so immense that it wasn’t possible to do that single-handedly.

On the other hand, there was no disputing the fact that Yang Qi had control over the God Legion Seal. Therefore, once he used his seal to call out to the final third piece within the Great Necropolis, it began to twitch and wriggle.

“You’re not going anywhere,” Proud Heaven said when he realized what happened. Drawing on his true energy, he summoned an enormous tombstone behind him. Grinning evilly, he said, “I just acquired a huge amount of godpower from the Great Necropolis, Yang Qi. My cultivation base isn’t any weaker than yours now. Considering we’re evenly matched, there’s no need to fight each other to death. Once you reach the god world, you’ll see how broad and spacious it is, and how many countless gods there are who will want to kill us. Why don’t we join forces and conquer the place together? What do you think?”

“I think you’re full of bullcrap. If I kill you, I get everything, including the Great Necropolis, the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, the will of King Immortal-Slayer, and the final piece of the God Legion Seal. Then I’ll turn you into a puppet and use you to conquer the god world. This is your last chance to hand the God Legion Seal over to me.”

“You're delusional!” Proud Heaven growled. Drawing on his true energy and the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, he summoned an enormous projection of a godmammoth behind him. It was powerful enough to trample heaven and earth, crush the sun and moon, and communicate with god-spirits. Instantly, a wild and sinister wind sprang up on the Ancient Road to the Gods.

This was Yang Qi's first time on the Ancient Road to the Gods, and looking around, he could immediately see how large it was. It was another world, and it had immensely powerful magical laws. However, thanks to how close-knit the laws were, it was impossible to get lost. All one had to do was follow the direction of the magical laws, and they would eventually reach the end of the road.

“Time to die!” Yang Qi said as he strode forward, his every footfall shaking the road and causing cracks to spread out on its surface. As he advanced, the King of Godmammoths appeared behind him and lashed out toward Proud Heaven with a whip.

It was the Mammoth King’s God Whip!

With two God Legion Seals, Yang Qi had immense enlightenment of the martial disciplines of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, and now understood the profundities of the King of Godmammoths.

As the Mammoth King’s God Whip snapped out, booms filled the ancient road, and there were even some nearby mountains that shattered from its might.

Next, Yang Qi fully drew on his Sage Monarch Grand Magic.

Of the ten great daos of humans, those of the hegemon and the hero once again appeared, causing Yang Qi to thrum with the energy of a heroic hegemon. In that short moment, Proud Heaven suddenly felt as if Yang Qi had transformed from one attacker into three. Bearing down on him was the Mammoth King’s God Whip, as well as the hegemon and the hero, who wielded a saber and spear respectively.

And not even a god could have predicted where exactly the strikes would land.

‘Fuck!’ Proud Heaven thought. ‘I can’t believe the kid has reached this level. With two pieces of the God Legion Seal, his abilities are vastly beyond what they were before. Not even I can defeat them! I don’t think even a Lesser God could kill him, and probably not even secure a slight victory. The brat may as well be a god himself.’

Proud Heaven exhaled deeply, bending like a bow as he sent the projected tombstone flying forth to meet the Mammoth King’s God Whip. Then he lunged forward as viciously as a wolf or tiger, unexpectedly using the Great Necropolis itself as a weapon to attack Yang Qi.

By the time Yang Qi realized what was happening, the energy of the hero and the hegemon were struck, and collapsed. At the same time, the Great Necropolis seemed to transform, being propelled by the power of King Immortal-Slayer to rumble toward Yang Qi.

It was a fist attack that surpassed the level of ordinary gods, and was obviously a secret magic of Proud Heaven.

“You think you can fight me using the power of the Great Necropolis?” Yang Qi said. “That’s wishful thinking if I ever heard it!” Thrusting his hand out toward the Great Necropolis, he seemingly prepared to fight force with force. “Who is King Immortal-Slayer anyway? If he defies me, he’ll die. I’m a true monarch, while he is a false one. The Sage Monarch Grand Magic is a true king in this world. A Monarch of Myriad Monarchs. I am the Sage Monarch!”

Under this immense pressure, Yang Qi unleashed his Sage Monarch Grand Magic. As he did, the ultimate meaning of kings and monarchs became clear in his mind. After all, he had long since mastered the Seventy-Two Monarchs Energy Art, and could use it to devastating effect.

Thanks to the pressure of the will of King Immortal-Slayer and the transformations to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, the moment he attacked Proud Heaven, his life force quintessence reached a higher level and he suddenly understood far more about the Sage Monarch Grand Magic.

Sage, Monarch, Ruler, Emperor, Sovereign, Lord, Hero, Hegemon, God, Nothing.

Yang Qi was like the king of the two aspects of Hero and Hegemon. Suddenly, the projected image of a monarch appeared behind him, a king with a military banner in his hand, severing heads and leaving carnage in his wake. Mountains and rivers are shattered, the wind is filled with catkins. State and country are exterminated, the generals die in war.

That was a king.

A king waged war in all directions, filling the lands with his banners.

The army followed the monarch’s commands, marching wherever he indicated, causing blood to flow in rivers. When the king gave an order, corpses would pile up.

That was a monarch.

The saber of a hegemon.

The spear of a hero.

The flag of a king!

“The monarch victorious!” Yang Qi said, clenching his hand into a fist and throwing all of his energy arts into it as he punched out toward the Great Necropolis. “You might have the Great Necropolis, Proud Heaven, but you can’t use it, you piece of trash! That thing belongs in my hands! I'm the only one who can unleash its might. Hand it over!”

The king’s banner waved behind him, and on either side, the hero and the hegemon channeled their power into it, causing energy to thrum that surpassed the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth and any of the magical devices Yang Qi possessed. It was the perfect match for Yang Qi’s cultivation base.

The will of a monarch entered the Great Necropolis, and instantly, King Immortal-Slayer sensed it. “A monarch! So, you’ve gained enlightenment of the profundities of the kings. It’s superficial, but you’re on the right path....”

King Immortal-Slayer’s will wanted to free itself, but was bound by the Great Necropolis. Yet it was still possible for Proud Heaven and Yang Qi to hear it speak.

“Damn this Great Necropolis. What is this thing? It can actually suppress my will!? Nothing in the world can defeat me, not even the God Legion Seal. Besides, I shattered that seal. And yet this necropolis actually seems stronger than that....”

RIP!

Proud Heaven lunged backward, his face ashen after meeting Yang Qi’s attack.

“Well done, boy!” Proud Heaven said, keeping his grip on the Great Necropolis. Unable to control himself, he coughed up a huge mouthful of blood; obviously, Yang Qi’s attack had severely injured him.

Yang Qi could immediately confirm that although Proud Heaven was strong, his enlightenment couldn’t compare to Yang Qi’s enlightenment of the Sage Monarch Grand Magic. It conformed to his own dao and was the bane of other daos, the Ten Universes included.

“Don’t fight back unnecessarily, Proud Heaven,” Yang Qi said coolly. “And there’s no need to pretend to be so hurt. I’m not going to fall for a trick like that and attack you for no reason.”

Chapter 1134: The Third Seal

“You’re too strong, Yang Qi!” Proud Heaven said, his eyes pulsing with venomous hatred. “I should’ve dealt with you earlier, before it was too late!” Even having taken the Great Necropolis, Proud Heaven couldn’t really use it. It was like having a god item in his hands, but sealed away so that it couldn’t be touched.

And even if he reached godly ascension, there was no saying whether or not he could actually use the necropolis. That meant that right now his best option was to flee to the god world and spend some time studying it and its godpower.

Unfortunately, Yang Qi was clearly determined to kill him, which meant that he couldn’t just turn and run. Yang Qi was too strong, and with his recent enlightenment of his Sage Monarch Grand Magic, he could definitely put an end to Proud Heaven.

Even Proud Heaven had to admit that the Sage Monarch Grand Magic was completely terrifying.

Unparalleled under heaven.

With it, Yang Qi controlled the transformations of yin and yang, the mysteries of ghosts and gods, and the nature of the sun and the moon.

Yang Qi burst out laughing. “Hand it over, Proud Heaven. Give me the God Legion Seal and the Great Necropolis. You have no chance of beating me here in the mortal world. You lost the moment that Doom joined me. Your life is forfeit, and there’s nothing you can do to get it back.”

Proud Heaven gave a cold harrumph. “You think you’ve won, Yang Qi? We still have a lot of time on our hands, and you haven't captured me yet. Eight Dharmas of Heaven and Earth. Shifting of Universes. Enter the God World!”

A host of universes popped into being around him, wrapping him up and whisking him further down the Ancient Road to the Gods. He was obviously going all out to reach the god world, which was the only place he could escape Yang Qi. Even if he tried to reach the future of the mortal world, it wouldn’t do him any good, as the Ancient Road to the Gods didn’t exist there.

“Trying to run? You think I’ll let that happen?” The golden figure emerged from Yang Qi’s forehead again, and the trumpeting of a godmammoth echoed out. Screaming winds slammed into Proud Heaven, who was shaken so badly that his own God Legion Seal seemed just on the verge of flying out of him.

In fact, golden light actually slipped past the bounds of the Great Necropolis and headed toward Yang Qi.

The third piece of the God Legion Seal really wanted to combine with the others. The combined God Legion Seal was a major force; years ago, it had crushed countless rebels. After all, King Immortal-Slayer was only one of many who had revolted.

If someone with two pieces of the God Legion Seal could be so domineering, it could only be imagined what the complete version would be like.

Not even Proud Heaven putting the God Legion Seal into the Great Necropolis was really an option.

“Magisters! Do the nine of you really need to sit on the mountaintop and watch the tigers fight, then try to reap the spoils when they tire out? If I lose my God Legion Seal, things won’t exactly go well for you. You’ll definitely chafe under his vicious rule. We ten magisters have worked together for years on end, first to build the future world into what it is today, and then to subjugate the god Brahma. I know that you have Brahma under your control and have been planning on using him against me. So why not bring him out to fight this brat!”

In response to his call, nine figures appeared further down the Ancient Road to the Gods, and behind them was another, taller and mightier figure.

In fact, from the godpower he emanated, it was obvious that he was a living god!

It was the god Brahma.

Long ago, Yang Qi had met Brahma in the form of his head. But apparently, the magisters of the future world had combined his head, heart, and the rest of his body parts. Now they had been put back together, except that his godhood was under the control of the magisters, making him like the walking dead, a mere puppet.

Brahma had been unlucky enough to be held captive for so many years, only to end up like this. Yang Qi couldn’t help but feel bad for him.

However, now was not the time to try to communicate with Brahma. If he was under the control of an enemy, that made him an enemy as well.

Of the nine magisters, seven were men and two were women. Of the men, some were old, some were middle-aged, and some were young, but they all seemed very domineering. Both of the women were bewitchingly charming, but at the same time elegant and graceful. All of these people were the kind who commanded immense power.

The ten magisters, the invincible power of an entire age, were now together in one place.

Although Proud Heaven wasn't technically their leader, he was definitely the most powerful among them.

He currently held the Great Necropolis, out of which was seeping the golden light of the God Legion Seal. However, because the other magisters also cultivated the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, they quickly got it under control.

Standing toward the back of the group was a man in a bronze mask, the very same one that had fought Yang Qi with the Mammoth King’s God Whip. Looking over at one of the older members of the group, he said, “Father... this is the same Yang Qi who fought with me over the position of league-lord, and refused to back down. Who would’ve guessed that he would grow to this level of strength?”

As for the old man, he was the head magister, and unexpectedly, the masked young man was his son.

The head magister could be identified by his robe, which was brown, and emanated an aura of space-time from the future world. In comparison, Proud Heaven was actually inferior in terms of how impressive he was.

“So, you’re Yang Qi?” the head magister asked, taking a step forward.

“That's right,” Yang Qi said coolly. “And you people are the magisters of the future world? Good. This way I don’t have to go to the future world to find you. Considering the future world is a dead end, without access to the Ancient Road to the Gods, why don’t the lot of you surrender and pay allegiance to me?”

“Big words,” the old man replied with a sneer. Looking at Proud Heaven, he said, “Your plan worked, Proud Heaven. You have both King Immortal-Slayer and the Great Necropolis under your control. But the Great Necropolis is supposed to belong to the future world as a whole, not for you to simply take for your own. Do you understand? Remember, I'm the head magister, the leader among us ten.”

“We can talk later about who gets what, Head Magister,” Proud Heaven said. “Right now, we’re facing a joint enemy, namely, Yang Qi. He has two pieces of the God Legion Seal, which makes him the top figure outside of the god world. If we don't kill him, then even the future world is going to fall under his control.”

“This really is the most pressing matter at hand,” said one of the female magisters. “Little Brother Yang Qi, it's a real surprise that a tiny savage like you from the immortal worlds could reach this level. And you have two pieces of the God Legion Seal? Not bad. Not bad at all. Why not join our side? I can guarantee that you’ll be the eleventh magister of the future world.”

Yang Qi laughed disdainfully. “You bunch of chickens and dogs plan to help Proud Heaven? If I wanted to destroy the future world, I could do it with a mere thought. You people are far from being on the same level as he is. It doesn't even matter that you have Brahma under your control.” He looked over at Proud Heaven. “Come on, Proud Heaven. Do you really think these fools are going to stop me from killing you?”

“Aiyo!” the other female magister said. “Quite a temper you have. You think the future world doesn’t count for anything? Perhaps we ought to teach you a little lesson to show you the truth.”

“Stop wasting your breath,” another magister said, a burly man. “Grab him and force his God Legion Seals out. Combine the three of them, then we ten magisters can follow through with the original plan. We work together to go to the god world and reach godly ascension. Why would we do anything else? Besides, this brat obviously has a death wish.”

“A death wish? I think you’re the one with a death wish!” Yang Qi threw his hands out in front of him. “All of you, prepare to die. As for you, Proud Heaven, do you truly believe that you can keep your God Legion Seal under control? Annulled Grand Magic! Break!”

A wind kicked up, and Yang Qi’s energy suddenly seemed to double. Golden light shone out from within him, making him seem like an ancient god that myriads of other gods would worship as their lord.

In fact, Brahma suddenly snapped into consciousness. Eyes flashing, he involuntarily said, “My Lord... my Lord....”

RUMBLE!

Suddenly, Brahma erupted with energy. “I can’t believe you people bound me as a prisoner! You contemptible mortals! How dare you try to control a god. Do you realize what you've done?!”

“Not good!” Proud Heaven blurted. “You pieces of trash allowed Brahma to wake up! What if the two God Legion Seals can control Brahma?!”

Sadly for them, it was too late!

Brahma looked over and unleashed a palm attack backed with such godpower that the burly magister was immediately sent flying, blood spraying out of his mouth.

Then Brahma’s gaze shifted to Proud Heaven, and his eyes radiated hatred. He knew that Proud Heaven was the one who had hurt him the most deeply. Therefore, he didn’t hesitate to unleash a fist strike that forced Proud Heaven to retreat in terror.

At the same time, the magisters all launched attacks at Yang Qi.

“True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body!” The power of tribulations and kalpas rolled off of Yang Qi, crumbling all of the attacks. At the same time, he made a grasping motion. “Come to me, God Legion Seal!”

The God Legion Seal erupted with power, smashing at the vital energy of the Great Necropolis, then breaking out into the open and radiating boundless light.

“Crap!” Proud Heaven shouted. “The God Legion Seal broke free! If Yang Qi gets it, we're all dead! I still haven’t unlocked the secrets of the Great Necropolis, so I can’t stand up to him!”

“Get Brahma under control!” the head magister said. “We haven’t completely lost him. Lord of the Future. Zodiac Divine Ability. Boundless Tribulations!”

A river of stars flowed out of his head. “I'm the Lord of the Future, and I understand the true meaning of what the future is. I control the future, and gods are no exception!”

All of a sudden, Brahma’s eyes went slack.

Chapter 1135: Nine Magisters, Dead

The nine magisters had appeared with Brahma under their control and surrounded Yang Qi. However, he didn’t seem the least bit afraid. Using his God Legion Seal, he awoke Brahma, instantly putting the magisters in a deadly situation. At the same time, he called out to the third piece of the God Legion Seal; if he got it, he would be completely invincible, capable of conquering a chiliocosm of worlds, and definitely able to kill the magisters and Proud Heaven.

“Proud Heaven, let’s work together to power our Ten-Secrets Grand-Monarch Formation!” said the head magister. “We were the ones who created the future world, and it was all thanks to our planning that it became great. There’s obviously been some misunderstandings between us. What need is there for this infighting? Let’s reconcile right now, and then get to the god world!”

“Alright!” Proud Heaven said, viciously grabbing his God Legion Seal. At the same time, a burst of light shot out of the top of his head, becoming like a pillar that connected heaven and earth, as if it might pierce through the Ancient Road to the Gods to reach the immortal worlds.

Simultaneously, all of the other magisters did the same thing, creating a huge spell formation.

“Ten-Secrets Grand-Monarch Formation! Future domination; change the future. We control everything, including your future, Yang Qi. Now hurry up and surrender!”

RUMBLE!

The ten experts transformed into a gargantuan hand that rumbled down toward Yang Qi to crush him. It was a hand that could snatch a person’s future away from them, leaving them bereft of all hope and forcing them to comply.

“You bunch of chickens and dogs!” Yang Qi said with a cold laugh. “Don’t tell me you really think that teaming up will be enough to fight me.” He shot up to meet the hand, simultaneously sending out millions upon millions of streams of light, like a scintillating river that sped right toward the hand.

The hand collapsed.

“Brahma: attack!” the head magister shouted. He then spat out a stream of blood that flowed into Brahma’s body. As Brahma stood there like he was ready to trample on the sun and moon, breathing primal-chaos in and out, a kingdom of the five phases appeared in his hands.

“Cardinal Grand Brahman Five Phases Energy Arts? I mastered that a long time ago, and my skill with the four tribulations of Success, Steadiness, Destruction, and the Void have reached the pinnacle. In fact, thanks to the God Legion Seal, I pushed it to a higher level. Brahma, you lost your godhood, and are nothing but an undying spirit now. Do you really need to let them control you? Hurry and wake up! If you work for me, I might be able to help you form your own godhood again, and once again become an actual god. With the God Legion Seal under my control, gods must obey my commands. So, attack!”

Yang Qi clenched his hand into a fist as he also unleashed the Cardinal Grand Brahman Five Phases Energy Arts, and his version was clearly superior to Brahma’s. As his energy flowed into Brahma, the god’s eyes became clear again, and his godpower began flowing more freely through him. Brahma was mighty, but without his godhood, he wasn’t really a true god. He was more like a banished god. That said, he was still strong, with a psychic scale at the mid Terrifying level, and an invincible power index of over nine thousand. If he unleashed all of his fighting prowess, he would be no weaker than Yang Qi, and would be a truly troublesome opponent.

But how could a god actually be controlled by mortals?

After being called out to by Yang Qi, Brahma said, “How dare you try to control me, mortals! Seeds, detonate!”

Bam. Bam. Bam. Bam! Bam! Bam!!

Booms rang out from inside Brahma’s body as true energy explosions rocked his insides and godpower flowed through him. Mortal cultivators worked with true energy, but gods worked with godpower. And there were fundamental differences between the two.

The nine magisters’ faces went pale, and blood sprayed out of their mouths as the warding spells they had placed inside Brahma collapsed. They were already experiencing a catastrophe that would be difficult to recover from.

The nine magisters had such powerful cultivation bases that they were superior to virtually all of the experts from the Ancient Road to the Gods. They were all mid Terrifying experts, and the reason was that they had implanted Brahma with seeds allowing them to draw on his power. They were like saplings planted in rich soil that could quickly grow into mighty trees. After all, one could only imagine the cultivation advancement that would be possible by drawing on the power, enlightenment, and experiences of a god.

But now that those seeds were being detonated, the ‘roots’ of those immense ‘trees’ were being severed.

Their foundations were shattering.

“Ten Dharmas Combined; Ten Universes Mastery!”

RUMBLE!

A strange expression appeared on Proud Heaven’s face as the energy of his Ten Universes technique suddenly slammed into the other nine magisters. Screams erupted from their mouths as they realized the catastrophic circumstances they were now in.

“You’re trying to take control of our souls, Proud Heaven!?” shrieked one of the female magisters. “How ruthless!”

“Just what do you think you’re doing, Proud Heaven?” the head magister said, his voice quivering with terror. “How could you be doing this? When did you get control of our souls?!”

“You scum have been following me for years,” Proud Heaven said. “Don’t you know what kind of person I am by now? Anyone I work with ends up dying in the end. I, Proud Heaven, am the only future! I'm the true Lord of the Future. The reason I sought enlightenment of the Ten Universes was to deal with the rest of you. Including me, there are ten of us. And now we’re going to be combined together in one body. Mine!”

All of these things happened so quickly that not even Yang Qi could react. The nine magisters screamed miserably as they exploded and turned into nine streams of true energy that shot into Proud Heaven. In the blink of an eye, he combined the ultimate powers of the future world.

Yang Qi backed up, grabbing Brahma as he did. That seemed his best option as Proud Heaven was experiencing his boost in power.

Furthermore, he needed to see what exactly Proud Heaven was planning to do.

Perhaps it would be best to take advantage of this moment to launch a fatal blow on Proud Heaven. Wipe him out down to his very soul, and make sure he understood that no matter how strong he became, he would never best Yang Qi. That way, he could kill him without fear of him being resurrected.

After all, when mighty individuals died, but their rancorous will didn’t dissipate, it indicated that they were unwilling to die, which would give birth to all sorts of problems with karma. For example, King Immortal-Slayer had been killed, but his rancorous will escaped, and now he was almost fully resurrected. Although it was only his will, it went to show that he was incapable of truly dying.

Yang Qi would only be satisfied if he slaughtered Proud Heaven down to his very soul, without allowing him any delusions of having a fighting chance. If he died in despair, without any hope of resurrection, then all loose ends could be tied up.

RUMBLE!

As Proud Heaven powered up, Yang Qi saw a passage open behind the man that led to the future world.

It was a place filled with glittering stars, planes of existence, and of course science and technology at its very peak. There were powerful battleships, enormous space station fortresses, and endless wormholes. It was an enormous place filled with so much life it was impossible to quantify.

It was a place where both science and cultivation flourished.

The future world.

But right now, Proud Heaven was extracting the power of that universe. Yang Qi watched as planet after planet withered, the living beings on their surfaces screaming as doomsday came. Billions of trillions of planets, with too much life to count, were all destroyed, their power flowing into Proud Heaven.

The young man in the bronze mask shrilly screamed, “Proud Heaven! You animal! You betrayed the magisters and are destroying the future world to power up?! You’re bringing about the end of all civilization!”

Gathering his strength, the young man lunged at Proud Heaven.

However, Proud Heaven did nothing but twitch, which transformed the young man into ash.

Yang Qi looked on coldly as the future world experienced its apocalypse. The person responsible for their grisly fate was their own Magister Proud Heaven, a vicious and merciless beast who was willing to destroy the very civilization he had created. What did it mean that he was now being blessed by the power of the future? It was almost like the power of a god was awakening within him.

There were countless planets and innumerable peoples in the future world. Some lived useless lives, while some worked hard on their cultivation in an attempt to stand out among their peers. Some were conniving tricksters, and some were just ordinary people. In the end, it didn’t matter; they all died.

It was the ultimate equalizer. When death came, when the apocalypse arrived, everyone met the same end: death.

Proud Heaven burst out into maniacal laughter. “You helped me reach my true goal, Yang Qi! I created the future world and the nine magisters, all with the purpose of absorbing them. And now I have. With the power of an entire age to back me, do you really think you can fight me?”

Chapter 1136: Ending One

Proud Heaven was such a ruthless and ferocious character that he was sacrificing the entire future world for his own benefit. He had brought doomsday to the future to make himself stronger. That was how merciless he was. It would have been like Yang Qi destroying every person in the Sage Monarch League and absorbing them. This was the dao of devils. The dao of evil. Or perhaps one could say it was the dao of selfishness.

In the dao of selfishness, one did anything and everything to benefit oneself, with no regard for others.

As long as one could guarantee their own benefit, anyone and anything else in heaven and earth could be sacrificed.

Yang Qi could never be like Proud Heaven in that regard. Yang Qi had his own dao, the Sage Monarch Grand Magic, which was in itself a dharma of extremities.

In fact, the Sage Monarch Grand Magic actually contained the Ten Universes within it.

Because of all this, Yang Qi remained calm as he watched things play out. At a certain point, he suddenly said, “Brahma, go to my Sage Monarch League. This fight is between me and Proud Heaven. I’ll wait until he finishes powering up, then put an end to him once and for all. I’ll make sure he dies down to his core and is reduced to ashes.”

With that, he flung Brahma out of the Ancient Road to the Gods. Brahma was visibly stunned by how obviously stronger Yang Qi was than he. Meanwhile, Yang Qi’s voice continued entering his ears via will projection. “Help the Sage Monarch League destroy the Executors of the Ancient Road and seize universal fortune. I’ll use that universal fortune to rebuild your godhood, then reach the god world. When that happens, you’ll be fully resurrected and become a god again. Right now, you’re only a half-dead projection of divine will, and if you want to progress beyond that you’ll have to rely on me and the God Legion Seal.”

“Very impressive, boy,” Brahma said. “Fine, I’ll do what you say.”

Brahma knew that his hopes of true resurrection lay with Yang Qi, so he shot directly to the battlefield where the Executors of the Ancient Road were fighting the Sage Monarch League.

With Doom, Proud World, and the Shepherd on their side, as well as the immortal-slaying clone, the Sage Monarch League now had some truly powerful mid Terrifying experts.

Unfortunately, the executors had immense resources and were the top force in all of the many heavens and myriad worlds that existed outside of the god world. For all intents and purposes, no one could possibly wage war against them and succeed.

Thankfully, the Sage Monarch League didn’t just have a host of top experts. They had numerous puppets as well, such as Mu Renwang, Su Xin, Huangfu Genesis, and the King of Assassins. They were all people who had stood up to the executors in the past, and right now they were causing major problems on the battlefield. In fact, they were driving the executors crazy.

Bitter, intense fighting was already underway.

The executors’ top experts were all engaged in the fight, with numerous old-timers operating spell formations to defend against the attacks of the Sage Monarch League. Meanwhile, the experts of the league were powering their own formations, sending immense beams of dazzling godlight shooting through the primal-chaos.

Unfortunately, the executors had the Gate to the Gods, which they were using to keep the league's spell formations in check. If it weren’t for all of the vast treasures Yang Qi had plundered, which could now be used to power the formations, the Sage Monarch League would have already been crushed into powder.

This wasn’t a battle of scattered scuffles here and there, but a contest between major spell formations. After all, with untold quadrillions of disciples powering even just one spell formation, how much might could it unleash? Even a mid Terrifying expert would have to dodge out of the way of a blast like that.

Enormous spell formations were the ultimate weapons of huge organizations like these. And when two such organizations went to battle, the formations were often the most valuable asset, rather than individual experts.

For instance, an organization that didn’t have a mid Terrifying expert, but far more disciples, enough to power an enormous spell formation, could theoretically hold their own. They could possibly even kill the opposing mid Terrifying expert, or at least send them running.

It was similar to how, in the martial arts world of the mortals, a kung fu expert couldn’t necessarily stand up to an entire army. That kung fu expert could easily kill any single soldier in the army, but if the army charged him en masse, he would either die or be forced to flee.

The countless disciples in the Sage Monarch League were all assigned to various spell formations, into which they were pouring their quintessence vitality and life essence. In this moment of great danger, everyone had their assigned place and no one was holding anything back.

As the sayings go, many grains of sand piled up will make a tower, and a hundred streams will flow together to make a sea.

The combined might of all of the members of an organization would reveal their true strength!

Of course, the Executors of the Ancient Road had far more latent power at their disposal than the Sage Monarch League. Plus, the Gate to the Gods was the most devastating magical treasure in the mortal world; it even surpassed the top god items. The downside for the executors was that they couldn’t match up to the number of disciples in the Sage Monarch League. Nor did they have as many puppets and thralls.

The two sides were mostly evenly matched, with the executors having a slight advantage.

Explosions rocked the primal-chaos, and immortal worlds were being destroyed left and right. It was impossible to say how many lives were being lost on each side as this final battle to surpass all final battles took place. Whoever came out on top would control the past, present, and future, including countless worlds, and even the innumerable hells that existed. All universal fortune would go to the organization that came out on top, and obviously, that organization would be the ultimate ruler of the mortal world.

If Yang Qi’s people vanquished the Executors of the Ancient Road, he would be able to completely free himself from the control of the gods and get so much destiny that it would be impossible to quantify.

Even as the executors were struggling into a winning position, the god Brahma arrived.

A true god!

Although he wasn't complete, he was still a god, and wasn’t particularly weaker than Yang Qi. Only the God Legion Seal could truly restrain him. As soon as he appeared in front of the Gate to the Gods, he unleashed a fist strike that instantly caused the enormous gate to seize up.

“Damnation!” the emperor of the executors cursed.

One of the other old-timers present shouted, “That’s a true god! Sadly for him, he’s lacking godhood. And the fact that he’s opposing the Executors of the Ancient Road means he's a wretch-god. A depraved god worthy of nothing but death! Attack him with full force! Sacrifice the thralls!”

On one of the enormous worlds they controlled, a massive altar rose up, onto which the disciples tossed countless thralls, all of them bound and trussed. Countless blades rose up, then fell, causing rivers of blood to flow onto the altar.

Bzzzzzzzz!

The power of the blood sacrifice towered into heaven, halting Brahma’s advance and sending him tumbling backward.

Brahma roared in defiance. However, that was when the immortal-slaying clone said, “Brahma, come into the Sage Monarch League grand spell formation. If we power it together, we’ll definitely crush the executors. You alone are strong enough to power countless formations and unleash their numerous enigmatic abilities. This is a battle of sect versus sect, a war of the top forces of the age. It’s not a time for people to show off and try to be heroes.”

“Fine,” Brahma said. Even in the god world, there were plenty of gods who would groom slaves and believers within their god kingdoms, imbuing them with their own quintessence energy and training them for battle, in case another god invaded. In many ways, the strength of a god lay in the strength of their believers.

It was even like that with Lesser Gods. If two Lesser Gods clashed and had the same godhood, but different numbers of believers, the one with superior numbers would likely win.

In an organization in the mortal world, the disciples were like the believers.

As soon as Brahma entered the grand spell formation, he sent his power into it, and loud cracking sounds could be heard as numerous subsidiary spell formations powered up. He was a god, and could have held his own against either of these organizations. In other words, he was as strong as the majority of the disciples put together.

Even a drop of his animadestiny quintessence vitality would be enough to instantly kill millions upon millions of disciples.

As soon as Brahma appeared, the tables turned. The Executors of the Ancient Road were now being forced into retreat, with many of them fleeing into the primal-chaos in the hopes of finding a place to hide.

As for the Sage Monarch League, they were intent on wiping out the executors, so they immediately gave chase.

Yang Qi could see what was happening, and he nodded in approval. It was now a given that the executors would be wiped out. Brahma had ensured that. Now Yang Qi could focus on the fight with Proud Heaven, who was still powering up.

“You were foolish to let me absorb the power of the future world to get stronger, Yang Qi,” Proud Heaven said. “I'm no weaker than you now. If you thought it would turn out any other way, then you’re sadly mistaken.” Proud Heaven knew that Yang Qi was allowing him to power up, which left him feeling very uneasy. However, he couldn't complain, and he most definitely wasn't ready to give up the fight.

“Power up as much as you want,” Yang Qi replied coolly. “You won’t have another chance to do so after today. As I'm sure you realize, this fight is a matter of karma. Fight as hard as you can, and don’t hold anything back.”

“Very impressive, Yang Qi. You have my admiration. In fact, you’re the first person I've ever admired. I’ve manipulated you to no end, even kidnapping your mother and sending her to the god world. Of course, I did that for your own good, to make you stronger. You realize that, right? If I had left your mother in the mortal world, you would have eventually found her.

“Now I’ll show you what I left behind in the Primeval Age. I just buried the future, and now I'll bury the past. Doomsday is coming to primeval times. After that, the Immortal Dao Age will be put to an end. And now, the debut of the Ending One.”

Proud Heaven burst out into maniacal laughter. “You're a Fateless One, Yang Qi. The best among the three thousand special constitutions. But I’ve surpassed those three thousand to create my own constitution. I will bring an end to the dao of heaven, and thus, I am the Ending One!”

Chapter 1137: Escape

A new vortex opened, revealing innumerable immortal worlds and planes of existence in the Primeval Age. Although Proud Heaven and his cohorts had already spread ruin in the Primeval Age, there were still plenty of humans, Demonfolk, and Devilfolk who had survived the war. But now, Proud Heaven was bringing about mass destruction there.

An apocalypse had come as one planet and immortal world after another was destroyed.

Proud Heaven really was particularly cruel and ruthless. During his years in the Primeval Age, he had secretly created numerous vital energy spell formations that, in this critical moment, he was using to devour the destiny of the entire age. He was powering up with the energy of both the past and the future, and it was definitely going to make him domineering and without rival.

And he had already stated his intention to do the same to the Immortal Dao Age.

Thankfully, the Immortal Dao Age was being watched over by Yang Qi, which meant Proud Heaven couldn't do anything to it at the moment. The presence of the Great Necropolis ensured that the Immortal Dao Age was the strongest of the three ages; not even a god could destroy it right now, much less Proud Heaven.

However, that didn’t mean that Yang Qi could do anything other than watch as the Primeval Age and the Future Age were destroyed, their dao of heaven put to an end.

Proud Heaven was already pulsing with the boundless power of Ending.

It was none other than the energy of an Ending One.

Among the three thousand great constitutions, the Fateless Ones were the kings, with the Eternal Ones and Fortuned Ones coming in secondary. Never before had there been such a thing as an Ending One.

Normally speaking, the dao of heaven was something that could never possibly end.

But now, Proud Heaven was absorbing the dao of heaven from innumerous immortal worlds. In other words, he was ending the dao of heaven. Thus, he was stepping into his role as an Ending One.

The Ending One.

Crash!

The Primeval Age was put to an end. From Yang Qi’s perspective, it was now nothing but darkness and gloom, filled with primal-chaos. Even if one traveled through time to the Primeval Age, they would find that the civilizations and history there had been completely removed. There were no epic sagas to recount their glory. There was only primal-chaos.

It was the same in the future world. There was no glorious history there, no amazing civilization. Science and technology no longer existed. There was only primal-chaos.

Only the present was concrete and safe.

Only it was true and real.

Yang Qi could sense the dao of heaven trembling as if in fear of Proud Heaven, as if it knew that Proud Heaven wanted to put it to an end. Without Yang Qi present, he definitely would. Then he would pierce through the void, reach the god world, and become the mightiest of gods. Unfortunately, that outcome was as unrealistic as flowers in a mirror or the moon in the water.

Two green streaks of light appeared like writhing dragons, swirling around Proud Heaven into the shape of a taiji symbol, which he then devoured.

They were the dao of heaven from the Primeval Age and the Future Age.

What was the dao of heaven? It encompassed natural and magical laws, and existed between that which had a will and that which did not. Proud Heaven devoured the dao of heaven from both the future and the past, and as it turned into true energy, it went on to solidify into godpower. In fact, he was just on the verge of forming godhood. All he had to do now was get to the god world, and his energy arts would advance, allowing him to form godhood and become a Lesser God.

“Yang Qi, did you know that I could have reached godly ascension any time I wanted? But I didn’t want to. Do you know why? In the god world, the Lesser Gods are led by the Common Gods. And I refuse to accept an arrangement like that. I want to be a god among gods. My power has reached an apex and my Ending One constitution is heading toward completion. Now I'm going to end you, and afterward, fully end the dao of heaven.”

“Fine,” Yang Qi said, standing there with his hands clasped behind his back. “You said it, Proud Heaven. Your power has reached an apex. Therefore, the time has come for me to kill you.”

“Make your move!” Proud Heaven shouted.

RUMBLE!

Yang Qi took a step forward, moving across the Ancient Road to the Gods like an explosive dragon. In the blink of an eye, he was in front of Proud Heaven, where he threw his arms out like spears, or sledgehammers, or mountains, or seas, or falling suns and moons, or kowtowing gods.

He only used one move, but he didn't hesitate to draw on the top capabilities of the Sage Monarch Grand Magic, unleashing fist strikes that could shatter anything they touched, even godhood. Proud Heaven’s body emitted creaking and crunching sounds, like a stone statue being struck with immense force. He had just absorbed the power of the dao of heaven, so his true energy currently burned like the sun.

‘How is the brat so strong?’ Proud Heaven thought, shocked. He had just absorbed the nine magisters and sacrificed both the Primeval Age and the Future Age, ending their dao of heaven. That had provoked a dramatic transformation within him, to the point where he had assumed he would be able to crush Yang Qi instantly. But contrary to expectation, Yang Qi only seemed to be getting fiercer and fiercer. In fact, this one move almost seemed too much to handle.

“Ten Universes!” he shouted, speeding backward to avoid Yang Qi’s attack. Then he struck back, using the Ten Universes. Nature, Void, Cosmos, Nihility, Chaos, Epoch, Civilization, World, Macrocosm, Universe. One universe after another appeared, harrying the dao of heaven and sowing chaos among the workings of heaven.

Yang Qi showed no fear. Head high and chest out, he strode forward. He was like a dragon embodied, with a mouth like a primal-chaos elder-snake and arms like mammoth trunks, his every move pulsing with power.

The God Legion Seal appeared over his head, releasing immense radiance and light, constantly calling out to Proud Heaven’s piece of the seal and forcing him to expend effort to suppress it.

Little did Proud Heaven know that during the time he had spent sacrificing the Primeval Age and the Future Age, Yang Qi hadn’t actually just stood there waiting for him to finish. Instead, he had been seeking further enlightenment of the God Legion Seal while simultaneously absorbing destiny from the Immortal Dao Age.

When the Great Necropolis had ejected so many countless immortal worlds, including all the top experts from the Ancient Road to the Gods, it ensured that the destiny in the Immortal Dao Age increased by millions upon millions of times. In fact, compared to the Immortal Dao Age, the combined destiny of the Primeval Age and the Future Age were unimpressive at best. And now that the Sage Monarch League had the upper hand in the fight against the Executors of the Ancient Road, his people were more enlivened than ever, which ensured that the flow of destiny entering him was constantly pushing his cultivation base and enlightenment to higher levels.

On top of that, Yang Qi was constantly unlocking more of the secrets of the God Legion Seal. There was no way that two combined pieces of the seal would only provide just a simple boost in strength.

“Innumerable Kalpas and Tribulations!”

The Mahātmā Jade and the sheepskin scroll appeared over his head, and as his quintessence energy flowed into the scroll, characters flowed out of it. Because of his advanced cultivation, his Unspoiled Body instantly broke through to the level of a thousand tribulations.

Meanwhile, his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth was also advancing triumphantly.

RUMBLE!

Instantly, dramatic transformations began occurring within him. At the same time, Yang Qi unleashed a cascade of attacks onto Proud Heaven.

“Dominating Saber of the Hegemon!”

RUMBLE!

A hegemonic energy flowed out, making his fist like a mountain of the gods as it slammed into Proud Heaven’s head. When Proud Heaven saw Yang Qi growing stronger by the moment, he thrust his hands out and revealed the ultimate meaning of Ending. They clashed, and Yang Qi flew backward, seemingly unfazed. At the same time, Proud Heaven staggered backward.

‘Damnation!’ Proud Heaven thought. ‘I’ve taken in so much of the destiny of the dao of heaven. Two ages full! But not even that is enough to crush Yang Qi? And I still can't take the upper hand? How is that even possible? It must be because of the Great Necropolis. The Immortal Dao Age didn’t inherently have much destiny, definitely not compared to the Primeval and Future Ages. But Yang Qi clearly has access to destiny that surpasses that of the two ages I sacrificed.’

The only upside to the situation was that Proud Heaven now had the Great Necropolis in his own hands, and within it, both King Immortal-Slayer’s will and the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

“Time to go for broke!” he said, unleashing his Ten Universes to their ultimate level. “Ten Universes; Heaven in Chaos; Gods Perish; Ghosts Befuddled!”

Quintessence energy within him ignited, and he was wreathed in intense flames.

Yang Qi backed up. ‘He’s burning his life force....’

Proud Heaven unleashed an attack that Yang Qi quickly dodged. Then, Proud Heaven spun and shot off in the opposite direction, clearly hoping to make his escape.

He was no longer confident that he would be able to defeat Yang Qi.

Yang Qi quickly sped after him. “Have you no sense of shame, Proud Heaven? You can't fight me so you just run? Do you really think you can run all the way to the god world?”

Proud Heaven laughed. “Follow me if you want, Yang Qi. You have the upper hand here in the mortal world, where I can't use my most powerful assets. If you’ve got what it takes, come find me in the god world to continue our fight. I’ll be waiting!”

With that, he vanished into the misty depths of the Ancient Road to the Gods.

Yang Qi hurried after him, keeping full vigilance. Before long, the chase led them to the end of the ancient road.

There, an enormous cavern could be seen, within which was a glittering, raging light that seemed capable of killing even mid Terrifying experts. Obviously, this passageway led to another world.

This was the end of the Ancient Road to the Gods, the part that led directly into the god world.

Seeing that Yang Qi couldn't catch up, Proud Heaven said, “You stay here!”

Just in front of the passageway, Proud Heaven stopped. The Great Necropolis in his hand was trembling violently and spitting out golden light everywhere.

Yang Qi wanted the third piece of the God Legion Seal, and knew that if it entered the passageway, he would never get it. And who knew what the god world would be like, or if he would ever be able to return once he went there? All enmities and grudges needed to be resolved in the mortal world before he could proceed.

Chapter 1138: Harmonious God Legion Seals

Yang Qi was reaching out with an energy art from the Unspoiled Body, which of course was the bane of the God Legion Seal. Proud Heaven had the last of the three God Legion Seals and was currently incapable of keeping it under control. Contrary to expectation, it suddenly flew right out into the open!

The last of the seals also looked like a golden imp.

Yang Qi made a beckoning gesture, and the seal flew toward him with lightning-like speed. There was nothing Proud Heaven could do to stop it.

Proud Heaven’s face fell. Never could he have guessed that something like this would happen, or that all of his energy arts would be useless in that moment. Unfortunately, he wasn’t the true owner of the Great Necropolis, and thus couldn’t use it to prevent Yang Qi from reaching out to the God Legion Seal within.

However, once the God Legion Seal flew out of Proud Heaven’s control, he knew that there was nothing he could do about the situation.

“Fine, Yang Qi, I shouldn’t take advantage of you. Since I get the Great Necropolis and King Immortal-Slayer, I’ll let you have my God Legion Seal. But the Great Necropolis and King Immortal-Slayer are mine. Once I'm in the god world, it won’t matter. You won't be able to do anything to me there.”

Keeping an iron grip on the Great Necropolis, he turned and leaped into the passageway. Intense rumbling sounds echoed out, followed by a shock wave, then he and the Great Necropolis were gone.

Yang Qi was about to give chase when the third piece of the God Legion Seal linked together with his existing composite piece, surrounding him in an impenetrable, swirling field of energy.

The three pieces of the God Legion Seal were finally one.

The seal had been broken long, long ago, and at long last, it was whole again. Yang Qi could now accept the legacy of the triple seal and achieve a baptism that would lead to complete transformation. No one could possibly guess what would result, as throughout all time, even in the god world, only the Sovereign Lord and Yang Qi had ever possessed the complete God Legion Seal.

“Damnation!” Yang Qi growled. The truth was that he wasn’t happy at all to have the complete God Legion Seal, and was completely surprised that Proud Heaven had allowed it to happen. He had simply forsaken the God Legion Seal and made his escape. Yang Qi had originally tried to take the God Legion Seal away from Proud Heaven as a way to force him to fight. He had hoped to use the opportunity to then seal Proud Heaven and prevent him from getting to the god world.

Instead, Proud Heaven abandoned the fight, let the God Legion Seal fly over to him, and used that moment to flee.

Golden light pierced into Yang Qi as if to completely transform him. And the power of three God Legion Seals was something he couldn't fight against. Apparently, that light wanted to strip away his Unspoiled Body, but thankfully he was currently being bolstered by the Mahātmā Jade and the sheepskin scroll.

So he unleashed his Sage Monarch Grand Magic and redirected the power of the God Legion Seal into it, causing himself to slip into an even deeper state of enlightenment.

Golden light surged on the Ancient Road to the Gods, pushing everything away, including treasure troves and vital energy, until the entire area was completely empty.

Right now, there was no question about it: Yang Qi was the top expert in the mortal world. As long as he didn't go to the god world, no one would ever have any hope of beating him.

‘I get it. So that’s how it is. The God Legion Seal truly is powerful.’ When the three pieces of the God Legion Seal combined, they were still a golden imp. However, this golden imp was very lifelike and active. In fact, it began to breathe slowly, as if it had a will and dao of its own. Was it about to be resurrected?

Absorbing the power that was being released, Yang Qi simultaneously sent his nascent divinity into the God Legion Seal to explore it and hopefully find out exactly what it was. As he did, an ancient voice suddenly spoke.

“At long last… I’ve finally been brought back to life.... no, I haven’t. But I'm awake. The Lord and the legion of gods blessed me with power so that I could become the most powerful entity in the god world. But that power destroyed me. Pure power cannot be controlled.... Who was it? Who brought me back?”

The voice was all that remained of the will of the God Legion Seal, and Yang Qi could tell that that it was profoundly weak, but at the same time, extraordinarily strong.

He tried to speak to it. “It was me. I brought you back. I'm the bearer of the God Legion Seal. You were split into three parts, one of which I was given, and the other two I managed to recover. Who are you? Your will is scattered. Why were you ensconced in the God Legion Seal?”

“You....”

As soon as Yang Qi’s will touched it, it shouted so loudly that it seemed it might destroy his nascent divinity. It was like the trumpeting of a godmammoth, filled with pure wildness. However, no one but Yang Qi could actually hear it.

“Who am I? Who am I...? How come I can’t remember who I am...?”

Yang Qi was very nearly killed by the mere reverberations of the voice. Thankfully, he had been prepared for something like this, and used the Purrfect God Art to protect himself.

“Who exactly are you? Even you don’t know who you are? If you don't, how could I possibly know?” In response to Yang Qi’s rapid-fire response of questions, the broken remnant of will emitted cracking sounds, as though it might collapse. Then it sank into silence.

“What almighty entity are you the remnant of? Don’t tell me you used to be the King of Godmammoths.” Yang Qi remained within the golden light, the God Legion Seal sitting there twitching on his palm, fusing with his energy until it seemed to be a part of him.

The seal was turning into an actual golden imp, sitting there with eyes closed, robe flapping as if in the wind. It seemed extraordinary, but at the same time, completely calm and collected. A dense stream of text flowed over its body, all of which were names. They seemed as numerous as the stars in the sky, to the point where they couldn’t be numbered. All of them were members of the legion of gods who had blessed the Sovereign Lord, yet Yang Qi didn’t recognize any of their names.

Looking over at the passageway to the god world, Yang Qi could see that it was as turbulent as ever, and he couldn’t see anything on the other side. It seemed likely that on the other side, there were violent flows of energy which would lead to a random destination in the god world. And likely, return was impossible.

If he went in, would he ever be able to come out? He didn’t know.

Unfortunately, although he had the complete God Legion Seal, he had lost King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions and the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart to Proud Heaven.

That could definitely be considered a huge loss.

The upside was that King Immortal-Slayer’s will had been awakened, and there was no way Proud Heaven would be able to control him. At best, they might be able to reach an agreement of some sort.

For now, Yang Qi didn’t worry about the God Legion Seal; he would study it slowly in the days to come. Based on his best guess, he wouldn’t be able to unleash its most powerful aspects until he was in the god world.

For now, he wanted to determine what other advances he had made. ‘Have my energy arts improved much?’

As it turned out, there were plenty of differences from before.

His psychic scale was now at five hundred, placing him just on the verge of the peak Terrifying level. His power index was at more than nine thousand nine hundred, just shy of ten thousand. He was definitely on the same level as the gods now. Furthermore, there was something brewing inside of him.

It was none other than a growing piece of godhood. For a variety of reasons involving magical laws, it hadn't grown to completion. Godhood could only truly take shape in the god world. It simply couldn’t happen in the mortal world.

At the moment, Yang Qi was high-spirited and full of mettle. The first thing he needed to do was completely unify the Immortal Dao Age and establish an iron-clad order that would never be undone. He would completely wipe out the Executors of the Ancient Road, then pick some of his most trusted people to go with him to the god world. He wanted his father and brothers to go there, but right now they wouldn’t be able to survive there. Perhaps the best course of action would be to talk to Brahma about the situation.

Blurring into motion, he left the Ancient Road to the Gods. He felt a powerful force trying to prevent him from doing so, but just shrugged it off. It was said that once you walked the Ancient Road to the Gods, you could never turn back. But that wasn’t true for someone like Yang Qi, who was already as strong as a Lesser God.

‘I wonder if the Ancient Road to the Gods will eventually disappear. It isn’t showing any signs of disappearing right now, but I have the feeling it will happen sooner or later. I need to get into the god world before that happens, otherwise I might never get in. Even with the God Legion Seal, I might not be able to break through the barriers and would be stuck in the mortal world. And that would be a big tragedy.’

He needed to take care of the executors as quickly as possible, unite his empire, and pick the people who were to go to the god world, before it became inaccessible.

RUMBLE!

Soon he was deep in primal-chaos, where he saw the enormous spell formation formed by the Gate to the Gods, as well as the formation created by the Sage Monarch League. Unfortunately, the executors had managed to even out the fight.

The Sage Monarch League’s formation was a relatively new construction, whereas the Gate to the Gods had been around for millions upon millions of years. As a result, holes were being blasted into the Sage Monarch League’s foundation, and Brahma was nowhere to be seen.

‘What’s going on here?’ Yang Qi thought, looking around. ‘How did the executors suddenly get more experts on their side?’

Chapter 1139: Destroying the Executors

The Gate to the Gods was an enormous gateway that had once led from the mortal world to the god world. Back then, the executors had tasked some of their top old-timers with guarding the door. Not even their emperor would be allowed to pass through it without a very good reason. Of course, things eventually changed. Later, it reached the point where the executors wouldn't let anyone through the gate.

Anyone who tried, whether their intentions were good or bad, whether they were immortals or fiend-devils, would be slaughtered without question, and their treasures and quintessence energy taken away.

The executors had long since become freaks; people who, because they couldn’t become gods, wouldn't allow anyone else to try to reach godly ascension. Furthermore, they would use the most powerful curses of the gods to plunder the resources of anyone who had prepared to reach godly ascension.

It was impossible to say how many people had fallen to their villainous tactics over the past millions upon millions of years. Unfortunately, there was nothing anyone could do about it. The executors’ headquarters occupied the end of the Ancient Road to the Gods. And whenever items spilled out of the god world, the executors were the first to fill their coffers. Whatever scattered items made it past them were fought over by the top experts on the ancient road, who could use them to become stronger, but never actually reach godly ascension.

No one knew how many ambitious people had launched assaults on the executors over the years, only to be slaughtered in bloody massacres.

But everything was changing because of Yang Qi.

The Gate to the Gods had been made part of a powerful spell formation that could part primal-chaos, summon god lightning, and unleash the most brutal of trump cards. In fact, in addition to the god lightning, it could send forth all sorts of primal-chaos soldiers, god mountains, god talismans, and god paintings.

It was called the Primal-Chaos Hundred-Weapons God-Assimilating Grand Formation.

When the formation was activated, it could summon power from the god world, transform primal-chaos into numerous types of weapons, and slaughter any defiant individuals.

It could be used to kill anyone who defied the executors.

“You won’t escape the magical net of justice!”

“Die!”

“How dare you challenge the dignity of the Executors of the Ancient Road! You’re going to be killed beyond the shadow of a doubt!”

“We’re the executors! We enforce the laws of heaven and earth. We control primal-chaos, and we can make it into whatever we want.”

“Destroy the Sage Monarch League!”

“Summon the magical net!”

In response to what was happening, numerous old-timers among the executors began shouting in rage.

Countless streams of primal-chaos swirled to create an enormous net that spread out, god lightning crackling across its surface. Then, numerous eyes opened up on the net, which could perceive everything in existence. As it was said, it is difficult to evade the net of justice.

The appearance of that net of primal-chaos seemed to have immediately put the Sage Monarch League at a disadvantage.

However, that was when Yang Qi showed up.

He threw his hand out with fingers splayed and grabbed the entire net, which began to pop and explode. The eyes shattered and the god lightning went wild, crashing into Yang Qi left and right. However, it didn’t seem to hurt him in any way.

“Be destroyed!” Yang Qi said, and an enormous primal-chaos elder-snake appeared behind him, a manifestation of King Heaven-Devourer’s energy arts. The snake opened its mouth and began devouring the primal-chaos vital energy.

Then, it lunged toward the Gate to the Gods as if to consume it.

However, the gate struggled to fight back.

“Are you really going to defy the heavens, Yang Qi!” a voice howled from within the gate. “The legion of gods tasked the Executors of the Ancient Road with guarding the road. It's the most holy of tasks! By defying us, you defy the gods!”

An old man appeared in front of the gate in nascent divinity form, clad in a yellow robe that pulsed with the energy of an emperor. Pointing at Yang Qi, he said, “Back down, boy, or—”

BOOM!

Yang Qi interrupted him with a fist.

He bent like a bow, causing golden light to converge above his head, which shot forth like an arrow to slam into the surface of the Gate to the Gods. The gate trembled violently, and the light shining off of it shattered, to be grabbed by Yang Qi. Then his golden light swept onward, crushing many of the lower-level executors into streaks of gore.

He was single-handedly destroying their formation!

Just what level of mighty power was that?

To see so many lower-level disciples being massacred caused the old-timers to howl with rage as they tried in vain to unleash the powers of the Gate to the Gods.

“This is a nice gate,” Yang Qi said. “I think I’ll take it.” Although it wasn’t on the level of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, it would make a great headquarters, as it contained a multitude of minor worlds. Reaching out with his hand, he sent his true energy into the gate to dismantle the warding magics inside.

“Yang Qi, if you think you can single-handedly defy the Executors of the Ancient Road, then you’re crazy!” The old-timers were clearly enraged.

Sadly for them, they couldn’t actually do anything to Yang Qi.

He was just too strong. His every attack shook heaven and earth, and shattered numerous warding spells in the Gate to the Gods. Before long, only the primary warding spell remained, into which all of the top executors had fled.

“That’s not going to do any good,” Yang Qi said. “Fighting harder is just going to make you die sooner. Die, all of you!”

Shouting, he launched an attack at the primary warding spell, blasting it apart and sending the executors tumbling out into the open. It was like a rain of humans descending through the primal-chaos. Thankfully for them, they were all top experts, otherwise the destructive primal-chaos would have ripped them to shreds.

The gigantic Gate to the Gods shrank down until it was only about seven inches tall on Yang Qi’s palm. It was stone, speckled with both blood and the slashes of blades. There was even moss visible on the surface, and its surface was etched with the history and memories of people from the mortal world who had passed through it.

After all, the Gate to the Gods had been the final obstacle on the Ancient Road to the Gods, and once one passed through it, they would enter the god world.

‘What an ancient gateway,’ Yang Qi thought. Cocking his ear, he could almost hear how old it was. ‘From now on, the Gate to the Gods will be mine. I wonder what it would be worth in the god world.’

Flicking his hand, he sent the Gate to the Gods flying out. “Everyone, get into formation. Get this area under control. The Gate to the Gods is going to be the strongest foundation we could have for the Sage Monarch League.”

“Yes sir!”

The experts in the Sage Monarch League knew that the Executors of the Ancient Road were finished. Yang Qi could destroy them single-handedly if he wanted to. Everyone knew that they were participating in establishing a new order, a new empire that would control myriads of worlds.

Looking around, Yang Qi spotted a group of people out in the primal-chaos. They were executors, arranged in formation, except that without the Gate to the Gods to provide power, they were pitifully weak.

Identifying their leader, he nodded and said, “You’re the emperor, right? Step forward.”

Shivering, the emperor stepped forward and glared at him. “Do you know what you’ve done, Yang Qi? You’ve violated universal principles of order! We Executors of the Ancient Road will—”

“I said step forward!” Yang Qi said. Waving his hand, he sent out a stream of golden light that shot directly toward the emperor.

“How impudent!”

“How dare you harm our emperor!”

“Looking to die?!”

“Attack him!”

A host of experts tried to block the path of Yang Qi’s golden light, but it did no good. He had completely mastered the martial disciplines of the God Legion Seal, so it scattered anyone that got in the way. As for the emperor, he bellowed in rage and tried to escape, but was quickly caught and dragged back to Yang Qi, who planted his hand on the man’s back.

That was how strong Yang Qi was now. The executors had several dozen mid Terrifying experts, yet none of them could stand in his way.

“An emperor?” Yang Qi said. “Look, I’ll give you two options. The first is to become my slave, a thrall of the Sage Monarch League. For the rest of your life, you can give your true energy and life essence to my people. Second option: die. Then the executors will disappear into the river of history, never to be seen again. You decide.”

“Fine, you win,” the emperor said venomously. “We surrender, Yang Qi. But don't forget, the legion of gods will look into this matter.”

“They will?” He laughed. “I control the God Legion Seal! The legion of gods will follow my orders. That's what the Lord wants. If you acknowledge allegiance to the legion of gods, then why won’t you acknowledge allegiance to me?”

“Such audacity!” the emperor said, shaking his head. “For you to have the God Legion Seal is blasphemy! Don’t you know? The fact that you have that seal means that the gods are going to track you down and kill you. None of them will rest at ease while the seal is in the hands of a mediocre person like you. Think about it. If the imperial seal fell into the hands of a farmer in the mortal world, what would happen? An ordinary man who possesses great treasure makes himself a big target!”

Yang Qi shook his head. “So you’re saying you refuse to work for me?”

“If you want to kill me, go ahead,” the emperor replied. “Besides, we executors can never reach godly ascension. Our lives are tragic to begin with, so go ahead and release me. Men! What joy be there in life? What bitterness be there in death?”

The rest of the executors settled down cross-legged. “That’s right! We’re the Executors of the Ancient Road! If we die, we die. For us, it will be a release!”

Chapter 1140: Advancing to the God World

“Look upon death as going home, look upon death as going home....”

All of the executors began murmuring the same words, making the scene suddenly seem profoundly tragic. All of them were prepared to meet death, and none were afraid.

All of a sudden, Yang Qi’s view of the Executors of the Ancient Road changed a bit.

They really weren’t afraid of dying.

As for the emperor, he burst out laughing. “As they say, one should look upon death as going home. So what do we have to be afraid of? How ridiculous to use death to threaten us, Yang Qi. We’re the Executors of the Ancient Road! We don’t fear death!”

“That's good,” Yang Qi replied. “I have to admire you for that. Sadly, I can’t just let you die. You’re too valuable. Instead, I think I’ll let you enjoy the eternal torment of my Heaven and Earth Furnace.”

An enormous furnace appeared behind him, a product of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. A primal-chaos elder-snake emerged from the furnace and quickly sucked the executors inside, whereupon their miserable screams rang out.

King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions were gone, the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart was nowhere to be seen, and the godhood stars couldn’t be used.

However, Yang Qi still had all of the legacy items of the other seventy-one monarchs. In fact, his divine will was so powerful that he could easily reach out to all of the various immortal worlds and pull the remaining legacy items to him, wherever they existed.

However, no such scattered items even existed anymore on any other worlds, which meant that any items he hadn’t collected yet could only exist in the god world.

When everyone else saw how Yang Qi dealt with the executors, they sighed. For such a powerful force to be disposed of so quickly and cleanly was something that had never been seen in the mortal world.

As for Yang Qi, his face betrayed neither delight nor sorrow. He remained expressionless as he returned to the Sage Monarch League, where expansion and construction was already underway. All of the executors’ remaining treasures had been plundered, and the god Brahma had taken charge.

The immortal-slaying clone approached around this time. Although he’d been freed from certain constraints, the fact that he had lost both King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions and the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart had weakened him significantly.

“Everything is taken care of, Yang Qi,” he said, “except Proud Heaven escaped. He could definitely cause big problems in the future. What are you planning to do? Are we going to head to the god world immediately?”

“Don’t worry,” Yang Qi said. “I’ll kill Proud Heaven eventually, and take the Great Necropolis back from him. And the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart belongs to you, so I’ll definitely help you get it back. I refuse to believe that Proud Heaven will be able to call the wind and summon the rain in the god world, especially now that he’s lost his God Legion Seal.”

At this point, Sectlord Will Manifestation approached. “We need to call a general meeting, Yang Qi,” he said. “Getting our top experts to the god world should be the main priority. If the Ancient Road to the Gods disappears, we’ll be stuck here forever. And then what would be the point of any of this?”

“Well, of course,” Yang Qi said. “Call the meeting. Everyone who’s even close to the mid Terrifying level should come. We’re going to have a big session of cultivation, in which we try to get as many people into the mid Terrifying level as possible. No one under that level will do any good in the god world. Brahma, why don’t you explain to us exactly what the god world is like?”

Brahma hurried forward. “If you go to the god world as you are, you’ll definitely be mobbed as soon as you arrive. After all, you have the complete God Legion Seal. Unless you manage to conceal its power, the other gods will sense it.”

“I can conceal its power,” Yang Qi said, “so don't worry about that. Furthermore, I don't have any true use for the God Legion Seal. I’ve broken free from its restraints, making it like a rowboat that I have no need of, having reached the opposite shore. How strong are the magical laws in the god world?”

“The magical laws?” Brahma said, then a thoughtful expression overtook his face for a moment. “They’re indescribable and unimaginable. Mid Terrifying experts there are like commoners in the mortal world. They can’t fly, can’t move heavy stones, can’t chop down trees easily, and would have a hard time building a house. And that’s not even to mention doing anything magical or superhuman. If you and your subordinates all went there and were attacked by some animals, most of you would die in the fight. The Sage Monarch League might be strong here, but a swarm of godlings would wipe you out there.”

“The god world is that incredible?” Yang Qi asked, frowning.

“It is!” Brahma replied seriously. “Because of how you’ve assimilated so many god items, you might think that the god world isn’t that impressive. But once a god item enters the mortal world, it loses a lot of its effectiveness. They can only truly unleash their potential in the god world itself. Think about it. A dragon in the shallows falls victim to the shrimps, a tiger on the plain can be torn to pieces by the dogs. Aren’t dragons and tigers incredibly powerful and fierce? Yet if they’re in the wrong environment, they can be considered weak. God items are like sharks, and the god world is the ocean. But if you take a shark and throw it on the seashore, then what happens? Just about anyone could kill it. Am I right?”

“That does make sense,” Yang Qi said, nodding. Even the God Legion Seal was limited as to what it could do in the mortal world. As Brahma said, it was like a shark thrown on the seashore.

“So I advise you to only take mid Terrifying experts with you,” Brahma continued. “And not just ordinary people. That would be the safest course of action. Of course, the best would be for you to go alone.”

“Alone?” He shook his head. “I definitely can’t do that. If the Ancient Road to the Gods vanished, then how would I bring my people to me? They would lose their chance to reach godly ascension.”

“That’s true. Gods from the god world can’t return to the mortal world, and that would be even truer if the Ancient Road to the Gods disappears. How about this: go ahead and take your most valuable people with you. But leave behind the ones with low cultivation bases. If you brought those to the god world, the tempestuous magical laws would either crush them to death, or damage them so badly they would long to die.”

Yang Qi was already aware that people beneath the Terrifying level couldn’t survive in the god world.

And early Terrifying experts would be able to do little more than crawl around and gasp for breath. Yang Qi wouldn't be able to care for them, much less establish his own authority or kingdom. In the god world, only Consummate Gods could establish kingdoms. Even Yang Qi himself would be like nothing more than a commoner in the god world. It might have been tolerable if he had the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, but it seemed unlikely that he would be able to reach out and open a passageway to it once he was in the god world.

That said, in order to truly understand the magical laws there, he needed to visit the place personally.

Yang Qi nodded. “In that case, I need to transform my father and brothers on the deepest level. I can probably take a few dozen people with me, no more.  Brahma, I’ll obviously be taking you with me. I won’t let you down considering how you’ve helped me. And I doubt it will be difficult for you to truly become a god again.”

“I trust you,” Brahma said. “The god world is a very dangerous place. There are peak Terrifying experts there who are not yet gods. If they realized what I was, they would definitely rip me to shreds and devour me to gain access to my memories and experiences.” He shivered involuntarily. Clearly, the god world was also a place where the weak were the prey of the strong.

With that, Yang Qi called forth his seventeen fellow disciples from the Invincible Society, plus his sworn siblings from the old Rich-Lush Continent. He also summoned his father Yang Zhan, and his brothers Yang Yunchong and Yang Hualong. Without any hesitation, he began to baptize them and help them push their cultivation bases to the Terrifying level.

The God Legion Seal shone with brilliant light that pierced into everyone present. Before long, their eyes shone with radiance and light as, one after another, they showed signs of imminent breakthroughs.

Eldest Brother was the first to break into the mid Terrifying level. After him was Yang Zhan. Unfortunately, Yang Yunchong and Yang Hualong were both stuck in bottlenecks and couldn’t proceed past the early Terrifying level.

Brahma sighed. “The God Legion Seal is indeed formidable. It can help people break through this easily? Is it complete? According to the rumors, the complete God Legion Seal was blessed by all the gods of the many heavens, and can make it easy to achieve godly ascension. Unfortunately, you can’t yet release its most profound nature.”

Next, more of Yang Qi’s sworn siblings broke through. Unfortunately, some had constitutions so weak that they could only progress so far before getting stuck.

As time went on, the Sage Monarch League secured its position as the absolute strongest force in the mortal world. All enemies were destroyed, and all resistance was routed. There was no question as to its superiority.

Yang Qi sighed. “It's too bad, Eldest Brother, Second Brother. I really wish I could help you reach the mid Terrifying level. I just can’t take you to the god world like this.”

“Don’t worry about it, Third Brother!” Yang Yunchong said. He laughed. “You’ve already done well enough as it is. You and father go to the god world and continue getting stronger. We’ll stay behind in the mortal world to take care of things here. We're already in an infinitely better position than we were in Yanhaven on the old Rich-Lush Continent. Besides, we’ll be safe here. Nothing around here could possibly hurt us.”

“That’s right, Third Brother,” Yang Hualong said, clasping Yang Qi’s shoulder comfortingly. “Go to the god world and continue growing. Take all of the mid Terrifying experts with you. Don’t worry, we can keep things under control here. Besides, one day you’ll be a Consummate God, or even a Paramount God. Maybe you’ll even surpass the Sovereign Lord himself. And once you are, perhaps you can open a passageway back to the mortal world for us to join you.”

“Alright, Eldest Brother, Second Brother. Maybe you can't achieve your breakthroughs, but I'm still going to plant some of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth in you, as well as the Unspoiled Body. Keep cultivating my Sage Monarch Grand Magic, and you shouldn’t have any problems with them. You’ll break through eventually. Remember, once you do, go to the god world, assuming the Ancient Road to the Gods hasn’t disappeared. Then we can reunite.”

Thanks to Yang Qi’s help, there was no way his brothers would need to fear even mid Terrifying experts.

Chapter 1141: Leaving for the God World

The Executors of the Ancient Road had been wiped out and the Sage Monarch League truly ruled everything under heaven. Yang Qi’s brothers, Yang Yunchong and Yang Hualong, were strong enough that they could easily keep an eye on things. And as long as they continued to cultivate the Sage Monarch Grand Magic, their cultivation bases would continually improve. In other words, Yang Qi could leave things in their care without having to worry about a thing.

In addition, Yang Qi had Brahma convey some of his experiences of godly ascension into their seas of consciousness, ensuring that his brothers would progress faster than anyone else in the mortal world.

At this point, Yang Qi began to take roll, calling out all of the mid Terrifying experts that he was planning to take with him to the god world.

The current list was comprised of his immortal-slaying clone, Brahma, Jadefall, Doom, Proud World, the Shepherd, Sectlord Will Manifestation, Peaklords Memory and Celestial, Eldest Brother, Sword Seventeen, Elder Seventh Brother Meng Shafan, Yang Zhan, and Patriarch Annalist. They were the only ones. After all, no one else had been able to reach the mid Terrifying level.

He did have some mid Terrifying puppets, but didn't intend on taking them with him. Puppets were puppets, and they wouldn’t be of much help in the god world. In fact, they would probably be a burden.

One thing of particular interest was that Patriarch Annalist had truly advanced by leaps and bounds. In fact, his rise to the mid Terrifying level had come as something of a shock. That said, Yang Qi knew that his self-created All-Eternity Spring-Autumn Annalist God-Dao Scripture had a lot of potential, so it made a lot of sense that he was able to become a mid Terrifying expert.

Everyone in the group took care of important matters before preparing to leave. The Yang Clan was now firmly in control of the Sage Monarch League, with Yang Qi’s two brothers having ultimate power and plenty of resources to maintain the status quo. Yang Qi’s other sworn siblings, and the old forces that had been loyal to the Holy Mother of the Hanging Mountain, such as Yan Wubing and those like him, were there to help his brothers keep order.

They had access to cultivation resources as well, and were all working hard to ultimately reach the peak Terrifying level.

A massive flow of destiny had converged on Yang Qi, but he had already split it and sent it to his various relatives and sworn siblings.

The time had come to walk the Ancient Road to the Gods.

That road was incomparably large and had once been filled with crouching tigers and hidden dragons. But now it was virtually empty. Some of the experts had been killed, while others had acknowledged allegiance to the Sage Monarch League. In any case, all opposition had been removed.

The Sage Monarch League controlled access to all treasure troves, as well as the immense wealth that had been accumulated by the Executors of the Ancient Road. There was also everything that had been ejected by the Great Necropolis.

The necropolis had changed everything. After swallowing up the will of King Immortal-Slayer, the necropolis had spat out so many treasure troves that it was impossible to determine how many there were out in the primal-chaos. And the Sage Monarch League now had a chance to collect them all. Furthermore, there were numerous hells to conquer; when the job was done, the Sage Monarch League would be like a mortal version of the halls of heaven.

Yang Qi was very pleased to see everything going so smoothly. After all the years of bitter conflict and fighting, he had finally reached the point of being truly invincible in the mortal world. The Future and Primeval Ages were no more. Only the Immortal Dao Age existed. And the destiny and dao of heaven were both there to provide a strong foundation for growth.

“Take care on your journey, Third Brother....”

Yang Yunchong and Yang Hualong waved goodbye as Yang Qi led his group of over a dozen top experts into the depths of the Ancient Road to the Gods. Eventually, they caught sight of the passage that existed at its end. Keeping firm control of the God Legion Seal, Yang Qi waved his hand and summoned an enormous bubble around himself and his people.

“This is the end of the Ancient Road to the Gods,” Brahma said. “The way to the god world. Once we step in, everything will spin into motion as we careen through space and time. When we arrive, we’ll find ourselves in a random place in the god world. Normally speaking, we would be separated, but considering you have the God Legion Seal and the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, I don’t think we need to worry about that. Connect our souls and impart the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth to all of us. That will unite us and ensure that we don't get separated. The best outcome would be for us to be transported to some remote mountain range where we can set up camp and start working on getting stronger. The sooner one or two of us become gods, the better. Otherwise we’ll be in great danger. The fighting in the god world is far more intense and deadly than anything from the mortal world!”

Everyone understood exactly what Brahma was saying.

In the god world, there were plenty of low-level gods who were nothing more than servants or commoners. As for mid Terrifying experts, they were only qualified to be slaves.

Therefore, the most important thing for them to do once they arrived in the god world was to stick together and defend each other. After all, they could even be ripped to shreds by animals of the god world.

“Purr, purr....”

The purrling rested in Jadefall’s arms, purring loudly, almost as if in disdain. At the same time, there seemed to be a gleam of anticipation in its eyes, as though it believed it belonged in the god world.

“God Legion Seal: Soul Integration!”

Yang Qi waved his fingers, sending a sealing mark into the foreheads of everyone present. In the past, some of these people had started out as friends, some had been enemies. But in the end, all of them ended up as Yang Qi’s core group of trusted and loyal allies. All of them knew that the god world was truly the ultimate destination, and each one was extremely excited to see what it was like.

They were like a group of floodwyrms just itching to swim into the ocean.

“Let’s go!” Yang Qi said, taking a last look at the mortal world and everything in it. He was now invincible in the mortal world, which meant that the god world was the only place where he could continue to grow.

WHOOSH!

Turning his back on the mortal world, he plunged into the passage leading to the god world.

RUMBLE!

He pushed the Purrfect God Art to the limit to protect everyone and keep them together. However, as they shot through the passageway, they were shaken deeply, to the point where they felt their souls being tugged at. In fact, their true energy was being destabilized, and rushing away from them uncontrollably.

“Crap!” the Shepherd blurted. “My true energy is being drained away! If this keeps up I'm going to die!”

“Stabilize your nascent divinity!” Brahma said. “Conceal your spirit and energy. Make sure you don’t let out any soul fluctuations. You’re experiencing the first baptism of the passage to the god world. The power of the god world is flowing through you, and if you can’t sustain it, you’ll be melted by the magical laws.”

The Shepherd complied, doing everything he could to stabilize himself and keep calm. Then he looked at the surrounding power fluctuations in the tunnel, and marveled. If it weren’t for Yang Qi’s presence, and his protection, the Shepherd knew that he would already have been killed and transformed into nothing but vital energy.

He was a top expert from the Immortal Dao Age, and the leader of all the fiend-devils, but in the god world, he might as well be an ant.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi sensed the frenzied weight of the magical laws around him and knew that they surpassed anything he had encountered in the past, whether that was the Cave Temple of the Vajra Māyādevī or the headquarters of the Executors of the Ancient Road.

Only now was he truly experiencing the boundless force of the god world.

Strange psychic powers assaulted him from all sides, bombarding him with the destructive forces of rebirth, and endless tribulations.

His God Legion Seal glowed faintly, illuminating the area; compared to the wild powers around him, he was like a tiny fish struggling in an enormous tsunami, incapable of making any significant movement.

In the mortal world, a mere thought on his part could transform the world around him, but not here. In fact, just staying safe was an accomplishment of its own.

All of a sudden, the ferocity of the power flows increased, making it seem like they were in a hurricane of god wind. In fact, the wind pierced through their defenses, tugging at their souls as if it was determined to separate them.

“Watch out!” Brahma called. “It’s trying to separate our souls. The magical laws of the god world want to keep us apart and send us to different locations in the god world. Give control of your souls to Yang Qi! Let him take charge!”

Everyone knew that it was a very dangerous situation. After all, if they ended up separated in the god world, it would be very difficult for them to survive on their own, and even more difficult to meet up.

Yang Qi drew on the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, the Unspoiled Body, the Purrfect God Art, the energy arts of the thirty-six masks, and ultimately a technique from his Sage Monarch Grand Magic called the Banner of Monarchs.

In the blink of an eye, he summoned a huge banner that wrapped around the souls of everyone present, putting them under his control.

Instantly, the powers tugging at them lessened.

The forces at play were so intense that everyone felt light-headed. Brahma had it a bit better than the others, but even he was gasping for breath. “I think we might be the first people ever to enter the god world without passing out! There are often mid Terrifying experts who enter the god world unconscious and end up getting captured and enslaved before they wake up. Some unlucky ones end up out in the wild, where the animals eat them before they can regain consciousness.”

Some of the others wanted to ask further questions, but they could hardly breathe at the moment, let alone talk.

RIP!

A bolt of god lightning fell, the kind that could destroy anything it touched if it fell on an immortal world.

BUZZ!

Blood sprayed out of the mouths of everyone present as they began to slip into unconsciousness.

Howling, Yang Qi drew further on the God Legion Seal, sending golden light into everyone present, healing them. “You absolutely, positively must not pass out! Once we get to the god world, we’ll focus immediately on getting stronger! We can’t let ourselves be taken captive!”

Everyone focused on maintaining lucidity, fully aware that their fates rested in the hands of Yang Qi.

Eventually, the winds grew so intense that they were sure they were about to be ejected.

But they had no idea where they would end up.

Chapter 1142: Fighting for Survival

The trial was over.

Everyone suddenly felt much more relaxed, although their heads were still spinning and they had no idea where they were. Yang Qi was the only one who had maintained his faculties from beginning to end; he wasn’t even light-headed.

RUMBLE!

He watched as the tempest around them sent them into a glowing exit aperture, whereupon they began falling at a shocking speed. Below them was a vast ocean littered with scattered islands, all of them covered in dense vegetation.

The world seemed to stretch without end in all directions, making it impossible to assess the world in general. Yang Qi quickly circulated his true energy in the hopes of stabilizing himself and floating in midair, or at least gliding downward.

Sadly, he completely failed.

Circulating his true energy did almost nothing, making him feel almost the same as he did back in his days in Yanhaven in the Rich-Lush Continent, before he reached the fifth phase of Energy Eruption.

SLAM!

He hit the ground and was sent tumbling. Thankfully, he had landed on sand instead of rock, otherwise his head would have been bashed in. He could already sense that his true energy was almost completely out of control.

Meanwhile, other shrieks and screams of pain could be heard as his companions landed around him. The only exception was Jadefall, who had the purrling in her arms, allowing her to safely descend in a bubble.

Despite having slammed hard into the sand, a look of wild joy could be seen on Brahma’s face. After catching his breath, he circulated his true energy, looked around, and then burst out laughing. “This is the god world! We’re really here in the god world! I'm back!”

Suddenly, he was wracked by a fit of coughing, then continued, “Not bad at all. We got lucky. We actually landed on sand instead of rock. If we’d hit rock, we would already be dead.”

“It's this dangerous?” Yang Qi said, sitting there on the sand. “You would expect most people who came here from the mortal world to end up dead. How do people survive?” Struggling to his feet, he looked out at the waves on the ocean around them. He felt immense pressure, and could sense that the magical laws were already weighing heavily on his psychic power.

He made an experimental leap into the air, and found that he only made a few feet up before falling back down.

RUMBLE!

All of a sudden, the tide brought some waves crashing into the shore, which pulled Yang Qi out into the water.

Face falling, Brahma said, “Hurry and get back on land! If you get attacked by the godfish in the ocean, you’ll be killed and drained of blood!”

Yang Qi struggled a bit, but managed to crawl back up onto the sandy shore.

Even as he did, a fish leaped out of the water, only about a foot long, but with a mouth full of snapping, razor-sharp teeth. It moved with such speed that it seemed even faster than a martial arts expert.

Yang Qi scrambled to get out of the way, but was too slow, and the fish latched onto his arm. Ripping and tearing sounds could immediately be heard as it started chewing on him.

“How could one tiny fish be so strong?” He quickly drew on the powers of his Unspoiled Body, and thankfully it prevented the fish from biting deeply into him. Then he clenched his other hand into a fist and struck the fish as hard as he could. It let out an odd shriek, but unexpectedly, didn’t die.

This shocking level of power was nothing to look down upon.

In the past, Yang Qi could have destroyed an immortal world ranked three thousand with his fist. But here in the god world, he couldn’t even kill a little fish?

“That's a fangfish,” Brahma explained. “Here, let me help get it off you. They have such incredible biting power that they can even dismember a peak Terrifying expert. I almost can’t believe that your body is this strong. It’s incredible....”

“Fuck,” Yang Qi said, holding the fish firmly in his hand now that it had been pulled off of his arm. “The fish are this strong?”

“This is the god world,” Brahma said, laughing. “Unless you’re an actual god, you’re nobody. Even just breathing will burn a lot of vital energy. We’re going to be getting hungry soon, and this fish will provide some valuable nourishment.”

Crash!

All of a sudden, another powerful wave hit the shore.

Yang Qi scrambled further up the beach, but lost his grip on the fish in the process, allowing it to leap back into the water, snapping its teeth the entire time as if it wished to shred Yang Qi to pieces.

All of a sudden, Yang Qi felt exhausted, weighed down, and drained of energy.

‘How could this be happening? I'm the number one figure in the mortal world. I slaughtered countless godlings there. But here in the god world, I can’t even beat a fish?’ He couldn’t help but feel a bit disappointed.

Everyone else standing on the beach felt similarly weighed down, their faces pale as they wondered if they would even be able to stay alive.

“That wasn’t an ordinary fish,” Brahma explained, “but rather a fierce fangfish. You people have just arrived, and aren’t used to the god world yet. You see, the godlings in the immortal worlds are actually just animals with a bit of the blood of true godlings from the god world. Listen. Can you hear your stomachs rumbling? You’re all hungry, aren’t you?”

As soon as he mentioned this, everyone realized that they did feel slight pangs of hunger.

“So that’s what that is,” Doom said. He almost couldn’t believe it, considering how strong he was. “Why exactly are we feeling hungry, though?”

Brahma gave a wry smile. “Because your metabolism works countless times faster here than it did in the immortal worlds. Every time you breathe in the vital energy here, your body is forced to break it down, leading to what is essentially a life or death battle inside you. The magical laws in the vital energy are very strong, which means that every breath you take causes you to lose some of your own essence vitality.”

“What if we just stop breathing?” Proud World said. He had just cast his sense inward and confirmed that the vital energy he breathed in was causing him to lose his essence vitality.

Brahma laughed coldly. “Not breathe? Then you would suffocate. Go ahead and try if you don’t believe me.”

Proud World held his breath, but after only a few moments, he started feeling dizzy and light-headed. Then, before he could do anything else, he collapsed onto the ground.

Yang Qi hurried over, propped him up, and tried to send some essence vitality into him. Unfortunately, he couldn't send his true energy out of his body and was forced to actually touch Proud World and make the transfer by contact.

“Incredible...” Brahma said. “You can actually impart your essence vitality to another person, Yang Qi? That’s really amazing. In any case, we have to breathe. If we don’t, the magical laws around us will destroy our bodies. Allow me to summarize our situation: now that we’re in the god world, we’re ordinary people with very weak bodies. In fact, we're probably even weaker than ordinary people. We’re essentially sickly. The only exception is Yang Qi, who has the God Legion Seal, making him so tough that not even that fangfish could bite through his skin. You know, even the locals would actually bleed if they were bitten by a fangfish.”

“So what do we do now?” Yang Zhan said coolly. “How do we survive if we're so weak?”

“By fighting tooth and nail. Thankfully, we ended up on a deserted island in the middle of the ocean. And it seems like there aren’t any animals here either. If we had ended up in a populated area, we would have been taken captive immediately. One reason we're so weak is that we're just not used to the magical laws of the god world. Once we get used to them and practice a bit of cultivation, we’ll be fine. It should only take a few days. By the way, if we don’t reach godly ascension, our lifespan will be very limited. I'm not sure about Yang Qi, but for the rest of you, I'd say you’ll only last about a hundred years before you shrivel up and die.”

“We understand...” Proud World said. He and the others all felt the same. After all, what was the point of living for even billions of years in the mortal world, compared to living in the god world? The god world was the ultimate destination, and a hundred years was plenty of time to cultivate one’s way to strength.

Expression flickering with fear, Jadefall said, “Now I finally realize why you can’t go to the god world unless you’re in the mid Terrifying level. Someone in the early Terrifying level would probably just drop dead instantly.”

Brahma nodded. “Exactly. Early Terrifying cultivators couldn’t even breathe here. I'm an actual god, and was very strong in the past, but now even I'm having difficulty. That said, I now have a chance to recover. And I’ll make sure to explain everything to all of you along the way. Come on, we need to go find some food.”

“I brought some god pills with me,” Yang Qi said, “do you think they’ll be effective?” He reached into his robe to pull them out, then looked in shock at his hand when all he held was a bit of powder.

“They won’t,” Brahma replied. “Things like that get destroyed on the way here. Your God Legion Seal should be fine, but any other magical treasures or god items will have been too tainted by the aura of the mortal world. Special items like the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart and the Cruiser of Civilization should be fine. But I think you’ll find that you can’t actually get into the Cruiser of Civilization right now. You’ll have to wait until you’re a god before you can do that.”

The immortal-slaying clone pulled out a saucer-sized fragment of the cruiser, but couldn’t do anything with it.

It had obviously been transformed during their journey, and was temporarily impossible to use. There was obviously no way they could use the Godly Positioning Systems, let alone use the cruiser to fly.

On the upside, Yang Qi was certain that the immense pressure of the magical laws would make their cultivation even more rewarding. Plus, he had a much better starting point considering he had the God Legion Seal.

Right now, the first task at hand was to get used to the magical laws around him.

Chapter 1143: Fighting for Survival (2)

Crack!

Yang Qi was wading bare-footed in the shallow water on the beach when a fierce fangfish leaped out to bite him. However, he quickly clenched his hand into a fist and hit it on the head as hard as he could, using some of his top fist techniques.

His blow struck true and the fangfish was knocked unconscious.

Meanwhile, more fangfish were closing in on him, an entire school it seemed. Grabbing the unconscious fish, he ran out of the water and up the shore. Some of the larger fangfish wriggled after him across the sand like enormous crocodiles. Thankfully, they couldn’t stay out of the water for very long and quickly retreated.

Gong!

Yang Qi smacked the fish onto a nearby rock a few times until it was dead, simultaneously marveling at its powerful life force.

“You're going to have to use your own power to chop it up, Yang Qi,” Brahma said. “We don't have any weapons or tools anymore, not even a knife. We’ll have to eat it raw. At least we can absorb the quintessence energy from its flesh. One of the reasons we're so weak is that we only have our own true energy inside of us, but no godpower. But the fangfish are natives of this place. Consume them, and we can convert our true energy into godpower, and finally start getting strong again. We have a big advantage compared to ordinary people who first arrive in the god world. After all, you have the God Legion Seal.”

Yang Qi quickly did just that, chopping the fangfish up into a bunch of tiny pieces for everyone to consume.

As soon as they ate the fangfish meat, they felt their quintessence energy thrumming and the weakness within them slowly fading away.

“How pitiful,” Doom sighed. “In the immortal worlds, we’re apex entities who can create worlds with a thought. But here in the god world we’re as weak as could be, forced to eat raw meat like savages. That said, I can already sense my true energy converting into godpower.”

“Well that’s a given,” Brahma said. “Yang Qi already imbued us with the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. Do you know what that means? That’s the top technique in the god world! And his God Legion Seal can help harmonize us with the magical laws here. It won’t be long before we can start cultivating our energy arts again.”

After eating the fangfish, they felt a bit less hungry, and at the same time, realized how dangerous the god world was and how they needed to acclimate themselves as quickly as possible.

Continuing, he said, “Most people need four or five years to get used to the god world and turn their true energy into godpower. But we’re different. I'd say we’ll only need a few hours, thanks to Yang Qi.” Sitting down cross-legged, he circulated his true energy and began working on his cultivation.

Yang Qi did the same, concentrating all effort on slowly turning his true energy into godpower, making sure it conformed to the vital energy of the god world.

The truth was that he was already incredibly strong, and just needed some time to get used to his new surroundings. And the God Legion Seal was constantly absorbing the god world vital energy and helping him to maintain his peak state.

‘I see how it is. The magical laws of the god world are so strong that I can’t release my true energy outside of my body, much less fly or manipulate space. I’ll have to reach the peak Terrifying level first.’

As he performed his breathing exercises, the God Legion Seal quivered as if with anticipation, greedily absorbing the vital energy of the god world. At the same time, his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth was undergoing transformations as his vital energy and blood grew denser and stronger.

RUMBLE!

A few hours later, he felt much stronger. Standing, he stamped his foot down, causing the ground to shake a bit. Then he launched an experimental fist strike, causing a whizzing sound to ring out.

He was already stronger, and although he couldn’t release his true energy outside of him, at least he wasn’t as weak as before.

One by one, everyone else opened their eyes and stood, already starting to feel a bit more at ease. As they breathed, they were growing more used to the god world and their bodies were getting stronger. At least now they could walk around a bit without gasping.

“Great,” Brahma said. “You’re already making progress. It’s nearly nighttime, and there’s no sun or moon in the god world. Days are simply marked by the alternating periods of light and dark.”

It was only at that point that Yang Qi realized there wasn’t a sun overhead. And yet light streamed down from above, leading to a very different sensation than in the mortal world.

“Why don’t we chop down some trees and build a shelter?” Brahma said. “At least then we won’t be caught unawares by any animals. Don’t forget, we're commoners now. Actually, we’re weaker than commoners! The animals in the god world are extremely fierce. You might as well consider the fangfish an appetizer compared to what’s to come. If there’s anything more dangerous than that on this island, we could be in a lot of danger.”

The island was actually huge, almost like a continent. In fact, it was so large that they had no idea where the other side was. It seemed to be nothing more than an endless jungle.

No one had any doubt that Brahma knew what he was talking about, so they quickly headed over to the tree line to chop down some trees.

“Hai!” The Shepherd targeted a tree about as wide as a bowl, and chopped his hand toward it. Unfortunately, all that happened was that the tree shook and a few leaves fell to the ground. “Damn it all,” the Shepherd growled. “I can’t believe that my amazing—”

“Look, I told you,” interrupted Brahma, “this is the god world. Use the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth to get used to the magical laws. If you do, you should be able to chop down some trees.” He circulated his energy until everyone saw his face glowing with golden light. Then he launched a fist strike that hit the very same tree, splitting it right in half.

Panting a bit, he said, “I did that thanks to the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. Yang Qi, you’re the strongest of us all. Why don’t you head back to the water and get some more fangfish for us to eat? If we run out of energy, we won’t be doing any tree felling. I can help everyone else figure out how to use the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth to get used to the magical laws.”

“Alright!” Yang Qi said. Thanks to the God Legion Seal, he had been constantly absorbing the surrounding vital energy, making him much stronger than he was when he first arrived.

He took another experimental leap, and this time he was able to jump about as high as an average person was tall. Nodding in satisfaction, he headed toward the shallows, instantly attracting the attention of the school of fangfish.

This time, he wasn’t as afraid as before. Dodging the attack of a small fangfish, he thrust his finger out in a powerful attack that pierced right through its head, killing it instantly.

Not wanting its blood to attract even more dangerous sea creatures, Yang Qi grabbed it before it hit the water and threw it up onto the sand.

During that time, several other fangfish had latched onto his legs. If it had been anyone else, their legs would already be mincemeat. But Yang Qi was too tough. Sending a powerful pulse through himself, he killed the fishes and sent them flying up onto the beach.

It was with casual ease that, over the course of the following hour, he caught upwards of a hundred fangfish. The largest was over two feet long, and pulsed with immense energy.

Meanwhile, Brahma was using his extensive experience to help everyone with their cultivation, assisting them in getting used to the god world. Before long, they felt a bit of familiarity with the magical laws and were able to use the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth to conform to the vital energy, then use it to start chopping down trees. And with plenty of fangfish to keep them energized, they were very efficient.

One tree after another fell, and before long, they were able to piece together a small cabin.

They were already about as strong as a martial arts expert from the mortal world who had been training his fleshly body for a decade or more.

Around this time, night fell.

Unlike the gradual transition that would normally occur when the sun set, this involved a sudden change. One moment it was light, the next moment, it was dark. In fact, it was so dark that it was impossible for them to see their hands even when holding them right in front of their noses.

Everyone suddenly felt as lonely as if they had been cast into an incomparably deep abyss. Yang Qi prepared to draw on the God Legion Seal to provide some light, but Brahma quickly reached out and stopped him. “Are you trying to get us killed?!” he said. “You definitely can’t do that. What are we supposed to do if the light of the God Legion Seal attracts some powerful godlings? Everyone, get in the cabin, and stay inside!”

Groping in the dark, they managed to get inside the wooden cabin. To people like this, there was virtually no difference between day and night in the immortal worlds. They could even sweep entire worlds with their thoughts. But here in the god world, they weren’t even able to use their divine sense.

“Night here in the god world is completely freakish,” Sword Seventeen said. “No stars and no moon? You can’t even see your hand in front of your face. I feel like I'm an ordinary person again, and I can't say I like the feeling. I definitely need to reach godly ascension as soon as possible. At the very least, I need to be able to fly. Hey, why don’t we start a fire?”

“Yeah, how do we do that?” Sectlord Will Manifestation asked.

Brahma shook his head. “Starting a fire won’t be easy. We’ll have to wait until we reach the peak Terrifying level. Then we can use our internal true flame to ignite wood. The only other option would be to find an inhabited area where we can get some man-made flame sparks. Other than those two methods, starting a fire is impossible.”

“I need to work on my cultivation a bit more,” Yang Qi said calmly. “Once I understand more profundities of the God Legion Seal and the god world, I should be able to send my true energy outside my body, and hopefully reach the peak Terrifying level. We’ve only been here a day, and I’ve already gained quite a bit of enlightenment.”

Aaaaoooooo!

All of a sudden they heard what sounded like the cry of a wolf.

“So, there are some animals out there,” Brahma said. "At night, we’re basically blind, but the animals aren’t. I wonder if this little cabin can keep us safe.”

Everyone shivered in fear at his words.

Chapter 1144: Night in the God World

Night in the god world was absolutely pitch black, without any moon or stars.

The howling of the wind made it seem like terrifying creatures might leap out from the night at any moment to grab them. Thankfully, they had shelter, which made them feel a bit safer.

The cabin was quite secure. Brahma had instructed them how to plant the logs deep into the ground to provide maximum defense against any wild animals.

Many people present were grandmasters when it came to spell formations, but at the moment, this structure was the only thing they had to keep them safe. They were now ordinary people who couldn’t even use their true energy externally. Because of that, they couldn’t carve or craft magical devices, or use the vital energy of the god world to unleash divine abilities, much less create and operate spell formations.

“We’ll need to be able to unleash godpower before we can use spell formations,” Brahma reminded them. “Right now, we’re like Energy Arts practitioners in the mortal world. For the time being, we need to focus on training and cultivation. Normally speaking, only people who are on the verge of godly ascension can work with spell formations. We call people like that Quasi-Gods. They’re a step above the average citizen of the god world.”

“Yang Qi,” Doom said, “how far are you from reaching the peak Terrifying level? From the way you were catching those fish earlier, it seems your cultivation base has already improved. You must be close to a breakthrough.”

Yang Qi cast his senses inside and found that his blood vessels and muscles were transforming, becoming more in line with the magical laws of the god world.

“I think I am,” Yang Qi replied. “I'm already starting to understand the god world a lot more, and godhood is forming within me. It won’t be long before I should be able to reach godly ascension without any problems. Thanks to my God Legion Seal, I can absorb the magical laws around me, and understand their ultimate meaning. With that, I can slowly form a god body and gain the constitution of the legion of gods.”

Of course, he was also thinking about how strong Proud Heaven was. If it was so difficult to survive in the god world, how had Proud Heaven returned from the place? What good fortune had he come across?

If Yang Qi wanted to return, he wouldn’t even know where to start.

Crash. Crunch.

All of a sudden, noise broke the stillness of the night; it sounded as though some creature was making its way through the forest at the edge of the beach.

Snap!

The animal stopped outside of their wooden cabin and struck the barrier with claws of some sort, as if it wanted to break in. Everyone jumped in shock, and were about to rush out to start fighting when Brahma reminded them, “It's very dangerous at nighttime. You can’t see a thing, which means you're an easy target for the wild creatures. Don't worry, it can’t get inside. Just wait it out.”

There were more scratching sounds  and everyone inched closer together, ready to start fighting if the creature somehow broke inside. Some nibbling sounds could be heard, then silence returned as the creature apparently gave up on trying to get inside.

Everyone breathed sighs of relief.

All of a sudden, Yang Zhan yawned and laid down on the ground as if to sleep. “It's so strange,” he said. “Even before I was a Master of Energy, I gave up sleeping. Now here I am, a mid Terrifying expert, and I'm about to fall asleep?”

“If you’re tired, sleep,” Brahma said. “Restore your energy. That’s another reason I suggested building this structure. When you’re a god, you can do without sleep. But before then, you need to get your rest.”

Hearing that, Yang Zhan laid his head over and was snoring a moment later.

By this point, everyone except Yang Qi was feeling tired. After all, he had the God Legion Seal.

“You all sleep,” he said, “I’ll stand watch. I don’t need rest. Hopefully, by the time I gain enlightenment of how the God Legion Seal and the god world interact, you’ll all be able to use your divine abilities.”

Everyone nodded, although no one could see that. Laying in various positions, they all drifted to sleep.

Yang Qi kept his ear cocked for any noises on the outside, and at the same time focused on his breathing exercises. The true energy in him flowed constantly, getting stronger as he worked. The God Legion Seal also seemed to be breathing, and whenever he circulated his true energy, the seal would absorb some of the magical laws of the god world, using them to turn his true energy into godpower, and by extension, help build his god body.

Brahma had not yet fallen asleep. “Yang Qi, once you reach the peak Terrifying level, you’ll be able to send godpower out of your body and use divine abilities. That will be very helpful. I'm getting the sense that this isn’t actually an island, but rather a continent.”

“You know a lot about the god world. Do you have any idea where we are?” Yang Qi asked.

“The god world is huge,” Brahma replied. “So big that not even the Sovereign Lord knew every square inch of it. So how could I possibly know where we are? That said, I'm fairly certain that this continent is controlled by pirates. If we run into them, we could be in big trouble.”

“Pirates?” Yang Qi said, unable to hold back from laughing at the idea of pirates in the god world.

“Yes, pirates. They’re extremely vicious characters who aren’t exactly commoners, but at the same time, can’t reach godly ascension. They’re very strong, second only to the actual gods. In fact, some are Quasi-Gods. So without being able to use divine abilities, we’re definitely not in the position to fight them.” Brahma sighed. “Ai, we really need to reach godly ascension....”

Snap!

All of a sudden, they heard a shriek out in the darkness, then a crashing sound. The cabin around them shuddered, and they heard what sounded like wood shattering.

Skin crawling, Yang Qi jumped to his feet.

For some reason, he was certain that there was now a hole in the wooden wall of the cabin, and although he couldn't see anything, he was sure that there was a very peculiar hand reaching inside, trying to grab one of his companions.

Cocking his head and listening very carefully, he then launched a palm strike. It was pure martial arts, backed by the power of his fleshly body, and it was aimed squarely at that strange hand.

A yelp rang out as he made contact with a furry paw and sharp claws. His arm stung from the impact, but at the same time, he heard the crack of a breaking bone. Then the owner of the hand scampered off into the night.

“What was that?” Yang Qi asked, his heart pounding with fear. “It broke into our cabin? This is god world wood that we could only break with the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth!”

“Based on the sound of its breathing, I’d say it was a ghost-face monkey. They’re even worse than the fangfish. We definitely need to be careful, as they’re so strong that only peak Terrifying experts can deal with them. That said, once it’s day again, we won’t need to worry.” Sighing, Brahma lay down and went to sleep.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi remained awake the entire night.

Eventually, the night passed and day came. There was no dawn, it simply went from darkness to light, almost instantly.

‘It’s day finally. What a rough night....’ That was what everyone was thinking. Making their way out of their shack, they saw bits of fur and blood in various places. Obviously, if they had been out in the open during the night, the consequences would have been too horrible to contemplate.

“Everyone get to work chopping more wood,” Brahma said. “We need to strengthen our cabin and accomplish whatever else we can during the daytime. Everyone take one of the fish Yang Qi caught yesterday and eat up.”

For breakfast, they ate raw fish. It took a few fish to get full, whereupon they set to work. They still didn't have any tools, so they were forced to use the raw power of their hands and feet to chop wood.

Yang Qi and Brahma did the majority of the work. Some of the trees were so enormous that not even Yang Qi could chop them down with his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. At most, he could leave some scratch marks on them.

But as he continued to work, and his true energy flowed faster and faster, his arm eventually glowed with golden light. At that point, he was able to chop down some of the larger trees.

Thus, the day passed, ending with their cabin much stronger than the day before. They used vines to tighten everything down, and thanks to the harrowing events of the night before, they worked hard to have three layers of wood on each wall.

Night fell, and this time they rested a bit more easily in the cabin.

Eventually, the nocturnal animals came out. Quite a few nosed around the cabin, and some even tried to break in, but they all failed.

More time passed.

They had now been in the god world for three days. Their days were spent chopping wood, catching fish, and working on their cabin. Their nights were spent sleeping.

Brahma also spent time helping them get used to the magical laws. Slowly but surely, everyone was converting their true energy into godpower, which helped them advance their energy arts and improve their psychic scales. Unfortunately, all of them were still far from the peak Terrifying level. But at least they were all coming to be like martial arts experts from the mortal world.

By now, it wasn’t very difficult to chop down trees and catch fish.

Their cabin grew larger, and on the third day, Yang Qi managed to kill a rather large python.

It was as thick as an arm and fully nine meters long, and had launched itself like an arrow at the Shepherd. Thankfully, Yang Qi was faster, intercepting it and bashing its head in with a palm.

Brahma recognized the beast as a black weedmountain python, which was so venomous that it could kill anyone under the level of a god.

Chapter 1145: Rain in the God World

Everyone was surprised that a snake could be so strong, and wondered what would happen if something like it escaped into the mortal world.

Using his hand like a blade, Yang Qi skinned the snake and pulled out its gallbladder. Instead of being soft, as might be expected, it was as hard as a diamond. It was virtual godhood, except completely different from the type they were used to in that it was corporeal.

Considering they had been in the god world for a few days now, they were all in the process of converting their true energy into godpower, and all of them had virtual godhood.

“Virtual godhood will be very useful in increasing our psychic scale,” Brahma said. “We can boil that gallbladder into a soup to eat.”

“Boil it into a soup?” Jadefall said. “We can't make fire, so how are we supposed to boil it?”

At the moment, the purrling rested in her arms asleep, seemingly unconcerned by any of the dangers around them.

“If I'm not mistaken, it's going to start raining soon. And when the lightning hits the trees in the forest, it will start fires.”

Apparently, Brahma was very familiar with how the weather worked in the god world.

RUMBLE!

In fact, even as the words left his mouth, they heard the rumble of thunder, and then a great bolt of lightning fell, smashing into the nearby forest with resounding force.

Almost immediately, they could see scorching hot flames rising up from the point of impact.

“Hurry, the storm is coming!” Brahma said. “Go get some of that fire! Let’s hope that our cabin can stand up to the rain. The storms that come off the ocean can be incredible!”

In the past few days, they had set about reinforcing the cabin with rocks, making it even sturdier against the animals. However, Brahma had only continued to ask them to strengthen the place, which before had seemed odd, but now made perfect sense. Considering that everyone here was so familiar with spell formations, it was a given that they would build the structure according to a set plan, and that it was well thought out. As of now, it looked much more civilized than it had when it was just sticks and logs.

Looking up into the sky, Yang Qi saw more lightning falling, and at the same time, could see powerful vital energy fluctuations from the incoming storm. There were also black clouds gathering, filling him with a sense of foreboding.

“Everyone get inside, I’ll go get the fire.”

He leaped into the forest, flying from tree to tree almost like an ape until he reached a spot where the fire was burning. Based on the intensity of the flame, Yang Qi could tell that this fire was vastly more destructive than anything from the immortal worlds.

Grabbing a rather oily fallen branch, he stuck it into the fire, resulting in hissing and popping sounds as it ignited. Then he hurried back to the cabin.

Even as Yang Qi entered the cabin, more crashing sounds could be heard as the rain began falling in earnest outside.

“Good, you’re back,” Brahma said, breathing a sigh of relief. “Hopefully the rain passes soon. Otherwise, we might be in trouble.”

The crash of rain was so loud that it sounded like top experts were unleashing torrents of sword energy onto their cabin. In fact, it seemed like the rain might break through the ceiling and walls.

“Ah, this is nothing,” Sword Seventeen said. “It’s just rain, right? What's there to be afraid of? In the mortal world, I used to look for the biggest storms possible to practice my sword techniques in. In fact, maybe I should go outside and do some practicing right now. The natural power of the god world should be great for improving my sword techniques.”

With that, he walked toward the door.

“Hold on!” Yang Qi said, blocking his path. It was just then that a raindrop happened to work its way through the roof and drop onto Yang Qi’s hand. Hissing sounds rang out as his skin started to dissolve!

It was so painful that Yang Qi let out a yelp.

“The rain is that corrosive!?”

He quickly drew on the power of the God Legion Seal, sending golden light out to repair the melted skin.

Meanwhile, Sword Seventeen was staring at him with his jaw hanging open, shivering at the thought that he had just been about to step out into the rain.

“Rainfall in the god world is nothing short of catastrophic,” Brahma explained. “If you’re born here, and your genes are connected to the essence of the god world, it won’t hurt you. But we just came here from the mortal world and are still tainted with its essence. This rain would be very damaging to us, and would probably kill us.”

“How come the ocean water didn't hurt us?” Yang Qi asked.

“Rain’s rain,” Brahma replied, “and ocean water is ocean water. The rain sits up in the sky, brewing, filling with the preheaven power of the gods. When that power falls to the earth, it becomes ordinary godwater. But the preheaven version needs to be avoided. Eventually, perhaps in ten or fifteen days, we’ll have refined enough of the mortal aura within us that the rainwater won’t cause major problems. At that point, we might get sick if we ended up soaked, but little more. In any case, the deadly nature of the rain makes it dangerous for anyone who hasn’t reached godly ascension. For weak people like that, the only hope is to become believers in some god and enter the protection of their god kingdom.

“Let's build the fire up. It’ll keep the cold away, and believe me, the chill in this rain would be harmful if it seeps into you.”

They had a lot of wood in the cabin, so they dug a pit and built up a roaring fire that drove away any cold. Soon, they all felt warm and cozy, and their true energy flowed even better than before.

By this point, they were all convinced of the extraordinary nature of the god world fire. At a certain point, Jadefall produced a stone pot they had hewn out, which they used to boil the snake gallbladder into a fragrant soup that soon had their stomachs grumbling.

Right now most of them were wearing the hides of various animals that Yang Qi had killed over the past few days. Their previous clothes had quickly disintegrated, and their god items were gone. The only items they had left were Yang Qi’s fragments of the Cruiser of Civilization. And in terms of disintegrated clothing, the only exception was Yang Qi, who, thanks to his God Legion Seal, could wear his God Legion Battle Robe.

Everyone else present had been used to wearing clothing made from true energy, but as commoners here in the god world, they would be naked if they didn’t wear beast hides.

For all intents and purposes, they were like savages now.

As the rain crashed and the storm raged outside, their cabin shuddered and creaked, making them worry that it might collapse at any moment.

In fact, they all regretted that they hadn’t worked harder in the previous days to make the structure even stronger.

RUMBLE!

As everyone scrambled to keep the cabin from collapsing, they suddenly heard a loud rumbling sound that sounded like something slamming into the shore.

However, they were too focused on keeping their cabin standing to worry about it.

Drip. Drop.

Soon, rainwater was making it through the roof, dropping into the interior of the cabin, forcing everyone to dance this way and that to avoid it. Unfortunately, the leaks got worse and worse, until water was falling everywhere.

Purr. Purr....

A drop landed on the purling, causing it to shiver and let out two angry purrs. A bubble popped into being around everyone. At the same time, Yang Qi used his God Legion Seal to heal them of any injuries they had sustained from the rain hitting them.

They were safe.

The rain continued without cease until, eventually, their cabin collapsed.

Everyone in the group marveled, fully aware that if it weren’t for the purrling, they would have been severely injured, or possibly even killed. Thankfully, not a single drop of rain could get through the purrling’s bubble.

The screaming winds raged around them, combining with the falling water to create a scene of chaos that was almost nothing but a blur. There were even occasions when the wind lifted up pieces of wood or rock, which would slam into the exterior of the bubble before flying away.

“Incredible,” Brahma said, looking at the purrling. “How can this godling have energy arts like this? It's a miracle! What is it? I’ve seen a lot of things in life, but I’ve never seen anything like it!”

Yang Qi wasn’t as surprised. Further, although he knew the purrling was amazing, the downside was that it wasn’t possible to control it. Sometimes it used its amazing powers, and other times it didn't.

Hour after hour passed. Eventually, the rain stopped and the sky cleared. At that point, the bubble vanished.

Landing on solid ground, everyone looked around. Although the sky was now bright and clear, the beach looked like a disaster zone.

“Hey, what’s that?” Jadefall said pointing up the beach. Everyone looked over and saw a ship that had apparently run aground into the offshore reef. Scattered corpses could be seen here and there around it, with a few living beings trying to crawl up onto the beach.

Chapter 1146: Pirate Ship

An enormous ship had run aground.

The storm had clearly blown it across the sea until it smashed into the offshore reef, killing quite a few people on board. That said, there were survivors who were now struggling to make it ashore.

It was a very impressive-looking ship.

Instead of being made from wood, it was made from incredibly tough bleached bones. Despite having struck the reef, it was merely stuck in the shallows. The actual structure of the ship was mostly undamaged and would need only minimal repairs to make it seaworthy.

As for the survivors, they were all fierce-looking individuals with sabers in hand.

Even as they cried for help, they emanated wretched, fiendish auras.

“They’re pirates!” said Brahma. “Pirates of the god world! They murder for profit, sailing the high seas to sack merchant ships and only coming ashore to capture slaves that they sell to the wretch-god kingdoms. Don’t let them see us! If they have a peak Terrifying expert, we're finished. The captain of that ship can definitely use true energy externally, and probably glide through the air. We obviously can’t fight a person like that. Furthermore, that ship is clearly made from seawyrm devil-bones. Seawyrms are like floodwyrms, except larger and more dangerous. When the gods kill them, they sell their bones for exorbitant prices for use in ship-building. The result is a ship that can terrify all kinds of godlings with its attack power. And the way it can split the water as it moves makes it incredibly fast. Let’s just slowly back away before they notice us.”

During the past few days, they had all developed a cautious nature. Considering they had just arrived in the god world, they wanted to avoid contact with any of the locals, especially the dangerous pirates. The last thing they wanted was to be enslaved and sold to some wretch-god.

There were all kinds of wretch-gods in the god world, and they were all extremely vicious and evil. They loved capturing ordinary citizens and draining them of power. To them, even mid Terrifying experts were nothing more than objects to be sacrificed.

“Wait a moment,” Yang Qi said, “they’ve already spotted us. Get ready to fight....”

Just as he had said, some of the pirates had made it to shore already and were heading in their direction, sabers at the ready.

They were speaking in Godtongue, the common language of the god world.

Of course, Yang Qi and his companions could all understand the language, and thus knew exactly what the pirates were saying.

“Look, some savages!”

“Drifters, right up ahead on the beach. It’s hard to say who exactly they are, but it doesn’t matter. Let’s capture them. The ship is only slightly damaged, and with a bit of work it’ll be as good as new. If we enslave these savages, we can make a nice profit selling them to a wretch-god somewhere.”

“There are more than a dozen of them, including a couple women. I haven’t enjoyed myself in a long time....”

The pirates were dressed in tough, serviceable clothing, and the sharp, glittering sabers in their hands were clearly remarkable god items.

Of course, god items sometimes made their way to the mortal world. However, such items were like gourmet delicacies dropped into a cesspool. They didn’t compare at all to their original nature and function.

Because of that, the god items that the group had brought with them had all been ground into powder during their journey through the space-time passageway. If the group had possessed tools or weapons, it would have been a lot easier to fell trees, but instead they had been forced to use their hands.

The approaching pirates were all extremely fit and muscular. Obviously, they had either been in the god world for a long time, or were natives. Their bulging muscles looked like rocks, and their pulsing godpower caused their garments to flap around them as they moved.

That said, Yang Qi could tell that they were all in the mid Terrifying level, with psychic scales around three or four hundred. They were like the old-timers from the Executors of the Ancient Road and were obviously not in a position to compare to Yang Qi.

“We’re going to have to fight,” Yang Qi said. “Be careful!”

Taking the lead, he rushed out toward the pirates. This was going to be his first fight in the god world, and he had no idea exactly what it would be like.

Swish!

The nearest pirate to him had a face full of scars. As Yang Qi neared, he slashed out with his glittering saber, using a very profound saber technique: the initial angle of attack made it seem like it was intended to hack him in two from top to bottom. But the truth was that the move was a feint! At the last minute, a second saber slashed out from behind the pirate's back, heading directly toward Yang Qi’s waist to lop him in half!

He had been hiding a second saber behind his back all along!

But was Yang Qi the kind of person who would fall for a trick like that? He had battle experience that stemmed from the God Legion Seal, making him the master of every type of fighting trick there was. In terms of fighting theory, no one could match him.

He twisted with blinding speed, his hand shooting into the saber light and right through the opening the man had left.

Planting one foot, he leaped forward like a snake slipping into a mountain crevice, his hand slicing through the pirate’s clothing and instantly stabbing into his chest.

“Aaaiiiieee!” the pirate screamed, his energy instantly draining out of him. Then he toppled backward and flopped onto the ground, a gaping hole in his chest. Meanwhile, Yang Qi stood over him, two sabers in his hands.

They were long and razor-sharp, with complex designs on the blades. Obviously, those designs were spell formations, but unfortunately, Yang Qi could tell that he wouldn’t be able to activate such things until he was in the Peak Terrifying level. That said, the sharpness of the blades would be more than enough to kill someone.

With that, he lunged into the pirates like a tiger among a flock of sheep. Saber light flashed as he attacked, using the saber to take advantage of the weaknesses of every opponent he faced.

He was far stronger than any of these pirates, being just on the verge of the peak Terrifying level. His only disadvantage was that he wasn’t used to the magical laws of the god world and couldn't release his true energy outside his body.

The average citizens in the god world were in the mid Terrifying level, which meant they couldn't even fly, and were as easy to slaughter as the commoners in the mortal world. Even wild beasts could devour them. In fact, Brahma had recently explained that they were generally referred to as Plebeians.

People who were even a bit higher, for example on the cusp of the peak Terrifying level, could dominate their fellows, and would be strong enough to enslave them. Brahma called people like that the Despots.

Yet even people like that were minor figures.

After all, they were like nothing compared to the true peak Terrifying experts. People such as that, who could release godpower outside of their bodies, were called Quasi-Gods.

And after them were the actual gods with godhood. Lesser Gods were the kind of people who could found their own kingdoms within the god world and would have forces of followers consisting of Plebeians, Despots, and Quasi-Gods.

Gods were the truly powerful entities in the god world.

These pirates were all Despots, and as for Yang Qi and his companions, considering their experiences so far, they could also be considered Despots. Thus, the close-quarter fighting raged.

Bam. Bam. Bam. Bam!

The pirates were immediately shoved back across the battlefield, with several of them falling in death. Yang Qi and his people were the cream of the crop from the mortal world, most of whom had millions upon millions of years of fighting experience. Although they were restrained by the essence of the god world, that didn’t do anything to their experience. In fact, when it came to fighting, they definitely had experienced much more in their lives than these pirates.

Compared to them, the pirates were like children playing a game.

After all, the average lifespan for ordinary people in the god world was a mere hundred years.

And although Despots could hope to live past two hundred, it was rare for any to reach a thousand years of age. It was only the gods who could be considered deathless. Could someone who only had a few dozen years of fighting experience really match up to someone who had been a warrior for hundreds of millions of years?

And that wasn’t to mention the fact that, thanks to the experience granted him by the God Legion Seal, Yang Qi surpassed everyone else by far.

SWISH!

The Shepherd was using martial arts from hell, unleashing spectacular moves as he twisted and turned across the beach. His hands blurred as he disarmed two pirates and turned their sabers on them, causing two streaks of light to pass through the necks of both opponents. The pirates flopped onto the sand.

“Blood from god world savages!” he shouted, delighted. Unfortunately, his godpower could only flow within his own body, and he couldn’t use it to unleash the devil arts necessary to absorb the blood.

“Ah, what a pity. Nothing like that blood could possibly exist in the mortal world. If I could absorb it, I would definitely advance by leaps and bounds. Oh well, after they’re all dead, I’ll see if I have anything that will work.”

As he continued fighting, the saber in his hand almost seemed to possess its own spirit. Any martial arts expert from the mortal world would have been completely flabbergasted at his display of skill.

Meanwhile, Sword Seventeen was laughing heartily. “These god world pirates are trash! They have almost no experience fighting! They might be as strong as us, but they’re like flowers in a greenhouse! They’re completely useless in a fight; I alone could cut down ten of them without any effort at all.”

Brahma nodded and thought, ‘These people are nothing to look down on. They rose to the top in the brutality of the mortal world, tempering their willpower and perseverance to the limit. Sooner or later, they’re going to be important people here.’

As Yang Qi slaughtered the pirates on the shore and took their weapons, there were people watching from aboard the ship.

“This is bad. Look, how could those savages’ martial arts be so advanced?” One of the pirates hurried into the main cabin. “Captain, there are some savages outside with incredible martial arts. They’re slaughtering the crew!”

“How dare they kill my men! I need to see what this is all about!”

The captain appeared, clad in a flowing cape, his eyes as sharp as razors. From the immense godpower swirling around him, it was obvious he was a peak Terrifying expert.

Chapter 1147: Peak Terrifying Expert

The pirate captain’s cape flapped in the ocean breeze as he looked down at his men being slaughtered. From the way his eyes flickered, he definitely viewed himself as an important general whose subordinates were little more than dirt beneath his feet.

After all, he was a peak Terrifying expert.

He could control the true energy of the god world outside of his body, making him a Quasi-God.

In the god world, the full measure of rankings went from the Plebeians, Despots, and Quasi-Gods, to the actual gods, the Lesser, Common, Greater, Consummate, Perfect, and Paramount Gods.

The Lesser Gods were all peak Terrifying experts, and as for this pirate captain, all he had to do was completely form his godhood, and he would reach godly ascension; then he would be able to call the wind and summon the rain.

“Where did these savages come from?” he asked.

“We don’t know,” one of his pirate subordinates said. “They showed up as soon as our men reached the beach. It seems they’ve been living here for some time. We were thinking of selling them to a wretch-god, but then they started slaughtering our men. They’re obviously very strong, with extremely impressive fleshly bodies. They’re not like the normal Plebeian savages. Plus, they obviously have extensive fighting experience.”

“Those are some incredible moves,” the captain murmured. He had been about to make a move when he realized that Yang Qi and his people were slaughtering the pirates with such incredible skill that they were obviously veterans of countless battles, people who had climbed mountains of corpses and swam through seas of blood to reach their current level of skill. The pirates were generally much more skilled fighters than the average person, but in this particular fight, they seemed like children play fighting.

“Captain!” one of the pirates exclaimed, “how could these people have such abundant experience in battle? It almost looks like they’re playing with the crew down there. None of them are even hurt! All of us are good fighters, but we can’t compare to them at all!”

“They seem as experienced as gods!”

“Don’t tell me....”

“There’s only one possibility. They're as strong as us, but have vastly more fighting experience. That means they must have ascended from the lower worlds.”

The captain listened to the discussion between his men, and his eyes grew even more piercing. Then his expression changed, becoming somewhat delighted as he threw his head back and laughed heartily. “You’re right. Thanks for reminding me. With fighting experience like that, these people can only be from the lower worlds. People like that are considered treasures here in the god world. We could sell them at a huge profit! In fact, people from the lower worlds haven’t been seen here for years. In the past, Ascendants always fetched astronomical prices, and we just happened to run into an entire group of them.”

The other pirates on deck roared with laughter.

From the way they were acting, it was as if they had just run into a mountain of gold and silver.

It was just as the captain had said; people from the lower worlds were considered very valuable. In fact, in the past, there had been certain powerful entities who rose to the god world and became very important.

SNICK!

Yang Qi stamped his foot on the ground, causing a few dozen dropped sabers to fly up into the air and into the chests of a dozen or so nearby pirates, dropping them dead.

Of the hundred or so pirates who had charged them, all were now corpses.

At that point, a round of cheering rose up from the deck of the pirate ship. Initially, Yang Qi was confused. Why would the other pirates be cheering after they had killed so many of their fellows? Were they addled from being caught outside in the recent storm?

Before anything else could happen, Brahma suddenly blurted in a fearful voice, “This is bad! There’s a peak Terrifying expert there! The pirate captain! They must be cheering because they realize we're from the mortal world. Didn’t I tell you how valuable people from the mortal world are? Only the top figures from the mortal world can come to the god world, and they’re always extraordinary people who have the potential to become very important. Some gods like to get their hands on people like that to study them and strip them of their destiny. They even turn them into puppets or out-of-body incarnations, and sometimes even absorb their experiences directly from their minds.”

“So you're saying we’re all considered invaluable?” Jadefall asked.

“That’s right,” Brahma said, smiling bitterly. “They’re cheering because we're worth a lot of money. Even those hundred dead pirates are like nothing compared to us. They’re going to capture us and sell us to wretch-gods, or perhaps one of the noble clans. With the money they’ll make, they can stop being pirates and probably even reach godly ascension. The pirate captain is coming, we have to run! He's a peak Terrifying expert, you can tell from how he's gliding off the ship!”

A caped figure shot off of the grounded ship, flitting like an enormous seagull to land on the beach. He was followed by a host of other pirates.

In the mortal world, people in the seventh phase of Energy Arts could fly, but things were different here in the god world. To even be able to glide, one had to be a Quasi-God with virtual godhood. And such people couldn’t possibly compare to the actual gods.

Before rising to the god world, Yang Qi had never seen someone with a psychic scale like this man, not even Proud Heaven. After all, Proud Heaven had been in the mid Terrifying level, not the peak.

The pirate captain landed on the sand and looked Yang Qi and his companions up and down. Thanks to the immense energy field surrounding him, all of them were locked in place and couldn’t move.

That was how strong peak Terrifying experts were.

“You people ascended from the mortal world, didn’t you?” he asked, speaking ordinary Godtongue. “It’s been a long time since anyone like you has shown up. I almost can’t believe I’ve run into such a large group of you.”

“What do you mean?” Sectlord Will Manifestation said. “I don’t follow. We're god world natives, not people from the mortal world. You’re mistaken.”

It was obvious that they weren’t going to just admit to being from the mortal world. They knew how valuable they were, and wouldn’t just hand themselves over to certainly horrific consequences.

The pirate captain snorted coldly. “Refusing to admit it won’t change anything. We’ll just take you captive and have you assessed. Then we’ll find out whether you're god world natives or people ascended from the mortal world. Don’t worry, we won’t kill you. Just cooperate and surrender. Why would we ever hurt anything as valuable as you? Of course, if you fight back, we’ll make you suffer.”

“We said we’re not from the mortal world,” Sword Seventeen said. “Why go through all this trouble?”

“Fine. If you refuse to do things the easy way, we’ll do them the hard way!” The pirate waved his hand, sending a stream of empyrean godpower out of his sleeve, which swirled like a vicious dragon right toward Sword Seventeen.

“Not good!” Sword Seventeen blurted. He knew he couldn’t fight someone at the captain’s level, yet his fighting instincts were so sharply honed that he immediately twirled in midair, using his sword technique to throw out the saber he had acquired. In the blink of an eye, he unleashed over a hundred moves, all of them exquisitely executed. Targeting the weakest aspects of the energy being sent in his direction, he slashed an opening for himself and fell back across the sand.

A moment later, the dragon-like stream of energy slammed into the beach, leaving a gaping crater behind.

“Well done,” the pirate captain said. “And you’re still trying to convince me you’re not from the mortal world? My Divine Snake Lance is a top energy art even among Lesser Gods. The fact that you, a mid Terrifying cultivator, could dodge it, just shows how skilled you are. You have a lot of enlightenment of the fundamental nature of heaven and earth, of vital energy, and of magical laws. Only someone who’s lived for millions of years could do something like that. And in the god world, people who aren’t gods simply can’t even dream of living for millions of years.”

Sword Seventeen had just used a technique that took advantage of his enlightenment of magical laws and vital energy. It allowed him to use one sword technique to destroy a myriad of laws, and had taken many years to master in the lower worlds.

There was no way someone with a lifespan of a few hundred years could possibly match that.

The difference between him and the god world natives was like the difference between the sky and the land.

“What exactly do you want, Sire?” Yang Qi said. He was well aware that it wouldn’t be possible to remain incognito forever in the god world. And it didn’t seem possible to pull the wool over the eyes of the pirates. Respectfully clasping his hands, he said, “Since you realize that we’ve only just risen to the god world, and are certain to become important people, then why not get on our good side by letting us go? We could definitely make it worth your while in the future.”

“What did you just say?” the pirate captain said, hardly able to believe his ears.

“I said you should let us go, Sire. It would be to your benefit. One day, when we become Paramount Gods, we’ll owe you a favor.”

The pirate captain started laughing so hard he nearly had a paroxysm. “Ignorant fool....”

Swish!

Even as he laughed, a stream of saber light shot toward him as fast as lightning. It was a saber Yang Qi had picked up from one of the pirates, backed by the power of the Mammoth King’s God Whip.

Yang Qi was the strongest of them all, with power that was equivalent to the peak Terrifying level. Although he couldn’t achieve his breakthrough right now, it would happen eventually. And despite not being able to use his true energy externally, he could imbue it into other items and propel them with force capable of smashing god formations.

In a flash, the saber was right in front of the pirate captain’s head.

Chapter 1148: Breakthrough

Yang Qi had just been distracting the pirate captain with his words, looking for the right moment to launch an unexpected attack. He knew that the captain was stronger than him and could use his true energy externally, which meant he was very dangerous.

He was so ferocious that he could kill all the mid Terrifying experts in the mortal world without hardly trying.

But in the god world, he couldn’t be considered particularly impressive. And although Yang Qi might have been able to pull off some sort of escape, that wasn’t what he was interested in. Besides, if word spread that there were people from the mortal world in this area, they would never be able to rest peacefully. It would definitely lead to no end of trouble.

There was only one option here: slaughter the pirates down to the last man.

RUUUUUUUUMBLE!

Golden light shone brightly as the blade shot forth, making it seem almost as if true energy were being released externally from it. Yang Qi had focused his quintessence energy so masterfully in this attack that it seemed like he might be ready to experience a breakthrough.

‘How could this be happening?’ the pirate captain thought. ‘My defensive godpower can’t stop him? I'm in the peak Terrifying level! I can manipulate godpower! There’s no way a mid Terrifying cultivator can break my defenses!’

His disbelief was meaningless, the razor-sharp blade making it clear what the facts were.

The pirate captain scrambled backward, incapable of even launching a counter-attack.

“Too slow!” Yang Qi shouted. “You lack fighting experience!”

Without any hesitation, he pressed the attack, not holding back anything. He knew that he was fighting a peak Terrifying expert, a Quasi-God, and that the slightest mistake on his part would end with him being injured or worse.

Thankfully, the man was sadly lacking in fighting experience, otherwise Yang Qi would never have been a match for him.

Yang Qi unleashed a tempest of saber techniques, backed by the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, making them formidable enough to conquer every obstacle. As a result, the pirate captain was boxed in and incapable of evading the assault.

The shocked captain unleashed his godpower to defend himself, but it did no good. His vital energy shattered like a crystal vase, quickly dissipating into nothing.

“Mammoth King’s Flowing Decapitation!” Yang Qi howled, his saber flowing forth in a succession of deadly moves so powerful that the saber apparently couldn’t take the force and began to crack.

“Damn you!” the pirate blurted as he realized he couldn't dodge the attack. Instead, he raised his arm to defend himself. Then a thwacking sound could be heard as his arm was chopped off, causing him to tremble in pain.

However, even as the blood spurted out of the wound, he shouted. “Blood Lightning Energy Art!”

RIP!

His severed arm exploded, turning into blood-colored light that shattered Yang Qi’s crumbling saber, then transformed into an enormous crimson hand that rumbled on toward Yang Qi himself.

Of course, thanks to Yang Qi’s extensive fighting experience, he could anticipate all sorts of possibilities, including this one. Sadly, the magical laws of the god world had his godpower locked down, making it impossible to manipulate it outside his body.

The hand slammed into him, throwing him a full nine meters back across the sand. At the same time, blood-colored light stabbed into him, piercing his meridians and spreading out to restrain him.

Meanwhile, the pirate captain was howling in agony. Now that his arm was severed, he had lost it for good. In the god world, the bodies of gods weren’t like bodies in the mortal world, which could continue existing even after being ground into powder.

“I’ll never forgive you for this!” the captain shouted, backing up. Waving his remaining hand, he said, “Attack! All of you! Kill them!”

The other pirates, who had just now made it to the shore, nocked arrows to their bows and began firing them up the beach. Arrows immediately began buzzing like hornets that could tear their victims to shreds.

“Watch out!” Brahma shouted. Of course, veterans of countless battles like Yang Qi’s companions didn’t need such warnings and were already leaping for cover behind various rock outcroppings on the beach.

“Take this!” the frenzied captain shouted, waving his remaining arm and sending a fist-sized projectile of godpower and vital energy shooting out. It slammed into one of the rocks, causing a massive explosion that sent Yang Qi and his people flying to the side, stunned.

“Capture them!” the captain yelled. Obviously, he didn’t want to kill someone as valuable as Yang Qi, so he reached out, causing an enormous hand of true energy to wrap around Yang Qi.

Then he sent the godpower inside of him to take control of his body. Unfortunately, he instantly lost control of the godpower as something like a black hole sprang open inside Yang Qi and began ravenously devouring it.

The pirate captain only had the energy arts of a Lesser God, so how could he possibly match up to the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth? If he simply battered Yang Qi with deadly attacks, it would have quickly injured him. But instead he was trying to control him with true energy, only to have that energy taken from him.

That was the result of the God Legion Seal having all types of godpower built into it.

The pirate had unleashed a huge torrent of godpower, therefore, this development provoked an expression of complete shock. He quickly tried to retract his godpower, but it was too late for that. Yang Qi bounded forward, laid hands on him, and sent the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth surging into him.

“Aaaiiiieee!” screamed the captain. He had just been injured, then suddenly found his godpower being sucked away from him, leaving him completely flustered. He had a lot of experience fighting, but obviously couldn’t compare to experts from the mortal world who had survived innumerable deadly situations.

Because of that, he couldn’t possibly ward off Yang Qi’s attack, and could only unleash a bevy of energy arts, in the hopes of landing a blow.

Sadly, his godpower disappeared as surely as if it were entering the belly of a gobblewock.

Golden light shone off of Yang Qi as he absorbed the captain’s true energy. Yang Qi smiled viciously as he then burned that energy to purify himself and grow his own power.

He felt as if something inside him was just beginning to emerge and grow strong. His psychic power seemed to be converging, and there seemed to be magical and natural laws that were about to break.

RUMBLE!

The vital energy around him started collapsing, and bright golden light shot out of him, spreading for dozens of meters in every direction.

“What’s this?” the captain shrieked in alarm. However, before he could do anything else, the golden light overwhelmed him, causing green smoke to rise off of his skin for a moment before he simply vanished into nothing.

Yang Qi had immense potential built up within him. Just now, he had used the God Legion Seal on the pirate captain’s godpower, and had even thrown in the devouring capabilities of King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans. That sacrifice had pushed him past his previous limitations. He had broken into the peak Terrifying level!

His reserves were more formidable than an average peak Terrifying expert; now that he had broken through, there was no way that some trashy pirate captain could possibly be a match for him.

Thus, Yang Qi killed him in one move.

Whoosh. Whoosh. Whoosh.

More arrows filled the sky, but how could Yang Qi possibly care about things like that?

He was now a peak Terrifying expert, a Quasi-God who merely had to wave his hand and summon a golden shield to stop the flying arrows. Now that he could unleash his godpower outside of his body and use his divine abilities, he was able to reveal his true strength.

Furthermore, he could use all of the potential of the God Legion Seal.

The God Legion Seal was complete, and now that it was in the god world, Yang Qi could funnel godpower into it and finally break through the strange barriers that had existed within it back in the mortal world.

Thanks to Yang Qi’s transformation, the entire beach was bathed in golden light, and the sand beneath his feet seemed to be on the verge of melting.

“Net!” he said, and golden threads shot out to create an enormous net that spread out to fill the entire area. It descended on the pirates and they screamed miserably as they were firmly immobilized.

“Very good.”

Yang Qi flew up into the air, and a pair of holy wings sprouted from his back, allowing him to hover and survey the scene from above. Thanks to the endless amount of godpower available, using the God Legion Seal didn’t tire him out now. As long as the god world existed, so would he.

It was as if he had an endless amount of fuel that ensured he would never dry up.

Furthermore, his cultivation base could operate at speeds surpassing that of ordinary gods.

Now that he had broken through, Yang Qi knew that he could devastate any other Quasi-God. And now he realized why Proud Heaven had wanted so badly to have the complete God Legion Seal. It was virtually a cheat item here in the god world, making him invincible in terms of cultivation and fighting.

Now that the pirates were trapped in the net, Yang Qi’s companions emerged from cover and stared at him in delight.

“You broke through, Yang Qi?”

“I did. Truth be told, I could’ve broken through the moment we arrived in the god world. My battle with Proud Heaven unlocked all sorts of enlightenment of my Sage Monarch Grand Magic. I originally intended to wait, except... the pirate king’s peak Terrifying godpower burned open a hole that helped me understand one of the first magical laws of the god world.”

Brahma nodded. “Yes, the god world has many laws, and breaking through the first one will provide immense power. Unfortunately, my cultivation base still needs some work before I can become a Quasi-God. My past injuries were too severe. But now we have a good opportunity on our hands. Instead of spending time cultivating in the wilderness, we can take these pirates and their treasures. If we can figure out where their base is, we’ll have even more resources available for cultivation.”

Chapter 1149: Godnotes

Yang Qi easily destroyed the pirates that had been attacking him.

As for all of the other pirates who had been wrapped up in his net, his energy arts were so powerful that they all immediately lost consciousness.

As a peak Terrifying expert, Yang Qi was truly a fear-inspiring individual, with energy arts and godpower so advanced that he was hundreds, or even thousands of times stronger than experts of the same level.

The complete God Legion Seal truly bolstered his godpower and abilities. In fact, with the help of the God Legion Seal, any godly-class energy art could be used with deadly force.

The golden light of the seal danced back and forth on Yang Qi, remolding him in a way that would have been difficult if he were to rely only on the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth and the Sage Monarch Grand Magic.

“What do we do with the other pirates?”

“What do we do with them?” the Shepherd said. “Kill them all! They know that we come from the mortal world, and if they spread the word, we would be chased down relentlessly. In the god world, it's survival of the fittest. Besides, it's not as if these pirates are good people. No one will mourn them if they die, and they’ll be the perfect fuel for my Blood-Hell Soul-Refining Ability.”

“Fine,” Yang Qi said, nodding. “It would definitely be a disaster if people found out about us. And these pirates are murderers and villains, people who slaughter innocents without thinking. That said, Shepherd, you don’t need to continue cultivating that Blood-Hell Soul-Refining Ability. Things like that are insignificant. Without the God Legion Seal, you can't really cultivate the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, but you can definitely work with my Sage Monarch Grand Magic. In the days to come, it will definitely surpass the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.”

“He’s right,” Doom said. He had been cultivating the Sage Monarch Grand Magic, and knew how incredibly amazing it was. Even the small taste he had experienced was enough to earn Yang Qi his respect. “Yang Qi, it’s great that you've imbued your Sage Monarch Grand Magic with the power of the God Legion Seal. The results are astounding. However, you need to be careful, otherwise you’ll experience cultivation deviation.”

“That won’t happen,” Yang Qi said, “at least, not when I use the Unspoiled Body to keep it in check. In any case, we need to leave some of the pirates alive for questioning.”

Whoosh!

He reached out, and one of the pirates flew right into his grasp.

‘It feels great to reach the peak Terrifying level and finally be able to unleash my true energy again,’ he thought.

Meanwhile, the pirate regained consciousness, whereupon a look of dread filled his face. “Mercy! Spare me! Oh great Gods, spare my life! Don’t kill me!”

“Presumably you realize that we're from the lower worlds,” Yang Qi said. “I killed your captain, and now your life is in my hands. Got it? So tell me. Where are we? Explain in detail.”

“I’ll talk!” the pirate gushed. “Really, I’ll talk. We’re on the... the Lightningbolt Continent.”

“Lightningbolt Continent?” Brahma said. “How come I’ve never heard of it? Which ocean district is this?”

“We’re in the Blackmare Ocean.”

“Blackmare Ocean?” Brahma shook his head. “I've never heard of that either. The god world is just too big for me to know every little location. Not even the Sovereign Lord knew how large the god world is. It’s almost like it goes on and on without end. But I know the fundamental laws that govern it. Just ask me whatever you need to know, Yang Qi. You don’t need pirates like this. Just go ahead and kill him.”

“No, don’t kill me!” the pirate shrieked. “Don’t you have any sense of honor or justice? Wait, I forgot something. We have a bunch of loot in our ship. And slaves. And even some children of important people!”

“Oh?” Keeping a tight grip on the pirate, Yang Qi flew up onto the bone-crafted pirate ship, which was several kilometers from prow to stern. Once there, he waved his hand to create a bridge of golden light connecting it to the shore.

Everyone else hurried over the bridge to meet him.

Upon seeing this, the pirate’s eyes went wide with disbelief. “You can fly? You just broke through to the peak Terrifying level and you’re already more powerful than all the other experts? Not even Pirate King Deku could do that!”

Of course, the pirate had no idea that Yang Qi was using the God Legion Seal.

There were some other pirates on the listing deck of the ship. As soon as they saw Yang Qi fly up, they turned to flee, but he waved his finger and they fell down dead, including the one he had dragged up from the beach.

“Rise!” Yang Qi said. Waving his hand, he sent out an immense force that slowly pushed the stranded ship out toward deeper water.

A ship like this would be so incredibly heavy it would defy description. Not even their captain, the Pirate King Deku, had been able to do something like that.

Yang Qi walked into the cabin. It was large, but not large enough that it needed a spatial formation to establish the room. Creating formations in the god world required a lot of effort and resources, so they were generally considered luxuries.

The cabin was packed with goods, foodstuffs, clothing, ores, minerals, tools, and weapons, none of which were particularly eye-catching to Yang Qi. However, there were bags of rice that glowed with such luster that they seemed similar to god pills from the mortal world.

“That's just rice,” Brahma said. “There’s nothing particularly unusual about it. It’s too bad we can’t return to the Ancient Road to the Gods and give it to our people. With stuff like that, your brothers would be able to reach the mid Terrifying level in less than a thousand years.”

“Yes, I can tell that it can completely change one's constitution,” Yang Qi replied. “Unfortunately, the effects of rice like this are going to be limited. It can make you strong, but can’t make you a Quasi-God. Reaching that level will definitely take god pills. Let’s keep looking around and see if we can find any currency. I'm very curious to see what godnotes look like.”

Thanks to the information provided earlier by Brahma, Yang Qi knew that the main currency of the god world was the godnote.

“Look here,” Jadefall said after a moment, holding out a godsteel strongbox. Placing it down in front of her, she struck at the lock with a saber, snapping it off. After opening it, she revealed stacks upon stacks of what appeared to be paper talismans, all of them pulsing with godpower.

“Those are godnotes, alright,” Brahma said. “They look like ordinary banknotes from the mortal world. Millions upon millions of years ago, the boundless Sovereign Lord established the use of currency, and its use spread so far and wide that it became the standard way to pay for expensive items throughout the god world. The Sovereign Lord later died, but the godnote system remained. If I'm not mistaken, I’d say it’s because of the efforts of some of the Paramount God clans. You see, you can find the mark of a Paramount God on every note. Only those clans can mint currency like this.”

Yang Qi picked up one of the godnotes and examined it closely. It was three inches wide and seven inches long, conforming to the common ratio of seventy to thirty. It was possible to see a host of talismans swirling inside the note, and even more telling, it was so heavy that it obviously wasn’t made out of paper or fabric. Sending some true energy into it, Yang Qi immediately saw the image of several majestic figures in his sea of consciousness, all of whom had the aura of Paramount Gods.

Given that, it was obviously impossible to forge godnotes.

“How much is one godnote worth?” Yang Qi asked. “There must be dozens of notes in that box. Considering it was locked up, it must be worth a lot.”

Brahma chuckled. “Godnotes are very valuable. Even just one is enough to buy a lot of goods. You see, godnotes aren’t just useful as currency. If you tear them up with true energy, it will release the might of a Paramount God, which can be used to cow countless godlings. And that’s just one thing you can do. Suffice it to say, they’re very useful. Back in my day, one godnote would be enough to buy a god pill that could propel an ordinary citizen to the level of a Quasi-God.”

“Very valuable indeed,” Yang Qi said, nodding. “It looks like there are about twenty godnotes here. If we can find a city where they sell god pills, we should be able to improve all of your cultivation bases. We need to get you all into the Quasi-God level as quickly as possible.”

Eating wild beasts when stuck in the wilderness was fine. But they eventually needed to get to civilization.

“Yang Qi,” Jadefall said, “considering you have the God Legion Seal, can’t you copy or forge some godnotes? The seal is so powerful you’d think it could do that. It has the auras of Paramount Gods in it, as well as the spirit of loyalty they showed to the Sovereign Lord.”

“I was thinking the same thing,” Yang Qi said.

He extended his hand and a stream of true energy appeared, which then converged into something that looked like a godnote. However, on the inside, it was obviously a fake.

Letting it dissipate, Yang Qi shook his head.

“What’s wrong?!” Jadefall asked. “It didn’t work?”

“No. My cultivation base isn’t strong enough yet. The godnotes contain magical laws and many other things I need to study further. And what’s more, the aura of a Paramount God isn’t easy to replicate. Anyone would be able to tell its fake the moment they picked it up. But once my cultivation base advances a bit more, I should be able to create some good forgeries!”

He smiled confidently.

Of course, everyone sucked in breaths of astonishment. The idea of forging godnotes was completely heaven-defying. Wouldn’t it give them a huge advantage in the god world if they could do that?

“I get it,” Doom said. “Now I realize why Proud Heaven wanted the God Legion Seal. He would ultimately have been able to create godnotes.”

“That's one of the reasons,” Yang Qi said. “Sooner or later, the god world is going to be ours.”

Chapter 1150: Young Woman from a Major Clan

The most difficult part of forging godnotes was replicating the aura and will of a Paramount God.

But with the complete God Legion Seal, it wasn’t out of the realm of possibility for Yang Qi. And when the day came that he could create massive quantities of godnotes, who could possibly compete with him?

Furthermore, he would be able to create godnotes that surpassed the current versions. After all, these godnotes had the wills of ten or so Paramount Gods, all of whom were considered potentates in the god world. But the God Legion Seal contained the auras of over a hundred Paramount Gods.

Some of them had perished, and some had simply vanished.

But by adding their wills and auras into a godnote, it would create something of immense power and value. For now, though, Yang Qi didn’t need to do that. He just wanted to create godnotes that were identical to the ones currently in his possession.

Waving his hand, he sucked the over twenty godnotes into his sleeve. Then he found garments for everyone else to wear instead of beast hides. After all, having them dress like savages would only draw unwanted attention.

The new garments were all extremely tough and durable, although not quite on the level of being powerful magical treasures. Even the dirt in the god world would be considered a marvelous material in the lower worlds.

“Didn’t that pirate mention something about some prisoners?” Yang Qi asked. “Let’s go see what they were talking about. They must be down below.”

Searching around, they found a shadowy staircase leading to the decks below.

“I’ll go get some fire,” Sword Seventeen said.

“No need,” Yang Qi replied. Opening his hand, he summoned a burning fire that illuminated everything around them. The area belowdecks was actually a small prison, which contained over a hundred slaves locked behind bars.

Most of them wore clothing that had once been extravagant and luxurious, but was now worn down to threads.

All of them were unconscious.

Apparently, they had been knocked out when the ship ran aground. Some of them were mid Terrifying experts, in other words, Despots. Apparently, there weren’t any Quasi-Gods.

Looking around, Yang Qi noticed that the central cell contained a young woman who was sealed with a paper talisman. From the flows of power, it seemed she was a Quasi-God, except she was restrained with a powerful warding magic.

Waving his hand, Yang Qi summoned a host of energies from within the prison area and converged them into an attack that he launched at the paper talisman. With a crack, the talisman exploded and the young woman jerked awake. Eyes snapping open, she said, “Damn you Pirate King Deku! I'm going to rip all of you to—”

“She’s strong!” Doom said, exchanging awkward glances with the others.

“She's a Quasi-God,” Jadefall added, “just as strong as Pirate King Deku. How did he capture her?”

Seeing herself surrounded by Yang Qi and his companions, the young woman’s jaw dropped. “You people are here to rescue me?”

“That’s right,” Yang Qi said with a cool smile. “We killed the pirates, and have already released you. Miss, we had no idea you were such a top expert. How did someone as strong as you fall victim to these pirates?”

“Damned pirates!” she said, her eyes flashing with killing intent. “I was on a merchant ship heading out to sea when Pirate King Deku ambushed us, using the Dragon-Sealing God Talisman to capture me. My clan’s vessels gave chase, but in the middle of it, a typhoon hit and led to the current situation. Many thanks to you, my saviors. Who exactly are you? You have my immense gratitude. Now please awaken my subordinates so that we can send out a call for help to my clan.”

“We’re just some wanderers,” Brahma said. Having lived in the god world in the past, he knew the conventions of speech, and at the same time, was careful to avoid providing any hints that they had ascended from the lower worlds. “Please forgive us for any offense, Your Ladyship, but nomads like us don’t need any reward for rescuing you. It wasn’t anything special.”

“Regardless, I owe you my thanks.” Smiling, she waved her hand in the direction of the other cells, causing a fragrant aroma to sweep over her subordinates that immediately woke them up. The energy art she used seemed familiar to Yang Qi. He could tell that it was a godly-class art, and that it originated with one of the ancient gods of medicine. Obviously, she had cultivated it by means of all sorts of powerful spirit medicines.

The truth was that, although people in the mortal world could cultivate godly-class energy arts, they could never push them to the ultimate peak because they could never get the true quintessence elements required.

It was only possible to do that in the god world.

The transformations of godly-class energy arts relied upon the transformations within the magical laws of the god world.

“Miss...” her subordinates said as they woke up. Many of them were weeping.

“You’re okay, Ma’am! This is wonderful. Is that damned Pirate King Deku dead? Our clan battleships will surely catch up soon and cut him down.”

“Shut your mouth!” the young woman snapped. “We happened to be rescued by these noble friends who killed the pirates. All of you follow me out of the ship and onto the beach. We’ll rest up and send out a call for help to the clan fleet.”

“Yes, yes of course,” her handmaidens said, and they hurried along to the beach. Of course, the sight of all the dead pirates caused them to cast furtive, admiring glances at Yang Qi and his people. The god world was no exception to the general rule of respect being given to the strong.

As for the young woman, the evidence of the slaughter only went to prove to her how vicious and merciless Yang Qi could be, and she nodded inwardly with approval.

Once out in the open, she pulled out a handheld flare that resembled a rattlesnake. Pointing it up, she released it, sending it flying up into the clouds accompanied by a piercing shriek of a sound.

After sending the message, she turned back and resumed her conversation with Yang Qi. Obviously, she was very perceptive, as she already realized that he was their leader.

“Miss, might I ask your honored name?” Yang Qi asked.

“I'm from the Wang Clan of the Lightningbolt Continent. My name is Wang Juan.” From her smile and the confident way she carried herself, she seemed to be a capable and experienced person. “As you may know, our clan is one of the most powerful on the continent. Might I ask which continent you wanderers hail from?”

“We’re from the Five Phases Continent,” Brahma replied quickly. “Unfortunately, we offended the nobility there, and had nowhere else to go to, so we fled here.”

“The Five Phases Continent.” Wang Juan frowned slightly. “It sounds familiar, but it must be very far away, so far that it would be difficult to calculate the exact distance. How did you possibly find your way all the way here?”

“Oh, we made use of an old teleportation portal,” Brahma replied. “As for our subsequent adventures, we’d prefer to keep the details confidential.” He was trying his best to word things in a way that wouldn’t attract too much suspicion. After all, this Wang Juan seemed very intelligent. If the pirate captain had been able to determine that they were from the lower worlds, then she would likely be able to pick up on the clues as well.

Yang Qi’s other companions knew exactly what Brahma was doing and kept their mouths shut, hoping to learn a bit from the conversation. If nothing else, they were getting used to how people in the god world spoke and interacted.

Considering they were all old-timers from the immortal worlds, people who had experienced just about everything there was to imagine, it wasn’t a hard task for them to get up to speed.

From the conversation so far, they had already been able to piece together some basic information.

The Lightningbolt Continent was obviously a large place with many people. As a continent in the middle of a huge ocean, it would have multiple kingdoms, or even empires in it. And there were definitely gods on the continent. Most likely, the patriarch of the Wang Clan was at least a Lesser God, with numerous subjects including Plebeians and Despots.

Wang Juan was obviously an important young one from the Wang Clan, probably someone who had a significant chance of forming godhood and becoming a Lesser God. In the god world, even Lesser Gods were vastly removed from the common people. Not even the Despots or Quasi-Gods could compare to them. The gods were the ultimate rulers of the god world, and it was only with a god in charge of a clan that it could truly prosper and flourish. And the only way the Wang Clan could be so important in the Lightningbolt Continent was if they had a god watching over them.

As for the pirate king that had kidnapped her, he was from the pirate forces who were led by a wretch-god. However, that pirate king was only a peak Terrifying Quasi-God.

There were many Quasi-Gods in the god world, but not all of them could become Lesser Gods.

Now that Yang Qi knew about the Wang Clan and the Lightningbolt Continent, he was already starting to form the next stage of his plan. After all, he could sense that Wang Juan was thinking of recruiting them.

Aaaaoooooo!

Even as they chatted, the sound of a bugle echoed out over the surface of the ocean and a huge battleship appeared off in the distance. It was pure white and sailed across the water without needing a sail.

“That's our Wang Clan battleship fleet!”

Three enormous battleships appeared, all of which were just as large as the pirate ship and pulsing with immense energy. And all of them flew flags that were embroidered with the character Wang, written in the script of the Godfolk.

Of course, this was no harbor, so the battleships couldn’t get too close to the shore. After stopping, colorful beams of light shot off the decks of the battleship, hitting the water and turning into a substance as hard as crystal.

Afterward, people from the ship hopped down onto the solidified water and approached.

From what Yang Qi could tell, it wasn’t a daoist technique, but rather some unique substance specifically designed to turn water solid, yet didn’t make it into ice. Nodding inwardly, he marveled at how amazing the god world was.

Chapter 1151: Wang Clan

The people of the Wang Clan approached, led by a young man in white clothing with a long, gem-encrusted saber hanging at his waist. The gems were all beautiful godstones that pulsed with godpower fluctuations. The young man had sword-like eyebrows and a sharp gaze that he directed at Wang Juan.

“You survived without harm, Elder Sister Juan? That's wonderful. And who are these people?”

He glanced at Yang Qi’s companions, his gaze lingering on Jadefall for a moment. Upon realizing that she was only in the mid Terrifying level, his eyes flickered with disapproval.

But then his gaze shifted to Yang Qi, and upon assessing his aura, he suddenly seemed to go on guard.

Nodding in greeting, Wang Juan said, “Well, if it isn’t you, Wang Yi. These are my benefactors. They killed all the pirates and rescued me. The Wang Clan owes them a big debt of gratitude.”

“Oh? They killed all the pirates?” Wang Yi looked at them a bit closer. “Despots, I see. Where did you all come from?”

“We're wanderers,” Brahma replied quickly, “from the Five Phases Continent. We offended the wrong people there and ended up here, hiding for our lives.”

“Wanderers, eh?” His expression changed suddenly. “Well, considering you rescued Elder Sister Juan, our Wang Clan won’t treat you unfairly. In fact, if you become attendants of our clan, you can end your wandering.”

“My apologies,” Yang Qi said coolly, “but we can’t agree to become attendants.”

The Wang Clan was obviously powerful, but working for them would involve following orders from other people, and Yang Qi wasn’t interested in that.

“What?!” shouted one of the disciples flanking Wang Yi. “Don’t you bunch of wanderers know how powerful the Wang Clan is? We're a clan of gods! Our glory will never fade, and we—”

“Shut your mouth!” Wang Juan snapped. “These people saved my life! How could we possibly try to make them attendants? They’re friends. Guests! Don’t you people understand the height of the heavens and the breadth of the earth?” Turning to Yang Qi, she said, “Sorry about that. The people of my clan are used to being arrogant bullies.”

“It's no matter,” Yang Qi replied. “I'm not interested in bickering. You see, we've grown used to the wandering lifestyle, and aren’t interested in relying on charity. That said, we wouldn’t mind heading to a city near your Wang Clan to do a bit of business.”

“I bet you plundered some godnotes from the pirates, didn’t you?” Wang Yi asked with a disapproving expression on his face. “Those pirates took a lot of wealth that belongs to our Wang Clan, including those godnotes. So hand them over!”

“What?!” Jadefall erupted. “Do you have any sort of proof that they originally belonged to you?”

“Enough, Wang Yi,” said Wang Juan, looking very displeased. “Those godnotes never belonged to us. And even if they did, we should offer them as thanks for the services rendered. How could we possibly demand them back?”

Wang Juan couldn’t help but be frustrated that her fellow clan members were being as short-sighted as rats. The godnotes were valuable, but people like her rescuers were even more valuable. Getting on their good side would be far more advantageous than causing problems and turning them from allies into enemies. In fact, she was inwardly cursing Wang Yi to death for his stupidity.

Wang Yi snorted coldly, but apparently wasn’t planning to quibble any further. Waving a hand to his men, he said, “Pull that pirate ship out from the shore and gather up the bodies. The corpses will fetch a high price from the consortiums.”

His subordinates jumped into action, collecting all of the scattered sabers and weapons, hauling the corpses onto the pirate ship, then sounding the signal to have the ship dragged out to sea.

Their actions were more than a little domineering. After all, Yang Qi and his people had killed the pirates, so they belonged to him by right of conquest. Besides, the pirate ship wasn’t an ordinary ship; it had been built on a framework of godling bones, which meant that it was worth at least two or three godnotes.

That was more wealth than most Despots would ever see, and now it was being snatched away right in front of them.

However, neither Yang Qi nor anyone else said a word. Instead, they stayed on full alert. It was obvious that Wang Yi was a petty and narrow-minded person. Of course, it made sense considering that he had only lived a few dozen years; there was no way an impetuous person like that would truly bother old-timers who had lived for millions upon millions of years.

By this point, even Yang Qi was over ten thousand years old.

After all, it was possible for a thousand years to pass in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart without hardly a moment passing on the outside.

Wang Juan was struck deeply by the indifferent expression of the faces of Yang Qi and his people, and realized that there was something unique about them. In fact, she was more interested than ever in recruiting them now. She had a good position in the Wang Clan, but wanted to bolster that position. And to do that, she would need capable helpers. Unfortunately, finding qualified people wasn’t exactly easy.

“That’s just what Wang Yi is like,” she said to Yang Qi. “Thank you for not getting into an argument with him. I’ll make sure that all of this is worth your while. You’re currently honored guests of mine, and I’d like to invite you to the Wang Clan for a visit. I’d be happy to show you some of the sights on the Lightningbolt Continent as well. It seems that most of your friends are stuck in bottlenecks. Thankfully, the cities under the control of the Wang Clan have plenty of spirit pills available that can clear the magical laws from within your bodies and help form a resonance with the world around you. With pills like that, your friends should have no problem becoming Quasi-Gods. Does that sound good?”

“That’s exactly what we were hoping to do,” Brahma said. “We all need god pills to help reach the Quasi-God level.”

A short distance away, Wang Yi snorted coldly. Looking over disdainfully, he murmured, “How could scum like you become Quasi-Gods? I was specially groomed by my clan, going through endless training sessions and brutal combat exercises. And even then, it took huge amounts of spirit medicine for me to reach this level. And incidentally, I just broke through. As for Wang Juan, the only reason she’s this strong is that she has a special master and is favored by the clan because of her betrothal to the Proud Clan. She already has the hope of reaching godly ascension, which means that I’m no match for her.”

One of the Wang Clan advisors next to Wang Yi stepped forward and said, “Young Sir Yi, it's obvious that Young Lady Juan wants to recruit those wanderers. Their leader has obviously reached a very high level. You can’t afford to underestimate him.”

“I know that,” Wang Yi said. “The fact that these wanderers killed so many pirates shows that they’re extraordinary. I'm just pissed that they cleared out all of the pirates’ godnotes. Considering how much raiding those pirates were involved in, they must have accumulated a dozen godnotes, or possibly even as many as twenty. That’s a huge amount of wealth! Just imagine the resources I could acquire with that much money. You know, my yearly stipend from the Wang Clan is only a single godnote. I can hardly imagine what it would be like to have twenty years of savings to work with.”

“That would definitely be a huge sum,” the advisor replied. “Unfortunately, the wanderers are under the protection of the young lady now, so there’s no way they’ll just hand over the godnotes. Let’s worry about it after we get back to the clan.”

“Good idea. Wang Juan is strong, but there’s no way she could ever attempt to win the position of clan leader. She's already engaged to one of the young elites from the Proud Clan, one of the most unimaginably large clans in existence, with subsidiary branches on countless continents. Maybe the Lightning Clan rules the Lightningbolt Continent, but they still have to acquiesce to the Proud Clan. Otherwise, how could the Proud Clan’s trading company have begun operations here? Well, at least we can sell the pirate corpses and their ship for a good two or three godnotes. This troublesome venture won’t have been a complete waste.”

As this conversation between Wang Yi and the adviser was playing out, Yang Qi accepted Wang Juan’s invitation and boarded one of the Wang Clan battleships.

The ship hoisted its sails and headed out onto the water. The deeper waters were occupied with all sorts of water-based godlings, and although some attacked the ship, they were easily repelled.

The ship had ballistas that could hit targets several kilometers away, as well as spell formations powered by godstones. Surprisingly, such weaponry actually reminded Yang Qi of the products of the ancient mechanical civilization.

Thanks to information from Brahma, Yang Qi knew that in ancient times, the god world had used godstones as currency. It was only later, when the godstone reserves ran low, that the Sovereign Lord and various Paramount Gods had instituted the use of godnotes. Eventually, godnotes became widespread. However, that didn’t mean that godstones were any less useful.

For example, even mid Terrifying experts could use them to power spell formations.

For all intents and purposes, godstones in the god world were like spirit stones in the mortal world.

“We’ll arrive at the main harbor of the Lightningbolt Continent soon,” Wang Juan said, “which is connected to the capital city. By the way, how many godnotes did you happen to take from those pirates?”

“Not many,” Yang Qi replied coolly. “Only about twenty.”

“Twenty?” Wang Juan said, gasping involuntarily. “That’s a huge amount of wealth. Your group should easily be able to establish a foundation in the Lightningbolt Continent with that. Settling down here would be a lot better than wandering in the wilds. Or you could join one of the major sects, which would be a great way to achieve faster progress.”

“Oh? What are the top organizations here on the Lightningbolt Continent? Would you mind explaining a bit, Miss?” Of course, Yang Qi was interested in learning as much about the god world as possible, this continent included.

“Well, that's simple. The Lightningbolt Continent is a small place, but to people like us, who haven’t reached godly ascension, it’s still enormous. You see, there aren’t any major sects here, just factions overseen by the Lesser Gods. The top group is the Lightning Clan, whose patriarch is a Lesser God that’s supposedly just on the verge of becoming a Common God. The patriarch of our Wang Clan is a bit behind him. You see, he has a godhood rating of two, whereas the Lightning Clan patriarch has a godhood rating of five.”

“Godhood level of two. And five?” Yang Qi had long since come to the realization that godhood was the quintessence of the gods, and determined exactly how strong they were.

Chapter 1152: Godhood Rating

In the god world, the psychic scale and power index measurements were superfluous. Godhood rating was the standard to measure the power of gods.

People who had just become Lesser Gods generally had a godhood rating of one.

As one’s cultivation base grew stronger, their godhood rating would climb. From one to two, two to five, five to ten, and so on.

Obviously, gods with a higher godhood rating could dominate those with lower ratings.

When Wang Juan said that her clan’s patriarch had a rating of two, while the Lightning Clan patriarch had a rating of five, it went to show how superior the latter was. And that was why the Lightning Clan ruled the Lightningbolt Continent.

Yang Qi was currently forming his own godhood and heading toward the point of being a real god. At the same time, he wanted to understand what other gods were like. For instance, he was very curious to see what Lesser Gods were capable of.

In the mortal world, he had come across plenty of godhood. Unfortunately, all such godhood was tainted and couldn’t compare to actual godhood from gods in the god world.

The godhood that existed in gods was alive, whereas the godhood in the mortal world was deathly and broken. Obviously, the two were impossible to compare to each other.

“I see,” Yang Qi said. “Are there any other major organizations on the Lightningbolt Continent?”

“Of course,” Wang Juan replied. “For instance, the Proud Clan. If the Lightning Clan acts as the feudal hegemon of the Lightningbolt Continent, then the Proud Clan are the administrators from afar. The leader of the Proud Clan contingency here is also a Lesser God with a godhood rating of five. Very formidable. That said, the Proud Clan’s main headquarters isn’t here. People say they’re based in a location much deeper in the god world. Despite that, they have a hand in affairs throughout the god world.”

“Proud Clan?” Yang Qi said, feeling a bit shaken. “And who’s their clan lord? I don’t remember hearing about them on the Five Phases Continent.”

“Oh really?” Wang Juan said, sounding a bit doubtful. “Don’t tell me the Proud Clan hasn’t established an outpost on the Five Phases Continent? That's simply impossible! They’re the top clan in the god world, so domineering that it almost defies imagination.”

All of Yang Qi’s other companions were equally surprised to hear about the Proud Clan, and although none of them showed that on their faces, they were all having secret discussions via divine will. “The Proud Clan? Could it be connected to Proud Heaven? It would make sense. And that would explain how Proud Heaven was able to leave the god world.”

Of course, it was all speculation at this point.

However, Yang Qi was already coming up with a plan.

Proud World was Proud Heaven’s son, and had his blood. If Proud Heaven really was from the Proud Clan, then by virtue of logic, he would have Proud Clan blood. Therefore, all they had to do was find a member of the Proud Clan here on the Lightningbolt Continent, get a blood sample from them, and compare it to Proud World’s blood. If they were similar, it would prove that Proud Heaven was from the immensely powerful Proud Clan.

Yang Qi was already making progress in his attempt to deal with Proud Heaven. After all, he absolutely had to get the Great Necropolis and the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart away from him. Furthermore, he needed to track down his mother, Aunt Susu, and Master.

The Great Necropolis and the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart were both foundational treasures that could shake the god world, so there was no way he could leave them in Proud Heaven’s hands.

‘Heaven helps those who help themselves! I just barely arrived in the god world, and I’ve already got some major clues. Unfortunately, if the Proud Clan really has a major presence on so many of the continents in the god world, then I obviously can't take them lightly.’

As the ship sailed on, they continued chatting. Yang Qi and his friends were doing everything they could to act like god world natives. It didn’t take long to settle into those roles, and soon enough, they were talking and acting very differently than they had upon first arriving. At this point, it would be very difficult for anyone to guess that they had ascended from the lower worlds.

A few hours passed, and soon it was night time. Because of the lack of moon and stars, it was pitch black, almost like the Hell of Gloom and Darkness. However, the Wang Clan was one of the top clans in the area, so they obviously had ways of dealing with that. The ship had a geomantic compass that they could use for navigation. It also created a bright flame that lit up everything around them. Soon, a harbor became visible, which was obviously the very same harbor Wang Juan had mentioned earlier.

All sorts of fancy and expensive-looking ships were sailing here and there. It was very different from the immortal worlds, where so many people could fly, even many commoners.

In fact, in some ways, Yang Qi actually felt like he was back among mortals.

It was a marvelous feeling. However, there was no doubt that this was the ultimate world among all the many heavens and myriad worlds. Of course, he had yet to see any actual gods.

The commoners he could see in the harbor were all mid Terrifying experts, and they were buzzing about as busily as bees.

‘The magical laws here are so strong!’ he thought, sighing inwardly. ‘Physical matter is so tightly bound to other physical matter that it can’t be separated. And every strand of vital energy is so incredibly dense that it's millions upon millions of times stronger than steel from the mortal world.’

In fact, the air in general here was so much heavier that, if you took a bit of energy from the god world and took it to the mortal world, it could easily transform into a sizable mountain.

That was why people beneath the mid Terrifying level couldn’t even breathe in the god world.

In fact, natives of the god world were born with mid Terrifying cultivation bases.

“We’ve arrived!” Wang Juan announced. “It’s night, but in Lightningbolt City, you can enjoy yourself from dusk all the way to dawn! Let’s go. Men, prepare quarters for my guests, and let them settle down to rest. Tomorrow, I’ll throw a big banquet.” After docking, Wang Juan led Yang Qi and his people into the city. The city was mostly crafted from ancient stone, mottled with age, but indescribably tough.

There were numerous towering buildings in the city, as well as castles, some of which glowed with soft but brilliant light while others radiated darkness and gloom.

One difference in this city compared to the lower worlds was that there were no spatial dimensions or minor worlds. The sprawling city in front of their eyes was all that there was. Lesser Gods wouldn’t waste their godly powers to create such god kingdoms.

As they walked down the street, they were struck by how everything seemed similar to the mortal world. There were shops, restaurants and hotels. The only difference was that the goods for sale were all god items.

“What are you looking to buy?” Wang Juan asked. As they walked down the street, people made way for them, and from the reverent looks in the eyes of many of them, it was obvious how important the Wang Clan was in the city.

“This city is huge,” Yang Qi said. In fact, he couldn’t even see the end of the street. And there were so many castles lining it that he couldn’t count them.

“We need to buy Godsieve Pills in bulk,” Brahma said. “After all, those are the best pills to crystallize godpower and break through magical laws. All of us are on the verge of being Quasi-Gods, so with enough Godsieve Pills, we should be able to break through. Where is the main business district of the city?”

Back on the beach where they had first landed, they had lived in a log cabin and devoured raw animal meat to survive. They had been living like wandering beggars. Now that they were in the city, if they could get the proper medicinal pills they could advance their cultivation by leaps and bounds.

“Godsieve Pills?” Wang Juan’s eyes glittered. “Those are rare. But with twenty godnotes you should be able to get some. Look, our Wang Clan’s main business is trading in medicinal ingredients. Why don’t you work out a deal with us? I’ll give you a good deal.”

“That works,” Yang Qi said, nodding. “Miss, would it be too much to ask for you to help us find a place to work on our cultivation?”

“Alright!” She led them to a rather large inn, and as soon as they walked inside, the innkeeper hurried over to greet them.

“My respects, Miss. How can I help you?”

“I want your best rooms for my guests here,” she said in a crisp tone. “A private villa with a courtyard, understand? And prepare a banquet with your best dishes.”

“Yes, yes of course!” Bowing and scraping, the innkeeper led Yang Qi and the others to their rooms. After all the details were taken care of, Wang Juan said, “I need to report back to my clan. I’ll have the Godsieve Pills delivered first thing in the morning. For now, get some rest.”

“Many thanks, many thanks!” they said, clasping hands formally as they escorted her out.

At long last they had some peace and quiet. Their quarters consisted of a room deep in the inn, with a peaceful garden in the middle and a host of private chambers. It was elegant and tasteful, but at the same time simple. Clearly, the place had been planned out by a master designer.

There was also a table in the dining chamber, which was currently covered with all sorts of delicious foods. There were crisp vegetables, savory meats, and aromatic rice. There was no way their diet of raw meat out in the wilds could possibly compare to this.

However, instead of eating, everyone was waiting for Yang Qi’s instructions.

“Our first order of business is to get stronger,” he said with a faint smile. At the same time, he emanated a faint golden light. As a Quasi-God in the peak Terrifying level, he was now strong enough that he could ensure privacy from prying eyes and ears.

After setting all the precautions in place, he continued, “We’re different from the people around here, and should be able to achieve breakthroughs more quickly. Plus, I have the God Legion Seal. Over the next few days, I’ll help all of you to purify yourselves in body and soul. I’ll also spend some time in seclusion, meditating on further profundities. Once all of you are in the peak Terrifying level, things should be a lot easier. From what I've seen so far, Quasi-Gods generally occupy high positions.”

“Well that’s a given,” Brahma said. “In the god world, gods are the leaders, with even the Lesser Gods ruling over countless commoners.”

“Alright. Right now, I'm going to help strengthen your godpower with my new enlightenment of the Sage Monarch Grand Magic and God Legion Seal!”

Sitting in the middle of the group, he began performing incantation gestures one after another. At the same time, over a dozen golden hands appeared above him, then settled onto the heads of his subordinates.

Chapter 1153: Godsieve Pills

Right now, Yang Qi’s companions were all woefully underpowered. Until they reached the peak Terrifying level and became Quasi-Gods, giving them the ability to use true energy externally, they would be in a very bad position.

After all, they couldn’t even fly right now, nor could they use most god items and spell formations. If they ended up surrounded by some enemy, they would surely end up slaughtered. After all, even bows and arrows could be deadly to them in their current state. To be able to use godpower externally was just as much a hallmark in the god world as the fifth phase of Energy Arts was, back in the mortal world.

Danger abounded in the god world. And while these people were at the top of the food chain in the immortal worlds, here in the god world, things were the opposite. They were at the bottom, almost as weak as slaves. Given their current level, it was impossible to even count how many people could kill them.

Now that they were back on the bottom, they had to work on rising to the top yet again.

“The Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth will enter you, improve your energy arts, purify your body and soul, and cleanse your blood....” Godpower converged in the golden hands Yang Qi had summoned, then flowed into the heads of his people as he drew on the Sage Monarch Grand Magic.

The Sage Monarch Grand Magic was definitely the most marvelous set of techniques in existence, and although Yang Qi’s mastery was shallow and far from complete, he had a strong foundation.

Purr. Purr....

The sounds emanating from Yang Qi caused the purrling to look at him with wide eyes, as if it suddenly sensed that he was like something of a brother to it.

He had long since fused the Purrfect God Art with his Sage Monarch Grand Magic. And as his cultivation base grew stronger, and he gained more enlightenment of yin and yang, the sun and the moon, heaven and earth, and time and space, his skills and abilities only grew more refined.

“Converge the godpower. Let the virtual godhood become true and real!”

Crack!

The virtual godhood within Yang Qi suddenly transformed; having absorbed such immense amounts of godpower, it was now as transparent as crystal and contained ten types of energy, which created a perfect peak of power.

“Sage, Monarch, Ruler, Emperor, Sovereign, Lord, Hero, Hegemon, God, Nothing!”

Ten characters appeared within Yang Qi’s virtual godhood, all of them written in the script of the Godfolk. They were incomparably true and real, contained all sorts of transformations and interactions, and thrummed with an invincible, destabilizing power. As a result, Yang Qi’s tendons, bones, blood, and flesh became numerous magical laws, as if he himself were transforming into godhood.

He was godhood, godhood was him.

It was a very enigmatic transformation.

Ten golden flows of energy swept through the room, and everyone shuddered from the godpower. They even coughed up necrotic blood as the impurities were removed from within them, and they were purified in body and soul.

“Purging!” Yang Qi spat out some blood, which burst into flames and flowed like cleansing water into his followers.

“Bathe the Psyche in Snow....” He twitched, and the flames turned into snowflakes which fluttered down and took away the impurities, leaving everyone clean and fresh. Holy melodies drifted into their ears, and whatever devils existed in their seas of consciousness were subjugated and crushed.

Because they were constantly absorbing the vital energy of the surrounding world, it was a given that they would build up impurities. Even the things they learned by observing their surroundings would create impurities in the seas of consciousness, which they would then need to eliminate.

Sometimes, knowledge could count as an impurity.

Now, with Yang Qi’s help, they were cleansing their psyches and bodies, and were drawing closer to the god world, allowing their minds to drift calmly in the ocean of magical laws of the god world.

It was now more obvious than ever how effective the God Legion Seal was.

Streams of power drifted through the god world toward Yang Qi, becoming vital energy that was nearly corporeal.

Reaching out, he grabbed it, causing cracking sounds to ring out as walnut-sized stones appeared in his hand.

Opening his eyes, he saw that everyone had much-improved psyches, and their bodies were now in a much higher state. Smiling, he exhaled.

“I should be able to break through at any moment!” Brahma said. Looking over at Yang Qi, he said, “Yang Qi, what’s that in your hand? Godstones? Where did you get them?”

“They’re the product of my most recent enlightenment,” Yang Qi replied. “During this session of cultivation, I gained more understanding of the profundities of the God Legion Seal. I was able to reach out into the void of the god world and turn its essence into godstones.”

“How is that even possible?” Brahma said, visibly surprised. “Godstones come from natural ores in the god world, and form in the very depths of the god world essence. They go through countless heaven-shaking, earth-toppling transformations and generally form a tiny bit at a time over endless years. But you just directly made some? You know, before godnotes, godstones were used as a hard currency. And although godnotes are more widespread and popular, they’re so valuable that some people don’t use them. Instead, they rely on godstones for everyday purchases. And that’s not to mention how godstones work with formations!”

“I know,” Yang Qi said. “I noticed along the way that a lot of people were using godstones for minor purchases. In fact, I didn’t even see any godnotes. It seems to me that godnotes are for huge transactions. It makes sense considering that although godnotes are bills of cash, they’re actually sealed by Paramount Gods and contain immense god vitality. And if I can already create godstones, it’s only a matter of time before I can create godnotes.”

By this point, it was already daylight.

It was a new day, and their stomachs were grumbling with hunger. Thankfully, the table was already set with food, so they ate and drank their fill. Afterward, Jadefall sighed and said, “Here in the god world, we’re like ordinary people again. I can’t even remember the last time I needed to eat or drink in the immortal worlds.”

“Soon enough we’ll reach the point of not needing to eat,” Brahma said. “Once we're Quasi-Gods, we won’t need food, and can subsist on the vital energy we absorb. Of course, we’ll still require medicinal pills.”

“Is the exalted Yang Qi present?” said the innkeeper from outside.

“Yes, what’s the situation?” Yang Qi said, stepping out to find that the innkeeper was waiting for him, flanked by a burly man in armor. The Quasi-God fluctuations he emanated placed him at around the same level as Wang Juan, and clearly he was some sort of military officer from the Wang Clan.

“I am your humble servant, Wang Xiang,” he said, offering a humble salute of greeting. Behind him were a few dozen servants who were all Despots, bearing several bulky chests with them. Scanning the servants, Yang Qi found that they had psychic scales of three or four hundred, which meant that they were all on the same level as the emperor of the executors!

“Hello,” Yang Qi said, clasping hands in return.

“These chests contain the Godsieve Pills you need,” Wang Xiang said. “It took a lot of effort for the young lady to put together this collection. It will cost a total of eighteen godnotes.”

“Only eighteen godnotes for all these pills?” Yang Qi said. “I don’t want to take advantage of the young lady. Here, take twenty-five godnotes.”

He had a total of twenty-six godnotes, and was only keeping one for himself to use for research purposes. Considering that he could already use the God Legion Seal to produce godstones, and would soon be able to produce godnotes, he knew that he would soon be a very rich person in the god world.

And he would rather not owe Wang Juan a favor.

“Oh?” Wang Xiang said, his expression flickering with surprise and indecision. But in the end, he accepted the godnotes. “It seems I underestimated you. I assumed that you were wanderers who saved the young lady by chance and would try to take advantage of our clan. Maybe you’re not like that. However, I should still explain to you that this collection of pills would probably sell for about thirty godnotes. Even with you being generous, the young lady is still taking a loss that she’ll have to make up for from her personal savings.”

“Oh, I understand. In that case, I’ll make sure she profits in the end. You’re dismissed.” Yang Qi nodded.

Without another word, Wang Xiang turned and left. Apparently, he didn’t want to spend any more time than necessary with lowly wanderers like them.

“What a damned snob,” Doom said. The Shepherd, Proud World, and the others were also grinding their teeth in irritation. It was definitely hard going from the top of the food chain all the way to the bottom.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi waved his hand, wrapping up all the chests with his true energy and pulling them inside. Upon opening them, they found that they were packed with medicinal pills, all of them the size of dragon eyes and extremely fragrant.

Even just smelling them caused their spirits to rise.

“Not bad at all!” Brahma said with a wide smile. “Godsieve Pills! Most people are unaware of the proper way to use them effectively, but I know how. With these, we should all be able to reach the Quasi-God level. Trust me.”

“In that case, let’s begin,” Yang Qi said. “The reason I helped you purify your bodies and souls was so that you could properly use these pills. Now I’ll use the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth and the God Legion Seal to cleanse the pills, extract their medicinal energy, and use it to create a medicinal spell formation. I’ll follow all of Brahma’s instructions in this regard.”

“Great. Let’s start building the formation.” Brahma began to sketch an outline on the table. “It works like this. Copy the designs onto your body as well, and prepare to start absorbing energy.”

Chapter 1154: Banquet

Brahma was actually an ancient Consummate God.

Because of a unique set of circumstances, he had ended up perishing. However, his experience and knowledge related to the god world remained with him, and no one else in the group could possibly match up to him in that regard. Yang Qi had the God Legion Seal, of course, but still had many of its secrets and abilities to unlock.

When it came to the everyday ins and outs of the god world, Brahma understood far more than Yang Qi. The God Legion Seal couldn’t help Yang Qi with such matters.

For example, it didn’t contain information about how to use Godsieve Pills in a medicine formation.

On the other hand, it required the ability to use godpower externally, which no one else but Yang Qi could do.

He flicked his finger, causing godpower to converge into a point of light, which he then sent over to the chests. The Godsieve Pills in the chests instantly evaporated into medicinal dragons that he took control of with the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.

The dragons transformed into a host of fist-sized medicine formations, which he then sent into everyone present.

It was a minor skill, but something that required exquisite control over his godpower. That said, the ability to quickly master such a minor skill was something the natives of the god world couldn't do. Only old-timers who had practiced cultivation for millions upon millions of years in the mortal world would be able to pull off something like that.

Everyone settled down cross-legged into meditative states as the Godsieve Pills vanished.

Normally speaking, medicinal pills like this would take three days per pill to assimilate, lest one explode. But with the adjustments of the God Legion Seal, Yang Qi could extract the ultimate medicinal efficacy from them and provide benefits that would be far better than consuming them individually.

RUMBLE!

Almost immediately, everyone’s auras began growing stronger.

Crack!

Two hours later, Brahma’s godpower reached a peak and he began to transform as he broke through to the peak Terrifying level. However, his flows of godpower seemed thin and weak compared to Yang Qi’s.

“Why are they so weak?” Yang Qi said, looking surprised.

“What were you expecting?” Brahma replied. “These results aren’t bad at all. Look, I can already release godpower externally. There’s no way we could achieve breakthroughs like this in the immortal worlds. Did you think everyone would be as freakishly powerful as you?”

A tremor passed through him as he sent a stream of true energy out of his palm, as thin as spider web. It wrapped around a nearby chair, which subsequently rose up into the air, then dropped back down with a thud.

“As we further our cultivation, our godpower will strengthen and we’ll get more powerful.”

“Right,” Yang Qi said, nodding. “At least you're stronger than the average expert. Going forward, I’ll try to find more god pills to help bolster your cultivation base and help you advance by leaps and bounds.”

“Is Mr. Yang Qi here?” a voice said on the outside. “Are you still working on your cultivation?”

“How can I help you?” Yang Qi asked, frowning.

“The young lady has invited all of you to attend a banquet,” the voice replied.

Yang Qi walked out to find some servants, one of whom bore an invitation card from the Wang Clan.

“Wonderful,” Yang Qi said, accepting the invitation. When he tapped the surface, it rang like metal. “Unfortunately, my companions are all in the middle of a session of cultivation. Only Brother Brahma and I are free to attend. Can you lead the way?”

“Of course,” the servant replied respectfully. The servant was a Despot and Yang Qi was already a Quasi-God, so there was no way he would speak to him in any other tone.

Brahma walked out, and was joined by Jadefall, who was holding the purrling in her arms.

“I’d like to come as well, Yang Qi.” she said. From her energy fluctuations, he could tell that she had also experienced a breakthrough. Even after arriving in the god world, the purrling hadn’t taken to eating or drinking anything. Other than crawling around, it didn’t seem to do anything, nor did it seem to require any power.

Yang Qi had previously assumed that it would transform once it reached the god world. At the very least, he had expected it to absorb the vital energy; but it seemed to disdain the vital energy of the god world. So far, Yang Qi had only seen it expend energy, never take it in. It was as if it existed on a level that completely defied the normal logic regarding energy conservation.

In the end, though, that only made it more terrifying. Of course, Yang Qi hadn’t stopped observing it in the hopes of gaining further enlightenment of its secrets. And he couldn’t forget how he had seen the purrling’s porcelain godspore being attacked by the ancient gods in primal-chaos, only to have it flee and never be caught.

Even King Heaven-Devourer was among the ones who had tried to consume the purrling, only to fail. It just went to show how completely strange and bizarre the purrling was.

Jadefall had brought it to life. She was a Reincarnated One, and as such was clearly blessed by heaven, which explained how she could achieve such quick cultivation advancement. In fact, her godpower was actually superior to Brahma's.

‘Two more Quasi-Gods?!’ the servants thought in shock. They all knew that the wanderers who saved Wang Juan were led by a Quasi-God named Yang Qi. But the rest of the wanderers were supposed to be Despots. However, these were clearly two Quasi-Gods, which was nothing short of astounding.

Of course, it wasn’t their place to speak, so they simply led the way out.

At the main entrance of the inn, a carriage was waiting, harnessed with four fine horses. They were god steeds, with horns on their heads and hooves that caused miniature tornadoes to spring up when they moved. And their fine, sleek coats looked like they were made of gold.

They took their seats in the carriage, and the horses began to trot smoothly. The ride wasn’t bumpy at all as the horses sped along, their hooves not even touching the ground. It felt like they were floating.

It took only a short time to reach a heavily guarded castle. There were Despot guards with sabers and spears at all the entrances, as well as a large number of carriages and sedan chairs parked outside the main entrance. Obviously, other famous people from the city were also attending this banquet.

As soon as Yang Qi, Brahma and Jadefall stepped out of the carriage, another servant approached and said, “Invitation card, please!”

Yang Qi handed him the card, whereupon he was led inside. As soon as the servant announced their names, Wang Juan went over to meet them. Upon looking at Brahma and Jadefall, she said, “You two achieved a breakthrough in one night? How did you do that?”

“Oh, it was nothing,” Brahma replied. “We have a special technique. Plus, with plenty of medicinal pills to consume, it wasn’t a problem.”

“Plenty of medicinal pills to consume?” Wang Juan said, visibly surprised. “I sent you so many medicinal pills that even if all of you consumed one every three days, it should’ve taken three or four years to reach the Quasi-God level. And that would’ve been considered fast. Most people would need at least ten years to consume so many Godsieve Pills. Otherwise, the convergence of godpower would be difficult to sustain.”

“Like I said, we have a special technique,” Brahma said, smiling.

“Could it be that you used to be in a higher level, but somehow experienced a decline? So you’re really just recovering?”

Brahma looked at Wang Juan as if he were considering something new about her. Nodding, he said, “That's right. I used to be a Quasi-God in the past. Someone destroyed my virtual godhood, so my progress is naturally faster than normal.”

Lowering her voice meaningfully, Wang Juan said, “Are you sure you were only a Quasi-God...?”

“What?!” Brahma said, instinctively unleashing some killing intent. Apparently, Wang Juan realized that he was actually a perished god who had been resurrected.

“There’s no need to show killing intent,” she said, smiling. “It was a guess, that's all. Your group has a mysterious background, and you’re getting stronger far faster than normal. It's going to be hard to avoid speculation. However, I’ll do my best to keep your secret. Surely you have enemies, and our Wang Clan can offer you protection. After all, you saved my life, so it only makes sense for us to cooperate, right?”

“We’ll follow your lead, Miss,” Yang Qi said coolly. Keeping his words as vague as possible, he said, “Right now, we’re solely focused on getting as strong as possible. Please consider us friends, not enemies.”

“Alright!” she replied. “This banquet is being held in celebration of the death of Pirate King Deku. With him dead, the surrounding seas will be much more peaceful. All of the important people in Lightningbolt City are here, and not a single one of them is lower than the Quasi-God level. Truth be told, some members of the clan didn’t want to invite those of you who weren’t Quasi-Gods. Considering you’ve broken through, we don’t have to worry about that now.”

Yang Qi nodded. “Of course. So, who from Lightningbolt City do you suggest we meet? Perhaps some people from the Proud Clan?”

“Proud Clan? Well, it’s a given that they’re here. In fact, the most important member of the younger generation will be coming, Proud Radiance. He’s the top Quasi-God in Lightningbolt City, and in fact, probably in the entire Lightningbolt Continent. They say that he's invincible, and it will only be a few years before he reaches godly ascension.”

“Is that so?” Yang Qi said. “Sounds very impressive. The gap between a Quasi-God and a true god is an insurmountable gulf that many people can't cross. I wonder if he’ll actually succeed.”

Even as the words left his mouth, a cold snort echoed out from across the room. “Unsurmountable gully? As far as I'm concerned it’s a ditch that I can walk across at any time.”

Yang Qi looked over to the entrance to find a young man walking in, hands clasped behind his back. He was followed by a group of burly Quasi-Gods, all of whom had cold, calculating eyes.

As for the young man, he wore a wide headband; and although he looked like someone who had gone through many years of bitter cultivation, he was also the picture of arrogance.

This was the top young expert in the Lightningbolt Continent, Proud Radiance.

Chapter 1155: Proud Radiance

“So, you’re finally here, Proud Radiance! Please, just come in and enjoy yourself!” Wang Juan immediately tried to resolve the tensions that had sprung up in the room. She knew that Proud Radiance grew particularly irritated when people talked about the fact that he wasn’t a god yet. Obviously, he had overheard Yang Qi’s conversation with her, and the last thing she wanted was for a fight to break out.

This was a banquet thrown by the Wang Clan, and she needed it to be a happy occasion.

“I'm fine, thank you very much,” Proud Radiance said coolly. “And this must be Yang Qi, right? Wang Juan’s supposed rescuer? Well, Wang Juan, I should remind you that you’re engaged to my eldest brother Proud Triumphant of the Proud Clan. Sooner or later, you’ll be a part of our clan. And over the years, we’ve spent a lot of effort on helping with your training and education. It wasn’t very long ago that Eldest Brother Proud Triumphant reached godly ascension in the primary temple in the Proud Clan. When he returns, he’ll take you as his wife. I sincerely hope that your relationship with these shady characters doesn’t harm the prestige and honor of the Proud Clan.”

Yang Qi had decided to use his actual name and surname in the god world. It was an enormously large place, and it was highly unlikely that anyone had ever heard of him. And if they had, perhaps he could use his name to draw the snakes out of their holes. After all, he needed to find Proud Heaven and take the Great Necropolis and King Immortal-Slayer’s will back from him.

“What did you just say?” Wang Juan said, her expression flickering. “There’s no need for you to butt into matters relating to me and Proud Triumphant. These benefactors saved my life, so it’s only natural that I entertain them at a banquet.”

“Benefactors?” Proud Radiance said. “Saved your life? Considering you’re my future sister-in-law, I’ll show respect to you. But I couldn’t care less about these so-called benefactors. When Pirate King Deku used that god item to capture you, I was the one who led the charge to catch him. The only reason your Wang Clan managed to exercise control was because of me. Did you know that?”

“Of course I did,” Wang Juan said.

“Good. Then I’ll pay off these so-called benefactors of yours and everything will be even.” Waving his hand, he sent a godnote flying over toward Yang Qi. However, it spun so rapidly that it was as sharp as a blade. “Take this godnote and get out of here. All debts are paid, and I don’t ever want to see you around Lightningbolt City again. Understand? You’re wanderers, so get back to your wandering!”

“Oh really?” Yang Qi looked at the godnote speeding in his direction, and could tell that it contained impressive godpower. However, it wasn’t as if he was worried about that. Reaching out, he grabbed the godnote between his index and middle fingers, whereupon it burst into flames. Obviously, it had been backed by some sort of fire-type godly-class energy art.

However, Yang Qi’s hand then erupted with a green light, which completely suppressed the flames.

“Hmm?” Proud Radiance’s expression flickered. He had thrown out that godnote using a secret attack art of his known as the Flamestreak Meteor, which was something few people could stand up to.

Shockingly, Yang Qi had simply caught it. And on top of that, he just stood there casually and suppressed the dangerous godpower on display. Godnotes were inherently dangerous when used in attacks, and Proud Radiance had imbued it with even more godpower than usual, which meant that even if someone did manage to defend against the attack, the note should have been destroyed in the process.

After all, even actual gods could be injured by weaponized godnotes.

Obviously, Proud Radiance’s plan had been for Yang Qi to be wiped out of existence.

He was clearly a vicious person who would kill people like scything flax. So why would he possibly be concerned with the life or death of a few random wanderers?

“I'm going to keep this godnote,” Yang Qi said. As everyone looked on in shock, he put the godnote away. “Many thanks for this gift, Brother Proud Radiance. It’s only proper that I should offer something in return, so please take this godstone.”

A walnut-sized godstone appeared in his hand, which he flicked toward Proud Radiance.

Proud Radiance’s face fell as he thrust his hand out and sent a flow of energy toward the godstone. However, the godstone merely shuddered and pierced right through the energy flow.

Howling, Proud Radiance drew on all of his godpower to summon a host of vortexes to slow down the stone. Then he reached out to grab it. However, when it hit his hand, the force shoved him backward by three paces, each step leaving a footprint in the incredibly tough floor.

“What? That kid is that strong?!”

“Proud Radiance is the most outstanding figure among the younger generation in the Lightningbolt Continent, but he was bested with only a single move?”

“Not necessarily. Perhaps Proud Radiance was just being careless or inattentive. After all, this wanderer... what was his name? Yang Qi. It should be easy for Proud Radiance to handle a character like him.”

All of the attendees were top experts, and it was easy for them to see that Yang Qi had just seized the upper hand.

Crack!

Face nearly green with rage, Proud Radiance crushed the godstone in his hand. Then, he snarled viciously and said, “Impressive godpower. And your energy arts aren’t bad. You've been hiding your true strength, haven’t you? But I think I need to teach you a lesson about what the martial path is really about!”

“Hold on!” Wang Juan said. “This is a banquet being held by the Wang Clan, and as we all know, harmony is the most prized possession. Proud Radiance, could it be that you think this friend of mine doesn't qualify to attend the banquet? If so, why not test him out? Afterward, you can turn weapons of war into gifts of jade and silk. What do you say?” Inside, she was shocked, and was thinking, ‘I can’t believe Yang Qi is that strong! How come I couldn’t detect that before? If nothing else, it’s a plain fact that Proud Radiance is incredibly powerful. Everyone in the continent knows that. But he was obviously put at a disadvantage just now. And Yang Qi looks completely calm, to the point where I have to wonder if he used his full strength. I sure hope they don't actually start fighting. It would be bad if either of them got hurt, let alone both.’

“I’ll prescribe by the adage a guest should act according to the host's wishes,” Yang Qi said. “This is the Wang Clan’s banquet, and I’m not here to fight. In fact, I admit defeat. I am a mere wanderer. And everyone knows that even a mighty dragon cannot overpower a snake in its lair. The Proud Clan is powerful and mighty, of that I'm well aware. You have my sincere admiration. Let’s just forget about all this, okay?”

“Absolutely not!” Proud Radiance said coldly. “I want to see what you’re capable of. And in front of all of these witnesses, I hereby say that, regardless of who wins or loses, the Proud Clan won’t cause further problems for you. The Proud Clan never goes back on its word!”

“I don’t think it would be appropriate for us to—” However, before Yang Qi could even finish speaking, Proud Radiance launched an attack. Before he was even close to Yang Qi, his explosive godpower had created the projection of a huge fist sailing through the air. Unexpectedly, he was taking the initiative.

Yang Qi merely dodged to the side, only to find that the fist of godpower turned to follow him, as if it were locked onto him. Clearly, it was a very dangerous situation.

“Nice fist technique,” he said, and he wasn’t exaggerating. In fact, it was just what he expected the top master on the Lightningbolt Continent to be capable of.

It was a profound and enigmatic attack that seemed impossible to avoid. However, all Yang Qi had to do was tap it with his finger, and cracking sounds rang out as the fist of godpower collapsed.

“Well done!” Proud Radiance said. “You actually managed to deal with my Spirit Turtle Godfist. But let’s see if you can dodge the Seven Killings of the Black Turtle Heaven!”

He lunged forward, drawing on his godpower to summon seven ‘kill’ characters in front of him. They were all written in the script of the gods, and looked almost like they had been slashed into being with swords. They pulsed with killing energy as they shot toward Yang Qi with mysterious variations.

“Seven Killings of the Black Turtle Heaven!

“Ghost God Killing!

“True Dragon Killing!

“Heavenly Void Killing!

“Blood Spirit Killing!

“Great Dao Killing!

“Pierced Void Killing!

“Self Destructive Killing!”

Seven shadowy, humanoid figures appeared, pulsing with roiling killing intent and creating a deadly pillar of godpower fully thirty meters tall that screamed toward Yang Qi. It was obviously a very impressive attack.

“Seven Killings of the Black Turtle Heaven?” Yang Qi murmured. The attack actually had aspects that reminded him of the Ten Universes technique. Obviously, the Seven Killings of the Black Turtle Heaven was a very high-level energy art that had been altered in some way, and that Proud Radiance hadn’t truly mastered.

And obviously, the Ten Universes had a part of the Seven Killings of the Black Turtle Heaven in it.

He realized things all with just one glance.

That alone was enough for him to be convinced that Proud Heaven was indeed connected to the Proud Clan somehow. And the quintessence of his Ten Universes was clearly far more advanced than Proud Radiance’s Seven Killings of the Black Turtle Heaven, which went to show that Proud Heaven must have a much higher standing in the clan than Proud Radiance.

Yang Qi already knew that the Proud Clan on the Lightningbolt Continent was only an auxiliary branch of the main Proud Clan. In fact, it was likely that they didn't follow the most orthodox teachings of the Proud Clan. After all, the Proud Clan was an immense organization in the god world, with branches on so many continents that they were impossible to count. Because of that, even legitimate members of the clan might not necessarily know where their main headquarters was located.

Yang Qi examined the incoming Seven Killings of the Black Turtle Heaven, and in the time it takes a spark to fly off a piece of flint, he dodged out of the way. Then a purring sound could be heard as a bubble flew out and entrapped Proud Radiance.

It was the Purrfect God Art, a one-of-a-kind remarkable ability in heaven and earth. Because no one could possibly recognize what it was, he wasn’t worried about using it in the open.

When the Purrfect God Art came into play, other godly-class energy arts could only sit on the sidelines. Not even the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth could surpass it, let alone some Seven Killings of the Black Turtle Heaven.

Everyone looked on as Proud Radiance unleashed a torrent of energy arts to try breaking free, except nothing worked.

“What magical treasure is this?” he howled.

“It’s not a magical treasure. It’s an energy art I cultivate.” Waving his hand casually, Yang Qi dissipated the bubble and sucked the godpower back inside of himself. He had gained a lot from this little encounter, primarily establishing the connection between the Ten Universes and the Seven Killings of the Black Turtle Heaven. There was no doubt: Proud Heaven was from the Proud Clan.

Meanwhile, Proud Radiance dropped back down to the ground, various expressions flashing across his face as he finally realized that he wasn’t a match for Yang Qi.

Chapter 1156: House of God Ordainment

Proud Radiance, the top young expert in the Lightningbolt Continent, had been defeated with one move. Everyone in the audience was either stunned, or gasping in shock. The gazes fixed on Yang Qi were those of fear and respect; it didn’t matter where someone had been born or what their background was, as long as they were strong enough, people would respect them.

As for Yang Qi, he was more than pleased with the performance of his Purrfect God Art.

It was becoming more and more refined, to the point where it contained about a third of the fundamental nature of the purrling itself.

Purr. Purr....

All of a sudden, the purrling in Jadefall’s arms started purring again, and a look of disdain could be seen on its face. It almost seemed to be laughing at the idea of comparing Yang Qi’s Purrfect God Art to itself.

However, it didn’t emanate any godpower fluctuations, making it seem like nothing more than an ordinary pet. No one present had any idea that the purrling was actually more powerful than even Yang Qi.

Suddenly, a peal of laughter rang out. “Who would’ve thought that a young genius like this had come to the Lightningbolt Continent? This is worthy of celebration!”

“Lightning Dragonriser?” said Proud Radiance. “I thought you were out training! What are you doing back?”

A burly, bearded man appeared, taller than the average person, whose every step caused the faint rumble of thunder to echo about him. It was as if destructive god lightning crackled in his very bones, making him seem doughty, stalwart, and as dangerous as a ghost-god or devil-king.

‘An impressive specimen,’ Yang Qi thought, already impressed by how bold and powerful he seemed. He was obviously strong enough to compare to mid Quasi-Gods, and his godhood was obviously superior to Proud Radiance’s.

“This is Lightning Dragonriser,” Wang Juan explained, “a powerful figure from the Lightning Clan. However, he's not one of the younger generation, but one of the experts from the older generation. Although he doesn’t look a day past thirty, he’s actually over a hundred years old. By chance, he happened to acquire some De-Aging Longevity Figwort Root, which gave him an extra century of longevity compared to ordinary people.” She had already come to see Yang Qi in a completely different light now that he had vanquished Proud Radiance in a single move. If someone like him wasn’t worth recruiting, then who was?

Proud Radiance was certain to become a Lesser God within a few dozen years, so for Yang Qi to have beaten him indicated that there was a one hundred percent chance Yang Qi would become a Lesser God.

“You might be a member of the older generation, Lightning Dragonriser,” said Proud Radiance, “but after you lost to my eldest brother Proud Triumphant, you skulked off into hiding. Now, ten years later, you’re finally sneaking back onto the continent? Could it be that you’re hoping to seek revenge? Sadly for you, my eldest brother Proud Triumphant is already a god! You two are on completely different levels now, and there’s no way you’ll ever catch up to him.”

Lightning Dragonriser gave a cold harrumph that boomed like a bell. “You haven’t made any progress with your cultivation base, Proud Radiance, yet your Proud Clan continues to grow here on the Lightningbolt Continent. You people are constantly taking away business from the Lightning Clan. Just don’t forget that we run the Lightningbolt Continent, so don’t you dare break any rules.”

“You think your Lightning Clan can compare to the Proud Clan?”

“The Proud Clan is definitely a domineering clan. But in my ten years away, I happened to join a similarly important sect. The House of God Ordainment! And I've already been promoted to novice disciple!”

Almost immediately, a buzz of surprised conversation rose up.

“What? Lightning Dragonriser is a novice disciple of the House of God Ordainment?!”

“The House of God Ordainment is a legendary sect of immense power. People say that every hundred years or so, they search the continents for the most qualified elites and ordain them as gods! That’s the meaning behind the name of their sect.”

“That’s right. For many years now, the prospect of joining the House of God Ordainment has been a goal for people of all continents. Sadly, even people considered top experts by the public are often looked down on by the House of God Ordainment. By what virtue or ability did Lightning Dragonriser somehow gain favor with them? And how did he become a novice disciple?”

Some of the people present were quite famous in Lightningbolt City, yet even they were sighing at the news.

Meanwhile, Brahma projected his voice directly into Yang Qi’s ears in a way that no one else could hear. “The House of God Ordainment is incredible. They’ve been a huge, important sect for many years now, and are very mysterious. I was once the ruler of the Five Phases Continent, and a Consummate God. You could say that I was an unmatched hegemon of my time. But not even I could compare to the House of God Ordainment. However, they're very secretive and don’t often step out into the world. There must be something very special about this Lightning Dragonriser for the House of God Ordainment to take a liking to him. And the elimination rate for their novice disciples is very high. The fighting involved to advance beyond that level is incredibly fierce and deadly. Out of ten thousand such disciples who compete, only one will eventually become an official disciple. And you know what happens to all the others? They die!”

“There's a sect like that?” Yang Qi asked, surprised.

If ten thousand novice disciples would fight to the death to become official disciples, it could only be imagined what such people were like.

The survivors would obviously be top elites.

That said, Yang Qi was no stranger to ruthlessness, so the arrangement wasn’t necessarily shocking to him. He and his people weren’t winners that were selected from a group of ten thousand contestants. They were the ultimate elites who had risen up in their respective ages. The Shepherd had climbed to his position on the corpses of uncountable denizens of hell, over a course of hundreds of millions of years, facing unending dangers. In comparison, these disciples of the House of God Ordainment who were picked out of a group of ten thousand, well, they were like nothing.

Laughing, Proud Radiance said, “You think you have some amazing prospects for the future, Lightning Dragonriser? Being a novice disciple of the House of God Ordainment is like being a flash in the pan! Are you aware that the Bloodgore Trials in the House of God Ordainment involve ten thousand novice disciples all fighting and killing each other until there’s only one left? You think you can survive something like that?”

Lightning Dragonriser laughed. “The only way to find out is to try, and I’m very confident. Once I'm an official disciple, your eldest brother Proud Triumphant won’t count for anything.”

“Why don’t we talk about that after you survive,” Proud Radiance said snidely. That said, he knew that if Lightning Dragonriser actually did become an official disciple of the House of God Ordainment, he would certainly be more impressive than Proud Triumphant.

The Proud Clan was powerful, but truth be told, they were on roughly the same level as the House of God Ordainment. And although the Proud Clan extended their influence almost everywhere, their subsidiary branches were often relatively powerless, and didn’t even know what the main branch was actually capable of.

Ignoring Proud Radiance, Lightning Dragonriser turned to Yang Qi, clasped hands, and said, “Who would’ve thought that an expert like this would appear in the Lightningbolt Continent? Salutations!”

Despite the politeness of his words, the truth was that they contained an immensely powerful force that bordered on an attack.

In response, Yang Qi merely clasped his hands formally and prepared to meet the onslaught. It was obvious that Lightning Dragonriser was simply curious to see what he was capable of, and was thus probing him a bit. As he stood there, he secretly sent out some godpower to defend himself.

Bam. Bam. Bam.

Yang Qi felt like his chest, back, head, and even his feet were being pummeled by a powerful fist attack.

However, thanks to being prepared, he was only slightly shaken, and managed to dispel the force of the attack, then used the energy arts of King Heaven-Devourer to consume the resulting fluctuations.

That said he was definitely surprised that his opponent could, with a mere clasping of the hands, send energy to hit his back and the top of his head. And that wasn’t to mention the bizarre fact that the bottoms of his feet had also been hit.

Meanwhile, Lightning Dragonriser was similarly taken aback. He had just used a secret magic from the House of God Ordainment, something called the Shadowless Emptiness Godfist. It was a very powerful technique that made the fist and the heart empty, and through true emptiness, brought about true fullness. By the multitude of variations of true energy that resulted, it could make invisible attacks from virtually any angle.

However, when the attack hit Yang Qi, it was like a statue of an ox tossed into the sea, and had no effect whatsoever.

‘How could this guy’s energy arts be so advanced? And he hasn’t reached godly ascension yet? It was by sheer chance that I met an elder from the House of God Ordainment and helped him out with some matters, which led me to learning a few of his moves. That elder said that I'm an outstanding figure among Quasi-Gods, but I couldn’t even lay hands on this guy! His energy is as strong as a mountain and as deep as a sea. He's definitely much stronger than me.’

Smiling, he said, “You have my sincere respect, Brother Yang. Your energy arts are extremely profound, more so than I imagined. I find it hard to believe that you’re just a mere wanderer. The energy arts of wanderers are usually nothing worth mentioning. How could you possibly be so skilled, Brother Yang?”

“You flatter me,” Yang Qi replied with a faint smile, not wanting to reveal any of his secrets.

“If you aren’t already a member of some organization, why not join the House of God Ordainment? We’re recruiting novice disciples right now, and the Bloodgore Trials will be beginning soon. Given the level of your cultivation base, Brother Yang, you could definitely come out on top of a group of ten thousand opponents. And then you’d be an official disciple of the House of God Ordainment.”

“Oh?” Yang Qi said curiously. “But Brother Lightning, aren’t you a novice disciple as well? You’ll take your place in the Bloodgore Trials as well, which means that if we fought each other, one of us would have to die. Wouldn’t that be picking up a rock only to drop it on one’s own foot?”

“No, it wouldn’t.” Lightning Dragonriser replied. “You see, there are going to be something around a billion people joining the Bloodgore Trials. Each individual group only has ten thousand members. With a hundred thousand such groups, there’s no way both of us would be in the same one.”

“In that case, maybe I’ll give it a shot.” Yang Qi had known all along that he would need to join some sort of organization. To gain enlightenment, enter the field. To gain further enlightenment, live in the world. To gain the greatest enlightenment, participate in the court. In the god world, the powerful sects were like royal courts. And the House of God Ordainment was one of the powerful sects. He would most likely have access to better cultivation resources there, and would also have the protection provided by a large organization.

Obviously, Lightning Dragonriser was trying to recruit him in the hopes of building up his own base of power. But when soldiers come, send a general to stop them. Right now, Yang Qi didn’t think of Lightning Dragonriser as being even close to a threat.

Chapter 1157: Wretch-God Sneak Attack

Based on the words that had just been exchanged between Lightning Dragonriser and Yang Qi, the top figures in Lightningbolt City could tell that they had just secretly compared strength. And obviously Yang Qi came out on top.

Yang Qi was already coming across as so mysterious and unpredictable that no one present felt confident in being able to keep him in check.

Raising her voice, Wang Juan said, “Today, the Wang Clan is holding a banquet to celebrate the death of Pirate King Deku. Everyone, please cast aside any cares or worries and join together in the celebration! Henceforth, commerce will prosper in the ocean districts, and our city will experience a new boom in prosperity!”

“Don’t be so quick to celebrate,” Lightning Dragonriser said, immediately throwing cold water on Wang Juan.

“What is that supposed to mean, Lightning Dragonriser?” Proud Radiance said, his expression darkening. “You weren’t invited to this banquet, but considering you’re from the Lightning Clan, I suppose that can be tolerated. But if you keep stirring up trouble, that could change!”

“I came here with some news, Proud Radiance,” Lightning Dragonriser casually replied. “The act of killing Pirate King Deku stirred up the wrath of the wretch-god who backed him! And that wretch-god is leading an army here to kill the gods of the Lightningbolt Continent!”

“Hmph! Wretch-gods? Who cares about them? You think the gods of the Lightningbolt Continent are worried about some wretch-god?”

“In that case, let me provide another piece of news that might rile you out of your repose. The wretch-god has the support of a devil church from distant lands, the Hell-Breaking Church. And this wretch-god has a godhood rating of six! A rating of six is more than enough to crush all the gods of the Lightningbolt Continent!”

“What?” Proud Radiance said, shocked. “Why would a famous devil organization like the Hell-Breaking Church want to cause problems for the Lightningbolt Continent? Are you serious about this?”

“Believe me, or don’t, it’s up to you. In any case, I just came here today to relay the news. I already explained matters to the Lightning Clan, and they’re making preparations for what's to come. You see, I got the details from an elder of the House of God Ordainment. I just hope that the Wang Clan can help defend the Lightningbolt Continent and work with the other gods to fight back this wretch-god. And the Proud Clan had better offer some help, too, otherwise the consequences will be too horrible to contemplate.”

“I need to go find out more information about this!” Proud Radiance said, obviously not willing to take Lightning Dragonriser’s words at face value. Turning, he left.

“Is this really happening?” Wang Juan said. “It seems we have some important matters to discuss. I’ll notify my clan seniors immediately. Ladies and gentlemen, the banquet is hereby canceled. Everyone, head back home and prepare for the worst.”

“Let's go. A wretch-god invasion is a big thing.”

“Hurry. The wretch-gods from the deep ocean are terrifying. I've heard they want to lay waste to everything. We have to go all out to defend ourselves. Maybe we should just flee the continent.”

“No, we can’t flee. Where would we go? The Lightningbolt Continent doesn’t have teleportation portals! The best thing to do is stand our ground and fight to the death against the forces of the wretch-god. As long as we stand united, we have a chance!”

“That's right. Although we can’t interfere when the gods fight, we can at least slaughter this wretch-god’s followers. And that will reduce his power!”

A sinister wind was already blowing overhead as the banquet ended and people scattered.

“I apologize, Brother Yang,” Wang Juan said. “Who could have ever guessed that a wretch-god would invade the continent? I invited you to my banquet for nothing. Brother Yang, considering how profound your cultivation base is, and the fact that you defeated Proud Radiance with a single move, you’re obviously going to make a name for yourself on the Lightningbolt Continent. Why not join us in fighting this invasion?”

“What do you know about this wretch-god?” Yang Qi asked. His initial inclination was to not get involved, but if this invasion involved the entire continent, it was likely he would get dragged into it whether he wanted to or not.

Furthermore, he was interested in siding with Lightning Dragonriser and joining the House of God Ordainment, which meant it would make more sense to get on Lightning Dragonriser’s good side. Besides, it was always possible that the battle itself would lead to benefits for him.

And he was very confident in his fighting ability.

“The wretch-god in question is a brutal entity known as the Bloodcorpse God. He established a wretch-god kingdom on an island out in the ocean, where he gathered a host of ruthless believers. Then he recruited the pirates to plunder other islands and locations to bring him tribute or slaves to be new believers. If the Bloodcorpse God is really on the way, he’ll likely reach here by tomorrow, or at the latest, the day after.”

“Oh really?” Yang Qi said. “In that case, I don’t think I can just let him off the hook. I’ll wait until the army arrives, then make a more detailed assessment.”

“His army is definitely going to besiege us,” Wang Juan said. “Our clan will work with the other clans and gods to fight back. When the gods fight, we won’t be able to interfere. But we can kill whatever pirates and believers he brings with him, and defend Lightningbolt City in general.”

The most important city in the Lightningbolt Continent was Lightningbolt City, which was located right on the shore.

Of course, being located so close to the water made it easy to conduct business. Most clans had a lot of wealth stashed away in the city, which meant that if the city were to be sacked by the wretch-god, the clans would suffer grievously. And of course, the wretch-god would benefit immensely.

Based on Yang Qi’s estimation, the population of Lightningbolt City was probably over a hundred million.

In other words, if the wretch-god sacked the city, he would end up killing a hundred million mid Terrifying experts! It was something that would be completely unthinkable in the mortal world. In the Immortal Dao Age, there were only a few hundred mid Terrifying experts total. The sacrifice of a hundred million mid Terrifying experts would be enough to found a new age, or completely transform the dao of heaven.

‘Fuck,’ thought Yang Qi. ‘In the god world, a slaughter like this counts for almost nothing. The average citizens are in the mid Terrifying level, although I'm sure there are quite a few peak Terrifying experts. With a sacrifice like that, the Shepherd could easily become a wretch-god.’

“Brother Yang Qi,” said Lightning Dragonriser, “if you’re going to help us, then I suggest that we head out on the water tonight and launch a sneak attack on the wretch-god’s army. What do you say? They’re definitely out there right now. If we can kill his Quasi-God believers, it would leave his army leaderless and take a lot of pressure off of Lightningbolt City. And we could probably get some loot in the process.”

“Alright,” Yang Qi said. “I’ll follow your lead. But first I need to head back and confer with my compatriots. Once you finalize your plan, Brother Lightning, just get in touch with me.” He gave a meaningful look to Brahma and Jadefall, who nodded in return.

“That’s fine. I’ll send you a message later tonight.” Lightning Dragonriser took out a paper talisman that glittered as if it were filled with lightning. “This is a messaging talisman from the Lightning Clan. If you ever run into trouble, you can use it to find people from the Lightning Clan to help you.”

Yang Qi took the talisman and hurried off.

A short time later, he was back at the inn, where he found that everyone had made their breakthroughs and were making adjustments to their cultivation with his Sage Monarch Grand Magic.

His immortal-slaying clone was surrounded by pulsing immortal-slaying power, and was now in the peak Terrifying level. Furthermore, his senses were now so advanced that he could summon an illusory projection of the final of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions.

Seeing Yang Qi approaching, the clone burst into hearty laughter. “I'm in the peak Terrifying level, Yang Qi. Now I can vaguely sense the will of King Immortal-Slayer, and even interact with it.”

“Is that so?” Yang Qi said. Reaching out, he put his hand on the clone, causing the God Legion Seal to appear in the clone's sea of consciousness. And there, it was possible to detect the presence of an immense will struggling with the clone’s, a will that bore the aura of King Immortal-Slayer.

“I understand,” Yang Qi said, a serious expression on his face. “These are some effects left behind by King Immortal-Slayer. When King Immortal-Slayer’s will entered the Great Necropolis, he knew that he had an immense opportunity. If he could use the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart to control the necropolis, he would be unparalleled under heaven. Not only would he restore his previous glory, but he could make the necropolis a part of him and become a paragon in the god world! I wonder who ended up winning, him or Proud Heaven.”

“Can Proud Heaven really compare to King Immortal-Slayer?” a few people murmured.

“You absolutely, positively cannot underestimate Proud Heaven!” Yang Qi replied. “His enlightenment of the Ten Universes divine ability is absolutely spectacular. Furthermore, I suspect that he has the support of some powerful gods. And I recently confirmed that Proud Heaven is indeed connected to the Proud Clan of the god world, an extremely important organization.”

“I've reached the peak Terrifying level as well,” Proud World said. “I can unleash my godpower externally. As a Quasi-God, I can finally hold my head high in the god world. Who would’ve guessed that the Proud Clan would be so important here? But maybe I can take over the clan and become the new ruler. Wait. No. I'm going to destroy it. Wipe it out of existence!”

Laughing, Doom said, “Wipe out the entire Proud Clan? Brutal! But I say forget it.” He had also achieved a breakthrough, thus entering a particularly mysterious state.

All of the people present had risen to the heights of the mortal world, so all they needed was the right resources and they were like fish in water. They could have achieved their breakthroughs normally, but Yang Qi had still baptized them with his God Legion Seal, making them even more compatible with the vital energy and essence of the god world.

“A wretch-god is about to invade this continent, but in the end, it could be a great opportunity for us. Furthermore, my intention is to join the House of God Ordainment, and ultimately get all of you in as well. We should fit in splendidly there.”

With that, Yang Qi began elaborating on his plan.

Chapter 1158: Nighttime Attack

Everyone nodded in approval at Yang Qi’s idea of joining the House of God Ordainment.

They had all fought their way up from the mortal world and were fully aware of the benefits of joining a big sect.

When millions upon millions of people joined forces into one group, they became incredibly powerful, such that a single person here or there couldn’t possibly stand up to them. True advancement had to be made by means of an organization. And if one could secretly seize the flow of destiny, or even come to lead the entire organization, it was possible to have a truly strong foundation.

There was no way a bunch of random stragglers could form a powerful organization.

Even in the mortal world, where Yang Qi could rely on the God Legion Seal, he had still ended up joining organizations like the Demi-Immortal Institute and the Titan Emperor Collegium. After taking control of the destiny of those locations, he had moved on to the Brahman Immortal World, the Dao Defense League, and the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect.

One step at a time, he had slowly taken control of the destiny of those powerful organizations.

That was what had led him to his current position.

That was the true method to practice cultivation.

The destiny of such organizations would include power, resources, hope, and more. At the very least, the resources required for breakthroughs couldn’t be acquired by a group of random stragglers. And if they ran into the wrong powerful opponent, they could be destroyed.

In the end, it was obvious that joining an organization was vitally important.

As they discussed the matter, everyone emphasized how important it would be to stick with Lightning Dragonriser and get into the House of God Ordainment. In terms of the Bloodgore Trials, none of them were particularly worried. How hard could it be to slaughter ten thousand opponents? They were experts who had killed millions upon millions of enemies in their lives, so why would they possibly be worried about some weakling savages from the god world?

As for Yang Qi, there was no way he would underestimate these friends of his.

Once they were in the House of God Ordainment, they would be able to work hard to rise through the ranks, and would surely reach the point of being able to take over or even overthrow the sect.

As they discussed matters, they continued working on their cultivation and Yang Qi helped them stabilize their cultivation bases after their breakthroughs, drawing on the God Legion Seal to do so.

Whoosh. Whoosh. Whoosh. Whoosh.

Blazing sword light shot out from Sword Seventeen’s fingers, easily leaving three-inch gashes in the ground. As for the Shepherd, Doom, Eldest Brother, and everyone else, they all experienced dramatic and profound advancements.

The sky went dark, and everyone was becoming much more familiar with their energy arts and higher levels.

“Ah, what a pity,” Brahma said. Chopping his hand out, he created a small, five-colored projection of a hand. It was made of true energy that conformed to the five phases, and it only lasted for a moment before vanishing. “If only we had the resources to produce large amounts of godnotes. I know all sorts of ways to use various spirit medicines to improve one’s godpower. With the right medicine, we could experience overnight what most people would take a hundred years to accomplish.”

“Just wait until we’re in the House of God Ordainment,” Yang Qi said. “When my cultivation base is a bit higher, I’ll be able to produce godnotes, and then we can buy whatever we want. Remember, Lightningbolt City, and even the Lightningbolt Continent in general, might as well be a little town compared to the god world in general. Even with a lot of godnotes here, we wouldn’t be able to get everything we need. We just need to wait until we’re part of the House of God Ordainment.”

“Are you sure you can trust Lightning Dragonriser, Yang Qi?” asked Yang Zhan. “What if he's plotting against you? We can't rest all of our hopes on him alone.”

“Of course he’s not trustworthy.” Expression flickering with killing intent, he continued, “But I can kill him any time I want. As long as I’m confident enough to use the God Legion Seal, then not even a Lesser God could cause problems for me.”

Suddenly, Yang Qi’s lightning amulet buzzed and a voice reached his ears. “Brother Yang Qi, the experts of the Lightning Clan are ready. We’re being joined by the Wang Clan to head out and launch a sneak attack on the wretch-god’s believers. They’re camping out on Egret Island, not far from the Lightning Continent.”

“We can head out shortly,” Yang Qi replied. “Where should we meet up?”

“On the beach thirty kilometers east of here. We’re waiting for you.”

“Come on, let’s go,” Yang Qi said to his companions. They all leaped into the air, pulsing with the auras of Quasi-Gods as they glided along. Of course, at the moment, they still weren’t capable of true flight.

Yang Qi could have flown if he really wanted to. His godpower was so abundant that he was in no way inferior to a Lesser God.

But if he did something that heaven-defying, it would definitely arouse the attention of the gods here on the Lightningbolt Continent.

They moved with normal speed for a time until they were on a beach of soft, white sand. It felt incredibly comfortable to walk on, and the breeze that swept off of the water was lovely. However, there was no moon or stars, ensuring that everything was as dark as could be.

It seemed like the perfect atmosphere for killing.

Thankfully, there were luminescent pearls on the beach that cast soft light about, revealing a host of experts from Lightningbolt City.

As for Yang Qi, he had a golden flame on his palm that illuminated the area around him.

The first people that caught his attention were the Wang Clan experts, of whom there were several dozen, all Quasi-Gods. Wang Juan was there, but she could only count as average in the group.

Wang Yi was also there.

“You really don’t know the difference between life and death, do you?” Wang Yi said upon seeing Yang Qi. “We're going to kill some elite believers in a wretch-god. We need to conserve as much godpower as possible, whereas you waste it without a care in the world to make that fire of yours. What kind of extravagance is this! Well, when your godpower runs out, don’t expect us to help you.”

“Oh really?” Yang Qi said with a dark smile, extinguishing his flame.

Obviously, he knew exactly what he was doing. He just wanted to make himself seem like someone without much experience, in the hopes of preventing anyone from speculating that he had ascended from the mortal world. It was a given that people from the mortal world would know how to conserve power.

Smiling coldly, he said, “I have a lot of godpower, so I'm not worried about wasting a bit.” It could help a lot to have himself come across as wildly arrogant. After all, everyone knew that he had come out on top of conflicts with both Lightning Dragonriser and Proud Radiance. It only made sense that he would be arrogant because of that, and hopefully it would cast the experts’ thoughts away from matters relating to the mortal world.

“Come on, Brother Yang, now's not the time for squabbling,” said Lightning Dragonriser. “We all want to work together to strike a blow against the enemy. Egret Island is about three hundred kilometers from here, and we aren’t planning to take ships there. Ships would be spotted too easily.”

“So what are we supposed to do?” Yang Qi replied immediately. “Don’t tell me you expect me to fly. Flying would drain just about everyone here of all their energy. There’s no way we could make a three hundred kilometer journey in that way.”

“Don’t worry, we came prepared. We have a windsail for everyone.” He pulled one out of his backpack and handed it to Yang Qi. It seemed to be crafted from special feathers that rippled as it moved. When he threw it over his shoulders, it spread out according to some internal framework, settling over him like a cloak.

“Windsails are made from the feathers of a godbird we call a helpwind. Send godpower into it, and you can use it to ride the winds and fly. The amount of godpower you’ll spend powering the windsail will be far less than actually gliding on your own. And once you get used to it, it can be used to fly without hardly any effort at all. Windsails are very expensive, Brother Yang, but I don’t mind giving some to you and your people. Please just return them when we’re finished with the operation.”

Other members of the Lightning Clan produced more windsails, which they handed over to the others.

Yang Qi found that the feathers of the windsail contained the power of a wind god, making the item a true treasure. That said, there was no spell formation built into it. If there was a spell formation, it would have been even more amazing.

“Let me explain how to use the windsails,” Lightning Dragonriser said, and went on to demonstrate how to control them. Yang Qi and his people were all extremely intelligent and quickly mastered all the methods.

Seeing that they could use them, the other experts present nodded. Not wanting to waste any more time, they opened their windsails like wings and flew out over the ocean. Although there wasn’t any light at all, everyone knew which direction to travel, and could communicate with paper talismans if necessary.

Yang Qi opened his Lord's Eye, and upon powering it with some true energy, was able to make out a few of the details that were obscured by the darkness. Thanks to the functions of the God Legion Seal, no one had any idea what he was doing. As he looked ahead of them, he could sense a wretch energy pulsing off in the distance like a tongue of flame.

They flew for about an hour until an island appeared ahead, surrounded by battleships of every size imaginable. Most were festooned with bones and skulls, and even patches of human skin dripping with blood. The rancorous energy they pulsed with was overwhelming.

Countless wretch-god believers manned the ships, most of them armed with sabers. And they had erected altars upon which they were sacrificing men and women alike, cutting their heads open while murmuring enchantments.

It was a particularly brutal and grisly sight.

Chapter 1159: Wretch-God Believers

The wretch-god believers were vicious to the core. However, they were all brainwashed, and believed that their acts of wretched evil were actually manifestations of holy piety.

Yang Qi watched as men and maidens alike screamed curses as they were beheaded, giving birth to towering rancorous energy. As for the wretch-god believers, they bore expressions of zealous reverence, without a hint of compassion. In fact, they looked as pleased as farmers harvesting a field of golden wheat.

The souls that they were taking from the victims provided them with abundant wretch-god power, and truth be told, it was something the Shepherd might have done, except that he couldn't in the current circumstances, lest he be hunted and killed.

Also, Yang Qi wouldn’t permit him to do so. Yang Qi couldn’t allow wretched evil to overcome that which was just and righteous. The last thing he wanted was to allow the world to descend into chaos.

Wretched evil thrived on the power of chaos, while righteous justice thrived on the power of order. The truth was that they had started out as one, with righteousness and justice prevailing much later on. Considering Yang Qi’s deep understanding of both righteousness and evil, in the end, he had chosen the path of order. That meant that he would suppress the path of chaos. He cultivated the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, which suppressed the chaos of hell and could assimilate wretch-gods.

“We’re here,” Lightning Dragonriser said. “There are plenty of Quasi-God experts among these wretch-god believers, and we can’t afford to underestimate them. And there are likely disciples from the Hell-Breaking Church. Considering how rich they are, it’ll benefit us a lot to fight and kill them. In any case, remember that our main goal here is to destroy their wretch-god altars, slaughter as many wretch-god believers as possible, and weaken the wretch-god himself.”

Even as he made his announcement, a group of experts shot higher up into the air, then dropped down toward the enemy. They were disciples of the Proud Clan, and they were obviously taking the initiative in the fight. Yang Qi spotted them and immediately recognized the sword energy of the Seven Killings of the Black Turtle Heaven.

Crack!

One of the battleships made of human bones collapsed into pieces.

Looking around at his people, Yang Qi said, “Everyone stick together. Don’t split up, got it? Although this might seem like a simple fight, we have to be careful.”

They nodded in response, then spread their windsail wings and headed into the fray. As soon as they arrived at one of the ships, Brahma launched an attack from his Cardinal Grand Brahman Five Phases Energy Arts. It slammed into one of the wretch-god believers, shattering his five viscera.

Cackling loudly, the Shepherd said, “I can finally gorge myself!”

The Shepherd was by no means a virtuous fellow, so he didn’t spare any effort on being merciful. As soon as he descended from above, his claws latched onto a wretch-god believer and crushed him to bits. Then the Shepherd sucked in the believer’s soul, causing the faint weeping of ghosts and wailing of gods to echo out.

“A mid Terrifying expert, absorbed like that!” The Shepherd almost seemed like he was enjoying an afternoon snack. “What could be better than a soul like that? I could never get stuff like this in hell!”

The Shepherd’s quick victory came as no surprise. After all, he had acquired all sorts of godly-class energy arts during his time in hell. In fact, Yang Qi’s people all had more godly-class arts on an individual basis than any of the average locals. It only made sense, considering they were apex individuals from the impure lands.

In the Lightningbolt Continent, even Wang Juan only had access to the energy arts of Lesser Gods, which couldn’t compare to what people like the Shepherd had. He and his compatriots had godly-class arts that were virtually on the level of those practiced by the Sovereign Lord himself.

That was one reason why people who had ascended from the impure lands were so prized.

The addition of their godly-class energy arts would be a huge benefit to any sect in the god world.

The Shepherd had just reached the peak Terrifying level, and his godpower was currently weak compared to what it could be. Therefore, he was using powerful godly-class energy arts to absorb the souls and quintessence energy of the wretch-god believers. And with the power of the God Legion Seal to back it up, the harmful side-effects could easily be negated, making him vastly stronger.

One after another, he slaughtered the wretch-god believers, transforming them into desiccated corpses. He was even able to use some of King Heaven-Devourer’s techniques that Yang Qi had taught him to speed up the process.

Whoosh. Whoosh. Whoosh...!

The Shepherd was like a butterfly that had just emerged from the cocoon, dancing in the breeze as he cut down the enemy and grew stronger in the process.

Meanwhile, Proud World also couldn’t hold back from using some devil techniques to improve his own godpower.

The others weren’t inclined to use such techniques, so they simply stuck close to Yang Qi. Together, their group was like a meat grinder that destroyed the wretch-god believers in their path with astonishing speed.

“Be broken!” Yang Qi landed on a battleship and struck out with his palm, sending out godpower that blasted a huge hole in the deck. In response, a Quasi-God shot out, sending out streams of wretched light that resembled centipedes.

However, Yang Qi simply grabbed the centipedes, and they shattered. Then his hand latched onto the neck of the Quasi-God, who he threw over to the Shepherd.

“A Quasi-God!?” the Shepherd shouted in delight. He quickly began devouring him like a gourmet delicacy, causing his own godpower to rise rapidly.

In the blink of an eye, the Shepherd’s godpower doubled.

With that, Yang Qi led the way into the ship’s hold, where massive amounts of godstones were piled up alongside chests filled with medicinal pills.

Crack!

Yang Qi chopped out with his hand, breaking open one of the chests and causing a host of crimson, walnut-sized pills to spill out.

“Those are Blood-Coagulation God-Recalling Pills,” Brahma said. “They’re concocted by taking a rare god herb and soaking it in fresh blood. It can improve the energy and blood, and transform the godpower even more effectively than Godsieve Pills. Those are going to be very useful!”

All of a sudden, a voice reached their ears. “What do you wanderers think you’re doing? Keeping the loot for yourselves?”

A group of Proud Clan disciples poured into the hold, and when they saw the Blood-Coagulation God-Recalling Pill, their eyes flickered with greed.

“You people can have one pill each. The rest belong to the Proud Clan!”

“In your dreams!” the Shepherd said, and he was just about to make a move on them when Yang Qi reached out to stop him.

“One pill a piece isn’t enough,” Yang Qi said. “These are our spoils of war, and we’re taking all of them. Don’t even think of trying to cause problems for us.”

“Can you even take all those chests with you?” one of the Proud Clan disciples said. “Proud Radiance has a storage ring that can contain all kinds of items. Do you really think you can just walk off with that much loot?” He burst out laughing.

“That's right! How will you wanderers take the loot away?”

“Our Proud Clan won’t do a thing about all these pills. Just eat them all right here and now! As long as they’re in your stomachs, of course we won’t take them.”

“Blood-Coagulation God-Recalling Pills are so powerful that you can only take one per month. There’s no way you could survive eating so many at once. And if you want to try, there’s nothing the Proud Clan will do to stop you.”

Although these Proud Clan disciples didn’t dare to actually fight Yang Qi, they weren’t going to just stand by while he took so many valuable pills.

“Is that so?” Yang Qi replied. “Actually, this one chest isn’t even enough for us.” Waving his hands, he pulled all of the medicinal pills over to him. Then he used some true flame energy arts to melt them into a blood-colored conglomeration of medicine that looked like a dragon. Next, he split the dragon into a host of smaller dragons that shot directly into his people.

They all burst out laughing. After all, with their experiences with the Godsieve Pills, and their God Legion Seal powers, how could they have any trouble with such pills?

All of them had small versions of the Heaven and Earth Furnace within them, making it an easy thing to turn medicine like this directly into godpower.

Crack. Crunch.

Sword Seventeen suddenly grew several times larger, and from the cracking sounds that rang out inside him, it was as if he had experienced a growth in his power and cultivation base that would normally take dozens of years. Not even people who had been Quasi-Gods in the god world for decades could measure up to him. It was almost like he was cheating in some way.

“You people...” blurted the Proud Clan disciples, who were stunned by what they were seeing. “You’re actually absorbing all of those pills without exploding? Your cultivation bases are improving more than they should in decades! How could you be doing this...?”

Chapter 1160: Experts from the Hell-Breaking Church

The young elites from the Proud Clan were completely stunned. How could these people possibly be consuming so many Blood-Coagulation God-Recalling Pills? Even Quasi-Gods would have to be careful when dealing with the explosive medicinal strength of such pills, lest their meridians be damaged and their bodies improperly transformed.

Medicine was not the kind of thing that should be casually consumed.

It wasn’t as though people in the god world didn't commonly consume pills. Clans often had large stocks of god pills, some designed to increase longevity and others for improving the cultivation base.

Randomly consuming pills usually ended with one of two possible outcomes: either having one’s mind wiped out, or simply dying.

But Yang Qi and his people were devouring an entire chest full of Blood-Coagulation God-Recalling Pills, yet nothing was happening other than improvements to their energy arts. The Proud Clan disciples exchanged awkward glances, and were clearly at a loss for words.

“Y-y-you... you people....” They began backing up, looks of fear overtaking their faces.

“You think we're just ordinary wanderers?” Brahma said, clearly displeased. “Let me tell you, we’re far stronger than you could ever imagine!”

The truth was that even he was surprised. Normally speaking, he knew that they shouldn’t have been able to accept such explosive medicinal power. But thanks to having been refined by the God Legion Seal into pure godpower, it could bolster them immediately.

‘No wonder Proud Heaven wanted the God Legion Seal so badly,’ Brahma thought. ‘It gives the full Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth and can be used to control god vitality, create godstones, and even forge godnotes. And now it’s obvious that it can neutralize the dangerous aspects of all kinds of medicinal power. It’s like cheating!’

In fact, given this development, it was obvious that with enough medicinal pills to bolster his vital energy, Brahma would unquestionably be able to reach the Lesser God level.

It would lead to incredible benefits and help all of them to advance by leaps and bounds in a way that they could never have done in the impure lands.

The god world was the ultimate destination, and the best place to make real progress. There were challenges, but those challenges were also opportunities.

“Screw the hell off!” Sword Seventeen said, waving his hand and sending out streams of sword energy that wrapped around the young ones from the Proud Clan like strands of silk. “You deserve death for trying to steal from us, but instead I’ll just tie you up and throw you out.”

His energy arts were so advanced that he didn’t even fear Quasi-God experts now.

Whooooosh!

Yang Qi’s group flew out into the open, looking for the next ship to attack.

The wretch-god disciples were dropping like flies, and in the shortest of moments the attackers were deep into enemy territory.

“What?!” Wang Yi had led the Wang Clan forces onto one of the biggest battleships, and was in the middle of bitter fighting with the enemy’s Quasi-Gods. When he saw Yang Qi’s group pouncing like wolves and tigers, and destroying everything in their path, he couldn’t have been more shocked. And that was especially the case when he saw the Shepherd casually dispatching the enemy and transforming them into desiccated corpses.

Not even Quasi-Gods could cause them to pause for a moment.

The Shepherd’s skill in fighting was second only to Yang Qi’s, and his godpower was already vastly beyond what it was before.

Wang Yi and his people felt chills at the thought of what would happen if the Shepherd laid hands on them. They would obviously become withered corpses in the blink of an eye.

“What incredible devil church energy arts!” Wang Juan thought. “How did these people get so strong so fast? They’re advancing as if they just finished dozens of years of secluded cultivation.”

A gust of wind blasted out as the Proud Clan experts landed on the deck of the ship and reported in to Proud Radiance. Proud Radiance’s face instantly turned ashen. “Those heinous bastards....”

“What’s wrong?!” Wang Yi asked.

“Those assholes stole a bunch of medicinal pills and consumed them all at once. Their energy arts just increased dramatically.” His eyes glittered with a wretched light. “There are barely more than ten of them, and they consumed several hundred Blood-Coagulation God-Recalling Pills.”

“You’ve got to be kidding, Proud Radiance,” Lightning Dragonriser said, flying over. Looking over at Yang Qi’s group slashing through the enemy forces, he said, “Those pills take a month to properly assimilate. And during that month, you can’t engage in any fighting or use any of your godpower. If the medicine isn’t properly controlled, it’ll explode and destroy your meridians. How could they have possibly consumed so many pills?”

“Believe it or not, I don’t care,” Proud Radiance said. “There’s something fishy about these people. Look at all the things they're capable of! I wonder if they’re rebels that escaped from some powerful organization. Maybe they were all injured, and their energy arts crippled, but they’ve finally recovered. I bet if we took them captive, we could benefit a lot.”

“Stow that talk, Proud Radiance!” Lightning Dragonriser said. “They’re friends of mine, now, so you’d better not lay a finger on them!”

“I'm just worried that you’re inviting the wolf into your house,” Proud Radiance said. “Are you really going to bring them to your sect? I know what you’re thinking. If you get them on your side, you’ll enter the House of God Ordainment with your own faction already established. But what if they’re only interested in their own power?”

“I have my own plans, thank you very much,” Lightning Dragonriser said. “You really do underestimate me, don’t you? Well, don’t worry. I know what to do and what not to do.”

“I guess we’ll see if you can keep them in check,” Proud Radiance said. “As for me, I'm not going to just take all of this lying down.”

“Take what lying down?” a voice said, and a moment later Yang Qi and his group flew over, all of them carrying chests of medicinal pills.

Blood-Coagulation God-Recalling Pills.

The wretch-god’s forces had brought all of these pills with them for their assault on Lightningbolt Continent in the hopes of using them to carry out a very ingenious plan. They hoped to set up wretch-god altars and then burn the pills to create sagefire, which would empower their wretch-god and simultaneously allow them to use spell formations to level Lightningbolt City, killing everyone in it.

Now that Yang Qi had looted their stash, such plans were meaningless.

As he and his people landed on the deck, he was surrounded by such a baleful energy and bloody-soaked aura that as soon as he looked over at Proud Radiance, the young man backed up instinctively, his face draining of blood.

It was obvious that Yang Qi’s energy arts had advanced yet again.

“Be broken,” Yang Qi said, and the wave of his hand opened one of the chests, causing medicinal pills to spill out. Before they could even hit the ground, they melted into what looked like blood-colored dragons that shot directly into all of Yang Qi’s people.

“What do you think, Brother Lightning? Like this technique of mine? To be honest, I have a few tricks that I can use to neutralize the negative effects of medicinal pills. I can reduce the medicinal strength to make them easy to assimilate.” Throwing out some more bait, he continued, “It could really strengthen your Lightning Clan, and maybe even make you stronger as the rulers of Lightningbolt City.”

“Is that really possible?” Lightning Dragonriser said, clearly astonished. However, seeing what was happening right in front of his eyes, how could he disbelieve? The Shepherd, Jadefall, Sword Seventeen, and even Yang Zhan were all stronger than he was. Their godpower was nothing short of miraculous.

“Facts can vindicate big talk,” Yang Qi said coolly.

“If you’re really capable of such things, Brother Yang Qi, it would definitely be of immense help to the Lightning Clan. If you could immediately boost our experts, then we’d definitely make sure to keep you absolutely safe. We won’t let anyone lay a finger on you.” Lightning Dragonriser obviously recognized how valuable someone like Yang Qi could be.

“To be honest, I don’t care much about the Lightning Clan,” Yang Qi said. “I want to get into the House of God Ordainment. That’s where the real resources are. Being there would be a lot better than being stuck in a backwater place like Lightningbolt City that no one has ever heard of. Once we’re official students of the House of God Ordainment... just imagine how much we could help you. You would get very strong, very fast.”

With the Blood-Coagulation God-Recalling Pills to help his people get stronger, Yang Qi cared less than ever about the current situation. It was as if they had just gone through a session of a hundred years of cultivation. Being at the peak of the Quasi-God level, they were beginning to turn their virtual godhood into the real thing.

With enough medicinal pills, they would be able to reach the true heights of strength.

When Lightning Dragonriser saw all of Yang Qi’s people absorbing the medicine, his face lit up with delight, and then he laughed. “That settles it. I originally thought the Bloodgore Trials were going to be difficult. But if you can help improve my godpower, Brother Yang Qi, then I won’t have any issues at all.”

“That’ll be easy,” Yang Qi replied. “I can do it right now.” He quickly summoned what looked like a blood-colored dragon that shot forth and entered Lightning Dragonriser’s chest. Lightning Dragonriser immediately sensed warmth flowing through him as the medicinal power became a spell formation inside of him, provoking constant transformations as it headed toward his dantian region.

Lightning Dragonriser looked more delighted than ever, in part because he realized that he couldn’t have avoided Yang Qi if it had been an attack, in which case he would be dead.

‘This guy is almost as strong as a god already,’ he thought. Drawing on his sea of energy, he felt the medicinal power filling him, causing him to grow stronger with each moment.

Bursting out in hearty laughter, he said, “My godpower is already twice as incredible as before! I don’t think any other Quasi-God could be a match for me!”

Meanwhile, Proud Radiance looked on, livid, but at a loss for words.

It was at that point that cackling laughter rang out from Egret Island and numerous sparks of ghostfire appeared, which resolved into the shape of people.

“Watch out! Hell-Breaking Church disciples!”

Everyone began shivering in fear.

As for Wang Juan, she said, “Crap, those really are disciples from the Hell-Breaking Church. We need to get out of here! We can't fight them! We might have hope against one or two, but not that many!”

Chapter 1161: Altar Destruction

Hell-Breaking Church was a huge devil church from the other side of the ocean. They had people with very powerful cultivation bases and boundlessly profound ghost-god techniques. Their disciples could use a variety of devil techniques, and their ranks were filled with wretch-gods and devil-gods, including everything from Lesser Gods to Common Gods to Greater Gods.

They offered support to wretch-gods in all parts of the god world, helping them carry out gory acts of terror.

And now the Bloodcorpse God was working with the Hell-Breaking Church in an attempt to destroy the Lightningbolt Continent. Although the Lightningbolt Continent might be considered an insignificant place in the god world as a whole, it still had a huge population, which made it an enticing source of food for wretch-gods.

All of a sudden, Yang Qi realized it made sense that the endless numbers of fiend-devils of hell were so dead-set on eventually coming to the god world.

The common people in the god world had mid Terrifying cultivation bases, so if fiend-devils consumed them, it was a given that their own cultivation bases would skyrocket.

Upon hearing Wang Juan’s exclamation, Yang Qi smiled and said, “Run? I’d say these Hell-Breaking Church disciples showed up at just the right time. Since they like sacrificing people and killing captives, we don’t need to show them the slightest mercy. That’s the cycle of karma: let justice be served.”

The Proud Clan disciples didn’t turn and run. Seeing how confident Yang Qi was acting, they were too embarrassed to flee. Besides, their mission to destroy the altars hadn’t been completed yet, and without the wretch-god weakened, the destruction of the Lightningbolt Continent was all but assured.

RUMBLE!

Ghostfire swirled, resolving into numerous figures who initially didn’t seem at all like people from a devil church. They wore beautiful clothing, had lofty demeanors, and seemed to be looking at the invaders like they were cattle about to be slaughtered.

One of the disciples stepped forward and said, “Are you from the so-called aristocratic clans that rule the Lightningbolt Continent? Sadly for you, to people like us from the Hell-Breaking Church, you’re nothing but trash.” He was tall and well-built, and looked to be only about twenty-six or -seven years old. However, emerald flames flickered deep in his eyes, making it seem like he was made from ghostfire inside and out.

“Who are you?” asked a disciple standing behind Proud Radiance. “The Hell-Breaking Church has a lot of guts to call us trash. Do you really dare to insult the Proud Clan like that?”

“Proud Clan?” The Hell-Breaking Church disciple glanced over the group from the Proud Clan. “Oh, I see. You’re from the Proud Clan, a very large organization. Unfortunately, people from the Proud Clan are split up into all sorts of grades and ranks. How much actual Proud Clan blood do you have? I doubt you have what it takes to compare to even the weakest auxiliary bloodline.”

“Who exactly are you?” Proud Radiance barked. “Tell us your name! Then we’ll see if the Proud Clan is willing to tolerate talk like this.”

“I'm Ghost Infernis,” the disciple replied. “And no, the Hell-Breaking Church isn’t scared of the Proud Clan. In fact, I highly doubt the Proud Clan would even notice if we slaughter the lot of you. And if they did cause problems for us, it would be the perfect excuse for the Thirteen Devil Churches Alliance to declare outright war!”

A female disciple from the Hell-Breaking Church then spoke up. “Eldest Brother Ghost Infernis, why waste your breath on them? The Bloodcorpse God’s plan is about to come to fruition. We’ll soon have complete control of the Lightningbolt Continent, and then we can sacrifice everyone there to unseal the Hammer of the Lightning God, the animadestiny god item of the original creator of the continent, the Lightning God. So let’s just enjoy ourselves by stomping these fools out of existence.”

“That’s fine,” said Ghost Infernis. “Just wipe them out. Attack!”

Swish. Rustle.

The robes of the Hell-Breaking Church disciples flapped as they lunged forward and started fighting. Ghost Infernis joined in, launching a casual palm strike that caused the wailing of ghosts and weeping of gods to echo, and surrounded him with flickering stars of ghostfire that seemed to come from the depths of hell.

When that ghostfire hit the disciples of the Wang, Lightning, and Proud Clans, they screamed as their flesh burned. And quite a few of them just directly dropped dead.

“This is bad!” Wang Juan shouted. “He’s using the Ghostfire Strike of the Devil-King! That’s a toxic energy art unique to the Hell-Breaking Church! They extract ghostfire from the corpses of fallen gods, then catalyze it with the will of a devil-king. If you get hit by those ghostfire stars, you’ll die no matter what!”

“Very observant, girl!” Ghost Infernis chuckled. “You recognized my Ghostfire Strike of the Devil-King!” He struck out again, sending stars flying and forcing numerous disciples to scatter in every direction trying to get out of the way.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi blurred forward, interposing himself between Wang Juan and Ghost Infernis, where he launched his own palm toward the incoming stars of ghostfire.

“No!” Wang Juan blurted in alarm. “Don’t let it touch you! The Ghostfire Strike of the Devil-King will burn even the bravest warrior to death!”

“Since when?” Yang Qi said, and his palm made contact with the ghostfire.

“Looking to die, boy?” Ghost Infernis said, smiling cruelly. He poured more power into his ability, causing what sounded like the language of ghosts to surround him with howls and screams. More ghostfire erupted from inside of him, ghostfire that originated in the corpses of gods, which then bored directly into Yang Qi’s meridians, wreathing him in flames.

But then Yang Qi took a deep breath, causing him to physically expand as a vortex of godpower sprang up inside him. Then he clenched his fist and let loose an explosive blow of mountain-toppling, sea-draining force.

“Aaaiiiieee!” screamed Ghost Infernis, jerking backward but moving too slowly. The explosive force slammed into him, making it seem like the water of an entire ocean was suddenly filling his abdomen. Before he could do anything else, a bang rang out as he exploded!

BOOOM!

Blood and gore rained down. A single clash with Yang Qi had turned a top expert into nothing but a cloud of mangled flesh and body parts!

“W-what...?” Wang Juan stammered, backing up with an expression of disbelief on her face.

Yang Qi didn’t say anything in response. Instead, he flew straight toward Egret Island, where he subsequently vanished without a trace as he began searching for the main altar.

In the moment he had dispatched Ghost Infernis, Yang Qi had sensed a mysterious surge of power on the island and knew that he had to find it before that power erupted with a catastrophic effect.

Even as Yang Qi left, the Shepherd, Doom, the immortal-slaying clone, Yang Zhan, Patriarch Annalist, and Yang Qi’s other people all attacked the disciples of the Hell-Breaking Church with full force. Although the disciples were powerful, and were roughly on the same level as the experts from the Proud, Wang, and Lightning Clans, they simply weren’t a match for Yang Qi’s people. As soon as the fighting began, miserable screams began ringing out.

The disciples of the Hell-Breaking Church were crushed like ice cubes that had been hit with a hammer.

Wang Juan, Proud Radiance, and Lightning Dragonriser looked on in shock as the Hell-Breaking Church disciples fell one after another, most after only a single blow!

“I...” said Proud Radiance, gripping his weapon tightly, “I'm supposedly the top fucking fighter in this continent?! Yeah right! I’m a frog in a well! A real frog in a well! This guy could kill me without even trying. He could slaughter me a hundred times over! How could a freak like this even exist? Our Lightningbolt Continent is too small of a place for a big fish like this. We need them gone! Sooner rather than later!”

By this point, Proud Radiance didn’t harbor even the tiniest inclination to fight Yang Qi. It was more than obvious that Yang Qi was far too strong.

After all, Ghost Infernis had been powerful, but he hadn’t even been able to stand up to a single blow before being ripped to shreds.

‘It was the right move to recruit these people!’ Lightning Dragonriser thought rejoicingly. ‘This is going to benefit me immensely in the House of God Ordainment....’

Yang Qi was already on Egret Island, and whatever experts got in his way, he crushed out of existence.

Not a single one could stand up to him.

Before long, he reached the middle of the island, where an enormous altar had been set up in what appeared to be a lake of blood, filled with corpses and bones. The altar was made of stone, begging the question of how many Quasi-Gods it must have taken to move it here. And the entire thing was simmering with power.

“Lord's Eye!”

Examining the altar, Yang Qi spotted streams of blood-colored true energy swirling toward the area beneath the altar, where there was what appeared to be a blood-colored infant. It was only the size of a hand, but it was constantly growing and had a wretched energy that seemed connected to some distant location.

“A blood infant?” Yang Qi murmured. “Amazing. This wretch-god must have gone through countless trials and tribulations, and sacrificed innumerable living beings to create this thing. It would be a real windfall if I could take it. The power that exists in it can't be underestimated. In fact, if I assimilated it with King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans and the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, it would probably give some of my people the full strength of gods!”

Yang Qi flew forward and chopped his hand out toward the altar.

Instantly, the weeping of ghosts and wailing of gods echoed out from the altar as blood-colored shadows lunged to intercept him.

“Screw off, foolish monsters. How dare you get in my way!” Dazzling golden light shone off of Yang Qi, dispelling the shadows.

Then he reached out with splayed fingers and pushed his hand down into the lake of blood, his godpower thrumming. “Godly Telekinesis!”

RUUUUMBLE!

The gigantic altar began to rise up into the air, causing some of the experts from the Hell-Breaking Church off in the distance to nearly pass out from shock.

“Dear lord!” one of them blurted. “It took thousands of us Quasi-Gods to bring that altar here, and we needed a huge spell formation! But this guy is lifting it single-handedly? Is he a god?”

“A god is here? Everybody, run!”

Terrified, the disciples from the Hell-Breaking Church turned to flee.

Then Yang Qi simply swept his arm through the air, hurling the enormous altar far out into the ocean.

At this point, he was finally showing the true extent of his godpower.

Shockingly, in the depths of the lake, the blood infant’s eyes had opened and it was looking at Yang Qi.

Chapter 1162: Blood Infant

The blood infant was alive, its eyes open, smiling evilly at Yang Qi. At the same time, there was something bewitchingly charming about it, as though it was destined to grow into a beautiful person.

“Trying to enchant me?” Yang Qi said. “Well that’s a joke if I ever heard one. Smashing of the Mighty Heaven-Dragon!” A massive roar erupted from his mouth, like the voices of millions upon millions of dragons all calling out at the same time. As the devil-subduing sound wave rolled out, the blood in the lake evaporated and the blood infant shot out into the open, transforming into a shadowy, blood-colored fiend-devil, pulsing with the power of a wretch-god.

The voice of a wretch-god then echoed out. “Who are you, boy? Why did you destroy my altar and try to take my blood infant?”

“Are you the will-clone of a wretch-god?” Yang Qi said, a serious expression overtaking his face. However, upon looking back in the direction of the Lightningbolt Continent, he saw that the wretch-god was there fighting the gods of the continent. And that meant that he couldn’t afford to split off a clone at the moment. At the same time, it went to show how valuable this blood infant was.

And even if it was a god, Yang Qi wasn’t going to be scared of it.

He reached out with an empty palm that seemed like it could seize hold of everything in the cosmos. Then he closed his hand into a fist and thrust it out with such deadly force that the entire island shook violently.

RIP!

The fist landed on the blood infant, but to Yang Qi it almost felt like he had hit an airbag. His godpower simply dispersed as if it were nothing.

“Nice energy art,” the blood infant said, sounding surprised. “You’re not even a god yet, but you’re already quite formidable. Once you become a Lesser God, you’re going to be shockingly powerful even with a godhood rating of only one. Why don’t we turn weapons of war into gifts of jade and silk? Just let my blood altar keep functioning, and we can share the Lightningbolt Continent!”

“You, a puny wretch-god, want to negotiate with me?” He threw his hands out, drawing on the Sage Monarch Grand Magic, summoning an illusory flag into his hands that was none other than the Banner of Monarchs. The flag instantly stretched out, flames burning on its surface as it wrapped around the blood infant.

“Blood Corpses Destroy Heaven!” the blood infant growled, and blood-colored lightning shot out and slashed into the banner, causing huge booming noises to echo out.

Eyes narrowing, Yang Qi sent immense amounts of godpower forth, giving mountain-crushing weight to the banner.

But then the blood infant said, “Heaven-Piercing God Ability!”

The infant began spinning like a drill, unleashing immense godpower that pierced right through the banner, which finally exploded. “You just wait until my true self gets here, boy. Then I’ll show you a thing or two.”

“Where do you think you’re going?” Yang Qi said with a smile. Flicking his finger, he sent out a miraculous bubble that instantly contained the blood infant. It was the Purrfect God Art!

Swish!

The bubble shrank down and flew over to Yang Qi, settling down onto his palm. Inside, the blood infant bashed back and forth, trying to escape, but it was all to no avail.

“Let’s go!” Yang Qi said, flying up into the air.

In response, the Shepherd, Jadefall, and everyone else flew over to join him.

“I acquired a blood infant,” Yang Qi explained. “Everything went very smoothly. Our cultivation is going to lead to godpower at least a hundred times greater than that of any ordinary Quasi-Gods.” With that, he raised his voice and said, “Ladies and gentlemen from Lightningbolt City, the wretch-god altar has been destroyed. I’ll take the lead from here. Follow after me as you can.”

The experts from the Wang, Lightning, and Proud Clans slaughtered what remained of the wretch-god believers, then flew up into the air as well. They knew that their mission had been accomplished, and that it was all thanks to Yang Qi.

Yang Qi and his people surreptitiously made their way back to the Lightningbolt Continent, where they eventually landed on a remote beach.

Rustling sounds could be heard as nearby wild animals detected their presence. Some of the animals rushed forward to attack them, but they were no longer the helpless individuals they had been when they first arrived in the god world. In short order, the wild animals were wiped out. Next, they cleared out a space in the forest to sit down and have a discussion. Yang Qi waved his hand and set up a spell formation, then summoned a bubble around them.

“The mission to destroy the altar netted us a blood infant!” he said, bringing it out and showing it to them. “Let’s join together to assimilate it. Afterward, we’ll be so strong that no one will be able to stand in our way.”

Looking at Yang Qi, Brahma said, “Tell us the truth, Yang Qi. None of us are really sure of how strong you are. If a Lesser God came, how confident are you that you could come out on top?”

“A Lesser God couldn’t kill me,” he replied coolly. “In fact, I could easily kill such a god, assuming it had a godhood rating of one.”

“Great,” Brahma said. “Then you should be the one to assimilate the blood infant. It’ll bolster you with significant god vitality and help you reach the Lesser God level even sooner than normal.”

“No need,” Yang Qi replied. “I’d rather enjoy blessings and endure misfortune together with you. And I'm definitely not interested in being selfish. Besides, here in the god world, I don’t need medicinal pills, because the God Legion Seal is constantly absorbing the surrounding essence and using it to bolster me. You really have no idea how powerful the complete God Legion Seal is.”

Everyone nodded, fully aware that the God Legion Seal was proving more powerful and useful than ever, now that they were in the god world.

“Everyone settle down. I’ll break down the blood infant and make you all stronger than ever.” Yang Qi released the blood infant from the Purrfect God Art, and everyone unleashed their animadestiny true flame, surrounding it with fire. The blood infant shrieked, but was locked down and couldn’t do anything.

Next, Yang Qi drew on the God Legion Seal, sending a stream of golden light out from his finger to destroy the blood infant.

Innumerable blood-colored projections flew this way and that, and while normal spell formations couldn’t have stopped them, Yang Qi’s Purrfect God Art could! Immense streams of godpower then poured into everyone present, causing them to slowly float up into the air as they went through their breathing exercises.

“Quickly assimilate it,” Yang Qi said in a voice that echoed in their souls. “Transform your bodies, stimulate the dao of gods. Seek enlightenment of god. As you do, begin forming godhood within you....”

The immortal-slaying clone took the lead, reaching out again to connect with the will of King Immortal-Slayer, which caused a projection of King Immortal-Slayer to appear above him.

“Where are you, King Immortal-Slayer?!” he said in a booming voice. “I know you want my help to turn the Great Necropolis into your new body. Let’s make a deal!”

“What deal?” the projection replied. “You’re the bearer of the God Legion Seal. The two of us are the ultimate enemies. Why would you want to work out a deal?”

“Only profit is eternal,” Yang Qi replied. “Enemies are not. Surely you understand that, King Immortal-Slayer. Give us power, and we’ll help you!”

“Power? I'm trapped in the Great Necropolis! I can talk with you and your immortal-slaying clone, but you’re crazy if I'm going to transfer power to you. I'm not going to waste resources like that.”

“Well never mind then,” Yang Qi replied. “I guess we’ll expel your will for all time. God Legion Seal!” Even as the words left his mouth, he began to activate the power of the seal.

“Slow down,” King Immortal-Slayer said. “Considering your cultivation base, you shouldn’t be able to compare to gods at all, much less be qualified to talk about making a deal with me. But since you’re the bearer of the God Legion Seal, it's a given that you’ll be a god eventually. How about I give you some advice about how to reach godly ascension?”

“Advice about godly ascension?” Yang Qi laughed. “I know of ten thousand ways to achieve godly ascension. Why would I need any advice from you?”

“You have your own dao, so of course you don’t need advice from others. But what about all your friends? In all fairness, your Sage Monarch Grand Magic really is spectacular. I almost can't believe you merged the Unspoiled Body and the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. But you’ve only reached a superficial level of accomplishment. Besides, everyone should have their own dao. If your people cultivate your dao, it will lead to problems.”

“So what do you want them to do, cultivate your dao instead?”

Yang Qi knew that King Immortal-Slayer had left some of his will on the immortal-slaying clone in the hopes of controlling him. Not even the clone was aware of it. However, there was no way Yang Qi would let that happen. However, because of that, it was entirely likely that King Immortal-Slayer not only knew about his Sage Monarch Grand Magic, but had actually mastered it. To someone like him, it wouldn’t have been hard at all.

“King Immortal-Slayer, you’re famous and invincible, a god from ancient times who actually fought the Sovereign Lord of the many heavens. So I'm very curious about your thoughts on my Sage Monarch Grand Magic.” Clasping his hands behind his back, he stared straight at the projection of King Immortal-Slayer. “Is it good enough to be on the same level as the Sovereign Lord’s technique? Is it enough to break through to the Annulled level?”

“It’s a bit early to say,” the projection replied. “Not even the Sovereign Lord achieved Annulled will convergence. He surpassed the Unbounded level, but was only half-Annulled. Then he perished. The framework you've built for your technique is impressive. Sage, Monarch, Ruler, Emperor, Sovereign, Lord, Hero, Hegemon, God, Nothing. The ten daos of the many heavens, with humans as the foundation. All ten daos are ways for humans to reach the peak. Unfortunately, despite how marvelous it is, there are huge gaps in it. You obviously can’t use its most refined aspects. For example, that Banner of Monarchs. Do you know what a monarch really is? The true dao of monarchs isn’t an expression of rage, backed by a million corpses, and used to conquer men. Instead, it’s a way to convince people to follow you by means of morality. Your version of the dao of monarchs has no morality, which means you don’t understand what it truly means to be a monarch. Your dao of monarchs is actually the dao of tyranny. The true dao of monarchs is governed by morality, while the dao of tyranny is governed by killing.”

Chapter 1163: A Chat with King Immortal-Slayer

King Immortal-Slayer’s words instantly illuminated Yang Qi’s heart and mind.

The dao of monarchs was one of morality.

And it was true that his version of the dao involved waging war, killing, and waving the banners of conquest. Where his flag was unfurled, heads rolled and blood fell like rain. Where was the morality in that?

The dao of monarchs used morality, while the dao of tyranny used killing. Apparently he had confused the difference between a monarch and a tyrant, and King Immortal-Slayer, being as formidable as he was, had instantly identified that weakness.

That said, Yang Qi still burst out laughing. “The high and mighty King Immortal-Slayer is talking to me about morality? You’re a monarch too, the fabled Immortal-Slayer, filled with killing intent. Where’s the morality in that? You spilled so much blood in the god world that no one can even quantify it. Just how many ancient gods fell to you? Was that an expression of morality? You’re more like the origin of chaos! The root of all evil!”

“How could you possibly understand the suffering I endured?” King Immortal-Slayer said coldly. “Besides, how much do you know of the chaos I wrought on the god world? Brahma, you know a bit of it. Would you care to explain?”

Brahma nodded. “Exalted King Immortal-Slayer, I still admire you for what you did back then. The boundless Sovereign Lord sought to wreak tribulation on the gods, with the goal of wiping them out. He wanted heaven and earth to be free of us gods. There was only one among us who dared to stand up to him, and in fact, the only reason that the gods are free and independent now... is because of you. Yang Qi, the truth is that the Sovereign Lord wanted to kill all the gods. That was his plan, and that was why he brought tribulation to the god world. It was called Operation Godless. Truth be told, it would probably take a thousand years to explain all of the complicated aspects of the situation.”

‘So that’s what happened,’ Yang Qi thought. That said, in the end, it didn’t really matter what happened in ancient times. The main thing he was concerned with was the cultivation of his Sage Monarch Grand Magic.

Thanks to King Immortal-Slayer, he now understood the difference between the dao of monarchs and the dao of tyranny. All of a sudden, his Banner of Monarchs transformed, filling up with benevolence and righteousness, and the concept of uniting everything under heaven.

The dao of tyranny vanished from the banner and was replaced by a faint sensation of morality. Although it reduced its attack power, it now seemed like a gentle spring rain shower, soft and unbreakable, a dao of monarchs based on morality, that was invincible wherever it went.

Of course, it would take time to grow that morality, and it wasn’t currently enough to push the Sage Monarch Grand Magic to greater heights.

“See?” said King Immortal-Slayer. “My advice about the dao of monarchs helped you. So perhaps we can talk about a deal of some sort. If you're interested, your immortal-slaying clone can lead you to me. Unfortunately, I have a matter to attend to right now, I can’t—”

King Immortal-Slayer’s voice vanished, as though he had suddenly come under attack.

The clone opened his eyes. “I didn’t realize King Immortal-Slayer left something behind in my sea of consciousness. And I can’t get rid of it. That means he could theoretically take control of me at some point. This is a problem. What are we going to do about it?”

“It should be fine,” Yang Qi said. “It seems he needs our help to get out of his current predicament. I’m sure we’ll figure out a way to deal with the situation.”

Meanwhile, everyone else was slowly absorbing the power of the blood infant and using it to vastly improve their godpower.

“Cruiser of Civilization. Engine of the One God!”

Yang Qi’s fragments of the Cruiser of Civilization flew out from the clone. Right now, he had most of the cruiser, and was only missing the godhood manufacturing systems. When he got that piece, the ship would finally be able to show its truly amazing capabilities.

“Let’s assess our power indexes,” Yang Qi said.

[Beep-beep-beep...] the photonic computers said. [In the god world, the assessment criteria is different. Assessing anyone who is not a god is pointless....]

“Well that’s disappointing,” Yang Qi said, shaking his head. “The Cruiser of Civilization’s power assessment systems don’t work here.” With that, he sent the cruiser back to the clone and decided to just stick to using the God Legion Seal.

The seal had essentially the same functions as the cruiser, but was more powerful.

“We're many times stronger than before,” Doom said. “Even if a god came, we’d be unstoppable. It's too bad King Immortal-Slayer didn’t explain how to make godhood. We’re going to have to figure that out on our own.”

“It’ll be fine,” Yang Qi said. “And we’ll still have more chances to talk to King Immortal-Slayer. Besides, gaining enlightenment of your own dao is a much better option.”

Everyone rose to their feet amidst creaking and cracking sounds. Their godpower reserves were immense, and their virtual godhood was already starting to crystallize.

The weakest of the group was currently Patriarch Annalist, yet he and everyone else could easily kill dozens, or even a hundred Proud Radiances put together.

All of a sudden, Yang Qi realized that his lightning amulet was vibrating. It was Lightning Dragonriser, trying to send him a message.

“Brother Yang Qi, are you around here? Where are you?”

Yang Qi could tell that Lightning Dragonriser was trying to pinpoint his location by using the amulet. But could such a tiny amulet really compare to Yang Qi’s Life-Death Void-Destruction Lightning?

Obviously not.

“We’re in the forest off the beach,” Yang Qi said, “just finishing a session of cultivation. Hurry over.”

“Forest off the beach?” Lightning Dragonriser said. “There’s a banquet being thrown in the city right now to celebrate the destruction of the altar. You played the biggest role in that, so you've got to attend! The gods of Lightningbolt City drove away the wretch-god, which means that this was a major victory. Furthermore, the gods of the city have summoned you and your people.”

“They’ve summoned us?” Yang Qi said. He chuckled coldly. “Nah, we’re not interested. We were in this for ourselves anyway. Lightning Dragonriser, why don’t you just meet up with us and then head to the House of God Ordainment?”

“What? The gods are summoning you and you’re refusing? That’s going to put me in a bad position. Look, I’ll come over there to talk this out in person.”

A moment later, Lightning Dragonriser appeared, flying through the air with his windsail. When he saw how much stronger Yang Qi and his people were, he shivered. “The patriarch gods have summoned you. You should really go see them.”

“Forget it.” Yang Qi replied in a cold voice. “There’s no way being summoned by patriarch gods is going to turn out well. I’ll pass. Do they really think they can just kill us now that we aren’t of use, or possibly steal our spoils of war? If so, they’re crazy. I could destroy gods like them if I had to.”

A rather forced expression overtook Lightning Dragonriser’s face. “Er... well, if that’s how you feel, Brother Yang Qi, then I won’t force you. I can handle any fallout from the gods regarding your refusal.”

“You don’t need to handle anything,” Yang Qi said. “Look, I want you to take us to the House of God Ordainment. After the Bloodgore Trials, when we all become official disciples, all of this will be worth it. And then I’ll truly trust you. What do you think?”

“You want to go now?” Lightning Dragonriser said.

“Now,” Yang Qi said coolly. “Of course, if you don’t want to, we can just part ways, and I’ll figure out another way to get into the House of God Ordainment.”

“Of course I want to! Why wouldn’t I? I’d be a first-class fool to refuse someone like you. Truth be told, I've already moved on from Lightningbolt City. It’s far, far too small. How could anyone make a name around a bunch of frogs in a well like those bickering Lesser Gods?”

“Then let’s go!” Yang Qi said. By now it was obvious who was calling the shots, and Lightning Dragonriser realized that. Little did the man know that Yang Qi could kill him with a thought if he wanted to.

“Take flight!” Everyone flew up with their windsails and had soon disappeared over the ocean.

As they flew along, Lightning Dragonriser explained, “We’re going to have to cross the Blackmare Ocean, our destination being another continent. The truth is that although the Lightningbolt Continent is called a continent, it’s really nothing more than an island. The real continents are far larger. The place we’re headed to is called the Primal-Chaos Continent. It's a true hodgepodge of good and bad people, and is thousands of times more dangerous than the Lightningbolt Continent. You can find murderous bandits, wretch-god believers, and even powerful devil-gods. Of course, there’s also the royal court.”

“How long will it take?” Jadefall asked.

“A year at the least. If we were gods, perhaps it would only take three days. But considering how slow we fly, a year.”

“That’s so long,” the Shepherd said. “Are we going to miss the Bloodgore Trials?” The mere thought of those trials filled the Shepherd with excitement, as he knew it would be an opportunity to kill people right out in the open.

“We won’t. But even if we did, the Bloodgore Trials are held every few years, so it’s not a huge deal. This is going to be a dangerous journey. The demonlings in the ocean won’t be easy to deal with.”

“Will we have opportunities to rest?” Yang Qi asked. Even top experts would need to stop to eat and drink in the god world. Although he could make do with the God Legion Seal, his people couldn’t.

In fact, if he were alone, he was confident he could make the trip in a month, not a year.

“Of course,” Lightning Dragonriser said. “There will be plenty of islands to stop on along the way. Someone who doesn’t know the way might get lost and end up dead. After all, running into a lair of demonlings or godlings can turn tragic very quickly. But you have me to lead you, so things are different.”

Below them, there was nothing but endless blue water, with occasional waves reflecting the sunlight back up to them.

After flying for a day, and just before darkness fell, they spotted an uninhabited island where they could land to rest.

According to Lightning Dragonriser, it wasn't safe to fly over the deep ocean without light, lest they get lost and fall prey to demonlings.

Chapter 1164: Flying over the Ocean

Out in the deep ocean, there were a plethora of demonlings that haunted the pitch-black night.

On the deserted island they had chosen to spend the night, the travelers lit a roaring fire. As they sat there, they could hear howls of rage from the water, apparently from various wild beasts fighting each other in deadly fashion. The waves crashed loudly, mixing with the sound of combat.

Whoosh!

Suddenly, something in the distance noticed their fire, and a shadowy figure blurred in their direction. A bird the size of a human became visible, with the face of an old woman. Its withered skin was covered with complex designs, and it had sharp claws that pulsed with godpower.

Apparently, it was at the level of a Quasi-God!

“Watch out!” Lightning Dragonriser said. “That’s a crone harpy! They’re very strong and fierce, just as bad as wretch-god witches!”

However, even as the words left his mouth, a beam of sword energy shot out and cut the crone harpy in half.

Sword Seventeen snorted disdainfully. “How dare a wimpy bird such as that attack us. Was it suicidal?”

Walking forward, he probed at the harpy with his sword until he managed to pull out something that looked like a pearl. ‘A godpower pearl! Not bad. Not bad at all. In the lands of mortals, demonlings have internal pellets, and it's the same with godlings in the god world.’

There was no way Sword Seventeen would speak his final thoughts aloud, lest Lightning Dragonriser guess that they were from the lands of mortals.

Lightning Dragonriser sighed.

“What are you sighing for, old pal Lightning?” the Shepherd said. “We just killed a daemon, and you’re acting like we killed your mother.”

“You have no way of knowing, but the crone harpies usually travel in groups. They’re a powerful group on the high seas, and when you kill one, its daemon energy will infect you. Afterward, it’ll be hard to stay safe. These daemons are the type who seek revenge over the smallest grievance, which means they’ll definitely come after us.”

He sighed again. “When we come across beasts like this, the best thing is to drive them away. Once they realize how strong we are, they’ll leave us alone. That’s how these creatures work. But when you break that rule, they won’t rest until you’re dead.”

“So that’s how things work?” As far as Yang Qi was concerned, rules like this made sense. It was better to give a warning that would prevent people from causing problems.

But what was done couldn’t be undone, and Yang Qi felt no fear.

“Most pertinent, some of the crone harpies are Lesser Gods,” Lightning Dragonriser continued. “If we keep killing the harpies, their demon-gods are eventually going to come after us. And the question is whether or not we can escape from pursuit like that.”

“I'm not worried about some demon-gods,” Yang Qi said, chuckling coldly. “They aren’t anything impressive. Even Lesser Gods with a godhood rating of one, two, or possibly even three won’t stand a chance if we work together. In fact, they’ll find out exactly what it means to ‘murder gods’.”

The Shepherd laughed heartily. “I love murdering gods. In fact, I was just wondering when I would have a chance to get some practice at that. If a god comes, let’s surround it and assimilate its blood. It will definitely help us to advance our energy arts and cultivation base.”

‘My god, who are these people?’ Lightning Dragonriser thought. All of a sudden, he wondered if he had misjudged them, and if bringing them to the Bloodgore Trials would be a mistake.

That night, while everyone rested on the deserted island, Yang Qi stayed awake and kept watch. With the God Legion Seal to help him, all he had to do was close his eyes for a brief moment and he would get as much rest as an ordinary person would get in a whole day.

There were no demonlings on the island itself, but there were plenty out in the darkness of the night. And when such creatures tried to crawl on land, Yang Qi would use a bubble to keep everyone safe.

Yang Qi was finally starting to realize how many creatures there were in the ocean. There were octopus-like creatures who crawled on eight legs, half-fish half-human creatures, and many more. Overall, the situation seemed generally dangerous, despite the fact that they were on an island.

Yang Qi wasn’t interested in slaughtering them all.

There was no point in killing animals, and he couldn’t strengthen himself with their corpses, nor could his people. And after his conversation with King Immortal-Slayer about the morality of the dao of monarchs, his desire to kill had lessened.

Although his own sense of morality seemed superficial at the moment, it was growing. As such, he simply drove the sea creatures back into the water instead of killing them.

Eventually, it was daylight.

Yet again, the ocean was illuminated with radiant light. However, Yang Qi could sense that there were faint strands of coldness seeping through the air, seemingly coming from one specific location.

“What's going on? Is winter coming or something?”

Everyone got the sense that the seasons were changing. However, it was strange, as the recent thunderstorms were clearly the hallmark of summer. And since the god world had no sun, how could there be changes in season?

“We absolutely, positively must not step out into the open,” Brahma transmitted into their minds. “The weather in the god world changes unpredictably. In fact, there really aren’t four seasons. The years are measured by the number of days, which is how things have worked for a long time. In terms of the weather, it could be hot like summer one day, then cold like winter the next, freezing everything in sight.”

“What a world...” Yang Qi said. The god world was seemingly unfathomable, yet that was just a representation of how mighty it was.

“Crap,” Lightning Dragonriser said. “I can’t believe winter is falling so quickly. In fact, I bet it’ll snow soon. It’s impossible to fly in a blizzard, and for all we know, a storm could last for months. What happens if we get seriously delayed?”

Even as they spoke, the howling of the wind picked up and the temperature dropped. Fist-sized snowflakes started falling, turning the sky white and making it impossible to get any sense of direction.

Whoosh!

Almost immediately, the wind grew so intense that they felt like they were going to be blown off their feet.

“Snowflakes...” Yang Qi said, reaching out to let one land on his palm. It had six sides and radiated a sharp chill that seemed more intense than anything from the immortal worlds.

In fact, just one of these snowflakes could probably freeze an immortal world solid.

Yang Qi’s people wouldn’t have been able to endure such temperatures before, and would have instantly been turned into corpses.

Thankfully, they had furthered their cultivation and were getting used to the god world. With their godpower, they could create coverings to prevent the snow from hitting them.

In this weather, the windsails weren’t going to be of any help. Using them in such intense winds could easily turn out to be deadly. Besides, if they flew out over the ocean and couldn't find another island to rest on because of the storm, they could easily tire and end up dead.

“It seems we have no choice but to rest,” Lightning Dragonriser said, sounding worried. “Once the snow passes, we can hurry on our way. Hopefully this doesn’t last for months, otherwise we might freeze to death.”

“Ah, what’re you scared of?” Yang Qi laughed. “You think a bit of snow like this is going to stop us from traveling? You’re kidding, right? Let’s go!”

With that, he flew right up into the wind.

Unleashing his godpower and energy arts, he cleared a path through the snow. Given his current level, it was something he could do without much effort.

“This....” Lightning Dragonriser’s face fell. “But how do we fly? We can’t use the windsails! It’ll be suicide!”

“Think of flying as a type of cultivation,” Brahma said. “And don’t worry about your godpower running out. Yang Qi will help you when you run low. You want to survive the Bloodgore Trials, right? Then think of this as a bit of a test.” With that, he flew up to join Yang Qi.

Seeing he had no choice in the matter, Lightning Dragonriser followed.

Despite the protection of their godpower and energy arts, it was still freezing cold as they flew over the water. Below them, the waves still surged, which was somewhat frightening.

If the water had frozen, they could have dropped down to recover their energy when flying became impossible. But the ocean water in the god world couldn’t be easily frozen. On the ocean floor were countless volcanoes that heated up the water, making it very warm. It would probably take thousands of years of endless snowfall to cause the surface to freeze.

That was nothing particularly miraculous. The history of the god world stretched back for so many trillions of years it was impossible to count. And there were points in history where snow fell for thousands of years, freezing numerous cultivators. During such ice ages, the commoners were forced to find refuge in the god legion kingdoms.

There was no rhyme or reason to the weather in the god world. Luckily, Yang Qi and his people hadn’t arrived in an ice age, otherwise he would have been the only one to survive the arrival.

Of course, as there were ice ages, there were also ‘fire ages’, in which the entire god world was so hot that everything dried up and died.

Chapter 1165: Chaotic Weather

They flew for a month, which was when Yang Qi truly came to understand what the weather was like in the god world.

Snow was constantly falling, making everything a somber white. Eventually, the demonlings stopped coming out, preferring to hide in the deeper, warmer water, where they weren’t in danger of freezing to death. No more crone harpies appeared. Apparently, even they had to fear the wind and snow.

During that entire month, it never stopped snowing.

When there wasn't snow falling, there was snow deluging.

It got colder and colder, to the point where they had to keep moving to prevent from freezing up. Patches of ice were now visible on the water, although the heat from below was slowly melting it.

It was Yang Qi’s first time seeing a freakish storm like this.

The month of travel often had Lightning Dragonriser feeling tired to the point of death. It required every ounce of godpower he had to keep flying along. And sometimes he was so exhausted he nearly fell out of the sky to be eaten by ravenous demonlings. However, Yang Qi would catch up and infuse him with energy. After a very short meditative rest, they would then continue on their way.

Thanks to this method of travel through the snowstorms, Lightning Dragonriser’s energy arts were actually improving.

They proceeded through the snow, never bothering to find islands upon which to rest. When they tired, Yang Qi would summon a Purrfect God Art bubble for them to meditate and rest in. He never gave them godpower, preferring to let them develop it on their own.

They had consumed numerous medicinal pills and assimilated the blood infant, giving them very impressive godpower. But there were still things within them that were holding them back. Thankfully, it was very helpful to go through this process of putting every ounce of effort into flying, then recovering their energy and repeating the process.

It was a session of tempering that was producing amazing results.

In fact, it was superior to anything they could have possibly experienced in the immortal worlds, except perhaps for their time in the Great Necropolis. That said, not even the Great Necropolis could truly compare to the god world.

“Yang Qi... I need to rest,” said Sword Seventeen, and with a yelp, he plummeted out of the air, spiraling down toward the water. Apparently, he was so exhausted that he had completely run out of godpower, down to the last scrap.

Before he could hit the water, Yang Qi flicked his finger, causing a bubble to spring into being around him, protecting him from the falling snow.

“I can’t do it!” Yang Zhan said, and he started falling as well, until Yang Qi summoned a bubble for him.

Lightning Dragonriser had made big progress lately, but it was an extreme form of cultivation that he never could have accomplished without Yang Qi’s help. And now, he was only starting to realize that Yang Qi never seemed to rest. He had been flying nonstop the entire time, heading in the same direction, using bubbles to help everyone else rest.

“What’s going on Yang Qi?” he asked. “Don’t you need to rest?”

“Of course not,” Brahma answered, flying over. “Why else do you think he was so quick to decline the invitation from the gods of the Lightningbolt Continent? He’s already become one with heaven and earth, and can go on and on without rest. You have no way of even guessing what his true level is.”

“But that’s impossible!” Lightning Dragonriser said. “Even the patriarch gods from Lightningbolt Continent couldn’t fly for a month in a snowstorm without stopping. Are you even stronger than the gods?”

“You’ll understand once we reach the House of God Ordainment,” Yang Qi said coolly. “Eventually, we’ll all get high standings, including you. Tell me, how has this month of tempering improved your cultivation base?”

There was no need for Lightning Dragonriser to even answer the question. He was already twice as strong as when he had left Lightningbolt City. He could obviously deal with the Bloodgore Trials without any problem now. That said, he wasn’t going to just let his guard down. The Lightningbolt Continent might as well have been a tiny village. In the wider world outside of it, it was impossible to predict what kind of people they would run into. More than ever, he was convinced that sticking with Yang Qi was the best thing.

“It's been snowing for a month,” Jadefall said. “When is it going to stop? Don’t tell me we're entering an ice age.”

“A month of snow?” Lightning Dragonriser said. “That’s nothing. Even if it snowed for fifteen or twenty years, it still wouldn't count as an ice age. It would need to go for a thousand years or more for that. I'm going to guess this snow won’t last for more than a few years. And it wouldn’t surprise me if, afterward, things get so hot and dry it becomes unbearable. Then we might have to seek refuge in the kingdoms of gods.”

“Let’s just keep flying,” Brahma said. “My only regret is that there aren’t any demonlings to kill along the way.”

“With snowfall this heavy, the demonlings are all in hiding. Think about it, even we're only able to fly because of Yang Qi helping us with his Purrfect God Art. If the demonlings tried to fly around right now, they would die. You’re right, let’s keep going. At this rate, we should reach our destination in half a year or so.”

Thus, their journey continued, with Yang Qi not resting at all, and everyone else only taking short breaks when they became completely exhausted.

**

One day, Yang Qi realized that a new continent had appeared up ahead.

He had to use his Lord's Eye to see it, whereas the others couldn’t see it at all thanks to the sheets of snow.

It was a sprawling land that was obviously bigger than the Lightningbolt Continent. The snow was still heavily falling there, but there was a busy harbor visible. Apparently, the people there weren’t worried about the snow, as there were all sorts of merchant ships going to and fro.

The city that surrounded the harbor was protected by a huge spell formation that kept the snow at bay.

It had obviously been built by gods.

Only the gods would have the resources to build such places. When the gods couldn’t afford to build kingdoms, but had enough believers, they would create cities to provide defenses against the evils that existed around them.

Both the harbor and the city were far larger than Lightningbolt City, and the mere fact that they were protected by spell formations was very telling. After all, Lightningbolt City didn’t even have any spell formations.

Yang Qi saw mountains on this continent, places that surely had godstone mines.

In a place with as much business and wealth as this, there were certainly major consortiums full of all sorts of dubious characters.

“That’s the Primal-Chaos Continent,” Lightning Dragonriser said, sounding more than a little excited. “I can’t believe we got here so quickly. It hardly seemed like half a year of travel. Hopefully we can still make it to the Bloodgore Trials.”

With that, they flew into the harbor.

When the locals saw people flying in from the open ocean, many of them gasped in surprise.

“I can’t believe there are people flying around in weather like this! Apparently there are a lot of people who don't fear death.”

“I didn't notice. Are they experts of some sort? They must be here for the House of God Ordainment’s Bloodgore Trials. I really don’t understand why so many people show up for the trials. Out of ten thousand participants, only one survives.”

“People have grand aspirations. It’s little wonder. Most of the participants are nobodies who live horrible lives. They would do anything for a chance to rise up in life.”

“Quit dreaming if you think that’s going to happen. Just live your life. Work. Earn some godstones. Buy some medicinal pills to get stronger. Look, it's snowing so badly that we would die without the right pills.”

“Do you know how expensive medicinal pills are? Those shysters are making it impossible for us to live. We should revolt!”

“Revolt? How? People like them could slaughter ten thousand of you with the flick of a finger.”

When Yang Qi landed on the pier, the crowds parted for him. They were all commoners and Despots, people who worked like porters and kept their heads down, struggling to survive.

How very miserable.

“This city is called Triopolis,” Lightning Dragonriser explained. “The House of God Ordainment has a sect hall here. I can help you become novice disciples there, and join the Bloodgore Trials. We arrived just in time. Remember, a lot of Quasi-Gods are going to be here to join the trials.” With that, he led them into the city.

Chapter 1166: Bloodgore Trials

As they approached the gate, a guard said, “Pay up! It’s ten godstones per person to get into the city.”

However, when the man saw Yang Qi and his group, he realized that their dignified and imposing air identified them as being something other than common Despots and suddenly became a lot more courteous. Obviously, they were Quasi-Gods who could release godpower externally, and also seasoned killers.

Of course, this city was administered by gods, and Yang Qi knew that it wouldn't be a good idea to cause problems by trying to force his way in without paying the tax. So he handed over the godstones and was given an identity medallion in return. With that, they entered the city.

As soon as they stepped inside the city, they felt a lot more relaxed. Snow was blowing around in the sky, but the spell formation prevented it from getting into the city.

Of course, not everyone in the area lived in the city. There were villages and houses around the outskirts, and in bad weather like this, the residents had no choice but to come to the city for refuge.

The local residents weren’t required to pay a tax to enter the city. However, they had to follow the rules of the city. For instance, they had to live in the emergency housing set up in one corner of the place.

The city was huge, and as a result, it wasn't crowded, not even with the influx from the snowstorm or the numerous Quasi-God experts converging on the city. In fact, business was booming.

Lightning Dragonriser knew that Yang Qi wanted to avoid any delays, so he hurried through the city toward a particularly large building, where they caught sight of a line of Quasi-Gods waiting outside.

There were also guards, clad in green garments, bristling with killing intent and immense cultivation base fluctuations. Although they weren’t full gods, they were obviously extremely dangerous.

When one of the green-clad guards saw that Yang Qi’s group was bypassing the line, he shouted, “If you’re here for the Bloodgore Trials, then get in line! Pay your godstones, otherwise we’ll cut you down without asking any questions!”

“It’s me,” Lightning Dragonriser said, handing out his novice disciple’s identification plaque. “I'm here on orders from Elder Sun, so I’ll just go in through the back. Alright?”

“Oh, it’s you, Lightning Dragonriser,” one of the disciples said, smiling. “So these people are with you? Well, that makes things easier. You’re welcome to skip the line. Go ahead into the main hall to register.”

With that, they went inside.

Although the other Quasi-Gods waiting in line were furious, they couldn’t say a word. They knew that the House of God Ordainment would punish them severely if they did. Not even gods would dare to defy the House of God Ordainment.

“Who are they? And why do they get to cut in line? Well, they’re obviously weaklings. If I run into them during the Bloodgore Trials, I’ll just slaughter all of them.”

Quite a few people were saying such things.

However, other people were saying things like, “They must be really strong, especially their leader. Look at how he walks! He's as majestic as a dragon or tiger. Terrifying!”

Of course, the ‘leader’ they noticed wasn’t Yang Qi, it was Lightning Dragonriser. Yang Qi and his people were so powerful that they were one with their surroundings, and didn’t reveal anything about their cultivation bases.

Inside the hall, Yang Qi and his group caught sight of several old men presiding over the registration process. When they saw Lightning Dragonriser lead a group inside, they nodded in greeting. “Are you here to join the Bloodgore Trials, Lightning Dragonriser?”

“That’s right. And these are some friends of mine who would also like to join. Elders, do you mind putting them into different groups so that we don’t end up fighting and killing each other?”

He accompanied his words with a large bag of godstones.

One of the elders took the bag, hefted it to get a sense of what was inside, then said, “Excellent. Come, use your energy to inscribe your name on this jade amulet. That’s all you need to do to register. Don’t worry, we’ll put you in separate groups. Now take these identity medallions and head back out into the city. Rest up, enjoy yourselves, and don’t go anywhere. You’ll be notified when the trials begin.”

Upon inscribing their names and taking their identity medallions, they left. The registration process was as simple as that.

With that, they found a tavern in the city where they secured lodgings and settled down to wait for news. Thanks to the spell formations in the tavern, its interior was as warm and cozy as a spring day. However, it cost quite a few godstones. In this city, the hard currency was the godstone, as godnotes were simply too valuable. Generally, godnotes were reserved for use in auctions and similar situations.

“Well, we’re all registered,” said Lightning Dragonriser. “As you all already know, the Bloodgore Trials have groups of ten thousand people all fighting each other. Those who survive become official disciples of the House of God Ordainment. I'm a novice disciple right now. Although I already have some measure of authority, once I enter the Bloodgore Trials, all of that goes away. Right now, we have a week or two before the trials begin, so is there anything in particular you need to do ahead of time?”

After what had played out so far, it was finally dawning on Lightning Dragonriser that Yang Qi seemed to have an unending supply of godstones.

‘If this guy is so rich, what was he doing in a tiny place like the Lightningbolt Continent?’ he thought.

Glancing at Lightning Dragonriser, Yang Qi said, “We don’t have anything important to do right now. Let’s just stay here and work on our cultivation. After the training of flying over the ocean through the snow, we’re all a lot stronger. We could slaughter gods if necessary, so what do we have to fear from these Bloodgore Trials?”

“As they say, preparedness averts peril,” Lightning Dragonriser said. “I have an idea. Why don’t we go to one of the big auctions they have here in Triopolis? We might find something useful. With the right magical treasures or medicinal pills, wouldn’t we be even more confident?” He sighed. “There are going to be countless experts participating in the Bloodgore Trials. And Triopolis is located near a few dozen other harbor cities. The business consortiums all trade with each other, stocking up on good magical treasures that the Quasi-Gods could use in the fighting. We could definitely make ourselves into a much bigger threat.”

“I really don’t understand,” said Patriarch Annalist, shaking his head. “The Bloodgore Trials are obviously a huge massacre. Out of ten thousand people, only one survives, and the others all die? I can’t believe people will scramble like a flock of wild ducks to join a competition like that. Do they all think they’ll survive?”

“People are motivated by profit. Do you know how much you can benefit from being an official disciple of the House of God Ordainment? At the very least, you can reach godly ascension! Become deathless! Even Quasi-Gods eventually die of old age, and most of those who join the contest have no hope of making further breakthroughs. Some already have one foot in the grave, while others are just wildly ambitious and willing to take the risk. Others are from aristocratic clans, where the competition to reach godly ascension is even fiercer. The possibility of becoming a god in the House of God Ordainment is just too enticing. Official disciples from the House of God Ordainment only need to practice a bit of cultivation, and they’re guaranteed to reach godly ascension.”

“Well that's a good reason,” Yang Qi said. “Where are these auctions? Which company runs the biggest one?”

“That would be the Archaean Trading Company,” Lightning Dragonriser replied. “I'm not sure how many godstones you have, but you’re obviously very rich. It seems like it would be a big waste not to buy some god items and medicinal pills to boost our fighting prowess. The more prepared we are, the more likely we’ll all become official disciples.”

“Alright,” Yang Qi replied. However, he didn’t rise to his feet. “We’ll go tomorrow. Right now won’t do, we’ve all been flying for days on end. Let's relax and clear our minds first. Remember, it’s important to balance work and leisure.”

“Okay.” Of course, Yang Qi’s followers knew what he really meant. He needed time to study godstones, and possibly gain more understanding regarding godnotes.

Everyone retired to their rooms to rest. They had just spent half a year working extremely hard under intense pressure, so they welcomed the chance to relax and recover.

Lightning Dragonriser could sense that there was more to the story than what he understood, so he also retired.

Once he was alone, Yang Qi waved his hand, sending out a mist that filled the room and protected him from any prying eyes. Then he examined the transformations within him and saw that his godpower was already crystallizing. The crystals resembled very small taiji symbols, constantly spinning and turning. However, as they converged in his sea of energy, they entered his virtual godhood and slowly began turning it into something true and real.

“God Legion Seal!”

The seal emerged from his forehead, becoming a golden stream of vital energy that surrounded him and started drawing on the essence of the god world. No one in Triopolis could sense what he was doing. After all, he wasn’t drawing on the vital energy of the god world, but instead, essence godpower.

Essence godpower and god world vital energy were as different as a person’s blood and nascent divinity. The vital energy of the god world was everywhere, and was like blood. The essence was like the nascent divinity of the god world.

Only someone at an extremely high level could sense the essence of the god world. Normally speaking, not even Lesser, Common, or Greater Gods could do so.

Yang Qi hadn’t rested at all during the half-year of cultivation and travel. He had worked harder than any of his companions, and had gained valuable experience as a result. He was now completely different than when he had first arrived in the god world. In fact, it would be impossible to find anyone else in the god world who had an aura like his. He was so closely tied to the god world now that no one could break that connection.

“Godstones!”

He extended his hand and a godstone appeared on his palm, glittering and solid, obviously of good quality. However, he wasn’t content. He exhaled, causing scorching fire to envelop the stone and melt it, slowly transforming it into what looked like a banknote covered with complex designs. It looked exactly like a godnote! He had only just recently come to the realization that godnotes were transformed godstones. They were convergences of power, which was why they could create such dramatic explosions when destroyed.

He was already exploring the possibility of forging his own godnotes!

Chapter 1167: Forging Godnotes

Yang Qi had started making his own godnotes.

He started by forming godstones, which were an expression of the power of the god world. Normally, they were formed after being compressed by the earth’s crust over millions upon millions of years, until they became rocks filled with energy.

But with the God Legion Seal, Yang Qi could take vital energy and directly crush it into the shape of a godstone. Truth be told, the power assessment systems of the Cruiser of Civilization could do the same thing, as long as they were backed by enough strength. But of course, it was much easier with the God Legion Seal.

The profundities of the Cruiser of Civilization were beneath the level of the God Legion Seal, especially the complete version, which was completely heaven-defying and confounded the dao of gods.

Next, Yang Qi compressed the godstones into godnotes by crushing them over and over again with immense pressure, filling them with magical laws.

Unfortunately, Yang Qi still needed to develop better control of the process.

Crack!

A godnote appeared on his palm, but it only lasted for a moment before crumbling into pieces. Obviously, it was a far cry from an actual godnote.

Even now, he wasn't sure exactly how the real godnotes were made.

Pulling out a real godnote, he encased it in a Purrfect God Art bubble and opened his Lord's Eye, which was extremely powerful now that he had the complete God Legion Seal. Blinding light shot out from his forehead, allowing him to peer into the structure of the godnote and examine all of its exquisite aspects.

He instantly identified some of the extraordinary elements of the note. The most difficult aspect was that the notes contained the will and energy of Paramount Gods. However, once he figured out how to deal with that aspect, everything else would fall into place relatively easily. The exquisite internal structure of the godnote contained magical laws formed from god vitality. That was one reason why, if ignited, they would create a destructive explosion.

The truth was that there were some formations so powerful that they had to be powered by godnotes.

‘The godnotes have a very complex structure,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘The god vitality creates countless shackles which represent the ultimate expression of wealth in the world....’ To him, the godnote almost looked like its own profound heaven and earth, with the vital energy inside making up the smallest particles. And those particles were nothing short of miraculous, with round exteriors and square interiors. In that respect, they were almost like copper coins.

These coin-like particles weren’t true particles. Instead, they represented all the wealth in heaven and earth. In other words, by converging the will of wealth into a single point, it was possible to create godnotes.

‘These things are incredible!’ Yang Qi said, his eyes widening. It was only thanks to the improvement in his godhood because of the trip over the ocean that he was finally coming to understand the profundities of godnotes.

‘The meaning of wealth. Amazing....’ All of a sudden, Yang Qi realized that his study of godnotes was actually helping refine his Sage Monarch Grand Magic. And if he could gain full enlightenment, it would have a more profound understanding of the ten levels of Sage, Monarch, Ruler, Emperor, Sovereign, Lord, Hero, Hegemon, God, and Nothing.

After all, sages, monarchs, emperors, and sovereigns all required wealth to establish authority. And it wasn’t possible to become a ruler without funds to back it. If one wanted to enlighten the masses, bring morality to the world, and establish peace, they had to have wealth. Wealth was an integral part of the journey of any person in life.

After acquiring the God Legion Seal, Yang Qi basically didn’t need medicinal pills to advance his cultivation base. To him, the god world itself was like an enormous medicinal pill, larger than it was possible to even imagine. Considering he could assimilate the medicinal strength of that gigantic pill, what need did he have of lesser pills?

If other gods realized that he viewed the god world as a medicinal pill, they would likely go completely crazy.

Yang Qi produced another godstone and crushed it into something that looked like a curved heaven and flat earth. It was money that represented the essence of wealth, and as it continued shrinking, it eventually became so small that it couldn’t be seen with the naked eye. Yet there it was, floating above his palm.

Yang Qi summoned more godstones and did the same with them, using the God Legion Seal to crush them into tiny particles. Then he started pushing the particles together.

“Heaven and earth. Flat and round. Form the foundation of wealth!” Within his mind, his understanding of wealth combined with his Sage Monarch Grand Magic, and as that happened, he came to realize that the rotation of heaven and earth contained profound truths, great daos that could benefit his cultivation base.

His original goal had been to forge godnotes so that he could have wealth to spend in the god world. But after coming to understand the true meaning of wealth, it opened a path for his cultivation base, a path that would lead to forming godhood. This was something that ordinary experts could never do. Perhaps Brahma and his other friends would be able to reach godly ascension the normal way, but now that Yang Qi had gained this new enlightenment, he knew that his own chances of succeeding had increased.

He reached out, and vital energy trembled as something that looked exactly like a godnote formed in his hand.

It pulsed with the power of gods, although it lacked the mark of a Paramount God.

Yang Qi burst out laughing. “I did it! The wealth of the god world is going to be mine. Although... I need to inscribe it with the aura of a Paramount God from the God Legion Seal.”

Drawing on the God Legion Seal, he sent out a massive force that somehow resembled a stamp, which touched the surface of the note, marking it with the aura of a Paramount God. Without that mark, it wasn’t a true godnote, thus, anyone who used it would be sentenced to death.

Unfortunately, as soon as the mark appeared on the note... crack! The godnote collapsed, incapable of sustaining the mark. Instantly, Yang Qi’s hopes were dashed.

“What’s going on?”

He settled back down cross-legged, and although he was disappointed, he wasn’t completely crestfallen. Instead, he sat there calmly thinking about the situation. ‘I must not have sufficient enlightenment of the profundities of wealth, so I can’t produce the shackles of magical law that are required. Because of that, the note can’t sustain the will of a Paramount God.’

The notes he could create right now weren’t stable.

Drawing on more godpower and the God Legion Seal, he created another godnote, but this time he didn’t inscribe it with the aura of a Paramount God. Instead, he just watched it. After some time passed, it collapsed, the vital energy melting like ice until it was nothing but air.

‘The structure isn’t stable. What I can create right now won’t last more than about ten breaths of time. What good is that?’ He shook his head and continued seeking enlightenment.

At a certain point, his nascent divinity shivered as he succeeded, gaining new understanding.

Obviously, the internal structure of real godnotes couldn’t be easily mimicked, otherwise there would be lots of counterfeit godnotes in the god world. There would definitely be plenty of people in the god world who studied godnotes in the hopes of duplicating them, even Consummate Gods. Yet, to date, no one had ever succeeded.

The more Yang Qi contemplated the mysterious nature of godnotes, the more he was convinced that he would benefit immensely if he could forge his own versions.

Behind Yang Qi, his enlightenment of the dao of wealth had caused projections to appear, along with magical devices and humanoid figures. There was even a sage-like figure whose facial features matched his own.

His Sage Monarch Grand Magic was now at the point of being able to produce three dharma clones, representing the hero, the hegemon, and the monarch. Of course, they were only shells at the moment. However, thanks to what he had learned from King Immortal-Slayer, he knew more about morality, and was now focused on developing it. Although the dharma clones he could form were currently only empty frames, they represented the Sage Monarch Grand Magic, and would slowly become more complete.

By way of analogy, the Sage Monarch Grand Magic was like a blueprint to a house that didn’t contain specific information about how to go about the construction.

But as he made his dharma clones, he gained the foundation to go about that construction. And as the actual construction took form, it surpassed what the blueprint could describe. That was how Yang Qi could build his foundation for godly ascension.

Within the hand of the sage was a magical device that resembled a round coin with a square hole in the middle. It represented wealth, and the sage could teach the common people how to safely conduct business. When people acquired wealth, they were happy; that was the point of wealth.

That was what wealth represented to most commoners: happiness, contentment, and joy.

People who helped others to become wealthy were called sages. Meanwhile, Yang Qi’s process of enlightenment was causing the other dharma clones, those of the hegemon, monarch, and hero, to grow more complete.

Money could confound heroes, but without it, they would be in a very tough situation.

As Yang Qi gained enlightenment, his nascent divinity grew even more perfect, and his sea of consciousness filled with understanding of the meaning of the world.

At the same time, his virtual godhood creaked as it crystallized, and the God Legion Seal shone with incisive golden light.

He was now stronger than before, such that he would definitely be able to kill an ordinary god who came to fight him. However, he didn’t have full enlightenment of the mysteries of wealth, otherwise he could have directly become a Lesser God.

Again he tried to make a godnote, and this time it lasted for the time it takes an incense stick to burn. From that it could be seen how much his cultivation base had advanced.

Unfortunately, it still wasn’t stable, and eventually collapsed. He still needed to further his cultivation.

Chapter 1168: Primeval Pavilion

As he experimented with creating godnotes, Yang Qi’s cultivation base improved. Eventually, he could create notes that would last for a full hour before disappearing. However, he still couldn’t affix them with the seal of a Paramount God.

Doing so would cause the note to immediately collapse. It seemed he would have to wait until after godly ascension to actually produce godnotes.

That said, the enlightenment he was receiving because of the process was making him much stronger.

Plus, the godstones he could produce were increasing in quality.

Obviously, there were different grades of godstones, and the top experts could very easily assess their quality. The main measure to assess them was the strength of the godpower.

Yang Qi’s palm contained a collection of soybean-sized godstones, all of them pulsing with terrifyingly intense godpower; they were quite different from the godstones he had created before.

Producing a box, he put the godstones inside, musing that he would definitely have enough to purchase whatever interesting items might come up at auction. The godstones weren't forgeries; they were real, and wouldn’t fade away for as long as heaven and earth existed.

The truth was that Yang Qi could actually make them even more powerful by shrinking them down even smaller, to the size of sesame seeds. But that would likely arouse suspicion, so he decided to work with what he had first to see how it went.

If he turned his godstones into ‘godsand’, even a tiny bag would be worth as much as a city. For now, he was content to have something bean-sized.

When everyone emerged from their night of rest, they found that, oddly, it had stopped snowing. Yang Qi walked out of the inn to find the light shining on his face and the temperature rising. He had previously assumed that the snowfall would last for years, only to be proven wrong.

The light was so bright and hot that it hurt his skin, making him feel like he was being slowly baked. Obviously, if he stayed out in this sunlight for too long, he would be dangerously burned. ‘What the fuck. How did the weather change this quickly? The snow outside is already melting away.’

Jadefall and the others emerged as well. Sure enough, off in the distance, it was possible to see the snow melting into water, which formed rivulets and streams that flowed into the bay. Not even immortals could stand such drastic changes in temperature, and if it weren’t for how strong this group was, they likely would have fallen ill from it.

There was no sun in the sky, but it was still blindingly bright. It begged the question of where exactly the light came from. It was almost as if there were some immense power overhead causing the light to shine down. Yang Qi looked up and opened his Lord's Eye, but he could only see the light streaming down. It was almost as if there was some enormous furnace burning on the other side of the sky.

The miraculous nature of the god world was simply impossible to gain easy enlightenment of.

In the end, heat was heat. By now, the streets were literally smoking, as if this were a city of fire. Thankfully, there were spell formations to deal with this, and clouds soon covered the city, blocking the burning light.

Looking outside, Yang Qi saw that the area beyond was not as lucky as the interior. Water was evaporating into steam everywhere, with the heat being so intense that it could even kill people. Yang Qi couldn’t help but muse that the god world seemed to be a place of constant catastrophe. And he wondered how many demonlings must die because of the weather. Yang Qi could see the bodies of various god world creatures in the water that resulted from the melting snow, yet it was already possible to see various birds and demonlings that didn’t fear the heat, pouncing on the corpses and devouring them.

There were fire-type birds in the god world that were particularly active when the weather got hot like this. And of course, they would go into hiding when it snowed.

‘Life is hard in the god world,’ Yang Qi mused. ‘How do the common people even survive? It’s not as if they can stay in hiding all the time. And how could they possibly know how the weather will change from day to day? The people here have to constantly try to improve their cultivation bases. It's like they’re fighting a war against heaven and earth. No wonder everyone is so hell-bent on getting stronger.’ Everyone was thinking similar thoughts.

The previous night, it had been snowing so hard that people could freeze to death almost instantly. The next day, it was so hot that one could be baked to death.

“Who knows how long this weather will last,” Lightning Dragonriser said. Even he was sighing. “Over the past few years, the weather has been particularly unpredictable, almost as if some catastrophe is approaching. Ever since the disasters of ancient times, the weather has been fairly good. But things are changing. And whenever tribulation is on the way, the first signs are always in the weather.”

“You think these are signs?” Brahma said. “The true signs of impending tribulation would be for fire to rain down, mixed with swords, with the power to destroy the world. In the depths of the god world, there are floods and fiery winds that not even the god kingdoms can defend against. That is the stuff I would consider terrifying. This weather is pretty tame by comparison.”

‘He’s serious, isn’t he?’ Yang Qi thought. ‘The god world really is a dangerous place. The only option is to cultivate, cultivate, and keep on cultivating. I have to get stronger.’ Clearing his thoughts, he said, “Let’s go check out the Primeval Pavilion’s auction.”

As they walked along, Jadefall slid up next to Yang Qi, touched his arm and whispered, “Did you manage to make some godnotes? If so, then we're definitely rich.”

“I didn’t,” he replied just as quietly. “It's not going to be easy to produce counterfeit godnotes. My cultivation base just isn't high enough. That said, I did learn a lot about them through the night, and it will help me reach godly ascension even sooner. And I produced some godstones the size of beans. They’re valuable enough that we should be able to purchase some useful items.”

He pulled out a sack to show her. Right now, none of them had spatial bags, dimensional storage items, or anything else like that. Such items required the power of gods. It wasn’t that they didn’t exist. For instance, Proud Radiance had a storage ring given to him by one of the patriarch gods of his branch of the Proud Clan. But such things were difficult to use without the help of a god, as they required immense amounts of godpower to open.

As such, Quasi-Gods generally didn’t use them.

Of course, Yang Qi had the Cruiser of Civilization and its spatial powers, but unfortunately, his cultivation base wasn’t quite strong enough to use them here.

Instead, he had to operate like a human in the lands of mortals, by using an actual bag to carry things.

“Is that what you’re planning to use at the auction?” Lightning Dragonriser asked, his eyes betraying some disappointment at the sight of the sack. “You can buy things at auction with godstones, but it's usually best to use godnotes. If you do use godstones, you have to use ones of extremely high quality.”

“What do you think of the quality of these godstones?” Yang Qi asked, opening the sack for him to look inside.

As soon as Lightning Dragonriser saw the contents, his eyes went wide. Reaching inside, he pulled out one of the glittering, bean-sized godstones, which weighed heavily on his hand because of the godpower swirling inside. “Th-this... this.... Where did you get godstones of this quality? Only the top sects in existence would have access to ore deposits that produce godstones like this. And they would only distribute them internally. Did you discover a mine or something? You’re completely rich!”

“Don’t think too much into it,” Yang Qi replied. “Suffice it to say that I can get high-quality godstones. So tell me. How many godnotes do you think this bag is worth? And what would happen if I could get my hands on even finer quality stones?”

“That bag is probably worth a few dozen godnotes,” Lightning Dragonriser said. “And if you had better quality stones, you could obviously buy even more things. The higher the quality of the godstones, the better the spell formations and magical treasures you can power. Lower quality stones either won't work, or will even destroy the magical items in question. That’s one reason why high-quality godstones are so popular. After all, it would be a big waste to use godnotes to power ordinary spell formations.”

“In that case, everything will work out fine,” Yang Qi said. “We’ll just use godstones to purchase whatever we want from the auction. I don’t have a lot of godnotes, but I have plenty of godstones.”

Everyone excitedly hurried in the direction of the Primeval Pavilion.

The Primeval Pavilion was actually a sprawling palace that stretched for several kilometers from end to end, filled with towering pagodas and surrounded by a sturdy wall. It was already packed with people. Obviously, there were a lot of travelers here hoping to get items that would help them in the Bloodgore Trials.

Yang Qi and his people didn’t make a splash at all, and no one paid them any attention.

Looking around, Yang Qi didn’t spot any gods in attendance. Everyone was a Quasi-God, with Despot attendants. Generally speaking, the gods of the god world didn’t have dealings with the commoners.

Although there were a lot of people present, everything was in order. Disciples of the Primeval Pavilion directed everyone in an organized fashion. When Yang Qi spotted one of the disciples in charge, he slipped him a godstone. Smiling at the generosity, the disciple led Yang Qi and his group to the back to a private room.

They were obviously very happy to have some privacy, and to be away from the crowded, sweaty general floor.

“Are you here for the Bloodgore Trials?” the disciple asked. “Our Primeval Pavilion has a few very powerful magical treasures to be auctioned, as well as some amazing medicinal pills. You don’t want to miss out.”

“What exactly are these items?” Yang Qi asked. “Do you mind explaining?” He offered another bean-sized godstone, but the disciple waved his hands to reject it. “I actually don’t know. The objects to be auctioned are always kept top secret. Everyone will find out at the same time, when the objects are revealed. And even those few disciples who do know would never reveal that information, otherwise we would be executed.”

“So those are the rules? Fine. Still, take the godstone as a reward for your information. Yes, we’re here for the Bloodgore Trials. And we're one hundred percent certain that we’ll end up as members of the House of God Ordainment. The main reason we're here is to see what our competition will be using against us. As the saying goes, know yourself, know your enemy. And if something truly powerful comes along, we’ll want to keep it out of our enemies’ hands!”

Chapter 1169: Godsand

“Many thanks, many thanks! Well, please enjoy the auction, and feel free to bid on any item that attracts your attention. I’ll be just outside; call for me if you need anything.”

Accepting the godstone, the disciple offered a salute and then left them in the silence they obviously desired.

Once outside, he smiled broadly as he examined the godstone. Meanwhile, a robed figure approached and, seeing the look on his face, asked, “What’s that in your hand, Yu Guo?”

“What?” Yu Guo said. Looking up, he suddenly said, “Oh, it's you, Eighth Elder!” He gave a deep bow. “The customers in this private room tipped me with two godstones.”

“Let me see them,” Eighth Elder said. Yu Guo didn’t dare to object, and quickly handed over the two bean-sized godstones, keeping his head down.

This Eighth Elder was a powerfully built old man, clad in a voluminous robe. His ruddy face was beardless, and he had a pair of eagle eyes that seemed capable of seeing anything and everything. Upon examining the two godstones, his eyes widened. “Amazing craftsmanship. And the vital power inside is incredible. I wonder which mine produced quality stones like this. It’s as strong as an ordinary godstone the size of a person, which means it’s perfect for use in spell formations. What kind of an individual would give something as precious as this as a reward to an ordinary disciple?”

“Elder,” Yu Guo replied quickly, “they’re aristocratic disciples here to participate in the Bloodgore Trials.”

Eighth Elder returned the two godstones to Yu Guo. “I recognize the look on your face. You thought I was going to keep the godstones, didn’t you?”

“I wouldn't dare to think that, not ever!” Yu Guo replied, beads of sweat visible on his forehead. “How could I possibly think something like that? If you want them, Elder, just take them.”

Eighth Elder snorted. “I don’t just want one or two. I want a lot! Stones of that quality are rare, and given how bad the weather has been, we need high-quality fuel for the spell formations. Take me in to see these people, I want to discuss business. If I can get a large quantity of those godstones from them, I’ll count it as service on your part. You’ll definitely get a reward from headquarters.”

“Many thanks, Elder!” Yu Guo said. Heart pounding with anticipation, he led the way into the room.

Inside, Yang Qi and his companions were watching the activity on the auction floor. A host of magical treasures were visible on the auction stage, although all of them were covered with red cloth that made it impossible to lay eyes on the actual items. Yang Qi wasn’t feeling inclined to use his Lord's Eye to identify the items. Considering he had the God Legion Seal, ordinary magical treasures didn’t interest him much, with the exception being the items of the seventy-two monarchs.

If any of those items showed up, he would definitely get them for his immortal-slaying clone.

“This is our first time attending an auction in the god world,” the Shepherd said via thought projection. “I wonder what kind of things we’ll see.”

Yang Qi suddenly waved his hand. “Someone's coming in.”

Only about ten breaths of time later, the door opened, and Yu Guo appeared, leading Eighth Elder. “This is Eighth Elder of the Primeval Pavilion,” he announced. “He’s here to talk with you about a business deal.”

“Business?” Yang Qi said. Looking at Eighth Elder, he saw that he was a Quasi-God. Although he had a high cultivation base, he wasn’t anyone Yang Qi needed to be worried about. “Eighth Elder, might I respectfully ask for your name? And could it be that you’re here to ask about my godstones?”

“That’s right, I’m here about the godstones,” Eighth Elder said. “My surname is Xu and my given name is Huadong. However, I’d prefer if you just call me Eighth Elder. I'm a member of the Primeval Pavilion, and Eighth Elder is what people call me.”

“That’s fine,” Yang Qi said. “Names are just ways to identify people, after all. Eighth Elder, could it be that you and the Primeval Pavilion are interested in my godstones?”

“The quality of those stones is incredible,” Eighth Elder said. “I’ll take however many you can offer. The higher the quality, the better.”

“And what might the Primeval Pavilion be offering in return? Godnotes?” Yang Qi shook his head. “Godnotes are amazing things, but I have plenty of them on hand. As you probably know, I'm preparing to participate in the Bloodgore Trials, and I want to be completely prepared. One mistake could lead to death. If your Primeval Pavilion has anything that could help with the Bloodgore Trials, or perhaps items which can help with godly ascension, then I’d be more than happy to work out a deal."

Eighth Elder laughed heartily. “You certainly set the mark high, Brother! It's not as though godly ascension is a simple matter. If we had ways to achieve that so easily, I would already be a god. That said, I can definitely get you magical treasures to make you stronger. Such things are expensive, though, too much to hand over for only a few godstones. We sell things like that for godnotes.”

“Oh?” Yang Qi said with a smile. “If godstones won't work, what about this?”

He extended his hand and something like fragments of starlight appeared, which floated in the direction of Eighth Elder.

Eighth Elder reached out, using his godpower to form an enormous hand to grab it. Still, he was physically shaken. ‘This guy’s energy arts seem as deep as the ocean. Just a casual movement from him nearly paralyzed me. I didn't even realize there were Quasi-Gods as powerful as this!’

Eighth Elder was immediately struck by the realization that there was no way he could fight Yang Qi. As such, he didn’t even consider treating Yang Qi as an enemy. They were just too far apart in power.

And because of that, he also didn’t consider resorting to any trickery.

“Eighth Elder, why don’t you appraise that godsand I just sent you?” Yang Qi said. From the expression he had just observed on Eighth Elder’s face, he could tell that he had been shaken to the core, removing any treacherous thoughts he might have harbored.

“Godsand?” Eighth Elder quickly looked down at his hand and saw that there were three grains of godsand, all the size of sesame seeds. Despite their size, they were immensely heavy and radiated sun-like brightness. They were clearly a hundred times as powerful as the godstones he had seen earlier, and just as valuable as an entire storehouse full of regular stones.

“Dear lord...” Eighth Elder said, visibly shocked. “Is this really the product of an ore? It must have taken millions upon millions of years to compress it down to this level. How old is it?”

“Well, what do you think? That godsand can operate some powerful god items. Just imagine how easy it would be to deal with the weather if you used it in some of your spell formations.” Yang Qi had already been in the god world for the better part of a year. Although much of that time had been spent flying over the ocean, he was still becoming more familiar with his surroundings. He understood many of the mysteries of the god world, for instance, how despite the fact that godstones were considered wealth to ordinary people, they were also used to operate spell formations.

Without godstones to power the formations, life in the god world would ultimately be impossible.

“How many grains of godsand do you have?” Eighth Elder asked, his heart pounding in his chest. After all, the power he could get from sand like this would definitely be enough to boost his cultivation base.

If nothing else, they could be used to power spell formations that would be particularly helpful in cultivation. And if he could push his godpower high enough, he might be able to gain enlightenment of godly ascension.

There were plenty of spell formations in the god world, but not necessarily the energy sources to power them. There were plenty of ordinary godstones, but they could only be used to power ordinary formations. High-level formations required high-level godstones. Unfortunately, high-level godstones took a lot of time to form. They needed to be compacted by the earth's crust for hundreds of millions, billions, or even tens of billions of years. And after the destruction that had been unleashed in ancient times, such stones were very rare.

Because of that, high-level godstones were very valuable. And Yang Qi’s godsand was basically an extremely high-level type of godstone.

“I don’t have much of that type of godsand on me,” Yang Qi said. “But if you want more, I can get it. As long as you can pay for it. Right now, I'm not interested in magical treasures or medicinal pills. I'm very close to reaching godly ascension on my own, as I'm sure you can sense.” When Yang Qi spoke, his words fairly thrummed with indisputable confidence.

There actually wasn’t a need for him to even explain, as Eighth Elder could sense his terrifying cultivation base. In fact, it wouldn’t be surprising if he became a god right here and now. And obviously, it made no sense to offend people like that.

Furthermore, Eighth Elder was one hundred percent sure that this person would end up as an official disciple of the House of God Ordainment, which would make him extremely important. And that was the type of person to recruit, not plot against.

“Well, Brother, you might not need medicinal pills or magical treasures, but what about your companions? We’ve prepared especially to do business with people attending the Bloodgore Trials, and have brought some magical flags here for just that purpose. I think they might be of interest to you.”

“What do you mean ‘magical flags’?” Yang Qi asked quietly.

“They can help you gather immense godpower, and ultimately, reach godly ascension.” Waving his hand, he said, “Go bring in a set of the flags.”

“Yes sir!” Yu Guo said, hurrying away. A moment later he returned with two other disciples, bearing an enormous chest between them. It was made from godsteel and secured with an enormous lock that Eighth Elder opened with a silver key.

Inside were ten magical flags.

Although it was impossible to tell what they were made from, they were spectacularly beautiful.

“These are not intended to be used in fighting,” Eighth Elder explained, “but to make a formation for cultivation. They’re Ten Directions God Convergence Flags. With high-quality godstones to power the formation they create, your godpower will soar. If you couldn’t normally push your godpower to the limit, you could definitely do so with these flags.”

Chapter 1170: Ten Directions God Convergence Flags

Yang Qi waved his hand toward the box, and the ten flags inside flapped into motion, creating a circular spell formation. And the magical symbols on the flags began to flicker and glow.

WOOOOSH!

His fingers flashed as he counted out ten grains of godsand and sent them flying toward the flags, which resulted in a massive outflow of vital energy.

Next, Yang Qi reached out, grabbed Yu Guo, and threw him into the middle of the formation. Instantly, streams of energy pierced into Yu Guo, whereupon a look of exultation appeared on his face. “Godpower! Godpower is forming inside of me. It’s crystallizing so quickly!”

Crack. Crunch.

“Return!” said Yang Qi. He beckoned, and the ten flags flew back into the box. A look of disappointment overtook Yu Guo’s face; he knew full well that if he had been able to spend more time in that formation, he would definitely have achieved a breakthrough. Even the short moment he had just spent had saved him a few dozen years of ordinary cultivation.

The general process to reach godly ascension involved building up godpower, then exerting immense pressure on it, over and over again, until it turned into true godhood. It was a very exhaustive process that also involved the development of the psyche and the will.

Ordinary people, even those who had the potential to reach godly ascension, would have a very tough time exerting enough pressure on the godpower. And a mistake in the process could result in the godpower going out of control and detonating!

Godhood was essentially a conglomeration of condensed power, or as some people referred to it, the Great Dao of the Gold Core.

The formation created by the Ten Directions God Convergence Flags could adjust one’s godpower and assist in the process of crushing it into submission.

It was similar to how, in the impure lands, people couldn’t simply use their hands to crush corn into meal. It required a grindstone. And the Ten Directions God Convergence Flags served the same purpose as that grindstone.

Yang Qi immediately understood the profound complexities of the flags. The Cruiser of Civilization had a similar function, except the ship wasn’t currently functional. He would need to reach godly ascension before he could use it, which meant that, for the time being, the Ten Directions God Convergence Flags were his best bet to achieve the same results.

“You certainly got lucky, brat,” Eighth Elder murmured as he glared with open envy at Yu Guo. It didn’t matter how amazing the Ten Directions God Convergence Flags formation was, without high-quality godstones to power it, it wouldn’t do any good. And although Yu Guo hadn’t experienced an overall increase in godpower, his substructure had transformed in a significant way.

It was like the difference between a pound of cotton and a pound of iron; both weighed a pound, but their structure was completely different.

Before, Yu Guo’s godpower had been like cotton, but now it was as hard as iron. Whether in terms of attack or defense, he was far beyond his previous level.

After all, being hit with a pound of cotton would be a lot less painful than being hit with a pound of iron.

Of course, Yang Qi didn’t need the formation, but Brahma and the others could definitely benefit from it. As long as there were enough godstones to power it, they would easily be able to reach the Lesser God level.

Right now, their godpower was immense but unstable, extensive but not refined.

In fact, because their godpower was so intense, it was difficult to shape it properly. By way of analogy, a puddle could easily freeze in cold temperature, but a mighty flowing river, not so much.

Godpower was like water, which meant that if it was too mighty and forceful, it could take forever for it to ‘freeze’.

Yang Qi’s people needed to ‘freeze’ their godpower, taking that mighty river and turning it into ice. And that was no easy task. But if they succeeded, their godhood would surpass that of ordinary Lesser Gods.

“How much godsand do you want for the formation?” Yang Qi said. “Name your price.”

Eighth Elder thought for a moment, then extended his index finger.

“A hundred?” Yang Qi asked quietly.

“Oh, no, not a hundred. That’s far too little. I made this god formation myself, and I spent blood, sweat, and tears to get it done. You definitely need to add a zero to that number.”

“A thousand?” Lightning Dragonriser blurted. “Are you trying to rip us off, Eighth Elder? Do you know how valuable that godsand is? A thousand should be enough to buy multiple formations.”

“You think making formations like that is some sort of game?” Eighth Elder said with a grim frown. “That formation inverts yin and yang, and contains the mysteries necessary to crystallize godpower. The flags themselves were filled with quintessence energy by the god patriarchs of the Primeval Pavilion. Although it can't be used to attack or defend, it's extremely powerful. It’s clearly the best option for your group. Besides, none of the other magical treasures up for auction can compare to it. If you want to condense your godpower into godhood, there is no better item to use than the Ten Directions God Convergence Flags.”

“Maybe it’s the best,” said Brahma, “but for most people, it would be useless. Who could possibly have enough godsand to actually make it operational? And of course, using that method to operate it would be an insult to the wills of Paramount Gods in godnotes.”

Eighth Elder laughed. “As the saying goes, bestow a valuable sword on a skilled swordsman, and provide beautiful women to accompany heroes. Only you deserve to use these flags, Brother Yang Qi.”

“Fine. If you want a thousand, that's what you’ll get.” Yang Qi wasn’t interested in haggling, so he waved his hand and sent out a stream of glittering godsand.

Eighth Elder quickly produced a box and used it to carefully capture all of the sand. He had to marvel at how casually Yang Qi seemed to produce the sand, and came to the conclusion that he must be using some sort of spatial god item to do it.

“So I get the flags now?” Yang Qi said, making a grasping gesture that caused them to fly toward him.

“Yes. They’re yours. Here at the Primeval Pavilion, doing business is simple, and we never cheat or swindle. By the way, Brother, if you have more godsand, we’d be happy to do more business.” Eighth Elder was actually very pleased to have inked such a good deal. “By the way, the formation works best if you use God-Convergence Pills or Vitality-Strengthening Pills.”

“Oh?” Brahma said. “Presumably you have such pills for sale?”

When it came to increased cultivation speed, none of them wanted to hold back anything.

“Of course.” Eighth Elder gave a meaningful look to Yu Guo, who hurried off.

Around that time, they heard voices from the auction floor.

Looking out, Yang Qi and his companions saw a sea of people clamoring loudly at a charming young woman who was presiding over the formalities. Apparently, the auction was finally starting.

“Lot one is a divine treasure known as the Cyclical Cauldron. If you practice cultivation inside the cauldron, you can instantly achieve nine thousand cycles of godpower. In addition, the cauldron can absorb both frigid and burning energies, then combine them. By using the power of yin and yang, the cycle of reincarnation is imitated and the person in the cauldron can benefit from the ultimate protection. No evil could possibly harm them!”

As she spoke, the cauldron appeared in the open.

Although it was exquisitely crafted, Yang Qi could tell that it was the work of a Common God. In other words, it was useless to him. However, the auction floor exploded into a frenzy and it ended up selling for quite a few godnotes.

The winner was a woman in one of the private rooms, whose high-pitched voice seemed to indicate that she was changing her voice by means of a spell formation.

Yang Qi watched as the auction continued. Unfortunately, compared to the Great Necropolis, the god items and medicinal pills on sale were pitiful. The only downside was that because it had been tainted by the impure lands, the Great Necropolis wouldn’t be useful for years to come.

After about two hours, a few cases were delivered to their private room that contained medicinal pills designed to increase godpower and strengthen the psyche. They were very expensive.

But Yang Qi didn't care. He bought them for about a thousand grains of godsand.

After all, as long as he had the God Legion Seal, he could produce as many godstones as he wanted.

Eventually, the auction was reaching an end and the final lot appeared on the stage. It pulsed with immense godpower, and when the red cloth was removed, Yang Qi saw that it was some sort of god tree.

“According to the rumors,” the auctioneer said, “this god tree was planted by a Consummate God, who carefully nurtured it into a sapling. It can refine godpower, and if it’s assimilated into the sea of energy, it will sprout, providing a never-ending flow of godpower.”

The crowd erupted into a buzz.

The worst fear for anyone involved in a fight was running out of godpower. In fact, unless someone had some way to flee from a fight in that situation, they would have no choice but to just lay down and be slaughtered. It could only be imagined how much of an advantage it would be to have an endless supply of godpower.

In fact, the main reason they had to stop and rest on their journey over the ocean was that Yang Qi’s companions would eventually run out of power and fall down.

The god world was filled with a variety of heterogeneous vital energies, but the God Legion Seal could absorb them all. Although this tree wasn’t at the same level, it could provide a similar function and was thus incredibly valuable.

Many eyes began shining with anticipation. Whoever got that tree would definitely have a much better chance of winning in the Bloodgore Trials.

Chapter 1171: Consummate God Tree

“You should buy that god tree, Yang Qi,” Jadefall said. “Assimilating it would provide a huge boost in godpower, making it much easier to interact with the vital energy of heaven and earth here.”

“My own path of cultivation is superior,” Yang Qi replied. “Assimilate something like that, and I would end up parasitized, which wouldn’t be of any help at all.” The tree looked lush and alive, and its trunk was covered with knobby protrusions that were evidence of the work of whatever Consummate God expert had created it. Obviously, that god had been attempting to use this tree to connect with heaven and earth, which was fine. But for Yang Qi to assimilate it into his sea of energy would be a mistake.

That said, other Quasi-Gods could probably make use of it.

“The bidding for this Consummate-level god tree will start at a hundred godnotes!” When Yang Qi heard the price that was being asked, he squashed any thoughts of trying to buy it. Although he could hand over enough godsand to match the price in godnotes, it would attract too much attention. Furthermore, it was a given that people would have designs on the tree, and would cause problems for him because of it.

“What's wrong, Brother?” asked Eighth Elder. “You’re not interested in that god tree? It's the best item we're offering for sale at this auction. If you don’t get it, one of your competitors will.”

“I'm not worried about that,” Yang Qi replied. “That thing is a disaster in the making. Whoever wins it will never have any peace. The business we’ve already done can remain confidential, but buying that treasure with everyone watching is just asking for trouble. An ordinary man who possesses great treasure makes himself a big target.”

“Trying to avoid trouble, Brother?” Eighth Elder asked probingly.

“I'm trying to avoid annoying side-issues,” Yang Qi replied, giving Eighth Elder a level stare. “The business we've done so far is more than satisfactory. After I'm an official student of the House of God Ordainment, I'm sure there will be plenty of chances to work out even better deals with your Primeval Pavilion.”

“That sounds wonderful. The Primeval Pavilion can’t compare to the House of God Ordainment, but we do have a very powerful patriarch god, as well as many years’ worth of resources. As long as you can produce the wealth and godsand, we can find whatever it is you need.”

“What about secrets?” Yang Qi said. “Do you traffic in those?”

“Secrets?” Eighth Elder thought for a moment. “You want to buy information? If so, you couldn’t have come to a better place than the Primeval Pavilion. Yes, we sell information. What exactly do you want to know?”

“Have you heard of the Proud Clan?” Yang Qi asked quietly.

“Of course. They have branches on many continents and are extremely powerful. What. Are you an enemy of the Proud Clan?” Eighth Elder’s expression flickered. “The Primeval Pavilion isn’t in the position to be able to offend the Proud Clan, so information about them is going to be extremely expensive.”

“I wouldn't say that we're enemies. Nor do I have any interest in you doing anything to offend them. But I am interested in their secrets.”

“Well that's good to hear. In that case, just tell me what secrets you’re interested in, and I can tell you how much it will cost.” Suddenly shifting his gaze to the auction floor, he said, “Would you look at that. Someone is actually buying the god tree!”

Down below, the auctioneer said, “Three thousand godnotes. Going once. Going twice. Any further bids? In that case, sold! For three thousand godnotes.”

Within moments, the god tree was taken away.

As Yang Qi watched it being taken into private room #9, he opened his Lord's Eye. Inside the room, several people were gathered. One of them was a young man who was sitting cross-legged, with a handful of old men and burly fellows standing around who were obviously his attendants.

“We won the Consummate-level god tree?” the young man said, smiling. “I'm sure that’s painted a target on our back. What do you think, Stewards?”

One of the old men in the group replied, “If anyone tries to make a move, we’ll kill them. I can't believe that animals like this have come to participate in the Bloodgore Trials. They’re obviously looking to get killed.”

Another old man said, “Young Master, that god tree was raised from one of the ninety-nine seeds created by the boundless Sovereign Lord. If you can collect the rest of the trees that came from those seeds, you can use them to track down the location of the Sovereign Lord’s palace of operations. The halls of heaven! I can’t believe the fools from the Primeval Pavilion just sold an item as priceless as this!”

“The halls of heaven? I must have them! Whatever secrets this god tree contains, I’ll acquire them when I assimilate it into my sea of energy. Eventually, I’ll collect all ninety-nine of the trees and use them to summon the halls of heaven, which I’ll also assimilate!” The young man burst out laughing.

Looking concerned, one of the burly men asked, “In that case, Young Master, are you saying you plan to push back godly ascension? Your godpower is so mighty, sir, that it'll be difficult to form it into godhood. Are you really going to participate in the Bloodgore Trials and become a disciple of the House of God Ordainment?”

“That’s right,” the young man said. “Little Huan is in the House of God Ordainment, and I must have her. So joining the House of God Ordainment myself is the only option.”

“Why bother? Young Master, joining the House of God Ordainment will be a big embarrassment for you. Our clan is no weaker than the House of God Ordainment! When people hear that a young master of the Cloudsoaring Mansion has done something like that, we’ll be a laughingstock.”

“It doesn’t matter,” the young man said. “I’ll conceal my identity. And who out there could possibly pierce that illusion? After I'm in the House of God Ordainment, I’ll advance by leaps and bounds, quickly becoming so powerful that the rest of the people in the Cloudsoaring Mansion will be forced to give me more respect.”

“If that’s your plan, Young Master, we’ll simply wait for the good news.” His attendants all offered respectful salutes.

With that, the young master inhaled deeply, causing the god tree to burst into flames, shrink down into an expression of power, and fly into his sea of energy. There, cracking sounds could be heard as godpower flowed through him like a mighty river.

“Come on, let’s get out of here! I'm already on the cusp of godly ascension! Those fools in the Primeval Pavilion clearly had no idea what they had on their hands with this god tree. I can't believe they gave it to me for a mere three thousand godnotes. Before, I was a bit lacking in godpower, but not any more. I can reach godly ascension with a mere thought, any time I wish!”

With that, their entire group vanished into thin air.

‘He’s obviously a top expert,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘The god world really is filled with hidden dragons and crouching tigers. Even among Quasi-Gods, there’ll be some dangerous people. I have to be careful. For example, this guy seems to be just on the verge of reaching godly ascension.’

With that, he led his people out of the auction house as well.

Back at the tavern, they split up the medicinal pills they had acquired and started another session of cultivation. They also activated the Ten Directions God Convergence Flags.

When the power of the ten directions began to flow, it was as if they were wrapped up in an enormous bag made of godpower. As they performed their breathing exercises and worked with their various techniques, their godpower grew, and at the same time, they exerted pressure to shrink it down.

Before long, the medicinal pills had all been assimilated.

Before, Lightning Dragonriser had been under the impression that his godpower had reached a peak level, and that he was right on the verge of a breakthrough. Never could he have guessed that he actually had a lot more progress to make; becoming a god was obviously no easy task.

That said, it was a good thing for him to know the truth, and it made him realize how backward the Lightningbolt Continent was.

Of course, now he was becoming truly powerful.

They had so many medicinal pills that, normally speaking, even if they had a larger group, it should have taken them years to assimilate them properly.

God pills simply weren’t designed to be taken in large quantities. But Yang Qi’s God Legion Seal changed everything. He could easily use burning sagefire to remove any impurities.

As the days passed, everyone experienced a dramatic improvement and advancement in their godpower.

As for Yang Qi, he furthered his enlightenment of godnotes. Now, it wasn’t just a matter of wanting to be able to create his own, but he also wanted to unlock the mysterious knowledge they could provide.

When he reached the point of being able to produce godnotes, he would be able to push his Sage Monarch Grand Magic to an even higher level.

“Use the god vitality of heaven and earth to produce godnotes!”

A tremor passed through him and a host of projected godnotes appeared above his head, making it seem like it was about to start raining money.

Chapter 1172: The Trial Begins

“What is this? Why did it suddenly start raining godnotes? Am I seeing things?” Lightning Dragonriser walked out of the spell formation and looked back to see Yang Qi sitting there in the middle, godnotes raining down around him. However, before the godnotes could reach the ground, they would vanish. Then new ones would appear above and start the process over again.

It almost seemed like a scene from a dream.

He reached out and grabbed one of the godnotes, but as soon as he did it exploded in his hand, flinging him backward with blood spraying out of his mouth until he landed on his back, unconscious.

Shocked, everyone else exited the formation and looked back to see Yang Qi slowly reining in his energy, causing the godnotes to vanish.

“What's going on?” Brahma asked. “What’s this all about?”

“I provoked a godnote transformation,” Yang Qi said, “using the power of wealth to create a killing move called Magnanimity to the Masses. Something new from my Sage Monarch Grand Magic. Lightning Dragonriser must have thought the godnotes were real, and when he tried to grab them, he suffered a big shock. Thankfully, he was only knocked unconscious, and will recover shortly.”

He waved his finger and sent a soft stream of energy into Lightning Dragonriser, who twitched in response.

Moments later, he opened his eyes and sat up.

“What were you cultivating just now?” he asked. “Why were there so many godnotes?”

“I gained some enlightenment of a new technique called Magnanimity to the Masses. What you experienced just now was a small test. If I used the real move, it would cause godnotes to rain down for dozens of kilometers in every direction. It would be a destructive, explosive rain that could kill even gods. It’s truly an unprecedented energy art. What do you think?”

Lightning Dragonriser shook his head. “It's simply... unbelievable! You're using godnotes as a means to attack your enemy? How extravagant. I've never heard of anyone doing anything like this before. Does it mean you’ll eventually be able to produce real godnotes?”

“It depends on my cultivation base,” Yang Qi replied. At the same time, he cast his vision deep into Lightning Dragonriser, where he saw something that almost looked like a sealing mark on his soul.

Lightning Dragonriser had been following Yang Qi for some time now, and seemed hell-bent on ingratiating himself. He really did seem to be treating Yang Qi as if he were some sort of omnipotent leader. Of course, some of that was a result of the Sage Monarch Grand Magic, which let Yang Qi become a sage or a monarch with a mere thought.

Magnanimity to the Masses was a truly powerful move. It would fill the air with a rain of godnotes that were so realistic it would be hard to identify them as anything but that. And while he had just caused them to gently flutter downward, he would eventually be able to use it to have them come crashing down like a true deluge.

The move was so named because it would cause wealth to appear in heaven and earth, providing endless blessings to the masses. With enough wealth, no one would be poor or hungry, and would instead live fruitful and happy lives. In fact, it hearkened to the teachings of the buddhist schools, and the dāna giving, which involved donating the treasures of chiliocosms of worlds.

Thus, it was called Magnanimity to the Masses.

Getting to his feet, Lightning Dragonriser assessed himself internally, and was relieved to find that there were no injuries or impediments. He was increasingly realizing that ever since he had met Yang Qi, his energy arts were advancing nonstop.

All of a sudden, everyone realized that the medallions they had been given were vibrating. Taking them out, they all heard the same announcement spoken in a cold voice. “The Bloodgore Trials of the House of God Ordainment are set to begin. All participants will come to the Hall of God Ordainment to be put into groups. The teleportation portal will then take them to the trials. Any who are late will be refused entry and will not be allowed to register for future trials.”

Yang Qi rose to his feet, eager to finally get a look at the top sects that existed in the god world. Perhaps he would even get a glimpse of some real gods.

To date, he had not yet seen any true gods. Not even the blood infant he had fought on Egret Island was really a god.

“Be careful, everyone,” Yang Qi said. “And if any of you run into a young master from the Cloudsoaring Mansion, be especially careful. Remember, I've placed true energy in all of you that you can use in the case of emergency, although success or failure will depend on how skillfully you use it.”

“If some arrogant and conceited young master manages to kill us, it would mean our years of hard work would be in vain.” That was what Doom and everyone else was thinking.

People were already gathering in the immense hall in the middle of the city and heading into the teleportation portal therein. It was Yang Qi’s first time seeing a teleportation portal in the god world, and when he and his group stepped onto it, dazzling light shone and everything seemed to tilt as spatial power wrapped them up.

They felt something like a blast of heat, then they were elsewhere.

Looking around, they realized they were in a huge, deep valley that was vaguely bottle gourd-shaped. The cliffs on either side of the valley were lined with individuals who pulsed with shocking auras.

“Gods! They’re all gods!”

Cries of shock rang out, although Yang Qi and his followers just quietly looked around. They were only one small part of the huge group of people that was being teleported in.

Considering how many people would be participating in the Bloodgore Trials, it was clear that they wouldn’t be held in the Primal-Chaos Continent. The House of God Ordainment had obviously arranged for the event to be held on another, larger continent.

Looking around, Yang Qi could see that there were millions upon millions of people present, a real hodgepodge of good and bad people.

The figures up on the cliffs all seemed to be Lesser Gods, but they were more than enough to keep control, especially considering they could join forces if necessary.

“Ladies and gentlemen...” one of the gods said, and as he looked over the crowd, Yang Qi felt the pain caused by the man’s gaze. Shockingly, he was a Common God!

The weather was still extremely hot, requiring everyone to use their godpower to protect themselves lest they be burned out of existence. It was an effect from the god world itself, not the House of God Ordainment. The heat Yang Qi had experienced in Triopolis wasn’t the true heat that could be experienced in the god world. This was.

“Presumably all of you are familiar with the rules of the Bloodgore Trials. You will be put into groups of ten thousand and be sent into the mountains. The pathways there are the locations where you will fight. The medallions you were given will indicate which group you will join. Understand?”

Even as the god’s words were still echoing out, Yang Qi felt his medallion vibrating, indicating that he was in the first group. Without any hesitation, he flew up into the air, along with many other people in the crowd.

The atmosphere was tense, as would be expected considering that only one person would survive.

As they flew further into the valley, everyone was thinking about the fact that nine thousand, nine hundred and ninety-nine people were about to die.

BOOM!

Someone passed out from fear!

However, it didn’t do them any good, as one of the gods above waved a hand, awakening them. They now had no choice but to participate.

It wasn’t permitted to back out of the Bloodgore Trials, and although that person had been awakened, it was obvious that they were so weak they would die. There was no way someone like that would survive a trial like this.

Thankfully, Lightning Dragonriser had ensured that Yang Qi and his people weren’t to be placed in the same group.

Although cheating wasn't allowed in the Bloodgore Trials, a bit of flexibility was allowed during the initial arrangements.

‘This is going to be intense,’ Yang Qi thought.

A few kilometers further into the valley, it was possible to see a host of paths snaking into the mountains, only one of which was opened.

The others were sealed tight for other groups.

The god spoke again. “You are participating in the Bloodgore Trials, so be prepared to die with no regrets. Whether or not you become an official disciple of the House of God Ordainment will depend on your performance. Kill everyone else, and you’ll survive. We don't want people who are like flowers from a greenhouse. Only the strong will come out on top, as the arrangement has been for millions upon millions of years. Enter, and let the killing begin!”

Yang Qi flew along, and upon entering the path, found himself in what seemed like a never-ending jungle.

Chapter 1173: Brutal Fighting

The immense trees in the jungle were leafless and seemingly made of metal, blanketing what was otherwise a completely barren landscape. What was worse, the trees were dripping with viscous blood, making them seem like they were made from red jade. And the intense heat weighing down only intensified the aroma of gore.

Metal and blood.

Metal trees, dripping with blood.

This was the location in which the Bloodgore Trials were held.

Yang Qi looked around and wondered if the blood here had been left behind after the Bloodgore Trials of years past. How many Quasi-Gods had died during the trials throughout the years?

The god world was huge, so what did a few billions of trial-takers count for? A group such as that was like one hair from a collection of nine googol oxen. That was why there was never any shortage of people willing to join the trials.

A horrifying atmosphere filled this area of bloody trees, to the point where no one dared to start fighting at first. Everyone knew that whoever took the initiative would be ganged up on by others; therefore, no one wanted to be the first in line.

Furthermore, the jungle was more than large enough to accommodate ten thousand people.

Some of the people began fanning out into the trees, in order to hide and prepare to launch sneak attacks. No one was forming groups. After all, even if the best of friends entered the Bloodgore Trials together, only one would come out alive in the end. Therefore, no one wanted to have their back to anyone, be they friend, sibling, or parent.

Only one person would survive.

It wasn’t a good feeling, even for Yang Qi. But he needed to get into the House of God Ordainment, so he wouldn’t hesitate to kill anyone who tried to kill him.

Whoosh. Whoosh. Whoosh.

As the trial-takers disappeared into the trees, one of them attracted Yang Qi’s attention, a burly looking man who seemed to sense his gaze, and glanced back. The man’s face fell and he scurried into the forked branches of the nearest tree, giving him an excellent defensive position.

The man was a mass of muscle that looked ready to explode with unending power, yet he was as limber as a monkey as he slipped among the branches.

The trees were huge, with their branches easily filling a sixty-square-meter area. And the branches were so sharp that few people would be willing to hide within them.

But this burly man was using the area as a defensive position.

“Hey,” the man said. “Who are you, kid? Interested in joining forces?”

“Join forces?” Yang Qi said. Inside, he was chuckling coldly. There was no way this man really wanted to team up. What would be the point, considering that only one person would survive the trial? Teaming up would be nothing but courting an early death. Asking a tiger for its skin. “How exactly do you envision that working?”

“We agree to a temporary truce between the two of us, and work to defend each other. Then, when everyone else is dead, we duel it out between the two of us. It’s the safest way to make sure we last to the end.”

“Sorry, not interested,” Yang Qi said coolly. “Truces in the Bloodgore Trials are complete hogwash. Did you really think I would trust you like that?”

The burly man shrugged. “Well then, I guess you’ll have to die. But you could have a fifty percent chance of surviving, considering all of the untold hardships I suffered to get some behind-the-scenes information. You see, I spent ten years cultivating the Iron-Blood Grand Divine Ability, which gives me profound enlightenment regarding these trees. If you work with me, we can hide in the branches and use them to attack unsuspecting opponents.”

The more Yang Qi heard from this man, the less he trusted him. “Well, congratulations. Maybe you really will pass the trial and become an official disciple of the House of God Ordainment.”

“You moron!” the man growled, furious that Yang Qi wasn’t falling for any of his tricks.

WHOOSH!

All of a sudden, a sword pierced through the air right toward Yang Qi, except no one had been standing there a moment before!

“An invisibility talisman?” Yang Qi said. Chuckling, he reached out and clamped his index and middle finger onto the sword, which shivered for a moment before snapping. Then a young woman appeared, who scrambled backward in shock and fear at the realization that Yang Qi was obviously far stronger than her.

“Leave. I'm not interested in killing women.” Flicking his finger, he summoned a translucent bubble of defensive empyrean energy around himself, then waved his sleeve to send the woman flying in the opposite direction.

After snorting coldly, she exhaled, sending out a stream of green energy that surrounded her and caused her to turn invisible. Of course, it did nothing to conceal the footprints she left in the ground.

Yang Qi’s Lord's Eye had revealed her to him despite the profundities of her ability.

As she crept away, invisible, the ground beneath her feet suddenly shone with silver light, causing blood to spray out of her as she toppled over.

A pit appeared, within which was a shadowy figure that grabbed the woman and sent fire out to envelop her. She screamed, but it didn't do any good, and she was quickly assimilated, leaving nothing behind except her clothing.

‘What a powerful devil technique,’ Yang Qi thought, watching in pity but doing nothing to save her.

Bam. Bam. Bam. Bam!

All of a sudden, a host of swords, sabers, spears, and lances appeared, stabbing into his defensive empyrean energy. Of course, his defenses were the product of the Purrfect God Art and couldn't be vanquished by a random ambush.

Crick! Crack!

As the weapons shattered, eight figures appeared, all of whom had been using invisibility talismans. Such talismans were extremely expensive in the god world, but the people participating in the Bloodgore Trials didn't hesitate to use them. Remaining invisible was one of the primary ways people tried to stay alive. As for Yang Qi, he was instead surrounding himself with a defensive barrier that would waste a lot of godpower. What person that came along wouldn’t try to kill him?

After all, anyone who killed him could then absorb his godpower.

Many of the trial-takers would use such tactics, trying to kill their competitors and absorb their godpower before unleashing their truly dangerous techniques.

“How can this guy be so strong?” said one of the members of the group. There were men and women, a few of them being older, but all of them were shocked that he had stood up to their attack. One of the old men suddenly exhaled, causing a thunderclap to echo out. The others in the group were caught completely unprepared. Some were dismembered by the sudden attack, and others were blasted out of existence.

“That was the Cosmic Righteous-Noble Lightning Blaster!” cried one of the men who had been dismembered. “Where did you get it? It’s a precious treasure from the Confucian Academy! It releases immense power that can slaughter demons and devils in the blink of an eye.”

“You really know what’s what,” the old man said. “But did you really think I'm going to tell you about where I got this treasure?” He inhaled, then released more lightning energy, using it to create a white ball of lightning in front of his chest. Then he produced a jade bottle and crushed it, releasing a red mist that shot out and killed all of the survivors of his original attack, transforming them into blood that he then sucked back into the bottle.

“Blood Conglomeration Mist: Blood-Devil Refinement!Boundless Clone Creation!” Seven streams of blood energy swirled out, then formed into a huge blood-devil with razor-sharp claws. Clearly, it was an out-of-body incarnation, and that bottle was a precious treasure among blood-devils.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi was shaking his head. This group had not only failed to kill him with a sneak attack, but they had also left themselves open for this old man to kill them all.

After finishing with his grisly work, the old man looked over at Yang Qi and was visibly surprised. “Y-y-you... you didn't die from my lightning attack?”

“Your lightning is powerful, but it can't do anything to me. That was pretty ruthless to kill those other seven people and use them to create a blood-devil incarnation. Very impressive.”

The man grinned cruelly. “Since you realize how impressive I am, you might as well just get on your knees and prepare to die! My Blood Conglomeration Mist, coupled with my Blood-Hell God-Bottle, are enough to kill anyone who stands in my way, and then take their quintessence energy to get stronger. Do you really think you can stand up to the combined energy of the seven people I just killed? My blood-devil incarnation will only function for about two hours, but that’s more than enough time to use the combined power of those seven to kill all the other trial-takers!”

Chapter 1174: All Kinds of Characters

As the words left his mouth, he walked toward Yang Qi, the immense blood-devil right behind him. Clearly, he wasn’t worried about anyone launching a sneak attack. He had a blood-devil formed from the life force power of seven enemies, people who had survived for hundreds of years in the god world. And the fact that the thing would only last for two hours only went to show how much of that life force was being burned to sustain it, thus, the incredible levels of power it was capable of.

Obviously, he really believed that two hours would be plenty of time to find more victims to kill and keep the blood-devil powered.

The man could see how strong Yang Qi was. He had just defended against something that had killed seven others, so adding him to the blood-devil would obviously lead to incredible results.

“Die!” the man shouted, his eyes flickering with blood-colored light as he sent the blood-devil rushing toward Yang Qi. The blood-devil sent a massive stream of energy slamming into Yang Qi’s defensive empyrean energy, yet the sphere surrounding him didn’t even show so much as a crack.

“What? Blood-devil, add more power!”

The blood-devil attacked with greater speed, yet it seemed like an ant trying to shake a big tree.

“Lightning!” He yet again summoned the ball of white lightning, which exploded, sending crackling lightning bolts in all directions. There were a few people in the vicinity who had been hiding and waiting to launch surprise attacks, but they were instantly killed.

Unfortunately, the old man was again disappointed when his lightning didn’t do a single thing to Yang Qi.

“Impossible!” he said, backing up and preparing to call back his blood-devil.

However, that was when Yang Qi made his move. He reached out, and the blood-devil shrieked miserably as it was wiped out of existence. Then Yang Qi held his palm out as all of the white lightning in the area converged atop it.

“You can leave,” Yang Qi said. “But I’m keeping your lightning and your blood-devil, that way you can’t carry out any more evil deeds.”

With that, he waved his hand, causing a wind to spring up that sent the old man tumbling off into the distance. There, he fell on the ground, a vicious expression on his face as he considered heading back to recover his lost items. Before he could, a blast of dazzling light erupted from the ground and he screamed as he died.

It was the same person who had just killed the woman from earlier, who attacked from underground, and apparently had a technique to make quick getaways.

“You’re good at sneak attacks aren’t you?” Yang Qi said, clasping his hands behind his back. “And you like attacking from underground. So why haven’t you attacked me yet?”

Thump! Dirt exploded up as a figure shot out of the ground and landed a short distance away from Yang Qi. It was a young man dressed in yellow garments, with a mischievous smile on his face. “I, Tu Longzhen, might not be good at much, but I have a lot of ways to stay alive. And killing a person here or there is par for the course. How could I have guessed that an expert like you would show up in the Bloodgore Trials? People attack you, and you let them go free. It's almost like you want to become some benevolent buddhist expert. Or could it be that you really are from one of the buddhist schools, and not allowed to kill people?”

As he spoke, Tu Longzhen swayed back and forth, making him seem very unstable.

SNICK!

All of a sudden, a few dozen meters behind Tu Longzhen, a host of spikes shot up out of the ground.

Then a scream rang out, and blood flowed as someone was killed who had just been trying to sneak up and stab him in the back.

“I’ll be keeping this bottle,” Tu Longzhen said, holding up the bottle he had just taken from the old man he'd killed. Apparently, he was planning to use it to make his own blood-devil.

Yang Qi simply stood there quietly, neither interfering, nor doing anything to kill anyone else.

After Tu Longzhen used the bottle to assimilate the person he had just killed, he looked over and said, “You’re a real weirdo. Are you really not planning to kill anyone? Don’t tell me you’re trying to conserve godpower and wait until everyone else has killed each other before making your move.”

“Whether or not I kill anyone is my business,” Yang Qi said with a smile. “I didn't feel like doing any killing a moment ago, but I will soon enough.”

“Are you saying you’re going to try to kill me?”

The two of them were talking to each other more as if they were friends than enemies.

“It’ll depend on my mood.” Yang Qi could see that this Tu Longzhen was vicious and merciless, and definitely wouldn’t let anyone off the hook. And he was obviously looking for weaknesses he could take advantage of.

“In that case, I suppose I’ll make my move.” Apparently, he had identified the weakness he was looking for and was taking action. The ground beneath Yang Qi’s feet collapsed, forming an enormous crater.

However, instead of falling inside, Yang Qi just hovered in place, surrounded by a bubble that had appeared out of nowhere.

“What? My sneak attack failed?” Tu Longzhen’s smile returned, more mischievous than ever. “Ferocious. Very formidable. Well, I’ll take my leave. I’ll kill a few others, then come back for you. After all, you’re not killing anyone, and there is virtue in sparing animal life.” With that, he burst into laughter and turned to leave.

However, that was when a plopping sound could be heard as he saw his body fall over onto the ground.

And that was when he realized that his head wasn’t attached to his body! His head was now in Yang Qi’s hands!

“I thought... you didn’t kill people!?”

“When did I say that? I told you, ‘whether or not I kill anyone is my business’. And when I feel like killing someone, that's what I do.” He shook his head. “Considering you were planning to come back and attack me later, the only fate you deserve is death.”

RUMBLE!

Tu Longzhen’s head exploded into fire, and his corpse flew over to Yang Qi, crumbling into ash along the way.

Afterward, Yang Qi began strolling through the trees, watching the slaughter around him. Almost immediately, he noticed that as people died, their destiny was being absorbed into the ground. It reminded him of his time in the thirty-third ranked Tusita Heaven, and its Live Forever God Tree with the god dao seeds. The dynasty there would invite geniuses from all over the immortal worlds to participate in a trial, in which they almost all participants died and their destiny was absorbed.

Apparently, the Bloodgore Trials were similar. The only difference from the Tusita Dynasty’s trials was that everyone knew ahead of time that only one person would survive the Bloodgore Trials, and that people who feared death shouldn't participate. Furthermore, becoming an official disciple of the House of God Ordainment really was a worthy prize. In fact, it was so enticing that countless people were willing to throw their lives away for the mere chance of winning it.

‘I can’t believe this brat is so strong. Is he really just going for a walk?’ The burly man in the trees was completely astonished. Drawing on his special energy arts, he was fused with the tree, causing the branches to shrink around him, and even causing his own skin to turn the same color as the tree. At this point, it would be almost impossible to detect his presence.

At a certain point, an expert wandered over and sat down beneath the trees. He was covered with wounds, and as he leaned up against the trunk, he pulled out some medicinal pills to heal himself. But before he could, his eyes went wide as numerous branches shot out, wrapped him up, and dragged him into a hollow in the tree.

A short while later, the burly man was slicing the man to pieces.

**

Meanwhile, the gods on the outside were observing what was happening on the labyrinthine battlefield.

“What low quality Quasi-Gods this time,” one of them said. “Their destiny isn’t impressive at all. The fighting is fierce, though. It's always a guess how much destiny our House of God Ordainment will get during the Bloodgore Trials.”

“Ah, this is nothing,” another god said. “Remember, we all started out just like those people down there, one person among ten thousand. We rose up through the blood and gore, and in the end, it was a big help. I wonder if there’s an Ascendant out there. It would be great to have someone like that in the mix.”

“An Ascendant? In your dreams, maybe. People are saying that the Ancient Road to the Gods has disappeared from the lower worlds, although no one knows exactly why. In any case, that just means there won’t be any Ascendants anymore. Of course, we’ll also be incapable of using the Ancient Road to the Gods to go down into the impure lands. What a pity. I heard there was a lot of treasure to be had there. But I guess it's sealed off to us now. A truly different world.”

“That’s too bad. If the Ancient Road to the Gods is gone, then heaven and men are forever separated. It’s a pity we can’t go down there, but it’s even worse that people from the impure lands can’t ascend and become gods.”

“Perhaps. Ascending is extremely difficult, but it’s much better to be a nobody in the god world than some tyrant in the impure lands.” A thoughtful expression overtook his face. “Although, Ascendants are truly formidable. We have a few in the House of God Ordainment, and they always advance by leaps and bounds. In fact, they're always quick to surpass people like us. To them, the Bloodgore Trials would be like children’s games.”

“They’re real people. They advance step by step, slaughtering their way to the heights of power. They're truly invincible geniuses. Unfortunately, I don’t see anyone in the trial slaughtering everyone else with ease. A true Ascendant would probably kill everyone else within an hour.”

Of course, Yang Qi and his people were all Ascendants. However, they didn’t want to make too big of a splash by killing everyone too quickly. In fact, the truth was that they wouldn’t need an hour. Each and every one of them could slaughter the other trial-takers in their groups in the time it took to drink half a cup of tea.

The real reason that Yang Qi had been acting so benevolent, and holding back from killing people, was that he didn’t want to draw too much attention.

Chapter 1175: Encountering an Expert

Yang Qi strolled through the forest, holding back from unleashing any major slaughter. Occasionally people would attack him from the shadows, and he would kill them. But other than that, he wasn’t doing much. Instead, he was employing the tactic of not showing the mountain and not revealing the water.

After all, he knew that the gods above were keeping a close eye on the competition.

All of a sudden, wild laughter met his ear. “You scum! How dare you try to fight me! I'm going to slaughter every last one of you. Being in the Bloodgore Trials with trash like you is no challenge at all. Can’t some real experts show their faces?”

Whack. Whack. Whack!

Off in the distance, Yang Qi saw a group of a dozen or so people surrounding a young man. In fact, ‘young man’ almost didn’t seem like the right description. He was so small that he looked more like a little boy.

Despite having the stature of a child, he wore adult clothing that dragged on the ground behind him when he walked. It was splattered with blood, although he didn’t seem to care.

His voice didn’t match his appearance at all. Instead of sounding like a child, he sounded more like an old man; perhaps he was someone who had reverted to a youthful appearance after consuming some sort of spirit medicine.

The boy unleashed a consummate palm technique that caused buddhist light to shine brightly as a flurry of golden hands appeared, which shot out in all directions.

As they flew out, they emitted an intense sound that weighed down heavily on everything, filled with godpower that seemed to be just shy of the legion of gods.

All the people surrounding the boy were sent flying.

“Buddhas Pierce the Cosmos!Buddhas Shake Mountains and Rivers!Buddhas Destroy Heaven and Earth!Buddhas Command Chiliocosms!Buddhas Rage at the Universe!Buddhas Destroy the World of Men!” He unleashed a host of explosive palm strikes, and not a single one contained the mercy and kindness one might expect of the buddhist schools. Instead, they were like the wrath of a furious buddha out to punish the wicked and exterminate evil.

Every person that was hit by one of those palms was first ripped to shreds, then collapsed into ashes. It took only a single volley to slaughter over a dozen people, a feat so impressive that, afterward, no one would possibly dare to launch another sneak attack.

After the dust settled, the boy happened to notice Yang Qi strolling along. A malicious expression appeared on his face, and his fingers curled into claws. “What are you doing walking along so casually, boy? Don’t you know that this isn't a place for children’s games? This is a battlefield of slaughter! Get over here!”

“Children’s games?” Yang Qi said. He chuckled. “You’re right, this isn’t a place for children’s games. In that case, why don’t you head home to suck on your mother’s teat?”

The boy’s face turned bright red and he howled in rage. “How dare you! Do you know who you’re talking to? I'm the Child of the Buddhist Lamp! I used to practice cultivation in a buddhist school, but in the end, I just slaughtered all of those damned monks. Then I left the sect to do some more killing. Nobody is a match for me, yet you dare to talk to me like that? You have no idea how much older than you I am! Although, it looks like your cultivation is respectable. In that case, if you get on your knees and beg for mercy, I’ll spare your life.”

“You really are a child, aren’t you?” Yang Qi said. “In the Bloodgore Trials, only one person will walk out alive. So why exactly would you waste your breath talking about sparing me?”

The Child of the Buddhist Lamp suddenly went green with fury. However, a moment later, he let out a stream of maniacal laughter. “You have a very sharp tongue, boy. I think I’ll cut your head off and remove your tongue! Then we’ll see what witty things you try to say. Buddhas Furious at Hell!”

He thrust his palm out, and fire raged into the shape of an enormous hand, which pierced through the air right toward Yang Qi, instantly surrounding him.

“Nice energy art,” Yang Qi said. Then he casually thrust his own hand out, sending out three waves of energy that instantly shattered the fiery hand.

The boy lunged forward with an enraged roar, unleashing more consummate buddhist palm techniques, each of them filled with the wrath of buddhas.

“Buddhas’ Rampaging Godfist!”

This time it was a fist strike, but Yang Qi easily met it. Then the boy unleashed a series of deadly kicks, filled with such shocking killing intent that Yang Qi had to float backward to avoid it. As a result, the boy's feet slammed into one of the iron trees, uprooting it and sending it flying off to the side. This level of power clearly was beyond that of a Quasi-God.

That said, Yang Qi was still able to negate the power of the attacks.

However, the boy only continued to attack with increasing speed and ferocity. “Psychotic-Devil Lokapāla Constraint!”

A host of projections appeared, wildly spinning around to create an invincible preheaven spell formation. It was like the energy art of a boundless lokapāla from a buddhist school, designed to restrain devils, and it quickly circled around to trap Yang Qi.

Yang Qi waved his finger, as casually as if he were writing words in the middle of the air, and as a result, the Psychotic-Devil Lokapāla Constraint started falling apart.

That said, this boy was the strongest opponent Yang Qi had faced so far, and was very close to becoming a god. And he wasn’t done fighting. Without pausing, he took a deep breath, causing a dharma idol of a lokapāla to appear behind him.

“Grand Lokapāla God-King!”

RUMBLE!

This was the energy art of a god-king. After all, the Grand Lokapāla God-King was a majestic protector of the buddhist schools who specialized in slaughtering wretch-devils.

This additional technique strengthened the Psychotic-Devil Lokapāla Constraint, boosting it by several times over.

Seeing this, Yang Qi reached out, sending energy arts and daoist techniques streaming out of all five of his fingers. It was as though a sage had descended into the world of men, bursting with indescribable strength.

SNICK!

He grabbed the lokapāla god-king, then crushed it into a śarīra that was actually a high-quality piece of godhood.

“Damnation! You destroyed my Grand Lokapāla God-King!” At this point, the boy realized that Yang Qi was truly a formidable enemy. “Who would’ve thought that an expert of this level would be in the Bloodgore Trials? That’s fine. I’ll just have to unleash my full power. Soon you’ll realize exactly how domineering I can be!”

Even as the words left his mouth, he unraveled a sealing mark within him.

“God from Heaven; Godhood Convergence; Golden Apex Buddhist Lamp!Join the Legion of Gods!Lesser Godhood, Form!” Wild streams of energy surrounded the Child of the Buddhist Lamp, as well as numerous bolts of dragon-like lightning. Everything in the area was shaking so violently that, unexpectedly, even Yang Qi’s defensive empyrean energy began trembling.

The meteorological phenomena on display were so intense that other experts in the trial noticed what was happening.

Numerous experts in the forest now had expressions of despair on their faces.

‘Why did we get so unlucky? I can’t believe someone is reaching godly ascension! They held their power in check, joined the Bloodgore Trials, and intentionally waited to become a god here!’ That was what many people were thinking.

Although the Child of the Buddhist Lamp was only aiming to become a Lesser God, it was still godly ascension. Already, he was surrounded by god tribulation, which despite being dangerous, was actually a safety measure, as no one dared to get too close to him.

A lamp suddenly appeared above his head, burning with intense fire as it absorbed the power of the god tribulation. Generally speaking, the tribulation of godly ascension involved numerous different tribulations that were incredibly difficult to pass. However, this Child of the Buddhist Lamp had somehow found a buddhist lamp that could deal with tribulations like that.

As such, he wasn’t in a weak position at all. In fact, he was getting stronger by the moment, and his godpower was surging, causing his eyes to flicker with immense fighting prowess.

Bzzz. Bzzz. Bzzz.

His eyes were like vortexes of lightning, emitting electric light to slam into Yang Qi’s defensive empyrean energy.

The gods on the cliffs noticed what was happening. “Very impressive. This is the first person to reach godly ascension in these Bloodgore Trials. Even in past trials, godly ascension is a rarity.”

“Rarity yes, impossibility no. He’s known as the Child of the Buddhist Lamp, a former genius from a buddhist school. However, after stealing and secretly mastering a consummate art known as the Ageless Longevity Divine Art, he returned to the state of being a child. They tried imprisoning him and crippling his energy arts, but he escaped, and even managed to steal the Golden Apex Buddhist Lamp from his school, which can be used to absorb tribulations. Although it can only use buddhist mental dharmas to operate, he obviously knows them. It was a given all along that he would become a god. I guess we’ll just have to wait and see if he ends up being the one to walk out of the valley of iron trees alive.”

RUMBLE!

The Child of the Buddhist Lamp burst out laughing. “I didn’t want to reach godly ascension so early, but you forced my hand. And because of that, there’s no way I'll let you off the hook. You have a death wish, right? In that case, I’ll just kill you.”

Meanwhile, others in the forest were coming to realize what was happening.

“Someone is reaching godly ascension?!”

“We can't let him succeed. If he becomes a god, we’re all dead for sure. Let’s kill him!”

“Heaven-Slaughtering God Fist!”

“Grand Dragon’s Hand of Capturing!”

“Fist of the God-Tiger’s Roar!”

Numerous experts were now converging on the location, and joining forces to wipe out the Child of the Buddhist Lamp.

Chapter 1176: Not Even Godly Ascension will Help

The Child of the Buddhist Lamp was in the middle of god tribulation, which should have meant that he was weak and vulnerable. Instead, he had the Golden Apex Buddhist Lamp, which allowed him to simply absorb the power of the tribulation. With every moment that passed, he got stronger, thanks to that freakish treasure. Meanwhile, god lightning crashed around him, and destructive vital energy swirled.

Off to the side, Yang Qi was just watching, hoping to learn a thing or two.

He wasn’t worried at all about the results. Even if this Child of the Buddhist Lamp passed the tribulation, Yang Qi knew he could still kill him. In contrast, there were many other experts present who were by no means just going to let him pass the tribulation.

Numerous attacks were being unleashed, some targeting only the Child of the Buddhist Lamp, but others that included Yang Qi as well. Godpower and brilliant light flared as dirt exploded everywhere. After all, what else would happen when thousands of attacks hit the same target?

Yang Qi didn’t care. He simply flitted about, avoiding the attacks and even absorbing the power of some of them. He moved so quickly that some people even assumed their attacks had destroyed him. At a certain point he headed to a more distant location where he used a godly-class energy art to make himself invisible so he could watch the fighting.

Wild streams of godpower shot back and forth as everyone went all out to kill the Child of the Buddhist Lamp. Everyone was clearly enraged at the idea of him reaching godly ascension.

No one was willing to let him live, and the combination of thousands of people all fighting desperately led to a completely chaotic scene. At a certain point, the Child of the Buddhist Lamp was hit so hard that he staggered backward and coughed up a mouthful of blood.

“You ants! How dare you attack me! I'm going to become a god and slaughter all of you!” His Golden Apex Buddhist Lamp continued sending out preheaven buddhist light which eventually converged into the shape of a fiery dragon.

Howling, the dragon swept forth, incinerating a dozen nearby experts and transforming them into ash. Then the Child of the Buddhist Lamp leaped up and mounted the fire dragon! No one could touch him!

Godhood was solidifying within him, and every person he killed was aiding the process. He was definitely going to reach godly ascension!

Techniques that devoured the vital energy and godpower of other people were considered to be from the dao of devils. That said, they were still very popular in the god world. In fact, just about everyone knew a technique like that, and although they often came with dangerous side-effects, they could be incredibly useful if they were used at the right time. The truth was that it wasn’t unheard of to use godly ascension as a tactic in the Bloodgore Trials. After all, the process required a huge amount of power, and what better place could there be to get that power than a battlefield where everyone was expected to kill each other.

“Myriad Buddhas Face the Sect!Myriad Buddhas Destroy the World!Myriad Buddhas Nirvanic Rebirth!Myriad Buddhas in Secret Dhyāna!Myriad Buddhas Infuriated!Myriad Buddhas Create the World!Myriad Buddhas Imprison Gods!Myriad Buddhas Ultimate Glory!” He unleashed a host of buddhist fist techniques, revealing how insanely powerful he was. He was really an old-timer from a major buddhist school, who was several hundred years old. In the god world, that was a lot. In fact, it was because he was running out of longevity that he had stolen the Ageless Longevity Divine Art, bolstering his longevity and returning him to the state of being a child.

He had acquired power that surpassed ordinary Quasi-Gods, so now that he was reaching godly ascension, it could only be imagined how incredible he would be. He would surely be able to crush immense armies single-handedly.

Blood was flowing in rivers as dozens of experts died at his hands.

“Heavenly Buddha Astral Projection!

“Longevity and Agelessness!”

The Child of the Buddhist Lamp erupted with energy flows that bubbled like boiling water, rising to fuse with the sky. It was almost as if his energy were somehow connecting to the god world itself as the godhood within him finally became complete.

He had succeeded in becoming a god.

He had a godhood rating of one.

As the godpower erupted from him, he burst out laughing. “I'll kill all of you! I've reached godly ascension! I’ll wipe you out to strengthen my godhood!”

The fire dragon instantly became ten times as large, and in the blink of an eye, over a hundred people were reduced to ashes!

‘At this rate, he's definitely going to kill everyone else,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘And although I could kill him, doing so right now would reveal too much. I'd still rather someone else start fighting him, giving me a chance to swoop in at the last minute and take both of them out.’ He knew that the gods on the cliffs were watching, and that if he showed off too much by simply slaughtering the Child of the Buddhist Lamp, it would attract attention and even investigation.

“Get down here! Did you really think you could get the edge on me with that iron and blood ability?”

Flying up, Yang Qi grabbed the burly man who was still hidden in the tree, grabbing him as firmly as if he were a child.

A look of terror filled the man’s face. “Y-you... you’re a god too?! How did you break through my divine ability? I couldn't even fight back!”

Yang Qi snorted coldly. “What, still trying to convince me you want to work together?” It wasn't lost on him that this man had remained hidden in the shadows, picking off numerous competitors. It was obvious that he wasn’t some kind of soft-hearted individual, and was just waiting until more people killed each other off before trying to take advantage of the situation.

“W-what... what do you want?” the burly man said, shivering.

“I want you to go kill the Child of the Buddhist Lamp!” With that, he touched the man’s head with his palm, sending a burst of energy arts into him. Of course, everyone else was so focused on the Child of the Buddhist Lamp that they weren’t paying any attention at all to Yang Qi and the burly man.

The energy Yang Qi had just sent into the burly man contained profundities of the Purrfect God Art, which encased him in a bubble and sent him flying through the air surrounded by a whistling scream. And before anyone knew what was happening, he had slammed into the defensive empyrean energy of the Child of the Buddhist Lamp.

RIP!

The fire dragon exploded, filling the area with a rain of fire as the burly man laid hands directly on the Child of the Buddhist Lamp in a double-handed strike.

The Child of the Buddhist Lamp let out a shriek, accompanied by a mouthful of blood. How could he ever have guessed that someone would hit him with a blow like this?

“Dammit! How could you be so strong?!” The Child of the Buddhist Lamp looked like a cornered animal as he glared at the burly man. Reaching out, he grabbed him in claw-like hands and ripped him apart! In the moment before death, though, the burly man howled and self-detonated, soaking the Child of the Buddhist Lamp in blood.

‘Perfect!’ Yang Qi thought, smiling broadly. He had successfully used the burly man to strike a blow against the Child of the Buddhist Lamp, all without revealing his own power.

Having sustained a serious injury, the Child of the Buddhist Lamp was overwhelmed with rage. “I can’t believe someone hurt me this badly. Everyone here must pay the price for his actions!”

Coughing up blood like mad, he unleashed further slaughter, killing hundreds of people in the blink of an eye. They might as well have been straw men compared to his godly might, and they fell instantly.

Compared to someone who had reached godly ascension, those who hadn’t reached that level almost weren’t worth mentioning.

“RUN!” people began screaming. They had hoped that ganging up would keep them temporarily safe, and weren’t interested in just throwing their lives away.

It was a very lopsided fight now, with the Child of the Buddhist Lamp mowing people down left and right. Roughly an hour passed in which he slaughtered everyone he could find around him. Eventually, there were only a few hundred people left in the trial.

Despite how resilient they were, even their arts of invisibility could be seen through by the Child of the Buddhist Lamp.

This was the moment Yang Qi had been waiting for.

Reaching out, he grabbed an expert hidden nearby, a youngster who was an expert in the dao of the sword, who reeked of blood, making it impossible to tell how many people he had killed. Before the young man knew what was happening, Yang Qi had sent some quintessence energy into him, then vanished.

The sword-wielding young man didn’t even notice Yang Qi. However he did notice that something odd had just happened. To his surprise, he felt power flowing through him, which then erupted into the open and attracted the attention of the Child of the Buddhist Lamp.

“Vicious Tactics in Buddha’s Heart!”

The youngster lashed out with his sword, only to suddenly realize that his godpower wasn’t under his own control as a deadly stream of sword energy slashed out toward the Child of the Buddhist Lamp.

The Child of the Buddhist Lamp was injured so badly that he couldn’t even speak.

However, the young man with the sword had just unleashed so much godpower that he almost fell to his knees.

“How dare you hurt me, boy!” The Child of the Buddhist Lamp lunged forward, launching a palm strike that crushed the young man into a smear of gore on the ground. He then went on to unleash more attacks on other people he could find. Meanwhile, Yang Qi was secretly sending his energy arts through the ground to the various people who were either chasing, or hiding from the Child of the Buddhist Lamp.

As a result, the Child of the Buddhist Lamp was receiving more and more grievous injuries.

Another hour passed and there were only a few dozen people left alive. They were all gathered in a far corner of the valley, hiding from the Child of the Buddhist Lamp. Exchanging glances, they finally shouted, “Let’s go for broke!”

Chapter 1177: Killing a God

The dozens of surviving experts were about to put everything on the line in the fight against the Child of the Buddhist Lamp! Yang Qi could hide, but the others couldn't. He had used his energy arts to manipulate all of the survivors into gathering in the same location. Now, they were like caged animals, and they definitely wouldn’t hold anything back as they fought for their lives.

RUMBLE!

“Buddha King Unbounded!” howled the Child of the Buddhist Lamp. “Heaven and Earth Sink to Oblivion!”

A massive divine ability was unleashed, slamming into the remaining experts. A moment later, a huge mushroom cloud rose up into the sky.

Other massive divine abilities were also on display, causing tempests of vital energy to sweep about everywhere, uprooting the iron trees and sending both dirt and blood flying high into the sky.

As it fell back down, a blood-colored mist filled the area, mixed with dust.

All of the gods were completely focused on the shockwaves rippling out.

Everyone who had been struck by the Child of the Buddhist Lamp were either ripped to shreds or flattened into streaks of gore.

Meanwhile, the Child of the Buddhist Lamp was also so badly injured that he flopped onto the ground, his skin torn and bleeding. A disbelieving expression on his face, he murmured, “How did they get so strong all of a sudden? I can't believe they hurt me. It doesn’t make sense. Although... I guess I killed them all in the end. I formed my godhood, only to be badly injured, which is going to cause some problems for my cultivation base. But as long as I get into the House of God Ordainment, it’ll all be worth it. I'll be invincible! Maybe I'm weak right now, so much so that an ordinary person who doesn’t know any martial arts would be able to kill me right here and now. But it doesn't matter! Everyone else is dead!”

He suddenly burst out laughing.

However, a moment later, his eyes went wide. “Wait. No! Once you kill everyone else in the Bloodgore Trials, you’re supposed to be automatically teleported out to rest up and meet the gods. Why am I still here?”

“Because, so am I,” Yang Qi said, walking out into the open. “Did I just hear you mention that an ordinary person who doesn’t know any martial arts would be able to kill you? Well, my energy arts are average at best, but I guess they’ll be enough to take you out.”

“You... y-y-y-you...” stammered the Child of the Buddhist Lamp. “How could this be happening? How come my magical eye wasn’t able to spot you? I definitely killed everybody!”

“I just have a good invisibility technique, that’s all,” Yang Qi replied. “Alright. You’ve killed enough people for today. The time has come to send you to hell.”

SHUNK!

The Child of the Buddhist Lamp’s head flew into the air, and the godhood he had just formed shattered.

Just like that, Yang Qi casually killed a newly ascended god. It was a tragic thing, even for the numerous observing gods from the House of God Ordainment.

Whoosh!

The moment Yang Qi killed the Child of the Buddhist Lamp, streams of vital energy converged on him, and his identity medallion flickered with radiant light. Apparently, the medallion was drawing in the vital energy of all the other dead competitors and turning it into a power that pulled him to meet with the gods above.

“You did it, boy,” one of the gods said. “The Child of the Buddhist Lamp reached godly ascension, but you killed him. And it doesn’t seem you took unfair advantage of the situation. How exactly was your invisibility talisman able to keep you hidden?”

There were a few dozen Lesser Gods there, all of them eying Yang Qi. They looked surprised, and were clearly wondering how Yang Qi managed to kill the Child of the Buddhist Lamp.

It seemed clear that he had just taken advantage of the moment to kill the Child of the Buddhist Lamp after he was badly injured. Although it was a strange way for the trial to end, what could they say? It was no strange thing for Quasi-Gods to have trump cards and other secrets.

The Child of the Buddhist Lamp was dead, and Yang Qi was the sole survivor, which meant he was now an official disciple of the House of God Ordainment.

“Patriarch gods, the truth is that I have an ancient invisibility talisman that works for only two hours. After it runs out of power, it ceases to exist. It took me years of saving up godnotes to be able to afford to buy it, but in the end, it was worth it. Who could’ve guessed that it would serve me as it did today?” Yang Qi was just making up a random story that obviously couldn’t be verified.

“You definitely got lucky,” another god said. “But luck is another type of power. By the way, you don’t need to call us patriarch gods now. According to the rules, you’re now an official disciple of the House of God Ordainment. Therefore, you may address us as Elder Brothers. That said, your cultivation base is a bit low right now. Your first task as a disciple is going to be godly ascension.” Raising his voice, he said, “Give him his uniform and identity medallion. And take a blood sample for registry purposes. Henceforth, he's an official disciple!”

“Yes sir!”

A handful of novice disciples hurried forward respectfully to follow through on the orders. Although these disciples were involved with some of the inner workings of the organization, they couldn't compare to the official disciples.

Considering the extreme death rate in the Bloodgore Trials, it was little wonder that some people didn’t have the guts to join.

Usually, the only disciples who would dare to do so would be the ones running out of longevity. Unfortunately for people like that, it required incredible willpower to survive the Bloodgore Trials. And people who held back out of fear generally weren’t the type who could form godhood anyway. As for those who reached godly ascension without participating in something like the Bloodgore Trials, it was usually because they had gone through similar experiences, or had perhaps encountered some incredible good fortune.

After donning his new attire, Yang Qi looked like a transcendent being, and at the same time, very dangerous. Of course, his God Legion Battle Robe was far more impressive, but he couldn’t reveal it right now without drawing unwanted attention. Therefore, he stuck to more ordinary clothing.

“Well, our very lucky little Junior Brother, why don’t we go to one of the altars in the House of God Ordainment and wait for the other disciples to finish with their trials? There are some rites and ceremonies to go through, plus you need to pay respects to the august patriarch. After you memorize all the rules and settle down, you’ll be a true member of the House of God Ordainment.”

Yang Qi had hoped to watch the performances of Jadefall and the others, but unfortunately he was already being whisked toward a teleportation portal.

The portal whirred to life and he was sent to a distant location, some sort of hall carved out of stone.

There were people seated in on the main floor, as well as a group of gods in positions of honor. One of them said, “All of you are elite cultivators who are now official disciples of the House of God Ordainment. This is our headquarters in the Primal-Chaos Continent! After everyone is gathered here, we’ll explain the history and rules of our organization. Understand? Please wait silently and avoid any hubbub. We know that you’re excited to be official disciples, but this one simple test is only the beginning of many more tests to come.”

Hearing this, Yang Qi quietly settled down into a cross-legged position. Looking around, he saw several hundred people gathered, all of them in high spirits. Some had clearly just reached godly ascension and had unstable godhood, similar to how the Child of the Buddhist Lamp had been.

‘I wonder if father and the others have passed their trials yet. They should be fine. Considering what they’re capable of, they should all come out on top.’

As Yang Qi thought more about the matter, he heard another teleportation portal whir to life, and some more people entered the hall and sat down cross-legged.

Suddenly, the aura of a god weighed down on the room. Yang Qi looked over and saw that it was the young master from the Cloudsoaring Mansion, the one who had purchased the Consummate God Tree. He was obviously a god now.

‘I wonder if this guy fought one of my people. If he did, does that mean one of them died?’ The thought was shocking to Yang Qi. ‘Probably not. It wouldn’t have been easy for him to beat any of them. He would definitely have come out licking his wounds.’

“You passed already, Yang Qi?” someone said. He looked over and saw Jadefall, holding the snoring purrling in her arms. Anyone who looked at the thing would think it was nothing but an ordinary pet.

To date, Yang Qi hadn’t noticed any growth in the purrling’s cultivation base. In fact, he wondered if it even had a cultivation base.

Regardless, it was obviously capable of dealing with any opponent it ran across.

“Keep it down,” Yang Qi said. “Come, sit down over here.”

“Alright,” she replied, sitting down and lowering her voice. “The Bloodgore Trials were interesting. There were some tough characters, but they all lacked fighting experience. None of them have experienced the ferocity of the impure lands.”

“I know. Fighting ten thousand opponents is like nothing compared to when dramatic things happen in the impure lands. That said, we can't afford to let our guard down....” Even as the words left his mouth, a teleportation portal whirred and a group of people emerged, including the Shepherd, Doom, Brahma, and Patriarch Annalist.

Chapter 1178: Official Disciples

‘Hmm. Why isn’t father out yet?’ Yang Qi thought. In addition to the Shepherd and Doom, he also saw Eldest Brother and Elder Second Brother from the Invincible Society. All of them had slaughtered their way through ten thousand opponents and come out on top.

Truth be told, it wasn’t really anything spectacular. After all, weren’t these people the kind who had slaughtered their way through ten thousand times ten thousand experts in the mortal world?

But as people continued to teleport into the hall, and Yang Qi’s father Yang Zhan wasn’t among them, he started to worry. Yang Zhan was probably the weakest of the entire group, although Yang Qi had imparted immense battle experience into him, including information from the God Legion Seal.

‘If someone killed him, I’ll slaughter them in revenge,’ Yang Qi thought angrily. ‘Thankfully, I sealed some energy in father with the God Legion Seal. Later on, when my cultivation base is high enough and I can draw on the heavenly workings of the god world, I’ll be able to resurrect him if he’s dead.’

Yang Qi was always planning for the worst case scenario.

However, even as he formulated specific plans for how to get revenge, a nearby teleportation portal activated and Yang Zhan stepped out.

He wore a new uniform, but his face was pale, making it obvious that he had fought a very draining fight. In the end, though, he had come out on top of ten thousand other opponents.

Yang Qi breathed a sigh of relief.

“Father, come over,” he said. “Let me heal you. What exactly happened in there?”

“Something unexpected,” Yang Zhan replied with a wry grin. “Someone reached godly ascension and started slaughtering everyone. But in the end, I killed him. Don’t worry, I'm not exactly easy to kill. Besides, I’m dead set on finding Greensura, and I won’t rest until it happens. There’s no way a god is going to stop me.”

“You’re injured down to your essence. But you did kill a god, which is a very shocking accomplishment.” As Yang Qi spoke, he sent a gentle stream of energy into his father, causing him to shiver.

Yang Qi’s true energy flowed through Yang Zhan, soothing his muscles and bones, and causing popping sounds to ring out as his wounds were stitched. It was obvious that he had fought a very dangerous battle, leaving his meridians badly damaged and his sea of energy in a complete mess. In fact, if he hadn’t possessed some energy from the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, he would likely have died.

Most denizens of the god world would be dead if they had experienced the same thing. It was so bad that Yang Zhan’s heart was shattered into pieces. His nascent divinity was only in one piece because of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.

Most likely, it was only because his opponent had underestimated him that Yang Zhan could come out on top.

After the healing process was over, Yang Zhan offered further details. “After reaching godly ascension, he started slaughtering everyone. So everyone teamed up against him. He hit me with a fist that shattered my heart, and assumed that the blow killed me. Little did he know that I had a bit of power left to unleash a move called No Heaven Beyond Heaven. That was how I killed him.”

“No Heaven Beyond Heaven?” Yang Qi asked quietly. “What’s that?”

“It’s a technique I created specifically to kill Proud Heaven,” Yang Zhan said proudly. “Even if he hides beyond heaven, I’ll make sure that he ceases to exist. He won’t be able to hide anywhere. The chiliocosm of worlds is immense, but it's not big enough to conceal him.”

“Is that so?” Yang Qi said. Although there were others in the group who had more fighting experience than Yang Zhan, he was apparently following Yang Qi’s footsteps and forming his own dao.

“None of us encountered anyone reaching godly ascension,” said Sectlord Will Manifestation, who was flanked by Peaklords Celestial and Memory. They all sat down. “In all fairness, the Bloodgore Trials are probably very difficult for the natives, but in the end, they’re simply too inexperienced. For people like us who have truly experienced dramatic fights in our lives, it wasn’t much to worry about.”

“Alright, we’re all here,” Yang Qi said. “We all got into the House of God Ordainment.” He was very pleased with how things had turned out. Now that they were all in the House of God Ordainment, they were definitely going to benefit greatly.

After they had sat there for almost a full twenty-four hours, one of the gods raised his voice. “Very well, ladies and gentlemen. You’re now members of the House of God Ordainment. The first thing you all need to do is accept our rules, which are very strictly enforced. We’re not a disunited organization; anyone who causes problems will be arrested by the law enforcement team. That said, you have the right to demand an audience before the parliament of elders to argue your case. But as long as you follow the rules, nothing like that will happen.”

Everyone in the hall joined voices and replied, “We understand!”

“What exactly do you understand!?” snapped another of the gods. “You haven’t even heard all the rules yet!”

“Cut them some slack,” another god said, waving his hand dismissively. “They just became members of the House of God Ordainment, so why not wait a bit before rebuking them?” Turning his attention to the crowd, he continued, “The House of God Ordainment was founded by a Paramount God named Patriarch God Ordainment. Even in the days when the Sovereign Lord controlled the god world, we were an independent entity. We didn’t participate in the struggles of the court, and although we paid fealty to the Sovereign Lord, we didn’t need to follow his every command. And we certainly weren’t members of the halls of heaven.

“Now, you are all official disciples of the House of God Ordainment. If the organization is strong, you’ll be strong. But if it weakens, you weaken. Understand? You can’t survive outside of this organization. Henceforth, your destinies, and your lives, are connected to the House of God Ordainment. Perhaps you don’t truly understand the gravity of my words now. But eventually, as your cultivation deepens, you will. In a word, those who join the House of God Ordainment must do everything for the sect. You live for it. You die for it. No one has ever betrayed the sect and escaped punishment. We hunt such people down... and kill them.”

His words were met with silence.

“What’s wrong with you people? Did you go mute or something?”

“Er, yes!”

“Yes sir!”

There wasn’t a unified response, but the disciples did voice their acknowledgment.

“And now, the almighty figures of the House of God Ordainment will select disciples they favor to serve as apprentices. Those who are selected will rise rapidly through the ranks. Those who aren’t selected need not feel resentment. You will be assigned important tasks on the outside, and as you further your cultivation, eventually reaching godly ascension, you will also rise through the ranks. First, would the disciples who reached godly ascension please step forward!”

As it turned out, the Bloodgore Trials were only the first part of the process.

There were roughly a dozen disciples who had become gods during the trials, and they were all holding their heads high. They knew they would almost certainly be looked on with favor. After all, only the disciples who could reach godly ascension would truly be accepted.

Bells tolled as immense energy flows filled the hall. At the same time, eight figures appeared, who were shocking even to Yang Qi. They were all Greater Gods!

The difference between Lesser Gods and Greater Gods was obviously greater than the difference between heaven and earth!

“Greetings, Elders,” one of the Greater Gods said. Seeing that he wasn’t seating himself, the disciples all scrambled to their feet out of respect.

“So these are the disciples who passed the trials here in the Primal-Chaos Continent,” said a female Greater God. “We held trials on thousands of continents, which begs the question of what this set of disciples is like.”

“Grand Elder,” one of the Lesser Gods said, “some of the disciples reached godly ascension during their trial. Might they be pleasing to your eye?” Glancing back, he said, “You disciples listen up. This is a Greater God and grand elder of the House of God Ordainment, Goddess Idlecloud. As the supervisor of the Idlecloud Pavilion, she's very important.”

“That’s enough,” said Goddess Idlecloud. “We’re here to select apprentices, not the other way around. And considering that all of the disciples who reached godly ascension are men, I’ll pass on selecting any. I’d rather see if there are any formidable women in the crowd.”

She waved her hand, sending out a stream of light that filled the hall and made everyone feel like this female god was looking into their souls.

Chapter 1179: Mysterious Mine

With the wave of a hand, Goddess Idlecloud sent godpower out to fill the room, and all of the female disciples immediately sensed her inspecting them. A moment later, it was to Jadefall’s shock that she felt herself fly up into the air.

“Excellent aptitude! I’ll take this girl. The rest, you can have.”

With a beckoning gesture, Goddess Idlecloud pulled Jadefall to her side. “And with that, I’ll take my leave.”

One of the other Greater Gods chuckled. “Oh? You’re only taking a single apprentice this time, Goddess Idlecloud?”

“That's right. Quality over quantity.” Looking at Jadefall, she said, “Come, let’s go. With my help, you’ll reach godly ascension sooner rather than later. Afterward, you’ll truly be able to reach new heights of glory.”

Jadefall gave Yang Qi a meaningful look and he nodded in return. Obviously, Jadefall would achieve a rapid rise through the ranks under the tutelage of a Greater God. And Yang Qi could breathe a sigh of relief knowing that she wouldn’t be unfairly bullied by anyone.

Taking hold of Jadefall, Goddess Idlecloud sent out a stream of godpower that wrapped the both of them up, whereupon they vanished via some spatial jumping technique. It was something that Greater Gods could do in the god world, but not Lesser Gods.

Lesser Gods could pierce through space to launch attacks, but only understood some of the profundities of space-time in the god world. Only Common Gods or higher could understand the transformations of space-time.

With that, the Greater Gods went on to select various apprentices. Of Yang Qi’s group, Brahma became an apprentice, as did Eldest Brother, Sword Seventeen, Patriarch Annalist, Doom, and the Shepherd.... The Greater Gods were clearly very perceptive, and could sense that they had particularly amazing aptitude.

Yang Qi was keeping his own substructure tightly under wraps, as he wasn't interested in taking a Master. He had too many secrets, including the fact that he was the bearer of the God Legion Seal. If word of that leaked, it would cause tumult.

In the end, all of his followers attained high positions, which he was very happy about. Not only would they become very powerful, but he trusted that they wouldn't reveal his secrets.

As for Lightning Dragonriser, he wasn’t privy to any of their true secrets.

Furthermore, none of the almighty beings took him as an apprentice.

After the selection of apprentices ended, the people left behind were the disciples with average talent who would be given various missions and assignments outside the sect. Not only would they be rewarded with resources for accomplishing those missions, but they could also further their cultivation. And if they reached godly ascension, it could change everything for them.

Of course, Yang Qi was in that group.

“Those of you who weren’t selected to be apprentices, losing the chance to immediately rise through the ranks, are still going to be very powerful people. You’ll be given tasks to accomplish for the House of God Ordainment and will be well-rewarded for success. Also, you can advance your cultivation bases. Now, all of you will be given a copy of the Great Classic of God Ordainment, which contains the history of the sect, as well as its rules. Afterward, you’ll be assigned your specific tasks.”

Yang Qi got his copy of the Great Classic of God Ordainment, which was a huge book filled with enough information that it couldn’t be perused in a short time.

“You, stand off to the side,” one of the Lesser Gods said. “You three, come over here. The rest of you....”

Yang Qi followed the instructions that were given and found himself in a small team standing in front of one of the Lesser Gods. “Your mission is to go to a mountainous mining district controlled by the House of God Ordainment. The Guardian Mines. Got it?”

“Guardian Mines?” said one of the other disciples. “Are we supposed to stand guard there, Elder?”

“Cut the chatter,” the elder snapped. “You’ll understand when you get there. You disciples might be Quasi-Gods, but you’re still frogs in a well. You have no idea about the true profundities of the god world. The House of God Ordainment has plenty of mines where we harvest godstones. That means we have miners in our employ. Of course, you’re not being sent to be miners, but foremen. Remember, it's not easy to work as a foreman. A lot of the miners are vicious characters, criminals, and even monsters that we've captured and forced into labor. You’ll be in charge of managing them. You’ll learn the rest of the details when you get to the mines.”

“Yes sir,” everyone replied. Including Yang Qi, there were a few dozen members in the group.

With that, they hurried over to one of the teleportation portals and stepped inside. When they emerged, they could instantly tell they were out in the wilds.

Ancient, towering mountains stretched up all around them, covered with primeval jungles and filled with wild demonlings. In fact, intermittent roars reached their ears from the creatures. There were mines visible everywhere, with miners streaming in and out of them like ants.

The god that had led them through the teleportation portal said, “This is only one of the mining districts operated by the House of God Ordainment. And these wild mountain ranges stretch on without end.”

There were quite a few novice disciples waiting to meet them, who immediately knelt and said, “Greetings, Elder, Elder Brothers.”

“Rise,” the god said. “You’ve done well, considering that your previous superiors are either dead or have become gods. We’ve heard your repeated requests for assistance and have assigned these official disciples to be your new superiors. Understand?”

“Understood!” the novice disciples said respectfully.

“Good. Now let’s make the specific assignments. There are fifty-six mountains being mined, which is why we brought fifty-six disciples. Each disciple will be a foreman for one of the mountains.”

With that, Yang Qi and the other disciples stood there waiting to hear their assignment.

“Yue Tianlin, you’re assigned to Mine One. Meng Long, you’re at Mine Two.” One by one, the god went through all the disciples. “Yang Qi, Mine Thirteen.... Ouyang Xin, Mine Fifty-Six.”

When all the mines were assigned, the god said, “All of the various mines have assigned production rates that must be strictly maintained. If any of you can surpass the assigned production rate, you’ll be rewarded. And anyone who discovers high-quality godstones will also be rewarded. However, don’t say that I didn’t warn you about the bad news. If large numbers of miners die in a given mine, whether from insurrection or demonling invasion, or if you don’t meet your assigned quota, you’ll be severely punished, possibly even executed! Understand?”

His voice thrummed with killing intent that caused everyone’s hearts to grow cold.

“Every year, inspectors will come to check the circumstances of your mines. You have the authority to kill any miners you see fit, even en masse. But all of that is under the assumption that you continue meeting your quotas. The more godstones you produce, the more seriously the sect will take you. You’ll be able to request more resources, or even apply to have female novice disciples come to serve you. And if you earn enough merit points due to your service, you could even use them to pay your way out of a death sentence! Understand?”

“We understand!”

In the end, the rules seemed simple. They had to meet the godstone quotas every year. If they failed, they would be punished; if they succeeded, they would be rewarded.

“Good.” The elder stepped back to the teleportation portal. “If you have any other questions about the sect, you can find the answers in the Great Classic of God Ordainment.”

“Yes sir! Farewell, Elder!” After the elder left, the fifty-six disciples breathed sighs of relief.

“Let’s head to our mines and check them out,” someone said. “When we have the time, we can get back together to compare notes. And if any demonlings invade, we definitely have to help each other.”

The person who spoke the words was a fair-faced young man who looked like he was a young master from some aristocratic clan.

Although he spoke with a voice of command, it wasn't as if the fifty-six disciples present were the kind of people who would simply accept orders from anyone. Most of them ignored him and flew off before he finished speaking. Yang Qi was one of them. It seemed to him that this assignment was going to be an easy one, and that was especially the case considering he could fabricate high-quality godstones.

‘I wonder what assignment Lightning Dragonriser got,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘Father and the rest were taken in by Greater Gods, so they won’t have assignments like this. They’ll be given the best resources and plenty of opportunities to work on their cultivation and reach godly ascension.’

Of course, although they had been taken away by Greater Gods, Yang Qi was still their ultimate protector. He was far stronger than any ordinary god could imagine. And once he reached godly ascension, he would surely understand more secrets of the God Legion Seal.

Only a real god could truly use that seal.

Right now, Yang Qi was like a child with a sledgehammer. But once he was strong enough to wield that sledgehammer, he could use it in a very destructive fashion.

Before long, he was at his assigned mine.

It was a huge mountain filled with all sorts of caves and tunnels, almost like an anthill. He had a mansion grotto of his own, located atop a high cliff, from which position he could oversee and issue orders to the entire mine.

Chapter 1180: Administration

“Foreman, sir, here’s the work roster. It contains the names of all the disciples who work here in the mines. Of course, they’re all novice disciples. Incidentally, congratulations on your promotion, Elder Brother.”

Yang Qi’s mansion grotto was essentially a cave, and in front of it was a vast platform of about six hundred acres. At the opposite end of the platform from the grotto, there was a towering cliff so steep that anyone who fell off of it would be smashed to bits at the bottom. At the same time, it provided amazing views of the scenery, including the entire exterior of the mine. The mountains were vast, making it impossible to determine how many demonlings lurked about, or what other secrets might be hidden there. Yang Qi opened his Lord's Eye, and immediately caught hints of the aura of demonlings.

These mountains were clearly dangerous; there were demonlings here that were on the same level as gods.

Demon-gods.

As could be expected, in the god world, Demonfolk and humans were always fighting each other. And because of the horrible climate in the god world, the demons were particularly powerful. A good example were the fish that nearly injured Yang Qi when he first arrived in the god world.

There were a host of novice disciples arrayed on the platform, all of them Quasi-Gods capable of unleashing immense power, especially if they joined forces. Normally, they were fiendish individuals who kept the miners under control.

But right now they were kneeling in front of Yang Qi. Although he was also a Quasi-God, he was an official disciple, and the ranking system was strictly observed in the House of God Ordainment. Novice disciples didn't count for anything, only official disciples who had survived the Bloodgore Trials were considered worthy of respect.

That was especially true out in a place like this. Yang Qi was now the foreman of Mine Thirteen, and had authority over life and death. As long as he met his yearly quota, he could do anything he wanted, including executing novice disciples.

The leaders among the novice disciples were all very attentive, and clearly wanted to make a good impression.

“Foreman, sir, we have three thousand novice disciples here in Mine Thirteen, but at the moment, only two thousand nine hundred and ninety are present at the mine. All the names are written here, Elder Brother. Please, take a look.”

The novice disciple leaders were powerfully built and had very impressive godpower and energy arts. When they spoke, their voices rumbled like thunder, revealing that they were definitely adept fighters.

Yang Qi flipped through the roster, which contained all the details of the various tasks assigned to the different disciples. Furthermore, he found that the miners were split into groups of a hundred, each managed by an individual novice disciple.

There were fully two hundred thousand miners, with two thousand novice disciples in charge of them. The remaining roughly one thousand novice disciples had jobs related to food preparation, logistics, guard duty, law enforcement, and security. For example, they had to watch very carefully to make sure that none of the miners stole any godstones.

The mine was almost like a small nation, complete with all of the various necessary parts. It was just like the saying the sparrow may be small, but all its vital organs are there.

After perusing the roster, Yang Qi was starting to get a much better idea of how the mine worked.

With that, he handed it back to one of the leaders, a burly fellow with a hairy birthmark on his face that made him look extremely fierce, obstinate, and unruly.

Although these people wouldn’t dare to defy Yang Qi’s authority, they were obviously used to lining their pockets thanks to their position. They were like local thugs, while Yang Qi was the gang boss.

“What’s your name?” Yang Qi asked.

“I'm Huang Weilong,” the disciple replied, his birthmark quivering along with the hairs that poked out of it. He didn’t just look fearsome; the other disciples didn't utter a peep, which seemed to indicate that he was the top figure of authority under Yang Qi.

“Huang Weilong,” Yang Qi murmured thoughtfully. “You said there are three thousand names on the roster, but only two thousand nine hundred and ninety present. Where are the other ten disciples? And why aren’t they here to receive me?”

“They left yesterday for patrol duty in the mountains, Elder Brother,” Huang Weilong replied. “Unfortunately, they were ambushed by some powerful demonlings and killed. Not even their bones were left behind. That’s why they aren’t here.”

Nodding, Yang Qi said, “I see. And what happened to the Elder Brother who previously ran this mine?”

“He was killed in a riot, Elder Brother. You see, he was a violent person who routinely beat the miners. He even executed a lot of them to help with the devil art he cultivated, in the hopes of reaching godly ascension sooner. Eventually, the miners ran out of patience and rose up in revolt. We weren’t able to keep control, and the foreman was killed. As a result, the sect had to step in and slaughter a full ten thousand miners before they regained control. We also lost a few hundred novice disciples during that time.”

“So it was an insurrection. Well tell me, what sorts of problems do I need to watch out for in managing the mine?”

“Yes sir!” Huang Weilong exchanged a glance with some of the other powerful disciples flanking him. “First, you have to guard against riots. As everyone knows, the miners are mostly career criminals sent here by the sect, some of whom have very powerful energy arts. There are even murderers and escaped slaves. When they get organized and riot, they can do a lot of damage. Sometimes they even manage to coordinate with the other mines, which is why we have to keep them under strict control. Of course, if worse comes to worst, gods from the House of God Ordainment will come to kill any rioters. But we prefer to avoid that.”

“Okay, what’s your second bit of advice,” Yang Qi asked.

“There's a second and a third,” Huang Weilong said. “Second, you have to prepare for invasions. The mountains are filled with demonlings, and every so often they mount large scale attacks, both to steal godstones and to kill and eat miners. If they break through our defenses and slaughter a lot of people, you’ll be held responsible, Elder Brother, and the sect will definitely punish you. About ten years ago, an invasion of demonlings broke through the defenses of Mine Fifty-Six and slaughtered a whole bunch of miners. Because of that, they weren’t able to meet their quota, which led to the foreman being stripped of his position and demoted to miner. It was really tragic. As for the third point, you have to be on guard for cultivators from the dao of devils. There are some big devil organizations that oppose the House of God Ordainment, and they sometimes try to come to steal godstones or damage the mines. If we’re not careful, we could lose an entire year's worth of stock, in which case you’ll definitely be severely punished.”

“That was a very thorough explanation,” Yang Qi said. From Huang Weilong’s description, it sounded like being a foreman was a dismal assignment. Whether it was riots or invasions, it was easy to fail in one’s duties and be punished. However, there was an unspoken message in Huang Weilong’s words: he wanted Yang Qi to back off and not interfere with the status quo. To focus on cultivation and be a figurehead leader, nothing more.

If Yang Qi were a god, these disciples wouldn’t dare to talk to him in this way. But he was only a Quasi-God, as were they. They were the ones who truly controlled the miners, and they didn’t want him interfering with their personal profit margins.

Of course, he had once been the leader of the Dao Defense League, an alliance of billions of trillions of immortal worlds, with a structure vastly more complicated than this mine. Back then, he had to worry about the ‘profit margins’ of various factions as well. If he had to guess, he would say that at least half of the godstones taken from the mines went into the hands of the novice disciples, who would then use them for cultivation purposes.

If he could somehow put an end to the embezzlement, he would obviously surpass the yearly quota.

Unfortunately, the only person who would benefit in that circumstance would be the foreman, which meant that the novice disciples obviously wouldn’t be happy about it. Why should they support the foreman in such an endeavor?

In the end, Yang Qi knew that he was in an important position, but at the same time, was relatively powerless. And although the novice disciples were being respectful, there was no way they would just hand over their power.

It was very similar to the games that were often played between mortal emperors and their court ministers.

Despite all of these realizations, Yang Qi remained completely calm and collected. He didn’t need these people to accomplish the tasks assigned to him, especially considering that he could create his own high-level godstones. In fact, a simple bag of godsand would be worth more than the entire yearly quota, earning him the praise of the sect. Nodding, he said, “You've all done very well here. As long as you stay on task, it seems I don’t need to directly manage things. For now, I'm going into seclusion to seek enlightenment of a technique I'm working on. In a few days, I’ll come out for an inspection. Understand?”

Eyes flickering with delight, Huang Weilong said, “Congratulations on going into seclusion, Elder Brother! We’ll head back down to the mines now, and make sure all the miners know you’ll be coming for an inspection soon. By the way, Elder Brother, there’s a bell at the entrance of your mansion grotto. Just ring it, and we’ll rush up here to accept any orders you give.”

Flicking his sleeve, Yang Qi walked into his mansion grotto and closed the door. The first thing he planned to do was study the Great Classic of God Ordainment, which went into detail about the structure of the House of God Ordainment and its rules. At the same time, he would prepare to push his energy arts to the next level and become a god.

The interior of the mansion grotto glowed with soft light from the spell formation set into the walls. In addition to providing light, the formations kept the temperature pleasant.

He also saw a spring of fresh water, a bed, an empty bookshelf, and a pill furnace. The pill furnace was nothing special, and was in fact so ordinary that no one had even bothered to take it away after the old foreman died. Obviously, his other belongings had been cleared out by the novice disciples.

Of course, Yang Qi didn’t need a pill furnace. His sea of energy contained the Heaven and Earth Furnace, which was the best kind of furnace that could ever exist.

Sitting on the stone bed, he began flipping through the Great Classic of God Ordainment.

Meanwhile, outside, Huang Weilong and the other novice disciples were walking down the mountain. “Elder Brother,” one of the disciples said, “that new official disciple is really a piece of trash. I can’t believe he was too scared to exert his own authority. Everyone knows that someone assuming a new position should make some changes to impress people. At the very least, he should have checked into the godstone deficits. I bet the new leaders of the other mines are causing big scenes.”

Huang Weilong chuckled coldly. “Actually, he's smart. He knows that if he pisses us off, things will go badly for him.”

Chapter 1181: Local Thugs

“You’re right, Elder Brother,” one of the novice disciples said ingratiatingly. “These people aren’t gods. They’re basically on the same level as us, they just got lucky along the way by passing the Bloodgore Trials. Out here, we fight demonlings and disciples from the dao of devils. We also have to keep the vicious miners under control. We have to use wits and strength alike, and that’s worth a lot more than the Bloodgore Trials.”

“That's right,” another disciple said. “The people who make a big fuss over these official disciples are really idiots. We're all Quasi-Gods, nothing more, nothing less. And it's not as if the gods are actually going to come out here to do anything. We actually have great lives here, and it's all thanks to you, Elder Brother.”

“True,” Huang Weilong said, “but we still don't want to offend the foreman. He is an official disciple, after all. In the end, we still have to follow the rules, and we have to treat him politely. If he plays nice, we’ll share a bit of our loot with him. But if he doesn't... we’ll teach him a lesson!”

“If he doesn’t play nice, we’ll make sure he ends up dead!” another disciple growled. “Elder Brother, haven't experts from the Ghost King Church been trying to work out a deal with you? They want a cut of our share of godstones, right?”

“Yes. As long as it benefits us, there’s no harm in doing business with them. And if the foreman causes any problems, we can have him killed by the Ghost King Church. If we lend someone a knife and have them do our dirty work, we won’t be implicated....” At this point they reached the foot of the mountain, whereupon a host of young women hurried over and clustered around Huang Weilong.

“You’re back, honey! We’ve been waiting for you!”

Huang Weilong burst out laughing, causing the hairs on his birthmark to quiver. “The new foreman is very reasonable. He’s basically gonna let us do whatever we want. He's mostly worried about us teaming up against him. Hmph! My cultivation base is already at the peak of the Quasi-God level, which means I could very well become a god soon. And I make a lot of godstones in my position here. With the resources I can get, I’ll definitely break through soon. What’s the point of the Bloodgore Trials for a person like myself? Look at the foreman—he went to the Bloodgore Trials, but he ended up here just like me!”

“Yes, that’s right, honey,” one of the charming young women said. “You’re definitely amazing. Even the foreman dispatched by the sect has to listen to you. Either that, or he’ll die! We’ve prepared food and alcohol to celebrate your successful return.”

“You’re too kind!” Huang Weilong said. “Lead the way!”

“Of course!”

The other disciples respectfully watched Huang Weilong and the woman walk away and then began talking amongst themselves.

“Elder Brother really has it good. Whenever they send new women to be miners, he picks the prettiest ones and we just get the leftovers.”

“A few days ago, a new woman got sent and Elder Brother took a fancy to her. But I heard she refused him. I wonder what happened in the end.”

“She refused him? How dare she! Have you forgotten what happened last year? Remember that rich girl whose sect got wiped out by our House of God Ordainment? She got sent here to be a miner, and Elder Brother grabbed her and tried to have his way with her. But she fought back and tried to kill him. Remember what he did?”

“Ai! That was tragic. Elder Brother tied her up and gave her to the miners. They took turns with her for seven days and seven nights until she finally died. I can still hear her screams echoing in my mind.”

“Tragic. Very tragic.”

“Well, it’s only natural that people like us are vicious and merciless. And in the end, as long as we follow Elder Brother, we’ll be fine. We all know how he does things. He has his fingers in everything. He's connected to the Ghost King Church, and some of the disciples there even call him daoist brother. And he’s friends with the leaders of the demonlings....”

“Although, all the mines have gang leaders like him. And in a few days, they're going to meet to size each other up. I wonder how Elder Brother will end up ranking.”

“Who knows? In the meeting last year, Long Dehai from Mine One took the top spot, which is why we've been forced to pay him tribute ever since. Ai. I hope that this time Elder Brother can come out on top and share some of the spoils with us.”

“Come on, let’s head back to our own caves and enjoy the night with our women. We can worry about everything else later. We’ve been so worried the past few days about the new foreman that we came up with all sorts of plans of how to deal with him. But in the end, he turned out to be a worthless loser.”

With that, the novice disciples went their separate ways.

As for Huang Weilong, his mansion grotto was luxuriantly decorated and seemed almost like the residence of a king or emperor. He had rugs made from the hides of icefire demonlings that were so soft that walking on them felt like walking on clouds. And because of the icefire energy, it didn’t matter what the temperature was outside, it always felt comfortable inside. That rug alone would be worth a lot of godstones on the outside. In fact, most experts would have turned it into a garment, yet here, Huang Weilong was using it as a rug.

“Did the new girl finally give in?” Huang Weilong said, haughtily sitting down and looking around at his collection of concubines. They were all women who had been sentenced to work in the mines, which meant that by sticking with him, they could have relatively nice lives.

The alternative was to have a miserable existence in the mines, which none of them could accept.

“Not yet,” one of the women said. “She refuses to eat and mostly just sits around crying.” This particular woman pulsed with devil energy, which indicated that she was a disciple of the dao of devils. The god world was huge, with too many continents to count, far more than the number of immortal worlds in the Immortal Dao Age. Not even the boundless Sovereign Lord had actually known how large the god world was. Because of that, it was a given that it was a hodgepodge of good and bad people. And when a powerful organization like the House of God Ordainment went on the warpath, it went without saying that they would take all sorts of people captive, men and women alike.

It was even said that the House of God Ordainment’s mines had gods who had been enslaved and forced to be miners.

Slapping the table angrily, Huang Weilong said, “Hmph! If she refuses to do things the easy way, we’ll do them the hard way! Take me to her immediately.”

Soon they reached an extravagantly decorated back room in the mansion grotto. Inside was a bed, atop which a beautiful woman was bound. She was as delicate as a peach flower and had clearly led a pampered life. She had a beauty mark on her forehead and was weeping profusely, her tears falling down like raindrops.

As soon as she saw Huang Weilong walk in, she said, “Let me go, Your Majesty! I'm just a weak woman. My family was all killed by the House of God Ordainment, and I'm the only one left. Please, have pity on me....”

Huang Weilong chuckled darkly as the killing intent within him transformed into a licentious smile. “I like your cute look, darling, which is why I didn’t just force myself on you right from the beginning. Why exactly are you refusing to give in? Your life is in my hands. With me, you can have nice meals and live in comfort. If I throw you down into the mines, it’s only a matter of time before you get raped to death. It’s hard to say how many women suffer that fate every year. Do you think you’ll be any exception?”

“Just let me go!” she cried. “If you show some grace and mercy, I’ll remember it for all eternity! Please, have mercy!”

Eyes gleaming viciously, he said, “If you refuse to do things the easy way, we’ll do them the hard way! If you don’t give in willingly, I’ll just rape you! Listen, do you know what happened to the last girl who refused me? The other concubines can tell you. If you don’t hurry up and give me what I want, I’ll send you down to the mines, and those deviant miners will make sure you die in torment!”

The young woman was so terrified that she was weeping.

“Nobody’s going to save you! Your only choice is to follow me.” He suddenly burst out laughing. “I'm the most important person in this mine! Even the new official disciple is a useless weakling who plans to give me everything I want. Before long, I’ll take over as foreman, and if he doesn't go along, he’ll die! I can think of a hundred ways to make sure that happens.”

With that, Huang Weilong prepared to pounce on the young woman.

“Oh really?” someone said, and a figure stepped forward to stand between Huang Weilong and the woman. It was none other than Yang Qi! Smiling, he said, “I was just doing some meditating when I sensed some rancorous energy, so I came to see what was happening. Imagine my surprise to find this. Ah, Huang Weilong, I never imagined you would talk about me like that, or do things like this behind my back. You're embezzling godstones to use in business deals with disciples from the dao of devils? And you even claimed that if I didn’t do what you say, you’d have me killed? Do you really care so little for the rules of the House of God Ordainment?”

“Yang Qi?!” he blurted, leaping backward. “You're a godpower incarnation, aren’t you? And you snuck into my mansion grotto?! You've got a lot of guts to do that.”

“I’ve got guts? I think you’re the one with the guts. I'm an official disciple of the House of God Ordainment, and you’re nothing but a novice disciple. The difference between us is like the difference between night and day. You oppress the common people just like a local thug, and even dare to act impudently in my presence. Get on your knees!”

Huang Weilong’s expression flickered, then settled into a vicious smile. “You might be an official disciple, Yang Qi, but you know the rules of this mine. Yeah, I'm a thug. But even a mighty dragon won’t attack a snake in its own haunts! If you stick to your place, I won’t bother you. Otherwise, you’ll die a miserable death.” His eyes narrowed. “Oh, I see what's going on. You took a fancy to this girl, right? Fine, you can have her.”

Chapter 1182: Purging the Degenerates

“If I wanted this woman, I wouldn’t ask for your permission,” Yang Qi’s incarnation replied, looking at Huang Weilong as if he were already a dead man. “I run this mine, and you’re only a novice disciple. If I want to kill you, I’ll kill you. Are you really so bold as to directly oppose me?”

Huang Weilong burst out into maniacal laughter. “You think way too much of yourself, Yang Qi. You really believe you’re the end-all and be-all here? Listen up. The person who runs this mine is me. I'm in charge! I'm the overlord here! Maybe if you become a god you might have what it takes to boss me around. But somehow, I doubt that you’re going to be achieving that breakthrough anytime soon. And that means that you’re mine! You do what I tell you! It’s like the old saying, the barracks are as permanent as iron, the soldiers are as temporary as water. You would do well to understand that you are the temporary water, and I'm the permanent iron!”

Shaking his head, Yang Qi’s incarnation waved his hand, and the young woman’s metal manacles collapsed.

The sight of it caused Huang Weilong to shiver slightly.

Those were godsteel manacles, which meant it would take incredible force to break them. Yet a mere incarnation of Yang Qi had actually destroyed them with ease.

“You might be strong, but do you really think I don’t have contingencies in place? Hmph! I’ve placed spell formations and traps throughout this entire mountain, including your mansion grotto. If you move a muscle, all it’ll take is a single word from me and all the disciples in this mine will revolt. Then, all of the ore that you have to deliver at the end of the year will disappear. And how will you explain that? If you defy me today, then tomorrow you’ll be demoted and forced to work in the mines like an ordinary miner. You see, the novice disciples here aren’t loyal to the House of God Ordainment. We can leave this place any time we want to, and simply disappear. They don’t care about us. But you... you're an official disciple. If you make any mistakes, you’ll be punished, and running away won’t do any good.”

Huang Weilong wasn’t just making idle threats. As he spoke, he sent some godpower out, connecting to a spell formation in the middle of his residence. “I’ll make it very simple for you, Yang Qi. Just walk away. Leave the girl, and I’ll pretend none of this happened. I’ll mind my business, you mind yours. And by the way, one more word of warning: the gang leaders from all fifty-six mines will be meeting soon, so if you cause any problems, you’ll be facing all of their wrath. Do you really think you can deal with both internal and external strife? Would you really dare to kill people from the other mines?”

Huang Weilong’s threats would have probably worked very well on other people. But to Yang Qi, they weren’t particularly moving.

“You clearly don’t understand what I'm capable of,” he said casually. “Why don’t you go ahead and activate one of those spell formations and see what happens. See if it affects my mansion grotto. Go ahead.”

“Fine, you asked for it!” Huang Weilong slapped his hand on the wall, causing one section to sink in and reveal a hidden recess. Then he shoved a relatively high quality godstone into it, which caused the wall to start thrumming and sent a tremor through the whole mountain.

However, after about two or three breaths of time passed, a grinding sound could be heard within the recess and the godstone shot back out into Huang Weilong’s face, accompanied by a mass of destroyed mechanical parts.

“My machine!?” Huang Weilong blurted, his face falling. “It’s broken? How? Not even a god should be capable of that. How could you break it?”

“Simple,” Yang Qi replied coolly. “Because I’m as strong as a god. In fact, I could easily kill a mere Lesser God. You have no way of knowing it, but I actually killed a god during the Bloodgore Trials.”

“Y-y-you...” Huang Weilong stammered. “But why didn't you get selected as an apprentice? If you're really that strong, one of the almighty entities should’ve selected you. You should’ve been promoted! Only the weak disciples get sent here to the mines.”

This was the entire reason Huang Weilong had been acting so haughty. The impressive disciples, including those who became gods, were always selected to be the apprentices of important people. They wouldn't be sent to the mines. Only the weaklings were sent to the mines, and even though they were generally strong, when people like Huang Weilong ganged up on them, they would have no choice but to act as puppets.

“I won’t accept this. I'm going to kill you or die trying!” Huang Weilong spun and prepared to rush out and activate the traps in his mansion. Sadly for him, before he could get anywhere, a huge golden hand appeared and clamped down onto him, making it impossible for him to move.

“You’re coming with me,” Yang Qi said, then a popping sound could be heard as he burst out into the open, destroying any warding spells that got in his way. A moment later, he was atop the mountain, where he exhaled sharply, causing the enormous bell to loudly ring, summoning all of the novice disciples.

The disciples had only just returned to their mansion grottos and were preparing to settle down with their concubines, only to be summoned back for a meeting.

“What’s going on here? We just came down from the mountain, and now the foreman is summoning us back up? Can’t he just leave us be?”

“Come on, let’s go and see what it's all about. Fuck. Unless there’s some big problem, the foreman shouldn’t be calling us out like this.”

Obviously, quite a few of the disciples were grumbling.

“Let’s see what Elder Brother has to say about it.”

“What? Elder Brother is up there already?”

“Come on, hurry up. If Elder Brother is already up there, we can’t afford to tarry. Whatever the issue is, we have to follow his lead. He's in charge, and we have to stick to him.”

Two thousand nine hundred and eighty-nine disciples raced up the mountain, where a nearly unbelievable sight met their eyes. They saw their Elder Brother, trussed up and kneeling in front of the entrance to Yang Qi’s mansion grotto. As for Yang Qi, he sat cross-legged off to the side, seemingly lost in thought.

Huang Weilong’s staunchest supporters were the first to the top.

“What’s wrong, Elder Brother?”

“What happened to you?”

“Hurry up!” Huang Weilong shrieked. “This Yang Qi is being completely unreasonable. He ambushed me and tied me up! Free me and kill him! Today, either the fish dies, or the net splits! I’ll take responsibility for everything.”

“What?!” the disciples growled, surrounding Huang Weilong and simultaneously casting enraged glares at Yang Qi.

“How dare you, Yang Qi!” one of them shouted. “I can't believe you would violate the rules like this.”

“Are you saying you’re planning to defy me?” Yang Qi said coldly. “You're a bunch of novice disciples, and I’m an official disciple blessed by the House of God Ordainment. You think you can just do anything you want? You’re disrespecting the chain of command! Back down!”

“Don’t listen to him!” Huang Weilong said. Grinning viciously, he continued, “He just wants to intimidate you. Don’t give him the chance. Yang Qi, you punk, do you think you’re a god now or something? I can’t believe you’d dare to violate our rules. Kill him! Grab him and throw him to the demonlings!”

SNICK!

Even as he gushed on in this fashion, a blood-colored light flashed and his head flew up in the air. “Everyone join forces and kill him. Kill him! Kill—er... what? What’s going on? How come I can see my neck but not my head? Am I dying?”

Thump! A shriek rang out that only ended when his head landed on the ground.

“What?!”

Everyone backed up in fear. Not a single one of them had seen exactly what Yang Qi did. He had moved with such incredible speed that all they saw was the head dropping to the ground.

“Any who disrespect the chain of command will be killed!” Yang Qi said coolly. “What. Does anyone else want to step forward and make a move against me? Did you really think I’d be scared of a disorderly mob like this?”

“Attack! Kill him! Wipe him out! He’s only capable of so much. He can't stop us if we gang up on him!” A few dozen of Huang Weilong’s most loyal supporters reached for the weapons hanging at their waists, which were of course powerful magical treasures.

However, before they could do anything with them, a host of ripping sounds rang out, and blood sprayed everywhere as a few dozen heads flew into the air.

The other disciples present were shaken to the core and edged away from Yang Qi, eying him fearfully. How could any of them have ever guessed that he would be this formidable?

“Did you moronic idiots really think you could do anything to me? Anyone who defies me today will die. I’ll kill you and promote people to replace you from among the miners. And don’t even think of trying to start a riot among the miners. Anyone who opposes me... dies.”

“There’s nothing to fear if we stick together!” shouted another of Huang Weilong’s supporters. “If he kills us all, the miners will rebel! There’s no way he could handle a situation like that. Besides, we've hidden a lot of the minerals we've mined. If he kills us, he’ll never get them!”

“Minerals?” Yang Qi said. “You’re trying to threaten me with rocks? Very funny.” He snapped his fingers, and to everyone’s astonishment an enormous stone appeared, glittering as if with lightning and rumbling as if with thunder.

“That’s... that’s an imperial caliber godstone! And those are godstone thunderclaps! How could this be possible? Only the most ancient mines in the god world can produce stuff like that!”

“Where did he get it? It's huge! If you put that up for auction, it would sell for multiple godnotes.”

“Hand in an imperial caliber godstone like that to the sect and the rewards would be unimaginable!”

Yang Qi laughed. “You’re right. It’s an imperial caliber godstone. So what do you think? If I handed this in to the sect, how many years’ worth of quotas would it cover?”

“Ten years!”

“Thirteen years!”

“Twenty years!”

Everyone was stunned to find that Yang Qi was actually incredibly rich. He had a single godstone that was worth upwards of ten years of production from the mine. In fact, it was virtually priceless.

Swish!

Yang Qi waved his hand and the godstone vanished. No one had any idea where it went or how he had made it disappear.

“In other words, I can personally meet the quota of this mine for ten or twenty years. And you think I'm worried about you revolting? That’s a joke if ever I've heard one. In ten years, I could easily replace every single one of you novice disciples!”

Chapter 1183: Seizing Control

By producing an imperial caliber godstone, Yang Qi had immediately seized control of the situation. Worst case scenario, he could just kill everyone who opposed him and replace them.

The disciples present all exchanged awkward glances. They realized that they had miscalculated. Yang Qi wasn’t worried at all about the output of the mine, which meant their threats were completely empty.

Things had gone from bad to worse for them.

They had no trump cards, and thus, what were they to do? Even worse, Yang Qi was obviously so strong that not a single one of them was a match for him. He could clearly kill anyone who opposed him.

So what needed to be done next?

No one had any confidence in their ability to control the situation.

After a long moment, one of the disciples dropped to his knees and said, “Oh exalted Yang Qi, foreman of Mine Thirteen, a person of great moral stature such as yourself will surely overlook the crimes of a scoundrel like me. Please forgive me. I would love to atone for my crimes by performing meritorious acts!”

“Hmph! You fickle bastard!”

One of the nearby disciples, obviously a friend of Huang Weilong, immediately raised his saber overhead to kill the kneeling disciple. Considering how many years Huang Weilong had run things in this mine, it was a given that he had a lot of friends.

However, before the disciple could even finish raising his saber, his head flew off his shoulders.

“Good choice,” Yang Qi said. “Considering you’ve chosen to be loyal to me, there’s no way I’ll let anyone hurt you. The situation here is simple. Follow me and live. Oppose me and die.” He made a beckoning gesture, pulling the disciple toward him. Then he placed his hand on his back, sending a burst of godpower into him that immediately increased his energy levels and pushed his cultivation base to new heights.

The disciple burst out laughing. “My energy arts! I've achieved a breakthrough! Many thanks, Elder Brother, many thanks!” Suddenly baring his teeth, he spun to face two disciples who usually bullied him. “Huo Qin. Lin Sen. You two always pick on me, but now the time has come for me to teach you a lesson! Prepare to die!”

Crash!

An enormous hand of godpower shot forth, crushing the two disciples to death.

“Whoever dares to oppose me and Elder Brother will be killed by me! Elder Brother’s godpower is unmatchable, and he can kill anyone he wants to! What prospects did you have following Huang Weilong? Following Elder Brother Yang Qi is the proper path. All of you need to surrender. Did you see how easily he helped me? He instantly cleared my blocked meridians and restructured my sea of energy. My interior is like a furnace of godpower now, constantly absorbing the vital energy of the godpower for my own use. It’s like I have a never-ending supply of energy! Any of you who refuse to surrender are going to die!”

More clanging sounds could be heard as more disciples dropped their weapons and got on their knees. “Spare us, Elder Brother. Spare us! We deserve to die for our crimes. It was all because of Huang Weilong!”

Huang Weilong’s severed head still had a bit of life left in it. “Spare me, Elder Brother!” he blabbered. “Spare my life! I was possessed. I can work with you! I can—”

RIP!

Yang Qi waved his hand, wiping Huang Weilong’s body out of existence.

“You can’t do this, Yang Qi! Things won’t end well for you if—” Then he screamed as Yang Qi mercilessly set his head on fire and watched as it burned out of existence.

“You’re unparalleled under heaven, Elder Brother!” the other disciples called.

“Hmph! Over the years you embezzled resources and made deals with the disciples of the dao of devils. But that stops now. We're going to work hard to get this mine working at top efficiency, understand? If that doesn’t happen, I’ll execute all of you. Henceforth, everything the mine produces comes to me. I’m going to personally check every bit. I’ll inspect the mine tomorrow. Henceforth, fighting isn’t allowed, and anyone who treats the women badly will be instantly executed. Your concubines and female slaves will all be sent up here to serve as handmaidens. From now on, everyone follows the rules. Got it?”

“Yes, yes of course,” the disciples said. “We’ll send any good looking women to you, Elder Brother.”

Yang Qi declined to comment on that. “Presumably you know where Huang Weilong hid most of the minerals? Hand them over. Now!”

“I know where he hid them,” said the disciple who had been first to surrender. “They’re off in a cave guarded by demonlings he hired. But considering you helped me get stronger, Elder Brother, I should be able to go get them myself.”

“Alright, what's your name?” Yang Qi asked.

“I'm your humble servant Zhang Jufang,” the disciple replied respectfully.

“Do it,” Yang Qi said. “Now that Huang Weilong is dead, you’re in charge. You represent me, and bear my authority to issue orders. Your first task is to go retrieve Huang Weilong’s stash of minerals. If you succeed, I’ll make sure you’re well rewarded.”

“Yes sir! Many thanks for your patronage, Elder Brother!” Turning to some of the other disciples, he raised his voice and said, “On your feet, you lot. We all know that you were close friends of Huang Weilong, so you know his secrets. Take me to the stash and maybe you can atone for the error of your ways. Otherwise, I’ll inflict strict punishment right away.”

Everyone knew that Zhang Jufang was like a dog relying on the influence of its master. But there was no question that he represented a power that no one could defy, so no one dared to defy him.

With that, Zhang Jufang led the group away.

Afterward, the rest of the disciples headed back down the mountain to put the mine in order. Already, Yang Qi could sense the destiny in the mine shifting in his favor.

The destiny here surpassed anything from the mortal world, such as the destiny of the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect, or even the Sage Monarch League. But that was little wonder. Destiny in the god world was true destiny, whereas that from the mortal world was vague and illusory. It was only when experts became Quasi-Gods that their destiny became truly powerful.

Although there were mid Terrifying experts who were sent to the mines, they generally died fairly quickly, leaving behind only the Quasi-Gods. The mines were simply too dangerous, whether because of demonlings or the environment itself.

Only Quasi-Gods were truly cut out to survive in these mines, and although their lives were miserable, it was better than being dead.

As Yang Qi stood atop the cliff looking down at the mine, he decided he wasn’t interested in making any changes to the overall situation for the miners. They had earned their karma. Some were vicious monsters and criminals, and some were probably innocent. But if he were to just start freeing people, it would likely cause problems of such a large scale that the House of God Ordainment wouldn’t tolerate it.

He was part of a larger system, and the first rule in situations like that was to play the game according to the rules, at least until you were strong enough to dismantle the system and its rules without getting hurt in the process.

Huang Weilong and his people had acted without the slightest scruple, and had broken all sorts of rules. Truth be told, the House of God Ordainment wouldn’t do much about people who challenged their superiors. In fact, if an inferior killed a superior, they would probably praise that person. No one would care if an official disciple killed even ten thousand novice disciples. But if a hundred thousand novice disciples managed to kill even one official disciple, they would pay with their life.

Three days passed, and Zhang Jufang returned triumphantly. He had infiltrated the demonling lair and brought back Huang Weilong’s treasure trove, which contained all sorts of amazing items from the mines.

Generally speaking, fighting was prohibited in the mines, and any who violated such rules were executed. Because of the brutally strict laws, fighting wasn't common. But miners would still occasionally get killed in private duels. The society of the miners was a complicated and brutal one in which people hardly viewed each other as humans. The powerful miners would lord it over the weaker ones, stealing and robbing from them, and occasionally murdering others for profit.

But after Yang Qi took charge, he put an end to such things.

After making all the necessary arrangements, he went back into seclusion.

He was mostly finished reading the Great Classic of God Ordainment. He had studied the rules and regulations of the House of God Ordainment, as well as its history and notable members. It also gave him a deeper understanding of the thousands of continents in the god world. As it turned out, the House of God Ordainment was in a group of the largest several thousand continents. Yet that was just the tip of the iceberg, as far as the god world went. The Great Classic of God Ordainment also contained information about the allies and enemies of the sect, and Yang Qi committed all that to memory. It even mentioned the Proud Clan.

According to the information, it was a very mysterious clan.

‘Supposedly, the original founder of the Proud Clan emerged from the void, and was born out of a shapeless universe. He was a follower of the Sovereign Lord, and was his most mysterious official. When the Sovereign Lord perished, the Proud Clan’s founder went missing. However, his blood ran strong and the clan prospered. The current clan lord is a Consummate God, and will likely break through to become a Paramount God. The Proud Clan has outposts on two thousand continents, but their headquarters is hidden in a mysterious location.’

There was more information that Yang Qi studied, ensuring that he had a very good foundational understanding of the Proud Clan. However, he didn’t see any mention of Proud Heaven.

The Great Classic of God Ordainment contained details about what rewards would come if the foreman surpassed the assigned production quota. If he could hand over high-quality godstones to the sect, he could receive mysterious martial arts manuals, medicinal pills, spell formation techniques, or pill formulas.

‘This is basically the same as in the mortal world. The rewards you get are based on what services you provide.’ From what Yang Qi could tell, sects were the same wherever you went. Whether you were dealing with gods or immortals, the basic rules still tended to be the same.

Chapter 1184: Assimilating the Mahatma Jade

Yang Qi had already learned a lot about the god world, thanks to reading the Great Classic of God Ordainment. The book didn’t contain cultivation techniques. But  of all the things he lacked at the moment, cultivation techniques were at the very bottom of the list. He had the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, Purrfect God Art, Sage Monarch Grand Magic, Secret-Ensconcing All-World Anything-Everything Fundamental-Law Magic, and the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body, all of which were boundless techniques even in the god world.

Having finished reading the Great Classic of God Ordainment, he began a session of secluded cultivation.

The God Legion Seal was in his forehead, constantly drawing in the essence of the god world, making it so that he didn’t need medicinal pills of any sort. And by passing that essence through the Heaven and Earth Furnace to be refined and cleansed, it turned into extremely powerful godpower.

Yang Qi was wreathed in burning sagefire, melting everything else that existed in his mansion grotto. At the same time, godnotes appeared, which fluttered down ceaselessly almost like snowflakes. As Yang Qi furthered his cultivation, his Sage Monarch Grand Magic grew more refined and his virtual godhood was gradually crystallizing and turning into true godhood.

“Sheepskin scroll! Mahātmā Jade! The time has come to reveal your true grandeur. We’re in the god world now, and my cultivation base is vastly beyond what it was before. I know that you two are both boundless treasures, and the time has come to completely assimilate you!”

Yang Qi pulled out the scroll and the jade.

They were diametrically opposed to the God Legion Seal, but Yang Qi had used the Purrfect God Art and the Sage Monarch Grand Magic to use them together. And if he could literally combine the sheepskin scroll, Mahātmā Jade, and God Legion Seal, it would definitely lead to some sort of incredible divine ability, something he could use to conquer the dome of heaven and be unparalleled in all creation.

Yang Qi didn’t care about any of the treasures to be had in the god world.

He was now just on the verge of being a god; therefore, it seemed like the perfect time to use the sheepskin scroll and the fragment of Mahātmā Jade. By now, he had realized the truth; they weren’t technically treasures, but rather expressions of mighty will. And ever since he had come to the god world, he had been constantly baptizing them with his energy arts. Now was the time to reveal their secrets, especially the Mahātmā Jade. The only downside was that he didn’t have the complete jade. If he did, the combined jade and scroll really would be on the same level as the God Legion Seal.

Yang Qi exhaled a stream of vital energy as he used his peak Terrifying will and the true energy of the Sage Monarch Grand Magic to wrap the two items up and start assimilating them.

He had performed innumerable tests on the Mahātmā Jade back in the Great Necropolis, using the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. However, he had never fully succeeded. But things were different now that his cultivation base was so much higher.

He was now strong enough to kill gods.

And gods didn’t even exist in the immortal worlds.

The will of the Sage Monarch Grand Magic entered the Mahātmā Jade, which immediately unleashed an incredible force of pressure. Almost immediately, Yang Qi felt like his soul was being dragged into the jade.

Shifting his concentration, he started fighting back. It was almost as if the jade were a boundless black hole that could devour any psychic power that got close to it.

The process was actually helping him increase his psychic power. Of course, he was already at the peak of the Terrifying level, and couldn’t achieve any minor breakthroughs. The next major step was the Paramount level, which was for mid-level gods.

Normal gods, the Lesser Gods with a godhood rating of ten or less, would be at the peak Terrifying level.

Unfortunately, Yang Qi had previously reached the point where his psychic power couldn’t increase, at least not without immense difficulty. But now, with the Mahātmā Jade tugging at him, it was growing.

As it turned out, the jade could be used to improve psychic power!

Normal. Stupendous. Destabilizing. Terrifying. Paramount. Unbounded. Annulled. Those were the levels that governed one's psyche and will, and each step was an immense increase. Back when Yang Qi had first fought the Terrifying Empress Joyflower, he was forced to flee with his tail between his legs.

Of course, the rise from Terrifying to Paramount would be one of even greater invincibility. It was theoretically possible for some Quasi-Gods to kill actual gods, but there was no way that a Terrifying expert could ever possibly fight a Paramount expert.

Lesser Gods with a godhood rating of one were definitely weak enough that Quasi-Gods could kill them. But even someone who had only just stepped into the Paramount level could, with a mere glance, slaughter Terrifying opponents.

Paramount will described that which was boundlessly paramount.

Thanks to the sheepskin scroll and Mahātmā Jade, Yang Qi was now developing Paramount will.

Compared to one’s will, everything else was false and unreal. Even godhood. Without the will, godhood could crumble. A deathless and everlasting body could fall apart without will to sustain it. People required will, lest they become like the walking dead.

During his time in the god world, Yang Qi had often thought of these magical treasures and had come to understand how and why the True Devil fought the Sovereign Lord.

The truth was that Yang Qi had come to suspect some things about the identity of the True Devil.

Generally speaking, the Mahātmā Jade was impossible to assimilate, except for one specific person, that being the bearer of the God Legion Seal. Throughout all of history, only two people had ever possessed the complete God Legion Seal.

One was the boundless Sovereign Lord, and the other was Yang Qi.

During the half-year he had spent flying over the ocean, cultivating both the Purrfect God Art and the Sage Monarch Grand Magic, he had done some further study of the sheepskin scroll and the Mahātmā Jade.

And now he was finally starting to pierce some of their secrets.

As the Mahātmā Jade tried to devour his power, he unleashed his consummate skills to defend himself. At the same time, he sent his godpower into the sheepskin scroll, which suddenly exploded, becoming a mass of ten thousand characters that swirled around him.

He opened his mouth and inhaled, breathing in the stream of characters and sending them to his sea of energy where they formed sutras, each of which contained countless expressions of will.

Intense rumbling sounds echoed out of Yang Qi, and the piece of the Mahātmā Jade suddenly erupted with immense power. At the same time, he sent the complete God Legion Seal flying toward the jade with the wave of his finger.

The light of the God Legion Seal enveloped the Mahātmā Jade and it turned into a flow of energy that shot into Yang Qi.

There in his sea of energy, a piece of the Mahātmā Jade could now be seen.

As he breathed, his psychic power swelled, and he suddenly caught sight of what looked like a paramount door within his sea of consciousness. All he had to do was open that door, and he would have Paramount will convergence.

Suddenly, he started shaking physically as though his body might fall to pieces. He immediately knew what was happening. His godpower had not yet been turned into godhood, which meant that he couldn’t actually break into the Paramount level.

Not even Yang Qi could do that without becoming a god first.

“What? I've subjugated the sheepskin scroll and the Mahātmā Jade and improved my psychic scale, but my godhood hasn’t completely formed yet, which means I can’t reach godly ascension. It makes sense that I can’t break through, but I really want to break through these shackles and reach the most invincible level of cultivation possible! If I could reach the Paramount level before forming my godhood, I would definitely be incomparably powerful!”

Yang Qi reined in his energy arts and inspected himself. His godpower and psyche were stronger than before, probably by three times. And that meant that right now he was in the mood to test out his fighting prowess.

Thrusting his palm out, he launched a stream of godpower that contained a host of characters that formed the same body of text that had existed on the sheepskin scroll. He clenched his hand into a fist, and Terrifying energy erupted, the kind that could consume the psyches of others.

It was exactly the same thing the Mahātmā Jade could do. It was different from any sort of devil technique. With devil techniques, the amount of psychic power that one could absorb was dependent on one’s specific capacity. Once that capacity was reached, one couldn’t absorb any more, unless it was into some sort of magical storage treasure, or an out-of-body incarnation.

But all such outside aspects could cause problems for one’s individual cultivation base.

Yang Qi rose to his feet and sent out a character that transformed into a clone surrounded by swirling tribulations. More characters flew out, until there were a total of ten thousand of them.

“Amazing. Amazing!” Yang Qi couldn't help but laugh with delight. “It's too bad I only have one piece of the Mahātmā Jade. If I could find more pieces, and use more of my Sage Monarch Grand Magic and Purrfect God Art, I could push this fusion to a higher level. It could be a boundless precious treasure that would definitely give me hope of reaching the Annulled level.”

No one actually knew how strong the Annulled level was. Supposedly, it could be used to transcend the limits of the god world and reach a state that was heretofore unknown.

Was there another world beyond the god world? No one knew for sure, although the general belief was that there was no such a world, and the god world was the ultimate world among all the other worlds that existed.

Chapter 1185: Secrets of the Mine

After assimilating the sheepskin scroll and the Mahātmā Jade, Yang Qi’s cultivation and godpower had improved dramatically. In fact, his godpower was almost at the point of being able to fuel a breakthrough to the Paramount level of will convergence.

Hopefully, he would soon be able to get his hands on more pieces of the Mahātmā Jade. He was certain that they were somewhere to be found in the god world. After all, he was the ultimate ruler of the immortal worlds now. The past world and the future world had both been sacrificed by Proud Heaven, and no pieces of the jade had turned up during that time. It seemed to indicate that there were no more pieces in the immortal worlds.

And that meant that they had to be in the god world.

As soon as he walked out into the open, he saw a young woman waiting respectfully outside.

“Young Sir,” she said, “do you need anything to eat? You were in seclusion for more than a month.” She was the very same young woman he had saved from being raped by Huang Weilong.

She was a delicate beauty who called herself Cherry. Clearly she wanted to keep her true surname and given name a secret, and Yang Qi wasn’t inclined to press the issue. He hadn’t harbored any ulterior motives in rescuing her, and in fact, after gaining new understanding into the value of morality, he had been attempting to add more moral actions into his behavior.

“I don’t need anything to eat,” he said. “From here on out, I want you to be in charge of this entire mountain. Keep an eye on all the other young women and concubines, as well as the female miners. We’re going to have new rules around here to make sure the women don’t get raped or killed. In fact, I want the men and women kept apart. Can you handle that?”

“I've already started doing it, Young Sir,” she replied. “There are quite a few related matters I wanted to report to you about, but you've been in seclusion, so I had no way to do so. Now that you’re out, I can catch you up. Young Sir, I truly hope you reach godly ascension soon!”

“I'm not in any hurry. By the way, we have a few more months before we reach the end of the year and need to turn in the year's production results. How are we doing in that regard?”

“Considering Zhang Jufang recovered Huang Weilong’s private stash, we have enough reserves that we can meet our quota for three years without doing any mining for a single day.” Cherry had already fallen into her role as Yang Qi’s stewardess.

“Wonderful. Please call in Zhang Jufang. I want to take a look at the mineral storehouses and inspect the mine itself. I'm interested to see how deep the ore deposits run.” With that, he waved his hand dismissively.

Cherry hurried away, then returned with Zhang Jufang and a handful of other disciples who were his loyal followers.

“We kowtow in salute, Elder Brother!” Zhang Jufang said, dropping to his knees and kowtowing deeply. He had quickly become very important, and now no one in the mine dared to defy his authority. He could essentially do whatever he wanted, although he was fully aware that all of it was thanks to Yang Qi. And he knew that Yang Qi could take everything away from him at a moment's notice.

Because of that, he hadn’t done anything rash in the month Yang Qi was in seclusion, such as using his authority for personal gain. Instead, he had been cautious and conscientious. Already, the mine was operating much more smoothly, with fewer miners engaging in embezzling operations, and many of the old ringleaders having been brought in line.

“Take me to the storehouse.”

“Yes sir!”

Zhang Jufang led him off the mountain and to the mine itself. The entire mine had an area of only a few hundred kilometers, and was constantly expanding, with tunnels being dug in every direction.

There were actually a few storehouses, which were constructed from rock and looked like enormous castles.

Upon entering the first of the storehouses, they saw piles of godstones, most of which were of low or middling quality and needed to be refined before they could be of use.

In another location in the mine, there were furnaces that could be used for just that purpose. By heating the ore, it was possible to extrude the impurities within it, which would result in the larger clumps being reduced to something the size of a walnut. That was the final product which would be handed in to the sect.

Every year when the time came to hand over the year's production, someone from the sect would come to inspect the godstones and make an official record of the results.

And of course, the storehouses were kept under strict guard by both men and spell formations.

However, upon seeing it all, Yang Qi shook his head. “Spell formations like this wouldn’t stop a true expert. I bet the storehouses get stolen from all the time. Am I right?”

“Yes. In the past, disciples from the dao of devils, and also certain demonling experts, would sneak in and steal godstones. Occasionally, the culprits are even people from other mines. We suffer losses every year because of theft.”

“What? People from the other mines rob us?” Yang Qi frowned. “Why would they do that?”

“Because the other mines are our enemies. True, we’re all members of the House of God Ordainment, but in the end, we have to meet our quota to the sect, and if we don't, we get punished. Thus, there’s constant infighting with the neighboring mines. In just the past month, we’ve had a number of fights with other miners we caught sneaking in to steal from us. They even have the support of their foremen.”

“I had no idea that was happening. Fellow disciples fighting and killing each other?” He smiled coldly. “What about us? Have we snuck into other mines to steal from them? Pay them back tooth for tooth?”

“In the past we would do that, but ever since you took control, Elder Brother, things changed. Huang Weilong had a deal worked out with the disciples from the dao of devils and the demonlings, and used them to strike at the other mines. He made quite a profit from that, but the arrangement is null and void now. Furthermore, we didn’t participate in the big meeting of gang leaders, which has made us the main enemy of the other fifty-five mines.”

As they walked out of the castle, Zhang Jufang went on to explain how the gang leaders from all the mines would occasionally meet to decide who was strongest among them. Whoever took the top spot would not only be immune from robbery, but would be given tribute. Of course, since Huang Weilong was dead and Mine Thirteen didn’t send anyone to the meeting of gang leaders, everyone assumed that they were weaklings who could easily be trampled on.

“Furthermore,” another disciple said, “word has spread that we confiscated Huang Weilong’s personal stash, and a lot of people would love to get their hands on it. With your remarkable abilities, Elder Brother, we hope you can strengthen our spell formations to defend us against outside incursions.”

“That goes without saying,” Yang Qi replied. He waved his finger, and cracking sounds could be heard as all of the existing spell formations collapsed. Then, the resulting vital energy swirled into the shape of new spell formations, which sank into the ground and faded to invisibility.

“Killing Intent of Heaven and Earth: Astral Redirection!” Yang Qi clenched his hands into fists, summoning the power of the one origin, two polarities, three powers, four divisions, five phases, six directions, seven stars, eight trigrams, nine palaces, and ten preeminences. He had created ten spell formations that were now secretly operating underneath the enormous castle. However, none of the disciples present could see what had happened.

One of the disciples looked around and said, “What happened? Elder Brother, did you just remove the spell formations? Won’t that leave the castle defenseless?”

Yang Qi smiled. “Why don’t you perform a little test? See if there are any spell formations in there.”

The disciple cautiously drew a saber, took a step forward, and lunged toward the castle. However, before he could get close, a field of bright light rose up and his saber collapsed into dust.

The other disciples immediately started sweating.

“Elder Brother, how do we get back inside?” Zhang Jufang asked.

“With these,” Yang Qi said. Waving his hand, he sent a paper talisman flying over to Zhang Jufang. “With that talisman, you can take an entire group inside. Understand?”

“Yes sir!” Zhang Jufang replied. “So if people come to rob us, do we kill them?”

“Just drive them away. They won’t be able to break through that formation, and if they insist on trying, they’ll die.”

“Aaaiiiieee!”

Turning, everyone saw someone working with one of the furnaces off in the distance being engulfed in a burst of flame. In the blink of an eye, he was turned into ashes.

“Another death at the furnaces,” one of the disciples said, shaking his head. “That fire is deadly. With the weather so hot, the heat of the furnaces is even worse than normal. It kills in an instant.”

Yang Qi looked up at the deadly light falling from the sky.

“There's already been a month of this intense, deadly heat, and the miners don’t have anything to protect against it. It's a given that there will be deaths in these conditions. Even Quasi-Gods who stay out in the sun long enough will run out of godpower and eventually die.” Yang Qi shook his head. “Go buy some medicinal items to protect against the heat.”

“But such things are very expensive,” Zhang Jufang said. “If we draw on our reserves, it’ll be difficult to meet the quota. Besides, Elder Brother, we have most of that set aside to make sure you make a good impression on the sect. Look, a few dead miners aren’t anything to worry about. They die all the time.”

Chapter 1186: Secrets of the Mine (2)

“Matters of cost aren’t anything you need to consider,” Yang Qi said. “The miners are people, and godstones are just rocks. Sparing life is a heavenly ideal, so get whatever medicinal items we need to keep those miners alive.” Yang Qi was attempting to govern with morality and benevolence, and it continued providing benefits for his Sage Monarch Grand Magic.

Of course, no one dared to defy his orders.

The disciples immediately headed out with resources from the mines to purchase medicinal items. Purchasing hundreds of thousands of medicines was a huge expense that could very well have thrown the entire mine into dire financial straits. However, Yang Qi wasn’t worried about that.

With the wave of a hand, he could produce godsand and high-quality godstones.

“Let’s go. I want to see exactly what kind of living conditions these miners have to deal with.”

“You really don’t need to do that, Elder Brother,” Zhang Jufang said. “The actual mines are very dangerous. Not only are cave-ins a constant concern, but a lot of the miners are angry over Huang Weilong’s death. Everything is peaceful now, and they’re scared to do anything, but a riot could break out at any moment. You’re far too important to put yourself in danger, Elder Brother.”

“I’ll be fine,” Yang Qi said. “If I don’t impress the miners with a show of force, they’ll definitely riot eventually.” Yang Qi knew that governing with morality and benevolence was crucial to preventing riots. However, he also needed to make it clear that there was a threat of military force to back it all up. Besides, he really did want to see what the miners’ lives were like, and assess the state of the mineral deposits. Although he could create godsand and godstones, it would definitely benefit his cultivation to see how the ores developed in their natural state. And that would surely help him in his efforts to make godnotes.

“Your remarkable abilities are unrivaled and matchless, Elder Brother,” one of the disciples fawned. “The miners won’t dare to lift a finger against you.”

With that, they headed deeper into the mine.

They saw quite a few miners along the way, most of them struggling with heavy loads of ore. Some looked over at Yang Qi with ingratiating expressions, while others barely hid the hatred that flickered in their eyes.

There was quite a contrast between Yang Qi and his group, who were walking around casually and uninhibited, and the miners, who carried such heavy loads on their backs.

The further down they went, the more miners they saw. As for the tunnels, they were like enormous caves stretching off in all directions.

“Get on your knees, you scum miners!” one of the disciples shouted. “The foreman is here!”

Some of the miners slowly got to their knees, but others just disappeared into the tunnels, seemingly numb to the presence of Yang Qi and the disciples.

“What the fuck!?” another disciple said. “These miners really did think of Huang Weilong as their leader. With him dead, they aren’t listening to us! And they’re even complaining constantly. I think we should just kill them all and get some new blood in here!”

“No, they’ll fall in line,” Zhang Jufang said. He already could tell how Yang Qi was planning to handle things.

Just when he was about to call all the miners together, a deep rumbling sound reached their ears, and the ground beneath their feet began to shake. At the same time, something like a gravitational force rose up from below.

“Cave-in! It's a cave-in!”

The miners immediately scattered in all directions, looks of terror on their faces.

The gravitational force was so immense that even gods would be incapable of escaping it. In the blink of an eye, Yang Qi and the disciples seemed to be in danger of being sucked in.

However, Yang Qi simply chuckled coldly.

He thrust his palm out and used his godpower to stop the cave-in. The ground instantly stabilized. In the mortal world, a move like that might not have been impressive, but in the god world, it would require a huge amount of godpower to pull off successfully.

“Cave-in?” Yang Qi said. “More like a trap. Get over here!” He made a grasping gesture, which resulted in a shriek from down below as something enormous was dragged up. It looked almost like a pangolin, except it was as large as an elephant.

RUMBLE!

As it shrieked, the miners looked on in shock. “That’s a delvebrute, a powerful type of demonling. I can’t believe one of them is here in our mine. They burrow tunnels through the earth and use subterranean baleful energy to create vortexes to capture prey!”

It was a demonling in the Quasi-God level, with pulsing demon-god power that made it capable of cutting down even dozens of human Quasi-Gods. It was obviously a leader among the Demonfolk, and had been lying in wait to kill Yang Qi and his subordinates.

“Put me down immediately, boy!” the delvebrute shouted as it struggled. “I’m a subordinate of the Flame Phoenix, an important general. According to our deal with Foreman Huang Weilong, you're supposed to give us a tribute of ore every month, but you reneged! If you don’t let me go, then we’ll raze Mine Thirteen to the ground during the next demonling invasion!”

A burly man stepped forward from the nearby miners and said, “Foreman, this means there’s going to be a demonling invasion in the near future. You absolutely, positively must not take the situation lightly. Delvebrutes are generals among the demonlings, and if we pay them off they’ll prevent the invasion. Please, Foreman, sir, you have to take this seriously.”

“Elder Brother,” said Zhang Jufang, “that’s one of the bosses among the miners. He's an obstinate and unruly fellow named Ba Tianxiong. He has a lot of clout among the miners, and had a good relationship with Huang Weilong. He's been here in the mines for more than twenty years, before which he was a fierce bandit. He's very strong, even beyond the level of most of the novice disciples.”

“Ba Tianxiong?” Yang Qi looked at the man and all the miners flanking him, and could tell that they were itching to start a riot. Smiling coldly, he said, “You get over here as well!”

He made a grasping motion, sending out a huge flow of godpower.

“Hmph!” Contrary to expectation, Ba Tianxiong actually resisted! Then he clenched his hands into fists and shouted, “Let's kill ‘em all! We already work for the Demon Emperor. He calls the shots in this mine, which means we can do whatever we want. Who cares about the House of God Ordainment? The Demonfolk are the truly powerful ones!”

RUMBLE!

He launched a punch, causing godpower to swell, transforming into a lifelike phoenix that flew directly toward Yang Qi with claws bared.

“Flight of the Phoenix!”

It was a formidable energy art of the Demonfolk.

“Is that supposed to be impressive?” Yang Qi said, hardly looking at it. “Be broken!” He flicked his finger and the godpower manifestation of the phoenix exploded. At the same time, a thump was heard as a bloody hole appeared in Ba Tianxiong’s chest. Even as a scream escaped his lips, Yang Qi reached out and grabbed his arm.

“You conspired against me with that delvebrute, didn’t you?” he said. “It takes a lot of guts for a scummy miner to plot against the foreman himself.”

“Attack!” Ba Tianxiong screamed. “Everyone, join forces! It's time to riot!”

“Whoever riots will be executed immediately!” Zhang Jufang shouted, rushing forward and slaughtering a dozen miners who had just been about to start fighting.

Looking around, Yang Qi saw that more miners were starting to go crazy, some of them calling out slogans and catchphrases. Smiling faintly, he let out a cold harrumph.

The noise was like an explosive soundwave that rolled out and sent the miners flying backward. Not a single one could even get close. Many of the miners were powerful Quasi-Gods, and some of them even had weapons. But the sound shattered the weapons and knocked many of the miners unconscious.

“What?!”

Other miners who had been rushing to the scene were terrified by the sight that met their eyes. It was almost like they were in the presence of a god. After all, a single snort had rendered hundreds of powerful Quasi-Gods completely unconscious. How could anyone there deal with force like that?

“Take the unconscious ones and toss them into the furnaces,” Yang Qi said. “They're about to become sacrifices.”

“What?!” Zhang Jufang said, visibly astonished. “What did you just say, Elder Brother?”

“Weren’t you listening? I said to round up the unconscious ones and throw them into the furnaces!” Yang Qi flicked his sleeve. “That's what happens to rebels and traitors.”

“Yes sir!”

Without further hesitation, the disciples walked forward and began rounding up the unconscious miners.

However, Yang Qi snorted coldly. “You’re far too slow. Forget those orders.” He waved his sleeve, and a godwind sprang up that grabbed all of the unconscious miners, then carried them out of the mine and into the furnaces.

Screams immediately rang out as they began to burn. However, the screams eventually faded away. The rest of the miners were shocked, and quickly began dropping to their knees.

“That's what happens to scum who refuse to accept my authority.” It was obvious that Yang Qi also understood the dao of tyranny and could use it whenever he wanted. The quintessence of the Sage Monarch Grand Magic was the ability to become a monarch, emperor, sovereign, or sage, all with the same thought.

Chapter 1187: Demonling Invasion

Yang Qi was using bloody tactics to deal with the surviving members of Huang Weilong’s faction. When Ba Tianxiong saw hundreds of his followers thrown into furnaces to burn alive, he nearly fainted from terror.

Yang Qi had no intention of being merciful with traitors. He still planned to provide medical supplies to the miners in general, but his willingness to be moral and benevolent in that regard didn't mean that he would be kind in everything he did. He was fully aware that good people were often taken advantage of.

These were rebels who had allied themselves with demonlings and fomented rebellion. Without dealing harshly with them, how could Yang Qi keep the rest in line?

In a world of chaos, a ruler had to use severe punishment to establish their authority. Decisive action was required, including executions to crush rebellions. That was how an emperor had to act. After all, if the uprising turned into a large-scale rebellion, people would easily give in to their devilish nature, and far more would die as a result. It was a truth Yang Qi knew about after becoming familiar with the histories of countless civilizations. Over and over again, when rulers showed too much kindness, the end result would be even more slaughter and death.

Many miners, and even many of the disciples, were only now coming to realize that the new foreman was capable of shedding blood without hesitation. In fact, he was even more willing to slaughter the miners than Huang Weilong had been.

“Starting right now,” Yang Qi said loudly, “I hope I never see any miners rioting again. Ba Tianxiong will have his godpower removed and be thrown out into the light until he's baked to death. As for the demonling, skin it and chop it up. We’ll boil it into a soup for everyone to enjoy for dinner!”

Two screams rang out as both Ba Tianxiong and the delvebrute felt Yang Qi extracting their godpower until they could do nothing but grovel on the ground. Ba Tianxiong was then thrown out into the burning light, where he began to smoke and burn as he was strung up on a pillar.

For several hours, his screams filled the mine, piercing into the ears of hundreds of thousands of miners, leaving them cold, shaken, and terrified.

The miners had been afraid of Huang Weilong, but could defy him on certain occasions. In contrast, Yang Qi had single-handedly executed hundreds of powerful miners and crippled Ba Tianxiong, all with casual ease. The other miners were struck with fear down to the core of their being thanks to that. In fact, most of them already realized that even if hundreds of thousands of miners rioted at the same time, it would be easy for him to wipe them out.

“Aaaiiiieee!”

The delvebrute screamed as a disciple hacked it apart with a saber, pouring its blood into an enormous wok, then cutting the meat off its bones. The aroma of boiling meat soon wafted out as they slowly turned it into a soup.

Normally speaking, the fare offered at the mine was rustic and not particularly delicious. It was usually coarse grain and cereals, with only occasional morsels of demonling meat thrown in. Therefore, this meal was met with much rejoicing.

Night fell as abruptly as ever, and the light disappeared, to be replaced by pitch black and biting cold. The chill that came with night was a stark contrast to the biting heat of the day. However, torches were lit, illuminating the entire mine and making it easy to see. There was no rest for the miners. At the most, they could take short breaks in which they would nap for an hour or two, then continue working.

It was extremely tough manual labor, the kind that only Quasi-Gods could handle. Weaker people would die from it fairly quickly.

More than ever, Yang Qi was curious about how day and night worked in the god world. The impure lands and the immortal worlds had suns and moons, which was what created the cycle of night and day. But the god world had no sun or moon, nor even stars, with nights so dark it was impossible to see your own hand if it was held out in front of your face. He had put a lot of thought into the subject, and had searched the Great Classic of God Ordainment for clues, but still had no idea why the god world was like this.

The god world’s seasons were completely chaotic as well. Sometimes, the day was burning hot and the night was freezing. Other times, the day was freezing and the night was even more freezing.

The only thing that was even slightly normal was the rainy season, which Yang Qi had only experienced a bit of when he first arrived.

The disciples weren’t holding anything back in trying to get on Yang Qi’s good side.

“Elder Brother,” Zhang Jufang said, “thanks to your swift and decisive actions earlier today, the entire mine has turned over a new leaf. The miners are working harder than ever, and none of them dare to do anything out of line. I’d say we’ll definitely surpass the quota this year.”

Meanwhile, Yang Qi had his Lord's Eye open as he attempted to learn more about the ore veins in the mines. His gaze pierced into the ground, then, backed by his immense godpower, flowed through the subterranean veins like a fish swimming through water.

Right now, he didn't have any divine abilities that were specifically designed for drilling through the earth. And of course, the lands of the god world weren’t ordinary in any way. Not even ordinary gods could dig through the ground using physical might alone. Only demonlings with special physiology could do that.

That said, his observations had already revealed some interesting things to him. He knew that this mine had existed for over a hundred years, and that the ores on the surface had long since been extracted, making it necessary to dig deeper and deeper to get any results.

‘This vein of ore goes down so far,’ he thought. From what he could tell, the ground went down for thousands of meters, and the vein snaked back and forth through it like an enormous dragon. It was only in the deepest parts of the god world that the truly high-quality godstones were located, which meant it would be virtually impossible to reach them. If the miners were gods, perhaps they could dig down that far. But Quasi-Gods simply couldn’t.

In the impure lands, Yang Qi could break apart continents with a simple chop of his hand. But here, not even Greater Gods could accomplish something like that. That was the realm of Consummate and Perfect Gods.

However, even just casting his vision down so far was very beneficial for Yang Qi. He saw how the power of heaven and earth sank into the depths of the land, where it was crushed with immense pressure that eventually crystallized it, although the process took a lot of time.

As years passed, and more pressure weighed down on that crystallized power, the quality of the ore would improve. At the same time, the immense pressure in those depths made it very, very difficult to extract those ores.

‘Now I understand how it all works,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘This has been very helpful.’

The wind had picked up, making it even colder, and forcing the miners to use more godpower to protect themselves and avoid freezing to death.

Soon, it was possible to hear what sounded like weeping or wailing in the wind, making it seem like something powerful and dangerous was coming.

‘Is there a big storm on the way?’ he thought. Suddenly, he whistled, and the sound was filled with such explosive godpower that everyone present was shaken. It was almost like a thunderclap, and after it shot out, the winds seemed to die down a bit.

Yang Qi’s godpower was so incredible that he could affect meteorological phenomena, which was really the realm of the gods.

‘This mine really is a nasty place. And I have to keep the miners alive, otherwise production will slow down too much. Just to extract some ore, I have to put together a huge spell formation. Unfortunately, I need a formation the likes of which only a god could produce. If I did it myself, it would attract too much attention.’

Looking around at the mine, he began formulating a plan.

“Aaaiiiieee!”

Suddenly, a shrill scream echoed out from deep within the mine.

“What happened?” one of the disciples shouted. “Why are they causing such a fuss? Can’t they see the foreman is in the middle of seeking enlightenment!? Anyone who interrupts him is just asking to be executed!”

“Go see what happened,” Yang Qi said, waving his finger.

As the disciple was about to head into the mine, a group of miners tumbled out screaming and yelling. Then some of them fell to the ground, their mouths frothing and their skin turning dark. It looked like they had been poisoned.

“Snakes... snakes... in the tunnels. They started crawling out of the cracks and biting us. They’ve got deadly venom!” The miner then dropped dead.

“Snakes?” Yang Qi said, visibly surprised. “Where’d they come from? Hmph! Did that miner just die? Well in that case, I’ll bring his soul back and extrude the poisons. Stand!”

Waving his hand, he sent out some godpower that entered the dead miner, filling him with life force. Then the poison was extruded and he opened his eyes.

“Is it some sort of snake attack?” Zhang Jufang said, looking around. However, there were no snakes outside, only in the mine tunnels.

“Foreman, there are definitely a lot of snakes in there,” one of the miners said, “and they're in the tunnels with the highest quality ore. What are they doing in there?”

“Take me to them,” Yang Qi said, flicking his sleeve. Soon they were in a tunnel as tall as four or five people and wide enough for multiple horse carts to ride through. It was lit with numerous torches, but their light couldn't dispel the sinister air which filled the place.

Whoosh!

All of a sudden, a viper lunged out at Yang Qi.

Chapter 1188: Demonling Invasion (2)

SNICK!

A black snake as thin as a metal wire shot through the air like an arrow loosed from a bow. It was clearly the venomous type whose bite would kill rapidly.

Sadly for it, before it could get close to Yang Qi it burst into flame. Thanks to his Unspoiled Body, he was able to summon the power of fire tribulations at any time.

Having seen the black snake, Zhang Jufang’s face fell and he said, “Elder Brother, that’s a black ironwire viper. They’re very venomous, and especially dangerous when in groups. But they shouldn’t be here in the mine. We cleared the trees for miles in every direction, which is where they usually make their home. So what exactly are they doing here? They're so venomous that they even scar the trees and the rocks they slither across.”

“Let’s keep going deeper and see if we can figure out what's going on. The snakes aren’t coming from outside, they're entering from the depths of the mine.” There were black ironwire vipers in every nook and cranny of the enormous tunnel. Despite their size, they were so dangerous that even people with profound energy arts might not be able to defend against them. But with Yang Qi there, any vipers that showed up were instantly reduced to ashes.

Despite that, the people at Yang Qi’s side didn't feel even a bit of heat from the fire.

After all, he wasn’t using ordinary fire, but rather the flame of tribulation.

Considering how amazing he was, everyone present was coming to think of him as a god. Eventually, they were deep in the tunnel.

“Watch out!” Zhang Jufang said. “Elder Brother, this has got to be the beginnings of a demonling invasion, and a big one at that. What happens if there’s a cave-in here? Wouldn’t we be buried alive?”

“We’ll be fine,” Yang Qi said. “I can send my godpower into the stone around us to strengthen it, if I have to. Did you really think I’d come down here if I couldn't do that?”

The deeper they got, the more black ironwire vipers they saw. Sadly for them, they were dealing with Yang Qi, an enemy the likes of which they had never seen before.

They collapsed into dust, without even leaving behind their corpses. Meanwhile, Yang Qi sped up, moving so fast he was almost flying, and killing the vipers the entire way. It was almost as if he had a destination in mind as he went through all sorts of twists and turns until finally reaching a dead end. This was obviously a huge vein of ore, with crystallized godstones sticking out of the wall, thrumming with power.

Of course, the godstones couldn’t be taken for use in cultivation like this; in this state they could only be used to power formations.

Visible directly ahead of the group was a large hole in the wall, out of which poured black ironwire vipers, almost like a flood of water. It was a flood of snakes that not even Quasi-Gods could stand up to. And if nothing happened to stop it, then by daytime, Mine Thirteen would be completely overrun.

That said, Yang Qi was standing there now, destroying all of the snakes that got close.

However, no matter how many he killed, more came out, as if they were hoping to wear down his godpower. Sadly for them, the phrase “run out of godpower” didn't exist in Yang Qi’s vocabulary. Smiling, he sent out a stream of energy that vanished into the hole as if it were a black hole.

Then, a shrill voice echoed out, “What brat is out there killing my snake children and grandchildren!?” As the voice washed over them, everyone in Yang Qi’s presence felt their souls shrinking away in response.

“A god! It's a god!” Zhang Jufang shrieked, backing up. “Elder Brother, this is bad. We have to get out of here! There’s a god controlling the black ironwire vipers. We can’t deal with something of this level. We have to report it to the sect!”

“What are you getting flustered for?” Yang Qi said, waving his hand dismissively. “It’s only a Lesser God with a godhood rating of one. What can something like that do in the end?”

“You’re not a god, boy, so you might as well be an ant to me. That said, you’re obviously strong.” Along with the words, an enormous, pitch-black snake appeared.

It pulsed with black energy and had a long horn on its head, as well as horns on its abdomen, which was the telltale sign of a dragon in the making. Yang Qi had encountered plenty of Dragonfolk in the mortal world and had eventually subjugated them. But the dragons in the god world were true dragons, making the ones in the mortal world seem like nothing more than loaches.

‘This is a godpower incarnation,’ Yang Qi thought as he looked at the huge snake. Instead of backing up, he merely smiled and said, “A Snakefolk god? What exactly are you doing here? Are you instigating a demonling invasion to provoke the House of God Ordainment?”

“Are you trying to scare me by bringing up the House of God Ordainment?” The snake god incarnation laughed. “You killed a lot of my snake children and grandchildren, boy. And that pisses me off. Considering you know I'm a god, I'm surprised you still have what it takes to smile.”

“Why shouldn’t I smile?” Yang Qi replied. “And I couldn't care less whether you're a clone or a real god. I’ll kill either version. So cut the crap and prepare to die. Sage Monarch Grand Magic!”

Because the Sage Monarch Grand Magic was Yang Qi’s unique divine ability, no one in the god world would recognize it. He had used it to kill the Bloodcorpse God that attacked the Lightningbolt Continent, and he was much weaker at the time. So there was little question as to whether or not he could deal with this snake god incarnation.

With a wave of his hand, he unleashed the Sage Monarch Grand Magic, sending out a wave of power that surrounded the snake.

The pitch-black snake’s face fell. “Impossible! How could this be happening? How are you so strong? And what energy art is that? Clone Retreat!”

“It’s too late for that!” Yang Qi said, thrusting out his palm with full power, backing it with the Mahātmā Jade and his Heaven-Devouring abilities. When they hit the snake, it crumpled down and flew over, landing on his palm. A moment later, it was sucked inside him.

“Be sealed!” he said, waving his hand to send a stream of power to the hole in the wall, causing it to fade away and return to its original state.

As it vanished, a voice cried out as if from a great distance away, “You’ll pay for this, boy! How could I have guessed you were this strong? What’s someone like you doing fooling around in a backwater place like this? I'm not going to let you off the hook for this....”

Yang Qi turned around as if he hadn’t heard the voice speaking. “Let’s go. There’s definitely a demonling invasion about to happen. We need to head back and put together a strategy. My main question is why a god is involved. What about the Guardian Mines is worth this level of demonling activity?”

The miners were already buzzing about in activity. After all, a demonling invasion wasn't something to take lightly, and any who weren’t fully prepared could end up being eaten.

‘It seems I need to set up a spell formation to protect the entire mine. It'll take a lot of godpower, but I should be able to defend against a Lesser God. Having assimilated the sheepskin scroll and the Mahātmā Jade, my energy arts have advanced a lot. It should be enough.’

Raising his voice, he said, “Gather the miners. For the next few days, work is on hold.”

Back on the ground level, he chopped his hand out, hewing out a huge ditch with a rampart of earth on the interior.

As soon as it had formed, complex designs were visible on the rampart. Next, he exhaled, and fire filled the designs as the formation powered up.

Then he walked the perimeter, doing the same thing over and over, wrenching up piles of earth and stone to create two sets of seven watchtowers each, for a total of fourteen. Afterward, he summoned a host of swords, all of them crafted from stone and filled with the godpower of the Great Necropolis. Considering their origin, there was no way anyone here would have any idea what they were.

“Step forward,” he said to the disciples. “Everyone take a sword and head to a watchtower. If you see any demonlings coming, attack them with the sword. The towers have spell formations with godstones already set into them, so they’ll automatically activate when necessary. We should be fine. However, remain in combat readiness at all times. Everyone else, keep an eye on the miners. If any of them try taking advantage of the attack to flee, kill them.”

“Yes sir!” the disciples replied in loud voices.

Chapter 1189: Demonling Invasion (3)

Yang Qi had just set up a Seven-Seven Reincarnation Formation, and had also created stone swords using his godpower. It was an imitation of the Lord of the Sword Dao and his Unbounded Sword River. Once unleashed, it would send out waves of sword energy that would cut down anything they touched. And the power of stone was connected to the earth in a way that would make the defenses impervious to assault.

They really were the perfect defenses.

‘I'm curious to see how strong these demonlings are!’ he thought.

Before long, they heard the pounding of drums and the piercing cry of bugles. “What’s that?” Yang Qi asked. "Don't tell me the demonlings are organized into an actual army.”

“Those aren’t demonlings,” Zhang Jufang replied. “Those are the other fifty-five mines, calling a meeting among the foremen. The call is coming from Mine One, which is where the foremen will gather. Considering a demonling invasion is expected, the foreman of Mine One wants to have everyone united in defense of the mines.”

“I see,” Yang Qi replied. “Now that I think about it, the god that brought us here from the sect mentioned something about this. That said, although Mine One might have the authority to call a meeting, they don’t have the right to order us around. Our mine is already completely secure, and there’s no way any demonlings will make it inside. But if the other foremen are expecting trouble, I suppose I can help them out. You stay on guard here. The formation I've set up won’t fall, and you can use it to kill hordes of enemies without being in danger.”

“Understood,” the disciples replied. “We won’t let you down!”

With a flick of his sleeve, Yang Qi flew up into the air.

In the darkness of night, the mines shone like torches, making it very easy to see them. Although they were separated, they were close enough that travel was possible without the use of teleportation portals.

Yang Qi flew toward the largest of the mines, Mine One, which was fully three times as big as his Mine Thirteen. It had over a million miners, making it even more difficult to govern. However, from what he had heard, the foreman of Mine One had a good relationship with an important elder from the House of God Ordainment, making his job a lot easier.

And it gave Mine One a lot more authority in general.

Drums pounded and bugles called out into the night.

Eventually, Yang Qi touched down in Mine One and saw a group of over fifty official disciples sitting in a square on a mountain peak. A glimmering shield protected the area from the cold wind. It would surely take a lot of godstones to keep a shield like that operational, but Mine One could afford it.

The gathered disciples noticed Yang Qi’s arrival, and most of them nodded in greeting.

“Yang Qi,” one of them said, “you’re the foreman of Mine Thirteen, right? We heard that you killed Huang Weilong right before the meeting of gang leaders. That bastard had it coming. Amazing!”

“You flatter me,” Yang Qi said, finding a seat. “We’re all official disciples, after all. How could we let ourselves be pushed around by some novice disciples?”

“But I heard that you had some rebels in your mine,” another disciple said. “If you go around killing them too readily, they’ll be difficult to control. All of the mines have gang leaders who cause problems. Some of them even have deals worked out with people from the dao of devils. In other words, if you handle them wrong it can easily lead to violent riots. And anyone who doesn’t meet the yearly quota will be severely punished.”

“Alright, everyone, quiet down,” someone said. Everyone looked over and saw a handsome, well-built young man walking out of the nearby mansion grotto. He was clearly an extraordinary individual and seemed to radiate the air of a leader. He had obviously done well for himself after becoming an official disciple.

“Elder Brother Yue, did you finally succeed in cultivating your Myriad-Hills God-Mountain Subjugation? Congratulations! You must be just on the verge of becoming a god!”

“You’re exactly right. The Yue Clan has elders in the House of God Ordainment, and they’re very powerful. Of course, I’m only an official student, so they can’t be too brazen in helping me. But after passing the Bloodgore Trials, things changed. I benefited a lot last time I went to the sect, and it won’t be long now before I reach godly ascension. If you people stick with me, I’ll make sure to take good care of you.”

This Elder Brother Yue seemed to fairly pulse with a powerful aura.

‘His energy arts are profound,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘He’s benefited a lot in the last month, and he seems to have put Mine One in order. Whatever elder supports him back in the sect, it seems they might not be just a Lesser God. Perhaps it was with that elder’s help that he took care of the gang leader in his mine. It seems to me he called this meeting because he wants to take advantage of the situation to benefit himself.’

“Elder Brother Yue, why did you call this meeting?” asked a female disciple. “Is it because of the demonling invasion?”

She was the foreman of Mine Thirty-Six. However, from the expression on her face, Yang Qi could tell that she was working with Elder Brother Yue.

“Yes, it's because of the demonling invasion,” Elder Brother Yue replied. “As you’ve all probably noticed, over the past few days there have been many more demonlings in the area than there used to be. And here and there some will pop up that are particularly powerful. That’s a sign of an upcoming invasion. Considering how your mines are so spread out, it's going to be impossible to simply repel the invasion. So we need to work together. We disciples of the Guardian Mines need to be united and focus our strength. The miners as well. If we don’t, we won’t be able to stand up to this invasion.”

“A demonling invasion. How terrifying....”

“You’re right. We haven’t even been here for a month, and there's already going to be an invasion. I guess we just have really bad luck. They say that there are always casualties during demonling invasions. Even foremen can die. What are we supposed to do?”

“Just listen to Elder Brother Yue. He has the backing of an elder, which means that if things get really bad, a god will probably come help out.”

“But he said we need to focus our strength. How? If we try to join the forces of all fifty-six mines, I doubt it would be very orderly. It’d be pure chaos.”

After the disciples discussed the matter amongst themselves for a moment, Elder Brother Yue chuckled. “There’s no need to worry, I’ve already taken care of everything. All of you will be fine. I’ve prepared plenty of spell formations here in Mine One. Plus, there’s plenty of open space for the rest of you and I’ve also stockpiled resources. Therefore, over the next two days, you need to bring as much of your ores and godstones over here as you can. The invasion will begin at any moment, so there's no time to lose.”

“Er....” The other disciples exchanged awkward glances. Only complete fools wouldn't realize by now what Elder Brother Yue was getting at. Obviously, he was trying to take advantage of the situation to seize complete control of all of the mines! He wanted control of all the resources!

Some of the disciples were inclined to leave, but when they saw Elder Brother Yue’s cold eyes, they reconsidered. The House of God Ordainment had strict rules, so Elder Brother Yue couldn't just kill them. But he could lend someone a knife and have them do his dirty work for him. Besides, if they went out on their own, they would have to deal with the demonling invasion on their own. And a mistake in that regard could lead to a quick death. Obviously, fleeing wasn't an option either, as the punishment for that was even more severe.

“That’s a great idea, Elder Brother Yue,” said the foreman of Mine Thirty-Six. “It’s simple. We combine the resources of all fifty-six mines, and follow your orders. You can hand everything over to the sect for us. I was just thinking recently about how difficult it would be to actually meet the quota. But with you in charge of all the resources, you can easily make up for any deficit. Then we’ll all end the year successfully. It's a really good idea.”

It was obvious what Elder Brother Yue wanted. The mines actually produced a lot more ore than the quotas demanded, which was why everyone who worked there could benefit to some extent.

But Elder Brother Yue wanted all the resources to go to him, which would mean that he could keep all the extra. Either that, or he could hand in the extra and receive amazing rewards from the sect.

If Yang Qi understood this, then how could the others not?

They had all passed the Bloodgore Trials, which meant they were all formidable figures. And none of them were fools.

“I agree with this proposal, Elder Brother,” another disciple said, the foreman of Mine Fifty. Considering how quick he was to speak, it seemed obvious that he and Elder Brother Yue had come to an agreement earlier. “After all, we’re all just simple cultivators. Who wants to worry about all the complicated aspects of running a mine? If you can make up for any deficit on our part, we’ll be eternally grateful to you.”

“I also agree. This will be the best for everyone. From now on, we don’t need to worry about meeting the yearly quota.” It was the foreman of Mine Forty. After him, another foreman spoke up, then another, and all of them were siding with Elder Brother Yue.

Chapter 1190: Elder Brother Yue

There were a total of fifty-six foremen, and a dozen or so were already loudly agreeing to go along with Elder Brother Yue’s plan. They only made up about a quarter of the total number of foremen. However, those who hadn’t yet voiced agreement weren’t united in their opposition. In fact, most of them were considering the veiled threats and promises, and would likely side with Elder Brother Yue.

“Elder Brother Yue, if we do entrust all of the resources of all the mines to you, will you really ensure that everyone meets their quota?” one disciple asked. “If so, I’ll agree to go along with the arrangement.”

“Of course I will,” Elder Brother Yue replied with a smile. “You’re all Junior Brothers of mine, so who else do you expect me to watch out for? Don’t worry, I’ll make sure all of this is worth your while.”

“Elder Brother Yue,” said another disciple, “do you think the sect will mind if we make a deal like this? It’s obviously related to personal profit.”

“Why would they possibly care? According to the rules, we have to hand over a certain amount of ore. Not meeting the quota is a violation of the rules. In that case, they could slaughter everyone in a given mine and no one would say a thing. When it comes time to hand in the yearly production, just send it to me here. It’ll save you a lot of worry and allow all of you to simply focus on improving your cultivation.”

There were still quite a few disciples who weren’t inclined to agree. After all, handing the resources over to Elder Brother Yue would enable him to profit handsomely. Furthermore, he would essentially have their lives in his control.

For example, what if he just didn’t hand over the resources of a given mine at the end of the year? The sect wouldn’t care at all about any personal deals that had been made and would just execute everyone who had failed to meet the quota.

Despite the fact that many people didn't want to go along with such an arrangement, there was also the complication of the impending demonling invasion. Furthermore, Elder Brother Yue seemed very threatening, and already had a lot of people on his side. Whoever chose to speak up would surely be made an example of. He probably wouldn't do it openly, but it wouldn't be difficult to have some gang leaders mount an invasion on the mines of anyone who refused to fall in line. Or he could use disciples from the dao of devils to cause endless trouble.

Everyone here was a clever and astute person, so there was no way they were ignorant of just what Elder Brother Yue was capable of.

“In that case, I agree too,” said another disciple. “I’ll give you all the resources, Elder Brother Yue. From now on, I'm your man. Whatever orders you give, I’ll follow.”

Elder Brother Yue laughed heartily. “Excellent. Wonderful! You really know how to take the big picture into consideration. I won’t let you down.”

“I'm in. I want your protection, Elder Brother Yue.” By this point, many of the disciples were worried about chiming in too late, thus angering Elder Brother Yue. It seemed obvious how things were going to end, so jumping in at the head of the line seemed to make the most sense.

Elder Brother Yue was already savoring the new power he was accumulating. Thanks to the demonling invasion, he was consolidating the forces of the fifty-six mines. Furthermore, he would also soon be lining his pockets with ore. In turn, that would allow him to acquire all kinds of resources from the sect, making it that much easier to advance his cultivation base.

A lot of disciples were thinking that it wouldn’t be worth it to stand up to Elder Brother Yue. As long as they could further their cultivation and reach godly ascension, then they could eventually leave these accursed mines behind forever.

Things went on in this way until Elder Brother Yue had fifty-four of the foremen on his side.

There was only one left: Yang Qi.

Rising to his feet, he looked around coldly.

“What,” Elder Brother Yue said, brow furrowed. “Yang Qi, you’re the foreman of Mine Thirteen, right? Are you saying you refuse to go along? Are you really going to stick your head out like this?” He was making no attempt to be polite. He had the power now, and everyone else had acknowledged allegiance to him. As far as he was concerned, if Yang Qi refused to see the light, there was no reason to beat around the bush with him.

“Of course I refuse, Mr. Yue. This idea of yours is nothing more than robbery. You’re just taking our resources for your own. Why would I possibly agree to that? Hmph! We’re all official disciples of the House of God Ordainment. As foremen, it's easy for us to skim some profit off the top. Or, if we manage our mines well, and crush the gang leaders, we can surpass the quota and be rewarded by the sect. With more resources from the sect, our cultivation speed will improve and we’ll reach godly ascension that much sooner. If, instead, we work for you, how would we be any different from the novice disciples? You’ve got to be kidding me if you think I risked my life to pass the Bloodgore Trials only to agree to be your flunky.”

Many of the other disciples present were thinking the same thing, but hadn’t dared to speak the words aloud. And now they were very interested in seeing how Yang Qi handled the situation.

In response, Elder Brother Yue clapped softly. “Well said. Very well said. You've got a lot of guts, Yang Qi, and I admire that. But aren’t you worried that being the only dissenting voice here will get you killed?”

Yang Qi chuckled coldly. “You’re saying you have enough guts to try and kill me? Not even elders in the House of God Ordainment would dare to violate the rules by killing an official disciple. Besides, you don't have what it takes to kill me. In any case, this discussion is over. I'm leaving. I'm strong enough to deal with this demonling invasion without you. If any of the rest of you have problems, just let me know. I can help you. And my help will come free of charge; I won’t ask for payment of any kind. In the meantime, you ought to spend some time thinking about whether you really want to be a flunky to Elder Brother Yue.”

With his words hanging in the air, Yang Qi turned to leave.

Many people felt their hearts stirring in response to Yang Qi’s words, especially when he mentioned helping them with the demonling invasion. If he could do that, then why did they need to be flunkies of Elder Brother Yue?

“You think you can just leave? Sorry, it won’t be that easy! Maybe I can’t kill you, but I can teach you a good lesson. I run the Guardian Mines!” Elder Brother Yue was well aware that if Yang Qi got away after making a big scene like this, it would be a big blow to the morale of his new followers.

“Myriad-Hills God-Mountain Subjugation!

“First stance: One Thousand Mountains!”

RUMBLE!

Clenching his hand into a fist, he shot toward Yang Qi, his godpower causing the image of a thousand mountains to be projected behind him. It was almost as if the power of a thousand mountains were about to crush Yang Qi, causing the entire area to rumble as if from thunder.

“Screw the hell off!” Yang Qi said, not even bothering to look at him. He flicked his sleeve, and a massive wind sprang up, shattering the incoming attack and continuing on toward Elder Brother Yue himself. When it struck, he was sent flying backward like a bullet, then slammed into the door of the mansion grotto, where he coughed up several huge mouthfuls of blood.

He struggled to rise, glaring at Yang Qi as he prepared to speak. Then he coughed up more blood and slumped back down. “You... you’re so strong....”

“There’s no way a piece of trash like you can run all fifty-six mines.” Without even bothering to look at him, Yang Qi flew up into the air and disappeared in a streak of prismatic light.

“What?!” Everyone knew that Elder Brother Yue was just about to reach godly ascension, but they had all just witnessed him being defeated with a single move. Only now were they starting to realize how strong Yang Qi truly was.

“Since when did Yang Qi get such amazing energy arts? Elder Brother Yue just used the move One Thousand Mountains, which is one of the top moves for Quasi-Gods, yet he was defeated so easily!”

“Well, it doesn’t matter. It seems to me that Elder Brother Yue doesn't have what it takes to keep us safe. Let’s get out of here and ask Yang Qi for help.”

“Yeah, exactly! Considering how strong Elder Brother Yang Qi is, there’s no way any of us are a match for him. Look what bad shape Elder Brother Yue is in.”

Even the disciples who were previously loyal to Elder Brother Yue were now reconsidering everything.

One of the disciples raised his voice and said, “Elder Brother Yue, it looks like you have a battle of wills on your hand. Since it doesn’t involve us, we’ll leave for now. After all, we have to make preparations for the demonling invasion.”

“I have to go, too. I’ll come back later to offer my respects, Elder Brother Yue....”

Before long, everyone had left, even the previously staunch supporters of Elder Brother Yue. He was completely alone.

After some time, he managed to struggle to his feet and pull out a jade bottle from inside the fold of his garment. After gobbling up the medicinal pills inside, he slowly recovered his godpower and vital energy.

Crack!

The bottle shattered. “Yang Qi... you just wait. I won’t let you get away with this. How dare you offend me! My clan has a lot of influence in the House of God Ordainment. You obviously have no idea who the Yue Clan is!”

Yang Qi returned to his mountain peak, a serious expression on his face. He knew that defeating Elder Brother Yue might cause complications, but in the end, he wasn’t very worried about it. He was an official disciple, so according to the rules of the sect, he should be fine. The main thing he needed to worry about would be subterfuge.

Of course, he didn’t fear subterfuge either.

The night passed.

The next morning, a large group of foremen flocked to Yang Qi’s mountain.

“Elder Brother Yang Qi, considering how Elder Brother Yue threatened us so openly, we hope you can provide us with protection.” There were over twenty foremen present. As for the rest, they didn't want to throw their lot in with either Elder Brother Yue or Yang Qi.

After all, switching loyalties to Yang Qi would obviously enrage Elder Brother Yue.

Although he was only a disciple like the rest of them, he had the support of an elder who was also a god.  As for those who chose to join Yang Qi, they decided there would be plenty of time to worry about such things later. The most pressing matter at hand was to avoid being a flunky of Elder Brother Yue.

“We're all fellow disciples, so it’s only natural that I help you,” Yang Qi said. “I've already set up a huge spell formation here in Mine Thirteen. You can always find protection here. And if you have gang leaders in your own mines who’re causing problems, I’ll help you get rid of them. For all we know, they might be in league with the demonlings.”

Chapter 1191: Demonlings

Quite a few disciples were seeking help from Yang Qi because of how he had offered it with no strings attached.

Whether or not people sided with him wasn’t extremely important to him. However, he wanted to take advantage of the situation to win some hearts. As for the potential retribution on the part of Elder Brother Yue, he wasn’t worried. Even if a god came to cause problems, he could handle the situation.

Furthermore, he didn’t let it affect his cultivation.

He continued with his daily routine, seeking enlightenment from the sheepskin scroll and Mahātmā Jade, and learning profound things by studying the essence of the god world.

His daoist techniques were becoming more refined, especially his Civilization Founding Grand Magic and imperial-heaven pre-beginning powers. He was now able to assess the psychic scales of others, and even see their godpower as it flowed through them.

And he could now confirm that his own psychic scale was in the thousands. He wasn't sure what ordinary gods had for psychic scales, but he was sure that they couldn’t compare to him.

His enlightenment of the Sage Monarch Grand Magic was growing more refined. He could now make godnotes that lasted for much longer periods of time, and the quality of the godstones he could create was increasing by the day.

He waved his hand and a fist-sized godstone appeared, glittering with bright light, it almost looked as if it contained a growing world of lightning. Godstones of this quality were considered a rarity.

In fact, he was almost in the position of being able to create godstones that contained god embryos. That was a mark of the Paramount level.

He was just on the verge of breaking through to a level of will that could devastate almost all other types of gods.

Long ago, Yang Qi’s immortal-slaying clone had started out as an immortal embryo in a godly-grade spirit stone.

However, godly-grade spirit stones were still just spirit stones. Spirit stones were very different from immortal stones, which were in turn very different from godstones.

The highest quality godstones could only be produced from mines in the god world and were never seen in the impure lands. And the power within them was the only thing that could activate and operate god formations. Godstones of the highest quality would eventually produce god embryos, which were expressions of god vitality and life force. Such things were very rarely seen in mines.

Taking a deep breath, Yang Qi opened the Great Classic of God Ordainment and flipped to the section about services rendered to the sect.

‘If you turn in an imperial caliber godstone, you get ten merit points. Hand in a godstone with a god embryo, and you can get five hundred!’ From that it was obvious how rare god embryos were.

In the House of God Ordainment, even just one merit point could be exchanged for many things. In fact, the foremen of the mines would generally be rewarded with a single merit point for meeting their yearly quota.

In the impure lands, spirit stones and immortal stones were classified as such: low-, mid-, high-, supreme-, royal-, imperial-, sovereign-, sagely-, heavenly-, and godly-grade.

But in the god world, godstones were described differently.

Considering that the Great Classic of God Ordainment contained all sorts of information about the god world, it was a given that it described godstones. The ranking went as followed: shoddy, normal, greater, noble, imperial, holy, and perfect.

As for the stones Yang Qi had originally created, they were greater godstones.

His godsands were worth a single noble caliber godstone each, which was why the Primeval Pavilion had been so interested in them. The stones he could create now, with the rumbling of thunder in them, were imperial caliber godstones, which his mine couldn’t even produce.

The type that had god embryos were holy caliber godstones, which Yang Qi still couldn’t produce.

As for a perfect caliber godstone, he had no idea what they were like. They were things that Paramount Gods would use to fuel their god kingdoms.

The Great Classic of God Ordainment didn't contain information about cultivation techniques. However, it had a lot of general information about the god world, describing its geography, the demonlings and fiend-devils that could be found there, and even details about the climate and weather. It also listed the rare types of treasures and medicinal ingredients that existed.

It was essentially an encyclopedia.

Most of the information wouldn’t be useful to ordinary disciples. However, Yang Qi was a veritable dictionary of martial arts, and of all the things he lacked, techniques weren’t even on the list. Therefore, information about the god world was very valuable to him, and it even helped with the God Legion Seal and his Sage Monarch Grand Magic.

Because of that, he spent a lot of time studying the Great Classic of God Ordainment.

Three months passed in a flash.

Of the fifty-five other foremen, about thirty had allied themselves with Yang Qi. And for safety’s sake, they had already moved all of their godstone reserves, as well as their miners and disciples, over to Mine Thirteen. As for their own mines, they had ceased operations.

Demonling attacks had become a daily problem. They would appear out of nowhere, kill some miners, then unpredictably disappear. Although it wasn’t hard to kill the invading demonlings, they never seemed to stop coming. And there were some demonlings who could tunnel through the ground and launch attacks in the deeper parts of the mines, making things even worse. There were also fierce bird-like demonlings that would attack from above and whose claws could easily crush the heads of humans into nothing. Miners were dying on a daily basis.

The demonlings in the god world had to be extremely fierce to survive, and thus attacked viciously, even using invincible divine abilities.

The repeated incursions seemed to confirm that there would be a large-scale invasion soon. It was with great fanfare that all of the foremen went around making preparations for defense.

Yang Qi was continuously bolstering his own defensive spell formations. As for the disciples under his protection, they could see the demonlings rushing forth in attack. But when they got to within about three thousand meters of the shield, streams of sword energy would fly out and slash them to bits. More often than not, their blood would evaporate before it even hit the ground.

There were no subterranean attacks.

The ground was so strong thanks to the spell formation that the tunneling demonlings had no way to break through, making the ground a very safe place to be.

Occasionally, smaller demonlings would try attacking on foot, but the sword energy would slash them to pieces before they could get close. In short, it was impossible for any demonlings to get close to Mine Thirteen.

Unfortunately, the demonlings didn’t fear death, and their numbers only grew as time went by.

**

Elder Brother Yue sat in a hall in Mine One. Behind him stood an elder with a long beard, flowing hair, and skin that glowed like gold. Obviously, he was a Lesser God.

“Boundless Gods Defend the Body; Overturn the Cosmos and Invert the Sun and Moon; Boundless Will of the Preheaven Dragon. Nine-Dragons Water-Breathing Heavenly-Doctor God Art!”

Crash!

Nine dragons appeared from behind him, spitting out water that became misty clouds. An intense medicinal aroma filled the area as the clouds entered Elder Brother Yue’s meridians and sea of energy, healing him completely.

Cracking sounds rang out as Elder Brother Yue began to thrum with a powerful aura.

“I’ll never forgive you for hurting me so badly, Yang Qi!” he growled, hands clenched into fists as he shot to his feet.

“What exactly happened here?” the elder asked, his expression grim and full of killing intent. “You were obviously beaten very badly. I heard about the demonling invasion, so I snuck over here to help you. You’re a member of the Yue Clan, so we can’t have you dying out here. But if word were to spread about this, it would make things difficult for you in the future. You would never become the next patriarch of the clan if everyone knew I was helping you. That’s why I can’t take action myself.”

“It’s like this, Uncle,” Elder Brother Yue said, then went into a detailed explanation. When he was finished, he said, “I can’t believe Yang Qi is that strong. He beat me with one move! In fact, I suspect he's actually stronger than he’s letting on.”

“What? There’s a foreman of that level here?” The elder was clearly shocked. “I’ll look into it and see if it’s as you say.”

A mirror formed of godpower appeared in his hand, into which he sent a pearl of energy. Instantly, a scene appeared in the mirror.

He saw all the mines, many of which were empty, other than the roaming demonlings in them.

As for Mine Thirteen, it was surrounded by a rampart of swords, and even the air above it was covered by an energy shield.

Any demonlings who got close, even the crawling type that resembled spiders, centipedes, or scorpions, would all die.

“What a powerful spell formation!” the elder said, visibly shocked. “Not even I could create something like that.”

Chapter 1192: Demonlings (2)

Upon seeing the serious expression on the face of this god uncle of his, Elder Brother Yue said, “Uncle, don’t tell me that even gods need to fear this Yang Qi?”

The elder snorted coldly. “I never said that. If there was a Quasi-God strong enough to stand up to a god, the sect would have noticed him much earlier. Why would they possibly force him to be a foreman here? Exalted figures like that are rarities, even in our House of God Ordainment. I did hear of a few people like that making a show in the recent Bloodgore Trials, although they were all taken away as apprentices by top figures in the sect.”

“In any case, Uncle, I'm not a match for him.”

Elder Brother Yue was doing his best to emphasize that part.

“That formation of his is extraordinary to say the least. I don’t think I could break through those defenses easily, but I doubt he was the one who set it up. He probably has the support of an important person from the sect, similar to how I support you. After all, that’s the reason why Mine One has such a powerful formation protecting it. I'm very curious to see what this Yang Qi’s cultivation base is like. Psychic Mightiness: Void Infiltration!”

A powerful stream of psychic power flowed out of the elder and surreptitiously headed toward Yang Qi’s formation. Once there, the elder used an ingenious magical method to pierce the formation.

He chuckled. “It's a strong formation, but considering I've mastered the Nine Flexures Psychic Concealment art, I can come and go without being detected by anyone, including this Yang Qi. And if I can raise my cultivation base to a slightly higher level, pushing me even closer to the Paramount level, I could probably take control of him and turn him into a puppet.”

“Uncle,” Elder Brother Yue asked, “my will convergence is currently at peak Terrifying, just a step away from the Paramount level. Do you think I have a chance of breaking through?”

The elder laughed heartily. Studying his nephew for a moment, he said, “You want to reach the Paramount level? I advise you to stop thinking about it. You probably think that, given your talent, all you need is some help from us to become a Lesser God. But breaking through to the Paramount level is nothing to take lightly. For you, it’s essentially a pipe dream. The difference between Terrifying and Paramount isn’t just a difference of a level. They're as far apart as heaven and earth. Not even I can achieve that breakthrough without coming across some very good fortune. For example, if you have enough merit points, you can hand them in to the sect to get a first-class treasure and slowly work toward a breakthrough. But for you, it’s not possible. You’d do better to focus on solidifying your godhood and becoming a Lesser God. Even with a godhood rating of only one, you can still accomplish a lot. Afterward, you can worry about trying to reach the Paramount level. And even then, don't forget that your chances will be slim. To step from the Terrifying level to the Paramount level requires passing all kinds of hurdles and tribulations. You have to overcome heart-devils, illusion-devils, will-devils, self-devils, faith-devils, and all sorts of devilish tests. They’re devil tribulations that involve fighting, not ordinary monsters, but fiend-devils that arise from within yourself. I've seen a lot of Common Gods who tried to reach the Paramount level, but ultimately went insane and then died within a few days.”

“It's that bad?” Elder Brother Yue said, his face ashen. “Many thanks for your advice, Uncle. I guess I had my sights set too high. I’ll just go forward slowly but surely. Oh, by the way, Uncle. What level is Yang Qi’s cultivation base?”

“He’s reading the Great Classic of God Ordainment,” the elder chuckled coldly. “I’ll send some more psychic power in to get an idea of exactly what’s going on with him. In fact, maybe I’ll infect him with my God-Ordaining Towering-Heaven Magic. If I implant one of those seeds into him, it will spread through his blood, nascent divinity, sea of consciousness, and psyche. He’ll have no idea what’s going on, and will probably even think that heaven is helping him further his cultivation!”

Waving both of his hands out in front of him, he sent out a stream of psychic energy.

Meanwhile, in Yang Qi’s mansion grotto, Yang Qi opened his eyes and locked his gaze onto the Yue Clan elder. The truth was that, given Yang Qi’s cultivation base, his psychic power was vastly superior to this elder’s. While the elder was on the verge of being able to start a Paramount breakthrough, Yang Qi had already begun the process. In fact, the only reason he hadn’t completed the process yet was that he wasn’t in the ideal circumstance.

Invisible psychic power flowed toward Yang Qi, but he didn’t react at all, as if he didn’t notice what was happening. He simply focused on the book he was reading. The truth was that he wasn’t there as his true self. It was a godpower incarnation that was so realistic that no one could possibly tell that it wasn’t real.

As the Yue Clan elder sent his psychic power in to implant the seed, the clone shivered and his cultivation base seemed to rise to a higher level.

An ordinary Quasi-God who experienced something like this would think that they were breaking through, and would simply accept what was happening. And of course, that would result in them falling for the trick.

But Yang Qi just chuckled darkly. ‘These people from the Yue Clan are really shameless. They’re actually plotting against me in complete disregard for the rules of the House of God Ordainment. Unfortunately, I don’t have any solid proof. That seed could’ve come about as a side effect of regular cultivation. Although, it’s impolite not to reciprocate! I think I’ll implant him with a devil embryo! Heaven-God Hell-Exterminating Devil Embryo!”

A virtual devil embryo appeared, which flew up into the air toward what appeared to be a golden eye hovering there, quietly observing everything.

Of course, it was a manifestation of the Yue Clan elder’s technique. Moments later, as the elder chuckled madly, he retracted the godpower eye, bringing the devil embryo along with it. That, in turn, made it possible for Yang Qi to instantly know everything about the elder. He saw one piece of godhood floating in his sea of energy, which meant that his godhood rating was one, albeit close to reaching the level of two.

Godhood was often described as the Great Dao of the Gold Core, and even having one piece made one deathless.

Already, the devil embryo had taken up residence within that piece of godhood like a parasite. All it would take would be a thought on Yang Qi’s part and the devil embryo would flare to life, either turning the elder into a puppet or completely draining his godpower.

It was definitely against the rules to kill an elder in the sect, and anyone who did would be severely punished. That said, Yang Qi hadn’t even met this elder yet, so there was no way anyone could link the two of them together. If Yang Qi wanted, he could wait until the elder returned to the sect and kill him during a session of cultivation, ensuring that no one would suspect foul play. Or he could wait until the man got into a fight with someone else, and do it then.

He now had control over a god.

“Very well, I’ve already helped you deal with your enemy,” the elder said. “Now that he has that seed in him, whenever he practices cultivation, the godpower he develops will be transferred to you. All you need to do is assimilate this paper talisman, got it?” He produced a paper talisman which Elder Brother Yue immediately devoured.

Almost immediately, Elder Brother Yue felt godpower flowing into him, which meant that for all intents and purposes, he didn’t need to practice his own cultivation. He burst out laughing. “How will you fight with me now, Yang Qi? Your cultivation is my cultivation. Your reserves of energy will be my reserves!”

Yang Qi watched all of this happen from his own mountain. He saw the godpower flowing from the clone into Elder Brother Yue, yet what Elder Brother Yue didn’t know was that he had also been infected with a devil embryo, putting him under Yang Qi’s control as well.

“I can’t kill this Yang Qi with my own hands,” the elder said. “He's an official disciple, so if the truth were to leak, the sect would never let me off the hook. Remember, you absolutely, positively must not actually kill any official disciples. Even if you were the son of the sect leader, as long as there was evidence incriminating you, no one would be able to keep you safe. However, if you can have him disposed secretly, then no one will be the wiser.”

“I know,” Elder Brother Yue said, nodding his head grimly.

It was around that time that day suddenly turned into night.

Howls echoed out in the night, like the screeching of monkeys. Clearly, there were hordes of demonlings approaching! The ground shook, and the mountains trembled.

“The demonling invasion!” the elder said, his expression turning serious. “Hurry up and get ready, I’ll keep the spell formation going. You lead your followers into combat against the demonlings. It’ll be dangerous, but will also be good training for them. Remember, you have to seize control of the Guardian Mines. Our clan needs them! And you have to do this on your own, without anyone realizing that I'm helping you.”

“I understand all that. I know it took a lot of resources on the part of the clan to make me an official disciple, all for the purpose of taking control of these fifty-six mines. Seizing control will be the ultimate service to the clan.” Elder Brother Yue shivered. Although it felt good to have the support of his clan, he knew that if he didn’t make himself useful, he would eventually be discarded. The clan rules were very strict.

The House of God Ordainment was a huge organization that contained many clans within it. It was just like how mortal empires would have aristocratic families in positions of power.

Back in Mine Thirteen, the disciples heard the sound of the incoming armies of demonlings. They couldn’t see them yet, but they could hear the sound, and feel the ground shaking.

Chapter 1193: Demon-Gods

The large-scale demonling invasion was finally starting, and they were using the cover of darkness to gain an advantage.

Yang Qi’s disciples were all waiting in combat readiness, as they knew that night was the optimal time for demonlings. Humans couldn’t see properly in the dark, but the wild demonlings were used to it, and some of them were even nocturnal.

That was why, when they had first arrived in the god world, Brahma had instructed them to build a shelter as quickly as possible. Of course, a cabin like that wouldn’t have done any good against a huge invasion like this. Even stone structures would be destroyed. The only way to fend off this many demonlings was to use a spell formation or a god kingdom.

There wasn’t any need to consider a god kingdom; the only gods who could create things like that were Consummate, Perfect, and Paramount Gods.

Humans who could reside in god kingdoms were considered truly blessed.

“This is bad, Elder Brother!” Zhang Jufang said, rushing in with a few other disciples. “The demonlings are finally invading! They’re all completely fierce, and there are even hordes of flying ones!”

“Calm down and make sure everyone is ready to fight,” Yang Qi said. “A horde of demonlings like this isn't going to break my spell formation.”

“But these demonlings seem to have been well-trained. And they even have some Quasi-Gods among them. When they unleash their power, it's definitely going to damage the spell formation. If you don't believe me, Elder Brother, just look up in the sky.”

“Fine,” Yang Qi said. Flicking his sleeve, he walked out into the open, looked up, and sent a burning column of flame up into the air. Screams rang out, then vanished as enemies were transformed into ash.

Up above were flocks of owls, each of them as large as an ordinary human, with wingspans of nine meters, soaring back and forth just waiting for an opportunity to dive down and kill someone.

RUUUUUMBLE!

There were over a hundred of them, and all of them could use godpower. In fact, they were actually flying in formation, which allowed them to pool that godpower. Every flap of their wings would summon an energy saber that slashed toward the spell formation, causing it to shake violently.

Before, the spell formation had been able to cut down as many demonlings as rushed against it. Unfortunately, there were Quasi-God demonlings on the attack now, and their combined energy arts were terrifying to say the least.

Normally, Quasi-God demonlings wouldn't appear in the presence of humans, but instead preferred to stay in hiding in the deep mountains and forests, maintaining contact only with their own people as they tried to cultivate their way to demon-godly ascension.

But in this invasion, they were attacking the humans with full force, hoping to plunder, not just flesh and blood, but also godstones, medicinal pills, wealth, and other items.

This was how war was waged between demonlings and humans.

Of course, the humans would never launch large-scale raids of the demonlings’ lairs. Instead, they would sometimes send disciples out to hunt demonlings for training purposes, or perhaps in order to harvest their internal pellets and hides.

And the demonlings would occasionally launch large-scale invasions in the hopes of destroying the humans and their bases.

“What are you scared of? They’re only a few owls. Get out there and kill them! This is going to be great training. The spell formation will hold against the ordinary demonlings, so get out there and fight those Quasi-Gods! Bitter, dangerous training like this is how you become part of the legion of gods!”

The Great Classic of God Ordainment contained many strategies for dealing with demonling invasions, and the simplest was to use a spell formation to block the ordinary demonlings and send out elite fighters to kill the Quasi-Gods.

“Yes sir!” Zhang Jufang said. He and a group of disciples quickly flew up and started fighting the owls.

At the same time, some of the official disciples who had sided with Yang Qi also went out to fight the Quasi-God demonlings. The demonlings rushed across the ground like a tide. Some of them looked like lions, tigers, or monkeys, while others had the faces of ghosts, or bodies covered with fur or scales. The demonlings of the god world were very strange in appearance.

RUMBLE!

There was one group of about a thousand monkeys with the faces of ghosts who, despite looking somewhat emaciated, were all Quasi-Gods. There were a thousand of them, and they were very intelligent, having set up an altar that they were powering by feeding it godpower.

A huge ghost face suddenly appeared, howling with piercing loudness as it transformed into a spear that slammed into the spell formation, causing it to tremble.

These were the ghostface monkeys of the god world, called such because of their horrific appearance that resembled that of an evil ghost. They were licentious by nature, and would often kidnap pretty young women, take them back to their lair, and rape them. Such young women ended up living lives worse than death, and would often hope to die.

Unfortunately, the ghostface monkeys were extremely powerful, and could advance through their demonic cultivation with incredible speed. As such, they were considered one of the most powerful types of Demonfolk. And right now there were a thousand of them, all Quasi-Gods, and all of them powering a magical altar.

“Quite impressive,” Yang Qi murmured. However, with a mere glance, he activated the spell formation, sending out hundreds of streams of thunderous sword energy to slam into the ghostface monkeys. Instantly, the monkeys’ vital energy was thrown into chaos and blood sprayed out of their mouths as they screeched in pain. One person had vanquished a thousand.

The ghostface monkeys were the main force in this wave, so with their ghost face crushed, there was a lot less pressure. Immediately, disciples rushed out of the spell formation in small groups to slaughter the demonlings.

There were countless demonlings in the invasion, but the majority weren’t Quasi-Gods, which made them easy targets. After all, in the mines of the House of God Ordainment, people under the level of Quasi-Gods virtually didn’t exist.

Many of the ghostface monkeys had been killed, and those that hadn't were fleeing in chaotic terror. However, that wasn’t the end of the fight. Next came the snakes. Tiny snakes, large snakes, pythons, anacondas, vipers, colorful snakes, flying snakes.... Every kind of snake imaginable could be seen, covering the ground and filling the sky. And despite the fact that none of them were gods, their sheer numbers made them formidable, as did their venom.

The mere sight was very impressive.

Even worse, some of the snakes mixed godpower into their venom, and could shoot it at targets many kilometers away. Even rocks would melt if venom like that hit them, much less a human.

The disciples and miners had just experienced a big boost in morale, and had begun slaughtering the demonlings with vigor. But then the snakes appeared, spitting venom, and almost immediately, some of the disciples on the forefront of the battle were killed. The venom was so strong it pierced through their defensive empyrean energy, causing them to melt down into pools of blood.

However, that was when fire dragons appeared on the towers built into the ramparts, which transformed into pillars of flame that shot out into the ranks of the snakes.

“Everyone fall back!” one of the disciples shouted from one of the towers. “That poison is deadly. Thankfully, the foreman prepared a Nine-Flames Fire-Dragon Grand Formation. We can use dragons to suppress snakes, and bury them in mountains of fire!”

As they fell back into the protection of the spell formations, some of the flying snakes shot after them. However, as soon as the snakes reached the border of the spell formation, they burst into flames. As a result, some of the snakes fled.

These demonlings were obviously intelligent, and would flee if they felt they needed to.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi stood atop the mountain, keeping an eye on the entire area. For now, there seemed to be endless hordes of demonlings advancing in their direction. It was a dangerous situation. Over at Mine One, bright lights shone into the sky, which Yang Qi knew was a result of the god powering the spell formation there.

‘I think I should take this moment to screw over the Yue Clan elder. If that spell formation falls, he’ll definitely be killed by the demonlings.’ Yang Qi chuckled coldly. He knew that if an elder died here, the House of God Ordainment would definitely investigate the matter. But it would never be tied to him. Furthermore, if he could divert some of the demonlings toward Mine One, it would take a lot of pressure off his own people.

However, it was right then that a burst of laughter rang out, along with a stream of energy that slammed into his spell formation and opened a hole.

Obviously, a top expert of the Demonfolk was here.

Yang Qi stood on his mountain, hands clasped behind his back. “So, a demon-god has come to this trifling mountain belonging to the House of God Ordainment? I'm honored. I find it interesting that you didn’t take part in any of the previous attacks. Unfortunately, this mine doesn’t have much of value in it.”

A dark chuckle rang out as a beautiful woman appeared, clad in black garments. She seemed like a snake, and was obviously a demon-god.

“You might as well show your face too, Ghostface Monkey-God,” she said. “This bastard did just kill a bunch of your people.”

As she chuckled, a blast of green fire erupted, shot through the hole in the spell formation, and landed onto the square atop the mountain.

Then an extremely ugly monkey became visible.

Chapter 1194: Snake, Monkey

A ghostface monkey-god had appeared on the scene.

He was so aggressive and domineering that he was less of a monkey and more of a gorilla. He was burlier than the average monkey, and his fur was thicker. As for his face, it was incredibly ugly, so covered with scars and pockmarks that he looked like an outright monster. He had vicious, yellow teeth that would cause any human who looked at him to get goosebumps.

That said, the godpower he radiated was nothing to look down on, and his godhood gave him control of everything around him.

A beautiful woman. An ugly monkey.

And both were demon-gods.

“What happened, snakewoman? Did this boy destroy your incarnation? How come you seem so weak?” Almost as soon as the monkey appeared, he scanned the entire mountain looking for women, revealing just how depraved he was.

“Bring out all your women, boy, and let me pick my favorite. Wait, no. Give me all of them. The hotter the better."

“Oh really?” Yang Qi said. “What makes you think you’ve broken my spell formation? How come I didn’t notice?”

“What?!”

The two demon-gods swiveled to look at the hole in the formation, only to find that it had stitched back up. Meanwhile, the sound of ancient buddhist chanting could be heard in the air.

“That's a dhāraṇī incantation! A devil-subduing art from the buddhist schools!” The ghostface monkey-god was visibly taken aback. “You’re stronger than I imagined. Unfortunately, you’re not a god. Did you really think that someone as weak as you could trap two demon-gods like us?”

“That’s right. I lured the two of you in here on purpose. Now that you’re on my mountain, you won’t be leaving. I can earn good merit points by simply killing your disciples. Do you know how much two living demon-gods will get me?” He opened up his Great Classic of God Ordainment and flipped to the pages describing the merit point rewards.

As it turned out, killing a demon-god and bringing the corpse to the sect would give a reward of ten merit points.

And a living demon-god would be worth a hundred.

That meant that these two demon-gods were worth two hundred merit points. Of course, if Yang Qi wanted merit points, he could simply create imperial caliber godstones. That said, he couldn’t do that continuously without attracting attention.

Handing in two living demon-gods would also attract attention of some sort, but Yang Qi wasn’t just going to pass on the opportunity.

“You’re a lunatic, boy,” the snake goddess said. “A raving lunatic.” Her eyes were as cold as ice, making her seem like the picture of a cold-blooded animal.

“I'm not crazy at all,” Yang Qi said. “Come on, you two. I know that one of you has a godhood rating of one and the other has a rating of two. You might be able to slaughter hundreds, or even thousands of Quasi-Gods, but sadly, you're still weak as gods go.”

The atmosphere quickly became very tense. As for the disciples, they didn’t dare to show their faces, and remained hidden in locations further down the mountain. They knew how deadly a fight between gods could be.

Quasi-Gods were like martial arts experts in the impure lands, who could come and go as they wished among the ordinary people. But actual gods had the power to move mountains and fill in seas, could manipulate space, alter astrological phenomena, and change the weather.

And of course, gods could easily suppress Quasi-Gods. Never before had two gods actually shown up in the mines. Normally speaking, it would have led to everyone present being slaughtered.

“In that case, let’s see how strong you are. You've certainly talked yourself up.” Gods maintained a certain level of dignity, even demon-gods.

The ghostface monkey-god lashed out with his palm, causing the image of a ghost face to appear, almost like that of the masked face Yang Qi had encountered some time ago. However, it couldn’t match up to the boundless nature of that original masked face. That said, it was powerful, and in the blink of an eye, it opened its mouth and emitted a howl that transformed into countless threads that shot toward Yang Qi’s acupoints.

“When the ghost face appears, a thousand ghosts illuminate the night!”

RIP!

Yang Qi hardly looked at it. He thrust his hand out, five fingers in the shape of a lotus, causing the head of a buddha to appear. The buddha was chanting zen songs, and when the power hit the ghost face, the face shattered and its godpower dissipated.

Backing up, the ghostface monkey-god stabbed his fingers out in front of him. “Ghost-God Strike!”

The finger contained flames of demon energy that shot out and engulfed the buddha head. However, the buddha head didn’t dissipate, but continued through the flames, even sucking them in. And its zen chant grew louder. “Daga-yaya... jili-gulu... lobo-miloba....”

Crack!

The buddha head exerted such immense pressure on the ghostface monkey-god that he couldn’t move at all. His hands flashed out as he drew on another demonic divine ability, causing streams of smoke to shoot out and attack the buddha head. However, the buddha head seemed as mighty as a mountain, and didn’t even budge.

“Prepare to die!” the snake goddess shouted. “Heaven-Snake Sword Technique; Heaven-Snake Circles the Mountain; Heaven-Snake Leaves the Sea; Heaven-Snake Diverts Rivers; Heaven-Snake Devours the World; Heaven-Snake Consumes the Sun!” She attacked, an incredibly sharp sword appearing in her hand. As she unleashed her deadly sword technique, an enormous heaven-snake appeared, swirling through the air before shooting toward Yang Qi.

Yang Qi hardly even looked at the incoming attack. In fact, he sent out a snake-like stream of energy that immediately began contending with the heaven-snake sword technique. Of course, it was a consummate technique from King Heaven-Devourer’s energy arts, which was now completely a part of Yang Qi, so much so that even the original King Heaven-Devourer wouldn’t have recognized it.

The snake goddess’ sword technique slashed back and forth in the form of a snake as she attempted to relieve some of the pressure on the monkey-god. Unfortunately for them, her efforts had no effect, and in fact, it only seemed to increase the pressure. Yang Qi just seemed to be getting stronger, while they were already gasping for breath.

When it came to godpower, it was obvious that gods were superior to Quasi-Gods, with the former being like steel, and the latter, cotton. But Yang Qi had developed his godpower with the God Legion Seal, making him vastly beyond an ordinary god.

In fact, his godpower would actually be superior to most Lesser Gods and could rival that of Common Gods.

RUMBLE!

The snake goddess thrust out her palm, and energy spat out like a spirit snake, twisting and writhing as it headed directly toward Yang Qi’s back. In response, Yang Qi threw his hand behind him to meet it. There was a bang, and Yang Qi didn’t move a muscle. In contrast, the snake goddess’ godpower collapsed.

It was now more than obvious that the quality of this snake goddess’ godpower was far below Yang Qi’s.

“You’re... you’re really a Quasi-God?” she said, shocked. “How can your godpower be so strong? How is the quality so high?”

Instead of responding, Yang Qi launched another palm strike. Their two palms collided again, and a mountain-toppling, sea-draining shock wave rolled out, causing everything to tremble as the snake goddess staggered backward.

SPLAT!

Blood sprayed from the mouth of the ghostface monkey-god. Throwing his palms out toward the buddha head above him, he finally managed to break free. Leaping over to stand in front of the snake goddess, he glared at Yang Qi and said, “Who exactly are you? Why would someone like you agree to be a measly official disciple of the House of God Ordainment? Your cultivation base is definitely good enough to make you an elite disciple. And once you become a god, you’ll be even more terrifying.”

“Why are you asking so many questions?” Yang Qi said coolly, his hands clasped behind his back as he strolled forward. “The only thing you need to know is that you won’t be returning from this little attack on my mine.”

“Hold on!” the snake goddess said. “I have something I want to say.”

“Go ahead and say it. I'm more than happy to let you utter a few last words. Although, don’t even think of asking me to let you go free.”

The ghostface monkey-god snorted coldly. “I admit you’re shockingly strong, boy. And I have no idea where a freak like you might have come from. But it's a bit early to be claiming you can kill us.”

“There’s no point in bantering now,” the snake goddess said. “I know that you’re not an ordinary person. And there’s something suspicious about how you ended up in the House of God Ordainment. In fact, if I'm not mistaken, you’re actually not from the god world. You're an Ascendant, aren't you? Only an Ascendant could be as strong and experienced as you.”

Yang Qi chuckled. “An Ascendant? Ascended from where, exactly?”

“Admit it or not, I know the truth,” she replied. “I know a lot about how the mortal world works. Only mighty Ascendants can reach the top, and only after fighting millions upon millions of battles. And that's what you’re like. You must have acquired some magical treasures that trickled down from the god world, and that’s why you don’t want anyone to know how strong you really are. You want to slowly work your way up through the ranks here in the god world before revealing the truth. However, if you kill us right here, word will spread. And how will you explain it? The answer is you can’t. This invasion is just too high profile. So why not turn weapons of war into gifts of jade and silk? We can pretend that none of this ever happened. What do you say?”

“I guess that could work,” Yang Qi replied, closing his eyes to think. However, what neither the snake goddess nor the ghostface monkey-god noticed was that a devil embryo had appeared behind each of them. Before they knew what was happening, they were infected with the Heaven-God Hell-Exterminating Devil Embryo.

Now he controlled both of them. Two gods.

One had a godhood rating of one, the other two.

Chapter 1195: Envoys from the Sect (1)

“Well, what do you think? Have you considered matters thoroughly? You’re definitely strong, and there’s no reason for us to cause problems for you. Considering you’re an Ascendant, you’ll obviously accomplish great things in the future. So why don’t we work out a deal?”

The ghostface monkey-god and the snake goddess obviously wanted to buy some time and escape, then come up with some other plan to deal with the situation. From the interchange moments ago, they knew how strong Yang Qi was and could tell that if they kept fighting they would die. Both had only become Lesser Gods fairly recently, and hadn’t even had time to earn a reputation as such. So there was no way they wanted to simply throw their lives away here.

One could only imagine how difficult it must have been to struggle up through the ranks of the Demonfolk until they were actual gods.

Despite being gods, they knew how to endure humiliation in order to survive. The Demonfolk were powerful beings, and the fighting among them was fierce. Even gods had to learn to endure certain situations; if they didn’t, they would die. Humans were the only ones who liked to protect each other, leading to concepts such as dignity and honor.

“Work together? Work together how? Normally speaking, I would just let you go. As the saying goes, river water shouldn’t mix with well water. But here you are, trying to invade my mine. Don’t tell me you think you can just walk away after that.” Yang Qi’s mind was spinning as he tried to decide what to do. He didn't want to kill these two now that he had infected them with devil embryos. If he let them go, it was entirely possible he could eavesdrop on them and learn some of the secrets of the Demonfolk. Furthermore, he could possibly use them to start creating his own personal power structure.

There was nothing in the rules of the House of God Ordainment that prohibited disciples from building power structures. For instance, it was common to establish businesses outside of the sect, which made it easier to acquire items to hand in for merit points. In fact, the sect actually encouraged disciples to do just that. The stronger the disciples were, the stronger the House of God Ordainment would be.

“What, you want us to give you a reward or something?” the ghostface monkey-god said. “If we work together, we can both benefit. As you surely know, these mountains go on forever, and there are all sorts of Demonfolk tribes in them. If we make a deal, you’ll profit like a madman. What’s the point of working so hard to defend this mine? Are you running short on money? Breaking your back just to get a few merit points seems like a real waste.”

“What kind of deal are you proposing?” Yang Qi said.

“You’re just doing more to prove you’re an Ascendant,” the snake goddess laughed. “Any native of the god world would know how profitable it is to do business with Demonfolk. These mountains are full of medicinal ingredients and precious materials that we don’t have any use for. But you humans love to collect those kinds of things. Unfortunately, we can’t exactly go into your cities to sell them. So you just get some disciples together to form a consortium to do business with us. You’ll start earning a huge profit right away.”

There were plenty of disciples who would secretly deal with the Demonfolk. The only downside was that it wasn’t easy to actually work with Demonfolk. The disciples were often viewed simply as carriers, and thus found it hard to make a profit. For instance, Huang Weilong had struck a deal with the Demonfolk, but had only been able to maintain a very meager profit margin. Most of the profit went to the Demonfolk.

As for Yang Qi, he was strong enough that the Demonfolk couldn't take advantage of him.

“Fine,” he said. “What do you want from me? Obviously I can provide godstones. That said, don’t even think of trying to pull a fast one on me. Remember, all I have to do is take you captive and hand you over to my sect to earn a huge sum of merit points, enough to reach godly ascension.”

“You really think becoming a god will be that easy?” the snake goddess said. “And do you really think turning us into the sect would be such a simple thing? The people in your sect would definitely want to know how you pulled it off, and then your secret would be out. You can still become a god by working with us. Your godpower is plenty strong, you just need the right catalyst. Since you ascended from the mortal world, you have extensive experience. Unfortunately, that experience also creates a barrier that you need to break through. To do that, you need to find a breakthrough point. And we can give that to you.”

“What breakthrough point?” Yang Qi asked, his heart starting to pound a bit.

Although he was indeed strong enough to defeat gods in battle, he wasn’t in the position to form his own godhood yet. All he knew was that he was missing something, something profoundly mysterious and enigmatic. And thus, the snake goddess’ words struck a chord.

“We Demonfolk have all sorts of medicinal pills that we use for godly ascension, as well as certain secret magics. In particular, we have the Psychic Devil-Raising Demon-Sacrificing Heaven-Defying Grand Magic. By feeding a heart-devil with your own psyche, you can grow it to the point where it can control your psyche. When it parasitizes you, you’ll become half human and half devil. And in that moment of extreme danger and potential death, you summon your valor and fight yourself. If you defeat that heart-devil, then no matter what obstacle you face in your cultivation, or what bottleneck you’re in, you’ll achieve a breakthrough. All of that comes from defeating your heart-devil.

“So, what do you think? If you want, I can find a way to give you this secret magic of the most ancient arch-patriarch of the dao of demons. With it, maybe you can become a god.”

Yang Qi smiled. “I can tell just from the name what that technique is all about. It’s obviously extremely dangerous. I’d bet that out of a hundred million people who use it, only one or two will succeed, with the rest suffering cultivation deviation and either being possessed by their heart-devils, or dying as lunatics. The Psychic Devil-Raising Demon-Sacrificing Heaven-Defying Grand Magic. Not bad. Not bad at all. I'm definitely interested in seeing it. It’s a technique that runs counter to the norm. It obviously had to have been created by a boundless patriarch of the Demonfolk.”

All the cultivation techniques and daoist magics in existence, even those cultivated by actual devils, involved expelling heart-devils, knowledge-devils, wisdom-devils, ambition-devils, greed-devils, lust-devils, and the like. Only by removing them completely was it possible to cleanse the sea of consciousness, develop true understanding, and control one’s vital energy.

Devils who cultivated devil arts would seem to abound with devil energy, but that was because their power thrived on things related to darkness and gloom, not because of inner devils.

If they actually had inner devils, their cultivation would eventually reach an end, and they would die.

Cultivation involved using one’s wisdom and strength to subjugate the inner devils, while also subjugating oneself.

But this Demonfolk secret magic seemed to function completely contrary to the norm. It involved growing the inner devil until it surpassed the self and tried to take over. Only in the final climactic battle would one subjugate it. And that would be a complete and utter subjugation of the self.

There was only one way to describe something like that: heaven-defying. Yang Qi had to admire whoever it was that had developed the technique. It was a technique that didn’t relate to fighting prowess at all, and was extremely dangerous, to the point where one’s chances of survival would be minimal at best.

Generally speaking, people who had the most trouble achieving breakthroughs were those who were far stronger than average. And people like that would have particularly formidable heart-devils.

Defeating enemies in battle was an easy thing, but defeating oneself was the opposite. Even the most amazing people would have trouble in that regard.

It had been the same for the Sovereign Lord.

Truth be told, now that Yang Qi knew of this technique, he could make his own version if he wanted to. However, that would take time, effort, and systematic study. If he could get a perfected version and study it instead, it could provide a big boost to his Sage Monarch Grand Magic.

“Alright,” Yang Qi said, “if you can get me that technique, then I’ll let bygones be bygones.”

“It’s a very formidable technique,” the snake goddess said, “so it's going to be very expensive to get it. Alright? If you agree, we can seal the deal.”

“That's fine. The deal is sealed. Later on, I’ll send people to get our business going. For now, the two of you can leave. I’ve opened the spell formation. And don’t even think of trying anything funny. Even if you send more demonlings against me, I’ll just wipe them all out.” With that, he waved his hand, causing a wind to spring up around the two Demonfolk that sent them outside the spell formation.

Once outside, they exchanged an awkward glance before shooting up into the sky and disappearing. Down below, the other Demonfolk backed down and retreated.

Within moments, the area around the mine was completely empty.

Later, deep in the mountains, the snake goddess said, “Where did that brat actually come from? He's definitely an Ascendant. And why did he let us go so easily? Do you think he has some trick up his sleeve?”

“A boy like that can’t have much experience, er—” the ghostface monkey-god actually cut himself off. Now that they knew he was an Ascendant, it would be ridiculous to claim that he had no experience. And it was a given that any Ascendant would be adept with crafty plots and machinations. He shivered. “There’s no way he did anything to us. Isn’t he worried about us causing more problems?”

“That's what I was thinking.” She shook her head. “All I know is that I have a very strange feeling when dealing with him. Like I have no idea what he's really thinking. There was something very odd about the whole thing. Should we just go ahead and do business with him? Maybe we should just give him the Psychic Devil-Raising Demon-Sacrificing Heaven-Defying Grand Magic and let him cultivate it.”

“It's the most taboo art among us Demonfolk, with an almost one hundred percent rate of cultivation deviation. Not even we would dare to look at the thing lest we start cultivating it automatically. So how are we supposed to give it to him?” The ghostface monkey-god shivered.

“I guess we have to take him to the Demon Master’s jade disc collection to look for himself.”

Chapter 1196: Envoys from the Sect (2)

“Right. The jade discs left behind by the Demon Master are inscribed with numerous taboo arts, and only Demonfolk gods can study them. Most of those techniques will cause cultivation deviation and death for those who look at them. Considering that brat is human, he’ll definitely die if he looks at them.”

The ghostface monkey-god burst out laughing.

The Demon Master had left behind a technique to develop a heart-devil and then defeat it. That was one way to achieve a breakthrough when faced with a barrier. Unfortunately, no one had ever successfully cultivated the technique to completion.

Many Demonfolk believed it was nothing more than a pipe dream created by the Demon Master. After all, even he hadn’t succeeded in cultivating it, and ended up perishing after cultivation deviation.

Neither the snake goddess nor the ghostface monkey-god would dare to look at that jade disc in order to give the information to Yang Qi. However, if they could get him to look at the disc, and he died as a result, they would be able to take whatever precious items he had.

It was a given that an Ascendant would have some treasures. At least, that was what they thought.

There were plenty of precious treasures from the god world that, because they had been caught up in the tribulations of whoever possessed them, ended up falling down into the mortal worlds. And Ascendants were peak entities from the mortal world, who would surely come across treasures like that and keep them for later use in the god world.

“Remember the seventy-two monarchs? I heard that a lot of their items ended up in the impure lands. Especially King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans. They all ended up there. If this kid is an Ascendant, maybe he has them. If so, I could use them to become completely domineering and invincible in all heaven and earth! Sadly, people in the impure lands couldn’t possibly unlock the full mysteries of King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans. Only we Snakefolk can do that. After all, we have the quintessence blood of King Heaven-Devourer in our veins.” The snake goddess sighed. “It’s too bad we can't descend to the lower worlds.”

“Quit dreaming,” the ghostface monkey-god said. “It's a lot easier to ascend to here than to descend to there. In fact, it's impossible. That is one of the most important magical laws governing humans and gods. In any case, it’s true that Ascendants tend to have treasures from the god world, and it’s usually a factor in why they can ascend to begin with. So that means this boy definitely has some sort of treasure. However, I suspect it's something related to the buddhist schools. Remember, he used that buddha head against me, and that's definitely something from a buddhist school.”

“I'd be happy to get a treasure from a buddhist school. Allowing things like that to remain in the hands of someone from the impure lands would be like throwing a bright pearl out into the darkness.”

The two demon-gods left, taking the hordes of demonlings with them into the night. In the blink of an eye, the storm became calm and the invasion was a thing of the past.

Back in Mine One, the Yue Clan elder sensed the pressure fading away from his spell formation, and he breathed a sigh of relief. He had been worried the whole time that some demon-gods might show up, which would have been a problem. Now the armies were leaving, for no apparent reason.

He had no idea why it was happening, but it was a good thing nonetheless.

Rushing over, Elder Brother Yue said, “Uncle, Uncle! The demonling armies are retreating! We're safe!”

“Don’t let your guard down,” the elder said. “Send orders to the disciples to remain in combat readiness until daybreak. If the demonlings are still nowhere to be seen by then, we can consider ourselves safe.”

Demonlings wouldn’t launch invasions in the middle of the day when the heat could be deadly; they preferred the darkness of night.

Everyone waited as the hours ticked by. At a certain point, light flared into existence, causing burning heat to press down.

The demonling army was really gone, and the danger had passed. No one had any idea it was all because of Yang Qi. If the sect knew it was him, they would have rewarded him with merit points. But since he had no way to prove that he was responsible, he said nothing.

“Alright, I'm going to call it a day,” the Yue Clan elder said, visibly relieved. “Don’t let the sect know about any of this. They’ll send envoys soon to inquire about what happened, and you just tell them that you worked in unison with the other foremen to repel the invasion. I’ll go back and try to find some information about which envoys will be coming. Unfortunately, the envoys are usually lone wolves without any clan affiliations. They're impartial and incorruptible, and live to serve the sect. Make sure to prepare plenty of money to offer as a gift, got it?”

“Yes sir!” Elder Brother Yue said. “But what about Yang Qi...?”

“He’s not important. Just let him do whatever he wants to do for now. When the right moment arrives, I’ll activate the godpower seed and force his energy arts to regress. Remember: for now, all of his cultivation will benefit you. So there’s no reason to fear him.”

“Right, thanks for the reminder, Uncle.” Elder Brother Yue watched with a smile on his face as the elder entered the teleportation portal and vanished.

“You’re dead, Yang Qi! I'm going to reach godly ascension soon. And as for you... you never will!”

‘He’s confused about who’s going to end up dead,’ Yang Qi thought. He had seen enough of what was going on in Mine One. In front of him on the wall was a rippling screen that allowed him to see everything the Yue Clan elder was doing and even thinking.

The two demon-gods were also visible there.

That said, it was a bit draining to be using the Heaven-God Hell-Exterminating Devil Embryo on three Lesser Gods at the same time. After all, Yang Qi wasn’t a god himself yet, and these Lesser Gods had godhood ratings of one, two, and three.

‘I’m done observing for now. I’ll just let the devil embryos grow.’

He dispelled the screen and sent orders to Zhang Jufang to send all the other foremen back to their respective mines. And he emphasized to let them take all of their ore and wealth with them, and not take a bit.

Then he sank into a trance of cultivation.

For now, he wasn't going to attempt to intentionally foster a heart-devil. After all, he wasn't sure he could get rid of it. And in cultivation, one of the most important things was to maintain a mind free of extraneous impurities.

Distracting thoughts in one's heart was an easy way to slip into cultivation deviation.

His current cultivation consisted of working on the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth and the Sage Monarch Grand Magic, as well as seeking enlightenment of the Mahātmā Jade and the Unspoiled Body. In addition to cultivating, he took care of some other tasks. For instance, he ordered some of his people to go meet with the demon-god people and start doing business.

He also gave some divine abilities to Cherry, enabling her to be as competent an assistant as Zhang Jufang. He was in charge of overseeing the male miners and disciples, while she supervised the female miners and disciples.

The mine was now operating at peak efficiency, and the business with the Demonfolk was bringing in plenty of extra wealth. Eventually, Yang Qi selected some of the most reliable disciples to become part of what he called the Sage Monarch Consortium. Such disciples were then sent out to the surrounding cities to establish business relations. Usually, big business consortiums were only taken seriously if they had an impressive backer, and thankfully Yang Qi and his followers were disciples of the House of God Ordainment. As long as they didn’t cause any conflicts with the other consortiums, no one would cause problems for them.

The rules of the House of God Ordainment were very strict. Disciples weren’t allowed to fight and kill each other. However, if outsiders caused major problems for them, they were permitted to react with lethal force. And they always knew that the sect was there to provide backup. Everyone knew that causing problems for any disciple of the House of God Ordainment was like poking a hornet’s nest, and anyone who did so would risk their sect or clan being wiped out. In fact, the reason there were always new slaves being sent to the mines was partly because of situations like that.

Three months passed. Yang Qi watched as his mining operations expanded, and his subordinates made advancements in their cultivation. It was a glorious feeling.

In fact, he was finally starting to understand what it must feel like to be one of the legion of gods.

Unfortunately, his cultivation was stuck in a bottleneck.

He couldn’t reach godly ascension, nor could he reach Paramount will convergence. Without that breakthrough, his energy arts couldn’t progress, and any further attempts at enlightenment would be in vain. He never would have guessed that this step would be so hard.

At a certain point, he thought about his father, Jadefall, Brahma, Doom, the Shepherd and even his immortal-slaying clone. Where were they? How were they doing? He had lost contact with them after entering the House of God Ordainment. Any previous communication methods didn't seem to work, thanks to being in such an immense god kingdom.

That said, he wasn’t worried. They had all been looked upon with favor by important people. Considering how intelligent they all were, they were sure to have made names for themselves. It was likely that Brahma was already a god, and the others would most likely succeed as well. They shouldn't have as hard a time as Yang Qi was having.

Even as everything seemed to be going perfectly, the sound of bells could be heard from Mine One.

They were bells that rang when welcoming visitors, which seemed to indicate that envoys from the sect would be arriving shortly.

The envoys would be tasked with inspecting the mines, and would also check the quotas. Those who met the quota or exceeded it would be rewarded by them.

“You keep an eye on things here in the mine,” Yang Qi said. “I'm going to Mine One to meet the envoys.” Reaching out, he grabbed a bag full of godsand and ore of high enough quality that it would definitely meet the yearly quota, or possibly even exceed it.

In addition to the main stockpile, he kept some imperial caliber godstones in reserve in case the envoys were initially unhappy.

Chapter 1197: Envoys from the Sect (3)

By the time Yang Qi got to Mine One, there were already plenty of other foremen there, waiting nervously for the teleportation portal to activate.

Elder Brother Yue was there, and quite a few disciples were clustered around him.

There were also disciples who gathered by Yang Qi, until the two groups were very clearly separated. Over the last three months, Yang Qi had been making efforts to get more people on his side. Of the fifty-six total foremen, thirty were currently loyal to Yang Qi, while the rest had stuck with Elder Brother Yue.

Elder Brother Yue looked at Yang Qi with open killing intent in his eyes.

His cultivation base had improved recently, but that was because Yang Qi let it happen to lull him into a false sense of security. He had allowed Elder Brother Yue to absorb energy from his godpower clone, yet it was all a trap. With a mere thought, Yang Qi could instantly drain him dry and turn him into a puppet.

As they waited for the envoys to arrive, Elder Brother Yue chuckled darkly and said, “So you recruited a lot of disciples, eh Yang Qi? You’ve done well.”

“What makes you think you have the right to talk to me, scum? Want me to smack you around again so you can cough up more blood?” Yang Qi obviously wasn’t in the mood to give any face to Elder Brother Yue.

“You!” Elder Brother Yue shouted furiously, and was about to launch an attack when intense rumbling sounds filled the area and a group of people emerged from the teleportation portal.

“Respectful greetings, Envoy!” Elder Brother Yue said loudly, obviously trying to make a good impression on the envoys.

Yang Qi and the others watched as six people emerged. The highest ranking among them was a woman in beautiful clothing, whose face was cold and calculating.

No one in this group had a godhood rating as low as one or two. All of them were either four or five, and the woman in the lead had a rating of nine. That meant she was just on the verge of becoming a Common God, causing anyone present who even looked at her to feel an urge to kneel.

Everyone in this group was an envoy sent to inspect the mines.

“Are all fifty-six foremen present?” asked one of the envoys, a man.

Joining voices in the prescribed response, the fifty-six foremen replied, “Present! Please, inspectors, begin your work!”

“Excellent,” the male envoy replied. “We heard there was a major demonling invasion recently, yet none of you disciples died. Furthermore, the casualty rate among the miners was low. That’s a big improvement from the past. The sect is very pleased, and will not only reward you, but will also make an official note of this in the sect records.”

“Many thanks, Envoy!” All of the disciples were visibly pleased. It was a big matter to have an official record made of an event like this. Whenever major figures in the sect considered taking in new apprentices, they would always consult the record and give a lot of weight to past loyalty and service.

Although it didn’t involve a reward of merit points, it was still very valuable.

For example, in the case of a martial arts competition in the sect in which two opponents fought to a draw, the judges would usually consult the official records and give the victory to whoever had the most impressive record.

It wasn’t a rare occurrence, as draws were common among people with the same godhood rating and similar sets of equipment.

“As you all know,” another envoy said, “the main purpose of our inspection is to see if you’ve met the ore quota. Remember, we don’t want any low-quality ore. Only greater godstones will be accepted. Those are the rules, as I'm sure you're aware. You should’ve taken any shoddy or normal godstones to trade with outside consortiums and converted the profits to greater godstones.”

“Yes, we understand!” Elder Brother Yue said. He waved his hand, and his subordinates brought out some cases of glittering ore. The quality was very high. Obviously, some of it had been personally mined, but the rest had been purchased with normal godstones.

“Count it up!” said the woman with the godhood rating of nine. Another envoy hurried forward and extended her hand, revealing a ring. Light shot from the ring, wrapped around the godstones, and pulled them inside. A moment later, she said, “Excellent. Greater godstones, all of them. And you have enough to meet the quota.”

A broad smile appeared on Elder Brother Yue’s face.

Looking at him, the envoy said, “You’ve met the quota for this year already, and you need to keep it up going forward. Understand? Do you have any other treasures you plan to offer to the sect? We can appraise them and compensate you with merit points. And with enough merit points, you can choose to leave this place and go somewhere else to further your cultivation. What do you say?”

“Many thanks!” Elder Brother Yue said, looking very pleased. At the same time, he produced a small box and handed it out toward the envoys.

“This box contains a medicinal plant that I would like to donate to the sect. It’s a three-hundred-thousand-year-old Redblood God Ginseng. I heard that a certain exalted figure in the sect needs to concoct a medicinal pill using a Redblood God Ginseng of at least a hundred thousand years of age, for the purpose of achieving a breakthrough. It’s for that reason that I procured the ginseng.”

He opened the lid of the box, whereupon a blood-colored light emerged, along with a strong medicinal aroma.

“Amazing, nothing short of amazing!” said the woman with the godhood rating of nine as she accepted the box.

Then she smiled, and it was hard to tell if it was a cold smile, or some other sort of smile. “You know, the Yue Clan has been part of the House of God Ordainment for many years. And all of a sudden you’re coming to us with a gift like this? Isn’t that peculiar....”

“Allow me to explain more, exalted Envoy!” Elder Brother Yue gushed. “You see—”

“No explanation required,” the woman interrupted. “I'm not interested in any of the backstory. All that matters is that you’re offering this as a donation. If there's anything fishy about where this came from, it's the responsibility of the Hall of Law Enforcement to investigate. Not mine. Since you’re the one donating the Redblood God Ginseng, you’ll be rewarded for it. The normal reward for a Redblood God Ginseng is ten merit points, but since this one is three hundred thousand years old, you’ll receive fifteen.”

“Many thanks, exalted Envoy!” Elder Brother Yue said, looking visibly pleased.

Next, the other disciples took their turns turning in their ore stockpiles. Most of them weren’t exactly rich, and had struggled to gather the ore they needed to meet their quota, much less acquire impressive gifts. As a result, none of them earned any extra merit points.

Luckily for them, they had all managed to meet their quota, so none of them were punished.

Eventually, it was Yang Qi’s turn.

When he handed over his bag of godsand, the envoy reached in, pulled out a handful, and was visibly shocked at the glittering, sand-like stones. “Noble caliber godstones?!”

The envoys were all completely taken aback.

“Noble caliber godstones? Where did he get them? The mines here can’t produce that. We usually just get shoddy and normal godstones. No one has ever dug up anything noble caliber!”

“Alright,” said the woman with the rating of nine. “Check to see if they’re really noble caliber godstones.”

A moment later, one of the other envoys nodded. “They’re real. Very high quality! This godsand goes so far beyond the quota that it's worth an additional reward of two merit points.”

“Fine, give him the merit points.” The woman looked at Yang Qi, a faint smile on her face. “You’re Yang Qi, right? You did well to meet the quota. No wonder Junior Sister Jadefall spoke so highly of you. However, you being her friend doesn’t mean that I’ll give you any special treatment. You’ll be rewarded with exactly what you should be rewarded. Now, do you have any other donations you’d like to make to the sect? If so, please produce them now. You’ll be rewarded fairly, and if your donation is worth enough merit points, you’ll be allowed to go further your cultivation in the sect headquarters.”

“What? Jadefall?” Yang Qi instantly realized that this woman with a godhood rating of nine was an Elder Sister of Jadefall. And although she made a point of being impartial, it was obvious that she had a favorable impression of him already. It seemed that Jadefall had made some progress in the past few months and was already rising through the ranks.

If Yang Qi had shown his true strength early on, and entered the sect that way, he would have advanced in the ranks much faster than Jadefall or any of the others. But the risk of someone finding out about his God Legion Seal was simply too great.

Instead, he kept low and quiet.

“After Junior Sister Jadefall entered Master’s care, she quickly reached godly ascension. She now has a godhood rating of four. And in a trial last month, she acquired a precious treasure which helped Master rise from being a Greater God to a Consummate God and be promoted to elder king. The sect has really come to value Junior Sister Jadefall. I’m sure she’ll soon become more important and powerful than me. These are all things that Junior Sister asked me to tell you. That said, your current cultivation base, despite being impressive, can’t compare to Junior Sister’s, and that disparity will only continue to grow. However, she has full faith in you. Although I'm uncertain how she knew, she said that you would provide an impressive donation to the sect, something worth a lot of merit points. So, I'm curious to see what it is. What donation have you prepared?”

‘So that’s what happened,’ Yang Qi thought, nodding inwardly. ‘Jadefall is already a god, and has been accomplishing missions for the sect. She really is talented. I bet it has to do with the purrling. And the hidden meaning behind her words is that because of her high position, she's already secure in the sect and can offer me protection. In other words, I can offer a big contribution without worrying about being investigated.’

Jadefall helping her new Master become a Consummate God was no small feat.

Chapter 1198: Merit Points

‘Considering I have some backup in the sect now, I guess I can feel free to do something a bit more impressive.’ Yang Qi wasn't surprised at all that Jadefall had already started climbing the ranks; it was all part of his plan anyway. He had known all along that she and her purrling would accomplish shocking things.

Back in the mortal world, the purrling had shown how domineering it could be, and that wouldn’t be any different in the god world.

Meanwhile, Elder Brother Yue was struggling to maintain a neutral facial expression. Never could he have guessed that Yang Qi would have the backing of someone as important as a Consummate God. Even the patriarch of his Yue Clan was nothing more than a Greater God who could only hope to one day become a Consummate God.

Furthermore, there was no way that he could ever hope to even be noticed by that patriarch, and wouldn’t even be able to get an audience with him if he tried.

‘What am I supposed to do now? ’ he thought. ‘I have to report this matter to the clan. And no matter what, I have to figure out a way to get Yang Qi killed.’

Meanwhile, the woman with the rating of nine said, “What’s your contribution to the sect, Yang Qi? I'm curious to see if Junior Sister knows what she's talking about. Are you really worth helping? I can tell how much she cares for you, so I hope you don’t let me down.”

“Of course I won’t let you down, exalted Envoy!” Yang Qi said. He waved his hand and produced a cloth bag, which emanated sounds that resembled thunder. “These are some imperial caliber godstones that I would like to give to the sect. Please take a look, Envoy.”

Before he even finished speaking, he was opening the bag. Instantly, flickering light like that of lightning spilled out, filling the area with dazzling brightness. There was also a burst of preheaven vital energy that felt like spring lightning.

“What’s this? Are those really imperial caliber godstones?!” One of the envoy’s nearly ripped the bag out of Yang Qi’s hand and turned it over to pour some godstones out into his hand. They looked almost like śarīras that were pulsing with lightning-like light and thunderous rumbling.

“Completely incredible!” said the woman with the godhood rating of nine. Reaching out, she grabbed one of the pearl-like godstones and looked at it closely, then smiled. “Not bad. Not bad at all. These things are amazing. They really are imperial caliber godstones, and high quality at that. Considering that the vital energy in them is almost on the verge of making god embryos, they're almost holy caliber. Where did you get them?”

“I happened to venture into the surrounding mountains and kill some demonlings. They had this stash in their cave, and while I have to admit I considered keeping them for myself, in the end I decided I should hand them in to the sect.” Yang Qi wasn't too worried about coming up with a believable story, as he knew that he wouldn't be investigated either way.

‘Are they really imperial caliber godstones?’ Elder Brother Yue thought, his eyes wide. ‘I heard rumors that he had godstones like that, but I didn’t believe they were true. But now... how many merit points will that be worth? You can't even find imperial caliber godstones for sale in the markets. They only show up in the big auctions, and even then, most people are lucky just to catch a glimpse of them.’

“How much are imperial caliber godstones worth in merit points?” asked the woman with the godhood rating of nine.

“This bag is definitely worth fifty merit points at the minimum,” one of the other envoys replied.

“Fine, let’s stick with fifty. Yang Qi, I hope you don’t mind the sect taking advantage of you by offering so few merit points.”

“Don't be silly. Fifty is plenty. I would hand those godstones over even if I didn’t get any reward.” Of course, Yang Qi knew that there was no way the sect would refuse to reward him. Matters such as this were written into the sect rules. In fact, even if he refused to accept the reward, the sect might demand that he do. After all, it would be a bad precedent. If word spread among the disciples that the sect took things without offering rewards, in direct violation of the Great Classic of God Ordainment, it could lead to very bad results.

Yang Qi couldn’t help but admire the sect for that.

“Envoys, I also have some gifts for you personally.” He gave a meaningful look to some of his subordinate disciples, who brought forth a box he had arranged for just this purpose.

The box opened, and more imperial caliber godstones could be seen inside. However, these had been carved into beads and strung into a bracelet.

“They aren't for the sect,” he said. “They’re just a little something interesting for you. Jewelry, that’s all.” He waved his hand and the disciple walked over and handed out the box.

If he handed this box in to the sect, he would get a merit point reward. Instead, he was giving it to the envoys, and in turn, that meant they would owe him a favor. Sometimes, favors could be a lot more valuable than things like merit points, especially if it meant getting help from people like this.

“Er....” The other envoys looked at their leader, the woman with the godhood rating of nine. Although it wasn’t against the rules to accept gifts, they weren’t sure if they should accept such an incredible gift right in the open.

“It’s fine, take them,” the leader said. “Even if word spreads, we can count on Junior Sister Jadefall to smooth things over. She’s like the sun climbing in the sky. Before long, she’ll be so important that no one would ever dare to offend her.”

The envoys accepted the gift. A bracelet made of imperial caliber godstones could be used to power a huge spell formation, and would make anyone who wore it incredibly stronger.

The envoys’ attitude toward Yang Qi changed as soon as they accepted the gifts. One of them even said, “Yang Qi, do you want to leave this place? These mines are virtually barren. They produce shoddy and normal godstones, but hardly ever produce greater godstones. With the fifty merit points you just earned, why not go work at the Scripture Pavilion? What do you say?”

“Work at the Scripture Pavilion?” Yang Qi couldn’t help but feel a bit excited. According to the Great Classic of God Ordainment, the Scripture Pavilion was basically a storehouse for ancient records and secret documents. Any official disciple would love to have a position there. First of all, it would give them easy access to the books and records there. Second, disciples who wanted to borrow books from the pavilion had to pay merit points for the honor. Third, there were ancient scrolls in the depths of the pavilion that could very well contain immense good fortune.

It would be considered a windfall for any official disciple to work in the Scripture Pavilion. It was almost on par with being picked as an apprentice by an important person in the sect. Best of all, there was no danger involved.

Although there were benefits that came with being a foreman at the mines, it was a very dangerous job, whether because of the infighting or the demonlings.

And there was no way the opportunities in the mines could surpass the opportunities in the Scripture Pavilion. After all, the Scripture Pavilion was a common destination for very important people, including the top disciples. And they would always come with gifts when they wanted to come inside to study.

Of course, there were other positions that were superior to the Scripture Pavilion. There was the Administration Vault, the Spirit Medicine Warehouse, the Spirit Pill Repository, and other such places. The disciples who worked in places like those received indescribable benefits.

And there were even disciples who could use thralls, which meant their cultivation bases would rise rapidly.

“Many thanks for the advice, Envoy,” Yang Qi said with a smile. “I agree.”

“In that case,” said the leader, “we’ll take the fifty merit points and give you a jade medallion instead. Take it and go check in at the Scripture Pavilion. As for matters here, don’t worry, we’ll send another official disciple to take over your position.”

“Yes ma'am!” Yang Qi said with a salute.

“Very well, the inspection is over. You've all done very well." Before leaving, the leader looked deeply into Yang Qi’s eyes and said, “You need to reach godly ascension as quickly as possible. Understand? Don’t disappoint Junior Sister Jadefall. I can tell that she cares about you, except that she's already vastly beyond you. She’s a god, and you are not, which means that your paths will soon separate. And there’s no shortage of disciples seeking to woo her.”

With that, she led the envoys toward the teleportation portal.

Yang Qi's eyes glittered as she left. Of course, he didn’t take her words to heart. Obviously, she had no idea of the details of his relationship with Jadefall or the truth about the difference between their cultivation levels. And she had no idea how terrifying Yang Qi really was.

With the jade medallion, Yang Qi could go to the Scripture Pavilion. However, he would still secretly keep an eye on the mines. After all, he had his business deal with the Demonfolk. And if he simply left, it was a given that Elder Brother Yue would end up taking over.

After the envoys were gone, Elder Brother Yue finally exploded. “You villain, Yang Qi! If I were you, I wouldn’t celebrate yet. You’ll get your comeuppance one of these days.”

“Is that so? I guess we’ll have to just wait and see.” Turning, Yang Qi left, taking many of the disciples with him.

Back on his mountain peak, he called over Zhang Jufang and Cherry. “I'm leaving, and the sect will send a new disciple to take over my position. Make sure he's nothing but a puppet, got it? Keep carrying on according to my plans. And now, I’ll make you even stronger than before. Be seated.”

“Yes sir!”

As they sat down, Yang Qi extended his hands. “Unrivaled God-King; Heaven-Toppling God-Dao; Invincible Sun and Moon; Yin-Yang Transformation!”

Something like a burning sun appeared in his left hand, shining with a dazzling golden light. And in his left hand was a moon, stark and glowing. When he sent them into his two followers, they were blessed and anointed with godpower.

Chapter 1199: Scripture Pavilion

Five days passed before Yang Qi finished his work. Both Zhang Jufang and Cherry now had cultivation bases so advanced that they could defeat multiple official disciples in battle.

Yang Qi didn’t just give them godpower, but also fighting experience. Among people of the same level as them, they were essentially invincible.

They had been working with Yang Qi for nearly half a year by this point, and were very loyal. They could now be like lieutenants to him, and would also be helpful in dealing with the ghostface monkey-god and the snake goddess.

Even though he was leaving, he would still have some level of control in the mine. After all, the last thing he wanted was for things to go bad, then get investigated as a result.

“I have the feeling we’ll be reaching godly ascension soon,” Zhang Jufang said. He kowtowed. “Many thanks for your magnanimity, Elder Brother.”

Cherry also kowtowed. “Young Sir, not only did you save me from Huang Weilong’s dirty hands, but you also blessed me with boundless energy arts. I know that you’re more than just an official disciple, but don’t worry, I’ll do everything in my power to carry out your work. Whoever comes in to replace you will either have to fall in line, or die.”

“Just don’t do anything over the top, alright?” Yang Qi replied. “If any of the other official disciples get out of hand, you can always have the Demonfolk deal with them. Make sure you aren’t implicated. We don’t want the law enforcement team coming to investigate.”

“Yes sir!”

“Another thing. After I'm gone, you can do whatever necessary to erode the Yue Clan’s power here in the mines. That Elder Brother Yue will definitely try taking advantage of my absence to take over. But don’t worry. Before I leave, I’ll make sure to take some preventative measures.”

Yang Qi had changed his mining district as surely as if he had molded it out of clay. Things were changing slowly but surely. He was starting with this tiny mining district, but would eventually continue on until he controlled the entire House of God Ordainment.

Having made all necessary preparations, he stepped into the teleportation portal and headed to the main headquarters.

He didn’t actually know where the headquarters was located. From what he could tell, it wasn’t on a continent or city, but in a god kingdom created by some unknown god. Because of that, searching the continent for their headquarters would be useless. One had to teleport in. And only official disciples could use the teleportation portals; anyone else who tried would be severely punished.

Stepping out of the portal, Yang Qi immediately felt cold air on his face.

It was quite a difference from the intense heat outside.

He was in a minor world, a standalone god kingdom that didn’t have the same horrible weather as the god world in general.

The air was fresh and carried a fragrant aroma, and although there was light, it was soft and gentle, instead of intense and burning hot like outside.

And unlike the god world in general, he saw a sun up above, a glowing ball of pure power. This god kingdom had a cycle of night and day very much like the impure lands, and also had the four seasons of spring, summer, autumn, and winter.

It was a big contrast to the god world, which had a chaotic climate and seasons that could last for decades or even centuries.

Of course, while winter or summer could last for years, it was the same with spring. And when spring came for centuries, life would flourish, and the god world looked exactly as one would expect.

As soon as Yang Qi stepped out of the teleportation portal, he felt safe and free.

Looking around, he saw mountains covered with palaces of crystal and jade, and beautiful waterfalls that made rainbow-filled mists.

Obviously, whoever had made this place had godhood strong enough to change reality.

It made Yang Qi wonder if the House of God Ordainment actually had a Paramount God in it.

This god kingdom was so huge he couldn’t see the ends of it; it simply faded into misty depths that were obviously restricted areas. He was standing in a wide-open square filled with numerous teleportation portals, where disciples of all levels were coming and going. Some were returning from missions, some had come to hand in items to get merit points, and some had fled back to the sect in fear after offending important people on the outside.

And of course some were like Yang Qi, here to accept cushy positions.

‘Where exactly is the Scripture Pavilion?’ he thought. He leafed through the Great Classic of God Ordainment until he found the information he sought, then headed in that direction.

Before long, he was standing at the base of a towering mountain covered with huge buildings. The entire mountain smelled like books, although, not the aroma of books penned with ink. After all, they didn’t use ink to write books in the god world. Instead, they inscribed them with psychic power. However, these books contained daoist texts and sutras that had stood the test of time and eventually come to emanate an aura of civilization.

Because Yang Qi cultivated the Civilization Founding Grand Magic, and knew a lot about ancient civilizations, this wasn’t lost on him.

He had visited a library in the Brahman Immortal World in which the books had their own minds and wills, and had become book-demons. It seemed likely that this Scripture Pavilion would be even more impressive than that.

As he stepped toward the main entrance that led up the mountain, two official disciples blocked his way. “Where are you from, disciple? Are you trying to trespass on the Scripture Pavilion?”

“I'm here to check in,” Yang Qi said, pulling out his medallion. “I've been given a post here.” The disciples looked at his medallion, then one of them said, “Wait here. I’ll notify them that you've arrived.”

He hurried back about an hour later with a smile on his face. “I had no idea it was you, Elder Brother Yang Qi. As a friend of Junior Sister Jadefall, it was a big mistake on my part to be so rude earlier. I hope you can forgive me.”

Upon hearing this, Yang Qi was once again impressed by what Jadefall had accomplished. Nodding, he said, “Not a problem at all. So, what am I supposed to do now?”

“I’ll take you inside to meet the elders. Then I’ll get you your new identity medallion as well as your assignment. From now on, you’re a member of the Scripture Pavilion!” The disciple led Yang Qi through a maze of corridors. There were bookshelves filled with ancient records everywhere, seemingly without end. There were books about the history of the god world, its people and customs, and just about everything else. What continents were in the god world? In those continents, how many royal dynasties were there? How many nations? How many civilizations existed? Such information was recorded in the books here. Of course, they couldn't contain all of the information about the god world.

Seeing Yang Qi's interest, the disciple said, “These are records penned by disciples of the House of God Ordainment, describing their travels and detailing the information and enlightenment they gathered. If you hand in reports such as this with valuable information, you can earn merit points. And if you read them, you’ll find out about missions that disciples accomplished in the past, what daoist texts they acquired, and other such data. All of it is audited and merit points are rewarded accordingly.” It seemed he was trying to get on Yang Qi’s good side.

Eventually, they reached a certain room. “Elder, Yang Qi is here!”

“Send him in and then be off!” Yang Qi looked in to see an old man with a stooped back. The man beckoned, wrapping up Yang Qi in a stream of power that pulled him into the room.

“My respects, Elder,” Yang Qi said. He could sense that the man was a Common God, although he wasn't sure what his godhood rating was. At the moment, he could only determine the godhood ratings of Lesser Gods.

“So, you're Yang Qi? Impressive cultivation base. I heard you donated some imperial caliber godstones, is that right?”

“I was lucky and came across them by random chance, that’s all,” Yang Qi said quietly. This man was so strong that, if he attacked Yang Qi, it would be a tricky situation. Although Yang Qi wasn’t afraid of him, there was no way he could kill him quietly. And of course, infecting him with a devil embryo was completely out of the question.

“Well, I hope you can make more contributions to the sect. Here’s your identity medallion, which identifies you as a disciple of the Scripture Pavilion. Your daily tasks are to tend to the books and go on patrol. Make sure no disciples sneak in to look at the ancient energy arts records.  For the moment, you can have access up to the second floor of the pavilion. The first floor contains information about the peoples and customs of the god world, but the second floor contains countless cultivation information, and insights into godly ascension. It also has books detailing the pill concocting and cultivation techniques of members of the senior generation.”

“Yes sir,” Yang Qi said. “Thank you for your consideration, Senior. I’ll remember all of this.”

He knew that, normally speaking, he would have been limited to the first floor.

And although he didn’t need any information about energy arts, having access to the experiences of members of the senior generation about godly ascension would be very useful.

Of course, the highest levels of the Scripture Pavilion definitely had all sorts of information about powerful techniques.

With that, Yang Qi produced a gift, which was none other than an imperial caliber godstone the size of an egg.

The old man smiled. “The boy is worth teaching,” he thought.

Chapter 1200: Personal Records

As of this moment, Yang Qi was one of the disciples in charge of caring for the House of God Ordainment’s Scripture Pavilion.

One of the main benefits was that when others came to peruse the personal records of previous members of the sect, they had to spend merit points to do so. As for the second floor that Yang Qi was assigned to, it contained information regarding senior members of the sect who attempted breakthroughs as gods. Some were records of Paramount will convergence breakthroughs, and whether such attempts were successes or failures, the details were kept here in order to help future generations.

There were even instances in which a top expert would have a thousand disciples all attempt a breakthrough at the same time and compare the results.

Of course, the Scripture Pavilion had more than just two floors. There were actually nine in total, and they contained all sorts of amazing secrets. For now, Yang Qi had no way to access any of the higher floors. Such secrets would require huge amounts of merit points to gain access to.

According to rumor, the ninth floor had the ancient records of the primeval halls of heaven. In other words, it was the Sovereign Lord’s personal collection of books, containing direct information about his actions and failures. There were even books personally penned by him.

There were also records regarding gods in the Paramount level who had attempted breakthroughs.

That included some in the Paramount level who had successfully reached the Unbounded level, and even some in the Unbounded level who had attempted to reach the Annulled level.

Such records were incomparably priceless, and weren’t things that ordinary disciples could study. Even the grand elders and elder kings of the sect would have to pay merit points for the opportunity. And not just a handful of merit points, but tens, or even hundreds of thousands.

Of course, Yang Qi couldn’t even go to the third floor, let alone the ninth. Right now he was limited to the second floor. That said, the bookshelves stretched high overhead, to the point where even he was shocked. The books seemed to go on and on without end.

Most of them were made of paper that was inscribed with an expression of will instead of ink. Because of that, there were all sorts of images on the pages, although flowery text was also common. Apparently, the people who inscribed the text were hoping to impress the reader with their exquisite command of the calligraphy of the god world script.

But not all of the records were paper books. There were also scrolls of beast hide, jade slips, and bamboo slips. Some were even made of rock or metal. It was possible to inscribe just about anything with godpower. In fact, there were some records that weren’t physical objects at all, but rather pure conglomerations of godpower. They resembled books, but were pure gold, and weren’t even corporeal objects.

After looking around for a bit, Yang Qi couldn’t find any other administrators on the second floor. Apparently, he was the only one.

There were so many books that he had no idea where to start in terms of reading them. In fact, there seemed too many to count. And this was just the second floor. It was hard to imagine how many books would be contained in all nine floors.

That said, he wasn’t anxious to start reading. He initially just walked amongst the bookshelves, which were almost like a maze. As he walked around, he noticed that the bookshelves were all protected with powerful warding magics. Even if a fight were to break out here, the books wouldn’t be damaged.

After some time, he randomly reached out and pulled a book off the shelf. Looking at the cover, it read Treatise on the Differences Between Buddhist School Śarīras and Godhood.

Sending some divine will inside, Yang Qi found that the author was a buddhist cultivator who was a Common God. He had done some very thought-provoking research comparing buddhist school śarīras to godhood. As he read the book, Yang Qi realized that he was gaining some new insight into his Secret-Ensconcing All-World Anything-Everything Fundamental-Law Magic.

He was also coming to understand a bit more about the dao of sages from his Sage Monarch Grand Magic.

After all, buddhas were fundamentally sages. Because of that, many of the concepts taught in the buddhist sects were the same as the dao of sages. And the buddhist sects offered many revelations regarding humanity, so how could Yang Qi possibly pass up information like that?

After finishing the book, he nodded thoughtfully as he mused about how some of his previous ways of thinking had been incorrect.

He put the book back and randomly grabbed another one. This one was entitled Pilgrim Mystico’s Discourse on the Deployment of Spell Formations.

As he paged through the book, he saw that the divine will inscriptions depicted an old man setting up various spell formations. The depictions revealed many tips and tricks that could save godpower and make formations more effective.

Upon finishing the book, Yang Qi felt his ability with spell formations had improved a bit.

People from the god world had a different way of looking at things, and the dao of spell formations was boundless and full of unending mysteries. With that, he went on to read a few more books, all of which were about spell formations, and all of which contained very thought-provoking information.

All of a sudden, a voice reached Yang Qi’s ears from overhead.

“Are you new here, Brother? And you're already reading?”

He looked up and saw a white-robed disciple with a bottle gourd of alcohol in one hand and a book in the other, sitting on top of one of the bookshelves. It looked like he had just woken from a nap. The title of the book in his hand was Seventy-Two Methods of Crystallizing Godpower.

‘Someone was sleeping up there and I didn’t notice?’ Yang Qi thought. ‘He must have a very high cultivation base. Although, I wasn’t exactly on guard. I was too focused on all these books.’ Because of assuming that no one would attack or try to kill him in the House of God Ordainment’s Scripture Pavilion, Yang Qi had indeed let his guard down a bit.

Clasping hands in greeting, Yang Qi said, “Who might you be, Sire? Are you also a disciple of the second floor?”

“Yeah, I am. And you’re new, right? I’ve been assigned here for ten years, so you should call me Elder Brother. You read really fast, don’t you? Most of the books here are designed for experts who've already reached godly ascension.” Lifting up his bottle gourd, he took a long swig of alcohol. “I have no desire to leave this place. I’d rather stay here, drinking and reading. It’s a really leisurely life. That’s how gods should live. Would you like a drink?”

He held out the bottle gourd.

“No thanks, but I appreciate the gesture. So how many people are assigned here?”

“How many people?” The young man laughed. “Here on the second floor it's just you and me. Before you came, I was alone.”

“You've been here for ten years, but haven’t been able to reach godly ascension?” Yang Qi frowned. “It seems to me you’re strong enough to beat a Lesser God in combat.”

“Godly ascension? I could do that any time I wanted. Right now I'm focusing on studying the basic structure of godpower. You see, I want to be a really impressive person as a god. So before I reach godly ascension, I want to break through to Paramount will convergence. Then, when I form my godhood, it’ll be what they call monarch godhood. Check out this book. It was written by a very interesting individual.”

Swish!

He threw a book down, which Yang Qi caught. As he did, Yang Qi felt himself shiver from the force of godpower, and nodded in admiration.

The man’s eyes went wide. ‘How could this guy be so strong? I've been studying the books in here for ten years, and have gained a lot of enlightenment. In fact, my cultivation is unmatched, although nobody knows that. So who is this guy? And how come he hasn’t caught the eye of the top figures in the sect?’

Meanwhile, he was keeping an eye on Yang Qi as he read.

Yang Qi read through the Seventy-Two Methods of Crystallizing Godpower and found some interesting information about how to use one’s psyche and will to make godpower more stable, then turn it into godhood.

Furthermore, from this information, it was possible to infer that godly ascension was a pivotal moment in which one’s life force would completely transform. Past that point, one stopped being human. That was why immense psychic power was required. And it was best to achieve that level before forming one's godhood. If one could reach Paramount will convergence and only form godhood afterward, it was called monarch godhood.

There were other interesting and useful concepts in the book, including tricks on how to crystallize godpower. For example, the Water-Fire Crystallization Technique, which used the opposing forces of yin and yang, and water and fire, to create a tempering effect that strengthened the structure of the godpower.

It also described ways to temper the crystallized godhood, so that it eventually formed a spiral structure. In some ways, it made the process of creating godhood seem very much like the process of forging a sword.

“Whoever wrote this book was extraordinary,” Yang Qi said. Looking back at the cover, he saw that the author was the Sword-Grinding Kid.

“The Sword-Grinding Kid was a legend here in the god world. Sadly, he passed away long ago. He was the son of a subordinate of the Lord of the Sword Dao. Although his cultivation base wasn’t particularly impressive, his theories were amazing.” The young man leaped off the top of the bookshelf and floated down to the ground like a snowflake.

Watching him land, Yang Qi asked, “Brother, what's your name?”

“I'm Bai Yin. At first I assumed you were just an ordinary person, but as it turns out, you’re nothing short of incredible.”

Considering that Bai Yin had directly offered his name, it would have been impolite for Yang Qi not to do the same. So he said, “I'm Yang Qi. You just mentioned some ideas about reaching the Paramount level, but it seems to me this Sword-Grinding Kid didn’t think the whole thing through. Before forming godhood, your fleshly body and life force substructure are weak. If you tried to form Paramount will convergence in that state, your fleshly body wouldn’t be able to take it, and your sea of consciousness would collapse. It’s like that bottle gourd of yours. If you tried to force more liquid into it after it’s full, it would burst.”

“Yes, that is an issue,” Bai Yin replied. “Otherwise, there would be lots of people who reached the Paramount level before attempting godly ascension. There are a lot of books here on the second floor, and some of them contain speculations on that very subject. For instance, there are ways to strengthen your fleshly body. However, I don’t think that’s the answer. My current guess is that the information we need is on the third or fourth floor. Or maybe even higher. We need to see the personal records of the real top experts.”

Chapter 1201: Monarch Godhood

Yang Qi looked around at the vast second floor of the Scripture Pavilion.

Even working at top speed, it would take him anywhere from three to five years just to look through everything. And that wasn’t even factoring in the time spent deciphering all the information.

Before he had a chance to start reading again, the medallion in his hand suddenly flickered with light.

Bai Yin’s medallion also flickered.

“Come on,” Bai Yin said, “someone just entered the pavilion. We have a chance to get some gifts.” He beckoned at Yang Qi, looking very much like a scammer who had just locked eyes on a rich target.

They walked out from the bookshelves into a wide hall filled with prayer mats. It was large enough to hold tens of thousands of people, and was obviously a place where the disciples could study books and seek enlightenment.

A group of a few dozen people had just entered.

Upon seeing Bai Yin and Yang Qi, one of them said, “We’re here to study in the second floor of the Scripture Pavilion. We want to pay for six hours of study time.”

“I'm sorry, ladies and gentlemen,” Bai Yin replied coolly. “According to the rules, disciples aren’t allowed to enter inside. You can read quietly here in the reading room. Just tell us what kind of books you’d like and we’ll bring them out to you.”

A man stepped forward, looked down his nose at Bai Yin, and snorted coldly. “I heard you Scripture Pavilion people have a habit of making things hard for other disciples. I guess it's true. But the Great Classic of God Ordainment doesn't say anything about the supposed rules you just mentioned. Therefore, you have to let us inside. According to the regulations, we can look at any books we want as long as we don't take them outside.”

“Well, that’s true,” Bai Yin replied casually. “But we still have to make sure that no one makes too much noise or damages any books. With a group as large as yours, it would be easy for someone to slip a book out, and then we would be held responsible. So it’s simple. You stay here, and we’ll bring you the books you want!” As he spoke, he pulled out a jade plaque inscribed with complex designs. “It’ll be five merit points each, and the limit is ten books per person.”

“So you want a bribe, huh?” another disciple said. “Fine, I have some godnotes that—”

“No, don’t give them anything,” said their leader, smiling coldly. “We aren’t going to support pigs like this. They sit around all day reading whatever ancient records they want. Meanwhile, we work ourselves to the bone to get the merit points we need to study here. And now they’re making things deliberately hard on us? I think I'm just going to walk right in and see what they do about it!”

With that, he strode toward the entrance.

“Back the fuck down!” Bai Yin shouted, and all of a sudden a white beam of light swirled out and wrapped around the entire group in front of them.

The other disciples were ready, though, and thrust their palms out as they unleashed all sorts of martial disciplines, energy arts, and godpower. Unfortunately, their efforts were useless. The white light shattered their techniques and plopped them down onto prayer mats, simultaneously rendering them completely immobile.

Then, Bai Yin reached out and grabbed the godnotes the disciple had been about to give him. Counting them out, he found there were twenty. Giving half to Yang Qi, he said, “Brother, you go get the books they need. Ten each. Find records about how to form godhood. Meanwhile, I’m going to teach a lesson to these poorly behaved fools.”

The leader of the small group of disciples was furious. He had believed his cultivation base to be extraordinary, only to be easily defeated and sealed by Bai Yin. “Y-you,” he spluttered, “my Master said—”

“Shut your mouth!” Bai Yin snapped. “Disturbances aren’t allowed in the Scripture Pavilion!” Bai Yin waved his hand, causing godpower to form into a paper talisman that he slapped onto the disciple’s head, making it impossible for him to speak.

Yang Qi clicked his tongue in amazement at how domineering Bai Yin was.

Entering the Scripture Pavilion, he collected a group of random books to give to the disciples. Placing the books in front of their various prayer mats, he said, “Please, take a look.”

The furious disciples were still immobile, and could only struggle to use their divine will to look at the contents of the books.

“Let’s go,” Bai Yin said. “When they’re finished reading, my White Prism Manacles will release them and send them out.”

“Alright!” Yang Qi said. It was a bit amusing to see Bai Yin deal with the disciples in this way. If things went like this every day, he could only imagine how profitable this position would be.

Six hours later, the White Prism Manacles released the disciples, who hurried away. As for the books they had been reading, they flew back into the Scripture Pavilion and returned to their places on the shelves on their own.

At the bottom of the mountain, the group of disciples glared back up at the Scripture Pavilion, and one of them even suggested going back to cause a scene. However, the leader said, “Forget about it. Let’s chalk this one up to a loss. But we’re not going to forget what happened. Bai Yin is going to get his comeuppance eventually. Come on, let’s go.”

However, that was when the voice of a woman reached their ears. “Hmph! You're still thinking of getting revenge on Bai Yin? I advise you to put such thoughts to rest. Do you think that just because he hasn’t reached godly ascension, you’re a match for him?”

A fair-faced woman appeared behind them, clad in a light yellow garment, her hair bound with a phoenix hairpin. When the disciples saw her, none of them dared to say anything out of line.

“Hello, Elder Sister Xue!”

“Leave. And remember, don’t bother Bai Yin. It's for your own good. He might not seem impressive, but he's wildly ambitious. Provoke him and you’ll end up dead, one way or another.”

“Yes, yes of course. We understand, Elder Sister Xue.”

The disciples hurried away.

Elder Sister Xue then walked right into the second floor of the Scripture Pavilion.

“Aha!” Bai Yin exclaimed when he saw her. “Well, if it isn’t Elder Sister Xue. Might I ask why you keep spending so many merit points to look at the books on this floor? Why not go to the third floor?”

Elder Sister Xue chuckled. “What. Don’t tell me you’re fishing for a bribe, Bai Yin.”

“I wouldn’t dare!” Bai Yin replied. “Anyone who dares to ask for a bribe from Elder Sister Xue would clearly be suicidal. By the way, allow me to introduce Yang Qi. He’s new around here. He’s a friend of the newly famous Jadefall, and he’s no slouch.

“Yang Qi, hurry up and offer greetings to Elder Sister Xue. She’s the founder of the Snow Society, and although she isn’t a god, she could easily slaughter a Lesser God. She could reach godly ascension at any time, and probably go all the way to the Common God level. No one with a godhood rating of less than ten could possibly stand up to her.”

“Well met, Elder Sister Xue,” Yang Qi said, nodding. Obviously, she was another formidable figure who wanted to wait until she reached the Paramount level before becoming a god.

Elder Sister Xue looked Yang Qi up and down, and was visibly surprised. “You’re a friend of Jadefall? Her cultivation base is amazing. But what’s even more amazing is that pet of hers. It’s completely invincible, and no one knows exactly what it is. In any case, you seem to be quite amazing in your own right.”

Casually reaching out as if to caress Yang Qi, she said, “Come. Let Elder Sister test out your cultivation base.”

“You flatter me, Elder Sister. My cultivation base is average at best.” Yang Qi was actually quite taken aback. Her casual gesture was actually so profound that it targeted all of the major acupoints on his body, making it impossible to dodge. It was obviously a martial discipline filled with stolen good fortune of heaven and earth.

In response, he simply extended two fingers such that if she continued moving her hand toward him, her palm would be stabbed through.

“Not bad,” she said. Her hand shifted directions, cutting an arc through the air as she changed the target of her blow to the Greater Yang acupoint on his temple.

Unfortunately for her, she suddenly realized that Yang Qi’s fingers had shifted and were already in the path of her hand.

Eyes glittering, she shifted to another technique that encompassed both yin and yang, her five fingers acting as the five phases. Her hands flowed through hundreds of various moves, a dazzling display that seemed both as slow as a turtle and as fast as lightning. In fact, most people who watched her movements would likely cough up blood.

Yet no matter what she did, Yang Qi would casually adjust to meet her, his two fingers always waiting. It was as if he were trying to tire her out.

Bai Yin watched, nodding in admiration at how unexpectedly formidable Yang Qi was. The truth was that Bai Yin and Elder Sister Xue were both extraordinary people who wanted to eventually form monarch godhood. Few people could possibly evade their wrath, not even Lesser Gods, much less people who hadn’t reached godly ascension.

Who could have guessed that another person such as them would suddenly appear?

“That’s enough,” Elder Sister Xue said, retracting her attack. “I almost can’t believe you’re this strong. I could even defeat Jadefall, at least, without her pet involved. But you're stronger than her. Why weren’t you taken as an apprentice when you became an official disciple? Could it be that you have some secrets you don't want let out?”

Yang Qi laughed heartily. “Very clever of you, Elder Sister Xue. I can see that, just like me, you want to reach the Paramount level before godly ascension, and form monarch godhood. Perhaps we could pool our efforts in that regard?”

The fact that she was the leader of the so-called Snow Society reminded Yang Qi of his old days in the Demi-Immortal Institute, when he led the Sage Monarch Society and had to deal with people like the Five Lightnings Society, Divine Ability Society, and of course, the Crown Prince Society.

Apparently, the House of God Ordainment had a similar arrangement of factions.

“Are you interested in joining my Snow Society?” she asked. “I can help you with whatever goals you have. Bai Yin, tell him who my Master is.”

Bai Yin laughed. “Elder Sister Xue’s Master is a Consummate God! Although, I have the feeling that Brother Yang Qi is the free and unfettered type who likes to do his own thing. Sort of like me.”

Chapter 1202: Still Alive

Upon seeing how incredible Yang Qi was, Elder Sister Xue tried to recruit him into her Snow Society. Of course, Bai Yin could already tell that Yang Qi wasn’t the kind of person who would like to be restricted, and would never agree to join such an organization as an ordinary member.

“He's right,” Yang Qi said. “Many thanks for your kindness, Elder Sister Xue, but for the moment, I’d rather not join. I haven’t reached the Paramount level of will convergence yet, so I’d prefer to stay here in the Scripture Pavilion increasing my knowledge and furthering my cultivation.”

“Oh really?” Elder Sister Xue said, sounding impressed. “You haven’t reached godly ascension, but you want to enter the Paramount level? You have some impressive ambitions. Regardless of the sect or clan, people like you are extremely rare. In fact, I haven’t heard of anyone who’s ever succeeded in such an effort. Aren’t you just following in the footsteps of Bai Yin? After all, my Snow Society has done a lot of study and research into this subject, and have come to believe that the best path lies in focusing on cultivating the fleshly body. If you can push your fleshly body to the point of being able to contain Paramount will convergence, you’ll succeed.”

“I really do appreciate it. And if you’re able to provide any direct help, I definitely wouldn’t refuse it. But as for joining the Snow Society, I'm still going to have to decline.”

“People with ambitions can’t be forced to action,” Elder Sister Xue said, nodding her head in approval. “That said, the doors of the Snow Society will always be open to you. If you want to join, just say the word.”

Yang Qi laughed. “Alright.”

“Are you here to do some reading, Elder Sister Xue?” Bai Yin asked. “Did you come to some new understanding recently in your cultivation?”

“I'm still interested in books about developing the fleshly body and filling it with psychic power. I heard that our House of God Ordainment recently wiped out a devil church known as the Asura Hegemon Chapel, and took all of their ancient records. Considering the members of their church were known for their powerful fleshly bodies and their expertise in ancient genetics, I'm very interested in those records.”

The House of God Ordainment was an enormous sect that was always wiping out some sect or another and seizing their ancient records. And it was more common for cultivators from the devil churches to develop impressive fleshly bodies. Therefore, it could only be imagined what could be learned from their books.

Chuckling, Bai Yin said, “You’re very well informed, Elder Sister. The pontifex of the Asura Hegemon Chapel was originally a devil-god from the Hell of Suras. It was only after he arrived here in the god world that he started his church. And you’re right, our House of God Ordainment recently joined forces with the Truth Academy and the Sole Immortal Sect to destroy them. Unfortunately, the ancient records that were taken are all stored in the fifth or sixth floor. In other words, Elder Sister, you won’t be able to look at them until after you reach godly ascension.”

“Like hell, Bai Yin. There’ve got to be at least a few books here on the second floor.” With a flourish, she revealed over a dozen godnotes. “This should get you plenty of alcohol. Now hurry and get me those books.”

Bai Yin coughed dryly. “Many thanks, Elder Sister. Follow me.”

With that, he led Elder Sister Xue through the maze of bookshelves. The books on the shelves were all tightly sealed, so that ordinary disciples couldn’t just take them, but Bai Yin and Yang Qi had different rights with their identity medallions. And Bai Yin had worked here for ten years, so he knew the place like the back of his hand.

After reaching a certain bookshelf, he waved a hand dismissively, removing the warding magic to reveal a bookshelf made of human bones, that pulsed with immense devil energy.

Most of the books and scrolls on the second floor were made of bamboo, jade, metal, or other similar materials. But on this bookshelf, they were carved from bone, and some of the books had covers that appeared to be crafted from human flesh.

“Alright Elder Sister,” Bai Yin said in a serious tone, “this bookshelf contains information from the dao of devils. And you can only read these things here; you’re not allowed to take anything away. If you did, we would all be punished by the sect.”

“You think I don’t know the rules or something?” Elder Sister Xue said, flashing a pearly smile. Looking at the books, she pulled one down that resembled a lotus flower, except made from human flesh. It pulsed with devil energy, as though the words in it were a manifestation of millions upon millions of evil ghosts and vengeful souls.

Yang Qi scanned it with his divine sense and saw that the title was Secrets of the Retroconversion of Dead Flesh.

“Oh, I’ve read that one,” Bai Yin said. “It was written by an outstanding figure among the asuras, who did a lot of research into fleshly bodies. That book has some very interesting revelations in it. In fact, I suspect that the author was also familiar with that most precious classic of the dao of devils, the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body. Ah, what a pity. If only I had a chance to learn about that legendary Unspoiled Body, then maybe I could resolve some of my own fleshly body problems, and actually prepare it for Paramount will convergence.

Elder Sister Xue flipped through the book, black mists pouring out of it the entire time. When she was finished reading, she shook her head. “This book talks about theoretical elements, but nothing practical. Although the wording is insightful, I think you’re right: it’s all based on the basic structure of the Unspoiled Body. Without having studied the Unspoiled Body itself, this book won’t do us any good.”

Putting the book back, she took something else off the bookshelf, a pile of human skin.

Looking over, Yang Qi saw that the title read The Origins of Devilfolk Genes.

It provided a detailed description and analysis of Devilfolk genetics, and by extent, an explanation of why, when humans cultivated devil arts, they would ultimately become devils, all the way down to their genes and very soul.

It would be impossible to find such detailed information in the impure lands. After all, this information had originally been written down by gods from the Devilfolk.

‘This is all incredible information,’ Yang Qi thought. Even just having looked over Elder Sister Xue’s shoulder as she looked through the records, he had gained new understandings of his Unspoiled Body.

Elder Sister Xue and Bai Yin might not understand the information, but he did. After arriving in the god world with the completed God Legion Seal, he’d gained further enlightenment of his Sage Monarch Grand Magic, and had temporarily given up on the Unspoiled Body. But now he was suddenly presented with more information about its secrets.

Reaching out, he took a book made of human bones and paged through it to find information about fleshly bodies from the dao of devils, and how they related to tribulation clouds. It was another book penned by a god.

The things that gods could perceive surpassed the vision of mortals by many times over. And the information they could provide was proving immensely beneficial to Yang Qi.

Within him, the sheepskin scroll stirred and tribulation energy brewed. Whether it was his fleshly body, his soul, or his sea of consciousness, tiny transformations were occurring everywhere within him.

Looking at these ancient records from the dao of devils, enlightenment from devil-gods poured through him relentlessly. In fact, he quickly became lost in study.

Over the next few days, Elder Sister Xue came back every day and spent a few hours studying. It was hard to say where she came up with so many merit points. Meanwhile, Yang Qi was so focused on studying that soon, a month had gone by and he had read several thousand ancient records from the dao of devils. Most disciples wouldn’t be able to read so many records without experiencing a fundamental shift in their dao and worldview. And most would have a hard time resisting the pull into devilry.

After all, knowledge-devils were powerful, and could easily lead to cultivation deviation. In fact, there were many sages and gurus who had transformed into devils after spending too much time in study. But Yang Qi had conquered knowledge-devils even when he was in the impure lands, so he wasn’t worried.

After reading, he simply crushed the knowledge-devils and focused on improving his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth and Unspoiled Body.

Life in the Scripture Pavilion was very casual and relaxed. Disciples would occasionally come to study, which would only lead to further profit. There was no danger or difficulty like in the mines, and he was slowly building up a collection of medicinal pills, talismans, and godstones....

Life was wonderful. Yang Qi almost felt like a fancy government official living in luxury.

One particularly bright day, the light of the god world pierced into the bookshelves, waking up Bai Yin, who stretched lazily. Pulling out a medicinal pill from his robe, he dropped it into his alcohol, which fizzed loudly for a moment before he chugged it all down.

“He who rises early gains the deepest enlightenment,” he murmured. “Ah, what a life. Reading, sleeping, drinking, getting a tan. This is how gods are supposed to live. What's the point of all the fighting and death all the other disciples participate in?”

Looking over, he saw Yang Qi reading a book. From the look of it, he had been in that same spot all night, reading.

“Hmm? Don’t go too crazy, Yang Qi. You’ve already been here a few months and all you do is read, cultivate, and seek enlightenment. You don’t even sleep! Remember, it’s important to balance work and leisure. It’s not good for you to just sit around studying.”

Closing the book, Yang Qi laughed and said, “You have your dao, I have mine. And as they say, all daos can lead to godly ascension.”

Bai Yin nodded. “I really don’t get it, though. What’s your trick? The fact that you don’t need to sleep is incredible. Even gods get tired and need to rest. Mind letting me in on the secret?”

Yang Qi shook his head. “You wouldn’t be able to master it, so what would be the point in telling you?”

“Pshh!” Bai Yin pointed a finger at Yang Qi as if to start cursing him, only to then look down toward the bottom of the mountain. Then he leaped to his feet. “Come on, Brother. Some more wealth is headed our way. Looks like they wiped out another sect and are bringing some books up. And of course, we have to appraise them to see how many merit points they’re worth.”

Appraising books was another part of their job in the Scripture Pavilion, and it left them a lot of room for shenanigans. After all, they were entirely in charge of whether a book was worth one merit point, or five.

In other words, they decided how many merit points people got for handing in books. Although it seemed like a small responsibility, it was enough to cause most people to fawn obsequiously to them. And of course, it could be a great source of wealth.

Walking out of the Scripture Pavilion, they met a group of several dozen disciples hauling some books toward the second floor.

When Yang Qi looked over the group, the first person that stood out was Elder Brother Yue, who apparently wasn’t working in the mines anymore.

He was still alive!

Chapter 1203: A Visit from the Demonfolk

“Yang Qi!? It's you!” The moment Elder Brother Yue caught sight of Yang Qi, his eyes flared with intense hatred.

He had originally assumed that, after Yang Qi left, he would be able to take control of the mines. Never could he have imagined that Yang Qi’s subordinates would be so fierce. They unified all of Yang Qi’s allies against Elder Brother Yue, which made his mine extremely inefficient. Even worse, the Demonfolk seemingly targeted him alone. And the new disciple sent to take charge of Mine Thirteen was little more than a puppet who followed the orders of his subordinates.

On one occasion, disciples of the dao of devils ambushed Elder Brother Yue and severely injured him.

After recovering, he stormed over to Mine Thirteen to make a scene and take control. However, to his complete surprise, he was soundly beaten by Zhang Jufang and had to crawl away in humiliation.

Returning to his own mine, he bitterly submitted an application to relinquish his position as foreman. It took a lot of bribes, but he finally managed to get himself a relatively good position as a manager of sect thralls.

Thralls were essentially slaves, and they were much easier to deal with than miners. They were given plenty of good food and alcohol, and were allowed to focus fully on their cultivation. The only downside was that all the godpower they built up would eventually have to be given to weaker disciples.

And of course, the techniques given to the thralls to cultivate were pure and focused on beneficial elements. They weren’t combat arts, which ensured that the thralls weren’t particularly dangerous.

Miners never lasted very long; they all died. As for thralls, they would also eventually run out of stamina and wither up into death.

Both experienced miserable fates.

Thrall managers would benefit from the energy arts of the thralls, much the same way that disciples who managed the Scripture Pavilion could read any books they wanted.

Both were very cushy positions.

In fact, most people considered the position of thrall manager better than being posted in the Scripture Pavilion. After all, the disciples who came to benefit from the thralls also had to show their “filial piety”, otherwise matters would turn difficult for them. The House of God Ordainment was a veritable empire, so it was a given that there would be some corruption here and there.

Elder Brother Yue’s cultivation base had clearly increased dramatically. His godpower thrummed with power, so much so that, as he faced Yang Qi, he looked like he was about ready to start fighting.

Before he could do anything, though, a young man reached out to block his path.

“Calm down, Tianlin. You’ll get your chance for revenge. Remember, we’re here to turn in books and get merit points, there’s no need to start a fight.” From the look of it, he was another member of the Yue Clan. Taking a step forward, he looked at Yang Qi and said, “I heard that you’re a friend of Jadefall. Unfortunately, you’re a bit too arrogant. You’re a disciple of the Scripture Pavilion, but you still try to manipulate things back at the mines, stuffing your pockets as a result. Maybe I should report you to the parliament of elders. Then you’ll really get what’s coming to you.”

The one to reply wasn’t Yang Qi, but Bai Yin. “Well, look who the cat dragged in. Yue He of the Yue Clan. Look, this is the Scripture Pavilion, so don’t you dare make a scene here! If you don’t calm down immediately, I’ll have to ask you to leave.”

“Don’t try to act tough, Bai Yin!” one of the other disciples shouted. “Everybody knows that you won’t become a god because you want Paramount will convergence first. But even people favored by the heavens fail when they try to do that. They either experience cultivation deviation, or they die. Who do you think you are? You’d better not take the Yue Clan lightly!”

“Oh really?” Bai Yin waved his hand, sending out a white streak of light.

Yue He smiled coldly and stepped forward. “I've long heard it said that Brother Bai Yin is unparalleled under heaven, with a profoundly mysterious cultivation base. You know, I’ve always wanted to see what you're capable of.”

Thrusting his palm out, he sent a stream of godpower flying at Bai Yin.

BAM!

Both of them shivered, making it seem as though they were completely evenly matched.

“Hmm?” Bai Yin frowned. “Since when did your cultivation base advance so much, Yue He?”

“You think you’re the only one who wants monarch godhood, Bai Yin? Truly ambitious disciples aren’t quick to form their godhood. They take their time. So what do you think? How does your stockpile compare to mine?” Looking over at Yang Qi, he said, “Presumably, you also want monarch godhood.”

“Enough of this,” Yang Qi said. Waving his hand, he sent out a surging stream of energy that forced Yue He to step back a few paces.

Looking at Yang Qi in shock, he said, “Your energy arts, they—”

“You’re here to hand in some books, right?” Yang Qi said. “Not try to resolve personal grudges. If you want to seek revenge, you can seek me out personally. Hand over those books and let us have a look.”

Even as the words left his mouth, he made a grasping gesture.

The carts full of books and records flew over, and one plopped onto the ground.

“Not worth anything,” he said. “It’s just someone’s record of the tribulations and vital energy transformations they experienced when forming godhood.”

The fact that Yang Qi had read the book so quickly caused Yue Tianlin and Yue He to react with visible shock.

Before long, Yang Qi had looked through all of the books. “Only ten of them are worth anything. The rest can go down to the first floor. We’ll give you three merit points apiece, for a total of thirty. What do you say?”

“Like hell!” Yue Tianlin said, taking a step forward. “You’re going to take all of these books, and you’re going to give us five merit points apiece for them. If you don’t, I’ll make sure you’re kicked out of here by tomorrow, believe me.”

Clicking his tongue and sighing, Bai Yin said, “You people from the Yue Clan really have a lot of nerve to stir things up at the Scripture Pavilion. Yue He, the fact that your Yue Clan produces disciples like this is just a guarantee that you’ll eventually end up getting wiped out.”

“Shut your mouth!” Yue He growled at Yue Tianlin. He knew that now wasn’t the time for altercations. “Fine. I see how it is. We’ll accept your terms this time. But next time you come to the Thrall Camp to get some godpower, we’ll see how things go for you.”

“You think we want godpower from thralls?” Bai Yin burst out laughing. “People who advance their cultivation base that way are complete morons.”

“Maybe, maybe not,” Yue He replied. “You’ll need a lot of godpower to reach the Paramount level, and it's the same for forming godhood. Considering the level of your cultivation base, I’d say you’ll have no choice but to come to the Thrall Camp eventually! I guess we’ll just have to wait and see!”

“Bye. You can see yourselves out. Here’s a talisman with your merit points.” Bai Yin tossed out a paper talisman.

With that, the people from the Yue Clan left.

“Those people don’t know the height of the heavens and the breadth of the earth!” Bai Yin said, a grim expression on his face. “The Yue Clan has a really bad reputation in the House of God Ordainment. Unfortunately, they also have a lot of power, so we have to watch our backs.”

“What did he mean about kicking us out of the Scripture Pavilion?” Yang Qi asked. “Could they do that?”

“No way,” Bai Yin replied with a smile. “They don’t have that much influence. The elders in the Scripture Pavilion are well aware of the broader situation. If a faction like the Yue Clan could remove disciples from the Scripture Pavilion, what else could they do? Besides, Jadefall is your friend, and her Master recently became a Consummate God, whose words carry enormous weight.”

All of a sudden, one of Yang Qi’s command medallions started buzzing. Pulling it out, he said, “Brother Bai, I have a matter to take care of. It shouldn’t take more than a few days. Can you keep an eye on the Scripture Pavilion while I'm away?”

“No problem.” Bai Yin wasn’t inclined to pry into Yang Qi’s business. Besides, his responsibilities in the Scripture Pavilion were so easy that he had handled them by himself for ten full years.

Yang Qi hurried to the main teleportation portal in the House of God Ordainment’s headquarters. It whirred to life, and he stepped out into the god world at large, finding himself in a boundless mountainous region. He was back in the Guardian Mines.

Having been inside a god kingdom for several months, he was suddenly reminded why so many people preferred living in a place like that; the weather in the god world really was horrible.

He sped into motion, and before long, was at Mine One.

Zhang Jufang was there waiting for him with a retinue of disciples including the new foreman. He was an official disciple, but living under Yang Qi’s shadow, he had no choice but to fall in line.

“My respects, Elder Brother Yang Qi!” said the new foreman, offering a polite salute.

He knew that Yang Qi was the true power in the mines.

“You’re doing well,” Yang Qi said. “Keep working hard and I’ll make sure you go a long way. I always take care of my people.” Pleased that the disciple knew his place, Yang Qi waved his hand, causing a pile of godsand to appear in front of them all. “This is noble caliber godsand. Take it. First, use it to expand the defensive spell formations to encompass the entire mining district. Second, buy all the medicinal pills you need to strengthen yourself. And third, use what's left to meet the yearly quota. Got it?”

“Yes sir!” the disciples all replied, looking at Yang Qi as if he were an actual god.

“I'm going into the mountains to talk things over with the Demonfolk. Stay busy while I'm gone.” With that, he flew into the air, blurring into motion and leaving behind afterimages as he achieved a flight speed far beyond what the demonlings were capable of.

Soon, he was deep in the mountains.

He had been called to a meeting by the snake goddess and the ghostface monkey-god, in order to go to visit the jade discs left behind by the Demon Master. He had made a lot of advancement in the Scripture Pavilion, and was considering taking advantage of his time among the Demonfolk to achieve his breakthrough to the Paramount level.

If he acquired monarch godhood, he would definitely come to be viewed as a genius among geniuses in the sect.

Chapter 1204: Demon Master

In the wild mountains, demon energy filled the forests and rose high into the sky. There were obviously countless demonlings lurking about; the trees were the best place for them to keep safe from the scorching light. The canopy overhead kept the brightness from seeping down into the cool, shady sections below.

The trees of the god world were tenacious and filled with life. They could absorb frigid energy, scorching energy, and even the strikes of lightning. They were tenacious, and those that weren’t strong enough to survive were quickly weeded out in a very direct display of survival of the fittest.

Some trees were even able to build collections of godpower, turning themselves into murderous things that could kill and assimilate demonlings and human cultivators alike.

Just about all of the plant life in the god world was unique.

In fact, if one were to create a record of all the types of plants and trees, it would surely fill a billion volumes of text. Of course, in addition to the towering trees, there were all sorts of rare medicinal plants. Some such plants were able to use godpower to take the form of imps that could walk about and actively evade pursuit.

Yang Qi wasn’t interested in studying such medicinal plants. Thanks to his deal with the Demonfolk, he got lots of medicinal plants on a monthly basis. After all, the demonlings were much better equipped to collect such plants. And the ghostface monkey-god’s people weren’t just adept at collecting medicinal plants, but also knew how to brew amazing alcohol.

Whooosh!

Yang Qi flew for so long that eventually, he didn’t feel like he was in the world of humans anymore. He was surrounded by towering mountain peaks and primitive forests. Occasionally, flying demonlings would appear, but he would simply make himself invisible and fly past them to avoid trouble.

He flew for about six hours until he was in an immense valley, quiet and peaceful.

Landing, he waved his sleeve, and a sound like sabers and swords echoed out as numerous areas on the surrounding cliff walls exploded. All of them were spell formation nodes.

“Ghostface monkey-god! Snake goddess. You sent a message for me to meet you here to look at the Demon Master’s jade discs. Instead, you set up spell formations to ambush me?” He threw his head back and laughed, and the sound reverberated out with such explosive force that it seemed the cliffs might collapse.

“Your cultivation base only gets more and more impressive, Yang Qi.”

The ghostface monkey-god and the snake goddess appeared, both of them looking a bit chagrined. They really had hoped to trap Yang Qi in a spell formation, only to have him destroy it with casual ease.

“We were just testing out your cultivation base,” the snake goddess said. “Please, don’t take offense.”

“You’d best not stir up trouble,” Yang Qi said. “Your lives are directly in my hands!” All of a sudden, both the ghostface monkey-god and the snake goddess felt power thrumming within their hearts. Instantly, looks of shock appeared on their faces as they realized they couldn’t control their own godpower.

“W-what... what did you do to us?” the snake goddess stammered.

“Oh nothing. Just planted some devil embryos in you. You've had them inside you for months now. I can use them to control your godpower, and even read your thoughts.” Yang Qi chuckled. “Did you really think I would just casually let you leave the day we met? No, the truth is that I could have killed you any time I wanted. And I know exactly what you've been thinking all along. You really are planning to open Demon Master Valley and join forces with other Demonfolk experts to try to unlock its secrets. However, some of the other Demonfolk gods have it out for me. For example, that moon-eating lion king and the ox god. The former has a godhood rating of eight, and the latter, nine. Did you really think they’d be enough to deal with me?”

The two demon-gods looked at Yang Qi with ashen faces.

“You....”

“Can you really spy on our thoughts?”

“Of course I can.” He flicked his finger. “For example, right now you’re trying to think of ways to expel the devil embryos. You're hoping that the other Demonfolk experts will be able to save you. Sadly, that won't work. Now lead the way. Take me into Demon Master Valley.”

“What?” the snake goddess said. “You know how dangerous Demon Master Valley is, but you want to just walk right inside?”

“Of course,” Yang Qi replied. “Now quit jabbering and lead the way.”

“Yes, of course....” The two demon-gods had no choice but to comply. Flying into the air, they led Yang Qi over a few mountain peaks until they reached an immense valley with a waterfall spilling into it, filling it with mist. In the depths of that valley was an enormous door that was currently tightly closed. The door itself was as big as a mountain, and engraved with calligraphy as flamboyant as dancing dragons and swirling phoenixes. Of course, it was the script of the Demonfolk.

Numerous demon-gods were converging on the area, most of them looking expectantly at the huge door.

There was a subterranean river below the surface of the earth, and the pulsing power of heaven and earth that flowed up from it was being gathered to use in a spell formation to open the door.

This place was none other than Demon Master Valley.

It was the location where the boundless Demon Master had left behind jade discs inscribed with all sorts of energy arts, spell formation instructions, pill concocting formulas, and the like. One of the discs even contained the Psychic Devil-Raising Demon-Sacrificing Heaven-Defying Grand Magic.

Whenever the power of heaven and earth was unleashed in Demon Master Valley, the local demon-gods would gather in hopes of gaining new enlightenment.

Yang Qi stood with the ghostface monkey-god and the snake goddess, looking around at all the other demon-gods flying into the valley. While some just quietly sat down, others were engaged in conversation.

A few of them called out greetings to the snake goddess and ghostface monkey-god. “Monkey, Snake, who’s that Junior Brother with you? Which demon tribe does he come from? And considering he hasn’t reached godly ascension, why did you bring him here? Does he actually want to get himself killed?”

“Oh, this is just a friend of ours from a distant tribe.”

However, before anything else could be said, a burly man with golden hair appeared, flanked by a similarly burly man in black.

Yang Qi could instantly see that they had godhood ratings of nine and eight respectively.

One was the moon-eating lion king, the other was the ox god.

They were the very same gods that the ghostface monkey-god and snake goddess had asked to help deal with Yang Qi. Now that they had caught sight of Yang Qi alive, they were obviously going to attempt to do something to him.

“Don’t do anything!” the snake goddess said to the burly man in black. “This has all been just a misunderstanding, Big Bro Ox.”

“A misunderstanding? Seems to me you’re under his control!” The ox god stepped forward and reached out toward the snake goddess, sending out a stream of godpower that entered her and caused cracking sounds to ring out from the godhood in her sea of energy.

Yang Qi looked over at the ox.

Although he didn't say a word, an enormous, devilish specter appeared behind the ox god, which entered him and caused him to shiver. All of a sudden, he realized that his godpower was flowing only in fits and starts.

“What did you just do to me, boy!?” the ox god bellowed angrily.

“Oh, nothing. Just made you a bit more obedient. And helped you understand how strong I am.” Yang Qi had secretly used the Heaven-God Hell-Exterminating Devil Embryo to infect him. Although the ox god was able to suppress the effects, it was causing problems for his godpower, and had already reduced his fighting prowess.

“Where exactly are you from, brat?” said the burly man with the golden hair. Although he was glaring at Yang Qi, he didn’t dare to make a move against him.

“That doesn’t matter. I came to seek enlightenment from the Demon Master’s jade disc. Considering that has nothing to do with you, and we don’t have any grudge, there’s no need to get into any life-or-death struggle.” Yang Qi waved his hand and retracted the devil embryo.

Instantly, the ox god’s godpower flows returned to normal, although he was still soaked with sweat.

“Incredible. Nothing short of incredible. I understand, Sire. You clearly have grand ambitions, and want to reach the Paramount level. So you came to acquire one of the Demon Master’s techniques, the one pertaining to developing inner devils. I was coerced into causing problems for you, so please, let’s turn weapons of war into gifts of jade and silk.” The ox god clasped hands respectfully.

The truth was that they didn’t have any personal grudge with Yang Qi, and they could see that he wasn’t interested in causing problems for them. Even Demonfolk knew of the axiom, dismount a donkey on favorable terrain, in other words, take advantage of favorable conditions. For the Demonfolk, survival came first, and dignity second. It was actually the opposite of humans. Because humans often lived comfortable lives, they could afford to put dignity ahead of survival.

Yang Qi gave a vague nod and sat down cross-legged.

Their small altercation hadn’t attracted the attention of other demon-gods. This was another difference between demons and humans. Demons’ interest in self-preservation made them different from humans, who loved to watch a big scene.

A few hours passed, and the sky turned dark. At that point, a strange glow rose up from the subterranean river, gathering above the valley in the shape of a crescent moon that cast soft light everywhere.

As the enormous stone door slowly opened, a voice echoed out. “Demon Master Valley will be open for three days and three nights. Take care. If you don’t leave before the door closes, you never will.”

Whoosh. Whoosh. Whoosh.

Numerous demon-gods flew forward in streaks of light.

As for Yang Qi, he slapped his palm on the ground and instantly disappeared, giving quite a shock to the moon-eating lion king and the ox god. He really could come and go like the wind. In fact, even the wind would marvel at his methods.

He flew past the door into the valley, and saw that the area was roughly shaped like a gourd. It was huge, and the cliffs were covered with numerous jade discs, all of which emanated immense demon energy. The floor was littered with the bones of those who had entered in times past, but hadn’t left before the door closed.

The Demon Master was a legendary figure among the Demonfolk, and his secrets were here in this valley, left behind for his people to gain enlightenment of.

Chapter 1205: Psychic Devil-Raising

Upon entering Demon Master Valley, Yang Qi looked around at the jade discs and saw that every single one had text inscribed on it using a demon energy secret magic. Some were sword techniques, some were energy arts charts, and some were even methods of using godpower to become Demonfolk. The energy arts were all extremely profound and advanced, and not the type that could be easily understood or mastered.

These were energy arts that would be on the third floor of the House of God Ordainment’s Scripture Pavilion, or even higher than that.

The only difference was that they were all out in the open for anyone present to study. Clearly, the legendary Demon Master had grand aspirations for the Demonfolk, and wanted his people to understand his most secret techniques.

The Demon Master was truly a boundlessly mighty figure, similar to the Sovereign Lord or the True Devil. He was the god of the Demonfolk and the master of myriad worlds. No one knew whether or not he had perished, but what was known was that he had established versions of his valley in different parts of the god world. Each of them were unique, and each was the subject of much anticipation on the part of the Demonfolk when it came time to open them.

In the past, there had been humans who did what Yang Qi was doing now. They had entered one of the Demon Master Valleys to study, but in the end, they always met with inauspicious events.

In other words, they had all died.

Yang Qi knew that, and was aware that humans who entered Demon Master Valley would generally meet bad ends. However, to him, it was simply a challenge, one that would hopefully improve his cultivation base and substructure.

Of course, the ghostface monkey-god and the snake goddess knew full well that humans who entered the valley would die, but there was no way they would give that information to Yang Qi. They wanted him to suffer the consequences of his actions.

Thump. Swish. Rustle.

Sword energy swirled on the surface of one of the jade discs as a group of demon-gods closely studied it. It was obviously a profound sword technique that could be used to slaughter one’s enemies.

There were also jade discs with fist techniques, leg techniques, movement techniques, and internal energy circulation diagrams.

Yang Qi skipped all of those and headed deeper into the valley to look for the Psychic Devil-Raising Demon-Sacrificing Heaven-Defying Grand Magic. He was very curious to see what it was like.

When the other demon-gods saw where he was going, they shook their heads.

“So someone is feeling really suicidal today. The jade discs in that area have taboo arts passed down by the Demon Master. You have to stand head and shoulders above all other Demonfolk to seek enlightenment there, otherwise you’ll die.”

“Maybe he thinks he’s an exception. Every year there are people like this. The Demon Master dominated all creation, and even led the Demonfolk to fight against the boundless Sovereign Lord. He also had his own share of the destiny of the god world, so who wouldn’t want to have his best secret magics?”

“That's right. Supposedly, the Demon Master left behind one billion eight hundred million taboo arts, and the one in this valley is the Psychic Devil-Raising Demon-Sacrificing Heaven-Defying Grand Magic. But cultivating that is only good for getting yourself killed.”

“Forget about this guy. People die every year here. Let's just focus on this particular martial arts fist technique.” Everyone knew that there was a time limit of three days, and that those who got stuck inside would die.

Eventually, Yang Qi reached what appeared to be the end of the valley, where he caught sight of a jade disc whose surface flickered with numerous devilish specters.

At first, it looked like complete chaos. But as he focused his mind, he could tell that heart-devils were flourishing within his soul and sea of consciousness.

And they weren’t illusions. They were very real.

Suddenly, he heard a voice speaking in his ears. “Heart-devils are born to feed on the psyche. The stronger the person, the stronger the heart-devils inside them. You truly have no idea how powerful the evil inside you could be. Stimulate it, then defeat it, and you can gain the eternal. Afterward, both the evil you and the righteous you will vanish and become nothing. And that is the strongest state you can enter, in which you can grasp at Annulled will convergence....”

It was none other than the voice of the Demon Master.

‘Wait, how come that voice sounds familiar?’ Yang Qi thought. To his shock, that voice sounded extremely familiar to him, as if it had been accompanying him throughout his entire life.

‘Is it just my imagination?’ Remaining fully on guard, he continued looking at the jade disc. As he did, he saw countless streams of devilishness swirling together into the form of a person, who demonstrated how to unleash the evil version of oneself.

The devil will in his sea of consciousness was getting so abundant he could hardly control it.

Devilish specters danced on the Demon Master’s jade disc, howling and shrieking to stimulate devilishness. Yang Qi reached the point where he felt like he couldn’t endure it all and howled, his voice thrumming with wretched evil and ruthless violence. Not even he had any idea what was happening.

He felt as though his psyche had split into two versions of himself. One was cold, empty, and in control of everything. The other was a howling mass of destruction and insanity.

Crack. Crunch.

A dramatic transformation was occurring within him. The structure of his godpower spun as a faint figure split off of him. It wasn’t a psychic projection, but an actual split in his humanity and godhood.

His vital energy, flesh, blood, and all the particles that made him were transforming according to what he was seeing on the Demon Master’s jade disc. The new version was filled with wretched evil, and his true self’s vital energy was growing weak as a result.

Two versions of himself were taking shape.

‘Is it really this bad? I was just looking at the technique, and didn’t even try cultivating it. But my nascent divinity and sea of consciousness have already split, and my true energy doesn’t seem to be responding to my thoughts.’

The truth was that the psychic split that was happening was being caused by his wretched, evil side. The “Psychic Devil-Raising” aspect operated upon merely seeing the technique, which would cause devilishness to appear, take over the body, then split it apart and ultimately devour it.

Yang Qi was now looking at another version of himself, a version that resembled him in every way and contained all of his energy arts and power.

The evil version had black hair that whipped around his head, making him look like a devil-god. “This is the real me, Yang Qi! I'm you, and you’re me. But sadly, you’re too weak. I'm the only one who can unite heaven and earth, not a piece of trash like you. Even with the God Legion Seal, you run around scared all the time. You even joined that so-called House of God Ordainment. It seems to me you don’t deserve the God Legion Seal. In fact, I'm going to kill you and take it for my own.”

However, the God Legion Seal still remained within Yang Qi. He couldn’t use it on the evil version of himself, because after all, that version was still part of him.

“The evil version of me,” he murmured. “You split off from me, and you think you can beat me? Very funny!”

“I'm just as strong as you, but more ruthless,” the evil version replied. “So how could you possibly compare to me? All I have to do is kill you to become completely wretched and evil. Then I can become the True Devil, conquer the world, and become unparalleled under heaven.”

“Bring it on! Let’s fight!” Yang Qi clenched his hands into fists. “I'm curious to see how strong the evil version of me is.”

“And I'm curious how strong the calm version of me is!” Chuckling in sinister fashion, the evil version of Yang Qi flicked his finger, unleashing the unmatchable Purrfect God Art.

Yang Qi did exactly the same thing in response!

“Die!”

The evil version stretched out his hand to use the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. He held nothing back, and the shock wave of vital energy caused the entire valley to tremble violently.

In fact, some of the demon-gods were caught off guard and were sent tumbling in the opposite direction.

“What just happened?” A demon-god who had cultivated up from the form of an eagle, and had a godhood rating of eight, couldn’t stand up to the force and was flung backward.

“It's that kid who went in there. He actually split his psyche and created two versions of himself. Now they’re fighting. Fuck! He’s screwing with our enlightenment! We only have three days in here, and he's ruining things. Join forces and kill him!” It was a burly man from the Horsefolk, who rushed forward and unleashed a palm strike backed by a godhood rating of five.

Crack!

Even as the attack rumbled into the depths of the valley, a mountain-toppling, sea-draining force shot out from therein. The burly horse demon-god was caught completely unprepared and was ripped to shreds, causing gore to fill the air. His godhood appeared, but before it could do anything, a blood-red mouth appeared and gobbled it up.

Just like that, a demon-god was killed.

“Dear lord!” another demon-god shouted. “That kid hasn't even reached godly ascension, but he’s already this strong? Considering he’s split in two, shouldn’t he be weak right now?”

“Everyone join forces and crush him!” another demon-god said. “We can't let his fighting ruin our own enlightenment.”

“Alright!”

Several dozen demon-gods joined forces, sending out incredible waves of godpower to create a sealing mark that shot toward the depths of the valley.

However, an even greater energy art met it, composed of countless golden hands which crushed everything in their path.

Bam. Bam. Bam. Bam!

All of the demon-gods had godhood ratings of five, yet they screamed horribly as they died.

Chapter 1206: Split Psyche

The demon-gods joined forces, but couldn’t do anything to get the situation under control. In fact, the explosive godpower Yang Qi was unleashing had them all stumbling backward.

Ever since he’d come to the god world, Yang Qi had been holding back. But now there were two versions of him, one calm and collected while the other was evil and full of devilishness. Both had the same immense fighting experience, so it was a given that a conflict between them would be heaven-topping and earth-shaking.

Thankfully, the fight was taking place in Demon Master Valley, ensuring that the shockwaves of energy couldn’t escape to the outside and draw wider attention.

As for the demon-gods inside, they quickly realized that they couldn’t do anything, and one by one, they just left the valley. After all, every single one of them was a Lesser God, so there was no way they could deal with two versions of Yang Qi.

“I don’t know where this kid came from, but he’s definitely seeking enlightenment of the Demon Master’s Psychic Devil-Raising Demon-Sacrificing Heaven-Defying Grand Magic! But considering he's split apart his psyche, he won’t last for much longer. Ai....”

“He’s basically gone crazy and is experiencing cultivation deviation. He’ll definitely blow up in the end. I guess we’re just screwed. There’s no point in worrying about plotting against someone who’s going to die anyway.”

“Well, that’s true. If it weren’t for the fact that he’s going to die anyway, we definitely wouldn’t let him off the hook.”

The demon-gods were furious, but there was nothing they could do. In any case, they were sure that he would soon die.

Intense rumblings continued rolling out from inside the valley.

It was a sound of such explosive power that it could give birth to god lightning, and was so strong it could pull the souls of those who heard it into deep trances.

“Don’t listen to that sound!” said one of the demon-gods, who happened to be a wolf god. “It’s a deadly resonance from the Demon Master’s psychic secret magics. That guy is already losing control!”

The fight between Yang Qi and his evil version was reaching a fever pitch. In fact, it was a fight more desperate than any he had ever fought. His opponent was an exact copy of himself, and knew all of his flaws. Unfortunately, he wasn’t sure what his enemy’s flaws were.

Even worse, he didn’t have any secret weapons to unleash unexpectedly.

His evil version laughed darkly. “I'm the real Yang Qi, Fateless One. You’re just my weak spot. Once I get rid of you, heart-devil, I’ll be what I've always been meant to be! You’re weak!”

“Bullcrap!” Yang Qi said, completely unfazed by what he was hearing. It was strange to hear the evil version of himself calling his true self a heart-devil and a weakness. Although it made sense in some ways, he wouldn’t be easily shaken by such words. And he knew that if he allowed himself to be swayed, he would meet a dismal end. He would definitely lose his senses and become an actual devil king.

Right now he needed to destroy his evil will and restore himself to normal.

“Die!” the evil version howled, furious that his weak version wasn’t giving in. Reaching up, he summoned a huge sword and slashed it down toward Yang Qi.

“Prepare to die!” the evil version shouted, his black hair swirling about, black energy pulsing at his feet, almost like the eternal sands of hell. “I'm Yang Qi, and I won’t be weak again. I don’t need any negative emotions, just strength and power. Weak human feelings won't do me any good. I don’t need friendship. I don’t need family. I just need to be as cold and hard as iron.”

His sword was as red as blood and filled with cruelty to dominate the far corners of reality.

To the evil version, Yang Qi was calm and had feelings, so he was a heart-devil. But to Yang Qi, the evil version was the heart-devil.

“Heart-Devil Submission!”

A pious expression appeared on Yang Qi’s face, and he began thrumming with empyrean energy as he drew on his Sage Monarch Grand Magic. Pooling all of his energy, he summoned a sword of morality that was the perfect opposite of his evil version’s weapon.

CLANG!

They slammed into each other, then rocketed apart, slamming into opposite cliff faces before rushing right back into battle.

Energy arts and sword energy were being unleashed in grand fashion. Obviously, this was a very important fight, more important than any he had ever fought.

It was a battle of the self.

Evil Yang Qi’s godpower flowed without end, and with the backing of the God Legion Seal it didn’t seem like he would ever run out.

Clearly, Yang Qi himself was in the same position, though.

“Tribulation!” Evil Yang Qi unleashed tribulations from the Unspoiled Body, while pure Yang Qi launched a move from the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.

Both of them were protected by bubbles that would cause huge shockwaves of godpower to roll out when they clashed.

“I don’t need your wretched, devil will. I need clarity, wisdom, valor, and nothingness. I need not evil, ruthlessness, distortion, ferocity....” Yang Qi was speaking such things as he fought, filling him with a sense of happiness, fighting spirit, and confidence.

“Bah! You’re weak, and it's all your fault! That’s why I haven’t been able to flex my muscles in the god world. If it weren’t for me, you would’ve been nothing but a hedonistic silkpants in the lands of mortals. You would’ve been a woman’s plaything, only to be thrown to the side. I'm the one who got you your revenge. I killed Yun Hailan. I helped you kill the Crown Prince! Without me, you’re nothing but a weak piece of trash! How many times have I helped you? Apparently not enough, and that's why I'm finally going to kill you today!”

The evil Yang Qi seemed to be getting fiercer and more ruthless, until he pulsed with so much killing intent that it seemed as if he were fully entrenched in the dao of wretch-devils.

“Wrong. I used wisdom, clarity, and emptiness in the impure lands. That's how I ended up here. I don’t need your insanity. With you, I'm nothing but an ignorant madman. In fact, the time has come for you to begone.”

RUMBLE!

Their fists collided and a deafening shock wave rolled out.

The fighting was reaching a peak. As it did, Yang Qi was gaining further enlightenment, yet his evil self also benefited from all of it.

“Hey, you!” his evil version said. “As we fight, our cultivation bases improve. And it doesn’t look like either of us can beat the other. How about we just go our separate ways, work on our cultivation for ten years, then have a rematch?”

“Yeah right. I have the God Legion Seal, and you might have split from me, but you can’t take it away. Nor can you take the sheepskin scroll or the Mahātmā Jade. The only way for you to get them is to kill me. Considering how raving mad you are, if you go out into the god world, you’ll end up dead sooner rather than later. So quit it with the tricks. I'm also Yang Qi, I know them all. You really think they would work on me? This is a fight of the self; in other words, a contest to see whose will is stronger. Whoever has the calmest heart will beat the other, and what you lack is my calm and clarity!”

Yang Qi’s voice was the perfect representation of emptiness and clarity.

“Die!” the evil version screamed. “I'm going to break through, then you won’t be able to do anything to me! You may be calm, but I'm strong! We’ll see who comes out on top. There will be only one! Fine, I’ll show you what it really means to go all out. True-Devil Myriad Tribulations. Tribulations Destroy Everything. I am Nirvanic Rebirth. Enter Destruction, Enter Tribulation!”

RUMBLE!

Over ten thousand tribulations converged on the evil Yang Qi. “I've gained enlightenment of the Unspoiled Body, and I know how to survive tribulations. Once you enter the sea of bitterness, tribulations are born!”

The tribulations exploded, and the evil version lunged forward. “We can also just die together. I'm your hatred, so if you want to get rid of me, I’d rather Yang Qi just cease to exist!”

Yang Qi had the ability to fight with the goal of ending in mutual destruction.

Except this time, it was being used by himself, against himself.

That said, he remained cool and collected, and as the evil version of himself approached, he dodged to the side and drew on the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. Godpower flowed through him like a mighty river bursting out of a dyke.

Thrusting his palm out, he struck directly toward a weakness he had noticed, striking the evil version with heaven-shaking, earth-shattering force.

However, in the end, nothing happened.

“Ready to give up, Yang Qi?” the evil version laughed. “I know you can't do anything to me. And if you don’t surrender, we’ll both die. I know you want to live, but I don't really care. That’s how ruthless I am!”

Chapter 1207: Defeating Oneself

Contrary to expectation, the evil Yang Qi was threatening to end the fight in mutual destruction, hoping that, in response, Yang Qi would surrender.

He was exerting all his force and putting everything on the line, backing every move with immense levels of godpower. In fact, it didn’t matter what the cool and collected Yang Qi did, the evil version struck back with a force that sent him reeling.

Winds screamed in Demon Master Valley, and the godpower fluctuations seemed powerful enough to rip apart space itself. In the god world, space was incredibly tough, so much so that even gods with actual godhood couldn't tear it apart. Only Greater Gods with Paramount will convergence could hope to pierce through it.

But the two versions of Yang Qi were actually doing it. And such an act could only be described using words such as heaven-defying, freakish, abnormal, and terrifying.

Of course, it all pointed to an imminent breakthrough to the Paramount level.

“I'm not worried about ending the fight in mutual destruction,” the calm Yang Qi said. “What joy be there in life? What bitterness be there in death? You listen to me. I rose from the impure lands, step by step. Starting from the Energy Arts level, I proceeded through Lifeseizing, Legendary, Great Sage, Demi-Immortal, Demolishing, and Godmyth. Then I stepped on the Deathless Heavenly Stairway to reach my current position. And I didn't do it by relying on brute force alone. I had to show tolerance. I had to have an empty heart, an annulled heart, a heart that exists above nothing. So... bring it on. If we die together, so be it. I'm a Fateless One who was never supposed to exist. So what does it matter if I die? Lifeless and destructionless, annulled and pure....”

At this critical juncture, it seemed that Yang Qi had actually reached a state of truly becoming lifeless and destructionless. Everlasting.

His will had reached a major juncture, causing an eruption that was forcing it toward the threshold of the Paramount level.

“You’re breaking through? Sadly, we’re one and the same. Whatever enlightenment you get, I get too!” The evil Yang Qi burst out laughing. “Psychic power boost! Annulled Grand Magic!”

RUMBLE!

Psychic shockwaves rolled out in all directions from the two combatants, provoking meteorological phenomena of all sorts. Thunder boomed, rain fell, snow showered down. There was even burning light and freezing ice.

This was definitely the power of the Greater God level.

After all, only Greater Gods could provoke meteorological phenomena like this, thanks to having Paramount will.

As Yang Qi unleashed his most powerful divine abilities, his evil version threw his head back and let loose a long cry. “God Legion Lament. Myriad Tribulations Devil Hand. Five Decays of the Deva!”

Whizz!

A terrifying devil hand appeared, boundless in size and scope, large enough to support the sun, moon, and the void itself, powerful enough to crush mountains and rivers, overturn the cosmos, upend primal-chaos, and shatter universes.

The evil Yang Qi was unleashing all of the devilishness he contained in his heart, including the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body. Thanks to his enlightenment of the secret magic, he could summon thousands of tribulation characters to create this terrifying hand that was now reaching out toward the calm Yang Qi to destroy him.

“Get ready to die, you weakling!” the evil Yang Qi said, laughing maniacally. “How could you possibly prevail over me? Now that I understand how to unleash the Myriad Tribulations Devil Hand, you’re going to see what real ferocity is!”

“When I was born, the void was peaceful and quiet. I was free and unconstrained....” Yang Qi didn’t seem to be throwing up any defenses at all. It was as if he had gained enlightenment of a higher level. A moment later, the terrifying devil hand hit him, and he shattered into nothing. He dissipated into the void.

Then he appeared directly above the evil Yang Qi, standing inverted, placing their heads almost touching.

“What are you doing?” the evil Yang Qi bellowed.

“Restoring my unified body. Defeating my heart-devil.” The calm Yang Qi’s voice was cold and seemed to lack anything that could stir the will. And as he spoke, his body turned as translucent as flowing water.

“DIIIEEEE!” the evil Yang Qi howled, his face distorted with rage. “Nobody can beat me! Not even myself! I’ll kill myself before I let you subdue me, Yang Qi. We’ll both die!”

Immense godpower erupted from the evil Yang Qi, causing his body to begin crumbling. “True Devil Disintegration; Damned by Myriad Tribulations; Sink into Everlasting Oblivion; Aeonic Darkness and Gloom!”

Anyone who heard that evil voice would be chilled to the core.

The hysterical laughter was the kind that could only be heard when someone reached the peak of madness and was ready to end their own life. In the past, many people who had attempted to cultivate the Psychic Devil-Raising Demon-Sacrificing Heaven-Defying Grand Magic would go mad at this point, ultimately exploding in death.

It seemed as though Yang Qi was no exception.

The evil Yang Qi’s devilishness erupted with destructive power, engulfing his calm version and ripping him apart.

All of Demon Master Valley reverberated with the sound of the explosion.

Then, after a long moment passed, everything went quiet.

Outside the valley, the demon-gods finally sensed that the energy shockwaves had died down. Looking inside, they saw nothing but ruins and rubble.

“Things finally calmed down.”

“The brat experienced cultivation deviation and couldn't extricate himself. He's dead. Ai. How come there are always suicidal people who think they’re the main characters of all heaven and earth? Well, this is how they die.”

“The brat died, just like all of the other people who study the Demon Master’s ultimate taboo jade disc. How tragic....”

Inside the valley, the ghostface monkey-god didn't dare to look at the taboo jade disc. Shaking his head, but with an expression of delight, he said, “I guess we can just assimilate the devil embryos now.”

“Yeah,” the snake goddess replied. “It would make no sense at all if he survived that. Plenty of elite Demonfolk experts have died here, much less people who aren’t Demonfolk. And even if he survived, there’s no saying he would benefit at all. Let's look around and see if he left behind any magical treasures worth taking. That was a big explosion. Almost on the same level as the self-detonation of a Common God with a rating of ten or more. I really can’t imagine how he caused something like that.”

Striding over, the ox god smiled coolly and said, “Considering he didn’t achieve godly ascension, he must’ve had a big stockpile of godpower. He was definitely one of the top geniuses I've ever seen. Better than the top geniuses of any of the major sects. But in the end, he couldn’t defy heaven and ended up dead. What a pity.”

“He’s dead, and that’s that,” said the moon-eating lion king. “But it doesn't look like he left behind any magical treasures. They were all destroyed in the explosion.”

Other demon-gods were there, looking around, but none of them could find any treasures left behind. Apparently, everything had been destroyed in the explosion.

“Forget about it. Some kid died, it’s not a big deal. This kind of thing happens millions of times per day in the god world. No one even knows how many top geniuses perish at any given time.” Many of the demon-gods turned to leave, not wanting to be close to the taboo jade disc and possibly suffer a similar fate.

However, before they could walk off, an immense force of will suddenly descended from above.

Cries of shock and bellows of rage rang out as the ghostface monkey-god, snake goddess, ox god, and moon-eating lion king were forced down on their hands and knees.

“This is beyond Terrifying! This is Paramount! Paramount will convergence!” Many of the demon-gods were being pressed down into the mud because of the force weighing down on them.

The Paramount level was something that countless gods dreamed of reaching, but only Greater Gods could understand.

In other words, gods that didn’t reach the Paramount level could only be Lesser Gods.

But now, someone with Paramount will had appeared.

“Who is it?”

Many of the demon-gods didn’t even dare to look up or release their divine will to check their surroundings. Thus, few saw the bizarre scene that was playing out. Countless scraps of power were collecting, flying through the air to create a perfect body as tall and strong as a mountain. But at the same time, its vital energy seemed empty and soft, as though it didn’t exist at all.

It was Yang Qi’s body.

He had exploded, but he’d also reached the Paramount level, whereupon he reformed his body. His previous body had become incomparably strong, but was destroyed. He had died, but his will survived. And after his death, he overcame his evil side, gaining deep enlightenment that allowed him to break through to the Paramount level.

His new body was stronger than the old one, because it had absorbed the spatial power of the god world. After all, he had been unable to manipulate that spatial power in the past. But now his will could spread out into the god world and perceive many things. His eyes were clear, able to perceive the cultivation methods of any type of energy art. He could perceive the secrets of space, and he now saw that the space of the god world wasn’t linear. It was a spatial labyrinth, filled with all sorts of dangers. Unfortunately, his cultivation base wasn’t at a level that would allow him to pierce through it yet. But he could draw on it to form a new body.

The God Legion Seal, sheepskin scroll, and Mahātmā Jade were hidden deep within the space that made up his body. After all, each particle within him was like its own dimension. They were small, each of them only the size of a bean, and that was after his major cultivation base improvement.

But in the past, they had been the size of dust. As such, the fact that they were now the size of beans went to show how much his godpower reserves had increased.

Now he realized why reaching the Paramount level before becoming a god led to monarch godhood.

Chapter 1208: Paramount Before Godly Ascension

In the Paramount level, one could absorb the power of space and imbue it into their flesh and blood. That made it possible to store greater levels of godpower, and when one used spatial might to crush it down, it would lead to godhood that surpassed that of ordinary experts by thousands of times over.

Upon closing his eyes, Yang Qi saw that the basic structure of the god world was much different than he had previously assumed. The surface was an ordinary world, but deeper inside were countless dangers, including wild energy flows and dangerous power convergences. And above the highest heavens was incomparable radiance and light, and indescribable darkness and gloom. They rotated in a cycle that created day and night, pulsing with a power that surpassed even the Sovereign Lord. There was no will that could surpass the very will of the god world that made everything turn.

With his body completely reformed, his Paramount will was complete and he radiated an incomparably imposing boldness.

His every move and action were like those of a consummate hegemon whose mere presence made it hard for the surrounding demon-gods to breathe.

Yet Yang Qi still hadn’t reached godly ascension. He had reached the Paramount level, but he was still not a god. He was like a furnace that had reached the ultimate level of heat, and all that remained was to pour the iron ore inside to smelt.

It was a given that, with enough time to work on his cultivation, he would easily crush any Greater God who got in his path. After all, while Greater Gods had Paramount will, they lacked monarch godhood. The moment one formed one’s godhood, it foreordained what would come for them in the future. And most cultivators needed to become Greater Gods before they could reach the Paramount level.

In the impure lands, it would be like the difference between an eighteen-year-old multi-millionaire, and someone who became a multi-millionaire at age seventy.

The wealth was the same, but the eighteen-year-old would be able to enjoy it more, and accomplish more with it.

Truth be told, although legends spoke of people who had reached the Paramount level before becoming gods, and even talked about the incredible things they were capable of, most people assumed they were just that: legends.

However, the demon-gods present were all here bearing witness to Yang Qi’s legendary achievement.

Yet even as they gasped in astonishment, an immense, overwhelming psychic will entered their minds and wiped their memories clean.

With his Paramount will, they couldn’t resist him at all and had no choice but to utterly and thoroughly accept his superiority.

Such was Paramount will. It was so far above everything else that there was no second option other than to acknowledge allegiance.

People below the Paramount level who tried to fight Yang Qi wouldn’t even be able to lift a hand in their own defense.

WHOOSH!

Yang Qi left Demon Master Valley.

He didn’t want word of his accomplishment spreading, as it would surely lead to a disaster. If his sect found out, it was possible they would view him as an invincible person worth helping. They might even give him a powerful position. Or they could denounce him as a freakish hellion and lock him up to experiment on.

At a certain point, one could become so amazing that their fortunes could be reversed. After all, when things reach an extreme, they can only move in the opposite direction. In order to keep his secret, he wiped away the memories of all the demon-gods who had witnessed the event.

Flying up into the sky, he looked down at the mountains and, with a faint smile, sent his will out to fill a five-kilometer area, causing black clouds to form and rain to fall.

Then, with another stir of will, he caused snow to fall and intense coldness to fill the area. With another thought, he made everything turn as calm and refreshing as spring, then thunder rumbled out.

He could use his will to manipulate the meteorological phenomena in the god world. Although he was limited to a five-kilometer area, that would improve with further breakthroughs.

“Open up!” he said, chopping his hand out like a blade. Rumbling sounds echoed out as a rift opened and a wild black wind erupted out from inside.

Swish!

Yang Qi dodged aside and the wind slammed into a nearby mountain, reducing it to rubble.

‘It’s that incredible?’

Even as Yang Qi looked on in shock, the rift closed up as surely as if he had just used a saber to slash through water. He had just tapped into the spatial power of the god world, similar to how, in the impure lands, the Space-Void Transformation of the Legendary level was when one could pierce through the void.

In the god world, space was too strong, and opening a rift in it would cause destructive tempests to fly out and destroy anything in their path, even mountains. Obviously, if it hit a person, it would destroy them just as well.

Yang Qi performed another experiment, using a finger to slice open a smaller opening.

WHACK!

Wind shot out like a flying sword, hitting him right in the chest.

He was flung backward, eventually slamming into the side of a mountain, a jagged hole in his chest. Shockingly, even his vital energy had been damaged significantly.

‘Strong. So strong....’ Struggling to his feet, he drew on the God Legion Seal, sending golden light into the charred hole in his chest that sank all the way into his bones, and even his five viscera and six bowels. After roughly an hour, he was healed.

At this point, he realized how powerful the spatial tempests here were. In fact, if he didn’t have his initial version of monarch godhood and a deathless body, he wouldn’t have survived.

‘Right. I wonder how high the sky is in the god world. I think I need to take a look.’ Leaping off the ground, he floated up into the sky. Before, he had been able to fly, but only at low altitudes where the energy flows were ordinary, even comfortable. As he rose higher, things changed.

In the god world, it was possible to fly at low altitudes below thirty thousand meters. But above that level, even gods had to proceed with caution.

At thirty thousand meters, the vital energy grew unstable and chaotic. Godwinds blew about wildly and the light was intense, causing hissing sounds to ring out when it touched Yang Qi.

He produced a dagger and threw it out. The dagger was caught up by a gust of wind, and sparks showered down as it was wiped out of existence in the shortest of moments.

‘Strong, but roughly on the same level as ordinary spatial tempests.’ Climbing higher, he soon reached a height of ninety thousand meters. Here, the winds screamed so loudly that he couldn’t hear anything, and the light was blinding.

Whoosh!

His clothes ignited from the heat. Although there was no sun in the god world, the light was still extremely hot, and more so the higher one flew into the sky.

It was almost as if the sky contained both wind and fire.

And wind helped fire burn. All of a sudden, Yang Qi realized that his Heaven and Earth Furnace was aptly named.

He continued climbing higher. One hundred and fifty thousand meters. One hundred and eighty thousand. Three hundred thousand. Three hundred fifty thousand. Six hundred thousand. At that point, everything around him was chaos and fiery rays of light. His clothes were completely burned off, and his vital energy was being eaten away. He could tell that if he flew higher, he would die.

Six hundred thousand meters was his limit.

Yang Qi stopped there and considered waiting a few hours to see what would happen when night fell. In the blink of an eye, everything changed, and when the darkness hit, it became freezing. In fact, in the blink of an eye, he was encased in solid ice and started falling.

He couldn’t move and was forced to draw on the true flame inside of him to melt the ice. Cracking sounds could be heard as it collapsed, and he finally stopped his downward motion, hovering at about three thousand meters.

Chapter 1209: Returning to the Sect

After reaching the Paramount level, Yang Qi flew as high into the sky as he could, then remained there until night fell. The experience gave him a lot of enlightenment. And although he couldn’t pierce through the void here, he was at least capable of incredible speed.

It only took an incense stick’s worth of time to fly out of the dense mountains and back to the mines. Before, that trip would have taken hours.

As of now, the speeds attainable by Quasi-Gods were snail-like to him.

In fact, compared to him, Quasi-Gods could do little more than glide. Part of that was due to the fact that they couldn’t meet the godpower requirement, and also because flying, and dealing with the winds, were fundamentally difficult.

Even ordinary Lesser Gods couldn’t fly particularly fast. At best, they might turn into a beam of light that shot off into the distance. As for Yang Qi, he could become a black streak that moved without sound and couldn’t be tracked with the naked eye.

After landing back at Mine One, he reined in his energy arts and used the Devil-God Seal to keep the level of his will concealed. To any prying eyes, he would seem like a Terrifying expert, and wouldn’t reveal any clues as to the truth.

“Zhang Jufang, Cherry, come here!”

Immediately, Zhang Jufang and Cherry hurried out and dropped to their knees. They were joined by others among Yang Qi’s most loyal followers from the mines.

“Brother,” Zhang Jufang said, “you’re back! Did anything noteworthy happen in your meeting with the Demonfolk?”

“Not really. In fact, things didn’t go very well.” Yang Qi looked around at the various disciples. Although they were weak Quasi-Gods, they were all loyal. Over the past months, they had done a good job running the Sage Monarch Consortium, and considering the profits they had brought in, it was only natural for him to reward them.

He flicked his finger, sending a bean-sized conglomeration of crystallized godpower into all of them. “You all work for the Sage Monarch Consortium, and I always reward my people for their service. This is some crystallized godpower that will purify you in body and soul, giving you increased hopes of achieving a breakthrough. Going forward, I want to expand the operations of the Sage Monarch Consortium. Focus on the godstone trade, and use this bag of imperial caliber godstones as your initial capital.”

“Yes sir,” Zhang Jufang said, accepting the bag. “But once these imperial caliber godstones hit the market, it's going to cause a huge stir. A lot of powerful organizations will take a fresh look at our mines, and I'm afraid we aren’t strong enough to defend against gods.”

“Don’t worry. The intention is for you to use those godstones to power your spell formations. I actually have additional plans for the consortium. Got it?”

“Yes!”

“Good. You stay here and work on your cultivation, I'm going into seclusion in the mansion grotto.” He entered the mansion grotto of Mine One. It was currently occupied by the new disciple who had been assigned as the foreman, but as soon as he saw Yang Qi approaching, he respectfully let him in.

Entering, Yang Qi sat down and began a session of cultivation. He was worried that if he entered the god kingdom of the House of God Ordainment, his practice of cultivation would attract attention. After all, Bai Yin was no fool, and knew that Yang Qi had secrets. Right now, he wanted to focus on unraveling more mysteries of the godnotes.

His previous efforts had been too flawed, and he hadn’t had any way to make up for them. Furthermore, he couldn’t place a Paramount God sealing mark on the notes. But now he had replaced hunting rifles with cannons, and considering he had Paramount will convergence, it was entirely possible that he could produce actual godnotes.

He also had no idea how much more powerful the God Legion Seal would be now that he was in the Paramount level.

‘Time to make some godnotes!’

He drew on his godpower, causing the God Legion Seal to produce an enormous golden hand. The hand reached out, and god vitality appeared, then began condensing into the form of a godnote.

One note descended onto his palm.

It looked like a piece of metal, and didn’t seem like it would dissipate at any time. Yang Qi took out a real godnote to compare them, and confirmed that they were the same. His version even had a Paramount sealing mark on it.

That was the result of the God Legion Seal.

Even a single godnote was worth so much that it could be used to purchase all sorts of things. And now Yang Qi could make them. Rising to his feet, he laughed heartily. ‘The Paramount level is extraordinary! I can actually make godnotes now!’ Waving his hand, he summoned more notes.

Clink. Clank.

Within moments, godnotes were falling like snowflakes around him, until they covered the floor.

That said, the effort completely drained him of godpower, leaving him totally empty. Creating godnotes took a lot of godpower.

‘What an effort,’ he thought. With the help of the God Legion Seal, he drew on the godpower around him once again. Thanks to the seal, even if he completely drained himself, he could recover fairly quickly. He had no idea how long it would take, even if he had medicinal pills to help. For all he knew it could take months, or even longer.

The God Legion Seal was proving to be truly useful nowadays.

Even with the help of the seal, he still needed over a month to completely refill his reserves of godpower. His capacity had increased a lot, but that meant that it took longer to recover from draining it.

That said, the month of time he spent bolstering his godpower also resulted in it becoming much more refined.

With Paramount will, he had the perfect balance. If he wanted to erupt with power, he could. If he wanted to hide his power, he could. Sending his godpower into the ground, he reached out to the fifty-six mountains and subtly transformed them, creating numerous hidden spell formations. He also planted numerous high-quality ores in the mines to be extracted later by the miners.

During the month of cultivation, he truly came to understand how different monarch godhood was from ordinary godhood. It required nearly endless amounts of godpower, such that not even the God Legion Seal could keep up with it. At the rate he was going, he would probably need a hundred years before his monarch godhood would actually reach a state of completion.

What he needed now was medicinal pills to boost his godpower.

‘A hundred thousand godnotes! I actually have a hundred thousand godnotes!’ After replenishing his godpower, he collected the godnotes and counted them.

He shook his head. ‘Ai, the only downside is that it drains my godpower so severely. It actually took a whole month to recover. And that's going to push back the date when my monarch godhood is complete. I won’t be a dominating force in the god world at this rate.’

Sighing, he decided not to make any more godnotes going forward. The loss of godpower was just too significant, and the delays were too severe.

The most pressing matter at hand was to finish forming his monarch godhood.

After replenishing his godpower, it roiled in his sea of energy and poured into his virtual godhood, which was currently fist-sized. But no matter how much godpower he poured in, it didn’t seem to get full. It was as if he was pouring his godpower into a bottomless pit.

The upside was that he could take the godpower back out if he needed to use it. That was why, when forming godhood, one needed to be able to cultivate in seclusion without worrying about fighting or being attacked.

Creating godhood was a very consuming process.

But how could one do anything worthwhile without paying a price?

Thankfully, Yang Qi had the God Legion Seal and could constantly draw on the essence of the god world and turn it into godpower. He also had medicinal pills to help. After all, it required so much resources for a Quasi-God to become a true god that many small clans couldn’t even afford to sustain one effort.

‘I need the godnotes to help fund the consortium,’ he thought. ‘It’ll be very helpful to have the Sage Monarch Consortium grow larger. For now, I can use them to buy medicinal pills that bolster godpower. As for making more, I’ll shelve that idea for now.’

“Zhang Jufang, take these godnotes. There are a hundred thousand. Use them to grow the consortium. If you have any important matters, don’t hesitate to let me know.”

“Yes sir!” Zhang Jufang said. Although he was shocked, he had been working for Yang Qi long enough that he wasn’t completely stunned. And he didn't ask any questions. Oftentimes, knowing too many secrets about one’s powerful superiors could be dangerous.

“You’ve done well in the past months, Zhang Jufang. However, you’re still not a god. Right now, I'm going to anoint you with a secret magic that’ll give you a solid foundation for godly ascension. If things go as expected, you should make your breakthrough within a year. At that point, with a god in charge of the Sage Monarch Consortium, I’ll be much more at ease.”

BAM!

Yang Qi placed his hand onto Zhang Jufang’s head and sent godpower flowing into him, causing a golden flower to bloom around him.

Chapter 1210: Returning to the Sect (2)

Yang Qi was really helping Zhang Jufang, as he wanted him to become a Lesser God as quickly as possible to help run the Sage Monarch Consortium.

In terms of funds, creating godnotes wasn’t a viable option right now. Even using godpower to make godstones wouldn't work. He needed every bit of godpower possible to finish his monarch godhood.

With those two options off the table, it seemed impossible for him to become truly wealthy. At best, he could pass as rich in a pinch.

For now, he had to rely on his little Sage Monarch Consortium. And it would be much easier for Zhang Jufang to run the business as a god. After all, as a Quasi-God, he was like a servant or slave to other gods, and would always have to defer to them.

As long as he was god, then other gods, be they Lesser or Common, would at least have to treat him with a modicum of respect.

With his Paramount will, Yang Qi helped Zhang Jufang to form his virtual godhood, causing a golden flower to form around him, sending golden light streaming into his sea of energy.

Eventually, the golden flower was firmly implanted in him.

Zhang Jufang rose to his feet, thrumming with endless power.

“Work hard on your cultivation,” Yang Qi said. “Got it? I'm going to give you a godly-class energy art called the Great-Void King-Bodhi Seal, which is perfectly suited for your constitution. Truth be told, before you become a god, there isn’t any other energy art that would be more suitable for you.” Yang Qi had so many godly-class energy arts at his disposal that it would be an understatement to claim that they were as vast as the open sea. Therefore, he picked the best one for Zhang Jufang. Doing anything else would have led to counterproductive results.

Having accomplished those things, he headed back to the teleportation portal that led to the god kingdom of the House of God Ordainment.

On the second level of the Scripture Pavilion, things were as relaxed as ever, with Bai Yin spending most of his time reading and drinking. Upon seeing Yang Qi return, and not noticing anything unusual about him, he said, “You were gone quite a while. Considering how upbeat you seem, my guess is that your trip was worth it. Did you get a nice magical treasure or something?”

“Actually, no. I went out to the mines and had a meeting with some demon-gods. I have a little business deal with them, that’s all. I'm not going to be able to accomplish much without some steady income.”

Bai Yin chuckled. “You’ve got big plans, don’t you? Want to make a big scene eventually? Oh, by the way, some new books came in. Our House of God Ordainment got into a fight with the Macrocloud Buddhist Sect, and we ended up wiping them out. A bunch of records came in, including some writings from Monk Great Virtue, describing methods of improving the fleshly body to form Paramount will convergence before godly ascension. Take a look.”

Countless people in the god world longed to reach the Paramount level before becoming a god. That included devils, buddhas, gods, geniuses, freakish hellions, and even wild animals. Experts from all walks of life would research the subject, and although no one had yet succeeded, it didn’t stop people from trying.

“Is that so?” Yang Qi said, looking over at the bookshelf Bai Yin was laying on top of. It featured numerous sutras inscribed on palm-leaf manuscripts. Taking one at random, he saw that the title was Profundities of Śarīras and Godhood. It didn’t contain any cultivation information, but it did have detailed, systematic explanations of the similarities and differences the buddhist schools had identified between śarīras and godhood. Even more noteworthy, it contained a theory about how to strengthen godhood toward the point of becoming monarch godhood.

“That’s pure fiction,” Yang Qi said. “How could it be that simple?”

He put the book back on the shelf and selected another one. This one was titled A Thesis on Wisdom and the Void. It discussed the correlation between one’s wisdom and the void, and mentioned important aspects of improving one’s psyche and will, although it was primarily theoretical.

After flipping through it, Yang Qi picked another book, this one entitled The Psyche and Dharma Idols. It talked of how to use psychic power to make dharma idols, and how to absorb the vital energy of heaven and earth to improve one’s attack power. It wasn’t something that would help with cultivation, but it did contain some good information about the psyche and vital energy. All of the books had been written by gods, and while they might have been helpful to Yang Qi in the past, now that he was in the Paramount level, he understood much more about such matters. Because of that, he wouldn’t be able to gain any enlightenment from books like these.

Time passed. Yang Qi spent most of his time gathering godpower and sending it into his virtual godhood with the goal of completing his monarch godhood. Other than that, he just found books to read.

He could read much faster now. While Bai Yin would need to look through one book at a time, Yang Qi could scan entire shelves with his psyche, and read thousands of books at the same time.

Knowledge poured into his sea of consciousness, which he then filtered to find little bits that could help him. In Demon Master Valley, he had defeated himself, and therefore, had even less to fear from knowledge-devils than before.

Days went by, and although he continued working on his cultivation, his virtual monarch godhood wasn’t making any significant progress.

His virtual godhood was like a professional eater with a bottomless stomach. At the current rate, it seemed likely that the process would take eighty or even a hundred years. He probably wouldn’t notice any significant change in only a year or two.

That said, he wasn’t in a rush. For half a year, he read books and worked on his cultivation. He had already read through most of the books in the Scripture Pavilion that were available to him, and the knowledge within them was his.

He knew just about everything there was to know about forming godhood, and as he worked on his monarch godhood, all of that knowledge served as an excellent point of reference.

He also knew much more about the local customs of the god world, its geography, and the businesses that operated there. No major events occurred, and life was leisurely. Neither Jadefall, the Shepherd, Doom, his father, nor anyone else he knew ever came to visit the Scripture Pavilion. He wasn’t sure why that was. However, after some asking around, he learned that Jadefall was in seclusion working on her cultivation. Besides, she was already so important that ordinary official disciples didn’t qualify to see her.

That was what often happened with disciples that were taken in by important people.

Over the months, the Sage Monarch Consortium had finally started growing. Zhang Jufang ended up reaching godly ascension earlier than Yang Qi had estimated. He was now a Lesser God and was doing his best to advance the interests of the business.

One morning, Yang Qi let loose a long, loud yawn. Inside him, godpower was constantly flowing into his sea of energy and the virtual godhood there.

Sensing what seemed like hunger from the godhood, he shook his head. ‘Maybe I should go work on some missions for the sect. With merit points to buy the god pills I need, maybe I can form my godhood faster.’

His monarch godpower was so mighty that ordinary god pills wouldn’t help him. In fact, they would only add impurities. He needed god pills concocted by Greater Gods with the Paramount will to extrude impurities.

Unfortunately, god pills like that went for astronomical prices, such that ordinary disciples in the House of God Ordainment could never afford them. Although he and Bai Yin could earn some merit points thanks to their duties, to date he had only accumulated a bit over a hundred. And that wasn’t even close enough to get god pills concocted by Greater Gods.

Such pills would cost ten thousand merit points at a minimum. It made sense, considering how unimaginably pure they were.

God pills were classified by the will of the gods that made them. Yang Qi needed paramount god pills at the least. Of course, they were normally split into three tiers of quality.

After the paramount version were the unbounded god pills, which were similarly split into three tiers.

The highest quality were the sovereign god pills, which were created by gods who were half a step into the Annulled level. In other words, people like the Sovereign Lord, King Immortal-Slayer, the King of Godmammoths, the True Devil, and the Demon Master. If such pills even appeared in the god world, they would create a tempest of blood as everyone attempted to get their hands on them.

Yang Qi wasn’t even thinking in terms of pills like that.

“Hey, Bai Yin, have you ever thought of doing missions for the sect to get merit points? I'm considering trying to get some god pills concocted by Paramount experts.”

“Sure, but even low-quality paramount god pills are going to cost ten thousand merit points or more. People like us can’t even dream of getting them. What are you trying to do? Have you figured out some way to reach the Paramount level?” Bai Yin’s eyes glittered.

“That’s right, I have an idea,” Yang Qi said. “And I want to do a little experiment.”

Chapter 1211: Taking a Mission

“What?! You want to use paramount god pills for an experiment? Have you gone crazy or something? A single paramount god pill is worth ten thousand merit points. Neither of us have enough to afford even one! If I were you, I wouldn’t use a pill like that unless I was absolutely certain it would work. You know, there are a lot of people in the world who want to form monarch godhood. Even junior sect leaders of big sects, who actually have the resources to use paramount god pills. Even the high-quality versions. And none of them have ever succeeded. I’d suggest not wasting your time on that. It isn’t going to work.”

Yang Qi knew that Bai Yin was just trying to give him some good advice.

And the truth was that he wasn’t interested in Paramount will convergence, but rather bolstering his godpower. Compared to the truly rich and powerful experts of the god world, Yang Qi and Bai Yin were ants. There were definitely junior sect leaders from major sects who could afford to snack on paramount god pills, yet none of them had ever formed monarch godhood.

In short, it just wasn’t possible for Quasi-Gods to use outside power to acquire Paramount will.

Bai Yin and people like him hoped they could figure out some secret that would lead to success. But could they compete in resources with junior sect leaders?

“I still want to give it a shot,” Yang Qi said, smiling.

“Whatever. If you want to waste time being crazy, go ahead. But I'm not coming. I’d rather enjoy my time with my books. Seek enlightenment and improve the compatibility of my psyche and fleshly body. Besides, if you use outside power, you’re going to have to deal with dependency-devils and heart-devils.” He shook his head. “Just go to the Missions Sanctuary. I'm sure you can find some missions to earn good merit points. But ten thousand? How long will that take? All for a single pill to do an experiment? Is it worth it? If I were to bet, I'd say it’ll take you between three to five years to save up that much. And how many years do you have left to live?”

No matter how strong Quasi-Gods were, they had limited longevity, perhaps a few hundred years at most.

For example, if Bai Yin didn’t acquire Paramount will within the next few dozen years, he would eventually reach the point where he couldn't hope to succeed. At that point, he would have to form his godhood and become a god, lest he die.

As for Yang Qi, he could actually live a lot longer now that he had reached Paramount will. In the impure lands, Terrifying experts were essentially undying. But in the god world, it required Paramount will to achieve the same thing.

“Go on,” Bai Yin said, waving his hand dismissively. “I can handle things in the Scripture Pavilion by myself. I’ll just wait till you’re done wasting your time, or perhaps crawl back bruised and bloody.”

‘I like this Bai Yin,’ Yang Qi thought, ‘although, he’s too independent. He can be a friend, but he wouldn't do well as a subordinate.’ With such thoughts on his mind, Yang Qi left and headed toward the Missions Sanctuary.

That was the majestic building in the sect where missions could be acquired. Disciples and elders alike would take missions there, then return later to turn them in for merit points, which they could exchange for magical treasures.

The god kingdom was so huge that it seemed almost endless. Thankfully, the Great Classic of God Ordainment contained a map. Furthermore, he had now been a disciple for over a year, so he was much more familiar with the place than he used to be.

He flew for about an hour until he found a sprawling plane, upon which were a host of temples and halls of various sizes. It looked almost like an imperial city from the impure lands, with countless disciples going to and fro. This was the Missions Sanctuary.

Some disciples were gathered in groups of four or five, while others formed teams in the hundreds. Some missions were so difficult that a single person could never accomplish them. Instead, large teams were required.

In fact, that was one way that various halls and factions in the sect were formed.

A good example was Elder Sister Xue’s Snow Society, which had many disciples as members, including gods.

Generally speaking, the Quasi-Gods in the House of God Ordainment were official disciples. Ordinary gods were called elite disciples, with higher-ranking ones called holy children. Above them were the children of primeval chaos. That was the ranking system for disciples in the House of God Ordainment.

There were only four ranks, and the differences between them were vast.

Upon arriving, Yang Qi ignored all the people going in and out, and simply went to get a mission. Inside, there were disciples whose job it was to describe the various available missions.

Yang Qi knew the rules. He slipped a few godnotes into the hands of the disciples, who smiled broadly in response. One of them said, “Junior Brother, are you from the Scripture Pavilion? Not bad. Not bad at all. In the future, I hope you can take care of me when I go there. This jade plaque contains all the missions we have right now. Send your divine will inside and pick one.”

Yang Qi did just that, and quickly had information streaming through his mind. The missions were broken up into various categories, including Assassinations, Plant Harvesting, Information Gathering, Godly-Class Energy Art Acquisitions, Demonfolk Extermination, Execution of Enemies of the House of God Ordainment, Execution of Devils, Medicinal Pill Concocting, and so on.

“What kind of mission are you looking for, Junior Brother?” one of the disciples asked. He knew that, considering how many countless missions there were, it could be hard to pick. “Given the level of your cultivation base, you should probably stick with one of the simpler ones.”

Right now, Yang Qi was only revealing what could be described as an average cultivation base.

“Oh, I’ll be fine. Hey, what’s this? This looks like a nice mission.” Yang Qi tapped on one particular mission, whereupon the details appeared in front of him: Enter the ruined temple of the ancient Pill-King God. Search for lost medicinal pills. Paramount pills will earn a reward of ten thousand merit points. Unbounded pills will earn a hundred million merit points....

It included a map to the very ruins that were mentioned in the mission description.

“I’ll take this one,” Yang Qi said, pointing.

“What?!” the disciples exclaimed, looking incredulously at Yang Qi. “That’s not a mission for ordinary disciples; you’d have to be an elite disciple at the minimum. The ruins of the Pill-King God's temple are very dangerous. Although there are medicinal pills there to be found, there are also incredibly dangerous toxic medicines. There was even a holy child who went in there once, and although he got some pills that he exchanged for some magical treasures, it turned out that he was infected with a poison named Three-Lives Three-Lifetimes Despair Powder. He turned into a madman and started killing people left and right. He was eventually locked up in prison, and hasn’t seen the light of day since.”

“I still want to give it a try,” Yang Qi said as he continued to study the mission details.

The ancient Pill-King God was a Paramount God who excelled in concocting pills. He created his own god kingdom, and even made pills that contained godpower strong enough to support entire worlds. Later, the Pill-King God was killed during the insurrection of the seventy-two monarchs, and his god kingdom was brought to ruin. However, the moment of his death came in a clash with one of the seventy-two monarchs, namely, King Hypertoxin.King Hypertoxin infected his god kingdom with toxins that remain to this day. In other words, even gods can be killed there.

That said, over the years, many people have explored the area and found valuable items inside.Some have been lucky enough to find god pills, although most have come up empty-handed, and others have even been killed by the toxins they encountered. Most noteworthy is that in the depths of the ruins there are experts who transmuted from medicinal pills, and will attack any outsiders.

This mission has a ninety percent death rate.

“You should really think this through, Junior Brother.” The truth was that there were a lot of disciples in the House of God Ordainment who didn’t pay attention to the facts, believing that they were unparalleled under heaven. They would take the most dangerous missions in the hopes of earning a name for themselves, only to end up dead. Obviously, the disciples in charge of the missions assumed that Yang Qi was like them.

“I have thought it through,” Yang Qi said.

“In that case, I’ll make note of it.” The disciple sighed. “Hand over the five godnote fee, and you can start the mission. This one isn’t that bad in that, if you fail, you won’t get punished.”

“Yeah, well, death is the biggest punishment,” another disciple said, shaking his head. “Besides, if you fail the mission and hand it back in, you can’t accept another mission. According to the sect rules, you have to finish a mission before you can select another one. The system is designed that way to avoid disorder.”

“I know that,” Yang Qi said, taking the mission plaque. The truth was that he was more interested in exploring the Pill-King God’s ruins in the hopes of finding paramount god pills to bolster his cultivation base. If he could form his monarch godhood that way, it could save seven or eight years. And if he could find an unbounded god pill, it would be even better.

Of course, that was unlikely. Unbounded god pills were filled with so much power that they usually developed spirits that were as strong as Consummate Gods. And that made them almost impossible to deal with.

Following his map, he headed to the teleportation portal that led to the Pill-King’s temple ruins.

Some disciples had gathered there, most of them elite disciples. When they caught sight of Yang Qi, one of their number laughed and said, “Well if it isn’t the brat Yang Qi. I can’t believe you’re not a god yet. You’re still just an official disciple. What a big disappointment!”

It was none other than ‘Elder Brother Yue’, Yue Tianlin.

Chapter 1212: Junior Houselord

Yue Tianlin was still around. Despite having been put in his place on more than one occasion by Yang Qi, he had never learned his lesson. But there was one big difference this time: from the cassock he wore, it was obvious that he now ranked higher than Yang Qi. He was an elite disciple!

In the House of God Ordainment, if you were an elite disciple, then by default, you were a god.

And Yue Tianlin was indeed a god. He had formed his godhood and was now a Lesser God. Considering that only a few months had passed since Yang Qi had encountered him at the Scripture Pavilion, it was obvious how much one could benefit by working at the Thrall Camp.

That was what you would expect when numerous disciples blessed you with godpower on a virtually daily basis. Stepping from the Quasi-God level to the level of an actual god required a lot of godpower, in addition to enlightenment. And Yue Tianlin obviously had plenty of enlightenment, otherwise he wouldn’t have become an official disciple.

Only people with a certain level of skill and ability could come out on top in the Bloodgore Trials.

Reaching godly ascension and becoming an elite disciple brought incredible changes. One’s word, identity, and mere bearing became far superior to anything from before. After all, there were many official disciples in the House of God Ordainment, while elite disciples were much more in the minority.

And obviously, elite disciples had a lot more formal power than official disciples.

“Well, if it isn’t Yue Tianlin. What do you want?” Yang Qi saw that Yue Tianlin was in a group comprised solely of elite disciples, each of them looking very high and mighty. It was hard to say whether they were coming to hand in a mission, or preparing to leave on one. But down to the last disciple, they were all looking at him with unfriendly gazes.

In fact, they almost looked like a pack of wolves staring at a sheep.

“Oh nothing,” Yue Tianlin said with a smile. “I'm actually surprised you haven’t become a god yet, Yang Qi. I guess you’re taking your cues from Bai Yin and are trying to form monarch godhood. Only fools would dream of doing something like that.”

“So, it's another delusional disciple, eh?” one of the other elite disciples said. “There are always children of sect leaders who try to form monarch godhood, but none of them ever succeed. And you’re trying the same thing on your own? Do you think you’re the main character of all heaven and earth or something?”

“Look, I’ve got business here,” Yang Qi said. “So if you don’t mind, please get out of my way. I'm not interested in chatting.”

“Grandstander!” snapped another disciple. “Haven’t you read the sect rules? Don’t you know that official disciples have to bow low and make way for elite disciples? In other words, you get out of our way! If you’re so stupid you don’t understand basic rules like that, perhaps I should teach you a little lesson.”

WHOOSH!

The elite disciple thrust out his hand, his godhood thrumming and godpower coursing through him. He was using a profound technique that caused an enormous iron hand to appear, weighing down with force that caused the ground to slowly sink down.

It was a move called Heaven-God’s Descending Wrath, and it was a powerful technique designed to take people captive. One's five fingers became like godly pillars that could crush the head of anyone caught within them.

“Screw the hell off!” Yang Qi said, waving his own hand in the air. Unexpectedly, he also used Heaven-God’s Descending Wrath, except he unleashed it in the opposite direction. When the two hands met, the elite disciple felt the bones in his hand shattering, forcing him to quickly pull a medicinal pill out of his robe, crush it in his mouth, and spit the content onto his arm to heal the bones.

“Y-you... how do you know the Heaven-God’s Descending Wrath?!” the elite disciple said, looking visibly shocked. “When did you steal my martial art?”

Yang Qi laughed. “Very funny. I work in the Scripture Pavilion, so I have access to all sorts of martial arts records. Why would I steal anything from you?”

“Profound-Truth Grand-Millstone Hand!” Another elite disciple had slipped behind Yang Qi and unexpectedly attacked him with both hands, summoning a huge millstone of godpower that rumbled forth to crush him.

Yang Qi didn’t even look over his shoulder. He thrust his hand behind him to summon his own millstone, which crushed the original and sent the elite disciple staggering backward three paces, his face draining of blood.

Yang Qi wasn’t using any deadly moves, just stopping them in their tracks. He wasn’t even doing anything to really hurt them. Giving them ammunition to use against him wouldn’t make any sense. In the end, official disciples really were ranked much lower than elite disciples.

All he had to do was unleash his Paramount will and he could detonate all of them instantly.

“I can’t believe you know the Profound-Truth Grand-Millstone Hand!” the disciple said in astonishment.

“Get out of my way, all of you,” Yang Qi said, waving his hand. “Don’t let Yue Tianlin convince you to cause problems for me. None of us have any grudge with each other. It’s true that I want to form monarch godhood. Why do you think I can come out on top of a clash with multiple Lesser Gods? Without a strong foundation, I could never form monarch godhood.”

The two disciples he had just defeated were no fools. Nor were they rash. Although it was difficult, they suppressed the fury in their hearts. One of them said, “Well done. It seems you’re even stronger than Bai Yin. Not even he could casually defeat us like you just did. You never know what you’ll see in this small world of ours. Well, I suppose we’ll just have to wait and see if you really can form monarch godhood.”

“You got lucky this time, Yang Qi,” Yue Tianlin said through gritted teeth. “For your sake, you’d better hope you keep getting lucky.” He had been hoping to sow dissension between Yang Qi and his new Elder Brothers, but the elite disciples weren’t stupid. Just because they came out on the bottom of a minor clash didn’t mean they would then go all out to get revenge. Instead, they were acting quite cool and collected.

“Let’s go!” one of the elite disciples said, waving his hand. With that, they headed into the Missions Sanctuary without a single one causing any problems for him. Clearly, they were here to get some dangerous and important mission as a group.

Without further ado, Yang Qi left.

The event hadn’t gone unnoticed. For a person with a Quasi-God cultivation base to stand up to actual gods was something that only true geniuses could pull off. It was something that could only happen in the immense sects like the House of God Ordainment, but even then it wasn’t anything to be taken lightly.

As such, there were some discerning eyes who had been paying attention to everything that just happened. Among that group were men and women, including one young woman who was none other than Elder Sister Xue.

She was wearing an elite disciple’s garment, as were the other disciples. Contrary to expectation, she apparently had the cultivation base of a god. And not a Lesser God, either; she was a Common God with a godhood rating higher than ten.

As for the other disciples, their cultivation bases were no weaker than Elder Sister Xue’s. They were all Common Gods. Considering how strong both of them were, it was obvious they weren’t ordinary people. People like them generally had a lot of influence in the House of God Ordainment.

“So, Junior Sister Xue, that was the Yang Qi you mentioned?” one of the men said. “He really does have some skill. Why not recruit him into the Snow Society?”

“He’s the independent type who won’t join up with other factions,” she replied. “Also, he's a friend of Jadefall, and she's watching out for him. You're right though, it would be great to recruit him. You saw how strong he is. He dealt with those gods as easily as drinking some water.”

“Your incarnation is getting stronger and stronger, Junior Sister Xue,” another disciple said. “You already have a Common God cultivation base. It seems your Snow Fills the Cosmos secret magic has already reached the highest level. Your true self is still a Quasi-God. Maybe you really will pull off a miracle and develop Paramount will as a Quasi-God. Maybe you’ll be the first person throughout the aeons to cultivate monarch godhood.”

“I got lucky, that’s all. I found a soul treasure left behind by the ancient Ice-Snow Goddess, which is how I formed this second version of myself. The Ice-Snow Goddess was the wife of the Lord of Civilization, and according to the stories, the two of them formed an unparalleled dao of clones. The truth is that my true self is probably strong enough to equal a Common God. Unfortunately, forming monarch godhood is no easy task. I'm actually planning on pushing this clone to an even higher level of will, then fusing back with my true self. Hopefully that will give me the advantage I need.”

“Seems very difficult,” one of the other disciples said. “Throughout the years there have been a lot of people who tried similar things, but no one has ever succeeded. I even heard that there are children of leaders here in the House of God Ordainment who have access to unending resources, yet still fail. You’re very well informed, Junior Sister Xue. Your Snow Society might not be a top faction in the House of God Ordainment, but even the fabled Preheaven Society shows you courtesy. In fact, their leader Wang Xiantian wooed you unsuccessfully for quite a while before ultimately going after Jadefall. Do you think he’ll win her hand?”

“I suspect Jadefall ascended from the lower worlds, which would explain how her cultivation base has advanced by leaps and bounds. But her pet is even more impressive. Wang Xiantian might be strong and have a lot of followers, but there’s no way that even he could do anything to Jadefall’s pet. In fact, a few days ago, I heard that she firmly turned him down. Then he tried to force her to accept him, and she turned her pet on him. One bubble from that thing, and Wang Xiantian lost nine clones. Lucky for him, his true self was safe in seclusion, otherwise he might have been killed. By now, he’s already laid down the flag and stilled the drums. Incidentally, I heard that the junior houselord has his eye on Jadefall, so I doubt Wang Xiantian will cause any more trouble.”

“What? The junior houselord?”

Everyone shivered as though she had just mentioned some incredibly terrifying person. “The junior houselord hasn’t shown his face in public for years now. Supposedly, he’s been seeking enlightenment of some consummate technique of our House of God Ordainment, something from the God-Ordaining Profound-Righteousness Stele. Once he succeeds, he’ll be able to dominate everyone. But are you saying he's going to make a public appearance soon?”

“It’s all rumor,” Elder Sister Xue replied. “We don’t count as high-ranking members of the House of God Ordainment. How could mid-tier people like us catch wind of the true secrets of the sect? However, rumors generally have a kernel of truth in them. So that’s why I say to avoid causing problems for Yang Qi. If Jadefall links up with the junior houselord, she’ll only get more and more powerful.”

Chapter 1213: Ruins of the Pill-King God

“It seems Yang Qi is only just starting his rise to the top,” one of the other elite disciples said in admiration. “Maybe we ought to go do a bit of brown-nosing.”

“You don’t need to do that,” Elder Sister Xue replied. “Just be friendly with him. I'm very curious about Jadefall’s pet, but you have to realize that even the most experienced and knowledgeable elders don’t know what it is or how it works.”

“That pet of hers is already a hot topic among the higher echelons of the sect,” another disciple said. “Supposedly, there are even powerful demon-gods on the outside who’ve learned of it and want to get their hands on it. On top of that, Jadefall has supposedly gone out for training.”

Elder Sister Xue laughed. “If the demon-gods go after her, then they’ll just end up getting killed by her pet. People say the bubbles it creates are impossible for any evil to pierce. In fact, more than half a year ago, she and her Master went on a mission to the Death God Wind Cave, beyond the highest heaven. It was thanks to her pet that they could safely get in and procure a psychic wind pear. And that was how her master reached the Consummate God level.”

“Not even the Death God Wind Cave could do anything to her pet's bubbles?” another disciple said in shock.

Around this time, a Lesser God elite disciple approached respectfully and said, “Elder Sister Xue, I got the information you asked about. Yang Qi picked a mission to go to the Pill-King’s temple ruins to search for medicinal pills. It's a very dangerous mission, but he insisted on taking it.”

“The Pill-King’s temple ruins?!” one of the disciples exclaimed. “He picked a mission like that? Those ruins are extremely dangerous. Even if we went as a group, we would probably end up dead. Forget about the medicinal pills there, it's the toxins you have to watch out for. It's deadly! That entire continent was razed to the ground by poison, and is covered with an endless miasma. Any living creature that enters, man or beast, will be dissolved into a mush.”

“Yang Qi isn’t an impulsive person,” Elder Sister Xue said. “He wouldn’t dare to go into a place like that unless he was truly confident in succeeding.” From the look on her face, she was looking forward to seeing how things would play out.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi had left the god kingdom via teleportation portal.

There were teleportation portals that led to all sorts of locations in the god world, as long as one had enough godstones to power them.

Of course, it wasn't as if they had teleportation portals leading to every corner of the god world. The god world was huge, and the House of God Ordainment only operated in a small portion of it. Not even the Sovereign Lord’s halls of heaven had been large enough to spread throughout the entire god world.

If Yang Qi tried to fly directly to his destination, it would simply take too long.

He put some noble caliber godsand into the teleportation portal, causing it to whir to life. As it powered up, he nodded inwardly. ‘As long as you reach the Consummate God level, you can create teleportation portals leading between two continents. But Consummate Gods are generally at the peak of Paramount will. They have to become Perfect Gods before they can hope to unravel the secrets of Unbounded will. Right now, my will convergence is at the early Paramount level, just on the verge of the mid level.’

Unfortunately, he was far from being strong enough to build his own teleportation portals. After all, it involved creating spell formations so stable that they wouldn’t be harmed or destroyed by spatial eruptions.

The teleportation portal flared with light, and he stepped out to find himself surrounded by noxious air. The ground below was like a marsh or bog, with occasional bubbles that would get larger and larger before ultimately popping. Overhead, the sky was dark and overcast.

The teleportation portal was located on a completely empty raised platform. There were no other people visible. Mist swirled about, and when it touched Yang Qi’s skin, it stung as it tried to bore into him to reach his blood and soul.

Ordinary Lesser Gods would melt upon being touched by such mist, and their godhood would be immediately tainted. Thankfully, Yang Qi had Paramount will, so all it took was a thought to negate the toxins. Then a bubble appeared around him as he drew on the Purrfect God Art.

After reaching the Paramount level, his Purrfect God Art had become more refined. Although he couldn’t quite match the purrling, the fact that he had combined its abilities with the Great Necropolis God Art had led to mysterious and profound augmentations.

Right now, the toxic energy had no way to reach him, so he turned into a prismatic beam that shot off into the mists.

Long ago, this continent had been a luxurious and bustling place. However, after the Pill-King God clashed with the seventy-two monarchs, hypertoxic poison had stained the land and turned it into this endless bog.

In fact, it had eventually come to be called the Toxic Continent.

The Toxic Continent was a huge place filled with mists and bogs that could degrade godpower and turn it into something poisonous.

Despite his current defenses, Yang Qi was still being very careful. He knew full well that things would get more dangerous the further he got into the Toxic Continent. For all he knew, the toxic energy might reach the point of being able to pierce his defenses. Therefore, he kept the God Legion Seal ready to use at any moment.

Furthermore, in his sea of energy, the sheepskin scroll was manifested in the form of ten thousand characters, and joined by a broken piece of the Mahātmā Jade. Of course, by now, the Mahātmā Jade wasn't a danger to Yang Qi’s flesh and blood, nor his psychic power. Unfortunately, it still wasn’t complete, and couldn’t release the potential of its full version that the True Devil had wielded. Most of the treasures Yang Qi had weren’t particularly important anymore, except for the Mahātmā Jade.

The Mahātmā Jade was on a similar level as the God Legion Seal. After all, it had been created by the True Devil specifically to fight the Sovereign Lord. Once it was complete, it would definitely be no less formidable than the God Legion Seal.

The difference was that the jade wasn’t as famous as the seal, and those who knew of it were aware that whoever pieced together the full Mahātmā Jade would still need the True Devil’s sheepskin scroll, as well as significant enlightenment. It was very different from the God Legion Seal, which would automatically impart the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth to anyone who acquired a piece of it.

As Yang Qi flew along, the bogs sped by beneath him and he kept his divine will spread out as far as possible, keeping an eye out for anything noteworthy. After about an hour, the ruins of some sort of temple complex appeared up ahead.

Numerous structures could be seen stretching off into the distance. They were dead quiet, without signs of demonlings or humans. Not even toxic demonlings could handle the toxic energy here, although according to rumor, there were certain devils who could cultivate poison arts in this environment.

That said, Yang Qi hadn’t seen any devils like that so far.

Swish!

He landed in one of the ruined structures, looked around, and could already see signs of places where experts had recovered medicinal pills in the past. To find anything useful, he would definitely need to go further in.

Of course, the toxic gas and mists were stronger than anything from before. Yang Qi took out a dagger and threw it out. Before it could even hit the ground, it corroded into a noxious liquid that evaporated into thin air.

‘So strong!’ he thought, nodding. ‘I'm only on the outskirts, and it's this bad? I wonder how strong it will be further in. Even with Paramount will, I would have a hard time here on my own. Thankfully I have the God Legion Seal and the Mahātmā Jade together. Otherwise I wouldn’t be able to go much further than this.’

He was even limited in terms of his psychic power; if he sent it out beyond his defenses, it would be quickly destroyed by the toxic mist.

Because of that, he could only look around for signs of medicinal pills.

Furthermore, he didn’t dare to simply fly over the ruins; he had to walk. Unfortunately, considering how many years these ruins had been around, and how many experts had explored them for loot, it wouldn’t be easy to find anything valuable.

With that, he set about exploring. Occasionally the sky would go completely dark, and at other times, bits of light would peek through. Because of that, it was possible to track the passage of days and nights.

He searched for over ten days until he came to the realization that there were certain places that had never been opened, and by extension had never been explored.

Unfortunately, he hadn’t found any medicinal pills so far.

That didn’t shake his resolve though. He was convinced that there were medicinal pills to be found; he just needed to keep searching. The toxic mist was getting so dense that it was hard to see his hand in front of his face, and his defenses were constantly being eaten away.

Thankfully he had his God Legion Seal to provide an endless source of godpower, otherwise he would have already run out.

Chapter 1214: Exploring the Ruins

The temple complex was crumbling into complete ruin, filled with an aura of decay and dense toxic mist. It was a terrifying place overall, and seemed almost like a hell unto itself. If even a bit of the toxic energy from the Toxic Continent somehow seeped down into the impure lands, countless immortal worlds would be destroyed.

Right now, Yang Qi was still searching for medicinal pills.

Although it was hard to make his hand out clearly if he held it out in front of him, he was still able to get a general sense of everything within thirty meters of himself. He was searching everything very carefully, leaving no proverbial rock unturned. Thankfully, not even Greater Gods would come to a place like this because of the toxic energy, which meant it wasn’t very well traveled.

Yang Qi was fully drawing on his True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body. After all, within the various tribulation characters was the character for poison. Because of that, he was able to assimilate some of the toxic energy around him, making the area around him less dangerous.

‘What's this?’

He had just spotted some jade bottles in one of the rooms he was exploring. They were pitch black, but emanated a faint medicinal aroma.

‘Don’t tell me I actually found some paramount god medicine!’ What else could it be? Only something created by an expert with Paramount will could possibly stand the test of time surrounded by such corrosive power.

He exhaled a stream of vital energy that burned like intense flame, parting the toxic mist. Then he flicked his finger, causing a bubble to spring up around one of the jade bottles. Fire swirled around the bottle, burning away the corrosive toxins on its surface.

Everything in this place was infected by poison so powerful that ordinary fire couldn’t do anything to it. Thankfully, the twin tribulations of fire and poison from the Unspoiled Body, backed by the Flame of Hope from the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, were more than enough to do the job.

Grabbing the bottle, he opened it.

Instantly, a strong medicinal aroma wafted out, along with emerald-green light.

‘Got some!’ he exclaimed. It was a paramount god medicine. He quickly unleashed his energy arts to pull the pill out of the bottle. However, to his surprise, the green energy contained a distorted human face that pulsed with devilishness.

‘I can’t believe it. It's been in the toxic mist so long it’s turned into poison medicine! So, it’s not a god pill. Ah, what a pity.’ He looked closer at the medicinal pill. ‘Maybe I should try to expunge the devilishness. Be refined!” A stream of true flame flowed out from him as he tried to remove the devilishness and restore the pill to its original state.

However, after only a moment, the pill let loose a shrill shriek and exploded, turning into a green smoke that quickly dissipated into nothing.

A medicinal pill thrown into toxic miasma was like gourmet food thrown into a dung heap. Once it happened, no amount of cleaning would do any good.

He tried to do the same thing with the rest of the bottles, but found that any medicinal pills inside were too badly infected with toxic energy. He had found some pills, but hadn’t benefited from them. In fact, he had wasted a lot of godpower trying to save them.

But he wasn’t discouraged, and continued his search. Some of the temples he found were complete, while others were crumbling into nothing. And there were so many that searching every single one would take a lot of time. After some quick calculations, Yang Qi came to the conclusion that if it weren’t for the God Legion Seal constantly replenishing his godpower, he probably wouldn’t last more than seven days here. Even an ordinary Greater God could only last for about ten days or so. That wasn’t even close to enough time to find anything useful.

Another ten days passed, and he still hadn’t found anything worthwhile. On the upside, the continuous effort to expunge poison was having a tempering effect on his godpower, making it purer than before.

Furthermore, he was coming to realize that there was a pattern to how the structures here had been built. It seemed like a god kingdom, and he could almost close his eyes and imagine how amazing it had been back in its heyday.

The further in he went, the larger and more impressive the buildings were. He saw statues of gods as tall as mountains, although most of them were smashed or had been toppled.

The glory of bygone days was no more, and the only things that remained were ruins filled with toxic mist.

“Hmm. Is that something ahead?”

He had caught sight of a huge temple of ancient design that almost looked like a pill furnace hulking in the mists. It was immense, fully three thousand meters tall, and several kilometers from end to end. It almost looked like a castle. As Yang Qi sized it up, he realized that it was roughly octagonal, and its surface conveyed all sorts of profound things, such as the circumference of the universe, the motion of the stars, the five phases, eight trigrams, yin and yang, two polarities, the taiji and wuji, primal-chaos and the origin of the universe, the true dharma of the three caves, and the profundities of the three doctrines.

The enormous building actually reminded him of the Heaven and Earth Furnace, and he could instantly tell that, in ancient times, it was a place where the Pill-King God would gather his disciples to concoct pills. That meant that it was highly likely to have pills inside.

If a medicinal pill was protected by a powerful warding magic, it wouldn’t be tainted by the miasma.

Unfortunately, it didn’t seem like it would be easy to get inside. As he got close, thunderous rumbling sounds echoed out and the surrounding mist converged into the shape of a spear that slammed into him like toxic god lightning, shaking his defenses deeply.

In fact, he was sent flying backward until he slammed into another nearby building, his godpower shaken to the point that he felt like he was suffocating.

‘Incredible. The mist is so toxic it actually turned into toxic god lightning.’ It wasn’t going to be easy to get close.

‘Whatever. I’ll just burn some of the power I've been saving for my godhood. Let’s open a path!’

CRASH!

He exhaled a stream of godpower from within the virtual godhood in his sea of energy, and the godpower instantly turned into godfire.

Because the godpower had experienced refinement in his virtual godhood, it was definitely extraordinary. Normally speaking, godpower that had been refined within virtual godhood wasn’t useful. Expending it would only be harmful to one’s cultivation base. Up to this point, Yang Qi had been using godpower that came directly from the God Legion Seal. Unfortunately, that wasn’t going to be sufficient to get into the pill furnace-shaped temple.

But the power in his virtual godhood was extremely formidable. Although he hadn’t fully formed his monarch godhood, considering he had Paramount will at work on it, how could it be anything ordinary?

The fire erupting from his mouth turned into a stream three hundred meters long, like an enormous pillar that bored through the miasma and created a clear and pure passageway.

In this manner, Yang Qi approached the temple. Although toxic god lightning continually tried to reach him, the fire that he sent out would consume it with abandon.

Three days and three nights passed before he finally reached the temple. He had wasted some godpower, but still had plenty to keep going. After all, if he found a single paramount-level medicinal pill, he would be able to fill himself right back up.

‘Grrrrr! If I don’t get anything out of this trip, I'm going to end up having wasted a good year’s worth of godpower!’

Yang Qi shook his head.

BAM!

Upon entering the temple, he looked around to find numerous alcoves with pill furnaces in them, all of them seemingly sealed tight.

Apparently, no one had ever stepped foot in this place.

Although the numerous sealed pill furnaces were all surrounded with toxic energy, most of them still glittered with faint light that seemed to indicate they hadn’t been completely infected.

As far as Yang Qi could tell, they were all precious treasures. That was emphasized by the fact that even though the subterranean balefire that had once heated the furnaces no longer existed, they still pulsed with power.

‘I wonder if the toxic mist here was left behind directly by King Hypertoxin?’ he thought. He suddenly recalled that, after acquiring his Seventy-Two Monarchs Energy Art, one of the least complete of his collections were the weapons of King Hypertoxin. They were called Atu’s Hypertoxic Hooks, and the complete set was made up of several thousand weapons, but he only had a few hundred.

That said, the hooks were currently in the possession of his immortal-slaying clone, along with all the other items.

But if he could get some more of Atu’s Hypertoxic Hooks, he might be able to lessen the severity of the poison. Back in the impure lands, his cultivation base hadn’t been high enough to make good use of those seventy-two types of weapons, but now he had Paramount will and a much deeper enlightenment of such mysteries.

Unfortunately, he didn’t have the weapons with him.

Putting aside such thoughts, he headed over to one of the pill furnaces, which was fully as tall as two average people. Reaching out toward the tightly-sealed lid, he prepared to take it off.

Chapter 1215: Expert in a Medicinal Pill

Ding!

The pill furnace lid popped off and crimson light spilled out.

“Hand of the One God!” Yang Qi unleashed one of his consummate techniques, causing an enormous hand to appear that crushed down on the red light and entered the depths of the pill furnace to snatch the medicinal pill inside.

It was wrapped up in numerous paper talismans and protected by a spell formation that still had godstones inset to power it and drive away the toxic energy.

‘Right, spell formations!’

Having no time to look at the medicinal pill, he looked around at the hall he was in and noticed that the pillars all had tiny holes in them, most of which were empty, seemingly implying that they had once housed godstones.

Luckily, Yang Qi had plenty of godstones on hand. Pulling some out of his bag, he sent them flying into the holes in the columns, which caused creaking and crunching sounds to echo out.

A clear breeze sprang up in the temple as a powerful spell formation activated, dispelling the toxic mist. Barely more than an hour later, the toxic mist was gone from within the temple.

There were a total of thirty-six pill furnaces in the hall, arranged according to the thirty-six stars associated with the Big Dipper. As for the hall itself, it was fully ten acres in size. Unfortunately, even powering the spell formation with noble caliber godsand, it would clearly remain functional for barely a few hours.

That should be enough. Yang Qi had wasted a lot of godpower from his virtual godhood to get this far, and needed to make up for those losses. Thankfully, he had already acquired a Paramount medicinal pill.

Pulling out the pill to look at it, he murmured, “It hasn’t been devilized.”

It was about the size of a lychee fruit and as red as a burning sun. And from the energy pulsing off it, it was obvious that it had been concocted by someone with Paramount will, perhaps in the mid or late stage.

“Imperial-heaven pre-beginning!” Drawing on his imperial-heaven pre-beginning powers, he analyzed the structure of the godpower in the pill and came to the realization that it actually wasn’t designed to improve godpower. It was never a good idea to casually consume medicinal pills. Some were designed for healing, some to serve as antidotes, some to strengthen vitality, some to increase power, some to fortify the psyche and fleshly body, and some to purify the body and soul.

After his analysis, he realized that this pill was designed as an antidote.

‘Ah what a pity that this Paramount pill is actually just an antidote. Well, perhaps that’s one reason why it’s lasted so long within this miasma. At the very least, I can turn it in to the sect for some merit points. There are always experts out there who get poisoned and have no way to cure themselves.’

A pill like this would be very welcome in the sect.

In fact, it was hard to say how many people would fight fiercely to get an antidote as powerful as this.

With that, Yang Qi moved on to the rest of the pill furnaces. He recovered pill after pill, all of which were antidotes that the disciples here had prepared in order to take a stand against King Hypertoxin. All of them were of extremely high quality.

After recovering thirty-six antidotal pills, Yang Qi still wasn’t very happy. Although he could turn the pills in for a huge sum of merit points, enough to be considered fabulously wealthy, what he really needed were pills to help boost his godpower.

‘I just have to keep searching. I refuse to believe that this is a fruitless effort.’ After all, there wasn’t just a single hall in this temple, but many levels.

After a few more hours, the spell formation ran out of power and the toxic mist returned.

However, Yang Qi had just acquired thirty-six antidotal pills, and the red light they cast kept the toxic mist at bay. The downside was that it would eat away at the medicinal strength of the pills, which meant that he would get fewer merit points when he turned them in later.

But in the end, he didn’t care about that. Continuing on, he eventually found a spiral staircase that led to the second floor.

The second floor featured another spacious hall with a nonfunctional spell formation and a set of pill furnaces. There were half as many pill furnaces as before; only eighteen. However, they were larger and seemed to contain greater medicinal strength.

Yang Qi rested for a few hours to build up some more godpower. Thankfully, the antidotal pills had reduced the corrosive effects of the toxic mists. When he felt ready, he chopped his hand out toward one of the pill furnaces, opening the lid and causing a bright yellow light to spill out.

Reaching out, he captured the yellow light, which was like a yellow dragon that refused to be captured. It pulsed with a shocking power that surprised even Yang Qi, prompting him to draw on the power of the God Legion Seal. Eventually, he got the medicinal pill under control, revealing it to be the size of a bean, and golden in color. It was also covered with complex cloud patterns. Although he wasn't sure what it was for, it didn't seem like something that would increase his godpower.

Yang Qi frowned as he examined the pill. It pulsed with an incredible killing aura and had metal-type properties. As he held it in his hand, he felt as though millions upon millions of swords were piercing into his acupoints.

Without question, this was a medicinal pill for the dao of the sword.

A sword expert who consumed this pill would have their sword energy boosted, becoming much deadlier. In fact, it would be perfect for Sword Seventeen. Such pills were often called sword pellets, and they were extremely powerful.

Unfortunately, Yang Qi couldn’t use it for any sort of breakthrough. And although it would be worth a lot of merit points, he would rather give it to Sword Seventeen. In fact, if he found any more sword pellets in these pill furnaces, he would definitely save them for his subordinates.

In years past, the Lord of the Sword Dao was a subordinate of the Sovereign Lord, and a powerful Paramount God. He slaughtered enemies left and right, including countless devil-gods from hell, and also enemies of the Sovereign Lord. Even other Paramount Gods died by his hands.

Clang, clang, clang!

Yang Qi opened all the pill furnaces and found that they all contained sword pellets. In the end, he was actually pleased. It was quite a windfall, and would definitely ensure that his Sage Monarch Consortium had numerous top sword experts in it.

After performing a final sweep of the second floor and finding nothing, he thought, ‘Alright, time to see what’s on the third floor. Hopefully some more pill furnaces. Preferably ones that increase godpower!’

With that, he flew up the staircase to the third floor. Unfortunately, he was disappointed to find no pill furnaces at all. There was only a toxic mist so dense he couldn’t see clearly. Thankfully, he had the antidotal pills and his own true flame to keep himself safe.

Without such protections, he would have died even if he was a Greater God.

After burning away some of the mist, Yang Qi found that there was a bottle gourd right in the middle of the third floor hall. It had a green exterior that swirled as if it were primal-chaos; apparently, it hadn’t been infected by the toxic mist. It was about thirty meters tall, and very heavy.

‘This thing is big. There must be something good inside. It must be a treasure of some sort.’ Flying up to the top of the gourd, he grabbed the lid and tried prying it open.

To his shock, there was a gravitational force inside that made it impossible to simply pull the lid off. ‘I can’t open it, even with godpower as incredible as mine? How strong is this thing?’

“Begone!” He activated the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, which was of course a type of power that was beyond the compare of anything else. Gripping the lid, he tried wrenching it open, causing the entire gourd to tremble.

WHOOSH!

A crack appeared, allowing a powerful medicinal energy to shoot out, along with a gravitational force that grabbed Yang Qi and pulled him inside. The lid slammed shut behind him, preventing any of the toxic energy from getting inside.

‘It’s pulling me inside?’ Unflustered, he dropped down and looked around. It was a small area, filled with a pure light that lacked any darkness. As for the walls, they were a greenish-blue color that resembled the warm embrace of seawater.

All of a sudden, a voice drifted into his ears. “How strange. I never imagined someone would make it this far.”

Looking over, he saw a prayer mat in the far corner, atop which was a medicinal pill. The medicinal energy it emitted created a small, humanoid figure that resembled a daoist priest. The pill pulsed with godpower that Yang Qi instantly identified as the high-quality type that he needed to improve his godpower.

And it had just spoken to him.

Chapter 1216: Chaos-Cavern Grand-Magnate Pill

‘What a great medicinal pill!’

However, Yang Qi wasn’t a rash person, and didn’t make a move. After all, the pill emanated a terrifying aura that marked its godpower as being shockingly high, and nothing to be taken lightly.

Medicinal pills that had achieved human form weren’t particularly common, but neither were they a total rarity. Any pill that achieved that would be invincibly powerful and could seize good fortune from heaven and earth.

From what Yang Qi could sense, this wasn’t a pill he could deal with by using force.

As he measured up the pill, it seemed to be measuring him up in return. The pill looked like a daoist in dark robes, middle-aged, with a solemn, contemplative look in his eyes.

“You haven’t even formed your godhood yet?” the pill asked. “What’s a pup like you doing here? In the god world, Quasi-Gods are little more than ants. This is really strange. Do you know that you’re in the Chaos-Forge God-Shrine of the Pill-King’s temple ruins? This is a core location in the Pill-King’s god kingdom. It was once an enormous pill furnace, originally built to conform to the twenty-four solar terms, thirty-six heavenly spirits, seventy-two earthly fiends, eighteen arhats, one hundred and eight ghost-gods, three hundred and sixty cycles, seven hundred and twenty acupoints, three thousand great daos, and millions upon millions of heavenly rivers. Although it was damaged in the fighting with King Hypertoxin, it still maintains its might and dignity. This specific location is some distance away from the main battleground where the Pill-King God fought King Hypertoxin, but the toxic energy here is still very strong. Not even Greater Gods would dare venture here, but you, a mere Quasi-God, have made it this far? That’s definitely heaven-defying. No one from ancient times until now has done this.”

Smiling at the middle-aged daoist that was the medicinal pill, Yang Qi said, “You flatter me, Senior. Might I ask who you are? Presumably you’re a medicinal pill from yesteryear that cultivated its way to intelligence?”

“That's right. I'm a Chaos-Cavern Grand-Magnate Pill, originally concocted over a period of one thousand god world years by a group of countless gods working together. Then, from primeval times until now, I remained in the Chaos-Cavern Bottle Gourd until three thousand god world years ago, when I developed a will of my own and experienced nirvanic birth. Unfortunately, the sea of toxins around me trapped me here, making it impossible to leave. And if it weren’t for the Chaos-Cavern Bottle Gourd keeping me safe, I would long since have become devilized. When you opened the lid just now, I had to waste a lot of vital energy to keep the toxic energy out. So, how exactly are you going to make it up to me?”

“You want compensation, Senior?” Yang Qi said, intentionally plastering a look of surprise onto his face.

“Why wouldn’t I?” the pill daoist replied. “It's not as though I can recover my godpower inside here. And the fact that you, a mere Quasi-God, has reached this point indicates that you must have some sort of medicinal pill to bolster godpower. And you probably have some magical treasure that can fend off the toxic gas.

“What?!” Yang Qi said, looking even more surprised. “But if I give you my medicinal pills and magical treasure, how am I supposed to get out of here?”

“Don’t worry. Give me the pills and treasure, and I’ll take you out with me. The Chaos-Forge God-Shrine has nine floors that are filled with all sorts of great things, including medicinal pills and pill concocting ingredients. Some have been devilized, but others have fended off the toxic energy. Those things will make everything worth it.” The pill daoist wasn’t being polite at all, and it looked like he was only moments away from trying to lay hands on Yang Qi.

“Nine floors?” Yang Qi was actually surprised by that. If the third floor had a medicinal pill this strong, then what else lay above him? As for the pill in front of him, if he assimilated it, he would definitely get much closer to finishing his monarch godhood. At the least, he would save a sixty-year-cycle worth of time.

“In that case, why don’t the two of us just work together? I’ll use my magical treasure to keep you safe on the way out.”

The pill daoist chuckled, and a nasty grin appeared on his face. “You think you qualify to ‘work together’ with me, boy? You made me waste a lot of power just now, and the only thing I can do inside this place is hibernate. I need medicinal ingredients to make up for what I just lost. Besides, how could I ever trust you? What if you betray me as soon as we’re out, and I get devilized? No, you need to give your assets to me.”

“I guess negotiating isn't going to do any good.” Shrugging his shoulders, he said, “After all, I'm not giving you my magical treasure or medicinal pills.”

“Oh?” The pill daoist laughed. “Apparently you don’t know how amazing Chaos-Cavern Grand-Magnate Pills are. Even if a measly Quasi-God like you was many times stronger than you are, could you ever hope to achieve Paramount will convergence?”

“I see, Senior. You’re saying you’re going to use force?” Yang Qi settled into a fighting stance.

“Hmph! Lucky for you I’ve been stuck in this Chaos-Cavern Bottle Gourd since ancient times, with nobody to talk to. All of my knowledge is based on what I received from the people who concocted me, otherwise I would’ve killed you already. How about you chat with me a bit to relieve my boredom. If you do, I won’t kill you. Just torture you a bit.” The pill daoist started walking toward him. “I can kill a Quasi-God as easily as turning over my hand, so don’t even think of trying to escape.”

“Aren’t you worried I might break open this bottle gourd and let the toxic energy inside? The bottle gourd is strong, but I could easily open the lid. Then what would happen?”

“Very funny,” the pill daoist said. “You think you can open the lid from inside?”

“I know I can!” Yang Qi had already assessed his surroundings, and knew that while the bottle gourd did have some mysterious spell formations built into it, they had no godstones to power them. Without activating those formations, there was no way for the pill daoist to escape the situation.

“Cut the crap and give me that magical treasure!” The pill daoist shoved his palm out with enough force to topple mountains and drain seas, causing intense rumbling sounds to fill the interior of the bottle gourd.

Yang Qi immediately smiled. Although this pill daoist was strong, he had virtually no fighting experience. He was launching a simplistic attack with godpower, little more. A foolish person who had mountains of gold and silver could easily have such things taken away from them, ending up with nothing.

This medicinal pill’s memories came from the people who had concocted him, so although he had some divine abilities and impressive godpower, he had never actually left the bottle gourd. How could he possibly compare to a veteran of numerous battles like Yang Qi, who had killed too many enemies to count?

Besides, Yang Qi also had access to the battle experience in the God Legion Seal, which included the experiences of the King of Godmammoths. There simply wasn’t anyone who could compare to him in that regard.

“Myriad Tribulations Dhāraṇī Incantation. Sovereign Lord’s Holy and Far-Reaching Consummate Omnicurse!” Yang Qi casually sidestepped the incoming godpower, then waved his finger and released his own godpower, backed by Paramount will. Although the movement seemed as slow as a turtle crawling across the ground, it was actually as fast as lightning. It pierced through space and completely wiped out all the force the pill daoist had unleashed.

The pill daoist backed up, a look of shock on his face. “Y-y-you... you actually have Paramount will convergence? You’re a miracle! No Quasi-God has ever reached the Paramount level!”

“Well I have. What do you think?” Yang Qi strode forward aggressively, showing not a hint of fear. The pill daoist had incredible godpower that clearly surpassed Yang Qi's, but unfortunately he had absolutely no control, and deeply unimpressive energy arts. And he had so little fighting prowess that he was essentially a moron in that regard. His attack just now was completely unfocused, allowing the godpower to leak out in all directions. It was really pitiful.

Truth be told, compared to Yang Qi, the pill daoist may as well have been a mere child. And now that Yang Qi had Paramount will, he could dismantle the pill daoist’s godpower. Other than him, the pill daoist would probably have been able to easily crush anyone under the Paramount level.

Sadly for the pill daoist, Yang Qi had seen through him on all levels.

Anyone else with this level of power who had fighting experience, even experience on the level of Bai Yin’s, would definitely be difficult for Yang Qi to deal with. In fact, maybe he would even be at a big disadvantage.

“You lack experience. Let me show you what real fighting is like!” Spinning, Yang Qi unleashed a stream of sword energy from the dao of King Life-Killer. He only used a tiny bit of godpower, but it created a huge net of swords that enveloped the pill daoist.

“Die!” the pill daoist screamed, chopping out with his hand again. Godpower raged, destroying the net of swords, yet Yang Qi’s smile only grew wider. He had only used a fraction of his power to back that net, while the pill daoist had used full force. If they kept fighting like this, the pill daoist was definitely going to lose.

He might as well be a turtle in a jar.

Chapter 1217: Extremely Shoddy Fighting Experience

“Life-Killing Sword Technique!”

The interior of the bottle gourd was cramped, making it difficult to unleash much in the way of a variety of moves. But Yang Qi had immense battle experience, so as he danced back and forth, he unleashed the sword dao of King Life-Killer, sending one deadly move after another toward his opponent.

“Bloody Slaughter of the Dome of Heaven!”

“Setting Sun Pursues the Soul!”

“Stars Bury the Vast Lands!”

“The Bane of All Existence!”

“Darkness and Light; Waxing and Waning Moon!”

Yang Qi was using the sword dao of King Life-Killer to full effect, and was actually improving with every moment. He had just taken eighteen sword pellets, so it was an easy matter to add their aura to his own sword energy to crush the Chaos-Cavern Grand-Magnate Pill energy arts being used by the pill daoist.

“This is really pissing me off!” the pill daoist growled. “How could a Quasi-God last for so long in a fight against me!?” It almost seemed as if this was the first time the pill daoist had ever been in a fight. He was backing every move with full power, which seemed impressive, but was really an empty effort. Although his energy rocketed out with mountain-toppling, sea-draining force, Yang Qi could easily negate it. The attacks were like thousand-kilogram cotton balls, and Yang Qi was like a tiny embroidery needle that could pierce through them with ease.

“Check out this fist technique!” the pill daoist shouted, proceeding into a consummate martial art that had once been practiced by the daoists of the Pill-King’s temple. The pill daoist had those memories, and was therefore able to send a huge mass of fist energy rumbling toward Yang Qi.

SNICK!

Yang Qi was nearly laughing out loud at how extremely shoddy this pill daoist’s fighting technique was. He had immense godpower, but no idea how to use it effectively. In fact, Yang Qi was convinced that he had probably possessed better skill than this pill daoist even back in the impure lands, when he had just learned the Hundred Paces Divine Fist.

The fact that the pill daoist was coming at him with such arrogance, claiming to be about to kill him, was actually really funny.

He swept his hands out in an arc, releasing a soft energy art filled with numerous transformations. In fact, it was so profound that a taiji symbol actually appeared right in front of him, which absorbed the incoming fist energy and shattered it into countless tiny medicinal pills.

Purr.

Yang Qi sucked those medicinal pills into his sea of energy, and the virtual godhood therein, which did a lot to bolster his godpower.

This daoist was actually a medicinal pill, so when Yang Qi negated his godpower, it turned into ordinary medicinal pills. By absorbing that one attack, Yang Qi had just gained godpower that would normally require two or three years of bitter cultivation to get.

Yang Qi suddenly felt quite enlivened, and his cultivation base had even improved.

“Damn you!” The pill daoist had apparently just learned something, as he sucked his godpower back and stopped attacking. He had realized that his successive attacks weren’t doing anything, and that he was just wasting godpower. Even worse, his opponent was actually benefiting from the attacks.

‘My godpower is so incredible that this brat shouldn’t be able to do anything to me. Damn him! I guess my fighting experience really is inferior. But as long as I can escape this place and get a few years of practice under my belt, I’ll definitely be a domineering figure. And when that time comes, I’ll beat this boy senseless!’ Clearing his throat, he said, “You’re strong, boy. I suppose you do qualify to be my friend. Why don't we join forces? Turn weapons of war into gifts of jade and silk? Just give me some of those antidote pills, alright? Say what you will, but I am your Senior, which means that you owe me some respect.”

Yang Qi laughed. “Senior? You’re my Senior? You’re nothing but a medicinal pill! And I have no reason to work with you. I'd rather consume you to help form my monarch godhood. As you obviously know, I haven’t yet reached godly ascension, yet I have Paramount will convergence. The only thing I lack now is godhood. And I want monarch godhood. How about that?”

Originally, he had found this pill daoist’s godpower to be very intimidating. But after finding out that his fighting experience was so shoddy, Yang Qi was left right in the middle of laughter and tears. Now he wasn’t worried at all, but was mostly interested in exploring the rest of the Chaos-Forge God-Shrine instead.

Without waiting for a response, Yang Qi made another move, drawing deeply on his godpower to attack with his Unspoiled Body, Purrfect God Art, Great Necropolis God Art, Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, and Seventy-Two Monarchs Energy Art, combining them into a river of death that smashed into the pill daoist.

“Die!”

Bam. Bam. Bam. Bam.

The pill daoist tried to defend himself, but completely failed. From his perspective, Yang Qi was like a blur that he couldn't defend against.

“Defensive energy arts!” he roared, summoning a shield of godpower around him. However, Yang Qi just smiled and thrust his hands out, then vanished, leaving behind a crystalline structure that transformed into a primal-chaos elder-snake which quickly wrapped around the pill daoist.

Snakes devour mammoths!

When it came to devouring other things, nothing under heaven could surpass the great dao of King Heaven-Devourer. With the enlightenment Yang Qi had of this dao, he was completely invincible. Before the pill daoist could react, Yang Qi opened his mouth and began sucking his godpower inside.

The pill daoist roared in rage, but was too ignorant regarding the usage of godpower. He had no idea how to focus it, much less skillfully manipulate it. He was almost like a child who hadn’t been trained in martial arts and would just randomly flail around with fists and feet.

His shouting did no good, and within the course of a few breaths of time, it was obvious that Yang Qi was rapidly growing stronger while the pill daoist was weakening.

As the pill daoist’s godpower flowed into Yang Qi, Yang Qi’s virtual godhood grew more and more solid. In those few breaths of time, Yang Qi benefited as if he had just spent several years working on his cultivation.

“Your technique is just too shoddy,” Yang Qi said. “If you knew even a few good moves, I wouldn’t be able to absorb you. For example, the vajra techniques of the buddhist schools could make you as hard as a diamond. Or you could use prajñā void techniques to make your godpower seem empty. You could even use the free and unconstrained teachings of the daoist sects to make your godpower impossible to latch on to. In those cases, I wouldn’t be able to do a thing to you. Your godpower really is impressive, but sadly, you just aren’t complete.”

Yang Qi chuckled as his snake form tightened around the pill daoist, who screamed shrilly in terror.

The pill daoist was like a slab of cold iron that had been pulled out of a mountain after ten thousand years, but had never been fully forged into a sharp sword. And now Yang Qi was assimilating him. How tragic!

“Die! Just go and die! I'm going to self-detonate and kill you! We’ll end in mutual ruin!” All of a sudden, godpower surged inside the pill daoist.

“Self-detonation? And how many self-detonation techniques do you actually know? The most famous of them all is from the dao of devils. It’s the Heaven-Devil Disintegration Grand Magic. Now that is a good self-detonation method. And then there’s the Life-Death Extirpation Art from the daoist sects, which is probably the most explosive, and even destroys your soul. There’s also the Myriad Buddhas Nirvanic Extermination from the buddhist schools, or the Heaven-Earth Devastation Art. You see, there are all sorts of self-detonation techniques that use godpower to create a deadly explosion. Unfortunately, you don’t know any of them, so I don’t think you’ll be doing any detonating at all. Gunpowder can be dangerous, but you have to know how to use it. And you need a spark to instigate the detonation. Considering your experience, there’s no way you know how to truly self-detonate. What a pity....”

“My god...” the pill daoist shrieked. “Mercy! Spare me! I don't want to die! I don’t want to be assimilated by you!”

“Forgiveness is off the table,” Yang Qi said. “No one else knows my secret but you, and if word got out, I’d be hunted down no matter where I went. If they caught me, they’d do anything to drag my secrets out. Sorry, this world is a brutal place, and you’re not destined to keep living within it.”

The pill daoist was now as helpless as a trussed pig just waiting to be slaughtered and cut into pieces.

Hours passed. Then days. Slowly but surely, all of the pill daoist’s godpower was drained away. After a month, he had turned into the shape of a three-inch-tall medicinal pill.

Yang Qi then consumed the pill, which dropped into his sea of energy and cracked open. At that point, Yang Qi began a session of cultivation.

His virtual godhood was crystallizing, and his godpower surged mightily. A fist-sized piece of godhood was forming, but it was illusory and dreamlike, surrounded by dazzling colors. None of the kinds of godhood Yang Qi had encountered in the impure lands were like anything compared to his own godhood.

Most shocking of all, after this entire session of cultivation with the Chaos-Cavern Grand-Magnate Pill, his godhood was still only half-formed.

That said, he had just saved about sixty god world years of cultivation time. And sixty years for him weren’t like sixty years for an ordinary person. Thanks to the God Legion Seal, sixty years for him were like six hundred years for someone else.

Chapter 1218: Chaos-Forge God-Shrine

‘I really benefited a lot from that. The godpower reserves in my godhood are reaching a peak. I wonder if I’m now in the position to seize the upper hand in a fight with a Greater God. That medicinal pill was amazing. What a boost.... If I could get one more pill like that, I would probably be able to form my monarch godhood.

‘Or perhaps not. The closer I get to completing the monarch godhood, the more power it’s going to require.’

From what he could tell, he was approaching a certain juncture that, once passed, would increase the requirement to thousands of times beyond anything from before.

In other words, even if he did happen to run into another Chaos-Cavern Grand-Magnate Pill, it probably wouldn’t be enough to complete his monarch godhood.

‘Time to head to the fourth floor! Considering the medicinal pill here was so strong, I have to wonder how powerful things will be on the fourth floor. If I can get an even stronger medicinal pill, maybe I really can form my monarch godhood, and afterward, keep my true level hidden from any prying eyes. After all, once I reach godly ascension, the powers of the God Legion Seal will become even more pronounced.’

What he was currently capable of with the God Legion Seal wasn’t anything close to its full potential; that would only come when he was a god.

After all, there was significance to the fact that it was named after the legion of gods. Upon reaching godly ascension, he would be part of the legion of gods; and how could someone who wasn’t a god possibly control the legion of gods!? Deep in his bones, he was convinced that once he reached godly ascension, the God Legion Seal would transform in some dramatic way.

With a whoosh, he shot out of the bottle gourd.

Glancing at it for a moment, he extended his hand and revealed a godstone. As of now, creating imperial caliber godstones was as easy as blowing some dust off his shoulder. Tossing the godstone into the bottle gourd, he exhaled deeply, causing the toxic mist in the chamber to disperse and revealing the evidence of the intense battle which had been fought in the chamber in years past.

“Spell formation: activate!” Yang Qi said coolly. Within the depths of the bottle gourd, a spell formation whirred to life, causing the gourd to shrink in size.

Yang Qi hadn't spent any time studying the bottle gourd to uncover its secrets, but he could tell there was spatial godpower in it, which allowed it to become a standalone dimension, and also allowed it to shrink.

Up until now, Yang Qi hadn’t acquired a good spatial magical device, which made it hard to store things. But now he had this bottle gourd. He was actually curious what the Chaos-Cavern Bottle Gourd was made of, considering it could fend off the toxic energy in this place.

Even though the temple itself hadn’t been melted by the toxins, Yang Qi knew that the materials that made it up had long since been completely infected.

Yet the bottle gourd was completely pure.

Yang Qi held the now palm-sized bottle gourd and sent some divine will into it. Inside, he saw so many spell formations that it was obvious the imperial caliber godstone he had just fed into the gourd was like nothing compared to what it was capable of. Obviously, there was more to this Chaos-Cavern Bottle Gourd than met the eye.

Tucking it into his sleeve, he headed toward the fourth floor.

There, the mist was even thicker than it was down below. However, Yang Qi’s cultivation base had advanced significantly after consuming the Chaos-Cavern Grand-Magnate Pill. He flicked his sleeve, creating a black hole that sucked in all the mist. A moment later, the fourth floor was empty, and on his palm was a tiny pearl full of poison.

The fourth floor was clear, but that didn't stop more toxic mist from pouring in from the outside. However, it would clearly take hours for the process to complete. Meanwhile, Yang Qi started searching around for medicinal pills.

Unfortunately, there weren’t any. Instead, there were numerous cauldrons.

All of them emanated strong medicinal aromas, which indicated that they were full of medicinal ingredients. They were huge, almost like storehouses, and when Yang Qi started opening them up, he found all sorts of ingredients that he had never seen before, but had read about in the Great Classic of God Ordainment. They were all extremely rare and precious.

In fact, they were all ingredients that could be used to counter toxins. And the furnaces were made from a special type of metal called detoxifying godsteel, which specifically grew stronger by absorbing toxins.

There were many miraculous things in the world.

‘I wonder how much these medicinal ingredients would be worth?’ He flew into one of the cauldrons and looked through the various ingredients, which included fruit, leaves, grasses, flowers... even ores and things that looked like flesh and blood.

‘That’s Crimson-Infernal Hell Weed.’ He picked up the weed, whose leaves were like serrated teeth dripping with fresh blood. ‘This is perfect for those who cultivate devil techniques, or follow the dao of devils.’

Looking around, he picked up another ingredient. ‘This is a Bright-Yang Godfruit, which contains immense god energy. It’s the perfect ingredient for concocting fire-type medicinal pills.

‘I might as well just take all of them!’ Taking out his Chaos-Cavern Bottle Gourd, he thought, ‘Well, little bottle gourd, it's a good thing I got you. Considering those spell formations of yours, you’re definitely anything but ordinary.’

With a flourish, he produced numerous imperial caliber godstones, which he tossed into the bottle gourd to activate it. A gravitational force sprang out, causing something like a black hole to appear within the cauldron.

Whoooosh... whooooosh....

One by one, the ingredients, and even the cauldrons, were sucked into the bottle gourd.

There were even some that were the size of houses, but fit inside the gourd perfectly. It went to show what the gourd was capable of with enough godstones to power it.

Before long, the fourth floor was completely empty. When Yang Qi took those medicinal ingredients back to the Sage Monarch Consortium, they would definitely cause too much of a stir to sell all at once. It would have to be done slowly, and with immense care. Otherwise it would attract the wrong attention.

More than ever, Yang Qi realized he needed to form his monarch godhood.

‘Time for the fifth floor!’

He slipped up to the fifth floor, only to find the toxic mist to be indescribably powerful. In fact, it was almost liquid, sticking to the body in a way that made it almost impossible to get rid of.

In fact, Yang Qi felt his godpower draining away because of it, and even found it hard to move.

‘This toxic mist is so strong!’ He quickly produced some of the medicinal ingredients he had just taken from the fourth floor and refined them with true flame. They swirled into the shape of a dragon, which spread out around him protectively. However, even as it formed, it began melting away. From what he could tell, it would give him about an incense stick’s worth of time safe from the toxic mist.

‘Let’s see what I can find in that time,’ he thought. Flying into motion, he sped around the hall, only to find that it was empty. There were no cauldrons, bottle gourds, or pill furnaces.

‘There’s nothing here? Seriously?’ Frowning, he searched again, until it was obvious the defensive dragon barrier was about to break down. It was at that point that he realized he had missed something on his first search: a corpse.

‘What? A corpse?’ Exhaling a stream of true flame to part the toxic mist, he looked around and confirmed that the corpse was the only thing on this floor.

‘What kind of corpse is this? It’s strong enough that it hasn’t broken down after all this time?’ It really was amazing. From what he could tell, even a corpse that had monarch godhood would quickly dissolve in a place like this. Other than truly indestructible things like the God Legion Seal, sheepskin scroll, and Mahātmā Jade, the toxic mist was completely destructive.

In fact, it was so much stronger than on the fourth floor that, given the level of his cultivation base, he was having trouble dealing with it.

Even more shocking, the corpse almost seemed alive. He looked like a young scholar, complete with a tall scholar’s hat, sitting there cross-legged with a book scroll in his hand. Unfortunately, the scroll had almost completely crumbled into nothing.

Yang Qi almost felt like he was looking at a sage who could provide instruction to everyone under heaven.

‘This scholar must have been an incredible person when he was alive!’

Chapter 1219: Scholar&#039;s Corpse

In front of Yang Qi was the corpse of a scholar, completely lifelike, and so strong that it seemed untouched by the toxic mist around it.

Normally speaking, when gods died, their corpses would eventually weaken and rot away. But that wasn’t the case here, which just went to show how incredible the corpse was.

‘What kind of scholar was this?’ Reaching out, he touched the scholar and found that his skin felt almost metallic. No wonder the toxic mist couldn’t get into him. He actually felt less like a human and more like a statue made from some sort of metal.

RUMBLE!

More and more toxic energy was building up in the area, making it difficult for Yang Qi to even remain standing, yet the scholar’s corpse just sat there completely still and unmoving.

There was also a sense of profound history on the scholar.

He was definitely someone from ancient times, perhaps someone who had fought the seventy-two monarchs. In any case, this was the fifth floor, a place that no other person had ever explored. It was a place that not even Yang Qi could handle, despite having just consumed a Chaos-Cavern Grand-Magnate Pill and being very close to completing his monarch godhood.

He made another grasping motion, but this time the mist didn't clear. Instead, the black hole he formed actually collapsed because of the influx.

Whooosh!

In addition to the general mist, there were spatial aspects that formed tiny blades, which slammed into Yang Qi’s defensive empyrean energy, causing sparks to shower down.

It was only thanks to his recent advances that he wasn’t instantly skewered. When he had just reached the Paramount level and descended from the mountains, Yang Qi had attempted to open spatial paths, only to fail.

But now his cultivation base had advanced, and things weren’t as hard as before. That said, he still couldn’t let his guard down. He still needed to form his monarch godhood and reach godly ascension before he could truly control spatial godpower.

“Senior Scholar, you might be dead, but your corpse is so strong it can survive in this toxic mist. I honestly can’t stand the idea of you being tormented this way day and night. I'm taking you out of here!” Reaching out, he grabbed the corpse.

However, the corpse was so incredibly heavy that he actually couldn’t move it. Curious, he walked around it a few times, then sent out some godpower to see if he could pierce inside the corpse and inspect it that way.

What happened, though, was that the corpse began devouring his godpower as if it were a gobblewock. It happened so quickly and forcefully that Yang Qi felt like it might start sucking away his essence.

‘What? The corpse is trying to absorb my godpower? Don’t tell me this scholar isn’t actually dead? Is he just hibernating?’ If the scholar wasn’t dead, it begged the question of how strong he actually was. After putting some godpower into the corpse, it wasn’t as heavy as before. Taking out his Chaos-Cavern Bottle Gourd, he threw a godstone into it and directed the gravitational force at the corpse, sucking it inside.

Some of the toxic mist came along with it, forcing Yang Qi to spend some time getting rid of it. Later, he would take some time to study the scholar further to try to figure out exactly who he was.

Yang Qi looked around the fifth floor again, but didn’t see anything else of note. Then he glanced at the stairs leading to the sixth floor.

The Chaos-Forge God-Shrine was located in the heart of these ruins, and had nine floors in all, each of which contained amazing items. So far, he had acquired antidotal pills, sword pellets, a Chaos-Cavern Grand-Magnate Pill, cauldrons filled with medicinal ingredients, and the corpse of a scholar.

And that meant that there were still four more floors to explore and loot.

Unfortunately, the toxic mist rolling out from the staircase was so incredibly strong that it was like a black sludge. And it had spatial fluctuations that seemed capable of boring through anything. It would obviously be difficult to last in those circumstances, even if he did have the God Legion Seal.

‘Might as well give it a shot!’ he thought. Drawing on the mysteries of the God Legion Seal, he summoned a golden shield of light around himself, then walked toward the staircase. However, after only taking one step, booming sounds rang out as his sea of consciousness was hit with force like a sledgehammer.

Then he heard a popping sound! His defensive energy had burst!

He had no choice but to step back and form it again.

Bracing himself, he took two steps, but the toxic godpower was so strong he was sent flying backward until he slammed into the wall, stunning him. And the toxic mist very nearly entered his body.

It seemed that the sixth floor might not be possible for him right now.

Although he was disappointed, the truth was that if word got out of what he'd already done, it would be considered a miracle. Even peak Greater Gods would have trouble reaching the fifth floor, and only Consummate Gods might have a chance at reaching the sixth. And that would only be with a huge supply of medicinal pills to bolster their godpower.

That said, he had benefited dramatically. He could turn in the antidotal pills for a hefty reward of merit points, use the sword pellets to groom top experts for his forces, and give the medicinal ingredients to the Sage Monarch Consortium to fuel growth of the business. And as his income grew, he could definitely be able to form monarch godhood sooner.

‘I suppose I should work on my monarch godhood before coming back. I have to see what mysteries lie in the rest of the nine floors.’

Having no need to remain behind, he headed down the stairs; he had spent roughly two months exploring the ruins.

As for the return trip, he was even less worried about the toxins. In fact, considering he had the Life-Death Void-Destruction God-Lightning from the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, he was able to use the mist to create toxic lightning pellets that would make great trump cards for use when fighting a Greater God.

Of course, he wouldn’t need items like that. But they would make great signature weapons for the Sage Monarch Consortium to use in its defense.

In almost no time at all, he was out of the Toxic Continent and putting godstones into the teleportation portal. In short order, he was back in the god kingdom of the House of God Ordainment, walking into the Missions Sanctuary.

“Junior Brother? You’re back!? Did you finish the mission?” The same two disciples from before were on duty, and they actually remembered Yang Qi. Obviously, they looked quite surprised.

“I finished it,” Yang Qi said, handing over one of the antidotal pills. “This is an antidotal pill concocted by someone with Paramount will convergence. I found it in the Pill-King’s temple ruins on the Toxic Continent. Go ahead and inspect it. How many merit points will I be getting?”

“You really got a Paramount medicinal pill?” The disciples took the pill and studied it for a long moment. Eyes glittering, one of them said, “Come with me, Junior Brother. The merit point rewards for Paramount medicinal pills have to be handled by an elder.”

“Okay.” Yang Qi followed them into a small room occupied by three Lesser God elders, all of whom were sitting with eyes closed in meditation. Looking them over, Yang Qi found that they had godhood ratings of two, three, and six. That made them so weak that Yang Qi could kill them with a glance if he wanted.

“Elders, this Junior Brother just returned from the Toxic Continent. He finished a mission there by acquiring a paramount medicinal pill. Can you please confirm the merit point reward for that?” The disciples handed the medicinal pill out on a jade platter.

“A Quasi-God disciple actually went to the Toxic Continent?” The elder with the godhood rating of six opened his eyes and looked over at Yang Qi. Seeing nothing that caught his eye, he took the antidotal pill and looked at it. His eyes opened wide. Meanwhile, the other two elders exchanged a glance. “It’s of average quality. In fact, it’s on the lower end of Paramount products. Because it’s been in close contact with toxic energy for so long, it’s become much less effective. In other words, it's only worth twenty percent of its normal price. Give him two thousand merit points.”

“What?!” Yang Qi frowned.

Paramount medicinal pills, even low-quality ones, were still supposed to be worth at least ten thousand merit points, and the antidotal pills he had acquired were of much higher quality. They were so good they should have been worth twenty thousand, and if they were auctioned, they would probably go for even a higher price.

But now these elders were trying to give him two thousand?

It was highway robbery. Of course, there was bound to be a certain amount of corruption in the Missions Sanctuary. Most of the time, the elders would make sure to earn a bit of personal profit, and the disciples would never dare to say anything about it.

For instance, a treasure worth ten thousand might only net eight thousand from the elders. A twenty-percent discrepancy was considered normal because of that.

But here Yang Qi was being cut from twenty thousand down to two thousand. They were really looking down on him.

Although he had squeezed some profit off of people back in the Scripture Pavilion, he and Bai Yin always made sure to operate within the rules. Therefore, what these elders were doing was a bit too much to take.

Yang Qi smiled coldly. “Elders, we all know what’s going on here. You’re trying to squeeze a bit too much out of me, don’t you think?”

“What incredible gall!” the lead elder said, slapping the table. “Who the hell do you think you are to talk to us like that?”

Chapter 1220: Squeezing

The elder from the Missions Sanctuary was clearly trying to intimidate Yang Qi by the mere tone of his voice.

However, Yang Qi’s expression remained the same as ever as he calmly said, “This medicinal pill is worth at least twenty thousand merit points. If you want to skim some off the top, fine. After all, we do the same in the Scripture Pavilion. But you’re not skimming off the top, you’re outright robbing me. That’s definitely against the rules of the game.”

Yang Qi knew the rules, and ever since joining the House of God Ordainment, he had been careful to follow them. Otherwise, he would have long since killed the people from the Yue Clan instead of simply infecting them with devil embryos.

“Game? Rules? What are you talking about?” The elder with the godhood rating of six laughed coldly. “In the Missions Sanctuary, I make the rules. If I say it's worth two thousand, then that's what it's worth. Although, I've actually changed my mind. We're not going to give you anything for the pill. That's your reward for talking back to elders.”

“Talking back to elders is a crime which can’t be forgiven,” another elder said. “It only stands to reason we won’t accept that pill of yours. Furthermore, if you continue to talk back to us, we’ll throw you into prison and ensure you live a life of torment. See? We actually do know how to play by the rules. Considering you got that pill, we’ll count your mission as having been completed. But you won’t get any merit point reward. Now begone.”

They were counting the mission as complete, because if they didn’t, word could spread that they were extorting disciples.

“You three...” Yang Qi said, his eyes glittering coldly.

“What!?” the third elder said. Slapping the table, he rose to his feet. “Not willing to back down? Thinking about making a scene here? Who do you think you are, a king or something?”

“Fine, fine,” Yang Qi said, smiling. “I understand what's going on. I’ll admit defeat this time around. Alright?” With that, he turned to leave.

“Wait,” one of the elders said, “for talking back to elders you need to get on your knees and apologize for—”

But Yang Qi just walked out.

“You two, leave,” the elder said to the other two disciples. “And you’re not permitted to speak of any of this. Otherwise, you know what will happen.”

“Right, of course.” The two disciples nodded and promptly forgot about everything.

“That brat sure ran off quickly,” said the elder with the godhood of six. Looking at the antidotal pill, he said, “This thing is worth a lot. But I think we should put this into our personal stash instead of handing it over to the sect. We can sell it at auction later for an even higher price. Antidotal pills from the Pill-King’s temple ruins will definitely be extremely effective, and there are always experts out there who have been poisoned somehow. People will part with their entire fortunes to save their lives in situations like that.”

“Good idea,” another elder said. “Except, considering the boy handed in the mission, aren’t we supposed to turn it over no matter how we assess it? I guess we’ll just have to break the rules a bit.”

“Replace it with some sort of defective medicinal pill. Toss a bit of powder into it that has Paramount will and pretend that's what he handed in. I honestly can’t believe the brat just chose to grin and bear it. Apparently, he’s not easily fooled. After all, the whole point of this was to goad him into attacking us so that we would be able to arrest him and bring charges against him.”

“That’s what the emissary from that person told us to do,” said the other elder with a nod. “The medicinal pill is secondary. The main task was to get him thrown in prison, which would give that person the leverage needed to negotiate with Jadefall and get some blood from that pet of hers.”

“That person has a very high position in the House of God Ordainment. Shouldn’t it be an easy thing to control a brat like this? Why get help from us?”

“Simple,” said the elder with the godhood of six. “That person can’t risk resorting to crafty plots and machinations. Besides, for him to directly make a move on Yang Qi would be like using a god item to kill an ant. If word spread, it would be a big loss of reputation. I was originally planning to have Yang Qi kneel, just to see if he would accept the humiliation. But he got away too quickly.”

“Let’s just go and grab him!”

“No, we can’t do that. We can’t do things so openly. It’s not as if we're members of the law enforcement team, so we have no right to arrest him. Even if we accused him of being rude to elders, we’d need proof. If he lost his temper, we could’ve done something, but we can’t now. There would definitely be an investigation, and if we were found to have broken any rules, it would cause big trouble for us.”

The rules in the House of God Ordainment were strict. Considering that these elders were extorting disciples, if they were found out, they wouldn’t meet a good end.

“So what? We just let it all drop? That person’s emissary gave us this task, and told us that person absolutely had to get the blood of Jadefall’s pet during the upcoming negotiations.”

“There’s nothing we can do about that,” said the elder with the godhood of six. “We just have to report what happened here. You wait here while I go talk to that person’s emissary.”

“Alright,” the other elders said as the one with the godhood rating of six hurried away.

After leaving the Missions Sanctuary, he headed to a teleportation portal that whirred to life, whisking him out of the god kingdom.

‘Now I get it,’ Yang Qi thought. He was currently on the second floor of the Scripture Pavilion, a slight smile on his face. ‘No wonder they tried so openly to extort me. I wonder whose emissary this is. Thankfully I didn’t make a scene in the Missions Sanctuary, otherwise I would’ve fallen right for their little plot. Sadly for them, plots won’t work against me. I’ve already destroyed any heart-devils of arrogance, ego, and hysteria that once existed in me. The only thing left is the cool and collected version of myself. In the past, I might’ve escalated the situation into a fight. But now....’ He chuckled. ‘I’ll make sure they die without any idea how they were killed.’

He had truly become much more calm and calculating after the events in Demon Master Valley, making it much more difficult for people to lure him into traps.

In fact, he was actually luring the three elders into a trap of his own. He had left behind devil embryos on all of them, so he knew everything that was going on with them.

As the elder from the Missions Sanctuary stepped onto the teleportation portal, Yang Qi left a godpower clone behind and made himself invisible, then followed the elder.

The portal led to another location in the House of God Ordainment.

However, the elder didn't stay in the city. Instead, he flew out to a distant location in the mountains that no one ever paid attention to.

He waited there for a few hours until the night had turned cold and pitch black.

Some time later, a dot of light appeared, piercing through the mountains and landing in front of him. It was a middle-aged man with chiseled, distinguished features, his hands clasped behind his back. He was unsmiling, and radiated the air of a superior meeting a subordinate.

“My respects, Grand Elder Meng Guo,” said the elder, clasping hands in greeting.

“Did you finish the task I assigned you?” Meng Guo said. His aura placed him as a Common God, which meant he definitely had a high position within the House of God Ordainment. Common Gods were grand elders, and wielded a lot more power and authority than ordinary elders. Of course, Greater Gods didn't even need to be mentioned, as they were usually prime elders.

“That brat was too crafty. After we tried to extort him, he offered a few words of dispute, but in the end, he didn’t make a big fuss. And before I could get him to kneel in apology, he left. At that point, we couldn’t do anything without getting the law enforcement team involved. Normally speaking, a person wouldn’t possibly tolerate that treatment. Furthermore, I investigated him. During the year or more that he's been a member of the House of God Ordainment, he’s always acted arrogant and domineering. He definitely has some secret weapons that makes him incredibly powerful, probably around the same level as Bai Yin. I’d even say he's strong enough to beat Lesser Gods in a fight. I really never could’ve imagined that he’d have so much restraint.”

“Restraint?” Meng Guo said, keeping his hands clasped behind his back. “Well, it seems he really is extraordinary to have done something like that. I suppose the situation calls for more drastic measures now.”

“Might you be able to help us in some way? Considering how badly we extorted him, there’s no way he’ll take another mission from the Missions Sanctuary. Furthermore, he's friends with Jadefall. If he tells her about this, or even starts working with her... it could be problematic.”

“Don't worry about it. As long as you work for my lord, he’ll make sure nothing bad happens to you.” Meng Guo laughed. “You might not have succeeded at the task at hand, but you did your best. Now we just have to think of a way to pull the wool over Yang Qi’s eyes. My lord is absolutely determined to get the blood of Jadefall’s pet! He’s already learned some very interesting things about it!”

“I know,” said the elder with the godhood rating of six. “ Why don’t we send some books to the Scripture Pavilion? He’ll definitely try to rip us off, and we can use that as an excuse to take action!”

“That's a good idea! Considering you just ripped him off, if you deliver some books, he’ll obviously take advantage of the situation to get revenge. And then we can grab him. There’s no way he’ll slip out of our hands this time!”

Chapter 1221: That Person&#039;s Plot

“Right, of course,” said the elder with the godhood rating of six, nodding his head obsequiously. “Although, I worry about what will happen if the brat doesn’t fall for it. He’s obviously got a lot of restraint. What if he’s on guard and realizes what we’re trying to do?”

“Then we’ll have to switch tactics. Lend someone a knife and have them do our dirty work for us.” Meng Guo grinned coldly.

“What?” the elder blurted. “You mean have him killed? I thought you just wanted to have him arrested and sentenced to death, then use his life as a bargaining chip when dealing with Jadefall. What good would it do to kill him?”

“Fool!” Meng Guo cursed. “Who said anything about killing him? What I meant was that we could find some other disciple to provoke Yang Qi. Then we kill that disciple and blame it on Yang Qi. We can even conjure up some false evidence. Slowly but surely, we’ll put him in a deadly situation he can’t possibly escape from!”

“Hmm. That is a pretty good idea.” The elder thought for a moment. “According to our recent investigation, Yang Qi actually has a grudge with someone from the Yue Clan. It’s Yue Tianlin, a former foreman from the mines. He and Yang Qi had a bit of an altercation, but since then, Yue Tianlin has become a Lesser God and an elite disciple. Why not use him?”

“That’s fine. If the victim was a mere Quasi-God, it would be easy for Jadefall to pull a few strings and get Yang Qi off the hook. But if he’s convicted of killing an elite disciple, it’s a high crime. Actual gods are the pride and joy of the House of God Ordainment.” Meng Guo smiled.

“The downside is that there are some pretty impressive people in the Yue Clan, people who might figure out that we're trying to frame Yang Qi. For example, they have that genius Yue Zifeng.” The elder was clearly taking the time to think the matter through carefully.

“Yue Zifeng? You think he can compare to my lord? My lord is one of the most powerful people in the House of God Ordainment, and on par with the junior houselord. The junior houselord has an interest in the Jadefall, but is currently in seclusion working on some boundless technique. Once he's out, he could cause problems, so we need to take care of this matter as quickly as possible. I’ll handle the Yue Clan and make sure they don’t cause any problems. In fact, even if they find out we’re responsible, they won’t dare to implicate anyone other than Yang Qi. This whole thing will only benefit us.”

“Right. I'm just trying to think of how to draw the snake out of its hole. How do we get Yue Tianlin into a no-win situation? Maybe bewitch him into challenging Yang Qi to a duel? That way there won’t be any questions about how he got killed. Or we could assassinate him. I have some friends from the dao of devils who’ll do that kind of thing for the right price. We obviously can’t do it ourselves.”

“That works. It seems to me you can handle the details. That said, the people from the Preheaven Society have been watching this Yang Qi, so be careful. Don’t let them beat us to the punch.”

“That goes without saying. The Preheaven Society? Hmph! They put on a big front, but Wang Xiantian made a big blunder recently. He lost a huge amount of face, so their prestige is lower than it's ever been.”

“Okay, so we have our plan set. You handle the details. And remember, my lord will reward you handsomely for this!” Meng Guo pulled out a bag filled with a collection of godnotes. “Here's fifty thousand godnotes. That's a huge amount, more than enough to hire experts from the dao of devils.”

“Many thanks for your generosity. Many thanks!”

After discussing a few final details, they parted ways.

Yang Qi watched them disappear, a thoughtful expression on his face. He had hoped to handle this entire situation right there and then. However, now he realized that these two were just pawns in a larger scheme. Clearly, there was someone far more powerful plotting against him.

Whoever that person was, they clearly weren’t someone that Yang Qi could handle in combat. More than ever, he needed to get stronger and form his monarch godhood. And he probably needed to find a way to meet Jadefall, and also see how his other friends and family were doing.

Over a year had passed, and Yang Qi hadn’t seen any of them. The time was approaching for a reunion.

**

It was evening, and the moon had already risen. God kingdoms had suns and moons, unlike the god world in general, which only had light and dark. Because of that, god kingdoms were considered very luxurious. Already, nightlife activities were underway. The House of God Ordainment wasn’t a boring place that focused only on cultivation; people liked to have a good time as well.

In this god kingdom, there was the Scripture Pavilion, Missions Sanctuary, Treasures Pavilion, Armory, Thrall Camp, Alchemy Wing, and other such “branches of government”. In addition to that, there were cities where one could wine and dine, or visit private enterprises set up by important disciples. There were even gambling halls, brothels, and bars, all of which thrived.

After all, godly ascension wasn’t just about bitter cultivation. Sometimes, enjoying oneself was a way to hone one's temperament. In fact, there were even people who tempered their will by means of gambling.

After all, gambling involved relying on luck. By winning and losing, it was possible to assess one’s own luck, then possibly grasp at strands of destiny to gain better control of oneself. It was no rarity for disciples to gain enlightenment during sessions of gambling.

There were many paths that led to godly ascension.

Yang Qi had never been to any of the cities, as he usually spent his nights working on cultivation, reading, or relaxing. He didn’t need stimulation to achieve breakthroughs.

Yang Qi was currently sitting on a lonely mountain peak connected to the Scripture Pavilion, using a communication talisman to send messages to his friends and family.

“All of you, come for a visit....”

He got immediate responses, and about two hours later, the first person appeared, flying up to meet him on the mountain.

It was Sword Seventeen.

He looked very impressive, and pulsed with sword energy that seemed incomparably sharp. It seemed as though an attack from him could devastate any obstacle. Even more impressive, he had reached godly ascension.

“Yang Qi!” he said. Laughing, he rushed forward and embraced him. “Junior Brother! It’s been an entire year, how have you been?”

“Fine. More than fine. You’ve actually reached godly ascension! I can’t say I'm surprised.” Gazing inside Sword Seventeen, he saw that his godhood was a sword pellet containing the ultimate core truths of the dao of the sword. His godhood rating was only three, but his fighting prowess was so astounding that he could definitely cut down that elder from the Missions Sanctuary with a godhood rating of six.

After all, Sword Seventeen was an Ascendant! In the god world, Ascendants were always terrifying individuals!

“Look, I have something for you.” Yang Qi handed him a sword pellet from the Pill-King’s temple ruins.

Sword Seventeen’s eyes glittered as he took it and popped it in his mouth. He didn’t feel any need for excessive pleasantries when dealing with Yang Qi, having followed him from the impure lands up to the immortal worlds. They had been together in the Titan Emperor Heaven, Brahman Immortal World, Dao Defense League, Great Necropolis, and the Ancient Road to the Gods. Now here they were in the god world. Few people understood Yang Qi as well as him.

Around this time, laughter rang out as another figure blurred onto the scene. “We're all gods, Yang Qi. And of course you should’ve expected that. Although, to be honest, I'm surprised you haven’t reached godly ascension yet.”

It was the Shepherd.

The Shepherd was even more impressive. His godhood was like an enormous vortex, constantly absorbing external power. Apparently, he had begun cultivating some very impressive divine ability, as his godhood rating had blown through eight and nine and was already at ten. He was a Common God!

Clearly, he fit right in here in the House of God Ordainment.

The Shepherd had been a king of hell, so without Yang Qi’s help, he would never have made much headway.

“Oh really?” Smiling faintly, Yang Qi waved his hand, whereupon the Shepherd’s face fell. In fact, he was so shocked he looked almost like a zombie. Yang Qi clapped his hands together loudly to awaken him from his reverie.

“Th-that... that... th-that’s... Paramount will! You actually achieved enlightenment of Paramount will convergence? But you haven’t reached godly ascension! This....”

The Shepherd was mumbling to himself out of shock. However, his voice soon took on a tinge of excitement. Laughing out loud, he said, “I knew you were extraordinary, Yang Qi. That’s why I was curious as to why you haven’t reached godly ascension yet. But now it makes sense. You’re forming monarch godhood! Other than some freaks in ancient times, no one has ever done this before! You’re turning a legend into reality! But if the House of God Ordainment finds out....”

“They would arrest me and experiment on me.” Yang Qi smiled. “How about you, Shepherd? As the apprentice of a Greater God, you have a very high position in the sect.”

“That’s right. I'm an apprentice of the Greater Devil-Exterminating God, who helps me cultivate the Devil-Exterminating God Art. He has a violent temper, but loves being brown-nosed. And he hates devils with a passion. Before I finished forming my godhood, I slaughtered a Lesser God devil, and even assassinated a pontifex of a major devil church. That earned my Master’s respect. Furthermore, during the last disciples’ convention, I crushed the opposition and earned him a lot of face. He’s worked hard to help me with my cultivation, and I’ve benefited a lot from it.” The Shepherd went on to explain some more details of what he had been up to in the last year. Then he said, “But when did you start forming monarch godhood? If you finish it, you’ll be so strong that not even my master, the Greater Devil-Exterminating God, would be a match for you.”

“He probably couldn’t beat me even now,” Yang Qi said. “However, there are a lot of hidden dragons and crouching tigers in the House of God Ordainment. In a massive sect like this, it’s usually better to keep a low profile.”

“That’s right,” boomed another voice. “You’re so strong you’re heaven-defying! It's better to keep a low profile.”

“Brahma!” Yang Qi said. “It's you!”

Chapter 1222: Reunion

Brahma had once been a god, but had fallen into the impure lands and been dismembered, then suppressed by Proud Heaven for years upon years. Eventually he was freed, and followed Yang Qi into the House of God Ordainment. Now he had recovered, and thanks to the experience he had gained, was a Lesser God again.

His godhood rating was nine, but his godpower was different from the Shepherd’s; when he formed his godhood, it crystallized into numerous characters that all read “Brahma”. There was something that seemed invincible about his godpower and will, and Yang Qi could see that he was actually holding back. If he wanted to, he could achieve another breakthrough right now and become a Common God.

Walking over, Brahma said, “I got help from a powerful person, and had access to even more resources than you did. But I have to admit, I still can’t measure up to you. To achieve Paramount will convergence while only a Quasi-God is unheard of. Countless people dream of it, but none have ever succeeded. You're the only one.”

“If I can’t do it,” Yang Qi said, “I don’t think anyone can.”

He wasn’t exaggerating. He had the God Legion Seal, sheepskin scroll, Mahātmā Jade, Seventy-Two Monarchs Energy Art, Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, and the Unspoiled Body, all of which were considered consummate techniques in the god world. Plus, he had his Sage Monarch Grand Magic. If he couldn’t achieve Paramount will convergence with all of that, who in the god world possibly could?

“How have things been going for you, Brahma?” Yang Qi asked.

“Very well. I follow a Greater God called Nāgārjuna. He's very powerful, just on the verge of breaking through to the Consummate God level. Unfortunately, I don’t think he’ll succeed. In my previous life, I used a deadly god item to reach the Consummate God level, so I know full well how difficult that is. In fact, I'm even worried about my own chances. But if you form monarch godhood, you should be able to help all of us. You know, Yang Qi, forming monarch godhood requires an indescribably huge amount of power. In fact, it’s a level of power that can destroy almost anything. Given your current rate of cultivation, it’s going to take years to finish, even with the help of medicinal pills. And ordinary medicinal pills won’t do any good. You’ll need Paramount medicinal pills.”

“You’re right,” Yang Qi said, “and unfortunately I don’t have any medicinal pills like that right now. Even a single Paramount pill is incredibly expensive. Even though I can make godnotes and godstones now, it wastes too much godpower.”

The Shepherd chuckled. “As they say, even the rich landlord runs out of money eventually. Don’t tell me you’re going to ask us for help! We’re all dirt poor!”

Yang Qi laughed. “Don’t worry, what's yours is yours. I won’t ask for it. I’ll form my monarch godhood on my own merits, building up every drop of godpower myself. In fact, you could say that I'm not building godhood, but humanity and confidence. How could one possibly build monarch godhood with the help of others?”

“Yang Qi, I'm here!”

“Me too.”

Whooshing sounds could be heard as several people landed on the mountain peak, including Proud World, Doom, Eldest Brother Mage Cloudwalker, and Elder Seventh Brother Meng Shafan.

Everyone else was either on missions, out training, or in seclusion.

Those who had come were all gods. As for Doom, he was even stronger than Brahma, being a Common God. He’d once been a bearer of the God Legion Seal, and had immense destiny, perseverance, and wisdom, so it was little surprise that he would achieve such progress.

His natural aptitude obviously surpassed everyone else, considering he had been selected to bear the God Legion Seal.

“You’ve all done very well,” Yang Qi said. “Do any of you know how Jadefall is doing? I heard she got a very high position of some sort.”

“She's very well-regarded right now,” Doom said. “However, she's out on another mission. She’s representing our House of God Ordainment to offer greetings and gifts of longevity to the emperor of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty as one of a group of top students who were selected for the task. One of the main goals of the mission is to make sure the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty knows what kind of top disciples we have here in the House of God Ordainment.”

Doom had access to better information, thanks to being a Common God.

The Eternal-Life God-Dynasty was an immense organization of a similar size to the House of God Ordainment, both of them superpowers with Paramount Gods. In fact, many other top organizations in the god world viewed the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty as the leader of all the other organizations. In that larger scheme of organizations, the House of God Ordainment was like a government official, whereas the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty was like the emperor. And when the emperor had a major birthday, the officials would obviously deliver gifts.

“Jadefall’s purrling is famous now,” the Shepherd said. “In the impure lands, the purrling was invincible, so I think we all assumed that when it got into the god world, it would be less impressive. Who could’ve guessed that it would remain just as invincible? It can even humiliate Greater Gods, and I suspect that even Consummate Gods probably wouldn't be able to deal with it. Because of that, no one can do anything to Jadefall.”

“I see,” Yang Qi said, nodding. “Well, it seems that my association with Jadefall has made me the target of some important person. Hey, hold on a second. Why isn’t Yang Immortal-Slayer here?”

Yang Immortal-Slayer was none other than this immortal-slaying clone.

At that point, a projection of will emerged from the talisman he was holding. “I'm in secluded cultivation, Yang Qi, at a very important juncture. The will of King Immortal-Slayer reached out to me and is helping me form Paramount will convergence. I'm going to have monarch godhood! King Immortal-Slayer is in a very dangerous situation; the Great Necropolis fell into the hands of a Paramount god, who’s using it to assimilate him! If that Paramount God succeeds, he’ll gain control of the Great Necropolis, King Immortal-Slayer, and the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart! That’s why he’s helping me. Because of making my attempt to be the first person to achieve monarch godhood, I can’t even send a projection there to meet you.”

The Shepherd burst out laughing. “Yang Immortal-Slayer, didn’t you know that Yang Qi has already reached the Paramount level? He’s the first! That said, I can’t wait to see how this all turns out. You’re his clone, so if you can also form monarch godhood, just how strong will the two of you be?”

Yang Qi wasn’t laughing. “The Great Necropolis fell into the hands of a Paramount God? What happened to Proud Heaven? Is that Paramount God in the Proud Clan? Or was Proud Heaven killed by someone? That seems unlikely. Proud Heaven isn’t the kind of person who’ll die easily. It must be a Paramount God from the Proud Clan. This matter must be more complicated than it seems, so we have to be careful.”

Yang Zhan, as well as Peaklords Celestial and Memory, were all out on important missions, but they had also reached godly ascension.

Right now, the only people who weren’t gods were Yang Qi and Yang Immortal-Slayer, both of whom wanted to complete their monarch godhood. And considering that Yang Immortal-Slayer had the help of King Immortal-Slayer, he was fairly confident in his ability to succeed.

“I didn’t just call this meeting to have a reunion,” Yang Qi said. “I have an important matter I need help with. Like I said, I'm being targeted because of my connection to Jadefall....” He went on to describe everything regarding the Missions Sanctuary and the meeting between the elder and the grand elder.

Doom’s expression flickered. “What? That’s what they’re doing? I wonder if this person they’re referring to is him.”

“Who are you talking about?” Yang Qi asked. “In the hope of not attracting too much attention, I've been sticking to the lower echelons of the House of God Ordainment. That's why I'm only an official disciple. Considering all of you are elite disciples with Greater Gods as your Masters, you must know more about the higher levels than I do.”

“There’s a very important faction in the House of God Ordainment called the Dragon Society,” Doom said. “The leader of the Dragon Society is named Dragon Floret. He’s young, but extremely ambitious, and is in the position to compete with the junior houselord himself. He’s known to be a Consummate God, and according to the rumors, he’s about to break through to the Perfect God level. And while his will convergence is known to be in the late Paramount level, he’s very close to the Unbounded level already. He’s considered the top disciple in the House of God Ordainment and is one of a handful of children of primeval chaos. If he wants to break through, he has to worry about the purrling. And if he succeeds and achieves Unbounded will, not even Paramount Gods would be able to kill him.”

It was a given that the Unbounded level was vastly more powerful than the Paramount level.

“Dragon Floret?” Yang Qi said. The name made him think of a dignified and imposing person who could control the entire cosmos, crush universes, and alter the dao of heaven. A person like that would definitely be able to perceive the workings of heaven. Thankfully, Yang Qi was a Fateless One and existed outside of such purvey.

“If Dragon Floret is plotting against you, there’s no way you can fight back,” Doom said. “Having been in the House of God Ordainment for more than a year, I've come to know the rules quite well. He won’t be able to outright kill you, but he can definitely take you captive and use you as a threat against Jadefall. Of course, he also knows that the purrling can destroy him.”

“He won't find it easy to make a move against me,” Yang Qi said. “How much power and influence do you have? Is it enough to do anything to the Dragon Society?”

Chapter 1223: The Dragon Society

“We have some influence, but nothing along the lines of the Dragon Society. If they’re at the top of the House of God Ordainment, we can only be considered to be in the middle. After all, we’ve only been here for a year, while the Dragon Society has been around for millions upon millions of years.

Doom and the others were all shaking their heads.

They were far beyond any ordinary person, and had accomplished amazing and extraordinary things. But they had only just started walking this path. They lacked reserve power, and even though they were advancing by leaps and bounds, they still couldn’t acquire the full trust of the sect so easily. Perhaps if they stuck around for a thousand, or even tens of thousands of years, they could establish a solid foundation and earn merit in the sect.

But after having only been around for a year? It was just impossible to have much power after such a short time.

“We have a long way to go before we can deal with the Dragon Society,” Proud World said. “For now, the only thing we can do is try to avoid getting crushed. Complaining about it won’t do any good. Back in the impure lands, we were apex entities. But here in the god world, we have to be very careful. We might have a bit of power and influence, but there’s plenty of people above us who could crush us. Now just isn’t the time to stick our necks out.”

“The god world is where things really happen,” Yang Qi said. “Before, we were like hegemons in a country village. If the Dragon Society as a whole is plotting against me, it’s not something I can just stand by and let happen. Maybe I am a weakling in the god world, but I'm still a bearer of the God Legion Seal. How could I possibly let myself be picked on by some random faction?”

“What do you intend to do?” Brahma asked. “Their leader, Dragon Floret, is at about the same level I was at my peak, and won’t be easy to deal with. Of course, we've been by your side since the impure lands, so we’ll do anything we can to help. What if we just leave the House of God Ordainment?”

“Yeah,” said the Shepherd. “Let’s just leave. We never planned on staying here permanently anyway. Considering what we’re capable of, we could just go to some other continent and continue growing there. I've learned of some devil churches that are roughly on the same level as the House of God Ordainment. In fact, if we killed some people from the House of God Ordainment to serve as blood tributes, they’d probably welcome us.”

“We’ll only do that as a last resort,” Yang Qi said, waving his hand. “If we openly betray the sect like that, we’ll be hunted down wherever we go. You already have good positions in the House of God Ordainment, so let’s not give that up just yet. The longer you stay here, the better your prospects for cultivation. As for me, it doesn’t really matter if I'm in a sect or not. Besides, if the House of God Ordainment really does treat me badly, you could stay behind as informants and moles. Then we could work together to destroy the entire organization!”

“That would work,” growled Meng Shafan. “Maybe I should change my name from Meng Shafan to Meng Shashen!”

Doom, Proud World, and the Shepherd had once been Yang Qi’s enemies, but had long since turned into friends. Having risen to the god world together, they knew how impressive Yang Qi was. And there was nothing any sect in the god world could do to wipe out the feelings that had developed in their hearts since their time in the impure lands.

They all knew that sticking together was their best chance to accomplish big things.

“Have a seat, everyone,” Yang Qi said. Setting up a defensive aegis, he continued, “How about I inspect all of your godhood? I learned a lot after I acquired Paramount will, and I've gained more enlightenment of the fundamental nature of the Sage Monarch Grand Magic. I should be able to help you solidify your godhood and push your psyches to higher levels. The stronger you are, the more you can help me, and the better we can deal with the Dragon Society.”

They felt their psyches trembling as Yang Qi’s Paramount will entered their seas of consciousness. Immense godpower swept over their godhood and they felt true flame burning at their souls, cleansing their impurities. Meanwhile, the Flame of Hope burned in their seas of energy, causing their godpower to become sturdier and tougher than ever.

When the process was over, they rose to their feet and exchanged shocked glances. “Your cultivation base is beyond any of our Masters’,” Doom said. “I don’t think even a Greater God could do anything to you. If you complete your monarch godhood, exactly what level will you be at?”

“Good question,” Yang Qi replied with glittering eyes. “In addition to assessing your cultivation, I called this meeting for another reason. I established a small business here, called the Sage Monarch Consortium, which I would like all of you to support. I recently went on a mission to the Pill-King’s temple ruins and acquired some medicinal ingredients that are all extremely rare and precious. Have a look and take anything that you need. Whatever is left over, I’ll deliver to the Sage Monarch Consortium to be put up for sale.”

The group left the god kingdom and traveled to a desolate mountain area. There, Yang Qi tapped his bottle gourd and produced a whole host of uncharacteristically rare medicinal ingredients.

“Dear lord!” Brahma said. “These ingredients will all fetch astronomical prices! In fact, if they all went to auction at the same time, people would go crazy! Yang Qi, these things might actually cause problems for your Sage Monarch Consortium!”

“That's why we won’t sell them all at once,” Yang Qi replied. “Take a look and find any that’ll help you. It seems most of you have good positions, but are strapped for cash. Also, I want you to work with the Sage Monarch Consortium to identify and groom the top geniuses. Here are seventeen sword pellets you can use to reward loyalists. Incidentally, I have a loyal follower who’s reached godly ascension, named Zhang Jufang, as well as some demon-gods who can be converted into puppets at any time. I want to grow the Sage Monarch Consortium as quickly as possible and make sure we have the funds necessary to get Paramount God god pills. With one or two pills like that, I should be able to achieve full success with my monarch godhood.”

“We understand. We've been wanting to start a business, but it seems you’ve beaten us to the punch. Of course we’ll help out. With us working behind the scenes, we’ll make sure no morons try causing problems for the Sage Monarch Consortium.” With that, they began selecting specific medicinal ingredients that could help them.

Afterward, the remains were sent to the Sage Monarch Consortium.

By now, the Sage Monarch Consortium’s headquarters was located in a thriving city near the House of God Ordainment’s headquarters, a place called Goldtreasure. It was a hodgepodge of good and bad people, with gods, devils, demons, and monsters to be found everywhere. However, the House of God Ordainment strictly enforced the rules, ensuring that things operated in orderly fashion.

The business had been operating very smoothly. Thanks to the godstones and godnotes Yang Qi had supplied, they were able to purchase a large building that functioned well for doing business. So far, their trade with the Demonfolk focused on medicinal ingredients and fur clothing. It was profitable, but not wildly so.

Now that Yang Qi was providing medicinal ingredients from the Pill-King’s temple ruins, the Sage Monarch Consortium could truly start doing good business. They were slowly building power and influence that they could tap into at any time.

Of course, Yang Qi didn’t handle the day-to-day affairs. Instead, he helped Zhang Jufang get even stronger, giving him a sword pellet that would make him very dangerous in a fight.

Yang Qi spent his time in seclusion on the second floor of the Scripture Pavilion, working on his cultivation and seeking enlightenment of monarch godhood. Thanks to having Paramount will convergence, he could use the God Legion Seal to draw in even more godpower from the void.

At the current rate, he was fairly certain it would only take twenty or thirty more years to finish the monarch godhood.

As it turned out, the elder from the Missions Sanctuary brought some books over a few days later. Yang Qi knew exactly what was going on, so he let Bai Yin handle the situation. Of course, that completely flummoxed the conspiracy, considering that the elder had come hoping to cause problems for Yang Qi, not Bai Yin.

With their first plan having failed, they resorted to their second plan: provoking a fight between the Yue Clan and Yang Qi.

In response, Yang Qi simply refused to make an appearance. No matter how Yue Tianlin challenged him, he didn’t respond. In the end, Yue Tianlin was like a dog trying to bite the hedgehog.

Over the course of the following months, they tried more ways to get to Yang Qi, but he didn’t respond to any of them. After all, both Yue Tianlin and the elder from the Missions Sanctuary had devil embryos in them, making it easy for Yang Qi to keep an eye on them.

Yang Qi had even infected Meng Guo with a devil embryo.

Back in Demon Master Valley, it had been difficult to infect the ox god with a devil embryo. But after achieving Paramount will convergence and consuming the Chaos-Cavern Grand-Magnate Pill, he became much more powerful. As such, it was easy to implant devil embryos even into Common Gods.

Because of all that, dealing with plots and conspiracies was an easy thing.

During the month that the battle of wits played out, Yang Qi had never let them get the upper hand even once. Meanwhile, the Sage Monarch Consortium was slowly growing stronger and more powerful. By sending the medicinal ingredients to auction, they earned a lot of godnotes, and even managed to buy a few Paramount god pills. With them, it would be much easier to finish his monarch godhood.

With the help of his friends and family, the Sage Monarch Consortium was able to overcome whatever small obstacles came up. It was obvious that within only a few years, the consortium would be a huge force to reckon with.

“Milord,” Zhang Jufang said, kneeling in front of Yang Qi, “We managed to buy three Psyche-Gathering Origin Pills. They’re early Paramount god pills, and should be of some help to you.”

Nodding, Yang Qi took them and consumed them.

Chapter 1224: Tit for Tat

‘They might be made via Paramount will convergence, but sadly, they’re not very impressive. The medicinal efficacy is probably only ten percent of the Chaos-Cavern Grand-Magnate Pill.’ As easy as blowing some dust off his shoulder, Yang Qi threw the three medicinal pills into his godhood and extruded the impurities, which became a black ball of filth.

How could pills with such impurities possibly measure up to the Chaos-Cavern Grand-Magnate Pill?

That said, the godpower in them would save Yang Qi three months of ordinary cultivation. Right now, every single day of cultivation brought immense benefit, so it was obvious how much it would help to jump ahead by three months. And as he furthered his cultivation, he became more and more aware of the vast power of monarch godhood.

Thanks to the God Legion Seal, he was able to constantly draw on the essence of the god world and turn it into quintessence vitality, something no one else could possibly do.

Most ordinary disciples would have to rely on medicinal pills to gain quintessence vitality, which they would then convert to godpower. It was similar to how people in the impure lands would eat food to be converted into nutrients, which would then become power within them. Being able to directly take power from one’s surroundings would be marvelously helpful.

For that reason, most people could spend thousands of years working on their cultivation without forming monarch godhood. Who knew how many medicinal pills would be required to succeed that way?

“How is business doing lately?” Yang Qi asked after consuming the pills.

“Very well,” Zhang Jufang replied. “We have branches opening up everywhere, and money flows in every day. Of course, we're following your instructions to not expand too quickly. From the perspective of any outsider, we’re just doing good business. At the moment, we're earning about a hundred godnotes a day in net profit, and we usually auction a single medicinal ingredient every day. Furthermore, Milord, some of your sworn siblings have been helping us deal with certain plots and conspiracies. The downside is that they have to dip into some of the profits to do so.”

“That's fine. What's mine is theirs. Besides, they need to get more influence in the sect, which requires a lot of godnotes. And they need medicinal pills to improve their cultivation bases. By the way, be careful. The Dragon Society might very well cause problems for the consortium.”

“Yes sir!” Zhang Jufang said. He was a god now, and was working on a way to become an official disciple, and after that, an elite disciple. That would place him in a higher position in the sect than Yang Qi currently was in.

Power always made it easier to accomplish things.

For all intents and purposes, Yang Qi didn’t have anything to do with the Sage Monarch Consortium; it was completely run by Zhang Jufang.

“Head back,” Yang Qi said. “From now on, minimize contact with me as much as possible. If you have any issues, get in touch with Brahma or one of the others.”

“Yes sir,” Zhang Jufang said, leaving.

Yang Qi closed his eyes and began focusing on his breathing exercises, working on his monarch godhood and causing dramatic transformations within himself.

**

BAM!

In the mountainous countryside, Meng Guo slammed his fist into a boulder, shattering it. “What exactly is going on here?! It’s been more than a month, and you still haven’t succeeded? How many treasures have you wasted so far?”

“Er....” The elder from the Missions Sanctuary looked very miserable. “It’s not as if I’m not trying! I've done everything I can think of. Yang Qi just can’t be fooled. It's almost like he knows all our plans before we carry them out, and sidesteps them all. He never even shows up in our presence! How are we supposed to do anything to him like that?”

“Think of something. Anything!! I refuse to believe that our Dragon Society can’t deal with a measly official disciple.”

“Sir, you’re definitely strong enough to just take him captive. But if we play by the rules, it's going to be hard to get at him.”

“So when you take books over there, Bai Yin is always the one that meets you? Not Yang Qi? Does that mean Yang Qi is hiding from you?”

“That’s right. It’s as if Yang Qi knows we’re coming. And when Yue Tianlin goes there to challenge him, he never shows his face. But after we’re gone, he comes out. He’s got to be hiding from us.”

“Bribe Bai Yin! Bribe the grand elder from the Scripture Pavilion! I refuse to believe that he can use the Scripture Pavilion to hide from our Dragon Society!” Meng Guo chopped his hand out, causing the mountain peak to burst into flame and sending rubble popping and hissing about in all directions.

“Okay.... I never thought of that. You’re as impressive as ever, Grand Elder. But if I'm going to bribe Bai Yin and the grand elder, I'm going to need something to bribe them with....”

“Don’t worry about that,” the grand elder said proudly. “You think the Dragon Society is poor or something? Go handle it right now. First talk to Bai Yin, then the grand elder. Understand? I’ll wait here for you. See what they want, and we’ll see what the Dragon Society can provide. Any price can be paid when it comes to ensuring our leader reaches the Unbounded level.”

“Yes, yes of course....”

The elder from the Missions Sanctuary hurried away.

A few hours later, whooshing sounds could be heard as two figures arrived on the mountaintop. One was a stooped old bald man whose eyebrows drooped all the way down to his shoulders. He seemed elegant and refined, but at the same time was clearly incredibly powerful. He was a Common God!

The other person present was Bai Yin.

The elder from the Missions Sanctuary introduced all of them. “This is Meng Guo from the Dragon Society. And this is Grand Elder Hong Lie from the Administration Vault of the Scripture Pavilion.”

“It's an honor to meet you at last,” Hong Lie said. “Might I ask why you summoned us here in the middle of the night?”

Although everyone present was from the House of God Ordainment, the sect was enormous and not everyone knew each other. It was very much how, in the impure lands, government officials in a huge imperial dynasty might not know each other. And of course, the House of God Ordainment was much larger than any mortal dynasty.

Of course, the Dragon Society was famous among all the disciples, so there was no way the grand elder from the Scripture Pavilion would dare to speak disrespectfully.

“It’s simple. Our Dragon Society wants to frame Yang Qi for a crime! Name your price, whatever it is.”

Bai Yin shook his head. “Frame Yang Qi? The Dragon Society is powerful and influential, and Yang Qi is just a kid. Nothing more than an official disciple. Is he really worth expending that much effort to frame?”

“You don’t need to worry about that,” said Meng Guo. “It’s part of our leader’s plan. As you know, Yang Qi has a close relationship with Jadefall. But although Jadefall asked you to take care of him, it’s not as if she compensated you, right? Besides, do you really think she can compare to the leader of the Dragon Society?”

“Er....” The old man from the Scripture Pavilion was clearly thinking the matter over.

Meanwhile, Bai Yin casually said, “I have a good relationship with Yang Qi, but it's not as though we’re best friends. If the price is right, I'm in. How about ten Paramount god pills, the kind that are full of godpower? I recently gained some new enlightenment, and I’ve decided to just form my godhood now. I'm giving up on monarch godhood.”

“What?” the elder from the Missions Sanctuary blurted. “You want Paramount god pills? Aren’t you being a bit too greedy? You know, when the Dragon Society gives orders to people like us, we don’t even ask for a reward. You should be scrambling at the chance to earn favor with the Dragon Society! It's for your own good!”

“Bah!” Bai Yin spat. “Unless I get paid, I won’t do anything. Even if the emperor of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty begged me, I’d still say no.”

“You!” the elder growled, and he had to restrain himself from starting a fight right then and there. After all, he and Bai Yin were on roughly the same level. And considering Bai Yin had been pursuing the path of monarch godhood, he obviously wasn’t the kind of person who could be easily pushed around.

“Very well, let’s hear what Grand Elder Hong Lie has to say,” said Meng Guo, sparing nothing but a cold glance for Bai Yin.

“This would involve offending Jadefall,” Hong Lie said. “And her Master is a Consummate God, not the kind of person to be trifled with. I need to think this through. Bai Yin, are you really willing to sell out Yang Qi for some medicinal pills? I thought you got along well with him.”

“So what if I am?” Bai Yin replied. “I’ll do anything for enough money.”

“Don't worry, Bai Yin,” said Meng Guo. “After you take care of the matter, you’ll get your ten Paramount medicinal pills.”

“After I take care of the matter?” Bai Yin said, his eyes wide. “Are you trying to get something for nothing? Since when does anything work like that? I'm taking a risk by offending Jadefall, and I’d better be compensated for it. Look, it’s simple: pay up now, or forget it. I'm not interested in offending the Dragon Society, either, but don’t think you can treat me like a tool. I don’t have powerful backing, so if Jadefall comes asking what happened, I would be the one on the hook.”

“You want it now?” The grand elder shook his head. “You really are greedy.”

“In that case, I guess we’ll go our separate ways from here.” Bai Yin turned to leave.

“Hold on. How about I give you half now, and half after? However, before we can finalize the deal, I need to know what Grand Elder Hong Lie here is thinking. Although you might be able to help a bit in this effort, his stance is the most important.”

After some thought, Hong Lie said, “Alright. We can look for a way to pull a fast one on Yang Qi, and get him in a deadly trap. After all, the second floor of the Scripture Pavilion is managed by the third floor. As for the fourth floor and higher, they’re run by people so important they wouldn't care about low level circumstances like this. That said, the risk of offending Jadefall is going to cost you. We want the same kind of medicinal pills. Except a hundred! High quality! I need them to become a Greater God!”

Chapter 1225: A Big Con

“A hundred...?” The grand elder from the Dragon Society involuntarily laughed. “Very ambitious, Grand Elder Hong Lie. Why not just resort to highway robbery?”

“It’s not ambitious at all,” Hong Lie replied. “In fact, it’s a very low sum. Jadefall’s Master personally asked me to watch out for Yang Qi, so if I help frame him, I’ll have to deal with her revenge. Unless you’re telling me the Dragon Society will stand in to protect me.”

“He’s a nobody!” Meng Guo growled. “Do you think that the Dragon Society is in the habit of just throwing our resources away?!”

“In that case, I guess we're done here. Don’t worry, I won’t tell anyone about what we talked about today. We can just pretend it never happened. By the way, Yang Qi is planning to stay in seclusion for ten years. We’ve already arranged for a comfortable study for him in the Scripture Pavilion.”

The Scripture Pavilion had a lot of influence of its own. For example, disciples who worked there could get access to higher levels to learn techniques or work on their enlightenment. If Yang Qi was going to be in seclusion for ten years, there was no amount of plotting or scheming that could do anything to him.

“Fine, fine,” said Meng Guo. “I had no idea you were such a shrewd businessman, Grand Elder. Unfortunately, I don’t have the authority to agree to a payment of a hundred Paramount god pills. I’ll need to ask my superiors about that. Please wait a moment.”

With that, he flew up into the air and vanished without a trace.

Bai Yin and Hong Lie simply waited. About four hours later, Meng Guo returned. “They agreed. However, we can only agree to give you half the pills up front. The other half we’ll give you after the task is complete.”

“How very generous of you. I almost can’t believe you’re willing to spend that much just to frame a nobody. On the black market, you could spend this much to get the head of a Greater God.”

“The deal is done!”

Before handing over the bag of medicinal pills, though, Meng Guo said, “Remember, you can’t breathe a word of this to anyone. And you need to accomplish the deed within three days. If you can’t, you’ll have to return the medicinal pills. Got that? The Dragon Society won’t let this matter drop if you mess things up.”

“That’s fine,” the grand elder said with a faint smile. “As a grand elder in charge of managing the Scripture Pavilion, if I couldn't handle an official disciple, then how could I do anything? Three days? No problem, we’ll get it done. But once we do, you’d better not get stingy and withhold the rest of the pills. If you do, I’ll make sure the truth comes out and Yang Qi gets justice. I'm not going to offend Jadefall’s Master for no reason!”

“Don’t worry. As long as you do the job, you’ll get your medicinal pills right away.”

With that, Meng Guo handed the bag of pills over to Hong Lie.

Hong Lie laughed heartily. “With these pills I finally have the hope of becoming a Greater God!” Taking out one of the pills, he saw that it was as big as a longan fruit and looked as if it were made from amber. It even contained a starry sky of its own. “This is a Double-Nines God-Dragon Starry-Sky Pellet, right?”

“That’s right. Those are Double-Nines God-Dragon Starry-Sky Pellets, personally concocted by our leader Dragon Floret. In order to concoct them, he killed a Greater God of the Dragonfolk and used his blood and core vitality along with all sorts of other rare medicinal ingredients. Then he purified it with his Paramount will. Normally speaking, the Dragon Society only hands out pills like those as a reward for immense services rendered.”

“Once this matter is over, you’ll definitely be rewarded,” Bai Yin said with a smile. “I've heard that Dragon Floret wants to use Yang Qi as a threat against Jadefall. Your Dragon Society has influence with the Law-Enforcement God-Palace, so any disciple who gets convicted of a crime will be under your control, am I right? Once Yang Qi is in custody, Jadefall won’t be able to do a thing to fight you, and you’ll get her pet.”

The elder with the godhood rating of six snorted coldly. “Hmph! Very smart, boy.”

“Let’s go,” said Hong Lie. “We’ll send news within three days. In the meantime, prepare the pills you owe us.”

With that, he and Bai Yin flew off.

Grinding his teeth, the elder said, “You’re really handing those pills over, just like that? Those were all Double-Nines God-Dragon Starry-Sky Pellets!”

“Calm down,” said Meng Guo. “Bai Yin was right. As long as we accomplish this mission, we’ll be handsomely rewarded. And if our leader can use the blood of that pet to reach the Unbounded level of will convergence, we can completely take over the entire House of God Ordainment. Besides, do you really think it will be easy for them to keep those pills? When the time comes, we’ll exterminate them and take them back. Anyone who has the gall to screw with the Dragon Society deserves to die!”

“But he’s a Common God! We can’t just kill someone like that, can we?” Killing Bai Yin might not be a big deal, but killing a grand elder would be very difficult to cover up.

“Even Greater Gods who get in our way will be killed! Believe you me, once our leader breaks through to the Unbounded level, it's a given that he’ll become the houselord of our House of God Ordainment. When he has the real power, people will have to submit to him and prosper, or oppose him and perish. And you and I can both rise to the top with him!” He flicked his sleeve. “You’re dismissed. Let’s see what happens over the next three days.”

Meanwhile, Bai Yin and Hong Lie had arrived back at the second floor of the Scripture Pavilion.

Once inside, Hong Lie’s appearance suddenly shifted, and in the blink of an eye, he was someone else. Yang Qi!

“Brother Yang Qi, you were amazing,” Bai Yin said, clicking his tongue in amazement. “I can’t believe you fooled a Common God! Truly incredible! You’re definitely far stronger than me. Where did you get the aura of a Common God?”

“You flatter me. I just so happen to have a Common God friend who gave me some godhood aura. That’s what made the disguise perfect.” The truth was that he had used his Life-Death Void-Destruction God-Lightning to disguise himself. And considering he had Paramount will convergence, he could pass himself off as a Greater God if he wanted to, much less a Common God.

Having been aware of the plot, he’d recruited Bai Yin to help and the two of them had successfully conned the Dragon Society.

“It’s a good thing Meng Guo didn’t attack us. You wouldn’t have been able to keep up the disguise then. And although we're stronger than the average Lesser God, we’d end up dead if we fought a Common God.” Bai Yin was still shivering from fear.

“I'm very impressed by your spirit of loyalty and self-sacrifice, Bai Yin,” Yang Qi said, his eyes glittering. “You’re even willing to stand by my side in defying the Dragon Society. Aren’t you worried about the consequences? In three days, they’ll realize they were fooled, and you’ll be in great danger.”

“Ah, what’s there to be scared of? We got paid under the table. Besides, I’ve never grovelled in my entire life.” He chuckled darkly. “They can’t very well accuse us publicly, so why shouldn’t we con them? Do you really think they’ll tell everyone they bribed us with medicinal pills to frame someone for a crime?”

“Obviously not,” Yang Qi said. “But they could try some underhanded tricks.”

“Look, you’re not afraid of the Dragon Society, so why should I be?” Bai Yin shrugged his shoulders casually. “I'm a man who wants to form monarch godhood. If I was a coward, how could I ever succeed with that?”

“Alright!” Yang Qi said, clasping his shoulder. “As a matter of fact, Bai Yin, you made a really good decision here. One of these days, I’ll make sure you understand why. You’re really going to benefit from this. I guarantee you that your fate is going to transform significantly.”

“Hmm?” Bai Yin looked at Yang Qi as if he didn’t know him. “How come you sound like an important person all of a sudden? Hey. Where are you from anyway?”

“I’ll explain everything later,” Yang Qi said, waving his hand dismissively. “Now, let’s split up these medicinal pills. How about fifty/fifty?”

“That works for me. By the way, what are you planning to do with so many medicinal pills designed to boost godpower? To form monarch godhood, we need to improve our fleshly body and psychic power. Godpower won’t really help. I mean, my virtual godhood is already completely full.”

“In that case, give the pills to me,” Yang Qi said. “I need as many as I can get. And I’ll make it up to you by purifying you in body and soul.”

Crack!

Before Bai Yin could do anything, Yang Qi’s hand had latched onto his head, rendering him completely immobile. Then he felt immense godpower flowing through him as cracking sounds rang out, making him feel like he was falling apart as countless noxious liquids emerged from his pores.

Then a burning fire raged through him, crystallizing his godpower and pushing his psychic scale higher and higher. The impurities were burned away and, in the end, Bai Yin was surrounded by golden light, including a halo floating behind his head. And he pulsed with a magnificent aura.

Yang Qi retracted his energy arts, and a short time later, Bai Yin opened his eyes. “My body. It’s been rebuilt on a fundamental level! I never even imagined that something like this could be possible. I'm so strong!” Looking at his hands in wonderment, he continued, “With a physical form like this, I have a much better chance of developing Paramount will convergence and forming monarch godhood!”

“I don’t think so,” Yang Qi said. “Monarch godhood isn’t as simple as that. Truth be told, Bai Yin, forming monarch godhood is simply too difficult. But if that’s your choice, then do as you will. In any case, after remolding your body just now, you have the capacity for a lot more godpower. That said, you’re still light years away from reaching the Paramount level. The further you go along this path, the more you’ll understand. Once you've reached enlightenment on the topic, you’ll see how difficult monarch godhood is.”

Chapter 1226: One Step Away

Double-Nines God-Dragon Starry-Sky Pellets didn’t have the same level of godpower as Chaos-Cavern Grand-Magnate Pills, but fifty-five of the former were at least the equivalent of about three or four of the latter.

Yang Qi had helped Bai Yin to purify himself in body and soul, but kept all of the pills. Overall, Bai Yin actually came out on top of it all. Meanwhile, as he focused on the transformations occurring in his fleshly body, Yang Qi took all fifty-five of the Double-Nines God-Dragon Starry-Sky Pellets and popped them into his mouth, resulting in an instant surge of power.

Energy flows rushed through him like dragons, releasing enough force to cause an ordinary person to explode. However, his cultivation base still lacked the godpower, so the merest twitch of his virtual monarch godhood sucked in all of the power. Then, a moment later, he exhaled a stream of pill energy that was nothing more than a collection of impurities.

“Dear lord, are you trying to kill yourself!?” Bai Yin exclaimed in shock. Even a Lesser God would need many months to consume and assimilate that many pills. Probably even a year.

Yang Qi was a Quasi-God, and in the end, was only human. Normally speaking, if someone like that consumed fifty-five Paramount god pills, they would simply explode.

However, no such explosion occurred. From what Bai Yin could sense, Yang Qi’s sea of energy was like a black hole that sucked in all of the godpower without cease.

Winds screamed as Yang Qi breathed in and out, his interior seemingly a void.

After exhaling all of the impurities, he rose to his feet, his monarch godhood so close to completion that he was only one step away from finishing.

Unfortunately, that final step wasn’t going to be easy, and would require incalculable amounts of energy. In fact, not even fifty-five more pills like those he had just used would possibly be enough.

However, after accomplishing everything he had, Yang Qi could now see that his monarch godhood was fist-sized and featured nine orifices, twenty-four types of energy, thirty-six acupoints, and formed a three hundred and sixty degree circle.

After he made that step, he could fully connect with the boundless heaven and earth, and reach godly ascension.

“Dominate Everything under Heaven!” Slashing his hand down like a knife, he sliced open the void in front of him, creating a vortex that erupted with a spatial tempest. However, before the tempest could do anything, he grabbed it, pacifying it and turning it into a pitch-black wind dragon that writhed back and forth in his grip.

“You can manipulate spatial power!” Bai Yin blurted. “You—”

“It doesn’t matter,” Yang Qi cut him off. “There’s no need to say it out loud. As I said before, as long as you stick with me, I’ll change your fate.” A tremor passed through Yang Qi, and the vortex vanished as though it had never existed.

Bai Yin looked up in thought for a moment, but was confused and couldn’t quite grasp what Yang Qi meant. However, one of Bai Yin’s strong points was that when he knew he couldn’t understand something, he didn’t waste any time trying to figure it out.

“You know, we’re going to have to deal with the aftermath of all this eventually,” Bai Yin said. “Grand Elder Hong Lie obviously has no idea that you impersonated him and made a deal with the Dragon Society. In three days, they’ll definitely come looking for him. What do we do then? I can’t see how any good will come of it.”

“It doesn’t matter. We can just wait and see how things play out. Grand Elder Hong Lie isn’t going to take responsibility for my actions when I impersonated him. So there will definitely be some sort of altercation. In fact, you need to deny involvement as well. Just say you never accepted any payment, and that someone was impersonating you.”

“Well, that’s obvious. Who would possibly admit to being involved in a deal like that? Besides, my cultivation base is a lot better than before. I'm someone else entirely now.” He chuckled. “Best of all, this was a private deal, which means they have no contract or any other evidence to rely on.”

Yang Qi also chuckled. “Let's see how Meng Guo handles the situation. Alright. For the next three days, we have to stay hidden here in the Scripture Pavilion.”

And they did just that. Over the course of those three days, nothing noteworthy happened. As for the two men from the Dragon Society, Yang Qi kept an eye on them by means of the devil embryo. And what he saw was that they were simply waiting in keen anticipation.

Sadly for them, after the three days passed, nothing happened....

**

Deep in a mansion grotto somewhere.

BAM!

Meng Guo smashed the table in front of him. “The three days are passed! How come we haven’t received any update? Hong Lie took those pills, but didn’t follow up on his end of the bargain. Was he just scamming us?”

“Perhaps there were some complications that came up," said the elder from the Missions Sanctuary. “There must be some sort of explanation. In any case, we need to bring Hong Lie here to explain things. I’ll get in touch with him right away.”

“Yes,” the grand elder said. “Let’s meet up in the same place as before.”

A short time later, the elder arrived at the Scripture Pavilion only to find that the second floor was closed. Eyes glimmering with hatred, he ascended to the third floor, where he sent someone to ask for an audience with Grand Elder Hong Lie.

About an hour later, Hong Lie arrived, and when he saw who was waiting for him, his eyes flickered with surprise. “An elder from the Missions Sanctuary? What are you doing here at the Scripture Pavilion? If you want to browse the books, you could just ask for help from one of the disciples. There isn’t any need to disturb my cultivation for something as mundane as that.”

Grand Elder Hong Lie was obviously a bit irritated at having been disturbed, and that was especially the case considering he was a Common God and the visiting elder was a mere Lesser God.

Seeing the attitude of Hong Lie, the elder from the Missions Sanctuary ground his teeth in fury and said, “Come on, Hong Lie. Don’t pretend you don’t know who I am. You accepted a payment of medicinal pills from the Dragon Society to do a job for us, and the three-day time limit has passed. Have you lived up to your end of the bargain?”

“What are you talking about?” Hong Lie replied in confusion. “When did I take any medicinal pills from you? The Dragon Society? Wait, you work for the Dragon Society? How could I possibly have agreed to do anything for you people? I’ve been in seclusion for several months straight!”

“What the fuck, you old codger! How dare you play dumb!” Despite his outrage, the elder obviously couldn't do anything rash, and definitely couldn’t take any action. Struggling to remain calm, he said, “Let me remind you of what went on. Grand Elder Meng Guo from the Dragon Society and myself had a nice discussion with you, in which you agreed to help us. And Meng Guo was acting on the authority of Dragon Floret himself!”

“The leader of the Dragon Society?” Hong Lie said. He was no fool, and as soon as he heard Dragon Floret mentioned, he knew that this was no minor affair. Snorting coldly, he said, “Fine, lead the way.”

They left the god kingdom and headed out into the remote mountains.

When Meng Guo caught sight of Hong Lie, he shouted, “It’s been three days, Hong Lie! What’s going on here!? We wanted you to frame Yang Qi, what’s taking so long? Don’t tell me you intentionally took our medicinal pills and did nothing!”

“What? Frame Yang Qi? For medicinal pills?” Furious but at the same time confused, Hong Lie said, “Don’t make the mistake of thinking your Dragon Society is invincible, Meng Guo. I’ve got powerful backers too. What makes you think I would ever take medicinal pills from you?”

“Alright, fine!” shouted Meng Guo, his fury rising to apoplectic proportions. “Apparently you aren’t afraid of dying, Hong Lie! I’ve never heard of anyone who dared to run a scam on the Dragon Society. It was three days ago on this very spot that you took over fifty Double-Nines God-Dragon Starry-Sky Pellets as a down payment for framing Yang Qi. You had three days, and the time period is up. So why hasn’t Yang Qi been framed?”

“Did you experience cultivation deviation, Meng Guo? Did you go insane? For the past three days, I’ve been in seclusion in the Scripture Pavilion. There are plenty of people who can corroborate that. There are even some other grand elders with whom I discussed various daoist techniques. Furthermore, why does your Dragon Society want to frame an unimportant disciple like Yang Qi? And why would you go to such lengths to pull it off?”

“Dammit! You old bastard! How dare you try to weasel out of this.” Meng Guo was going crazy from anger to the point where he wanted to simply kill Hong Lie right here and now.

Unfortunately, that wasn’t an option. He couldn’t just kill an important elder with powerful backers like Hong Lie.

“You’d better think this through clearly,” Meng Guo grated. “There’s still time to go back and frame Yang Qi for a crime. I can even give you a few more days to do it. But if you insist on being stubborn, the Dragon Society won't let you off the hook.”

“Are you threatening me?” Hong Lie said, his eyebrows shooting up in anger. “I never took any medicinal pills from you. And now you’re trying to frame me? Look, I'm not going to deal with a lunatic like you. The Dragon Society might be powerful, but you have no right to simply cause problems for me for no reason. This is the House of God Ordainment! You can't just do whatever you want here.”

The Dragon Society was indeed powerful, but they still couldn’t order the law enforcement team to go arrest someone without evidence; that would be an abuse of power. The House of God Ordainment had very strict rules about that, and although there had been disciples in the past who tried to manipulate the system to their advantage, when they were found out, they were imprisoned and forced to cripple their own energy arts.

If the law enforcement team of a huge organization like this could be easily manipulated for personal reasons, it would lead to mass chaos.

For hundreds of thousands of years, the House of God Ordainment had worked this way. Although it was definitely possible to frame someone for a crime, the laws couldn't be openly manipulated to that extent.

Hong Lie turned on his heel to leave, furious at having been dragged out of seclusion only to be accused of such absurdities.

Looking over his shoulder, he said, “I'm going to pretend none of this ever happened. And if you insist on pressing the issue, I’ll report the matter to the highest elders of the Scripture Pavilion. And if that happens, the council of chief elders will make the final decision about what happens.”

With that, he flicked his sleeve and flew away, leaving Meng Guo and the other elder standing there wide-eyed with shock.

Chapter 1227: Killing Intent

“Dammit, dammit...!” When Hong Lie was out of sight, Meng Guo couldn’t hold back any longer and unleashed a blast of godpower, detonating some nearby boulders and sending debris showering down onto the surrounding trees. He was obviously so mad he was in a killing mood. “That bastard. How dare he! He took our payment and then did nothing!”

“What do we do now?” said the elder with the godhood rating of six. Obviously, he didn’t have any good ideas at the moment.

“We have to report what happened. There’s nothing we can do now other than wait to be punished.” Meng Guo knew full well that he had made a huge mistake. And considering how much he had cost the Dragon Society, it was a given that he would be punished for it.

Upon hearing the word ‘punishment’, the elder’s face fell for a moment before his expression turned cold. “Look, I'm not taking responsibility for any of this, Meng Guo. I'm not a member of the Dragon Society. I just work for you, that’s all. This whole thing is Yang Qi’s fault. I didn’t do a single thing. And if it weren’t for him, I wouldn’t have done any of this for you.”

“What did you just say?” Meng Guo growled, glaring at the elder with bloodshot eyes. “It was with your own mouth that you vowed to join the Dragon Society after all of this was over. And that’s a big opportunity. Don’t tell me you're going back on your word now.”

“I did say that I would join the Dragon Society after all of this was over. But now it's obvious the mission was a failure. And I'm not a member yet. Furthermore, I don’t want any payment for my services. Considering I'm no fool, there’s no way I’ll just accept punishment for no reason.” He chuckled coldly. “I think you should try harder to get Hong Lie to pay up.”

“Y-y-you!” Meng Guo shouted. “I can’t believe you’re sneaking away at a critical juncture! Aren’t you afraid you’ll get yourself killed?”

“Killed? I'm an important elder from the Missions Sanctuary, and a Lesser God with a godhood rating of six. Would you really dare to kill someone like me? Do you think your Dragon Society runs our sect or something? That’s a joke if I've ever heard one.” He let loose another cold laugh. “I agreed to help your Dragon Society, and maybe I failed in the end, I still worked hard to make it happen. And I never even got paid. In fact, not only am I not getting paid, but now I'm even being threatened with punishment. Are you fucking kidding me? Do you really think I’m stupid?”

The elder was now worked up enough that he was really turning hostile.

“Alright, fine,” Meng Guo said, suddenly looking at the elder as calmly as if he were looking at a corpse. “It seems you really aren’t afraid of getting killed. Sadly for you, anyone who betrays the Dragon Society has no choice but to die!”

“Don’t push things too far! The only thing that happened was you failing a mission. If your Dragon Society dares to kill me over this, you’re all finished! I've already made detailed records of all of this, so if I die, there’s plenty of evidence that’ll implicate you. I have a friend who’ll hand it all over to the council of chief elders. Heed my warning, Meng Guo! You may be a Common God, but you won’t escape punishment from the sect if you break any rules!”

“You!” Meng Guo shouted furiously. “You’re quite the troublemaker aren’t you? Well, you just wait. Even if you don’t end up dead, you’ll suffer for this!”

With his words hanging in the air, Meng Guo turned and flew off.

‘I'm not that easy to kill! Who would’ve thought it’s so difficult to turn a profit from the Dragon Society. And on top of not getting paid, they’re threatening to punish me. Fucking Dragon Society. Although, how did that Yang Qi get Hong Lie to switch sides?”

Lost in thought, the elder turned to leave.

Swish!

But then, without any warning at all, a beam of sword light appeared and stabbed right through him, slicing into his godhood and piercing his sea of consciousness. At the same time, a bubble popped into being around him.

It was an assassination!

And whoever was assassinating him was so ferocious and ruthless that he could kill with a single blow.

As the sword energy slashed through him and his godhood, damaging his psyche as well, he saw a black-cloaked man appear in front of him, face hidden in the deep hood of the cloak.

Voice gurgling weakly, the elder said, “Dragon Society?! You actually had the gall to kill me?! I won’t let you get away with this!”

BAM!

He exploded, flames consuming every last bit of him.

He was dead. Finished.

Then the black-cloaked figure faded away.

Some distance away, in a hidden location, the black-cloaked figure appeared again. The cloak faded away, revealing a smiling Yang Qi. “Down to the last moment, he believed it was the Dragon Society. Hmph. His energy will only bolster my own godhood. Unfortunately, it’s not going to be enough to have any meaningful effect.”

In the moment of the assassination, Yang Qi had activated the devil embryo to search the elder through and through. Unfortunately, the man didn’t have any wealth or treasure on him. It was all in his private chambers, which meant Yang Qi wouldn’t benefit much from killing him.

‘As a Fateless One, it’s easy to assassinate people like that. No one can predict my actions like they’d be able to if I were an ordinary person.’

Secretly killing people wasn’t easy to do in the House of God Ordainment. Once word spread, it would generally be possible for Consummate or Perfect Gods to analyze the workings of heaven and dig up clues to identify the culprit.

Thanks to being a Fateless One, though, Yang Qi couldn’t be investigated in that way.

This was the same elder who had taken Yang Qi’s antidotal pill without giving him a single merit point in exchange. Yang Qi’s hands were tied back in the Missions Sanctuary, and he had been waiting for a moment just like this to kill the man.

When Yang Qi made a killing move, he didn’t show mercy. He could suffer in silence for however long it took, but when the time came to make a move, he struck with deadly force!

A moment later, he vanished.

**

In the House of God Ordainment’s god kingdom, there was a certain mountain covered in a lush bamboo forest, and was wreathed in clouds year-round. Meng Guo was currently climbing the mountain. He didn't dare to fly in the air, so it took him about an hour to reach the palace at the peak.

“Elder Brother, I screwed up. Hong Lie took the medicinal pills, but didn’t do the deed. And now he’s denying involvement.”

“Get in here!” a voice growled, and a vortex sprang up and dragged Meng Guo inside.

A moment later, Meng Guo found himself inside a mansion grotto, facing a young man in a white robe, with long white hair and white fingernails. He seemed untainted by even a speck of dust, and was the picture of elegance.

His gaze was so sharp that Meng Guo felt uncomfortable, and it was made only worse when the young man said in the coldest of voices, “Despite the immense resources our Dragon Society gave you, and the time you had to work with, you still couldn’t handle a measly Quasi-God?”

“I really don’t know what's going on!” Meng Guo said. “It’s all the fault of that Hong Lie! Please, Elder Brother, give me another chance. Who could’ve guessed that he’d be so undaunted of our Dragon Society and would just take our reward then refuse to follow through with the agreement?”

The white-haired young man snorted coldly. “You want another chance? Our leader is waiting impatiently for results! The birthday of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty’s emperor is coming soon, and our leader needs the blood of that pet beforehand! He needs it to form his Unbounded will and crush all of his competition. And you want him to keep waiting? For how long?! Are you saying you want the leader to personally handle this brat? That’s completely ridiculous! Do you think I should do it myself or something?”

“Please, give me a chance, Elder Brother. I know I can pull it off. Worst case scenario, we can resort to calling on the law enforcement team. We can frame him for some random thing and call in the crime to have him arrested.”

“Frame him for some random thing? And what happens when they investigate the situation? If you casually report a crime to the law enforcement team, and they find out the truth, then I’ll be in big trouble! When you frame someone for a crime, you can’t leave any loose ends. Make sure everything is in perfect order, then call the law enforcement team. Got it?!”

“R-right, of course,” Meng Guo stammered. “I’ll make sure that the losses our Dragon Society have suffered are completely made up for. And I'm also going to make sure that Hong Lie from the Scripture Pavilion gets what’s coming to him!”

“Listen, scum, if I have to, I’ll send some people from the law enforcement team to help you. But you can’t just randomly arrest him without good cause. Got it?” The white-haired youth thought for a moment. “This Yang Qi seems particularly clever, but not even the cleverest mouse can outsmart a cat.”

It was at this point that whooshing sounds could be heard as several experts landed on the mountain peak and rushed over to the white-haired young man. All of them were elite disciples, and down to the last one, they all looked flustered.

“This is bad! Something big is happening!”

“What do you mean? Why do you look so discombobulated!? You’re from the law enforcement team, you shouldn’t have anything to be afraid of!”

“You don’t understand, Elder Brother. An elder from the Missions Sanctuary was just killed. And right before he died, he sent a message implicating the Dragon Society. A few of his friends are already submitting evidence to the council of chief elders, who’re going to file a case against the Dragon Society and start a formal investigation! And Grand Elder Meng Guo is named in the evidence. There are even witnesses who say the victim was seen with Meng Guo right before he died.”

“What did you just say?” Meng Guo blurted in shock. “Impossible. Completely impossible! I would never kill someone. How could I be getting the blame for this?”

“What exactly did you do, Meng Guo!?” yelled the white-haired youth.

“I can explain, Elder Brother! It was like this: I just said a few threatening things. But that doesn’t mean I killed him! He was refusing to work with our Dragon Society, so I had to put him in his place. This is a setup! I'm being set up! I know this looks bad, Elder Brother, but you have to help me here!”

“Help you? How?” The white-haired youth thought for a long moment. “No, you brought this on yourself. You wanted to get on the good side of the leader, so you came up with a plan to frame Yang Qi and use him against Jadefall. The Dragon Society is filled with straightforward and upright people. How exactly did a traitor like you sneak into our midst!?”

“What? But, Elder Brother....” Meng Guo looked completely devastated. “Elder Brother, don’t tell me you’re abandoning me?” Of course, he knew exactly what the white-haired young man was doing.

BAM!

The white-haired youth chopped his hand out and hit Meng Guo, causing numerous explosions inside his body. Then blood oozed out of his eyes, ears, nose, and mouth, and he collapsed, dead.

“Get him out of here. Meng Guo killed an elder from the Missions Sanctuary, so I executed him.” Eyes glittering with frigid light, the white-haired young man waved his hand dismissively. He had just dispatched a Common God with a single blow, which just went to show how incredibly mighty he was.

Chapter 1228: White-Haired Young Man

The white-haired young man was incomparably vicious, and hadn’t hesitated to simply execute Meng Guo, a Common God. After all, the young man was a Greater God, so he had every right and authority to kill someone like Meng Guo who had broken the law and ‘resisted arrest’.

The matter was settled just like that. By shifting all blame to Meng Guo, then executing him, the white-haired young man ensured that the Dragon Society wasn’t implicated. After all, without Meng Guo there to provide testimony and evidence, there was nothing linking his actions to the society in general.

The students present exchanged awkward glances.

“Elder Brother, you didn’t really need to execute Meng Guo. He might be a murderer, but you’re definitely going to be punished for this. He should’ve at least had a trial.”

“All of you saw what happened when you tried to arrest him. He immediately started fighting back. And if he’d taken a hostage, things would’ve been even worse. Thankfully, I executed him before that could happen. I might be punished for it, but in the end, it won’t be anything to worry about.”

Not even Greater Gods could just kill people without facing any consequences. That said, the past couldn’t be changed. Therefore, he would just accept whatever punishment he was dealt.

“Yes, of course,” the disciples said, leaving with Meng Guo’s corpse.

Looking down at the bloodstained ground, the white-haired youth smiled faintly. ‘There’s no way that elder was killed by Meng Guo,’ he thought. ‘He wasn’t gutsy enough to do something like that. If my suspicions are correct, it was actually Yang Qi. Unfortunately, I doubt there’s any evidence to be found. He obviously wanted Meng Guo blamed for the murder of that elder. With the evidence coming in, there was no way Meng Guo would ever have been able to explain his way out of the situation. And someone as useless as that is only fit for death! Not only did he screw up his mission, but he got himself wrapped up in tricky complications. If the council of chief elders investigated, and he blabbed about the Dragon Society trying to frame Yang Qi, things would get really bad. Better to make him a scapegoat. Ah, Yang Qi. You really know what you’re doing. A mere Quasi-God like you ran circles around a Common God from our Dragon Society....

‘I really have to meet you and see what you’re like. You’ve offended the Dragon Society, and for that you’ll die. Did you really think you could just mess with us and not pay the price? If so, you’ve made a big mistake. Perhaps if you’d just fallen in line and done what the Dragon Society wanted, you would’ve lived through this. But instead, you tried to be clever and frame us. For that, you’ll die, and no one will possibly be able to save you.’

He was really in a killing mood.

The Dragon Society had suffered an unexpected failure in this venture.

**

Later that night....

Yang Qi was on a mountain attached to the Scripture Pavilion, using the God Legion Seal to work on breathing exercises and refine his energy. He was slowly working on his monarch godhood, and was closer than ever thanks to the fifty-five Double-Nines God-Dragon Starry-Sky Pellets.

Although his requirements grew the further along he was, he was still confident that, because of the God Legion Seal, he would ultimately succeed.

WHOOSH!

A few figures flew up to meet him, including Brahma, the Shepherd, and Doom.

“You really did something remarkable this time, Yang Qi,” the Shepherd said. “Not only did you win a bunch of medicinal pills, but you also got the enemy to slaughter each other. We heard about the drama today. That was your doing, right?”

“That’s right, it was me,” Yang Qi replied. “However, it won’t be possible to keep the truth from the upper echelons of the Dragon Society. It won’t be long before danger comes my way. The Dragon Society won’t just take this lying down.”

“With your monarch godhood, you’re completely domineering,” Doom said admiringly. “Who would dare to cause problems for you? Although, according to what I heard, the person assigned to deal with you is the White-Haired Boxer King from the Dragon Society.”

“The White-Haired Boxer King?” Yang Qi said, his eyes widening slightly. “Who’s that?”

“A Greater God, who also happens to be a powerful person in the Law-Enforcement God-Palace,” said Brahma. “Not only is he tasked with enforcing the law in the sect, but he’s also one of the eight primary leaders in the Dragon Society. He’s virtually invincible, and completely ruthless, having executed too many people to count. He’s a natural-born martial arts genius, and when he fights, he’s a horror to see. It would be hard to find another Greater God who could stand up to him.”

Yang Qi smiled. “Oh? That just makes me want to try him out and see what his cultivation base is like. By the way, how are things going with the Sage Monarch Consortium?”

“Business is doing well,” the Shepherd said. “We started putting those medicinal ingredients to market, and they’re fetching astronomical prices. Unfortunately, it’s impossible to do that without attracting at least some attention, and we don’t have any truly powerful experts to keep us safe. Once you complete your monarch godhood, Yang Qi, you’ll soon become an actual god. If we could have a Lesser or Common God as an official leader, it would make things a lot easier. Even better, a Greater God. If we had a Greater God, then no one would dare to cause any trouble for us.”

“That’s easier said than done,” Yang Qi said. “Even after forming my monarch godhood, I’ll only be a Lesser God. I’ll have immense fighting prowess, but each rise in level requires immense godpower, and by extension, a big collection of medicinal pills.”

“What exactly is monarch godhood like?” Doom asked. “I'm curious to learn more about it. And what will the God Legion Seal be capable of when you’re a god? Right now, it's hardly at one ten-thousandth of its full potential.”

“You’ll find out when the time comes. Suffice it to say, when I become a god and unleash the true power of the God Legion Seal, I’ll dominate everything under heaven. By the way, there’s something else I need you to keep an eye out for. Mahātmā Jade. It’s a boundless magical treasure that can improve psychic power that was broken into pieces many years ago. Once I complete it, it will complement the God Legion Seal. I'm currently in the early Paramount level, but if I could get another piece of the Mahātmā Jade, I could rise to the mid level. If I get two pieces, I’d reach the late level or even the peak. In fact, I might even be able to break into the Unbounded level.”

“We’ll try to get you some leads on the Mahātmā Jade,” the Shepherd said. He knew more than anyone that even if they got pieces of the jade, they wouldn't be able to do anything with them. Yang Qi was now their destined owner.

Yang Qi wasn’t particularly interested in magical treasures, the exceptions being the Mahātmā Jade, Great Necropolis, and Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

Other than them, everything else was superfluous and could be discarded.

After discussing some daoist techniques and other matters, the group dispersed.

Returning to the Scripture Pavilion, Yang Qi found Bai Yin flipping through a book. Looking over, Bai Yin said, “Those important people outside just now... were they your brethren?”

“Yes, they were,” Yang Qi replied. “Actually, I wanted you to catch a glimpse of them.”

“Impressive. I couldn’t even assess them. Your brethren are all gods! The lot of you will definitely accomplish some amazing things in the future.”

“You flatter me,” Yang Qi said. Reaching over, he pulled a book off one of the nearby shelves, a jade-bound tome describing research into pill concocting. It was entitled The Calcifying Methods of the Exalted Celestial’s Dao of Alchemy.

By now, Yang Qi had read through more than half of the books on the second floor, yet he was still interested in continuing his reading.

After reading through the book, he picked another, this one a scroll made from human skin that was taken from a bookshelf filled with content from the dao of devils. It was a record of ancient devil items, as well as techniques of devil alchemy, including ways of devilizing humans.

Yang Qi read it, and suddenly had new inspiration. Without hesitation, he sent godpower pouring into this godhood in a novel form of cultivation from the book.

Next, he found a devil record bound in bronze, with the title Book of Mahātmā: Volume Three Thousand Nine Hundred and Sixty.

“Book of Mahātmā?” Yang Qi murmured.

“Yeah,” Bai Yin said, “It’s like an encyclopedia of the dao of devils, similar to the Great Classic of God Ordainment. There are a total of five hundred and forty thousand volumes, describing just about everything you can imagine from hell. I'd say it would be pretty difficult to acquire a complete collection. Our sect has destroyed a lot of devil churches, but despite that, we only have a few thousand volumes. Sadly, there aren’t any interesting techniques in the volumes we have. That's why they’re relegated here to the second floor of the Scripture Pavilion. See that bookshelf over there with all the bronze books? They're all part of the collection.” He pointed at a bookshelf some distance away.

Heading over, Yang Qi started searching through it until he found the first volume, the opening chapters of which discussed how the True Devil had created hell to begin with. Subsequent content went into history and warfare, written in the form of an epic saga.

Yang Qi began skimming through it, until he happened to notice a reference to the Mahātmā Jade.

“The Mahātmā Jade was created by the boundless will of the True Devil,” he murmured as he read. “It combines heavenly transformations, earthly death, quintessence vitality, godly punishment, sage tribulation... and all sorts of other almighty concepts. It is neither corporeal nor psychic, neither of the void, nor of thought.... It represents the quintessence of the dao of devils, and surpasses actual devils. It can contend with the God Legion Seal and can only be controlled by truly great sages and mahātmās. Any others who try to use it will die....” After some further details regarding the exact process by which the Mahātmā Jade was created, the text continued, “The god world was thrown into chaos, and the seventy-two monarchs joined forces with the True Devil and the Demon Master to fight the Sovereign Lord and the Heavenly Court. During that time, the Mahātmā Jade and the God Legion Seal were both shattered, and subsequently scattered into the god world. Only someone with immense destiny can collect either of them and make them whole again. The complete Mahātmā Jade represents the passage of countless tribulations, after which comes rebirth, and then an entirely new level. Thus are the tribulations of this magical treasure.

“What a pity,” Yang Qi said. “The Book of Mahātmā doesn’t say exactly where the different pieces of the Mahātmā Jade ended up.”

“What, you’re interested in the Mahātmā Jade?” Bai Yin said, walking over. “That's a precious treasure from the dao of devils, and is considered very inauspicious. I've heard that someone in the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty has a piece, but even after immense research, nothing ever came of it. Anyone who has contact with it is cursed and ends up dying. That said, it’s still considered an invincible treasure. Like it says in that book, it's on the same level as the God Legion Seal. If I had to pick between the two, I would definitely go with the God Legion Seal. That thing would be worth dying for.”

“You know about the God Legion Seal?” Yang Qi asked.

“Of course I do! Who in the god world doesn't know about it? It’s the identifying mark of the ruler of everything. Supposedly, whoever has it will become the next lord of the god world. Of course, nobodies like us could never hope to have a treasure like that.”

Chapter 1229: Eternal-Life God-Dynasty

“The Eternal-Life God-Dynasty has some of the Mahātmā Jade?”

Yang Qi ignored Bai Yin’s drooling over the God Legion Seal. There was no way that Bai Yin could possibly even dream that the most coveted item in all of the god world was actually right in front of him.

He knew that Yang Qi’s energy arts were unfathomably high, but there were plenty of details he wasn’t privy to. For example, he had no idea that Yang Qi had already reached Paramount will convergence and begun working on monarch godhood. And it was a given that he had no idea about Yang Qi’s God Legion Seal or Mahātmā Jade.

In the end, Bai Yin was still on the lower scale of impressiveness in relation to the god world as a whole. There was no end to the number of people in the god world who came across good fortune, so from Bai Yin’s perspective, Yang Qi, despite being somewhat mysterious, still wasn’t some heaven-shaking, earth-shattering figure. Otherwise, Yang Qi wouldn’t be skulking in the shadows and hiding from the Dragon Society.

Yang Qi closed the bronze-bound Book of Mahātmā. As for the other books about the dao of devils, he ignored them; he was already familiar enough with hell that he didn’t need more information.

The only thing that mattered to him now was the Mahātmā Jade.

If it was true that the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty had some of the Mahātmā Jade, he definitely had to go investigate. He already possessed the sheepskin scroll, and as such, was the only person who could cultivate the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body. By extension, there was no one else who could unlock the profundities of the Mahātmā Jade.

Besides, with the God Legion Seal, it was possible to keep the Mahātmā Jade under control without hurting himself in the process.

Considering he was in the early Paramount level, making progress was going to be hard. In fact, not even thousands upon thousands of years of cultivation could necessarily lead him to the mid Paramount level.

But with the Mahātmā Jade, he could achieve breakthroughs instantly. In the future, he might even be able to seek enlightenment of the Annulled level of will convergence.

Unfortunately, it wasn’t going to be easy to get that Mahātmā Jade from the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty.

The Eternal-Life God-Dynasty was actually more powerful than the House of God Ordainment. After all, sects like the House of God Ordainment offered them fealty, and actually boasted the presence of a Paramount God.

Paramount Gods generally had Unbounded will.

And how terrifying was that? All of heaven and earth could exist within the thoughts of a person like that, and their mind could contain the past, present, and future, plus the god world and the void. Such an entity could rip apart the space of the god world and create god kingdoms with ease. They could control reincarnation, and all of the transformations of the void.

‘It seems I don’t have many options here. It’s lunacy to think I could get that Mahātmā Jade right now.’ When Yang Qi had desired some treasure in the impure lands, he could just infiltrate whatever organization possessed it, then eventually steal it. But that wasn’t possible here in the god world. Given the level of his cultivation base, he couldn’t sneak into god kingdoms, much less steal things within them.

In the god world, he was a weakling.

After thinking about the matter for a while, he decided to worry about it later. He would surely have other opportunities to find pieces of the Mahātmā Jade. And the more pieces he collected, the easier it would be to find the others. Eventually, he might even be able to create a spell formation or altar that he could use to summon other pieces directly to him.

“I really don’t get you,” Bai Yin said. Guzzling some alcohol, he stretched lazily and continued, “Considering how strong you are, not even you can form monarch godhood. It's actually a bit depressing. I guess if I can’t form monarch godhood within three years, it’ll prove I'm destined to fail. At that point, I’ll just become a god. I suppose people just need to abide by the restrictions set upon them by heaven and earth. Apparently, I'm not supposed to be the main character of this heaven and earth.” Murmuring to himself, he slowly fell asleep.

Yang Qi looked at him and shook his head. No matter how much Bai Yin wanted monarch godhood, it simply couldn’t happen. Even Yang Qi’s immortal-slaying clone, with the help of King Immortal-Slayer’s will, only had a slight chance of succeeding.

Things had finally calmed down, and Yang Qi wasn’t in any danger. He could finally rest a bit. He hadn’t needed sleep since he had arrived in the god world. But upon seeing Bai Yin laying there comfortably on the book shelf, Yang Qi decided that he had earned some relaxation. Allowing the God Legion Seal to automatically function on its own, he sank into rest.

His psychic fluctuations reached a perfect resonance, and he slept.

A day later, when the light was bright, he opened his eyes and saw Bai Yin’s face right in front of him.

“What are you doing?!” Yang Qi blurted, scrambling back and jumping to his feet.

“I thought you didn’t need to sleep,” Bai Yin said suspiciously. “During the entire time you've worked at the Scripture Pavilion, I've never once seen you sleep. So what were you doing just now?”

“Having some nice rest, that’s all.” Yang Qi examined himself and found, to his surprise, that his psychic power had actually improved a bit.

He truly didn’t need to sleep, but apparently, relaxing his heart and mind had helped him to enter a state of nothingness in which, slowly but surely, his psychic power had improved.

From the moment he had achieved Paramount will convergence, his psychic power hadn’t grown at all. Therefore, any growth was very welcome.

His time in the god world had been completely spent in tense and dangerous situations, so whenever he had free time, he had always spent it on cultivation. And it was very clear that this increase in psychic power was only because of the rest.

Obviously, resting could be very dangerous. If someone made a move against him when he was asleep, he would be powerless to defend himself. People who cultivated the dao had to be on constant guard, paying attention to even the slightest ripples in vital energy.

That was the only way to prevent being cursed, plotted against, ambushed, or the like. Falling asleep was like putting one’s life in the hands of anyone who came along. It was like how people in the impure lands who slept every day were essentially putting their lives in the hands of whatever deities they believed in.

Yang Qi made up something to tell Bai Yin, then chatted a bit. Afterward, he spent more time assessing the changes that had occurred. In the following days, he worked on his cultivation, read books, and generally didn’t waste any time. He had a very disciplined way of life in this regard. Thus, the days went by. The Dragon Society never caused any problems; however, in the course of Yang Qi’s cultivation he could sense that there were prying eyes trying to spy on him, despite him being in the Scripture Pavilion.

The Dragon Society had suffered a big loss and was now trying to make a move against him from the shadows.

‘It’s a pity I had to kill Meng Guo,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘It would’ve been nice to have him alive to provide a window into what's happening in the Dragon Society.’ Thankfully, he had already severed ties with his close companions. Now that the Dragon Society was plotting against him, the last thing he wanted was for them to hurt the people he cared about.

Besides, the Sage Monarch Consortium was already doing well on its own.

Obviously, killing Meng Guo had destroyed the devil embryo as well. Yang Qi had hoped to avoid anyone discovering the devil embryo, so he hadn’t activated it. He hadn’t been sure of who exactly killed Meng Guo, but he knew the person was strong enough to slaughter a Common God with a single move.

It was only later that he learned that the culprit was a holy child from the Law-Enforcement God-Palace, and also a high-ranking member of the Dragon Society.

As it turned out, the White-Haired Boxer King, a Greater God, wasn’t just an elite disciple, but rather a holy child.

In Yang Qi’s mind, he had the image of a young man with white hair, his hands clasped casually behind his back, mighty and dignified like an ancient mountain. He was not only extremely strong, but also had a very powerful position. Yang Qi couldn’t even use his heavenly workings calculations systems to assess the man.

Nearly two months passed in which Yang Qi was certain he was being watched. However, he never left the second floor of the Scripture Pavilion, and thus, his enemies couldn’t do anything to him. And he was very careful to follow all the rules and be cautious in anything he did. Because of that, extortion and blackmail were also off the table as weapons to use against him.

Bai Yin knew what was going on as well, and was on his best behavior to ensure there was nothing that could be used against him.

One particular day when Yang Qi was in the middle of a session of cultivation, he felt his godhood vibrating as though it wished to break through. Yang Qi knew that he had reached the extent of the bottleneck, and as a result, he smiled and rose to his feet. “The time has come. Let’s see exactly how strong this White-Haired Boxer King is like.”

With a whoosh, he flew out of the Scripture Pavilion and headed to a nearby teleportation portal. Taking out a godstone, he activated the formation and disappeared.

When he reappeared, he was on a distant continent filled with pestilential energy, and surrounded by a toxic aura.

It was the Toxic Continent. And of course, he could sense eyes on him.

Smiling faintly, he walked off the teleportation portal and flew out over the bogs of the Toxic Continent. Before long, he had reached the Pill-King’s temple ruins. Everything looked familiar.

Meanwhile, there was still some sort of energy following him, and he was very curious to see what it would do.

Stopping in place, he smiled and said, “Why exactly are you following me, Sire? Are you waiting for an invitation or something? You’re the White-Haired Boxer King, right? That’s my guess. I don’t think anyone else would have an aura like this.”

Soft clapping sounds could be heard as a majestic figure walked out of the toxic mists, which didn’t even come close to touching him; it was the white-haired young man. Staring at Yang Qi, he said, “Very strong. I should’ve realized there was something fishy about you. How exactly did you know that I was following you?”

Chapter 1230: Testing Each Other Out

The White-Haired Boxer King was standing right in front of Yang Qi and looking at him imperiously, as though Yang Qi’s fate rested completely in his hands.

It was the immense confidence of someone who had come out victorious in thousands upon thousands of battles. Only someone who had killed countless enemies could carry himself like this, and it would cause most people who stood in front of him to tremble reflexively.

Yet that pressure didn’t do anything to Yang Qi. He was an Ascendant, and was actually a lot more impressive than the White-Haired Boxer King. In the impure lands, he had slaughtered his way toward the level of a god, and was infinitely superior to any disciples that could be found in the sects of the god world.

To Yang Qi, the White-Haired Boxer King’s confidence made him seem like little more than a frog in a well. Whatever battles he had fought through, they were definitely like children’s games compared to what Yang Qi had experienced.

“What did you just say, White-Haired Boxer King?” Yang Qi said, tapping his fingers together. “I didn't quite understand.”

“Don’t play dumb, Yang Qi. Only the two of us are out here. There’s nobody else to interfere. So just tell the truth. Did you kill that elder from the Missions Sanctuary? Furthermore....” Before finishing the sentence, he released some true energy that caused a whirlwind to spring up, ejecting all of the toxic mist half a kilometer away in all directions.

“Furthermore,” he continued, “were you the one who conned our Dragon Society out of fifty-five Paramount medicinal pills, namely, Double-Nines God-Dragon Starry-Sky Pellets? If I'm not mistaken, you impersonated Hong Lie and worked with Bai Yin to scam those two pieces of trash you were dealing with. It was a very treacherous and formidable plan, I’ll give you that.”

Obviously, the White-Haired Boxer King was interested in getting some information from Yang Qi rather than simply attacking him.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Yang Qi said, plastering a confused expression onto his face. “I came here to the Toxic Continent to look for medicinal pills, and found some. Then I went to the Missions Sanctuary, only to have one of the elders from your Dragon Society pull a fast one on me. Even though I completed the mission, he refused to give me any merit points. But in the end, I just chose to suck it up. As for anything else related to the matter, I have no idea....” There was no way Yang Qi would give any information to the White-Haired Boxer King. If he did, the man could instantly summon the law enforcement team and have him arrested.

Standing there calmly, the White-Haired Boxer King said, “Feel free to deny it, but I know you’re responsible. Look, I came here today to make some matters clear. Remember, I work for the Law-Enforcement God-Palace, so if I want to have you arrested, there are countless ways I could make it happen. In fact, by merely talking disrespectfully to a superior the way you are now, I could have you taken in. Got it? I'm not here today as your opponent, but rather to discuss business.”

“You’re a bigshot, and I'm a nobody. And I haven’t done anything wrong. So why would you want to talk business with me?” Yang Qi had no reason to believe him, therefore, he made sure to answer in a way that didn’t reveal any information. That way, if his conversation was heard by anyone else, it would be clear that he hadn’t done anything wrong. “Incidentally, I'm not a talented businessman by any means. So what business are you talking about? Considering you have the Missions Sanctuary under your thumb, you must realize that all I'm interested in doing is living my life as an ordinary disciple.”

“Still playing dumb?” The White-Haired Boxer King frowned. “Are you really going to force me to make a move on you?”

“What? You want to kill me? I didn’t commit any crime, or even do anything you could consider inappropriate. In contrast, you snuck around behind my back and are actually threatening to kill me. Do you really qualify to enforce the laws of the House of God Ordainment? That’s called knowing the law and breaking it anyway, and there are few crimes worse than that.”

“Let’s make this simple. What do you want? Whatever it is, the Dragon Society can get it for you. I know you have a special relationship with Jadefall, and we want some blood from her pet. If you can help us get it, we’ll pay any price. For example, is there some girl in the sect you've taken a fancy to? We’ll make sure you get in bed with her. Or do you want some special magical treasure? We’ll get it for you. In fact, if you have a grudge against someone, we can have them killed. I know you’ve had your issues with the Yue Clan. There are some important people in the sect who are from the Yue Clan, but a word from the Dragon Society will keep them silent. Or if worst comes to worst, we could just kill them all.”

“Oh really?” Yang Qi said. Inwardly, he was chuckling coldly, but on the outside, he tried to look as righteous as possible as he said, “Yes, I've had issues with Yue Tianlin. But they’re nothing more than the squabbling of lower-ranking disciples. It seems to me like you people from the Dragon Society are actually trying to get me to break the rules of the sect. Did you really think that, just because of a minor beef with another disciple, I’d want his entire clan exterminated? Wouldn’t that just weaken our sect? Why would I possibly want to do that? No, I'm not that kind of person, understand? Jadefall’s an important person, but I'm not. I just met her by chance and helped her with a minor task. How exactly does that enable me to get the blood of her pet? Incidentally, Yue Tianlin and I have turned weapons of war into gifts of jade and silk. Furthermore, it's a matter that relates to the strength and unity of our sect. Even if Yue Tianlin came trying to cause trouble for me, I’d do everything possible to resolve the situation.”

“Well said,” White-Haired Boxer King replied. At first, he had seemed a bit impatient when Yang Qi started talking, but now he seemed to have calmed down. “Such lofty words could only be spoken by someone with a truly wicked and villainous heart. Are you really refusing to work with the Dragon Society?”

“A nobody like me doesn’t qualify to work with the Dragon Society,” Yang Qi replied calmly.

“A nobody? Would a nobody notice me spying on them? I bet you want to form monarch godhood, don’t you? What if the Dragon Society helped by giving you the resources you needed? We could help you purify your body.”

“I do want to form monarch godhood, but I won’t do it by asking for help. Furthermore, I refuse to do anything that violates the rules of the sect.”

“What did you just say?” the White-Haired Boxer King growled.

“I don’t think I could’ve been clearer. You want me to break some sect rules, and I'm saying I won’t. If your leader wants the blood of Jadefall’s pet, he can go get it himself. What’s the point in wasting time on games like this?” Yang Qi knew it would be impossible to forcibly take the blood of the purrling.

“I get it,” the White-Haired Boxer King said. “You’re obstinate. Very obstinate. Alright, well considering I know you stole those fifty-five Double-Nines God-Dragon Starry-Sky Pellets to bolster your godpower, it's obvious you’re in need of godpower. And that means you can use a Ten-Directions Many-Heavens Pill! This pill was concocted personally by the leader of the Dragon Society! It contains his personal enlightenment of Paramount will convergence, and contains all sorts of uncharacteristically rare medicinal ingredients.”

He produced a bottle containing a single medicinal pill. The pill pulsed with a mist that created a bizarre and grotesque world around it. From what Yang Qi could sense, the pill energy of that world contained all sorts of godpower, as well as a crystallized core.

It was a Paramount medicinal pill that was definitely ten times stronger than the Chaos-Cavern Grand-Magnate Pill, with incomprehensible levels of godpower in it.

In fact, Yang Qi was ninety percent certain that if he could get that pill, he would be able to complete his monarch godhood. Unfortunately, considering it was in the hands of the Dragon Society, it might as well have been poison.

“What do you say?” the White-Haired Boxer King said. “It’s a good medicinal pill, don’t you agree? Work with us, and you can have it. I’ll even give it to you up front, before you accomplish the task. Considering how devoted you are to righteousness, I know you won’t just take it and refuse to keep your word. All you have to do is nod in agreement, and the pill is yours.”

“No,” Yang Qi replied. “Are you deaf or something? I'm not interested in medicinal pills. As I already said, I just want to live a normal life. I'm not interested in getting wrapped up with the likes of you.”

“Damn you!” The White-Haired Boxer King had run out of patience. He had tried everything he could think of to entice Yang Qi. However, all Yang Qi did was refuse him and talk about sect rules. He’d had enough. “In that case, I think you should just die!”

RUMBLE!

Without hesitation, he launched a fist strike. “Thousand-Worlds Imperial-Polarity Fist!”

A thousand worlds appeared, along with a massive blast of wind like the roar of a dragon. Godpower surged, powerful enough to change the face of heaven and earth, cause the sun and moon to sink into oblivion, and send all of creation into nirvanic rebirth.

It was an indescribable attack that would cause most people to lose their minds just from seeing it. And in the blink of an eye it was right in front of Yang Qi.

Obviously, the White-Haired Boxer King could deal with the consequences of killing a mere Quasi-God official disciple.

However, as the fist strike neared Yang Qi, it passed through him as though he didn’t exist! It was like a breeze passing through the leaves of a willow tree.

“I knew there was more to you than you were letting on!” Smiling, the White-Haired Boxer King continued, “I refuse to believe you could survive my Thousand-Worlds Imperial-Polarity Fist without using some sort of secret weapon. Only a Greater God could meet an attack like that, and you’re no Greater God! So how long will you last?”

“You're really ignoring sect rules and attacking me, White-Haired Boxer King? I’ve already made a recording of this. You’d better back down, otherwise I’ll send the evidence of your foolish actions to the elders in the Law-Enforcement God-Palace.”

“Who will you give it to? I'm a holy child of the Law-Enforcement God-Palace! I'm more important than the elders. The fact that someone as weak as you can fight me only goes to show that you have big secrets. And the sect will be very interested in getting that information! So get over here, traitor!”

Chapter 1231: What a Greater God is Capable of

As the White-Haired Boxer King continued unleashing a flurry of fist attacks, he said, “I have plenty of reasons to arrest you. Whatever secrets you have, I can force them out of you for the safety of the House of God Ordainment. I'm your superior, and I have the power to decide what’s right and wrong here. You obviously have some big secrets, otherwise you wouldn't be able to stand up to me!”

The White-Haired Boxer King was right. He was a powerful person in the House of God Ordainment, and although he couldn’t just do as he pleased in any situation, it would be easy for him to come up with an excuse for why he arrested Yang Qi, then subsequently tortured him for ‘important’ information.

It was a risky tactic, and if the truth were to come out, he would be punished. But in the end, he wasn’t worried about that. Besides, he was convinced that Yang Qi was hiding something, and that attacking him would force him to reveal his secrets.

The fact that Yang Qi could use the power of a Quasi-God to fight back against his attacks was reason enough to prove that, and to justify using torture to further the interests of the sect.

“I do have secrets, White-Haired Boxer King,” Yang Qi said. “And since you want to see them, I guess I should show you. Take a look at something called the Purrfect God Art!” A tremor passed through Yang Qi as a huge bubble appeared around him; when the fist strikes hit it, it bent inward, but didn’t break. In other words, it was impossible to hit Yang Qi directly.

“What?!” the White-Haired Boxer King blurted. “A bubble?”

He stared at it for a moment, then said, “Is that a bubble from Jadefall’s invincible pet? How can you use it?”

Yang Qi snorted. “This is my secret, and it’s the reason I can stand up to you. Didn’t you say you wanted to arrest me and force me to reveal my secrets?” Truth be told, this had been his plan all along. “Jadefall knows that your Dragon Society has been trying to get to me, all because of her pet. You see, she left a scrap of godpower on me that I can activate at any time to become completely invincible. You can’t do anything to me now. So now that you know my secret, you can go tell it to the council of chief elders.”

Of course, the leaders of the House of God Ordainment knew a bit about the purrling. They knew that anyone who opposed it would end up dead, or at least severely injured. And if the purrling had left some godpower on Yang Qi, it made sense that he could do this.

“A purrling bubble,” the White-Haired Boxer King murmured, shocked. However arrogant he was, he knew full well that he wasn’t a match for the purrling. After all, Wang Xiantian of the Preheaven Society had once tried to forcibly take the purrling, only to sustain grievous injuries that he still hadn’t recovered from.

Wang Xiantian was almost a Consummate God, whereas the White-Haired Boxer King was only a mid Greater God, which was a massive difference.

“What do you think, White-Haired Boxer King? You can’t do anything to me right now. And although I can't do anything to you, I can say this: stop arguing with me. I don’t want to work with you, so stop trying to force me.”

Yang Qi was already certain of how strong the White-Haired Boxer King was, and knew that vanquishing him in a fight would be very difficult. That said, there was no way the White-Haired Boxer King would be able to defeat Yang Qi easily.

And if a real fight broke out, and Yang Qi decided to use his secret weapons, he could kill the man. That said, he didn’t want to waste the godpower to do that. It would definitely set his cultivation base back by decades, and make him an enemy of the House of God Ordainment.

Until he formed his monarch godhood, Yang Qi didn’t want to waste even a scrap of godpower.

The main reason Yang Qi had done all this was to assess the White-Haired Boxer King’s strength and see how it measured up to his own. He was now certain that, despite not having completed his monarch godhood, he could definitely hold his own against mid Greater Gods. If word spread about that in the sect, it would cause a big stir. However, Yang Qi had successfully convinced the White-Haired Boxer King that it was all because of the purrling, and not Yang Qi himself.

“Fine. Since you have some of the godpower of the purrling, I guess we don’t need its blood after all. We can just use you. We’ll extract that godpower and give it to the leader. You can wear out iron shoes in a fruitless search, then find what you're looking for without even trying!

“Maybe you can stand up to my fist technique, Yang Qi, but you obviously don’t understand how terrifying Greater Gods can be. Our Paramount will convergence enables us to draw on the spatial power of the god world. Spatial Manacles! Spatial God Pillars!”

RUMBLE!

Spatial rifts streaked into existence around Yang Qi, creating what looked like a cage. Within the rifts were raging spatial tempests that could wreak havoc that would crush god items into dust.

This was what Greater Gods could do when they manipulated space.

Expression flickering, Yang Qi caused the bubble to shrink down, then pop out of the cage before it could fully form. “Not even spatial tactics can stop a purrling bubble, White-Haired Boxer King. You wasted your trick. You really can't do anything to me. Soon enough, you’ll be trying to explain to the council of chief elders why you inexplicably attacked an innocent disciple, you psycho!”

“You’re going to accuse me of a crime? You, a puny Quasi-God? I could wipe you out of existence without any effort at all! I could kill you like a chicken!” The White-Haired Boxer King threw both of his hands out as he drew on a truly powerful divine ability that caused a stream of saber energy to rumble out. “I wasn’t using my full strength just now. Let’s see if you can handle the power of my Space-Severing God-Saber Incantation!”

Spatial saber energy shot forward, seemingly locked onto Yang Qi’s soul as it slammed into his defensive energy.

RUMBLE!

His defensive energy started to crumble, and spatial power seeped through the cracks toward him. Shouting, he drew on the Heaven-Devouring God Dao to devour the saber energy.

“You’re doing everything you can to kill me, aren’t you White-Haired Boxer King?!” Inside, Yang Qi was laughing, but on the outside he had a very serious expression as he dodged his opponent’s attacks. Although it seemed like he was in a very dangerous situation, he was actually in complete control, and every bit of godpower that reached him, he devoured with King Heaven-Devourer’s abilities.

King Heaven-Devourer specialized in devouring everything, including destiny, godpower, and the psyche....

Considering Yang Qi had intentionally drawn the White-Haired Boxer King out to test his strength, it was a given that he was prepared for a fight. In fact, considering how he could benefit from a situation like his, he had actually been worried that a fight wouldn’t break out.

One of the things he lacked was godpower for his monarch godhood. And if a Greater God went all out trying to kill him, there would definitely be godpower in the blows levied against him. And that would only benefit him.

Yang Qi might not be able to deal with a Consummate God, but he wasn’t worried at all about a mid Greater God like the White-Haired Boxer King.

In fact, in order to use the spatial manipulation magic that he was using, he would also have to draw on his essence, which was something that not even Yang Qi would dare to do.

If the White-Haired Boxer King knew that all the effort he was going through to kill Yang Qi was actually helping form his godhood, he would definitely cough up blood.

‘You moron,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘I really fooled you. I'm in a bottleneck, so I intentionally provoked you, and now you’re attacking me, letting me use King Heaven-Devourer’s abilities to improve my position. In what other situation could I have found a Greater God willing to work so hard to help me?’

Although he was laughing inside, on the outside he actually forced himself to cough up some blood. Forcing the bubble around him to seemingly weaken, he shouted, “Are you really going to kill me, White-Haired Boxer King? How dare you!”

“So what if I kill you? Nobody will ever know the truth. They’ll just think you got killed somewhere in the Toxic Continent. Thousand-Emperors Space-Piercing Slash!”

All of a sudden, a thousand sabers appeared, slashing through space and leaving behind nothing but afterimages as they became a net that shot toward Yang Qi and his bubble.

‘Great!’ Yang Qi thought, absorbing the saber light and causing his monarch godhood to tremble. Godlight flowed through his meridians, which actually felt wonderful. However, continuing with the act, he let blood spray from his mouth, and caused his face to turn deathly pale. Of course, it was all thanks to his Life-Death Void-Destruction God-Lightning.

If the White-Haired Boxer King had somehow been able to reach the Consummate God level, he would have seen that Yang Qi wasn’t actually being hurt at all. He was actually very comfortable and secure within his bubble, and was absorbing all of the godpower that came his way.

“That bubble still isn't gone?” growled the White-Haired Boxer King. From his perspective, it looked like Yang Qi was unconscious, yet the bubble hadn't dissipated. Rage filled his heart.

“How could that godling be so powerful? It can do all this with just a bit of godpower left behind in this brat? How come I can’t break through it? At least he’s injured. I need to get that bit of godpower for my own use! Then I’ll be stronger than even Dragon Floret!” He chuckled darkly. “Ah, Dragon Floret, you might be the leader of the Dragon Society, and I might be your subordinate, but I’m not willing to live like that forever.”

Clenching his hand into a fist, he launched another mighty attack.

Chapter 1232: Borrowing Nourishment

“Heaven-Dao Reincarnation-Cycle Severing!”

“God-Dragon Strangle-Murder Devil!”

“Wind-Reversing Cloud-Shocking Slaughter!”

“Immortal-Butchering Ghost-Severing Sword!”

“Black-White Natural-Heaven Attack!”

“Lightning-Displacing Three-Thousand Detonations!”

“Mega-Boulder Heaven-Smashing Bash!”

“Black-Turtle Sea-Boiling Upturn!”

“Grand-Extermination Predestination-Summoning Slap!”

“Cold-Wave Rage-Flame Transformation!”

The White-Haired Boxer King used one move after another, all of them consummate and invincible fist techniques. Each blow, each strike, each attack... were all uncharacteristically rare, and were considered secret magics in the House of God Ordainment. Together, they formed something like a rumbling river of destruction that smashed into Yang Qi.

The nature of these attacks revealed how immensely powerful the White-Haired Boxer King’s godhood was. It shone like a sun within him, rotating billions of times per second and causing godhood to flow out in seemingly never-ending fashion. And of course, all of that power was flowing right into Yang Qi’s godhood.

It was another immense baptism for him.

The White-Haired Boxer King was blessing Yang Qi with his own essence and cultivation base. He was drawing on the vitality of his own godhood and life essence to power his attacks to destroy the bubble protecting Yang Qi. Yet every time it seemed like the bubble would burst, the White-Haired Boxer King’s hope would turn into disappointment.

Of course, it was all because of the formidability of the purrling, not Yang Qi. After all, even within the protection of the bubble, Yang Qi was actually coughing up blood and seemed to be on the verge of collapsing into unconsciousness.

"I refuse to believe that I can’t break through these defenses!" the White-Haired Boxer King shouted, forcing his godhood to rotate even faster. In fact, in the blink of an eye, it was circulating at ten billion times per second! Thanks to the consummate influx of power, his next attack caused a huge black hole to appear and slam into Yang Qi’s defenses, detonating them!

“Finally broke through!” the White-Haired Boxer King yelled, laughing heartily as he reached out toward Yang Qi. However, in that exact same moment, the bubble popped into being again, nearly trapping him inside.

As a result, the power of the bubble touched him, causing him to burst into flames.

Instantly, his godpower, energy arts, and psyche were burning away.

‘This bubble is incredible!’ he thought, lunging backward. Meanwhile, Yang Qi turned, shot into the mist, and disappeared.

‘What!?’ the White-Haired Boxer King thought. ‘He’s trying to escape? Well, it’s not going to be that easy. I definitely can't let him get away. If he reveals the details of this fight to the council of chief elders, it's going to cause problems.’ The White-Haired Boxer King knew that Yang Qi had broken some sect rules and was harboring secrets that could theoretically harm the sect. Unfortunately, it was a bit of stretch to use that as an excuse to harm him.

The main thing he was interested in was getting the purrling’s power that Yang Qi possessed. However, if he attacked and killed him, it would be a clear violation of sect rules.

Although the White-Haired Boxer King was important enough that he wouldn’t be severely punished, if certain people found out, they would push hard to bring him to justice. For instance, Jadefall.

So if he wanted to pull this off successfully, he needed to capture Yang Qi, destroy any and all evidence, and make sure no one was aware of what he’d done.

‘I have to catch up to him!’

The White-Haired Boxer King shot into the mists of the Pill-King’s temple ruins. Eventually, he was closing in on the center of the ruins, where he caught sight of the Chaos-Forge God-Shrine.

As soon as he entered, he realized how strong the toxic mist was, to the point where even he had to exercise great caution. As he proceeded, he produced medicinal pills that drove away poisons, using them to create a protective barrier around himself.

‘This is the central region of the Toxic Continent, and the toxic mist here is obviously deadly. But how can this brat move around so freely? Maybe I actually knocked him out, and the bubble just floated here with him in it. If he gets dissolved by the toxic mist, that's going to be troublesome, especially if people find out I was chasing him. Although... I should be able to come up with an explanation.’

Not ready to give up, he followed the bubble through the second, third, and fourth floors.

He was on the fifth floor when the toxic mist started getting too much for him to handle. This was where Yang Qi had discovered the corpse of the scholar, which was still floating there serenely. Meanwhile, Yang Qi was feeling very confident about his chances on the sixth floor. After all, his cultivation base had significantly improved in the past several months, thanks to the fifty-five Double-Nines God-Dragon Starry-Sky Pellets he had consumed.

However, he continued pretending to be unconscious within his bubble. Although it might look like the bubble was just randomly floating along, he was actually using his top energy arts to maneuver it behind the White-Haired Boxer King.

Without the toxic mist in the Chaos-Forge God-Shrine, it would have been impossible for him to get close to the White-Haired Boxer King. But given the circumstances, it wasn’t very hard at all.

“Lord's Eye!”

An eye appeared on his forehead, which he used to peer at the White-Haired Boxer King and locate the tiny jade bottle he had hidden in his robe. It contained a single god pill, which was none other than the Ten-Directions Many-Heavens Pill. Back when Yang Qi had first become aware of it, he secretly imprinted the bottle with an energy marker, making it much easier to locate again.

It was all in preparation for this moment.

‘Purrfect God Art. Dexterous Thievery!’

A bubble shot out, silent and undetectable. Wrapping around the jade bottle, it pulled it right into Yang Qi’s hand. It happened so quickly and quietly that the White-Haired Boxer King had no idea what had just happened. His attention was completely focused on protecting himself from the toxic mist, and trying to figure out a way to break the bubble protecting Yang Qi.

At this point, Yang Qi directed the bubble to float up to the sixth floor. Instantly, muffled rumbling could be heard as toxic god lightning smashed into him, seemingly reducing him to ashes.

“Woah!” the White-Haired Boxer King blurted, not daring to go any further. Obviously, the fifth floor was his limit. Seeing Yang Qi ‘die’, he sighed regretfully. ‘What bad luck. The brat is obviously dead, dissolved by the toxic mist. And if I stay here, I’ll end up dead too. I have to get out of here.’

With that, he hurried away, convinced that Yang Qi was dead. There didn't seem to be anything he could do to profit now, and the best thing would be to get away from the Toxic Continent as quickly as possible.

‘I have to go into secluded meditation as soon as I get back. I’ll just pretend I’ve been in seclusion this entire time. There’s definitely no evidence to prove I had anything to do with this. No one will ever connect a measly Quasi-God disciple like him to someone like me.’

With a whoosh, he departed.

After he was gone, Yang Qi appeared, a crafty smile on his face. Hefting the jade bottle, he thought, ‘Ah, White-Haired Boxer King, you really got screwed. And you’re not going to realize you’re missing this bottle until you get back. It's good that my illusion arts lasted long enough to fool you. Now you have to fabricate some evidence to prove you weren’t here, which will give me plenty of time to go into hiding and use this Ten-Directions Many-Heavens Pill to form my monarch godhood. It’s all thanks to you. You’re saving me a good fifty or sixty years of hard cultivation.’

The nascent monarch godhood within him was pulsing, occasionally letting loose sounds like a booming bell, other times sounding like buddhist chants. Occasionally it sounded like hosts of gods offering worship to the Sovereign Lord, or like hosts of mortals engaged in petty business.

For godhood to produce sound like this now was something unprecedented.

Normally speaking, it would have taken decades to purify himself in this way, but thanks to the fight with the White-Haired Boxer King, it was happening almost instantly. Right now, none of Yang Qi’s people were Greater Gods. The highest among them was Brahma, who was a Common God, so obviously, none of them could be of much help to him.

‘I need to leave the Toxic Continent and try to achieve my monarch godhood breakthrough. It's going to be dangerous, so I can’t risk it in a deadly place like this. If the poison seeps into my godhood, I’ll definitely die. On the other hand, a god kingdom would definitely pick up on the fluctuations of the breakthrough, and I would also end up dead in that situation.’

He waited for a few hours, until he was sure the White-Haired Boxer King was gone.

Then he slipped back into the teleportation portal. However, instead of going to the god kingdom, he headed out into the mountains. Avoiding Zhang Jufang and the others, he headed into the wilds beyond civilization.

Chapter 1233: Monarch Godhood Breakthrough

‘Ai. Breaking through to monarch godhood is going to be really difficult. I spent a huge amount of effort to get god pills and further my cultivation. Don’t tell me that I'm still going to fail at this point.’

As Yang Qi searched for an appropriate mountain to land on, he thought back to everything he had done so far in his attempt to complete his monarch godhood. In the Pill-King’s temple ruins, he had consumed a Chaos-Cavern Grand-Magnate Pill. Then he ran a scam to get even more pills, and today he slipped the Ten-Directions Many-Heavens Pill off of the White-Haired Boxer King.

Although he hoped he would succeed, he wasn’t one hundred percent certain he would.

Thus, he found this remote place to settle down for a time and work on his cultivation.

Thankfully, he was very familiar with the mountains near the mines. In fact, there was nowhere in the god world that he was more familiar with. The ghostface monkey-god, the serpent goddess, the wolf god, the moon-eating lion king, and the ox god all had devil embryos in them. Because of that, he knew about all of the activities of the Demonfolk in these mountains. And he also knew that there were no experts stronger than a Common God here.

Even if the most heaven-rending, earth-crushing events were to play out in these mountains, no one from the outside would notice.

As he flew along, he looked around with his Lord's Eye. After a few hours passed, he identified a mountain range that resembled a dragon, a tiger, or perhaps a black turtle. The mountains seemed desolate, but there was a swirling destiny there that seemed to imply powerful entities or treasures lurked there.

In fact, as Yang Qi peered closer, he noticed that thirty thousand meters beneath the soil beneath the mountains, there was thriving life force.

It wasn’t the vital energy of living ore, but some other type of life force that seemed to indicate dramatic transformations would occur here in the future.

In the Scripture Pavilion, he had read a few geography books, and thus recognized that this location of converged life force was something called an innate lifeland. If a sect were to be established here, and spell formations erected, future generations would definitely produce top geniuses.

That said, most innate lifelands were located a few thousand meters below the surface of the earth, whereas this one was located thirty thousand meters down. Not even Greater Gods would be able to detect such a place. Only Yang Qi could, thanks to the God Legion Seal.

‘This place is amazing. Nine dragons spitting water. The full moon shining brightly. The white tiger like metal. The vermillion bird in dancing flame. The black turtle diving into water....’ Yang Qi had studied a lot about geography, so as soon as he studied the place, he could see how amazing it was. Waving his finger, he sent out a stream of sword energy that felled some of the trees and hewed open a cistern. Sweet water immediately bubbled forth, releasing the strong aroma of innate life.

‘Incredible. It seems like a scraggly and rugged place, but it actually has deep springs of water. This should be a great place to work on my cultivation. Instead of staying on the surface, I’ll go down thirty-thousand meters, then use the life force there to help perfect my monarch godhood.’

Exhaling deeply, he used streams of godpower to create something like a shell around him, a defensive barrier that was as strong as steel.

Then he shot into the ground, boring down noiselessly and leaving no trace of his passage.

The world beneath the surface of the ground was a very different place. For the first few meters, it wasn't very noticeable. It was all a tangle of roots, as well as hidden creatures such as snakes, bugs, rats, ants, and the like. Further down, there was a network of waterways and subterranean rivers. Then came a layer of rock, followed by pulsing baleful energy. As he burrowed deeper, Yang Qi used his psychic power to ‘see’ everything around him for several kilometers.

Things were constantly transforming around him. Sometimes it was hot, sometimes cold. Sometimes it even seemed like there was wind. In the impure lands, there was only earthflame beneath the surface of the ground, but not so in the god world. There were numerous layers, some that had fire, some that had ice. There were sections of metal and rock, and tunnels dug almost as if by earthworms. There were also creatures that lived there, including devils and dragons.

However, the area Yang Qi was moving through was very calm and peaceful.

He went downward for a night and a day until he was thirty thousand meters down. There were deeper depths beyond, but what lay there, he couldn’t tell.

Having reached his target destination, he hewed out a cave for himself, roughly thirty meters in height, length, and width. Using his psychic power, he turned the soil into stone bricks to line everything.

He sat down in his subterranean cave and looked at the stone walls, upon which pulsed a greenish energy flow. It was none other than the pure subterranean life force in the area. With energy like that, plants on the surface would flourish; without it, the area would turn into a desert.

It was a huge conglomeration of life force that stretched thousands of kilometers from end to end. Right now, it was the reason the mountains above contained towering, ancient trees. However, after Yang Qi absorbed it, it ensured that, in the years to come, the area overhead would eventually wither up and turn into a desert of bare mountains.

‘Don’t disappoint me, Ten-Directions Many-Heavens Pill!’ he thought, pulling out the pill. Smiling, he exhaled some vital energy to ignite the pill. Obviously, he wasn’t just going to consume it directly. He needed to test its medicinal properties first. As the saying went, be careful, and you can pilot the same boat for ten thousand years.

Thanks to the fire, intricate designs appeared on the surface of the pill, which were warding spells put in place by the White-Haired Boxer King to protect it.

With hardly any effort at all, Yang Qi removed the warding spells and continued the burning process until the pill was nothing more than a crystalline expression of godpower, shining with dazzling light.

Wham!

At that point, Yang Qi consumed it, causing his entire body to shine with scintillating beams of light. The light connected with the vital energy of heaven and earth in these depths, and the life force. Innumerable streams of energy started flowing into his nascent monarch godhood, until it rumbled loudly.

It was like hearing all living beings speaking at the same time, and all the musical instruments thrumming together to form a single word.

“Monarch!”

“Monarch!”

“Monarch!”

Yang Qi knew that if he succeeded in this effort, he would be a god. No matter how strong he had been in the past, he hadn’t been anything more than an immortal. A human. Not a god. But when he formed actual godhood, his life force substructure would change, and he would become part of the legion of gods. Then, the true nature of the God Legion Seal would be revealed to him. After all, what he had access to right now was only the tip of the iceberg.

‘The moment of truth has come.’ Even as he absorbed the medicinal strength of the pill, the God Legion Seal was drawing deeply on the essence of the god world.

This was definitely going to be the most important and critical breakthrough attempt in his entire life. If he succeeded, he would no longer be an ordinary person....

**

In the god kingdom of the House of God Ordainment, in a mansion grotto atop a mysterious mountain peak, the White-Haired Boxer King was adjusting his breathing to heal himself and extrude the poison from within him.

‘I didn't get anything after killing Yang Qi, other than revenge. But that’s what happens to people who cross the Dragon Society!’ At the moment, he was still pretending to be in seclusion, hoping to avoid any fallout from Jadefall from having killed Yang Qi.

As far as anyone was concerned, he had been here this entire time and had never left his mountain.

‘That brat Yang Qi didn't even want this amazing Ten-Directions Many-Heavens Pill, not even in his death. Well, he might not want it, but I do. I wasted a lot of godpower in this effort, probably ten years’ worth of cultivation. This pill will be perfect to restore my reserves.’ With that, he began patting around in his robe.

However, after a moment, his face fell. ‘My medicinal pill! Where did it go? It was right here in my robe! How come it's gone? That pill is incredibly expensive! And I only had one of them! Impossible. Impossible!’

Shooting to his feet, he began frantically searching for it, but couldn’t find any traces.

Anyone who could have seen the White-Haired Boxer King in this moment would have been shocked. Normally, he kept his composure perfectly, always looking elegant and handsome, which was why so many female disciples fell for him. But right now, he looked like a crazed, stray dog.

‘Did I drop it back on the Toxic Continent? A divination should reveal the details!’ He immediately performed a divination, but didn’t get any results.

SNICK!

He spat out some blood which formed into a mirror, except that it didn't reveal any information at all. It was almost as if he had never even possessed that medicinal pill to begin with.

Chapter 1234: A Monarch Appears

Pacing back and forth, the White-Haired Boxer King thought, ‘How come I can’t divine its location? I’ve cultivated my Heavenly Workings Secret Magic to the highest level, and should be able to use it to locate any item I've lost.’

None of his divinations were working.

Finally, he gave up. Expression twisting into a vicious semblance of an evil ghost from hell, he thought, ‘Killing that brat Yang Qi lost me a medicinal pill, plus, I didn’t gain anything at all from the effort. Is it really possible that I just dropped the pill in the toxic mist? Someone must have plotted against me. But who? Was it Jadefall? No, no. She doesn’t have that level of ability. Maybe it was her Master. But her Master is in seclusion.’

Despite wracking his brains, he couldn't come up with any good theory.

It got so bad that he seemed to be on the verge of experiencing cultivation deviation and becoming infected with heart-devils. Just when he was about to plunge past the point of no return, a talisman on his person vibrated, bringing him back to lucidity.

‘That was dangerous. I almost experienced cultivation deviation.’ His heart was pounding from fear as he pulled out the talisman that had just activated. It currently pulsed with the power of a heart-devil. It was a talisman that Dragon Floret had personally crafted for him for his protection, designed to suppress the power of heart-devils. And it had just saved his life.

‘Without this talisman, I definitely would have experienced cultivation deviation.’ The White-Haired Boxer King settled down into a meditative state. ‘I lost that pill, and there’s no more to be said about it. It’s not even worth thinking about. Once my cultivation base is back to normal, I’ll be able to uncover the truth.’

Although hatred for Yang Qi was still simmering in his heart, he believed him to be dead, and thus not worth thinking about. For now, he tried to put the matter of the medicinal pill in the back of his mind, although it was only minimally effective.

Unfortunately, he had developed a heart-devil, which meant that his cultivation base wasn’t going to progress well in the future.

Meanwhile, the Yang Qi that he thought was dead was actually making progress the likes of which no one had ever dreamed of, not even in aeons past.

Ten days passed. Twenty. A month.

Deep underground, Yang Qi was constantly absorbing godpower and life force. He had taken in more than ten thousand ordinary gods combined could handle, but it still wasn’t enough. He was like a gobblewock or a chymera who could devour the essence of everything. The voice of the godhood within him continued echoing out, creating images of heavenly palaces, the halls of heaven, the Sovereign Lord, godmammoths, the True Devil, the Demon Master, and countless other entities.

However, in the end, an enormous necropolis appeared and devoured all of those mighty entities.

Three months passed, during which time Yang Qi worked hard on his cultivation. At that point, he had absorbed all of the life force, and only had the power of the God Legion Seal to work with.

The God Legion Seal was now a perfect representation of himself. Instead of being an imp, it was like a giant that could prop up heaven and earth. The surrounding soil couldn’t stop the brilliant light shining out from it, as it existed in the depths of a different space-time.

It howled, and godpower surged out like a river, filling Yang Qi and stirring the nascent monarch godhood within him. It began rotating faster and faster, like a millstone spinning in water. It rotated a billion times. Ten billion. A hundred billion. A trillion. Ten trillion. In the blink of an eye, the rotating of Yang Qi’s godhood vastly surpassed anything the White-Haired Boxer King was capable of.

RUMBLE!

“Monarch godhood, form!” At a certain point when the three months had passed, Yang Qi threw his head back and howled. As he did, the God Legion Seal, the piece of the Mahātmā Jade, and the sheepskin scroll in the form of ten thousand characters, were all sucked into his virtual godhood.

That was when the godhood began to transform dramatically.

Heaven and earth seemed to tremble; thankfully, he was deep underground. The spell formations he had erected around himself glittered like diamonds, and the mountains above quaked, with some of them collapsing. Rivers were diverted, and wild animals were thrown into chaos.

Meteorological phenomena appeared in the sky overhead, including thunder and lightning. However, no one realized what exactly was happening, as Yang Qi had used the God Legion Seal to suppress the energy fluctuations.

When monarch godhood formed, it would release immense power that would have dramatic effects if it wasn't deep underground. There would have been shocking pillars of light and great dao resonances that would have definitely attracted the attention of top experts.

Thankfully, there were no such disturbances.

In fact, the thunder and lightning actually masked some of the effects.

A rift opened, allowing spatial godpower from deep in the god world to pour into Yang Qi’s godhood, causing dazzling light to shine everywhere.

It was a success!

His godhood was completely formed!

It was a monarch among other godhood, and it rumbled with such intensity that heaven and earth bowed to it. But then, as quickly as the moment had arrived, everything went still and calm deep under the earth. All the living things above withered, and everything turned completely still and quiet.

Within Yang Qi, godhood rotated.

It was different from any other kind of godhood, such that not even Yang Qi had ever seen anything like it. A great dao would hang shapelessly in the void, and this resembled that.

This godhood was like a world of its own, but at the same time, like a lonely monarch. It glowed with brilliant colors, but at the same time, was colorless. It was alive, but simultaneously, dead. When Yang Qi breathed, the godhood breathed, and at that point, he realized he had reached godly ascension.

The God Legion Seal settled down in his forehead, and Yang Qi could tell that it was rejoicing. At the same time, something deep within it became unlocked.

Memories rushed into Yang Qi’s sea of consciousness like the tide, filled with indescribable brightness.

He wasn’t sure of exactly what was happening, so he simply allowed the memories to swirl in his sea of consciousness and would worry later about what to do with them.

CRASH!

A vortex suddenly appeared above his head, and it wasn’t remotely illusory. It was real.

He stepped into the vortex and vanished. He was now able to open spatial rifts, which was a level of power that surpassed even the White-Haired Boxer King. The White-Haired Boxer King could create similar rifts, but never would have dared to pass through them. But Yang Qi could, so it was only a moment later that he was on the surface.

‘Godpower influx!’ He drew on the God Legion Seal, causing a tremor to pass through him as endless godpower flowed through space and into his monarch godhood, transforming his body on the most fundamental level.

After forming his godhood, the next step was to use its power to remold his body into something deathless.

Ordinary Quasi-Gods would only be able to live a bit over a hundred years. Even the strongest among them might last for a few hundred, and that would be miraculous. But after reaching godly ascension, one’s longevity would increase by ten times at the least.

When the God Legion Seal absorbed godpower from the god world, it didn’t come in drop by drop, but rather in a huge torrent.

In the past, he couldn’t do this. But now he could absorb however much godpower he needed or wanted.

‘Let’s form some godstones!’ He waved his hand and godpower erupted from his monarch godhood, instantly causing a mountain of imperial caliber godstones to form!

A collection of godstones like that was something most people would fight to the death over. Even the top experts in the House of God Ordainment would go crazy over something like that.

“God Legion Seal: Form God Kingdom!”

The God Legion Seal flew up, and an illusory god kingdom took shape around Yang Qi. Even as it formed, it sucked in all of the imperial caliber godstones, which vanished without a trace.

‘Impressive. Except that it’s a huge drain on godpower.’ Even a Consummate God who saw Yang Qi doing these things would be left tongue-tied.

However, despite having spent so much power, he simply inhaled, and the God Legion Seal sucked immense godpower into him. It was like a mighty river flowing into his godhood. After only a few breaths, his monarch godhood was full again.

Even Yang Qi was shocked. ‘I just made a mountain of imperial caliber godstones, using godpower that even a Consummate God would need decades of cultivation to build up. Perhaps even more than a hundred years. And I filled it back up with only a few breaths? Is this real? I knew that when I became a god, the God Legion Seal would reveal stunning power. But this is simply terrifying!’

“Godnote forging!” A tremor passed through him as countless godnotes appeared, fluttering down to form a tiny mountain. It took a huge amount of godpower, but again, only a short time later, the God Legion Seal had refilled him.

As long as the god world existed, so would Yang Qi!

Chapter 1235: A New Beginning

Whether it was creating godstones or godnotes, Yang Qi could now do it easily, then recover the lost godpower with very little effort.

For all intents and purposes, he could just keep creating godnotes as long as he wanted. Millions. Billions. Trillions. There would be no end to it.

He was essentially a money printing machine.

Things were already very, very different from before his godly ascension. Back then, it had been far too draining to make godnotes.

Now he was completely rich. In the days to come, there wouldn’t be anyone who could match up to him in terms of wealth. Now that he had monarch godhood, he was already in the position to match up to Consummate Gods, and the God Legion Seal would ensure that he would never run out of godpower.

Even more impressive were the additional functions of the seal that he could now access. For instance, he had just created a virtual god kingdom which had absorbed the godstones and godnotes he had summoned. That was a function of the God Legion Seal.

Yang Qi was a god now, but he wasn’t able to actually make a real god kingdom. At best, he could make a virtual version. Right now, he was only an early Lesser God, and an actual god kingdom wouldn’t come until he was a Consummate God.

As for the other functions of the God Legion Seal now available to him, they would take some time and research to reveal.

‘What if I take that mountain of imperial caliber godstones and condense it!? Let’s make some holy caliber godstones!’

Exhaling some vital energy and backing it with his monarch godhood, he sent intense flames onto the mountain of imperial caliber godstones, which began slowly shrinking as impurities were forced out.

RUMBLE!

The outflux of vital energy and godpower caused Yang Qi’s face to turn a bit pale.

In the shortest of moments, he lost more godpower than a Lesser God could build up in ten thousand years of cultivation. Yet in the blink of an eye, the God Legion Seal restored him to normal.

Now, that small mountain of imperial caliber godstones was only the size of a fist. It was now a holy caliber godstone, and as he pulled it from the god kingdom and into his hand, it thrummed with what sounded like a holy saint preaching the dao or baptizing believers.

Shoddy, normal, greater, noble, imperial, holy, perfect. Those were the calibers of godstones. Among them, imperial caliber stones were considered very high quality, and were the type that many people never even laid eyes on. In the House of God Ordainment, one had to turn in a lot of merit points to get even one. As for holy calibers, they could be encountered by chance, but never searched for and found.

And they would never appear in the mines operated by the sect. They only came about thanks to dramatic and disastrous events.

Yet here Yang Qi had one in his hand.

Unfortunately, he could sense that it wouldn't be a good idea to make more of them. Although he could deal with the godpower loss, in terms of will and psyche, he couldn’t sustain the effort over and over again.

‘Now let’s check my fighting prowess!’ With that, he reined in the God Legion Seal. Right now, he wanted to see what his own cultivation base was capable of. Launching a fist strike, he broke open a rift in space, which caused a huge tempest to spring up, accompanied by the wailing of ghosts and weeping of gods.

Not worried at all, he sent out the power of his will to pacify the tempest, then stepped forward into the rift.

Inside, he saw endless darkness, as well as chaotic space-time. It was hard to say what unfathomable secrets were hidden in the god world. One thing he knew was that there were almighty entities who resided in this chaotic space-time, instead of in the actual god world.

The god world obviously wasn’t as simple as it seemed. It contained countless other minor worlds within it.

Off in the distance, Yang Qi saw an immense god kingdom that radiated dazzling light that pacified the chaotic fluctuations around it. That was the god kingdom of the House of God Ordainment.

Right now, he couldn't simply go there. He needed to return the normal way, through teleportation portals.

Waving his hands, he opened another portal and stepped out onto a mountain that was fully five kilometers away from where he had been standing earlier.

‘Spatial teleportation like this makes it easy to move around very quickly. But it's a big drain on godpower, and requires a very strong psyche. The mental strength required to lock on to the spatial coordinates is immense. No wonder the White-Haired Boxer King didn’t try anything like this.’ After making some inward assessments, Yang Qi nodded. ‘Given my current cultivation base, I should be able to go directly to the sixth floor of the temple on the Toxic Continent. I wonder what treasures exist there. Or should I go back to the sect first? The White-Haired Boxer King thinks I'm dead. There’s no way that he could ever guess that, not only am I still alive, but I’ve actually formed monarch godhood. Although, for the time being I should probably hide my monarch godhood. Given that I'm a god now, I can apply to become an elite disciple. However, that would involve them inspecting my godhood. Maybe I’ll just hold off for now. Yeah. The best thing to do now is to head back to the Toxic Continent and see what's on the sixth floor and higher. Maybe I can even reach the ninth floor!’

He had already been gone from the sect for three months, so what was another three? Besides, Bai Yin was there to cover for him, and would say that he was out on a mission. And the White-Haired Boxer King would claim ignorance if anyone asked about him.

It wasn’t uncommon for disciples of the House of God Ordainment to vanish for years at a time. There were even situations where a disciple might be gone for a hundred years before returning. So a few months obviously wasn’t a big deal.

Using his Devil-God Seal, he hid the evidence of his god aura, making him virtually invisible. Then he entered the god kingdom, went to the teleportation portal, and used it to go to the Toxic Continent.

The place was filled with toxic mist just like always, but obviously, Yang Qi wasn’t worried about that. Before long he was in the Chaos-Forge God-Shrine, but this time it looked very different. He could see the internal structure of the place, the innumerable spell formations that made it up, and how they were almost welded to space itself.

Soon he was on the fifth floor.

Just as casually as before, he summoned a black hole that sucked in all of the toxins on the fifth floor, turning them into a crystalline mass that dropped into his palm. It was an object that, if detonated, could easily kill most Greater Gods.

He didn’t need something like that, but it would definitely be useful to his people.

If he wanted to kill the White-Haired Boxer King now, he could use a simple fist strike to blow the man up, killing even his nascent divinity.

Unfortunately, none of his subordinates could possibly survive a fight with the White-Haired Boxer King. But with this weapon, they might, although they would likely injure themselves in the process. Yang Qi decided he would have to study it some more, and perhaps strengthen its structure, turning it into a more powerful god item.

It was similar to a gunpowder explosive from the impure lands. If detonated incorrectly, it could hurt or kill the person wielding it. But wielded properly, it could make someone almost invincible.

Yang Qi climbed the stairs to the sixth floor and saw that the dense toxic mist was fully fused with the space around it.

But with his monarch godhood, Yang Qi didn’t care. He drew on the God Legion Seal, and golden light shot out, stilling any spatial tempests. Then he waved the sleeve of his God Legion Battle Robe, sucking in all of the toxic mist and clearing the sixth floor.

The place was made completely of dark gold, making it look similar to the Hell of Mahānata. And it looked like there wasn't anything there, not even a single treasure.

However, that was when Yang Qi realized that there were nine pillars holding up the ceiling. And they were covered with cinnabar-colored magical symbols that almost looked like they had been written in blood. In fact, they were flowing. Yang Qi could tell that they were ancient, and had been placed there by some supremely powerful expert. After all, blood that could flow after so many years surrounded by a toxic miasma was obviously incredibly strong.

‘What incredibly powerful god put this here? It's such an incredible sealing magic. I guess the treasures here must be in those nine columns.’

Chapter 1236: Treasures Hidden in Pillars

The pillars were sealed in a way that wasn’t affected at all by the toxic miasma. In fact, the seals were so strong that Yang Qi didn’t feel like he could actually unravel them.

Chopping out with a knifehand, he used the Seventy-Two Monarchs Energy Art to attack one of the pillars. When the blow hit, fire broke out on the pillar, accompanied by hissing and popping sounds.

However, it was almost as if the magical symbols could sense the incoming attack and instinctively stirred into action, causing blood-colored light to rush out and negate it.

‘I just formed monarch godhood and I'm almost completely invincible, yet I can’t even undo a warding magic?’ Yang Qi was shocked. However, he was more delighted than frustrated. After all, for the warding magic to be this strong meant that whatever was inside was obviously incredible.

And if he couldn’t personally break the seal, he could always resort to the God Legion Seal.

As soon as he drew on the God Legion Seal, soft golden light shot out in all directions, surrounding the pillars and boring into them. This time, the blood didn’t do anything to stop the light, as if it had encountered its ruler.

“Myriad Gods Bowing to the Lord!”

Countless god-spirits appeared around Yang Qi, and at the same time, an aura of the legion of gods rose up from within the columns.

The God Legion Seal had been formed by countless gods prostrating in worship to the boundless Sovereign Lord. The blood warding spells that protected the pillars contained the power of ancient gods, which was why they reacted this way to the God Legion Seal.

The ancient gods always bowed to their lord.

The blood on one of the pillars flowed until it took the shape of a word in god script that then fell onto Yang Qi’s palm. It was the character for ‘warding’. It was made of blood, and contained incredible godpower. If absorbed, it would obviously bolster the energy and blood, and transform the fleshly body. However, Yang Qi didn’t do that. He would keep it to study later, and then decide if he could use it to make medicinal pills to help his subordinates.

With the warding magic gone, the pillar glowed with dazzling light, then cracking sounds rang out as the godpower revealed a small dimension, inside of which was a jade box.

Yang Qi waved his hand and the jade box flew out to him. There was another warding spell on the box itself, and upon inspecting it, Yang Qi realized that its function was to seal time itself. In other words, whatever existed inside the box wouldn’t experience the passage of time.

‘A talisman that stops time?’ Yang Qi was shocked. In the impure lands, his cultivation base was such that he could alter or even reverse the flow of time. He could even create passages that led to primeval times or the future.

But the god world was different. Only Paramount Gods could possibly harness the power of time here. Did that mean that this box had been left behind by some Paramount God?

Yang Qi broke the talisman and opened the box, which caused a fragrant aroma to drift out, like flower petals. A small, hand-sized flower petal was revealed, almost like that of a lotus, yet clearly from some other type of flower. It was very beautiful.

“A flower petal? And a talisman that can actually stop time?” The talisman that had been sealing the box was now in Yang Qi’s hand. Looking down at it, he saw that it wasn’t working anymore. It was as if all the godpower inside of it had vanished as soon as he removed it from the box. Or perhaps it had been sucked into the flower petal.

‘Don’t tell me that there are flower petals like this in all of the pillars?’

He went on to use the God Legion Seal to open up the rest of the eight pillars, finding that all of them contained jade boxes with flower petals in them. And all of them were protected by talismans that stopped time, yet ceased to function after the boxes were opened.

Nine flower petals which, when formed together, created the shape of a flower.

Unfortunately, the combined flower lacked a central stamen.

The flower wasn’t complete.

The nine petals were all different, and were inscribed with glowing magical symbols that almost seemed to be naturally occurring.

Yet despite fitting together, the petals didn’t actually click into place. For now, all Yang Qi could do was put them back into the boxes to save for later study.

Thinking back, he reviewed what he had taken from the Chaos-Forge God-Shrine. From the first floor, antidotal pills. From the second, sword pellets. From the third, the Chaos-Forge God-Shrine. From the fourth, the medicinal ingredients. From the fifth, the corpse of the scholar. And here on the sixth floor he recovered some flower petals. What would he find on the seventh floor? He couldn’t use the scholar’s corpse or the strange flower petals. Therefore, it seemed his only course of action was to go up.

The toxic mist on the seventh floor was even more intense, and was like a pure spatial tempest so strong that it took the shape of devil-ghosts that ravenously lunged toward Yang Qi.

A huge skull of liquid black crystal appeared, surrounded by black fire, snapping its jaws at him.

BAM!

He thrust his palm out and hit the skull, causing cracks to spread out all over it. However, the skull inhaled, and spatial power rushed into it, returning it to its previous state.

SPLAT!

Toxic fire erupted from the skull, turning into fiery dragons that rushed with deadly force toward Yang Qi.

‘Incredible,’ he thought. ‘I wonder who created this spatial toxic skull, and how it got so strong?’ He opened his Lord's Eye in the hopes of identifying the profound aspects of the skull. Instantly, he could see that when the skull opened its jaw and inhaled, it would draw on the spatial tempests and quintessence in the area to power itself up.

And there were more than one of the skulls here on the seventh floor.

‘They must have been created by a top expert from the Chaos-Forge God-Shrine. When that expert’s undying will convergence merged with the toxic spatial nexuses around it, the result came in the form of these pitch-black crystalline skulls. If I were to assimilate them, it should dramatically increase my fighting prowess.’ Almost immediately, Yang Qi’s mind filled with understanding regarding the black skulls.

Long ago, the Toxic Continent had been a god kingdom belonging to the Pill-King God. Eventually, the countless experts in that god kingdom had come under the attack of King Hypertoxin, one of the seventy-two monarchs. Ultimately, they all died. However, their psyches weren’t completely destroyed, and they eventually fused with the toxic miasma. That was what led to these crystalline skulls on the seventh floor.

Looking around, he counted thirteen of the skulls, all locked in combat with each other, although none seemed capable of dealing with any of the others. After all, Yang Qi had just attacked one to almost no effect whatsoever. Right now, he was strong enough to dominate even peak Greater Gods, and could possibly even fight early Consummate Gods, but not much beyond that.

“Heaven-Dao Pacification; Radiance Like Fire; Nothing Escapes the Net of Justice; Laws of the God Legion!” Yang Qi drew on the God Legion Seal, causing an immense, heavenly net to shoot out of his left hand and spread out toward the skulls. Jaws snapping, they looked up as if to devour it.

‘Be suppressed!’ Yang Qi said, and immense power crushed down. However, the crystalline skulls continued to rush forward, forcing Yang Qi to back up.

“Mahātmā Jade; Unspoiled Body; Seventy-Two Monarchs Energy Art; Grand God-Dao of Poison. Be suppressed!” Yang Qi drew on all kinds of consummate techniques from the depths of the God Legion Seal. For twenty hours, the fighting raged, until he finally suppressed the skulls.

During that time, he had completely drained his monarch godhood upwards of three thousand times.

Thanks to that, his fighting prowess was now at the level of an early Consummate God, and that was without using the God Legion Seal, Mahātmā Jade, or sheepskin scroll.

However, that just went to show that not even a Consummate God could deal with these skulls.

In the end, though, Yang Qi immobilized all of the skulls with his Devil-God Seal. Unfortunately, if he removed the seal, they would go right back to their previous state of activity. Right now, he would need to come up with another idea if he wanted to assimilate them.

Perhaps he needed to go work on gaining more enlightenment of King Hypertoxin’s abilities.

After all, if he could gain complete control of the skulls and give them as puppets to his people, they could definitely fight a Consummate God. Even in the House of God Ordainment, Consummate Gods were mighty, invincible individuals who commanded universal respect. They could do whatever they wanted including pronouncing the death sentence.

The main reason Jadefall was in such a good position was because her purrling had enabled her to finish a mission that ended up with her Master becoming a Consummate God.

Chapter 1237: King of Specters

Each skull was as strong as a Consummate God. Thankfully, they didn’t possess actual wills of their own, otherwise they would have ripped Yang Qi to shreds. They were formed from the undying quintessence of members of the legion of gods, but that just meant that the God Legion Seal exercised innate control over them, which was why Yang Qi eventually got the upper hand.

Were it not for that, then even if he were much stronger than he was, he wouldn’t have been able to seal the skulls.

Any god from the ancient era, which was when the Sovereign Lord existed, would definitely be put under control by the God Legion Seal.

After the Sovereign Lord vanished, many new gods came along, and they were a different story. They had not been connected to the God Legion Seal, and thus they weren’t necessarily under its absolute control.

He took the thirteen crystalline skulls, leaving the seventh floor utterly bare of any items.

After a quick search to confirm there wasn’t anything left, he headed to the eighth floor.

Surprisingly, there was no toxic mist on the eighth floor. It was almost as if some powerful force had cleansed the place. This floor wasn’t particularly large, and the ground seemed to be made from pure green crystal. It was almost completely transparent, free of any impurities at all. And floating in the air in the middle of it all was a single god pill.

It was roughly the size of a thumb, and although it hadn’t evolved into a human form, in terms of quality, it obviously surpassed the Chaos-Cavern Grand-Magnate Pill by many times over.

Furthermore, this pill actually wasn't complete. However, it wasn’t created by someone with Paramount will convergence. No, it was made by someone even more incredible than that. It was created with Unbounded will. Unfortunately, its creator had died before finishing the pill, yet the pill was still so incredible that it could clear the entire floor of toxic mist, creating something like a kingdom of its own there.

‘I finally found something really valuable. A god pill made by someone with Unbounded will.’ Despite being only partially complete, Yang Qi knew that not even the House of God Ordainment would have anything like this.

If he handed it in to the sect, he would get an immense amount of merit points. However, he wasn’t foolish enough to do something like that, as it would draw too much attention. He was only staying in the House of God Ordainment to be as safe as possible, and over the past two years, he had made significant advancements in that regard. At the very least, the books he had access to in the Scripture Pavilion were worth it. And once he was recognized as a god, he would be able to go to the third floor and read the books there.

Slowly and carefully, he unleashed the power of the God Legion Seal to take hold of the Unbounded pill.

A smile touched his face as his fingers closed around it. However, he didn't immediately consume it. He knew that, given the level of his cultivation base, he wouldn’t actually be able to absorb and benefit from it.

‘I wonder what miraculous item is going to be on the last floor.’ As soon as he put the medicinal pill away, toxic mist rushed back in to fill the room. As it did, he hurried up the stairs to the ninth floor.

This floor was also empty, without any toxic miasma. The entire place bore the scars of fierce fighting, and just by looking at them, Yang Qi could imagine the epic battle which must have been fought here in ancient times.

Chopping his hand out at the floor, he used all the power he could muster to try leaving a mark on it, only to fail.

‘This ground is so hard it seems impossible to damage. So what type of people could actually leave such deep marks in it from their fighting?’ Sitting down cross-legged, he studied the marks, which he soon realized contained traces of Unbounded will that prevented the toxic mist from entering the area.

Each mark contained profound and mysterious principles of heaven and earth, boundless profundities that would be difficult for even gods to understand. Closing his eyes, Yang Qi sent out his psyche to make contact with the marks.

Crack!

All of a sudden, he touched a mark that had been left behind by a sword. When he did, the psychic power in the mark emerged, taking the shape of a sword that slashed toward him, cutting him in half at the waist.

Shocked, he quickly drew on his energy arts to stitch himself back together.

‘So strong!’ he thought. ‘In fact, too strong. Even just the psychic remnants here are enough to cut me in half! Just how much will I benefit from gaining enlightenment here?!’ With that, he continued working with the battle scars. Some would cause his entire body to explode, and some would cut his head off. However, none could harm his godhood, so he could recover from whatever injuries he suffered.

As he studied the marks, it was as if he could see a fight playing out between Paramount Gods of ancient times. And that fight contained profundities of heaven and earth that brought enlightenment to his own skill.

Although Yang Qi’s fighting experience would make him invincible among ordinary gods, he couldn't compare to ancient entities like King Immortal-Slayer. After all, he had never truly fought in a war against gods. In the impure lands, he had done a lot of fighting and killing, but that was all among low-level entities. In battles like that, there were plenty of profundities of power that weren’t revealed. It was only by participating in the fighting of actual gods that one could accrue truly amazing experience.

Now, Yang Qi was able to benefit from something just like that. Eventually, he sank into a state of contemplation in which he forgot about the passage of time and became oblivious to everything around him.

After an indeterminable amount of time passed, a brilliant light appeared.

It was his monarch godhood, which glowed with radiance and light as it rose up into the air, slowly rotating. Then, shafts of light shot out of it to connect to the scars of battle.

Soon, the Mahātmā Jade floated out to join the monarch godhood. At first, Yang Qi wasn't sure what was happening.

He opened his eyes.

‘The Mahātmā Jade is absorbing the psychic power,’ he thought. Despite the fact that the jade was transforming, it wasn't complete, which meant that after it absorbed the psychic power from these ancient battle scars, Yang Qi wouldn’t have access to them until he had collected the other pieces of the jade.

If he could take that new psychic power, his own power would advance by an unbelievable level.

Even as he watched, the battle scars on the ninth floor slowly faded away.

‘I basically didn’t get anything useful. On the sixth floor I got those flower petals, which I don’t know how to use. The seventh floor had those skulls that I suppressed, but can’t assimilate or turn into puppets. The eighth floor had a partially complete medicinal pill that I can’t use. And the ninth floor had battle scars that I can’t actually add to my own fighting experience.’

Shaking his head, he flew out of the Chaos Forge God-Shrine and started searching around the rest of the Pill-King’s temple ruins. After all, there were other shrines and temples in the area. Unfortunately, the others had been mostly picked clean by other experts. Thanks to his higher cultivation base, he was able to locate a few dozen Paramount medicinal pills, a few medicinal ingredients, and some other random items.

The Chaos Forge God-Shrine was one of the main core elements of the ruins, but there were others. Yang Qi wasn’t sure exactly how much time he spent searching, but eventually, he decided to stop while he was ahead. Getting too greedy might cause unnecessary complications.

The time had come to leave.

Stepping onto the teleportation portal, he headed back to the god kingdom of the House of God Ordainment.

As it turned out, he had spent about half a year contemplating the battle scars on the ninth floor. It was enough time that the White-Haired Boxer King should have been convinced that he was actually dead.

When he walked into the second floor of the Scripture Pavilion, he startled Bai Yin, who jumped up and said, “Yang Qi? It’s you!? You’re back! I thought you were dead! Do you know how long you've been gone? It's been nearly a year. Considering I haven’t seen you for so long, I assumed you were killed by the White-Haired Boxer King.”

“A year? That long?” Yang Qi chuckled. “Isn’t it normal for disciples to be gone for that long on missions?”

“That's true,” Bai Yin said, clasping Yang Qi’s shoulder. “Tell me, how did you escape the wrath of the White-Haired Boxer King? He made an announcement a while back that he was in seclusion. I assumed it was because he had killed you and didn’t want to get in trouble for it. Who could have guessed that you’re actually fine! I was really worried.”

“The White-Haired Boxer King couldn’t kill me,” Yang Qi said casually. “Furthermore, I'm ready to become an elite disciple.”

“You’re going to become an elite disciple? Wait, did you reach godly ascension?!” Taking a closer look at Yang Qi, he realized that he had the aura of godhood on him. “Dear lord! You really chose to become a god?” From his reaction, he didn't seem very pleased. “But why? Why would you do that? You coward! Your cultivation base is far beyond mine, so if you can’t form monarch godhood, then what hope could I possibly have?”

“I had no choice. The White-Haired Boxer King was trying to kill me, so I had to take advantage of the situation. Becoming a god was my only way to stay alive. Otherwise, you’d be looking at a corpse right now.” There was no way Yang Qi was going to tell the truth to Bai Yin. After all, Bai Yin hadn’t ascended from the impure lands with him. For now, Yang Qi would keep the secrets of his monarch godhood to himself.

Chapter 1238: Promotion to Elite

Bai Yin was angrily lamenting over the fact that Yang Qi had reached godly ascension. He felt like all the wind had been taken out of his own sails because of it.

If Yang Qi, despite being vastly more powerful than himself, had finally given up, then what could he possibly do? Perhaps he should just become a god rather than continue pursuing vague goals that could never be met.

Yang Qi could tell what he was thinking. However, after his own experiences of forming Paramount will and then completing monarch godhood, he knew exactly how hard it was. It was only because of the God Legion Seal that he had succeeded.

With monarch godhood, Yang Qi could defeat Consummate Gods despite only being a Lesser God himself. That was a jump of quite a few levels. It involved going from the early Lesser God level to the mid, late, and peak levels. After, one had to pass the early, mid, late, and peak of the Common and Greater God levels. Only then would one be a Consummate God. Counting all the sub-levels, that was a total of twelve levels to jump. The idea of a gap of twelve levels was simply unimaginable.

A Consummate God could normally kill a host of Lesser Gods with a mere glance. It would be similar to pouring a pot of boiling water onto some ants. Yet with monarch godhood, a Lesser God could fight a Consummate God; one could hardly imagine the power, psyche, and will that would be required for that.

For all intents and purposes, Bai Yin could work hard for his entire life and never succeed. It wasn’t a matter of how much effort he spent on it, but rather the destiny and fate that existed in the god world.

Yang Qi couldn’t help but admire Bai Yin for his tenacity, no matter how unrealistic he was being. And he wasn't going to be the one to burst his bubble. Eventually, Bai Yin would come to realize the truth on his own and decide to give up on aiming for monarch godhood.

“Ai. Just go ahead and apply to be an elite disciple. With your new position, you’ll definitely be able to push your cultivation base higher and higher. You’ll soon reach the mid Lesser God level, then the late and peak levels. At that point, you’ll become a grand elder, and no one will be able to touch you.” Bai Yin waved his hand dismissively, and Yang Qi left.

Before long, he was at a wide plane in the middle of the god kingdom, where a huge temple could be seen, which was the location where disciples would come to be promoted to the elite level. Of course, the only way to go from being an official disciple to an elite disciple was to first become a god. And then one had to pass certain tests.

Elite disciples were also broken up into ranks, which corresponded to the Lesser God levels of early, mid, late, and peak. In other words, it came down to a test of godhood.

A godhood rating of one would place one in the early Lesser God level. Four and five were the mid level. Six, seven, and eight were the late level. And nine was the peak.

A godhood rating of ten would make one a Common God.

Of course, that was for average disciples. There were some Lesser Gods who had godhood ratings that surpassed ten, and climbed as high as twelve or even fifteen. People like that who were still Lesser Gods were considered top geniuses who would receive special attention from the sect.

As for Yang Qi, he had spent the better part of a year working on his cultivation in the ninth floor of the Chaos Forge God-Shrine. During that time, he had gained much enlightenment regarding methods to control one's godhood. Because of that, he could make his godhood look to be whatever level he wanted it to be.

Upon arriving at the temple, he saw quite a few disciples coming and going. The House of God Ordainment was huge, and the god kingdom it controlled was so large it defied imagination. Because of that, there were always disciples coming to take the tests for promotion. In turn, that meant having a job in this place was even more lucrative than working in the Scripture Pavilion.

Upon entering, he caught sight of the disciples in charge of the place, who were standing there looking cold and indifferent.

“You two,” Yang Qi said. “I’ve reached godly ascension and am here for my promotion.”

“Oh? You reached godly ascension? Well, there are always disciples in the House of God Ordainment doing that. You’ll have to wait your turn.” Looking Yang Qi up and down, the disciple shook his head. “I’d say you’ll have to wait for about a year.”

Yang Qi waved his hand, causing godnotes to appear in the hands of both of the disciples. They suddenly looked a lot more polite than before.

“You obviously know how things work, boy. But you want to cut your wait time from a year to a month, you’ll need to fork over ten more godnotes.”

Yang Qi produced twenty godnotes and handed them over.

“In this case, you’ll only need to wait for three days.” The two disciples exchanged a glance.

Yang Qi produced twenty more godnotes, and the disciples nodded.

“Excellent. You don’t need to wait at all. You can take the test right now. Follow us.”

They led him deep into the temple, to a private chamber where three Common God grand elders were waiting.

“A disciple wanting to be promoted?” one of them asked.

“Yes,” the disciples replied respectfully. Then one of them leaned over to Yang Qi and said, “These three grand elders deserve their due as well....”

“Alright,” Yang Qi said, and he handed them a total of fifty godnotes.

The grand elders nodded. “Not bad. Not bad at all. Let’s start the test right now.” Even as the words left his mouth, a spell formation in front of him activated and a hexagramic image appeared. Yang Qi walked forward onto the formation, whereupon it began to assess him.

“Godhood rating one. Body substructure, life force power....” The spell formation went on to analyze him in detail. In response, the grand elders nodded, occasionally assessing his godhood themselves.

“Very good,” one of the grand elders said. “Congratulations on becoming a god. Now, hand over your identity medallion.”

“Alright.”

The grand elder took the medallion and sent some godpower into it to scan Yang Qi’s information. “Let’s see here. Yang Qi. You joined the House of God Ordainment two years ago, and you’re currently assigned to the second floor of the Scripture Pavilion.”

“What?” one of the grand elders said, a look of surprise on his face. “Your name is Yang Qi?”

“That’s right, I'm Yang Qi.” Yang Qi looked at the grand elder and knew something fishy was going on. Smiling coldly inside, he surreptitiously sent a tiny stream of devil energy into the man to form a devil embryo.

‘This is Yang Qi from the second floor of the Scripture Pavilion? But isn’t he supposed to be dead? Wasn’t he killed by the White-Haired Boxer King? What is he doing here? This is completely shocking! I have to go report this to the White-Haired Boxer King!’ Obviously this grand elder was also an important person in the Dragon Society.

Clearing his throat, he said, “Something important just came up. You two continue with the assessment.” Rising to his feet, he hurried out.

The other two grand elders didn’t seem fazed. They continued with the assessment, and after about an hour passed, they both nodded.

“You definitely deserve to be an elite disciple. However, to get your promotion, you need to pay the requisite merit points. Unfortunately, you don’t have enough merit points in your identity medallion. Look, it’s obvious that you’re anxious to become an elite disciple, so how about this. I can arrange for you to get those merit points right away. It will cost you five thousand godnotes, that’s all. Then you’ll meet all the requirements to be an elite disciple. What do you think?”

Yang Qi nodded. “That’s fine.”

These grand elders were obviously using their position for personal gain, but Yang Qi didn’t care. After all, he could make as many godnotes as he needed.

There were plenty of disciples in the sect who had businesses related to providing merit points. For example, some disciples had a pressing need for certain magical treasures and would pay other disciples for them in merit points. Or sometimes disciples would just have too many merit points and would sell them for godnotes.

As long as one had a jade identity medallion to perform the transaction, anyone could make deals like that. And by adding commissions on top, many disciples could make a tidy profit from such business.

Yang Qi handed over the five thousand godnotes, and the deal was sealed.

A moment later, he was an elite disciple, with a new uniform. He was also given some medicinal pills and magical devices, as well as a few other random things. His position was now very different. At the very least, no one would consider simply trying to get rid of him. The penalty for killing an elite disciple was severe.

That much had been obvious from how the White-Haired Boxer King dealt with Meng Guo after learning about the death of the Lesser God from the Missions Sanctuary.

An important person in the sect might be able to turn a blind eye to the death of an official disciple, but not an elite disciple.

Now that Yang Qi was an elite disciple, he should be able to get a much better position in the sect.

For example, a job on the third floor of the Scripture Pavilion.

All he would have to do would be grease the wheels with the right grand elder.

Of course, although the Scripture Pavilion was a nice job, it couldn't compare to working in the Treasure Storage Warehouse, the Medicinal Pill Warehouse, or the Thrall Camp. Yang Qi was already considering trying to get assigned to work at those places.

**

Meanwhile, in the White-Haired Boxer King’s mansion grotto, the same grand elder from before was just now entering for an audience.

“What's going on?” the White-Haired Boxer King said coolly. “Aren’t you aware that I'm in seclusion?”

“Sir, I had to see you about that Yang Qi. He just showed up looking for a promotion!”

“Yang Qi? Which Yang Qi?” The White-Haired Boxer King was obviously unconvinced that the man was referring to the same Yang Qi he had ‘killed’.

“The same Yang Qi from the second floor of the Scripture Pavilion. The friend of Jadefall. He hasn’t been seen for the last year, so we assumed he’d been killed by you. But he showed up today as a god! And I'm afraid that by now, he’s probably already an elite disciple.”

Chapter 1239: Jadefall Appears

“What did you just say?” the White-Haired Boxer King said, his eyes blank from shock. “He's not dead? How can he not be dead? I saw him dissolved by the toxic mist. There wasn’t even a corpse left behind. How could he be back now? Was he resurrected?”

“I don’t know. But he’s reached godly ascension. The upside is that when we assessed him, his godhood rating was low. So you don’t need to worry about that. He’s still a nobody, so killing him should be as easy as squashing an ant.”

WHACK!

The White-Haired Boxer King slapped the grand elder on the side of the face, much to the man’s surprise.

“Sir, why did you hit me?”

“You think he’ll be as easy to kill as an ant? He’s much cleverer than that. He fooled even me! This entire thing was a big trick. The brat is obviously far, far stronger than he’s letting on, so much so that he could fool me into thinking he was dead. And he even stole a Ten-Directions Many-Heavens Pill from me at the same time. That’s the only explanation for why I couldn't divine the location of the pill. The fact that he dares to return to the sect now shows that he’s even stronger than before, and isn’t afraid of me.” The White-Haired Boxer King had already put together all the pieces of the puzzle.

BOOM!

He stamped his foot into the ground, creating a small crater. “Fine. Fine, Yang Qi. You pulled the wool over my eyes. But now I see what happened. Exactly what remarkable ability did you use to do this?” Returning his attention to the grand elder, he said, “That godhood-assessing spell formation of yours is crap! If he could hide from me for over a year, do you really think it’d be hard for him to pass fake information into the formation? I couldn’t kill him back then, so it’s going to be even more difficult now. And now he's an elite disciple. To get rid of an elite disciple without a good reason is no easy task.”

“True, it’s not easy to kill an elite disciple.” The grand elder didn’t dare to say anything further. He was only an early Common God with a godhood rating of eleven. He could call the wind and summon the rain around Lesser Gods, but in the presence of the White-Haired Boxer King, he had to be very careful.

The White-Haired Boxer King was a mid Greater God, making him quite formidable. They were separated by five levels, which meant the White-Haired Boxer King could easily kill him, although how he would fare under the sect rules was a different matter.

Even worse, they were both members of the Dragon Society, which gave the White-Haired Boxer King even more authority over him.

“So what do we do now?” the grand elder asked.

“We do nothing. Jadefall went to the birthday celebration of the emperor of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty, and while she was there, she earned the good graces of one of the imperial concubines. She was accepted as an adopted daughter, which means she's even more powerful in our sect now. Everyone is giving her triple the normal face! Yang Qi is one of her people, so if we actually kill him, not even our leader Dragon Floret could keep us safe.”

“Jadefall is just getting more and more powerful,” the grand elder said. “I can’t believe she's the adopted daughter of an imperial concubine from the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty. How come everything goes so smoothly for her?”

“Because of her pet, that’s all,” the White-Haired Boxer King said. “Even the top experts from the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty were intrigued by the thing. I heard that some of them intentionally provoked her, only to meet defeat. No one can last for a single move against her pet. It's just too strong.”

“Oh right. Was anyone from the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty able to identify the creature?”

“No. Not even the wise and knowledgeable high priest or prime minister have any idea what her pet is. For now, we just need to bide our time. Jadefall has returned, and it’s only a matter of time before she meets with Yang Qi. If we make a move on him now, she would surely come to find out, and we would be in big trouble.”

**

Meanwhile, Yang Qi had returned to the Scripture Pavilion to work on his cultivation and think about what position he wanted to aim for. The ancient records in the Scripture Pavilion had been incredibly useful so far, and he was interested in learning more. So staying put was an option.

Or he could go to the Thrall Camp. Considering he didn’t need to worry about running out of godpower, it would be easy to work there.

The Treasure Storage Warehouse would be another good possibility, except that it was already under the control of powerful factions in the sect, which meant it wouldn’t be easy for him to have much authority.

The Medicinal Pill Warehouse might work, except he didn’t really need medicinal pills. In the end, it didn’t seem that he needed to change positions at all. He didn’t lack wealth, thus, it was probably best to just remain in the Scripture Pavilion, where he could relax and further his cultivation. That said, he was definitely interested in rising in the ranks of the House of God Ordainment. That would be the best way to get close to the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty, which was where he knew he could get another piece of the Mahātmā Jade.

Even as he was contemplating all these things, someone came to see him. It was Yang Zhan.

“Father, what are you doing here?” Yang Qi asked. At first glance he could see that Yang Zhan had reached godly ascension! He must have come across some good fortune of some sort.

“Hurry and come with me,” Yang Zhan said. “I’m going to take you to see Jadefall. She returned some time ago, and has been asking to see you. But you’ve been gone for the past year. She’s really made some major advancement. She was taken in as the adopted daughter of an imperial concubine from the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty, and is now a princess there! It’s definitely nothing to look down on. Unfortunately, she now has a lot of suitors, which she finds annoying, so she wants your help to resolve the situation. By the way, how is your cultivation base? I heard that you—”

“Shh!” Yang Qi interrupted. “The less you say out loud the better. My cultivation base has improved significantly, but for now, I don’t want to reveal that to anyone. I need to reach an even higher level of enlightenment, and be truly powerful and invincible.”

“So you really have reached godly ascension!” Yang Zhan said, looking visibly delighted. “Brahma told me that you achieved Paramount will convergence even when you were a Quasi-God. As a god, you must be even more domineering.”

“That’s right. I’ve reached heights no one has ever reached before. There's definitely no one that can pose problems for me now. I know Jadefall has made some major advancements lately. Unfortunately, there are villains everywhere; people have been targeting me in the hopes of taking her down. I'm actually looking forward to meeting some of those people in person. Come on, let's go. It's been a long time since I’ve seen anyone I know. It's time for a reunion. I got a lot of incredible stuff while I was exploring the ruins in the Toxic Continent.”

Yang Zhan nodded. “Let’s go. I’ll take you right to Jadefall.”

“You lead the way!”

They flew out of the Scripture Pavilion and headed to a distant location in the god kingdom. Before, Yang Qi never would have been able to access places like this.

After all, there were locations that official disciples weren’t allowed to go to. But now that he was an elite disciple, he could go to many places that had previously been restricted.

In the depths of the god kingdom, there were many experts flying about. Some were Common Gods, others were Greater Gods. Eventually, they caught sight of numerous palaces floating in the air, surrounded by clouds.

“They’re all mansion grottos of the Consummate Gods,” Yang Zhan said. “Only Consummate Gods are allowed to have residences here. Jadefall lives with her Master in a place called the Jade Daylily Paradise. That said, her Master is in a session of critical seclusion right now in the God-Ordaining Dais, so Jadefall is in charge.”

“I read about some of this in the Great Classic of God Ordainment.” The clouds looked like they were made from jade, and when they landed on them, they were firm. It was almost as if they were made from nephrite, and emitted a fragrant aroma as they walked along them. They stretched out for hundreds of kilometers in all directions, and were covered with buildings of all sorts.

“Who are you?” an armed female disciple said. The area was patrolled by elite disciples, all of them Lesser Gods. As soon as they saw a newcomer, they would stop them and ask for identification. However, as soon as she realized it was Yang Zhan, she politely offered a salute and said, “Well, if it isn’t Mr. Yang Zhan. You’re one of Jadefall’s guests, right? Please, come this way.”

With full courtesy, she led Yang Zhan and Yang Qi into the depths of the jade-colored clouds.

Upon entering one particular palace, the sounds of lovely traditional music reached their ears, as if someone were throwing a banquet.

“Is Jadefall throwing a party?” Yang Zhan murmured.

There were some young women who were attendants standing nearby, and one of them said, “That’s right. There are some princes and princesses from the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty here, and Jadefall is entertaining them. And of course, there’s some important people from the House of God Ordainment as well.” Considering that Yang Qi wore the garments of a mere elite disciple, they obviously didn’t think he qualified to attend the banquet. But if Jadefall had issued orders that he come, none of them would dare cause any problems.

They were escorted into the banquet itself, where they saw a host of young women in the middle of performing a dance. Seated at the surrounding tables were all sorts of important guests, who were chatting amongst themselves. There were also some people standing in various parts of the room talking to each other.

Beautiful female disciples drifted through the crowd, serving the guests. Considering how important the guests were, the servers were doing their best to make a good impression; if one of these guests took a liking to them, their days as a lowly disciple could be over.

Yang Qi immediately caught sight of Jadefall. She was in the seat of honor, the purrling nestled in her arms. Two years had passed and she looked better than ever, her aura strong and powerful. The purrling hadn’t changed much, and just lay there lazily, looking around with a gleam of condescension in its eyes, as if it viewed the guests as little more than animals.

Then the purrling noticed Yang Qi; its eyes flashed and it started purring loudly.

‘The purrling is incredible!’ he thought. ‘With one glance it realized I have monarch godhood.’ In the past, the purrling had always looked at him with vague contempt. But now things were different. It seemed to be looking at him as if he were finally worthy of notice.

Chapter 1240: An Equal to the Purrling?

The purrling had spotted Yang Qi’s monarch godhood.

Yet again, he was convinced that the beast was simply too strong and invincible. Yang Qi was tens of thousands of times stronger than he had been in the impure lands, but he still didn’t feel superior to the purrling.

As he and the purrling looked at each other, he suddenly felt that he could hear its voice, praising him for his monarch godhood.

The exchange made him feel as though his energy arts had advanced again, all because of the aura of the purrling. After all, the reason he had been able to combine the Unspoiled Body and the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth was because of the Purrfect God Art. Of course, enlightenment of the Great Necropolis God Art had something to do with it as well.

Those two remarkable abilities were the main reasons he had reached his current state.

“You’re finally here, Yang Qi!” Jadefall said in delight. She rose to her feet and glided over to him. “Two years! It's been two years since I saw you last. You’ve reached godly ascension, I see. I also heard—”

She winked.

Obviously, she had been talking with Brahma and knew that Yang Qi had achieved Paramount will convergence as a Quasi-God. And that meant he had started forming monarch godhood. Although it looked like his godhood was weak and unimpressive, she knew the truth.

She understood more than almost anyone just how amazingly powerful and strong Yang Qi really was.

Jadefall had changed a lot in the past two years, and met some very important people. She knew more than many people exactly how terrifying monarch godhood was. For example, there were many top young ones from the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty who sought to form it, yet none had ever succeeded.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi was assessing Jadefall and could see that she was an early Common God. However, her godhood had undergone some special tempering, which meant she was definitely above average. She actually had one large piece of godhood surrounded by numerous smaller pieces.

‘That comes from a unique technique, and is called child-mother godhood.’ Yang Qi recognized it from some of the ancient records he had perused. Although it couldn’t compare to monarch godhood, it was still something very difficult to cultivate, and required going through numerous transformations. There were actually eighty-one different trials to be passed before one could succeed with it, but the result was godhood that surpassed the ordinary kind by many times over.

There were many types of godhood, and while monarch godhood was considered the strongest, there were other impressive versions, including child-mother godhood, seven-apertures godhood, myriad-colors godhood, shapeless godhood, spirit-communion godhood, and more.

Normal cultivators would have ordinary godhood. But by cultivating special techniques, one could alter their constitution and form unique types of godhood.

It was similar to how, in the impure lands, there were people who cultivated the three thousand unique constitutions.

In that respect, people with monarch godhood were like Fateless Ones.

The other kinds of godhood were like the Eternal Ones, Fortuned Ones, Reincarnated Ones, Devouring Ones, Slashing Ones, Leading Ones, and so forth. And they were all superior to the ordinary type.

Neither Yang Zhan, Brahma, the Shepherd, or even Doom could form special types of godhood. It wasn’t because they weren’t unique and special, but because they lacked the proper resources. That said, you can still mend the pen after the sheep are lost. If they got the proper resources in the future, it was always possible for them to form a unique type of godhood.

Monarch godhood required one to take action in the Quasi-God level, but other types could be formed over time.

“Ladies and gentlemen, this is my good friend, Yang Qi,” Jadefall announced. “And now, I’ll introduce all of you to him. This is Princess Shan Luo from the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty.”

“Greetings,” Yang Qi said. The woman being introduced to him was a Greater God who glanced at him as though she were vastly superior to him, obviously viewing him as little more than an animal.

She nodded, barely looking at him. After all, he was a mere Lesser God, so to a Greater God, he was like nothing. And she was a princess from the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty. Even Greater Gods from the House of God Ordainment would treat her with respect, and wouldn’t dare to do anything other than treat her as an equal.

Jadefall went around and introduced everyone to Yang Qi. They all nodded without much fanfare. Obviously, they were giving face to Jadefall, otherwise they would have just kicked Yang Qi out.

It was a real disappointment to have a measly Lesser God ruining the banquet like this.

Yang Qi didn’t care. He wouldn’t make a big fuss over a minor situation like this, nor would he do anything impolite.

After the introductions were over, the festivities continued and Yang Qi sat down near Jadefall. Delicacies and alcohol were served, the latter being god liquor, which was brewed with special medicinal ingredients from the god world. In fact, most types of god liquor were actually created in pill furnaces and were very aromatic.

Unfortunately, the atmosphere in the room was now different. It was a bit tense and awkward.

It was like a case in which a group of royalty were having dinner only to have a beggar come in and start stuffing his face.

The tense atmosphere continued for about an hour before someone finally couldn’t take it anymore. It was a Greater God from the House of God Ordainment, a person on roughly the same level as the White-Haired Boxer King. He wore a black robe and was fiddling with a silver dagger as he looked at Yang Qi and said, “Jadefall, this friend of yours is an elite disciple, right? Where exactly does he currently work?”

“The second floor of the Scripture Pavilion,” Yang Qi said. “Although, I’ve been thinking of looking for a position somewhere else.”

“Oh? The second floor of the Scripture Pavilion isn’t particularly impressive. And it’s definitely not suitable for an elite disciple. I have some friends in the Law-Enforcement God-Palace I could talk to. Why not go work there? You could earn a lot of extra profit, if you know what I mean. What do you think?”

From the haughty tone of the man's voice, it seemed like he was offering to give charity.

He wasn’t exaggerating about the ‘extra profit’. Disciples in the Law-Enforcement God-Palace could make a lot of money, and could even randomly arrest people ‘on accident’, only to release them for money under the table. All disciples gave them face, because they knew that causing problems for them was a good way to get arrested.

The House of God Ordainment had strict rules, but there were always ways to game the system.

Most ordinary disciples just wanted to avoid trouble, so if they were arrested, they would rather pay a bit of money to get off the hook.

Of course, it wasn’t easy to become a disciple in the Law-Enforcement God-Palace. Most applicants weren’t necessarily very strong, and had to rely on powerful backers to make any headway. There were also faction struggles to deal with, as well as blackmail.

Yang Qi had considered trying to join the organization, but didn’t feel like he had the proper backing. And considering this black-robed fellow was offering him help like charity, it was obvious he wouldn’t accept.

“That won’t be necessary,” he said, making sure to keep his tone neither servile nor overbearing. “I heard there’s a test you can take to join the Law-Enforcement God-Palace, if I want to, I’ll just apply that way.”

“Is that so?” said someone sitting next to the black-robed man. It was another important person from the House of God Ordainment. “You’re very confident, boy. Do you know how many people take the test to join the Law-Enforcement God-Palace? And do you know how many people get crippled during the process? Some disciples even die! That test is so hard that it makes the Bloodgore Trials seem like nothing.”

Another expert from the House of God Ordainment laughed and said, “Come now, Exalted Celestial Silver-Dagger, you’re a holy child of the Law-Enforcement God-Palace. You even serve as a proctor on the test. If this boy wants to take the exam to become a law enforcement disciple, why not just administer it right now? If he passes, he’s qualified to join. If he fails, well, he’ll just have to deal with the embarrassment.”

All of the experts from the House of God Ordainment were Greater Gods, and would normally outrank Jadefall. It was only because she was now a princess of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty that they were forced to try to get on her good side. But brownnosing aside, they were all disgusted by Yang Qi and wanted to see him put in his place.

“That should work,” said the black-robed Exalted Celestial Silver-Dagger, nodding. Looking back at Yang Qi, he said, “As it happens, I’m one of the proctors of that test. Why don’t I assess your skills right here and now?”

Even as the words left his mouth, he sent a stream of silver energy flying out of his finger, which converged into the shape of several tiny silver daggers that then clumped together into what looked almost like a swallow that flew back and forth.

“What kind of a test is it?” Yang Qi asked casually.

“It’s simple,” Exalted Celestial Silver-Dagger said. “This swallow is made from a stream of blade energy. It’s a manifestation of the Thirty-Six Stances of the Sweeping Silver Swallow. If you can block it, you pass the test. I have the paperwork to sign you up right here. Alright?”

“Sure. Let's begin.” Yang Qi didn't seem at all concerned about what was coming.

“The ignorant are often brave.” That was what everyone was thinking. Exalted Celestial Silver-Dagger was a holy child from the Law-Enforcement God-Palace, and everyone knew what people from the Law-Enforcement God-Palace were like. They specialized in killing and warfare. And Exalted Celestial Silver-Dagger’s weapons had surely killed innumerable devil-gods and experts. When people spoke of his skill with his daggers, they would often say, “When gods see him, they fret. When ghosts see him, they cry.”

A single scrap of that blade energy would be enough to slaughter countless Common Gods, and likely even kill an early Greater God.

Chapter 1241: Exalted Celestial Silver-Dagger

Seeing that so many people were watching the events played out, Yang Qi said, “That's some pretty shoddy blade energy, Exalted Celestial Silver-Dagger. In fact, it won’t even be able to hurt me.”

His words caused an immediate stir. The visiting nobility from the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty and the top experts from the House of God Ordainment were all visibly stunned. Now more than ever, they despised and hated Yang Qi, and thought him to be a cocky and arrogant punk who deserved to be violently put in his place.

“Shoddy?” Exalted Celestial Silver-Dagger said, his eyes widening with rage. For someone to call his blade energy shoddy was an outright insult and humiliation. “I’ll show you some shoddy blade energy!”

Rotating his finger, he caused the silver swallow of blade energy to beat its wings and whoosh right over to Yang Qi, giving him no chance to dodge or jump out of the way.

“Purr. Purr....”

A bubble expanded out of Yang Qi, and when the streams of blade energy hit it, their momentum vanished as surely as the statue of an ox tossed into the sea. Then the blade energy remained stuck in the bubble like a fly in amber.

Purr!

The bubble rotated, shrinking down until it was the size of a hand. And right in the middle of it was a conglomeration of blade energy that looked like a swallow, sitting there completely unmoving.

Yang Qi shook his head. “As I said, very shoddy blade energy.”

“What?!” Exalted Celestial Silver-Dagger blurted, leaping to his feet and glaring at Yang Qi. “That wasn’t your power. That was the power of the purrling!”

The people from the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty were first shocked, but then they looked over at Jadefall and came to the conclusion that it really wasn’t Yang Qi defending himself, but rather the purrling. After all, only the purrling could have negated Exalted Celestial Silver-Dagger’s blade energy so easily. Otherwise, there was no way a measly Lesser God could have done anything other than be slaughtered.

“Jadefall,” said one of the people from the House of God Ordainment, “Exalted Celestial Silver-Dagger was just administering a test. It's not appropriate for you to secretly help out. It's a good thing this is just an informal banquet. If we had been in the Law-Enforcement God-Palace, you would be in big trouble for breaking the rules.”

“If the purrling had done anything, it would’ve been a lot more impressive,” Jadefall said. “Yang Qi learned that ability from the purrling. Not even I’ve been able to do that. The truth is that Yang Qi was the one who helped the purrling hatch from its godspore, and got some of its quintessence in the process. What happened now was all him, and I had nothing to do with it. Besides, I can’t order the purrling around. It’s my friend, not my pet.”

Purr, purr....

Even as the words left Jadefall’s mouth, the purrling looked over at Exalted Celestial Silver-Dagger and let out two purrs, as if to say, “You think I would waste any effort on a loser like you?”

The derision in its eyes couldn’t have been clearer.

Exalted Celestial Silver-Dagger was furious, but didn’t dare to make a move on the purrling. He knew that if the purrling wanted to, it could kill him without any effort. After all, it was the reason why Jadefall had such a powerful position now.

“I never would’ve guessed that a puny elite disciple would be able to do something like that,” Exalted Celestial Silver-Dagger said, glaring at Yang Qi. “Apparently I was mistaken. However, if you think you can use tricks like that to join the Law-Enforcement God-Palace, you’re mistaken. Next month, we’ll be holding the yearly test to enter the Law-Enforcement God-Palace. If you have what it takes, then you should participate. And now, Jadefall, I’ll take my leave.”

Swish!

He turned into a stream of silver light that shot into the air and vanished.

“Apparently, Exalted Celestial Silver-Dagger is quite a sore loser,” one of the princesses from the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty said. Looking at Yang Qi with an intrigued expression, she said, “Your name is Yang Qi, right? Your energy arts aren’t bad. Please, allow me to offer a toast.”

She waved her finger, and a cup of alcohol lifted off the table and floated through the air toward Yang Qi. It seemed like a very casual move, but Yang Qi could see that the cup was no ordinary object. It was like an ancient mountain of immense size and weight, and it nearly overwhelmed his senses with the pressure it emanated.

This was the result of a secret magic of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty, something called God-King Mountain-Range Suppression.

However, all Yang Qi did was send out a pulse of psychic power, and the immense pressure vanished. Then he flicked his finger, sending out a bubble that caught the vessel and pulled it over to his hand. Taking it, he drained it in one gulp, then nodded. “That’s some nice liquor. Many thanks to you, Princess. I'm eternally grateful.”

With the wave of his hand, he sent the cup flying back to the table, encased in a bubble. When it settled down in front of the princess, it actually sank down into the table, causing her expression to flicker. Then, she smiled radiantly. “Well done! You’re very impressive for a Lesser God. Considering how strong you are, I'd say you’re on the same level as the geniuses we produce in the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty. Jadefall, this friend of yours is amazing. No wonder you want to keep him safe. This was a wonderful banquet. For now, we’ll leave. When you have a chance, why not bring this young friend of yours over to the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty for us to entertain him?”

“Absolutely,” Jadefall said, her eyebrows raised with delight. “Allow me to see you out.”

The banquet was over, and before long, things quieted down. Although many of the guests had already come to view Yang Qi in a new light, there were others that were still convinced he was only impressive because he could use the power of the purrling.

Of course, that was intentional on Yang Qi’s part. He didn’t want to do anything that would attract too much attention. If he had wanted to, he could have crushed Exalted Celestial Silver-Dagger into a bloody paste with a single move. But killing him like that wouldn’t have been of any benefit at all.

Instead, he would wait until he could further refine his monarch godhood, and also acquire another piece of the Mahātmā Jade.

Jadefall’s mansion was now peaceful and quiet. Looking very excited, she led him into a private chamber where they sat down to converse.

“Did you really form monarch godhood, Yang Qi?” she asked.

“I did. No joke.” He smiled faintly. “You can tell it’s true from how the purrling reacted to me.”

Having heard his confirmation, Jadefall sucked in a breath of surprise. “You’re really amazing. We absolutely, positively must not let word of this get out. It would bring absolute disaster. At a certain point, a genius cultivator will become so valuable that he becomes a treasure that people want to take for their own.”

“Trust me, I know,” Yang Qi replied. “It's similar to the purrling. The purrling has attracted a lot of attention, even from the higher-ups in the House of God Ordainment.”

“You're right. There’s one particular old-timer, a Consummate God, who wants to take the purrling away from me to study it. When I refused, he got very angry. But I had no choice other than to offend him. In fact, he’s Exalted Celestial Silver-Dagger’s master. His name is Exalted Autarch Martial-Apex. He’s extremely powerful, just on the verge of reaching Unbounded will convergence.”

“Exalted Autarch Martial-Apex? A Consummate God?” Yang Qi nodded. “I could beat an early Consummate God in a fight, but it would be a lot more difficult fighting one in the mid level. And if I faced one in the late or peak level, I would have no other option but to flee. If I ran into a Perfect God, I would definitely end up dead. In any case, don’t worry. I think the purrling would be able to handle a Perfect God. And although it looks on the surface like the purrling hasn’t grown in the past two years in the god world, I think it has.”

Purr. Purr....

The purrling’s reaction to Yang Qi’s assessment seemed to be, “You do understand me, boy.”

“Jadefall, it seems to me that you’re not strong enough. Although, it's not as if improving one’s cultivation base is something that can happen overnight. Thankfully, I happened to explore a very dangerous location recently, and I got some good treasures. If I can refine them, they’ll make great secret weapons for you and the rest of my people.”

“What exactly is it?” Jadefall asked.

“I have some hypertoxic crystalline skulls, infused with undying psyches and toxic spatial nodes.” He pulled out a necklace of beads, each of which looked like a black, thumb-sized skull. There were thirteen in total, and they looked completely terrifying.

“Each skull is equivalent to an early Consummate God, and is infused with deadly toxins. It was very difficult to seal them like this. Next up, I want to use a grafting magic to try to convert them into hypertoxic puppets. Everyone who has one will essentially have a Consummate God as a bodyguard. You watch me work, and pay close attention to the godpower fluctuations. It’ll be very beneficial to you.”

“Alright,” Jadefall said, watching him closely.

Yang Qi plucked at the necklace as if it were a stringed instrument, causing tiny sound waves to roll out and enter the skulls. They contained spatial profundities that Jadefall, despite being a Common God, had difficulty understanding.

Obviously, Paramount will was required to do something like this, but Jadefall was still in the peak Terrifying level.

Those sound waves were from multiple sources: the Sovereign Lord’s Holy and Far-Reaching Consummate Omnicurse, the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body, and the Sage Monarch Grand Magic.

The spirit controls the psyche.

The psyche controls the soul.

The soul controls everything.

In the briefest of moments, Yang Qi’s spirit fused with the undying psyches of the skulls, and in that moment, he could sense the brutal, vicious, and deadly emotions that existed within them.

Chapter 1242: Consummate Toxic Devils

Yang Qi infused his will into the skulls, using a variety of daoist techniques to cleanse and purify them. The wills of Consummate Gods erupted from the skulls, but he kept them in check with the Purrfect God Art.

Soon, the skulls were emitting mournful howls.

Unfortunately, they had undying wills from almighty beings of ancient times, and were not the type that could be easily subdued. They fought fiercely, refusing to become puppets under Yang Qi’s control. In fact, they were filled with defiant emotions.

They would defy heaven, defy earth, defy men, defy gods, and defy buddhas.

They wanted to poison all living beings to death and turn all creation into a world of toxicity.

Yang Qi pushed harder with his will in an attempt to crush them, but they only fought back with increasing ferocity. So far, not a single one had come under his control.

“Very tenacious,” he murmured. Even after three days and three nights had passed, he made no progress. In fact, the skulls were emitting a toxic gas that filled the area and would have melted the palace if Yang Qi didn’t keep it in check.

This place wasn’t nearly as tough as the Chaos Forge God-Shrine, so poison like this would destroy it in short order.

These skulls had the power of Consummate Gods, thus they couldn’t be easily converted into puppets. Given Yang Qi’s strength, all he could really do was seal them. It was similar to the relationship between an emperor and the common people. The common people could generally accept a tax, but if the emperor’s forces went around pillaging and murdering, then the common people wouldn’t tolerate it and would rise up in revolt.

The skulls could tolerate being sealed, but in terms of being assimilated, they would instinctively resist it.

The skulls howled as Yang Qi tried to devour them with his godpower.

“Heaven-Devouring Grand Magic!” A primal-chaos elder-snake flew out into the open to devour the skulls. However, the skulls simply opened their mouths and emitted a powerful gravitational force in an attempt to devour the snake. Instantly, they began to fight back and forth fiercely.

Yang Qi was going all out, but so far he wasn’t making any progress at all in turning the skulls into puppets.

If he failed, then the instant they managed to break free, they would try to devour him.

“Mahākaruṇā of Heaven and Earth; Reincarnation Dao of Gods; Transformations of Yin and Yang; Chiliocosmic Chain Reaction; Many Heavens God Seal; Be Suppressed!”

The Many Heavens God Seal appeared and he shoved it out violently toward the skulls.

At the same time, he exhaled a burst of sagefire that surrounded the skulls, emitting crackling sounds the entire time. Creating sagefire of this level was a big drain on his godpower. In fact, even normal Consummate Gods wouldn't be able to sustain the drainage. Thankfully, Yang Qi had the God Legion Seal.

Specifically, this sagefire was the Flame of Hope, which could fill the void and bring hope to countless living beings in the universe.

The purrling looked on, licking its paws as if in derision, as if the wastage of energy was childish.

Jadefall was very familiar with the purrling after dealing with it for all these years, and knew how it worked. “Purrling, Yang Qi has been trying for three days and three nights, and has wasted a lot of godpower. Why don’t you help out?”

“Purr, purr....” It made two purring sounds that seemed to mean: “Helping Yang Qi would be a big waste. If he does it himself, he’ll benefit a lot. Subduing those skulls will provide a big tempering effect to his godpower.”

In the end, it was a contest of wills.

Seven days and nights passed, and Yang Qi’s vital energy was getting stronger. His cultivation base was being pushed to the limit, and as a result, he was actually making good progress. At a certain point, he pushed with explosive force, causing sparks to shower down into the skulls, filling their eyes with the Flame of Hope and causing their auras to weaken.

Yang Qi was finally gaining control.

Those seven days and nights had been a torment for Yang Qi, and had involved wasting an indeterminable amount of godpower. Even if a thousand Consummate Gods joined forces to try to do the same thing, they would fail.

Yet he still hadn’t succeeded in dealing with the skulls.

What was worse, Yang Qi could tell that if the right expert came along, someone much stronger than him, that person could take the skulls away from him very easily.

He exhaled some godpower onto the skulls, and five more days and nights passed. The skulls were now a pure golden color instead of pitch black. They were still filled with toxins, but those toxins were being converted into something that belonged to the legion of gods.

Next, he sent some of the energy of the Unspoiled Body into the golden skulls, filling them with countless tribulations and making them stronger and tougher than ever.

He flicked his finger, and a host of tiny, golden godmammoths flew into the skulls, filling them with the immense power of the King of Godmammoths.

The thirteen skulls had been impressive to begin with, but had been slightly lacking in raw power. But now Yang Qi was imbuing them with such immense force that they would truly be invincible going forward.

But Yang Qi wasn’t done yet. He began inscribing the skulls with spell formations that were filled with his knowledge of the dao of heaven and enlightenment of the chiliocosm of worlds. Yang Qi was expending blood, sweat, and tears to turn these skulls into a powerful magical treasure.

In fact, it was the first time in the god world that he was forging a treasure.

Magical treasures needed the right materials, and these thirteen skulls had formed naturally, and were a fusion of the wills of almighty experts and spatial toxins. They were like uncut jade, and Yang Qi was like a sculptor.

Purr. Purr....

Yang Qi next used the Purrfect God Art to create thirteen bubbles around the thirteen skulls. Then an image of the Great Necropolis appeared, into which he interred them.

The Great Necropolis God Art could bury the legion of gods. The Purrfect God Art was mysteriously unfathomable.

Now they had been combined into this magical treasure.

As the process continued, Yang Qi realized that, within the depths of the thirteen skulls, there was some unidentifiable object forming.

Around this time, it seemed the purrling finally wanted to join in, and it spat out a series of bubbles that wrapped up the thirteen skulls.

Yang Qi watched as the skulls shrank down until they were the size of dust, impossible to see with the naked eye, but thousands of times stronger than before.

‘So strong. Too strong!” Yang Qi looked over at the purrling, still having no idea what it was. In fact, if someone had said it was the King of Godmammoths, he would have been happy to believe it.

That said, there was no way the King of Godmammoths looked like a little pink piglet.

“Got it!”

The purrling had just made the skulls vastly stronger, saving Yang Qi upwards of a thousand years of hard work.

Normally, that’s how long it would have taken him to properly refine them into the treasure he wanted them to be.

Now, the skulls landed on his hand, transforming into a string of golden prayer beads.

With the flick of his wrist, he sent the skulls shooting out, which then grew bodies and limbs until they were golden skeletons, bursting with immense power. Their faces seemed filled with fury, grief, sorrow, and joy, all at the same time. They were like devil-gods with no godhood, who would kill enemies instinctively.

And they were comparable to Consummate Gods.

Yang Qi had created a true magical treasure.

“Incredible,” he murmured. At his direction, the golden devil-gods ripped at the space around them, creating a black vortex that swept out in all directions.

“It worked,” Jadefall said. “Those golden skeletons are about as strong as my Master. You really found some amazing materials to work with.”

Yang Qi nodded. “They can be used for self-defense, but not cultivation. My Sage Monarch Consortium needs something just like this.”

“Your consortium has been growing,” Jadefall said, “and I've been supporting it from behind the scenes while you’ve been gone.” She watched Yang Qi pull the skeletons back into skull form, then said, “You don’t need something like that?”

He laughed. “No, I don’t. And neither do you. With the purrling on your side, no one will be able to harm you. I’ll give these prayer beads to Doom, the Shepherd, and my father. They can use them to defend against Consummate Gods, and accomplish dangerous missions for the sect. Within a few dozen years, a hundred at most, we’ll be able to form a Sage Monarch Society within the House of God Ordainment.”

“I’d say you’re strong enough to do that right now,” Jadefall said.

“I could, but what's the point of forming a tiny society?” He shook his head. “I want something big. Oh, by the way, I heard the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty has a piece of the Mahātmā Jade.”

Chapter 1243: Taking the Law Enforcement Disciple Test

Looking very serious, Jadefall said, “That’s right. I heard that the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty has a piece of the Mahātmā Jade, too. Unfortunately, nobody can make any use of it, and no research into it has produced any results. That said, it's still viewed as a priceless treasure, and I'm fully aware that you need it. In fact, it’s exactly why I agreed to be adopted by that imperial concubine.

“But listen to me, Yang Qi. You absolutely, positively must not entertain any thoughts of trying to steal the jade from the dynasty. They have countless warding magics and experts guarding it. If you fall into their hands, you’ll never escape.”

“Don’t worry about that. I know I’m not strong enough to try stealing anything from the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty.” Although Yang Qi wasn’t particularly familiar with the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty, he knew that if they could keep the House of God Ordainment in check, they were obviously formidable.

Right now, he couldn’t even break into the House of God Ordainment’s treasure storehouse; there was simply too much security.

In fact, that was also the reason why Yang Qi didn’t work on his daoist techniques in the sect's god kingdom, nor did he attempt breakthroughs there.

‘Now that I know for sure there’s a piece of the jade there,’ he thought, ‘I need to think of a way to get to it. Any other type of treasure, I can do without. But I absolutely must have that jade. By using the principles of mutual augmentation and suppression to combine it with the God Legion Seal, I can break through fate and defy heaven.’ After thinking for a moment, he said, “Considering you’re the adopted daughter of an imperial concubine, it shouldn’t be too hard for me to eventually get into the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty. For now, we don’t need to worry about it too much.”

“Alright. By the way, are you really considering taking the test to become a law enforcement disciple? The Law-Enforcement God-Palace is a good place to make some extra profit, but considering you can make your own godnotes and godstones, I don’t see why that would be important to you.”

Yang Qi nodded. “You’re right, but think about it for a moment. There are other benefits that would come with working in the Law-Enforcement God-Palace. It's an independent entity among all of the various factions in the sect, and if I can get in there, recruit some disciples onto my side, and eventually gain power, it would be a lot easier to keep you and the rest of my people safe. And the more important I am in the House of God Ordainment, the more likely I’ll be received with favor by the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty. In contrast, if we don’t get power like that in the House of God Ordainment, then it will be all the more easier for people to frame us for crimes.”

“How do you intend to seize power? I'm just worried that if you get in, the other disciples will cause problems for you. It’s not uncommon for disciples to pass the test, but cross the wrong people and end up imprisoned. The disciples of the Law-Enforcement God-Palace are all very crafty, and I'm worried that if you get involved in scheming against them, it could negatively affect your cultivation base.”

“Why would I get involved in schemes against them?” Yang Qi said. He chuckled. “I can even infect Greater Gods with my devil embryos, turning them into faithful followers. That’s the fastest way to do it.”

Yang Qi was very adept with the Heaven-God Hell-Exterminating Devil Embryo now, and could easily use it to manipulate a person’s faith. He could even use it to secretly make them loyal to him.

Yang Qi was already strong enough in terms of cultivation base and psyche, but when you added in the God Legion Seal, he was completely invincible.

He could even take control of Greater Gods!

Furthermore, the God Legion Seal needed the faith of gods.

It already contained such faith, which was its ultimate foundation. However, after the seal broke apart, a new legion of gods had risen up that had never even seen the seal, nor offered faith to the Sovereign Lord. And Yang Qi was thinking of making a new God Legion Seal.

The simplest way to go about that was to force gods into offering him faith, then sending that faith into the seal. Thankfully, there were a lot of gods in the House of God Ordainment. Even Lesser Gods were still gods, and were considered part of the legion of gods.

It was after becoming a god himself that Yang Qi had unraveled some of the profound mysteries of the God Legion Seal. It was only now starting to reveal its true potential.

He and Jadefall sat there talking for a bit longer before he left. After he was gone, Jadefall called in Yang Zhan, Brahma, the Shepherd, and the others to instruct them about the golden skull necklace. With it, they were far better equipped to deal with any challenges that might come their way.

With the power of a Consummate God to protect them, what did they have to be afraid of? In the god world, Greater Gods were important people, while Consummate Gods were nobility.

Afterward, everyone went their separate ways to work on whatever endeavors they were involved in. All of them were also working to improve their cultivation and gain footholds of power within the House of God Ordainment.

A few days later, Yang Qi showed up at the main square in front of the Law-Enforcement God-Palace.

The place was packed with innumerable disciples, all here to take the test.

Every year, the Law-Enforcement God-Palace administered an examination to choose new disciples. Whoever fought their way to the top would have new work as a law enforcement disciple.

The job of the law enforcement disciples was simple: enforce the law! And they were given free rein to fight and kill however was necessary to make sure that the laws were upheld.

Of course, it was a given that the elders of the Law-Enforcement God-Palace would take advantage of the situation to turn a bit of a profit.

Plenty of people would rely on relationships, bribes, or clever schemes to get into the Law-Enforcement God-Palace. But Yang Qi didn’t plan to rely on any such tactics; instead, he planned to rely only on his skill. After all, if one used underhanded means to get in, and people had evidence of that, it was an easy way to get thrown in jail. And right now, he knew that a lot of people had their eye on him.

‘There are so many disciples in the House of God Ordainment!’ he thought. They had converged on the main square like locusts, covering the ground and giving rise to a hubbub of conversation.

Everyone was very tense considering the rules governing the test. In the past, there had been disciples who performed so poorly that they were beaten within an inch of their lives and imprisoned, or even turned into thralls.

“Everybody line up!” shouted a disciple from the Law-Enforcement God-Palace. “Get into groups of ten thousand, just like in the Bloodgore Trials!”

“Provide your name and pay the ten godnote registration fee!”

Godnotes were flowing into the coffers of the Law-Enforcement God-Palace, and the elders were grinning from ear to ear because of how much they were profiting.

Yang Qi paid his godnotes and got into his assigned group, then listened carefully to the instructions being provided by the grand elder.

“Anyone can participate in the test to join the Law-Enforcement God-Palace,” the grand elder said. “Just be aware that there will be casualties. Of course, there won’t be as many deaths as in the Bloodgore Trials. After all, you disciples are the foundation of the House of God Ordainment. If you feel that you can’t go on any longer, you can always forfeit now. For the first part of the test, you’ll head into a unique dimension which we call the Heaven-Devil Zone. There are countless heaven-devil kings inside, and you have six hours to kill them all. Each of you is required to collect three souls from heaven-devil kings. Remember, this dimension isn't a part of the House of God Ordainment. The heaven-devils inside are all devil-gods that originally come from the ancient Hell of Heaven-Devils. It just so happens that our House of God Ordainment figured out a way to enter this place, and decided to use it as a training ground. Six hours after you enter, you’ll automatically be teleported out. If you die before then, your corpse will be teleported out, unless you're devoured by a heaven-devil. If there is no corpse to teleport out, you’ll never leave. You’re free to leave of your own accord now, but once you’re in the Heaven-Devil Zone, you’ll be stuck there until the teleportations begin.”

After the introduction was over, not a single disciple chose to leave.

Truth be told, Yang Qi didn’t need this explanation, as the details were recorded in the Great Classic of God Ordainment. He knew that the Heaven-Devil Zone had originally been created by armies of heaven-devils in ancient times, although it had changed over the years.

It was filled with heaven-devils and heaven-devil kings. The ordinary heaven-devils were equivalent to Quasi-Gods, while the heaven-devil kings were like full gods. Although one of the prerequisites to taking part in the examination was to be a god, the truth was that even people like that who ended up mobbed by a group of Quasi-God heaven-devils would likely perish. In the impure lands, the psychic power of the heaven-devils from the Unrestrained Heaven was legendary, and they were known to easily kill immortal cultivators. So there was little need to mention what heaven-devils in the god world would be like.

When the elder saw that no one was backing down, he shrugged his shoulders and activated the spell formation. A furious wind sprang up as the portal activated, and before an incense stick’s worth of time could pass, they arrived at their destination.

It was so large that it was impossible to gauge exactly how big it was. Off in the distance were the heaven-devils, most of whom looked like enormous birds with human bodies. They pulsed with devil energy, and were so numerous they were impossible to count. And they seemed to be waiting for something. Yang Qi and the other disciples immediately realized that they were like food that had been thrown out in front of these hungry heaven-devils.

There were some who didn’t look like birds. Some were three-headed, six-armed creatures with armor and weapons. Others looked human. Regardless, as soon as they saw the disciples arrive, they howled and began to get in formation.

Chapter 1244: Easy

The Heaven-Devil Zone was filled with heaven-devils that were rushing toward them like a cloud of locusts. And they weren’t advancing individually, but sticking together in formation.

“Everybody scatter!” shouted one of the disciples. “Don’t stick together. These heaven-devils are too strong. Focus on taking out the heaven-devil kings. Remember, all you have to do is get three souls and stay safe for six hours until they teleport us out.”

Whooosh!

Some of the disciples charged forth to meet the incoming heaven-devils. Those heaven-devils that had developed godhood were called heaven-devil kings, and the only way to pass this test was to collect the souls of three such creatures.

Of course, everyone knew that this was only the first stage of the test. Law enforcement disciples started out as veterans of numerous battles, so it was a given that there would be more parts to the test.

RUMBLE!

Looking out, Yang Qi saw that there was a group of several hundred thousand heaven-devils who were in a formation that made them an enormous devil hand rumbling toward the disciples.

Devil energy surged around it, and flames burned, making it obvious that it was strong enough to kill even gods.

When heaven-devils got into formation, they could produce results that vastly surpassed what humans were capable of. Humans could power huge formations, but because their hearts would never be completely in unison, the results were less desirable. The only exception would be if a sect created an army of thralls to do the job.

When humans became gods, they became more unique and independent than ever, which precluded them from acting like soldiers who simply followed orders.  And of course, they would never agree to live and die as a group.

But heaven-devils could do that. They were born as devils, and under the direction of the heaven-devil kings, they could easily form into huge, unified groups that could focus their godpower to deadly effect.

As the enormous devil hand rumbled forth, some of the disciples were too slow, and were crushed to death, whereupon the heaven-devils devoured their godhood.

Bam. Bam. Bam.

As Yang Qi saw the heaven-devils approaching, he realized that the group of disciples around him were like fish food, floating in the water, just waiting for a fish to gobble it up.

There were actually thousands of heaven-devils in this huge group, and even just the cries that escaped their lips were enough to strike fear into the hearts of the disciples.

‘The perfect opportunity!’ Yang Qi thought. Taking advantage of the chaos among the disciples, he turned into a beam of light and vanished without a trace. When he reappeared, he was right in the middle of the heaven-devils and their roiling devil energy. Waving his sleeve, he sucked in eight heaven-devil kings, and before any of the others realized what was happening, he disappeared again.

Yang Qi wasn’t interested in carrying out a mass slaughter here, as it would attract too much attention. He just wanted to finish the mission. Planning ahead in case unforeseen circumstances arose, he took eight heaven-devil kings instead of the required three, then went into hiding.

Meanwhile, the enormous heaven-devil army was spreading out everywhere. Some of them had entered a formation that resembled an ancient bell, whose tolling was so deadly it actually killed some of the disciples. It was no exaggeration to say that this test was deadly.

And there weren’t just early Lesser Gods. Yang Qi had spotted some who were in the late level, some in the peak, and even a handful of Common Gods.

Swish!

All of a sudden, a stream of sword light slashed into the bell formation, causing it to crumble. Yang Qi looked over to find a young man of about fifteen or sixteen years of age who was already a Lesser God with a godhood rating of thirteen.

Normally speaking, people with godhood ratings over ten were Common Gods, so the fact that this young man was still just a Lesser God went to show that he was very powerful, and had a lot of potential. Even stranger, when Yang Qi looked at him, it was as if he wasn’t a single person, but rather a split between yin and yang, a combination of the sun and moon. Yin begets yang, yang begets yin. Harnessing that principle could lead to vastly superior power.

The young man had a jade sword, and seemed completely at one with it. When he wielded it, the sword light was like strands of silk that slashed this way and that, allowing him to cut his way through the formation right toward one of the heaven-devil kings. Without a hint of mercy, he cut it down, absorbing its soul into his sword.

Unfortunately, that attracted the attention of over a hundred heaven-devil kings who joined forces to launch a massive palm attack, creating a huge devil hand that slammed into his sword light. The sword light instantly went dark, and the young man tumbled backward.

The young man regained his footing and sent forth another beam of sword light.

Unfortunately, the heaven-devil kings shifted their formation, creating a huge eye that glared at the young man in a deadly attack.

‘A heaven-devil-eye,’ Yang Qi thought. He could tell that the young man was at a big disadvantage, facing so many heaven-devils. And in formation as a devil-eye, they could definitely slaughter even Common Gods.

After all, Yang Qi knew that these heaven-devil kings were actually ghost-eye heaven-devils, which could unleash psychic attacks that would devastate all sorts of living creatures.

Among the seventy-two monarchs, there had been one named King Ghost-Eye, who was an exalted figure among ghost-eye heaven-devils.

Without any further hesitation, Yang Qi blurred into motion, grabbing the young man and vanishing. When he reappeared, it was in a cloudy location with no heaven-devils.

“Who are you?” the young man asked.

“I'm Yang Qi. It seems your sword technique is a cut above the rest, and you even have special godhood. Yin-yang grand-brightness gemini godhood. I just couldn’t bear to see you killed by that devil-eye. Those devil kings were all ghost-eye heaven-devils, and in formation, they make a force you couldn’t possibly defeat.”

“Many thanks.” the young man said. “I'm called Cold Jade. You know, there are only limited spots for students to pass this test. For all we know, we might end up as opponents later. Do you really think it was worth it to save me?”

His voice was quite cold and emotionless, as if he were the kind of person who wouldn't easily be moved.

Yang Qi burst out laughing. “Nobody can stop me from becoming a law enforcement disciple. Saving you won’t cause any problems for me at all.”

“You really talk big,” Cold Jade said, looking Yang Qi up and down. Then he shivered. “Those ghost-eye heaven-devils are chasing us.”

All of a sudden, a huge eye became visible. It was fully fifteen kilometers from end to end, and looked like an enormous meteor rumbling toward them.

The hundred ghost-eye heaven-devils that made it up were wailing like ghosts or gods, and were moving so quickly that, in the blink of an eye, they were closing in on Yang Qi.

“Get out of the way!” Cold Jade said, then reached out as if to push Yang Qi aside. However, that was when he found that Yang Qi was as immovable as a mountain.

Then, to his shock, he saw Yang Qi reach out with blinding speed to grab the huge eye. When he did, the ghost-eye heaven-devils screamed plaintively as he crushed them with pure strength. A moment later, they had been smashed down into the form of a tiny eyeball that dropped onto Yang Qi’s palm.

He casually closed his fingers, and the eyeball disappeared.

Cold Jade was so shocked he nearly passed out. “You... what kind of cultivation base do you have? You just killed over a hundred ghost-eye heaven-devils with a single move? That group was strong enough to kill a peak Common God!”

“A peak Common God?” Yang Qi said. “What do they count for? Here, take a few of these souls. Now you don’t have to do any more fighting. Just wait until we’re teleported out of here. You're obviously a genius, and you also have a special constitution, so it’s a given that you’re an apprentice of some important person in the House of God Ordainment.”

“My Master is Exalted Celestial Cold Cruelty. A peak Greater God.”

“I see. Yes, someone important indeed.” He nodded. “Well, I'm planning on forming my own faction. Want to join?”

“You really talk big,” Cold Jade replied. “You might be strong, but you're still only a Lesser God. And there are too many factions to count in the House of God Ordainment. Why would you make your own tiny faction instead of joining a group like the Dragon Society or the Preheaven Society?”

Yang Qi laughed again. “Dragon Society? Preheaven Society? They're too trashy. You see, I normally stick to myself. But when I decide to do something, I go all out. When I make my own society, I’ll crush all the others. And that includes the number one organization, the Mystery Society.”

The Mystery Society was indeed the top group in the House of God Ordainment, and as their name stated, they were very mysterious. In fact, most people didn’t even know who their members were. Some people claimed that the leader of the Mystery Society was actually the junior houselord.

Of course, it was only a rumor.

Yang Qi had been a member of the House of God Ordainment for two years now, so he knew a lot about the organization. However, he wasn’t completely certain of what kind of cultivation base the houselord had, or the other top old-timers.

“Are you kidding me?” Cold Jade said. He laughed. “So you just randomly ran into me, and you’re already trying to recruit me? And you’re basically even asking me to rebel? If you were in my place, what would you do? Would you fall for something like that?”

Yang Qi chuckled. It was more obvious than ever that although Cold Jade looked young, he was no less capable than Yang Qi’s current subordinates. That was why he was attempting to recruit him.

Chapter 1245: Another Crown Prince Society

“Are you going to join me, or not?” Yang Qi asked imperiously.

Instead of answering Yang Qi’s question, Cold Jade started fishing for information. “Given how strong you are, you should be someone really important in the House of God Ordainment. Except, I’ve never even heard of you before. Considering how openly you’re trying to recruit me, does it mean you plan to found your new faction soon? Wait, you’re not some sort of spy, are you?”

“No, I'm not,” Yang Qi said. “Have you heard of Jadefall?”

“Jadefall? The one who’s now an adopted daughter of an imperial concubine from the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty? She’s a very important person. Nearly invincible. Nobody can defeat that pet of hers, and some of the old-timers are even scheming to take it from her.” All of a sudden Cold Jade realized what Yang Qi was implying. “Oh, you work for her. So you aren’t some sort of mole.”

“Now will you agree to join me?” Yang Qi said. “You obviously realize how powerful Jadefall is, and she’s only going to get stronger. And she definitely won’t join the Dragon Society or the Mystery Society.”

“Hmph! Nobody cares about the Dragon Society or the Mystery Society.” Cold Jade laughed. “And I suggest you don’t bother making your own group. Why not join a truly powerful organization?”

“Which one?” Yang Qi asked curiously. “I thought the most powerful and enigmatic group was the Mystery Society. Beneath them are the Dragon Society, Preheaven Society, Honorable Glory Society, and Brilliant Radiance Society, who are always fighting amongst themselves. And of course, the smaller societies don’t really count for anything. What society could possibly look down so much on the Mystery Society?”

“The Crown Prince Society,” Cold Jade said. “Considering you’re one of Jadefall’s people, I’ll be perfectly up-front. Compared to the Crown Prince Society, the Mystery Society is like nothing.”

“Crown Prince Society?” It was a very familiar name that caused Yang Qi’s heart to start pounding. “Where did this Crown Prince Society come from?”

In the impure lands, Yang Qi had struggled with the supposed Crown Prince for a long time. The Crown Prince had possessed one of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions, and if he had lived long enough, he would probably have made it to the god world and become an important person. Except that Yang Qi had killed him.

Now, here Yang Qi was in the god world, and he had run into another Crown Prince Society.

What was its origin?

During his time in the House of God Ordainment, Yang Qi had never even heard of it.

Could it possibly have anything to do with the Crown Prince he knew in the impure lands? Yang Qi had always felt like there was some destiny tugging at him. The Crown Prince, who had been a prominent member of the Demi-Immortal Institute in the Rich-Lush Continent, had been completely wiped out of existence. But for some reason, he felt certain that this new Crown Prince Society must have some destiny-based connection to the Crown Prince he had killed.

“The Crown Prince Society was put together by the crown prince of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty,” Cold Jade replied. “Truth be told, I'm a member of the Crown Prince Society. And since your behind-the-scenes supporter in the House of God Ordainment, Jadefall, is the adopted daughter of an imperial concubine from the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty, there’s no harm in telling her the truth. The Crown Prince Society has members in all the major sects, the reason being that the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty has already unified many locations in the god world, and plans to further that effort in the future. Let me ask you, who do you think is more powerful, the crown prince of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty, or the junior houselord of the House of God Ordainment?”

“The crown prince,” Yang Qi replied. The mere mention of a ‘crown prince’ caused his eyes to glitter. He even felt his Wheel of Fate stirring.

The fact that the Wheel of Fate was turning indicated that this new crown prince would definitely become entangled with Yang Qi in the future. Now, Yang Qi was very curious to meet this person and see what he was like.

Unfortunately, his cultivation base was now far too low to even consider causing problems for this crown prince.

It was a given that the man would be incredibly strong and powerful.

“Very impressive,” Yang Qi said. “And how interesting that an outsider could set up his own group within the House of God Ordainment. Presumably he’s confident that he’ll become a Paramount God?”

“That's right,” Cold Jade replied. “He’s already at the peak of the Consummate God level, so he’ll definitely be a Paramount God sooner or later. The crown prince has an invincible cultivation base, and has already developed Unbounded will convergence.”

“What?!” Yang Qi said in shock. “Unbounded will convergence?”

Unbounded will convergence was a sign of true power. A person like that could destroy anyone they wished with a thought. Of course, considering that Yang Qi had developed Paramount will convergence as a Quasi-God, it was a foregone conclusion that he would eventually have Unbounded will.

And someone with Unbounded will convergence would most assuredly become a Paramount God.

In the god world, people with Unbounded will convergence were true potentates who were considered completely domineering and invincible.

“That’s right, he has Unbounded will convergence. For all intents and purposes, he’s deathless and undying. Eternally invincible. So, what do you think? Your cultivation base isn’t bad, so why not join the Crown Prince Society? I’ll vouch for you. You see, the Crown Prince Society has only just infiltrated the House of God Ordainment. I'm the first agent. If you join up early, then when the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty truly begins to take over everything, you can obviously play a very important role in the whole thing.”

“It seems I made an error in judgment,” Yang Qi said. “The Crown Prince Society, huh. Well, I need to think about this....” His original plan had been to recruit people to form a new Sage Monarch Society, and this Cold Jade had seemed like a perfect candidate. But as it turned out, he was already a member of a colossal monster of an organization.

“That’s fine. Think it over. But remember to keep the matter to yourself. Don’t go talking about it publicly. Not that it really matters. It’s not as though the House of God Ordainment could do anything to stop what’s happening.” Cold Jade laughed. “Although, if you do go blabbing about it, things will go bad for both you and Jadefall. The crown prince is more powerful than anyone throughout all history."

“I know,” Yang Qi said, smiling. “Besides, matters like this are for important and powerful people, not weaklings like me. I'm sure things will work out for you. And don’t worry, I'm not stupid enough to go telling the House of God Ordainment about what's going on. It wouldn’t do me any good at all, and would probably just end with me getting interrogated.”

“Very wise and farsighted of you,” Cold Jade said, clapping softly. “In all fairness, you’re strong enough that you could be a major player in the Crown Prince Society here in the House of God Ordainment. You could probably even rise within the ranks of the Crown Prince Society in general.”

“I’ll definitely think about it. As long as it benefits me, I'm willing to do anything.” Yang Qi was already wondering if this was his ticket into the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty to look for the Mahātmā Jade.

Glancing off in the distance at the other disciples that were fighting fiercely with the hordes of heaven-devils, Cold Jade said, “Alright, since we don’t need to kill any more heaven-devils, let’s just wait until the six-hour period is up.”

**

Meanwhile, in the Law-Enforcement God-Palace, a group of people were in the middle of a discussion. One of them was a young man with long white hair and a vicious expression on his face.

“What?! Are you sure Yang Qi is taking the test? He could have strolled his way to heaven, but instead, he barged into hell.”

“Did he really cause such big problems for you, White-Haired Boxer King?” asked a young woman with flaming red hair.

“I'm not in the mood for jokes, Crimson-Maiden Inferno,” the White-Haired Boxer King said snidely. “Besides, I heard your ex had a run-in with the brat at Jadefall’s banquet. He didn’t come out on top, either.”

“Don’t drag me into this, White-Haired Boxer King,” said Exalted Celestial Silver-Dagger. “Your Dragon Society tried to grab that kid to force Jadefall to give you some of the blood of her godling. But your plan completely failed, from what I can tell. And I was just testing the brat at that banquet. The kid’s skilled, so in the end, I called it a day. That said, he won’t find it as easy to become a law enforcement disciple.”

“What, are you saying you’re going to try recruiting him?” the White-Haired Boxer King said. “The boy’s ambitious, so there’s no way he’ll play along and follow orders. In fact, he would probably take advantage of you.”

“I guess we’ll just have to wait and see how things play out. I can see the killing intent in your eyes. Could it be that you’re hoping the brat dies in the test? I can’t see how that will be easy to pull off.”

“It won’t do me any good to kill him. Jadefall would look into the matter, and if she got any evidence at all that I was involved, I’d be in trouble.” The White-Haired Boxer King chuckled darkly. “Besides, you two aren’t exactly on my side. I'm from the Dragon Society, and you two are from the Brilliant Radiance Society. If I hit him when he’s down, wouldn’t you two take advantage of the situation?”

“Why make us sound so bad?” Exalted Celestial Silver-Dagger said. “That said, the boy did make me lose a lot of face, and I can’t just let that slide. The best result would be for him to join the Law-Enforcement God-Palace as one of our subordinates. Considering we’re all exam proctors, any of us can perform the final assessment. Who should it be? Me? Or you?”

“What if we do it together?” the White-Haired Boxer King said.

“I want in, too,” Crimson-Maiden Inferno said with a charming smile. “He seems like quite the interesting fellow.”

The six hours went by quickly. Yang Qi and Cold Jade chatted the entire time. Yang Qi learned that Cold Jade really was about sixteen years old, and was a native of the god world. It was really shocking. In the impure lands, there were old-timers who had lived for millions upon millions of years, but couldn’t reach the same level.

Whooosh!

At a certain point, they were teleported out into a temple somewhere. This round of testing was over.

Some people had succeeded in acquiring three heaven-devil king souls. Some had failed, and wouldn’t proceed to the next round of testing.

Yang Qi and Cold Jade had both passed, and would continue on.

The next test was one of individual combat. They were put into groups of a hundred, in which only one person would come out on top and go to the next phase of testing.

There was no suspense about how it would play out; Yang Qi easily passed, defeating all his opponents.

Next were tests of will. Participants would face illusions, traps, and spell formations, all of which were very challenging. Except not for Yang Qi.

Over the course of the next three days, he passed all the various rounds of testing, until he reached the final phase: one-on-one exams with official proctors.

Chapter 1246: Making Things Difficult

Yang Qi had passed all of the tests, and was now going to take the final interview.

This was the most difficult part of the exam. The proctors were all-important Greater Gods tasked with assessing the examinees’ cultivation base and fighting ability. It was a common thing for people to fail at this point. After all, everything before the interview was designed to automatically weed people out, ensuring that the proctors didn’t need to pay much attention to those aspects.

As he walked into the examination hall, Yang Qi thought, ‘I wonder who’ll be interviewing me. Don’t tell me it's going to be that Exalted Celestial Silver-Dagger. He hates me down to his bones. Not that I care. As long as I perform well, it won’t matter how much melodrama he tries to stir up.’

Upon entering the hall, he saw a young man with white hair, a beautiful woman with flaming red hair, and Exalted Celestial Silver-Dagger.

There were three proctors.

“White-Haired Boxer King,” Yang Qi said, nodding in greeting. “I never would’ve guessed that you’d be one of my proctors.”

“That’s right,” the White-Haired Boxer King said, his eyes flickering with hatred. “Well, now we get to see what you’re capable of, Yang Qi. Do you have what it takes to pass this part of the exam?”

“Are you going to be the one to decide?” Yang Qi replied. “Didn’t you already test me earlier? You didn’t hold anything back, yet failed to kill me.”

“That’s complete nonsense,” the White-Haired Boxer King spat, his expression flickering. “How dare you slander one of your superiors! I ought to arrest you right here and now, and charge you with something that would make sure you never see the light of day again!”

Remaining completely calm, Yang Qi replied, “It’s hard to say who wouldn’t see the light of day again, you or me. This is the Law-Enforcement God-Palace, right? Maybe I should produce my evidence and hand it over to the elders. That would cause quite the commotion, wouldn’t you say? Although, considering this is a test for me to become a law enforcement disciple, as long as you don’t make things difficult for me, I can keep that evidence under wraps. We can just pretend nothing ever happened.”

“Very cunning, you brat,” said the crimson-haired beauty. “Are you saying you have incriminating evidence against the White-Haired Boxer King? If so, hand it over for us to have a look. What do you say? If your evidence is good enough, it might be enough for us to just let you pass immediately.”

Yang Qi nodded respectfully. “May I venture to ask who you are?”

She giggled. “I'm Crimson-Maiden Inferno, a Greater God and holy child of the Law-Enforcement God-Palace. And yes, I'm important enough that I could easily allow a puny person like you to become a law enforcement disciple. So what do you say?”

“I agree. I’ll use a water-type godly-class energy art to show the circumstances in which the White-Haired Boxer King tried to kill me. I’ll even include what was said between the two of us. Take a look, and see if it’s enough to allow me to pass the test.” Yang Qi pulled out a jade amulet and tossed it over to Crimson-Maiden Inferno.

“Oh?” Crimson-Maiden Inferno said, catching the jade amulet. Sending her true energy inside, she watched the scene play out between Yang Qi and the White-Haired Boxer King. Laughing, she said, “You loser, White-Haired Boxer King! I can’t believe you couldn’t even beat a measly Quasi-God in a fight!”

“So do I pass the test?” Yang Qi asked.

“Absolutely not,” she replied. “Do you really think you can pass the test just because I say so? My words were actually part of the test! Did you actually believe what I said? Ai! Sadly, you’ve failed. A law enforcement disciple must always remain cool and collected, and shouldn’t be trusting. That’s the best way to enforce the law. When you're out in the field, chasing down criminals and executing the guilty, do you really think you’ll survive without good judgment? I hereby declare that you are unfit to be a law enforcement disciple!”

She looked down at the jade amulet. “And I'm keeping this. If you want it back, White-Haired Boxer King, you’ll need to offer me something valuable in exchange.” With that, she burst out laughing.

The White-Haired Boxer King chuckled grimly. “That’s fine. What do you want? Although, only a lunatic would dare to use evidence as flimsy as that to try bringing me down. Don’t bite off more than you can chew.”

“I think I’d like a medicinal pill of some sort,” Crimson-Maiden Inferno said. As of this point, she seemed to be completely ignoring Yang Qi. Until....

CRACK!

The jade amulet in her hand collapsed into powder, which then faded out of existence.

“What?!” she blurted, looking over at Yang Qi.

“I knew from the beginning that you were testing me,” he said with a faint smile. “Do you think I’m that stupid? The amulet I gave you just now was an illusory projection. The real version is with Jadefall. I'm an elite disciple and a god, so if I die, the sect will definitely run a full investigation. And in that case... you’ll be out of options, White-Haired Boxer King. Incidentally, I also made sure to record everything you just said, young lady. Although it’s not much in the way of evidence, it does prove that I actually passed the test you gave me. If you suddenly try to change things so that I fail, I suppose we’ll need to turn this into a more formal dispute.”

“How dare you play games with me!” Crimson-Maiden Inferno growled, her eyes flashing with rage. After all, how could someone as powerful and important as her not be infuriated at being toyed with by such a weaker person?

“I wasn’t playing games,” Yang Qi replied coolly. “I was passing your test, that’s all.”

“Fine,” she said in an ice-cold tone. “Fine! But I'm not going to forget this. Remember well: you’ve offended Crimson-Maiden Inferno, and people who do that don’t end up in good places. Unless they pay plenty of compensation.”

“I'm open to that,” Yang Qi replied casually. “Why don’t we find some time to sit down and chat about it?”

“Alright, I’m taking over the testing now,” Exalted Celestial Silver-Dagger said, producing a small silver dagger. “Last time at the banquet, Jadefall was there, so I couldn’t thoroughly test you. If you fail, and end up dead, the worst that will happen is I’ll get a slap on the wrist. There’s still time to back out if you want.”

Yang Qi stood there with his hands clasped behind his back. “Let’s see what you've got. The truth is I don’t really care if I become a law enforcement disciple or not, I'm just curious to see what you people are capable of. You see, I benefited a lot during my time in the Pill-King’s temple ruins. I succeeded in cultivating some amazing divine abilities, and it's only a matter of time before I become a Greater God.”

Yang Qi was finally starting to forge his own path. It was nice to have Jadefall as a backer, ensuring that no one in the sect would truly view him as an ant to be crushed. But up to this point, he had yet to show what he was truly capable of. That was why he was making a scene here. By leading people to believe he had come across good fortune in the Pill-King’s temple ruins, it would hopefully prevent people from suspecting the truth, that he was the bearer of the God Legion Seal.

“Grandstander!” Exalted Celestial Silver-Dagger growled. Then, without any warning, he swished his dagger out, sending a glittering beam of blade energy flying toward Yang Qi in a ruthless attack.

Yang Qi hardly looked at it. An arm formed of godpower sprouted from his back, which reached out and grabbed the blade energy. The blade energy writhed and flailed like a silver snake, yet it couldn’t free itself.

“What!?” the White-Haired Boxer King blurted. He, Crimson-Maiden Inferno, and Exalted Celestial Silver-Dagger were all visibly stunned. Obviously none of them had ever considered that Yang Qi would actually be this strong.

“Your dagger is strong,” Yang Qi said coolly. “But it didn’t do anything to me. Does this count as passing your test, Exalted Celestial Silver-Dagger?”

“No, it doesn’t!” Exalted Celestial Silver-Dagger strode forward, summoning another spinning dagger that slashed toward Yang Qi. “You think my test would be that simple?”

“What does that mean?” Yang Qi said. “That you’re intentionally making things difficult for me? It’s a good thing I'm keeping a recording of all this. Don’t tell me you’re not afraid of breaking sect rules.”

“Hmph. I’ll make things hard for you however I want. What are you going to do about it?” Exalted Celestial Silver-Dagger attacked with a host of deadly moves.

Silver blade energy flashed everywhere, making the testing hall seem like a hell of lightning. But Yang Qi just danced back and forth, avoiding every single attack.

“The brat’s movement techniques are incredible,” the White-Haired Boxer King murmured. “Exactly what good fortune did he come across? Exalted Celestial Silver-Dagger isn’t going all out, but....” He shook his head. “The kid’s even stronger than he was before. It’s going to take a lot more effort than this to kill him.”

“We can’t do that,” said Crimson-Maiden Inferno. “The parameters of the exam are strictly enforced, and we’re limited to only using thirty percent of our power. The fact that Exalted Celestial Silver-Dagger has already surpassed thirty percent is a violation of the rules.”

“That’s true. Besides, the brat has a powerful backer, so we can’t just randomly kill him. But do we really have to let him become a law enforcement disciple? I don’t think I'm okay with that. And are you fine with the brat toying with you like he did?”

“It doesn’t matter. Let him become a law enforcement disciple. We still outrank him, so we should be able to find plenty of opportunities to deal with him. For example, we can arrange for some really difficult missions for him to go on.”

“That’s true. As his superiors, we have the right to assign missions. But what if he actually succeeds with the mission? Remember, law enforcement disciples can’t be given missions above the Expert level.”

In the House of God Ordainment, missions were ranked Novice, Expert, Master, and Elite. Of course, the Elite missions came with incredible rewards, but were almost impossible to finish.

For example, one of the Elite missions was to search for the God Legion Seal. Any disciple who succeeded in that mission would be given unimaginable rewards.

“Well, we can still arrange for a very difficult mission. Remember, even some of the Expert missions are very difficult to finish. For example, the Yaksha’s Curse, God Item Unsealing, or God Herb Harvesting.”

Chapter 1247: Harvesting Mission

“Oh you mean...? Send Yang Qi on one of the missions no one ever wants to take? That’s not a bad idea.” Smiling, the White-Haired Boxer King used his divine will to impart this new information to Exalted Celestial Silver-Dagger, who was in the middle of trying to cut down Yang Qi in battle.

A moment later, the silver blade light suddenly faded away.

Exalted Celestial Silver-Dagger sheathed his dagger and looked at Yang Qi. “Very impressive, boy. Except I was only using thirty percent of my full strength.”

Yang Qi sneered. “Thirty percent? More like fifty percent.”

“Hmph! I'm not in the mood to squabble with you.” Plastering a fake smile onto his face, he continued, “You pass. I'm not going to make it any harder on you. However, you’re not a law enforcement disciple yet. There’s one final hurdle. You have to accomplish a mission for the sect. And considering your capabilities, it’s going to be an Expert mission.”

“An Expert mission? What's the task?”

Yang Qi could tell that they were still making things hard for him. There was no question that they would be sending him on some very difficult mission.

That said, he was happy to comply. Becoming a law enforcement disciple would help him grow the power of his own faction in the sect. Before long, he would be running the Law-Enforcement God-Palace. After all, it would only take a few devil embryos for him to take control.

The White-Haired Boxer King, Crimson-Maiden Inferno, and Exalted Celestial Silver-Dagger conferred secretly via divine will. Then, Exalted Celestial Silver-Dagger said, “Your mission is to go to the Spritefolk and collect some spritefruits, which are panaceas that can be used to boost the medicinal efficacy of just about any type of medicine. They can also be used to forge god items and weapons, or improve the quality of existing equipment. Finish that mission, and you’ll be a law enforcement disciple.”

“Here’s the briefing. Take a look.” Crimson-Maiden Inferno produced a form that contained all the details of the mission. “Go to the medicine gardens of the Spritefolk and take eighty-one extremely rare spritefruits. Mission difficulty level: Expert.”

Although the mission briefing made it seem simple, Yang Qi knew that it would be anything but. Thankfully, he remembered reading about spritefruits in the Great Classic of God Ordainment.

They were considered the most precious of treasures, and were compatible with just about any medicinal pill. Add the fruit to the recipe, and the success rate would skyrocket. Unfortunately, the fruits only grew with the Spritefolk, who guarded them jealously and would kill anyone that tried taking them. If the Spritefolk learned the name of any person who even attempted to steal them, that person would be marked for death. The Spritefolk would then do everything in their power to see them dead.

There had even been cases of people who successfully stole spritefruits, only to let their guard down a hundred years later and be killed.

Spritefruit thieves were considered archenemies to all Spritefolk, an enmity that couldn’t be erased even if hundreds of thousands of years passed.

Obviously, the consequences for taking this mission were far-reaching.

Even if Yang Qi accomplished the mission, he could be marked for death by the Spritefolk, and would have to spend the rest of his life looking over his shoulder.

It was a mission that would obviously come with no end of difficulties. That said, it was the consequences that were troublesome; the actual act of stealing the fruit shouldn't be particularly hard.

In the end, Yang Qi knew that if he refused to accept the mission, these three proctors would claim that he didn't qualify to become a law enforcement disciple.

“I accept the mission,” he said. Taking the briefing, he turned and left.

The proctors smiled.

“I'm going to keep an eye on him and see if he tries any funny business,” Crimson-Maiden Inferno said. “I wonder how he plans to finish the mission. Maybe he'll even aim for a breakthrough before trying. If so, it won’t help. Spritefruit trees will absorb the energy of anyone who picks fruit from them, which will lead the Spritefolk right to them. Not even changing one’s appearance would do any good.”

“I'm also interested in the brat's secrets,” the White-Haired Boxer King said. “Unfortunately, we have more candidates to interview. Crimson-Maiden Inferno, we’ll have to rely on you to keep an eye on Yang Qi.”

“Okay,” she said, and subsequently vanished.

As Yang Qi accepted the mission and left the Law-Enforcement God-Palace, there were numerous disciples who were also leaving, but for a different reason. They had been rejected. Some were sighing in regret, some were severely wounded. There were even corpses being carried out, disciples who had lost their lives in the testing.

Yang Qi ignored them. Such disciples were gods, but they weren’t worth his attention. They might as well have been simple mortals from the impure lands.

Stepping into a teleportation portal, he left the god kingdom.

Moments later, he was on a continent that abounded with fresh flowers. The sky was bright and cloudless, and the weather was pleasant.

Yang Qi could sense that there was a power in the depths of the continent that connected it to all of heaven and earth, ensuring that it had a wonderful climate.

The continents in the god world had to deal with very bad conditions. If they weren’t frozen in ice, they were baked by intense heat, or battered by rain as sharp as blades.

Only the strong could survive in the god world.

But this continent wasn't like that. Everyone was beautiful, and the scenery was like something out of a painting. Furthermore, instead of a sense of death and blood, Yang Qi felt peace and tranquility.

Standing atop the mountain peak he had just arrived at, he took a deep breath, and it smelled like flowers.

This was where the Spritefolk lived. Yang Qi knew a lot about the Spritefolk, as they existed in the impure lands as well. His aunt, Yang Susu, was actually one of them; one of the reasons he had accepted this mission was that, up to this point in the god world, he hadn’t had a chance to search for her.

The best place to start had to be with the Spritefolk. They were one of the big races in the god world; they weren’t human, although they resembled humans in virtually every way. In fact, the Spritefolk believed themselves to be an evolved, higher form of humans. They were proud and noble in a way that defied words.

At least, that was how they were described in the Great Classic of God Ordainment.

Instead of immediately trying to steal some spritefruits, he waited a moment, then turned and coolly said, “You might as well stop hiding, Crimson-Maiden Inferno. Is following me around really that fun?”

A moment later, a young woman with crimson hair appeared, who was none other than Crimson-Maiden Inferno.

“Very impressive, boy,” she said. She actually seemed much more at ease than she had back in the Law-Enforcement God-Palace. “I'm surprised you noticed me.”

“Why are you following me?” he asked. “Don’t tell me you’re monitoring my progress on the mission. Unfortunately for you, there won’t be much to monitor. I'm not going to finish the mission, because I've decided not to become a law enforcement disciple.”

“Don’t ask questions you already know the answer to!” she said. “You played me back in the Law-Enforcement God-Palace, and now you owe me.”

“I played you?” Yang Qi said. “I thought it was a test.”

“If I say you played me, then that's what happened. Don’t you dare try mincing words with me.” Glaring at him coldly, she continued, “Now fork it over.”

“Fork what over?”  Yang Qi said, looking surprised.

“The compensation! No one toys with me and gets away with it. Everyone knows that Crimson-Maiden Inferno will rain fiery destruction onto anyone who causes problems for her. So you have one choice here. Pay up!”

“I don’t have anything to pay you with,” Yang Qi said.

“Wrong answer. I know that you took a lot of precious things from the Toxic Continent. Bring them out and give them to me.”

Yang Qi burst out laughing. “Do you really think you can just order me around? The White-Haired Boxer King couldn’t deal with me in the Toxic Continent, and that was before I improved my energy arts. So what exactly do you think you’re going to do?”

“The ignorant are often brave.” Smiling snidely, she continued, “The White-Haired Boxer King is only a mid Greater God. But I'm at the peak, although nobody knows it. I'm just on the verge of becoming a Consummate God. Few people know that other than you, so you should feel honored.”

RUMBLE!

All of a sudden, streams of power erupted behind Crimson-Maiden Inferno, and a huge, square spell formation popped into being, pulsing with spatial power that locked down the entire area.

“This is my Square-Macrocosm Void-Fire God Formation,” she said. “Unfortunately for you, although I'm not a Consummate God yet, I came across some good fortune that allows me to wield the power of that level. I'm not going to kill you today, but I'll definitely put you in your place if you don’t hand over that treasure!”

Chapter 1248: The Fate of Crimson-Maiden Inferno

Crimson-Maiden Inferno was acting extremely overbearing, and was apparently willing to defy sect rules in dealing with Yang Qi.

Looking at her spell formation, his eyes flashed and he said, “Crimson-Maiden Inferno, you’re a Greater God, yet you’re willing to just defy sect rules!? Aren’t you worried about being held accountable to the law?”

“Held accountable to the law?” She threw her head back and laughed. “I am the law! And I'm stronger than you. Besides, I'm not trying to kill you, just take something in compensation. That’s no violation of the law, it’s a matter of debt collection. You owe me, and I'm forcing you to pay up. Even if the sect somehow found out about this, the worst I would get would be a slap on the wrist.”

“Debt collection? I don’t owe you a thing, so exactly what debt are you collecting? This is just downright robbery. And robbing a disciple is definitely a crime. The sect rules make that clear.”

She waved her hand dismissively. “I'm the one who says whether it’s a robbery or debt collection. I'm a peak Greater God, so if I want something you have, I can take it. I have a hundred percent chance of becoming a Consummate God, at which point I’ll be even more important to the sect. Even if I do break a few rules here and there, nobody will be able to do anything about it.

Yang Qi shook his head. “So this is how you do things? You bend the rules of the House of God Ordainment for your own personal benefit. That’s a defiance of the natural order of things.”

“It’s not your place to lecture me. I’ll do what I want, according to my own principles. Do you really think that some nobody like you is qualified to talk about the destiny of the House of God Ordainment?”

Clasping his hands casually behind his back, Yang Qi said, “So what are you saying? I have no choice here?”

“That’s right. You have no choice.” She extended her hand. “Hand over that treasure, and you’ll escape a lot of pain. But if you refuse to fall in line, you’ll end up wishing you could die today. And ultimately, I’ll wipe every memory of you out of existence. Remember, someone with Paramount will convergence can completely obliterate someone with Terrifying will. If I want to wipe memories of you out of existence, I can.”

Yang Qi laughed. “Crimson-Maiden Inferno, you’re a perfect example of the ignorant being fearless.”

“Still laughing, even now?” she said, her gaze burning into him. “So that’s it? You’re still refusing to give me what I want?”

“Yeah, I'm laughing. At you.” Looking around to confirm they were alone, he said, “I suppose I might as well show you the truth. You see, I’ve been suffering in silence here in the House of God Ordainment. But that doesn’t mean I’ll just forget about the people who’ve heaped humiliation on my head. You think that being a peak Greater God is impressive, Crimson-Maiden Inferno?”

RUMBLE!

An aura erupted from Yang Qi that seemed to contain a power that could destroy the heavens and extinguish the earth. In the blink of an eye, her spell formation shattered and was replaced by a formation that resembled an enormous necropolis.

He had turned the tables, and taken full control of the situation. With his monarch godhood, he could easily kill a Consummate God, much less a peak Greater God like Crimson-Maiden Inferno.

After all, a peak Greater God was still an entire level below a Consummate God.

“Th-this...” she stammered, and she tried to back up, only to run right into the projection of the Great Necropolis. Looking at Yang Qi in disbelief, she said, “How could you possibly be this strong?”

“Because I have monarch godhood,” he said. He knew that he was going to completely put Crimson-Maiden Inferno in her place, and thus he didn’t lie to her. Furthermore, his words were such a strong blow that it was as if her entire world started crumbling.

“Monarch godhood?” Her gaze suddenly turned sharp. “Impossible! That can’t be! Nobody can make monarch godhood, especially not a measly person like you! You—”

“I'm a ‘measly’ disciple?” Simply standing there with hands clasped behind his back, he shook his head and said, “It seems you really are a fool. I’m an Ascendant from the lower worlds. I united all of heaven and earth down there, broke through space and time to ascend to the god world, infiltrate the House of God Ordainment, and ultimately formed monarch godhood.”

“No.... Not even an Ascendant could form monarch godhood. There have been other Ascendants before, and none of them have ever succeeded with monarch godhood!”

“Because I also control the God Legion Seal,” he said, striding forward aggressively. “You’re the first person to find out about this, so you should feel very honored. You're not a god from the primeval past, but rather a modern god. Therefore, this will be your first time encountering the God Legion Seal. Now acknowledge allegiance and give me your faith. Considering how many of my secrets you now know, there’s no way I’ll just let you walk away as is.”

“The God Legion Seal!” Crimson-Maiden Inferno blurted. She jumped like a startled cat upon hearing him speak the words.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi was standing there waiting for her to make her decision.

A moment passed, and she burst out laughing. “You can wear out iron shoes in a fruitless search, then find what you're looking for without even trying! The God Legion Seal? You have the God Legion Seal? Does that make you think you have the upper hand on me? All I have to do is spread word about your secret, and the entire god world would be after you. And you wouldn’t be able to return to the impure lands either. You’ll be completely stuck between a rock and a hard place.”

“Are you saying you have a backup plan to get out of here?” Yang Qi asked.

She giggled. “You’re in over your head. You see, if I reveal your secret, I won’t truly die. Maybe you could kill me, but my will remains in my mansion grotto, and is deeply connected to the sect’s god kingdom. You can’t truly end my life.”

“Oh really?”

Seemingly completely confident in her situation, she continued, “Unless you want your secret revealed, Yang Qi, you have to do exactly as I say. First of all, bring out the God Legion Seal and let me see it. And remember, don’t try anything funny. If you do, I’ll make you regret it to your dying day.”

“You really think I'm in over my head?” He shrugged. “Apparently you forgot that Ascendants slaughter their way through countless battles in the impure lands to reach the god world. I’ve caused blood to fall like rain, unlike you greenhouse flowers of the god world. Do you want a demonstration? Let’s see if you remain this feisty after you’ve seen the truth.”

Her face fell as she suddenly realized that something seemed off.

“What...?” she blurted, a look of terror appearing on her face.

“Look at your sea of energy,” he said, pointing.

She shifted her senses inside herself and saw a devil embryo in her sea of energy, absorbing all of her godpower. In fact, even the will she had left behind in her mansion grotto was being pulled into it.

“It’s a consummate technique from the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, called the Heaven-God Hell-Exterminating Devil Embryo. The truth is that I infected you with it back during the exam. I know everything you do, even your deepest thoughts. So it doesn’t matter what secret weapons you have. I control everything about you. With a single thought, I can turn you into a mindless puppet. You really underestimated what Ascendants are like. Did you really think I’d tell you my most important secrets without being positive I could make sure you didn’t squeal?”

“You.... I refuse to believe it!”

RUMBLE!

All of a sudden, brilliant light flared in her eyes and erupted out in a deadly attack, like a fire dragon seeking to consume all creation.

“All-Creation Fire-Dragon; Raging-Flame Dragon-God!”

Unleashing her most devastating attack, she shot to the side, hoping to break free and escape.

But Yang Qi just reached his hand back and...

CRACK!

He slapped her hard on the side of the face, sending her tumbling back with blood streaming out of her mouth, until she landed prone on the ground, her godpower in complete chaos.

Walking over, he grabbed her by the hair, hauled her off the ground, and slapped her face again. “Enough silly games, Crimson-Maiden Inferno. The time has come for you to learn how to offer your most sincere sacrifice to the God Legion Seal.”

“No!” she shouted, trying to jerk her head free, and yet failing miserably. How could she ever have guessed that she would be defeated so easily, and by a mere slap on the face at that?

“No? In that case, I’ll stop being polite.” He reached down toward her chest.

“What are you doing?” she shrieked. “Don’t you dare touch my chest! No man has ever touched me! You can kill me, Yang Qi, but if you do this I won’t ever let you off the hook for it!”

WHACK!

With a single move, he ripped her clothing off, revealing her snow-white breasts, and two rosy nipples.

She let loose with a most devastating scream and immediately covered her chest with her arms. Yet that just made it easier for Yang Qi to rip her trousers off, leaving her completely and utterly naked.

“You immoral pervert!” she screamed, tears leaking out of her eyes. “Don’t tell me you’re going to.... I cultivate the Holy-Flame Chaste-Virgin God Dao! If I lose my virginity, my godhood will weaken and I’ll never be able to become a Consummate God. Please, I beg of you! Let me go!”

“You really know how to jabber nonsense,” Yang Qi said. Sighing, he waved his hand, sending out numerous golden paper talismans onto her. “With the devil embryo in there, you’ll give in whether you want to or not. You’re the beginning of the new legion of gods. Now, offer your piety to the ancient seal! Sagely Sacrifice!”

Chapter 1249: Mental Probing

The talismans sank into Crimson-Maiden Inferno, making it completely impossible for her to move. Of course, Yang Qi didn’t do anything untoward to her. But he did use the domineering Sagely Sacrifice to force her to offer her heart to the God Legion Seal.

“Sagely Sacrifice Without Limit; Martial Path that Spans the Heavens; Subjugate the Legion of Gods; Create New God-Spirits; Return Forthwith!”

A beautiful image of the halls of heaven appeared, filled with golden thrones that numbered like the eternal sands. Shadowy figures sat on the thrones, thrumming with ancient auras. Of course, the figures were the primeval legion of gods, horde of devils, and multitude of buddhas.

All of them were entities that had sacrificed their hearts to the God Legion Seal in the past.

Right now, Yang Qi was creating a new foundation.

RUMBLE!

Thanks to the Sagely Sacrifice, a new golden throne appeared in that throng in a middling position. And it was new, not like the ancient versions, which in turn added something mysterious and enigmatic to the God Legion Seal.

That throne belonged to Crimson-Maiden Inferno.

All God-Lord members of the legion of gods who offered faith to the boundless lord would have a throne in the halls of heaven. This was a new first. With Crimson-Maiden Inferno’s addition, the God Legion Seal had a new Greater God to fuel it.

Crash!

Yang Qi could sense the fluctuations of the God Legion Seal, which seemed like an old tree suddenly sprouting new leaves. And his own will and psyche were also thrumming with new fluctuations.

‘Oh, I see. How could I have forgotten about this? The God Legion Seal is going to awaken and grow. As long as I continue to subjugate members of the legion of gods, its power will improve, which will benefit my cultivation base and push my psyche to new heights.’ All of a sudden, new enlightenment appeared within him.

‘Yes, the Mahātmā Jade can be used to reach the Annulled level of will convergence. I have to continue subjugating gods and using their wills to combine with the jade. Although, only time will tell if this will work. In ancient times, there were almighty entities who could dominate everything, but they still failed to achieve Annulled will convergence. The Sovereign Lord, True Devil, Demon Master, and King Immortal-Slayer.... They were all half-Annulled, but never fully stepped into that level. For now, I shouldn't worry about that. At least I have proof that by continuing to take advantage of the God Legion Seal and gathering the faith of other gods, then I can break through my bottleneck and reach the mid Paramount level of will convergence.”

Yang Qi was currently stalled at the early Paramount level. Even if he practiced cultivation for a thousand years the normal way, he would fail to make progress. He had to subjugate more gods.

“You...” Crimson-Maiden Inferno said, her voice trembling with terror. “What did you do to me? Do you control my mind now? Did you sacrifice me?”

“Yes, I sacrificed you. You have been given to the God Legion Seal, and your soul is now bound to it. You’re like the ancient members of the legion of gods. Your life, your death, your very thoughts are now connected to the God Legion Seal. In other words, you belong to me. If I don’t exert control, you can live your life as normal. But if I do take control, your very life will be in my hands. You should feel honored to be in the good graces of the God Legion Seal. Going forward, your life is going to change. You’re part of my new system. The House of God Ordainment is a system, and the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty is a system, both complete with their own powerful destinies. But those systems are like nothing compared to the God Legion Seal. The God Legion Seal represents the ancient era and the destiny of the entire god world. Although the seal vanished for a time, it’s now in my hands. Therefore, I will establish a new system with it. Congratulations, you’re the first person to be part of that new system.”

Various expressions were flashing across Crimson-Maiden Inferno’s face.

Not even she was sure what she was thinking.

But Yang Qi knew that she couldn't defy him. By means of the God Legion Seal, he had access to all of her thoughts, and any actions she wished to take had to be approved by it first.

For example, now that she knew Yang Qi’s secret, she wanted to tell the leaders of the House of God Ordainment. And as soon as that thought appeared, Yang Qi knew about it. If the God Legion Seal didn't sense any threats in her thoughts or intended actions, it wouldn't do anything. But if it disapproved, she wouldn’t be able to take that action.

That was how powerful the God Legion Seal was.

It could audit each and every thought.

For example, Crimson-Maiden Inferno wanted to put on a new set of clothing. But after those thoughts were audited by the God Legion Seal, Yang Qi rejected them. Because of that, it didn't matter how much she wanted to put clothing on, she couldn’t.

Even subconscious thoughts were controlled.

Only someone who could annul their own thoughts by reaching the Annulled level of will convergence could free their thoughts from the auditing of the seal.

Yang Qi had come to understand that the God Legion Seal was another way to gain enlightenment of the Annulled level. Namely, it was a way to control the psyche and will.

Life was about freedom.

Everyone sought it. Even if one wasn’t physically free, at least their thoughts could be. And how miserable would it be if everyone had their thoughts audited by another person.

At the moment, Crimson-Maiden Inferno didn’t realize what was going on. Until she had numerous thoughts audited by the God Legion Seal, she wouldn’t truly understand how powerful the seal was.

“You may leave now, and put on some clothes. Remember, you work for me now. Don’t have anything to do with groups like the Brilliant Radiance Society or the Dragon Society. You serve me, heart and soul. For now, I don’t have any specific missions for you. Go back and work on your cultivation. Breaking through to the Consummate God level should bring some great opportunities.”

“I can’t believe that I made such an absurd error,” she said. “What exactly are you planning to do, Yang Qi? How can the God Legion Seal control me? What’s it capable of? Tell me! Otherwise, why wouldn’t I just reveal your secret? After you became public enemy number one, you would be chased down and killed, and I would be free.”

“I'm not worried, because the truth is you won’t say a word. You can’t.” Based on her psychic fluctuations, Yang Qi knew exactly what she planned to do. Knowing that he had absolutely nothing to fear, he said, “Putting your faith in the God Legion Seal will even benefit your cultivation base, and do it no harm. In the ancient era, the innumerable gods all wanted to exercise faith in the God Legion Seal. Do you think that would be the case if it hurt their cultivation base?”

“Hmph! I refuse to believe that you can really control me. And since you’re letting me go and allowing me to do whatever I want, I'm going back to the sect to tell the truth about you.”

“Go ahead. Tell them everything.” Waving his hand dismissively, Yang Qi faded from sight.

He wasn’t interested in wasting any more time on this woman.

“Damn you!” she cursed. “I won’t let this drop, Yang Qi. I refuse to believe you can control me!” Circulating her godpower a few hundred thousand times to confirm her current state, she headed back to the god kingdom.

‘I'm going to see Master. She’s a Consummate God that’s just on the verge of breaking through to the Perfect God level. I'm going to tell her everything!’ However, as soon as she was about to do just that, she heard a voice speaking in her head. ‘Your thoughts have been audited and are not approved. Now, they will be destroyed.’

RUMBLE!

A beam of golden light appeared in her sea of consciousness, and her thoughts from moments ago faded away.

“What?!” Crimson-Maiden Inferno blurted, dropping to her knees. ‘What’s going on? Don’t tell me my thoughts have been imprisoned.’ She sat there in deep terror, her mind trembling on the verge of collapse.

At this point, Yang Qi stopped worrying about Crimson-Maiden Inferno.

Unfortunately, it took a lot of effort for him to use the God Legion Seal to audit and control her thoughts. The mere thought of subjugating hundreds more gods and auditing their thoughts was exhausting. And that wasn’t to mention what would happen if the gods were as numerous as the eternal sands.

That said, it was a way to temper the psyche.

Auditing the thoughts of other gods would actually be a big weight on his back. How could he possibly keep track of the random thoughts of so many individuals?

As he considered all of these matters, he noticed a sprawling region of gardens off in the distance. It was none other than the gardens of the Spritefolk.

Chapter 1250: Spritefruit

The garden was filled with immense trees, each of which rose hundreds of meters into the air, with leafy canopies that spread out to cover several kilometers, making something like worlds of their own.

It was hard to imagine what went into keeping such trees alive.

Strangely, there was only one fruit on each tree. They were roughly fist-sized, and looked like glittering diamonds. They also had numerous tiny holes on their surface that emanated a colorful mist. And they shone with bright light that illuminated all potentially dark parts of the trees.

There were people underneath the trees who lived in the various holes and knots that existed on their trunks.

As it turned out, the Spritefolk consisted of numerous clans, each of which would occupy a single one of these god trees. The sprawling trees created something like a palace or mansion grotto for the Spritefolk who lived beneath them, and in turn, they took care of the tree. As for the fruit atop them, they were like suns, providing warmth and spirit energy to those who lived beneath it.

Thump, thump, thump.

The Spritefolk beneath some of the trees were pounding on drums as they enacted some kind of rite or ceremony.

They didn't look like savages or barbarians by any stretch of the imagination. Yang Qi saw both men and women, old and young. They wore brightly colored clothes, and had faces flushed with excitement as they partook in the ceremony.

In Yang Qi’s estimation, there were hundreds of thousands of the trees, which meant that there were hundreds of thousands of clans. And some trees were bigger than others, with the larger ones climbing thousands of meters into the sky. Obviously, trees like that were home to extremely powerful experts.

There was one tree, several hundred meters tall, beneath which stood a group of haughty Spritefolk. “Bring out those despicable humans!”

Some of the captive humans were Quasi-Gods, others were Lesser or even Common Gods.

Also visible beneath the tree was a huge altar that the humans were being led toward.

One of the Spritefolk priests raised his voice and said, “These people dared to steal our god fruit, bringing dishonor to the Spritefolk. Therefore, they will be sacrificed to the god trees to produce more fruit.”

“Kill them!” the other Spritefolk shouted. One by one, the humans were hauled onto the altar and beheaded. Yang Qi watched as the blood poured into the tree, allowing it to absorb their souls and destiny.

“I didn’t steal any fruit!” one of the Common Gods cried. “We're all innocent. You destroyed our sects! Why are you doing this?”

A young Spritefolk expert stepped forward, clad in a white garment, with a colorful crown on his head. Snorting coldly, he said, “If we say that you stole them, you stole them. Denying it won’t do any good. And even if you didn’t, you despicable humans are going to be sacrificed as food for our god tree. Your souls, flesh, blood, and destiny are the perfect nutrients. You should feel honored that the trees will absorb you and cleanse you of your sins.”

Apparently, this young Spritefolk was someone important. He was a Greater God, and held a shining sword in his hand that he used to execute the Common God that had just spoken up.

And with that, the sacrifice was over.

Voice cold, the young Spritefolk said, “Ladies and gentlemen, we need to make sure our god tree gets stronger and stronger. That’s the key to our successful cultivation. War is coming. The Spritefolk is a race favored by heaven above! It is only by waging war that we can prosper and flourish, and it is only in battle that we can slaughter the human gods and sacrifice them!”

“Kill them! Kill them all!” the Spritefolk shouted.

Yang Qi shook his head. ‘So the Spritefolk want to wage war, take captives, and sacrifice them to their god trees. The more people they kill, the stronger their trees get. And the fruit grows because of that spirit energy. No wonder the spritefruits are so powerful. And no wonder they have such amazing benefits to medicinal pills.’

Looking at the Spritefolk and their warrior spirit, he couldn’t help but chuckle coldly.

Being as stealthy as possible, he stole into one of the trees, which was when he realized that it was protected by a spell formation. However, his cultivation base was so impressive that the spell formation couldn’t do anything to him. This was an Expert mission that was generally supposed to be impossible to finish; after all, anyone who tried it would most likely run into the Spritefolk and end up dead.

But considering the level of his cultivation base, it took almost no effort at all for him to get to the spritefruit.

Among the Spritefolk residences beneath the tree, there were Quasi-Gods and gods alike. Some were in the middle of practicing cultivation or martial arts. Some sat in meditation, some interacted with their fellows. They all seemed very fierce, as if they were just itching to go out on a raid. Even the women were no exception.

The Spritefolk women were all seductive and good-looking, as beautiful as flowers. Unfortunately, they also thrummed with a baleful energy that made them seem extremely murderous, like colorful but extremely venomous spiders.

Yang Qi ignored them all. The Spritefolk had a lot of top experts, but none who could cause any problems for him.

He headed toward the nearest tree, appearing right in front of the spritefruit that grew on it, which emanated a soft and warm feeling. But instead of grabbing it, he absorbed the vital energy that flowed from it, and used some of his daoist techniques to analyze its structure.

‘Boundless Simulation: Nascent Divinity Creation!’

A spritefruit appeared on his palm; it was illusory, and would only last for about an hour before fading out of existence.

Reaching out, he quickly replaced the real spritefruit with the fake, then flitted over to another tree to repeat the process. In quick succession, he took several hundred pieces.

The mission only called for eighty-one, but considering how marvelous the fruits were, he wanted some for his friends and family.

Soon, the one-hour time period was nearly over, and the time had come to leave. He wasn’t interested in tangling with the Spritefolk. Besides, they surely had some consummate experts in hiding somewhere, so therefore, the best thing would be to leave before anyone noticed him.

Even as he left, the first of the fake spritefruits started disappearing, leading to a huge commotion among the Spritefolk.

People were running around left and right, with top experts flying around trying to identify the culprit. Of course, none of them were even aware of Yang Qi’s presence.

As he watched the buzz of activity, he thought, ‘They have no idea it was me. And it doesn’t matter that the trees keep a record of the auras of whoever steals from them. That’s simply a record of destiny and fate, so how will it help them find me? After all, I'm a Fateless One....’

With that, he flew back to the hidden teleportation portal and left the continent.

Before long, he was back in the House of God Ordainment’s god kingdom, and the Law-Enforcement God-Palace.

The White-Haired Boxer King and Exalted Celestial Silver-Dagger were there, along with Crimson-Maiden Inferno. As for the latter, her expression flickered when she laid eyes on him. Thanks to the auditing of her thoughts, she hadn’t been able to cause any problems whatsoever. She had struggled at first, but soon came to realize that her fate was now completely tied up with the God Legion Seal, and she belonged to Yang Qi.

It left her with very mixed feelings.

When Yang Qi handed over the eighty-one spritefruits, the White-Haired Boxer King said, “What? You got the spritefruits already? Shocked, he exchanged a glance with Exalted Celestial Silver-Dagger, then both of them looked at Crimson-Maiden Inferno.

Voice icy, she said, “So you acquired the spritefruits. That means you’ve passed the exams and are now a law enforcement disciple. We won't cause any further trouble for you.”

‘What!?’ Exalted Celestial Silver-Dagger and the White-Haired Boxer King were both stunned. They had assumed that Crimson-Maiden Inferno would come up with more hoops for Yang Qi to jump through, only to find out to their surprise that she was just letting him pass. The White-Haired Boxer King had been dead set on making sure Yang Qi never succeeded, but as of now, there really wasn’t anything he could do. The sect rules were rigid, and he had no way to cause any more problems.

‘He’s just a low-level law enforcement disciple now,’ the White-Haired Boxer King thought. ‘That means he has to follow my orders; therefore, I can control him. I can send him on dangerous missions and keep the rewards for myself. He's strong, but he's part of the machine now, and will have to stow his personal ambitions.’

Exalted Celestial Silver-Dagger was thinking the same thing. After exchanging a meaningful glance with the White-Haired Boxer King, he said, “Since you got the spritefruit, Yang Qi, there’s nothing further we can say. You pass. I hope that in the future, you’ll work hard to enforce the law.”

He and the White-Haired Boxer King went through some more formalities, giving Yang Qi a uniform and identity medallion.

Starting now, Yang Qi no longer worked for the Scripture Pavilion. He was a disciple of the Law-Enforcement God-Palace, with the authority to arrest other disciples and punish them for breaking the rules. Other disciples had no such rights. At most, they could report crimes to the Law-Enforcement God-Palace, then wait for them to handle things.

It was a huge amount of power, which was why so many people tried to become law enforcement disciples, many of whom even lost their lives in the process. The Law-Enforcement God-Palace was so powerful that even disciples from other divisions who were stronger than the law enforcement disciples would never dare to provoke them.

“Great, I’m a law enforcement disciple now,” Yang Qi said. Donning his new garment, he looked at the White-Haired Boxer King and Exalted Celestial Silver-Dagger and said, “If the two of you have no other plans tonight, why don’t we sit down and have a good chat. I have some gifts I’d like to give you.”

Chapter 1251: Subjugating Gods

When Yang Qi proposed a meeting later that evening, Exalted Celestial Silver-Dagger and the White-Haired Boxer King exchanged surprised glances, then they both smiled.

“So, you have a sense of propriety after all, boy,” said Exalted Celestial Silver-Dagger. “I'm very curious to see what gifts you might offer that could calm our anger.”

“Ah, that's easy,” Yang Qi said, a faint smile on his face. “Now that I'm a law enforcement disciple, you two are direct superiors, which means you’ll have plenty of ways to keep me in line. That’s why I’d prefer to turn weapons of war into gifts of jade and silk. It's a given that I’ll provide some amazing treasures to settle our little dispute.”

“Then I suppose we’ll wait and see what treasures you offer,” said the White-Haired Boxer King, a vicious smile playing out on his face. “If they aren’t satisfactory, we’ll be sending you on plenty of dangerous missions to suffer all sorts of humiliations.”

“Of course, I wouldn’t expect anything else.”

With that, he turned and left. Meanwhile, a look of pity could be seen on Crimson-Maiden Inferno’s face. She knew full well that the White-Haired Boxer King and Exalted Celestial Silver-Dagger were next on Yang Qi’s list of targets, and that they would fall under his control this very evening.

Later that night....

Outside of the god kingdom, far out in the desolate mountains, Yang Qi sat on a barren peak, surrounded by cold winds. Of course, it was pitch black, and the cries of various wild animals echoed out in the night.

WHOOSH!

A stream of silver light appeared, which was none other than Exalted Celestial Silver-Dagger, who held a small silver dagger in his hand. “Where’s the treasure, boy?”

“What happened to the White-Haired Boxer King?” Yang Qi replied. “You see, I have half of an Unbounded medicinal pill that I found in the Pill-King’s temple ruins. But I'm not sure how to split it between the two of you. I just hope that after you get it, you won’t cause any more problems for me.”

Even as the words left his mouth, he held out his hand, upon which rested a medicinal pill, surrounded by a medicinal aroma so strong that it would cause one's hair to stand on end.

“An Unbounded medicinal pill?” Exalted Celestial Silver-Dagger said. “Give it to me!”

“Hold on!” someone said. It was the White-Haired Boxer King. Unexpectedly, he had actually arrived earlier and was waiting in the shadows to see what Yang Qi was truly planning to do. Now that he saw half of an Unbounded medicinal pill, he stepped out into the open to prevent Exalted Celestial Silver-Dagger from taking it.

“I’ll be taking that half pill, Exalted Celestial Silver-Dagger,” the White-Haired Boxer King said. “You can take one of his other treasures.”

“Wrong. I’ll be taking the pill,” Exalted Celestial Silver-Dagger said, obviously not willing to back down.

All of a sudden, they heard the sound of someone clicking their tongue in disapproval as Crimson-Maiden Inferno stepped out. “Even in the face of imminent catastrophe, the two of you are still haggling over a medicinal pill?”

“Don't tell me you want in on the action as well, Crimson-Maiden Inferno,” the White-Haired Boxer King said, his expression flickering.

“No, I’m just here to see how exactly Yang Qi subjugates the two of you. How so very tragic. He really fooled you, didn’t he? But that’s just what happens when you’re so set on personal gain. Now that you’re out in the open, you’re damned no matter what you do. If you’d stayed in the god kingdom, Yang Qi wouldn’t have been able to do much.”

“What?!” the White-Haired Boxer King said, suddenly coming to the realization that something was off.

Exalted Celestial Silver-Dagger was having similar qualms. Glaring at Yang Qi, he said, “What's going on here, boy? Don’t tell me you think you’re in a position to fight us. Is that why you asked us out here? I doubt you’re that stupid. So spit it out. What do you want?”

“It’s just as Crimson-Maiden Inferno said: you're facing imminent catastrophe. Do you think I'm braindead or something? Did you really think I joined the Law-Enforcement God-Palace so I could place myself as your subordinate to plot and scheme against at will? No, I joined the Law-Enforcement God-Palace to take it over. And I already have Crimson-Maiden Inferno on my side.”

“Is he telling the truth, Crimson-Maiden Inferno?” asked Exalted Celestial Silver-Dagger, looking over at her through narrowed eyes.

“I had no choice in the matter,” she spat. “I actually want to kill him, but unfortunately, I can’t defy his will. And in short order, you’ll be just like me.”

“Who are you, brat?!” the White-Haired Boxer King said, his voice cold. Despite the circumstances, he was keeping his cool and was already scrambling to come up with a way to deal with the situation.

“Me? I’m an Ascendant from the impure lands. And I'm not inclined to go into more detail. The time has come for both you to be put in your place!”

RUMBLE!

The Many Heavens God Seal appeared, hovering above their heads for a brief moment before sinking down into them.

Next, Yang Qi said, “Eternal Suppression of Rivers and Mountains!”

In the blink of an eye, a rift opened up and numerous golden chains spread out of it.

The White-Haired Boxer King screamed and dropped to his knees, his flesh splitting apart in many places and his meridians shattering.

“Silver-Dagger Surefire-Slaughter Skill!” A tremor passed through Exalted Celestial Silver-Dagger as his acupoints opened and immense power flowed into the small silver dagger he held. Then the dagger shot forth with indescribable speed, piercing through space to appear right in front of Yang Qi.

This was the skill he would use when he absolutely needed to kill someone. It contained all of his quintessence energy, and was an invincible attack that could slaughter anything in its path. In fact, it could even be used to take down Consummate Gods.

This flying dagger move was a surefire way to slaughter his enemies.

Sadly, it turned out to be disappointing; as it closed in on Yang Qi, he simply reached out and grasped the blade between two fingers, stopping it in place.

“Impossible! How could he just grab my flying dagger?” Exalted Celestial Silver-Dagger looked completely crestfallen. “My Silver-Dagger Surefire-Slaughter Skill is impossible to stop. Even a Consummate God who faced it would end up dead, guaranteed!”

“He’s only a Lesser God, but he has monarch godhood,” Crimson-Maiden Inferno explained. “I said you two had fallen for his trap. But you think a bit too much of yourselves. Don’t worry, I’ll weep for you after you've been beaten.”

“She’s right,” Yang Qi said. “The time has come to sacrifice your hearts and minds to the God Legion Seal. You new gods are going to be just like the ancient gods. New thrones are about to appear in the god legion hall.”

RUMBLE!

Golden light erupted from within Yang Qi, sweeping over Exalted Celestial Silver-Dagger and the White-Haired Boxer King with mountain-toppling, sea-draining force.

They screamed until their voices went hoarse. An hour later, they lay limp on the ground, surrounded by golden light.

“You... Yang Qi, you’re....” They couldn't say anything more than that, much less move or take any action.

“Our thoughts... all of them, they’re being audited?” Exalted Celestial Silver-Dagger said, his voice dripping with terror.

“That's right. From now on, your destiny is tied up with the God Legion Seal. I’m your lord, and your minds and bodies are mine. I control them. I’m privy to all your thoughts, and I decide what you can think and do.”

C-C-CRACK!

Exalted Celestial Silver-Dagger lost control of his dagger, which fell to the ground.

Now that Yang Qi had monarch godhood, he could deal with Greater Gods as easily as drinking water or eating a snack. He would only need to worry about a protracted fight if he were to face a Consummate God.

Two new golden thrones appeared within the God Legion Seal, representing the seals placed on the White-Haired Boxer King and Exalted Celestial Silver-Dagger. Yang Qi was now in complete control of them. That said, considering how many thoughts were flitting about in the minds of the three gods, it wasn’t necessarily easy to keep track and control all of them.

Yet, even with just the thoughts of those three gods in his mind, Yang Qi felt as though he could sense anything and everything. As he improved and continued on this path, he would eventually be able to oversee the thoughts of all living beings. He would be reincarnation. He would be the dao of heaven.

In fact, he would surpass the dao of heaven. After all, he would control the thoughts of the legion of gods, and it was the legion of gods who created all living beings.

“Yang Qi... I can’t believe this is what you are,” the White-Haired Boxer King said. “I really misjudged you. I thought you worked for Jadefall. How could I possibly have guessed that it was actually the other way around? She's your subordinate.” He suddenly chuckled miserably. “How ridiculous. I really bit off more than I could chew in trying to take you on.”

“What a tragedy,” Exalted Celestial Silver-Dagger said with a bitter smile. “Why did I have to be so unlucky? Of all the people in the god world, why did I have to be the one to run into you? I can't believe that all of this is happening all because of one measly disciple....”

“You think you’re unlucky?” Yang Qi said, clasping his hands behind his back. “There’s nothing unlucky about it. You should feel honored! Follow me, and you’ll have boundless prospects for the future. For instance, given your constitution, you’ll never break through to the Consummate God level. But if you sacrifice your heart to the God Legion Seal, there will be no end to the breakthroughs you can achieve.”

“What are you planning to do now, Yang Qi?” Crimson-Maiden Inferno asked. “Are you really going to try to take over the entire House of God Ordainment? You’re only a Lesser God. You might have powerful godhood, but your level is still low. You definitely can’t take on a Consummate God, much less control one.”

“You’re right. For now, I can’t handle a Consummate God. My current limit is Greater Gods. And it would be meaningless for me to take control of Lesser and Common Gods. You Greater Gods need to serve me well. If you do, you’ll be rewarded. If you don’t, I’ll kill you with a thought.”

Chapter 1252: Joining the Crown Prince Society

Exalted Celestial Silver-Dagger was ambitious and ruthless, so he quickly calmed down and said, “You beat us, Yang Qi. We’re under your control now. If you want us dead, we’ll be dead. And you even monitor our thoughts. So what choice do we have other than to follow your orders? What do you want us to do?”

“Nothing specific,” Yang Qi replied. “Just help me to build my power structure and start gathering wealth. Whatever resources you have available, bring them to me. I have a few sworn siblings in the House of God Ordainment that I’ll introduce you to soon. And I also have a business called the Sage Monarch Consortium that I want you to help expand. Understood?”

“Understood,” the White-Haired Boxer King said, not sounding the least bit defiant.

“Good. You can go now.” Yang Qi wasn’t worried about them trying anything funny. With the God Legion Seal controlling their thoughts, what could they possibly do?

With Greater Gods at his beck and call, his overall position in the sect was much more secure.

That said, Yang Qi could tell that, considering how difficult it was to actually control Greater Gods, his current psyche and will could only sustain a maximum of about ten of them. Any more than that and his control would wane.

If he didn't bother trying to advance his cultivation base, and literally didn’t do a single thing, then he might be able to control a hundred. But then he would be virtually defenseless if he had to actually fight someone.

And obviously, he would face cultivation problems. However, later on, when his psyche reached a more developed state and he broke through to the Unbounded level, he wouldn’t have such limitations.

‘The next task at hand is to get into the Crown Prince Society and see what’s going on there.’

With Crimson-Maiden Inferno, the White-Haired Boxer King, and Exalted Celestial Silver-Dagger under his control, Yang Qi felt a bit more at ease. So now he was able to deal with something else that had been weighing on him heavily recently: the crown prince of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty.

He wanted to get into the Crown Prince Society and see what this crown prince was all about, and whether or not he had any relation to the Crown Prince from the impure lands.

After all, it had oft been said that the Crown Prince in the impure lands was really ‘a god from heaven descended into the mortal world’.

Perhaps that Crown Prince was an extension of will sent by the crown prince of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty. Yang Qi wasn’t worried about any ramifications if that was the case. After all, there was no way the owner of that expression of will would have any idea who Yang Qi was.

The extension of will had formed a new body in the impure lands, essentially becoming its own unique entity.

If the crown prince of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty and the Crown Prince from the impure lands were the same person, it would be easy to explain the entire situation. The crown prince of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty had obviously sent some of his will to the lower worlds as a unique entity, hoping he would gather certain treasures and ultimately bring them back to the god world.

The lower worlds had contained the God Legion Seal, King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions, and countless other god items. And because gods couldn’t descend into the lower worlds, the only way to try to collect what remained of the almighty ancient entities was to send down expressions of will.

Generally speaking, even sending an expression of will to the lower worlds was considered impossible, and even now, Yang Qi had no idea how to do it.

By extension, that was why it was so miraculous that Proud Heaven had somehow personally traveled to the god world and returned to the impure lands.

There were many things in the god world that completely confounded Yang Qi’s ability to understand.

It was likely that, in ancient times, the god world and the impure lands had been connected. That would explain the existence of the god bastards, and how they had been relegated to life on the Ancient Road to the Gods.

In fact, during his time in the god world, Yang Qi hadn’t heard a single mention of the god bastards.

After thinking about the matter for a while, he produced a jade amulet and crushed it. Some time passed, and a figure approached. It was none other than Cold Jade.

When Cold Jade saw that Yang Qi was wearing the robe of a law enforcement disciple, he nodded. “You passed the exam and became a law enforcement disciple. Well done, Yang Qi. That said, I'm not surprised. Considering what you’re capable of, it was a foregone conclusion that you’d succeed. Have you finished thinking about my suggestion? Is that why you summoned me? Interested in joining the Crown Prince Society?”

“Yes, I'm in,” Yang Qi said.

“Alright!” Cold Jade said, smiling broadly. “In that case, I’ll take you to see one of the higher-ranking members. This isn’t someone from the House of God Ordainment, by the way. I’ll give you my endorsement, then once you’re a member, you’ll definitely advance by leaps and bounds.”

“Okay. Who exactly are you taking me to meet?”

“You’ll see soon enough.” The two of them flew to a nearby teleportation portal, which led them to another city named Coiling Dragon. It was outside of the House of God Ordainment’s god kingdom, but was still considered to be administered by the sect. That said, there were many outsiders there, as the city was a major trading hub. As for the city magistrate, he was a Greater God from the House of God Ordainment, a man named Exalted Celestial Coiling Dragon.

Yang Qi’s Sage Monarch Consortium had a branch in this city, and it was doing quite well. Because it was backed by the House of God Ordainment, no one would ever dare to cause trouble here.

Upon entering the city, the guards saw that Yang Qi was wearing the uniform of a law enforcement disciple, and as such, they didn’t dare to charge him the entry tax. And once Yang Qi and Cold Jade were walking through the city, everyone scurried out of their way, even some Common Gods. Even ordinary disciples of the House of God Ordainment would be respected here, much less law enforcement disciples.

“This uniform is pretty useful,” Yang Qi said. “People seem scared just seeing me.”

“Well that goes without saying,” Cold Jade replied. “Why else do you think people want to be law enforcement disciples so badly they’ll even risk their lives for the chance?  Okay, here we are. This place is called the Eternal Mark. It’s a restaurant run by the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty. Not even the House of God Ordainment would dare to cause problems here.”

The two of them entered the restaurant and were met with an extremely luxurious scene inside. They were now in a sumptuous god kingdom, filled with innumerable beautiful women, with fine wine and gourmet food everywhere. Of course, none of it was cheap. Yang Qi caught sight of a few disciples from the House of God Ordainment handing over stacks of godnotes to order food and purchase the services of the beautiful girls.

He even saw some female Lesser Gods that were nothing more than slave girls.

“What’s wrong?” Cold Jade asked, noticing his expression. “The slave girls here are all from organizations conquered by the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty. The most beautiful girls go through special training that makes them so good in bed that afterward, you can hardly breathe. And if you're willing to pay, you can even absorb their godpower and take it for your own. Unfortunately, this place is really expensive. Too expensive for me, even. All the customers here are children of very important people. Either that, or they’re extremely powerful in their respective sects.”

Yang Qi shook his head. ‘I feel bad for these women,’ he thought. ‘They’re basically thralls, trained by the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty to use their own cultivation bases for the benefit of the customers. And eventually, they’re just sold. What a miserable fate.’

He knew of certain godly-class energy arts that women could cultivate to form pure yin bodies. Although it made them strong, if they lost their virginity, whatever man did the deed would reap an immense reward. Obviously, the men who patronized this establishment enjoyed ravaging women and absorbing their cultivation bases.

Seeing Yang Qi and Cold Jade enter, a man walked forward and said, “How can we help you, gentlemen?”

He was only a Quasi-God, but from this aura, it was obvious that he was no weaker than a Lesser God.

Cold Jade produced a jade amulet and said, “I'm here to see the exalted Dream.”

“Of course!” the man said, looking visibly surprised. Being as respectful as possible, he led them through the corridors into the depths of the restaurant. It was a unique heaven and earth, cut off from the rest of the world and filled with beautiful streams and ornamental rocks. Immortal cranes flew through the air, and the faint sound of zither music reached their ears. Eventually, they came to a stop in front of the zither player, who was a woman, her back to them as she played.

Cold Jade simply stood there respectfully until the music ceased.

“Cold Jade?” a woman asked. “Have you finally recruited someone into the Crown Prince Society? Is it your Master?”

“Exalted Dream, I dare not try to recruit my Master yet. But I did find someone of unusual talent that should be a great member. This is Yang Qi. He just became a law enforcement disciple, and is also a friend of Jadefall.”

“Oh? A friend of Jadefall?” The woman looked over her shoulder at Yang Qi, staring at him with eyes that seemed capable of piercing deep into his heart and mind.

‘This woman is a Consummate God!’ he thought, surprised to find someone like this here. Although she only released the aura of a Greater God, she couldn’t hide the truth of her cultivation base from him.

“Yes, I'm a friend of Jadefall,” he said. Considering he was dealing with a Consummate God, there was no way he could infect her with a devil embryo. He had to be very, very careful, lest he reveal the wrong information. If she knew the truth about him, she would very likely try to kill him.

“You’re strong,” she said, looking him up and down. “A godhood rating of nine, early Lesser God. Not bad at all.”

Yang Qi had loosened his Devil-God Seal a bit, lest he make himself seem too weak. At the same time, he pretended to be surprised that she had seen through to the ‘true’ level of his strength.

“What?!” he exclaimed. “You can actually assess me? Very few people can see through my concealment!”

Chapter 1253: Scheming for the Jade

The ‘exalted Dream’ laughed softly. “If I couldn’t assess you, wouldn’t that imply that you’re stronger than me? In any case, it's good that you've chosen to join the Crown Prince Society. Congratulations on making the right decision. Henceforth, you’re going to rise rapidly through the ranks. You won’t regret this.”

“Might I inquire how to address you?” Yang Qi asked.

“I'm Dream Daylily,” she replied coolly. “Now, step forward. The process to join the Crown Prince Society is very simple. This is a medallion personally crafted by the crown prince. Place a drop of blood on it and swear an oath to be loyal to him. That’s it. Afterward, you’ll be a member.”

She waved her hand, causing an altar to appear, atop which was a small flag. Beneath the flag was a medallion crafted from jade.

Stepping forward, Yang Qi forced out a drop of blood and let it fall onto the medallion. “I hereby swear loyalty to the crown prince and his society. Never shall I betray it.”

The blood was absorbed by the medallion, and Yang Qi suddenly felt as if he were being connected to something immense and mighty.

Of course, it was a connection to the crown prince.

The crown prince had already reached the Unbounded level of will convergence, and had used that power to create a warding spell in the medallion. Of course, the warding spell wouldn’t work on Yang Qi. He had been expecting something like it, and was prepared.

In fact, he had turned the tables on this crown prince, and planned to use this chance to spy on him a bit, and hopefully discover whether or not he really was connected to the Crown Prince from the impure lands.

If he was, more caution would be required.

Thankfully, even if they were connected, there was no way the crown prince here could know what had played out in the impure lands.

“Very well, the ceremony is over.” Dream Daylily was pleased to see how decisively Yang Qi acted, and was already feeling good about recruiting him. “You’re now a member of the Crown Prince Society. As such, no one will ever dare to bully you.” She waved her hand, and a stream of light shot over to Yang Qi’s hand, which resolved into the shape of a handkerchief. “That’s the Silkcloud Kerchief, a god item I personally created. If you ever run into trouble, even from a Greater God, you can activate it to resolve the situation.”

“Many thanks,” Yang Qi said, plastering a look of extreme gratitude onto his face. Of course, the truth was that the thing might as well have been a literal piece of trash to him.

“You’ll receive many other benefits as a member of the Crown Prince Society, especially considering your attitude. Some people who want to join suddenly get reluctant when they're asked to pledge their loyalty. Faceless bastards!” She smiled coldly. “But considering your attitude, I can assure you that you won’t regret your decision.” Raising her voice, she said, “Girls, get in here!”

“Ma’am! What orders do you have?”

Three handmaidens entered. To Yang Qi’s surprise, they were all Common Gods, and they were all dazzlingly beautiful.

“This is Yang Qi, a new member of the Crown Prince Society. Take him to pick a girl, and let him drain her dry. Who’s considered the most desirable girl right now?”

“Exalted Dream,” one of the women said,” the most desirable girl right now is one that just finished her training and graduated from the Chapel. Her name is Summer Tearfall. She cultivated the Profound-Jade Sex-Goddess Liquid-Jade Divine Art in her training. She’s originally from the Nacrelight Sageland, and was captured with a larger group of women from there during a clash between our organizations. She’s a peak Lesser God, but with the Profound-Jade Sex-Goddess Liquid-Jade Divine Art, she could be an amazing asset to any man who bedded her. A Lesser God who takes her virginity could easily become a Common God. That said, she’s worth a huge amount of money. In fact, it might even be better to auction her off....”

“Auction her? Is the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty really so low on funds that we need to auction things off?” Dream Daylily chuckled coldly. “Spare no expense here. Call this Summer Tearfall out and deliver her to one of the rooms for Yang Qi to drain.”

“Yes, we’ll handle it right away.” The handmaidens quickly left.

“Hurry up and offer thanks to the exalted Dream Daylily!” Cold Jade said, the envy visible on his face. Back when he had joined the Crown Prince Society, he’d received similar treatment, which was why his godhood was so unique.

Yang Qi offered his thanks.

Before long, the handmaidens returned with a beautiful young woman in tow. She had large eyes and was surrounded by an enticing aroma. That said, her face was expressionless, making her seem almost like the walking dead. It was obvious why; her fate was to be sold, her virginity paid for and her vitality drained. It was obviously going to be a miserable fate. Women like this were essentially thralls designed for the benefit of others’ cultivation. Their godpower would be drained away, and in the end, they would simply die.

“Yang Qi, this young woman is Summer Tearfall. She’s worth over a hundred thousand godnotes, or perhaps even more to someone who fancies her. She's yours now. Use her to get stronger, and you’ll be better equipped to handle tasks for the society.”

“Many thanks for the reward,” Yang Qi said. “That said, I don’t need methods like this to improve my cultivation base, and harming innocents goes against my code of conduct. Therefore, I must reject the offer. That said, I’d like to pay the godnotes to buy her outright.”

Even as the words left his mouth, he produced two hundred thousand godnotes, then plopped them down on the table.

“So many godnotes! That’s no small sum!” Looking visibly taken aback, Dream Daylily eyed Yang Qi. “Where did you get so much wealth?”

“Simple,” Yang Qi said coolly. “I have a business called the Sage Monarch Consortium. You might even have heard of it, oh exalted Dream Daylily.”

“Sage Monarch Consortium?” She thought for a moment. “Yes, I remember hearing about a business selling certain ancient medicinal ingredients. Definitely an up and coming consortium. They’ve even been coming into direct competition with the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty. I’d been planning to strike a blow against it, but if it belongs to you, I won’t need to. Things couldn’t have worked out better.”

“Yes,” Yang Qi said. He was quite pleased to have spared some difficulty for the Sage Monarch Consortium. He had been able to tell right away that his business would be in direct competition with this restaurant.

“I'm a member of the Crown Prince Society now, but I haven’t made any worthy contributions, and that means I don’t deserve any rewards. Therefore, I won’t take advantage of this young woman. That said, I still want to buy her. There is virtue in sparing life, so please, just let her leave.”

“Leave? I'm afraid that won’t be possible. She might have impressive energy arts, but they were specifically imparted to her so that she could give them to others. She can’t do anything in a fight. Given her skill and ability, she’d only be recaptured and end up suffering the same fate. Since you run the Sage Monarch Consortium, why not have her work as a servant there?”

“Hurry up and thank the young sir!” the other handmaidens said, cursing Summer Tearfall.

However, her face remained as expressionless as before.

Yang Qi didn’t seem to take any exception to her attitude. “I only hope that I can meet the crown prince one day and admire him in all his glory. And if he gave me even a small tip about cultivation, I would be boundlessly grateful.”

“Perform some meritorious services, and you’ll be able to meet him,” Dream Daylily said. “Aren’t you a friend of Jadefall’s? It would be very simple to get her into the Crown Prince Society as well. If you could pull that off, the crown prince would definitely give you an audience, and he’d surely help you form Paramount will convergence. What do you think?”

“Er...” Yang Qi said, “that might be hard to pull off, but I’ll do my best.”

“I’ll wait for the good news. In the meantime, do your best to recruit other talented people for our society. If you recruit a capable Lesser God, you’ll be rewarded in kind. Recruit a Common God, and you’ll be doubly rewarded. For Greater Gods, you’ll receive even more amazing rewards. Perhaps you’ll even be allowed to enter the treasure storehouse in the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty and pick something you like.  Considering what you’re capable of, you should do well. Of course, the Greater Gods of the House of God Ordainment won’t be easy to recruit, but you can try.”

‘The treasure storehouse of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty?’ Yang Qi thought, his heart pounding a bit. He had to wonder if the piece of the Mahātmā Jade was stored there. The Mahātmā Jade was the entire reason he was going through with this whole scheme. That said, he wasn’t in a hurry. Technically speaking, he could instantly recruit Crimson-Maiden Inferno, the White-Haired Boxer King, and Exalted Celestial Silver-Saber into the Crown Prince Society if he wanted to. But that would cause too much of a stir, and draw the wrong kind of attention.

“Very well,” Dream Daylily said, “let's call it a day. Going forward, you work for the Crown Prince Society, and do everything in your power to advance its interests. This jade medallion is an authentication device linking you to our society. It allows us to communicate any tasks you might need to complete. Understand?”

Yang Qi nodded vigorously. “Yes! I’ll take my leave now, and bring Summer Tearfall with me.”

“That’s fine.”

Yang Qi turned to leave, whereupon he heard Dream Daylily say, “Cold Jade, you stay. You’ve earned a reward for recruiting Yang Qi....”

Yang Qi didn’t bother trying to eavesdrop. Cold Jade had a devil embryo in him, which meant Yang Qi could easily listen in on the conversation he was about to have with Dream Daylily.

After leaving, he didn’t go back to the god kingdom, but instead went to the Sage Monarch Consortium’s headquarters.

“My respects, Milord!” Zhang Jufang said. He was now a Lesser God. “The Sage Monarch Consortium has been doing great business lately. That said, we’ve been butting heads with the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty. What do you suggest we do? Back down, or force a conflict?”

“Just keep doing business as normal. The Eternal-Life God-Dynasty won’t cause any problems. How are the rest of my people doing? Have any of them been by recently?”

“The exalted Brahma, the exalted Jadefall, the exalted Shepherd... they all come by occasionally. Because of that, no one dares to pick a fight with us. Milord, I also received one of those skulls as a reward, which enabled me to kill a Greater God from the dao of devils who came to cause problems. Later, we actually worked out a deal with some sects from the dao of devils. Some of them should be coming soon to fence some stolen goods.”

Chapter 1254: Flower of Time

Business had been booming for the Sage Monarch Consortium ever since Yang Qi plundered the Chaos Forge God-Shrine, taking thirteen crystal skulls that he refined with the God Legion Seal and his Unspoiled Body. With the spell formations he had inscribed with them, they pulsed with the power of godmammoths, and could easily unleash the power of an early Consummate God.

The skulls were even more impressive considering that they were created by the undying will of countless almighty figures from the past, making them much better than average magical treasures. Most treasures could withstand assaults by ordinary energy, but not attacks of will.

For example, if Zhang Jufang were to rely on his other magical treasures, then if a Greater God came along with Paramount will, he would be in real trouble without the skull. But with the skull, he would be able to defend himself.

With it, he could slaughter any enemy under the level of a Consummate God.

Consummate Gods were considered luminaries in the god world, and were usually ambitious and ruthless figures that no one would dare to cause problems for.

Because of that, the Sage Monarch Consortium was able to peddle its medicinal ingredients without the slightest scruple. They were also able to fence stolen goods brought to them by the Demonfolk, and even people from the dao of devils. It was for that reason that they had been butting heads with the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty. However, now that Yang Qi was a member of the Crown Prince Society, he was actually under the protection of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty, and would be able to partake in plenty more shady business.

“Zhang Jufang, the time has come for me to help you with your cultivation base again. You’re going to become a Common God!”

Yang Qi reached out and clamped his hand onto Zhang Jufang’s head, who was kneeling in front of him. Power coursed into Zhang Jufang, causing his godhood to grow stronger, and his body tougher. It was actually the Sovereign Lord’s Holy and Far-Reaching Consummate Omnicurse, which Yang Qi was using to baptize his godhood and remove impurities from it.

Ever since forming monarch godhood, Yang Qi’s Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth and its associated energy arts had all transformed significantly.

As for the Sovereign Lord’s Holy and Far-Reaching Consummate Omnicurse, it was getting closer and closer to the level it had been at when it was used by the Sovereign Lord himself.

Zhang Jufang kneeled there, a solemn and pious expression on his face as the power of the technique flowed through him. Impurities were forced out of him, almost like black liquid, which subsequently faded into nothing, having been absorbed into the void.

What was left behind was something far more pure than before, a godhood in which the dao of heaven itself swirled.

Zhang Jufang immediately started kowtowing. “Many thanks, Milord! Your benevolence knows no bounds, and I shall be eternally grateful!”

“Rise,” Yang Qi said. “Within less than half a year, your energy arts will advance by leaps and bounds, and you’ll reach the early Common God level. Remember to diligently cultivate the techniques I've imparted to you, and you’ll do fine.” Next, he gestured at the wooden-faced Summer Tearfall standing next to him. “Find a place in the Sage Monarch Consortium for this woman. She’ll be an assistant of sorts to you. Got it?”

“I understand, Milord.”

With that, Zhang Jufang hurried away.

Now, the only two left in the room were Yang Qi and Summer Tearfall. Seeing that her expression was as blank as ever, he said, “Were you born mute or something?”

A long moment passed, then she said, “Why didn’t you drain me? My fate was to cultivate a technique that would result in me being drained. I don’t care about anything anymore. Kill me. Torture me. Do whatever you want. My heart is dead, so what’s the point of jabbering about it?”

“Your heart is dead?” Yang Qi laughed. “Your sect was destroyed, you were captured, and you were forced to cultivate a technique that would result in you being drained. That’s it? What’s there to sigh about? In the end, you weren’t drained. Furthermore, you actually gained some godpower. I've given you a new life, and want you to work for me. As for your godpower and techniques, they aren’t good for fighting, but I'll change that and make sure you can defend yourself. How about it?”

“Really?” she said, a bit of expression returning to her eyes. “Except, I’m not interested in having my godpower for fighting. I just want to be back the way I was before. By the way, my sect wasn’t destroyed. The Eternal-Life God-Dynasty could never destroy the Nacrelight Sageland. So if you can just help me recover, and get me back home, then my gratitude will know no bounds.”

“That should work,” Yang Qi said. “I'd wanted you to help out in my Sage Monarch Consortium, but if you just want to go back to your sect, that's fine. I can find the kindness in my heart to help you.”

“I know that you spent two hundred thousand godnotes to free me,” Summer Tearfall said, “and I’ll make sure that wasn't a waste. Once I'm back in the Nacrelight Sageland, I’ll repay those godnotes. Okay?”

“That’s fine. We’ll treat it as a business transaction. If you want to pay me back, I’ll accept. If you don’t want to, it’s no matter.” Yang Qi waved his hand dismissively.

Summer Tearfall was visibly surprised at Yang Qi’s nonchalant attitude. She also recalled how he had just helped his subordinate improve his godhood. After thinking about it for a moment, she couldn’t help but ask, “Do you mind if I ask who exactly you are? Most people can’t just casually pull out two hundred thousand godnotes.”

“That’s not really any of your business,” he said. Then his hand snaked out and clamped onto the top of her head. “You have a warding spell in your sea of consciousness that makes it impossible to use your previous energy arts. I’ll help you remove it. Then I’ll convert your godpower into something of the pure void, and of primal-chaos. It won’t take long until you’re fully recovered and can leave to return to your Nacrelight Sageland. I’ll also give you a protective talisman that will keep you safe, even if a Consummate God tries to cause trouble for you.”

There was a flash of light, then Summer Tearfall sensed something like an explosion in her mind, whereupon everything about her changed. Once again, she became elegant, noble, and refined.

Nodding at what he was seeing, Yang Qi produced a golden talisman that resembled a swirling dragon, which he placed in her hand.

“You can use the talisman three times to escape from a Consummate God,” he explained. “After the third time, it will vanish forever. Don't get involved in a fight with a Consummate God. Just run. The talisman isn’t good for anything other than that. If you try using it to fight, you’ll end up getting killed.”

“If you can create a talisman to escape from a Consummate God, then that means you’re no weaker than a Consummate God. You’re definitely not an early Lesser God, so why are you pretending to be one?”

“Remember, curiosity can get even gods killed,” Yang Qi said. “You and I are not on the same level, so you shouldn’t be asking questions like that. Everyone has secrets, and prying at them is a good way to end up dead.”

“I understand.” Surprisingly, Summer Tearfall actually smiled. “Many thanks to you for saving me. I’ll never forget the kindness you've shown me. When you have the time, come visit me in the Nacrelight Sageland and I’ll do my utmost to entertain you.”

“That’s fine. Now, take your leave. And considering you have no money whatsoever, take these twenty thousand godnotes. That should cover your expenses on your way back to the Nacrelight Sageland.” Yang Qi handed her the money, and she accepted, then gave him a profound look before turning and flying off into the distance.

‘She wasn’t telling the truth about who she is,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘I’d say it’s highly likely she’s actually someone very important from the Nacrelight Sageland. Now that I think about it, I remember reading about that place before.’ Closing his eyes, he recalled the information he had gleaned from the Great Classic of God Ordainment.

‘The Nacrelight Sageland is made up entirely of women. It’s considered a very important church located on the distant Great Continent of Radiance.’ As it turned out, the Nacrelight Sageland was a huge sect of similar size and scope to the House of God Ordainment, and had been in opposition to the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty for many years.

Not that Yang Qi cared about that. Saving Summer Tearfall was just planting a seed that may or may not bear fruit in the future.

As he sat there in the Sage Monarch Consortium, he summoned a bottle gourd, out of which flew nine jade boxes and a body.

They were items he had taken from the Chaos Forge God-Shrine, but hadn’t yet had a chance to study thoroughly. Inside the nine jade boxes were nine flower petals, whose function he still hadn’t identified. As for the body, it was that of a scholar, and he was also unsure of what it did.

In addition to these items, there was also a medicinal pill he had acquired that he was unsure about, as well as the markings he had observed on the ninth floor.

Of course, the wills of the top experts from those battle scars had been absorbed by his piece of the Mahātmā Jade and were inaccessible to him. So for now, all he had to work with were the flower petals and the scholar’s body.

‘Time to open the boxes and put the flower petals together!’ Yang Qi waved his hand, sending some godpower into the boxes, resulting in the flower petals flying out into the open and taking the shape of a strange flower. Yang Qi had never seen a flower like this. Furthermore, it was missing a stamen, which meant that it wasn't complete.

Yang Qi took the flower petals in his hands and fiddled with them for a bit, whereupon he suddenly sensed the power of time itself. Yang Qi thought back to certain things he had read about in the Great Classic of God Ordainment, as well as some of the books he had studied in the Scripture Pavilion.

‘Is this...’ he thought, then frowned. ‘Don’t tell me this is the legendary flower of time? One of the ten miraculous and boundless godflowers? In years past, the Sovereign Lord had a garden filled with numerous godflowers. The concubines in his harem palace would always discuss which of them were the best, and the flower of time was definitely one of them.’

Chapter 1255: Taking Control of the Playing Field

Rumor had it the flower of time could actually control the way time passed in the god world, at least in a small area. It was very useful, especially when forming godhood. If one could insert the flower into their godhood, and use certain special methods, it could actually improve the godhood significantly, and provide immensely better control over one’s godpower.

The flower was considered invincible. However, the downside was that this particular flower lacked a stamen, which meant its time powers were incomplete and would be difficult to properly control. Time in the god world didn't pass like time in the impure lands, and tampering with its flow was an easy way to get killed.

As soon as Yang Qi had arrived in the god world, he realized that all of the magical laws of the impure lands, from the Rich-Lush Continent to the immortal worlds, were illusory. In fact, those places weren’t truly real. Only the god world was real.

Those worlds were like the virtual reality games played in the future world. One could go inside of them, look around, and see things that seemed real. But they weren’t real. Only by reaching godly ascension could one ‘cultivate truth’, thus dispelling all illusions.

For now, he couldn’t use these petals belonging to the flower of time. But one day, he would be able to. Furthermore, there wasn’t just one flower of time. But they were exceedingly rare, similar to how rare Unbounded experts were. It would be easier to find a phoenix feather or a qilin horn than one of those flowers, and if one was found, it would be worth ten times more than all of the wealth Yang Qi had accumulated with his Sage Monarch Consortium. If a master alchemist could take this flower and use it to concoct a god pill, it would be a spectacular medicine that contained the power of a Paramount God. And finding more petals like these would help Yang Qi quickly improve his lifespan and cultivation base.

The time flow of the god world was the true and real flow of time. It was for that reason that the old-timers in the impure lands could live for millions upon millions of years, whereas lifespans in the god world were generally about a hundred years.

Although Yang Qi had formed monarch godhood, he still couldn’t manipulate time. In fact, he was still having difficulty with the space of the god world, let alone the time. If he tried to make a god kingdom, it would be illusory, and would only last for a short time.

And a tiny, temporary god kingdom like that wouldn’t do him any good.

Thus, Yang Qi needed to push his cultivation base to even higher levels. Only by commanding an Unbounded will convergence would he be able to manipulate time. And of course, before he could even think about the Unbounded level, he needed to reach the late stage of Paramount will convergence, then the peak.

Right now, he was only in early Paramount will convergence, and breaking through to the mid level wouldn’t be easy.

‘Now, about this scholar's body...’ he thought. The scholar sat there, looking very much alive. He even had a smile on his face as he perused the book scroll in his hand, as if he found the contents amusing.

Yang Qi drew on his monarch godhood, causing it to flow with immense force. Then he looked closer at the scholar, hoping to determine if he was alive or dead. Regardless, this person had obviously been someone astoundingly powerful. His fleshly body, including his skin, muscles, and everything else, was so powerful that, despite the conditions he had been in, it hadn’t been hurt at all. He was obviously far stronger than the crystal skulls had been.

Reaching out, Yang Qi put his hand on the scholar's back and sent some godpower into him. Almost instantly, he felt a reaction from the scholar’s sea of energy. It began gobbling up the power so rapidly that it seemed like it would go on forever before it would feel sated.

Yang Qi tried again, draining himself of true energy three times in a row during the process, yet the scholar's sea of energy seemed like a bottomless pit.

‘Incredible. This scholar was obviously someone immensely powerful. And he’s currently in a state that is neither dead nor undead. I wonder what happened to him all those years ago in the Chaos Forge God-Shrine. He doesn’t seem like one of the Pill-King God’s people. From what I understand, his people were all daoist priests, not confucian scholars. Furthermore, all of those almighty entities of ancient times ended up dying and dispersing into nothing, but this scholar remained behind. He must be some consummate expert.’

Yang Qi shook his head.

He had the feeling that if he kept sending godpower into the scholar, he would eventually gain something. If nothing else, the body should be worthy of study. Entering a state of being neither dead nor undead wasn’t an easy task, to the point where not even Yang Qi could emulate it.

What did it mean to be neither dead nor undead?

Death implied being without life. But this scholar wasn’t dead. On the other hand, he wasn’t alive, either. It was hard to say exactly what he was. Maybe he was dead, maybe he was alive. Maybe he wasn’t dead, maybe he wasn’t alive. It almost seemed like he had achieved a state of being lifeless and destructionless.

To be able to study someone in that state would lead to huge gains.

Suddenly, he heard someone approaching from behind.

Flicking his sleeve, he sucked the corpse inside, hiding it. Although he was wearing the robe of a law enforcement disciple, underneath it, he still had his God Legion Battle Robe on.

“What’s going on?” he said, having identified the intruder. It was Zhang Jufang.

“Milord,” Zhang Jufang said. “Some experts from the dao of devils are here. They don’t seem very friendly. Apparently they’ve earned a behind-the-scenes supporter in the form of a Consummate God from the dao of devils. I don’t think I should be tangling with a Consummate God, so I decided to report the matter directly to you. Do you want to see them?”

Yang Qi nodded. “Alright. I'm curious to see what these people from the dao of devils are like. Do they really want to do some business, or are they just here to try ordering us around? If it’s the latter, I might as well just wipe them out of existence and be done with the matter.”

He flicked his sleeve and was instantly outside. The Sage Monarch Consortium’s headquarters was huge, and contained all sorts of buildings, including storehouses and meeting halls in which to discuss business.

Upon arriving at the meeting hall where the people from the dao of devils were waiting, he immediately sensed how tense the atmosphere was.

There was a servant girl sprawled out on the floor, dead, her body completely drained of blood in what must have been a horrific death. She was a Quasi-God, and was one of the many employees that the Sage Monarch Consortium had picked up over the past two years.

Obviously, the experts from the dao of devils had killed her. One of them enjoyed feasting on the blood of virgins, and had no qualms about killing them on sight.

Yang Qi’s face immediately turned very grim.

At the moment, none of the other handmaidens dared to enter the hall for fear of being killed, therefore no one was waiting on the experts from the dao of devils.

There were about a dozen experts present, and they all looked different. But Yang Qi quickly identified the four most powerful among them, all of whom were Greater Gods. Of those four, one was completely naked, his body plastered with colorful paints that formed vicious and terrifying designs, even on his face.

Another was a tall, emaciated man clad in a green robe. He was so skinny he looked like a bamboo pole, and was ghostly in a way that made it seem like he might vanish at any moment.

The other two were obviously brothers. They were extremely muscular and radiated fiendish auras. At a glance, it was obvious that they must be important people in the dao of devils. As soon as Yang Qi and Zhang Jufang entered the hall, the eyes of those experts locked on to them in a fashion that would make most people shiver.

One of the muscular brothers currently had a bit of blood dribbling down his chin, making it obvious that he was the one who had killed the handmaiden.

“Milord, these are all elite experts from the dao of devils. As for the four Greater Gods, they're all apprentices of a patriarch of the dao of devils, the famous Lone King Heavenbane. The fellow with the colorful paint on him is Man Tu, the Totem Warlord. His fighting prowess is extremely shocking. The man in green is Shaqing Jun, a famous assassin. And the other two are the Tu Clan Brothers, Tu Xing and Tu Xue. As soon as Tu Xue saw that handmaiden, he killed her and sucked out all her blood. As a group, they belong to a group from the dao of devils called the Emptyhell Throne. Their Master, Lone King Heavenbane, is a very important person from the Emptyhell Throne.”

“Well, that’s interesting,” Yang Qi said, nodding. Walking over to the conference table, he sat down.

Meanwhile, the people from the dao of devils were visibly surprised to see Yang Qi. After all, it seemed clear that Zhang Jufang’s cultivation base was far beyond his, so how could he be the person in charge?

“What kind of game are you playing, Zhang Jufang?” said one of the experts. “We said to get your boss out here to talk about making a deal with the Emptyhell Throne. So what’s this brat doing here?”

“Watch your mouth,” Zhang Jufang snapped. “This is my boss!”

“Oh? You work for a wimp like this?” They all started laughing. Obviously, people from the dao of devils didn’t follow any conventions or rules, nor did they have the slightest scruples.

“Very well,” said the Totem Warlord, eyeing Yang Qi. “If this brat is here to negotiate, then let's get down to business. From your clothing, I can tell that you're obviously the son of someone important from House of God Ordainment. Our Emptyhell Throne has something we want to sell you: a bunch of living slaves. Agreed?”

“You suck the quintessence-blood out of your slaves,” Yang Qi replied, “turning them into the walking dead. And now you want to sell them to us for three or four times what they're worth? Do you think we’re idiots? Why would we possibly agree to that? Normally speaking, we don’t even do business with you people from the dao of devils. Besides, your slaves are usually infected with devilishness that causes them to randomly go crazy.”

“Shut up, you!” said the Totem Warlord. “We never agreed to make any concessions, and if you refuse to do business with us, aren’t you worried about reprisals?”

“Is that a threat?” Yang Qi said. “Are you trying to force us to do business with you?”

Tu Xing chuckled darkly. “Take it as you will. Our Consummate God patriarch, Lone King Heavenbane, is currently low on funds, and we know that your Sage Monarch Consortium has interfered in the business between the Demonfolk and the dao of devils. In other words, you need to compensate us for our losses.”

Yang Qi smiled faintly. “So you want to do business? As long as there’s profit involved, we can talk things over.”

Upon hearing what they assumed was Yang Qi backing down, the people from the dao of devils looked even haughtier than before.

“You know what’s good for you, boy,” said the Totem Warlord. “But you still need to pay up to apologize. Hand over a million godnotes.”

“Slow down,” Yang Qi said. “If you want to do business, there’s an open account that needs to be settled first.”

“Open account? What do you mean?”

Yang Qi pointed at the corpse of the handmaiden. “You killed my handmaiden, so now you owe me.”

Chapter 1256: Patriarch from the Dao of Devils

“What did you just say?” Totem Warlord said, visibly shocked that Yang Qi would dare to demand compensation. “We killed some servant who wasn’t even a Quasi-God, and you're demanding compensation? Am I hearing things?”

“You’re not hearing things,” Yang Qi replied coolly. “I want compensation. You took a life, so what makes you think I wouldn’t ask for it?”

BAM!

One of Lesser Gods slapped his hand down on the table. “Are you tired of living, boy!? You may be the son of somebody important from the House of God Ordainment, and maybe you did start this Sage Monarch Consortium. But we’re from the dao of devils! Unless you run back and hide in your sect's god kingdom, then never come out, you’ll end up dead if you cross us!”

“That’s right! Over the past few years, the Emptyhell Throne has killed a lot of disciples from the House of God Ordainment.”

“Who do you think you are? You’re just a Lesser God! That’s nothing compared to the god world as a whole. Besides, Eldest Brother Tu Xue is a Greater God. Do you know how vastly separated the two of you are? Have you even thought about that? We're giving you a lot of face by just sitting here and talking to you, yet you're actually being so insulting as to demand compensation?”

“This is a real joke. I can’t believe a Lesser God is demanding compensation from a Greater God. You’d better watch out, I might just kill you where you stand.”

Most of the experts from the dao of devils were laughing, although some were spitting in contempt.

“Slow down,” said the Totem Warlord. “We came here to do business, and this is a city controlled by the House of God Ordainment. We can’t afford to offend the wrong people. Tu Xue, you killed a servant girl, so pay up. Give him a godnote.”

“A single godnote?” Tu Xue burst out laughing. “I love nothing more than to drain the blood of virgins. Here. Take ten godnotes and bring me nine more virgins.”

He produced ten godnotes, which he sent flying toward Yang Qi in the form of a razor-sharp saber.

Yang Qi waved his hand and sucked the godnotes into his sleeve.

“Hmm?” Tu Xue murmured. “Well done, boy. It seems you do have some skills. Sadly, they’re complete crap compared to what I can do. Now go find me those nine virgins. I can almost taste them already.”

“Your compensation is one godnote?” Yang Qi said, looking completely unfazed. “Do you think this is some kind of game?”

“How much do you want, then?” Tu Xue asked.

“Simple. If you kill a person, you pay with your life. That’s heaven’s law and earth’s principle. You killed this servant girl, therefore you won’t leave here alive. Alright? Those are the rules.”

“Kill a person, pay with your life?” Tu Xue’s jaw dropped as if he had just heard a very funny joke. “I killed some ant-like servant girl, and you want my life in return? Am I hearing things?”

“You’re not hearing things. Kill a person, pay with your life. And that's why I say you won’t be leaving here alive.”

BOOOM!

Rising to his feet, the Totem Warlord suddenly smashed his fists into the table, shattering it. Glaring at Yang Qi, he said, “You’re quite the showoff, boy, aren’t you? Don’t you realize that you’re trying to pull a tooth from the tiger’s mouth? We’re all Greater Gods, yet a puny Lesser God like you dares to run your mouth without any thought at all. I honestly can’t believe you’d say something like ‘kill a person, pay with your life’. And you would apply that to some servant girl? Even if we killed you, the House of God Ordainment wouldn’t do a thing to us.”

“It seems to me we need to take this ignorant brat and put him in his place,” Tu Xue said, and he and his brother Tu Xing rose to their feet, staring at Yang Qi as if he were already dead.

“I suppose that means you’re refusing to pay with your life for killing my servant girl,” Yang Qi said, simply sitting there calmly. “You also broke my conference table. That’s just making your outstanding bill even larger.”

“That’s enough,” said one of the other disciples. “This brat is a complete and utter psycho. Elder Brothers, there’s no need for you to do anything. I’ll teach him a lesson right now!” The disciple strode over to Yang Qi and reached out with a hand that resembled a ghost claw, with fingers like pitch-black iron hooks.

RUMBLE!

Yang Qi didn’t so much as look at the devil palm heading toward him. He thrust his palm out, and a scream could be heard as the disciple was thrown back into the wall, where he was crushed into a mass of gore that oozed down onto the ground. He was so dead that he couldn't possibly be more dead.

“What?!” the Totem Warlord blurted, his energy arts surging as he first looked at Yang Qi, then at the smear of gore dripping down the wall and onto the floor. Voice icy cold, he said, “Well, who would have guessed that you're so strong, boy?”

“Kill someone, pay with your life,” Yang Qi said, brushing off his shoulders. “The time has come to give your life, Tu Xue.”

“You know your stuff, boy,” Tu Xue said. “But given the level of your cultivation, you're insane if you think you can take my life. However, I admit you’re right. If you kill a person, you have to pay with your life. You just killed a disciple from the dao of devils, so what do you think is going to happen next?”

“Disciples from the dao of devils are people?” Yang Qi said. “I think not. I said ‘kill a person, pay with your life’ not ‘kill a devil pay with your life’. Ridding the world of devils and demons is a very virtuous thing to do.”

“Damn you!” said Shaqing Jun, the skinny man that looked like a stalk of bamboo. He had remained silent up to this point, but now he turned into a green streak of light that shot toward Yang Qi with incredible speed, aiming directly at his heart.

“You’re next,” Yang Qi said. Without even looking at him, he thrust his hand out in a very mundane fashion.

BAM!

Shaqing Jun was hit directly in the face, sending him flying back into the wall. However, he didn’t die. Gasping for breath, he remained sprawled on the wall as if he had been chained there, or even nailed to it.

“What?!” the Totem Warlord blurted. Tu Xue and Tu Xing were both visibly stunned. It might not have been very shocking for Yang Qi to have killed a lesser disciple, but for him to have defeated Shaqing Jun with a single move was unthinkable.

By way of comparison, it would be like an ordinary human picking up a rock and throwing it off to the side. That wouldn’t be impressive at all. But for that same ordinary human to pick up a mountain and throw it away would be terrifying.

Compared to the unlucky disciple who had just died, Shaqing Jun’s cultivation base was as superior as that mountain was to a rock.

“The rest of you aren’t going anywhere, either. How dare you come here and try to cause trouble for me?” Yang Qi extended his hand, showing no mercy as he resorted directly to the Hand of the One God.

RUMBLE!

His move immediately caused the space in the area to begin collapsing. The disciples from the dao of devils all tried to back away, but the huge energy field Yang Qi had created made it impossible for them to do much of anything.

“Damn you!” the Totem Warlord said.

At that moment, he, Tu Xue, and Tu Xing all realized that Yang Qi was unfathomably powerful.

“D-don’t... don’t you realize we’re the apprentices of Lone King Heavenbane?”

Yang Qi looked back at them. “Your Master is going to be dead soon. Do you really think I’ll spare you?”

Then he became a streak of mysterious light that shot right into the Tu Clan Brothers. It was a consummate move from the Hand of the One God, bringing endless night and never-ending darkness. In the blink of an eye, the devil disciples were overwhelmed by pitch blackness.

Bam. Bam. Bam. Bam.

A dozen of the disciples exploded into clouds of blood. Meanwhile, Totem Warlord and Tu Xing were also hit, causing them to slam into the ground with blood spraying out of their mouths. As for Tu Xue, Yang Qi grabbed him with such strength that the man was immediately immobilized.

“You scum,” Yang Qi said, shaking his head. “I almost can’t believe that I took all of you out with only a single move. You couldn’t stand up to just one little move?”

It wasn’t as if there had been any suspense in the fight. Yang Qi could destroy any Greater God he encountered, and would only have had trouble if he faced a Consummate God.

Totem Warlord let out some rattling coughs that made it obvious his internal organs had been smashed to pieces. “Who exactly are you? There’s no way you’re a Lesser God. Only a Consummate God could possibly beat us. We made an absurd error here! We have eyes but didn't recognize gold-inlaid jade! We admit defeat!”

“Let my brother go!” Tu Xing said, coughing up blood. “Our Master is a patriarch from the dao of devils. You don’t want to get into trouble with him!”

“I said it clearly already. Kill a person, pay with your life!” Yang Qi stared into the terrified eyes of Tu Xue and continued, “No one is allowed to casually kill people in the Sage Monarch Consortium. Did you really think I would let people from the dao of devils come here, kill someone, and just saunter off? If word spread, my people wouldn’t have any sense of security. And who would agree to do business with us? Considering how wildly arrogant you’ve been, you won't be leaving here alive. Prepare to die!”

Crack!

A sound like an explosion could be heard inside Tu Xue as his godhood shattered.

Then, intense flames sprang out, and although he wanted to run, he was being held firmly in place by Yang Qi. The flames ate him up, and he was dead.

“You killed him!” Tu Xing wailed.

“You’ll be next,” Yang Qi said, walking toward him, his eyes burning with killing intent. “Anyone who dares to oppose me forfeits their right to life.”

“If you kill me,” Tu Xing screamed, “my Master will definitely come and kill you!”

“I want your Master, too. You people from the dao of devils disrupt the natural order. No wonder the boundless Sovereign Lord wanted to suppress hell. You people will never be purified.” With that, Yang Qi viciously stomped his heel down on Tu Xing’s head, causing it to explode in a cloud of blood.

“Don’t kill me!” the Totem Warlord cried. “Don’t kill me! I’ll serve you like an animal!”

However, the moment he finished speaking, a beam of sword light shot from Yang Qi right into his heart, burning his godhood and sending him screaming into death.

Shaqing Jun was the only one left alive. “D-don’t... don’t kill me! I know we made a mistake! We shouldn’t have tried to extort you. But who are you? Tell me so I can die in peace!”

“I really am just a Lesser God.” Yang Qi extended his hand, surrounding Shaqing Jun with an expression of power that crushed him down into a little ball of blood and flesh.

All of the disciples from the dao of devils were dead.

Waving his hand, he gathered all of the quintessence energy from the dead disciples, collecting them into a devil śarīra. In some ways, it resembled godhood, but it clearly wasn’t godhood.

It was the collected will, blood, and flesh of the people he had just killed, and it would make a very powerful ingredient for a medicinal pill.

Chapter 1257: Patriarch from the Dao of Devils (2)

The devil disciples had been completely obliterated, leaving behind nothing but some scattered magical treasures mixed in amongst the blood and gore.

Yang Qi absorbed their quintessence energy into something that looked like a pearl, which he then used the Mahātmā Jade to turn into an aspect of his own psyche and will. It didn’t do much in terms of helping him reach the mid Paramount level of will convergence, but it was better than nothing.

The most pressing matter at hand was reaching the next higher level. And to do that, he needed a second piece of the Mahātmā Jade. That was the only way he could reach the Unbounded level.

“You wiped them out, Milord,” said Zhang Jufang. “There is nothing more gratifying than punishing evildoers. What do we do about the servant girl?”

“Deliver her corpse to her family, and compensate them well. Explain that she was killed by disciples from the dao of devils. Take some of the treasures that belonged to the devil disciples and let the family pick some of the best ones. They can serve as both evidence of what happened, and also compensation.”

Although the magical treasures could count as a huge mass of wealth, Yang Qi didn’t need them, so he left them in Zhang Jufang’s care.

Next, Yang Qi knew he would have to deal with reprisals from Lone King Heavenbane from the Emptyhell Throne. Therefore, he simply sat down and waited for the man to come.

Consummate Gods were all incredibly important people in the god world, and Lone King Heavenbane wasn't someone who had only just become a Consummate God.

The Emptyhell Throne was a huge devil church that was no weaker than the House of God Ordainment. That said, they were headquartered a huge distance away, past many continents. Without the use of teleportation portals, it was so far away that it could take decades to fly over from there.

The fact that Lone King Heavenbane’s apprentices had been active in this area indicated that he was also nearby. And that Yang Qi had killed his Greater God apprentices, the man obviously wouldn’t rest until he got revenge.

The loss of four Greater Gods was no small matter. Even in the House of God Ordainment, it would be considered a huge blow. In fact, even just three Greater Gods being killed would be enough for the sect to go all out to exterminate whatever organization the culprit came from.

That said, even the top figures from the Emptyhell Throne couldn’t just waltz right into the territory of the House of God Ordainment. They would need to sneak in carefully to avoid causing an all-out war.

Yang Qi sat waiting for half a month, but the patriarch never showed up. That said, Yang Qi didn't let his guard down. He just sat there cross-legged, meditating and working on his cultivation until the psychic fluctuations caused snow to slowly fall around him.

One evening, as he was working on his cultivation, a strange amalgamation of sounds reached his ears. It was like an invasion of all six senses, sometimes like the buzz of insects, sometimes like the moan of desire. It would change, sometimes being the cry of a child, sometimes being the sigh of a mother. It was like senseless mumblings of mortals, slowly penetrating the heart and mind, and seeking to take control of the sea of consciousness.

“Six Senses Devil Reverberation,” Yang Qi said, opening his eyes. “I'm impressed. Why not show your face, Lone King Heavenbane?”

“So, you're a real expert. Who exactly are you? And how did you detect my presence? I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised that my favored apprentices were killed by you.” A shadowy figure appeared in the meeting hall, tall and imposing, with a fleshy mass on his forehead that seemed to be a horn of some sort. Other than that, though, he seemed completely ordinary in nature, the type of individual who could easily melt into a crowd.

The fleshy horn was the only strange thing about him.

“I'm sorry, Lone King Heavenbane,” Yang Qi said, “but unfortunately I don’t have any refreshments prepared to entertain you with. I hope you aren’t offended.” As he spoke, Yang Qi assessed the man, confirming that he was a Consummate God.

“Considering you killed my apprentices, we obviously have an irreconcilable enmity between us. So what’s the point of talking about entertaining me? Why did you kill my four apprentices? Do you know what would happen if four Greater Gods from the House of God Ordainment were killed? Do you know what the consequences would be?”

“The sect would send numerous experts to exterminate the culprit,” Yang Qi said.

“That's right,” Lone King Heavenbane replied. “And the Emptyhell Throne will do exactly the same thing. It doesn’t matter how impressive you are, you won’t escape death. That said, before I kill you, I'm curious to know who you are. I don’t recall the House of God Ordainment having a Consummate God like you before. Our Emptyhell Throne still has good sources of information about your sect.”

“I'm not a Consummate God,” Yang Qi replied. “I'm just your run-of-the-mill Lesser God.”

“Do you take me for a fool?” Lone King Heavenbane said. “Am I supposed to believe a Lesser God could kill four Greater Gods, and even resist my Six Senses Devil Reverberation? Anyone who isn’t a Consummate God would be destroyed by that technique.”

“Believe what you want. You came here today, alone, to a city controlled by the House of God Ordainment, all because you didn’t want to make a scene. You're worried that if you do, you might not make it out alive. Unfortunately, that wasn't a very wise decision.”

“I don’t care. True confidence stems from superb skill. That said, if I fight you here, then it’s true I won’t be able to get away easily. So how about we select a good location for a duel? It’s obvious that fighting right here isn’t an option. The mere shockwaves would destroy everything around us, including your business.”

“You’re right about that. This is my place of business, so I don't want to do any fighting here. It's nice to have a worthy opponent like you. Those apprentices of yours really were useless. I slaughtered them with hardly any effort at all.”

“Please, come with me. If you don’t, I’ll have no choice but to slaughter your subordinates.” As the words left his mouth, Lone King Heavenbane vanished into thin air.

Yang Qi also vanished, following Lone King Heavenbane out of the city to a mountain region many tens of thousands of kilometers away.

Soon, they were surrounded by endless jungle. At a certain point, Lone King Heavenbane stopped, perching on the branch of a towering tree and waiting for Yang Qi to catch up. “I'm honestly surprised that you could keep up.”

“So this is the place?” Yang Qi said, looking around. “Beautiful mountains. Flowing rivers. This place has great scenery. It’s the perfect place to fight. Oh, by the way, you might as well call out the hidden forces you have waiting here in ambush.”

“What?” said Lone King Heavenbane, looking visibly surprised. “If you knew I set an ambush, why did you come here?”

“Why wouldn’t I?” Yang Qi replied, clasping his hands behind his back.

“The ignorant never fear death, do they, boy? You sound very impressive and heroic, but in the end, you're going to die here.” Lone King Heavenbane shook his head. “Devil-Lord Jubilation. Exalted Celestial Exultation. You can come out. I thought we would be dealing with some impressive person from the House of God Ordainment, but as it turns out, my apprentices were killed by this brat.”

“You're right, it's definitely a surprise,” spoke two voices, both of them thrumming with immense devil energy that marked them as boundless patriarchs from the dao of devils.

They had pallid faces, and one wore black while the other wore white. They almost looked like the legendary Heibai Wuchang. As for their energy arts, they were clearly in the Consummate God level, which meant they were very important in the dao of devils. And they were here to ambush and kill Yang Qi.

Three Consummate Gods were working together to take Yang Qi out.

“Three Consummate Gods?” Yang Qi said, his expression flickering. “Lone King Heavenbane, I almost can’t believe that a grand and mighty person like you, a potentate from the dao of devils, would actually ask for help from people like these. Aren’t you worried about your reputation?”

The white-clothed Exalted Celestial Exultation looked Yang Qi up and down and said, “Reputation? Do you think I lived this long worrying about reputation? I'm not like you people from the dao of righteousness, who spend so much time worrying about standing and prestige. In the god world, you either live or you die. What does reputation count for? Once you walk the dao of devils, you walk it your entire life. And people from the dao of devils value survival and profit, nothing else. So, you’re a Consummate God pretending to be a Lesser God? It’s hard for me to tell for sure one way or the other. If you’re really a Lesser God, you must harbor some heaven-shaking, earth-shattering secret. And if you’re a Consummate God, the fact that you killed some disciples from the Emptyhell Throne means you’ve earned the death sentence.”

Yang Qi laughed. “It sounds like you’re saying that it doesn’t matter who I am, I'm going to die one way or the other.”

“That’s right,” said the black-robed Devil-Lord Jubilation “It doesn’t matter who you are, you’re going to die shortly. Even if you’re really just some Lesser God from the junior generation, we’ll use our most ruthless tactics, and won’t show any mercy. Reputation be damned.”

“Why are you so convinced that I’ll be the one dying, and not you?” Yang Qi asked. “You shouldn’t overestimate yourselves. Alright, let’s get started. I haven't had a fight like this since my latest breakthrough. I'm really curious to see what it’s like to fight three Consummate Gods. Will you three be unable to deal with me, or will my cultivation base be insufficient to kill the three of you?”

“Summon the formation!” Lone King Heavenbane said. He, Devil-Lord Jubilation, and Exalted Celestial Exultation weren’t taking Yang Qi lightly at all. They weren’t the type to be swayed by random things, and definitely weren’t lulled by Yang Qi’s seemingly low cultivation base. Even if he looked like nothing but a pig, they would still go all out to make sure that he died, and there weren't any accidents.

As a result, a huge devil formation popped into being above them, almost like a gigantic turtle shell, covered with countless underworld inscriptions. It looked like some sort of magical device that the infernal deities of hell would use when they waged war against the halls of heaven.

“The Hellfire Reincarnation Disc!” Yang Qi murmured, looking surprised.

Chapter 1258: Reincarnation God Item

In yesteryear, hell had waged war against the halls of heaven and the Sovereign Lord. And the most powerful magical device the infernal deities had used was the Reincarnation Disc. It contained the boundless essence of the netherworld, fused with the ancient will of the infernal deities, making it capable of unleashing the most intense power of reincarnation. It could destroy the heavens and crush the earth, and had been one of the most incomparable weapons used in defiance of the Sovereign Lord.

The spell formations connected to the Reincarnation Disc had long since been lost in the river of time, but now it was back, and being used with devastatingly destructive force.

The three Consummate Gods, Lone King Heavenbane, Devil-Lord Jubilation, and Exalted Celestial Exultation were invincible figures, and for them to pool their devil powers to unleash this devil formation showed that they were going all out to crush Yang Qi.

“This is the ancient infernal grand formation of reincarnation,” Lone King Heavenbane said in a cold voice. “The Reincarnation Disc. The gods of hell in ancient times used their own bones to make a precious treasure, a turtle shell suit of armor that would never die even if millions upon millions of years passed. We acquired one such suit of armor, so even if you can control the transformations of space itself, you can’t escape us. And now you’ll meet your ultimate fate: death!”

Thump. Swish. Rustle.

He flew up into the air and reached out with fingers splayed. Shockingly, his fingers then transformed; distorted human faces appeared on their tips, their features devilish and fierce.

“Five Emotions, Five Faces. Happiness, Anger, Sorrow, Joy, Grief!Five Emotions Grand Palm!”

Buzzzz.

The five faces quivered with emotion that would affect any who looked at them, making it almost impossible to deal with the force on display.

However, that was when Yang Qi made his move, his arm as fluid as a whip as he unleashed the Mammoth King’s God Whip. A sound echoed out like the howl of millions upon millions of godlings. At the same time, the sky went dark as a streak of blackness appeared, opening like a mouth to consume everything in its path, including the devilishness and devil energy.

“Not good!” Lone King Heavenbane barked as the spatial rift closed in on them. He could tell that this wasn’t any ordinary rift; the spatial power on display was vibrating too quickly to track, and contained such profundities that it could be considered all-destructive.

Yang Qi was using a move from the Mammoth King’s God Whip called Ghost-God Laceration.

In the impure lands, he had been unable to grasp enlightenment of the deepest aspects of the Mammoth King’s God Whip. But now that he was in the god world, with his cultivation having reached immense heights and having formed monarch godhood, all of his martial arts were better.

And right now, he had no reason to hold back.

Lone King Heavenbane immediately retreated, not daring to allow the blow to land on him.

Roar!

Yang Qi spun, howling in a thunderous voice, growing so large that he towered over all three of the devil patriarchs. Then he clenched his hands into fists and struck out at Devil-Lord Jubilation.

It was a strike of ultimate perfection, as though the quintessence of the legion of gods were contained within it, a porcelain streak that pierced through the air and caused grating sounds to ring out as space itself burst into flame.

Devil-Lord Jubilation was shocked. Before he could even see the fist-wind, he sensed the strike closing in on him and knew that he couldn’t block it. If he did, he could tell that even though he was a Consummate God, he would explode, his godhood irreparably damaged.

Spinning to avoid the attack, he drew on a movement technique from the dao of devils called the Dance of Jubilant Heaven. It was a beautiful and artistic move that was designed to negate any type of hard and unyielding attack.

Yet as he danced about, Yang Qi suddenly spun round and round, his fist becoming like a flood of water unleashed from the highest mountains. Unexpectedly, he was changing directions!

Winds screamed and swirling clouds appeared around him as his attack suddenly targeted Exalted Celestial Exultation.

His two fists were merged into a single invincible attack, rushing forth like the tide.

Exalted Celestial Exultation didn't hesitate to fall back, moving as quickly as lightning, looking like a frightened animal as he tried to hide in the protection of the spell formation.

In the end, Yang Qi’s attack hit the turtle-shell-like spell formation, causing the entire thing to shake violently. Holes and cracks even opened up on it.

Yang Qi laughed loudly as a pair of wings sprouted out of his back. At the same time, he ripped open a rift in space, and as the immense spatial tempest poured out, he disappeared into the rift, leaving behind only a few words. “Very sloppy work, Devil Patriarchs. Your grand formation of reincarnation can't do anything to me. Thanks for giving me a taste of your cultivation bases. Sooner or later, we’ll meet again, but for now, let’s call it a day. I have to say, I'm disappointed you didn’t dare to meet my attack just now.”

Yang Qi had unleashed three moves in quick succession, then departed. He could tell that these three patriarchs of the dao of devils were a bit too tough for him to eliminate quickly. At most, he might be able to seriously injure one or two of them before getting tangled up in a complicated fight. So he used one move from the Mammoth King’s God Whip and two fist strikes of immense power, forcing the three experts back into their own formation, then fled. Truth be told, although he had backed down from the fight, the method he used was so shocking that if news got back to the House of God Ordainment, it would cause a huge stir.

That said, there was no way word would spread.

As the dust settled, the three devil patriarchs regrouped and exchanged extremely awkward glances. Obviously, not a single one of them was inclined to chase after Yang Qi. His blows had been unthinkably unusual, and they couldn’t help but envision what horrible things might happen if they actually caught up with him.

After a moment, all three said, “Infernal!”

The spell formation vanished, causing three chunks of bone to appear that resembled pieces of turtle shells, which fell into the hands of the three patriarchs.

Expression grim, Lone King Heavenbane said, “He’s strong. That formation of ours was used by the ancient dao of devils to fight the god items of the legion of gods. And although it’s not complete, it should be more than enough to weaken any opponent. But it didn’t seem like it weakened him at all. His fighting prowess is astonishing.”

“It’s hard to say, but I wouldn’t be surprised if he had some sort of formidable magical treasure,” Devil-Lord Jubilation said.

“No, I don’t think so,” Exalted Celestial Exultation said. “I didn’t sense the power of a magical treasure in that whip attack, or the two fist strikes. They were backed by pure godhood. At the very least, his godhood rotations can reach the level of one billion per second.”

“What?!” Lone King Heavenbane said.

“How could that be possible?” Devil-Lord Jubilation asked. “When outputting godpower, your godpower rotates the most rapidly of all. The more power, the fiercer the result. It doesn't work any other way. Lesser Gods should only be capable of somewhere between a thousand to ten thousand rotations per second. Only Common Gods can reach the level of tens of thousands of rotations per second, or possibly a hundred thousand. Greater Gods can reach levels of hundreds of thousands to millions, and early Consummate Gods will climb to tens of millions or possibly a hundred million. If his godhood was rotating at a billion times per second, doesn’t that mean he’s as strong as a mid or late Consummate God? Or possibly even peak? But he's definitely at the Lesser God level. And if a Lesser God rotates their godhood too quickly, it’ll collapse. How could his godhood possibly be that strong?”

“Maybe he has some sort of special godhood,” Exalted Celestial Exultation speculated. “But that seems unlikely. Even the strongest types of special godhood shouldn’t be capable of this. It’s absurd! For godhood to rotate that rapidly and not collapse is a miracle of miracles. In fact, based on my understanding, it’s literally impossible for any type of godhood, even the most special and unique type, to do that. Unless....”

“He has the legendary monarch godhood!” said Lone King Heavenbane and Devil-Lord Jubilation simultaneously.

“No,” Exalted Celestial Exultation replied, “there exist certain consummate magical treasures that can help you to rotate and strengthen your godhood. This is the god world, after all. Nothing is impossible. Although we’re old-timers, and understand some of the most profound secrets of the god world, we don’t know everything. There’s even Paramount Gods who don’t know everything about the god world. From ancient times until now, there’s never been a single person who successfully formed monarch godhood. Not even the top potentates and geniuses from the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty have done it. So how could someone from the House of God Ordainment have succeeded? I bet he’s actually a Consummate God who’s disguised himself as someone weaker. We just can’t see through the illusion, that’s all. For now, we can’t afford to have him as an enemy. Let’s run an investigation and find out his background. And we have to report to our superiors that a formidable entity has risen up in the House of God Ordainment.”

With that, the three devil experts departed. Not only were they not interested in chasing after Yang Qi at the moment, but they had also put aside the idea of getting revenge. The last thing they wanted was to be assassinated. They knew that if he really had it out for them, it would be difficult to stay safe.

After they left, Yang Qi appeared again. Accompanying him were Brahma, the Shepherd, Doom, and others among his most trusted subordinates. And all of them held beads in the form of a skull.

“Ah, it’s too bad. They fled.” Yang Qi shook his head. “With our dozens of skull beads, we could have surrounded them, destroyed their formation, and either sealed or killed them.”

“Three Consummate Gods?” Brahma said. “It wouldn’t be easy to take out people like that. They could’ve unleashed deadly devil arts and completely leveled this place. But it would definitely have attracted a lot of attention in the House of God Ordainment. Going forward, you need to be very careful.”

“Hmph! How dare people from the dao of devils cause problems for me!” Yang Qi chuckled coldly. “Alright, let’s go.”

Chapter 1259: One Crown Prince Versus the Other?

Although his fight with the three devil patriarchs hadn’t lasted very long, Yang Qi actually benefited a lot from it. New information about the attacks, formations, and godpower of Consummate Gods was now firmly etched in his mind. The truth was that among truly high-level experts, it often wasn’t necessary to fight a battle to the death. Sometimes, a mere gaze was enough to allow for a psychic interchange. Then, the battle might be over just a moment after it started, with both parties knowing exactly who had won and who had lost.

Right now, Yang Qi couldn’t kill even an early Consummate God, and when it came to mid Consummate Gods, he could at best hold his own in a fight.

Therefore, he needed to get stronger. Unfortunately, improving his monarch godhood wasn't something that could be done quickly, and in fact, he couldn’t do it at all until he got some more of the Mahātmā Jade.

Returning to the god kingdom, he continued working on his cultivation. For the time being, life was uncomplicated. The only major change was that instead of being in the Scripture Pavilion, he now resided in the Law-Enforcement God-Palace, which was a much, much larger place.

His accommodations were excellent, with numerous spell formations that provided spirit energy and godpower, and could transform one’s constitution. They were on the sixth floor of one of the best pagodas in the palace. The interior was a spatial dimension of its own, fully dozens of kilometers wide.

It had once been occupied by Crimson-Maiden Inferno, except that she now worked for Yang Qi. She, along with the White-Haired Boxer King and Exalted Celestial Silver-Dagger, were all Greater Gods who had high positions in the Law-Enforcement God-Palace. And now Yang Qi had access to their resources and networks, which in turn made him very important.

Days passed by relatively uneventfully.

In the blink of an eye, it was three months later. Yang Qi had spent all of that time working on his cultivation, trying to improve his psyche and will. Unfortunately, his progress to the mid Paramount level of will convergence wasn’t going particularly quickly. Based on some quick calculations, if he continued in this manner, it would take several hundred god world years for him to achieve his next breakthrough.

On a few occasions, he used his jade medallion to try gaining further understanding of the Crown Prince Society. Because it was packed with the aura of the society’s leader, the crown prince himself, it also contained faint traces of his destiny.

It was a given that the crown prince would have immense destiny. It was impossible to say how many smaller organizations the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty controlled, or how many experts they had working for them. The flows of destiny they commanded surpassed anything ordinary people could comprehend. Furthermore, the crown prince was trying to cultivate Unbounded will convergence, so Yang Qi knew he had to be very, very careful in spying on him.

‘It has to work this time,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘For three months I've been trying to use the crown prince’s aura to get information about him, but every attempt has been a failure. At least I’ve mastered some new techniques in the process. If he’s really the true self of the Crown Prince I knew in the impure lands, then it’s highly possible I could benefit a lot by interacting with him.’

Once again, he pulled out the jade medallion and toyed with it for a bit as he tried to unlock the mysteries of its energy fluctuations.

The medallion was a marvelous thing, and some of the energy that fluctuated off of it was designed to be a warding spell. However, to Yang Qi, it wasn’t anything to worry about. Things like that couldn’t reveal any information about his secrets.

All he had to do was call on his Life-Death Void-Destruction God-Lightning, which could fool all sorts of warding spells, making it seem like all he was doing was simply working on his cultivation nonstop.

And hopefully, he could use it to turn the tables and spy on the crown prince.

‘Time to bring back the Crown Prince from the impure lands....’ Stroking the jade medallion, he closed his eyes and the aura of the Creator appeared above him. It was the unique power of the Sovereign Lord, who was also called the Creator. After all, he had created countless humans, living beings, and races.

Yang Qi understood the profundities of genetics, the fundamentals of vivicreation, and had imperial-heaven pre-beginning powers. Because of that, it was possible for him to reach into the boundless river of time and draw out the life force quintessence of the Crown Prince from the impure lands.

After all, he had killed the Crown Prince, enabling him to take some of his aura and quintessence.

Another thing he had been doing during the past three months was seeking enlightenment of various aspects of his fragments of the Cruiser of Civilization. The Lord of Civilization had been a faithful follower of the Sovereign Lord, and his energy arts reflected that. In fact, he had even received personal instruction from the Sovereign Lord.

Drawing on the boundless skills to catalyze genes and life force, Yang Qi drew on his vivicreation power. Slowly but surely, vital energy swirled in front of him, and as he added in various medicinal ingredients from the god world, a tiny fetus formed in front of him. And it was no illusion; it was real! This was the god world, where things could be true and real.

Slowly, the image of a human took shape.

As the process went on, Yang Qi realized at a certain point that he was about to be drained of his godpower. Quickly using the God Legion Seal, he reached into the void to fill the gap.

Even a Consummate God who tried to do what he was doing would have already been killed by the drainage.

It was completely heaven-defying, and was definitely subverting the magical laws of the god world. Yang Qi was recreating the Crown Prince from the impure lands! This was nirvanic rebirth! His plan? To use the old Crown Prince as a tool, a pawn to deal with the crown prince of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty.

“Fetal Convergence; God Legion Power; Eternal Blessing; Heaven-Dao Transformation; I Shall Defy Heaven; Man Conquers Nature!” Yang Qi drew on his monarch godhood, extending his fingers to unleash countless transformations. Soon, buzzing sounds could be heard, like winds from the Nine Serenities underworld. They were sounds that could call out to the soul, and they were none other than a consummate technique from the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth that could reach out into the heavens and recall lost souls.

With each subsequent flick of his fingers, Yang Qi’s godpower surged, creating something like a mighty river. In fact, he completely drained himself over ten thousand times. In other words, this was like a Consummate God being totally drained of power over ten thousand times. It didn’t matter what type of medicinal pill someone used, that was a drainage that couldn’t be sustained. It was only with the God Legion Seal that he could defy heaven and subvert the magical laws of the god world to do so.

The fetus grew larger and larger until it looked like an infant version of the Crown Prince from the impure lands.

But Yang Qi didn’t stop there. He continued to work hard and expend energy. Forty-nine days passed in which he didn’t rest for a moment. By that time, his godpower had been completely drained fully a hundred thousand times over!

Finally, what had started out as a fetus now looked like a full-grown human, with features exactly like those of the old Crown Prince. In fact, he looked just as arrogant and crazy as before.

“Boundless Psyche; Call Spiritual and Physical Souls; Bring them into Unison; No Death in Heaven and Earth; Magnanimous and Fluttering; the Will Shines Eternally....” Yang Qi interlocked his fingers to look like a blooming lotus flower. ‘Use the moment of life force transformation to catalyze the being. Illuminate the future path. Seek what is true and real of he that exists in the void. Reach out to the illusory impure lands, and bring him into the true and real god world....’

SPLAT!

Yang Qi’s godhood had been pushed to an unprecedented limit. Even a Consummate God would have long since been dead by this point. Spitting out some blood, he created a bubble that surrounded the Crown Prince, drawing a boundless will from the void and sucking him inside.

RUMBLE!

Everything trembled violently.

The Crown Prince slowly opened his eyes, looking like a terrifying fiend-devil.

But his cultivation base was only at the Great Sage level! If it weren’t for the fact that Yang Qi had him inside a bubble created by the Purrfect God Art, he would have immediately been destroyed by the environment of the god world.

After the Great Sage level came Demi-Immortal, Demolisher and Godmyth. After that were the nine stairs of the Deathless Heavenly Stairway, whereupon one became a Grand Emperor. After that, one needed mid Terrifying will convergence, where it would be possible to pass through the Ancient Road to the Gods and reach the god world. But a Great Sage, even one in the early Terrifying level, would instantly die in the god world.

It wasn’t even worth talking about Great Sages in the god world. People like that were so pathetically weak that they weren’t even one-ten-thousandth as strong as an ant. In other words, the tiniest of bugs in the god world could easily devour millions upon millions of Great Sages.

Yang Qi had resurrected the Crown Prince at exactly the same level in which he had died, way back in Sage Monarch City on the Rich-Lush Continent, during their climactic final battle.

In other words, this Crown Prince was the same Crown Prince as back then. The only difference was that he now lacked one of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions.

Yang Qi had bent the magical laws of the god world, drawing on his monarch godhood and the might of the God Legion Seal to recreate his life force and genes, restoring his destiny, psyche, personality, and everything else about him.

They were all exactly the same!

The Crown Prince looked around. “Where am I? I’m not dead? How long have I been unconscious? This isn’t the Rich-Lush Continent! I led eighteen Great Sages to destroy Yang Qi, but he killed me. How could I have been resurrected?”

The Crown Prince even had his memories up to the moment of his death.

As such, it was only natural that his first thoughts upon being resurrected were questions about what exactly was going on.

After looking around, he realized that he was in some sort of bubble that obscured his view of the world beyond. Circulating his true energy, he found that it flowed mightily, to the point where he might actually be on the verge of a breakthrough. Suddenly, rumbling sounds filled his ears as he achieved multiple breakthroughs in the Great Sage level. The Born Again Step. The Nirvanic Resurrection Step. The Eternal Sands Step. The True Real Step. The Light King Step. The Heavenly Workings Step. The Planet God Step. The Without Limit Step. And finally the ninth Epic Saga Step. With that, he broke out of the Great Sage level and entered the Demi-Immortal level.

“What’s going on here? Not only am I not dead, but I’ve ended up in some strange bubble where I'm experiencing multiple breakthroughs. I’ve already left the Great Sage level and broken into the Demi-Immortal level.” The Crown Prince looked at his hands, scarcely able to believe what was happening. Then he burst out laughing. “The Demi-Immortal level?! There are hardly any Demi-Immortals in the Rich-Lush Continent and the Quake-Dawn Continent! Yang Qi, you’re only in the sixth Legendary transformation! Even if you do have the God Legion Seal, how could you possibly do anything to me? Can a Personal-Domain Legendary do anything to a Demi-Immortal!?”

Chapter 1260: How Could This Be Happening?

The Crown Prince remembered dying.

But here he was, resurrected, with his cultivation base climbing higher and higher. He had gone through all nine steps of the Great Sage level until he was a Demi-Immortal. Furthermore, it seemed like he still had more breakthroughs in him. He could tell that it was no illusion, and of course, it caused joy to surge in his heart. In fact, he was already itching with the desire to get out into the open and give vent to his ever-increasing hatred of Yang Qi.

After all, if Yang Qi was in the sixth Legendary transformation, and the Crown Prince was a Demi-Immortal, it would be a simple thing to kill him.

“Ah, the God Legion Seal,” the Crown Prince murmured. “Yang Qi is a bearer of the God Legion Seal. Unfortunately for him, now that I'm a Demi-Immortal, crushing him out of existence will be easy. Then I’ll exterminate his entire clan. No, wait. That would be making it too easy on them. I’ll treat them like the basest animals. The women will be enslaved, and the men will become eunuchs.”

Clenching his hand into a fist, he unleashed a mighty fist strike.

The Son of Heaven’s Godfist!

RUMBLE!

The fist hit the surrounding bubble and did nothing. It didn’t even cause a banging sound.

“Hmm?” Confusion fluttered in his heart. “Wait, what’s going on here? Am I captive in this thing? Hold on, I remember something happening the moment I died. Something unexpected. Don’t tell me that I'm trapped inside King Immortal-Slayer’s legacy medallion! Or am I in an immortal world somewhere? I need to reach immortal ascension! I need to get to the immortal worlds! The immortal worlds are a truly worthy destination. I'm going to become the ruler of the Titan Emperor Heaven!”

Meanwhile, Yang Qi was on the outside, watching what was happening inside the bubble. He could hear everything the Crown Prince was raving about, and could see his cultivation base increasing. It had been a lot of work, but he had successfully recreated the Crown Prince.

And this Crown Prince contained all of the personality and memories of the earlier version, including his hatred of Yang Qi.

It was a perfect recreation in every way.

Of course, it only worked because, after killing the Crown Prince, Yang Qi had absorbed his psyche, will, and even his flesh and blood. Without that, he would have failed, even with divine abilities vastly more powerful than his current arsenal.

Furthermore, this recreated Crown Prince was far, far too weak. If he somehow escaped the bubble he was in, he would die. He needed to stay in that bubble and continue working on his cultivation until he was a Quasi-God. Only then would it be safe to emerge.

This recreated Crown Prince was what Yang Qi intended to use to make his move against the crown prince of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty.

As soon as Yang Qi heard there was a Crown Prince Society in the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty, he had guessed it had something to do with the Crown Prince from the impure lands. It had taken months of research, but he was now absolutely convinced that the Crown Prince in the impure lands had been an expression of the crown prince’s divine will. However, after sending that divine will into the impure lands, the crown prince had lost his connection to it. That divine will had eventually grown into a completely separate entity, similar to what had occurred with Yang Qi and his immortal-slaying clone.

That said, they still had the same essence and origin. Their energy and soul structure were the same, a fact that Yang Qi intended to take advantage of. In fact, after his recreation of the Crown Prince reached godly ascension, he would subjugate him with the God Legion Seal, and use him to spy on the true crown prince’s every action.

Unfortunately, the true crown prince was just too strong. And if he achieved Unbounded will convergence, he would probably become impossible to control. And he would likely be able to find out the truth about Yang Qi. Unless Yang Qi himself also formed Unbounded will convergence, he would be too weak to defend himself.

“Who's out there? Are you King Immortal-Slayer?” The Crown Prince let loose a bevy of fist strikes on the bubble, but none of them did any good. Compared to the Purrfect God Art, the cultivation base of a Demi-Immortal was like nothing. The Crown Prince was like an ant trying to tear down a mountain. “Where am I? How come there wasn’t any tribulation when I reached the Demi-Immortal level? Why was it so easy?”

As he asked these questions, the bubble suddenly started transforming. A pagoda appeared, along with an illusory region that were all created by Yang Qi using his Life-Death Void-Destruction God-Lightning within the Purrfect God Art. Of course, to the Crown Prince, the illusions were all completely real.

The Crown Prince shivered as he saw a world unfold in front of him, complete with a continent, stars, a sun, a moon, and spirit energy.

He inhaled deeply, then shivered with delight as creaking and cracking sounds rang out within him. Unexpectedly, he went from the first order of the Demi-Immortal to the second.

However, at the very same time, he caught sight of a person walking toward him. When he saw who it was, his eyes tightened with anger. It was none other than his most hated archenemy Yang Qi!

Bursting into laughter, he said, “I can’t believe you’re here, Yang Qi. Are you ready to be killed by me? I'm already at the Demi-Immortal level!” All of a sudden, the Crown Prince lunged forward, attacking Yang Qi with a deadly move from the Son of Heaven’s Godfist.

However, before the attack could even get close to Yang Qi, it simply fell apart.

Voice cool, Yang Qi said, “We meet again, Crown Prince. It’s been a very, very long time. I know you remember what happened on the Rich-Lush Continent, and how I killed you. Do you have any idea where we are now?”

“Stop trying to sound so impressive, Yang Qi. What do you mean? Where are we?” The Crown Prince was arrogant and egotistical, but even though the blow he had just unleashed was a formidable one, it had done nothing. Everything since he was resurrected had been strange and mystifying. Therefore, he was secretly circulating his energy arts to defend himself, but preparing a killing move to unleash on Yang Qi at the same time, hopefully inflicting a fatality with a single move.

Yang Qi didn’t bother to even check what he was doing with his energy arts. “This is the god world.”

In response to this revelation, the Crown Prince’s face filled with a look of complete and utter shock. In fact, it took him a long moment to regain his composure. “The god world? Are you kidding me? Even if you said we were in an immortal world, I wouldn’t believe you, much less the god world. Are you trying to convince me this is a dream or something? Or that I've fallen into some sort of illusion?”

“Sad to say, I actually did kill you in the impure lands. You need to calm down. I’ve already reached godly ascension, which is how I resurrected you. If you don’t believe me, just look. I’ll show you everything that happened after you died. Watch for yourself.”

He waved his hand, causing an image to appear in front of the Crown Prince that showed all of the main events that played out after his death: Yang Qi destroying the Demi-Immortal Institute; the creation of the Sage Monarch Continent; the destruction of the Quake-Dawn Continent; the eradication of the Titan Emperor Collegium; the ascension to the immortal worlds; the devastation of the Titan Emperor Heaven; the invasion of the future world; the creation of the Dao Defense League; the struggles that ended with Yang Qi becoming league-lord; the appearance of the Great Necropolis; the restructuring of the immortal worlds; the establishment of the Sage Monarch League, and all the bloodbaths that came along with it; and finally the events on the Ancient Road to the Gods and the fight with Proud Heaven.

At that point, Yang Qi combined all the pieces of the God Legion Seal and ascended to the god world.

That was where the images ended.

The process took several hours, and it left a deep impression in the Crown Prince’s mind. When it was over, the Crown Prince looked aghast. Back on the Rich-Lush Continent, he had been the type of arrogant person who defied all laws and principles, even those of the heavens. But after what he had just seen, he understood what it truly meant to be someone who saw the sky from the bottom of a well.

“No. How could this be happening? It’s not real, is it? I really died? And you resurrected me in the god world?” The Crown Prince seemed like he was going through some kind of mental breakdown.

“That’s right,” Yang Qi said coolly. “You’re a Demi-Immortal now, but that's only because of the godpower I imparted to you. Furthermore, what you see around you is also a manifestation of my godpower. If you leave this place, you’ll be crushed out of existence by the paramount magical laws of the god world. You need to push your cultivation to the mid Terrifying level as quickly as possible, got it?”

“Like hell, Yang Qi. I'm going to kill you! I can’t believe you’d try to frighten me with an illusory region like this! Ohhhh. I know what’s happened. You killed me and captured my soul, and we’re in the Demi-Immortal Institute.” Raising his voice to a shout, he cried, “Son of Heaven’s Godfist; Nine Prefectures Sink into Ruin; Nine Cauldrons become Complete; Nine Times Nine is Paragon!Grand Emperor of Heaven and Earth!”

Rumbling sounds echoed out as he sent another fist flying in Yang Qi’s direction. However, before it could touch him, the attack crumbled into nothing.

“Ai...” sighed Yang Qi. “Fine, I’ll dispel the illusion so you can see the god world around you.” As the words left his mouth, all of the surrounding images collapsed and the Crown Prince once again saw himself surrounded by a bubble.

Taking the bubble with him, Yang Qi flew over to a teleportation portal and exited the god kingdom. Normally speaking, outside cultivators weren’t allowed inside the god kingdom, but the Crown Prince was a mere Demi-Immortal, making him like a speck of dust on the wing of a fly. The god kingdom wouldn’t even react to someone as weak as that.

“That back there is the god kingdom of the House of God Ordainment, one of the top sects in the god world. Out here, you can see what the god world is really like. See those people over there? They’re Quasi-Gods. If it weren’t for this bubble of mine surrounding you, you're so weak that you would die in an instant. You don’t even remotely qualify to exist in the god world.”

At first, the Crown Prince didn’t believe any of what Yang Qi was saying. But eventually, three days passed, and as he observed everything that was happening, he gradually came to realize that he really was in the god world. He had died, and Yang Qi had rescued him. Or if not rescued him, at least recreated him.

Of course, it only caused the hatred in his heart to grow, and made him wish more than ever that Yang Qi was dead. “Maybe you killed me, Yang Qi, but there’s no way you can make me acknowledge allegiance to you. You’ll always be my enemy. I don’t care if you’re a god, I’ll never submit to you. And one day, I’ll kill you. Then you’ll know the truth of the saying raising a tiger is inviting calamity.”

“You might as well forget trying to do that, Crown Prince,” Yang Qi said. “I created you, and I can destroy you. Right now, you’re weaker than a speck of dust. So work on your cultivation and get to the Quasi-God level. Once you can get out of that bubble, I have work for you. Namely, reaching godly ascension. Remember, if it weren’t for me, you wouldn’t even be in the Demi-Immortal level.”

With that, he flicked his sleeve, sucking the bubble containing the Crown Prince inside.

During the three days that had just passed, he’d been watching the Crown Prince and had confirmed that the fluctuations of his thoughts were very similar to the fluctuations of the jade amulet. In fact, they almost seemed like they belonged to the same person. Although the Crown Prince was extremely weak right now, once he reached godly ascension, he would be the perfect tool to use against the crown prince of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty.

Chapter 1261: Dragon Floret

Months passed.

Yang Qi performed some calculations on his fingers and came to the realization that he had been in the god world for three years. It wasn’t a long time, but couldn’t be considered short either. Most people wouldn’t consider three god world years to be very impressive, but during that time he had created a very solid foundation in the House of God Ordainment.

He had three Greater Gods under his complete control, namely Crimson-Maiden Inferno, the White-Haired Boxer King, and Exalted Celestial Silver-Dagger. As such, he could call the wind and summon the rain in the sect. Furthermore, his friends and family were advancing rapidly in their cultivation, and as they built their own foundations of power, were starting to make names for themselves.

In fact, during the past year, the Shepherd, Eldest Brother, Doom, Brahma and the others had used their crystal skulls to accomplish all sorts of missions for the sect. With the power of Consummate Gods, they slaughtered wretch-devils, earned merit points, and had come to be very valuable to the sect. According to rumor, some of Yang Qi’s people had even been in audiences with Perfect Gods, which was a shocking thing.

Perfect Gods commanded peak Paramount will convergence, and were in the position to break through to Unbounded will. They existed at the top echelon of power in the sect, and their words were considered commands. Even Greater Gods would kneel to them.

Consummate Gods were somewhat powerful.

Perfect Gods were extremely powerful.

Of course, Paramount Gods existed above them all. They were patriarchs who could create sects and offer the protection of god kingdoms. And experts like that were exceedingly rare.

In fact, Yang Qi hadn’t heard anything to indicate that there was even a Paramount God in the House of God Ordainment at all. If there was, he likely had to reach a much higher level of cultivation before he would be privy to such information.

During the months that passed, the Crown Prince came to his senses and resigned himself to the truth that Yang Qi had recreated him. He remained inside the Purrfect God Art bubble, working hard on his cultivation and constantly contemplating ways to get revenge. In that respect, he was like a dangerous viper just waiting to lunge out with a deadly bite.

For the most part, Yang Qi ignored him. All he needed was for the Crown Prince to eventually become a god. Then he would force him into submission and make him a part of the God Legion Seal. And then he would finally be confident in his ability to take on the crown prince of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty.

The Crown Prince’s cultivation base continued to climb.

He went from Demi-Immortal to Demolishing to Godmyth, eventually ending up as a Grand Emperor on the ninth stair of the Deathless Heavenly Stairway.

Anyone from the impure lands who watched him rise through the ranks like that would have been completely flabbergasted, but truth be told, no one in the god world would be impressed.

In the god world, Grand Emperors were considered scum. In fact, they couldn’t even breathe in the god world. Unfortunately, after becoming a Grand Emperor, the Crown Prince found himself stuck at the peak of the Destabilizing level of will conversion. He was in a bottleneck, unable to reach the Terrifying level, but Yang Qi wasn’t worried. He had helped many of his people in the impure lands break through to the terrifying level, and the task would be even easier now that he was in the god world.

Of course, there was a downside to the Crown Prince’s astonishingly fast progress. The fact that he didn’t experience any tribulations was actually bad for his cultivation base, and led to an almost lackadaisical attitude on his part. It was like an ordinary person who was given an immense loan, and didn’t have to work to survive. It would be fun while it lasted, but once the money ran out, they would be in trouble.

Most people who ascended from the impure lands were invincible experts. However, despite the fact that the Crown Prince was technically an Ascendant, he had come to the god world in a very different fashion. Because of that, he was like many of the natives of the god world, lacking experience and a solid foundation. In fact, he could even be considered inferior to many god world natives.

That said, Yang Qi didn’t need him to have a strong foundation. He was raising the Crown Prince almost like livestock, and all he cared about was getting his cultivation base to the right point as quickly as possible.

When the Crown Prince finally reached his bottleneck, Yang Qi simply drew on his own will to stimulate his mind, and simultaneously fed him numerous medicinal agents that could stimulate the psyche.

Only a day later... Pop!

The Crown Prince entered the Terrifying level. The next major hurdle was the mid Terrifying level, after which he would finally be able to survive on his own in the god world.

Unfortunately, pushing the Crown Prince into the mid Terrifying level wouldn’t be easy for Yang Qi. Or at least, it would be time-consuming.

But he would make the attempt. However, just as he was preparing to begin, his communication medallion buzzed with a message from Jadefall. “Yang Qi, the leader of the Dragon Society, Dragon Floret, has come out of seclusion. He’s invited me to a meeting, and I’d like you to come with me.”

“Hmm?”

Yang Qi waved his hand and sealed the Crown Prince in the depths of the God Legion Seal, where Yang Qi had created a very small god kingdom. There, the Crown Prince would remain undetected by the House of God Ordainment’s god kingdom.

Yang Qi left the Law-Enforcement God-Palace and went further into the god kingdom, until he reached a location where a sprawling palace had been built atop an expanse of green clouds. This was Jadefall’s mansion grotto. During the past few months, her cultivation base had grown more refined, and she had advanced to the mid Common God level. Over the course of the next four or five years, as long as she continued advancing in her cultivation, she would eventually become a Greater God.

The biggest problems Yang Qi’s people had were the lack of time and lack of resources.

If they had a few dozen more years in the House of God Ordainment, or perhaps a few hundred, they would definitely come to control the entire sect.

“Yang Qi! You're here!” Jadefall was clearly excited to see him. “I heard you’ve been in seclusion recently. What exactly were you doing?”

“Working on something big. And I'm getting close to a breakthrough. Unfortunately, it's going to take a lot of resources for me to reach the mid Lesser God level. My monarch godhood makes things very difficult. You wouldn’t believe how much energy it uses. So, what’s going on with this Dragon Floret?”

“Look at the invitation card,” she replied, handing it to him.

He took it, and the first thing that struck him was how heavy it was; it was clearly made of some sort of metal. The actual words were written in calligraphy as flamboyant as dancing dragons and swirling phoenixes.

“Come to me for a chat. Dragon Floret”.

They were written in such a bold and impressive style that anyone who read them would instantly realize that the person who wrote them was both ambitious and powerful.

“I thought he was in seclusion trying to break out of the Consummate God level and become a Perfect God,” Yang Qi said. “And isn’t he working on Unbounded will convergence? Given the current situation, I would assume he didn’t succeed in any breakthroughs. That said, we still can't afford to underestimate him.”

“That’s why I asked you to come along,” Jadefall replied. “And it’s not as if I can refuse to see him. That would be downright insulting.” She stroked the purrling, which rested in her arms. “That said, any banquet thrown by him is certain to be a deadly trap. He’s definitely not inviting me out of goodwill, so we have to be very careful.”

“As long as he isn’t a Perfect God, and doesn’t have Unbounded will convergence, he’ll be easy to deal with. I’ve gained a lot of enlightenment in the past few years; he definitely won’t be in the position to be a threat to me.”

“Well, we also have the purrling on our side,” Jadefall said, “which means that no one will dare to cause any problems for me.”

“Let’s go. I'm curious to see what this leader of the Dragon Society is all about.” Yang Qi and Jadefall left, and before long they were standing in front of a divine mountain that rested on a cloud bank in the middle of the god kingdom. It was fully twenty-seven thousand meters tall, and resembled a writhing dragon. At first glance, Yang Qi could tell that it was a god item of some sort, a magical treasure that could easily match up with any of the seventy-two monarchs’ items.

In fact, it was something akin to the Cruiser of Civilization.

‘Darnit,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘I spent so much time working on the Crown Prince that I forgot to ask the White-Haired Boxer King for more information about the Dragon Society. He definitely could’ve told me about Dragon Floret. Of course, compared to the crown prince, the Dragon Society isn’t very important at all.’

As they neared, Jadefall said, “This is the foundation of the Dragon Society. It's called Mount Dragon Head, and supposedly, it was built from the spine of a patriarch of the Dragonfolk. It’s considered a top treasure in the god world, and after it was discovered by Dragon Floret, it helped him advance his cultivation base with explosive speed. That’s how he reached the peak Consummate God level. It’s also how he mastered his signature ability, the Ancestral Dragon Burst.”

“Who goes there!?” a disciple said, flying out and staring at Yang Qi and Jadefall with cold eyes. He held a trident in his hand, and was flanked by a whole group of disciples. The lead disciple was a Common God, while the rest were Lesser Gods. The fact that so many disciples were guarding the residence of another disciple only went to show how powerful the Dragon Society was. After all, they were one of the top societies in the sect, just below the Mystery Society.

“Here’s my invitation card,” Jadefall said, handing it out. “Dragon Floret asked us here.”

“Well, if it isn’t Miss Jadefall,” the Common God disciple said, his expression turning slightly more respectful. And he couldn’t help but eye the purrling. Truth be told, the fact that Jadefall was only a Common God meant that she didn’t personally command a lot of respect. However, everyone knew that the purrling was hers, and that anyone who tried causing problems for her would meet a dismal fate because of it.

“Yes,” Jadefall said. “Now please escort us into Dragon Floret’s banquet.”

“I'm sorry, Miss Jadefall,” the disciple said. “Your friend here doesn’t have an invitation card, so I can't let him in.”

“What? We’re not even allowed to bring guests? In that case, I guess I won’t be attending.” She turned to leave.

“There’s no need to get angry, Miss Jadefall,” someone said. “It’s just a matter of invitation cards.” The voice belonged to a very attractive young woman with long legs, and a figure as graceful as an immortal crane.

WHOOSH!

An invitation card appeared in her hand which she tossed out, sending it flying toward Yang Qi.

He grabbed it and looked over at the young woman. “Might I dare ask how to address you?”

The beautiful woman was a Greater God, and was clearly no weaker than the White-Haired Boxer King.

“She’s a leader in the Dragon Society,” Jadefall said, “Goddess Jade Egret. Her leg techniques are incredible, enough to kill innumerable experts from the dao of devils.”

Chapter 1262: Dragon Floret (2)

Yang Qi had noticed from the get-go that Goddess Jade Egret had particularly long and shapely legs.

That said, he wasn’t interested in them because they were attractive. He could tell that she cultivated some boundless leg technique with them, which was why they were so perfect. They were legs that could captivate the soul, and at the same time, take one’s life.

Upon seeing how casually Yang Qi caught the speeding invitation card, Goddess Jade Egret reacted with visible surprise.

“Excellent kung fu. You definitely qualify to attend the leader’s banquet. The two of you can come with me.”

“I'm curious to see who else will be in attendance,” Yang Qi said.

“Invitations were sent to the leaders of the Brilliant Radiance Society, Preheaven Society, Honorable Glory Society... in fact, the leaders of several dozen of the societies got them. There will even be some venerable elder kings in attendance. In fact, you and Jadefall will be the only people in attendance who aren’t Consummate Gods.” She looked at Yang Qi. “Unfortunately, since I extended you an invitation at the last minute, there won’t be a seat for you. You’ll have to stand at Jadefall’s side.”

“What?!” Jadefall said, her eyes widening.

“It's fine,” Yang Qi said. “That won’t be a problem.”

They entered Mount Dragon Head, which was filled with endless palaces and mansion grottos, and had countless streams of powerful vital energy going this way and that. Yang Qi secretly tried to absorb some of that vital energy, only to completely fail.

“This is the ultimate foundation of the Dragon Society,” Goddess Jade Egret said with a smile. “Mount Dragon Head, which contains the animadestiny vital energy of an ancient dragon patriarch. Of course, other than members of the Dragon Society, no one can actually absorb that vital energy.” It was almost as though Goddess Jade Egret knew that Yang Qi had surreptitiously tried to do just that. “Once someone becomes a member of the Dragon Society, our esteemed leader will provide that person with a dragon seed, which can be used in cultivation to absorb the vital energy of the dragon patriarch. The result is that one’s every move and action is filled with immense power, making our members the bane of wretch-devils. Furthermore, we can destroy all cultivation obstacles, and negate any sort of curse or damnification.”

“When you put it that way, Goddess Jade Egret,” Jadefall remarked, “it makes it seem like you want to recruit us into the Dragon Society.”

“We would love to have you in the Dragon Society! There are countless disciples who wish they could join, but can’t get in.”

“Unfortunately, we have no interest in joining,” Jadefall said coolly.

Goddess Jade Egret didn’t seem to get angry in response. Smiling, she led the way through the corridors, all of which were decorated with lanterns and colored banners, and were filled with disciples. The disciples were all very well-disciplined, and nobody spoke loudly as they went about their business.

‘This Dragon Floret is supposedly very impressive,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘But how impressive, I wonder? Is he a peak Consummate God? Does he have mid Paramount will convergence? Or late?’

Eventually, an immense golden palace appeared in front of them, dazzling and luxurious.

It also pulsed with immense energy. Using the Son of Heaven's Horoscopy, Yang Qi identified multiple auras, some of which were like mighty pillars, some of which were dense and incisive, and some that resembled twisting dragons.

There was one that was mightier than the others, like a pillar that could prop up heaven and earth, and seemed completely and utterly invincible.

Without question, that one belonged to Dragon Floret.

After entering the golden palace, Yang Qi caught sight of a sprawling square, within which dozens of tables had been set up, one table per guest. The figures seated at the tables were all leaders of powerful factions in the sect, who were flanked by attendants that were all Greater Gods. It was obvious that this banquet was only being attended by the most important people in the House of God Ordainment.

As for the leaders, they were all Consummate Gods.

In the seat of honor was a young man clad in golden garments embroidered with numerous golden dragons. He was handsome, but at the same time, extremely dignified. And he was surrounded by an energy field that created a spatial void behind him, within which it was just barely possible to make out the image of a lurking dragon, ready to lunge out with land-shaking, mountain-rocking force.

‘An illusory nascent divinity?’ Yang Qi thought. It was obvious that this person’s true nascent divinity was concealed in the god kingdom behind him. Of course, he was none other than the leader of the Dragon Society, Dragon Floret.

Nodding, Dragon Floret said, “Jadefall, you’re here. Please, have a seat....”

“Many thanks for your invitation,” she said. There was only one open seat, so she walked over and sat down.

As for Yang Qi, he remained standing at her side. Considering that all of the leaders present were Consummate Gods, and had Greater Gods as attendants, the fact that Yang Qi was a mere Lesser God really did make him stand out in a bad way.

That said, the attendees actually weren’t focused on him so much as they were on the purrling.

The purrling made a few purring sounds that Yang Qi interpreted to mean, “These people aren’t worth crap. They couldn’t possibly compare to me.”

Sadly, the purrling couldn't actually speak. However, considering its power and cultivation base, it seemed possible for it to eventually learn to communicate like humans. Perhaps it just believed itself to be too refined to do that. Perhaps it viewed speaking in the human tongue as too debasing, similar to how humans would view speaking with dogs to be debasing.

After Jadefall sat, Dragon Floret casually waved his hand in greeting to his guests. “Ladies and gentlemen, the reason I came out of seclusion isn’t because I achieved the breakthrough I sought. However, I did gain some significant enlightenment. I trust all of you know which enlightenment I was seeking?”

“Pray tell,” said one of the guests, a man in a long white robe who glowed with a faint but brilliant radiance. He had a lonely look that seemed to come from being an amazing expert.

He was none other than the leader of the Brilliant Radiance Society, an organization that was a clear rival of the Dragon Society.

“The answer has to do with why I invited Jadefall to this gathering,” Dragon Floret said. “You see, all of us here today are either late Consummate Gods, or at the peak of that level. For us, breaking through and reaching a higher level of enlightenment is a very difficult thing, if not impossible. In many ways, the only path to success is by acquiring some unique and unusual asset.”

The next person to speak was the dour-faced Wang Xiantian, leader of the Preheaven Society. “Presumably you’re talking about some sort of divine creature like that purrling.”

The glare in his eye showed that he hadn’t forgotten his previous humiliation at the hand of the purrling. From what Yang Qi could tell, this man was sinister, vicious, and adept at crafty plots and machinations. Although, he couldn’t match up to Dragon Floret in that regard.

“That's right, I'm talking about the purrling,” Dragon Floret said. “No amount of research on my part provided any information about it. And there were even members of the senior generation who are similarly stumped. The bubbles created by the purling are completely invincible, and can destroy anything inside them. The god world has never before seen anything like it. It’s definitely a perfect level of power. As long as I can acquire some of its blood to make into a medicinal pill, I wouldn’t have any problem breaking through to the Perfect level, and also developing Unbounded will convergence.”

“It's really that miraculous?” said the leader of the Brilliant Radiance Society. Obviously, the idea of a breakthrough was something all of them found very enticing.

“Absolutely. I was told this fact by one of the Paramount God old-timers. In fact, it was none other than Patriarch Deva!”

Many of the leaders were shocked.

“What? Patriarch Deva?”

“You’ve met Patriarch Deva? He's one of the top patriarchs, an old-timer who was around during the time of the Sovereign Lord. He remains hidden in a secret and chaotic flow of space-time, in the depths of his own god kingdom. He never makes public appearances, and generally speaking, only Paramount Gods even have the chance to meet him and get some advice. How did you get an audience with him?”

“That's classified,” Dragon Floret said, sounding very pleased with himself. “That said, Patriarch Deva was very interested in the purrling, and he even gave me a talisman specially designed to capture it and take its blood.”

“So” said the leader of the Brilliant Radiance Society, “it was after meeting Patriarch Deva that you decided to throw this banquet and carry out the plan he suggested?”

“That’s right. I invited Jadefall here for the specific purpose of asking her to give me some of the purrling’s blood. Hopefully, she’ll give us all a share, even herself. Well, Jadefall, what do you say?”

WHACK!

Slapping the table, Jadefall shot to her feet. “You invited me here because you're after my purrling? Listen carefully: that’s never going to happen!”

The purrling had emerged from the porcelain godspore she had borne for many years, so how could she possibly allow others to tap into its power?

“We’re not asking for a handout, Jadefall,” Dragon Floret said. “With the blood of the purrling, I can guarantee you that at least ten people here will become Perfect Gods. And it’s likely some would even reach the Unbounded level. That would be a huge benefit to the sect, don’t you think?”

“A benefit to the sect?” Jadefall said coldly. “More like a benefit to you! I’ll take my leave now.”

“Don’t be in such a hurry!” Dragon Floret said, and he gave a meaningful look to some of his subordinates, who quickly closed all of the exit doors.

“What’s the meaning of this, Dragon Floret? Are you really going to defy all the laws and principles of the sect, and attack me right here in the god kingdom? You're still a disciple of the House of God Ordainment. Your Dragon Society may be powerful, but don’t forget that the Mystery Society keeps an eye out for rebellious behavior.” Jadefall wasn’t actually worried at all about the situation. With Yang Qi at her side, she was confident that any danger could be resolved.

“No, no, it's not like that,” Dragon Floret said, wagging his finger. “I would never make a move on you. I always follow the rules. I simply wanted to give everyone a chance to vote on the matter. Don’t tell me you really won’t consider the good of the sect?”

Chapter 1263: Unable to Withstand a Single Blow

Looking at Dragon Floret, Jadefall said, “As I said, I don’t see how this is for the benefit of the sect so much as you, personally. And I don’t care if you have a dozen faction leaders here. Even if you had hundreds, it still wouldn’t do you any good. Do you really think there aren’t rules in this sect of ours?”

“Oh, there are rules,” said Wang Xiantian from the Preheaven Society. “In fact, I seem to remember a sect rule about what happens when our sect comes across an important item. Remember, we’re all children of primeval chaos. So we have the right to call a Primeval Chaos Assembly.”

“Primeval Chaos Assembly?!” Jadefall said, her expression flickering.

As was explained in the Great Classic of God Ordainment, the children of primeval chaos were few in number but extremely important. They were considered the future hope of the House of God Ordainment, and they had the right to call assemblies to discuss the future of the sect. As long as at least thirty-six or more of the children of primeval chaos agreed, a Primeval Chaos Assembly could be held. And if all of the children of primeval chaos in attendance agreed about a matter, not even the houselord could oppose their decision.

After all, the children of primeval chaos all had the potential to be the future houselord. When they joined forces in a common cause, they could definitely change the future of the sect.

However, the children of primeval chaos all belonged to different factions, so it was generally unlikely that they would all work together. It was for that reason that a Primeval Chaos Assembly hadn’t been called for many, many years.

But now the subject was being brought up. And it wasn't a coincidence that there were more than thirty-six children of primeval chaos present. In fact, there were forty. And they had all come because of Dragon Floret’s promise of a blessing of power.

Whenever the houselord wanted to go into an extended period of seclusion, he would retire, and a new leader would be selected from among the children of primeval chaos. When that happened, the leaders of the various factions in the sect would campaign for support in their bid for the position. The position of houselord in the House of God Ordainment wasn’t handed out by appointment, nor was the position hereditary. Every disciple in the sect who had reached godly ascension was allowed to vote.

Usually, it came down to which faction was the strongest, and could bring in the most votes.

Competition was fierce, as that ensured that only the most powerful people would end up coming out on top.

It was a method that was actually quite popular among the large organizations in the god world. Of course, there were a lot of unwritten rules regarding the process. For example, in the House of God Ordainment, the largest faction was the Mystery Society, which was said to have been founded by the junior houselord. When the old houselord retired, it was a given that the junior houselord would be considered the top candidate to take over.

But there was no way the other children of primeval chaos would just allow that to happen. They would obviously do their best to change the overall situation in the sect.

However, there was a belief in the House of God Ordainment regarding the Mystery Society: “It doesn’t matter what faction you talk about, it definitely has members of the Mystery Society in it. The person standing right next to you could be one of them!”

The Mystery Society lived up to its name. It was huge, but so mysterious that few people knew much about it.

In any case, if the children of primeval chaos called an assembly here today, they could make a decision to force Jadefall to give them the blood of the purrling.

“What do you say?” Dragon Floret said. “Should we call a Primeval Chaos Assembly? I'm sure that everyone present would agree to take the blood of the purrling. And Patriarch Deva even provided a talisman that can be used to capture the thing. So don’t even think of telling it to run away. Don’t worry, considering you're a princess, we won't do anything to you. We’ll just take some of that blood and use it to make some medicinal pills. Alright? The alternative is for you to hand the purrling over to the sect.”

“How brazen of you!” Jadefall spat. Looking around at everyone else present, she said, “Don’t tell me that all of you are going to shamelessly stand with Dragon Floret in this. You're going to steal my pet? All you have to do is refuse to call the Primeval Chaos Assembly, and I’ll be very much in your debt. I’ll definitely repay you for a kindness like that.”

Wang Xiantian chuckled darkly. “And what repayment will you give, Jadefall? If we get the blood of that purrling, we can become Perfect Gods. And maybe we’ll even acquire Unbounded will. Don’t tell me that you can provide a reward as good as that?”

Many of the faction leaders were nodding in agreement. When it came down to it, compassion, familial love, and friendship didn’t really count for much. In the very end, power was the only thing that mattered. Without power, everything else was empty.

“Ladies and gentlemen,” Dragon Floret said, “the reason I called this banquet is because the time has come for a Primeval Chaos Assembly. Shall we cast our votes about whether to take the blood of the purrling? It's a simple matter. I have this talisman from Patriarch Deva, which can be used for that very purpose. The resulting medicinal pills will be shared equally among us all. Of that, you have my word.”

“I vote yes,” said Wang Xiantian. He had long hated Jadefall and the purrling, so it was a given that he would be quick to agree.

“I also vote yes,” said the leader of the Brilliant Radiance Society.

“I vote yes as well.”

“I also vote yes.”

One by one, the voices rang out. As it turned out, all of the faction leaders present, who of course were also children of primeval chaos, approved of the idea. After all, Yang Qi hadn’t been in the House of God Ordainment for very long, so few of them had interacted with him or knew what he was capable of.

Some of it was because Yang Qi hadn’t built a truly solid foundation in the sect yet. If he had, these people would have been more inclined to give him face, perhaps even by abstaining from voting.

But for now, none of them cared a whit about Jadefall and Yang Qi. The only reason any of them had shown even a bit of respect to Jadefall was because of the purrling, and now that Patriarch Deva had provided a talisman to capture it, even that modicum of respect went out the window.

Jadefall was a mere Common God, while they were all Consummate Gods. To them, even Greater Gods were nothing more than yes-men who wouldn’t dare to argue with them.

“Very well,” Dragon Floret said to Jadefall. “When the Primeval Chaos Assembly makes a decision, Jadefall, not even the houselord can countermand it. According to the rules of the sect, you must give us the blood of the purrling. Now.”

“You might as well quit dreaming!” Jadefall said icily.

Wang Xiantian chuckled in sinister fashion. “So you’re openly rebelling against the sect? The Primeval Chaos Assembly has made a decision, and you’re defying it. That’s outright treason! We have every right to arrest you right here and now. The only reason we're giving you a bit of face is that you’re the adopted daughter of an imperial concubine from the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty. Otherwise, we wouldn’t show the least bit of mercy. Do you know what the penalty for treason against the sect is? You should be thrown into Heaven Penitentiary and ravaged day and night by the savages there!”

“Enough with the wild talk, Wang Xiantian,” said the leader of the Brilliant Radiance Society. Obviously, he didn’t want to go too far in offending Jadefall. “Jadefall, the decision has been made by the Primeval Chaos Assembly. Not even the houselord has the power to go against it, much less you. Besides, you may have that purrling, but there are enough of us here to join forces and keep it under control. Furthermore, we have the talisman from Patriarch Deva. Even if your purrling were stronger than it is, Patriarch Deva is ten times stronger than any of the other patriarchs in the sect. If he's created something to keep the purrling in check, there’s no way anything could possibly overcome it.”

‘These assholes,’ Yang Qi thought. It was a tricky situation. Any of these faction leaders acting alone wouldn’t be worth worrying about. But they had joined forces, which was a different story. Even worse, they were in the middle of Mount Dragon Head, and had to deal with the talisman provided by Patriarch Deva.

He could sense the power of that talisman on Dragon Floret, and could tell that it was strong enough to destroy god kingdoms. It was something Yang Qi knew that he couldn’t quite handle.

Rumor had it that Patriarch Deva was a Paramount God who had been around since the Sovereign Lord’s Age. It was a given that he would vastly surpass any Paramount God that existed in modern times.

‘If this Patriarch Deva is from the Sovereign Lord’s Age, his nascent divinity should be contained in the God Legion Seal. Unfortunately, I can’t reveal that I have the seal. I wonder what the purrling thinks about all this.’ Plans and ideas flitting through his mind, he looked over at the purrling.

He knew that the purrling was intelligent, and that it was enlightened regarding the profound mysteries and invincible secrets of the god world. There was no way the purrling wouldn’t understand what was being said around it.

Sure enough, its ears were locked in a forward position. However, its eyes glittered with a look of pure ridicule. When Yang Qi saw that, he relaxed a bit.

Up to this point, he still wasn’t sure exactly how strong the purrling was, and was very interested in further demonstrations.

Purr. Purr....

All of a sudden, the purrling purred... at Yang Qi. And a tremor passed through him as he realized he understood what the Purrling meant.

“What did it say?” Jadefall asked.

Meanwhile, all of the faction leaders had gone completely silent and were looking at the purrling, wondering what it was trying to say. Obviously, none of them understood it.

“The purrling wants me to translate for it,” Yang Qi said. He wasn’t sure if it was his understanding of the Purrfect God Art, or his God Legion Seal, but he really could decipher what the purrling was saying.

As of this moment, everyone was staring at him. Moments before, he had been a nobody that they hadn’t even bothered looking at. But in the blink of an eye, he became a very, very important person!

Purr. Purr-purr-purr.... The purrling emitted a string of purring sounds, and the faction leaders looked on as if they were hearing an imperial edict. Eventually, Yang Qi nodded, then looked around at the faction leaders.

“You dumbasses want some of my blood? I could crush all of you with a single move.”

The translated words of the purrling boomed like a stentorian bell.

“Did I translate that correctly, purrling?” Yang Qi asked.

Purr. Purr....

No one needed a translation of the final two sounds. Yang Qi’s translation was correct.

Chapter 1264: A Higher State of Invincibility

Purr, purr....

The purrling emitted a few more sounds that Yang Qi translated.

“You think a talisman from this so-called Patriarch Deva can deal with me? Do you bitches want to die or something? I could wipe out the entire House of God Ordainment if I felt like it. Paramount God? Hah! More like Paramount Ant!”

Only Yang Qi was capable of understanding what the purrling was saying, and even he was taken aback by the tone the purrling was using. As far as he was concerned, they were in a very dangerous situation. He could have controlled the situation if they were dealing with a single Consummate God. But there were too many Consummate Gods here. And he also knew that he couldn’t handle Patriarch Deva’s talisman.

Yet the purrling itself didn’t seem to be even slightly worried.

More than ever, Yang Qi realized that the purrling was completely mysterious and unpredictable.

“What did you just say?” someone said. The faction leaders had all risen to their feet with looks of complete shock on their face, as if they couldn't believe what they had just heard. And they were all staring at Yang Qi.

Although he had merely been translating, the words had still come out of his mouth. And they had been very biting. He had essentially said that they were all complete weaklings who could be defeated with a single blow.

They were Consummate Gods, and he was only a Lesser God! To them, he might as well have been a slave, yet he had dared to say the things he had.

The atmosphere was tense, and it seemed like fighting could break out at any moment. However, Dragon Floret said, “Hold on, everyone.”

Walking out from behind his table, he approached Jadefall. “Jadefall, is that really what your pet just said? Or did it come from you? Is that little punk standing next to you intentionally provoking us? You need to be very clear about your stance here. Are you really going to defy a decision made by the Primeval Chaos Assembly? If so, we can just expel you from the sect and brand you as a traitor and enemy! Then everyone will have the right to punish you, and not even your purrling will be able to keep you safe. In other words, you’ll end up dead. So let me be clear: you absolutely, positively mustn't piss us off!”

“I think the purrling made itself very clear,” Jadefall replied, not looking even a little frightened. “This isn’t a banquet, Dragon Floret, it’s an ambush. A deadly ambush. Incidentally, you’ll find that expelling me from the sect won’t be a very easy task, so your threats aren’t going to work.”

“Oh, I know that,” Dragon Floret replied. “Trust me I did my research. If you refuse to do things the easy way, we’ll do them the hard way. And in the end, you’ll get what's coming to you. Punks like you always do.”

As the words left his mouth, he reached out with fingers splayed.

It was a move that seemed to extend and retract at the same time. It blurred with countless transformations, making it seem like an invincible ghost-god that, before anyone could react, had already reached the top of Yang Qi’s head. In fact, it moved so quickly that no one present could possibly have reacted to it.

This was a unique move Dragon Floret used when he wanted to capture someone. It was a consummate skill from the martial path, something called the God-Dragon’s Empty-Void Claw, which could mysteriously pass through the void like the claw of a god dragon to capture any target.

It actually wasn't a killing technique, no matter how many times Dragon Floret had tried to make it one. However, it was still deadly. In the past, he had once captured an expert from the dao of devils with this move. The result was that the man, upon being struck, shrank down to only a few inches tall. And the effect was permanent. It was really a miserable fate.

Remembering that event, everyone present was now sure that Yang Qi would shortly be dead.

WHOOSH!

As the hand descended, Yang Qi vanished, ensuring that Dragon Floret didn’t even touch him. Instead, a bubble remained in the spot he had just occupied.

It was only the size of a chicken egg, but as soon as Dragon Floret grabbed it, it started expanding, simultaneously causing thunderous rumbling to echo out.

“What’s this?” Dragon Floret blurted as he realized that he had actually grabbed a bubble of surging energy. Then that bubble began expanding with explosive speed, forcing Dragon Floret to shoot backward.

“Be suppressed!” he growled as the bubble exploded outward, surrounded by crackling lightning. Dragon Floret’s energy swirled into the shape of a god dragon as he continued, “Grand Dragon Consumes Pearls!”

The enormous dragon opened its mouth and consumed both the bubble and the lightning.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi was standing off to the side.

“That was an impressive move, Dragon Floret,” he said, clicking his tongue in admiration. “Unfortunately, it's not enough to cause problems for me. You’re a late Consummate God, right? What a surprise you can’t deal with me, a mere Lesser God.”

“A purrling bubble?” Dragon Floret said, various expressions flashing across his face. “Was your purrling causing mischief just now, Jadefall?”

“If that’s what you want to believe, sure,” Jadefall said. Of course, she knew full well that it was Yang Qi, not the purrling. She just wasn’t inclined to say it.

“Fine. That beast has been causing problems ever since it arrived in the House of God Ordainment. It's definitely an inauspicious creature. I'm taking it captive right now to ensure it can’t cause any disasters for the sect!”

All of a sudden, a fluttering talisman popped into being behind him.

Instantly, the people present sensed that the talisman contained an aura that none of them could resist. It was as if the talisman were filled with unbounded worlds, unbounded mountains, unbounded voids, and unbounded will.

An old man stepped out from the talisman. He had an amiable smile on his face, and wore voluminous robes. With his high forehead and dangling earlobes, he looked exactly like a sage, monarch, emperor, or sovereign.

His mere presence on the scene made everyone feel the urge to drop to their knees and offer obeisance.

Instantly, the various faction leaders on the scene scurried backward, fully aware that the power of this talisman was far beyond anything they could deal with. It had been created by a Paramount God, and not just an ordinary one at that, but rather, Patriarch Deva.

Crack!

Yang Qi’s godpower shattered, and under the force of the pressure, his monarch godhood stopped rotating! Normally speaking, his monarch godhood could easily rotate a billion times a second, but right now he was feeling so much pressure he couldn’t even move a finger.

“Dear lord, that really is a talisman from Patriarch Deva!” shouted the leader of the Brilliant Radiance Society. “Dragon Floret, you weren’t lying!”

Chuckling, Dragon Floret said, “Don’t worry, the talisman isn’t intended for killing. Patriarch Deva created it specifically to deal with the purrling! Although the rest of you feel the pressure caused by Unbounded will, it isn’t targeting you. If it were, you’d all be dead already. No, it’s only targeting the purrling!”

“Dragon Floret! Tell us the truth. How did you get a talisman created by Patriarch Deva? Even a Paramount God would have a hard time getting an audience with him. How could you possibly have gotten him to make a talisman for you?”

“That’s confidential,” Dragon Floret replied. He currently radiated a sense of invincible dignity, and because of the power of the talisman weighing down on Mount Dragon Head, it was impossible for anyone to leave the area. “Truth be told, I already have the backing of Patriarch Deva. I'm planning to be the next houselord of the House of God Ordainment, which means that my Dragon Society is the sect! Because of that, you all have to support me. And once we suppress the purrling and take its blood, we’ll all become vastly stronger!”

Dragon Floret clearly had some major ambitions.

Thanks to Patriarch Deva’s talisman, Mount Dragon Head had become like a god kingdom unto itself. A kingdom within a kingdom. Patriarch Deva sat cross-legged above them all, a slight smile on his face as he exerted immense pressure on the psyches, godpower, and godhood of everyone present. None of them could even cause their souls to stir.

Then he extended his hand and made a tapping gesture toward the purrling.

The gesture seemed as if it could cause heaven to deteriorate and earth to wane, all in the blink of an eye.

The leader of the Brilliant Radiance Society recognized the move, and wanted to shout, “It’s the Heaven-Deteriorating Earth-Waning Finger!”

However, because of the pressure, his mind could hardly function, and he couldn’t make the words leave his mouth. That said, he knew that the legendary Heaven-Deteriorating Earth-Waning Finger was something from primeval times, which had killed countless Consummate Gods... and even Paramount Gods!

It was the ultimate technique used by Patriarch Deva.

With the wave of one finger, heaven deteriorated, and earth waned.

Not even a Consummate God would be able to resist the power of this move, much less counterattack. Yang Qi instantly drew on the God Legion Seal, but even the seal had stopped functioning. Yang Qi’s cultivation level was just too low; even though he had monarch godhood, he was still only a Lesser God. Perhaps if he were a Common or Greater God he might have been able to put up a fight.

‘This Patriarch Deva is incredible,’ he thought. ‘I wonder if the purrling can deal with this.’

As of this moment, all of Yang Qi’s hopes rested on the purrling. He was convinced that the purrling was invincible, and had power that could extinguish the heavens and crush the earth.

The Heaven-Deteriorating Earth-Waning Finger neared the purrling, then touched it.

The entire time, the purrling just lay there lazily, watching things happen. Then it let out a purr. It was a purr that was far more than just a casual noise. Instead, it was as sonorous as trillions of bells ringing at the same time.

RUUUUUUUUMBLE!

Everything that had been locked down moments before was freed.

All of Mount Dragon Head, and in fact, the entire god kingdom of the House of God Ordainment, violently trembled as the sky opened up and a spatial tempest erupted.

Yang Qi could have sworn an oath that he had never heard anything this loud. It was a sound to surpass all other sounds, something that seemed to originate from the void of the god world itself.

In fact, he suddenly realized that it hearkened back to when the god world had first been created. He could see a boundless, endless void, filled with nothing, whereupon the purrling uttered a sound, and the god world was created.

It was the sound of the creation of the god world!

Crack. Crunch....

As the sound echoed out, Patriarch Deva’s attack, the Heaven-Deteriorating Earth-Waning Finger, collapsed into nothing.

Chapter 1265: A Higher State of Invincibility (2)

A sound that was like the monarch of all sounds crushed Patriarch Deva’s paper talisman and destroyed the Heaven-Deteriorating Earth-Waning Finger.

The purrling was angry.

Yang Qi had never seen it like this before.

It was so furious it had unleashed a consummate technique that hearkened to the creation of the god world itself, an invincible, enraged sound that could shake all heaven and earth.

It wasn’t just the warding magics of Mount Dragon Head that collapsed. The entire god kingdom of the House of God Ordainment shook violently, ripping open holes in its defenses and frightening countless experts out of their minds. However, at least some of them flew up and started repairing the damage to the god kingdom; if they didn’t, it wouldn't be long before the entire place collapsed.

Purr....

In addition to the sound of its purr, the purrling summoned a bubble that quickly surrounded all of Mount Dragon Head. Meanwhile, Patriarch Deva’s talisman still seemed to be working hard to suppress the purrling. Unfortunately, the explosive power being released by the purrling had gone far beyond anything it could handle.

Creak. Crack. Snap!

Cracks started spreading out on Dragon Floret’s skin.

RUMBLE!

With everything under the purrling's control, Yang Qi was recovering.

Because of the pressure, Patriarch Deva’s talisman shrank down until it was only three inches wide and seven inches long. Although it was the color of jade, it was actually impossible to tell what material it was made from.

The purrling spat out another bubble, which surrounded the talisman, then shrank down, causing the thing to burst into flames before collapsing into dust.

Dragon Floret shrieked, tumbling to the ground with blood oozing out of his eyes, ears, nose, and mouth. Looking in shock at the purrling, he said, “This is impossible! Impossible! How could it destroy Patriarch Deva’s talisman?”

The leader of the Brilliant Radiance Society, as well as all the other faction leaders, were also writhing on the ground, blood oozing out of their orifices. Some of them even experienced damage to their godhood, causing significant cultivation base regression.

After destroying Patriarch Deva’s talisman, the purrling finally reverted to its usual lazy demeanor. Glancing at the writhing faction leaders as if they were trash, it made a few more sounds that Yang Qi interpreted.

“Purr, purr....”

“I'm not interested in scum like this. You punish them for me.”

“What?” blurted one of the faction leaders, sounding terrified.

“Punish us?! We're all children of primeval chaos! We’re all in line to become the next houselord. How dare you, Jadefall! How dare the two of you!”

“It’s not our fault you sought your own downfall,” Jadefall said, having regained her composure. As it turned out, the purrling hadn’t disappointed her at all, and she couldn't have felt more pleased. “I almost can’t believe you people actually sought to harm my purrling. And you think you deserve to champion the future of the sect? I say that you’re all trash. What do you think, Wang Xiantian?”

Seeing Jadefall walking up to him, Wang Xiantian stammered, “W-what... what are you doing?!”

“What am I doing? I'm getting ready to kill you!” Smiling, Jadefall suddenly produced a long, sharp sword and waved it back and forth right in front of Wang Xiantian’s face.

Sadly for him, his godpower had been completely drained, making it impossible to lift even a finger in defense.

His godhood had been shattered, which meant it would take years of cultivation for him to recover, even using medicinal pills and spending all of his time in seclusion.

“Don’t you know you’ll be punished by the sect if you kill me?!” Wang Xiantian said. “We just had a little disagreement a moment ago, that’s all. Let’s just call it a day! We’ll all get in trouble for causing a scene, but if you kill me, it’ll be an entirely different situation!”

“You think I'm scared?” Jadefall said. “Considering how strong my purrling is, there’s nothing the sect can do to me. The purrling just completely destroyed Patriarch Deva’s talisman, so what exactly do you think the sect will use to punish me? Do you think I'm kidding around here?”

“You!” Wang Xiantian said, his face falling.

Patriarch Deva had a reputation for being very close to truly invincible. He was on almost the same level as the emperor of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty, and his talismans were unequaled in existence. Yet the purrling had just easily destroyed one. That meant there wasn’t anyone in the House of God Ordainment that could contain it. If there was something that could wipe out one’s entire sect, how could you expect to get revenge against it?

In other words, it was important to respect the rules, but in the end, strength was the biggest rule. Everyone knew that the strongest person had to be respected. It was a universal truth.

A look of despair overtook Dragon Floret’s face. He had meticulously planned how to get the purrling’s blood, use it to grow stronger, and ultimately give the purrling to Patriarch Deva. Under the tutelage of Patriarch Deva, he would be without equal, eventually seizing control of the House of God Ordainment and reaching new heights of glory.

Sadly for him, he had just pissed off the purrling, and in the end, his grand plan had been destroyed. His dreams were crushed in a way he never could have imagined. His beautiful bubble had burst.

How tragic!

“Should I kill him, Yang Qi?” Jadefall asked, eyeing Wang Xiantian.

“Kill him,” Yang Qi replied. “Leaving him alive will only make us seem weak. With him gone, the Preheaven Society will collapse, and we can step in to take their place. Killing him will ensure that no one will defy us, and we won’t have to worry about giving anyone face.”

“Alright, I’ll kill him,” she replied, and prepared to stab him through.

“Spare him the sword!” a voice interrupted, booming out to fill all of Mount Dragon Head. Sadly, although the speaker was an almighty being, no matter how he unleashed the power of his cultivation base, it wasn’t enough to gain entrance to Mount Dragon Head.

After all, the purrling had encapsulated it in a bubble.

“The big shots from the House of God Ordainment have finally shown up,” Yang Qi said. He could tell that these newcomers were Perfect Gods. The difference between Consummate Gods and Perfect Gods was immense. Their godpower was different on a substructural level, and when they unleashed it, it was far beyond anything beneath it.

Perfect Gods could create stable god kingdoms, but Consummate Gods couldn’t. Yet not even these three Perfect Gods could get into the purrling’s bubble.

“Purr, purr, purr....” Yang Qi said to the purrling.

He was asking the purrling to let the three figures inside. After all, he didn’t want the situation to get completely out of control.

The purrling gave Yang Qi a long look, then the bubble vanished.

The three figures descended, pulsing with immense power. Although they were Perfect Gods with surging energy, the fact that they had been blocked by the purrling's bubble took a lot of the wind out of their sails.

“What?!” Wang Xiantian blurted. “Arbiter Torment, Arbiter Law, and Arbiter Punishment from the Law-Enforcement God-Palace!? Sirs, you have to punish Jadefall immediately! She’s only a Common God, but she refused to give her devilling to the Primeval Chaos Assembly! And the thing hurt all of us!”

“Shut your mouth!” Arbiter Law snapped brusquely. Looking at Jadefall, he said, “What’s going on here?”

“Allow me to explain, Arbiters,” she replied. “These people conspired to take my purrling, and were subsequently foiled. It happened like this....” She went on to describe what had played out.

“What?!”

The three arbiters were visibly stunned, and couldn't help but look back and forth between Dragon Floret and the purrling.

Arbiter Punishment looked like he was about to lose his temper, which was something he apparently did a lot. However, after a moment, he swallowed hard and suppressed his anger. Obviously, he was terrified of the purrling. “Did that purrling really destroy a talisman created by Patriarch Deva?”

“Yes,” she said, stroking the purrling. “What’s so impressive about Patriarch Deva, anyway?”

The purrling looked disdainfully at the three Perfect Gods, as if to say, “You three pieces of trash better not do anything to piss me off.”

“Patriarch Deva...?” The three Perfect Gods exchanged another look, and then seemed to have a short conversation via divine will.

“Jadefall,” said Arbiter Law, “let’s just call it a day. Turn weapons of war into gifts of jade and silk. You head home, and we’ll stay behind to talk things through with Dragon Floret. There’s a lot of work that needs to be done to get the sect back in order.”

“Yang Qi...?” Jadefall said.

He nodded.

“That's fine,” Jadefall said. “Hopefully you three will be able to get to the bottom of this and provide a good explanation.” With that, she and Yang Qi flew away. Normally speaking, a person with a cultivation base like hers would do nothing but instantly kowtow to three Perfect Gods.

Instead, she treated them with almost no courtesy. Yet the three Perfect God didn’t dare to berate her for being rude.

After Yang Qi and Jadefall left, the three Perfect Gods produced medicinal pills which they sent flying out like rain into the mouths of the various faction leaders. After about an hour passed, the faction leaders managed to circulate their godpower again and struggle to their feet. However, all of them had sustained such extensive damage to their godhood that it would take much bitter cultivation to fix.

“What were you thinking, Dragon Floret?” said Arbiter Torment. “You really caused a disaster here! You took it upon yourself to call a Primeval Chaos Assembly without any approval? Well, just look at what happened!”

“We were doing it for the good of the sect!” Dragon Floret replied. “If we could get the blood of that purrling, we’d become Perfect Gods! Think about it! With that many Perfect Gods in our sect, who would ever dare to do anything to us? In fact, what happened just now proved how important that purrling is. The sect has to get it!”

“Like hell!” Arbiter Punishment barked. “You used a talisman from Patriarch Deva, but not even that could do anything to the purrling. Who in the sect could surpass Patriarch Deva?! We don’t have anyone like him in the sect. Are you trying to bring disaster down on all of us?!”

Lowering his voice, Dragon Floret said, “What if we activated the secret reserve power of the House of God Ordainment....”

Chapter 1266: Secret Reserve Power

“Secret reserve power?”

The three arbiters’ faces grew even colder.

“Enough!” Arbiter Law snapped. “This matter is over. If we used the secret reserve power, our sect wouldn’t have any secret weapon in case of a true emergency. There are countless other sects eyeing us like tigers eyeing prey, and you think we should make a huge fuss over some animal? Have you gone insane? Or are you just incredibly selfish? And have you considered what would happen if the secret reserve power didn’t work? Or what if it did, but resulted in mutual injury?”

Dragon Floret didn't seem ready to back down. “But, Arbiters, I can call for another Primeval Chaos Assembly! As long as all the children of primeval chaos stick together, not even the houselord can reject our decision!”

“Like hell!” Arbiter Torment said with a cold smile. “We don’t live in ancient times. Primeval Chaos Assembly? Back then, it’s true that the children of primeval chaos could make decisions about the sect. But times have changed. The Primeval Chaos Assembly is welcome to make decisions about inconsequential matters, but don’t think you can somehow take control of the sect.”

“Exactly,” said Arbiter Punishment. “This matter is over. From now on, stop causing such a fuss over that godling. Also, Dragon Floret, fooling around with Patriarch Deva is like asking a tiger for its skin. Be careful not to invite disaster on yourself.”

“You’d better not cause another scene like this in the future. Our god kingdom was significantly damaged, and it's going to take a lot of resources to restore it to normal. Understand? If you cause another fight like this, then you’ll have to suffer the consequences!”

With that, the three arbiters flicked their sleeves and vanished.

Dragon Floret simply stood there, his face ashen.

Meanwhile, the leader of the Brilliant Radiance Society snorted coldly. “What do you have to say for yourself, Dragon Floret? We all came here because you personally invited us, and look how things turned out! Not only did we end up empty-handed, but our godhood was also damaged. Who knows how long it's going to take for us to recover from this. You’d better compensate us for this!”

The faction leaders were all furious, but couldn’t possibly have acted out of line in front of the three arbiters. And of course, they didn’t dare to go cause problems for Yang Qi, Jadefall, and the purrling. Therefore, now that the three arbiters were gone, they focused their wrath on the person responsible for the whole thing: Dragon Floret.

“What... what do you people think you’re doing?” Dragon Floret said, sounding quite flustered. “I had good intentions here, and I really thought we had the cat in the bag! Don’t forget I'm backed by Patriarch Deva, so don’t even think of messing with me.”

“Why can't we mess with you?” said the leader of the Brilliant Radiance Society. “And what would happen if we didn’t? We lost big here, and the Dragon Society has to take responsibility. We want Dragon Marrow Pills. We know that you found the treasure trove of an ancient patriarch of the dragon gods, and that it contained a lot of medicinal pills. We need those pills to repair our godhood, so hand them over!”

“That's right. We want one of your Dragon Marrow Pills! We won’t let you take advantage of us. We got seriously injured just now, so you owe us. You have to help us recover!”

“That's right, we want medicinal pills. If you don’t comply, it means war. We’ll join forces to crush the disciples of the Dragon Society. It doesn’t matter how strong your society is, you can't stand up to all of us together. We could wipe you out in a night.”

“You’d better do the right thing here, Dragon Floret. Otherwise today will be you trying to steal a chicken only to end up losing the rice you used to lure it. It’s only for the sake of the sect that we haven’t already teamed up to destroy you. Do you really think we’ll just sit around suffering in silence?”

Dragon Floret looked around at the other leaders and could tell that if they really did team up against him, he wouldn’t stand a chance. “Calm down. We can always talk this over. If you want Dragon Marrow Pills, fine, I can give them to you.”

The truth was that inside, his heart was dripping blood. He really had shot himself in the foot, and instead of getting a big windfall, he was now being forced to pay people off. He had no choice but to go to a hidden storage cabinet in his mansion grotto and pull out a stash of medicinal pills. His face was crimson with anger, to the point where he almost felt like committing suicide. These Dragon Marrow Pills were extremely powerful pills that he had originally intended to use to break through to the Perfect God level. Now that he was losing them, it meant he had no way to achieve that breakthrough.

After handing them out to the other faction leaders, he flopped onto the ground like a deflated balloon. Meanwhile, the other leaders simply left, not deigning to speak another word to him. Even Goddess Jade Egret just walked away.

“I’m not going to let you get away with this, Jadefall!” he shouted to no one. “I’ll make sure that you scream and grovel to no end! You just wait! That beast of yours destroyed Patriarch Deva’s talisman, and there’s no way he’ll let that slide. Even if you hide in the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty, we’ll still find you and make you pay!”

Time passed.

Eventually, things quieted down on Mount Dragon Head.

A few hours later, Yang Qi had gathered all of his friends and family in Jadefall’s mansion grotto. The scene that had just played out was a big shock to the sect in general, and the news was spreading fast about the purrling vanquishing all of the duplicitous faction leaders.

The fact that the god kingdom had been shaken to its core had ensured that the matter couldn’t be covered up.

Besides, a lot of people had been keeping an eye on the situation. Already, the purrling was becoming something of a legend in the sect.

“Did you cause too much of a scene this time, Yang Qi?” the Shepherd asked. “Isn’t it going to cause problems for us in the House of God Ordainment? You’re going to be attacked from all sides over this.”

“Once you nock the arrow to the bow, you cannot but shoot it,” Yang Qi replied. “Don’t worry. We can use this opportunity to consolidate our power in the sect. With the purrling to keep us safe, I highly doubt that the higher-ups in the House of God Ordainment will try making a move against us. However, a cornered beast will do anything, so we have to be on guard against Dragon Floret. And it's highly likely that he’ll escalate the matter to his backer, Patriarch Deva, a Paramount God.”

“My main concern,” said Jadefall, “is that the purrling's show of strength will attract attention. It would probably be a good idea to lay low for a while. Consolidate our power, but slowly and carefully.”

“I disagree,” Doom said. “We need to take advantage of the situation to make bold advancement. Establish our authority, and make sure everyone knows that they’d better not mess with us. If Dragon Floret gets Patriarch Deva to cause problems for us, then we should just slaughter him!”

“What?!” Jadefall said. “No. Absolutely not. We’re all members of the House of God Ordainment, so we can’t go around just killing people, especially not a sect leader. That's a major taboo, and a clear violation of the rules.”

“I'm inclined to agree with Doom,” Yang Qi said in a voice as cold as the coldest winter day. “And we don’t need the purrling to do it. I can handle it myself. Now is the perfect time to go kill Dragon Floret. Truth be told, I'm not currently a match for him. But he was just injured by the purrling, and his godhood is fractured, making him much weaker than normal. Recovering isn’t going to be easy.”

“Are you serious about this?” Jadefall said, frowning.

“Don’t worry, I’ve already thought it through. He's definitely going to ask Patriarch Deva for help. I want you to go meet with the leaders of the sect, and make up some story about the purrling disappearing. Meanwhile, I’ll find a way to kill Dragon Floret outside of the sect where no one will be able to prove it was me who did it. With him out of the way, we’ll be free to act as we please. We can even take over the Dragon Society. Of course, people will suspect the truth, but without evidence, they won’t be able to do anything about it. It will add to our mystique, and make sure that people don't cause problems for us. Besides, I have the feeling that Dragon Floret has some secrets he's keeping. Killing him should net a huge stash of medicinal pills, which will be very useful for our cultivation advancement.”

“If you’re sure about this, then fine, I agree.” Jadefall sighed. “I’d originally hoped we could just work on our cultivation for a few hundred years. How could I have ever guessed that carnage like this would play out?”

“We only have this opportunity because we have the purrling to keep us safe,” Yang Qi said. “You see, Dragon Floret has no way of knowing that, at the moment in which he was severely wounded and had his godhood fractured, I infected him with a devil embryo. He’s a Consummate God, which means I can’t control him, but I can spy on his thoughts. I’ll be able to track his movements, and will know when he leaves the god kingdom.”

They continued to discuss the matter for some time, until one of Yang Qi’s jade amulets started glowing.

“What? Dream Daylily from the Crown Prince Society wants to see me? She must want to know about the events that just played out. Alright, we’ll go forward with the plan as is. Jadefall, get a meeting with the sect leadership as soon as you can.” With that, Yang Qi left the god kingdom.

Soon he was in the same restaurant run by the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty. The Consummate God Dream Daylily was playing her zither, and in fact, didn’t even look up when Yang Qi entered. “I heard there was a big uproar in the House of God Ordainment a few hours ago. Something to do with Jadefall and the purrling?”

“That’s right, ma’am.” Yang Qi went on to describe what happened.

Looking shocked, Dream Daylily said, “Are you sure about that? Dragon Floret had a talisman from Patriarch Deva, but it was useless against the purrling?”

“That’s right. I witnessed it with my own eyes.”

“I’d always assumed people were underestimating that godling, but I never would’ve guessed it was this strong.” Her fingers danced on the zither, causing beautiful music to stream out.

“You have a good relationship with Jadefall?” she asked.

“I do. She trusts me. But that doesn't really matter. There’s no way she’ll reveal secrets about the purrling to me.”

“I know that. And I also know that you’re loyal to the crown prince. After all, you swore an oath and sealed it with psychic power. That’s why I'm about to give you a very important mission.”

Chapter 1267: Striking Dragon Floret

“What mission?” Yang Qi said. He had known all along that the incident with the purrling would attract the attention of the Crown Prince Society, and they would want his help in trying to recruit Jadefall.

Sure enough, Dream Daylily said, “You need to recruit Jadefall. She absolutely must be a member of the Crown Prince Society, or at the very least, offer backing. There’s no doubt that this incident will soon be a hot topic in the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty, and that the crown prince’s enemies will be trying to recruit her. You need to keep your eyes and ears open! Pay attention to who comes to visit Jadefall, and report that information to me immediately.”

“Understood. Not long ago, I was at a banquet attended by various princesses, imperial ladies, vice princes, and heirs apparent. Unfortunately, the banquet didn’t end well, and I left on bad terms with all those people. Afterward, not a single one ever reached out to me.”

“I’ll make this simple: report all information to me. And keep an eye on Jadefall.”

“Yes, ma’am!”

“Incidentally, your Sage Monarch Consortium has been rapidly growing as of late. Assuming you can successfully recruit Jadefall, it’ll count as a major meritorious service. And in that case, we’ll help you with your business. With our help, you can expand it into a major force.”

“I understand.”

“You’re dismissed,” she said, waving her hand.

Dream Daylily watched Yang Qi leave and thought, ‘It’s a good thing we have someone so close to Jadefall. That said, his cultivation base is still a bit too low. We need to help him advance his energy arts before he can truly be useful. Now, as for this purrling... I almost can’t believe it was strong enough to deal with a talisman from Patriarch Deva. Its true level of strength is still a mystery. I wonder if it’ll play a decisive role in the struggles taking place in the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty.’

After Yang Qi left, he didn’t go back to the god kingdom of the House of God Ordainment. Instead, he flew out of the city and over the open ocean.

He had just sensed Dragon Floret leave the god kingdom and head out toward some unknown location, presumably to meet with Patriarch Deva.

Yang Qi planned to intercept and kill him. If he didn't strike quickly and eliminate the man, and Patriarch Deva were pulled into the situation with the purrling, the consequences would be too horrible to contemplate.

WOOOOSH!

Locking on to his quarry, Yang Qi shot across the water at top speed. Things had changed a lot since the time he left the Lightningbolt Continent and headed to the House of God Ordainment. The distance it had taken him half a year to traverse back then could now be covered in an hour.

And if he hadn’t been concerned about conserving vital energy, he could have slipped through the spatial tempests and covered the distance in the time it takes an incense stick to burn.

He flew for three days and nights across the boundless ocean as he chased after Dragon Floret. He had no idea where the man was heading, but he had a feeling that the destination was approaching.

Eventually, he found himself in an area where the water was covered with thick fog, making it almost impossible to see. However, it was certain that there were powerful sea beasts lurking below the water’s surface. The god world was a dangerous place, so it was entirely likely that patriarch-level beasts could appear, the type that could destroy the heavens and extinguish the earth.

Rocky reefs soon became visible everywhere, and Yang Qi caught sight of sea dragons within them, all of them in the Quasi-God level.

The sea dragons didn’t even notice Yang Qi, and before long, he reached a reef that Dragon Floret had just passed through.

It was pitch black, and stretched for about five kilometers from end to end. There were no signs of life, whether sea dragon or any other kind, as Dragon Floret’s aura was strong enough to drive away any such creatures.

“Damn you, Jadefall,” Dragon Floret murmured as he popped a medicinal pill into his mouth. “I can’t believe you hurt me so bad I had to run out looking for Patriarch Deva. It's going to take another two months before I reach my destination. And I'm going to drain a lot of energy and life force to get there. When I reach the spatial nexus, I’ll have to send my report in and wait another month before I get a response. Only then will I know if I can get into the god kingdom and see Patriarch Deva. Who knows if I’ll be given an audience, but I have to try. I have to make sure that Jadefall and her purrling get what they deserve. That Yang Qi, too. That arrogant amateur is nothing but a dog relying on the influence of its master.”

Dragon Floret rose to his feet and prepared to fly away.

However, that was when he realized that there was someone else standing on the reef with him, someone who had arrived without him detecting them.

“Who are you?!” Dragon Floret said. He could sense that this person’s psyche had locked on to him, which meant that no matter where he ran, the person would be able to track him down. It was obviously a top expert!

“It’s me,” Yang Qi said, flicking his sleeve to dispel the nearby fog. Instantly, the entire area for dozens of kilometers in every direction was completely bright and clear. “Did I just hear you call me an arrogant amateur, Dragon Floret? And a dog relying on the influence of its master?”

“It’s you?!” Dragon Floret’s pupils constricted as he realized it was Yang Qi. “What are you doing here?”

“I’m here to kill you!” Yang Qi replied, his hands clasped behind his back. A quick assessment confirmed that Dragon Floret’s godhood was still fractured, and he had not recovered from his injuries. He could only fight at about thirty percent of his normal strength, which meant that right now was the best opportunity to attack him.

Back when Yang Qi took the Ten-Directions Many-Heavens Pills from the White-Haired Boxer King, it had given him a strong foundation for his monarch godhood. And the White-Haired Boxer King was inferior to Dragon Floret. If he could get Dragon Floret’s medicinal pills, Yang Qi was fairly certain that he could reach the mid Lesser God level, or perhaps even the late or peak level.

“Is Jadefall here? And the purrling?” From the way Dragon Floret was looking around, it seemed he wasn’t worried at all about Yang Qi specifically.

“No, they’re not here,” Yang Qi said. “They’re safe back in the god kingdom. I'm going to kill you myself.”

“You came alone?” Dragon Floret said, and he visibly relaxed as an expression of scorn appeared on his face. “You’re going to kill me? And how exactly are you, a mere Lesser God, going to do that? The sect rules prohibit killing amongst disciples, but you’re a nobody. I could kill you and no one would care at all. Besides, your lunatic ravings about trying to kill me are inherently a violation of sect rules.”

Yang Qi sighed. “Ai. Why do so many people look down on me? Although, I suppose it makes sense, considering I've been keeping a low profile. The purrling has been attracting all the attention, and I've been trying to refrain from making any waves. Don’t worry, though. No one will suspect me of being the one who killed you.”

“Prepare to die!” Dragon Floret shouted, and a streak of silver light shot rapidly toward Yang Qi’s forehead. It was a silver needle; not a concealed weapon, but a crystallized form of godpower used as a deadly assassination technique.

However, the silver needle stopped about three inches away from Yang Qi’s forehead, whereupon he reached out and grabbed it with two fingers. The needle instantly burst into flames and melted into nothing.

“A Dragon Whisker Needle?” Yang Qi said. “Not bad at all, Dragon Floret. You just said I'm a nobody, right? So why exactly did you resort to something as ruthless as a Dragon Whisker Needle?”

“You actually stopped my Dragon Whisker Needle?” Dragon Floret said, his expression turning serious. “Who exactly are you? I used a lot of power in that move, so there’s no way a measly Lesser God could deal with it. You're obviously hiding your true strength. So what exactly are you here to accomplish?”

“Didn't I already make that clear? I'm here to kill you. And you’re right, the reason I'm so confident is that I’ve been hiding my strength. Considering you’re about to die, I guess I might as well tell you that I'm with the Crown Prince Society.”

Of course, the entire goal here was to cast guilt on the Crown Prince Society.

“The Crown Prince Society?!” Dragon Floret said, his expression hardening further. “So, you and Jadefall have been getting help from the crown prince? No wonder she became a princess of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty. So what's your goal? Overthrow the House of God Ordainment?”

“It’s hard to say whether we’ll overthrow it or not. Regardless, the time has come for you to die. Now that you know we're from the Crown Prince Society, there’s no way I’ll let you get away with your life. Incidentally, seeking help from Patriarch Deva isn’t going to do any good. He might be strong, but he won’t go up against the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty for your sake. To him, you’re nothing but an ant.”

Dragon Floret suddenly burst out laughing. “You really like to monologue, don’t you? Look, are you going to try to kill me, or not. I’ve been in more fights than you can imagine, and I always come out on top. I have killer instincts, so in the end, there’s no way you’ll ever kill me. Now that I know Jadefall’s secret, I'm even more certain I can have her expelled from the sect.”

“Enough jibber-jabber,” Yang Qi, clenching his hand into a fist.

RUMBLE!

Heaven and earth crumbled, and the sun and moon sank as Yang Qi resorted to a killing move. It was the most powerful of the stances in the Hand of the One God: Immortality. Everything around him crumbled as he grew physically larger, his godhood pulsing to the limit.

As soon as the attack was unleashed, Dragon Floret suddenly realized that all he could see was the incoming fist. Nothing else was visible. And he could tell that there was no way to dodge the move. Within the approaching fist-wind were holy hymns, buddhist chants, prayers, the sighs of gods, and the pleas of all living beings. It was almost as if he were looking at a scripture that was both devilish and not devilish, which described the profundities of predestination and tribulations.

“This....” he said, his heart pounding. “How could your fist technique be so powerful? So enigmatic? This can’t be the fist technique of a Lesser God! This is invincible! Not even I can match up to this!”

Chapter 1268: Complete Devastation

“Devastation of the Furious Dragon!” Dragon Floret growled, unleashing a palm move that was like a divine dragon rising out of the sea.

His palm met Yang Qi’s fist, and considering they were both incredibly powerful moves, it was little wonder that the resulting shock wave of godpower devastated the reef around them. The water was shoved away with such force that many of the sea beasts within were ripped to shreds.

SPLAT!

Blood spewed out of Dragon Floret’s mouth as he staggered backward across the shattered remnants of the reef.

On the other hand, Yang Qi was standing right on the surface of the ocean, which had crystallized for acres around him.

“I hit you with my Devastation of the Furious Dragon, boy. And we both wasted just as much godpower in that interchange. You won’t last much longer!”  Dragon Floret was spitting up blood, but he was convinced that there was no way Yang Qi would be able to stand up to his Devastation of the Furious Dragon. It was an attack that involved sending a cyclone of dragonfire into the target’s godhood, which would ignite it and cause it to drain godpower rapidly.

Yang Qi had indeed spent a lot of godpower in the exchange. And any other expert in his situation would have already lost all of their fighting prowess. But even when Yang Qi was almost completely drained of energy, he could take a few breaths, and the God Legion Seal would draw on the essence of the god world to replenish his godhood.

“Your Devastation of the Furious Dragon is impressive. You definitely deserve to be a Consummate God. And if you weren’t injured, I would never be a match for you. But sadly, you’re not going to live through the rest of this day!”

“What? You aren’t out of godpower?” He could sense that Yang Qi's godhood was rotating at full speed, and could even see a godflower above his head, burning with light and fire as it blessed him constantly.

“Infernal Deity Spear!”

It had been a long time since Yang Qi had used the Infernal Deity Spear, but it felt just as familiar as ever. That spear had accompanied him since his days in the impure lands, but this was his first time using it in the god world.

This time, the spear was corporeal. It was pitch black and surrounded by countless swirling hell vortexes, the might of which revealed the ultimate meaning of death.

In fact, he was currently surrounded by a pulsing death energy.

In the blink of an eye, the area for dozens of kilometers in all directions surrounding Yang Qi became like a pitch-black hell, its space completely locked down as he held the Infernal Deity Spear in his hand, pointed straight up. “You’re going to die today, Dragon Floret. No matter what.”

“What energy art is that?” Dragon Floret asked.

“The Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth,” Yang Qi replied. “Considering you’re about to die, I don’t mind telling you.”

“The Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth?!” Dragon Floret said, his jaw dropping and his eyes nearly popping out of his skull. “But that’s....”

Yang Qi didn’t give him a chance to finish speaking. His spear became a black streak of deathly light that pierced through everything, surrounded by the screams and wails of infernal deities from hell.

“Die!” Yang Qi said, and before anything else could happen, the spear was at Dragon Floret’s throat.

Dragon Floret was shaken to the core, but in that moment of deadly crisis, he achieved a sudden state of peace and calm. Reaching out with fingers splayed like the claw of a dragon grasping at a chiliocosm of worlds, he said, “Power to Smash a Chiliocosm!”

A move designed to claw at a chiliocosm of worlds grabbed toward the Infernal Deity Spear.

“Death Symbols!” Yang Qi swept the Infernal Deity Spear around like a pen, causing numerous strings of text to appear in front of Dragon Floret. This wasn’t something from the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, but rather a result of the Unspoiled Body, pushed to such a high level that no one could possibly defend against it.

The Infernal Deity Spear slipped through Dragon Floret’s grasp, and no matter what he did to try grabbing it again, he failed.

SNICK!

The spear stabbed deeply into Dragon Floret’s shoulder, causing a plume of blood to spray out.

Dragon Floret let out a muffled grunt as he leaped backward, then tried flying up into the sky to escape. He had just received a grievous injury; after all, when gods were hit by the Infernal Deity Spear, they almost always perished. Already, the aura of tribulations and infernal deities was coursing through Dragon Floret’s meridians and blood, heading right into his sea of energy.

Reacting with blinding speed, he pulled out a medicinal pill and popped it into his mouth, then glared at Yang Qi and said, “I refuse to believe that you know the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.”

“Whether or not you believe doesn’t really matter. You’ll die either way.” His spear began to thrum, and although he didn’t launch an attack, a vortex formed that seemed to lock down Dragon Floret’s soul. Dragon Floret could sense the immense power involved, and instantly knew that Yang Qi’s next blow would be a killing move.

“You’re forcing my hand, Yang Qi. If the purrling were here, I might be a bit worried. But I'm not afraid of you. Prepare to see one of Patriarch Deva’s consummate techniques, and my true killing move. Heaven-Deteriorating Earth-Waning Finger!”

All of a sudden, immense power started coursing through Dragon Floret, causing him to vibrate as it converged on his fingertip.

WHACK!

A wild aura surged out of Dragon Floret as he seemed to physically transform into a person that actually resembled Patriarch Deva.

As he pointed his finger out, massive pressure weighed down on everything, causing Yang Qi’s Infernal Deity Spear to crumble.

“The Heaven-Deteriorating Earth-Waning Finger?” Yang Qi had seen Patriarch Deva’s talisman being used, and knew how amazing the patriarch was. When that talisman had been unleashed, it was something Yang Qi couldn’t handle; only the purrling had been able to deal with it.

And although Dragon Floret wasn’t unleashing something on the same level as the talisman, Yang Qi knew he couldn't afford to take the attack lightly. Throwing his palms out, he drew on his monarch godhood to use the God Legion Seal’s god-absorbing abilities.

“Sage Monarch Grand Magic; Time Immemorial, Everlasting Existence; Invert the River of Time; Transform Ancient to Modern!”

A manifestation of his personal dao appeared behind him, the Sage Monarch Grand Magic, and a fist technique that could strike into the past itself.

WHIZZZ!

The two attacks were like two shooting stars heading toward each other, and when they collided, a crack rang out. Eight holes were punched into Yang Qi’s body by the Heaven-Deteriorating Earth-Waning Finger, even piercing into his sea of energy and revealing his monarch godhood. Another of the holes stabbed right into his sea of consciousness.

Any other person would already be dead.

But not Yang Qi.

Meanwhile, Dragon Floret was hit with the Sage Monarch Grand Magic, which caused his chest to cave in.

Both parties had been badly hurt.

Laughing heartily, Dragon Floret landed on the rubble of the reef. “Still not dead yet? I pierced your sea of consciousness! The Heaven-Deteriorating Earth-Waning Finger is going to wipe out your mind!”

“Oh really?” Yang Qi said, rising to his feet, his body rapidly stitching itself together and the God Legion Seal quickly refilling his godpower.

Even if he had been killed, he would have been born again, but in this case, he didn't die, nor had his godhood been damaged.

“Your Heaven-Deteriorating Earth-Waning Finger couldn’t even hurt my godhood, and you think I'm going to die from it?” To kill a god, one had to destroy their godhood.

“Your godhood wasn’t crushed?” Dragon Floret blurted in surprise. “How is that possible? My Heaven-Deteriorating Earth-Waning Finger couldn’t even damage your godhood? How?”

“Simple. Because I have monarch godhood.” Yang Qi unleashed an energy field that pulsed with the will of a monarch, the kind of godhood that would make all other godhoods kneel in allegiance to it.

“Monarch godhood?” Dragon Floret’s eyes glazed over. However, a moment later, he regained his senses. “I can’t believe that someone in the god world has actually formed monarch godhood! You.... Wait! There’s something I want to say. We don’t need to be enemies! We can work together! We—”

Swish!

Yang Qi wasn't going to give Dragon Floret any more chances. He knew about the God Legion Seal and Yang Qi’s monarch godhood, which was far too much information. If word spread, it would cause huge problems.

Yang Qi unleashed a bevy of attacks that included aspects of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth and the Unspoiled Body.

He included King Immortal-Slayer’s techniques, the Seventy-Two Monarchs Energy Art, the buddhist schools’ Secret-Ensconcing All-World Anything-Everything Fundamental-Law Magic, the Great Necropolis God Art, the God Tombstone Palms, the Purrfect God Art, and the Sage Monarch Grand Magic.

He unleashed every consummate technique he had, giving Dragon Floret no room to escape.

Seeing that death was approaching, Dragon Floret angrily shouted, “Time to go for broke! Maybe I'm going to die, but I’ll make sure you pay for it!”

Chapter 1269: Complete Devastation (2)

Dragon Floret had reached the end of the line, and was now going for broke.

His actual cultivation level was far above Yang Qi’s, but he had been seriously injured and his godhood was fractured. No matter how much he wanted to defeat Yang Qi, he just wasn’t in the right place to do so. Perhaps if Yang Qi couldn’t replenish his own godpower, Dragon Floret might have been able to beat him. Unfortunately for him, Yang Qi had a virtually unending supply, which meant he had the luxury of being able to simply wear Dragon Floret out.

Dragon Floret had medicinal pills to replenish his godpower, but that method was too slow to keep up with Yang Qi.

After all, medicinal pills took time to assimilate, and couldn’t restore someone to full levels of godhood in the blink of an eye.

Without true energy to back his attacks, how could Dragon Floret fight? To kill a god, one had to crush their godhood; without doing that, a god wouldn't die no matter how much you wanted to kill them.

“Going for broke won’t do you any good,” Yang Qi said. “You’re still going to die. And you’re going to be the first Consummate God who dies by my hand. Considering you’re a late Consummate God, killing you is going to be great experience for me.”

In the wink of an eye, the two of them exchanged thousands upon thousands of fist and palm strikes.

Pop. Pop. Pop.

The two of them were beating each other like punching bags, leaving both of them trembling as a result. Yang Qi was soon pierced full of holes by the Heaven-Deteriorating Earth-Waning Finger, whereas Dragon Floret had been pummeled so badly that his godhood was in worse shape than ever.

Yang Qi was truly showing what he was capable of.

No matter how badly he was beaten, he wouldn’t explode or collapse. The True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body really was eternally indestructible. Even if time itself came to an end, he would never rot away. In fact, time would eventually end, but his monarch godhood, and Unspoiled Body, would continue existing even beyond that.

Yang Qi was using his ultimate techniques; he could recover his godpower with insane speed, and his injuries would heal almost immediately. Dragon Floret was starting to feel overcome with despair.

“I won’t let you succeed even if I die! Heaven-Defying Art!” Dragon Floret shot toward Yang Qi, simultaneously unleashing a technique of heaven-defying proportions that caused countless explosions to fill the area. Unexpectedly, he was resorting to a technique of self-detonation!

However, in response, Yang Qi threw out his hands, causing a huge bubble to appear around Dragon Floret and instantly suppress him.

Stepping into the bubble, he looked at Dragon Floret and said, “You’re dead.”

“You can't kill me, Yang Qi! You’re breaking the rules of the game! The House of God Ordainment doesn't allow children of primeval chaos to be killed! Besides, I can pay you off! M-my... my background is beyond anything you can imagine! Nobody knows this, but the reason I got all of those things left behind by the dragon patriarch is because—”

Crack!

He never finished speaking.

A stream of sword light pierced into his sea of consciousness, destroying his mind. That sword light came from the number one dao of the sword, that which even the Lord of the Sword Dao, a Paramount God, had admired. It was the dao of King Life-Killer, and it was beyond the compare of anything and everything.

Yang Qi knew that long delays usually lead to trouble, therefore he wasn’t interested in dragging out the fight any longer than necessary.

Dragon Floret, the mighty and famous leader of the Dragon Society, a child of primeval chaos, and a top expert in the sect, had met his end. He was utterly and completely dead. Yang Qi searched him and produced a dragon-shaped bracelet of holding, within which was a large dimension filled with medicinal pills, magical treasures, and other items.

Yang Qi wasn't interested in the magical treasures, but the medicinal pills did interest him.

Every single one of them was a pure Paramount medicinal pill, which was exactly what Yang Qi needed.

In fact, this was one of the main reasons he had chosen to kill Dragon Floret. Thankfully, it seemed it was all worth it. They were all medicinal pills from ancient times, left behind by a dragon patriarch. That patriarch had actually possessed Unbounded will, yet he had created Paramount pills to leave behind to his descendants. To him, they were like trifles.

It was like a great swordmaster who left behind some toy swords for his grandchildren. Although they were little more than trash, they were still from a grandmaster.

He pulled out a Dragon Marrow Pill, which actually resembled a tiny dragon made of mercury. He knew that if he consumed it, it would provide a huge influx of godpower and cleanse his meridians. In fact, it was even possible that it would strengthen the connection between the particles in his body and the space around him, providing increased storage capacity and solidifying his godhood. The benefits would be immense.

“I’ll consume them all.”

He took every single one of the medicinal pills out of the bracelet of holding and absorbed them. That collection was Dragon Floret’s life savings, and every pill had taken immense effort to acquire. But Yang Qi was devouring them with abandon. Anyone who saw what he was doing would have been completely shocked.

Purr, purr....

The medicinal power of the pills instantly exploded within him, only to be gobbled up by his monarch godhood, crystallizing the godpower within it

“Time to break through to the mid Lesser God level!” He threw his head back and howled as the seawater around him shot into the air.

Yang Qi felt like it took unending amounts of godpower to fill his monarch godhood and make even the slightest progress. Any observer who saw what was going on would have been shocked to say the least. Even after consuming what was like a small mountain of medicinal pills, he still lacked what it took to reach the late Lesser God level.

He just didn’t have enough pills.

‘What a damn pity,’ he thought. ‘Even with all those medicinal pills, I only advanced by one minor level. Monarch godhood is insanely difficult to work with. What’s going to happen later on? Will I even be able to find enough medicinal pills?’ He shook his head, not feeling very pleased at all. Dragon Floret had possessed a stockpile of medicinal pills so immense that their value surpassed a hundred Sage Monarch Consortiums put together. And Yang Qi had consumed them all at once.

He flicked his finger, summoning a primal-chaos elder-snake to devour Dragon Floret’s corpse. There was now nothing left of him in existence. However, if Yang Qi needed, he could always recreate him like he had done with the Crown Prince.

After everything was over, Yang Qi didn’t leave. He remained there on the surface of the ocean and flicked his sleeve, summoning the bubble that contained the Crown Prince, who was currently in the early Terrifying level.

“Have you finally realized the truth of it all, Crown Prince?” Yang Qi asked. “I just killed a late Consummate God. Maybe he was even as strong as the peak level. Did you see?”

The Crown Prince’s eyes glittered with an ominous light. He had indeed witnessed what played out, and knew that Yang Qi wasn’t somehow fooling him. Everything was real. He had always been an intelligent person, so how could he not see the truth?

“Very impressive, Yang Qi. I really was looking at the sky from the bottom of a well before. The measly Rich-Lush Continent is like nothing, compared to the god world. In fact... I can't even find the words to describe the difference. I died, and you resurrected me here in the god world. And while I was dead, a lot changed.”

The Crown Prince seemed to have changed down to the level of his soul.

“That's right. You and I could hardly be more vastly separated right now. Everything that happened in the impure lands might as well have been a dream. Including our conflicts of the past. What do they count for here in the god world?” Yang Qi smiled. “I recreated you out of nostalgia, to see an opponent from the past.”

“Don’t be so quick to rejoice. Sooner or later, I’ll make sure you understand it was a big mistake to recreate me. And then you’ll regret everything.”

“Cut the crap,” Yang Qi said. “I’m going to help you reach the level of a god. Do you know how many levels there are between Great Sage and godly ascension?” Taking some of the quintessence energy he had absorbed from Dragon Floret, he flicked his finger and sent it into the Crown Prince, instantly causing his psyche to improve.

Thump!

Almost instantly, the Crown Prince jumped to the mid Terrifying level.

At that point, the bubble around him vanished.

Without the protection he had been receiving, the magical laws of the god world instantly crushed down on him, and he dropped to his knees, gasping like a fish out of water.

At that moment, he felt incomparably weak.

“This is the god world?” he murmured, looking at his own two hands. “The only real and true world?”

Chapter 1270: Shaking the Upper Echelons

“It’s a bit early to think of being a domineering force in the god world,” Yang Qi said as he looked calmly at the Crown Prince. “But you’re lucky. A lot of people from the impure lands struggle endlessly, and never reach godly ascension. Even many of my own friends and family. But you... you haven’t done anything at all, and you’re already in the mid Terrifying level. As for reaching the peak, that will be up to you and your own hard work.”

The Crown Prince was an ambitious and ruthless individual who was always wrapped up in wild thoughts of how to strike back at Yang Qi, and ultimately devour him. Sadly, he was just overestimating himself. He had been recreated by Yang Qi, and there was no way he could actually betray him.

“So this is the god world,” the Crown Prince murmured. It was taking time, but he was slowly getting used to the vital energy fluctuations of the world around him. He was now able to perform cultivation breathing exercises, although he was far from being able to fly. His next goal would be the late and peak Terrifying level, then godly ascension.

“Come on, let’s go. Being directly exposed to the god world just showed you how incredibly weak you are. I’ll give you some armor to protect yourself, and you’ll be fine.”

He waved his hand, and a suit of armor made from vital energy flew out to cover the Crown Prince. Yang Qi already had plans for how to make use of the Crown Prince. In fact, he would be instrumental in Yang Qi’s effort to get that piece of the Mahātmā Jade.

He had all sorts of plans brewing in his mind, and now that he was a mid Lesser God, he could finally start implementing them. After all, he was now in a position where he could actually kill mid Consummate Gods. That said, he would still have trouble dealing with Dragon Floret if he were at his peak state.

Right now, the best thing he could do was find some extremely high-quality medicinal pills to push his cultivation base higher and reach the late Lesser God level.

Sadly, while most people could achieve a breakthrough with a single pill, he would need collections in the tens or hundreds of thousands. In fact, for all he knew, he would need millions of pills.

And of course, he needed pills that were far better than the pills most experts would have access to. Only pills created with Unbounded will convergence would suffice.

‘I wonder when I’ll finally be able to go to the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty. If I can get into their treasure storehouse, I might be able to get the medicinal pills I need.’ After some thought, he flicked his sleeve to grab the Crown Prince, then headed back the way he had come.

There were innumerable sea beasts that he could theoretically kill and harvest for ingredients. But he wasn’t really interested in doing that, any more than a millionaire would be interested in stockpiling some trash.

He was curious to see if killing Dragon Floret would cause any waves in the leadership of the House of God Ordainment. It was a given that they would be aware of it; children of primeval chaos were considered the quintessence of the sect, and the death of one would be instantly noted. And generally, it would lead to a huge commotion.

Meanwhile, in the god kingdom of the House of God Ordainment, there was a location in the depths of space-time called the Primeval Chaos Palace.

It was one of the most elite institutions in the sect, a place where Consummate Gods, and even the houselord himself, would practice cultivation.

The people here were the true leaders of the sect, and they rarely made public appearances. Generally speaking, the people who took care of daily affairs were the children of primeval chaos, the elder kings, and the prime elders.

Children of primeval chaos and elder kings were Consummate Gods, and were essentially administrative management. They were like the prime ministers of an imperial dynasty. As for the Perfect Gods, they would remain in the depths of the Primeval Chaos Palace, like the emperors of an empire.

Jadefall’s Master was a Consummate God, and was thus an elder king, which was one reason why Jadefall had the freedom to do as she wished.

Right now, both Jadefall and her Master were together in the Primeval Chaos Palace.

That palace was considered like primeval chaos itself, and those who represented it on the outside were like its children. Thus, they were called children of primeval chaos.

Also in the presence of Jadefall and the purrling were a handful of Perfect Gods. There were Arbiters Torment, Law, and Punishment, as well as some other individuals seated on prayer mats. It had taken some time for Jadefall to arrange a meeting with them, but now it was fully underway.

One of the Perfect Gods cleared his throat and said, “Jadefall, we understand everything you just said. But Dragon Floret did call the Primeval Chaos Assembly, and they did agree to take your godling. Perhaps they pushed things a bit too far, but they did everything by the book. It makes sense that you want Dragon Floret punished, but that wouldn’t be appropriate. There just isn’t any legal reason to do so.”

“You’re wrong about that,” Jadefall’s Master said. “Exalted Destruction, although it didn’t violate sect rules for Dragon Floret to call the Primeval Chaos Assembly, he did call on the power of an outsider, namely, Patriarch Deva. That complicates things. If he was colluding with outsiders to overthrow the sect, then... at the least it requires an investigation.”

One of the other Perfect Gods snorted coldly. ““Colluding with outsiders? Stop lobbing around wild accusations. Dragon Floret simply asked for help from Patriarch Deva, with the goal of bringing honor and glory to our sect. Investigation? The only investigation we should be doing is into your own apprentice. Isn’t it more than a bit suspicious that she’s now the adopted daughter of an imperial concubine from the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty? Everyone knows that the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty ultimately wants to take over our House of God Ordainment. So why don’t we start this supposed investigation with your apprentice!?”

“I have to take issue with your wording, Exalted Heroism,” Jadefall said.

There were a total of nine Perfect Gods present, and they all had names that were one word, as had been the custom in primeval times. In addition to Torment, Law, and Punishment, there were Destruction, Heroism, Truth, Dancing, Celebration, and Sealing.

These nine experts were a primary component of the true power of the House of God Ordainment. They could make many decisions, including whether or not to execute members of the sect.

As for Heroism, he was Dragon Floret’s Master, and he supported the Dragon Society. It was a given that when Jadefall brought up punishing Dragon Floret, this man would speak out in his defense.

Of course, none of them had any idea that it was all a sham, and that Jadefall was just buying time for Yang Qi to kill Dragon Floret.

“You take issue with my wording, Jadefall?” Heroism said coldly. “Then how should I have worded it? Are you saying I should bow and scrape to you and beg for forgiveness for Dragon Floret? Do you know how vastly separated you are from me? The truth is that, were it not for your godling, I wouldn’t even grace you with my presence. In fact, I wouldn’t even deign to accept an audience with your Master. The fact that you two are here today is a violation of numerous sect rules. You should be groveling at my feet!”

“That's right, Jadefall,” said the Perfect God Sealing. “You have no grounds to request we punish Dragon Floret. It's completely inappropriate. You’re already asking enough of us as it is, so don’t push your luck. Can’t you think of the sect as a whole? I say we just forget everything that happened. You've earned your respect, Jadefall. Nobody will dare to cause problems for you going forward. Isn’t that enough for you?”

“Jadefall, where exactly did that godling of yours come from?” asked Truth. “Remember, when you join the House of God Ordainment, it's for life. It seems to me that the only reason you were taken as an adopted daughter by that person in the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty is that they’re after your godling. You should really be careful.”

“The truth is that the godling belongs to the sect!” said Heroism. “In fact, I advise you to leave it here in the Primeval Chaos Palace to be cared for and studied by us. According to Patriarch Deva, the blood of that godling can be used to break through to Unbounded will convergence. That would be a huge asset to the sect!”

“What?!” Jadefall said, and then she laughed. “Patriarch Deva failed and you’re still trying the same thing, oh exalted Heroism? You’re actually asking that I give you my purrling? If you want it, why don’t you just come and take it? The downside is that my purrling has a very bad temper, and doesn't let anyone other than me get close to it. And if anyone tries, it gets very, very angry.”

“You mean...” Heroism said, and he looked at the purrling with his brow furrowed so hard it looked like the character 川. But then the purrling suddenly yawned and shivered, and Heroism didn’t even dare to approach it. However, he still chuckled coldly and said, “Leave the purrling here in the Primeval Chaos Palace, and you can be on your way.”

“Don’t push things too far, exalted Heroism,” Jadefall’s Master said. “We’re here to discuss punishment for Dragon Floret, not matters related to the purrling. You’re straying from the subject at hand.”

Heroism slapped his hand down onto the table, causing the entire hall to tremble. “Who the hell do you think you are? How dare you talk to me like that! Have you no sense of respect for your seniors! Get out of here!”

Jadefall’s Master’s face turned bright red. She was a Consummate God, but had only just reached that level. And although she was an elder king, putting her on the same level as the children of primeval chaos, she was still only an early Consummate God. Perfect Gods were many levels above her, so it was only natural she would wilt under Heroism’s tirade.

“How dare you talk to my Master like that, exalted Heroism!” Jadefall barked.

“What, you think you’re going to make a move on me or something?” Heroism crossed his arms over his chest and leaned back, as if waiting for them to take action.

RUMBLE!

However, it was in that moment that the entire god kingdom shook violently.

“What just happened?” The nine Perfect Gods shot to their feet, and one of them waved his hand to summon a projected image of the god kingdom as a whole.

The first thing they saw was a god item that hovered in the depths of the god kingdom. It was Mount Dragon Head, and it had just fallen out of the sky, slamming into the ground below, causing a huge earthquake and wreaking much destruction.

Mount Dragon Head, the home of the Dragon Society, had fallen.

And that could only mean one thing: Dragon Floret was dead.

Chapter 1271: Fallen

Mount Dragon Head was actually a piece of an invincible god item from ancient times, similar to the Cruiser of Civilization. By imbuing it with immense godpower, Dragon Floret had made it an animadestiny item of his own, allowing it to hang in the air in the god kingdom of the House of God Ordainment.

The mountain had become a part of him, an aspect of his soul that flourished as he flourished, and declined if he declined.

The fact that Mount Dragon Head had fallen out of the sky was incontrovertible evidence that Dragon Floret had been destroyed in body and soul. In other words, he couldn’t be resurrected. It was an extremely dramatic and tragic thing for a child of primeval chaos to have been truly killed.

It wasn’t just the lower-level disciples in the sect who were shocked by this development. The nine Perfect Gods who had been discussing matters with Jadefall and her Master were stunned. After a long moment passed, Heroism let loose a groan as wretched as if he were mourning his own father and mother. “Dear lord... Dragon Floret, you’re dead? Who killed you? How could you have died?”

“Dragon Floret is dead?” The other experts present exchanged awkward, disbelieving glances.

However, there was no doubt that Mount Dragon Head had fallen, providing concrete evidence of his death.

A very long moment passed, and then the entire god kingdom devolved into chaos, with experts from all the factions bursting into activity. The nine Perfect Gods knew that something huge had happened. Even the most vicious expert would never dare to kill a child of primeval chaos, lest they provoke the wrath of the entire sect and cause war to break out.

Eyes bloodshot, Heroism pointed a shaky finger at Jadefall and said, “It was you, wasn’t it!? You killed Dragon Floret! You just leveled a bunch of accusations at him, and then he died! You killed him! How dare you so brazenly defy the rules of our sect!”

“Please don’t make such irresponsible remarks, oh exalted Heroism,” Jadefall replied. Inwardly, she was delighted at the fact that Yang Qi had obviously succeeded in his mission. But she didn’t let that show. “As you well know, I’ve been here with you this entire time, along with the purrling. How could I possibly have killed Dragon Floret? Didn’t he go to meet Patriarch Deva? He must have run into some trouble along the way. Besides, if I could actually kill him, why would I have come here and asked for you to punish him?”

“If Dragon Floret is dead, the most important thing is to stabilize the situation in the sect,” Arbiter Law said. He and the other two from the Law-Enforcement God-Palace were visibly taken aback. Although they suspected that Jadefall might have had something to do with Dragon Floret’s death, it was true that she had been in their presence. Furthermore, killing Dragon Floret wouldn’t have been an easy task, and without the purrling to help her, Jadefall would never have been able to pull it off.

If Jadefall were strong enough to kill Dragon Floret without the purrling, she would have long since risen to a much higher position, a position that would have ensured that Dragon Floret never caused problems for her.

“Maybe it wasn’t you, but it was definitely some of your friends,” Heroism hissed. “Lock her up immediately! And her Master too. And the purrling! Lock them all up! We need to get to the bottom of this.”

“My friends? What friends? Which of them could have killed Dragon Floret? If any of them tried to fight him, they would be the ones to die.”

“It must have been some people from the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty. Aren’t you the adopted daughter of a concubine from there? You could’ve found some expert from there to help you. Admit the truth, you bitch!”

“Yes, I’m the adopted daughter of an imperial concubine from the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty. But how does that make it possible for me to get experts from there to perform an assassination? Everyone knows that the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty is just using me to try to get to my purrling. Furthermore, I have almost no dealings with them. Why exactly are you trying to pin Dragon Floret's death on me? Could it be that you’re hoping to sow tension between the House of God Ordainment and the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty, ultimately starting a war?”

It was a grave accusation, but it hit home. The other Perfect Gods were already starting to wonder if what Jadefall had suggested was true, and were considering the grave consequences if it was.

If the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty really was responsible for Dragon Floret’s death, then it was highly likely that they would soon make a move on the House of God Ordainment in general. That would eventually lead to full-scale war, and possibly the extermination of the sect. If the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty really was responsible, and they wanted war, then they would take responsibility for the killing. Either way, the House of God Ordainment absolutely needed to investigate the matter to find out the truth.

That said, everyone present knew that, although the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty was domineering and tyrannical, they actually had a good relationship with the House of God Ordainment. It didn't make sense for them to do something like this. They generally did things aboveboard, crushing their opposition and using their overwhelming power to do as they wished.

Besides, if it really was an expert from the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty who had killed Dragon Floret, it would have been an elite among elites. And how could Jadefall possibly order someone like that around?

“Cut the crap,” Heroism shouted. Addressing the other eight Perfect Gods, he said, “Let’s use a tracking magic to get to the bottom of this. Bring out the Archaean Mirror. Hold nothing back. We have to identify Dragon Floret’s killer. We're talking about the death of a child of primeval chaos! We can’t just let this matter slide!”

“This is a huge matter that absolutely must be investigated,” said Arbiter Punishment. “We need to find the culprit, whoever it was. If we don’t, the House of God Ordainment will have a hard time maintaining order, and will end up a laughingstock among the other sects. It will even cause a big problem for our destiny.”

“Fine, we all agree. Let’s use the Archaean Mirror.”

Heroism flashed a cruel grin in Jadefall’s direction. “If we find out you were involved... hmph!”

“Investigate all you want,” Jadefall said coolly. “If you’re upright, you don’t need to fear slanderous accusations.”

The nine Perfect Gods exhaled streams of godpower mixed with fresh blood, and as a result, the entire hall trembled. A moment later, an enormous mirror appeared, crafted from stone that was the color of primal-chaos.

However, even after the Perfect Gods powered the mirror with their vital energy, nothing appeared on its surface.

“What's going on?” one of the Perfect Gods said. “Why aren’t there any traces of the killer’s fate visible?”

They tried numerous methods, but nothing worked. Not a single image appeared of Dragon Floret or his killer.

It was as if no traces of his fate were even present.

Angry and frustrated, another of the Perfect Gods said, “This doesn’t make any sense! Even if a Paramount God manipulated the workings of heaven to do the deed, there would still be evidence left behind. Don’t tell me Patriarch Deva is the killer! Only someone like him could possibly manipulate the workings of heaven in a way we couldn’t detect.”

“It must have been Patriarch Deva,” said Arbiter Torment. “No one else could possibly have succeeded. And that means there’s no way Jadefall had anything to do with it. Even the emperor of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty would be incapable of evading our Archaean Mirror. Only Patriarch Deva could do it.”

“Patriarch Deva.”

Even Heroism had given up suspecting Jadefall at this point. After all, if she were strong enough to evade the Archaean Mirror, she could take on the entire House of God Ordainment single-handedly.

But why would someone as powerful as Patriarch Deva want to kill Dragon Floret? It was a real mystery.

“If Patriarch Deva did kill Dragon Floret, how should we respond?” asked Arbiter Torment. “Should we try to get revenge? Perhaps... because Dragon Floret didn’t live up to his end of the bargain he made with Patriarch Deva, that’s why he was killed. Someone as invincible as Patriarch Deva could’ve killed him with the snap of a finger, and probably isn't even worried about reprisals from us.”

Meanwhile, Jadefall was laughing up her sleeve. However, she also realized she needed to get in touch with Yang Qi and make sure he knew that Patriarch Deva was going to be taking the blame for the killing. After all, if word reached Patriarch Deva, and he came to take matters into his own hands, it could lead to trouble.

“In the end, this was all caused because of Jadefall!” Heroism suddenly said. “We can’t just let her off the hook. If it weren’t for that purrling of hers, Dragon Floret would never have made a deal with Patriarch Deva, nor fallen victim to him.”

Jadefall laughed. “You sound like a criminal. Your friend tries to steal something and gets killed in the process, then you blame the victim?”

“Enough, Heroism,” said Arbiter Law. “This matter is over. For the time being, we can’t do anything about Patriarch Deva. That said, we can’t just let him off the hook, so we need to think long and hard about what to do next. Furthermore, we need to keep the truth from spreading. For now, we’ll report the matter to the houselord and start considering our next move. For all we know, Patriarch Deva might come here, in which case we’ll need the purrling to deal with him.”

Heroism let loose a cold harrumph. Flicking his sleeve, he said, “Remember, Jadefall: I'm not going to let this go. Dragon Floret’s death won't go unavenged.”

She just smiled. Later, she would tell Yang Qi all about this.

If Yang Qi could kill Dragon Floret, then he would eventually kill Heroism as well. He would definitely root out all opposition to him.

The matter having been concluded, Jadefall left. She kept to herself in her mansion grotto for a few days until Yang Qi returned.

**

Meanwhile, a secret meeting was going on.

Dragon Floret’s death had thrown the sect into complete chaos, and the faction leaders were all going crazy.

“What? Dead? Dragon Floret is dead?!”

The leaders of the Brilliant Radiance Society, Honorable Glory Society, and Preheaven Society were all discussing the latest developments.

“People are saying that Patriarch Deva did it. But I thought Patriarch Deva liked Dragon Floret. I bet Jadefall is actually behind it.”

“No. There’s no way it was Jadefall. Jadefall was in the Primeval Chaos Palace when it happened. Besides, she’s not strong enough to kill Dragon Floret.”

“There’s a lot more to this story than meets the eye,” said the leader of the Brilliant Radiance Society, “and Jadefall is a lot more mysterious than anyone realizes. Think about it. She and Dragon Floret just had an altercation, and then this happens? If I were you, Wang Xiantian, I’d start watching my back.”

Wang Xiantian’s face drained of blood. However, he still managed to talk big. “Hmph. She wouldn’t dare do a thing to me. If she killed Dragon Floret, then killed me, everyone would know she was responsible. And do you really think the sect would let the matter slide then?”

Chapter 1272: King Immortal-Slayer and the Purrling

Dragon Floret’s death had caused many of the faction leaders to go on guard. Some people suspected Jadefall was the culprit, but many didn’t, and went with the theory that Patriarch Deva was behind it. Regardless, there was a lot of discussion and speculation, and in the end, most people agreed that Dragon Floret had died in vain.

It would be obvious suicide for the House of God Ordainment to try taking revenge on Patriarch Deva, so many people were starting to blame Jadefall using the same ‘gangster logic’ Heroism had, and suggesting that none of it would have happened without her and the purrling.

Of course, because of the purrling, no one dared to actually make such accusations publicly. Without the purrling, she would probably already have been arrested.

Yang Qi had known all along that this would happen, which was why he had killed Dragon Floret to begin with.

After Dragon Floret died, the Dragon Society started falling apart. As their members fled to other organizations, Jadefall announced the founding of the Sage Monarch Society.

One of the first to join was Goddess Jade Egret, and with her came a large group of former members of the Dragon Society.

Almost overnight, the Sage Monarch Society was a proud and glorious faction in the sect.

They had Greater Gods from the get-go, and in fact, about half of the old Dragon Society ended up as members. The rest of the Dragon Society had gone to other factions.

Everyone wanted a piece of the pie that had been the Dragon Society.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi was secretly inviting certain people to meet with Dream Daylily and join the Crown Prince Society. That earned him the praise of Dream Daylily, as well as rewards that, while not useful to him, could be given to his friends and family.

For the most part, Yang Qi didn’t care about any of the other societies, with the exception of the Mystery Society. That was especially true when he came to realize that there were members of the Mystery Society joining the Sage Monarch Society.

They did so secretly, but thanks to Yang Qi’s devil embryos, such matters couldn’t be kept hidden from him. His devil embryos could pry into the thoughts of even Greater Gods, so it was only natural that he could identify the infiltrators from the Mystery Society.

One interesting thing he realized was that almost no one knew who the members of the Mystery Society were. In fact, there were even occasions in which two members would be in each other’s presence, but have no idea that they were both in the Mystery Society.

It was just what someone would expect of a secret society founded and run by the junior houselord.

Despite knowing who all the infiltrators were, Yang Qi didn’t plan to do anything about them for the moment. All he cared about was expanding his influence and reputation. The current state of affairs would only lead to more opportunities in general, and would help him assess what resources were available in the sect. The House of God Ordainment was an enormous organization, so it was a given that there were all sorts of medicinal pills secreted away here and there.

Truth be told, he didn’t feel any sense of belonging in the House of God Ordainment. It was merely a resource to be taken advantage of. Whether it was the Demi-Immortal Institute, the Titan Emperor Collegium, the Titan Emperor Heaven, the Dao Defense League, the Will Manifestation Heaven Sect, or the alliance he had created on the Ancient Road to the Gods, all were simply tools to be taken control of.

There was no way that the House of God Ordainment would escape that fate either.

That said, he wasn’t in a hurry. He needed to reach a higher level of cultivation, at least the level of a Greater God. At that point, he would be able to kill Perfect Gods.

Of course, if he could get another piece of the Mahātmā Jade and push his will convergence to the Unbounded level, he would easily be able to crush all opposition in the House of God Ordainment.

A year passed. The uproar surrounding Dragon Floret’s death finally settled down. At the same time, Yang Qi’s cultivation base had improved, although not by much. In contrast, virtually all of his friends and family had become Common Gods.

Jadefall was at the peak of that level, just on the verge of becoming a Greater God.

Unfortunately, there was one of his people who hadn’t become a god yet.

It was his immortal-slaying clone, known as Yang Immortal-Slayer.

Yang Immortal-Slayer had been working very hard at forming monarch godhood. His Master in the sect was a Greater God, so in terms of his position, he was formidable. He was roughly on the same level as the White-Haired Boxer King, and furthermore, his position helped him in terms of enlightenment of monarch godhood.

Of course, his Master in the sect wasn't the person he actually relied on for help. Instead, he was being advised by King Immortal-Slayer.

No one knew exactly where King Immortal-Slayer was at the moment, but he was in contact with Yang Immortal-Slayer, communicating to him via will, helping him to improve his cultivation base and form monarch godhood.

Unfortunately, Yang Immortal-Slayer still couldn’t achieve that breakthrough.

Monarch godhood was no simple thing, and although Yang Immortal-Slayer’s substructure was the same as Yang Qi’s, he wasn’t a Fateless One.

King Immortal-Slayer was mighty in a way that Yang Qi couldn’t even comprehend at the moment, so he was actually very pleased that he was helping Yang Immortal-Slayer.

On one particular day, Yang Qi went to visit Yang Immortal-Slayer in his cultivation chamber, which was when he met his Master.

The man was a Greater God known as Arhat Thousand-Hands, who cultivated an art called the Thousand-Hands Void-Snatching Fist. It could be used to create what appeared to be a thousand projected fists that could all strike at the same time. It was very impressive.

That said, Arhat Thousand-Hands didn’t dare to be impolite to Yang Qi. The Sage Monarch Society had already become very influential, and Jadefall was more powerful than ever. Yang Qi was her main ‘general’, and despite being a Lesser God, he spoke the language of the purrling.

A lot of people whispered that the leader of the Sage Monarch Society wasn’t actually Jadefall, but the purrling.

And not a single person dared to do anything to offend it.

The fact that Arhat Thousand-Hands’ apprentice, Yang Immortal-Slayer, was a friend of Yang Qi and Jadefall had brought him plenty of benefits as well. That said, he was completely unconvinced that Yang Immortal-Slayer could possibly succeed at forming monarch godhood. As far as Arhat Thousand-Hands was concerned, it was an impossible endeavor.

“How has my brother’s cultivation been going, Arhat Thousand-Hands?” Yang Qi asked.

“Ai...” sighed Arhat Thousand-Hands. “Yang Immortal-Slayer is completely obsessed. You really need to have some words with him. If he doesn’t give up this idea, he’ll become overwhelmed by heart-devils.”

“Alright, I’ll talk to him,” Yang Qi said, heading into the mansion grotto.

Inside, he found Yang Immortal-Slayer seated in the middle of a host of tiny vortexes, within which were items from the seventy-two monarchs, as well as the Cruiser of Civilization. They were all heaven-shaking, earth-shattering treasures, the kind of things that would cause pandemonium in the god world if word spread of their existence. Unfortunately, Yang Immortal-Slayer wasn’t strong enough to use them.

He had been in the House of God Ordainment for four years, but his cultivation base hadn’t made much progress at all.

Of course, having visited him numerous times over the years, Yang Qi knew that he was incomprehensibly strong. King Immortal-Slayer had rebuilt his body with divine will, giving him a unique constitution that was no weaker than that provided by the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth or the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body.

It was something the god world had never seen before.

“Yang Qi, it’s you!” Yang Immortal-Slayer said, opening his eyes.

“How are things? Have you made any progress with your monarch godhood? I understand a bit about your situation, and have a few ideas that might help, but I'm not completely confident in success.”

“I'm not very confident either,” Yang Immortal-Slayer replied. “But if you can do it, then I'm confident I’ll be able to as well. Remember, you’re me, and I'm you. I'm your clone after all. For the past few years, King Immortal-Slayer has been communicating with me once per month. Unfortunately, he’s not in a very good situation. He’s severely suppressed by the Great Necropolis, and can barely protect himself with the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. He’s under constant assault by that Paramount God. The upside is that he's gained some enlightenment of the Great Necropolis, and is thus able to hold his own. The reason he's helping me is that he wants to work out a deal with you to help him. Unfortunately, you’re not strong enough to be of any help right now. You’ll have to wait until you reach the Unbounded level of will convergence.”

“You’re right,” Yang Qi said. If he tried interfering in the standoff between King Immortal-Slayer and that Paramount God, he would only end up dead. That said, he was the bearer of the God Legion Seal, and was certain to become an invincible individual. That was why King Immortal-Slayer was willing to show him some respect.

As for people like Patriarch Deva, they weren’t even fit to tie King Immortal-Slayer’s shoes.

In ancient times, they had been nothing but weaklings among gods.

Yang Qi and Yang Immortal-Slayer had a long conversation, sharing bits of enlightenment and knowledge with each other.

At the same time, Yang Qi sent the God Legion Seal into Yang Immortal-Slayer, using it to change certain parts of him in the hopes of helping him break through his current bottleneck.

Time passed.

All of a sudden, a powerful expression of will pierced through the void, something so incredible that it could likely overturn the entire god kingdom of the House of God Ordainment. That said, it moved with such stealth that the god kingdom didn't even detect it.

It was half-Annulled, a level higher than the peak of the Unbounded level. To a will convergence like that, even Perfect Gods were like nothing.

Yang Qi’s heart thumped as he realized that King Immortal-Slayer’s will had come.

A shadowy figure appeared in the mansion grotto. It was illusory, but looked true and real. He was a middle-aged man with a face that seemed both young and ancient at the same time.

“Hello, King Immortal-Slayer,” Yang Qi said. Despite how impressive the will projection was, Yang Qi knew it wasn’t a true manifestation of King Immortal-Slayer’s power, thus he didn’t fear it.

King Immortal-Slayer took one look at Yang Qi and said, “Well, well. You formed monarch godhood.”

Chapter 1273: King Immortal-Slayer and the Purrling (2)

“What’s your current situation, King Immortal-Slayer?” Yang Qi’s eyes had been opened in many regards after forming monarch godhood, which meant he understood many of King Immortal-Slayer’s secrets.

King Immortal-Slayer sighed. “You might have formed monarch godhood, Yang Qi, but you’re still far too weak. You definitely aren’t qualified to work out a deal with me. All I can tell you is that the god world is currently in the midst of a momentous time, where things are changing in an unimaginable way. In fact, the god world might even end up destroyed, in which case all heaven and earth will return to a state of emptiness. A grand undertaking has been implemented by certain people, which is why I’m trapped in the Great Necropolis. I suspect that you’ve been foreordained to save the god world from ultimate destruction.”

“Come on, you’ve got to be kidding me,” Yang Qi said. “The god world is massive. It’s the ultimate stage of existence! There have been endless numbers of invincible experts that have risen up throughout the years. Even in the Sovereign Lord’s Age, when you seventy-two monarchs waged the greatest war of all, it didn’t threaten the god world itself. Are you really trying to tell me that the god world might be destroyed? Is that supposed to be some sort of joke?”

King Immortal-Slayer sighed. “There are both internal and external reasons. Surely you know the saying a single ant-hole can cause the collapse of a thousand-kilometer dike. Well, imagine what an entire colony of ants can do. And that’s why time is reaching an end.”

“Time is reaching an end?” Yang Qi asked. “Time can end?”

“Everything ends, and time is no exception. And there are reasons why some people want time to end. At the end of time, it’s possible to acquire Annulled will convergence.”

“The things you're saying are going over my head,” Yang Qi replied. “I suppose I’ll understand later on. Let’s talk about more pressing concerns. How can we help Yang Immortal-Slayer form monarch godhood?”

“You might have formed monarch godhood, but that doesn’t mean you can directly help someone else to do the same. You were favored by heaven, having acquired the legacy of the True Devil and the God Legion Seal. You were also transformed by the Great Necropolis, and gained enlightenment from the purrling. Because of all those factors, you succeeded with monarch godhood. But nobody else could possibly match that luck of yours. I’ve been pondering the matter over the past few years, and I think I have an idea.”

“Didn’t you form monarch godhood?” Yang Qi asked.

“Yes, I did. But things were different back then, and times have changed. In those days, all of us were born in primal-chaos, and the god world itself hadn’t fully formed. Eventually, primal-chaos receded, and after millions upon millions of years passed, the god world emerged. Remember, the primal-chaos in the impure lands is just a pale reflection of the energies of the true version.”

Yang Qi nodded. He knew that the god world of the past was different from the god world he existed in. It had been trillions of god world years since the god world was first formed, and ages upon ages had passed in which mighty entities rose and fell.

The purrling’s godspore had existed back in that very early age in which true primal-chaos existed.

“King Immortal-Slayer, can I ask what the purrling actually is? It seems you’ve recovered some of your memories and abilities. You might be trapped in the Great Necropolis, but you’re actually benefiting from the process. After all, you figured out how to send your divine will out into the open. You’re obviously in a much better position than at first.”

“How about this,” King Immortal-Slayer said. “Bring the purrling here. If you do, I can join forces with it to help Yang Immortal-Slayer develop Paramount will convergence. I've accepted Yang Immortal-Slayer as my apprentice, and I intend for him to take my legacy. Before I reach the Annulled level and become completely invincible, I want to pass some things on to him. Besides, my hope of salvation rests in him, so I definitely want him to form monarch godhood.”

“You want to join forces with the purrling?” Yang Qi said in surprise. However, the idea was intriguing. After all, watching two invincible entities like them working together would be profoundly enlightening.

With that, he sent a message to Jadefall, who quickly headed over with the purrling in her arms. It obviously loved being held by Jadefall, and never left her embrace. It even slept in her arms.

From its moment of birth, it hadn’t ever eaten food, at least not that Yang Qi had ever seen. It didn’t even absorb vital energy from its surroundings. It was as if it had unending energy to work with.

When Jadefall arrived and saw King Immortal-Slayer’s will projection, she backed up in shock. Obviously, she could sense how immensely powerful he was.

At the same time, the purrling let loose two dissatisfied purrs as if to say, “With me here, girl, what are you afraid of? Don’t be such a fool!”

King Immortal-Slayer looked long and hard at the purrling, then said, “Greetings, oh Powerful Entity... you can speak to me as an equal, and I understand how strong you are. Thus, I would like to ask for your help. Join forces with me to remake my apprentice’s constitution. Help him form monarch godhood. What do you say?”

Yang Qi looked at King Immortal-Slayer in shock.

He would never have guessed that the man would treat the purrling with such respect, speaking to it as an equal. King Immortal-Slayer had devastated the god world, killing countless gods in the ancient era. The fact that he was being so respectful to the purrling went to show how incredible it must be. Yang Qi had a feeling that the purrling actually did practice cultivation, except of a type he couldn’t perceive or understand. And he was certain that it had made immense progress since coming to the god world.

“Purr, purr....” When the purrling responded to King Immortal-Slayer, it seemed to do so with its own respect, as if it realized that it was dealing with a boundless and invincible entity that had risen from the material world to the empty world.

The impure lands, the immortal worlds, primal-chaos, and the god world were all formed from matter, and were thus material. But the Annulled level was empty.

The purrling continued to purr, and Yang Qi quickly started translating its words. “I return your greetings, oh Powerful Entity. I see you’ve traveled quite far down the path to the Annulled level, and your life force has reached a truly mighty state. Yes, I can work with you to help this person form monarch godhood. Let’s start with you explaining your understanding of how the void is both material and immaterial....”

King Immortal-Slayer was obviously surprised that Yang Qi could translate for the purrling. However, he simply shook his head and said, “Monarch godhood actually is not godhood. It's an expression of embodied power that surpasses godhood. I've been studying it since my days in ancient times, and from it I gained significant enlightenment about the profundities of space....”

With that, King Immortal-Slayer went on to explain what sounded like a sutra or scripture. Jadefall’s jaw dropped as she listened, and she almost immediately felt herself sinking into a state of deep understanding.

Yang Qi listened as well, and his enlightenment grew.

At the same time, he translated for the purrling. Unfortunately, there were some words he didn’t know how to speak in the purrling’s language, as they were too profound. For those aspects, he had to impart the information by means of will projection.

As the purrling listened, it sat up straight in Jadefall’s arms, its fur rippling as if it were thinking deeply about something. Its thoughtful expression looked somewhat comical, yet both Yang Qi and Jadefall were deeply shaken by what King Immortal-Slayer was saying about monarch godhood.

As for Yang Qi, he actually gained new understanding of his own monarch godhood. Although he had formed monarch godhood, he hadn’t done any deep research into it. In fact, he had succeeded in forming it almost by mere chance. Therefore, the information King Immortal-Slayer was providing was extremely helpful.

It was similar to how most ordinary people didn’t really understand their own physiology. It was their body, but that didn’t mean they could understand it on a deep level.

King Immortal-Slayer was truly living up to his reputation as an almighty and knowledgeable figure from ancient times. To Yang Qi, it almost felt like attending a class. And it was much more useful than reading a book. King Immortal-Slayer was explaining deep truths about the material and immaterial, providing a thorough description of the fundamental structure of monarch godhood.

His monarch godhood rotated, and as it did, it seemed to grow stronger and more refined.

As the saying goes, listening to the words of a wise man can be superior to studying ten years of books.

Yang Qi sensed that even if he worked on his cultivation for a hundred years, he wouldn’t be able to gain understanding such as this. King Immortal-Slayer was King Immortal-Slayer. His ancient knowledge and might surpassed Yang Qi’s comprehension.

Meanwhile, the purrling nodded as if in understanding.

After King Immortal-Slayer was done, the purrling nodded and started purring again. Of course, Yang Qi translated. “You're truly a venerable and powerful ancient one. You have my admiration for your understanding of monarch godhood. However, there are a few points in which your insight is lacking. Allow me to explain my view....”

With that, they continued discussing the matter, with Yang Qi benefiting the entire time. The discussion went on for three days and three nights. Apparently, King Immortal-Slayer was also benefiting from the discussion.

After the exchange was over, King Immortal-Slayer said, “So, we’ll do just as we discussed. Oh, Powerful Entity, I can tell that, like me, you are someone who seeks the Annulled level. You wish to walk the path to the very end. We can both control time, but we have no way to break through the end of time. Before that end comes, we must figure out a way to step out of the river of time. We must make preparations.”

“Purr, purr....” the purrling replied.

“Yes,” Yang Qi translated. “You’re absolutely right, oh venerable King Immortal-Slayer. The end of time approaches, and no one can evade it. We must make preparations....”

Purr!

After Yang Qi finished translating, the purrling spat out a huge bubble that surrounded Yang Immortal-Slayer.

Chapter 1274: A Paramount God Arrives

Two almighty beings were joining forces to remold Yang Immortal-Slayer and help him form monarch godhood. The purrling and King Immortal-Slayer were each completely one-of-a-kind, and they had taken the time to compare their respective understandings and come up with the perfect plan.

The purrling started by using its energy arts to create a bubble around Yang Immortal-Slayer.

Before long, Yang Immortal-Slayer was transforming. The particles that made him up thrummed with power as they changed into something like bubbles that could expand or retract at will. It was as if they existed, yet didn’t exist, or were alive, but at the same time were destroyed. Boundless, unending power flowed through him in indescribable fashion.

“Excellent,” said King Immortal-Slayer, “he’s in a state of being neither false nor empty, both material and immaterial. His dao is transforming. Now, I shall send my will into him to stimulate his mind!” Without any hesitation, he sent his will into Yang Immortal-Slayer’s sea of consciousness. “Yang Immortal-Slayer, hurry and draw on your psyche to form a resonance with me!”

Yang Immortal-Slayer did just that, causing energy streams of the preheaven dao of gods to flow through him.

“Consummate enlightenment,” King Immortal-Slayer said. “With one thought, flowers bloom. With one thought, trees wither. With one thought, life and extermination. With one thought, nirvanic rebirth. Remember, your thoughts are your everything. What you imagine in your sea of consciousness is true and real. You must come to understand what is true and real, and what is empty and void. Understand what are thoughts and what are not thoughts. This is called Nevasaññānāsaññāyatana, which is neither perception nor non-perception. It is a world, an expression of space-time, a place with neither desire nor physicality, a miraculous thought. Your fleshly body is surrounded by a world that doesn't exist. It is not thought. Yet it isn’t a lack of thought.”

All of a sudden Yang Immortal-Slayer vanished from sight.

Yang Qi could tell that he had entered a marvelous aspect of space-time that was impossible for he himself to reach. Only someone halfway into the Annulled level could enter it.

There were many aspects of space-time in the god world, and in this case, the world of Nevasaññānāsaññāyatana was without desire or physicality. It consisted only of minute psychic fluctuations. Although Yang Qi understood what it was, understanding it didn’t mean he could enter it.

For instance, in the impure lands, everyone understood how amazing it was to be an emperor. But that didn’t mean they could simply be emperors.

The purrling and King Immortal-Slayer were working together, one remolding that which was physical, the other remolding that which was psychic. As a result, Yang Immortal-Slayer’s physical body vanished and he entered the space-time of Nevasaññānāsaññāyatana, a place of infinite secrets.

According to legend, only half-Annulled experts could enter that place. Those who reached the half-Annulled level would disappear, leaving behind only their thoughts. Yet those thoughts could destroy heaven and earth, pierce through everything, invert the cosmos, and bring extermination to the legion of gods.

It was the level the Sovereign Lord had reached.

Yang Qi suddenly realized that he had gone into a trance. His psychic power twitched, and he experienced a baptism, gaining even more enlightenment of his monarch godhood.

Shortly afterward, Yang Immortal-Slayer returned from the realm of Nevasaññānāsaññāyatana. His body formed again, and the purrling spat out another bubble, which entered him and caused his cultivation base to rise. Then King Immortal-Slayer unleashed more profound psychic and divine abilities.

As Yang Immortal-Slayer slowly gained enlightenment, he shivered, and like a caterpillar emerging from a cocoon, Paramount will convergence emerged. He had achieved his breakthrough before reaching godly ascension, which meant that he had successfully formed monarch godhood. Of course, there was still a lot more work to do going forward.

“I did it!” Yang Immortal-Slayer said, breathing a sigh of relief. The psychic power in his sea of consciousness felt invincible, and very different from before.

“It worked,” King Immortal-Slayer said, also sighing with relief. “I almost can’t believe that the mighty purrling and I were able to work together to create an expert with monarch godhood. It was a big drain on my power. I don’t think I could do this a second time. Yang Immortal-Slayer, the next thing you need to do is have Yang Qi explain to you all of his experiences regarding completing monarch godhood. You’ll need a huge amount of medicinal pills and power. For now, your current state is too eye-catching. I’ll place a sealing mark on you that will keep your psychic power under wraps. You’ll seem like nothing more than a peak Terrifying expert. That said, you’ll still seem incredibly powerful. Incidentally, an even more powerful entity will want to take you as an apprentice in the future, and help you grow further. Be prepared.”

As King Immortal-Slayer vanished, the purrling purred twice to say, “Take care, Powerful Entity.” Then it snuggled into Jadefall’s arms and fell asleep.

“Where are we going to get all these medicinal pills we need?” Yang Qi grumbled. He needed medicinal pills for himself, and now Yang Immortal-Slayer was being added into the mix. Where was he ever going to get his hands on everything he needed? He could create his own godnotes and godstones, but couldn’t simply pull Paramount medicinal pills out of thin air. It might be possible to find small collections for sale, but he needed millions or possibly even hundreds of millions of them. Anyone who heard of such a thing would pass out from shock.

Furthermore, there was another problem. When forming his own monarch godhood, he had relied on the God Legion Seal’s ability to absorb godpower from around him. But Yang Immortal-Slayer wouldn’t have that option, so what were they to do? Completely forming monarch godhood was no easy task.

“What do we do next, Yang Qi?” Jadefall asked. She knew that Yang Qi would need to find medicinal pills, and was confident that they would be able to do so. Given how strong they were getting, they would have plenty of opportunities to search for medicinal pills.

As they discussed the matter, Arhat Thousand-Hands hurried over.

“Well? Did you break through?”

“No,” Yang Immortal-Slayer replied. Even if he had told the truth, there was no way Arhat Thousand-Hands would have believed him.

“I shouldn’t even have asked. By the way, something really big happened in the sect. As the leader of the Sage Monarch Society, Jadefall, you probably already know.”

“Oh? What happened?” Jadefall asked. “I’ve been in seclusion, and only came out to visit Yang Immortal-Slayer. I’m not aware of what's been going on.”

“Oh, I see. A Paramount God came to visit our sect and offer formal greetings. The Lord of the True Void. People are saying that he’s friends with the houselord. As soon as he arrived, the houselord sent down orders that all disciples are to come attend a ceremony at the God-Ordaining Dais. Supposedly, it wasn’t easy for the houselord to convince the Lord of the True Void to come, but he’s going to give a lecture about the dao for a full two hours. He may even take some of our disciples as novitiates, if he sees someone impressive.”

‘The Lord of the True Void? A Paramount God? A lecture about the dao?’ Yang Qi had never personally seen a Paramount God. King Immortal-Slayer didn’t count, and the nine chief elders of the sect were only Perfect Gods.

Paramount Gods with Unbounded will convergence could look down on anything and everything.

However, considering that Yang Qi had just listened to King Immortal-Slayer explain the dao, he wasn't particularly impressed by the idea of hearing whatever this Lord of the True Void had to say.

That said, if the sect had mandated disciples attend, he wouldn’t defy the orders.

“Sounds important,” he said. “I think I’ll go talk to everyone about this. If the Lord of the True Void is really going to take some apprentices, perhaps some of my brethren will be accepted.”

“Good point,” Jadefall said to Yang Qi via will projection. “This might be a great opportunity. By the way, remember what King Immortal-Slayer said when he left just now? That he was sealing Yang Immortal-Slayer in the hopes that he’d be taken as an apprentice by an almighty being? Maybe that's the way to get those medicinal pills.”

“Right, right,” Yang Qi replied. “He did say that. He must have anticipated that the Lord of the True Void was coming.” Raising his voice, he said, “Let's go. We have things to talk about.”

With that, he and his people converged in a palace that Jadefall had ordered to be constructed for them. Obviously, the Sage Monarch Society needed an actual headquarters to meet at. It wasn’t nearly as impressive as Mount Dragon Head had been. However, Yang Qi didn’t care. Once Jadefall improved her cultivation base a bit, perhaps by becoming a Consummate God, he could give her his fragments of the Cruiser of Civilization to use as the foundation for their headquarters. Like Mount Dragon Head, the cruiser could hang in the air above the god kingdom, with a minor world inside.

Soon, everyone had gathered, including Peaklord Memory, Peaklord Celestial, and Sectlord Will Manifestation. All the experts of the Sage Monarch Society were present.

“A Paramount God has come to the sect, Yang Qi,” the Shepherd said. “What are we going to do? It seems like a good opportunity. If we could attract the attention of his Paramount God and be taken as apprentices, we’d have access to amazing resources, and would also have much better protection.”

“But what if this Paramount God has evil intentions?” said Proud World. “What if it's a wretch-god of some sort? I say we should keep a low profile for now. There will always be opportunities to take advantage of; we don’t want to press our luck right now.”

Chapter 1275: A Paramount God Arrives (2)

“I’m curious to see what this Lord of the True Void is like, and what his story is.”

Some of Yang Qi’s people wanted to take advantage of the situation, while others wanted to play it safe. The latter view did make sense; they were a group of people with many secrets to keep. However, Yang Qi didn’t think that the Lord of the True Void was a wretch-god. It was more likely that he was scouting for talent.

Besides, if he was a wretch-god, why would the houselord have invited him? The House of God Ordainment was considered to be a major orthodox group, and their core teachings and doctrines were righteous. True, they had infighting and power struggles. And they would wage war, exterminating other sects and enslaving their members to work in brutal mining colonies.

But they weren’t like people from the dao of devils, who openly robbed, murdered, and assimilated the souls of their enemies. The god world was a bloody place where foul winds blew everywhere, and life was bitter and tragic. But in general, the House of God Ordainment’s destiny was positive, not steeped in destruction and foulness. Even in the most orthodox of empires, slaves and thralls existed, and such practices couldn’t be eliminated. And even the most prestigious confucian institutes would engage in slaughter of their enemies.

“Does anyone in the Sage Monarch Society know anything about the Lord of the True Void?” Jadefall said.

“I’ll ask around,” Brahma replied. “I doubt he’s a god from ancient times. He’s from after the time of King Immortal-Slayer, when the Sovereign Lord and the halls of heaven were gone. He’s an expert of the new age. In any case, I don’t remember anyone like him existing in ancient times.”

Brahma left, then returned shortly after with more information. “I got some interesting information. The Lord of the True Void is indeed a powerful Paramount God. However, he's not affiliated with any particular sect. He's essentially a wandering expert who rarely shows his face in public. Most of the time, he drifts about in the void of the god world, working on his cultivation and enlightenment. Occasionally he’ll show up on a continent and look for geniuses, then provide them with a blessing of enlightenment. When the houselord was young, he received a blessing of enlightenment from him, and even followed him around the god world for a time. In fact, there are many experts like that. That’s why everyone is going crazy now that he’s here. Everybody wants to be noticed by him and taken as a novitiate. Whoever gets taken with him will be in an amazing position upon returning to the House of God Ordainment.”

“So that's how it is,” Yang Qi replied, nodding. “No wonder King Immortal-Slayer said that Yang Immortal-Slayer would get an amazing Master. Why don’t we come up with a plan to attract the attention of this Lord of the True Void?”

“That’s not necessary,” Doom said. “All we have to do is act normal. The Lord of the True Void is a Paramount God, so he’ll be able to detect the traces of genius on us. Even my natural talents have already vastly surpassed those of ordinary gods. I used to be a bearer of the God Legion Seal, so what if he notices me?”

“I can use my Devil-God Seal if I have to. Let’s wait and see if the situation is actually dangerous. After all, this man is a Paramount God. Thankfully, I just learned a lot from King Immortal-Slayer and the purrling. With the energy of the Exalted Purrling to help me, he shouldn’t notice anything about me, so long as he doesn't inspect me closely.” Yang Qi had utter faith in the purrling, to the point where he wasn't even afraid of Paramount Gods. After all, Patriarch Deva was more famous than this Lord of the True Void, yet Patriarch Deva’s talisman hadn’t been able to do a thing to the purrling. It stood to reason that the Lord of the True Void wouldn’t be able to either. King Immortal-Slayer viewed the purrling as an equal, which meant the purrling was on the same level as the Sovereign Lord, Wretch God Ultimate, the Demon Master, and the True Devil.

But then, a thought occurred to him. ‘What if the houselord invited a Paramount God for a more specific reason? What if he wants him to try dealing with the Exalted Purrling?’

Yang Qi had switched his form of address to ‘Exalted Purrling’. After all, if the purrling was on the same level as King Immortal-Slayer, it was important to show it respect.

“That’s very possible,” Jadefall said, suddenly sounding very nervous. “The purrling has caused a huge commotion in the god world recently. And during this entire time, the houselord has never shown his face. But there’s no way he isn’t aware of everything that happened. Maybe he did invite someone to make a move on the purrling....”

“I don’t think so,” Yang Qi said. “The houselord couldn’t be that monumentally stupid. I doubt he wants to openly make a move against the Exalted Purrling. More likely, he wants to use the powers of a Paramount God to try getting more information about it. It's lucky for him the purrling doesn’t seem to have any ambitions at all. It just sleeps and enjoys life. Otherwise, it could accomplish a lot. As far as it's concerned, people aren’t even worth worrying about.”

The purrling really did view humans as being too low-level. Only people like King Immortal-Slayer were worth dealing with.

As for Jadefall, although she wasn’t very strong, she was its mother, and it treated her like that. Yang Qi also wasn’t an ordinary person. He had monarch godhood and the God Legion Seal, and was a Fateless One. But everyone else might as well have been trash in its eyes.

In terms of accomplishing something big, it viewed that as laughable as a human gathering a bunch of pigs and declaring himself an emperor among them. Of course, the fact that Yang Qi had established the Sage Monarch Society had a lot to do with the threat of the purrling. He wouldn’t have been able to accomplish it alone.

“Purrling, is there any chance the Lord of the True Void could forcibly take you?” Jadefall asked.

The purrling gave her a sidelong glance that obviously meant, “I'm not even going to bother answering that question.”

At that point, Yang Qi felt a bit better. “We still need to come up with a plan for what to do if the Lord of the True Void notices any of us. There has to be more to this situation than we understand.”

With that, they went on to discuss the matter in further detail.

Several hours later, a booming voice echoed out and filled the entire House of God Ordainment. It entered the souls of everyone present, and although no one knew who exactly it belonged to, it was obviously the voice of a Perfect God.

“All disciples will gather at the square in front of the God-Ordaining Dais. Organize yourselves by faction. We’ll be offering greetings to the Paramount God, the Lord of the True Void.”

“Alright, let's go,” Jadefall said. “The Sage Monarch Society needs to find a place to gather.”

Before long, everyone was at the square, which was a huge place that spread out in front of the God-Ordaining Dais itself. The dais was immense, and had several thrones spread out in front of it for the leadership of the sect to use. Other than when important meetings were called, it was a restricted area.

Usually, it was only used when it came time to vote for a new houselord, but today was different. Today, the sect was meeting to receive a Paramount God.

It was an impressive sight to see all of the factions in the sect. Overall, the Sage Monarch Society wasn’t particularly large. The biggest factions were the Brilliant Radiance Society, the Honorable Glory Society, and the Preheaven Society. As for the Mystery Society, it didn’t have any representation at all; the identities of its members were top secret.

Bells tolled as important people flew out of the Primeval Chaos Palace and took their places on the thrones. Of course, they were the chief elders, all of them Perfect Gods. Fully a hundred of them appeared, most of them people who were generally in secluded cultivation. They were powerful individuals down to the last, many of them mid or late Perfect Gods.

A moment later, two individuals appeared, one of whom was a burly man who seemed to pulse with energy. He was the houselord, who was at the peak of the Perfect God level and had peak Paramount will convergence.

The other was shorter and less muscular, but at the same time, physically resembled the houselord. He glowed with divine light, and seemed to pulse with unending power. He was the junior houselord, the leader of the Mystery Society.

As soon as they appeared, the entire House of God Ordainment went absolutely silent, and the atmosphere turned somewhat stifling. Many of the disciples assumed the houselord was going to give them some sort of speech, but instead, he just said, “I offer respectful greetings, oh venerable Lord of the True Void!”

RUMBLE!

As soon as the words left his mouth, an immense passageway appeared, piercing through the god kingdom to reveal a daoist with empty hands, strolling along through the spatial tempests. Such tempests could shred Consummate Gods to pieces, but not this man. He simply stepped out in front of the God-Ordaining Dais and looked around at the surrounding god kingdom.

He didn’t have even a trace of a wretched, evil aura, making it obvious that he cultivated a very righteous and orthodox energy art. There was no doubt that he was definitely not a wretch-god.

The Lord of the True Void had come.

All of the disciples prostrated on the ground, including Yang Qi. The only exception was Jadefall, who stood there to allow the purrling to get a look at the Lord of the True Void.

Their eyes met, and instead of the respect the purrling had shown to King Immortal-Slayer, all that could be seen in its gaze was ridicule. In that moment, Yang Qi realized that the purrling definitely wasn’t worried about the Lord of the True Void.

Paramount Gods were sorted into various grades and ranks, and it was obvious that the Lord of the True Void couldn’t compare to King Immortal-Slayer.

Ordinary Paramount Gods had early Unbounded will convergence. In terms of the mid, late, and peak levels, they would reach the level of King Immortal-Slayer, and step halfway into the Annulled level. Logically speaking, it seemed unlikely that the Lord of the True Void was in the late or peak level. At the most, he was in the mid level. That said, even mid Unbounded will convergence could shake heaven and earth. With a single thought, a person like that could create a god kingdom or bring devastation to the dome of heaven.

After looking at the Lord of the True Void for a moment, the purrling closed its eyes and went to sleep. It was obviously bored. The Lord of the True Void casually retracted his gaze as well. However, Yang Qi could tell from the look in his eye that he didn’t dare to do anything to the purrling. Their simple exchange of glances had made it clear who was the superior, and who was the inferior.

Chapter 1276: The Lord of the True Void

‘First challenge, passed,’ Yang Qi thought, breathing a sigh of relief. The pressure Paramount Gods could exert was simply too immense. Even just the early Unbounded level of will convergence was far more than Yang Qi could defy. A single glance from this man could kill him.

Thankfully, the purrling could stand up to him.

Standing on the God-Ordaining Dais with the Lord of the True Void was Houselord God Ordainment, who was a peak Perfect God with peak Paramount will. “Teacher,” he asked, “why is the purrling so amazing? Did you pick up on any clues?”

Looking very serious, the Lord of the True Void replied, “It’s a powerful entity that was born from primal-chaos before the god world came into existence. As for what exactly it is, I can't say. But I do know that it absolutely mustn’t be angered. I almost can’t believe it chose to take up residence in this sect. Logically speaking, it would look down even on the kingdom of a Paramount God. And why has it chosen that young lady?”

“Teacher, are you interested in taking her as an apprentice?” Houselord God Ordainment asked. “She’s also the adopted daughter of an imperial concubine from the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty.”

“No, that won’t do. With that creature at her side, she doesn’t have any need of help from me. Besides, although that creature doesn’t seem to be very temperamental, it could obviously be very dangerous. We’re lucky that it has a generally calm demeanor. In the future, be careful around it.”

“Teacher, there are a number of reasons I invited you here today. First, out of concern that Patriarch Deva might come and cause problems. Second, for you to see the purrling, hopefully identify it, and possibly benefit from it. Third, because my son and I have both reached late Paramount will convergence, and hope you can give some advice on what to do next. Fourth, to see if there are any geniuses in the sect for you to take as a novitiate.”

“Patriarch Deva won’t bother coming here. He’s a very mysterious person who doesn’t randomly take action. Furthermore, I left a seal on the exterior of the god kingdom here. If he wanted to destroy the god kingdom, he’d have to deal with the sealing mark first, and I doubt he wants to start a war like that. As for the purrling, forget about it. It’s not anything you can handle. In regards to you and your son, you’ve both reached a zenith in your cultivations and need to start seeking enlightenment of how to proceed. I can’t help you with that. If you want to become Paramount Gods, you’ll have to break through to the Unbounded level, which requires personal enlightenment. You must come to your own understanding of what exactly it means to be bounded and unbounded. It’s something that can’t be explained to one person by another. And yes, I'm interested to see if there are any geniuses in your sect. My research into the way geniuses advance in their cultivation actually provides a lot of help to my own understanding of cultivation. Hopefully, the culmination of my research will lead to creating a dao of the ultimate genius.”

“I don’t think I’ll ever match your level of thinking, Teacher,” Houselord God Ordainment said in what was obviously a bit of brown-nosing. “There are a lot of geniuses in the House of God Ordainment, the only question is whether they’re connected to you by destiny.”

The Lord of the True Void laughed. “You have geniuses in the House of God Ordainment? I think not. It’s easy to seem tall when everyone around you is short.”

“Er, right. I suppose you can just say they stand head and shoulders above the rest. In any case, considering how many disciples have gathered to hear you speak of the dao, I really hope you can help strengthen them, and by extension, the sect itself.”

“I accepted your invitation, so I’ll provide what little help I can. The Eternal-Life God-Dynasty has been putting a lot of pressure on your House of God Ordainment lately. Their emperor, Eternal Nightless, is a very ambitious person. However, it’s his son, the crown prince, who’s truly worth keeping an eye on. He’s even more mysterious and unpredictable than his father, and will eventually strike a heavy blow to your sect. You mustn’t allow yourself to be caught off guard.”

“Many thanks, Teacher. I’ll remember that. As long as I can break through to Unbounded will convergence and become a Paramount God, the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty will have to pay a very heavy price to destroy the House of God Ordainment. Besides, the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty has been at war with the Nacrelight Sageland for tens of thousands of years, and they need us for that conflict.”

“I recently gained enlightenment of a little skill called the Grand-Wisdom True-Void Samādhi Sutra. I’ll recite it for your disciples and see if any of them can understand it. If they can, it’ll improve their psychic power. It’s a combination of a buddhist teaching, a daoist technique, and a confucian scripture. If there really are some geniuses present, after they hear the sutra, their will convergence will release a visible radiance and light. Whoever has the brightest light will be the top genius, and I’ll take them as an apprentice.”

“Please, begin your lecture whenever you’re ready, Teacher.”

“Grand-Wisdom True-Void Samādhi Sutra!” The Lord of the True Void waved his hand and a string of sutra text flew up into the sky, then fell down into the god kingdom like flower petals.

As the sutra merged into the bodies of the disciples, they felt cleansed down to the level of their souls. Then they started shining with brilliant light as the sutra acknowledged their fundamental nature. Apparently, it could remove a person’s desires and leave behind only their wisdom.

Thus, the brightness of the light that shone off of them was a way to assess that wisdom, identifying the level of their genius.

Yang Qi was shocked to see the sutra text falling into him and merging into his sea of consciousness, so he quickly emptied himself completely. ‘He is a Paramount God after all. It’ll only take him a moment to identify the geniuses present. Thankfully, I placed Devil-God Seals in all of my people. A paltry sutra like this won’t be able to pierce through that unless he specifically targets one of us.’

As he was suppressing his own fundamental nature, he looked around to see what other geniuses were in the House of God Ordainment.

As it turned out, there were quite a few bright halos of light on various disciples. Some people only had faint halos, and others were actually dark. Those were individuals who were obviously a far cry from being geniuses.

However, some people shone like bright stars.

Yang Qi noticed some of the children of primeval chaos who had halos like intense suns. That wasn’t an indication of the level of their cultivation base, but rather their genius.

There were also some ordinary disciples who were only Quasi-Gods, but radiated a brightness that surpassed even the children of primeval chaos.

All of a sudden, a thrumming sound could be heard as a pillar of bright light shot up into the air. It was a female disciple whose brightness surpassed any of the children of primeval chaos, and when Yang Qi looked over, he recognized her. It was Elder Sister Xue, the leader of one of the mid-level factions, the Snow Society.

A moment later, another expression of brightness appeared that also surpassed the children of primeval chaos, and it came from Bai Yin.

As it turned out, there really were some geniuses hiding among the ordinary disciples.

“Hmm?” The Lord of the True Void looked over in surprise. “Well, you do have some geniuses. It might be worth it for you to provide some extra assistance to that girl, as well as that boy.”

“Chief elders,” said the houselord, “please take note of who has the brightest light, and mark them for future help. Teacher, you’re acknowledging that those two are geniuses, but are you saying you don’t plan to take them as apprentices? Do they really not meet up to your standards?”

“I'm curious to see if there are any other disciples out there who might surprise me.” Even as the words left his mouth, the Lord of the True Void waved his hands, and the falling sutra text surged with greater power.

All of a sudden, another burst of radiance and light appeared.

It looked like an exploding sun, and it caused even the Consummate Gods to momentarily shield their eyes. It came from Yang Immortal-Slayer, who was apparently one of the ‘ultimate geniuses’. His radiance and light were like the glory of the ancient halls of heaven, as if he were the origin of all light, the wellspring of brightness, the source of all enlightenment of that which was bright.

The other geniuses present were shocked.

“What?!” blurted the Lord of the True Void. “What is that light? What kind of genius is that coming from? How could the brightness be so incredible? What’s going on here? Even someone I personally groomed as a novitiate who since became a Paramount God wouldn't shine as brightly as this. Does he really have such consummate potential?”

The Lord of the True Void wasn’t the only one to be surprised. The Consummate Gods present were all completely taken aback that Yang Immortal-Slayer had proved to be such an ultimate genius.

CRASH!

The Lord of the True Void stopped the rain of sutra text, and the light radiating from the disciples faded away.

“Come here,” said the Lord of the True Void, and he made a beckoning gesture that caused Yang Immortal-Slayer to fly over to him. Reaching out, he touched the top of his head, whereupon a look of even greater shock covered his face, and then it appeared as if he were communicating with someone.

The leaders of the House of God Ordainment had no idea what was going on, and none dared interrupt the Lord of the True Void to ask.

Two hours passed in deathly silence. Then, the Lord of the True Void laughed. “This is destiny. Incredible destiny! You’re my new novitiate!”

Chapter 1277: A Sinister Plan

The Lord of the True Void was unprecedentedly happy.

He had found an incredible, consummate genius that he could take as an apprentice and groom into being a top expert. In fact, if this apprentice became a Paramount God, he would definitely be able to help the Lord of the True Void accomplish many things.

Of course, the Lord of the True Void wouldn’t take just any genius he came across as an apprentice. After all, there were plenty of people in the world who would return evil for good. He needed to assess the temperament of whoever he was considering accepting. The two hour period that had passed obviously involved him communicating with Yang Immortal-Slayer and learning about him. Upon confirming that he wasn’t the duplicitous, back-stabbing type, he agreed to take him as an apprentice.

“Many thanks, Master!” Yang Immortal-Slayer said, dropping down to kowtow.

He was the subject of quite a bit of envy, even from the children of primeval chaos. Everyone yearned to be under the tutelage of a Paramount God, especially one like the Lord of the True Void. It was something that could be encountered by chance but never searched for and found.

“Arhat Thousand-Hands, come here,” the Lord of the True Void said.

Arhat Thousand-Hands was Yang Immortal-Slayer’s previous Master, and was a Greater God. As soon as he was called out, he hurried over to the God-Ordaining Dais.

“You are Yang Immortal-Slayer’s previous Master, and he said many good things about you. He also said he would need your approval for this change. I’m very pleased that he shows such respect. And given that I’m stealing such a talented apprentice from you, it goes without saying that I’ll offer compensation. In fact, I’ll use my True-Void Invincibility Art to refine your godhood and make you a Consummate God!”

RUMBLE!

A stream of energy flowed out and wrapped up Arhat Thousand-Hands.

His godhood emitted creaking sounds as impurities were extruded from within, purifying him and cleansing his psyche.

Soon, he began to emit the aura of a Consummate God!

Paramount Gods couldn’t provide such blessings, but the Lord of the True Void had mid Unbounded will convergence, so he could. It was possible to receive blessings as a reward from the sect, but it required a massive amount of merit points. Furthermore, it wasn’t possible for Greater Gods to become Consummate Gods in that way, as there were no Paramount Gods in the sect, only Perfect Gods.

“I’ve benefited a lot from this visit,” said the Lord of the True Void. Waving his hand, he opened a rift leading to another destination.

“Master,” Yang Immortal-Slayer said, “might I say farewell to my brethren?”

“Yes, go ahead. However, after you make enough progress, you can return here. You’re my apprentice, but I won’t be placing any heavy restrictions on you. Every three years, you can come here to visit your friends. Furthermore, why don’t you take these magical treasures and medicinal pills as a gift from me? You can give them to your brethren if you’d like.”

Yang Immortal-Slayer flew over to Yang Qi, Jadefall, and the others. “I succeeded,” he said. “We’ll meet again in three years. After I return, we can rebuke heaven and earth and take control of the entire god world!”

With that, he handed a magical treasure bag to Yang Qi, which contained the gifts he had just received from the Lord of the True Void.

“Understood,” Yang Qi said, nodding. “We have powerful enemies. Remember what King Immortal-Slayer said.” Then he watched as Yang Immortal-Slayer left.

Yang Immortal-Slayer didn’t have the God Legion Seal, and completing monarch godhood was a very difficult thing. But with a Paramount God to help him, he would have a big advantage. It was how King Immortal-Slayer had intended for things to go.

Yang Immortal-Slayer was now the subject of widespread envy. Furthermore, it gave added weight to Jadefall and the Sage Monarch Society, as everyone knew they were connected. Now, the Sage Monarch Society had an additional supporter in the Lord of the True Void. Because of that, it was a given that no one in the House of God Ordainment would cause problems for them.

Soon enough, Yang Immortal-Slayer would become an invincible entity. Plus, they had the purrling. One of the questions it raised was whether or not the junior houselord would actually succeed his father and be the new houselord next time the voting took place.

From the flickering expression on the junior houselord’s face, it was obvious he was thinking about this. But he didn't say anything.

Meanwhile, odd expressions could be seen on the faces of many of the chief elders as they looked at Jadefall. She had further stabilized her position, and now some of the chief elders were wondering if they should get on better terms with her.

With that, the event concluded and everyone dispersed.

In the following months, more people joined the Sage Monarch Society. Furthermore, some of the Consummate God chief elders came to visit Jadefall, offering medicinal pills, magical treasures, and crafting ingredients as gifts. Slowly but surely, the Sage Monarch Society’s treasure storehouse was filling up.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi and his brethren took every opportunity to strengthen the power and influence of the society.

Furthermore, there were other parts of the sect that wanted to get on good terms with the Sage Monarch Society, such as the Thrall Camp, Treasure House, and Pill Repository. They also came bearing gifts.

The big downside was that the Sage Monarch Society didn’t have a truly powerful expert leading them. Because of that, some of the other factions didn’t hold back from secretly opposing them. Furthermore, Yang Qi had come to the realization that the Mystery Society was planning something big. After looking further into it, he found that they were trying to foment rebellion in the Sage Monarch Society, even among some of the most loyal members. Apparently, they were even planning to target some of his brethren in an attempt to flip their loyalties.

Five months passed.

Although everything seemed stable in the House of God Ordainment, the truth was that things were chaotic behind the scenes. Factions of all sorts had big plans.

On one particular day, a gathering took place in the Primeval Chaos Palace. Present in a secret chamber were the houselord, junior houselord, and a few dozen of the most loyal Perfect God chief elders.

This was the most powerful group in the sect, and represented about fifty percent of its overall forces.

Yet they were all nervous about the growth of the Sage Monarch Society.

“Son, what do you think?” asked Houselord God Ordainment. “The Sage Monarch Society really is getting a lot stronger. And I'm going to be retiring before long, whereupon there will be a vote to see which of the children of primeval chaos will become the new houselord. I have the feeling it'll be a troublesome affair. If we don’t get the Sage Monarch Society in check, it will likely come into conflict with you.”

“Although Jadefall is technically the leader of the Sage Monarch Society,” said one of the chief elders, “she’s only a Common God. She wants to become a Consummate God, but that's easier said than done; however, it is true that her cultivation speed is incredible. She’s only been in the House of God Ordainment for a few years, and has already made such incredible progress. Houselord, your term will only last for another three hundred years, and she’ll definitely be a Consummate God by then.”

“We have to be very careful,” Houselord God Ordainment said. “Furthermore, I wonder what level of cultivation Yang Immortal-Slayer will reach by that time. We really need to come up with a good plan. There are some members of the council of chief elders that have shifted loyalties to Jadefall. They’re even secretly providing her with resources. I wonder if that's going to cause problems for our group.”

There were over a hundred chief elders in the House of God Ordainment, and they were by no means united. They all had their own plans and goals, and were always jockeying for power and influence.

If they all threw their support behind whoever became the next houselord, it would obviously lead to big benefits.

Because of the complex relationship between the houselord and the chief elders, the houselord couldn’t act like a tyrant. When decisions needed to be made, he would call a meeting to discuss the matter, and would listen to the majority.

And the houselord definitely couldn’t execute people with impunity.

“It's very simple,” said the junior houselord. “In the world we live in, power reigns supreme. As long as I can reach the Unbounded level and become a Paramount God, I can definitely secure the position of houselord. They’ll have to submit to my authority, or be killed!”

“That's true, son,” said the houselord, “but are you sure you can do all of that in only three hundred years? We should at least have a backup plan. For example, what about that Mystery Society you founded? Can you get some of the Sage Monarch Society’s main supporters to rebel?”

Frowning, the junior houselord said, “The Sage Monarch Society is proving to be a hard nut to crack. Their key figures are all people who’ve only been members of the sect for four or five years. Look, I have all the information here.”

He tossed out some files with detailed information about Yang Qi, Jadefall, the Shepherd, Doom, Proud World, Yang Zhan, Sword Seventeen, Brahma, and Eldest Brother. There was even a packet about the Sage Monarch Consortium.

“Those are the key members, and all of them are hiding their true strength. They stick closely together, and thanks to the numerous missions they’ve accomplished over the past few years, they're incredibly strong. They can actually kill Consummate Gods! Each one possesses a crystal skull they can use to fight people much stronger than them. Furthermore, they’re all extremely experienced fighters. There’s no way an ordinary person in the same level would ever be able to beat them. In fact, because of that, I suspect that they’re all Ascendants.”

It was shocking how much information the junior houselord had gathered in such a short time.

“Ascendants?” said one of the chief elders. “If they’re really Ascendants, it’s going to make things even more difficult. Ascendants always become important people.”

“How could I have ever guessed that the House of God Ordainment would have Ascendants?” Houselord God Ordainment said. “In the future, we need to be more careful about what disciples we accept. They’ve done well to achieve so much without attracting attention.”

“It’s not really a big deal,” the junior houselord said. “Without Jadefall and the purrling, we could easily crush them. Even if they are Ascendants, it’s not as though they're all as strong as Consummate Gods. I could destroy them all in one move. Cripple their energy arts. It all comes down to their leader, Jadefall. If we can take care of her, the others will be easy to deal with.”

“How do you plan to do that?” asked Houselord God Ordainment.

The junior houselord smiled faintly. “Simple: win her heart! Once she’s my woman, everything will be easy to take care of.”

Chapter 1278: Emissary from the God-Dynasty

The junior houselord seemed very confident. “Even if she were stronger than she is, she’s still just a woman. Besides, she’s only a Common God, whereas I should have Unbounded will convergence soon. As a Paramount God, there’s no way I’ll fail to win her heart. It couldn’t be simpler.”

“But that's going to be dangerous,” Houselord God Ordainment said. “She still has that purrling. What if—”

“That doesn't matter. Once I get on her good side, I’ll just slowly win her over. Once she’s my woman, there won’t be anything to fear. I’ll even start by helping her out. Over the past few years, I spent some time with an expert from the dao of devils, a Paramount God who taught me a very powerful divine ability called the Emotion-Devil Six-Desires Heart-Entrance Skill. Using that, I can make sure she’s as docile as could be, and jumps at the chance to be my woman.”

The junior houselord had clearly thought the matter through.

“Fine,” one of the chief elders said. “Since you’re not doing anything aggressive, you should be safe. Just don’t forget that she already has someone close to her heart. Yang Qi. I've done some digging into the Sage Monarch Society, and although Jadefall is the leader, that Yang Qi pulls a lot of strings. His energy arts aren't very high, but he’s very powerful. He’s basically her most trusted adviser, and she listens to his suggestions. I'm afraid winning her heart won’t be easy with him around.”

“I can do it,” the junior houselord said. “I’ve done my own research into that brat Yang Qi. He’s clever, but too weak and unimportant. Personal strength is the most important factor here. I know I can’t do anything about the purrling, but there’s nothing protecting Yang Qi. I’ll take him out directly, if I have to.”

“What,” another chief elder said. “You’re going to make a move on Yang Qi? Given the level of your cultivation base, Junior Houselord, dealing with him should be easy. But killing a gnat with a sledgehammer will draw a lot of attention, and could cause unnecessary complications. Remember, the genius that the Lord of the True Void took as an apprentice is also surnamed Yang. He’s Yang Immortal-Slayer’s close friend, and likely a blood relative.”

“I’m obviously not going to kill him personally. First I’ll try recruiting him. If that fails, I’ll get rid of him. He’s one of the most important people in the Sage Monarch Society, so taking him out will be a big blow to them. Of course, I can’t do it with my own hands. If Yang Immortal-Slayer reaches a truly high level of cultivation, it’ll be easy for him to figure out that I was the culprit. In fact, I don’t want anyone from the House of God Ordainment to be involved. Thankfully, in my years outside the sect, I made a lot of friends from the dao of devils that I can get to help. And again, that’s only if he refuses to cooperate.”

The junior houselord truly believed that he had everything firmly under control.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi was working on his cultivation. After Yang Immortal-Slayer left, he felt more than ever that he wasn’t strong enough.

At the most, he could kill a mid Consummate God in a fight, but when it came to late or peak experts, he would have no choice but to run away.

And facing any Perfect God, even in the early level, would mean certain death.

He would similarly be slaughtered by anyone with Unbounded will.

Thankfully, he had learned a huge amount from observing the purrling and King Immortal-Slayer working together. Sending his divine will into his monarch godhood, he saw numerous power doubles in the shape of bubbles. At the same time, he summoned a huge bubble to surround himself.

Spatial tempests raged in the void, flowing into his monarch godhood and cleansing it. Then, Yang Qi started to retract his thoughts, causing the fluctuations of his mind to settle, like an insect going into hibernation.

He was slowly heading toward a state of Nevasaññānāsaññāyatana.

He was forgetting about his physical self and entering a new world of miraculous thinking. It was neither thought, nor was it not thought. Empty, but not empty. Existing, but not existing.

It was a miraculous state that caused his physical body to slowly collapse, leaving behind only his godhood, slowly rotating. The fact that his godhood remained showed that he hadn’t actually entered Nevasaññānāsaññāyatana. If he had, he would be invincible, and would be able to control all of heaven and earth.

That said, his current state was still incredibly impressive.

He had removed his fleshly body, godpower, and everything else about himself until only his monarch godhood remained. Monarch godhood was simply too impressive. It surpassed all other things in existence.

Because of that, reducing it to a state of nothing was extremely difficult. That said, he didn’t need to enter that state right now. As soon as his fleshly body vanished, he felt his thoughts and psychic power stirring and improving.

Doing things like this, it would probably take several hundred years to reach the mid Paramount level.

It was a big improvement from before. Given his previous psychic power, he probably wouldn’t ever have achieved the breakthrough. But now, it was a possibility within the next few hundred years. In the god world, hundreds of years could pass in the snap of a finger. It had already been five years since he ascended from the impure lands, and it had gone by in a flash. Almost like a dream.

Next, something very strange happened. Yang Qi took control of his monarch godhood and sent it piercing through space. He left the god kingdom and entered the wild spatial tempests.

When the power of the tempests struck his monarch godhood, nothing happened except that a few sparks flew. It was much like when iron was struck and impurities were removed from it, making it stronger and more complete.

An indeterminable period of time passed before Yang Qi pulled his godhood back to its original position.

Back in his mansion grotto in the god kingdom, he formed his body anew, complete with a sea of energy, dantian region, meridians, and everything else. His psychic power had been boosted significantly. That was when he found that forty-nine days had passed, although he hadn’t been aware of the passage of time.

To cultivators, time was often not worth calculating. If anything, time sometimes passed too quickly.

As he came out of his trance, one of his jade medallions buzzed, and he found that it was a message from Dream Daylily of the Crown Prince Society.

Leaving the god kingdom, he headed to the city where she resided.

“Have you been working on your cultivation? It's been awhile since you came to check in.” She seemed a bit irritated.

“My apologies, exalted Dream Daylily. I was making use of a medicinal pill given to me by the Lord of the True Void. I fell into a deep trance in which I lost track of everything.”

“The Lord of the True Void?” she replied. “That’s what I wanted to ask you about. Seven months ago the Lord of the True Void came to the House of God Ordainment and took one of your brethren away with him. Is that right? Yang Immortal-Slayer. I wanted to ask you much earlier about this, except you went into seclusion.”

“That’s right, he’s a brother of mine,” Yang Qi said. “He’s much more talented than the average person. He’s supposed to return for a visit after three years. When he does, I’ll try to get him to join the Crown Prince Society.”

“Forget about that,” Dream Daylily said. “The Lord of the True Void doesn’t belong to any particular organization, and is a wanderer. But he can't be taken lightly. If he finds out we're scheming about his apprentice, he may react with extreme violence. The crown prince already has Unbounded will convergence, but isn’t a Paramount God yet. He will be, sooner or later, but at the moment, he’s not a match for the Lord of the True Void. We don’t want to make a fool of ourselves in trying to be clever, so just drop the idea of recruiting his apprentice.”

Yang Qi nodded, but inside, he was laughing coldly.

“Your Sage Monarch Society has been growing rapidly,” Dream Daylily continued. “I heard that you’re the top lieutenant of the leader, Jadefall, and that she listens to everything you say. I've reported this matter up the chain of command, and because of it, the leaders have come to think of you as being very important. They want you to get stronger as fast as possible. In three hundred years, the House of God Ordainment will finally vote to select a new houselord. The old houselord will step down and become a chief elder; either that, or he’ll go out to live as a wanderer. The current houselord wants his son to succeed him, which is why the junior houselord founded that Mystery Society of his. At the moment, none of the other factions in the sect can deal with this Mystery Society. Furthermore, I've uncovered information that indicates the Mystery Society is going to take action against your Sage Monarch Society. The junior houselord cultivated a devil technique that he plans to use to win Jadefall’s heart. You need to be very careful. Stick close to Jadefall and make sure she doesn’t get fooled by him.”

“I see...” Yang Qi said. He knew that in the seven months that had passed, the junior houselord had been wining and dining Jadefall, talking about daoist techniques and plying her with gifts. But how could she fall for a trick like that?

She was planning to beat him at his own game in what she viewed as a battle of wits.

“The words of the lowly carry little weight,” Yang Qi said, putting an angry, jealous glint into his eyes. He even cracked his knuckles. “And I think Jadefall actually likes the junior houselord.”

When Dream Daylily saw his performance, she chuckled inwardly. “That’s why we’re going to help you get stronger. Incidentally, an emissary from the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty has come to see you. Prepare for the meeting.”

Chapter 1279: God-King Ruthless

“An emissary is here to see me? To bless me?” Yang Qi’s heart was starting to pound. Whoever this emissary was, they would definitely be an important person. And if they planned to bless him with power, it was going to be something dramatic. Dream Daylily was a Consummate God, so if she treated this emissary as more important than her, they were definitely a Perfect God at the least.

“The emissary is one of the crown prince’s valiant generals,” Dream Daylily said. “God-King Ruthless. He’s a Perfect God, so make sure to be extremely respectful, alright? You absolutely, positively must not do anything out of line. If you do, I won’t have any way to help you out.”

“Got it,” Yang Qi said, and he meant it. There was no question that Perfect Gods were incredibly powerful, and he knew he wasn’t in the position to defy one.

That said, not even a Perfect God would have any way to pick up on the truth about him. So as long as he was careful, he would be fine.

With that, Dream Daylily led Yang Qi into another room.

He immediately felt the atmosphere turn extremely tense. The air seemed to fill with a ruthless feeling, as though he were entering the presence of a despotic tyrant.

He saw a middle-aged man clad in a suit of armor, with an aquiline nose and glowing green eyes. He had long, bushy sideburns, and seemed like the picture of a mighty warrior, a ruthless person who had killed too many people to ever count. It was even possible to see souls drifting around his person, and he pulsed with the rancorous energy of his uncountable victims.

Yang Qi instantly realized that even if all of the Perfect Gods in the House of God Ordainment teamed up, they would be killed by this man. Of course, the House of God Ordainment had secret reserve powers that would likely enable them to fight someone like this.

“Greetings, God-King Ruthless,” Dream Daylily said.

Yang Qi dropped to his knees to kowtow. “Your humble servant offers greetings, oh exalted God-King. Congratulations on your Unbounded will; I'm sure that you’ll become a Paramount very soon!”

This person was so incredibly powerful that the slightest slip-up on his part would lead to a huge disaster. Normally speaking, he would never even have a chance to associate with someone like this; he was only able to now because of what had been happening with the Sage Monarch Society.

Of course, Yang Qi had hidden his true nature from the Lord of the True Void, so doing the same for God-King Ruthless wasn’t anything too difficult.

“Well spoken, boy,” God-King Ruthless said. Even as he just stood there, his armor clinked as though he was prepared to start fighting at any moment.

“Exalted God-King Ruthless, this is Jadefall’s most trusted adviser, and he's also a member of the Crown Prince Society. He's done much for our society since joining, and has recruited a lot of new members. Thanks to him, we have quite a bit of influence in the House of God Ordainment now.” Dream Daylily was talking Yang Qi up, in part to highlight her own accomplishments, considering she had recruited him.

“I’m well aware of everything he's done,” God-King Ruthless said. “There's no need for you to embellish matters. You have a lot of important tasks at hand. For example, turning the Sage Monarch Society into a part of the Crown Prince Society, like a cicada sloughing its skin. What do you say?”

“That’s what we’ve been planning to do,” Dream Daylily replied. “That said, it's not going to be easy. As you can see, Yang Qi isn’t exactly very strong....”

“That’s exactly what I'm worried about,” God-King Ruthless said, a cold smile playing out on his face. “Come to me, I’ll provide a blessing of power.”

“Many thanks, oh exalted God-King.” Looking like the picture of gratitude, Yang Qi stepped forward. Of course, inwardly, his killing intent was swirling. He had worked hard to build the Sage Monarch Society, and to think that they wanted him to make it part of the Crown Prince Society was infuriating. Furthermore, it ensured that they would eventually meet the same fate as Dragon Floret.

He would take that piece of the Mahātmā Jade and make sure the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty suffered a grievous blow in the process.

“Let’s first see what potential you have,” said God-King Ruthless.

He reached his hand out and sent some godpower deep into Yang Qi, which was actually quite a painful process.

‘He’s so incredibly strong. Thankfully, I learned a lot from King Immortal-Slayer. If I hadn't, I might not have gotten through this situation safely.’ Yang Qi simply endured the pain, using the Life-Death Void-Destruction Lightning to keep the God Legion Seal well-hidden. Furthermore, he also made his monarch godhood seem like the ordinary godhood of a Lesser God.

A moment later, God-King Ruthless nodded. “Not bad. You actually endured the intense pain of my Ruthless Soul Examination. Even Common Gods who experience that technique will often pass out, or even be reduced to a vegetative state. But you maintained clarity. You definitely deserve a blessing of power.”

The pain vanished.

“Many thanks, exalted God-King!” Yang Qi said fawningly. “Your abilities are world-encompassing! You are a peerless hegemon of—”

“That’s enough,” said God-King Ruthless. “I'm not interested in empty platitudes, so cut it with the brown-nosing. I slaughtered my way to where I am now. I’ve commanded millions upon millions of troops in battle, and have sent so many heads rolling that nobody can count them. I only care about services performed on the battlefield, so if you want my support, you need to earn credit in battle!”

“Right. Credit in battle. I’ll definitely make sure the Sage Monarch Society becomes part of the Crown Prince Society, and that the entire House of God Ordainment falls under the control of the crown prince. I’ll go through hell and high water for the crown prince’s sake!”

“Very good,” God-King Ruthless said. “Although you’ve earned some merit points lately, they don't come close enough to pay for a meeting with me, much less a blessing of power. But the crown prince ordered this. He’s paying close attention to the House of God Ordainment, and he wants to see results! He even gave me some treasures you can use to recruit more members. We especially want Jadefall. As for that junior houselord, he’s refused the crown prince over and over again, so for that, he’ll die.”

Upon hearing this, Yang Qi thought, ‘This is really a dog-eat-dog situation. That said, it's good for me. They’re the sandpiper and the clam, whereas I'm the fisherman waiting to step in and catch both.’

“How exactly do you plan to bless me, oh exalted God-King?” Yang Qi asked. “I've been stuck in a cultivation bottleneck recently, and am having trouble breaking through. It seems to be mostly related to my will convergence.”

“Don’t concern yourself with that. That said, during the process of blessing, you need to be careful. I’ll draw on a spell formation of battle and slaughter, which will be used to imbue you with godpower, remold your body, and strengthen your psychic power. Because of the rapid speed involved, there could be side-effects. You have to reach the Consummate God level to continue your cultivation, otherwise you could explode. The crown prince gave me a medicinal pill to use. It's a Nation-Fate God Pill, one of the most valuable pills in the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty, which contains the destiny of the entire dynasty. You’re lucky to get something like this.”

With that, he produced a medicinal pill.

It was the size of a fist, and red, making it reminiscent of the red dust of the mortal world. It seemed to contain blood, slaughter, benevolence, righteousness, enlightenment, law, tactics, trickery, and warfare. It was as if an entire nation had been combined into a single medicinal pill.

A Nation-Fate God Pill.

Yang Qi was inwardly shaken. He had never heard of any type of pill like this. Apparently, it took the destiny of a nation and put it in the form of a medicinal pill designed to boost the psyche and improve one’s power. It was an Unbounded god pill, and would obviously be extremely valuable.

He knew that he couldn’t assimilate that pill, but apparently, God-King Ruthless planned to use a spell formation to help him. There was no doubt it would cause serious side-effects.

“Exalted God-King,” said Dream Daylily, “Nation-Fate God Pills are very rare and powerful. Considering how weak Yang Qi’s cultivation base is, can he really consume it? I don’t think even I would dare to try.”

God-King Ruthless looked at her coldly. “Obviously he can't. If he consumed this medicinal pill, there would be many harmful side-effects. The pill is just too strong. But with me to help, what does he have to be scared of? As long as he follows my instructions, I’ll take care of everything. The power of the crown prince can overcome any type of side-effect. Now remember, when I give you this medicinal pill, I’ll be using my spell formation at the same time. It will set up a permanent sealing mark within you that will make you impervious to any magical treasures or wretch arts. It will limit your actions, but at the same time, will improve your power to carry out slaughter. Can you deal with that?”

“I understand!” Yang Qi blurted. “Please, exalted God-King, do as you wish!”

“Very gutsy. I like you! You’re going to accomplish a lot in the future.”

Waving his hand, he said, “Warfare Destiny Vortex!”

Then he grabbed Yang Qi, even as an enormous outpouring of killing intent surged around him.

“We can’t do this in the city, it would cause too much of a scene, and would surely attract the attention of the House of God Ordainment. I’ll take you to a distant aspect of space-time where I can set up the spell formation. It’s a place where I waged war over a hundred years ago, slaughtering countless experts that I then used to form an army of souls capable of unleashing endless killing energy. It will stimulate your psyche, but the process will be very dangerous.”

With that, he vanished into the spatial tempests, taking Yang Qi with him.

Chapter 1280: Nation-Fate God Pill

‘Who would’ve thought that God-King Ruthless would use a Nation-Fate God Pill to try to improve my cultivation base? Although he’s obviously only doing it to control me and seize control of the Sage Monarch League, it’s still an incredible pill. Will I be able to deal with the side-effects? I'm curious to see what a god pill made of the fate of an entire nation is going to be like.’

God-King Ruthless grabbed Yang Qi and stepped into the void, where spatial tempests whipped about everywhere.

Wormholes and vortexes were all around, some of which resembled enormous castles, and some of which resembled primeval godworms. Others looked like rivers of bladed weapons, enormous beasts, or spirits. They were formed from ancient divine elements, and were incredibly powerful, and while they lacked consciousness, they roamed the spatial tempests, ejecting or slaughtering intruders.

The depths of space-time were profoundly mysterious and contained unending dangers, yet at the same time, there were magical treasures for the taking. Sometimes, Consummate Gods would enter the depths of space-time, but get lost and never be able to escape.

In such cases, they would ultimately die. The only people who could safely traverse such places were Perfect and Paramount Gods, who would often go there to set up spell formations or god kingdoms.

The space-time of the god world was filled with crevices and rifts. It was similar to the ocean floor, in which some areas were perfect places for fish or other sea creatures to thrive, but also featured places of extreme danger.

Right now, God-King Ruthless was leading Yang Qi into a huge maelstrom.

It contained numerous spatial tempests, and shockingly, had a huge spell formation in the middle. It looked almost like the map of a nation, pulsing with a sensation of history, civilization, knowledge, and culture.

It was a spell formation whose foundation was built on the fate of a nation, and it was powerful beyond belief.

The Eternal-Life God-Dynasty had been a domineering force in the god world for many years, and administered innumerable vassal states, sects, clans, and cities. Considering that, it was almost impossible to say how abundant its destiny was. As for the crown prince, he was a child of that nation, which meant that he had access to the fate of the nation, and could unleash it in mysterious ways.

Buzzzz.

The spell formation trembled.

“Get inside, boy,” God-King Ruthless said, shoving Yang Qi forward. The power of time flowed across Yang Qi like water as everything outside the spell formation was sealed. Then, the power of time stabbed into him like needles.

“Converge the fate of the nation. Use the small to see the large. The large is the country, the small is the needle.” God-King Ruthless pointed his finger at Yang Qi. “You're lucky, boy. This spell formation was personally created by the crown prince to draw on the fate of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty. It also contains boundless vital energy from the god world, which it converts into the same kind of nation fate. The Eternal-Life God-Dynasty is a dynasty that will last for all eternity, and is invincible in all heaven and earth. As for this god pill the crown prince concocted, it’s nothing short of amazing. Normally speaking, you’d never be able to consume this pill, but in this circumstance, it's going to be very useful for you. Once you consume it, your destiny will link with the destiny of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty. Afterward, no matter what dramatic things happen, you’ll always belong to the dynasty. Understand? Your life will always be connected to the dynasty. If it falls, you die. You will work for the crown prince forevermore, and that will never change. It’s only in this way that the crown prince will truly trust you.” With that, he burst out laughing.

‘Crap,’ Yang Qi thought. This was going to be a breakthrough that involved extreme danger. If he consumed the Nation-Fate God Pill, his destiny would become linked with that of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty. It was similar to the purification ceremonies of the buddhist schools, except more powerful.

The experts from the buddhist schools could purify monsters, transforming their hearts and minds, removing the evil from them and turning them into virtuous monks. Of course, it had to be done voluntarily.

Consuming a Nation-Fate God Pill would give him a huge boost in power, but would transform him, forcing him to be subservient to the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty. He would be a faithful minister or a loyal general who would die for his country if he had to.

It was terrifying to think of completely losing himself and turning himself over to become the loyal tool of some country.

At the same time, Yang Qi realized that God-King Ruthless’ fate was also completely tied up with that of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty. He was a loyal servant who would do anything for his country, and would view dying for it as going home.

“Giving up his life for the sake of his country; He looks toward death as a journey home!”

As God-King Ruthless recited the two lines of poetry in a stern and awe-inspiring voice, energy surged out of him, and the Nation-Fate God Pill appeared. As the pill hovered above Yang Qi’s head, God-King Ruthless said, “Consume the pill, and remember these lines. Giving up his life for the sake of his country; He looks toward death as a journey home! Understand? If the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty wants to send you to your death, you won’t feel the least bit of grievance!”

“Understood!” Yang Qi said loudly.

“Good. Let’s begin!” God-King Ruthless thrust his palm out, and the Nation-Fate God Pill exploded into numerous streams of power that shot into Yang Qi, filling him with the will of countless passionate heroes rushing forth to do the bidding of the nation.

Inside, Yang Qi snorted coldly. ‘Trying to brainwash me? That’s not going to happen. Let everything become empty. Nevasaññānāsaññāyatana. Fame and fortune, honor and glory, let them all be abandoned. Leave only thoughts; independence is empty. Let the psyche experience ultimate freedom....’ He could feel the powerful fate of an entire nation trying to change him, force thoughts of glory and heroism into him, and transform him into a Consummate God expert.

It was hard, but he held on to himself. An undying spark burned in his brain, and his psyche clung to freedom. And the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth was at work, using the illusions of Life-Death Void-Destruction to fool God-King Ruthless.

“Godhood Infusion!”

God-King Ruthless never could have guessed that Yang Qi would be causing mischief in this situation. How could a Lesser God trapped in the middle of a formation like this, with his psyche under assault, ever fight back?

Yet that was what Yang Qi was doing, right under God-King Ruthless’ nose.

Under the immense pressure, his psyche advanced. The invincible destiny of the entire Eternal-Life God-Dynasty was weighing down on him, with another will trying to take control of him and restrict his freedom.

However, there could hardly be any better training than this. On a few occasions, he very nearly succumbed, and fell into the mindset of a noble hero willing to sacrifice for the country. But each time, his own spirit rebounded.

If this assault had occurred before he learned so much from King Immortal-Slayer and the purrling, then not even the God Legion Seal and his monarch godhood would have been of any help. The reason was that the God Legion Seal couldn't control his heart.

In contrast, the fate of a nation, the spirit of the country, heroism, nobility, loyalty, and other such things were related to the heart. Thankfully, Yang Qi was keeping a firm grip on such things.

Immense power flowed into his godhood, which emitted creaking and crunching sounds. Although he was keeping the truth hidden, his monarch godhood, his psychic power, his will, and his power were all rising dramatically.

RUMBLE!

He suddenly rose from the mid Lesser God level to the late level. Then he exerted some more effort, and rose to the Common God level.

No one in existence actually knew exactly how much power it required to improve monarch godhood. It was an astronomical amount that could wipe out all the medicinal pill reserves of even the largest sect.

But right now, the power of the Nation-Fate God Pill was flowing into Yang Qi, which was normally something that only Perfect Gods or higher could sustain.

Off to the side, God-King Ruthless was working hard to keep the formation going and to balance the vital energy streams. It was only because the crown prince had personally provided this pill and formation that something completely unthinkable was happening.

“Blessing of Nation-Fate!” An hour passed, whereupon the sweating God-King Ruthless had to start drawing on his own power.

A vortex appeared above his head, swirling with explosive force as he sent his own animadestiny true energy into the formation.

“Crown Prince Talisman!”

Seeing that Yang Qi seemed on the verge of losing control, he waved his hand, pulling a dragon-shaped talisman out of his garment. After throwing it out, it turned into a host of magical symbols that settled onto Yang Qi, piercing into his sea of consciousness.

“The boundless will of the crown prince is one with the fate of our nation. It will transform your spirit and soul on all levels. Even if you die and are reincarnated, you will still be a loyal subject!” God-King Ruthless burst out laughing.

Yang Qi was in unprecedented danger. The immense will of the crown prince rumbled forth, fusing with the fate of a nation and bringing to bear immense force as it unrelentingly battered against him.

Chapter 1281: Successful Transformation

The Unbounded will of the crown prince was mixed with the impressive power of the Nation-Fate God Pill. It rumbled forth with invincible, obliterating force, trying to force Yang Qi to become a loyal subject and servant. Of course, because of this, he was in a very dangerous situation.

The crown prince was trying to turn him into nothing more than a pawn.

The crown prince was a very formidable figure, and rumor had it that he was even more mysterious and unpredictable than the emperor himself. Not many people were worthy to receive his personal assistance.

But Yang Qi was one of them. Of course, the crown prince had no idea who Yang Qi really was. He just knew that he was connected to Jadefall and the purrling, and that their Sage Monarch Society was a rising force in the House of God Ordainment. Therefore, he wanted nothing more than to turn Yang Qi into an agent and pawn. And there was no way he would agree to let Yang Qi be an agent with free will, so he concocted the Nation-Fate God Pill and sent God-King Ruthless to administer it.

Of course, Yang Qi had his own backup moves to rely on.

Within the god kingdom of the God Legion Seal was the Crown Prince from the impure lands. Taking that expression of will, he sent it to meet the will of the crown prince from the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty, and it instantly lost some of its ruthlessness and power of control.

The Crown Prince from the impure lands had originated with the crown prince of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty. The latter had used some unknown daoist technique and passageway to secretly send some of his will into the impure lands to search for lost god items. Whether it was the God Legion Seal or King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions, he had hoped to locate them and bring them back to the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty. Unfortunately, that expression of will had clashed with Yang Qi, and ended up being killed.

That said, the Crown Prince from the impure lands was ultimately an expression of the will of the real crown prince. When the will of the true crown prince encountered a version of itself, it was a given that it wouldn’t do something to harm itself. Therefore, it was easy for Yang Qi to ultimately subjugate it.

RUMBLE!

Yang Qi was taking advantage of this moment to finally achieve a big success. Thanks to the Unbounded will surging in his mind, and the godpower at work, he was able to finally push his own will convergence from early to mid Paramount level.

In Paramount will convergence, there were four sublevels of early, mid, late, and peak. And all of them were significant upgrades that came with different abilities.

By practicing cultivation the normal way, it would have taken Yang Qi hundreds of years to reach the mid level. But thanks to the will of the crown prince and the nation-fate of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty, his will was receiving a major blessing that was pushing him to a much higher level.

Furthermore, the effort to take control of him was turning out to be a complete failure.

The Nation-Fate God Pill, the spell formation, the talismans, the power... all of it was pouring into Yang Qi to help his monarch godhood improve, and pushing his will convergence to a higher level.

He was now as strong as a Consummate God, at least in the term of his will convergence.

Early Paramount will convergence was generally for Greater Gods, whereas the mid level was for Consummate Gods.

As for Perfect Gods, they absolutely required late Paramount will convergence.

There were even outstanding figures among Perfect Gods who actually had peak Paramount will. After that came the breakthrough to Unbounded will convergence, which came along with the godhood of Paramount Gods.

The power Yang Qi felt within him was something that would normally take three thousand god world years of cultivation to achieve. With it, he might not be able to take on the crown prince, but he would at least be able to hold his own against God-King Ruthless.

“It finally worked?” God-King Ruthless asked, not having seen any of the true transformations in Yang Qi. The control Yang Qi had exerted with the God Legion Seal and the Life-Death Void-Destruction Lightning was enough to completely fool any Perfect God. Of course, Paramount Gods would be a different story.

When he looked at Yang Qi, he simply saw a version that pulsed with the fate of the nation, and the aura of the crown prince.

“Many thanks for your help, God-King Ruthless!” Yang Qi said, dropping to his knees and kowtowing. Of course, inwardly, he was laughing coldly. ‘Sadly for you, my God Legion Seal is more than capable of dealing with a Perfect God. In fact, maybe I should actually force you to submit to me. Dive into your mind, learn what you’re thinking, and make you do my bidding.’

“You work for the crown prince now, and are a loyal servant of the imperial dynasty. Got it?” Although God-King Ruthless was fairly certain that the Nation-Fate God Pill had successfully subjugated Yang Qi, he still wanted to test Yang Qi out to confirm.

Yang Qi immediately expressed his undying loyalty to the dynasty. “Your humble servant is indeed fully loyal to the dynasty. I have no other thoughts in my mind. I am a tool of the dynasty and the crown prince.”

God-King Ruthless nodded. “Good. Your cultivation base isn’t bad, now all you need to do is take the time to assimilate the residual power of the medicinal pill that's still within you. Remember, if you aren’t loyal to the crown prince in every action, you’ll automatically detonate. That said, although you’re strong, I'm still going to teach you a very ferocious energy art unique to our Eternal-Life God-Dynasty. It’s called the Nation-Fate Godfist. Watch closely!”

He launched a punch, ripping open a rift into the void, out of which lunged a host of ghost-gods. He struck out again, and a shadowy figure appeared behind him, which crushed all the forces pouring from the rift.

“The Nation-Fate Godfist is a consummate art of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty, which has been studied and augmented by countless generations of emperors. It contains the auras of Paramount Gods from ancient times, as well as the destiny and fate of our nation. All of these things are combined into three stances. First stance: Sovereign and State Die Together!”

RUMBLE!

The moment the fist strike was launched, the cosmic power of a nation was unleashed, reversing the dao of heaven and sending out vital energy fluctuations pulsing with the tragedy of an entire country, including the fallen dead and the living heroes who championed its cause.

“What an incredible fist technique!” Yang Qi was actually shocked. He had long since mastered the Hand of the One God from the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, as well as the various abilities that came with the Unspoiled Body. All of them were domineering abilities that could completely look down on other martial disciplines.

But after seeing only the first move of this Nation-Fate Godfist, he could see why it was said to contain the wills of ancient Paramount Gods and the quintessence of the martial path.

“Second stance. Break the State, the Lands Remain!”

The second stance furthered the grief and mourning, and Yang Qi could even see the children of countless heroes, bravely advancing forward and looking upon death as going home, disregarding safety and even life itself for the sake of their nation.

Heroes died willingly, creating a dao of both valor and heroism.

This fist caused an immense spatial tempest to appear, establishing a beautiful vision of a new age and era.

‘This fist technique is one for heroes,’ Yang Qi thought, sighing in admiration. ‘If a dynasty could be this strong, and be built on the blood sacrifice of countless heroes, it would be truly mighty. This technique borders on the level of the Sovereign Lord himself! And the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty benefits every time the Nation-Fate Godfist is unleashed. Amazing.’

“Third stance. Blood Stains Spring and Autumn!”

God-King Ruthless went on to go through the stances, using countless variations. He conjured the image of the blood-soaked severed heads of numerous heroes, like an epic saga unparalleled under heaven, creating a dao of humanity that couldn’t be resisted. This was definitely something of the gods.

Yang Qi watched closely for three days and three nights.

As he did, the various daoist techniques built into his Sage Monarch Grand Magic advanced, becoming more complete.

“Are there more moves after that?” Yang Qi asked.

“It wouldn’t do you any good to see them, as you’d be unable to use them. Furthermore, it could harm you. That’s enough for now. Head back and further the interests of the crown prince and his plan. Remember, your life is his now. Hopefully you can perform well over the next few years, but if you don’t, the Nation-Fate God Pill will ensure that you end up dead. Got it?” With that, God-King Ruthless waved his hand, slicing open another passageway that Yang Qi disappeared into.

Soon, Yang Qi found himself out in the wilderness again. Smiling coldly, he thought, ‘You think it’s that simple? I've assimilated that Nation-Fate God Pill. And it also helped me compare the real crown prince with my version. Right, let's see how the Crown Prince is doing.’

He waved his sleeve, and the Crown Prince appeared. Surprisingly, he had already formed his godhood and broken through to the peak of the Terrifying level.

He already had the aura of a god!

He had finally reached godly ascension.

“I’m a god now, Yang Qi,” the Crown Prince said, opening his eyes. “You’ll eventually regret not killing me.”

Yang Qi snorted. “As long as you’re a god, that’s all that matters. Now you’re going to become part of my God Legion Seal.” The time had come to truly start working on his big plan.

Chapter 1282: Who&#039;s the Pawn Now?

“You now understand who you are, Crown Prince,” Yang Qi said. “An expression of will from a powerful entity, sent to the impure lands to search for lost god items. You really were a god from heaven descended into the mortal world. Unfortunately, I need your services now, to benefit from the person who created you and eventually get into his treasure storehouse. That’s my key to developing Unbounded will convergence.”

The Crown Prince burst out laughing. “Of course I knew I had an impressive origin. But don’t you think this plan of yours is like playing with fire? Haven’t you heard the saying play with fire, die by fire? That’s what you’re doing.”

“You and the crown prince of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty are just people. And you have the same will. Do you really think you’re a match for me? You were trash back in the day, even when you were an invincible figure in the Demi-Immortal Institute. Now you’re even less important than you were back then. I killed you and your eighteen allies back then, and I can kill you just as easily now.”

“I've already died once, Yang Qi, so I'm not afraid of dying again. So there’s nothing you can do to scare me or force my hand. I'm just waiting to watch you die.”

Apparently, the Crown Prince was never truly going to submit, and really wanted to see Yang Qi dead.

“Enough jibber-jabber. You’re a god, so it’s time for you to put your throne inside the God Legion Seal.” Yang Qi waved his hand, and the Crown Prince was forced to seal his soul inside the God Legion Seal. Almost immediately, he sensed a golden throne appear in the seal, which actually belonged to the crown prince of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty.

An immense stream of power flowed forth.

‘Awesome!’ At long last, Yang Qi had finally locked on to the true crown prince. He could sense his life force, and even some of his scattered thoughts. It was going to take a lot more work before he could take control of him, but this would at least make it possible to start doing things like looking for a way into the treasure storehouse, or track down the piece of the Mahātmā Jade.

WHOOSH!

With that, he flew back to the House of God Ordainment.

Jadefall was in the middle of a session of cultivation, and at a mere glance, Yang Qi could tell that she was just on the verge of a breakthrough. Exhaling, he sent some of the quintessence of the Nation-Fate God Pill toward her. Instantly, cracking sounds rang out within her as impurities were extruded and her power became more pure. Then, her godhood glowed with bright colors as her cultivation base advanced.

“What just happened, Yang Qi?” Jadefall asked. “When did your energy arts get so strong?”

“Well, it's like this...” he said, and we went on to explain about God-King Ruthless. “I'm now in favor with the Crown Prince, which thankfully fits in perfectly with my plan. Instead of him controlling me, I'm going to take advantage of him to get my hands on some of the things I need. This will save me at least three thousand god world years of hard cultivation.”

“So that’s how it is...” Jadefall replied. “Well, does that mean you’re going to the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty to look for that piece of the Mahātmā Jade? I have an idea in that regard.”

“Oh, what idea?” Yang Qi asked.

“The Sage Monarch Society has become quite powerful, and many of our brethren have developed impressive cultivation bases. But we still lack a truly powerful potentate to lead us, and the infighting in the House of God Ordainment is as intense as always. The junior houselord has started exerting himself and invited me to attend a banquet. Obviously, he has some scheme at work. Instead of accepting, I've decided to return to the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty to visit my adopted mother. She has a very powerful cultivation base, and is very influential. She’s actually the supreme concubine, and she has sons who run powerful factions in the dynasty. They oppose the crown prince, so if I can get her support by offering her some power in the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty, then....”

“There’s no need to go into any more detail. I get it.” Yang Qi chuckled. “That is a good idea. Let’s take advantage of your connections to the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty to try getting into their treasure storehouse in a way no one will ever realize what's happened. As long as I can get that piece of the Mahātmā Jade, my psychic power will skyrocket.”

“There’s no time to lose. Let’s go now.”

“Hold on a moment,” Yang Qi said. “I should inform the Crown Prince Society of what's going on and see how they react. We might be able to make the best of both worlds here.”

“Agreed,” Jadefall said.

He blurred into motion, heading out to the headquarters of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty in the nearby city. Soon, he was in Dream Daylily’s presence.

“What?!” she shouted, slapping the table. “Jadefall is going to see the supreme concubine? She wants her support to help grow the Sage Monarch Society? This is big! It's a good thing you reported this, and it'll be very worth your while. Recruiting you into the Crown Prince Society was obviously the right choice.”

“What’s the meaning of it all, exalted Dream Daylily?” Yang Qi said.

“It’s simple. The supreme concubine is nobody to look down on. She has several sons, all of whom are imperial princes, and they all oppose the crown prince. In fact, they’ve joined forces for personal interest and have even tried spying on the imperial bureaucracy.”

“How could that possibly be?” Yang Qi scoffed. “The crown prince is completely invincible! He has Unbounded will convergence, and it’s a foregone conclusion he’ll become a Paramount God! Who could possibly try to take on the crown prince? Only someone suicidal would try that.”

“There’s truth to your words, but we still have to be very careful. The reality is that before the crown prince reached Unbounded will convergence he was in extreme danger, and was very nearly crippled. Certain members of the imperial house worked with a woman from the dao of devils, an imperial concubine who accused the crown prince of seducing her. It caused an uproar in the imperial house, and the emperor was furious. He even sentence the crown prince to be crippled. However, the crown prince managed to turn everything around at the last minute by breaking through to Unbounded will convergence. After that, the chief elders were left completely speechless.”

“The crown prince can really shake heaven and earth. He’s a true hero among heroes!” Although Yang Qi offered praise with his lips, inside he was thinking, ‘Things are complicated in the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty.’

“The Eternal-Life God-Dynasty has very strict rules, and not even the crown prince can push them too far. There are certain powerful chief elders in the court, Paramount Gods in charge of enforcing the law and maintaining etiquette. Because of them, the crown prince can’t just seize power. And if one of the other imperial princes manages to gain the favor of the emperor, the crown prince could end up ousted. And in that case, he would have no recourse, not even armed resistance. The Eternal-Life God-Dynasty has been around for countless generations, and throughout all that time, there’s never been a successful revolt that overthrew the throne. Because of that, we have to be very careful how we handle our internal struggles, otherwise we could be branded as traitors.”

“Understood,” Yang Qi said. “So what do we do? Please give me some instructions, exalted one.”

“You’ve already done well. Unfortunately, we can’t interfere with Jadefall asking the supreme concubine for support. The supreme concubine is very, very powerful; in fact, she’s one of the most powerful figures in the entire court. It’s too bad the crown prince can’t just kill those sons of hers. For now, just play things by ear. Head to the dynasty and see what information you can gather. The agents of the Crown Prince Society will support you as best they can. And make sure you check in with any new information.”

“Yes ma’am!” Yang Qi blurted.

“You already have the aura of the crown prince on you, so all you have to do is draw on the Nation-Fate Godfist, and you’ll be able to get support from our agents. Once you’re in the imperial harem, find the majordomo, a eunuch named Nie Yinyang. He’s a very powerful and mysterious member of the Crown Prince Society, and he's even stronger than God-King Ruthless. He’ll definitely help you, and could possibly even promote you within the society. If that happens, I just hope you’ll remember me fondly.”

“I would never dare to forget you, oh exalted one.” Yang Qi knew what he had to do. He had already learned a lot of secret information from Dream Daylily, and was now much more clear about how complicated the infighting was in the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty.

There were obviously double agents everywhere, and even triple agents.

Hopefully, he could use that to his advantage. With that, he headed back to the god kingdom to meet with Jadefall and some of his brethren. After some preparations, they headed to the teleportation portal leading to the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty. On the surface, the two organizations had good relations, which was why they had a formal agreement allowing for teleportation portals linking their capital cities. They even had a mutual defense pact, in which either side would come to the aid of the other in the case of an invasion. It was obvious that the House of God Ordainment acted like a vassal state.

After putting godstones into the teleportation portal, it activated. This was the largest portal in the entire god kingdom, and required high-level godstones to operate. Thankfully, the Sage Monarch Society could afford it.

Meanwhile, there were chief elders in the House of God Ordainment who were meeting with the junior houselord, and they saw what was happening.

The junior houselord had a very grim expression on his face. “So Jadefall didn’t take the bait. She’s refused my invitations over and over again. Well, it’s not going to be that simple. Does she really think I don’t have people in the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty? We’re going to find out exactly what she's up to.”

Chapter 1283: Heading into the Dynasty

One of the Consummate God elder kings present said, “Junior Houselord, it seems obvious that Jadefall of the Sage Monarch Society is going to the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty looking for support. They’re already growing fast as it is. What happens if she succeeds? Furthermore, that Yang Qi disappeared recently, and we couldn’t track him down. We couldn’t even get a meeting with him to try to recruit him.”

“It’ll be fine,” the junior houselord said, waving his hand dismissively. “We’ll figure out how to deal with them after they return from the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty.”

The junior houselord crushed a talisman in his hand, causing a popping sound as dazzling light filled the room. Then, a person appeared, who looked almost like an emperor, surrounded by glittering starlight. He even had wings made of stars that radiated brilliant light.

“Third Prince,” the junior houselord said, clasping hands respectfully.

“What did you call me for?” the man said, his voice cold and detached, but his entire person thrummed with boundless and shocking power.

He was the third prince of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty, and his name was Eternal Starmaker.

He was a peak Perfect God, just on the verge of breaking through to the Unbounded level of will convergence. If he succeeded, he would be a full rival of the crown prince and have immense power in the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty.

At the moment, he was still weak compared to the crown prince. That said, he had the support of many ministers and officials, and was also a big supporter of the junior houselord. Of course, he couldn’t directly interfere in the god kingdom of the House of God Ordainment. Not even the crown prince could do that.

“Third Prince, sir, you probably know that if I become the new houselord of the House of God Ordainment, it will be a big help to you. But right now, things are in flux. Jadefall just left for the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty to seek help from the supreme concubine. If she succeeds, it could be a big threat to me in the election three hundred years from now.”

“I’m aware of what's going on with Jadefall. However, her cultivation base is fundamentally so-so. So there’s no need to worry.”

“You don’t understand. The Lord of the True Void recently visited our sect and took in a member of the Sage Monarch Society named Yang Immortal-Slayer. He’s a really impressive genius who the Lord of the True Void plans to groom into a top expert. Worse, there are definitely members of the Crown Prince Society who’ve infiltrated our House of God Ordainment. The only problem is we don’t know who they are. If the crown prince makes a move, it could really muck things up. And if the Lord of the True Void interferes, we’ll be even worse off.”

After all, the Lord of the True Void was a Paramount God, and not an ordinary Paramount God at that.

Even if the third prince were more wildly arrogant than he was, and even more confident, and had even stronger backers, he still couldn’t match up to a Paramount God of that caliber. To such gods, he was scum that wasn’t worth paying attention to. They were people who could fundamentally change the entire world, or even create new worlds of their own.

“I’ll think of a way to help you,” the third prince said after a moment. “The House of God Ordainment is my territory, so I definitely won't allow others to interfere here.”

“Many thanks, Third Prince,” the junior houselord said, bowing slightly at the waist.

Starlight flared, filling the entire room. Then it faded away, and the third prince was nowhere to be seen.

“Bah!” spat the junior houselord, and his expression became filled with savage disdain. “The Eternal-Life God-Dynasty is far too powerful, and they’ve been lording it over us for far too long. We’re just not in the position to fight back. But never before has anyone dared to say what the third prince just said. Our sect is his territory? That’s intolerable! I'm going to drain his blood one day, and turn him into a slave!”

“That’s right,” said one of the chief elders. “The people from the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty are all far too arrogant. That said, they're going to swallow us up eventually. It's even worse because people like Jadefall and the leaders of the Brilliant Radiance Society and Honorable Glory Society don’t show you any respect. They should bow to the might of the House of God Ordainment instead. Damn them! Troublemakers like them need to be rooted out so that our sect can thrive!”

“You’re completely correct,” said another chief elder. “If we don't get rid of them, how can we be united? The House of God Ordainment is divided into far too many factions. We should enslave the troublemakers and either make them thralls or send them to the mines. If we don’t, our god kingdom is going to end up getting destroyed eventually.”

“There are no unbroken eggs beneath an overturned nest, right?” the junior houselord said. “And without skin, what can the hair adhere to? Even someone as powerful as me will end up as a thrall if the House of God Ordainment is overthrown. Therefore, we can’t let this ship of ours sink. Anyone who opposes my advancement, any who refuse to join me, shall die. And Jadefall is no exception.”

**

Creaking and crunching sounds could be heard as the teleportation portal activated, then Jadefall, Yang Qi, and the others sped through the tunnel toward their destination.

RUMBLE!

A full day passed before they stepped out onto the opposite portal to find themselves in a city so huge that it couldn’t possibly have existed in the real world. Yang Qi immediately sensed the invincible fate of a nation, filled with prosperity, riches, and power.

“A heavenly kingdom.” That was what anyone would think upon entering the capital city of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty.

Countless immense buildings rose up left and right, like ancient celestial mountains, and the broad pathways were like divine dragons snaking this way and that. Flying ships and crafts of all sorts made their way through the sky in orderly fashion. People were everywhere, and there wasn’t any sign of fighting, theft, or any other disorder.

The god world was an immense place that was almost impossible to control. Even the law enforcement in the god world of the House of God Ordainment was a far cry from being perfect. But as he looked around, Yang Qi even saw shops with Consummate God shopkeepers who were bargaining with Lesser Gods. And no one was fighting or even looking irritated. Soldiers patrolled the streets and skies, keeping a sharp lookout for any problems. There was also an immense spell formation covering the entire city, keeping the weather pleasant.

The Eternal-Life God-Dynasty wasn’t contained in a tiny god kingdom. Instead, it occupied an entire continent, and was so large it was reminiscent of the halls of heaven from ancient times. Quasi-Gods could live comfortable lives here, and there were even lower-level slaves, although they had less enjoyable existences.

“See how powerful the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty is, Yang Qi?” Brahma said. “Forget about the construction itself. Do you sense the nation-fate? It’s so powerful it seems like it could ignite at any moment and turn into a fiery stream of destiny.”

“He’s right,” said the Shepherd. “This destiny is incredible. This nation-fate is so powerful, the destiny of the House of God Ordainment is like nothing compared to it. One is like a candle and the other is like a volcano preparing to erupt.”

“You’re perceptive, my brothers,” Yang Qi said. “Your vision has become truly impressive.” However, the truth was that the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty only looked impressive on the surface. Though its nation-fate was real, from what Yang Qi could see, as time went on, it would grow more and more intense. In other words, it hadn’t even come close to reaching its full potential.

As soon as their group walked out of the teleportation portal, a host of ships appeared overhead, filling the square in front of the portal. On the ships were armored troops, all of them Common Gods, but led by a Greater God. Upon seeing Jadefall, they knelt.

“Greetings, exalted Princess. Your message to the supreme concubine was received, and we’re here to receive you. Please, follow us.”

“Many thanks to you all,” Jadefall said, giving a sidelong glance to Yang Qi.

Yang Qi produced a stack of godnotes which he handed to the soldiers. “Take this and have a night on the town.”

The soldier’s eyes flickered with delight. “Many thanks! Many thanks! Your kindness is heart-warming, Princess, please, step aboard our ship. There’s no reason for you to walk around like a commoner.”

Already, Yang Qi was getting an idea of how Jadefall was treated here. The ship took off, and they flew for several hours. Eventually, they reached a place where some divine mountains had been organized to create an immense palace structure. They were built according to the nine palaces and eight trigrams, reminding Yang Qi of his ten preeminences spell formation from the impure lands.

The truth was that the ten preeminences spell formation was a collection of the quintessence of all heaven and earth.

One origin, two polarities, three powers, four divisions, five phases, six directions, seven stars, eight trigrams, nine palaces, and ten preeminences. Those ten transformations could power all spell formations.

“Those mountains are rumored to be from the ancient halls of heaven,” Jadefall explained. “Later, the halls of heaven vanished and the experts of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty took the mountains and set them up here. After millions upon millions of years passed, they were used to create the imperial court, palace, and various other structures for the nobility. The mountains shine with intense radiance and light that defies all wretched incursions. And if you cultivate there, you’ll absorb some of the energy of the ancient halls of heaven, cleansing you and leading to incredible cultivation speeds. They’re called the Mountains of Radiance.”

Chapter 1284: Supreme Concubine

‘The Mountains of Radiance.’ Yang Qi looked over with anticipation, and soon realized that there were conglomerations of sagelight in the mountains. Furthermore, the mountains actually weren’t made from rock, but were instead a crystallized manifestation of radiant godpower. It was something that seemed to originate with two of the Sovereign Lord’s main generals, the Lord of Radiance and Light and the Lord of Civilization.

Unfortunately, both of them had eventually perished.

That said, the godpower of the Sovereign Lord was known for its radiance and light, and according to the stories, he had been the actual sun of the god world. He emitted endless light, and it wasn’t until after he vanished that the god world had lost its sun, although it remained bright and well-lit.

The Sovereign Lord was radiance, and was in fact the origin of all radiance.

Anyone filled with the holy light of the halls of heaven would obviously be able to cultivate at a much faster speed. Their substructure would become vastly more holy, and as the impurities within them were melted away, the streams of true energy within them would cause their god vitality to improve and their energy arts to abound.

Yang Qi was truly impressed. ‘Heaven’s helping me!’ he thought. ‘After all, my God Legion Seal controls the Sovereign Lord’s Holy and Far-Reaching Consummate Omnicurse, which has innate control over radiance and light. In other words, that radiance and light might as well be my own home. Now I’m more confident than ever in my search for that piece of the Mahātmā Jade.’

Jadefall could tell what he was thinking just by the look on his face, and she nodded.

They flew into the mountains and eventually touched down in a certain square. The soldiers weren’t allowed to disembark, but a contingent of eunuchs had been sent in advance to wait for them, all of them Greater Gods. Of course, while technically eunuchs, they were also gods, and the gods didn’t care very much about distinguishing between the sexes. In fact, the high-level gods could change their bodies to become male or female whenever they wanted.

That said, these eunuchs had followed the pattern of the ancient angels, and didn’t have any specific sex, thanks to a unique cultivation technique of the sect.

Because of that, they were completely different from the eunuchs from the Joyflower Palace in the impure lands.

The eunuchs of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty weren’t wretched and vile. Instead, they were cold and calculating, almost as if they had been molded from ice. They followed orders without question and were very much like hardened killers.

“Princess, the supreme concubine has asked you to come inside,” one of the eunuchs said, stepping forward and offering a salute.

“Lead the way,” Jadefall replied. Yang Qi followed along, not bothering to look left and right, but instead sending his psychic power out to examine his surroundings. He soon realized that there was a lot of feminine energy in the area, indicating that this was indeed the imperial harem.

Palaces of radiance and light filled the area, and the mountains seemed almost like a world of their own. They were filled with unending numbers of beautiful women, down to the palace maids and handmaidens. They all seemed to live happy, careful lives, with the eunuchs constantly there to wait on them. Not a man was in sight.

In fact, it was only because Yang Qi and the other men in the party were under strict watch by the eunuchs that they were allowed inside at all.

These mountains weren’t the treasure storehouse of the dynasty. Yang Qi resolved to make contact with Nie Yinyang from the Crown Prince Society and see if he could get more information.

Of course, as soon as he was in the mountains, he secretly drew on the God Legion Seal to see if he could absorb the power of the radiance and light.

The godpower of radiance and light that he could personally cultivate wasn’t completely pure. In contrast, the godpower here was from the ancient halls of heaven, which meant that absorbing it was like getting a personal gift from the Sovereign Lord.

Furthermore, he soon realized that those who practiced cultivation here could only use that godpower to temper their bodies. They couldn’t actually absorb it and make it part of their godhood.

It was almost like how, on a cold winter day, people could huddle around a fire to get warm, but couldn’t actually consume the flames. On the other hand, Yang Qi could absorb it into his godhood.

His monarch godhood was like a ravenous gobblewock, devouring the godpower of radiance and light, revealing aspects of darkness that were impurities. Godhood was supposed to be transparent, pure, and holy, without any taint of mortality. Eventually, striations would appear on its surface, conforming to the dao of heaven. They were almost like spell formation charts describing the primitive lineaments of the beginning of the universe. In the face of godpower like this, the aura of humanity and the impure lands would shrink away.

Yang Qi’s monarch godhood was virtually leaping with excitement.

Of course, no one had any idea what was going on, or that he was absorbing the godpower of radiance and light. Not even Perfect Gods could do what he was doing; they could only use the godpower to temper their fleshly bodies.

Anyone who tried to do anything other than that would be playing with fire, and would risk killing themselves.

Yang Qi was already benefiting from this trip to see the supreme concubine, almost as much as he had benefited from God-King Ruthless and the Nation-Fate God Pill.

They spent four days working their way through the mountains, and although Yang Qi kept completely silent, to him it was like he had spent a thousand years working on his cultivation. In fact, he had already climbed from the early Common God level to the mid level. The godpower of radiance and light was just as good as any boundless medicinal pill.

Halfway up one of the mountains was a palace. Stopping outside, one of the eunuchs turned and said, “The rest of you wait here, and don’t cause any problems. No striking up conversations with any of the palace maids. Understand? The princess will go see the supreme concubine now.” Yang Qi and the others obviously couldn’t say anything, and simply waited while the eunuch led Jadefall inside.

Seeing there were some of the eunuchs who remained to stand guard, Brahma lowered his voice and said to Yang Qi, “This is all very impressive. Back then, I could never do anything like this. It’s too bad I died, otherwise it wouldn’t be so difficult for me to become a Paramount God.”

Years ago, Brahma had never been anything more than a Consummate God.

“Stop worrying about it,” laughed the Shepherd. “You were only a Consummate God, so there’s no telling how long it’ll take you to make any serious progress. Anyway, there’s got to be some benefit to us accompanying Jadefall to see the supreme concubine. We’re the backbone of the Sage Monarch Society, so if the supreme concubine wants to gain some influence in the House of God Ordainment, what better way than to help us?”

“We’ll benefit somehow,” Proud World said. “We’re not quite strong enough to call the wind and summon the rain in the House of God Ordainment right now, but if we become Consummate Gods, we’ll finally be able to make a difference.”

Before they could say anything else, a eunuch stepped over and said, “Consummate Gods? Forget about. You’d best be content to be Greater Gods. The supreme concubine has asked you in to see her.”

“Yes sir!” they said, and followed him inside. They walked for a full hour through the winding palace corridors until they reached an audience hall, where two people were waiting for them. One was Jadefall, and the other was a woman who sat behind a pearl screen. Yang Qi couldn’t see her, and she didn’t emanate any power fluctuations at all, yet Yang Qi was certain that she had reached an immense and terrifying level of strength.

“Our respects, Supreme Concubine!” they said, dropping to their knees.

“Jadefall, are these the key members of your Sage Monarch Society that you mentioned?” All of a sudden, everyone felt a gaze land on them that seemed capable of piercing into the depths of their being.

Eventually, that gaze rested on Yang Qi for a long moment before finally being retracted. “They’re all geniuses. Wise, resolute, and filled with immense experience. Forget about the House of God Ordainment, they’d be rare even in the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty. I heard one of your brethren was even taken as an apprentice by Lord of the True Void. Yang Immortal-Slayer?”

“Yes, that's right, Concubine,” Yang Qi replied. “Yang Immortal-Slayer is my blood brother.”

“It must have been some time since you ascended to the god world,” the supreme concubine replied.

They exchanged awkward glances.

“Don’t worry,” she continued, “I'm no fool. I know that only Ascendants could make progress like this. In the past millions upon millions of years, there have been quite a few Ascendants from the impure lands. That said, the Ancient Road to the Gods vanished, and afterward, we haven’t been able to pry into the affairs of the lower worlds.”

Yang Qi knew that, in the distant past, it hadn’t been as much of a rarity for old-timers to ascend to the god world. After all, that was why the ten magisters of the future world had been able to seize control. And if the Ancient Road to the Gods hadn’t disappeared from the future world, they wouldn’t have had any need to invade the Immortal Dao Age.

“What are things like in the impure lands now?” asked the supreme concubine. “By the way, I'm an Ascendant too, so you don’t have to feel nervous talking about it.”

“What? Supreme Concubine, you're an Ascendant?!” Yang Qi was deeply shocked.

“Yes, I ascended a long time ago,” she replied. “The fighting and killing on the Ancient Road to the Gods can be brutal. I'm curious to hear how things are now.”

“Of course!” Yang Qi said, then went into a completely fabricated tale about the chaos in the impure lands, and how he and his people had bitterly fought with the Executors of the Ancient Road before finally secretly ascending.

Chapter 1285: The Eunuch

As it turned out, the supreme concubine was an Ascendant. However, that didn’t mean that Yang Qi was just going to reveal the secrets of the impure lands to her. Furthermore, he was a complete expert at fabricating lies when he needed to.

The supreme concubine listened attentively and didn’t interrupt.

After he finished, she said, “There are a lot of magical treasures in the impure lands, the most important being King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions, and the second being the God Legion Seal. Are you aware of them?”

Obviously, this subject was what the supreme concubine was most interested in.

Yang Qi thought for a moment, then said, “I’ve definitely heard of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions and the God Legion Seal. Supposedly, a fellow named Proud Heaven took them. He brought a lot of bloodshed to the impure lands, ultimately winning the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, King Immortal-Slayer, and the God Legion Seal! His path to the god world threw the entire Ancient Road to the Gods into complete and utter chaos.”

“What? Proud Heaven?” The supreme concubine looked shocked.

“That’s right, Supreme Concubine. I think he’s from the Proud Clan. There was also a rumor that he visited the god world, then went back to the impure lands. But everyone’s always said that the magical laws of the god world prohibit that, so I'm not sure how he did it. Do you have any idea?”

“It’s true that no one has been able to go to the lower worlds since the Sovereign Lord disappeared. Proud Heaven. Proud Heaven.... I almost can’t believe he acquired so many important valuable treasures. The Proud Clan is certainly keeping plenty of secrets. No one even knows where their headquarters is located. That said, this is heaven-shaking, earth-shattering news. And of course, I'm going to reward you well for it. Guards! Bring in a reward for these people. Get each of them a Jade-Dew Heart-Refining Pill, a magical treasure, and a suit of armor. And since you’re all Ascendants, it would be a real pity for me to not help you. I hereby give you permission to enter the Sage Hall for three months of training and cultivation.”

They all dropped to their knees and kowtowed. “Many thanks, Supreme Concubine!”

“You’re dismissed. Eunuchs, take this order from me and lead them to the Sage Hall for cultivation. They’re free to interact with anyone else there who’s training or cultivating. You have three months, don’t waste any of that time. Along the way, make sure to explain the secrets of the Sage Hall. Jadefall, you stay here. I have some personal training for you, considering you’re the leader of the Sage Monarch Society. Your current cultivation base is simply far too lacking.”

Upon hearing this, Yang Qi inwardly sighed in relief.

Meanwhile, some of the eunuchs led them toward another location in the mountains. As they walked along, they passed numerous palaces and buildings, all of them shining and pure.

“The Sage Hall existed back in the days of the halls of heaven. Nowadays, it's set aside for the imperial clan for use in training. Lesser Gods can train on the lower platforms, Common Gods can use the middle platforms. And Greater Gods can use the upper platforms. You can cultivate martial arts, or use the power of the halls of heaven to purify your bodies. You can also strengthen your fleshly soul. The supreme concubine blessed each of you with a Jade-Dew Heart-Tempering Pill, which is an extremely rare item. They’re made from jade dew harvested in ancient times, and can clear the heart and help the psyche to transcend.”

As they neared, the eunuchs guarding the entrance made to block their path. However, the eunuch leading them produced the supreme concubine’s command medallion and they were let in.

Inside, Yang Qi felt his godhood surge. The holy power in this place was many times stronger than outside, to the point where it was almost corporeal.

The others in Yang Qi’s group felt a painful sensation as black smoke rose up from them, making them seem like zombies that had suddenly been thrust into direct sunlight.

“This sagelight is so incredibly strong!” the Shepherd exclaimed. “It has a tempering effect, but it's painful. This light is actually vastly more intense than the light of the god world!”

If the Shepherd hadn’t been cultivating Yang Qi’s Sage Monarch Grand Magic, his own devil energy arts would have ensured that he was reduced to dust. They all felt like they were inside an oven.

“This is the sagelight of the halls of heaven,” Yang Qi said. “Use it to temper your soul, blood, and flesh. It’ll hurt, but if you can endure it, it will be worth it. I have the feeling that the Jade-Dew Heart-Tempering Pills are no joke. Hurry up and consume them!”

They all did just that, and as soon as they consumed the pills, the power flowed through them, countering the evaporating heat of the sagelight and putting them into a state of pleasant coolness.

“Head to the platform for Common Gods,” the eunuch said, “and join the disciples there. Remember, don’t cause any problems. And, while you're allowed to fight, killing is prohibited. Got it? You have three months.” The eunuch hurried away.

Yang Qi looked around and saw that there really were a lot of experts training here. All of them were from the imperial clan; outsiders were prohibited from entering.

People were working hard on their cultivation, engaged in fierce fighting, sitting in meditation, using medicinal pills, doing breathing exercises, or engaging in other forms of training. And even the weakest Lesser Gods among them were probably ten to a hundred times stronger than any Lesser Gods from the House of God Ordainment.

In other words, the people practicing cultivation here could single-handedly defeat a hundred ordinary people in the same level as them.

The training here was difficult, and the sagelight made it like an oven. It was painful, but the benefits were immense. It didn’t take long for Yang Qi and his people to get used to the situation. Then they set to work. That was especially true of Yang Qi, who began madly absorbing the bright light into his godhood.

Instantly, numerous quintessential aspects of his godhood started growing stronger.

He had never been bolstered in this way, not even by any medicinal pill he had consumed. How could medicinal pills compare to the glory of the ancient halls of heaven? Yang Qi headed to the platform for the Common Gods, where the light was even stronger than at the entrance and would pierce directly into the body.

However, he had no problem absorbing it, causing him to tremble as he sensed himself getting close to breaking out of the mid Common God level. He was already convinced that he would be able to reach the Greater God level before the three months were up.

His companions quickly started looking around for appropriate places to work on their cultivation and energy arts. However, before they could really begin working, a group of people approached, imperial clansmen who looked at them coldly. One of them, a Common God with an impressive cultivation base, said, “Who are you people? You don’t have the imperial blood of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty, so what are you doing in here?”

The rest of the group were all Common Gods.

Brahma prepared to explain by saying, “We’re—”

“Hey,” Yang Qi interrupted. “Are you here to pick a fight or something? What business is it of yours if we’ve come here for some training? If you want to fight, let's get to it. There’s no point wasting time on jabbering. Bring it on! Let’s go, boys. I'm really curious to see what these imperial disciples are capable of.”

“Alright!”

Yang Qi’s people had originally hoped to smooth the situation over, but seeing his attitude, what did they have to be afraid of? Without hesitation, they attacked. The Shepherd was the fastest, and he slashed one of the imperial disciples across the chest with a devil claw.

BAM!

Even though these were imperial disciples, how could they possibly compare to the Shepherd with his immense experience? Before they even had a chance to react, they were all hit.

Proud World, Doom, Brahma, Sword Seventeen, Eldest Brother... all of them attacked like lightning from the highest heavens. In the blink of an eye, the imperial disciples were bleeding profusely and crying out piteously.

The disciple who had been in the lead, and was trying to cause problems, never even had a chance to cause problems before he was screaming in pain.

“How dare you pieces of trash try to provoke us!” Yang Qi said, shaking his head. “Screw off.”

One by one, he literally kicked them away, sending them rolling off into a far corner of the platform.

“We only have three months here, and we don’t want any of you scum wasting our time.” Looking around at his friends, he said, “If anyone else causes problems, don’t waste time with explanations. Just immediately beat the crap out of them.”

“That’s fine.”

Two months passed. Everyone was making great progress, and Yang Qi had already broken through to the peak of the Common God level. Occasionally, imperial disciples would come looking for trouble, but without fail, Yang Qi and his people would beat them mercilessly. Eventually, no one dared to approach them.

Word had spread of how fierce they were.

Eventually, Brahma became a Greater God. Next was Proud World, then Doom, the Shepherd, Yang Zhan, Sword Seventeen, Eldest Brother, and Patriarch Annalist. One by one, they all became Greater Gods.

Only Yang Qi was lagging behind.

As he absorbed the sagelight into his monarch godhood, he was slowly getting to the point of being able to create a world, tiny as it may be. It was a god kingdom, illusory, but at least capable of holding things within it.

As Yang Qi worked hard trying to break into the Greater God level, a figure approached him. It was a eunuch, and as he moved along, the sagelight seemed to acquiesce to his mere presence. Half of him seemed associated with yang, and half with yin. As he neared, Yang Qi made a beckoning gesture.

“Grand Eunuch Nie Yinyang,” he said, fully aware of who this person was.

Chapter 1286: Nie Yinyang

‘Apparently this eunuch Nie Yinyang is actually more terrifying than God-King Ruthless.’ Yang Qi immediately started thinking of how to deal with him. Glancing at his brethren, he hurried over and clasped hands respectfully. “I am your humble servant, Yang Qi of the Crown Prince Society. My respects, Your Excellency.”

Clasping his hands behind his back, the eunuch said, “I'm Nie Yinyang. Presumably Dream Daylily mentioned me to you. I’ve been watching your performance here in the Sage Hall over the past two months, and you've done well. You and these friends of yours are all people of exceptional ability. You’re even more impressive than the imperial disciples. Among people in the same level as you, I doubt anyone exists that could be considered your match. Word has spread in the imperial clan, and no one dares to take you lightly. You’ve done well with the blessing you were given to be able to train here in the Sage Hall.”

“Yes. Many thanks for your words of praise, Your Excellency. Although, I should make it clear that my brethren here aren’t interested in joining the Crown Prince Society yet. I'm still working on that. Furthermore, Jadefall and the supreme concubine, well—”

“There’s no need for any further explanation. Everyone knows about the supreme concubine helping Jadefall. And it’s common knowledge that the supreme concubine opposes the crown prince. I won’t hold that against you. I know that you received training from God-King Ruthless, and that you’re completely loyal to the crown prince. Furthermore, I can sense the crown prince's aura on you. The crown prince is interested in meeting you, but he was delayed in the Eternal Void, where he went to search for the opportunity to become a Paramount God, but ended up in a big fight with some other Paramount Gods. In any case, because of that, he can't see you.”

Yang Qi immediately plastered a look of disappointment on his face.

“That said,” Nie Yinyang continued, “he’s already spent a huge amount of effort grooming you, so he ordered me to take you from this place and escort you to the imperial treasure storehouse and let you pick a treasure as a reward. How about that?”

“The imperial treasure storehouse?” Yang Qi’s heart immediately soared. The whole point of this venture was to get into that storehouse, and up to this point the most progress he had made was determining its general location. He had infected quite a few people here with devil embryos, allowing him to spy on their thoughts and memories. Using that method, it hadn’t been very hard to track the place down.

Once the opportunity arose, he had planned to sneak in and take the piece of the Mahātmā Jade.

By drawing on the piece of the jade he already had in his possession, he was able to sense the general presence of the other piece nearby. Furthermore, he had recently used his monarch godhood to create a Sagelight Body, which would allow him to travel through these mountains undetected.

“Let’s go!” Eunuch Nie Yinyang said. Grabbing Yang Qi, he flew up, leaving the Sage Hall and heading over toward another nearby mountain. Given the ease with which Nie Yinyang moved about, it was obvious how powerful he was in the imperial city. Apparently, he was the majordomo that oversaw all of the eunuchs on staff. Furthermore, from the way he had easy access to the treasure storehouse, it was clear how influential the crown prince was.

They soon arrived at a mountain that shone with intense radiance and light that was shaped into a powerful spell formation, and was guarded by powerful Consummate and Perfect Gods.

Nie Yinyang landed, and numerous streams of energy shot toward him. However, when they reached him, they immediately backed down as they realized he was their superior.

“Our respects, Majordomo,” the eunuchs chorused, dropping to their knees.

“Open the treasure storehouse,” he said. “The crown prince has given orders to take this person inside to select a treasure or medicinal pill as a reward.”

“Yes sir.”

The eunuch guards immediately complied, and Nie Yinyang led Yang Qi inside.

Looking around, Yang Qi saw that the entire interior of the mountain had been hollowed out and restructured into a huge storehouse filled with goods. Medicinal pills, building materials, magical treasures, spell formation charts, godstones, god corpses, godhood, antiques, and even stacks upon stacks of ancient records.

It was too much to take in with a single glance. That said, Yang Qi couldn't care less about all of the ordinary treasures. He sent his divine will out, and drew on the power of his Sagelight Body to connect to the vital energy inside the mountain as he searched for the Mahātmā Jade.

One thing was certain: the jade was here.

Earlier, he wouldn’t have been able to do anything untoward with Nie Yinyang present. But the past two months of cultivation had put him so close to the Greater God level that not even a Perfect God would be able to kill him. Furthermore, he had the crown prince’s aura and the sagelight of the God Legion Seal. As long as he played his cards right, there was no way Nie Yinyang would notice a thing.

Truth be told, this was only an outer section of the storehouse; there were interior sections that not even Nie Yinyang could access.

As Yang Qi looked around, he sent his Sagelight Body ahead into the deeper parts of the storehouse. The Sagelight Body was made from the very same kind of sagelight that filled the imperial city, and was bolstered by the aura of the crown prince and the God Legion Seal. Because of that, it could move about freely, regardless of what spell formations were set up.

Soon, his Sagelight Body was in the depths of the storehouse, passing numerous enormous spell formations that were designed to instantly kill anyone who entered them. If he had gone into this place with his true self, he would have instantly been discovered. But his Sagelight Body was impossible to detect.

Truth be told, there were some very impressive treasures here, but in the end, he wanted to stay focused on the Mahātmā Jade. If what he had heard was correct, the Paramount Gods of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty had studied the Mahātmā Jade, but hadn’t learned much of anything from it. Supposedly, a few people had even experienced cultivation deviation because of it, which eventually gave it the reputation of being inauspicious.

Of course, if a Paramount God had been in possession of it right at that moment, Yang Qi wouldn’t have any chance of getting it. But considering it was known to drive people crazy, and even absorb the psychic power of anyone who worked with it for too long, few people were interested in getting too close to it. Therefore, it was kept locked up in the storehouses, suppressed by the very mountains of radiance and light whose power the Sovereign Lord had used to suppress the True Devil.

In other words, it was the perfect situation for Yang Qi.

‘Wow, there are so many treasures here,’ he thought, looking around with the Sagelight Body. It was a dazzling sight, but he knew he couldn’t take anything, or he would be discovered.

He could look, but not touch. In other words, he was window shopping.

‘What's that?’ It was the corpse of a Perfect God, a boundless entity from ancient times. He also caught sight of numerous high-quality medicinal pills, as well as some of the items belonging to the seventy-two monarchs. And there were spell formations that could lock down entities as strong as Paramount Gods.

He even caught sight of a fragment of a spacecraft that he instantly identified as the godhood manufacturing systems of the Cruiser of Civilization. Here it was, abandoned in a storehouse! Without the imperial-heaven pre-beginning systems, Engine of the One God, genetic systems, power assessment systems, and the like, the godhood manufacturing systems weren't particularly useful.

‘Hot damn. If I grabbed this stuff I would be discovered immediately. But if Yang Immortal-Slayer could complete the Cruiser of Civilization, it would definitely be strong enough to create a god kingdom superior to that of the House of God Ordainment.’

Yang Qi couldn’t help but drool over what he saw. However, he kept his excitement in check.

Continuing on, he passed through a destructive spell formation in which he saw numerous flowers. Strangely, one of the flowers lacked petals, consisting only of stamens, which was when he realized it was the missing part of the flower of time he had taken from the Chaos Forge God-Shrine. If he could complete the Flower of Time, he could unleash its powers and alter time itself. And with it in his monarch godhood, he would definitely reach a much higher level of formidability. In fact, he had no idea what exactly would happen if he did that.

Unfortunately, he could only look, not touch.

Continuing on, he saw all sorts of treasures. And as he proceeded, the vital energy grew stronger and stronger, as did the sensation of history. From what he could tell, it had been thousands upon thousands of years since anyone had been in this place.

All of a sudden, his Sagelight Body caught sight of something up ahead. It was an ancient piece of jade, resting on a magical altar.

It was only a fragment, half the size of a palm, but the designs that had been etched on its surface depicted hell and the dao of devils. They contained profound meanings, and were similar to the ten thousand tribulation characters from the sheepskin scroll.

It was the piece of the Mahātmā Jade he had been looking for.

‘Incredible. I’ve been dreaming of this moment for a long time. Nobody else can use that thing, as it turns into a disaster for them. But in my hands, it's on the same level as the God Legion Seal.’

Chapter 1287: Taking the Jade

At long last, the piece of Mahātmā Jade he had been looking for was right in front of him. Or more precisely, in front of his Sagelight Body.

Of course, it was covered by all sorts of sealing marks.

The slightest wrong movement would trigger those marks, and an alarm would be raised. So for now, he couldn't touch it.

But that didn’t mean he was out of options.

‘It's such a big piece. Definitely a lot bigger than the one I got in the impure lands.’ Of course, the things his Sagelight Body were seeing were transmitted right into the sea of consciousness of his true self. And he couldn’t help but wonder how much his psychic power would improve if he took this jade.

He had to get it, even if it meant blowing his cover. Based on how large it was, Yang Qi could sense that this piece would probably facilitate a breakthrough to late or peak Paramount will convergence, and possibly even the Unbounded level.

Even if Yang Qi's cultivation proceeded with blinding speed, it wouldn’t be possible to reach the Unbounded level even in a hundred million god world years using normal methods.

After all, every single breakthrough he made was infinitely more difficult than the same breakthrough would be for ordinary gods. However, everything would be different with the Mahātmā Jade. It was the product of countless sages and mahātmās from the dao of devils pooling their wisdom and psychic power into a crystallized form, creating something befitting of the True Devil. It contained the fundamental nature of the Annulled level, and had been used to defy the God Legion Seal. In fact, its clash with the God Legion Seal was what resulted in both of them shattering. But now, Yang Qi was taking the two and merging them into something new.

Even if the Sovereign Lord of yesteryear were resurrected, he could never guess that something like this would happen.

“Unspoiled by Myriad Kalpas and Tribulations; Myriad Characters in Text; Implanted and Sealed; Permeate the Ancient Jade!”

Activating the Unspoiled powers that he had inserted into the Sagelight Body, he sent them into the Mahātmā Jade, which immediately sucked them up. Afterward, nothing happened.

However, he now felt connected directly to the jade.

‘Things are going as expected. By putting a nascent divinity sealing mark into the Mahātmā Jade, it ensures that I’m the only person who can do anything with it. Thanks to my Unspoiled Body and God Legion Seal, I should be able to go back, put together a spell formation, and call out to the jade. By breaking through the limitations of space, I can summon it to me, then fuse it with my monarch godhood and become completely invincible. Maybe I really will have a chance to break through to the Unbounded level.’

Yang Qi was already making some very daring plans.

In the entire House of God Ordainment, there wasn’t a single person who had Unbounded will. If Yang Qi succeeded at it, he wouldn’t have any need to hide the truth about himself anymore. He could unfurl his proverbial banners and show how powerful he really was. At the same time, he could directly stand up to the Proud Clan. And if he could get his hands on Proud Heaven, maybe he could reach King Immortal-Slayer and finally get back the Great Necropolis and the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

He could hardly imagine how formidable he would be if he had the Great Necropolis, the God Legion Seal, and the Mahātmā Jade all under his control.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi’s true self was with Nie Yinyang, looking left and right in the storehouse like a country bumpkin in the city for the first time

After a long moment passed, Nie Yinyang said, “What type of weapon do you usually use?”

“I'm good with spears,” Yang Qi replied, thinking of the Infernal Deity Spear.

“Spears?”

Yang Qi nodded and reached out to pull a divine spear toward him. Its structure was similar to the Infernal Deity Spear, such that as soon as it fell into his hand, it felt like it was part of him.

“Excellent,” Nie Yinyang continued. “I can see that your skill with the spear is astonishing. That’s a very powerful weapon that was once the animadestiny spear of a Perfect God. Whether used for stabbing, slashing, or any other kind of slaughter, it will serve you well. Of course, you won’t be able to use all of its powers immediately. But you’ll eventually get used to it.”

Nie Yinyang wasn’t bothering to be on guard around Yang Qi. He was convinced that he had been thoroughly brainwashed, and was now a completely loyal servant. As such, Nie Yinyang wouldn’t cause any problems for him as he selected his treasure.

In fact, he even went so far as to pick a few medicinal pills to give Yang Qi as well.

They emerged from the storehouse some time later, and Nie Yinyang said, “You’re strong, Yang Qi, but you still need to work hard on your cultivation. By the time the House of God Ordainment’s tri-centennial election arrives, you should be in the Consummate God level. At that point, we can enact our plan to take control of the House of God Ordainment, and you can further prove your loyalty to the crown prince.”

“Majordomo, does the crown prince really need to take control of the House of God Ordainment? The people there aren’t really very impressive. They don’t even have any Paramount Gods.”

“You’re looking at it all wrong,” Nie Yinyang replied. “The House of God Ordainment has a secret reserve power that no one knows about. Although it's true they don’t have any Paramount Gods, they definitely have what it takes to fight on that level. That’s the main reason the House of God Ordainment has stuck around for such a long time. They don’t have a Paramount God, but everyone is hesitating to shoot the rat for fear of breaking the vases. Taking down a sect like that would definitely involve heavy losses on the part of the conqueror.”

“Secret reserve power?” Yang Qi said. He had heard the term thrown around a lot, and knew that the ultimate secrets of the House of God Ordainment could only be unleashed by the houselord. However, it also required the backing of the chief elders. He was very curious about what exactly it was.

“What secrets are they keeping?”

“Don’t worry about it now. You’ll eventually become privy to the biggest secrets in the House of God Ordainment. Under no circumstances should you attempt to get the information by doing some sort of investigation. You’ll only end up dying a painful death if you do. Now, you have some more time left to work on your cultivation. You can do so in my personal palace. I’ll give you some advice in terms of your energy arts and godhood.”

“Many thanks, Majordomo.”

The truth was that Yang Qi was inwardly cursing. He was very anxious to find a place to set up that altar and reach out to the Mahātmā Jade. If Nie Yinyang was watching over him the whole time, that wouldn’t be possible.

That said, personal instruction from Nie Yinyang would generally be considered a precious blessing, so he couldn’t just refuse.

And so, the third month passed. Yang Qi’s friends and family spent it in the Sage Hall, where they all reached the Greater God level. Yang Qi was the only one who didn’t experience a breakthrough, but remained as a Common God.

That said, he did a lot of training with Nie Yinyang, and simultaneously absorbed the surrounding quintessence of radiance and light, significantly improving his cultivation base. Of course, he didn’t reveal any of the truth of himself to Nie Yinyang, who was stymied by Yang Qi’s cultivation.

If it weren’t for the fact that the old eunuch was so incredibly powerful, Yang Qi would have loved to infect him with a devil embryo.

After the three months had passed, Yang Qi and the others had to wait for Jadefall to emerge from her training with the supreme concubine. Eventually, after the better part of a year, she did. Unexpectedly, her cultivation base was at the level of a Consummate God.

It was a cultivation speed that could shake heaven and earth to the point where even ghosts and gods would weep.

Surprised, Yang Qi said, “Jadefall, you really benefited a lot from training with the supreme concubine. You’re actually at the Consummate God level? Just be careful not to develop an unstable foundation. Let me assess you.”

He sent some godpower into Jadefall and found that her godhood was very stable, unlike what he would expect of someone who had made such immense progress in less than a year.

“The supreme concubine took me into a boundless god item,” Jadefall explained. “It's a precious treasure that can reverse the flow of time and invert life force. I actually spent about five hundred years inside cultivating. She also gave me all sorts of medicinal pills to help solidify my godhood and cleanse my will. As a Consummate God, I qualify to become a child of primeval chaos, and can even join in the election process to become the next houselord. The Sage Monarch Society is definitely going to experience some incredible growth.”

After finishing with the main explanation, Jadefall lowered her voice and said, “The supreme concubine is mysterious and unpredictable. She’s definitely someone we have to avoid offending.”

Yang Qi nodded. “Understood. I suppose it’s expected that other Ascendants would be domineering figures as well.”

Everyone had benefited immensely from their time in the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty. Of course, both the supreme concubine and Nie Yinyang were thinking about the conflicts between their respective factions. And now the Sage Monarch Society was stuck between them.

Whoosh. Whoosh. Whoosh.

As they flew away, Nie Yinyang watched them go, and smiled coldly. ‘The supreme concubine is very impressive. How did she manage to get Jadefall into the Consummate God level in such a short time? Consummate Gods are very important people in the House of God Ordainment. It seems there will be some fierce struggles there soon. Hopefully that boy Yang Qi can deal with it all. Thankfully, he's keeping us completely updated on Jadefall’s situation. As long as we can get control of the House of God Ordainment and their secret reserve power, we’ll have a big bargaining chip to use against the people plotting against us.’

Once outside, Yang Qi gave his next set of orders. “You all head back to the sect and resume your responsibilities. I'm going on a bit of a journey into the void to set up a spell formation. If I succeed, I’ll be truly invincible. Neither the junior houselord nor any Perfect Gods will be able to stand up to me.”

“Don’t tell me you actually found that piece of the Mahātmā Jade, son!” Yang Zhan exclaimed. “We’re only getting more and more powerful nowadays!”

“I’ll wait until I succeed before going into any more detail. If I fail, it will be hard to avoid beating the grass and startling the snake, and then a second attempt to get the jade will be that much harder.” Yang Qi reached out, tore open a rift, then stepped inside and vanished.

Considering the level of his cultivation base, it was an easy thing for him to pierce through the void. Even the space-time tempests of the god world were now easy to deal with, as long as he expended some effort.

Chapter 1288: Taking the Jade (2)

Yang Qi ripped open the void and stepped through space. The spatial tempests couldn’t harm him in the least bit as he surrounded himself in concentric rings of sagelight, completely suppressing them.

“Space-Time Convergence; Perfect Heaven and Earth.”

He traveled for three days and three nights before finding a suitable location to set up the spell formation. Waving his hand, he caused the spatial power in the area to crystallize, transforming into the taiji and wuji, the two polarities.

Numerous enormous flags shot forth, formed from the vital energy and tribulations of the god world, offering clear evidence of the incredible and mysterious things Yang Qi was capable of now.

He spent seven days putting the formation together, until something resembling an altar made of flags took shape.

Any observer who managed to catch sight of this would have been absolutely flabbergasted. The ability to set up spell formations in the void was something that only Perfect Gods or higher could do. So a Common God doing it was considered totally impossible.

RUMBLE!

Vital energy surged in all directions as Yang Qi took control of all heaven and earth. Boundless psychic power filled the void, creating cyclones and lightning. At the same time, space-time sank down as a physical object took shape.

“Psyche of Heaven and Earth; Let the Sages and Mahātmās Come; Mahātmā Jade; Appear within the Void; Let my Soul Pierce the Aeons; Summon and Reform the Future.” All of a sudden, an image of the complete Mahātmā Jade appeared, making Yang Qi seem like the ancient sages and mahātmās who had worked with the True Devil to create the Mahātmā Jade for the first time.

His boundless psyche had managed to extrapolate what the complete jade looked like. Next, the piece of the Mahātmā Jade that was in his godhood flew out, almost as if it had been summoned.

Let the Sages and Mahātmās Come!

As Yang Qi threw his head back and howled, shadowy projections of sages and mahātmās appeared behind him, standing as though in the river of time, filled with understanding of the great dao of humanity, and the morality of people.

“Ultimate Summoning!”

Yang Qi drew on the summoning techniques of the God Legion Seal, using the might of the legion of gods to pierce through the shackles of space and touch upon its very origins.

“The end of time? The origin of time?”

His psyche expanded without limit until he saw two antipodes, one being the actual origin of time, and the other its end. Unfortunately, his psyche was currently not nearly capable of actually reaching those limits. Only Annulled will convergence could actually reach the origin and end of time.

That said, as his psychic power expanded, it was enough to cause the shadowy image of the Mahātmā Jade to become more complete. It almost seemed as if some almighty power of summoning was at work.

The ultimate summoning.

Relying on his spell formation, he was extracting the Mahātmā Jade from the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty’s treasure storehouse by summoning it directly to himself. And in order to pull off the summoning, he was completely unleashing all of his psychic power.

As he roved through the river of time, he searched for the right vector, although he was having trouble keeping control. What he was doing was something few people could actually control.

He pushed his psychic power harder and harder, until he finally exploded, leaving behind only his godhood. Then his godpower faded and a new body formed. Blood flowed through him as his godhood quintessence-blood slowly faded away.

Normally speaking, when one cultivated to the point of being a god, they didn’t have blood. Everything from blood, to vital energy, to bones became part of one's godhood. However, if one was badly injured, then psychic power could flow from their godhood and restore the body, including the blood.

He was like an oil lamp on the verge of flickering out.

Psychic power was the ultimate foundation of everything, and could turn vital energy into godhood. When the psychic power vanished, godpower would unravel and return to its essence, then disappear into the void. That was how the magical laws of the god world worked.

In the impure lands, things were different.

RUMBLE!

Yang Qi’s psychic power was draining so rapidly that not even the God Legion Seal could help. The God Legion Seal could fill his godhood up with godpower, but it couldn’t replenish psychic power. If you ladled water out of a bucket, you could fill the bucket up again from a stream. But if the bucket itself was broken, no amount of water would help.

Psychic power was the bucket, and godpower was the water.

‘This is bad,’ Yang Qi thought. At the rate he was going, he was going to fade and be destroyed by the spatial tempests.

But in the end, this was actually a type of cultivation, and it was within the throes of death that one could forge the most powerful psyche and will.

“Second Summoning; Exceed Limitations; Unbounded Psyche!” He exploded again, and all the godpower in him boiled away. Then, his monarch godhood unexpectedly shrank down.

It was now listless and dark, as though its quality had been significantly reduced.

He was regressing from the peak Common God level to the late level. Then the mid level, and finally the early level! His cultivation base was suffering a major setback, all in the hopes that this desperate gamble would pay off.

Unfortunately, he still hadn’t successfully summoned that piece of the Mahātmā Jade.

‘Time to go for broke!’ he thought. ‘Monarch Godhood Regression!Return Everything to the Beginning!’

Power flowed out of Yang Qi’s monarch godhood, and considering it was the strongest type of godhood there was, one could only imagine what was involved in draining it this way.

He dropped from the Common God level all the way to the early Lesser God level, which was a decline of an entire major cultivation level.

However, the power he could unleash this way was astonishing, and it created an explosion so incredible that it wiped out all of the space-time tempests and left behind nothing but a pure, clean void.

A massive, psychic passageway opened up, piercing through the remotest antiquity.

At that exact moment, deep in the imperial treasure storehouse in the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty, the piece of the Mahātmā Jade slowly faded away without anyone noticing.

The small piece of jade then flew through the void to enter Yang Qi’s sea of consciousness.

RUMBLE!

His fleshly body formed again, and the psychic power that had drained away started recovering. At the same time, his cultivation level once again began climbing. He felt as if he could sense all of the sages and mahātmās that had existed from ancient times until now, and they were becoming one with him. A mighty spirit entered him, and at the same time, he sensed the true nature of that which was nothing, annulled.

His psychic power advanced by leaps and bounds, rising from the mid Paramount level to the late and peak level. It only stopped when he was half a step into the Unbounded level.

Although it stopped there, he could sense that he was just on the verge of breaking through to the Unbounded level.

Yang Qi felt like he had developed psychic antennae that could stretch out through all heaven and earth, allowing him to see the void of the universe and the antipodes of time. That was the sign of Unbounded will. With a single thought, all heaven and earth was under his control.

‘I have to keep going. I need Unbounded will convergence. Only then will I be truly invincible. A regression in godhood is nothing. Even if I'm an early Lesser God, as long as I have Unbounded will convergence, I could kill Perfect Gods, even if I didn’t have godhood at all! I have to reach Unbounded!”

He threw his head back and howled, sending out waves of psychic power, the fluctuations of which caused the spatial tempests to return.

After reaching the half-Unbounded level, his psychic power continued improving. However, he wasn’t able to achieve the breakthrough he wanted, so he sank into thought. Breaking into the Unbounded level was like a caterpillar becoming a butterfly. It didn’t matter how big or impressive the caterpillar was, it couldn’t fly, and the butterfly could.

He threw his head back and howled, causing his godhood to rotate as he tried to force a breakthrough.

Unfortunately, at the exact moment in which he expected to succeed, he failed to break through to the Unbounded level.

The limits of the psychic power in the Mahātmā Jade had been reached.

He was short by an infinitesimal amount. That said, he was still vastly more powerful. It really didn’t matter that his godhood had regressed to the early Lesser God level. In terms of will, he could stand shoulder to shoulder with terrifying peak Perfect Gods.

He didn’t need any godpower to devastate any Consummate God who faced him. That was the impressive benefit of powerful will convergence.

Truth be told, he had already cultivated his will to a very critical juncture. After all, once he reached the peak Unbounded level, he would be half a step into the Annulled level, which was the same level as the Sovereign Lord, True Devil, Demon Master, Wretch God, and King Immortal-Slayer. He could enter the realm of Nevasaññānāsaññāyatana, whereupon all of his mental fluctuations would cease, and his godpower and godhood would vanish.

Godpower and godhood were merely vessels, like the ‘boat’ that could be used to ‘cross to the other shore’.

The will was the self.

Yang Qi’s current will convergence was such that he could soon restore his godhood to its previous level.

Ignoring his godhood, he drew on his psychic power to clear out the surrounding spatial tempests, then ripped open a huge wormhole.

‘I have to find the other pieces of the Mahātmā Jade. Even the smallest piece will allow me to break through to the Unbounded level.’

Chapter 1289: Almost Unbounded

Yang Qi was on the very cusp of attaining Unbounded will convergence, which would make him a true potentate in the god world, a person who could call the wind and summon the rain, and do as he wished wherever he went. However, he also knew that succeeding in that would be extremely difficult, and was technically something that should be impossible for him. It was like a crown prince wanting to be the emperor. Success would involve passing through innumerable dangers and overcoming countless obstacles.

The only way it would be possible would be with the Mahātmā Jade.

He was lucky to have two pieces, but now he needed more. Thankfully, all he needed to do was once again elevate his godhood and step back into the Common God level, then use his current pieces of the jade to track down the others.

He was now an early Lesser God again, and was going to have to deal with the frustrating task of climbing back up again.

Thankfully, he had more powerful will than ever, and furthermore, he could devour godpower and send it into his godhood with ease. His cultivation speed was now thousands of times faster than before, but even still, relying only on normal cultivation methods meant it would take two or three god world years to return to his previous state.

He had to find some suitable medicinal pills.

There were many medicinal pills in the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty’s treasure storehouse, but sadly, he had no way to get inside. And once the people there realized the Mahātmā Jade was missing, it would definitely cause a huge commotion and lead to vastly increased security. At least he hadn’t left any evidence that would implicate him.

Furthermore, despite his cultivation base regressing, his fighting prowess and substructure were stronger than ever, which meant it would be even easier to deal with any enemies.

‘It’s a pity I can’t get into that storehouse. I could get my cultivation base back to normal, and also get so many things I need. For example, the stamens of that flower of time and that piece of the Cruiser of Civilization. I guess I’ll have to wait until I have Unbounded will convergence. Then I can slip in there like I did back in the Joyflower Palace, or the Executors of the Ancient Road.’

By now, Yang Qi was an expert at robbing treasure storehouses.

‘Although...’ he thought, his eyes brightening, ‘the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty is off limits now, but what about the House of God Ordainment? Given the level of my will, I don’t think anyone in the entire sect is a match for me, not even the junior houselord, the houselord, or the chief elders.’

There were no Unbounded experts in the House of God Ordainment, otherwise they wouldn’t be in their current situation. After all, even among the princes of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty with its immense nation-fate, only the crown prince had reached the Unbounded level. That alone went to show how hard it was.

The junior houselord, the houselord, and some of the Consummate God chief elders all had peak Paramount will, but that was a far cry from the Unbounded level. In contrast, Yang Qi was already half a step into the Unbounded level.

Although he might not be able to seize the upper hand in a fight, it wouldn't be easy for them to kill him, either.

Yang Qi had replaced hunting rifles with cannons, so in terms of will convergence, he could definitely beat a Perfect God.

‘I ought to reassess my psychic scale. I wonder what it is now.’ Unfortunately, in order to use the psychic scaling systems, he would have to wait for Yang Immortal-Slayer to return with the Cruiser of Civilization.

‘Oh, right. I almost forgot that I got a partial Unbounded god pill in the Chaos Forge God-Shrine. If I assimilate that, will it restore my godhood to normal?’ Without any hesitation, he pulled out the pill in question.

Of course, this time, he was able to examine the pill in much more detail than before. It was obviously concocted with top secret methods; there were crystalline connections between the different aspects of power, and it was impossible to say how many types of vital energy had been used to make it.

An Unbounded expert had spent blood, sweat, and tears to create this pill, and although it wasn't complete, it was still incredible. Sending some of his psychic power into the incomplete god pill, he saw what looked like a veritable mountain of explosive vital energy.

‘So strong.’ His will stirred, and his psychic power became like a screen covering the entire enormous mountain. Then he slowly dragged it into his monarch godhood.

Before long, he had risen from the early Lesser God level to the mid, late, and peak level. Then he jumped into the Common God level: early, mid, late, peak.

That one incomplete Unbounded medicinal pill was all he needed to get him all the way back to where he was in the beginning.

‘I can’t believe it was that strong,’ he thought, letting loose a long breath. ‘Unbounded medicinal pills are incredible. I wonder if the House of God Ordainment has more pills like that in their storehouse. If I can get a few, I might be able to reach the Consummate God level. And as a child of primeval chaos, it wouldn't be hard to take over as the houselord.’

Back at full power, feeling high-spirited and full of mettle, Yang Qi vanished without a trace as he headed back to the House of God Ordainment.

**

BAM!

In a palace hall in the House of God Ordainment, the junior houselord was so flustered and exasperated he had just slapped the table in front of him so hard it collapsed.

“It wasn’t even a year!” he said. “All the key members of the Sage Monarch Society became Greater Gods in less than a year?! They're all far more influential now. Furthermore, Jadefall is a Consummate God and a child of primeval chaos! Her faction is now officially in the position to oppose us!”

Before, Jadefall had always relied on the purrling. And the key figures of the Sage Monarch Society hadn't been particularly helpful. They had good fighting prowess, but in terms of their level, they just didn’t meet the standard.

But now, everything had changed.

Thanks to their newfound levels of power, it would be much more difficult to scheme against them.

“Junior Houselord,” one of the Consummate God chief elders said, “I'm as surprised as you that training from the supreme concubine would be this amazing. Getting that group of people to this level in less than a year is shocking. However, although they might have wings, they haven’t taken flight yet. In other words, they have the potential to make even more progress. And the tri-centennial election is coming soon. What happens if they all become Consummate Gods before then? That would be a very tricky situation to deal with.”

“You’re right,” the junior houselord said through gritted teeth. “Considering their progress in cultivation, and the fact that the supreme concubine is helping them, it’s entirely possible that the core group from the Sage Monarch Society could end up as Consummate Gods in time for the election. And Jadefall might even be a Perfect God by then. But you know who we have to worry about the most? Yang Immortal-Slayer. What level will he reach by then? I don’t think anyone can say for sure.  We should make a move immediately. I need to find out once and for all if I can make Jadefall my woman. If she refuses, I’ll have no choice but to clip those wings of hers and turn her into nothing!”

Frowning, one of the chief elders said, “Junior Houselord, what about that purrling of hers? Not even a Paramount God can do anything to it. So how exactly will you get rid of her?”

“I said clip her wings, not kill her. In any case, don't worry. I can lend someone a knife and have them do my dirty work for me. The third prince is plenty ambitious, isn’t he? If we take Yang Qi hostage, Jadefall will have to submit to us. What else can she do? She’ll definitely hesitate to shoot the rat for fear of breaking the vases.”

The junior houselord clenched his hand into a fist, shattering the void around him. At the same time, a devilish projection appeared behind him.

“No secrets can be kept from me in the god kingdom of the House of God Ordainment.”

**

With half Unbounded will, the god kingdom of the House of God Ordainment didn’t seem like it could keep any more secrets from Yang Qi. Even if he wasn't a disciple of the sect, he was about fifty percent sure he could still sneak inside.

Without a single sound, he entered the god kingdom and opened his Lord's Eye. Looking around, he realized that although the place was large, there were plenty of ways to secretly move around.

Casting his vision further in, he saw a large mountain where a group of Perfect Gods had gathered. Some were working on cultivation, some were concocting medicinal pills, some were working with magical treasures, some were discussing business, and some were seeking enlightenment of profound things.

As for Houselord God Ordainment, he was nowhere to be seen.

However, the junior houselord was indeed present.

He was in the middle of some sort of meeting, and had just used a boundless daoist technique to create a shadowy projection that seemed like a combination of a god, devil, ghost, and buddha.

Yang Qi wasn’t interested in the details.

‘Where exactly is the treasure storehouse?’ he thought, casting his vision this way and that.

Chapter 1290: The House of God Ordainment&#039;s Treasure Storehouse

Yang Qi had his sights set on the House of God Ordainment’s treasure storehouse. He had never felt a sense of belonging in this sect. It had been nothing but a host, and he, a parasite, taking advantage of its destiny and resources. After he was done taking what needed, he would move on and find another host.

He had even already identified the next target: the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty. Slowly but surely, he would suck that sect dry too.

RUMBLE!

He could see everything that made up the god kingdom of the sect, including the Perfect Gods and the junior houselord among them. Only someone with true Unbounded will could possibly escape his gaze.

It didn’t take long for him to find the storehouse, which thrummed with the aura of treasure. There was no trace of its existence out in the open, as it was located in another dimension of the god kingdom.

“Life-Death Void-Destruction.”

Drawing on the powers of his Life-Death Void-Destruction Lightning, he headed into the depths of the god kingdom, which contained far too many minor dimensions to count. Of course, they were all bare to his will. Before long, he found one that was under guard by Perfect Gods. The treasure storehouse.

It contained the countless treasures that had been built up over many years by the House of God Ordainment. After all, they were constantly wiping out smaller organizations, taking their treasures and resources, and enslaving their disciples.

Yang Qi wasn’t actually interested in anything other than medicinal pills concocted by experts with Unbounded will.

Although there were some impressive treasures, Yang Qi ignored them all. Sweeping the place with his psychic power, he saw a part where some pills had been hoarded. Some were piled up like mountains, while others looked like pagodas, stūpas or palaces.

Only the most powerful of medicinal pills would naturally take such forms.

At a glance, Yang Qi identified the three strongest pills among them.

One had created a daoist rite center around itself, complete with a daoist priest and a temple. The daoist sat there in the temple like a heavenly celestial, constantly lecturing other medicinal spirits about the dao.

Another pill looked like a monk from one of the buddhist schools, and was chanting sutras, surrounded by a holy land.

The third pill looked like a confucian scholar, sitting in a place of learning and instructing other medicinal spirits about the truths of life.

The medicinal pills had developed spirits and could practice cultivation, making them very similar to actual people. After all, the godhood created by people was similar to a god pill; the two shared many characteristics.

‘What an amazing set of pills. Together, they represent daoism, buddhism, and confucianism. Combined, they’ll be unparalleled under heaven.’ The cultivation bases of the pills seemed invincible, as if each was a Consummate God. And they were obviously beyond the compare of the pill he had found in the Chaos Forge God-Shrine. Inwardly, Yang Qi was marveling. ‘I have to get those pills. If I assimilate them, I should be able to break out of the Greater God level and climb much higher in my cultivation! They were definitely concocted by someone with Unbounded will convergence, possibly even a Paramount God.’

The three pills hadn’t been concocted by anyone in the House of God Ordainment, but had instead been plundered from a sect they had warred with that specialized in alchemy. And no one in the sect could have benefited from them, including the junior houselord and the houselord himself. Thus, they had been stored here.

Examining the surroundings, he saw that the pills were sealed in place by a huge talisman.

In other words, other than preaching, they couldn't do anything.

That would only make things easier for Yang Qi. If he had to suppress the pills on his own, it would have taken some work, and would have been impossible to do in secret.

Inside, he was laughing up a storm. On the outside, he quickly transformed into a primal-chaos elder-snake that opened its mouth and used the profound arts of King Heaven-Devourer to consume the pills.

In the blink of an eye, the pills became a massive stream of power flowing through him.

As they entered his monarch godhood, the Heaven and Earth Furnace flared to life, ready to extrude all impurities and extract all essences.

“Who’s there?” the three pills blurted, rising to their feet as they realized what was happening.

Sadly for them, their cultivation bases were already locked down by the House of God Ordainment.

For now, Yang Qi didn’t assimilate them. Keeping them suppressed, he used the God Legion Seal and created replicas to leave behind. Even if the junior houselord came and examined the pills, he would be fooled.

He would even experience a slight boost in power if he assimilated it, before ultimately realizing that it was a forgery. And by that point, no one would believe him, considering the pill was gone.

That was the benefit of having a superior psyche and will.

He could essentially bully all of the non-Unbounded experts in the entire House of God Ordainment. If the Mahātmā Jade wasn’t that amazing, how could it be considered equally as impressive as the God Legion Seal?

And no one knew what marvelous things would happen when those two treasures were combined.

‘Finished. Now I’ll just take all the rest of the pills, then find a good place to stabilize my cultivation base and advance my godhood.’

After the final work was done, he left the god kingdom and went out into the chaotic void, eventually finding a good place to set up a spell formation. Then, he summoned the Heaven and Earth Furnace.

In its depths were the pills he had just devoured, which he broke down into expressions of vital energy and sent into his godhood.

There had been millions upon millions of pills in the storehouse, most of them concocted by Paramount Gods. Only those three were Unbounded, but Paramount pills were still Paramount pills, and provided pure godpower that could be used to fill in Yang Qi’s godhood.

Crack!

Yang Qi’s monarch godhood suddenly broke into the Greater God level. Breathing deeply, he summoned the primal-chaos elder-snake again.

With its eyes open, the snake almost looked like the real King Heaven-Devourer.

Roaring, it opened its mouth, causing the space-time tempests to roll into it, making its energy of primal chaos even stronger and more corporeal.

Yang Qi had finally become a Greater God.

He had stolen so many resources from the House of God Ordainment that he could sense its destiny decline by thirty percent.

However, Yang Qi was a Fateless One and commanded the Life-Death Void-Destruction Lightning; therefore, no one could ever place the blame on him. Only someone with full Unbounded will could have determined the truth.

‘And now, it's time to assimilate these three Unbounded god pills. Let’s see what they’ll do to my godhood. They shouldn’t just affect my godhood and cultivation base, though, but also my psychic power and thought fluctuations.’

Without hesitation, he summoned the three pills, which had assumed the form of a buddhist, daoist, and confucian.

“Who exactly are you?” said the one that looked like a buddhist. “And why have you taken us out of the House of God Ordainment? Release the sealing mark immediately! If you do, we can give you boundless blessings and unending power!” His words were very enticing.

However, Yang Qi simply looked at them like they were idiots. “Are you brain-addled? I've consumed you to boost my godhood and cultivation base! What power do you think you’re going to bless me with?”

“Who exactly are you? Are you from the House of God Ordainment, or some other group?” the confucian scholar said, sounding very stern and awe-inspiring.

Chapter 1291: Buddhist, Daoist, Confucian. Three God Pills

Three god pills, one a buddhist, one a daoist, one a confucian. They all knew they were in extreme danger, and on the verge of being destroyed. How could they possibly just resign themselves to their fate?

Therefore, they decided to join forces to kill Yang Qi.

Not that he cared. Quietly drawing on his psyche, will, and boundless godpower, he set up a spell formation.

The confucian pill unleashed energy that became like a white dragon, shooting upward to smash into the warding magic. “I'm a Noble-Energy Exist-Forever Confucian God Pill! I control the noble energy of heaven and earth, and was concocted by the combined effort of numerous teachers, saints, sages, and scholars from a boundless confucian college. I was formed from the energy of books and scrolls, and shall exist forever within heaven and earth. How could you possibly assimilate me?”

“Let heaven be the game board, and the stars the pieces.” The daoist pill unleashed an attack that filled the sky with consummate energy, forming an immense star chart that battered at the warding magic.

“Compassion cometh from Buddha. Pilgrimage of a myriad buddhas. Nirvanic rebirth of a myriad buddhas. The buddhist lamp is like a dream. With a buddha, one has a lamp.”

A shining lamp rose high into the sky as the buddhist pill called on an incredibly powerful divine ability. All three of the pills attacked together, unleashing devastating power that smashed through the warding magic with unstoppable force.

“Very impressive energy,” Yang Qi murmured. Drawing on his cultivation base and will, he transformed his monarch godhood into a divine pearl. Bright light shone into the void, and immense psychic power crackled like silver lightning or fire dragons.

“Unspoiled by Myriad Kalpas and Tribulations. Mahātmā Jade!” Ten thousand characters appeared within Yang Qi’s monarch godhood, rapidly forming what appeared to be an enormous cannon.

Devilish, godly text flowed back and forth to form the cannon, which was none other than a devastating weapon the True Devil had devised in the ancient past. It was called the Grand Tribulation Cannon, and it lobbed projectiles formed of raw tribulation. When firing the cannon from the depths of hell, it could blast the halls of heaven in devastating barrages.

Hell was the lowest point in the world, and the halls of heaven were the highest.

Hell could only look up at heaven.

Yet, according to the stories, the True Devil really had blasted the halls of heaven with his cannon all the way from hell. There was nothing in existence that could match the attack power of the Grand Tribulation Cannon.

After Yang Qi got his second piece of the Mahātmā Jade, his True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body improved dramatically, and he learned of this new transformation.

RUMBLE!

Even as the three god pills destroyed the warding magic, the Grand Tribulation Cannon appeared and a deafening roaring sound could be heard as it was unleashed. The recoil was so immense that Yang Qi staggered backward from the force.

The projectile ripped through the defenses of the three god pills, and they screamed miserably as their vital energy was shredded apart.

“Is all this worth the trouble?” Yang Qi asked them. Reaching out with the Hand of the One God, he grabbed the three pills and wrapped them up in a bubble.

“Out of power, right?” he said. “I devastated your pill energy, leaving behind only pure medicinal strength and godpower. You’re at the end of the line here.”

“Just who are you?” the confucian pill asked. “How come you're so strong?” Suddenly, he spat out some blood that was pure pill energy, which he used to try to break through the Purrfect God Art bubble. He completely failed.

“If I'm not mistaken,” said the buddhist pill, “you have the cultivation base of a Greater God. But your psychic power is on the verge of the Unbounded level. It took a lot of hard cultivation for us to reach this level. Why destroy us? Compassion cometh from Buddha! Don’t tell me you have no compassion in your heart?”

“I have compassion,” Yang Qi said. “Otherwise I would’ve killed you already. Don’t worry. All I need are your medicinal pill bodies. In terms of your boundless wills, they would only be impurities to me. Just separate your wills from the medicinal pills that contain them. Eventually, I can find new fleshly bodies for you, and help you become true gods. What do you say?”

The pills had long since developed intelligence, and the truth was that Yang Qi didn’t actually want to destroy them. He just wanted their exterior shells, the medicinal pills. Considering they had survived a blast from the Grand Tribulation Cannon, they were obviously on the level of Consummate Gods.

All he would have to do would be find them appropriate bodies for them to continue on their paths of cultivation.

The three god pills exchanged glances. “In that case, we believe you. Our wills would indeed be impurities to you, and wouldn’t be of much help.”

Three beams of light appeared, one golden, one green, and one white. Yang Qi waved his sleeve and sucked them inside, leaving behind three medicinal pills on his palm. They now contained only pure psychic power, godpower, and almost limitless medicinal strength. He could sense the pills almost pulsing in his hand.

As for the buddhist pill, it had obviously been concocted by the joint effort of countless ancient buddhas, who chanted their sutras and gave form to crystallized expressions of enlightenment.

The confucian pill had been created by innumerable confucian teachers, combining their academic knowledge of righteousness and virtue into the form of a pill.

The daoist pill was similar, having been created in a calm and natural fashion by numerous daoist priests.

The three pills contained the wisdom of three main teachings, and while it was hard to say where exactly the House of God Ordainment had acquired them, it didn’t matter. They now belonged to Yang Qi.

It was impossible to say how many merit points it would have cost him to take them. Most likely, it would require saving the sect from imminent destruction ten times over. Yet Yang Qi had just spirited them away.

One after another, he popped them into his mouth, and his monarch godhood virtually burst into flame.

The fire was so intense that his fleshly body once again vanished, leaving behind only his godhood. Cracking and creaking sounds rang out as it began growing larger and larger.

Soon it was like a tiny mountain, burning as brightly as the sun.

It was the longest session of cultivation Yang Qi had engaged in for a long time, lasting three years. Three god world years passed, in which he remained in the depths of the void, assimilating the medicinal strength and growing stronger. At the same time, his psyche was still operational and in touch with Jadefall and his other people.

Three years wasn’t really a long time. To the House of God Ordainment as a whole, it was like the snap of a finger. During that time, Jadefall and the others stabilized their cultivation bases and continued growing stronger, although that wasn’t necessarily obvious to outside observers. After all, they still needed more time to consolidate their benefits from the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty.

Yang Immortal-Slayer came to visit during that three-year-period, but obviously, he didn’t see Yang Qi.

Yang Immortal-Slayer had formed monarch godhood, and was proceeding rapidly with his cultivation. Not only was he benefiting from the help of the Lord of the True Void, but he was also in contact with King Immortal-Slayer. The Lord of the True Void knew about his monarch godhood, and was both keeping his secret and also doing everything in his power to help him.

Yang Immortal-Slayer’s rapid advancement in cultivation delighted some people in the sect, but had the opposite effect for others. The Sage Monarch Society had already turned into a major force in the sect, surpassing the Brilliant Radiance Society, Honorable Glory Society, and former Dragon Society.

Now, they were second only to the Mystery Society.

No one discovered the fact that the medicinal pills had been stolen from the treasure storehouse. They were stored in a place so deep that it would sometimes go for thousands of years without being visited.

One day, deep in the void, a massive explosion occurred. A huge, divine mountain appeared, which slowly shrank until it became obvious that it was godhood.

Monarch godhood. When it was roughly the size of an egg, Yang Qi’s body formed around it.

‘I finally understand the deepest secrets of how to improve godpower and godhood. It touches on the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth and the Annulled Grand Magic. Now I know for sure that, even without the Mahātmā Jade, I’ll eventually gain enlightenment of Unbounded will convergence.’

Yang Qi was now a Consummate God!

Chapter 1292: Consummate Godhood

Yang Qi had spent three years assimilating three powerful god pills. And as a result, he had finally become a Consummate God. The Consummate God level was a major milestone, and was the point where one could truly pursue grand ambitions. Even in the largest of sects, Consummate Gods commanded immense power and authority. For example, in the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty, Consummate Gods would be conferred titles of nobility.

Right now, Yang Qi’s will convergence still wasn’t in the Unbounded level, but he was confident he would be able to reach that level, even without the Mahātmā Jade.

Three years ago, he had been stuck because he needed more pieces of the Mahātmā Jade.

But during the three years of hard cultivation and deep enlightenment, he had broken through that obstacle. Now, achieving the breakthrough he desired wouldn’t be an impossibility.

Furthermore, to rise from the early Consummate God level to the mid level, he needed more medicinal pills. The House of God Ordainment was now useless to him in that regard, as he had already cleared out their treasure storehouse of every useful pill possible.

Right now, anything that wasn’t an Unbounded medicinal pill might as well have been trash to him.

Looking at the god kingdom of the House of God Ordainment, he realized that there were no secrets in it any longer. One thing he realized was that the secret reserve power they kept actually wasn’t in the god kingdom itself, but somewhere outside.

At this point, Yang Qi was far too big a fish to remain in the pond that was the House of God Ordainment. Never could he have guessed that he would progress so rapidly in his cultivation.

His friends and family were all Greater Gods, and in another eight to ten years, they would all be Consummate Gods. Right now, he and Jadefall were both already Consummate Gods. All they had to do now was use their status as children of primeval chaos to enact the next phase of their plan.

With his half Unbounded will convergence, Consummate God monarch godhood, and God Legion Seal, Yang Qi could definitely crush all of the experts in the sect. Not even the houselord, who was a peak Consummate God, was anything to worry about. The only thing he wasn’t sure about was the reserve power they had.

The only thing that could currently cause a problem for him would be a Paramount God with Unbounded will.

Without any fanfare, he returned to the god kingdom and headed directly to the Hall of Promotions.

When the disciples there caught sight of him, some called out enthusiastic greetings, while others looked at him with hard expressions and hurried off to report the matter to others. Approaching one of the disciples in charge, he released some of his Consummate God aura.

In response, the disciple, who was a Lesser God, immediately dropped to his knees. “Spare me, Elder Brother, spare me!”

“I’m here for a promotion,” Yang Qi said. “As you can see, my godhood has reached the level of a Consummate God. Therefore, I want to be a child of primeval chaos. Please go report the matter to the chief elders.”

“Yes, of course,” the disciple said, crawling to his feet and hurrying away.

Yang Qi waited patiently as the hours ticked by. He knew that news of him being a Consummate God would spread, and that the chief elders would be calling a meeting of other Consummate Gods to discuss the matter.

The Sage Monarch Society had been rising in power rapidly over the past three years, with its members completing all sorts of missions and earning many merit points. Further, the Sage Monarch Consortium had also been growing.

Now that Yang Qi was a Consummate God, it meant the Sage Monarch Society very well might surpass the Mystery Society.

Ding dong. Ding dong.

Bells rang in the Hall of Promotions, filling the god kingdom and announcing to all disciples that a new child of primeval chaos had arrived.

Then, several Consummate God elder kings approached. “Please enter the hall. To become a child of primeval chaos, you’ll have to pass some tests administered by the Perfect God chief elders.”

“Alright,” Yang Qi said, nodding. He had no idea what discussions might have gone on over the past few hours, and wasn’t interested in knowing any details. Whatever tricks anyone might be planning, he was now strong enough to deal with them.

The Hall of Promotions had several floors, and the disciples and elders that worked there were considered very lucky. He walked up to the highest floor, entering a spacious room that overlooked many of the other palaces in the god kingdom.

There were a handful of Consummate God elder kings present, along with eight Perfect God chief elders. Yang Qi recognized the chief elders; only three of them actually worked in the Hall of Promotions, so the fact that there were others present seemed to indicate that something fishy was going on.

Not that Yang Qi cared.

After he walked in and took his place, one of the chief elders said, “So, Yang Qi, you want to be a child of primeval chaos? Is your cultivation base in the Consummate God level?”

“Yes,” Yang Qi said, releasing the aura of a Consummate God.

“Excellent. You really are a Consummate God.” Nodding, the chief elder glanced at his fellow chief elders, then said, “Unfortunately, it’s also possible that you’re using some unknown magical object to fabricate a Consummate God aura. Therefore, we need to do our routine inspection to rule that out.”

“Alright,” Yang Qi said. “How exactly will the inspection work?”

“Simple,” another chief elder said. “We’ll directly inspect your godhood to make sure it's actually in the Consummate God level.”

“Sounds fine.” He knew something unusual was going on, but true confidence stems from superb skill, and he wasn’t worried about whatever games the chief elders might be playing.

“Then we’ll begin.” Vaguely sinister expressions flitted across the faces of the other five chief elders.

“Hold on a moment!” Yang Qi suddenly said.

“What are you doing?” one of the chief elders said.

“What’s the meaning of this, Yang Qi?” said another.

“According to the Great Classic of God Ordainment, when being promoted to child of primeval chaos, the inspection will be carried out by three chief elders. If the subject’s godhood is in the Consummate God level, he’ll pass the test. So why exactly do you need eight chief elders instead of three?” Yang Qi even pulled out his Great Classic of God Ordainment and flipped to the specific passage he was referring to.

“The Hall of Promotions has changed its policies,” one of the chief elders replied immediately, as if he had anticipated this might happen. Smiling coldly, he continued, “Corruption has become a big problem here. For instance, certain members of the Sage Monarch Society have been promoted even though they clearly don’t meet the cultivation requirements, by bribing disciples here. And there are some disciples who haven’t actually reached godly ascension, but claim to have done so in the hopes of gaining access to better resources. Therefore, the council of chief elders has issued orders that more chief elders supervise the inspection process. We have to eliminate this problem of cheating. Understand?”

“So that’s how it is. In that case, I suppose there’s nothing more I can say.”

“Good. Then we’ll begin now.” The eight Consummate God chief elders exchanged glances, then waved their fingers out, causing brilliant light to shoot into Yang Qi’s sea of energy and the godhood therein.

In reaction, his godhood began to rotate rapidly.

Yang Qi immediately felt pain in his godhood. And from the vicious grins on the faces of the five chief elders, it was obvious they were jointly using some powerful technique to try forcing his godhood down to a lower level.

It was a very vicious move, and it begged the question of who was behind it.

If he were an ordinary Consummate God, he would have been powerless to fight back. The five chief elders working together could have wrested away the power of his godhood, and forced him back down to the peak Greater God level. It would have been a grievous injury, and worse, he would then have been accused of a crime in the sect. It would most likely have resulted in him being imprisoned, which would force Jadefall to make major concessions to get him out.

There was no way that a plot such as this could be less than sinister.

All of a sudden, Yang Qi’s face fell and he said, “You—”

SPLAT!

Blood spewed out of his mouth, and his aura suddenly declined, dropping from the Consummate God level to the peak Greater God level.

Staggering backward, he pointed an accusing finger at the eight chief elders and said, “You actually forced my level down! You villains!”

One of the chief elders shot to his feet. “How dare you, Yang Qi! We discovered your ruse and destroyed the treasure that made it seem like you were a Consummate God. The truth is that you’re only a Greater God! As it turns out, the Sage Monarch Society really is full of cheaters and con artists who egotistically take advantage of the rules of the sect! And now we have our proof. Next, we’ll do a full inspection of the Sage Monarch Society and see how many of your members have lied to the sect.”

RUMBLE!

“That’s exactly right!” said another chief elder. “The Sage Monarch Society is wicked to the core, and has lied directly to our faces. This Yang Qi brazenly pretended to be a Consummate God in the hopes of gaining the title of child of primeval chaos. How villainous! Take him into custody, and call a meeting to interrogate all the key members of the Sage Monarch Society!”

The other chief elders were all smiling as they looked on, confident that their villainous plan had succeeded.

They had removed Yang Qi as a threat, and would now be able to threaten Jadefall. They could accuse all of the key members of the Sage Monarch Society of being frauds, which would be such a heavy blow that the society would definitely fall apart.

After all, with the key members arrested, how could anyone trust that Jadefall could deal with the junior houselord?

It was no wonder they had kept Yang Qi waiting for several hours outside.

That was when they had come up with their evil plan.

Seeing that Yang Qi wasn’t saying a word, not even refuting their accusations, the chief elders were sure that they had succeeded. “Guards, arrest Yang Qi and throw him into Heaven Penitentiary. Summon the other chief elders to a meeting. We're going to finally get to the bottom of the Sage Monarch Society’s lies!”

They had their ‘irrefutable’ evidence.

Chapter 1293: Irrefutable Evidence

Unless something unexpected happened, it seemed the evidence really was going to be ‘irrefutable’.

But Yang Qi had only pretended to be injured and weakened, in the hopes of finding out what exactly was going on. And now he knew. It seemed most likely it was a plot hatched by the junior houselord, or at the very least, one of his advisers.

The three chief elders of the Hall of Promotions were obviously on the junior houselord’s payroll, which came as no surprise.

The Sage Monarch Society didn’t have any Perfect God chief elders working for them, but they had only been around for a few years. How could they? But the junior houselord had access to unmatchable resources. He had been around for thousands of years, and had most of the chief elders under his thumb. If he wanted to hatch a plot to harm someone, it wouldn’t be hard for him at all.

“Yessir!”

Dozens of elder kings fanned out to surround Yang Qi, all of them either mid, late, or peak Consummate Gods. Considering their numbers, they wouldn’t have been afraid of Yang Qi even if he was a Consummate God, much less after he had been weakened by five chief elders.

They would arrest him and force him to make a confession, which would then seal the case. At that point, even if Jadefall made a big scene, it wouldn’t do any good.

Jadefall had the purrling, so no one could do anything to her directly. But that didn’t mean they couldn’t target her advisers and subordinates. As long as the accusations were made within the law, Jadefall couldn’t do a thing.

That was how sect infighting worked: by doing things one step at a time, deadly and shocking acts could be accomplished.

“Don’t struggle, boy,” said one of the elder kings. “I can’t believe you pretended to be a Consummate God to try getting appointed as a child of primeval chaos. We knew all along you were faking. You've only been in the sect a few years, and you joined as a Quasi-God. Normally speaking, it takes hundreds of years to become a Greater God, much less a Consummate God. And now you’ve given us the evidence to prove your guilt.”

Metal chains and manacles appeared in the hands of the elder kings as they closed in.

However, before they could touch him...

RUMBLE!

A huge bubble appeared, sending them flying away to slam into the walls of the audience hall, their faces ashen and blood spraying out of their mouths. Furthermore, cracking sounds could be heard as their godhood was damaged, and their cultivation levels regressed.

The Perfect God chief elders looked around in shock, unsure of what was happening. Then, to their shock, a tremor passed through Yang Qi as his godhood healed itself. Yet again, the aura of a Consummate God appeared, and it weighed down heavily on everyone present.

Shaking out his arms and shoulders to loosen up, he smiled and said, “You people really are villains. I'm not sure who came up with this wicked scheme, but a sect like this shouldn’t tolerate such behavior. You tried to cripple my cultivation base, then slandered me. It’s really not fitting for an organization like this. I bet you could never have guessed that your plan to cripple me would completely fail.”

The elder kings who had just been about to arrest him had been so badly hurt that all of them, regardless of whether they were early, mid, late, or peak Consummate Gods, had now fallen to the level of Greater Gods.

They were now essentially crippled, and would find it almost impossible to once again become Consummate Gods. Yang Qi had just ruthlessly hamstrung over a dozen elder kings, which was quite a brazen display.

“Are you okay?” one of the chief elders said, an early Consummate God. Reaching out to one of the elder kings, he sent some godpower into him. When he found that the man’s godpower was shattered, his expression flickered dramatically.

“Y-you... you crippled them?” Glaring murderously at Yang Qi, he said, “What exactly is going on here? We didn't reduce your godhood?”

“No. Are you kidding me? My godhood can’t be crippled that easily.” Yang Qi threw his head back and laughed. “Did you really think your energy arts were that impressive? You were pretty proud of leading these Consummate God elder kings, weren’t you? Sadly, I crippled them. Wait, just kidding. You see, they weren’t really Consummate Gods. They were just pretending to be. Sadly, there’s a lot of corruption in the Hall of Promotions, and obviously, the place needs to be thoroughly investigated. In fact, I think all of the chief elders should just resign and hand their positions over to people from the Sage Monarch Society.”

The arrogant, domineering, imperious, and unforgiving Yang Qi was back.

He was once again acting the way he had back in the impure lands.

After coming to the god world, he had acted carefully and with caution. But now he could finally throw caution to the wind. Thus, he was crushing his opponent and showing that no one in the House of God Ordainment could possibly stand up to him.

“What outrageous gall!” one of the Perfect God chief elders snapped. Looking Yang Qi up and down, he said, “You’ve got some guts to say things like that out loud. How dare you cause such a scene in the Hall of Promotions!”

“What. You chief elders actually set a trap to harm me, forcibly lowering my cultivation level, and when I fought back, exposing you for violating the rules of the sect, you say I’m the one with outrageous gall?” Yang Qi chuckled coldly.

“Shut your mouth!” spat one of the chief elders, a man named Ding Lian’gen. Glaring at Yang Qi, he said, “You might be strong, but it's only because of some magical treasure you got from the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty. And everything you just said about the Hall of Promotions is a lie.”

“That’s right. And I, Ding Lian’gen, can prove it. We just performed an open and above-board inspection on you. What you just said about us forcibly reducing your cultivation is complete balderdash. As all of us can see, although you indeed are a Consummate God, it’s obvious that you're using an energy art from the dao of devils. You’ve been possessed, and driven mad as a result. You even injured these elder kings here, which is a high crime!”

“Yang Qi, what proof do you have that we were plotting against you? You were a Consummate God before, and you still are. We didn’t force your cultivation level down. It seems to me you’ve been possessed and are acting completely crazy. We have every right to arrest you and throw you into the deepest dungeons we have in the House of God Ordainment. Later, we’ll execute you and wipe out your soul so thoroughly that you’ll never be reborn.”

“How could I, Deity Megamountain, possibly allow a rebellious disciple like you to go crazy in the House of God Ordainment? You and everyone else from the Sage Monarch Society, are complete degenerates! And those from the dao of devils will be expunged!” The man thrust his palm out, using a consummate technique of his known as the Megamountain Suspension. As a result, an enormous mountain appeared in the air up above, which would fall to crush everyone beneath it.

POP!

Yang Qi thrust his own palm out to meet the Megamountain Suspension, and wasn’t shaken in the least. However, the Perfect God known as Deity Megamountain was sent flying backward, where he slammed into the wall and coughed up blood as his godhood shattered.

He was an early Perfect God expert, a chief elder who had achieved his breakthrough a few hundred years ago. He had a violent temper, yet wasn’t a match at all for Yang Qi. After all, other than someone with Unbounded will, there wasn’t anyone who could cause problems for Yang Qi.

Crack. Crunch....

The residual godpower from Deity Megamountain’s move was causing further explosions inside of him, damaging his godhood so badly that his aura faded down to that of the peak Consummate God level.

Letting loose a shrill scream, he said, “My energy arts! My godhood cracked! This is impossible! It took such effort to reach the Perfect God level! I even used a Thousand-Mountains Myriad-Rivers Pill to get to this point. Now that I’ve fallen, how could I do the same thing again?”

“You’ve reaped what you’ve sown,” Yang Qi said coolly. “If you hadn’t set out to cripple my godhood, I wouldn’t have been so ruthless.”

“Do you have a death wish or something?! Kill him!”

The seven remaining chief elders couldn’t hold back any longer, and attacked in unison, causing streams of energy to shoot forth like dragons and tigers. They obviously couldn’t let Yang Qi leave this situation alive.

Of course, Yang Qi had never even considered running. With his monarch godhood and the strength of a Consummate God, he thrust his palm out, unleashing seven different attacks from the Hand of the One God.

Seven popping sounds rang out as Yang Qi met the attacks of all seven experts. Yet nothing happened to him. In the blink of an eye, his godhood rotated trillions of times over, releasing unmatchably domineering godpower.

All seven chief elders staggered backward in utter defeat.

If Yang Qi pressed the attack, he could kill them all where they stood. But he wasn’t prepared to go that far. He didn’t mind crippling some godhood, but he didn’t want to go so far as to slaughter people in the sect.

“How could he be so strong?” one of the chief elders muttered. As each of them examined their own godhood, they realized that the one palm strike had completely drained them of godpower. Little did they know that Yang Qi had used some of King Heaven-Devourer's divine abilities to drain them dry, making them so weak they could hardly lift a finger.

“How could I be so strong?” Yang Qi laughed. “If I weren’t supremely powerful, how could I have ever dared to come to the Hall of Promotions?” He was now more glad than ever that he had made the decision to steal those medicinal pills and rise to the Consummate God level. As a Greater God, he never would have come out of this situation on top.

Chapter 1294: Head Held High

Yang Qi was finally able to speak his mind after years of keeping his head low in the House of God Ordainment. Before, he had always held back, but now he was violating the greatest of taboos as he directly shook all seven of these chief elders, each of them a Perfect God. Not even the houselord could have easily done something like this.

Each of the chief elders could sense the boundless power flowing through him, and knew it was something they couldn’t possibly stand up to.

All they could do was writhe weakly as his energy smashed into them, his godhood exerting such immense pressure that they were nearly crushed where they stood.

“How could you be so powerful? Who are you?” The seven chief elders didn’t want to believe what was happening, but they had no choice.

“Hmph! Who am I? I work for the crown prince!” Yang Qi had decided to quit while he was ahead. If he revealed his monarch godhood, it would draw the attention of Paramount Gods, and that would likely end with him suffering a miserable fate.

In response, the seven chief elders stared at Yang Qi.

“You work for the crown prince? The crown prince of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty?”

“Not even someone personally groomed by the crown prince should have a cultivation base like yours.”

“There’s nothing special about me,” Yang Qi replied. “It’s just that you fools don’t understand how incredible the crown prince is. The only reason I'm as strong as I am is because of him. He knew you were plotting against me, so he used an ensconcement magic to fill me with enough power to devastate you with a single move. Now do you understand?”

The chief elders were at a loss for words. The explanation Yang Qi was providing did make sense in some ways.

“As you likely know,” Yang Qi continued, “three years ago I spent some time working on my cultivation in the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty, which was when Grand Eunuch Nie Yinyang personally boosted my energy arts. Then I had an audience with the crown prince, who gave me further blessings. So did you really think I wouldn’t achieve any breakthroughs in the three years after that? I’d originally considered slaughtering everyone here today, but considering we’re from the same sect, I think I’ll let you off the hook. By the way, did you think I was ignorant of the fact that the junior houselord is in league with the third prince? And do you really think the third prince is strong enough to deal with the crown prince? If so, you’re sadly mistaken. He’s just going to end up arrested and executed. And you’ll get dragged down with him, unless you side with me. Why not let bygones be bygones, and join the Crown Prince Society? The ship that is the House of God Ordainment is going to sink sooner or later, and if you stick with the third prince, you’ll go down with it. But if you side with the crown prince... then you can sail off into the sunset and eventually become Paramount Gods.”

Yang Qi’s cultivation base had finally reached the point of being able to control Perfect Gods, so he was using his words to slip devil embryos into their seas of consciousness.

These chief elders had originally hoped to pool their strength and kill Yang Qi, but things had quickly spiraled out of control. Upon hearing that he worked for the crown prince, their sails deflated as they understood the larger picture. The junior houselord had sided with the third prince, but unfortunately, the third prince couldn’t compare to the crown prince.

And apparently, the crown prince favored Yang Qi so much that he had ensconced some of his nascent divinity within him. That seemed to be the only explanation for how a mere Consummate God like Yang Qi could unleash such devastating force.

In fact, if he hadn't put on such a display of force, they wouldn’t have believed that he was actually working with the crown prince. Now, however, they had no choice but to believe.

“I’ll join the crown prince!” said the chief elder whose godhood Yang Qi had crippled. “I know that His Majesty the crown prince has amazing abilities, and I can only hope that he might heal my godhood, returning me to the Perfect God level.”

Yang Qi nodded. “Excellent. You may join the Crown Prince Society. Considering your status, you’ll be rewarded handsomely for joining. Just remember that I'm in charge of all members of the Crown Prince Society in the House of God Ordainment, which means you have to follow my orders. For instance, word of today's events mustn’t leak. Everyone who was injured needs to go into temporary seclusion.”

“Right, of course.” In their eyes, Yang Qi had essentially been possessed by the crown prince, to the point where they weren’t even sure who they were actually talking to. So they simply nodded in acquiescence and agreed to join the Crown Prince Society.

In order to solidify their terror of him, Yang Qi laughed heartily as he unleashed a wave of psychic power, filling the area and making them feel like they were being sucked into a vortex. Then, they found themselves in an illusory region from which they couldn’t escape.

“What do you think of my psychic power?” Yang Qi said.

“This level of psychic power and will is nothing short of horrifying!” As of this moment, they were convinced that they were actually communicating directly with the crown prince. Who but that almighty figure could unleash psychic power like this?

“I’ll join the Crown Prince Society!”

“Me too! I can only hope you’ll put in a good word for me!”

“Very good,” Yang Qi said, laughing. “In that case, I'm now a child of primeval chaos. Please make a note in the records, and bring out my new uniform and identity medallion. Oh wait. You’re still in a state of shock from the crown prince’s abilities. I’ll just handle it myself.”

He made a beckoning motion, and a jade medallion and a set of clothing flew over to him. As he did, he felt completely connected to everything around him, as though his destiny had fused with the god kingdom around him.

‘So, that’s how it is,’ he thought, nodding. The children of primeval chaos were top leaders in the House of God Ordainment, and being given that title gave them a connection to the god kingdom’s essence, and also immense authority and power.

“This matter is now concluded,” Yang Qi said in a cold voice. “Again, don’t breathe a word of this to anyone. I’ll wipe the memories of the elder kings. The rest of you, go into seclusion and claim that you’ve experienced cultivation deviation.” With that, he turned and left.

After he was gone, the chief elders sagged in defeat, and many of them pulled out medicinal pills that they used to heal themselves.

Then they glanced around at each other awkwardly.

“We suffered a huge defeat here. Who could have guessed that the crown prince had infused Yang Qi with his nascent divinity? He even took the elder kings away.”

“How are we supposed to explain this to the junior houselord? He's still waiting for a report about how things turned out.”

“We don’t say anything. Let’s just say something unexpected happened, and then go into secluded cultivation. Then, we wait to see how all of this plays out. And we definitely can’t leak the news, otherwise the crown prince will make sure things go badly for us. We won’t survive if he comes after us with deadly intent.”

The chief elders all went into seclusion, as if nothing had ever happened. The elder kings had their memories wiped by Yang Qi, then went into seclusion where they experienced ‘cultivation deviation’ and godhood decline. It would be years before they emerged, possibly even a decade.

As for the chief elders, Yang Qi was already devising a way to get them into Dream Daylily’s presence to officially join the Crown Prince Society. He was curious to see what kind of reward he would get for the service provided.

Considering they were Perfect Gods, it would make sense for the reward to be something at least as impressive as a Paramount god pill.

And Yang Qi had a feeling that the crown prince would probably want to meet him in person.

That would be a tricky situation to handle. For all he knew, the crown prince might be able to perceive some of his secrets. If he didn’t manage to achieve another breakthrough, there was no way he could deal with an Unbounded expert.

‘Where are the rest of the pieces of the Mahātmā Jade?’ he thought, frowning. His surest bet right now was to reach the Unbounded level.

Perhaps the best thing to do would be to set up another spell formation to try to hone in on the locations of the other pieces.

‘Right, my energy arts have advanced again. I could probably head into the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty’s treasure storehouse again. If I complete the Flower of Time and insert it into my godhood, I’ll definitely get a lot stronger. Maybe I could even use that to push my will convergence to Unbounded.”

By adding the Flower of Time to his godhood, it would create a closer connection between his godhood and his psychic power, as well as give him a better understanding of time. He would even be able to grasp at understanding the end of time.

At a certain point, Jadefall showed up. “Are you finally a Consummate God, Yang Qi? And a child of primeval chaos? The people from the Hall of Promotions didn’t cause any problems for you, did they?”

“They tried to cause problems, but I subjugated them all. In the past three years, I've gotten a lot stronger. Other than the House of God Ordainment’s secret reserve power, nobody here can stand up to me.” As Yang Qi looked at Jadefall, and the purrling in her arms, he suddenly realized why the purrling didn’t seem to have any godpower.

Its godpower had already been annulled, which meant it didn’t need godhood or godpower.

In the Annulled level, everything became nothing.

When Yang Qi reached that level, his monarch godhood would be cultivated into nothing. It was like truly returning home to one’s original state. Yang Qi thirsted to reach that level.

Purr, purr.... The purrling mewled, as if to praise Yang Qi for his advancement in psychic power. It was as though it knew he would soon reach the Unbounded level, which was a truly major accomplishment in the god world.

Normal. Stupendous. Destabilizing. Terrifying. Paramount. Unbounded. Annulled.

Those were the seven major levels that described one’s psyche and essence. Throughout all history, though, no one had ever reached the Annulled level. It was the highest level, and the fact that Yang Qi was heading in that direction meant he had earned the purrling’s praise and admiration.

**

“What?!” the junior houselord shouted in rage. “Yang Qi became a child of primeval chaos?! What about our plan? It was flawless! What were the chief elders thinking?!”

Chapter 1295: Nacrelight Sageland

The junior houselord was fuming with intense rage. He had created what he thought was a seamless plan that would manipulate the rules of the House of God Ordainment to strike a mortal blow on the Sage Monarch Society. But now, the chief elders had all gone into seclusion and were ignoring him. Even the most foolish dolt in the world would realize that something had gone awry.

The junior houselord knew exactly what was going on. Yang Qi had been appointed a child of primeval chaos, which meant the junior houselord now had another major antagonist to deal with. If the junior houselord wanted to seize power, he would have to destroy the Sage Monarch Society or die trying.

The chief elders that were still in the presence of the junior houselord quickly tried to offer explanations. “We're going to look into the situation, Junior Houselord. I refuse to believe that there aren’t any clues. Unfortunately, now that Yang Qi is a child of primeval chaos, he has the same status as you. That means not even elders from the Law-Enforcement God-Palace can punish him. It’s going to be very difficult to do anything to him. It was bad enough that we had Jadefall to deal with, but now Yang Qi is a factor. I'm afraid you’re in real danger.”

“Either the fish dies, or the net splits. If I have to, I’ll take them down with me into death. If only they would leave the sect on a mission or something. Then I could have some Perfect Gods from the dao of devils ambush them. The third prince has connections with the League of the Devil-Dao and the League of Wretch-Gods, and is planning to use them against the crown prince.”

“The League of the Devil-Dao and the League of Wretch-Gods?” one of the chief elders said. “The wretch-gods and devil-gods are ruthless, vicious, and greedy. Working with them is asking a tiger for its skin.”

“That doesn’t have anything to do with us,” the junior houselord replied. “As long as some of their experts can help us get rid of the Sage Monarch Society, it’ll be worth it. Right now, I need to pay whatever price is necessary to break through to the Unbounded level. I'm a peak Perfect God right now, just on the verge of Unbounded will convergence. If I break through, I’ll be on the same level as the crown prince. In fact, then the third prince would have to take orders from me, instead of me having to bow and scrape like I do now.”

“That’s right. The House of God Ordainment has never had an Unbounded expert. If you could reach that level, you’d be the first throughout all history. And then you could absolutely crush the Sage Monarch Society.”

“Unfortunately, I don’t have enough medicinal pills or magical treasures for that, and I'm not sure where to get them. Although, I heard that the Nacrelight Sageland has one of the top ten godflowers of all time, the heaven-fate godflower. If I could get it, I’d surely be able to reach the Unbounded level.”

“You absolutely, positively must not think along those lines, Junior Houselord,” another chief elder said. “The Nacrelight Sageland is a big enemy of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty, and we’re an ally of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty. As soon as they realized who you are, they’ll kill you.”

“I’ll be fine,” the junior houselord said, laughing. “I already have contacts in the Nacrelight Sageland. The Eternal-Life God-Dynasty wants to control us, but we can play both sides against each other. You see, the Nacrelight Sageland wants to take advantage of us too. We’ve actually been communicating with them for some time now, and as long as we can harm the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty, they’ll reward us. Right now, Jadefall is the adopted daughter of the supreme concubine, and the Sage Monarch Society in general is being supported by the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty. So we simply use the third prince to take down the Sage Monarch Society, then hand them over to the Nacrelight Sageland for the bounty. After that, well....”

“You’re a real genius, Junior Houselord!”

Multiple chief elders made similar expressions of praise.

“I’ll go talk to my contact in the Nacrelight Sageland,” the junior houselord said, and then he faded from sight.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi had called a meeting of his people in one of the halls of the Sage Monarch Society’s headquarters. The Sage Monarch Society had grown much larger and more powerful over the past three years. Their headquarters rose up in the middle of the House of God Ordainment’s god kingdom, and above the main gate was a sign that shone with golden light: Sage Monarch God Temple.

While Yang Qi had been spending time reaching the Consummate God level and achieving half-Unbounded will convergence, his people weren’t sitting around wasting time. They were all mid or late Greater Gods, and it seemed a given that they would break through to the Consummate God level within five or ten years.

Ascendants were different from ordinary people, and that was especially true of Yang Qi’s friends and family, who had been remolded with the God Legion Seal. That made it possible for them to achieve even faster cultivation speeds than should have been possible. Furthermore, Yang Immortal-Slayer had brought gifts with him on his return visit, things that had provided even more cultivation benefits.

Looking around at them, Yang Qi nodded in approval. Unfortunately, they still had a lot of room for improvement if they wanted to stand up to Proud Heaven in the future.

According to King Immortal-Slayer, major unrest would soon visit the god world, and Yang Qi was firmly convinced that he was right. It would likely be similar to what happened years ago with the Sovereign Lord. And if the river of time reached its end and was destroyed, the god world would end and the legion of gods would perish. It would truly be doomsday.

Right now, he had no idea what he would do if that happened.

“Yang Qi, did you really defeat eight chief elders when you went to the Hall of Promotions?” asked the Shepherd. “It seems we finally have a truly powerful expert in the Sage Monarch Society.”

“No, not yet. Only those with Unbounded will convergence are true experts. That’s why I’m planning to try to find the other pieces of the Mahātmā Jade. Friends, I need your help.”

“What do you need us to do?” Jadefall asked. “As long as you can find those other pieces of the Mahātmā Jade, you’ll definitely reach Unbounded will convergence. And then we won’t have to fear anyone.”

“Locating its general position will be simple. I’ve already given you my Sage Monarch Grand Magic, which is divided into ten sections: Sage, Monarch, Ruler, Emperor, Sovereign, Lord, Hero, Hegemon, God, and Nothing. They encapsulate everything there is to be. Imperial-heaven pre-beginning powers, heavenly workings calculations, the Unspoiled Body, the power of godmammoths, the purrling, the Great Necropolis. They’ve all been combined into a dao of my very own. And all of you have a dao within it. Jadefall, you command the dao of the lord. Brahma, the dao of the sage. Shepherd, the dao of the hegemon. Proud World, the dao of the hero. Doom, the dao of the god. Eldest Brother, the dao of the monarch. Sword Seventeen, the dao of the sovereign. Patriarch Annalist, the dao of the emperor. Sectlord Will Manifestation, the dao of the ruler. Everyone else will be the dharmic guards who prevent anyone from entering the spell formation I’m about to create.”

“Alright!”

Everyone sat down and got into position. Then Yang Qi loosed his psychic power, filling the area and causing a god kingdom to slowly form.

As the group drew on the Sage Monarch Grand Magic, nine shadowy images appeared behind Yang Qi. During the past three years in which he had fused his energy arts to an even higher level, his Sage Monarch Grand Magic had reached an incredible state. Furthermore, he had been drawing on the nation-fate of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty, enabling him to create bodies related to the sovereign and the emperor.

There were actually ten aspects to the art, but the central-most one, Nothing, was not yet ready.

Therefore, the nine projections entered the bodies of his nine brethren, who shivered as their thoughts all merged together.

In the blink of an eye, ten days and ten nights passed.

The sky filled with dazzling colors as a huge spell formation took shape, with the God Legion Seal in the middle, and the Mahātmā Jade present as well. A huge river of psychic power was constantly flowing.

Eventually, an image appeared, seemingly without any order to it, a boundless cycle of flashing light. The group poured their psychic power into it, until images from the god world eventually appeared within it. No one knew how large the god world was, or exactly how many experts lurked within it. Not even Paramount Gods who could pierce through space were able to completely map the god world, and Yang Qi was no exception.

The image resolved into a landmass of extraordinary beauty, filled with flowers, streams, and mountains. Rain fell, and beautiful women danced about. There was no fighting or killing; everything was happy and blessed. In fact, there weren't even any men in this land.

There were ancient cities in the middle of it, perfectly built, with streams flowing through them. And in the middle of the countless cities bloomed an enormous lotus.

It wasn’t a real flower, but rather a god kingdom, floating in the middle of a lake so green it looked like it was made from liquefied jade.

“The Nacrelight Sageland?” Everyone immediately realized what they were looking at. It was the colossal organization of women known as the Nacrelight Sageland, the biggest enemy of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty.

Within its depths, psychic power seethed as Yang Qi caught sight of a piece of jade floating in the air.

At that point, the image slowly faded away. He had located another piece of the Mahātmā Jade. Unexpectedly, it was in the Nacrelight Sageland.

“Right,” Jadefall said. “During the past three years, I became privy to a lot more secret information, including details from the supreme concubine. Now it all makes sense. The Eternal-Life God-Dynasty and the Nacrelight Sageland have long since been fighting over a treasure trove from the dao of devils. Supposedly, it was left behind by the ancient halls of heaven. They fought fiercely over it until finally splitting it, each one of them taking half. It must have been a piece of the Mahātmā Jade!”

“In that case, there’s no question about what to do next,” Yang Qi said. “The Nacrelight Sageland has a piece of the Mahātmā Jade, although finding it and getting it is going to be very, very difficult. I need to slip in there, find it, and put my mark on it. Then I can summon it to me from a distance later. Unfortunately, getting into the Nacrelight Sageland is going to be a lot harder than infiltrating the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty. After all, the mountains in the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty are remnants of the ancient halls of heaven, so my God Legion Seal is particularly effective against them, and made it impossible for anyone to detect me. If I’d been caught by a Paramount God, I would’ve been killed.”

“So what do we do?” Jadefall asked. “Should I go? After all, the Nacrelight Sageland is made up only of women. Any men who go there get enslaved.”

“No, you can’t go. You’re the adopted daughter of the supreme concubine, and they surely know that. If they catch you, they’ll kill you. I actually have a foolproof plan.”

Chapter 1296: What Reward?

Now that Yang Qi knew there was another piece of the Mahātmā Jade in the Nacrelight Sageland, he at least had a target and goal. No longer was he attempting to fish a needle from the sea. Unfortunately, it wouldn’t be easy to get into the Nacrelight Sageland. He wouldn’t be able to use the God Legion Seal without fear of being discovered, which meant he needed to come up with a good plan before moving forward. Thankfully, he had plenty of time to work with; if there was one thing people who practiced cultivation didn’t need to worry about very often, it was time.

And one thing was certain: he would be going alone.

“How about I send the purrling with you?” Jadefall said. “In that case, you’d at least have some insurance to make sure things don’t go horribly wrong.”

The purrling immediately let out two purring sounds which indicated, “There’s no way I'm bothering myself with this. Cultivation inherently comes with a lot of problems, and you need to figure them out on your own. Don’t bother me with your petty melodrama.”

Yang Qi understood, and nodded. “The Mahātmā Jade is my challenge, and I’ll handle it on my own. I actually know someone from there, a young woman named Summer Tearfall. I got the sense she's someone important, so perhaps I can take advantage of my relationship with her to get into the Nacrelight Sageland.”

“When do you plan on leaving?” Jadefall asked. “Our position in the House of God Ordainment is extremely stable right now, so you don’t need to worry about things here. We just need to wait until the tricentennial election, then either you or I will take over as the houselord, and control the destiny of the entire sect. At that point, the old houselord and his son will have to follow whatever orders we give.”

He shook his head. “I’m afraid we can't wait for the tricentennial election. The destiny of the sect has experienced a sharp drop recently, and I fear it’ll actually be destroyed before the election arrives. Why don’t we just take whatever destiny we need, by force? I think there should be enough to get most of our people to the Consummate God level, and a few of us might even become Perfect Gods. At that point, we can just move on to the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty, and drain them dry as well. The destiny of the dynasty should be enough to make me a Paramount God.”

The Shepherd burst out laughing. “You make us sound like deadly parasites that just move from one fat target to the next.”

“That’s exactly what we are,” Proud World said. “We’re locusts who plunder everything in our path. It’s just the law of survival. It seems to me that the boundless Sovereign Lord of years past actually wanted to use his Sagely Sacrifice on the entire god world, but ultimately failed.”

“If the destiny of the House of God Ordainment is a candle,” Doom said, “then the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty’s is a volcano. Let’s take care of the House of God Ordainment before we worry about anything else. The Shepherd and I recently mastered a consummate art from the dao of devils. If we use it to sacrifice the entire House of God Ordainment and assimilate the quintessence vitality and souls of the Perfect God chief elders, we would definitely become invincible.”

“There’s no need for that,” Yang Qi said. “In the heaven above, there’s virtue in sparing life. We aren’t going to be the kind of people who go around slaughtering everyone. Anyone who tries to kill us will pay the price, but those who back down will be given a chance to survive. For instance, the junior houselord is definitely going to die, otherwise he’ll just become a huge disaster. He’s trying hard to reach the Unbounded level, and if he succeeds....”

“It's not as if the Unbounded level is easy to reach,” Jadefall said, shaking her head. “So what’s our next move? Perhaps you should continue taking advantage of your connections in the Crown Prince Society.”

Yang Qi smiled. “Soon enough, I'm going to take those three chief elders from the Hall of Promotions to see Dream Daylily. They're Perfect Gods, so if they join, I should be able to get a big reward from the crown prince.”

With that, Yang Qi and his people continued working on the Sage Monarch Grand Magic, provoking numerous transformations within them. As for Yang Qi, he was making progress on the path of “Nothing”.

Unfortunately, he wasn't even close to grasping at the Annulled level.

As for his friends and family, they were all making great progress and were either heading into the mid, late, or peak of the Paramount level.

Ever since he had acquired a second piece of the Mahātmā Jade, Yang Qi’s energy arts and cultivation had skyrocketed, and he was able to add deeper levels of enlightenment into the Sage Monarch Grand Magic.

Months passed as they worked on their cultivation. The entire time, Yang Qi didn’t make any public appearances.

At a certain point, three figures appeared at his side, wearing wide, conical hats that obscured their facial features. No one would be able to tell, but these were the three chief elders from the Hall of Promotions, the Perfect Gods Ding Lian’gen, Ding Lian’gong, and Ding Lian’xun.

They were brothers.

In fact, they were triplets who had worked very hard, climbing their way through the ranks until they were chief elders. However, Yang Qi had wiped the floor with them and infected them with his devil embryos, which meant they had to follow his orders.

“In a moment, I'm going to take you to see someone important from the Crown Prince Society, a woman named Dream Daylily. Despite her status, she doesn’t have the right to make decisions about people as important as you. She’ll definitely send word up the ranks, and they’ll send someone more important to talk with you. I want you to say that I glibly convinced you to join the Crown Prince Society. Don’t tell the truth about things, obviously. After you join the Crown Prince Society, you still need to take orders from me, got it? The infighting in the Crown Prince Society is intense, and without someone to rely on, you’ll quickly get in trouble. But I can make sure you're safe, and benefit from the position.”

“We understand,” the three brothers replied in unison. Of course, if Yang Qi got them into the Crown Prince Society, it would solidify his own power, and enable him to start building his own faction within the society. It was nothing out of the ordinary.

After all, even the factions in the House of God Ordainment had smaller groups within them.

A moment later, Yang Qi was secretly leading them into the restaurant run by the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty to see Dream Daylily. As soon as Dream Daylily caught sight of Yang Qi, her eyes flashed with anger. “So, you’re finally coming to see me, Yang Qi? It’s been over three years! Almost four! What have you been doing this whole time? Working on cultivation? You haven’t accomplished a single thing! The leaders of the Crown Prince Society are very angry, and if I hadn’t worked hard to smooth things over, they might have decided to just eliminate you. If you don’t accomplish something noteworthy, you’re going to end up punished.”

“What was I doing for the past three years?” Yang Qi asked. “I was working hard on my cultivation. Now I'm a Consummate God, and also a child of primeval chaos. And I have plenty of plans for how to further the interests of the crown prince. I suggest you tell the leaders to have a bit more patience. Furthermore, I've brought these three top experts here to join the Crown Prince Society.”

Only then did Dream Daylily look over at the three figures, who removed their hats to reveal their faces. When Dream Daylily saw who they were, her eyes widened. “Are those the three chief elders from the Hall of Promotions? Ding Lian’gen, Ding Lian’gong, and Ding Lian’xun? All Perfect Gods? How could people like that agree to join the Crown Prince Society?”

The three chief elders went on to do exactly as Yang Qi had ordered.

“Yang Qi offered some very persuasive arguments,” said Ding Lian’gen. “We used to support the junior houselord, who is of course backed by the third prince. But Yang Qi revealed the truth to us, and showed how unreliable the third prince is. We realized that if we didn’t make a change, we wouldn’t have any foundation in the future. We obviously have to stick with the Crown Prince.”

“Oh?” Dream Daylily’s look of shock only continued to grow. “You three are very important people. I don’t have the authority to recruit you. Please wait a moment while I get in touch with one of my superiors. As for you, Yang Qi, if you really convinced three chief elders to join the Crown Prince Society, you’ve provided a huge service. In fact, I'm not even sure how you’ll be rewarded.”

With that, Dream Daylily burned several different paper talismans to send messages to her superiors.

A few hours passed, then an immense energy weighed down and three figures pierced through space, landing right in front of them.

Yang Qi recognized two of them. One was Grand Eunuch Nie Yinyang, who was a peak Perfect God, and the other was God-King Ruthless. The third wore a long, golden robe, and held a fan in one hand. He was obviously a very important person, and had an extremely impressive cultivation base. It was very telling that both God-King Ruthless and Nie Yinyang stood slightly behind him on either side.

Yang Qi could immediately tell that this was some lower-ranked prince that worked for the crown prince.

There were thousands of princes in the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty, but only a few dozen of them could be considered truly powerful. So it was only natural that some of them would join up with someone like the crown prince.

“Yang Qi, this is the eighteenth prince,” God-King Ruthless barked, “quickly get on your knees and kowtow in salute.”

Yang Qi hurried to comply, but the eighteenth prince waved his hand dismissively and said, “There’s no need for that mumbo-jumbo. Let’s just get down to business. Do you three chief elders really want to join the Crown Prince Society? You need to think this through carefully. Once you join the Crown Prince Society, you can’t leave it without being severely punished. Furthermore, the crown prince will insert a warding spell into you, which he can use to kill you if you betray him. Of course, there’s plenty of benefits. The third prince is a ruthless and ambitious figure who wants to control the entire House of God Ordainment and gain access to their reserve power, all in the hopes of crushing the crown prince. We have to make sure he fails.”

“We want to join!” the three brothers said in unison.

Then Ding Lian’gen said, “Yang Qi has explained that the crown prince treats the virtuous men courteously and the scholars with respect, and is a gentleman who will die for his friends. So it’s only natural that we would want to serve him. If a measly person like Yang Qi could receive such excellent treatment, then surely we Perfect Gods will be treated even better.”

“Excellent!” the eighteenth prince said in delight. “Then the time has come to swear your oaths. This is a talisman provided by the crown prince, which I will use to officiate the ceremony. Unfortunately, the crown prince is off fighting some Paramount Gods, and won’t be back for another three years. In any case, considering your outstanding backgrounds, you’ll definitely rank as counts in the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty, at the minimum.”

“Let’s begin!”

The three chief elders bowed their heads as the crown prince’s warding spell entered them, taking away their freedom and ensuring that they never betrayed the crown prince.

“You’ve done shockingly well, Yang Qi,” the eighteenth prince said. “As the saying goes, he who hasn’t made a splash yet will often make the biggest splash of all. What reward are you aiming for in this? Say the word, and I’ll approve your request on the behalf of the crown prince.”

Chapter 1297: Stamens

“A reward?” Yang Qi said, his heart pounding a bit. “Eighteenth Prince, my brother Yang Immortal-Slayer, an apprentice of the Lord of the True Void, is currently at a bottleneck in his cultivation. Presumably you’ve heard about his amazing potential. Unfortunately, after forming his godhood, he’s found it incredibly difficult to achieve further breakthroughs. Recently, he came to realize that he lacks a certain medicinal ingredient that will help him push his godhood to the next level. Might it be possible to acquire that ingredient as my reward? I’ve been talking with my brother about joining the Crown Prince Society, and this could probably seal the deal. I might even be able to recruit the Lord of the True Void.”

“The Lord of the True Void?”

The eighteenth prince, Nie Yinyang, and God-King Ruthless exchanged glances. All of them knew that getting the Lord of the True Void into the Crown Prince Society would make the crown prince supremely powerful, and ensure that no amount of opposition could cause any problems.

Unfortunately, Paramount Gods were independent figures who would be hard to recruit. And using methods of force on them, such as warding spells, wouldn’t work.

The only methods that worked for people like that were courtesy and respect. After all, neither the eighteenth prince nor the crown prince were close to being a match for the Lord of the True Void in combat.

That said, Yang Immortal-Slayer was his new favored apprentice, so recruiting him would at least establish a connection. And they could possibly start by offering the Lord of the True Void a position as a guest elder.

“What medicinal ingredient? As long as we have it in stock, I’ll do my best to get it for you. Incidentally, if you can get the Lord of the True Void to join the Crown Prince Society, even as a guest elder, the crown prince will personally bless you with some energy arts. In fact, I can guarantee that he’ll take you as an adopted son and transform your blood into that of the Eternal Clan. He might even make you his successor.”

The eighteenth prince was making a very weighty promise.

The princes of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty were all surnamed Eternal. And the emperor himself was named Eternal Nightless, a name designed to impart the idea of never-ending brightness, and an eternal lack of night in the god world.

It was a truly impressive and domineering name.

“My brother, Yang Immortal-Slayer, needs a flower of time.” Yang Qi finally threw out the description of the item he wanted. A flower of time would be considered extremely precious, and he knew that asking for one would come across as arrogantly greedy to most people. To lessen the effect, he said he needed it for his brother Yang Immortal-Slayer, and wrapped it up in the promise of recruitment.

And he was even bringing the Lord of the True Void into the picture.

“A flower of time?” the eighteenth prince said, his jaw dropping. Then he looked closer at Yang Qi to see if there was something he was missing. However, Yang Qi’s expression remained the same, only displaying loyalty and selflessness.

“Eighteenth Prince,” said God-King Ruthless, “Yang Qi was subjugated by a Nation-Fate God Pill, which I personally administered. There’s no question about his loyalty. Unfortunately, we don’t have a full flower of time, only the stamen of one. What about offering that as the reward?”

“A flower of time really could be used to help one's godhood,” Nie Yinyang added. “I’ve heard rumors that this apprentice of Lord of the True Void is quite amazing. I'm not sure what kind of godhood he formed, but it must be thousands of times stronger than ordinary godhood. Supposedly, the Lord of the True Void recently attended a banquet with some other Paramount Gods, and that apprentice of his defeated all the other genius apprentices in combat. Unfortunately, God-King Ruthless is right. We don’t have a full flower in the treasure storehouse.”

The eighteenth prince thought for a moment, then said, “You’re always thinking about the Crown Prince Society, aren’t you Yang Qi? We recognize your loyalty, but unfortunately, a flower of time is nothing to take lightly. And we don’t even have a whole one, only the stamen of one. Worse, if you assimilate the stamen alone into your godhood, it will cause the godhood to lose control over the power of time, and ultimately explode.”

“Then what do you suggest?” Yang Qi said. “I hope you can provide some advice, Eighteenth Prince. My brother repeatedly made me promise to help him look for that flower. I guess not even the Lord of the True Void could find one, so I'm not sure how I’m supposed to do so.”

“How about I just give your brother the stamen? Perhaps the Lord of the True Void can think of a way to use it. It might not be a full flower of time, but it’s still an amazing reward. If something like that can’t earn the favor of the Lord of the True Void, nothing will. When your brother returns in three years, bring him here to join the Crown Prince Society. Got it?”

“I’ll make it happen,” Yang Qi replied. “There’s one other small matter I was hoping to mention, Eighteenth Prince.”

“Oh? What matter?”

“You three explain,” Yang Qi said, glancing at the three chief elders.

“It's like this,” said Ding Lian’gen. “Back when Yang Qi recruited us, there were four other chief elders present who said they’d think about the matter. Now that we're members, and have benefited so much, perhaps we can go convince the other four to join.”

The truth was that the three chief elders hadn’t been given a thing upon joining the Crown Prince Society, other than the warding spells. And their mention of “benefiting” was a reminder that they were currently empty-handed, giving them no incentive to recruit more people.

The eighteenth prince had already considered this, so he pulled three jade bottles out of his robe, each of which pulsed with mountain-crushing, sea-shattering energy flows.

They were Unbounded medicinal pills!

Yang Qi’s eyes went wide.

Although the pills couldn’t compare to the buddhist, daoist, and confucian medicinal pills he had acquired, they could still provide a big boost to him and help advance his godhood another step.

“These are three Eternal-Life Heaven-Defying God-Thought Pills, personally concocted by a Paramount God. Each one is worth as much as an entire city, and you’ll get one each as your reward. Remember, we must stop at nothing to recruit more top experts to join the Crown Prince Society. Our society is the most powerful of all, and will unify and control all other societies in the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty.”

The three chief elders took the pills from the eighteenth prince, but didn't consume them. After all, they were completely under Yang Qi’s control, thanks to the devil embryos lurking within them.

In other words, it would be sheer insanity for them to assume that they could just consume the pills.

“Go about your various tasks while I wait here,” the eighteenth prince said. “Nie Yinyang, you go pen an order in the crown prince’s name to open the treasure storehouse and retrieve the stamen of the flower of time.”

Nie Yinyang left to do as he was bid, while Yang Qi and the three chief elders headed back to the god kingdom of the House of God Ordainment, to track down the four chief elders they had just mentioned.

There were originally eight chief elders that plotted against Yang Qi, but he had struck one so hard that his godhood was destroyed, leaving him a cripple. As a result, there were only seven left from the original group of eight.

But for seven chief elders to join the Crown Prince Society was a monumental thing that would change everything. It essentially meant that the Crown Prince Society had infiltrated the highest levels of leadership of the House of God Ordainment.

The eighteenth prince was delighted, and acknowledged that Yang Qi had performed an extraordinary service. And all he had to do was give a reward that most people would consider useless. On top of it all, there was even the possibility of recruiting Yang Immortal-Slayer and the Lord of the True Void.

The fact was that the Crown Prince Society actually didn’t have a lot of Perfect Gods, so the addition of seven chief elders would drastically transform their overall strength. And that was important, considering there were still many unaffiliated princes that the Crown Prince Society wanted to bring into the fold.

It took a few days for everything to play out.

In the end, seven chief elders became members of the Crown Prince Society, and were given Eternal-Life Heaven-Defying God-Thought Pills.

The pills contained the energy of the void, and Unbounded will convergence, making them incredible beyond belief. They could remold the fleshly body and allow one to defy heaven for the purpose of gaining eternal life.

It was little surprise that the seven pills ended up with Yang Qi, along with the flower of time stamen.

After all was said and done, the eighteenth prince left with Nie Yinyang and God-King Ruthless. When they were gone, Dream Daylily said, “Congratulations, oh exalted Yang Qi. You now have as much power and authority as me. It’s just like I said, you've been advancing by leaps and bounds here in the Crown Prince Society. In the future, I hope you’ll keep me safe.”

“Of course I will, Dream Daylily,” he replied, smiling. “For now, I need to go find my brother Yang Immortal-Slayer and give him this stamen.”

As the words left his mouth, he vanished.

‘He’s progressing so quickly!’ she thought. ‘His cultivation base is already higher than mine. I wonder how I can get him fully on my side. Don’t tell me I have to seduce him.’

Meanwhile, out in the void, Yang Qi was laughing heartily. ‘I pulled it off. With devil embryos in those seven chief elders, there’s no way they’ll betray me. And with these seven god pills, I wonder if I can reach the Unbounded level. Doubtful.’

He produced the seven pills, which he popped into his mouth.

Immense medicinal power flowed through him, causing him to feel his half-Unbounded will convergence and Consummate God godhood advancing. But unfortunately, it didn’t push them to the point of a breakthrough in his will.

He still lacked that last bit he needed. However, at least he was now in the mid Consummate God level.

Chapter 1298: Essence of Time

Sensing the changes within him, Yang Qi shook his head and thought, ‘It seems my earlier guess was correct. Monarch godhood is so incredible that every breakthrough needs more energy than seems possible. The fact that those seven god pills got me to the mid Consummate God level is impressive enough.’

Although his psychic power had received a bit of a boost, it wasn’t anything close to a breakthrough.

There was no way medicinal pills could be used to break through to Unbounded will convergence, otherwise, Unbounded experts would be a common thing.

One only needed to look at the princes of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty to prove that point. Despite all of the resources of the dynasty, only the crown prince was in that position, and truth be told, it wasn’t because of the resources. It was hard to say what good fortune he had come across, but it definitely wasn’t a mere seven god pills. In fact, not even seven hundred such pills would do anything for Yang Qi other than provide some random upgrades.

Next, Yang Qi took out the flower of time stamen to see what it was all about.

Pulling out a jade box, he opened it and a burst of vital energy surged out as he caught sight of the petals.

“Flower of Time; Complete Reforming; Unleash your Splendor....”

Buzzing sounds rang out and dazzling shafts of light shot in every direction, creating a wild stream consisting of the power of time. As the stamen connected with the petals, a strange flower took shape.

The godpower in Yang Qi’s godhood flowed like a river into the flower, which seemed like a bottomless pit. Thankfully, his will could control the godhood drainage, and he had the God Legion Seal to replenish himself.

He was drained eighty-one times in a row before the flower of time stabilized.

From that alone, it was obvious that even a Paramount God would have had a tough time forming a flower of time. Clearly, Yang Qi’s godhood was very close to the strength of a Paramount God.

The flower Yang Qi held had a long green stalk and was roughly one-third of a meter from top to bottom. It looked like a ruyi scepter, and while the petals all looked different, they connected perfectly. And the flower glowed with dazzling light that contained the pure power of time itself. Already, Yang Qi could sense that it contained profound mysteries.

‘Am I supposed to just fuse it with my godhood? Supposedly, it’ll make the godhood stronger and provide control over time if you do that. It’ll also give one’s will the capability to seek the meaning of the end of time. Perhaps this is what I need to achieve my next breakthrough and reach the Unbounded level.’

Proceeding deep into the void, he set up another spell formation, then exhaled some fire onto the flower of time. Summoning the Heaven and Earth Furnace, he placed the flower inside. According to the stories, in the ancient halls of heaven, the Sovereign Lord had grown flowers in a garden, and there were ten that were considered the best: first, the flowers of fate; second, the flowers of karma; third, the flowers of faith; fourth, the flowers of time. And so on. Of course, there was debate about the exact order, but one thing was certain: the flowers contained the profundities of heaven and earth, and were impossible for mortals to grow. In fact, not even Paramount Gods could successfully raise them.

Apparently, the Sovereign Lord had used special techniques to grow the flowers of time, using spell formations that the god world had never seen before or since. They were grown from seeds that only appeared once every few hundreds of thousands of years, and could cause wars when they did.

No one knew how the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty managed to get their hands on the stamen of one, nor how the petals had ended up in the Toxic Continent. But Yang Qi had collected them all, and now he could use the complete flower.

WHIZZZ!

The Many Heavens God Seal appeared in Yang Qi’s palm, and when he unleashed it, thunder boomed and spatial tempests raged, surrounding the flower of time.

When the flower of time melted, it seemed to grow stronger, sending out such intense power of time that Yang Qi felt like he was going to be wiped out of existence.

As the process proceeded, Yang Qi’s divine will eventually connected with something mighty, which was none other than the boundless river of time.

Streams of energy flowed into his monarch godhood, causing it to shrink again, from the size of a chicken egg to the size of a thumb tip. However, that only caused its energy to grow even more intense.

According to the rumors, when one stepped from Unbounded will convergence to the Annulled level, one’s godhood would shrink down to the size of a tiny particle, then ultimately disappear. Once the godhood was gone, only thoughts would remain, and that was the highest level of cultivation base.

As for Yang Qi, as he absorbed the essence of time, his godhood rapidly shrank.

Crack!

It was soon the size of a bean, and couldn’t be constricted any further. Yang Qi shook his head as he realized that his psychic power wasn’t at a level that would allow him to fully assimilate the flower of time.

He was able to take some of its essence, but he couldn’t do anything to its basic foundation. He just wasn’t strong enough yet. He inhaled, sucking the flower inside and placing it into his monarch godhood, which now glittered like a dazzling gem.

‘My monarch godhood is now in the mid Consummate God level, which is a big improvement. If I could get a few hundred more Unbounded medicinal pills, I might be able to reach the late or peak level. With a thousand or ten thousand, I would probably be able to break through to the Perfect God level, although it’s hard to do, so I can’t say for sure.’

For now, he wouldn’t worry about assimilating his godhood.

He was now more than capable of dealing with multiple Perfect God opponents. Whether it was God-King Ruthless or Grand Eunuch Nie Yinyang, both would fall before him in a fight.

‘I’ve done well recently. Whether it was the Mahātmā Jade, the three religious pills, the seven god pills, and the flower of time. They were all very helpful. At this point, the House of God Ordainment doesn’t hold anything valuable for me except their secret reserve power. When the time is right, I’ll take all the destiny the sect has available.’

With that, he returned to the god kingdom, whereupon Zhang Jufang rushed over and knelt in front of him. “Milord, the Sage Monarch Consortium has run into a situation in which we could experience major growth. However, there’s danger involved, so I was hoping you could make the final decision.”

“Oh, what’s the situation?” Yang Qi said, tapping his finger on the table. “Please, explain.”

“It’s like this, Milord. We successfully completed negotiations to establish an outpost on the Heaven-Wretch Continent. But the continent is in chaos, and wretch-devils are everywhere. That said, the wretch-devil cultivators have plenty of goods to fence, so there’s opportunity along with all the danger.” Zhang Jufang was now a peak Common God, and close to breaking through to the Greater God level. Not seeing any reason to hold back, Yang Qi waved his finger, sending a soft stream of power into Zhang Jufang that caused his godhood to glitter brightly as it extruded impurities from within him.

Crack!

Like a butterfly emerging from a cocoon, Zhang Jufang smoothly rose to the Greater God level.

“Many thanks, Milord. Many thanks!” he said, kowtowing.

Yang Qi nodded. “Now, explain the situation in more detail.”

“It’s like this. The Heaven-Wretch Continent is in a good position, geographically. It acts like a buffer between the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty, the Nacrelight Sageland, the League of Wretch-Gods, and the League of the Devil-Dao. None of the parties is strong enough to invade it, and as a result, it’s a veritable hodgepodge of all the various powers. There are many business opportunities there, but you have to have the power to keep yourself safe. We made some deals with local warlords to set up a base there, but every time we get close to completion, we get attacked by wretch-god forces and cleared out. In fact, none of our people have survived any of those attacks, and we’ve even lost some people from the Crown Prince Society. Later, I realized we were being lured into those situations on purpose, and I’m fairly sure the true culprits are spies from the Mystery Society. They’re just relying on the wretch-gods to do their dirty work for them. In any case, we don’t want to lose out on potential profit from the Heaven-Wretch Continent.”

Zhang Jufang had developed a good sense for business, and knew a good opportunity when he saw it.

“Let’s check the map,” Yang Qi said.

He waved his hand, causing a large map to unfurl, showing a host of continents and land masses, probably ten thousand in total.

In the middle of the various dynasties, alliances, and holy lands was the evil Heaven-Wretch Continent.

“Oh? So the Heaven-Wretch Continent was a former battleground where the Wretch God fell in combat. And it’s very close to the Nacrelight Sageland.” After studying the map a bit longer, he said, “I think I’ll take a trip over there and see what’s going on. Maybe I can find out who’s targeting us.”

Chapter 1299: Land of the Fallen Wretch God

The Heaven-Wretch Continent wasn’t far from the Nacrelight Sageland. It was a hodgepodge of good and bad people, but it was also true that both the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty and the Nacrelight Sageland would go there to rid the world of devils and demons, and occasionally clash with each other. In the end, it was more of a battleground between the righteous and wretched cultivators.

It was also true that the ancient Wretch God had perished there.

The Wretch God had been an apex entity. In fact, during Yang Qi’s time on the Ancient Road to the Gods, he had been imprisoned by the Executors of the Ancient Road, who threw him in a cell with the Wretch God Apostle. That was when he had acquired the cultivation method for Wretch God Ultimate's Obsidian Flame.

He had also acquired a wretch-god cultivation manual called Wretch God Ultimate’s Legendary Sutra, which was strong enough to devastate people like King Immortal-Slayer.

The True Devil, the Wretch God, the Demon Master, and King Immortal-Slayer.

Together, they were called the Four Scourges of the god world of yesteryear, and they had jointly opposed the Sovereign Lord. As for the Wretch God, after perishing, his flesh and blood permeated the Heaven-Wretch Continent, filling it with darkness and causing the living beings there to become freakish and vicious. And deep within those lands were the mausoleums erected to the Wretch God, which contained all sorts of treasures. Of course, they were a big target for grave robbers. There were even some disciples from the House of God Ordainment who had acquired items from such mausoleums.

The Heaven-Wretch Continent was a place full of peril, but also bursting with treasure.

Therefore, Yang Qi planned to head there first, then hopefully slip into the Nacrelight Sageland to look for the piece of the Mahātmā Jade and advance his business interests.

After all, there was nothing more for him to take from the House of God Ordainment, and sitting around working on cultivation in the normal way wouldn’t lead to much progress.

“Alright, I'm going to take some people with me to the Heaven-Wretch Continent. We'll find out who has dared to target us.” He sent a message to Jadefall, and also had Zhang Jufang select some members of the Sage Monarch Society. Together, they headed to the teleportation portal to make the journey to the Heaven-Wretch Continent.

**

Their departure did not go unnoticed.

“Junior Houselord, it looks like our plan worked! By making moves against the Sage Monarch Consortium, we’ve forced Yang Qi to head to the Heaven-Wretch Continent to investigate. We can now move on to the next phase of the plan!”

Delighted, the junior houselord exclaimed, “Excellent. The brat is going to have a hard time escaping justice now! He could have strolled his way to heaven, but instead, he barged into hell! It would’ve been impossible to make a move against him if he hid out in the god kingdom, but now he's going to the Heaven-Wretch Continent, a place of immense peril. If he doesn’t lose his life there, he’ll at least suffer major losses.”

“Should we try capturing him alive, Junior Houselord? The downside is that he didn’t take any of his core people with him. He’s only taking some of the lower-ranking members of the Sage Monarch Society.”

“It doesn’t matter. He’s the main target. Jadefall will be in huge trouble without his support. Besides, he's the only Consummate God among them.” The junior houselord burst out laughing. “Maybe I should go myself and see exactly what they’re up to. I've always gotten the sense that this Yang Qi is keeping some big secrets, so after we capture him, I can personally interrogate him to find out the details. Besides, it won’t do us any good if he just gets killed by wretch-devils. We have to get our hands on him. Maybe I’ll even save him, then assimilate him and turn him into a clone. That would make it a lot easier to get close to Jadefall and win her over.”

With that, he faded out of sight.

**

Yang Qi and his people left the god kingdom via teleportation portal, eventually arriving in a city in another location. From there, they went to another teleportation portal and repeated the process. It took about ten days of travel in this manner before they found themselves in a huge fortress made of metal.

It was a fortification that belonged, not to the House of God Ordainment, but instead the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty. Its perimeter covered an area of millions of kilometers, and its metallic walls were covered with spell formations. Troops stood watch everywhere, keeping an eye on the numerous slaves that were mining ores, smelting iron, and doing other things to further fortify and strengthen the position.

This was a strategic border location for the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty.

If they went past these walls, they would be in the Heaven-Wretch Continent, where the slaughter was brutal, and the aura of wretch-gods abounded.

Of course, there was a constant stream of people coming and going. Some left seeking fortune, some came seeking peace and refuge.

Inside the fortress was the sovereign territory of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty, where it was forbidden to cause trouble. In contrast, the area beyond was outside the purview of the law.

Yang Qi was about to walk out the gate when some soldiers of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty stopped him and demanded treasure to pass. However, he simply pulled out his authentication token from the Crown Prince society, and they dropped back in terror. Not daring to cause any problems, they respectfully let him pass.

With that, they flew outside.

“Milord,” said Zhang Jufang, “we’re now on the Heaven-Wretch Continent, which means we could come under attack at any time. If you look up ahead, you can see cities where fighting and bloodshed are completely commonplace.”

Looking off into the distance, Yang Qi saw the cities he was referring to. They glittered as if with flames and blood, as though fighting was going on at every moment. And they were rife with an aura of rot and evil. Anyone who stayed in an atmosphere like that for too long would risk becoming stained with a wretched, devilish aura. It was even present in the ground itself, which was pitch black and covered with bizarre, misshapen trees and vegetation. At one point, Yang Qi saw a huge tree, three thousand meters tall, with enormous vine-like tentacles that would shoot out to capture any living things that got too close.

There were animals that stalked the forests, all of which were very dangerous. There were even bugs such as scorpions, who roved in packs and attacked with devastating weapons that could pierce defensive godpower.

Yang Qi and his people flew high in the air, avoiding contact with anything below. Most other gods wouldn’t be able to do this, but Yang Qi’s energy arts were advanced enough that they could help his people pierce through the air.

“Milord,” Zhang Jufang said, “if we keep flying along this course, we’ll eventually run into the Wasteland Bazaar. It has no rules or ruler, although there are certain powerful warlords who have staked out areas of power and businesses. In the Heaven-Wretch Continent and the Wasteland Bazaar, everything comes down to strength. Whoever is strongest gets the biggest share of everything.”

They continued flying forward until they reached a city made up of all sorts of random buildings and structures. There seemed to be no order or structure to it at all, with random streets going in different directions. There were even people fighting out in the open.

“Welcome to the Wasteland Bazaar,” Zhang Jufang said. “Milord, our Sage Monarch Consortium established an outpost on the bank of the Wretch-Dragon River, right there. Unfortunately, our building came under attack and our people were wiped out. Other people then swooped in and occupied the area.”

Yang Qi looked in the direction Zhang Jufang had indicated and saw a majestic river that seemed to teem with all sorts of bizarre animals. There were also many buildings on the banks, one of which seemed larger than the others, and flew a flag with a bizarre and wretched design on it.

Yang Qi and his people looked around, then dropped down into the Wasteland Bazaar.

The streets were wide, and they teemed with cultivators, who walked to and fro, patronizing the buildings and stalls with their business. There were some instances in which people tried to rob or steal, but were cut down immediately when they tried.

No one seemed to be in charge, and the scene was generally chaotic.

Yang Qi could sense Lesser, Common, Greater, and Consummate God auras, and even a few auras of Perfect Gods. All in all, it made the Wasteland Bazaar seem like a booming and prosperous place.

Yang Qi had brought about a hundred people with him, which was no small force. They attracted a bit of attention, with some people being just curious, but others who seemed to be sizing them up to rob them.

“Milord, that building over there is the one that our Sage Monarch Consortium built.” Zhang Jufang said, pointing at a huge structure off in the distance. “After it was taken over, its name was changed to the House of Blood Sacrifice.”

“Okay, let’s go check it out.”

As they made to enter, their path was blocked.

“Stop right there. What are you doing? You here to buy stuff, or not?” A handful of individuals stood in their way, all of them clad in blood-red clothing. They also had red skin and hair, with eyes like rubies and long sharp nails. “According to the rules of the House of Blood Sacrifice, it doesn’t matter who you work for, you can only enter in groups of ten. Everyone else can wait outside.”

Yang Qi could tell that these were all Lesser Gods who were just on the verge of the Common God level, with the exception of their leader, who was already a Common God.

Chapter 1300: Wasteland Bazaar

“Things are really chaotic out here,” Zhang Jufang said. “We can’t just leave our people standing around to get attacked. Since when is there a rule about only ten people going inside at a time?”

“Those are the rules set by the House of Blood Sacrifice,” said a man in bright red. “If you come here to do business with us, you follow our rules. Plain and simple. There are millions upon millions of organizations here in the Wasteland Bazaar, and each one has their own rules. If you don’t want to respect them, either screw off or die!”

Swish!

Even as the final word left his mouth, the leader of the men in red, the Common God, shrieked in abject horror as he realized that he had been decapitated, and his head was flying through the air.

It wasn't Yang Qi that had done the deed, but rather Zhang Jufang, who lunged forward, thrusting out his palm to summon a primal-chaos elder-snake that devoured the man’s body and assimilated all of his quintessence vitality and godpower.

Zhang Jufang was a Greater God now, and had been running the Sage Monarch Consortium for years. Because of that, he had learned to be decisive and ruthless. He knew Yang Qi had come on a killing mission to seize back his own territory, therefore Zhang Jufang wasn’t inclined to waste time chatting with the people from the House of Blood Sacrifice.

The other disciples from the Sage Monarch Society took quick action. They were like world-class assassins, unleashing dazzling sword light that slashed into the disciples of the House of Blood Sacrifice with no mercy.

It only took about three breaths of time before all of the enemy disciples were dead.

Zhang Jufang again used the energy arts of King Heaven-Devourer to consume the souls, flesh, and blood of the enemies, then led the charge inside. During the entire time, Yang Qi didn’t lift a finger. It wasn’t worth it when dealing with shrimps like these. Besides, it was good experience for the disciples of the Sage Monarch Society.

Jadefall had long been focused on that aspect, making sure all disciples got chances to go out and do real-world training on a monthly basis. It was also a good opportunity to quietly get rid of the Mystery Society infiltrators that Yang Qi had identified.

Because of that, there were a lot less infiltrators than before, a fact which the junior houselord had noticed, much to his exasperation.

Inside the building, a huge fight broke out. However, Zhang Jufang led the disciples to slaughter all of the people from the dao of devils while Yang Qi just followed along behind them.

Meanwhile, there were people out on the street who had witnessed the initial slaughter, and rushed inside hoping to take advantage of the situation.

A handful of Greater Gods flew through the entrance. However, Yang Qi simply waved his finger, and they transformed into dead corpses.

Everyone behind them saw, and backed away in fear.

Then Yang Qi waved his finger again, creating a shimmering wall of light that prevented further entry.

“Whoever dares to barge in on the House of Blood Sacrifice will be executed without exception!” At long last, one of the top experts of the House of Blood Sacrifice had shown up, a Consummate God, followed by a host of other disciples in blood-red garments.

The leader had a willowy beard and thick eyebrows, and was surrounded by shimmering, blood-colored light, almost as if he were inside a raincloud of blood.

“Who are you people? I'm Exalted Celestial Blood Rain. What did the House of Blood Sacrifice do to offend you?”

“Die!” Zhang Jufang said. He was only a Greater God, so normally speaking, he couldn't do a thing to a Consummate God. But he wasn’t worried at all. He waved his hand, and a golden skull flew out, transforming into a golden devil-god that ran directly toward Exalted Celestial Blood Rain, claws bared, hair flowing behind it, bursting with toxic energy.

Exalted Celestial Blood Rain had little time to react, and in the blink of an eye, his defensive energy was hit. Then, the toxic energy that surrounded him transformed, and the blood-colored rain cloud turned into a golden toxic miasma.

“What is that thing?!” he blurted in shock, preparing to launch a counter attack. Before he could, the disciples flanking Zhang Jufang joined forces to create a spell formation, sending out sword light that became a river of brightness that began slashing Exalted Celestial Blood Rain to pieces.

“This is an ability from the Lord of the Sword Dao! What group do you people come from?” He was going all out to fight back, but the combination of the golden devil-god and the sword techniques of the disciples had him panting for breath.

“Life-Killing!” Zhang Jufang roared.

A river of sword light flashed forth, containing pure white killing energy, slashing all of the disciples of the House of Blood Sacrifice to pieces.

Of course, it was the sword dao of King Life-Killer.

When that sword dao was unleashed, nobody could stand up to its might. What was more, the disciples who were killed were all absorbed into it, becoming a part of the dao of life-killing.

“That’s the sword technique of King Life-Killer!” shouted Exalted Celestial Blood Rain as he watched his disciples being slaughtered. All of a sudden, he came to the realization that he needed to flee and turned into a beam of blood-colored light.

“Blood Rain Devil Lightning!” he shouted, piercing a hole in the formation of sword light.

However, Zhang Jufang hardly even looked at him before saying, “Unbounded Sword River; Dao of King Life-Killer; Two Polarities Distinguished; Taiji Yin-Yang!”

Of the over one hundred disciples present, half became an unbounded sword river, and the others became a white streak of life-killing sword energy.

CREAK!

The Blood Rain Devil Lightning was wiped out of existence and Exalted Celestial Blood Rain was shredded to pieces, leaving only his godhood intact. The golden devil-god reached out with a skeletal hand, cackling as it devoured the blood-colored godhood.

At this point, the disciples of the Sage Monarch Society took time to consume medicinal pills, causing their sword energy to surge, and their auras to grow more united.

This was rare and valuable training, and it was only in the course of deadly fighting like this that true discipline could be developed. In all the House of God Ordainment, only the Sage Monarch Society could do things like this.

Yang Qi had combined the Life-Killing Sword Technique with the Unbounded Sword River, and imparted the new technique to his brethren. And of course, how could people like the Shepherd, Doom, Proud World, and the others, top elites from the impure lands and immortal worlds, not impart those techniques to their apprentices and disciples.

The disciples of the Sage Monarch Society had been molded into loyal, disciplined fighters, and Yang Qi was very pleased with it all.

He hadn’t even needed to do a thing to wipe out a Consummate God. And while Exalted Celestial Blood Rain had only been an early Consummate God, he was still a Consummate God.

Those hundred disciples had obviously mastered the profound quintessence of both King Life-Killer and the Lord of the Sword Dao. Combined, they could defeat enemies ten times as strong as them, and their sword technique could wipe out all wretched evils. Next, more fighting played out as the disciples continued clearing out the building, killing the various Greater Gods who remained behind.

During the entire time, Yang Qi continued simply watching, nodding in approval. Considering the Sage Monarch Society was already capable of this, it wouldn’t be a problem at all to take over the House of God Ordainment, or even organizations stronger than it.

A few hours later, Zhang Jufang hurried over and said, “Milord, we’ve cleared the place out. The House of Blood Sacrifice had three hundred thousand medicinal pills, four hundred thousand godnotes, a hundred noble caliber godstones, and one holy caliber godstone. In addition to that, there were countless building materials, magical treasures, and other sundry items. Please, take a look.”

“I see. These treasures will at least make up for some of the Sage Monarch Consortium’s losses. Change the names on all the signs on the building to Sage Monarch Consortium. We can start by selling off the building materials, and using the godnotes to purchase other items.”

“But the godnotes here aren’t really enough to work with!” Zhang Jufang said hesitantly.

“Don't worry. Look.” Yang Qi smiled, and moments later it started raining godnotes. Roughly two hours later, they had a collection of approximately a billion godnotes.

Yang Qi’s cultivation base had advanced so much that it was like the difference between night and day. He could now produce tens of billions of godnotes per day if he wanted to. Of course, even that much was a mere drop in the ocean compared to what was available in the god world as a whole, and wouldn’t attract too much attention.

In any case, the billion he had created was still enough to buy all sorts of goods. After all, godnotes were considered hard currency, and were accepted everywhere. In the Wasteland Bazaar, it was the only currency that was accepted, as magical treasures were easy to steal, and often emanated an aura that revealed their presence. In contrast, godnotes emitted no aura.

Shocked, Zhang Jufang said, “Milord, this—”

“Make an announcement that the Sage Monarch Consortium is open for business, and is also interested in expanding. I want a solid base of operations here.” Next, Yang Qi waved his hand and started setting up spell formations, preparing for major operations in the bazaar.

Chapter 1301: Devils and Wretches

After taking over the building previously occupied by the House of Blood Sacrifice, the disciples of the Sage Monarch Society got to work. Three months passed, during which time Yang Qi continued to create godnotes, which the disciples used to pay for everything they needed, including medicinal ingredients, exotic building materials, god items, magical treasures, corpses, and whatnot. Anything that could be valuable for cultivation purposes was stockpiled.

The Sage Monarch Consortium was already making a name for itself in the Wasteland Bazaar, expanding operations and erecting new outlets for various aspects of the business. Given the level of Yang Qi’s energy arts, it was easy for him to create puppets to help construct buildings or set up spell formations.

Numerous structures sprang up on the banks of the river, all of them belonging to the Sage Monarch Consortium. Hosts of experts could be seen frequenting the area.

The Heaven-Wretch Continent was a haven for fugitives, loners, and people in desperate situations. Many such people sought places of refuge, and the Sage Monarch Consortium offered it to them.

This continent was a place where, as long as you had enough money, you could hire people to do any type of dangerous job you wanted them to do, even assassinations or robberies. Of course, if you weren’t strong enough, you could easily fall victim to such people.

Many of the experts who now worked for the Sage Monarch Consortium were actually people who had originally been hired to spy on them. It was a given that as soon as a new business popped up, other experts in the area would want to find out more information about it. When it came to the conflicted paths of the righteous and wretched, there was always mutual slaughter and robbery to worry about.

Sadly for the people who opposed the Sage Monarch Consortium, they had Yang Qi to deal with. Those people who caused problems, but were too weak to be an asset, ended up killed, while the higher-level experts were turned into puppets.

During the three months that passed, he acquired three early Consummate God experts, nineteen Greater Gods, and a larger group of Common Gods. The Lesser Gods were useless and were just killed. It seemed as if, in the Heaven-Wretch Continent, good people simply didn’t exist.

The new captives had their brains washed, and were given tasks such as guarding the warehouses, operating the sales booths, dealing with enemy incursions, or powering spell formations. Despite the progress Yang Qi was making, it wasn’t anything particularly noteworthy given how large the Wasteland Bazaar was. Nobody even knew how many organizations operated there, and a company that had been around for three months was like nothing, considering there were others that had existed for thirty thousand years.

During the first month, all the customers were all Lesser and Common Gods; the Greater and Consummate Gods would do little more than try to gather information about the new business. In the second month, business grew. And in the third month, the Sage Monarch Consortium was getting so well-known that they finally had Consummate God customers.

As business boomed, Yang Qi finally erected a spell formation leading directly back to the god kingdom of the House of God Ordainment. His cultivation level was such that he could create teleportation portals now, albeit with some difficulty, and only with the assistance of the God Legion Seal.

With the portal in place, he could start sending goods into the House of God Ordainment, providing immense benefits to the disciples of the Sage Monarch Society there.

Meanwhile, Jadefall and the other leaders arranged for a rotation of disciples to head to the Wasteland Bazaar and gain experience. The fighting and killing that went on with people from the dao of devils could provide immense benefits to the cultivation base.

Another thing that happened during the three month period was that membership in the Sage Monarch Society soared.

Unfortunately, no Perfect Gods had come to patronize the new business, thus Yang Qi had not yet acquired any unique treasures, boundless medicinal pills, or other incredible items. That was only to be expected. After all, the type of things he needed would be of interest even to Paramount Gods, so how could they appear in a place like this?

In any case, business was booming so much that the Sage Monarch Society could be considered fabulously wealthy now. Doing business in the Wasteland Bazaar was vastly more profitable than doing business in the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty. After all, this was a place where people constantly fought and killed enemies, looted their corpses, and returned to sell that loot for profit. And considering the Sage Monarch Consortium always had godnotes to pay for such things, it was quickly becoming a favored destination by many people.

Back in the god kingdom, Jadefall smiled broadly as, on a daily basis, she had to assign people to sort through the goods that poured in through the teleportation portal. Soon enough, word spread in the House of God Ordainment that the Sage Monarch Society was getting very rich, very quickly.

And of course, that only led to even more people joining.

If things went on like this, it seemed a given that the Sage Monarch Society would eventually control the entire sect.

**

At a certain location out in the void was a place called the Heaven-Devil Dimension, where countless heaven-devils roamed. Right now, over a thousand members of the Sage Monarch Society were there under the leadership of Sword Seventeen, fighting with their godpower and thoughts in perfect unison.

“Everybody get ready: Sword Energy Megabeam!”

CRASH!

Staying in tight formation, they became a huge beam of sword light that slashed this way and that, cutting a wide swath through the heaven-devils and causing many of them to fall in death.

“Now, switch sword techniques!” Sword Seventeen said coldly. “Kill All Life under Heaven!”

The disciples bristled with killing energy as they switched to King Life-Killer’s sword technique, instantly causing a mass slaughter of heaven-devils.

The disciples of the Sage Monarch Society were training so smoothly that they seemed like soldiers in an army.

After the training was over, they headed to the Heaven-Wretch Continent, where they gained more experience hunting dangerous godlings, and fighting powerful devil-gods. Thanks to their efforts, their borders were expanding in the Wasteland Bazaar.

Of course, during the process, they earned plenty of loot.

A few months passed, during which the territory they commanded had expanded to cover an area of three thousand square kilometers.

However, the Wasteland Bazaar occupied an area of a trillion square kilometers, so three thousand square kilometers within that was like one hair on ninety thousand oxen. No matter what activities they were involved in, it still wasn’t much in the grand scheme of things.

After all, the Heaven-Wretch Continent had countless powerful organizations on it. Furthermore, it was considered a buffer region between the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty, Nacrelight Sageland, and League of Wretch-Gods, all of which were thousands of times larger than the House of God Ordainment.

That said, even though their business only occupied a three-thousand-square-kilometer area, it was still a bustling place. Eventually, Yang Qi didn’t even need to make godnotes to ensure the business was highly profitable.

‘Ah, what a pity. The business is only bringing in goods that can be useful to Consummate Gods or lower. Business is booming, but there’s nothing I can personally use.’

It really was a disappointment.

At a certain point, Zhang Jufang hurried in. “Milord, a group of experts arrived, and I’m pretty sure they’re Perfect Gods. They claim to have some Unbounded medicinal pills, plus talismans created by an ancient Paramount God. They want to know if we're interested in them.”

“What? Perfect Gods? So after all this time, some Perfect Gods have finally come. Excellent, maybe now we can finally do some big business. I’ll take however many Unbounded medicinal pills they have to offer.”

Zhang Jufang led him to the audience chamber, where he saw a group of about fifteen experts, all of them wearing hooded cloaks that made it difficult to read their auras. However, after scanning the group, Yang Qi came to the conclusion that they were all Perfect Gods. Furthermore, they all emanated the auras of devil-gods and wretch-gods.

“This is our number-one boss. If you want to discuss a big business deal, he's the one to talk to.” Feeling uncomfortable because of the auras present, Zhang Jufang left after making the introduction.

“Please, have a seat, everyone,” Yang Qi said, gesturing at the chairs in the middle of the room. “What sort of deal are you interested in? I heard you had some god pills created by an Unbounded expert, and some talismans left behind by a Paramount God. If you bring them out, I can assess them.”

“So, you’re Yang Qi?” one of the experts said, throwing back his hood to reveal a treacherous-looking face. He looked middle-aged, with bushy eyebrows, an aquiline nose, sunken eyes, and black teeth. He looked quite terrifying, and his aura was so sinister it would make most people faint from sensing it.

Frowning slightly, Yang Qi said, “Yes, I'm Yang Qi. I'm honestly surprised you know my name, Sire. Who might you be?”

“I'm King Blacktooth, Perfect God,” he replied, flashing a mysterious smile full of black teeth. “And you, boy, are only a mid Consummate God. Normally speaking, someone like you wouldn’t even qualify to talk to me. But your Sage Monarch Consortium has been making waves lately, and I know you’re important in the House of God Ordainment. Furthermore, you have the support of that girl Jadefall, as well as your brother Yang Immortal-Slayer, the apprentice of the Lord of the True Void.”

“Ah, you really do know a lot about me.” Yang Qi studied this King Blacktooth, and immediately realized that he pulsed with toxic poison. That was especially true of his teeth, which were a result of his cultivation of a dao of wretches. Even his mere breath caused a poisonous mist to fill the area. Thankfully, there weren’t any employees present, otherwise they would have been killed by it, melted away until nothing was left but their godhood.

“The fifteen of us are all wretch-gods and famous experts from the dao of devils. We're here today to talk business.” With a flourish, King Blacktooth went on to introduce the other fourteen experts present. “This is Arhat Blackheart, and this is King Banehand. Over here is—”

“Enough, King Blacktooth,” someone said in a screeching voice. “What’s the point of introducing all of us? This brat is nothing but a Consummate God. What exactly is the point of telling him our names?”

Chapter 1302: Fifteen Hegemons

The person who had just spoken had a voice as piercing as a sharp blade. It seemed to slice through the meridians and into the soul, bringing intense pain that was obviously the result of some powerful and baleful energy art.

Yang Qi looked over to see an old woman with wrinkled skin, who looked like a witch or sorceress of some sort. She seemed sinister and ruthless in every way, the type of person who had killed countless opponents.

And from the way she was looking at Yang Qi, it seemed she wanted to drain him of all his blood right then and there.

“So you’re not really here to talk business,” Yang Qi said with a slight smile. “The fifteen of you are all Perfect Gods, and that’s quite impressive. Fifteen hegemons of the Wasteland Bazaar, you could say. I shouldn’t be surprised that important people like you wouldn’t actually want to come talk business with a small company like the Sage Monarch Consortium.”

“We are here to talk business,” the witch said. “Specifically, the business of you becoming our slaves. Every single disciple in the Sage Monarch Society. Understand? If you agree, then we won’t kill you, which will be a great benevolence on our part.”

As she spoke, she reached out with a wrinkled hand, pointing at Yang Qi with razor-sharp fingernails. At the same time, a black smoke swirled around her hand, seemingly filled with countless vengeful souls that shrieked in piercing voices.

Ignoring the witch, Yang Qi said, “Is this how it’s going to play out, King Blacktooth?”

“Yes, it is,” King Blacktooth replied. “Granny Witch-Ghost is right. Don’t you agree that it's courting death for the Sage Monarch Consortium to set up shop in the Wasteland Bazaar? Thankfully for you, we believe that there is virtue in sparing animal life. The only question is whether or not you realize what's good for you.”

“I see. Well at least I realize now that you’re not here to discuss business, but rather to pick a fight.” Looking around without a hint of fear in his eyes, he continued, “If I'm not mistaken, you're actually in league with the junior houselord of the House of God Ordainment, right?”

“I would never work for that loser,” King Blacktooth said.

“Oh? Then perhaps the junior houselord’s backer, the third prince?” Tapping his finger, he said, “And am I right that the people who destroyed our previous branch locations here were working for you?”

“That’s right, they were our people,” said a mid Perfect God, throwing his cloak and hood back to reveal that he was a tall, burly fellow. “I'm Devil-Duke Hercules, and to be honest, I'm curious about you. You’re only a measly Consummate God, yet you haven’t once flinched in the face of us Perfect Gods. That level of willpower is worth at least some attention. Normally, even if it was fifteen Consummate Gods facing a single Perfect God, the former would be trembling in their boots. So why exactly aren’t you afraid? Perhaps you're unaware, but the moment we arrived, we locked down this entire building.”

“Devil-Duke Hercules, is it?” Yang Qi said. “You seem pretty strong, and it looks like you have a special type of godhood. If I were to guess, it's herculean true warfare godhood. With godhood like that, you have access to limitless strength, and can unleash devilish techniques that obscure the sky, making you invincible in combat. Unfortunately, you’ve made the foolish mistake of throwing your life away today.”

Devil-Duke Hercules roared with laughter. “I'm throwing away my life? You’re really not willing to shed a tear until you see the coffin, are you, you sharp-tongued brat. Fine, let’s see what you have that makes you so confident.”

He threw out a fist that reached Yang Qi with incredible speed, and without causing a single sound to spread out. It was like the night sky, crushing down with such force it could even kill people in their dreams.

Normally speaking, when incredibly strong people attacked, it would cause explosive rumbling sounds. But after reaching a certain point, the opposite would happen and their attacks wouldn’t make any sound at all.

Yang Qi saw that this attack contained the transformations of yin and yang, and the ultimate expression of the martial path. This opponent was no fool, and clearly surpassed the Perfect Gods from the House of God Ordainment in many ways. After all, the wretch-gods and monsters from the Wasteland Bazaar not only had shocking fighting prowess, but ample combat experience as well.

Yang Qi gently waved his palm to meet the incoming attack in what seemed like a completely casual gesture.

When Devil-Duke Hercules’ fist strike met his palm, it suddenly changed. Devil-Duke Hercules’ fingers snapped into vicious hooks designed to rip out the heart of the opponent, a transformation that happened so quickly it would cause most onlookers to gasp in amazement.

Yang Qi’s palm slid down to cover his chest and protect his heart.

However, the claw move was only a feint; Devil-Duke Hercules shifted to an open palm, which then shot up toward the top of Yang Qi’s head as if to slap it.

Yang Qi responded with a move so smooth that it seemed as if he had anticipated what tactic Devil-Duke Hercules would use; extending his finger, he thrust it toward the acupoint in the middle of Devil-Duke Hercules’ palm.

Devil-Duke Hercules quickly withdrew his hand and flew back, eyes flickering with astonishment.

They had fought for three rounds, but hadn’t even touched each other. Devil-Duke Hercules had even used his energy arts to completely lock down the area surrounding Yang Qi, which a Consummate God normally couldn’t escape from. In fact, not even an early Perfect God could have dealt with it. Any such person would have been instantly killed.

But Yang Qi had easily evaded his attacks, and even fought back.

Meanwhile, King Blacktooth’s expression fell. He knew full well what Devil-Duke Hercules was capable of. The three moves he had used—a fist strike, an attack on the heart, and the open-palmed slap—were from a consummate martial ability called the Mountain-Shoving Heart-Snatching Head-Crushing Stances. Combined, they contained the transformations of yin and yang, and had been used to kill countless enemies.

How strong was this Yang Qi?

How could a puny Consummate God do something like this? Furthermore, it was true that Devil-Duke Hercules had a special type of godhood, which meant he was far beyond the compare of ordinary Perfect Gods.

The truth was that Yang Qi was also quite surprised. He had used a very powerful counter-attack, but was still incapable of even touching Devil-Duke Hercules. Obviously, the man’s energy arts were so powerful that he could crush any of the Perfect Gods from the House of God Ordainment. Yang Qi had originally assumed that he would be able to at least injure Devil-Duke Hercules within three moves, only to find that the man easily dodged out of the way.

Devil-Duke Hercules had a body like an iron pagoda, but was unexpectedly as slippery as a loach.

Earlier, Yang Qi had been looking at these fifteen Perfect Gods with contempt, but after the exchange just now, he changed his attitude.

Silence reigned.

Not a single one of the wretch-gods said a word, causing the tension to mount.

Finally, Yang Qi cleared his throat. “It seems I underestimated you, which was my mistake. You fifteen experts have come to pick a fight, so I suppose I have no choice but to accept. Everyone knows the rules of business in the Wasteland Bazaar. Whoever is strongest gets the biggest share. So have you come today to fight as a unified group, or will you be selecting a champion to fight me? Or will you be taking turns? Regardless, I'm ready to start whenever you are.”

His words were spoken with the casual confidence of an elite master.

His cultivation level seemed low, but everyone could tell from the exchange with Devil-Duke Hercules that Yang Qi was definitely some mysterious person. There was clearly more to him than met the eye. The fifteen experts exchanged glances, then King Blacktooth said, “You’re a puny Consummate God, so it wouldn’t be appropriate for us to bully you. Although we don’t care much for rules, we’re not the kind of people who feel the need to use a battle-ax to kill a chicken. Devil-Duke Hercules, how do you feel after your initial clash? It looks to me like you weren’t finished fighting. Why don't we continue and see who comes out on top?”

“Alright!”

Devil-Duke Hercules floated back into the middle of the room with seeming weightlessness. But then he landed, and his feet crushed holes into the floor, revealing how incredibly heavy he actually was.

Remaining fully on guard, he said, “Considering how you handled my three moves earlier, I can tell you’re a worthy opponent. Your name is Yang Qi, right? From here on out, I won’t talk down to you. Get ready, the real fighting is about to start. Let’s see whether you survive it.”

All of a sudden, his cloak burst into flames as he said, “Herculean Supple Fist!”

He launched a punch that contained both hardness and softness, and would inflict such pain that anyone who survived being hit by it would cough up blood. Yang Qi’s eyes flashed as he splayed his fingers, causing an energy field to pop into being that transformed into a huge vortex. Everyone present felt as though the area was trembling violently, but the truth was that everything was still. Yang Qi was shaking their minds with the Annulled Grand Magic, one of the top psychic arts of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.

Bzzzzzzzz!

When Devil-Duke Hercules’ fist entered the vortex, he saw Yang Qi standing there as powerful as a mountain and as majestic as a sea. He was like a sun that caused the area to fill with radiance and light, and Devil-Duke Hercules was so shaken he could barely speak.

Even his mind stopped working. However, Yang Qi could still move. He walked forward, unleashing a fist, a finger attack, and a palm strike that were all backed with mountain-toppling, sea-draining force. Heaven and earth shook, as if the King of Godmammoths himself was charging forth.

BAM!

He slammed into Devil-Duke Hercules with such force that the man was sent flying backward.

Chapter 1303: Come At Me, All Of You!

In the end, it only took one move to defeat Devil-Duke Hercules.

The other fourteen experts’ jaws dropped. In the clash moments before, it didn’t seem like either Devil-Duke Hercules or Yang Qi had the upper hand. So how could one of them have lost so easily?

Little did they know that, earlier, Yang Qi had just been probing Devil-Duke Hercules’s strength and ability. In fact, he had only been using a tenth of his full strength. But that was enough to accurately assess what he was capable of, so he had unleashed his divine abilities and will to negate the power of yin and yang, then inflict a stunning blow on Devil-Duke Hercules.

In terms of fighting experience, if Yang Qi was said to occupy second place, then nobody in existence would dare to claim first place.

Within the experience provided by the God Legion Seal were all sorts of fighting styles and cultivation base types, enough to cause hordes of enemies to concede defeat, much less this one, paltry Devil-Duke Hercules.

After becoming a Consummate God, Yang Qi had become invincible to anyone other than someone with Unbounded will convergence. After that, he acquired the flower of time, whereupon he became truly domineering, to the point where he wasn’t even worried about being ganged up on by a group of Perfect Gods.

Even if his opponent did have a special type of godhood, could it possibly match up to monarch godhood?

“You little punk!” growled Devil-Duke Hercules as he struggled to rise. But then blood sprayed out of his mouth and his eyes clouded over. The seriousness of his injuries was obvious. At this point, one of his compatriots flew over to help him, a young woman. Reaching out, she tapped several of his acupoints, then forced a few medicinal pills into his mouth. Only then did he finally crawl to his feet, his vital energy slowly building back up.

“Okay, fine,” Yang Qi said. “Come at me, all of you. Fifteen Perfect Gods isn't a force that I have anything to fear. After all, none of you have Unbounded will convergence, so even if you join forces, it’s still unlikely you could match up to me. You barged in here talking about enslaving me just when I was thinking of expanding operations in the Wasteland Bazaar. I need some more top experts on staff, and you fifteen will definitely help my expansion efforts.”

“What did you just say?” King Blacktooth said grimly.

“I said for you to come at me en masse,” he replied, standing there with his hands clasped behind his back. “I want to see exactly what you’re capable of. And if you refuse to do it, I’ll just force you. I'm going to guess you monsters and wretch-gods haven’t seen a truly consummate expert for a long time. Otherwise you wouldn’t be so arrogant and conceited. After being taught a good lesson, you’ll know the height of the heavens and the breadth of the earth.”

“You want us to team up against you, you psycho?” Granny Witch-Ghost said. “If that’s the case, I suppose we’ll just have to crush you. You obviously have some big secrets, otherwise you wouldn’t have been able to defeat Devil-Duke Hercules. And we're going to benefit from those secrets shortly!”

Even as the words left her mouth, she made her move.

She lashed out with her sharp fingernails, causing a black mist to streak forth and create a skull that rumbled toward him.

Yang Qi merely flicked his finger, sending out a bean-sized flame that entered the skull’s mouth. A moment later, a popping sound rang out, and the skull exploded in flames, which then shot back toward Granny Witch-Ghost, who screamed in pain as she was engulfed.

“Let the Wretch God Come!Myriad Worlds Destruction!”

King Blacktooth lunged forward, becoming a black streak that shot toward Yang Qi’s back, palm extended as he drew on a consummate wretch-god technique. Instantly, an enormous maw filled with razor-sharp teeth was threatening to rip Yang Qi to shreds.

Yang Qi responded by directly attacking the maw with a fist strike, causing it to shatter into pieces.

Arms tingling, King Blacktooth said, “Nine Transformations of the Iron Devil!”

Changing into something like pure metal as black as night, he attacked with a strength that could shatter great daos and cast everything into oblivion.

Yang Qi strode forward, surrounded by whipping winds as he directly met the wretch energy of King Blacktooth with outstretched arms. Instantly, King Blacktooth could sense that his opponent seemed to have unlimited power, making him like a river of pure energy, or a force of trillions upon trillions of godmammoths trampling forth.

BAM!

King Blacktooth was sent flying, his entire body tingling numbly.

RUMBLE!

Then the other twelve experts joined forces to attack all at the same time, releasing such incredible energy that it made it seem like the entire meeting chamber had been transported into ancient times. These twelve Perfect Gods were attacking with such force that they could easily punch a hole right through the House of God Ordainment’s god kingdom.

“God Legion Paradise....” Yang Qi said, putting his palms together as if in prayer. As he did, a domain spread out around him, which was something he hadn’t used in a very long time: the Superlative Defense of the God Legion Paradise. It was something that no wretch-god could penetrate, and as a result, all of the energy arts that hit it simply crumbled into nothing.

Then, without any warning, the entire room lurched into motion.

Yang Qi and everyone else present were pulled into another dimension in another location. After all, Yang Qi didn’t want the Sage Monarch Consortium harmed by the conflict, so he used a teleportation magic to move it to another place.

A vibration rolled out from Yang Qi, negating any lingering attack force and causing the God Legion Paradise to fade away. Smiling, he said, “Well, what do you think, ladies and gentlemen?”

The fifteen Perfect God wretch-devils looked around in alarm, and then turned their attention back to Yang Qi, their eyes filled with terror and shock. Granny Witch-Ghost had already managed to douse the flames that had engulfed her, but she was now blackened and covered with ash. Eyes filled with disbelief, she said, “Y-you... you actually met our combined attack? What kind of cultivation base do you have? Don’t tell me you’re not actually a Consummate God! You must be a peak Perfect God!”

“You can believe that if you want to. But in the end, I really am a mid Consummate God. My godhood is just a bit different from yours.” He smiled. “Right now we're in the depths of chaotic space-time, so we can fight to our hearts’ content. Please, don’t let me down.”

RUMBLE!

Yang Qi attacked again, and within moments was right in front of King Blacktooth, thrusting out his palm with ten different types of power, which were none other than the ten different states of the Sage Monarch Grand Magic.

King Blacktooth had no way to dodge to safety, so his only choice was to meet the attack head-on.

“Egg of the Wretch God!” he shouted. White godpower flowed around him, interlocking into a shape like an eggshell that was covered with sharp barbs.

However, even this did little good; as soon as Yang Qi hit it, cracks spread out over the entire eggshell.

Crack!

King Blacktooth’s body collapsed, leaving behind only his godhood, which shot back in retreat along with a piercing scream.

The other Perfect Gods lunged forward, unleashing a host of attacks as they tried to rescue King Blacktooth. Yang Qi looked up and saw a writhing river of wretched evil sweeping out in all directions.

Of course, he knew it was only an illusory manifestation of these experts’ godpower, so instead of dodging, he summoned a huge primal-chaos elder-snake, which shot forward and swallowed the ‘water’.

As King Blacktooth’s body formed anew around him, he shouted, “We have to unleash the Wretched Brain God Art! Only a formation designed to crush Unbounded experts can truly deal with this!”

Unfortunately for him, his vital energy had been severely damaged. However, that alone was enough to prove to him that it would take the combined effort of their entire group to deal with Yang Qi.

The group of experts howled, and the wretch-god river transformed, turning into a spell formation that they planned to use to crush the primal-chaos elder-snake.

Up above, a huge brain appeared, covered with such deep wrinkles that it looked almost like a walnut. At the same time, it emanated a most incomparable wretch aura.

This was the Wretched Brain God Art!

The measure of a person was in their brain; that was where the sea of consciousness was, and where the will and psyche resided. And now, fifteen Perfect Gods, all of them fiend-devils and wretch-gods, were using all of their power to summon an enormous, wretched brain via spell formation. As soon as it appeared, Yang Qi could sense the immense destructive power contained within.

Buzz!

The fifteen wretch-gods vanished, leaving behind only an enormous brain that pulsed with deadly fluctuations. It was a psychic power that could remold anything and everything, and it caused the entire dimension around them to transform into a land of wretch-gods. Tombs and gravestones popped up like bamboo after a spring rain, and bones could be seen everywhere.

Incredible psychic pressure weighed down on Yang Qi.

Then, a strange voice echoed out from within the huge brain. “My brain becomes your brain. Your flesh and blood... become a sacrifice to me!”

All of a sudden, Yang Qi felt like he couldn’t move.

It was obvious that these Perfect Gods were using some consummate technique against him. At least now he knew there were indeed secret magics in the god world that could be a threat against him.

The brain floated down as if to merge with Yang Qi’s brain and turn him into some half-human half-wretch freak.

Of course, there was no way Yang Qi would be dealt with so easily.

Smiling coldly, he said, “You’re still lacking some psychic power. If you had ten times as many on your side, say a hundred and fifty Perfect Gods, then maybe this Wretched Brain God Art would be a threat to me.”

Suddenly, Yang Qi vanished, leaving behind his monarch godhood, which rotated at blinding speed as it transformed into a huge cannon. It was none other than the Grand Tribulation Cannon, a weapon that could rock the halls of heaven!

RUMBLE!

A thunderous roaring sound could be heard as blinding light shot out, slamming into the huge brain.

The brain crumbled in the blink of an eye, vanquished by a single attack.

All of the Perfect Gods coughed up blood and scattered in every direction. “Run! Not even the Wretched Brain God Art can do anything to him! He must have Unbounded will convergence! Get out of here!”

“Where are you going? You think Yang Qi lets people off the hook that easily? If you try to kill someone, you’d best do the job all the way!”

Chapter 1304: Wretched Brain God Art

Right now, Yang Qi’s most powerful attack was his Grand Tribulation Cannon.

When the True Devil fought the Sovereign Lord, he had drawn on the most powerful tribulations in hell to create a cannon that could attack the halls of heaven. Just how mighty must a weapon like that be? It was the ultimate manifestation of the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body, and as Yang Qi’s collection of the Mahātmā Jade grew more complete, the cannon became more refined and powerful.

Yang Qi still had a lot of progress to make, but he’d also come up with a new idea that had worked splendidly; he used the power of the God Legion Seal and the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth to make the cannon even more formidable.

Now the cannon contained the might of both the legion of gods and the horde of devils. And one could only imagine the might that would be unleashed by a combination of myriad tribulations and the King of Godmammoths.

It made the Grand Tribulation Cannon something completely different from before, with an attack power that could be considered unparalleled in heaven and earth.

In fact, a single blast was enough to destroy the Wretched Brain God Art and scatter all fifteen Perfect Gods.

Swish!

Wings sprouted out of Yang Qi’s back, which were the Freedom Wings, the next iteration of the Angel Wings. With a flap of those wings, he became a blur of immense speed.

Pop. Pop. Pop. Pop. Pop. Pop.

Fifteen bangs rang out as he struck all of the Perfect Gods and forced them back together. No matter how they tried to flee, it didn’t do any good.

Forgetting about Yang Qi’s strength, his speed alone was stupefying.

“Let the Great Necropolis Descend!”

A huge necropolis appeared, which settled down around the fifteen experts. They could instantly sense the immensely solid magical laws that they were now surrounded with, and knew that escape wasn’t an option.

As they huddled together in fear, King Blacktooth said, “What do you think you’re doing, Yang Qi?”

“What do I think I'm doing?” he replied. “Enslaving you. I defeated your strongest move, unless you happen to have another you want to try. You're completely under my control now, so do you really think you have a chance to escape with your lives?”

“This was all a big misunderstanding!” Granny Witch-Ghost said. “We don’t have any grudge with you. We had no idea you were such a top expert in hiding. It was our fault for trusting that third prince of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty. He wanted us to capture you, then use you to threaten Jadefall from the Sage Monarch Society. Why don’t we just let all this stuff drop? We can turn weapons of war into gifts of jade and silk. We’ll even help you get revenge on the third prince! Your beef with him doesn’t have anything to do with us.”

“Doesn't have anything to do with you?” Yang Qi laughed. “You tried to kill me! And if I wasn’t so strong, you would have succeeded, and wiped out all my people in the process. And you think none of this has anything to do with you? Even you must realize how ridiculous that sounds. It doesn’t matter how glib your tongues are, you're all going to end up as my slaves today.”

“Don’t push things too far, Yang Qi!” King Blacktooth said. “Don’t you know that we're all chief elders from the League of Wretch-Gods? You can't afford to offend a group like that. The league represents an alliance of all the top wretch-god groups in the god world. You really think you can fight something like that? Don’t be naive. We have countless Paramount Gods on our side, making us so strong that not even the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty would dare to offend us. And don’t even mention the House of God Ordainment. We could raze it to the ground with the snap of a finger.”

“Oh? Countless Paramount Gods?” Yang Qi laughed heartily. “You're not very good at bragging, are you? Not even the Sovereign Lord could say that he had countless Paramount Gods working for him!”

“Your House of God Ordainment doesn’t even have a single Paramount God!” King Blacktooth replied. “My Master has Unbounded will, and just broke through to the Paramount God level. Even the crown prince of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty is scared of Emperor Blackheaven! It doesn’t matter how strong you are, you’re no match for him. And I'm his favorite apprentice. If you kill me, he won’t let the matter drop.”

“Let’s just pretend this never happened, Yang Qi,” said the woman who had saved Devil-Duke Hercules, a beautiful devilwitch with green hair and pointed ears. “All of us here have impressive backgrounds. Getting on good terms with us will benefit you a lot. And maybe we could even help you grow your business. What do you say?”

“You think I’m going to believe the rubbish you wretch-gods are spewing?” Yang Qi said, continuing to tap his finger. “You’d betray me the first chance you got. You think I’ll just sit around while you go get a group of a hundred and fifty companions to power that Wretched Brain God Art?”

“So, you’ve made up your mind to be our enemy?” Devil-Duke Hercules said. “You really don’t care about the consequences?”

“Look, cut the crap,” Yang Qi said grimly. “I'm going to give you two options. One: submit. Two: die!”

“Let’s go for broke!” The fifteen Perfect Gods all attacked at the same time, once again summoning their Wretched Brain God Art and sending ruthless psychic fluctuations toward Yang Qi.

In response, he vanished, causing the vital energy of the Great Necropolis to rumble out and create a huge bubble around the gigantic head.

When the powers of the Purrfect God Art and the Great Necropolis God Art were combined, they were unparalleled under heaven.

Screams rang out as Yang Qi reached out, grabbed the bubble, and looked inside to see fifteen pieces of godhood grouped in the shape of a brain. Sending his own psychic power inside, he analyzed the profundities of the brain, which was when he realized that it was actually a manifestation of the life force and genes of those who wielded it.

‘This thing isn’t complete, but it’s obviously capable of transforming my psychic power, and my very substructure. After I get back, I need to do some more research into it.’ The fifteen Perfect Gods had spent a huge amount of vital energy to summon the giant brain, so it was now an easy matter for Yang Qi to seal them. Perhaps he could learn something from the structure of the brain, and use it to alter the relationship between his fleshly body, godhood, and psyche. Perhaps that would help in his attempt to reach Unbounded will convergence.

“Let us free!” the Perfect Gods wailed.

Yang Qi paid them no heed. Hurrying back to the Sage Monarch Consortium, he passed along word that he was going into secluded cultivation for a time. Then, he slipped into the depths of space-time to do further training and research.

Without any hesitation, he sent powerful psychic power into the seas of consciousness of the fifteen Perfect Gods.

Soon, cultivation techniques, energy arts, and other knowledge was flowing into his mind. Before long, he knew a lot more about the profundities of the technique. It was an energy art unique to the League of Wretch-Gods, and was the combination of a host of techniques originating with Paramount Gods of ancient times. Those techniques had been combined into the Wretched Brain God Art. By using boundless vital energy and life force fluctuations, it was possible to create something that was like an energy art, but wasn't. It was like a spell formation, but wasn't.

The reason was that, according to legend, after Wretch God Ultimate had been killed by the Sovereign Lord and the King of Godmammoths, only his brain remained. Later, the League of Wretch-Gods hid it in a secret location as an object of worship and veneration.

It was a profound energy art that was different from the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth or the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body. It used something physical to create something psychic, and could violate the void with the quintessence of that which was Annulled.

When experts practiced cultivation to a very high level, their brains would normally turn into expressions of vital energy and psychic fluctuations. But that didn’t mean they were destroyed; they still existed in the form of godhood or expressions of will.

That was why brains were said to be either godhood or psychic will.

What was matter? What was a lack of matter? What was something that lacked the lack of matter?

Many profound questions were popping up in Yang Qi’s mind as he combed through the minds of the Perfect Gods. At a certain point, he suddenly came to a realization. A moment later, vital energy swirled, forming an enormous brain that seemed to exist between the psychic and corporeal.

Buzzzz.

Psychic power rolled out everywhere from the wretched brain, equivalent to roughly thirty percent of his own power.

‘I get it. I really get it.’ As it turned out, the psychic power rolling out of the brain was like a voice. Normally, it was low and hard to distinguish, but if yelled at, would become much stronger. If he could master the energy art related to this brain, then when he released his psychic power, it would increase it dramatically, and would make it much more similar to Unbounded will.

He continued his study for seven days and nights.

At a certain point, he received a flash of inspiration, whereupon he understood the structure of the wretched brain, and its power. Any psychic power that was passed through the brain would experience a huge boost.

Yang Qi’s psychic power had already reached the peak of the Paramount level, making it immeasurably close to the Unbounded level. By using this wretched brain, he could use his Paramount power to devastate an Unbounded expert.

Unfortunately, he couldn’t cultivate the Wretched Brain God Art right now. He needed to study it further. After all, the fifteen Perfect Gods hadn’t been using the complete art. In other words, he would need to venture into the League of Wretch-Gods to seek advice from a Paramount wretch-god.

From what Yang Qi could tell, those fifteen Perfect Gods had only been able to unleash about ten percent of the Wretched Brain God Art’s potential.

That said, even ten percent was enough to boost his psychic power by about thirty percent. And that begged the question of what the complete version could do.

‘This is a good technique. I can’t believe that these fools gave me such an amazing gift.’ Yang Qi was feeling very excited. Although he didn’t currently have Unbounded will convergence, at least he knew he was now in the position to fight an Unbounded expert if he had to.

He wouldn’t be helpless if he faced the crown prince; at worst, he could probably make an escape. Furthermore, he was now much more confident of getting into the Nacrelight Sageland and getting that piece of the Mahātmā Jade.

‘I still need to keep studying this Wretched Brain God Art, though. I need more than a thirty percent boost!’

Chapter 1305: Foundation Complete

The Unbounded level was considered a monumental upgrade. Even with a thirty percent increase in Yang Qi’s psychic power, he couldn’t defeat opponents like that. However, he was convinced that, with enough hard work on his part, he could unlock another thirty to fifty percent of the Wretched Brain God Art. After all, his knowledge base surpassed even the Perfect Gods he had just been dealing with.

Time passed as he stayed in place and worked on his cultivation.

Eventually, he physically transformed, becoming an enormous brain that pulsed with such immense psychic power it seemed capable of devastating the highest heavens, and slaughtering both the legion of gods and horde of devils. And thanks to the boost in psychic power, his energy arts became vastly mightier.

That said, reaching the Unbounded level would still be immensely difficult. It wasn't a transformation that would occur overnight.

From what he could tell, his best shot was still the Mahātmā Jade.

“Get out here!” Yang Qi said, and the fifteen wretch-gods scattered, their faces tinged with terror, as well as varied expressions of shock, entreaty, self-deprecation, grief, and just pure fear.

They were no longer Perfect Gods who could rebuke heaven and earth; instead, they were pitiful slaves.

After everything Yang Qi had done to them, their thoughts had been stripped clean. As he experienced burst after burst of enlightenment, they felt immense pressure crushing down on them until his psyche left them powerless to resist.

They had no choice but to accept their misfortune. It was simply their fate.

“Is there anything else you have to say for yourselves?” Yang Qi asked King Blacktooth. “I've taken the Wretched Brain God Art away from you, and deprived you of your physical bodies. Now my understanding of the technique even surpasses yours by many times over. Why not just willingly work for me now? We’ll start with you, King Blacktooth. Do you agree?”

“We have no choice but to accept our fate. As long as you agree not to kill us, we’ll do anything.” King Blacktooth looked crestfallen. He could sense the devil embryo slowly growing inside him, controlling him, like a parasite slowly eating away at him, turning him into the walking dead.

It was no illusion. If Yang Qi wanted to, he really could turn him into a zombie.

“Well, that’s good,” Yang Qi said. “We need to change your names. From now on, you’ll share my surname, Yang. And your names will be Wretch-One, Wretch-Two, and so forth, all the way to Wretch-Fifteen. King Blacktooth, you’ll be Yang Wretch-One, got it? You now belong to me, my faithful slaves. Incidentally, your wretch energy is too intense and appalling. If you go out like this, you’ll terrify everyone you meet. I'm going to impart a new, more powerful ability to you, which will allow you to cleanse your wretch-god energy and fuse with righteousness. With a mere thought, you can become heroic, and with another, ruthless. Follow along as I demonstrate....”

Drawing on the God Legion Seal, he sent out a stream of golden fire to surround them.

What followed was a hundred days of cultivation in which he thoroughly transformed all of the Perfect Gods. King Blacktooth, who was now Yang Wretch-One, had once possessed a mouth full of pitch-black teeth, and emanated a noxious aura of wretched evil. But now he looked like a stately, middle-aged man who stood tall and straight, a golden cloak draped over his shoulders, pulsing with an immense fighting prowess.

Buzzzz.

All fifteen of the Perfect Gods experienced similar changes, and transformed physically. The sinister Granny Witch-Ghost now resembled a kindly old woman from a rich and noble family.

“You’re now my slaves,” Yang Qi said, “and you are hereby tasked with administering the business here. Also, you shall hand over any Unbounded medicinal pills you have. Understand?”

He quickly stored away all the pills they handed over.

In total, he now had thirty-two Unbounded medicinal pills, all of which were very rare. After all, even Perfect Gods would find it hard to track down more than two or three such pills.

With this new group of experts in the Sage Monarch Consortium, the business would definitely be safe without Yang Qi there to personally watch over things. They now belonged completely to him, and thanks to the God Legion Seal, no one would ever be able to tell who they were in the past. Their energy arts were more impressive than before, and in terms of their looks and bearing, they had gone through heaven-shaking, earth-toppling transformations.

Furthermore, they all now had golden thrones in the God Legion Seal.

The thirty-two god pills looked like walnuts, or more precisely, like brains, as if literal brains had been shrunk into the form of medicinal pills.

Truth be told, that was exactly what they were.

They were called Ultimate Brain Pills, and were made by Paramount Gods from the League of Wretch-Gods. The concocting method was relatively simple; it involved capturing young geniuses from opposing sects, then refining their brains in pill furnaces along with various medicinal ingredients.

Yang Qi could sense that each of the Ultimate Brain Pills abounded with pure psychic power that made them no weaker than the buddhist, daoist, and confucian pills he had encountered. Without any hesitation, he chomped down the pills, which caused numerous flows of energy to sweep through him.

Sadly, after it was over, he found he hadn’t experienced any sort of major breakthrough.

Monarch godhood required even more astonishing levels of power than this.

On the upside, consuming the Ultimate Brain Pills helped significantly with the Wretched Brain God Art. Obstacles were cleared, and new knowledge coalesced in his sea of consciousness.

Drawing on the Wretched Brain God Art, he could send psychic fluctuations rolling out that shredded space, and created dimensional passageways leading for thousands of kilometers in every direction.

He was now at the point where he could at least fight to the death with an Unbounded expert.

**

“What? The fifteen experts the third prince hired haven’t sent any updates? And the Sage Monarch Consortium’s business is booming?” The junior houselord of the House of God Ordainment was enraged. He had left the god kingdom in the hopes of personally witnessing Yang Qi being killed. However, he hadn’t been able to get any news, and actually had no idea where Yang Qi was.

Eventually, he had simply returned.

After a few months without even a single update, he was getting very angry. Then he saw that the Sage Monarch Society continued receiving huge shipments of materials, allowing its members to achieve breakthroughs, and of course boosting their reputations so that more and more people wanted to join them. The leaders of other factions were constantly complaining about how many of their members were resigning and switching to the Sage Monarch Society.

Jadefall and the others were obviously playing for keeps. It didn’t matter who joined the Sage Monarch Society, they were automatically given resources, medicinal pills, magical treasures, and even special techniques, all with no questions asked. It was very different from the House of God Ordainment in general, in which one had to go on missions to get any sort of reward.

Such methods were usually counterproductive, but in the early stages of an organization, they were a great way to attract new members. After all, the Sage Monarch Consortium could provide an endless influx of wealth.

If things went on like this, it wouldn’t take three hundred years for the Sage Monarch Society to become the top faction. It would be more like thirty years.

The junior houselord felt like he was going crazy. Worse, he didn’t have any idea what to do next.

“There’s no news from the League of Wretch-Gods?” he asked again.

The Perfect God chief elder replied, “Not at the moment. They sent fifteen Perfect Gods to capture Yang Qi, but they haven’t accomplished the mission yet, nor returned. However, they said that this is nothing out of the ordinary. Maybe we should wait another four or five years to see what happens.”

“What?! Wait another four or five years?” The junior houselord furiously kicked a nearby table, shattering it. “By that point the Sage Monarch Society will be so powerful they’ll be shitting all over me!”

As the junior houselord vented his rage, the chief elder thought to himself, ‘The Sage Monarch Society really is growing quickly. I wonder if I should switch loyalties. This junior houselord always seems to be on the losing end of things. Destiny is shifting, and the Sage Monarch Society seems to be on the way to the top.’

He wasn’t the only chief elder to be thinking in this way.

“I’m going to personally speak with someone from the League of Wretch-Gods,” the junior houselord said, vanishing.

Meanwhile, the Sage Monarch Consortium had expanded their area of control in the Wasteland Bazaar to a full ten thousand square kilometers. Wealth was constantly pouring into their coffers, and the disciples patrolled the area constantly to repel any invasions. Spell formations protected things above and below, and were powered by noble and imperial caliber godstones. Furthermore, there were other spell formations operated by both slaves and disciples alike, used to create weapons and such.

There were even slaves who were Greater Gods.

As for the fifteen Perfect Gods, they kept an eye on everything. Thanks to their help, the consortium had forcibly recruited a lot of experts to work for them, and business was booming more than ever.

The cheapest thing in the Wasteland Bazaar was life, and with fifteen Perfect Gods to handle things, they could get their hands on however many slaves they wanted.

Right now, Yang Qi stood on the tallest tower in their territory, looking out over the Wasteland Bazaar with a pleased smile on his face. His foundation was finally complete.

Chapter 1306: An Expert Shows Up

With wings unfurled, one could fly high into the sky.

That was what Yang Qi was thinking.

Unfortunately, although the Sage Monarch Consortium was making headway in the Wasteland Bazaar, it wasn’t quite in the position of having its wings unfurled. It needed to build up more resources, gain more experience in conflicts with enemies, maintain an undefeated record, and slowly make sure everyone realized that messing with the Sage Monarch Consortium was a quick way to die.

And he needed Unbounded will to truly accomplish that.

‘I need to think of a way to get into the Nacrelight Sageland.’ With that, he left the consortium and headed in the direction of the Nacrelight Sageland. The Wasteland Bazaar was huge, to the point where even Yang Qi would need time to fly from one end to the other.

He took the opportunity to take in some of the sights, with the hope of learning more about the Heaven-Wretch Continent, the location where the Wretch God had fallen.

As he flew along, he passed other consortiums that had been built by organizations like the Sage Monarch Society. Some were little more than stalls on the street, while others stretched across tens of thousands of square kilometers.

Yang Qi didn’t need to actually enter the other consortiums; he could scan them with his divine will and easily identify what treasures and experts were inside.

Similar to the Sage Monarch Consortium, any consortium that covered an area of at least ten thousand square kilometers would have Perfect Gods present to watch over things.

Yang Qi didn’t consider trying to plunder any of the valuable things he saw. He knew that the Perfect Gods would be backed by even stronger forces, otherwise they wouldn’t have reached their current level of cultivation. Tangling with forces like those would only cause unneeded complications for the Sage Monarch Consortium.

And any gains made would not make up for the losses incurred.

As for Yang Qi, the only reason he had made such progress was because he had taken advantage of the destiny of the House of God Ordainment. Without it, he would just be a measly rogue cultivator desperately hunting for resources.

True, some of his gains were made by theft. But that theft was only possible because of his status as a disciple of the House of God Ordainment.

The point was that any extremely powerful individual would have impressive backing; it was an ironclad rule.

‘Hm. Looks like there’s a big consortium up ahead that has some impressive wares.’

He had been casually flying along for some time when he caught sight of something that resembled a school of learning. The people making their way to and fro inside all resembled confucian scholars, and the experts of the dao of devils refused to get too close to it. That was because it pulsed with a righteous, noble aura that repelled wretch-devils.

It covered an area of millions and millions of square meters, and was filled with towering structures of all sorts. Located in the very center of the Wasteland Bazaar, it was very unique in its style.

Yang Qi could sense several extremely powerful auras within it that came from medicinal pills. Clearly, they were pills or talismans that had been made by Paramount Gods, or at least something similar. Regardless, he could tell that they would boost his godpower and psyche.

It was worth taking a look.

Landing outside, he approached and was greeted by some confucian scholars.

“This is the consortium of the Truth Academy. Which organization are you from? Are you here to do business?”

“Er, hello. I'm a disciple from the House of God Ordainment, here in the Wasteland Bazaar for training. I'm hoping to buy some treasures to boost my cultivation base, and everyone talks about how impressive the Truth Academy is. So I decided to come take a look for myself, and see if any of your wares might be worth purchasing.” Even as he spoke, he pulled out some godnotes and stuffed them into the palms of the scholars. “Do you mind leading the way for me? What kind of wares do you sell here? I especially need medicinal pills that can boost psychic power and strengthen godhood. Specifically, Unbounded pills.”

The scholars stuffed the godnotes away, and at the same time, suddenly turned much more courteous. They were all Lesser Gods, and upon seeing that Yang Qi wasn’t a wretch-devil, and was a Consummate God, they didn’t dare to be anything but attentive.

“Ah, that's easy.”

“We have a big auction house here, and auctions are held there every day. In fact, there’s one starting right now. We can take you there.”

Everything was easier with money. Yang Qi followed the scholars into the consortium and could see that it was a bustling place. He even saw high officials and noble persons from the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty doing business here and there. And he spotted some extremely beautiful women who were obviously from the Nacrelight Sageland. He inwardly nodded at the realization that the Truth Academy was obviously a major force. People from all sorts of other organizations were here, and some even had taken advantage of the magnanimity of the confucians to open auxiliary campuses to provide instruction.

The confucians were a big group in the god world, and nobody wanted to offend them. People from both the righteous and wretched daos feared them, and often admired them. They focused on virtue, didn’t fear death, and were generally idealistic.

Their energy arts pulsed with a righteous energy that repelled wretch-devils. And according to the stories, it could actually vanquish the righteous energy of the Sovereign Lord’s radiance and light. Supposedly, the Lord of Civilization had been a confucian, which was why he was so adept at creating and preserving civilizations.

A short time later, Yang Qi was at the auction house, which was actually an enormous public square filled with a sea of people. No one from the dao of devils could be seen; because of the righteous energy that filled the academy, such people found it intolerable.

However, Yang Qi noticed that there were some experts from the dao of devils who were in disguise. However, they didn’t dare to cause trouble, and were obviously only there in the hopes of taking advantage of the auction.

Everything was very orderly, which was a big exception to how things usually worked in the Wasteland Bazaar.

The auction had already started. Yang Qi didn’t put in any bids; but just watched the buzz of activity, and kept an eye on who was participating.

At a certain point, he noticed that some officials from the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty were in a frenzied bidding war with some experts from the Nacrelight Sageland. The two groups were diametrically opposed, and Yang Qi was thinking of using that as a way to somehow get into the Nacrelight Sageland.

Suddenly, Yang Qi realized that there was a top expert from the Nacrelight Sageland present in one of the private booths. It was a young woman who had already purchased quite a few treasures. She lay sprawled on a divan of icy snow, attended by a host of beautiful handmaidens. Of course, without his Lord's Eye, Yang Qi would never have noticed her.

‘She’s a peak Consummate God, and is half a step into the Unbounded level,’ he thought. ‘I wonder if I can get an audience with her.’

Heart pounding, he decided to wait a bit before taking action.

The auction went on for several hours, until a treasure appeared that caused the entire auction floor to erupt into a frenzy.

“Ladies and gentlemen,” announced the confucian auctioneer, a Perfect God, “we are now offering a flower of wisdom up for auction. We discovered it while exploring some ancient ruins, and according to rumor, it can be added to over three thousand varieties of rare medicinal ingredients, and if refined by a Paramount God using the pill formula created by the Lord of Wisdom, it can create a Wisdom and Knowledge God Pill. With such a pill, a peak Perfect God will find it much easier to break through to the Unbounded level of will convergence. Unfortunately, our institute lacks the requisite pill formula, thus, we’re offering it up for auction. Please, let the bidding begin.”

Yang Qi immediately sensed that the woman in the private booth had become very nervous, as though she very much wanted to acquire the flower of wisdom.

‘She must have come here specifically for this flower,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘And that means she must have the pill formula for that Wisdom and Knowledge God Pill, and possibly all the other medicinal ingredients as well. So how do I get in to see her? There’s no way being a disciple of the House of God Ordainment will be enough. I think I need to change identities.’

All of a sudden, he remembered that he happened to have a very strange fleshly body in reserve. It was the scholar he had found in the Chaos Forge God-Shrine on the Toxic Continent. It was possible to tell just by looking at the corpse that the man had been a confucian.

It seemed like the perfect disguise.

Women from the Nacrelight Sageland generally abhorred men and would refuse to have dealings with them. But ironically, because of their incredible beauty, men would scramble like a flock of wild ducks to pursue them. Some of the women couldn’t help but yearn for love, and would make exceptions when it came to certain men. And women were usually more tolerant of scholars.

This could very well be the ticket he needed.

Yang Qi surreptitiously switched his fleshly body with that of the confucian scholar. No one around him noticed the change.

His old body was no more, having been sucked into his godhood. Taking over another body was a simple matter that involved putting one’s godhood and will into the new body.

Yang Qi felt very different. There were certain aspects of this scholar's body that he didn't understand, but he could tell that it was immensely powerful. Its sea of energy was like a black hole that seemed to constantly consume massive amounts of godpower.

RUMBLE!

Every move he made drained his monarch godhood by about half. Thankfully, he had the God Legion Seal to fill it back up, otherwise he wouldn’t have been able to walk, much less fly.

This being his first time inside this body, he was completely shocked. ‘How could this body be so strong? Was this guy a Paramount God? I’d say it’s highly likely. How could anyone other than a Paramount God be this strong?’

Unfortunately, it wasn’t easy to control a body like this, and he couldn’t even unleash godpower outside of it.

Thankfully, he had the God Legion Seal to compensate.

More than ever, he was convinced that, in life, this scholar had been some inconceivably powerful individual.

After getting used to the new body, he looked up and saw that the auction of the flower of wisdom was nearing its end.

Chapter 1307: Confucian Scholar

“Fifty billion godnotes!” someone shouted. It wasn’t the woman Yang Qi was interested in, but a sinister-looking man in an imperial gown who fairly radiated the fate of a nation. It was an imperial prince from the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty, flanked by numerous experts as he sat in his own private booth.

The surrounding nobility all looked very nervous.

“Tenth Prince,” one of the nobles said, “we absolutely, positively must not let the flower of wisdom fall into the hands of Summer Vastcold. Her cultivation base is on the very cusp of the Unbounded level, and she also has the formula for the Wisdom and Knowledge God Pill, as well as all the other ingredients. Now all she needs is that flower, and she’ll rise to the Unbounded level! That would be very bad for us.”

The man was a marquis, and a powerful Perfect God.

“There’s no need to even bring that up,” the tenth prince growled. “The Nacrelight Sageland is our sworn enemy, and we’ve had our eye on Summer Vastcold for a long time. Although we haven’t managed to get our hands on her personally, we’ve killed a lot of her sisters. Besides, it's not a guarantee that if she gets that flower of wisdom she’ll be able to concoct the pill, nor that it will help her achieve her breakthrough if she does. But in the end, you’re right, it would be better to not give her the opportunity.”

“But Tenth Prince,” another noble said, “if you keep bidding and raising the price, you could very well make a fool of yourself in trying to be clever. What if you win the auction but can't pay up? Besides, we don’t have the formula for the Wisdom and Knowledge God Pill, so that flower won’t do us any good in the end. If His Majesty the emperor finds out you spent tens of billions on it, he’ll be furious, and we’ll all suffer the consequences.”

“Transfer whatever funds are necessary,” the tenth prince said. “I want that pill! Even if I don’t do anything with it! If Summer Vastcold wants to reach the Unbounded level, she’ll do it because I let her. And I’ll make her work for it! Whatever I spend on the pill, I’ll make back, thanks to her. Then I’ll sell it to her for an even higher price than I paid!”

The bidding was at fifty billion godnotes, and the auction floor was so quiet you could hear a pin drop.

No one was jumping in with competing bids. Not even the entire House of God Ordainment could produce that many godnotes, unless they first sold all of their most valuable magical treasures and medicinal pills.

“Fifty-two billion godnotes!” someone said from the Nacrelight Sageland booth. Summer Vastcold looked on with cold eyes as she upped the bid.

“Vastcold,” one of the handmaidens said, “if this keeps going, we’ll run out of funds. The bidding has already gone higher than we can afford. How can we possibly scrape that much money together? If we can't pay up, we’ll end up offending the Truth Academy. We’ll have to pay compensation, and at the same time, lose the flower of wisdom!”

“Yes, but I absolutely have to get that flower,” Summer Vastcold said. “We all know what it can do. All the preparations are in place, except the flower. It's my only hope to reach the Unbounded level. Compared to that, what are fifty billion godnotes? Not even five hundred billion or five trillion could compare!”

“But we just can’t keep bidding!” another young woman said, clearly anxious. “The Truth Academy knows what our limits are, and if we surpass the collateral we’ve put down, they’ll know. We can’t just blurt out prices we can't afford. Even with all of our savings put together, we only have sixty billion godnotes. Our only hope is that our enemies will run out of money.”

“Fifty-five billion!” cried the tenth prince, having called on all of his closest friends to loan him the money he needed to win the flower.

This was a very heated auction.

“Fifty-eight billion!” Summer Vastcold said through gritted teeth. She knew that if the bidding reached sixty billion, she wouldn’t be able to offer any higher bid.

“Sixty billion!” the tenth prince said. He chuckled darkly. “If I'm not mistaken, Summer Vastcold doesn’t have much collateral left. I bet she hasn't put down more than sixty billion. And if I draw on all my family fortune, I can go as high as seventy billion. She’s out of options!”

“Tenth Prince, if this auction ends with us going broke, it's going to be hard to survive in the dynasty. Money is an absolute requirement to deal with the imperial court.” The marquises, counts, and dukes in his retinue were all starting to get very nervous.

“We’ll be fine. Once I win the flower of wisdom, I’ll sell it back to Summer Vastcold. Her Master will pay more for it than she could afford, and we’ll end up profiting handsomely.”

The women in Summer Vastcold’s booth were all so anxious they were crying out loud. “Crap. We can't bid any higher!”

Meanwhile, one of the Perfect Gods from the Truth Academy entered and said, “Miss Summer Vastcold, you have no further funds deposited. According to the rules of the Truth Academy, you aren’t allowed to make any more bids. We hope you understand.”

“Damnation!” Summer Vastcold spat, her face a mask of rage. Unfortunately, there was nothing she could do. All of her savings, even when coupled with that of her sisters, still wasn't enough to do anything.

“Hold on!” someone said from the entrance of the private booth. It was none other than Yang Qi. Extending his hand, he revealed a crystal bracelet, which was a holding item filled with a mountain of godnotes. “Miss Summer Vastcold, I’d like to invest in you. This bracelet has twenty billion godnotes in it. That should be enough.”

“Who are you?” Summer Vastcold said, visibly taken aback. Obviously, she was wondering why a complete stranger was being so generous as to hand over twenty billion godnotes. Even in the god world, that was still a vast amount of wealth, such that even superpower sects might not be able to afford it. It was enough to cover investments of all sorts.

Yang Qi waved his hand dismissively. “Worry about such questions later. Win that flower, otherwise your enemy will take it, and you’ll be filled with regret.”

Handing the bracelet over to the Perfect God from the Truth Academy, he said, “Please, assess this immediately. Miss Summer Vastcold, hurry up and make your bid!”

“Alright!” Summer Vastcold said. “Sixty-five billion godnotes!”

“How could this be?” the tenth prince shouted, leaping to his feet. “How could she have more money?! I know for sure that she only had sixty billion godnotes and not a bit more!”

“How could you people let her make a bid when she can’t afford it!” shouted one of the counts.

“I'm sorry,” said the Perfect God attendant from the academy. “Miss Summer Vastcold just added an additional twenty billion in cash to her account. It's been carefully counted.”

“What?!” the tenth prince shouted madly. “What's going on? Who gave her that money?”

“Apologies, but we can't provide that information. We're not even supposed to tell you how much money she's added to her account.”

“Seventy billion!” the tenth prince blurted in exasperation.

A short moment later, the response from the other booth came. “Seventy-two billion!”

The tenth prince looked like a deflating balloon, and one of the nobles said, “Let’s just give up.”

“No more bids?” the Perfect God asked. When he saw the nods of agreement, he left.

“Tenth Prince, don’t be disappointed. Why don’t we just wait until Summer Vastcold leaves the Truth Academy, then ambush her and take the flower by force? We can contact some boundless wretch-devils to help. Maybe we can even arrange for some assassins.”

“That’s our only option,” said the dejected tenth prince. With that, they packed up and left.

“Many thanks for your help, Young Sir,” Summer Vastcold said. “Without you, I wouldn’t have this flower of wisdom. It would be in the hands of that damned prince from the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty.” The flower had already been delivered to her private booth, and she beamed with smiles as she looked down at it. “Now it looks like I have a real chance to reach the Unbounded level.”

“It was my pleasure,” Yang Qi said, waving his hand dismissively. “The truth is that I hate the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty with a passion, so it's only natural that I’d want to help you. You see, by helping you, I helped myself.”

“Many thanks, Young Sir,” she repeated. “I’ll definitely find a way to repay your twenty billion godnotes.”

“Don’t worry about that,” Yang Qi replied. “You just spent an astronomical amount of money, so now's not the time to talk about repayment. In fact, if you need more help with money in the future, I’ll be here to lend a hand.”

“Oh?”

At this point, Summer Vastcold finally calmed down from the rush of winning the flower. Meanwhile, the surrounding women from the Nacrelight Sageland were whispering among themselves. Then one of them said, “Young Sir, you must be extremely rich to give twenty billion godnotes as a gift, then talk about giving more. What organization are you from? Are you a confucian? Have you taken a liking to our Vastcold?”

“Any enemy of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty is a friend of the Nacrelight Sageland. And confucian scholars aren’t heretical wretch-devils, so we can be friends with them.”

“Young Sir, exactly how rich are you? Even the son of the rector of the Truth Academy wouldn't be able to hand over that much money without blinking. It’s definitely enough to sway the heart of a woman.”

Yang Qi laughed. “As long as Miss Vastcold is happy, that’s enough for me. That said, I do consider this an investment. I hope that Miss Vastcold will use that flower to concoct the pill she needs to reach the Unbounded level. When that happens, I’ll surely benefit. It’s really a matter of reaping and sowing karma. I'm sure you all understand.”

“Of course, Young Sir,” Summer Vastcold said. “Again, many thanks to you. If you’re willing, I’d like to extend an invitation to you to come visit the Nacrelight Sageland.”

Chapter 1308: Summer Vastcold

Yang Qi had seized an opportunity, using twenty billion godnotes to win the favor of Summer Vastcold, thus earning a way into the Nacrelight Sageland as a guest.

Of course, those twenty billion godnotes hadn’t earned him Summer Vastcold’s trust. But he didn’t care. As long as he could establish the relationship, he could work on getting her to trust him later.

With that, they left the Truth Academy and headed toward the Nacrelight Sageland.

“You still haven’t told me where you’re from, Mr. Void Qi.”

‘Void Qi’ was the alias Yang Qi was using.

“I learned some of the core teachings and doctrines of the Lord of Civilization, which was how I came to be a scholar. But I never formally joined any particular institute. I did infiltrate some of them in disguise to learn what I could, but I've spent most of my time wandering, teaching people about history and virtue, and propagating the righteous energy of the confucian schools. The truth is that my wealth is from the legacy of the Lord of Civilization that I discovered, not my own merit. Please, don’t laugh at me for that, Miss Vastcold.”

Yang Qi had no trouble spinning a believable tale. After all, there were too many confucian scholars in the god world to possibly count, and it was the same with confucian institutes. There was no way the Nacrelight Sageland could ever corroborate or refute his story, so he simply made up a tale, not worrying at all whether Summer Vastcold believed him or not.

The Lord of Civilization was one of the subordinates of the Sovereign Lord. In fact, he was one of his most competent generals. And everyone knew that his core teachings and doctrines had never been handed down, so how could this random person know of them?

Expression flickering, Summer Vastcold said, “Young Sir Void Qi, it's said that the Lord of Civilization had an extremely powerful energy art known as the Imperial-Heaven Pre-Beginning Art. It was shockingly powerful and completely domineering. Do you mind giving us a demonstration?”

Obviously it was a test to see if he really knew of the teachings of the Lord of Civilization. If he did, it seemed a given he would found a school that would ultimately become extremely powerful. But if he was just blithely making up a fake story, then he would be someone to guard against. It was obvious that he had used the twenty billion godnotes to get close to her, and as the saying went, one who is unaccountably generous is hiding evil intentions.

Many of the other young women were looking closely at Yang Qi. Some were Consummate Gods, while others were Perfect Gods, yet none of them could assess his cultivation base. Of course, the reason was that he wasn’t using his own fleshly body at the moment, but was instead using the body of the mysterious scholar he had discovered. Were it not for that, his status as a mid Consummate God would have been hard to hide.

“Of course, no problem!” Yang Qi said. Obviously, he knew that Summer Vastcold wouldn’t be easily fooled.

Waving his hand, he summoned a complex image in the form of a long scroll that pulsed with an ancient aura and the shocking power of civilization.

“Very impressive,” Summer Vastcold said, looking a bit surprised. “So you do have some imperial-heaven pre-beginning powers. What a surprise to see a daoist technique like that finally making its reappearance. You’re clearly a successor of the Lord of Civilization, Young Sir. I have no choice but to believe you. Your cultivation base will reach unfathomable heights, and you’ll surely establish your own school to educate the masses.”

“Not necessarily,” Yang Qi said. “I prefer freedom and simple living. Besides, I actually had a school in the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty, but after offending the crown prince, it was destroyed, and all of my disciples were massacred. As for me, I had to flee with my life. That's why I hate them down to the core of my being, and won’t rest until they’re wiped out.” By the end of his speech, his voice was fairly dripping with animosity.

Slowly but surely, he was winning Summer Vastcold’s trust.

“So, that’s how it is,” she said. By this point, she trusted him by about sixty percent. After all, the imperial-heaven pre-beginning powers he had shown indicated that he was a successor of the Lord of Civilization.

Getting him on her side would provide major benefits, not to mention the fact that he was extremely wealthy.

“Young Sir Void Qi,” said an early Consummate God, “given your incredible cultivation base and immense psyche and will, you’re surely on the verge of reaching the Unbounded level. Considering how much you've helped out, does it mean you’re looking to share some of the spoils? For instance, some pill formulas from the Nacrelight Sageland? Or some valuable ingredients? Unfortunately, the flower of wisdom can only be used to make a single pill, which can only be used by one person. Furthermore, I don’t even know if I can successfully concoct it.”

“A Wisdom and Knowledge God Pill wouldn't do me any good,” Yang Qi replied casually. “And it definitely wouldn’t push me to the Unbounded level. I have no intention of trying to take something Miss Summer Vastcold so needs. That said, I wouldn’t mind studying such a pill. Miss Summer Vastcold, how do you intend to concoct it?”

She chuckled. “You think I have the ability to concoct a pill like that? Only a Paramount God can do so. I plan to ask help from my Master, as well as my Sect Uncles. Together, they probably have a fifty percent chance of succeeding.”

“Oh, I see,” Yang Qi said. Of course, the truth was that he really wasn’t interested in the flower of wisdom, only the Mahātmā Jade.

As the group was chatting, a burst of strange cackling rang out, laughter that contained weeping and wailing. In fact, it was hard to tell if it was really laughter, and it made everyone who heard it feel very uncomfortable.

“It's an ambush!” Summer Vastcold said. “Junior Sisters, man the turrets!”

They weren’t simply flying through the air, but in a nine-decked ship that was a god item crafted by a Paramount God. It was made from a colorful type of metal, and covered with magical inscriptions that made it capable of incredible speed. And of course, it had spell formations that required high-level godstones to operate.

As soon as the orders left her mouth, the women of the Nacrelight Sageland burst into motion, heading to the various guns that were located throughout the ship and putting imperial caliber godstones into them to power them up. Moments later, brilliant shafts of light were shooting this way and that as they targeted the enemy.

‘It’s too bad they don’t have holy caliber godstones to power those weapons,’ Yang Qi thought, shaking his head. Unfortunately, such godstones were far too rare and valuable. Each one would be as precious as an entire city.

Furthermore, these women had just purchased a flower of wisdom, cleaning out their wealth in the process. How could they have anything left after that?

The sky outside was dark and leaden, as if the entire area had been sealed down. Black clouds roiled and lightning flashed, as though doomsday had come.

“Natural Disaster Secret Magic!? These are wretch-gods from the Natural Disaster Sect!”

Summer Vastcold’s expression flickered as she led Yang Qi to the main deck of the ship. Looking out, they saw that the dark clouds were so thick that it was obvious the ship wasn’t going to be able to pierce through them easily.

Suddenly, laughter burst out as dozens upon dozens of Perfect Gods descended from the clouds. In fact, Yang Qi counted, and found that there were a hundred and eight of them, and they were organized in a formation. No wonder they were so confident in springing a successful trap. When Yang Qi had faced fifteen Perfect Gods who used the Wretched Brain God Art, it had been tricky to deal with. Here there were a hundred and eight such opponents, all working together.

“The Natural Disaster Sect from the League of Wretch-Gods,” Summer Vastcold said, her voice icy. “What do you people think you’re doing? Don’t tell me you’re declaring war on the Nacrelight Sageland!?”

More laughter rang out as a young man took the forefront. He had a very fair face, almost feminine, but he pulsed with killing intent. “We're here for your money. Let me explain, Summer Vastcold. Certain people from the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty want you dead, and they hired us to do the job. But the truth is we don’t have to kill you. Just give us that flower of wisdom, and we’ll spare your lives.”

“You want the flower of wisdom? You don’t have the pill formula or the other medicinal ingredients. What good would it do you?”

“Simple,” replied the feminine young man. “If we capture you, the Nacrelight Sageland will give us the pill formula and the ingredients. Then we can definitely make that Wisdom and Knowledge God Pill. And if I can reach the Unbounded level because of this, it’ll all be worth it, don’t you think? That's why I put together this group of a hundred and eight Perfect Gods. With the Natural Disaster Cyclical Formation Magic in play, you’ll never escape. So either surrender, or die.”

“Damnation,” Summer Vastcold said. Looking at Yang Qi, she said, “Young Sir Void Qi, it looks like we're in a very troublesome situation here. This guy is named Disaster Trek, and he’s a top expert from the Natural Disaster Sect. He's no weaker than me, and he’s obviously been planning this trap for a long time.”

“We can’t break free?” Yang Qi asked. “This ship of yours was created by a Paramount God. With the right godstones, it should be able to unleash the power of a Paramount God. That should be enough to blast through their formation.”

“I thought of that,” Summer Vastcold said with a wry smile. “Unfortunately, we’d need holy caliber godstones. And where are we going to get anything like that? We have nothing better than imperial caliber. I did have some better godstones, but I traded them in so I could afford the flower of wisdom.”

“Oh?” Yang Qi smiled. “Thankfully, I happen to have some right here.”

He flicked his sleeve, and clinking sounds rang out as a host of holy caliber godstones tumbled out onto the deck, flashing like tiny suns.

“This....” Summer Vastcold was temporarily at a loss for words. “Where did you get so many holy caliber godstones? Don’t tell me the Lord of Civilization’s treasure trove was this incredible! I can't believe you just casually poured out what must be ten billion godnotes worth of godstones!”

Chapter 1309: Limitless Wealth

When Summer Vastcold saw the mountainous pile of holy caliber godstones, she realized that Yang Qi was so fabulously wealthy it surpassed anything she could have guessed earlier. After all, even the Nacrelight Sageland as a whole would have a hard time producing this much wealth.

Seeing that Summer Vastcold was in such a daze, Yang Qi said, “Now’s not the time for chatting. Activate the weapons and blast our way through this formation of a hundred and eight Perfect Gods. If we don’t get out of here quickly, we're going to be in big trouble.”

“Many thanks to you, Young Sir. Your sense of righteousness knows no bounds. I fear I’ll never be able to make this up to you.”

WHIZZZ!

Summer Vastcold was a decisive person, so she waved her sleeve and sent the holy caliber godstones flying throughout the ship into the various spell formations.

The ship gobbled them up as if they were medicinal pills, causing the ship to suddenly surge with the aura of a Paramount God. Then, fiery blasts erupted from the ship, scorching everything in their path and piercing through the spell formation and the black clouds.

“Use the Nine Yangs Escape Magic! Full speed ahead!”

Under Summer Vastcold’s command, the ship sucked up the godstones and used them to become a fiery streak that shot forward, completely unstoppable. It looked like a blade of fire slashing through everything with destructive power, complete with shadowy projections of Paramount Gods.

Swish!

A breath of time passed, and the ship was nowhere to be seen.

“What's going on here?!” said Disaster Trek. “I worked so hard to set up this formation! And they broke through it that easily? There’s no way they had a reserve of holy caliber godstones to unleash the might of the Paramount god weapons!”

Paramount god weapons were hard to get, and it was even harder to power them up. Normally speaking, even Perfect Gods would go broke if they tried.

Of course, Yang Qi actually had a lot of Paramount god items, namely, those belonging to the seventy-two monarchs. There were also his fragments of the Cruiser of Civilization. To truly unleash the might of such items would require might that couldn’t be provided by ordinary godstones.

“To do that they would have had to spend godstones worth at least ten billion godnotes!” one of his cohorts said. “There’s no way they have that kind of wealth! The Natural Disaster Cyclical Formation Magic was destroyed! This is a huge loss!”

“Damnation,” another expert spat. “The Natural Disaster Cyclical Formation Magic requires a huge amount of souls to unleash. It’s virtually priceless. I can’t believe we tried to steal a chicken only to end up losing the rice we used to lure it. Who does Summer Vastcold have as a backer now? We have to investigate this. Supposedly, there was some mysterious expert who gave her twenty billion godnotes back in the auction. I can’t believe that her backer would then go on to give her so many godstones. What billionaire could it possibly be?”

“What the fuck!? Who the hell would use that much money just to hook up with a girl!?” Disaster Trek had an odd smile on his face as he thought about what kind of moron would waste that much money on a woman.

“Let’s go. We’ll figure out who this guy is and what he’s up to. What a pity we couldn’t get our hands on his money. With that much money, he’ll definitely attract the attention of Unbounded experts.”

With that, they left.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi and company had long since flown far away, and were in a land of beauty that looked totally different from the Heaven-Wretch Continent. Normally speaking, it should have taken them a few weeks to reach the edges of the Heaven-Wretch Continent. But with the caliber of godstones they had, it had only taken them a few hours to reach the Nacrelight Sageland.

The lands around them were covered with flowers, rivers, and mountains, and looked as beautiful as a painting. Even the clouds and sky resembled an immortal realm.

No wretch-devil would dare to barge into a place like this.

“We're safe,” Summer Vastcold said, breathing a sigh of relief. She looked at Yang Qi. “We're now in the Nacrelight Sageland, so those wretch-devils won’t be following us. They know they’ll die if they do.”

“The Nacrelight Sageland lives up to its reputation as a holy land,” Yang Qi said. “The goddesses here are enough to make anyone gasp in amazement.” At some point, Yang Qi had produced a fan with which he slowly fanned himself. “Miss Summer Vastcold, whatever you need, just let me know. If I hadn’t produced those godstones at just the right moment, I think we’d be dead already.”

He wasn’t even trying to sound humble.

The power of over a hundred Perfect Gods was such that, although he might not have been instantly defeated, and might even have been able to escape. But he had also been watching out for Summer Vastcold and the other women. Perhaps Summer Vastcold might have been able to escape from that situation, but the others wouldn’t have.

In a battle that fierce, he just couldn’t have saved everyone.

As a mid Consummate God, he could definitely kill dozens of ordinary Perfect Gods with ease. But when it came to peak Perfect Gods, or over a hundred of them together, it was a different story.

After all, two fists are no match for four hands.

Of course, if his godhood reached the Perfect God level, he wouldn’t need to fear even a host of gods of the same level as himself. He would crush them like ants.

“I wonder how many godstones you could provide, Young Sir?” Summer Vastcold asked.

“And why might you be asking a question like that, Miss?” Yang Qi replied with a faint smile. “Don’t tell me you have a need for a large number of godstones....”

“Well...” she replied awkwardly, “yes, I do. I'm about to go beg my Master to concoct the Wisdom and Knowledge God Pill. Unfortunately, part of the process will require using a signature item of our Nacrelight Sageland, the Light King God-Furnace. And that furnace requires a huge amount of godstones to operate. The more godstones it has to work with, the higher the chance of success.”

Yang Qi nodded. “I see.”

He knew that the Light King God-Furnace was a powerful god item that had once belonged to the Lord of Radiance and Light, master of Mount Radiance. And he had heard that it was a signature treasure of the Nacrelight Sageland.

“In that case, don’t worry, Miss. However many godstones you require, I can provide. Ten billion? A hundred billion? Hundreds of billions? Regardless of the amount, I can help.” Right now was the moment in which to flaunt his wealth. After all, the Mahātmā Jade was on the line, and he wasn’t planning on holding anything back.

When the words left his mouth, stars of envy glittered in the eyes of many of the young women present.

Although the women of the Nacrelight Sageland were arrogant and looked down on men, their hearts would still be stirred by the sight of someone like Yang Qi, who seemed willing to throw away any amount of money to win the attention of a woman.

Some things will never change.

Furthermore, these women had seen plenty of men who seemed generous at first, but when it came down to it, were actually stingy. Of course, Yang Qi wasn’t actually spending his own money, so how could he be stingy about it?

As far as he was concerned, money might as well have been dirt.

The female disciples were already whispering amongst themselves about the situation.

“Just how rich is this Void Qi? He’s obviously after Summer Vastcold. She isn't exactly poor, but not even a Paramount God would normally be able to provide this much money.”

“That’s right. Void Qi hardly blinked when he pulled out twenty billion godnotes and over ten billion in godstones. If he can keep this up, he must be richer than the richest Paramount God! This is going to throw the whole Nacrelight Sageland into a big uproar! There's a real moneybags going after Miss Summer Vastcold!”

“Oh, how I envy her!”

“She has no idea how lucky she is to have run into someone like Void Qi.”

Meanwhile, Summer Vastcold simply nodded in response to Yang Qi. “This is only going to be a loan, Young Sir Void Qi. After I get Unbounded will convergence, I’ll pay everything back. Summer Vastcold isn’t the type of person that takes advantage of others.”

Yang Qi smiled warmly. “I know. How could someone with a reputation as irreproachable as Miss Summer Vastcold ever care about money? Truth be told, I'm similar to you in that regard. I've never cared much for money. A true gentleman doesn’t focus on profit.”

“Oh really?” She chuckled. “I should’ve guessed that you have such high ideals. In that case, Young Sir, please come with me to meet my Master. Perhaps she’ll even give you some assistance with your cultivation base.”

“Alright!”

Yang Qi was definitely interested in meeting a Paramount God with Unbounded will. If he could get on the good side of a person like that, it would make things much easier in the Nacrelight Sageland, and would also increase his chances of finding the Mahātmā Jade.

Furthermore, he was curious to see who Summer Vastcold’s Master actually was.

The ship flew along for two days and nights, until they finally reached a place where a beautiful palace hung high in the sky, filled with the most amazing buildings. This was the headquarters of the entire Nacrelight Sageland.

The clouds were filled with flowers, and pulsed with spirit energy that was beneficial for all living beings.

“Sisters, you’re free to be on your way,” Summer Vastcold said. “After I concoct this pill, I’ll be sure to pay back all the money and resources you loaned me.”

“Sister Vastcold, as long as you reach the Unbounded level, the Vastcold Society will skyrocket to power and we’ll finally be able to dominate all the other factions. We’ll be like the Crown Prince Society from the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty. Dangerous times are coming, so to stay safe, we need an Unbounded expert!”

“That’s right. With Young Sir Void Qi’s help, you’ll definitely succeed.”

Chapter 1310: Evading Notice

Summer Vastcold led a group of ‘sisters’ who were essentially a faction within the Nacrelight Sageland, similar to the factions that existed in the House of God Ordainment.

Another similarity between the two sects was that the Nacrelight Sageland also held occasional elections to select a new leader for the sect when the old one went into retirement. When that election approached, numerous elite disciples would compete viciously for the votes of the other disciples.

It was the same with the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty as well.

The main difference in the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty was that only imperial princes qualified to compete. Many people denounced the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty for that, and some said that it limited their capacity for growth.

“And now, Young Sir Void Qi, I'll take you to see my Master,” Summer Vastcold said. “We’re currently in the primary headquarters of the Nacrelight Sageland. Don’t underestimate this palace. It's filled with countless god kingdoms and dimensions of various sizes. The people here are by no means ordinary in nature, so stick close to me and don’t get lost. If you do, you’ll be killed by whatever warding spells you stumble across.”

“A guest should act according to the host's wishes,” Yang Qi replied. “I know how these things work. Please, Miss Vastcold, lead the way.”

“Okay.”

They entered the palace, and the first thing Yang Qi noticed was that the boundless space-time within it had no violent spatial tempests. Countless spell formations had been erected to create world after world, all of which combined made up a greater megastructure.

“As you can see, every three thousand minor chiliocosms create a common chiliocosm, and every three thousand common chiliocosms create a greater chiliocosm. It’s very impressive, no?” As Summer Vastcold explained matters, she seemed to glow with a strange and lustrous radiance.

Apparently, because this was her home territory, her cultivation base received boundless blessings that increased her overall power by thirty percent.

Although this palace looked surpassingly beautiful from the outside, once on the inside, Yang Qi realized how dangerous it was. There was no way he could sneak around here like he could in the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty. The God Legion Seal couldn’t help him here; he would be immediately discovered, then killed.

So right now, it was very important to stay close to Summer Vastcold.

Worlds and god kingdoms sped by in streaks of light. To Yang Qi, it seemed as though the god kingdoms actually existed outside the god world, but at the same time, they were different from that which existed outside the god world.

Eventually, a mountain peak rose up ahead of them. And instead of a palace atop it, there was a simple grass hut, only about three meters from end to end. A woman sat cross-legged in the hut; she looked to be around thirty years of age and wore simple attire, with a plain wooden hairpin binding her hair up. Despite her modest getup, she seemed extremely refined and elegant.

This was obviously Summer Vastcold’s Master.

‘An Unbounded expert!’ Yang Qi thought. If this person saw through to his deepest secrets, it could be very troublesome. Unfortunately, he had no choice but to continue with his plan. If he wanted to get into the treasure storehouse of the Nacrelight Sageland, he would have to deal with the sect's top experts. Even when taking the Mahātmā Jade from the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty, he had still been forced to earn the trust of Nie Yinyang first.

“This is my Master, Mother Voidwalker,” Summer Vastcold said. “She’s one of the boundless chief elders of the Nacrelight Sageland, an Unbounded expert who’s currently seeking enlightenment of the Paramount God level. When the conditions are right, I fully believe she’ll achieve her next breakthrough.”

Yang Qi nodded. “Right. Having reached the Unbounded level of will convergence, it’s a given that she’ll reach the Paramount God level.” Clasping hands with full respect, he said, “I am your humble servant, Void Qi. Please accept my greetings, Mother Voidwalker.”

Mother Voidwalker glanced briefly at Yang Qi, but declined to respond to him. Instead, she said, “Why did you bring a man here, Vastcold?”

“Master, this Young Sir Void Qi offered me immense help. Without him, I wouldn’t have acquired the flower of wisdom. Furthermore, I was ambushed on the way back, and only escaped thanks to the godstones he provided.”

Having heard this, Mother Voidwalker looked back at Yang Qi with glittering eyes.

“Let me explain further,” Summer Vastcold said. “Young Sir Void Qi is definitely not a bad person. Furthermore, he has the legacy of the Lord of Civilization, which could be of immense help to me.”

“The Lord of Civilization?” Mother Voidwalker said, her expression flickering.

Yang Qi could sense that this woman was incomparably powerful. When her will touched him, he felt immobilized down to the tips of his fingers. Her psychic power entered his pores and swept through him, making him feel like little more than a marionette under her control.

‘Unbounded will convergence is incredible,’ he thought. He had previously assumed that he wasn’t that far separated from the actual Unbounded level. But now he realized that not even the Wretched Brain God Art would be enough to fight against an Unbounded expert. And that was even more so the case if he wanted to keep his secrets.

If he revealed his secrets and drew on the powers of the God Legion Seal, then he would have hundreds of moves that he could use to hold his own against this woman. But ultimately, that would be suicide.

Thankfully, he knew how to keep his godhood and will convergence hidden in his sea of energy.

As for the body he was using, it was of such a mysterious origin that no one would be able to pierce its secrets, no matter how much godpower they poured into it.

Thanks to all these things, Yang Qi was safe from Mother Voidwalker’s inspection.

Of course, when she sent her Unbounded will into him and didn’t find any traces of his thoughts, will, or godhood, she immediately focused on his sea of energy, only to find that it was like a gobblewock that could insatiably devour psychic power.

Even her Unbounded will was gobbled up.

Shocked, she thought, ‘What’s going on here? What kind of body is this?’ She quickly retracted her psychic power, not wanting to lose any more of it than necessary.

“Just who exactly are you?” she asked.

“I'm not sure what you mean, Senior,” Yang Qi said, looking confused. “Oh, wait, I get it. You’re wondering about my body. You see, the lingering will of the Lord of Civilization remolded it, which is why you probably found your godpower vanishing when you inspected it.”

“You were remolded by the lingering will of the Lord of Civilization?” Mother Voidwalker said, a strange expression on her face. “Are you aware that your body is actually on the level of a Paramount God? In fact, I don’t even think it belongs to you. It’s definitely the work of the Lord of Civilization, which surpasses anything we can even imagine. He cultivated to the peak of the Unbounded level, and was also a peak Paramount God, making him tens of thousands of times more powerful even than me. Alright, tell me the truth. What’s your interest in Vastcold?”

“I hate the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty with a passion, Senior. If you’re going to accuse me of having any other motives, I should probably just leave.” Clasping hands respectfully, he turned to leave.

However, before he could do anything, Mother Voidwalker waved her finger, and he felt immense power weighing down on him, immobilizing him.

“Senior, what are you doing?” he said, plastering a look of shock onto his face.

“Just giving you a little test,” she said. “You see, there are a lot of scoundrels in this world, people who try to get close to my beautiful apprentices to take advantage of them. Therefore, I'm always on guard against such wicked people.”

“I understand that,” Yang Qi replied carefully. “But Senior, I can guarantee that I don’t harbor any such thoughts. I really just want to hurt the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty. That’s why I wanted to make friends with Miss Vastcold. Helping her reach the Unbounded level will be helping myself. If I could have a friend that was an Unbounded expert, then I would truly have a good behind-the-scenes supporter.”

“Yeah, that’s right, Master,” Summer Vastcold said. “Young Sir Void Qi promised to help me with that Wisdom and Knowledge God Pill.”

“Oh? Wisdom and Knowledge God Pill?” Mother Voidwalker looked at Yang Qi again. “Your cultivation base is a bit low to talk about concocting a pill like that.”

“Young Sir Void Qi is offering to provide holy caliber godstones to power the spell formations in the Light King God-Furnace, thus significantly increasing the chances of success. It would be a huge shame to have spent so much on the flower of wisdom, only to fail in concocting the pill. Flowers of wisdom only show up once every ten thousand years or so. Who knows when another one will appear.”

It was a given that Summer Vastcold didn’t want Yang Qi to just walk off.

Mother Voidwalker nodded. “He must be quite wealthy to have godstones like that. Unfortunately, I still haven’t finished preparing all the ingredients. When I've done so, I’ll call on your Sect Uncles to help concoct the pill.

“It’s going to take a few months. During that time, you and Young Sir Void Qi can get to know each other a bit better. Considering he has the legacy of the Lord of Civilization, you two could benefit a lot from each other. Perhaps share some daoist techniques and cultivation methods. The more you prepare to use that Wisdom and Knowledge God Pill, the more likely it is that you’ll reach the Unbounded level.”

With that, Mother Voidwalker vanished into thin air, leaving Summer Vastcold and Yang Qi alone.

‘Looks like I passed the test,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘Now I just need to use the time I've bought to learn more about the Nacrelight Sageland, and hopefully find the location of the Mahātmā Jade.”

Chapter 1311: High Priestess

Yang Qi had passed the deep inspection of Mother Voidwalker, an Unbounded expert.

Now he felt free to do as he wished, although he knew he still couldn’t act rashly. If he wanted to survive in the Nacrelight Sageland, he needed to continue earning trust. That was the only way he would get into the treasure storehouse and ultimately secure that piece of the Mahātmā Jade.

He was in no hurry. He could be patient in his effort to get the jade, especially considering that, once he got it, he was fairly certain he would immediately achieve Unbounded will.

After encountering the Unbounded will convergence of Mother Voidwalker, he knew more than ever how important it was to reach that level himself. His current cultivation base simply wasn’t high enough to deal with someone that powerful.

Seeing Yang Qi standing there, lost in thought, Summer Vastcold smiled and said, “Young Sir Void Qi, if you have nothing else to do, why not come with me for a tour of the Nacrelight Sageland? I can show you the scenery.”

Yang Qi smiled. “That sounds wonderful.”

With that, he followed her as she flew up into the clouds.

“By the way, Miss Vastcold, exactly how many factions are there in the Nacrelight Sageland? And which ones are problems for you? The more I know, the more I can help you avoid any dangerous situations.”

“You know a lot about faction infighting?” she asked in surprise. “Aren’t you from a confucian college? I thought you people avoided forming factions, and focused on mutual study and philosophizing.”

“Times change,” he replied. “Even philosophers have to form factions to defend their interests. Furthermore, I saw a lot of faction infighting in the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty. There was very bitter conflict. Blood flowed. In any case, all of the confucian academies, including the Truth Academy, the Righteousness Academy, the Noble Academy, the Heavenly Serenity Academy, the White Rainbow Academy... they all have factions in them.”

“I suppose you’re right. We live in an era in which factions proliferate, and the Nacrelight Sageland is no exception. Much of it has to do with our next election. Alright, let me explain some more. I'm the leader of the Vastcold Society, one of over a hundred thousand factions in the sect. Most are only second or third tier, or even smaller. But the Vastcold Society is a first-tier faction, of which there are only about ten. And the leaders of those all hope to win the coming election.”

“Are there superpower factions?” Yang Qi asked. In the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty, the Crown Prince Society was led by the crown prince, who was already in the Unbounded level. And if the Nacrelight Sageland was considered a major enemy of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty, it only made sense that they would have someone like that. “If I were a betting man, I would guess that the Nacrelight Sageland has a faction leader with Unbounded will convergence.”

“That’s right. The Eternal-Life God-Dynasty has the Crown Prince Society, and Nacrelight Sageland is no weaker. In fact, we actually have two leaders with Unbounded will convergence. One is the Clairvoyance Society, led by Summer Clairvoyance, who was in the Unbounded level long before the crown prince of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty, yet isn’t a Paramount God. The other Unbounded expert is Summer Heartless, who leads the Heartless Society, and long since earned the legacy of Mister Heartless from ancient times.”

“Mister Heartless?”

Yang Qi remembered that in ancient times, there had been an expert who was considered both righteous and evil at the same time, yet neither righteous nor evil. He had been called Mister Heartless, and although he couldn't quite compare to King Immortal-Slayer, the Sovereign Lord, the True Devil, Wretch God Ultimate, or the Demon Master, he had still been extremely famous. In fact, he very nearly earned the title of lord.

In other words, he was on par with the Lord of Radiance and Light, the Lord of the Sword Dao, the Lord of Civilization, and the other lords like them.

“Summer Clairvoyance. Summer Heartless.” Yang Qi smiled. “The old saying claims that clairvoyance stems from the heart. Considering one of these faction leaders is ‘heartless’, it’s obvious they’re destined to oppose each other. Miss Vastcold, you definitely have to reach the Unbounded level as soon as possible. Then there will be three superpower factions in the sect.”

“I completely agree,” she said. “Right now, the Vastcold Society isn’t strong enough to tangle with them. That said, there are plenty of other factions that cause problems for us. For instance, the Melodic Rhythm Society, the Elegance Society, the Soundfyre Society, the Nacre Zither Society, and so on. We're constantly clashing with them. The upside is that none of their leaders have any hope of reaching the Unbounded level.”

As she gave these explanations, she also interspersed some introductions regarding the various god kingdoms filling the Nacrelight Sageland. “That god kingdom is occupied by the Law Enforcement God Temple. Over there is the Scripture Pavilion. And that's the Missions Pavilion....”

The basic layout was actually very similar to the House of God Ordainment.

That said, all huge sects were similar in many ways. After millions upon millions of years went by, optimal sect management methods would be identified and broadly adopted. It was similar to how the process of evolution had led to the five viscera and six bowels in humans.

All sects had divisions devoted to law enforcement, missions, thralls, slaves, scriptures, and the like. Without such things, a sect simply wouldn’t be complete.

“See that god kingdom over there? It's different from the others. It’s called the Supplication God Temple. Supposedly, it facilitates communication with the god world itself, and is a creation unique to the Nacrelight Sageland. If disciples go in there and pray with complete piety, they can receive blessings from ancient times. Of course, it all comes down to piety and destiny, with destiny being the most important factor. Disciples with the proper destiny to pray in the Supplication God Temple can rise from Lesser Gods to Greater Gods. Disciples without the right destiny could pray in there for hundreds of years without benefiting at all.”

“Supplication God Temple?” Yang Qi said, surprised. “Was it created by the founder of the Nacrelight Sageland?”

“Good guess. The founder was a member of the ancient halls of heaven, and a subordinate of the Sovereign Lord. His High Priestess, who officiated over rites and ceremonies. Back then, the countless members of the legion of gods would come to offer formal greetings to the Sovereign Lord, and the High Priestess would oversee it all. And that’s the origin of the Supplication God Temple.

“I went in there once to pray, which is how I broke through to the Consummate God level so quickly. Normally it would’ve taken a long time, but with the boost in power from ancient times, I succeeded. Unfortunately, you’re not a disciple of the Nacrelight Sageland, so you aren’t allowed inside.”

The truth was that Yang Qi was completely bowled over by what he had just learned. How could he have guessed that the founder of the Nacrelight Sageland was actually the High Priestess who served the Sovereign Lord himself?

According to legend, the Sovereign Lord had two subordinates who could be considered his primary assistants. One was the King of Godmammoths, and the other was the High Priestess.

The King of Godmammoths was a font of power who suppressed hell, while the High Priestess oversaw rites and ceremonies of all kinds. In mundane terms, the King of Godmammoths was the generalissimo, and the High Priestess was the prime minister. Together, they were a combination of the martial and the civil.

‘If the Nacrelight Sageland was founded by the High Priestess,’ Yang Qi thought, ‘then it must be filled with immense secrets. I wonder if I’ll have time to visit that Supplication God Temple.’

“Up ahead is the Warfare God Temple, which is a huge god kingdom where disciples can practice fighting and warfare. And if any disciples have personal vendettas or grudges, they can go there to fight things out. Of course, some people just go in to watch the excitement. Do you want to take a look?”

The god kingdom of which Summer Vastcold spoke fairly bristled with killing energy.

“Sure. Sounds interesting.” The House of God Ordainment had no location such as this, and in fact, disciples there weren’t even allowed to fight each other. Personal disputes had to be resolved in the Law Enforcement God Temple, which oftentimes led to unfair results.

Some matters were best handled between the two parties involved.

As soon as they entered, a beam of intense light shot toward them as if to bar their path. However, when the people in the beam of light realized it was Summer Vastcold, they came to a stop.

“Well, if it isn’t the leader of the Vastcold Society, Summer Vastcold.” It was a woman who had spoken, and she held a jade flute in her hand. She was flanked by a group of young men and women. The men were all young elites in the sect; Yang Qi hadn’t been in the Nacrelight Sageland for long, but he had already come to realize that although the women here didn't accept male disciples, and claimed to hate men, the situation was more complicated. Young men would still come here to woo the women, and they would sometimes stay as guests. And because of that, the young women often had groups of men who clung to them and acted like dharmic guards.

“The leader of the Soundfyre Society,” Summer Vastcold said. “Summer Soundfyre! Are you also here to watch the fighting in the Warfare God Temple?”

“Didn’t you hear, Summer Vastcold? There’s a big match being fought today. Summer Speechice and Summer Voice are here representing their respective factions, who recently discovered an ancient treasure trove filled with tens of billions of godnotes. The fighting over it resulted in a lot of casualties, therefore, the grudge can only be resolved here in the Warfare God Temple. Whoever wins will get the treasure trove! How could I not show up for a spectacle like this?” Looking at Yang Qi, Summer Soundfyre continued in a sinister voice, “Well, you must be Young Sir Void Qi, am I right? I heard that you helped Summer Vastcold get that flower of wisdom, and even loaned her twenty billion godnotes to do it.”

Chapter 1312: Complicated Circumstances

It was a bit of a surprise to have run into another faction leader so quickly.

Summer Soundfyre clearly had a profound cultivation base, and was no weaker than Summer Vastcold. By now, Yang Qi realized that all the young women in the Nacrelight Sageland were surnamed “Summer”, the reason being that the High Priestess was also surnamed Summer. Anyone who joined the Nacrelight Sageland would change their name to match.

The women in the sect were all surpassingly beautiful, and the leaders stood head and shoulders above the rest of the disciples. As for this Summer Soundfyre, she moved with entrancing grace and splendor, and was surrounded by an intoxicatingly fragrant aroma. A natural result of the bewitching techniques cultivated in the Nacrelight Sageland, it could entrance any man who encountered it.

Just being in Summer Soundfyre’s presence caused warmth to spread through Yang Qi, and filled his mind with strange thoughts.

‘Hmph!’ He snorted coldly inwardly to clear his thoughts. However, he didn’t let anything show on his face other than a faint smile. “I am your humble servant, Void Qi. I performed a minor favor for Miss Vastcold, nothing more.”

Standing firmly in their path, Summer Soundfyre said, “You dropped billions without even thinking about it. That’s wealth that most people would fight to the death over. Not even Paramount Gods could talk lightly about that much money. Just what exactly is your family background, Void Qi?”

“What does his family background have to do with you?” Summer Vastcold said coldly. “He’s my friend, Summer Soundfyre, so don’t even think of stirring up trouble for him. That will only cause more friction between our two factions.”

Summer Soundfyre laughed. “That's the wrong attitude, little sister Vastcold. Good things should be shared. If you’ve found a rich young patron, you shouldn’t be keeping him to yourself. I think all of us should benefit, don’t you agree, Young Sir Void Qi? I’ve been running low on cash recently, maybe you can loan me a few billion godnotes. I’ll be sure to pay you back later.”

The other young men and women flanking Summer Soundfyre burst into laughter, and one of the men said, “With money, you can do anything, right, boy? Unfortunately, while having money is nice, it’s nothing compared to power and cultivation level. Without them, how can you keep your money safe? How about you fork over thirty or forty billion godnotes to give to our Soundfyre Society as protection money? We’ll make sure nobody goes after your wealth.”

“Oh really?” Yang Qi said, looking the man up and down. He was a Consummate God with a faint destiny that seemed to imply he had an impressive background. Leaning over to Summer Vastcold, Yang Qi asked, “Who is this guy?”

“He’s an expert from the Proud Clan named Proud Realm, who’s been chasing Summer Soundfyre for some time now. She’s simply toying with him, forcing him to spend huge amounts of wealth on her. But he seems to enjoy it, and doesn’t complain at all. That said, his energy arts are impressive, so be careful.”

Summer Vastcold obviously wasn’t going to underestimate him. He was “only” a man, but he was still an early Consummate God, with impressive godhood and even more impressive connections. Obviously, ordinary people couldn’t possibly tangle with him.

‘An expert from the Proud Clan? You can wear out iron shoes in a fruitless search, then find what you're looking for without even trying!’ Yang Qi thought back to when he had first arrived in the god world, and encountered a member of the Proud Clan in the Lightningbolt Continent. Of course, it was only a member of an auxiliary branch, one so obscure it was possible the headquarters didn’t even know it existed.

In contrast, this Proud Realm was a Consummate God, which meant that he surely had an important standing in his clan. Perhaps he even knew something about Proud Heaven.

Looking at Proud Realm, Yang Qi said, “What did you just say? You want me to give you billions of godnotes? I'm happy to talk business with Miss Summer Soundfyre, but do you really think I want to hear some fool like you jabber in my ear? What a joke!”

WHOOSH!

Yang Qi blurred into motion, piercing through space in the blink of an eye and appearing right in front of Proud Realm, where he unleashed a vicious palm toward the man’s face.

Proud Realm sensed the killing intent surrounding him and knew he had almost no time to react.

“Hidden Universe!” he shouted, unleashing a killing move that caused energy to swirl around him, taking the shape of a nascent universe. Flickering lights surrounded him, as though an entire universe was collapsing as radiance and light fought darkness and gloom.

Yang Qi was shocked as he realized that his opponent was fighting with something that resembled Proud Heaven’s Ten Universes. It was different, but seemed to have similar origins; it apparently connected to some mighty plane of existence, which provided the power for an immense attack.

‘This is a move the likes of which no ordinary person could possibly evade. Thankfully, I have experience dealing with the Ten Universes. Furthermore, I’ve put a huge amount of thought into analyzing how to deal with it. Considering that, dealing with this punk won’t be difficult at all.’ His hands shifted back and forth between being blades, whips, and cudgels as he targeted what he knew was a central power nexus in the Hidden Universe move. His move struck home and the nascent universe exploded, sending a massive, chaotic shock wave out in all directions.

SPLAT!

A glob of blood erupted from Proud Realm’s mouth as he was flung dozens of kilometers in the opposite direction, cracking sounds ringing out as his meridians and godhood shattered.

Yang Qi glided back to Summer Vastcold’s side. Flicking his sleeve, he said, “Everything’s fine. I smacked the pesky fly away.”

‘This guy is incredible,’ she thought. ‘I assumed he was rich, but lacking in strength and energy arts. In fact, I thought that was why he was currying favor with me, because he wanted protection in the Nacrelight Sageland. Who could ever have guessed that he’s actually this powerful?’ The brief exchange had completely changed Summer Vastcold’s impression of Yang Qi.

“You vanquished the energy arts of the Proud Clan?” she said. “The founder of that clan is extremely mysterious, and provided them with extremely enigmatic energy arts. Even I would have to work hard to handle Proud Realm. But you defeated his killing Hidden Universe move without even breaking a sweat?”

“I just got lucky,” Yang Qi said, declining to explain, which only furthered his air of mystique.

“Well, go help him up and give him some of these medicinal pills. Then send him back to the Proud Clan.” As Yang Qi complied, Summer Vastcold continued, “It's a big surprise to find that you’re not just wealthy, Young Sir Void Qi. You also have a shocking cultivation base, making you more than strong enough to protect yourself. That said, you would still be in danger if you encountered an Unbounded enemy.”

Yang Qi smiled faintly. “I'm not too worried. I'm fully confident that once you reach the Unbounded level, I’ll have nothing to fear from anyone.” Of course, his words were very pleasing to her.

Meanwhile, Summer Soundfyre chuckled harshly. “Sounds like you’re taking a gamble, Young Sir Void Qi, In the end, Wisdom and Knowledge God Pills aren’t easy to concoct. Even with your help, there’s only a fifty percent chance of success. And if the pill fails, you’ll have lost your investment.”

“Nonsense.” Summer Vastcold said. “The Wisdom and Knowledge God Pill won’t fail. You just wait, Summer Soundfyre. Once I’m an Unbounded expert, I’ll do everything in my power to dismantle your faction and make you one of my subordinates.”

“Nothing is certain. Even if you concoct the Wisdom and Knowledge God Pill and consume it, there’s still only a fifty percent chance that you’ll achieve your breakthrough. And you’ll also have to deal with the tribulations. There have been plenty of people throughout the history of the Nacrelight Sageland who have gathered all of the precious materials needed to reach the Unbounded level. But how many of them succeeded? Relying on medicinal pills is an easy way to experience cultivation deviation.” Smiling radiantly, she said, “I have a proposal, Young Sir Void Qi. You see, I like gambling as well. So why not meet me at the Destined Marriage God Temple later tonight? I’ll be waiting.”

With that, she turned and left with her retinue.

“We got really unlucky today,” Summer Vastcold said, her face ashen from anger. “Let’s go. I'm not interested in staying here in the Warfare God Temple.”

“What's the Destined Marriage Temple?” Yang Qi asked.

“Summer Soundfyre said she’d wait for you there, are you going to take her up on it?” Summer Vastcold asked.

He turned up his nose. “Like hell I well. You think I take orders from her?”

She laughed. “Actually, I think you need to go. I give you my permission.”

“What?!” Yang Qi said, putting on a front of being extremely confused. “Hold on, what’s going on here?”

“Oh, nothing. She just wants you to hedge your bets, right? Who knows, maybe she’ll be the one to reach the Unbounded level first.”

In response, Yang Qi threw his head back and laughed heartily.

“What’s so funny?” she said, obviously not sure what he was laughing about. “You think I'm joking or something?”

“You want me to probe her for more information,” Yang Qi said bluntly. “She didn't seem nervous at all when you mentioned the Wisdom and Knowledge God Pill, so now you’re wondering if there’s some conspiracy afoot. After all, whoever reaches the Unbounded level first will obviously be able to crush the other. If you know yourself and know your enemy, you’ll always be victorious, right?”

“You’re very smart!” Summer Vastcold said. “You pick up on things quickly, and you understand what I'm thinking. There’s much more to you than meets the eye, Void Qi.”

Chapter 1313: Destined Marriage God Temple

How could someone as experienced as Yang Qi not be able to tell what Summer Vastcold was thinking? Of course, there was no way that she would simply trust him immediately. She was no fool. Considering the ridiculous amount of wealth he’d showered on her, it was obvious he had ulterior motives that went beyond his desire to defy the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty.

And as an experienced faction leader, she was fully capable of playing games.

The fact that Summer Soundfyre had invited Yang Qi to the Destined Marriage God Temple had created the perfect opportunity to get more information. Not only might she get more information about Summer Soundfyre’s position, but she could also learn more about Yang Qi and his motives. Who wouldn’t want to kill two birds with one stone in this way?

As for Yang Qi, he wasn't so full of himself that he assumed people would just instantly fall in love with him.

Of course, that wasn’t his goal anyway. Once he had created a relationship so deep that Summer Vastcold and her faction had to stick by his side, he would be able to make a move on the Mahātmā Jade.

Furthermore, the more godstones and godnotes he threw at them, the more suspicious they would be, and the less inclined they would be to trust him. He was playing with fire, and knew he had to be very careful. If they learned the truth, they would definitely start thinking about taking advantage of him.

“Fine, I’ll meet her,” Yang Qi said. “That said, Miss Vastcold, I hope that after you reach the Unbounded level, you can help me with a certain matter. It won’t involve betraying your sect, nor will it be a violation of morality and justice. What do you say? If you agree, then going forward, I’ll do everything in my power to help you.”

She smiled. “So, that’s how it is. Well, I guessed that you had a reason for getting on my good side, Young Sir Void Qi. Only a complete moron would throw away tens of billions for no reason. What exactly do you need my help with?”

“It’s nothing too important, and I’d actually hoped to wait until you reached the Unbounded level to explain. Basically, I need someone to help me open the Lord of Civilization’s treasure storehouse.” In order to dispel Summer Vastcold’s suspicions, Yang Qi had to make up a story that was fantastic, but at the same time believable. If he kept her in the dark, she would be constantly on guard and worried. But if he told her something that could alleviate her concerns, it would loosen tensions and make it much easier to work with her.

“You want to open the treasure storehouse of the Lord of Civilization?!” Summer Vastcold seemed surprised. “Wait, do you mean that only someone with Unbounded will convergence can open it?”

He nodded solemnly. “That’s right. Specifically, only my own Unbounded will can open it.”

“Then what do you need my help for? Don’t tell me you think I'm going to give you my Wisdom and Knowledge God Pill.” She chuckled coldly.

He shook his head. “No, I wouldn’t do anything like that. It’s going to be very difficult for me to reach the Unbounded level, and the Wisdom and Knowledge God Pill won’t help. I need something else!”

“Oh, what is it?”

“The treasure storehouse has the Engine of the One God, and within it, the imperial-heaven pre-beginning systems. With that, I can reform my constitution and push my will convergence to a higher level.” He smiled faintly. “I'm sure you know a few of the secrets of the Cruiser of Civilization.”

“Yes, I do,” she replied.

“And isn’t there a piece of the cruiser in the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty’s treasure storehouse?”

“Oh, you know about that too?” Suddenly, everything clicked for her. “Are you saying the reason you’re targeting the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty is because of that?”

“Yes, exactly. The truth is that I need someone who I can trust, an expert with Unbounded will convergence, to join me in a dual cultivation technique that will make me seem like an Unbounded expert. Then I can get into that treasure storehouse. Of course, you’ll also be able to have your pick of the treasure.”

“So that’s how it is. And why exactly do you think you can trust me?” She still seemed a bit suspicious.

“Because I'm a good judge of character. Also, the Nacrelight Sageland is an orthodox sect. You people won’t murder others just to get treasure. Besides, I plan to spend more time getting to know you. Once we’re actually friends, I’ll actually be able to trust you.” Yang Qi was wording things so well that he had almost convinced himself of what he was saying.

His skill at lying had long since reached the ultimate level.

“Now I understand,” she said. “In that case, I feel a bit better. Fine, let’s team up. But first, you have to do everything you can to help me reach the Unbounded level.”

“A word once spoken...” Yang Qi said, extending his hand.

“... cannot be taken back even by a team of four horses,” Summer Vastcold finished, reaching out with her own beautiful, delicate hand to clasp his. With that, they formalized their agreement and reached a temporary position of mutual trust.

“You have to be very careful with Summer Soundfyre. She’s not going to be easy to deal with....” As they continued along, Summer Vastcold went on to explain many details about Summer Soundfyre.

Meanwhile, off in the distance, Summer Soundfyre and her people were talking about Yang Qi.

“Elder Sister Soundfyre, that Void Qi is truly incredible. Where exactly is he from? He actually defeated Proud Realm with a single move! It’s hard to tell what level he’s really at. After all, Proud Realm is an early Consummate God.”

“Whatever,” Summer Soundfyre said. “Proud Realm is scum who used a bunch of medicinal pills from the Proud Clan to achieve his breakthroughs. If I didn’t need to give face to the Proud Clan, I wouldn’t give him the time of day. That said, I'm definitely interested in this Void Qi. I wonder who he really is.”

“Elder Sister, are you really going to meet him tonight at the Destined Marriage God Temple?” another female disciple asked. “That’s where couples usually go for dates. Isn’t that going to give people the impression you’re interested in him? Rumors will fly! You’re an expert at manipulating men, but you’ve never had a date with someone at the Destined Marriage God Temple. So why are you starting now?”

“It’s not a big deal,” Summer Soundfyre replied coolly. “He’s obviously key to Summer Vastcold’s plan for her breakthrough. As long as I can get him on our side, and get access to his wealth, our Soundfyre Society will be able to move on to the next phase of our plan. Hmph! I'm definitely going to reach the Unbounded level before Summer Vastcold!”

“But how are you going to deal with him, Elder Sister?”

“Oh, I have my ways. Suffice to say, this meeting at the Destined Marriage God Temple is only to get an idea of what he's capable of.”

“But Elder Sister, what if Void Qi doesn't show up?”

Summer Soundfyre laughed. “He’ll definitely show up. If nothing else, Summer Vastcold will want to get more information about me, so she’ll make him meet me. Trust me, I know her all too well.”

Later that night....

It was evening, with only a bit of light left on the horizon, and a host of twinkling stars overhead. It provided a very romantic backdrop. The Destined Marriage God Temple of the Nacrelight Sageland was a place filled with beautiful, ancient statues, as well as inscriptions of poetry and countless fresh flowers. It was clearly a place devoted to romantic love, a location where people would whisper sweet nothings into each other’s ears.

There were couples everywhere, and the atmosphere was filled with romance. Originally, it had been a location where female disciples would come to be married, but now it was mostly used for dating.

Normally speaking, when a young woman felt sparks with a young man, she would invite him here to see if true romance would blossom.

“Hey everyone, look! That’s the leader of the Soundfyre Society, Summer Soundfyre. I can’t believe she's here for a date! Don’t tell me....”

“Summer Soundfyre usually manipulates men, nothing more. So why is she bringing one here for a date? Hasn’t she sworn off all men in existence?”

“There’s no man in existence who’ll ever win Summer Soundfyre’s heart,” a man said. “It’s hard to say how many men have fallen for her schemes.”

As soon as Summer Soundfyre looked over at the gossipers, they went as silent as cicadas in winter and hurried away to other corners of the chapel.

WHOOSH!

A moment later, Yang Qi approached her.

“I knew you’d come,” she said, smiling at him. “At first, you didn’t want to, but Summer Vastcold convinced you to come fish for information.”

“Impressive. You guessed exactly right. Now that I've done what she asked by coming here, I'm done.” With that, he turned to leave.

“Hold on,” she said hurriedly. “Maybe we can come to an agreement.”

“You and Summer Vastcold are archenemies. Meanwhile, I'm just getting to know her. If I suddenly start working with you, it would ruin my relationship with her.” He waved his hand dismissively. “Forget it. I'm not interested in standing with a foot in two different boats. It might seem fun, but I’d only make a fool of myself in trying to be clever. Besides, getting mixed up with you two will only get me killed.”

“Look, I know what you’re after. You want to help Summer Vastcold reach the Unbounded level so she can help you with some task. Unfortunately, you’ve bet on the wrong party. How about you help me reach the Unbounded level instead? If you tie yourself to her, you’re just going to make it harder on yourself in the future.”

“You want to reach the Unbounded level?” He stopped and looked back, his eyes glittering. “And how exactly do you plan to do that?”

“Simple. Aren’t you aware of Summer Vastcold’s secret weapon? Her whole plan revolves around that Wisdom and Knowledge God Pill. But I don’t care about that. You see, I know for a fact that I’ll reach the Unbounded level before her. Want to know my secret?”

“What?” he said. “You’re saying you have some secret weapon too? Don’t tell me you have something superior to a Wisdom and Knowledge God Pill.”

“I’ll tell you in a moment. First, we have something else to discuss.” Summer Soundfyre had slowly but surely seized the initiative in their conversation.

Chapter 1314: History

“What exactly do you have to say, Miss Soundfyre?” Yang Qi said, his expression softening. Of course, he was simply putting on a show. None of these people could possibly guess what he was really planning. As someone who had experienced so many things in life, how could he possibly let people like these understand his true motives?

Only outstanding people like King Immortal-Slayer, or perhaps other Paramount Gods, could possibly read into Yang Qi true thoughts and motives.

Shoulder to shoulder, the two of them strolled through the temple, which was actually a god kingdom in its own right. It had its own sky full of glittering stars, and at the moment, a meteor shower was making it look particularly beautiful, almost reminiscent of the godhood stars in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

As Yang Qi looked around, he realized that whoever created this place had combined the diametrically opposed daos of love and heartlessness into one, creating a unique dao of heaven that was simultaneously emotional and emotionless. Its structure was strong and tight, such that it couldn’t easily be broken. That said, Yang Qi had already reached the level of being able to pierce through god kingdoms.

If he were back in the god kingdom of the House of God Ordainment, he could easily destroy the place. However, this Destined Marriage God Temple was vastly stronger than that, and was something he couldn’t deal with as easily.

Right now, he definitely couldn't destroy it.

“Young Sir Void Qi, do you know much about the history of the Destined Marriage God Temple?”

“The person who created the Destined Marriage God Temple was no minor figure,” Yang Qi said, looking visibly surprised by what he was seeing. “Who could possibly create a place like this?”

“You have sharp eyes, Young Sir Void Qi,” Summer Soundfyre said with a sigh of admiration. “Truth be told, the Destined Marriage God Temple is the most profound and enigmatic location in our entire sect, even surpassing the Supplication God Temple. Originally, it should never even have come to exist in the Nacrelight Sageland, and it wouldn’t have, save for a heaven-shaking, earth-shattering event.”

“What event was that?” Yang Qi asked curiously.

“As you already know, Young Sir, the Nacrelight Sageland originally had strict rules enforcing the hatred of men. Any man who came to this place would be executed without hesitation. And the women here weren’t permitted to have dealings with any man, upon penalty of death. But things are different now. Men are allowed to come here to woo our disciples, which indicates that somewhere along the line, there was a major change. Doesn’t that pique your curiosity?”

“It does. It must’ve been a very dramatic change, something akin to a revolution. Although, I can’t imagine there having been an actual civil war. The Nacrelight Sageland does indeed have the reputation of hating men, but after coming here I realized that things were different. And now I’ve come to find that the Destined Marriage God Temple is a place for love and romance. It’s almost too much to believe. Furthermore, I met Vastcold’s Master, Mother Voidwalker, who seems to cling to the tradition of hating men.”

“Long, long ago, there was a woman in the Nacrelight Sageland who was named Summer Sentimental, who fell in love with a man from the outside. Back then, the women of the Nacrelight Sageland had strict instructions to either kill or enslave any men they encountered. Even speaking to a man unnecessarily was considered a big crime. So what do you think they did to that woman? The chief elders arrested her, threw her in prison, and sentenced her to death.”

Looking around at the Destined Marriage God Temple, Summer Soundfyre continued explaining the history of the place. “However, Summer Sentimental’s man came right here and demanded that his lover be handed over. It led to a massive battle in which nine Unbounded experts all teamed up against him. In fact, the three top matriarchs of the sect joined the fight, all of them Paramount Gods. Yet, despite all of that, the man destroyed the spell formation and saved his lover. The three matriarchs, who were all top apprentices of the High Priestess, subsequently changed the rules of the sect to allow for romantic relationships. The Destined Marriage God Temple was built by that very man who’d come to rescue his lover, and it’s survived untouched for hundreds of millions of years. Many elite experts of the sect tried to destroy it, but none have succeeded. And in fact, their efforts caused them such grief that, eventually, no one dared to do anything to it. Nor has anyone dared to reinstitute the previous rules of the sect demanding that all men be killed. After all, everyone feared the return of the man who created the Destined Marriage God Temple.”

“Did this man have a name?” Yang Qi asked. After all, the Nacrelight Sageland of the past must have been vastly more powerful than the current incarnation, yet that man had single-handedly taken it on.

How powerful must the apprentices of the High Priestess have been?

Of course, Yang Qi had met people who were close to the level of King Immortal-Slayer, the Sovereign Lord, and the High Priestess. Furthermore, Yang Immortal-Slayer was currently an apprentice of King Immortal-Slayer, and his future successor.

“He had no name, and no one knows who he was or where he came from. In fact, after all the time that’s passed, many experienced and knowledgeable Paramount Gods have weighed in on the subject, and even run investigations, all to no avail. Those were the years during which chaos reigned, and war raged between the Sovereign Lord, High Priestess, King Immortal-Slayer, and various ancient God-Lords. Many major gods vanished during those dark ages. Great figures rose, and great figures fell. In any case, the three matriarchs of the sect offered sacrifices and prayer to the fallen High Priestess, who responded by saying that the man was a Fateless One, therefore it was impossible to learn anything about him or his fate.”

‘What?!’ Yang Qi thought, stunned. At first, the story hadn’t seemed to be anything special. A woman fell in love with a powerful man and was subsequently imprisoned by her sect, then rescued by the man, who then forced the sect to acknowledge him.

But then he found out that this ‘nameless’ man was a Fateless One, and Yang Qi realized that the story wasn’t so simple after all. After all, he was also a Fateless One, and as far as he knew, there wasn’t anyone else like him. Two tigers cannot live on one mountain, and generally speaking, there couldn’t be two Fateless Ones in the same era.

If there was another Fateless One, did that person have some connection to Yang Qi?

Where was he from? Apparently, not even the High Priestess’ apprentices had ever learned anything about him. And it seemed unlikely that the perished High Priestess’s lingering psyche would be mistaken about the man being a Fateless One.

Numerous thoughts were running through Yang Qi’s mind, but in the end, he couldn’t reach any conclusions. That said, he had the feeling that his journey to the Nacrelight Sageland was going to result in some dramatic upheavals. And he had the feeling that even if he tried to abandon this mission right now, he would surely get dragged into whatever storm was brewing.

Besides, he had no intention of leaving. He needed to get the Mahātmā Jade, become a Paramount God, then ultimately shake off the fetters of the God Legion Seal and the Unspoiled Body to reach the Annulled level.

Seeing Yang Qi standing there silently, Summer Soundfyre asked, “What are you thinking?”

Of course, there was no way she would ever guess that he was a Fateless One.

“I’m wondering what kind of man he was,” Yang Qi replied calmly. “The Nacrelight Sageland carries on the core teachings and doctrines of the High Priestess, who was a contemporary of the King of Godmammoths, and served alongside him as a key subordinate of the Sovereign Lord. Yet not even her top three apprentices could pierce this mysterious man’s secrets. There are a lot of ‘nameless’ experts in the god world, hidden here and there.”

“Aren’t you one of those ‘nameless’ experts?” she asked. “The first thing you did here in the Nacrelight Sageland was defeat Proud Realm. And not even I can tell what your true level is.”

Yang Qi laughed involuntarily. “You think that because I defeated Proud Realm that I'm some consummate expert? That piece of trash has virtually no fighting experience. I could tell with a single glance that he's a greenhouse flower who’s so full of himself he has no idea what real ability is.”

“You're right, defeating Proud Realm isn’t anything worth mentioning. But why exactly have you been throwing your wealth around? Tell me, exactly how rich are you?” It was no surprise that, after telling her story, Summer Soundfyre started trying to pry information from Yang Qi.

“What if I told you there’s no end to the money I have access to?” he said with a smile. “Then what? Would you rob me?”

“There’s no end to the money you have access to? Only the Sovereign Lord would ever dare to say something like that, as he controlled the entire legion of gods. You might have the legacy of the Lord of Civilization, but there’s no way you have that much money. Keep throwing your money away and you’ll run out eventually.”

“The money I got from the Lord of Civilization is enough to keep me going for a long time, even if I throw it away. Besides, I really don’t care about wealth. Miss Soundfyre, if you want me to invest in you, that’s not out of the question. But you have to tell me exactly what you want. What do you need to reach the Unbounded level? I'm curious whether you’ll achieve the breakthrough first, or if Summer Vastcold will. I wouldn’t mind betting on both of you, considering how amazing the two of you are.”

“Fine, I’ll explain, as long as you don’t tell the truth to Summer Vastcold. First, though, how am I supposed to trust you? If word of my secret leaks. Summer Vastcold will definitely try to stop me and ruin my plan. And if that happens, you’ll never be able to make up for it. Furthermore, I need to purchase various items to ensure my plan works. So I really need to know how much money you have.”

“How much do you need?” Yang Qi asked.

“At least two hundred billion godnotes,” she replied. It was really an astronomical number.

Chapter 1315: Master Plan

Yang Qi laughed. “Two hundred billion godnotes. Are you joking, Miss Soundfyre?”

It wasn’t as though the idea of two hundred billion godnotes was shocking to him. He could create that many if he wanted to. But even in the god world, that was a huge sum. The imperial court of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty would have trouble putting together that much wealth, and not even their crown prince would likely manage to secure such a loan. The only way he could would be if the emperor and ministers all agreed to it.

Yet Summer Soundfyre was directly asking for that much. Her outrageous demand made her seem like a lion opening its jaws wide.

“I bet you think I'm like a lion opening its jaws wide, don’t you?” she said, smiling.

“That’s right. And not just an ordinary lion. You’re like a nine-headed lion. Your appetite seems out of control.”

“So you're saying you can't give me that much?” she replied. From her tone, it seemed she didn’t think her request was too big at all. “In any case, that was just a test to see how much money you have access to. If you can produce that much, my assessment of you will completely change.”

He thought for a moment, then said, “I can produce that much, but it will take some time.”

Now it was Summer Soundfyre’s turn to look taken aback. “You can really get that much money? You’d better not be joking about this. I wasn’t really being serious, you know. I didn’t think you would really have access to that much wealth.”

However, after looking at his expression, she realized that he wasn’t exaggerating.

Originally, she hadn’t dared to hope that this deal would work out, and was only trying to negotiate with him to assess his financial state.

Who could have guessed that he would actually give her hope?

“Two hundred billion godnotes is no small sum. Not even I can just casually produce that amount of wealth. Also, I need to know what your plan is, and if it's even realistic. If it is, and if I can benefit by helping you, then I will. What do you say?”

Waving his hand, he caused the air around them to crystallize, then turn into godnotes that poured down into her hands. “Here’s ten billion godnotes. Consider it a deposit. Now, out with your plan.”

“Oh?” she blurted. Accepting the godnotes in astonishment, she looked at them closely with divine will, and found that they were real. “You’re really not worried that I’ll just take the money and refuse to tell you my plan?”

“Not really,” he replied coolly. “I can tell that you have some sort of master plan, and clearly you need money to implement it. I'm the only person who can give you the money you need. If you’re the type to just take my money and run, then so be it. I don’t care about a paltry sum like ten billion.”

“Now I'm starting to believe that you really can produce two hundred billion godnotes. I've never seen anyone from any faction who can just pull out ten billion godnotes as a gift. The Lord of Civilization’s treasure trove really lives up to its reputation. I suppose it makes sense. In the past, the Lord of Civilization was one of the main God-Lords responsible for creating the godnotes we use here in the god world.”

Putting the godnotes away, she said, “Considering this gift, I won’t hide the truth from you. I know of a shortcut to reach the Unbounded level, with the only downside being that the rate of success is only thirty percent.”

“A thirty percent success rate?” Yang Qi said. “That’s not bad. I doubt Summer Vastcold’s Wisdom and Knowledge God Pill will provide much more than a thirty percent chance of success, either. And that's not to mention the low success rate of concocting the pill to begin with. Considering your chances are so much higher than hers, maybe I should bet on you instead.”

“You’d better not reveal any of this to Summer Vastcold,” Summer Soundfyre said with another smile. “Did you ever really think you could woo her? She uses men, that’s all. To her, men are just tools.”

“The same as you,” he said with a chuckle. “Now, please explain your plan in detail.”

“Fine, let’s not mince words.” Drawing on a minor energy art, she created a canopy that surrounded them and provided them with some privacy. “You’re familiar with the Supplication God Temple, right?”

“Yes. It's one of the most mysterious locations in the Nacrelight Sageland. However, there doesn’t seem to be any standard for how it works. Some people pray for a day and get blessed by the High Priestess, while some people can pray for hundreds of years with no results.”

“That's right. The Supplication God Temple is a completely profound and mysterious place. The High Priestess was like a prime minister to the Sovereign Lord, officiating all rites and ceremonies. She led the legion of gods in worship of the Sovereign Lord, and presided over the creation of the God Legion Seal. But in the end, the Sovereign Lord gave the God Legion Seal to the King of Godmammoths. In any case, in the course of her duties, the High Priestess created her own unique god kingdom, which was different from all other kinds of god kingdoms. It contained the power of the entire primeval age, as well as the godpower of the Sovereign Lord. It was that god kingdom that provided the foundational power of the Nacrelight Sageland. In other words, it’s the Supplication God Temple, and it’s how we’ve managed to survive unscathed for so many millions upon millions of years. When dramatic circumstances arrive, the Supplication God Temple will select a powerful disciple to benefit from an influx of the High Priestess’ power, which will push that person to the Unbounded level.”

Yang Qi listened carefully and with patience. After all, this was all very important information.

The High Priestess had been roughly on the same level as King Immortal-Slayer, and her god kingdom had been built with the godpower of the Sovereign Lord. In that respect, it even rivaled the halls of heaven. And when disciples prayed in it, the blessings they received were such that it seemed entirely likely it could produce multiple Unbounded experts.

“Actually, I’ve discovered the standards by which praying works,” Summer Soundfyre said. “It has to do with the quality of the sacrifice. I spent a lot of time studying the ancient records in the Scripture Pavilion, and I found a book containing the ceremonial records of the High Priestess herself. After gathering certain resources, I performed a test in the Supplication God Temple, and used those ancient methods along with prayer to confirm that the god kingdom can draw on the divine might of the High Priestess. Using that method is definitely a valid way to reach the Unbounded level, and compared to it, Wisdom and Knowledge God Pills are like children’s toys.”

“An ancient ceremony,” Yang Qi said, his brow furrowing. “And no one’s ever tried this before?”

“Never. The main reason is that it requires too many resources. Remember, I asked for two hundred billion godnotes. Throughout the history of the Nacrelight Sageland, there’s never been a single person who could accumulate that much wealth. Furthermore, given there’s only a thirty percent chance of success, a failure would essentially mean losing one’s entire life savings.”

“If you failed, you would lose my life savings. And if you succeed, but failed to reach the Unbounded level, then not only would it be unhelpful to me, but you would also probably try to kill me and take the rest of my wealth. Neither outcome is good. This whole thing seems far too dangerous.”

“Do you really think I'm that untrustworthy?” Summer Soundfyre said, sounding less than pleased. “The Nacrelight Sageland is a righteous and orthodox sect, after all.”

“When there’s enough profit to be made, any so-called righteous and orthodox sect would be tempted. Forget the Nacrelight Sageland, even the Lord of Radiance and Light himself could be lured onto the path of darkness and gloom. How exactly am I supposed to trust that you’ll help me after you reach the Unbounded level?”

“What do you suggest? Don’t tell me you want me to bring you with me to the ceremony. Unfortunately, that would only lower the chances of success. Furthermore, you’re not a disciple here, so there’s no way you’d be blessed by the High Priestess. Instead, you would die. After all, the High Priestess hated men with a passion.”

“No, I'm not interested in that. I want you to help me get a treasure that's here in the Nacrelight Sageland.”

At this point, Yang Qi finally decided to reveal the bait.

“What treasure? There are a lot of signature treasures here. Unfortunately, if that’s what you’re after, you’re going to be disappointed. Even if I reached the Unbounded level, I probably wouldn’t be able to help you get any of the sect's signature treasures.”

“No,” he said, waving his hand dismissively. “The treasure I want won’t be of any use to the Nacrelight Sageland.” As they conversed, Yang Qi secretly slipped a tiny devil embryo into Summer Soundfyre. Although he couldn’t use it to control her, he could at least spy on her. And only Unbounded will convergence could possibly reveal the existence of the embryo.

“Well what treasure is it, then?”

“A piece of the Mahātmā Jade,” he replied. “I know that the Nacrelight Sageland and the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty discovered an evil treasure trove belonging to the True Devil. And you got a piece of the Mahātmā Jade from it. That’s what I want. Can you help me get it? If not, I don’t see how we can continue to work together. That said, even if our business deal fails, we can still be friends. And you can consider that ten billion to be a gift between friends.”

“A piece of the Mahātmā Jade?” Summer Soundfyre said. “That’s what you want? It’s a boundless treasure, except it’s only a fragment of the whole. Plenty of Paramount Gods from our sect have studied it without ever uncovering any of its secrets. It's a very dangerous thing that can lead to cultivation deviation. I heard it's the same in the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty; no one has ever been able to unlock its secrets. So why do you want it?”

Chapter 1316: Everything Going Smoothly

“I won’t personally be able to benefit from the Mahātmā Jade. However, I'm acquainted with a Paramount God from the dao of devils who’s willing to trade it for something extremely valuable to me.” Yang Qi was so adept and spinning yarns such as this that he hardly needed to think about it.

Of course, even if he had told the truth and said that he planned to assimilate the Mahātmā Jade, there was no way Summer Soundfyre would have believed him.

“Are you from the dao of devils?” Summer Soundfyre asked, suddenly on guard.

Yang Qi laughed. “Look at me. Do I seem like I am?”

“You’re obviously a scholar from a confucian college, who cultivates pure confucian techniques. So it’s surprising that you’re friends with a Paramount God from the dao of devils. People like that are unreasonable, villainous backstabbers. They would kill, sell, or even eat their own wife or child if it benefited them. Maybe you made a deal with a Paramount God like that, but that’s like asking a tiger for its skin. Definitely far more dangerous than working out a deal with me.” Summer Soundfyre was obviously wording things vaguely in the hopes of getting Yang Qi to reveal more information.

“I have things planned out well,” Yang Qi said. “Besides, I don’t intend to just hand the Mahātmā Jade over to that Paramount God. I'm going to make sure that, in the end, he ends up completely empty-handed.”

“Which Paramount God is it?”

“You know I can’t tell you that. Let’s cut to the chase. Are you going to help me get that piece of jade, or not?”

“It’s a difficult request. Although nobody in the sect can use the Mahātmā Jade, it is an extremely valuable treasure, created long ago by the True Devil himself, and filled with profound secrets. Not even I can just waltz into the treasure storehouse. The only people who have that right are Paramount Gods, in other words, the housemother and chief eldresses. That said, considering it's not a signature treasure that we actually use for the protection of the sect, it’s not impossible to acquire it. Of course, the chances of success will be very small. Perhaps one in ten thousand.”

She thought for a moment. “I’ll try to find an opportunity to get into the treasure storehouse and find exactly where the Mahātmā Jade is. But that's all I can do. Once I have Unbounded will convergence, and along with it, a higher position in the sect, I’ll have the authority to help you take the jade.”

“Fine. In that case, I'm going to place two bets. One on you, and one on Summer Vastcold. Hopefully the cooperation between the two of us works out well. For now, gather all the items you need for the ceremony, and I’ll start putting together the cash.”

“Excellent. You help me reach the Unbounded level, and I’ll help you get the Mahātmā Jade. It's a deal.”

“Deal.”

Yang Qi knew that he couldn’t truly trust or rely on either Summer Soundfyre or Summer Vastcold. And that was why he had other motives for helping them reach the Unbounded level. He had already infected them both with devil embryos, which he could activate when they attempted their breakthroughs, forcing them to fail. It hadn’t been easy, but he had figured out a way to do it.

Having been in the Nacrelight Sageland for some time, he was familiar with the techniques its disciples used, and the vital energy in the area. By using his Sage Monarch Grand Magic in combination with the quintessence of this heaven and earth, he was able to do the impossible. And even though the legacy of the High Priestess was very impressive, it couldn’t separate itself from the influence of the God Legion Seal.

When the two women attempted their breakthroughs, they would fail, and all the power they were using would be transmitted to him. Because of that, it was entirely possible he could achieve his desired breakthrough even without using the Mahātmā Jade.

In any case, Summer Vastcold and Summer Soundfyre were lucky that the ‘help’ he was giving them wouldn’t kill them. He really was dragging them into a big plot.

As he had just agreed, Yang Qi went on to explain various daoist techniques and energy arts to Summer Soundfyre, including some of his imperial-heaven pre-beginning powers. During the process, he learned more about the quintessence of the Nacrelight Sageland.

The High Priestess had been skilled in all sorts of arts of sacrifice, and in fact, they closely resembled his own Sagely Sacrifice. Therefore, as he learned about the techniques of the Nacrelight Sageland, he was able to quickly devise methods to counter them if necessary.

Soon, the sun was rising. They had spent the entire night talking and exchanging information.

“We both benefited a lot tonight,” Summer Soundfyre said. “I hope we can do this again soon. In the future, you can visit me in my mansion grotto, the Fyre Zither Hall. Take this medallion; it’ll let you in whenever you want. This is the first time I've ever given a medallion like this to a man.”

“Many thanks,” Yang Qi said, accepting it. “Now I’ll go see Summer Vastcold. Don’t worry, I won’t tell her anything about your ceremony.”

She laughed. “No, that's fine. Tell her. If you don't, how will you earn her trust? I know you want things to go smoothly. Just remember, if you try to stand with a foot in two different boats, you’ll eventually fall. At some point, you’ll need to pick one of us, or the other.”

Yang Qi laughed. “I will, eventually. It’ll be easy. Whichever of you reaches the Unbounded level first will be my choice.”

“Alright!”

With a swoosh, Summer Soundfyre vanished.

Yang Qi stood there thinking for a moment, then left himself. A short time later, he was in a heavenly palace that resembled a shining moon. It was Vastcold Palace, which was Summer Vastcold’s mansion grotto. She was a Consummate God, so she had a high position in the sect, similar to Dragon Floret’s position as leader of the Dragon Society. She and the others like her vied for leadership of the entire sect, and were beyond the influence of most other people.

When Yang Qi arrived, the disciples didn’t dare to bar his path, but in fact, led the way. “Young Sir Void Qi, Elder Sister Vastcold is in the depths of the palace working on her cultivation. There’s no need to announce your presence, we can take you right to her.”

“Many thanks.”

Yang Qi was led into a wide hall that was filled with the darkness of night. However, there were also a thousand moons rising overhead, casting beautiful, cold light everywhere.

This was where Summer Vastcold practiced cultivation.

Yang Qi didn’t interrupt her. He simply sat down quietly and waited. An hour passed before she finally opened her eyes, whereupon the numerous moons slowly sank back down into her body. Looking at Yang Qi, she smiled. “Well? How did your evening discussion with Summer Soundfyre go? Did you find out what she’s planning to do?”

He nodded. “I know everything she’s planning. She found an ancient sacrificial technique that she plans to use in the Supplication God Temple. She believes the noble spirit of the High Priestess will bless her with the power of prayer, which she can use to reach the Unbounded level.”

“What?!” Summer Vastcold said. “An ancient sacrificial technique? What a stupid idea. Wait, did you find out what specific technique it is?”

“She didn’t say. It’s obviously a big secret, and she’s not stupid enough to just tell me all the details. In fact, I suspect that she might have told me this knowing that I would reveal it to you, hoping it would affect your thinking. Maybe she wants you to experience cultivation deviation when you take the Wisdom and Knowledge God Pill. Furthermore, I have no way to determine if she was telling the truth or not.”

“You’re right,” Summer Vastcold said. “She’s full of craft and cunning, and absolutely must not be trusted. Did she ask for your help?”

“Yes. She said that to complete the ceremony, she needs innumerable precious materials, and that she can’t afford all of them. So she proposed a cooperation.” He smiled coldly. “But I'm no fool. It’s not as if I’ll just hand over money without getting something in return.”

“She actually asked for a loan from you to perform her ceremony? Hmph! I can already see what's going on here. It must be a very expensive ceremony. How much did she ask for?”

“Two hundred billion,” Yang Qi said.

“What?!” she blurted. “Say that again? Did I hear clearly? How much?!”

“Two hundred billion!” he repeated.

Summer Vastcold’s face went slack for a moment, but then she sneered and rose to her feet. Pacing back and forth, she said, “Two hundred billion... two hundred billion.... Not even a host of sects in the Nacrelight Sageland could come up with that much money, at least not quickly. She’s like a lion opening its jaws wide. Incredible. This Summer Soundfyre really doesn’t know the height of the heavens and the breadth of the earth. So what did you say? Did you agree?”

“Of course not! I said I could probably come up with that much money, but that it would take time. Furthermore, I knew that even if I wanted to come up with some plot against her, I’d still need to come back here and discuss the matter with you first.”

“Can you really produce two hundred billion?” she asked quizzically.

“Not easily. But given enough time, I could. Maybe in six months or a year.” In this regard, he wasn’t lying. He could make godnotes, but it took effort.

“Incredible. Simply incredible. Two hundred billion godnotes is an incredible amount. I think you and I need to talk things over again. It seems to me that if Summer Vastcold really needs that much money to perform her ceremony, then without your help, she’ll never succeed.”

“That’s exactly the situation,” Yang Qi said. “So there’s no way I'm going to give her the money.”

“No. You have to help her. It’s an opportunity provided by heaven itself. Remember, there are dangers involved in using the Wisdom and Knowledge Pill. I might not necessarily reach the Unbounded level. But if I could use that sacrificial technique at the same time, it would increase my chances of success to seventy or eighty percent. That’s the safest bet. In other words, I need you to work with Summer Vastcold, but in the end, after she's collected all of the materials, we’ll steal them from her!”

Chapter 1317: Concocting the Pill

Neither Summer Vastcold nor Summer Soundfyre were inconsequential figures.

Yang Qi couldn’t help but be surprised at how, in the briefest of moments, Summer Vastcold came up with a ruthless plan to rake the firewood from beneath the kettle of her opponent, and inflict treacherous losses. ‘This woman is vicious and merciless,’ he thought. ‘It doesn’t matter if I help her or not, she won’t be grateful. She didn’t even ask my opinion on the matter. She just told me to give Summer Soundfyre the two hundred billion godnotes and then wait to take advantage of the situation later. I guess I’m working for her now.’

Everything from Summer Vastcold’s tone to her words put Yang Qi on guard as he realized that she was not someone to take lightly.

After all, the other men she had drawn into her web had ended up picked clean to the point where not even their bones remained behind.

It made sense. In the Nacrelight Sageland, men generally didn’t suffer good fates. Ninety-nine percent were fools who ended up getting killed. But many of them were fine with that. They were people who became too devoted to women, and allowed themselves to be used and discarded.

Thankfully, Yang Qi wasn’t the kind of person that could be easily taken advantage of. He would allow these women to use him as a pawn, and as long as they didn’t harm him, he wouldn’t take the initiative to harm them.

“What?” Yang Qi said with glittering eyes. Not wanting there to be any misunderstandings, he continued, “You want me to give Summer Soundfyre the two hundred billion godnotes? That's no small sum. If I give her that much wealth, I need to benefit from it as well, and right now, I don’t see how I will.”

Looking up at Yang Qi, Summer Vastcold said, “You’re right. Two hundred billion is a huge sum, but this is a good opportunity. As I said, even a Wisdom and Knowledge God Pill doesn’t guarantee a breakthrough. But if I could benefit from that ceremony, it would be a very different story. Young Sir Void Qi, I have to beseech you for your aid in this. Afterward, I’ll fulfill any request you have.”

“Any request?” His heart pounded a bit at her statement; it was very clear that she was willing to do anything for him if he could help her succeed. Other men might have felt overwhelmed at this, but not Yang Qi. He wasn’t inclined to trust women, and had never developed romantic feelings for a member of the opposite sex. Of course, all of that stemmed back to the situation with Yun Hailan, which had set him on the path of being distrustful of women.

As for Jadefall and the other women like her, he considered them his siblings, which was a completely different matter.

In other words, seduction just wouldn’t work on Yang Qi.

In the exact same moment that Summer Vastcold said “any request you have”, Yang Qi felt a pulsing psychic fluctuation that was obviously her attempting to seduce him, to change his thoughts and desires so she would be better able to manipulate him.

‘This is a very powerful art of seduction,’ he thought, shaken. ‘She's trying to entice me with her most powerful technique, something that can actually change a person’s view of the world. Incredible. I wonder if this is some secret magic from the High Priestess.’

Moments ago, Yang Qi had suddenly felt as though her suggestion wasn’t a very bad idea at all, which was a complete reversal of his actual worldview.

His world didn’t contain romantic feelings for the opposite sex. He espoused nothingness, and pursued the dao of the Annulled, which was empty, devoid of anything, and completely pure. But she had attempted to change that worldview, and had even succeeded to some extent, showing how incredibly powerful the technique was.

It would have worked on any other person, without them even realizing what was happening.

He quickly severed such thoughts, leaving no trace of them behind. However, he didn’t show any trace of that externally. He simply smiled and said, “Fine, it's a deal. As long as I have your word, Miss Vastcold, then I can die without regrets. Even if I go broke helping you reach the Unbounded level, it would be worth it.”

Smiling broadly at his words, she said, “Oh, don’t crack jokes, Young Sir Void Qi. How could you possibly go broke? Actually, we need to talk this matter over. You might have a lot of wealth, but you can’t just go throwing it around. Summer Soundfyre isn’t a moron, so you can’t let her on to your weaknesses. Thankfully, I have a lot of information about her, and can reveal many of her secrets to you. That way, you can be a lot more confident in dealing with her.”

“That sounds great. I’ll follow your lead in everything.” Yang Qi was making sure to seem like he was willing to follow all of Summer Vastcold’s orders.

In response, her smile grew even broader, and her attitude, more genial.

“Young Sir Void Qi, your daoist techniques are incredible, so I hope you’ll give me some advice. I’ve heard that the imperial-heaven pre-beginning powers are among the most refined of psychic secret magics. Is there any more information you can give me about them? Of course, I'm not asking for a handout. I’ll explain some of the psychic cultivation techniques we have here in the Nacrelight Sageland. For instance, the Chiliocosm Unrestrained Mental Dharma. How about it?”

Summer Vastcold was trying to slowly lure Yang Qi deeper and deeper into her control.

“Chiliocosm Unrestrained Mental Dharma?” Yang Qi said, looking surprised. “I’ve never even heard of it. I thought the Nacrelight Sageland's top mental dharma was called the Soul-Sacrificing Heaven Method. It involves sacrificing one’s psyche to reverse the dao of heaven and take control of anything and everything.”

“Wrong. Our top mental cultivation is indeed the Chiliocosm Unrestrained Mental Dharma. The chiliocosm aspect isn’t to be taken literally, but rather relates to a chiliocosm of worlds that exists within your heart and mind. In other words, it relates to your worldview. Every person has their own unique perspective on the world, which is what leads to there being a ‘chiliocosm’ of worlds. You see, everything about you, including your thoughts, your will, your soul, your spirit... perhaps even the world itself, are all products of the way you view what is around you. Illusions are unrestrained, and we must transform those illusions, pierce through them, and leap past them, returning to the world that is real. And that is the fundamental nature and meaning of the Chiliocosm Unrestrained Mental Dharma.”

“How exquisite!” Yang Qi said. He truly had received a sudden flash of enlightenment, but at the same time was more on guard than ever. This technique was shocking, and befitting of something that had been created by the High Priestess. And it was more obvious than ever that Summer Vastcold was using this moment of discussion about daoist techniques to actually try to take control of and transform him.

As he put on his act, he drew on the devil embryo inside Summer Vastcold to peer into what she was thinking.

This was actually a contest of wills, and even if Summer Vastcold were more formidable than she was, she couldn’t possibly be a match for Yang Qi. After all, he had the God Legion Seal, monarch godhood, and some of the Mahātmā Jade.

Meanwhile, Summer Vastcold was thinking to herself, ‘After seeing Void Qi, my Master taught me the Chiliocosm Unrestrained Mental Dharma. No wonder. Using it right now is the perfect way to get control of him. There’s no way that he wants my help to open the supposed treasure trove of the Lord of Civilization. He must have some other scheme afoot, otherwise he wouldn’t be throwing away so much wealth. Well, now I'm using him. He’s making a fool of himself in trying to be clever, and now that he's fallen for my Chiliocosm Unrestrained Mental Dharma, it’ll only take a thought on my part to make him fulfill any request I make. Such as giving me every last bit of his wealth....’

All such thoughts were now clearly apparent right in Yang Qi’s sea of consciousness.

Inside, he chuckled coldly. Despite offering up his imperial-heaven pre-beginning powers, it was a given that Summer Vastcold wouldn't give him the complete Chiliocosm Unrestrained Mental Dharma. She would only give him bits and pieces. That said, he didn't care. He could fill in the missing parts on his own later.

They were both double-dealing, but in the end, Summer Vastcold was convinced that Yang Qi had fallen right into her trap, even though he hadn't.

The discussion went on for half a month, during which time Yang Qi’s cultivation base grew more and more refined. He had taken about thirty to forty percent of the Chiliocosm Unrestrained Mental Dharma, and still had plenty of energy to spare to defend against Summer Vastcold. At the same time, he would occasionally reach out to Summer Soundfyre and give her godnotes.

He also took time to absorb some of the Unbounded medicinal pills he had already acquired to bolster his godpower, improve his cultivation base, and refine his godhood. He was now a mid Consummate God, and was confident that he would soon reach the late and peak levels. All he needed was enough power.

As for Summer Vastcold, she was elated in her belief that she had thoroughly entranced Yang Qi.

Yang Qi knew he had to be very careful. Summer Vastcold’s Master, Mother Voidwalker, was a very ferocious individual, and if she came to realize that he had infected her apprentice with a devil embryo, the consequences would be horrific. In fact, he would likely die.

Another month passed, whereupon Summer Vastcold anxiously summoned Yang Qi into her presence. “Young Sir Void Qi, have you prepared all the godstones? My Master has gathered all of the ingredients for the Wisdom and Knowledge Pill, and has extended the invitation to the other two Paramount Gods to help. They’ll fire up the pill furnace soon, so now is when we need your help.”

“They’re ready this soon?” Yang Qi said. “Yes, I have the godstones ready. Unfortunately, they’re only holy caliber, not perfect caliber.”

“Holy caliber is fine. After all, perfect caliber stones are extremely rare, and are best saved for the defense of the sect in critical moments. Let’s hurry to the Pill-King’s God Palace! That’s where they’ll use the Light King God-Furnace to start concocting the pill!”

Chapter 1318: Concocting the Pill (2)

Yang Qi and Summer Vastcold hurried to the Pill-King’s God Palace.

The palace was, of course, a standalone god kingdom.

Inside, it was beautiful, with strange, fragrant plants visible everywhere. It abounded with all sorts of medicinal plants and animals, all of them things that could be used as ingredients for medicinal pills. It was enormous, far larger than any of the medicinal ingredient storehouses in the House of God Ordainment.

Of course, it was also kept under strict guard. Yang Qi saw thousands of deadly spell formations that had been set up to prevent unlawful entry.

With Summer Vastcold to lead the way, there was no danger. Together, they went into the depths of the palace, until they caught sight of a huge pill furnace that resembled a mountain shining with boundless light.

‘Sand of radiance and light!’

With his Lord's Eye, Yang Qi could see that the furnace had originally been constructed from sand of radiance and light. Furthermore, its structure was so orderly and strict that it almost resembled genetic material. It was so profound that it made the furnace seem alive.

It was very different from his Heaven and Earth Furnace, which only made sense considering it was created by the High Priestess.

“Master!”

Summer Vastcold’s Master was waiting beneath the enormous furnace. Mother Voidwalker sat on a prayer mat, her eyes closed, a mountainous stack of medicinal ingredients next to her.

Other than her, no one else was present.

“I thought you invited two other Paramount Gods to help?” Yang Qi said.

Looking coldly at Yang Qi, Mother Voidwalker said, “They won’t come as their true selves. Once I begin concocting the pill, they’ll send their will through the void to assist. Normally speaking, men aren’t permitted to even look at the Light King God-Furnace. But since you’re providing so many holy caliber godstones as fuel, we’ll make an exception. In a moment, you’ll need to listen to all of my instructions as I tell you how to set the godstones into the spell formation surrounding the furnace. Understand?”

“Yes, ma’am,” Yang Qi replied, not daring to say too much.

“This pill concocting session will also be a session of cultivation for you. Considering how much you've helped Vastcold, you can watch the concocting process. I’m sure you’ll learn a lot from it, and also improve your psychic power and godhood.”

“Many thanks, Senior. My gratitude knows no bounds.” Inside, he was chuckling coldly, as he knew that there was no way Mother Voidwalker had any good intentions. She likely intended to use this opportunity to gain deeper control of him, and assess him on a deeper level.

After all, she was the one who had imparted the Chiliocosm Unrestrained Mental Dharma to Summer Vastcold, all for the purpose of transforming his worldview.

She was vicious and merciless, otherwise she wouldn’t be an Unbounded expert. Every Unbounded expert was an invincible and domineering figure, and Yang Qi being an Ascendant only meant that she would try taking advantage of him. Every Unbounded expert had fought tooth and nail for years to reach their current position.

When soldiers come, send a general to stop them. When flood waters come, use earth to block them. Yang Qi had spent the last month formulating countermeasures to the Chiliocosm Unrestrained Mental Dharma. And although he wasn't a hundred percent free of it, he was at least seventy to eighty percent confident that his true identity wouldn’t be revealed.

“Good,” Mother Voidwalker said, apparently satisfied with Yang Qi’s attitude. She also gave an approving glance at Summer Vastcold, as if praising her success in getting Yang Qi under control.

“Now, let’s fire up the Light King God-Furnace,” Mother Voidwalker said. “You two sit in the qian and kun positions. When qian and kun combine, heaven and earth intersect, yin and yang combine, and the taiji is completed.”

“Yes ma’am.” Summer Vastcold and Yang Qi sat on opposite sides of the formation while Mother Voidwalker unleashed the power of her will, causing a wild tempest to spring up as the medicinal ingredients were pulled into the formation.

‘Those are some incredible ingredients,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘There are even spritefruits in there.’

He nearly gasped in amazement at what he was seeing. There were millions and millions of ingredients of all kinds, which swirled together to form a huge vortex.

This was a much more difficult act than engaging in a fight. It required exquisite control over godpower, and a brain that could calculate matters that even the heavenly workings calculations systems would have trouble with.

Even three medicinal ingredients would have all sorts of interactions and combinations that could produce a variety of effects. That wasn’t even mentioning the degree of heat or other matters. That was why concocting pills was almost like an act of creation.

Here, there were many millions of ingredients all interacting. As they entered the enormous formation, all sorts of medicinal effects were unleashed, then transformed based on their interactions. The slightest mistake at any step would lead to ruin.

Yang Qi knew that he couldn’t do this. Although his psychic power was formidable, it couldn’t compare at all to Mother Voidwalker’s.

Her psychic power seemed unending and boundless, as though she could pierce any substructure, create millions upon millions of incarnations, connect to the realm of Nevasaññānāsaññāyatana, and extrude all impurities when she created god pills.

‘Incredible,’ Yang Qi thought as he watched. ‘Nothing short of incredible. Unbounded will convergence definitely lives up to the hype. And now I can tell that I'm still far, far away from the Unbounded level. All I can do is just watch what she's doing. She was right; this experience will benefit me a lot in terms of understanding of how to control psychic power.’

Smiling faintly, Mother Voidwalker exhaled a blast of fire that engulfed the Light King God-Furnace, causing it to shine with radiant light as the medicinal ingredients inside melted.

“Add the godstones now, Void Qi!”

“Sure thing!” Yang Qi waved his sleeve and a stream of walnut-sized godstones flew out like rain, entering the spell formation around the Light King God-Furnace and causing it to flare to life.

Within that light it seemed possible to glimpse countless worlds.

“Elder Sisters, please, let your will come! Help concoct this pill!” Mother Voidwalker said as she tossed the flower of wisdom into the mix. Instantly, two expressions of will pierced through the void and arrived at the furnace.

RUMBLE!

Yang Qi could see them in his mind’s eyes, and they looked like god dragons from primeval times of chaos. They were so mighty and destructive that they could easily crush the House of God Ordainment out of existence.

Wailing sounds erupted from inside the Light King God-Furnace.

“Send in more godstones, boy!” Mother Voidwalker barked.

Yang Qi increased the volume of holy caliber godstones, until he was certain he had surpassed ten billion. However, Mother Voidwalker still didn't seem satisfied. “Keep going! Don’t hold back any godstones. If we fail because you didn't give enough, I’ll throw you into the furnace!”

From these words alone, it was obvious that Yang Qi wasn’t just helping out. Mother Voidwalker was assigning the primary responsibility for this session of pill concocting to him, and would blame him for any failures.

Yang Qi’s heart felt cold, but he knew that now wasn’t the time to be defiant, lest he end up dead. However, one thing was already determined in his heart: Mother Voidwalker would pay for this!

‘I'm not afraid of you, Mother Voidwalker. I’ll suffer in silence for now. But once your apprentice consumes the Wisdom and Knowledge God Pill, I’ll use my devil embryo to absorb it!’ Even as he was thinking that, he continued throwing out godstones. “Don’t worry, Exalted Mother Voidwalker! I won’t hold back at all!”

Swissshhhhh!

Godstones continued pouring out like falling rain.

There seemed no end to the godstones that poured out of his sleeve. Ten billion. Thirty billion. Fifty billion.... Over the course of fourteen or fifteen hours, he produced no less than eighty billion godstones to power the formation.

RUMBLE!

Meanwhile, the two visiting expressions of will provided immense psychic power, causing world after world to appear within the pill furnace. Yang Qi could see that, inside the furnace, it was almost as if numerous Big Bangs were occurring one after another, each of them creating new universes. And yet it was all occurring according to some fixed set of rules.

The Light King God-Furnace let loose a piercing howl of a sound.

“More godstones! Hurry! This is the critical moment!” From the glare in Mother Voidwalker’s eyes, it seemed if Yang Qi didn’t provide more godstones immediately, she would kill him right there and throw him into the furnace.

He waved his sleeve, and more godstones poured out.

‘This is incredible,’ Mother Voidwalker thought. ‘I can’t believe this kid has so many godstones. It seems the treasure trove of the Lord of Civilization is nothing to look down on. With him under control, it’ll provide access to a huge amount of wealth.’ The more Mother Voidwalker realized how rich Yang Qi was, the more it stoked her killing intent.

Of course, Yang Qi knew exactly what she was thinking. However, he also knew she was nervous. She believed that the body he was using had been left behind by the Lord of Civilization himself, whose will would protect his successor.

At this point, the concoction effort had reached a critical moment.

Chapter 1319: Surging Killing Intent

‘Paramount Gods are Paramount Gods, after all,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘Perhaps they’re not as strong as the Lord of the True Void or Patriarch Deva, but their cultivation bases make them virtually invincible. Unbounded will convergence is completely domineering. It can strike from across space-time and god kingdoms, and can’t be blocked. Even in the absolute best case scenario, I’d be severely injured trying to escape from a conflict.’

The critical moment had arrived, in which Mother Voidwalker and the two other Paramount Gods were going to form the medical pill.

Yang Qi was benefiting immensely from the process; his control of psychic power was improving, and the connection between his will and magical laws was growing deeper. The combinations of the various medicinal ingredients, and their connection to the psychic power, were like genetic sequences that provided major inspiration regarding daoist techniques and energy arts.

A chain reaction of enlightenment spread out to his flesh, blood, vital energy, and even his godhood.

Of course, this body wasn’t his own, but rather that of the mysterious scholar, who he suspected had been a Paramount God. Because of that, he couldn't completely control it. That said, the power of the body could enter his monarch godhood and push it to a higher level.

At the same time, Yang Qi felt a mighty godpower in the pill furnace, as though the medicinal pill inside contained a convergence of preheaven wisdom and vital energy that was slowly flowing into him.

The body was like a black hole that would never be satiated.

“Void Qi, hurry up and provide all of the godstones you can. Don’t hold any back!” Mother Voidwalker shouted angrily.

“Yes ma’am!” He was throwing out tens of billions of holy caliber godstones, which was an immense fortune, yet neither Mother Voidwalker nor Summer Vastcold seemed the least bit grateful. All they cared about was the success of the medicinal pill. As far as they were concerned, it didn't matter what miserable fate Yang Qi suffered as long as he produced enough godstones for them.

In their minds, they already had him under control, so there was no need for any act.

Thanks to the godstones, the concocting effort went much smoother than it otherwise would have. Three streams of Unbounded will swirled about in the Light King God-Furnace, and the sensation of wisdom echoed out like beautiful music.

Ding!

All of a sudden, a medicinal pill appeared within the furnace. It was only the size of a thumb, but had such immense medicinal power that it twitched as though it wanted to shoot away and escape.

“Ghost and gods alike wish they could get their hands on you, medicinal pill. Do you really think you can escape?” Mother Voidwalker clamped her hands down, causing psychic power to create a host of domains that suppressed the pill. The domains crystallized into talismans, which sealed the pill and immobilized it.

“Congratulations on the completion of the pill, Mother Voidwalker,” said one of the expressions of will.

“You’ll have an Unbounded expert as an apprentice quite soon,” said the other.

“It’s hard to believe this man your apprentice brought actually had so many holy caliber godstones. That’s more than even we could get together in a short time. That collection must have been worth at least a hundred thirty, or even a hundred fifty billion godnotes.”

“That many godstones is an astonishing amount of wealth. Your apprentice picked up a real treasure in this man!”

Mother Voidwalker laughed and said, “She got lucky. Many thanks to the two of you, Elder Sisters. I’ll definitely live up to my end of the bargain.”

“Very well. We’ll remain in our god kingdoms out in the void, continuing our pursuit of enlightenment. There isn’t much time left. Your apprentice must be careful when consuming that pill. And don’t do it now. Wait for another four or five months until her psychic state is in the optimal condition. Only in that circumstance can she unleash the true potential of the pill, and achieve the best chance of success.”

“I understand,” Summer Vastcold said, “and I thank the both of you for your advice, Elder Aunts.”

It was impossible for her to conceal her elation.

Yang Qi stood quietly by, as if he were mourning the loss of so many godstones. Not even Paramount Gods would view such an amount lightly, and would become murderously furious at its loss. However, he didn’t care. That said, he had to look like he was profoundly sad, lest Mother Voidwalker and Summer Vastcold try to take advantage of him again.

“Many thanks for your help, Young Sir Void Qi,” Summer Vastcold said. “I never would’ve guessed that it would cost you so much to help concoct the pill. Without those godstones, we would have failed.” She was staring at him intently as if to read into his expression.

Expression bitter, Yang Qi sighed, “Ai! I never could have guessed that it would take so many godstones. That’s definitely not what I planned on. I'm almost completely broke now!”

“I'm sure you’ll think of something, Void Qi,” Mother Voidwalker chuckled. “Remember, no matter how you do it, you have to fulfil Summer Soundfyre's demands. Help her get everything she needs. Then, at the very last moment, we’ll take it all from her. Meanwhile, I'm going to help Vastcold prepare her psyche, energy, and blood for the upcoming breakthrough. Keep us informed about everything you’re doing, got it?”

From her tone, she wasn’t asking questions, but rather giving orders.

“How much money do you have left, Young Sir Void Qi?” Summer Vastcold asked. “Can you even give her what she's asking for?” She obviously cared a lot about this issue, and was doing nothing to hide that fact.

“Well, I still have some money left, but....” He hesitated.

“Alright, don’t get anxious,” Mother Voidwalker said. Waving her hand dismissively, she said, “Go. As long as you have enough money to help, we can just wait until Vastcold reaches the Unbounded level. Then all your investments will be paid back thousands of times over.”

“Many thanks, Senior,” Yang Qi said, feigning a look of thanks as he left.

Watching him leave, Mother Voidwalker said, “Vastcold, the fact that this man produced so many godstones just goes to show how immense the Lord of Civilization’s treasure trove is.”

“That's exactly what I was thinking. He gave us somewhere between a hundred thirty and a hundred fifty billion godstones, without which you probably wouldn’t have been able to concoct the Wisdom and Knowledge God Pill. I wonder if he actually does have some perfect caliber godstones.”

“He definitely does,” Mother Voidwalker replied, clenching her hand into a fist. “Perfect caliber godstones are true treasures. Ah, what a pity. The brat has so many treasures, but unfortunately, we can’t kill him right now. Well, one step at a time. He's been entranced by the Chiliocosm Unrestrained Mental Dharma, but he still hasn't lost all of his reason yet. But it won’t be long before he's a complete puppet.”

“What do we do with him afterward?” Summer Vastcold asked. “Normally speaking, unless a man is incredibly important, I just let them go after using them, to avoid harming my reputation. But this one is different. He’s not so simple.”

“Don’t tell me you’ve developed feelings for him,” Mother Voidwalker said in an ice-cold voice.

“Are you kidding? No way. I would never develop feelings for a man. I'm just trying to figure out what he really wants here in the Nacrelight Sageland. I was just wondering if we should just kill him afterward, or if we should try to get access to that treasure trove.”

“I'd say leaving him alive would be the better move. If he does have the legacy of the Lord of Civilization, then he has destiny of some sort. Killing him could provoke a reaction from the Lord of Civilization’s will. Just wait until you’re in the Unbounded level before making the final decision. Now, let’s do some cultivating in preparation for using that pill. It’ll be a few months before you're ready, understand? If you take it now, you’ll never reach the Unbounded level. Don’t get anxious. Let’s wait to see how things work out between Void Qi and Summer Soundfyre.”

Summer Vastcold nodded. “Right.”

‘Thinking about killing me?’ Yang Qi thought as he drew on the devil embryo to eavesdrop. Thanks to the profundities of the scholar's body that he was using, Mother Voidwalker hadn’t picked up on what he was doing.

Of course, he had to be careful. For instance, it would be lunacy to try to take control of Summer Vastcold, or siphon power away from her.

He could only try something like that if Mother Voidwalker wasn’t present.

But Mother Voidwalker couldn’t watch over her apprentice at all times for the rest of her life. When that happened, Yang Qi would take action. Of course, he didn’t plan on killing her, just taking some of the power of the Wisdom and Knowledge God Pill.

Right now, he was on his way to meet Summer Soundfyre.

Her palace hung in the air near the sea, surrounded by white clouds and fresh flowers. It was filled with the sound of zither music, and was a very elegant and relaxing place.

However, Yang Qi ignored all of the beautiful scenery.

Before long, he was in Summer Soundfyre’s presence. Looking at Yang Qi, she said, “With your help, Summer Vastcold made the Wisdom and Knowledge God Pill, didn't she?”

“How did you find out so quickly?” Yang Qi asked, surprised at how well-informed she was.

“A blind person could tell. Considering the fluctuations that have been coming from the Pill King’s God Palace, and that you've shown up here, coupled with the fact that no news has spread of a failure to concoct the pill, it's obvious. Furthermore, do you really think Mother Voidwalker and Summer Vastcold would let you go if you failed them?”

Chapter 1320: Stealing another Piece

“What? There’s no way. I offered help without asking for a bit of compensation. And you think they’d kill me?” Chuckling as if in ignorance, he continued, “You must be joking, Miss Soundfyre. The Nacrelight Sageland doesn’t follow the dao of devils. No one here would possibly return evil for good.”

“I'm sorry to say it, but the truth is that money can affect the heart. You have too much wealth, so it's a given that if the Wisdom and Knowledge God Pill failed, they’ll try to kill you. Trust me, I'm not trying to drive a wedge between you and them. It’s just a fact that Mother Voidwalker is a vicious and merciless figure who kills people without blinking. She spent a huge fortune getting those other two Paramount Gods to help her, so if she didn’t get a return on her investment the normal way, she would have to do it through you.”

“They’d really try to kill me?” he asked suspiciously.

“I wouldn’t be surprised if they still plan to do it even after succeeding with the pill. One thing is certain: the moment Summer Vastcold reaches the Unbounded level, you’ll die. Believe me or not, it’s up to you. By the way, not even that Wisdom and Knowledge God Pill will get Summer Vastcold to the Unbounded level. That's why I'm certain they want to use you to get to my sacrificial resources. The combination of the two would lead to a seventy or eighty percent chance of success. Tell me, am I right? You've been working on your cultivation recently with Summer Vastcold, and I bet she ‘taught’ you the Chiliocosm Unrestrained Mental Dharma. Little do you know that you're already on death’s door. Do you really think she's going to help you get the Mahātmā Jade?”

“What? She harmed me with the Chiliocosm Unrestrained Mental Dharma? How is that even possible?”

“Tell me, how many godstones did they use making that pill? The Light King God-Furnace isn’t exactly easy to power. Normally not even a Paramount God would casually use it, as it burns through godstones extremely quickly.”

“Er...” Yang Qi said hesitantly.

“Tell me!” she shouted, her voice piercing into his sea of consciousness like a needle.

“A hundred fifty billion!” Yang Qi blurted.

“What? That many!” She shot to her feet and stared at him. “How could you have given them that many?! Don’t you believe me now?! Doesn’t it hurt you to have given away that much wealth! Your worldview was obviously altered by the Chiliocosm Unrestrained Mental Dharma. Look, I just used my Fyre Destruction God Resonance to stimulate your heart and soul. Think about it! Recall everything that happened recently.”

“Well, a lot of things happened...” he stammered, pretending to be confused as he thought back to recent events. “How could this be happening? Why would I just give away a hundred fifty billion godstones?! Wait a second. Mother Voidwalker kept pressuring me. She said if they failed to make the pill, she'd throw me into the furnace!”

“See what I mean?” Summer Soundfyre said, sounding very pleased with herself. “Now do you understand? Even after saying that, you weren’t the least bit angry with Mother Voidwalker. And the reason is that they changed your worldview. If I hadn’t woken you from your reverie, you would have stayed under their control, unable to extricate yourself, then ultimately suffered a very miserable fate.”

“Dammit. Dammit!” he shouted furiously. “Mother Voidwalker! Summer Vastcold! I'm not going to let you off the hook for this. This is preposterous. Preposterous!”

“At least you finally realize how wickedly ambitious they are,” she said. “But if you work with me, I guarantee that you won’t lose out. In fact, whatever you give me to help, you’ll get back.”

“I'm going to go take that Wisdom and Knowledge God Pill to make up for what I lost!” he said angrily. “After this, I'm definitely going to help you. I don’t care much for money, but how could I ever have guessed that Mother Voidwalker and Summer Vastcold would treat me like this! Miss Soundfyre, I’ll give you whatever you need. More than I gave them! You just have to promise to help me destroy them both! Preposterous!”

Of course, this anger was supposed to be a result of being entranced by Summer Soundfyre.

“You’re going to give me more than them?” Inwardly, she was elated at having ‘won’, but outwardly she maintained a calm demeanor. “You still have some wealth left? They didn’t bleed you dry?”

“You only need two hundred billion, right?” Yang Qi said. “Well, I still have four hundred billion. The only requirement is that you help me kill Mother Voidwalker and Summer Vastcold. Before, I was just interested in Summer Vastcold’s treasures. But now I realize they enchanted me and want to kill me! If it weren’t for your help, I would’ve been stuck in their trap!”

“Four hundred billion!?” she blurted in shock. “You still have that many left?”

“That's right,” he said viciously. “I want to make sure they know what happens to people who cause problems for me! From this day on, I'm going to pay any price to see them ended!”

“Good. I actually feel a lot better hearing that. I supposed now is a good time to tell you that I got some information about the Mahātmā Jade. Unfortunately, I can’t just get it for you. It’s deep in the treasure storehouse, under the protection of an extremely powerful spell formation. It’s also surrounded by vital energy booby traps. If you have what it takes, you can get it. If not, you’ll only have yourself to blame.”

Even as the words left her mouth, a spell formation chart appeared, something that resembled the sheepskin scroll.

Yang Qi took it and found that it depicted an area surrounded by countless spell formations, almost like a full chiliocosm of worlds. Obviously a location like that could be considered impenetrable.

“Incredible,” he said with a sigh. “Those spell formations are nothing less than incredible. You’re right, there’s no way I can deal with that.”

“Well that’s a given. Not even a Paramount God can just sneak into the treasure storehouse of the Nacrelight Sageland and steal things. However, at the end of this month, I'm going to have a chance to get into the treasure storehouse to take something as a reward. And during that time, I might be able to create the opportunity you seek.”

“You can take me in with you?” Yang Qi said, feeling a twinge of anticipation.

“Of course not,” she replied. “The rules of the Nacrelight Sageland are clear. It’s a huge honor to be allowed into the treasure storehouse to pick something as a reward. How could I possibly take an outsider in with me during that time?”

“Then what's the point?” Yang Qi shook his head.

“I can’t change the rules, so there’s only so much I can do. But if I can reach the Unbounded level before then, I could possibly borrow the Mahātmā Jade to study it. Keep in mind, I couldn’t give it to you permanently. You’d have to return it.”

“What about Unbounded medicinal pills?” Yang Qi asked. “Do you have any of those?”

“Definitely,” she replied. “Except, such pills would be useless to me. What are you aiming to do? You’re rich! Don’t tell me that the Lord of Civilization’s treasure trove doesn’t have Unbounded medicinal pills!”

“I haven’t opened the section of the treasure trove that has the medicinal pills. And I personally need Unbounded medicinal pills, not for my personal cultivation, but to help create an illusory projection of the Engine of the One God. With it, I can strike a deadly blow at Mother Voidwalker!”

Instead of praising Yang Qi for his bold statement, she replied, “Mother Voidwalker isn’t going to be that easy to deal with, so I advise you to stop dreaming! That said, you could use the Engine of the One God to at least defend yourself from an attack by her, and possibly escape from a deadly situation. How many Unbounded pills do you need?”

“A hundred thousand!” he said, throwing out a completely shocking number.

“What did you just say?” she blurted incredulously. “You’ve got to be kidding me! A hundred thousand Unbounded medicinal pills?! Not even Paramount Gods would have that many pills saved up. Forget it. I have a few hundred, and that’s years of savings. Do you think I can clear out the entire treasure storehouse of our sect?”

“I can pay for them with godnotes! And I’ll pay a premium. I really need those pills!”

“Money doesn’t matter. I might be able to get you a few thousand pills, but a hundred thousand is simply out of the question.”

“A few thousand? Fine. Something is better than nothing.” It was true that Yang Qi needed the pills to improve his monarch godhood. Perhaps he could reach the late Consummate God level, gaining a bit more strength, and by extension, safety. That was especially important, considering Mother Voidwalker was eyeing him.

“Fine. It’s a deal. But you still have to give me the cash you said you would give me.”

“No problem at all. Here are two hundred billion godnotes. The rest will take me a month to get. You need to hurry up and gather all the materials you need before Summer Vastcold reaches the Unbounded level.” With that, he produced the godnotes, encased in a crystalline container.

“Excellent,” Summer Soundfyre said. Taking them, she vanished.

Yang Qi also left.

Some time later, he was outside the Nacrelight Sageland.

There, he opened the spell formation chart he had just been given, and started studying it carefully. ‘The spell formations of the Nacrelight Sageland are incredible. There’s no way I can get through them at the moment. However, if I use the Cruiser of Civilization....’

With that, he began the summoning effort.

A few hours later, a figure appeared.

It was none other than his brother, or rather, the other version of himself, his clone, Yang Immortal-Slayer, who was both following the Lord of the True Void and learning from King Immortal-Slayer. He had already succeeded in forming monarch godhood, and had gathered more of the items belonging to the seventy-two monarchs. He also had the Cruiser of Civilization, including the Engine of the One God.

“What’s wrong, Yang Qi? I could sense the urgency in your summons. I've been in seclusion with the Lord of the True Void, and am already at the peak Greater God level, just on the verge of becoming a Consummate God.”

“It's like this,” Yang Qi began. “I'm in the Nacrelight Sageland for the time being, and I finally located another piece of the Mahātmā Jade. Unfortunately, I can’t get to its location. So I came up with a plan involving you. I want us to go to the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty and use our pieces of the Cruiser of Civilization to find the godhood manufacturing systems there. With those systems, the cruiser will be complete. And with all of its functions activated—” He chuckled. “—the Mahātmā Jade will be mine!”

Chapter 1321: Cruiser of Civilization, Completed

Yang Qi had come to the Nacrelight Sageland to steal a treasure, but now he was heading to the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty.

His plan was to cause some major upheavals and chaos, then take advantage of the resulting crisis for personal gain. And he would complete the Cruiser of Civilization to unleash its full might and potential.

He already had the Engine of the One God, the vivicreation systems, power assessment systems, genetic systems, heavenly workings calculations systems, and psychic scaling systems. He was only lacking the godhood manufacturing systems.

The Eternal-Life God-Dynasty was built on the Mountains of Radiance, which allowed Yang Qi to easily take advantage of them. Furthermore, his cultivation base was vastly more powerful than it had been before, so slipping in to take the final part of the cruiser shouldn’t be particularly difficult.

Another benefit to getting the final piece of the cruiser was that he would be able to fully assimilate the flower of time into his monarch godhood.

That flower was far more powerful than a flower of wisdom, and while Yang Qi had absorbed some of it, he couldn’t assimilate it in its entirety.

Of course, all of this was in service to his ultimate goal: getting another piece of the Mahātmā Jade.

When Yang Immortal-Slayer heard the plan, he thought for a moment and said, “Are you completely sure you can pull that off, Yang Qi? You won’t attract the attention of the Paramount Gods there? Thankfully, you saved that young woman Summer Tearfall. Did you ever make contact with her?”

“She won’t be of any help. I'm not here as Yang Qi; I'm using an assumed name. Besides, if we want to do something really big, how could we rely on a minor figure like her?”

“I guess you’re right. In that case, let’s head to the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty.”

“You set up a spell formation outside of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty to call out to the Cruiser of Civilization. I’ll use my Sagelight Body to sneak into their treasure storehouse to find the godhood manufacturing systems, then bind them with a nascent divinity sealing mark.” Yang Qi was planning to do just as he had done with the piece of the Mahātmā Jade he’d stolen before. After all, he couldn’t just go in, grab what he wanted, and walk away.

“That’ll work.”

The two discussed the plan in a bit more detail, then got to work.

After becoming an apprentice of the Lord of the True Void, Yang Immortal-Slayer’s cultivation base had improved dramatically. He was already in the position to defeat Consummate Gods, and although he couldn’t quite match up to Yang Qi himself, it would only be a matter of time before he was able to do so.

Yang Immortal-Slayer had started out as Yang Qi’s clone, but had since separated from him. However, they still had a flesh and blood connection, and would never oppose each other. Also, the fact that they both had monarch godhood ensured that they would be able to survive together no matter what.

Moving as quick as lightning, they pierced through the void, and within a matter of days were in the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty. Yang Qi was very familiar with the mountains there, and was able to slip through them completely unnoticed with his Sagelight Body.

These were familiar haunts for him, and nothing caused any trouble.

During his original heist, he had been a Greater God, but now he was a Consummate God, with a will convergence vastly beyond anything from before. With the full power of the God Legion Seal to mask his aura, the vital power in the Mountains of Radiance didn’t notice him at all.

‘Is this heist going to go even smoother than the last one?’ he thought. ‘Maybe I should take some medicinal pills too.’

After all, there were plenty of Unbounded medicinal pills around as well.

However, after considering the matter, he decided against it. For one thing, he wasn’t here with his true body, but rather his Sagelight Body, which was a combination of the God Legion Seal and the powers of radiance and light. Therefore, he couldn’t actually consume the pills. And just grabbing them and taking them away wouldn’t be possible.

It would be hard enough to call to the godhood manufacturing systems and summon them away. After all, the Mahātmā Jade he had stolen wasn’t a corporeal object, but rather a conglomeration of psychic fluctuations.

Physical objects would be much more difficult to spirit away, and much more likely to alert to the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty.

That said, his plan was to frame the Nacrelight Sageland for all of this, to foment discord. And that was key to his effort to get the next piece of the Mahātmā Jade.

‘There. I have eyes on the godhood manufacturing systems.’ The hulking systems were encased in numerous spell formations, and seemed to have remained inactivated for so long they were dusty from age.

‘I can’t believe it's this easy. Now to brand it with my sealing mark.’ Using his Sagelight Body, he slipped into the presence of the godhood manufacturing systems.

No alarm sounded. His ability to move through the vital energy couldn’t have been more perfect.

Immediately, various profundities of the godhood manufacturing systems appeared within his sea of consciousness. He had already gained the deepest of understandings of virtually all the other daoist techniques built into the Cruiser of Civilization, even the imperial-heaven pre-beginning powers.

But the godhood manufacturing systems were very specifically focused on godhood, therefore, he was bound to benefit greatly from the addition.

After all, Yang Qi had monarch godhood, which was the greatest of all the types of godhood; with it complete, he would be unparalleled under heaven. And the godhood manufacturing systems would obviously help him push his monarch godhood to the highest levels possible.

‘The godhood manufacturing systems are so incredible. As long as they're powered with enough godstones, they can convert ordinary types of godhood into special versions.’ Deep in the boundless void, Yang Immortal-Slayer had set up a magical altar, and was sitting in the middle of it with Yang Qi. Three days and nights passed, during which Yang Qi familiarized himself with all of the details of the godhood manufacturing systems. Then he waved his hand, sending godpower pouring out of the God Legion Seal to create a perfect replica of the godhood manufacturing systems.

“Bring out all the other systems!”

“Alright!”

Yang Immortal-Slayer knew that his own enlightenment in this regard couldn’t match up to Yang Qi’s, so it was without hesitation that he pulled out the silver disc that was the Cruiser of Civilization, which was currently missing only one section. It was pale white, and covered with countless magical symbols.

Taking the godhood manufacturing systems, he inserted them into the spacecraft, which hummed as it powered up.

Unfortunately, the fact that the new piece was only a replica meant it wasn’t actually complete. Thankfully, Yang Qi was still planning on summoning the real thing.

Reaching out, he placed a number of holy caliber godstones into the formation around him, sending their energy into the Cruiser of Civilization and causing it to thrum even more loudly than before.

Godstones were the only thing that could power this treasure.

In the immortal worlds, he had only been able to power it up to a very weak level. In fact, back then, it was so weak as to be laughable. The only downside was that, as of yet, he was unable to produce perfect caliber godstones.

“You’re the only person who can truly use this thing, Yang Qi,” said Yang Immortal-Slayer. “You have the God Legion Seal, which enables you to create an endless supply of godstones. Anyone else, even a Paramount God, would never be able to sustain its power requirements.”

“You’re right. Once we complete the Cruiser of Civilization, and I reach Unbounded will convergence, we can use the spacecraft as our headquarters. It’ll be like a god kingdom that surpasses that of the House of God Ordainment by many times over.” He laughed. “That way, the Sage Monarch Society, the Sage Monarch Consortium, and all my friends and family will finally be truly safe. In the past, I relied on the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, but unfortunately, I lost it before I got to the god world. Since then, I haven’t had any true place of refuge. But the complete Cruiser of Civilization will be impenetrable!”

“You’re right. None of our friends and family have a god kingdom to keep them safe. The House of God Ordainment is dangerous enough, and when you add in the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty and the other powers at play, along with the fact that we don’t have a Paramount God, we’re in a delicate situation. We have to make preparations for what's to come.”

“I'm more concerned with how to take over the House of God Ordainment. Even rotten boards will have some sharp nails in them, so if we gain control of all their power and resources, as long as I reach the Unbounded level and become a Paramount God, I’ll definitely be able to complete the Mahātmā Jade, then hopefully open up the path back to the impure lands to get all of our people. With all those Ascendants on our side, we can crush anyone in our path, including the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty and the Nacrelight Sageland. And don't forget, we still have to deal with the Proud Clan.”

Even as he spoke, he continued feeding godstones into the formation, causing an illusory god kingdom to spread out around the Cruiser of Civilization.

RUMBLE!

Yang Qi threw his hands out, tearing open a rift in the cosmos. Yang Immortal-Slayer unleashed all three thousand of King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans, unleashing their full heaven-devouring power.

Next, a tremor passed through Yang Immortal-Slayer as seventy-two halos appeared above him, within each of which sat a shadowy expert that represented one of the ancient seventy-two monarchs.

“It’s go time!” Yang Qi said. “The moment of truth has arrived. Let’s summon the final piece of the Cruiser of Civilization. When this happens, I bet the Paramount Gods of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty will notice.”

Chapter 1322: Cruiser of Civilization, Completed (2)

Summoning the godhood manufacturing systems wouldn’t be like getting the Mahātmā Jade. It would cause a huge commotion and would be like breaking ground where the subterranean Taisui deity presides. Once Yang Qi and Yang Immortal-Slayer took it, they were sure to be chased, and if they didn’t follow their plan perfectly, they would end up captured and killed by the Paramount Gods.

Back in the immortal worlds, the two of them had been able to use the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart to escape from nearly any situation, which made stealing treasures very easy. They had even successfully ransacked the storehouse of the Executors of the Ancient Road. But here in the god world, they didn’t have the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, and had thus lost a massive safety net.

If the Cruiser of Civilization was complete, it was likely that not even Paramount Gods could ever catch them.

“Let’s start the summoning,” Yang Qi said. In the treasure storehouse, the godhood manufacturing systems flickered, then started glowing brightly. Simultaneously, the replica version out in the void flickered with light that flowed into Yang Qi.

Yang Immortal-Slayer activated his godpower to help Yang Qi perform the summoning. King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans and the other items of the seventy-two monarchs floated around him, creating a seventy-two-headed devil king god body that caused everything to tremble violently. Using those seventy-two items all at the same time created a trembling godpower so fierce that even monarch godhood would have trouble sustaining it. Thankfully, Yang Qi had both the God Legion Seal and the help of Yang Immortal-Slayer. With two monarch godhoods in play, they could just barely surpass the capabilities of an Unbounded expert.

RUMBLE!

A huge explosion ripped through the void, so immense that, if it were in civilized parts, it could wipe out a continent hundreds of millions of kilometers from end to end, leaving behind nothing but a crater.

Thankfully, out in the spatial tempests, it didn’t do anything.

That was what happened when Yang Qi and Yang Immortal-Slayer joined their vital energy.

The Cruiser of Civilization rose up, growing larger with every moment that passed, until it was as large as the god kingdom of the House of God Ordainment. As it floated above the altar, the flags set into the spell formation flapped. At the same time, Yang Qi’s will became like an ancient dragon, swirling through the air surrounded by a downpour of flower petals.

This was what came along with mastering the psychic power of a Paramount God.

Yang Qi waved his finger and drew the outline of a dragon, a beautiful image that was a reflection of the imperial city of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty. Then, a silver streak of light appeared and shot out of the city.

In that exact moment, numerous expressions of will rose up as the Paramount Gods realized that something was happening.

WHOOSH!

The silvery white fragment landed on the altar in front of Yang Qi, trembling for a moment before sliding into the Cruiser of Civilization. An aura of ancient civilizations spread out from the spacecraft, and the rumbling River of Civilization appeared, sweeping over Yang Qi and Yang Immortal-Slayer. To their delight, they could sense that this god item was now complete!

“Hurry, run! The Paramount Gods are coming!”

Yang Qi knew there wasn’t time to study the profundities of the Cruiser of Civilization. Blurring into motion, he and Yang Immortal-Slayer entered the cruiser, then used the God Legion Seal to spit out a stream of godstones to power it. The cruiser shivered, then vanished.

In almost the exact same instant, a sea of power arrived, forceful enough to topple the highest mountains and shred spatial tempests into pure primal-chaos.

It was the will of the Paramount Gods.

Paramount Gods occupied the peak of existence in the god world, and their wills and godpower were so immense that they could teleport entire continents and evaporate seas. They could shift time, invert the cosmos, grasp at heaven’s workings, defy the dao of heaven, and create all types of living things.

Yang Qi and Yang Immortal-Slayer didn’t hesitate for even a moment, lest they perish and be wiped out of existence. In fact, were it not for the unmatchable speed of the Cruiser of Civilization, and the fact that they had the godstones to power it, they would already have been dead.

“This is exciting!” Yang Immortal-Slayer said as he looked over at Yang Qi pouring godstones into the Engine of the One God. Although the Cruiser of Civilization was piercing through space with utter ease, there were still five or six streams of will pursuing them with deadly focus.

The slightest slip-up, and the two of them would be dead.

Meanwhile, the photonic computers in the Cruiser of Civilization spoke up. [Danger. Danger. Extreme danger. Paramount Gods in pursuit....]

It was a critical warning; Paramount Gods simply couldn’t be resisted, and would reduce any opponent to dust in a matter of moments.

“Very exciting indeed,” Yang Qi replied. “One mistake and our lives are gone. Given our speed, I don’t think we can shake these Paramount Gods. This is turning into something of a disaster.”

“Yes, a big disaster. If we go to the Nacrelight Sageland, what if the Paramount Gods there turn against us? We’ll be dead.”

“I don’t think that’ll happen. The Nacrelight Sageland and the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty are as incompatible as fire and water. Furthermore, neither is really stronger than the other. I'm almost at the point of understanding all the profundities of the Cruiser of Civilization. In a moment, I’ll be able to use the imperial-heaven pre-beginning powers to turn us invisible.”

Yang Qi had everything planned out down to the tiniest detail. However, from everything that was going on, it was possible to see how inferior the Cruiser of Civilization was to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

After all, it was possible to evade any chase by jumping into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, which was a world unto itself.

Unfortunately, the Cruiser of Civilization was not its own world.

All of a sudden, Yang Qi had a major realization.

The Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart existed in the Nevasaññānāsaññāyatana realm. Thoughts were unreal, yet at the same time real. That was the source of King Immortal-Slayer’s boundless divine might.

With this realization, he sent his divine will into the Cruiser of Civilization, whereupon he vanished bodily. His psychic fluctuations connected to the cruiser’s systems, and his thoughts were those of the photonic computers, and vice versa.

In that moment, it was as if the Cruiser of Civilization had become his body. All of a sudden, the cruiser experienced a burst of speed, then vanished.

At the same time, the wills of the Paramount Gods closed in at similarly blinding speed.

“Become the void; psychic fluctuations; Mahātmā Jade; ultimate concealment....” Powered by Yang Qi’s psyche, the Cruiser of Civilization entered the Nacrelight Sageland, whereupon he drew fully on the imperial-heaven pre-beginning powers and the talismans given to him by Summer Vastcold and Summer Soundfyre. Because the latter had the aura of the Nacrelight Sageland, he was considered a disciple, and was allowed entry.

However, it was different for the Paramount Gods.

A massive force slammed into the defensive energy surrounding the Nacrelight Sageland, sending devastating shockwaves rolling out that caused most disciples present to cough up blood as they staggered backward.

SPLAT!

Summer Vastcold was in the middle of a session of cultivation when blood sprayed out of her mouth. It almost seemed like doomsday had come. “What’s going on?!”

“Not good!” Mother Voidwalker said. “Those are Paramount Gods from the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty! Are they openly declaring war on us?!”

Mother Voidwalker sent her Unbounded will spreading out in all directions.

Meanwhile, furious expressions of Paramount God will surged out from other dimensions in the Nacrelight Sageland. There was no discussion between them and the Paramount Gods from the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty, both sides simply attacked.

‘So strong!’ Yang Qi thought from within the Cruiser of Civilization. He was already in the treasure storehouse of the Nacrelight Sageland, watching a display that showed the clash between the various Paramount Gods.

Something like a thousand blazing suns fell with mountain-crushing, sea-shattering force, slicing through space-time and causing numerous spatial tempests to erupt. Crazed dragons danced, heaven and earth mourned, and the sun and moon cried out as the greatest powers of the Nacrelight Sageland were tapped into.

Yang Qi could sense the spell formations protecting the treasure storehouse weakening, and knew that this was the opportunity he had been looking for.

Chuckling, he thought, ‘If the Paramount Gods of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty hadn’t pressed the attack, I would never have this chance to get the Mahātmā Jade. And once I get it, I might as well just clean out the entire Nacrelight Sageland storehouse....’

According to his plan, he would get the Mahātmā Jade and then reach the Unbounded level, use the Cruiser of Civilization to take everything from the storehouse, and finally vanish without a trace.

Mother Voidwalker, Summer Vastcold, and Summer Soundfyre all thought that they were manipulating him, but in the end, it was the opposite.

Chapter 1323: Seizing Victory Within Chaos

Chaos was truly spreading as Paramount Gods clashed. If nothing else, the vital energy shockwaves from the fighting provided the perfect cover for Yang Qi and Yang Immortal-Slayer to take action.

Thankfully, Yang Qi had identity medallions from both Summer Vastcold and Summer Soundfyre, and could even use the devil embryos in them to replicate their auras. That made it easy to get back into the Nacrelight Sageland without attracting any attention. Of course, it was a different story for the Paramount Gods from the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty. Their expressions of will slammed into the defenses with deadly force, provoking an immediate reaction.

And because of the chaos, no one was paying attention to what Yang Qi and Yang Immortal-Slayer were doing in the treasure storehouse.

This widespread chaos had provided them the perfect opportunity.

‘Where is that Mahātmā Jade?!’

Following the map Summer Soundfyre had given him, he was making his way through the storehouse looking for the jade. He didn’t dare to act casually the way he could in the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty’s treasure storehouse, where his Sagelight Body made things so simple.

He was here as his true self, and only had the cloaking abilities of the Cruiser of Civilization to rely on.

‘So Summer Soundfyre was actually lying. This map is a complete fake.’ To his frustration, the map she had given him only led to a trap, not the Mahātmā Jade.

Summer Soundfyre was just as bad as Summer Vastcold. Yang Qi would make sure they received their comeuppances alongside Mother Voidwalker.

Thankfully, he had infected Summer Soundfyre with a devil embryo, and although he couldn’t use it to control her, it did inform him of her ill intent. As such, there was no way he would fall into her trap.

Furthermore, he could use the pieces of the Mahātmā Jade he already possessed to guide him to the piece he sought.

As he passed through the treasure storehouse, he looked around at all the countless treasures, medicinal pills, and rare objects. He didn’t touch a single one of them. He knew that as soon as he did, the defensive spell formations would activate and sound an alarm.

Although the Nacrelight Sageland was currently in the midst of a big battle, that didn’t mean the Paramount Gods would ignore someone breaking into their treasure storehouse.

Moving slowly but surely, he crept through the storehouse, passing by countless treasures as he attempted to fish a needle from the sea.

‘It’s just up ahead.’

Sure enough, he had just sensed the fluctuations of the jade forming a resonance with the pieces he already possessed.

Deep in the world that was the treasure storehouse, there was an area of pure crystal that contained a host of different unique jades. Heaven Jade, Earth Jade, Cloudsoaring Jade, Medusa Jade, Profound-Yang Jade, Yin-Yang Godjade, Nethernorth Jade, Frigid Jade, and the like. Each of these pieces of jade was a unique heaven and earth of its own.

Among the mountainous piles of jade was one fragment that, upon initial inspection, seemed like it didn't contain any psychic or spirit energy fluctuations at all. However, Yang Qi could tell at a glance that this was the ultimate type of jade in existence, a god among other types of jade: the Mahātmā Jade.

A smile broke out on Yang Qi’s face. ‘Excellent. This piece is similar in size to the piece from the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty. If I'm not mistaken, there are several more pieces out there in the god world. But where...?’

WHOOSH!

Knowing there was no time to lose, he burst into motion.

Locking onto the psychic fluctuations of the Mahātmā Jade, he activated his Unspoiled Body, then reached out and grabbed the jade.

Almost instantly, he felt immense power surging through him, completely unbounded and without limits. His psyche and will shot higher, breaking through the bottleneck he had been stuck in for so long.

“Let’s get out of here! GO!”

Yang Qi didn’t intend to cause a scene upon first taking the jade. Ignoring all of the other treasures around him, he remained focused, using the Cruiser of Civilization to slip out of the treasure storehouse, through the chaos, and away from the Nacrelight Sageland.

As he made his escape, the Paramount Gods were still fighting, sending out vital energy shockwaves and blasts of lightning so violent and chaotic it made it impossible to see anything.

“You finally got the Mahātmā Jade!” Yang Immortal-Slayer said excitedly. “Yang Qi, this means you can reach the Unbounded level, right? You’re going to be the first true expert of all of us. Now it'll be a lot easier to accomplish things.”

“Yes, I just didn't want to attempt the breakthrough in the middle of the treasure storehouse. I need to find a good place to do it. This is obviously going to be a major step.” Yang Qi felt the psychic power in his sea of consciousness surging to the point of detonation. He needed to find a place to settle down and focus, lest his entire body explode. Once he reached the Unbounded level, then combined with his cultivation base, he could easily return to the Nacrelight Sageland and clear out their treasure storehouse.

As he currently was, he couldn’t even think of dealing with Unbounded experts. He was like a caterpillar, but once he rose to the Unbounded level, he would be like a mighty roc.

Now that they were out of danger, Yang Qi and Yang Immortal-Slayer flew into the depths of space-time until they found a stable place to settle down.

There, Yang Qi activated the cloaking functions of the Cruiser of Civilization, which would ensure that even if a Paramount God passed by, they would only see a flickering mirage. The cruiser was the ultimate treasure of the Lord of Civilization, and now that it was complete, it was immeasurably powerful.

The thing was huge, containing countless subsections and innumerable aspects that related both to the dao of immortals, as well as science and technology.

“Incredible. The Cruiser of Civilization is much more effective now that it’s complete.” It was almost as if Yang Immortal-Slayer had never been inside the cruiser before, that was how different it was.

“Yeah. This will function well as a god kingdom for the Sage Monarch Society. It’s definitely superior to the god kingdom of the House of God Ordainment. After all, we just used it to escape from some Paramount Gods. And once I reach the Unbounded level, it’ll only be even more incredible. I’d say that, right now, we're only able to use about fifty percent of its full potential.”

Now that Yang Qi’s thoughts could fill the entire cruiser, he realized how incredibly mighty the Lord of Civilization had been. Furthermore, he could tell that, with the power of the cruiser, he could definitely help his subordinates to develop unique types of godhood.

After all, there were other types of godhood besides monarch godhood that were incredibly formidable.

Even with his current cultivation base, Yang Qi could bring his people in here, transform them, and make them three to five times as powerful as before. And once he was in the Unbounded level, he could probably make them ten times stronger.

Years ago, the Lord of Civilization suffered untold hardships to complete the cruiser, and even relied on the support of the Sovereign Lord. And with it, he had helped the countless subordinates of the Sovereign Lord dramatically improve their fighting prowess.

“How confident are you that you can reach the Unbounded level?” Yang Immortal-Slayer asked.

“One hundred percent!” Yang Qi replied. “I've been building up to this moment for a long time now. With the piece of the Mahātmā Jade I just got, I can definitely do it.”

“Great. I’ll stand as dharmic guard for you.”

Yang Immortal-Slayer powered up his cultivation base and took control of the Cruiser of Civilization.

Yang Qi nodded. He was already trembling, unable to control the psychic power that was coursing through him. If he didn't achieve his breakthrough soon, his monarch godhood was going to crumble.

“Unbounded Psyche; Defy All Laws and Principles!”

A shadowy projection appeared behind him, which was none other than the “Nothing” from the Sage Monarch Grand Magic.

The Mahātmā Jade erupted with mountain-crushing, sea-shattering psychic power, filling every aspect of Yang Qi. As it did, Unbounded will grew within him, and he glimpsed even more profundities of the god world. He saw space within space, continents within continents, and even more enigmatic aspects. His thoughts, psyche, and worldview expanded as his fundamental nature changed.

He could also see invisible shackles within him, binding his soul, spirit, and will.

As they collapsed, his psyche gained freedom, and his will became Unbounded. He was now a true potentate in the god world.

Chapter 1324: Unbounded Will

Yang Qi was foreordained to be an Unbounded expert.

By putting together the pieces of the Mahātmā Jade he had collected, he had a huge burst in psychic fluctuations.

There were ways in which the Mahātmā Jade didn’t measure up to the God Legion Seal. But it was especially unique in its ability to strengthen the psyche and will. In terms of will convergence, the God Legion Seal had the Annulled Grand Magic, incredible fighting experience, and shocking power. Those were the three features of the seal. But the Sovereign Lord had only reached the level of Nothing, not the level of two “Nothings”, in other words, Annulled. Because of that, the Annulled Grand Magic was actually incomplete.

However, the Mahātmā Jade could fill in that second, missing “Nothing” in the Annulled Grand Magic. It became a psychic flow that poured into his mind, causing his spirit to expand to an unbounded degree. It was like the difference between an ancient emperor who was used to expanding his territory, then suddenly conquered an entire planet.

Yang Qi felt like that as his psychic power surged, and images of sages and monarchs appeared behind him, strong enough to crush the many heavens.

Tribulations appeared above, and devils rose up in his mind, hoping to seduce him into cultivation deviation.

‘No devil can affect my willpower. The Mahātmā Jade was originally created by the True Devil, who subjugated the horde of devils. So how can things like that be any threat to me? Heart-devils, yang-devils, pleasure-devils, pestilence-devils, spirit-devils, soul-devils, knowledge-devils, dependency-devils... none can pose any problem for my cultivation base.’

Yang Qi identified three thousand devils, dispelling each of them with ease. His words were a great dao, and his orders had to be strictly enforced.

That was what Unbounded will was like.

“With my name, mountains and rivers are Unbounded, god kingdoms are Unbounded, the psyche is Unbounded. My soul is free....” His animadestiny nascent divinity and soul rose to higher levels, to the point where a face appeared in his monarch godhood. It was none other than his own face, covered in countless golden shackles that held his soul back.

But then a destructive power swept forth, completely shattering the shackles.

In that moment, he felt as though his monarch godhood had become free of the world, and at the same time, his psychic power rose even higher. As that happened, the photonic computers in the Cruiser of Civilization spoke. [Congratulations. Soul fetters shattered. Unbounded will convergence achieved. Your psychic scale has now surpassed the level which can be assessed with numbers.]

Although Unbounded will convergence couldn't be assessed by normal means, there were still ranks within it. Just like other levels, it had early, mid, late, and peak.

The late Unbounded level was considered half a step into the Annulled level, and had been achieved by the Sovereign Lord, King Immortal-Slayer, True Devil, King of Godmammoths, Demon Master, Wretch God, and of course, the High Priestess.

Other members of the legion of gods, such as the Lord of Radiance and Light and the Lord of Civilization, had never reached that level.

And no one had ever become an Annulled expert.

Yang Qi rose to his feet, and all heaven and earth seemed to rotate around him. No vital energy, no daoist technique, and no magical laws could bind him. He had finally reached the Unbounded level.

Furthermore, his psychic power wasn’t in the early Unbounded level. After all, he wasn’t an ordinary person. He was a Fateless One, and the bearer of both the God Legion Seal and the Mahātmā Jade.

He had completely absorbed the psychic fluctuations of the Mahātmā Jade, assimilating and taking control of them. It was as if the will of the True Devil had been added into his own will convergence, combining with the God Legion Seal without any negative side-effects.

When the Sovereign Lord and the True Devil opposed each other, it led to a consummate psychic power that Yang Qi could make use of.

Slowly but surely, his aura went calm, making him seem more profound than ever.

Yang Immortal-Slayer looked at Yang Qi and couldn’t see a single fluctuation of any type, making him seem almost like an ordinary person with no energy arts. However, that just meant he had returned to a natural psychic state.

“Did it work, Yang Qi?” Yang Immortal-Slayer asked.

“Yes. I'm in the Unbounded level. After this, the Sage Monarch Society will rise to new heights, and no one will be able to stop us. Just wait until I build up enough power to become a Paramount God. At that point, I’ll go slaughter the Proud Clan. Not even their Paramount Gods will be able to get in my way.” He threw his head back and laughed heartily. “Incidentally, I can sense the other pieces of the Mahātmā Jade. Getting them is going to be much easier now.”

As the words left his mouth, the God Legion Seal rose up above his head. In its complete form, it wasn’t a golden imp, but a golden giant whose roar could shake the entire god world.

As Yang Qi grew stronger, the God Legion Seal also reached higher levels of power.

Obviously, he could draw even more deeply on the essence of the god world to create godnotes and godstones. Before, he could create billions per day, but now trillions wouldn’t be out of the question. In short, he would never run out of godnotes or godstones.

With Unbounded will behind the God Legion Seal, even Paramount Gods would have to run from its might.

The will was the basis for everything, even magical treasures.

“Perfect caliber godstones!”

Yang Qi made a grasping motion, and a veritable sea of vital energy surged toward him, which then crystallized into one godstone after another. Each stone resembled the halls of heaven as it floated in the air, radiating white energy. They were like an army of perfect angels, perfect and without spot.

Supposedly, perfect caliber godstones had only existed in the ancient halls of heaven, and the kind that grew in modern times never surpassed the holy caliber.

There were some enormous sects who found treasure troves that remained from the halls of heaven, in which they discovered perfect caliber godstones. But now Yang Qi could create them himself.

With a wave of his hand, he sent the stones into the Cruiser of Civilization, causing it to ripple and then completely vanish from any kind of perception. It was now like the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, in that it could quietly transform into nothing.

Yang Qi’s cultivation base was truly unparalleled under heaven.

The cruiser now possessed some of the characteristics of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, and was also like a god kingdom. In fact, it was now a given that he could simply absorb the god kingdom of the House of God Ordainment if he wanted to. It wasn't even close to being on the same level as the Cruiser of Civilization.

“Let’s go back to the Nacrelight Sageland and see how the fight is progressing,” Yang Qi said. “I might be in the Unbounded level, but you have yet to make your breakthrough. We need to figure out a way to make that happen. Summer Vastcold plans to use a Wisdom and Knowledge God Pill, and Summer Soundfyre has a sacrificial ceremony planned. Perhaps if we focus all of that power on you, you could succeed. With Unbounded will, you could definitely reach the peak of the Consummate God level, or perhaps even become a Paramount God.”

Yang Qi would never forget about his own friends and family. And while neither Wisdom and Knowledge God Pill, nor the sacrificial ceremony, were as good as the Mahātmā Jade, they were still formidable.

WHOOSH!

Back around the borders of the Nacrelight Sageland, Yang Qi found that the fighting had ended, although wreckage was everywhere, which the disciples were currently in the process of cleaning up. Both sides had inflicted serious injuries on each other. Apparently, he had been out in the void for over a month reaching the Unbounded level. That was how long it had been since the fighting ended.

Sucking the Cruiser of Civilization into his sea of energy, Yang Qi once again used the body of the mysterious scholar, who he was now certain wasn’t just an ordinary Paramount God, but someone special among Paramount Gods.

The first person he looked for was Summer Soundfyre.

She was in the middle of a session of cultivation, and when she saw Yang Qi, she said, “What are you doing here? Where have you been?”

“I had to do a few things to get all the money together,” he said. Then anger flickered in his eyes and he said, “How could I possibly rest in my effort to get revenge on Mother Voidwalker and Summer Vastcold? Even if it meant going back to the Lord of Civilization’s mansion grotto to tap into his treasure trove again, of course I would do it. It looks like something recently happened here? Was there a big battle or something?”

“You haven’t heard? The Paramount Gods of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty attacked us. They claimed one of our disciples broke into their treasure storehouse and stole something very valuable. But as everyone knows, if you’re out to falsely accuse someone, it's easy to trump up a charge. They obviously made it all up. Anyway, three of our matriarchs went out to fight them, and ultimately drove them off.”

Chapter 1325: Ruthless Vengeance

To Summer Soundfyre, Yang Qi looked like someone with an ordinary cultivation base.

To her, he seemed the same as before, whereas in reality, he had Unbounded will convergence and a cultivation base that was a thousand times stronger than earlier. Not even Mother Voidwalker would be able to pierce through the Life-Death Void-Destruction Lightning. In fact, Yang Qi could actually kill Mother Voidwalker if he wanted. So what could Summer Soundfyre possibly do?

“Oh, I see,” Yang Qi said. “But why did the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty attack? Seems a bit too cocky. How are things now? Did Summer Vastcold reach the Unbounded level?”

“How could that be possible?” she replied, turning up her nose. “You think she's capable of that? With some pill? Never. Although, based on what I understand, she's very confident, and plans to take the pill soon. In any case, it doesn’t matter. I've gathered all the sacrificial items I need for my ceremony, so I'm definitely going to reach the Unbounded level soon. What about the two hundred billion godnotes you said you’d get for me? I can’t wait any longer. Of course, it would be better to have that sum in godstones instead of godnotes. If only I could have perfect caliber godstones too.”

“As long as you're sure you can help me kill Summer Vastcold and Mother Voidwalker, then of course I'm going to help you. I’ll definitely make sure you achieve this breakthrough!”

“Many thanks.” Inwardly, Summer Soundfyre was thinking, ‘Mother Voidwalker is already an Unbounded expert. Even after I break through, I’ll be her equal at best. There’s simply no way I can just kill her. Well, at least I can finally get this Void Qi under control. I’ll just imprison him and force him to tell me all the secrets of the Lord of Civilization’s treasure trove. Then I’ll finally be invincible!’

Yang Qi could guess what she was thinking. Pulling out a handful of godstones, he said, “There are a few perfect caliber godstones in the collection, but I can’t extract them. You have to be in the Unbounded level to do that. The Lord of Civilization’s treasure contains some of the most profound secrets of the ancient halls of heaven. Once you achieve your breakthrough, we can unlock them and benefit immensely. Although, I'm not going to completely trust you until after you kill Summer Vastcold.”

“Secrets of the halls of heaven?” Summer Soundfyre’s heart started pounding. ‘I absolutely, positively must not let Mother Voidwalker take control of this man. He must submit to me! Does he really think I would just give him our Mahātmā Jade? That’s just asking a tiger for its skin. No, I'm going to destroy and consume him, down to the crushed powder of his skull.’

Taking the godstones from Yang Qi, she found that they really were worth about two hundred billion. He was also giving her godnotes worth eighty billion. Smiling, she said, “You’re beyond amazing, Young Sir Void Qi. I knew I’d judged you correctly. And do you see how much better I am than Summer Vastcold? She was just using you. Although, you need to go check in with her now, and make sure she has no idea what's really going on.”

“But...” he said, “what if Mother Voidwalker tries to do something to me?”

“Don’t worry. You’re too valuable to them, considering Summer Vastcold’s attempt to reach the Unbounded level. Why would Mother Voidwalker possibly do anything to you? When you report in about me, tell them I’ll be performing my sacrifice in ten days.”

“Ten days?” Yang Qi said. “That soon?”

“Yes. Actually, I’ll be performing the ceremony in five days. I just want you to pass along some misinformation to confuse them.”

Yang Qi’s eyes lit up as though he had just realized something. “I get it. You want to buy time. If I tell Summer Vastcold you're doing the ceremony in ten days, but you're actually doing it in five, then when she makes a move to interfere, you’ll already have reached the Unbounded level. When she does, according to the sect rules, you’ll be justified in killing her. After all, she’s trying to rob you.”

Summer Soundfyre smiled faintly. “Exactly. You’re very clever.”

“Fine. For the sake of revenge, I have to go.” With that, Yang Qi hurried away.

As Summer Soundfyre watched him leave, her smile deepened, and she snorted derisively. ‘Five days? I already have all the materials ready to go. All I have to do now is go to the Supplication God Temple and start praying. Once I start the process, nobody will be able to stop me. There’s no way Mother Voidwalker will believe Void Qi when he tells her about me doing the ceremony in ten days. I wouldn’t be surprised if she soulsearches him. And if she does, she’ll only uncover the information about me waiting for five days. By that time, I’ll already be in the Unbounded level.’

By then, Yang Qi was already at the Vastcold Palace. There, he saw Summer Vastcold in a session of cultivation, being aided by Mother Voidwalker.

As he neared, Mother Voidwalker opened her eyes, and her vision stabbed toward him like sharp blades as she assessed him. Before, her gaze would have been very harmful, but not anymore. Pretending to feel agonizing pain, he said, “Senior, you—”

“Where have you been!?” Mother Voidwalker barked. “You haven’t shown up for an entire month, not even after I summoned you.”

“Let me explain. I went back to the Lord of Civilization’s treasure trove and unearthed another massive fortune, which was previously sealed away in another world that I didn’t notice. In my efforts to help Miss Vastcold, I had to get on Summer Soundfyre’s good side, which is why I needed all that money.”

“Oh?” Mother Voidwalker nodded. “How much wealth did you unearth?”

“Senior, it was about eight or nine hundred billion in godnotes and godstones. It's definitely enough to get Miss Vastcold into the Unbounded level. Whatever’s left over can be used to purchase the other precious materials Miss Vastcold needs.”

“What? That much wealth?” Summer Vastcold and Mother Voidwalker shared a shocked glance. Then, killing intent flickered in Summer Vastcold’s eyes, as if she were ready to kill Yang Qi to get that wealth.

Eight or nine hundred billion was an astonishing sum that most people would do anything to acquire. Even if the Vastcold Society completely liquidated all of their assets, it would probably only add up to about sixty billion.

“Don’t try for small gains only to lose big,” Mother Voidwalker said via projection. “Just trick this Void Qi into working with us, got it? The treasures trove of the Lord of Civilization is like nothing compared to our true goal.”

“Right, Master,” Summer Vastcold replied. Then she smiled at Yang Qi and said, “Young Sir Void Qi, did you get any information about when Summer Soundfyre is going through with her ceremony?”

“Yes, I did,” Yang Qi replied in a very serious tone. “She’ll be doing the ceremony in ten days.”

“Ten days?” Mother Voidwalker said. Suddenly, her eyes flared with light as her gaze pierced into Yang Qi’s brain. As expected, she was using a very powerful soulsearching technique!

Yang Qi immediately reacted with the Life-Death Void-Destruction God-Lightning, creating an illusion that completely fooled Mother Voidwalker. In fact, he even used that moment to infect her with a devil embryo.

As Mother Voidwalker’s soulsearching technique seemingly failed to provide any results, Yang Qi staggered as if dizzy. “Senior, what did you just do?”

“Oh nothing,” Mother Voidwalker replied. “I was just checking to make sure Summer Soundfyre didn’t do anything suspicious to you. By the way, Vastcold needs a lot of wealth to grow the Vastcold Society. Why don’t you hand over half of that wealth right now so she can get started.”

With that one demand, she made it obvious that she thought Yang Qi was like a slave who had to follow her orders.

When she saw Yang Qi hesitate, her tone of voice hardened. “What. Not willing to comply?”

“I'm willing! Of course I'm willing!” Shivering, he handed over a crystal sphere that contained a large collection of godnotes and godstones.

Looking it over, Summer Vastcold smiled and said, “Just wait until I achieve my breakthrough, Young Sir Void Qi. The growth of the new Vastcold Society will all be thanks to you.”

“Many thanks, Miss Vastcold. Just let me know if you need anything else. I’ll take my leave now. I need to make sure Summer Soundfyre has no idea what's going on.”

“Of course, farewell,” Mother Voidwalker said. Watching him leave, she chuckled coldly and said, “What a treacherous little brat. He said that Summer Soundfyre would wait for ten days, but the truth is she’s only waiting for five.”

“I knew it!” Summer Vastcold said, her voice thrumming with killing energy. “Summer Soundfyre realized I used the Chiliocosm Unrestrained Mental Dharma on Void Qi. She has someone powerful backing her who’s also working against me. And it’s obvious that Void Qi realizes what we're up to, and is trying to defy us.”

“Is that why I could sense killing intent from you just now?” Mother Voidwalker asked. “You’re getting too anxious. Just wait until after your breakthrough. Then you can kill him with a mere thought if you wish. A moment ago, I implanted him with something we can use to watch his every word and action.”

“So what do we do now? How do we steal Summer Soundfyre’s resources? You can’t do it personally, Master.”

“No, I can’t, otherwise I’ll end up being accused of unfair bullying by whoever her backer is. Now is the time for you to consume your Wisdom and Knowledge God Pill. I’ll help you to reach the Unbounded before those five days are up. The past few days of refinement have pushed your quintessence energy to the peak. Trying to force further progress will just lead to heart-devils. Besides, with these godstones, I can power the spell formation even more efficiently than before.”

“Alright!”

Summer Vastcold produced the Wisdom and Knowledge God Pill and popped it into her mouth. At the same time, Mother Voidwalker placed her palm onto her back and sent psychic power pouring into her.

“Start absorbing the pill!”

Meanwhile, Yang Qi could see everything that was happening. Chuckling coldly, he said, “I'm going to bleed the two of you dry!”

Chapter 1326: Ruthless Vengeance (2)

Next, Yang Qi sent his divine will to observe Summer Soundfyre.

There she was, in the Supplication God Temple, organizing all the things she needed for her ceremony.

The Supplication God Temple was filled with altars of all sizes, in front of which knelt various praying disciples. Some of them flickered with faint, glowing light, as though their prayers had mysteriously linked them to the noble spirit of the High Priestess, who was now blessing them.

‘Marvelous,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘You really can offer prayers here and then receive blessings of power. Incredible.’

RUMBLE!

Yang Qi looked over and saw an early Consummate God kneeling in fervent prayer, who was suddenly bathed in dazzling light that caused her godhood to rise an entire level. In that moment, she became a mid Consummate God.

A buzz of conversation rose up among the surrounding disciples, including expressions of admiration, envy, and hatred.

Apparently, this kind of dramatic blessing wasn’t particularly common.

There were millions of altars at which one could pray to the High Priestess, but only a few disciples would get lucky. Among the hundreds of thousands of disciples who were in the temple at any given time, only a handful would succeed.

Yang Qi didn’t use his divine will to inspect the powers of prayer that were at play, nor did he attempt to uncover any of the secrets of the High Priestess. He might be in the Unbounded level now, but there was no way he could compare with the noble spirit of the High Priestess. And if he provoked a reaction, he would likely be destroyed.

There had been occasions in the past in which people who weren’t members of the Nacrelight Sageland tried to pray here, but were punished by being killed in body and soul.

That was why Yang Qi was actually helping Summer Soundfyre; he wanted her to successfully perform her ceremony and receive a blessing of power. He would then use the devil embryo in her to siphon the power away, which would be a much safer endeavor.

She would do all the hard work, and he would receive all the benefits.

As for the altar she had picked, it was huge, being a few dozen kilometers across. Summer Soundfyre was an important person in the sect, so it had been easy to secure the exclusive use of this particular altar.

Waving her hand, she sent out a series of silk-like streaks that covered the altar, interlacing together and locking it down.

It was a powerful spell formation filled with numerous ancient souls that would protect her while she prayed to reach the Unbounded level. And it pulsed with boundless power and killing intent. Although fighting was strictly prohibited in the Supplication God Temple, what if some disciple made a mistake and caused a dangerous accident?

‘That’s a nice spell formation. Definitely the work of an Unbounded expert. I wonder who Summer Soundfyre has backing her.’ As Yang Qi looked on, Summer Soundfyre waved her hand and sent out a host of sacrificial items, all of them extremely rare materials such as god corpses, godling internal pellets, domestic animals, flowers, fruits, alcohol, and even godhood.

Most eye-catching of all was a severed head, its eyes open in death, with long fangs in its mouth. Unexpectedly, it was a devil-god from the dao of devils, and from the energy fluctuations rolling off of it, it had been a Paramount God.

It was impossible to say who had been strong enough to behead a Paramount God, but it obviously wasn’t Summer Soundfyre, which indicated that she must have purchased it. Even more shocking was that the head had clearly been severed recently. Whatever rancorous energy existed on a Paramount God slain in ancient times would have long since dissipated. Only a freshly-killed god like that would have energy fluctuations like this. It was for the same reason that mortals would offer fresh blood and flesh to their ancestors in sacrifice, not rotting meat.

From the rancorous energy emanating from the devil-god head, Yang Qi knew exactly how powerful it was. It pulsed with defiance and rage, as well as hatred of heaven, earth, living things, ghosts, gods, immortals, buddhas, and even space-time itself. Ordinary people couldn’t even get close to it.

Even Yang Qi was shaken by the sight of it, and he wondered how Summer Soundfyre had acquired something like this for her sacrifice. No wonder she had asked for two hundred billion in wealth. Without massive capital, it would have been impossible to purchase something like that.

Although Yang Qi had access to immense wealth, he didn’t have the connections to acquire items such as this head. And even if he did, he wouldn’t know what exactly to do with it. The Sovereign Lord had disappeared, so who would he sacrifice it to?

‘Let’s see what else this woman acquired to sacrifice,’ he thought, looking on silently.

“Oh almighty High Priestess,” Summer Soundfyre prayed, “your glory fills the god world. You are the ultimate commander of radiance and light. You presided over all the ancient sacrifices....”

Continuing to prostrate herself, she pulled out a silver knife and sliced a large cut down her palm. “By the piety of my spirit, and for the glory of the High Priestess, I hereby sacrifice this Paramount God’s head, an expert from the dao of devils, rife with rancorous energy, filled with hatred and evil. May it fill you with delight....”

With that, she squeezed her hand, causing blood to drip onto the Paramount God’s head.

An intense surge of hatred shot high into the heavens, reaching far into an unknown aspect of space-time. Simultaneously, all of the sacrificial items vanished, almost as if they had evaporated. A smile broke out onto Summer Soundfyre’s face.

She knew that her sacrifice was a success, and that her prayer was going to lead to an influx of power.

RUUUUMBLE!

Moments later, a surge of power descended from that unknown aspect of space-time, and the entire temple trembled, ensuring that all disciples present realized what was happening.

Yang Qi could sense a vital power that surpassed any type of medicinal pill or magical treasure, and was superior to the blessing of any Paramount God. In that critical moment, Yang Qi and Yang Immortal-Slayer shot back out into the chaos of space-time.

“Go! We need to leave the Nacrelight Sageland and set up the spell formation and altar. Use the God Legion Seal to take control, and fuse the power of Summer Vastcold, Summer Soundfyre, and Mother Voidwalker with us.”

For Yang Immortal-Slayer, this was a very important moment in the process of completing his monarch godhood. Unlike Yang Qi, he didn’t have the God Legion Seal or the Mahātmā Jade to help him. He had direction from King Immortal-Slayer, but that didn’t help in terms of resources. Things were much harder for him than for Yang Qi, so this was obviously a very critical moment.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi was drawing on the God Legion Seal to activate the devil embryo inside all three of his enemies: Summer Soundfyre, Summer Vastcold, and Mother Voidwalker. The time had come to hopefully help Yang Immortal-Slayer to break into the Unbounded level.

Yang Qi didn’t hesitate to draw on the divine might of his Unbounded will convergence, using the God Legion Seal to implant Yang Immortal-Slayer with a devil embryo. This devil embryo was different from the normal type; it was a dominant embryo that could rapidly absorb power. In fact, it quickly turned into a vortex that sucked in all the power around it.

“I finally did it!” Summer Soundfyre exclaimed. “My sacrifice worked! I can sense the mighty power flowing toward me. Sacrificing the head of a Paramount God from the dao of devils really earned the approval of the noble spirit of the High Priestess. She's blessing me with immense power!” She threw her head back and howled, her psyche climbing toward the Unbounded level as the blessing of power poured into her like a river.

Being a peak Consummate God with half Unbounded will convergence, she could sense that she was just on the verge of a breakthrough.

However, that was when the devil embryo inside of her twitched, and the influx of power was sucked inside of it, vanishing.

“What’s going on here!? Don’t tell me something went wrong with my sacrifice!”

At that moment, Summer Soundfyre was filled with a sensation of foreboding.

Meanwhile, Summer Vastcold was assimilating the Wisdom and Knowledge God Pill under the watchful care of Mother Voidwalker, causing a massive influx of power within her.

RUMBLE!

Summer Vastcold’s countenance lifted as the power of the pill surged through her.

“You're going to reach the Unbounded level!” Mother Voidwalker said. “I’ll help you. Impermanence of Heaven and Earth!Invincible in Everything; Double-Nine Paragon; Heart and Will Unbounded!”

RUMBLE!

Summer Vastcold’s meridians and sea of energy surged with unending vital energy as Mother Voidwalker used her boundless techniques to direct the effects of the Wisdom and Knowledge God Pill. The massive surges of vital energy caused chiliocosms of worlds to appear above their heads, worlds within worlds, endless cycles around them.

It was the Chiliocosm Unrestrained Mental Dharma!

Yang Qi could sense that the moment had come for him to act.

Suddenly, devilish specters appeared behind the two women, which neither could see or sense.

The devil embryos had been activated, and as a result, all of the power on display was sucked inside, vanishing without a trace.

And of course, all of that power went straight to Yang Immortal-Slayer.

Chapter 1327: Bleeding Them Dry

Feeling overwhelmed with pain, Yang Immortal-Slayer said, “Yang Qi! Yang Qi! I feel like my body and mind are about to explode! The pain. It’s horrific! My body is going to fall apart. I can’t do this! I can’t! My monarch godhood can’t handle this level of power!”

“You've got to hang in there!” Yang Qi shouted, backing his words with his Unbounded will. “Get control of yourself! If your thoughts are out of control, how can you accomplish anything? Expand your heart and mind. Allow them to contain anything and everything. Give freedom to your psyche! The only one who controls the shackles of your mind is you!

“A clay jug can’t contain a sea. But if you break the jug, there’s no limit to what you can contain. The world will be yours!”

“I understand.” Yang Immortal-Slayer had started out as Yang Qi’s clone, so all it took was a few words, and their thoughts were aligned.

He opened his body and mind, ignoring his monarch godhood as he began to slough off the shackles that held him back from unbounded freedom. It was a lack of action or thinking that led to the realm of Nevasaññānāsaññāyatana, which was that of neither perception nor non-perception.

He was beginning to tame his mind and thoughts, and as power coursed into his monarch godhood and psyche, the devil embryo refined it and added it to his cultivation base.

He climbed from the peak of the Greater God level to the Consummate God level, then to the mid, late, and peak of that level. Next, he went through the early, mid, late, and peak of the Perfect God level.

His will convergence rose without stop as well, going from the mid Paramount level to the late and peak, until he was half a step into the Unbounded level.

Yet even with Yang Qi stealing power from Summer Soundfyre, Summer Vastcold, and Mother Voidwalker, then channeling it directly into Yang Immortal-Slayer, it still wasn’t quite enough to push him into the Unbounded level.

Perhaps he was ready for the breakthrough, but unfortunately, his cultivation base needed some more tempering. He needed to do some more bitter cultivation before he could take advantage of everything he had built up in terms of resources.

SPLAT!

In the Supplication God Temple, Summer Soundfyre slumped weakly. Not only had her sacrifice failed, but she’d apparently been drained of the power she started out with.

She was so weak she couldn’t even lift a finger!

‘What’s going on here? How come my power disappeared like water escaping from a burst dam?’ Summer Soundfyre still didn’t dare to believe that it was really happening. It seemed more like something from a nightmare.

Meanwhile, Summer Vastcold and Mother Voidwalker were both coughing up gobs of blood as they realized that they had also been drained of power. Mother Voidwalker had it a bit better off. Circulating her will, she struggled into a sitting position, her face a mask of fear. “What’s going on here? What just happened? Why did things change all of a sudden? From the time I first reached the Unbounded level until now, nothing like this has ever happened!”

“M-Master,” Summer Vastcold stammered, “the power of the Wisdom and Knowledge God Pill is gone! Not only that, my original power reserves are gone, and my godhood’s been weakened. What's going on? Did I experience cultivation deviation?”

Trembling physically, Mother Voidwalker replied, “You didn’t just slip into cultivation deviation. You fell victim to a plot! But who was it? Who managed to get in and out unnoticed? Not even a Paramount God should’ve been able to do that easily.”

“Master, we’re right in the middle of the Nacrelight Sageland? Who could plot against us?” Summer Vastcold shivered as her will collapsed. Only moments ago, she thought she was going to enter the Unbounded level, only to end up like this. Not even cultivation deviation would result in something this bad.

“I have to notify the Paramount Gods immediately,” Mother Voidwalker said. “If we don’t get help, we're going to lose all our techniques and become ordinary people. At this point, any god who came along could kill us. Only Paramount Gods can help us now. We have to get out of this state of cultivation deviation!”

“But if you’re also suffering from cultivation deviation, Master, how will we notify the Paramount Gods? Without your Unbounded will convergence, how can you pierce the god kingdom of the Paramount Gods?”

“I have another way to do it,” Mother Voidwalker said. “I have a talisman I can use to summon a Paramount God. In the end, I'm still an Unbounded expert, so there’s no way the sect will throw someone like me away.”

“Hurry, Master!” Summer Vastcold said, although in truth, she was actually completely demoralized.

“There’s no need for that,” someone said from behind them, and Yang Qi suddenly stepped into view.

“Void Qi!?” Summer Vastcold blurted.

Mother Voidwalker’s face immediately fell. “Are you behind this mischief, Void Qi? You... you couldn't do this on your own. Who are you working for?”

“I'm not going to waste words. You two bitches tried to take advantage of me; did you really think I would just let that slide?” Waving a hand, he sent out a stream of light that bound up both women. “Now, you’re mine. And Summer Soundfyre, too.”

Swish!

Taking the two of them with him, he vanished.

Simultaneously, an invisible hand appeared in the Supplication God Temple, which grabbed Summer Soundfyre and whisked her away. Yang Qi’s cultivation base was so advanced that he could move about freely in the Nacrelight Sageland. That was what happened when Unbounded will was powering the God Legion Seal and Cruiser of Civilization. It was something not even Paramount Gods could deal with.

A short time later, Yang Qi had all three women somewhere far outside of the Nacrelight Sageland, in the midst of the chaotic void.

With a smack, the three of them were flung down onto a huge altar in the middle of the Cruiser of Civilization, an altar that thrummed with imperial-heaven pre-beginning powers.

He wasn't planning to kill them, but rather use them to take control of the entire Nacrelight Sageland. After all, the Nacrelight Sageland was a major sect, with numerous Paramount Gods, so taking it over wouldn't be an easy task.

As soon as she looked around, Summer Soundfyre blurted, “Summer Vastcold? It’s you!”

Meanwhile, Summer Vastcold and Mother Voidwalker looked over with expressions of shock.

“Summer Soundfyre?!” Hatred flashed across Summer Vastcold’s face, but just as quickly, it vanished, and she smiled bitterly. “We were both fooled by Void Qi, weren’t we?”

“That’s right.” Yang Qi said, walking out with hands clasped behind his back, flanked by Yang Immortal-Slayer.

Smiling ruthlessly, he continued, “Of course, you brought this disaster on your own heads. I offered to help you, and even gave you immense wealth. But you were plotting against me the entire time. You planned to take control of me in the end, and take my wealth. So can you really blame me?”

“How could I have fallen for this?” Mother Voidwalker said, glaring at Yang Qi as she struggled to sit up straight. “Tell me, who are you working for? Your cultivation base isn’t strong enough to do this to us.”

“My cultivation base?” He laughed loudly as a tempest of Unbounded will erupted around him crushing everything around them.

Mother Voidwalker’s face fell. “Unbounded will convergence?!”

“That’s right. I'm an Unbounded expert. And you think I can’t do anything to you? Very funny. You just can’t see the truth about my cultivation base, that’s all.” Reining in his will, he clasped Yang Immortal-Slayer on the shoulder and said, “By the way, let me introduce my brother, who’s an apprentice of King Immortal-Slayer.”

“King Immortal-Slayer!” Mother Voidwalker said in shock. “King Immortal-Slayer isn’t dead?”

“Of course not. How could he have an apprentice if he’s dead? And we’re in the Cruiser of Civilization right now. The complete cruiser. Did you really believe me when I said I hadn’t unlocked the full legacy of the Lord of Civilization?”

“Void Qi!” Summer Vastcold grated. “The Nacrelight Sageland won’t let you off the hook for treating us like this. It doesn’t matter if you have help from the Lord of Civilization. He was inferior to the High Priestess!”

“The High Priestess?” Yang Qi clasped his hands behind his back. “I forgot to tell you that I'm not just the successor of the Lord of Civilization. You see, I bear the God Legion Seal.”

He waved his hand, and a vortex sprang up, sending a dazzling stream of golden light shooting out. It weighed down so heavily on the three women that they were immediately forced to prostrate themselves on the ground. As for Mother Voidwalker, her eyes were already blank with shock.

“You three are going to acknowledge allegiance to me and become my slaves,” Yang Qi said. “Don’t worry, I’ll restore your strength. The God Legion Seal is omnipotent, after all. I want to take over the Nacrelight Sageland, and even though the three of you have been bled dry, I can help you recover. After all, I command the Cruiser of Civilization’s godhood manufacturing systems, psychic scaling systems, imperial-heaven pre-beginning systems, genetic systems, vivicreation systems, and of course I have my God Legion Seal.”

“You're delusional!” Mother Voidwalker said. “You’ll never enslave us, Void Qi. We’re loyal to the Nacrelight Sageland. Not even killing us will change that.”

“In that case, I suppose I have no other choice than to kill you. Most people say, better a bad life than a good death. But if you disagree, then so be it.” Yang Qi shook his head sadly.

“Hold on a moment, Young Sir,” Summer Soundfyre said. “Just wait a second.”

“Oh? What is it?” Yang Qi asked.

“Young Sir, surely you understand everything that happened before,” Summer Soundfyre said. “People will die for riches just as birds will die for food. You want to punish me, and I understand that. Perhaps Mother Voidwalker and Summer Vastcold want to be stubborn, but not me. If you restore my power and give those two to me to handle, I’ll serve you faithfully, no matter what.”

Chapter 1328: Planting Moles

Summer Soundfyre hated Summer Vastcold and Mother Voidwalker with a passion, and had no desire to wallow in the muck with them. From what she could tell, she had an opportunity on her hands, so why not take advantage of it?

“Summer Soundfyre!” Summer Vastcold growled. “We're both from the Nacrelight Sageland, and this man clearly has evil intentions. I can’t believe you would side with him against our sect! Do dignity and faith mean nothing to you?”

“What’s the point of dignity and faith?” Summer Soundfyre replied. “Life and death are on the line here. And I couldn’t be happier to see you two morons dead. Young Sir, instead of just killing them, why not let me take their strength?”

“Go ahead. They want to be stubborn, and killing them won’t do any good.” He flicked his finger, and a golden stream of light entered Summer Soundfyre, connecting directly to her soul.

“What are you doing to me, Young Sir?” she asked in trepidation.

“As a successor of the High Priestess, you know about the God Legion Seal, right? I'm marking you with the seal, and placing a throne for you in its god kingdom. You belong to me now. Soon, you’ll be back at full strength. And now for your first task: kill Summer Vastcold.”

“Oh,” Summer Soundfyre murmured. She now knew that she was well and truly tied to Yang Qi. All the major sects in the god world knew the stories of the God Legion Seal, although no one had actually laid eyes on it.

In fact, her heart sank as she realized that even the High Priestess had feared the God Legion Seal. So what could Summer Soundfyre do against it?

Regardless, she had a chance to kill Summer Vastcold now, so she was happy.

Struggling to her feet, she walked in Summer Vastcold’s direction and said, “Well, Summer Vastcold, we've been fighting each other our entire lives. And now you’re finally going to die at my hand. Any last words?”

“You’re betraying the sect, Summer Soundfyre!” Summer Vastcold replied in a shaky voice. “You’ll die a miserable death for this!”

“Betraying the sect? This young sir commands the God Legion Seal! He's the successor of the boundless Sovereign Lord! The High Priestess was a subordinate of the Sovereign Lord in years past, which means the Nacrelight Sageland ranks below the young sir! What do you have to say to that? Maybe the noble spirit of the High Priestess is actually happy for me, and is using me to punish you!”

As the words left her mouth, she prepared to strike Summer Vastcold atop the head.

“Hold on!” Mother Voidwalker shouted, knowing full well where things were going. As Summer Soundfyre stepped back in surprise, Mother Voidwalker glared at Yang Qi and said, “Void Qi, are you really planning to kill us? If we die, the three matriarchs will definitely use heavenly workings divination arts to determine who did it. You can't hide from them, and once they identify you, they’ll chase you forever until they bring you to justice.”

“Oh? Chase me forever?” Yang Qi threw his head back and laughed. “Sorry. I forgot to tell you. I'm a Fateless One. It doesn’t matter what divination techniques your Paramount Gods use. Once I vanish, they’ll never find me.”

“What?” Mother Voidwalker said. “You’re a Fateless One? But I locked onto your destiny before!”

“Fool! Have you never heard of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth and the Life-Death Void-Destruction Lightning? I'm done wasting my breath on you. You two lied to me again and again, all with the goal of killing me. Draining you of power is less than you deserve. I should sell you as slaves to the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty’s mining colonies, where you would be ravaged day and night. That said, you do have profound cultivation bases, so the safest thing is just to kill you in body and soul.”

His words were cold and ruthless, and the determination in his tone struck icy fear into their hearts.

“Hold on!” Mother Voidwalker said. “I’ll join you. I’ll be your slave!”

At this point, she realized that resistance wouldn’t do any good.

“Master!” Summer Vastcold blurted in horrified shock.

“Enough,” Mother Voidwalker said. “He’s made things very clear. He has the God Legion Seal and he's a Fateless One. He’s destined to be an important person in the chiliocosm of worlds that make up the god world.” Looking at Yang Qi, she continued, “If my speculation is correct, you have monarch godhood, don’t you?”

Yang Qi nodded. “I do. And so does my brother here.”

“Impossible!” Summer Vastcold shrieked. “How could two people have monarch godhood!? Two tigers can’t live on one mountain!”

“The explanation is simple. This brother of mine is actually my clone. Although he’s already started walking his own path, we’re still the same on a substructural level. He’s me. I'm him. And because I'm a Fateless One with no fate, he borrowed my place in the river of fate to form monarch godhood. Alright, cut the crap. Since you're all acknowledging allegiance to me, I’m going to place a sealing mark on all of you to help you recover. I bled you dry, but your substructure wasn't damaged. The God Legion Seal and the Cruiser of Civilization can ensure that you get right back to normal. Perhaps you’ll even make some progress.”

RUMBLE!

Yang Qi’s Unbounded will exploded out, and all of the systems of the Cruiser of Civilization whirred to life. He made a clutching gesture, and a perfect caliber godstone appeared, which he fed into the cruiser, causing power to surge out of it and into the three women.

Already, Yang Qi had adjusted the flow of time inside the cruiser, so that a day on the outside was like a hundred years inside.

Five hundred years passed in the cruiser, but only five days passed on the outside.

When it was over, Summer Vastcold, Summer Soundfyre, and Mother Voidwalker had all recovered. Unfortunately for Mother Voidwalker, though, she was still very weak, and would need special medicinal ingredients and pills to regain full strength.

“My best wishes to you, Young Sir,” Summer Soundfyre said. “It’s all thanks to you that I've fully recovered. Going forward, I'm sure that I’ll eventually reach the Unbounded level.”

“Well, of course,” he replied with a smile. “You three are now completely under my control. I even monitor your thoughts. Now I'm going to give you forty trillion godstones each, which I want you to use to start a new society. Call it... hmm... call it the Sage Monarchess Society. In less than three hundred years, I expect it to be the top society in the Nacrelight Sageland.”

“Forty trillion each?” Summer Soundfyre said, her jaw dropping. “You’re really giving us that much wealth?”

“You think that’s impressive?” Yang Qi said with a cynical smile. “If you serve me well, forty trillion will be nothing compared to what you can receive in the future. I could even give you four hundred trillion. Going forward, you’ll provide full support to the Sage Monarch Consortium on the Heaven-Wretch Continent. I want it to become the top business there.”

“Yes sir....”

After five hundred years inside the Cruiser of Civilization, Mother Voidwalker knew full well that she couldn’t defy Yang Qi. It almost didn’t matter that he had the God Legion Seal; he could crush her with pure psychic power alone.

“Go!”

Majestic godpower wrapped up the three women and sent them hurtling away from the Cruiser of Civilization like shooting stars.

“I need to head back too, Yang Qi,” said Yang Immortal-Slayer. “I have to continue working on my cultivation with the Lord of the True Void. It’s possible I could break into the Unbounded level soon. I may be a Paramount God before long.” The five hundred years spent in the Cruiser of Civilization had helped Yang Immortal-Slayer stabilize his cultivation base, and although he hadn’t made any observable progress, after absorbing everything from the sacrifice and the medicinal pill, he had achieved major enlightenment.

Yang Qi nodded. “Be careful. Don’t reveal everything to the Lord of the True Void.”

“I know. King Immortal-Slayer helps me hide the truth. With him at my side providing assistance, I'm not worried about anyone trying to take advantage of me.”

With that, the two of them split up. Yang Qi kept the completed Cruiser of Civilization to help train his subordinates. He was now the most powerful force in the House of God Ordainment; never before had an Unbounded expert appeared in the sect. That said, he wasn’t going to make a big show of might. Although he would be secure within the sect, if word about him spread, other major sects might take an interest in him and send Paramount Gods to investigate. For instance, the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty.

For now, he would keep everything secret as he focused on finding more pieces of the Mahātmā Jade.

If he could complete the Mahātmā Jade as well, his cultivation base would definitely reach the virtually incomprehensible half Annulled level. When that happened, he would be able to dominate everything under heaven.

Yang Qi slipped back into the House of God Ordainment with little fanfare. After all his time away, he realized more than ever how weak this sect was.

“Yang Qi! You’re back!”

Jadefall was the first to meet him. “How are things? Did everything go well? I heard some major things happened. Paramount Gods from the Nacrelight Sageland and the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty clashed, causing a major scene.”

“Call everyone together,” Yang Qi said, snapping his finger to summon a bubble.

He looked over at the purrling, and his gaze was now vastly beyond anything from before. Now he could perceive certain things about the purrling that he couldn't before. Its substructure was so shocking that it could topple cosmoses. And it had an entire universe inside of it, something different from the god world, yet no weaker than it. In fact, it seemed that it could ultimately turn into something very similar to the god world.

Chapter 1329: Transforming Subordinates

Purr. Purr....

The purrling looked at Yang Qi in shock, clearly surprised that he had reached the Unbounded level so quickly. Apparently, he was finally in the position of being able to earn its respect.

It didn’t take long for all of his friends and family to gather. All of them were there, other than Yang Immortal-Slayer.

“Did you really reach the Unbounded level, Yang Qi?” the Shepherd asked enviously. “In that case, we're really going to be able to expand now. We’re the top faction in the House of God Ordainment, and soon we’ll be able to take it over completely.”

“That’s right,” Proud World said, a hint of complaining in his voice. “During the year you’ve been gone, we had to suffer in silence. Some of the Perfect God chief elders have been going hard on us, and there have even been assassins from the dao of devils trying to take us out. Thankfully, we all got plenty of experience dealing with assassins back on the Ancient Road to the Gods, otherwise some of us wouldn’t be here today.”

They were all still Greater Gods, which meant they couldn’t dominate Consummate Gods, let alone Perfect Gods.

The Sage Monarch Society continued growing stronger, but that only meant the leaders of the sect were working that much harder to keep them in check. If it weren’t for Jadefall and the purrling, they would have already been wiped out.

Thankfully, they were all clever and experienced, and normally kept the truth about their cultivation and techniques hidden. That, coupled with the various magical treasures they held, ensured that the assassination attempts against them had all failed.

“We’re not in any hurry. It’s been years since an Unbounded expert rose up in the House of God Ordainment. When I make my presence known, it’s going to cause a massive shakeup. And I'll instantly become a big target. For the time being, I want to stay hidden and keep working on growing stronger.

“The reason I came back is to help all of you improve your energy arts and develop unique godhood. You’ll have godhood second only to monarch godhood. And of course, you can pick your most loyal apprentices and disciples to be blessed as well.” With that, he produced the Cruiser of Civilization, and also explained all the dramatic events of the past year in the Nacrelight Sageland.

“You completed the Cruiser of Civilization?!” Doom said, reaching out and running a hand over its surface. “With this, we really can remold ourselves.”

“So you mean the fight between the Nacrelight Sageland and the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty was your doing?” Jadefall asked. “How strong are you now that you have that Mahātmā Jade? You must be stronger than an ordinary Unbounded expert. Can you defeat Paramount Gods in battle?”

“Yes, I can defeat ordinary Paramount Gods,” Yang Qi said. “And I also have some moles in place in the Nacrelight Sageland, which means I can funnel more resources to the Sage Monarch Consortium.”

“Qi’er,” said Yang Zhan, “I don’t mean to impose, but shouldn’t we just go ahead and make a huge scene here? If you can get into the treasure storehouses of both the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty and the Nacrelight Sageland, why not just clear them out? With those resources, we could take our most loyal people out into the depths of space-time and train them into one of the top sects in existence. Or maybe we could just flee to some other continent. The god world is huge. Even the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty and the Nacrelight Sageland are only so influential.”

“There’s no need to be in a rush,” Yang Qi replied. “You have Paramount Gods on your side. Furthermore, me stealing the godhood manufacturing systems from the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty put them on guard against thieves. Getting back in there won’t be easy. And it's the same with the Nacrelight Sageland. However, after things calm down a bit, I’ll definitely head back and clear them out.”

“Plan well, then make a move,” Sectlord Will Manifestation said. “You can't rush things like this, otherwise you’ll lose out.”

“Okay, let's head into the Cruiser of Civilization. I’ll remold you and give you special godhood. Each of you will have at least two or three types of unique godhood, which will boost your cultivation base significantly. Maybe I can even add more than three types.”

As they entered the cruiser, Yang Qi produced more perfect caliber godstones to begin the process.

Special godhood had major requirements. And Yang Qi’s friends and family were all top geniuses, which meant that, normally speaking, it would have been very difficult for them to do this. But with the Cruiser of Civilization, they could remold their godhood, boost their fighting prowess, and improve their cultivation bases.

Bzzzzzzzzzzz....

Yang Qi had Unbounded will and perfect caliber godstones. Although that wasn’t quite enough to power the cruiser to the same level it had reached in years past when it was in the hands of the Lord of Civilization, it was very close. At the very least, it surpassed any treasures in the House of God Ordainment, and was on par with the best that the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty or Nacrelight Sageland could offer.

As the cruiser analyzed the genes of his friends and family, as well as their godhood and psyches, Yang Qi again adjusted the flow of time inside. At the same time, he used the heavenly workings calculations systems to start tracking down the general location of the next piece of Mahātmā Jade he wanted to get.

Within his mind, a map appeared depicting a sea of continents and a web of teleportation portals. It was so far away that the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty and the Nacrelight Sageland weren’t even depicted.

No matter how much of the god world Yang Qi had explored, he was still a frog in a well. After all, not even the Sovereign Lord had ever come to understand the true extent of the god world. And despite how powerful the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty was, it was hard to say how many other sects existed that were their equal. Perhaps there were as many as the eternal sands.

In that distant oceanic area, there were numerous islands, continents, kingdoms and the like, as well as boundless destiny that surpassed that of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty.

Just what sort of powers existed there?

Yang Qi had no way to easily speculate or figure out the answer to that question.

Furthermore, even given the speeds he was capable of, reaching that location would involve at least a year of flying.

That was no surprise. In the ancient era, there had been Paramount Gods who explored distant regions, and would fly for countless years to do so. That was why not even the most powerful gods truly understood the god world. And it made it clear how much more growth Yang Qi had ahead of him.

‘These islands have so many nations on them,’ he thought. ‘The next piece of the Mahātmā Jade is there, but with so many organizations, how will I check them all?’

After studying the map for a time, he found that the destiny swelled and grew to the point where it forcibly dispelled the image.

‘The destiny there is so intense it resists inspection.’ Waving his hand, he summoned a similar representation of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty and the Nacrelight Sageland, and found that their networks of destiny were strong, but not so strong that they resisted his inspection.

That made it even more obvious how strong the organizations in this location were.

With that, he focused on his friends and family. A month passed, and the Sage Monarch Society’s position within the House of God Ordainment grew stronger than ever.

Next, he began summoning loyal disciples into the Cruiser of Civilization to benefit their cultivation. Another month passed. The Sage Monarch Consortium was extremely profitable, thanks to the help of Summer Soundfyre, Summer Vastcold, and Mother Voidwalker.

When Yang Qi needed something, whether Paramount medicinal pills, Unbounded medicinal pills, or rare god plants, he would simply send a message to Mother Voidwalker, and she would get them.

In the past, Yang Qi had possessed capital, but no connections.

Mother Voidwalker was different. She and Summer Soundfyre had plenty of contacts among the Paramount Gods and even leaders from the dao of devils.

With the money to operate with, they could do almost anything. After all, Summer Soundfyre had acquired the head of a Paramount God from the dao of devils not too long ago.

The Sage Monarch Consortium was thriving in the chaos of the Heaven-Wretch Continent. Unfortunately, there was still the Nacrelight Sageland as a whole to deal with. Mother Voidwalker alone wasn’t strong enough to influence the sect in general.

In the end, they didn’t lack anything.

Medicinal pills flowed in, completely unbeknownst to the other forces in the House of God Ordainment. Many people assumed that the Sage Monarch Society had fallen silent because someone attacked them and struck a big blow.

Meanwhile, for every day that passed, a hundred years went by in the Cruiser of Civilization. Considering a month had passed, that meant three thousand years had gone by. Normally speaking, that would have been a bad thing. Gods in the god world had limited longevity, and most would die if three thousand years passed.

But the Cruiser of Civilization could resolve that issue.

The genetic systems and vivicreation systems could increase life force and extend longevity. If it couldn’t, then how could it be considered a marvelous god item?

Chapter 1330: Battle Armlets

As long as there were enough godstones to power the Cruiser of Civilization, its systems could be activated and used. Power could be converted into corporeal objects and bodies could be remolded. Even a Paramount God could be completely transformed by the cruiser. Of course, thanks to the God Legion Seal, Yang Qi could produce a never-ending supply of perfect caliber godstones to power the cruiser, something no other Paramount God could do.

The Sage Monarch Society was growing like an inflating balloon.

All the important disciples spent three thousand years practicing cultivation in the cruiser, unlocking their true strength. Their life force, genes, and godhood transformed, so that in the end, Yang Qi’s friends and families were all Consummate Gods. And they weren’t ordinary Consummate Gods, but rather peak Consummate Gods.

All of them had three unique types of godhood which, when combined, could unleash immense power, to the point where they could devastate even peak Perfect Gods in combat.

As for Jadefall, she actually broke into the Perfect God level, and her psychic power reached the late Paramount level. She really was a top figure.

Meanwhile, among the ordinary disciples of the Sage Monarch Society, there were over a thousand who became Greater Gods.

There was no lack of medicinal pills and other resources, so everyone was able to further their cultivation very smoothly. Bai Yin was there, and was now a Consummate God.

The Sage Monarch Society was advancing by leaps and bounds; in the month that passed, they quickly became the strongest faction in the House of God Ordainment.

Not even the Mystery Society could compare.

Of course, that wasn’t publicly known at the moment. None of the elite members of the Sage Monarch Society made a big show publicly, but instead spent their time in quiet meditation, or outside the sect on missions.

That said, there were some who didn’t need to go out of the sect to get combat experience. The vivicreation systems in the Cruiser of Civilization were able to create a biochemical dimension filled with hordes of vicious morphlings. The creatures were so ruthless that no demon-devil, godling, devil king, or asura could compare to them. As such, it could be imagined how useful it was to gain combat experience in that fashion.

The Lord of Civilization had created the vivicreation systems by gaining enlightenment of the most ruthless and malicious creatures among all the countless civilizations that had existed at the time. He mixed their genes with both devil-gods from hell and godlings from the god world. He even added in genetic material from creatures that hadn’t yet come to exist at that time, or were from the most ancient primal-chaos.

An army of morphlings like that would be so violent and destructive that it could crush just about anything in its path.

Considering Yang Qi now understood many of the profundities of the cruiser, and could work with the vivicreation systems, genetic systems, godhood manufacturing systems, and power assessment systems, it was a simple thing for him to make endless armies of morphlings to use for training purposes.

In fact, he could even make morphlings that were as strong as Consummate Gods. Given some time, he would become a Paramount God, and then he could create Perfect God morphlings.

That was what could be done when one had an endless supply of power.

In fact, it was easier for Yang Qi to use the Cruiser of Civilization than it had been for the Lord of Civilization in years past. After all, the Lord of Civilization had also needed godstones to operate the ship.

“Morphlings, come forth!”

On a large world on one of the cruiser’s training decks, Yang Qi waved both hands, sending out his Unbounded will to activate the powers of the cruiser and its various systems.

Bzzz. Bzzz. Bzzz.

Thunder and lightning crashed within the world, and rain fell in torrents from the dark clouds above. Meanwhile, vital energy swirled, forming flesh and blood. Streams of life force and genetic material converged, and great daos swirled out of the void.

In the end, an enormous morphling appeared.

It was extremely vicious-looking, with the wings of a fiend-devil, a spiraling horn on its head, razor-sharp fangs, and innate battle instincts. As for the godhood within it, it was at the peak of the Consummate God level, and its will convergence was in the late Paramount level.

It was just on the verge of being in the Perfect God level!

Roar!

Scales rippled on the morphling’s body, like magical symbols that were impervious to all sorts of weapons. No attacks could pierce this creature’s hide.

All of a sudden, Doom flew out and attacked the morphling. It howled, dodging back and forth as quickly as lightning as it unleashed a host of dazzling techniques. It had hundreds of divine abilities from the martial path, as well as energy arts from both the dao of devils and the dao of righteousness, which it combined in unparalleled fashion.

This morphling was very impressive, but it couldn't stand up to Doom. He threw both hands out as he blurred into motion, unleashing thirty-six different moves that smashed into the morphling and found all of its weaknesses. In the end, a stream of sword energy slashed into the morphling’s head, cutting the entire thing into eight pieces.

But then the morphling wriggled and twitched, and in the blink of an eye, it was whole again and back on its feet. And apparently, it had learned from the encounter.

In response, Doom transformed into a stream of golden light as he attacked with the Sovereign Lord’s Holy and Far-Reaching Consummate Omnicurse.

SHUNK!

The morphling burst into flame, and in short order it was reduced to nothing more than a pile of ashes.

“That was a strong morphling, Yang Qi,” Doom said. “Freakish defenses and a solid cultivation base. If I hadn’t used that killing move, I probably wouldn’t have been a match for it. This deck is almost too much! I can’t believe you can casually create morphlings as powerful as this. It’s like cheating!”

“Casually create morphlings?” Yang Qi waved his hand dismissively. “That’s the strongest morphling I can create at the moment, and it takes a huge amount of godstones. In fact, it's about a hundred billion godnotes worth of godstones. Think about it. Who else but me could create something like that?”

“What? It took a hundred billion godnotes worth of godstones to create that thing?” Doom shivered. “So I might as well have just burned a hundred billion godnotes?”

Yang Qi nodded. “You could say that. I can create peak Consummate God morphlings, but it’s extremely expensive. If an ordinary Paramount God somehow got ahold of the Cruiser of Civilization, he’d go broke trying to make morphlings. Thankfully, I have an endless supply of wealth.”

“Make some more!”

RUUUUUUUUMBLE!

Nearly ten morphlings took shape, each of them peak Consummate Gods, their eyes glowing red as they looked around for victims to slaughter.

“I can make ten or so of these type per day, so over the last month, I've been able to create a stockpile of about three hundred of them. In a few years, I’ll have an army of them. And they’re definitely superior to human troops, because they all share the same thoughts.”

In the god world, armies were generally preferred over individual fighters. If a thousand Quasi-Gods pooled their godpower in a formation, they could easily kill a Lesser God.

A few hundred Lesser Gods could kill a Common God, and a few hundred Common Gods could kill a Greater God.

With enough training, just about anything was possible.

As for the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty, it could muster millions upon millions of troops, the weakest of which were Lesser Gods. As could be imagined, when their troops got into formation, even Consummate Gods would be in real trouble.

And it could only be imagined how terrifying it would be to have an army of a billion, ten billion, hundred billion, or trillion.

Back in the primeval era, the most powerful armies were those made up by angels. After all, they could unify their thoughts and wills, which were completely pure.

The worst thing for an army was for its soldiers to have individual thoughts. When that happened, it would disrupt the vital energy and damage the spell formations. Soldiers needed to be united.

Although all armies had various training regimens for their soldiers, how could any of them measure up to either angels or morphlings?

“Morph!”

Drawing on the God Legion Seal, Yang Qi transformed the morphling, causing its devil energy to vanish, and replacing it with a holy, white halo. Although the creature wasn’t an angel, it was purer and stronger, without a scrap of devil energy.

The morphling had transformed into a holy beast!

“All of you, take these holy beasts out into the world. Ten for each of you. I've placed a ten preeminences spell formation into each of their brains so that each group of ten can act as one. In turn, all of them have hundreds of Greater God holy beast subordinates, thousands of Common Gods, and tens of thousands of Lesser Gods. With an army like this, you’ll be able to take down Perfect Gods.”

He waved his hand, causing crystal bracelets to appear on the wrists of all his people.

“I've created these using the techniques of the Lord of Civilization. They’re called Battle Armlets. You can use them to house the armies under your control, and release them at any time.”

Civilization was born out of battle. In other words, without battle, civilization couldn’t exist. Thus, it was only war that led to the rise of great cultures. It was a basic truth.

So it was a given that the Lord of Civilization was inextricably tied to battle.

Yang Qi had created his morphling armies, and now he had given Battle Armlets to his friends and family, giving them instant access to, and control over, those immense armies.

Chapter 1331: Bringing an Army

The Battle Armlets could contain the armies of morphlings Yang Qi had created. They could also bestow halos from the Eternal Heavenly Aria, and even had other functions and abilities. They could control troop deployments, release killing energy, transform the environment, improve troop morale, and more. They were the ultimate tool for warfare.

There were some experts who would use thralls to create armies. However, such armies were difficult to control, and required the use of immensely powerful magical treasures. Furthermore, if the person controlling the army lost control, it could instantly turn the tide of a battle and lead to a deadly defeat.

The Battle Armlets were different. With a mere thought, the user could control everything related to the army.

They were manifestations of the energy of war, and very different from ordinary spatial treasures. Those ordinary treasures usually involved opening a spatial portal that an army could march through. However, the Battle Armlets could be used to instantly create an entire battlefield filled with holy beasts.

If word spread that items like this existed, it would cause a major uproar, and countless experts would rush to try to get them.

Yang Qi created enough for all of his friends and family, as well as the key figures of the Sage Monarch Society.

The months started ticking by, and soon enough, a year had passed.

Yang Qi didn’t further alter the flow of time in the Cruiser of Civilization. Allowing for three thousand years of cultivation was enough. After all, it was possible for the blurring of reality in such circumstances to lead to cultivation deviation.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi’s three thousand years of cultivation ensured that his foundation was very solid. He had fully mastered his use of the Mahātmā Jade, and his Unbounded will convergence was solid. At the same time, his godhood reached the late Perfect God level.

He would need a lot more power and medicinal pills to push his godhood to the peak of the Perfect God level, and beyond it, to the Paramount God level.

During the year that passed, Mother Voidwalker, Summer Soundfyre, and Summer Vastcold followed orders, using the vast wealth they had been given to purchase as many Unbounded medicinal pills as they could get their hands on.

Of course, they had no other choice but to follow orders. Yang Qi controlled them down to their very thoughts, and wouldn’t permit them to do anything that defied him.

Also during the year that passed, Yang Qi created more holy beasts to populate the armies in the Battle Armlets of his friends and family.

His goal was for each of them to command an army of millions or tens of millions. That way, if they ever encountered an Unbounded enemy, they would have a chance of coming out on top in a conflict.

Of course, that wasn't something that could be accomplished overnight.

He was an Unbounded expert, but even he would tire from such activity.

Besides, at the moment, creating Common, and even Greater Gods wouldn’t be particularly helpful, much less Lesser Gods. And Consummate Gods took a lot of resources to complete.

For now, the best thing was to create peak Greater God holy beasts.

At the end of the year that passed, his friends and family all had armies of hundreds of thousands of holy beasts.

How terrifying of a concept was an army of hundreds of thousands of peak Greater Gods?

If the House of God Ordainment counted all of its Greater Gods, it probably wouldn’t even reach the level of a hundred thousand. By extension, that meant that even one of Yang Qi’s friends or family could take on all the Greater Gods in the House of God Ordainment. And that wasn’t even mentioning the fact that their armies contained some holy beasts that were as strong as peak Consummate Gods.

“We’re finally getting truly strong,” Jadefall said after her most recent breakthrough. “Yang Qi, the Sage Monarch Society is stronger than any of the other factions. Don’t you think it's time to take over the House of God Ordainment? Do we really need to wait for the tricentennial election?”

“I suppose we can do it soon,” Yang Qi said with a nod. “You’re half a step into the Unbounded level, and your godhood is at the peak Perfect God level. You’re essentially on the same level as Summer Vastcold and Summer Soundfyre. That said, it's not likely that you’ll break into the Unbounded level in the next few hundred years. I don’t want to reveal the fact that I’ve already reached the Unbounded level. That said, the Sage Monarch Society has secretly reached the level of being able to crush all the other factions. Let’s wait until Yang Immortal-Slayer reaches the Unbounded level. Then we can raise our flags in the House of God Ordainment. For now, though, let’s keep operating in secret.”

“Alright, I’ll start making the arrangements.” With that, Jadefall passed along a few orders. Already, the secret preparations were underway.

**

The ocean beyond the House of God Ordainment was occupied by various sects, nations, and peoples. On one particular island, a series of white streaks of light shot up, interlocking to create something like a white lotus. It was a spell formation that could keep out the vile climate of the god world.

The leader of the Preheaven Society, Wang Xiantian, was on that island, and as he looked at the white lotus formation, he said, “Greetings, oh forty brothers of the White Clan. I am Wang Xiantian, leader of the Preheaven Society in the House of God Ordainment. I'm here for an audience.”

Buzzzz.

“Well, if it isn’t Wang Xiantian from the House of God Ordainment. That’s a very big sect. Why exactly have you come to White Stone Island to see us forty brothers?”

Thump. Swish. Rustle.

White lotuses bloomed as forty individuals appeared, all of them Consummate Gods, except for one, who was an early Perfect God. These forty brothers led a powerful organization, although it wasn't close to being on the same level as the House of God Ordainment.

“My reason for coming is simple,” said Wang Xiantian. “I need your help dealing with someone. The forty brothers of the White Clan are well known for their power on the ocean. Although you’re not on the same level as the superpower sects, you’re definitely first-tier. And when you join forces together, you’re beyond compare. Together, you’ve vanquished many enemies in battle.”

“Who do you want us to fight, Wang Xiantian?” said the oldest of the brothers. “And you’re willing to pay, right?”

“I can pay. I want you to rob a consortium that belongs to the damned Sage Monarch Society of the House of God Ordainment. They have seafaring operations with plenty of ships carrying goods back and forth. So what do you think? The key members of the Sage Monarch Society have been on the move lately, and according to my information, the person in charge of the seafaring aspects of the consortium is a woman named Yang Memory. I want her killed! Either that, or taken captive.”

Yang Memory was actually Peaklord Memory, who had since taken the surname Yang.

She was in charge of sourcing products from the various islands in the area, which would then be brought in and sold in the main headquarters. Business had been expanding rapidly, and countless pirates were killed in the process. As of now, the Sage Monarch Consortium had a virtual monopoly on seafaring trade.

“No problem,” said the leader of the White Clan brothers. “We would probably have done it whether you asked us to or not. The Sage Monarch Consortium has been meddling in the seafaring business, and has started being very obstinate. We've actually lost a lot of business because of it, so striking a heavy blow in this regard will be good. That said, if we kill a disciple from the House of God Ordainment, how will we escape retribution?”

Wang Xiantian laughed. “Don’t worry about that. The junior houselord, and even the houselord himself, are very interested in keeping the Sage Monarch Society in check. Killing a few people from the Sage Monarch Society won’t provoke any reaction at all. That I can guarantee.”

“Fine. We’ll do the killing first and then talk about the price later.” The White Clan brothers then flew up into the air.

However, that was when a melodious string of laughter reached their ears, and a young woman appeared.

“You want to have me killed, Wang Xiantian? As I'm sure you’re aware, the penalty for conspiring with outsiders to harm fellow disciples is... death!” Of course, it was none other than Yang Memory.

Jaw dropping, Wang Xiantian said, “Yang Memory?! When did you become a Consummate God? This is impossible! How can you achieve progress so quickly?”

“Nothing is impossible,” she replied. “Now, come with me to report your crime to the House of God Ordainment. And you forty brothers of the White Clan, you come with me to testify as witnesses.”

The brothers of the White Clan burst out laughing, and the oldest among them said, “Do you know what you’re asking, bitch?!”

“Did I not say it clearly enough? Should I repeat myself? I'm arresting Wang Xiantian for conspiring against a fellow disciple. And you’re coming with me to testify and also be sentenced for your crimes.”

Wang Xiantian let loose a stream of maniacal laughter. “You’re insane! Maybe you’re a Consummate God, but so am I. And while you’re an early Consummate God, I'm in the peak level. You’d end up dead trying to fight me alone, let alone all of these forty brothers. You could have strolled your way to heaven, but—”

“Cut the crap,” Yang Memory growled. “Since you’re not complying, I’ll use force. Battle Armlets!”

RUMBLE!

The bracelet on her wrist flared with bright light, causing everything to shift and tilt as an enormous battlefield appeared, filled with holy beasts arrayed in formation, battle banners flapping in the wind and drums beating.

It contained five hundred and sixty thousand Greater God holy beasts and a hundred peak Consummate Gods, all of them blessed by the Eternal Heavenly Aria.

Even just a few thousand Greater Gods who joined forces could take down an early Consummate God, and here were five hundred and sixty thousand. There were also holy beasts in the Consummate God level. This was a force that could shake the heavens and topple the earth!

“What’s going on here? How could you have an army this big?!”

“Peak Greater Gods?! How are there so many? Dear lord! Even the House of God Ordainment as a whole only has about a hundred thousand Greater Gods!” Wang Xiantian couldn’t believe his eyes. “This is a trick! It's only an illusion!”

Chapter 1332: Big Trial

Five hundred and sixty thousand peak Greater Gods, all free from impurities. No ordinary person could create an army like that, but Yang Qi could, with his morphlings transformed into holy beasts. They were essentially like angels! When in formation, a force like that could even contend with an Unbounded expert.

In other words, even if an Unbounded expert showed up and tried to cause problems for Yang Memory, she could sacrifice her army and escape with little more than a few cuffs and kicks.

Of course, those five hundred and sixty thousand Greater Gods would end up wiped out of existence in the process. But it would be worth it to escape from an Unbounded expert. Besides, Yang Qi could always build another army to replace it.

In the entire god world, only he was capable of such things.

For example, the House of God Ordainment only had a hundred thousand Greater Gods, and they were considered elites within the sect. To sacrifice all of them to save a single person would be a loss too great to sustain.

Therefore, it was obvious that an army of five hundred and sixty thousand Greater Gods could conquer mountains and rivers, and subjugate everything around it. Wherever this army went, the glory of monarchs was visible.

RUMBLE!

War drums pounded as the five hundred and sixty thousand Greater God holy beasts howled, the sound causing space to crumble. Meanwhile, vital energy and godpower surged out of them, transforming into an enormous hand that rumbled forward.

With one smooth move, it reached into the water and ripped the island up into the air.

“Agggghhhhh!” screamed Wang Xiantian. He didn’t even have the chance to flee before he was grabbed up, godpower piercing into him to prevent him from even moving.

The leader of the White Clan brothers, an early Perfect God, tried to fight back, but he was viciously beaten down. Meanwhile, the spell formation protecting the island was wiped out of existence.

SPLAT!

The leader of the White Clan coughed up a huge mouthful of blood, and a halo appeared above his head; it was none other than the Light of Weakness, which rapidly ate away at his power.

“Manacles of War!” Yang Memory said from in the middle of the huge army. The holy beasts shifted formation, causing the outflux of godpower to become majestic manacles that bound up the White Clan brothers.

That was how smoothly things went when a well-oiled machine of an army was commanded by a competent general. For an army like this to pull off the Manacles of War move was incredible; even the most crack troops of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty couldn’t do something similar.

That said, in the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty, the crack troops would be limited to thousands of soldiers. It would be difficult to get a force of over ten thousand, and armies in the hundreds of thousands would prove completely impossible to gather.

The only way it would be feasible would be to use puppets, but they were sluggish and couldn’t pull off complicated maneuvers. Furthermore, they couldn't advance their cultivation level.

“Well, White Clan brothers? You're obviously no match for me. Do you submit to the Sage Monarch Society?” Even as the words left her mouth, Yang Memory took the entire battlefield and sucked it back into her Battle Armlet. “If you refuse, the only end you’ll meet is death.”

“Where... where did the Sage Monarch Society get an army that big?” said the leader of the White Clan. “Of all the sects on all the continents around here, only the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty could possibly accumulate so many crack troops. But they’d never give them over to a single person to command.”

“This is nothing. All of my brethren in the Sage Monarch Society have armies like this. And given some time, our armies will be even larger.”

Even as the leader of the White Clan gaped, Yang Memory took out a bean-sized perfect caliber godstone, which she put into the bracelet.

Instantly, the bracelet was completely charged back up.

The Battle Armlets were spatial magical treasures that were created by the Cruiser of Civilization, which meant they needed fuel to operate. Of course, the godstone costs were astronomical, but Yang Qi could provide them with whatever they needed.

And with perfect caliber godstones, they could fit even more troops into the Battle Armlets, if they needed to.

“Hmph! We're leaving. This conspiracy is a major violation of sect rules, Wang Xiantian. We're going back immediately and putting you on trial. Let’s see how the chief elders sentence you.”

Waving her sleeve, Yang Memory swept them up into the cosmic storage space in her sleeve.

‘The Sage Monarch Society is really going to rise to prominence now!’ she thought. Arresting the leader of the Preheaven Society and taking him back to stand trial was a huge show of dominance for the Sage Monarch Society. There were definitely going to be people in the sect who weren’t pleased with this. After all, not even the junior houselord would dare to arrest the leader of one of the major factions. It was a disruption of the equilibrium in the sect, as well as an inherently dangerous move.

Yang Memory knew that, but she also recognized that this was an important step forward in seizing power. She wasn’t afraid. She knew that Yang Qi had reached the Unbounded level, and had just spent three thousand years in the Cruiser of Civilization, stabilizing his cultivation base and creating hordes upon hordes of holy beasts. In all of the House of God Ordainment, only the secret reserve power was something they needed to be leery of.

What was more, Yang Immortal-Slayer would soon reach the Unbounded level.

Once he did, the Sage Monarch Society would have two sharp swords, one shining and bright, the other dark and gloomy. And the House of God Ordainment would fall easily to their control.

Yang Memory took all of the captives back to the god kingdom of the House of God Ordainment. Although she now qualified to become a child of primeval chaos, she first went to the Law-Enforcement God-Palace and sounded the enormous bell there. That bell was usually only struck once every few years, when a major trial was held. And whenever its toll was heard in the sect, all the disciples would head to the Law-Enforcement God-Palace to attend.

Generally speaking, Yang Memory didn't qualify to strike the bell. But when she reached it, she didn’t hesitate at all. Booming sounds rang as the sound of the bell caused the sect to tremble.

Three Consummate Gods in the Law-Enforcement God-Palace opened their eyes, and their expressions were filled with rage.

“What? Who struck the Punishment Bell?”

“What gall! What outrageous gall! Who dares to strike the Punishment Bell?”

The three Consummate Gods flew out and saw Yang Memory standing right in front of the bell.

RUMBLE!

“How dare you strike that bell, Yang Memory! Do you have a death wish?” Without mercy, the Consummate God struck out with his palm.

Yang Memory snorted coldly, releasing some power from her Battle Armlet, which slammed into the chief elder and forced him back several steps.

Flicking her sleeve fearlessly, she said, “I struck the Punishment Bell because something huge just happened. Wang Xiantian, the leader of the Preheaven Society, conspired with the pirates known as the White Clan. And I arrested them all.”

She wasn’t personally a match for these three chief elders. However, she had her Battle Armlet, and she could also sense that Yang Qi’s Unbounded will was watching over the proceedings.

“What?!” The chief elder who had just been struck by Yang Memory looked at her in disbelief. “You’re a peak Consummate God!? Why haven’t you applied to be a child of primeval chaos? And when did you reach that level?”

“Why are you surprised? Yes, I might as well be a child of primeval chaos, so therefore, I have every right to strike the Punishment Bell. Now, get out here, Wang Xiantian!”

She flicked her sleeve again, causing Wang Xiantian and the forty White Clan brothers to tumble out. As soon as he was out in the open, Wang Xiantian started babbling, “Five hundred and sixty thousand peak Greater God soldiers! She has five hundred and sixty thousand! Five hundred and sixty thousand!!”

“What’s going on here?” The chief elders were stunned, and had already forgotten why they were angry at Yang Memory.

“White Clan brothers, speak,” Yang Memory said. “Did you collude with Wang Xiantian to harm me and the Sage Monarch Society?”

Chapter 1333: Playing Games

“Yes, that's exactly right...” said the leader of the White Clan. All forty of the brothers were trembling in fear. “Wang Xiantian came to visit and said he wanted us to kill you. He said something about you breaking the rules of the game and causing a lot of chaos on the open seas. We never reached an agreement, though. You showed up, arrested us, and brought us here. None of this has anything to do with us! It's all Wang Xiantian’s doing! We were talking about what he wanted, but never agreed to do anything!”

Yang Memory nodded. “That's fine, I forgive you. But this vile Wang Xiantian needs to be punished. Otherwise the disciples of the sect as a whole will be furious.”

“Hold on!” said one of the chief elders from the Law-Enforcement God-Palace. “What do you mean the disciples as a whole will be furious? Do you speak for all the disciples? Forget about whether Wang Xiantian really did conspire to harm you, Yang Memory. You struck the Punishment Bell without authorization, which is itself a huge crime. You should be the one being punished right now!”

This chief elder was clearly enraged at Yang Memory’s behavior, and how she had broken the rules by sounding the bell. Normally, that bell was only struck when all the chief elders agreed to do so. Not even the children of primeval chaos would strike it, for fear of being executed.

Countless disciples were already present, and they saw how shocked the numerous elders and elder kings were by what was happening. Meanwhile, some of the chief elders were high above, conferring with each other. “Why was the Punishment Bell sounded? It shouldn’t be sounded casually, does she not know that? It’s only to be struck when all the chief elders agree.”

“Chief Elders,” Wang Xiantian shouted, “this Yang Memory arrested me for no reason! You have to punish her! I didn’t do anything. She’s not even a child of primeval chaos, so she has no right to take me captive, much less ring the Punishment Bell! She deserves the strictest punishment there is!”

“Yang Memory, release Wang Xiantian immediately,” said one of the chief elders. “We’ll further investigate the matter of the Punishment Bell, and as long as you admit your crime, you can escape the death penalty. But if you do the wrong thing, then every last member of the Sage Monarch Society is going to be dragged into this.”

“In my opinion, this already involves most of the Sage Monarch Society,” another chief elder shouted. “They're always sticking their noses into sect business, so I say it's time to crack down on them.”

More and more chief elders were gathering, and many of them were already siding against Yang Memory.

“Who just said they want to crack down on the Sage Monarch Society!?”

A voice rang out that caused everything to tremble, whereupon Jadefall appeared, flanked by Yang Qi and the other key members of the Sage Monarch Society. Counting the ordinary members they led, there was a crowd of several tens of thousands. That said, the Law-Enforcement God-Palace was a huge place, and its public square could hold hundreds of thousands of people.

Jadefall’s cultivation base was already at the peak Perfect God level, and she had peak Paramount will. She was roughly on the same level as Summer Soundfyre and Summer Vastcold. Those three thousand years of cultivation in the Cruiser of Civilization weren’t in vain.

Unfortunately, her breakthrough to the Unbounded level was going to be very difficult, and she wouldn’t succeed unless she came across the right good fortune.

“You....”

The chief elders and elder kings were all shocked by Jadefall’s aura. “How did your cultivation base improve so much? You’re at the peak of the Perfect God level?”

“That's right. I'm a peak Perfect God. And my will is at the peak Paramount level. Without some cultivation base to back it up, why would I ask Yang Memory to ring the Punishment Bell? Am I right, brethren and disciples of the Sage Monarch Society?”

“Yes ma’am!” the tens of thousands of disciples chorused. “Sage Monarch invincible! Sage Monarch invincible! Bring about punishment! Bring about punishment!”

As the disciples shouted in unison, they released their auras, revealing that all of them were peak Greater Gods! The only exceptions were those that pulsed with the aura of Consummate Gods!

In the House of God Ordainment, there were about a hundred thousand Greater Gods, and most were prime elders, not disciples. Because of that, most such gods weren’t members of the various factions. After all, it would be hard to maintain balance among the factions if that happened.

Even the Mystery Society didn’t have ten thousand Greater Gods as members.

But here the Sage Monarch Society had a full fifty thousand Greater Gods, something the likes of which the House of God Ordainment had never been seen before. For unimportant people to achieve such monumental progress in such a short time was shocking. What level of resources had been put into this?

Everyone was so stunned by the development that silence reigned.

After a long moment passed, a new chief elder appeared, eyes blazing as he glared at the Sage Monarch Society and shouted, “What do you people think you’re doing? This is rebellion!”

The mere surge of his aura caused all the sound in the area to die down. The Perfect Gods had arrived!

Jadefall’s eyes flickered as she looked at this chief elder, whose name was Tian Bubai. He was a very powerful man, and a staunch supporter of the junior houselord. He was so strong that not even fifty thousand Greater Gods working together would be able to best him in combat.

“I knew the Sage Monarch Society was arrogant, but how could I have guessed that it would reach a state like this in such a short time? Very peculiar.” Tian Bubai chuckled coldly. “So this little force is what you’re relying on? Fifty thousand Greater God disciples? How exactly did they achieve their breakthroughs? You can tell us, Jadefall. You're a member of this sect, so if you have a way to achieve breakthroughs faster than normal, you should hand it over to the sect. We need contributions like that. As for your subordinate Yang Memory, she struck the Punishment Bell without authorization, but we can let that slide. The caveat is that you have three years to ensure a hundred thousand sect disciples become Greater Gods. And you have to disband the Sage Monarch Society.”

The other chief elders started weighing in.

“That's right. Hand over all the resources of the Sage Monarch Society. Besides, what good does it do for you to have so many Greater Gods? We chief elders could crush them with ease. The difference between Perfect Gods and Greater Gods is so immense you can hardly calculate it.”

“Thankfully, we chief elders are all here today, so we can agree on the matter of disbanding the Sage Monarch Society.”

“Exactly. The Sage Monarch Society is way out of line here. They’re making too many deals with outsiders, and have even been stealing sect resources. If things keep going on like this, the sect will fall apart. Where’s the houselord? Houselord, come grace us with your presence, and help us crush the Sage Monarch Society out of existence!”

If enough of a scene developed, the chief elders and elder kings would all show up. The only higher level of leadership was the houselord, and if he showed up, it would be an easy thing to disband the Sage Monarch Society.

“What’s this commotion all about?”

An immense will weighed down as two figures descended from above.

It was the houselord and the junior houselord, and their expressions were grave as they glared at Jadefall and the disciples of the Sage Monarch Society.

The faction leaders present joined their voices in greeting, along with the various elders and important people present.

“Our respects, Houselord, Junior Houselord!”

In contrast, the members of the Sage Monarch Society didn’t say a thing, but were in fact ignoring the houselord and junior houselord.

The disciples were completely loyal to their own leader, and couldn't care less about the leaders of the sect at large. In fact, if their leader told them to kill the houselord, they would follow through on the orders without a second thought.

“What incredible gall!” Tian Bubai said furiously. “You people from the Sage Monarch Society are real rebels aren’t you? I can’t believe you even refuse to greet the houselord!”

The houselord snorted coldly, and everyone could sense his anger. After all, it was a sect rule that everyone had to offer him greetings, so the Sage Monarch Society’s refusal to comply went to indicate that they were attempting to seize power.

All of a sudden, Jadefall said something completely shocking to Tian Bubai. “Who the hell do you think you are? How dare you lob accusations at me? Until it’s your turn to speak, kindly fuck off!”

RUMBLE!

Unexpectedly, she launched an attack!

She was a peak Perfect God, and also had a Battle Armlet filled with the power of countless holy beasts. Even an Unbounded expert would need two or three moves to get that level of power in check, much less someone like Tian Bubai.

“God Tombstone Palms!”

She launched a consummate technique from the Great Necropolis, which was inferior only to the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. Instantly, a huge tombstone appeared, inscribed with names of buried gods. Its aura contained the grieving and wailing of divine beings, and it made everything seem like a graveyard as it rumbled toward Tian Bubai.

“How dare you attack me, you animal!” Although Tian Bubai had been caught off-guard, his energy arts were extremely profound, so he reacted in the blink of an eye. Shoving his hands out in front of him, he said, “Nine Heavens God Incantation!”

Nine enormous hands shot out to meet the incoming tombstone.

However, the God Tombstone Palms were so powerful that Tian Bubai was thrown backward and slammed into the wall, blood spraying out of his mouth, his bones, sea of energy, and every other part of him devastated and thrown into chaos.

As countless shocked gazes locked onto her, Jadefall said, “How dare scum like you jabber in my presence. Incidentally, if you want to commit suicide, this isn’t the best way. Mention disbanding the Sage Monarch Society again, and I’ll cripple you. Henceforth, anyone who crosses us will be killed.”

Chapter 1334: Completely Arrogant

Tian Bubai was a peak Perfect God, yet Jadefall’s God Tombstone Palms had defeated him in a single move. Now he lay prone, gobs of blood oozing out of his mouth. He wasn’t angry, just confused. It was clear he’d been struck senseless, and had no idea where he was or who hit him.

A peak Perfect God with peak Paramount will was the type of person who generally dominated everyone around them. So how could one be beaten silly?

Of course, the reason was that Jadefall was incredibly domineering.

Her Battle Armlet didn’t actually contain five hundred and sixty thousand peak Greater God holy beasts. It contained three million six hundred thousand! And it had a thousand Consummate God-level holy beasts as well. That, combined with the God Tombstone Palms, ensured that she could break the defenses of the surrounding god kingdom with a single move. How could a measly Tian Bubai do anything against strength like that?

The chief elders and children of primeval chaos were all stunned, as were the countless other disciples present. Who could ever have guessed that Jadefall would be this ferocious? Not only did she dare to make a move against Tian Bubai, but she defeated him soundly. In fact, it was still questionable whether he would survive, as he was simply laying there grinning like an idiot.

Meanwhile, veins bulged on the houselord’s forehead as he smiled with rage. However, he managed to keep himself under control. Obviously, the fact that Jadefall had defeated Tian Bubai so easily meant that she was beyond his own level.

He had survived countless dramatic situations to become the houselord, so although it was shocking that the Sage Monarch Society had changed, seemingly overnight, from an ant-like faction to a major player, he still kept his cool.

“This is the House of God Ordainment, and you're a disciple of the sect,” he said. “Despite that, you dared to strike one of the chief elders with a vicious move. What exactly are you planning to do here? Are you rebelling?”

Jadefall simply smiled back at him. She could tell that the houselord wasn’t a match for her; therefore, she didn't find anything he said threatening.

“Houselord, this chief elder attacked me first,” she said casually, as if she were discussing a very trivial matter. “I'm a child of primeval chaos, someone who could serve as the houselord in the future. In the coming tricentennial election, I could very well win. What. If someone tries to kill me, I'm just supposed to stand there and let it happen? Not likely. It just so happens that I'm strong enough to defend myself, so the chief elder got hurt. In the end, he deserved it! Whether in the House of God Ordainment or other sects, strength comes first. If you’re not strong enough, you’d better not act arrogant in my presence. Don’t you agree, Houselord?”

Everyone could read between the lines. She was saying that she was stronger than the houselord, and actually challenging his authority. It was completely unprecedented. In all of the history of the House of God Ordainment, never had a child of primeval chaos brazenly challenged the houselord like this.

“This is preposterous!” the junior houselord blurted. “Completely preposterous!” He had been pushed too far recently. The Sage Monarch Consortium had been growing and growing, damaging his own business and profits. How could he ever have predicted that the Sage Monarch Society would expand so rapidly? “Don’t you know how to respect your elders, Jadefall?!”

“Respect my elders?” Jadefall said. “If I didn’t, I wouldn’t be standing around talking. Didn’t you see what happened to Tian Bubai?”

Again, her meaning couldn’t have been clearer. It was because she was showing respect to her elders that she wasn’t slamming the houselord into the ground like she had Tian Bubai. Although she didn't spell it out in plain words, the meaning was obvious.

The chief elders who backed the houselord and junior houselord were virtually fuming with rage, and some of them were even developing heart-devils.

In fact, many of them started shouting out rebukes.

“What gall! What outrageous gall!”

“This is over the line, Jadefall. I can’t believe you would speak to the houselord that way. I suggest we sanction the Sage Monarch Society and declare them an evil faction!”

“Sanction the Sage Monarch Society! Sanction them!”

Other faction leaders also started denouncing Jadefall and the Sage Monarch Society. They knew that if they didn’t put the Sage Monarch Society in check today, it would lead to no end of trouble. After all, if they dared to defy the houselord like this now, what would they do in the future?

The scene quickly devolved into an uproar.

Some people were shouting to sanction the Sage Monarch Society, while others were saying they should be expelled or executed.

At a certain point, the houselord waved his hands to silence the crowd.

It was as if his powerful air as a leader caused the entire god kingdom to go silent.

“Jadefall, what sort of good fortune did you come across? Why not just tell me directly? Do you really think that because you're a peak Perfect God with peak Paramount will, you can defy the House of God Ordainment?”

Apparently, the houselord had made a decision about how he wanted to handle the situation, otherwise he wouldn’t have been speaking so calmly.

“I haven’t said a single thing about rebelling against the House of God Ordainment. I'm just talking about its leadership.” Jadefall was looking at the houselord as if he were a clown. It seemed that she wasn’t the least bit afraid, not even of whatever secret reserve powers might be in play.

The houselord laughed. “You’ve got a lot of guts to talk about the leadership of the sect. Do you really think that, with your cultivation base, you qualify to lead the House of God Ordainment? As you just heard, all of the disciples and chief elders want the Sage Monarch Society sanctioned. Exactly how many members do you have? You only make up about one percent of our members. So if everyone else wants you sanctioned, what exactly are you going to do about it?”

“What am I going to do about it? Simple. Kill everyone who opposes us.” She wasn’t making any attempt to hide the fact that she was making an open threat.

Things were going according to plan. The time had come to seize power, even if that meant holding back from occupying the position of houselord. And if the houselord couldn't do anything to the Sage Monarch Society, it meant that nobody could, and they were free to do whatever they wanted in the sect.

“You’ll kill everyone who opposes you?” The houselord laughed angrily. “Am I supposed to be scared? You people have hardly been in our sect for ten years, yet have made progress like this? My guess is that you're Ascendants. Well, are you? Did you come here from the lower worlds?”

“That’s right,” Jadefall said, “we're Ascendants. With us here, the House of God Ordainment is heading into a new golden age. Houselord, you really shouldn’t make such a big fuss over something so trivial. We haven’t done anything to harm the interests of the sect. And all we want right now is to punish Wang Xiantian according to the sect rules.”

“Punish Wang Xiantian?” the houselord said. “What if I don’t agree to that?”

“You’ll agree whether you want to or not,” Jadefall replied. “Do you really think you can fight the Sage Monarch Society by ganging up on us? Wang Xiantian, why don’t you explain to them how many members the Sage Monarch Society has?”

“Houselord!” Wang Xiantian shrieked. “You absolutely, positively must not underestimate the Sage Monarch Society. They’ve been training armies in secret! When Yang Memory captured me, she used an army of five hundred and sixty thousand peak Greater Gods! And the army had a hundred peak Consummate God generals! That's how she beat me so easily. And she said that all the key figures in the Sage Monarch Society have armies like that. Killing them isn’t going to be easy!”

He shouted the words at the top of his lungs, causing all eyes to lock on to Yang Memory.

“What? An army of five hundred and sixty thousand peak Greater Gods?” The junior houselord simply couldn’t believe it. “Impossible. We don’t even have that many Greater Gods in the House of God Ordainment! And every one of them has an army like that? There’s no way! Do you think the Sage Monarch Society is the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty or something?”

The houselord was staring at Jadefall, and eventually his eyes landed on her bracelet. “That has an immense aura of battle. What kind of treasure is it? Do you have it packed with thralls? I'm very curious to see how many thralls the Sage Monarch Society has on hand.”

Jadefall smiled faintly. “You want to see? Fine. Brothers of the Sage Monarch Society, produce your Battle Armlets. Let’s fill this god kingdom with our armies and let them see exactly how many troops we have.”

“Yes ma’am!”

RUMBLE!

The key members of the Sage Monarch Society who were present produced their Battle Armlets and activated them. Instantly, the god kingdom transformed into a huge battlefield, pulsing with an energy of battle.

Other than Yang Qi’s closest friends and family, the other key members of the Sage Monarch Society consisted of people like Zhang Jufang, Elder Sister Xue, Bai Yin, Goddess Jade Egret, Exalted Celestial Silver-Dagger, the White-Haired Boxer King, and Crimson-Maiden Inferno, as well as the former Masters and brethren of all the various members.

They were people who would never betray the society, even if threatened with death. Furthermore, all of their cultivation bases were in the Consummate God level. Yang Qi had given all of them Battle Armlets, as well as plenty of godstones to power them.

Therefore, when everyone joined forces and summoned a battlefield, the armies it contained numbered over ten million peak Greater God soldiers and three thousand peak Consummate God generals.

Roar!

The army unleashed a terrifying battle cry.

“Sage Monarch invincible! Submit to us and prosper, or oppose us and perish!”

Their psychic fluctuations were so powerful that cracks started spreading out in the House of God Ordainment’s god kingdom.

Meanwhile, the houselord’s eyes went wide in utter disbelief.

Chapter 1335: Reserve Power Activated

An army of ten million peak Greater Gods and a host of peak Consummate Gods were gathered, creating a convergence of immense power.

It was a threat that could easily crush the puny House of God Ordainment.

In the blink of an eye, the pulsing aura of the army reached such an incredible level that it inflicted serious damage on the surrounding god kingdom. In fact, the damage was so severe it was impossible to say how long it would take to repair.

“Alright everyone, put the troops away. We’re not supposed to be fighting a war today. Just punishing Wang Xiantian. How could we remain part of a united sect by waving our weapons in the face of the houselord?” It was Yang Qi. He was clearly giving the orders, yet in his attempt to not show the mountain and not reveal the water, he was still pretending to be a mere Consummate God and wasn’t letting anyone see his Unbounded will convergence.

However, the moment the words left his mouth, all of his subordinates immediately complied. The enormous battleground that had just appeared, as well as the armies that filled it, were sucked back into the Battle Armlets. The only thing that remained was a gentle breeze, making the entire thing seem almost like a dream. Only the damage to the god kingdom provided any evidence of what had just occurred.

A single Greater God wasn’t anything noteworthy. But a force of ten million was nothing short of terrifying, and could definitely stand firm against an Unbounded expert for a short time before being wiped out.

Silence reigned.

The leaders of all the factions were looking on with wide eyes, confused at how Yang Qi and his people had acquired such an immense force of troops.

“My apologies, Houselord,” Jadefall said. “You see, I recently came across the treasure trove of an ancient Paramount God, who left behind an army of ten million peak Greater God holy beasts. Even if the House of God Ordainment were ten times as large as it currently is, I doubt it could produce a force like that. So what do you think? Do we have enough soldiers? Is the Sage Monarch Society strong enough to dominate the other factions? Don’t tell me you’re displeased with this. You should be rejoicing! With the Sage Monarch Society as strong as this, the sect is more powerful than ever.”

The houselord looked around at the shocked onlookers, then pulled himself together. He was the first one. “Well, well, well. Very impressive. I really did underestimate the Sage Monarch Society. Who could’ve guessed that you’d have so many thralls? And it's all thanks to some ancient treasure trove. Impressive. Unfortunately, seizing power isn't going to be that easy! You think you can make a big scene because you have an army like that? You’re right, all of those soldiers working together could cause problems for our top experts. Sadly, you’ve forgotten something. The House of God Ordainment has a secret reserve power!”

“Secret reserve power?” Jadefall nodded. “Yes, I’m interested to see what that’s like. Incidentally, Houselord, you’re wrong. I'm not interested in seizing power. I just want to help our sect.”

“Help?” the junior houselord spat, his voice filled with hatred. “You want to help us the way wolves help a flock of sheep! You’re trying to force the houselord to abdicate, but sadly for you, you jumped the gun. If you’d waited until the tricentennial election, maybe you could’ve pulled this off. But you just couldn't wait, could you? Father, you don’t need to waste words on these people. Just summon the secret reserve power. Wipe out their armies and take them all captive. Enslave them and seize their resources, and the House of God Ordainment really will reach a higher level.”

“You really are evil-minded, aren’t you, Junior Houselord?” Yang Qi said. “I can’t believe you want to mount an insurrection. Do you really want the House of God Ordainment to be damned by myriad tribulations? Regardless of who comes out on top, us or your reserve power, the sect will be severely damaged in the process.”

“What’s wrong, are you scared?” the junior houselord said. “Ten years ago, you weren’t here, and the House of God Ordainment was doing just fine. After we get rid of you, we’ll be doing just as fine.”

“I never wanted to use the secret reserve power, Jadefall,” the houselord said coolly. “Sadly, you’re so arrogant you tried to force me to abdicate. In the end, I have no choice. Now you’ll see why the House of God Ordainment has stood strong for so long without an Unbounded expert or a Paramount God. War God Commander’s Tally!”

WHIZZZ!

An aura of battle rose up that surpassed anything from before, filling the god kingdom. This time, it didn’t damage anything, but rather repaired the damage from earlier. At the same time, the god kingdom seemed to be rising to a higher level and transforming significantly.

In the depths of the god kingdom, a bright light erupted like the rising sun, shooting out like a dragon to create a complex image.

It was a paper talisman, or more specifically, a commander’s tally from ancient times, something left behind by a mighty war god.

In the depths of the commander’s tally, Yang Qi could see troops lined up in formation, all of them thralls.

This was the secret reserve power of the House of God Ordainment, the War God Commander’s Tally, filled with an army of tens of thousands of ancient thrall soldiers, all of them trained to fight in formation. They were all war gods, and they were in the peak Perfect God level, clad in armor and bursting with a baleful energy of pure battle.

Their aura surpassed the ten million Greater Gods by many times over, and was majestic beyond words.

“This is the War God Commander’s Tally, which was originally used by the great general of the Sovereign Lord, the Paramount God called Army Slaughterer. This commander’s tally contains forty-eight thousand war gods, all of them elite experts in killing and slaughter, and each one as strong as a peak Perfect God. In the face of these war gods, those ten million holy beasts of yours will be defeated in a single move. After all, the war gods have the combined will convergence of a half Unbounded expert, which means that they can crush even Paramount Gods. You want to force me to abdicate? I'll use our secret reserve power against you!”

‘I can’t believe he has so many peak Perfect Gods at his command!’ Yang Qi thought, shivering inwardly as he realized the level of might that was on display.

The House of God Ordainment only had a bit more than a hundred Perfect Gods, most of them in the early and mid level, making them a far cry from late or peak Perfect Gods.

Only the houselord, junior houselord and a handful of others were peak Perfect Gods. Of course, none were even close to the Unbounded level in terms of will convergence.

In other words, these forty-eight thousand peak Perfect God thrall soldiers were the equivalent of hundreds of the top members of the House of God Ordainment put together.

The War God Commander’s Tally was a treasure similar to the Battle Armlets, containing an entire immense army kept in a state of stasis. It didn’t matter how much time passed on the outside, the forces inside the commander’s tally would remain in the same state, and would come out as peak Perfect Gods, ready to fight.

Not even the Nacrelight Sageland or Eternal-Life God-Dynasty had forty-eight thousand peak Perfect God experts to send into battle.

Summer Vastcold and Summer Soundfyre were both leaders of domineering factions in their sect. It was simply impossible for their sect to contain countless similar individuals.

“Perfect caliber godstone!” the houselord said, and in shocking fashion, he produced exactly that type of godstone to activate the War God Commander’s Tally, causing dazzling light to spring up from it.

A war god kingdom immediately sprang up around him, causing him to laugh heartily. “Your thrall army is like a collection of dolls compared to ours! Now I’ll show you what a real army is supposed to look like. You fool. Prepare to be crushed!”

RUMBLE!

The houselord made a grabbing motion in Jadefall’s direction, and the forty-eight thousand peak Perfect Gods’ energy surged. The clink of armor could be heard as they shifted formation, becoming a huge hand with the character “army” imprinted on the palm.

“You villains from the Sage Monarch Society are going to see what a real army is capable of! You might have some early Paramount Gods, but I’m going to slaughter you nonetheless!”

The crushing power of this force, filled with the fate of a nation, was what an army was truly meant to be.

All of a sudden, everyone in the Sage Monarch Society felt death weighing over them. This reserve power was nothing to be taken lightly, and was something that, while it couldn’t destroy Paramount Gods, could crush anyone beneath that level.

“Kill them!” the elder kings and chief elders howled. “Crush the Sage Monarch Society out of existence!”

The enormous hand crushed down toward the Sage Monarch Society with seemingly unstoppable force. But then a stream of will appeared to stop it.

“Unbounded will convergence?!”

The houselord’s face fell as he watched the enormous hand being stopped in its tracks. He had no idea where this expression of will came from, but it was definitely an Unbounded expert, and as it slammed into the war god kingdom, the army was relentlessly shoved backward.

“Psyche of the Army: Augment Me!”

Blood sprayed out of the houselord’s mouth; his cultivation base actually wasn’t high enough to properly control the entire army.

As for Yang Qi, he was strong enough to vanquish an early Paramount God, which meant he was essentially as strong as that level.

Right now, his plan was to simply take the War God Commander’s Tally for himself. If he did, he would have taken the reserve power of the House of God Ordainment, meaning that the sect would be his!

Chapter 1336: Taking the Commander&#039;s Tally

The reason the War God Commander’s Tally had been able to stop the force of holy beasts created by the Cruiser of Civilization was that the tally had been originally created by a Paramount God, the boundless general called the Army Slaughterer. That tally was one of his trump cards, and the forty-eight thousand peak Perfect God soldiers within it could crush just about anything in existence.

In fact, Yang Qi really wanted the commander’s tally, as he knew it would provide a big boost to the Sage Monarch Society.

Furthermore, the houselord’s cultivation base was relatively weak, which meant he couldn’t unleash the full power of the tally. The mere fluctuations let off by so many peak Perfect Gods was so incredible that even the houselord was negatively affected by them, and couldn't completely control them.

And that was why Yang Qi had a chance to take them for himself.

Unbounded will converged and targeted the houselord in a powerful attack.

“Unbounded will convergence? Who is it? I can’t believe an Unbounded expert is here!” The houselord was deeply shocked. The secret reserve power of the sect was more than enough to devastate any early Paramount God, but the fact that Unbounded will convergence was on display left the houselord feeling empty inside.

Most shocking of all, Yang Qi’s will seemed to be equivalent to that of a Paramount God.

When Yang Qi made his move, backing it with the boundless psychic fluctuations of the Mahātmā Jade, it filled the god kingdom of the House of God Ordainment, forcing everyone inside to drop to their knees in obeisance.

“Don’t shatter our god kingdom!” the houselord blurted. “If you want to fight, let's go out into the void! You may be a Paramount God, but you can’t defeat our secret reserve powers. Tell us who you really are! Who do you have backing you?! War Path of the Gods!”

His next move unleashed a blast of power that could pierce souls, and it shot into the depths of Yang Qi’s Unbounded will convergence, locking on to it and dragging him out of the god kingdom and into the void itself. Meanwhile, he also summoned countless battle souls to defend the god kingdom.

“Whoever you are, show your face and fight! Who are you? Why are you helping the Sage Monarch Society! Why are you interfering in the internal business of the House of God Ordainment!?”

It was at this point that Yang Qi finally revealed himself, right in front of the houselord. Smiling, he said, “Houselord, you’re mistaken. There’s no Unbounded expert interfering in the business of the House of God Ordainment. It’s just me. I'm here for that commander’s tally of yours. You see, I’m the real leader of the Sage Monarch Society. Me. Yang Qi. I've been running everything from behind the scenes. Jadefall works for me and follows my every command. So in the end, this definitely isn’t a case of outsiders interfering in sect business.”

“You! Yang Qi...!?” It looked almost like the houselord’s eyes were going to pop out of his skull, and his voice sounded strangled and wheezing. “You have Unbounded will convergence...?”

The houselord, the junior houselord, and all other powerful entities in the Houselord all longed for the Unbounded level, yet none of them had ever succeeded in reaching it. Yang Qi was the only one in the entire sect.

Even using the commander’s tally to summon forty-eight thousand peak Perfect God gods, the houselord still wasn’t in the position to defeat someone in the Unbounded level.

He was simply powerless to fight it.

“That's right, I have Unbounded will convergence. What do you think? If you let me lead the House of God Ordainment, it’ll become a truly domineering sect, such that the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty won’t stand against it. Abdicate, Houselord. Give your position to Jadefall and let me run things from behind the scenes. If you side with me, I won’t harm you. In fact, if you’re loyal, I might help you reach the Unbounded level too.

“Also, give me the War God Commander’s Tally. I'm in a much better position to control those thrall troops. It’s a waste for them to be sullied by your hands. I can unleash the true vital energy and battle will of those troops, and I can even refine the tally to release even more shocking power. With it, I could fight a Paramount God to the death.”

Yang Qi wasn’t lying. The War God Commander’s Tally required godstones to operate. Once it ran out, it would become useless, and the troops within it would wither away. In fact, the House of God Ordainment had to spend a huge amount of godstones just to maintain the tally on a yearly basis.

In other words, Yang Qi truly was its rightful owner. Only he could unlock the true meaning of battle that it held, and use that to become completely invincible. Combining the tally with his Unbounded will convergence, the Cruiser of Civilization, and the God Legion Seal, he would definitely be able to kill an early Paramount God.

At this point, the houselord managed to regain control of himself. He was an elite expert who had led a massive sect for many years. Because of that, he had an invincible heart that weaklings couldn’t even begin to understand.

“Yang Qi, I really am surprised that you've kept such immense strength hidden for so long. That said, you’re not a Paramount God. Do you really think you can match up to me? Right now, the person giving out opportunities is me, not you. If you swear to faithfully serve me and the House of God Ordainment, we can forget about everything that's happened today. What do you say? With Unbounded will convergence, you have what it takes to be an important person in the sect. You’ll have a stable position, and in fact, I’ll even make you the chief elder king. You’ll have only one superior, and many subordinates.”

“Chief elder king? Only one superior, and many subordinates?” Yang Qi laughed. “I have Unbounded will convergence. As you should know, will convergence such as that is beyond mighty. Just who the hell do you think you are, trying to place yourself above me? As far as I'm concerned, you’re an ant. Speaking to an Unbounded expert the way you just did should earn the death penalty for both you and your entire clan.”

It was a well-known truth in the god world that, to Unbounded experts, all others were like bugs.

It didn’t matter how strong someone was. If they didn’t have Unbounded will convergence, they were useless. And that wasn’t even mentioning the fact that Yang Qi also had the God Legion Seal, monarch godhood, numerous magical treasures, and countless divine abilities. Not even Mother Voidwalker had been a match for him.

The Houselord grinned cruelly. “Does that mean you’re really rebelling against the House of God Ordainment? Just because you're an Unbounded expert doesn’t mean you have what it takes to deal with me. Come forth, my army! Fight! Army of souls!”

RUMBLE!

Thrusting his hands out in a boundless fist technique, he said, “Devastation of Myriad Armies!”

Rumbling vital energy swept forth into the shape of a sea of troops and horses, ready to launch an eternal campaign to strike fear into the hearts of enemies.

“Since you insist on being pigheaded, Houselord, I won’t waste any more words,” Yang Qi said, unleashing his own Sage Monarch Grand Magic, using a palm to send rumbling godpower out to form a host of black holes. “Take a look at my personal dao, the Sage Monarch Grand Magic. This is a new move I’ve gained enlightenment of recently. A sage is a master of all under heaven. A master of a myriad worlds! Sage as the Master!”

After achieving Unbounded will convergence, Yang Qi had spent three thousand years seeking enlightenment in the Cruiser of Civilization. During that time, he had perfected his energy arts, especially the ten aspects of the Sage Monarch Grand Magic. And now he was using that newfound knowledge on the houselord.

This was a move that related to being a teacher and master of all creation. Yang Qi was like a burning torch on a dark night, bringing wisdom to the masses, being their teacher and master, and offering up civilization to all peoples. Righteousness. Independence. Freedom. Such things were all wrapped up in civilization.

Immediately, the houselord’s spirit was shaken to the core and he was relentlessly shoved backward.

“What move is that?! How come I’ve never seen anything like it before?” To the houselord, Yang Qi’s attack felt as powerful as that of a Paramount God, to the point where he was about to lose control of his commander’s tally.

“Second move. Monarch Invincible!”

RUMBLE!

Another massive explosion occurred, crushing everything in a way that hearkened to the combined might of the seventy-two monarchs of yesteryear.

It was definitely the might of monarchs.

SPLAT!

When the houselord’s palm met the incoming attack, he felt the War God Commander’s Tally crumbling, and could sense the wills of the war gods gasping. Then, what remained of the attack entered him, causing blood to spray out of his mouth.

“What? How can the power of that palm be so fierce? My War God Commander’s Tally has the power of forty-eight thousand peak Perfect Gods, and it reduced the power of the attack by ninety-nine percent! But the remaining fraction that entered me was enough to nearly kill me!?”

Backing up in alarm, he scrambled to come up with a way to destroy Yang Qi.

However, Yang Qi wasn't giving him any breathing room. “Third move. Hegemon Without Bounds!”

This palm strike could end the heavens and crush the earth!

Domineering energy flowed forth, parting the primal-chaos like an immense, axe-wielding giant.

It was like a hegemon on the warpath, boundlessly expanding his territory.

Chapter 1337: The Houselord Acknowledges Allegiance

Three moves.

Sage as the Master.

Monarch Invincible.

Hegemon Without Bounds.

They were moves Yang Qi had gained enlightenment of during his three thousand years of contemplation. Each move built on the previous, creating a cycle of explosive power as bright as the sun and moon, and a momentum akin to primal-chaos itself.

The first move shoved the houselord back. The second caused him to cough up blood. And third ripped the War God Commander’s Tally out of his grasp, provoking a howl of rage.

Then, Yang Qi made a grasping gesture and said, “God Without Limit!”

It was a move that defied description, containing the marvels of creation and the good fortune of nature. It was a consummate move that related to God himself.

Sage, Monarch, Hegemon, God. They were four moves from the Sage Monarch Grand Magic!

“No!” screamed the houselord, blood spraying out of his mouth as he tried to keep control of the War God Commander’s Tally. Unfortunately for him, Yang Qi simply grabbed it, causing a violent tempest to sweep about, provoking wails of grief from the forty-eight thousand war gods.

The houselord was completely powerless to fight back, and could only watch as the war god kingdom was sealed and the commander’s tally landed on Yang Qi’s palm.

Next, Yang Qi spat out some blood, causing white steam to rise up off of the tally as it lost its connection to the houselord.

Then he threw it into his bag.

As a peak Perfect God with Unbounded will, who was just on the verge of becoming a Paramount God, he could easily use the Sage Monarch Grand Magic to break the bindings of magical treasures.

With the commander’s tally in hand, he had control over the souls of the numerous puppet war gods within it. Meanwhile, within Yang Qi, it was possible to see a host of glittering stones, all of them perfect in every aspect.

Houselord God Ordainment had never seen so many perfect caliber godstones in his entire life, and the sight left him completely shocked.

“What do you think?” Yang Qi said. “Your commander's tally doesn’t really do you much good. Your cultivation base isn’t high enough to use it properly, and when you’re not using it, you need to burn a lot of godstones to maintain the spell formation within it. Without that, the war gods held within it would quickly wither away into nothing. Beings that existed in the true primeval times have all died, with the exception of Paramount Gods. Something like this surpasses your ability to comprehend. And I'm the only one who can unleash its true powers, thanks to my stock of perfect caliber godstones.”

Of course, to unleash its ultimate potential, he would need to spend some time refining it and binding it to himself. Regardless, with this commander’s tally, he didn’t need to fear early Paramount Gods.

The houselord sagged listlessly. Without the War God Commander’s Tally, he was completely incapable of resisting Yang Qi.

“W-what... what are you going to do to me?”

“Nothing,” Yang Qi said. “I just want you under my control. As long as you don’t reveal the fact that I'm an Unbounded expert, you can continue on as the houselord.”

“You're saying you want me to be your puppet?” the houselord said, his face falling.

“Are you valuable enough for me to do anything else? I could kill you on a whim and take all of the resources of the House of God Ordainment for my own. Perhaps start my own sect. But of course, that would attract the attention of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty. So keeping you alive does have some advantages.”

“I’d rather you kill me than turn me into a puppet,” the houselord grated.

“In that case, I suppose I’ll have to kill your son,” Yang Qi said.

“Wait!” the houselord blurted. “Don’t kill my son! Let him go. I swear that I’ll serve you faithfully. I only ask that you let my son leave the House of God Ordainment, and that you don’t turn me into a puppet.”

“And what if your son goes and raises an army to come back and save you? No. This is how things are going to work: you acknowledge allegiance to me. Either that, or you die. There are no other options. And don’t look for loopholes. Remember, even the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty is going to end up conquered by my hand eventually. If you want, I can allow your son to be a puppet too. Just make sure he understands he mustn’t do anything rash. Otherwise I’ll do something truly lacking in mercy.”

Yang Qi wanted control of the House of God Ordainment, but he didn’t want to cause a scene that would attract the attention of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty.

The houselord thought about the proposal for a long moment, then said, “Fine, as long as you don’t kill my son, I’ll follow your orders.”

“Hmph!”

Yang Qi thrust out his palm, sending a seed from the God Legion Seal into the houselord. A moment later, another golden throne appeared within the seal.

The houselord actually didn't know the details. He assumed Yang Qi had put some sort of powerful warding magic inside of him to control him.

‘He has Unbounded will convergence without being a Paramount God,’ the houselord thought. ‘Once I become a Paramount God, I’ll just dissolve the warding magic and deal with him as I see fit. For now, I’ll pretend to go along. After all, a wise man knows when to back down when the odds are against him.”

“You can leave now,” Yang Qi said. “Just pretend that you had a big fight with some mysterious person you couldn’t defeat. Soon enough, the commotion from today’s events will die down.”

“Right, of course,” the houselord said, not daring to say anything in defiance. Turning, he left.

A moment later, Yang Qi also faded from view.

The god kingdom had returned to a state of calm and quiet as everyone waited to see what happened upon the return of the houselord. When he flew back, the junior houselord delightedly exclaimed, “Father, you drove that expert away? Can we finally get rid of the Sage Monarch Society?”

“Shut your mouth!” the houselord shouted, his expression livid. “Listen everyone, today’s events are over. Nobody speak of anything that happened, otherwise you’ll be instantly executed! Furthermore, any issues with the Sage Monarch Society are considered a thing of the past. From now on, unity and stability are the most important thing to the House of God Ordainment. Everything else will be resolved in the coming tricentennial election.”

With that, he flicked his sleeve. “And the three chief elders from the Law-Enforcement God-Palace will make sure that news of today’s events doesn't leak. Anyone who violates that precept will have their clan executed down to the ninth generation!”

“Houselord,” said Jadefall, “it seems to me that the Law-Enforcement God-Palace is running short on good officers. Why don’t we provide some forces from the Sage Monarch Society to help out? Shepherd. Proud World. Doom. Brahma. Annalist. As peak Consummate Gods who are just on the verge of being Perfect Gods, they’d serve well as leaders there.”

“Yes ma’am!” they replied. Of course, the other members of the House of God Ordainment looked on in shock. The fact that Jadefall was issuing orders that the houselord didn’t countermand went to show that the Sage Monarch Society had definitely secured a powerful position in the sect.

“Very well, everyone is dismissed,” Jadefall said, waving her hand dismissively.

“Hmph!” The houselord flicked his sleeve and vanished.

“Father. Father!” The junior houselord scurried after him, unsure of what had played out, but his heart sinking. One thing was obvious: his father’s secret reserve power had failed.

“Let's go,” Jadefall said to the other members of the Sage Monarch Society. “This matter is over.”

“By the way, Jadefall, what do we do with him?” Yang Memory asked, pointing at Wang Xiantian, the leader of the Preheaven Society.

“For conspiring against you the way he did, he deserves worse than death. Kill him!” The cruel smile on Jadefall’s face deeply shocked all of the elder kings and faction leaders present.

“Yes ma’am!” the Shepherd said. Stepping forward, he grabbed Wang Xiantian with both hands and unleashed a powerful devil technique. Wang Xiantian screamed like a pig as his body withered up, his quintessence blood, vital energy, soul, and godhood sucked away until he was nothing more than a desiccated corpse.

The Shepherd chuckled. “As a leader of the Law-Enforcement God-Palace, I have full authority to execute wicked villains like him. And starting today, we're cracking down on the Preheaven Society. All members are hereby ordered to report to the Law-Enforcement God-Palace to confess their crimes and be punished. Any who refuse to comply will be executed immediately!”

The bloodsoaked scene was enough to shake the entire sect down to the core. The Brilliant Radiance Society, Honorable Glory Society, and all the other societies felt the urge to betray the sect and flee. After all, if the rabbit dies, the fox grieves. Wang Xiantian had just been slaughtered in front of their own eyes. He had been just as strong as most of them, so if he could be cut down so easily, then for all they knew, they would be next.

Not even the houselord had been able to stand up to the Sage Monarch Society.

“What do we do next, Yang Qi?” Jadefall asked. “Do we absorb the Preheaven Society to make the Sage Monarch Society stronger? And then slowly take over the rest of the sect? It seems to me the time has come to unify the sect. Remember, the sect's Bloodgore Trials are the perfect time to identify new geniuses. As long as we have enough resources, we could all get some good apprentices.”

“I’ll handle everything. And going forward, let's ease up a bit. We don’t want everyone in the sect feeling terrified all the time. Right now, I need to spend some time working with the War God Commander’s Tally. Once I'm finished, I can slaughter any Paramount God who causes problems for us.”

Chapter 1338: The Crown Prince&#039;s True Self

Yang Qi had efficiently defeated the houselord and taken the sect's reserve power. Going forward, nothing in the sect would pose any threat to him, and the Sage Monarch Society would be free to rise to new heights of glory.

The Shepherd and the others were now leaders in the Law-Enforcement God-Palace, which meant they had immense power in the sect and the authority to execute dissenters. Of course, no one would dare to defy them.

It was obvious who was in power.

The factions in the sect were now required to act together, making them a much more effective force. Also, the Bloodgore Trials were being expanded to involve more distant continents.

After all, Yang Qi wasn’t particularly interested in the current crop of experts in the House of God Ordainment. He wanted to recruit new geniuses through the Bloodgore Trials. He wanted fresh blood. The morphlings and holy beasts he could create were useful as killing machines, but they couldn’t be used as administrators, nor did they provide any flow of destiny.

Furthermore, the House of God Ordainment had a lot of interests outside the sect, and as long as they were properly invested in, they could provide healthy profits.

Yang Qi went into seclusion to contemplate the profundities of the War God Commander’s Tally. Wanting all forty-eight thousand peak Perfect Gods to be in top fighting condition, he infused them with the power of the God Legion Seal, making them even more powerful than before.

Also, he could take advantage of the various auras within the commander’s tally, including the boundless secrets of Army Slaughterer, to learn quite a few helpful things.

“Ancient Traceback; Unbounded Will!”

Yang Qi exhaled some true energy onto the War God Commander’s Tally, simultaneously drawing on the God Legion Seal to provide perfect caliber godstones to imbue into it. Then he tapped into the genetic systems of the Cruiser of Civilization, as well as its heavenly workings calculations systems.

The war gods in the tally were all peak Perfect Gods, and at the moment, Yang Qi was limited to being able to create peak Consummate Gods with the Cruiser of Civilization.

But once he was a Paramount God, that would change.

Unfortunately, that was going to be a very difficult task. Although having monarch godhood meant that developing Unbounded will convergence had been a foregone conclusion, the power he would require was still astonishing.

In fact, it would likely take tens of thousands of years via normal cultivation methods.

However, the commander’s tally pulsed with the aura of a Paramount God, which he could study and imitate. Eventually, the power flows relaxed as Yang Qi sank into a deep trance.

At the same time, the Cruiser of Civilization flew outside of the House of God Ordainment’s god kingdom, where it grew in size, becoming like a heavenly net covering everything below.

Yang Qi was slowly merging the War God Commander’s Tally into the Cruiser of Civilization, making it more impressive and durable.

Meanwhile, a big purge was going on in the House of God Ordainment.

The Preheaven Society was being dismantled, its members secretly arrested and brought in for questioning. Those who offered loyalty to the Sage Monarch Society were made members, and those who refused were given the death penalty.

Then, Jadefall and the others started using other tactics, such as control over business and resources, to put pressure on the members of other factions. The best and most profitable positions were given to members of the Sage Monarch Society, while the worst positions went to members of other factions. And the leaders of groups like the Brilliant Radiance Society and the Honorable Glory Society were forced to either give tribute, or face arrest and punishment.

The vicious disciples of the Sage Monarch Society would even trump up false charges if they had to, as long as it resulted in control. Months passed in which, slowly but surely, the Sage Monarch Society became the top force in the sect. Of course, membership soared.

Normally speaking, circumstances like this would have weakened the House of God Ordainment. But Yang Qi could create godstones and godnotes. Furthermore, business on the Heaven-Wretch Continent was soaring, and resources poured into the sect through the teleportation portals. There were also rogue cultivators, such as the White Clan brothers, who were working hard for the sect. Because of all that, the House of God Ordainment was actually growing stronger on all fronts.

The Sage Monarch Consortium had captured numerous wretch-gods and experts from the dao of devils, enslaving them and forcing them to renounce the darkness and seek the light. That also provided a source of many new disciples for the House of God Ordainment.

Slowly but surely, the Sage Monarch Society took control of the Law-Enforcement God-Palace, the Missions Sanctuary, the Hall of Promotions, the Thrall Camp, the Treasure Palace, the Medicinal Pill Shrine, and the Scripture Pavilion. And not a single chief elder dared to speak up about it.

The chief elders and other leaders of the Thrall Camp were actually furious over how the Sage Monarch Society had taken control of the thralls, so much so that they came up with a plan to attack some of the disciples of the society. However, those disciples somehow learned of the conspiracy and crushed the chief elders, imprisoning them in some nameless hell where they experienced torment that made them wish they could die.

After that incident, none of the chief elders dared to offer any resistance.

In fact, they all just went into seclusion on Mount God Ordainment, ignoring outside matters and relinquishing any power they had previously possessed.

It was obvious that resisting the Sage Monarch Society was futile.

Their only hope was that the chaos that resulted as the Sage Monarch Society took over the House of God Ordainment would be an opportunity for them to make a comeback. Sadly, they were left disappointed. A year passed, in which all of the factions in the sect were absorbed into the Sage Monarch Society. Whether it was the Honorable Glory Society or the Brilliant Radiance Society, their leaders were brought under complete control.

All disciples in the sect now offered loyalty to the Sage Monarch Society.

Meanwhile, business boomed for the House of God Ordainment. The treasure storehouses were filling up with magical treasure, building materials, medicinal pills, and resources of all kinds. Also, more and more experts were joining, ensuring that the destiny of the sect surged to levels dozens of times higher than they were before, perhaps even close to a hundred.

Not a single member of the Sage Monarch Society ever lacked godstones. Before, the sect had tightly controlled godstones, making them very difficult to get. But now they were gathered into mountainous piles.

Godstones were used to power spell formations and provide energy.

Also, the god kingdom itself was growing larger and stronger, and more spell formations were set up to bolster it.

Before, the houselord and chief elder could have set up more and more spell formations, but it wouldn’t have done any good without godstones to operate them.

The sect was replacing hunting rifles with cannons, and the disciples were all bursting with excitement about it. It also made recruitment efforts a lot easier.

As time went on, the members of the Sage Monarch Society realized what was going on. The older generation was being pushed aside. If the chief elders and others like them wanted cultivation resources, they had to apply for them from the Sage Monarch Society.

In the depths of Mount God Ordainment....

BAM!

Destroying the table in front of him, one of the chief elders shouted, “This is preposterous! Absolutely outrageous! I need thirty-thousand nine-headed stalks of blood ginger that have grown for ten thousand god world years! But the disciples running the storehouse actually said I needed permission from the leader of the Sage Monarch Society! What exactly is going on here!? Has the House of God Ordainment really been taken over? Are the millions upon millions of years that went into growing it being thrown away? Has the sect really been given over to rebels and traitors?”

“Yeah,” another chief elder said, “I went to request some medicinal pills, but the disciples in charge said I had to ask Jadefall first! Since when did famous chief elders like us get relegated to such a low position? In the past, we could go take whatever we wanted from the storehouse!”

“Houselord, what do we do? We can’t just sit around and wait to die! The Sage Monarch Society has only grown stronger and stronger over the past year, and you haven’t done a thing about it. Don’t tell me they have someone that powerful backing them? What Unbounded expert did you end up dealing with?”

Generally speaking, none of the chief elders had given loyalty to the Sage Monarch Society, feeling that they were too important, so it would be too much of a loss of face. Yet the houselord wasn't doing anything, and they were essentially trapped in Mount God Ordainment.

“Father,” the junior houselord said angrily, “I’ve been trying to get out and pass word to the third prince of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty! But I'm not allowed to leave. It's ridiculous! The sect is sealed tight and the way to the teleportation portals is blocked!”

“We might as well be in prison!”

As the chief elders simmered like beasts in a cage, Yang Qi was in the middle of a session of cultivation when he received a message from the leaders of the Crown Prince Society.

‘At long last, they’re reaching out to me. Have I hooked the big fish?’ Yang Qi smiled coldly. ‘It seems that after a year, word has finally spread of what's been going on in the House of God Ordainment. The crown prince has finally taken an interest.’

Chapter 1339: The Crown Prince&#039;s True Self (2)

Yang Qi had done everything possible to keep the recent events in the House of God Ordainment under wraps. But he knew it would be impossible to keep word from spreading forever. Disciples inevitably went out of the sect for missions or business, and would interact with outsiders. So he had known all along that, within a year or so, rumors would leak.

And it was only natural that, upon finding out about the rumors, the Crown Prince Society would come to him with questions. After all, he was still a member.

WHOOSH!

Vanishing, he reappeared in a city outside the god kingdom, the very same location that was a business owned by the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty. Waiting for him were none other than Dream Daylily, Grand Eunuch Nie Yinyang, and God-King Ruthless. These three were core members of the Crown Prince Society, and high-ranking ones at that. That was especially true of Grand Eunuch Nie Yinyang, whose cultivation was on par with Summer Vastcold and Summer Soundfyre of the Nacrelight Sageland. In other words, he was on the verge of breaking into the Unbounded level.

God-King Ruthless wasn’t quite on that level, but was still incredibly strong, being capable of vanquishing multiple peak Perfect Gods in combat. As for Dream Daylily, she was so weak as to be hardly worth attention.

Even peak Perfect Gods were broken up into various grades and ranks. After all, such individuals could have different types of godhood. There was ordinary godhood, but there were also unique types of godhood. Monarch godhood was the ultimate version, but there were others, such as child-mother godhood, dark netherworld godhood, ten preeminences godhood, heavenly halls godhood, radiant light godhood, epic saga godhood, hundred transformations godhood, infinite transformations godhood, and many more.

One type of godhood that was second only to monarch godhood was called the eternal sands godhood, in which numerous aspects of godhood were present, like the eternal sands of the universe. They became a flowing river that was unparalleled under heaven, and led to incredible levels of destructive power.

As for Grand Eunuch Nie Yinyang, he had a godhood called yin-yang double-fish godhood. In other words, he had two specific godhoods, one icy, one fiery. Together, they could unleash two polar opposites of power, ensuring that no other peak Perfect God could match up to him.

Of course, Yang Qi had remolded all of his friends and family using the godhood manufacturing systems of the Cruiser of Civilization. They all had unique types of godhood, which meant that if they reached the peak Perfect God level, they would actually be far more powerful than Grand Eunuch Nie Yinyang.

For example, Jadefall, who was already a peak Perfect God, had developed eternal sands godhood, myriad longevities godhood, death messenger godhood, empty tribulation godhood, and indestructible avināśya godhood.

When she released her godpower, it might not be as strong as an Unbounded expert, but at least it would enable her to flee with her life from one.

“Yang Qi, you're here!” said Grand Eunuch Nie Yinyang, rising anxiously to his feet along with God-King Ruthless.

“Yes. Why exactly did you exalted figures summon me with such urgency?” Although Yang Qi spoke with humility, his heart pulsed with killing intent. Unfortunately, the House of God Ordainment was still on the rise, and he didn’t want to throw it into a fight of mutual destruction with the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty. Perhaps in a few hundred years, after the sect had grown much stronger and built up more resources, when he reached the Paramount God level, he might be ready to put himself on equal footing with the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty and Nacrelight Sageland.

But right now, it would just cause too many problems.

The Eternal-Life God-Dynasty had numerous Paramount Gods, and if they worked together, they could even cause problems for Yang Qi. Although he might personally be able to escape, they could severely damage or destroy his foundations.

But once he was a Paramount God, his monarch godhood would ensure that his fighting prowess reached a point where he could cut down other Paramount Gods with impunity.

Besides, thanks to the God Legion Seal, he could now produce trillions of godstones and godnotes every day. Investing that into business was bringing immense wealth that only grew on a daily basis.

“You're asking why we summoned you?” Grand Eunuch Nie Yinyang said in a grim tone. “Yang Qi, the Crown Prince Society spent a lot of resources to help you grow. And yet you didn’t bother to report in about everything that's happened in the House of God Ordainment over the past year? According to our information, the Sage Monarch Society has taken over the House of God Ordainment. Also, Jadefall is backed by an Unbounded expert. Houselord God Ordainment even used the sect’s secret reserve power, but came out on the losing end. Now the houselord, junior houselord, and other chief elders are essentially imprisoned. Meanwhile, the Sage Monarch Society grows stronger and stronger. Have you withheld this information because you’re planning to rebel against us?”

Yang Qi shook his head. “No, I wouldn’t do anything like that. You're thinking too much into this. I benefited a lot in the last year; Jadefall took me to a secret dimension to work on my cultivation, allowing me to finally reach the Perfect God level! But I've been plotting and scheming this entire time in the hopes of turning the situation to the benefit of the crown prince. I'm willing to sacrifice myself for the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty, so how could I possibly rebel?”

“He's right,” said God-King Ruthless, who could sense the aura of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty on him. Nodding firmly, he continued, “So, you reached the Perfect God level? How is that even possible? Last time we met you were a Greater God, and now, only two short years later, you’ve reached this level? What kind of speed is that? I refuse to believe that Jadefall of the Sage Monarch Society is that impressive!”

Grand Eunuch Nie Yinyang seemed similarly shocked, but didn’t say anything.

Yang Qi released some of his aura, and it was indeed that of the early Perfect God level. Furthermore, he made it seem like he had three unique types of godhood, which would make him so strong that not even three ordinary Perfect Gods would be a match for him.

It was a sham, but considering he had Unbounded will convergence, even the crown prince himself would have been deceived, much less these people. Fooling Grand Eunuch Nie Yinyang and God-King Ruthless was as simple as playing a trick on children.

“Three-discs martial-dao godhood!? That’s a supreme-grade godhood combination!” The two experts looked at Yang Qi with expressions of shock. “Tell us how this happened? When did Jadefall get this powerful? What magical treasure did she get? And what level has she reached by now?”

“I don’t know all the details. I just know that she acquired an incredible magical treasure that’s the legacy of an important God-Lord from ancient times. She’s a peak Perfect God with half Unbounded will convergence. She’ll definitely reach the Unbounded level soon, at which point she’ll be more terrifying than ever. And her patron, whoever it is, must be a mysterious Unbounded expert.” Yang Qi didn't even need to think twice before weaving tales such as this. After all, among the three thousand special constitutions he had was that of the Fraudulent One. “She secreted me away to some hidden dimension, a place filled with falling flower petals and other dramatic transformations, where primordial chaos is inverted from normal. There, she stood within the river of time and looked into the future. That was when my godhood blossomed and I was remolded. Thankfully, I’ve already accepted the teachings of the crown prince, otherwise she would’ve scraped my destiny clean.”

“It sounds like a very impressive magical treasure,” Nie Yinyang said. He exchanged a glance with God-King Ruthless, and then the two of them projected a quick conversation. Afterward, they smiled, and Nie Yinyang continued, “So, please explain about everything that’s happened recently. Does the House of God Ordainment really have new leadership?”

“Not really,” Yang Qi replied. “Jadefall is actually very afraid of the houselord’s secret reserve power. The sect is basically divided between two factions: the Sage Monarch Society and the Mystery Society. The Mystery Society has agents everywhere, and it's difficult to identify them. Of course, some of the major divisions of the sect are indeed under the direct control of the Sage Monarch Society, such as the Law-Enforcement God-Palace, Thrall Camp, Treasure Storage Warehouse, Scripture Pavilion, and whatnot. The Sage Monarch Society has taken over enough aspects of the sect to be considered sixty percent in control.”

“So that’s how it is. The Sage Monarch Society’s business operations on the Heaven-Wretch Continent are constantly expanding. They actually have Perfect Gods from the dao of devils in charge there. And they’re very loyal. We also suspect they’re having dealings with the Nacrelight Sageland. Do you know anything about that?”

“A bit. Apparently, Mother Voidwalker from the Nacrelight Sageland came and tried to assert her authority, only to be staved off by Jadefall. Later, they reached a deal, although Jadefall is constantly trying to come up with a way to get rid of her.” Yang Qi was really spinning some wild tales.

“Mother Voidwalker?!” Both Nie Yinyang and God-King Ruthless were visibly taken aback by the name. After all, Mother Voidwalker was an Unbounded expert, someone only the crown prince could fight without experiencing many losses.

“If Mother Voidwalker has gotten herself involved, it’s no wonder our own plans failed,” Nie Yinyang said. “During the past year, we dispatched quite a few experts to try making deals with killers from the League of Wretch-Gods, all in the hopes of destroying the Sage Monarch Consortium. Unfortunately, they all failed. If Mother Voidwalker is there right now, it makes sense. We need to report this to the crown prince immediately. In any case, that doesn’t have anything to do with you. Now that you’re a Perfect God, we’ll take you to meet the crown prince in person.”

“Meet the crown prince?” Yang Qi said. At long last he was finally going to see what this extremely important person was like. “He's back?”

“Yes, he's back, although that’s a secret,” God-King Ruthless said proudly. “He's a Paramount God now, which means that he's completely invincible. For now, he wants it to remain a secret until he cleans house in the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty and gets rid of his rivals. Not even ten people are aware of the truth, and now you're one of them, which shows how much he trusts you. Come on, let’s go!”

With that, they led him toward a teleportation portal.

Yang Qi wasn’t afraid. He stepped into the portal, which whirred to life and sent them toward the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty.

“We're now heading to a secret base set up in the wilds by the Crown Prince,” Nie Yinyang said. “It’s called the Harvestland. Even most of the top officials in the dynasty aren’t aware of its existence. Only his most trusted confidants are allowed there. You’re very lucky.”

Chapter 1340: The Crown Prince&#039;s True Self (3)

Eventually, Yang Qi caught sight of what appeared to be vast fields of wheat, all of them just beginning to bear fruit. And it emanated an aura reminiscent of the preheaven beginnings of the god world and the universe.

He was secretly shocked at this Harvestland, which wasn’t a god kingdom, but a brewing fragment of the primal-chaos of the god world itself, instead.

He opened his Lord's Eye and saw how each stalk of wheat was fully three thousand meters tall. Furthermore, what they were growing wasn’t actually wheat, but fetuses, all of them pulsing with immense godhood.

It was extremely bizarre.

“This is the Harvestland?” Yang Qi said, looking around. “What are those things?”

“This is where the Crown Prince is growing his thrall army,” God-King Ruthless said. “Don’t ask too many questions. The Harvestland was originally a fragment of the god world that existed in ancient primal-chaos. The crown prince acquired it, then used a powerful divine ability to turn it into a smaller version of the god world. As for the crops, they’re actually the result of an ancient and boundless organic technology that combines psychic and daoist techniques to create preheaven martial-god soldier-kings. Right now, they’re only just beginning to grow.

“Most people assume the crown prince is only putting on a show of strength. But the truth is that his power comes from these martial-god soldier-kings. They require a huge amount of power to grow, and numerous perfect caliber godstones. In addition, they require all sorts of preheaven precious treasures and medicinal ingredients. They’ll eventually form the most powerful army in existence. In fact, these troops were originally designed to fight the Sovereign Lord and the halls of heaven, specifically, to counter the angels.”

“Martial-god soldier-kings?” Yang Qi frowned, never having heard of thralls like this before.

In the impure lands, immortal worlds, and the god world, thralls were a necessary aspect of all major organizations. And the mightiest of all thralls were angels, whose fighting prowess was second to none. Only slightly below them were the various forces of the Devilfolk, including the bronzeblaze fiend-devils, dark-gloom paleo-devils, asuras, and infernals, all of which had started out as thralls.

Later, the thralls became free, then proliferated and created new societies of their own.

As for what exact kind of thrall these martial-god soldier-kings were, Yang Qi had no idea. But he did know that the power on display in this Harvestland was incredible. It connected to the essence of the god world, and was absorbing all sorts of destiny.

As they neared the Harvestland’s borders, they could sense an immense power pushing against them, something completely unsurpassable. But then Nie Yinyang released a fluctuation of energy, which became a talisman that sank into the defensive shield.

That allowed them to pass into the fields. As they proceeded toward the middle of the Harvestland, they eventually reached an enormous altar, upon which sat a single individual who emanated the aura of a Paramount God. It was none other than the crown prince.

That altar was designed to absorb the fate of a nation and bring it here, to the middle of the Harvestland. It was a nation-fate altar.

The crown prince was absorbing the nation-fate of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty and using it to create his martial-god soldier-kings. It was a clear case of taking advantage of public assets for personal use, and if he continued doing this, the nation-fate of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty would eventually dry up.

That said, the martial-god soldier-kings were obviously the crown prince’s secret weapon, and once he finished creating them, he would be invincible.

These martial-god soldier-kings were completely beyond the compare of the reserve power of the House of God Ordainment.

RUMBLE!

As they approached, the crown prince turned, and Yang Qi could see that he looked exactly like the Crown Prince from the impure lands. He was burly, and emanated the aura one would expect from the Son of Heaven. He was completely domineering, like an emperor who commanded the great dao, and understood both yin and yang. When he opened his mouth, he issued imperial decrees, and when he closed his mouth, night fell for all eternity.

‘It’s him. The real crown prince!’ Yang Qi quickly dropped down and kowtowed. “I am your humble servant, Yang Qi. My respects, Crown Prince. Congratulations on becoming a Paramount God! May you be invincible for tens of thousands of years! May you—”

“Hmph!” The crown prince interrupted with a snort that rumbled like thunder. “I spent a lot of resources grooming you, Yang Qi. But you can’t even keep the Sage Monarch Society in check? They’ve taken over seventy percent of the House of God Ordainment! Now, admit to your crimes!”

“Your humble servant is deserving of death ten thousand times over!” Yang Qi blabbered. Inwardly, he was assessing the crown prince, and he came to realize that the man was extremely enigmatic. Furthermore, he was impossible to read clearly. But one thing was for sure: he definitely surpassed any ordinary Paramount God.

Yang Qi’s original plan had been to assess whether or not this crown prince would be easy to deal with. If he was, then Yang Qi would simply have killed him, or at least used his commander’s tally and other secret weapons to force him to submit. Then he could take over the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty with ease.

Given the current level of Yang Qi’s cultivation base, he could definitely kill an ordinary Paramount God. But the crown prince wasn’t ordinary in any sense of the word. If they started fighting, Yang Qi had no idea if he could come out on top. In fact, he was sure that he couldn’t win. At best, they might seriously injure each other. And that would just be beating the grass and startling the snake, thus making things difficult for the House of God Ordainment, where he still had a lot of work to do.

Furthermore, Yang Qi could now see that the crown prince was even willing to take the nation-fate of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty to grow his martial-god soldier-kings. It made sense. Clearly, this crown prince operated in just the same fashion as the Crown Prince from the impure lands.

“You’re not going to argue?” the crown prince said, clearly surprised that Yang Qi had simply admitted guilt.

“If your humble servant has failed in his tasks, he will accept any punishment he deserves!” In order to make his show of subservience complete, Yang Qi drew on the Life-Death Void-Destruction Lightning. For someone who wasn’t in the Unbounded level, he wouldn’t have had to resort to such methods. But the crown prince was just too formidable to fool easily.

‘It seems this crown prince is probably on the same level as me. But he definitely has secret weapons up his sleeves, and if he used them, I might not be able to win a fight. But if he thinks he can defeat me, he’ll find it’s much harder than he supposes. Furthermore, I have a big advantage. He's out in the open, whereas my advantages are hidden. And it's easy to dodge an open spear, but hard to ward off a hidden arrow. So I may as well be as merciless as can be. I’ll show him what it means to break the bones and suck the marrow. I'm going to take all of his secret weapons away from him!’

“Good,” the crown prince said. “I like your attitude. If you fail, live up to it. I hate people who avoid responsibility, or people who try to argue when they’re at fault. Those are the people I just kill immediately. But since you've admitted your crimes, I won’t punish you. I’ve seen the chaos in the House of God Ordainment, and I know that the sect has split into two factions. That said, its destiny continues to grow. In fact, it's already many times stronger than before. Perhaps a hundred times. So what exactly is going on? It seems to me there are only two possibilities. One is that the sect has been growing so much that some imperial dynasty has thrown their support behind it. But only the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty could do something like that, and we haven’t given them our open support. Which leaves only the Nacrelight Sageland. That said, I don’t see why the Nacrelight Sageland would support them, nor why it would lead to such an increase in destiny. It would require a huge investment, and multiple Paramount Gods working together. And why would the Nacrelight Sageland work so hard to do something like that?”

“There is merit to your speculation, Crown Prince,” Nie Yinyang said. “Mother Voidwalker from the Nacrelight Sageland has thrown her support behind the Sage Monarch Consortium. That said, her personal wealth wouldn’t be enough. From what I've heard, there are countless experts rising up in the Sage Monarch Society.”

“In that case, there’s a second possibility. Perhaps the sect discovered an ancient treasure trove. That would explain their soaring destiny. Remember, long ago, our Eternal-Life God-Dynasty was only a tiny court. But the founding emperor discovered a treasure storehouse of the ancient halls of heaven. After that, we expanded rapidly and conquered everything in our path. It seems to me that the Sage Monarch Society, and by extension the House of God Ordainment, are in a similar situation. Don’t you agree, Yang Qi?”

“You are a person of outstanding ability and grand vision, Crown Prince,” Yang Qi replied, bowing respectfully. “You’re exactly right. According to what I've heard, Jadefall found a treasure trove belonging to the ancient legion of gods. I'm not sure what exactly it contained, as I don’t have Jadefall’s complete trust at the moment. She's not going to reveal such secrets to me.”

The crown prince nodded. “That’s no surprise. She wouldn’t reveal the truth of such matters even to her most trusted confidants. I don’t even tell my secrets to my father. Yang Qi, do you know the purpose of my Harvestland?”

“To grow martial-god soldier-kings?” Yang Qi replied. “Unfortunately, I'm ignorant and ill-informed, so I’m not actually sure what martial-god soldier-kings are.”

“It's not that you’re ignorant and ill-informed. Martial-god soldier-kings have never appeared in the world before. Only a handful of Paramount Gods know about them. They’re the ultimate type of thrall, created by a secret method devised in ancient times. They were originally designed to fight angels, and the only reason I can grow them is because I happened across four hundred and eighty million martial-god soldier-king seeds. After planting them in an ancient section of primeval chaos and feeding them with the nation-fate of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty, I've been able to grow them to the fetus stage. There’s still a long way to go before they’re complete. Now that the House of God Ordainment’s aura is increasing, I want you to take control of the Sage Monarch Society, then give its destiny to me.”

Chapter 1341: Martial-God Soldier-Kings

‘This guy is very ambitious,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘He just wants to take over the House of God Ordainment, then use its destiny to help with these martial-god soldier-kings of his.’

“Oh respected Crown Prince,” Yang Qi said, “I'm embarrassed to say it, but if you want me to deal with Jadefall and take control of the Sage Monarch Society, then I’ll need a way to handle that purrling of hers. The Lord of the True Void once assessed it and found that it was beyond even him to deal with, so he backed down.”

“What?!” the crown prince replied.

Before Yang Qi could react, he was hit with a blast of lightning, knocking him to the ground.

“I know it won’t be an easy task,” the crown prince continued, “but don’t think you can make excuses around me. I’ll personally handle the purrling. You're already a Perfect God, so just do your job, and I’ll make sure you achieve your next breakthrough.”

“Your humble servant will abide by your commands, Crown Prince,” Yang Qi said, crawling to his feet. “You were right to punish me, and I’ll definitely think of a way to handle the situation.” Of course, inwardly, he was chuckling coldly.

“Very well, that’s much better.” the crown prince replied, apparently pleased by Yang Qi’s attitude. Smiling faintly, he continued, “Just what I would expect of someone who studied the Nation-Fate Godfist. You're truly willing to sacrifice yourself for the good of the state. I have no reason to doubt your loyalty. That said, if you fail in your task, you’ll be punished. But if you succeed, you’ll be rewarded. So I’ll make it very simple: help bring the House of God Ordainment and the Sage Monarch Society under my control. If you do, I’ll make sure you reach the Unbounded level. Alright?”

“Many thanks, oh generous and magnanimous Crown Prince!” Yang Qi said, clasping hands and bowing repeatedly.

God-King Ruthless and Nie Yinyang both looked over at him enviously. However, there was nothing for them to do. Yang Qi was being rewarded for his loyalty, and was being placed as a pawn by the crown prince in the House of God Ordainment, with the purpose of ultimately swallowing it up.

“Observe. This is the previous destiny of the House of God Ordainment!”

The crown prince waved his hand.

All of a sudden, a projection of the House of God Ordainment appeared, except it was the previous version of the god kingdom. Then, something like a mist rose up from it, forming a burning flame above the projection.

It looked almost like a giant torch that would burn for all eternity. Of course, it was the flame of destiny.

“In the past, the destiny of the House of God Ordainment was like a torch. Although it was impressive, it was nothing I found impressive; thus, I wasn’t inclined to take action. But now, things are different. Look!”

He waved his hand again, and the current House of God Ordainment appeared.

The god kingdom was many times larger, and the destiny above it was a sea of flames, burning like a huge sun. The mere sight was shocking to the core.

“Such incredible destiny!” Nie Yinyang exclaimed. “If it keeps growing at that rate, it will rival the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty within a few tens of thousands of years.”

“That’s right. This is real destiny, and it will be of immense help to the thrall troops here.

“Destiny. The fate of nations. That is what the Harvestland thrives on. In any case, there’s no need to kill the chicken to get the eggs. From what I can tell, Jadefall and Mother Voidwalker are working together to siphon away the destiny of the Nacrelight Sageland. Observe!”

The image transformed, and the destiny of the Nacrelight Sageland appeared, and it was many times more impressive than that of the House of God Ordainment. If the latter was a tiny stream, the former was a mighty river.

However, the destiny of the Nacrelight Sageland was somehow flowing through a channel into the House of God Ordainment. That was thanks to the fact that Yang Qi had Mother Voidwalker under his control.

The crown prince had noticed this.

“Crown Prince,” said Nie Yinyang, “it’s obvious the destiny of the House of God Ordainment is growing with every moment. Taking it now wouldn’t help the martial-god soldier-kings. It would make more sense to wait until it’s reached a greater state of maturity, then take it. You’re already using the nation-fate of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty to feed the martial-god soldier-kings. But unfortunately, you can only use about one percent of it. That’s obviously not enough.”

Not even the crown prince could take all of the destiny of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty. If he tried something like that, he would be found out, and ultimately executed. The destiny of the nation was simply too important, and everyone from the most minor noble all the way up to the emperor himself would condemn him for such an act.

Therefore, he simply drew on a tiny fraction, small enough that no one would notice. Unfortunately, growing his martial-god soldier-kings in that way was like tunneling through rock with dripping water. He had no idea how many tens of thousands of years it would take. But if he could get the full destiny of the House of God Ordainment, it would be much more than the one percent he could get from the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty. And there, no opponent would be able to do anything to him.

After a moment of consideration, the crown prince said, “You’re right, Nie Yinyang. The destiny of the House of God Ordainment has become very impressive, but the time hasn't come to take it. In fact, I think I ought to help it grow even stronger. Yang Qi, I have several tasks for you. First, find out exactly what treasures Jadefall has stashed away in the House of God Ordainment. Second, find a way to seize power in the Sage Monarch Society. Considering that Jadefall helped you become a Perfect God so quickly, she obviously values you. Third, keep the houselord and junior houselord safe. Don’t let them fall victim to Jadefall. Otherwise, the Crown Prince Society isn’t going to have any good reason to interfere later. Fourth, use Jadefall to find out Mother Voidwalker’s current location. Then I can figure out a way to go deal with her in person.”

“Yes sir!” Yang Qi replied immediately.

“The other figures in the Sage Monarch Society that Jadefall has been helping, such as the Shepherd and Proud World... you must make sure they don’t seize power before you. Get rid of them one by one. Make sure you’re the only important person around. Also, keep an eye on any dealings between Jadefall and the supreme concubine. The supreme concubine is enigmatic and impossible to predict, and she's been opposing me from the very beginning. In fact, she’s the one who nearly got me deposed years ago. If I hadn’t reached the Unbounded level, I would’ve already been replaced.” His expression hardened for a moment, then he chuckled. “Ah, Ling Chuang, I won’t let you off the hook for that. I don’t care that you’re the supreme concubine. I’ll make sure you beg me for mercy and suffer the most horrific humiliation. Neither of us have ever come out on top in our conflicts, and you've never ceased trying to throw me out so one of your sons can take my place. But how could I, Eternal Millennium, ever let that happen?”

It was only at this moment that Yang Qi came to find out the crown prince was named Eternal Millennium. His father, the emperor, was Eternal Nightless, and both of them were obviously ambitious and ruthless individuals. Yang Qi had also come to understand just how deeply the crown prince hated the supreme concubine.

“Whatever you want me to do, Crown Prince, I’ll do! In fact, I’ll head back right now and start planning things out.” With that, he turned as if to leave.

“There’s no hurry,” Eternal Millennium said. “Considering you’re here in the Harvestland, I might as well give you some help with your cultivation. Do you know why exactly I’ve been making these martial-god soldier-kings? And do you know the true nature of the House of God Ordainment’s secret reserve power?”

Curious to see how Eternal Millennium would react, Yang Qi said, “Oh revered Crown Prince, I am aware of the secret reserve power of the House of God Ordainment. It’s called the War God Commander’s Tally, and it contains forty-eight thousand thrall troops that are peak Perfect Gods with half Unbounded will convergence. Together, they can devastate Paramount Gods. That’s the treasure the houselord used to keep Jadefall in check. Otherwise, he would’ve already lost his position to her.”

Eternal Millennium chuckled coldly. “You think the War God Commander’s Tally is impressive? Hardly! Just wait until my martial-god soldier-kings are finished. They’ll be able to crush that commander’s tally with hardly any effort. The martial-god soldier-kings are more powerful than you can imagine. They’ll stun any enemy into mindlessness, and their military might is so immense they can overturn the god world. With them, I’ll come to control all nations that exist!”

“So invincible!” Yang Qi said obsequiously.

“The martial-god soldier-kings are vastly superior to the ancient war gods. In fact, one of the former could easily defeat a hundred of the latter. However, I need to grow them to the proper level, then assimilate them to attain a fighting prowess at the peak of the Paramount God level. At that point, I’ll be similar to people like the ancient King Immortal-Slayer, Lord of Civilization, or Lord of the Sword Dao. Look at the fetuses around you. They have no godhood and no thinking ability. They’re simply a manifestation of the preheaven energy of the martial path. As they grow, they’ll develop godhood that thrums with unsurpassable fighting prowess!”

“Crown Prince, do you mean that you intend to fill me with some of that preheaven energy of the martial path?” Yang Qi blurted.

“Very good guess,” Eternal Millennium replied. “I'm going to bless you in a way that will boost your fighting prowess by ten times over. You’ll be invincible to anyone under the Unbounded level! Step forward onto the altar! With my blessing, you’ll truly be heading toward a breakthrough!”

“Yes sir!” Yang Qi said. Not worried about any probing from Eternal Millennium, he stepped onto the altar and settled down cross-legged, whereupon the crown prince placed a palm on the top of his head.

Instantly, a stream of martial energy rushed into his godhood, where it attempted to seize control of him. Of course, he had been ready for that, so he simply entered the realm of Nevasaññānāsaññāyatana and left behind a body made from Life-Death Void-Destruction God-Lightning.

As a result, it didn’t matter how Eternal Millennium attacked him, it wouldn’t do any good.

Slowly but surely, some of the preheaven vital energy of the martial path started building up inside of him.

‘He still doesn’t trust me,’ Yang Qi thought, ‘so he's filling me with this vital energy of the martial path as a way to control me and guide my attempts to get close to Jadefall. What he's doing will make him like my shadow. This is a very vicious technique. It's none other than the brutal Shadow-Devil Heart-Devil Sauvastika-Devil Divine Ability, a consummate technique from the depths of hell....’

Yang Qi was struck with sudden inspiration.

Chapter 1342: Plotting against Eternal Millennium

Preheaven vital energy of the martial path was perfect for use with a consummate technique of a Paramount God from the dao of devils, such as the Shadow-Devil Heart-Devil Sauvastika-Devil Divine Ability. With that technique, one’s own soul would become like a shadow on the target, making it possible to spy on their every move, and even exert control over them.

In other words, it would make Yang Qi like a reflection of Eternal Millennium.

Whatever Eternal Millennium wanted Yang Qi to do, he would do. Eventually, it would transform Yang Qi down to his soul, flesh, and blood, and would allow the crown prince to absorb his destiny. Eternal Millennium was downright vicious and merciless. Despite the fact that Yang Qi had agreed to do everything he asked, the crown prince still wasn’t letting him off the hook. And that was after he had promised to help Yang Qi reach the Unbounded level.

Actually, it was the moment in which he made the promise about the Unbounded level that Yang Qi had realized he was full of hot air. He had obviously been randomly making some impressive promises in preparation for a vicious move.

After all, breaking through to the Unbounded level was no casual thing. Eternal Millennium himself had gone through countless trials and tribulations to do that, and as for Yang Qi, he had only succeeded by unlocking the secrets of the Mahātmā Jade.

As for Yang Immortal-Slayer, he had benefited from the help of King Immortal-Slayer and the purrling, as well as the tutelage of the Lord of the True Void. Yang Qi had also given him some of the legacy power of the High Priestess in the form of the Wisdom and Knowledge God Pill. Add in the power they had taken from Mother Voidwalker, and that was how he had reached the Unbounded level.

As such, Yang Qi knew full well that Eternal Millennium’s promise of helping him reach the Unbounded level was completely empty.

Thankfully, Yang Qi could deal with a vicious technique like the one Eternal Millennium was using; the God Legion Seal could crush it like dried twigs. However, he didn’t do that. After all, the technique was being used on a fake body. Even if the vilest of curses were used on that body, he could detonate it any time he wanted, sending the destructive power back to whoever had cursed it to begin with.

Besides, the preheaven energy of the martial path could actually be beneficial to him. Therefore, he made the fake body rise to a higher level, until it was in the mid Perfect God level.

Furthermore, he secretly sent a devil embryo back through Eternal Millennium’s true energy, right into his body.

Both were plotting against the other, but in this case, Eternal Millennium was being obvious about it, and Yang Qi was being very stealthy. Furthermore, since Yang Qi had the aura of the Crown Prince from the impure lands, it made it that much easier. And in the end, Eternal Millennium had absolutely no idea what was going on.

‘Eternal Millennium has some spectacular godpower in him. I definitely can’t activate the devil embryo. If I did, he would destroy it immediately!’

The devil embryo became like a speck of dust in Eternal Millennium's energy, where it would rest quietly near his godhood waiting for a chance to possess him.

To Yang Qi, Eternal Millennium’s godhood looked like a burning sun that could dispel all darkness and gloom, and keep all wretched evil away.

If Yang Qi didn’t have the Crown Prince’s aura from the impure lands, his devil embryo would never have been able to get close. But at least it was inside Eternal Millennium. Now Yang Qi just needed to wait until he got a bit stronger, and then he could activate it! Then he would be able to take all of Eternal Millennium’s quintessence.

‘I need another piece of the Mahātmā Jade,’ he thought. ‘Then I’ll be able to take control of Eternal Millennium, and have the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty in my pocket. At least I can use the devil embryo to spy on him and figure out how he’s growing these martial-god soldier-kings.’

Of course, Yang Qi didn’t dare to do anything rash.

Crack!

Meanwhile, Eternal Millennium watched as his technique caused ‘Yang Qi’ to rapidly grow stronger. Smiling, he said, “Not bad. Not bad at all. I’ve already enhanced your godhood and your psychic will. Now you can leave. Remember the plan: get control of the Sage Monarch Society and gather information about Jadefall. Got it?”

Kowtowing deeply, Yang Qi said, “Yes. Many thanks, Crown Prince. Your magnanimity and generosity make me wish I could die in your service!”

“Go!”

Eternal Millennium waved his hand, sending Yang Qi flying over to the teleportation portal, which activated and sent him away.

Only Nie Yinyang and God-King Ruthless were left behind in the Harvestland.

“Oh Crown Prince,” Nie Yinyang said, “this Yang Qi seems to be completely loyal ever since he consumed the Nation-Fate God Pill. Why did you use the Shadow-Devil Heart-Devil Sauvastika-Devil Divine Ability on him? Are you really going to turn him into your shadow?”

“That’s just his fate. He is indeed a faithful subordinate, but Jadefall is getting too strong. If she really got some sort of treasure trove, and is able to reach the Unbounded level, the control of the Nation-Fate God Pill will weaken. In fact, she might even be able to dispel it. If they know I've been controlling him, they might try to take revenge. But if he becomes my shadow, my control of him will be complete!

“The god world is descending into chaos, and I need to rise to the top. I must complete my martial-god soldier-kings. The destiny of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty is powerful, but I don’t have enough of it. Even as the emperor, I couldn’t take too much without threatening to bring about the end of the dynasty. And sadly, even if I chose to go that route, it might not complete the martial-god soldier-kings. So in addition to places like the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty and the Nacrelight Sageland, I must drain the destinies of all the other sects and organizations. Then, with my martial-god soldier-kings, I can dominate the god world and unleash the ultimate fighting prowess!”

As Eternal Millennium spoke, intense rumbling sounds echoed out and the entire Harvestland trembled, as though the fetuses were reacting. At the same time, an immensely domineering energy swept out.

After leaving the Harvestland and reentering the god kingdom of the House of God Ordainment, Yang Qi waved his hand, and the Crown Prince appeared.

“Well, was that fun for you, Crown Prince?” Yang Qi said mockingly. “You finally got to see your true self. You really were a god from heaven descended into the mortal world. And not just an ordinary god, but a Paramount God. I wonder if your true self even remembers you. After all, you were nothing more than a tool for him. A scrap of will.”

“Yang Qi...!” the Crown Prince said through gritted teeth, as if he wanted to rip him to shreds and eat him. “You animal! You think you can use me against my true self? Even I can see that he's far too strong for you to deal with. And if my true self knew of my existence, he’d definitely do everything in his power to kill you.”

“Your true self is strong, but not strong enough to do anything to me. Also, don’t forget that you are you, and Eternal Millennium is Eternal Millennium. You started out as a scrap of his will, but you're a different person now. Unique. If you die, he won’t. If he dies, you live. If you feel pain, he won’t. If he’s injured, you’ll be safe. He has absolutely no idea that you’re suffering in my hands. By this point, your auras aren't connected at all.”

“So what exactly are you planning to do? I'm under your control, tormented on a daily basis, living a life worse than death! Our grudge from the impure lands has already been resolved! Do you mean to tell me you plan to torture me forever? Why not just kill me!? I've already died once!”

In response to the Crown Prince’s tirade, Yang Qi said, “How could I bear to kill you? It took a lot of effort to create you, and I plan to use you against your true self. He's not dead yet, so just calm down. Once I come up with a plan, you just have to go along with it, and I can make sure you take over your true body and become a Paramount God. What do you think?”

“What?!” the Crown Prince said, his jaw dropping. “You’re going to make me a Paramount God? You’ll help me take over my true body? Impossible! My true self is too strong! He can’t be possessed!”

“Nothing is impossible,” Yang Qi replied. “Do you really think your true self is that impressive? He doesn't count for anything to me. All I need to do is find another piece of the Mahātmā Jade, and I can cut him down any time I wish! Cooperate with me. Help me carry out my plan. If you do, I guarantee you can possess him. And then you can help me take over the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty. What do you say?”

“Alright. Done deal!” However, inside, the Crown Prince was thinking, ‘Ah, Yang Qi, do you really think I’ll let you off the hook that easily? If this possession succeeds and I become a Paramount God, am I just going to keep taking orders from you? No! I’ll make sure everyone you care about dies! None of them will survive!’

No one could possibly hate Yang Qi as much as he did.

Flicking his sleeve, Yang Qi put the Crown Prince away and stepped into the headquarters of the Sage Monarch Society.

“What did you think of Eternal Millennium, Yang Qi?” Jadefall asked. “Is he planning to make a move against the House of God Ordainment?”

“Yes, he is. Although I'm not afraid of him, at the moment, a fight between us would only end with both of us being seriously hurt. And he obviously has backers in the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty. If he brought multiple Paramount Gods with him, we’d be beaten like stray dogs, and they would take all of the destiny we've accumulated. But I have a plan. We need to stick it out for a few more years while I get stronger. I'm going to head out onto the open ocean to find a certain mysterious island nation where there’s another piece of the Mahātmā Jade. Once I'm there, I’ll establish a teleportation portal linking it to here. I'm going to leave the War God Commander’s Tally and the Cruiser of Civilization with you. With the perfect caliber godstones I’ve created, you can use them to beat a Paramount God. With that, and the help of the purrling, you should be fine. Before long, Yang Immortal-Slayer will return with Unbounded will convergence. At that point, even if I'm still gone, you can go full steam ahead with growing the House of God Ordainment. Of course, I’ll leave a clone behind to fool Eternal Millennium.”

“Sounds good!” Jadefall said. “You might as well get going. Considering our strength and assets, we obviously have nothing to fear.”

Chapter 1343: Ocean Travel

Eternal Millennium had amazing energy arts, and was growing an army of martial-god soldier-kings. Although his army wasn’t finished yet, once it was, it would make the War God Commander’s Tally seem virtually useless.

The War God Commander’s Tally was the secret reserve power of an entire sect, which could be used to fight a Paramount God and defend the entire sect. Considering that, what would the martial-god soldier-kings be capable of? Would they be able to slaughter angels in battle? Would they make Eternal Millennium the ultimate figure in existence, someone beyond the match of any Paramount God?

Now that Yang Qi knew Eternal Millennium’s secrets, there was no way he would let his plot come to fruition. However, he didn’t simply ruin the growing martial-god soldier-kings. He would let Eternal Millennium bring them to fruition, then turn them into a weapon for his own use, most likely against the Proud Clan.

He wanted to use the destinies of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty and Nacrelight Sageland to finish the martial-god soldier-kings, but to do that, he had to be stronger. Thus, he intended to track down another piece of the Mahātmā Jade.

Thanks to his previous divinations, he knew a piece of the Mahātmā Jade was located in an island nation.

The ocean was covered with countless such island nations, most of which were entire continents as large as the House of God Ordainment. Many times, hundreds or thousands of those continents would join forces as a sect or imperial dynasty. Such locations had destiny greater than the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty or the Nacrelight Sageland, and a proliferation of countless experts.

Thankfully, Yang Qi wasn't worried about even Paramount Gods.

“Clone!”

Yang Qi shivered as he used Life-Death Void-Destruction God-Lightning to create another body. It was a mid Perfect God that would completely fool Eternal Millennium. In fact, Eternal Millennium would even be able to control it.

Next, he produced a bracelet and handed it to Jadefall. “This is all the wealth created with the God Legion Seal after I reached the Unbounded level. There are trillions in godnotes and plenty of perfect caliber godstones. I doubt even the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty has as much wealth as this. It should be more than enough to fuel the growth of the Sage Monarch Society. Give some of it to Mother Voidwalker and her people to improve profits. Use the godstones to get the various precious materials you need for your cultivation. I want you to reach the Unbounded level as soon as possible. I’ve also had Mother Voidwalker arrange to make you a disciple in the Nacrelight Sageland. That way, you can go to the Supplication God Temple and use the ancient sacrificial techniques to benefit yourself. I’ve already had them purchase the head of a Paramount God from the dao of devils, which you can sacrifice to gain a fifty percent chance of reaching the Unbounded level.”

“I’ve already started working on that. The sacrifice should be an easy thing to do. And although it's good to have so many godnotes, there are some things that godnotes can’t buy. Thankfully, Paramount Gods will scramble like a flock of wild ducks for perfect caliber godstones, so we should be able to work something out.”

The House of God Ordainment only had a few perfect caliber godstones, but Yang Qi could create mountains of them. Of course, the Sage Monarch Consortium wouldn’t just throw around such godstones casually, otherwise Paramount Gods would gather like sharks to blood, and destroy the consortium.

The Sage Monarch Consortium as a whole was only as strong as an early Paramount God, and would need many thousands of years before it was on the same level as the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty.

Next, Yang Qi summoned his friends and family, which was when an immense force suddenly weighed down on the god kingdom of the House of God Ordainment.

All of the top experts were shocked, as it was the aura of an Unbounded expert.

Yang Qi’s expression flickered for a moment, then resolved into a smile. “I should’ve known. The Wisdom and Knowledge God Pill, plus that ancient sacrifice and the godpower of Mother Voidwalker, actually did the trick. Yang Immortal-Slayer is now an Unbounded expert!”

The newcomer was indeed Yang Immortal-Slayer, and he had reached the Unbounded level.

Laughter rang out as he appeared. “I've finally developed Unbounded will convergence, everyone. Henceforth, I’ll take the lead in the Sage Monarch Society. I’ll operate in the light, and Yang Qi will operate in the shadows. With the two of us working together, nothing in the god world can stop us.”

“Excellent!” Yang Qi exclaimed. “This is going better than I’d planned! You must’ve spent a lot of blood, sweat, and tears to achieve this breakthrough so quickly. According to my previous calculations, it should’ve taken you a few hundred more years. The Wisdom and Knowledge God Pill and the power of that ancient sacrifice really did provoke a major transformation.”

“It was King Immortal-Slayer,” Yang Immortal-Slayer said. “He used a heaven-defying ability to draw on ultimate powers of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. In the critical moment, my thinking expanded by hundreds of times, and I broke through all limits to reach my current level.”

Yang Qi’s heart thumped a bit. “Is King Immortal-Slayer that anxious to help you? Are you sure this isn't some kind of trick?”

Looking very serious, Yang Immortal-Slayer said, “According to what he said, his Paramount God opponent has been speeding up their efforts to break into the Great Necropolis and the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Before long, King Immortal-Slayer won’t be able to hold on any longer. Whoever this peak Paramount God is, he’s a God-Lord roughly on the same level as the Sovereign Lord of years past. King Immortal-Slayer has to find him within three thousand years, and neutralize him. Otherwise, King Immortal-Slayer will end up being assimilated, and that Paramount God will truly become a new Sovereign Lord.”

“Three thousand years? Ha! That means we still have a lot of time left. That's definitely enough time to find the rest of the pieces of the Mahātmā Jade. Once I completely combine it with the God Legion Seal, I’ll be on the same level as the Sovereign Lord.”

“In that case, hurry up and get to finding the other pieces of that jade! I’ll take care of things here in the House of God Ordainment, starting with some very dramatic reforms.”

“That’s fine. However, be wary of Eternal Millennium. I’ll leave my clone here to help you completely snooker him.”

With that, Yang Qi continued talking matters over with his brethren, and making sure everything was planned out well.

Seven days later, he flew up into the air and vanished over the ocean.

Behind him, the House of God Ordainment was already being turned upside down. Word was spreading rapidly among the disciples that, at long last, an Unbounded expert had risen up in the sect.

That individual would definitely become a Paramount God and take control. Everyone could already feel the destiny of the sect burning hotter and brighter than ever.

The houselord, junior houselord, and chief elders imprisoned in Mount God Ordainment were all completely shocked by the news that a group of Mystery Society disciples had brought them.

“What?!”

“What did you just say? Yang Immortal-Slayer returned from training with the Lord of the True Void, and has Unbounded will convergence? And he's working with the Sage Monarch Society to make a big deal about his breakthrough?”

“They’re recruiting new members for their society? They’re expanding operations?”

“That's right. You see, there aren’t many members of the Mystery Society left. They’ve been dropping one after another, and only the most deep cover disciples are left. And this is the news they’re sending! And there’s more! Yang Immortal-Slayer is working for Jadefall! And he says that she's going to be the next houselord. They’re even calling for an early election!”

“We’re finished. Completely finished!”

The junior houselord and numerous chief elders sagged in defeat. “An Unbounded expert. And he's a key figure in the Sage Monarch Society? Now we have no hope of putting things back to the way they were before.”

However, the junior houselord wasn't willing to give up hope yet. “Father.... Father! You’re still an apprentice of the Lord of the True Void! Can’t you call him here to help? Have him take control of the sect!”

“That won’t work,” the houselord replied. “He doesn’t care about sect politics. He’s only interested in finding geniuses. Yang Immortal-Slayer is also his apprentice, and an Unbounded expert at that. The Lord of the True Void probably approves of him far more than he does me.” Of course, the houselord was fully aware that Yang Qi was more impressive than Yang Immortal-Slayer, and that he was the one pulling the strings. However, he didn’t say anything about that. He knew that Yang Qi could eavesdrop on his thoughts, and therefore, he didn’t dare to do anything rash.

“A new regime is taking over the House of God Ordainment,” the houselord said, seemingly having aged many, many years. “Chief Elders, you need to join Jadefall. The Sage Monarch Society has become too powerful to resist. Tell her I'm willing to abdicate and hand over all official authority to her. All she has to do is get the support of enough disciples to win the vote. Then she can have the position of houselord.”

“Father! No!” the junior houselord screamed maniacally. “You can’t do this! You still have control of the secret reserve power! You can fight Jadefall! She won't dare to cause trouble for you! Just give me control of the reserve power! I can use it to break through the blockade, get to the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty, and get help from the imperial court! They’ll definitely put down this rebellion. Remember, we're still a vassal state! We can request troops to quell the insurrection. Then we can put everything back to normal.”

“None of that will do any good. You’ve forgotten that Jadefall is the adopted daughter of the supreme concubine. Getting troops from the court will be very troublesome. After all, that third prince of yours isn't very influential. Besides, Jadefall has control of the secret reserve power.”

“What?!”

RUMBLE!

His words were like a bolt of lightning that struck the junior houselord completely mute.

Without the reserve power, they really were finished.

Chapter 1344: Ocean Travel (2)

When the junior houselord learned that Jadefall had control of the secret reserve power, he fell into complete despair. During the entire time he’d been trapped with the houselord and chief elders, he had held onto the hope that they could use the reserve power to turn things around.

But now Yang Immortal-Slayer of the Sage Monarch Society had reached the Unbounded level, and there was no reserve power to call on. The Sage Monarch Society was on the rise, and those trapped in Mount God Ordainment were simply waiting to be executed.

They had no options at hand.

“I have some further advice for you,” said the weary houselord. “Do not under any circumstances cross the Sage Monarch Society. There’s no way you can compete with the power that backs them. It’s even possible they might take down the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty one day. So hurry over to Jadefall and offer her your allegiance. Dissolve the Mystery Society, and give her the roster of former members. That's your only hope of coming out of this alive. I can’t protect you. However ruthless you think you are, they’re unimaginably worse. And remember, with them in control, the sect could very well grow in dramatic fashion.

“Truth be told, the House of God Ordainment has grown a lot in recent years, thanks to them. The treasures stored up are far more plentiful than they ever were before. The Sage Monarch Consortium in the Heaven-Wretch Continent has suppressed countless cultivators from the dao of devils, and swallowed up multiple competing consortiums. Even some of the confucian academies give them respect. And the Demonfolk from the wild parts of the continent will work with them. Their daily profits are incredible. On top of that, their disciples are constantly becoming stronger and breaking through, which has led to the god kingdom expanding and the cities growing larger.

“Remember, for years we’ve been warring with the other powerful sects from the dao of devils, groups similar in strength to us, such as the Hell-Breaking Church, Ghostface Assembly, Wretch-Dao Gang, House of Blood and Gore, and the like. Although none of them have Paramount Gods, they’re still very strong, and have impressive destiny. We’ve been struggling with groups like that for millions of years, but nowadays they’ve been falling left and right, and providing us with plenty of new slaves.”

Most of the chief elders were relieved to hear the houselord talking in this way, as they had all been thinking of joining the Sage Monarch Society anyway. They had only feared what might happen if the houselord finally managed to turn things around. But now they could see that there was only one way to get out of this situation alive.

“Go. All of you. Surrender to the Sage Monarch Society!”

Although the destiny of the sect was being shaken dramatically, it was still growing with blazing speed.

BUZZ!

Meanwhile, in the Harvestland, Eternal Millennium was in a session of secluded meditation with Nie Yinyang, God-King Ruthless, and a handful of other trusted advisers. Suddenly, he opened his eyes, looked down at his map of the House of God Ordainment, and immediately noticed its destiny, which was expanding as if it were a fire that was doused with oil.

“What is it, Crown Prince?” one of his advisers asked. “Why is the House of God Ordainment’s destiny increasing so dramatically? It's definitely different from before.”

“Yang Immortal-Slayer returned, and with the help of the Lord of the True Void, he’s reached the Unbounded level.” Eternal Millennium rose to his feet and started pacing back and forth. “The houselord is powerless, and even gave the secret reserve power to Jadefall. The sect is being united, and given that the houselord is capitulating, our Eternal-Life God-Dynasty has no excuse to interfere. Because of that, the previous instabilities and holes in their destiny are gone. The House of God Ordainment has become ironclad!”

“What? If Yang Immortal-Slayer is an Unbounded expert, and they also have the secret reserve power, it means they can definitely unleash the might of a Paramount God. No wonder their destiny is so much more impressive. But what do we do now, Crown Prince? We have a pawn in Yang Qi, but is he going to be useful?”

“Yang Qi will definitely prove useful. Remember, we have plenty of time to work with. There’s no need to get antsy. The House of God Ordainment has better destiny than before, but it's still not good enough for me. Let Jadefall keep expanding and absorbing other sects. Let her create a fantastic dynasty for me to snatch up when the time is right. You see, I have big plans for Yang Qi. Once the martial-god soldier-kings are finished, I’ll impart their immense energy into him, then use him to ambush Jadefall and force her to submit to me! I’ll also use him against Yang Immortal-Slayer!”

He threw his head back and laughed.

All of a sudden, the Harvestland trembled as a massive column of destiny shot into it, piercing its depths and causing the fetal martial-god soldier-kings to grow larger.

“It’s working!” Eternal Millennium exclaimed. “Jadefall is giving Yang Qi greater authority in the Sage Monarch Society, and he’s using that authority to deliver more destiny here. Excellent. Excellent! That will increase the growth speed of the martial-god soldier-kings by a good ten percent. But I need more. Too many people in the imperial court are watching me, making it impossible to get more nation-fate. For now, I need to rely on the House of God Ordainment. All of you, listen. Draw on every resource available to widen the path to the House of God Ordainment. Make sure the destiny from there can flow freely! Got it?”

Several of Eternal Millennium’s trusted confidants smiled.

“Yes sir! The House of God Ordainment is already your property, oh great Crown Prince. We’ll naturally make way for their destiny.”

“With destiny constantly flowing into my Harvestland, my power will grow on a daily basis. My day of ultimate control only continues growing closer!”

Meanwhile, back in the House of God Ordainment, Jadefall watched as one particular stream of energy flowed in a seemingly random direction. Looking at Yang Immortal-Slayer, she said, “Yang Qi’s plan is already working. After giving control to the clone he left behind, he's sending destiny to Eternal Millennium's martial-god soldier-kings. That sweet taste of what is to come will only get him to trust Yang Qi’s clone even more, and help him to grow the House of God Ordainment. Although we're losing a bit of destiny in the process, the long-term gains will be well worth it! And little does Eternal Millennium know that the day he completes his martial-god soldier-kings will also be the day he dies. Yang Qi has already prepared for that moment, and will easily take control of the martial-god soldier-kings. The Crown Prince from the impure lands is his greatest trump card!”

Yang Qi had planned everything out, and everything was going according to plan.

**

Yang Qi was flying over the open water, moving trillions of miles with every moment that passed. With his Unbounded will convergence, and his endless supply of godpower, he could easily rip through the void and make dramatic progress.

He was far from the location of the House of God Ordainment, Eternal-Life God-Dynasty, Nacrelight Sageland, League of Wretch-Gods, and League of the Devil-Dao. In fact, he wasn’t familiar at all with his surroundings.

Opening his Lord's Eye, he looked around and saw a complicated seascape, filled with continents, islands, sects, and groups, including those from the dao of devils and dao of demons. There were even buddhist nations. In addition, there were all sorts of unique races here, including Spritefolk, Aeriefolk, Savagefolk, and Cyberfolk.

The Cyberfolk traced their heritage back to the robots humans had created in the ancient god world’s mechanical civilization. The Cyberfolk were made primarily from metal, and were extremely intelligent. They had started out as little more than puppets, but as time progressed, they developed their own type of life force and genes, then eventually learned to procreate. That was when they became the Cyberfolk. They were different from humans in that they were extremely strong; even their children were astoundingly powerful. Unfortunately, the actual bearing of children was difficult for them. That in turn made it difficult for them to be a domineering force in the god world.

There were all sorts of alliances and groups. It really went to show how amazing the god world was, and the incredible level of diversity there was there. And it reinforced the fact that the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty and Nacrelight Sageland only occupied a tiny corner of the god world as a whole.

It took him an entire month of flying before he found what he sought: a group of landmasses roughly as large and powerful as the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty.

That was very telling, considering he could fly as quickly in a month as most Paramount Gods could in a year. He could fly nonstop without his godpower running out, whereas most Paramount Gods would need to take time to rest and build up their reserves.

Yang Qi might as well have been a perpetual motion machine.

If Paramount Gods could only travel this distance in a year, it went without saying that most ordinary people could never come to locations like this without teleportation portals.

Yang Qi flew along, taking in the scenery and learning a lot just from the process of traveling. His energy arts and godhood were constantly at work, replenishing him.

Because of that, his path toward the realm of Nevasaññānāsaññāyatana advanced.

Of course, that was also the realm of Nothing. Beyond the Unbounded level was the Annulled level, which no one in the god world had ever succeeded in reaching. But Yang Qi was confident that he could do what had never been done.

He flew for several more days, until he felt like his godhood was about to vanish. It was as if he could become removed from the world, leaving behind only his thoughts. He was definitely closing in on the Paramount God level.

Chapter 1345: Deva Dynasty

‘I’m finally here!’

After an extended period of flight, Yang Qi finally reached the island nation that he knew was home to another piece of the Mahātmā Jade. The islands and continents looked almost like enormous sea turtles floating on the water, their backs covered with living beings, countries, civilizations, and destiny.

There were too many landmasses to count, all of them connected by shipping networks that facilitated various businesses. There were countless experts of all sorts, gods of every type that flew back and forth. And there were countless temples, allowing the faith and destiny of the various lands to surge.

Yang Qi even saw quite a few experts from buddhist schools. There were people from the dao of devils and confucian scholars, although the former were hiding their devilish auras.

CRASH!

A blood-red streak of light descended, which was none other than a peak Perfect God, someone from the dao of devils whose cultivation base was no weaker than that of Grand Eunuch Nie Yinyang. As the person landed on the continent, their aura turned from blood-red to a more mellow reddish color, indicating that they hadn’t come for killing, but rather, to do business.

The destiny on this continent burned so hotly that it actually affected the climate.

There were no storms here like there were out over the water. The destiny suppressed the vital energy that could lead to such meteorological phenomena.

The weather in the god world was fickle. Sometimes ice ages would come that could last for a thousand years, followed by heat waves that baked and broiled everything in existence. Sometimes rain would fall for years on end, or storms would batter the lands, leaving nothing behind but wreckage and craters.

Of course, it was worse on the open ocean. If a traveler wasn’t careful, they might get caught up in a storm and be ripped to shreds before they could find a safe place to hunker down.

Sometimes, islands would appear overnight. Other times, inhabited lands would vanish in the night, destroyed by tempests of unimaginable ferocity. Such storms couldn’t be suppressed by Perfect Gods; only Paramount Gods could possibly deal with them.

But the continent Yang Qi had just arrived at didn’t give off any sense that such disasters could occur here. Furthermore, there were no spell formations protecting it. It was its destiny alone that made the climate so safe. It begged the question of just how powerful that destiny must be.

Normally speaking, the climate of the god world was so fierce that it couldn’t possibly be affected by mere destiny. Even if the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty’s destiny were ten times as powerful as it was, it wouldn’t be enough to do something like this.

It would require the destiny to climb high into the sky to affect the weather, and even the light, making it impossible for the dangerous storms to be a problem.

It even cleared the surrounded ocean of demonlings.

Obviously, this was a flourishing location that existed in a golden age of peace and prosperity.

‘What kind of a place is this?’ Yang Qi wondered. Before landing, he reached out into the void, summoning to himself that very same peak Perfect God who had arrived in the blood-colored light. His action caused no spatial ripples at all, and before anyone could notice what he had done, he was holding the man by the throat.

He didn’t waste time trying to interrogate him. Instead, he pierced directly into his mind and soul to find all of the information he sought.

As it turned out, this place was called the Deva Dynasty. It was made up of billions of smaller island nations, all connected together into a larger composite continent.

The Deva Dynasty was a huge place. Among the billions of islands that made it up, there were countless sects, clans, and virtually endless amounts of life underwater. There were even places outside of the actual dynasty itself that offered fealty to it.

The founder and patriarch of this Deva Dynasty was none other than Patriarch Deva!

‘Patriarch Deva!? I should’ve known!’

Yang Qi was shaken. He knew exactly what kind of being Patriarch Deva was. He was the very one who had given a talisman to Dragon Floret of the Dragon Society for the purpose of capturing the purrling. Of course, the purrling easily crushed it and Dragon Floret had subsequently left to find Patriarch Deva, only to be killed by Yang Qi along the way.

Despite the years that had passed, there was no way Yang Qi could forget the name.

How could he have guessed that this person would be so inextricably linked with himself?

Patriarch Deva was no small figure. He had lived in the Sovereign Lord’s Age, and continued practicing cultivation through the years until he was a peak Paramount God that even other Paramount Gods feared. And normally speaking, Dragon Floret should have been an ant-like nobody that Patriarch Deva would never have dealt with.

‘So the Deva Dynasty was created by Patriarch Deva. I obviously have to be careful here. He must have a reason for having created a place like this. The destiny here is strong enough to change the climate and weather. I wonder what would happen if it were given to the martial-god soldier-kings. What would they become? It would definitely nurture them to completion. And assimilating it would also make it possible to push the destiny of the House of God Ordainment to the highest level imaginable. I could then consume both the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty and Nacrelight Sageland. In any case, there are plenty of resources that I could acquire here to take home. Even that could be considered lucky.’

Yang Qi looked around at the billions of islands that made up the dynasty, and couldn’t help but sigh in admiration, and simultaneously start thinking of a way to take this destiny.

It only took a moment to come up with several plans. The most obvious and direct way would be killing Patriarch Deva. But at the moment, he could only accomplish something like that in his dreams. He wasn’t King Immortal-Slayer, after all. Another option would be to sneak in and stealthily steal the destiny, which seemed a bit more realistic. The third method would be to mount an invasion. That seemed even less realistic.

‘First, I need to track down that piece of the Mahātmā Jade. Then I can figure out my next move.’ Once he found that Mahātmā Jade, he could use it to reach the mid Unbounded level, whereupon he could definitely kill Paramount Gods.

After all, each subsection of the Unbounded level—early, mid, late, and peak—involved heaven-shaking, earth-toppling increases in power.

The Eternal-Life God-Dynasty mostly had early Paramount Gods, with only a few mid Paramount God patriarchs. People like that could shake chiliocosms of worlds, suppress destiny, create spectacular treasures, and give orders to mobilize the entire sect.

If Yang Qi reached the mid level, he could definitely overwhelm the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty, vanquish the crown prince, and take the martial-god soldier-kings.

‘This fellow from the dao of devils is called Patriarch Bloodcloak. His Bloodcloak God Art involves soaking himself in blood that then turns into a holy garment similar to my God Legion Battle Robe. It makes him impervious to all sorts of weapons, and even natural substances like fire or water. His cultivation base is clearly superior to anyone in the House of God Ordainment.’ After rifling through Patriarch Bloodcloak’s thoughts, Yang Qi had no intention of simply letting him go.

Clenching his fist, he forced him to shrink down and be surrounded by a spatial crystal. Cleansing his mind, Yang Qi turned him into a thrall that he could use to strengthen his sect.

For a small sect to have a peak Perfect God under their control would ensure that no one could easily invade them.

When rifling through Patriarch Bloodcloak’s memories, Yang Qi had found that he was an important person from the dao of devils, someone who had committed unimaginable crimes. For instance, he had repeatedly massacred entire cities, using their blood to enhance his own quintessence.

Considering that Yang Qi couldn’t use the Cruiser of Civilization to create Perfect Gods yet, getting some as thralls was his best option now. If he could reach the mid Unbounded level, he would definitely be able to create morphlings at the Perfect God level. At that point, conquering the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty and Nacrelight Sageland would be a matter of course.

WHOOSH!

After sealing Patriarch Bloodcloak, he assumed his appearance and snuck into one of the major cities in the dynasty.

Patriarch Bloodcloak was a well-known figure in the Deva Dynasty, where he did a lot of business. Therefore, his presence wasn’t anything to be suspicious of. Normally speaking, when outsiders came to the Deva Dynasty, they were questioned thoroughly before being allowed in. If Yang Qi had shown up as himself, a person with Unbounded will convergence, he would have attracted far too much attention.

As for Patriarch Bloodcloak, he came from a distant island, where he led the Bloodcloak Assembly, a sect of his own creation. He would come to the Deva Dynasty to purchase blood śarīras left behind by buddhist gods, which he would then use to advance his Bloodcloak God Art, all in the hopes of eventually reaching the Unbounded level.

Using the identity of Patriarch Bloodcloak to track down the Mahātmā Jade seemed like the perfect plan.

Looking around, Yang Qi saw numerous buildings and businesses, and countless experts, including Consummate and Perfect Gods. Even the common people were generally stronger than those from the capital city of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty.

In the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty, Consummate Gods were important people, while Perfect Gods were generally elite leaders like God-King Ruthless and Nie Yinyang.

But here, they were as common as bok choy!

Yang Qi did a quick test to see if he could locate the Mahātmā Jade, and sure enough, he quickly pinpointed its general location.

This was all because his cultivation base was so advanced. Even ordinary Unbounded experts, like Mother Voidwalker, who came here would be devoured by the destiny.

Chapter 1346: A Big Haul

The destiny of the Deva Dynasty was so immense it could affect the workings of heaven, as well as the psyches of cultivators. Anyone who tried manipulating it would suffer greatly.

Even Yang Qi had experienced some backlash; however, it wasn’t enough to harm him significantly. That said, there was enough resistance that he couldn’t pin down the exact position of the Mahātmā Jade.

It seemed his only option was to start a manual search, which would likely take some time.

His original plan had been to slip in, take the jade, and leave. Unfortunately, that plan wasn’t going to work. Thankfully, he was patient. Yang Immortal-Slayer was already in the Unbounded level, and with the Cruiser of Civilization, he could definitely keep the House of God Ordainment and Sage Monarch Society safe for the time being. Eternal Millennium was plotting against the House of God Ordainment, but that would take years to come to fruition, which meant Yang Qi had some time to work with.

He walked down the street in the guise of Patriarch Bloodcloak. Thanks to the information he had gleaned from his soulsearch, he knew that this particular island was called the Heaven Temple Continent, and was one of billions of places like it. As for the city magistrate, he was a Consummate God who hoped to reach the Unbounded level soon.

There were many businesses on the street, and countless experts strolling about shopping. Just about everything imaginable was for sale: demonling internal pellets, godhood, divine medicines, ores, magical treasures, maps, information....

There were even places to hire mercenaries. If you had enough godnotes and godstones, you could hire Perfect Gods to keep you safe.

Yang Qi soon reached a place of business deep in the city, run by the Deva Dynasty itself. It was a very busy place, with all the customers being Perfect Gods. ‘The Deva Consortium!’

Upon seeing ‘Patriarch Bloodcloak’ approaching, some of the salesmen approached. “How can we help you, Patriarch Bloodcloak? What would you like to buy today? Last time you asked about the blood śarīra of an ancient buddhist expert, and we managed to track one down. The only question is, can you afford it?”

“I can afford it!” Yang Qi replied. “I struck it rich recently. In fact, I don’t just want that śarīra, I'm willing to buy all sacrificial items useful to the dao of devils!” Flicking his sleeve, he produced a stack of ten thousand godnotes and handed it to the salespeople. “Take this as a little tip.”

None of them had very high cultivation bases. They were all Greater Gods who would normally grovel in front of a Perfect God. However, that wasn’t how they had been acting in front of ‘Patriarch Bloodcloak.’ After all, this was a place of business, and as natives of the Deva Dynasty, they obviously didn’t think much of people from the dao of devils.

No one would ever dare to cause problems in the middle of the Deva Dynasty, not even Paramount Gods.

That said, upon being given ten thousand godnotes, their eyebrows shot up in delight. After all, money talks.

“You really did strike it rich, Patriarch Bloodcloak! Where did you find a treasure trove this amazing? Don’t tell me you robbed someone? In any case, what’re you looking for? As long as you have enough money, the Deva Consortium can get you anything you want. We can even arrange for Paramount Gods from the dao of devils to be killed!” They were obviously bragging, but Yang Qi had no doubt that they could actually follow through on their words.

The Deva Dynasty was huge, and its destiny was so incredible that he was certain that buying the life of a Paramount God was indeed within the realm of possibility.

“Are you serious?” Yang Qi said, plastering a look of surprise onto his face. “You can have a Paramount God killed?”

“That’s nothing,” one of the Greater Gods said. “Not too long ago, a young sir from the profoundly majestic Proud Clan headquarters came here and struck a deal. He paid a hundred perfect caliber godstones to hire Assassin King Heavenmaster to kill an Unbounded expert from the dao of devils, and the operation was a complete success. You see, the Deva Dynasty doesn't cheat anyone. As long as you have the money, we can do whatever you want. That’s our reputation, and we’ll never allow it to be tarnished. In any case, why are you asking, Patriarch Bloodcloak? Don’t tell me you want some Paramount God assassinated! If so, you’ll need to produce some perfect caliber godstones.”

“I have no animosity toward any Paramount Gods from the dao of devils,” Yang Qi said. “But I did acquire a devilish treasure trove, which was how I mastered a new sacrificial technique to gain a blessing of power from the noble spirit of the True Devil. Unfortunately, I need a lot of materials to pull it off. If I succeed, I’ll reach the Unbounded level.”

Sacrificial techniques were very popular, and there were a whole host of them. For instance, the Nacrelight Sageland specialized in sacrifices to the ancient High Priestess. But there were other sacrifices than to the High Priestess. The True Devil had also perished, leaving behind his deathless will convergence.

Many experts from the dao of devils would offer sacrifices to the True Devil. If their sacrifices succeeded, it was possible to be bestowed with boundless devil energy that they could use to achieve breakthroughs.

Therefore, it was the perfect excuse for Yang Qi to use. He could use that as a ruse to do some business deals, and simultaneously try to gather some information about the Mahātmā Jade.

One of the Greater Gods led Yang Qi into a private meeting room. “What items do you need for your sacrifice? If you can list them out, I can simply send the request to the general headquarters and have them start gathering all the items.”

Yang Qi nodded and used the Bloodcloak God Art to create a blood-colored piece of paper. Then he wrote down a list of items in flowing calligraphy. He included things like the reborn golden body of a buddhist expert, figfruits from hell, discarnate godspheres, ghost-god quintessence, dragon-soul devil-banes....

He wrote down a huge list filled with all sorts of random things.

He didn’t need these items personally; he was more interested in finding out what it was possible to get. Furthermore, he had friends and family back in the Sage Monarch Society who could use such items. After using the Cruiser of Civilization to remold their life force and genes, many of them had special requirements. After all, not even the cleverest housewife can cook a good meal without rice.

There were many ingredients that not even Mother Voidwalker had been able to procure.

For instance, the photonic computers of the Cruiser of Civilization contained information about a certain unique body called the Myriad-Buddhas Royal-Pilgrimage Devil-Subduing True Body. It needed śarīras from the reborn golden bodies of buddhist experts, tribulation ash, and the devilish sense of a buddhist expert. Such items weren’t exactly easy to find.

Since the Deva Dynasty claimed to be able to get anything in existence, Yang Qi wasn't going to make it easy on them. One after another, he listed out a host of extremely rare items that he wanted to purchase.

“That’s a lot of items,” the salesman said, his expression flickering at the site of the list. “And it's going to be very expensive. Patriarch Bloodcloak, you’re a regular customer, so please tell me this isn't some kind of joke. If you want that many things, you need to prove you can afford them before I pass the list along to my superiors.”

“I understand,” Yang Qi replied. “How much will it cost to get everything on this list?”

After performing some calculations, the salesperson said, “At the very least, a hundred billion godnotes. Maybe even a trillion. In other words, dozens of perfect caliber godstones. Didn’t you realize that? And that’s the most conservative estimate. If anything, the final price will be higher.”

“That’s fine,” Yang Qi said. Flicking his sleeve, he produced ten walnut-sized godstones, all of them perfect caliber. “Here are ten perfect caliber godstones. Put that down as my deposit, and after you’ve finalized the quote, I’ll pay the rest. I trust the reputation of the Deva Dynasty, and I’m confident you won’t try to take advantage of me.”

If nothing else, the Deva Dynasty did work hard to maintain their reputation for doing honest business. Over all the years that had passed, and the various bloodbaths that had taken place, it had become a hard and fast rule that anyone who tried to scam customers would be immediately executed.

That was one reason why business boomed in the Deva Dynasty. Everyone knew that they could come here and not fear being swindled.

As for the Deva Consortium, they even did business with Quasi-Gods, and would still be fair with them. Scams simply weren’t allowed.

Those were things that Yang Qi had gleaned from Patriarch Bloodcloak’s mind. And of course, those who gave a lot of business to the Deva Dynasty were considered important customers, and given even more consideration.

“Ten perfect caliber godstones?!”

The salesperson’s expression flickered, and he quivered with shock. If he ruined a deal involving this many godstones, he would earn the death penalty a hundred times over.

“I can’t take responsibility for a deal like this. I need to report this to the viceroy who runs this continent, Ser Temple. He's a feudal official working for the Deva Dynasty.” Not daring to move an inch, the salesperson sent a message to call some Consummate Gods to hand over custody of the godstones to. Then, he scurried away. Shortly after, a beautiful young woman stepped into the room, a Perfect God. “I almost can’t believe you came across such a fortune, Patriarch Bloodcloak. I'm a majordomo working for the viceroy here on the Heaven Temple Continent. You can call me A’ling.”

Yang Qi let loose a cackling stream of laughter that sounded exactly what would be expected from a member of the dao of devils. “Well, if it isn’t the exalted A’ling. Quite a beauty, you are. I'm glad they sent you to take care of me.”

“I'm here to handle this deal, that's all,” she said, looking at him with glittering eyes. “Patriarch, where did you get your hands on this much wealth? As I recall, your sect has always been strapped for cash.”

Chapter 1347: Full Probing

This peak Perfect God A’ling was no ordinary individual, and because of that, Yang Qi wouldn’t be upfront with her. Instead, he made up a story in the hopes of getting some more information. “I found a devilish treasure trove that once belonged to a subordinate of the True Devil. The Second Devil General, whose original name was Desireless. You see, I stumbled across his burial chamber. It contained all sorts of treasures, including the Desireless Devil Sutra, which features a host of techniques relating to desire. With it, I can use heart-devils to achieve advancement to the Unbounded level, as long as I have the proper items to sacrifice to the True Devil.”

“Oh? So that's how it is.” Of course, A’ling only partially believed him. “And do you have any more perfect caliber godstones, Patriarch? The more you have, the more things we can sell to you. What do you think?”

“I only want to buy the things I listed out, although I'm sure I’ll be interested in other purchases in the future.” He suddenly snapped his fingers. “Oh, right. There are a few other rare magical treasures I'm interested in, sage items from the dao of devils. And I'm willing to spend a lot of money on them.”

“Please, go on. It sounds like you have a lot of perfect caliber godstones, Patriarch.”

Perfect caliber godstones were things that countless sects sought after. They were extremely useful for powering spell formations, offering as sacrifices, practicing energy arts, and improving the psyche. A single one could be considered a precious treasure to most sects. Generally speaking, sects that acquired them would keep them hidden and secure, only bringing them out in the case of a dangerous emergency.

Every sect in existence longed for godstones like that. After all, they could even be used to suppress destiny.

Paramount Gods could use them in spell formations to help in breaking through bottlenecks. And when used in pill furnaces, they could create god pills that were extremely useful in advancing one’s cultivation.

Back in the Nacrelight Sageland, when he had helped Summer Vastcold with the Wisdom and Knowledge God Pill, if Yang Qi hadn’t used holy caliber godstones in the formation, the effort would definitely have completely failed.

Even the Deva Dynasty would hoard godstones like this, and would never pass up an opportunity to get more.

“I don’t have many. But I do know that the Deva Dynasty is always interested in getting more for your Paramount Gods to use in the creation of medicinal pills. That said, I won’t give them up for anything but sage items from the dao of devils. And what I need are the most spectacular magical treasures left behind by the Supreme True-Devil. For example, the Mahātmā Jade or the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body....” Only now was Yang Qi truly starting to dig for information.

A’ling laughed. “You've got to be kidding me, Patriarch. Things like those are considered the most precious of treasures. Even if our Deva Dynasty did have them, we would keep their existence top secret.”

“Well, that’s too bad,” Yang Qi said, sighing. “I really would’ve liked to get that Mahātmā Jade. You see, in the Second Devil General’s notes in the Desireless Devil Sutra, it talks about how the True Devil filled that jade with the combined might of countless sages and mahātmās from the dao of devils. People from the dao of devils who use it to practice cultivation can receive a major blessing to their psyche. What a pity. Well, anyway, what other things does the Deva Dynasty have to sell?”

“I was under the impression nobody could use the Mahātmā Jade,” A’ling said. “Is that not true? Do you really have a way to benefit from it? As you know, the Deva Dynasty can get anything, as long as you have enough money. If you want, I can send your request to my superiors. How much are you willing to pay for it?”

“I’ll pay whatever you ask!” Yang Qi said. “As for whether or not I can use it, the truth is that I don’t know for sure. But I do know that the Desireless Devil Sutra does say that someone who cultivates the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body can use the jade. That's why I asked about that technique too. Does your Deva Consortium have it? To be honest, those are the only two things I really need. I’ll even pay for information about them. How much for that?”

“Both of those items are extremely rare, so the cost for information will be high. Let me check for you.” She pulled out a book and consulted it. “According to the cost lists, it will set you back thirty billion godnotes.”

Thirty billion godnotes was an astronomical sum, especially when it came to a simple business transaction. After all, Summer Vastcold’s entire family fortune had only totaled sixty billion. Not many people in existence could simply hand over thirty billion. However, Yang Qi had trillions of godnotes, so to him, thirty billion was actually like spare change.

He waved his hand, summoning a spatial crystal and handing it over to A’ling.

When she inspected it and found thirty billion godnotes, a smile broke out on her face. “Don’t worry, Patriarch Bloodcloak. Considering how huge this deal is, we’ll definitely give you the treatment of a top customer. We’ll track down all the information about the two items you just mentioned.”

With that, she hurried away.

Yang Qi simply sat there, calmly sipping tea as he waited. The tea they had provided was of the highest quality, and the snacks were miraculous medicinal items that provided immense boosts of vital energy. Not even the House of God Ordainment had things like this.

Yang Qi picked up something that looked like a three-leaf clover, but was actually a type of candy that had been concocted by a top expert. By refining it in a pill furnace tens of thousands of times, it became filled with vital energy that could lead to high levels of enlightenment. It was clearly the masterwork of top alchemists.

And they were serving this to him with tea. It was all very luxurious.

‘Incredible. The Deva Dynasty puts so much attention even into the candy they serve guests. This must’ve been created by dozens of Perfect God alchemists all working together.’

Soon enough, A’ling returned, followed by a middle-aged confucian scholar who emanated the fragrance of books and scrolls, and looked like he was bemoaning the state of the universe and pitying the fate of mankind. He was obviously a confucian cultivator, and when it came to governing nations, the confucians would always be superior to the daoists and the buddhists.

“This is Ser Temple, viceroy of the Heaven Temple Continent,” A’ling said. “Viceroy, this is Patriarch Bloodcloak, who wants to work out a big business deal with us.”

“Your humble servant offers salutations, Patriarch Bloodcloak,” Ser Temple said.

“There’s no need for such courtesy, Viceroy,” Yang Qi said, pretending to be somewhat overwhelmed. “I specifically wanted to do business with your Deva Consortium because of the sterling reputation you’ve built up over the years. I know you have rules, and you follow them. You never scam people. I admire you a lot, so when I came across this huge fortune, I decided to come here to spend it.”

“I see. It did indeed take millions upon millions of years for the Deva Consortium to build its reputation. No member of ours would ever dare to violate the rules! Whatever you need, Patriarch Bloodcloak, we can get it. In fact, we've already collected the items on your list and put them into this spatial god kingdom. Here.”

He produced a golden sphere, filled with the piles of rare items Yang Qi had requested.

“Very good.”

He scanned the sphere to confirm all the requested items were there, and couldn’t help but be surprised at the resources the Deva Consortium had at their disposal. Despite all of the capital he had given to Mother Voidwalker, not even she had been able to produce these items.

“It's going to cost fifty-four perfect caliber godstones,” Ser Temple said.

“No problem at all!" To the shock of the viceroy, Yang Qi counted out the godstones and put them in a magical treasure bag, which he handed over.

“Patriarch Bloodcloak, do you still have more perfect caliber godstones?” Ser Temple asked. “If so, might you be interested in further purchases? We don’t just sell magical treasures, you know. We offer other services, such as baptisms by Paramount Gods. For instance, our Deva Baptism, which costs a hundred perfect caliber godstones, involves nine famous Paramount Gods reaching out into the void to summon a blessing of power. When the light of the great dao washes over you, baptizing you, your energy arts will be boosted, greatly aiding your effort to reach the Unbounded level. Fairly recently, a young sir from the Proud Clan spent a thousand perfect caliber godstones to be baptized ten times in that fashion, and he actually reached the Unbounded level as a result!”

“What?!” Yang Qi said. “You offer services like that? Who was this young sir from the Proud Clan?”

“His name is Proud Void. He already headed back home, though. You see, many experts from the great clans will come to the Deva Consortium to take advantage of our Deva Baptism. As long as you have enough perfect caliber godstones, you could give it a try. Who knows, you might even achieve a breakthrough.”

Chapter 1348: Profundities of the Baptism

Even Yang Qi’s ears pricked upon hearing of this Deva Baptism. It involved nine Paramount Gods reaching out into the void, using the most powerful of divine will to initiate a baptism that would both purify the beneficiary and push them to unimaginable heights. It could even lead to breakthroughs. And it was so amazing they charged a hundred perfect caliber godstones for a single session.

Not even the House of God Ordainment could produce a hundred perfect caliber godstones.

Perhaps the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty could, but if they did, their savings would take a devastating hit. As a result, the Deva Baptism was such an incredible luxury that not even the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty’s crown prince could consider taking advantage of it.

As for this Proud Void, it was almost unthinkable that he had paid a thousand godstones for the service. That would have completely bankrupted the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty.

That made it obvious how superior the Proud Clan was to the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty.

“The Deva Baptism originated in ancient halls of heaven,” Ser Temple said, going into even more detail, “among the gods who traveled to offer worship to the Sovereign Lord. The Sovereign Lord would personally officiate the silent and majestic ceremony of those most pious of the gods. You see, even other sects that are as large as our Deva Dynasty, and have nine powerful Paramount Gods who could theoretically perform the baptism, actually can’t do it. You have to know the proper ceremonies as well as be able to create both silent and majestic formations. The spell formations themselves take fifty perfect caliber godstones to operate, with the rest being set aside as profit for us. Patriarch Bloodcloak, if you experience this baptism, it's entirely likely that you could reach the Unbounded level of will convergence.”

“Is there a hundred percent chance of success in achieving a breakthrough?” Yang Qi asked.

Ser Temple shook his head. “Unfortunately no. How could there be a one hundred percent chance of success in anything? In any case, Patriarch Bloodcloak, if you want to go through with it, I can go into more detail about the benefits. Suffice it to say, the Deva Baptism will definitely be worth it. What do you say? It’s completely up to you.”

“I do have a hundred perfect caliber godstones. It's a fortune, but it’ll be worth it if I can achieve a breakthrough.”

He wasn’t sure if this Deva Baptism was real or not. But if it was true that someone from the Proud Clan had gone through with it recently, it seemed unlikely to be some sort of trap. In terms of the so-called sterling reputation of the Deva Consortium, Yang Qi didn’t trust that at all. Anyone would sacrifice their reputation if there was enough profit on the line.

For example, if word leaked that he had the God Legion Seal, there was no question that hordes of people would do everything in their power to kill him, even sacrificing the greatest reputation to succeed.

That said, this Deva Baptism did seem enticing. If nothing else, it must be superior to Summer Soundfyre’s sacrificial technique. Although Yang Qi didn’t need it at the moment, if he could redirect the power of the baptism to Jadefall, and maybe do it twenty or thirty times, she might even be able to reach the Unbounded level.

And he could possibly help out others among his friends and family.

Of course, he wasn’t ready to do it now. He needed to put more thought into the matter, and do some more business with the Deva Dynasty in preparation for plundering its destiny.

“I’ll take some time to think about it later,” Yang Qi said. “I’ll be back in a month. I hope that when I return, you can give me some good information about the Mahātmā Jade and the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body.”

Smiling, Ser Temple said, “That’s fine, Patriarch Bloodcloak. Take care. Men, escort him out.”

As an honored customer, Yang Qi was escorted out with full ceremony. Once outside, he turned into a blood-colored streak of light and vanished without a trace.

“Viceroy,” said A’ling, “this was a very large transaction. When you report that you earned a profit of dozens of perfect caliber godstones, our continent is going to rise in the ranks, and you’ll be personally rewarded.”

“Patriarch Bloodcloak is a very formidable person from the dao of devils. However, he's not so impressive that he should be throwing around perfect caliber godstones. Where did he get them? It's quite suspicious.”

“Should we just take him out, Viceroy? He has a huge amount of wealth. And nobody will notice if we betray him, as long as we’re careful about it. If you took his treasure trove, you could use the godstones to partake in a Deva Baptism and possibly reach the Unbounded level.”

“Forget about it. That would be too dangerous. The guilty can never escape justice from heaven, and if we were found out, the imperial court would never agree to pardon us. No amount of wealth is worth breaking the rules like that. Even if there was no chance of error, it would still be dangerous. No, let’s just send some people to keep an eye on Patriarch Bloodcloak. Let’s see what he does going forward. Our superiors are aware of the situation, so if he dies, they’ll definitely come to us looking for answers.”

“Yes sir.” A’ling shivered at the realization that she had said something very inappropriate in front of Ser Temple.

**

Using what he had gleaned from Patriarch Bloodcloak’s memories, Yang Qi flew for three days straight. Eventually, he left the continents of the Deva Dynasty and reached a collection of several million islands that seemed to be made from bright red stone. They looked like they had been painted with fresh blood, and the palaces that covered them were the same color. It was obvious that Patriarch Bloodcloak had killed countless demonlings and humans to create these islands.

Blood had special power in it, which was why people from the dao of devils loved to use it for their devil arts.

Upon landing, Yang Qi saw numerous disciples offering him worshipful greetings, all of them Common Gods. It went to show that Patriarch Bloodcloak wasn't very good at running his Bloodcloak Assembly. Actually, that was a common thing in the dao of devils, and a major downside to such sects. Patriarchs in the dao of devils were always out for their own benefit and would never trust their own disciples. And of course, the disciples were ferocious, cunning murderers who would often turn on their superiors as soon as they got strong enough.

Individual experts from the dao of devils were often impressive, but they always had a very difficult time running large organizations.

It was a given that these disciples wouldn’t realize Yang Qi was an imposter. Heading to the middle of the island, he started working on a teleportation portal. As he did, he could sense experts watching him, which were definitely agents from the Deva Dynasty. Thankfully, his Life-Death Void-Destruction Lightning ensured that no one would learn his secret.

It took three days to finish the formation, whereupon he inserted some perfect caliber godstones to begin the activation process.

The Deva Dynasty was far, far away from the House of God Ordainment, which would normally make it difficult to establish a teleportation portal. But he could connect to the Cruiser of Civilization, which made the task a bit easier. Even so, the actual act of teleporting was difficult and would take a full seven days.

Seven days might seem like a long time, but not really when considering that a Paramount God would need to fly for three years to go from the Deva Dynasty to the House of God Ordainment. That was one reason why people from the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty or Nacrelight Sageland didn't come here to do business.

With the teleportation portal established, Yang Qi had a way to make huge profits back home.

But that wasn’t his goal. Instead, he would send resources back to his people in the Sage Monarch Society, helping to create even more top experts.

RUMBLE!

The teleportation portal activated.

Seven days later, the Cruiser of Civilization flickered with bright light as a huge bundle of resources was sent over. Immediately, Jadefall and the others smiled broadly.

“Such incredible resources!” said Yang Immortal-Slayer. “We could never find any of these things. Where is Yang Qi that he could collect all of these items? Now we can use the Cruiser of Civilization to make new fleshly bodies for all the disciples. And there are rare ores here that we can use to make robotic soldiers, battleships, mechas, and the like.”

**

Meanwhile, in the Harvestland, Eternal Millennium’s eyes snapped open, and he looked over in the direction of the House of God Ordainment.

“What? The House of God Ordainment’s destiny just increased by thirty percent!” Smiling, he continued, “The Sage Monarch Society is doing marvelously. Before long, their destiny will rival that of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty. Sadly, all of it will go to me.”

**

After sending the shipment of goods, Yang Qi waited until it was time to go back and meet Ser Temple.

“Viceroy,” he said, “I've made my decision. I want to go through with the Deva Baptism. And I also want to buy some more goods!”

With that, he held out another list.

Chapter 1349: Profundities of the Baptism (2)

After sending all the resources to the House of God Ordainment, Yang Qi could sense the destiny there improving. However, it wasn’t enough, so he decided to ask for more. Furthermore, after thinking the situation through and identifying some of the danger areas, he had decided to go through with the Deva Baptism.

He wanted to speed up the progress with Eternal Millennium’s martial-god soldier-kings, but unfortunately, they required a huge amount of destiny. The best way to acquire that would be to tap into the destiny of the Deva Dynasty.

“What? You’re going through with the Deva Baptism?!”

Ser Temple was delighted. After all, if he could seal a deal like this, his standing in the yearly viceroy assessments of the Deva Dynasty would rise. Whenever he met his profit quotas, he would be rewarded, but if he could surpass those quotas, his rewards would further increase.

He could theoretically even be promoted.

“Yes, I’ve made my decision. I have the hundred perfect caliber godstones right here.” He pulled them out and handed them over. “As for the list of items I want, it's longer than before, but I hope you can get them for me as quickly as possible.”

“Alright,” Ser Temple said. He looked over the list, and his expression flickered. “This is a very long list, and they’re all extremely rare items. Some of these aren’t used for cultivation in the dao of devils. For instance, the fossilized remains of an ancient dragon? Blood from a Dragonfolk expert in the Paramount God level? The shattered soul of a perished Paramount God from the dao of devils? What do you need these things for?”

“I cultivate a Paramount divine ability from the dao of devils that actually does require those things. Forgetting everything else, I have the godstones to pay for all this. So do we have a deal? Also, did you get me any information on the piece of the Mahātmā Jade and the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body?”

“Yes, we got plenty of information,” Ser Temple replied, his face completely expressionless. “The Unspoiled Body was recorded on a piece of sheepskin, but it was later lost. Apparently, it fell down into the impure lands. And ever since the Ancient Road to the Gods disappeared, no one has been able to descend there. As for the Mahātmā Jade, there are actually many pieces of it. We couldn’t locate every single one, but we can tell you of some nearby pieces. For instance, there are two forces some distance away, the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty and the Nacrelight Sageland, who both have a piece. There’s a piece here in the Deva Dynasty, and the Proud Clan also has one. And there's a place near the former location of the halls of heaven where a piece exists. It’s called the Bastille of the One God. The bastille is actually where the Sovereign Lord and the True Devil fought each other, and where the Mahātmā Jade was shattered.”

“The Bastille of the One God?” Yang Qi murmured. He had never heard of this place.

“Yes, the Bastille of the One God. It's a very dangerous location, but also very popular among Paramount Gods. After all, many ancient treasures from the halls of heaven exist there. Many Paramount Gods have gone there hunting for treasure, and many have died. Supposedly, it’s the core of the entire god world. That’s all the information we could dig up. Hopefully it was worth the thirty billion godnotes you paid.”

“Hold on. Are you saying your Deva Dynasty won’t part with its piece of the Mahātmā Jade? From what I understand, none of your Paramount Gods can do anything with it, nor benefit from researching it. So why not sell it?”

“You really want to buy it?”

“Any top expert from the dao of devils would want to buy it,” Yang Qi said. “Even if I can’t directly use it, studying it should still provide benefits.”

“But it won’t,” replied Ser Temple. “There have been Paramount Gods from the dao of devils who studied our piece of the Mahātmā Jade, and they never learned anything from it. That’s why we have it tucked away in storage. That said, it’s still considered a first-tier treasure, so if you insist on buying it, I’ll have to contact my superiors to see if they approve of the idea.”

“That’s fine,” Yang Qi replied.

“Alright. Wait here while I go find out how much it's worth.”

Ser Temple left to talk with his superiors. A short time later he returned, a smile on his face. “The items on your list are worth three hundred perfect caliber godstones. And the Deva Baptism costs a hundred. Considering you just gave us a hundred, that means you now owe three hundred. Regarding the Mahātmā Jade, my superiors are going to discuss it and give you a response after your baptism.”

“Alright!”

Without any hesitation, Yang Qi handed over the godstones, which Ser Temple accepted with trembling hands. Not even he had ever seen this many perfect caliber godstones together in one place.

A few hours later, Ser Temple said, “Patriarch Bloodcloak, all of the items you’ve requested have been gathered. As for the Deva Baptism, it’ll take place in two weeks. Just return here, and you can take the teleportation portal to the baptism ground.”

“Alright,” Yang Qi said, accepting another golden sphere. After checking it to confirm it contained all of the items he had requested, he smiled and left, heading back to the teleportation portal he’d built on Bloodcloak Island.

Without hesitation, he sent the new collection of resources back to the House of God Ordainment, causing the destiny there to rise dramatically. The disciples were advancing by leaps and bounds considering the resources that were being lavished on them. Not even the imperial princes back in the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty could receive resources one-tenth of this level.

Eternal Millennium was completely taken aback.

He even considered heading to the House of God Ordainment as his true self to check the situation, but in the end, he held back. After all, as the destiny of the House of God Ordainment grew, the martial-god soldier-kings shivered with desire, leaving him with little mental capacity to spend on other matters.

Two weeks later, Yang Qi was back at Ser Temple's residence.

Ser Temple was waiting for him, and acting more courteous than ever. At the same time, he inspected ‘Patriarch Bloodcloak’ more closely than before, and came to realize that he was extremely mysterious and hard to read.

Inwardly, he was shocked. ‘What good fortune did this devil come across? Hardly any time has passed, but his aura has become even more formidable than mine. Has he really been using all those resources? The people I sent to keep an eye on him haven’t reported anything noteworthy. My superiors already agreed to sell him the Mahātmā Jade. After all, we’ve studied it for countless tens of thousands of years without learning a thing. It might as well be a piece of junk. Besides, he’ll probably just end up painting a target on himself because of it. And after he gets killed by some other Paramount God from the dao of devils, we’ll just end up getting it back.”

“Viceroy, is it possible that your superiors have actually agreed to sell me the Mahātmā Jade?” Yang Qi suddenly asked.

“Congratulations,” Ser Temple replied. “In keeping with the longstanding traditions of the Deva Dynasty, we’ll sell anything for the right price. You’re a valuable customer, after all, and this transaction will further boost our reputation. After all, there are Paramount Gods who are willing to fly four or five years just to get here to do business.”

“And what’s it going to cost me?” Yang Qi asked. “A lot, I'm going to guess.”

“Well, that’s a given. The Mahātmā Jade is on the same level as the God Legion Seal. It might be broken, and countless people might have failed to gain enlightenment from it, but there’s always a chance someone could use it to become a paragonic entity. And that's why the price has been set at three thousand perfect caliber godstones!”

Ser Temple stared at ‘Patriarch Bloodcloak’, absolutely convinced that he would never be able to afford something that expensive.

As expected, Yang Qi’s face became a mask of shock. “Three thousand? Did I hear that correctly? Or did you say three hundred?” Of course, it was an act. He could obviously pay three thousand if he wanted to. But how could he just agree to the first offer? That would attract far too much attention, and if his secrets were revealed, it could lead to trouble. In fact, they might even try to do something to him during the baptism.

“You heard me right,” Ser Temple said, his face expressionless. “Three thousand.”

“I couldn’t possibly afford that.” Yang Qi sighed. “Ai.... Well, I guess we can just forget it. I’ll have to wait until I'm an Unbounded expert. Maybe then I can amass that much wealth.”

“You’re welcome to purchase it at any time,” Ser Temple said. “Alright, let’s head to the baptism site.” If Yang Qi had actually claimed to be able to afford three thousand perfect caliber godstones, he might have done something untoward.

‘Who could’ve guessed that I would just be able to buy that piece of the Mahātmā Jade!’ Yang Qi thought. ‘Not that I can just go and do that. I’ll go through with the baptism and pretend to experience a breakthrough. Once “Patriarch Bloodcloak” is in the Unbounded level, I can afford to make the purchase without worrying about them trying something funny. Plans within plans. They think I can’t use the Mahātmā Jade, and that if I take it, I’ll end up killed by some Paramount God from the dao of devils. In that case, it would eventually find its way back to them. How could they possibly know what I'll be capable of if I get my hands on it?’

Chapter 1350: Profundities of the Baptism (3)

Yang Qi really hadn’t considered the possibility of simply purchasing a piece of the Mahātmā Jade. Perhaps if he made payments, slowly building up to three thousand perfect caliber godstones, he might be able to avoid attracting undue notice. If he pulled them all out in one lump sum, he would definitely make himself a big target, and probably end up losing his life.

Right now, he needed to go through with the baptism, reach the Unbounded level, and gain enlightenment of his new powers. Then he could go through with the purchase.

“I'm very curious what this baptism is all about,” Yang Qi said. “Viceroy, please lead the way.”

“Of course. Come right this way.” Ser Temple led Yang Qi deeper into his mansion, a trip through numerous winding corridors that took a full hour. Eventually, they stepped into a teleportation portal and vanished.

The actual teleportation process took a full four hours. When they emerged, Yang Qi looked around and saw an altar set up in the middle of the void. It was surrounded by the most quiet and still of auras, which made it seem particularly majestic.

It was covered with complex silver designs, through which pulsed holy power that provoked a reaction from his God Legion Seal. It was almost as if the seal was familiar with the power.

‘This really is a place where the Sovereign Lord baptized gods in the distant past,’ he thought. ‘I wonder how these nine Paramount Gods plan to perform the baptism on me.’

“Please have a seat, Patriarch Bloodcloak, and begin praying. Before long, the wills of the nine Paramount Gods will pierce through the void and bless you. You mustn’t speak or cry out during the baptism, and you must avoid any extraneous thoughts. Remain calm and pious. That will ensure the best result.”

“Alright!” Yang Qi said, sitting down.

With that, Ser Temple left.

Two hours passed, then rustling sounds could be heard as the flags adorning the altar lifted up as if a breeze was passing through. Lightning appeared in the dome of heaven, creating a dense web of electricity that resembled dancing dragons. The electricity gradually transformed into talismans that descended like flower petals, immortals, goddesses, and angels, surrounded by the chant of holy hymns.

Bzzzzzzzz!

Tranquil and majestic power flowed into Yang Qi’s mind, piercing all the way to his sea of energy. Godpower filled his sea of consciousness, extruding impurities from his flesh and blood. At the same time, power rose from the altar, transforming his fleshly body and causing him to pulse with a holy power that made him glow with radiant light.

‘Very domineering power. This is a really dramatic transformation. And the power is on par with that of the High Priestess, or perhaps even beyond that level. I wonder exactly who these Paramount Gods are.’ Yang Qi reached out with his psyche, following the power to its source. Eventually, he saw a distant god kingdom in which existed the immense projection of some spectacular figure. And seated next to that figure were nine experts.

Each of those experts were roughly on the same level as the Lord of the True Void. They were mid Paramount Gods, and when they combined their power, it was hard to say exactly what level they would match up to.

‘Patriarch Deva himself? With nine of his apprentices? That immense figure must be Patriarch Deva, and it looks like he’s a late Paramount God. Not quite at the peak, but close to it. That means he’s not on the level of the Lord of Civilization. He needs another breakthrough first.’

As Yang Qi observed, he manipulated his ‘Patriarch Bloodcloak’ form to accept the power of the baptism and store it in a devil embryo. Later, he would send it to Jadefall via teleportation, to help her reach the Unbounded level.

There were definitely hidden dangers within the power of the baptism, but with the God Legion Seal, he could cleanse it for use by his friends and family.

“Hmm?”

He suddenly sensed a new development. The immense figure that he took to be Patriarch Deva had stirred, waving a finger and sending a beam of lightning-like light piercing out, filled with a myriad of transformations. Soon, Yang Qi saw a lake of lightning building up, which then rumbled down toward him.

A moment later, he found himself surrounded by the lightning, which was actually pure psychic power.

In the god world, it was a sign of incredible skill and power to be able to use psychic power to create a lake of lightning.

In the blink of an eye, the lightning caused profound transformations within him.

The old fleshly body of ‘Patriarch Bloodcloak’ dissolved into ash, and a new fleshly body was formed.

Lightning appeared within his godhood, as well as his sea of consciousness, immense psychic power that could dry up rivers and drain seas.

“Retract!” nine voices said in unison, and nine streams of power retracted. Then, one of the voices said, “Master, why did you join in on the baptism of this person? Normally, we nine apprentices handle such things. Your version requires at least two hundred perfect caliber godstones, which means we won’t make any profit at all. This guy is just some patriarch from the dao of devils. Is he really worth your time and effort?”

“During the course of observing the baptism,” Patriarch Deva replied, “I noticed some interesting aspects of this young patriarch from the dao of devils. So I decided to take a closer look. Don’t worry. I’ll make sure you all benefit from this, and that your psyches will improve dramatically. You see, I implanted him with a Deva Psychic God-Lightning Seed in order to see what secrets he's keeping. All I need you nine to do is keep a close eye on him. Incidentally, don’t forget about that young man from the Proud Clan. He’s no minor figure. He accepted ten baptisms from us, yet managed to negate all of the side-effects. He even reached the Unbounded level afterward.”

“We understand, Master.”

The psychic fluctuations of their conversation were minute, but Yang Qi could pick up on them.

Heart pounding, Yang Qi drew on his own power to scan himself. It took effort, but he finally saw something entangling his soul. If it weren’t for the fact that he already had some of Patriarch Deva’s aura in his God Legion Seal, it would have been impossible, and he would have suffered significant harm.

As the lightning settled down into a rippling lake, pulsing with power, it made it seem like he was just on the verge of being able to rise to the Unbounded level.

However, he knew it was an illusion. That immense power was actually a restriction on him, something that would make it eternally impossible for him to achieve further breakthroughs.

Of course, it was the doing of the Deva Dynasty.

‘Hmph! After I leave this place, I’ll negate those restrictions. Patriarch Deva was once a minor god in the service of the Sovereign Lord. He may have reached incredible heights since then, but what do I have to fear from him? The God Legion Seal can destroy warding spells put in place by Paramount Gods as if they were nothing. Jadefall might not be able to use this power to experience a breakthrough, but it will still be a big upgrade for her. And if I go through more baptisms, it will help the rest of my friends and family, too.’

The fluctuations settled down, and Yang Qi was already thinking of the specific way to negate the magic.

A moment later, Ser Temple returned. Smiling, he said, “The baptism is over, Patriarch Bloodcloak. How do you feel?”

“It was worth more than I paid! I’ll head back now to work on my cultivation and absorb everything I just received. After I'm done, I’ll be back for another purchasing deal!” He followed Ser Temple back, then returned to Bloodcloak Island and went into seclusion.

Using the teleportation portal he had created, he sent everything back to the House of God Ordainment, both the resources he had purchased and the devil embryo.

Of course, that devil embryo was covered with countless talismans from the God Legion Seal, locking it down.

Inside it was the warding spell Patriarch Deva had cast into Yang Qi, which he was now giving to Jadefall for her benefit.

Filled with lightning, the devil embryo was fully nine meters tall and glittered with incisive light.

As usual, the teleportation process took seven days.

Afterward, the Cruiser of Civilization had that enormous lightning-filled devil embryo resting within it. Jadefall had analyzed the message from Yang Qi and was preparing to assimilate the embryo.

Yang Immortal-Slayer was by her side, using his own Unbounded will convergence to help her.

“This lightning is incredibly powerful,” Yang Immortal-Slayer said. “A Paramount God used one of the Sovereign Lord’s tools of baptism to unleash it. It’s even more incredible than the power I received from the sacrifice of the High Priestess. I’ll help you break it down to use for your own benefit, Jadefall. You’ll definitely have a chance to break through to the Unbounded level. This is the equivalent of ten thousand years of bitter cultivation.”

“Okay, let's begin. Activate the powers of the Cruiser of Civilization to use on the devil embryo. And also, let's distribute the resources Yang Qi purchased for our core disciples in the Sage Monarch Society. We're going to rise to even higher levels of power now.”

With that, she began a major session of cultivation.

Yang Qi had purchased an unimaginable collection of resources that the disciples of the Sage Monarch Society couldn’t even fully benefit from. Therefore, they began a new recruitment drive....

The House of God Ordainment was growing rapidly, adding one new city after another.

And its destiny quickly tripled.

Eternal Millennium watched all this from the Harvestland and sighed in delight. ‘The House of God Ordainment is performing far better than I ever expected. Ever since Yang Immortal-Slayer reached the Unbounded level, it’s been expanding like crazy. I wonder where they’re getting all the resources for this. Not even the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty would be able to keep up this pace!’

Chapter 1351: Putting Things Aside Secretly

Thanks to Yang Qi constantly funneling goods to the House of God Ordainment, its destiny was climbing at a breakneck pace. Hordes of morphlings were being created, each of them like numerous ordinary thrall troops put together. Together, they made an army that could crush virtually any invading opponent. Whenever the House of God Ordainment actually clashed with forces from the dao of devils, they absolutely devastated them.

They destroyed devil dao sects one after another. Occasionally, Yang Immortal-Slayer joined in when Unbounded experts were in the opposing force. And with the secret reserve power of the sect, Yang Immortal-Slayer always had the upper hand.

Because Yang Immortal-Slayer had monarch godhood, he could normally defeat three or four Unbounded experts at the same time. But with the Cruiser of Civilization and the secret reserve power, he could hold his own against even greater numbers.

In the various battles, he never managed to kill any of the truly elite experts from the dao of devils, but he did manage to grow the prestige of the House of God Ordainment.

Everyone knew the House of God Ordainment had an Unbounded expert now, someone who could tangle with Paramount Gods. And that helped when it came to the increase in destiny.

There were even other sects roughly on the same level as them who seemed interested in joining them as allies.

In this region of hundreds of thousands of continents, the major powers were the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty, Nacrelight Sageland, League of the Devil-Dao, League of Wretch-Gods, and the League of Academies. As for groups like the House of God Ordainment, there were thousands of them, encompassing righteous sects, devilish sects, and wretched sects. There were groups of all sorts.

Other than the five major sects, there were some first-tier groups who had multiple Perfect Gods as chief elders, or perhaps secret reserve powers that gave them similar levels of strength.

But none had Unbounded experts.

Therefore, the fact that the House of God Ordainment had gained such an expert really disrupted the balance of power.

What was more, that Unbounded expert was the same as several early Paramount Gods working together. It really changed everything.

The top entities in the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty and Nacrelight Sageland were both eying the House of God Ordainment now.

There were even chief elders from the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty who were interested in directly meddling with the House of God Ordainment, except they were stopped by Eternal Millennium. He wanted the House of God Ordainment to keep growing, so his martial-god soldier-kings could benefit from its destiny. Any interference in that effort would be detrimental to him, so he obviously wouldn’t allow it.

And although no one could tell whether it was intentional or otherwise, Jadefall was giving more power to Yang Qi’s clone, which made it even easier for Eternal Millennium to benefit from the destiny of the sect.

All in all, it was currently a given that Eternal Millennium wasn't going to let anyone bother the House of God Ordainment.

Thus, days turned into weeks, and weeks turned into an entire month.

In his role as Patriarch Bloodcloak, Yang Qi continued doing business with the Deva Dynasty and sending resources back home. He also worked on his cultivation. Every time Ser Temple saw ‘Patriarch Bloodcloak’, he could sense that his energy arts had improved.

He was secretly marveling at this.

“Ser Temple, I'm here to pay for another Deva Baptism!”

Six months later, Yang Qi had funneled so many resources back to the House of God Ordainment that all of his friends and family had achieved major progress. The time had come for another baptism.

It was a much simpler affair this time. Yang Qi handed over a hundred perfect caliber godstones and received the baptism.

This time, Patriarch Deva didn’t personally do anything, nor did Yang Qi even see him. It was only the nine apprentices that handled the matter.

Yang Qi took the power of the baptism, and just the same as last time, gave it all to Jadefall.

Jadefall’s cultivation base was rising constantly, but unfortunately, she still couldn’t break into the Unbounded level. She needed more enlightenment.

But Yang Qi didn't stop. In fact, after another month passed, he went in for another baptism.

Proud Void from the Proud Clan had been baptized ten times, whereupon he reached the Unbounded level. As far as Yang Qi was concerned, twenty or thirty baptisms wouldn’t be a big deal.

Slowly but surely, two years passed.

During that time, Yang Qi bought fifteen baptisms. He would also purchase more items, all of which he sent back to the House of God Ordainment, whose stockpiles were reaching mountainous levels.

Jadefall had benefited from the power of fifteen baptisms, and had also furthered her enlightenment. Considering how busy she was, Yang Immortal-Slayer took care of day-to-day affairs, along with the clone Yang Qi had left behind.

Fifteen baptisms was an incredible number. It was essentially the same as fifteen of the ceremonies Summer Soundfyre had carried out. Yang Qi was throwing caution to the wind in his effort to get Jadefall into the Unbounded level.

With all of the resources they had to spare, Yang Qi’s friends and family were all rising to the level of peak Perfect Gods.

Meanwhile, Bai Yin, Elder Sister Xue, Zhang Jufang, and others like them were all peak Consummate Gods. After all, they could go into the Cruiser of Civilization for a thousand years of cultivation, then come out with their life force and genes completely transformed, and their godhood made anew. Even a fool who benefited in that way would make advancement.

Because these people were rising through the ranks with Yang Qi’s help, even if they faced hundreds of opponents on the same level, those people would all be slaughtered.

They couldn’t deal with Unbounded experts, but beneath that level, they were virtually invincible. And if they did encounter someone in the early Unbounded level, they could unleash their hordes of thrall troops to at least come out of the conflict alive.

In the two years Yang Qi had been in the Deva Dynasty, the House of God Ordainment’s power and destiny had become a hundred times greater than before. In the eyes of Eternal Millennium, the sect was like an endless sea of fire. In fact, it was reaching the point where he wondered if he would be able to keep control of it.

Even if the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty were to mobilize, they would probably suffer eighty percent casualties if they invaded it.

Meanwhile, Jadefall was in a session of cultivation, dazzling light streaming down around her. At a certain point, she finally saw the shackles within her heart and soul, which meant she was now able to grasp at the Unbounded level. She felt like a chained dragon, and if she could only break through the fetters that bound her, she would be able to fly to the highest heavens.

‘Great,’ she thought. ‘I’m finally at a key cultivation juncture. Another half a step and I’ll break through the fetters to become Unbounded!’

Just because someone was a Perfect God with Paramount will convergence didn’t mean they could break through to the Unbounded level. That breakthrough required a huge stockpile of power, as well as the right circumstances. Yang Immortal-Slayer had benefited from Summer Soundfyre’s sacrifice and a Wisdom and Knowledge God Pill, yet had still failed to break through. He had needed assistance from King Immortal-Slayer in the critical moment to do so.

But Jadefall, with the benefit of fifteen Deva Baptisms, was just on the cusp of succeeding.

It was a rare position to be in. After all, of all the countless Perfect Gods in the god world, only one in a trillion would be able to cultivate to this point.

Yang Qi had sensed what was happening with Jadefall.

‘She’s finally ready,’ he thought, rising to his feet. ‘Just a bit more, and she’ll break through. She only needs the right circumstances and the resources. Soon, I can move on to the next phase of my plan. It's time to see if I can really just purchase that piece of the Mahātmā Jade.”

RUMBLE!

Bloodcloak Island trembled as a boundless will rumbled forth, like endless waves of blood. It was filled with domineering majesty, a clear announcement to everyone in the world that ‘Patriarch Bloodcloak’ had reached the Unbounded level.

Of course, Yang Qi was really just revealing some of the true nature of his cultivation base.

After achieving his ‘breakthrough’, he flew back to the Deva Dynasty, and was soon back in the presence of Ser Temple.

The sight of the new ‘Patriarch Bloodcloak’ was quite a shock. “Patriarch Bloodcloak, you’ve broken through! You’ve reached the Unbounded level!?”

“It's all thanks to your Deva Consortium,” Yang Qi replied. “With those fifteen baptisms, I got enough power to assimilate the devil seed of the Second Devil General. The seed sprouted, and it helped me to break through all fetters to reach the Unbounded level!”

“You’ve really made some amazing progress, Patriarch!” Ser Temple had no choice but to grovel obsequiously before the newly elevated ‘Patriarch Bloodcloak’. However, his eyes still glittered with defiance, envy, and hatred.

“I’m here to buy some more goods,” Yang Qi said. “As well as that piece of the Mahātmā Jade. After reaching the Unbounded level, I fully opened the treasure trove of the Second Devil General. I now have access to incredible wealth, including all the perfect caliber godstones I need to buy that jade. Soon, I’ll go far away from the Deva Dynasty and establish my own kingdom. I’ll create an organization so amazing it’ll last for generations to come! And that's why I need so many resources. Here’s the list of what I want!”

He waved his hand and sent out a blood-colored book.

Ser Temple took the book and looked through it to find that there were ten times as many resources as Yang Qi had purchased up to this point. His expression one of delight, he said, “This is going to cost at least ten thousand of the same godstones as before. I don’t have the authority to seal a deal like this. I need to report this to my superiors. Please wait here. I have to ask, considering you've already spent four or five thousand godstones, who could you possibly be buying all these resources for? It couldn’t be for you alone.”

“That’s my business,” Yang Qi said with an enigmatic smile. “Please keep the questions to a minimum, Ser Temple.”

Chapter 1352: Purchasing the Mahatma Jade

It actually wasn't all that suspicious that Yang Qi had purchased so many resources, but hadn’t used them to grow his sect.

After all, it was a common thing to purchase items in one location and sell them somewhere else for a profit. And if he had used those resources to rapidly develop Bloodcloak Island, it would have attracted a lot of unwanted attention.

Now that ‘Patriarch Bloodcloak’ was an Unbounded expert, he would have to deal with other villainous characters of his own level, so it made sense that he would want a stockpile of resources.

Of course, Yang Qi was actually planning for some of those resources to go to Summer Soundfyre and Summer Vastcold. He wanted them to improve the Nacrelight Sageland, and by extension, its destiny.

Thanks to the resources Yang Qi had already sent back, Mother Voidwalker had recovered, and was back at her previous level of power. Summer Soundfyre and Summer Soundfyre were making progress as well, and were very close to the Unbounded level. Of course, Yang Qi wanted to focus on Jadefall first.

Yang Qi was spending so many godstones that not even ten Paramount Gods would be able to match up to his level of wealth. Clearly, he had big plans.

“I understand, Patriarch Bloodcloak. As long as you’re willing to do business, the Deva Consortium is happy to accommodate. For now, I need to go out and handle these matters. In the meantime, you relax here. Incidentally, the Deva Consortium offers a better discount to Unbounded experts. You’re now a truly important customer to us. Women, come attend to the patriarch while I go handle some business!”

The beautiful majordomo A’lian brought in a whole host of other beauties, who danced and sang while Yang Qi feasted in delight.

Of course, it was all an act on the part of Yang Qi. His smile was fake, and he was actually using his identity as a Fateless One to ensure that nothing untoward happened to him while he waited for the Mahātmā Jade.

As he watched the performances being put on by the beautiful women, he waited patiently, his anticipation building regarding what he would do when he got the next piece of jade.

“Patriarch,” A’lian said flirtatiously, “now that you’re in the Unbounded level, you’re really an invincible expert. I really hope you’ll continue doing business with us.”

“Well that's a given,” he replied. “You see, I have the Second Devil General’s treasure trove now. I couldn’t spend all the godnotes even if I tried. And my perfect caliber godstones will never run out. Henceforth, we can do a lot of business together. And I’ll make sure to tell everyone how you lived up to your reputation. With enough godstones, you can buy anything here. Even a piece of the Mahātmā Jade! I just hope I can use the Second Devil General’s sutra to unlock its secrets!”

“Oh, by the way, Patriarch, just what are you going to do with the ten thousand godstones worth of items you’re purchasing? Are you really going to just resell all of them? Oh, another thing. Do any of these Perfect God women interest you? Do you want one of them? I remember hearing rumors that you enjoy drinking the blood of women like this.”

“Now that I have Unbounded will convergence, I’ve gained a lot more enlightenment, and I realize that the brutal dao of devils that I followed in the past is actually completely third-rate. Going forward, I'm going to change my evil ways and walk the orthodox path. That's why I didn’t bother growing my Bloodcloak Assembly. Eventually, I'll even force all my disciples to change their ways as well.”

“What? You've changed that much?” A’lian was visibly taken aback at how much this ‘Patriarch Bloodcloak’ had changed. However, it wasn’t that much of a surprise. Reaching the Unbounded level involved dramatic transformations. Sometimes, an expert who walked the righteous path would transform into a murderous monster as a result. And occasionally, experts from the dao of devils would turn over a new leaf, cast their weapons aside, and become buddhas.

Many people would definitely rejoice to hear that Patriarch Bloodcloak had chosen to become righteous.

A few hours later, Yang Qi suddenly rose to his feet as he sensed an immense power within Ser Temple's mansion.

‘It’s a Paramount God,’ Yang Qi thought, and he wondered who it could be.

A moment later, that Paramount God appeared. It was a young woman who didn’t appear to be older than seventeen or eighteen years old. Her expression was threatening without being angry, and her aura was very intimidating. She was obviously only an early Paramount God, but she was a Paramount God nonetheless. Even in the Sovereign Lord’s Age, Paramount Gods were incredibly powerful and influential.

“My respects, Matriarch Yin Xiu!” everyone said, dropping to their knees in respect. This woman was obviously very important in the Deva Dynasty.

“You’re Patriarch Bloodcloak?” said the young woman. A throne appeared and she sat down on it.

“Yes,” Yang Qi said with a nod. Now that ‘Patriarch Bloodcloak’ was an Unbounded expert, he had a much higher status, and thus didn’t need to bow and scrape. “Are you here to talk business, Matriarch?”

“That’s right,” she replied. “Now that you’re in the Unbounded level, you’re a very important person, and thus, you qualify to talk to me. I won’t beat around the bush. I have the piece of the Mahātmā Jade that you want to purchase. It’ll cost you fifteen hundred perfect caliber godstones. Hand over the godstones, and this jade is yours.”

“What? You have it on you?”

Yang Qi really would never have guessed that things would be this easy. However, there was a big downside. He didn’t sense any fluctuations of the Mahātmā Jade coming from this Matriarch Yin Xiu. That meant that either she didn't actually have it on her, or she was using some sort of warding magic to keep it sealed.

“I have fifteen hundred perfect caliber godstones right here. You can count them if you want.” He handed over a magical treasure bag filled with godstones. For now, he wasn't worried that she would go back on her word. If she was a Perfect God, it was possible she might be considering scamming him. But he had Unbounded will convergence, which would make that extremely hard. Furthermore, he could then spread word that the Deva Dynasty cheated people, which would be a big blow to their reputation.

After counting the godstones, Matriarch Yin Xiu looked up and said, “Yes, there are fifteen hundred. Excellent. Well, since you’ve paid the asking price, here’s the Mahātmā Jade.”

She produced a box that contained two items. One was a golden sphere that was a minor god kingdom filled with the resources he had requested earlier. The other was a piece of jade sealed with a paper talisman. The jade wasn’t emanating any sort of fluctuations at all.

‘It looks like the Mahātmā Jade,’ he thought, ‘but it seems to have been completely sealed. Until I get my hands on it, I won’t be able to confirm whether it’s real or not.’

“Is it real?” he asked, looking directly at Matriarch Yin Xiu.

“The Deva Consortium doesn't sell forgeries,” she replied. “But considering you've never seen a piece of the Mahātmā Jade, there’s no way you’d be able to tell if it's real or not just by looking. Don’t you have some technique to assess it? If you have the divine abilities of the Second Devil General, as well as Unbounded will convergence, you’re surely aware of some profound secrets in this regard.”

“The Mahātmā Jade has passed through the hands of numerous experts throughout the years, but sadly, it's never been in the hands of a true expert from the dao of devils. In any case, yes, I know how to assess it.” Taking the piece of jade into his hands, he could confirm that it was indeed tightly sealed. However, it was sealed in such a way that most people wouldn’t even be able to identify the specific technique. And not even Paramount Gods would be able to break through that seal. Therefore, nobody who bought jade would be able to use it.

Based on what Yang Qi could sense, not only did the seal make the jade impossible to access, but it was so powerful that whoever had put it in place could use it to retrieve the jade with a thought.

No wonder they were so willing to sell it. Perhaps the leadership of the Deva Dynasty were interested in seeing what Yang Qi was capable of.

If he really did have a way to unlock the jade’s secrets, then they could use the seal to retrieve it instantly.

“Take care of that jade,” Matriarch Yin Xiu said coolly. “Our business is concluded here. If you ever find that you can't do anything with the Mahātmā Jade, you can sell it back to us for half of what you paid for it. Understand? Those are the longstanding rules of the Deva Consortium, and we can't change them. We only pay fifty percent on returns.”

“I knew that. Don't worry. Even though other Paramount Gods from the dao of devils have never succeeded in unlocking its secrets, I will. And now, I’ll take my leave.”

“Forgive me for not escorting you off,” Matriarch Yin Xiu said.

Yang Qi turned and vanished.

After he was gone, Ser Temple approached and said, “Matriarch, are you really going to let him just take that piece of the Mahātmā Jade? It's on the same level as the God Legion Seal! And how do you know he can even keep it safe?”

“Don’t worry. Patriarch Deva himself put a sealing mark on it. He can retrieve it with a mere thought any time he wishes. And we leaders want to see exactly what this Patriarch Bloodcloak is capable of. Who knows. There might be more profit to be made from all of this.”

Chapter 1353: Pursued by Paramount Gods

“Do you want me to keep a close eye on Patriarch Bloodcloak?” Ser Temple said.

“There’s no need,” replied Matriarch Yin Xiu. “As long as he has that piece of the Mahātmā Jade, we can track him down wherever he is. We don’t want to do anything to tarnish the reputation of the Deva Consortium, so we can’t kill him ourselves. But if some other Paramount God from the dao of devils does the deed, it won’t have anything to do with us. It’s too bad this Patriarch Bloodcloak doesn’t understand how to keep a low profile. Buying something like that so flagrantly will only attract attention. It won't be long before some Paramount God comes along to take that jade and the sutra of the Second Devil General.”

“I remember hearing that, of the top subordinates of the True Devil, the Second Devil General was known as the best fighter, while the First Devil General was adept at manipulating the workings of heaven and was considered a mahātmā who could produce clouds with one turn of the hand and rain with another. I just hope our surveillance will reveal some of the secrets of that Mahātmā Jade.”

“We shouldn’t get our hopes up. Even the True Devil himself, the creator of the Mahātmā Jade, never actually understood the totality of its secrets. If he did, he would have broken through to the Annulled level and defeated the Sovereign Lord.

“In any case, the matter is now out of your hands, and will be overseen by the Paramount Gods of the dynasty. There’s no need for a viceroy like you to ask further questions about it. And don’t send people to Bloodcloak Island to gather information. Patriarch Bloodcloak is an Unbounded expert now, which means you can’t deal with him. On the upside, we've profited handsomely, thanks to doing business with him. You’ll definitely come out on top in the viceroy rankings this year, which means you’ll soon be promoted to head of the secretariat.”

“Wonderful!” Ser Temple said. The head of the secretariat was a very lucrative and cushy position, as every year, the viceroys were required to offer tribute. The head of the secretariat also exercised authority over all of the viceroys in general. Ser Temple was going to be very well rewarded for his services.

Ser Temple left, leaving Matriarch Yin Xiu alone. ‘This Patriarch Bloodcloak seems to be similar to that young sir from the Proud Clan,’ she thought, ‘who purchased ten Deva Baptisms then reached the Unbounded level. Somehow, they both managed to slough off the hidden elements that Patriarch Deva himself placed into the baptism. The Proud Clan has immense reserve powers, so that’s little wonder. But how did Patriarch Bloodcloak do it?

‘The Mahātmā Jade was sealed with the aura of eighteen Paramount Gods from the dao of devils, as well as Patriarch Deva’s personal sealing mark. Nobody can unravel that. Let’s see how strong this Second Devil General’s energy is. Patriarch Deva is a late Paramount God, which means that with one more breakthrough, he’ll be like the Lord of Civilization, the Lord of Radiance and Light, and the other God-Lords of the distant past.”

Of course, Patriarch Deva, the founder of the Deva Dynasty, was a late Paramount God.

In the modern god world, everyone knew that there were early, mid, late, and peak Paramount Gods. However, the vast majority of Paramount Gods were in the early level. Mid Paramount Gods were as hard to find as phoenix feathers or qilin horns. Those in the late level were potentates among potentates, and those in the peak level were so rare as to be unheard of.

The primary ministers and subordinates of the Sovereign Lord had been peak Paramount Gods, in other words, God-Lords such as the Lord of Civilization, the Lord of the Sword Dao, and the Lord of Radiance and Light. Those who existed at a higher level than the God-Lords were people like King Heaven-Devourer, the Sovereign Lord, the King of Godmammoths, King Immortal-Slayer, the True Devil, Wretch God Ultimate, and the Demon Master.

**

Meanwhile, back on Bloodcloak Island, Yang Qi was holding the piece of the Mahātmā Jade and carefully unleashing the Life-Death Void-Destruction God-Lightning. He knew that there were experts spying on him through the warding magics, and therefore, he had set up a spell formation to obscure their view and pierce through to the truth of things.

‘I still can't believe I was able to just buy this thing. I thought it would require some major heist to get it. Instead, they just handed it over me. The only downside is that it's been tightly sealed. The road to happiness is always strewn with setbacks.’ He shook his head. He knew it was going to take some effort to undo this sealing. Thankfully, he had a lot of power at his disposal.

And if he succeeded, he could assimilate the jade, whereupon he could vanquish any Paramount Gods who caused a problem for him, even if they teamed up against him.

He could also turn the crown prince into a mere puppet.

There were other pieces of the jade out there, and he could sense them resonating with the pieces inside of him. As a result, he could sense the ultimate majesty of the Supreme True-Devil, and the glory of the countless sages and mahātmās of the dao of devils.

The true meaning of ‘devil’ was slowly forming in his heart.

‘There’s no need to rush the situation. For now, I’ll worry about sending these resources back to the House of God Ordainment to improve its destiny!’ Keeping a bit of attention focused on the jade, he concentrated mostly on sending the ten thousand perfect caliber godstones’ worth of items back to the House of God Ordainment. That was more resources than even the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty had, and it begged the question of what exactly it would do to the sect's aura.

Creak. Crunch.

The teleportation portal activated, and he sent the items inside.

At the same time, he waved his hand and caused numerous altars on Bloodcloak Island to flare to life. Blood-colored flags waved, tens of thousands of them, all of which were special items from the dao of devils.

Devil energy surged, creating a bright red canopy that covered the island like a cocoon, making it seem like he was in the middle of cultivating some special divine ability.

Of course, the truth was that he was taking the Mahātmā Jade far away from Bloodcloak Island, to a location deep beneath the surface of the ocean. There, in the unimaginable depths, the currents were as violent as spatial tempests, and the sea beasts were as powerful as Consummate Gods.

The seafloor was a place of extreme danger and violence, where the law of the jungle prevailed in every sense imaginable. However, Yang Qi managed to find an ocean trench that was the perfect place to hide his aura and set up a god kingdom.

“God Legion Paradise....”

It had been a very long time since he’d used the consummate energy art that was the God Legion Paradise. Back in the impure lands, when he was in the mere sixth transformation of the Legendary level, he used it to vanquish the Crown Prince, who was a Great Sage. Now, he had Unbounded will convergence, and was using it to carve out a pure land at the bottom of the ocean.

That pure land was filled with god trees of wisdom, valor, fate, the dao of heaven, and entire worlds. One god tree after another propped up that pure land. Beneath them, Yang Qi could defend against the most vicious of blows.

Not even seven or eight early Paramount Gods would have been able to pierce into it.

Next, Yang Qi waved his hand and summoned a string of text that represented the essence of the dao of devils, which caused an enormous cannon to appear within the pure land. It was the most powerful offensive force from the Unspoiled Body, the Grand Tribulation Cannon. Once unleashed, it would cause its victims to be damned by myriad tribulations!

One main feature of the cannon was that the more time it had to power up, the more devastating the attack that would be unleashed. After all, the True Devil had used it in hell to attack the halls of heaven, and it actually damaged them. Normally speaking, Yang Qi didn’t use this cannon when fighting, as it didn’t do much good to fire it in the heat of the moment.

But now, he was integrating it into the God Legion Paradise, and giving it plenty of time to power up. If he did unleash its might, it would be completely devastating.

Yang Qi continued drawing on the God Legion Seal, causing power to flow into the cannon and making it more solid and sturdy than ever.

Seven days later, as the cannon was still powering up, Yang Qi aimed it at Bloodcloak Island! Who could possibly guess what he was planning to do?

Creaking and crunching sounds could be heard as the teleportation portal he had set up vanished, then reappeared in his God Legion Paradise. Remaining in its place was a projection of Patriarch Bloodcloak, pulsing with an aura that smacked of immense treasure and resources.

Yang Qi knew full well that there would be experts keeping an eye on him, just waiting to pounce. So he was setting a trap for the first expert that chose to invade Bloodcloak Island. Once the cannon was fired, it would devastate just about any target.

After all, he had been powering it up for seven days straight! There was no way that, in an ordinary fight, any enemy would sit around for seven days waiting for a weapon to be powered up to use against them.

Two more days passed, and the devil energy on Bloodcloak Island seemed to grow stronger.

All of a sudden, a foul wind sprang up over the ocean, kicking up huge waves. Everything trembled as a vortex appeared, through which flowed the boundless aura of a Paramount God.

Someone had come to kill Patriarch Bloodcloak and steal his treasure!

Chapter 1354: Pursued by Paramount Gods (2)

Devil energy surged as a top expert from the dao of devils appeared, a Paramount God. Obviously, this person sought to seize the legendary techniques left behind by the Second Devil General. And he was flanked by a handful of followers. Although this general region was dominated by the Deva Dynasty, there were still plenty of scattered organizations. Furthermore, there were plenty of surrounding groups with Paramount Gods that would spend a few years flying to come to this area for business purposes.

The area surrounding the Deva Dynasty could generally be described as a hodgepodge of good and bad people.

‘One, two, three four... five. It looks like there are five experts present. One of them is a Paramount God. Where are they from? At least that Paramount God is only in the early level....’

Yang Qi remained at the bottom of the ocean, observing.

Up above, five ripples appeared in the air, and five experts descended. They were all men, four of whom had Unbounded will convergence, but hadn’t reached the Paramount God level. Even so, they were obviously very formidable. Their leader was the early Paramount God, and he was clad in a suit of armor. The horns on his head made him look like some sort of dragon, and he was surrounded by crackling lighting that represented the dao of devils.

The man spoke in a voice that seemed to thrum with many voices. “You’ve done well, Patriarch Bloodcloak. You actually acquired the legacy of the Second Devil General, as well as an immense fortune. Was it the items you purchased from the Deva Dynasty that got you to this level of power? Unfortunately, you've reached the end of the road here. So I’ll give you one chance to surrender. Give me all of that wealth, and become my slave. The only other option is for you to die.”

“Who are you people?!” Patriarch Bloodcloak’s voice said from within Bloodcloak Island. “I can’t believe you’re willing to stab me in the back like this! We're both from the dao of devils!”

“For enough treasure, people like us will do anything. I know that you’ve reached the Unbounded level, so if I came at you alone, you’d simply flee. But look. I brought friends. I’m Iron-Emperor Wretch-Dragon, and these are my associates Monsieur Darkmoon, Lord Liquidator, Grandmaster Soul-Torturer, and Pontifex Sceletus. All of them are famous tyrants from the dao of devils, and over the past few months, we formed a temporary alliance. We've already set up a Linked-Heart Devil Net to cover all of Bloodcloak Island, making it impossible for you to escape. We spent a lot of time and effort ensuring that we can kill you if we have to.”

Iron-Emperor Wretch-Dragon then let loose a stream of grating, maniacal laughter, the likes of which would cause anyone who heard it to feel like their psyche was being pulled out of them.

“You won’t get away with this!” came the voice of Patriarch Bloodcloak, then a stream of blood-red light appeared, shooting up into the air as he attempted to flee.

Smiling, Iron-Emperor Wretch-Dragon said, “We already set up the Linked-Heart Devil Net! You're crazy if you think you can escape!”

“Iron-Emperor Wretch-Dragon is completely right,” said Monsieur Darkmoon. “You’re a minor figure in the dao of devils, Patriarch Bloodcloak. Even if you did find the legacy material of the Second Devil General, you should definitely just give it to us. You were a mere ant when the likes of us became famous. If we want you dead, you’ll end up dead!” Monsieur Darkmoon was a gaunt fellow whose white robe was embroidered with a pitch-black moon. He held a black spear in his hand, and pulsed with killing intent.

Around this time, a huge net appeared.

It was made from white strands whose intersecting points wrapped around what appeared to be a host of pitch-black, wriggling hearts.

A pale white net filled with black hearts. It made a very disturbing image.

The red streak of light that was Patriarch Bloodcloak slammed into the net, but was completely rebuffed. In fact, he completely exploded, turning into a host of red streaks that shot back into the middle of Bloodcloak Island. At the same time, he let loose a miserable shriek. “Are you really trying to kill me?”

“Cut the crap! Hand over those treasures, or you’re done for!”

The five experts were clearly preparing to attack the island.

“The four of you join forces and slaughter all of Patriarch Bloodcloak’s disciples and offspring,” Iron-Emperor Wretch-Dragon said. “Then we’ll attack the center of the island and crush him.”

“Alright!”

“Thousand-Monarch Thousand-Mountain Suppression!”

“Myriad-Devils Myriad-Wretches Slaughter!”

“Nine-Yins Nine-Evils Dao!”

The five experts joined forces and unleashed a host of extremely powerful energy arts. The blood-red defenses of the island were shattered, and in the blink of an eye, the attack was closing in on the central region.

However, that was when ‘Patriarch Bloodcloak’ suddenly smiled. “It's time to say goodbye forever, you five. Your souls, flesh, and blood are going to be the perfect sacrifice to open the sealing mark on the Mahātmā Jade!”

All of a sudden, Iron-Emperor Wretch-Dragon experienced a very bad feeling. “What did you just say? You’re full of nonsense!”

RUMBLE!

A scintillating beam of white light shot out of the ocean, filled with the immense power of lighting and tribulation. Before anyone could react, it had reached Bloodcloak Island, which it wiped out of existence in the blink of an eye.

Yang Qi had powered up the Grand Tribulation Cannon for more than a week, so it was obviously more than enough to deal with the five experts.

Iron-Emperor Wretch-Dragon’s armor collapsed, revealing his true features. His face was that of an attractive young man, and while his torso was that of a human, everything below that looked like a dragon. As for the other four Unbounded experts, there was no need to mention them, as they were ripped to shreds by the light.

Before any of them could even wonder what was happening, they were overwhelmed by the destructive power.

A moment later, the white light disappeared.

It was almost as though it hadn’t existed to begin with. Bloodcloak Island was nowhere to be seen. All of a sudden, black holes sprang up everywhere, throwing all of space into chaos, and causing water to spray violently in all directions.

Vital energy was sucked into the black holes, bending light itself as the area was turned into a stretch of pure chaos.

Nothing was left behind.

Thrummmm!

All of a sudden, an old man appeared. Frowning slightly, he waved his hand to calm down the chaos. As everything returned to normal, he thought, ‘What type of power was that? And what kind of attack was it? It destroyed those five experts in the shortest of moments! Was Patriarch Bloodcloak really the cause? There’s no way! He’s not that strong. He couldn’t kill five experts like that. Not even I could, at least not without wasting a huge amount of vital energy. Don’t tell me that was the power of the Second Devil General! If so, perhaps I should track down Patriarch Bloodcloak and see what he's truly capable of.’

That old man was none other than the legendary Patriarch Deva, founder of the Deva Dynasty, late Paramount God, and invincible figure in the god world.

Yet even he felt his heart thumping with fear based on what he had just seen.

But even after performing some divinations, he couldn't come up with any clues. After all, Yang Qi was a Fateless One, so how could anyone possibly divine information about him?

‘Strange. Patriarch Bloodcloak’s aura isn’t anywhere to be found. It's as if he’s dead. Maybe it was some other top expert who stole Patriarch Bloodcloak’s legacy materials. Whatever expert it was from the dao of devils, he’s very formidable. Except I know all of those experts, and there are only a few who could possibly pull this off. For example, Devilord Worldcrusher, the Wretch Master of the Witch People, or the Lord of Waves. But none of them have any sort of cannon that could unleash a shot like that.’ Patriarch Deva continued performing divinations, all to no effect. Eventually, he smiled. ‘So, it really was some expert from the dao of devils. Unfortunately, I'm only here in clone form, so I can’t draw on my full potential. That's why the divinations aren’t working. Once I get back, I’ll track down the location of that piece of the Mahātmā Jade. With my sealing mark on it, no one can actually steal it.’

With that, Patriarch Deva vanished into thin air.

‘So strong!’

Out in the void, a mote of dust drifted along. At a certain point, it rapidly expanded to form the God Legion Paradise, with Yang Qi in the middle of it, panting. ‘That Patriarch Deva is incredible. Even just a clone of his was able to instantly still that entire area. If I hadn’t fled quickly enough, he would have caught me. It seems I'm still not ready to face him directly. Luckily, I planned everything out perfectly. The Grand Tribulation Cannon wiped out those five experts in the blink of an eye, and I was able to get away before Patriarch Deva showed up. Now his divinations are telling him that Patriarch Bloodcloak is dead. And there’s no way he’ll be able to track me down. I should be able to assimilate the Mahātmā Jade now.’

Waving his hand, he pulled out five souls, which were all that remained of the five experts he had just killed. The soul of Iron-Emperor Wretch-Dragon was wailing in anger and desperation as he pleaded with Yang Qi to free him.

“Why would I let you go? Your souls are going to be the perfect fuel for my Sagely Sacrifice. Time to unravel this sealing mark! A Paramount God and four gods with Unbounded will convergence. I was thinking of enslaving you to add to the destiny of the Sage Monarch Society, and help in the fight against the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty. But no, I think the Sage Monarch Society is the best choice. Not even Patriarch Deva would be able to sacrifice something this incredible.”

The Deva Dynasty was immense, but there weren’t a lot of people with Unbounded will convergence. And every single one was very important. There was no way Patriarch Deva would sacrifice someone like that. If nothing else, the backlash from other experts would be too severe.

The only reason Yang Qi could do it was that he was a Fateless One, and didn’t need to worry about anyone figuring out what he had done.

Sacrificing these five experts was definitely going to be enough to get to that piece of jade.

Chapter 1355: Five Unbounded Experts

Five Unbounded experts from the dao of devils had been snatched by Yang Qi in a single move. Then, with little fanfare, he took them to a remote aspect of space-time, where he set up an altar, prepared his God Legion Seal, and pulled out a golden command medallion that contained a host of sacrificial items.

He was carrying out a Sagely Sacrifice.

Yang Qi placed the Mahātmā Jade on the altar, then exhaled deeply, causing a glittering stream of light to swirl out and surround the altar in the form of a large bubble. It was the Purrfect God Art, and it even contained a portion of the might and majesty of the actual purrling.

“Ancient legion of gods; sacrifice to the heaven on high; let the One God appear; suppress everything everywhere....” An image of the Sovereign Lord appeared, holding the world in one hand and ripping apart the void with the other. He exhaled time, and his feet stomped on hell below. His hair was long and exceedingly white, and he himself seemed capable of manipulating all times and dimensions.

SNICK!

The Sovereign Lord breathed out a stream of fire that surrounded the five Unbounded experts, whose screams Yang Qi ignored.

Heaven and earth trembled as Yang Qi held the sun and moon in his grasp, maintaining control of everything above and below.

The quintessence energy and will of the Iron-Emperor Wretch-Dragon shattered, entering the pure white fire, then transforming into a burning pillar that shot upward as if to break free.

However, the Purrfect God Art bubble sent it bouncing back.

In this place, Yang Qi controlled space and could easily create a host of mirrors to reflect any light within it.

“No! Don’t kill me! Don’t sacrifice me! Who are you? Are you controlling Patriarch Bloodcloak?” The four remaining Unbounded experts were all making such pleas. They were even hoping Yang Qi would simply enslave them. However, their pleas fell on deaf ears.

How profoundly tragic!

They quickly sank into the depth of despair as they realized that Yang Qi was unmoved. He threw his hands out, sending out a host of complex sealing marks that caused them to melt into a white light that shot into his God Legion Seal.

“By my name, enter the Unbounded; the holiest of sacrifices, will reveal the Annulled!” After melting their souls, Yang Qi drew on the nine deadly stances of the Hand of the One God, not to destroy the souls, but to sacrifice them. Next, colorful ripples and distortions rolled out from him.

The Eternal Heavenly Aria!

As he sang, halos blossomed everywhere.

Then a glowing beam erupted from the God Legion Seal, hot enough to end any ice age. And it slammed right into the Mahātmā Jade.

RUUUUUUUUMBLE!

The piece of jade expanded as if it might explode, and the sealing marks that covered it started snapping and shattering. An ancient aura surged out from it, along with shockwaves that felt to Yang Qi like they were Paramount Gods being detonated alive. It was a level of force he would expect if he powered up the Grand Tribulation Cannon for ten days and nights.

What wouldn’t he do to break this seal?

He continued singing, and explosive power built up in the sealing marks. At the same time, bubbles popped into being, surrounding the seals and crushing them with deadly force.

With the boundless power of the Devil-God Seal, he captured the destructive power in the sealing marks and channeled it into a sphere that was both transparent and opaque, like a mixture between darkness and light, blackness and white. It was neither good, nor bad, yet was both.

‘Incredible. I had to sacrifice the power of five Unbounded experts to remove the destructive power in those seals. Even still, I have to be careful. If the power escapes from confinement, it would kill even a Paramount God. I can only use this in a very dire situation. And now I have to deal with the final and most ultimate of the sealing marks, the one created by Patriarch Deva. Once I do, I can assimilate the jade, and when my cultivation base climbs to the next level, I’ll be a Paramount God with mid Unbounded will convergence!’

Yang Qi looked at the final sealing mark on the jade, which wrapped around it like a sinuous dragon.

‘It seems to me that I need to use the psychic fluctuations of the Mahātmā Jade itself to destroy this seal.’

Within Yang Qi’s sea of consciousness were boundless psychic fluctuations centered on a collection of jade fragments. They were mixed with ten thousand tribulation characters, making something like a massive tornado.

Devils converged until an army appeared, as numerous as the eternal sands, heaven-devils that were both real and illusory.

Yang Qi knew that these devils had come for him, yet he wasn't worried. He had already assimilated three pieces of the Mahātmā Jade, making him like the embodiment of an ancient mahātmā. Therefore, he simply sat there in the swirling cloud of devils, smiling as he said, “I will sacrifice myself and go to hell before I let anyone else do so.”

One golden character at a time poured into that final sealing mark, until it finally started trembling.

‘It's the moment of truth! Patriarch Deva, you’re not the Sovereign Lord. In fact, you don’t even measure up to the Lord of the Sword Dao or the Lord of Civilization. Maybe if I didn’t have some other pieces of the Mahātmā Jade already, I wouldn’t be able to deal with your sealing mark. But sadly for you, I already have three pieces! Do you really think you can overwhelm the resonance created by the True Devil and all the sages and mahātmās of the dao of devils?’

Smiling coldly, Yang Qi unleashed the Sovereign Lord’s Holy and Far-Reaching Consummate Omnicurse, as well as the tribulations characters of the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body. One was an ultimate energy art from the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, the other a trump card from the dao of devils. And their combined might was now smashing into the Mahātmā Jade.

The sealing mark seemed to howl in grief as it was sucked into a bubble created by the Purrfect God Art.

RUMBLE!

Astonishing signs and portents flashed in the sky as the workings of heaven fluctuated in an enigmatic fashion.

Finally, the sealing mark faded, becoming a green glow that Yang Qi sucked inside of him. As the glow entered him, he pulsed with astonishing psychic fluctuations.

“Boundless Lightning Reserve; Divine Will Evolution!”

His psychic power climbed, pushing him slowly out of the early Unbounded level. The area surrounding him became filled with lightning, like hosts of primal-chaos elder-snakes writhing about.

Already, the mere blink of his eyes could unleash psychic power strong enough to rend apart entire continents.

RUMBLE!

A massive eruption of power occurred as he again drew upon the God Legion Seal, absorbing the essence of the god world at a rate a hundred times faster than before. Endless tribulations descended, enough to destroy the void of the god world.

Images appeared behind Yang Qi, featuring the destruction of innumerable god worlds, and at the same time, his forehead contained both the sun and the moon.

Boundless power flowed through him, countless convergences of energy that swirled into his monarch godhood. At long last, his godhood was transforming, becoming a vortex of energy that seemed to exist and simultaneously not exist.

This was the strongest state he had ever entered!

He had finally become a Paramount God!

By way of illustration, if Unbounded will convergence were a crown prince, or the minister of a nation, then a Paramount God was the emperor. Although Unbounded experts inevitably became Paramount Gods, it was something that only came with time. And in terms of fighting prowess, it was obvious that Paramount Gods were superior to anyone below their level.

Paramount Gods were Paramount Gods, and they had godhood that allowed them to produce clouds with one turn of the hand and rain with another. They were the true rulers in the god world.

Yang Qi had finally reached a point where he could play a critical role in the god world. Furthermore, after assimilating another piece of the Mahātmā Jade, he was now in the mid Unbounded level.

All he had to do now was get more pieces of the jade, for instance, the one in the Proud Clan, and the one in the Bastille of the One God, and he could reach the late, or even peak Unbounded level. And ultimately, he should be able to step into the Annulled level.

The most ultimate patriarchs of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty and the Nacrelight Sageland were nothing more than mid Unbounded experts. And even though Patriarch Deva was stronger than them, he still wasn’t a late Paramount God, otherwise he would indeed be on the same level as the Lord of Civilization.

Although Yang Qi currently couldn’t beat Patriarch Deva in a fight, considering he had monarch godhood, it wouldn’t be possible for Patriarch Deva to kill him.

‘Considering I broke the seal on the jade, it’s certain Patriarch Deva will be hurrying in this direction to interfere. But I'm not afraid of him. I think it’s time to see what my cultivation base is capable of. I wonder how many moves I can last against him. He won't find it easy to deal with me. And that means I could kill the crown prince with ease....’

Retracting his power, Yang Qi changed his appearance, causing black armor to spread out over his body and devil energy to spring up around him. He was drawing on the devil arts of the Mahātmā Jade, making his face seem twisted and evil. In fact, he looked exactly like a powerful expert from ancient times, an elite member of the dao of devils.

Meanwhile, a ripple appeared, out of which stepped an old man who was none other than Patriarch Deva.

Staring at Yang Qi in surprise, he said, “You’re not Patriarch Bloodcloak. Who are you?”

“Me?” Yang Qi cackled madly. “Who could have guessed that people would forget about me? I waged war alongside the True Devil for years! I'm the Second Devil General! It seems I’m back in an age of true power!”

Chapter 1356: Second Devil General

Yang Qi had assumed the guise of the Second Devil General!

In the past, the Second Devil General had rebuked heaven and earth, and deeply shaken the devil world. He was someone who had very nearly overthrown the god world. Considering that Patriarch Deva wasn't going to be an easy opponent to fight, Yang Qi was hoping to scare him. Hopefully, some psychological warfare would put him in the position to somehow handle Patriarch Deva.

“What? Second Devil General?” Patriarch Deva stared at Yang Qi in shock. Not daring to do anything rash, he scanned him with psychic power and said, “You’re not the Second Devil General. If you were, you’d be unleashing immense pressure. The Second Devil General was on the same level as the Lord of Civilization or the Lord of the Sword Dao, and was no weaker than the High Priestess. How could you possibly be the Second Devil General?”

“Because I haven’t recovered yet! I was slaughtered by the Sovereign Lord, and have only now begun my comeback, thanks to the Mahātmā Jade. Did you really believe that I would just give my legacy materials to someone like Patriarch Bloodcloak? He was nothing more than a pawn that I used to purchase the various materials I needed to crack open the sealing mark that imprisoned me. It was enough to send out a nascent divinity clone, which is what you’re looking at right now. If you think you’re going to fight me, boy, you’re being a bit too impulsive.”

Patriarch Deva was shaken by the words. “A clone?”

Despite being an experienced old-timer, Patriarch Deva was falling for Yang Qi’s story. None of his divinations were revealing any of the ‘Second Devil General’s’ methods, which only furthered his confusion. Of course, that was really just the result of Yang Qi being a Fateless One.

Originally, Patriarch Deva had been planning to attack immediately and crush this interloper. But now he was hesitating. If this really was a clone of the Second Devil General, and he killed it, then when the general’s true self emerged, it would spell certain doom for the Deva Dynasty.

Given all he’d experienced in life, he was very familiar with the saying be careful, and you can pilot the same boat for ten thousand years.

“Well, boy, do you have any more pieces of the Mahātmā Jade? If so, hand them over. Thanks to Patriarch Bloodcloak, I know you've established some sort of impressive organization. Work with me, and I guarantee I can make you stronger. What do you think?” Yang Qi was really laying it on thick in his attempt to hoodwink Patriarch Deva.

Of course, trying to run a scam like this was dangerous to say the least.

All of a sudden, Patriarch Deva’s suspicions were piqued. “Why should I believe you? The Second Devil General was a person who rebuked heaven and earth in the past. What if you release your true self and then just destroy the dynasty I’ve created? Furthermore, I’m still not convinced you’re really the Second Devil General. I can sense that your substructure isn’t very strong at all. It seems to me that you’re not being truthful!”

“How dare you insult me, boy! I'm going to cut you down and wipe out your Deva Dynasty as well!”

Yang Qi attacked without warning. Winds screamed as he drew on his mid Unbounded will convergence and monarch godhood to unleash the most powerful fist strike he could manage. He knew that Patriarch Deva had intentionally baited him to see what would happen. If he simply accepted the provoking words, it would prove that he wasn’t the domineering Second Devil General. There was simply no way the Second Devil General would tolerate insults from an inferior in that way.

Yang Qi knew exactly what type of thoughts were running through Patriarch Deva’s mind, therefore he attacked with every scrap of understanding he had of the dao of devils. He drew on the deepest aspects of the Unspoiled Body, causing a pitch-black devil hand to appear, pulsing with the energy of hell.

“King of Hell!”

The instant the move was unleashed, Patriarch Deva’s expression turned very serious. However, he could see that the power within the move was lacking, so he laughed coldly and said, “Each generation will produce talented individuals; their dissertations will be passed down for centuries. You have some amazing and unique moves, Second Devil General, but sadly, they aren’t enough for you to deal with me. Watch as I vanquish your moves! Deva Eternal Isolation!”

Patriarch Deva casually swept his hand out, creating a rift that divided the world in two and separated yin and yang. The boundless hellish devil energy that had just appeared was dispelled, having had no chance to even get close to Patriarch Deva.

“Feeling suicidal, boy?! I might only be here as a clone, but I can still kill you!” All of a sudden, Yang Qi drew on one of the ten moves from the Sage Monarch Grand Magic: God Without Limit!

RUMBLE!

Rumbling devil energy transformed into the most pure and holy energy imaginable. It formed the core meaning and great dao of gods, filled with their natural and magical laws, making it inextricably linked to the god world itself.

Yang Qi had extrapolated four of the ten moves from the Sage Monarch Grand Magic, and they had been enough to completely defeat the reserve power of the House of God Ordainment. And now, he was a hundred times more powerful than he was then. You could say that his single fist strike could kill a Paramount God.

With his mid Unbounded will, he had an even deeper ability to extrapolate moves from the Sage Monarch Grand Magic. In fact, he planned to use this very fight with Patriarch Deva to do so.

So far, he had mastered four of the moves, including Sage Monarch Grand Magic, Monarch Invincible, Hegemon Without Bounds, and God Without Limit.

As the devil energy became completely holy, his fist smashed through Patriarch Deva’s move of Deva Eternal Isolation. Before Patriarch Deva could do anything, Yang Qi’s fist was right in front of him.

‘What move is that? It’s some sort of mixture between godly and devilish?’ Patriarch Deva’s heart was already pounding. If Yang Qi hadn’t assimilated the Mahātmā Jade, Patriarch Deva wouldn’t have had anything to worry about. He could have sent him tumbling into death with a mere snap of his finger. Unfortunately, Yang Qi had assimilated the Mahātmā Jade, and was now on a totally different level than before.

“Prepare to die, boy! This is a new great dao that I gained enlightenment of during my countless years of being sealed!” Yang Qi was doing everything he could to ensure he really seemed like the Second Devil General.

“Hmph! You may have caught me by surprise, but that doesn’t mean you can beat me!” Flitting straight backward, Patriarch Deva shouted, “Deva Warp; Deva God-Fist. First stance: Return to the Origin!”

He levitated straight up to dodge Yang Qi’s fist, then thrust out with splayed fingers, causing a host of weapons to appear around Yang Qi.

“Sage as the Master!” Yang Qi shot after him, unleashing a deadly attack that combined devil energy and god power.

“You’re really putting a lot into those moves of yours. Let’s see how long you can last!” Patriarch Deva shifted tactics again as he met Yang Qi’s attacks. He was only using thirty percent of his power, while the ‘Second Devil General’ was going all out, leading him to feel very confident.

“Second stance: Creator of the Great Heaven!”

The second move was also extraordinary. Patriarch Deva normally looked like a stooped old man, but suddenly became tall and mighty. Reaching out, he negated Yang Qi’s attack, his hands dancing like the creator of all things manipulating physical reality to create humans.

“Hegemon Without Bounds!”

“Monarch Invincible!” Yang Qi unleashed two attacks in a row, like blows from axes that could sunder heaven or cleave apart primal-chaos.

The moves of his Sage Monarch Grand Magic were improving as he gained further enlightenment!

“Very skillful, Second Devil General!” Patriarch Deva said, his own godpower pulsing like a mighty ocean. “The transformations of the human way contain many types of conscious life. But now I'm going to show you what natural life is really about! Try out this next move. Long Life!”

An aura of natural life erupted out of him, transforming into something like a long river.

This was the move Long Life.

Yang Qi suddenly felt as if Patriarch Deva’s life really could last so long as to be indefinite, as though his lifespan was a river whose beginning and end matched those of time itself.

“In the term natural life, the natural has to do with all types of thinking, the six senses, the seven senses, the ālāyavijñāna. All such things fall under the description of that which is natural. Life is you being sealed within the world. If you are not sealed within the world, then you have lost your life. Second Devil General, you need to realize that those who have come after you are far superior to you. Take a look at my dao!” Patriarch Deva was unleashing his consummate strength!

He thrust out his fist, and Yang Qi’s Sage Monarch Grand Magic collapsed. The mighty river of Long Life shot toward him, and it seemed that he was about to die.

“Not bad at all, boy. But you can’t kill my clone.” Yang Qi’s thinking had reached the most elevated level, allowing him to unleash a move called Sovereign Lord Without Bounds.

It was another move from the Sage Monarch Grand Magic, and it contained the full meaning of the word Lord.

The two fists met, and while Patriarch Deva wasn’t hurt at all, Yang Qi’s entire body exploded into vital energy that slowly dissipated.

“What do you think? Second Devil General? That body of yours was destroyed, and your clone’s vital energy has been drained.” Patriarch Deva burst out laughing, but a moment later, his expression turned serious as boundless godly might surged in his direction. He had no idea what it was or where it came from, but he knew that it caused him to tremble down to his heart and soul.

In the blink of an eye, Yang Qi’s ‘Second Devil General’ form appeared again, and it was even stronger than before.

The truth was that it was the power of the God Legion Seal, but Yang Qi was certain it would be enough to terrify Patriarch Deva into believing he really was the Second Devil General.

The power in the God Legion Seal was boundless and without limit; while Patriarch Deva would always have to worry about building up lost power reserves, Yang Qi didn’t. That alone would be enough to terrify most experts.

“Well done, boy. However, I can always get more power from my true self. I'm ready to fight this battle to the finish. Get ready to die!” Yang Qi seemingly prepared to start fighting again.

“Hold on!” Patriarch Deva blurted.

Chapter 1357: Inflicting Fear

“What do you want, boy?” Yang Qi said. His heart was pounding with anticipation at seeing the wily old fox that was Patriarch Deva reacting with such terror. However, he didn’t let his act slip. “Could it be that you’re scared? Considering how you've insulted me, the Second Devil General, it’s only natural that I’ll wipe out the Deva Dynasty.”

“Just wait a moment,” Patriarch Deva said, brushing off his sleeves as if to remove any evidence that he had been fighting. “There’s no need for this bravado, Second Devil General. I was able to see how strong you are. Furthermore, I was only using thirty percent power. I only needed to confirm that you’re really the Second Devil General. Now that I have, there’s no need for further fighting.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Yang Qi growled.

“There’s no need to play dumb, Second Devil General. You can’t beat me in a fight, not considering how strong the destiny of my Deva Dynasty is. Back in the era of the Sovereign Lord, when the legion of gods perished, I survived. And I've been working on my cultivation ever since, creating a flourishing group of loyal disciples. I also have immense reserve powers. Considering you possessed Patriarch Bloodcloak to do business with us, you surely know how strong the Deva Dynasty is. If I fully mobilize all of my forces, I could probably even harm your true self! As for this clone of yours, it would be reduced to ashes!”

“Are you threatening me?” Yang Qi said, crossing his arms over his chest.

“Take it as you will,” Patriarch Deva said, feeling very confident in his position. “In any case, we’re not enemies. In fact, we can even work together. I now know that your true self is sealed, although where exactly? And what would happen if we could unseal your true self?”

“You’d do that out of the kindness of your heart?” Yang Qi asked. Patriarch Deva had taken the bait, and now Yang Qi was reeling him in. However, he wouldn’t let his guard down. Continuing to act as he felt the Second Devil General would, he said, “Why should I believe you? This clone of mine is weak, but my true self is more powerful than you can imagine. Aren’t you worried that I’d instantly kill you if you freed me? We devil generals aren’t known for our sense of honor, and we fart on promises and oaths.”

“I'm not worried. Even if your true self did try to take out my Deva Dynasty, it wouldn't be an easy task. I'm only interested in helping you so that I can get stronger. And it's not as if I’ll free your true self without asking for any compensation. What do you say? You help me strengthen my Deva Dynasty, and I’ll give you your freedom.”

Yang Qi smiled broadly. “My true body is imprisoned in the Bastille of the One God. Can you free me from there?”

“What? The Bastille of the One God?” Patriarch Deva’s face flickered, then he said, “It's just as I guessed. The only place the Second Devil General could possibly be imprisoned is of course the Bastille of the One God. Yes, I can help you. The destiny of the Deva Dynasty is strong enough to alter the magical laws of the god world. What do you say?”

“What's your specific plan?” Yang Qi asked. “I was sealed in the Bastille of the One God by the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth and the Sovereign Lord’s Holy and Far-Reaching Consummate Omnicurse. And that was after being seriously injured in a fight with the King of Godmammoths. The only upside is that I gained a bit of understanding regarding the secrets of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. Once I’m freed, I’ll be invincible in all heaven and earth!”

Of course, he was just setting the stage to be able to use the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth later. And his words made Patriarch Deva feel even more convinced that he really was the Second Devil General.

‘He actually knows some of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth?’ Patriarch Deva thought. ‘Incredible. I have to be very careful in dealing with him. His clone might not be very impressive, but his true self will be terrifying to the extreme. And that’s especially true if he's freed from the Bastille of the One God. Working with him will be like playing with a double-edged sword. It’s going to be hard to keep the upper hand. And I could very well get my dynasty destroyed. Thankfully, I have secrets of my own. If I can get the sealed Second Devil General, then assimilate him, I’ll be able to rise to a higher level and be like the Sovereign Lord himself!’ Patriarch Deva was putting some very vicious plans into motion.

‘At my current level, achieving breakthroughs is extremely difficult. Nowadays, God-Lords like the Lord of Civilization are extremely rare. Even after all my years of cultivation, and with the destiny of the Deva Dynasty to back me, I still can’t rise to a higher level. I have to work with the Second Devil General, then assimilate him! With his devil vitality, I can definitely break through!’

Chuckling in his heart, Patriarch Deva said, “In that case, let’s work together, Second Devil General!”

“What do you mean ‘work together’?” Yang Qi asked, knowing full well that his chance had arrived.

“The Deva Dynasty would love to have you as one of our most important elders. You can even have a share of our destiny. However, you have to teach some of your energy arts to the lower-level disciples. And you need to be ready to fight for the sect at any time. Of course, you'll be required to share any wealth you come across. In short, it’ll be like your previous working arrangement. And it will be purely a matter of profit for both of us. What do you think? As long as you have enough perfect caliber godstones, we can get you anything you need.”

Obviously, Patriarch Deva was eyeing Yang Qi’s wealth.

Yang Qi burst out laughing. “That works perfectly. Of all the things I lack, wealth isn’t one of them. Luckily, my true self was sealed inside a massive treasure storehouse, filled with endless perfect caliber godstones and ancient godnotes. If you want a partner, Patriarch Deva, you've found the right person. With my support, your Deva Dynasty’s destiny is going to become a hundred times as strong as before.”

“Are you serious?” Patriarch Deva said. “You really have an endless supply of godnotes and perfect caliber godstones?”

“What. You think I'm lying?” Yang Qi laughed coldly. Waving his hand, he summoned ten thousand perfect caliber godstones, forming a pile that glittered as brightly as the halls of heaven.

Patriarch Deva stared at them blankly, fully convinced that Yang Qi was indeed a clone of the Second Devil General. After a long moment, he burst out laughing. “Incredible! From this moment forward, we're working together, Second Devil General. Amazing things are definitely just around the corner. With you as a member of the Deva Dynasty, we’ll be able to gobble up all the other sects in existence!”

“What do you mean?” Yang Qi said coolly. “The Deva Dynasty is already pretty impressive. Don’t tell me there are other sects out there that are more powerful. I assumed this age was withering into decay, and that there weren’t any truly consummate masters out there.”

“You’re wrong about that. The god world is huge, and it's filled with hidden dragons and crouching tigers. You definitely can’t afford to let your guard down. There aren’t many old-timers with cultivation bases similar to mine, but they do exist. For instance, the Dragonfolk from the Nine Dragons Court, or the Sumeru Temple, which is a buddhist school. All of them are on par with me and my dynasty, and occasionally clash with us. Of course, compared to the ancient halls of heaven, we’re little more than ants.”

“Oh? Well, in order to free myself, I need to cultivate an energy art that requires massive amounts of destiny. The destiny of your Deva Dynasty is impressive, but it alone won’t suffice. So I'm going to need your help to get even more destiny. Whether it’s a buddhist school or a lair of Dragonfolk, I need to devour them all! Devils will destroy the world of men!” With that, he burst out laughing.

At the same time, he erupted with devil energy, provoking a smile from Patriarch Deva.

“Exactly how much cash can you come up with, Second Devil General?” Patriarch Deva asked.

“Tens of millions of perfect caliber godstones,” he replied. “Why? I imagine your Deva Dynasty has a similar amount in reserve, right?”

“Tens of millions?!” Patriarch Deva said, his eyes going wide. “Do you know what you could accomplish with that many perfect caliber godstones? Do you know what you could purchase? Do you know how many experts you could develop?”

“Of course I know,” Yang Qi replied loftily. “In a moment, I'm going to open the floodgates. Although, I need you to help me find more pieces of the Mahātmā Jade.”

“You can actually assimilate the Mahātmā Jade?” Patriarch Deva said in surprise.

“Of course. And with enough pieces of the Mahātmā Jade put together, I can resurrect the slumbering will of the True Devil to conquer the god world and unify the cosmos. The age of the True Devil is coming. After all, the Sovereign Lord doesn’t exist anymore.”

‘This guy is crazy!’ Patriarch Deva thought. ‘Although, it's an opportunity for me. Once he puts all the pieces of the Mahātmā Jade together, I can take advantage of the situation....’

Patriarch Deva knew that rewards come only with risk; therefore, he planned to use the Second Devil General to further his own ends.

“Alright. Give me that destiny, and I’ll give you my wealth. It’s the perfect arrangement.”

The two of them shook hands.

As it happened, Yang Qi could sense an immense influx of destiny, vastly superior to that of the House of God Ordainment.

“Please, Second Devil General. I would like to formally invite you into the Deva Dynasty to serve as a vassal chief elder king. You can go about whatever business you need to, and we can get you any resources you require.”

“Here are a million perfect caliber godstones. For now, focus on finding more pieces of the Mahātmā Jade. Furthermore, I have another list of items I need.” He handed over the list with the godstones.

Patriarch Deva was fully convinced that he was really dealing with the Second Devil General. After all, who else in existence could provide so many perfect caliber godstones?

A moment later, Yang Qi and Patriarch Deva vanished.

The plan was working!

Yang Qi was very pleased with how things were going. Soon, he would send the destiny of the Deva Dynasty into the House of God Ordainment. After the martial-god soldier-kings awoke, he would capture the crown prince, destroy the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty and Nacrelight Sageland, and consider taking on the Deva Dynasty. And now, he could also use the Deva Dynasty to get more information about the Proud Clan.

Chapter 1358: Destiny like a Furnace

In the House of God Ordainment, in the depths of the Cruiser of Civilization, an enormous teleportation portal had been activated.

Jadefall was there, working hard on her cultivation. Although Yang Qi had imparted the power of fifteen Deva Baptisms to her, she still hadn’t been able to reach the Unbounded level. Although she was on the cusp of the breakthrough, she still lacked what she needed to reach the next higher level of enlightenment.

However, as she was working so hard on her cultivation, a huge influx of destiny emerged from the portal, like a burning furnace, a hundred times as powerful as the destiny of the House of God Ordainment. It swirled around the Cruiser of Civilization and entered Jadefall.

Of course, it was what Yang Qi had taken from the Deva Dynasty.

In his guise as the Second Devil General, he had fooled Patriarch Deva and become a vassal chief elder, thus gaining access to a portion of the dynasty’s destiny. He had also purchased a host of new supplies, which he sent through the portal alongside the destiny. Among his purchases were hosts of slaves, servants, killers, and puppets, all of them elites among their various people.

Included were Cyberfolk and Mechfolk, both of whom were adept with creating machinery. And there were slaves with the blood of war gods, who were skilled at fighting, as well as thrall troops who were Perfect Gods. It was an army like a horde of locusts.

Only the Deva Dynasty could procure things like this. And it was thanks to the huge amount of perfect caliber godstones Yang Qi had given them, which allowed them to go to other places such as consortiums run by the Sumeru Temple.

RUMBLE!

This was destiny that could transform heaven itself, and it was pouring into Jadefall, causing her eyes to snap open as she broke through the final barrier and rose into the unbelievable Unbounded level.

The House of God Ordainment finally had three Unbounded experts.

Yang Qi was currently an early Paramount God with mid Unbounded will convergence. His next task was to build up enough power and resources to rise to the mid Paramount God level.

As soon as she broke through to the Unbounded level, Jadefall came to realize everything that had been occurring with Yang Qi. “You got that piece of the Mahātmā Jade, didn’t you, Yang Qi! You fooled Patriarch Deva perfectly. With the Deva Dynasty as a temporary headquarters, it’ll only take ten years before the Sage Monarch Society will surpass the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty. Now, we just continue with the plan, and make sure as much destiny as possible gets into the crown prince’s martial-god soldier-kings.”

“Congratulations. Congratulations!”

Meanwhile, the core members of the Sage Monarch Society hurried over to offer congratulations. Yang Immortal-Slayer, Yang Zhan, Brahma, the Shepherd, Proud World, and all of the others were delighted that Jadefall was now an Unbounded expert. Instead of needing to be extremely careful in everything they did, they knew they could now operate with much more freedom.

With Yang Qi working behind the scenes, they were confident that the rest of them would eventually reach the Unbounded level as well.

“All of us must work hard to carry out Yang Qi’s plans,” Jadefall said. “He has access to the destiny of the Deva Dynasty, which he’ll use to fool the crown prince, and secretly further his aims. For now, don't tell anyone that I reached the Unbounded level. Keep it a secret, lest it provoke the crown prince. We mustn’t allow him to directly oppose the House of God Ordainment.”

“The crown prince is an obstacle that we’ll kick out of our way eventually,” the Shepherd said through gritted teeth. “Look at all these god pills we have. Let’s split them up and start working on our cultivation. I want to be the next one to break into the Unbounded level.”

“Split things up fairly, everyone,” Jadefall said. “It's going to take time to go through all these resources. And not all of them can be converted directly into fighting prowess. Make sure plenty of resources go into recruiting new disciples and expanding our territory.”

“I'm afraid that's not quite appropriate,” Yang Immortal-Slayer said with a frown. “The House of God Ordainment is reaching its limits. If we expand too much, it’ll destabilize the larger balance and attract the attention of Paramount Gods. Right now, the League of Academies, League of Wretch-Gods, and League of the Devil-Dao all have Unbounded experts. And the Paramount Gods from the dao of devils are watching us. If we just start expanding randomly, they might make a move on us. And if a life-or-death struggle results, the crown prince will just swoop in and take advantage of the situation.

“Stop worrying,” Jadefall said. “Yang Qi already gave orders to expand. If problems arise, he’ll take action. He's already in the mid Unbounded level, and his cultivation base is ten times what it was before. Before, he needed seven days to teleport things here, but now it only takes two hours. Furthermore, he can easily keep tabs on what’s happening here. When the time comes, he’ll help us deal with any Paramount Gods that become a problem. Besides, I'm also an Unbounded expert now. If you and I work together, and Yang Qi sends his will to help, we can easily kill early Paramount Gods. And how could we truly establish our might without taking the heads of some Paramount Gods?”

Many plans were coming to fruition....

**

Meanwhile, in the Harvestland, the crown prince was sitting cross-legged in the middle of a session of cultivation.

All of a sudden, he shivered and looked over in the direction of the House of God Ordainment, an expression of disbelief on his face. The destiny from there was like a burning ocean now, vastly beyond anything from before.

It was like a furnace filled with millions of little suns, banging back and forth as if to free themselves.

‘So strong!’ the crown prince thought. The destiny of the House of God Ordainment was like a furnace. Going forward, every disciple in the sect would experience immense fortune when out on missions, and the cities of the sect would be even more protected from the destructive elements of the god world.

‘What is Yang Qi doing to improve their destiny so much?’ Even as he pondered this question, something like a red stream of fire shot out from the ‘furnace’, heading straight toward the Harvestland and the martial-god soldier-kings.

‘This surpasses the destiny of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty. Excellent! I almost can't believe this is happening. It seems turning that Yang Qi into a pawn was really the right choice. But why is this happening?’ The crown prince couldn’t come up with any viable theories. In the end, he shook his head. ‘It doesn’t matter. The main obstacle to deal with now is that purrling. Maybe I should just sacrifice my martial-god soldier-kings to take it out.’

As the House of God Ordainment expanded, the crown prince simply waited in anticipation.

Considering the circumstances, many other organizations were furious because of the protection he was offering them.

**

Far away in the deep, wild mountains, in a location filled with temples and altars, it was possible to see disciples of the dao of devils flying everywhere. Many had demonlings in their hands, which they would slaughter on the altars to receive blessings of power from the Supreme True-Devil.

The aura of blood, carnage, and sacrifice filled the area. Obviously, this was territory controlled by the League of the Devil-Dao.

The fastest cultivation progress that disciples from the dao of devils could achieve didn't come from killing victims and draining their blood, but from sacrificing them directly to the True Devil to gain devil vitality.

RUMBLE!

In one huge temple, a host of patriarchs from the dao of devils had gathered. Some were peak Perfect Gods, yet they were respectfully waiting for someone more powerful than them to arrive.

Devil energy filled the area as a young sir arrived, clad in golden garments, a fan in his hand. He was an Unbounded expert, although he wasn’t a Paramount God.

He was Young Sir Gold-Devil, who was considered a top genius in the League of the Devil-Dao. He had once captured a Paramount God from a buddhist school and sacrificed him to the True Devil. That had given him a blessing of immense power, which enabled him to rise all the way to the Unbounded level.

In the past, the True Devil had built an immense god kingdom in the void that surpassed even the High Priestess’. As a result, when disciples of the dao of devils offered sacrifices, the blessings they received were incredible. Unfortunately, most disciples came away emptyhanded.

It was really a gamble to offer sacrifices in this way. And one was gambling not money, but power.

The True Devil had set it up that way. In some ways, it wasn’t an arrangement of sacrifice, but of harvesting.

That was why Yang Qi hadn’t set up a system of sacrifice in the House of God Ordainment; he didn't want to take advantage of the disciples.

He could have set up altars to himself, then taken most of the sacrificed power, while doling out only a few rewards. But that would only make the disciples hate him.

Along with Young Sir Gold-Devil came several other devil kings who had Unbounded will convergence. Upon seeing them, Young Sir Gold-Devil laughed and said, “Laird Darkevoid! Daoist Nine-Deaths! Corpse King Miragespirit! Archdevil Zombielord! You're all here! It's been a long time since we called a full meeting of the League of the Devil-Dao. Presumably this meeting was called to talk about dealing with the House of God Ordainment.”

“That’s right,” said an expressionless man who looked like a zombie, who was none other than Corpse King Miragespirit. “As of late, our League of the Devil-Dao has been having trouble dealing with the wild actions of the House of God Ordainment. They're expanding too rapidly. They even attacked one of our continents recently, freeing all the people we’d intended to turn into thralls or sacrifice. The time has come to destroy the House of God Ordainment!”

Chapter 1359: Attack from the Dao of Devils

“Have you seen the destiny of the House of God Ordainment? It’s burning like wildfire! And that Yang Immortal-Slayer reached the Unbounded level. Normally speaking, I’d stay out of their business, but they’ve been meddling in ours. At this point, we have no choice but to wipe them out.”

Laird Darkevoid was a sinister-looking middle-aged man. He was also in the Unbounded level, but had yet to become a Paramount God. His organization had recently been attacked by the House of God Ordainment and his disciples hadn’t been able to put up even a passable defense.

“That's right!” growled Daoist Nine-Deaths. “The House of God Ordainment has been too aggressive lately. Our disciples are too weak to fight them, which means we have to take action ourselves. Their people all have special godhoods, and are exceedingly capable fighters. They also have a huge army of thrall troops. I even had an apprentice who was a peak Perfect God, but was captured by them and turned into a thrall. It was infuriating!”

“So, what do we do now?” said Corpse King Miragespirit. “Join forces and strike to kill? We need to take out their strongest figure, Yang Immortal-Slayer. With him gone, the rest will be easy to handle.”

He exchanged a glance with Archdevil Zombielord, who said, “It won’t be a surefire win with only us. I think we need help from the two ultimate patriarchs of our League of the Devil-Dao, the brothers known as the Sauvastika-Devil Gentlemen. After all, they’re Paramount Gods! With all of us working together, we would cut down Yang Immortal-Slayer before he can fight back. I wonder if he’s called Yang Immortal-Slayer because he has something to do with King Immortal-Slayer.”

As these masters from the dao of devils discussed matters, two newcomers arrived.

They were both Paramount Gods, and they resembled each other perfectly. They were twins, and both of them had bright red hair and long beards. And their armor looked as though fresh blood flowed down it.

These were the brothers, the Sauvastika-Devil Gentlemen.

One was named Sauvastika-Devil Heaven-Gentleman, the other was Sauvastika-Devil Earth-Gentleman

They were well known for their ferocious nature, and there were few people who could stand up to them. After all, they would fight together, complementing each other by using devil energy as yin and yang to make themselves far more powerful than ordinary Paramount Gods. One could only imagine what it would be like for twin brothers to jointly become Paramount Gods.

“Greetings, Patriarchs!” chorused Young Sir Gold-Devil, Laird Darkevoid, Daoist Nine-Deaths, Corpse King Miragespirit, and Archdevil Zombielord, all of them offering respectful salutes.

“Enough with the formalities,” Sauvastika-Devil Heaven-Gentleman said. “We're aware of the situation with the House of God Ordainment. Although our League of the Devil-Dao is generally as disunited as a dish of loose sand, we can always stand together when the circumstances require it. These people have been gobbling up our territory and killing our disciples. We can’t tolerate them any further. We’ll join this fight, help you kill Yang Immortal-Slayer, and destroy the House of God Ordainment!”

“Excellent!” said Young Sir Gold-Devil. “We’ll work together to destroy the House of God Ordainment. But, Patriarchs, do we directly assault their god kingdom, or do we set up some sort of ambush?”

Sauvastika-Devil Heaven-Gentleman chuckled darkly. “Of course we set up an ambush! We start with guerrilla tactics, destroying some of their outlying cities. There’s no way Yang Immortal-Slayer will tolerate that, and once he's out in the open, we surprise him and kill him!”

“Where do we start?”

“Simple. The Sage Monarch Consortium’s headquarters in the Heaven-Wretch Continent. It’s been growing rapidly, and is definitely full of all sorts of goods and resources. Nobody knows where they get all the goods that they auction off, but it’s the perfect place to launch an attack, kill some disciples, and steal some treasure.”

“Great! Destroying some of their smaller cities won’t do anything. But taking out their consortium in the Heaven-Wretch Continent will definitely be a big loss for them.”

“Let’s go!”

Whoosh. Whoosh. Whoosh...!

With that, the five Unbounded experts and the two Paramount God twin brothers vanished into thin air. Shortly after, they appeared in the air hundreds of kilometers above the Heaven-Wretch Continent.

It was such an incredible height that ordinary people could never go there, filled as it was with tempests of natural laws and primal-chaos. Even Consummate Gods would die there; only Unbounded experts could possibly survive.

It was said that treasure troves existed there, which was why some Unbounded experts and Paramount Gods would explore the area, looking for remnants of the ancient halls of heavens.

“Look, that's the Sage Monarch Consortium down there.”

The area being pointed to was a collection of mighty buildings that was much more impressive than the consortium’s original base. There were countless spell formations everywhere, manned by servants and powered by holy caliber godstones.

It currently spread out over about a third of the entire Heaven-Wretch Continent, which was shocking even to these masters from the dao of devils. And some of the slaves down below were Consummate Gods, the spell formations they powered such that it would prevent anyone from invading very easily.

Not even the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty or Nacrelight Sageland had Consummate Gods as slaves to man their defensive spell formations.

“Look at that!” Laird Darkevoid said. “They have Cyberfolk experts!” He pointed down, and sure enough, there were some Perfect God slaves manning the forges whose bodies were half metal and half flesh. Obviously, they had immense fighting prowess, and none of the devil patriarchs had any idea where they might have come from.

“Incredible,” said Sauvastika-Devil Earth-Gentleman.”Our continent has never seen a single Cyberfolk slave. It seems the House of God Ordainment has opened a new channel of commerce. Everyone, prepare to attack. We’ll strike right into their treasure storehouse, then kill as many of their people as we feel like. None of them will be able to stop us!”

“Alright!”

All of them began pooling their strength in preparation to attack.

However, even as they were simply clenching their hands into fists, one of the spell formations in the consortium below activated, and an enormous, pure-white cannon appeared!

BOOOOOM!

Tribulation erupted. Pure, deadly tribulation.

It ripped forth, screaming up into the air in the most devastating of attacks. Yang Qi had previously used the Grand Tribulation Cannon to kill a Paramount God and four Unbounded experts. Now, his cultivation base was far beyond that level. As a result, the seven experts above his consortium were instantly shredded to bits and engulfed in burning sagefire, provoking miserable screams.

“What happened? What power is this? This is tribulation! Grand tribulation of heaven and earth!” The Paramount God twins watched in crazed horror as their vital energy drained away and their godhood shattered.

“We've been waiting for you,” someone said. A huge spacecraft appeared, pulsing with power that reached out, grabbed the masters from the dao of devils, and sucked them inside. Then the spacecraft vanished.

No observer had any idea what had just happened.

Just like that, seven experts from the dao of devils, including five Unbounded experts and two Paramount Gods, were taken captive by the House of God Ordainment.

“That went smoothly,” said Yang Immortal-Slayer. “Yang Qi really knows how to plot and scheme. He said these people would attack us like this, which is why he sent us the Grand Tribulation Cannon. One shot was enough to shred their defenses and seriously injure them. Afterward, capturing them was simple. If Yang Qi had been here, he definitely could’ve killed them. But why kill them when we can enslave them?”

Yang Immortal-Slayer and Jadefall were in the Cruiser of Civilization, where the Engine of the One God burned brightly as the two of them fed perfect caliber godstones into it. With that fuel, the imperial-heaven pre-beginning systems were activated, making it almost as if the Lord of Civilization himself had reached out to capture the seven devils and throw them onto an altar in the middle of the spacecraft.

“Yes, it went very well,” Jadefall said. “Although, it's going to be hard to control those seven. And it's a big drain of perfect caliber godstones to keep them immobilized. We need to completely subjugate them as quickly as possible. Yang Qi, you should know about all of this happening even so far away in the Deva Dynasty. Hurry and subjugate them!”

The seven experts lay splayed out on the altar like toads, no idea what was happening, their faces full of shock.

However, they actually weren’t afraid. Even if they had been captured by the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty, and were being kept suppressed in a huge formation, they knew that such formations would quickly drain supplies of perfect caliber godstones. So as long as they struggled hard enough, they were convinced they would eventually get free. Little did they know that the House of God Ordainment would never need to worry about running out of perfect caliber godstones.

“Who are you people?” Sauvastika-Devil Heaven-Gentleman said angrily. “Jadefall? Yang Immortal-Slayer? How did you get so strong?”

Smiling, Jadefall said, “I’d like to welcome you to the Cruiser of Civilization. I have some news for the seven of you. You’re going to become puppets of the House of God Ordainment. More precisely, you’re going to be puppets of the Sage Monarch Society. So please prepare your minds to start working for us!”

“You’re dreaming!” shouted Young Sir Gold-Devil. “You might have some warding magics to imprison us temporarily. But you’ll run out of godstones eventually. And then how will you control us? You lunatics! You can’t just control Unbounded experts! Even if you’re in the same level as us, that just means we’re equal enough that you can’t kill us!”

“You people really are ignorant and ill-informed,” a new voice said.

It was none other than Yang Qi.

Chapter 1360: Subjugating Them All

When Unbounded experts fought other Unbounded experts, it usually resulted in mutual injury. And even if one party was inferior to the other, they would at least be able to escape alive. For all intents and purposes, it should be impossible for one Unbounded expert to simply kill another.

The most likely conclusion to a lopsided fight would be for one party to be captured. But even then, the captured party wouldn’t be kept suppressed for long. That was why Unbounded experts didn’t often fight each other. Of course, it was a different story when it came to teaming up.

In this case, there were seven patriarchs from the League of the Devil-Dao, all intent on cutting down Yang Immortal-Slayer. Sadly for them, they had fallen right into Yang Qi’s trap. After being devastated by the Grand Tribulation Cannon and having their vital energy harmed, they were easily captured. Of course, they all were still under the assumption they would be able to escape the situation.

But then Yang Qi’s will exerted control.

Previously, Yang Qi had killed five experts from the dao of devils, sacrificing all of them to open a powerful sealing mark. Ultimately, that had been something of a waste. Now he had seven experts, two of whom were Paramount Gods. And he was absolutely, positively not going to simply kill them. Instead, he would secretly subjugate them, turning them into slave puppets. With such people on call in the House of God Ordainment and the Sage Monarch Society, they would be no weaker than the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty.

He had previously been trying to think of a way to kidnap some experts like this. But now they had offered themselves up to him. Obviously, there was no reason not to just trap them like turtles in a jar.

“Who are you?” Sauvastika-Devil Heaven-Gentleman said, his expression one of abject astonishment. “You’re a mid Unbounded expert?”

“Good guess,” Yang Qi replied. The God Legion Seal appeared, sending out a shaft of light that encompassed all seven devil patriarchs, piercing into their seas of consciousness and souls. Three days and nights passed, after which there were seven new golden thrones in the God Legion Seal, indicating that the devils were now completely under Yang Qi’s control. He could even monitor their thoughts.

“You have freedom of thought,” Yang Qi told them. “In other words, you’re not puppets. Nor are you slaves: you’re free to continue growing stronger and stronger. But you’re now part of the legion of gods, subordinates of the Sovereign Lord. You should feel honored.”

Now they understood how mighty Yang Qi was. After all, he controlled the God Legion Seal. As of this moment, Laird Darkevoid, Daoist Nine-Deaths, Corpse King Miragespirit, Archdevil Zombielord, Young Sir Gold-Devil, and the Sauvastika-Devil Gentlemen had all been subjugated by Yang Qi and couldn’t ever betray him.

With a thought, he could kill them.

The warding spells vanished and the seven devil patriarchs rose to their feet, exchanging looks of helplessness.

“I would never have been able to guess that the God Legion Seal would appear again,” said Sauvastika-Devil Earth-Gentleman. “We have no choice but to admit defeat. What are we supposed to do now?”

“Nothing,” Yang Qi replied. “Just go back and grow your power and influence in the dao of devils. I want to have many subordinates like you, so do your best to recruit as many as you can. For now, stay away from the House of God Ordainment. If you joined, it would have too much of an effect on their destiny. And if the Nacrelight Sageland, Eternal-Life God-Dynasty, League of Wretch-Gods, and League of Academies all teamed up against us, it would be hard to survive.

“I’ll provide you with all the resources you need to advance your energy arts and get stronger. Incidentally, I'm aware that the top patriarch in your League of the Devil-Dao is a mid Unbounded expert. Where can I find him?”

“Our top patriarch is Devil-Patriarch Principium,” Young Sir Gold-Devil said. “He resides in the deepest depths of the earth, cultivating the Principium Devil Classic. No one else in the League of the Devil-Dao is even close to being a match for him. There are a few other Paramount Gods other than us, but that’s the sum of our forces.”

There were millions upon millions of experts who were part of the dao of devils in the god world, but the League of the Devil-Dao didn't represent all of them. They only represented a small fraction. No one could possibly guess how many total members of the dao of devils there were. In fact, perhaps the real Second Devil General was still out there somewhere.

“I need to subjugate this Devil-Patriarch Principium. For now, why don’t you seven go into the Cruiser of Civilization and work on your cultivation? I’ll transform your godhood and give you some of the true cultivation methods of the dao of devils. I’ll adjust the flow of time as well, to ensure that, by the time you emerge, you’ll truly be top experts from the dao of devils. You might consider yourselves important patriarchs now, but when it comes to your understanding of the true dao of devils, you’re like children.”

All Yang Qi needed was the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, and he could crush all hell-born fiend-devils. But he also had the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body and the Mahātmā Jade. It was no exaggeration to say that, other than the True Devil, no one knew as much about devils as he did.

“Many thanks, Milord!”

A wise man submits to the circumstances, and these seven devil patriarchs realized that they had no hope of fighting back against Yang Qi.

Thus, they simply went into the Cruiser of Civilization and started working on their cultivation.

Yang Qi could provide them with plenty of resources, and since they were already in the Unbounded level, with the right medicinal pills and ingredients, the five lesser of the devil patriarchs could all become Paramount Gods soon.

Unbounded experts were considered top potentates, but those who weren’t Paramount Gods were obviously inferior to those who were. The crown prince would never have any hope of being the emperor if he didn't become a Paramount God.

Yang Qi’s intention was to, in one fell swoop, ensure that the five devil patriarchs, Yang Immortal-Slayer, and Jadefall all become Paramount Gods.

Counting Yang Qi, the House of God Ordainment now had nine Paramount Gods, which was more than enough to surpass the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty and the Nacrelight Sageland.

The Eternal-Life God-Dynasty only had a single mid Unbounded expert, whose fighting prowess was similar to Yang Qi’s. That meant that, overall, the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty would be weaker than the House of God Ordainment on the battlefield. And with all the training they had received, and the continuing help from Yang Qi, the disciples of the House of God Ordainment were beasts in battle.

Not to mention the fact that they could use thrall troops. By now, Yang Qi could use the Cruiser of Civilization to make morphlings in the Perfect God level. With them, he could overwhelm the forces of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty in a fight.

With seven new devil patriarchs, the destiny of the House of God Ordainment should have grown dramatically. However, Yang Qi used special methods to ensure that it remained the same for now.

If anyone attacked the House of God Ordainment’s god kingdom now, they would be very surprised to see who was defending it.

Meanwhile, in the Deva Dynasty, on a sprawling continent that housed a huge temple, Yang Qi sat cross-legged, circulating his energy with a smile on his face. “Now that I’ve subjugated those devil experts, I can relax a bit. They can spend three thousand years inside the Cruiser of Civilization and only three months will pass on the outside. With the resources I've given them, they’ll become Paramount Gods, which will make everything a lot easier going forward.”

Having absorbed four pieces of the Mahātmā Jade, his psychic power had reached a higher level than ever. With almost no effort, he could make his monarch godhood vanish, then draw on his Annulled Grand Magic.

His fight with Patriarch Deva had led him to a much higher level of enlightenment. His godhood was in the early Paramount God level, and his will convergence was in the mid Unbounded level.

At this point, medicinal pills were useless trash to him, even those forged by Unbounded Experts. He had to continually temper his own quintessence to reach higher levels. Only things concocted by the Sovereign Lord, the High Priestess, or the Lord of Civilization could possibly benefit his godhood.

A mere single breath on his part was enough to inhale the same amount of power that ordinary Paramount Gods would get in hundreds of years of cultivation.

All of a sudden, he heard footsteps outside, and a moment later, a young woman appeared who was an Unbounded expert. She had an oval face and charming eyes, with luxuriant black hair piled high atop her head.

She was Princess Charming of the Deva Dynasty, a very important person there, and also the leader of one of its top secret societies, the one that was tasked with infiltrating other sects.

All of her subordinates were bewitchingly charming young women who excelled at seducing men. They could even sway the hearts of buddhas! Patriarch Deva had sent her to serve Yang Qi in his guise as the Second Devil General, with the true goal of extracting information from him.

Chapter 1361: Princess Charming

As she approached, Princess Charming smiled and said in a honey-sweet voice, “Mister Second, how has your cultivation been progressing lately? Can you give me any tips about the fundamental nature of the dao of devils?”

Anyone who wasn't careful would fall into the sweetness of her voice and be forever lost.

She was calling Yang Qi ‘Mister Second’ because although he was in disguise as the Second Devil General, there was no way Patriarch Deva would want word spreading that a consummate devil general from ancient times was present. Therefore, he had his people address Yang Qi as ‘Mister Second’.

Not even Princess Charming knew that ‘Mister Second’ was really the ‘Second Devil General’. She only knew that he was a vassal chief elder king, which meant he was very important.

Yang Qi was an early Paramount God, and his aura didn’t seem extremely impressive. Although Paramount Gods were looked up to in the Deva Dynasty, they generally didn’t deserve to be vassal chief elder kings. Because of that, some experts weren’t impressed by Yang Qi, and would even intentionally provoke him to see what he was capable of. When he simply sloughed off such provocation, it made him seem even more mysterious to some people.

Princess Charming was one of those people.

When Patriarch Deva originally assigned her to Yang Qi to learn from him, she had been completely unconvinced that he qualified to teach her anything. Yet none of her attempts to seduce him had been effective.

Sometimes, he ignored her outright, although he would occasionally provide her with useful aid.

“Princess Charming, your Red-Dust Devil Voice still isn’t quite up to snuff. Although you can seduce people on a physical level, you have no way to truly stir the heart and soul of any Paramount God. In fact, if you encounter someone strong enough, they might be able to turn your technique back around and use it to harm you. Patriarch Deva might have asked me to help you, but if you don’t put your heart into it, my help won’t do you any good.”

Princess Charming smiled. The truth was that she didn’t believe what Yang Qi had just said, and assumed he was trying to get a rise out of her. “Mister Second, I came today because there’s an upcoming banquet I was hoping you would agree to attend.”

“Banquet?” Yang Qi said. “Don't bother me with things like that. I’m only interested in furthering my cultivation. Patriarch Deva might have invited me here to serve as a vassal chief elder king to handle various matters, but that doesn’t mean I need to waste my time on trivialities. You think I have spare time for that kind of thing?”

“It’s an important banquet,” Princess Charming quickly explained. “You simply have to attend, Mister Second. The Nine Dragons Court and Sumeru Temple are both sending people here to do business. And most likely, cause problems. Patriarch Deva can’t attend, which means that you’ll need to take charge.”

“Nine Dragons Court? Sumeru Temple? Those are two important sects. In that case, I suppose I should go check in.” Yang Qi’s heart was already starting to pound a bit. The Deva Dynasty had amazing destiny, gathered as it was from countless billions of islands and continents. And the Nine Dragons Court and Sumeru Temple had destiny of a similar nature.

In fact, in some ways, their destiny was superior.

After all, the Nine Dragons Court had been founded by a patriarch of the ancient Dragonfolk. In the distant past, the Dragonfolk were extremely impressive. In fact, back in the immortal worlds, there was a thirty-third ranked immortal world called the Eight Tribes Heaven, where eight tribes of the Dragonfolk held sway over everything around them. Although Yang Qi had ultimately subjugated them, as far as ordinary immortals were concerned, they were an extremely impressive force.

There was little need to mention the Sumeru Temple. It was a group founded by an ancient buddhist school, and the buddhists were even more impressive than the Dragonfolk. In years past, the buddhist schools had built impressive organizations of faith, which put them in the position to rival the Sovereign Lord. Although they had paid lip service to following his commands, they had actually been more than willing to flippantly defy him.

The leader of the ancient buddhists hadn’t been on exactly the same level as the Sovereign Lord, but had at least surpassed the High Priestess.

Whatever organizations remained from those days were sure to be able to shake heaven and earth. And it was a given that the Nine Dragons Court and the Sumeru Temple would have immense treasures stored up.

Yang Qi didn’t know where they were headquartered, so he was curious to see what their people were like.

“There’s some more news, Mister Second,” Princess Charming said. “It seems the reason the Nine Dragons Court and the Sumeru Temple have sent people here is that they want to join forces with us to take a trip to the Bastille of the One God to dig up some more treasure. I'm sure you’d be interested in a venture like that.”

“Dig up treasure in the Bastille of the One God?” Yang Qi said, his heart rate increasing.

He knew that there was most likely a piece of the Mahātmā Jade there, which meant that he definitely had to go there eventually.

He waved his hand dismissively. “You lead the way. I want to see these people from the Nine Dragons Court and Sumeru Temple.”

“Right this way, Mister Second.” She led the way, transforming into a flash of mist that quickly disappeared. Of course, Yang Qi was locked onto her psychic fluctuations, and he was able to keep up easily. Soon, a palace appeared ahead of them.

Ranks of guards stood out front, all of them Consummate Gods clad in resplendent ceremonial armor. They also held gleaming weapons, and bristled with killing intent that made them terrifying to behold.

However, as Yang Qi approached, all of the guards offered crisp salutes and said, “Greetings, Mister Second!”

Obviously, Patriarch Deva had issued orders for them to do this. He was the true behind-the-scenes power, while his son acted as the emperor.

Convinced that Yang Qi was the Second Devil General, it was a given that Patriarch Deva would try to avoid letting anyone openly offend him. He had even left standing orders that every demand Mister Second gave was to be met.

That said, Yang Qi hadn’t made any excessive demands over the past few months. Instead, he had continued giving perfect caliber godstones to Patriarch Deva, which resulted in the dynasty’s destiny growing stronger and stronger.

The dynasty was large and powerful, but they had to spend a lot of resources on training disciples and keeping the spell formations running. With Yang Qi’s recent support, they were able to do all of that while also making plans for future endeavors.

Based on Yang Qi’s secret observations, he could tell that the destiny of the Deva Dynasty had increased by thirty percent recently.

If things continued at this rate, it would only take eight or ten years for the destiny to increase by several times over, at which point they would be able to easily conquer other nearby sects. In fact, it was likely that was the real reason the Nine Dragons Court and Sumeru Temple had sent people over. Although they said they wanted to join forces to go to the Bastille of the One God, the truth was that they wanted to get a sense for how strong the Deva Dynasty was, and what their destiny was doing.

‘Patriarch Deva is incredible,’ he thought. ‘Of course, it doesn’t matter that the Nine Dragons Court and the Sumeru Temple have sent people here. They’ll drum up some clues here and there, and eventually realize that “Mister Second” is responsible for the increase in destiny. But that’s fine. If they try to make a move on me, I can take out some of their experts, and also get some more information about them.’ It was more than obvious that Patriarch Deva was actually doing all of this in an attempt to deal with Yang Qi.

That said, he didn’t care. He was actually short on top experts now, so the more he could capture, the better.

Not even Patriarch Deva would be able to capture and puppetize Unbounded experts. It would be just too dangerous and draining. But Yang Qi was different. With the God Legion Seal, he was like the boundless Sovereign Lord of old, leader of the legion of gods and master of the God Legion Seal. Years ago, the Sovereign Lord had come to realize that controlling the god world was too difficult to do on his own, which was why he had created the God Legion Seal.

Perhaps Patriarch Deva could have captured five or ten Paramount Gods, but not hundreds. The slightest mistake, and one could escape, then turn around and unleash ultimate destructive power.

But Yang Qi didn’t have to worry about that.

In the end, the fact that the Nine Dragons Court and Sumeru Temple had sent people here was only going to benefit him.

“Right in here, Mister Second,” Princess Charming said. Yang Qi followed her into the palace and into a huge banquet, which had been roughly divided into three sections. In the host’s position in the middle were a few dozen Unbounded experts of the Deva Dynasty, including Paramount Gods. There was even a mid Paramount God!

On the left side, there were numerous monks with heads shaved clean. They wore kāṣāyas of different colors, including red, gold, and yellow. Some had austere expressions, and were well-built and physically intimidating. Those ones had a majesty and a baleful energy that would strike fear into the hearts of wretch-devils. Others were as skinny and withered as firewood, and looked like they might drop dead at any moment. Of course, those were the ones who were on the verge of transcending their physical bodies.

On the right side were the people from the Nine Dragons Court, about a dozen of them, all of whom were very domineering. There were young ones, old ones, and children, including both males and females.

Furthermore, everyone present was an Unbounded expert. Anyone beneath that level could only quality to serve food and tea here.

When Yang Qi and Princess Charming entered, they immediately attracted some attention.

Many of the gazes burned with a hidden passion for the alluring Princess Charming. Of course, all of those came from the Nine Dragons Court. Dragonfolk males were inherently licentious, even their top experts.

Chapter 1362: Nine Dragons Court, Sumeru Temple

“Mister Second is here....”

“Mister Second.”

“Only Mister Second could preside over this meeting.”

Some people rose to their feet out of respect, and of course, they were the people from the Deva Dynasty. Again, they were acting on the orders of Patriarch Deva to show him respect.

Despite their outward show, they secretly despised him. After all, he hadn’t done a single impressive thing after joining the Deva Dynasty. As far as they were concerned, important people like them shouldn’t have to show respect to something like this.

But in the end, they had to put on a show.

“Please have a seat, Mister Second,” said a tall, burly young man. “It's good you’re here to preside over this meeting.” This man was a mid Paramount God with a mid Unbounded will convergence. He was one of the chief elders of the imperial clan, and although he looked young, he was actually very old. He was Grand Prince Yi.

He had a lot of power in the military, and commanded a secret division of clairvoyants that could interpret the workings of heaven to divine information about the past and the future. And that enabled him to control the present.

In the past, he had often presided over various diplomatic meetings, so he was not at all pleased that Mister Second had been given that honor in this meeting. However, he was a wily old fox, and knew how to control his emotions. Therefore, he didn't do a thing to violate Patriarch Deva’s orders, and readily offered the seat of honor to Yang Qi.

The people from the Nine Dragons Court and Sumeru Temple were clearly surprised that someone like ‘Mister Second’ would be put in charge.

In fact, one of the young ones from the Dragonfolk glared at Yang Qi with piercing eyes and said, “Grand Prince Yi, you’re usually the one in charge of meetings like this. Why have things changed? Who is this person? How come we've never heard of him before?”

Smiling, Grand Prince Yi said, “Er, Young Sir Buddha Tyrant, please meet Mister Second. He’s a chief elder king here in the Deva Dynasty. Patriarch Deva himself ordered that he be in charge of all important meetings. It just goes to show how much respect the Deva Dynasty wants to show you.”

“Respect us?” Young Sir Buddha Tyrant chuckled coldly. “Your cultivation base isn't very impressive, Mister Second. You’re only a mere early Paramount God! In the god world, the strong have the power. How could an early Paramount God possibly preside over a meeting like this? This is supposed to be a show of respect?”

Instead of reacting with anger to what was clearly a provocation, Grand Prince Yi smiled and said, “Mister Second, sir, it's obvious that these Dragonfolk experts aren’t very pleased. I don’t see how we can continue the meeting, given the circumstances.”

He was obviously putting the ball in Yang Qi’s court, and waiting to see how he would handle the situation.

“This is a diplomatic banquet relating to national affairs,” Yang Qi replied casually. “It’s only natural for there to be differing opinions. Do I understand correctly that this brat is challenging my dignity? That’s a crime punishable by death. In fact, normally speaking, I would have all of these Dragonfolk executed. Considering my relationship with Patriarch Deva, I don’t want to cause trouble like that. However, to sate my anger, I’ll definitely take the life of this slanderous brat.”

He was being arrogant, domineering, cruel, vicious, and seemed willing to defy all laws and principles that existed. At the same time, he unleashed a powerful aura from the dao of devils. After all, he was supposed to be the Second Devil General, so he couldn’t allow himself to be perceived as being weak. And there was no way the Second Devil General would tolerate members of the junior generation being sarcastic to him.

Thankfully, his cultivation base had advanced a lot recently. The months of cultivation after his fight with Patriarch Deva had involved pushing the God Legion Seal and the Mahātmā Jade to newer heights of perfection. He had also remolded his own body. Although he might not be able to beat Patriarch Deva in a fight right now, he would at least be able to hold his own for a while.

It was a level of power that gave him the confidence to act domineering.

WHOOSH!

As the words left his mouth, a sinister stream of sword energy shot out, piercing through everything, filled with killing intent as it closed in on Young Sir Buddha Tyrant.

Young Sir Buddha Tyrant could never have guessed that this person would just attack him. Even as he realized that his instincts had betrayed him, space and time seemed to vanish, and he found himself in the middle of an empty universe, looking at sword light as it headed right toward him.

There was simply no way he could avoid this blow.

It was actually a combination of the sword techniques of King Life-Killer and Star Swordlife, and it contained the power of both life and destruction. Backed by Yang Qi’s psychic power and monarch godhood, it was definitely enough to slaughter Young Sir Buddha Tyrant.

Young Sir Buddha Tyrant was only an early Paramount God, so how could he possibly fight with Yang Qi?

“Stay your hand!”

“You wouldn’t dare!”

“Die!”

The sword moved with indescribable speed, yet the Dragonfolk experts were no slouches. One of them, an old man, simply blinked his eye to summon a host of god dragons that spun into the image of an undulating blue sea.

The sea, filled with ten thousand dragons, intercepted the sword energy before it could reach Young Sir Buddha Tyrant. However, the energy slashed the image in half, causing it to collapse.

Without a moment of pause, the sword energy continued onward and slammed into Young Sir Buddha Tyrant.

He shrieked as he was sent flying backward, blood spraying out of his mouth. He had been hit so hard that he immediately reverted into his true form, which was a buddha dragon. Landing onto the ground with a thump, he lay there panting, blood streaming away from him in all directions. His godhood had been shattered!

“What just happened?”

The monks from the Sumeru Temple looked over, shaken, but also secretly delighted at the misfortune that had befallen the Dragonfolk. Yang Qi had attacked with such a heaven-shaking, earth-shattering force that not even one of the Dragonfolk old-timers had been able to stop him.

That old-timer was named Buddha Lawtongue, and he was a mid Paramount God with mid Unbounded will convergence.

He was the leader of this diplomatic force that had been sent to investigate why the Deva Dynasty had experienced such an increase in destiny. He cultivated something called the Myriad Dragon Image, which was supposedly capable of blocking all types of attacks, and repelling all sorts of evil. Yet he had completely failed to protect Buddha Tyrant with it.

“What do you think you’re doing?”

“The Deva Dynasty is pushing things too far!”

“Is this a diplomatic meeting? Or an ambush!?”

“Fight! If they want to start attacking people in a meeting like this, that means they don’t care about the rules. That’s intolerable! The Deva Dynasty had better compensate the Nine Dragons Court for this, otherwise it’s going to lead to war!”

“To battle! We're the supreme Dragonfolk! We’re not afraid of the Deva Dynasty! We’ll slaughter all of them!”

In a very short moment, everything had changed. The experts of the Dragonfolk were rising to their feet, glaring angrily at the people from the Deva Dynasty. Some of them were even preparing to attack and kill Yang Qi.

At the same time, Patriarch Buddha Lawtongue flew over to heal the injured Buddha Tyrant.

“Is he okay?” said one of the Dragonfolk experts as he headed over to check on Buddha Tyrant. “What happened to him?”

“His godhood is shattered,” growled Buddha Lawtongue, “and his divine will regressed. Even if he survives this, he's crippled. He won’t make any further cultivation progress, and he’ll never be the same level of Paramount God again. Right now, he has Paramount will convergence and is only a Perfect God. Brutal! Ruthless! I can't believe they would harm his life force in this way!”

Buddha Tyrant had been injured so badly that he might as well be dead. Among the Dragonfolk, strength was everything, so as far as they were concerned, someone who couldn’t recover from an injury was useless.

Rising to his feet, Buddha Lawtongue stalked through the hall, his eyes blazing with such anger that everyone from the Deva Dynasty backed up, allowing him to walk right up to Yang Qi.

“You're a vicious person, Sire. But can you put your money where your mouth is? Your despicable act just now has made you an enemy of all Dragonfolk. Neither the emperor of the Deva Dynasty nor Patriarch Deva can do anything for you now. So you’d better take a long moment to think about what exactly you’re going to do next.”

From the energy that pulsed off of Patriarch Buddha Lawtongue, it seemed he was preparing to rip Yang Qi to shreds.

“Maybe a few billion years ago, I wouldn’t even have wasted words on you. I would’ve just exterminated the Dragonfolk. Don’t you realize that talking to me that way is suicide?” Yang Qi wasn't afraid at all, as he knew he could kill Patriarch Buddha Lawtongue with almost no effort.

The man had mid Unbounded will convergence, the same as Yang Qi. However, their godhood couldn’t have been more different. Buddha Lawtongue had high-level godhood, but how could it possibly compare to monarch godhood?

Yang Qi could fight people levels above him.

He had terrified Patriarch Deva into submission, so what did he have to fear from these Dragonfolk?

“Just who are you? What do you mean ‘billions of years ago?’” Buddha Lawtongue was hesitating. Yang Qi’s words seemed to indicate that he was some sort of almighty being who had lived billions of years ago, which would be the age of the Sovereign Lord.

In those days, heroes abounded, as described in the great myths and epic sagas.

“Hmph! Back down right now, otherwise you won’t leave this place alive. Patriarch Deva! Why haven’t you shown your face yet? I'm not in the mood to haggle with these brats. If you want my help to deal with the Sumeru Temple and the Nine Dragons Court, fine. I’ll help you. But if things get out of hand, you’ll have to deal with the consequences.”

RUMBLE!

At that point, Patriarch Deva appeared. Smiling, he said, “There’s no need to get angry, Mister Second.”

Chapter 1363: Bastille of the One God

Patriarch Deva had finally shown up.

Truth be told, he was quite surprised by how the events were playing out. Although he’d reached an agreement with Yang Qi, he had never felt completely comfortable about it. Thus, he had decided to observe him and get a better idea of what he was capable of. To his shock, Yang Qi seemed to advance rapidly with every moment that passed, giving no clue as to why or how.

This only convinced Patriarch Deva even more that Yang Qi was a clone of the Second Devil General, and that although his true self was being suppressed in the Bastille of the One God, he was able to send power to his clone.

On the one hand, Patriarch Deva knew that raising a tiger is inviting calamity, but on the other hand, he loved the increase in destiny Yang Qi was providing.

Thanks to the wealth Yang Qi had been funneling to him over the past months, he had increased his sect’s destiny by thirty percent. It was a shocking thing, considering that the dynasty had reached a bottleneck in growth, which meant that, normally speaking, it was a good thing for it not to regress, much less advance. The key to advancement would have been a huge treasure trove.

Unfortunately, although the god world had plenty of treasure troves left behind by ancient gods, most were located in extremely dangerous locations. Furthermore, over the years, many of those treasure troves had already been discovered.

Given the destiny at stake, there was no way Patriarch Deva was going to let Yang Qi slip out of his hands.

Seeing Patriarch Deva, Yang Qi snorted coldly and said, “You make the decision here, Patriarch Deva.”

“I don’t care, Mister Second,” Patriarch Deva responded. The pressure he emanated immediately locked down the entire area. Looking over at the Dragonfolk experts, he said, “Mister Second here was just joking around. Young Sir Buddha Tyrant, it’s only natural that I’ll restore you to your previous level.”

Whizz!

A god pill flew out and entered Young Sir Buddha Tyrant’s mouth.

“Eternal Encasing!” Patriarch Deva said, waving his finger to summon a sphere of primordial chaos, which surrounded him. Yang Qi could sense that time flowed differently inside the sphere as Young Sir Buddha Tyrant was healed, restoring him to his previous state.

Young Sir Buddha Tyrant rose to his feet, looking as good as new, as if he had never been injured to begin with.

“Friends from the Dragonfolk,” Patriarch Deva said, “this was all a misunderstanding. Mister Second has a short temper, so I’d advise against crossing him. My true self is in seclusion right now, but I sent out this clone to explain things. Now that the misunderstanding has been resolved, please continue with the subject of the meeting.” With that, the clone faded out of existence.

A mere clone of Patriarch Deva had suppressed the area, and as a result, the people from the Nine Dragons Court and the Sumeru Temple didn’t dare to say a word. And after the clone left, they looked at Yang Qi with odd expressions.

Patriarch Deva was as highly-ranked as the leaders of both the Nine Dragons Court and the Sumeru Temple, and such people normally didn’t make public appearances. Yet this Mister Second had summoned him with a single word. Even though it was just a clone that had appeared, the fact that Patriarch Deva had given him such enormous face was very telling.

Of course, Yang Qi was playing with fire. If Patriarch Deva knew the truth about him, the man wouldn’t stop chasing him until he was dead.

Flicking his sleeve, Yang Qi said, “For the sake of Patriarch Deva, I'm not going to quibble with you people. Let's talk about the business at hand.”

Many of the experts present were thinking similar thoughts.

‘Oh, I see. The destiny of the Deva Dynasty is increasing because of him.’

‘We have to report this back to the sect. And the patriarchs need to know how arrogant and unreasonable this Mister Second is. It seems highly likely Patriarch Deva tracked down some old-timer from the ancient era, and somehow has him under control. It’s likely this Mister Second has access to an immense treasure trove, and agreed to work with the patriarch. Apparently, he doesn’t really know how vicious and greedy Patriarch Deva is. Working with him is only going to lead to death.’

“Wonderful. Excellent,” said a monk in a yellow kāṣāya. “Considering the Deva Dynasty has an expert like Mister Second on their side, it seems we picked just the right time to come talk about business. We have no complicated reason for being here. First, we want to work with the Deva Dynasty to explore the Bastille of the One God. Second, we heard that the Deva Dynasty is buying up resources left and right, so we combed through our storehouses to find some medicinal pills and other treasures to sell to you. For perfect caliber godstones, of course.”

“That's fine,” said Grand Prince Yi. “We’ll take whatever you’ve brought. In terms of perfect caliber godstones, that’s no problem. Of all the things Mister Second lacks, wealth isn’t one.”

That alone was enough to let all of them know that Yang Qi was incredibly rich. And it confirmed their suspicions that he was the reason behind the increase in destiny.

Standing, Yang Qi said, “You wanted to call a meeting for that? That's it? Very annoying. You didn’t need to interrupt my cultivation for something like that. As for exploring the Bastille of the One God, fine. I’ll lead the people from the Deva Dynasty. Now, show me what resources you’ve brought.”

“Well, Mister Second, we have a host of god items, medicinal pills, suits of armor, spell formations, and the like, all taken from the ancient treasure troves of the Sumeru Temple. Unfortunately, we don’t have any godstones to power any of them. We're a bit short on funds right now. Altogether, these items are worth one million three hundred thousand perfect caliber godstones.”

“What?” Grand Prince Yi blurted in shock. “That much!?”

“Calm down,” Buddha Lawtongue said. “You still have us to deal with. We have about one million five hundred thousand godstones worth of items with us.”

“That’s too much!” Grand Prince Yi said. “How could we afford so much?”

“It’s fine,” Yang Qi said. Waving his hand, he produced a spatial crystal that contained a mountain of perfect caliber godstones. “Here are three million godstones. Take inventory of everything and identify all of the quality items. Have all of them sent to me, and you keep the inferior things. I have a deal with Patriarch Deva to improve the destiny of the Deva Dynasty.”

Even as Grand Prince Yi snatched the spatial crystal out of the air, Yang Qi turned and vanished. Grand Prince Yi stared down at it in shock, as did everyone else. Of course, many of them were now wrestling with feelings of envy or murderous resentment.

Suffice it to say, Yang Qi had made a big impression.

After the dust settled, and the people from the Nine Dragons Court and the Sumeru Temple left, Grand Prince Yi went to see the emperor to report on the situation. Obviously, Grand Prince Yi didn’t dare to take responsibility for the situation.

The emperor was a middle-aged man, exceedingly handsome, who seemed more like a kind advisor than a powerful emperor. However, he had immense power within him, and the truth was that only those who knew him well knew what he was truly capable of.

“Your Majesty, what should we do? We just acquired a huge amount of inventory from the other two powers. Given the number of perfect caliber godstones involved, they’re definitely going to try to dig for information and find out the nature of our savings. Do we give all the good things to Mister Second? Or do you want to keep them?”

After a moment of thought, the emperor replied, “Give the good items to Mister Second. He’s no simple character. Patriarch Deva personally instructed us on how to handle things, and we can't afford to be lax. For now, don't do anything to offend Mister Second. After all, he was the one that paid for all of this, and it's going to do a lot to fill our storehouses and increase our destiny.”

“Alright,” Grand Prince Yi said. “By the way, who should we send to explore the Bastille of the One God? It's going to be very dangerous.”

“Whenever we send people in there, casualties result. The place is not to be underestimated. That said, with Mister Second to lead the way, our forces should do well. Of course, now that they know he's the reason for our increase in destiny, it's highly likely they’ll send people to try to kill him. We shouldn’t worry about that, though. This will be a good opportunity to see how strong Mister Second really is. If he kills them, it’ll save us some trouble. But if he’s weaker than we expect, maybe we can arrange to have him eliminated, so that we can seize his wealth. We win either way, so why not take advantage of the situation? Do you already have a list of potential experts to recruit for the mission?”

“Yes sir! Here’s a list of all the experts in the court and in seclusion. If they lead our thrall troops into the Bastille of the One God, they should be able to successfully track down some magical treasures and medicinal pills. Furthermore, I’ll go along as well to direct matters.”

The emperor nodded. “That would definitely be for the best. The Bastille of the One God is extremely dangerous. It seems to me the Nine Dragons Court and Sumeru Temple are in a similar bottleneck as we are. They’re having trouble expanding, and not even finding a huge treasure trove will necessarily help them. It would be like adding flowers to the brocade. The Bastille of the One God is going to be where everyone really flexes their muscles. That’s why you need to be very careful. And if anything unexpected happens, make sure to immediately notify both me and Patriarch Deva.”

“Of course. Don’t worry, Your Majesty. I’ll definitely do everything necessary to further the glory of the Deva Dynasty.” Nodding obsequiously, Grand Prince Yi left to make arrangements.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi was in seclusion, keeping a close watch on events outside. Soon, he noticed a group of people flying along far in the distance, eventually landing on an island with a teleportation portal on it.

Immense spatial power swept forth, taking the group to the bottom of the ocean.

The ocean floor was a huge world unto itself. Down there, crystalline palaces could be seen everywhere.

It was the home of the Dragonfolk, and the seat of power of the Nine Dragons Court. Yang Qi had implanted Buddha Tyrant with a devil embryo, acting so surreptitiously that not even Patriarch Deva was aware of what he had done.

Chapter 1364: Bastille of the One God (2)

The ocean floor teemed with godlings, demonlings, and devillings of all sorts. Their population surpassed that of the humans on the surface. And not even the demonling population in the mountains and forests could compare.

It was easier to survive under the surface, where it wasn’t necessary to deal with the vile climate of the god world.

Of course, if you were swept up by the current and smashed into one of the enormous underwater mountains that existed below, you could easily die. But once familiar with life underwater, most creatures found survival much easier.

The Dragonfolk were a majorly domineering force underwater.

It was hard to say how far down the ocean went. It was as dark as night down there, far beyond the reach of light. However, one thing was certain: this part of the ocean floor was a hundred times larger than the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty and Nacrelight Sageland put together.

There were countless buildings, palaces, and castles to be seen, and teleportation portals that were active day and night. There were all sorts of undersea denizens who practiced cultivation that would travel through this area.

Furthermore, this area was surrounded by a tyrannical destiny that pushed away the dark and dangerous ocean currents.

This was where the Nine Dragons Court held sway, the location of centralized power that the Dragonfolk used to control the surrounding oceans.

And the central palace was a huge network of immense crystalline structures.

‘It’s huge,’ Yang Qi thought, ‘and the destiny is incredible. It almost turns the water solid! Ordinary people who came here wouldn’t even be able to swim.’ He almost felt like he was dreaming.

Mountains jutted up like massive clams, except the pearls they spat out were like suns that cast light in all directions.

Some of the cities were built on immense, slumbering sea turtles, each of them as large as a continent. Although they were still and unmoving, they pulsed with immense power.

If he could take the destiny of the Nine Dragons Court, he was convinced he wouldn’t even need the Mahātmā Jade to break through to a higher psychic level.

His Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth and Unspoiled Body could both use destiny to further cultivation. And in his Sage Monarch Grand Magic, the Ruler and Emperor aspects were similar.

With strong enough destiny, it was definitely possible to break through previous psychic limitations.

He was already coming up with a plan. He would work with the Deva Dynasty for as long as it took to start taking the destiny he needed. He already had a devil embryo in Patriarch Deva, although there was absolutely no way he could use it to take control of him now.

The only reason he was able to work with him now was by relying on his status as the Second Devil General’s clone. If the truth leaked, he would be in trouble.

**

“Damn it all!” spat Buddha Tyrant from within one of the crystalline palaces. He was in a meeting with Buddha Lawtongue and the others. “Who exactly is that Mister Second? His cultivation base isn’t very high, only in the early Paramount God level. But he sure talks big. And he used a really vicious sneak attack on me. And even Paramount Gods and the other old-timers treat him with a lot of respect.”

“You absolutely, positively mustn’t do anything rash, Buddha Tyrant,” said Buddha Lawtongue. “I suspect he has some sort of profound and ancient energy in him. He might even be some ancient entity who was injured and is still in the process of recovery. Otherwise, why would Patriarch Deva be so polite to him? Patriarch Deva ranks as high as our own leader! He doesn't go around being polite to early Paramount Gods!” Remember, the destiny of the Deva Dynasty increased by a shocking thirty percent recently, and it's all because of him. He must have an endless sea of wealth, otherwise he couldn’t just throw out millions of perfect caliber godstones without batting an eye. Soon enough, the destiny of the Deva Dynasty is going to surpass that of the Nine Dragons Court, and when it does, Patriarch Deva is going to attack us. He's a vicious and merciless old bastard who won’t show mercy or pity to anyone. When the time comes, he won't hesitate to wipe us out.”

“Damnation!” Buddha Tyrant raged. “The Deva Dynasty is the one that needs to be wiped out!”

“Our top priority right now is to tell His Majesty the emperor about all this. It's not as though we’re completely out of options. We already made the agreement with the Deva Dynasty to go to the Bastille of the One God. Once we're there, maybe we can capture this Mister Second and force his secrets out of him.”

The other experts of the Dragonfolk approved of the idea.

“True, that's a good idea.”

“That said, his cultivation base is very strong. What if we can't keep him under control? And he's going to be with other people from the Deva Dynasty. They’ll definitely protect him! Are we going to wipe out everyone from the Deva Dynasty?”

“Don’t worry about it,” Buddha Lawtongue said. “Based on the information I have about the Sumeru Temple, they’re already planning on dealing with Mister Second. With us working toward the same goal, how could we possibly fail to crush him? Besides, we can also call on our king of fighters and lord of destroyers! With his help, it definitely won’t be impossible to destroy this mysterious Mister Second.”

“What?” Buddha Tyrant said, a look of fear flitting across his face. “Uncle Lawtongue, are you sure we need the help of that freak? He might be the king of fighters, the lord of destroyers, and the master of fear, but he was imprisoned years ago by the patriarchs! They locked him up in the Eye of the Myriad Seas, ensuring that he’ll remain immobile for all eternity. I even heard that his cultivation base is almost on the same level as the patriarch’s. What if releasing him causes trouble?”

All of a sudden, a new voice echoed out. “The Deva Dynasty has already broken all the rules. We can’t keep playing the game in the same way.”

They looked over and saw a majestic man approaching, clad in an imperial dragon robe. The other Dragonfolk quickly dropped to their knees and chorused, “Greetings, Your Majesty!”

“Rise, everyone,” said the emperor, sitting down on his throne. “I'm already aware of everything that’s happened, and I’ve discussed matters with the patriarch. We’re going to take advantage of the upcoming mission to the Bastille of the One God to kidnap Mister Second. Unfortunately, although the patriarch has his differences with Patriarch Deva, he can't take action directly. Both of them are late Paramount Gods with late Unbounded will convergences, and both are on the verge of a breakthrough. However, we Dragonfolk have a trump card in the form of Buddha Testimony. He’s my younger brother, and although he was imprisoned in the Eye of Myriad Seas, he's already been brought in line by the patriarch. All he has to do is crush Mister Second, and he’ll earn his freedom. Cooperate with him in all sincerity. He is the most deadly secret weapon we have in the Nine Dragons Court.”

“Yes sir,” the Dragonfolk chorused.

Yang Qi slowly retracted his view. ‘Very impressive. I'm barely on par with the emperor of the Dragonfolk. He's already in the mid Unbounded level, and is a mid Paramount God. Furthermore, he has unique godhood in him and not even I can tell what it is. In fact, it’s more like a nest of godhood, filled with billions upon trillions of immense dragons.”

Thanks to his eavesdropping, Yang Qi now knew that there was an elite expert among the Dragonfolk, called the king of fighters, lord of destroyers. His name was Buddha Testimony, and he was actually stronger than their emperor.

If he was going to be lurking within their forces, Yang Qi had to be very careful.

He had also learned that the Sumeru Temple planned to make a move against him. Sadly, the monks’ buddhist bodies made it impossible for him to insert devil embryos into them.

It had only been in the moment he injured Buddha Tyrant that he managed to infect him.

‘There’s danger everywhere,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘That said, all I have to do is get to the Bastille of the One God and find that piece of the Mahātmā Jade. Then I can assimilate it and improve my cultivation base dramatically. Then none of them will be a match for me. I can subjugate the experts from all three factions, and when I head back, no one from the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty or the Nacrelight Sageland will pose a threat to me.’

The Mahātmā Jade was the key to it all.

Most people had to spend huge amounts of time in contemplation and training to make any progress as Paramount God. Even the most spectacular treasures couldn't really change that.

In fact, even Yang Immortal-Slayer had only reached the Unbounded level thanks to the incredible hard work of King Immortal-Slayer and the Purrling. And he still had yet to become a Paramount God.

Drawing on his cultivation base, Yang Qi established a connection to the House of God Ordainment.

The destiny there raged like a burning fire as it rapidly approached the same level as the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty and Nacrelight Sageland.

A small portion of it was being funneled into Eternal Millennium’s Harvestland, causing the martial-god soldier-kings to stir in anticipation.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi had seven agents inserted into the League of the Devil-Dao, all of them Paramount Gods with Unbounded will. With them, he would be able to recruit even more devils into his forces.

‘The time has come,’ he thought. ‘The Bastille of the One God is going to be dangerous, but I have to take the risk. Once I get stronger, I’ll finish Eternal Millennium’s martial-god soldier-kings and seize them for my own!’

Chapter 1365: Starting Operations

Somewhere in the House of God Ordainment....

Months were spent in rest and recovery. At the same time, massive amounts of resources were sent into the Cruiser of Civilization.

Yang Qi had purchased millions and millions of godstones’ worth of items from the Nine Dragons Court and the Sumeru Temple, then sent the best of it to his people in the House of God Ordainment.

They now had immense hordes of treasures, and actually didn’t have enough geniuses to spend it on.

Unfortunately, Yang Qi still didn’t know of any way to get back to the impure lands. If he could summon all of his people from the Sage Monarch Society there, he would have so many Ascendants in his forces that the House of God Ordainment would become a truly formidable organization.

On the upside, the Cruiser of Civilization could use the resources to create thrall troops and provide some help to his current disciples. The rest, he kept in storage, for use later when Eternal Millennium’s martial-god soldier-kings were finished.

Although the martial-god soldier-kings were formidable, Yang Qi had learned about some of their weaknesses from the crown prince.

There were also things he knew based on his experience with angels. Thrall troops could be powerful, but angels were the ultimate soldiers. There was simply no way the martial-god soldier-kings could match up to them, much less surpass them. Unfortunately, Yang Qi didn’t know how to create angels the way they had existed in ancient times.

Forgetting about angels, the Cruiser of Civilization could create morphling kings, which were in no way inferior to martial-god soldier-kings.

Unfortunately, Yang Qi couldn’t create morphling kings yet. He needed to push the Cruiser of Civilization to a higher state of functionality. Once he was a peak Paramount God with peak Unbounded will convergence, and had access to even more abundant resources, he would be able to.

After all, each morphling king would be as strong as an Unbounded expert.

There was no way the martial-god soldier-kings would be that strong. At most, they could reach the Perfect God level, and get close to being as strong as Unbounded experts.

[Beep-beep-beep. Beep-beep-beep.]

In a massive god kingdom in the Cruiser of Civilization, Jadefall, Yang Zhan, the Shepherd, and many of Yang Qi’s other friends and family were gathered on a golden platform, looking out at a host of enormous pods. There were so many of them they were impossible to count. These were the vivicreation systems.

Beneath each pod was a pool of liquid filled with crackling lightning. Strangely, this lightning wasn’t the usual silver color, but rather as red as blood. In fact, it somewhat resembled wriggling blood vessels.

“These are the vivicreation pods used to create the morphling kings,” Proud World said. “Is it really possible to create morphlings as powerful as Unbounded experts?”

“There’s one way to find out,” Jadefall said. “Although we can’t create the highest level morphling kings right now, at least we can make something that surpasses the Perfect God level. Call them morphling princes, if you will. Shepherd. Brahma. What do you think? Have you made all the proper adjustments to the various materials we need?”

“Don’t worry, Jadefall,” the Shepherd said. “Over the past few years, Yang Qi has sent immense resources to us from the Deva Dynasty. There’s no way we could use them all even if we tried. We have a huge stockpile built up here in the Cruiser of Civilization. Maybe we can't make morphling kings, but we can at least create a prototype. I'm also curious to see what level these morphling princes will be. And what will their godhood be like?”

“Prepare the materials,” said Yang Manifestation, who was none other than the former Sectlord Will Manifestation. “Yang Memory, start funneling the resources into the vivicreation tanks!”

RUMBLE!

A huge channel appeared, through which flowed a host of items including gems, flesh, blood, spirit medicine, medicinal pills, ores, souls, vital energy, and the like.

They were all rare items in the god world.

In addition, massive amounts of power also rumbled forth.

These were the ingredients that would go into creating a morphling king, and as they poured into the lightning-filled vivicreation tanks, they crumbled and melted into the liquid.

“Activate the vivicreation lightning!” Jadefall said, hitting a series of buttons to activate some of the functions of the Cruiser of Civilization.

Afterward, she turned to the people present and said, “Yang Qi is going to the Bastille of the One God, so all of you need to be ready. The Deva Dynasty, Nine Dragons Court, and Sumeru Temple are all going to target him at some point. Given the current level of his cultivation base, it’s going to be difficult for him to hold his own. In order to have a fighting chance, he needs some powerful thrall troops. This prototype morphling king, or morphling prince if you will, is what he plans on using to deal with Eternal Millennium. He wants to take his martial-god soldier-kings. If he uses the God Legion Seal to combine them with the secret reserve power of the House of God Ordainment, then throws in aspects of angel creation and his enlightenment of the True Devil’s techniques, he’ll create an extremely powerful weapon that will surpass even ancient angels.”

“What?” Yang Memory said. “Yang Qi wants to make thrall troops that will surpass ancient angels?”

Ancient angels were supremely powerful entities that could command great daos, subvert reality, and overcome any opponent.

“Yang Qi has a new idea,” Jadefall explained. “Because he has the God Legion Seal, he has the full legacy of the Sovereign Lord. With the sheepskin scroll and the Mahātmā Jade, he has the legacy of the True Devil. He also has King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions and all of the various legacies of the seventy-two monarchs. In addition, he knows the secrets of the Great Necropolis, and has cultivated the techniques of the purrling. Using all of those, he created his own unique Sage Monarch Grand Magic, which, although not complete, is more than enough to create his own thralls. In a moment, we’ll have a chance to see exactly how it works.”

Even as the words left her mouth, an immense will weighed down in the area. It was none other than the will of Yang Qi’s true self.

“Well, Yang Qi?” Yang Zhan asked. “Is your plan going as intended? You’re in a very dangerous situation there, what with Patriarch Deva keeping such a close eye on you. And he has his eyes on the purrling as well.”

“Don’t worry, Father,” Yang Qi replied, waving his hand dismissively. “Patriarch Deva can't do anything to me. That said, if he joined the Nine Dragons Court and Sumeru Temple to oppose me, I would have a hard time coming out of it alive. And if word leaked about my God Legion Seal, it would make things worse. That's why I've changed plans and am going to try to take out Eternal Millennium.

“I'd originally planned to stay in the Deva Dynasty for a bit longer. By absorbing more of its destiny, I could help the martial-god soldier-kings reach a state of completion, then kill the crown prince. Afterward, I was going to conquer the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty and Nacrelight Sageland, for use as a tool against Patriarch Deva and the Proud Clan. But now I don’t have time for all that. I need to deal with the Bastille of the One God first.”

“Oh, right,” Yang Zhan said. “Have you gotten any more good information about the Proud Clan?”

“The Proud Clan is very secretive. The information available in the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty, and even in the Deva Dynasty, doesn’t actually provide any concrete details about their headquarters. They just have too many branches set up in different parts of the god world. But considering they’ve imprisoned King Immortal-Slayer, it means they’re my top enemy. And I can’t afford to underestimate them.”

“I used to think the House of God Ordainment was large,” said the Shepherd. “But then my cultivation base improved, and I learned of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty and the Nacrelight Sageland. Just when I thought they were the truly colossal organizations, I found out about the Deva Dynasty, Nine Dragons Court, and Sumeru Temple. Do you think there are organizations even more powerful out there?”

“Of course there are,” said Brahma. “Based on my experience in ancient times, I can tell you that the House of God Ordainment is like a backwater village. The Eternal-Life God-Dynasty and Nacrelight Sageland are like small towns, while the Deva Dynasty, Nine Dragons Court, and Sumeru Temple are like large towns. There are definitely more powerful groups than them.”

“That's right,” Yang Qi said. “And although some of the God-Lords of ancient times vanished, some still exist. Forgetting King Immortal-Slayer, the most powerful person I've encountered in the god world so far is Patriarch Deva, who’s a late Paramount God with late Unbounded will convergence. There are definitely peak Paramount Gods out there with peak Unbounded will. There may even be people who surpass peak Paramount Gods, and are actually half-Annulled. And the organizations attached to such people are the truly powerful ones. Right now, we’re fooling around with the small fries.”

RUMBLE!

Around then, the materials being sent into the vivicreation tanks caused an immense rumbling sound. At the same time, perfect caliber godstones were being thrown in one after another. Not even the Deva Dynasty could possibly sustain an effort like this.

As the materials were inundated with the blood-colored lightning, a hulking figure took shape, like some sort of ancient devil king arising from primal-chaos.

It was neither humanoid nor mechanical in nature. It was flesh and blood, with thick hair that wriggled like tentacles.

It had elements of humans, devils, and beasts, yet was none of those. It had a human face, a beastly body, and walked on all fours. Its godhood pulsed with power, and when it howled, psychic fluctuations rolled out that could rip space-time to shreds.

“A prototype morphling king,” Jadefall said. “It definitely doesn't have Unbounded will convergence. Cruiser of Civilization, use the power assessment systems to analyze it.”

The photonic computers in the Cruiser of Civilization glowed to life, sending a beam of light to pass over the morphling. A moment later, the computers spoke.

[Beep-beep-beep. Assessment systems recalibrating. Henceforth, Lesser Gods are the standard. Early Lesser Gods have a psychic scale and godhood rating of one. As for this morphling, it has a psychic scale and godhood rating of three hundred thousand!]

Chapter 1366: Sage Monarch Magistrates

Early Lesser Gods had a godhood rating of one and a psychic scale of one. With that as the basis, it was possible to accurately assess a person’s fighting prowess.

Normally speaking, a Lesser God’s godhood would progress from the early level to the mid, late, and peak level. And in terms of godhood or psychic scale, their rating could never surpass ten.

It was only Common Gods who could go into the tens. Greater Gods rated higher than a hundred and could climb into the hundreds. Consummate Gods would surpass a thousand and go into the thousands.

Then there were Perfect Gods, who would go over ten thousand and reach the tens of thousands. Peak Perfect Gods were considered elite experts. For instance, Houselord God Ordainment had a godhood rating of over seventy thousand. The psychic scale operated similarly.

Even the most powerful Perfect Gods would never have psychic scales or godhood ratings that surpassed a hundred thousand. That was a hard and fast threshold. To break through it, one would have to have an immense level of genius, as well as incredible resources.

For instance, some of Yang Qi’s brethren had special types of godhood which enabled them to surpass a hundred thousand as peak Perfect Gods.

Jadefall and Yang Immortal-Slayer were even more impressive.

Both of them were already in the Unbounded level, which was beyond the level where people used numbers to calculate strength. As for someone like Yang Zhan, he had a godhood rating somewhere between one hundred and eighty thousand and two hundred thousand. And others in the group were higher than two hundred thousand.

Yet this prototype morphling had come into the world with a godhood rating and a psychic scale of three hundred thousand! It was stronger than any of Yang Qi’s brethren!

His brethren were all outstanding figures from the impure lands who had ascended to the god world and were considered top geniuses. And ever since he’d reached the Unbounded level, he had been giving them even more help to advance. He gave them the best resources and best advice, enabling them to reach incredibly high levels.

While ordinary peak Perfect Gods would have ratings of a hundred thousand, they had two hundred thousand. And it was much more than simply double the level of fighting prowess. After all, they were from the impure lands! In terms of power, reactions, senses, thinking ability, and life force, they were many times superior.

“Dear lord,” Jadefall said. “Am I seeing things, Yang Qi? That morphling king has a godhood rating and psychic scale of three hundred thousand!? The troops in the War God Commander’s Tally only have psychic scales and godhood ratings of about ninety thousand. This single morphling king could slaughter tens of thousands of those war gods!”

“None of us measure up to it!” Doom said. “Photonic computers, assess my godhood and psychic power!”

Light swept over Doom.

[Beep-beep-beep. Beep-beep-beep. Yang Doom, your godhood rating and psychic scale are in perfect balance, both being two hundred and eighty thousand!]

“You’re not even on the same level as this prototype!” Proud World exclaimed. “And if it was the full morphling king, how strong would it be? None of us could possibly measure up to it. Is it made of pure power?”

“A complete morphling king would be equivalent to an Unbounded expert,” Yang Qi said. “Jadefall, let’s assess you.”

“Alright!”

She stepped forward, and the light slid over her.

[Beep-beep-beep. Beep-beep-beep. Unbounded expert. Godhood rating: five hundred thousand. Psychic scale: one million, two hundred thousand. Psychic scale surpasses godhood rating, which is not quite on the Paramount God level.]

“See?” Yang Qi said. “It seems early Unbounded will convergence rates at about a million. And the godhood of Paramount Gods requires a million as well. An Unbounded expert is definitely many times more powerful than a peak Perfect God.”

Peak Perfect Gods would rate around a hundred thousand. And someone with a rating of a million could obviously kill someone with a rating of a hundred thousand as easily as popping a bubble.

Even the prototype morphling king, with its rating of three hundred thousand, would be ripped to shreds by an Unbounded expert.

“Now, assess me!” Yang Immortal-Slayer said.

The lights flashed.

[Beep-beep-beep. Beep-beep-beep. Godhood rating: three million. Psychic scale: one million, eight hundred thousand. With monarch godhood, advancement will be difficult, and breakthroughs challenging....]

“What?!” Yang Immortal-Slayer said. “My godhood rating is three million? Ordinary Paramount Gods would have a rating of one million. Shouldn't I be many times stronger than an early Paramount God? Although, I’m actually not a Paramount God myself.”

“That's because you have monarch godhood,” Yang Qi said. “If my speculations are correct, early Paramount Gods will have a godhood rating of a million, or millions. The mid level will surpass ten million, and the late level will surpass a hundred million. I suppose I might as well assess my own psychic scale and godhood rating.”

With that, he stepped forward.

A moment later, claxons started blazing in the Cruiser of Civilization, as though an incredible event were underway, which was draining the power in the ship.

[Monarch godhood and a Paramount God! Godhood rating, fifty million! Psychic scale... psychic scale... eighty million!] Even the photonic computers seemed surprised.

[According to the data in the heavenly workings calculations systems, monarch godhood normally surpasses psychic scale. Why is that not the case here? Further assessment required. Genetic systems, activate....]

He nodded.

His monarch godhood was currently in the early Paramount God level. Normally speaking, the godhood of a Paramount God would be rated at a million. Some such gods who practiced cultivation in that level might push their godhood rating into the millions.

As for mid Paramount Gods, they would break past the level of ten million. What that meant was that Yang Qi’s current godhood rating was actually superior to normal mid Paramount Gods.

And his psychic scale was at an even more terrifying level.

Once he broke past a hundred million, he would be ready to hold his own against Patriarch Deva, and possibly even crush him.

Everyone was so shocked it took them a few minutes to gather their senses. Finally, Jadefall said, “Yang Qi, your godhood rating is fifty million? And your psychic scale is eighty million? Doesn’t that mean you could create a psychic tempest that would destroy the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty?”

Smiling coolly, Yang Qi replied, “Given my current cultivation base, yes, I could. I'm fairly certain the current patriarchs of the dynasty, and the emperor as well, have godhood ratings and psychic scales of around twenty million. At most, their strongest member might be at around thirty or fifty million. In other words, beneath me. I could single-handedly go there and crush them with my will alone.

“I purchased a fourth piece of Mahātmā Jade from the Deva Dynasty, and that made me strong enough to handle both the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty and the Nacrelight Sageland. I even fought with Patriarch Deva himself. I've definitely reached a higher level of enlightenment. In fact, my will convergence is basically in the mid Unbounded level.”

“So are we going to kill Eternal Millennium right now?” Jadefall said. “Take his martial-god soldier-kings?”

“There’s no rush,” Yang Qi said. “I've gained enlightenment of a way to make a new type of thrall. With all of the resources I've purchased, we should be able to make some more of these prototype morphling kings. Jadefall, bring out the War God Commander’s Tally.”

“Alright!”

She produced the commander’s tally and summoned the numerous peak Perfect God thralls from within it.

“Heaven and Earth Furnace!” Yang Qi said, then filled it with thralls and morphlings when it appeared, including the morphling king they had just created.

“And now for the resources!” he waved his hand, sending countless resources from the stockpiles into the furnace.

Settling down cross-legged in front of the furnace, he sent the golden light of the God Legion Seal streaming out.

At the same time, the power of the Cruiser of Civilization activated, connecting with the Heaven and Earth Furnace to create a new form of life. Lightning crackled as flesh and blood came into existence.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi was mumbling an enchantment in some unknown language, causing intense psychic fluctuations to roll out. Genetic combinations swirled as all sorts of bizarre images appeared.

The depths of hell, the halls of heaven, the god world, the immortal worlds, the Great Necropolis, ancient images, seas, jungles....

Destiny also appeared, flowing directly into the Heaven and Earth Furnace.

The process lasted nine days and nights.

Suddenly, the Heaven and Earth Furnace trembled as an immense figure appeared within the tempest of blood inside, of humanoid shape, with a perfect body.

He wore a cloak that depicted mountains and rivers, plants and flowers, suns and moons, stars and asteroids, fish and game, great daos, and the yin and the yang.

This was a figure of immense authority, a top expert in all creation.

[Scanning. Unknown creation. Thrall troop. Unique life force and genetics. Unable to assess. Godhood rating: five hundred thousand. Psychic scale: five hundred thousand.]

“Did that many war gods really get combined into one form?” Jadefall asked. “He's strong, but he doesn't seem to be on the same level as the thrall troops in the commander’s tally.”

“This is just the first state of my new creation,” Yang Qi replied. “He's not complete. Eventually, he’ll form a new body. Then he’ll split into multiple forms. Furthermore, I need the martial-god soldier-kings to be part of the mix.”

“What kind of thrall is this?” the Shepherd asked, clicking his tongue in admiration. “It's definitely strong. Impressive, Yang Qi, but if you think you’re going to surpass the ancient angels, you might as well give up now.”

“I need to keep working on it,” Yang Qi said. “As for what we’ll call this new kind of thrall, it will be something completely unique. They’re going to be similar to the ancient angels in the halls of heaven.”

“What are we going to call them?” Jadefall asked.

“Sage monarch magistrates!”

Chapter 1367: Sage Monarch Magistrates (2)

“Sage monarch magistrates?”

Jadefall, Yang Zhan, Yang Immortal-Slayer, Yang Manifestation, Yang Memory, Yang Doom, Yang Proudworld, and everyone else was completely taken aback. How could they have guessed that Yang Qi would already have a name for his new type of thrall?

“That’s right,” Yang Qi said. “Sage monarch magistrates. They’ll be the most powerful type of thrall troop in the Sage Monarch Society. They aren’t slaves, but rather a higher form of existence. Eventually, they’ll run daily affairs, administer justice, assess disciples, and handle important business. In any organization, corruption is a big problem in the administration. And one corrupt administrator can cause problems for the destiny as a whole, eventually leading to the downfall of the organization. But our sage monarch magistrates will be both powerful and selfless. Their minds will be clean, and they’ll serve public interests with complete loyalty. Imagine the purity of our organization, and the nature of the destiny.”

Everyone nodded in approval and provided their own input.

“True.”

“It’ll be good to have them in charge of things like breakthroughs, medicinal pill distribution, assessments, arrests, law enforcement, and whatnot. It’s important for administrators to be impartial. The House of God Ordainment isn't large, but as the saying goes, the sparrow may be small, but all its vital organs are there. For example, in the past, many disciples formed cliques for personal gain, making unity difficult and resulting in an overall reduction in power. But after prohibiting personal conflict, we experienced dramatic growth. Without corrupt disciples, we’ll be much stronger.”

“That's right. Calling them sage monarch magistrates is appropriate. Very appropriate.”

Everyone seemed to be on the same page.

“Exactly,” Yang Qi said. “That said, don’t be too quick to rejoice. This is only the nascent form of a sage monarch magistrate. I still need to add in the martial-god soldier-kings to make the complete version. I'm going to the Harvestland to look for Eternal Millennium. With my Unbounded will, I can subjugate him and get him under control. Then I can work on the larger plan of taking over the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty and seizing its destiny.”

“Do you need our help?”

“No. I can do it on my own, and bringing you along would only be beating the grass and startling the snake. If the higher echelons of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty found out what was happening, it could lead to open war, and that would harm all my plans. Although we could beat them in a fight, it would most assuredly attract the attention of the League of Academies, the League of Wretch-Gods, the League of the Devil-Dao, the Nacrelight Sageland, and other major powers. And some of them would surely try taking advantage of the situation.

“So I want to accomplish this task with Eternal Millennium as surreptitiously as possible. If he were in the middle of the court, it would be very difficult to subjugate him. But he’s far away in that Harvestland he set up, harvesting destiny. No one in the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty will have any idea what's happening.”

“How long will it take? Do you already have all the information you need about him?” Jadefall asked. She had full trust in Yang Qi, especially after hearing the results of his assessment, as well as his plan.

“I know everything I need to know. What’s more, even though his Harvestland is a profound place, I have his will convergence clone, which will only make it that much easier for me to take control of the place. I’d hoped to prepare more for this moment, but I'm out of time.”

WHOOSH!

Yang Qi vanished, and when he reappeared, he was right outside the Harvestland. The place was enormous, and it was sucking in massive amounts of destiny, both to temper Eternal Millennium’s physical form, and also to grow the martial-god soldier-kings.

Yang Qi had taken a lot of destiny from the Deva Dynasty, and most of that had been given to Eternal Millennium.

Eternal Millennium was spending all of his time cultivating his energy arts, and wasn't even bothering to check in with his formal duties at the court. To him, power was the most important thing. Without it, how could he ever control the dynasty?

Meanwhile, Yang Qi was looking over the Harvestland as a whole. If he hadn’t been secretly funneling destiny to it, it would have been very difficult for him to find, as it was hidden in the middle of enormous spatial tempests.

Even Paramount Gods would get lost trying to come here without teleporting directly in.

But Yang Qi was different. Locking onto Eternal Millennium’s position, he quickly set up a spell formation to lock down the area and make sure no messages could be sent out of the Harvestland. Meanwhile, the crown prince was working on his cultivation inside, completely unaware that he was already trapped.

In the past, Yang Qi’s cultivation base hadn’t been superior to Eternal Millennium’s. But with four pieces of the Mahātmā Jade, and the time he had spent cultivating in the Deva Dynasty, he had replaced hunting rifles with cannons.

The crown prince sat cross-legged, slowly working, not with his energy arts, but with the magical laws of the universe. Doing this allowed him to gain a greater understanding of the great dao of the universe itself, and by extension, allowed him to grasp at the workings of heaven.

BAM!

All of a sudden, one of the heads of wheat collapsed, and a martial-god soldier-king appeared, its aura immense, with psychic fluctuations around the level of a hundred and fifty thousand.

The War God Commander’s Tally only produced troops in the range of eighty to ninety thousand! The martial-god soldier-kings were living up to their reputation. And these weren’t prototypes, but the final version, albeit not in a complete state of growth.

Eternal Millennium threw his head back and roared with laughter. “I’ve finally produced a juvenile martial-god soldier-king! Such power! I'm not disappointed at all. Just this one version is many times stronger than a peak Perfect God! But this still isn’t good enough....”

“You're right,” a voice echoed out, “it's far from good enough. That juvenile martial-god soldier-king has a psychic scale and godhood rating of a hundred and fifty thousand. That just won’t do. It needs to be more like three hundred thousand.”

“Who’s there? A hundred fifty thousand? Three hundred thousand? What are you talking about?”

Eternal Millennium was already on his feet looking around. Of course, he had no idea how the Cruiser of Civilization assessed cultivation, so he had no idea what Yang Qi was talking about.

“Ordinary Lesser Gods have a godhood rating of one, and a psychic scale of one. It's an ancient assessment method passed down by the Lord of Civilization, designed to gauge fighting prowess.”

“Who are you? How did you get into my Harvestland? Show your face!” Baleful energy surged within the crown prince, causing screaming winds to fill the Harvestland.

That was when Yang Qi appeared, standing only a few dozen meters in front of Eternal Millennium.

The crown prince had no idea how he had come to be there, but as soon as he saw him, he recognized his face. “Oh, it’s you, Yang Qi. You—”

“Yes, it's me. What do you have to say for yourself? Did you think that just because I joined your Crown Prince Society and gave you some destiny, that you controlled me? The truth is that I control you! I know everything about you, including the fact that you’re too weak to fight me. You wanted to turn the Sage Monarch Society and the House of God Ordainment into puppets. Sadly, what’s actually going to happen is that I'm going to take over the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty.”

Eternal Millennium stared at Yang Qi for a long moment, then burst out laughing. “For the first time ever, I actually misjudged someone. So, you’re some sort of top expert? I knew that although Yang Immortal-Slayer had reached the Unbounded level, Jadefall was still the leader of the Sage Monarch Society. But in the end, you were running things from behind the scenes. You’re the real villain behind the curtain, aren’t you? Not even a Paramount God should be able to sneak into my Harvestland without me knowing. Who exactly are you?”

“Yang Qi,” he said. “That’s my real name.”

“There’s no way. It’s impossible that someone as powerful as you would be a complete unknown.” The crown prince smiled coldly. “You’re definitely the patriarch of some top organization.”

“The god world is a big place. There are probably a lot of top experts out there you’ve never heard of. Furthermore, the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty is little more than a village that’s hardly worth mentioning. You really are ignorant and ill-informed, Eternal Millennium.”

“If you want to be like that, then prepare to die!”

Eternal Millennium suddenly launched an attack.

Thrusting out a palm, he drew on the power of the Harvestland, exerting such immense pressure that the magical laws of the god world, and even the great dao of the universe, started collapsing. Then he sent all of that immense power rumbling toward Yang Qi.

“Heaven-Fate Martial-God Palm!”

A domineering, invincible power was bearing down on Yang Qi.

However, he just laughed.

As the palm neared him, its force vanished as surely as a statue of an ox tossed into the sea. In the end, Eternal Millennium’s hand stopped about three inches away from Yang Qi, and couldn't proceed any further.

Chapter 1368: The End of the Line for the Crown Prince

‘How could this be happening? It’s completely impossible!’

Eternal Millennium's palm was inches away from Yang Qi, but couldn’t move forward at all. All of the power behind the strike was gone, neutralized by Yang Qi.

Yang Qi didn’t even have to make a move to defeat Eternal Millennium.

“You're far too weak, Eternal Millennium. Whether in terms of psychic power or godhood, you’re just completely pitiful. Your godhood rating is at about eighty thousand, and your psychic power is the same. I'm ten times stronger than you in terms of psyche. Furthermore, I’m only here in clone form. My true self is even stronger. That said, my current psychic power is more than enough to defeat you. You’re no match for me, so surrender. If you acknowledge allegiance to me, I won’t kill you. You see, we actually have some history. I have some of your will from the impure lands. In fact, here, you can have it back.”

“My will from the impure lands?”

Eternal Millennium took a few steps back, his eyes locked onto Yang Qi. “Are you saying that my rating is eight million, and yours is eighty million? That’s completely ridiculous. You’re just trying to frighten me! Tell me who you really are. You may be strong, but not enough that I can’t deal with you. You see, with little effort at all, I can call all of the top experts of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty here to crush you.”

Yang Qi clasped his hands behind his back and stood there. “I don’t think so. Go ahead and try. See if you can reach out to your allies outside the Harvestland. You’ll find you can’t. I've locked this entire place down.”

“No!” Eternal Millennium blurted. Drawing on all of his psychic power, he tried to send a message out, only to find that the entire Harvestland was covered with something like an enormous net.

“I'm telling you, your godpower of eight million is nowhere near enough to fight me. If you don’t believe me, try. You’ll be like a mantis trying to stop a war chariot.” Waving his hand, he said, “Come out, Crown Prince. See your true self.”

The Crown Prince from the impure lands suddenly appeared.

The two of them looked exactly the same, and had the same aura and life force characteristics. The only difference was their comparative level of power.

The Crown Prince stared at Eternal Millennium, his eyes glittering as unknown thoughts ran through his head. A long moment passed, and then he said, “So, you’re Eternal Millennium, my true self?”

“You’re my clone?” Eternal Millennium replied, a look of shock on his face. “That sliver of will I sent to the lower worlds? You look exactly like me! How did you get up here?”

“You’re really useless, did you know that, Eternal Millennium?” the Crown Prince replied through gritted teeth. “Yang Qi and I are mortal enemies through life and death. I was on my way to conquering everything in the impure lands when he came along and killed me. Originally, I’d hoped that once he reached the god world, my true self would be able to stand up to him. Apparently not!”

Instead of responding, Eternal Millennium reached out with his will to try to assimilate his clone. However, there was no reaction. The clone’s aura was the same as his own, but he couldn’t control it. Even worse, the Harvestland couldn't target the clone because of his fundamental nature.

“I have a question, Eternal Millennium,” Yang Qi said. Pointing at the Crown Prince, he said, “This piece of trash was very arrogant in the impure lands. He got the legacy of King Immortal-Slayer, and thought that would put him in the position to fight me. But then I killed him. I suppose if he hadn’t run into me, he might have ended up getting very strong. However, how did you get your sliver of will down into the lower worlds? Given the level of your cultivation base, even if you were ten times stronger than you already are, you shouldn't have been able to open a passageway. And you were surely even more pathetically weak back then than you are now.”

Eternal Millennium chuckled. “Thanks for reminding me, Yang Qi. It doesn’t matter how powerful you are, you can’t kill me here. You see, I have a top expert watching out for me. It was that very expert who gave me the ability to send my sliver of will down into the lower worlds. You may be impressive, but you can’t compare to that expert. He can crush you as easily as an ant.”

“Oh, who is this person?” Yang Qi asked. He’d known all along that Eternal Millennium had some sort of powerful backer, otherwise, how would he have ended up with the martial-god soldier-kings? And how could he have sent his will to the lower worlds?

“Hmph! Even if you could manipulate the workings of heaven, you would never be able to divine the identity of my backer. No one can possibly identify his aura.” As he spoke, Eternal Millennium was secretly gathering his power in the hopes of making a move.

“Oh, I know who it is!” Yang Qi suddenly said. “It’s a Fateless One, isn’t it? The same person who was connected to that woman from the Nacrelight Sageland. With one sweep of his palm, he crushed the leaders there. Not even the High Priestess could do anything to him, and in the end, he left behind the Destined Marriage God Temple. I bet it was him, wasn’t it!?”

“You...!” Eternal Millennium said, his eyes glittering with fear. “How could you possibly know about that? Although, it doesn’t matter that you guessed the truth. Fateless Ones are the strongest people in existence. He could kill you as easily as flipping over his hand!”

“Is that so? Well I’m going to subjugate you right here and now. Let’s see if this Fateless One comes to save you.”

Yang Qi was now getting serious.

He waved his finger, and the Crown Prince from the impure lands suddenly grew immensely larger, and simultaneously exerted forceful control over the Harvestland. There was great godpower in the Harvestland, and Yang Qi didn’t want to give Eternal Millennium a chance to draw on it.

Yang Qi was fairly certain that the Harvestland had been given to Eternal Millennium by that mysterious Fateless One, who had also left some of his power within it. If that power were unleashed, it would be very troublesome. Although Yang Qi could handle the situation, it would arouse the attention of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty.

That was why he was using the aura of the Crown Prince to keep the Harvestland under control and give him time to capture Eternal Millennium.

As Yang Qi strode forward, Eternal Millennium staggered backward, desperately trying to draw on his energy arts and magical techniques to save himself. None did any good.

“Acknowledge allegiance, Eternal Millennium. Acknowledge allegiance!”

Yang Qi spoke in a holy voice that connected to the Harvestland and wrested away control of it.

RUMBLE!

Eternal Millennium sensed that Yang Qi’s psychic power surpassed anything he could imagine. As it swept over him, it created an immense kingdom that shrank down and formed a prison around him.

Crack! Snap!

Golden manacles snapped into place on him, making it impossible for him to move.

“I refuse to believe I'm going to die at your hands!” Heart bursting with defiance, Eternal Millennium shivered, causing explosive power to erupt from his godhood, transforming into a huge dragon that snapped the manacles binding him.

“What's this?” Yang Qi murmured. “That’s not your power. Someone left some godpower inside of you to use in a moment of crisis.” An eye opened up on his forehead, which was none other than the Lord's Eye. As he examined Eternal Millennium, he saw that there was a smaller piece of godhood within his main godhood. Or rather, a godhood seed.

It was the size of a walnut, but seemed to contain an entire minor world that not even Yang Qi’s vision could pierce. And when he exerted pressure on it, it responded with a boundless level of power.

“This was obviously left behind by some top expert.”

A serious expression appeared on Yang Qi’s face. Although the seed wasn’t a threat to him, it was serving its purpose of protecting Eternal Millennium. And if things continued on as they were, it might make it impossible to fully suppress him.

Laughing, Eternal Millennium said, “That’s right, it’s a seed left behind by a top expert! I can’t normally use it, but if my life comes under threat, its power will be released!” He continued roaring with laughter as he surged with seemingly unending power. “Die!”

With no warning, he suddenly launched a palm strike.

It wasn't related at all to his previous palm move. This was filled with three types of killing intent; that from heaven, which could redirect the stars; that from earth, which could summon dragons; that from men, which could overthrow heaven and earth.

Three types of power. Three types of will. A combination of heaven, earth, and man!

“Nation-Fate Godfist. Bring Peace to All Nations!”

Yang Qi saw what appeared to be all the nations in existence, led by a sage who could unify all creation. All countries and peoples prostrated in worship, leading to a shining golden age.

“Bring Peace to All Nations? Nice move!”

Yang Qi blurred into motion, unleashing a string of moves that seemed like something that could exist for time immemorial. When a deva took control, it was possible to seize the cosmos!

This wasn't one of his top moves, but rather a consummate move used by Patriarch Deva. It was Long Life!

BAM!

Yang Qi’s fist met Eternal Millennium’s palm, and a massive explosion surged out from the point of impact.

Yang Qi wasn’t really affected, nor was Eternal Millennium. In fact, the latter even moved in for another attack, numerous streaks of light appearing behind him as he used another strange and deadly move.

He was currently operating at roughly ten times his actual level of strength!

“I'm going to take your life today, Yang Qi! I should thank you. Without you, I wouldn’t have been able to unlock the hidden strength within me!”

Eternal Millennium’s attacks grew swifter and fiercer, until he was a blur that shot upward; then he reached out toward Yang Qi with two pitch-black hands that could devour all living things.

“Eradication God Claws!”

Chapter 1369: The End of the Line for the Crown Prince (2)

Unexpectedly, Eternal Millennium had a power seed from some top expert hidden within him, allowing him to suddenly achieve incredible fighting prowess. In fact, he was now able to fight Yang Qi’s will clone.

A beam of sword light shot forth as Eternal Millennium used a consummate sword technique from the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty, combined with something called the Eradication God Claws.

“A thousand hills with no birds in flight, ten thousands paths with no human tracks.”

His Eradication God Claws were a truly consummate technique, merciless and vicious. The sword energy within it easily pierced through Yang Qi’s defensive empyrean energy, and the claws then attempted to rip out his soul.

“A very impressive claw technique,” Yang Qi said, nodding in admiration. “Not bad at all. Unfortunately, you’re dealing with me, so that’s not going to cut it. I'm curious to see what martial quintessence this Fateless One left within you. Is it enough to stop me?”

He stretched his fingers out and unleashed one of the consummate abilities of the Sage Monarch Grand Magic.

All of a sudden, something that sounded like zither music filled the air.

The Eradication God Claws started crumbling, and Yang Qi casually sent what appeared to be strands of silk out to wrap up Eternal Millennium until he couldn’t move.

“You coward, Yang Qi! Fight me like a man! I want to see how strong you are!”

“Fight you like a man? Alright.”

Seeing that the fight had reached this point, Yang Qi unleashed a palm.

Intense rumbling sounds could be heard as a huge tombstone appeared, stone-colored, but green with age, mottled with the passage of time, and slashed by swords and sabers.

The God Tombstone Palms were on display.

Yang Qi had a better understanding of the God Tombstone Palms than ever, and could use them to conquer everything in his path.

That was especially true now that he had monarch godhood to back them with.

POP!

The Eradication God Claws met the God Tombstone Palms, and the former couldn't pierce the latter. Instead, immense power rose up within the tombstone, which then exploded outward.

Then, Yang Qi leapt forth with another instance of the God Tombstone Palms, adding a second tombstone to the mix and instantly putting immense pressure on Eternal Millennium.

The tombstones slammed into him, causing blood to spray out of his mouth.

“What energy art is that?” he said, shocked.

“After you acknowledge allegiance to me, I’ll tell you all about it. In fact, I might even teach some of it to you. It's called the God Tombstone Palms. For now, just enjoy it. And watch how I use its power to bury your soul!” He chopped both hands out, causing numerous tombstones to appear that filled the Harvestland until it looked like an enormous graveyard.

Thump!

Tombstones slammed into Eternal Millennium, sending him staggering backward, dazed and shouting in rage. He tried drawing on the godpower seed within him, but sadly, his will convergence was too weak, making it impossible for him to unleash the full extent of its potential. He was like a child holding a sledgehammer; how could someone like that possibly defeat a powerfully built martial arts expert?

All of a sudden, Yang Qi vanished amidst the tombstones.

‘This crown prince has a very impressive godpower seed in him, left behind by a Fateless One. If I can take it and assimilate it, then temper it with my god legion angst, it’ll be a perfect asset to add to my sage monarch magistrates.’ Two tigers cannot live on one mountain, and now that Yang Qi had evidence there was another Fateless One in the god world, he knew he had to kill the other one to remain on the top.

“Power, activate!” Eternal Millennium screamed. “Oh mighty figure, consummate expert, I'm about to die! I need your will to help control the godpower within me!”

‘I can’t let him go around praying like that,’ Yang Qi thought. He was actually unsure if the spell formations he had set up outside would prevent such prayers from leaving the Harvestland.

‘I’ll use my god legion angst to combine the two crown princes, down to their very soul!’

Yang Qi suddenly unleashed a consummate move.

The Crown Prince shivered, and a blank expression could be seen on his face as he shot toward Eternal Millennium, flying along inside a huge bubble.

Eternal Millennium couldn't do anything to stop it. The Crown Prince from the impure lands smashed into him, then popping sounds could be heard as the two of them combined.

The Crown Prince from the impure lands was under the control of the God Legion Seal, and now he was becoming one with Eternal Millennium. Immense shockwaves rolled out as they struggled, but eventually, the godpower seed ceased to move.

‘Hmph. Not even that Fateless One could have predicted this would happen. I captured Eternal Millennium’s sliver of will, controlled it with the God Legion Seal, then combined it with the original. Now I have the true self under my control!’

Yang Qi flew over, clamped his hand down onto Eternal Millennium's true self, and sent golden light streaming into his sea of consciousness.

Deep within the God Legion Seal, a golden throne arose and fused with another throne that had already existed there.

Another god had been subjugated.

The Harvestland went still and quiet as Yang Qi's will spread through it, taking control of everything.

He quickly realized that the Harvestland was a treasure, but it was incomplete. And there was an inherent preheaven vital energy in it that he needed to study further before he could understand it.

However, he didn't need any extra time to deal with the martial-god soldier-kings.

After taking control of everything, he sent his will out to stimulate Eternal Millennium.  Eternal Millennium howled and his eyes snapped open.

Then he looked over at Yang Qi with clarity in his eyes, but at the same time, mixed emotions.

“So, it turns out you're the bearer of the God Legion Seal.” By this point, he had completely fused, and was both the Crown Prince from the impure lands, and Eternal Millennium, crown prince of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty.

That said, they had started out as a single person anyway.

“You’re whole again, Crown Prince,” Yang Qi said. “So now what do you think? I can do whatever I want to you. You're like the ancient legion of gods, subservient to something greater and more glorious than you.”

Venom flaring in his eyes, Eternal Millennium said, “If you’ve got what it takes, Yang Qi, just kill me. You've already done it once. You killed me in the impure lands, and now you need to kill my true self. If you don’t, the time will come when you’ll eventually fall completely into my hands.”

Eternal Millennium had been consumed by hatred that could never be washed away.

Yang Qi chuckled coldly. “That’s fine. If you think you can kill me, you’re welcome to try. You see, even if you want to chop me into a million pieces, you can’t actually defy my wishes. That said, I don’t think I’ll give you a chance to try. What’s your plan? Become a Paramount God and then go against me?”

“Look, Yang Qi, either kill me, or I’ll kill you. Maybe you can monitor my thoughts, but don’t rejoice quite yet. The God Legion Seal is powerful, but remember what happened in the past. The legion of gods rebelled, bringing tribulation with them. In the end, the Sovereign Lord perished. That’s what he got for trying to control the thoughts of the gods. Death! And the same thing is going to happen to you.”

At this point, he had no hope left. He had been killed in the impure lands, and thanks to Yang Qi’s plots, his true self had been captured. Now he was Yang Qi’s puppet, without even the capacity to kill himself if he wanted.

“If that's what you want, so be it.”

However, Yang Qi had already planned for this. “I want to make the ultimate thrall, and what I'm missing is a backbone for it. That's where you come in. As a Paramount God, you’ll serve as the perfect foundation. You even have the godpower seed of a Fateless One. I'm going to take you and this Harvestland, as well as the martial-god soldier-kings, and add them to my sage monarch magistrates. You’ll still be Eternal Millennium, but you’ll be colder and more ruthless. And you’ll be just the tool I need to take over the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty and seize its destiny.”

Chapter 1370: Tribulation Monarch Cannon

“No! You can't do this! You want to turn me into some thrall that isn’t even a person or a ghost?” the crown prince said, visibly appalled. “I’d rather you kill me than turn me into some cold-blooded freak with no thoughts or feelings of my own. That would be torture!”

“You chose this,” Yang Qi said, reaching out and grabbing the crown prince, then floating up into the air. At the same time, he thrust his palm out, causing numerous cracks and craters to appear on the surface of the Harvestland.

Growing physically larger, he rose into the spatial tempests, looking down at the Harvestland below. Then, with a mere thought, he summoned the Flame of Hope, causing fist-sized tongues of flame to descend on the land below, almost like snowflakes.

“Destiny!”

He made a grasping gesture, causing the destiny of the House of God Ordainment and the Deva Dynasty to rush toward him. Simultaneously, destiny from the League of the Devil-Dao and the Nacrelight Sageland also flowed in his direction.

After all, he had Mother Voidwalker, Summer Soundfyre, and Summer Vastcold in the Nacrelight Sageland, working for him to acquire resources, and simultaneously advancing their cultivation. They were his pawns in that sect, there to help take destiny.

In the League of the Devil-Dao, he had five Unbounded experts and two Paramount Gods as pawns. With them working for him, it was even easier to take some of the destiny of that sect.

Now he was using all of it to fuel the Harvestland.

RUMBLE!

The Harvestland trembled as its surface was ripped off and sent into the crown prince’s body, including all of the martial-god soldier-king seeds. As his genes were unlocked and power coursed through him, the crown prince screamed shrilly. However, he couldn’t stop Yang Qi’s will from transforming him from the inside out. The crown prince writhed as he slowly became an unfeeling, merciless, cold-blood, and loyal servant. His life, genes, soul, and thoughts were now a combination of the martial-god soldier-kings, morphlings, and war gods from the commander's tally.

All of a sudden, a deep wailing sound filled the void.

Yang Qi made a grasping gesture and a spatial passageway appeared, out of which a hulking shape emerged. It was none other than the sage monarch magistrate he had created earlier.

The magistrate flew out and landed hard onto the surface of the Harvestland, and almost immediately, his life force and genes began to transform dramatically.

Yang Qi threw out both of his hands, causing complex sealing marks to fly out and make an intricate design that was none other than the Sage Monarch Grand Magic. As it merged into the magistrate, it filled him with all of Yang Qi’s accumulated knowledge of thralls and administrators.

“When the world is at peace, the government requires magistrates such as this. Selfless. Unfeeling. Cold-blooded. Ruthless. They must operate according to the law, not their own will....” As he poured his thoughts and understanding into the sage monarch magistrate, the seed pods throughout the Harvestland started exploding like popcorn, sending genetic material flying into the crown prince.

At this point, the crown prince and the sage monarch magistrate started fusing. Destiny rumbled like an enormous river as Yang Qi drew on everything he had accumulated up to this point and threw it into his new creation.

The new creation sat there in the middle of the Harvestland, a consummate god embryo.

As the Cruiser of Civilization continued pouring resources into him, numerous spell formations popped into being around him.

“Blood of the One God!”

In the most critical of moments, Yang Qi stabbed his own chest, causing the Blood of the One God to pour forth into the Harvestland.

Countless memories and fractions of civilizations appeared as the blood was sacrificed into the sage monarch magistrate.

Time passed.

Gradually, the crown prince vanished, having been completely absorbed into the magistrate. The Harvestland’s martial-god soldier-kings were also gone.

Something brand new had been created.

This was the true sage monarch magistrate.

He hovered in the void, the perfect man, his features chiseled, his eyes glittering with unswerving determination. It was obvious that this was the kind of man who would never be swayed from whatever tasks he set out to do.

His limbs were like those of an exquisitely sculpted statue, and his skin was fair and glossy. He thrummed with power and ability, making it seem like he could accomplish any mission.

There was a seed of power within him that no one could possibly comprehend. However, as the moments ticked by, it gradually turned golden. That seed had been provided to the crown prince to give him power and further his cultivation, and it only seemed to be growing stronger.

RUMBLE!

Yang Qi’s will suddenly shot out and pierced into the seed of power.

According to his original estimate, he didn’t think that the sage monarch magistrate would be completed even after absorbing the crown prince. But how could he ever have guessed that the crown prince would actually have the power of a Fateless One within him? That was a power that surpassed humans!

Not even Patriarch Deva could measure up to this power seed’s substructure.

Yang Qi knew that the seed would contain many profundities, so he used the crown prince’s substructure to fool it. As a result, it erupted with power to help the crown prince. But Yang Qi simply used the Life-Death Void-Destruction God-Lightning to ensure that all of the changes benefited the sage monarch magistrate.

Furthermore, Yang Qi could tap into that power to determine the general location of the Fateless One that was its origin.

If someone killed the crown prince, that Fateless One would know it instantly. The same would happen if someone tried forcibly assimilating the power seed. But Yang Qi was using the crown prince’s own cultivation base to do what he was doing. And considering he was also using the Life-Death Void-Destruction Lightning, there was no way the other Fateless One would have any idea what was going on.

Of course, it was all made more complicated by the fact that Yang Qi was also a Fateless One.

With a psychic scale in the tens of millions, it was an easy task for him to send his will into the crown prince’s sea of consciousness and fuse with him. As the crown prince transformed down to his substructure and soul, the seed of power erupted, causing a complex, multilayered design to appear behind him. It was composed of numerous bizarre colors, and depicted palaces and temples that made up a huge nation. Next, a man in white clothing appeared, hands clasped behind his back as he stood in a palace and looked out into the depths of the universe. It begged the question of what he was thinking.

‘This is the Fateless One in question?’ Yang Qi thought. Inwardly, he chuckled, but he didn’t take action yet. He just observed, making every effort to commit this person’s aura to memory, and to remember all the details of his substructure.

‘Time to assimilate this power seed!’

Drawing on the psychic power of the Mahātmā Jade, he forced Eternal Millennium into a standing position. As he rose, the images of the palaces and the white-garbed man collapsed, transforming into a milky fluid that rose up, then descended back down.

The flow of power absorbed the destiny of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty and fused into the sage monarch magistrate.

A huge explosion occurred as Yang Qi also transformed. Golden strands erupted from this forehead, creating genetic shackles that connected him to the heavenly workings calculations systems in the Cruiser of Civilization.

And the imperial-heaven pre-beginning systems roared to life.

Heaven and earth collapsed as numerous tribulations appeared within the void. Monsters and devils of all kinds appeared, descending with deadly abandon. However, the sage monarch magistrate was alert, his eyes blazing as he vanquished every tribulation that descended.

About twenty hours passed, then everything went quiet.

All of a sudden, an elegant system of order spread out in the area. At the same time, the tinkling of bells could be heard, almost like the gurgle of a fountain.

‘Time to create the ultimate weapon!’

Yang Qi drew on his will, causing an enormous and ancient cannon to form behind the sage monarch magistrate. It was different from the Grand Tribulation Cannon, and was the result of immense amounts of enlightenment that Yang Qi had achieved.

‘Henceforth, every sage monarch magistrate that I create will have unsurpassed martial skill, and the ability to slaughter the enemy on a horrific scale. Now that this initial master version of the sage monarch magistrate has been created, producing duplicates will only require enough godstones.’

To prepare for this day, Yang Qi had created a stockpile of perfect caliber godstones the likes of which couldn’t be rivaled even by the combined stockpiles of the Deva Dynasty, Nine Dragons Court, and Sumeru Temple.

By pouring those godstones into the body of the sage monarch magistrate, it made him capable of unleashing unimaginable destruction.

With those stones used in a formation, they would literally be capable of wiping out continents like the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty or the Nacrelight Sageland.

All of a sudden, the sage monarch magistrate started splitting in half.

Creak, crunch.... Creak, crunch....

A new body formed, a new sage monarch magistrate.

The sage monarch magistrates weren’t humans, demons, devils, or robots. They were an existence unto their own. And they could reproduce asexually.

New body after new body appeared, hundreds in number. Though they weren’t as strong as the master version, as soon as they appeared, their godhood formed and began to rise. From a godhood rating of a hundred thousand, it went to two hundred thousand, three hundred, five hundred, then eight hundred thousand. That was where it ultimately stopped.

Chapter 1371: Tribulation Monarch Cannon (2)

Godhood rating: eight hundred and eighty thousand. Psychic scale: eight hundred and eighty thousand!

Those were the ratings that all of the sage monarch magistrates achieved. Already, there were several hundred, representing hundreds of millions of perfect caliber godstones. And they were continuing to split apart into new versions.

What did it mean to have a godhood rating of eight hundred and eighty thousand? Paramount Gods only had a rating of one million. And the same went for psychic scale.

In other words, each of these sage monarch magistrates could actually escape from a conflict with an Unbounded expert.

Back when Yang Qi created his morphling king, it only had a psychic scale of three hundred thousand. These sage monarch magistrates were beyond compare!

It was a given that they needed to be strong. And although they weren’t in the Unbounded level, they were definitely powerful. Even more impressive was that, with enough perfect caliber godstones, it was easy for them to split apart and create new versions.

Of course, the only reason they were so incredibly strong was because they had benefited from the martial-god soldier-kings, the Harvestland, the War God Commander’s Tally, various morphling kings, and an incalculable amount of resources. Plus, there was even the power of an ancient and almighty Fateless One, thanks to Eternal Millennium.

Only Yang Qi was capable of something like this. And going forward, he would have the sage monarch magistrates continue to reproduce.

“Gather!” Yang Qi said, drawing on his divine will.

The sage monarch magistrates grouped together in ranks, according to Yang Qi’s wishes. Visible on their right arms were ancient cannons, which they extended and pointed forward.

RUMBLE!

A massive roar echoed forth as they fired the cannons, carving out a huge path ahead of them that stretched far into the distance.

It was an ancient road filled with tribulations and the energy of monarchs.

After all, the sage monarch magistrates also had the genes of the seventy-two monarchs in them. They were so incredible that it would be very difficult for anyone to kill them.

‘What power!’ Yang Qi thought, looking at the road of tribulations with a smile on his face. ‘Who could be a match for me now? With the sage monarch magistrates, my power is only going to grow going forward. With these thrall troops, I can go to the Bastille of the One God unafraid of any sort of crafty plots and machinations.”

‘Each magistrate wields a Tribulation Monarch Cannon, which is superior even to the Grand Tribulation Cannon. There’s no need to even mention what the sage monarch magistrates can do when working together. Even one of them alone is strong enough to injure an Unbounded expert.’

With that, Yang Qi flicked his sleeve and sucked in the sage monarch magistrates. The Harvestland and Eternal Millennium also vanished.

Then, he headed back to the House of God Ordainment.

“What happened, Yang Qi?” Jadefall asked. “Did you subjugate Eternal Millennium? Why did the sage monarch magistrate suddenly fly away? Did something go wrong?”

“Everything went perfectly. In fact, I encountered something good that I wasn't expecting. And I succeeded in completing my sage monarch magistrates.” With that, he went on to explain everything that had played out, including the discovery of a power seed from another Fateless One.

Jadefall was shocked, and couldn’t help but say, “Are you telling me that the sage monarch magistrates are strong enough to match up to an Unbounded expert? And maybe even fight early Paramount Gods?”

Yang Qi smiled. “You could say that. I now have several hundred sage monarch magistrates. With the addition of the master version, they’re incredibly strong. And I’ll continue making more on a daily basis. As long as the sage monarch magistrates have enough godstones, they can split apart and make new versions of themselves.”

“Incredible!” Jadefall exclaimed. “Their potential for further growth is staggering. The sage monarch magistrates are the ultimate type of thrall. They even surpass the ancient angels, although they're still not quite as powerful as archangels.”

“Well that’s a given. My cultivation is still relatively limited. Once I get to the peak of the Paramount God level, and my thralls become Paramount Gods, things will change. I'm taking the sage monarch magistrates with me, but I’ll leave behind the master version, which can assume the form of Eternal Millennium. He can be used to take over the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty.”

Yang Proudworld, the Shepherd, and everyone else chuckled.

“Perfect,” said Yang Proudworld. “We’ll help the sage monarch magistrate infiltrate the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty and slowly take control of it.”

“Upon your return, Yang Qi,” said the Shepherd, “we all hope to rise to the Unbounded level.”

“Indeed. Just wait for me to come back.” With that, Yang Qi left with the host of sage monarch magistrates, leaving behind only the master version, who had already assumed the physical appearance of Eternal Millennium.

The massive stockpiles of resources the House of God Ordainment had been working on were almost completely used up, and the destiny reserves had all gone into making the sage monarch magistrates. Any expert who came along and checked the destiny of the sect would think that they had befallen some sort of calamity. It would actually serve as a great distraction.

“Pass along orders to have everyone hunker down and pretend we’ve suffered a huge loss,” Jadefall said. “And send Eternal Millennium back to the dynasty to start taking over. Let everyone know that the House of God Ordainment now belongs to the crown prince and has offered him complete loyalty!”

“Yes ma’am!” Numerous experts nodded in affirmation and then went about spreading the orders.

Three days passed.

Far, far away, in the Deva Dynasty, which would take even Paramount Gods years of flying to reach, Yang Qi’s true self opened his eyes. At the same time, he opened a space-time passageway within himself.

The sage monarch magistrates poured into him, causing his monarch godhood to shiver as though it might rise to a higher level.

Up until now, his godhood had been unable to reach the mid Paramount God level, but with the sage monarch magistrates within him, he was reaching a higher level of enlightenment.

The sage monarch magistrates were his thralls, and as such, were a part of him.

Crack!

As the sage monarch magistrates entered his true self, he tapped into the collection of godstones and godpower he had built up over the past three days.

As that happened, more sage monarch magistrates split off. Each one was like having a new Unbounded expert on his side, ready to fight to the death for him.

If he got another piece of the Mahātmā Jade, and could improve his psychic power even more, then he could make more perfect caliber godstones and sage monarch magistrates.

‘Excellent,’ he thought, sensing the rise in his fighting prowess. He sensed that he could now hold his own for even longer against people like Patriarch Deva, and as time went on, his cultivation base would only continue growing stronger.

Chapter 1372: A Month Delay

Seven days passed, during which Yang Qi sat there still and unmoving. Of course, he was practicing cultivation, seeking enlightenment of profound mysteries, building up resources, and splitting off more sage monarch magistrates.

The process of making more sage monarch magistrates was providing him with a deeper understanding of all sorts of profound matters, including secrets of thralls, the quintessence of the martial path, and the substructure of Fateless Ones.

It was also pushing his cultivation base toward a higher level.

His progress was rapid. He had added seven sage monarch magistrates during the past seven days, and each one improved his breathing exercises, vital energy quality, and his cultivation base in general. It was similar to how an increase in population would benefit a nation. Although it would need to expend resources to sustain such citizens, when they went to work for their country, they could make it stronger and wealthier.

Sage monarch magistrates were different from ordinary thralls. Ordinary thralls required a constant intake of resources, similar to how mortal soldiers in the impure lands needed to be fed.

But the sage monarch magistrates could absorb power from the void itself. After all, they also had the aura of the God Legion Seal within them. Of course, they couldn't absorb that power as quickly as the God Legion Seal itself. But even the slow rate they were capable of was nothing to look down on. In the future, as they built their power and propagated further, they would become their own race of people, self-sustaining and forever-growing.

That was one of the outstanding features of the sage monarch magistrates.

During the course of Yang Qi’s cultivation, he had learned a lot about ancient angels, and knew the differences between them and his sage monarch magistrates. And he had used that knowledge to make something more perfect.

In some ways, he had become like heaven and earth.

Heaven and earth had given rise to humans, which meant that humans were a part of heaven and earth. And Yang Qi had given rise to the sage monarch magistrates, which were a part of him.

In that respect, they were actually superior to thralls, and existed as a higher state of being. Furthermore, they weren’t clones. Their profundities could be understood, but not fully explained with words.

As Yang Qi sank into further enlightenment, he understood more and more of the secrets related to the Sovereign Lord and his angels. And he unraveled one riddle after another regarding them.

All of a sudden, Princess Charming appeared outside of his cultivation chamber. “Mister Second?” she said in a soft voice. “Mister Second?”

“What happened? Why have you come to see me?” Yang Qi opened his eyes, and they flashed with coldness.

A look of disappointment flitted across Princess Charming’s face. She had been waiting on Mister Second for so long, and was considered so beautiful and skilled at the arts of seduction that she had hoped to have long since taken advantage of him, luring him into giving her some or all of his wealth. But Mister Second seemed as cold as ice, and no matter what she did, it didn’t seem to have any effect on him.

She was even starting to get the sense that Mister Second was actually some sort of ancient devil king who she couldn't afford to provoke.

“Well, it’s like this. The experts from the Nine Dragons Court and Sumeru Temple have sent messages saying they want to meet up to prepare for the coming mission to the Bastille of the One God. So we wanted to know if you have any special instructions. Our team is assembled, but Patriarch Deva gave orders that you’re to take the lead. So we’ll follow whatever orders you give.”

“We won’t be going to meet up with them right now,” Yang Qi replied, his expression flickering. “I'm currently in the middle of cultivating a special ability, and I’ve reached a critical juncture. I need another month. Then we can go. Tell the people from the Nine Dragons Court and the Sumeru Temple that they need to wait. If they refuse, they can go into the Bastille of the One God ahead of us.”

“What? You want them to wait a month? I'm afraid that won’t work. The Nine Dragons Court and Sumeru Temple won’t agree to that.”

“I don’t care if they don’t agree. I need to work on my cultivation, and I’m immediately going into seclusion. Come back in a month.” Yang Qi’s tone of voice brooked no argument, which was just what people would expect of the Second Devil General.

Princess Charming could tell that ‘Mister Second’ wasn't going to back down, so she quietly left to pass along the message.

“What? Mister Second wants to wait a month? We spent a lot of effort getting ready for this, and now we’re supposed to just sit around waiting?”

In a palace hall not too far away, a host of large thrones had been set up. On the thrones sat bald-headed monks and Dragonfolk experts, all of them Unbounded experts and Paramount Gods. Young Sir Buddha Tyrant was nowhere to be seen; apparently he had been kicked out of the group, leaving only the elite experts behind.

Buddha Lawtongue was still there.

One of the burly Dragonfolk experts viciously slapped the table in front of him and said, “There's absolutely no way we’re going to just sit around here for a month!”

“That’s fine,” Princess Charming said, not feeling very pleased at all by the Dragonfolk expert’s outburst. “Mister Second made it clear that if you don’t want to wait you can go ahead without us. He’s working on a divine ability and needs a month to finish. Then we’ll go into the Bastille of the One God. If you don’t want to wait a month for our help, that's your loss.”

“This is completely preposterous!” the man said.

“That’s enough, Buddha Exterminator,” said a young man from within the group of Dragonfolk. “Let’s drop the matter. If we need to wait, we wait. I'm curious to see this supposedly superhuman Mister Second.” This young man seemed almost fragile, with pale skin that resembled a scholar's. He looked sick, and unlike someone who practiced cultivation. Yet as soon as he spoke, the domineering and burly Dragonfolk expert who had just lost his temper meekly sat down and closed his mouth.

Seeing this, the experts from the Sumeru Temple and Deva Dynasty exchanged odd glances, clearly curious about who this young man was. He looked like a weakling, but his words caused Buddha Exterminator to tremble like a cicada in winter.

Buddha Exterminator was well-known among the Dragonfolk, and had a reputation as a vicious killer who would sometimes eat his slain opponents. That was why his name was ‘Exterminator’. Furthermore, he was a mid Paramount God who was as strong as most sect patriarchs, and obviously wasn’t the type who would take orders from a junior. Not even the most important members of the junior generation would dare to treat him disrespectfully.

So who exactly was this sickly young sir from the Dragonfolk? Was he an old-timer of some sort? It seemed unlikely, as everyone present was experienced and knowledgeable, but had never heard of anyone matching his description.

After speaking, the young man closed his eyes and sat there without moving. Apparently, he was ready to just wait for a month to go by. As for the monks from the Sumeru Temple, they didn't see any reason to cause further arguments, so they also settled down to wait.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi snorted coldly. ‘With every day that passes, I get stronger. I’ll make them wait for a month while I build up more and more sage monarch magistrates. When I finally leave seclusion, I’ll be in a completely different state than before.’

At this point, an expert like Mother Voidwalker wouldn’t be able to hold her own against a single sage monarch magistrate. If she wasn’t careful, and was struck by a Tribulation Monarch Cannon, she would be instantly killed.

Considering Yang Qi could make a new sage monarch magistrate every day, it meant that after a month went by, he would have an additional thirty. And that was nothing to look down on.

He already knew the Dragonfolk were planning a trap for him. And although he couldn’t spy on the Sumeru Temple, it seemed obvious that they would be plotting against him too. There were likely even people in the Deva Dynasty who were hoping to take advantage of the chaos to make a move against him.

Therefore, every scrap of extra strength he could build up would be a huge help.

The month passed quickly.

On that specific day, Princess Charming went to his cultivation chamber to remind him about the time, only to find him standing out front. “Alright, Princess Charming, there’s no need for chatting. Lead the way. I'm ready to take the Sumeru Temple and Nine Dragons Court into the Bastille of the One God to hunt for treasure.”

“Did you succeed with your amazing divine ability, Mister Second?” she asked, fairly certain that there was something different about him compared to before.

He ignored her as they walked into the palace hall, where the other experts were waiting. There were thirteen people from the Dragonfolk, and unexpectedly, five of them were mid Paramount Gods with mid Unbounded will convergence. And those who were early Paramount Gods were all famous geniuses.

Not a single one of these people was any weaker than Eternal Millennium.

The monks from the Sumeru Temple numbered eighteen, and Yang Qi spotted six among them who, despite their gaunt appearance and humble clothing, had golden skin and concentric halos representing the Trailokya, the three realms of sensuous desire, form, and formlessness.

They were obviously mid Paramount Gods.

There was one monk who looked different from the others. He wasn’t completely bald, but instead had a crew cut, and seemed very young. He seemed profoundly mysterious, and upon catching sight of him, Yang Qi was immediately reminded of the yellow-garbed young man with the buzz cut from the impure lands.

Chapter 1373: The Trump Cards of the Dragons and Buddhists

The Dragonfolk experts and elite buddhists were all present.

But there were two who had especially attracted Yang Qi’s attention. One was the young monk with the crewcut. Normally speaking, monks who had taken their oaths couldn’t grow their hair out even a little bit; perhaps this fellow had such a high rank that he could ignore the rules.

The other noteworthy figure was the sickly looking young man in the forces of the Dragonfolk.

Both of them seemed to be Paramount Gods with ordinary auras, but Yang Qi got a sense of extreme danger when looking at them.

Of course, there were experts from the Deva Dynasty present as well. In addition to Grand Prince Yi, there were fourteen experts, four of whom were mid Paramount Gods, with the rest being ordinary Paramount Gods. Among the ordinary Paramount Gods, there was a particularly handsome young man who sat there with eyes closed, wooden-faced, as if he were in a trance. He wore a brand new suit of armor, and although there was nothing specific about him that seemed impressive, Yang Qi also got a sense of danger from him.

Perhaps he had some sort of secret weapon.

Yang Qi’s ability to assess the cultivation level of other people had reached the point of perfection. He had entered the realm of Nevasaññānāsaññāyatana, and could sense that these three individuals were the trump cards of their respective organizations, likely the ones who were going to try to kill him.

He was going to have to be very careful.

Upon seeing ‘Mister Second’ arrive, Grand Prince Yi rose to his feet and said, “Alright everyone, let's get going. We've been waiting for you, Mister Second. For an entire month! Our friends from the Nine Dragons Court and the Sumeru Temple are getting impatient.”

“I’ve been very patient, actually,” said the sickly young man from the Dragonfolk. “This Mister Second is so incredible, I’d wait three months to see him, let alone one month.”

“You flatter me,” Yang Qi said in a cold voice, trying to seem as distant as possible. He was worried that if he engaged in too much conversation, this mysterious, sickly young man might see through to some of his secrets. “If everyone is ready, let’s go.”

“Yes. Let’s be off!”

Grand Prince Yi gave a meaningful glance to the people in his immediate vicinity, then flew up into the air, where the empyrean winds were filled with frigid energy that could instantly freeze even Greater Gods. Of course, these people didn’t have anything to fear from such winds. All they had to do was exhale, and a path opened up in front of them.

The larger group was split into three main groups. The forces of the Deva Dynasty were being led by ‘Mister Second’, with the Nine Dragons Court and Sumeru Temple remaining separate. However, any observer would be able to see that the forces of the Deva Dynasty weren't particularly united. They clearly weren’t interested in following the lead of Mister Second, although he didn’t seem to care about that.

It was almost as if he were just along for the ride, because he didn’t know the way to the Bastille of the One God.

In contrast, Grand Prince Yi knew exactly which way to go. After setting up a spell formation to clear the path, they flew onward.

Seeing the odd look on Yang Qi’s face, Grand Prince Yi said, “Mister Second, why does it seem you aren’t pleased with the route we're taking? This is the best path to the Bastille of the One God. It's a bit long, but it's free of danger. Other roads are shorter, but too close to ancient and dangerous creatures. Overall, this way will save us a lot of time.”

“How long will it take us to get there?” Yang Qi asked.

“About five months, if things go well,” Grand Prince Yi replied confidently. “If things don't go smoothly, perhaps seven or eight months.”

It was a common thing in the god world to have to travel for months to get places. After all, the place was huge. And ordinary gods would generally stick to the same areas most of the time.

For example, in the area of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty and Nacrelight Sageland, it would take a Consummate God from the House of God Ordainment months to get to the Heaven-Wretch Continent.

And that was a small, out-of-the-way place.

“Five months?” Yang Qi frowned, but was secretly pleased. That just meant he had another five months to get stronger.

And these people wouldn’t attack him on the road, which meant he wouldn't be in any sort of dangerous situation until they got close to the Bastille of the One God.

“What, not pleased, Mister Second?” Grand Prince Yi said. “That’s actually not a long time.”

“I'm neither pleased nor displeased,” Yang Qi replied coolly. “Five months is like the snap of a finger as far as I'm concerned. Look, enough talking. Let’s be on our way.”

With that, he continued flying along. He was capable of such incredible speeds that their current rate seemed like a stroll in the park to him.

They flew along for about ten days, whereupon some in the group expressed the desire to rest. Therefore, they stopped and set up a temporary god kingdom where they could stop for a time, consume some medicinal pills, regulate their energy, and proceed. After all, Paramount Gods were still made from flesh and blood, and their godpower could run low.

To the shock of many, though, Mister Second didn’t seem to need to rest at all. Despite all the flying, he thrummed with just as much godpower as before.

The young sir from the Dragonfolk, the monk with the crew cut, and the wooden-faced young man from the Deva Dynasty all seemed surprised by this. They were elite experts, and trump cards in their respective groups, yet even they had to worry about running out of power. But Yang Qi clearly wasn’t in that situation. By this point, many were becoming thoroughly convinced that he was an almighty being from ancient times.

As a result, many were now hesitating about whether to take action against him.

‘Hmph,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘Even if you people were more amazing than you are, how could you possibly surpass the profundities of the God Legion Seal?’ Looking around coldly at the forces around him, Yang Qi decided to further assess the three ‘trump cards’ present. Although none of them could match up to Patriarch Deva, they were definitely impressive.

From what he could tell, their godhood ratings and psychic scales were all around the level of ninety million. In other words, none were past a hundred million, and all of them were either on the same level as him, or possibly higher.

Even fighting one-on-one, he wasn't confident that he could achieve victory over any of them.

For now, it was a waiting game. During the past ten days of travel, he had kept his God Legion Paradise open within himself, and had produced ten more sage monarch magistrates. If things kept going at this rate, it was hard to say how many he would create during the coming months of travel.

Of course, they were Yang Qi’s trump cards, and he would only reveal them in a critical moment.

“Let’s go!”

After enough rest, everyone headed back out into the spatial tempests. After some travel, they suddenly noticed a beastly aura around them, violent and vile.

Apparently, they had stumbled into the lair of some sort of animalistic creature.

“Watch out, everyone,” said Grand Prince Yi. “The road to the Bastille of the One God is stained with the aura of the ancient halls of heaven. And because of that, the spacetitans that can appear here are extremely powerful. Don’t underestimate them.”

RUMBLE!

Almost as soon as the words left his mouth, the space-time around them collapsed, revealing a horde of beasts rushing in their direction. Apparently, when spacetitans like this smelled the aura of a Paramount God, they were like sharks encountering blood in the ocean.

‘So, these are spacetitans,’ Yang Qi thought. He’d never seen them in person, but had read about them in the ancient daoist texts he had come across. They were gigantic beasts formed from the vital energy of the god world itself, and only appeared in the most profound depths of space-time. In that respect, they were like enormous whales and other sea creatures that would never be seen in the shallows, only the deep ocean.

Many Paramount Gods had died after being attacked by spacetitans.

Roar!

One of the spacetitans honed in on Yang Qi.

Its head was enormous, and looked like a book, while it had the body of a tiger, with human limbs. It was extremely bizarre, and its roars caused everything to tremble violently.

‘So strong!’ Yang Qi thought. However, he casually waved his hand and the spacetitan shrank down, landing on his palm, the size of an ant. Then, true flame erupted out, melting it into a ball of pure vital energy. It was so intense that it seemed to surpass the power of the God Legion Seal.

‘This thing is incredible. It’s perfect for an instant replenishment of godpower during a fight.’ He quickly absorbed the flaming ball, which provided plenty of fuel for his sage monarch magistrates.

The others present reacted with shock. ‘This guy is incredible! He just killed a spacetitan with hardly any effort, then assimilated it with ease. Isn't he worried about the negative side effects? This guy’s definitely some sort of consummate devil.’

Chapter 1374: Spacetitans

One after another, the spacetitans rushed forth to attack.

All of the spacetitans were huge, but had various forms. Some looked human, some looked like animals, some looked like magical treasures or even swords.

Roar!

A group of them were charging in formation, making something like a gigantic mountain pulsing with the vital energies of death, water, fire, and wind.

RUMBLE!

Yang Qi thrust his hands out and a primal-chaos elder-snake appeared behind him, its mouth open so wide it gobbled up the incoming mountain like a python swallowing an egg. Then cracking sounds rang out, after which the snake burped, exhaling a stream of baleful energy.

Yang Qi wasn’t saying anything; he was simply bowling people over by his actions. Some of the old-timers were analyzing what they were seeing and began conferring via divine sense.

“Was that... a consummate technique of King Heaven-Devourer?”

“We have to be very careful around this Mister Second. It won’t be easy dealing with him. Could it be that he really is some sort of ancient devil?”

“I think so. And I bet he's going to be even more formidable once we get to the Bastille of the One God.”

“How are we supposed to handle him?”

“Calm down. The more strength he reveals, the more it stirs my fighting spirit. This situation couldn't be better. Heh heh heh.”

Some of these people obviously viewed Mister Second as a worthy opponent. Yang Qi ignored them. After consuming each spacetitan, he would send its quintessence straight to the sage monarch magistrates, causing more duplicates to appear.

‘This kind of slaughter is great. I now have a few hundred sage monarch magistrates. If we keep having fights like this, and they’re all with spacetitans, I bet I’ll end up with a few thousand of them. Maybe even ten thousand or more. At that point, I won’t even need to fear Patriarch Deva. Furthermore, I’ll be able to take advantage of the situation in the Bastille of the One God to either kill or enslave all of these people going in with me. They’re the cream of the crop from three powerful sects. If I take control of three organizations like that, how many resources would I have at my disposal?’ Yang Qi felt like his path forward was as bright as could be.

“Die!”

The other experts present had already banded together to fight the incoming spacetitans.

Grand Prince Yi attacked with the other experts from the Deva Dynasty, shooting out something that looked like a spider web, which spread out and captured several spacetitans. Any who were trapped quickly fell asleep and physically shrank.

Of course, Grand Prince Yi and the others couldn’t assimilate the spacetitans. The spacetitans were a combination of divine power and space-time elements that couldn't be easily broken down.

The best thing to do would be to subdue them and take them back to the headquarters, where they could be safely kept in a god kingdom and used for training disciples. As for trying to turn them into pets or thralls, that was too unrealistic.

The fact that spacetitans could pierce through space-time made it very difficult to keep them tame. If they regained their thoughts, they could easily slip free and cause chaos.

“Nine Dragons Hegemony!” shouted the people from the Nine Dragons Court.

Nine enormous dragons appeared, swirling through heaven and earth to surround some of the spacetitans, causing them to drop like flies.

As for the monks from the Sumeru Temple, they summoned a huge buddha dragon that unleashed dhāraṇī incantations, causing shining buddhist halos to shoot out. When the light hit the spacetitans, they instantly turned on each other and started tearing each other to pieces.

It was an act of purification, although the spacetitans couldn’t be permanently purified. They would only remain in that state for about ten breaths of time. However, that was long enough for them to damage each other and allow the monks to swoop in and finish the attack.

“Incredible,” Yang Qi said at the sight of it. He was very impressed with the monks.

He had a remarkable ability from the buddhist schools, the Secret-Ensconcing All-World Anything-Everything Fundamental-Law Magic. Because of that, he had a deep understanding of buddhist arts and their methods of purification. Once such arts were used on someone, they would become free of all mortal thoughts and willing to devote their life to buddhism.

As for the spacetitans, they would revert from a state of purification within a few short moments. The upside was that in those short moments of purification, they would ruthlessly attack each other.

Another primal-chaos elder-snake appeared behind Yang Qi, which swept back and forth gobbling up spacetitans like ants.

It even grabbed the corpses of those killed by the Nine Dragons Court.

Pure power coursed into Yang Qi.

Several hours passed in which the hordes of spacetitans didn’t seem to end. Yang Qi slaughtered to his heart’s content, and as a result, produced about a dozen more sage monarch magistrates. He was very pleased.

The other experts were already starting to pop medicinal pills to recover their spent godpower. It wasn’t that they were getting exhausted, but rather that they always needed to be at their peak level, just in case things got really dangerous.

“Die!”

Yang Qi unleashed another burst of power, cutting down a host of spacetitans.

This time, in addition to the primal-chaos elder-snake, he summoned a river of sword light consisting of millions upon millions of swords that slashed the spacetitans to pieces.

“That looks like... the Unbounded Sword River of the ancient Lord of the Sword Dao! According to the stories, he would use an endless supply of swords to create a river just like that. But wait, there’s something different about it. The aura of the Unbounded Sword River was pure and mighty, but this aura seems to contain both life and death at the same time!”

“What a mighty expression of power!”

“He looks like he's hardly expending any effort at all!”

“Mister Second is really living up to his reputation. No wonder Patriarch Deva acted so respectful toward him.”

That was what the people from the Deva Dynasty were thinking.

The truth was that the members of these three groups were mostly mid Paramount Gods with mid Unbounded will convergences. Their psychic scales and power indexes weren’t particularly high, only ranging from twenty to fifty million.

The sickly young sir from the Dragonfolk, the monk with the crew cut, and the wooden-faced young man all had godhood ratings and psychic scales of roughly ninety million.

The ordinary members were so weak that, to them, the methods Yang Qi was using seemed supernatural.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi wasn’t even looking at them. He was just cutting down the spacetitans and using them to make more sage monarch magistrates. The process to split a sage monarch magistrate into a new one was actually rather slow. Even after several hours of slaughter, he had only produced about a dozen.

Twang. Strum.

All of a sudden, a sound reached their ears that resembled someone vigorously playing a zither. In response, the spacetitans seemed to surge into greater action.

Roar!

Even those that had been hit with the light of purification suddenly sloughed it off.

“Not good!” someone cried. “The most mysterious and strange of all spacetitans have appeared. Zithertitans!”

Yang Qi looked over, and to his surprise saw some spacetitans that were larger than the others, each of them as large as multiple enormous continents put together. They were zithertitans, which physically resembled ancient zithers, and emanated the constant sound of frenzied zither music.

They actually didn’t look particularly intimidating, and resembled magical treasures more than living beings. That said, they were nothing particularly unusual. There was a heaven-devil called the zitherdemon heaven-devil, and they also resembled ancient zithers, just not as large as these.

As soon as the zither music reached Yang Qi’s ears, he felt a sudden desire to run away. And the other experts weren’t faring any better! The early Paramount Gods’ faces drained of blood, and they quickly pulled out magical treasures to protect themselves. Some of them coughed up blood, while others began fleeing, their eyes blank with fear.

“Not good!” someone else shouted. “With zithertitans present, this horde of spacetitans will be even harder to deal with. How come these things have never appeared on this path before? Something is going on. Something has attracted these things. Everybody, run!”

“Run from what?” Yang Qi said, laughing coldly. “I’ll kill these zithertitans. I can't believe you people are actually scared of these things.”

All of a sudden, the mocking voice of the burly Buddha Exterminator could be heard from the Dragonfolk. “Well, why don’t you go show us how strong you are, Mister Second?”

One of the experts from the Sumeru Temple added, “Yes, let’s see what Mister Second can do. We waited a whole month for him in the Deva Dynasty because he was cultivating a special ability for use on this mission. Let’s see him use it on this horde and wipe them out!”

Snorting coldly, Yang Qi burst into motion. A huge pair of wings sprouted from his back as he shot into the spatial tempests. These weren’t the Freedom Wings from the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, but rather something from the Sage Monarch Grand Magic. They were the Tribulation Wings!

Chapter 1375: More Than a Thousand Magistrates

Yang Qi singlehandedly charged toward the spacetitans, who had been whipped into a vicious frenzy thanks to the vigorous zither music. Thankfully, he had his Tribulation Wings, so he had nothing to fear. As he flew out on his own, none of the enemy attacks could even touch him. It was almost as if he were traveling past them on a different dimension of existence.

Meanwhile, every spacetitan he passed collapsed into clouds of dust, which were then sucked into his wings.

Strum. Twang. Thrum....

As if sensing the threat, the zithertitans increased the intensity of their music, which caused some of the spacetitans to self-detonate, sending waves of destructive power racing toward Yang Qi. It contained the weeping of blood, the perishing of the sun and moon, the transformation of the cosmos, and the inverting of the great dao.

‘Very impressive,’ Yang thought. Drawing on the energy arts of King Heaven-Devourer, he sent the primal-chaos elder-snake on the offensive. When it came to devouring, no energy arts could compare to those of King Heaven-Devourer, not even the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. The snake opened its mouth wide and gobbled up the vital energy of the self-detonations, then converted it into something the sage monarch magistrates could use.

Yang Qi was slaughtering enemies with abandon, moving with lightning-like speed, killing spacetitans left and right, then using the primal-chaos elder-snake to absorb them. With his combination of techniques, he was cutting his way closer and closer to the zithertitans while simultaneously growing more sage monarch magistrates within him.

Thrusting his hand out with fingers splayed, he drew on Grand Tribulation Cannon, which had already powered up within him. For the moment, he chose not to use the Tribulation Monarch Cannon, which was his true trump card, something that would unleash a destructive power that would be too horrible to contemplate.

A high-pitched whine could be heard from within him as he stretched his hand out, then the onlookers saw an enormous beam of white light smash into the spacetitans. Blasting through the ranks of the ordinary beasts, it hit the first few zithertitans and ripped them to shreds.

“What an incredible trump card! Amazing!” The other Paramount Gods present were shocked, having been caught completely off guard by Yang Qi’s deadly attack.

The zither music stopped as the remaining zithertitans were thrown into chaos. When they worked together, they were mighty, but receiving a blow from the Grand Tribulation Cannon had devastated their ranks.

Yang Qi took advantage of the extremely rare opportunity. Blurring into motion, he sent his primal-chaos elder-snake out, which gobbled up the vital energy of the spacetitans and rapidly grew in size. Then it set upon the zithertitans with a ferocious appetite, devouring them and absorbing their might.

All of the energy it took, it sent directly to the sage monarch magistrates.

Yang Qi was like a starving gobblewock as he attacked left and right, slaughtering the spacetitans. While most people would consider this place to be a deadly location, to him it was like a holy land of cultivation.

The slaughter went on for an entire day and night. When it was over, the zithertitans were gone. The remaining spacetitans fled, and Yang Qi finally stopped fighting.

He could sense something like an ocean of energy within his dantian region, where sage monarch magistrates were splitting apart like mad to create new versions.

Creak. Crack.

Thanks to the slaughter he had just carried out, he had amassed a thousand magistrates.

Going from a hundred to a thousand was a major increase, and Yang Qi could sense there was still plenty more power to work with.

Going forward, it would only take a day to create one and a half magistrates. In other words, it would take two days to create three.

‘Excellent! I'm now strong enough that I don’t need to worry about a fight with a mid Paramount God.’ Rejoicing inwardly, Yang Qi flew back.

The combined forces of the three major powers were in a much better position now that Yang Qi had dealt with the zithertitans. Everyone was breathing sighs of relief.

“Let’s rest for a moment, and then continue on our way,” said Grand Prince Yi.

Everyone nodded and settled down to recuperate.

A short while later, they were again flying through space-time, killing whatever beasts they encountered. They continued onward for a month, then two months. Eventually, Yang Qi lost track of his surroundings and had no idea of exactly where they were.

When traveling in the god world, one would encounter mountains, rivers, lakes, countries, different types of weather and customs, and even different types of living beings. But out in the depths of space-time, there were only deadly spatial tempests, some of them so large it would take weeks to pass through them. Within such tempests, it was so dark and chaotic it was almost impossible to see clearly.

Thankfully, this group of experts all had immense willpower and were able to proceed in such conditions. And whenever they ran into deadly beasts, they just attacked and killed them efficiently.

Five months went by and Yang Qi had more and more sage monarch magistrates, thanks to all of the beasts he encountered and slaughtered. He now had about fifteen hundred. However, he was looking physically exhausted, as the nonstop flying and fighting was apparently draining even to him.

The sight of Yang Qi looking so tired caused many in the group to exchange meaningful glances. The fact that this ‘monster’ Yang Qi was being worn down meant it was obviously possible to kill him.

Of course, the truth was that he wasn’t tired at all, nor was his cultivation base declining. He was at a higher peak than he had ever been, and was stronger than ever. No one had any idea about the sage monarch magistrates, nor the fact that, because of them, he was probably twice as strong as he had been before.

‘Bring it on, people,’ he thought. ‘I'm going to subjugate each and every one of you!’ He was really looking forward to reaching the Bastille of the One God.

Two more weeks passed, when suddenly everything around them went calm, and they saw a brilliant light up ahead of them. Eventually, a sprawling complex of buildings and altars appeared, a sight that made everyone think of the ancient halls of heaven.

They stopped short, not daring to go any further.

“We’ve arrived!” Grand Prince Yi said. “We’re now on the edge of the Bastille of the One God, so going forward, we need to be very careful. Dangers abound in this place, and even Paramount Gods are like children playing in the deep ocean. Death and destruction can rain down at any moment.”

“Well said,” said one of the monks from the Sumeru Temple. “According to the stories, the reason the Bastille of the One God shines with such radiant light is because it's actually part of the ancient halls of heaven. We need to join forces now, and link our vital energy to form a triple-sided formation to protect us from danger as we search for treasure.”

“That should work,” people said, nodding in agreement. The members of the three major powers formed a triangular formation, then headed toward the sprawling complex of buildings.

The closer they got, the more intense the light grew, until it was so pure and bright that they could hardly see.

To Yang Qi, it felt wonderful; it was many thousands of times more powerful than the light he had experienced in the Mountains of Radiance in the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty.

As the light poured into him, the particles within him thrummed with life. And the sage monarch magistrates, who had the genetic material of angels within them, also thrived because of it.

‘The Bastille of the One God is the perfect place for me to further my cultivation.’ he thought. Although it was a dangerous location, he knew the God Legion Seal would be able to gobble up the light and make him stronger.

“Be careful, everyone!” Grand Prince Yi said. “This light is so powerful it can melt anything. Even Paramount Gods who get infected by it will be in trouble. And if it gets into your soul or sea of consciousness, it will transform you from a human into an angel, with no mind of your own, fixated only on fighting intruders.”

Chapter 1376: Bathed in Sagelight

Being bathed in the sagelight felt incomparably wonderful to Yang Qi.

In contrast, the other Paramount Gods were in mortal danger. Considering they had no God Legion Seal, they were in worse danger than if the most evil denizens of hell were attacking them. And if the light got inside them, they would quickly be parasitized and turned into angels.

Paramount Gods were attracted to the Bastille of the One God because, if they could get the right treasures, they could instantly become patriarch-level figures that could lead massive organizations. But a more common outcome was for them to be infected by the sagelight and transformed into angels.

Because of that, everyone had magical treasures that they were using to protect themselves.

Yang Qi pretended to do the same, but of course, he was actually absorbing the sagelight, within which he could sense the majestic aura of the Sovereign Lord. The beams of sagelight were actually alive in a certain sense, although their existence differed from that of corporeal objects.

Of course, when Yang Qi absorbed the light, the God Legion Seal would transform it into something beneficial for his monarch godhood.

His godhood rating was already at fifty million, which meant that he was an early Paramount God. He had no idea how much energy it would take to reach the mid level. However, what he did know was that his cultivation speed here was many times faster than outside, which gave him hope that he would indeed achieve his next breakthrough soon.

When his psychic scale and godhood rating matched, his fighting prowess would reach an unheard-of level of strength.

RUMBLE!

The group threaded their way through the sagelight until they reached solid ground.

Everything was constructed from pure white stones, and it seemed to stretch without end. Although not a speck of impurity could be seen, it bore the scars of what must have been an incredible battle in ancient times. There were immense trees present, although they were all so petrified they were pitch black and emanated a sensation of rotten death.

Above them in the sky were collections of white light that resembled clouds, but were clearly far denser than clouds. The magical laws here were much stronger than in the god world, making it impossible for Paramount Gods to fly or pierce through space.

“Be careful,” said Buddha Lawtongue from the Dragonfolk. “Those clouds are made from pure sagelight, and are far stronger than any of the light we’ve encountered up to this point. We're on the periphery of the Bastille of the One God now. These crumbling buildings were part of the god kingdom that was the exterior border of the Sovereign Lord’s halls of heaven. They weren’t part of the true halls of heaven, but they’re still very dangerous. See all the buildings? They were the barracks of the angel guardians of the halls of heaven.

“Now we can start searching for treasure. We can split up, but if we encounter any enemy forces, we should handle them together. Most enemies here will come in the form of Paramount Gods who came to search for treasure, but died and became angels.

“Remember, we came as a team, so fighting amongst ourselves isn't allowed. Treasure is first come, first served. That's the official rule. We can team up to fight enemies, but can't fight each other. Don’t forget what happened last time we were here. We personally witnessed a group of experts from the dao of devils fighting over a flower of karma, only to be set upon by angels and wiped out.”

“We know all that,” said Grand Prince Yi. “There’s no need to waste time with such talk. Mister Second, you said that your month of cultivation back home would enable you to move about the Bastille of the One God with complete ease. I hope you were telling the truth, and that you can keep us safe.”

“No problem,” Yang Qi said, more than happy to play the role of leader.

RUMBLE!

All of a sudden, a fifty-kilometer-wide ball of sagelight shot in their direction, emanating what sounded like ancient voices calling out to them, tugging at their souls like the embrace of a mother.

“Crap. That’s a conglomeration of ancient angel souls! Why did we have to encounter something like this!?” Everyone looked at the incoming ball of sagelight with grim faces.

“Everyone run!” cried one of the experts from the Dragonfolk.

Someone from the Sumeru Temple said, “Those are undead angels! They’re far stronger than ordinary sagelight, and can easily consume our souls and flesh. And we can't beat them in a fight. No type of fire, sword energy, or divine ability can harm them. If they touch us, we’ll be possessed immediately!”

Everyone was starting to panic, even the sickly young sir from the Dragonfolk, the monk with the crew cut, and the wooden-faced young man.

“Mister Second, now would be a good time to see that amazing ability of yours,” Buddha Exterminator said in a snide voice. “Can you get rid of these ancient angel souls? Last time we were here, we encountered a similar conglomeration that was only about ten kilometers wide. Even so, we barely survived. Hopefully you can at least buy us some time to get out of here.”

“Quit jabbering, Buddha Exterminator!” said the sickly young man. “We need to get out of here before it notices us. That thing isn’t intelligent, it simply acts on instinct. But if it consumes some of us, and gains intelligence as a result, that will only make it vastly more dangerous.”

Everyone was preparing to flee from the angel soul conglomeration.

However, that was when Yang Qi actually charged directly toward it.

“What are you doing, Mister Second?” The people from the Deva Dynasty were so shocked they didn’t have time to react. In the blink of an eye, Yang Qi vanished into the enormous glowing ball of souls.

“What’s he doing? Trying to kill himself? Those angels died during the catastrophe of ancient times. Protected by the vengeful will of the Sovereign Lord, they continued to grow, transforming into what they are today. He might as well be throwing his life away.”

“Don't tell me he has something that can be used against those things.”

Even as they discussed the matter amongst themselves, they fled to a distant location, fearful of what could happen if they stayed behind.

As for Yang Qi, as soon as he burst into the conglomeration of angel souls, he activated the God Legion Seal, providing him with absolute protection.

From his position, he could sense the true genes of angels with all their profundities. The truth was that, although he had the God Legion Seal, he had never seen true angels from the past. Because of that, the sage monarch magistrates he had created were somewhat deficient.

But now, in the Bastille of the One God, he had encountered something completely unprecedented.

“Be subjugated!”

From within the protection cast by the God Legion Seal, he started absorbing the souls around him, causing them to flow into his sea of energy like a river. At the same time, he created an illusion to make it seem like he was involved in the most bitter of battles.

Several hours passed.

Suddenly, a huge explosion ripped out, and everyone looked over to see Yang Qi sealing the angel souls and absorbing them into himself.

“Incredible....”

The sickly young sir, the crew-cut monk, and the wooden-faced young man exchanged astonished glances, and could tell that they were all thinking roughly the same thing: ‘Amazing. He’s definitely some sort of almighty ancient being filled with incredible secrets. That said, it’s obvious he’s trying to make a big impression by absorbing those souls. Now that they’re inside him, it’ll only make him easier to deal with.’

WHOOSH!

Having absorbed the souls, Yang Qi flew over with a faint smile on his face and said, “You juniors don’t have anything to fear from wimpy souls like that. I can crush them as easily as turning over my hand.”

At that point, he suddenly shivered briefly. It only lasted a moment, but anyone looking closely would notice, and would assume it was him struggling to keep control of the souls he had absorbed.

After all, not even Patriarch Deva could have sealed those souls.

“You really do have an amazing ability there, Mister Second,” said Grand Prince Yi. “No wonder Patriarch Deva favors you so much. That said, Mister Second, it must have taken a huge amount of godpower for you to do that. Why not rest for a bit?”

“There’s no need,” Yang Qi said, casually, although to everyone present it seemed like he was forcing it a bit. Truth be told, those ancient angel souls were already fusing with his fifteen hundred sage monarch magistrates, causing them to become vastly stronger.

Before, he could only cause them to split and reproduce, not become fundamentally stronger. But things were different now.

Slowly but surely, their psychic scale rose from eight hundred and eighty thousand to nine hundred and fifty thousand. They were close to the level of an Unbounded expert!

Going forward, whenever they split to reproduce, the new versions would be just as strong.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi was doing everything to convince the others present that he was expending a huge amount of effort to keep the souls under control. If you ride a tiger, it's hard to get off, and that's what he wanted them to think he was doing.

Chapter 1377: Incredible Upgrade

The sage monarch magistrates had become even more impressive, reaching a psychic scale and a godhood rating of nine hundred and fifty thousand. Their life force and genes had yet again been remolded, and thanks to having assimilated a large conglomeration of ancient angel souls, another hundred had been added to their number.

Yang Qi knew there were other angel souls in these ruins, and if he could devour more of them, he might be able to push his sage monarch magistrates to another major milestone, that of reaching a psychic scale and godhood rating of a million. At that point, they would be just as formidable as Unbounded experts.

Unfortunately, the level of nine hundred and ninety thousand was actually a bottleneck, and breaking through it would be incredibly difficult. But if he succeeded, his sage monarch magistrates would be truly invincible.

In any case, sealing all of the angel souls had provided a huge boost for his sage monarch magistrates. As for Yang Qi, his own godhood rating continued climbing.

In fact, he had risen from fifty million to sixty million.

“You seem fine, Mister Second! I guess that means you’ll be taking care of any further angel souls we encounter.” Similar expressions could be heard from various members of the Nine Dragons Court and the Sumeru Temple.

“Hmph! It’s only natural that someone important like me would handle such matters. Of course, it also means that I’ll be taking a larger share of the rewards.” Then Yang Qi frowned. “Actually, never mind. Considering how weak you people are, there’s no way you’ll be getting any treasures worth taking. It would be laughable for me to compete with you in that regard. If the old-timers from the distant past found out, I’d become a laughingstock.”

No one responded to his clearly arrogant words. After all, he obviously had the strength to back them up. However, the fact that he had shivered so visibly after sealing the souls had everyone convinced that his strength was empty.

“Let’s continue exploring, Mister Second,” said Grand Prince Yi. “From here, we’ll split up. Anyone who runs into trouble, notify the group, and we’ll meet back up. After all, sticking together may be safer, but it could lead to conflicts regarding how to split up whatever treasure we find.”

“I don’t have the time to waste my breath on you children,” Yang Qi said loudly. “I’ll go explore on my own. Just remember to call for help if you run into any trouble. I’ll be sure to come save you.” Now that he was here in the Bastille of the One God, he wanted to find the piece of the Mahātmā Jade. And even if he couldn’t track it down, he could at least absorb the sagelight here, and possibly more angel souls.

He was fairly certain that if he stayed here for about half a year, he would end up on the same level as Patriarch Deva.

“Hold on a moment, Mister Second,” Grand Prince Yi said. “Remember, you’re in charge of our group. That's what Patriarch Deva ordered.”

WHOOSH!

However, Yang Qi didn’t even respond to his words. Instead, he turned and vanished without a trace.

Grand Prince Yi didn't dare to chase after him. This location was just too full of danger; one wrong move, and one would end up buried.

“Alright, let’s go our separate ways,” said the sickly young sir from the Dragonfolk.

“Let's go.” The monks from the Sumeru Temple left, and within moments they were nowhere to be seen.

Grand Prince Yi looked over at the seemingly unimpressive, wooden-faced young man who was an early Paramount God. “What do we do now, Imperial Uncle? Mister Second went off on his own, should we do something about him?”

The wooden-faced young man’s eyes suddenly glittered, and his aura rose to a higher level, until he was thrumming with the fluctuations of a late Paramount God.

He exhaled, and his features transformed, until he looked like a decrepit old man. “Mister Second is very impressive. But sealing all those angels was a mistake. Now they’re struggling to escape, and if they do, he's going to transform into an angel. That’s why he was in such a hurry to leave. He needs to find a safe place to settle down and deal with the side-effects of his actions. He's strong, but stupid. He went through all that effort just to make sure he seems like a formidable old-timer from ancient times. Well, that’s fine. It’s just an opportunity for me. I’ll go find him. Once he reaches a critical juncture in dealing with the angel souls, I’ll jump in and crush him!”

“Just be careful, Imperial Uncle.”

“Don’t worry. Just go about your exploring. And since I won’t be here to help you, be extra careful.” The imperial uncle flickered into motion, vanishing.

Meanwhile, in another location in the crumbling ruins of the Bastille of the One God, the Dragonfolk experts were planning their next move.

“Exalted Buddha Testimony,” said Buddha Exterminator, respectfully clasping hands to the sickly young sir. “What do we do now? That Mister Second vanished, most likely to find a place to recover from his injuries. He's obviously a real moron.”

“This is an extremely rare opportunity,” replied the young sir, whose name was Buddha Testimony. “We have to find him. Thankfully, I can track him by his aura. Once we reach him, we’ll capture him. If nothing else, his collection of perfect caliber godstones will be worth all the effort.”

They turned and left, but before they could get very far, they suddenly saw the crew-cut monk standing in front of them.

Smiling broadly, he said, “I trust you’ve been well since we last met, Buddha Testimony? I have to say I'm surprised that the Dragonfolk went so far as to send you here to deal with Mister Second. It seems you’re really taking him seriously.”

Buddha Testimony was initially taken aback, but quickly composed himself and said, “You’re exactly right, Archmonk Dibarra. You're the heir apparent in the Sumeru Temple, with only one superior and many subordinates. It seems you people aren’t taking Mister Second lightly either.”

“Perhaps. I take it you want the lion’s share of the benefit in this situation?”

“No,” replied Archmonk Dibarra. “How about we work together to deal with the Deva Dynasty? If I'm not mistaken, they also sent one of their most powerful experts here, the imperial uncle. It’ll be nigh impossible to capture Mister Second with the imperial uncle helping him.”

“My guess is that the imperial uncle is also out to get Mister Second. You see, Patriarch Deva and the leaders of our two organizations can’t act directly, so they’re relying on us to deal with Mister Second. If Mister Second really is some almighty entity from the ancient past, he’ll eventually break the status quo. Which we can’t tolerate. So we only have one choice here: work together! We can split Mister Second’s belongings between the two of us, and hopefully kill the imperial uncle at the same time. Remember, nobody can use divination techniques to find out what happens in the Bastille of the One God. We can just say that Mister Second’s devilishness flared up, and he killed the imperial uncle. As long as we slaughter everyone else from the Deva Dynasty, no one will ever know the truth. It’ll be a major blow to them, considering that fully two thirds of their top experts are here.”

“Fine. It’s a deal. The Sumeru Temple and the Nine Dragons Court will work together to deliver a crushing blow to the Deva Dynasty.”

“Great. Let’s go.”

**

By now, Yang Qi was deep in the Bastille of the One God, his divine will fully unleashed. No one was around, so he was devouring the light with impunity.

Unfortunately, he hadn’t encountered any more of the angel soul conglomerations.

Looking around at the various buildings and structures, he mused that they made the Deva Dynasty’s infrastructure seem like children’s playthings. And these hadn't even been a true part of the halls of heaven, which made him wonder how amazing the halls of heaven must be.

All of a sudden, he heard a familiar sound, and turned to find a conglomeration of angel souls heading toward him, several dozen kilometers across. However, this one was made of wriggling flesh and blood that was apparently the physical remains of ancient angels. Delighted, he headed over to absorb it and send it directly into his sage monarch magistrates.

As he did, he looked off in the distance and saw even more souls, as well as several hulking figures made of sagelight. They were pure white and had amazing wings; clearly, they were Paramount Gods who had been infected and transformed into angels.

‘Amazing!’ he thought, laughing heartily. Meanwhile, the angels caught sight of Yang Qi and flew toward him with deadly force. Of course, it took almost no effort for him to rip them to shreds, then have his primal-chaos elder-snake leap out and devour them, parsing their genes for use by the sage monarch magistrates.

Going forward, he saw more and more conglomerations of angel souls, and every one that he consumed boosted his sage monarch magistrates. He was like a rat dropped directly into a rice warehouse.

His sage monarch magistrates were transforming, reaching the level of nine hundred and ninety thousand in both psychic scale and godhood rating.

Furthermore, he now had about two thousand of them.

Sitting down, he spent about an hour assimilating everything, whereupon his godhood rating climbed to seventy million.

Then, with no warning, he quickly forced himself to look sweaty and wracked with pain, as though some immense power were inside of him, struggling to get out. That was when a shadowy figure appeared a short distance away.

Chapter 1378: Three Experts

The approaching figure was none other than the imperial uncle, who once again looked like a wooden-faced young man.

“What a surprise to find you here, Mister Second,” he said, walking toward him with a broad smile on his face.

“Stop right there, boy!” Yang Qi shrieked. “What do you think you’re doing? Stand right there! If you take another step, I’ll cut you down!”

Of course, the more frantic he sounded, the broader the imperial uncle’s smile grew, and the more convinced he was that Yang Qi had reached an extremely critical juncture in dealing with the angel souls.

“Could it be that you’re in this state because of absorbing those souls, Mister Second?” He didn’t make any effort whatsoever to stop, but in fact, just kept walking right toward Yang Qi. “How about I help you pass this difficult moment? You put on a really big show by absorbing all those souls. But how could you possibly keep them suppressed? Not even Patriarch Deva could pull that off!”

“I said to stop moving, boy! Didn’t you hear me? If you take another step forward, I’ll crush you! If you think I can’t deal with these souls, you’re mistaken. I have an ancient divine ability that I can use to assimilate them and turn their power into my own. Patriarch Deva couldn’t do it, but I can! Do you know what Patriarch Deva was like in the ancient era? He didn't count for anything. But I was important and almighty, even back then!”

All of a sudden, he started building up power as if he were preparing to attack the imperial uncle.

“Enough, Mister Second. There’s no need for this show.” The imperial uncle was feeling more confident than ever. “I know you were an almighty being in the past. But even in your prime, you would have been roughly on the same level as me. And now, you’re far beneath me. You think you can kill me? Do you even know who I really am?”

“Listen, boy!” Yang Qi shrieked. “You might be extraordinary, and you did well to hide your true nature. But I saw through it from the beginning. You’re one of the leaders of the Deva Dynasty! A trump card of theirs! Am I right?”

“That's right. I'm the imperial uncle of the dynasty. And now I'm going to crush you. You've reached the end of the road, Mister Second. The fact that you’re from ancient times isn't going to help you. We live in a new age now, and it’s time for you old-timers to make way for the new generation.”

Yang Qi snorted coldly. “How dare you act so arrogantly in my presence? In the past, I would’ve killed you and slaughtered your family down to the ninth generation. Do you really think you have what it takes to defy me? I can kill you a hundred times over! Are you just the vanguard for Patriarch Deva? When is he going to show up?”

The imperial uncle laughed loudly. “Stop it with the act, Mister Second! You know full well Patriarch Deva wouldn’t be so rash as to appear here. Besides, I'm more than capable of handling you myself. You see, neither you nor anyone else in the entire Deva Dynasty actually knows how strong I am.”

Shrinking back, Yang Qi said, “I don’t care how strong you are, boy. You’re still beneath me!”

“I’m done wasting my breath on you, Mister Second. Prepare to be crushed.” All of a sudden, mist swirled about the imperial uncle’s head, forming the shape of a palm that was clearly about to shoot forth in an attack.

“Hold on!” Yang Qi blurted. “If you attack me, boy, the seals within me will shatter, releasing the trapped souls. Then we’ll both die. Is that really what you want?”

“Hmph! Those souls aren’t even human. They have no intelligence, and act only on instinct. Maybe I can't capture or kill them, but I’ll have plenty of time to get out of the way. You aren't fooling anyone, Mister Second. You know that I can crush you, so you're desperately grasping at straws. Am I right?”

“You’re pushing things too far, boy!” Yang Qi gushed.

“Get ready to die! I'm going to take all your wealth and power, and I'm going to see exactly what sort of being you were in ancient times!” Grinning viciously, the imperial uncle said, “You're in the wrong time period, you old bastard. This age belongs to the new generation!”

Just when the imperial uncle was about to make his move, the sound of two clucking tongues rang out.

“That's exactly right. This age doesn't belong to old-timers like you, Mister Second. But just look at how things are playing out. After the services you performed for the Deva Dynasty, you were given a third of their destiny, yet now they're trying to kill you.”

“Buddha Testimony! Dibarra!” The imperial uncle looked over at them coolly. “I should’ve known that you two would show up.”

“You’re very impressive, Imperial Uncle,” Buddha Testimony said. “But I knew all along who you were. Why exactly did you waste so much time talking with Mister Second, without making a move? My patience has a limit, you know. At a certain point, I had to actually do something.”

“What are you planning to do?” the imperial uncle asked.

“Oh, nothing,” Dibarra said. “We’re just here to offer an invitation for Mister Second to join us as a guest. That shouldn't be a problem, should it, Imperial Uncle? Our Sumeru Temple has been running low on funds recently, and it shouldn't be difficult for Mister Second to loan us a few billion perfect caliber godstones. Am I right?”

“Each of you is more vicious than the next!” Yang Qi growled. “It's settled. I'm going to get rid of all of you! I won’t leave a single one alive!”

“You're going to get rid of all of us?” Buddha Testimony said. “Mister Second, given your current condition, do you really think that's possible? What do you think, Imperial Uncle? Should the three of us join forces to deal with Mister Second?”

“As the two of you well know,” the imperial uncle said, “Mister Second is a member of the Deva Dynasty. Therefore, all of his wealth rightly belongs to the dynasty.”

“Wrong,” Dibarra said. “We’re going to split it. Come on, Imperial Uncle, don’t tell me you think you can kill Mister Second on your own, then just waltz away. Do you really think you’re going to just take all his wealth?”

The crew-cut archmonk wanted nothing more than to kill the imperial uncle, but knew that he had to be patient and first work together with him and Buddha Testimony to take down Mister Second.

Originally, he and Buddha Testimony had been planning to just let the imperial uncle kill Mister Second. Never could they have guessed that the imperial uncle would actually detect their presence, which was why he had spent so much time talking instead of doing anything.

He had forced their hand.

“You two have really taken the bait,” Yang Qi suddenly said. Chuckling, he continued, “Attack, boy! Patriarch Deva sent you here for the express purpose of luring these two out into the open. Let’s join forces to kill them!”

WHOOSH!

Yang Qi lunged toward Buddha Testimony, moving so quickly the man had almost no chance to react.

“Dibarra!” Buddha Testimony shouted. “Block the imperial uncle! I’ll handle Mister Second!”

Throwing out his hands with fingers splayed, he stomped his feet down in a profound rhythm and said, “Heaven-Defying Eight Steps!Dragon-Defying Seven Claws!”

Cracking sounds could be heard as he unleashed a consummate art of the Dragonfolk. According to rumor, the Heaven-Defying Eight Steps was a collection of eight movements created by the original emperor of the Dragonfolk. They were extremely domineering, and each one was capable of defying fate, destiny, truth, great daos, order, law, and even the yin and yang.

Eight defiances!

SWISH!

As Buddha Testimony took the eight steps, they caused Yang Qi’s attacks to completely miss him. Then, Buddha Testimony, who was known as the lord of destroyers and king of terror in the Dragonfolk, drew on another consummate and deadly technique. He thrust his hand out, causing the entire area to fill with the aura of a dragon.

“All Living Things Become Dragons!”

Suddenly, numerous streams of vital energy in the area transformed into draconic true energy!

“Myriad Dragons Strangling Slaughter!”

Thus, Yang Qi and Buddha Testimony began fighting back and forth.

Meanwhile, Dibarra lunged toward the imperial uncle, whom he hated with a vengeance. He had been caught completely off guard by Yang Qi’s tactic, and was convinced that he and the imperial uncle really had been sent to kill him.

Yang Qi had pulled off a very clever move.

Although the people from the Sumeru Temple had been dealing relatively politely with the Deva Dynasty, in the end, they were enemies. Yang Qi knew that, and had decided to use it to his advantage. If these three experts had joined forces against him, he wouldn’t have lost. But now he had created a situation in which he only had to deal with one enemy, and could potentially trap him like a turtle in a jar. Furthermore, in the Bastille of the One God, he could move about freely, whereas the others had to be very careful.

Of course, he had to make the situation seem realistic. Therefore, as he faced the Heaven-Defying Eight Steps and the Dragon-Defying Seven Claws, he made it seem like he was starting to run out of godpower. Then he turned as if to flee.

“Where do you think you’re going?” Buddha Testimony snapped. Convinced that Mister Second was severely wounded, and not really trying to work with the imperial uncle, he decided to try to handle him alone.

WHOOSH!

Yang Qi shot out into the Bastille of the One God, followed by Buddha Testimony.

“We were fooled, Dibarra!” the imperial uncle shouted. “I wasn't working with him! Now Buddha Testimony’s going to come out on top. What's the point in us fighting to the death here!?”

Things had really slipped out of control for him.

“Fine, there’s no reason to fight to the death.” He suddenly launched thirty-six fist strikes, all of them incredibly powerful. They were from a set of moves called the Myriad-Buddhas Devil-Crushing Palms.

The imperial uncle was shoved backward, and Dibarra shot into motion after Yang Qi.

Chapter 1379: Feinting to the East and Attacking in the West

“Deva Lunge!”

Upon seeing Dibarra taking action, there was no way the imperial uncle was just going to give up. Instead, he drew on a consummate movement technique called the Deva Lunge, allowing him to burst into motion.

As that happened, Yang Qi was leading Buddha Testimony on a chase deep into the crumbling temples of the Bastille of the One God. Here, the buildings rose high into the air, but they looked different from the other buildings. Plants crept up and covered cover the walls, strange vegetation the likes of which wasn't seen in the god world in general.

RUMBLE!

Heaven and earth shook as Yang Qi and Buddha Testimony exchanged blows.

Buddha Testimony was being very careful. There were numerous soul conglomerations here, floating around like jellyfish, and he didn't dare get too close to them.

Yang Qi was putting on a show of being scared of them as well, and was spending more effort luring Buddha Testimony to a location where he could effectively take him out.

They proceeded along for several hours, exchanging blows here and there. Eventually, they reached a large temple, the vicinity of which abounded with soul conglomerations and groups of converted angels.

At that point, Yang Qi stopped and plastered an odd smile on his face. They were in such a dangerous situation that no one in their right mind would dare to take any action. Of course, Yang Qi was different.

He now had Buddha Testimony in a location where he couldn’t use any trump cards to easily escape.

“What are you smiling for, Mister Second? Don’t you understand that there’s nowhere left to run to? How are those angel souls inside you feeling? We're surrounded by soul conglomerations! You can’t go back, because I'm blocking the way, and you can't go forward. This is a very dangerous place that not even I dared to come to in the past. Where do you think you’ll escape to? Just surrender! Stop fighting, and I might spare your life. Refuse, and things will go very bad for you.”

“Nowhere left to run to?” Yang Qi said. “Those words apply to you, not me.” All of a sudden, his facial expression changed. All of the artificial fear from before vanished and was replaced by a confident, powerful expression.

He suddenly inhaled, and a vortex sprang up around him, sucking in all the soul conglomerations for hundreds of kilometers in all directions. To the complete and utter shock of Buddha Testimony, the glowing balls of light vanished into Yang Qi. Inside of him, the sage monarch magistrates began splitting apart and growing stronger.

“Y-y-you...” Buddha Testimony stammered. “Who are you? How are you not hurt? You just absorbed those soul conglomerations?”

“That's right. I'm not injured at all. I lured you out here to kill you. Even if your original dragon ancestor were still alive, he couldn't save you now. What do you say, Buddha Testimony? Did you really think I'm so stupid that I would absorb a bunch of deadly souls just to maintain face? As for my identity, I’ll tell you after you acknowledge allegiance to me. All three of you top experts from the various sects will become my puppets today.”

“You’ve got some wild ambitions, don’t you?” Buddha Testimony said, keeping his cool. He knew he was now in an extremely dangerous situation, but that remaining calm was crucial if he wanted to escape alive. Obviously, Mister Second had completely surpassed any of his speculations or expectations.

Just as Yang Qi was about to respond to his question, Buddha Testimony suddenly thrust his palm out and used a move from the Heaven-Defying Eight Steps.

“Savage Dragon Emerges from the Sea!” he shouted.

In response, Yang Qi unleashed his energy, summoning an immense pure land from the Sage Monarch Grand Magic.

“God Legion Paradise. Magisters!”

RUMBLE!

The pure land spread out in all directions, erupting with a gravitational force that sucked in all of the sagelight and angel souls in the area. At the same time, the two thousand sage monarch magistrates appeared, along with a few newcomers that had just split off.

All of these sage monarch magistrates had psychic scales and godhood ratings of nine hundred and ninety thousand.

Joining their voices together, they unleashed a shocking battle cry.

“Triumph in Every Battle! Triumph in Every Battle!” Their voices echoed loudly in the God Legion Paradise. Normally speaking, no one would dare to unleash a personal domain in the Bastille of the One God. Doing so would be pure suicide, as it would instantly attract the attention of the angel souls. And as the saying goes, it's easy to invite a god in, but hard to send it away.

But Yang Qi wanted those angel souls to come, even the converted angels.

Once they were sucked into the God Legion Paradise, they would explode and add to his strength.

He launched a fist strike at Buddha Testimony, and when their blows met, Buddha Testimony felt immense power smashing into his five viscera and six bowels, devastating his meridians and causing true energy to erupt out of him.

“That power is incredible! Are those thralls? How could thrall troops be so strong?”

Buddha Testimony staggered backward, his face ashen at the sight of the sage monarch magistrates pouring out of Yang Qi.

“That's right, these are my thralls. And guess what? I can absorb the power of the Bastille of the One God to make more of them. Do you know how strong that makes me?” He inhaled, and numerous cracking sounds rang out from inside him.

There was currently one main thought running through Buddha Testimony’s head: ‘I have to get out of here!’

Outside the Bastille of the One God, he would have been willing to hunker down and fight. But inside, he had to be extremely careful. Worse, his opponent was apparently able to use all the dangerous parts of his surroundings to boost his fighting prowess.

Even the thrall troops he was using seemed to be equivalent to Unbounded experts. What did that imply? Enough ants could bite an elephant to death. And Unbounded experts were far more than ants!

“Thinking of running? It's not going to happen!”

Psychic power spread out, covering the area as the God Legion Paradise spread out. In the blink of an eye, it had expanded to cover Buddha Testimony. All of a sudden, he found himself in the midst of countless godtrees and godflowers, with a gentle breeze touching his cheeks. And he was facing a host of sage monarch magistrates.

Yang Qi was there, sitting between two godtrees. One of them swayed in the wind, its leaves rustling gently. The other wasn’t moving at all, almost as if it were made of metal.

“What do you think of my god kingdom, Buddha Testimony?” Yang Qi asked. “These trees are manifestations of my own fundamental nature. One of them represents permanence, and the other represents impermanence. That is the nature of human life. Permanence is truth, and can never transform throughout all eternity. It represents my heart. Impermanence represents the transformations of the universe. The universe is impermanent, but my heart is permanent. Thus it is.”

“You... who are you?” Buddha Testimony asked. “You’re not some big shot from the dao of devils. Your personality from before was just an act! And your cultivation is obviously totally different than you were letting on!”

“You don’t need to know,” Yang Qi replied. “The only important thing to understand is that you can’t escape. My pure land has been unleashed, and I'm absorbing energy every moment. In other words, I’m getting stronger with each second that passes!”

“Fine, I guess I just have to kill you. I’m still the king of fighters among the Dragonfolk, and the lord of destroyers! Even if you were stronger than you’re letting on, I'm still going to kill you! Prepare to die. Vile Dragon Destroys Heaven!”

RUMBLE!

A vile dragon erupted from inside Buddha Testimony, lunging toward Yang Qi, shattering the godtrees in its path and slamming the sage monarch magistrates aside.

“You made a mistake by coming here as your true self. Let’s see what you’re really made of! Not many people remember the name of Buddha Testimony, as I've been sealed for a hundred million years by the Dragonfolk old-timers. My true form is that of a vile dragon! A preheaven dragon formed from ultimate sin and enmity. I’ll kill you, take those thrall troops, and reach the late Paramount God level. Then I’ll wipe out all those damned Dragonfolk patriarchs. Eat them alive! And you too!

“Dragon Soars over Four Seas!

“Myriad Dragons Leave their Lair!

“Yin Dragon, Yang Dragon!

“Dragon Flies, Phoenix Swirls!

“Dragon-Snakes Contend for Hegemony!

“Eight Tribes, One Dragon!”

Buddha Testimony’s power began rising, his psychic scale and godhood rating climbing past ninety million and heading toward a hundred million!

He was using this evil dragon to smash everything, and using the energy of sin and enmity to transform the God Legion Paradise into a kingdom of dragons.

“Myriad Things Become Dragons; Kingdom of God Dragons; Lair of Vile Dragons; Cave of Evil Dragons; Chasm of Savage Dragons!”

Immense power erupted everywhere.

Crack!

One of the godtrees couldn't withstand the force, and transformed into a vile dragon!

Before, the God Legion Paradise had been filled with flowers and vegetation, but with Buddha Testimony there, sending out immense quantities of the energy of sin and enmity, all of the plants were transforming into dragons!

“I don’t care who you are. You're going to see a magic of magics that I've been cultivating for hundreds of millions of years! The Sin and Enmity Dragonization Incantation!”

Chapter 1380: Crushing Down

Sitting between the twin trees of permanence and impermanence, Yang Qi growled, “Evil creature! I can’t believe you’re acting so impudently here in my pure land. Tribulation Monarch Cannon: FIRE!”

His will spread out, stilling the twitching god kingdom around him. Truth be told, he was actually shocked that his opponent was so powerful, and that his energy arts could transform everything around them into dragons. Even the vital energy was being turned into dragon scales.

If he had clashed with someone like this while in the Deva Dynasty, he would have been in big trouble.

Thankfully, his trip to the Bastille of the One God had involved slaughtering spacetitans and going through five months of cultivation. Furthermore, after entering this place, he had devoured ancient angel soul conglomerations and actual transmogrified angels, furthering his cultivation again. Right now, he was stronger than ever, so even if Buddha Testimony’s cultivation were stronger than it was, he would still be in real trouble.

RUMBLE!

All heaven and earth trembled violently.

The sun and moon inverted, and mysterious power surged everywhere. At the same time, the sage monarch magistrates leaped into a tight formation, creating an enormous cannon that pulsed with the power of tribulations. Godpower surged and an immense roaring sound was heard, then a massive blast shot out and smashed into the vile dragons.

This cannon also contained elements of the Cannon of Civilization. The white beam of light that shot out of it could both create and destroy countless civilizations.

Who could create civilizations, destroy civilizations, and carry the legacies of civilizations? Who could make full use of civilizations?

It was as if these questions were being asked of all living beings by the great heaven above. But then the living beings asked the gods, and the gods asked time and fate itself.

This was an attack that surpassed both the corporeal and the psychic.

Crack. Rattle.

When the dragonized vital energy was hit by the blast from the Tribulation Monarch Cannon, it shattered and exploded. There wasn't anything that could survive power like that.

“Aiiiiieeee!”

Buddha Testimony shrieked as the white light locked onto him. He tried using the Heaven-Defying Eight Steps to dodge the blast, but this was an attack that surpassed the corporeal and the psychic, and it transcended time, space, souls, and physical bodies. It contained permanence and impermanence, and was something that simply couldn’t be dodged.

C-C-CRACK!

The sky ripped open from the force of the attack, and Buddha Testimony’s magical treasures and defensive powers were incapable of defending him.

As blood sprayed out of countless wounds on his body, he drew on the most powerful counterattack his godhood could muster.

“Heaven and Earth Become Dragons; Lair of Ten Thousand Dragons!”

The area around him transformed into a lair filled with ten thousand dragons. There were so many that they almost looked like writhing earthworms. Red dragons, azure dragons, green dragons, silver dragons, gold dragons, jade dragons, ghost dragons, underworld dragons, bone dragons, iron dragons, god dragons, heaven dragons, buddha dragons, spike dragons, white dragons, grey dragons, snake dragons, earth dragons, tiger dragons.... Every possible type of named dragon in existence could be seen.

It was truly a lair of ten thousand dragons!

This was his most powerful energy art, and it was his only hope of fending off the power of the Tribulation Monarch Cannon.

Both the Lair of Ten Thousand Dragons and the God Legion Paradise were physical god kingdoms that could absorb immense levels of power, providing an incredible level of defense.

Yang Qi shouted, “Tribulation of the One God! Let the Halls of Heaven Fall from the Sky!”

Within the white light of the Tribulation Monarch Cannon, the halls of heaven appeared. After all, the Tribulation Monarch Cannon had originally been created in the depths of hell by the Supreme True-Devil, and its power had been used to fire at the god world, and its most core element, the halls of heaven.

But Yang Qi had transformed the cannon, changing it from the Grand Tribulation Cannon into the Tribulation Monarch Cannon, making it stronger and more mysterious than ever. And this was its most powerful volley, called Let the Halls of Heaven Fall from the Sky.

RUMBLE!

Immense power split through everything and crashed into the Lair of Ten Thousand Dragons, ripping it to shreds causing blood to spray out of the mouth of the wild-eyed Buddha Testimony as he was thrown backward to slam into one of the godtrees of the God Legion Paradise.

The blow had severely damaged his godhood, soul, and sea of consciousness, nearly destroying them. There was no way he could recover from this injury!

Everything in the God Legion Paradise went calm, and Yang Qi walked forward, then squatted next to the twitching Buddha Testimony.

“Now are you convinced?”

“No! I refuse to accept this. If we were outside, I’d definitely crush you. I would never have ended up in this situation. I hate you! I should’ve done everything differently!” Buddha Testimony was no fool, and was aware that he was in an extremely dangerous situation. He also knew there was no way Yang Qi would let him off the hook. “If I’d done something on the way here, you wouldn’t have been able to fight back.”

“There’s no point in dragging out this conversation. In life, there’s no medicine you can take to cure regrets.” He shoved his palm out, causing an embryonic version of the halls of heaven to appear right over Buddha Testimony’s head, then crush down!

The halls of heaven were crushing down!

Buddha Testimony had no time to react. The God Legion Seal had taken the form of the halls of heaven, and as it pierced into his head, golden light flared. The power of the God Legion Seal transformed his soul and mind, and at the same time, a golden throne appeared within the seal.

A moment later, he struggled to a sitting position, his eyes darting about, his hair in disarray. He no longer looked like a handsome young sir. Instead, his eyes were slack, with a sealing mark that looked like the halls of heaven, sitting there in his pupils.

“Awaken,” Yang Qi said, tapping his forehead.

Buddha Testimony leaped to his feet. “You... you’re actually—”

“Yes. I'm the bearer of the God Legion Seal. Now do you understand why I can move about so freely in the Bastille of the One God?” Yang Qi clasped his hands behind his back. “The God Legion Seal now administrates your thoughts. I control everything about you, and there’s nothing you can do to free yourself. On your knees!”

RUMBLE!

Buddha Testimony tried to resist, but he couldn’t fight back against the power of the God Legion Seal. Nothing did any good, and trying to take back control of himself only caused more power to flow through him and control him.

With a flop, he dropped to the ground and lay there unmoving. His thoughts and actions were no longer under his own control, to the point where the humiliation he felt in his heart was quickly dispelled.

In the past, he had been the type of expert that would feel it an immense insult to be forced to kneel to anyone. Even if heaven and earth fell, and countless of his own people were slaughtered in bloody fashion, he would never agree to do such a thing.

But now he couldn't even harbor thoughts of resisting.

“I bet you want to feel humiliated and furious, don’t you, Buddha Testimony,” Yang Qi said, his voice thrumming with a devilish tinge. “You want to think of killing me. But you can’t. That’s because I’ve transformed your mind and heart. If I want you to smile, you’ll smile. If I want you to cry, you’ll cry. If I want you to fly into a rage, you’ll fly into a rage. And if I want you to cease any such activities, you will. Even if I tell you to go lick someone’s boots, you won’t get angry. I control your happiness, anger, sorrow, and joy.”

Buddha Testimony looked up, a faint, enigmatic smile on his face. “I'm not myself anymore. Not even inside.”

Yang Qi laughed. “Correct. Serve me well, and when I become the Sovereign Lord in the future, I’ll give you back your freedom.”

“You....” But in the end, Buddha Testimony had no words to speak.

“Enough chatting. I’ll heal you now. With you back to full strength, you can help me subjugate Dibarra and the imperial uncle. After I have all of you on my side, I can deal with the rest of the experts from the Nine Dragons Court, Sumeru Temple, and Deva Dynasty. Then, after about half a year of cultivation and progress, I’ll be able to seize control of all three sects.”

Yang Qi thrust out his palm and sent godpower surging into Buddha Testimony. Within moments, his injuries were healed.

“They're here,” Yang Qi said. Retracting the God Legion Paradise, he looked at Buddha Testimony and said, “You ambush Dibarra, and I’ll grab the imperial uncle. We have to keep them apart.”

“Exactly!”

Already, Buddha Testimony had reached the point where he didn’t even consider defying Yang Qi.

All of a sudden, Yang Qi attacked with his palm, sending vital energy surging out. At the same time, he had Buddha Testimony unleash a trump card move, making it seem like the two of them were fiercely fighting.

Dibarra and the imperial uncle appeared, then stopped some distance away and looked thoughtfully at the battle playing out in front of them. At a certain point, Yang Qi let loose a howl as he hit Buddha Testimony with a bevy of palm strikes that forced the man backward several paces. But then Buddha Testimony spat out a dragonpearl, which hit Yang Qi and sent blood spraying out of his mouth as he was thrown to the ground.

Seemingly falling back in retreat, Buddha Testimony headed toward Dibarra. Meanwhile, thinking he could take advantage of the situation, the imperial uncle shot toward Yang Qi.

“Where are you going, Buddha Testimony?!” Dibarra shouted angrily. “You’re supposed to be helping me get Mister Second!”

“I know. Quick, you handle the imperial uncle!” At this point, the two of them were passing each other so closely they nearly brushed up against each other. And of course, Dibarra wasn't at all suspicious of Buddha Testimony.

Without warning, brilliant white light suddenly shot out of Buddha Testimony, a cannon blast filled with the power of tribulation. And it shot right toward Dibarra’s back.

He was caught unawares, but still was able to sense the danger, and quickly summoned a shining field of buddhist light behind himself.

RUMBLE!

The ground trembled as the buddhist light shattered, and he was hit, sending him slamming into the ground with blood spraying out of his mouth. “Buddha Testimony! I can't believe you would dare to ambush me!”

Uninterested in exchanging words, Buddha Testimony simply attacked with a host of killing moves, drawing on his Sin and Enmity Dragonization Incantation to fight Dibarra without a single indication that he was willing to hold back.

Chapter 1381: They All Kneel

The sneak attack worked!

Buddha Testimony pulled off the move perfectly. Yang Qi had not only healed him, but had also given him some of the power of the Tribulation Monarch Cannon, allowing him to unleash attacks that a Paramount God just couldn't dodge. Perhaps outside the Bastille of the One God, Dibarra might have been able to get out of the way of the attack. But inside the bastille, the limitations on him were too great. His aura was suppressed, and he constantly had to be careful about attracting the attention of angels and soul conglomerations.

In terms of both speed and power, he was very limited, and the results in this specific circumstance were tragic.

That said, despite the ambush having worked, Dibarra wasn’t dead. Instead, he simply found his godpower impeded.

“You animal, Buddha Testimony! What do you think you’re doing? Don’t tell me you’re trying to cut me out and take everything for your own?”

Dibarra was obviously furious.

However, Buddha Testimony only took advantage of his moment of weakness to press the attack, unleashing even more deadly attacks, seemingly without concern for his own safety.

It was as if Dibarra was his most hated archenemy.

“Blood Sacrifice to Myriad Dragons; Blood-Tainting Dragon Banner!”

SPLAT!

Buddha Testimony spat out a spray of blood that floated into the air and took the shape of a dragon banner, its surface covered with a host of fanged, clawed dragons fluttering in flight. This was a forbidden art that required a huge drain on one’s lifespan in order to use it.

In the blink of an eye, the banner wrapped around Dibarra.

“Are you crazy?! You're actually using the Blood-Tainting Dragon Banner? That’s a forbidden art among you Dragonfolk! Are you looking to be killed? Since when did you have such a big grudge with me? You’re really willing to fight to the death over this Mister Second?” Dibarra was convinced that Buddha Testimony had gone insane.

Not only was the Blood-Tainting Dragon Banner a huge drain on one's life force, but the Bastille of the One God was also a very dangerous place. Not even the most confident person would risk using a move like this in such a dangerous place.

Yet it was happening right in front of Dibarra’s eyes.

As the banner wrapped around him, he unleashed a buddhist light of protection, filled with three thousand chiliocosms of worlds. Then, he and Buddha Testimony were trapped together in the Blood-Tainting Dragon Banner.

This move was a true trump card, and was so dangerous that he hadn’t even resorted to it when fighting Yang Qi. It would reduce one's lifespan by a third, and when its effects ended, it would leave the user extremely weak and sometimes even injured.

The fact that he was using it on Dibarra showed that he truly intended to destroy him.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi was fighting with the “wooden-faced young man” who was the imperial uncle.

BAM!

Yang Qi’s palm slammed into the imperial uncle’s, and the latter staggered backward. To him, it felt like Yang Qi’s power was unending and infinite.

Then he saw the Blood-Tainting Dragon Banner wrapping around Dibarra and a look of shock filled his face. “What’s going on here?! You’re not even wounded?”

“It couldn't be easier to explain, boy,” Yang Qi said. "I lured you here into the Bastille of the One God, to a location you couldn't flee from. I already forced Buddha Testimony to acknowledge allegiance to me. He works for me now. What, did you really think I'd fallen victim to that soul conglomeration? Look and see how strong I really am!”

All of a sudden, the God Legion Paradise exploded out.

This time, it was thousands of kilometers in diameter and filled with a host of buildings and palaces. As it sucked in more souls, angels, and clouds, it sent their power into the godtrees, and through them to the sage monarch magistrates.

The sage monarch magistrates took the power and split into new versions, growing stronger at the same time. In the blink of an eye, their numbers swelled to three thousand.

“You—” the imperial uncle said.

“What about me?” Yang Qi interrupted. “Take a look at my two godtrees, one of permanence, the other of impermanence....” The two trees sprouted on either side of him, one flourishing with vegetation, the other withered and leafless. The former seemed to sway and rustle in the wind, while the latter was as solid as truth and the great dao, and like iron, completely unmoving.

The transformations of withering and flourishing had appeared within the God Legion Paradise. Permanence and impermanence. The power of karma flowed through the pure land around him, and Yang Qi’s every move was filled with the dynamics of heaven and earth. Winds and clouds screamed, causing fluctuations to roll out everywhere.

It created the momentum to crush people, suppress them, awe them, and subjugate them.

“Be subdued!” Yang Qi said, unleashing the Sovereign Lord’s Holy and Far-Reaching Consummate Omnicurse.

Instantly, a god script of enchantment swirled out from him, a string of text like a horde of locusts, which flew directly toward the imperial uncle.

“Hmph! Parlor tricks!” Unafraid, the imperial uncle suddenly erupted with energy, causing numerous white rainbows to blossom above him. “White Rainbows Stab the Sun; Void of the Northwest!”

RUMBLE!

It was a dhāraṇī god curse that caused the white rainbows spread out and become a heavenly net, which then slammed into the Sovereign Lord’s Holy and Far-Reaching Consummate Omnicurse.

However, as soon as they entered, they faded into nothing, as surely as snowflakes falling onto hot ground.

Then, the omnicurse pierced the imperial uncle’s defensive empyrean energy, stabbing into his body and making him squeal like a pig being led to the slaughter.

Crack. Snap. Pop.

Numerous popping sounds rang out inside him, and he writhed as though he was being stung by a colony of bees.

To him, it felt like his soul was being stabbed over and over again by the curse, which was obviously vastly more painful than it would be if an ordinary person were to be stung by bees.

Meanwhile, the God Legion Paradise spun rapidly around him, creating a tempest with Yang Qi in the middle. At the same time, the vital energy, soul conglomerations, and angels in the area were sucked inside, converted into power, and fed to the sage monarch magistrates, whose numbers blew past three thousand.

Yang Qi’s godhood rating was already past eighty million, but he was still an early Paramount God. He lacked the bit of power he needed to climb to the mid Paramount God level. After all, the requirements of monarch godhood surpassed that of ordinary godhood by many times over.

Gasping for breath, the imperial uncle said, “Stop! Don’t curse me, Mister Second! I know you’re an almighty being from ancient times. I was a fool to think I could beat you and steal from you. For the sake of Patriarch Deva, please let me off the hook just this once. I'm an important leader in the Deva Dynasty! If you harm me, Patriarch Deva will be furious.”

“It’s a bit late to start begging for mercy now. And why did you think I would do anything for the sake of Patriarch Deva? Hmph! He can’t even defend himself! Once I return, I'm going to crush him just like I'm crushing you. I'm curious to see why he thinks he qualifies to plot against me.” Yang Qi continued pouring the power of the curse into the imperial uncle, until the fluctuations were so intense his clothing exploded off of him.

There he stood, naked within the pure land. Then he dropped to his knees and prostrated himself on the ground. The text of the curse flowed across his skin, looking almost like ants, causing him to simultaneously writhe and shine with radiance and light.

“You’re now my slave, and I am your lord.” Yang Qi activated the God Legion Seal, then tapped the imperial uncle's head. Instantly, another gold throne appeared in the seal.

The imperial uncle had a godhood rating and psychic scale of ninety million, but even he was forced to acknowledge allegiance to Yang Qi.

Off to the side, howls of rage could be heard as Buddha Testimony and Dibarra fought with deadly abandon within the Blood-Tainting Dragon Banner. Dibarra had come to hate Buddha Testimony so much that he was resorting to his most deadly moves.

However, that was when Yang Qi drew on the God Legion Paradise and pulled the Blood-Tainting Dragon Banner into its depths.

“You help too, Imperial Uncle.” The imperial uncle attacked, joining Buddha Testimony in the fight. At the same time, Yang Qi again released the omnicurse. As a result, Dibarra’s shining buddhist light shattered, and he was sent flying into the air, where Yang Qi quickly bound him.

Then, Buddha Testimony and the imperial uncle forced him onto his knees. “Oh exalted Sovereign Lord, we’ve captured Dibarra!”

“Excellent! Henceforth, you three will follow my instructions and do exactly as I wish.”

“No!” Dibarra blurted. After all, he hadn’t yet acknowledged allegiance. But unfortunately for him, he was completely immobilized. “Who exactly are you? How could you subjugate Buddha Testimony and the imperial uncle so quickly? Buddha Testimony, Imperial Uncle, you’re both consummate experts on the verge of becoming top patriarchs and taking over leadership of your own sects. How could you kneel to him? Have you no sense of dignity?”

“No, we don’t,” Buddha Testimony said. “And in short order, neither will you.”

Yang Qi reached out and put his hand on Dibarra’s head. The man screamed and fought, but moments later, the power of the God Legion Seal pierced into the buddha power in his mind.

Chapter 1382: Major Success

Majestic and invincible godpower from the God Legion Seal flowed into Dibarra’s mind, forcing the archmonk to become Yang Qi’s servant. He had no choice but to be loyal, and would never defy orders.

As of this moment, Yang Qi had three followers whose godhood rating and psychic scale were at ninety million. That was actually greater than Yang Qi’s own numbers. However, he had his sage monarch magistrates and, when he used them, could unleash a might that would allow him to fight Patriarch Devas and the other late Paramount Gods like him.

And that wasn’t even mentioning how favorable the terrain was for him.

Looking at the three experts kneeling in front of him, Yang Qi knew that he had just achieved a major success. With these people working for him, he could shake the heavens, topple the earth, and bring major transformations to anything and everything.

As of now, it shouldn’t be a problem at all to conquer and unify the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty, Nacrelight Sageland, League of Academies, League of the Devil-Dao, and League of Wretch-Gods.

“Now I need to assimilate all of the angels and soul conglomerations in the Bastille of the One God. And also search for treasure! If I work on my cultivation here for half a year or so, and find that piece of the Mahātmā Jade, I should be able to reach the mid Paramount God level.” Looking at the three experts, he said, “Rise. Go back to your respective sects and start recruiting followers for me. Just say that I escaped into the Bastille of the One God and you lost track of me. I’ll secretly keep in touch and provide whatever help or assistance you need. For now, I’m not quite ready to deal with Patriarch Deva, Patriarch Dragon, and Buddhist Lord Sumeru. And that’s not to mention whatever reserve powers they can call upon. So for now, all we can do is lay the groundwork.”

The Patriarchs of the Deva Dynasty, Sumeru Temple, and Nine Dragons Court were so immensely powerful that even if Yang Qi somehow managed to subjugate them, it would only be after spilling rivers of blood.

So for now, he would just continue to plot against them from the shadows.

After his three new servants returned and began furthering his interests, he would decide what to do next. For the moment, the main thing he wanted to do was handle the House of God Ordainment, Nacrelight Sageland, and Eternal-Life God-Dynasty. After he took them over and seized their destiny, he would decide how to take over the Deva Dynasty, Nine Dragons Court, and Sumeru Temple.

If nothing else, Yang Qi was now confident that he would eventually reach the late Paramount God level.

And even though Patriarch Deva was also in that level, Yang Qi had monarch godhood. So when he got to that point, he could slaughter a hundred Patriarch Devas if he wanted to.

“You may leave now!” Yang Qi said.

The three experts turned and left.

Before long, they were reconvening with their own people.

“How did it go, Imperial Uncle?” Grand Prince Yi said.

“We're leaving,” the imperial uncle ordered. “Call everyone together so we can meet back up with Buddha Testimony and Dibarra.”

The people from the Deva Dynasty naturally followed his orders without question. Meanwhile, Buddha Testimony and Dibarra had gone to meet up with their respective groups.

**

“What happened, exalted Buddha Testimony?” Buddha Exterminator asked. “Why didn't you capture that Mister Second?”

“Watch your mouth!” Buddha Lawtongue snapped. “The exalted Buddha Testimony is in charge here!”

**

“Exalted Dibarra, did that Mister Second get away?” one of the senior monks asked.

“Stop asking so many questions. The time has come to meet back up with the Deva Dynasty and Nine Dragons Court.” Dibarra didn’t dare to say anything further, as his thoughts were being administered by Yang Qi. Although he didn't particularly want to lead all of his people into a trap, he had no choice in the matter.

**

Before long, the groups from the three sects had gathered in a rather large palace hall.

There, a pure land appeared, encompassing everything around it. At the same time, Buddha Testimony, Dibarra, and the imperial uncle all unleashed streams of energy that turned into a huge net and settled over everyone present.

“Imperial Uncle... you!”

Grand Prince Yi was so shocked that he couldn’t react, and within moments, was completely sealed.

“Calm down,” a voice said. “Buddha Testimony, Dibarra, and the imperial uncle have all acknowledged allegiance to me.” Yang Qi floated onto the scene with a smile on his face, flanked by row upon row of sage monarch magistrates, the Sovereign Lord’s Holy and Far-Reaching Consummate Omnicurse already at work.

The gathered forces of the Nine Dragons Court, Deva Dynasty, and Sumeru Temple all erupted into furious shouting.

“What’s going on here!?”

“What are you up to, Mister Second!?”

“Nothing much. Why don’t the three of you explain?” With a wave of his hand, he caused power to surge and the God Legion Paradise to slowly start shrinking down.

“Mister Second is an almighty being from the ancient past,” explained Dibarra. “He’s invincible, here in the Bastille of the One God, and as a result, subjugated the three of us. So all of you need to fall in line. Be baptized, and acknowledge allegiance to him. Together, we will found a new era in which Mister Second rules the Deva Dynasty, Sumeru Temple, and Nine Dragons Court.”

“Never!” shouted an old monk. “Dibarra, you’re supposed to be the next patriarch! How could you betray the Sumeru Temple like this? What exactly are you thinking?”

“Enough jabbering,” Yang Qi said. “Start the baptism!” Putting his palms together as if in prayer, he sent the power of the God Legion Seal shooting out, causing boundless golden light to wash over everyone present.

Bam. Bam. Bam. Bam! Bam!!

Howls of rage could be heard, intermixed with pleas for mercy. Many people trembled violently, and some even passed out as dramatic transformations occurred.

Yang Qi ignored it all, choosing to focus on the God Legion Seal instead. There, throne after throne rose up, one for every person present.

Whizz!

A flow of destiny entered Yang Qi as everyone there was forced to be loyal to him. And considering how powerful these people were, Yang Qi could tell that he already controlled about a third of the respective destinies of the Deva Dynasty, Sumeru Temple, and Nine Dragons Court.

Fiery flows of energy ripped through the God Legion Paradise as unimaginable faith power settled onto Yang Qi.

He had truly experienced an immense success.

‘No wonder!’ Yang Qi thought. ‘No wonder the God Legion Seal can be used to subjugate so many gods. Each one provides a huge amount of destiny, beyond anything I realized before.’

The process took several hours.

When it was finished, the God Legion Paradise vanished and everyone slowly regained their wits, whereupon they exchanged awkward glances. All of their thoughts were now laid bare before Yang Qi, and none of them could resist him.

“We’re all slaves now. Puppets....”

“There’s nothing to be done about it. That was the God Legion Seal!”

“Who is Mister Second, really? If he has the God Legion Seal, doesn’t that mean he's the successor of the Sovereign Lord?”

“Come on, let’s go. We have orders to follow from Mister Second. We need to go back, seize destiny, and serve his interests.”

“We can't defy Mister Second’s orders. Let’s go....”

With that, they turned and left the Bastille of the One God. The trip to the Bastille of the One God had been very difficult, but the return trip wouldn’t be. Yang Qi could easily create a dimensional passageway for them to travel without any obstacles.

‘It's finally quieted down....’

After they were gone, Yang Qi smiled at the thought of his immense gains. Now, he could focus fully on working on his cultivation here in the Bastille of the One God.

‘Oh, right. I ought to set up a spell formation to teleport stuff back to the House of God Ordainment. The vital energy here has a resonance with me, so I can use the God Legion Seal to create a teleportation portal very easily. That way, if anything happens in the House of God Ordainment, I can easily get back without flying there.’

Normally speaking, a teleportation portal linking a place as distant as the Bastille of the One God to the House of God Ordainment would be too expensive to use. Thankfully, Yang Qi had a virtually unending supply of power.

Chapter 1383: Breakthroughs for the Brethren

Yang Qi absolutely had to set up a teleportation portal.

Considering he had the God Legion Seal, the Bastille of the One God was like his own backyard. In other words, he could do exactly as he pleased here.

Of course, the Bastille of the One God was still a mysterious location that numerous top experts would come to explore, so he had to be careful. What would happen if some expert the likes of Patriarch Deva came along? If someone like that discovered that he had created a teleportation portal, what would happen? After all, who would possibly set up a teleportation portal in the Bastille of the One God? It was such a shocking thing that it might lead them to the conclusion that he had the God Legion Seal. And if they realized that the portal led to the House of God Ordainment, it could lead to a path of complete destruction.

The god world was huge, and filled with hidden dragons and crouching tigers. Patriarch Deva and his Deva Dynasty were only one of many similar forces that could only be considered as important as provincial capitals in an empire.

And Yang Qi refused to believe that Patriarch Deva represented the highest level of expert in the god world.

After searching around a bit, he found a temple that, even from the outside, appeared to have been completely picked clean of any treasure. It was the type of place that top experts weren’t likely to enter. After all, this area was still considered to be the periphery of the Bastille of the One God.

Venturing further inside to explore wasn’t something that could be done in a day or two. In fact, not even one or two years would be enough.

Long ago, this was a place that members of the legion of gods would have to pass through to reach the halls of heaven.

In other words, the Bastille of the One God was a stepping stone to the halls of heaven.

Likewise, if powerful experts from the dao of devils wanted to attack the halls of heaven, they would have to get through the Bastille of the One God first.

It was a battlefield, and that was why the Mahātmā Jade had been shattered here.

The palace he selected was solid and quite large. Looking around a bit, he selected a secluded side chamber where he would set up his teleportation portal. He didn't need physical items to set it up. Reaching out with his will, he could connect to heaven and earth and use the vital energy of the God Legion Seal.

Before long, complex designs could be seen on the surface of the formation, featuring people, mountains, rivers, oceans, space, suns, moons, and other magical symbols, all of which pulsed with godpower and the aura of tribulations.

“Power of the Bastille of the One God, come to me,” Yang Qi roared. “Pierce through space and time. Connect worlds to worlds. Remove all barriers!”

Surpassing the barriers of space-time, the God Legion Seal reached out with streaming light, causing cracking sounds to ring out.

This was no ordinary teleportation portal.

Yang Qi was using his boundless arts, including his enlightenment of the imperial-heaven pre-beginning systems, Annulled Grand Magic, and Sage Monarch Grand Magic to create it. It was far more exquisite than any other type of teleportation portal, as it was drawing on the natural laws of the Bastille of the One God to connect to another distant location.

A sound echoed out like the wailing of ghosts or weeping of gods, and as the portal slowly activated, something like a beehive of wormholes appeared.

“I hereby call on my own energy to reach out to the House of God Ordainment!”

Yang Qi circulated his energy, pouring it into the teleportation portal and causing the crackle of lightning to be seen as it stretched out to the Cruiser of Civilization in the House of God Ordainment.

The experts of the Nine Dragons Court, Deva Dynasty, and Sumeru Temple that he had just subjugated were people of immense power and authority. As a result, their destiny was in no way inferior to that of the emperor of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty. That was especially true of Buddha Testimony, the imperial uncle, and Dibarra, who surpassed even the patriarchs of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty and the Nacrelight Sageland.

And all of that destiny was flowing into Yang Qi.

Meanwhile, in the Cruiser of Civilization, Jadefall shivered as she sensed a teleportation portal opening up. Then destiny erupted out like lava from an exploding volcano, spreading out to fill the Cruiser of Civilization.

[Beep-beep-beep. Beep-beep-beep. Immense destiny and power detected. Absorbing. Storing. Transforming....]

Normally, destiny couldn’t be seen without special techniques and methods. For instance, the Son of Heaven’s Horoscopy. Yet this flow of destiny was visible. That was how dense and powerful it was. Thankfully, the Cruiser of Civilization was there to collect it into the reserve tanks.

The cruiser was a magical device created by the Lord of Civilization, and it was specially designed to collect the destiny of different civilizations and store it up.

RUMBLE!

Everything shook violently, and the disciples of the House of God Ordainment sensed that something extremely dramatic was happening. It was an explosion of a benign nature, and it caused an aura of radiance and light to fill everything around it. Palaces rose up in the god kingdom, and soft light filled the air. It was even possible to see flower petals falling down.

“Yang Qi succeeded in getting more destiny!” Jadefall said, rising to her feet. “Accelerate the plan! Brethren, speed up your cultivation with this influx of destiny. I refuse to believe that we can’t break through to the Unbounded level!”

Yang Zhan, the Shepherd, Brahma, and all of Yang Qi’s other friends and family were in the middle of sessions of hard cultivation. Ever since Yang Qi had left, they had been working hard to improve, and making use of the immense resources he’d left them to seek enlightenment and break through whatever barriers were in their path.

Not too long ago, Summer Vastcold and Summer Soundfyre had requested billions upon billions of godnotes in their attempt to reach the Unbounded level.

Now, Yang Qi’s friends and families were making use of resources that, if they were to be quantified in terms of godnotes, would definitely be in the level of trillions, or even tens of trillions. And of course, there were some unique treasures of heaven and earth that couldn’t even be purchased with godnotes.

All of Yang Qi’s friends and family were Ascendants, so they were far more qualified than Summer Vastcold and Summer Soundfyre in every regard. However, they had less abundant foundations. Thankfully, Yang Qi had allowed them to practice cultivation in the Cruiser of Civilization for three thousand years. He had also sent them immense amounts of resources from the Deva Dynasty, including numerous streams of destiny. If they still couldn’t reach the Unbounded level with all that, they might as well just kill themselves for being so useless.

Burning, lava-like destiny poured right into Yang Doom.

He had been a previous bearer of the God Legion Seal, and as such, was one of the most preeminently qualified of them all. Therefore, it was no surprise that he was the first one to break through to the Unbounded level.

The destiny was just what he had needed to succeed, and now he was surrounded with godpower so intense it formed something like a heavenly net that could destroy god kingdoms.

The Shepherd was the next to succeed.

The destiny Yang Qi was sending was equivalent to roughly one third of the totals of the Deva Dynasty, Nine Dragons Court, and Sumeru Temple, and the results it provided were shocking.

Next came Yang Manifestation, Yang Memory, Yang Celestial, Brahma, and the others. One after another, they succeeded in reaching the Unbounded level, causing immense space-time fluctuations to roll out in the Cruiser of Civilization.

“This is excellent,” Jadefall said, her eyes flickering with surprise. “Everyone's succeeding at the same time. With this, the power of the House of God Ordainment will be in no way inferior to the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty and Nacrelight Sageland. The time has come to announce what we’ve done. Before, we had to be careful about everything, but no longer will we slink about in the shadows. We don’t need to wait for Yang Qi to come back and protect us. We can start expanding now!”

“Exactly,” said Yang Doom, clenching his hands into fists. “Now that we have Unbounded will convergence, we're a hundred times stronger than before. I can’t wait for a big battle! Let's lead the forces of the House of God Ordainment to war against the other powers!”

“Congratulations, everyone! The time has come for the House of God Ordainment to rise to prominence!”

RUMBLE!

Jadefall issued orders, and before long, word was spreading about all of them reaching the Unbounded level. It didn’t take long for the news to spread to even the distant continents.

The first to get the news was, of course, the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty. The emperor, Eternal Nightless, had called a meeting in his study, gathering all the top officials. After all, there were always countless issues to handle in a dynasty this large. All of a sudden, the destiny of the entire dynasty experienced a sharp drop.

“What did you just say?”

“There’s no mistake,” said one of the court eunuchs. “The House of God Ordainment announced that they now have numerous Unbounded experts on their side. Our intelligence reports can't be wrong. What should we do, Your Majesty?”

This particular eunuch was on a similar level to Nie Yinyang. He was a peak Consummate God, and although he wasn't a Paramount God, he was a court eunuch, so he was very famous and powerful.

Of course, there were other imperial princes present during this meeting, and they weren’t about to let a good opportunity pass.

“How could this have happened? I thought the House of God Ordainment was working for the crown prince? How could they suddenly have numerous Unbounded experts? They’re supposed to be a vassal of our Eternal-Life God-Dynasty! The crown prince won’t be let off the hook for letting this happen!”

Chapter 1384: A Plot to Seize the Throne

In the emperor’s study in the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty, Eternal Nightless was holding a meeting. The most important ministers were in attendance, as well as generalissimos and nobilities of all sorts. There were also Unbounded Paramount God patriarchs there. This was obviously a very important meeting.

For the House of God Ordainment to suddenly have over a dozen Unbounded experts of their own was an extremely astonishing thing. For even one person to rise to the Unbounded level was a shocking event. For instance, when Eternal Millenium had done it, all of the ministers and generals of the imperial court had been dumbfounded, and the crown prince had completely solidified his position because of it. After all, throughout all the years that had passed, not a single other person among the genius princes had achieved the same thing.

Therefore, the House of God Ordainment getting over a dozen in one instant was obviously a major, destabilizing event. It went against the ‘rules of the game’, and was obviously going to cause a huge stir.

Already, opposing factions in the court were starting to blame Eternal Millennium.

Everyone knew that, only a few years back, Jadefall had made a huge scene in the House of God Ordainment, seizing power, imprisoning the houselord, and beating the junior houselord near to death. Afterward, she had come up with an excuse to seal the House of God Ordainment shut, and ever since, no one had any idea if the junior houselord was even alive.

The power in the House of God Ordainment had centralized in the Sage Monarch Society, with no other factions even operating.

As time passed after those events, the House of God Ordainment had continued expanding its borders and recruiting more experts.

The court in the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty had previously debated whether or not to crush the House of God Ordainment. But the crown prince had always said he was grooming it to be assimilated. In other words, it was his personal property that no one could touch.

Unfortunately, it seemed that the House of God Ordainment was no longer under his control. After all, how could the crown prince keep numerous Unbounded experts in line?

This new turn of events had the other imperial princes feeling very excited.

Eternal Millennium had finally made a huge error, and therefore, the time had come to overthrow him.

Stepping forward, the third prince said, “Father, I think we need to call the crown prince here and demand an explanation of what's going on.”

“I agree,” said the fifth prince. “Father, the crown prince has obviously lost control of the situation. Yet the House of God Ordainment is still benefiting from his protection, and using that to grow and expand. The fact that they’ve announced they have numerous Unbounded experts makes them an obvious threat to us.”

“The crown prince had better provide a good explanation for all this,” said the ninth prince, his voice thrumming with a decisiveness that could sever nails and chop iron.

There were several dozen princes present, and all of them joined in to berate Eternal Millennium.

Emperor Eternal Nightless couldn’t really say much about the matter. Although he was the emperor, he knew he had to keep a very close eye on the crown prince, who he knew had extremely high ambitions and was obviously eyeing the throne. According to what everyone understood, the crown prince had been in seclusion recently, seeking enlightenment and offering sacrifices to some great dao.

After a long moment of thought, the emperor nodded. “Men, call Crown Prince Eternal Millennium here. If he’s in seclusion, use a transmission talisman to reach him. This is extremely urgent. Even if he's at a dangerous, critical juncture, he must come!”

“Yes sir!”

A group of eunuchs complied, and soon enough, they were burning transmission talismans, which sent streams of silver light vanishing into the depths of space-time.

Several hours passed, then a thrumming power descended on the study and the voice of Eternal Millennium could be heard. “Allow me to kowtow in salute, Father.”

“Come in,” Eternal Nightless said. “Something big has happened.”

The door creaked open, and the tall, muscular Eternal Millennium appeared. He currently pulsed with a terrifying power so intense that everyone present, especially the other princes, suddenly felt inexplicably wary.

The other princes had all been preparing sarcastic and biting things to say, but all of a sudden, they realized that probably wasn't a good idea. The situation with the House of God Ordainment was obviously a big deal, but there was something about the crown prince that had them all feeling completely horrified.

Of course, this Eternal Millennium wasn’t the previous crown prince. He was a thrall, the master version of the sage monarch magistrates.

Although Yang Qi hadn’t taken him with him, he had sent power and destiny back to him, provoking numerous transformations, and making him stronger and stronger. Right now, he didn’t have a godhood rating and psychic scale of nine hundred and ninety thousand. That would be far too weak.

He was already at the level of over a million! He was the master version, with the power of the crown prince and a combination of the martial-god soldier-kings, the Harvestland, the seed of a Fateless One, and incredibly powerful morphlings. All kinds of precious treasures had been thrown at him to improve his cultivation, and he was now no weaker than Grand Prince Yi.

Within his godhood was a vortex that sucked in all surrounding energy in terrifying fashion.

Eyes glittering Eternal Nightless said, “Eternal Millennium... did you succeed in cultivating some sort of special divine ability? Why does your aura seem so different?”

Of course, he didn’t even need to point this fact out verbally, as all of the various ministers and princes had noticed the same thing.

“That’s right, Father. I’ve finished my martial-god soldier-kings, and am now as strong as a mid Paramount God. Sir, why did you call me here? Is it because of the House of God Ordainment? I wouldn’t worry about that. I have them under complete control. Jadefall and the others are all gathered in my personal mansion. In fact, with a single word, I can summon them here to offer formal greetings to you. Would you like that?”

He spoke smoothly and with confidence. After all, his strength had improved by leaps and bounds, and right now he was no weaker than his father, Emperor Eternal Nightless. Not even the top patriarchs of the dynasty could do anything to him. And upon hearing his words, the other princes broke out into cold sweat as they realized that their plans to overthrow him were pointless.

It was enough of a miracle that the crown prince was a Paramount God, but the fact that he was a mid Paramount God, the same level as the patriarchs, meant that he was going to be impossible to control.

“What? You're a mid Paramount God now? And you control the House of God Ordainment?” Eternal Nightless seemed both pleased and shocked at the same time. He was pleased that the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty was in such a good position, but at the same time shocked at Eternal Millennium’s cultivation advancement. After all, it meant the crown prince was now a greater threat than ever.

However, this wasn’t a forum to discuss matters of succession. The top priority at the moment was ensuring that Jadefall and the others in the House of God Ordainment surrendered and paid allegiance.

There wouldn’t be anything to worry about having them here. It shouldn’t be too difficult to keep a dozen or so Unbounded experts under control.

After all, the emperor was himself a mid Paramount God.

“Call them in immediately!”

“Yes, Father,” Eternal Millennium said, bowing slightly at the waist. He snapped his finger, and a paper talisman ignited. Then, a moment later, a voice rang out.

“Jadefall of the House of God Ordainment’s Sage Monarch Society is here with the key faction leaders to offer greetings to His Majesty the emperor.”

“Excellent. Come in, all of you.”

The emperor waved his hand and a pathway appeared. Jadefall entered, along with all the key members of the Sage Monarch Society, each of whom had Unbounded will convergence, making them comparable to early Paramount Gods. And all of them had special types of godhood.

Upon entering, Jadefall led her people to flank Eternal Millennium.

“What gall!” one of the ministers shouted. “How dare you enter the presence of the emperor and refuse to kneel! You’re subservient to the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty, and would do well to know your place. Understand?”

Ignoring the minister, Jadefall looked at the crown prince and said, “Exalted Magistrate, how do you view this matter?”

After all, he wasn’t the crown prince of old, but a key administrator of the Sage Monarch Society, tasked with keeping the sect going on a daily basis and serving with complete impartiality.

“I’ll handle it,” Eternal Millennium said. Looking at Eternal Nightless, he said, “Father, Your Majesty, the House of God Ordainment has chosen to serve me with full loyalty. Not the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty. And they’re here today to bear witness to history in the making.”

Already, Eternal Nightless could sense that something was off, and his face went slightly pale before turning bright red.

RUMBLE!

Slapping the table in front of him, he said, “How dare you! What are you saying? Are you trying to depose me, you unfilial son?!”

Everyone present was completely stunned, and didn’t know what to say. None of them would ever have guessed that the crown prince would say something like this. He was obviously on the path of full rebellion, his heart full of defiance.

“There’s no need to get so angry, Father. I've been the crown prince for a long time, and it’s definitely reached a point where you need to retire and focus on your cultivation. Don’t let mundane matters bother you. After all, you’re getting very close to the late Paramount God level.” The crown prince’s voice was ice cold. As the master version of the sage monarch magistrates, he was completely devoid of emotions, and could speak with cold clarity.

“Rebellion!” Eternal Nightless shouted madly. “This is outright rebellion! Men, arrest this unfilial son immediately!”

It was now more than obvious that the crown prince had been plotting to do this for a long time, and the fact that he had the gall to do it in the open seemed to be pure madness. Either that, or it stemmed from pure confidence.

Thump. Swish. Rustle.

Some of the experts in the study prepared to take action.

One of them, the extremely loyal Grand Prince Yong, lunged toward the crown prince and said, “Crown Prince, I can't believe you’re being such a defiant rebel. Get on your knees and maybe you’ll be spared the death penalty. Either way, you obviously don’t qualify to be the crown prince any longer!”

Chapter 1385: A Plot to Seize the Throne (2)

The top members of the Sage Monarch Society had reached the Unbounded level, and revealed this fact with great fanfare. And part of it involved Eternal Millennium seizing the throne.

That was the most simple and effective thing to do. With him in charge of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty, the place would essentially be under the control of the House of God Ordainment. And there wouldn't be any risk of rebellion, as the crown prince was already the rightful heir. After all, if the House of God Ordainment attacked the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty and defeated it by force, it would cause significant damage to its destiny.

But if the crown prince just took over, the destiny would remain completely intact.

A simple change in the specific leader was something that most people in an organization could accept. Furthermore, Eternal Millennium had his Crown Prince Society, filled with people who already wanted him to become the emperor as quickly as possible.

That said, seizing the throne wouldn’t be an easy task.

Grand Prince Yong was a Paramount God with plenty of people on his side, top experts who were in opposition to the crown prince. And it was without hesitation that Grand Prince Yong unleashed a deadly attack from the Nation-Fate Godfist.

“Nation-Fate Godfist: Son of Heaven Subdues the Border Regions!”

A huge fist pierced through the air, filled with a domineering imperial aura. This was a consummate art of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty, which drew on the destiny of the nation to power its devastating attacks.

Surging with energy, Eternal Millennium snorted coldly and said, “Your Nation-Fate Godfist doesn’t have what it takes to match up to me. Watch and learn as I show you the true Nation-Fate Godfist. Sovereign and State Die Together!”

BAM!

The two fists struck each other, and Grand Prince Yong was sent flying backward until he flopped on the ground, his flesh mangled and bloody. There he lay, still, unmoving, and gasping raggedly for breath.

“Arrest the crown prince!”

The old-timers in the study all lunged forward, preparing their own various versions of the Nation-Fate Godfist.

“This is a plot to seize the throne. How dare you use the Nation-Fate Godfist here, Crown Prince! You rebel! We won’t let you do this. Nation-Fate Godfist: Break the State, the Lands Remain!”

“We have control of the national destiny. We’re the loyal subjects of His Majesty the emperor, and our job is to crush traitors. Because of that, our Nation-Fate Godfist is tens of times stronger than yours. See if you can handle this move: Blood Stains Spring and Autumn!

“Sacrifice Oneself during National Crisis!

“View Death as Returning Home!

“Long Live the Spirit of Heroes!

“Righteous Energy of Heaven and Earth!”

All of the various stances of the Nation-Fate Godfist were on display, and it was more obvious than ever that it was an invincible, consummate art. The old-timers weren’t holding anything back, and were drawing deeply on the destiny of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty, such that any opponent they faced would feel like they were going up against an entire nation.

Meanwhile, Eternal Millennium casually met all of their attacks with his own Nation-Fate Godfist.

“I’m the legal successor, tasked with bringing the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty to greater levels of glory. The fact that you want to stop me, the official crown prince, and are even going to the length of attacking me, shows that you are the true rebels. You even dare to use the Nation-Fate Godfist against me? The matter of who sits on the throne is something between me and my father. How dare you people interfere! This is unforgivable insurrection and treason! So screw the hell off!”

He unleashed a torrent of fist strikes full of immense energy and psychic power. Of course, it was godpower that had been given to him by Yang Qi, and it made him so singularly powerful that not even an entire nation could stand in his path.

“Observe a true trump card from the Nation-Fate Godfist: Sun and Moon Propagate New Leadership!”

A sun and moon shot up into the air above Eternal Millennium, rotating rapidly to create something like a burning fire that could shake the heavens and topple the earth.

The Nation-Fate Godfist didn’t actually include this stance; it had been added into it by Yang Qi. His Sage Monarch Grand Magic had the dual daos of the Emperor and the Sovereign, which were specifically designed to deal with the destiny of nations. As a result, he had a deep understanding of such matters and could surpass the original Nation-Fate Godfist.

The move of Sun and Moon Propagate New Leadership was fundamentally about rebellion. The idea was that when a nation was broken and overthrown by powerful forces, new leadership would be installed. However, the nation would remain the same and the change would elevate the country to a higher level, boosting its destiny.

Normally speaking, a plot to seize the throne wouldn’t be considered righteous and just. But when Eternal Millennium used this move, everyone could sense the destiny of the nation shifting in his direction. They could tell that when he wielded the national destiny, the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty’s glory would increase. It was an expression of the highest national idea, something that not just any ruler could accomplish.

Bam. Bang. BANG!

In the blink of an eye, countless people were thrown back into the walls, or even out of the study. Some of the princes were knocked unconscious, depriving them of the opportunity to actually see the crown prince take power.

The study went quiet, and Eternal Millennium walked over to Emperor Eternal Nightless, who was simply sitting there on his throne. “Father, the time has come for you to write an edict explaining that you’re stepping down and handing authority to me. I’ll arrange a lovely place for you to relax and work on your cultivation. Incidentally, the other patriarchs also need to go into retirement with you.”

“You’ve won here, Eternal Millennium, my unfilial son,” Eternal Nightless said, his expression placid. “But you should know that your cultivation base isn’t quite up to snuff. You really need to reach the mid Paramount God level before you can consider yourself impressive. Don't forget, there are other mid Paramount Gods in the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty besides myself. For instance, there are the three imperial grandfathers, currently in seclusion trying to reach a higher level of cultivation. If I called them here, you’d end up dead in short order. So I’ll give you one more opportunity to stop this nonsense. I won't hold any of this against you, and considering how strong you are, I can even give you a higher position in the dynasty. What do you say?”

“Cut the crap, Eternal Nightless,” Eternal Millennium replied. “Imperial grandfathers? After I finish dealing with you, I’ll go handle them. I’ll put them in their place and ensure they don't cause any problems for me later. Big changes are coming to the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty, and you half-baked eggheads are only holding us back. Only after I kick you to the side will I be able to bring true peace and harmony!”

As the words left his mouth, the crown prince prepared to attack.

A major fight was about to take place between father and son!

“You unfilial bastard! Prepare to see why I'm the emperor. I control the entire destiny of the nation. I have access to thousands of times more destiny than you.

Whizz!

The eternal destiny of the nation erupted, focusing solely on the emperor, and not allowing the crown prince access to any of it! That was simply how powerful the emperor was! The emperor had a golden mouth and jade words, which meant that once given, his orders would be strictly enforced, no matter what.

“Without the destiny to power the Nation-Fate Godfist, what will you do, my unfilial son? I can draw on every scrap of destiny, and that’s what I'm going to use to absolutely crush you!” Immense power was building up behind Eternal Nightless, like a vast ocean that caused wild colors to flash everywhere.

“Ai...” sighed Eternal Millennium. “You're trying to show off with the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty’s pitiful destiny? Alright, Eternal Nightless. Allow me to show you what real national destiny is, and what a truly flourishing dynasty is like!”

A spatial passageway opened above Eternal Millennium’s head, and in the briefest of moments, a destiny ten times greater than that of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty poured out. It was like a river of magical laws that could transform the void and alter life itself.

“Th-this....” Eternal Nightless stammered as he stared at the destiny, which made that of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty seem almost like nothing.

All of a sudden, he was faced with incontrovertible evidence that the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty was more like a village than a nation. Meanwhile, Eternal Millennium was in charge of a true nation.

Of course, the destiny Eternal Millennium was drawing on came from the Nine Dragons Court, Deva Dynasty, and Sumeru Temple.

“Where did you get that destiny? Are you... using power from an outsider? You must be! You’re working with foreigners to steal the destiny of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty! You’ll damn our nation to myriad tribulations!”

“You really talk a lot,” Eternal Millennium said. Stepping forward, he extended his hand and said, “I prepared this move just in case you refused to pen that edict. Prepare to see what it means for a ruler to pass away with his nation. Nation-Fate Godfist!Sovereign and State Die Together!

Mountain-toppling, sea-draining force erupted out, powerful enough to shatter great daos, and it forced Eternal Nightless to stagger backward.

“Resign, Father. You don’t deserve to be an emperor. My time has come!” Eternal Millennium continued walking forward, his every step causing the area to tremble. He was out to found a new dynasty, and behind him, his father Eternal Nightless could see an image of himself in chains, while the crown prince ruled as emperor, leading the nation to new heights of glory.

Chapter 1386: The Throne, Seized

Eternal Millennium had been blessed by Yang Qi’s psychic power, pushing his own energy to incredible heights. As a result, his version of the Nation-Fate Godfist revealed to Eternal Nightless an image of himself imprisoned and Eternal Millennium as the emperor of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty.

That image alone was a devastating blow to him. The seeds of failure were planted in his heart, and quickly sprouted, growing into immense trees.

RUMBLE!

Eternal Nightless was sent flying backward, his defensive godpower collapsing as blood oozed out of his mouth.

One move. Eternal Millennium had vanquished him with a single move.

Eternal Nightless had been completely confident in his ability to crush Eternal Millennium. Little did he know that Eternal Millennium’s true strength and destiny reserves were far beyond anything he could ever have imagined. The Nation-Fate Godfist could draw on the destiny of a nation in a way that made it virtually impossible to block, making it so strong it could crush all enemies.

But Eternal Millennium had access to destiny vastly stronger than Eternal Nightless. And how could a tiny country stand up to a huge one?

They existed on completely different levels.

Thus, after one clash, Eternal Nightless was completely devastated.

“Be suppressed!”

Eternal Millennium’s Nation-Fate Godfist had been combined with all sorts of other martial abilities, such as the God Tombstone Palms, the Hand of the One God, the Unspoiled Body, and others. It vastly surpassed the previous Nation-Fate Godfist, and was like a river of destruction that could overwhelm anything in its path.

“I won’t let you get away with this, you unfilial son! Imperial Grandfathers! Emerge from the depths of space-time! Someone is trying to seize the throne and take over the dynasty! The nation is in danger!” Eternal Nightless threw out a jade seal, which exploded and became a beam of golden light that pierced out into the void.

“You’re asking the imperial grandfathers for help? That’s fine. That’ll save me the effort of going after them. After I subjugate them, the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty will be completely under my control.”

RUMBLE!

All creation trembled, and Eternal Millennium sensed a mighty power debuting on the scene, piercing into his sea of consciousness.

It was none other than Yang Qi, taking over his thinking.

As of this moment, Yang Qi was using Eternal Millennium’s body to personally deal with Eternal Nightless.

Yang Qi’s martial path was vastly superior to Eternal Millennium’s, and it instantly caused an influx of vital energy in him, raising him to an even more perfect level.

Compared to Yang Qi, Emperor Eternal Nightless’ fighting experience was like that of a child compared to a grizzled general.

And the grizzled general that was Yang Qi instantly resorted to a killing move.

“Sage as the Master!

“Monarch Invincible!

“Hegemon Without Bounds!”

It was the Sage Monarch Grand Magic, and he wasn’t hesitating to draw fully on it. In fact, it was at a level so high that even if he was fighting Patriarch Deva, he would be able to crush him, much less Eternal Nightless.

He unleashed three moves in a row, and Eternal Nightless was shoved backward relentlessly, completely unable to deal with the Sage Monarch Grand Magic.

The final blow struck him in the chest, yet again sending him flying backward to land spread-eagle on the ground, unable to move a muscle.

Without hesitation, Yang Qi stepped forward, grabbed him by the top of the head, and sent psychic power flooding into him to bind him to the God Legion Seal.

Even as he did that, three streams of energy approached, and three old-timers stepped out of the dimensional passageway that had been opened earlier.

All of them were mid Paramount Gods, and they were the true protectors of the dynasty.

The imperial grandfathers were previous emperors of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty who had eventually abdicated to focus on their cultivation. They would only come out for major matters relating to the survival of the dynasty itself.

They were known as Eternal Longevity, Eternal Health, and Eternal Peace.

When they appeared on the scene and saw the ‘crown prince’ holding the emperor by the top of the head, they erupted with rage.

“What outrageous gall!” Eternal Longevity shouted. “How dare you try to seize the throne. Did you think the three of us were dead?”

With that, he attacked with the Nation-Fate Godfist, using a stance called Beautiful Scenery Like a Painting.

It caused a beautiful scroll painting to unfurl, containing a vision of an epic saga from the dynasty’s past. It was neither vicious nor merciful, but it pulsed with energy of the highest nature. It was none other than a complex display of the destiny of a nation.

Eternal Nightless’ version of the Nation-Fate Godfist contained the aura of armies and warfare. But Eternal Longevity’s version contained the flavor summed up in the saying ruling a big country is like cooking a small fish. In other words, an effective ruler should respect the natural order of society, and refrain from interfering too much in the lives of the people.

That was the highest level of the Nation-Fate Godfist.

“A brilliant general comes to the fight prepared!”

“Excellent Nation-Fate Godfist, Eternal Longevity. Just what I’d expect of the founding emperor of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty. Impressive. Very, very impressive!” Although Yang Qi was indeed sighing in admiration at the exquisite nature of the technique, the truth was that it wasn’t enough to truly impress him.

Eternal Longevity couldn't compare to Buddha Testimony, Dibarra, or the imperial uncle of the Deva Dynasty. Those three had godhood ratings and psychic scales that were beyond compare. As for Eternal Longevity, he was only at the level of sixty million, and the other two imperial grandfathers were at fifty and forty million, respectively.

As for Eternal Nightless, his psychic scale and godhood rating were at twenty million, which was even more pathetically weak. Combined, the four of them couldn't even match up to Buddha Testimony alone.

In other words, even these three patriarchs couldn’t pose a threat to Yang Qi in the body of Eternal Millennium.

Facing the move Beautiful Scenery Like a Painting, Yang Qi flicked his finger, causing an immense rift to open up and rip the painting in half, destroying the image.

“Endless Rivers of Heroic Blood!”

The three patriarchs all attacked in unison. Normally speaking, any one of them should have been enough to deal with Eternal Millennium. But seeing him deal so easily with Eternal Longevity’s move, they were shaken, but also certain that they had to work together, otherwise the consequences would be too horrible to contemplate.

“Behead Endless Numbers of Commoners!”

The three patriarchs attacked from three different directions in a complex move.

“When Will the Dirges Cease?” Yang Qi wasn't afraid. He thrust out his palm, smashing the incoming attacks left and right, completely crushing them.

Then he strode forward, using the Heaven-Defying Eight Steps of Buddha Testimony to attack the three patriarchs from unpredictable angles. It took only a moment for the three patriarchs to realize that they were in extreme danger.

RUMBLE!

Next, the three patriarchs combined their energy and voices, saying, “Eternal-Life God-Dynasty; Shield of Destiny; Nation-Fate Convergence; End in Mutual Destruction!”

The destiny of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty converged, igniting into a spectacular suicidal technique.

“You want to end things in mutual destruction?” Yang Qi said. “You pig-headed old-timers. You really plan to use the destiny of your nation to stop me via suicide? Sever your dragon meridians and die together? If you're willing to throw your own foundation away, it seems I need to put you in your place for all eternity. Henceforth, you’ll be working for me!”

They wanted to take all the destiny of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty and pack it into the dragon meridian, then sever it. Doing that would cause the dynasty to physically collapse, ending in its destruction.

These three patriarchs were extremely vicious.

They had worked hard to build the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty, and they would rather destroy it than see it fall into the hands of someone else.

“Hmph!Dragon Meridian Suppression. Heaven-Defying Seven Claws!”

Yang Qi once again threw out a consummate technique he had picked up from Buddha Testimony, exhaling a breath of draconic energy. As a result, the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty’s immense dragon meridian trembled and swelled, even as the three patriarchs tried to destroy it.

Sadly for them, Yang Qi was filling the dragon meridian with the energy of true dragons. Not only was the dragon meridian not breaking, but it was actually growing stronger and fighting back against the patriarchs.

RUMBLE!

Within moments, the patriarch's psychic power was smashed by the backlash from the dragon meridian, damaging their vital energy and provoking miserable screams as blood oozed out of their eyes, ears, mouth, and nose.

Yang Qi then used that opportunity to send his own almighty will piercing into them.

“Soul Seizure.”

Although Yang Qi’s will wasn’t literally almighty, it wasn’t something these three patriarchs could deal with. It stabbed right into their hearts and minds, crushing them with the power of the God Legion Seal.

Chapter 1387: Unification Begins

The three patriarchs had been vanquished by a single attack from Yang Qi’s will. They had hoped to sever the dragon meridian of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty, ending the fight in mutual destruction. But Yang Qi had redirected the destiny of the three experts from afar, sending it into the dragon meridian and causing it to attack the patriarchs.

Then he had sent the energy of the God Legion Seal directly into them.

Now they couldn’t even talk. Yang Qi simply hated the idea of them viciously destroying their own nation just to defeat him. So he wiped out their thoughts, ensuring that they would be, not ministers of his, but slaves.

“From now on, you’re no longer ‘imperial grandfathers’ of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty. You’re eunuchs. And no one in the dynasty will even remember that there were once three imperial grandfathers.”

The change was made, and the three old men dropped to their knees.

The emperor did the same.

“Rise, Eternal Nightless. Write the imperial edict of resignation. Give power to me, and issue orders for all the other princes to be sentenced to death. They do nothing but cause chaos for the dynasty and siphon away its destiny. Killing them will only lead to rejoicing among the commoners.”

“Y-yes, yes, of course....”

Not daring to be defiant, Eternal Nightless nodded, his eyes blank as he wrote out the edict.

Soon, news of the shocking event was spreading.

Thanks to teleportation portals that linked the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty, news of the shift in leadership spread far and wide within only ten days. And of course, the reputation of the House of God Ordainment rose as a result.

Everyone knew that they had over a dozen Unbounded experts who were loyal to Eternal Millennium. He had led them into the palace to depose the emperor, execute the other princes, and purge the government officials.

The Crown Prince Society had a lot of members, many of them among the officialdom. As a result, the general change in the government itself wasn’t particularly momentous. Of course, some of the imperial princes fought back, but in the end, they were crushed.

Some people were executed. Some were only crippled. That was how things went in a revolution. Outside of the court itself, there was no chaos.

No one knew where the old emperor had gone after it was all over. There were even rumors that he had been puppetized.

There were also three mysterious new eunuchs serving in the court, all of them immensely powerful.

Because the three imperial grandfathers had rarely made public appearances, no one recognized them. They fit right in as eunuchs.

One of the new emperor’s first acts was to integrate the House of God Ordainment into the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty. It was renamed the Sage Monarch Department, and it had the authority to make arrests even among the most prominent members of the court. They were truly a terrifying group.

Of course the new emperor was really a sage monarch magistrate, so the ultimate goal of all his actions was to allow the Sage Monarch Society to take over everything.

However, he couldn’t make too big a scene in that regard. Therefore, he started the Sage Monarch Department in the government to allow the disciples of the Sage Monarch Society to slowly build power within the dynasty. Later, the time would come to fully seize control.

And having the Sage Monarch Society disciples watching over the various ministers and officials would be a good way to keep corruption and conspiracies in check.

Jadefall was the official leader of the Sage Monarch Department, and she was also given a leadership position in the armed forces.

When everything was handled, there was little damage done to the destiny of the dynasty.

The first step of Yang Qi’s plan had succeeded.

Now he had access to the entire dynasty’s destiny.

Of course, he didn't really care that much about it. In the grand scheme of things, it didn’t matter. For him, controlling the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty was only done out of convenience.

**

Jadefall and Eternal Millennium were meeting in the imperial study with all of the important members of the Sage Monarch Society. After offering greetings to Eternal Millennium, the group began discussing important matters.

“The situation is stable here in the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty. But our work isn’t over. We need to expand, and our next target is the Nacrelight Sageland.”

“That won’t work. We can’t make a move on them for the time being.”

“Why’s that?”

“The Nacrelight Sageland has incredible reserve powers. They also have a dimension set aside for the High Priestess. If we destroy the Nacrelight Sageland and free the will of the High Priestess, it could cause major problems. Yang Qi has already installed Mother Voidwalker, Summer Vastcold, and Summer Soundfyre as pawns there. Now that we have the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty under control, we can move on to the League of the Devil-Dao and the League of Wretch-Gods. After all, no one will fault us for ridding the world of devils and demons.”

“I suppose that will work. We might as well wage a war to exterminate the devils. They're a very destructive force among the countless islands and continents, constantly killing, kidnapping, and robbing people. Without destroying them, it’ll be hard to collect the destiny of the locations they control.”

Of course, dealing with the League of the Devil-Dao would be a very different matter than handling the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty. Every member would need to be either killed or enslaved. After all, the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty was a place of general order, with its own laws designed to protect itself and its people.

The dao of devils was different. It had no specific laws, and each member had committed countless blood-soaked crimes. Devils didn’t respect order, and liked sowing chaos wherever they went.

Because of that, getting them to acknowledge allegiance wasn’t an option. They had to be puppetized to be used, which was something that the God Legion Seal could accomplish. That said, Yang Qi wasn’t at the point of being able to control so many devils. It would be too great a drain on his psyche. That was why he had only subjugated a few Paramount Gods with Unbounded wills from the dao of devils.

Not even the Sovereign Lord had considered conquering the dao of devils. He had only been interested in wiping it out.

It was the same with the wretch-gods.

In the millions upon millions of continents in existence, the dao of righteousness was espoused by the League of Academies, Nacrelight Sageland, and the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty, whereas the dao of devils was championed by the League of the Devil-Dao and League of Wretch-Gods.

Of course, in the dao of righteousness, the Nacrelight Sageland and Eternal-Life God-Dynasty were diametrically opposed to each other, and both sought the other’s destruction.

The League of Academies was willing to just sit on the mountaintop and watch the tigers fight, then reap the spoils when they tire out. Of course, there was plenty of fierce infighting in the League of Academies as well, with various groups such as the Truth Academy and the Righteousness Academy trying to wipe each other out.

“Alright. First, we’ll wipe out the dao of devils. Then, we’ll unify all of our conquered territory. As the saying goes, to catch brigands, first catch their chief, so the key to this all is taking out the devil patriarchs. Get rid of the mid Paramount Gods, and the alliance will crumble. And the upside is that they hate each other so much that none will come to the aid of the others.”

“We’ll start immediately,” Eternal Millennium said. “This will do a lot to boost my reputation and authority.”

If they absorbed the League of Wretch-Gods and League of the Devil-Dao, the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty would truly rise to prominence. Then they could get to work dealing with the League of Academies and the Nacrelight Sageland.

**

Meanwhile, back in the Bastille of the One God, Yang Qi was working on his cultivation in what were the perfect surroundings.

Now that the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty was taken care of, and his friends and family were all in the Unbounded level, he didn’t need to directly control things on the other side of the teleportation portal.

Now, he could focus fully on his cultivation.

He ceaselessly absorbed all of the angels and soul conglomerations that he could.

After some time, he thought, ‘It’s time to leave.’

Carefully hiding the teleportation portal he had made, he made his way toward the border of the Bastille of the One God.

It was there that his heart suddenly pounded as he heard an intense rumbling sound and could sense the space in the area being ripped open. Immense power suddenly appeared.

‘What’s going on?’ he thought. From what he could tell, this new influx of energy surpassed even Patriarch Deva! Hiding himself, he prepared to see what top expert was making an appearance.

Chapter 1388: Very Dangerous People

Immense psychic power filled the area. In terms of the psychic scale, it was definitely over the level of a hundred million, which meant this person was similar to Patriarch Deva.

The early Unbounded level was a psychic scale of between one and ten million.

The mid Unbounded level was up to ninety million.

The late level was between a hundred million and a billion. As for Patriarch Deva, he was at around a hundred million, and definitely not past two hundred million, otherwise he would be a peak Unbounded expert.

Anyone with a psychic scale past a hundred million was nobody to take lightly. They were conquerors who could found sects, unleash shocking fighting prowess, and surpass the ordinary limits of martial might.

They could even unleash destructive power on the magical laws of the god world itself.

It was a person such as that who was coming into the Bastille of the One God. Therefore, Yang Qi didn’t dare to do anything rash. Although he was invincible among mid Paramount Gods, and could even fight those in the late level with psychic scales of a hundred million, when it came to opponents with scales of two or three hundred million, he would have no choice but to run for his life.

So when he realized someone like that was coming to the Bastille of the One God, he had no choice but to hide and see what was going on.

Soon, he realized that there were actually multiple individuals approaching.

There were two men and two women, all of them late Paramount Gods.

Yang Qi didn’t dare to read their psychic scales or godhood ratings. But he was fairly certain that they surpassed Patriarch Deva. Who exactly were these people?

“Let’s head in deeper, Junior Sister. This is only the periphery of the Bastille of the One God, where trashy early Paramount Gods can come and go. There’s definitely nothing worthwhile out here. Let's go to where the Army of Radiance and Light was once housed. We might be able to find a place where a battle was fought in ancient times. That's where you can find some really good loot. There might even be undying expressions of will sealed up there that we can subjugate and use for cultivation breakthroughs.”

The man who was speaking wore a flowing yellow robe, its voluminous sleeves embroidered with a dark golden trim. He came across as being confident and relaxed, but at the same time full of boundless majesty.

He had smooth skin that seemed to glow with health and life, and his eyes contained the birth and death of space-time itself. It was almost as though his eyes had seen the birth of countless universes.

Standing next to him was an elegant woman dressed in the attire of a noble lady of the court. She held a pitch-black flower in her hand that seemed like a lotus or ‘queen of the night’ flower, yet was neither. It emanated a nightmarish aura, making it seem like anyone who looked too closely at it would be sucked into a nightmare.

‘That’s... a flower of illusion!’ Yang Qi thought. ‘One of the top ten godflowers. However, this woman has crafted it into an incredible magical treasure. Amazing. Even a Paramount God who had that flower, but lost control of it, would end up dead.’

Years ago, Yang Qi had acquired a flower of time, as well as Summer Vastcold’s flower of wisdom. Sadly, he had simply directly assimilated them to boost his power. The truth was that such flowers could have their life force stimulated, which would allow them to grow to their full potential and even ultimately turn into magical treasures.

By way of comparison, what Yang Qi had done was like finding an egg, breaking it open, and cooking it. A much better use of that egg would have been to hatch it into a chick, which could then lay more eggs and produce even more chickens.

The young woman with the flower replied, “Elder Brother, the path up ahead leads right to the former location of the Army of Radiance and Light. But we have to be very careful in the Bastille of the One God, lest we end up dead.”

The other man present said, “You’re right about that. For instance, there are soul conglomerations that simply can’t be killed, and will chase you down forever until you're dead. The best you can do is temporarily seal them. Thankfully, we have a secret map leading to the encampment of the Army of Radiance and Light. Supposedly, they had a powerful devil general sealed there by the Lord of Radiance and Light and a contingent of angels. The sealing marks should be loosening by now, which means we can nab that devil before he escapes and causes chaos. Master will be very pleased to get it.”

“Ancient devils like that are nothing to take lightly,” the other young woman said. “Are you sure we can handle it? If he was sealed by the Lord of Radiance and Light, and has been alive this entire time, he’s got to be at the peak Paramount God level. Why didn’t Master come himself? Why did he send us to handle this? We don’t even know if we can do this, and for all we know, we might end up dead along the way.”

“There’s no need to get nervous. Master couldn’t come because he was injured in a fight recently, and needs time to recover. We can definitely handle this devil. Once we get him back to Master, he can assimilate him to fully heal his wounds, and even rise in cultivation level. Perhaps he’ll even achieve a breakthrough and reach the ultimate level.”

“So that's how it is. Well, if Master assimilates the devil, are we going to benefit at all?”

“Definitely! Master would never let us down.”

“Come on, there’s no time to lose. Let’s get in there before someone else beats us to the punch.”

Whoosh. Whoosh. Whoosh.

Not having noticed Yang Qi, they simply flew along. Of course, this all begged the question of what type of person would have four late Paramount Gods as apprentices. For someone to simply be strong wasn’t necessarily impressive. But for someone to have followers this incredibly strong was another matter entirely.

As for Yang Qi’s brethren, he had groomed all of them personally, yet none of them were even close to being as strong as he was. Even Yang Immortal-Slayer, who also had monarch godhood, was still barely a tenth as strong as Yang Qi when it came to fighting prowess.

So who exactly would have four apprentices that were all as strong as Patriarch Deva? The mere thought caused Yang Qi’s hackles to rise. However, the fact that they had mentioned the Army of Radiance and Light and a sealed devil was very intriguing.

He couldn’t help but wonder what type of devil it was that the Lord of Radiance and Light had been forced to imprison as opposed to killing it.

It would definitely be monstrous to the extreme.

Considering that he could move about with complete ease in the Bastille of the One God, it wouldn’t be hard to follow these four late Paramount Gods without them seeing him. He had all the advantages when it came to terrain. Therefore, he crept along behind them, keeping his distance. About twenty hours later, they were deep inside the Bastille of the One God. There were more and more soul conglomerations, which Yang Qi would surreptitiously assimilate when he could.

When it came to such tasks, he could operate with incredible speed and efficiency now. As a result, he was constantly acquiring more and more sage monarch magistrates.

‘If I can get enough sage monarch magistrates, I could probably handle these four if necessary.’ There were also more angels present. The four figures Yang Qi was following didn’t engage them in battle, though, for fear that the shockwaves might attract the attention of even more dangerous entities. But that just made things easier for Yang Qi.

He was like a ghost, slipping about this way and that, assimilating soul conglomerations and angels.

Every time he absorbed a soul conglomeration of a few dozen kilometers in diameter, the resulting influx of power would provide dozens of new sage monarch magistrates. Furthermore, it slowly but surely helped his godhood to advance, and even helped transform the God Legion Seal.

All of a sudden, he caught sight of a soul conglomeration that was thousands of kilometers in diameter. It looked almost like a writhing cloud filled with vicious faces. The four experts he was following were careful to avoid it. Although they were strong enough to seal it, there was obviously no need to get into any sort of fight with it.

‘That thing is huge,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘I don’t think I’ve seen one that big before.’ Of course, he was delighted. As soon as the way was clear, he pounced, and started absorbing it.

The process took about an hour, after which he felt every inch of himself thrumming with energy.

Crack!

Clusters of lightning appeared within his monarch godhood, and many of the sage monarch magistrates began splitting into new versions.

‘My monarch godhood is on the verge of reaching the mid Paramount God level. The Bastille of the One God doesn’t have medicinal pills, but for me, these soul conglomerations are better than any pill I can think of.’ Yang Qi couldn't help but feel excited. If he hadn’t come to the Bastille of the One God, it would be impossible to say how many years it would have taken him to achieve a breakthrough like this. He could probably have cleared out the resources of the Sumeru Temple, Deva Dynasty, and Nine Dragons Court and not succeeded.

But all he had to do was absorb these soul conglomerations, and he would make natural progress.

‘I'm at ninety million. Just on the verge of a breakthrough!’

Considering how far away the four experts were, he simply started absorbing everything in sight, even the angels.

Chapter 1389: Mid Paramount God Level

After absorbing incalculable amounts of power, Yang Qi’s godhood was transforming. The particles within him surged as his godhood erupted like a volcano, and spectacular scenery appeared as the God Legion Paradise rose up around him.

The two trees in the pure land, one representing permanence and the other impermanence, grew even larger and taller than before. Golden sutra texts were everywhere, making up the ground and the sky alike, so that every breath inside the paradise would provide huge influxes of power.

Yang Qi was stepping into the mid Paramount God level, and his godhood rating and psychic scale were reaching a major threshold. Both were at ninety-nine million, nine hundred and ninety thousand, just a hair away from a hundred million.

Of course, the distance to the next breakthrough would be more difficult than the entire journey so far. Breaking into the late Paramount God level was an incredibly difficult task.

For most people, breaking into the late Paramount God level would require a godhood rating of ten million, and it would take hundreds of billions of years to reach a level of several tens of millions. Some Paramount Gods would go their entire lives without ever reaching ninety million. For instance, the three major powers of the Sumeru Temple, Deva Dynasty, and Nine Dragons Court only had three patriarch-level individuals who had reached that level: Buddha Testimony, Dibarra, and the imperial uncle.

Everyone else in their organizations could be considered trash by comparison.

Yang Qi was essentially the first person since ancient times to go past ninety million.

Eventually, his aura shrank back down, and after a few dozen breaths of time passed, he looked like an ordinary person again.

‘It seems I still need a lot of power built up to reach the late Paramount God level. Once I break through, the God Legion Seal will undergo major transformations. That said, it's not going to be easy. My overall level has been rising far too quickly. Most people need hundreds of millions of god world years to do what I’ve done. In any case, to reach the late Paramount God level, I first need to work on a psychic breakthrough, and that won’t happen until I find another piece of the Mahātmā Jade. For now, I want to see what these four experts I’ve encountered are up to, and whether or not I can cause any trouble for them that will benefit me.’

For now, he knew he had reached a limit that couldn’t be passed without immense difficulty. He was like a water bucket that was completely full; pouring more water into it wouldn’t do any good. And unfortunately, he still needed a lot of power to propagate the sage monarch magistrates, so much so that not even the God Legion Seal could keep up with it by absorbing nearby godpower.

He now had several thousand sage monarch magistrates, which was a very insignificant number. Even the War God Commander’s Tally had forty-eight thousand thralls in it, and it wasn’t uncommon for ordinary people to have billions of thralls. For example, in ancient times, there were armies with so many angels they were like the eternal sands.

A number in the thousands was just too small.

In other words, any extra bits of power he acquired would be poured into the sage monarch magistrates. Every additional magistrate that he created made him that much stronger.

Yang Qi blurred into motion, moving as stealthily as a ghost as he continued to track the four mysterious experts. Any soul conglomerations he passed would vanish as surely as snowflakes in the sun.

The only reason he wasn’t devouring such resources even more rapidly was because he didn’t want anyone to realize what he was doing.

About six hours later, he caught up with the four experts, as they were being very careful as they moved along. They weren’t an army, so they were fearful of attracting the attention of soul conglomerations and angels. Unlike Yang Qi, they couldn’t just consume them.

The surroundings were incredibly dangerous. The palaces were enormous, and the sky was packed with soul conglomerations. Some were dozens of kilometers across, and Yang Qi even saw one that was several thousand kilometers from end to end. They flickered as if with lightning, and in some cases the conglomerations were consuming each other and growing larger.

As for the four experts, whenever they encountered a soul conglomeration, they had to stealthily move around it before they could continue on their way.

“Antiquarian Seal!”

The two men and two women suddenly unleashed a powerful sealing mark. Countless threads of light shot forth, binding one of the soul conglomerations. Intense wailing sounds could be heard as the conglomeration shrank down to a tenth of its previous size and was locked in place as if with steel bonds.

“Hurry up and get past it!” shouted one of the men. “The seal will only hold it in place for a hundred breaths of time. After that, it’ll revert to its previous condition, and we can't be around. We also need to make sure to cleanse our auras so it can’t track us down. Some of these conglomerations are on the verge of developing intelligence, and if they do, they’ll take humanoid shape and be even more impossible to deal with!”  With that, the four of them altered their auras and then vanished into thin air.

Observing them, Yang Qi chuckled inwardly. ‘These soul conglomerations make things so easy for me. And these people might as well be gift-wrapping them for me. That one is so large it’s already developing a will of its own. In other words, it would be difficult for me to deal with it on my own. But now that they’ve sealed it, it's a different story. How could I not help myself to it?’

Releasing his God Legion Paradise, he dragged the sealed soul conglomeration over and quickly assimilated it.

By way of comparison, it would be like a normal person who wanted to eat shark fin soup, but had to go to the ocean and catch the shark on their own. That would be a very complicated and difficult ordeal. How much better would it be to simply have the soup served up to them in a bowl? That was essentially what Yang Qi was doing here.

As soon as he assimilated the soul convergence, the sage monarch magistrates took that power for their own. Thanks to the major influx of power, the magistrates were splitting apart left and right, and their fighting prowess was improving immensely.

In the blink of an eye, he had another thousand.

Currently, he had about five thousand in total, and considering they could unleash the firepower of the Tribulation Monarch Cannon, even Patriarch Deva would have to fear them. Of course, that still wasn’t enough for Yang Qi. He felt that he needed at least ten thousand of them to be truly effective.

After finishing with the process, he continued on his way.

He had also broken down the energy of the sealing mark so that he could use it to spy on the four experts. Never in their wildest dreams could those four ever have guessed that someone would be following them around in a dangerous location such as this.

It took him about an hour to track down the four experts, who were in a wide public square, surrounded by an army of over ten thousand ancient angels.

They had perfectly shaped bodies, and all of them were as strong as mid Paramount Gods.

That said, they weren’t true angels, but rather mid Paramount Gods who had come to explore the Bastille of the One God but had been infected and transformed. Real mid Paramount God angels would be far too terrifying.

After all, the ancient angels had been created as early Paramount Gods.

These false angels had surrounded the four experts, but the four didn’t seem particularly worried, and were cutting them down with a host of deadly attacks. Every time an angel was killed, it would transform into a white beam of light that would vanish into the depths of the earth. Then, a short while later, it would return at full strength. In other words, these angels were virtually impossible to kill.

Chapter 1390: Army of Radiance and Light

The angels in the Bastille of the One God were extremely difficult to kill, unless one had the ability to assimilate them. Even blasting them to the point of turning them to ash wouldn’t do any good, as the ash would fall to the ground and form back into the angel’s previous shape. There was something underground that caused this, although no one knew exactly what it was. It was one of the profound secrets of the Sovereign Lord’s ancient barracks, and not something that some late Paramount Gods could reveal the truth of.

The Sovereign Lord had been halfway into the Annulled level, which was far beyond any late Paramount God in existence.

Therefore, the four experts Yang Qi was following had no choice but to simply forge ahead, deeper in the ruins.

Angels were visible everywhere, and their daoist techniques, energy arts, and vital energy kept the Bastille of the One God completely locked down at all times.

“Damnation,” said one of the women. “On the outside, we could’ve destroyed these false angels. But here in the Bastille of the One God, our abilities are limited. Worse, the angels regenerate after you kill them.” Her flower of illusion was useless at the moment, as the false angels had no souls, and therefore couldn’t be confused by it.

“These false angels aren’t too bad,” said one of the men. “They might be as strong as late Paramount Gods, but they're a far cry from true ancient angels. True angels who were even just early Paramount Gods would be able to get into formation and unleash a will convergence that could slaughter virtually any enemy they faced on the battlefield. The false angels here can’t use formations to pool their power. And their genes are basically the same as our own.”

“We might as well just pool our psychic power and use the taboo technique Central Grand Tempest to clear out this whole area. They’ll be resurrected eventually, but in the time it takes, we can get out of here.”

“I suppose that’s our only option.”

The four experts joined their psychic power together, then unleashed a massive whirlwind.

Crunch. Crack!

Angels collapsed into dust left and right, clearing out the entire area. Even the soul conglomerations were destroyed.

“Let’s go!”

After unleashing the Central Grand Tempest, the four experts vanished into thin air. Meanwhile, Yang Qi had been forced to back up in the face of the devastating technique.

‘These four are very impressive,’ he thought. ‘I had no choice but to avoid that Central Grand Tempest of theirs. If I’d been sucked in, I would’ve been shredded to pieces. It would’ve been a very grievous blow.’

It didn’t seem the tempest would abate any time soon, and it was sending smaller individual gusts of wind whipping about everywhere. Each of those smaller gusts was roughly the size of a person, and when Yang Qi thrust his palm at one that got near, it released such destructive power that he was forced to stagger backward.

“Stop!” Yang Qi said in shock.

Waving his finger, he unleashed the Devil-God Seal, sending out vital energy and stopping the gust in place. Yang Qi had been forced to use the God Legion Seal to draw on the magical laws of the Bastille of the One God to stop that gust of wind.

It went to show just how shocking that tempest was. If he had faced this thing in another location, it probably would have killed him.

Yang Qi’s acute senses had picked up on the fact that this expression of psychic power had a unique signature that led to its ability to shred things to pieces.

Godpower was similar. Some energy arts could use godpower to generate mountain-toppling, sea-draining force. Others were extremely precise and incisive. There were even some that were soft in nature. It all came down to how they were supposed to be used.

It was the same with psychic powers. Some could generate illusions, others could take over the mind of the enemy. Some could create corporeal items, and some were just purely destructive in nature.

Yang Qi was extremely proficient in understanding and using psychic power. In fact, few could compare to him. After all, the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth and the God Legion Seal both had aspects related to the use of psychic power.

Because of all that, he knew that the Central Grand Tempest was a pure representation of destructive psychic power. And it was such a high-level representation of those factors that ordinary people could never understand it. Of course, Yang Qi was far from ordinary. After all, he had combined the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth and the Unspoiled Body into his Sage Monarch Grand Magic, which contained immense psychic force.

After sealing the gust of wind, Yang Qi’s eyes glittered like a photonic computer as he analyzed it on the deepest level. Then, moments later, he added the best elements into his own will, thereby forming the basis of a new technique of his own.

His will stirred, and he released his psychic power, forming concentric circles that rolled out around him. Then, Yang Qi turned his attention to another gust of wind.

Bam. Bam. Bam. Bam.

He destroyed one gust of wind after another, and the process repeated. In essence, he was using his mind like a sledgehammer, which was not an easy task. It was similar to killing people by beating them with one's bare hands. Although it was a simple task in terms of the process, it wasn’t easy by any means.

Adding godpower to psychic power in such a task would be like killing a person with a sharp blade.

Godpower was a tool, not something inherent to a person’s substructure. In other words, psychic power was like a person’s physical body, and godpower and godhood were like weapons in their hands.

Upon reaching the same level as King Immortal-Slayer, one’s godhood would vanish, leaving them in a pure psychic state, that of Nevasaññānāsaññāyatana, which was neither perception nor non-perception, neither thought, nor lack of thought. When one could enter a state of neither thought nor lack of thought, their psychic power could fuse with any universe or set of magical laws. They could create godhood with their will, send their mind across all of the continents in the depths of the god world, and scan all the hells that existed like the eternal sands.

Yang Qi was far from that level. At the moment, his will could only cover a handful of continents. As for the innumerable other continents, he couldn’t possibly cover all of them.

That said, given his current state of cultivation, he could at least understand the fundamental nature of psychic power.

He closed his eyes and sank into thought, considering countless matters, until at last he reached the end of his train of thought.

RUMBLE!

His psychic power converged on a single point, then shot out with explosive, uncontrollable force.

All of the gusts of wind around him were ripped to shreds and a nearby palace was torn to pieces.

The palaces of the Bastille of the One God were extremely tough, and not easy to tear down. Yet Yang Qi had just done exactly that, and with only psychic power. It was nothing short of astonishing.

‘I've finally gained enlightenment of a truly consummate technique. This move will be called Hero’s Last Stand, and it stands on par with Sage as the Master, Monarch Invincible, and Hegemon Without Bounds. From what I can tell, I've taken another step along my path to the late Unbounded level.’

His will was evolving yet again.

Only by reaching the late Unbounded level was it possible to rise to the late Paramount God level.

Hero’s Last Stand used psychic power of an incredibly intense nature, making it like a mighty hero who had reached the end of the road and was ready to hold his head high as he fought to his last breath.

It was now another trump card at Yang Qi’s disposal.

If he unleashed this move, he was confident he could strike a grievous blow on Patriarch Deva, probably even draining him of much of his fighting prowess.

Now, it was time to resume the chase.

Although the four experts had been taking a circuitous route, he knew exactly how to track them down. And along the way, he continued to make more sage monarch magistrates. Two days passed in which he lost track of how many soul conglomerations he had consumed.

He actually avoided the angels, as the fluctuations that were released when he subjugated them might have alerted his quarry as to his presence.

During this time, he broke past the level of six thousand sage monarch magistrates to seven thousand. It was a terrifying number. With his psychic power, and the new move Hero’s Last Stand, he could use them to unimaginable effect.

More time went on, he reached the level of eight thousand.

It was around that time that the four experts reached an enormous military base, or at least the ruins of one. It was a huge castle, apparently crafted from some sort of pure white stone. However, it was in ruins now, and even had some pitch-black devilishness in it, the scars of an ancient war.

“The former base of the Army of Radiance and Light!” one of the men said, his expression very serious.

Chapter 1391: Army of Radiance and Light (2)

The entire area shone with plenty of radiance and light, in other words, a pure expression of sagepower without even a hint of a speck of impurity. It was so grand it could purify the heart of anyone who came near it, making them a loyal servant of the Sovereign Lord. There were all sorts of buildings that made up the base, as many as the stars in the sky, and most of them glittered with resplendent glory.

Unfortunately, there were some buildings that had been infected with pitch black devilishness. And the conflict between the light and the darkness made for a very chaotic scene.

As a result, the area wasn’t completely filled with radiance and light.

“We’re here,” said one of the men. “The military base of the ancient Army of Radiance and Light. We have to proceed with the utmost caution, lest we end up dead and buried here. Do you see that dazzling radiance and light, and the sagepower? They’re filled with magical symbols that, if inhaled, will enter the body and transform your godhood. It will cause seeds of radiance and light to take hold, eventually transforming you into an angelic member of the Army of Radiance and Light. In other words, we absolutely, positively must not breathe them in.”

The four experts took out various magical treasures and talismans and activated them, surrounding themselves in glowing shields that staved off the intruding sagepower.

As for Yang Qi, he could see the magical symbols in the sagelight, like jellyfish swaying to the holy hymns of the Lord of Radiance and Light himself.

They had the power to brainwash even Paramount Gods, ensuring that if these four experts assimilated them, they would be severely injured and unable to escape.

WHOOSH!

All of a sudden, something appeared within the depths of the radiance and light, like a swarm of black locusts that shot toward the four experts at top speed. They had no time to dodge, and soon pinging sounds rang out as their defensive empyrean energies were hit and started cracking.

Looking closer, Yang Qi realized that the ‘locusts’ were actually devilish talismans that, if they were attached to a human, would transform them into a monster.

They were roughly finger-sized, and they almost looked alive, with vicious teeth and snapping jaws. They were completely incompatible with the magical symbols in the radiance and light, and the two would clash so violently that sparks would shower out, creating a very dangerous environment.

‘I can already sense the auras of numerous magical treasures and medicinal pills....’

They were the remnants of the immense battle that had been fought between the dao of devils and the Army of Radiance and Light. To this day, they were still fighting back and forth.

Along the way here, Yang Qi had come across quite a few stashes of magical treasures, but most of them were ordinary in nature, and nothing that he would find particularly useful. Furthermore, he didn’t want to do anything to attract the attention of the four experts he was following. So he had ignored all such treasures.

But there were definitely some amazing things to be had here, and in fact, Yang Qi could even sense some of the items belonging to the seventy-two monarchs.

Although he had a large number of those items collected already, it was obvious that the seventy-two monarchs had fought in this area, and left behind some of their weapons and items. If he could complete the collection of those items, Yang Immortal-Slayer’s cultivation base would likely rise to a higher level.

‘I need to head into this base and see if I can absorb that radiance and light, or perhaps the power of the devilishness.’ He blurred into motion without provoking any action whatsoever from the light or the darkness, as if he were a part of both of them.

If he had only possessed the God Legion Seal, the devilishness would have instantly attacked him. However, he also had the aura of the Mahātmā Jade. Therefore, he was at home in both the darkness and the light.

Bzzzzzzzzzzz....

He extended his palm, and one of the devilish locusts landed on it. Sucking it into him, he used the aura of the Mahātmā Jade to turn it into something deathless that he then inserted into his godhood.

The same thing happened with the radiant magical symbols. They turned into pure, raw power that he could use.

‘Perfect. This part of the Bastille of the One God really is a blessed land for me. I can absorb both the godly and the devilish energy, and if anyone tries to kill me, at the very worst I can just escape.’ However, Yang Qi actually couldn’t accept anything more into his godhood. He could absorb power to feed to the sage monarch magistrates, but anything else would simply go to waste.

Meanwhile, the four experts were fighting fiercely with both the light and the darkness, making it very difficult for them to make progress.

Obviously, their overall strength and fighting ability was greatly reduced. It was similar to how it would be extremely difficult for ordinary travelers to move about in the middle of a torrential rainfall.

‘Considering the state they’re in,’ Yang Qi thought, ‘if I ambush them, I might actually win. Should I try? If I pulled it off, it would be a huge windfall in terms of destiny. I’d instantly get about a hundred times stronger. Then, it would definitely take less than a year to conquer and unify the Nacrelight Sageland, League of the Devil-Dao, League of Wretch-Gods, League of Academies, Deva Dynasty, Nine Dragons Court, and Sumeru Temple. Then what would my destiny influx be like? Regardless, it’ll be extremely beneficial to my cultivation.’

It wasn’t an easy thought to let go of, but eventually, Yang Qi shook his head and decided he wasn’t confident enough. He was only thirty percent sure it would work, and he couldn’t forget that these four people had a Master backing them.

That person would definitely be beyond Yang Qi’s ability to handle. Even if they weren’t a peak Paramount God, and were only in the late level, they would still have a psychic scale and godhood rating of five or six hundred million. For a person like that, striking a devastating blow against him would be as easy as drinking water.

That wasn’t to mention what would happen if that person had a rating of seven or eight hundred million. And if they had reached the peak level, with a rating of a billion or higher, then that person could send a mere expression of will into his apprentices, and Yang Qi would be in real trouble.

Therefore, he would simply wait patiently and watch the situation develop.

Whooosh!

It was very easy for him to absorb the godliness and devilishness. After all, the four experts were so wrapped up in staying safe that they couldn’t spare the effort to keep a close eye on their surroundings.

‘I've got to absorb as much as possible!’ Yang Qi thought, and he became like a vortex that pulled in the light and darkness everywhere he went. ‘Hmm? What’s this?’

He had reached a certain point in the ruins where he sensed the aura of the seventy-two monarchs. All of a sudden, he transformed, becoming a magical symbol that was a combination of the godly and devilish, which allowed him to sink down into the ground.

Deep underground, he found a series of sealing stamps that were as black as the darkest ink, each the size of a hand, seemingly carved from jade.

These were the origin of the aura he had just sensed.

‘These... are from one of the seventy-two monarchs known as King Sealer. He had a total of five thousand four hundred of these sealing stamps, and although I collected some of them in the impure lands, my collection isn’t complete. Who would’ve guessed that they would be here? I wonder if King Sealer died here and left these behind. This must also be the location from where some of the sealing stamps eventually fell into the impure lands.’

Yang Qi unleashed his God Legion Paradise and collected the sealing stamps, of which there were about three thousand.

As of this moment, he had two full collections of items from the seventy-two monarchs. One was the set of King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans, and the other was the set of sealing stamps of King Sealer. Their official name was the Imprint of the God Seal, and they were actually very similar to the Many Heavens God Seal.

After taking the treasures, Yang Qi almost immediately sensed other treasures in the surrounding ruins. And they were located deep underground, where the four experts above would never get them. Yang Qi was the only person who could do so, by transforming himself into a magical symbol that was both devilish and godly.

‘That’s a very strong medicinal aura,’ he thought. There were no obstacles underground for him, so he followed the aura until he found a collection of pill furnaces, each of which contained a golden pill whose glow resembled that of the God Legion Seal.

‘Those are... Deathless God-Lord Pills! They were created by the Lord of Radiance and Light for use by angel kings. The years must’ve taken their toll on them, and they’ve probably lost some of their medicinal properties, but they're still boundless medicines. If I give them to some of my brethren, they’ll surely break through to the Paramount God level!’

Yang Qi couldn’t have been more delighted.

Chapter 1392: Devil General of Antiquity

The Deathless God-Lord Pill had been created by a powerful God-Lord.

God-Lords were more powerful than peak Paramount Gods, but weren’t in the half-Annulled level. In other words, they were slightly below King Immortal-Slayer, the Sovereign Lord, the True-Devil, Demon Master, and Wretch-God Ultimate.

Items created by God-Lords couldn’t possibly be simple in nature, especially medicinal pills. They contained incredible godly might, the type that could alter the genes of living beings. Even gods that consumed them could experience dramatic transformations, and become a newer, more perfect type of creature.

Top figures from the Deva Dynasty, Nine Dragons Court, and Sumeru Temple could wrack their brains to no end, yet never be able to create things like this. And it wasn’t possible to use perfect caliber godstones to purchase them, as there were no beings who could create them to sell.

Even Patriarch Deva would drool over a medicinal pill like this, as it would even allow him to reach a higher level. Of course, it would be difficult for people like him to come this deep into the Bastille of the One God to hunt for medicinal pills and the like. It was simply too dangerous. These four experts were far more advanced in their cultivation, and even they were having trouble in their travels.

The buildings here were immense, with many of them being tens of thousands of kilometers high, or even hundreds of thousands. When a building like that collapsed, it could truly be said to be a case of the heavens collapsing and the earth being crushed. Any items inside would end up buried deep below the surface, making them virtually impossible to acquire without using a technique like Yang Qi had.

Even the most elite experts of the time could do little more than scratch at the surface of such rubble and, if they were lucky, scrounge up a few magical treasures.

Looking down at the Deathless God-Lord Pill in his hand, Yang Qi nodded and smiled. Then he once again transformed into the shape of a magical symbol that easily roved about underground, looking for not only items from the seventy-two monarchs, but also the piece of the Mahātmā Jade.

He could sense that, in the depths of this military base, there was a location where a massive convergence of devilishness fought against the radiance and light. It was obviously from some ancient devil, and from what he could tell, it was likely that there was a devil general sealed there.

Yang Qi had been masquerading as the Second Devil General.

The Supreme True-Devil had employed numerous devil generals, and the Second Devil General was one of the strongest among them. He had personally fought the Lord of Radiance and Light, and had eradicated many top experts from the Army of Radiance and Light, including angel kings and archangels.

‘Don’t tell me my casual remark will turn out to be tragically poetic. What if the Second Devil General really is buried here?’ As he continued searching, he came across many treasures from the seventy-two monarchs, including sabers, swords, hammers, palace halls, flags and the like. There had obviously been a very dramatic battle fought here, and he was actually surprised he hadn’t come across any corpses.

‘I suppose any corpses would have long since been eaten up by the sagelight and transformed into vital energy. If living beings have a hard time dealing with the lingering power of the Army of Radiance and Light, then corpses would have an even harder time.’

After acquiring more of the items of the seventy-two monarchs, his God Legion Paradise came to pulse with more of the energy of monarchs, and a host of deadly weapons could be seen floating there.

‘Excellent!’ Yang Qi thought. As his collections grew closer to completion, and his understanding of the dao of monarchs grew deeper, it was reaching the point where he was like the embodiment of the seventy-two monarchs. He was the seventy-two monarchs, and the seventy-two monarchs were him.

Ding. Dong.

He found yet another item, this one deep in a subterranean cave that pulsed with the undulating aura of time. There were bells flying about here and there, releasing sound waves that could destroy the spirit and crush the soul.

These were items from one of the female members of the seventy-two monarchs, who was known as Queen Void-Melody. Her weapon suite consisted of a host of bells, and their clinking contained melodies of heaven, earth, men, and devils. Together, they formed a universal melody that could create new worlds and new civilizations. It was truly amazing.

After collecting the bells, he thought, ‘I was right. The seventy-two monarchs obviously fought a huge battle here, and lost many of their items in the process. Some of them are still here, but the majority fell out into the god world in general, and the lower worlds as well. Does that mean this place is connected to the lower worlds?’

As soon as the thought occurred to him, he couldn't get it out of his mind. If he could find a passage to the lower worlds in this place, he could get the rest of his friends and family from there and bring them up to be reunited.

The god world was the only real world. As for the lower worlds, they were illusory and virtual in nature, and it was only upon leaving them that a person could become truly real. The things that happened in the lower worlds were like dreams, which meant coming to the god world was like waking up.

The more he thought about it, the more it made sense. There had to be a way to the lower worlds here. In fact, he was starting to wonder if this place had something left behind by the Sovereign Lord, like a method to control the Ancient Road to the Gods.

With these thoughts on his mind, he redoubled his search efforts.

Meanwhile, the four experts had no idea what was going on. They were exploring the ruins above, but still had to deal with the dangerous tempests of devilishness and godliness. As they tired out, it became more obvious that Yang Qi could casually crush them if he wanted to.

He was growing stronger by the moment, and truth be told, there was no better place than here for him to improve his cultivation. It was even better for his cultivation than the Cruiser of Civilization.

Every breath he took allowed him to create more sage monarch magistrates, to the point where his collection was reaching the level of ten thousand.

More and more items built up in the God Legion Paradise as Yang Qi continued his search. As he proceeded, he realized that the devilishness was getting more and more intense, to the point where it was vanquishing the nearby radiance and light. It seemed he was reaching the origin of the devilishness.

There had to be some sort of fiend-devil sealed here, some immense and mighty devil general who, despite all the years that had passed, had never managed to break free. If that entity did free itself, it was likely that it would unleash a storm of destruction onto the god world.

‘I’m very curious to see what this general devil is like. Er, what’s that? How come I can suddenly sense a piece of the Mahātmā Jade...?’ Looking at the intense devil energy, he pondered whether or not he should proceed. Whatever devil general was sealed here, it was obviously nothing to be taken lightly, and if it were freed, would lead to incredible disaster.

There was no way he was a match for something like this.

But then he remembered the four experts had come here with the intention of supposedly capturing a devil general to give to their Master. They would clearly have some tools at their disposal to deal with that devil general if he managed to free himself.

That said, he was aware of the saying be careful, and you can pilot the same boat for ten thousand years. Perhaps it would be best to refrain from any reckless decisions. However, he could clearly feel the energy of the Mahātmā Jade stirring within him, indicating that the piece of the Mahātmā Jade he sought was secured in the same location as the source of that devilishness.

In other words, he had to continue onward whether he wanted to or not. He was meant to absorb that piece of jade, otherwise he would never make any further cultivation progress.

‘If the Mahātmā Jade is here, I have to get it. Even if that sealed devil general is extremely powerful, I must go forward.’ Calming himself, he continued onward.

WHOOSH!

Deep beneath the surface of the Army of Radiance and Light’s base, there was a huge tunnel, the walls of which were inscribed with innumerable holy magical symbols. However, the walls had been so infected with devilishness that they wriggled like bloody flesh.

A primal-chaos elder-snake appeared within Yang Qi and gobbled up the surrounding devilishness. Considering he had already subjugated the Mahātmā Jade, devilishness like this was of immense help to him.

As he slipped along like a phantom, the devilishness grew more intense, until it surrounded him on all sides. Eventually, within that black, wriggling flesh, soaked with blood, he caught sight of a terrifying human face.

It was actually a devil embryo, filled with the power of nirvanic rebirth and the reincarnation elements of devils.

‘What's this?’

He entered the devil embryo and found himself in a chiliocosm of worlds. Were it not for the fact that he had the quintessence of the Mahātmā Jade, not even the God Legion Seal would have protected him.

After entering the devil embryo, he found himself face to face with a shackled man with long, ink-black hair.

He was naked, and so tall and burly that he was twice as large as an ordinary person. Furthermore, he was bound in place by manacles of pure radiance and light. And behind him was an immense image, also formed of pure light.

Chapter 1393: Unrivaled Devil Might

There was an unrivaled devil general sealed here!

Yang Qi was actually shocked at how strong he was. He was so mighty that, despite being locked up in a world of radiance and light, he had managed to create a devil embryo around himself.

In addition to the glowing manacles that restrained him, there was a shining lantern in front of him, the flame of which kept the surrounding devilishness at bay.

Yang Qi’s jaw dropped.

‘Is that... the true form of the Lord of Radiance and Light? The Everlit Godlamp?’

According to the stories recorded in countless ancient daoist texts, back in the era of primal-chaos, before the god world was created, the Lord of Radiance and Light had started out as a mere lamp. Eventually, he grew into a mighty god, and in the end, was known as the Lord of Radiance and Light. He cast aside his true form when he became an almighty entity, but that lamp, his original body, remained behind. That was why the Army of Radiance and Light always shone with immense brilliance.

In fact, all of the light in the god world originated with that lamp. It was a boundless magical treasure that was second only to King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions, the God Legion Seal, and the Mahātmā Jade. In fact, it even surpassed the Cruiser of Civilization and the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

With a lamp, one had light.

The reason heaven and earth was forever lit with light was because of this lamp.

Unexpectedly, that shocking lamp was being used to imprison this devilish man. He was constantly burned by its shining light, and truth be told, his vital energy was virtually nonexistent. However, his devilishness was growing and he had clearly reached a critical point in which he could possibly struggle free.

‘That's a piece of the Mahātmā Jade!’

To Yang Qi’s surprise, the man had a piece of jade embedded into the middle of his chest. It was about the size of a person’s palm, and was both elegant and crude. If it wasn’t the Mahātmā Jade, what could it possibly be?

The power of the Mahātmā Jade that constantly flowed into this devilish man enabled him to resist the power of the lamp and refrain from being melted into nothing.

‘He can’t assimilate the power of the Mahātmā Jade, he’s just using it to protect himself. That’s the only way he’s struggled along through the years. But even though he's on his last legs, I'm still no match for him. So how can I deal with him without being absorbed in the process?’

Even if this devilish man was dead, Yang Qi wouldn't dare to get close to him, much less in this state of being alive. The Mahātmā Jade was there, as was the Everlit Godlamp, but he still didn’t have the guts to simply take them. It would be pure suicide. If he took the Everlit Godlamp, the man would be able to break free, and would likely kill Yang Qi.

Similarly, taking the Mahātmā Jade was also impossible. It was embedded in the man's skin; digging it out would surely provoke a reaction, and Yang Qi would be just as likely to end up dead.

Making a deal with the man wasn’t an option either. Devils would go back on their word without thinking, making any promise from one of them completely meaningless. That was why members of the dao of devils never swore oaths.

After thinking the matter through, he came to the conclusion that he had no other choice but to leave and wait for another opportunity to come along. It would be bad enough if this man broke free from the binding of the Everlit Godlamp.

But what would happen if he actually took control of the lamp? What if he converted it into a devilish object that made him even more powerful? He would be unstoppable. If Yang Qi didn’t do something about this man right here and now, he could end up as a major enemy to deal with later.

The man was an obstacle he couldn’t simply avoid, whether now or in the future.

‘What if I somehow boosted the power of the Everlit Godlamp?’ he thought. ‘And what if I unleash the power of my pieces of the Mahātmā Jade? I could power the lamp with the God Legion Seal and use it to keep this devil’s devilishness under control. Then I could use that moment to summon the Mahātmā Jade to me. That would severely weaken him, and benefit me on both fronts.’

Yang Qi immediately decided to go forward with the plan.

However, he didn’t just leap into action. Instead, he melted into the shadows to observe the situation a bit longer.

First, he watched the man, and saw how he unleashed devil energy to protect himself. Then he observed how Everlit Godlamp took that devil energy and burned it, converting it into radiance and light. However, the lamp had no owner, making it incredibly dangerous.

‘I’ll start by strengthening the lamp….’

He drew on the energy of the God Legion Seal, reaching out to make a connection with the lamp. His godhood stirred, and he found the throne in the God Legion Seal that had once belonged to the Lord of Radiance and Light. His throne was immense, and his energy shook even Yang Qi’s soul. However, he still managed to wrap it up in devil energy and send it into the Everlit Godlamp to burn.

BAM!

The lamp suddenly surged to life, its fire shining with increased brilliance. Boundless radiance and light filled the interior world of the devil embryo, causing the bloody flesh that made it up to steam and hiss as it was transformed into black smoke.

All of a sudden, the man screamed as his skin started bubbling and bursting open.

“What’s happening to me? How is this possible? Why is the lamp so strong? For years I've unleashed unrivaled devil might to crush it, and just when I was about to succeed, the lamp erupts with power? Don’t tell me I'm about to really meet my end?!”

Howling, the man unleashed even greater devil energy in a desperate attempt to crush the radiance and light.

‘The perfect opportunity!’ Yang Qi thought. Focusing his thoughts on the Mahātmā Jade, he quickly created a connection to the piece embedded in the man’s chest.

Bzzzzzz. Bzzzzzz.

The piece of jade started twitching, but unfortunately, it didn’t fly over to Yang Qi.

“What?!” the devil general shouted, looking down at his chest, an expression of shock in his eyes. “The Mahātmā Jade just reacted to something. It almost flew out of me! What's going on? Don't tell me...?” Glaring around, he roared, “Who’s out there?! Who’s infiltrated my devil embryo? Let me out of here!”

There wasn’t any response.

Yang Qi had no intention of revealing himself. Instead, he stuck to the shadows, waiting for the right moment to make another attempt at summoning the piece of jade. Given that his first attempt had failed, he knew this man was definitely exceedingly formidable.

“Not gonna show your face, are you? Well, I'm going to make you! Devil Embryo Transformation; Three Powers and Nine Circulations; True Ego With No Dao; Heart Subjugation!” A blast of explosive power shot out of the devil's forehead, a madly rotating expression of psychic power that surpassed the Central Grand Tempest by many times over. As a result, the devil embryo started pulsing madly, as though it would dissolve everything inside it.

This was a terrifying expression of devil will that was so intense it could create a chiliocosm of worlds, and also destroy it, millions upon millions of times over.

‘Not good!’ Yang Qi thought, but before he could react, the tempestuous power slammed into him and revealed his position.

“So, someone is in here with me! Get over here!”

As the devil smiled cruelly at Yang Qi, black light shot out of his forehead, changing into a pitch-black hand that shot toward Yang Qi with unstoppable force.

In that critical moment, Yang Qi gasped, “God-Lamp!”

In response, the Everlit Godlamp erupted with radiance and light, which crashed into the imprisoned devil, provoking a miserable shriek. At the same time, the pitch-black hand was wiped out of existence.

“Dammit! You’re tapping into the Everlit Godlamp?!” The devil pulled his power back into himself, trying to avoid having it burned out of existence by the lamp. Glaring at Yang Qi, he said, “How did you do that, boy? Bah! Get away from here! World-Exterminating Devil Voice!”

He unleashed a shriek that Yang Qi had no chance to avoid. The sound hit him, and he was flung back like a bullet until he slammed into the opposite wall of the devil embryo. The devil embryo wriggled as if to devour him, but he quickly called on the power of the Mahātmā Jade to calm it down.

‘Incredible. This monster is truly incredible. That sound was enough to send me flying, and if it weren’t for all the sage monarch magistrates I have to help me, I probably would’ve been severely injured.’

About ten of his sage monarch magistrates had been destroyed by the blow from moments before, and a large number of them had been severely injured.

This devil's energy arts were beyond anything Yang Qi could deal with, and he was starting to believe that he needed to get out of here before he ended up trapped.

The devil looked at Yang Qi in shock. “That was the power of the Mahātmā Jade! That’s how you resisted the power of my devil embryo! Who are you? How do you have the power of the Mahātmā Jade? Tell me immediately!”

Chapter 1394: The Real Second Devil General

Seeing that he had been exposed, Yang Qi simply stood there and said, “It's nice to find you in good health, Senior!”

This devil was a terrifyingly powerful creature, but he was still bound in place. Also, Yang Qi could always draw on the God Legion Seal and detonate the lamp in a final suicidal blast.

“I asked you a question, boy,” the devil general said. “Who are you? And how do you have the power of the Mahātmā Jade?”

Smiling, Yang Qi launched into a fabricated tale. “I am a successor of the true dao of devils, so of course I have the power of the Mahātmā Jade on me. Senior, I’m actually wondering who you are. You must be some devil patriarch, am I right? I hereby offer greetings, Patriarch! There were rumors that a senior member of the dao of devils was sealed in the depths of the Bastille of the One God, so I came here on a rescue mission. You must be that very person mentioned in the stories!”

The devil general chuckled coldly. “Enough! Drop the act, boy. I'm not interested in your lies. The Everlit Godlamp just flared to life. Was that you? The fact that you could do that means you’re definitely not from the dao of devils. But you couldn’t have faked the aura of the Mahātmā Jade. So who exactly are you?”

“Senior, I really am from the dao of devils!” Yang Qi said indignantly. “And I came here to rescue you.”

“Hmph! You think you can just refuse to answer the question? I can still get the answers I seek! I’ll reveal all the details of your life! Myriad Devils Projected Display!”

The wailing of ghosts and weeping of gods rang out, and the devil embryo twitched as countless streams of energy erupted, forming something like a river of fate. At the same time, countless images stirred, as if all the details of Yang Qi’s life were about to be put on display.

This devil general was trying to force out the details of Yang Qi’s fate, using an invincible ability that few people could resist. However, although the river of fate appeared, no details about Yang Qi appeared on it.

“Projected Display!” the devil general shouted, and the river of fate erupted with power, sending shockwaves out everywhere. Yet not a single image of Yang Qi appeared.

‘What? This person doesn’t exist in the river of fate?’ The devil general looked on in shock as the river faded away.

Staring at Yang Qi, the devil general said, “No one can escape the power of my Myriad Devils Project Display. It seems there’s more to you than meets the eye. There are only two explanations for why you wouldn’t appear in the river of fate. The first is that you’re using some sort of incredible daoist technique to hide yourself. However, I’m unaware of any technique that could do such a thing. And that means that the second possibility, however unlikely, is the only explanation. You’re a Fateless One. People like you are rarities among rarities, yet here you are.”

Smiling obsequiously, Yang Qi said, “Senior, I’m not really sure what you’re talking about. I'm just a servant of the dao of devils. How could I possibly be one of these... what did you call them? Fateless Ones?” The truth was that Yang Qi was completely shocked that this old devil was so astute. It seemed impossible to hide anything from him.

“Don’t try to double-deal with me, boy,” the devil general said. “I think you know exactly who I am. I'm the Second Devil General, top subordinate of the boundless True Devil! You might think you can hide the truth from me, but I already detected the aura of the Mahātmā Jade on you. And the fact that you're a Fateless One makes you even more formidable. Sadly, you haven’t reached your full potential yet. You came to me because you sensed this piece of the Mahātmā Jade that I have, and were hoping to take it. That was a very vicious move just now. You activated the power of the Everlit Godlamp, then tried to summon the Mahātmā Jade to you. Listen, child, how about you just free me and become my apprentice? As a follower of the Second Devil General, you can join me in conquering the god world. The Sovereign Lord. The True Devil. The Wretch God. The Demon Master. King Immortal-Slayer. They’ve all perished. But I remain. The Second Devil General. The most powerful expert in the god world!”

“You’re the most powerful expert in the god world?” Yang Qi said. By now, he realized he couldn’t pull the wool over the eyes of the Second Devil General.

He had convinced Patriarch Deva that he himself was the Second Devil General, but now he had actually run across the very person he had been impersonating. It really was a good example of karma at work.

Thankfully, the Second Devil General was still restrained, and had the Everlit Godlamp suppressing him. He could hardly move, and that meant that Yang Qi had a good chance of escaping. Furthermore, the situation wasn't completely hopeless. Yang Qi could sense that the Second Devil General feared the power of the lamp, and therefore, there was still a chance to crush him.

“Oh exalted Second Devil General, what if I told you that King Immortal-Slayer is still alive? Would you still call yourself the top expert in the god world?”

The Second Devil General shivered. “What?! King Immortal-Slayer lives? Have you seen him personally? How is that even possible? The Sovereign Lord and the King of Godmammoths personally crushed him into dust. Nobody could have saved him! How could he still be alive?”

“Oh exalted Second Devil General, I've personally met King Immortal-Slayer. One of my friends is his apprentice. But you don’t have to take my word for it. Why don’t I just use one of the exalted King Immortal-Slayer’s own techniques to prove it?” For now, Yang Qi only had the reputation of King Immortal-Slayer to try to keep the Second Devil General in check.

A moment passed, then the Second Devil General threw his head back and laughed heartily. “He's still alive? Well, that’s fine. I was just thinking that it would be very lonely to be alive with no rivals. If I appeared as an invincible force in the god world, but all my old friends were gone, then what would be the point of anything? Now that I know King Immortal-Slayer is alive, I can go find him. Then, with the full legacy of the True Devil at my command, the two of us can finally see who is superior.”

‘The Second Devil General isn't even afraid of King Immortal-Slayer? What do I do now?’ Yang Qi was already trying to come up with a backup plan.

“If you thought you could scare me with talk of King Immortal-Slayer, boy, then you’re plain wrong. I don’t care if he’s alive or not. I'm not afraid of him. I fought with the Sovereign Lord and wasn’t afraid! You think I’ll suddenly start getting scared now? I’ll give you an opportunity here. Get on your knees and accept me as your Master. I won’t cause problems for you. If you can strengthen the power of the lamp, you can also suppress it. So crush the lamp and give me your current pieces of the Mahātmā Jade. I’ll release their true power, then convert the Everlit Godlamp into a devil weapon of ultimate darkness. With that added strength, no one will be able to stand in my path.”

Secretly smiling, Yang Qi said, “You’re mistaken, Senior. I don’t have any pieces of the Mahātmā Jade.”

“Hand them over!” the Second Devil General said, obviously not believing him. “The Mahātmā Jade does nothing in your hands, and in the end, it will absorb you. Even if you do cultivate the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body, it won’t do you any good. I followed the True Devil for years, and was there when the countless sages and mahātmās converged their will to create that jade. The purpose was to fight the God Legion Seal, and there’s no way you can tap into its true potential. It will only suck away at you until you die. In fact, taking it from you will be saving you from calamity.”

“I really don’t have any pieces of the Mahātmā Jade. Oh exalted Second Devil General, you’ve really misread the situation.”

“If you’re going to be like this, I’ll just take it by force!” The Second Devil General reached out toward Yang Qi.

Yang Qi knew he couldn’t dodge this move, and in the blink of an eye, he sensed the vital energy of the Mahātmā Jade stirring within him. It even felt as if the memories of the jade that existed in his sea of consciousness were about to fly out of him.

Thankfully, he had fully assimilated all of the pieces of jade, which made them a part of his thoughts, impossible to take away.

‘Soul Stabilization! Mahātmā Convergence!’ Yang Qi secretly used the connection between the God Legion Seal and the Mahātmā to suppress the devilish power running through him and stabilize his soul.

“Hmm?” When the Second Devil General came away empty-handed, he was obviously surprised. “You’ve already assimilated your pieces of the Mahātmā Jade! They're part of your soul and mind! But how did you do it? Not even the ancient True Devil could’ve done that! Impossible. Inconceivable! Am I hallucinating?”

“I'm serious. I don’t have any pieces of the Mahātmā Jade. They all belong to King Immortal-Slayer! He used a divine ability from the dao of devils to unlock some of their secrets. Then he imprinted some of their energy into my soul and sea of consciousness. That’s why I'm virtually invincible. By the way, I'm really not a Fateless One. King Immortal-Slayer hid my fate, that's all.”

“What? King Immortal-Slayer did something like that? Was he really born again after the catastrophe? What cultivation level has he reached? Does he really have the other pieces of the Mahātmā Jade?” Slowly but surely, Yang Qi was pulling the wool over the Second Devil General’s eyes.

Chapter 1395: Unravel the Sealing Mark?

“In a word, exalted Second Devil General, I really don’t have any pieces of the Mahātmā Jade. And I'm not a Fateless One. Because of that, I can't help you. Please, I hope you don’t take offense.”

At the moment, Yang Qi wasn’t admitting to anything, and the Second Devil General couldn’t really do anything about it.

The Second Devil General knew he was being lied to, but was having a hard time telling the truth from the fiction. He had never encountered someone as slippery as this. “Then how did you tap into the Everlit Godlamp? Tell me!”

“The truth is as you've already guessed. King Immortal-Slayer sent me here. He awoke recently, and is working on some sort of consummate devil technique. Despite dying in the past, he was resurrected, apparently because of some sort of necropolis.”

“Necropolis? Which necropolis? Wait, did King Immortal-Slayer get the Great Necropolis?” A look of fear flitted across the Second Devil General’s face. “The Great Necropolis is back? Every time it appears, tribulation and catastrophe come with it. That means the god world is going to be destroyed! It's not from the god world! The Sovereign Lord somehow acquired it, then eventually decided to use it to entomb the legion of gods and thus transcend the god world. But the legion of gods fought back, which led to the God Legion Tribulation, and the current state of everything. If it weren’t for the fact that the Sovereign Lord created the King of Godmammoths to crush hell, we wouldn’t even be in this situation.”

Yang Qi was secretly shocked. He had been trying to slowly probe the Second Devil General for information, only to have the devil blurt out all of these details in his surprise.

Obviously, there were still plenty of mysteries wrapped up in the Great Necropolis. The mere fact that it could keep King Immortal-Slayer sealed and unable to escape just went to show how powerful it was.

“Do you believe me now, Second Devil General?” Yang Qi said. “King Immortal-Slayer got this mysterious Great Necropolis, with some thanks to me. Then he promised to help me boost my cultivation base if I helped him again. That's why he sent me here to the Bastille of the One God, into the main base of the Army of Radiance and Light, to look for treasures. He also told me the Lord of Radiance and Light had left behind his body in the shape of a lamp to seal a powerful expert from the dao of devils. If I could take the Everlit Godlamp, and simultaneously assimilate that devil, then I would become invincible. So King Immortal-Slayer gave me some divine abilities to help. For instance, some of the godliness of the Lord of Radiance and Light. He said that if the devil expert struggled, or tried to harm me, I could use that godliness to boost the power of the Everlit Godlamp, which would enable me to subjugate the devil.”

Yang Qi was mixing lies and truth. After all, he was having some success intimidating the Second Devil General with talk of King Immortal-Slayer.

“That’s total rubbish! Are you trying to scare me? I'm gonna kill you!”

The Second Devil General was infuriated by Yang Qi's talk of assimilating him. Enraged, he prepared to attack. After all, other people might fear King Immortal-Slayer, but the Second Devil General definitely didn’t.

However, Yang Qi thrust out his palm, and everything shook violently as a huge tombstone appeared.

He didn’t use it as an attack, but rather as a show for the Second Devil General. Obviously, the man was scared of the Great Necropolis, and what better way to convince him of Yang Qi’s connection to it than to show off the God Tombstone Palms.

Suddenly, a tremor passed through the Second Devil General, and he said, “The God Tombstone Palms? The God Tombstone Palms! How can you use that technique? How is that even possible? It's a completely heaven-shaking, earth-shattering technique! That said, the Sovereign Lord experienced cultivation deviation because of cultivating the Great Necropolis God Art. If King Immortal-Slayer is trying to do the same, he’ll end up going down the same path. Just what is he trying to do, throw the entire god world into chaos again? Destroy all living things? The entire purpose of the Great Necropolis is to entomb everything alive! It’s nothing but catastrophe and tribulation. Doesn’t he realize that? The Sovereign Lord eventually realized the error of his way, sealed the Great Necropolis, and killed himself! That was the only way to avoid ultimate tribulation and destruction for the god world. But now you’re telling me the Great Necropolis is back, and it’s in the hands of that madman King Immortal-Slayer?!”

‘So, that’s how it is,’ Yang Qi thought, deeply shaken at what he was hearing from the Second Devil General. He’d had no idea the Great Necropolis had a backstory like this. Apparently, it caused the Sovereign Lord to experience cultivation deviation, which was why the god world had been thrown into complete chaos.

Given that, it seemed likely that when the Sovereign Lord realized what he had done, he sealed the Great Necropolis in the depths of the Bastille of the One God. However, it had later broken free of that seal and fallen into the impure lands. And that was what led to Yang Qi and his people ascending.

This seemed to confirm Yang Qi’s speculation that the Bastille of the One God contained a passageway to the impure lands.

‘It seems I need to do some further exploration in the Bastille of the One God. If I can find that passageway, I’ll finally be reunited with all my friends and family. No matter how amazing they get down in the impure lands, they’ll never rise to the true heights they’re capable of.’

Of course, he couldn’t afford to be distracted in the presence of the Second Devil General, so he focused his thoughts and said, “That’s exactly right, Second Devil General. I know the God Tombstone Palms. As you probably know, the Great Necropolis is capable of many things. Sometimes it ejects godpower seeds to create Inheritors. That’s exactly what I am, an Inheritor. And that’s how I know the God Tombstone Palms.”

“Great Necropolis Inheritors?” the Second Devil General said, his expression one of fear. “That’s something new.”

“Whether or not it's new, I don’t really know,” Yang Qi said grandly. “But I can tell you one thing, Second Devil General. If you kill me, or try to do anything to hurt me, the Great Necropolis will definitely bite back!”

“The Great Necropolis will bite back?!” the Second Devil General said, his eyes glittering. The truth was that he wouldn’t have shown fear even in the face of the Sovereign Lord. But the Great Necropolis was a different matter. The True Devil had tried to warn the Sovereign Lord about the Great Necropolis, saying that while he had nothing to fear from the things in the god world, the Great Necropolis was from some other mysterious location. Therefore, it was a deadly threat.

So how could the Second Devil General not fear it?

“Listen, Second Devil General. The truth is that King Immortal-Slayer wants that piece of the Mahātmā Jade, and sent me here to work out a deal to get it.”

Reigning in his killing intent, the Second Devil General replied, “He's not from the dao of devils. What can he do with it? Although, I suppose I could consider that type of deal, assuming you help me suppress the power of the lamp, and set me free.”

“Suppress the power of the lamp? You think too highly of me, Second Devil General.”

Yang Qi was finally making an effort to take control of the situation. “Furthermore, if you got free, wouldn’t you just kill me? You would risk getting bitten by the Great Necropolis, but I would be dead.”

“How about I swear an oath! I promise not to do anything to you. Furthermore, if you help me, then in my appreciation, I’ll take you as an apprentice and teach you a consummate devil art.”

“Oaths aren’t worth crap. I wouldn’t even accept an oath from the True Devil!” Yang Qi shook his head. “How about this. Give me that piece of the Mahātmā Jade, and I’ll pass a message from you to King Immortal-Slayer.”

“The Mahātmā Jade is what's keeping me safe. Maybe I can’t assimilate it, but without it, I’ll succumb to the power of the lamp. Wouldn't giving it to you be the same as killing myself? Besides, I understand that you don’t trust me, so I have another idea. How about I shrink myself down and insert myself into the lamp. You can take the lamp with you when you leave the Bastille of the One God and go back to King Immortal-Slayer. Then I can personally work out a deal with him. How about that?”

“What? You’ll shrink yourself down and enter the lamp?” In that case, the Second Devil General would still be sealed and suppressed. Furthermore, Yang Qi might even be able to use his God Legion Seal to take control of the lamp and directly assimilate the Second Devil General.

‘Is he considering it?’ the Second Devil General thought. ‘As long as I can get out of this accursed place and away from this godpower of radiance and light, the lamp will slowly weaken. Eventually, I’ll break free and kill this little bastard. Although, I can’t stop worrying about the God Tombstone Palms. A backlash from the Great Necropolis would be very dangerous. Even the Sovereign Lord couldn't defend against it. So I have to be careful. I also need to figure out if his talk about King Immortal-Slayer is true.’

Meanwhile, Yang Qi had made his decision. ‘You can’t catch tiger cubs without entering the tiger’s lair. I’ll take this devil with me. Worst case scenario, I can ask the purrling for help dealing with him. And the Purrfect God Art should be able to keep me safe if anything really goes wrong. This is going to be a battle of wits with the Second Devil General. I have to win it and get that Mahātmā Jade.’

“Alright, Second Devil General,” he said. “Shrink down and get into the lamp.”

“Slow down. It’s not just a simple matter to do that. These manacles were created by the Lord of Radiance and Light! You need to figure out a way to get them off me first.”

A tremor passed through the Second Devil General, and the devil embryo around them vanished. Next, an enormous talisman appeared behind him, several kilometers across, filled with images of dragons and other magical symbols. And it pulsed with the aura of the Lord of Radiance and Light.

Chapter 1396: Giving a Devil a Ride

“A talisman?”

It only took a single glance for Yang Qi to realize that this was what was truly keeping the Second Devil General sealed up. If he destroyed the talisman, the consequences would be too horrible to contemplate. The talisman and the lamp were a combination that had been created by the Lord of Radiance and Light’s personal quintessence-blood!

“If I destroy that, Second Devil General,” Yang Qi asked, “doesn’t it mean you’ll just be free sooner rather than later?”

“Destroy the talisman? You think you can do that?” The Second Devil General sneered. “Look, just tamper with the talisman a bit. The lamp will think I’m escaping, and it will suck me inside. Once I'm in there, I’d normally be stuck forever. However, in the moment that the dimensional passageway opens to suck me inside, that's when you can make your move and take the lamp. Afterward, you’ll have to come up with a method to get me outside of the lamp.”

“So that’s how it is.”

Yang Qi could tell that the Second Devil General was telling the truth. And even if he had some tricks up his sleeve, Yang Qi could still use the God Legion Seal to level the playing field.

“Alright! It's a deal, Second Devil General. I’ll take you out of here, and you’ll reward me for it.”

“No problem. I can even give you a boundless devil art.”

“I don’t need any devil arts. I have the God Tombstone Palms, so I don’t need anything else.”

“What? I'm the Second Devil General! My martial disciplines are unparalleled under heaven! You don’t want them? The God Tombstone Palms are, um....” He had been about to say that the God Tombstone Palms were useless. But the truth was that the God Tombstone Palms were so amazing that even the Sovereign Lord had studied them. “If I'm not mistaken, boy, it seems you’re in a cultivation bottleneck. You’re a mid Paramount God with a godhood rating and psychic scale of ninety million. What if I could help you break past that bottleneck?”

“What? You could help me break through?” Yang Qi made sure to look shocked, but inside he was thinking, ‘That's right. You are going to help me with my breakthrough. After I take that Mahātmā Jade from your chest. Other than that, you think I want any of your divine abilities touching me?’

“By the way,” Yang Qi continued, “what’s a psychic scale? Ninety million? What does that mean?”

“It’s an ancient calculation method,” replied the Second Devil General. “An ordinary early Lesser God would have a godhood rating and psychic scale of one. The Lord of Civilization was the one who came up with this method. It's very simple. Anyway, do you want to break past the level of a hundred million? You could enter the late level! And I could help you do it right now!”

“I’ll pass,” Yang Qi replied. “I’d rather achieve breakthroughs on my own, or at the most, with the help of King Immortal-Slayer. Let me handle this talisman, and we can discuss other details later.”

“Hold on a moment. Given the level of your cultivation base, messing with that talisman will be very dangerous. Any mistake on your part could hurt me. It was designed by the Lord of Radiance and Light to self-destruct if it’s tampered with.” The Second Devil General waved his hand, sending out a stream of devilishness that created a suit of armor around Yang Qi, making him ten times larger than before.

“That’s my boundless War Devil Armor. Now, go ahead and deal with the talisman. Remember, the moment you attempt to do anything to it, it’ll fuse with the lamp and suck me inside. As soon as the dimensional passageway is opened, you have to act fast. Grab the lamp in that moment, and you should be safe.”

“I got it,” Yang Qi replied. He knew full well that the Second Devil General was desperate to be freed from his hundreds of millions of years of imprisonment. “Alright. Here I go!”

Yang Qi launched himself at the talisman and immediately sensed a powerful sword light slashing into the armor. That said, he smiled coldly and used the power of the God Legion Seal to suck in the attack power and use it to heal his sage monarch magistrates, even growing a few dozen more.

‘This power of radiance and light is incredible. Just what I’d expect of the Lord of Radiance and Light. If the talisman hadn’t been slowly breaking down over the past hundreds of millions of years, this would be much more difficult. With this influx, I should be able to reach the late Paramount God level without issue.’ Gobbling up the power, he reached out toward the talisman.

WHOOSH!

The talisman immediately began bending toward his hand.

However, as it did, intense sagelight shot out from the talisman and entered him. Yang Qi caught sight of a mighty god-spirit, holding a long spear that shone with radiance and light, which was currently stabbing in his direction. As it entered him, power that was more than ten times strong enough to kill Patriarch Deva coursed through him. This was the will of the Lord of Radiance and Light, and it was trying to wipe him out of existence with a single deadly blow.

‘The brat's dead!’ the Second Devil General thought, a smile spreading out on his face.

However, a moment later, his smile turned to an expression of shock as he realized that Yang Qi wasn’t even the least bit injured. In fact, he even seemed to be benefiting.

The Lord of Radiance and Light had his place in the God Legion Seal, so there was no way that an attack by him would harm the person bearing that seal. It would only help them.

And how much power had been contained in that attack?

Crash!

Sage monarch magistrates were proliferating like mad in the God Legion Paradise in his sea of energy.

Eight thousand!

Ten thousand!

Twelve thousand!

Fifteen thousand!

Twenty thousand!

The numbers continued climbing until they finally stopped at twenty-five thousand. At the same time, dramatic changes occurred to Yang Qi’s God Legion Paradise.

For now, though, he didn’t have the time to concentrate on such matters. Looking over, he saw the talisman had transformed into a stream of brilliant light that shot toward the Second Devil General, causing him to let loose a mighty howl. At the same time, he shrank down and was sucked into the lamp.

Then a dimensional passageway opened, revealing a host of tombs. Meanwhile, an enormous hand of radiance and light rose up from the graveyard, intending to grab the Second Devil General and crush him out of existence!

“Lord of Radiance and Light!” the Second Devil General shrieked. “You left behind your resentful will to try to destroy me! You couldn’t do it in years past, so you lured me into this base, where I’ve been trapped by the countless vengeful souls here. You thought we would both end up dead here, but do you really think I would just let that happen? Even without this boy to help me, I still would have succeeded with my plan to escape this place! Inexhaustible Devil Wave!”

RUMBLE!

A boundless black sea of devil water surged, pouring into the dimensional passageway.

He was hoping to make his escape even while stuck in the lamp. As long as he got out of the Bastille of the One God, he could rebuild his strength, break free from the lamp, and become invincible.

However, even as the lamp began to move, Yang Qi thrust his hands out. As he did, a golden figure appeared behind him, which reached out and grabbed hold of the lamp. Then, golden godpower flowed into the lamp, causing it to flare with radiance and light. Instantly, hissing and popping sounds rang out as the Second Devil General’s devil energy evaporated.

Yang Qi grabbed the lamp, then blurred into motion and vanished.

Moments later, a rumbling explosion could be heard as the entire area caved in dramatically. Meanwhile, Yang Qi was back in the form of a shining magical symbol, speeding up toward the surface. Soon, he was back in the military base aboveground, looking around at what seemed like a major disaster.

The quaking of the ground lasted for a few hours, then everything went still. However, the devilishness in the area was being vanquished by the sagelight, to the point where, in a thousand years or less, this place would have no darkness, only light.

Yang Qi found an appropriate place to hunker down and take out the lamp. Smiling broadly, he said, “We’re out, Second Devil General.”

“You have the God Legion Seal, boy! And it’s complete! What’s going on here? The only reason the Lord of Radiance and Light couldn’t kill me back then was that he didn’t have the God Legion Seal. With that seal combined with the power of his lamp, he would have killed me for sure. Your psychic scale is only ninety million, and mine is in the billions! I could kill an endless number of you! But how could I have guessed that you have the God Legion Seal!? The only upside is that your cultivation base isn’t strong enough to release its full might, which means you can’t kill me.”

Assured that he had the upper hand, Yang Qi smoothly said, “Maybe I can’t kill you, Second Devil General, but have you forgotten that you’re sealed inside the Everlit Godlamp? I can use the power of the lamp to assimilate you in a very painful fashion.”

Chapter 1397: Giving a Devil a Ride (2)

“Dammit, are you threatening me, boy?!”

Intense fluctuations of devilishness rolled out from inside the lamp. In response, Yang Qi shouted, “God Legion Seal; Devil Lamp Suppression; End in Mutual Destruction; Hero’s Last Stand!”

Surging godpower erupted from the God Legion Seal and smashed into the lamp, causing an actual image of the Lord of Radiance and Light to appear, his palms clasped together as if in prayer. Instantly, the lamp began burning brighter than ever, provoking a howl of rage from the Second Devil General. “Stop it, boy! Stop! Otherwise I’ll burn away half my cultivation base to break out of here and kill you!”

“Stop it with the bullshit,” Yang Qi replied. “You’re not even at full power right now. If I didn’t have the God Legion Seal, you could probably break free, devour the Everlit Godlamp, and become completely invincible in the dao of devils. But right now, I have the seal to suppress you and add to the power of the lamp. So you can't do anything to me.”

Without the God Legion Seal, Yang Qi would have been powerless to deal with the Second Devil General even if he had ten Patriarch Devas to help him. Except... he did have the seal.

Furthermore, although his psychic scale and godhood rating were currently stuck at the level of ninety-nine million, nine hundred and ninety thousand, and he had no hope of achieving another breakthrough right now, he did have twenty-five thousand sage monarch magistrates.

If he unleashed them all, he could temporarily boost his psychic scale and godhood rating past the level of a hundred million, and be in the position to hold his own against people like Patriarch Deva, or possibly even defeat them in combat. He wasn’t sure if he could actually kill experts like that, but at the very least, he didn't need to fear late Paramount Gods.

Even more amazing, Yang Qi could sense that using the God Legion Seal on the lamp was actually pushing him in the direction of fusing with it.

That lamp was the true form of the Lord of Radiance and Light, so what sort of amazing power must it have? It surpassed the Cruiser of Civilization and was probably on equal footing with the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. It was born from the pure power of radiance and light, and it could illuminate the dome of heaven, and easily crush any type of devilishness.

‘Just wait until I assimilate the Everlit Godlamp. The Second Devil General will have no way to escape me then. And even if he dies in the process, I’ll definitely get that piece of the Mahātmā Jade. If I can push my psychic scale and godhood rating into the billions, or tens of billions, exactly what type of cultivation base will I have?’

After some thought, he said, “Come to me, Mahātmā Jade!”

Yet again, he used the God Legion Seal to try to pull the piece of the Mahātmā Jade out of the Second Devil General, which would keep the general fully occupied, and incapable of splitting his attention to other tasks.

“How come you can reach out to my Mahātmā Jade? Just who are you? Everything you said before was a lie, wasn’t it! You do have some of the Mahātmā Jade!” Howling, the Second Devil General sent out another surge of devilishness, causing inky blackness to spread out in the lamp, as if he were about to convert it into a devilish object. However, Yang Qi forcefully suppressed it as much as possible with the God Legion Seal. At the moment, the lamp was half godly and half devilish.

‘This Second Devil General really is unrivaled in devil might. Without this lamp to suppress him, I’d be dead many times over already.’ At the moment, the lamp was like a volcano trying to erupt, but Yang Qi was keeping the opening clamped shut. If he slipped up and the volcano erupted, he would be dead.

“You guessed right, Second Devil General!” Yang Qi said loudly. “I'm the bearer of the God Legion Seal. But I’m many other things as well: wielder of the Mahātmā Jade; Fateless One; successor of the Great Necropolis. I’ve also combined the God Legion Seal with the Mahātmā Jade, the fluctuations of which are fused with my own mind. You could never take any of that away from me. And that's why I have to take your piece of the Mahātmā Jade away.”

Yang Qi was revealing his secrets in the hopes of delivering another big blow to this devil. “Spare yourself some trouble and just give me the jade. If you do, I’ll let you live. But if you keep causing problems, I’ll take you away from this place and just have King Immortal-Slayer help me assimilate you.”

“What did you just say?” the Second Devil General said. “You combined the God Legion Seal and the Mahātmā Jade?! What’s going on here? Don’t tell me you’ve come up with an actual way to control the Great Necropolis without suffering any consequences!”

“Answer me this, Second Devil General: are you going to give me that piece of the Mahātmā Jade?” As the conversation went on, Yang Qi continued to move about in the army camp, absorbing the power of the radiance and light and using it to make more sage monarch magistrates. Although he had twenty-five thousand of them, enough to destroy the three major sects, it still wasn’t enough to deal with the Second Devil General.

He would need to have a hundred times more of them to be able to come out on top of a fight like that.

The Second Devil General had lapsed into silence, apparently contemplating certain matters. After a short time passed, he said, “You’re clearly an outstanding figure, boy. Uncharacteristically extraordinary. Who would ever have thought to combine the God Legion Seal and the Mahātmā Jade? How about you and I make a deal? I’ll give you this piece of the jade, and even help you assimilate the lamp. That will put your cultivation base on roughly the same level as my own. However, you have to let me go free. Then we work together to take over the god world. What do you say?”

Yang Qi didn’t trust a single thing the Second Devil General said, and wasn’t inclined to banter. So he simply said, “Alright. First, give me that jade.”

“I don’t trust you, boy. First, let me go.” Of course, the Second Devil General wasn’t a particularly trusting person either.

“Are you kidding me? Without the lamp to suppress you, I'm not a match for you. And not even the Lord of Radiance and Light could kill you way back then. If I let you go now, how could I possibly handle you? You’d imprison me and try to take the God Legion Seal and the Mahātmā Jade. I'm not the type of person who will release a captive tiger into the mountains. I might be extraordinary, but as you yourself said, I haven't reached my full potential yet. The only reason I can even interact with you like this is because of the lamp.” Yang Qi knew he had the upper hand with the lamp. And considering the Lord of Radiance and Light hadn’t been able to kill the Second Devil General, Yang Qi decided to worry about how to do that later.

“Give me the Mahātmā Jade, Second Devil General. I’ll use it to boost my cultivation base to the point of being your equal. Only then will I consider freeing you and working with you.”

“I just don’t trust you, boy. What if I gave you the Mahātmā Jade and then you refuse to release me. What then?”

“If you’re not willing to back down, then we’ll just maintain the status quo. As long as you don’t cause trouble, I’ll take you with me on my travels. At the very least, that’s better than being stuck in the Bastille of the One God, right? For now, we’ll just agree not to oppose each other directly. How's that?”

“That’s fine.”

The Second Devil General could tell he wouldn’t be able to fool Yang Qi, so for now, he would just pretend to go along with his wishes.

At first, he was furious that he hadn’t been able to manipulate this ‘boy’. But now that he knew about the God Legion Seal, Mahātmā Jade, and Great Necropolis, he realized what type of person he was dealing with.

“So, we’re working together for the time being. Although, now that we're being civil with each other, you have to let me absorb some devilishness to recover. You’re going to be getting stronger with every day that passes, but I'm stuck here in this lamp, unable to practice cultivation, and in fact, growing weaker and weaker. And that’s going to be far too detrimental in the long term.”

“No problem at all!” Yang Qi said. “If it’s godpower you want, I can open some channels into the lamp. Unfortunately, there are still some profound aspects of the lamp that I don’t understand. But they’ll have to wait for later. I'm looking for something here in the Bastille of the One God, a passage leading to the lower worlds. Hey, do you know about that, Second Devil General? I have friends and family in the impure lands that I’d really like to bring up here.”

“This was the primary battlefield of the final war fought in ancient times. And it caused a lot of damage to the god world. There are actually multiple passageways to the impure lands. However, it won’t be easy to track them down. Too many years have passed, and most of them have either closed or simply vanished. And I was locked up that entire time, so how would I know where they are? But I do know other secrets of the Bastille of the One God.”

“By secrets, I assume you mean magical treasures? I'm not interested. And if you don’t know where those passageways are, I’ll just find them on my own.” Yang Qi knew that powerful magical treasures would be surrounded by incredible danger, and he wasn't stupid enough to fall for a trick like that.

“By the way, Second Devil General, do you see those four experts over there? They're all late Paramount Gods, and I plan to capture, seal, and assimilate them. Want to join forces to puppetize them? You could even use one of them as your own body. As long as you’re not strong enough to harm me, I’d be happy to let you out of that lamp in such a form.”

“Those four children over there?” the Second Devil General said. “I noticed them the moment they entered this place. But I'm not interested in killing them. They might have weak cultivation bases, but they have the blood of the ancient Dugu Clan. And that means they're backed by a very impressive figure.”

Chapter 1398: Dugu Clan

“What?” Yang Qi said. “Dugu Clan? What’s their story? And how come I've never heard of them? You’re the Second Devil General, who doesn't fear anything in heaven and earth, and even dared to personally challenge the Sovereign Lord. But you’re afraid of this Dugu Clan?”

“The Sovereign Lord did everything wrong. That's why all of the gods in existence revolted against him. And it was only by attacking him from all sides that it was possible to launch any deadly blows. Otherwise, no one would’ve dared to make a move. Back in my prime, I would never have feared the Dugu Clan. But now I'm stuck in this lamp, so things are different. If you let me out in the open, I really won’t fear anything in heaven or earth.”

The Second Devil General was still angling for Yang Qi to release him.

‘The Dugu Clan,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘My Master ended up here in the god world, and he was called the Invincible Dugu. I wonder if he's part of that clan.’

Many years ago, his Master, leader of the Invincible Society, had ascended to the immortal worlds. But when Yang Qi followed, and eventually conquered all of those immortal worlds, he still never encountered the Invincible Dugu.

Even after arriving in the god world, he hadn’t managed to get any information about him. That said, he was certain his Master was in the god world. And maybe he had something to do with this Dugu Clan.

“The Dugu Clan was very powerful in the past. They weren’t direct subordinates of the Sovereign Lord, but instead had an alliance with three other clans. It was called the House of the Invincible, and it was a very powerful vassal state. Although they couldn’t necessarily compare to the Sovereign Lord, True-Devil, Wretch-God, or King Immortal-Slayer, their nine founders were very impressive. They were called the Heaven-Extinguishing Dugu, Heaven-Defeating Dugu, Heaven-Eclipsing Dugu, Heaven-Immolating Dugu, Heaven-Propping Dugu, Heaven-Conquering Dugu, Heaven-Rending Dugu, Heaven-Sacrificing Dugu and Heaven-Reaching Dugu. And they weren’t human. They started out as embryonic forms in pure primal-chaos, then eventually cultivated human form. They founded the Dugu Clan and reached the level of God-Lords, and were called Invincible Children. When working together, they could even hold their own against King Immortal-Slayer. Thus, when the great tribulation hit, they were hurt, but didn’t die!

“Considering all the years they’ve had to rest and recover, I suspect they’re as strong as they ever were. Furthermore, when the tiger is away from the mountain, the monkey becomes king. And that’s why they’re so powerful here in the god world.”

“I had no idea about all that,” Yang Qi said, clearly taken aback.

Not only had he been unaware of this Dugu Clan, but he’d never even heard of the House of the Invincible. And he had to wonder if these Invincible Children had anything to do with the Invincible Dugu.

His Master had been called ‘invincible’ in the impure lands, so it only made sense that he had a very impressive background. Perhaps it had something to do with karma. Yang Qi was starting to think it was highly likely that his Master was in this House of the Invincible.

Furthermore, his mother had been a friend of the Invincible Dugu. Therefore, if he could find his Master, maybe he could finally get some clues about his mother’s whereabouts.

‘I'm curious to see if these four experts’ aura and blood is similar to that of Master. I don’t have Master’s blood in me, but I did have close dealings with him in the past, and remember enough to make a comparison. Besides, he also imparted some energy arts to me, which gave me some of his aura.’

Given his current strength, he could deal with these four experts. Of course, that was assuming that the Second Devil General didn't cause any problems. If he were to cause problems, it would be a different story.

Although Yang Qi still wasn’t a late Paramount God, he now had ten times as many sage monarch magistrates as before, and their might, combined with the fact that he was on favorable terrain, ensured that he could use the God Legion Seal to turn the four into puppets.

“Regardless of their status, Second Devil General, I'm going to capture them and force them to be my people. I’ve been running low on manpower lately. And maybe I can use them to get some information about the House of the Invincible. If they’re late Paramount Gods, that indicates the House of the Invincible must have even more powerful people in it.”

“If you want to do that, boy, do it on your own. I’m not helping you. I’ll just sit back and relax.”

“Don’t cause any mischief, Second Devil General. If you do, I’ll make sure we both go out together!”

“How dare you threaten me, boy!”

“So what if I threaten you?” Yang Qi shot back. “If I throw caution to the wind and combine the God Legion Seal with the lamp, what do you think will happen?”

“Hmph. You might end up resurrecting the Lord of Radiance and Light, and things will definitely end badly for you.”

“The two of us just need to stick to business and not fight,” Yang Qi said. “That will be the best for both of us.”

He was in a very dangerous situation going around with the Second Devil General sealed in a lamp. Although the general couldn’t do anything, it would be a disaster if he got out. Yang Qi was already planning to get together with Yang Immortal-Slayer and see if they could deal with him. After all, Yang Immortal-Slayer had a direct connection to King Immortal-Slayer.

“Hmph. Do what you want, boy. I'm not interested in the squabbling of the younger generation. Although, I'm curious to see what kind of energy arts those four children use. Their cultivation level is higher than yours, and they have superior psychic scales and godhood ratings. Do you really think you can take all four of them on by yourself? Well, what are you waiting for? I want to see exactly how strong you are!”

WHOOSH!

Ignoring the Second Devil General, Yang Qi headed toward the four experts off in the distance.

As they hunted for treasure, the four were using their energy arts to defend against the tempests created by the clash between light and darkness. Of course, the moment the Second Devil General had emerged, a huge earthquake had rocked the entire area. Because of that, areas that were normally buried had been upturned, and numerous treasures were now visible.

The four experts were delighted, and were running around getting as much treasure as possible.

“Elder Brother, look! This is an ancient god item!” One of the women reached out and grabbed a beautiful painting that was covered with images of enchanting outdoor scenery, soaring eagles, flying dragons, and mysterious mist.

“That’s a magical treasure belonging to King Cinnabar-Azure, one of the seventy-two monarchs!” one of the men exclaimed. “He created a total of one thousand two hundred and ninety-six exquisite paintings, all of them minor worlds of their own that represent an eon of time. Incredible! If you collect them all, they form the Cinnabar-Azure God-Painting, which is second only to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. According to the stories, King Immortal-Slayer actually got the inspiration for the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart from the Cinnabar-Azure God-Painting.”

“That treasure alone is enough for us to strike it rich. And there are more magical treasures from the seventy-two monarchs around here. Most people don’t have what it takes to unleash the might of those items, but in the hands of patriarchs like us, they’ll be incredibly mighty.”

“There’s another one over here!” the other woman said, picking up a painting.

“By the way,” the other man said, “the Bastille of the One God has remained exactly the same for the past millions upon millions of years. So what was that earthquake all about? What if that devil broke free? If he did, we need to find him! It seems to me that even if he broke free temporarily, he’s still sealed. We should take advantage of his moment of weakness to strike a fatal blow!”

It was true. Even if the Second Devil General had broken free, the Lord of Radiance and Light had a contingency plan. The general would have been sucked into that destructive dimensional passageway, which would have then detonated. He might not have ended up dead, but he would have been severely wounded, and possibly suffered the same fate as a dragon in the shallows who falls victim to the shrimps.

“How dare those children plot against me!” the Second Devil General spat. It didn’t matter that these four had an impressive background, he still bristled at the humiliation of their words. And now he was more curious than ever to see what Yang Qi was going to do next.

Transforming into an energy flow that combined the godly and the devilish, Yang Qi headed closer toward the four experts. Yang Qi could perfectly blend into the surroundings in the Bastille of the One God, and no one could possibly track him.

He was like someone who could transform into a snowflake on a snowy night. Who would ever notice someone like that?

He closed in on one of the men, who had no idea he was nearby. The man was keeping his defenses up after the earthquake, but was still searching around for treasure.

All of a sudden, the man noticed a bottle gourd in one of the buildings that had collapsed because of the earthquake. And it contained some high-level medicinal pills. “This is a god pill concocted by the Lord of Radiance and Light!”

Because of his excitement, his defenses were lowered for a moment.

That was when Yang Qi struck.

RUMBLE!

It was a very precise use of Hero’s Last Stand, and it instantly descended on the man like a violent tempest.

This man had a cultivation base on roughly the same level as Patriarch Deva, but he was in a very weak position, and Yang Qi took every advantage he could get.

Crack! Snap!

The man’s shields shattered, and Yang Qi’s psychic power, bolstered by that of the twenty-five thousand sage monarch magistrates, pierced into his sea of consciousness. The man screamed, then blood sprayed out of his mouth.

“God Legion Seal: Instantaneous Seed Infection!” Yang Qi sent the power of the God Legion Seal flying into the man’s body, which then exploded with golden light. As that happened, a new golden throne appeared in the God Legion Seal.

It took only that short moment to subjugate this top expert and make him Yang Qi’s servant.

Next, Yang Qi took the battle experience in the God Legion Seal and put it into the man’s mind, bringing him to clarity.

Roar!

Howling, the man turned and charged at one of the two women who had come with him and his other companion.

Chapter 1399: Perfect Return

Yang Qi attacked like lightning and instantly took control of a peak Paramount God. The Second Devil General was completely shocked by what he saw, as the might and psyche on display were many times beyond what he was capable of.

After all, a single sage monarch magistrate had a psychic scale of nine hundred and ninety thousand, so technically speaking, ten thousand could combine their power to a level of nine billion nine hundred million. Of, course, it wasn’t possible to just add their levels together like that. There was a big difference between two people acting together, and one person wielding the strength of two people.

That said, the combined power Yang Qi was unleashing was around two hundred million in terms of psychic scale and godhood rating. Because of that, the target had been unable to fight back and was instantly taken over by Yang Qi.

The others in the group didn’t even have a chance to react.

One of the women looked over at the man, and when she saw him coughing up blood, hurried in his direction. “What's wrong, Elder Brother?”

Sadly for her, by the time she noticed the problem, Yang Qi had already taken control of him.

As she neared, she sensed a projected message of psychic will from him. “This is bad! I've been attacked by devil will. Hurry and send your psyche into me to help drive it out!”

The woman had no reason to suspect anything was awry, so she immediately complied and sent her will into the man. As she did, he reached out and grabbed her, allowing Yang Qi’s godpower and psyche to pour into her.

Face falling, she said, “Elder Brother, what are you doing?!”

Sadly for her, this was the Bastille of the One God, and she was under heavy limitations. She couldn’t even fly, much less resist attacks from Yang Qi.

RUMBLE!

His divine will flooded into her sea of consciousness and immediately began taking over.

Moments later, another golden throne rose up in the God Legion Seal. After taking control of the man, and drawing on his power as well, it was even easier to take control of the woman.

“This devil will is powerful!” the woman shrieked. “Hurry up and help, you two! I'm pretty sure it’s that devil that was sealed in here. We have to work together to drive it out!”

“Alright!”

The other man and woman didn't suspect anything, thus unhesitatingly sent their psyches over.

Just like that, they fell into Yang Qi’s trap.

With each person that he took over, the overall power he could wield against the others grew stronger. As the other man and woman sent their psyches over, they realized something was amiss.

Unfortunately for them, Yang Qi acted in the time it takes a spark to fly off a piece of flint, sending his will into the mind of the man.

Another golden throne appeared.

Having taken over three people, the fourth was simple. Yang Qi expended almost no effort of his own, instead using the power of the first three to invade and take control of the fourth member of the group. Back when they had first entered the Bastille of the One God, Yang Qi wasn't even close to being a match for them. But just now, he had vanquished all of them in less than ten breaths of time.

His success came first because of his sudden ambush, and second, because of the thousands of sage monarch magistrates he had helping him. Of course, the third reason was that the Bastille of the One God was the perfect location for him, making him ten times stronger than usual.

It would never have worked outside.

“Well done, boy,” the Second Devil General said. “I thought there would be some sort of epic fight, but you beat them easily. Your fighting experience has reached the point of perfection, and you have enlightenment of your own dao. You’re definitely beyond the level of ordinary geniuses. Maybe you haven’t reached your full potential yet, but assuming your cultivation base rises, you’ll definitely be a difficult opponent to deal with.”

At this point, Yang Qi assumed his normal form and looked around at the four experts.

“You...” said one of the men, a look of surprise on his face. “You have the God Legion Seal. You enslaved us! Are you that devil that was sealed here?”

“That's right. I'm a top subordinate of the True Devil. I'm the Second Devil General!” He threw his head back and laughed loudly. “The Lord of Radiance and Light sealed me years ago, just after I happened to take the God Legion Seal. Now I've broken free of my constraints and am unparalleled under heaven! You should feel honored to be serving me now.”

‘This brat is quite a braggart! I can’t believe he’s impersonating me!’ The Second Devil General was infuriated, yet found himself caught between laughter and tears. And he was actually curious to see what would happen. Little did he know that Yang Qi had long since been impersonating him in the Deva Dynasty.

“Second Devil General? You’re the Second Devil General?” These four were powerful patriarch-level experts, but even they couldn't compare to the Second Devil General. That said, it didn’t matter. They were under Yang Qi’s complete control right now. Although they might be furious, they could no longer control their own life or death. “Oh exalted Second Devil General, what do you want us to do?”

“I can sense the aura of the Dugu Clan on you,” Yang Qi said. “Your clan established the House of the Invincible in years past, correct? Is it still around? And what about those nine bastards who used to be so obstinate and unruly. Are they dead yet?”

One of the women replied, “Second Devil General, are you referring to the nine founders of the House of the Invincible? They haven't perished yet. But they're all in secluded cultivation trying to reach a higher level. The god world has fallen into decline, and the nine of them are apex entities who can dominate everything else in existence. Second Devil General, is there any chance you might want to work with our founding patriarchs?”

“Yeah!” said the other woman. “Working with them would be a great idea.”

“Shut your mouth!” Yang Qi barked, then laughed. “I control your life and death! Now go back and work for me as spies. I still have some recovering to do. Once I'm back to full strength, I’ll go kill those nine bastards and assimilate them. Now get out of here!”

He waved his hand dismissively, and the four experts, unable to defy his commands, quickly left the Bastille of the One God. Given that they were completely under his control, it was an easy thing for him to scan their memories and learn everything there was to know about the House of the Invincible. And since he could always send them orders remotely through the God Legion Seal, there was no need to stick around chatting about things.

For now, his main plan was to continue his search of the Bastille of the One God. Of course, he had already added to his collection of items from the seventy-two monarchs, thanks to those the four experts had collected.

After the four experts were gone, the Second Devil General grimly said, “I can’t believe you dare to impersonate me, boy. You've got guts. Major guts. How exactly are you going to pay me for this?”

“I'm not paying you a thing. We're working together, so there’s not much difference between me threatening them and you doing it. Alright, I need to work on my cultivation. Hopefully with the Mahātmā Jade, I can reach the late Paramount God level. Heaven-Devouring God Dao!”

A huge primal-chaos elder-snake appeared, which devoured all of the radiance and light in the area. There was no better energy arts when it came to devouring things. Upon seeing the snake, the Second Devil General nodded. “The more time that goes by, the more I realize how much I underestimated you, boy. You actually know King Heaven-Devourer’s consummate technique? King Heaven-Devourer was on about the same level as King Immortal-Slayer. Although, with the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, King Immortal-Slayer was actually able to come out on top. That said, we fiend-devils all feared King Heaven-Devourer, just like the angels did. The only thing he had to worry about was being surrounded on all sides. After all, he could devour anything that got in his way. Anyway, you’ve clearly mastered his techniques. Not bad. Not bad at all.”

Yang Qi ignored the Second Devil General’s comments, and as he used the energy arts of King Heaven-Devourer, the image of an enormous snake appeared behind him. As the snake devoured the surrounding sagepower, Yang Qi took it into himself, causing countless vortexes to spring up. At the same time, he sent his will out in all directions, even under the ground, in search of treasure. Every scrap that he found ended up in the God Legion Paradise.

The God Legion Paradise was transforming again; the trees were growing taller, and all kinds of amazing things could be seen, from the impermanence of human life to the grandeur of the world.

There were even people in the God Legion Paradise now, and their lives were those of the ultimate existence.

Some of the medicinal pills he found went into storage, others he used. Slowly but surely, he was going through the entire base of the Army of Radiance and Light. And more and more soul conglomerations and angels were falling to him.

Chapter 1400: Perfect Return (2)

Unfortunately, he wasn't benefiting as much as he had before. After taking the Everlit Godlamp, the final deadly attack left behind by the Lord of Radiance and Light had entered Yang Qi and led to a massive influx in sage monarch magistrates. Since then, his efforts weren’t having much effect; despite days of work, he hadn’t even created a hundred new sage monarch magistrates.

The godpower here was proving less and less effective as time went by.

That said, Yang Qi wasn't worried about that aspect. As he proceeded along, he took everything that was useful, even the angels. Some of those angels were from ancient times, while others were Paramount Gods who had later been transformed into angels. The true angels were of great benefit to his sage monarch magistrates, pushing their psychic scales past nine hundred and ninety thousand toward a million.

His sage monarch magistrates weren’t Unbounded experts, but rather peak Consummate Gods with peak Paramount will convergence. Of course, that put them very, very close to the Unbounded level.

As he absorbed the angels, he was learning a lot from examining and analyzing their genes. Truth be told, his main goal now wasn’t increasing the number of the sage monarch magistrates, but rather improving their quality and pushing them toward a cultivation breakthrough. And hopefully, the key to that were the angels, angel kings, and archangels here in the base of the Army of Radiance and Light.

His sage monarch magistrates were already extremely unique in the god world when it came to thrall troops. But the god world was vast, and there were hidden dragons and crouching tigers everywhere. For instance, the Second Devil General had seemingly come out of nowhere, and who knew what other entities like him might be out there.

“Hey, boy. Absorbing godpower like this will lead to a fast breakthrough. But if you assimilate too many of those angels, or too much radiance and light, it loses effectiveness. Just like when you absorb medicinal pills. In fact, I'd say you’ve already reached that point. And that's going to make it harder for you to reach the Paramount God level. But I have a technique I can tell you about that will help. What do you think? We’re in the military base of the Army of Radiance and Light, but we're still only in the periphery of the Bastille of the One God. I can tell you how to get to the ruins of the actual halls of heaven. There are medicinal pills there concocted by the Sovereign Lord himself. Get one of those pills, and you’ll definitely achieve a breakthrough. Remember, the Sovereign Lord was vastly stronger than the Lord of Radiance and Light.”

“No, I’m going to leave now,” Yang Qi replied coolly. “My cultivation base isn’t strong enough to go to the actual halls of heaven. Plenty of people have been killed trying to venture into that area.”

“You’re very cool-headed, boy,” the Second Devil General said. He knew that none of his temptations would work on Yang Qi.

“If I wasn't, I’d be dead already.” He had only explored about a tenth of the Army of Radiance and Light, but he knew it wasn’t effective to absorb the power from here.

Therefore, the time had come to leave.

It was finally time to lead the Sage Monarch Society in taking over the Nacrelight Sageland and the other organizations. He would unify the Deva Dynasty, Nine Dragons Court, and Sumeru Temple, creating a composite destiny that would enable him to make a new dynasty that would never fall.

Of course, he had learned of another major organization that existed: the House of the Invincible. It was the creation of the Dugu Clan, and might contain clues about his Master, the Invincible Dugu. Surely it had amazing resources as well. Compared to it, Patriarch Deva’s sect was ant-like. After all, the Dugu Clan had been a vassal of the ancient halls of heaven.

With new options on the horizon, Yang Qi needed to go back and make sure he was fully prepared.

Of course, he had already created a teleportation portal in the Bastille of the One God, so he could easily travel back and forth.

WHOOSH!

He flew back to the palace wherein he had constructed the teleportation portal. The godstones he had inserted into it had still not yet been used up. Sitting down in the portal, he activated it, immediately creating a connection to the Cruiser of Civilization in the House of God Ordainment.

The power of the portal pierced through countless worlds and dimensions as Yang Qi used a method he had picked up from the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

The Second Devil General sighed with admiration. “You’re very skilled, boy. If I had to guess, I’d say you just used a method from the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. It’s the Myriad Worlds Greater Teleportation, isn’t it? In the blink of an eye, it can pierce through myriads of worlds. I originally assumed you were lying about being taught some things by King Immortal-Slayer, but it seems I was mistaken. You must be a very important pawn of his.”

Yang Qi could tell the Second Devil General was trying to get under his skin. “You think I'm a pawn? When the time comes, I’ll make sure to introduce you to King Immortal-Slayer. Then you’ll understand the situation.”

The teleportation took about a day.

Crack!

Yang Qi and the Second Devil General appeared within a god kingdom of pure silver, surrounded by flickering lights of all sorts. The Second Devil General gasped. “This is the Cruiser of Civilization! This thing is still around? You have a lot of treasures. The Cruiser of Civilization was shattered in years past, and the pieces were scattered everywhere, but you collected them all? No wonder you were able to create a teleportation passage leading out of the Bastille of the One God.”

“Yang Qi. You’re back.”

Jadefall and the others had already gathered by the teleportation portal. As soon as he appeared, they greeted him with great enthusiasm. “We have control of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty. Eternal Millennium took over and has already purged those who refuse to accept him. The destiny of the nation didn't suffer any major hit. We’ve also launched attacks on the League of the Devil-Dao and League of Wretch-Gods. The League of the Devil-Dao has suffered the worst so far, and we've taken over much of their territory. For the most part, we don't accept their experts as members; we turn them into thralls instead. Now that you’re back, we can speed things up.”

“Where's the purrling?” Yang Qi asked. One of the first things he noticed was that the purrling wasn’t in Jadefall’s arms like usual. And considering he had the Second Devil General with him, he had been assuming he could rely on the purrling for support if things went bad.

Purr.

As soon as the words left his mouth, a bubble appeared, within which lounged the purrling. Although it looked as cute as ever, it pulsed with a grandeur and might that was far beyond anything from before.

Yang Qi very nearly took a few steps back. He had never seen the purrling like this before.

And it was staring at him, or more precisely, his torso.

‘Right. The purrling would obviously be able to sense the Second Devil General, and knows how dangerous he is.’ Yang Qi’s heart was actually pounding in anticipation of seeing the purrling fight the Second Devil General.

Purr!

A bubble shot out, and before Yang Qi could do anything, it encased the Everlit Godlamp and pulled it over to the purrling.

Instantly, devilishness poured from the lamp, and the voice of the Second Devil General could be heard. “What is this thing? How can it be so strong? How come I’ve never seen anything like this before! I'm going to blast my way out of this bubble!”

The Second Devil General unleashed his devil voice, causing terrifying fluctuations to roll out in the Cruiser of Civilization. Instantly, the voice of the photonic computers could be heard.

[Beep-beep-beep. Beep-beep-beep. Extreme danger. Unstoppable power. Power index three billion. Four billion. Five billion....]

“Everyone get out of here!” Yang Qi shouted. “Evacuate the cruiser!”

How could he ever have guessed that this would happen? It was a disaster! The Second Devil General was calling on all the power he could muster to break out of the purrling’s bubble.

Purr. Purr....

The purrling’s voice actually sounded anxious in the face of a psychic scale and godhood rating like the one on display. Yang Qi had never heard it sound this way before. That said, it was only to be expected. The Second Devil General was an almighty being from ancient times, and had a cultivation base no weaker than the Lord of Radiance and Light. Even the Sovereign Lord would have treated him seriously. Despite having been sealed for countless years, an emaciated camel is still bigger than a horse, and he was still an invincible expert.

All of a sudden, more bubbles popped into place around the lamp.

Meanwhile, the Second Devil General howled, and devil energy expanded outward, causing one bubble after another to pop. Unfortunately for him, for every bubble that popped, a new one appeared.

There was no way the Second Devil General was going to escape.

Chapter 1401: A Tough Nut to Crack

Two top experts, the purrling and the Second Devil General, were clashing. The purrling was using its same old tactics, and the trapped Second Devil General was unleashing a host of deadly devil arts. The latter looked like doomsday, a horde of devils, and the transformations of the sun and moon. It was as if the world of devils had come to the world of men.

Yet the purrling didn’t seem to care at all. Its expression was cold as it spat out bubble after bubble. And although the Second Devil General’s devil energy could pop the bubbles, the purrling would simply make more. In the end, the Second Devil General was crushed as if by an enormous mountain.

The Second Devil General howled with rage.

“Thousand Devil Slaughter!”

All of a sudden, millions upon millions of arms appeared in the Everlit Godlamp, holding a host of devil items as they attacked the bubbles with furious fervor.

“What animal is this? It's so strong! Is this the infant form of the King of Godmammoths?!” The Second Devil General wanted to drag the purrling into the lamp with him.

But the purrling just sat there, dignified, dealing with all of the Second Devil General’s attacks the same way: with bubbles. Despite the fact that the purrling was right in front of him, the Second Devil General might as well have been worlds away.

He finally resorted to one of his most powerful attacks, the Thousand Devil Slaughter, which popped all of the bubbles. Then he reached out to grab the purrling.

Sadly, it didn't work. A bubble appeared that was the color of porcelain, and when it surrounded the Second Devil General, it almost looked like a godspore. And he was powerless to break through it.

Purr....

The purrling purred again, but this time it was talking to Yang Qi. “This is an almighty entity from ancient times. Thankfully, he’s trapped in that lamp, otherwise I wouldn’t be able to keep him suppressed. My bubbles can prevent him from using his most deadly techniques, or a lot of people would be dead. The House of God Ordainment and the Sage Monarch Society would be destroyed in the blink of an eye.”

“I was careless,” Yang Qi replied. “Many thanks, Exalted Purrling. Now that you have him locked down, I can do some things to get him more under control.”

The purrling shrank the bubble down until it was the size of a fist. At this point, it really was a porcelain godspore, except that inside was the Everlit Godlamp and the sealed Second Devil General.

That said, they could still hear his voice.

“What is that thing, boy? I can’t believe it sealed me like this. I'm the Second Devil General! How could you have something like that? Wait, is it the reincarnation of the Demon Master?” The Second Devil General was terrified. The truth was that he had plenty of trump cards that he’d been holding in reserve, but none of them were working.

If he had been able to escape, he would have been able to destroy everyone in the House of God Ordainment, with the possible exception of Yang Qi.

Sadly, the purrling was around to stop him.

Thankfully, Yang Qi had immediately asked about the purrling as soon as he arrived in the Cruiser of Civilization. At least he had correctly calculated that the purrling would be able to deal with the Second Devil General.

At the moment, the Second Devil General was really in a tragic situation. He was trapped in a lamp that was secured in a purrling bubble. He couldn’t do anything to Yang Qi, not even make a suicidal attack against him.

He could only wait as Yang Qi gained further control of the lamp and became its full master.

Of course, that wasn't going to be an easy task. At the current rate, it would take him thousands of years to accomplish that task. It would probably be easier to just become a late Paramount God.

“The Second Devil General can’t be taken lightly,” Yang Qi said. “And it won’t be easy to take his piece of the Mahātmā Jade. Yang Immortal-Slayer, can you consult with King Immortal-Slayer and see if he can provide assistance? If he has time, it would really help me deal with the Second Devil General.”

“Alright,” Yang Immortal-Slayer replied, immediately reaching out to contact King Immortal-Slayer.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi took out a host of Deathless God-Lord Pills. “I found these in the Bastille of the One God. They were concocted by the Lord of Radiance and Light, and they can provide a huge boost to your psyche and godhood. It should raise all of you to the level of Paramount Gods!”

“Great!”

Yang Qi flicked his sleeve and sent out a host of pills. Along with them came numerous items from the seventy-two monarchs, forming a small heap on the ground. The quality of these items were far superior to anything he had acquired from the Deva Dynasty, and it caused a loud cheer among everyone present.

As soon as they consumed the pills, dramatic transformations began to take place in them.

Godhood everywhere began improving, and energy surged as breakthroughs occurred. Yang Zhan was the first to become a Paramount God, then Brahma.

The Shepherd. Yang Manifestation. Yang Memory. Yang Celestial. Yang Annalist. Yang Doom.... With the Deathless God-Lord Pill, their godhood erupted like fire when oil was thrown onto it.

Next, Jadefall and Yang Immortal-Slayer both became Paramount Gods.

It took a day, but all of Yang Qi’s close friends and family successfully broke through.

RUMBLE!

Suddenly, a manifestation of will appeared in the Cruiser of Civilization that surpassed the Second Devil General. It was a tall, imposing figure who was none other than King Immortal-Slayer.

Yang Qi instantly noticed that King Immortal-Slayer’s will had changed significantly. He was stronger and tougher, just as one would expect of someone considered a peer of the Sovereign Lord.

“It's been some time, Yang Qi, and your cultivation base has improved dramatically,” King Immortal-Slayer said, nodding in admiration. “Not bad. Not bad at all. And it seems it won’t be long before you reach an even higher level.”

Knowing that King Immortal-Slayer’s time was very limited, Yang Qi immediately got to business, saying, “Oh exalted King Immortal-Slayer, I’ve prepared a bit of a gift for you. Take a look at what's sealed in this bubble.”

“King Immortal-Slayer!” the Second Devil General blurted. “It's really King Immortal-Slayer! I can't believe you’ve been resurrected! What animal was it that sealed me?”

“Is this...?” King Immortal-Slayer’s eyes widened with shock. “The Second Devil General? Subordinate of the True Devil?!”

“Yes, it is. Exalted King Immortal-Slayer, this is the Second Devil General, who served the True Devil. It's impossible to say how many enemies he killed in the past. In any case, he was sealed for hundreds of millions of years by the Lord of Radiance and Light, and now he’s spluttering on the verge of death. Unfortunately, on a fundamental level, I'm not a match for him. Thankfully, the Exalted Purrling was able to seal him. I know you need a lot of power to escape from your predicament, King Immortal-Slayer. Perhaps if I use my Sagely Sacrifice on the Second Devil General, it can help you.”

King Immortal-Slayer suddenly burst out laughing. “Heaven is really helping me. There are few gods who could help me, but this Second Devil General is different. Although he wasn’t on my level back in the day, he was roughly as strong as some of my brethren. And on a substructural level, he’s already half a step into the Annulled level. This will definitely help in my escape effort!”

In the face of King Immortal-Slayer, the Second Devil General was no longer arrogant and condescending. He was an almighty individual from the past, but he definitely couldn’t compare to King Immortal-Slayer! “What do you think you're doing, King Immortal-Slayer?

“We worked together to fight the Sovereign Lord!” the Second Devil General blubbered. “We fought in the halls of heaven, unleashing incredible destruction. Don’t tell me you've forgotten! I heard this boy mention you’re cultivating the arts of the Great Necropolis! You’re making a huge mistake! Don’t let yourself slip into cultivation deviation!”

“You’re right, Second Devil General. We did fight the Sovereign Lord together. But that doesn’t mean we were allies. You were on the side of hell, and the dao of devils. I and my seventy-one brethren were in the camp of monarchs. The True Devil tried to conquer us, but we always fought back, and never surrendered. So... no. I'm not going to make any sort of deal with you. And I'm not cultivating the arts of the Great Necropolis, I'm trapped inside it, held prisoner by ambitious fools who are trying to assimilate me. These people are very dangerous, and they’re working on a plan that, if it succeeds, will bring about the destruction of all living beings in the god world. They’ll burn the entire god world in their effort to transcend it. You're going to help me, Second Devil General.”

“Help you? How, King Immortal-Slayer?”

“Simple. I'm going to release you and let Yang Qi use the Sagely Sacrifice on you. With the talisman I’ll give him, all of your power can be sent into my true self. Once I'm back at my previous level of strength, their plan won’t be so easily accomplished.”

“What? You want me to sacrifice myself to help you? I might’ve been imprisoned for a long time, King Immortal-Slayer, but I didn’t lose my mind. Other people might fear you, but not me. Killing me isn’t going to be a simple task for you. I have all sorts of devil arts I can’t use while I'm trapped in here. Remember, not even the Lord of Radiance and Light could handle me. I admit that, long ago, you were stronger than him. But things have changed. Do you really want to compete with me in strength?”

Apparently, the Second Devil General was convinced that King Immortal-Slayer was only putting on a show of strength.

Chapter 1402: The Plan to Destroy the God World

“I don’t want to kill you,” King Immortal-Slayer said. “Given the level of your cultivation base, even if you meet destruction, as long as you leave behind some of your will, you can break through the aeon bonds. Then, once my plan succeeds, I can easily resurrect you. That’s how I came back to life. Believe me, Second Devil General. There is a group of people who plan to destroy the god world with the Great Necropolis. And I’m part of their plan. If they succeed, I’ll die, and so will you.”

“What?!” the Second Devil General said. “Where did these people come from? They plan to destroy the god world? Not even the Sovereign Lord could’ve done something like that.”

“You’re right. The Sovereign Lord couldn’t have done that. But these psychos might just be able to pull it off. The Sovereign Lord left behind a certain item that they’ve already recovered. You see, he was changing the Great Necropolis into something different, and they’re continuing that undertaking, pushing it far past anything he accomplished.

“Right now, I'm trapped in the Great Necropolis. However, I've also managed to unlock some of its deepest secrets and I plan to use them to vanquish these villains. If I don’t, the god world will be no more. And time is running out. Allow me to emphasize this point: the Sovereign Lord couldn’t destroy the god world, but the Great Necropolis can. The god world represents everything. So if it's gone, there is Nothing. The god world is the heart of the many heavens, and in fact, is the most paramount of all worlds. There’s no other world that surpasses it. Therefore, the only way to reach the Annulled level of will convergence is to destroy the god world. To create the true and real world, which is a world of Nothing. If someone can reach the Annulled level and transcend by destroying the god world, humanity can break through the ultimate limits.”

‘So, that’s how it is,’ Yang Qi thought.

The god world was the ultimate world. The path of cultivation involved rising from the impure lands into the immortal worlds, then going to the god world. To achieve breakthroughs, one had to fly to higher heights. Unfortunately, if there were no worlds above the god world, how could one fly higher?

Yang Qi was finally starting to understand the mental anguish experienced by people like King Immortal-Slayer and the Sovereign Lord.

They had reached the highest heights possible, only to find that they were stuck for all time. Perhaps they were eternally undying, but in the end, it was an existence of eternal pain.

It was similar to Yang Qi’s own brethren, who existed at the height of their world, but were unable to rise any higher. For them, it was an existence of sorrow.

‘I wonder what it’s like to stand on the ultimate peak,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘How do you transcend that? I suppose it’s a bit premature to be wondering about such things. After I become like the Sovereign Lord, the highest level of existence, then I’ll worry about it.’

“Are you refusing to help me, Second Devil General?” King Immortal-Slayer asked.

“Why should I?” the Second Devil General replied. “Once you’re free, you’ll just take control of the Great Necropolis and follow in the footsteps of the Sovereign Lord. You're ambitious, just like he was. Don't think I don’t know that. Anyone who reaches the ultimate peak will want to transcend, and will then consider destroying the god world. You’re no exception. Neither was the True Devil. Nor am I. There’s no alternative path to take.”

“So the answer's no?” King Immortal-Slayer said. “Do you really think I have no way of dealing with you by force? Don’t forget, you’re still sealed in that lamp, which means that I control your life and death. All I have to do is help Yang Qi assimilate the lamp more quickly.”

“Bring it on, King Immortal-Slayer! I refuse to believe you can actually kill me. I’ve already fully cultivated the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body! I might have suffered years of torment, and I may be reaching the end of my road, but I have full and complete confidence in my will! All I need to do is recover a bit of strength, and then you won’t even come close to being a match for me.”

It didn’t seem like the Second Devil General would be won over. If he was the type to surrender, he would have surrendered to the Lord of Radiance and Light long ago.

Snorting coldly, King Immortal-Slayer prepared to take action. However, just before he did, his expression flickered. “Those damned bastards are messing with the Great Necropolis again. I have to go back to deal with them. Take this talisman, Yang Qi. It’ll help you assimilate the lamp more quickly!”

Whizzzzz....

A sliver of will swirled forth, transforming into a talisman that landed on Yang Qi’s palm. At the same time, King Immortal-Slayer’s will projection faded away.

“Who are these people, King Immortal-Slayer?!” Yang Qi called after him. “Don’t tell me it's the Proud Clan! Please, clear this up for me!”

Unfortunately, King Immortal-Slayer didn’t say anything in response. Apparently, he was in too much of a hurry.

Meanwhile, the Second Devil General laughed heartily. “It seems King Immortal-Slayer has landed himself in just as bad a predicament as I'm in. Alright, boy. I have to admit I didn’t think you were really acquainted with King Immortal-Slayer. But even if you are, he’s just using you. If you use that talisman to assimilate me, it’s not going to help you. Instead, it’ll only harm you! You have the God Legion Seal and some of the Mahātmā Jade, as well as plenty of other amazing things. You’re a Fateless One! King Immortal-Slayer lacks a physical body, so he’s obviously planning to possess you. The only reason he’s working with you now is because he can’t take over your body yet.”

“Hoping to sow dissension between us?” Yang Qi said. He laughed. “Nice try. The stronger I get, the more confident I am. King Immortal-Slayer is trapped right now, so there’s no reason not to help him a bit. You’re a far bigger threat. With you around, I'm in constant danger. It’s simple: I want that lamp, and King Immortal-Slayer wants you! It's only natural to help each other out a bit. King Immortal-Slayer and I have been working together for a long time now, and it's gone splendidly. Did you really think that a few words from you are going to suddenly make me distrust him? If so, that’s very foolish of you. Besides, even if King Immortal-Slayer really does plan to reach the peak by destroying the god world, well, I still have my own plans. And right now, they involve assimilating you.”

The Second Devil General was temporarily struck speechless. Yang Qi had analyzed matters quite thoroughly, and clearly had things planned out in detail.

“My physical body has reached a threshold, Second Devil General. A limit. The Everlit Godlamp is the true form of the Lord of Radiance and Light. It’s his body! If I assimilate it, I’ll be able to reach a higher level. I’ll become stronger than ever. So give in and hand over the Mahātmā Jade. If you do, I won’t assimilate you. What do you say?”

Without hesitation, Yang Qi thrust King Immortal-Slayer’s talisman into the lamp.

Instantly, the lamp flared with fire, and a devilish specter could be seen within it, twisting and writhing. The Second Devil General was gasping for breath, as if he were fighting for his life.

“Bring it on, boy! Bring it on! I hereby swear that as soon as I have the chance, I'm going to kill you and everyone you know! You think I’ll stand for this humiliation? You can't vanquish my will this easily!” All of a sudden, boundless baleful energy erupted from the Second Devil General.

The devilish specter shrank, turning into a dazzling conglomeration of flickering light, which was a devilfire śarīra that fought back against the flame of the lamp.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi drew on the power of God Legion Seal and the Mahātmā Jade, as well as the talisman from King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions. At the same time, he sent forth bubbles from the Purrfect God Art. He was using every single technique he could think of, yet he was still unable to deal with the Second Devil General.

“I refuse to believe you can keep this up, Second Devil General.”

Yang Qi suddenly inhaled, sucking the lamp, and the Second Devil General with it, into his God Legion Paradise.

He would never have dared to do this before the purrling encased the lamp in a bubble. If the Second Devil General escaped into the God Legion Paradise, he could take it over, and Yang Qi would have crumbled. Even his more than twenty-five thousand sage monarch magistrates would have been destroyed.

But things were different now. He had help from two almighty entities, the purrling and King Immortal-Slayer, and their mysterious and invincible cultivation bases were absolutely crushing the Second Devil General.

The Second Devil General had fled the tiger's den only to subsequently fall into the wolf’s lair. Yang Qi had set up everything perfectly.

His own methods weren’t enough to assimilate this devil, but he could assimilate the lamp. Of course, part of the lamp had been taken over by the Second Devil General’s devilishness. But after getting rid of that devilishness, he could take the lamp, bring it into himself, and use it to boost his powers. Then he could keep the Second Devil General imprisoned permanently.

As Yang Qi howled from the effort, the sun and moon sank into oblivion, and the ground quaked.

All of his sage monarch magistrates were working with him, chanting sutras of radiance and light that came from the Sovereign Lord’s Holy and Far-Reaching Consummate Omnicurse. As a result, an image of the Lord of Radiance and Light appeared in the depths of the lamp, boosting its power to ten times its previous level.

“You want to assimilate this lamp, boy? Turn it into your physical husk? Sadly for you, it's the body of the Lord of Radiance and Light, and he never died! What if he achieves the breakthrough he seeks, then comes back and possesses you? You’d best not rush into consuming poison!”

Yang Qi chuckled. “You forget, Second Devil General. I have the God Legion Seal. Even if the Lord of Radiance and Light is resurrected, his throne is still in the God Legion Seal, which means I can control him. He wouldn't be able to do a thing to me.”

The Second Devil General burst out laughing.

“What’s so funny?” Yang Qi said.

“What's funny is that you have no idea what you’re talking about. Don’t you know why the Lord of Radiance and Light, the Lord of Civilization, the Lord of the Sword Dao, and all the other God-Lords really perished? The truth is that if they hadn’t chosen to die, they’d still be alive. You see, they wanted to be free of the God Legion Seal. So they decided to wait until they could be reborn in new bodies. In other words, if the Lord of Radiance and Light is resurrected, you won’t be able to use the God Legion Seal on him. And you would be the first person he’d aim to kill! There’s no way that any of them will allow the God Legion Seal to continue to exist!”

Chapter 1403: Speeding up the Subjugation

‘Is that really how it went?’ Yang Qi thought. He didn’t see any reason why the Second Devil General would lie. The Second Devil General was still alive, and there didn’t seem to be any reason why the Lord of Radiance and Light would have been willing to die, other than freeing himself from the clutches of the God Legion Seal. Any almighty being would have a deep-seated desire to be free, and it was a given that peak Paramount Gods would be no exception.

The God-Lords’ thoughts had been overseen by the Sovereign Lord.

When he was alive, they had defied him. But after he died, they must have come up with various ideas of how to be freed from the God Legion Seal. Perhaps being reborn was the key.

That said, this new information wasn't going to change Yang Qi’s mind about the Everlit Godlamp. ‘Regardless of whether or not he gets free, as long as I get stronger, it won’t matter. There’s no way to predict when the Lord of Radiance and Light will be resurrected. Once I assimilate the lamp, I can get the Mahātmā Jade and reach an even higher level. Then, even if the Lord of Radiance and Light does come back, he won’t be able to do anything to me. The lamp itself is just a husk, and has no will in it. Assimilating it will definitely boost my strength by at least tenfold!’

“Why don’t we join forces, boy?” the Second Devil General said. “It’s a win-win situation! What do you say?”

“What do you mean a win-win situation?” Yang Qi asked as he continued the assimilation process.

“I’ll give you the Mahātmā Jade. But you have to agree to free me after you assimilate it. How about that? The only catch is that, in order to cement my trust, you have to let me put a warding spell on you.”

“You really do take me for a fool, don’t you,” Yang Qi said. “Implant me with a warding spell? Not even a child would fall for a trick that obvious. Have you already started to turn stupid because of this assimilation process?”

“Wait a second. Hear me out. This warding spell is called the Life-Force Body-Conjoining Hex. It’s from the dao of devils, and it’s designed to connect two people via their hearts and blood. It’s not an ordinary warding spell. It’ll actually give you access to some of my powers and abilities. You can even use my energy arts and get enlightenment of my cultivation base. And if you die while we're connected, so will I. At the same time, if I kill you, I’ll die in the process. We’ll essentially become like conjoined twins. Think about it. If you share my life force, cultivation base, and experiences, you’ll benefit immensely. And just imagine what level you can ultimately reach. It really will benefit both of us.”

“Share our life force? A warding spell to connect our hearts and blood?”

Yang Qi had to admit that he was intrigued. In terms of strength and cultivation, he really couldn’t measure up to the Second Devil General. The Second Devil General was at the level of a God-Lord, and had an invincible cultivation base. He might be weak and nearing the end of his road, but at his peak, he had been indescribably mighty. If he recovered his full strength, Yang Qi would be like an ant to him.

Sharing the life force of a powerful entity like that would surely come with immense benefits.

It would be like replacing hunting rifles with cannons, and would surely put him in the position of being able to kill countless experts from the Proud Clan when he finally faced them.

“Sounds interesting, doesn’t it?” the Second Devil General said. “This is no trick or lie. Given your cultivation base, and the fact that you can assimilate the Mahātmā Jade, you should know that the sharing of life force is a high level secret technique from the dao of devils. Think about it. What good would it really do you to assimilate me? Would it really lead you to a breakthrough? Not likely. At your level, cultivation progress comes by taking things one step at a time. Maybe you can assimilate me, but you won’t get the full power of my fleshly body, and in the end, it’ll all just be a big waste. Why do something so useless? Say a person eats an elephant. Would it turn him into an elephant? No.

“Besides, since you have the God Legion Seal, once we share our life force and can tap into each other’s power, we can finally trust each other. You can’t actually use the God Legion Seal to its full potential, but with my power, it’ll be different. Together, we can enslave everyone in existence, and no one would be able to oppose us. The two of us can find all the other pieces of the Mahātmā Jade and endlessly benefit. And neither of us would need to worry about betrayal from the other. Why? Because if you die, I die. And if I die, you die. Our power would be linked, so you couldn’t steal my power, nor could I steal yours. Come. I'm willing to make this big sacrifice to work together with you. Unless you do this, your cultivation base will remain like nothing in my eyes.”

Yang Qi thought about it for a moment, then said, “That's a nice plan. The secret magic of sharing life force really is a high level art from the dao of devils. Because I assimilated the True Devil’s sheepskin scroll, I know all about it. However, I also know that you have to be very careful when using it.”

“Then what’re you waiting for? Once we link our blood and hearts, we can rise to greater heights. What's the point of any bickering or arguing? Look, don't you want to subjugate the League of the Devil-Dao and the League of Wretch-Gods? They're pitifully weak, as far as I'm concerned. They’re like some ruffians in a remote village, engaged in a street fight. Think about how much destiny you could get from them!”

Yang Qi knew that he was telling the truth.

For him to share heart and blood with the Second Devil General would be like a bedraggled beggar encountering an emperor who promised to share his wealth and power.

“This is a big matter,” Yang Qi said. “I need to think it over.” Of course, there was no way he would actually agree to this suggestion. He was just trying to buy some time.

“Think what over?” the Second Devil General roared. “I've already sacrificed a lot here. I'm the Second Devil General! You think I’d stoop to playing games with you? What exactly do you need to think about, boy? I'm willing to share my life force with you! And my cultivation! Don’t tell me you don’t want power!”

“I'm not just anybody,” Yang Qi said. “I might not be as strong as you are, but I have the God Legion Seal, the Mahātmā Jade, and my status as a Fateless One. If we go through with this, you’d actually be benefiting a lot more than me.”

“However I benefit afterward, boy, you’ll get half. You can’t gain any further enlightenment of all of those magical treasures of yours. For example, the Cruiser of Civilization. You can use it to create some random things, but with my help, you could use it to be the most destructive force in existence, and overwhelm any army that rose against you. Furthermore, I can help you use the God Legion Seal to tap into the might of the entire god world. You can establish a new version of the halls of heaven and become the new Sovereign Lord, while I’ll be the new True Devil. We can split the god world between us. And who knows, maybe later on we could think of a way to split apart and become two free entities again.”

“I still need to think about it,” Yang Qi said. “I’ll tell you what my decision is later.”

“Fine. Go think about it, boy. Come tell me your answer whenever you’re ready.” The Second Devil General knew that Yang Qi wasn’t impulsive or foolish, therefore, he decided to finally back down.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi went back to focusing fully on assimilating the lamp.

After the Second Devil General quieted down, Yang Qi exhaled slowly. He had just passed through a major temptation by this devil. Moments ago, he really had been intrigued at the thought of speeding things up. Unfortunately, if he followed through with the plan, his heart wouldn’t be his own anymore. Furthermore, although he had some obstacles to reaching the highest of heights, he was still making progress. And he would rather make progress on his own; the result would be much more solid than relying on someone else.

Besides, it seemed obvious that the Second Devil General had some secret plan to ultimately take the God Legion Seal and the Mahātmā Jade.

The man was an ancient devil who had crossed more bridges than Yang Qi had walked roads, and already knew many secrets of the Mahātmā Jade.

The best strategy was definitely to take things slowly.

Already, Yang Qi had started taking control of the Everlit Godlamp. Nodding, he continued the work within the God Legion Paradise, and simultaneously rose to his feet. “Jadefall, prepare for war. It's time to take the fight to the League of the Devil-Dao and the League of Wretch-Gods. Your power has reached a pinnacle. As for me, I'm going to go subjugate the patriarchs of the Nine Dragons Court, Deva Dynasty, and Sumeru Temple. Their destiny will be mine!”

“Great!” Jadefall said, nodding.

Yang Qi was strong enough that he could easily crush the Nacrelight Sageland and the League of Academies. However, in a fight like this, it wasn’t necessary to kill a chicken with a battleaxe. Furthermore, he wanted his friends and family to benefit from the valuable experiences they would gain in real-life combat.

WHOOSH!

After giving his orders, he vanished. Soon, he reappeared over the ocean of the Deva Dynasty, looking at the islands spread out like stars in the sky, and the surging aura of the dynasty.

He had Grand Prince Yi under his control, as well as the imperial uncle. However, he didn’t control the power of the nation as a whole. He had always held back for fear of attracting the attention of Patriarch Deva. His current plan was to subjugate Patriarch Deva, then worry about the emperor.

Soon, the time would come for the Deva Dynasty to have new leadership.

After that, he would go to the Nine Dragons Court and the Sumeru Temple.

The only downside was that Patriarch Deva was a hard person to track down.

Chapter 1404: Capturing Patriarch Deva

The key to Yang Qi’s plan was capturing Patriarch Deva. Right now, Yang Qi’s cultivation base was at the point that he couldn’t necessarily defeat the man with complete ease. However, achieving victory wouldn't be difficult, either. After all, Patriarch Deva was roughly on the same level as the four Dugu Clan experts Yang Qi had recently vanquished. The difference was that he had beaten those four in the favorable terrain of the Bastille of the One God.

On the outside, he would never have been able to succeed like he did.

Of course, he was still assimilating the Everlit Godlamp. And the twenty-five thousand sage monarch magistrates that he had were far beyond anything from before. His psychic scale and godhood rating were at ninety-nine million, nine hundred and ninety thousand, but his actual fighting power was so far past that level it couldn't be mentioned in the same breath.

Patriarch Deva would have a hard time escaping this time.

The downside was that Patriarch Deva was hard to track down. Unlike an emperor, who always had to remain near the court, a patriarch like him could travel about as freely as he wanted.

And it didn't matter that Yang Qi had the imperial uncle. Not even he knew the whereabouts of Patriarch Deva. Thankfully, Yang Qi had a consummate technique to call upon: the Son of Heaven’s Horoscopy.

The Deva Dynasty had roiling destiny that could affect meteorological or astronomical phenomena, and Patriarch Deva would use that to cultivate his various techniques. After all, he cultivated incredibly advanced techniques.

It was similar to how the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth required incredible destiny.

That was why there were no unaffiliated wandering heroes in existence who were truly top experts. The invincible patriarchs always required the backing and power of a dynasty or sect, otherwise they wouldn’t have access to the destiny they needed.

After Yang Qi had helped boost the destiny of the Deva Dynasty, Patriarch Deva had gone into seclusion and was using it for cultivation. However, because of that, Yang Qi could analyze the fluctuations of the destiny to identify where Patriarch Deva was.

It was a tried and true method.

“Son of Heaven’s Horoscopy: Sovereign Lord’s Version!” An eye appeared on Yang Qi’s forehead, which was none other than the Lord's Eye. As it swiveled back and forth, it peered at the substructure of the world around it and quickly identified the fiery streams of destiny, which formed something like an immense ocean. Destiny was like the lungs of a nation, allowing it to breathe freely.

The stronger the destiny was, the less likely it was for the energy of sin and enmity to infect it. But if the destiny was weak, it could lead to the decline and end of the dynasty.

That was how things worked in the impure lands as well. If the destiny of a nation was infected with sin and enmity, ambitious and ruthless villains would arise, people who would slaughter the righteous government officials and bring disaster to the lands.

It was actually easier for dynasties in the god world to deal with such matters. A consummate patriarch could keep the destiny under control. Even if devilish rebels arose, a powerful patriarch could crush them.

Yang Qi had read many ancient records with specific examples of flourishing dynasties in which bizarre meteorological or astronomical phenomena occurred. Fireballs falling from the sky, asteroids, tempests.... Such things could lead to the destruction of the entire dynasties.

But in the Deva Dynasty, there was no way such natural disasters could occur. The destiny was just too strong. In fact, it was so strong, and so riddled with complexities, that it was almost impossible to assess. It was similar to how difficult it was to track currents in a massive ocean.

‘Hmph. My Lord's Eye can see anything and everything. You might have some arts of illusion in play, Patriarch Deva, but do you really think they’ll pull the wool over my eyes?’ Dazzling light shot out from his Lord's Eye, and the world seemed to shrink in his view. A short time later, he was looking at all of the destiny of the Deva Dynasty, except it was the size of a fist in front of him. Then he saw a god kingdom hovering in the void, far off in the distance, with a tiny red thread linking it to the destiny in front of him.

It was almost like a kite hovering far in the distance, slowly but surely drawing on the destiny of the Deva Dynasty.

‘Very crafty, Patriarch Deva. If it wasn’t for my Lord's Eye, I probably never would’ve found this god kingdom of yours. But now I can just walk up to your front door. This is going to be one incredible fight.’ Blurring into motion, he headed toward the god kingdom.

It was a calm and silent place, hanging within the spatial tempest, slowly moving about without a fixed location. Obviously, Patriarch Deva was being very careful and doing everything possible to make sure no one could find him.

No one but Yang Qi, that was. Smiling, he transformed into a streak of light that closed in on Patriarch Deva’s god kingdom.

Despite the daoist technique he was using, the god kingdom detected him.

A tremor passed through it, and a massive flow of will appeared. Then Patriarch Deva’s voice rang out, ancient, calm, and benign.

“Mister Second? Is that you? You tracked the destiny out to this god kingdom? Just what I would expect of an expert like you.”

‘What?’ Yang Qi thought, surprised. ‘The old bastard knew I was coming?’

Entering the god kingdom, he saw that it was very simple, containing little more than a prayer mat upon which Patriarch Deva sat, smiling as Yang Qi approached.

Standing a short distance from the prayer mat, he said, “You knew I was coming, Patriarch Deva?”

“Of course. When I make plans, they don’t go awry. I take it you benefited a lot in the Bastille of the One God. Is that right, Mister Second? When the imperial uncle returned, he reported in right away, saying that you disappeared into the Bastille of the One God. Did you end up finding your true self?”

“My true self is imprisoned deep underground, suppressed by the Lord of Radiance and Light and his army. For now, I'm stuck. But the time will come when I make my return!” Snorting coldly, Yang Qi continued, “I have to say I’m very disappointed in you, Patriarch Deva. You harbor evil intentions against me, don’t you!? You sent the imperial uncle and those other brats with the intention of ambushing me. Did you really not fear my rage?”

Patriarch Deva immediately burst out into loud laughter.

“What’s so funny?” Yang Qi asked suspiciously.

“What's funny? This act of yours! It was a good performance, Mister Second, but do you really think you had convinced me you were the Second Devil General? You see, I knew all along that you were an imposter, not some clone of the Second Devil General. Tell me. Who are you really?”

‘So, that’s how it is.’

Yang Qi had assumed that Patriarch Deva had some secret trump card that he was preparing to use. Instead, he was just revealing that he knew about Yang Qi’s secret identity.

Patriarch Deva was clearly very perceptive. If this had happened before Yang Qi went to the Bastille of the One God, he would have been in a lot of danger. But as of this moment, he might as well be the Second Devil General. After all, he had the general imprisoned in a lamp on his person.

“Well, boy, what now? Feeling a bit embarrassed?” Patriarch Deva slowly rose to his feet, then waved his hand and transformed the surrounding space-time. It rippled, and a wind sprang up as a host of interlocking nets appeared. “I knew you would come for me eventually, boy. So I was waiting here, ready to fight at a moment's notice. You've thrown yourself into my trap! So, what do you say? Are you going to tell me who you really are? Perhaps you're someone who stumbled across the Second Devil General’s treasure trove. When you saw me nervous that day, you decided to say that you were the Second Devil General. How about this: give me all of that treasure, and join my side. If you do, you might live through this. What do you say?”

“Do you know why I came here today, Patriarch Deva?” Yang Qi said in a cold voice, loosening his shoulders. “To enslave you and take the destiny of the Deva Dynasty. You see, you’re right, I'm not a clone of the Second Devil General.”

RUMBLE!

He suddenly attacked, using a consummate move from the Sage Monarch Grand Magic. It was Hero’s Last Stand, a palm strike of ever-changing variations, as well as massive psychic force.

“Oh? What palm technique is that?” Patriarch Deva didn’t seem worried at all that Yang Qi was attacking him. Although he was surprised by the specific palm strike, he clearly looked down on it.

“Five Strikes of the Deva!”

He quickly unleashed a succession of five palm strikes, all of them filled with the majesty of heaven, supernatural workmanship, boundless grandeur, the crushing force of mountains, the sharpness of the sharpest blade, and the delicacy of silk.

“Crushing of the Mountain!

“Madness of the Sea!

“Slash of Heaven!

“Strands of Earth!

“Cleaver of Creation!”

These five palm strikes were his dao, similar to the ten moves that made up the Sage Monarch Grand Magic. Every one of them illustrated a fundamental truth about him, and as they came crushing down, the entire area filled with surging energy that would be impossible to escape from. And they would specifically target the enemy. They were moves that Patriarch Deva had used to kill countless formidable enemies through the years.

Bam. Bam. Bam!

Yang Qi’s palms collided with Patriarch Deva’s attacks, and the latter quickly stabbed into the former.

In that moment, Yang Qi realized the exact nature of Patriarch Deva’s psychic scale and godhood rating. They were at approximately two hundred million. And that meant that, with his own power augmented by the twenty-five thousand sage monarch magistrates, he could deal with this.

In the blink of an eye, the sage monarch magistrates surged into action, and psychic power blasted out.

Chapter 1405: Capturing Patriarch Deva (2)

Yang Qi had succeeded in his enlightenment of Hero’s Last Stand after encountering the four experts from the House of the Invincible. Their Central Grand Tempest had psychic power that could rip anything to shreds, and a very unique deployment method. Thanks to the battle experience in the God Legion Seal, Yang Qi had been able to imitate certain aspects of it. He could even use it as a spell formation.

It was definitely a trump card now.

Combined with the might of twenty-five thousand sage monarch magistrates, he was definitely in the position to strike a deadly blow on Patriarch Deva.

BAM!

Patriarch Deva had no time to dodge, and was hit. As he was thrown backward, Yang Qi’s psyche stabbed into his sea of consciousness, striking a stunning blow that caused blood to pour out of the man’s eyes, ears, nose, and mouth.

In the blink of an eye, he was a blood-soaked mess.

However, he wasn’t dead. As he stood there, blood dripping off of him everywhere, he howled, “What attack was that? How could your psychic power be so incredible! It's beyond my own? You're clearly nothing but a mid Paramount God. You haven’t broken through!”

Patriarch Deva had gravely underestimated Yang Qi.

Of course, he had no idea that Yang Qi had the force of sage monarch magistrates to draw on, all of whom were just on the verge of major breakthroughs. Once Yang Qi pushed them all to the point of having psychic scales of a million, in other words, the Unbounded level, Patriarch Deva’s end of days would be around the corner.

At the moment, they were at the level of nine hundred and ninety-nine thousand, nine hundred and ninety-nine. All they needed was a bit more to reach the next major watershed point.

Yang Qi couldn’t do it at the moment, but it would happen eventually. In fact, all he needed to do was subjugate Patriarch Deva, then move on to the leaders of the Nine Dragons Court and the Sumeru Temple. With those streams of destiny, he would have ultimate control, and his sage monarch magistrates would definitely break through.

RUMBLE!

In the depths of space, countless streams of will burned brightly. Yang Qi waved his hand to ensure that Patriarch Deva didn’t have a chance to fight back, unleashing a dazzling stream of light from the God Legion Seal. It was the type of light that could crush the cosmos and reverse reality, and it rushed like the tide toward patriarch Deva.

“Are you looking to die, boy? How dare you attack me! I've lived since primeval times! I survived the God Legion Tribulation! You think that counts for nothing? Watch and see why I'm called Patriarch Deva! The word deva 天人 is made of heaven 天 and man 人. I'm the patriarch of all heaven, and of all men. I'm the patriarch of everything!”

Patriarch Deva was enraged at having been wounded, so he lifted his hands above his head, causing a shaft of light to shoot up, like a pillar that propped up the heavens. And its target was obviously Yang Qi’s psychic power.

Then he threw his hands down. “Divine Dao of the Deva; Deva Communication; Deva Path; Man Wishes to Ascend to Heaven; Heaven wants to Destroy Man; Man Marvels at Heaven; The Lands have No Heaven!”

The Deva Path appeared, almost like the Ancient Road to the Gods, rumbling toward Yang Qi with deadly force.

It was an extraordinary counterattack, and all of the true energy, radiance, godpower, and spell formations that Yang Qi threw up in defense were crushed.

A smile appeared on Patriarch Deva's face, and he said, “Prepare to die! You hurt me, boy. And that’s an unforgivable crime. I'm going to slaughter you to ease my rage and cleanse my humiliation!”

However, that was when the Deva Path met the God Legion Seal.

Brilliant light hit the Deva Path, and it collapsed after only a few breaths of time passed. Face grim, Yang Qi strode forward, psyche and energy thrumming.

“Myriad Worlds Capturing Method!”

RUMBLE!

His hand became a projection of a myriad of worlds, which then shrank down into a stream of true energy that created something like a chart. It wrapped around Patriarch Deva, whereupon the God Legion Seal shot into him.

The Myriad Worlds Capturing Method was something Yang Qi had gained enlightenment of after creating teleportation portals. He could use his godpower to create a version of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, which he could then use to bind an enemy and take them captive.

“What technique is this? The ancient Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart? What's that golden light?”  Despite seeing the golden light, it still didn’t occur to Patriarch Deva that it might be the God Legion Seal. However, as the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart bound him, his alarm grew. “Just who exactly are you? I can’t believe you have a consummate energy art like this!

“But that doesn’t matter. You still can’t deal with me. Eternal Deva Separation!”

Patriarch Deva shoved both hands out, causing an eruption of power from seemingly nowhere. It penetrated Yang Qi’s daoist technique, then suddenly exploded, destroying the Myriad Worlds Capturing Method.

‘Incredible,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘I can’t believe Patriarch Deva is this hard to deal with.’

As it turned out, late Paramount Gods really were difficult to deal with. If Patriarch Deva were in the Bastille of the One God, Yang Qi could mop the floor with him in only a moment or two. But here on the outside, he had no special advantage in terms of terrain.

It was a tough battle, but it went to show how Yang Qi was advancing toward a position of such incredible superiority.

Yang Qi staggered backward, creating a string of afterimages that made it impossible to tell which one was actually him. Thinking that Yang Qi was trying to run away, Patriarch Deva smiled viciously and lunged forward like a crazed tiger. “Where do you think you’re going, boy? Are you looking to die?! You’re not going anywhere! Three Cycles of the Deva: Capture Destructive Devils; Snatch Away Heaven; Apprehend Myriad Ages!”

All three of these moves were consummate techniques that could be used to capture an enemy. In other words, they ensured that Yang Qi had no avenues of escape.

“My Life is Like a Lamp!”

Yang Qi suddenly stopped in place and exhaled, causing him to transform into an enormous, burning lamp. As soon as Patriarch Deva’s hand touched him, his hand burst into flame that traveled back up his arm until his entire body was on fire.

This was another of Yang Qi’s trump cards, a consummate technique from the Everlit Godlamp. Although he didn’t have complete enlightenment of the lamp yet, he had definitely made progress in recent days.

The lamp was a treasure similar to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. The Lord of Radiance and Light hadn’t quite measured up to King Immortal-Slayer, but his lamp wasn’t some item he had created. It had existed even before the god world came to be. Therefore, it contained profundities of heaven and earth that Yang Qi had absorbed and converted to his own use. By combining those elements with the God Legion Seal, he could unleash godly power that surpassed even that of the Lord of Radiance and Light.

After all, the Lord of Radiance and Light didn’t have the God Legion Seal.

Zzzzzap. Zzzzzap.

As the flames engulfed Patriarch Deva, he howled, and at the same time, was battered by the power of the God Legion Seal.

The lamp was powerful enough on its own. But backed by the God Legion Seal, it was more than enough to subjugate Patriarch Deva.

“Take Control!”

The power of the God Legion Seal filled Patriarch Deva’s mind, simultaneously extinguishing the flames and leaving him in a state of blankness.

“You're at the end of the road, Patriarch Deva,” Yang Qi said. “Surrender. Acknowledge defeat.” Yang Qi spoke with a smile, and his words contained charming power. Stepping forward, he clasped his hand down onto Patriarch Deva’s head and began to take control of his psyche.

The process lasted several hours. When it was over, Patriarch Deva opened his eyes, and although they flickered with killing intent, he quickly sagged in defeat. “Y-y-you... you used the God Legion Seal to take control of me? You’re not the Second Devil General. Who are you?”

“You don’t need to know who I am. You just need to know that you belong to me now. You’re my servant, Patriarch Deva. And now that I have control of you, the Deva Dynasty is going to be mine. I’ll control its destiny going forward. Furthermore, I know everything that goes on in your mind. Don’t worry, I’ll take care of you. However, if you ever try anything funny, I can kill you with a thought. Anyone who’s been subjugated by the God Legion Seal loses their ability to cause mischief.”

Even as he spoke, he felt the immense destiny of the Deva Dynasty shifting in his direction.

Crack! Snap!

As it entered him, fusing with the particles inside, he began evolving, climbing closer and closer to the late Paramount God level. Unfortunately, no significant transformations occurred and things soon calmed. He had reached a major obstacle.

“It seems I need to go subjugate the Nine Dragons Court and the Sumeru Temple. Once I do, their destiny will lead me to a breakthrough.” With that, he pulled out a medicinal pill and handed it to Patriarch Deva. “This is a Deathless God-Lord Pill. Consume it, and all the injuries you’ve suffered at my hands will be healed. Once you’ve recovered, we’ll move on to Patriarch Dragon.”

Chapter 1406: Dragon Lair

Yang Qi had finally subjugated Patriarch Deva, and he couldn’t have been more delighted. During the fight, he had gained plenty of enlightenment of various fighting techniques; for instance, how to use the God Legion Seal to power the Everlit Godlamp. It took a huge amount of psychic power and godly might to power the lamp, so without the God Legion Seal it would have been very difficult to use.

‘Who would’ve thought that the Everlit Godlamp would be so effective in combination with the God Legion Seal?’

It was quite a surprise that he had managed to crush Patriarch Deva in only a few breaths of time. His original plan had involved using the four experts from the House of the Invincible. But in the end, he realized that might attract unwanted attention, so he’d decided to go it alone.

Now that he’d subjugated Patriarch Deva, he could move on to the patriarch of the Dragonfolk.

“Patriarch Deva, tell me. Where is the patriarch of the Dragonfolk? You’ve been familiar with him for years, surely you have an idea. And don’t lie to me. If I have to, I can use a tiny bit of psychic power to scour your memories.”

Yang Qi could access not only Patriarch Deva’s memories, but his experience, his cultivation techniques, his understanding of the martial path, and even things that had happened to him when he was a child.

That said, he would rather save the psychic power by just getting a direct answer.

“His name is Buddha First-King, and he normally hides out in a hidden world located in the spatial tempests of the god world. It's called the Myriad Dragons Lair and is a place that was once inhabited by the ancient Dragonfolk. After the Sovereign Lord shattered the god world, the Dragonfolk scattered to the winds. Nowadays, the Myriad Dragons Lair is a very dangerous location that only the Dragonfolk can enter. Normal gods, even Paramount Gods, will end up dragonized if they go there. You see, the boundless patriarchs of the Dragonfolk cursed that place to ensure that no one would be able to enter it.

“I’ve always wanted to kill Buddha First-King, but I never succeeded. Mostly because he’s always hiding there, making it impossible to strike at him. If it weren’t for the Myriad Dragons Lair, I would’ve killed him a long time ago.”

‘So, that’s how it is,’ Yang Qi thought. It was similar to how he had such an advantage in the Bastille of the One God, and had ten times the fighting prowess to deal with enemies.

‘So Buddha First-King is always hiding in the Myriad Dragons Lair. And even with both of us working together, we can’t beat him there. That said, I do have certain techniques that are the bane of the Dragonfolk. And King Heaven-Devourer was a primal-chaos elder-snake who had some of the Dragonfolk in him. Snakes and dragons are essentially the same type of creature.

‘With King Heaven-Devourer’s energy arts, I might be able to get safely into the Myriad Dragons Lair. I think I ought to go over there and have a look.’

Yang Qi waved his hand, and a dimensional portal appeared, out of which flew three thousand imperial snakecharms, direct from Yang Immortal-Slayer.

Before Dragonfolk existed in the god world, they lived in primal-chaos. And King Heaven-Devourer was really half dragon, half snake.

With his three thousand talismans, Yang Qi was confident that he could go to the Myriad Dragons Lairs without suffering any negative consequences. And he would be very careful. If anything went awry, he would simply flee.

The higher his cultivation base climbed, the more he realized how dangerous the god world was. Unless he reached the level of the Sovereign Lord, there would always be enemies to be wary of.

Looking a bit weak in the knees, Patriarch Deva said, “You have all three thousand of King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans? Just who are you? How do you have so many treasures?”

Even one of King Heaven-Devourer’s legacy talismans was an extremely precious thing that was the subject of many legends.

Of course, no one in the god world had ever seen one. According to the stories, after the God Legion Tribulation, King Heaven-Devourer perished and his talismans all fell into the impure lands. The mortals there, who called themselves things like Demolishers, Godmyths, Grand Emperors, and Terrifying experts, all squabbled over them.

They were said to contain profound secrets that were only unlockable after becoming one of the legion of gods. Even Yang Qi was only capable of unlocking about twenty or thirty percent of their might, although that was enough to devour just about anything in the god world.

The question was whether they would be able to convert the energy of the Myriad Dragons Lair into Heaven-Devouring True Energy, or whether the lair would turn the talismans into precious treasures for the Dragonfolk’s use.

“What's so strange about it?” Yang Qi replied coolly. “Although I don’t have every single one of the items belonging to the seventy-two monarchs, I have most of them. And yes, I do have the complete collection of King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans. With the God Legion Seal, the Everlit Godlamp, and all the other magical treasures I have, dealing with this measly Buddha First-King shouldn’t be difficult at all. By the way, remember how you said I was impersonating the Second Devil General? The truth is that I have him captive in the Everlit Godlamp. What do you think about that?”

Patriarch Deva was obviously not happy about being subjugated by Yang Qi, although he knew he had no choice in the matter. But gradually, that attitude was changing.

“What?! You have the Second Devil General as a prisoner? How could you have subjugated him?!”

“Quit bragging, boy!” the Second Devil General said, erupting from the lamp in an expression of devil will. “If it wasn’t for the lamp the Lord of Radiance and Light used to suppress me, plus that purrling’s seal, the power of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions, and the God Legion Seal, I could’ve killed you ten thousand times over. This boy is nothing without the God Legion Seal. I can’t believe a bastard like him would dare to defy a paragonic entity from the dao of devils.”

Although he didn’t have the power and psyche to launch any attacks, his devil energy was still unrivaled. And Patriarch Deva instantly recognized what type of being he was.

“Enough with the melodrama, Second Devil General!” Yang Qi said. “I'm going to assimilate the Everlit Godlamp sooner or later. And when that happens, I won’t accept your surrender even if you beg me to. That piece of the Mahātmā Jade will be mine.”

“Keep dreaming, boy! Subjugating ants like this Patriarch Deva is the opposite of impressive. And the destiny you’ll get because of it is pitiful. So don’t rejoice. Let me tell you, if you can sneak into the House of the Invincible, that’s where you’ll find some incredible destiny. It's thousands of times what the Deva Dynasty has. Maybe even ten thousand times. But I doubt you’ll have time for that. Didn't King Immortal-Slayer say those people are trying to break into the Great Necropolis? You might only have a few years of time to reach the ultimate pinnacle. For all you know, it might only be months. And there will be countless dangers along the way. Just remember, you always have the option of linking your life force with mine. You might not treat me fairly, but I'm still willing to offer you a hand in friendship. What do you say? Think it through well!”

After that, the Second Devil General sank back into silence.

Yang Qi simply snorted coldly and didn’t deign to respond to him. “Let’s go, Patriarch Deva. Your cultivation base should be back to normal. We don’t have any time to lose. Off to the Myriad Dragons Lair!”

The Deathless God-Lord Pill had healed Patriarch Deva and put him back in top form. Sadly for him, he didn’t have the destiny of the Deva Dynasty anymore. That destiny was now pouring into Yang Qi, who was using it to make more sage monarch magistrates.

Unfortunately, his progress was still pitifully slow.

“The Myriad Dragons Lair is over there!” Patriarch Deva said. He had already fallen in line and wasn’t interested in causing trouble. Yang Qi could now use the Myriad Worlds Greater Teleportation and his Tribulation Wings to pierce through spatial tempests with immense speeds that surpassed anything Patriarch Deva could even imagine.

Chapter 1407: Dragonization

With his Myriad Worlds Greater Teleportation and Tribulation Wings, Yang Qi’s flight speed was mind-boggling. Even experts of a higher level than him would never be able to catch him, and he was actually capable of speeds that could surpass many teleportation portals.

It was similar to how, in years past, he could use the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart to teleport to any location he desired.

And thanks to the God Legion Seal, he could easily replenish any energy he lost due to his efforts.

At first, Patriarch Deva had mostly been shocked by Yang Qi’s speed, but then he became even more shocked by his endurance. Patriarch Deva knew that, in ancient times, there were many techniques of flight, many of which were based on the use of quintessence-blood, lifespan, or the like.

In other words, they couldn’t be used for extended periods of time.

But Yang Qi could fly along without ever stopping. It seemed almost impossible, yet his energy continued flowing without cease. It was something that not even Paramount Gods should be capable of.

“You....”

“What, surprised that I can go on for so long without resting? That’s just how I operate. Remember it. With the God Legion Seal, my godhood can never be drained or destroyed. What do you think? I'm so fast that you couldn’t catch me, let alone keep up with me.”

Patriarch Deva didn’t know how to respond.

Yang Qi was able to move so fast he could hardly track his movements; if he used that level of speed in a fight, it would be almost impossible to deal with him.

“We should arrive at the Myriad Dragons Lair in about two hours,” Patriarch Deva said. “Look around, the vital energy is already showing signs that it’ll dragonize you.”

“Hmm?” Yang Qi stopped for a moment and looked around very seriously. He could see that the spatial tempests were weakening, but there was something acrid and magical about the spatial nodes.

He made a grasping motion, and the surrounding space-time compacted into a crystallized form, within which was some sort of demon energy that resembled flowing scales. In fact, they were dragon scales. Some such dragon scales had already infected Yang Qi’s vital energy, crystallizing it and slowly transforming it, altering his very genes and substructure.

It was obvious that the power of the Myriad Dragons Lair had seeped into space-time itself, creating a demonic energy that could transform anyone it touched into a dragon.

Strictly speaking, dragons actually weren’t living beings, but rather a manifestation of energy.

That was why, in the impure lands, dragons were sometimes referred to simply as dragon energy or dragon lodes. They could even be born directly out of the vital energy of heaven and earth, and as such, they represented power, majesty, terror, destruction, and eminence.

Yang Qi waved his hand, unleashing the power of King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans. Instantly, the dragon energy rumbled toward him and was converted into Heaven-Devouring True Energy. Obviously, King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans could handle the energy of the Dragonfolk. That said, it was hard to say what things would be like in the depths of the Myriad Dragons Lair. The dragon energy there would definitely be much, much stronger.

Yang Qi proceeded onward.

About two hours later, things suddenly changed without warning.

Thrummmm!

Dramatic transformations occurred in heaven and earth, as the entire area was filled with a complex, destructive energy. Dragon scales whipped about like flurries in a snowstorm, creating draconic tornadoes, some of which were millions upon millions of kilometers in diameter. They were almost like worlds of wind.

‘Such a strong dragon aura,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘Just what I would expect of a place called the Myriad Dragons Lair. Supposedly, anyone that comes here will be dragonized.’ As a test, he tossed out a magical treasure that had been created by an ordinary Paramount God, a golden disc that shone with dazzling light.

As soon as it was swept up by one of the windstorms, it collapsed, then reformed into the shape of a golden dragon. Baring its fangs and claws, it flew off into the distance.

‘Wow, it can even dragonize that. Amazing.’

RUMBLE!

A massive tempest swept forth, filled with draconic lightning formed by the clash of vital energies. Thousands upon thousands of lightning bolts slashed toward Yang Qi, blasting into his defensive empyrean energy in the hopes of converting him to a dragon.

However, using King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans, he simply devoured the draconic lightning.

He still hadn’t drawn directly on the power of the God Legion Seal, because considering how they were already in the vicinity of the Myriad Dragons Lair, it would be sure to beat the grass to startle the snake. The last thing he wanted to do was attract the attention of Buddha First-King and whatever other patriarchs of the Dragonfolk might be lurking about here.

After all, he was here to subjugate Buddha First-King, not pick a fight with the Dragonfolk in general.

“Draconic Transformation!”

Yang Qi suddenly vanished, leaving behind only his monarch godhood, which he surrounded with King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans in a shape that was vaguely draconic and vaguely snake-like.

Obviously, he couldn’t enter the Myriad Dragons Lair as a human, lest he be instantly identified and besieged from all sides. It would be darkly humorous if he ended up killed in the Myriad Dragons Lair before he even found Buddha First-King.

It wasn’t very difficult for Yang Qi to do something like this. Considering his deep understanding of the Cruiser of Civilization, he had long since come to understand his genes and life force. He could transform himself even on a genetic level, making it possible for him to become a real Dragonfolk in just about every sense of the word.

He waved his finger, and the dragonization technique was unleashed on Patriarch Deva, causing dragon scales to ripple out across him. As he howled, he transformed first into an enormous dragon, then into a strange half-dragon half-person hybrid. Now it wouldn’t be any problem at all for him to enter the Myriad Dragons Lair.

“Let’s go!”

After making all of the proper preparations, he proceeded onward with only the Myriad Worlds Greater Teleportation technique. He chose not to use the Tribulation Wings, as they were too mighty and would provoke a power of tribulations that would attract far too much attention.

In contrast, the Myriad Worlds Greater Teleportation was much quieter, making it perfect for both assassinations and heists.

Piercing through the tempests and roiling dragon energy, he used King Heaven-Devourer’s talisman to devour everything that came his way, even the powerful dragon vitality that had been created by Paramount Gods. By feeding the resulting Heaven-Devouring True Energy into his sage monarch magistrates, he enabled them to improve on a genetic level, becoming even more perfect.

‘Incredible. Dragons are paragonic entities. In the ancient era, the Sovereign Lord subjugated the Dragonfolk and turned them into thrall troops. He was also the one that split them into eight tribes. However, his efforts were ultimately defeated for unknown reasons. The genes of the Dragonfolk remained unique, and now that I have access to the dragon vitality in the Myriad Dragons Lair, I’ll benefit to no end.’

RUMBLE!

After piercing through numerous tempests within the Myriad Dragons Lair, Yang Qi encountered a powerful greyspace. Up ahead was a conglomeration of flesh and blood that seemed to stretch without end. And it wriggled as scales flowed across its surface.

It was an entire world made of nothing but flesh and blood. Furthermore, the dragon aura was so intense that not even Paramount Gods could possibly stand up to it.

“This is the greyspace of the Myriad Dragons Lair,” Patriarch Deva said. “At this point, I would be completely rebuffed. Inside, Buddha First-King will be ten times more powerful than normal. In other words, even if I was ten times stronger than I am, I wouldn’t be able to handle him. Thankfully, you’ve imparted to me a method to transform my genes and life force into that of the Dragonfolk. Now I'm confident that I can actually fight him.”

“We’re not here to fight him,” Yang Qi reminded Patriarch Deva, “we're here to subjugate him. I want to strike like lightning. Find his location, crush him, and avoid stirring up attention. Let’s go.”

With that, they pierced into the greyspace of flesh and blood, and moments later, found themselves in a grand world of the Dragonfolk.

Chapter 1408: Buddha First-King

Yang Qi was finally getting a look at the Myriad Dragons Lair.

It was an enormous world made up of wriggling flesh and blood. The lands, mountains, rivers, and even vital energy were all made from either blood or flesh. The rivers flowed with blood, and the flowers, plants, and trees were flesh. And there was no rotting odor; everything smelled as fresh as could be.

As for the air, it thrummed with the aura of dragons. Any Paramount God who came here would be infected and transformed into a demonic dragon.

Tapping his foot on the ground, Yang Qi confirmed that it was also made from flesh. Reaching down, he tore a chunk out and found that it dripped with blood and the vital energy of dragons. It would obviously make the perfect food for a dragon.

Breathing a sigh of admiration, Patriarch Deva said, “The Myriad Dragons Lair was actually created by the sacrificed flesh and blood of countless Dragonfolk experts. And the flesh and blood here has a name: Dragonessence Bloodfood. If a human ate it, they would instantly become an incredibly powerful divine dragon. And any dragon that roosts here will have an endless supply of sustenance. Think about it. A dragon who holed up here, doing nothing but eating and sleeping, would still have an unimaginable cultivation base. Even better, there couldn't possibly be any danger here.

“Just what you’d expect of the Dragonfolk. Only they would create a lair as perfect as this. There are even rumors that the Dragonessence Bloodfood contains the flesh and blood of peak Paramount Gods.”

Yang Qi smiled. “That's true. I can sense life force and genes here that are millions upon millions of years old. I also sense consummate godlings. The Dragonfolk are the kings of all beasts, so it’s a given that they captured the most powerful godlings to sacrifice to their Myriad Dragons Lair. You can wear out iron shoes in a fruitless search, then find what you're looking for without even trying. I actually collect the life force and genes of ancient godlings, except most of them are now extinct, making them impossible to track down and buy. Yet this Myriad Dragons Lair is full of the stuff.”

He clenched his hand, crushing the flesh and blood, which then transformed into a tiny world filled with countless top experts and godlings, flitting about in dazzling fashion.

He chuckled. ‘Look at all these ancient creatures. Spirit apes, cloudgulps, heavengems, stonelords, soulites, skynets, heart lemurs, mind horses.... They're all powerful beings that existed in the preheaven before the god world. And they all went extinct in the God Legion Tribulation. I never would’ve been able to get things like this in the Deva Dynasty, Nine Dragons Court, or Sumeru Temple. I can break down this flesh and blood and transform it into raw genetic codes! I'm finally going to be able to push my sage monarch magistrates through their final breakthrough. They'll all be Unbounded experts!’

Yang Qi’s primal-chaos elder-snake transformed into a manifestation of draconic vital energy, then burrowed into the ground and began devouring the flesh and blood, sending it into the God Legion Paradise and the twenty-five thousand sage monarch magistrates there.

Before long, the sage monarch magistrates were surrounded in blood-colored cocoons, conglomerations of wriggling flesh covered with flowing magical symbols. Genetic material flowed, becoming chains filled with the genetic codes of ancient godlings and cultivation experts. There were also some of Yang Qi’s genes.

If this process concluded successfully, the sage monarch magistrates would transform into the most invincible type of thrall troop in existence.

At the same time, Yang Qi used the flesh and blood to transform the God Legion Paradise itself.

RUMBLE!

Things were happening to Yang Qi himself, thanks to all the dramatic proceedings. His aura surged within him, but he exercised complete control and only revealed a slight flush on his face from the effort. This trip to the Myriad Dragons Lair was proving to be an incredible opportunity, possibly even fuel for a breakthrough.

Unfortunately, his cultivation base still needed more time before it reached the next level.

The Second Devil General could sense what was going on. Sadly for him, he was imprisoned in the Everlit Godlamp, sealed by the power of King Immortal-Slayer and the purrling, and couldn’t benefit at all.

“Alright, let's find Buddha First-King,” Yang Qi said. “As a matter of fact, I already have Buddha Testimony from the Nine Dragons Court under my control, as well as some other Dragonfolk. Because of that, I actually command a third of the destiny of the Nine Dragons Court. I've just refrained from fully tapping into it because I didn’t want to tip off Buddha First-King. But now it doesn’t matter. Besides, tracking down Buddha First-King in this gigantic place would be like fishing a needle from the sea, so I might as well try to locate him via the flow of destiny.”

All truly powerful experts needed to use destiny. Any who didn’t would eventually just die.

“Destiny Inspection!Acquisition!” He made a grasping gesture, and the destiny of the Nine Dragons Court flowed madly into him. If it was the destiny of any other group, it wouldn’t make it into the Myriad Dragons Lair. But the Nine Dragons Court was made up of Dragonfolk, therefore, it posed no obstacle.

With the destiny of the Nine Dragons Court flowing into him, he opened his Lord's Eye and looked around for the clues he sought. Instantly, the destiny became like a clawed dragon, flying in the direction of Buddha First-King.

Yang Qi didn’t hesitate to follow, and Patriarch Deva stuck right to his heels.

The terrain of the Myriad Dragons Lair, from mountains to rivers, was completely composed of flesh and blood. And that meant a dragon could settle down anywhere and have plenty of delicious food to eat. However, Yang Qi could already tell that some areas here abounded with dragon vitality, and others had less. There were also other Dragonfolk here, including powerful patriarchs who were early or mid Paramount Gods. There were even some late Paramount Gods.

The Myriad Dragons Lair actually resembled the impure lands in that some places were poor and impoverished, while others were rich.

RUMBLE!

After some time passed, Yang Qi caught sight of pulsing destiny piercing through the greyspace of the Myriad Dragons Lair, thousands of times beyond anything from the Nine Dragons Court. In fact, it was so immensely stronger that it sucked up the destiny of the Nine Dragons Court in the blink of an eye.

“That destiny is incredible!” Yang Qi said, shocked. “What organization is it from? It’s obviously from some group founded by dragons, but it’s vastly beyond the destiny of the Nine Dragons Court!”

“The god world is incalculably huge,” Patriarch Deva replied, and his voice seemed to tremble with a bit of fear. “That must be from some dragon dynasty founded by a peak Paramount God. Without the destiny of the Nine Dragons Court, how do we find Buddha First-King?”

“We're fine,” Yang Qi replied. “I’ve sensed Buddha First-King's rage at having his destiny taken. He's considering coming out to investigate. Let's go!”

WHOOSH!

Using the Myriad Worlds Greater Teleportation, Yang Qi flew onward, eventually arriving at an enormous mountain.

It was tens of thousands of kilometers high, and hundreds of thousands of kilometers from end to end at the base. The Myriad Dragons Lair had large and small mountains, and given the level of Buddha First-King’s cultivation base, he was only powerful enough to occupy one of the small ones.

As Yang Qi neared, he used the Life-Death Void-Destruction God-Lightning to turn himself and Patriarch Deva invisible. The mountain was full of passageways and caves, almost like a huge maze, and in the middle of it was an old dragon.

He glowed with golden light. He had long, curved horns and flowing dragon whiskers. His eyes glowed with rage at how his destiny had been stolen, yet he didn’t dare to come out lest he fall under attack.

Crack. Crunch.

His body folded in on itself until he looked human. He was an old man in a golden robe, wearing an imperial crown and holding a long scepter.

He was none other than Buddha First-King, the founder of the Nine Dragons Court.

Chapter 1409: Dragonpearls

Buddha First-King was indeed a buddha dragon, which was the most respected type of Dragonfolk. He was the founder of the Nine Dragons Court, a late Paramount God with late Unbounded will convergence. Sadly, that level of cultivation meant he was actually weak in the god world as a whole. Only people like the Second Devil General could be considered potentates that could act like ambitious and ruthless tyrants.

“Dammit!” Buddha First-King grumbled. “It’s that damn Buddha Shockheaven. I can’t believe he stole my destiny. Does he think that just because he founded the Dragonswarm Society, he’s the top figure in existence? That he can dominate the Myriad Dragons Lair? The lair is a true treasure, created as a place of safe shelter by the ancient Dragonfolk founders. It was severely damaged in the God Legion Tribulation, but its core is still as strong as before. Nobody can take control of that core, not even Buddha Shockheaven.

“Just wait until I reach my next cultivation breakthrough. I’ll take over the Deva Dynasty and the Sumeru Temple, and even devour that so-called ‘Mister Second’. With the boost in destiny, I’ll be able to dominate all Dragonfolk. No one will be able to stand in my way!”

“Oh really?” Patriarch Deva said, stepping into the mansion grotto, apparently completely unaffected by the warding magics protecting it.

Of course, Yang Qi was hidden in the shadows behind him.

“We're old friends, Buddha First-King,” Patriarch Deva said with a chuckle. “Why do you look so surprised to see me? I have to say, I’m surprised at how insanely ambitious you are. You really want to devour my Deva Dynasty? And the Sumeru Temple as well? The question is whether or not you can fit us down your throat!”

“Y-y-you... Patriarch Deva!? How did you get in here?” At first, Buddha First-King seemed livid, but then he grinned with vicious excitement. “I can’t believe you dared to come here to the Myriad Dragons Lair. Feeling suicidal? Tired of living?”

“I obviously have reasons for being confident enough to come here. Although, I didn't come alone. I brought someone to meet you, and he has something to discuss with you.” Patriarch Deva stepped to the side and allowed Yang Qi to walk forward, his aura pulsing with a mysterious and unreadable air.

“You’re that so-called Mister Second,” Buddha First-King said. “You’ve been helping out the Deva Dynasty recently, which is why their destiny has increased so much. And supposedly, you're incredibly rich. It's quite impressive that you could just walk into the Myriad Dragons Lair to see me. What are you here for?” He wanted to simply attack Patriarch Deva and ‘Mister Second’, and take them captive. However, he knew that the two of them wouldn’t be stupid enough to simply jump into a hopeless situation, so they must have come prepared. Therefore, he started building up his power to unleash a devastating attack when the time was right.

“Allow me to make formal introductions,” Patriarch Deva said, his eyes flickering with amusement as he looked at Buddha First-King. “This is Mister Second, a clone of the Second Devil General, subordinate of the True Devil and a famous leader from the dao of devils. He went into the Bastille of the One God and found his true self, which was sealed by the Lord of Radiance and Light. After freeing himself, he started working with me, the Nine Dragons Court, and the Sumeru Temple. By following his orders, we're going to conquer everything under heaven.”

“What?!” Buddha First-King was so shocked that his crown nearly fell off his head. Staring at Yang Qi, he said, “Mister Second is actually a clone of the Second Devil General?! The mighty and paragonic figure from the dao of devils of ancient times?”

“That's right, Buddha First-King,” Yang Qi said, easily slipping back into the role he had played before. “I'm the Second Devil General. And my main question is why you haven’t dropped to your knees already.”

“A clone of the Second Devil General? He was a person who brought destruction wherever he went and would fill everything with devilishness. But I don’t sense any devilishness on you. Furthermore, your cultivation level is low. It looks to me like you're only a mid Paramount God with mid Unbounded will convergence. You're no match for me. You’re just pretending to be the Second Devil General! You thought you could hide that from me? Even a mere clone of the Second Devil General would be identifiable by his aura, which would strike fear into my heart. You're a far cry from that! It couldn't be more obvious that you’re not the Second Devil General!”

“He really is a clone of the Second Devil General. Yet you dare to accuse him of lying? Ai....” Patriarch Deva shook his head. “You’d best prostrate yourself and beg for forgiveness, otherwise, it wouldn't do any good even if I beg for leniency on your behalf. You see, you and I have been at each other’s throats for years. But at least I respect you. The time has come to stop fighting, and work together. Mister Second is a good leader, and I’d hate to see you defy him and pay the consequences.”

“Time to die!” Buddha First-King howled. “Heaven-Defying Eight Steps!Dragon-Defying Seven Claws!”

He immediately resorted to a consummate art of the Dragonfolk, striding forward in a specific, profound set of steps, simultaneously baring clawed fingers like a heaven-defying dragon. This was the type of attack that nobody could possibly defend against.

BAM!

In response, Yang Qi launched into the God Tombstone Palms. Although he wasn’t even close to having full and complete enlightenment of the technique, it was the most powerful suite of palm moves in existence. When used, it would cause a tombstone to appear, inscribed with the fate of a god.

As Yang Qi launched his attack, a tombstone appeared, upon which was carved the name and epitaph of Buddha First-King. All of a sudden, Buddha First-King felt like he was already dead and was remembering what had occurred previously in his life.

“Damn you!”

However, he was a late Paramount God with a godhood rating and psychic scale of two hundred million. He was vastly beyond the level of Patriarch Deva, and was in the middle of the Myriad Dragons Lair, which made him even stronger than normal. Therefore, he wasn’t terribly shaken.

“Your attacks can’t do anything to me,” Yang Qi said. “You would do well to know, Buddha First-King, that Buddha Testimony, who is second only to you, has already submitted to me. He already taught me your Dragon-Defying Seven Claws. They're nothing special, as far as I'm concerned, and I know exactly how to beat them. In fact, take a look at something I developed on my own. I call them the Dragon-Capturing Seven Claws!”

Yang Qi lunged forward like a bolt of lightning or a flurry of snow.

“Dragon-Capturing Seven Claws, First Stance: Blast of Dragon-Slaughtering!”

Yang Qi’s hand was like an axe that could slaughter dragons, and as he swept it forth, it targeted every single weak spot on Buddha First-King.

He could devour the essence aura of the Myriad Dragons Lair without any negative side-effects whatsoever, which meant he could fight in here as easily as he could fight on the outside.

“Second Stance: Ring of Dragon-Imprisoning!

“Third Stance: Curse of Dragon-Trapping!

“Fourth Stance: Fire of Dragon-Extinguishing!

“Fifth Stance: Pressure of Dragon-Suppressing!

“Sixth Stance: Energy of Dragon-Breaking!

“Seventh Stance: Scream of Dragon-Ending!”

Yang Qi unleashed all seven moves, each of them targeting a weakness of the Dragonfolk. Whether it was the vital energy in the moves, or the stances alone, they were backed by profound will. And the final move, Scream of Dragon-Ending, was particularly effective, and was filled with a momentum that could end all dragons under heaven. In fact, it could remove the Dragonfolk from the god world and expunge them from the many heavens. A screaming filled the area that resembled the death of countless dragons, to the point where the flesh and blood that made up the surrounding area began melting away.

‘Incredible!’ thought Patriarch Deva. ‘Where did he get stances like those? I've never even heard of anything like this before. They’re the perfect weapon to use against Dragonfolk. Don’t tell me he really created them on his own. That’s impossible! Except, if a technique like this existed in the ancient era, the Dragonfolk wouldn’t have survived.’

Patriarch Deva wasn’t making a move, just watching things play out. That was what Yang Qi had ordered him to do.

Yang Qi was curious to see what a late Paramount God from the Dragonfolk was capable of, and he wanted to learn from the experience of fighting him. When he unleashed the Scream of Dragon-Ending, he shot forward like a spear, shattering Buddha First-King’s defensive empyrean energy into dust and stabbing into his body. Buddha First-King was flung backward into the wall, where he coughed up a mouthful of blood, making it obvious that he had been seriously injured.

“You! What was that technique!? I obviously have no choice but to go all out against you! I've spent billions of years perfecting my buddha dragonpearls. They’re my ultimate trump card, the result of the Dragonfolk’s top technique, the Dragonpearl Creation Skill!”

Face twisting with madness, Buddha First-King drew on every scrap of power his cultivation base was capable of.

“The consummate arts of the Dragonfolk are without peer! Compared to the Seven Stances of Creation, those Dragon-Capturing Seven Claws of yours are like nothing. Watch and learn.

“First Stance: Use Energy to Oppose the Enemy!

“Second Stance: Use the Mind to Attack the Will!

“Third Stance: Use the Will to Intercept Thoughts!

“Fourth Stance: Use Thoughts to Continue Life!

“Fifth Stance: Use Life to Seize Fate!

“Sixth Stance: Use Fate to Gather Momentum!

“Seventh Stance: Use Momentum to Create Worlds!”

Chapter 1410: Seven Stances of Creation

Buddha First-King was using his most powerful trump card, the animadestiny dragonpearls he had bitterly cultivated over many years, which contained a consummate technique called the Seven Stances of Creation.

The stances were Energy, Mind, Will, Thoughts, Life, Fate, Momentum. Combined, they created a beautiful tableau that was the quintessence of dragons. In other words, dragons represented those things.

Truth be told, dragons weren’t pure godlings, but a type of quintessence.

In the impure lands, there were dragon lodes and dragon energy. And the Son of Heaven was said to be a true dragon. All such terms illustrated how dragons represented the energy, mind, will, thoughts, fate, and momentum of both humans, and also heaven and earth.

When a person reached a certain level of power and influence, others would say they were a ‘convergence of dragon energy’.

That was the quintessence of the dragon. In other words, dragons were civilization. And when the Seven Stances of Creation were unleashed, they weren’t about raw power, but the momentum needed to create worlds. They surpassed the ordinary martial disciplines of dragons, reaching a higher level that transcended ordinary godly-class energy arts.

As soon as Buddha First-King spat out his dragonpearl and unleashed the Seven Stances of Creation, Yang Qi’s Dragon-Capturing Seven Claws were destroyed. Then Buddha First-King pressed the attack.

Yang Qi immediately sensed how difficult it would be to deal with these stances. However, he wasn't worried. He knew that their power came from the Dragonpearl Creation Skill. And dragonpearls weren’t godhood, nor were they internal pellets. They were like seeds that would grow after practicing cultivation for millions upon millions of years.

RUMBLE!

Yang Qi resorted to the Myriad Worlds Greater Teleportation to dodge the attack, and the result was that the blow hit the wall and caused it to cave in. Patriarch Deva was shocked, and was forced to use his Five Strikes of the Deva to dodge out of the way.

Unfortunately, he was deep in the Myriad Dragons Lair! He wasn’t a match for Buddha First-King, even with the quintessence of King Heaven-Devourer’s energy arts that Yang Qi had given him. Thankfully, Yang Qi had already dissipated ninety-nine percent of the force.

‘Damnation!’ Patriarch Deva thought, furious. ‘I’d be evenly matched with Buddha First-King if we were on the outside. I’d even have ways to land some good blows. But in the Myriad Dragons Lair, I can’t even use a tenth of my power!’

‘These Seven Stances of Creation are very formidable,’ Yang Qi thought as he continuously used the Myriad Worlds Greater Teleportation to dodge to safety.

Then Buddha First-King reached the last of the seven stances, and Yang Qi finally made a move.

“Everlit Godlamp!”

SNICK!

A bean-sized spark shot out into the seventh move, then exploded into radiance and light.

A miserable scream rang out as Buddha First-King was thrown backward, blood spraying from his mouth.

“Purrfect God Art!” Yang Qi said, flicking his finger and sending out a bubble that wrapped up the energy of his opponent’s attack, shrinking it down into a dragonpearl.

‘This thing is incredible!’ he thought, grabbing it. Without hesitation, he gobbled it down, sending it flying into the God Legion Paradise, and from there to the Everlit Godlamp. After all, that dragonpearl was strong enough to melt anything in existence; even the Second Devil General wouldn’t dare to take it lightly.

CRASH!

As the dragonpearl melted, it transformed into countless dragons of radiance and light, which shot into his sage monarch magistrates.

The final transformation was beginning! The dragonpearl contained the quintessence of the ancient dao of heaven and the Dragonfolk, and with it, the sage monarch magistrates were changing in a very dramatic way. At long last, the sage monarch magistrates had reached a critical moment in which they were about to reach Unbounded will convergence.

‘Excellent,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘They’re finally on the verge of a breakthrough. That said, there’s no rush. I need to take things slowly.’ Ignoring the sage monarch magistrates, he pressed the attack. Buddha First-King had lost his momentum, and now Yang Qi was using the Myriad Worlds Greater Teleportation offensively.

Then he saw an opening and blurred into motion, attacking with the Sage Monarch Grand Magic.

Pop. Pop. Pop. Pop.

The attacks came so swiftly that Buddha First-King was hard-pressed to defend against each one, let alone launch a counter-attack. In fact, all ten of them hit him, then Yang Qi was right in front of him, reaching out to grab his head.

However, that was when an immense force suddenly weighed down on the mountain, and three voices spoke out that caused everything to tremble violently.

“Get out here, Buddha First-King! Why hasn’t your Nine Dragons Court agreed to join us? Are you looking to get killed?!

“That’s right, Buddha First-King. Your Nine Dragons Court is like a tiny village, compared to the god world as a whole. The fact that we want to enlist you to our side is a big honor. If you refuse to come to your senses, you can’t blame us for just wiping you out of existence. Incidentally, you’re not permitted to stay in the Myriad Dragons Lair from now on. If we see you, we’ll attack you on sight. Got it? That is to say, unless you join us. Then you can stay here. You see, we’re going to unite all Dragonfolk and restore us to our previous glory. And anyone who refuses to comply isn't welcome!”

“Get the hell out here, Buddha First-King! If you hide like a turtle in its shell, we’ll make sure you die a very horrible death!”

Yang Qi could tell exactly what was going on.

‘Dammit. I wanted to get the Nine Dragons Court under my control without attracting any attention. Screw these fools!’ Unwilling to simply give up, Yang Qi continued using the God Legion Seal to subjugate Buddha First-King.

The process was quick, and when it was over, Buddha First-King immediately understood the situation. “So that’s who you really are....”

“Quiet. Who are those people outside?”

Not daring to respond too slowly, Buddha First-King said, “People from the Dragonswarm Society. Their patriarch is Buddha Shockheaven, one of the most powerful old-timers there is among us Dragonfolk. His cultivation base is far beyond my own, and for all I know, he's already in the peak Paramount God level. As for his subordinates, they’re all roughly on the same level as me. Their society has been working hard to take over the Myriad Dragons Lair, and now they’re here to besiege me. For years, I’ve refused to join them, and now it seems they finally decided to go on the offensive.”

“Go out and do what it takes to fool them. I want to see exactly how strong this Dragonswarm Society is.” He flicked his finger, activating the Dragonfolk genes within himself and Patriarch Deva, instantly causing the two of them to turn into small dragons. Together with Buddha First-King, they flew out and found that the mountain around them was covered with swirling mist.

There were three people present, one man and two women. All of them were late Paramount Gods like Buddha First-King, with psychic scales and godhood ratings above a hundred million. Furthermore, they had magical treasures that caused them to glow with shining light. Clearly, they all possessed powerful thrall armies.

“Meet Buddha Swallow, Buddha Lotus, and Buddha Trueheaven,” Buddha First-King said with a bitter smile. “They're all proud apprentices of Buddha Shockheaven, and each of them are extremely powerful. If I had to face one of them alone, I wouldn’t be worried. Worst case scenario, I could just flee. But together, they’re a problem. Furthermore, Buddha Shockheaven designed a special kind of thrall called a shockheaven wardragon. Each one is as strong as a peak Consummate God, and they proliferate like flies. When their power is combined, it's completely shocking. I’d say that each of these three probably has a billion thralls ready to unleash.”

“Oh? Shockheaven wardragons? Sounds interesting. You do the talking. The best outcome would be for you to trick them into coming to the Nine Dragons Court, where I can make special arrangements to deal with them.”

If Yang Qi could somehow subjugate these three, he would have agents in the Dragonswarm Society just as he did in the House of the Invincible.

Which would get him even more destiny.

That said, it didn't seem to him that the Dragonswarm Society was on the same level as the Dugu Clan’s House of the Invincible. As they headed out into the open, Yang Qi made himself and Patriarch Deva invisible, so they wouldn’t alert their enemies that anything was amiss.

The first to speak was the woman known as Buddha Lotus. “So, Buddha First-King, you finally decided to stick your turtle head out of your turtle shell?  I think we should start calling you Buddha First-Turtle!”

Ignoring her taunt, Buddha First-Dragon said, “I’ve thought the matter through, and I'm ready to join the Dragonswarm Society. In fact, I can take you to the Nine Dragons Court right now to go through the formalities.”

Chapter 1411: Getting them Under Control

“Well, well!” said Buddha Trueheaven, exchanging a nod with the two women. “Very straightforward of you, Buddha First-King. And you're even offering to take us to the Nine Dragons Court? You’re not trying to pull a fast one, are you?”

Smiling wryly, Buddha First-King said, “You think I’d try to fool the three of you? The Nine Dragons Court isn’t possibly in a position to defy the Dragonswarm Society. It was only a matter of time before we had to back down. That's the only way we can avoid meeting a violent end. Besides, maybe I can benefit some in the end.”

Buddha Trueheaven burst out laughing. “A wise man submits to the circumstances, right, Buddha First-King? Good decision. I’ll make sure to take care of you going forward. After all, you’re roughly on the same level of strength as the three of us. With all of us working together, we’ll all benefit. Let’s get going. Take us to your Nine Dragons Court.”

“Of course, right away,” Buddha First-King said, obsequiously nodding his head.

“Let’s go!”

The three of them shot with incredible speed out of the greyspace of the Myriad Dragons Lair. Outside, the spatial tempests were violent and chaotic; however, it wasn’t anything difficult to deal with. The group flew for several days, until they were over the open ocean. Eventually, they reached an area where enormous sea creatures existed that would take in seawater and spray it into the air, creating a region of mist that blocked the rays of the sun.

“Down below you’ll see the crystalline palace of the Nine Dragons Court. Please, you first. The government officials are all gathered and have been notified that we’ll soon announce the Nine Dragons Court is swearing allegiance to the Dragonswarm Society. Afterward, you three will be able to take command of all the destiny here. Of course, there’ll be a ceremony to make it all official.”

“How much destiny does the Nine Dragons Court have?” said Buddha Swallow. “Not that it matters. We’ll be taking it no matter what. Also, don’t forget that you’re with the Dragonswarm Society now. If any other group comes along and tries recruiting you, what will you do? Will you be tempted?”

“Never!” Buddha First-King said, bowing at the waist. “It would never happen. I know exactly what would happen if we allowed ourselves to be tempted in that way.” Given his subservience, he almost didn’t look like the consummate expert that he was.

Waving his finger, he summoned a passageway of pure, glowing crystal, which they all entered.

“Wonderful! Excellent!” The three experts seemed right at home and were completely oblivious to the fact that they were entering a place as dangerous as a dragon’s pool or a tiger’s den. They seemed completely and utterly confident.

At the end of the crystal passageway, they entered a sprawling palace hall, which was where court would normally be held.

Seeing the throne at the end of the hall, Buddha Trueheaven strode over and looked it up and down. “Call the younger generation here, Buddha First-King. They’re also Dragonfolk, and I'm curious to see what kind of geniuses you have. The best of them might qualify to become thralls for us.”

“What? You want to turn the geniuses of the Nine Dragons Court into thralls?” Buddha First-King seemed shaken.

Buddha Trueheaven’s face hardened. “What, you have a problem with that? You’re loyal to the Dragonswarm Society now, so you should be ready to sacrifice your best to it. What the Dragonswarm Society needs most now is material to make good thralls. You see, we didn’t want to recruit the Nine Dragons Court because you’re strong. In fact, you’re so weak it’s pathetic. We want your top geniuses; their flesh and blood will make perfect thrall troops. With enough of the Dragonswarm Society’s thrall troops in a fight, it’s possible to kill people of a higher cultivation level than you.”

“Er, I suppose I’ll have to ask my lord about that,” Buddha First-King said.

“Your lord?”

The three other Dragonfolk exchanged glances, realizing something was not as they had assumed.

“Milord! Patriarch Deva. Please, come out!”

Chuckling, Yang Qi appeared. “You three are very impressive. Unfortunately, Buddha First-King and the Nine Dragons Court are already loyal to me. And should I just stand around while someone tries to take what belongs to me?”

Out here, he had nothing to fear from these three.

The environment was different, and the truth was that it was like a huge bubble at the bottom of the sea. In fact, it was a world of its own, with godtrees, flowers, and a divine lamp that shone with radiance and light.

It was a spell formation Yang Qi had set up, and these three had walked right into it.

Now, he knew they couldn’t just flee.

“What do the three of you think of my spell formation? I've been waiting for you for some time now. It seems to me that it's quite a waste for you to be members of the Dragonswarm Society. Why not join my Sage Monarch Society? And of course, I'm the Sage Monarch.”

“You?” Buddha Trueheaven said, his expression one of utter rage. “How dare you, Buddha First-King! You actually lured us into a trap!? Do you have any idea what’s going to happen to you now? This is an unforgivable crime!”

“An unforgivable crime? I don’t think so. The three of you are going to be working for my lord soon, too. We’ll be colleagues!” Suddenly turning to Patriarch Deva, he said, “The two of us will handle the women while our lord handles Buddha Trueheaven!”

“Alright!” Patriarch Deva said. Looking at Buddha Lotus, he smiled oddly and said, “What’s so special about you Dragonfolk? You make good mounts for us humans, but that’s about it. In fact, I think you’ll make an excellent mount.”

Without hesitation, he attacked, using a very vicious move. Although he had been defeated by Yang Qi, he was still the founder of an immense sect and a powerful late Paramount God.

Meanwhile, Buddha First-King was unleashing deadly attacks on Buddha Swallow.

As for Yang Qi, he flicked the sleeve of his God Legion Battle Robe, causing the space around Buddha Trueheaven to shrink as he used another technique he had created, the Dragon-Beheading Seven Stances.

His Dragon-Capturing Seven Claws had proved useless in the face of the Seven Stances of Creation. But after taking Buddha First-King’s dragonpearl, he had come to understand the true quintessence of the Dragonfolk.

Therefore, he had altered the Dragon-Capturing Seven Claws, transforming them into the Dragon-Beheading Seven Stances. Now, his hands were like incredibly sharp blades that created a torrent of slashing destruction. Buddha Trueheaven's defensive energy arts were instantly sliced apart, and before he could do anything, his skin was pierced, causing blood to spray out like a fountain.

Not only had Yang Qi improved a lot after assimilating that dragonpearl and improving his draconic substructure, but Buddha Trueheaven was also arrogant and conceited. Therefore, Yang Qi beat him with a single move.

“Dammit!” howled Buddha Trueheaven. “I'm gonna slaughter you! I'm gonna slaughter your whole family! Have a death wish?! Vast Ocean Transverse Overflow!”

RUMBLE!

Drawing on a consummate art of the Dragonfolk, he caused the ocean to reverse its flow and push away in all directions!

Normally, all rivers flowed into the ocean, but now it was the opposite, indicating the arrival of universal destruction and chaos. And in the midst of that chaos, Buddha Trueheaven was like an unparalleled hero.

“A very impressive technique. Sadly, it's not enough to deal with me. Everlit Godlamp!” Tapping into his God Legion Seal, he activated the Everlit Godlamp. “If you hadn’t waltzed right into my trap, it would’ve been a lot more difficult to deal with you. But in your arrogance, you fell right into my spell formation!”

The Everlit Godlamp unleashed a blazing radiance and light that made it almost impossible to see.

RUMBLE!

Then he unleashed the Tribulation Monarch Canon.

Three volleys slammed into the three experts. Buddha Trueheaven had already been hurt, and couldn’t avoid this trump card attack.

The three experts were sent flying, blood spraying out of their mouths, until they slammed into the greyspace. Yang Qi exhaled a stream of shining fire that wrapped them up and slammed them onto the ground.

Then, with practiced ease, he prepared to forcibly subjugate them. However, the moment he unleashed the power of the God Legion Seal, something completely unpredictable happened.

Vicious expressions appeared on the faces of all three experts. “You think you can plot against us? We’re Dragonfolk! We’ll never surrender! You can kill Dragonfolk in battle, but you can never conquer them. There are no losers among Dragonfolk, and no slaves! Patriarch, avenge our deaths! Heaven-Startling Explosion!”

“Not good!”

To Yang Qi’s surprise, they were unleashing a devastating energy that wasn’t their own power, but rather a self-destructive power their patriarch had inserted into them to ensure that they would never be captured!

Chapter 1412: Shocking Self-Detonation

Yang Qi really was caught by surprise that the three experts he had been about to subjugate were resorting to self-detonation.

All of them had power seeds inside their bodies, placed there by a peak Paramount God. They were seeds of pure arrogance and defiance that would prevent anyone from enslaving them. And if they reached a deadly situation, the seeds would explode, destroying everything around them.

That was why they said the Dragonfolk could be killed in battle, but never conquered.

And now, it was too late for Yang Qi to stop them.

How devastating would this explosion be? Enough that nobody could stand up to it, that was for sure. As the explosion spread out, Yang Qi quickly threw Patriarch Deva and Buddha First-King out of the spell formation. However, he didn’t flee.

Right now, he was in a moment of extreme danger. Of course, it wasn’t the explosion itself that he was worried about. Rather, after the three patriarchs exploded, their backers would come investigate. And when they came, the entire Nine Dragons Court would be wiped out of existence.

As to whether or not they would track Yang Qi down, he couldn’t say for sure. If they did, and they realized he was responsible, they might end up finding out about the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty and the Nacrelight Sageland. And that would be troublesome.

Then all of Yang Qi’s conquests up to this point would be meaningless, as he would be forced to flee to parts unknown.

How could he ever have guessed that the Dragonfolk would be this ruthless? This arrogant!? How could people who reached the late Paramount God level be so willing to kill themselves? It was one of the biggest mistakes he had made in a long time.

‘I can’t let the energy of this blast escape. I can definitely hide it. Life-Death Void-Destruction God-Lightning! God Legion Paradise!’

He quickly deployed the God Legion Paradise, which wrapped up the vital energy and confined the destructive tempests within the pure land.

Unfortunately, the forces of destruction were impossible for even the God Legion Paradise to handle. The twin godtrees of permanence and impermanence were ripped to shreds, and the rest of the lands transformed into something from an apocalyptic doomsday. Volcanos raged and the earth quaked; lightning crashed, and heaven and earth filled with bloody rain and the wailing of ghosts and weeping of gods.

Yang Qi suppressed the explosion as fiercely as he could. And he had twenty-five thousand sage monarch magistrates within him joining in the effort.

Bam. Bam. Bam. Bam! Bam!!

The force was too immense.

The sage monarch magistrates were shoved backward step by step, until they started exploding as well. In short order, thousands were wiped out of existence.

However, Yang Qi wasn’t ready to give up.

He held firm, but soon he, too, was being wiped away, until even his godhood was melting.

“Sage Monarch Grand Magic; Rapid Rederivation; End of the Road; Ultimate Flourishing and Decay!”

RUMBLE!

All of a sudden, a mysterious and enigmatic void popped into being within the numerous streams of destructive power.

This was a true void. A vacuum.

RUMBLE!

The death of his precious sage monarch magistrates had pushed Yang Qi into a pain so great he reached a level of complete, icy calm.

The self-detonation was about to wipe out the God Legion Paradise, but Yang Qi wasn't ready to give up. He knew that if he didn’t keep the power of the explosion in check, and the slightest fluctuation escaped, the patriarchs of the Dragonfolk would find out. Then, he would be in a truly dangerous situation. For the moment, all he could do was draw deeply on the Life-Death Void-Destruction God-Lightning to make sure no one found out about what was happening.

He was now trying to buy time. Even if he ultimately had to pack up and run, he could deal with that.

He had the complete Cruiser of Civilization now, which meant he could take the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty, Sage Monarch Society, Nine Dragons Court, and Sumeru Temple with him if it became necessary.

After all, the space available within the cruiser was immense. It was as large as his heart needed it to be. In years past, the Lord of Civilization had filled it with countless civilizations. In comparison, Yang Qi’s groups were negligible.

Fifteen thousand sage monarch magistrates had collapsed into ash!

He had lost more than half of his force! And yet, he didn't frown. Thanks to his relentless efforts, the power of the explosion was finally starting to shrink within the God Legion Paradise.

“Be melted! The blood of the Dragonfolk is eternally proud! Your fighting spirit is immense. And now I finally understand what my sage monarch magistrates have been missing. Your three Dragonfolk patriarchs are so proud you decided to self-detonate rather than be defeated. And that is exactly what I need for my sage monarch magistrates to reach the next highest level!”

RUMBLE!

As the explosion shrank, he forced the genetic material and proud will of the Dragonfolk into his surviving sage monarch magistrates. Almost instantly, their energy skyrocketed, breaking through all fetters as they developed a pride and arrogance like that of dragons.

The remaining ten thousand sage monarch magistrates all acquired Unbounded will convergence, breaking past the level of nine hundred and ninety thousand into a million!

An indescribable aura rose up from them as they reached vastly higher levels of power. Whether it was their substructure or their fighting prowess, they were far beyond anything from before. The sage monarch magistrates from before were like weaklings, compared to these versions.

And although Yang Qi was spending a lot of vital energy, he was able to absorb the remaining vital energy from the self-detonation of the three experts to improve his sage monarch magistrates!

Even though he was only left with ten thousand of them, the fact that they had Unbounded will convergence meant their fighting prowess was equivalent to forty or fifty thousand of the previous version!

Meanwhile, fluctuations from the explosion had died down. Buddha First-King and Patriarch Deva were watching closely, very serious expressions on their faces.

“We’re finished,” Buddha First-King said. “Done for. All my work building the Nine Dragons Court, and it's going to be destroyed just like this. Now that those three experts are dead, the Dragonswarm Society’s patriarchs are going to wipe us out of existence. There’s no way to escape it.”

“It's worth worrying about,” Yang Qi said. “But I used my Life-Death Void-Destruction God-Lightning to cover everything up. As long as the Dragonswarm Society leaders don’t summon those three for a meeting, no one will have any idea of what’s happened. We should have time to come up with a plan. For one thing, we have to move locations. Patriarch Deva, call a meeting to discuss the particulars. We need to get all of the people and resources of the Deva Dynasty, even the continents, and take them away.”

“What? We're really going to move?” Patriarch Deva said, shocked. “The Deva Dynasty has a population in the billions. Moving that many people is going to be a huge task. Even if I were ten times as strong as I am right now, I probably couldn’t do it.”

“He's right,” said Buddha First-King. “And how could I possibly move the Nine Dragons Court? The patriarchs of the Dragonswarm Society are vicious, and they’ll definitely wipe us out down to the chickens and dogs.”

“It's not going to be easy, but we can do it if we handle it one step at a time.” Yang Qi opened his Lord's Eye to examine the details of the Deva Dynasty and the Nine Dragons Court. They were huge, and had immense destiny. Furthermore, they were so inextricably tied to the space around them that even if Yang Qi were ten times stronger than he was, he probably wouldn’t be able to move them.

It would only be possible to take away some of the most important items. But that would be a huge blow in terms of destiny, negating all of his efforts so far.

That was when laughter suddenly rang out from inside the Everlit Godlamp. “Not strong enough, are you, boy? You really got in a bad position within the Myriad Dragons Lair, didn’t you? All you have to do is share your life force with me, and you could probably conquer the entire Myriad Dragons Lair!”

Chapter 1413: Extreme Climax of Danger

Yang Qi was in a truly dangerous situation.

He had failed to subjugate the three experts from the Dragonfolk and turn them into agents. They had resorted to self-detonation rather than be subjected to subjugation. Word would spread eventually, and it would lead to big complications. The Dragonfolk would definitely come after him in full force, so for the time being, the best option was to gather his valuables and flee.

The Second Devil General chose that moment to ply him with temptation.

If the two of them shared their life force and bodies, Yang Qi would instantly become vastly stronger. Even the Dragonfolk patriarchs would fall to him in combat, as they definitely weren’t a match for the Second Devil General. Even years ago, the most elite dragon experts, their most brutal killers, couldn't have done anything to the general. However, there were too many downsides.

“Stow it, Second Devil General,” Yang Qi. “Your temptations won’t work on me. I can handle this situation with the Cruiser of Civilization; it has more than enough room to take everything away with me. Besides, my sage monarch magistrates have cultivated a divine ability that pushed them into the Unbounded level. Given some time, not even the top Dragonfolk experts will pose a threat to me.”

“You might be strong,” the Second Devil General replied, “but the Dragonfolk have a lot of amazing resources. In the ancient war that led to the God Legion Tribulation, the dragons managed to avoid the bulk of the destruction. So I’m very curious to see how you plan to evade their wrath. When the critical moment comes, I think that instead of helping you, I'm just going to sit back and watch you struggle. Then, when you truly need me, I’ll just devour you and revel in your pleas for mercy. So think this through well. If you wait too long, regret won’t do you any good.” Having finished his threats, the Second Devil General remained silent for a moment. When he realized that Yang Qi wasn't saying anything in response, he added, “I’ll be waiting, boy. Just call out to me at any time.”

Yang Qi snorted coldly. “My sage monarch magistrates already have Unbounded will convergence. And my cultivation base has made progress as well. I’ll be breaking into the late Paramount God level any time now. Once I’m there, the transformations of the God Legion Seal will make it even easier for me to deal with the Everlit Godlamp. Once I assimilate it, your doomsday will have arrived, Second Devil General. I’ll use my Sagely Sacrifice to give you to King Immortal-Slayer. Besides, the more danger I face, and the more pressure I'm under, the better progress my cultivation base makes.”

Yang Qi was telling the truth. Once he was a late Paramount God, and the God Legion Seal transformed, he would be in a very different position. And when he took the flesh and blood that was the Everlit Godlamp, and used it to acquire the corporeal husk of the Lord of Radiance and Light, just how strong would he be? It was hard to say. But his cultivation base would definitely reach a peak level.

“What do you want us to do going forward, Young Sir?” Patriarch Deva asked.

“Are we going to subjugate Buddhist Lord Sumeru?” asked Buddha First-King.

“How could I not subjugate him? But I’ll be doing it alone. You two gather all of the elites from your respective organizations and tell them a major event has occurred. Clear out all the valuables you have in storage. Understand? Fortify the defenses and raze the fields. Mobilize everything you can and relocate as much of your populace as possible. I’ll notify my people of the situation and have them bring the Cruiser of Civilization here to start loading it up. The faster the better.”

Yang Qi had big plans underway.

“Right, of course. We’ll get to work immediately. Right away.”

Yang Qi then sent a message to Jadefall and the others, with an update about the Dragonfolk and instructions to bring the Cruiser of Civilization.

Although they had control of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty, there were other groups to conquer, including the League of Academies, League of Wretch-Gods, and Nacrelight Sageland. As for the League of the Devil-Dao, it was almost at the point of being under control.

However, expanding to conquer other groups wouldn’t do any good right now. As such, Yang Qi gave orders to temporarily stop the work in the Nacrelight Sageland. After all, the Nacrelight Sageland had the Destined Marriage God Temple, which had been created by a Fateless One. And the power of the High Priestess was still strong there, which meant it was entirely likely that overt action would provoke a deadly response.

The League of Academies was also a unique situation. They followed the dao of righteousness, not the dao of devils; therefore, Yang Qi didn’t want to use excessive violence to deal with them.

He watched Patriarch Deva and Buddha First-King leave, then nodded to himself as he turned and headed in the direction of the Sumeru Temple.

Of course, he already had some of their monks under his control, so he knew exactly where their headquarters was. And considering his recent gains and advancements, subjugating them wouldn't be a big problem.

Using his Tribulation Wings and Myriad Worlds Greater Teleportation, he easily pierced through space with a speed that surpassed anything that Paramount Gods were capable of. Soon, he reached a continent filled with golden clouds and rippling buddha power. It was a paradise filled with temples and buddhist statues. It also contained innumerable countries and civilizations, all of them flourishing buddhist states, from the commoners to the rulers.

As Yang Qi approached, he sensed the immense faith at work, and saw how it could transform space, land, and even the meteorological phenomena. Everything seemed to glow with golden light.

‘That’s an incredible convergence of faith.’ Glancing around, he saw that the numerous countries all had temples that were connected to each other with teleportation portals. Although it wasn’t as expansive as the Deva Dynasty, it was tightly connected in a way that made it a very difficult place to invade. There would be no wretch-devils sneaking into this place to cause trouble.

As for the Deva Dynasty, it was extremely powerful, and although wretch-devils wouldn’t outright invade, they would definitely infiltrate it.

But there was no way any wretch energy could enter a place as pure as this.

‘Very impressive,’ Yang Qi thought, nodding. After reaching out and making connections to the various pawns he had put in place here, he turned his attention to a temple hovering high above everything else in the golden clouds. It almost looked like a mirage, and it was none other than the headquarters of the Sumeru Temple.

It took the faith of trillions of citizens to create a power strong enough to levitate that temple headquarters high into the sky.

Yang Qi quickly summoned some vital energy from the Secret-Ensconcing All-World Anything-Everything Fundamental-Law Magic, which was a consummate technique from the buddhist schools. As a result, he felt no force of expulsion pushing against him. Instead, he felt right at home as he flew toward the headquarters.

The headquarters was huge, and was made up of countless magical treasures. There were buddhist masters working on their cultivation inside, including old-timers who were roughly on the same level as Patriarch Deva.

These experts had no way to evade Yang Qi’s detection. As late Paramount Gods, they burned in his sight as surely as signal fires.

‘Hm? There are actually two of them?’

Yang Qi’s sharp senses easily detected the fact that there were two specific auras. One of them belonged to Buddhist Lord Sumeru; he glowed with buddhist light, and seemed tranquil, as though he could entice anyone to be purified. The other aura was twisted, distorted, mysterious, and impermanent. It was coiled like a snake, and hidden in a way that made it almost impossible to detect. However, it pulsed with power that either met or exceeded that of Buddhist Lord Sumeru.

Not daring to do anything that would attract too much attention, Yang Qi carefully entered the temple complex.

Eventually, he caught sight of two people seated cross-legged in the temple hall. One was an old, emaciated monk whose skin flickered with faint, golden light. Sitting opposite him was a tall, arrogant-looking man with a profound and mysterious aura. At a glance, Yang Qi could tell that he was one of the Spritefolk. After all, he had become very familiar with their aura during his spritefruit heist.

Furthermore, his aunt, Yang Susu, was one of the Spritefolk. Over the years that had passed, he had been focused fully on his cultivation, and his efforts to get stronger. So he had never gone to the Spritefolk to search for his Aunt Susu. However, he was confident that she was among them in the god world.

Unfortunately, the Spritefolk had many subsidiary branches, and searching through all of them wouldn't be an easy task.

‘This man’s psychic scale and godhood rating are at three hundred million! Even if I got the jump on him, I wouldn’t be able to beat him. I have to be very careful here.’

“Buddhist Lord Sumeru, I came here today as a representative of the royal branch of the Spritefolk. I’d like to invite you to the wedding of one of our princesses to one of the elite young ones of the Dugu Clan’s House of the Invincible. His name is Dugu Yunkong. Although your Sumeru Temple isn't particularly impressive, you were an apprentice of the ancient Buddhist King Clearsky, and you’ve carried on his core teachings and doctrines. Therefore, I've come to give you this formal invitation card. Will you accept?”

Chapter 1414: Yang Susu&#039;s Whereabouts

“Of course I accept, Patriarch Sprite Desolation,” Buddhist Lord Sumeru said, sounding very honored. “It’s a grand occasion involving both the monumental House of the Invincible and the royal Spritefolk. How could I possibly refuse? Unfortunately, my cultivation base is a bit weak. I worry I might make a fool of myself.”

The truth was that the Sumeru Temple was pitiful when compared to the House of the Invincible or the Spritefolk. The Spritefolk patriarch was giving a lot of face to the old monk by inviting him to an event held by those two groups.

“Forget about that,” Sprite Desolation replied. “Just come and offer your respects. Maybe bring a nice gift. Don’t worry, you’ll be paid back handsomely. Dugu Yunkong is a boundless expert from ancient times, how could he not be incredibly rich? That said, if you don’t have any appropriate gift, then just don’t worry about that aspect.

“Either way, here’s the invitation card. Now that I’ve delivered it to you, I need to make my way to the other top organizations and deliver their cards. When the date arrives, simply bring the invitation to the House of the Invincible, and you’ll be escorted in with full fanfare.”

“Er, Patriarch Sprite Desolation... where exactly is the House of the Invincible? I've never been there.”

“Oh. Don’t worry about that. When the date comes, the invitation card will create a teleportation portal that leads directly to the entrance of the House of the Invincible. So keep track of that card. It's a valuable magical treasure created by a peak Paramount God, a person dozens of times stronger than either of us. Maybe a hundred times stronger.”

With that, Patriarch Sprite Desolation flew up into the air.

“Another thing, Buddhist Lord Sumeru. That invitation card will allow you to bring a guest with you. Perhaps your favorite apprentice? It will be an amazing experience, to say the least.”

“Many thanks. Many thanks! I look forward to this incredible event. Patriarch Sprite Desolation, are you sure you don’t want to stay for a bit? I’d love to entertain you.”

“There’s no need for that. I have more invitation cards to deliver, and some need to be taken to very distant places. Oh, I almost forgot. I need to go to the Deva Dynasty and the Nine Dragons Court.”

“Oh? Well, okay, I understand.” Buddhist Lord Sumeru obviously wasn’t particularly pleased, but didn’t want to show it.

Patriarch Sprite Desolation nodded, then turned and vanished into thin air.

‘He’s giving an invitation to Patriarch Deva? And Buddha First-King? It’s a good thing I found out about this.’ He quickly sent the two of them a message alerting them of what was to come. That way there wouldn’t be any accidents.

Meanwhile, Buddhist Lord Sumeru looked at the invitation card and let out a long sigh. “The House of the Invincible…? The House of the Invincible.... What a pity the Ancient House of Buddha is all but dispersed. Without a Buddhist Monarch to take the lead, things have really declined. Years ago, when the Ancient House of Buddha was still around, those bastards at the House of the Invincible never would’ve dared to speak to me like that. Sadly, ever since the boundless Buddhist Tribulation came, our most ultimate technique, the Secret-Ensconcing All-World Anything-Everything Fundamental-Law Magic, was lost for all time.”

“You’re wrong about that, Buddhist Lord Sumeru,” Yang Qi said, stepping out of the shadows. “It isn't lost. And if you want to bring your buddhist school back to glory, all you have to do is join me.”

Spinning, Buddhist Lord Sumeru blurted out, “Who are you?”

Anyone would react with similar surprise when someone popped out of nowhere like Yang Qi had just done.

“It doesn’t matter who I am. I'm here to save you. The Deva Dynasty and Nine Dragons Court have already acknowledged allegiance to me. The Sumeru Temple is the only one who hasn't. Incidentally, your successor Dibarra is already working for me. I'm Mister Second from the Deva Dynasty. Presumably you’ve heard of me.”

Buddhist Lord Sumeru seemed to relax upon hearing that. “Mister Second? The one who went missing in the Bastille of the One God? You sure know how to talk big. Trying to pull a fast one, huh? Tell me exactly what you're trying to accomplish here. It’s not exactly easy to get this deep into the Sumeru Temple undetected.”

“Did you not understand what I just said? Dibarra. Come out here, please.”

Whoosh. Whoosh. Whoosh...!

In response to his command, the door slammed open and Dibarra walked in, flanked by a handful of other monks.

A look of alarm flashed across Buddhist Lord Sumeru’s face. “What do you people think you’re doing? How dare you enter this hall without my permission! That’s going to earn you the death penalty! In fact, blasphemy like this will get you thrown into the Blood Cistern, cutting you off from rebirth for all time!”

“Buddhist Lord,” Dibarra said, “we've already acknowledged allegiance to Mister Second. His divine abilities are incomprehensible, and his magical power is boundless. If you submit to him, the benefits will be astounding.”

“Evil creature!” Buddhist Lord Sumeru shouted, thrusting his palm out with deadly force and causing the golden image of a buddha to appear behind him.

Unfortunately, while this technique was impressive, it was weak as far as Yang Qi was concerned.

Yang Qi struck back and the palm technique shattered. “If you refuse to give in, Buddhist Lord Sumeru, I’ll have to force you. Time is of the essence here, and I don’t have time for chit-chat. Sage monarch magistrates, come forth!”

WHIZZZ!

He was actually itching to see how his sage monarch magistrates would perform, now that they had Unbounded will convergence. He only had ten thousand left, but they had been significantly upgraded and were now pulsing with the battle aura of a horde of dragons.

As the sage monarch magistrates appeared, Yang Qi began chanting the Sovereign Lord’s Holy and Far-Reaching Consummate Omnicurse.

Immediately, dramatic things began happening in the temple hall. The majesty of the ten thousand sage monarch magistrates easily crushed the buddhist light coming from Buddhist Lord Sumeru.

“Myriad Buddhas Enter the World!”

Buddhist Lord Sumeru knew it was a moment of life or death, yet he wasn’t crestfallen. Drawing on the preheaven vital energy he’d cultivated over countless years, he used a consummate technique that caused a host of buddha-like infants to appear behind him.

However, Yang Qi simply strode forward and waved his finger, causing all of the buddhas to vanish. Emptiness. The lack of self. Such were the highest mysteries of the buddhist schools.

However, Buddhist Lord Sumeru simply burst out laughing. “You fell right for it! One Buddha Ascends to Heaven!”

As it turned out, it had all been a trick. The move Myriad Buddhas Enter the world could be turned into One Buddha Ascends to Heaven, which was a very powerful escape technique. In the blink of an eye, Buddhist Lord Sumeru turned into a golden streak of light and shot upward.

Unfortunately, before that golden streak could escape, a host of golden chains wrapped around it. It was a given that Yang Qi had set up a safety net to make sure Buddhist Lord Sumeru couldn't flee.

Ding!

A stentorian boom rang out and Buddhist Lord Sumeru slammed back down to the ground, his face deathly pale. Quickly placing his palms together as if in prayer, he said, “I'm willing to acknowledge allegiance, Mister Second.”

“Oh?” Yang Qi had been prepared for Buddhist Lord Sumeru to pull the same trick as the Dragonfolk and die rather than submit. Surprisingly, he hadn’t even needed to inflict a serious injury and the man was ready to give in. “You can't seriously be ready to surrender already, Buddhist Lord Sumeru.”

“I've already lost the initiative, Mister Second. Your abilities are obviously unparalleled, and you’ve prepared well for this moment. What would be the point of struggling? It’d just be just begging for humiliation. You've obviously played things well, ensuring that the Sumeru Temple is alone and outnumbered. So why fight? It makes more sense to surrender and follow your lead. Go ahead and place whatever warding spells you feel necessary into this mortal flesh of mine.”

With that, he sat there unmoving.

“Excellent,” Yang Qi said, glad that things were finally going smoothly again.

He waved his finger and a stream of fire shot out, entering the top of the monk’s head and piercing directly into his soul and sea of consciousness. The monk let loose a long sigh, almost as if he had just died. But an hour later, he opened his eyes, and they shone with surprise. “You... you bear the God Legion Seal?”

“Yes, yes. No need to go on about it. I'm tired of hearing people say the same thing.” Waving Buddhist Lord Sumeru into silence, Yang Qi reached out and took the invitation card from the House of the Invincible.

It was incredibly heavy, almost as weighty as a mountain, which came as a surprise. Opening the invitation, Yan could see the immense flows of power within it, including violent energy that came from before the time the god world existed.

‘Incredible workmanship. And sure enough, there’s a teleportation portal in here. It can't be activated right now, though. Wait, hold on. This is an invitation to the wedding of Sprite Susu to Dugu Yunkong?’

The name shook his heart. ‘Don’t tell me things are really going to work out this fortuitously! Is this Sprite Susu the same as my Aunt Susu? It seems very likely. My Master, the Invincible Dugu, is from the Dugu Clan. I wonder what cultivation level he's reached by now. Aunt Susu’s cultivation base must be incredible as well. She’s a princess of the Spritefolk? She’s obviously very important. How did all this happen? Wait a second. Could this be part of some plot worked out by Proud Heaven? Is he trying to lure me out into the open?’

All of a sudden, he started wondering if he should go to this wedding at all. Although it seemed dangerous, he couldn’t bear the thought of staying away. Perhaps the best thing to do would be to go to the House of the Invincible in disguise.

Chapter 1415: Mass Migration

Just like that, Yang Qi completely crushed Buddhist Lord Sumeru and took the reins of power in the Sumeru Temple. As its flows of destiny shifted to him, joining those of the Deva Dynasty and Nine Dragons Court, his thinking rose to a higher level.

As they flowed through him, they created something like godpower, causing a river of fate to roil through his meridians.

‘Perfect!’ Yang Qi thought. ‘The more destiny I get, the more I benefit. It won’t be long now before I break through to the late Paramount God level. Then I’ll be a matchless patriarch with endless magical power. But for now, I still need to pull off this big move. The last thing I need is to have to deal with the Dragonfolk right now. I can’t leave the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty out of it. Everything is going to go into the Cruiser of Civilization. I suppose I can use this as a chance to pull all of these organizations into the Sage Monarch Society. It would be too chaotic to have them all be independent entities.’

“Everybody, get ready to relocate,” Yang Qi ordered.

“Relocate?” Buddhist Lord Sumeru said. “To where? If we abandon our ancestral home, we’ll experience a big drop in destiny.”

“The arrangements have already been made. We're going to the House of the Invincible. You see, I already have some low-level spies there who can get me an official position. The fact is, I killed three experts from the Dragonswarm Society, and once the truth comes to light, they’ll definitely want to destroy me. But if I'm in the House of the Invincible, I’ll be safe. Besides, I’ll eventually be able to tap into their destiny as well, and even work on seizing power.”

After providing the explanation, Yang Qi concluded by saying, “Now get to work!”

Yang Qi had been planning to infiltrate the House of the Invincible all along, and the invitation card had only cemented his intentions.

If he could go there and get information about Yang Susu and the Invincible Dugu, and possibly even figure out what Proud Heaven was planning, what reason was there not to go?

Any ordinary patriarch, such as Buddhist Lord Sumeru, would think it a completely insane idea to try infiltrating the House of the Invincible.

But Yang Qi already had four of their top experts working for him. Of course, while people like that might be considered ‘patriarchs’ outside their sect, they obviously weren’t very powerful in their own hierarchy.

They probably wouldn't even know much about the secret inner workings of their sect. Yang Qi’s plan was to get into the House of the Invincible just like he had joined the House of God Ordainment via the Bloodgore Trials.

The House of the Invincible had such incredible destiny that it was obviously a rare and incredibly powerful force in the god world.

Compared to it, the Deva Dynasty was like a backwater town. And when people in the Deva Dynasty got in fights, it was like local thugs getting into a scuffle.

But the House of the Invincible was like the imperial court. And the internal struggles of the court were fundamentally different.

“I understand. We’re relocating.” Buddhist Lord Sumeru was sad to part with the location he had worked so hard to develop. But after hearing Yang Qi’s explanation and plans, he fully understood. A random ‘hair’ from the House of the Invincible would be bigger than a ‘leg’ from the Sumeru Temple!

Even a little bit of their destiny would be worth far more than everything he had ever collected.

**

The Deva Dynasty, Sumeru Temple, and Eternal-Life God-Dynasty were all preparing to relocate.

Back in the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty, Eternal Millennium was issuing orders. The Cruiser of Civilization flew over to the imperial palace and unleashed a gravitational force. Jadefall and the other Paramount God assisted, and all of the resources and government officials were sucked into the cruiser.

The cruiser was now roughly the size of a continent, at least on the outside. And as it floated from location to location, entire cities vanished beneath it.

Within less than a day, all of the important cities, people, and resources of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty had been pulled inside.

By evening, the thousands of continents that made up the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty were completely empty, as if they had never been inhabited to begin with.

The Eternal-Life God-Dynasty had been wiped off of the map.

It now existed inside the Cruiser of Civilization. For the time being, it would work well. However, it was hard to say what would happen with the Deva Dynasty, Nine Dragons Court, and Sumeru Temple. They were vastly larger than the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty, and it wouldn’t be possible to get them into the Cruiser of Civilization in a short time.

Eight years? Ten years? It was hard to say how long it would take.

Regardless, it was certain that the Dragonfolk would learn about the death of their three experts before then.

“Move it, move it, move it!” Jadefall announced inside the Cruiser of Civilization. “Activate all relevant systems. The Cruiser of Civilization was designed to escape the great tribulation of the past. And now tribulation is coming our way. Complete annihilation! Head to the Deva Dynasty!”

“Yes ma’am!”

Yang Qi’s other brethren, all of them Paramount Gods, held nothing back to send the Cruiser of Civilization speeding along as quickly as possible. Perfect caliber godstones were being sucked up like mad, but they didn't care. It was a critical moment, and definitely not the time to be worrying about saving money.

After a bit of flying, and by making use of certain teleportation portals, they soon arrived in the Deva Dynasty. There, Yang Qi sent his ten thousand sage monarch magistrates out to help with the relocation effort.

Considering how disciplined and hardworking they were, it helped a lot.

The city magistrates throughout the Deva Dynasty had already received orders from Patriarch Deva, and they sprang into action, clearing out their storehouses and preparing all of their top experts. Many of them even shrank their cities down into personal god kingdoms, making them easier to transport.

Inside the Cruiser of Civilization, whirring sounds could be heard as countless cities popped up like ants.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi, Patriarch Deva, Buddha First-King, and Buddhist Lord Sumeru were working together to create a teleportation portal that would bring items from the Nine Dragons Court and Sumeru Temple.

“The Cruiser of Civilization lives up to its reputation,” Buddhist Lord Sumeru said. “This is going a hundred times faster than we could manage alone.”

“Yes,” said Buddha First-King. “According to the stories, the Lord of Civilization built the Cruiser of Civilization in the face of coming tribulation. He’d hoped to carry the seeds of countless civilizations inside it. Although we can’t unleash its full potential right now, at least it’ll help us survive.”

“It's too bad we can’t take all the people and resources with us. It won’t be long now before the Dragonfolk realize something unusual is going on. A relocation operation this big can’t be hidden forever. I wish I had more sage monarch magistrates. If I had a hundred thousand, or a million, it would barely take a day to clear out the three sects.”

How much strength would a million Unbounded experts represent?

The Deva Dynasty only had about two hundred such experts, and even adding in the Nine Dragons Court and the Sumeru Temple, the total would only be about eight hundred.

It was impressive enough that Yang Qi had ten thousand. Besides, they were all expert fighters, and what was more amazing, they could communicate with each other to make their actions like those of a single person.

With them in his service, Yang Qi didn’t need to recruit more geniuses and experts. What he needed now was more destiny. Thankfully, the three sects had provided a huge influx.

Three days and nights passed, during which the teleportation portals were constantly at work. At the same time, more and more god kingdoms appeared inside the Cruiser of Civilization.

Doing something like this would obviously take a huge amount of power.

“You need more time, boy,” the Second Devil General said with a dark chuckle. “That’s the only way you’ll clear out all three of these sects. You’re just not strong enough to do it. You don’t have enough perfect caliber godstones! But if you let me out, I can do it all in a short moment. Of course, if you let me free, there wouldn’t even be a need to relocate. I could subjugate that damned Dragonswarm Society with ease.”

“Shut your mouth!” Yang Qi said.

He had his plan. And although it was going to waste a lot of godpower, once he got to the House of the Invincible, he would be able to recoup his losses.

“You’re really stubborn, boy! You’d better not fall into my hands. If you do, I’ll make you wish you could die!”

Chapter 1416: The Dragonswarm Society Attacks

“Enough, Second Devil General. The time hasn’t come for you to die yet, so just sit back. Once I'm in the House of the Invincible, I’ll tap into their destiny to crush you and turn you into a puppet. Or maybe I’ll add you to my sage monarch magistrates, so they can finally surpass the ancient angels of yesteryear.”

By this point, the Second Devil General hated Yang Qi down to his guts. Even in moments of chaos and danger, Yang Qi wouldn’t accept his help, and even talked of killing him.

Of course, Yang Qi knew that crises were the best times to grow and improve. Therefore, he would never give in to the Second Devil General’s suggestion of merging their life force. He considered the Second Devil General to be a major adversary, and the constant struggle with him was good training.

As he slowly worked at assimilating him, he could sense what an incredible cultivation level the Second Devil General possessed. Because of that, his assimilation attempts were constantly thwarted. That said, he wasn’t anxious. Each defeat gave him new insights and enlightenment that he could use in the future.

“You’re delusional, boy! Just wait and see. Once you get into the House of the Invincible, I’ll do everything in my power to expose you. I'm sure the people there will be very interested in the God Legion Seal. You have too many secrets. They’ll definitely slaughter you, force you to tell them everything you know, then bury you!”

Yang Qi snorted coldly and promptly ignored the Second Devil General.

Instead, he turned his attention to the heavenly workings calculations systems of the Cruiser of Civilization, which he activated to check the current progress. The three sects were in such a flurry that he was certain it had already attracted attention.

In fact, that was when a mighty expression of will, filled with dragon energy, appeared in his God Legion Paradise.

“Buddha Swallow. Buddha Lotus. Buddha Trueheaven. Why are your auras so weak? Did something happen? Did anyone dare to harm you? If so, they’ll die!”

“Not good!”

Yang Qi knew full well it was a patriarch from the Myriad Dragons Lair, looking for the three dead apprentices.

Yang Qi had taken what he could of their aura and combined it with the Life-Death Void-Destruction Lightning to keep the illusion that they were alive. But this person had sensed that those auras were weaker, and used a powerful divination magic to track them down.

“Everyone, hear my orders!”

Even as the words left his mouth, he waved his hand, pulling all ten thousand of the sage monarch magistrates back inside of him. “Keep working on the relocation effort. Dragonfolk experts are coming, and I'm going to lead them away.”

“What are you going to do?” Jadefall asked. “Shouldn't we join you to fight them?”

“No. They're too fierce, and I don’t want any of you getting hurt. It was hard work building up the Sage Monarch Society, and it has immense destiny. Damaging or losing it in a fight like this wouldn’t be worth it. I’ll lead the Dragonfolk experts as far away as possible and fight them myself. I’ll drag things out as long as possible.

“That’ll be extremely dangerous!” Jadefall said. “If we work together, we don’t have anything to be afraid of. Besides, the purrling is right here to guarantee our safety.”

“No, the purrling is expending too much effort keeping the Second Devil General suppressed. Any further action on its part could result in the general breaking free.”

Yang Qi knew the purrling was strong. But unfortunately, the Second Devil General wasn’t the type to just sit around and wait for things to happen. He was constantly struggling to break free from the Everlit Godlamp and the purrling’s bubble. That was why the purrling had been spending most of its time in deep sleep.

Even years ago, the Lord of Radiance and Light had barely been able to imprison the general. And although the purrling surpassed the Lord of Radiance and Light, it wasn’t completely invincible.

Therefore, Yang Qi wasn’t going to place all his bets on the purrling.

“Remember, keep the relocation going until everything is cleared out. Don’t leave anything behind. These Dragonfolk patriarchs are going to want to kill me, but it won’t be that easy. And I know the perfect place to take them. In fact, I might even be able to kill them there.”

“Are you talking about the Bastille of the One God?” Jadefall asked.

“Exactly. That place is my territory. If I can lure them there, I’ll definitely be able to keep myself safe and out of danger. Look, I don't have any more time. I'm leaving!”

RUMBLE!

Unfurling his Tribulation Wings, he became a stream of tribulation that shot out into space-time and vanished. With the speed he was capable of, combined with the use of various teleportation portals, he was easily able to reach the Bastille of the One God.

Suddenly, three streams of vital energy erupted in his God Legion Paradise, along with a howling voice. “Dammit. Dammit! You killed my apprentices! How dare you! And you even assimilated their vital energy! Did you really think you could kill them and keep it a secret? I’ve already locked onto the position of your soul. You’ll never escape!”

Far off in the distance, in some unknown location, he sensed an explosive rage locking onto his soul with incredibly destructive power.

Normally speaking, because he was a Fateless One, it would have been impossible for the Dragonfolk experts to find him. But because he had incorporated the life force and genes of the three experts into the flesh and blood of his sage monarch magistrates, there were clues to be found. And even if he had completely gotten rid of the clues, the Dragonswarm Society would have been able to come to the Nine Dragons Court, and eventually that would have led them to him.

‘That’s an incredible will convergence heading right toward me. I have to get into the Bastille of the One God, otherwise the Second Devil General is going to take advantage of the chaos to break free.’ Yang Qi pushed forward with greater speed than ever, as a sound drew near that resembled the weeping of ghosts and wailing of gods.

‘If I'm not mistaken, this Dragonfolk patriarch must have a psychic scale and godhood rating of around a billion. I wonder if it’s past a billion. If so, this will be a hopeless battle. But if it’s not past a billion, I might stand a chance.’

Psychic scales and godhood ratings at the level of a billion were those of peak Paramount Gods. Old-timers like that were close to becoming God-Lords. The Second Devil General would be in that position, if he weren’t so weak. And any such figure could kill Yang Qi with almost no effort.

That said, a rating of less than a billion was that of the late Paramount God level. Although it was still far above Yang Qi, he could still fight someone like that. For instance, Patriarch Deva had a psychic scale and godhood rating of around two hundred million, and Yang Qi was fairly confident that he could at least hold his own against someone with ratings of three hundred million. But this Dragonfolk expert was definitely at nine hundred million or more.

That was why the Bastille of the One God was his only hope.

BAM!

Even as Yang Qi slipped into a teleportation portal, a massive force hit the portal and destroyed it behind him. And that wasn’t even an attack! It was just a result of the Dragonfolk expert’s approach!

“Must go faster,” Yang Qi said through gritted teeth. “Must go faster!” He sensed the Bastille of the One God up ahead. However, looking over his shoulder, he saw massive dragon claws rushing in his direction, ripping apart space and time as they neared. He quickly used the Myriad Worlds Greater Teleportation.

‘So strong!’

He was drawing so deeply on his godpower that his monarch godhood had cracks spreading across it as it neared the point of collapsing. However, that didn’t matter. As long as he got to the Bastille of the One God, the sagelight there would replenish him.

WHOOSH!

Again, he sped up. However, before he could get any farther, everything around him collapsed and a massive dragon began closing in on him.

Chapter 1417: Rating of a Billion?

The dragon claw was a manifestation of space-time itself, filling the area like expanding ball lightning that could destroy anything and everything.

Yang Qi was going all out to flee, but he couldn't shake the dragon claw. Everything trembled violently as the roars of the Dragonfolk patriarch rang out, making Yang Qi feel like he was being hit in the head with a sledgehammer while simultaneously being sucked into a riptide from which he couldn’t escape.

Thankfully, he was a veteran of numerous battles, with incredible experience and immense fighting prowess to back it up. In that most critical of moments, he turned, and numerous halos sprang up as he received blessings from the Eternal Heavenly Aria.

At the same time, he unleashed halos of damnification in a massive, roiling river of fate.

The attack hit the dragon claw, slowing it down slightly. But then the claw unleashed an explosive draconic tornado. “Halos of damnification? Primeval god skills? Get the fuck out of my way!”

Bam. Bam. Bam. Bam! Bam!!

The halos of the Eternal Heavenly Aria were crushed out of existence and the claw closed in, having locked onto Yang Qi’s soul, spirit, flesh, and blood.

However, there was no way Yang Qi wasn’t going to take advantage of that brief moment of time he had bought. Focusing his power, he became like a fish piercing through the waves as he shot into the Bastille of the One God, and the teleportation portal he had set up there.

“Be broken!” a voice shouted, and the portal started crumbling!

Yang Qi dodged out of the way of the claw. Now that he was in the Bastille of the One God, he could sense the claw's might fading, and could tell that the surrounding sagelight was pouring into him, healing his injuries and powering him back up.

‘It’s not very strong here,’ he thought. ‘I need to go deeper. I have to get to the base of the Army of Radiance and Light. That’s going to be the best place.’

Already, his speed was picking up again.

RUMBLE!

Meanwhile, an enormous dragon had finally appeared, thirty-thousand meters in length and able to crush anything in its path. Although it wasn't quite as impressive as the Second Devil General, it was still nothing to look down on.

Furthermore, it was so powerful that it shoved away the sagepower of radiance and light. After a moment, the enormous dragon shrank down into human form.

As a human, he looked like a young man in his early twenties. He wore scale armor, and although his hands were empty, his eyes burned like fiery torches and contained a disdain for all other forces in heaven and earth.

“The Bastille of the One God?” he murmured, frowning slightly as he looked around. He knew that, while it was a place of immense potential benefit, it was also full of danger.

Clasping his hands behind his back, the young man thought, ‘So, the culprit fled here. He must not have been thinking clearly. How dare he kill apprentices belonging to me, Buddha Thunderjolt. I’ll never let him off the hook for that. But how come it seems like his cultivation base is weak? He’s not even a late Paramount God. He does have some strange power in him, though. I guess I’ll capture him and force him to reveal who his backer is. And once I assimilate him and take all of his memories, then I’ll figure out the whole story.’

This young man was a patriarch in the Dragonswarm Society, and although he wasn’t as strong as the invincible leader of that sect, the powerful Buddha Shockheaven, he was still considered a top elite expert.

‘Where’d he run off to?’

Latching onto Yang Qi’s aura, Buddha Thunderjolt shot after him, his dragon energy surging. Any soul conglomerations he encountered, he shot with dragon aura, which would convert them into draconic entities. However, the soul conglomerations were strong enough that they could quickly slough off the effects after he passed.

Effects that would be permanent outside the Bastille of the One God wouldn’t last long inside.

Yang Qi could still sense the looming presence of the Dragonfolk expert. However, he already had a plan in place. As he shot toward the Army of Radiance and Light’s base, he absorbed any angels and soul conglomerations he came across.

The chase went on for about an hour, until they finally reached the base.

Most of the devilishness there had been purified now that the Second Devil General was gone. As such, the sagelight was even brighter and more intense than ever, to the point where it was almost liquid platinum.

As Yang Qi pulled it into himself, it replenished him, but at the same time, it was profoundly draining to Buddha Thunderjolt. Despite that, he was still closing the distance to Yang Qi.

‘This guy is incredible,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘Although, I suppose that’s only to be expected of a peak Paramount God. His psychic scale and godhood rating are definitely at nine hundred and ninety-nine million, ninety thousand. That’s ten times my own level. However, he still hasn’t leaped that final hurdle, which means I still have a shot here. I need to keep him running around here for as long as possible to give them time for the relocation effort. Then I can go to the House of the Invincible. There’s no way that even this high and mighty dragon will dare to cause problems in the House of the Invincible.’

“I can’t believe you dared to harm experts from the Dragonfolk, boy. Those three that you killed were my apprentices! Who’s your backer? Do you really think you can hide from me in the Bastille of the One God? Even if you fled to the ancient halls of heaven, your fate would be the same: death!”

All of a sudden, Buddha Thunderjolt appeared right behind Yang Qi, where he unleashed a unique walking technique, along with a palm strike that alternated between hard and soft. It seemed to contain pulling and pushing, explosions, attacks, flight, flows of water, cleansing, tempests, and waves.

Yang Qi felt like he had been thrown into a meat grinder.

Ding!

He actually had no idea how to defend against something like this! Therefore, he had no other option than to throw up a huge bubble around himself as his defense.

RUMBLE!

He was instantly sent flying.

The bubble popped, and countless meridians within him shattered. Even his godhood seemed on the verge of collapsing.

That one single attack had seriously injured him.

‘Interesting,’ Buddha Thunderjolt said upon seeing that Yang Qi had survived. He had just used a consummate technique of the Dragonfolk, something called the Grand Buddha Eight Strikes. It should have been capable of destroying entities even more powerful than Yang Qi, yet somehow he had survived. From that, Buddha Thunderjolt realized that his opponent must have an incredibly powerful type of godhood.

“Do you have monarch godhood?” he asked, surprised. A swarm of dragons appeared behind them, all formed from pure dragon energy, which shoved away the surrounding sagepower as he started walking toward Yang Qi.

Yang Qi stood there, trembling a bit as he absorbed sagepower to restore himself to his previous condition. As Buddha Thunderjolt, he was trying to think of a way to escape. The discrepancy in psychic scale and godhood rating was just too immense here.

And if it wasn’t for the fact that he was in the Bastille of the One God, he would be dead already.

The attack from moments ago had been filled with power, and contained the ability to strike from multiple hyperdimensions, making it impossible to evade.

Unfortunately, Buddha Thunderjolt’s energy had the entire area locked down, making escape impossible. Yang Qi could only watch as the dragon walked closer, until they were about thirty meters away.

An aura of death accompanied him, such that Yang Qi realized he had never been in a more dangerous situation than this. Even his clash with the Second Devil General hadn’t been as threatening. After all, the Second Devil General had been sealed and incapable of unleashing his true might.

Surprised that Yang Qi was still alive, Buddha Thunderjolt said, “You have monarch godhood, don’t you? How did you get it? You can't escape from this place, so talk. Who’s your backer? And what gave you the gall to attack and kill Dragonfolk?”

Struck with sudden inspiration, Yang Qi said, “If you... if you dare to hurt me, you’ll meet a bad end! I'm from the House of the Invincible! If you kill me, they’ll never let you go. Those three Dragonfolk tried to rob me, so one of my seniors killed them for me. It didn’t have anything to do with me. They deserved their fate! Who are you, anyway?”

Yang Qi had fooled countless opponents over the years, and now he was once again attempting to use that tried and true method.

Chapter 1418: Bluffing

Yang Qi had resorted to one of his best abilities: bluffing.

He had cultivated this technique to the point of perfection, and had used it on too many people to count. He bluffed his way from the impure lands to the immortal worlds, then from the immortal worlds to the Ancient Road to the Gods, and from there to the god world. He had used bluffing techniques on Patriarch Deva and the Second Devil General, and now he was targeting Buddha Thunderjolt, an expert from the Dragonfolk.

The moment he claimed affiliation with the House of the Invincible, Buddha Thunderjolt hesitated. The Dragonswarm Society was powerful, yet they didn’t even control all of the Myriad Dragons Lair. Therefore, they weren’t even close to the level of the colossal monster of an organization that was the House of the Invincible.

With the destiny, power, and resources the House of the Invincible had at their disposal, they could easily crush the Dragonswarm Society.

And that wasn’t to mention the fact that they had certain experts that the Dragonswarm Society simply couldn’t deal with. The mere mention of the House of the Invincible was enough to frighten virtually anyone that was familiar with them.

Normally speaking, Buddha Thunderjolt wouldn’t have believed Yang Qi’s claim to be from the House of the Invincible. But moments ago, he had sensed that Yang Qi had monarch godhood, which gave him pause for thought.

Most sects couldn’t produce monarch godhood, not even the Dragonswarm Society. It was only a truly colossal group like the House of the Invincible, who had directly associated with the Sovereign Lord in years past, that could produce disciples with monarch godhood. And of course, it wasn’t just any old disciple from such a group that would have it. Only their core disciples, like the children of important members of the sect, would have it. Therefore, if Yang Qi was a person like that, and Buddha Thunderjolt killed him, it would definitely spell disaster for the Dragonswarm Society.

Monarch godhood wasn’t anything to take lightly; any group that had it would view such members as extremely important.

“Are you really from the House of the Invincible?” Buddha Thunderjolt asked.

“Yes. As you noticed, I have monarch godhood. I'm a genius that the House of the Invincible has been grooming for a long time. If it weren’t for Buddha Swallow, Buddha Lotus, and Buddha Trueheaven trying to outright rob me, I wouldn’t have pulled out that talisman to kill them. And if you try harming me, I’ll pull out that same talisman and you’ll have a hard time avoiding death.”

“Hmph. Talisman? You don’t have any sort of talisman. If you did, you would’ve used it already. And you haven’t done anything to prove that you’re actually from the House of the Invincible.”

“Look. Harm a single hair on my head, and my backer will make sure you die a horrible death.” Yang Qi was really going for broke with this bluff of his.

“So what if you’re from the House of the Invincible? Does that mean you just get to kill people from the Dragonswarm Society with impunity? Hmph. The House of the Invincible is indeed impressive, but it's not as if they’d dare to tangle with the Dragonswarm Society in the Myriad Dragons Lair. We Dragonfolk aren’t afraid of anybody, and we never have been. Even if you were the son of the Sovereign Lord himself, I’d still take you captive. If the patriarchs of the House of the Invincible are so incredible, they can just come to the Myriad Dragons Lair to get you back. And if they come in with weapons drawn and banners flapping, we’ll just awaken the patriarch of all dragons to slaughter them!”

Yang Qi’s blood went cold at what he was hearing. After all, there was no way the House of the Invincible would mount an invasion of the Myriad Dragons Lair.

It was considered a profoundly enigmatic place, a massive world that had been created by ancient holy ones among the Dragonfolk who had slaughtered endless demons, animals, and even gods, harvesting their flesh and blood to create a sacrifice of the most epic proportions. As for the Dragonswarm Society, they were only one group to be dealt with. And if the patriarch of all dragons was woken from slumber because the House of the Invincible invaded, it would be hard to say how things would turn out.

In the Myriad Dragons Lair, Dragonfolk had as much of an advantage as Yang Qi had in the Bastille of the One God. Their fighting prowess would be significantly boosted, and they would never run out of godpower.

“What are you planning to do?” Yang Qi said, slowly backing up. “If you take another step toward me, you’ll regret it.”

Buddha Thunderjolt threw his head back and laughed maniacally. “There’s nothing in all existence that could possibly make me, Buddha Thunderjolt, regret anything. I'm very interested in seeing what a young pup from the House of the Invincible is capable of. Honestly, I'm surprised you chose to run to the Bastille of the One God. It—”

RUMBLE!

Before he could finish speaking, Yang Qi attacked. In the blink of an eye, the Tribulation Monarch Cannon appeared behind him, which had been powering up for quite a while, filling it with destructive energy that could cause entire worlds to go up in smoke.

Intense white light shot out, like the wrath of ancient angels.

It was divine punishment, filled with such bright sagelight that it was almost impossible to look at. After all, the tribulation energy of ancient times was so intense that it could destroy anything and everything.

Before Buddha Thunderjolt could even react, the screaming light of the Tribulation Monarch Cannon was right in front of him. Expression flickering, he thrust his hand out, summoning a huge shield covered with dragon scales and ancient magical symbols from the Demonfolk.

The white light from the Tribulation Monarch Cannon slammed into the shield, causing it to tremble violently. However, it held, preventing the shot from actually hitting Buddha Thunderjolt.

“A very powerful attack,” Buddha Thunderjolt said. “But how come it doesn't seem like a technique from the House of the Invincible? Most people would’ve been unable to defend against something like that, but thankfully I have my trusty Shield of the Dragon, which was blessed by magic from the exalted Demon Master, the powerful Demon Transformation Dhāraṇī Incantation. Do you have anything else that you think can pierce this shield?”

The Demon Master was a mighty figure in ancient times. He was one of the Four Scourges, along with the True Devil, Wretch God, and King Immortal-Slayer. Of course, ‘Four Scourges’ was the moniker given to them by the Sovereign Lord, because the four of them had opposed him.

Yang Qi had actually cultivated one of the consummate techniques of the Demon Master, that being the Psychic Devil-Raising Demon-Sacrificing Heaven-Defying Grand Magic. It was that very cultivation magic that he had used to reach the Paramount level of will convergence, forming a strong foundation for his monarch godhood.

Considering that his opponent was also using a consummate technique of the Demon Master, Yang Qi knew he couldn’t afford to take it lightly. Thankfully, Yang Qi had his own plans for how to proceed, and wasn't at all interested in testing out this shield.

WHOOSH!

Spinning, he unleashed the Myriad Worlds Greater Teleportation. At the same time, he became like a black hole, sucking in all the surrounding light until he shone like a sun comprised of sagelight. Then, he simply vanished.

“Damn you!” Buddha Thunderjolt growled. “Trying to escape from me, boy? Stop dreaming! Even if you run all the way to the halls of heaven, you won’t escape my wrath!”

A mighty psychic power flowed out from him, so immense that it could instantly cover thousands of continents if it were unleashed outside the Bastille of the One God. And although he was limited here, he was still able to search hundreds of thousands of kilometers with no problem at all.

After all, he had a psychic scale of nearly a billion, which was vastly superior to Yang Qi’s.

In the blink of an eye, he identified Yang Qi’s aura.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi was speeding through the various ruins with practiced ease, simultaneously absorbing the sagelight, angels, and soul conglomerations.

Crack. Rattle.

The sage monarch magistrates within him were once again starting to duplicate. However, now that they had Unbounded will convergence, the power required to do so was a hundred times that of before. Therefore, the process went much more slowly. Right now, it was taking about six hours to produce just one more.

Before, he could have made dozens in that same period of time, possibly even a hundred.

All of a sudden, he heard the sound of military horns up ahead, as if there were an army there performing drills. Killing energy surged, and godpower pulsed. Soon, he caught sight of a host of angels marching through the air. And instead of being pure white like normal angels, they were faintly golden, with crown-like halos. They were archangels!

‘There’s an army of archangels here in the Bastille of the One God?’ Yang Qi thought. ‘It seems they have no leader, so they’re just randomly marching around.’

Meanwhile, Buddha Thunderjolt had also caught sight of the same group of angels, and stopped in his tracks. After all, the Bastille of the One God was also a dangerous location for him, especially if he ran into the rancorous will of certain almighty entities from the past. There were also mighty and destructive spell formations that could trap even him if he wasn’t careful.

By now, Buddha Thunderjolt was starting to be very confused about why Yang Qi seemed to be able to move around so freely here.

“That's an army of archangels, boy,” he said. “If you run into them, not even I would be able to save you. And the House of the Invincible wouldn’t blame me for your death in such circumstances.” But when he saw that Yang Qi was indeed charging straight toward the army, he let out a shout, the soundwaves of which were like tiny dragons that turned into a rope and shot right toward Yang Qi.

“Sound-Dragon Demon-Coil!”

Normally speaking, this was a technique that would be impossible for a person to escape from.

“Not good!”

Yang Qi knew that if the rope wrapped around him, he would be stuck. He drew on the power of the God Legion Seal, and golden light surged around him as he sped up dramatically, sending him right into the midst of the archangels.

The archangels would generally attack anyone who got close to them. But Yang Qi had the God Legion Seal, which made his aura seem exactly like that of the Sovereign Lord.

The loyal angels thus did nothing to him as he entered their ranks.

Chapter 1419: Archangels

As soon as the soundwave rope entered the group of angels, it lost its effectiveness. At the same time, the archangels howled with rage, and angry bugle calls rang out.

These archangels were extremely powerful, but they never actually spoke. They could only shout with rage and sound their bugle horns. However, the sound was so powerful it could crush wretch-devils without mercy. In ancient times, the battle cries of these archangels would strike fear into the hearts of demons and devils, as they knew the calls were a portent of judgment.

BAM!

The mere sound shattered the rope, causing an unsightly expression to appear on Buddha Thunderjolt’s face. What was worse, Yang Qi seemed completely unaffected, despite being in the middle of a huge group of archangels. And he hadn’t been able to clearly identify what the golden glow from moments before was.

The tempests in the Bastille of the One God were too numerous and severe, and he was forced to constantly defend against the invasive sagelight, as well as all the other dangers. For instance, directly underneath him was a spell formation tens of thousands of kilometers in diameter that resembled an enormous eye. It was an Angel Eye Formation, and if it weren’t for the fact that he was hovering above the surface of the ground, he would have been trapped within it. And it took a lot of energy to defend against its tug.

‘Who is this kid? And how come those angels aren’t attacking him?’

Meanwhile, the archangels surged into motion, some of them sweeping about to surround Buddha Thunderjolt, and others lunging toward him with razor-sharp spears that resembled holier versions of the Infernal Deity Spear.

“Be destroyed!” Buddha Thunderjolt growled and waved his sleeve, shattering numerous spears and causing hundreds of angels to collapse into powder.

Unfortunately, he could tell that he was rapidly being forced into a very bad position.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi was taking advantage of his position to launch attacks of his own. He summoned a primal-chaos elder-snake, which immediately began devouring the surrounding archangels. Inside of him, crunching sounds could then be heard as they were given to the sage monarch magistrates, who used the influx to duplicate themselves.

Every few dozen archangels could produce a single sage monarch magistrate.

“Well done, boy!” Buddha Thunderjolt said. “It seems the Bastille of the One God is the perfect battleground for you. You obviously have a magical treasure left behind by the Sovereign Lord. Perhaps a commander’s tally that keeps you safe from the angels. Is that what my apprentices were trying to take?”

Bam. Bam. Bam!

Buddha Thunderjolt burst into action, cutting down numerous archangels as he cut his way to freedom. Moments later, he was right in front of Yang Qi and reaching toward him with a clawed hand.

“Heaven in my Grip!”

However, it was to Yang Qi’s surprise that Buddha Thunderjolt didn’t actually lay hands on him. Instead, he reached up as if to grab heaven in his grip.

It was as if he were taking control of the dao of heaven!

What kind of a technique was this?

“The Dao in my Hand!”

Yang Qi suddenly felt like he had been grabbed tight and couldn’t move a muscle. Although he was in the middle of a host of angels, he felt like he was completely alone and lonely, facing an evil fiend-devil that was Buddha Thunderjolt.

Buddha Thunderjolt reached out with his hand again.

The move The Dao in my Hand was so named because it was as if one held a great dao in one’s hand. In Yang Qi’s view, it was as if Buddha Thunderjolt had leapt into the air and grabbed the dao of heaven, creating a taiji symbol in his palm, which spread out as if to completely cover him.

“When I Was Born, Radiance and Light Shone like a Lamp!”

In that critical moment, Yang Qi unleashed a move that he had been keeping in his back pocket up to this point. The Everlit Godlamp appeared, sending out dazzling light like a flame, which surrounded Buddha Thunderjolt’s hand.

WHACK!

Buddha Thunderjolt’s hand was burned so badly it turned black, and he felt pain radiating up his arm as he looked at Yang Qi’s lamp.

Shocked, Buddha Thunderjolt said, “Is that... the legendary... true form of the Lord of Radiance and Light?! The lamp that existed before heaven and earth were hewn out, and before the god world existed? The Everlit Godlamp? How did you get it? No wonder you’re able to move about so freely here! Not bad. Not bad at all. If I had a lamp like that, what would I have to fear from the House of the Invincible? And here I thought you just had a commander’s tally of some sort. But you actually have something far better. Give that lamp to me, and I’ll let you go free. I don’t care if you’re from the House of the Invincible. Even if you were more important than that, I wouldn’t let you go free.”

Buddha Thunderjolt was nearly going mad. He knew that if he could take that lamp and assimilate it, he would very likely achieve the breakthrough to the peak level he sought. And it was entirely likely that his psychic scale and godhood rating would climb into the billions. In fact, it might even get to ten billion. Furthermore, he would be able to freely enter and exit the Bastille of the One God, and even command the Army of Radiance and Light. He would be able to take command of the Dragonswarm Society, and also take over the Myriad Dragons Lair.

With all of those opportunities right in front of him, how could he possibly hold anything back?

“God Dragon Blood Sacrifice!”

He spat out a huge mouthful of blood, which transformed into a blood-colored dragon, burning and sizzling. “I'm going to sacrifice my own lifespan, boy. I’ll give up ten thousand years to summon this blood dragon, if that’s what it takes to get you. And if you die, so be it. I’d originally planned to let you live so that I could ransom you back to the House of the Invincible. But now it seems that killing you is the only option.”

Thanks to the burning blood dragon, his power levels were rising exponentially.

‘This is bad!’ Yang Qi thought, turning and fleeing. Meanwhile, the archangels remained clustered around him protectively, almost as if they were his own thrall troops.

WHOOSH!

Obviously, Buddha Thunderjolt wasn’t going to let him get away. He transformed into a blood-red streak and sliced through the air like a saber, destroying any angel that got too close to it.

‘What the fuck!? This damned dragon is really difficult to deal with!’

Buddha Thunderjolt was actually sacrificing thirty thousand years of lifespan to use his Blood Severing Void Saber technique, which was incredibly powerful and almost impossible to block.

Fleeing for his life, Yang Qi threw a handful of Purrfect God Art bubbles behind himself to buy time.

The blood-colored saber slashed through them with very little effort, buying Yang Qi only a very short bit of time.

After all, he wasn’t the purrling.

The army of archangels was leaderless and without organization. As a result, this event was playing out very differently than it would have in ancient times. With the Lord of Radiance and Light there to issue orders, they would have quickly crushed Buddha Thunderjolt.

Yang Qi had never been in a deadly chase as bitter and intense as this.

The fact that he couldn’t even escape here in the Bastille of the One God went to show how incredibly formidable Buddha Thunderjolt was. Of course, if word got out, it would lead to widespread shock. After all, Buddha Thunderjolt stood head and shoulders above the rest of the Dragonfolk, and was second only to Buddha Shockheaven.

The fact that Yang Qi had lasted this long just went to show how extraordinary he was.

The only upside was that, as the chase played out, Yang Qi was continuing to absorb what he needed to create more sage monarch magistrates. Up to this point, he had created a few hundred more, all of them as strong as Unbounded experts.

Unfortunately, Buddha Thunderjolt could sense Yang Qi getting stronger, and that only convinced him that he absolutely had to catch him and devour him.

Yang Qi’s gums itched with anxiety, yet there was nothing he could do.

Meanwhile, in the Everlit Godlamp, the Second Devil General could sense what was happening, and he was trembling with anticipation. The truth was that he wasn't sure that if he took action now, he could break through the seals put in place by King Immortal-Slayer and the purrling. Furthermore, if he did the wrong thing and fell into the hands of Buddha Thunderjolt, his fate would be dismal.

‘Is this some sort of personal tribulation of mine,’ Yang Qi thought, ‘retribution for all the people I’ve conquered and subjugated? As long as I can get through this, I’ll probably benefit greatly. The Bastille of the One God is just too dangerous. I refuse to believe that this dragon can move around here completely freely.’

It didn’t matter how he used his Tribulation Wings and Myriad Worlds Greater Teleportation, he simply couldn’t shake his pursuer.

“Die!” Buddha Thunderjolt shouted, speeding up and heading directly toward Yang Qi’s back with deadly force.

However, Yang Qi had already leaped forward several dozen meters, leaving behind a clone to take his place.

“You're fast, boy,” Buddha Thunderjolt growled angrily. However, he kept his fury under control; he was willing to sacrifice anything to get that Everlit Godlamp.

All of a sudden, the energy of radiance and light vanished.

They had passed completely through the military base of the Army of Radiance and Light, and now the surrounding scenery was different. Countless stars were visible overhead, all of them pulsing with holiness. There was no radiance and light, yet the magical laws were profoundly strong and the entire area was filled with the energy of the Sovereign Lord.

There was a palace visible, immensely far away and incredibly huge. And it radiated the aura of the halls of heaven.

Chapter 1420: Ancient Halls of Heaven

Yang Qi and Buddha Thunderjolt had passed all the way through the encampment of the Army of Radiance and Light and were nearing the halls of heaven. High in the sky, the stars glittered endlessly as they surrounded a beautiful palace. However, it was a huge distance away. In fact, it was so far away it was similar to how mortal beings would look up at the sun and never be able to get close to it.

Even now, the halls of heaven emanated the majestic and godly might of the Sovereign Lord. In fact, as the air vibrated, it was possible to see something like chains, which were magical laws created by the will of the Sovereign Lord.

Meanwhile, the shining stars created a cascade of light, filled with godpower that could slaughter devils.

Because Yang Qi had the aura of the God Legion Seal, he could approach the halls of heaven without provoking a reaction. Furthermore, because the surrounding energy contained the might of the Sovereign Lord, he could absorb it and use it to further his cultivation with rapid speed.

As for Buddha Thunderjolt, it was a very different situation.

RUUUUMBLE!

The moment he looked up at the halls of heaven, it was as if he had activated some sort of warding spell. Countless stars flared to life and shot toward him with a speed that surpassed lightning by millions upon millions of times over. They slammed into him before he could react, provoking a bitter scream.

“This....”

His blood and energy boiled as he tried to expunge the starlight. However, it had locked onto him so tightly that it was impossible to get rid of. Worse, one explosion after another was ripping through his insides. Now, every step he took was difficult to the extreme. This starlight could slaughter devil-gods, and was so incomparably powerful that any other person in this situation would already be dead.

‘This is a great opportunity!’ Yang Qi thought. ‘Why does this seem so similar to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart? Both have the power of stars. I guess the difference is that the stars in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart are made of godhood, whereas these stars are made of.... What are they made of? Yang Immortal-Slayer used the stars in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Maybe I can do the same here. Can I absorb their power?’

As soon as the thought crossed his mind, he secretly unleashed the God Legion Seal.

RUUUUMBLE....

Incomparable godly might flowed into him, and was converted by the God Legion Seal into something far stronger and purer than sagelight.

It was the Power of the Lord.

The Sovereign Lord had created these stars, and they surpassed godhood. They were actually godstones. Godstones had various calibers, such as noble, imperial, and holy. And the final type was the perfect caliber godstone.

Perfect caliber godstones were incredibly precious, so much so that Paramount Gods would be extremely careful when storing them. Yet this sky was filled with countless stars that were all perfect caliber godstones. As Yang Qi absorbed their power, his heart and mind were filled with countless new truths.

‘These stars are actually perfect caliber godstones, and the Sovereign Lord collected them from throughout the god world and put them here. They’re preheaven objects filled with preheaven auras. And the truth is that they actually surpass ordinary perfect caliber godstones. I suppose they’re sovereign caliber godstones. If I didn’t have the God Legion Seal, I’d already have been destroyed here, and would definitely be incapable of taking the power of these stones.’

It seemed most likely that King Immortal-Slayer had modeled the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart on the Sovereign Lord’s halls of heaven.

As the power of the sovereign caliber godstones poured into Yang Qi, he felt the sage monarch magistrates splitting apart into new versions. Now it only took a few breaths of time to make a single one. Furthermore, he was pushing on toward the late Paramount God level.

‘Incredible. This is simply incredible. If I’d known my cultivation would progress this quickly, I would’ve come here sooner....’

It was almost as if the Bastille of the One God had been created just for him.

He looked back at Buddha Thunderjolt being assailed by the intense starlight and couldn’t help but start laughing. As of this moment, Buddha Thunderjolt wasn’t much of a threat at all.

“Hey you worm!” he called. “Why aren’t you chasing me? You see, I'm just getting stronger and stronger, while you're already a hundred times weaker. You really think you can fight me like that? I’d say the time has come for me to kill you!”

Yang Qi then launched a palm strike, unexpectedly taking the initiative to attack Buddha Thunderjolt.

“I might have to deal with some restrictions, boy, but I can still kill you and take that treasure. Considering how low your cultivation base is, do you really think you can do anything to me?  Dragons Exterminate the Horde of Devils! Dragon of Myriad Demons!” Buddha Thunderjolt launched a counterattack, a palm move of his own that caused countless demon-dragons to shoot out, creating a preheaven blade nimbus that slashed back and forth toward Yang Qi.

Unfortunately for him, those demon-dragons also had to deal with the devil-exterminating starlight, and as a result, they never even reached Yang Qi.

As for Yang Qi, he had attacked with the Hand of the One God, which was bolstered by the starlight, causing cracking sounds to ring out everywhere as it expanded in size, pulsing with the might of the Sovereign Lord.

POP!

There was no more time to do anything; Buddha Thunderjolt was struck by the palm and sent flying backward.

‘What's going on? What’s going on?!’ He was completely stunned by this unexpected development.

Laughing loudly, Yang Qi said, “Your attacks are all going to be dispelled by the might of the Sovereign Lord. Meanwhile, my attacks are bolstered, making me hundreds of times stronger. Might as well just accept your fate! Considering how long you’ve been chasing me, there’s no way I’ll let you off the hook! Dragon-Beheading Seven Stances!”

SWISH!

A host of blades slashed at Buddha Thunderjolt. Outside of this place, nothing like this could possibly have happened. Buddha Thunderjolt’s movement techniques were too advanced, and the attack would never have hit him. But here, Yang Qi’s every movement was so smooth and quick that not even the most elite expert could avoid his attacks.

Buddha Thunderjolt was being hit badly, to the point where he was struggling to hold his own.

‘This is bad. If this goes on, the brat might actually beat me.’ Realizing his predicament, Buddha Thunderjolt decided that the time had come to back off.

Sadly for him, there was no way Yang Qi was going to let that happen.

“Inescapable Net of Heaven and Earth; God Legion Battle Robe; God Legion Paradise; Activate!” A tremor passed through him as he locked down everything around him. The God Legion Paradise spread out rapidly, bolstered by the godpower of the starlight. Godtrees sprang up everywhere, and the sage monarch magistrates fanned out in formation, with new ones constantly splitting off thanks to the starlight.

BAM!

Buddha Thunderjolt tried to flee, but he only slammed into the border of the God Legion Paradise. The God Legion Paradise was resonating with the halls of heaven, and as a result, Yang Qi’s cultivation was ten times stronger than normal.

Buddha Thunderjolt’s head was spinning from it all.

“Now it’s my turn to brutalize you!” Yang Qi growled, then he unleashed a torrent of blows onto Buddha Thunderjolt, holding absolutely nothing back.

“Damn you!” Buddha Thunderjolt howled. He tried fighting back, but his attacks simply dissipated. At a certain point, he pulled out a dual-crescent-bladed halberd, not a manifestation of godpower, but an actual weapon.

“Fine, boy. Maybe godpower isn’t the way to deal with you. Instead, I’ll use martial arts! Don’t forget what makes us Dragonfolk so powerful. It’s our fleshly bodies! Using that power, I’ll rip you to shreds. Die!”

His halberd was made from bone, and was incredibly heavy and difficult to wield. When he attacked, it rumbled like a huge mountain, slashing through the starlight directly toward Yang Qi.

Ding!

Yang Qi reached out and blocked the attack with his forearm, causing his entire body to tremble.

“Vile dragon!” Yang Qi said. “Get ready to be slaughtered!” Although he was shaken by the blow, it only boosted his confidence. On the outside, the blow from moments ago would have ripped him to pieces. But here, he was simply a bit hurt. And that was something he could easily recover from.

The Bastille of the One God was his territory.

“Sage Monarch Grand Magic!”

All of a sudden, he transformed into ten versions of himself, each of which unleashed one of the stances of the Sage Monarch Grand Magic. Normally, he couldn’t sustain that level of attack, but things were different here. He was launching the most brutal assault possible on Buddha Thunderjolt.

Chapter 1421: Major Counter Attack

In the light of the halls of heaven, Yang Qi made a major counterattack, using the Sage Monarch Grand Magic to full effect. His opponent had been chasing him with deadly intent, and because of that, Yang Qi wouldn’t show any mercy.

Whizz!

Starlight poured into him, until he was nearly translucent. His every move seemed profound to the extreme, pulsing with the majesty of the Sovereign Lord and filled with the ability to injure and kill.

And with the power of the sovereign grade godstones pouring into the Everlit Godlamp, the Second Devil General’s devilishness was completely suppressed. The burning of the lamp also tempered Yang Qi’s fleshly body, and the sage monarch magistrates’ bodies as well.

As for the sage monarch magistrates, they were now clad in battle garments that radiated bright light, as did their flesh, blood, meridians, godhood, and godpower. They were stronger than ever. Before, their psychic scale and godhood rating had been at a million, placing them in the Unbounded level, but now they were beyond that.

Each and every one of them was turning into a true Paramount God.

The previous transformation had only involved Unbounded will, not the Paramount God level. Yang Qi had known that it would take the right opportunity for them to transform into something like the true angels of the past.

Now that opportunity was here.

Suddenly, Buddha Thunderjolt started chanting in a strange and mysterious voice, causing him to transform into a strange-looking dragon, complete with wings that pulsed with demon energy.

“You’re forcing my hand, boy. This is my ultimate trump card, a talisman that was personally crafted by the Demon Master. It can block the will of the Sovereign Lord, and is perfect for this scenario. The fact that you’re making me waste this talisman ensures that I won’t let you leave here alive.”

A demonic talisman flew out, and the cascade of light from the stars instantly ceased. A projection of the Demon Master appeared behind Buddha Thunderjolt, and dark clouds spread out in all directions.

“Myriad Demons Canopy!”

The clouds turned into a huge canopy, like one that an emperor would sit under while on patrol. And beneath it, there were countless demon kings roving about. The starlight immediately increased in intensity, but the demon energy on display shoved it back. As a result, the restrictions on Buddha Thunderjolt began loosening.

It was just one what would expect of a talisman created by the Demon Master to counter the might of the Sovereign Lord.

Unfortunately, the talisman would only work for a limited time. Furthermore, it would cause the stars to increase the intensity of their light. It was almost as if they were furious at the insult to the Sovereign Lord.

In the blink of an eye, Yang Qi felt the stars surging with indescribable might.

Whizz!

Each stream of starlight became like a burning sea of fire, and as he was bathed by them, he sensed himself rapidly growing stronger. At the same time, the sage monarch magistrates started splitting even faster than before.

By this point, all of the sage monarch magistrates had completed their rise to the Paramount God level. And that meant that Yang Qi was also reaching the point of his breakthrough. He had already been just on the verge of the late Paramount God level, but had been unable to complete the final step. But it seemed that being close to the halls of heaven, and fighting with Buddha Thunderjolt, was exactly what he needed for that ultimate transformation.

Pop. Pop. Pop. Pop. Pop.

Countless halos appeared around Yang Qi, causing him to grow taller, with his every step able to crush continents and seas, and reach the past and future.

In the chiliocosm of worlds, countless shocking things could occur.

As the psychic transformation occurred, Yang Qi surged with power, and the God Legion Seal changed in incredibly dramatic ways, drawing in more godpower than seemed possible.

Inhale, exhale. Inhale, exhale. Inhale, exhale.

As Yang Qi breathed, godly might filled him, surging into him through his forehead, nose, and even his pores.

At long last, he had broken into the late Unbounded level, as well as the late Paramount God level. He was now on the same standing as Patriarch Deva! Of course, this breakthrough made him vastly stronger than Patriarch Deva, considering he had monarch godhood. Furthermore, he had the Everlit Godlamp, the God Legion Seal, and the Mahātmā Jade, all of them unique and one-of-a-kind treasures.

And all of them would improve as he got stronger.

“God Legion Seal; Invincible Vitality and Might; Substructure of the God World; Vivid in My Mind!”

By means of the God Legion Seal, Yang Qi could see into the true substructure of the god world, and as it happened, he smiled. At the same time, the sage monarch magistrates proliferated madly, with dozens and dozens popping into being every moment. Ten thousand. Fifteen thousand. Twenty thousand....

The moment he experienced his breakthrough, he doubled his reserve! And all twenty thousand were shockingly powerful Paramount Gods. It was almost absurd to think of even the most powerful sect having twenty thousand Paramount Gods. Not even an uncharacteristically formidable group like the House of the Invincible could amass a force like that. And if someone like Patriarch Deva saw it, he would likely pass out from terror.

RUMBLE!

Meanwhile, Buddha Thunderjolt was calling on the most immense power possible to lunge forward and hit Yang Qi with a deadly attack. Sadly for him, the Yang Qi of this moment was very different from the Yang Qi of the previous moment.

Even more shocking, thanks to the Mahātmā Jade there to unleash the potential of what he had built up in preparation for this moment, his psychic scale had just jumped all the way to the level of three hundred million.

Yang Qi truly felt as though he was unparalleled in all heaven and earth.

Now, he had control of numerous spell formations in the Everlit Godlamp, ensuring that the Second Devil General was instantly vanquished on numerous fronts there.

Shocked, the Second Devil General thought, ‘This boy is strong! I can’t believe he made an advancement like that in such a short moment. Incredible. But if he thinks he can take me out, he’s crazy. That said, he now has access to more tools in this lamp, which is going to make things more difficult for me. And if he gets the Mahātmā Jade out of my chest, his psychic scale will reach an even higher level. At that point, he’ll probably be able to assimilate me. What do I do? There’s no way that the shocking and mighty Second Devil General is going to fall to the hands of a brat like that. Is there? Impossible.’

The Mahātmā Jade in his chest was wriggling, as if it were alive and wanted to unite with Yang Qi. The Second Devil General was no fool. Despite the fact that he had cultivated the consummate divine abilities of the True Devil, he knew that he would eventually lose control. Could he hold on much longer?

“Buddha Thunderjolt, you vile dragon, the time has come. On the outside, I could barely fight you. But now, thanks to you using the Demon Master’s talisman, I actually experienced a breakthrough. Many thanks! Although, how exactly should I show my gratitude? I think the best way would be to kill you and assimilate you! You’ll make my thrall troops much stronger! Or maybe I’ll take control of your mind and turn you into a puppet!” Surging with might, Yang Qi went on the offensive, and the two began fighting fiercely.

Chapter 1422: Slaughtering Buddha Thunderjolt

The bitter fight was reaching a climax.

Shockingly, Yang Qi actually opened a huge wound on Buddha Thunderjolt’s arm, but at the same time, received a massive blow that nearly ripped him to shreds.

Thankfully, he recovered quickly.

All he had to do was breathe, and all of his injuries would heal up. Even if he died here, he would almost instantly come back to life. So what was there to worry about being injured?

Meanwhile, Buddha Thunderjolt was both injured and furious. He had impressive recovery abilities, yet was still soaked with blood as those powers were being pushed to their limit.

“Boy, you—”

“That Demon Master talisman of yours incited the wrath of the Sovereign Lord,” Yang Qi interrupted. “Even if I don’t kill you, you’re going to have a tough time getting out of here. That starlight is going to keep at it until you’re dead.”

Without further ado, he attacked again, this time with the God Tombstone Palms.

Numerous tombstones appeared, smashing with tremendous force into Buddha Thunderjolt before he could dodge.

Now, Yang Qi was in the same level as Buddha Thunderjolt: the late Paramount God level. Unless Buddha Thunderjolt somehow rose to the peak, he was definitely going to get crushed.

Thanks to the assault of the God Tombstone Palms, he was powerless to do anything but be slammed backward, his head swimming to the point where he was having trouble seeing. Thanks to Yang Qi’s breakthrough, the God Tombstone Palms were stronger than ever.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi blurred into motion, heading to Buddha Thunderjolt’s side, where he produced the Infernal Deity Spear and stabbed him.

Screaming with shock at this unexpected development, Buddha Thunderjolt shouted, “Vile Dragon Armor!”

Power flowed out of him, transforming into a suit of armor that ejected the part of the Infernal Deity Spear that had stabbed into him, and then shattering the weapon.

“Heaven-Dao Transformation!” Yang Qi’s hands blurred in a complex incantation gesture, as he simultaneously chanted a host of enchantments. It was none other than the Sovereign Lord’s Holy and Far-Reaching Consummate Omnicurse, and it created a stream of chains that shot forward and bound Buddha Thunderjolt so he couldn’t move.

Howling as he powered up his energy arts, Buddha Thunderjolt said, “I'm going to kill you, boy! There’s no way I'm going to fall here!”

Spitting out some more blood, he drew on a sacrificial technique. “Oh mighty Dragon God, I am a child of yours, just on the verge of being slaughtered. Don’t tell me you’re blind to this! I hereby sacrifice my spirit, soul, flesh, and blood to call you to me!”

The power of sacrifice ripped through the void, yet apparently, it didn't do a single thing.

Yang Qi burst out laughing. “You think your sacrifice will call out to the will of the ancient Dragon God? Impossible. Don’t you know where we are? This place belonged to the Sovereign Lord. Even when the ancient Dragon God was alive, he wouldn’t dare to come here. If he did, he’d have to kowtow in subservience to the Sovereign Lord. Are you crazy?”

Meanwhile, Yang Qi was trying to decide what deadly move to use next. He had plenty at his disposal, and this was the perfect opportunity to get a bit of experience. Buddha Thunderjolt couldn't fight back now, and could be used as target practice.

Furthermore, the power of the Demon Master’s talisman was waning. Once it ran out, Buddha Thunderjolt was definitely going to die.

His only hope was to become a peak Paramount God, but how could that possibly happen?

“Fine. You’re really forcing my hand, boy. Inimitable Dragon-Pill!”

Buddha Thunderjolt was being ripped to shreds, to the point where he was losing human form. Now he looked like a dragon, and his demon energy was rapidly fading. That was when he reached out and produced a god pill that shone with a brilliant red light. It was an inimitable pill whose medicinal aura was so strong that Yang Qi’s nose twinged.

“In the ancient era, the Dragonfolk patriarchs concocted numerous Inimitable Dragon-Pills, which were later scattered in the Myriad Dragons Lair. I just happened to come across this one day, but never dared to use it. But now I have no choice. Once I reach the peak level, boy, you’re dead! Do you know what peak Paramount Gods are? That’s the same level as the Lord of Radiance and Light reached! Only the Dragonfolk are truly unparalleled in this world. We’ve never been defeated. And I’m going to break through right now!”

Gulp!

With that, he tossed the Inimitable Dragon-Pill into his mouth and swallowed it down.

The wailing of ghosts and weeping of gods could be heard, and spread rapidly, becoming like the howls of a myriad of dragons. Meanwhile, behind Buddha Thunderjolt appeared an enormous placenta of flesh and blood, filled with the wriggling shadows of thousands of dragons.

“What? You’re reaching out to connect to the Myriad Dragons Lair?” Yang Qi recognized immediately what this new development entailed.

He launched a series of powerful attacks, but this enormous mass of flesh and blood absorbed all of them, making it impossible to hurt Buddha Thunderjolt any further.

RUMBLE!

Buddha Thunderjolt's power was rising like the burning sun; he was back in human form, tall and mighty, and thanks to the wriggling mass of flesh and blood, he was yet again climbing toward a breakthrough.

‘Don’t tell me he's going to do the same thing as me. He’s going to use this moment of critical danger to achieve a cultivation breakthrough!?’ Yang Qi knew that as long as someone had enough destiny, then even if they normally couldn’t use it for a breakthrough, if they faced a life or death situation, they could often turn ill fortune into good luck and use it to get stronger.

That was just one of the useful aspects of destiny.

And Buddha Thunderjolt obviously had access to a huge flow of it.

“Fine. Let’s see how strong you can be. Sage Monarch Grand Magic, Final Stance: Annul Death; Eternally Bury!” He knew that he absolutely, positively couldn’t allow Buddha Thunderjolt to reach the Paramount God level. If he did, the power from the Myriad Dragons Lair would be too much for Yang Qi to handle, and he would end up captured or killed.

Therefore, he resorted to the final move in the Sage Monarch Grand Magic.

To date, he hadn’t used this move, mostly because he didn’t have full enlightenment of it. But just now, during his breakthrough, he had come to a deeper understanding of many things, including this final move.

RUMBLE!

Even as Buddha Thunderjolt was transforming, Yang Qi jumped up into the air and seemingly vanished without a trace.

“What? Where did his aura go? How could I have lost track of it?” Before Buddha Thunderjolt could wrap his mind around what was happening, he realized that something had appeared overhead.

Looking up, he saw an enormous necropolis, ancient, and immense enough to bury the entire god world, as well as the legion of gods. This wasn’t something that belonged to the god world. It came from some other place, bringing with it the substructure and essence of the void. And whatever was buried in this great necropolis would remain buried for all time, with no clues left behind.

This was Yang Qi’s final move, which was a transformation of the Great Necropolis, and was intended to bury the enemy.

He was an Inheritor of the Great Necropolis. And the Great Necropolis was the most mysterious object in the entire god world. It was even said that whoever came to understand its profundities could transcend the god world and reach the Annulled level.

The Sovereign Lord had attempted to use the Great Necropolis, leading to his attempted destruction of the god world. However, Yang Qi instinctively knew it was because the Sovereign Lord had made a grave mistake in his study and research. He hadn’t used the Great Necropolis correctly.

On the other hand, Yang Qi had a special understanding of the necropolis. That was why his final move in the Sage Monarch Grand Magic incorporated the Great Necropolis God Art, and led to the final move of Annul Death; Eternally Bury.

It could bury the enemy, and it could bury oneself.

As soon as the projection of the Great Necropolis appeared, Yang Qi felt as if he were inextricably connected to the actual Great Necropolis. As if it were part of him, and he could control or borrow its godpower.

Not even Buddha Thunderjolt could fight against the might of the Great Necropolis. As it rotated above him, he felt like he was being ground into mincemeat, and his godhood even started to crack. His mind filled with agony and horror, just like an ordinary person’s would be if they found themselves tossed into a necropolis and buried alive.

Buddha Thunderjolt knew that this move of Yang Qi’s was something he couldn’t fight against. It was making him so weak that he couldn't possibly step into the peak Paramount God level.

“The only way Dragonfolk die is in battle! We never surrender! I'm going for broke! I’ll end this in mutual destruction!” Hatred consumed Buddha Thunderjolt, causing him to unleash a destructive power within him that would detonate both himself and the Great Necropolis.

It was suicide.

As the Great Necropolis expanded larger and larger, it seemed like it might explode. But then, the stone solidified, and started rapidly shrinking down.

Just like that, Buddha Thunderjolt’s detonation of will was contained.

Then, Yang Qi began the work of assimilating him.

Chapter 1423: Explosive Increase in Cultivation Base

Buddha Thunderjolt was dead.

His attempt to reach the peak Paramount God level failed, as Yang Qi had used the might of the Great Necropolis to crush him. The final stance of the Sage Monarch Grand Magic was simply the best of the best.

Yang Qi controlled the quintessence of the Great Necropolis, and when you added in the starry godpower of the God Legion Seal, he finally accomplished what was a nearly impossible task.

In a defiance of what seemed possible, he had killed Buddha Thunderjolt.

Given his current level of cultivation, it should have been impossible. In the final critical moment of the fight, Buddha Thunderjolt actually could have escaped. But his thoughts had been dominated by greed, and in his hope of taking Yang Qi’s numerous magical treasures, he ended up meeting a tragic end.

His explosive unleashing of godly might had been suppressed by Yang Qi, without a tiny fraction of it leaking out into the open. Then Yang Qi had assimilated him, shifting between various forms, including the Great Necropolis, Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart and others.

Buddha Thunderjolt had a psychic scale of a billion, which was almost too mighty to comprehend. Furthermore, he had consumed an Inimitable Dragon-Pill, something left behind by the ancient ancestors of the Dragonfolk. It was normally something that couldn’t be casually consumed without running the risk of exploding.

Sadly, that power was now going to Yang Qi, who was converting it by means of King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans. Without those talismans, he would have detonated from the immense forces at play. Thankfully, they could take the draconic essence and convert it safely.

Immense godly might flowed endlessly into the depths of the God Legion Paradise. There, the sage monarch magistrates were again splitting apart like mad.

All of a sudden, another dramatic transformation occurred, as the godpower in the God Legion Paradise transformed into a host of blood-red flower petals that filled the sky. They were roughly bowl-sized, and resembled peonies, yet at the same time, looked like swirling dragons.

They were none other than myriad dragon peonies, which could be immensely beneficial.

Within moments, his force of sage monarch magistrates reached a total of forty thousand. Then, they climbed to forty-five, fifty, and finally sixty thousand.

Sixty thousand sage monarch magistrates.

All of them were domineering figures, Paramount Gods who could act in such unison that, when they stood together, no one could tell the difference between them. In fact, they were identical down to their life force, genes, and psyches. They really were the perfect thralls.

Thanks to having the sixty thousand sage monarch magistrates, Yang Qi’s own cultivation base also increased. When the process was complete, his psychic scale and godhood rating reached the level of five hundred million.

It was a complete and utter transformation. The only downside was that, because he had monarch godhood, he wasn’t able to progress as quickly. If he had normal godhood, assimilating Buddha Thunderjolt and all his Dragonfolk magical treasures and god items would have instantly pushed Yang Qi to the level of a billion.

‘Excellent. Even if Buddha Shockheaven came at me now, I wouldn’t need to be afraid. I’ve become so strong! The Bastille of the One God really is a blessed land for me.’ After the process was over, he drew on his monarch godhood and stirred his psyche, and instantly sensed that, with a single fist strike, he could crush hundreds of continents. And his mind could cover thousands of landmasses, detecting everything within them down to the tiniest ants. This was what it meant to have late Unbounded will convergence.

Sadly, the peak level was far, far away.

It took several days for him to assimilate all of Buddha Thunderjolt’s quintessence blood and vital energy. And among the new abilities he had gained enlightenment of was a way to absorb even more starry godpower.

Precisely speaking, it wasn’t starry godpower, but rather, sovereign caliber godstones. And of all the places in the god world, this was the only one where he could assimilate sovereign-caliber godstones. Their power levels were many, many times beyond anything from perfect caliber godstones.

It was easy to get wrapped up in cultivation here. He knew that if he stayed here for about half a year, he would end up on a completely different level than everyone around him. However, he couldn't afford to do that. There were very important things to do right now, such as going to the House of the Invincible to search for his Master and Aunt Susu. He wanted to stop the marriage of Yang Susu to this Dugu Yunkong, yet he didn’t even know the level of the latter’s cultivation base. If he was a peak Paramount God, he might be difficult to deal with. If he was the same level as Buddha Thunderjolt had been, then at least Yang Qi could probably stand up to him.

Unfortunately, the House of the Invincible had as many experts as the sky has clouds, so the job of infiltrating them wouldn’t be an easy one. Thankfully, Yang Qi had agents there, which would make it a lot easier to get in undetected.

“Still cowering in there, Second Devil General?” Yang Qi asked. “I've got you completely locked down now. Itching to get out and stretch your legs? I'm a lot stronger now, so maybe I should just throw caution to the wind and use the power of these sovereign caliber godstones to assimilate you. I’ve definitely got the upper hand here. What do you think? Interested in working out a deal?”

“What sort of deal?” the Second Devil General said, his voice faint. “What are you thinking, boy? It's true, I'm surprised that you got lucky and managed to gain enlightenment of such a consummate technique. You actually mastered the Great Necropolis God Art and used it to crush that little dragon. If the dragon had escaped and blabbed your secrets, you’d have all of the Dragonfolk chasing after you. However, the truth is that not even the Great Necropolis God Art is going to put you in the position to deal with me. The Sovereign Lord had it, and he couldn’t kill me. So what exactly are you going to do?”

“Don’t forget,” Yang Qi said, “once I get the Mahātmā Jade from you, my psychic scale is going to get much higher. At that point, I might even agree to let you go free. What do you say?”

Of course, Yang Qi knew that, despite all his advantages, it would still be dangerous to try to handle the Second Devil General. But rewards come only with risk, and there wasn’t any time to lose.

He had the feeling that going to the House of the Invincible to find Yang Susu was going to be a very dangerous and deadly affair. And there was likely some grand conspiracy he would have to deal with. There was definitely someone manipulating everything from behind the scenes.

And bringing the Second Devil General with him into that situation would be dangerous.

“Tell me, boy,” the Second Devil General said. “If I give you this piece of the Mahātmā Jade, will you really free me? And how could I ever trust you?”

“You can only take the risk. You’re probably worried that if I assimilate that jade, I’ll try to assimilate you next. But not even the Lord of Radiance and Light could do that, so there’s no way I’ll be able to, at least for the time being. That said, you heard what King Immortal-Slayer said. There are ambitious forces at work in the god world, and before long, major events are going to take place. In other words, I don’t have hundreds of thousands of years to wait around before being able to assimilate you. What would be the point? But if we join forces, then what could we accomplish?

“Think about it. Once you’re free, I can assimilate the Everlit Godlamp, which is the true form of the Lord of Radiance and Light. Then, my cultivation base will be even stronger. It’s a win for both of us. What good does it do me to have you imprisoned in the lamp? All that’s doing is making the lamp completely useless to me.”

“That’s true. Even if I gave you the Mahātmā Jade and you increased your cultivation base, all you could do would be to tighten my bonds. You couldn’t force me out of the lamp, nor take complete control of it. And even if you were at the same level as the Lord of Radiance and Light was, you wouldn’t be able to assimilate me in the next hundred million years.”

“That’s right!” Yang Qi said. Seeing that the Second Devil General seemed to be considering the offer, he continued, “I know you thirst for freedom, Second Devil General. You've been sealed for tens of billions of years, ever since the God Legion Tribulation. So why not accomplish big things with me instead of just being a prisoner?”

“You make a lot of sense, boy. And I have to say, I'm tempted. But I need to think it over. I do want my freedom, as you say. But even in my weakest state, I could kill Buddha Thunderjolt, let alone you. Aren’t you worried that's what I’ll do as soon as I'm free? Unless you can answer that question, there’s no way I won’t believe this to be anything other than a trap.”

“Oh. Well, that’s simple. Once I have that piece of the Mahātmā Jade, I’ll get so much stronger that, although I won’t be a match for you, I can use the Everlit Godlamp to reach the peak Paramount God level. And at that level, I might not be your equal, but with the God Legion Seal, I’ll be strong enough that you wouldn’t dare to try taking me on. And don’t forget that I have the purrling on my side.”

“The purrling...” the Second Devil General murmured. He knew exactly how powerful the purrling was. After all, the purrling had sealed him not too long ago. From what he could tell, it must be on roughly the same level as the King of Godmammoths of yesteryear.

Chapter 1424: Reaching an Agreement

Yang Qi was getting down to business with the Second Devil General.

Infiltrating some ordinary sect wouldn’t have been a big deal. But this was the House of the Invincible, and the task wouldn’t be easy. He was confident that he could sneak in as a nobody, then slowly grow to power. But he didn’t have ten thousand years to take things slowly. Time was of the essence; therefore, being able to assimilate the Everlit Godlamp and the Mahātmā Jade was very important to his plan.

The Second Devil General was tempted. He knew that this opportunity to help Yang Qi could theoretically lead to his own freedom. And what was more precious than freedom? To him, nothing. After being imprisoned for hundreds of millions of years, it was the stuff of dreams.

The Second Devil General thought about the matter for a time, then said, “Fine, is that the agreement, boy? I give you the Mahātmā Jade, and you let me free. Then you assimilate the Everlit Godlamp. We both get what we need. I help you solve some of your problems, then we work together to take down King Immortal-Slayer, assimilate the Great Necropolis, and overthrow that group that’s trying to destroy the god world.”

“It's a deal. I'm going to activate the teleportation portal that leads to the Cruiser of Civilization and the purrling. Don’t cause any mischief!”

Yang Qi’s eyes glittered as he considered numerous matters. This deal with the Second Devil General was definitely going to benefit him greatly.

Of course, releasing the general was going to be a very dangerous thing, which was why he wanted to have the purrling ready to step in.

“Even if you try to cause mischief, boy, I'm not worried. Besides, you’re going to assimilate the Everlit Godlamp and kick me out into the open. Other than that lamp, there’s not much in the world that could possibly cause problems for me. You don’t actually have the Great Necropolis with you, otherwise you really could kill me without much effort.”

“Don’t worry,” Yang Qi said. “I've made a promise, and I keep my word.”

“Hmph! You think the Second Devil General believes in promises? If I did, I would’ve been killed a long time ago. The only person I trust is myself. And that's why I’m not just going to hand over the Mahātmā Jade. I'm going to slowly give you more control of the Everlit Godlamp. Then, at just the right moment, you release me, and we both live up to our end of the bargain. I’ll also issue a temporary blood oath to live up to all the details.”

“I didn’t think you were simply going to hand it to me,” Yang Qi replied. He knew the Second Devil General was a wily old fox, and there was no way he was going to just trust him. And in fact, he was ready to turn the tables at a moment's notice.

The two had made a temporary deal, but both had ulterior motives, and the time would soon come in which they were both struggling for the upper hand. Yang Qi wanted to get the Mahātmā Jade and Everlit Godlamp, use them to improve his cultivation base, and ultimately turn the Second Devil General into a puppet. In the end, the general would have a throne in the God Legion Seal, making him as subservient as the Lord of Radiance and Light had been to the Sovereign Lord.

He was confident in being able to do this.

Years ago, the Lord of Radiance and Light had been roughly the same level as the Second Devil General, and the Sovereign Lord had been able to subdue him with the God Legion Seal. Therefore, he should be able to do the same thing to the Second Devil General.

At least, he could do it when he reached the peak Paramount God level.

With his current cultivation base advancement, it was even easier to operate the teleportation portal to the Cruiser of Civilization. Upon activating it, a tunnel of starlight shot off into the distance.

Considering his location, and the fact that they had the God Legion Seal, he was the only person who could possibly do such a thing.

Jadefall and his other friends and family emerged from the portal, and looked around at the star-filled sky. Immediately, gasps rang out.

“The halls of heaven!” Brahma shouted. “This is actually the ancient halls of heaven!”

Even in ancient times, he had never qualified to come to this place, as he had only been a Consummate God, like the bumpkin leader of a tiny village.

As for the purrling, it sat upright in Jadefall’s arms, looking around like a general out on parade. Then it flew up into the air, whereupon the stars above transformed, sending divine lighting smashing down into it. It responded with a look of disdain as it created a bubble that completely protected it. Obviously, the purrling was many, many times beyond the level of Buddha Thunderjolt.

The power of the starlight here was like a walk in the park for the purrling.

It flew higher, heading toward the actual halls of heaven as if to inspect it. That was when the might of the Sovereign Lord flared, and the sky filled with bright beams of light that all shot directly toward the purrling.

However, it didn't matter how strong those beams of light were. They didn't do a single thing to stop the purrling.

Yang Qi looked on in amazement.

Although he hadn’t been injured by that light, he knew that the halls of heaven were so powerful that if he tried to force his way in, he would fail. That was why, for the time being, he wasn’t trying to pry his way inside. Yet the purrling just completely ignored it.

WHOOSH!

In fact, it even sped up, and moments later, vanished into the halls of heaven. However, as it did, an enormous figure appeared, human in shape, but with features that were impossible to distinguish. It was incomparably mighty, such that Yang Qi felt suffocated just looking at the figure.

It was obviously a spell formation filled with the will of the Sovereign Lord.

The mighty Sovereign Lord reached out, causing immense pressure to weigh down as he reached toward the purrling. Before the hand could close around the purrling, though, it spat out a bubble that blocked the hand’s path. Then the purrling dodged to the side and vanished into the halls of heaven.

The will of the Sovereign Lord seemed to pause as if searching for it, but failed. The purrling had slipped into the halls of heaven like a rat sneaking into a granary.

Moments later, the will of the Sovereign Lord faded away.

Shortly thereafter, the purrling appeared, seemingly swaggering as it flew along. Landing in Jadefall’s arms, it revealed a jade thumb-ring which had obviously been taken from the halls of heaven.

At a glance, it was obviously extremely mysterious and profound, like the deepest of waters.

Nodding, the purrling indicated for Jadefall to put on the thumb-ring.

She did, and immediately felt a pulse of cold running through her, stimulating her psyche and pushing her will convergence to a higher level.

“How could this be happening? After putting this ring on, my psychic scale improved dramatically! What ring is this?” Jadefall was a Paramount God, and her psychic scale was already around eight or nine million, just on the verge of reaching ten million.

It was already incredibly mighty.

But after putting on the ring, her mind expanded many times over, to the point where her thoughts could cover many continents at the same time.

“Incredible!” the Second Devil General exclaimed from within the Everlit Godlamp. “Simply incredible. That purrling managed to get the Heart-Spirit Ring from the halls of heaven. That used to belong to one of the Sovereign Lord’s concubines! It was forged from heart-spirit jade that can boost the psyche. Just putting it on will increase one's psychic scale by at least ten times! The only downside is that removing the ring will return you to the previous level. It’s second only to the Mahātmā Jade in effectiveness. In fact, the Sovereign Lord knew full well that the True Devil created the Mahātmā Jade specifically to counter the might of the God Legion Seal. Therefore, he tracked down that heart-spirit jade and carved it into that ring. Unfortunately, it wasn’t quite on the same level as the Mahātmā Jade. And in the end, the Mahātmā Jade and the God Legion Seal clashed, breaking both. The Mahātmā Jade shattered into countless fragments, and the God Legion Seal broke into three pieces.”

“Well, it sounds quite amazing,” Jadefall said. “Yang Qi, why don’t you wear it?”

With that, she prepared to pull the ring off.

“No,” he said. “I have the Mahātmā Jade, so you keep the Heart-Spirit Ring. It's not good for one person to have everything. Besides, my psychic power actually can't be boosted any further without the Mahātmā Jade. What’s worse, I'm fairly certain the two types of jade would conflict with each other.”

“You’re absolutely right, boy,” the Second Devil General said. “If you tried using them at the same time, the ring would shatter. In any case, not even I could get into the halls of heaven, which shows how incredible the purrling is. Not even the will of the Sovereign Lord is strong enough to keep it in check.”

“Enough with the meaningless jibber-jabber, Second Devil General,” Yang Qi said. “Tell me your plan, and let’s see if we can actually work out some sort of deal.”

Chapter 1425: Everyone Scheming

These two mighty individuals, the Second Devil General and Yang Qi, were both wily old foxes.

Although the Second Devil General considered Yang Qi his junior, he didn’t dare underestimate him. Having been present as a witness to many of Yang Qi’s actions, he knew that Yang Qi wasn’t someone who could be dealt with easily. In fact, the difficulty level of profiting off of him would be sky-high. That said, it was an amazing opportunity.

“From now on, Yang Qi, perhaps I should hold back from calling you ‘boy’. You might not be strong enough to fight me right now, but you have incredible potential. Fine. I'll back off. I’ll leave the Everlit Godlamp and give full control to you. The lamp can shift into different states. If you can push it into its second state, it’ll become a torch of radiance and light, capable of illuminating the forward path of fate. That's the key to seizing further control of it.

“Use whatever amazing ability you have that will extract me from the lamp. Once I have my freedom, you can assimilate it. However, there’s going to be a certain critical point in which you need my assistance. You see, the lamp belonged to the Lord of Radiance and Light, so you can’t just assimilate it. Thankfully, I was imprisoned in it for many years, so I'm completely familiar with it. When the moment comes in which I give you the Mahātmā Jade, your cultivation base will skyrocket, and you’ll automatically start assimilating the lamp. That’s when you have to free me. If you don’t do it right away, it’ll make things dangerously difficult. After all, if you ride a tiger, it's hard to get off. What do you say?”

“Fine,” Yang Qi said. “It seems like a great plan. But let me warn you again: don’t try anything funny!”

“You think the Second Devil General would try something funny, boy? Cut the crap. There are limits to my patience!”

“Alright, let’s begin. Hurry up and relinquish your control over the core of the lamp.” Yang Qi opened his Lord's Eye and was soon able to see the lamp as a whole, and could tell that the devilishness within it was receding, making room for his own energy to enter it and take control of the spell formations.

Before, he had only controlled about ten percent of the lamp. The other parts were filled with the Second Devil General’s devilishness. Truth be told, his attempts to take the lamp had really been a contest with that devilishness.

But now the Second Devil General was retreating.

They were like two countries at war, with one of the countries expanding and the other ceding territory.

Things started out well.

But then, before Yang Qi could pick up any speed, he realized that the Second Devil General’s ‘retreat’ was actually a way for him to build up power. And when he had built up enough power, he’d have a chance to strike back and take control of all the spell formations.

Yang Qi wasn't stupid; he had assumed something like that would happen. That was why he had struck this deal with the Second Devil General while in the Bastille of the One God, right under the halls of heaven. Here, the power of the starlight flowed continually, and could be transformed into vital energy that he could pour into the lamp to take control of it.

Using his own cultivation base to assimilate the lamp simply wouldn’t be possible. He obviously couldn’t provide enough of his own vital energy to succeed. It would be similar to an ordinary person standing in front of a mountain of gold. No matter how much they might want that gold, it wouldn’t be possible for them to just take it.

Looking at Yang Qi struggling to gain control of the lamp, Jadefall said, “Purrling, this Second Devil General isn’t going to cause any trouble, is he?”

The lamp was burning with incredibly intense light, while at the same time, black smoke rose up from it.

“Purr, purr....” the purrling said, seemingly the opposite of anxious. Seeing that, Jadefall felt a bit better.

Eventually, the critical moment arrived. Yang Qi had fifty percent control over the lamp.

“Second Devil General,” he said via will projection, “now's the time to give me the Mahātmā Jade.”

“Take a bit more control,” the Second Devil General responded. “Then you’ll be able to eject me from inside the lamp. You haven’t reached the golden ratio yet! Let me give you some devilishness. I know you can absorb it, given that you have the Mahātmā Jade. Take it and use it to grow stronger!”

The Second Devil General suddenly erupted with boundless devilishness that shot right into Yang Qi.

Yang Qi shuddered as he suddenly started being devilized and scales rippled out over his body, all of them covered with the magical symbols of the Devilfolk.

At the same time, his monarch godhood started rising to a higher level, and the sage monarch magistrates in his God Legion Paradise began transforming. Splitting rapidly, they turned from a force of sixty thousand into one of seventy thousand. Then eighty, ninety, and ultimately a hundred thousand!

It was as if the Second Devil General was personally channeling his own essence into Yang Qi to help him!

‘There’s no way the Second Devil General is doing this out of the kindness of his heart. It’s no small thing to have my sage monarch magistrates instantly reach the level of a hundred thousand. And my cultivation base is now so advanced that I definitely wouldn’t lose in a fight with Buddha Thunderjolt.’

Had the Second Devil General gone insane? However, even as Yang Qi accepted the massive influx of devilishness, the lamp suddenly trembled and a massive stream of radiance and light shot out of it, wrapping around Yang Qi’s soul, spirit, sea of consciousness, and will.

WHOOSH!

Everyone looking on watched as Yang Qi’s fleshly body was suddenly sucked into the Everlit Godlamp! Even his God Legion Paradise vanished. In the blink of an eye, everyone was exposed to the boundless power of the starlight, which shot toward them wildly.

It was a very serious situation. After all, Yang Qi’s friends and family had very low cultivation bases. Even Buddha Thunderjolt hadn’t been able to sustain the onslaught of power here.

Thankfully, the purrling was there. It quickly created a huge bubble that surrounded everyone and protected them from the starlight.

‘Not good!’ Yang Qi thought. ‘As expected, the Second Devil General is vicious and merciless. The power he gave as a gift was really a deadly trap! Now I’ve been sucked into the Everlit Godlamp, where the will of the Lord of Radiance and Light is going to take me for the Second Devil General and try to seal me. Then the real Second Devil General will break free and take control of the lamp. We’ll have switched places! Impressive. Very impressive. But how could I fall for a trick like this?’

Yang Qi had known all along that the Second Devil General would try to pull a trick. In the dao of devils, treachery like this was considered an art.

‘The Second Devil General filled me with devilishness so that I’d take his place. Little does he know that he's actually given me an amazing opportunity! Mahātmā Jade. God Legion Seal. Great Necropolis God Art. Combine into one!Boundless Everlit Godlamp, Fly to the Halls of Heaven!’

It was Yang Qi’s turn to unleash his own secret preparations. All of a sudden, the Everlit Godlamp shot into the air like a rocket, heading right toward the halls of heaven.

Yang Qi had set up a teleportation portal that the Second Devil General had no clue about. And within that portal was the Tribulation Monarch Cannon.

At the moment, Yang Qi was inside the Everlit Godlamp, having replaced the Second Devil General. He couldn't use any of his own powers, but that didn’t mean the Tribulation Monarch Cannon had ceased functioning.

The Tribulation Monarch Cannon was a transformed version of the Grand Tribulation Cannon, which the True Devil had used as a trump card against the halls of heaven. And now, Yang Qi was using it to shoot the Everlit Godlamp right toward the halls of heaven like a missile.

It was a given that the halls of heaven would react to that.

As soon as the Tribulation Monarch Cannon unleashed a volley toward the halls of heaven, they responded, sending out light in the form of a huge hand.

It was enormous, its five fingers each containing three thousand chiliocosms of worlds, all of which contained millions upon millions of flourishing civilizations, as well as endless time and space.

It was the hand of the Sovereign Lord!

In the blink of an eye, a third type of power was raging into the Everlit Godlamp, which flared with blinding light.

Yang Qi felt like an ant facing an avalanche. However, it was all going according to plan. Smiling, he drew deeply on the God Legion Seal, which sucked the power of the Sovereign Lord into himself, neutralizing the devilishness and creating a complete synthesis between the godly and the devilish.

The Second Devil General never could have predicted that something like this would happen, that Yang Qi would set a trap that would invoke the raw power of the halls of heaven.

As soon as the power of the Sovereign Lord slammed into him, he let loose a miserable shriek.

Chapter 1426: Breaking Free

Yang Qi had yet again come out on top.

Instead of relying on the purrling to save him, he was using his own wits and abilities. It was the might of the Sovereign Lord himself that was stabbing into the Everlit Godlamp to vanquish what remained of the Second Devil General.

Unfortunately, the Second Devil General was strong. Although he was being vanquished at every turn, and was already seriously injured and in retreat, he was still strong enough to fight back against the might of the Sovereign Lord without dying.

“Very crafty of you, boy!” the Second Devil General growled hatefully. Sadly for him, he had no options. His plan had been to switch Yang Qi for himself, then take the Everlit Godlamp and slowly assimilate it. Eventually, he would take the God Legion Seal from Yang Qi and become unparalleled under heaven, surpassing both the True Devil and the Sovereign Lord.

Unfortunately, he had lost his chance and was now being boxed into a corner. And likely, he would never be able to escape.

‘The might of the Sovereign Lord is so formidable!’ Yang Qi thought. ‘Seems I've succeeded! The Second Devil General is definitely ambitious, but he still can’t surpass me.’ The combination of the Sovereign Lord’s might and the Second Devil General’s devilishness had combined, fueling a massive transformation. Not only had his force of sage monarch magistrates grown larger, but his godhood rating and psychic scale were also climbing.

Before, his hundred thousand sage monarch magistrates had boosted his psychic scale and godhood rating by around a hundred million. But now, that number was more like two or three hundred million.

Furthermore, he was gaining more control over the Everlit Godlamp. He could sense how the lamp had existed before heaven and earth, and that it was a true body of radiance and light, something that would fuse perfectly with his Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.

“Everlit Godlamp. Be assimilated!”

Not even Yang Qi would have guessed that he would be able to assimilate the lamp and the Mahātmā Jade at the same time.

WHOOSH!

The piece of the Mahātmā Jade in the Second Devil General’s chest was vibrating violently, then finally transformed into a rippling blur and shot into Yang Qi’s sea of energy, where it merged with the other pieces of the Mahātmā Jade.

His plan had finally succeeded!

Yang Qi threw his head back and howled in exultation. Every additional piece of Mahātmā Jade that he collected didn’t just provide a linear boost in power, but an explosive eruption that caused his psychic scale to skyrocket with abandon.

It was considered impossible for any person to have such a dramatic increase in such a short time. That was why the Mahātmā Jade deserved its reputation as an eminently precious treasure.

His psychic scale shot from five hundred million to six hundred. Then eight hundred million. And finally, nine hundred million, where it finally stopped. In that short moment, Yang Qi shot right into the peak Unbounded level. However, his monarch godhood remained in place. After all, the Mahātmā Jade could only improve his psyche, not godhood.

However, he still had the ability to improve his godhood rating, as he wasn’t done assimilating the Everlit Godlamp. As he sucked it into himself, his monarch godhood rose to higher levels, providing an experience that would have been hard to replicate in any other circumstance.

“No!” the Second Devil General screamed as the Mahātmā Jade vanished from his chest. Then he saw Yang Qi powering up dramatically, and knew he was in an extremely dangerous situation.

RUMBLE!

He erupted with devilishness as he went all out, trying to fight and kill Yang Qi right there.

Unfortunately, all Yang Qi did was transform into an image of the Great Necropolis, and the devilishness was sucked inside. Then he drew on the power of the Everlit Godlamp, the Mahātmā Jade, and the Sovereign Lord.

At the same time, the God Legion Seal erupted with the dramatic power of the god world itself.

WHACK!

Golden light stabbed into the devilishness of the Second Devil General.

Deep in the God Legion Seal, an immense golden throne rose up, one that the other thrones could hardly compare to. This was Yang Qi’s ultimate move. Unexpectedly, he was subjugating the Second Devil General!

“Dammit! You’ve sucked me into the God Legion Seal?! You shouldn’t be strong enough to do that?! How dare you try to subjugate the mighty Second Devil General!”

The Second Devil General knew that if this happened, he would become a puppet, little more than the walking dead. His thoughts would be monitored, just like the Lord of Radiance and Light and others like him in the past. And worst of all, the Second Devil General was at his weakest right here and now.

“Devils Exterminate the World of Men!”

RUMBLE!

Without hesitation, he threw his most powerful efforts into resisting. “There’s no way the God Legion Seal can take control of me! The True Devil actually researched how to slip free from the control of the seal, as did the Lord of Radiance and Light! I learned enough from them that I can make sure this doesn’t work!

“Devilishness Floods Heaven!

“Ocean of Myriad Devils!

“Heaven-Devil Creates the Earth!

“Primeval Devil Patriarch!

“Devil Among Devils!”

Tempests of devilishness smashed into the God Legion Seal and flowed toward the forming throne. To Yang Qi’s shock, he watched as the God Legion Seal actually stopped working! This was something that had never happened before. What was going on?

“Ultimate Freeing; Devil Invincible!”

As Yang Qi continued transforming, the Second Devil General took advantage of the moment to make his move. An immense explosion rocked the interior of the Everlit Godlamp, causing a black, devilish cloud to rise up as the godpower of the Sovereign Lord was smashed into oblivion.

The Second Devil General was finally free.

“Everlit Godlamp; Be Absorbed!”

Yang Qi quickly sucked the Everlit Godlamp into him and started assimilating it. It was now free of devilishness and didn’t have the Second Devil General in it, so the God Legion Seal immediately accepted it.

Having formed a new body, the Second Devil General looked around with delight, then fixed his eyes on Yang Qi.

“I'm free, Yang Qi. What do you think?” As he spoke, he surged with devil power that would cause most people to faint just sensing it.

“Whatever. I have half of you sealed already. Although I’m not sure how you managed to fight back, the fact that I already have a throne forming for you indicates that you’re no real threat to me.”

After all, Yang Qi had known all along that assimilating the lamp would involve the Second Devil General getting free. And although he didn't fully control the general now, the fact that he was partially sealed in the God Legion Seal meant that he couldn't attack Yang Qi.

“You’re courting death, boy! You can’t fully control me. And I can make sure that both of us die together, if I have to!” Although the Second Devil General was at his weakest state ever, he was still many times stronger than Yang Qi.

Around this time, the purrling flew over with all of Yang Qi’s friends and family in tow, safely contained in a bubble. Without the slightest nervousness, Yang Qi unleashed the God Legion Paradise to protect them.

Smiling, Yang Qi said, “If you hadn’t tried to switch places with me, Second Devil General, things wouldn’t have gone so smoothly for me. You broke your promise first, remember that. And although I can’t control you right now, once my cultivation base gets a bit stronger, I will. That said, I'm still interested in making a deal. Let's work together. You help me whenever I want, and eventually, I’ll remove you from the control of the God Legion Seal. What do you say? Neither of us are strong enough to defeat the other, and neither of us are willing to let the other leave. And I definitely don’t want you spreading word about the God Legion Seal.”

“Work together?” the Second Devil General said quietly. “The two of us?”

Looking over, he had to admit that Yang Qi was really turning into a threat. If his cultivation continued like this, he would soon reach the peak Paramount God level, at which point he would be very dangerous.

“Fine. Let’s work together. But this is only temporary. Once you’re a peak Paramount God, you have to release me from the God Legion Seal’s fetters.”

“No problem,” Yang Qi replied with a cheerful smile.

Chapter 1427: A Temporary Alliance

The Second Devil General and Yang Qi had reached a temporary agreement.

Snap! Crack!

The Second Devil General transformed into a tall, middle-aged man with flowing black hair. And he reined his aura in until he seemed like a person similar to Patriarch Deva. Of course, the truth was that his godhood rating and psychic scale were no less than three billion. Back before he had been so badly injured, he was at around six billion.

Three billion was actually the weakest he had been in a long time, leaving him almost on the verge of being dead.

Yang Qi could even imagine what he had been like in his prime. He expanded the God Legion Paradise to encompass the Second Devil General, whose first act was to secretly start absorbing the vital energy from around him.

“Stop that immediately, Second Devil General!” Yang Qi shouted. “It wasn’t easy to build up all this power. You think I’m going to just let you take it all away for your own cultivation?”

“Your absorption abilities are weak, boy,” the Second Devil General replied coldly. “I thought you had King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans. Don’t you know that, back in the old days, he was known for being completely domineering and tyrannical? He devoured so many daos of heaven from so many innumerable worlds that no one could count them. Don’t be so stingy as to refuse me this little bit of vital energy. Did you take that piece of the Mahātmā Jade for nothing? Can’t you use its powers? If you want to really get powerful, I suggest you go up and explore the halls of heaven. What do you say? The purrling got that ring up there, just think what you might be able to find. Perhaps some medicinal pills concocted by the Sovereign Lord himself. Then you’d definitely reach the peak Paramount God level.”

“Yeah right,” Yang Qi said. “The halls of heaven are far too dangerous. I may have the God Legion Seal, but not even I can just randomly waltz up there. I'd rather just stay down here and work on my cultivation. By the way, Jadefall, how is that relocation work going?”

“Quite well. So far, no one has come to cause us any trouble. Patriarch Deva and the others are carrying out the work smoothly and efficiently. We should be completely moved within a week or two. At that point, the destiny flowing in the Cruiser of Civilization should be thousands of times what it was before. After moving, we need to unify all of the various forces under our command and create a dynasty of the purest destiny imaginable.”

“Yes, we definitely need to do that. However, over the course of the next few days, we need to focus on our cultivation. And I need to create a teleportation portal here that connects directly to the Cruiser of Civilization. The endless perfect caliber godstones here will make it much easier to power the cruiser going forward.”

Yang Qi knew the Cruiser of Civilization used a huge amount of fuel on a daily basis, and eventually, he would run out. When that happened, the numerous god kingdoms in the cruiser would wither away.

Having a teleportation portal would be very safe. After all, not even the mighty Second Devil General could come here without immense effort, much less ordinary people. So not only would Yang Qi be able to power the cruiser, but he would also have a place to escape to if necessary. Who wouldn’t want to kill two birds with one stone that way?

It was all thanks to him being able to borrow the might of the halls of heaven.

Yang Qi suddenly spun into action, and a host of spell formations descended, creating a complex image that resolved into an altar. It was an altar created purely from the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, and it pulsed with a powerful aura that constantly absorbed the power of the starlight.

Eventually, the starlight formed a pure white residue on the surface of the altar, which slowly crystalized into the shape of stones. They weren’t perfect caliber godstones, but rather sovereign caliber! In fact, because they came from the halls of heaven, they could also be called heaven caliber godstones!

Perfect caliber godstones could only form in the halls of heaven. And this altar could create stones that were superior to that. If word spread of this, it would be major news in the god world. After all, there hadn’t been any new calibers of godstones in the god world as long as anyone could remember.

Crack. Crunch.

As the godstones formed, they tumbled into the dimensional passageway and sped through the void to appear in the Cruiser of Civilization, which shuddered as a result. Then it expanded, and all the god kingdoms inside did the same.

The photonic computers flared with bright light as all of the systems surged to greater levels of activity. Because of the heavenly workings calculations systems in the cruiser, it had the ability to improve itself and make itself more perfect.

In that regard, it was similar to a person who could practice cultivation.

“Excellent! With this spell formation in place, I can make plenty of heavenly caliber godstones!” Yang Qi chuckled with satisfaction as he picked up a heaven caliber godstone and assessed it. With this portal to channel godstones into the cruiser, Yang Qi wouldn’t even need to use a bit of his own energy arts to fight an expert like Buddha Thunderjolt. And he could fit a hundred Deva Dynasties inside without it being cramped.

That would be very helpful when it came to making his own dynasty.

He wanted his Sage Monarch Society to be a true refuge, similar to how the Myriad Dragons Lair was a refuge for the Dragonfolk.

“You can use that formation to take god vitality and turn it into a godstone with a higher caliber than perfect?” the Second Devil General said. “That’s incredible. It seems to me you must be thinking of founding your own dynasty. Look, I have a very impressive plan that I’ve created. Want to hear it?”

“Impressive plan? Do go on.” Yang Qi was still leery of the Second Devil General. He couldn't control him with the God Legion Seal; at most, he could ensure that the general couldn’t suddenly attack him without warning.

“Simple. The Cruiser of Civilization has a weakness in that it's not on the same level as the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart or the Myriad Dragons Lair. You see, the Lord of Civilization was relatively weak, and didn’t have the enlightenment he needed. Why don’t the two of us work together? We can sacrifice the blood of all the Dragonfolk in the Myriad Dragons Lair, then use my heaven-defying divine abilities to combine that with the Cruiser of Civilization. At that point, you’ll have a truly precious god kingdom treasure. Call it the Sage Monarch Lair! Or the Sage Monarch Kingdom. Whichever you want. What do you think?”

“No thanks. You really think I’ll let you drag me into some war? There are countless Dragonfolk experts there, and some of their original patriarchs are still around. You see, I was able to take some of Buddha Thunderjolt’s memories when I assimilated him, so I know the truth. Maybe I can do something like that later when I'm stronger, but not right now. You're weak, Second Devil General. You just want to devour the souls of some of those Dragonfolk patriarchs to restore your cultivation base. If you want to do something like that, do it on your own. I'm not helping.”

“It’ll help you too, boy! But if you don’t agree, then forget about it. Rewards come only with risk, but you want to play it safe. That’s not how you accomplish big things. If you’re going to go to the House of the Invincible, you can’t do it as a weakling.”

“I'm fine where I am. I’ll be sneaking into the House of the Invincible. And that’s not to mention that I haven’t finished assimilating the Everlit Godlamp. I’ll worry about other things once I'm finished with that. When that lamp becomes my physical form, I’ll be many times stronger than before.”

“Going to the House of the Invincible will be very, very dangerous. There are patriarchs there that not even I could deal with unless I recover my full strength. If you get into a tricky situation there, don’t expect me to save you.”

“I’ll be fine. I have a plan.”

“Fine, boy. I'm curious to see what you have up your sleeve. I’ll just wait until you’re a peak Paramount God, which is when you’ll remove my throne from the God Legion Seal. If you don’t live up to your word, I’ll make sure you regret it.” The Second Devil General didn't say anything further.

Yang Qi spent the next several days working on his cultivation while the relocation work continued. Thankfully, his sage monarch magistrates made the work much faster. Without them, it would never have gone so quickly.

The three major sects previously had a few hundred Paramount Gods each. Combined, that gave them barely over a thousand. Therefore, the addition of ten thousand Paramount God level sage monarch magistrates was simply shocking.

When people of the various sects saw that force, they suddenly realized what kind of person their new ruler was.

Everyone knew calamity was coming. However, the fact that they had over ten thousand Paramount Gods to help keep order indicated that they had immense potential for future growth.

Chapter 1428: Heading to the House of the Invincible

When the hearts of the people were unstable, destiny would decline because of the chaos. But when the hearts of the people were stable, destiny would flourish.

It was an eternal truth.

Yang Qi had deployed ten thousand sage monarch magistrates, all of them Paramount Gods, to control the mass migration of the three great sects. They instantly brought stability to the situation, which was no surprise considering they had been created for the specific purpose of providing stable leadership.

In the future, the sage monarch magistrates would be responsible for managing the entire Sage Monarch Society, and would take the lead in all vital departments. It was an arrangement that would be free of selfishness, corruption, and conspiracies of any type.

The Sage Monarch Society would be well ordered from top to bottom.

Obviously, that would lead to an unprecedented surge in destiny.

There was a reason Yang Qi had called them ‘magistrates’, as they were intended to be officials entrusted with the administration of the laws. Not only would they form the substructure of the organization, but they could also draw on its destiny to propagate and grow. It was a virtuous cycle that only served to strengthen itself.

Most ordinary organizations would find corruption impossible to avoid. The Deva Dynasty, Sumeru Temple, and Nine Dragons Court all had serious problems with selfish administrators, who would go out of their way to accumulate private resources, groom trusted followers, and crush opponents. Such things could have a very negative effect on the organization’s destiny, reducing its overall strength, sometimes to a deadly level.

Not even the top patriarchs of such organizations could really do anything about that.

But the sage monarch magistrates were completely bucking that trend. After all, each magistrate was essentially like a computer. They could make perfect calculations, relied purely on logic, and operated according to strictly defined parameters. They would never treat people unjustly, nor allow guilty parties to go free. In short, they were perfectly capable of maintaining order. After all, the sage monarch magistrate had been created by Yang Qi combining the quintessence of both the God Legion Seal and the Mahātmā Jade.

Not even the ancient angels could do all of that.

As a result, a storm of activity was taking place in the depths of the Cruiser of Civilization. The complex state of affairs that existed in the various organizations had previously been almost impossible to unravel. There were countless interest groups, some loyal to various patriarchs. But Yang Qi preferred to cut a mass of tangled hemp with a sharp blade.

In the past, all of those organizations had required administrators of varying types.

And whenever administrators had superiors, it was impossible to get rid of the problem of bribery. For enough profit, even top patriarchs would be willing to look the other way in certain circumstances. In such situations, there was no way to truly purge an organization. After all, the people carrying out the purge could easily use their power for personal gain, leading to rancorous energy that would harm the overall destiny.

But things didn’t work like that with Yang Qi. His sage monarch magistrate ensured that there was no personal interest applied to public law, and that ‘face’ wasn’t a factor. It was a case where one equaled one, and two equaled two. There was no room for other interpretations.

Thanks to the strict enforcement of the rules, as the months passed, a powerful organization was forming in the Cruiser of Civilization.

On the outside, only a few hours had passed.

In the end, the Sage Monarch Society was the only ruling authority, and the sage monarch magistrates were the ones who kept order.

Furthermore, everyone who was part of the organization had come to realize something: as long as someone was skilled, they could rise to the top, even if they didn’t have a network of relationships. The sage monarch magistrates would take notice of talent, and would reward those who provided quality service.

Everyone was coming to realize that this was a very different type of organization.

That included all of the original members of the Sage Monarch Society. Not even they were allowed to form interest groups, and they were considered to be of the same rank as similar people from the old Deva Dynasty, Sumeru Temple, and Nine Dragons Court.

There was no way around it. The only way to truly get rid of corruption was to remove power from the hands of every individual.

As a result, the organization was well ordered, lacking in rancorous energy, and surging with destiny!

The presence of rancor of the populace didn't stem from the amount of resources present, but rather the fair application of justice and righteousness.

For example, the ancient halls of heaven had abounded with plentiful resources, but the top figures had eventually rebelled, resulting in the God Legion Tribulation. It was just like the idiom troubles stem, not from lack of resources, but from unfair distribution. Yang Qi was distributing everything fairly, and dismantling any group that was out for self interest. Although that would initially lead to a few hard feelings, the selfless sage monarch magistrates would make sure that everyone was treated fairly.

A pure and orderly aura filled the Cruiser of Civilization, bubbling and growing stronger constantly.

Shocked, Patriarch Deva said, “This destiny... it’s as pure and clear as water. It has no impurities at all! This is the type of destiny we yearn for in our dreams. Supposedly, when sages and mahātmās rule a nation, and the people all become sages and mahātmās themselves, it will produce a destiny like this. But here it is, right in front of us! Any impurities disappear as soon as you sense them!”

Everyone else was similarly astonished.

“This is the highest quality destiny you could imagine. Pure and orderly! And bubbling with intensity!”

“Our previous destiny was turbid and impure, tainted by the rancorous energy of the masses, and the reek of corruption. But in this destiny, the energy of corruption is just fading away....”

It was a common thing for the destiny of an organization to be filled with impurities and rancorous energy, which could cause problems for anyone using it. Thus, the patriarchs present couldn’t have been more shocked.

Destiny that was pure, clean, and orderly, all thanks to the administration of the sage monarch magistrate, proved righteous and just, lacking any rancorous energy.

This was the destiny of a true sage monarch.

“Sage Monarch!”

Of course, there was still progress to be made, and it could only come with the addition of more sage monarch magistrates.

Yang Qi’s organization had not yet reached the point of perfection.

That said, the quality of the destiny still surpassed anything anyone had ever seen.

The migration was complete, and everyone was settling down in the Cruiser of Civilization. Yang Qi’s teleportation portal ensured that the godly might of the ancient halls of heaven was constantly flowing into the cruiser, providing endless heaven caliber godstones. As a result, it was possible to directly tap into the vital energy of heaven and earth to create primal-chaos paleo-energy.

With primal-chaos paleo-energy, it was possible to create all sorts of things.

Originally, everything in the god world had been created from primal-chaos paleo-energy, but that was something that couldn't be accomplished with any level of ordinary divine might. In other words, Paramount Gods simply couldn't do it. After all, the only person with something higher than perfect caliber godstones was Yang Qi.

In other words, it was now possible for everyone to stay in the Cruiser of Civilization and not leave, yet still have access to everything they needed. With primal-chaos paleo-energy, it was possible to create virtually any type of precious material.

The photonic computers of the cruiser even had records of how to create all sorts of things, even things that had existed in the most ancient of times. Theoretically speaking, with enough power, and enough primal-chaos paleo-energy, it would even be possible to create a new god world.

Of course, the cruiser itself couldn't create the god world, even if it were infinitely stronger than it was. The heavenly workings calculations systems simply weren’t at that level.

With everything going smoothly, Yang Qi invited the Second Devil General into the cruiser. “Senior,” he said, “it’s time to go to the House of the Invincible. You’re not going to cause any trouble, are you? If you really want to get back to full strength, you need to rely on my help. Maybe I can even give some of the patriarchs of the House of the Invincible to you to devour.”

“Don’t worry, boy. I'm not strong enough to take on the patriarchs of the House of the Invincible right now. People such as the Heaven-Defeating Dugu weren’t a match for me in ancient times, but I've been imprisoned for so long that I definitely have to be on guard against them. So this is all going to benefit me as well.

“Boy, if you weren’t so weak, we really might be able to accomplish a lot together. You might be destined to succeed in all your actions. After all, you did come out on top against me. But the patriarchs of the House of the Invincible probably have a piece of the Mahātmā Jade. Remember, they sent people into the Bastille of the One God, not just to randomly search for treasure, but to find me. They knew I was sealed there!”

Chapter 1429: Heading to the House of the Invincible (2)

“If there’s a piece of the Mahātmā Jade in the House of the Invincible, that’s great,” Yang Qi said. “I’ll definitely get it. Jadefall, when I go to the House of the Invincible, I’ll shrink the Cruiser of Civilization down and put it into my God Legion Paradise. That way, you and all my other people can focus on your cultivation. You and the purrling won't even need to show your faces. Considering I don’t have enough sage monarch magistrates at the moment, I need your help to help run the Sage Monarch Society.”

Jadefall nodded. “Alright. It's true that all of us going to the House of the Invincible would probably attract attention. If you and the Second Devil General are the only ones who infiltrate it, things will go much more smoothly.”

They definitely couldn’t get into the House of the Invincible en masse the way they had joined the House of God Ordainment. The House of the Invincible operated much more strictly, so it made much more sense for Yang Qi to slip in and do some reconnoitering first. Once he had a foothold, he could then start his rise to the top.

As for the Second Devil General, he had no desire to hide out in the Cruiser of Civilization, and truth be told, Yang Qi actually wanted to have someone to back him up in the House of the Invincible.

‘I wonder if the House of the Invincible has any close ties to the Proud Clan,’ Yang Qi thought as he left the Bastille of the One God and headed toward the House of the Invincible.

He was leaving the vicinity of the old Eternal-Life God-Dynasty and House of God Ordainment for good. He hadn’t conquered the League of Academies or Nacrelight Sageland, but at this point, he didn’t care. There were better opportunities to be taken advantage of.

Besides, Summer Vastcold, Summer Soundfyre, and Mother Voidwalker were all working on improving their cultivation bases. Eventually, they would be strong enough to simply take over the Nacrelight Sageland on their own. So there wasn’t any reason to be anxious.

Perhaps when it happened, Yang Qi would be able to get some clues about the other Fateless One he had learned of.

Thanks to subjugating the two men and two women from the House of the Invincible, he knew exactly where their headquarters was located. And he had already come up with his infiltration plan. He would have his four agents take him to meet their Master. Then, he and the Second Devil General would pounce on that Master and take him captive. Yang Qi would subsequently subjugate him with the God Legion Seal. Of course, it was a risky plan. If anyone in the House of the Invincible realized what was going on, they would be in great danger.

Thankfully, Yang Qi was hovering right on the brink of a breakthrough. His psychic scale and godhood rating were both at about nine hundred and ninety million, which meant that as soon as he finished assimilating the Everlit Godlamp, he would break through to the peak level.

Yang Qi already knew that his agents had a Master whose cultivation base wasn’t at the peak Paramount God level. He was more on the level of Buddha Thunderjolt, which meant Yang Qi should be able to handle him alone, much less with the help of the Second Devil General.

Once he was in the House of the Invincible, it wouldn’t be a situation of carrying out complicated plots and schemes. He would just identify targets to subjugate and puppetize.

Using the God Legion Seal was the only surefire way to avoid leaving behind clues that could be discovered.

For example, he could use techniques of purification and conversion from the buddhist schools. But that would cause the person to pulse with buddhist fluctuations. And of course, the House of the Invincible would most assuredly have ways of detecting any devil arts that the Second Devil General could provide. Only the God Legion Seal could be used secretly.

Yang Qi and the Second Devil General were currently flying through the void toward the House of the Invincible.

Seeing that Yang Qi was actually moving along rather slowly, the Second Devil General couldn’t help but say, “Boy, those wings of yours are impressive when combined with the Myriad Worlds Greater Teleportation. But unfortunately, you can’t use them to their full potential. How about I take over? Just tell me how to use the Myriad Worlds Greater Teleportation.”

“Alright. Even if I told you how to use the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, it wouldn’t matter.” Sending out some psychic fluctuations, he imparted the Myriad Worlds Greater Teleportation technique to the Second Devil General. Truth be told, he was already at a level in which techniques didn’t matter. What mattered was personal strength and enlightenment, which could lead to one’s own dao.

Proud Heaven had created his Ten Universes, and Yang Qi had generated the Sage Monarch Grand Magic. Later, he would combine that with the Great Necropolis God Art to create something aligned with his own dao.

Because of that, he didn’t mind sharing the Myriad Worlds Greater Teleportation technique with the Second Devil General. The Second Devil General had seen all sorts of techniques in his time, so one random technique wouldn’t make any difference.

The Second Devil General knew how things worked as well, which was why he had casually asked for the technique.

After familiarizing himself with the details, the general nodded. “This technique isn’t bad at all. It can actually save me a lot of effort. Alright, let’s get to the House of the Invincible.”

WHOOSH!

Drawing on his devilishness, the general took Yang Qi and pierced through millions upon millions of worlds. As Yang Qi watched the greyspaces speed past, he realized he was getting a more overarching view of the god world. All of a sudden, he came to the understanding that it was neither a sphere, nor a pyramid, nor an enormous continent. It was some other profoundly strange shape.

Shortly thereafter, the Second Devil General and Yang Qi caught sight of an enormous continent, filled with hills, mountains, forests, lakes, oceans, streams, rivers, grasslands, deserts, cities and nations. Everything seemed larger than life. For instance, the trees in the forests seemed at least ten times taller than ordinary trees in the god world.

It was the same with the rivers.

Yang Qi almost felt like he was looking at a land made for giants.

The clouds in the sky had cities and palaces on them, and from what he could tell, everything was organized according to a strict ranking system. He couldn’t sense any destiny at all, because it was so incredibly powerful that it surpassed his ability to detect.

The Second Devil General stopped and hovered in the air, and as he looked out at the sprawling continent, he said, “So this is the House of the Invincible. I think I underestimated it. After all these years of growing stronger, I wonder what level this place has reached. The destiny has fully fused with space-time, making it separate from the magical laws of the god world in general.”

“Why can’t I see the destiny at all?” Yang Qi asked. Not even his Lord's Eye was able to reveal any hints of its existence.

“Your cultivation is too low, boy,” the Second Devil General replied. “Here, I’ll share some power with you so you can see.”

Instantly, Yang Qi saw that the entire continent was covered by what appeared to be a dense net. It was destiny, and it was so strong that it would be impossible to escape from once entangled. Thankfully, he and the Second Devil General were outside that net at the moment.

It was incredibly orderly, covering every bit of the land and containing the fate and karma of everyone who lived there.

“Incredible. This place is wrapped up with karma. Look! We’re only on the border of the House of the Invincible, and you can see that the city right down there has a population equal to about a third of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty. And that place is obviously just a village compared to other places here. The leader is only a Greater God, yet he has a staff of Consummate Gods who don't dare to defy his orders.”

How could Consummate Gods possibly take orders from mere Greater Gods?

It seemed completely impossible, yet it was happening here.

Obviously, that Greater God had been appointed to his position by the House of the Invincible, and because he commanded destiny, people had no choice but to obey him. Whenever the city magistrate spoke, his words caused fluctuations in the magical net of law, forcing the Consummate Gods to listen. Yang Qi was completely taken aback.

Thanks to the information recorded in the Cruiser of Civilization, Yang Qi knew of certain ancient civilizations from the impure lands that didn’t possess any military might. And sometimes, there were government officials who were physically weak, but had authority over life and death. That was power that didn’t stem from strength, but from law, order, and destiny.

It was the same here in the House of the Invincible.

Chapter 1430: Net of Law

The destiny of the House of the Invincible was so intense that it formed a magical net that could bestow people in positions of authority with immense power. Such people were similar to mortals in the impure lands whose emperor had bestowed them with an “execution-exemption plaque”.

In reality, could such people really avoid execution in every circumstance? Obviously not. But it was also true that no one would dare to harm a person with a plaque like that. And it related to destiny.

Of course, in the impure lands, destiny couldn’t literally affect the corporeal world.

But here, it was the opposite. Density most assuredly could affect the world around it, and could even be used to create divine abilities. In the end, destiny was so powerful that no one could fully express the extent of it.

In any case, there was no way that Yang Qi’s tiny Sage Monarch Society in the Cruiser of Civilization could possibly compare to this. Comparing the destiny he had to that of the House of the Invincible was like comparing a sesame seed with an ocean.

“The destiny here is strong enough to directly ordain someone as a god. Look!”

The Second Devil General pointed at a group of people in the city below. All of them were young, and apparently they were undergoing some sort of baptism.

There were five of them, all Quasi-Gods, and all prostrated on the ground. In front of them was a person who appeared to be some sort of government official, holding a book in his hands.

“Because of the services you have performed, the court has decreed that you shall become true gods. Prepare to form your godhood!”

RUMBLE!

He opened the book, and Yang Qi sensed the net of law stirring. As a result, destiny poured into the four young Quasi-Gods. Moments later, it was without any medicinal pills whatsoever that godhood appeared within them, making them actual Lesser Gods!

What an impressive arrangement!

In the impure lands, it was possible to name people as gods after their death. But bestowing titles on ghosts was like nothing compared to what was happening here in the god world.

The destiny of this place really did seem invincible. And suddenly Yang Qi was struck with the realization that if he just charged right into the House of the Invincible, it was likely that the destiny would identify him.

This was not a place where one could kill government officials and foment rebellion.

The punishment from the destiny would be too severe. Even the tiniest and weakest government official in the House of the Invincible had access to immense destiny, which meant that killing such a person would be like provoking the entire organization.

Attempting an assassination here would just be inviting an attack from the destiny, which could strike like lightning.

“Incredible. Simply incredible!” Yang Qi sighed. “I've never seen anything like this destiny. I’ve never even heard of anything like it. When the Sovereign Lord built the halls of heaven, was the destiny like this?”

“Compared to the old halls of heaven, this House of the Invincible is like nothing. If the Sovereign Lord hadn’t done things all wrong, and tried to destroy the god world, then nothing could ever have vanquished the halls of heaven. But because dissension and discord struck the legion of gods, destiny declined, and it led to the Sovereign Lord’s organization being destroyed. That said, the Sovereign Lord isn't around nowadays, and the House of the Invincible has definitely grown strong. It seems to me you won’t have an easy time subjugating an expert from this place. It’ll provoke a reaction from the destiny of this heaven and earth, and that will make things troublesome. And if I tried to fight the patriarchs here, it would end up very badly for me!”

“You’re right. I guess I got lucky with those four experts from before. I probably only succeeded because I was in the Bastille of the One God. If I tried to do the same thing in the House of the Invincible’s territory, I’d fail. Those four have much more influence in the destiny than that city magistrate down there.”

The Quasi-Gods, Lesser Gods, Greater Gods, and Consummate Gods in this area were small fish, to say the least. The four experts Yang Qi had subjugated were big fish, or in fact, more like whales or rocs.

After seeing this terrifying net of law, Yang Qi was starting to think he needed to come up with a new plan.

For instance, perhaps he should lure his targets out of the House of the Invincible before trying to subjugate them. After all, outside of the borders of the House of the Invincible, its destiny couldn’t do anything.

Even the Sovereign Lord’s halls of heaven had distant locations it couldn’t influence.

It was similar to how, in the impure lands, it would be wiser to perform a murder in a distant location where the emperor’s forces couldn’t interfere.

Destiny!

It was a very mysterious and miraculous thing.

Yang Qi felt like he suddenly had a much deeper understanding of things relating to destiny and fate. And it was going to have a very beneficial effect on his rule of the Sage Monarch Society. The House of the Invincible had really opened his eyes.

They were truly a domineering sect in the god world.

“Considering all of this, let’s just wait here for my four agents to come,” Yang Qi said. “The destiny of the House of the Invincible is strong, but it can’t overcome the God Legion Seal, so my control of them remains firm.”

“I can’t even use my devil arts to control the government officials here. They're all connected to each other through the destiny. If I use anything from the dao of devils, it’ll provoke an immediate reaction. The effort might succeed, but the patriarchs of the sect would know immediately, and they wouldn’t hesitate to attack. Ah, what a pity. If I hadn’t been imprisoned, I could definitely have created an organization to rival this House of the Invincible. With the destiny here, the patriarchs of this place are going to be like tigers that have grown wings.”

“Enough jabbering,” Yang Qi said. “Even if you hadn’t been imprisoned, you know full well that in the dao of devils, the weak are the prey of the strong. There’s no order there, only chaos. The hells that exist are as numerous as the eternal sands, yet no matter how powerful they get, they never have even a scrap of destiny. In chaos like that, fiend-devils can flourish, but there’s no stability. The law of the jungle prevails at all times. If you don’t surpass that devilish nature of yours, you’ll never create any lasting organization.”

“Do you have a death wish, boy?” the Second Devil General said with a glare. But the truth was that he knew Yang Qi was right. The dao of devils was one of chaos, so any destiny that could form there would be chaotic and useless.

Hells were places of chaos, but density was an expression of order. How could order possibly grow from chaos?

Before, the Second Devil General hadn’t been particularly interested in destiny. But after seeing the House of the Invincible, he was reminded of how powerful it could be, and how beneficial it was to the cultivation base. It was no wonder the Sovereign Lord had worked so hard to build destiny for himself.

Whooosh!

Nearly ten hours passed before four individuals flew out, which were none other than the four experts Yang Qi had subjugated.

“Milord!” they said, kneeling. “We received your message. You want to come into the House of the Invincible? We can help with that. Unfortunately, there’s a limit to what we can do. We can’t get you any position that’s superior to our own.”

“That's expected,” Yang Qi said.

He knew that, considering the impressive net of law, he would need to infiltrate the organization first before thinking of a way to rise in power. Then, he and the Second Devil General would need to think of a way to get some powerful patriarchs outside of the net of destiny.

“Get both of us an easy job somewhere so we become part of the structure of the House of the Invincible. We’ll also help you rise through the ranks. Going forward, you represent me.” Turning to the Second Devil General, Yang Qi said, “This here is the Second Devil General, the very same one who was sealed in the Bastille of the One God. In years past, he was on the same level as your founding patriarchs. As such, you can imagine what we’ll accomplish with him on our side.”

The Second Devil General didn’t look very pleased. “I was on the same level as them? What's that supposed to mean? Back then, the Heaven-Defeating Dugu was a second-tier nobody. Did he and his people dare to fight the Sovereign Lord? No. They sat around like obedient little servants. Although, they did manage to somehow escape being controlled by the God Legion Seal. Presumably because the Sovereign Lord didn’t care about them.”

Chapter 1431: Infiltration

“Stow it, Second Devil General,” Yang Qi said. “The best thing is to face reality. After all of the billions of years that have passed, for all you know, they could be stronger than you. Considering they built this immense sect with its shocking destiny, you have no idea what they’re capable of.

“I'm going to rely on you to groom these four agents of mine. I want them as close to the peak level as possible. That shouldn’t be any trouble for you. The higher their rank, the more control they’ll have of the destiny here, and the easier it will be to take control.”

“I know all that. But remember, getting them to the peak of the Paramount God level isn't going to be easy. Not even you have broken through. The best thing would be to go to the Myriad Dragons Lair and take out some of the patriarchs there. With their flesh and blood in my hands, helping these four break through would be a lot more realistic.”

“You're always going on about the Myriad Dragons Lair, aren’t you? Is there some sort of treasure there that you want? Something you've been dreaming of getting your hands on?”

The Second Devil General snorted. “What treasure could compare to the Myriad Dragons Lair itself? It’s the most precious treasure the Dragonfolk have. Well, to be precise it’s actually the Dragon Compendium, which forms the core of the Myriad Dragons Lair. If I want to get back to my previous level of strength, sacrificing that book might be the key. Otherwise, I might not make any progress even if a hundred million years passes.”

“Dragon Compendium?” Yang Qi said. He had never heard of such a book.

“That book appeared before the god world even existed. According to the stories, it contains profound secrets about the genes of Dragonfolk. You see, before it appeared in primal-chaos, the only things that existed were primeval godworms and primal-chaos elder-snakes. But then the Dragon Compendium appeared and absorbed the genetic material of countless ancient beasts that existed in primal-chaos. And that was how the first dragon came to be. To this day, nobody knows where it came from. Later, the Sovereign Lord wanted to exterminate the Dragonfolk, but the Dragon Compendium saved them. One of their patriarchs took the book to the Demon Master, who then offered them his protection. Although, not even the Demon Master was able to understand all the secrets of the book.”

“The Demon Master didn’t understand it, but you will?” Yang Qi said. “You aren’t trying to pull a fast one on me, are you?”

“Rewards come only with risk!” the Second Devil General replied. “You have the God Legion Seal and the Mahātmā Jade, and you combined them. You could definitely unlock the secrets of the Dragon Compendium. That's why I’m willing to help you get it, as long as you agree to my demands. After all, the Dragon Compendium is in the middle of the Myriad Dragons Lair. If we go there, you can achieve your breakthrough, and I’ll benefit as well. That said, we should probably get into the House of the Invincible first. I'm interested in tapping into their destiny and seeing how it feels. As a devil, destiny like that is surely going to be wonderful.”

“Be careful in absorbing it. If you attract attention, both of us will be in big trouble.”

“How dare you talk to me like that, boy!” the Second Devil General snapped angrily. However, there was nothing he could actually do in retaliation.

“Enough, enough. The four of you need to take us into the House of the Invincible now. With you leading the way, there shouldn’t be any major backlash from the destiny.”

“Don't worry, milord,” one of them said. “We're nobility in the House of the Invincible, with our own fiefdoms and kingdoms. We’re nothing like the commoners. If you want a position in one of our governments, it would be easy to do, much less just keep you safe.”

“We just hope that you can help us climb through the ranks too,” another said.

“Lead the way,” Yang Qi said, flicking the sleeve of his God Legion Battle Robe. The four experts summoned an enormous flying ship that they used to enter the territory of the House of the Invincible. From what Yang Qi could tell, the net of destiny was so strong that it would be impossible for anyone to slip in unnoticed.

Thankfully, they were being led by his four agents, who could bring them in as guests. After all, it wasn’t uncommon at all for powerful people to bring in guests to visit.

As they entered the depths of the House of the Invincible, Yang Qi looked around and saw flourishing continents everywhere. Compared to this area, the border regions were virtually impoverished.

Deep in the House of the Invincible there were numerous continents, each of which was just as flourishing as the entire Deva Dynasty. People lived in peace, and the destiny was immense. As for the government officials, they used their power and authority to make sure that all regulations were enforced down to the letter.

However, when Yang Qi examined the situation closely, he saw that there was chaos in the destiny. It wasn’t pure, which indicated that there was infighting and corruption here. That said, it was sufficient enough to maintain a peaceful equilibrium.

That didn’t necessarily mean that the incorruptible officials outnumbered the corrupt ones. Truth be told, all of the officials were corrupt in some way. However, the extent of their corruption wasn’t such that it aroused public wrath. There were unwritten rules to it all, and the officials followed them.

‘What a pity. If I were in charge here, the destiny would improve by several times over. It's so sad to see the wastage here.’ Yang Qi shook his head, yet he couldn’t help but drool over this place. If he had access to the destiny of this place, he would easily be able to assimilate the Everlit Godlamp and become a peak Paramount God.

The ship sailed on, deeper and deeper into the House of the Invincible.

Eventually, Yang Qi realized that they were flying along special pathways that ordinary people couldn’t use, which went to show how important his four agents were.

In the House of the Invincible, late Paramount Gods were considered honored nobility, so it was a given they would have special privileges. He could even see destiny flowing into them, making them seem as if they benefited from the protection of heaven and earth.

The nobility were protected by good fortune and could never be harmed.

It was like how, in the mortal world, some government officials would receive protection from the spirits, making them impervious to sorcery. In the House of the Invincible, that type of arrangement was even more prevalent. Thanks to the protection they received, these four experts would never fall victim to any expert from the dao of devils.

‘I got really lucky to subjugate them in the Bastille of the One God. Otherwise, it would’ve been very hard to get into the House of the Invincible.’

The truth was that immense destiny existed in the Bastille of the One God, and Yang Qi was able to tap into it, which was what made him so strong there.

They passed through countless countries, dimensions, cities, and the like, giving Yang Qi a much better idea of how immense the House of the Invincible was.

And it didn’t exist in a state of martial law. There was truly centralized state power at play, and the destiny made it impossible for any factions to rise up in opposition. After all, the leaders of the sect could easily deprive their subordinates of the destiny, and make their godhood vanish.

That was the power of the net of law.

No place that Yang Qi had ever seen was as complex and tightly controlled as here.

It was truly a terrifying organization.

A perfect system.

After flying along for several hours, they saw an immense mountain rising up in front of them, made up entirely of a rare type of godjade that could produce illusions which could dazzle the mind. It was called illusionary godjade, and although it couldn't compare to the Mahātmā Jade, people who practice their cultivation here would develop incredible powers of illusion.

Back in the Deva Dynasty, even a tiny piece of illusionary godjade would be extremely expensive. Yet here was a mountain made from the stuff.

“Milord, this is the mountain we occupy. Unfortunately, although we’re nobility, it’ll be hard to advance further in rank. We’d first need to improve our cultivation bases, then provide offerings to the sect. Upon returning from the Bastille of the One God, we were punished for failing our mission.”

“Milord, can you work out a plan for us? Our Master was recently injured, and because of that, his position in the court suffered a huge blow.”

Chapter 1432: Seizing Destiny

“That won’t be a problem at all,” Yang Qi said. “I have plenty of money at my disposal. Why don’t you start by explaining your situation?”

“Milord, this is our mountain, and as you can see, the land beneath it belongs to us.” One of the men waved his finger, and everything trembled. The mists below cleared, revealing an expansive plane filled with cities, mountains, rivers, cultivators, nations, dimensions, god kingdoms, palaces, and worlds.

They were all arranged around the central mountain, and Yang Qi could see at a glance that it was at least twenty or thirty times as large as the Deva Dynasty.

“Milord,” the man said, “the lands we command are known as the Land of Flowerhill. This mountain is known as Dreamhill. I'm the viceroy, and I rank as a count.”

One of the women added, “We're also counts in the Land of Flowerhill. However, we’re not all viceroys. I'm the generalissimo of the armed forces, he's the minister of finances, and she’s the minister of officials. We’re all roughly the same rank, although the viceroy is the one who makes the final decisions. Of course, we always have to follow the orders from our superiors.”

Yang Qi nodded. “I see. So you split up the duties of running this place.”

The Land of Flowerhill was run by these four, with each having a different position: viceroy, generalissimo, minister of finances, and minister of officials.

It was a solidly-built organizational structure.

From what Yang Qi could see, the resources that had been built up in the Land of Flowerhill surpassed those of the Deva Dynasty by thirty times, yet its destiny was far more than thirty times. Obviously, it was well-managed.

“How many Paramount Gods do you have here?” Yang Qi asked.

One of the women, whose name was Dugu Wen, replied, “A total of two thousand three hundred and twenty-five that don’t have Unbounded will convergence. In terms of Unbounded experts, we have one thousand eight hundred and sixty-three. The mid Paramount Gods number one hundred and thirty four, and there are only four late Paramount Gods: us.”

“The destiny here is incredible, but obviously, it isn’t an easy thing to create Paramount Gods. Still, the fact that the Land of Flowerhill has over two thousand Paramount Gods is impressive. Although, it probably doesn't count for much in the House of the Invincible as a whole, am I right?”

“Exactly right, milord,” replied one of the men, whose name was Dugu Sheng. “The House of the Invincible is a monstrous organization in the god world. Over the past several hundred million years we've expanded so much that few other organizations can rival us. One is the Central Dynasty, the other is the Chiliocosm Dynasty. We three form a tripartite balance of power that not even the Dragonfolk can match up to. The Invincible Dynasty. The Central Dynasty. The Chiliocosm Dynasty. Those are the true powers in the god world.”

“What about the Proud Clan?” Yang Qi said.

“The Proud Clan is the Central Dynasty,” replied the other man, named Dugu Ti. “More precisely, the imperial clan that runs it is surnamed Proud.”

“That’s right,” said Dugu Hu, the other young woman. “Milord, other than the Sovereign Lord himself, the god world has never seen three dynasties as powerful as ours. Beneath us are the other forces such as the Dragonfolk, Spritefolk, Mechfolk, Demonfolk, and the various primal-chaos creatures that exist. But those lesser groups are slowly being integrated into the three major powers. In fact, an important upcoming event is the wedding between a princess of the Spritefolk, Sprite Susu, with Dugu Yunkong from our Invincible Dynasty. It’s intended to be a formal linking of the Spritefolk with the House of the Invincible.”

Dugu Sheng, Dugu Ti, Dugu Wen, and Dugu Hu formed a small interest group, one of thousands in the House of the Invincible.

‘So the Central Dynasty is run by the Proud Clan.’ Yang Qi was finally learning some good information about the Proud Clan. Now he was curious what the Chiliocosm Dynasty was all about.

Regardless, he now had a much clearer vision of who the truly major players were in the god world. After all, the House of the Invincible could easily make people into gods, which just went to show how amazing they were.

Unfortunately, Yang Qi’s previous plan seemed like a complete bust. He had hoped to infiltrate the House of the Invincible, then slowly take it over. But considering its incredible destiny, it would be too dangerous to try to secretly bring people from the Sage Monarch Society here. They would likely just end up dead. For now, it was better to have them in the depths of the Cruiser of Civilization, working on their cultivation.

For now, he and the Second Devil General would be enough to make some progress.

“Cut the crap and explain how you're going to help us infiltrate your sect!” the Second Devil General said impatiently. “The Invincible Dynasty is obviously a very powerful organization that I can benefit a lot from. And the first step is going to be tapping into the destiny here.”

“We have two options,” replied Dugu Wen. “First is to give you a position here in the Land of Flowerhill. After performing some services, you’ll eventually rise in the ranks. Unfortunately, Milord, you’d only be able to benefit from the destiny given to mid Paramount Gods. That's the extent of our authority. The second option is to declare war on one of the rivals of the Land of Flowerhill. If we could install you or the exalted Second Devil General as a new leader there, it’d be a much faster way of getting power.”

“I don’t really care,” the Second Devil General said, “as long as it's helping me out. I'm not interested in planning and managing. Look, it's simple. Tell me who your enemies are, and I’ll go kill them. Simple.”

“Enough, Second Devil General,” Yang Qi said. “We don’t need chaos here. Nowadays, things don’t work like they did back in your day. The House of the Invincible is a huge organization, and cannot be taken lightly. I'd say they have some good plans. Even if there are competing interest groups, simply killing the opposition won’t help. After all, they’re not our direct superiors, so it won’t facilitate a true rise to power. We need to stay here in the Land of Flowerhill, make a name for ourselves, and improve the destiny of this place. That will help our four agents rise to better positions, and by extension, us.”

“We don’t have that kind of time on our hands!” the Second Devil General said with a cold harrumph. “King Immortal-Slayer is getting anxious! And those enemies he talked about are only going to continue working on their plan!”

“Those conspirators have to be from the Proud Clan. And they’re not really going to take action until there's a major development. I know you’re not good at leadership, Second Devil General. So let me handle this. You be the puppet emperor while I run things behind the scenes. And whenever I run into a sticky situation I can’t handle, you take over. What do you say?”

“Fine. I suppose you’re right. The dao of devils is all about chaos. I'm not good at making complicated plans. But there’s nothing complicated about taking out enemies. I normally just kill anyone I don’t like, devour them, and wipe out their people.”

“Fine. Now, the four of you listen well to my plan.”

Taking out some heavenly caliber godstones, Yang Qi said, “This is a type of godstone I can make that surpasses perfect caliber godstones. They don’t exist anywhere else in the god world, and I'm the only person who has them. Take them to your superiors and say that you found them in the Bastille of the One God. You’ll definitely be rewarded well for them. Furthermore, I'm going to give you some capital to work with. Use it to improve the Land of Flowerhill. By the way, Second Devil General, what do you think of these four in terms of their cultivation? It seems to me we ought to work together to strengthen them up a bit.”

The Second Devil General snorted coldly. “Why the hell don’t I get any sort of reward? Ever since I met you, boy, the only thing I’ve received is endless trouble!”

Despite his words, he knew that when it came to doing business, you have to make an investment before you can earn any profit.

All of a sudden, he erupted with devil energy, then waved a finger at the four experts. Before they could even react, popping sounds rang out as devil seals appeared within them.

“This is a consummate technique from the dao of devils, the Devil-Sealing Triple-Myriad Seal. It’ll create a combination of devilish and godly within you, a contrasting mix of darkness, gloom, radiance, and light. And of course, as you assimilate it, it will give you powerful divine abilities. It's something I gained enlightenment of during the billions of years I was imprisoned in the Everlit Godlamp.”

The four experts immediately felt their cultivation bases rising, making them like house cats transforming into tiger cubs. Although house cats and tiger cubs had roughly the same fighting prowess, in terms of future growth, it was obvious who was superior.

They were different on a substructural level.

“Many thanks, exalted Second Devil General!” the four experts said exultingly. Then they looked at Yang Qi.

Nodding, he sent out a stream of radiance and light as he imparted other divine abilities to them. “Go. You’re definitely going to get amazing rewards from the sect.”

“Yes sir!”

After they were gone, Yang Qi and the Second Devil General sat down, not daring to do anything to attract attention before getting official positions in the sect.

About a day passed, whereupon his four agents hurried back and dropped to their knees.

“Milord, congratulations!” said Dugu Wen. “When we handed in that heaven caliber godstone, we received a lot of attention from the leaders. The emperor personally blessed us! We received a lot of rewards, such as medicinal pills, and were also allowed to make a request. We asked for approval to add two new positions to the hierarchy of the Land of Flowerhill. The two of you can be supervisory inspectors, with a rank roughly similar to ours. You’ll essentially be like police chiefs!”

“Good,” Yang Qi said. “Excellent. Bring out the book of appointment.”

The four experts pulled out the book and handed it to Yang Qi.

RUMBLE!

In the blink of an eye, unimaginable changes occurred in Yang Qi.

Chapter 1433: Chief of Police

After the book was opened and the ordainment complete, Yang Qi felt a tremor pass through him, and could then sense some of the destiny converging on him. A tiny, fiery stream flowed down from the overarching net, passing into him as he became part of the system.

The power in that destiny was enough to directly push an ordinary person into the peak Perfect God level. To a weak and unimportant person, it would represent an incredible amount of godpower. Unfortunately, it didn’t really provide much help at all to Yang Qi. After all, he was already on the verge of stepping into the peak Paramount God level.

However, being connected to this destiny was going to be very helpful, as it gave him a middling standing in the House of the Invincible.

He was now a supervisory inspector of the Land of Flowerhill. In other words, a police chief.

It was a position that involved overseeing various criminal cases and disputes in the land, as well as dealing with friction between different interest groups. Even in a tiny place like the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty, there were still numerous conflicts to resolve, so it was hard to imagine what was involved in administering a place like the Land of Flowerhill.

Of course, he wouldn’t have any authority outside of this place.

Right now, he was under the direct authority of his four agents. In fact, as soon as he received the destiny and became part of the system, he could sense that he was supposed to be literally under their control.

Yang Qi wasn’t worried about that. The God Legion Seal could negate all such forms of control, ensuring that he still had complete authority over his four agents.

Meanwhile, the Second Devil General was also ordained as a supervisory inspector, and as the destiny flowed into him, he initially smiled with satisfaction, then frowned. “This destiny is insufficient! Our power and authority is far too weak!”

“Don’t worry,” Yang Qi said. “We have time to work our way up. We’re only police chiefs now, so this level of destiny is more than sufficient. Going forward, we’ll throw ourselves into the infighting! Now, the four of you need to take this wealth and start building up the Land of Flowerhill. Improve its destiny, and at the same time, start stockpiling resources from the House of the Invincible. In the coming days, I'm going to refine my plan and figure out what to do going forward.”

“Yes sir!”

As a police chief, he wouldn’t actually command subordinates or handle day-to-day affairs. Right now, his focus was on ensuring that his agents could rise through the ranks. All he needed was an official position in the House of the Invincible, and he would be able to get to work furthering his interests.

During the days that followed, the Second Devil General worked on his cultivation, and Yang Qi familiarized himself with the House of the Invincible, including the resources available and its general structure.

SLAM!

Yang Qi opened an enormous book, causing the entire mansion grotto to tremble from the force.

The book was as tall as an average person, and glittered with golden light. Several characters were carved into its cover, revealing its title to be True Sutra of the Invincible. It was a record of everything related to the House of the Invincible, and was similar to the Great Classic of God Ordainment.

One thing he learned was that there were too many places like the Land of Flowerhill to count. And they rose and fell constantly, whether by warfare or because of other reasons.

Because of that, a new edition of the True Sutra of the Invincible would come out every year. And even then, it was never up to date, considering the changes that would happen on a daily basis. In fact, in the handful of days it took Yang Qi to study the book, it was likely that numerous territories on the same level as the Land of Flowerhill had sprung up throughout the sect.

The god world was huge, and the House of the Invincible was constantly expanding. But at least he had a basic understanding now. And he also knew which interest groups were in conflict with the Land of Flowerhill.

For the most part, the Land of Flowerhill was too small to have dealings with any groups other than those in the immediate vicinity. For example, the Land of Godscript, Land of Heavenclan, Land of Deadleaf, Land of Witherdrift, Land of Lilypads, Land of Amberflight, and others.

Some of those areas were more powerful than others. And some people within them were too important to be limited to one land.

For instance, of Yang Qi’s four agents, one of them was the viceroy. However, he was only the viceroy of a single land. Some viceroys controlled three, or even four lands. There were even some government officials who acted as viceroy of ten different lands.

And truly powerful individuals would control thousands or tens of thousands of them.

Obviously, someone who was a viceroy of ten thousand lands would be a peak Paramount God with a psychic scale and godhood rating of at least a billion.

Clearly, while the leader of a single land and the leader of ten thousand would both share the title of viceroy, they were completely different from each other. It was similar to how an elephant beetle and an elephant both shared the word ‘elephant’. Yet could they really be compared to each other?

Yang Qi’s immediate plan was to ensure that each of his four agents became the viceroy of multiple lands. Right now, the destiny they could provide was simply too negligible. It would only be when they commanded ten or more lands that they could start to make a difference.

He had already confirmed that the Invincible Dynasty was a feudal system in which power was relegated downward along with destiny. For now, he wasn’t able to even make contact with the truly powerful people, such as the emperor and the court.

Sprite Susu’s betrothed, Dugu Yunkong, was a high-ranking person like that.

While Yang Qi did his research, his agents remained at his side to answer any questions. At a certain point, Yang Qi pointed at a listing in the True Sutra of the Invincible and said, “This person. He's the one we’ll take out!”

His four agents responded with surprise. “A viceroy of ten lands? Dugu Nimou? He’s one of our most powerful adversaries, the same one who colluded with people from the Chiliocosm Dynasty to harm our master. You see, our Master learned of a major conspiracy involving the Chiliocosm Dynasty, and wanted to get hard evidence. Unfortunately—”

“I'm already familiar with the details. This is the person we’re going to target, since the higher-ups won’t ask any questions. They’ll just chalk it up to a personal vendetta. I've already read all his information. He colluded with the Chiliocosm Dynasty for the purpose of improving his destiny and cultivation base. Although he technically didn’t do anything treasonous, we can still claim that we're punishing him for his misdeeds.

“Let’s do it this way. Figure out a way to get your Master outside of the sect. There, the Second Devil General will subdue him and I’ll heal his wounds. Then we can start working on our master plan. We’ll figure out where Dugu Nimou does business with the House of the Chiliocosm. Then we’ll ambush them, rob him blind, kill the people from the other dynasty, and frame him for everything. Afterward, we’ll simply take over his lands. And in the end, both I and the Second Devil General will be viceroys.”

“Not bad,” the Second Devil General said. “Not a bad plan at all. Although, it's nothing but a small-scale conspiracy.”

“Things always start out small,” Yang Qi replied. “Besides, to us, it's not small-scale. Jumping up to a position of commanding ten lands is going to bring immense benefits.”

“Fine. Besides, you’re the one in charge of all the crafty plots and machinations. You really are full of wicked tricks, boy. You even fooled me in the past. I'm just going to continue focusing on getting my strength back. I don’t have the time to plot and scheme. I'll just get myself ready to destroy the House of the Invincible.”

“Considering how strong the House of the Invincible is, even if you were at full strength, you might not succeed in destroying it. In any case, the plan is set, it's time to get to work.”

“Yes sir,” his four agents said as they flew away.

Their Master was named Dugu Hong, and he wasn't a viceroy, but rather an imperial supervisory censor, in other words, an official in charge of the discipline of viceroys. Because of his position, he had offended many people.

Although imperial supervisory censors were of a higher rank than viceroys, in terms of general power in the sect, there wasn’t a huge difference between them. And as long as the censors had evidence of misconduct, they could punish the viceroys however they wished.

Dugu Hong had a powerful cultivation base. His psychic scale and godhood rating were around five or six hundred million, placing him high on Yang Qi’s list of targets to acquire.

“Let’s go, Second Devil General,” Yang Qi said. “We're leaving the House of the Invincible to handle Dugu Hong. Doing it in the sect would be just too dangerous.”

“Let’s go!”

WHOOSH!

Now that they had official positions and were part of the system, it was easy to come and go. The destiny didn’t cause any problem for them.

“By the way, Yang Qi, considering we're both police chiefs and the destiny won’t cause any problems for us, why don't we sneak deeper into the sect and try to steal some treasure? I know the bastard patriarchs of this place have stockpiled some amazing things. For instance, they used to have Invincible Gold Pills, which were born out of primal-chaos and are considered preheaven treasures. If we could get some of those pills, my cultivation base would be back to normal in no time. And that piece of the Mahātmā Jade is probably near those pills. Let’s just work together to steal them.”

Yang Qi gave an enigmatic smile. “If you’re so confident, why not go do that yourself? What do you need my help for?”

“I could if I wanted to. But that purrling of yours might come in very handy. If it could sneak around in the halls of heaven, then getting around in the House of the Invincible would be a simple task for it.”

Chapter 1434: Viceroy of Ten Lands

“We need to take things slowly but surely. And don't forget, the halls of heaven are completely empty except for the will of the Sovereign Lord. The House of the Invincible is different. There are patriarchs keeping watch constantly.” Truth be told, Yang Qi was tempted to agree with the Second Devil General, as he sorely wanted that piece of the Mahātmā Jade.

Furthermore, he could sense that his collection was nearly complete. Once he got all the pieces and combined the jade with the God Legion Seal, he would be so mighty that he might surpass the Sovereign Lord.

Of course, he couldn't combine them on his own. But with the Great Necropolis, he could. The Great Necropolis was powerful enough to bury anything and everything, and was what had led to the ultimate downfall of the Sovereign Lord.

For that reason, Yang Qi knew that he had to get back into the Great Necropolis.

“What exactly are you waiting for?” the Second Devil General asked, frowning.

“I’m waiting to get a better handle on our current situation. Right now, we’re not even close to the higher echelons of power. You think being a chief of police is worth anything? Besides, the destiny is stronger in the depths of the sect. It would be too easy to alert the enemy to our presence. You were imprisoned for billions of years, Second Devil General. Why are you suddenly being so impatient?”

“It's because I was imprisoned for so long that I’m impatient!” the Second Devil General snapped back. “But everything you said makes sense. Fine, I’ll keep waiting.”

“Smart decision.” As their conversation played out, Yang Qi and the Second Devil General were flying out of the territory of the House of the Invincible.

Normally speaking, if a Paramount God tried to fly from one end of the House of the Invincible to the other, it could take hundreds or even thousands of years. But the Second Devil General was a mighty figure who, in a single breath, could pass by millions upon millions of worlds. And of course, the House of the Invincible was only a drop of water in the ocean compared to the god world as a whole.

Once they were outside the net of destiny, both the Second Devil General and Yang Qi felt a bit more relaxed. Things were so strictly monitored inside the sect that they couldn't use all of their divine abilities.

Now, it was a waiting game.

Hours passed, until eventually, they saw five figures flying in their direction. Leading the group was an old man. He was tall and muscular, but had a slightly hunched back. And there was a flicker of confusion in his eyes. This was the Master of Yang Qi’s four agents, Dugu Hong.

“Master, these are two consummate experts we recruited to help us take down Dugu Nimou.”

“Where exactly are these ‘consummate’ experts?” Dugu Hong asked, looking around with eagle eyes.

“We’re right here,” Yang Qi said, stepping forward with hands clasped behind his back. “Second Devil General, why don’t you take the lead here?”

“Hmph!” Snorting coldly, the Second Devil General waved his hand, causing devil clouds to roil out in all directions. It was as if a world of devils had arrived. The pitch black of countless hells erupted, instantly engulfing Dugu Hong.

The old man’s face fell, and then he burst into motion, becoming a lightning-like streak that shot up into the air. Unfortunately, as soon as he hit the devil energy, he was sent tumbling back down.

RUMBLE!

The Second Devil General reached out and grabbed Dugu Hong by the neck, immobilizing him.

“Y-you... who are you?” Dugu Hong stammered.

Voice cold, the Second Devil General said, “You sent your apprentices into the Bastille of the One God to look for me, didn’t you? You said that because I was injured, you could assimilate me to help you recover from your injuries. Well, I'm here, and I'm curious to see how you plan on assimilating me.”

So shocked that he looked like he might pass out, Dugu Hong said, “Y-you’re... y-you’re the ancient Second Devil General? Subordinate of the True Devil? His strongest follower?”

The Second Devil General really had been considered the strongest, as the First Devil General was a mahātmā who was adept at manipulating the workings of heaven, but not necessarily at battle.

The Second Devil General had a fiendish reputation and, similar to the Lord of Radiance and Light, was virtually invincible. He had shocked millions upon millions of worlds, and shaken the legion of gods. There were many legends about him, and all of them spoke of him as being the fiercest of fiend-devils. Now he was free, and although his cultivation base wasn’t back to normal, on a substructural level he was so mighty that any god that encountered him would piss their pants in terror.

“There’s no need to frighten him. And leave the sealing to me. If you try using your devil seal on him, it will be detected by the destiny of the sect, and will alert our enemies.” Without further fanfare, Yang Qi walked forward and latched his hand onto Dugu Hong’s head. Dugu Hong shivered as the power of the God Legion Seal sank into him.

At this point, Yang Qi’s cultivation base actually surpassed that of Dugu Hong. And he was being assisted by the Second Devil General! Because of that, Dugu Hong didn't stand a chance. Of course, Yang Qi could have handled him alone, but it would probably have involved many rounds of fighting. And Dugu Hong would have been further injured in the process.

Instead, Yang Qi was taking control of him before anything like that could happen.

Dugu Hong’s face went slack, and the Second Devil General clasped his hands behind his back, reined in his devil energy, and said, “I helped you rope in another expert, boy. Yet again your destiny will get stronger.”

Looking at Dugu Hong, Yang Qi said, “He’s nothing impressive. Dugu Hong, now that the process is over, you understand what’s going on. And I’ve already transmitted my plan directly into your sea of consciousness. What do you think? Second Devil General, hurry up and help heal his injuries. Extrude the chaotic true energy, and I’ll pour some restorative vital energy into him.

“Who do you think I am, boy? Hired labor?” The Second Devil General wasn’t pleased at all. However, he knew that Yang Qi had a master plan at work, and it would benefit himself.

He waved his hand, and Dugu Hong’s energy and blood started flowing rapidly, producing an incisive blade nimbus that spun in the Second Devil General’s direction.

“How impudent, you worthless piece of crap!” The Second Devil General chuckled coldly and flicked his finger, causing the blade nimbus to shatter. “The Grand-Chiliocosm God-Blade Incantation? The consummate art of the old Lord of the Chiliocosm? Don’t tell me he's been resurrected. Or did he just never die?”

Yang Qi could tell that the Second Devil General had learned something from what he’d just seen, but wasn’t inclined to press for details. Drawing on the aura of the Everlit Godlamp, he sent out a spark of flame into Dugu Hong, replenishing his vital energy. Before long, the man was back in top shape, and in fact, had made some cultivation progress.

Assessing Dugu Hong, Yang Qi nodded and said, “Not bad. Not bad at all. Now, there’s no time to lose. We're going to head to where Dugu Nimou does business with the House of the Chiliocosm, and rob him blind. I’ll also subjugate some people and have them blame him. That way, Dugu Nimou will have no way out.”

“Alright, let’s go,” Dugu Hong said. Truth be told, he was very pleased with how things were going, considering that he was going to get revenge on Dugu Nimou.

“The place where he does business with the House of the Chiliocosm is a great distance away, but I can lead the way.”

“There’s no need,” Yang Qi said. “I took the information from your mind a moment ago. Second Devil General, here’s the map. You take the lead.”

Whoosh. Whoosh. Whoosh.

Without bothering to waste words, the Second Devil General flew off over the glittering ocean. The ocean here looked different than anything Yang Qi had seen before. For one thing, the waves were wild and immense, so tall that they could touch the empyrean winds in the sky.

“This place is called the Wild Ocean. In the depths of the water, the godly might is wild and chaotic, so only Paramount Gods can come here. However, there are Demonfolk here, which makes it a profitable place to do business.”

They flew over the ocean until they came to a place filled with islands, all of which were covered with god kingdoms and strange peoples. And of course, there was plenty of fighting over everything from resources to godnotes to godstones.

It was very similar to the Heaven-Wretch Continent.

Of course, the Heaven-Wretch Continent was far smaller than this. Truth be told, although everyone said the Heaven-Wretch Continent was where the Wretch God had perished, Yang Qi had looked into the matter and couldn't find any conclusive evidence to prove that. For all he knew, it was just a place with strong wretch energy.

“Look, up ahead!” Dugu Hong pointed, and they saw a huge continent, atop which was a sprawling city with crystal walls protecting it from the wild winds.

Chapter 1435: Business Headquarters

It almost looked like an enormous, crystal turtle. In terms of size, it actually didn’t measure up to the Deva Dynasty. However, its destiny was fully ten times that of the Deva Dynasty. Although it was far beneath the level of the Land of Flowerhill, it was a perfect location for business out on the ocean.

Yang Qi could see that the interior of the headquarters was its own minor world, complete with a sun, moon, stars, mountains, rivers, plants and vegetation. By the standards of the impure lands, this would count as an immortal world with a rank of more than three thousand.

As for the roiling destiny here, it wasn’t that of the House of the Invincible, but the destiny of some other sovereign power.

It was obviously being used by an individual for off-the-books business.

Truth be told, it was very common for people in the Invincible Dynasty to have slush funds like this. They would use them to do business with foreign powers, and to build up personal destiny. In the House of the Invincible, the destiny ultimately belonged to the sect; who wouldn’t want to have their own private locations where they could have complete control of the destiny?

Nodding in admiration, Yang Qi said, “That crystal is made from the quintessence of divine water, solidified to make a god kingdom. It alone can be considered a treasure. Not only can it provide protection from the Wild Ocean, but it can also absorb vital energy from its surroundings.”

“It’s a magical treasure created by the ancient Water God,” the Second Devil General said. “I wouldn’t call it amazing, but it gets the job done. It’s called the Crystalline Turtle Shell Kingdom.”

He waved his hand to reveal the true state of the island, which was a turtle, flickering with bright light as it absorbed the surrounding vital energy. It was actually the center of an enormous tempest that drew power from the ocean and stored it inside.

“There’s incredible godly might in the depths of the Wild Ocean,” said Dugu Hong. “And it’s perfect for use in forging magical treasures. That’s why lots of top experts have kingdoms out here. Kill the demonlings in the ocean, and they can be brought to places like this to be harvested. Their meat is incredible, and they also have explosive power in them that can be put into medicinal pills that make thralls vastly more effective in battle.

“Milord, do we just attack right away? Destroy the crystalline kingdom and then capture those people from the House of the Chiliocosm?”

“Not yet. Dugu Nimou does business with these people, but it's not going to do us any good to capture some small fries. That won’t be enough to take down Dugu Nimou. We need someone important from the House of the Chiliocosm. Someone that ranks roughly the same as you. Who was it from there that injured you so badly? Do you have a name? I can go fight them personally.”

“His name is Chiliocosm Hegemon, and he's very strong. He’s a peak Paramount God, but he’s on the very cusp of a breakthrough, with a psychic scale and godhood rating of more than nine hundred million. You have to be careful, Milord. If I hadn’t used an ancient talisman to escape him, I would’ve been captured. He would have then forced me to make a confession of treason against the House of the Invincible, which would have been my ultimate downfall.”

“When does Chiliocosm Hegemon come here?” the Second Demon General asked. “You’re going to have to handle this on your own, Yang Qi. I can’t help you. The founder of the Chiliocosm Dynasty is someone that not even I can take lightly. If this Chiliocosm Hegemon summons him, then all our plans will be ruined. In fact, I'm going to use my Devil-World Nine-Transformations Three-Myriads Divine Ability to hide my aura. The task of capturing Chiliocosm Hegemon is yours alone.”

“No problem at all!” Yang Qi said. He knew the Second Devil General was just being lazy, but didn’t care. He was fully capable of handling the situation alone.

The entire group went into hiding, and night eventually fell.

At a certain point, a fierce wind kicked up over the sea. And at the same time, Yang Qi sensed an immense power piercing in their direction. Obviously, its destination was the crystalline turtle.

‘Chiliocosm Hegemon is here.’

Opening his Lord's Eye, he looked out and saw that a unique teleportation tunnel had sprung up, almost like a wormhole. And there was a group of people in it.

They were all dignified, imposing, and they were led by a man who wore a royal crown and was impressive in both bearing and cultivation level.

Obviously, he was a peak Paramount God.

The Second Devil General’s eyes widened. “What? What’s a peak Paramount God doing here?”

“A peak Paramount God?!” Dugu Hong said, shivering. “Crap. He's an important person from the House of the Chiliocosm! His name is Chiliocosm Kingnorth! He’s actually a marquis in the Chiliocosm Dynasty, where he's known as Marquis Three Realms. His magic can pierce through the three realms of truth, illusion, and that which is neither truth nor illusion. His divine abilities are boundless, and he's incredibly domineering.”

“Marquis Three Realms?” Yang Qi knew that in the god world, the ‘three realms’ were different than what people generally viewed the three realms to be. Normally, those three realms were the impure lands, immortal worlds, and god world. But in the god realm, things were different. The three realms referred to: the true realm; the illusory realm; and the realm that was neither true nor illusory. They were three realms that essentially represented reality, imagination, and Nevasaññānāsaññāyatana, that which was neither perception nor non-perception.

This Marquis Three Realms had magic that could encompass all three of those realms.

Looking over, Yang Qi saw that this newcomer’s godhood rating and psychic scale was somewhere between one and one point one billion. Although he might be able to fight someone like that, it wouldn’t be possible to crush him. The level of one billion was a major threshold, and reaching that point involved heaven-shaking, earth-toppling transformations. People like that were like the God-Lords of old, and generally had a name that conformed to the convention Lord of Such-and-Such.

Truth be told, the ‘Lord of the True Void’ from the House of God Ordainment didn't actually qualify to have a name like that. In ancient times, he would have been hunted down and killed for being so disrespectful. But nowadays, the Sovereign Lord had perished, and the old rules regarding status weren’t enforced. So when people started calling him the Lord of the True Void, he didn’t really care. And there wasn't anyone around who would cause him trouble because of it.

“Perfect timing,” Yang Qi said. “Second Devil General, you handle this Marquis Three Realms. I want him captured alive. If I infect him with a devil embryo, we’ll have a pawn in the Chiliocosm Dynasty, and will also be able to tap into its destiny. What do you think? We can split it seventy-thirty.”

“Seventy-thirty?” The Second Devil General said. “Sure. Me seventy, you thirty!”

“Fine, we can do fifty-fifty. Look, it’s not the time for haggling. Remember, even though you can beat this Marquis Three Realms in a fight, without the God Legion Seal, you can't control him. So let’s make sure we both benefit here. What do you say?”

“Fine. I’ll do it. Intercept the incoming teleportation. Use the Cruiser of Civilization to take that crystalline kingdom. You shouldn’t have any trouble doing that, right? Back during your relocation effort, you took the Deva Dynasty without any trouble. And now you have a hundred and fifty thousand sage monarch magistrates, all of them Paramount Gods, plus an additional piece of Mahātmā Jade from the halls of heaven. How strong are you now? You should be able to do that within a few breaths of time.”

“Intercepting a teleportation would be too dangerous. I’d rather wait until they’re in that crystalline kingdom, then secretly use the Cruiser of Civilization to take the whole thing. It’s just too bad we don’t have the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. It’s much better at this kind of thing than the cruiser. In any case, they’ll be trapped like turtles in a jar, which will make things very easy. Besides, if you make a move now, and one of them escapes, you’ll be beating the grass and startling the snake.”

The Second Devil General nodded. “Okay, that’ll do. You really think things through, don’t you, boy?” Let’s trap them in the Crystalline Turtle Shell Kingdom, that way none of them can escape.”

With that, they watched as the group proceeded through the teleportation tunnel until they were in the crystalline kingdom. Then, the Second Devil General exhaled a stream of devil light that covered them and made them as transparent as water.

“The Arūpa Nirābhāsa Heaven-Devil Battle Magic?” Yang Qi said. “Impressive. Not a bad way to hide yourself. Although, as a Fateless One, no one can divine any information about me.”

Having been rendered impossible to detect, they summoned the Cruiser of Civilization and shot up into the air.

With numerous heavenly caliber godstones to power it, Yang Qi could unleash aspects of the cruiser far beyond anything he had been capable of in the past.

Next, the power of the Arūpa Nirābhāsa Heaven-Devil Battle Magic spread out to cover the Crystalline Turtle Shell Kingdom, ensuring that no clues would spread as to what they were doing.

The Second Devil General was obviously being very careful.

Chapter 1436: Trapping Turtles in a Jar

It was really a case of trapping turtles in a jar.

They set the trap well, waiting for the target to enter the Crystalline Turtle Shell Kingdom. Then they would capture the people from the House of the Chiliocosm, plus Dugu Nimou.

They couldn't kill Dugu Nimou. Instead, they would injure him, then have the people from the House of the Chiliocosm blame him for attacking them. He would immediately fall from grace, whereupon Yang Qi could take over his territory before any of the leaders of the sect could do anything.

“I’ve already explained the plan in detail,” Yang Qi said. “Dugu Hong, take these heaven caliber godstones and bribe the necessary leaders in the House of the Invincible. I want to make sure that after all of this plays out, I can take over his territory.”

“Yes sir,” Dugu Hong replied. “We can’t kill Dugu Nimou, nor can we formally arrest him. All we can do is investigate any crimes he committed and then accuse him of misconduct. That’s the only way to overthrow him, according to the law. If we don’t follow the rules down to the last letter, it's going to be very problematic. Remember, Dugu Nimou has backers in the House of the Invincible, and they’ll rain violence onto us if they find out we’re trying to take him out.”

“It’s simple. Injure him and let him get away. In fact, make sure he escapes. The Second Devil General will just intercept him and entrap him in a warding magic from the dao of devils. While he’s trapped in there, he won’t be able to participate in the fighting. Then, after we leave, he’ll come back out with no idea of what happened.” Yang Qi laughed at the thought of it.

“Then that’s what we’ll do,” everyone said, nodding.

The Second Devil General was the only one who wasn’t nodding. “This is really annoying. We're still plotting? Yang Qi, why don’t you just subjugate him and put him under your control?”

“The downside to that is there wouldn't be any reason for us to be promoted to viceroy afterward. What good is it for us to be police chiefs? We need to step out from behind the curtain! That's what we’re doing here. Right now we’re in the shadows where no one will ever see us. But when we're viceroys, we can really flex our muscles. And then, when we can perform truly amazing services for the sect, we can start skyrocketing through the ranks. What do you think?”

“Agreed. Alright, let's begin. Boundless Devil Realm. Nurture the Dome of Heaven. The Dome of Heaven Devilized. Nine Yins Sun and Moon!”

RUMBLE!

The Second Devil General was drawing on a major trump card technique, causing an incomprehensible devil domain to spread out. It was called the Heaven Dome Devil Domain. It was also a major spell formation, and when it linked with the Cruiser of Civilization it would trap even the most powerful of experts. After making all the necessary preparations, the Second Devil General transformed into a tall young man with a waterfall of inky black hair and a black robe. He fairly radiated wretched evil, making it obvious at a glance that he wasn't a good person.

“Let’s go,” he said. “I’ve set everything up. Nobody can possibly escape this trap, so we might as well head into the Crystalline Turtle Shell Kingdom and see what these people from the House of the Chiliocosm are like. And I'm curious to see what this Yang Chiliocosm is all about. I've always considered him a major enemy.”

“Hold on,” Yang Qi said. “Are you saying that the Lord of the Chiliocosm is actually named Yang Chiliocosm?”

Yang Qi was obviously sensitive about the surname Yang, and was more than a little surprised to hear the Second Devil General calling the Lord of the Chiliocosm, a powerful God-Lord from ancient times, by the same surname as himself.

“Yeah, that’s right. The Lord of the Chiliocosm is named Yang Chiliocosm. He’s a reflection of the chiliocosm of worlds, and was born in ancient times in a mysterious and enigmatic way. In other words, he predates the god world. He has a lot of descendants too. Right, you’re surnamed Yang, and so is he. I bet that’s not a coincidence. I wonder if the two of you are related. Think about it. There are three major powers in the god world. The Central Dynasty is run by the Proud Clan, and they’re obviously your enemy. The House of the Invincible is connected to your Master from the impure lands, the Invincible Dugu. And the House of the Chiliocosm has the Yang Clan, which is the same surname you bear. You think that’s just random chance? I think not. It looks to me more like fate and predestination.”

“I think you’re right,” Yang Qi replied. “I need to get to the bottom of this. Oh, right. Second Devil General, you know a lot about the ancient god world. Are you aware of any Fateless Ones other than myself?”

“Fateless Ones?” The Second Devil General’s brow furrowed in thought. “I haven’t heard of any. Eternal Ones and Fortuned Ones, yes. But Fateless Ones were little more than legend. That said, I’ve been imprisoned since the God Legion Tribulation. Who knows what happened in the billions of years I was away. Although, it would be strange if there was another Fateless One besides you. The old stories always said there could only be a single Fateless One at any given time.”

‘It does seem strange,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘Fateless Ones are supposed to be extremely formidable, so why wouldn’t he settle down and found some sect? I'd say it’s highly likely he’s in one of the three major dynasties. I have a feeling this other Fateless One is my archenemy. I have to be on guard constantly.’

“Enough jabbering. Let's get inside.” The Second Devil General waved his finger to call on the Myriad Worlds Greater Teleportation, causing himself and the others to enter the Crystalline Turtle Shell Kingdom.

Big things were happening inside.

In a majestic meeting hall, a teleportation portal whizzed to life and a group of people appeared.

Leading them was Marquis Three Realms, a peak Paramount God from the House of the Chiliocosm. And standing next to him was someone roughly on the same level as Buddha Thunderjolt. He was Chiliocosm Hegemon, the same one who had previously injured Dugu Hong.

The rest of the people present were all late Paramount Gods with godhood ratings and psychic scales of two or three hundred million. All of them were viceroys in the Chiliocosm Dynasty.

There was a group of people waiting for them, including Dugu Nimou and certain other viceroys from the House of the Invincible, who Yang Qi could identify thanks to the destiny around them.

“Greetings, greetings!” Dugu Nimou said, rising to his feet and bowing at the waist.

“Cut the crap,” Chiliocosm Hegemon said. “We have demands, Dugu Nimou. You have to stop the upcoming wedding. It won’t do to have Sprite Susu marry Dugu Yunkong. If this marriage alliance happens, the Spritefolk will be inextricably linked with the House of the Invincible. And the combined strength of the Dugu Clan and the Spritefolk will disrupt the balance of power among the three major dynasties. We’ve already called on many of our most important relationships to make sure this doesn't happen. Our leaders are all involved, and numerous spies have been called to action. Normally speaking, the responsibility would be all mine, but considering the important nature of the matter, Marquis Three Realms has been sent to help. There’s not much to discuss, Dugu Nimou. You've done a lot of work for the Chiliocosm Dynasty, and have benefited a lot as a result. And when you help this time, you’ll benefit more than ever.”

Turning to Marquis Three Realms, Dugu Nimou said, “And what benefits will they be, exactly?”

“Simple,” Marquis Three Realms replied. “We’ll make sure you reach the peak Paramount God level. But you have to accomplish the mission. We know that you have a lot of connections to the top leaders in your sect. And I’ve brought lots of valuables and treasures that you can use for bribes.”

Eyes lighting up, Dugu Nimou said, “In that case, this won’t be a problem, Marquis Three Realms. Don’t worry. I've been working for the Chiliocosm Dynasty for years, so surely you trust me by now. When have I ever failed you?”

Marquis Three Realms smiled. “You're right. However, you're still a member of the House of the Invincible, which makes it a bit odd that you’re so willing to work with us.”

“There’s nothing odd about it. People will die for riches just as birds will die for food. What’s so strange about that? I can’t profit enough in the House of the Invincible, so it's only natural that I would branch out to the House of the Chiliocosm. I'm out for myself. And if the House of the Invincible can't take care of me, screw ‘em. As long as I can rapidly improve my cultivation, why should I care who dies? I'm sure there are plenty of people like me in the House of the Chiliocosm as well. You know, I heard that the Central Dynasty has sent a lot of spies into the Chiliocosm Dynasty. It seems like a tricky situation. You people should be on the lookout.”

“There will always be spy wars,” Marquis Three Realms said. “Let’s cut to the chase, Dugu Nimou. Do you agree to the deal?”

“I can do it for you, no problem. The truth is that there are quite a few leaders who aren’t happy with Dugu Yunkong. They think he’s too arrogant, and in reality, he has a lot of competition. There are many parties who would love for his marriage to Sprite Susu to fail. After all, if it goes through, he’s only going to have more reason to be cocky. Furthermore, the Spritefolk really are thinking of throwing their support behind the House of the Invincible. If they do, the destiny of the House of the Invincible will grow by at least thirty percent. That's definitely going to disturb the balance of things, and affect the dao of heaven of the god world as a whole. So yes, I’ll definitely do this for you, Marquis Three Realms. As long as you don’t hold back when it comes to the compensation.”

Marquis Three Realms chuckled coldly. “How much compensation are you asking for? Don’t get too greedy!”

Chapter 1437: Trapping Turtles in a Jar (2)

Dugu Nimou flashed a smile tinged with greed. “It’s not that complicated. Look, I just want to profit a bit off of this situation. The House of the Chiliocosm isn’t going to be stingy, is it?”

“What do you want?” Marquis Three Realms repeated, looked slightly less than pleased.

“Not much. Just national destiny. As you know, Marquis Three Realms, my current situation only provides me with a bit of destiny. The land we're in now is my personal property, but back in the House of the Invincible, the fact that I’m a viceroy of ten lands doesn’t mean much. After all, that land is really the property of the House of the Invincible. I just administer it. So I need destiny. At the very minimum, the same amount that would be provided by thirty lands back home. What do you say? In the end, I want a hundred times what my Crystalline Turtle Shell Kingdom can provide. All you need to do is give me enough slaves, nations, and sects to fill up my personal property here, and boost its destiny.”

“A hundred times what you have here? Thirty lands’ worth of destiny?” Marquis Three Realms smiled. “That’s pretty greedy of you, Dugu Nimou. I myself am only a viceroy of a hundred lands, which means you're essentially asking for thirty percent of what I command back home. That’d be quite a setback for me.”

“Wrong, it wouldn’t be a setback. Your original offer was to make me a peak Paramount God, right? Sadly, I have no way to trust that you can make that happen. So this is my offer. My Crystalline Turtle Shell Kingdom needs to grow a hundred times larger. With that much destiny, I can reach the peak level on my own.”

“Well played,” Marquis Three Realms said, his eyes glittering with killing intent. “Fine. I’ll help you achieve your goals. But if it turns out you’re trying to screw with me, I’ll make sure you die a horrible death.”

“I’m not screwing with you. I want us both to come out of this on top! I need to expand my personal holdings and use the improvement in destiny to bolster my cultivation base. Without destiny, it's impossible to do anything! And unfortunately, the destiny of the House of the Invincible is sealed as tight as can be.

“You’re right,” a voice said. “Destiny is very valuable. Everyone wants to get their hands on more of it. Unfortunately, Dugu Nimou, you're selling out your own sect to get it, and that’s a capital offense. I had evidence of this before, only to be set upon by the House of the Chiliocosm, who stole that evidence. But things are different now. You can't wriggle out of this situation!”

It was Dugu Hong who, to the shock of everyone present, stepped out into the open, flanked by Yang Qi, the Second Devil General, and Yang Qi’s four agents. Of course, the Second Devil General had disguised himself so that he looked exactly like one of the four agents.

“It’s you!” Dugu Nimou growled, and the atmosphere suddenly became extremely tense. “How dare you come here, Dugu Hong. Are you feeling suicidal or something?”

“I'm here to expose you, Dugu Nimou. I can hardly believe you’d sell out our sect for personal gain! Not even pigs or dogs would stoop so low. I'm going to report you to the leaders of the sect, and they’ll take everything from you. This time, you have no way to get rid of the evidence. So get on your knees and admit your crimes! If you don’t, I’ll make sure you’re damned by myriad tribulations!”

Before anything else could happen, Dugu Hong turned to Marquis Three Realms and the others. “You're an important person, Marquis Three Realms. But this is an internal matter pertaining to the House of the Invincible. Please don’t interfere. I’m arresting Dugu Nimou and his rebel followers, then taking them back home to stand trial. I'm also going to tell them all about how you’ve infiltrated our sect. Going forward, it's not going to be easy for you to get more spies to work for you.”

In response, the people from the House of the Chiliocosm burst into laughter.

“What did you just say? Did you catch a mental illness, Dugu Hong? Have you gone completely insane? You think you can just burst in here and take control of the situation. Hilarious! Do you really think you can just tell us to go away and leave your sect alone, and we’ll agree? I had no idea people as stupid as you even existed! Seriously, this is very funny!”

“What, are you saying you intend to continue interfering in our sect’s affairs?” Dugu Hong’s expression flickered. “You were the one who injured me recently, Chiliocosm Hegemon, and now I can prove it. Aren’t you worried about instigating a war between our two sects? Will you people take responsibility if that happens?”

“War?” said Chiliocosm Hegemon, smiling sardonically. “So what if there’s a war? And do you really think killing you is going to be difficult or something? You've walked into a trap here. We can just kill you and give your land to Dugu Nimou to save a bit on what we owe him.”

“Dugu Nimou? How dare you! You still have time to make things right. But if you insist on siding with these people, it’ll prove that you’re a traitor. Word will spread, and even if you kill me, the sect will find out. I'm an imperial censor! My death will affect the destiny of the sect, and they’ll send people to investigate. Did you never consider that?”

Dugu Hong was playing everything according to the rules and was denouncing Dugu Nimou on the record to serve as incontrovertible proof of his treason.

“That’s rubbish. I can subvert the workings of heaven, so of course I can kill you without anyone ever finding out. We're outside of the House of the Invincible, so their law doesn’t apply here. Furthermore, we can make sure you’re accused of colluding with outsiders. We were just working out a business deal here with Dugu Nimou when you barged in and started causing problems. You definitely deserve to die. In fact, if I didn't kill you, heaven and earth would accuse me of misconduct! So, are you ready to die?”

At this point, the Second Devil General suddenly sighed in boredom. “Ai. All of this posturing is really annoying. If you’re going to fight, just fight. Why drag things out?”

With no warning, he thrust his hand out, causing clouds of devil energy to fill the sky, like an army of devils out to defy heaven and subvert reincarnation. In the blink of an eye, Dugu Hong and all the others from the House of the Invincible were locked in place and unable to move.

This was a consummate art from the dao of devils, the Devil-Domain Grand-Emptiness Claw, and once it was unleashed, few people in existence could break out of it.

The wailing of ghosts and weeping of gods could be heard as the devil claw covered everything, removing time, space, fate, movement, and even thought.

The minds of everyone affected went completely blank, as their souls were removed and they became like the walking dead. As for the peak Paramount God, Marquis Three Realms, he stood there with a look of pain on his face, as if he had been thrust into a nightmare.

A pitch-black devilish crystal formed around all of the viceroys from the House of the Invincible, imprisoning them in a way that would last for all eternity unless the Second Devil General released them.

“W-who... who are you?”

When a true expert acts, real skill will be on display. And everyone from the Chiliocosm Dynasty could sense that they were looking at just that. Even Marquis Three Realms seemed to be shaking with fear. Voice trembling, he said, “W-what... what do you think you’re doing?”

Clasping his hands behind his back, the Second Devil General gave a cold harrumph and said, “Your Lord of the Chiliocosm, Yang Chiliocosm, might be able to ask me questions like that. But you think a little brat like you has the right? I'm not inclined to force you to submit to me. I'd rather you do it of your own accord. Join me, and live. Refuse, and die.”

Having sensed the Second Devil General’s mighty devil energy, Marquis Three Realms couldn't stop himself from asking, “Just who exactly are you?! You must be some expert from ancient times. You actually know our founding patriarch, the Lord of the Chiliocosm?” Having reached this level of cultivation, Marquis Three Realms was no fool, therefore, he didn't dare to take any action.

He knew that the Second Devil General was some sort of terrifyingly almighty entity that existed on a higher level than himself.

It was just like when an animal met another animal that was higher on the food chain. It wasn’t just a difference of cultivation base, but rather, of the substructure of their life force. It was like a rat facing an eagle. How could the former even think about trying to fight the latter?

“Allow me to explain, Marquis Three Realms,” Yang Qi said, stepping forward. “This is the Second Devil General, subordinate of the True Devil, who fought the Sovereign Lord himself, and killed the Lord of Radiance and Light. Even your Lord of the Chiliocosm couldn't compare to him. So the question now is... why haven’t you dropped to your knees? Are you really trying to get yourself killed?”

“S-s-second... Second Devil General?!” Marquis Three Realms stammered, his teeth literally chattering from fear.

Chapter 1438: Peak Battle Prowess

The Second Devil General’s name would strike fear into the hearts of any who heard it, especially the top experts who existed among top experts. People like that were in the know, and weren’t like low-level hotheads, who were unaware of how terrifying ancient devils could be.

“How about we just keep out of each other’s affairs, Second Devil General?” Marquis Three Realms said deferentially.

“‘Keep out of each other’s affairs’? Cut the crap! I want you to acknowledge allegiance to me, so get down and start kowtowing! Give me your souls, flesh, and blood as a sacrifice. The alternative is for you to die horrible deaths.”

The Second Devil General was a brutal and ruthless person who didn’t offer any quarter. He definitely qualified to act that way, and who would dare to defy him?

Maintaining his cool, Marquis Three Realms said, “Second Devil General, we're from the House of the Chiliocosm. Our patriarch, the Lord of the Chiliocosm, has always admired you. How about, instead, we take you to our sect to meet him. He’ll definitely be willing to give you at least half of the destiny of the House of the Chiliocosm. That would be much better than working for the House of the Invincible like you are now.”

He was an insightful man, and therefore, he immediately angled to recruit the Second Devil General. Having an apex expert like him would obviously be incredibly useful. And if Yang Qi didn’t already control the Second Devil General with the God Legion Seal, it might have worked.

As soon as the offer was made, Yang Qi could sense the calculating thoughts within the Second Devil General’s mind. After all, if the Second Devil General could get access to a major flow of destiny, he might be able to break free from Yang Qi’s control.

“Second Devil General, please, think about it. Although it wouldn’t be possible to share control of the nation with you, as long as you were working with us, it would change everything. The Chiliocosm Dynasty would easily defeat the Central Dynasty and the Invincible Dynasty. And just imagine the destiny you would have access to then!” Marquis Three Realms was being very glib.

“Are you serious?” the Second Devil General said.

“Very serious, sir. Given how mighty you are, it's no exaggeration to say you can subjugate countless other top experts. In fact, you really are one-of-a-kind. Besides, your name alone would be enough to cause countless experts from the daos of demons and devils to flock to you. With their destiny, plus the destinies of the other major sects, you would be able to break through any bottleneck. And our alliance would be so strong that nobody could possibly resist us.”

“He talks a good talk, but you can’t trust him,” Yang Qi said. “Enough jabbering, Second Devil General. Let’s see some action here.”

The Second Devil General snorted coldly. He knew that Yang Qi could spy on some of his thoughts, although at the moment, he didn’t care. “I know I can’t trust them. And for the moment, I'm not interested in fighting with you.”

“Well alright then!” Yang Qi said. Without any further ado, he launched a sudden attack on Chiliocosm Hegemon, using the God Tombstone Palms. He also threw in some of the various consummate arts from the Dragonfolk, as well as the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth and the Unspoiled Body. In the end, it was a massive, surging attack that nobody would be able to identify.

The Second Devil General was inwardly surprised. ‘The boy’s cultivation just keeps advancing. Very impressive. He has a very high level of command of the martial path, and will definitely reach the peak Paramount God level soon. Once he fully assimilates that lamp, he's going to be even harder to kill. This is getting more and more troublesome.’

Even as Yang Qi attacked, he projected a message to the Second Devil General. “You keep Marquis Three Realms under control, Second Devil General. I’ll handle the other experts from the House of the Chiliocosm. Got it?”

“Hmph!” Although the Second Devil General wasn’t particularly pleased, he complied.

In the blink of an eye, an enormous devil claw was rushing toward Marquis Three Realms.

“Damn you!” Marquis Three Realms blurted, his face falling. With a shout of rage, he unleashed boundless fighting prowess, his psychic scale and godhood rating surging as he transformed into a shining saber nimbus that shot, not toward the devil claw, but toward Yang Qi.

He could tell that Yang Qi was the person calling the shots here, and given the fact that his cultivation base was low, if he could be captured, Marquis Three Realms would probably have a perfect bargaining chip.

Refusing to fight the Second Devil General was actually a very good decision. There was no way he was strong enough for that. It would have been as humorous as an ant trying to fight an anteater.

“Chiliocosm God Saber; Slash Three Thousand Worlds; Reintegrate Worlds; Transform Lands; Let Catastrophe Come; Civilization Appears!” He fully transformed into a saber, every particle, scrap of blood, and trace of energy within him, causing him to speed forward, slashing through anything in his path with invincible momentum.

This was a killing move that had been perfected by the Lord of the Chiliocosm himself. It was the Chiliocosm Slash!

The idea behind the name was that the technique could slash through a chiliocosm of worlds.

Make the man a blade. Make the blade energy. Make the energy a god. Make the god kill!

When the blade locked onto Yang Qi, he immediately felt his hackles rising. After all, he hadn’t expected this development. Marquis Three Realms was a peak Paramount God with a psychic scale and godhood rating of over a billion. And although he was too weak to fight the Second Devil General, his attack was more than enough to cause problems for Yang Qi.

Theoretically speaking, Marquis Three Realms could have tried to kill Dugu Hong and the others. But that wouldn’t have done any good. Yang Qi and the Second Devil General were the truly important people here, and Marquis Three Realms could tell they had an agreement between each other.

Therefore, he was making a gamble.

As he drew fully on his psyche and energy to use the Chiliocosm Slash, the Second Devil General’s devil claw suddenly stopped moving. He could have blocked the slash, but obviously he was waiting to see if it would kill Yang Qi.

He was trying to lend someone a knife and have them do his dirty work for him. He couldn't do it himself because he was bound up by the God Legion Seal. But if he could ensure that Yang Qi was dead, the end result would be the same.

Then perhaps he could devour Yang Qi and benefit wildly.

“God Legion Paradise. Superlative Defense!”

But it wasn't as if Yang Qi was the type of person who would freeze in the face of danger. And his reactions surpassed what ordinary humans were capable of. It had to do with how Yang Qi had come to a deep understanding of the heavenly workings calculations systems in the Cruiser of Civilization. He had removed any negative emotions from himself, remaining completely cool and collected. In fact, he himself was like a photonic computer, his own version of the heavenly workings calculations systems that could analyze anything in one-septillionth of a second. All of a sudden, there was an eruption of the most majestic invincibility imaginable.

It was the Superlative Defense of the God Legion Paradise, and it had appeared so quickly that it almost seemed as if he had anticipated this moment, and prepared for it.

Crash. Rattle.

The Chiliocosm Slash hit the Superlative Defense, causing a huge collapse of greyspaces, warding magics, spell formations, god trees, mountains, oceans, and civilizations. However, despite those things being destroyed, the attack couldn't touch Yang Qi, who remained in the middle of the God Legion Paradise, seemingly a combination of illusory and real, full and empty.

RUMBLE!

Marquis Three Realms became an embodiment of godly might that pierced into the God Legion Paradise, like an intense fire that could conquer every obstacle.

The Chiliocosm Slash could slice through three realms: the real realm, the illusory realm, and the realm of Nevasaññānāsaññāyatana.

“Die!”

The blade slashed all the way through the Superlative Defense until it was right in front of Yang Qi. He sat between the twin trees of permanence and impermanence, seemingly oblivious to the incoming blade.

It was hard to say exactly what psychic state he was in.

From the moment the Second Devil General had attacked, to when Marquis Three Realms shifted tactics, and Yang Qi unfurled the Superlative Defense, only a brief moment had passed.

Chapter 1439: The Blade Misses

One slash to destroy a major chiliocosm.

The God Legion Paradise’s Superlative Defense was pierced in the blink of an eye, and the attack was right in front of Yang Qi. The Second Devil General was intentionally refraining from interfering, as he viciously hoped to see Yang Qi suffer a major loss.

However, Yang Qi’s mind worked like the heavenly workings calculations systems, allowing him to remain calm and perfectly react to any development.

Marquis Three Realms was using his most powerful move. However, Yang Qi wasn’t necessarily in a bad position. He had achieved incredible cultivation advancement recently, getting another piece of the Mahātmā Jade, the Everlit Godlamp, and some of the Second Devil General’s devilishness. He also had over a hundred thousand sage monarch magistrates, all of them Paramount Gods.

Although Yang Qi was still a late Paramount God, his fighting prowess was definitely equivalent to the peak level.

Ding!

Yang Qi reached out and grabbed the incoming blade, and as he did, dazzling light surrounded him.

The saber nimbus exploded, and the light once again took the shape of a Marquis Three Realms, tall and mighty, bursting with a domineering energy that made him seem like someone impossible to defend against.

“Grand Chiliocosm Retroconversion!”

“A Hundred Battles in the Dome of Heaven!”

“Cauldron Furnace Triple Participation!”

“Temperamental Unified Destruction!”

“Splitting of Heaven and Earth!”

“Myriad Truths Prolong Life!”

“Establishing a Holy Pilgrimage!”

“Paragonic Nines!”

He unleashed a host of deadly moves, all of them filled with explosive godpower that sought to chop Yang Qi into mincemeat.

Unfortunately for Marquis Three Realms, Yang Qi’s cultivation base was actually superior to his. And although his overall level was weaker, his fighting prowess was exponentially better. Some of that was because of the God Legion Seal, while some was from his personal enlightenment. Of course, he also had the Everlit Godlamp, which allowed him to tap into the ancient battle records of the Cruiser of Civilization, which could be inserted directly into his mind.

Because of that, his fighting experience was in no way inferior to that of the Second Devil General.

And because he had partial control of the Second Devil General, he could also connect with his thoughts and peer into his life force substructure. And of course, that also improved his fighting capabilities. It was hardly possible to imagine how many blood-soaked battles the general had been involved in during his time.

Yang Qi erupted with a consummate attack that could end the heavens and crush the earth, culminating in the final move from the Sage Monarch Grand Magic, the one he had added in thanks to the Great Necropolis: Annul Death; Eternally Bury.

As he unleashed the move, he transformed into an enormous necropolis that could crush any type of vital energy. It was as if the Great Necropolis itself were present. The Great Necropolis was the ultimate god item. After all, not even the God Legion Seal, Mahātmā Jade, Cruiser of Civilization, or Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart could compare to it. Even the Sovereign Lord himself had failed to deal with it.

The Great Necropolis could bury the entire god world!

As the Great Necropolis, Yang Qi crushed all the moves that had been unleashed against him.

Chiliocosm Hegemon and all the other late Paramount God experts were also affected, and could only watch wordlessly as Annul Death; Eternally Bury was unleashed. Deep in the Cruiser of Civilization, the spell formations Yang Qi had set up were constantly producing heaven caliber godstones, which were true expressions of godpower.

“Cruiser of Civilization; Godpower Eruption!”

RUMBLE!

A boundless surge of godpower appeared as the cruiser shot into the open, glowing with boundless light as a hundred thousand sage monarch magistrates charged forth.

The cruiser's power instantly negated the warding spells of the Crystalline Turtle Shell Kingdom, transforming the dao of heaven. At the same time, a thunderous voice rang out.

“All living beings in the Crystalline Turtle Shell Kingdom should know that their leader, Dugu Nimou, has been captured. Traitors will be purged from the House of the Invincible. If you surrender and abandon your traitorous way, you’ll be allowed to live. Otherwise, be slaughtered!”

With the primeval god skills provided by Eternal Millennium, the sage monarch magistrates were unstoppable. In fact, everyone was paralyzed with fear. Of course, the fact that they were supposedly acting on behalf of the House of the Invincible was extremely helpful.

Meanwhile, Dugu Hong and the others all flew out. “I am Dugu Hong, imperial censor of the eastern division in the House of the Invincible! All ye present, surrender immediately! Otherwise, you’ll be punished by this army!”

Everything was going according to Yang Qi’s plan.

The destiny of the Crystalline Turtle Shell Kingdom was immense, such that it was nearly ten times that of the Deva Dynasty. Obviously, it would provide a major boost to Yang Qi.

In addition to the sage monarch magistrates, Yang Qi’s friends and family flew out to help subjugate the Crystalline Turtle Shell Kingdom. No one resisted. After all, ‘the army of the House of the Invincible’ was here, and not even Dugu Nimou could do anything, despite being a viceroy.

WHOOSH!

Jadefall flew into the Crystalline Turtle Shell Kingdom and soon faced the gathered government officials, a group of thousands of Paramount Gods with Unbounded will convergence. They immediately dropped to their knees and offered Jadefall the official national seal, which was made of crystal.

“Ma’am, we’re the officials of the Crystalline Turtle Shell Kingdom. We followed orders from Dugu Nimou, but had no idea that he was a traitor. We all surrender! We’re willing to turn from the evil path to the righteous one. Just spare our lives!”

They knew full well that a major change was taking place, and if they weren’t careful, they would end up dead.

RUMBLE!

Jadefall accepted the seal of authority.

As she did, the Crystalline Turtle Shell Kingdom shook as the destiny shifted, flowing into the Sage Monarch Society in the Cruiser of Civilization. It was a major increase, triple what the Sage Monarch Society had possessed before.

Yang Qi, being directly connected to the Cruiser of Civilization, could sense how amazing the influx was.

At the same time, the cruiser suddenly expanded as it achieved a higher state of being.

[Beep-beep-beep. Beep-beep-beep.]

Deep in the imperial-heaven pre-beginning systems, the Engine of the One God whirred to life.

[Legacy of Civilization activated. Destiny has reached a critical mass. Start the destiny systems. Destiny valuation: one.]

Yang Qi wasn’t at all surprised to hear that there was something called the destiny valuation. He was familiar with things like the psychic scale and the godhood rating, and since destiny was vastly more profound and powerful, it only made sense that there would be systems governing it.

Before, the destiny Yang Qi had accumulated, that of Eternal Millennium, the Deva Dynasty, the Sumeru Temple, and the Nine Dragons Court, had been so insignificant it didn't even merit a valuation of one. Not even the destiny he had tapped into from the House of the Invincible had reached the level of one.

But now, his influx of destiny had reached that level.

Before, Marquis Three Realms, Chiliocosm Hegemon, and the others had at least been able to struggle against the Great Necropolis. But now they were completely crushed.

Yang Qi had vanquished the Crystalline Turtle Shell Kingdom and made it part of the Cruiser of Civilization. As a result, his cultivation base was climbing higher.

Aaaaoooooo!

His speed of assimilating the Everlit Godlamp increased, and his godhood rating rose. Streams of radiance and light filled him.

RUMBLE!

As he subjugated Marquis Three Realms, a new throne appeared in the God Legion Seal.

Chapter 1440: Destiny Valuation

After conquering the Crystalline Turtle Shell Kingdom, Yang Qi reached a destiny valuation of one. To him, destiny was a key that could be used to unlock the various ‘treasure chests’ he owned.

He had many such ‘treasure chests’, including the Everlit Godlamp, God Legion Seal, and Mahātmā Jade, all of which contained boundless might, but weren’t possible to fully tap into without enough destiny.

As a result, as soon as he conquered the Crystalline Turtle Shell Kingdom, the Everlit Godlamp became like his own flesh and blood, and his Great Necropolis form crushed Marquis Three Realms with such force that the man couldn't move. At the same time, the God Legion Seal bored into his mind.

Now Marquis Three Realms was under his control. And of course, there was also Chiliocosm Hegemon and the other experts from the Chiliocosm Dynasty, all of whom now realized that he was the bearer of the God Legion Seal.

‘Unfortunately,’ Yang Qi thought, ‘although I subjugated them, I don’t have their destiny. It’s tied too closely to the Chiliocosm Dynasty and there’s no way for me to take it forcibly.’

It was similar to how, in the impure lands, it wasn’t possible to just kill a government official and take over their position. On the contrary, killing that government official would only make one the target of a deadly manhunt.

In fact, not only did Yang Qi not get any destiny after subjugating Marquis Three Realms and the others, but the destiny of the Chiliocosm Dynasty actually fought back against him. Thankfully, that fight was easily negated.

Going forward, though, things would be much easier. With these people working for him, he could get into the Chiliocosm Dynasty much more easily. And Marquis Three Realms would be able to send resources to him in secret.

“You're... you’re the bearer of the God Legion Seal? That’s what’s controlling us? We’re now like the ancient legion of gods, who were always under the control of the Sovereign Lord?” All of them had ashen expressions as they realized the unchangeable situation they were in.

“This matter is concluded. Sadly, you lot, especially you, Chiliocosm Hegemon, are going to have to sacrifice yourself so we can put the blame of Dugu Nimou, and get the position of viceroy. Marquis Three Realms, you go back and start fomenting war between the Chiliocosm Dynasty and the House of the Invincible. You also need to send me as many resources as possible, including whatever destiny you can give.”

Yang Qi knew that all of these people had slush funds full of resources, like the Crystalline Turtle Shell Kingdom, and that with such destiny, which would be greater than the Deva Dynasty, he could accomplish a lot.

Destiny was everything now.

With the destiny systems of the Cruiser of Civilization to assess it, Yang Qi now knew that, with the addition of the Crystalline Turtle Shell Kingdom, his own destiny valuation was one. As for the House of the Invincible, what was its valuation? Tens of thousands? Millions? Tens of millions? Perhaps even a hundred million?

They had been building it up for billions of years, and could use it to directly ordain gods. It was truly terrifying.

Regardless of the actual number, it was certain that Yang Qi's destiny didn’t compare to it at all. He just couldn’t have done so in the amount of time he had lived. Destiny and cultivation base were different. One could only advance their cultivation base by breaking through countless difficult bottlenecks. But once they started accumulating destiny, there would be no limits to its growth.

In the impure lands, many royal dynasties were so plagued by corruption that they would collapse. Eventually, a dynasty would reach a point where there was no territory left to expand into, whereupon competing internal factions would ultimately grow too powerful, and everything would fall apart. But the god world was different. There was no limit to the expansion that was possible there. What was more, teleportation portals made immensely large territories possible to navigate.

Back when Yang Qi joined the House of God Ordainment, he had thought it was a large place, until he reached the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty.

But then he had seen the Deva Dynasty, and realized that a minor magician pales into insignificance in the presence of a great one. And it wasn’t until he learned of the Invincible Dynasty that he knew what a truly paragonic organization was like in the god world.

How could he possibly compete with an organization like that, which had been accumulating destiny for billions of years? Right now, his only hope of getting anything like that was infiltrating the place and taking the destiny for his own.

Now that he had people like Marquis Three Realms under control, he could just take from their personal stores. As for Dugu Hong, he would be tasked with taking Dugu Nimou and Chiliocosm Hegemon back for trial.

They couldn’t just execute them without risking a strong negative reaction from higher-ups in the sect. They needed to do things by the book for now, and back them up with some bribes with the heaven caliber godstones Yang Qi had given to Dugu Hong for that purpose.

Yang Qi remained behind, directing the sage monarch magistrates in a campaign to conquer more territory in this area and grow his destiny. He also needed to do more research into the profundities of destiny.

For now, he was confident that his enlightenment of daoist techniques was sufficient.

He had fully mastered pill concocting, energy arts, the dao of heaven, and magical laws. But he still didn’t understand everything there was to know about destiny.

Before, he had been able to effectively use destiny, but there were many unimaginable aspects that he couldn’t utilize. But after seeing how the House of the Invincible worked, he realized that destiny was much more useful than he had ever imagined.

The higher-ups in the sect could take a random chief of police with a nonexistent cultivation base, and directly push them all the way to the peak Consummate God level.

He even suspected that a Quasi-God that was appointed as a viceroy could be made a Paramount God. Of course, it would be a huge waste of destiny.

The Invincible Dynasty wouldn't actually do something like that. According to the ironclad laws of the sect, viceroys had to have a late Paramount God cultivation base before being appointed.

What techniques would be involved in pushing a Quasi-God all the way to the Paramount God level? It was something Yang Qi couldn't possibly do. Rather, it was something one would expect only the old Sovereign Lord to have been capable of.

In the depths of the Cruiser of Civilization, Yang Qi looked out at his immense kingdom, with the sage monarch magistrates there to run things impartially.

They didn’t need any of the destiny, which was a very important point.

Normally speaking, government officials would need to tap into the destiny to exercise authority. In other words, the more government officials there were, the more damage it would do to the national destiny.

If there was one thing that could herald doom for any dynasty, it was a proliferation of government officials. It was different with Yang Qi. His government officials were the sage monarch magistrates, and they didn’t require even a drop of destiny. It was a mysterious thing. Even demons made of wood who became government officials would still need destiny.

Not even ancient angels were an exception to that.

But with Yang Qi, his government officials were willing to sacrifice selflessly, leading to flourishing growth. Furthermore, because his kingdom was inside the Cruiser of Civilization, it made things even more efficient. The cruiser could produce all sorts of goods as long as there was enough power to keep it running. And that, in turn, fueled further growth.

Looking out, Yang Qi saw the destiny pulsing out. Some of it was chaotic, but he quickly exercised control and cleared it up. In most large empires, there would be plenty of infighting. But in the Cruiser of Civilization, the photonic computers could scan everything, and ensure that the guilty could never escape justice from heaven. No one could escape karma here.

Anyone who tried to plot against an enemy would face the full wrath of the law.

With justice enforced so strictly, no one dared to act unlawfully. The destiny of his dynasty was growing stronger constantly.

All of a sudden, a new thought popped into his head. ‘Now I understand the ranking of destiny. At first, destiny like that of the House of God Ordainment will only stir the psyche. But destiny such as that from the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty is different. It can affect the cultivation base, and lead to progress. As for the destiny of the Deva Dynasty, it can interfere with meteorological or astronomical phenomena, and even corporeal objects. The destiny of the House of the Invincible can be used to directly ordain gods, yet it isn't strong enough to affect karma. But when the destiny is so strong that someone who breaks the law will be instantly punished by karma, that's an even higher level. Unfortunately, although my kingdom is reaching that point, the power of the Cruiser of Civilization isn’t enough to push it all the way.’

Chapter 1441: Karmic Retribution

The destiny of the House of the Invincible was extremely impressive, and could be used to ordain people as gods. It was even possible for it to push a Quasi-God to the level of a Paramount God. However, it hadn’t reached the level where its net of law could unleash karmic retribution.

Yang Qi had finally come to understand this point.

With his kingdom established in the Cruiser of Civilization, no one there would dare to violate the law. The photonic computer would know. Unfortunately, it wouldn’t work outside of the cruiser.

What was destiny?

It was a power that came when large groups of people lived together in orderly fashion. It could shake the heavens, topple the earth, and overcome anything and everything.

The law and order in Yang Qi’s kingdom in the Cruiser of Civilization was beyond anything that any other kingdom in existence could compare to.

In the tiny House of God Ordainment, violations of law occurred constantly. But Yang Qi’s kingdom was hundreds of millions of times larger than the House of God Ordainment, with a population that was virtually impossible to count, so it could only be imagined what would happen if people didn’t respect the laws.

Yang Qi looked out of the cruiser and into the surrounding ocean. The water was red with blood in many locations, as powerful organizations and the experts who had founded them fell to his conquest. Order spread, and destiny flourished.

About ten days later, Marquis Three Realms and the other experts from the House of the Chiliocosm returned with their personal treasure hoards.

Marquis Three Realms had the largest personal kingdom, thus, the most destiny. It looked like a green bottle gourd and pulsed with a preheaven aura.

“Milord, this is an immortal gourd I came across. It originally came to exist in ancient primal-chaos before the god world came to be. It’s a world of its own, filled with vital energy, which I use to grow thralls. It took billions of years of development to reach its current state, in which it provides me with much destiny.”

“Everyone else placed their personal kingdoms into the gourd to create a larger empire. It will surely provide you with plenty of destiny. After all, your administrative abilities vastly surpass our own. You’ll definitely be able to create an organization that surpasses the House of the Invincible, the Chiliocosm Dynasty, and the Central Dynasty.”

Marquis Three Realms and the other experts didn’t dare to hold anything back or try fooling Yang Qi about anything.

“Excellent,” Yang Qi said, taking the gourd. Inside were nearly ten thousand peak Paramount Gods, and countless other experts. The interior of the gourd contained countless god kingdoms, and was obviously a powerful preheaven treasure, pulsing with destiny.

In fact, the destiny was almost like a burning fire that ignited Yang Qi’s hand when he touched it. Yang Qi exhaled, using a dhāraṇī incantation that sent an army of sage monarch magistrates into the gourd.

Time passed.

Yang Qi waved his hand, sending a host of heavenly caliber godstones flying into the gourd to power its spell formations. They instantly whirred to life.

RUUUUMBLE....

The gourd trembled, then erupted with god kingdoms, almost exactly like the Great Necropolis had ejected three thousandth ranked immortal worlds in the past. As a result, the Cruiser of Civilization began changing dramatically. Thankfully, the leaders of the Sage Monarch Society were there to control things, and help use the transformation to improve destiny.

The words being ejected by the gourd were anything but simple. In terms of population and resources, they created destiny comparable to the Invincible Dynasty.

In fact, they quickly surpassed the kingdom of the Sage Monarch Society. Thankfully, Yang Qi could use the sage monarch magistrates and Marquis Three Realms himself to bring everything under control.

Time sped up in the Cruiser of Civilization.

A day passed outside, while a hundred years went by inside.

Afterward, Yang Qi opened his eyes and sent his will out into his kingdom.

Instantly there was a flourishing of continents, mountains, lakes, seas, mines, and even demonling and devils. Yang Qi even snagged a few experts from the dao of devils and threw them inside. After all, hunting and killing devils was great training.

[Beep-beep-beep. Beep-beep-beep. Destiny valuation has reached five.]

Yang Qi nodded.

“Yang Qi,” Jadefall said, “our Sage Monarch Empire is growing rapidly. The net of law is well-established, and although the power comes from the Cruiser of Civilization, with the sage monarch magistrates to lead the empire, the destiny is beyond compare. It's a hundred times purer than anything else in existence.”

“Yes,” Yang Qi replied. “Although, if the empire keeps growing, the Cruiser of Civilization will eventually be too small to sustain it. For example, if I took the House of the Invincible, there wouldn’t be enough room inside, and it would make karmic retribution impossible. Without justice upheld, the destiny will degrade, the hearts of the people will change, and the empire will eventually collapse.”

He waved his hand, and a stream of destiny flew over, as pure as water. It formed into a paper talisman which he looked at, then nodded. “Call Wei Wen over.”

“Yes sir!” Moments later, a young Quasi-God approached. He wasn’t an important person, and previously didn’t really have any future prospects. But because of the strictly enforced laws in the empire, there was no way for people to illegally suppress their inferiors. Thus, certain minor figures now had a chance to stand out.

This particular Quasi-God was a true genius, not in terms of his cultivation base, but rather his thinking. He had written many political treatises describing how to rule a nation, and how to cause culture and society to thrive. And his writings had provided important revelations to leaders in the Sage Monarch Society.

He was clearly a master of the vicissitudes of literature.

Even Yang Qi had heard of him, and now he wanted to appoint him into the nobility.

The government officials were all sage monarch magistrates. And as the magistrates continued splitting, their numbers grew. By now, there were nearly a hundred and ten thousand.

But there was a difference between the nobility and the government officials. The nobility didn’t need as much of a share in the destiny. After all, the government officials needed to actually exercise power and make use of wealth to do their job. But the nobility was noble in name only, and therefore, didn’t need destiny the way the officials did.

“My respects, Your Highness!” Wei Wen said as he kowtowed.

“Hear my orders, Wei Wen,” Yang Qi said. “You are a famous writer who has produced numerous literary works regarding politics and civilization. Your contributions have not been on the battlefield, but they are contributions nonetheless. They have even changed the way of thinking of the leaders in this empire. As such, I appoint you as a third rank baron in the Sage Monarch Empire!”

He waved his hand, and destiny descended onto Wei Wen’s head, causing him to shiver visibly. Then, he rose from the Quasi-God level into the Lesser God level. Then came the Common God, and finally the Greater God level.

Yang Qi nodded.

He had confidence in the quality of the people in his empire, thus, he was willing to expend destiny on them in a way that the House of the Invincible never would.

Normally speaking, in the House of the Invincible, a Quasi-God would never be ordained to a level past Common God.

As Wei Wen left, Jadefall watched him go, aware that he would soar to new heights in the Sage Monarch Empire. It normally wasn’t easy to become a baron.

“Yang Qi,” she said, “considering how rapidly the empire is growing, we don’t have enough sage monarch magistrates to take charge. But adding in government officials will be bad for the destiny. It's a tricky situation.”

“Yes. For now, stop the growth and focus on other business. My cultivation base is reaching the point of another breakthrough. Once I'm a peak Paramount God, the God Legion Seal will transform again, and I should be able to take more heaven caliber godstones from the halls of heaven. At that point, we’ll have hundreds of thousands of sage monarch magistrates. Perhaps even a million or more. They’ll be able to rule much more effectively.”

“That’ll do. Remember, in about ten days, Dugu Hong and the others will return. You and the Second Devil General will take your places as viceroys, and things will go much more smoothly. Then you can finally stir up some real trouble in the House of the Invincible. Right now, our empire’s destiny isn’t sufficient. Targeting the House of the Invincible is the obvious thing to do next.”

Chapter 1442: Taking Office as a Viceroy

“They’re almost here.”

Yang Qi was fully aware of everything the Second Devil General was up to, and it was the same with Dugu Hong and the others. And it was a given that the heavenly caliber godstones he had provided would get them somewhere with the patriarchs in the House of the Invincible.

Even as he said the words, a teleportation portal whirred to life.

The Second Devil General, Dugu Hong, and the others all stepped out, then knelt in front of Yang Qi.

“Milord,” Dugu Hong said, “I offer my most sincere and profound congratulations. You’re officially a viceroy now, appointed to serve in the Land of Dreamvoid. Here’s the official documentation, already stamped with an official seal. And this is your identity medallion.”

Dugu Hong handed the documents and medallion over to Yang Qi.

As Yang Qi took them, he shivered, and the flows of destiny around him shifted, immediately causing him to sense a connection to the net of law in the distant House of the Invincible.

He was now a viceroy. His position in the sect was completely different from before.

“Milord,” Dugu Hong continued, “as the viceroy of the Land of Dreamvoid, you have a lot of power. And considering what you’re capable of, becoming a viceroy of ten or even a hundred lands shouldn’t be difficult. According to the longstanding rules, new viceroys are supposed to go meet their direct superior, who is always one of the Three Preceptors or Nine Ministers. But we were worried that you and the Second Devil General might have a problem with that, so we used our connections to bypass that step. Thankfully, the wedding ceremony uniting the House of the Invincible and the Spritefolk has thrown everything into quite a bit of chaos, making it easier to bend the rules. Matters regarding ordinary viceroys aren’t considered hugely important anyway. It's only the viceroys of a hundred lands or more that really have to follow that rule.”

“It’s fine either way,” Yang Qi said coolly. “I'm actually curious what the higher echelons of leadership are like. The Three Preceptors and Nine Ministers are the true leaders anyway. The viceroys are just feudal governors that don’t have any sway in the central government. And the destiny we get is like nothing compared to the Three Preceptors and Nine Ministers. That said, we should definitely keep the Second Devil General away from them. He’s much too aloof and arrogant, and if they demand that he starts bowing and scraping, he’ll likely flip out and cause a big scene.”

“Do I really seem that impulsive, boy?” the Second Devil General said.

Yang Qi ignored him, and instead kept asking questions of Dugu Hong. “You must’ve been rewarded for your recent actions. It seems you have a much better flow of destiny. Were you given a new appointment?”

“Yes, Milord. I'm no longer an imperial censor. I'm an arch minister. Arch ministers are much more powerful than imperial censors, and are even authorized to impeach important members of the court. Imperial censors are usually limited to viceroys with less than a hundred lands under their control. Viceroys more powerful than that are completely out of reach. But now, I can investigate and accuse viceroys with up to a thousand lands. Furthermore, new viceroys are constantly being added to the dynasty, and they’re expected to give me gifts, sometimes even minor kingdoms.”

Yang Qi nodded. “That’s great.”

The best gifts that could be given within the court of the House of the Invincible weren’t things like medicinal pills, magical treasures, godstones, godnotes, or martial arts techniques. No, the best gift was destiny.

For example, Dugu Nimou’s Crystalline Turtle Shell Kingdom.

It was the same in the impure lands. Things like gold and pearls were nice, but land was the most valuable thing of all. Along with land came servants, workers, houses, castles, and the like.

From ancient times until now, whether it was in the impure lands or the god world, things had always worked this way.

Yang Qi understood that fully.

Thankfully, the House of God Ordainment had never been something people would pass around as a gift, otherwise things might not have gone well for him there. Perhaps he never would have had a chance to rise to prominence.

Of course, the House of God Ordainment was simply too small. Nobody important would have cared a whit about it. And the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty wasn’t much better.

Perhaps the Deva Dynasty might have been attractive to some people, but it was so remote that it was unlikely anyone would have stumbled across it. In the god world, kingdoms like the Deva Dynasty numbered as many as the eternal sands.

“Let’s go. My empire’s already established, and it has a destiny valuation of five. As my cultivation base increases, it’ll expand and grow stronger. For now, I want to see what this Land of Dreamvoid is like.”

Yang Qi wanted to exercise full control over the place, as it would surely result in a nice boost in destiny.

Unfortunately, all viceroys were legally required to perform services to the House of the Invincible as a whole. And the rules were very strictly enforced. Every year, the viceroys were required to submit destiny to the sect. And the more destiny they provided, the more they were rewarded. That was why most viceroys worked as hard as possible to make their lands thrive.

There was plenty of scheming and infighting in the House of the Invincible, but trickery wasn’t tolerated at all when it came to contributing destiny.

“Second Devil General, I know you have no interest in governing your lands. But don't worry, I can help you. Jadefall, you work with him to manage his lands, while he focuses on the formalities only.” Yang Qi and Jadefall exchanged a knowing glance, and the purrling in her arms seemed to smile.

The reality was that Yang Qi was doing more and more to keep the Second Devil General under control. In the situation with Marquis Three Realms, he had intentionally held back in the hopes that Yang Qi might get hurt or killed. In the end, that didn’t happen. Furthermore, the Second Devil General had actually benefited significantly from the subjugated Marquis Three Realms.

For now, Yang Qi wasn’t going to place any significant trust in the devil general.

In the end, the Second Devil General was cooperating with Yang Qi for two main reasons: first, because he feared the God Legion Seal, and second, because he feared the purrling. The fact that the purrling had snuck into the halls of heaven and taken out a powerful thumb-ring had made a deep impression on the general.

If they got into a fight, the general wasn’t sure if it would end in mutual injury, or the purrling coming out on top. Neither was a good option. After all, the purrling had never been injured to date, which was very telling. When it met powerful obstacles, it responded with power. When it met weak resistance, it crushed it.

That was exactly why Yang Qi assigned Jadefall and the purrling to work with the Second Devil General.

“Hmph!” The Second Devil General knew exactly what was going on. But the fact was that he was now in a position where he wouldn’t have to do any work at all, yet could still benefit from the destiny. That meant he could continue his recovery, and work toward freeing himself from the God Legion Seal.

With that, Yang Qi drew on his daoist techniques.

Crack. Crunch.

The Cruiser of Civilization shrank down and flew into his sleeve. However, destiny continued flowing from it into Yang Qi. And inside the cruiser, his kingdom grew continuously. There was no true conflict or war, and resources were plentiful. The law was strictly enforced, and everyone enjoyed happy and productive lives.

Occasionally, Yang Qi would adjust the flow of time so that a single day on the outside would see ten or twenty years pass inside.

In other words, ten or twenty times as much destiny would be available on a daily basis.

Not everyone could do that. In fact, if the Cruiser of Civilization were in the hands of someone else, using it in that way might result in a loss of destiny. After all, resources were required to fuel growth.

But the Cruiser of Civilization had access to power from the halls of heaven. That power couldn’t be drained in a thousand years, much less ten. Therefore, speeding up time only came with benefits.

With all of his matters settled, Yang Qi headed to the House of the Invincible and his new Land of Dreamvoid.

Because it had been formally gifted to him, he didn’t need a map. As soon as he was in the House of the Invincible, he sensed the net of law, and knew exactly which way to go. He flew for several hours until the land appeared up ahead. Unexpectedly, it was about a third larger than the Land of Flowerhill.

This was one of the largest lands that Dugu Nimou had administered. Dugu Nimou had already been imprisoned, and had no hope of ever being freed.

Of course, he had been a viceroy of ten lands, which meant there were others to be redistributed. Three of them had been given to Dugu Hong and his people, and Yang Qi and the Second Devil General had been given one each. The remaining five had been distributed to other powerful groups.

It was a given that there were always people in the court looking to expand their power and influence.

Technically speaking, Yang Qi now controlled five lands, and it was all thanks to his heaven caliber godstones.

There was nothing blocking him as he landed on the surface of the Land of Dreamvoid. After all, his energy was connected to the net of law, giving him control of the armed forces in the Land of Dreamvoid. The experts present all felt the energy fluctuations of his arrival, and knew that the new viceroy had come.

There was no way for the leaders of the House of the Invincible to secretly mingle with the commoners. The energy fluctuations made it obvious who everyone was. Any subordinate who defied a superior would be punished by destiny. They could even have their godhood removed.

As the viceroy of the Land of Dreamvoid, Yang Qi could, with a single word, fire any of the police chiefs who worked for him. He could even have them skinned alive. And it was the same for anyone in his armed forces.

Because of that, revolt against the government wasn’t likely to happen.

Upon entering the viceroy’s mansion, Yang Qi found that there was a large group of top experts waiting for him. There were police chiefs, army officers, city magistrates, and other important people.

Even the weakest among them had Unbounded will convergence, and were early or mid Paramount Gods. All of them were nervous to see what their new viceroy would be like.

Chapter 1443: Shaking the Upper Echelons

As Yang Qi entered, the gathered officials joined their voices in a formal greeting. “Our respects, exalted Viceroy. May you command boundless magic and bring untold blessings, wealth, and peace!”

The viceroy held their very lives in his hands, so there was no way any of them would defy him in any way.

Yang Qi grunted a response, then looked around to find that there were over nine thousand officials gathered, all of them Unbounded experts. Thinking back, he recalled that not even the Deva Dynasty, Nine Dragons Court, and Sumeru Temple had boasted so many experts. Yet the Land of Dreamvoid was considered to have a relatively low population of top experts.

It reinforced the point that reaching the Unbounded level was extremely difficult to reach.

Logically speaking, if the Land of Dreamvoid was hundreds of times larger than the Deva Dynasty, it should have had hundreds of times as many Unbounded experts. Instead, it had dozens of times more. Furthermore, it didn’t have any late Paramount God patriarchs. It really was a very difficult thing to reach a high level of power.

“Rise, everyone,” Yang Qi said, waving his hand. After they got to their feet, he continued, “There’s no need for you to fear. Although I'm the new viceroy of the Land of Dreamvoid, I don’t plan to do anything wildly dramatic. What I do require is loyalty and unity. I want to get rid of any lingering influence of Dugu Nimou, and improve the destiny of this land. Understood?”

The gathered officials were already feeling a bit less nervous.

However, some were still a bit anxious at Yang Qi’s demand for an increase in destiny. Unfortunately, the Land of Dreamvoid had already reached its limit in terms of destiny. Dugu Nimou had not only poured resources into it, he had also called in favors from his sphere of influence to help improve its destiny. Now that Dugu Nimou was gone, and the land was cut off from that old sphere of influence, it was going to be difficult to keep things going as they had been in the past, much less improve the destiny.

In fact, the most likely outcome was that the destiny was going to decline in the coming years. If that happened, the viceroy would definitely be punished. All the officials knew how things worked in that regard. It occurred all the time when there were changes in leadership.

Yang Qi could tell what they were thinking. Voice cool, he said, “I bet you’re thinking that with Dugu Nimou gone, the loss of the resources and sphere of influence he had provided will be a big blow to the destiny here.”

“Exalted Viceroy, asking for more destiny is going to make things extremely hard for us,” said the minister of finances. “Truth be told, our Land of Dreamvoid was previously doing business with the Central Dynasty and the Chiliocosm Dynasty. Dugu Nimou was making money off of both sides, but now things are very different. We're losing money everywhere, and our old trade routes have dried up. The Land of Dreamvoid is in a really bad financial situation right now. We're incredibly low on both godnotes and godstones. I hate to say it, but virtually all of our income used to come from the Central Dynasty. Right now, it's hard for us to even keep up with daily expenses.”

“What’s the real problem, though?” Yang Qi asked coolly. “Why were we getting godnotes from the Central Dynasty to begin with?”

“In the Central Dynasty, they have the means to print godnotes. Neither the House of the Invincible nor the House of the Chiliocosm can do that. The reason is that the Central Dynasty got control of the Sovereign Lord’s Eye of Wealth, which is a boundless magical treasure from ancient times that can be used to print godnotes. Furthermore, the Central Dynasty took control of an uncharacteristically rare preheaven spirit meridian, which produces godstones of exceptionally high quality. The upside for the House of the Invincible is that we excel at making medicinal pills, which we can sell for godnotes. Sadly, the Land of Dreamvoid doesn’t control any of the resources needed to make medicinal pills. Any wealth we do generate goes to our superiors, or is reinvested into business. But now that our trade routes aren’t accessible, it's going to be hard to make any profit.”

“No problem.” Yang Qi said. “I can solve this problem immediately. I have access to endless godnotes and godstones, which you can use to expand our territory. However, let me make one thing very clear. You're all prohibited from stuffing your own pockets. Any who try something like that will be executed immediately. I want destiny. Lots and lots of destiny. Got it?”

Yang Qi produced the bottle gourd he had taken from Marquis Three Realms, which was a powerful magical treasure filled with numerous worlds. It wasn't quite on the level of the Cruiser of Civilization, but it was perfectly suitable to store treasure.

“Come forth, thralls!”

RUMBLE!

Ten thousand sage monarch magistrates poured out into ranks around Yang Qi, all of them Paramount Gods with stony expressions on their faces.

“These are my ancient thrall troops,” Yang Qi said, “and from here on out, they’ll serve as private advisors to you. They’ll help you manage wealth and create destiny. You’ll find that they’re all very competent, and won’t tolerate any sort of corruption.”

The officials’ faces fell. The truth was that most of them had immediately begun coming up with little plans and schemes to benefit themselves. As soon as they found out that their new viceroy had apparently come across a massive treasure trove of wealth, including perfect caliber godstones, they expected that they would be able to skim some off for themselves.

But then they found out that he was dispatching thrall troops to supervise them. And those thralls were ten thousand Paramount Gods! Their faces were ashen as they realized that there was obviously no way they would be doing any skimming off the top. With these thrall troops as their ‘assistants’, they might as well be puppets.

“Very well, you're all dismissed. Incidentally, these thralls are versed in the calculation techniques of the ancient mechanical civilization. Because of that, their understanding of finances and management are far beyond yours. Now, go ahead and use the money in that gourd to facilitate the operations of the Land of Dreamvoid.” Yang Qi waved his hand dismissively.

“Yes sir!”

RUMBLE!

The sage monarch magistrates responded with a thunderous affirmation, then split apart to attach themselves to individual government officials, to whom they all said the same thing. “Exalted Sir. The viceroy has commanded that we put the finances in order. Please, lead the way so we can begin.”

Yang Qi had taken swift and decisive control. With the government officials being monitored by sage monarch magistrates, they couldn’t cause problems or embezzle funds.

Meanwhile, he reached out to Marquis Three Realms and his other moles in the House of the Chiliocosm, ordering them to open up some new trade routes.

A month later, the destiny in the Land of Dreamvoid was flourishing.

The highest quality godstones were here, the type that surpassed perfect caliber. And Yang Qi provided endless amounts of godnotes to purchase whatever needed to be purchased.

The truth was that he didn't use his godstones to benefit the House of the Invincible as a whole. That would have been a conflict of interest. The Sage Monarch Empire didn’t need to have outside dealings with any group. In contrast, it could produce goods that the businesses in the Land of Dreamvoid could use to promote foreign trade.

As a result, the Sage Monarch Empire was becoming very profitable.

Of course, there wasn’t just business to be had with the other two major sects. There were all sorts of people who were eager to make deals. There were Mechfolk, Spritefolk, Magefolk, Demonfolk, Dragonfolk, and others that Yang Qi had never seen or heard of before.

Now that he was a viceroy in the House of the Invincible, he was benefiting a lot.

The destiny of the Land of Dreamvoid was rising, and the same was happening in the Sage Monarch Empire. Meanwhile, his cultivation base was improving with his daily cultivation routines. He was assimilating the Everlit Godlamp and gaining further enlightenment of its profundities. The lamp was from the Lord of Radiance and Light, and was definitely not something that could be considered easy to assimilate. But Yang Qi had the God Legion Seal and the Mahātmā Jade, and therefore, was making constant progress. Already, he was capable of unleashing radiance and light the likes of which the God Legion Seal had never seen before.

He spent most of his time outside of the House of the Invincible. Instead, he used the teleportation portal he had set up to return to the halls of heaven, where he absorbed starlight and used it to temper his physical body, nascent divinity, and substructure.

As the months went by, he grew stronger and stronger, until his godhood rating reached the level of nine hundred and ninety-nine million, nine hundred and ninety thousand. With only a bit more progress, he would become a peak Paramount God with peak Unbounded will convergence.

When he achieved his next breakthrough, the God Legion Seal would transform again, and he would be able to enter the halls of heaven like the purrling had, to find magical treasures left behind by the Sovereign Lord. The halls of heaven had wealth that surpassed the combined reserves of the House of the Invincible, House of the Chiliocosm, and the Central Dynasty. With them, he could further grow his empire, ultimately taking control of the halls of heaven.

As he looked up at the halls of heaven from the Bastille of the One God, the destiny of the Land of Dreamvoid was rapidly growing, and it was attracting the attention of the leaders in the House of the Invincible.

Deep in the sect, surrounded by countless snaking corridors, there was a palatial meeting hall, the entrance of which bore the description ‘Palace of Destiny’.

This was a testing location where various viceroys would be assessed. Furthermore, the contributions of the viceroys would be measured here. The viceroys’ contributions weren’t about prestige, slaughter, relationships, or the likes. It was all about the destiny they produced in the lands they controlled, and how much they provided to the sect.

Everything else was meaningless in comparison.

At the moment, a host of late Paramount Gods, all of them clad in flowing robes, were looking at an enormous mirror. In that mirror was a visible representation of the destiny of the Land of Dreamvoid.

Chapter 1444: Shaking the Upper Echelons (2)

As the white-robed individuals stared in shock at the flowing destiny, a voice reached their ears. It belonged to a young woman.

“Why have so many of you destinors gathered here today? Has something big happened?”

She wore the garments of an imperial princess, as well as numerous jewels and pearls in her hair. She seemed elegant and refined, and her garment draped behind her as she walked, like a dragon flitting in the clouds.

The white-robed destinors all bowed their heads and said, “Greetings, exalted Priestess.”

Priests and priestesses were common in any dynasty. They officiated over rites and ceremonies, manipulated destiny, adjusted yin and yang, and helped spread civilization throughout the many heavens.

Back in the days of the Sovereign Lord, the High Priestess had occupied a position similar to the King of Godmammoths. She had administered cultural affairs, and he, the military.

The High Priestess had controlled the rites and ceremonies, and was thus like an imperial adviser, while the King of Godmammoths had been entrusted with suppressing hell, and was the generalissimo of the armed forces.

As for this young woman, she obviously wasn’t the High Priestess, but rather an ordinary priestess. That said, in the Palace of Destiny, she had a lot of power and influence. Of course, her cultivation base was anything but ordinary; she was a peak Paramount God, and was about twice as strong as Marquis Three Realms. Marquis Three Realms had only just broken into the level of about a billion, whereas this woman was nearing two billion.

When the Second Devil General had just emerged from being sealed, and was at his weakest, he had been at the level of three billion. By now he had recovered a lot and was so enigmatically powerful that few experts in existence could compare to him.

In the Invincible Dynasty, the Palace of Destiny had a unique structure.

The destinors were very important, and were similar in rank to the imperial censors. The priests and priestesses occupied higher positions and could be compared to the Three Preceptors and Nine Ministers.

“Exalted Priestess, we were just observing some changes in destiny to the various viceroys. We noticed a good sign. It seems that the destiny of a place called the Land of Dreamvoid has grown dramatically. Please, have a look.”

The destinors operating the mirror were all late Paramount Gods with psychic scales of two or three hundred million. Bowing and scraping, they presented the mirror to the priestess.

Some time ago, the destiny of the Land of Dreamvoid was comprised of a host of white beams of light that connected into the net of law, then pulsed through the House of the Invincible like blood.

In the past, it hadn’t been anything impressive. But in recent months, the Land of Dreamvoid had experienced a big boost in destiny. The beams were much bigger than before, and actually looked golden, making them almost like mighty dragons that flowed into the net of law. Furthermore, they were stronger and purer than the destiny from any of the other viceroys.

In fact, the destiny contribution from the Land of Dreamvoid was now equivalent to what would normally be provided by a viceroy with dozens of lands under his control. And its level of purity could only be encountered by chance, but never searched for and found.

Other viceroys had white or silver beams, while his were golden. Normally speaking, that was considered impossible.

If all the viceroys could provide destiny like this, the House of the Invincible’s overall destiny would increase by numerous levels, and the idea of crushing the Central Dynasty and the Chiliocosm Dynasty wouldn't be a mere fantasy.

When the priestess looked at the mirror, her eyes went wide. “What’s going on here? Look into the matter! Find out exactly what's happening. For pure destiny like this to be provided to the sect is going to be extremely beneficial! That said, conduct the investigation secretly, and keep the information under wraps. Also, summon the viceroy to me for a meeting. I want him as one of my personal subordinates, and definitely don't want anyone snatching him away from me.”

“Ma’am,” one of the destinors said, “we already compiled some information about the viceroy in question. A few months ago, he was an ordinary police chief in the Land of Flowerhill, under the tutelage of Dugu Hong. Apparently, some of Dugu Hong’s followers acquired a treasure trove in the Bastille of the One God, including godstones that surpass perfect caliber. They’ve been doing business with them lately, which has caused quite a stir. Dugu Hong was appointed as an arch minister, after which he went into seclusion to try to break into the peak Paramount God level.”

“So that’s how it is,” the priestess said. “This increase in destiny is all thanks to some treasure from the Bastille of the One God? That’s good. Call the viceroy to me immediately.”

“Yes ma’am.” Several of the destinors immediately flew off in the direction of the Land of Dreamvoid.

**

Back in the Bastille of the One God, Yang Qi opened his eyes as he awoke from a meditative trance. He had sensed the fluctuations in destiny that occurred because of the priestess’ words, and knew he’d attracted the attention of the upper echelons of the sect.

He had used his own personal resources to improve the destiny of the House of the Invincible, but that had benefited him as well. It gave him a much deeper understanding of destiny and the net of law. And because he was now personally linked to the destiny, it would make it easier for him to use the God Legion Seal to seize the sect's destiny for his own in the future.

He was really usurping state power.

Of course, considering how strictly the House of the Invincible’s net of law operated, it would discover him if he tried to take the destiny unlawfully. But Yang Qi wasn’t worried about the situation. He knew that he would eventually run into a situation in which he and the House of the Invincible would become enemies.

At that point, he would attack, simply taking all of the destiny and using it to achieve a breakthrough.

Before that, though, he had to come to a much deeper understanding of the sect's net of law.

Aaaaoooooo!

Heaven and earth trembled violently.

‘People are looking for me. I suppose I caused a big stir among the leaders. I wonder what they’re like.’ It was a given that he would interact with them eventually. His overall plan was to make contact with them, then slowly improve his influence and control. When he had enough of them working for him, and enough control over the destiny, he would be able to pierce into the deeper mysteries of the net of law.

WHOOSH!

Using the teleportation portal, he whisked himself back to the House of the Invincible, and the viceroy’s mansion in the Land of Dreamvoid.

Shortly thereafter, a host of destinors descended onto the mansion. Finding Yang Qi, they said, “Viceroy of the Land of Dreamvoid, after assuming leadership of these lands, a large amount of destiny has been added to the net of law, provoking profound transformations. Your contributions are immense, therefore, the priestess in charge of the Palace of Destiny has summoned you for questioning and a reward. Hurry and come with us.”

“Yes sir,” Yang Qi replied, trying to look both obedient and overwhelmed. His demeanor was very pleasing to the destinors.

The group flew into the depths of the House of the Invincible, and before long they were nearing the Palace of Destiny. It occupied a very important position in the sect, and was just as influential as the army. At a mere glance, Yang Qi could see how the place was responsible for balancing yin and yang, and managing the flows of destiny.

‘Very impressive,’ he thought. ‘The Palace of Destiny controls some of the most important aspects of the sect. I can learn a lot from this place.’ Of course, he didn’t dare to do any spying, as his cultivation base was just too low.

“You may enter, Viceroy. Don’t keep the exalted priestess waiting for too long, otherwise you’ll be punished.”

“Many thanks to all of you. Please, accept a small show of respect in the form of a gift.” He handed dimensional sacks to all of them, within which were heaps of perfect caliber godstones. They weren’t heavenly caliber, but they were still extremely valuable. Destinors were very important, as they inspected the contributions of destiny that the viceroys provided to the sect. Although they were prohibited from causing mischief, it was always possible for them to take advantage of their position and cause problems for people.

When the destinors examined the contents of the sacks, broad smiles appeared on their faces.

“You’re too kind, Viceroy.”

Smoothing out his garments, Yang Qi entered the Palace of Destiny and found himself in front of a young woman clad in imperial garments that seemed to fuse with the surrounding void.

‘Impressive! Even outside of the sect, I couldn’t defeat this woman. She’s far stronger than Marquis Three Realms. Even if I got her into the Bastille of the One God, I’d only stand a fifty-fifty chance of winning.’ Yang Qi was shocked, and could see that his plan of subjugating the leaders of the sect with the God Legion Seal might not be that realistic. This priestess was strong. Very, very strong!

On the surface, she seemed unimpressive.

But underneath, she obviously existed on a different level. She might not match up to the Second Devil General, but compared to her, Marquis Three Realms was like a toddler.

“My respects, exalted Priestess,” Yang Qi said, kowtowing dramatically.

“On your feet,” she replied. “You shouldn’t put on such a show of humility. You’re a viceroy, which is a very high rank. An ordinary salute is more than enough in my presence. Dramatic kowtowing should be reserved for the emperor alone. Understand?”

“Right, of course,” Yang Qi said, doing everything possible to make sure she couldn’t read his cultivation base.

He had already decided that he needed to work with the Second Devil General to subjugate this woman. She was extremely important, so if he could get her on his side, his work in the House of the Invincible would progress dramatically.

Chapter 1445: Earning Favor

“Your name is Yang Qi?” the priestess asked, her eyes glittering as she looked at him, as if she were attempting to send her gaze deep inside to examine his cultivation base and substructure.

Despite the fact that he was fully drawing on the Life-Death Void-Destruction Lightning, he could still feel her gaze piercing into him. Thankfully, his recent months of bitter cultivation, as well as the improvement in destiny of both the Land of Dreamvoid and the Sage Monarch Empire, had provided many benefits. He was now just on the verge of reaching the peak Paramount God level, making him even more impressive than before.

As a result, the priestess had no way to see his actual cultivation base. All she could perceive was an illusion.

“Yes, I'm your humble servant Yang Qi.”

“You joined the Invincible Dynasty only a few months ago, in service of Dugu Hong, is that correct? How were you able to accomplish such impressive work in the Land of Dreamvoid? Who exactly are you?”

It wasn't anything unusual for new members of the Invincible Dynasty to be questioned about their past. And that was especially true of people appointed as viceroys, who would often have to undergo thorough investigations.

“Oh exalted one, I used to be nothing but a rogue cultivator. I founded my own empire, but it was eventually attacked and destroyed by the Dragonfolk. Afterward, I went to the Bastille of the One God to try to find some sort of magical treasure that I could use to get my revenge. Unfortunately, I got sucked into a deadly spell formation, and was just about to die when Dugu Hong saved me. In my gratitude, I offered him my loyalty!”

Yang Qi was offering perfect answers that should pass any detailed inspection.

The priestess sighed. “All of that makes sense. However, I'm curious about the good fortune you came across in the Bastille of the One God. I heard you have some powerful thrall troops at your command now? It’s a bit of a surprise that you use thralls to administer your Land of Dreamvoid. They're without corruption and don’t try to embezzle funds, which makes the destiny you provide much better than anything from before. That's quite a feat. Normally speaking, puppets don't do a good job of governing countries. In contrast, bright individuals can generally bring impressive influxes of destiny. Granted, they’ll often embezzle funds and bring corruption into the destiny, but it’s par for the course. And if you want your subordinates’ cultivation bases to improve, you have to learn to deal with corruption.”

‘Is she fucking kidding me?’ Yang Qi thought. ‘She claims to be worried about the state of the nation and its people, but she’s implying that everyone has to steal destiny and resources from the country just to improve their cultivation bases. The leaders of the House of the Invincible must be worried about this kind of thing.’ Although Yang Qi wanted to say that out loud, he didn’t.

After a moment of silence, the priestess said, “Well? Are you going to show me those thralls or not?”

“Of course,” he replied. Waving his hand, he summoned a sage monarch magistrate.

The priestess’ eyes lit up as she examined the magistrate. Sending her will into his sea of consciousness, she saw the complicated functions of the heavenly workings calculations systems, which were so complex they seemed impossible to replicate.

“Incredible. This thrall is no weaker than an ancient archangel. Yet unlike the archangels, this thrall can think for itself and is clearly skilled at governing. Its mental structure is completely profound. How many of these thralls do you have?”

“I have a total of ten thousand, oh exalted one. That’s just enough to govern the Land of Dreamvoid. Unfortunately, without enough power to keep them running, they’ll collapse.”

Even as the words left his mouth, the thrall's skin started withering up, until it collapsed into a cloud of greenish dust which dissipated into nothing.

“Oh?” the priestess said, her eyes suddenly flickering with killing intent.

She knew full well that the thrall hadn’t just collapsed randomly. No, Yang Qi was toying with her. He didn’t want to give her a thrall, so he had done something to kill it.

“You killed it, didn’t you!” she said. “That thing is a national treasure! What, did you think I was going to take it away from you and study it?”

“You're very shrewd, oh exalted one,” he replied, pretending to tremble in trepidation. “But I wasn't kidding. If you don’t provide enough power to the thralls, they die.”

“Alright, stop it with the act. I know that you’re backed by Dugu Hong, who in turn has the support of an even more powerful figure. You see, you and I are actually in different factions. Dugu Hong’s faction is run by the grand exarchs. So it’s only natural that you would be suspicious of my faction, the Palace of Destiny. That said, you’re only a viceroy, so you’re nothing more than a foot soldier in the intrigue between factions. Are you aware that, given how quickly tides can shift in the Invincible Dynasty, you could be killed at any moment?”

“There’s no need to threaten me, exalted Priestess,” Yang Qi replied, being careful to be neither servile nor overbearing. “Your humble servant is indeed a viceroy of a single land. Although that doesn’t count for much, you have to admit that I'm providing a lot of destiny to the sect. Could we cut to the chase here, Priestess? Did you call me here just to threaten me? If this is supposed to be an actual trial, shouldn’t you explain all the charges against me?”

“Oh?” The priestess looked at him with a touch of surprise in her eyes. “You’ve got guts, boy. I’m honestly surprised you’d talk to me like that.”

“I wouldn’t dare be disrespectful. I'm just calling it as I see it.” Obviously, Yang Qi wasn't going to back down.

Stifling her killing intent, the priestess waved her hand and said, “In that case, you're dismissed.”

“Very well. Your humble servant takes his leave!” Turning, he left the Palace of Destiny, all the while thinking, ‘She might be a powerful person, but did she think she could get her hands on me that easily? With no offer of compensation? Never. Does she take me for a fool?’

Upon seeing Yang Qi leaving, the destinors rushed over, eyes glittering with killing intent.

“Exalted Priestess,” one said, “it was obvious you called him here to try to recruit him. How could he possibly be so stubborn as to refuse you? He should have spilled all his secrets immediately! What a malicious fellow!”

“That’s right!” another destinor said. “If we don’t go beat a bit of sense into him, he’ll never understand how mighty the Palace of Destiny is. How about I pull a few strings to make sure that he doesn’t meet his destiny quotas?”

“No, we can’t do that. If we violate sect rules so flagrantly, and he applies for an appeal, we could be investigated, and then we’d be in huge trouble. Destiny is the foundation of the country, and if we tamper with it, we could be accused of high crimes. Besides, he does have a powerful faction backing him.”

“Enough,” the priestess said, an icy smile visible on her face. “Although I was interested in recruiting the boy, I could see the glimmer of greed in his eyes. Long story short, he wanted far more than I was willing to pay. Besides, I don’t make offers to people. If he had been interested in cooperating, and had explained the secrets of his thralls, I would have paid him. But he’s obviously on guard against me. Maybe he thinks he can just defy me to earn some points from his side, staying safe all the while. If so, he’s dreaming. That said, I can't give anyone any ammunition to use against me. We have to wait until he's outside the sect before killing him. After all, viceroys die all the time. You over there, send a message to the Spritefolk to make it happen!”

“Yes ma’am,” one of the destinors said. “The Spritefolk will be part of the House of the Invincible soon. And they’re powerful enough that it shouldn't be hard at all for them to kill a viceroy. How dare that brat refuse you, Priestess. Although, he did give us quite a few perfect caliber godstones. He’s obviously very rich.”

With that, he pulled out the dimensional sack Yang Qi had given him.

However, as he did, the sack exploded and the godstones crumbled into dust!

The rest of the destinors staggered backward in shock as all of the dimensional sacks collapsed into nothing. All the while, the priestess looked on with an ashen expression.

**

Meanwhile, Yang Qi was back in the Land of Dreamvoid. He knew it wouldn't be long before the faction he was part of would send people to ask what had just occurred.

Sure enough, before he had been sitting around for long, Dugu Hong hurried over. Kneeling, he said, “Milord, you just went to the Palace of Destiny, right? Summoned by Priestess Dugu Wanqing? The leaders of the faction know about it, and they want to see you. What do you want to do? Should I notify the Second Devil General?”

“No, it's fine. This is a good thing.”

Yang Qi was actually pleased to hear that the grand exarch’s faction knew about his trip to the Palace of Destiny.

It seemed likely that they had informants there, otherwise how would they have known?

Yang Qi was finally starting to get an idea of how the factions worked in the court of the House of the Invincible. The number one faction was the Palace of Destiny. They were like the daoists. The second faction was that of the grand exarchs, who were like the confucians, and held a lot of power in their hands. The third faction was the army.

Those three main factions were always struggling against each other, although there was a general balance maintained. And the imperial princes and grandchildren would recruit members of the three factions to work for them for various reasons.

Yang Qi was part of the grand exarchs’ faction, so there was no way that the priestess expected him to actually accept her offer. If he had, he would have been considered a traitor to the grand exarchs’ faction. Even Dugu Hong would have been dragged into it. And considering he had refused her offer, he had gained some favor with the leaders of his own faction, who were now summoning him for a debriefing.

“Let’s go see what the leaders of this faction are like, and how they’ll reward me.” With that, Yang Qi left with Dugu Hong.

Chapter 1446: Earning Favor (2)

Yang Qi flew away with Dugu Hong, yet again headed into the depths of the House of the Invincible, but this time in a different direction from the Palace of Destiny. He was heading to the base camp of the grand exarchs’ faction, which was none other than the Land of Officials.

It was the main headquarters for the government officials in the dynasty.

They were extremely powerful politically, and were constantly at odds with the armed forces and the destinors.

As they flew along, Dugu Hong said, “Milord, the person you’ll be meeting is Duke Nine Cauldrons. He's extremely powerful and influential, and is considered a cornerstone of the dynasty. Be very careful in dealing with him, sir.”

“Got it,” Yang Qi replied. “I've heard of him. He’s a bigshot among the political advisors. Don't worry, I know what to do and say. Eventually, this will bring benefits to you, as well.”

“Excellent.”

Soon, they were approaching the Land of Officials, which was many tens of thousands of times larger than the Land of Dreamvoid. It was clearly a glorious and luxurious place where the destiny surged bright. And it abounded with the energy of confucians.

It was just what Yang Qi had expected.

The gathering place of the grand exarchs was a location where confucian experts abounded, people who excelled at governing nations.

Confucian academies were generally powerful in the god world. For example, there was the League of Academies, which Yang Qi had yet to conquer. When it came to matters of national destiny and the flourishing of nations, no one could surpass the confucians.

As soon as Yang Qi and Dugu Hong landed, a group of imperial censors approached to ask their business and direct them to their destination.

Before long, they entered an enormous, sprawling library that covered an area of ninety thousand kilometers. The aroma of books filled the area, and in fact, it was like a world of books unto itself. And with books came the aura of civilization, which was very inspiring to Yang Qi.

As it turned out, this library was actually an enormous magical treasure.

“This place is the incarnation of an actual book,” Dugu Hong explained. “Its title is Book of Heavenly and Earthly Wisdom and Knowledge. It's an ancient text that was born directly out of primal-chaos.”

“Incredible.” Yang Qi stepped inside and found himself surrounded by constant transformations, as well as a pervasive aura of wisdom and antiquity.

In the depths of the ancient library was a desk, behind which was seated a middle-aged confucian scholar. The man had a long beard and a faint smile on his face as he perused a scroll book that apparently contained information about the transformations of the three realms. This was Duke Nine Cauldrons.

“My respects, exalted one,” Yang Qi said, bowing respectfully. Dugu Hong did the same.

Duke Nine Cauldrons’ cultivation base was superior to that of the priestess Yang Qi had dealt with shortly before. He didn’t dare to try probing him for details, especially considering how foreign the aura here was to him.

In all likelihood, he would be discovered if he tried doing something like that, which would put him in great danger.

“You’re Yang Qi?” Duke Nine Cauldrons said. “You have the aura of a confucian on you. Are you a confucian scholar?”

“Yes. I cultivated confucianism in the past, and even founded a flourishing academy. Unfortunately, Dragonfolk experts destroyed it. In my thirst for revenge, I went to the Bastille of the One God....” Yang Qi went on to fabricate a seamless tale about his exploits as a confucian.

“That’s wonderful,” Duke Nine Cauldrons said. “You’ve done well in administering your Land of Dreamvoid. It's providing incredible destiny to the sect, and of course, the Invincible Dynasty will see to it that you’re rewarded well for that. In fact, I’ll be submitting a request to the court regarding this matter in just a few days.”

“Many thanks, sir. Although, the Palace of Destiny is supposed to assess me soon, and—”

“Hmph!” Duke Nine Cauldrons interrupted with a cold snort. Rising to his feet, he said, “The Palace of Destiny wouldn’t dare do anything to you. Anyone can see how amazing your destiny contributions are. If Dugu Wanqing goes so far as to threaten you, it’ll be a clear violation of national law. Don’t worry, they might dare to try recruiting you, but they won’t cause problems for your destiny production. If they do, I’ll immediately report them to the court for investigation. The Palace of Destiny has been corrupt from its inception. We would’ve gotten rid of them a long time ago, if it weren’t for the fact that we need their skills and abilities to resurrect our patriarch. You see, a dynasty usually only needs two major branches: civil and military. The destinors are interlopers, and they’re worse than dogs. How could they possibly participate in important national affairs?!”

‘Who is this patriarch he's talking about resurrecting?’ Yang Qi thought.

Apparently, Duke Nine Cauldrons sensed his curiosity. “Patriarch Invincible of the Dugu Clan existed in the preheaven primal-chaos before the god world came to be. The current nine patriarchs are his descendants. Many years ago, the House of the Invincible waged war with the Sovereign Lord, and the patriarch was sealed with the Sovereign Lord’s Holy and Far-Reaching Consummate Omnicurse. He’s remained sealed ever since then, in perpetual slumber. Once he awakens, the House of the Invincible will once again rise to glory. The reason we need more destiny is that we have to awaken the patriarch.”

“Patriarch Invincible?” A completely preposterous idea had just occurred to Yang Qi.

“Do you know why we’re called the House of the Invincible?” Duke Nine Cauldrons asked. “The name comes from our first patriarch. He comes from the Dugu Clan, and was known as the Invincible Dugu. That’s why there are so many people surnamed Dugu in our dynasty. All of the patriarchs have his blood, and his people have proliferated over the past hundreds of millions of years, becoming incredibly powerful in the process.”

‘The Invincible Dugu is their founding patriarch!?’ Yang Qi was completely rocked with shock. He had come to the House of the Invincible in part to search for his Master, the Invincible Dugu.

And now he was being told that the Invincible Dugu was actually the first patriarch, except he was sealed in slumber. If that was the case, then who was his Master from the impure lands? Was he a will clone? A projection of some sort?

Things were getting very confusing.

“These are all confidential matters, but considering you're a member of the sect, you have the right to hear them. In any case, everyone knows about your amazing improvement of the destiny in your land. As a result, you deserve a reward. Men, come in!”

Several grand exarchs hurried in.

“Give him a copy of the Confucian Kingdom of Grand Righteousness from the bookshelf over there. And if I recall, the viceroy of the Land of Triplicity was recently assassinated by experts from the Dragonfolk. Henceforth, Yang Qi will be the viceroy of that land, making him a viceroy of two lands. Bring forth the Viceregal Seal!”

RUMBLE!

As soon as the title was officially conferred on Yang Qi, he felt a pleasing flow of destiny being added to him.

At the same time, some of the grand exarchs hurried over to a nearby bookshelf, from which they took an enormous book bound in what appeared to be a bronze turtle shell. Shockingly, the book contained an enormous kingdom within it, filled with living people. It was actually similar to Marquis Three Realms’ bottle gourd, and was obviously something very valuable.

The kingdom within the book was roughly the size of ten Deva Dynasties put together. And from the bright white destiny within, it was obviously a purely confucian nation.

It was an amazing gift.

‘Now this is a good reward,’ Yang Qi thought. If that priestess had given him a reward like this, he might have at least pretended to accept her offer. Instead, she chose to be stingy, which was something Yang Qi couldn't accept. In contrast, Duke Nine Cauldrons seemed to be pulling out all the stops, rewarding him with a viceroyship, destiny, and actual land.

Of course, there were likely spies among the experts in the kingdom he had been given, but he didn't care. He would just take it into the Sage Monarch Empire in the Cruiser of Civilization, and that would take care of everything.

One thing was for sure: it was going to be a big boost in destiny.

It was only now that Yang Qi was starting to get an idea of what the House of the Invincible was capable of. Even weak leaders would have personal kingdoms filled with flourishing destiny.

“You can take your leave now. Continue working hard for the House of the Invincible. I hope that by the end of the year, you’ll have even greater destiny. Incidentally, there’s something you should know. Managing your own lands isn’t anything particularly amazing. If you can expand the territory of the sect, you’ll be truly rewarded! That's when you can jump up to being the viceroy of ten, a hundred, a thousand, or even ten thousand lands.”

Nodding, Yang Qi took his leave.

After he was gone, Duke Nine Cauldrons looked at Dugu Hong and said, “What do you think of him, Dugu Hong?”

“Sir, I personally rescued him from death in the Bastille of the One God, where he obtained a huge amount of wealth. He has a feud with the Dragonfolk that can only be ended with seas of blood. He's been following all of the rules since he joined the House of the Invincible, and has accomplished a lot. He exposed Dugu Nimou, and refused to be enticed by the Palace of Destiny. I’d say he’s a very reliable person.” Of course, Dugu Hong was acting in line with what Yang Qi wanted.

“I see,” Duke Nine Cauldrons said. “He’s a genius that we should groom to his full potential. However, you need to keep an eye on him, as he’s only been in the House of the Invincible for a short time. Let’s see if he actually attempts to conquer some other territories. Ideally, he’ll clash with the army. Maybe you can hint to him that he should do that. Tell him that the army has been colluding with the Dragonfolk. If he can capture some Dragonfolk kingdoms, he’ll be rewarded with a higher position.”

“Yes sir!” Dugu Hong said, his eyes glittering with a strange light.

Chapter 1447: Dragon Compendium

‘I found favor in the eyes of someone very important this time,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘Now I need to come up with a way to keep this momentum going. It’s not going to be easy. And my current progress isn’t fast enough. I'm never going to subjugate the leaders of the sect at this rate. Unfortunately, I haven't performed any services that warrant a big advancement. The Second Devil General could be of help, but he’s obviously out for his own interests, not mine. It would be too easy for him to cause problems. But maybe I could manipulate him somehow....’

In dealing with Marquis Three Realms, the Second Devil General had provided help in name only.

In fact, he had even attempted to get Yang Qi hurt or killed, and it was only thanks to the God Legion Seal that Yang Qi had come out unscathed.

Going forward, Yang Qi knew he had to be very careful and thoughtful in dealing with the general.

“Call over the Second Devil General,” he said.

The Second Devil General was a viceroy of one land, whereas Yang Qi already controlled two. That said, he wanted his friends and family to start becoming part of the House of the Invincible’s system of government. So he would send one of them over to the Land of Triplicity to run things, and have a share in the destiny. That way, he didn’t need to take action personally.

Taking out the book kingdom Duke Nine Cauldrons had given him, Yang Qi scanned it with divine will and saw that it was a bustling place. Unfortunately, it only had enough resources to sustain itself for a few months.

After that, the kingdom would wither and die.

Kingdoms of this size obviously had to have abundant resources to be sustainable. And that was especially true of kingdoms sealed inside magical treasures like this one. Such kingdoms were entirely in the hands of their owners and would generally be a big drain of resources.

That was one of the big downsides of these things.

Of course, of all the things Yang Qi lacked, resources were not one of them. He had business interests that brought in a lot of profit, and could also harvest heavenly caliber godstones directly from the halls of heaven.

With a thought, he sent sage monarch magistrates into the new kingdom to establish order and distribute resources. At the same time, he used the Life-Death Void-Destruction Lightning to create an illusion that would fool Duke Nine Cauldrons and ensure he had no idea of what was really happening.

Then he sent the kingdom into the Cruiser of Civilization.

The Sage Monarch Empire was only growing more and more impressive.

Thanks to the constant rise in destiny, Yang Qi’s cultivation base was stirring, and he knew he was inching toward another breakthrough. For him, reaching the peak Paramount God level would be much harder than it was for ordinary people. But of course, he would be so strong that he would be able to slaughter countless people in the same level as himself.

At the moment, there were three possible ways for him to achieve his breakthrough.

The first was to find another piece of the Mahātmā Jade.

The second was to grow the destiny of his empire, funnel it into himself, and use it for an explosive burst that propelled him into the peak Paramount God level.

The third was to find various other treasures that would fuel the transformation.

WHOOSH!

A devilish blur entered his presence. The Second Devil General was now standing in front of him, having entered in a very mysterious fashion. He was stronger than before; clearly, the destiny he was getting from the House of the Invincible had aided in his recovery. Right now, his devilishness seemed more immense than ever.

“I heard about how you got summoned to talk to some of the leaders in the sect, boy,” the Second Devil General said. “So what exactly do you want to talk to me about? I've been in secluded cultivation recently, so I haven’t had time to screw around with you. If you want my help subjugating the leadership, then let’s split that reward of yours fifty-fifty. I need more destiny for my cultivation.”

“That’s not going to happen,” Yang Qi replied bluntly. “And I don’t need your help subjugating them. The last thing I want to do is work with you right now. You haven’t proven to be the type of person who keeps your word. Furthermore, we need to settle accounts regarding what happened when I subjugated Marquis Three Realms, and you refused to help. By the way, did you know that the first patriarch of the House of the Invincible was the Invincible Dugu, and that he’s my Master? You did know, didn’t you? Why didn’t you say something?”

The Second Devil General gave a cold harrumph. “The incident with Marquis Three Realms was just a little test. Besides, do you really think I'm your thug or something? Don’t get carried away with wishful thinking. As for the Invincible Dugu, he might as well not exist. He’s sleeping, or something along those lines. I personally witnessed the Sovereign Lord strike him down, destroying his aura completely. There’s no Invincible Dugu in this world, so whatever Master you had in the impure lands was a projection at best. And that projection has long since run out of power to run it. So I advise you to not try pulling tricks on me. Think about it. Remember what it took for you to rise from the impure lands to the god world? And a lot of it had to do with chance. That Master of yours wasn't even close to being your equal. Do you really think he’s actually someone so important in the god world?”

“You’re full of crap, but I'm honestly not interested in quibbling with you. Here’s the deal. I want to reach a higher level, so I'm going to the Myriad Dragons Lair. Conquering a Dragonfolk kingdom will give me the boost in destiny that I need. So let’s work together. And once it’s in my Cruiser of Civilization, I can turn the thing into something like the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. And didn’t you say you wanted that Dragon Compendium?”

“What? You’re willing to go to the Myriad Dragons Lair with me?” The Second Devil General seemed delighted. “Alright. Great idea. You’re doing well in terms of destiny, but if you want a breakthrough, you’ll need much, much more. The Dragonfolk kingdoms in the Myriad Dragons Lair could be just what you need. Dragons can provide huge destiny. After all, that’s why emperors in the impure lands are called True Dragon Sons of Heaven, and rely on dragon meridians to rule their empires.”

“In that case, let’s get going.”

“No problem at all!”

Of course, Yang Qi would remain fully on guard. He knew that if the Second Devil General wanted this Dragon Compendium, acquiring it wouldn’t be an easy task . And there might be some other reason entirely for his desire to go to the Myriad Dragons Lair.

Regardless, Yang Qi was prepared to make a move at a critical moment. Hopefully, he could somehow trick the Second Devil General in a way that would end with him completely under the control of the God Legion Seal.

With that, they left the House of the Invincible.

Yang Qi unfurled his Tribulation Wings and pierced through the cosmos on his way to the Myriad Dragons Lair. After killing Buddha Thunderjolt and taking his memories, he knew the best route to take to get there.

Truth be told, he had been eying the Myriad Dragons Lair like a tiger eying its prey.

The place was made of many dragon kingdoms, most of which were constantly at war with each other. Last time, he had subjugated Buddha First-King, and that was only the tip of the iceberg. After all, what did Buddha First-King count for? He couldn't even create his own kingdom in the Myriad Dragons Lair. His kingdom had existed on the outside.

One needed immense destiny to found a kingdom in the lair, as they were equivalent to multiple lands in the House of the Invincible.

Obviously, taking places like that into his Cruiser of Civilization would provide immense benefits.

One problem was that he wasn’t certain if the Cruiser of Civilization could carry so many kingdoms in it. Eventually, the drain on resources would be too great, and he would need to bring his empire out into the open.

Soon, Yang Qi and the Second Devil General were passing through the greyspace of the Myriad Dragons Lair, which was a mass of wriggling flesh and blood, the same as before. The Second Devil General seemed very anxious.

“Hurry up! This is going to take a lot of searching. In ancient times, the King of Godmammoths sealed the Dragon Compendium shut tight. Ah, dragons and mammoths. Dragons are the number one race in the god world, and mammoths are number two. But then the King of Godmammoths came along and vanquished the Dragonfolk, making megamammoths supreme in all creation. That’s why I need that Dragon Compendium. And of course, I need your help. With the God Legion Seal, you can undo the sealing marks left behind by the King of Godmammoths. He used his own blood to seal that book, you know. In other words, unsealing it will give you access to some of his power. What do you think? This is all going to work out great for you.”

“Is that so...” Yang Qi said. Drawing on the God Legion Seal, he cast his senses out and realized that there were godmammoth fluctuations here. And that godmammoth energy was suppressing some sort of fiend-devil that was no weaker than the Second Devil General.

‘Wait, I know what's going on here,’ Yang Qi thought, having been struck with sudden inspiration.

Now he realized why the Second Devil General wanted to come here looking for the Dragon Compendium. It was entirely likely that the King of Godmammoths had sealed another devil general here!

Years ago, the Second Devil General had ranked first in strength among the True Devil’s subordinates. And legend had it that the Third Devil General was a devil-dragon! The founders of the Dragonfolk had been considered both devils and demons. After all, there was little difference between the two.

Chapter 1448: Third Devil General

‘That’s got to be it,’ he thought. ‘There’s a devil-dragon imprisoned here. It’s said that the ultimate ancestor of the devil-dragons was the Third Devil General. That’s why the Second Devil General is so raring to go right now, and why he’s been pressuring me to come here for so long. Well, I need to take advantage of this situation. If the King of Godmammoths imprisoned a devil-dragon here, and the Second Devil General manages to free him, I'm going to be in big trouble.’

Yang Qi was already making plans.

“Are you sure I'm going to benefit from this, Second Devil General?”

“Absolutely. The King of Godmammoths used a blood-seal, and if you can take it, your cultivation will definitely experience a breakthrough. The most important thing to consider is that, although the King of Godmammoths has long since perished, you have the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth! If you get that seal, you could summon his soul and then assimilate it. It would be an amazing trump card for you. After all, the only person who could possibly summon the mighty soul of the King of Godmammoths is someone with the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth!”

The Second Devil General was obviously doing everything possible to entice Yang Qi.

Trying to sound cautious, Yang Qi said, “I doubt that taking the blood seal of the King of Godmammoths is going to be an easy task. I'm sure it’ll fight back.”

“It might fight back against other people, but not you. You’re going to make out like a bandit here. You have the God Legion Seal, and the reality of the situation is that the creator of the God Legion Seal wasn’t the Sovereign Lord, but the King of Godmammoths. That’s why the technique that goes along with it is called the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. What do you say? I wouldn’t dare to lie to you. Come on, let’s get going!”

“Fine,” Yang Qi said, following him into the Myriad Dragons Lair.

The Second Devil General only seemed to be getting more and more excited. “Forget about the kingdoms in this place. Let’s focus on the most important task at hand. You can worry about everything else after we deal with the sealing mark.”

“No, hold on,” Yang Qi replied. “I want some of these Dragonfolk kingdoms in my Cruiser of Civilization. And you’re going to help me do it. Otherwise, why would I help you out with something as dangerous as undoing that seal?”

“What?!” the Second Devil General said, his expression turning frosty. However, the killing intent quickly faded away, as he knew that if he pushed too hard, Yang Qi could just leave, and he would end up empty-handed.

“What, not willing to cooperate, Second Devil General? In that case, forget it. I’ll just come back later when I'm a peak Paramount God.” He turned to leave.

Seemingly more anxious than ever, the Second Devil General said, “We're negotiating an important deal here, boy. There’s no need to let your emotions affect your decisions. Fine, I’ll help you take a few of the dragon kingdoms to improve your destiny. Make your breakthrough to the peak Paramount God level, then we can handle my affairs.”

Yang Qi smiled. “Alright, that makes sense. Besides, if I have a better cultivation base, it’ll only help with your situation. Besides, remember our agreement? We said that once I was a peak Paramount God, I’d remove your connection to the God Legion Seal. Your soul would be free. Doesn’t that prospect excite you? In the end, helping me is helping yourself.”

“Fine, let’s get to work,” the Second Devil General said, sounding a bit impatient.

“There’s one other thing, Second Devil General. As you know, my empire in the Cruiser of Civilization is growing larger and larger. But before long, the cruiser won’t be able to sustain it. I'm just not strong enough. So I need your help. The destiny valuation of my empire has already reached nine, and I need more power for the countless god kingdoms inside the cruiser. The flesh and blood of the Myriad Dragons Lair is the perfect resource for that. But the cruiser is controlled by the psyche, and your psychic power is far superior to mine. So I want you to help me use the Engine of the One God and the imperial-heaven pre-beginning systems to expand my empire and reforge the cruiser into something bigger and better. A treasure that truly belongs to me.”

Yang Qi was turning the Second Devil General into hired labor. The general hadn’t really provided much true help to him, and had even plotted against him. So Yang Qi was definitely going to use this trip to his advantage.

Although the Cruiser of Civilization was complete, its core elements and basic aura weren’t those of Yang Qi. Instead, it belonged to the Lord of Civilization, who was its creator.

But the Second Devil General was powerful enough to help him change that. In the past, the Second Devil General never would have agreed to help him in this way. But now that he was on the verge of rescuing the Third Devil General, he was willing to do just about anything.

“What?” the Second Devil General barked angrily. “You want me to help remake the Cruiser of Civilization? That’s not some random task. That’s going to be very difficult! You think I’m just hired labor or something?!”

“It’s not like that at all,” Yang Qi said. “First, the Cruiser of Civilization simply won’t hold very many dragon kingdoms as it is right now. Second, the cruiser isn’t particularly easy to use right now. But with your help, it’ll become a lot easier. Third, and most important, if you help me, I’ll be able to absorb more of the essence of the Myriad Dragons Lair. And as I get more familiar with its vital energy, it’ll make it easier to deal with that sealing mark, and get you the Dragon Compendium. Isn’t that our ultimate goal here? I'm not asking you to be hired labor. I'm asking you to help me plan ahead!”

“Well, that does make sense.” The Second Devil General nodded.

Yang Qi hadn’t mentioned anything about the Third Devil General, and thus the Second Devil General was doing everything he thought necessary to keep the ruse going.

“Fine. Bring out the Cruiser of Civilization. But if you really want to make use of the essence of the Myriad Dragons Lair, you need to give me King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans. All three thousand of them.”

“No problem at all!

Yang Qi promptly handed the talismans to the Second Devil General, who immediately sent his devilish sense inside. A moment later, a heaven-devouring aura erupted out and an enormous primal-chaos elder-snake appeared. However, the Second Devil General quickly exercised control and the aura vanished.

After all, they didn’t want to attract the attention of any of the old-timers. The Myriad Dragons Lair was no smaller than the House of the Invincible. The big difference was that it existed in a state of chaos, with no ultimate leader. The general state of bloody conflict was why the place didn’t have any overall destiny.

The snake shrank down, and the Second Devil General sent it flying out into the flesh and blood. It instantly began devouring it, and in the blink of an eye, over a thousand continent-sized areas were gone.

All of them were continents filled with minor dragon roosts, but they didn't count as kingdoms.

“Yang Qi, go into the heart of the cruiser and take control of the Engine of the One God. You have to help out as well, otherwise all this work will be in vain.”

“Well, of course,” Yang Qi said, and flew into the cruiser to do just that.

As soon as Yang Qi took control of the enormous engine, he could sense the immense blood-soaked aura flooding inside. Then, under the control of the Second Devil General, it became something like a host of blood-red dragons flying into all of the various planes of existence inside.

“Everlit Godlamp; Disseminate Radiance and Light; the Legacy of Brightness; the Essence of Civilization....”As Yang Qi sank into a trance, the Everlit Godlamp rose up above him, casting out radiance and light that transformed the blood dragons into dragons of shining brightness.

The lamp was now fusing with the cruiser!

The cruiser had originally been a machine, but Yang Qi was turning it into something of flesh and blood.

Flesh and blood were like opposites, but now one was changing into the other. They were becoming a part of Yang Qi, or more precisely, part of the God Legion Paradise.

Chapter 1449: Hired Labor

Yang Qi really had turned the Second Devil General into hired labor.

The Second Devil General’s cultivation base was preeminently powerful, so not having him help with the Cruiser of Civilization would have been a big pity. And he was obviously willing to do just about anything to free the Third Devil General. Sadly for him, it hadn’t occurred to him that Yang Qi might deduce what he was really trying to do.

And Yang Qi was going to milk the situation for everything it was worth.

When the time came to cross the river and burn the bridge, he would come up with a way of dealing with the Second Devil General. But the most important thing right now was to get stronger as quickly as possible.

As the blood dragons surged, the Everlit Godlamp became streams of bright light that pierced into the Cruiser of Civilization.

Inside the cruiser, dramatic changes were underway. With every twitch and pulse, the photonic computers were changing into something more like brains of flesh and blood.

“Oh, right. Wretched Brain God Art!”

A flash of inspiration hit Yang Qi, and he drew on the remarkable ability he had gained enlightenment of that originated with Wretch-God Ultimate. It was none other than the Wretched Brain God Art. Originally, he had used it to transform his psyche, energy, and blood into an enormous brain that could unleash immense psychic power.

But now, he realized he could use the same technique to create a real brain for the cruiser.

Wretch-God Ultimate’s brain and his own brain were going to become one and the same.

He knew that at this point in his cultivation, his body wasn’t particularly important. What was truly important were his psyche and will.

By now, his body was actually a part of the Everlit Godlamp. Or more precisely, the Everlit Godlamp was part of him. He had a body of radiance and light, and the God Legion Seal was part of it. And the Mahātmā Jade was an expression of his psychic fluctuations.

Numerous magical treasures were part of him now, which was a cultivation level few people could reach.

“Wretched Brain God Art. Sage Monarch Grand Magic!”

Yang Qi was a master of all sorts of martial disciplines and daoist techniques, and as such, he knew that Wretch-God Ultimate’s technique was now perfectly ready to be assimilated. He had long since come to understand what Wretch-God Ultimate was like, including his abilities. Yang Qi had legacies from the True Devil, the seventy-two monarchs, the Great Necropolis, the Sovereign Lord, and the King of Godmammoths. And with them had come numerous memories that made his enlightenment of the Wretched Brain God Art much easier.

Whizzzzz!

Dragons of radiance and light swirled along with dragons of blood, piercing into the depths of the Cruiser of Civilization and causing numerous streams of destiny to erupt. In the blink of an eye, that destiny took the flesh and blood of the Myriad Dragons Lair and turned it into the shape of an enormous brain.

In the depths of the Cruiser of Civilization, the brain twitched and wriggled, casting out psychic fluctuations as it became part of the cruiser. And the flesh and blood of the dragon lair was also turning the mechanical parts of the cruiser into organic material.

As for the numerous god kingdoms in the cruiser, as the Second Devil General’s mighty vital energy poured into them, the people there could sense the world around them expanding. Land erupted, precious materials appeared, and bizarre creatures were birthed.

It was just like how, when the god world first came into being, numerous precious materials came to exist.

As the destiny poured into the various lands in the cruiser, it caused life to proliferate, which in turn caused the living beings to offer prayers of thanks.

It was a virtuous cycle.

“Halls of heaven, give me your strength!”

Inside the cruiser, a teleportation portal cracked and creaked as it activated, and Yang Qi sent his will inside, causing starlight to fall like mad from the halls of heaven into the portal in the Bastille of the One God.

The mighty aura of the Sovereign Lord then poured into the cruiser.

Not even Yang Qi had ever witnessed anything the likes of this.

“Dammit!” the Second Devil General cursed angrily. “What are you doing, boy!? Are you really turning me into hired labor!?”

However, if you ride a tiger, it's hard to get off, and he knew that if he did the wrong thing now, Yang Qi would abandon him, and his plan to rescue the Third Devil General would end in complete failure.

“This is all going to benefit you, Second Devil General,” Yang Qi said. “I'm using the Wretched Brain God Art to transform the Cruiser of Civilization. You’ll be able to pick up on some of the profundities of the art, so what are you complaining about?”

“Wretched Brain God Art? You have a lot of tricks up your sleeve, boy. I have to admit, you have some wild ambitions. Are you really going to step into the peak Paramount God level right here and now?”

“Not necessarily. But I'm doing everything possible to prepare to get the Dragon Compendium. I promised to help you, right?”

“I think I got very unlucky to get tangled up with you, kid. Ah, whatever. The Dragon Compendium is my key to recovery. Helping you transform the Cruiser of Civilization is like tangling directly with the Lord of Civilization. Although he wasn’t on the level of the Lord of Radiance and Light, he had a lot more profound secrets.”

Even as he spoke, the Cruiser of Civilization shrank down, shining brightly as it transformed into what looked like a huge brain. Beneath it was Yang Qi, who was rapidly pushing his cultivation base to a higher level. As the process went on, he became like a glowing figure who could prop up worlds, sending bright light pouring into the cruiser.

Flesh and blood vanished at a rapid rate as the Second Devil General and Yang Qi both devoured the surrounding Myriad Dragons Lair like hungry gobblewocks.

“Let my devilish soul sacrifice its blood to civilization....” The Second Devil General was throwing caution to the wind. Biting his tongue, he spat out some blood, which splashed onto the Cruiser of Civilization and formed a devil seed within its depths.

Although he was helping Yang Qi, he was secretly trying to get something of a hold on the Cruiser of Civilization. Given his personality, there was no way he would put forth so much effort without getting a direct benefit.

Unfortunately for him, as soon as the huge devil seed entered the Cruiser of Civilization, a bubble floated out of a teleportation portal inside, surrounding the seed. Of course, it was the work of the purrling.

RUMBLE!

Vital energy surged in violent fashion as Yang Qi’s body was returned to its previous state.

The Cruiser of Civilization was nowhere to be seen. What existed instead was an organic brain that was part of Yang Qi. He had now assimilated ninety-nine percent of the Everlit Godlamp, and that power combined with that of the Cruiser of Civilization had improved his fighting prowess by ten times over.

Although he was still only a late Paramount God, in terms of his fighting power, he was vastly superior to before.

Considering the dramatic changes, it would have been completely appropriate to change the cruiser’s name to Brain of Civilization.

Yang Qi no longer had a body of flesh and blood, nor of machinery, nor of anything demonic, but rather a body made of pure power.

RUMBLE!

He thrust out a fist, and a vortex of flesh and blood appeared in the Myriad Dragons Lair, sucking in an area the size of thousands of continents.

The sage monarch magistrates within him began multiplying again. Starting at a hundred and ten thousand, then a hundred and twenty, thirty, forty. It finally stopped at a hundred and fifty thousand.

He hadn’t reached the peak Paramount God level, but with this many sage monarch magistrates, he was so strong he could shake heaven and earth to the point where ghosts and gods would weep. And the more magistrates he had, the easier he could administer everything he controlled.

“Great, it worked! Many thanks, Second Devil General! With your help, I’ve changed the Cruiser of Civilization and made it larger. It's now part of my own flesh and blood; it’s become my brain. Furthermore, I've almost finished assimilating the Everlit Godlamp. It's all thanks to you. I never would’ve been able to do this on my own.”

“You’re nothing less than amazing,” The Second Devil General said, although his expression was extremely unsightly as he realized he had been fooled. He’d assumed he would be able to secretly take control over the cruiser, only to have his devil seal negated by the power of the purrling.

Chapter 1450: Wanton Plundering

In the Second Devil General’s attempt to get control of the Cruiser of Civilization, he had spent a lot of quintessence vitality to create a devil seed. But Yang Qi had outwitted him and assimilated the seed before it could do anything. The general was furious, but couldn't do a thing about it lest he lose Yang Qi’s help in unsealing the Third Devil General. And the Third Devil General was absolutely critical to his ultimate goal of revitalizing the dao of devils.

‘I'm just taking advantage of you to free the Third Devil General, boy. As soon as I don’t need you, I'm going to slaughter you and take your cultivation base for myself! Then what’ll you do?! Everything of yours will belong to me! The God Legion Seal. Your destiny. The Mahātmā Jade. The Everlit Godlamp. The Cruiser of Civilization. Once I have all that, I’ll become something that surpasses even the old Sovereign Lord!’

Of course, he didn't dare to give Yang Qi any clue as to what he was really thinking.

“Alright, boy,” he said, “your task is accomplished. Now we need to go find the Dragon Compendium. I wasted a lot of quintessence-blood helping you reforge the Cruiser of Civilization with the essence of the Myriad Dragons Lair. Now the cruiser has become your brain, and your physical body is ten times what it was before. If I’m not mistaken, you should be able to fully assimilate the Everlit Godlamp at any time, and rise to the peak Paramount God level. In fact, I bet you’ll be able to do that while we go about getting the Dragon Compendium.”

Yang Qi chuckled. “There’s no rush, Second Devil General. Furthermore, you promised to help me reforge the Cruiser of Civilization and assimilate some dragon kingdoms. So let’s get to work on some of those kingdoms, alright? Once my Sage Monarch Empire is large enough, and has enough destiny, then I’ll achieve that breakthrough. At that point, our success with the Dragon Compendium will be even more assured.”

The Second Devil General was so infuriated he nearly coughed up blood. “Give you an inch and you take a mile, huh?! You want more hard labor from me?”

“You’re looking at it the wrong way,” Yang Qi said. “How about this. Whatever dragon kingdoms we take, we split the destiny fifty-fifty. Dragon destiny is far superior to human destiny, which is why emperors in the impure lands are called True Dragon Sons of Heaven. I have the feeling you could benefit from some of that as well, right?”

“Fifty-fifty?” the Second Devil General said, realizing that it wasn’t a bad deal.

He had developed a taste for destiny in the House of the Invincible, except that what he had access to there was trifling.

The idea of capturing some Dragonfolk and establishing a kingdom to harvest destiny was intriguing. Unfortunately, he wasn’t cut out to administer a government. Any nation that he led would quickly be infected with devilishness, leading to widespread carnage and chaos.

There was no way a kingdom like that would provide any good destiny.

From the birth of the universe to now, the dao of devils had never been able to achieve any sort of decisive victory over the dao of righteousness. One of the reasons was that the dao of devils lacked order. And without order, there couldn't be destiny.

One of the biggest differences between the dao of righteousness and the dao of devils was, of course, destiny.

The Second Devil General knew that, but there was nothing he could do to change it. So Yang Qi’s offer of splitting the destiny of any kingdoms they conquered was obviously very attractive.

“What do you think? You talked about being hired labor, Second Devil General. But in reality, taking dragon kingdoms and adding them to my empire is going to be hard, complicated work. I'm going to be doing the labor, and you're going to reap the rewards. You know just as well as I do that managing an empire is a lot harder than assimilating a magical treasure!”

The Second Devil General had to agree with Yang Qi. Thus, their deal was sealed.

RUMBLE!

The two of them flew into the air and headed deeper into the Myriad Dragons Lair. Almost immediately, they ran into a large Dragonfolk kingdom. It took some time, but they conquered it and inserted it into Yang Qi’s empire, adding to its destiny.

The destiny of a dragon kingdom was superior to that of any ordinary human kingdom. However, there were downsides to it. The destiny was chaotic, as dragons generally didn't have official leaders. Dragons valued independence and individuality, which led to a very different type of destiny.

The difference between humans and dragons was like the difference between ants and humans.

An ant colony was extremely orderly, where every ant had a specific task and purpose. A human kingdom was obviously not as orderly as an ant colony. However, the ant colony’s destiny was pitiful in comparison to the kingdom of humans.

Yang Qi was extremely sensitive to destiny, so all he had to do was close his eyes and concentrate.

“That way, Second Devil General.”

The Second Devil General just casually followed his directions, and before long they found themselves closing in on an enormous sea of blood, covered by floating mists that were, naturally, the color of blood.

If those blood mists entered the body of even a mid Paramount God, that person would soon find dragon scales rippling out over their flesh and their godhood transforming into a dragon core.

With his Lord's Eye, Yang Qi could see that in the depths of that blood-colored mist was an enormous Dragonfolk kingdom. It featured huge palaces, cities, and countless gigantic dragons in human form. This place was, at a minimum, ten times the size of the Land of Dreamvoid or the Land of Flowerhill.

In other words, if Yang Qi took this place, he would instantly become a ‘viceroy with ten lands’. And he wouldn’t need to give most of that destiny to the sect.

Unfortunately, he wasn't quite sure how to go about conquering this place.

“What a pure sea of blood,” the Second Devil General said with a sigh of admiration. “Such plentiful dragon vitality. This is the perfect place for dragons to roost. In fact, it's much better than most other locations in the Myriad Dragons Lair. I can even sense the aura of preheaven dragon blood and god vitality. The kingdom in the depths of this blood sea is incomparably invincible, and the destiny there is mighty to the extreme.”

“It’s mighty, alright,” Yang Qi said. “But the destiny is chaotic. Too chaotic. Using it for cultivation purposes isn’t going to be possible. It’s unmanageable.”

The truth was that, although the massive destiny was impressive, it contained numerous smaller flows of conflicting destiny that represented the constant conflict between the various competing dragons.

The destiny here was similar to ten lands from the House of the Invincible. But in terms of how much of it was usable, it was more like one or two lands. If Yang Qi could fully conquer it and use his sage monarch magistrates to govern it, he could theoretically increase the destiny output to rival that of thirty lands.

It all came down to the governing. It was similar to how untended farmland would end up choked with weeds, severely damaging the crops. But if the weeds were cleared out, that same piece of land could be extremely productive.

This Dragonfolk kingdom was fertile, but in desperate need of care.

“It's an amazing kingdom. The question is whether or not the Cruiser of Civilization can take it in.” Yang Qi wasn’t interested in making any rash decisions. “The cruiser is huge, and has plenty of resources, but that doesn’t mean it can handle something this immense.”

Having a huge slab of meat was great, but the method of eating it was important. Trying to stuff it down whole could lead to choking to death.

“What are you waiting for, Yang Qi?” the Second Devil General said eagerly. “Conquer this place!”

“Hold on!” Yang Qi replied. “Are you trying to beat the grass to startle the snake? Trying to tackle a kingdom this large is virtually suicide. We have to come up with a good plan. For instance, we can infiltrate it and find the emperor. Ambush him and use the God Legion Seal on him, then force him to do whatever I want.”

“That’s going to be a huge waste of time!” the Second Devil General snapped.

“We're doing all of this to help you get the Dragon Compendium, right? Let me ask you a question. Are the old-timers among the Dragonfolk unaware of the compendium? If I break the King of Godmammoths’ seal, it's going to cause a big uproar that will alert all of the old-timers. And if they all show up in the middle of it, what will our chances of success be? Or could it be that you're not really after the Dragon Compendium? Do you have some other motive that’s causing you to be in such a rush?”

“That's utter nonsense!” the Second Devil General blurted. Of course, the truth was that Yang Qi had hit the nail on his head. Quickly regaining his composure, the general put on a bored expression and said, “The Dragon Compendium is a huge secret. I’m just worried that word will leak somehow. You’re very cunning, boy. So fine. Let’s do it your way.”

‘He’s so worried I’ll “find out the truth” about the Third Devil General that he’s willing to do just about anything. I think I ought to take full advantage of this. And when I finally become a peak Paramount God, I’ll put him fully in his place. Although, I need to keep up the act until I achieve the breakthrough. After I have all the resources I need, I’ll do it in one shot and really shake things up.’

Chapter 1451: Massive Kingdom

The Second Devil General was no match for Yang Qi when it came to coming up with plans.

That was one reason why the Second Devil General was always coming out at a disadvantage in his dealings with Yang Qi. That said, the general was so incredibly powerful that he wasn’t worried about minor losses here and there.

Of course, Yang Qi wasn’t so naive as to truly lord it over the general. If he pushed things too far, the general could theoretically flip out and kill him.

So Yang Qi was turning up the heat, slowly but surely. As he did that, he continued growing stronger and stronger. Obviously, he was going to have to fight the Second Devil General eventually, and he wanted his fighting prowess to be as high as possible when that time came. For most people, reaching the peak Paramount God level involved achieving a psychic scale of one billion. But Yang Qi was different. When he achieved his breakthrough, he would be rising into the billions.

It could be two billion, or even three billion. At that point, he could probably hold out in a fight against the general, but wouldn’t be able to kill him. That said, his ultimate goal was to use the God Legion Seal to form his golden throne and fully subjugate him.

“Maybe I can figure out what type of nation this dragon kingdom is,” the Second Devil General said. “I wonder who leads it.”

A vertical eye opened on his forehead, glowing with dazzling light as he peered into the depths of the kingdom. It was his Paleo-Devil God-Eye, which was similar to the Lord's Eye that Yang Qi had.

Through Yang Qi’s psychic connection via the God Legion Seal, he could also see into the depths of the sea of blood. It was a complex mass of spatial dimensions, connected together to create numerous worlds.

Even a late Paramount God who tried to traverse a labyrinth like this would likely get lost and possibly die trying to escape.

“It seems like the destiny is all swirling in one direction,” the Second Devil General said. “There’s a dimension in the middle with a huge palace. It must be the imperial palace.” The palace he indicated pulsed with an imperial aura, and the buildings were all violet-gold. It was clearly the center of the entire kingdom.

There really wasn’t any way that Yang Qi and the Second Devil General could attack and conquer this place. It would have involved a deadly battle that would result in incredible death and destruction. In fact, the place would be mostly destroyed in the process.

Sometimes, the best way to conquer a nation was to get rid of its leader first.

Given Yang Qi’s level, there was no way he could do that on his own right now. This place’s leader surely had a cultivation base no weaker than Duke Nine Cauldrons or the priestess from the Palace of Destiny. Even just spying on a person like that would be difficult for Yang Qi.

But the Second Devil General’s cultivation level was much higher, allowing him to get a clear view.

In the depths of the palace, the destiny of the kingdom converged on a man with piercing eyes that seemed to roil with endless lightning, sitting on a throne as he held court.

He was stately, but at the same time, pulsed with a destructive aura. And although he was sitting still, Yang Qi sensed that he could instantly unleash explosive power that could shake chiliocosms of worlds.

‘Fuck,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘This dragon is so strong I couldn't fight him one on one. He must have a godhood rating and psychic scale of at least two or three billion. Not only does he command the destiny in this kingdom, but he's connected to the Myriad Dragons Lair as well. Forget subjugating him. If I catch his attention, it would be hard for me to escape. So how exactly am I going to conquer this kingdom?’ He was starting to think he might need to give up, yet couldn't quite bring himself to make that decision.

Although the kingdom in general wasn’t united, and the dragons within it were constantly fighting each other, there was still plenty of destiny here. If he could get it, and put it into order, he would have destiny equivalent to that of thirty lands, or possibly even forty.

That would make him as powerful as a viceroy with a hundred or even a thousand lands. After all, a viceroy of a hundred lands had to give most of their destiny to the sect, and was only able to keep a small percentage.

“They’re holding court,” Yang Qi said. “Make sure not to tip them off about our presence. We need to figure out what they’re talking about. Look, there are non-Dragonfolk present. It looks like those people are royal emissaries of some sort.”

“Quit jabbering, you’re going to drain my eye technique. Let’s just infiltrate them right now. You’ve almost assimilated the Everlit Godlamp, plus you have that divine ability from the Lord of Radiance and Light, the Brilliant Radiance Latent Projection. With that, you can hide out in the open where light exists, and no one will be the wiser.”

“Fine. Let’s sneak in there and see what’s going on.”

He placed his palms together as if in prayer, and then transformed into a streak of light. At the same time, the Second Devil General turned into a devilish phantom that wouldn’t attract any attention. The two of them shot forward, and before long, they were in the royal palace.

This was possible because of the chaotic nature of the destiny here. The destiny of the House of the Invincible was so orderly, and the net of law so dense, that sneaking into it this way would be impossible.

The depths of the palace were lit with divine lamps, fueled by oil from various ancient godlings. Merely being in their presence would help improve one's wisdom, and would provoke a very profound feeling.

Yang Qi decided to use one of those lamps as his cover, becoming the flame that burned within it.

“Your Majesty Buddha Shockheaven, we of the Central Dynasty have come here in good faith. We sincerely hope that you’ll consider joining our dynasty.”

The mere voice was so powerful it caused Yang Qi’s ears to ring. Obviously the person who had spoken was no weaker than the emperor himself.

‘Buddha Shockheaven?’ he thought. ‘I can’t believe it! This is the leader of the Dragonswarm Society! One of the main reasons I fled and ended up joining the House of the Invincible was because I was worried about him causing problems for me. This place must be the kingdom of the Dragonswarm Society. That just makes me more convinced than ever that I have to take it, no matter how difficult. The Central Dynasty is run by the Proud Clan, and they’re here right now. I can’t let them get away. I have to subjugate them and drag out everything they know about King Immortal-Slayer and Proud Heaven.’

Heart pounding, he projected a message to the Second Devil General. “Second Devil General, these are emissaries from the Central Dynasty. We can't let them get away from here. I will take them. And you're going to help me.”

“Why are you always asking for my help, boy?” the Second Devil General said.

“It relates to the Great Necropolis. You see, King Immortal-Slayer is imprisoned there, and people from the Central Dynasty are trying to break in and assimilate both him and the necropolis. They want access to profound secrets beyond anything the Sovereign Lord was privy to.” Yang Qi was fairly certain that the only thing which could possibly entice the Second Devil General was the Great Necropolis.

“You're talking about something of immense importance,” said the Second Devil General. Not even he dared to take the Great Necropolis lightly. “It relates to the survival of the god world itself, and by extension, our very lives.”

Furthermore, he knew that if Yang Qi could capture some people from the Central Dynasty, he might finally be able to get some answers about what was going on.

With that, they focused on observing what was happening in the palace.

Buddha Shockheaven sat on his throne, flanked left and right by important ministers, over a hundred of them late Paramount Gods, as well as a few that were in the peak level. There were also numerous mid Paramount Gods, minor officials who had psychic scales between ten million and ninety million.

And in the middle of the hall was the delegation from the Central Dynasty.

Chapter 1452: Juicy Morsel

The diplomatic group from the Central Dynasty wasn’t large; there were only three people in it.

They were all men, without a single woman present. The leader was a middle-aged man with white hair at his temples, whose mere voice had caused Yang Qi to tremble down to his soul. The second was an old man who had such a profound air to him that he must surely have experienced all there was to experience in the world of men, and had come to understand all of the transformations of gratitude, grudges, and karma.

The third member of the group was young, yet was clearly on the same level as Marquis Three Realms.

All of them were peak Paramount Gods, which made sense considering they were in the middle of the Myriad Dragons Lair. Only people like that could resist the power of true dragons, and prevent themselves from being dragonized.

“Is that supposed to be a threat, Proud Mindtravel?” Buddha Shockheaven said, his eyes flickering with killing intent. Of course, he didn’t dare to make a move. Although he was in his own mighty kingdom, he knew full well that the Central Dynasty viewed him as a juicy morsel to be devoured.

In fact, they probably thought of the entire Myriad Dragons Lair as a juicy morsel.

“It’s not a threat at all,” Proud Mindtravel replied. “Everyone with eyes can see how mighty and grand the Central Dynasty is. And you’re no exception. We control the distribution of godnotes in the god world, and we have the best godstone mines. We also have the most powerful magical treasures, and the most abundant destiny. The House of the Invincible and the Chiliocosm Dynasty will fall to us eventually, and the only reason your Myriad Dragons Lair has been able to survive in such peace is that we're currently in the process of conquering the Demonfolk, Devilfolk, Wretchfolk, Mechfolk, and other peoples. For now, we don’t have time to deal with you Dragonfolk. All of the other races are yielding to us, and before long, you’ll be the only ones left out. And if you don’t surrender, we’ll have to send our army here to sort things out.”

Although Proud Mindtravel’s words were a clear threat, they were backed with such might and grandeur that even the top experts from the Dragonswarm Society were actually chilled to the bone. It was obvious that the Central Dynasty had come to do business.

Dragonfolk were inherently arrogant and obstinate, but the Central Dynasty was just too powerful. After all, they were the top organization in the god world.

Although they often clashed with the House of the Invincible and the House of the Chiliocosm, the Central Dynasty had such impressive destiny that they could always hold their own. And everyone had to acknowledge that they were the strongest.

Of course, one of the big reasons for that was that the Central Dynasty was the only dynasty that could distribute godnotes.

In other words, even the House of the Invincible and the House of the Chiliocosm had no choice but to use the godnotes from the Central Dynasty. Although other currencies had been introduced over the years, they weren’t used. It actually stemmed from rules laid down by the Sovereign Lord himself.

That was another factor that improved the destiny of the Central Dynasty so much. And it was why the Central Dynasty always had an advantage in their struggle against the House of the Invincible and the House of the Chiliocosm.

“What do you think, Buddha Shockheaven?” Proud Mindtravel said. “You Dragonfolk have a lot of top experts, but we've already recruited some of the other kingdoms here in the Myriad Dragons Lair. Those who join the Central Dynasty first will get the best rewards. And those who insist on being pigheaded will have to deal with our army, and either ground to dust or enslaved. Surely you know the reputation of our dynasty. Truth be told, Generalissimo Proud Longday is already preparing troops to invade the Myriad Dragons Lair.”

“Are you serious?” Buddha Shockheaven blurted, clearly taken aback.

He knew full well that if the Central Dynasty launched a full-scale invasion, his own kingdom would fall into ruin. The Dragonfolk were as disunited as a dish of loose sand, and simply couldn’t unite against an invading force. Furthermore, even if their top experts did fight side by side, they still wouldn’t be strong enough to halt the advance of the Central Dynasty’s army.

Everyone knew that their army had the reputation of being unbeatable. When they went on the warpath, they would leave behind mountains of corpses and seas of blood. And they would wipe out their enemies down to the last man.

“It’s up to you, Buddha Shockheaven. I just came here today to explain what the Central Dynasty is thinking. And now I’ll take my leave. I hope that in three months’ time, you and all the other top leaders of the Dragonswarm Society will come to the Central Dynasty to offer fealty. Understand?”

As the words left his mouth, Proud Mindtravel suddenly exploded into dust, as did the other two of his fellows.

No one had any idea what technique they had used to leave.

“What do we do?” the Second Devil General said to Yang Qi. “Do we chase those three down and subjugate them? Or do we take on Buddha Shockheaven and the Dragonfolk first?”

“We start with Buddha Shockheaven. Those three from the Central Dynasty are too mysterious and unpredictable. And the fact that they seem completely capable of coming and going as they please in the Myriad Dragons Lair, without any fear of old-timers from the Dragonfolk causing problems for them, seems to indicate that taking them on directly would be very dangerous. Besides, look at the things they left behind. There are official letters of surrender, banners and flags, and other tokens from the Central Dynasty. We can use those to track them down when the time comes. Let’s subjugate Buddha Shockheaven and take control of this entire kingdom. Then I’ll use him to create a spell formation we can use as a surefire trap against those three emissaries.”

The Second Devil General couldn’t help but sigh in admiration of Yang Qi’s methods, and also muse that, if he really helped in the effort to conquer the dao of devils, the plans would surely succeed without a hitch.

Unfortunately, he also knew how profoundly ambitious Yang Qi was.

“Fine, let’s do it,” the general said. “What's the plan? Are we going to snatch up all the officials in the court in one fell swoop?”

“No!” Yang Qi said, shaking his head firmly. “Causing a huge scene won’t do us any good. Attacking openly would lead to a very dangerous fight, and likely damage the destiny here. Besides, for all we know, those three emissaries are actually hiding nearby, observing this place and waiting to see what will happen. If we reveal ourselves to them, it could cause big problems. I suspect that, considering what the Central Dynasty is trying to do, Buddha Shockheaven is probably going to announce his resignation as emperor. Then he’ll sneak around and try to get the help of other Dragonfolk old-timers. The fact that he has an amazing kingdom like this, in the middle of this sea of blood, indicates that he has powerful backers. Throwing ourselves out in the open with people like that in play would just be suicide.”

“Then what do you plan to do?” the Second Devil General asked quizzically.

Before their conversation could continue, Buddha Shockheaven raised his voice and said, “Ladies and gentlemen, all of you heard what just happened. The Central Dynasty is being very overbearing, and unfortunately, they have the strength to back up their threats. They're probably stronger than our Myriad Dragons Lair, and that’s not to mention that we’re completely disunited. That said, simply rolling over for them would be far too much of a stain on the honor of us Dragonfolk.”

“Let’s put everything on the line and just fight them!”

“I refuse to believe that the Central Dynasty would truly dare to launch an invasion. Aren't they worried that we might ask for help from the House of the Invincible or the House of the Chiliocosm?

“Hmph! There are plenty of secrets to our Myriad Dragons Lair. For instance, we haven’t opened the Dragon Compendium. Once we do, the true guardian of the Dragonfolk will be in play, and there’s no way the Central Dynasty could deal with such fury.”

“I have orders,” Buddha Shockheaven said. “A moment of life or death is upon us, and any conflict of interests between different factions needs to be set aside. We have to work together, train our troops, and arouse the passions of the entire kingdom. As far as I’m concerned, this is an opportunity. For too long, we’ve stayed hidden in the middle of this sea of blood, living comfortable lives. But now, a catastrophic war looms on the horizon. And perhaps that’s all we need to finally achieve some unity.

“Our destiny will improve by ten times over. I’ll be leaving to recruit help from the outside, and consult some of our most senior members. I hope that by the time I return, our destiny will have improved, and we’ll be united! If there’s no unity, then don’t blame me for taking some heads!”

“Yes sir!” The officials knew that now was definitely not the time for infighting.

Almost as soon as the announcement was made, Yang Qi could sense the destiny shifting and growing more consolidated.

Outside pressure could definitely cause a temporary unity, while lives of comfort and peace could do the opposite. When things were too peaceful, competing interests could actually cause so much disunity that the destiny could collapse. According to the ancient saying, life springs from sorrow and calamity, and death comes from ease and pleasure.

Of course, Yang Qi’s Sage Monarch Empire didn’t have to worry about that. With the sage monarch magistrates to control everything, there were no competing interest groups to cause problems.

After making his announcement, Buddha Shockheaven vanished.

“Damn, boy, you really guessed exactly how it would play out. I guess turning the Cruiser of Civilization into your brain was a good idea.”

With that, the two of them shot out in pursuit of Buddha Shockheaven.

At a certain point, where the terrain was favorable, the Second Devil General assumed human form and jumped out to block Buddha Shockheaven’s path.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi was setting up a spell formation.

“Who are you?” Buddha Shockheaven said, his expression flickering. He nearly attacked, but could sense that this person was incredibly strong, so he held back.

Chapter 1453: Gobbling a Juicy Morsel

Yang Qi and the Second Devil General were working together to intercept and defeat Buddha Shockheaven.

His Dragonfolk kingdom was already a thriving place. It had amazing destiny that Yang Qi knew he could use to create fabulous magical treasures and amazing sage monarch magistrates, not to mention significantly improving his cultivation base.

As he got more sage monarch magistrates, they not only provided purer and more powerful godly might, but could also be used to create destiny. The magistrates were his government officials, and since he used them to shape and control destiny, they were crucial to everything.

His current plan was to subjugate Buddha Shockheaven, then slowly take over his kingdom. By taking control of the explosive destiny, he was certain he could push his over one hundred thousand sage monarch magistrates to the level of two or three hundred thousand or more.

Not only that, he could improve the magistrates’ cultivation bases.

Right now, each magistrate was an early Paramount God. It was only logical that, while godly might could be used to produce more of the magistrates, it would take destiny to improve their overall level.

So in this case, he was really killing two birds with one stone.

There was nothing that would deter Yang Qi from taking advantage of his situation. He absolutely wasn’t going to waste time on the Second Devil General’s “Dragon Compendium”, or his original plan of slowly conquering various Dragonfolk kingdoms. In fact, it was entirely possible that he could use this destiny to directly vanquish the general.

“Who are you people?” Buddha Shockheaven said, staring intently at the Second Devil General while simultaneously waiting in combat readiness.

“The reason I’ve blocked your path today, Buddha Shockheaven,” the Second Devil General said, “is that I want to help you. I know the Central Dynasty threatened your kingdom. They say they want you to join them, but the truth is that you’ll be nothing but a slave. And if their army comes, they’ll chop you to mincemeat. That’s why you've gone to seek the help of other Dragonfolk experts. You want to form an alliance to fight the Central Dynasty, don’t you? Unfortunately, such efforts are pointless. Even if all of the Dragonfolk old-timers stand up to the Central Dynasty, you won’t win. The only chance you have is to join me in opposing them.”

The Second Devil General spoke in such a supercilious way that anyone would get pissed off just hearing him. And of course, Buddha Shockheaven was already enraged past the boiling point.

“Looking to die?!”

RUMBLE!

He launched an attack that caused wild winds to whip everywhere, and sent blinding light out along with deafening rumbling sounds.

“God Dragon Sunders Heaven!”

It was a fiery fist technique of the Dragonfolk, and it was designed to kill the opponent without mercy. It created an enormous god dragon, shaking its head back and forth with rage as it shot forward with the power to sunder heaven.

This move was considered a quintessential expression of what it meant to be Dragonfolk, and it was one of Buddha Shockheaven’s rare, consummate arts.

However, the Second Devil General simply flicked his finger.

Twang. Strum.

A sound thrummed out like a devilish zither, accompanied by musical symbols from the Devilfolk. They shot toward the god dragon, which subsequently exploded, having been completely wiped out of existence by the Second Devil General.

Thump. Thump. Thump.

Buddha Shockheaven staggered backward, his eyes gleaming with shock. Never in his wildest dreams could he have guessed that, given the level of his cultivation base, his attack would be defeated as easily as blowing some dust off the shoulder. What cultivation level would it take to do that?

“You...” he said, looking astonished. “Who are you?” He was even considering just running away. However, before he could, a net appeared, an overlapping of radiance and light that contained some of the complex destiny of the House of the Invincible.

“Trying to run, Buddha Shockheaven?” It was Yang Qi. He had finished setting up the spell formation, which meant that flight would now be very difficult for Buddha Shockheaven. Everyone knew that to catch brigands, first catch their chief, and now Buddha Shockheaven was stuck like a turtle in a jar. With him captured, conquering his kingdom was going to be very easy.

“You're from the House of the Invincible?” Buddha Shockheaven said, having sensed that energy.

“Yes,” Yang Qi replied. “We’re from the House of the Invincible. But at the same time, we're not. Precisely speaking, the House of the Invincible belongs to us. In any case, congratulations, Buddha Shockheaven. You’ve won the grand prize. The person who blocked your path is the magnificent Second Devil General. He wants to join forces with you to conquer the Myriad Dragons Lair. So get on your knees and offer him your allegiance. It’ll be much better than working for the Central Dynasty.”

“Second Devil General?” Buddha Shockheaven looked over at him, even more astonished than before to have a fiendish monster from the past standing right in front of him. “Second Devil General, sir, you shouldn't be opposing us! The original devil-dragon patriarch of the Dragonfolk was the—”

“Cut the crap and surrender!” the Second Devil General interrupted loudly, making it more than obvious that he was trying to hide something. Of course, Yang Qi knew full well that the Second Devil General was worried Buddha Shockheaven might reveal the fact that the Third Devil General was a devil-dragon.

“Devil Souls Fill Creation!”

Clearly unwilling to leave anything to chance, the Second Devil General launched a deadly attack filled with devilish soul projections that almost immediately blotted out the sky. And he wasn’t done.

“Devilish Specters; Ghost Imprisonment!”

“Heaven and Earth Create Devils!”

“Original Sin of Ancient Devils!”

“Lack the Devil; Lack the Heart!”

“Lack the God; Lack the Ghost!”

He unleashed a whole succession of attacks, finally giving Yang Qi a good idea of what a boundless and invincible king among devils was capable of. His every move thrummed with devil energy, and combined, they created a complicated web that seemed to lock Buddha Shockheaven into a position of certain death.

“Dragons Dominate the Nine Prefectures!”

“Dragons Soar over Four Seas!”

“March of Dragons in Heaven and Earth!”

“Dragons Devour the Sun and Moon!”

“Dragons Guzzle the Ocean!”

“Dragons Return to Myriad Worlds!”

“Dragon Coiled around a Thousand Mountains!”

Buddha Shockheaven wasn’t going to just give in. He howled with rage as he unleashed the most consummate battle abilities and martial disciplines contained in the genes and instincts of the Dragonfolk. Such things were not to be looked down on.

However, when it came to substructure, random dragons couldn’t possibly measure up to the Second Devil General.

The general’s devil abilities crushed Buddha Shockheaven’s Dragonfolk arts, and devil energy raged about in the surrounding parts of the Myriad Dragons Lair.

“Devil Heart!”

The pulsing heart of a devil appeared, negating any effects of dragonization. In fact, the devil energy was so incredible that Yang Qi knew it could devilize even him, if he didn't have the Mahātmā Jade to protect him, as well as the God Legion Seal to back it up.

The Second Devil General was obviously capable of some amazing things.

BAM!

The enormous devil heart crushed down onto Buddha Shockheaven, who was so overwhelmed he couldn’t do anything, not even think.

In that moment, Yang Qi drew on the power of the Mahātmā Jade, sending it out to seal the devil heart. Then he stepped forward and sent the power of the God Legion Seal stabbing into Buddha Shockheaven’s head.

“Damnation, boy! The only reason you don’t fear my devil heart is because of the Mahātmā Jade! It can negate any devil technique! It was created by countless mahātmās from the dao of devils, and now I can see how truly terrifying it is! Not even my billions of years of attempts to assimilate it did me any good.” The Second Devil General was obviously furious that he had failed in his attempt to take personal control of Buddha Shockheaven. After all, he wasn’t in the House of the Invincible, so it should have been an easy task. Except Yang Qi interfered.

A moment later, Buddha Shockheaven sagged weakly.

Chuckling darkly, Yang Qi said, “You tried to use your animadestiny devil heart to control him, eh Second Devil General? What level has that ability of yours reached? The Eternal level? Deathless level? Undying level? Dao-Equalization level? World-Creation level?”

There were many types of devil hearts, and they came in all sorts of levels and grades. And because Yang Qi knew all about the dao of devils, it made it easy for him to make fun of the Second Devil General.

“So, boy, you've subjugated Buddha Shockheaven. Well, you must have some plan up your sleeve. Hurry up and get working on it!”

The Second Devil General obviously wasn’t interested in a debate.

“Alright!” Yang Qi sent his will piercing into Buddha Shockheaven, who then rose to his feet in shock.

“So, it’s you. You’re the bearer—”

“No jibber-jabber,” Yang Qi interrupted. “I have work for you. Go back to your sect with us at your side. Call the ministers in one by one and say you want to have personal discussions with all of them. We’ll subjugate them and take control of the destiny of the Dragonswarm Society.”

“Yes, of course,” Buddha Shockheaven said. He had fallen completely under Yang Qi’s control, and couldn't do a thing to defy him.

Thus, Yang Qi took the Second Devil General and Buddha Shockheaven back to the Dragonswarm Society’s kingdom.

There, a great purge began.

The officials were surprised to see their leader back so soon. Then, he immediately started summoning them to secret meetings. They eagerly lined up outside his study, certain that they were going to be rewarded in some manner. And that in turn led many people to believe that there was now hope for their situation.

Chapter 1454: Gobbling a Juicy Morsel (2)

BAM!

In Buddha Shockheaven’s study, the Second Devil General slapped a peak Paramount God so hard he tumbled onto the ground. Then Yang Qi pounced like a tiger and subjugated him in the blink of an eye. This expert had a godhood rating and psychic scale of one billion three hundred million, and was none other than the generalissimo of the armed forces.

He was roughly as powerful as Buddha Shockheaven himself, being the commander of the army, with a whole host of subordinates and interest groups under his command. In fact, he was strong enough that he could even oppose Buddha Shockheaven directly if he wanted.

During the past few days, Yang Qi had been in the royal study, subjugating government officials one after the next. After being subjugated, they had no choice but to heed all of his commands without defiance. As a result, the king’s power seemed to be growing constantly in the realm, as opposed to how things usually worked, with numerous officials feigning compliance but opposing him behind the scenes.

It was a snowball effect that led to more and more leaders answering the summons.

The final obstacle had been the generalissimo, whose cultivation base was no weaker than the king’s, and who commanded immense military might. Because of the power he commanded, it was impossible for the king to openly move against him.

All of the leaders in the army would follow his instructions, and he was so strong politically that he would often make direct demands of the emperor, even causing harm to the national destiny as a result.

After all, when the military was idle and demanded resources, the government officials would have to comply. Even the common people would have to bear responsibility, causing the destiny of the entire country to slowly decline.

It was only after securing the loyalty of numerous other powerful figures that Yang Qi had finally summoned the generalissimo.

As soon as he stepped in, the Second Devil General smacked him silly, and then Yang Qi struck him with the power of the God Legion Seal. He never stood a chance.

Just like that, Yang Qi took control of the destiny of a dynasty.

RUMBLE!

The destiny flowed toward him without any hindrance whatsoever. There was now truly a state of centralized state power. The competing interest groups were being done away with.

Yang Qi immediately took the flows of destiny from the king and used them to refine his nascent divinity and hopefully do the final assimilation of the Everlit Godlamp.

However, after a moment he stopped and focused on the sage monarch magistrates. When they rose to a higher level, it represented Yang Qi’s cultivation base rising. And of course, it made their administration abilities even more refined.

In the past, a single sage monarch magistrate could govern a population roughly the size of the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty. If they were assigned to govern anything larger than that, their effectiveness would break down and the destiny would suffer.

But if he could improve them, their potential for governing would increase to match the size of the Deva Dynasty.

“Your destiny is improving. Now you’re really benefiting from this unification.” The Second Devil General could see what was happening, and could tell that the previously chaotic destiny was now much more unified.

No longer was this country a dish of loose sand, a change that was nothing short of astonishing.

“Yes,” Yang Qi said. “With this destiny, it's the equivalent of ten lands back in the House of the Invincible. Unfortunately, it’s still not good enough. Considering this kingdom’s location in the middle of this sea of blood, it should have a destiny equivalent to thirty or forty lands. With that much destiny, we could really claim to have struck it rich, Second Devil General. We need to enact some reforms. I'd say it’ll take another month of work. You’re not going to start disagreeing now, are you?”

“Whatever you want,” the Second Devil General said. “Take this juicy morsel on your own. Just don’t forget that you owe me half of everything.”

“Well, that goes without saying,” Yang Qi said. “Come forth, sage monarch magistrates!”

Rumbling could be heard as more than a hundred thousand sage monarch magistrates appeared.

By now, the empire in the Cruiser of Civilization didn’t need constant oversight. Yang Qi had absolute control of the Cruiser of Civilization, including all of its various systems. Therefore, it was possible for him to take all of those sage monarch magistrates and use them to control this enormous kingdom of Dragonfolk.

Of course, he had already subjugated all of the high-level government officials. However, compared to the officialdom as a whole, they were few in number. But with the sage monarch magistrates to back them up, getting all of the lesser officials under control was completely possible.

“Buddha Shockheaven, call all of the subjugated officials to a meeting. We’re going to initiate some major reforms. Henceforth, this place will be called the Sage Monarch Dragon Kingdom! These are my sage monarch magistrates, and one will be assigned to each of you. They’ll be making the decisions, and you just have to follow along with them. It's that simple.”

“Yes sir!”

RUMBLE!

With that announcement, a major undertaking got underway. Yang Qi sat down in the palace and watched as things played out. Orders were issued, interest groups were disbanded, and more unity was achieved. And this led to a more intense destiny.

Yang Qi was now the true leader here, and destiny was growing and converging on him on a daily basis.

His sage monarch magistrates were constantly proliferating, and improving in quality. In fact, a month later, they reached a major watershed point. They were now on the verge of reaching the mid Paramount God level.

Eventually, every last interest group was dissolved and the destiny in the kingdom shuddered, becoming like a bright red beam of light that shot through the air like a dragon. As it flew along, it sent out a net of law that covered everything, similar to the way things were in the House of the Invincible.

Although this one was much smaller, it was just as orderly.

During this past month, the sage monarch magistrates pushed their numbers all the way to three hundred thousand! And all of them were mid Paramount Gods with psychic scales of ninety million.

Yang Qi breathed deeply as the destiny of the place filled him. Shockingly, it was almost at the level of forty lands, which meant he had access to the same amount of destiny that a viceroy of seven or eight hundred lands would have.

‘Now this is how progress is supposed to be made,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘Not even a month of time spent right beneath the halls of heaven in the Bastille of the One God could be as beneficial as this. No wonder all those old-timers give up on cultivation, choosing instead to build their own kingdoms and foster their own destiny. It can lead to progress millions upon millions of times faster than ordinary cultivation.’

Yang Qi knew all about how destiny worked. For instance, how much effort normally went into a Quasi-God going all the way to the Paramount God level? But in the House of the Invincible, it took little effort for them to ordain a person directly into that level.

Yang Qi could practice cultivation in the Bastille of the One God for a thousand years and not benefit as much as he had in a single month from this dragon kingdom.

“You’ve unified this kingdom, Yang Qi,” the Second Devil General said. “And you’ve benefited immensely. Now, according to our agreement, I get half of that destiny!” He had been watching enviously from the sidelines this entire month, and knew full well that if he’d been in charge of things, all of the destiny in this place would have crumbled.

And now, he wanted his share.

Chapter 1455: No. No Destiny for You

‘What the fuck! This Second Devil General really does want to steal the fruit of other people’s labor. There’s no way I’m going to give him any of this destiny.’ It was obvious that the general was drooling over the destiny of the dragon kingdom.

In the past month, Yang Qi had purged the Sage Monarch Dragon Kingdom of all private interest groups and unified the hearts of the people. Thanks to the major reform, destiny had converged, and although it couldn’t completely match the pure destiny of the Sage Monarch Empire in the Cruiser of Civilization, it was still profoundly abundant.

After all, destiny as pure as that of the Sage Monarch Empire wasn't something that could come about in a short moment.

Perhaps he could throw the dragon kingdom into the Cruiser of Civilization and torment it with karmic retribution for a thousand years. Then its destiny could be forcibly purified, and be much more than the level of forty lands.

But he wouldn't do that.

There was also no way he would give any of the destiny to the Second Devil General. This was his destiny from his kingdom, and forcibly giving it away would be harmful. As was said, when a nation is about to perish, villains will always arise.

It was a simple truth. If a nation’s destiny was about to dissipate, it would obviously be in a weak state, allowing baleful energy to seep into the country. As a result, all sorts of ambitious and ruthless individuals would rise up, revolt against authority, and sow chaos.

In a similar vein, it was said that turbulent times call for great heroes.

For instance, back in the impure lands, the Rich-Lush Continent had abounded with the baleful energy of heaven and earth. If it hadn’t, then how could a nobody like Yang Qi rise up and eventually take over the place?

If the Second Devil General suddenly took away half of the national destiny, the country would become weak, baleful energy would enter it, and ruthless villains would rise up. Perhaps Yang Qi could suppress them, but it would damage the vital energy of the nation in the process.

What good would it do to kill a thousand enemies while losing eight hundred of his own troops in the process?

“I might have successfully established this Sage Monarch Dragon Kingdom, Second Devil General, but things aren’t stable. If we both tap into the destiny, it's going to damage it significantly. Why don’t I foster some more growth first? Wait until the destiny has reached its true potential, then we can conquer all the other dragon kingdoms and get access to some truly amazing destiny.”

“You’re going back on your word, boy!” the Second Devil General shouted angrily. “How dare you! We had an agreement. I help you conquer this dragon kingdom, and we split the destiny fifty-fifty. What, you think that I’d just help you take down Buddha Shockheaven and you reap all the rewards?!”

“You’re looking at it the wrong way, Second Devil General. Look at all the destiny out there in the Myriad Dragons Lair. Do you know how many top experts were slaughtered in ancient times, their flesh and blood quintessence sacrificed to create this place? And do you know how much baleful energy resulted because of that? If we split the destiny right now, it's going to severely damage the foundation of the nation. Furthermore, the destiny I'm taking is just going to make more of my sage monarch magistrates, which I can use to govern these lands and establish an even more orderly nation. And what exactly are you contributing? You just want to take the destiny and harm everything. Think about it. What would be better for a vampire? To suck a pig dry of blood? Or raise more pigs? Simply put, Second Devil General, now is not the time to be splitting up the destiny.”

“So you’re saying you really are going back on your word?” the Second Devil General growled, his killing intent roiling in a way that made it obvious he was about to take action.

“It’s not going back on my word. It's building a strong national foundation. Things haven’t been established yet, so why would we possibly go about damaging things? Also, second Devil General, don't forget that when you get access to the destiny, you have to give a lot of it back to the nation. It's sort of like farming. After the harvest, you still have to fertilize the farmland. Or did you have some other way to increase destiny? After all, this is our mutual property here, and I don't want to see you do anything self-destructive.”

“Er....” The Second Devil General thought about it, but in the dao of devils, there wasn’t much emphasis on order. People just took what they wanted and never offered reciprocation. There was no virtuous cycle that could lead to an increase in destiny, thus, the concept was quite foreign to him.

Yang Qi was actually telling the truth in this regard.

“We worked really hard to establish this kingdom, so we don’t want to do anything to harm it,” Yang Qi continued. “Think about it, Second Devil General. If we do things my way, we can continue expanding and slowly conquer all the other dragon kingdoms. Eventually, all of the Dragonfolk in the Myriad Dragons Lair will be under our control, and we’ll control an immense empire! Although we won’t be invincible, we’ll at least be in the position to stand up to the Invincible, Central, and Chiliocosm Dynasties. We don’t want to mess things up now. We want to expand! What we’ve experienced so far is only a minor achievement. How could you not have surpassed the basic weakness of the dao of devils already? Don’t you realize why you devils were ultimately defeated? Why you could never conquer everything under heaven? It's because of your natural weaknesses. The power of construction surpasses the power of destruction, and the power of order surpasses the power of chaos. It’s a fundamental truth.”

“You're very glib, aren't you, boy?” the Second Devil General said, but his tone had already softened.

After all, he knew it was just as Yang Qi had said. If creating a huge empire was as simple as conquering other dragon kingdoms, the Dragonfolk themselves would have done it long ago.

But Dragonfolk could never accept a true leader, and were always fighting amongst each other, reducing the destiny. Yet, even with the Dragonfolk in that state, the Central Dynasty didn’t seem eager to try to invade them militarily, but rather wanted them to accept some sort of agreement.

If Yang Qi could do as he said he would do, the destiny would increase by hundreds of times over, and they really could stand against the Central, Chiliocosm, and Invincible Dynasties. And that would be a truly good time to steal the fruit of other people’s labor.

Right now, the “immortal peaches” up for grabs were more like seeds. But in the future, they would be full grown peaches.

At the moment, Yang Qi was planning many moves ahead.

“Another thing, Second Devil General. Take a look at what this destiny is doing to my cultivation base. Do you see? It's not doing anything. I'm using it to make more of my sage monarch magistrates, to replace the Dragonfolk as administrators of the kingdom. You see, the destiny of the Sage Monarch Dragon Kingdom is really being used to increase production capacity, nothing more.”

“But the sage monarch magistrates all belong to you,” the Second Devil General replied. “The more of them you have, the stronger you are.”

“There’s nothing I can do about that. And in the end, I'm the one doing all the hard work. As you can clearly see, the more sage monarch magistrates there are, the better the destiny of this kingdom. And the purer. If you start taking destiny now, it’ll change everything. Let me ask you this, Second Devil General. Would it be possible for you, using your power alone, to take over the entire Myriad Dragons Lair? That’s the goal we’re working toward, and that’s when we will split everything fairly. Why mess things up now?”

“Fine, boy,” the general spat angrily. “I’ll do it your way this time.”

Inside, he thought, ‘Just wait until I get you to unravel the sealing mark on the Dragon Compendium. When the psychic seal from the King of Godmammoths enters you, you’ll be thrown into complete chaos. After all, the King of Godmammoths will be attempting to be born again using your body. While you’re fighting him, the Third Devil General and I can work together to take complete control of the Myriad Dragons Lair. Of course, it would be a pity to kill you, so I’ll just turn you into a thrall and have you manage my empire and feed me destiny.’

The general had originally planned to devour Yang Qi, but after seeing how he could keep order so well, he decided to spare him.

“Let’s go,” Yang Qi said. “We need to find that Proud Mindtravel. He’s likely visiting other dragon kingdoms to recruit them. If we can subjugate him, those kingdoms will fall to us much easier. And you’re coming with us, Buddha Shockheaven.”

Buddha Shockheaven had a psychic scale of two or three billion, so having him around to follow orders was like Yang Qi becoming twice as strong!

If he could add Proud Mindtravel and his two companions as well, he would be in a much better position to deal with the Second Devil General.

Swish!

With that, the three of them flew off. The Second Devil General snapped his finger to use a tracing magic from the dao of devils, allowing them to follow the aura of Proud Mindtravel deeper into the Myriad Dragons Lair.

After a few hours of travel, the general said, “They’re just up ahead. There’s another dragon kingdom there.”

Yang Qi caught sight of it instantly. It wasn’t built in a sea of blood, but rather atop an enormous mountain range. And all of the towering mountains were made of flesh! Buildings covered the endless peaks, and rivers of blood flowed between the mountains.

This mighty kingdom was definitely no weaker than the Dragonswarm Society.

In fact, it might even be a bit stronger.

Yang Qi could see that the destiny was incredibly powerful, but at the same time, chaotic and violent. In fact, in that regard, it was actually worse than the Dragonswarm Society, which meant that the destiny would initially be less useful to Yang Qi.

Proud Mindtravel was in the middle of that kingdom, negotiating with the king and his advisors. As Yang Qi and the Second Devil General looked on, they realized that the mighty destiny of the place was connected to another powerful energy of some sort.

“Crap!” Yang Qi said, shaken. “That’s the destiny of the Central Dynasty. This dragon kingdom has already accepted Proud Mindtravel’s offer of recruitment! If we conquer this place, the Central Dynasty will know about it immediately. What are we supposed to do now?”

Chapter 1456: Proud Mindtravel

This dragon kingdom was essentially made of pure flesh, and was even more fertile than the kingdom of the Dragonswarm Society. The mountains of flesh and rivers of blood were far superior to the sea of blood. Yang Qi could also see that there were mines in the mountains, from which the dragons excavated spirit stones that were as pure red as blood. From sight alone, he could tell that they were roughly equivalent to perfect caliber godstone.

Any items crafted in this location would be so amazing they would make people gasp in astonishment. Furthermore, the mountains of flesh teemed with godtrees, godgrass, godflowers, and all sorts of medicinal ingredients.

Although this place didn’t have orderly destiny, as it was ruled by numerous opposing warlords, Yang Qi knew that if he conquered it, he would definitely reach a higher level of enlightenment, and increase his force of sage monarch magistrates to the level of five hundred thousand.

Also, the disunited state of the place would make it much easier to conquer. After all, dealing with squabbling warlords was a lot simpler than dealing with a single king.

This place was a juicy morsel that Yang Qi couldn’t help but start drooling over. In fact, he had to resist the urge to gobble it down right away. After all, after conquering the Dragonswarm Society’s kingdom, it had only taken a month for him to achieve cultivation benefits that would normally have taken thousands of years. Perhaps even ten thousand.

And adding them together wasn't going to provide a simple linear increase.

With those two kingdoms added to his Sage Monarch Empire, he would have destiny equivalent to over a hundred lands. And with that destiny, it would be much more likely that he could eventually reach the peak Paramount God level.

Unfortunately, he was now in the situation of having that juicy morsel placed right in front of him, only to find that he couldn’t take it. From the power thrumming in it, he could tell that it already belonged to the Central Dynasty. Clearly, the various warlords here had already sworn oaths to be feudal lords loyal to the Central Dynasty.

Buddha Shockheaven’s kingdom, that of the Dragonswarm Society, was now Yang Qi’s, but no one had any idea, as the destiny had always remained under the control of Buddha Shockheaven. If one bandit stole from another, no one would be the wiser.

But if Yang Qi tried to conquer this new kingdom, it would be like a bandit trying to steal from local authorities.

The Central Dynasty would know about it immediately, and it would definitely cause a fuss.

“We’re too late,” the Second Devil General said. “Ah, what a pity. This place has already acknowledged allegiance to the Central Dynasty. If we touch it, the Central Dynasty will chase us down until we’re dead, no matter where we run. They might not be willing to send their army here right now, but they’d definitely send some top experts to take care of the situation.”

Yang Qi snorted coldly. “What’s the problem, Second Devil General? Scared? Even you fear the Central Dynasty? I want this juicy morsel, and I'm going to get it. It's not a simple open-and-shut case. Do you really think I'm willing to let the Central Dynasty just go around marking out territory in the Myriad Dragons Lair?”

“You’ve got a lot of guts to talk to me like that, boy. I'm not scared! Are you kidding me? The Proud Clan with their Central Dynasty were important even in ancient times, and they clashed with the dao of devils on numerous occasions. And trust me, they never matched up to us. However, we were always preoccupied by waging war with the halls of heaven, so we never had a chance to put them in their place. That said, boy, you have to be careful when dealing with them. How come you usually sit around coming up with crafty plans, but now you’re planning to do something so impulsive?”

“Impulsive? You don’t understand.” He chuckled. “I'm going to divert the floodwaters to the east. In other words, I’ll subjugate Proud Mindtravel, then have him go back to the Central Dynasty and tell them that the House of the Chiliocosm or the House of the Invincible are opposing them here in the Myriad Dragons Lair. If I can get a fight going between them, we would obviously benefit from it. Furthermore, you're right. They won’t send an army in, just some individual experts. And not their top old-timers. And in that case, I’ll just subjugate them one after another.”

As long as Yang Qi didn’t have to deal with an army, he wasn’t worried. Armies could be backed by national destiny, but individual experts wouldn’t.

It was similar to how an individual expert might have a shot at killing Yang Qi if he was out on his own. But if he was in the House of the Invincible, it would be impossible, as he was officially appointed as a viceroy there.

Anyone who wanted to kill him in the sect would first have to deal with the net of law. And early on, not even the Second Devil General had dared to trifle with the net of law in the House of the Invincible, much less other random people.

“So, boy, your plots are as complicated as ever. What do we do next?” The Second Devil General was generally fine relying on Yang Qi’s plans, that way he didn’t have to do any thinking.

“We start by subjugating Proud Mindtravel. Then we use his help to unify this kingdom and harvest its destiny. The people from the Central Dynasty will assume Proud Mindtravel is taking it, which is probably par for the course in matters such as this. He’s helping expand the dynasty’s territory, and carving out areas for himself along the way. In any case, they won’t suspect it's actually the work of an outsider.”

“Sounds like a perfect plan,” the Second Devil General said. “Look, Proud Mindtravel is on his way out.”

Whoosh. Whoosh. Whoosh...!

Three blurs exited the kingdom, then stopped to hover above it in the air.

“Exalted Mindtravel,” one of them said, “who could ever have guessed that this dragon kingdom would be so easy to take over. Buddha Shockheaven really doesn’t know how to accept favors. But why don’t you take some time to put this place in order? The destiny Dragonfolk can provide is amazing. If you consolidate it, and simply refrain from telling the Central Dynasty about this place, you could push your cultivation base to a higher level. With this destiny, you could gain tens of thousands of years’ worth of cultivation, just like that.”

“I considered that. But this kingdom is leaderless, and breaking up the various interest groups wouldn't be easy. The destiny wouldn’t be worth all the effort. Besides, without the name of the Central Dynasty backing me up, nobody here would follow my orders. It's a juicy morsel, but not one that can be swallowed easily. So I'm not going to try. Besides, this will count as a big service to the dynasty. Once I’ve returned and reported this, I’ll be rewarded handsomely.

“Is that so, Proud Mindtravel?”

Yang Qi suddenly appeared right in front of him, flanked by Buddha Shockheaven.

Back when Yang Qi had first laid eyes on Proud Mindtravel, he knew he was too powerful to subjugate. But after bringing order to Buddha Shockheaven’s kingdom, and receiving a huge boost in destiny, his cultivation base had advanced. He could assimilate the Everlit Godlamp with greater ease, and his psychic scale was getting closer and closer to a breakthrough.

Coupled with the fact that he had Buddha Shockheaven on his side, he was now in a position to deal with Proud Mindtravel.

Even better, he still had the Second Devil General as well.

“Who are you?” Proud Mindtravel reacted first with surprise, then with vigilance. He could see that Yang Qi was only a late Paramount God, someone he should be able to kill with the snap of a finger. However, he didn’t react with arrogant confidence. He knew that such a weak person wouldn't dare to block his way unless he had a very good reason.

In the impure lands, there were a lot of people who were suicidally reckless. But in the god world, people like that were much rarer. Gods had to gain enlightenment of the dao of heaven, understand the rotation of the cosmos, and have deep control over magical laws. So how could such people blindly throw themselves into deadly situations?

“Me?” Yang Qi said with a smile. “I'm a friend of the Central Dynasty. And I know you’re from the Central Dynasty, so I wanted to ask if you have any information about a friend of mine. He's an Ascendant named Proud Heaven. Ring a bell?”

“Proud Heaven?” Proud Mindtravel’s expression flickered. “Who exactly are you? And why are you asking about Proud Heaven? What makes you think you can go around doing that?”

“Why couldn’t I? Proud Heaven and I were close friends back in the impure lands, and on our journeys on the Ancient Road to the Gods. He even gave me an identification token so that I could prove that. He said that after we reached the god world, I should go to the Central Dynasty to find him. Well, I'm a late Paramount God now, and I'm almost about to break through to the peak level. So it seems like the perfect time to go looking for my old friend.”

Proud Mindtravel was already falling for Yang Qi’s casual fabrications. “What? You’re an Ascendant? What are you doing here in the Myriad Dragons Lair? Of course I know Proud Heaven. But he’s not a person you qualify to have dealings with. In fact, it's not even permitted to speak his true name aloud. That’s considered blasphemy! Understand? What’s this token of identification you mentioned? Let me see it.”

“It’s a seed, that’s all,” Yang Qi said. “It's not very important. But I can’t just give it to you. Proud Heaven said that it comes from the Great Necropolis. I can only hand it to him personally. And that’s why I want you to take me to the Central Dynasty to see him.”

“What? The Great Necropolis? You know about the Great Necropolis?” Proud Mindtravel was quickly losing his composure.

Swish!

All of a sudden, a devil hand shot out of nowhere and latched onto Proud Mindtravel’s neck. It was the Second Devil General.

Someone like the Second Devil General launching a sneak attack on Proud Mindtravel would normally be like an emperor starting a fistfight with a street thug. It just wouldn't be considered appropriate. But the Second Devil General was from the dao of devils, and didn’t care about such conventions.

All it took was for Yang Qi to distract Proud Mindtravel, and he made his move.

“Are you looking to get killed!?”

The two experts flanking Proud Mindtravel were both peak Paramount Gods with psychic scales of over a billion. And they reacted quickly.

However, Yang Qi and Buddha Shockheaven leaped into motion, each unleashing a finger attack that was impossible to evade.

Chapter 1457: Proud Heaven&#039;s Whereabouts

“Shockheaven Finger!”

Buddha Shockheaven thrust his finger out, and it was like a host of dragons soaring through heaven in the most shocking fashion. This was clearly a consummate energy art that would take a lifetime to cultivate, and was filled with spectacular and enigmatic powers.

Yang Qi also used an extraordinary finger strike. He clenched his fingers into a fist, which then exploded, dispelling four of his fingers and leaving behind only his thumb. It was a technique from the Many Heavens God Seal, and it caused the wailing of ghosts and weeping of gods to echo out as it crushed toward its target.

Although Proud Mindtravel’s two traveling companions were both top experts, they weren’t quite on the same level as Buddha Shockheaven or Yang Qi.

There was no way their sudden attack would be a success.

Both men had cultivation bases similar to Marquis Three Realms, and Yang Qi had long since been in the position to crush people like that. In the blink of an eye, Yang Qi subjugated both of them, whereupon their destiny shivered and the energy of the Central Dynasty started flowing into him.

RUMBLE!

He finally broke through the final barriers in the Everlit Godlamp, allowing him to fully assimilate it, and causing power to erupt within him.

‘Not good! I didn't want to break through right now! Devil-God Seal!’

He quickly drew on the Devil-God Seal to temporarily seal the power of the lamp. ‘I can't believe the destiny of the Central Dynasty is so formidable! Incredible! Simply incredible! It’s pure beyond belief, and contains some of the righteous energy of heaven and earth. If I'm not mistaken, this destiny is far superior to anything from the Invincible Dynasty or the Chiliocosm Dynasty.’

It was a really unexpected surprise to find that the destiny of the Central Dynasty was this amazing. Just taking a little bit of it had provoked incredible transformations.

Its level of purity was so incredible it virtually defied description.

Yang Qi’s empire was pure, but not to this extent. Right now, he wasn't even sure he could quantify how superior the Central Dynasty’s destiny was to his. More than ever, he realized how dangerous it would be to defy them. He would have to be very careful in doing so, lest he end up dead.

With the two experts under his control, Yang Qi looked over to Proud Mindtravel, who was being held up by the neck by the Second Devil General. Without hesitation, he activated the God Legion Seal, sending its power piercing into Proud Mindtravel’s mind. The destiny on Proud Mindtravel was like a seething ocean, all of it as pure white as jade, and it resisted Yang Qi with immense vigor.

‘Amazing. It's actually fighting against the God Legion Seal. Is this destiny really capable of resisting the control of the halls of heaven?’ Yang Qi had never experienced anything like this.

The Second Devil General was also surprised by what was happening. Ever since being released back out into the world, he had been accompanying Yang Qi, so he wasn't aware of what the Central Dynasty had been up to. But now, it was obvious that the pure white sea of destiny was fighting the golden light of the God Legion Seal. It was nothing short of amazing.

In the impure lands, an emperor who went on an inspection tour would be protected by countless guards. Similarly, Proud Mindtravel’s destiny was protecting him from all manner of invaders. Of course, Yang Qi was no weakling. He had just fully assimilated the Everlit Godlamp, and had sealed it so that he wouldn't undergo his breakthrough at this moment. However, much of the power of the Lord of Radiance and Light was still coursing through him and his psyche.

“Upend the Boundless; Heaven-Dao Transformations; Positive Life; Righteous-Dao and Wretched-Dao; Converge in Impermanence!” He was using the transformations of permanence and impermanence. In other words, he was ensuring that heaven and earth didn’t contain any eternal dao of righteousness, only the endless transformations of impermanence.

“Agggghhhhh!” screamed Proud Mindtravel, his piercing cry echoing about. “Stop! I'm from the Central Dynasty! You can’t subjugate me. If you try, you’ll regret it for sure. The Central Dynasty represents the righteous dao of the god world. Not even the Sovereign Lord of years past could compare to the Central Dynasty in terms of righteousness!”

“Like hell!” Yang Qi growled as he made contact with Proud Mindtravel’s soul. From the destiny there, he could see that Proud Mindtravel was definitely a person who would live and die for the Central Dynasty.

Yang Qi was shocked. “What's going on here? I had no idea destiny could even reach a level like this. After death, the soul will still adhere to the destiny of the dynasty, transforming him into a noble spirit that will defend his country? This is simply miraculous. The Central Dynasty definitely can’t be looked down on. Although, it’s not as if I want you dead, Proud Mindtravel. You have information I want about Proud Heaven, as well as the Great Necropolis.”

Drawing on the Sovereign Lord’s Holy and Far-Reaching Consummate Omnicurse, he continued peeling away the layers of Proud Mindtravel’s soul, sending curse power deep into his sea of consciousness.

A short while later, Proud Mindtravel spasmed as he gave in and was subjugated. However, the process had Yang Qi feeling profoundly exhausted.

Thankfully, he quickly recovered, and was soon back at his peak state. Now that he had subjugated Proud Mindtravel, he felt pure white destiny pouring into him, filling his sea of energy, meridians, godhood, and also his brain, which was the Cruiser of Civilization.

Instantly, his sage monarch magistrates lit up with radiance and light. Their auras rose rapidly, until all of them were late Paramount Gods.

It was a chain reaction.

It didn’t matter how many sage monarch magistrates there were, they all shared exactly the same genes, therefore, genetic changes affected all of them at the same time.

‘My sage monarch magistrates are finally late Paramount Gods with psychic scales of one hundred million! Now I'm strong enough that I don’t have to fear the Second Devil General anymore!’ Yang Qi was actually surprised that subjugating Proud Mindtravel had led to benefits like this.

The destiny of the Central Dynasty had proved to be a major catalyst. He was like a vat of oil, and that destiny was like a spark landing right in the middle of it, causing it to burst into flame. This trip into the Myriad Dragons Lair had provided far more benefits than he’d imagined it would.

Even if he didn’t get the Dragon Compendium, it would still be worth it. Unfortunately, it still wasn't enough for him to deal with the current circumstances. The House of the Invincible was making a big fanfare about the upcoming wedding. And it was highly likely that Sprite Susu was also Yang Susu. Given Yang Qi’s current strength, he wasn’t in the position to deal with the true leaders of the House of the Invincible. They had destiny that was just too immense for him. In that sect, if the leaders told the government officials they needed to die, then die they would.

That was why he needed to continue his work conquering the Myriad Dragons Lair.

It had actually taken quite a bit of time to subjugate Proud Mindtravel. And unexpectedly, the Second Devil General hadn’t interfered. In the past, he would have feigned compliance but then tried to sabotage Yang Qi. But now, he was actually trying to work with him, secure in the knowledge that Yang Qi was supremely qualified to handle affairs in the Myriad Dragons Lair.

After all, what good would it do to simply slaughter all the Dragonfolk? There were lots of magical treasures to be had, but none of them could be considered more precious than the destiny here.

It was much better to allow Yang Qi to do things his way.

“Tell me, Proud Mindtravel. Who exactly is Proud Heaven?” Yang Qi’s order pierced into Proud Mindtravel’s will, stirring his memories.

Dropping to his knees with a look of pain on his face, he said, “Milord, Proud Heaven is the profoundly mysterious Son of the Central. His name is a taboo, and no one’s even seen him in public for hundreds of millions of years. That said, he occupies a position of utmost power and authority. He’s second only to the patriarch of the Central Dynasty, the boundless Proud Central.”

“Second Devil General, who is this Proud Central?” Yang Qi asked.

“A figure that was domineering even before the god world existed. He wasn’t on the same level as the Sovereign Lord, but was fundamentally as strong as me. He was very mysterious, remaining in hiding even after the god world came to be. He didn't found any sort of dynasty, and never interfered in the dynasties and destinies of others. He roamed free, which was how he evaded the God Legion Tribulation. Who would’ve guessed that he was waiting until after the legion of gods and the Sovereign Lord perished to found his dynasty? Truth be told, even I fear him. It’s impossible to tell what his true goals are, and although I did meet him on one occasion, he wore a bronze mask, so I'm not sure what he actually looks like.”

“What? A bronze mask?”

All of a sudden, Yang Qi thought back to the thirty-six bronze masks he had uncovered in the Great Necropolis and assimilated into his sea of consciousness. Each of them represented one of the thirty-six emotions. Could those masks have something to do with Proud Central?

Chapter 1458: The Dao of Righteous Justice

The fact that Proud Heaven was an extremely important person in the Central Dynasty explained how he was able to descend to the impure lands in search of the God Legion Seal.

Although Yang Qi had ended up with the seal, Proud Heaven managed to snatch the Great Necropolis, with King Immortal-Slayer sealed inside. He had actually profited immensely.

Proud Heaven and Yang Qi were mortal archenemies. Every day that passed in which Proud Heaven existed was one in which Yang Qi couldn’t live in peace. Furthermore, Yang Qi was constantly worried about the possibility of Proud Heaven somehow opening a passageway back to the immortal worlds, and exterminating his friends and family there.

The immortal worlds were unified under the leadership of Yang Qi’s friends and family, so they were generally safe there. But if someone from the god world went down, it could easily lead to a bloodbath.

That was another reason why Yang Qi was constantly on the lookout for a way back to the impure lands. He very much wanted to bring all of his brethren to him. Given how powerful he was now, it was entirely possible that he had enough destiny to instantly ordain them all as gods.

“So you’re saying you've never met Proud Heaven? What’s your status in the Central Dynasty?”

“I'm a third-ranked duke, which is a fairly impressive rank. Please, let me go, Milord. Don’t kill me.”

“I have no intention of killing you. From now on, you work for me as a double agent in the Central Dynasty. Got it? Keep me informed of any developments there, especially any important individuals that suddenly leave the dynasty. I want to subjugate as many as I can.”

“Milord, now that I’ve been subjugated by you, my soul no longer belongs to the Central Dynasty. If I go back, the destiny will reject me and likely even kill me!”

“It won’t. The God Legion Seal is too profound for that. The destiny of the Central Dynasty is strong, but not strong enough to surpass the Sovereign Lord. Otherwise, they would’ve already eliminated the House of the Invincible and the House of the Chiliocosm. Furthermore, I can use you to further study the profundities of the dynasty’s destiny. How do you infuse it with such righteousness? Is it by means of some sort of magical treasure?”

“That’s right, Milord. In the past, Patriarch Central subjugated the Lord of Righteous Justice and imprisoned him in the imperial city, ultimately refining him into a magical treasure. Afterward, our destiny was filtered through the Lord of Righteous Justice, causing it to be filled with an incomparable dao of righteousness that perfectly conforms with the god world’s dao of heaven.”

“Lord of Righteous Justice?” Yang Qi looked over at the Second Devil General. “How come I've never heard of him, Second Devil General?”

“He was one of the founders of the confucian colleges, and was responsible for producing the energies of righteousness and justice that filled the god world. You see, in the beginning, there were two primary flows of energy in the god world. That of righteous justice, and that of wretched evil. The Lord of Righteous Justice commanded the energy of righteous justice, while the True Devil used the energy of wretched evil to create hell. The Lord of Righteous Justice wasn’t part of the halls of heaven. The halls of heaven belonged to the Sovereign Lord, and although they shine with radiance and light, they don’t represent righteousness and justice. They represent power.”

Although some might find it confusing, radiance and light weren’t necessarily righteous or just.

“Later, the Lord of Righteous Justice vanished. Because his cultivation base was superior to that of the Lord of Radiance and Light, we assumed he’d been killed by the Sovereign Lord. Who could have guessed that he was actually subjugated by Proud Central and turned into a magical treasure? This Proud Central really was a clever schemer. I'm starting to think that I might not even be a match for him, even if I was in my prime.” The fear that glittered in the Second Devil General’s eyes was very telling.

The Lord of Righteous Justice was superior to the Lord of Radiance and Light, yet he had been defeated by Proud Central. And after the Sovereign Lord died, Proud Central had gone on to found his own dynasty, which had been around for hundreds of millions of years, and possessed immensely profound destiny. Meanwhile, the Second Devil General had been imprisoned for all that time, constantly growing weaker. It was obvious the two of them weren’t on the same level.

It made sense that the Second Devil General would fear him.

Yang Qi gave an enigmatic smile. “So, you’re finally afraid of something, eh Second Devil General?”

“Me? Afraid? You’re underestimating me, boy. I’d love to fight with this Proud Central. Unfortunately, he has a powerful dynasty, and I don't. That puts me at a disadvantage. But I know you always like to do things differently. I'm waiting for you to finish conquering the Myriad Dragons Lair. Once you have the Dragonfolk under your command, you’ll have some incredible destiny.”

“I might not have enough time. Even if I get all the destiny of the Dragonfolk, the House of the Chiliocosm, and the House of the Invincible, I still might not be strong enough to oppose the Central Dynasty. They’re really the top dogs.”

“Why do you say that?” the Second Devil General said, seemingly confused.

“The Lord of Righteous Justice represents the power of righteousness and justice in the god world. What are righteousness and justice? Legitimacy. The fact that the Central Dynasty captured the Lord of Righteous Justice and took his destiny means that it has legitimacy in the eyes of the god world. It’s like how, in the impure lands, someone with royal blood and an official stamp of the dynasty is the legitimate ruler. Just look at the Central Dynasty’s destiny.”

Yang made a grasping gesture, and the destiny of the Central Dynasty flew out in a pure white stream of light, flawless and without any impurities. At the same time, he produced the destiny of the House of the Invincible, which despite being so powerful that it rumbled like thunder, clearly contained corrupt auras. He also pulled out the destiny of the House of the Chiliocosm, which was different, like a river of stars, but at the same time nowhere close to being as pure as that of the Central Dynasty. Even Yang Qi’s personal destiny, despite being clear, wasn't flawless, nor did it have the pure white of righteousness and justice.

“Why is it like this?” the general asked. “You’d think the Central Dynasty would also have a problem with corruption. But their destiny is absolutely, positively pure.”

“It's because of the legitimacy provided by the Lord of Righteous Justice. Because of that, the dao of heaven in the god world recognizes the Central Dynasty as being legitimate. Furthermore, the corrupt energy of the dynasty is filtered out by the Lord of Righteous Justice, making it pure. No dynasty in the god world could possibly compare. Not even the aura of the Sovereign Lord’s halls of heaven could compare to this destiny in terms of righteousness. The Sovereign Lord’s organization was larger, and he was more powerful, so he could purify his destiny to a certain extent, making it incomparably mighty. That’s why Proud Central never dared to establish his own dynasty in the past. He knew that it would be doomed to fall to the Sovereign Lord. However, despite being weaker than the Sovereign Lord, Proud Central was far more cunning. He realized that there would eventually be a rebellion against the Sovereign Lord, and that afterward, whoever earned the true legitimacy of the god world would be able to create the ultimate dynasty. Impressive. Very impressive.” Yang Qi had to admit that Proud Central was extremely clever, and was profoundly worthy of admiration in that regard. But at the same time, Yang Qi’s heart went cold at the thought of facing an opponent like him.

Would it actually turn out that King Immortal-Slayer couldn’t break free?

If Proud Central was the one opposing him, which seemed entirely likely, that meant Proud Central was obviously going to be extremely difficult to fight.

The Second Devil General obviously understood everything Yang Qi meant. “So what do we do now? It’s too bad the Sovereign Lord didn’t kill him back in the day. Damn it all. When the tiger is away from the mountain, the monkey becomes king. The True Devil is dead. The Sovereign Lord is dead. The King of Godmammoths is dead. The Wretch God is dead. And the Demon Master is dead too. As for King Immortal-Slayer, he’s trapped in the Great Necropolis. Proud Central is the most domineering figure there is. Who could possibly be a match for him?”

“Perhaps my Master can help. Except, I don’t know how to awaken him. He's the Invincible Dugu, the top patriarch of the House of the Invincible. King Immortal-Slayer could probably do it as well, except that Proud Central is trying to assimilate the Great Necropolis. He’s going the same thing the Sovereign Lord did, and if he succeeds, we’re all dead. Years ago, the Sovereign Lord lacked that legitimacy, thus he couldn’t destroy and assimilate the god world. But things are different now. Proud Central has everything he needs. I wouldn't be surprised if even a resurrected Sovereign Lord couldn’t defeat him.”

“Damnation!” the Second Devil General said.

“Calm down. I'm foreordained to destroy his fate. I can sense that. The Central Dynasty can’t destroy the House of the Invincible, most likely because of my Master, the Invincible Dugu. And there must be someone in the House of the Invincible that he fears. Unfortunately, I still can’t confirm with absolute certainty that my Master is the same Invincible Dugu from the House of the Invincible. And even if I resurrect him, will he remember me? So, for now, my main target is still the House of the Invincible.”

“Alright, enough jabbering. Let’s get to work. We’ll conquer more of these dragon kingdoms, unite them, and get your cultivation base as high as possible. And we need more sage monarch magistrates. Once you're really in the peak Paramount God level, you won’t need my help anymore. Furthermore, at that point, you can remove me from the constraints of the God Legion Seal. You can’t go back on your word in that regard! Otherwise, I’ll get really pissed off.”

“No problem,” Yang Qi said, although inside he was laughing coldly. He knew that the Second Devil General was diametrically opposed to him. There was no way he would casually free him of the God Legion Seal. The Second Devil General had repeatedly gone back on his word, so there was no reason for Yang Qi to feel obligated to do anything other than the same.

“Proud Mindtravel, let’s head back into this dragon kingdom. Call all of the warlords, ministers, and other leaders in one at a time so I can subjugate them. There’s no time to lose!” Yang Qi was keeping the Everlit Godlamp under tight control, and doing everything possible to prevent that fact from showing on his face. And the more he kept it under control, the more violently it tried to break free.

Chapter 1459: Reaching the Peak

“Milord, our two dragon kingdoms are now united, and their destiny has improved dramatically. We also completed the teleportation portals and linked them together.”

This king of dragons was Buddha Lheafe, and he had been the leader, in name, of the massive kingdom of dragons. Of course, Yang Qi had subjugated him.

It took three days, which was as fast as Yang Qi could act. With the help of the Second Devil General, he had subjugated hundreds of thousands of government officials, ensuring that all of them had golden thrones in the God Legion Seal.

Yang Qi was truly feeling the threat of the Central Dynasty hanging over his head.

Proud Central and Proud Heaven were like immense mountains that might crush him at any moment. Not even the Second Devil General could stand up to them. He had just been imprisoned for too long, and there was simply no way he could be restored to the true height of his former glory. He was more like a sun setting over the horizon.

Yang Qi had subjugated the warlords and the king, then set about putting everything in order. And finally, he had made it a part of his growing Sage Monarch Dragon Kingdom.

He couldn’t physically combine them, of course. That would have attracted too much attention. Furthermore, the sea of blood and the mountains of flesh were the perfect locations for the Dragonfolk who resided there. In other words, moving either of them would cause a big drop in destiny.

For now, Yang Qi wasn’t even thinking about bringing them into the Sage Monarch Empire. The Cruiser of Civilization just couldn’t sustain them. He had to leave them where they were. But he didn’t mind; he could still benefit from the destiny just the same.

At the moment, Yang Qi hovered cross-legged high in the air, looking down at the two massive dragon kingdoms that were now linked via teleportation portal. Already, the fact that they were linked was leading to an interchange among the officials, as well as a growth in business.

And the sage monarch magistrates were keeping everything under control.

Everything was working smoothly, and it was all thanks to the God Legion Seal. Without it, there was no way he could have taken control of so many high-level Dragonfolk. Without being able to monitor their thoughts, they would definitely have plotted against him, and ultimately rebelled. But now, they couldn’t have any errant thoughts at all, and had to serve him with unswerving loyalty.

That was why the Sovereign Lord had created the God Legion Seal to begin with.

All those years ago, he hadn’t had legitimacy, or justice and righteousness. Therefore, the only way for him to conquer the god world was by using the seal.

There were countless matters to attend to in the two new kingdoms, but thankfully, Yang Qi’s mind could calculate the workings of heaven. In the blink of an eye, he could handle millions upon millions of unique thoughts, and send orders to countless government officials, orders that they would follow completely. Of course, it was a result of turning the Cruiser of Civilization into flesh and blood, then converting it with the Wretched Brain God Art.

‘Impressive!’ the Second Devil General thought. ‘The boy’s commands are really running these two nations. He controls every tiny thing. And everything runs so smoothly. I don’t think I'm a match for him now.’

With the two nations under his complete control, the destiny of the Sage Monarch Dragon Kingdom was incredibly powerful. It flowed out like a net composed of countless tiny dragons, which was of course the unencroachable net of law.

At the moment, there were over a million government officials gathered together carrying out a ceremony of sacrifice to him.

A huge altar had been erected.

Yang Qi descended from above, and when he landed on the altar, the two kings, Buddha Shockheaven and Buddha Lheafe, knelt in front of him. “Milord, all the officials in the Sage Monarch Dragon Kingdom offer respectful greetings!”

“Today, the Sage Monarch Dragon Kingdom is officially founded!” Yang Qi said. It was with a golden mouth and jade words that he made the pronouncement clearly for all to hear.

Everything trembled slightly, and all of a sudden, the gathered officials felt a sense of belonging. As of this moment, they were part of the Sage Monarch Dragon Kingdom.

As soon as the announcement was made, major transformations occurred. The net of law spread out, becoming like a shell that surrounded all of the territory and made it impossible to invade.

Yang Qi could sense immense destiny pouring into him!

The moment the Sage Monarch Dragon Kingdom was officially founded, the destiny surged to an enigmatically amazing level. In fact, Yang Qi could sense that it was the same as the destiny of hundreds, or even thousands of lands.

In the House of the Invincible, a viceroy of a thousand lands was a very important and powerful person, as much as Duke Nine Cauldrons or Priestess Dugu Wanqing. And viceroys of thousands of lands were even more important.

As the destiny burned with intense brightness, Yang Qi called his friends and family out and gave them shares, allowing all of them to advance their cultivation bases dramatically.

By now, Yang Qi’s cultivation wasn't about building up vital energy and storing godpower. It was about founding nations and using the destiny that came with them. That was how cultivation worked in the late Paramount God level and higher.

Because of the huge influx of destiny, the seal on the Everlit Godlamp finally shattered and intense light exploded out in the depths of the God Legion Paradise. However, it wasn’t the Lord of Radiance and Light’s Everlit Godlamp, but rather Yang Qi’s own animadestiny lamp.

Before the god world came to exist, there was no light in primal-chaos. It was only when the Everlit Godlamp appeared that radiance and light had begun to spread.

The Cruiser of Civilization ceased to exist, although everyone within it had no sense of that.

The various systems of the cruiser were now thought patterns that conformed to Yang Qi’s thoughts. Henceforth, there would be no Everlit Godlamp, nor would there be a Cruiser of Civilization. They had become part of him. And the Sage Monarch Empire was a mere particle floating within the God Legion Paradise inside Yang Qi.

As for the God Legion Paradise, it contained elements of the cruiser, the lamp, the God Legion Seal, and the Mahātmā Jade. It was a new type of paradise, a true pure land.

Yang Qi had now assimilated two of the rarest treasures in existence, and was now himself an amazingly precious and unique treasure.

RUMBLE!

His monarch godhood erupted, and his psyche and thinking achieved breakthroughs.

He had reached the level of two billion, both in psychic scale and godhood rating. His psychic power and fighting prowess had undergone a heaven-shaking, earth-toppling transformation. He was now in the peak Paramount God level, with peak Unbounded will convergence.

The next step was to break through Unbounded and become Annulled.

It was a path that numerous almighty beings of the past had walked.

King Immortal-Slayer. The Demon Master. The True Devil.

All had explored the path. Of course, Yang Qi was still far from their level. They had broken past the Unbounded and stepped halfway into the Annulled level. He still had some ways to go before that point. Perhaps when his psychic scale and godhood rating broke past ten billion, he would be in that position. Or perhaps it would require tens of billions, or a hundred billion.

As these changes occurred, Yang Qi also sensed the God Legion Seal changing in numerous ways. It was as if he could feel the ancient halls of heaven, far larger and more magnificent than the Myriad Dragons Lair. As of now, his thoughts, and the teleportation portal within him, were completely linked to the Bastille of the One God.

The projections of countless stars appeared in the God Legion Paradise. Looking up, it was possible to see them spread out everywhere, causing godly might to shower down in the form of heaven caliber godstones. And the might within them was a hundred times greater than before.

At the same time, more sage monarch magistrates were being created.

Chapter 1460: Sage Monarch Dragon Kingdom

At long last, Yang Qi had broken through to the peak Paramount God level. His psychic scale and godhood rating were both at two billion, and they were continuing to grow.

Even more importantly, his cultivation base was climbing continuously, as if it was grasping at something profoundly mysterious. He had combined the profundities of the Mahātmā Jade, Everlit Godlamp, and Cruiser of Civilization into himself, making him neither a magical treasure, god item, or power double. It was more like he was an embodiment of the natural laws of the dao of heaven.

Within him, in the depths of the God Legion Paradise, the Sage Monarch Empire existed in peace and prosperity.

Furthermore, every breath he took allowed endless streams of primal-chaos paleo-energy to enter him and flow into the God Legion Paradise, there to be broken down to naturally create unique treasures, bizarre creatures, and even devils.

The god world had been created out of primal-chaos paleo-energy, so with enough energy and psychic power, it could be used to create anything and everything.

Yang Qi was acting as the Creator.

The Cruiser of Civilization had functions that allowed for the refinement of primal-chaos paleo-energy, and could use it to create precious materials of heaven and earth. And Yang Qi had fully assimilated the cruiser, giving him thoughts, flesh, and blood that were expressions of civilization. However, his ability to use the functions of the cruiser for creative purposes surpassed anything the cruiser had been designed to do, since he had also fused with the Everlit Godlamp and the Mahātmā Jade, and could tap into the essence of the Myriad Dragons Lair.

He was his own heaven and earth, like a minor god world that could constantly produce new things and peoples.

However, he was very different from an ordinary god kingdom.

God kingdoms were standalone dimensions that couldn’t produce precious materials of heaven and earth, such as veins of ore that could be mined and stockpiled. Furthermore, any ordinary god kingdom that left the god world would eventually cease to exist.

As the ancient saying elucidated: just sitting and eating, one can deplete even a mountain of wealth.

Yang Qi’s God Legion Paradise was different. It could produce things straight out of primal-chaos paleo-energy, which meant it didn’t need a connection to the god world to survive.

Of course, it couldn’t produce precious materials as quickly as the god world could.

The god world could produce precious materials without end. Every moment that passed saw the creation of such things, and it happened automatically.

Yang Qi obviously couldn’t compare.

Most important of all were the transformations to the God Legion Seal. His connection to the halls of heaven had grown tighter and more distinct, and the power flowing into him allowed the sage monarch magistrates to propagate more. In the blink of an eye, they split apart to the point where their numbers climbed to five hundred thousand.

With that many magistrates, it was now possible for him to thoroughly run and control the dragon kingdom he had.

“Go,” he said, and the sage monarch magistrates became dazzling streams of light that shot into the Sage Monarch Dragon Kingdom like meteors catching up to the moon. As orders were transmitted and enforced, the destiny that Yang Qi was constantly absorbing slowly changed. Impurities were extruded, and it gradually became clearer and clearer.

It was like a turbid flood of water descending from a mountain that eventually became an enormous, crystal-clear river.

The destiny was slowly reaching the point of perfection.

Seeing this, the Second Devil General licked his lips and thought, ‘What are the limits of the boy's sage monarch magistrates? The destiny of the Sage Monarch Dragon Kingdom is growing stronger and clearer by the moment. Just what exactly is it doing to his psychic power? And it's a virtuous cycle that’s only improved now that he's reached the peak level. He should be able to free me from the God Legion Seal now. Let’s see what he has to say about that....’

“Yang Qi!” he roared.

“What?” Yang Qi replied as he watched the Sage Monarch Dragon Kingdom growing stronger and purer.

“You’re a peak Paramount God now. Your cultivation base is incredible. So now you need to keep your word and free me from the God Legion Seal. You absolutely, positively mustn’t go back on your word, otherwise I’ll just outright destroy this dragon kingdom you've worked so hard to build!”

“Oh?” Yang Qi said, smiling. “Tell me, Second Devil General. When did I swear an oath to free you when I was a peak Paramount God?”

“Damn you, boy!” the Second Devil General shouted, so angry he was nearly coughing up blood. Furious that Yang Qi was apparently going back on his word, he unleashed his devil voice, causing everything to tremble violently. The Sage Monarch Dragon Kingdom was unaffected, however, it had already produced a destiny so powerful that it had an enormous draconic net of law.

All of a sudden, a strange omen appeared, as the united will of all living beings in the Sage Monarch Dragon Kingdom converged, causing a huge boost in destiny.

Bam! Bang! Boom!

The devil voice slammed into the net of law, but couldn’t pierce through it into the Sage Monarch Dragon Kingdom.

That was the power of destiny.

Truth be told, it was somewhat weak. If the Second Devil General had attacked the net of law in the House of the Invincible, it would have fought back and possibly sucked him inside.

That wasn’t even to mention what the Central Dynasty could do.

“What do you think?” Yang Qi asked. “The dao of devils doesn’t use destiny, so even if your magical powers were stronger, it wouldn’t help you understand it more. Destiny can interfere with psychic powers and corporeal objects, and in this case, even natural laws. After combining these two great dragon kingdoms, I've ensured that anyone who tries breaking in will suffer a counterattack equivalent to my own strength combined with the destinies of the two kingdoms. If you want to fight me, it won’t be as easy as you think. Furthermore, the time has come to form a full throne for you in the God Legion Seal.”

RUMBLE!

All of a sudden, the throne representing the Second Devil General in the God Legion Seal began twitching and transforming.

“Have a death wish!?” the Second Devil General shouted. “How dare you try fully sealing me. I’ll crush you!”

Devilishness flared as the general leveled a psychic attack against the incursions of the God Legion Seal.

“Halls of heaven!” Yang Qi shouted, and his thoughts connected via the God Legion Seal to the halls of heaven, allowing boundless might to flow into him. As it did, an enormous golden figure appeared in the God Legion Seal and faced off against the Second Devil General.

“We had a deal, boy, and now you’re backing out? You’re worse than anyone from the dao of devils! I helped you conquer these two kingdoms, and even an emissary from the Central Dynasty. Without me, you’d never have become a peak Paramount God. Do you have even a scrap of decency in you?”

As the Second Devil General spoke, he resisted the God Legion Seal so forcefully that the golden throne stopped advancing, much to Yang Qi’s surprise.

Thankfully, Yang Qi was stronger now than he had ever been, and also had the backup of Buddha Shockheaven, Buddha Lheafe, and Proud Mindtravel. Therefore, handling the Second Devil General wasn't going to be a problem.

“Do you really have the face to complain about betrayals, Second Devil General? You claimed that our journey to the Myriad Dragons Lair was all about the Dragon Compendium, but the truth is that this whole thing is a big trap. There’s a devil-dragon sealed in that book, and it’s the patriarch of all Dragonfolk, the Third Devil General! You want my help to free him. Furthermore, the seal left behind by the King of Godmammoths is also a trap. You claim that it’ll make me stronger, but you know that as soon as I unravel it, the will of the King of Godmammoths will try to possess me and kill my soul. In that critical moment, you could easily kill me and take my God Legion Seal. Did you really think I would be so easily fooled?”

“You!” the Second Devil General blurted. “How did you find out? My thoughts are protected by my powerful devil will. Not even the God Legion Seal should allow you to read my intentions.”

“You think I need some special way to figure out your intentions? I'm not an idiot. I can calculate the workings of heaven, and manage immense kingdoms. It's simple. You’re heartless, and I'm not loyal to you. You stab me in my back, I stab you in yours. You can't blame me for that. If you want to cast blame, cast it on yourself for being too stupid to realize what was really happening.”

“I'm going to kill you, boy. Either the fish dies, or the net splits! Let’s see if the Sovereign Lord and the God Legion Seal are really strong enough to deal with me.” Throwing his hands out, he growled, “Boundless Devilishness!”

Chapter 1461: Sudden Hostility

The Second Devil General had turned very hostile.

He simply couldn’t stand how Yang Qi toyed with him, treating him like a foolish monkey. After all, he was the grand and mighty Second Devil General! Even ordinary people wouldn't tolerate such treatment, much less him. Ever since he had come to the Myriad Dragons Lair, he had been treated like nothing more than hired labor. He hadn’t benefited at all, because Yang Qi had taken everything. For example, Yang Qi now controlled two dragon kingdoms, and everyone in them were his subordinates.

He had taken all of the destiny, refused to share a bit, and had even revealed the details about the Third Devil General.

The fact that Yang Qi knew about the Third Devil General made it more than plain that he had been playing the Second Devil General like a fiddle.

Devilishness erupted.

“Hold on!” Yang Qi shouted. “Do you really want to make this a battle to the death, Second Devil General? Don't you want to free the Third Devil General? Maybe you’re strong enough to resist the God Legion Seal, but that doesn’t mean you have what it takes to kill me. Why get in such a pointless fight?”

The Second Devil General stopped. “What? You still want to help me free the Third Devil General?”

“Why wouldn’t I? Maybe it’ll be a bit dangerous, but I also want to get the Dragon Compendium. You can see for yourself how much destiny these two dragon kingdoms have provided. If I could control all of the kingdoms in the Myriad Dragons Lair, just think of how amazing it would be. With the entire lair under the control of my sage monarch magistrates, I wouldn’t have anything to fear from the House of the Invincible. You see, I'm already connected to the halls of heaven. They’ll be mine eventually, and with them, combined with the Myriad Dragons Lair, I might even be able to crush the Central Dynasty. If freeing the Third Devil General is what I need to do to get the Myriad Dragons Lair, then that's what I’ll do. And then I’ll rock the entire god world. Any other path will involve us being little more than roving bandits, causing mischief here and there. We wouldn’t even be considered warlords. You don’t want to be a random stray dog, do you, Second Devil General? The truth is that I was the one who saved you from the Bastille of the One God, and ever since then your fate has become tied to me. So what exactly are you making such a big fuss over? This is all about personal interest. That’s what binds the two of us together. Why should we be trying to fight and kill each other? And that's even more the case, considering that neither of us can kill the other. So why not work together? We’ve been lying to and scamming each other this entire time. Let’s just join forces!”

“You're as glib-tongued as ever boy. But do you really think you can fool me again?” The Second Devil General knew that, because of the God Legion Seal, he couldn't kill Yang Qi. He hadn’t been able to before, and going forward, it would be even less possible.

Fighting was meaningless.

“There’s no fooling going on,” Yang Qi said. “Fooling isn’t scheming. You were scheming against me, I was scheming against you. Parting ways with me isn’t going to help the situation. Remember, I'm the one who got you the destiny of the House of the Invincible. Without me, you’d be stuck in that regard.”

“Aren’t you worried I might spread word that you have the God Legion Seal?” All of a sudden, it seemed the Second Devil General was trying to resort to threats.

“Of course I’m worried about that,” Yang Qi replied coldly. “That’s why I want to talk this out right here and now. Look, I already have an agreement with the purrling and King Immortal-Slayer regarding how to deal with you. And that’s why I'm just putting all my cards on the table.”

“You’re worried? How come I don't sense even a scrap of worry in your voice?” The Second Devil General frowned, not quite willing to buy Yang Qi’s explanation. It would have made a lot more sense if Yang Qi listed out some complicated reasons as to why he wasn’t worried. But for him to coldly say that he was worried just seemed too suspicious. Ever since he’d started working with Yang Qi, he had been played over and over again. Truth be told, he was deeply afraid of Yang Qi’s plots.

“How about this,” Yang Qi said. “I know a lot of secrets about the halls of heaven now. Why don’t I take you there one day? There are all sorts of medicinal pills to be had, as well as plenty of other things. You find something that you can use, and I’ll do everything I can to make sure you get it and restore yourself to your previous level of power and glory. I don’t want there to be any hostility between us. Having you as a friend would be much better than having you as an enemy. You see, I still have to deal with the Central Dynasty and Proud Central. He’s a ruthlessly ambitious fellow who wants to assimilate the Great Necropolis and bring about calamity to you, me, and everyone else in the god world.”

“I don't trust anything you say anymore,” the Second Devil General said.

“I can’t do anything about that,” Yang Qi replied. “If you want to free the Third Devil General, you need to accept the God Legion Seal. I don’t want to fight you, Second Devil General, but if you leak word about the seal, I’ll have no choice. I’d rather be friends. And if you feel you can’t trust me, we could just become sworn brothers.”

“Sworn brothers? Don’t you know who I am, boy!?” the Second Devil General turned up his nose.

“If you don’t want to, then forget it. Just remember, I'm offering to actually work with you. You’d better consider it well.”

“We can work together. But under the following conditions. First, I'm not going to help you subjugate any more dragon kingdoms. You have to do that yourself. Second, we have to go to the heart of the Myriad Dragons Lair immediately to unseal the Dragon Compendium and free the Third Devil General.”

“No problem,” Yang Qi replied. “I'm curious to see what kind of sealing mark the King of Godmammoths left behind, and what sort of aura it has.”

“In that case, let’s go,” the Second Devil General said.

The two of them flew into the air.

Yang Qi left his five hundred thousand sage monarch magistrates behind to manage the Sage Monarch Dragon Kingdom. With the destiny there, and the connection to the halls of heaven, they would continue rapidly propagating.

And thanks to the sage monarch magistrates constantly increasing in numbers, the destiny in the Sage Monarch Dragon Kingdom constantly grew, such that Yang Qi didn’t need to be there to watch over things.

And given the level of his cultivation base, he didn’t need attendants, not even his own thralls.

With the Cruiser of Civilization as his brain, the Mahātmā Jade as part of his thoughts, and the Everlit Godlamp as his body, he was something the likes of which had ever existed in all history. And he could tap into the halls of heaven at will.

His psychic scale and godhood rating were currently at two billion, but they would continue rising. He was at the peak of the Paramount God level with peak Unbounded will convergence, making his potential as vast as the sea.

As long as he continued this path of cultivation, and continued to harvest destiny and godly might, the numbers would climb to four, eight, ten, and then dozens of billions. Eventually, he would pass the Unbounded level and step into the half Annulled level.

Supposedly, once in the half Annulled level, it wasn’t necessary to even refer to psychic scale or godhood rating.

After all, in that level, everything was annulled, and one became so powerful they entered an entirely different realm.

Furthermore, as the ultimate leader of the Myriad Dragons Lair, he would be able to benefit from a constant influx of destiny that would boost his fighting prowess to unimaginable levels.

That was why he wasn't worried about the current situation. If the Second Devil General couldn’t do anything to him, who could? Also, he had the feeling that, although the depths of the Myriad Dragons Lair were going to be dangerous, he was certain he would benefit dramatically.

This time, he and the Second Devil General were truly going deep into the lair.

Along the way, they saw endless vistas of flesh and blood. And as they got deeper in, that flesh and blood stopped wriggling and twitching, instead becoming so solid it seemed almost metallic.

Metallic flesh and blood!

Mountains, rivers, streams, lakes, oceans, continents, marshes... all of them were made of metallic flesh and blood, with so much vital energy they completely surpassed the ocean of blood and the mountains of flesh from the two kingdoms he had already conquered.

There were truly mighty kingdoms in this area.

As they traveled, Yang Qi realized that they were passing thousands of kingdoms, none of them smaller than the Sage Monarch Dragon Kingdom. And some of them were ten times bigger. It was little wonder this place was the true foundation of the Dragonfolk in the god world. And the kingdoms here were all at odds, and constantly fighting each other.

Once he conquered all of these places, creating an organization like the House of the Invincible wouldn't be a problem at all.

‘Incredible. Completely incredible. The Myriad Dragons Lair is huge!’ It was so big he wasn’t even sure how to gauge its exact size. Everything was made from flesh and blood, and he knew that if he took these places for his own, the influx of destiny would be unthinkable.

To do that, though, he needed to strengthen the Sage Monarch Dragon Kingdom and get more sage monarch magistrates. He would need millions or tens of millions of them before he could consider any true expansion. After all, if he conquered these places, but couldn't govern them, it wouldn’t do any good.

Chapter 1462: King of Godmammoths&#039; Sealing Mark

Kingdoms proliferated in the deeper areas of the Myriad Dragons Lair. Yang Qi and the Second Devil General had to be very careful not to make any wrong moves. They could sense almighty Dragonfolk experts who had psychic scales of ten billion or more in this area. They were boundless old-timers that the Second Devil General and Yang Qi didn’t necessarily have to fear in a fight, but at the same time, couldn't afford to tangle with.

They were experts best left alone.

‘These kingdoms are huge,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘One of these days, I'm going to help myself to all of these juicy morsels.’

He was currently contemplating the best way to further his cultivation. Going into seclusion and meditating to pass obstacles was probably the stupidest and worst ways to advance one’s cultivation. Establishing and conquering kingdoms was the true way to benefit from universal fortune and reach an invincible level.

Yang Qi didn’t just travel along blithely. He kept his eyes and ears open, and his senses active. As such, as they traveled deeper into the Myriad Dragons Lair, he sensed a heaven-destroying, earth-extinguishing power deeper in, something that came from the same source as the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.

It was the sealing mark of the King of Godmammoths.

The King of Godmammoths had truly been invincible, and strong enough to even shake the Sovereign Lord. He was the full concentration of the power of the legion of gods and the Sovereign Lord, and could crush hells, smash devils, support the halls of heaven, and prop up heaven and earth.

After passing too many kingdoms to count, they reached an area in the Myriad Dragons Lair that had such a violent and amazing aura that not even Dragonfolk old-timers would dare to come here.

Wind screamed and fire raged in what was a barren and desolate desert, with no dragon kingdoms anywhere to be seen.

‘Up ahead is the blood sealing mark from the King of Godmammoths,’ Yang Qi thought.

“Amazing,” the Second Devil General said as he stood at the edge of the screaming winds. To him, it felt as if his defensive empyrean energy was being battered by millions upon millions of megamammoths, making it difficult to stand in place.

For Yang Qi, it was different. Although the winds touched him, he was filled with the aura of the God Legion Seal, and by extension, his blood pulsed with the power of the King of Godmammoths.

Ordinary people who came here, even old-timers from the Dragonfolk, would be shredded into dust.

Not even the Second Devil General was able to stand up to it.

His cultivation base was on par with the Lord of Radiance and Light, but the Lord of Radiance and Light hadn’t even been close to being as strong as the King of Godmammoths. In terms of raw strength, the King of Godmammoths was unparalleled in the god world. Not even the Sovereign Lord could match up.

Of course, the Sovereign Lord had drawn on so many great daos that they rivaled the eternal sands, using that universal might to create the King of Godmammoths.

As the energies related to the King of Godmammoths smashed into the Second Devil General, his power started draining rapidly and he roared, “Yang Qi, hurry up and shield me with the power of the God Legion Seal!”

“Sure thing.” Yang Qi sent out a stream of golden light that surrounded the general and kept the wind from hurting him.

At long last, he realized why the Second Devil General had been so dead set on keeping his help. The truth was that you had to have the God Legion Seal to enter the heart of the Myriad Dragons Lair. Getting to the Dragon Compendium any other way would be virtually impossible. That was one reason why not even the old-timers from the Dragonfolk had ever seriously considered trying to get to the book.

“I kept my word, Second Devil General. And now I'm going to give you some permanent power from the God Legion Seal. It won’t fade away. Cultivate it, and you’ll be able to fend off this wind.”

He waved his hand, causing golden light to flow out and turn into a talisman filled with swirling daoist techniques and images of godmammoths.

It floated over and landed on the Second Devil General’s palm.

The Second Devil General took it and sent some power inside to fuse with it. He nodded. “Not bad, Yang Qi. It seems you've changed. Instead of pulling tricks, you’re actually helping me. I was worried you’d just give some temporary help, then take it away in a critical moment, leaving me stranded.”

Yang Qi snorted coldly and clasped his hands behind his back. “You really make me out to be a lot more villainous than I am. I only plot against people who plot against me first. Treat me honestly, and I’ll do the same to you.”

“Fine. Count this as our first time helping each other without ulterior motives.”

“In that case, let’s get in there and free the Third Devil General. I have a feeling this is going to work out perfectly.”

The two were finally starting to develop a bit of trust between each other. The basis of trust was strength, and now that Yang Qi could stand up to the Second Devil General, the two of them were able to negotiate an agreement.

With that, they stepped into the screaming wind and were instantly surrounded by such destructive force that they could hardly see their hands in front of their faces.

They were surrounded in all directions by what seemed like the weeping of ghosts and wailing of gods. All of a sudden, an ancient megamammoth appeared, formed completely from wind, its trunk flailing about violently.

RUMBLE!

This was an aura that could blast suns and moons, and tear stars out of the sky. And it was fully focused on Yang Qi and the Second Devil General. The Second Devil General was nearly scared out of his mind, but Yang Qi was actually enjoying himself. After all, he was able to simply absorb the aura of the King of Godmammoths, then use it for his benefit.

His genes had reached an incredible level, and while he had been able to absorb the aura of King Heaven-Devourer, King Immortal-Slayer, and many of the other seventy-two monarchs in the past, he hadn’t had occasion to acquire any of the aura of the King of Godmammoths.

As Yang Qi got closer to the destructive blood sealing mark of the King of Godmammoths, he used the God Legion Seal to absorb that aura and turn it into gene chains.

They were gene chains containing the genetic blueprint of the King of Godmammoths!

Normally speaking, the King of Godmammoths was so powerful, and so genetically complex, that duplicating him would be impossible. But with the aura of this blood seal, Yang Qi was able to begin replicating his genes and prying into his deepest secrets.

An illusory genetic chain was now visible in the God Legion Paradise.

It was different from an ordinary genetic chain, as it was made up of countless particles, each of which resembled a taiji symbol, with black representing hell, white representing the halls of heaven, and a golden line separating the halves.

These genes were the ultimate expression of perfection, and there was nothing in the god world that could surpass them genetically.

Yang Qi was benefiting immensely from this trip into the Myriad Dragons Lair. After all, where else could he have acquired the invincible and perfect genes of the King of Godmammoths?

‘Such incredible genes. I've really struck it rich this time! Although I'm strong, my strength isn't consolidated. But now, with these genetic chains, things will be different. Furthermore, I can also alter the genes of the sage monarch magistrates so that they surpass the ancient angels!’

The truth was that, despite having combined the Everlit Godlamp, Cruiser of Civilization, and other magical treasures, their power required constant attention to keep control of. They weren’t truly united.

His body was like a kingdom with various competing interest groups that resulted in an overall weakness. But now that he had the genetic chains of the King of Godmammoths, he could use them to create an overarching structure that could consolidate both his strength and that of the sage monarch magistrates.

Although they weren’t complete, based on what Yang Qi now knew of the King of Godmammoths, he would be able to cultivate and improve them going forward.

“What a powerful tempest,” the Second Devil General said, looking at the gusts of wind that resembled powerful megamammoths. Without the protection of the God Legion Seal, he would definitely have been crushed out of existence.

“I never would’ve imagined that the King of Godmammoths would leave behind such strong blood and life force even after his death. No wonder the True Devil clashed with him unsuccessfully so many times. What a fool the Sovereign Lord was. He eventually turned on the King of Godmammoths, killing his most powerful servant. If it wasn’t for the King of Godmammoths perishing, perhaps the halls of heaven would still have control over the god world in general.” However arrogant and conceited the Second Devil General was, he still admired the King of Godmammoths. After all, his own superior, the True Devil, who commanded the combined godpower of hell, had fought the King of Godmammoths many times, yet failed to defeat him.

The King of Godmammoths was like the backbone of the legion of gods, and it was his power that kept the horde of devils in check.

He really was the one who propped up heaven and earth.

Chapter 1463: Most Powerful Genes

The genetic chains of the King of Godmammoths, which were truly the most powerful genes in existence, still only existed in illusory form, hovering in the God Legion Paradise almost like a primary natural law of the dao of heaven. But even in that form, it still filled Yang Qi with an immense sensation of power.

He had to wonder if the genetic chains would improve as he got closer to the actual sealing mark.

As he absorbed them, far away in the Sage Monarch Dragon Kingdom, his five hundred thousand sage monarch magistrates shivered as their own genetic material transformed, and they shot to an inconceivably higher level, much to the shock of the ordinary government officials.

After all, their enlightenment corresponded to Yang Qi’s enlightenment.

Swish!

The magistrates’ muscles rippled as they grew stronger and taller, and their auras thrummed with destructive energy. This was a dramatic change to their life force and substructure, and had nothing to do with their cultivation base.

They were like rabbits transforming into tigers.

The sage monarch magistrates had started out as combinations of ancient angels and martial-god soldier-kings, as well as certain other types of thralls. Later, as Yang Qi gained further enlightenment, they became more and more perfect, transforming in numerous ways.

RUMBLE!

As the cosmic aura of the dao of heaven flowed through each and every magistrate, a projection of the King of Godmammoths appeared on their foreheads. And as they breathed, it was as if they could inhale the powerful essence of the god world itself.

What was power? Few people could explain in detail, let alone understand what it represented. But the sage monarch magistrates had finally touched on the true root of power.

As a result, they were experiencing explosive growth.

Before, they had been mid Paramount Gods with psychic scales and godhood ratings of ten million. That alone was hardly enough to govern the entire Sage Monarch Empire. But now they were transforming and growing on a fundamental level. Ten million. Twenty million. Thirty million. They were undergoing changes that defied description.

They were almost like clones of the King of Godmammoths, each of them capable of tapping into his great and mighty power.

In the end, each sage monarch magistrate reached the level of ninety million, placing them at the limit of the mid Paramount God level. They were just shy of a hundred million, which would make them equivalent to Patriarch Deva.

In the House of the Invincible, people like that could serve as viceroys. And now, they were definitely in the position to maintain order in the Sage Monarch Dragon Kingdom.

In fact, they could probably govern a place ten times as large.

Yang Qi was now in a position to expand his territory. And once he started taking over more kingdoms in the Myriad Dragons Lair, it would lead to a snowball effect.

‘My friends and family shall also gain enlightenment of the King of Godmammoths’ power!’

There was no way Yang Qi would forget his closest brethren.

Jadefall, Yang Doom, Yang Proudworld, the Shepherd... all of them were making constant progress thanks to the destiny they had access to. And most of them were on the verge of breakthroughs. Ever since Yang Qi had joined the House of the Invincible, they had been in a much better position, as they were able to benefit from what he shared with them.

BAM!

Yang Immortal-Slayer was the first to reach a higher level. He had monarch godhood, which made things immeasurably harder for him. But now that he gained this new enlightenment, his psychic scale and godhood started climbing rapidly.

“I'm finally stepping into the late Paramount God level!” Brahma shivered as he absorbed the destiny and screaming winds from the King of Godmammoths. In the blink of an eye, his Cardinal Grand Brahman Five Phases Energy Arts caused the true preheaven five phases to stir within him.

Next came the Shepherd, Yang Proudworld, Yang Doom, and more. All of them broke into the late Paramount God level, the same as Patriarch Deva.

“My dear brethren,” Yang Qi said via projection, “just wait until I finish my work in the heart of the Myriad Dragons Lair. Then I’ll secure viceroyships for all of you in the House of the Invincible, giving you access to even more destiny, and faster cultivation speed.”

They all nodded. In the meantime, they would use their newfound strength to help administer things in the Sage Monarch Dragon Kingdom, helping Yang Qi to improve the destiny of the place.

Looking at the net of law and the surging destiny, Jadefall murmured, “To think that, not long ago, Yang Qi was out over the open ocean, subjugating the Crystalline Turtle Shell Kingdom. Back then, the destiny valuation of the Sage Monarch Empire was one. I wonder what it is now.”

“I wouldn't be surprised if it’s in the tens of thousands!” the Shepherd said. “The Sage Monarch Dragon Kingdom is far, far superior to that Crystalline Turtle Shell Kingdom.”

“From what I can tell,” Yang Immortal-Slayer said, “I have more power from the Cruiser of Civilization. Its destiny systems are very profound, and I’m on the verge of being able to imitate them.” Even as he spoke, an enormous spinning wheel appeared above his head, which then assessed the destiny of the Sage Monarch Empire.

“Eight hundred thousand!”

“Simply amazing! The valuation is at eight hundred thousand! In only a few months, not even a year, we went from one to eight hundred thousand!”

“What does that count for, though? Our empire is weak compared to the House of the Invincible. I wonder what their valuation is. Can you assess them?”

“They’re impossible to assess at the moment. I would guess their valuation is beyond eighty billion. Who knows, it could even be eight hundred billion. Comparing us to them would be like comparing a drop of water to the ocean. Not even all of the Dragonfolk in the Myriad Dragons Lair put together could fight them.”

“Well, let’s just hope Yang Qi succeeds.”

“Just look at everything he's done so far. When has he ever failed? When has he ever let us down?”

All of Yang Qi’s brethren were very excited to see things progress. Meanwhile, he was piercing through the tempest winds, benefiting the entire way. The gains from the King of Godmammoths’ genes made this place superior even to the halls of heaven.

This was real cultivation.

Hooooooowlllll.

All of a sudden, a piercing howl of grief reached them. It was that of a dragon, so powerful it seemed capable of crushing everything in its path.

“What's causing that cry?” Yang Qi said, shaken. “Don’t tell me it’s the Third Devil General.”

“It is,” the Second Devil General said excitedly. “That’s the voice of the Third Devil General, the ultimate ancestor of all devil-dragons. I can sense the Dragon Compendium up ahead!”

“He must be extremely weak at this point. Even you were nearly crushed into powder after being imprisoned for so long.”

“The Third Devil General is actually under the protection of the Dragon Compendium. Even though the book is a prison, the general is the ancestor of devil-dragons, buddha dragons, sage dragons, god dragons, and all of that. And the Dragon Compendium is an ancient item from primal-chaos, which gave birth to many dragon patriarchs. It was originally the ultimate lair for dragons, designed to protect them.

“But when the Dragonfolk sided with us Devilfolk, and of course the Demonfolk as well, the True Devil and Demon Master looked kindly on the Dragon Compendium, and blessed it. Because of that, the King of Godmammoths couldn't destroy it. You see, it's on par with the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. King Immortal-Slayer was really incredible to have created that chart. After all, the Dragon Compendium is a preheaven item, while the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart is a postheaven creation. To create something that could rival a preheaven creation like the Dragon Compendium just shows how in tune he was with the will of the god world.”

“Look! There it is! The Dragon Compendium!”

Up ahead, Yang Qi saw an enormous book floating right in the middle of the deadly tempests.

Chapter 1464: Expert Interlopers

The Dragon Compendium had finally appeared within the windstorms.

And it was indeed a book.

However, it was vastly larger than any ordinary book. It was the size of a continent, and indescribably thick. Writing flowed across its surface, and it looked like god dragons twisting and writhing this way and that. Of course, it was ancient dragon script.

RUMBLE!

As if suddenly sensing the presence of intruders, the book trembled, and an immense roaring sound echoed out from within, shaking everything in the vicinity.

The leather cover of the book was sealed with a blood-colored talisman covered in golden scrawl. The talisman pulsed with an aura that seemed filled with war, destruction, conquest, subjugation, and the trumpeting of megamammoths.

“That must be the King of Godmammoths’ seal,” the Second Devil General said. “It’s keeping the Dragon Compendium sealed, and giving rise to the tempests in the area. Assimilate it, and you’ll gain immense power.”

“I know,” Yang Qi said coolly. “I can sense it. I need to use the God Legion Seal to break the seal. However, that process is going to involve a clash with the will of the King of Godmammoths. It's entirely likely that his will can destroy my own, turning my body into a husk that can easily be possessed. If that happens, the King of Godmammoths will once again exist in the world. Meanwhile, I’ll sink into eternal oblivion, completely losing myself.”

“You’re right. You've obviously thought this matter through. However, without undoing that seal, we can’t open the Dragon Compendium. Since we’re here together, it's definitely possible. I trust you, and have full faith that you don’t take on tasks that you can't accomplish.”

“That’s a given. And I do feel confident about this. However, I need to take some time to study that sealing mark.”

Thanks to his recent gains, his cultivation base was creeping forward, and the sage monarch magistrates seemed like they might be heading toward a breakthrough. If he could get them all into the late Paramount God level, what level of power would he commend then?

In any case, he was highly confident in his ability to unravel the King of Godmammoths’ sealing mark. He knew that this effort was going to involve a major tempering, and would be a trial of blood and fire. And he was looking forward to the clash. After all, the God Legion Seal was deeply connected to the King of Godmammoths, so this would almost be like an apprentice fighting a master. However, if Yang Qi could come out victorious, then the God Legion Seal would truly become his own.

It was going to be a contest of elite experts, of wills that Yang Qi hoped would facilitate a further boost in power. To him, it would be like a tribulation.

WHOOSH!

The two of them landed on the surface of the book, coming to stand at the edge of what appeared to be a golden river. Yang Qi looked at the flowing gold, and immediately sensed immense pressure weighing down on him, like a mountain descending onto his soul.

BAM!

The Second Devil General reached down as if to scoop up some of the golden liquid from the river, but before he could even touch it, he was flung backward violently. There was no way he was going to get even a drop of liquid out of it.

SPLAT!

He coughed up a mouthful of blood and his face looked as pale as death. “I can’t believe the King of Godmammoths’ blood is filled with such power. That sealing mark is so strong I couldn't possibly undo it.”

“That’s for sure,” Yang Qi said. “The King of Godmammoths exists at the peak of power. He was so strong he could transform the dao of heaven and reverse the cosmos. Only the God Legion Seal can deal with this. There’s no way someone like you could handle something so mighty. Of course, I still need to study it. Don’t do anything rash.”

“I'm curious to see exactly how you study it.” The Second Devil General was a bit suspicious about the situation, but there was nothing he could do about it. All he could do was follow Yang Qi’s lead.

Yang Qi sat down on the bank of the golden river and started doing some breathing exercises, inhaling some of the golden water vapor that drifted over the surface. Almost immediately, he could sense the genetic chains within him growing more plentiful. This river was made of the King of Godmammoths’ eternally unchangeable blood, so bringing it into himself was the best way to study it. Soon, he realized that the blood had the amazing property of constantly absorbing the power of the god world, and even that of the Dragon Compendium.

In fact, as it absorbed godpower from the book, it seemed as though the purpose was actually to form a body.

‘Not good!’ Yang Qi thought. ‘Now I get it. This sealing mark is made up of life force, flesh, and blood. The King of Godmammoths put this here on purpose in an attempt to be reborn. If someone assimilates the Dragon Compendium, then uses its power to conquer the Myriad Dragons Lair, the resulting power will cause the King of Godmammoths to be resurrected. Although he won’t be at full strength, he’ll still be alive.’

Having become aware of this, there was no way that Yang Qi would do anything rash. The last thing he wanted right now was to awaken the will of the King of Godmammoths.

For the time being, he simply sat in place, absorbing power and observing the magical laws. In this way, he gained greater and greater understanding of the King of Godmammoths’ genes. And as the God Legion Seal broke down the golden liquid, he used his internal teleportation portal to send it back to the Sage Monarch Empire, both to grow more sage monarch magistrates and to help his brethren improve their true energy.

With actual blood from the King of Godmammoths, the sage monarch magistrates’ genes became more well-developed than ever, allowing them to creep closer and closer to the late Paramount God level.

Once they broke through, the benefits to Yang Qi would be immense, and he would definitely advance by leaps and bounds. If he wanted to open this sealing mark, he needed to be as strong as possible, lest he end up dead in the process.

“Someone’s coming!” the Second Devil General blurted, drawing Yang Qi out of his trance. Sure enough, Yang Qi could sense an immense power piercing toward them, devastating any windstorms along the way.

“What the fuck? Who could be this strong? I can’t believe someone is braving these windstorms. The only way to get through them easily is with the God Legion Seal. Otherwise, it would take an immense amount of quintessence-blood and vital energy, or possibly some sort of peerless magical treasure.”

Eyes flashing, the Second Devil General said, “We need to hide. This newcomer obviously can’t be taken lightly!”

Yang Qi quickly unleashed the Life-Death Void-Destruction God-Lightning from the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, allowing the two of them to merge perfectly with heaven and earth. In the blink of an eye, they seemingly vanished into thin air.

The Dragon Compendium was located in the middle of a massive vortex of tempests. Other than Yang Qi, no one had ever come here. Yet someone was approaching? Who could it be? How could someone this strong actually exist?

Yang Qi was about to find out who it was.

Two blurs approached; unexpectedly, two people were coming! Both of them were young men, seemingly in their twenties, but with auras completely enigmatic and mysterious. Each of them bore a jade amulet, one white and one black, creating something like a taiji symbol when they were linked together.

The jade amulets cast a profound light that made a sphere around them, keeping them safe and untouched by the winds.

Yang Qi’s heart was already pounding wildly, as he realized that these people were so similar to him they might as well have been brothers. And the reason was that those two jade amulets were pieces of the Mahātmā Jade!

Some almighty power had been used to alter them so they no longer bore their original shape and appearance. Obviously, whoever had done that was a person whose cultivation base couldn’t be weaker than that of the High Priestess. In fact, they probably surpassed the Lord of Radiance and Light and the Lord of Civilization, and were close to the level of the True Devil.

There were few people Yang Qi knew of who matched that description. Proud Central. The nine chief elders of the House of the Invincible. The Lord of the Chiliocosm. In years past, such people couldn’t even come close to resembling King Immortal-Slayer, the True Devil, the Demon Master, or the other almighty entities. But all of those apex beings had fought and killed each other.

New people had taken advantage of the following billions of years to rise to prominence, pushing their destiny and cultivation bases to the point of rivaling those almighty entities of yesteryear.

Not too many years ago, Patriarch Deva had worked with a piece of the Mahātmā Jade, but had failed to unlock any of its true secrets. Eventually, it had ended up with Yang Qi. Now, two pieces were right in front of him, having been refined into something different from before, and capable of piercing through the godmammoth tempests.

Other than the God Legion Seal, the only thing that could possibly deal with winds like this was the Mahātmā Jade. However, the God Legion Seal absorbed the winds, it didn’t repel them, which made it superior to the Mahātmā Jade.

‘One of those guys is from the House of the Invincible!’ Yang Qi thought. The young man had skin as white as fine jade, and pulsed with the aura of the House of the Invincible. And from his aura, he wasn’t a viceroy of a thousand lands. In fact, not even a viceroy of ten thousand or a hundred thousand lands could compare to him.

He had so much destiny that his aura was that of true invincibility! He represented the very substructure of the House of the Invincible.

In other words, he surpassed the level of the nobility!

Chapter 1465: Dugu Yunkong

These two young men were obviously extraordinary individuals. They had pierced the storms that surrounded the Dragon Compendium, and were obviously elites among elites, and top figures in the god world. Quickly assessing them, Yang Qi found that their psychic scales and godhood ratings were, at the very minimum, over ten billion. As for the exact numbers, he couldn’t tell for sure. For all he knew, they could be in the tens of billions.

After the level of ten billion, there were so many complicated interactions and transformations in psychic scales and godhood ratings that it was essentially considered another level altogether. It was more like half-Annulled, which meant that people like Yang Qi couldn’t assess or comprehend it.

“Incredible,” the Second Devil General said, his eyes glinting with malicious light. “These two are so strong that they’re on the same level as the God-Lords of old. It’s just as they say: each generation will produce talented individuals, and their classic works will survive for centuries. It's too bad I'm still not back at my peak. If I was, I could definitely crush at least one of these kids.”

“Wrong. Even at your peak, you couldn’t handle them. At best, you might be able to hold your own in a fight, or possibly get a tiny upper hand. But there’s no way you could crush either of them. Both of them are top potentates of the god world. One of them is from the House of the Invincible, and the other is from the House of the Chiliocosm. Both have a piece of the Mahātmā Jade, the very same magical treasure I have. By using the will fluctuations of the True Devil, they managed to stave off the psychic tempests of the King of Godmammoths. Very, very impressive. They definitely can’t absorb those pieces of jade into their thoughts like I have, though. They’ve turned them into usable magical treasures instead, so there's a big difference between how they’re using them, and how I am.

“There are few things I desire more deeply than pieces of the Mahātmā Jade. With those two pieces, my sage monarch magistrates would all become late Paramount Gods, which would make them capable of serving as viceroys. And I’d be so much stronger that dealing with the will of the King of Godmammoths wouldn’t be such a challenge. If the House of the Invincible and the House of the Chiliocosm both have pieces of the Mahātmā Jade, it means the Central Dynasty must also have one. For now, I’ll just wait patiently and watch how the situation develops. Maybe I’ll even have a chance to pull a fast one and get those two jade pieces. I wonder what those two are doing here anyway.”

Yang Qi remained hidden, yet continued drawing on the golden liquid from the river to strengthen himself.

The Second Devil General looked over at him and knew he was planning to just wait there, unmoving.

Both of these newcomers were superior to the Second Devil General. He currently had a psychic scale of five or six billion, which was a far cry from ten billion. And unfortunately, getting back to his previous level, let alone surpassing it, was going to be a very hard task. His inner devilishness had been sorely damaged.

With that, he joined Yang Qi in simply looking on.

The two young men landed on the Dragon Compendium, then exchanged a glance and burst out laughing.

“Brother Dugu Yunkong, we’re finally here. The Dragon Compendium. The King of Godmammoths’ tempests are strong, but with our pieces of the Mahātmā Jade formed into a yin-yang taiji symbol, we managed to get here. Without them, we would never have succeeded.”

“That’s right, Brother Yang Jian. This was no easy task that we accomplished. Luckily, of all the various heirs apparent in the Chiliocosm Dynasty, you managed to get the Mahātmā Jade.”

The ultimate patriarch of the Chiliocosm Dynasty was called the Lord of the Chiliocosm. However, his name was Yang Chiliocosm. Therefore, all of the true nobility in his kingdom were also surnamed Yang. It was similar to how viceroys in the Invincible Dynasty were all surnamed Dugu. Neither were actual surnames, but instead represented the fact that they were part of their respective dynasties.

“Brother Yunkong,” said Yang Jian, “you know full well I can’t measure up to you. It won’t be long now before you and Sprite Susu are married. And she’s the most powerful princess among the nobility. I heard that she actually ascended from the lower worlds, which caused a huge stir among the Spritefolk. After arriving in the god world, she shocked everyone by winning an amazing legacy, that of the Spritely Sage Grail. After assimilating that treasure, she became a true holy daughter to the countless Spritefolk. The Spritely Sage Grail is an ancient object born from primal-chaos, and it was what eventually brought the Spritefolk into existence. Over the hundreds of billions of years that followed, they turned the grail into a magical device that only the future leader of the Spritefolk can use to bring their people to glory. Considering all that, why hasn’t Sprite Susu been named as the leader of the Spritefolk? And why is she marrying into the House of the Invincible? Do you know, Brother Yunkong?”

Dugu Yunkong chuckled. “The Spritefolk are as disunited as a dish of loose sand. They’ve never established a true kingdom, and their old-timers are constantly fighting amongst themselves. None of the competing interest groups can gain dominance. Although the Spritely Sage Grail did fall into the hands of Sprite Susu, indicating she is supposed to be the future leader, to a lot of people, that’s just a fairy tale. A symbol that isn't supposed to be taken literally. Do you really think the interest groups and old-timers are going to follow the leadership of a woman? That’s a joke if I’ve ever heard one. That’s why we agreed to work together. Sprite Susu will marry into the Invincible Dynasty, and she picked me because I'm the most likely of all the heirs apparent to eventually ascend the throne. Of course, it's all a big plot. Once Sprite Susu is mine, I’ll use our marriage as an excuse to invade the lands of the Spritefolk and conquer their interest groups one by one. With that increase in my destiny, I can definitely seize the throne without a hitch.”

Dugu Yunkong seemed completely confident in his plan, as though he had everything under control. From his bearing, it was obvious that he wasn’t the type of person who should be underestimated.

Yang Qi nodded inwardly. ‘Considering this Sprite Susu is an Ascendant, I think I can now say with certainty now she is indeed Yang Susu. And she has the legacy of this Spritely Sage Grail. All seems well with her. However, this Dugu Yunkong seems to be plotting against her, which means I need to wreck his plans. Unfortunately, given my current level of strength, that’s not going to be easy! I'm not a match for this Dugu Yunkong, especially considering he has the backing of an entire dynasty.

‘It seems I need to take a trip to visit the Spritefolk. But in the meantime, I hope I can get these two pieces of the Mahātmā Jade. If I do, I’ll get a lot stronger, and might even be able to take further advantage of the situation.’

“Brother Dugu,” said Yang Jian, “we’ve come here together today to break open the King of Godmammoths’ sealing mark, and take the Dragon Compendium. Very few people could possibly do what we're about to do. Do you think we’ll really succeed?”

“Don’t be unduly humble, Brother Yang. Perhaps you were outdone by that Yang Voidprime, but that’s to be expected considering his status. He’s a Fateless One, which gives him an incredibly outrageous advantage. If it weren’t for that, he wouldn't be a match for you. And we don’t live in ancient times anymore. The famous God-Lords of the past, such as the Lord of Civilization and the Lord of Radiance and Light, weren’t necessarily any stronger than we are right now.”

Yang Jian gave a disdainful nod of agreement. “Well, that's true, Brother Yunkong. Although Yang Voidprime did crush me, and always has in the martial arts competitions, the truth is that he can’t kill me. And if we succeed in getting the blood of the King of Godmammoths, then what will his Fateless One status count for?”

‘Fateless One? Yang Voidprime?’ Based on what Yang Qi understood, whether it was in the god world or ancient primal-chaos, there could be multiple Eternal Ones and Fortuned Ones. But there should only be one Fateless One. And yet now there were two? One named Yang Qi and the other named ‘Yang Voidprime’?

Both had the surname Yang, and there had to be some unknowable and enigmatic reason for that.

“It looks like another Fateless One has popped up, Yang Qi,” the Second Devil General said, and he didn't sound very happy. “The world is changing too rapidly. I don’t even understand what's going on nowadays. I was sealed up for too many billions of years. There are just too many experts nowadays.”

“Oh please, Second Devil General. The world isn’t ‘changing too rapidly’. You were sealed for billions of years, not hundreds. Although, if these two know of some way to undo the King of Godmammoths’ sealing mark, maybe we have a good opportunity on our hands.”

“You’re the expert schemer. I’ll follow your lead.” The Second Devil General was obviously not going to take the initiative to do anything.

“Brother Yunkong, we really had no choice but to come here today. The Central Dynasty is eroding the foundation of the Dragonfolk, and it won’t be long before full-on war breaks out. If they take over the Myriad Dragons Lair, their destiny will improve so dramatically that neither of our dynasties would be able to stand up to them.” A serious expression appeared on the face of Yang Jian. “Proud Central from the Central Dynasty is the most vicious and merciless person in existence. Furthermore, their dynasty has the most righteous destiny there is. We ‘heretical’ sects are at a big disadvantage because of that. But if we take over the Myriad Dragons Lair....”

“Don’t worry about that,” Dugu Yunkong said proudly. “I already own this place. You see, once we get the Dragon Compendium, we can easily take over the other dragon kingdoms. Then I’ll subjugate the Spritefolk, and my personal destiny will be so incredible that I’ll easily achieve my next cultivation breakthrough. Everything is going according to my master plan.”

Chapter 1466: Clearing the Haze

Listening to this conversation between Dugu Yunkong and Yang Jian was clearing up a lot of the haze in Yang Qi’s mind.

Sprite Susu had to be Yang Susu. And he needed to find her, lest she fall on very bad times. He had to stop the wedding between her and Dugu Yunkong, and he also needed to help unify the Spritefolk under her leadership. It seemed more than obvious that the Spritefolk old-timers would rather marry her off than accept her as their leader.

Another thing he now understood was that there was a Fateless One in the House of the Chiliocosm. And he was probably connected to this person somehow.

Of course, Yang Qi needed to look into the matter further. If there really was another Fateless One just like him, that person had to die. It was a showdown of predestination, and it was a given that they couldn’t be friends. However, Yang Qi had long since had the feeling that there was something about himself that wasn’t complete. And now he realized that the key to becoming complete would be killing the other Fateless One. Only then would he be a truly one-of-a-kind entity.

Thankfully, he had the advantage, as no one knew he was a Fateless One, whereas this other person was sitting out in the open.

Unfortunately, he had no way to divine information about the other Fateless One. Whoever it was, they obviously had an exceedingly high position. Even this Yang Jian had plainly stated he wasn’t a match. So it was pointless for Yang Qi to speculate about how he himself would match up.

Thankfully, Yang Qi was confident that he would come across the opportunities he needed. Rewards come only with risk, and right now he had two pieces of the Mahātmā Jade right in front of him, along with the blood in the King of Godmammoth’s sealing mark.

“Let’s get to work,” Yang Jian said. “How exactly do we undo the sealing mark? Drain this golden river?”

“Yeah,” Dugu Yunkong replied. “The golden liquid here is actually made from the blood of the King of Godmammoths. Getting rid of it is the only way to reveal the true material the sealing mark is made of. If we stimulate the power of the Dragon Compendium, the King of Godmammoths will fight back. And when his will is unleashed to fight the book, we can seize that moment to assimilate the book. Then we’ll have the approval of the Myriad Dragons Lair, and will command the magical laws of this place. After that, conquering the numerous Dragonfolk kingdoms will be a simple task.”

“How are we going to split things up?” Yang Jian asked.

“Simple. Fifty-fifty. You get the blood of the King of Godmammoths, and I get the Myriad Dragons Lair. Once you gain control over the nascent divinity true self of the King of Godmammoths, you can use that to detect the presence of the God Legion Seal. It's been lost for countless years now, but it hasn’t ceased to exist.”

“The God Legion Seal?” said Yang Jian, his expression immediately becoming one of greed. “Brother Yunkong, how exactly are we supposed to go about draining this golden blood? There’s no magical treasure that could possibly contain it. Not even our combined pieces of the Mahātmā Jade could do so. All the jade is good for is to use the aura of the True Devil and the countless Devilfolk sages and mahātmās to fend off the psychic tempests defending this place.”

“Did you really think I would come here without a plan, Brother Yang?” Dugu Yunkong said with a cold smile. “The King of Godmammoths was powerful, but he has a major weakness. Have you ever heard of the maxim snakes devour mammoths? The King of Godmammoths had one main archenemy, and that was King Heaven-Devourer! King Heaven-Devourer was actually a primal-chaos elder-snake, and because he was never as strong as the King of Godmammoths, he was constantly devouring mammoths! And although they clashed many times, the King of Godmammoths was never able to kill King Heaven-Devourer. Defeat him in battle, yes. But kill him? No. And that was because King Heaven-Devourer had gained enlightenment of the boundless truths contained in the saying snakes devour mammoths. Then, he cultivated his soul to a profound level in the dao of devils, in which the human heart is insufficient; the soul is never sufficient; the void contains all things, including everything everywhere. Of course, he didn’t attain absolute enlightenment, which was why he was never able to devour the King of Godmammoths.”

“King Heaven-Devourer? Don’t tell me you have King Heaven-Devourer’s legacy talismans? The imperial snakecharms!?”

“Of course not!” Dugu Yunkong said. He sighed. “If I had those talismans, then I wouldn't be here now. I would’ve come here a long time ago and devoured the King of Godmammoths’ blood. And I certainly wouldn’t need the help of the House of the Chiliocosm in the form of the Mahātmā Jade.”

“I get it. So what are you planning to use? Do you have something related to King Heaven-Devourer? Mind opening my eyes a bit?”

“The answer is simple. I happened to get King Heaven-Devourer’s head!”

All of a sudden, a vortex of primal-chaos appeared behind Dugu Yunkong, the type that abounded with primal-chaos paleo-energy that could create all manner of living things.

Within that primal-chaos was the skeletal head of a snake, its mouth open wide as if to devour everything in heaven and earth. Green flames burned in its eyes, and it pulsed with a devouring energy so intense that some of the surrounding windstorms were instantly sucked inside. It was almost as if another god world existed inside that mouth.

“The head of King Heaven-Devourer!?” the Second Devil General said, shivering.

Among the seventy-two monarchs, King Heaven-Devourer ranked second, right under King Immortal-Slayer. Although he wasn’t as powerful as King Immortal-Slayer, the two had a relationship similar to the Sovereign Lord and the King of Godmammoths.

King Immortal-Slayer corresponded to the Sovereign Lord, as he relied on wisdom and intelligence to manipulate the dao of heaven, make complicated plans, subjugate enemies, bring his heart in line with truth, and strive toward the Annulled.

As for King Heaven-Devourer, he was like the King of Godmammoths in that he was domineeringly strong.

Those two did the fighting, while King Immortal-Slayer and the Sovereign Lord laid complicated plans leading up to battle.

It was impossible to say how many times King Heaven-Devourer had fought the King of Godmammoths. And every time, King Heaven-Devourer lost. But he always regrouped and came back stronger in the next fight. And the King of Godmammoths could never quite kill him.

Eventually, King Heaven-Devourer died mysteriously. Many people assumed that he was killed by the Sovereign Lord, although some think it was the Great Necropolis who did him in.

The latter was entirely likely, as Yang Qi had found some of the remains of King Heaven-Devourer in the Great Necropolis, and had long since assimilated them with King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans. And now that he saw this skeletal head, the talismans within him were quivering as if they wanted to shoot out of him.

Although he had full control of all three thousand talismans, his cultivation base was obviously nowhere close to the level of King Heaven-Devourer in the past. And if the actual body of King Heaven-Devourer were found, the talismans could inhabit it, turning into a perfect recreation of him.

King Heaven-Devourer had been used by King Immortal-Slayer to fight the King of Godmammoths, precisely because of the truth of snakes devour mammoths.

“The head of King Heaven-Devourer!?” Yang Jian exclaimed, looking a bit leery. “Brother Yunkong, did you already fuse with that thing?!”

“That's right, I did. This is my ultimate secret weapon. And once I find any other incarnations and remains of King Heaven-Devourer, and my collection becomes complete, I’ll become stronger than you can possibly imagine. Eventually, I’ll transcend to be higher than all other gods. The nine patriarchs of the House of the Invincible spent years working with this head with their Invincible Profound Technique. What do you think? Listen, Brother Yang. I know that Yang Voidprime is your greatest enemy. So I'm going to help you kill him, and then I’ll devour him! What do you say?”

Yang Jian looked a bit pale in the face. “Dugu Yunkong, I never imagined that you were this strong. You've really managed to keep your true strength hidden! In that case, I suppose the real reason you asked me here today is that you want to kill me and steal my piece of the Mahātmā Jade. Then you’ll devour me to get some of the power of the House of the Invincible.”

“You’re overthinking things, Brother Yang,” Dugu Yunkong said with a smile. “It wouldn't benefit me at all to kill you, and in fact, it would probably cause a war between the House of the Invincible and the House of the Chiliocosm. If that happened, the Central Dynasty would swoop in and wipe us all out. What good would it do to fight amongst ourselves?”

“But why do you want to devour Yang Voidprime?” Yang Jian said, still looking terrified.

“Simple. With him in the way, how can you take the throne? I want you as the king of the Chiliocosm Dynasty, then we can work together as allies. The current old-timers in the Chiliocosm Dynasty think of me as their enemy, and refuse to get with the times. The best possible strategy for both of us is to work together.” It was obvious that Dugu Yunkong had both outstanding ability and grand vision.

And Yang Qi could tell that he was profoundly ambitious and ruthless. It was no wonder he was the top figure among the heirs apparent in the Invincible Dynasty.

“Alright,” Dugu Yunkong said, “the time has come for you to help me with every bit of strength you’ve got. I’ll make sure this is all worth it for you. Don’t worry. In a moment, you’ll be clashing with the will of the King of Godmammoths, and I’ll help you by infusing you with the will of King Heaven-Devourer. Succeed, and you can take the blood of the King of Godmammoths. Then we both get what we want. It's a win-win situation.”

“Fine, Brother Yunkong. I trust you.” Yang Jian nodded sincerely. He had chosen to throw caution to the wind.

However, Yang Qi could see that, deep in his eyes, there was a glint of craftiness, as though he were planning something tricky of his own. This Yang Jian was no simpleton, and it was highly likely that he was plotting against Dugu Yunkong, and was pretending to be weak to force his opponent to reveal his secret weapons.

Chapter 1467: The Head of King Heaven-Devourer

Dugu Yunkong was planning to use King Heaven-Devourer’s head to push his cultivation to a higher level! The head was devouring the surrounding windstorms, which were psychic tempests created by the will of the King of Godmammoths.

Of course, it couldn’t fully assimilate them. That would only be possible with the God Legion Seal and the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. But it could temporarily suppress them.

Unfortunately, the difference in power levels between Yang Qi and these two was too immense. At the moment, he couldn’t take any action against them. Even one of them alone would be more than a match for both Yang Qi and the Second Devil General working together.

For now, they had to bide their time and wait for the right moment.

And that moment was quickly approaching. Right now, they were completely unprepared, and just about to undo the sealing mark of the King of Godmammoths. Striking at that time would be the best moment to hurt them badly.

“King Heaven-Devourer, make your move!” Dugu Yunkong said loudly. “Devour this river of golden blood. All of my cultivation in life has led me to this very point!” He waved his hand, and the enormous skeletal head shifted to face the river, which it then started devouring.

“By the way, Brother Yunkong,” Yang Jian said, “what happens if our actions here get the attention of Dragonfolk experts? If they attack us when we're distracted, we could really get hurt.”

“It’s not as simple as you make it sound. For all intents and purposes, no one else can come to this location. If they could, the Dragonfolk would already have come. Before you and I agreed to work together, not even I could have made this trip. So what are you worried about? There’s definitely no way anyone can interfere.”

“True. The psychic tempests around here are extremely deadly. Without the Mahātmā Jade and the will of the boundless True Devil, I have no idea how anyone could come here. Yet, for some reason, I feel like there’s some deadly power out there.”

“In that case, give me a hand. Pour some of your vital energy into me so that I can power King Heaven-Devourer’s head. With the two of us working together, we're like two ancient God-Lords. We can definitely handle this sealing mark! If we couldn’t, it would be the worst joke in the world!”

Yang Jian seemed hesitant, but at the same time, he knew he couldn’t defy Dugu Yunkong’s wishes, otherwise he might end up getting stuck here.

Exhaling, he sent a stream of vital energy into the skeletal head, which lurched back and forth, a magical symbol glittering on its forehead as it pulsed with a destructive aura.

WHOOOOOSH!

It inhaled, and golden river water flowed into it in massive waves.

“Who is that!? Who is profaning my mighty will?

“Who are you? Who is stirring the sleeping spirit of the dead?

“Who are you? Who is trampling on my power?

“Who are you? Who is violating the ancient natural laws?”

All of a sudden, immensely powerful magical symbols erupted from the golden water, slamming into Dugu Yunkong and Yang Jian, sending them staggering backward. Their defensive empyrean energies were cracked; apparently, not even they could stand up to an attack from the golden river.

“Dammit, why is it this strong?” Dugu Yunkong shouted. “Invincible Whisper!”

His voice pierced out, slamming into the psychic tempest created by the river. But the only result was that the sound attack collapsed.

“Invincible God Voice!” Magical symbols erupted from his mouth and rushed forth to stop the psychic tempest. At the same time, he said, “King Heaven-Devourer, devour all of this! Snakes devour mammoths!”

The snake's eyes burned with intense green fire as it lunged back and forth, devouring everything in the area.

‘This is awesome!’ Yang Qi thought. The chaos being created by these two people was enabling him to inhale a lot of the golden water and vapor, thus helping him refine and perfect his gene chains. As he stood next to the river bank, gold liquid flowed into him without cease.

His power climbed constantly.

Two point one billion. Two point three billion. Two point five billion. Three billion. His godhood rating and psychic scale climbed in dramatic bursts of hundreds of millions. Yang Qi had an advantage over Dugu Yunkong in that he could actually assimilate the golden blood of the King of Godmammoths. All Dugu Yunkong could do with it was take it away, study it, and possibly concoct it into some medicinal pills.

Meanwhile, as endless amounts of golden liquid poured into King Heaven-Devourer’s skeletal head, it slowly turned a golden color.

“Come on, Second Devil General,” Yang Qi said. “Let’s jump into this river.”

“What? Are you crazy? That stuff will melt me! I’ll die if I jump in there! Don’t you know that the blood of godmammoths is the absolute bane of all Devilfolk? It doesn’t matter how strong of a devil you’re talking about, that liquid will melt us away. Years ago, the King of Godmammoths was said to have the most destructive blood in all existence.”

“I have a way to keep you safe. Absorbing this blood is helping me to gain enlightenment of the maxim snakes devour mammoths. With the protection of the God Legion Seal, you’ll be completely safe. And in the river, we can wait for the right moment to take action. I have an idea for how to really screw Dugu Yunkong over.” Yang Qi chuckled darkly at the thought of it.

“What’s the idea?” the Second Devil General asked quizzically.

“Simple. As that skeletal head turns more and more golden, it’ll reach the point where Dugu Yunkong will have trouble controlling it. Under normal circumstances, I’d never have been able to do anything about it. But this situation is unique. So we wait in the water where they have no idea of our presence. Eventually, the head will devour us, and once I'm inside, I’ll use my imperial snakecharms to connect with the discarnate will of King Heaven-Devourer. Once that happens, the head will become mine, and I’ll benefit in ways I can't even predict. Then, Dugu Yunkong and his friend will be toast!”

The Second Devil General’s eyes lit up with surprise, and he nodded. “That’s not a bad idea. He’s using that head like an out-of-body incarnation, a second nascent divinity. So normally speaking, you couldn’t just take it from him. But given the circumstances, maybe this is a good opportunity.”

“Exactly. Come, let’s head into the river. I’ll continue working on my cultivation, and you just wait patiently and don’t do anything to attract attention.”

“You underestimate me, boy. Do you really think I can’t read the circumstances!? If I did anything to ‘attract attention’ in that river, I'd just end up dead!”

Nodding, Yang Qi used the God Legion Seal to create a protective barrier around the Second Devil General, then they jumped into the river. Immediately, they could sense the immense power of the river crushing onto them, making them feel like they had been squished flat. It actually reminded Yang Qi of the flatverse.

The Second Devil General felt as if his mind and soul were filled with howls. And his body seemed like it might explode at any moment, with cracks opening up on his skin that flowed with blood.

“Devil Cocoon!” Howling, he summoned a blood-colored cocoon to surround himself.

Even though he was protected by the God Legion Seal, the surrounding liquid was so powerful that even being near it was dangerous to him.

“This is amazing!” Yang Qi murmured as he sensed the powerful magical laws around him. With every moment, the gene chains in him were being perfected and growing stronger. And as they became more complete, his godhood rating and psychic scale climbed to four billion!

Chapter 1468: Entering the Belly of the Devourer

The power of the golden liquid converged inside Yang Qi, filling the particles that made him up. His genes originated with the King of Godmammoths, and therefore, acquiring this blood made him like a tiger that had grown wings.

As he absorbed it, he started connecting to the power of the blood.

It was as if he was the successor of the ancient King of Godmammoths, and as a result, he was entering a mysterious state in which his particles turned into those of his forbear.

Now that his psychic scale and godhood rating were at four billion, he reached another level of fullness that would be impossible to break out of for the moment. However, he was still able to make use of the teleportation portal within him to send power out to his sage monarch magistrates.

Back in the Sage Monarch Dragon Kingdom, the sage monarch magistrates were again reproducing.

They didn’t achieve breakthroughs, however. All were at the level of nine hundred and ninety-nine million, nine hundred and ninety thousand, just on the verge of a billion. Once they did break through, they would be dramatically different from before. Unfortunately, that breakthrough was not going to be easy to achieve.

That said, the power of the blood was so incredible that it was similar to an Invincible Gold Pill from the House of the Invincible. And as a result, the sage monarch magistrates were splitting apart like mad.

From five hundred thousand, their numbers climbed to six hundred, seven hundred, eight hundred, and ultimately one million.

The new sage monarch magistrates didn’t just sit around twiddling their thumbs. They immediately joined the bureaucracy, helping govern the Sage Monarch Empire, which resulted in the destiny growing more pure and intense.

Because the magistrates didn't experience happiness, anger, sorrow, or joy, one might think of them as ants in terms of how they went about their work. Except even ants might fight each other, whereas the sage monarch magistrates would not. They all thought in exactly the same way, and would cooperate almost as if they were all part of the same photonic computer.

Thanks to them, the Sage Monarch Empire didn’t have any idlers.

In the past, the Dragonfolk’s kingdoms had been filled with idlers. The Dragonfolk would sit around eating, drinking, sleeping, fighting each other, or sometimes traveling. But they never accomplished anything noteworthy. They had no real concept of how to run a nation, and because of that, the destiny they produced was always very low. But now, with the magistrates running things, destiny surged and development was constantly underway.

Jadefall and the others were constantly surprised at how the sage monarch magistrates worked. Every area they managed ended up flourishing, and they had the Dragonfolk working hard at all sorts of tasks, from concocting pills to building teleportation portals and magical treasures.

Some of the Dragonfolk went out of the Myriad Dragons Lair to other locations in the god world, conquering other peoples and nations. Others set up bases in various locations.

In the immeasurably large god world, places like the Deva Dynasty numbered as many as the eternal sands, so as the Dragonfolk conquered them, they led to large increases in destiny.

The sage monarch magistrates also set up schools of learning in the Sage Monarch Dragon Kingdom in order to teach their ways. And with more qualified officials beside them, managing things was even easier.

The destiny improved on a daily basis.

“Eight hundred thousand. Eight hundred and thirty thousand. Eight hundred and fifty thousand. Nine hundred thousand.” Yang Immortal-Slayer was constantly checking the destiny valuation, and as the days passed, it rose higher and higher.

RUMBLE!

At a certain point, the sage monarch magistrates’ numbers blew past a million. Shockingly, the destiny valuation reached the same number!

“I think the time has come to start conquering more dragon kingdoms,” Yang Immortal-Slayer said. “The Sage Monarch Dragon Kingdom has rested and built up resources for long enough. And Yang Qi can't be expected to handle all of the expansion on his own. In places like the House of the Invincible or the House of the Chiliocosm, subordinates are the ones that go out waging war, not patriarchs. That's the way to run a nation. And with passions high on the warpath, the destiny will only get better.”

“That's right,” Jadefall said. “I completely agree. Let’s wage war! Let’s start by taking out the nearest dragon kingdoms. Look at the map here. There's a plain of flesh and blood over here that seems even more impressive than our mountains or sea. The converged flesh and blood is particularly stable there. It's called the Blood-Diamond Dragon Kingdom.”

By now, everyone knew that the more stable the flesh and blood was in the Myriad Dragons Lair, the better the kingdom would be.

In some locations deep in the lair, Dragonfolk could just sleep on the ground and absorb the power of the flesh and blood to improve their cultivation base.

“Fine. Onto the warpath!”

The commands were given, and the Sage Monarch Dragon Kingdom burst into action, heading off to wage war.

“Excellent. Most excellent!” Back in the golden river of blood, Yang Qi sensed what was happening and nodded in approval. He was glad that his empire was organic in nature, and didn’t need him there to micromanage everything. And waging war was one of the best ways to keep an empire healthy.

He was completely confident that his forces would come out on top. His people were a well-oiled machine that the chaotic dragon kingdoms couldn’t possibly compare to.

He continued to focus on absorbing the golden blood and using it to create more sage monarch magistrates.

Rumble. Rumble....

All of a sudden, he gained deeper enlightenment of certain aspects of the King of Godmammoths, and his psychic scale and godhood rating climbed to four point one billion.

Around that time, Yang Qi and the Second Devil General suddenly felt something tugging at them! In the blink of an eye, they were sucked into the mouth of the enormous skeletal snake head.

‘It finally worked!’ Yang Qi thought. ‘We're inside the mouth of King Heaven-Devourer’s head!’ He opened his eyes and probed his cultivation base increase. Right now, he knew that he could actually best the Second Devil General in open conflict. But now wasn’t the time for that. Looking around, he could see that he was inside a virtual god world made of pure gold. It was like he was in the belly of King Heaven-Devourer!

Chapter 1469: Secretly Carrying out the Plan

After being sucked into the ‘belly’ of the skeletal head of King Heaven-Devourer, Yang Qi couldn’t move. However, his ability to assimilate the golden blood improved. After all, this skeletal head was filled with immense power, and conformed to the maxim snakes devour mammoths.

The digestive capabilities of snakes were astonishing.

They could digest virtually anything they devoured. Even ordinary snakes that couldn’t chew anything, but consumed an animal, would digest everything from their fur to their bones.

King Heaven-Devourer was essentially the ultimate snake, and could digest anything and everything. Rumor had it that he could have digested the King of Godmammoths if he had been able to swallow him.

Normally speaking, that meant Yang Qi would definitely have been digested. But he had the imperial snakecharms, all three thousand of them, and that made him perfectly in line with the will and soul of King Heaven-Devourer. As such, he could resist the digestive power, and at the same time, remain completely undetected by Dugu Yunkong.

For one thing, he was surrounded by golden blood. Furthermore, he had connected the imperial snakecharms to the skeletal head, allowing him to tap into the power of the blood even more effectively.

In other words, without the blood present, he wouldn’t have been able to do this. Dugu Yunkong would eventually return to the House of the Invincible, so obviously, his plan was to take as much of the golden blood as he could, and worry later about strengthening his connection to the head. Sadly for him, it would be too late, as Yang Qi would soon have complete control of the head, allowing its full might to be unleashed.

“God Legion Paradise; Kingdom of Gold; Liquid Fills the Golden Mountain.”

Not holding anything back, Yang Qi used a host of daoist techniques to unleash explosive power.

Golden blood poured into the God Legion Paradise, filling everything in it, eventually even covering the magical gene chains.

Once the golden blood touched those chains, they started hissing and popping.

Furthermore, there was a teleportation portal in the middle of the God Legion Paradise, which he activated, allowing the shining starlight from the halls of heaven to pour into the blood.

At the same time, his soul, which was connected to King Immortal-Slayer’s soul, worked hard to absorb more of the golden blood.

He was making an attempt to fully fuse with the skeletal head.

Even if Dugu Yunkong were stronger than he was, he wouldn’t be able to tell what was happening, as he was fully focused on battling the will of the King of Godmammoths. Undoing the sealing mark on the Dragon Compendium was no minor task, especially considering he had to deal with the distraction of the psychic tempests.

Yang Qi smiled coldly. “You can absorb the power too, Second Devil General. I’ve converted it, so it’s safe. Hurry up and get back to your full strength!” He waved his finger, converting godliness to devilishness that the Second Devil General could use.

The Second Devil General shivered as the pressure on him eased up and he felt himself growing stronger.

“Amazing!” he blurted involuntarily. “Simply amazing. You can actually convert godliness into devilishness!? Have you gained enlightenment of the ultimate limits of power?”

“Yes,” Yang Qi said. “At least for the moment, I understand many of the mysteries regarding gods and devils. The Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth contains the meanings of both gods and devils. It was originally a combination of the divine abilities of both devils and gods. And since I have the God Legion Seal, which is the ultimate expression of gods, and the Mahātmā Jade, which is the ultimate expression of devils, I can see how godliness and devilishness are interchangeable. Stop jabbering, Second Devil General. Circulate your magical power and take the devilishness I'm giving you to get stronger!”

“Of course!” the Second Devil General said, immediately drawing on his animadestiny devil vitality to do just that.

It was as if ghostfire from the depths of hell had flared to life, shooting toward Yang Qi’s God Legion Paradise as the Second Evil General greedily tried taking more godly might. Yang Qi didn't care, and simply kept feeding him devilishness.

The truth was that it was actually a trap. He was using the Second Devil General to help assimilate the golden blood. As godliness was converted into devilishness, which the Second Devil General then absorbed, it passed through the God Legion Seal, which was where the Second Devil General’s throne was. And the process made it grow stronger.

Of course, how could the Second Devil General possibly know that?

He immersed himself in the influx of power. The devilishness was simply too abundant. After all, what would it have been like if the King of Godmammoths had descended to hell and become a devil king? What would his devilishness have been like? The greater the godliness being converted, the greater the devilishness that would result.

Yang Qi could sense the Second Devil General’s psychic scale being restored, and his overall strength rising.

Over the course of the following hours, more and more golden blood poured in, and the Second Devil General’s cultivation base actually rose at a higher rate than Yang Qi’s. Six billion. Seven billion. Eight billion! Yang Qi was also achieving progress, but his breakthroughs always came more slowly. During the hours that passed, he rose from four point one billion to five billion. Going any further than that wouldn’t happen easily.

As for the Second Devil General, he blew past eight billion and kept climbing, making it seem like he might actually reach ten billion. Originally, he had actually existed in the realm of ten billion, and was only weaker because he’d been injured and imprisoned for so long. And recovering from that was no simple task.

Not that Yang Qi was very impressed.

The Second Devil General would never have been in this position to begin with if he hadn’t been nearly beaten to death so many years ago.

Nine billion. Nine point eight billion. Nine point nine billion.

After several days passed, the Second Devil General’s damaged devilishness was almost completely repaired, placing him just on the verge of ten billion. He was now feeling more powerful and vigorous than ever, like a normal person who had a severed limb suddenly repaired.

“Die! Let true devilishness enter the world... and devour it! I am the devil general, king among kings! Devil among myriad devils! DIE!”

Thrumming with incredible devilishness, he launched himself toward Yang Qi and prepared to take the God Legion Seal away from him.

He was finally turning on Yang Qi!

In the end, the Second Devil General was a devil, after all. He didn’t believe in honor or trust, and only cared about himself. Deceit, treachery, theft, and other such things were all built into him. It made perfect sense that he would try to devour Yang Qi and reach the ultimate level of power, that which the Sovereign Lord had achieved in the past.

POP!

As soon as his soul came in contact with the God Legion Seal, he encountered Yang Qi’s devilishness. After all, Yang Qi had both godliness and devilishness within him, as he’d assimilated part of the Mahātmā Jade.

As soon as the Second Devil General sensed the Mahātmā Jade, he burst out laughing. “The spirit of the Mahātmā Jade!? I'm going to devour that too. This is perfect. I'm finally going to break through. It’s like the True Devil set this all up as a gift to me! I'm going to become the Second True Devil now!” His soul bared its fangs as it approached Yang Qi’s soul and prepared to devour it whole. At the same time, the aura of the Mahātmā Jade washed over him, repairing more of the damage he had sustained in the past.

Crack!Crack!

His psychic scale and godhood rating suddenly broke past the barriers and reached the level of ten billion! He was reaching a higher level of cultivation!

“I reached ten billion! I'm fully a third healed now, Yang Qi. And you’re dead! You underestimated the Second Devil General, boy! Did you really think I would let you control me forever!?”

However, it was at that moment that he suddenly received an order from the God Legion Seal that he couldn't resist. The moment he achieved a psychic scale of ten billion, his golden throne in the God Legion Seal became complete. Then, Yang Qi had instructed his psychic scale and godhood rating to stop increasing.

“What? What’s going on!?”

He tried moving his arms, but found that they didn't respond. His mind wouldn’t permit them to!

“Hit yourself,” Yang Qi said.

WHACK!

The Second Devil General slapped himself hard across the side of his face.

“You trapped me!? I'm enslaved by the God Legion Seal!?” The slap had brought the Second Devil General to his senses, and he now realized what had played out.

“Correct,” Yang Qi answered. “You thought I was just helping you heal yourself? Did you really think that you could outscheme me? I knew all along you’d try to devour my soul. Every time you improved your cultivation base, you were becoming more closely connected to the God Legion Seal. And when you reached the level of ten billion, the process was complete. You are now enslaved, and you are now my devil general.”

Chapter 1470: Yang Clan Devil General

The Second Devil General had been subjugated, all thanks to having reached a psychic scale of ten billion. Now he belonged to Yang Qi and would never be able to betray him. At long last, Yang Qi had a servant who was on the level of the God-Lords.

The moment the act was complete, Yang Qi sensed the destiny of the Sage Monarch Dragon Kingdom rising significantly.

After all, with the Second Devil General, the Sage Monarch Dragon Kingdom had a new consummate expert, putting it in the position to rival the experts of the Chiliocosm Dynasty and Invincible Dynasty.

People with psychic scales of ten billion could found dynasties, and in the past, had been known as God-Lords.

In the ancient halls of heaven, they had names that conformed to the pattern ‘Lord So-and-So’, and all of them were incredibly important. Yang Qi was far from reaching that level, as he currently was only at the level of five billion.

“You...” the Second Devil General said, his heart swelling with anguish.

However, there was no place in his heart for regrets, as all of his thoughts and plans were now under the control of Yang Qi. Struggling wouldn’t do any good. Countless years ago, the God-Lords had been under the control of the God Legion Seal, and even they had been unable to resist or refuse to comply with the Sovereign Lord. To them, it had been a life worse than death.

“I, the mighty Second Devil General, hero of a generation, have fallen to your traps, Yang Qi?! Were you sent by heaven above to be the bane of my existence?!” The Second Devil General's voice couldn’t have sounded more dejected.

Yang Qi snorted coldly. “If you’d just agreed to work for me, and not plotted against me, this wouldn’t have happened. Besides, you should’ve already known that I’m the favored child of heaven. I have the God Legion Seal and the Mahātmā Jade, and all other manner of magical treasures. But no, you were blinded by greed. As a result, you’ll be eternally shackled, and shall receive no pity or compassion. You are now the devil general of the Yang Clan, my servant, there to comply with my every command. Now, absorb more devil vitality and prepare to use it against Dugu Yunkong. An ambush against him now will be extremely damaging! And once we free the Third Devil General, whose cultivation base is around the same level as yours, we’ll subjugate him as well. Then I’ll have two major subordinates I can use to help conquer the Myriad Dragons Lair.”

“You're really despicable, Yang Qi.”

The Second Devil General’s hatred for Yang Qi soared to the heights of heaven, yet he was like nothing more than meat on the chopping block.

“Despicable? Maybe a little bit. In any case, my orders for now are simple. Help me with my cultivation! I already helped you heal a third of your injuries. You should be thanking me!” Trudging like the walking dead, the Second Devil General drew on his own might to create a vortex in the God Legion Paradise, which began drawing in more of the golden blood to help solidify Yang Qi’s gene chains.

Instantly, the sage monarch magistrates in the Sage Monarch Empire began proliferating at an even higher rate, reaching numbers greater than one million and one hundred thousand. Furthermore, the united destiny of the place was impossible to stop.

In the days that had passed, the golden blood continued pouring into the Dragon Compendium, until an enormous talisman was visible on its surface. It was none other than the character for mammoth. That mammoth character was suppressing the dragon inside.

The talisman continuously absorbed the essence of the Dragon Compendium and the Myriad Dragons Lair, converting it into megamammoth blood.

Eyes cold, Dugu Yunkong said, “The King of Godmammoths was incredible. He really locked down this Dragon Compendium. If we hadn’t come along, this book would never have been opened, and eventually, the King of Godmammoths would have been reborn.”

“We have to open that sealing mark!” Yang Jian said with a grim smile. “We have to wipe out that mammoth character! If I can take that sealing mark into me, I can get the most powerful type of blood there is!”

“That's right,” Dugu Yunkong said. “The mammoth character will go to you. Absorbing it will cause you to advance by leaps and bounds, and you’ll become the new King of Godmammoths. You’ll definitely have no trouble dealing with Yang Voidprime then.”

“Brother Yunkong, this was a great idea. But it’s very dangerous. Once I devour that mammoth character, my fleshly body will be clashing with the will of the King of Godmammoths. If I'm not careful, I’ll be possessed. Get ready to connect me to the will of King Heaven-Devourer. Is the fact that King Heaven-Devourer’s head is full of golden blood going to cause any problem? Will it be too sluggish to be of help?”

“Too sluggish to help?” Dugu Yunkong said with a cold smile. “Brother Yang Jian, do you really think I don’t have ways of getting King Heaven-Devourer’s head to speed up?”

“Do you?”

“Hmph! All I have to do is use an Invincible Gold Pill!” All of a sudden, a golden pill appeared on Dugu Yunkong’s palm. It was the very same pill that Yang Qi and the Second Devil General had previously drooled over, and considered trying to steal in a heist. In the end, they decided that the danger was too great, forcing them to cancel such plans.

Yet here one was in Dugu Yunkong’s hands!

It emanated a dazzling, glorious glow, making it seem like a king among medicinal pills. And its medicinal energy remained completely concentrated within the pill itself.

It was like an embodiment of some elite expert.

“Go! Invincible Gold Pill!”

Dugu Yunkong flicked his finger, and the pill shot out, entering the fanged mouth of the skeletal snake. Moments later, flesh rippled out to cover the skeletal head, then the immense aura of a primal-chaos elder-snake spread out. It seemed as though King Heaven-Devourer was actually going to be resurrected!

“Invincible Gold Pill!” Yang Jian blurted, shuffling backward with a look of shock on his face. “That's the most precious, unique pill we have in the House of the Invincible. How did you get it? Supposedly, it can be used to summon souls from the depths of the universe, and return them to where they belong. It could push an ordinary mortal all the way to the peak Paramount God level, and increase their psychic scale into the billions! That pill isn’t even supposed to be taken outside of the sect. Why did you just give it to that snake?”

“It is indeed an Invincible Gold Pill, and I only had that one. I gave it to the snake so that the primal-chaos elder-snake body of King Heaven-Devourer could take form. At least temporarily, it’ll provide a version of King Heaven-Devourer that's filled with one third of his actual will. And now, I'm going to help you suppress the King of Godmammoths, and take that talisman! What do you say? I just sacrificed an Invincible Gold Pill to help you succeed. As I said, I get the Dragon Compendium and the Myriad Dragons Lair, and you get the blood of the King of Godmammoths.

“Hurry up and decide. Once the power of the Invincible Gold Pill fades, it’ll be too late to do anything. If we haven’t succeeded at that point, this whole thing will be a failure.”

“Alright! Devour everything under heaven! Chiliocosm Pagoda!”

Streams of energy flowed above Yang Jian’s head, taking the shape of a nine-story pagoda. On every story was a magical treasure that looked like a seated humanoid figure. And as soon as Yang Jian summoned it, he transformed into a beam of light that shot up to sit on the ninth level.

“It's the Chiliocosm Pagoda!” Dugu Yunkong said, his expression flickering. “I can’t believe you got the Chiliocosm Pagoda! What’s going on here? According to rumor, the Lord of the Chiliocosm existed in the preheaven primal-chaos as a pagoda, similar to how the Lord of Radiance and Light was once a lamp. Later, the Lord of the Chiliocosm shed his body, but it should still belong to him. So how did you get it?”

“You're right, Brother Yunkong. You see, before I left for this mission, the Lord of the Chiliocosm summoned me for a meeting. He knew how dangerous this venture would be, so he bestowed the Chiliocosm Pagoda upon me to keep me safe. Now that I’ve fused with it, there’s no evil that can harm me. Don’t defy me, Brother Yunkong!”

After a brief moment of shock, Dugu Yunkong calmly said, “I have no intention of defying you. Hurry up and get to work. I’ll help!”

Then, he sent the primal-chaos elder-snake rumbling toward the talisman.

‘Just as I guessed,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘He did have a secret weapon. It seems the Lord of the Chiliocosm is even involved in this matter. But he couldn't come himself. That Invincible Gold Pill is powering the primal-chaos elder-snake, and I'm going to benefit from it!’

Thanks to the burst of power from the pill, Yang Qi immediately broke through his bottleneck, his psychic scale rising past the level of five billion, and his connection to the snake growing even stronger.

‘You’re really helping me, Dugu Yunkong. That Invincible Gold Pill is making me stronger, so I suppose I should thank you. Now this head is going to be mine even sooner!’

Chapter 1471: Invincible Gold Pill

The power of the Invincible Gold Pill was more than formidable.

As it entered Yang Qi, he benefited tremendously. Ever since coming to the Myriad Dragons Lair, he had been advancing by leaps and bounds, going from a mere late Paramount God to an almighty peak Paramount God.

Given the current level of his cultivation base, he could definitely cause major problems in the House of the Invincible now. And he could subjugate many of their top leaders without any resistance.

As the power of the pill filled him, his psychic scale and godhood rating climbed from five billion to six billion. That was where it finally slowed and stopped.

However, that didn’t mean that the power of the pill was weakening. He quickly opened the teleportation portal within himself and connected to the Sage Monarch Empire, where he sent the surplus power to Yang Immortal-Slayer.

Yang Immortal-Slayer’s monarch godhood immediately rose, improving his martial capabilities and overall deadliness.

The power of the pill also filled the destiny of the kingdom, flowing through it into the hearts of the people.

The hearts of the people were deeply connected to destiny. The greater the destiny of a nation, the more confident and proud its people would be. In contrast, if the destiny was in a slump, the people would be weak and wretched. It could be a beneficial cycle, or a destructive one.

Right now, the power of the Invincible Gold Pill was flowing into the destiny of the Sage Monarch Dragon Kingdom, causing the hearts of the people to fill with an aura of invincibility.

We are invincible. We will triumph in every battle. We will achieve victory in every fight!

The sage monarch magistrates were also improving because of the pill, causing them to shine with brilliant expressions of light.

They were halos from the Eternal Heavenly Aria!

Although they still weren’t in the late Paramount God level, Yang Qi could use the blood of the King of Godmammoths to increase their life force, power, genes, and fighting ability. And with the Eternal Heavenly Aria to bless them, they were even more amazing.

“Wonderful! Most wonderful!”

Jadefall and everyone else were all involved in fighting the Blood-Diamond Dragon Kingdom, and had been stuck in something of a deadlock.

But now, with the sage monarch magistrates shining with halos of blessing from the Eternal Heavenly Aria, they and all their subordinates were vastly more effective.

Soon, the Dragonfolk from the Blood-Diamond Dragon Kingdom were being shoved back across the battlefield.

Whoosh. Whoosh. Whoosh.

Buddha Shockheaven and Buddha Lheafe flew out and seized the king. All of the leaders of the enemy army were captured, and as a result, the army started collapsing. The Sage Monarch Empire really was able to triumph in every battle.

The king was named Buddha Blood-Diamond, and he had a psychic scale and godhood rating of three billion. With him captured and in the custody of the sage monarch magistrates, there was no way his own force could hold their own.

His kingdom was soon swallowed up by the Sage Monarch Empire. As order spread, the destiny valuation rose to the shocking level of over one million!

Yang Qi could sense his empire expanding, and the destiny improving.

Around this time, Dugu Yunkong and Yang Jian had reached a critical juncture in their work.

With the Chiliocosm Pagoda and the head of King Heaven-Devourer, they were starting to suck away at the sealing mark.

It was deeply infused into the Dragon Compendium, and as soon as they tampered with it, the will of King of Godmammoths stirred into action.

Suddenly, a voice boomed, “Whoever blasphemes the essence of my power will die!”

A figure appeared with an elephantine head and a human body, with a long spear in its hands. Even before its spear could reach the vicinity, Yang Qi and the Second Devil General could feel its weight. So obviously, Dugu Yunkong and Yang Qi were even more affected.

SPLAT!

Blood sprayed out of their mouths, and Dugu Yunkong’s eyes were even dripping with blood.

“The King of Godmammoths can’t be underestimated. But he's an arrow that's reached the end of its flight! Watch as I subjugate him! Invincible Heaven Wheel!” An enormous, glittering wheel appeared behind Dugu Yunkong. The Invincible Heaven Wheel was no magical treasure, but rather a daoist technique. It was powered by the converged national destiny of the Invincible Dynasty, and could be used to crush the dome of heaven and invert the magical laws of the cosmos.

The megamammoth projection stabbed its spear toward the wheel, and sparks showered down as everything trembled.

“We technically shouldn’t be able to deal with this sealing mark. But we came prepared with lots of tricks. We're not going to let this opportunity pass! Yang Jian, hurry and absorb the power of that sealing mark! The Lord of the Chiliocosm gave you the Chiliocosm Pagoda for this very moment!”

“Thanks for the reminder! Chiliocosm Power. Endlessly Prosperous Nation-Fate!” Yang Jian surged with power as he drew on the national destiny of the Chiliocosm Dynasty, funneled through the Chiliocosm Pagoda.

The national destiny swirled into the form of a picture, depicting beautiful natural scenery, towering cities, sprawling provinces, and the like. The Dragon Compendium fought back fiercely against the pressure weighing down upon it, but the sealing mark was finally moving.

‘Incredible,’ Yang Qi thought, licking his lips in envy. ‘These two are really incredible. But the national destiny backing them is even more incredible. If I could get the destiny of the Invincible Dynasty and the Chiliocosm Dynasty, I’d definitely be able to transform on a fundamental level.’

Compared to those two dynasties, his Sage Monarch Empire was like nothing. In terms of the destiny, his was like a spluttering spark while theirs were like volcanoes.

Although the destiny valuation of the Sage Monarch Empire was at more than one million, those of the other dynasties were on the level of ten billion or more.

Could those two levels even be compared?

Here, two top experts from those organizations were using the Dragon Compendium to fight the sealing mark placed there by the King of Godmammoths. Thankfully, the King of Godmammoths had long since perished, otherwise these two never would have been a match for him.

BAM!

All of a sudden, a massive explosion occurred as the talisman lifted off of the Dragon Compendium.

“Blood Devouring!” Yang Jian shouted exultingly.

National destiny roared through the Chiliocosm Pagoda, causing the mammoth character to speed toward it like lightning.

Seeing this, Dugu Yunkong’s face suddenly fell. “Back up, Yang Jian! Don’t absorb it! It’s a trap! We’re in huge danger!”

He spoke too late. Yang Jian sucked in the talisman and then burst out laughing. “Why shouldn’t I absorb it? It's the sealing mark of the King of Godmammoths! Now that I have it, I have his blood, and I’ll become the most powerful person under heaven! I can—”

Before he could finish speaking, he cut himself off by unleashing a bloodcurdling scream. “NO! Don’t!”

It sounded almost like he was being dragged forcibly down into hell.

“What’s going on?” the Second Devil General murmured.

“Is he suicidal?” Yang Qi said. “He just devoured that sealing mark, which means that the will of the King of Godmammoths is trying to devour his flesh, blood, and soul. He's going to be possessed! I think this is the opportunity we’ve been waiting for. I'm going to get two pieces of the Mahātmā Jade, plus the Dragon Compendium. And I'm going to subjugate Dugu Yunkong!”

All of a sudden, from within Yang Jian’s screaming came a booming voice so impressive that anyone who heard it would be hard-pressed not to pass out. “Pitiful humans! How dare you try to wreck my life force sealing mark! Who gave you the gall to blaspheme the essence of my power? You think you’re strong enough to deal with me?”

It was the voice of the King of Godmammoths!

“I knew this was going to happen, Yang Jian. You can’t absorb the life force sealing mark of the King of Godmammoths! Mahātmā Jade! Suppress the Godmammoth!” Dugu Yunkong flew into motion, grabbing the second piece of the Mahātmā Jade from Yang Jian, then combining it with his own to make a black and white taiji symbol. Then he shoved it toward Yang Jian’s forehead.

“The Mahātmā Jade is the bane of the King of Godmammoths!”

Chapter 1472: A Critical Moment

The Mahātmā Jade and the King of Godmammoths were diametrically opposed.

In years past, the King of Godmammoths was tasked with suppressing hell, which meant he clashed repeatedly with the True Devil, who led the horde of devils from hell. Therefore, to resist the possession of the King of Godmammoths, it seemed logical to rely on the Mahātmā Jade.

“Will of King Heaven-Devourer. Snakes devour mammoths!”

Of course, Dugu Yunkong had more than one main strategy. He was planning to rely on both the Mahātmā Jade and the will of King Heaven-Devourer. With the snap of a finger, he ignited the Invincible Gold Pill, causing it to burn with unprecedented intensity as the primal-chaos elder-snake burrowed deep into Yang Jian.

Little did he know that Yang Qi and the Second Devil General were right inside that enormous snake.

Dugu Yunkong snorted in his heart. ‘The King of Godmammoths? I know you’ve been waiting in this seal, just looking for an opportunity to be resurrected. But there’s no way I’ll let that happen. With the power of the Mahātmā Jade and the will of King Heaven-Devourer, how could you possibly resist me? In the end, I'm going to benefit from all of this. I’ll sit on the mountaintop and watch the tigers fight, then reap the spoils when they tire out. When you two are tired and wounded, I’ll jump in and take everything.’

“This is it!” the Second Devil General said. “This is the opportunity we’ve been waiting for!”

The fighting between the wills of the King of Godmammoths, King Heaven-Devourer, the Chiliocosm Pagoda, and Yang Jian himself was heading toward a peak of intensity.

A sly smile spread out on Yang Qi’s face. “I can subjugate the wills of King Heaven-Devourer and the Mahātmā Jade. Normally speaking, it would be impossible, but with the will of the King of Godmammoths in there, it’s the perfect set of circumstances for me. It seems as if I'm foreordained to be the most powerful expert there is! Everything is just being handed to me on a silver platter!”

“I can’t believe it, Yang Qi. You’re just stumbling right into every benefit there is.”

Despite how the Second Devil General grumbled, he knew there was absolutely nothing he could do but watch Yang Qi progress and benefit.

BAM!

Two pieces of the Mahātmā Jade slammed into the will of the King of Godmammoths, and sparks flew out from the black and white aspects of the taiji symbol. However, the national destiny of the Chiliocosm Dynasty and the Invincible Dynasty were enough to crush down on the will of the King of Godmammoths.

That was when Yang Qi made his move, sending the devilishness of the Mahātmā Jade shooting out from the pieces he possessed. He was using his Mahātmā Jade to summon the other two pieces to him!

Crack!

The two pieces flared with the essence of the Mahātmā Jade, releasing the energies of sages, mahātmās, and devils.

“Come to me!” Yang Qi murmured, surging with the energy of the True Devil, calling out to the pieces of jade with practiced ease.

“Who’s trying to steal my jade piece!?” a voice thundered. It was the voice of whatever old-timer had recrafted the jade piece into its current form, and it came along with a mountainous wave of crushing energy.

Yang Qi chuckled coldly. “Normally speaking, the national destiny of the Invincible Dynasty and the Chiliocosm Dynasty would make it impossible for me to take these jade pieces. But with the will of the King of Godmammoths helping me, who can stop me!?”

Drawing on the God Legion Seal, he sent golden light flowing out to meet the incoming psychic attack. After crushing it, the black and white color vanished, replaced by two perfect pieces of jade. Then, they became two streams of psychic fluctuations that shot into his own will, combining with it.

In virtually no time at all, his psychic scale skyrocketed, going from six billion to seven. Then to eight. Nine billion!

BAM!

It only stopped after blasting into the level of ten billion!

By merely getting those two pieces of the Mahātmā Jade, he surpassed the Second Devil General’s speed in reaching a psychic scale of ten billion! If he went back to the Invincible Dynasty now, he could easily become a top patriarch, and could probably even take control of the entire organization.

Duke Nine Cauldrons, Priestess Dugu Wanqing, and any other people like that could be subjugated with mere thoughts.

However, Yang Qi still wasn’t content with what he saw as only a minor achievement. He wanted to get the Chiliocosm Pagoda and the Dragon Compendium, plus the King of Godmammoths’ sealing mark. He also wanted to subjugate Dugu Yunkong.

With the two additional pieces, Yang Qi could sense that his Mahātmā Jade was getting very near to a complete state. There were only a few more pieces out there. Suddenly, a projection of countless sages and mahātmās appeared around him, as well as the boundless True Devil. The latter was fully fused with him, as if he were the True Devil, commander of countless hells, and the ultimate representation of devils.

Within his mind, he could see an enormous ‘devil’ character, although it was somewhat unclear, and not complete.

Now that he had a psychic scale of ten billion, he could also sense the God Legion Seal changing. In fact, the golden figure that represented it no longer looked humanoid, but rather resembled a specific character: god. It was the character for god!

It represented countless transformations and all of the profundities of the legion of gods. Furthermore, it wasn’t the script of the god world; apparently, it came from some other profound preheaven universe.

God and devil combined!

The Second Devil General met Yang Qi’s eyes, and his heart trembled as he realized that Yang Qi was now far above him in terms of life force and substructure.

‘He’s going to end up like the Sovereign Lord,’ the general thought. ‘As of this point, there isn’t anybody who can possibly stop him!’

“Mammoth character, be subjugated!”

Yang Qi wasn’t done. He immediately sent out a stream of psychic power, along with the combination of the Mahātmā Jade and the God Legion Seal, creating a huge hand that reached toward the mammoth character and grabbed it!

Crack. Rattle.

The life force genes within him were changing, and the power of his various magical treasures were combining. Going forward, there would be no Cruiser of Civilization or Everlit Godlamp. They were him. He now possessed the true pure blood of the King of Godmammoths.

The talisman represented power, power that could end the heavens and crush the earth. It was the ultimate godpower.

When the will of the King of Godmammoths met Yang Qi’s will, which was backed by the God Legion Seal and the Mahātmā Jade, it melted as surely as a block of ice sent flying into the sun.

Yang Qi’s godhood rating started climbing again.

From six billion, it also rose all the way to ten billion!

The Mahātmā Jade pushed his psychic scale to ten billion, and the sealing mark from the King of Godmammoths did the same for his godhood rating.

All of these dramatic and rapid transformations were making Yang Qi a truly powerful figure.

RUMBLE!

As soon as he achieved the breakthrough, he activated his internal teleportation portal and reached out to his sage monarch magistrates in the Sage Monarch Empire, further perfecting their life force, genes, power, and magical laws.

Every single sage monarch magistrate dropped into a seated position, and thunderous rumblings echoed out as they became late Paramount Gods.

Furthermore, they started replicating!

Two million!

He now had two million sage monarch magistrates, all of them with psychic scales of one hundred million. They were now equivalent to Patriarch Deva, and all of them could be viceroys in the Invincible Dynasty.

It was a major breakthrough.

Instantly, the destiny of the Sage Monarch Empire grew more stable.

Moments before, the work of subjugating the Blood-Diamond Dragon Kingdom had been underway, but it had been proceeding tenuously, with many individuals considering rebelling or fleeing. And there had been other dragon kingdoms eyeing it like tigers eyeing prey.

But things were different now. The sage monarch magistrates grew visibly stronger, and shone with even brighter light from the Eternal Heavenly Aria.

The nation was stronger than ever, and with an army of two million powerful experts like this, who could compare? With hardly any effort, they could depose national leaders with psychic scales in the billions.

All of the members of Yang Qi’s empire grew stronger, including the dragons. At the same time, the essence of the Myriad Dragons Lair flowed toward the headquarters in the sea of blood.

Chapter 1473: Numerous Benefits

The destiny of the Sage Monarch Dragon Kingdom had actually incited the essence of the Myriad Dragons Lair, much to the shock of the old-timers there, who were now unsure of exactly how immense the kingdom was.

War was brewing, as the other dragon kingdoms certainly wouldn’t allow a kingdom such as this to expand unchecked.

Unfortunately, the destiny of the place was transforming constantly. Even if it didn't go on the warpath, it would still expand in an unimaginable fashion. That was thanks to the fact that the sage monarch magistrates were proliferating and growing more powerful.

By way of example, consider an ordinary city with a population of ten thousand people. If those people were at each other’s throats all the time, it would have a negative effect on the city as a whole. But with effective leaders to unite the city, it would not only be powerful, but it would also grow. Soon, those ten thousand inhabitants would become twenty thousand. Then thirty thousand. Eventually they would become a hundred thousand.

Throughout history, there were countless examples of tiny nations with populations of ten thousand people who could never dream of conquering a nation of a hundred thousand. That was what resulted from effective leadership.

The sage monarch magistrates used all of the most effective and ancient principles of leadership to command the people, produce goods, and expand the nation in an incomparable way.

From his place within King Heaven-Devourer’s skeletal head, Yang Qi could sense the destiny transforming over and over again, and was very pleased. If the destiny at his command could affect the essence of the Myriad Dragons Lair, then what else did he have to fear?

He could just sit back and let his territory expand.

‘The only thing I need to focus on right now is subjugating King Heaven-Devourer with the imperial snakecharms.’

Given the fact that he had just reached a psychic scale of ten billion, there was no way anyone present would be a match for him. So now he just needed to take control of the situation.

RUMBLE!

His will erupted, first taking control of the will of King Heaven-Devourer. The skeletal head became a flow of vital energy that was devoured by the imperial snakecharms, almost as if they had their own soul.

“Now take the Chiliocosm Pagoda!” Yang Qi said, and the talismans shot toward it.

In the blink of an eye, the will of the Lord of the Chiliocosm within the pagoda was shattered.

The pagoda was an amazing preheaven treasure comparable to the Everlit Godlamp. It existed in the ancient primal-chaos before the god world came to be, and was the original form of the Lord of the Chiliocosm.

In some ways, both the Chiliocosm Pagoda and the Everlit Godlamp were actually similar to the god world itself, which had also come to exist out of primal-chaos.

However, although their characteristics were similar, they were incomparable in terms of power. The god world was like a vast ocean, while the Chiliocosm Pagoda and the Everlit Godlamp were like springs of water. Obviously, the two were vastly different.

To Yang Qi, though, the Chiliocosm Pagoda was an amazing treasure that, upon being devoured, gave him access to the power of a chiliocosm of worlds. Instantly, it caused his God Legion Paradise to thrum wildly.

Crack!

When the Chiliocosm Pagoda was devoured, Yang Jian shivered. It was as if he had just glimpsed a huge giant snatching the Mahātmā Jade, taking the sealing mark, then seizing both the Chiliocosm Pagoda and King Heaven-Devourer’s skull.

Then that giant turned and consumed him, causing everything to turn dark.

Time passed, although he wasn’t sure if it was a mere moment, or billions and trillions of years. Then Yang Jian regained consciousness and saw a golden throne. Of course, the throne was in the God Legion Seal, and in that moment, Yang Jian came to understand everything.

“I’ve been subjugated by the God Legion Seal....”

He was now a loyal servant to Yang Qi. After inspecting him, Yang Qi found that his psychic scale and godhood rating were both at the level of fifteen billion. If it weren’t for the will of the King of Godmammoths that Yang Qi had tapped into, even he and the Second Devil General combined would never have been able to deal with an opponent like this.

Yang Qi also knew much more about the Chiliocosm Dynasty. Yang Jian was only a second- or third-level noble there, placing him firmly under the control of the Fateless One, Yang Voidprime. Of course, Yang Qi knew that it was only a matter of time before he devoured this Yang Voidprime.

Meanwhile, Dugu Yunkong was understandably flabbergasted.

‘What exactly is happening? Why can’t I sense the aura of King Heaven-Devourer’s head anymore? And what happened to the aura of the Mahātmā Jade?’ He had been waiting to jump in and take advantage of the situation, only to see the signs of struggle within Yang Jian fade away. In fact, Yang Jian was now thrumming with a most majestic and indescribable power.

‘I have to take back King Heaven-Devourer’s head and my piece of the Mahātmā Jade!’

His instincts were telling him something was wrong, so he curled his fingers into claws and drew on the national destiny at his control to bring his treasures back to him. However, he got no response, as if those treasures no longer existed in the world.

Of course, they were now part of Yang Qi.

‘I refuse to believe this! There's no way Yang Jian subjugated everything. It’s impossible!’ Face twisted viciously, Dugu Yunkong launched a palm at Yang Jian.

“Die!” Yang Jian said, his eyes snapping open as a vortex of power sprung up around him. In that moment, he suddenly transformed into a completely different person, striking cold fear into the heart of Dugu Yunkong.

Yang Jian threw his hand out, except it was a strange hand. It lacked fingers and seemed more like the limb of a mammoth, enormously thick and pulsing with ancient power.

BAM!

When their two hands smashed together, Dugu Yunkong shivered violently, and blood sprayed out of his mouth as he was thrown backward.

However, Yang Jian seemed to be in some sort of trance, as he didn’t follow through with another attack.

“Not good!” Dugu Yunkong murmured. He knew that he was now in an extremely unfavorable position. Furthermore, Yang Jian had apparently been possessed, and it seemed very likely it was by the King of Godmammoths. Fear gripping his heart, Dugu Yunkong turned to flee.

“Trying to run?” Yang Qi burst out from inside Yang Jian and gave chase.

However, at that moment, the Dragon Compendium suddenly erupted with a draconic aura, forcing him to stop and look back. Now that the King of Godmammoths’ sealing mark had vanished, the book was opening!

‘I suppose Dugu Yunkong will live. For now,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘The Dragon Compendium is opening and the Third Devil General is about to come out. He’s probably going to be stronger than the Second Devil General. He's been sealed for about the same length of time, but unlike the Second Devil General, who was constantly eaten away at, the Third Devil General has been constantly nurtured by the essence of the Dragon Compendium.’ He could sense the immense devilishness inside the book, combined with the aura of the Dragonfolk. It was building up, obviously preparing to burst out into the open.

Before, Yang Qi would never have been a match for the Third Devil General. But now he had a psychic scale and godhood rating of ten billion. He had the head of King Heaven-Devourer, the Chiliocosm Pagoda, and also the support of the Second Devil General and Yang Jian. They could probably be considered the top three figures present in the Myriad Dragons Lair, so how could they possibly not be able to deal with the Third Devil General?

“You think it's going to be that easy to earn your freedom? Dragon Compendium: Diminish!”

All of a sudden, the God Legion Seal transformed into the character god!

At the same time, the Mahātmā Jade became the character devil!

When gods and devils united, everything could be crushed!

Yang Qi landed on the Dragon Compendium, suppressing its power as he caused the entire book to start shrinking down.

The roar of a devil-dragon echoed out with explosive force.

However, Yang Qi crushed the sound and simultaneously entered the book, which contained an immense world inside of it, just like the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

It was pitch black, and in the middle of it all was an enormous devil-dragon, whose psychic scale was clearly at the level of twenty billion! The dragon’s eyes were locked on to Yang Qi as if it was preparing an attack.

The swords were drawn and the arrows were nocked, and fighting seemed likely to play out at any moment.

“Third Devil General!” someone said.

“Second Devil General? What are you doing here? Is it really you?” Shocked, the devil-dragon suddenly shrank down into human form, and contrary to expectation, she was a petite female! She wore a gauzy black garment, and had a black veil that made her facial features hard to see.

The Third Devil General was actually female!

Chapter 1474: Third Devil General

The Third Devil General, progenitor of devil-dragons, was standing right in front of Yang Qi. And this devil-dragon was a woman! At first sight, she seemed profoundly mysterious, her every movement cloaked in darkness and gloom, as though she wanted to spread the blackness of hell throughout all creation. That said, there wasn’t anything particularly special about her as far as Yang Qi was concerned. Now that he had taken the King of Godmammoths’ sealing mark, as well as the additional pieces of the Mahātmā Jade, her psychic scale of twenty billion wasn’t anything he feared.

He was absolutely confident that he could crush her.

His own cultivation base might only be at ten billion, but now that his Sage Monarch Empire had fully occupied the former Blood-Diamond Dragon Kingdom, he now had more than two million sage monarch magistrates, all of whom were late Paramount Gods. Together, their might was such that he definitely had an advantage over the Third Devil General.

Coupled with the fact that he had numerous magical treasures, and could draw directly on the Halls of Heaven, he was more than confident. And he had the Second Devil General at his side, which meant the Third Devil General wouldn’t have any breathing room.

Clasping his hands behind his back, Yang Qi took a moment to assess his surroundings inside the Dragon Compendium. The book was a spectacular treasure comparable to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, but the Third Devil General hadn’t completely fused with it. And thanks to the huge amount of golden blood Yang Qi had absorbed, as well as the King of Godmammoths’ sealing mark, he was actually connected to the Dragon Compendium to some extent.

If he could control the entire thing, he would control the Myriad Dragons Lair, and by extension, everything that happened inside it.

It was similar to how King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions were the key to controlling the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Whoever controlled the Dragon Compendium controlled the Myriad Dragons Lair. It didn’t matter what powerful old-timers existed inside. Once the lair was under the complete control of one person, everyone else would be trapped inside like turtles in a jar.

Many people had long yearned to obtain the compendium, but because of the sealing mark, no one had ever even gotten close to it. Dugu Yunkong and Yang Jian were the first to do so, other than Yang Qi, and they might have taken it, if not for him.

“It’s really you, Second Devil General,” the Third Devil General said. She glanced at Yang Qi and Yang Jian, then looked back at the Second Devil General and continued, “But you're so much weaker! You came at just the right moment. After all the countless hundreds of millions of years that’ve passed, I’ve almost fused with the Dragon Compendium. Now that you’re here, we can work together to complete the process, then take over the Myriad Dragons Lair. Agreed? I don’t know who these two companions of yours are, but we obviously need to kill them to keep our secrets safe.”

“Third Devil General, allow me to introduce my lord and master,” the Second Devil General said. “He's the one who unraveled the sealing mark. He has the legacy of the King of Godmammoths, and as such, you should be able to deduce why he’s here. He wants you to join him. Together, we can accomplish things that have never been accomplished before. And he has the power to do it.”

“What are you talking about, Second Devil General?! Have you gone mad? Only the boundless True Devil deserves to be our lord and master. Other than him, any who try to do so shall die. Unfortunately, the True Devil is dead, therefore, we're free to take over all creation.” Turning to glare at Yang Qi, she continued, “Who exactly is he, anyway? He must have taken advantage of your weakness to subjugate you, presumably with some sort of powerful sealing mark. Don’t worry, I’ll kill him for you.”

“Stop!” the Second Devil General blurted. “He really is my lord and master. He has the God Legion Seal and the Mahātmā Jade. What's more, he’s done what no one ever thought to do: he combined the two of them. He's the one who freed you, so if you defy him, it’ll be a big show of ingratitude. And then we’ll have to use force.”

“I can’t believe you’re talking like this, Second Devil General!” It was a big shock to her to go from thinking the Second Devil General had come to free her, to being told that he was actually a servant of Yang Qi. Suddenly, her eyes flickered with understanding. “He used the God Legion Seal on you, didn’t he? You're just like the God-Lords of old, enslaved by the Sovereign Lord. So, the God Legion Seal is back in play.”

Suddenly, her voice turned ice cold. “Hand it over, boy. You have one chance to live, and if you don’t take it, you’ll die. We're inside the Dragon Compendium, and I'm a devil-dragon. I was born in this book, and as long as we’re here, you’re no match for me. Not even the God Legion Seal can help you.”

“Oh really?” Yang Qi said, clasping his hands behind his back. “You’ve been sealed in here for hundreds of millions of years, Third Devil General. And instead of growing weaker, you’ve been working on your cultivation. Sadly, you haven’t made much progress. You see, the only way to truly get stronger is to establish a kingdom out in the god world, and obtain powerful destiny. Second Devil General, take her into custody.”

“Yes sir,” the Second Devil General said. Reaching out with fingers splayed, he unleashed a string of powerful attacks.

“Grand Devil Divine Ability!”

“Five Devils Leave the Ocean!”

“Six Thieves Travel Undetectable!”

“Seven Emotions and Six Sensory Pleasures!”

“Heart-Devil Like the Sea!”

The Second Devil General was actually using newfound knowledge of the battle techniques of the dao of devils. In order to strengthen him, Yang Qi had given him battle experience from the God Legion Seal. As a result, his energy arts had reached an unprecedented level.

Devil energy rushed forth like the tide, catching the Third Devil General totally off-guard.

“Chiliocosm God Fist!” Yang Jian said, attacking. Talking wasn’t going to win the Third Devil General over; quick and decisive action was needed to force her to acknowledge allegiance.

“I can’t believe you’re attacking me, Second Devil General!” the Third Devil General shouted. “Fine, don’t blame me for casting aside our old friendship. Besides, what need is there for friendship in the dao of devils? I'm going to crush you and turn you into an out-of-body incarnation that I can use to conquer the Dragonfolk and take over the world!” The Third Devil General’s black hair swirled around her, and her veil flipped up as she unleashed a wave of dragon energy, causing numerous dragon characters to rush forth from the depths of the Dragon Compendium.

“The Dragon Compendium is mine!” she grated. “And I'm going to show you what it feels like to be imprisoned for an eternity. Dragon Horde Ascends to Heaven. Dragon Horde Slaughters Gods!”

RUMBLE!

The Dragon Compendium trembled, yet it didn’t do what she had just ordered. Instead, spell formations popped up everywhere, spewing out the character mammoth, which began trampling the dragon characters.

“There’s no point in resisting, Third Devil General,” Yang Qi said. “The Dragon Compendium was sealed by the King of Godmammoths, and that lasted for billions of years. This place is filled with the power of the King of Godmammoths, and you can’t just take control of it like that. I’ll show you what it really means to take control of something. Let the Halls of Heaven come!”

Vortexes sprang up in the Dragon Compendium, revealing countless stars, which were of course heaven caliber godstones.

Now that he had a psychic scale of ten billion, his connection to the Bastille of the One God and the Halls of Heaven was even stronger and more reliable.

The power of the Halls of Heaven was filling the Dragon Compendium, and Yang Qi was using it to completely take over. What was the mightiest magical treasure in the world? It wasn’t the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Nor was it the Dragon Compendium, the Everlit Godlamp, or the Chiliocosm Pagoda. It was actually the Halls of Heaven. The palaces created by the Sovereign Lord, his god kingdom, which struck fear into the heart of hell.

As soon as the Third Devil General caught sight of the Halls of Heaven, she knew why this young man in front of her had been able to subjugate the Second Devil General. It was a shocking thing, and the fact that he had this legacy meant that another Sovereign Lord had appeared, someone who could enslave the entire legion of gods.

Suddenly, she blurred into motion. “Devil Specter Weighs Heaven; Devil Hallucination Myriad Transformations!”

She seemed to surpass time and space to appear right in front of Yang Qi, ignoring all spell formation and defenses. The mighty claw of a dragon slashed toward Yang Qi’s face, pulsing with devilishness so intense it could devilize even the strongest expression of godliness.

This was her consummate move, the Heaven-God Enslaving Claw, designed specifically to enslave gods.

Yet Yang Qi simply thrust his palm out, and the claw vanished as surely as if it had been trampled by a mammoth. Then a massive explosion rippled out.

Thump, thump, thump!

Yang Qi took three steps back, while the Third Devil General was sent flying. Yet before she had even landed, she spun in place and started laughing. “You’re strong, boy. But your psyche and godhood are only half of what mine are. Strength is the foundation of everything, and in terms of strength, you don’t measure up. So prepare to die!”

“Mammoth King’s God Whip!”

Seemingly completely unconcerned by her words, Yang Qi chose to unleash one of the King of Godmammoths’ most ultimate techniques.

Chapter 1475: Intense Fighting

The Mammoth King’s God Whip was purely made for battle, and every stance within it could be considered heaven-rending and earth-crushing. It could devastate entire worlds, and slaughter all sorts of evil creatures.

“Uproot Mountains and Rivers!”

Yang Qi's entire body was like a whip, with both arms and legs resembling mammoth trunks as he battered at the Third Devil General, who defended herself with a bevy of dragon claws.

Sparks flew, and hissing sounds rang out; each blow that they exchanged caused both Yang Qi and the Third Devil General to feel shaken down to their souls.

Yang Qi felt physically numb as a result, and the Third Devil General felt inhibited in her movement.

The King of Godmammoths was designed to be the bane of devils. Furthermore, the Mahātmā Jade was a boundless item from the dao of devils. Therefore, the combination of the two was something the Third Devil General just wasn’t equipped to deal with.

Her only advantage was her superior strength and momentum.

“Son of Heaven Defends the Nation’s Gate!”

Having fully unleashed the Mammoth King’s God Whip, Yang Qi shifted to another technique, the Nation-Fate Godfist. It was also a top-rate technique, although the downside was that it required immense destiny to operate. But with superior destiny, it was amazing beyond belief. And right now, it was impossible for the Second or Third Devil General, or any other expert like them, to wield it in the same way as Yang Qi.

He had a very profound understanding of what exactly national destiny was, and he could draw on the destiny of the Sage Monarch Empire to power his technique to incredible levels.

He even threw in the destinies of the House of the Invincible, Central Dynasty, and House of the Invincible, thanks to all the moles and agents he had in place there.

Of course, he had already integrated the Nation-Fate Godfist into his Sage Monarch Grand Magic, specifically, into the Emperor and Sovereign aspects.

Emperors and sovereigns were embodiments of national fate.

An unprecedented flow of destiny was unleashed on the Third Devil General’s dragon claws, sending her stumbling backward. Then a splat could be heard as her veil was shredded to pieces and blood erupted from her mouth, revealing a bewitching, enticing, and charming face that could seduce any living being under heaven.

The Third Devil General was a consummate devilless, who lived to conquer worlds and entice men, gods, devils, immortals, and buddhas alike. No one could resist her temptations.

Except for Yang Qi. Because he had the aura of the Mahātmā Jade, she couldn't use her abilities to overwhelm him.

“What fist technique is that?” she said, coughing up some more blood.

“The Nation-Fate Godfist and the Sage Monarch Grand Magic. My personal dao. And the fate of my own personal empire!” Striding forward, he raised his voice and said, “Sovereign and State Die Together!”

In the past, he had gained superficial enlightenment of the two aspects of Emperor and Sovereign. But now things were different. As the leader of the Sage Monarch Empire, he had firsthand experience dealing with destiny and the net of law. He knew how closely he was connected to his empire. The sovereign was the empire, and the empire was the sovereign. If the empire was destroyed, the sovereign was destroyed. If the sovereign died, the empire died. The empire was the foundation of the sovereign, and the sovereign was a symbol that represented the empire.

Thus, his fist technique now represented the ultimate path of war and conquering, with his every move as fierce as though the combined hearts of trillions of citizens were attacking the enemy.

His flurry of blows shoved the Third Devil General backward, and at the same time, the light of the Halls of Heaven shone out into the Dragon Compendium.

Whoosh. Whoosh. Whoosh.

At the same time, the Second Devil General and Yang Jian circled around the Third Devil General and launched attacks of their own, keeping her completely pinned down.

The Third Devil General was not in a good position. She was being attacked by three top experts at the same time. And two of them were completely controlled by Yang Qi’s will, making them almost like clones of him.

Eyes flashing with anger, Yang Qi unleashed two more moves from the Nation-Fate Godfist, ones that were even more intense. “Blood Stains Spring and Autumn, Wage War and Sing Dirges!”

The two moves instantly caused the Third Devil General to sink into an illusion in which she was surrounded by endless armies, all of which were attacking her.

Crash!

“You’re all courting death!” the Third Devil General screamed. “Myriads of Dragons Ascend to Heaven!” Tens of thousands of dragons rose into the air to break her free from Yang Qi’s moves.

However, that was when Yang Qi unleashed the most mysterious move from the Sage Monarch Grand Magic, that which conformed to the aspect of Nothing. “Annul Death; Eternally Bury!”

Even as the Third Devil General fought back, everything vanished into absolutely nothing, including the immense energy created by the move Myriads of Dragons Ascend to Heaven. The Third Devil General was confused by what was happening, as she had never fought anyone with moves as complex and exquisite as this.

“Not good!”

She quickly drew on profound energy arts to heal her wounds and try to make an escape from the battlefield. Unfortunately, she was too late.

The move of Annul Death; Eternally Bury caused an enormous necropolis to appear, which crushed down to bury anything and everything.

However, even being confined in the Great Necropolis, the Third Devil General was still able to show how domineeringly powerful she was. She suddenly transformed into an enormous devil-dragon that started flailing this way and that as she tried battering her way out. “You can’t trap me, boy. I'm the Third Devil General. How could you possibly hold me in place? Myriads of Dragons Break the World!”

The scales covering her body shot out, slamming into the walls of the Great Necropolis and causing massive explosions. Of course, this wasn’t the real Great Necropolis, but rather a version formed from Yang Qi’s vital energy. The real version would have been able to trap the Sovereign Lord, much less the Third Devil General.

“Second Devil General, Yang Jian,” Yang Qi commanded, “give me your life force quintessence. Sacrifice your lifespan. Keep the Third Devil General trapped in there while I fuse with the Dragon Compendium.”

Biting down on their tongues, the Second Devil General and Yang Jian spat out mouthfuls of blood, which ignited in a sacrifice as they did exactly as Yang Qi had asked.

The Dragon Compendium had no true owner, but completely taking it wasn’t an easy task. Thankfully, the King of Godmammoths’ sealing mark had worked away at it for billions of years, paving the way for Yang Qi.

A golden streak of light shot out from the God Legion Seal, entering the Dragon Compendium and causing it to tremble violently. The countless descriptions of Dragonfolk genes within it were laid bare for Yang Qi to see. He saw the creatures it had birthed into primal-chaos, and he watched as they mindlessly fought and killed each other. Some went extinct, but others survived and eventually took the form of humans.

Immeasurable amounts of time passed. After all, there was no reckoning of years in primal-chaos. Eventually, the Dragon Compendium formed. It then gave birth to animals with pride, wisdom, and might, but also evil. They were the Dragonfolk.

The Dragonfolk were the mightiest among the various creatures that prowled primal-chaos. Later, the primal-chaos paleo-energy converged to form the god world....

Yang Qi saw countless pictures revealing the history of the god world, the Dragon Compendium, and primal-chaos. And he gained new insights. For instance, he found that the god world was the most powerful and largest of all the worlds that had come to be in primal-chaos. And it was constantly expanding, even now.

In fact, it was almost as if the god world was alive, and it was practicing cultivation by performing breathing exercises. If the god world was like a person performing breathing exercises, then the air it breathed was primal-chaos paleo-energy.

Yang Qi, the Sovereign Lord, and everyone else were like mere parasites that existed within it.

Seeing all of this, Yang Qi shivered in his heart.

Chapter 1476: Taking Control of the Lair

Yang Qi wanted to fully fuse with the Dragon Compendium, but that wouldn’t be an easy task. He had just peered into many of its secrets, such as the details it contained about the birth of the god world. He had also seen how the god world was expanding on a daily basis. And now he knew that all of the almighty entities within it were little more than parasites, even the most ancient ones. That was why such people were eventually extinguished by the god world. What else would ultimately happen to parasites?

Now it made sense to Yang Qi why the Sovereign Lord had attempted to destroy the god world. The god world was also a cultivator, and when the Sovereign Lord got strong enough, the god world had decided to destroy him. So it was only natural that he would respond in kind.

As this information flitted through Yang Qi’s mind, he reached the heart of the Dragon Compendium.

The book had no wisdom or intelligence, as it was simply a magical treasure. That said, it would instinctively resist anyone who tried controlling it. Therefore, as Yang Qi’s will spread through it and examined the details of its creation, it took it to be a profound blasphemy.

The Dragon Compendium was reacting with rage. Of course, as it had no intelligence, it was similar to how a person playing with fire could be burned by that raging fire.

An intense attack of will entered Yang Qi, like an enormous dragon seeking to occupy his sea of consciousness. However, Yang Qi wasn’t afraid of the will of the Dragon Compendium, as he had the utmost confidence in his plan.

“Halls of Heaven!” Within the psychic world of his sea of consciousness, countless daos of heaven collapsed and the legion of gods perished. That was when the Halls of Heaven appeared and crushed the enormous dragon.

The dragon was defiant, roaring in anger, even changing its own shape over and over again as it unleashed the preheaven powers of dragons.

“Boundless Great Dao; Preheaven Destruction!” Yang Qi’s sea of consciousness transformed again, and a god appeared there, not the King of Godmammoths, but rather the purrling.

It immediately spat out a string of bubbles that surrounded the dragon.

Massive explosions rocked Yang Qi’s sea of consciousness as the fighting raged.

‘I can’t believe the Dragon Compendium is proving so hard to subjugate. It’s still not working even though I have both the Mahātmā Jade and God Legion Seal?’ Drawing deeper on his power, he caused an eye to open on his forehead, which sent out a stream of light that pierced into the Dragon Compendium.

“Myriad Treasures Combined; God World Integration; Distant Primal-Chaos; Come Forth for Me!” Numerous kinds of energies rushed toward him as he actually created his own imitation of the Dragon Compendium right there in his sea of consciousness, like a tiny copy of the original.

This was a unique ability that he could use to create civilizations. And that included Dragonfolk civilizations. The Creator was far beyond the God-Lords, and Yang Qi already understood many of the fundamentals of creating things out of primal-chaos.

After all, the god world had been birthed out of ancient primal-chaos.

The tiny version of the Dragon Compendium was instantly noticed by the dragon in his sea of consciousness. And as it rushed to surround it, the tiny version started growing larger. Then, it swallowed the dragon.

Yang Qi shivered as his will pierced the will of the compendium, making it his own. His thinking filled it, and at the same time, his mind reached out to the Myriad Dragons Lair.

He had fused with the Dragon Compendium.

It was the key to the Myriad Dragons Lair, just as King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions were the key to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

As soon as he took the Dragon Compendium, the Myriad Dragons Lair became his, and he felt a massive surge of invincible power.

Numerous transformations also occurred to the Myriad Dragons Lair; the world of flesh and blood grew immensely stronger, and all of the chaotic tempests that filled it suddenly disappeared.

Like the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, it entered a state of Nevasaññānāsaññāyatana. All of a sudden, the Myriad Dragons Lair wasn’t flesh and blood, but made of thoughts instead. At the same time, it wasn’t made of thoughts. It was a mysterious and profound state in which something could become both a corporeal object and a mere thought at the same time. It was a state that gods generally couldn't enter, any more than a real person could enter a flat universe.

All of the exits and entrances to the lair were now shut, so that whatever old-timers or other experts were inside couldn’t leave. Nor could any powerful experts enter it, or even find its location. It was now similar to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart of the past, which had been so difficult to find and enter.

Now that Yang Qi had taken initial control over the Myriad Dragons Lair, the time had come to move on with his larger plan of subjugating the entire place.

If he could command all of the millions upon millions of dragon kingdoms within it, his Sage Monarch Empire’s destiny would reach a level of one third that of the House of the Invincible, the House of the Chiliocosm, and the Central Dynasty.

His hope of reaching the Annulled level continued growing.

Eventually, he would use various methods to erode the destiny of the three great sects, and conquer all the other peoples of the god world. The mighty Devilfolk, the chaotic Demonfolk, the Mechfolk, Spritefolk, Magefolk, and all of the other races.

Of course, once word spread of him taking the Myriad Dragons Lair, the three major dynasties wouldn’t turn a blind eye. The Dragonfolk could provide immense destiny, and all three of those organizations wished they could do what Yang Qi had just done. It was a certainty that, in their anger, they would try to track down the new location of the lair, kill Yang Qi, and take it.

It wasn’t guaranteed that they could find him. But they had enough experts that he couldn't afford to underestimate them. He already had an inkling of a plan. He would spread rumors that the Second and Third Devil Generals had worked together to seize the Myriad Dragons Lair and create a fourth major power.

The name ‘Sage Monarch Dragon Kingdom’ would spread far and wide.

And with his sage monarch magistrates to run the entire place, it really would become the fourth major power.

The Central Dynasty. The Chiliocosm Dynasty. The Invincible Dynasty. And the Sage Monarch Empire.

BAM!

The Dragon Compendium shrank down and entered Yang Qi, causing the Third Devil General to feel wracked with despair as she felt the power of the Great Necropolis growing stronger and stronger.

“The horror! The despair! Why does life have to be so tragic! I was imprisoned for billions of years, and just when I finally got my freedom, and before I could even lay eyes on the god world, I was enslaved! I refuse to accept this! I refuse!” She felt as if she had been cast into the most bitter and grievous of hells.

However, no matter how resentful she felt, she couldn't do a single thing. Yang Qi sent the power of the God Legion Seal into her sea of consciousness, and moments later, she was subjugated. What other fate could she expect, considering he had the Dragon Compendium under control?

Whizz!

As the fluctuations rolled out, the Third Devil General’s expression went cold and she transformed from a devil-dragon back into the form of a bewitchingly charming young woman. A devilless.

She seemed profoundly weak and pitiful, and was so attractive that the nearby Yang Jian could hardly restrain himself from throwing himself on top of her. She was truly a beautiful devilless capable of seducing any man.

At least, any man with a cultivation base as low as Yang Jian’s.

Chapter 1477: Reconstructing the Dragon Lair

Yang Qi had pulled everything off as planned, and acquired a huge windfall. He was now in a position to be a truly powerful person in the god world.

People who didn’t have their own kingdoms or empires couldn’t be considered potentates of the god world. After all, such potentates required immense destiny.

Yang Qi didn’t have the billions of years it would take to build up an organization from scratch. Therefore, he had to steal the fruit of others’ labor. His most recent efforts had netted him more pieces of the Mahātmā Jade, the Myriad Dragons Lair, the Chiliocosm Pagoda, the head of King Heaven-Devourer, and the blood of the King of Godmammoths. The only thing he had failed to do was subjugate Dugu Yunkong. Everything else had succeeded wildly.

That aspect was a true pity. It was a blemish in an otherwise perfect thing, like a slight flaw in white jade.

That being said, Yang Qi wasn't worried too much about losing Dugu Yunkong. Right now, his first priority was to conquer all of the Dragonfolk, and make sure the destiny of the Sage Monarch Dragon Kingdom burned like the sun.

Without getting his internal affairs in order, how could he possibly lead the kingdom to glory on the outside?

His second priority was to bring more humans in to populate the Myriad Dragons Lair. The dragon kingdoms weren’t sufficient. Therefore, he planned to reconstruct the lair in a large way, making it a free and independent world. That would make it far more formidable.

Few people would dare to even attempt such a thing, but Yang Qi was different.

He had a plan.

The Myriad Dragons Lair was similar in many ways to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Unfortunately, it wasn’t big enough to support a colossal organization like the House of the Invincible. But it could serve as a foundation to stockpile resources.

The first step in reconstructing it was to draw upon the power of the Halls of Heaven, then pour it into the essence of the lair and use it to expand it, and also alter its fundamental structure.

Right now, any non-Dragonfolk who was under the Paramount God level couldn’t even enter the place safely without being dragonized. That was what made it unsuitable for humans; or any other beings for that matter. Only by making it safe for all kinds of people could it be considered a grand and unified nation.

Yang Qi wanted it to be a place for everyone, irrespective of their background.

“Rise, Third Devil General. True, I’ve subjugated you. But I haven’t harmed you in any way. And considering the level of your cultivation base, there’s no need for you to grovel. As you may have guessed, I'm a Fateless One, who came to exist out of nothing. And I'm foreordained to become like the Sovereign Lord. Neither you, nor the Second Devil General, will suffer due to serving me. You’ll only benefit in the long run. For now, I want the three of you to go out into the Myriad Dragons Lair and get in contact with the Dragonfolk old-timers and leaders. Get them to acknowledge allegiance to me. Given how strong you three are, you should be able to do that. In the meantime, I’m going to start reconstructing the lair, transforming its dao of heaven and altering its magical laws.”

WHOOSH!

Already, the destiny of the Sage Monarch Dragon Kingdom was becoming purer and stronger, causing intense rumbling sounds to fill it. And at the same time, it surged with an aura that represented justice, righteousness, order, and law.

After all, its leader, Yang Qi, now had the Dragon Compendium, which made him the orthodox ruler of the Myriad Dragons Lair. However, it wasn’t a case of true orthodoxy in the general sense. Only the Central Dynasty was truly orthodox.

“Third Devil General, Yang Jian, let’s go,” said the Second Devil General. “We're going to pay a visit to the Dragonfolk old-timers!” The Second Devil General was already in line with Yang Qi’s will, and would do whatever he asked.

In the depths of the Myriad Dragons Lair, there were old-timers who had cultivation bases of ten billion or more. They weren’t to be looked down on, and absolutely had to be subjugated before Yang Qi could truly unify the place. Otherwise, fighting would eventually break out, leading to immense casualties that would severely harm the destiny.

“Before you leave, I’ll bless you with the essence of the Myriad Dragons Lair. You’ll be able to travel anywhere in this place without being affected by any of the spell formations. Now go and help me cleanse this place.”

His gaze had long since pierced into the depths of the lair, and he knew that many of the powerful old-timers had gathered together in defense, setting up spell formations to help. But since Yang Qi controlled the essence of the Myriad Dragons Lair, he could obviously deal with such spell formations.

Those formations were like tumors that would need to be excised eventually. And any of the old-timers who refused to give in also needed to be crushed.

Yang Qi even saw some old-timers holding secret meetings and trying to come up with plans to break out of the lair.

Sadly for them, the lair was now like the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. It existed in a state of Nevasaññānāsaññāyatana, which meant that escaping it was impossible. Only someone with a cultivation base like King Immortal-Slayer, a half Annulled expert, could stand a chance. And none of the old-timers were that strong. If they were, they would have already taken the King of Godmammoths’ sealing mark, established a larger kingdom, and waged war on the Central Dynasty.

Having blessed Yang Jian and the Second and Third Devil Generals with the essence power of the lair, they were equipped with a powerful weapon that would let them decapitate enemies first, and report the matter later. There was no way the old-timers in the lair could stand up to these three. And that was even more so, considering the Third Devil General was an actual dragon.

It was true that each generation will produce talented individuals; their dissertations will be passed down for centuries, but right now, there were simply no dragons who could match up to the Third Devil General.

“Do we start expanding now, Yang Qi?” asked Jadefall. “Do we start conquering more dragon kingdoms? Now that you have the Dragon Compendium, there’s no way we’ll meet defeat. We should be able to expand much more rapidly. Once this place is united, the destiny convergence will be incredible.”

“There’s no rush. Although I have the Dragon Compendium, I still have lots of reconstruction work to do. Going around fighting and killing will only damage the destiny of the Dragonfolk right now. I just sent the Second and Third Devil Generals out with Yang Jian to start spreading word about the Sage Monarch Dragon Kingdom. Soon, everyone here will know that I'm the rightful ruler, and hopefully we’ll be able to start taking over the dragon kingdoms without having to wage war.”

“What if they attack us in the hopes of getting the Dragon Compendium?” Yang Immortal-Slayer asked.

“That won’t happen,” Jadefall said. “With the compendium in hand, we control the various natural laws of the Myriad Dragons Lair. There’s no way anyone could launch a full-scale assault on us. Doing it this way is perfect. The Second and Third Devil Generals are already famous, and the news about the Dragon Compendium will seal the deal. The dragon kingdoms will know that going up against us is just too dangerous.”

“Jadefall’s right. The compendium makes us unbeatable. And because no one can attack us, we don't need to go out waging war. In the past, we went on the offensive to stay alive. That's the dao of the sage monarch. Remember, sage inside, monarch outside. For now, we’ll simply make sure all of the Dragonfolk know who the rightful ruler is, and wait for unity to result.” Yang Qi’s way of ruling was vastly superior to that of the viceroys of the House of the Invincible. And he had thought things through in a lot of detail. “Start setting up the spell formations. I’ll tap into the starlight of the Halls of Heaven and start transforming the Dragon Compendium and the Myriad Dragons Lair into something suitable for me. Right now, they’re designed for the Dragonfolk. I'm going to make them into something more like the Cruiser of Civilization.”

By now, Yang Qi’s cultivation base was no weaker than that of the Lord of Civilization himself. His cultivation base was at the level of ten billion, which was the ancient designation for the God-Lords. If Yang Qi were to be given a title in the old way, he would be the Lord of Sage Monarchs. Of course, he wasn’t interested in a title like that. Besides, it would only make it easier for Proud Heaven to track him down.

He would rather remain hidden in the shadows.

With that, he reached out to the Halls of Heaven, causing dazzling starlight to fall into the Myriad Dragons Lair. Instantly, the flesh and blood that made it up started crystallizing, and in some locations, it exploded because of incompatibility with the power.

Chapter 1478: Reconstructing the Dragon Lair (2)

“Use the primal-chaos paleo-energy in an act of creation!” Yang Qi cried.

Power from the Halls of Heaven descended into the dragon lair, causing explosions because of power incompatibility, which sent shockwaves out in all directions.

It was a very dangerous situation. Truth be told, it was little wonder that explosions like this would result from forcibly attempting to transform a magical treasure. And the resulting chain reactions could easily ripple out and destroy everything inside it, including all of the Dragonfolk.

However, only the power of the Halls of Heaven could result in something this destructive.

Thankfully, Yang Qi had been prepared for this. Being no weaker than the Lord of Civilization, he exhaled deeply, sending numerous streams of primal-chaos paleo-energy out to cover the areas that were exploding.

As a result, the primal-chaos paleo-energy could draw on the power of the explosions to carry out acts of creation.

Years ago, in the ancient original primal-chaos, it was explosions such as these that created the numerous preheaven magical treasures and godlings of yesteryear, as well as all sorts of precious materials.

Now a similar thing was happening here, allowing Yang Qi to transform the substructure of the Myriad Dragons Lair.

In other words, he wanted the explosions!

“Let the power of the Halls of Heaven descend in torrents! Primal-chaos paleo-energy: flourish!” Howling, Yang Qi threw his hands up, and a vortex appeared above him, like a heavenly river coming from the Bastille of the One God. As it fell, the explosions increased, but Yang Qi just sent more primal-chaos paleo-energy out to cover them. As that energy combined with the power of the explosions, the world around him expanded. The flesh and blood of the Myriad Dragons Lair transformed, with beautiful mountains and rivers appearing, covered with lush vegetation, and bursting with preheaven spirit energy.

It was a minor god world of its own.

Yang Qi was imitating the Big Bang that happened within the early primal-chaos paleo-energy, resulting in the god world.

The primal-chaos paleo-energy seemed to flow without cease as Yang Qi drew it in from outside. Some old-timers would have magical treasures that could store primal-chaos paleo-energy; however, such treasures required a lot of power to operate. Furthermore, few old-timers knew how to manipulate the big bang explosions to do what Yang Qi was doing.

All of a sudden, one of the enormous big bang explosions, and the resultant combination of primal-chaos, produced a divine lamp. It was made of pure radiance and light, and was roughly the same size as the Everlit Godlamp. However, this was a preheaven treasure, and whoever took it would become like a new version of the Lord of Radiance and Light.

Yang Qi had done this intentionally. He was doing something without parallel in history. Most people who created treasures created postheaven versions, whereas he was creating the preheaven kind.

Even almighty people like the Lord of Radiance and Light, the other God-Lords, and even King Immortal-Slayer would be shocked if they could see this.

BAM!

Another big bang explosion ripped out, and a bottle gourd appeared from within. Then came something that resembled the Dragon Compendium. The aura of a minor god world flared, and it was perfectly suitable for everyone, not just dragons.

It was very much how things had been during the initial creation of the god world.

Everyone in the Sage Monarch Empire was flabbergasted, especially those who had once been part of the Deva Dynasty or the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty. Under the leadership of the sage monarch magistrates, they quickly spread out into the new world, where they began to erect cities and buildings, as well as locations for cultivation.

Everything was extremely orderly, and the destiny flourished.

Yang Qi was working hard to make his own smaller imitation of the god world.

The Myriad Dragons Lair was like an enormous desert that Yang Qi was converting into a lush paradise.

RUMBLE!

All of a sudden, another big bang explosion occurred, resulting in the appearance of a continent. Upon it were primitive humans organized into tribes, the same type that had appeared in the original primal-chaos.

It was a shocking thing. At the same time, godlings appeared in the mountains and rivers of the continent. Fighting broke out between the primitive humans and the godlings, just as had occurred in the original creation of the god world.

A true world was being born.

More continents appeared, replete with more primitive people and godlings. To an outsider’s perspective, it wasn’t obvious, but time operated differently within those big bang explosions. While they might take only a moment to the outsider, inside the explosion, billions or trillions of years would pass, allowing for the proliferation of the humans and godlings.

It was something that only the power of the Halls of Heaven could fuel. Even if Yang Qi were ten times stronger than he was right now, he couldn't do it.

“This is amazing!” people said. Under the leadership of the two million sage monarch magistrates, they were traveling about into the new continents and found them to be true paradises.

Everything operated with complete order. And of course, many of the godlings and treasures that were being produced were harvested to create medicinal pills and other items to boost cultivation and fighting prowess.

Some of the primitive humans were also found to have exceptional qualities and potential, and were taken away for special training.

All of the things Yang Qi was doing were attracting the notice of various Dragonfolk old-timers.

Many of them had been eyeing him with the intention of attacking him and taking the Dragon Compendium away. However, after what they were seeing, they knew that any attempt would be pointless.

“Such incredible godpower. This is actual creation! He’s transforming the Myriad Dragons Lair into a world of his own creation, a place like the god world. Only the power of the Halls of Heaven could do this. His minor god world is spreading, causing continents to rise up. Look at that destiny!”

“Terrifying. This is truly terrifying. It’s a new world that he controls. If we attack him, it would be like attacking the Halls of Heaven.”

“The Second and Third Devil Generals are traveling around telling everyone that the Myriad Dragons Lair has a new ruler. But we Dragonfolk are proud, and we obviously can't acknowledge allegiance to someone like that. If they attack us, we’ll fight to the death. But we can’t take the initiative to fight. He’s creating his own world! How could we attack him? He’s the orthodox ruler of the Myriad Dragons Lair, and he also has the God Legion Seal. He controls the Halls of Heaven! We Dragonfolk can't do anything to him!”

“Incredible. Look! Another continent popped up, and it's filled with preheaven treasures. And there are rare spirit medicines there. Is that a grand world godflower? Those flowers are extinct! Get them, and you can make some incredible medicinal pills that will heal all injuries. I was attacked by someone from the Central Dynasty years ago, and still have lingering injuries.”

“So many preheaven treasures. If we join him, it might not be a bad thing after all. If he turns the Myriad Dragons Lair into a minor god world, we could all benefit.”

Already, many of the old-timers were thinking of joining Yang Qi.

Chapter 1479: Internal Restructuring

“Look,” Jadefall said, “the hearts of the inhabitants of the Myriad Dragons Lair are changing. They used to be inherently antagonistic, but now it’s different.” She, Yang Immortal-Slayer, and others among Yang Qi’s friends and family stood on a towering mountain peak that overlooked much of the Myriad Dragons Lair.

It was an enormous mountain, emerald green in color, jutting high into the sky, almost like a finger. It was actually made of pure jade, a type that had been produced in a big bang explosion and subsequently named heavensplendor jade. It suppressed vital energy and collected destiny, gathering the quintessence of heaven and earth into something particularly exquisite. It was something that could only come to exist because of primal-chaos big bang explosions, and was beyond the ability of any old-timer to create. In fact, it didn’t exist anywhere else in the god world.

It was in the middle of the minor god world Yang Qi was creating, and from it, Yang Qi’s brethren could see that the destiny of the Sage Monarch Dragon Kingdom was no longer chaotic and conflicting.

“Well, that's a given,” the Shepherd said. “Not going on the warpath does have some advantages. We sit back while Yang Qi transforms the Myriad Dragons Lair into his minor god world. Within a few thousand years, everything is going to be completely united. And what are the Dragonfolk to do about it? They can’t run. Surrendering is definitely the best option for them.”

“Look!” Yang Doom said excitedly. “As the minor god world grows, the destiny increases, and that produces more sage monarch magistrates. Every new continent produces even more destiny! Land is the key to everything!”

“Incredible. Yang Qi is simply incredible.” Buddha Lheafe and Buddha Shockheaven were astonished. As more people from the Sage Monarch Empire poured in and helped with the building projects, they cooperated fully with the Dragonfolk, all thanks to the sage monarch magistrates. There was no fighting, plotting, or scheming. Everything went in an orderly fashion. No criminals were allowed to go free, and no innocents were ever convicted of crimes.

Neither the most important leaders nor the lowliest citizens ever dared to cross the boundaries of propriety by even half a step. The empire was a well-oiled machine in which every tiny part operated properly and knew its place.

The efficiency on display was incredible. No one just sat around doing nothing, especially when it came to the expansion of the minor god world. Resources needed to be gathered, inventoried, stored, and used, ultimately turning into fighting prowess and power. It was complicated work, but the sage monarch magistrates monitored it perfectly.

If the House of the Invincible tried to found a minor god world, the selfish and corrupt government officials would immediately form conflicting interest groups, which would cause a decline in destiny. Instead of constantly producing more resources, they would do the opposite, fattening themselves to the detriment of the empire.

Although it might seem odd, sometimes an enemy invasion could serve to unite the people and cause a surge in destiny.

Ruling a nation involved understanding many of these things. The key was controlling the hearts of the countless people that made it up. That was the trick to true power.

Yang Qi understood all of that.

RUMBLE!

As the minor god world expanded, the destiny of other kingdoms flowed toward it as other leaders, interest groups, and peoples decided to join it.

Jadefall and the others were visibly delighted. As soon as a nation made its decision, the destiny would shift, even before they made a formal declaration of allegiance. Because of the natural changes that would occur to destiny because of these things, it was difficult for nations to hatch clever plots and schemes against each other.

A short time later, a host of peak Paramount Gods, all of them with cultivation levels in the billions, flew over together. “We’re from the Kingdom of Roland, and we want to join the Sage Monarch Dragon Kingdom. Here’s our official letter of state with all the details.”

“I’ll take it,” Jadefall said. The letter of state flew over, and Jadefall looked it over, then shared it with the others. “Please, come into our minor god world. We’re happy to discuss all of these matters in detail.”

Jadefall and the others were late Paramount Gods with cultivation bases around a hundred million. Normally speaking, they couldn't have fought enemies with cultivation bases of a billion, but now their every move and action was backed by the national destiny of the Sage Monarch Dragon Kingdom. Plus, they could rely on the essence power of the Myriad Dragons Lair, which meant these experts felt shame just being in their presence.

It was similar to how, in the impure lands, an unimportant eunuch could carry an imperial edict to either appoint or execute even the most powerful generalissimo of the armed forces.

As these peak Paramount Gods entered the minor god world, they could sense the immense aura within it. And when they stepped onto the towering mountain peak, they could see all the grandeur of the Sage Monarch Dragon Kingdom, and the dense net of law created by its powerful destiny.

The Dragonfolk from the Kingdom of Roland included a generalissimo, a liberal senior minister, a conservative senior minister, a crown prince, and a royal uncle. They were the highest leaders of their land, with the exception of the king.

When they saw that the leaders of the Sage Monarch Empire were only late Paramount Gods, they weren’t very impressed. But then they saw the net of law, and their hearts trembled in fear as they realized that Jadefall and the others could slaughter them in a moment.

They wouldn’t even need to launch an attack. They could simply draw upon the essence of the Myriad Dragons Lair to launch internal attacks on them, or even eject them from the lair's greyspace.

In other words, they were invincible.

It was similar to how, not so long ago, Yang Qi and the Second Devil General could look into the Invincible Dynasty but not enter it. Nor could they kill even a minor official once inside.

The rumble of big bang explosions could be heard from the mountain peak as preheaven treasures came into being, and more continents rose up, which resulted in more destiny flowing forth.

The leaders from the Kingdom of Roland were shaking in their boots.

“Since you've come with your letter of state,” Jadefall said, “we won’t beat around the bush. Hand over your lands and people, and become citizens of the Sage Monarch Dragon Kingdom. Everyone here is equal. Sage monarch magistrates! Third Devil General!”

RUMBLE!

Everything trembled as a massive devil-dragon appeared, floating in the sky around the mountain peak. It was none other than the Third Devil General, flanked by a million sage monarch magistrates. “I’ll take that letter of state. And I’ll now lead my officials to take over your kingdom!”

The leaders from the Kingdom of Roland were so terrified by the Third Devil General that they couldn’t resist at all.

With that, the Third Devil General led a huge army in the direction of the Kingdom of Roland. The Kingdom of Roland was roughly the same size as the Blood-Diamond Dragon Kingdom. However, with a million sage monarch magistrates, and the Third Devil General there to take charge, no one dared to act defiantly. Soon after, the destiny of the place was flowing into the net of law of the Sage Monarch Dragon Kingdom.

The leaders of the Kingdom of Roland had hoped to gain some advantages in the negotiations, and maybe even make the whole situation profitable for them. Sadly, their calculations were all pointless. They couldn’t fight the Third Devil General, and in the end, they became servants.

Under the direction of the general and the magistrates, all the people of the Kingdom of Roland were escorted into the minor god world.

Yang Qi looked over at the previous location of the nation, and a huge explosion covered the land, which was then covered by a stream of primal-chaos paleo-energy. Moments later, another minor god world was born.

The people of the Kingdom of Roland felt like they had just narrowly escaped a major disaster, and were happy to be alive.

It was a psychological trick on the part of Yang Qi.

As soon as the kingdom joined him, he detonated their lands and created a minor god world, ensuring the citizens knew that they owed their life to him. And from now on, the Sage Monarch Dragon Kingdom would be their homeland.

Chapter 1480: Delegations Come

The Kingdom of Roland had been subjugated and added to the Sage Monarch Dragon Kingdom. Any interest groups or factions within it were disbanded, and all of its people were cleansed and brought under the control of the sage monarch magistrates. Soon, they were busy concocting pills, practicing cultivation, and growing stronger.

Never had a massive kingdom been subjugated so quickly.

With all of its people subordinate to the net of law, they would follow all orders and never think of fanning the flames of disorder.

Even if the House of the Invincible conquered a kingdom, they wouldn't be able to root out the old factions, and it would inevitably lead to trouble. Yang Qi didn’t have to deal with that. Anyone who harbored such thoughts would cause tremors in the destiny, and would be quickly tracked down and arrested.

Destiny came from the hearts of the people.

When the peoples’ hearts were unsettled, destiny would be affected.

Of course, in the Invincible Dynasty, they had the Palace of Destiny to inspect the destiny. And one aspect of that was to hunt down errant behavior among the citizens. But that didn’t stop important people in the dynasty from setting up private stockpiles of resources and destiny. In the end, it ensured that the dynasty was a hodgepodge of good and bad people.

There was no way anything like that could happen in the Sage Monarch Dragon Kingdom.

Many of the Dragonfolk old-timers had spent years campaigning on the outside, and had captured kingdoms of humans as their personal fiefdoms. But the sage monarch magistrates uncovered all such private stashes, and appropriated them for public use.

Unfortunately, Yang Qi knew that the Central Dynasty already had command of the truly orthodox destiny that existed. Even if his own destiny grew more intense, he couldn’t compare with that. So he decided to take his destiny in a different direction.

As soon as the Kingdom of Roland became part of the Sage Monarch Dragon Kingdom, its destiny transformed. Yang Qi could clearly see the net of law becoming a heavenly canopy that filled the souls of the people, transforming their fate in a heaven-shaking, earth-toppling fashion.

The destiny valuation was climbing.

Although he was still far from the level of the House of the Invincible, what he had at his command was in no way inferior to any of the top leaders there. After all, the destiny they could tap into was only a small fraction of what the sect as a whole controlled. In contrast, Yang Qi controlled all of the destiny in the Myriad Dragons Lair.

“Yang Qi,” Jadefall said, “with the Kingdom of Roland having joined us, our destiny increased significantly. Do you want to initiate a large-scale takeover of the Myriad Dragons Lair? In my opinion, the sooner we take full control the better. Who knows what outside factors could cause problems.”

“There’s no rush. I control all aspects of the Myriad Dragons Lair, which means I even control time here. I’ll shift things so that a single day on the outside is a thousand years inside. A thousand years should be enough time to unite the entire lair. Unfortunately, creating the minor god world I want to isn’t going to happen that quickly. After all, I can’t adjust the time in the Halls of Heaven.”

“There’s nothing you can do about that. The best we can do now is unify the Myriad Dragons Lair. After all, the more we take over, the more sage monarch magistrates we’ll have. I was just doing some initial calculations with Yang Immortal-Slayer, and we came to the conclusion that running the entire lair isn't going to be easy. We need at least a hundred million magistrates, and right now, all we have is two million.”

“I already thought of that. Since we don't have enough sage monarch magistrates, we have to subjugate as many Dragonfolk old-timers as possible, and enforce our laws strictly upon them. As long as I use the God Legion Seal on them, they’ll have no choice but to follow orders. Although they won’t run things as well as the magistrates, it’s at least better than going on the warpath.”

“That’ll work,” Jadefall said. “Should we start working on those old-timers right away?”

“No. First, let me make some adjustments to this influx of destiny. It should help to make some more sage monarch magistrates, which will make things easier overall. I want things settled and in balance before making another move. Furthermore, with all of the continents and minor god worlds I’ve created, there’s plenty of resources and treasures to be harvested. Let's not let them go to waste. For now, focus on consolidating what I’ve already made, and continue sending delegations to the other dragon kingdoms to win them to our side.”

The orders were sent down.

Of course, they had a big advantage, considering that the primary source of orthodoxy in the Myriad Dragons Lair was the Dragon Compendium in Yang Qi’s possession.

Soon enough, experts were going out in all directions to start persuading the locals to join Yang Qi.

With all the enticements that were being offered, numerous kingdoms threw in their lot with Yang Qi over the following ten years. The Tower Heaven Kingdom, Fierce Dragon Kingdom, Fiend Evil Kingdom, Silver Blood Dragon Kingdom, Dao-Defying Dragon Kingdom, Soaring Dragon Kingdom, Double Nines Dragon Kingdom, Warfare Dragon Kingdom, Giant Dragon Kingdom, Heart-Shaking Dragon Kingdom, Grand Sun Dragon Kingdom, Moonlight Dragon Kingdom, Precious Treasure Dragon Kingdom, Myriad Oceans Dragon Kingdom, and more.

Numerous Dragonfolk kingdoms were offering their letters of state. Yang Qi would send delegations to get them, then gift their leaders with golden light from the God Legion Seal. Of course, that just let him take control of them.

Supposedly, in years past, the Sovereign Lord would occasionally summon new gods, and have the High Priestess oversee a ceremony to make them part of the legion of gods. During that process, he used the God Legion Seal to take control of them.

None of the Dragonfolk leaders put up any resistance, and the interest groups were dissolved.

As their people were moved into the minor god worlds, they started to become more and more packed.

Eventually, hundreds of years passed, while less than a day had gone by outside. Because of the disparity, Yang Qi couldn’t draw on the power of the Halls of Heaven to make more minor god worlds. He could only maintain what he had already created.

To turn the entire Myriad Dragons Lair into a minor god world would probably take thousands of years of adjustments, and he didn’t have that time. The only way to speed up the transformations would be to improve his cultivation base.

During the time that passed, Yang Qi had taken over about fifty percent of the Myriad Dragons Lair, thanks to his careful planning and execution of those plans.

The sage monarch magistrates had increased in number over the years, and there were now five million of them.

Also, Yang Qi’s cultivation base improved, thanks to the increase in destiny provided by the sage monarch magistrates. His kingdom was expanding constantly.

Meanwhile, none of the other powerful Dragonfolk kingdoms dared to fight with him. Some were deluded enough to believe that they could form alliances to resist him. But in the end, all such efforts were useless. Perhaps if they had been vicious enough to gang up on him the moment he had taken the Dragon Compendium, not giving him any breathing room, and completely going for broke, they might have been able to force him to negotiate with them.

Sadly for them, even if they had been given more time to react, they could never have put their affairs in order to do that. And now that Yang Qi was on a roll, there was no alliance that could stop him.

As of now, forgetting about all the random tiny kingdoms that still existed, Yang Qi knew there were some places that had extremely powerful patriarchs, Dragonfolk with psychic scales and godhood ratings of ten billion. In fact, there were twenty-eight of them. Twenty-eight major dragon kingdoms.

After taking them, he would have all of the dragon kingdoms under his control. Unfortunately, the combined might of twenty-eight patriarchs of that level was nothing to look down on. Even the House of the Invincible, Central Dynasty, or Chiliocosm Dynasty would think twice about trying to take on a group like that.

‘They’re like the God-Lords of the past,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘And considering their numbers, they conform perfectly to the Twenty-Eight Mansions, which means they could form a very dangerous spell formation. I suppose I’ll just have to besiege them.’

He waved his hand and summoned a map of the Myriad Dragons Lair.

Clearly visible were twenty-eight enormous kingdoms that were now linked together to form something like their own net of law. Although it was laughable compared to what Yang Qi had created, it did create a system of order that allowed for their area to be like a separate world within the Myriad Dragons Lair, not governed by the Dragon Compendium or the local natural laws.

It was an annoying obstacle that Yang Qi needed to deal with before his unification effort was complete.

Chapter 1481: Twenty-Eight Potentates

The twenty-eight potentates had created an alliance that made them a world of their own. They were rivals to Yang Qi, and to some extent, their attempt to stave him off had worked. Thanks to the pressure he had provided, they finally came to understand how to distribute resources, unite their people, and converge destiny. Although they still had competing interest groups, their nations weren’t filled with as much chaotic infighting as before.

Now that Yang Qi was attempting to exert full power in the Myriad Dragons Lair, he finally discovered this alliance of twenty-eight kingdoms that he couldn't penetrate with magical laws.

Of course, they weren’t truly united. They were a loose federation, each part of which had its own interests at heart. Most of their destiny was wasted, and they had no hope of actually escaping.

He would crush them eventually, although now wasn't the time.

Initially, Yang Qi’s kingdom definitely wasn’t as strong as the alliance of twenty-eight. But after the hundreds of years that had passed, things were different. Furthermore, Yang Qi could bring resources in from the outside, while the alliance of twenty-eight could do nothing. And as the saying went, just sitting and eating, one can deplete even a mountain of wealth. They couldn’t leave, and they couldn't attack Yang Qi, who was growing stronger all the time. Because of that, Yang Qi saw that their people were in a state of unease.

Eventually, they would submit, whether they wanted to or not. Not even impassioned resistance would do anything. However, Yang Qi didn't want to turn things into a life or death battle. He viewed those twenty-eight kingdoms as his own, and didn’t want them significantly damaged.

‘Those old-timers don’t want to give in. But at the same time, they’re scared of me. I wonder how long they’ll hold out.’ He smiled and examined their destiny, which revealed how unstable they were.

Although they had created a net of law, there were impurities within it that came from the anxiety of the people as they watched the situation play out. And it was obvious that those circumstances would only get worse.

Worst of all, they had absolutely no hope. It really was a bitter situation.

“Wait another hundred years,” Yang Qi said, “and we’ll see what mood they’re in. All the while, we’ll continue to build our forces and get stronger.

The days ticked by.

The years ticked by.

With every year that passed, the minor god worlds produced more preheaven treasures, which enabled everyone to grow stronger. Eventually, the destiny valuation of the Sage Monarch Empire reached a level of so many tens of millions it was closing in on a hundred million.

He had five million sage monarch magistrates who could all subjugate peak Paramount Gods, even people with psychic scales and godhood ratings of over a billion.

Normally speaking, a nation like this couldn’t form in thousands of years, let alone hundreds.

Jadefall and the others were growing stronger as well, thanks to all the blessings available. If national destiny could be used to make a Quasi-God into a peak Consummate God in the blink of an eye, what could hundreds of years of cultivation do for people like Jadefall?

The hearts of the people remained peaceful and calm.

Jadefall and all of Yang Qi’s other friends and family were now in bottlenecks, having reached the level of nine hundred million nine hundred and ninety thousand. Soon, they would reach one billion. And considering they were Ascendants, once they became peak Paramount Gods, they would be elites among the elites.

By the House of the Invincible’s reckoning, Yang Qi had so much destiny that even viceroys of a million lands would cower in front of him.

Another hundred years passed. There were now seven million sage monarch magistrates, and the burgeoning empire’s destiny had reached a plateau.

Normally speaking, a kingdom would eventually reach a point where its destiny had passed its zenith and was on the decline. The hearts of the people would decline, and the nation would never return to its former glory.

But with the sage monarch magistrates, Yang Qi could always stay at the peak.

RUMBLE!

Yang Qi looked up and saw that the net of law was complete, and the power of his kingdom had reached the highest point it could at the moment. Now was the time to make his move.

It was time to face the twenty-eight dragon kingdoms.

After gathering his friends and family, he first took another chance to closely observe the twenty-eight kingdoms. Their nets of law were even more impure than before, and there were even areas of direct conflict.

Obviously, people were struggling over resources inside.

Hundreds of years had passed for them, and resources were getting lean. And since they didn’t dare to invade Yang Qi’s lands, they had to fight amongst themselves. As a result, their destiny was on the decline, and infighting was abounding.

In the end, Yang Qi didn’t want to watch them crumble into nothing. Therefore, he decided to act.

“Third Devil General. Second Devil General. Yang Jian. You three come with me. We’re going to pay a visit to this alliance of twenty-eight dragon kingdoms. The time has come to negotiate.”

“Yes sir!”

Figuratively rolling up their sleeves and cracking their knuckles, they prepared for a day that had been long in the making.

They stopped at the border. Although Yang Qi could teleport into any location in the Myriad Dragons Lair, this place was blocked off.

“Come out, you twenty-eight potentates,” he said in a booming voice that he bolstered with the power of the Dragon Compendium. “I'm here to chat. I have the Myriad Dragons Lair completely controlled and closed off, and you're just sitting there running out of resources. That's not a very good plan. There is virtue in sparing life, and I don’t want to see you destroying each other. Therefore, I’ll give you a chance to get out of this situation. As you can see, my kingdom is well established, and my destiny has reached a peak. I'm ready to open up the Myriad Dragons Lair and turn it into a full minor god world. If you don’t acknowledge allegiance to me, I’ll have to use force.”

After his voice echoed out, it was obvious that the people in these kingdoms had been deeply shaken, as the destiny immediately grew more turbid.

RUMBLE!

All of a sudden, an enormous world appeared in the air, which was a gigantic meeting hall. The twenty-eight potentates were there, emanating the power that came from a godhood rating of ten billion. They were seated on thrones as they stared at Yang Qi, the Second Devil General, Third Devil General, and Yang Jian. One of them, an old-timer in a long white robe, said, “As they say, each generation will produce talented individuals and also heroes come from among the young. Who could have guessed that we would end up as the old-timers, even as a new era had come for the youngsters? Your name is Yang Qi, am I right, child? Please, come in and talk things over.”

“This could be a trap,” the Third Devil General said. “That right there is Paragon-King Sage Dragon, who was born directly out of the Dragon Compendium. He's even older than me, and he's definitely the backbone of this alliance.”

“It doesn’t matter,” Yang Qi replied. “Let’s go in. Crafty plots and machinations aren’t going to do anything to me.”

They flew into the meeting hall, whereupon four thrones rose up for them. Immediately, Yang Qi could sense the difference in this place, as he couldn’t use the powers of the Dragon Compendium.

Without any pretense of courtesy, Yang Qi plopped down in one of the thrones and looked around. All the old-timers present were at the level of ten billion, and some were even higher than that. In fact, the white-robed Paragon-King Sage Dragon was beyond twenty billion, which made him stronger than the Third Devil General.

In fact, he was so high that Yang Qi couldn’t completely assess him. But it didn’t matter. If he wanted to be the rightful ruler, he had to get everyone to acknowledge allegiance to him.

There was no other option.

As soon as he sat down, the doors slammed shut, and the magical laws locked down the entire world. Yang Qi and his subordinates were now trapped like turtles in a jar.

One of the Dragonfolk old-timers, a man clad in a suit of armor, grinned viciously, slapped the table, and said, “You’re really arrogant, aren’t you? This is our meeting hall, got it? It's called the Myriad Dragons Holy Hall, and it’s a magical treasure that we jointly created. You fell for our trap! You thought our destiny was in decline, and that we were just letting our resources waste away. The truth is that it was all to get your guard down. And we're not here to negotiate. We're here to end you forever!”

Chapter 1482: Sinister Negotiations

The Dragonfolk old-timer in the armor was tall and burly, and he carried a scepter wrapped with vicious thorns. From his expression, he seemed to think of Yang Qi as nothing more than a fish on the chopping block.

He wasn't alone. All twenty-eight Dragonfolk old-timers had psychic scales and godhood ratings of around ten billion. In other words, they would have been God-Lords in ancient times. For all intents and purposes, as long as they pooled their strength, no one in the god world could possibly stand up to them.

Logically speaking, even if Yang Qi, Yang Jian, and the Second and Third Devil Generals were stronger than they were, they wouldn’t be able to stand up to these twenty-eight Dragonfolk.

Before Yang Qi got his hands on the Dragon Compendium, that would have been true. But now, he controlled the Myriad Dragons Lair. This was his territory. His world. He controlled everything, and it was all these twenty-eight could do to simply defend themselves.

Unfortunately, the twist was that they had created their own territory inside of his, a territory that was separate from his control. He was now in their world, making the situation very different than it would have been on the outside.

As soon as the doors slammed shut, all of the gathered Dragonfolk experts’ eyes locked onto Yang Qi, burning with cold killing intent. All of them seemed intent on taking his God Legion Seal, his magical treasures, and the national destiny he had access to.

Looking calmly at the posturing of the fellow in the armor, Yang Qi addressed the Third Devil General and said, “Who's this little dragon? And what exactly gives him the gall to rant at me like this?”

When the Third Devil General saw how calm Yang Qi was, she also remained calm. “Unfortunately, Milord, I have no idea who he is. But from his blood, I’d guess he’s a later-generation heaven dragon.”

Outside in the Myriad Dragons Lair, their group of four would have had nothing to fear from these twenty-eight experts. And although they had walked into a trap here, she was confident that Yang Qi had a plan.

“Calm down, Buddha Eastprime,” Paragon-King Sage Dragon said. “We don’t want fighting to break out. We're here to negotiate. Isn’t that right, Yang Qi? Hopefully you can take an objective look at the situation. We have this place completely locked down, ensuring that the magical laws you control can’t enter. You might have the Dragon Compendium, but you four aren’t a match for us in here. There’s really only one thing you can do. Give us control of the Dragon Compendium, leave the Myriad Dragons Lair, and hand over control of the kingdoms you’ve taken.

“I know you’re very strong. But we can kill you if we have to. Sure, we’ll have to pay a bit of a price, and some of us will even die in the process. That's why we’d rather just come to an agreement through negotiation. But if we have to, we aren't afraid to make sacrifices to get what we want.”

Looking back at him coolly, Yang Qi said, “I have the God Legion Seal, all three thousand of King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans, the Chiliocosm Pagoda, the Everlit Godlamp, and the Mahātmā Jade. And you want to take all of them? You've got quite an appetite, don't you? Frankly, I'm amazed.”

Numerous Dragonfolk experts shot to their feet.

“What?! You have that many treasures? We actually had no idea!”

“This is perfect! Hand them all over, and you can walk out of here free and clear. Wait. No. You’re obviously too important. You’ll need to stay behind as our slave. You can help us manage our dragon empire. You’re obviously skilled at administration, considering how much you've grown the destiny beyond what we could do.”

“Excellent. He’ll be the perfect slave to act as steward of our dragon kingdom.”

“Your administrative skills are the only reason we're going to let you live, brat.”

Already, the Dragonfolk old-timers were pulsing with immense pressure, seemingly indicating that they were about to make a move to forcibly crush Yang Qi.

Shaking his head in disappointment, Yang Qi said, “I'm very disappointed, Paragon-King Sage Dragon. You Dragonfolk old-timers are really close-minded. I can calculate the workings of heaven, and am able to smoothly manage a huge empire. Did you really think I’d fall for a little trap like the one you’ve set? And your repulsive chattering has really revealed your true motives. I actually did come here to negotiate with you, but obviously, negotiation isn’t something you’re interested in.”

“Hold on!” Paragon-King Sage Dragon said. “You’d better not be putting on some kind of act. Do you really have some trick up your sleeve? I don't believe you do. We control everything inside this meeting hall, making it impossible for you to rely on the Dragon Compendium.”

“Quite the blowhard, aren’t we?” Yang Qi said. Obviously, these old-timers had been living high and mighty for too long. Without even moving a muscle, he said, “Tribulation Monarch Cannon!”

RUMBLE!

Everything seemed to move in slow motion as seven million sage monarch magistrates popped into being and fired their Tribulation Monarch Cannons.

Just what ferocious level of power would that entail?

A white column of light shot forth, smashing into the greyspace of the meeting hall, instantly shattering it and allowing the power of the Halls of Heaven to flood inside.

RUMBLE!

Yang Qi exhaled a stream of primal-chaos paleo-energy, and the resulting big bang explosions caused countless preheaven treasures to appear. And each of those treasures was a copy of the same thing: the Dragon Compendium!

They were exact copies of the real Dragon Compendium, just smaller. And all of them pulsed with the godpower of the Myriad Worlds Dragon Lair.

“Go!” Upon Yang Qi’s command, the numerous Dragon Compendiums swirled together to form twenty-eight versions of the book, which then shot rapidly toward the twenty-eight Dragonfolk old-timers.

Yang Qi did all of these things, buying time with the Tribulation Monarch Cannons and using a stockpile of primal-chaos paleo-energy to create the copies of the Dragon Compendium, with such incredible speed that the twenty-eight experts had no idea what was happening.

To them, utter chaos had just broken out.

Bam. Bam. Bam. Bam.

However, they were soon forced to face reality as the Dragon Compendiums slammed into them. The dragon energy in the books instantly filled them with fear as they were sent flying backward.

“Attack!” Yang Qi growled.

SWISH!

Yang Qi, Yang Jian, and the Second and Third Devil Generals all sprang into motion, the four of them targeting a single person: the arrogant armored man known as Buddha Eastprime.

When he saw them closing in, he sensed the impending danger and let out a shout of rage. However, he was unable to track Yang Qi’s movements, and had no idea which direction he would attack from, so he was forced to chop his hand out and send defenses springing up all around him.

“Cloud Dragon Rainstorm; Wrapped up in Wind!” he shouted, causing wind and rain to create a barrier against any incoming attacks.

Unfortunately for him, Yang Qi unleashed a vicious punch that pierced through the defenses and landed on Buddha Eastprime's belly, right where his dantian region was. Buddha Eastprime bent nearly in half, making him look like a cooked shrimp as tears streamed out of his eyes. Of course, the tears weren’t caused by physical pain, but rather, psychological pain.

He was a Dragonfolk old-timer with a psychic scale and godhood rating of ten billion, putting him on the level of an ancient God-Lord. Yet Yang Qi, a person who shouldn’t have even been able to stand up to him, had united the dragon kingdoms, and was now more than a match for him, or even Paragon-King Sage Dragon.

His three allies also landed blows, and before Buddha Eastprime could do a thing, Yang Qi’s hand gripped his head, and he unleashed the power of the God Legion Seal. Moments later, a golden throne rose up as the man was enslaved.

“Attack again!”

In the time it took a spark to fly off a piece of flint, Yang Qi went from having three experts to help him, to having four.

The five of them didn't waste any time. They immediately turned on another of the old-timers, an old man in gray clothing who had been chomping at the bit to devour Yang Qi. His name was Buddha Fiercemurder.

He was known as one of the more ferocious of the group of twenty-eight, and had a psychic scale of twelve billion, making him even more formidable than Buddha Eastprime.

Unfortunately, he was facing five very fierce opponents. What could he possibly do?

The Dragon Compendium shoved him backward, and the continuous explosions in the area were making it difficult for him to even see what was happening.

“A copy of the Dragon Compendium! A preheaven treasure? I’ll just take it and use it to grow stronger!” Before he could follow through on his idea, five shadows converged on him.

Crushing weight weighed down, causing his five viscera and six bowels to churn painfully, and his soul to fill with eternal darkness and gloom.

Yang Qi’s hand clamped onto his head.

“No!”

Buddha Fiercemurder knew it was over. A moment later, he was subjugated.

Chapter 1483: Planned All Along

Yang Qi had come in prepared, so how could he possibly fall for any sort of trap? The twenty-eight Dragonfolk old-timers thought they could pull a fast one on him, but instead, he turned the tables. Just when they thought they were about to seize victory, he exploded into action and caught them completely unprepared. These Dragonfolk simply had no way to assess what level of power he was truly capable of unleashing.

They were quick to react to the blast of the Tribulation Monarch Cannon and the unleashing of the Dragon Compendiums. But they were still thrown into chaos, and that was all the opportunity Yang Qi had needed.

One important aspect of the situation was that the old-timers weren’t working together. As soon as the situation turned dangerous, all of them immediately resorted to protecting their own heads.

That was how Yang Qi seized the upper hand.

In contrast, Yang Qi and his people, including the sage monarch magistrates, were all so in sync that they were essentially thinking the same thoughts. If they weren’t, there was no way Yang Qi would have succeeded like he just had.

In the blink of an eye, he had seized both Buddha Eastprime and Buddha Fiercemurder. And from there, it was a snowball effect.

Swish. Rustle.

Moving in a blur, he and his five expert allies targeted the next Dragonfolk old-timer. This one resembled a young man, and had a sinister bearing that revealed how twisted and distorted his heart was. He looked more monstrous than an actual monster.

His name was Buddha Detestation, and he commanded all the energies of hatred and detestation in heaven and earth, making him extremely dangerous. Although he hadn't spoken this entire time, his eyes were filled with malice and loathing, and it was clear that he had been concocting a plan to kill Yang Qi. Obviously, there was no way Yang Qi was going to risk letting this person get away.

RUMBLE!

Primal-chaos paleo-energy flowed out of Yang Qi’s mouth, and the energy of the Halls of Heaven swept about like tidewater. The Dragonfolk experts were all falling back from the big bang explosions and focusing on their own lives. Meanwhile, as the explosions continued rippling out, the Dragon Compendiums swirled together to form an even larger version of the book.

Dramatic transformations struck heaven and earth as Yang Qi closed in on Buddha Detestation. The evil dragon immediately prepared to fight back, thrusting out a claw in a martial discipline unique to the Dragonfolk.

Sadly for him, Yang Qi didn’t even let him complete the move. After all, Yang Qi had already built up immense momentum, not to mention the five top experts at his side.

“Dragon Compendium!” he growled, and the enormous book opened, unleashing a massive gravitational force that caused all of the Dragonfolk old-timers to feel as though their souls were about to be ripped out of their bodies. Buddha Detestation couldn’t fight the force, and was sucked inside the book, where Yang Qi quickly subjugated him.

It really was a snowball effect.

“Attack, everyone together!” In three short breaths’ worth of time, Yang Qi had subjugated Buddha Detestation, Buddha Eastprime, and Buddha Fiercemurder. Adding in the Second and Third Devil Generals, Yang Jian, and himself, he had seven top experts, all of whom could power the Dragon Compendium.

All seven of them had psychic scales of ten billion or more, and because of that, the Dragon Compendium unleashed tornados of such incredible power that the nearest three Dragonfolk experts were instantly sucked in.

One of them was female. She was the weakest of the group, having only just recently reached the level of ten billion.

“Save me, Paragon-King Sage Dragon. Save me!” she screamed.

“Join forces, otherwise we’ll all get sucked in!”

“Hurry and do it!” Of the group of three who were being most affected, one was an old man named Buddha Greenpeak, and the other was a middle-aged man with a confucian aura, a scholarly and refined man named Buddha Cunfucian-Immortal. The third, the woman who had just screamed out, was Buddha Lady.

They were all fighting hard in their various ways, but simply couldn’t stand up to Yang Qi and his allies.

“Heaven and Earth Explosion!” Yang Qi growled. “Sage Monarch Magistrate Power!”

RUMBLE!

Seven million sage monarch magistrates unleashed their power, empowering Yang Qi so much that he didn’t even need to do anything. The pages of the Dragon Compendium erupted with even more power, and the three experts were sucked inside, whereupon the book slammed shut.

Crunch. Crack!

The book opened, and the three experts emerged, glowing with halos from the God Legion Seal as they knelt before Yang Qi. They had all been subjugated.

All of these dramatic events had occurred in only five breaths’ worth of time.

Six Dragonfolk experts had been subjugated, and were now loyal servants of Yang Qi.

Buddha Eastprime. Buddha Fiercemurder. Buddha Detestation. Buddha Greenpeak. Buddha Lady. Buddha Cunfucimmortal.

Yang Qi’s power was surging beyond anything from before, and he had also experienced a big uptick in destiny.

“Stop!” Paragon-King Sage Dragon shouted angrily, using a Dragonfolk secret magic called the Sweeping Voice of the Dragon. “Everyone stop what you’re doing and pool your power. We have to join forces and forget our former enmities. Otherwise we’ll all end up enslaved!”

Paragon-King Sage Dragon was the most influential among the group, so as soon as he uttered the words, people began flocking to his side.

Of the original twenty-eight, Yang Qi had subjugated six, leaving twenty-two who were still free. And now they were standing united against Yang Qi.

For the moment, Yang Qi just stood there smiling coldly at Paragon-King Sage Dragon. “I came here with good intentions to negotiate with you, Paragon-King Sage Dragon. But you were plotting against me the whole time. What’s surprising is that you thought a trick like that would work. You made a grave mistake, and now I'm going to teach you a harsh lesson.”

One of the other Dragonfolk old-timers, seeing that they had the advantage of numbers, shouted, “You think you have the advantage, boy? There are twenty-two of us, which means we completely outnumber you. If you refuse to back down, both of us are going to be severely hurt in the fighting.”

In response, Yang Qi laughed loudly. “You just had twenty-eight on your side, and now you only have twenty-two. Meanwhile, I’ve gained six. If you couldn't deal with me when you were at full strength, what makes you think you can do so now that you're weaker and I'm stronger?”

In their hearts, the old-timers knew that Yang Qi was absolutely right. In the shortest of moments, he had enslaved six of their number and was now stronger than ever. Their confidence was crumbling as they realized that Yang Qi was an unbeatable monster.

“You just caught us off-guard, Yang Qi, that’s all,” Paragon-King Sage Dragon said. “Now that we’ve pooled our strength, we’re no weaker than you. It's true that we were plotting against you, but let’s set that aside. How about we split the Myriad Dragons Lair between us? Fifty-fifty. And we enter a nonaggression pact. You make your empire, we have ours. The other possibility is that you open the Myriad Dragons Lair and let us free. Allow us to move our empire away.”

Yang Qi snorted coldly. “You love wishful thinking, don’t you? I'm building something called the Sage Monarch Empire, and the Dragonfolk are part of it. You think you can just walk away from that? As you know, the three top groups on the outside are the Invincible Dynasty, the Central Dynasty, and the Chiliocosm Dynasty. Well, I’m making a fourth. And nobody is going to harm its foundation. So be good little dragons and acknowledge allegiance to me. If you don’t, I’ll use force.”

“He’s right,” the Third Devil General said. “Don’t you see the situation here, Paragon-King Sage Dragon? If you don’t surrender, the Sage Monarch Empire will just continue growing stronger and stronger, and we’ll harvest more power from the Halls of Heaven. Meanwhile, you’ll sit here just sitting and eating, depleting your mountain of wealth. Eventually, things will fall apart for you. Probably within a few hundred years. But if you join us, things will be different. My lord Yang Qi has the God Legion Seal, and his cultivation base is unfathomable. He can unite the Dragonfolk, creating a fourth power in the god world. It's a given that he’ll control the Halls of Heaven, and once he does, what will the other three dynasties count for?”

The Second Devil General chuckled darkly. “Actually, I’d prefer to eat a few of these dragon patriarchs. I've heard they’re delicious. I hope they continue to be stubborn, that way I can truly be vicious and merciless. Look, I’ll put it simply. Acknowledge allegiance. Or die!”

“You’re pushing things too far, you three!” one of the old-timers shouted angrily. Yet he didn’t move a muscle. They all knew that if Yang Qi unleashed another explosive attack, the resulting chaos would be extremely dangerous for them.

Chapter 1484: Who Won&#039;t Submit?!

“It's already obvious how things are going to play out here,” Yang Qi said. “But if you really want to keep fighting, I’ll give you time to think it over. After all, I have plenty of time on my hands. Buddha Detestation, Buddha Lady, and all the rest of you six. Go prepare your kingdoms for migration to the most recent minor god world I created. Got it?”

“Yes sir....”

The six experts he had just subjugated quickly flew off to follow his orders.

“You!”

The remaining twenty-two experts were so angry their hearts nearly exploded from rage. For Yang Qi to do this was really raking the firewood from beneath their kettle.

All six of those old-timers had kingdoms of their own, and the destiny they provided was a big boost to the alliance. Now that they were going to move their kingdoms, the alliance would suffer a major blow.

Furthermore, the boost in destiny Yang Qi would receive wasn't anything to take lightly. And it would also have a big negative effect on the thinking of the leaders of the remaining twenty-two kingdoms.

For these six to leave the alliance right now was like a big hole opening up in a massive dike. Once water started flowing out, it would be impossible to patch the hole.

Unfortunately for the remaining old-timers, there was nothing they could do about the situation. They didn’t own those kingdoms, thus they had no say in the matter.

Within moments, the six old-timers had reached their kingdoms and were passing out orders.

RUMBLE!

A mass migration was underway.

Six enormous kingdoms were moving into the latest minor god world Yang Qi had created. At the same time, his sage monarch magistrates entered those kingdoms to establish a better system of order.

As a result, the overall destiny of the twenty-eight-kingdom alliance was crumbling.

Word started spreading immediately, and of course, it struck fear into the hearts of the people of the other kingdoms. That, in turn, had a negative effect on the destiny, which began collapsing even faster than before.

As a result, the power of the Dragon Compendium started seeping inside. Yang Qi was slowly gaining control.

He was winning a victory without shedding any blood by eroding the foundation of the alliance itself.

The remaining twenty-eight old-timers had extremely unsightly expressions on their faces. They knew there were already some of their subordinates who were thinking of joining Yang Qi.

RUMBLE!

Big bang explosions occurred on Yang Qi’s side as the power of the Halls of Heaven detonated primal-chaos paleo-energy, causing preheaven treasures to emerge and pour into the six new Dragonfolk kingdoms.

The other dragon kingdoms could only look on in envy.

Shortly thereafter, defectors appeared, leaders from other nations who ran to Yang Qi’s side, where the sage monarch magistrates would take care of them.

Seeing this, the twenty-two old-timers were even angrier than before.

“Anyone who tries to defect from my kingdom will be slaughtered! Send the army in to crush the rebels!” Many such orders were sent out via projection and a bloodbath immediately ensued.

Seeing this, Yang Qi raised his voice and said, “Any who join me will be rewarded. Show faith in me, and offer your prayers, and you can come to the Sage Monarch Empire. I’ll teleport you out, and nothing will be able to stop me. On my side, no one will suppress you, and you’ll have freedom of thought and action.”

Everyone could hear his words clearly, and they knew he controlled the balance of power in the Myriad Dragons Lair.

Instantly, numerous dissenters began praying in their hearts, saying things such as, ‘I’m willing to join the Sage Monarch Empire!’

Moments later, they were teleported into the minor god world, where the sage monarch magistrates took charge of them.

Chaos was engulfing the alliance! No one could restore control, as no one could control the thoughts of the citizens.

The dragon kingdoms were rapidly emptying, while Yang Qi was opening more minor god worlds for the influx of people.

The preheaven treasures popping into being were like huge chunks of meat being dangled in front of starving people.

Yang Qi’s Sage Monarch Empire was experiencing a rapid increase in destiny, and the net of law was expanding and growing stronger. The sage monarch magistrates were proliferating, and the Dragonfolk old-timers could sense his psychic scale and godhood rating rising.

“We're finished....”

They knew that there was nothing they could do now. Yang Qi was winning a victory without shedding blood, simply by destroying their alliance.

They wanted to rush out and forcibly control the situation, but it wasn't as if they could control the thoughts of their people. Freedom of thought couldn't be removed except by means of one thing: the God Legion Seal.

That fact made it obvious how mighty the Sovereign Lord had been, as well as how savage and mad he was. He had controlled people’s hearts and minds, which was almost unimaginable. And even though Yang Qi could use the seal to monitor the thoughts of those he had subjugated, he actually wasn’t even sure how it all worked.

The twenty-two experts watched helplessly as more people deserted them.

“Bah!” Paragon-King Sage Dragon said. “Well played, Yang Qi. You planned things out perfectly. What a pity. If we’d planned things out better, perhaps attacking you when you first seized the Dragon Compendium, things might not have turned out this way. We should’ve strangled you before you started growing.”

“That's exactly right,” Yang Qi said. “If you had teamed up on me in the very beginning, I never would’ve been able to build this empire of mine. But it's too late now.”

“A single slip may cause everlasting pain, regret won’t bring the past back again.” Paragon-King Sage Dragon shook his head regretfully. “I really never could have imagined you’d become this strong. I suppose that's fate. That said, Yang Qi, it’s still not going to be easy for you to subjugate us. Look, I’m willing to work for you. But I won’t accept you using the God Legion Seal on me. I'd rather die!”

Yang Qi laughed coldly.  “You’re really counting your chickens before they’re hatched, Paragon-King Sage Dragon. Even if you die, your soul will remain stuck inside the Myriad Dragons Lair. I could just use the power of the lair to bring you back. You see, this place is like the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, which I gained complete control over many years ago. Considering the threat you pose, I think I’ll just kill you all, harvest your power and essence, then remake you in a more loyal form.”

What he said was completely true.

Chapter 1485: No Other Choice

The alliance of twenty-eight dragon kingdoms had been a mighty force, but it was crumbling into nothing. Its citizens were deserting like mad, and even the most loyal members could tell that it was time to start making plans for the worst.

Once the citizens of a nation lost their heart, it would be impossible to get back. A massive empire collapsed in no time at all.

Yang Qi himself was simply focusing on making more minor god worlds. The sage monarch magistrates were handling everything else.

The government officials from among the Dragonfolk were also a lot of help, and were very orderly considering they had been trained by the sage monarch magistrates. Although they weren’t perfect, they were far better than, for instance, the viceroys from the House of the Invincible.

Yang Qi’s destiny burned like the sun, and was so intense that the remaining twenty-two old-timers couldn’t possibly stand up to it. He now had the upper hand in everything.

“You’ve completely lost the initiative,” Yang Qi told them. “So what do you have to say for yourselves? It would be foolish for you to just let yourselves die. Your only option now is to acknowledge allegiance to me. Become like the ancient God-Lords who acquiesced to the Sovereign Lord.”

“No!” Paragon-King Sage Dragon shouted bitterly. “I won’t acknowledge allegiance to you! The Sovereign Lord couldn’t force me to do that in ancient times, so how could you possibly do it!?”

“The past is the past, and the present is the present. Just because the Sovereign Lord couldn't do something doesn’t mean that I can’t. Furthermore, maybe the Sovereign Lord just wasn’t really interested in having you as a servant. Look, this is a simple matter. Either acknowledge allegiance, or die. You choose. I'm not a very patient person. I want destiny, and you have a lot of it. And your refusal to surrender is harming the destiny. So if you don’t change your mind quickly, don’t blame me for being vicious and merciless.”

He clenched his hand into a fist, which pulsed with killing energy. Above his head, it was possible to see countless devils, gods, buddhas, demons, and wretch-gods swirling about, slowly merging together until they formed a huge megamammoth.

“No!” one of the old-timers blurted. Lunging forward, he dropped to his knees in front of Yang Qi and started kowtowing. “Stop! Don’t attack me! I surrender. I’ll acknowledge allegiance! I’ll join the Sage Monarch Empire.”

“Excellent!” Yang Qi reached out and placed a palm on his head, sending the power of the God Legion Seal into him. This particular old-timer had only recently pushed his cultivation base to the level of ten billion. His name was Buddha Sectduke.

He wasn't an expert who had been around in ancient times, but rather, was a newly-risen genius among the Dragonfolk. Considering he had only just reached his current level, he had absolutely no desire to die, and was already convinced of Yang Qi’s superiority.

Another top expert had been subjugated.

Buddha Sectduke.

Yang Qi’s cultivation base was again rising, and considering the flows of destiny from the Myriad Dragons Lair, and the net of law, there was no way anyone could possibly resist him. Once the net filled the entire lair, and connected completely with the essence power of the place, he could transform the world with a single word.

Buddha Sectduke’s surrender was the straw that broke the camel's back.

The other twenty-one old-timers were now completely crushed, and in the blink of an eye, four of the younger ones flew forward to acknowledge allegiance.

Yang Qi quickly dealt with them using the God Legion Seal.

These were people who weren’t so proud that they would rather die than surrender.

“You little bastards!” Paragon-King Sage Dragon shouted. “Have you no spine? Dragonfolk are supposed to be proud! You’re not even fit to be dog food! You should be putting everything on the line right now. Self-detonating! Using your secret magics to destroy everything around you! Everyone, join forces. Let’s use the most ancient Dragonfolk primal-chaos curse to end this in mutual destruction!”

“Shut the fuck up,” one of the old-timers said. “That’s the stupidest plan I’ve ever heard, Paragon-King Sage Dragon. You think that we’ll use the power of that curse to blow ourselves up and give you a chance to escape? We've all been in the Myriad Dragons Lair for hundreds of millions of years, do you really think we're that stupid? Following you was a mistake. I should have known from the beginning that this alliance of yours was a bad idea. Brothers, ignore Paragon-King Sage Dragon. Let’s join Yang Qi. Even the Second and Third Devil Generals are on his side. If we follow him, maybe we can bring back the glory of the Sovereign Lord.”

This particular dragon had been on the receiving end of a lot of pressure from Paragon-King Sage Dragon, and in this critical moment, he chose to turn traitor.

Flying over to Yang Qi, he said, “Exalted Yang Qi, this Paragon-King Sage Dragon is too pig-headed and stubborn. If you imprison him and torture him a bit, maybe he’ll acknowledge allegiance to you. But truth be told, I think you should just execute him. His flesh and blood will taste delicious, so as long as I get a mouthful or two, I’m willing to serve you for life.”

“Very good.” Yang Qi reached out and touched the old-timer’s head, subjugating him so that he couldn’t offer even the least bit of resistance.

“I’ll surrender as well. I’ll acknowledge allegiance!”

One by one, the other old-timers were all surrendering.

Yang Qi smiled coldly at how these Dragonfolk feared death. The dragons he had tried to subjugate early on were obviously extremely proud and arrogant, which was why they had resorted to self-detonation. These higher-ranking dragons had apparently manipulated the younger ones into risking life and limb, but when it came to their own life or death, they did things differently.

Before long, only Paragon-King Sage Dragon was left. He was the strongest of them all, and was even superior to the Third Devil General. But for him to be all alone facing Yang Qi made him seem quite lonely and pitiful.

“You’re all alone, old man,” Yang Qi said. “Why don’t you just give in? Are you really going to throw your life away? Dying isn’t going to do you any good, and besides, I'm strong enough that I could make it a hard task for you to actually die.”

Paragon-King Sage Dragon’s face was as white as his robes, and at first he seemed to be at a loss for words. Finally, he said, “Oh, how tragic. If I’d known things would happen like this, I would’ve just joined the Central Dynasty. Then none of this would have happened. I can’t believe that I, Paragon-King Sage Dragon, elite genius of the Dragonfolk, would fall to a youngster like you.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Yang Qi asked, clasping his hands behind his back. “Are you saying you want to die? In that case, fine. I’ll give you that as an option. Your fellow dragons seem interested in devouring your flesh and blood, so maybe I should give you to them as a reward. Go ahead and commit suicide.”

In response, Paragon-King Sage Dragon trembled and let out a bitter moan. “I can’t believe things are ending like this. We Dragonfolk are proud! Does our honor mean nothing? In the Sovereign Lord’s Age, we dragons kept our freedom. Now that the Sovereign Lord is dead, we should be stronger than ever. But with no pressure and no enemies, we've grown weak. Why? Why is all this happening?”

The other old-timers’ hearts were thrown into chaos by his words. What he said was right. The Dragonfolk had no true enemies, and no pressure. Instead of advancing by leaps and bounds and taking over the god world, they had ended up in this situation.

“You fought among yourselves like fools, with every dragon out for himself. In the end, you’re like nothing more than animals. Look around the god world! There are plenty of animals that have survived for billions of trillions of years, yet haven’t changed. Because they’re not human. Don’t think that just because you can take human form, it makes you human. True humans form groups, spread order, build up power, and create new things. That's what it means to be human. You might look human, but inside, you’re animals. Because of that, you can't grow. The Dragonfolk that join me are no longer dragons. In their souls, they’ve become human.”

His words crashed in their ears.

They were weak because, in the end, they were still animals.

That was why, no matter what they looked like on the outside, they could never truly conquer the god world. It was similar to how, in the impure lands, there were plenty of animals that were stronger than people. Yet those animals couldn't create kingdoms or empires. In the end, humans would always be able to wipe them out.

That was the power of order. And of destiny.

“Paragon-King Sage Dragon, I’ll give you one last bit of honor. Kill yourself and give your flesh and blood to your companions so they can become true humans.”

“No!” Paragon-King Sage Dragon blurted, staggering backward. “Don’t eat me. I’m willing to join you! I’ll become human.”

Thump!

A Dragonfolk old-timer that was as strong as the God-Lords of old suddenly dropped to his knees and kowtowed.

Chapter 1486: Rapid Development

The strongest of all the Dragonfolk was on his knees, acknowledging allegiance to Yang Qi, bereft of all pride and dignity. Seeing this, Yang Qi waved his hand and sent a golden stream of light into Paragon-King Sage Dragon.

After the baptism of sagelight was over, Paragon-King Sage Dragon shivered and looked up, his face a mask of despair. He could sense the golden throne that existed for him in the God Legion Seal. How ironic that, in ancient times, he was never bound to the God Legion Seal, but now he was.

Yang Qi’s friends and family began talking amongst themselves.

“Impressive! With Paragon-King Sage Dragon sealed, the fate of the Dragonfolk is sealed. We now have the foundation necessary to truly establish the fourth great power of the god world.”

“Yeah, that's right. With the converged might of all the dragon kingdoms, we might not be able to fight the three other dynasties, but given Yang Qi’s capabilities, and the resources from the halls of heaven, they won’t be able to take advantage of us.”

“We finally have a true dynasty under our control.”

“Should we go ahead and make ourselves publicly known in the god world?”

“Not yet. We still haven’t reached our full potential. I think we should do the same thing the junior houselord of the House of God Ordainment did. Make a faction called the Mystery Society and use it to infiltrate the other dynasties. Then we can use it as a secret weapon when the time is right.”

“But if we remain in the shadows, nobody will know there's a fourth great power in the god world, and our destiny will never match up to that of the other three dynasties.”

“That’s true. We can’t just sit around hiding all the time. If we want to seize ultimate control, we need more destiny.”

They knew they now had a major foundation in the Myriad Dragons Lair, the basis upon which they could build a true empire.

However, it was a tricky matter trying to decide whether or not to announce it publicly. Both options came with upsides and downsides.

All of the races in the god world, from demons to devils, would think of three names when it came to the top forces. Invincible. Chiliocosm. Central. There were always people hoping to join them. That was just how the hearts of people worked; and hearts were the basis of destiny.

Yang Qi was still technically a viceroy in the House of the Invincible, so he knew full well that there were always people coming and wanting to join the sect. In fact, the foreign affairs department was constantly giving aptitude tests to the gods who came and applied for membership.

Of course, that aptitude test was extremely difficult. After all, those who passed it and joined the House of the Invincible gained its protection, which meant no one could just randomly kill them.

If Yang Qi had a dynasty, but nobody came to join it, his destiny would never truly be able to rival that of the three major dynasties.

At a certain point in the god world, things could only operate out in the open. When power levels reached those commanded by the three dynasties, crafty plots and machinations were useless. Only open strength could be used. And that was why operating in the shadows just wasn't a good option. They had to declare themselves as the fourth power, which would lead to streams of people coming to join them, and a resulting increase in destiny.

Yet now wasn’t the time. Yang Qi wanted to bring more human kingdoms into the fold. Right now, his empire was only made up of roughly half humans, while the other half was Dragonfolk. And that wasn’t a very good ratio.

Yang Qi had a goal already. He wanted the Spritefolk on his side. The Spritefolk were no weaker than the Dragonfolk in terms of the resources they had access to. And they were strong. They were currently considering throwing their support behind the House of the Invincible, but Yang Qi planned to change their minds.

The first task at hand, though, was simple. Exercise complete control over the Myriad Dragons Lair, and turn the entire thing into a minor god world.

The Myriad Dragons Lair wasn’t a suitable place for human habitation, but if he transformed it in the same way that worlds were created from primal-chaos, he could make something like a new version of the god world. And that would be the most suitable type of empire to spread.

Not even Proud Central and the Central Dynasty could consider transforming the Myriad Dragons Lair into a minor god world. But Yang Qi could tap into the power of the halls of heaven, the God Legion Seal, and the Mahātmā Jade.

The truth was that during the process of making the minor god worlds he already had, he’d gained a lot of new enlightenment. For instance, he could use the power of the explosions to make weaker copies of the Everlit Godlamp, the Chiliocosm Pagoda, the Dragon Compendium, and other such treasures.

In some ways, he actually felt as though he himself had become a world of primal-chaos.

If some almighty entity could enter a state of Nevasaññānāsaññāyatana at this moment, they would see the flesh and blood that made up the Myriad Dragons Lair transforming into crystal. And although it was only happening on a small scale, it was like a spark that could cause a forest fire. The effects were already spreading through the entire world.

Given the current speed, it would probably take thousands of years for Yang Qi to finish the work. Maybe even ten thousand.

That was actually fast for a truly powerful magical treasure. There were some treasures from ancient times that would take hundreds of millions of years to create. And the Myriad Dragons Lair was a magical treasure to being with, its heart being the Dragon Compendium. Because of that, it had the potential to match up to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. If Yang Qi could succeed in crystallizing the flesh and blood, it would become even more powerful, such that it would surpass the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Thankfully, Yang Qi could tap into the halls of heaven, and was no weaker than the Lord of Civilization or Lord of Radiance and Light had been.

As his cultivation base continued to increase, it was no longer wishful thinking to consider what it would be like to be on the same level as the King Immortal-Slayer of old.

The twenty-eight dragon kingdoms had been subjugated, but now they needed to be put into order. Adding a bunch of chaotic kingdoms could actually be very harmful to the overall destiny, if they weren’t brought into line. With the God Legion Seal, just about anything was possible.

Using the seal, he subjugated all the leaders of the twenty-eight kingdoms who were peak Paramount Gods, then put them in charge of various matters.

He was creating an organization unlike any other, and it was already equivalent to roughly twenty or thirty percent of the Invincible Dynasty. Normally speaking, one person couldn’t manage something so large.

But Yang Qi was different from other people.

He hovered in midair, countless thoughts running through his mind at lightning speed.

Then he would send those thoughts into the minds of the government officials under his control, who would carry out his orders without question. Of course, the only reason he could handle so many complicated and important thoughts at the same time without his head exploding was that his brain was a combination of the Cruiser of Civilization and the Mahātmā Jade.

The Lord of Civilization had originally hoped to create an enormous brain that could control an entire nation without the need for government officials, eliminating the problems of corruption and vice.

Unfortunately, he had never succeeded.

But where he had failed, Yang Qi had succeeded, thanks to combining the cruiser with the Mahātmā Jade. The jade contained the most profound secrets relating to wisdom and thought. Throughout the years, countless sages and mahātmās in hell had dreamed of doing what Yang Qi had done, thus bringing order to the chaos of the devils.

Even the True Devil himself had long tried to bring order to the dao of devils.

Unfortunately, they had all failed. But with that combination, Yang Qi was now able to send his thoughts out to bring order to his empire, causing it to advance by leaps and bounds.

With every day that passed, things grew more orderly. Interest groups were disbanded, and the citizens worked hard under the new rules. Civilizations flourished, and Yang Qi oversaw it all.

Yang Qi’s friends and family were all in amazement and how he had turned a dish of loose sand into something so orderly. Normally speaking, it would take iron control and a lot of executions to do that, which would harm the destiny.

But Yang Qi did it without killing anyone. Everything was carried out smoothly and without any hitches.

Chapter 1487: Psychic Scale of Twenty Billion

With Yang Qi’s thoughts guiding the nation, it expanded dramatically in the half a month that passed. He subjugated all of the top leaders, who then followed his commands to the letter and didn’t dare to try to profit personally from their positions.

For now, Yang Qi needed their influence.

Eventually, everything calmed down.

On one particular day, the Myriad Dragons Lair trembled as the net of law became fully integrated, covering the entire place. As of that moment, the lair was the net, and the net was the lair.

Going forward, no one would ever be able to seize authority in the lair.

Opening his mouth, Yang Qi devoured the Dragon Compendium.

Using the powers of King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans and the golden godmammoth blood that ran through his veins, he broke it down and made it part of his body.

His body was a strange thing now. It was incomparably perfect, beyond the level that words could be used to describe. And in the moment that the net of law became fully integrated into the Myriad Dragons Lair, the destiny of the place flowed into him more mightily than ever, causing him to undergo fundamental transformations.

Crack!

He shot to his feet, white energy flowing around him as teleportation portals whirred to life, connected directly to the halls of heaven. He exhaled, and primal-chaos paleo-energy flowed out, causing big bang explosions to occur that made minor god worlds pop up with even greater frequency.

Buzzzz.

King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans flew out, forming a primal-chaos elder-snake that sucked in countless streams of primal-chaos paleo-energy. Then, shockingly, the snake started to change. Its body remained that of a snake, but its head changed into that of a human with Yang Qi’s face.

It indicated that Yang Qi had truly transformed. He was King Heaven-Devourer, and King Heaven-Devourer was him. The legacy talismans were now an integral part of him.

And his cultivation base was rising.

Once the net of law integrated with the essence of the lair, everything settled down. The flowing destiny led to an ever greater sense of order, filling the inhabitants with a sense of awe, and a feeling that there was the power of karmic retribution at play.

The combination of karmic retribution and the dao of heaven was intense, and could only have appeared in the sealed environment of the Myriad Dragons Lair. Yang Qi was creating his own system that existed separately from the natural and magical laws of the god world.

Right now, the destiny couldn't compare to that of the House of the Invincible. However, its valuation was still in the billions.

Originally, his Sage Monarch Empire had had a valuation of two million, and that had been impressive. But now, the valuation was so far beyond that it was almost impossible to compare the two levels. He had really replaced hunting rifles with cannons. After all, the twenty-eight additional dragon kingdoms he had taken were mighty compared to the innumerable smaller ones he had taken before.

That was especially true considering he had combined them all into one force, and had the sage monarch magistrates to manage them.

Thanks to the dramatic increase in destiny, he now had ten million sage monarch magistrates. Unfortunately, it still wasn’t enough to fully manage his empire. But thankfully, considering he now had a destiny valuation in the billions, new sage monarch magistrates were coming into existence at every moment.

Thanks to the immense power at his disposal, he was also able to help all of his friends and family achieve breakthroughs.

All of them pushed their psychic scales to the level of a billion, reaching the peak level, then climbing even higher.

As for Yang Qi’s own psychic scale and godhood rating, they climbed without stop, until they reached the level of twenty billion. They were now at the point where he could shake the halls of heaven!

Twenty billion! Even in ancient times, the God-Lords didn’t have cultivation bases of that level.

Before coming to the lair, Yang Qi had been a weakling. But now he could be considered a true potentate in the god world.

It wasn’t a trick, and it wasn't due to random chance. He had set up a nation and managed its destiny, then used it in the best way possible. If destiny could turn a Quasi-God into a Paramount God, then what would it do to devour a thousand times that level of destiny?

Going forward, the previous type of cultivation would be completely pointless.

Only destiny could be relied on for all time.

By cultivating energy arts, one could smash fate. However, Yang Qi wasn’t jumping up and down with glee because he had reached a psychic scale of twenty billion. After all, the leaders of the House of the Invincible, House of the Chiliocosm, and Central Dynasty had ruled their respective organizations for billions of years, and he had no idea how much destiny they had consumed, or what level their cultivation bases were.

One thing was certain: they were at a higher level than him. Therefore, the only course of action he could take was to expand his borders, grow his organization, and get stronger.

‘The halls of heaven....’ When he thought about how the purrling had entered the halls of heaven and taken that jade thumb-ring, it made him wonder what other magical treasures were up there. He had the feeling that getting those treasures would be the key to making his empire the greatest in existence.

‘I think I need to take a trip to the halls of heaven.’

His cultivation base was now strong enough that, with the help of the God Legion Seal, he should be able to enter the halls of heaven and search for some useful items.

In fact, he was even thinking about trying to take the halls and add them into his own lands. Compared to the halls, even the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart was pitiful. Only the Great Necropolis could possibly compare to the halls of heaven.

He also needed to take whatever items existed in the Bastille of the One God and add them to his minor god worlds.

He exhaled, and winds swept through the Myriad Dragons Lair, ensuring that everyone knew their ultimate leader Yang Qi had reached a very enigmatic level of cultivation.

Minor god worlds proliferated constantly.

“Friends, family, brethren,” Yang Qi said, “I'm leaving this place in your care. Practicing cultivation here will be much more beneficial for you than doing so in the House of the Invincible. I'm leaving. I've received news that the House of the Invincible has begun preparations to welcome the princess of the Spritefolk, and I need to make sure that wedding doesn't take place.”

“Don't worry, Yang Qi, we’ll take care of everything,” Jadefall said. She and all of Yang Qi’s other friends and family were now the top leaders of the empire, and had such command of the destiny that they could ordain a Quasi-God into a Paramount God, if Yang Qi permitted it.

“Good. I'm leaving now, but my will shall always be here overseeing things. These lands are like clones of me now. And my will shall also remain connected to the halls of heaven, creating more minor god worlds. Right now, I can sense the other pieces of the Mahātmā Jade, and one of them is in the halls of heaven. There's also a piece in the Central Dynasty. I have to get them!”

Yang Qi still had big ambitions.

He had achieved a major goal by founding a true empire. Now he needed to reach the half Annulled level. He needed to become like King Immortal-Slayer, the True Devil, Wretch-God Ultimate, the Demon Master, the Sovereign Lord and the King of Godmammoths.

In the past, reaching that level had been nothing more than a dream, but not anymore.

Now, he could truly attempt to bring the Spritefolk into his kingdom, which would cause it to double in size, and make its destiny even more amazing. And that would be the key to actually stepping halfway into the Annulled level.

Chapter 1488: Returning to the House of the Invincible

Having completed his work in the Myriad Dragons Lair, Yang Qi could connect to it no matter where he was. He no longer needed to remain there as his true self. It would continue its transformation into a full minor god world, and his ten million sage monarch magistrates could manage things while he was away.

The flesh and blood that made up the lair would continue crystallizing, uniting it in a way that had never occurred before. And its destiny was constantly increasing.

At the same time, preheaven treasures proliferated without end, providing endless resources for the people of his empire.

Now that the initial period of chaos had passed, things would continue developing naturally without Yang Qi’s direct oversight. And once the process was complete, his cultivation base would increase even more.

There was no way to compare the benefits of destiny to what Yang Qi could accomplish via personal cultivation. It would be like trying to compare a rich businessman’s income from his business to what he could earn by going out and doing manual labor.

Yang Qi became a blur that left the Myriad Dragons Lair and reached the House of the Invincible in virtually no time at all. Although the destiny here was dazzling, it wasn’t as mysterious and enigmatic as it had been in the past. And he was confident that, in future times, the destiny of his own empire would surpass the House of the Invincible. In fact, he would eventually conquer this place.

Right now, his psychic scale and godhood rating were at twenty billion, making him no weaker than any of the old-timers in existence. And that wasn’t to mention all of the treasures he commanded, or the fact that he had acquired the blood of the King of Godmammoths.

He was so strong that even if people with godhood ratings and psychic scales of thirty, forty, or even fifty billion tried to chase him down and kill him, he would probably be able to stand his ground.

And if he called on the aid of his ten million sage monarch magistrates, he would likely be able to kill any expert there was, with the exception of people as strong as the Sovereign Lord, King Immortal-Slayer, and the Demon Master. Right now, the only people he needed to truly fear were those with Unbounded will convergence who were half a step into the Annulled level.

That said, he still needed to act with caution. The three major dynasties all had secret reserve powers that he needed to take into consideration.

However, with the God Legion Seal, he could now start subjugating the leaders of the major powers.

‘I have a few things to start out with. I can find out what Dugu Hong is up to. And I can subjugate Duke Nine Cauldrons and that priestess, Dugu Wanqing.’ Upon entering the House of the Invincible, he headed to his own territory.

I hadn’t actually been very long since he was there, as he hadn’t spent an inordinate amount of time in the Myriad Dragons Lair.

It wasn’t unheard of for viceroys to leave for long periods of time, even thousands of years.

Before long, Dugu Hong appeared and dropped to his knees. “Congratulations, Milord.”

“Oh? What happened?” Yang Qi asked.

“Because of how well you’ve managed your territory, news came down that you’re to be rewarded. Now that you’re back, you need to report in immediately.”

Dugu Hong was Yang Qi’s servant, but he didn't know about what had gone on in the Myriad Dragons Lair. And Yang Qi wasn’t inclined to tell him.

The fewer people who knew his secrets, the less likely that word would accidentally leak. Being able to monitor the thoughts of his subordinates couldn’t prevent slips of the tongue. For now, he needed to play things as safe as possible.

“Fine, take me to see the leaders,” Yang Qi said, smiling.

However, before Dugu Hong could even respond, a whooshing sound could be heard as a group of white-robed destinors appeared just on the border of his lands. “Viceroy of the Land of Dreamvoid, our exalted Priestess Dugu Wanqing has summoned you. Hurry with me to the Palace of Destiny.”

From their bearing, it seemed they were just on the verge of coming in and arresting Yang Qi.

‘What’s this?’ Yang Qi thought, a bit surprised. ‘The Palace of Destiny already knows I'm back? Information must’ve leaked from inside my own palace. Well, it doesn't really matter. It’s like having someone deliver a pillow just when you’re getting ready to take a nap. Who the hell does this priestess think she is, anyway? I could subjugate her with the snap of a finger.’

Because of the incredibly strong destiny in the House of the Invincible, and the strictly enforced rules, it was essentially impossible to fight and kill anyone inside.

Of course, Yang Qi didn’t care about that now, considering how strong he had become. If he wanted to, he could create a void around himself that would cut him off from the local destiny.

As long as he didn't run into anyone with a godhood rating and psychic scale greater than ten billion, he could subjugate anyone he encountered.

People with ratings greater than ten billion could be troublesome to deal with, at least as long as he was actually inside the House of the Invincible. Outside, beyond the net of law, even such people wouldn't be problematic for him.

“The people from the Palace of Destiny are obviously up to no good, Milord,” Dugu Hong said. “You need to figure out a way to get out of this.”

“Don’t worry about it. Also, don't tell my superiors, understand? I’ll handle the situation.” Straightening his clothing, he walked out into the presence of the white-robed destinors. Their leader was a peak Paramount God, and he was glaring at Yang Qi as he walked out. “Come with us immediately, Viceroy. Any unnecessary delays will be severely punished!”

“Oh really?” Yang Qi said languidly. “Since when does the Palace of Destiny have the authority to order around a viceroy like me? If I feel like ignoring this summons, I can ignore it.”

“You!” the peak Paramount God destinor said angrily. “You've got a lot of gall to talk like that. When our priestess summons you, you come. Otherwise you’re just asking to get killed.”

“I never said I wasn't going. Go ahead and lead the way.”

He waved his hand, and an invisible stream of golden light entered the destinor, causing him to shiver as he was subjugated. In fact, the man was just about to drop to his knees when Yang Qi stopped him.

“Let’s go!”

The newly subjugated destinor led the way to the Palace of Destiny.

Yang Qi ignored the other destinors. They were too weak. He was only interested in having peak Paramount Gods with psychic scales of a billion or more.

As for the destiny provided by this newly subjugated peak Paramount God, it was so negligible as to be beneath Yang Qi’s notice. At this point, only subjugating people on the level of Dugu Yunkong would provide any helpful amount of destiny.

In the blink of an eye, they were at the Palace of Destiny.

The destinors led him into an expansive meeting hall, closing the door behind him as he entered. A handful of priestesses were there, sitting on thrones, including Dugu Wanqing. He obviously hadn't forgotten how she had tried recruiting him without offering any substantial benefits.

The other priestesses were obviously lower-ranked than her.

There were other people present who obviously weren’t members of the Palace of Destiny. There were roughly ten of them, men and women who were all peak Paramount Gods. One of the men was attractive, with a fit physique and long, slender fingers. He was also visibly taller than everyone else. He had a psychic scale of more than nine billion, putting him just on the verge of being like the God-Lords of old.

‘He's from the Spritefolk!’

Yang Qi had become familiar with the aura of the Spritefolk during his spritefruit heist. Thanks to the spritefruit, he was also familiar with their life force and genes.

Nowadays, he didn’t focus much on people's aura or physical appearances, as he could assess their genetic substructure. Many things could be faked, but not genes.

“Well, aren’t you an important person, Viceroy!” Dugu Wanqing said sarcastically. “We’ve sent people to summon you on many occasions, yet you were never around. Now that you’re back, do you mind explaining what you’ve been doing this past year that you were away?”

Chapter 1489: One of the Spritefolk

Yang Qi was actually delighted that one of the Spritefolk was present. He was definitely going to kill multiple birds with only one stone here.

Nobody present had a psychic scale of over ten billion, which would ensure that things went very smoothly. Of course, that didn’t mean he could act rashly. The net of law in the Palace of Destiny was particularly strong, so if people found out he was doing something shifty, it would be difficult to escape.

Once that net of law was provoked, it could unleash innumerable attacks, and it would lock down like a spider web, trapping the target within it.

In response to Dugu Wanqing’s reproachful question, Yang Qi acted neither servile nor overbearing. “Exalted Priestess, I was out trying to expand the territory of the House of the Invincible. I wanted to see what kingdoms could be conquered. I’d made a bit of progress when I decided to return to take care of some business. That was when you summoned me.”

“What incredible gall!” another of the priestesses shouted, rising to her feet and unleashing immense pressure that was obviously designed to force Yang Qi to kneel. “How dare you talk to us like that. Have you no respect? On your knees!”

Crack!

Yang Qi unleashed a bit of godpower to counter the pressure and remained standing. “Our sect has rules. I'm a viceroy, and as long as I observe the proper etiquette, I don’t need to kneel. You’re going far beyond your authority here.”

“How outrageously brazen!” the same priestess replied, a cold smile on her face. “You’re just getting cockier and cockier here. Could it be that you think your backer, Duke Nine Cauldrons, will help you? Is that why you’re being so rude? Don't forget, we're planning to run an investigation to see why the destiny you control is so unusual. Let's cut to the chase here. You need to cut ties with Duke Nine Cauldrons and join us instead. Tell us how you managed to improve that destiny, and give us whatever magical treasure you recovered from the Bastille of the One God. After you join us, we’ll reward your loyalty.”

“Did the Invincible Dynasty decide to stop following the rules or something?” Yang Qi replied. “Aren't you worried that openly trying to turn me into a turncoat will provoke a reaction from the destiny here?”

Even as the words left his mouth, the destiny in the area began to pulse, with him at the center.

It was a natural function, as he was currently speaking with righteousness and justice on his side, whereas the priestesses were violating the interests of the sect, not to mention being very unreasonable.

Unfortunately, the destiny in this hall was actually very weak. Obviously, someone had used special techniques to reduce its effectiveness.

“Provoke a reaction from the destiny?” Dugu Wanqing laughed. “This is the Palace of Destiny! We control the destiny here, and can adjust it any time we want. Furthermore, you aren’t the least bit important. You’re nothing but a measly viceroy. It might be a slight violation of the rules, but we can bring you here for punishment if we want. It’s an unwritten rule among the officials of our dynasty. You’d better watch out, because your life’s on the line here.”

“Why do you people care so much about me? I’m just a simple viceroy. Isn’t it going a bit overboard for the Palace of Destiny to treat me like this?”

“There’s more to you than meets the eye,” the Spritefolk man suddenly said. Rising to his feet from the guest throne in which he sat, he strolled over to Yang Qi, his eyes twinkling. “You act very cool under pressure. In fact, I don’t think any other viceroy could act as cool as you in this situation. And that’s not to mention that you’re only a late Paramount God with a psychic scale of a few hundred million. You’re definitely hiding something. You see, I looked into the lands you run, and I understand it quite clearly. You have a lot of thralls running things there, unintelligent thralls that can't fight. Not even the ultimate thralls of all time, the ancient angels, could possibly run a nation. Yet your thralls do it perfectly. Their policies see instant results, which should be completely impossible for thralls.”

“Who are you?” Yang Qi asked.

“I’m a general of the Spritefolk. Sprite Guyuan.” Clasping his hands behind his back, he smiled coldly and continued, “As it turns out, there are crouching tigers and hidden dragons in the House of the Invincible. Such geniuses really shouldn’t be skulking around as viceroys. What are you really doing here? Why are you hiding in the House of the Invincible?”

“Why should I answer any of your questions?” Yang Qi said coldly. “This is the House of the Invincible, and I’m a viceroy here. I have a responsibility to my nation and people, and have to answer to the emperor. You’re an outsider who has no right to be demanding answers from a viceroy. I'm a government official, and you’re nothing but a vassal. Who gave you the authority to interrogate me like a criminal?”

Yang Qi’s words were spoken extremely sharply, an open humiliation of Sprite Guyuan.

“Are you looking to die!?” Sprite Guyuan barked. “I think I’ll cut your head off right here and now, so everyone knows the price to be paid for insulting me!”

“Such audacity!” Yang Qi replied loudly. “How dare you talk about attacking a viceroy in the middle of the House of the Invincible? This is outright rebellion! You people from the Palace of Destiny, are you really going to stand for this repulsive behavior?”

“If a fight breaks out, General Sprite Guyuan, we can always look the other way,” one of the priestesses said. “Boy, did you really think the rules of our dynasty are that rigid? Do you really think they can't be broken? Let me tell you the truth. Those in superior positions here are vastly more powerful than their inferiors. We make the rules here, and if Sprite Guyuan wants to kill you, we’ll just say the two of you agreed to have a martial arts match, and you accidentally lost your life. No one will care that much. Besides, Princess Sprite Susu is going to be marrying the exalted Dugu Yunkong soon. In other words, Sprite Guyuan will soon be a general of the Invincible Dynasty. And what do you count for compared to that?”

“Wow, you people really don’t care about the rules. You’ll harm the national destiny just like that?”

Glancing around, Yang Qi confirmed that they were completely cut off from the outside, and it caused him to smile inwardly. That was exactly what he wanted.

Glaring angrily, Sprite Guyuan said, “Considering how you just talked to me, boy, I’ve decided that I'm not going to ask any more questions. I'll just kill you and drag the answers out of your soul afterward. You think I won’t kill you because you’re a viceroy? All you’ve succeeded in doing is pissing me off!”

He seemed to view himself as an angry tiger facing a bunny, as though Yang Qi didn’t even have the ability to fight back.

In fact, his hand shot out, glittering with dazzling light as he said, “This is my Prism-Devil Nightmare Hand. After it latches on to you, you’ll descend into an endless nightmare that’ll make you wish you could die. Except I won't let you!”

CRACK!

The moment the words left his mouth, a loud smacking sound rang out as Yang Qi slapped him so hard he flew off to the side and slammed into the wall, blood pouring out of his mouth.

Yang Qi moved so quickly that none of the priestesses could even see what happened. Some of them even assumed he had experienced a sudden onset of cultivation deviation.

“You think a bit too much of yourself,” Yang Qi said, shaking his head. “And you people are the ones who blocked this place off from the outside destiny, so don’t blame me for this. You think some puny Spritefolk general can steamroll me?”

Instead of pulling his hand back, Yang Qi left it hanging in the air, making it obvious that he was the one who had just done the slapping. Then he made a grasping gesture, and Sprite Guyuan flew back toward him. Yang Qi grabbed him by the throat and held him up like a trussed chicken. Staring into his eyes, he said, “You’re weak, Sprite Guyuan. Couldn’t even stand up to a single slap from me. And you think you’re going to actually fight me?”

“You....”

The priestesses were all flabbergasted. However, after a moment passed, some of them took action. Some tried to unleash magical techniques, some tried sending out warning messages, and some tried unsealing the hall. Sadly, they then found that there was a greyspace surrounding them, which repelled all magic and all messages.

“Too late, ladies and gentlemen. I've already made this place into a pure land controlled by me. It's a good thing you cut this place off from destiny, otherwise I wouldn’t have been able to do this. You’ve spun a cocoon around yourselves.” He waved his hand, and godtrees sprouted up everywhere. Above, stars appeared, mighty and grand in every sense.

“Who are you?” Dugu Wanqing said. “How are you doing this? And what are you doing in the House of the Invincible?” She obviously knew it was a dangerous situation, and given that they were stuck, she decided to try talking to him, and possibly scheme her way out of trouble.

“Who am I?” Yang Qi threw this head back and laughed. “My master is the Invincible Dugu, so you tell me who I am.” It was no lie. He was telling the truth.

“What?!” Dugu Wanqing said. “That’s absurd! Patriarch Invincible has been sleeping since the primeval era, and he never had any apprentices. Right now, the nine patriarchs are in control!”

Chapter 1490: I&#039;m the Successor

Yang Qi was telling the truth, yet  not a single person believed him. After all, not even the highest leaders of the dynasty had ever seen their Patriarch Invincible, the Invincible Dugu. The Invincible Dugu had fallen in the Sovereign Lord’s Age, and it didn’t seem possible that he could be alive right now. It was said that the whole reason the House of the Invincible was gathering destiny was to resurrect him and follow his leadership to dominate everything under heaven.

But many people thought that was nothing more than an old story, and that Patriarch Invincible was like the Sovereign Lord: impossible to resurrect.

Yang Qi looked at Dugu Wanqing and snorted coldly. “Why would I lie to you children? You lot are so weak that I could kill you in half a moment. And you think that I’d just make up something about my Master? Let me explain things here. I’m from the lower worlds, and my master there was the Invincible Dugu. There’s no reason for me to just make that up.”

“You ascended from the lower worlds?” Dugu Wanqing said. “Then why are you targeting us? If you really are the patriarch’s apprentice, you shouldn’t be opposing us! That would be harming your own Master’s interests. Look, we can talk this out. Given how strong you are, we can arrange for an important position for you in the House of the Invincible. But if you kill us, you’d be cutting off any future that you have here. Come, let’s negotiate!”

“Negotiate? You think you deserve to do that? The reason I'm telling you all this is that you're going to be my slaves in a moment. I'm the real successor of the House of the Invincible. And now you’re all going to be subjugated, starting with you, Sprite Guyuan!”

Crack!

Golden light shot out from Yang Qi’s palm, entering Sprite Guyuan and causing him to slump to the ground. Then a shocked expression overtook his face, and he got to his knees and kowtowed. “My respects, Milord. I deserve to die for what I did. I had no idea you were so mighty. You have the God Legion Seal! I'm truly blind.”

“What? The God Legion Seal?!”

“What nonsense are you spouting, Sprite Guyuan?”

“You’re the top expert in our faction, Sprite Guyuan. You couldn’t possibly be so foolish. I can’t believe you’re kowtowing to him? You're besmirching the honor of the Spritefolk!”

“Dammit. Attack!”

“Let’s all attack together. I refuse to believe that he would dare to kill us!”

Roar!

One of the Spritefolk experts, with a psychic scale and godhood rating of about seven billion, transformed into a stream of sword light that resembled a striking snake and shot toward Yang Qi.

Yang Qi didn’t even look in his direction. “Be subjugated,” he said. Instantly, the man stopped in mid-flight, whereupon Yang Qi flicked his finger, sending a stream of light into him.

A moment later, the man dropped to his knees. “Milord, you are truly invincible. I deserve to die for my actions!”

“Now for the rest of you.”

CRASH!

A massive hand descended, like the Sovereign Lord reaching from the halls of heaven down to hell. To the shock of the handful of Spritefolk, they could only watch as that hand crushed down on them.

The entire group was sucked up into the hand, which closed around them. Flashes of light exploded out, then they dropped to the ground, all of them addressing Yang Qi as ‘milord’.

Yang Qi felt the surging destiny they provided. It was a different type of destiny than that of the Dragonfolk, but it was fragmented and disunited. And it couldn’t come close to matching up to the destinies of the three major organizations, which was why the Spritefolk had to pick a side to join.

Now Yang Qi controlled the destiny of these Spritefolk, and any who refused his orders would be killed instantly.

Roar!

Yang Qi quickly blessed them with the Eternal Heavenly Aria, then turned and smiled at the group of priestesses. “Do you really think you can refuse to serve me, ladies?”

“Y-y-you...” Dugu Wanqing stammered, a look of fear finally showing on her face. “Stay away from me!”

“You’re very stubborn.” Yang Qi exhaled, causing the Sovereign Lord’s Holy and Far-Reaching Consummate Omnicurse to fall like snowflakes and enter the bodies of the priestesses. Before any of them knew what was happening, they were kneeling in front of Yang Qi.

They had all been subjugated.

Yang Qi smiled. “Excellent. My command of the Sovereign Lord’s Holy and Far-Reaching Consummate Omnicurse has reached the highest level. I can turn it into a falling snow that baptizes anyone it touches.”

“My respects, Milord!” the priestesses all said.

“On your feet,” Yang Qi replied, simultaneously reining in the God Legion Paradise so that the meeting hall returned to its original state. Instantly, the net of law rumbled in and filled the place.

As soon as it made contact with him, he shivered as he felt himself contacting the essence of the destiny of the House of the Invincible. As for the destinies of these priestesses, they were far beyond the level of a viceroy with two lands.

Of course, it wasn’t even close to sufficient. He needed to subjugate more of the leaders, those that had godhood ratings and psychic scales of ten billion. With that, he would gain a very deep enlightenment of the organization’s destiny and net of law. Then he could become like a parasite, taking away the destiny and giving it to his Sage Monarch Empire.

As he subjugated more and more people here, he was actually creating a secret organization in the dynasty. The Sage Monarch Society, which he would eventually use to take over.

There were some existing factions in the Invincible Dynasty. For instance, the grand exarch’s Confucian Society and Dugu Yunkong’s Sky Society.

The nine Dugu patriarchs that ran the entire dynasty didn't pay much attention to such affairs; as long as they had the destiny to work on their cultivation, they only showed their faces for important matters.

Of course, Yang Qi wouldn’t give them an opportunity to do anything. They would have no idea he was eating away at them until it was too late.

“For now, just carry on with business as normal. But remember, you’re now members of the Sage Monarch Society, which will eventually control the entire Invincible Dynasty.” Turning to Sprite Guyuan, he said, “By the way, there’s something I need to know. Where is Sprite Susu?”

“Milord, Princess Sprite Susu is currently at her mobile palace of operations. It's called the Cloud Palace, and it’s been set up here in the House of the Invincible as a special place for her to reside. You see, we’re actually guards assigned to keep her safe.”

“Let’s go!” Yang Qi said. “Take me to see her.”

“But...” Sprite Guyuan said. “Men aren’t allowed to enter the Cloud Palace. Not even Dugu Yunkong can see her before the wedding. We only patrol the exterior.”

“That doesn’t matter,” Yang Qi said. “Take me there. I’ll just sneak inside.”

“Yes sir!” the Spritefolk said, not daring to argue. And with that, they led the way.

After he left, the priestesses sagged limply. Exchanging awkward, fearful glances, they said, “We're finished. I can't believe we've fallen into the hands of that monster. We’re done for.”

“Ai. There’s nothing we can do now except follow his orders.”

“He's wildly ambitious. I can’t believe he wants to eat the Invincible Dynasty from the inside out. Well, we work for him now. He planted seeds in our minds and souls that will make it impossible to be free.”

“So what do we do now?”

“Whatever he says, that’s what.”

All of the priestesses were filled with regret that they had chosen to trifle with Yang Qi. That said, he would have come for them regardless. The Palace of Destiny was just too important to him.

Before long, Yang Qi was deep in the Invincible Dynasty, where he caught sight of an enormous palace hovering in the air, slowly rotating. It looked like a violet planet, reminding him of the Tusita Heaven from the immortal worlds.

Shockingly, there was an entire army guarding the palace, composed of crack troops from the Spritefolk.

Sprite Guyuan was one of the generals from that army.

WHOOSH!

Upon catching sight of the Cloud Palace, Yang Qi became a shadow that slipped inside completely unnoticed.

Chapter 1491: Finally Reuniting

Yang Qi was very excited to be in the Cloud Palace.

He was absolutely certain Sprite Susu was Yang Susu, and he was very curious to find out how she managed to ascend to the god world. Had she encountered some sort of good fortune in the immortal worlds? That didn't seem likely. So had she been taken to the god world by Proud Heaven? But if she had, how did she slip free from his control and get the Spritely Sage Grail?

There were too many unanswered questions for Yang Qi to piece together a theory. He wasn't worried about this being a trap. He had always been a fan of the saying when soldiers come, send a general to stop them; when floodwaters come, use earth to block them.

‘I need to lock on to the aura of the Spritely Sage Grail.’

The Cloud Palace was huge, and all of the handmaidens were Spritefolk women. There were some experts present, but they were all irrelevant, so Yang Qi wasn’t interested in subjugating them. Instead, he focused on locating the aura of the Spritely Sage Grail, which was the most powerful item the Spritefolk possessed.

Supposedly, it had existed back in the days of the preheaven primal-chaos, and it was what had given birth to the Spritefolk. Furthermore, it possessed a preheaven will of its own, making it vastly superior to ordinary preheaven treasures. In other words, it was similar to the Dragon Compendium and the Myriad Dragons Lair.

Sprite Susu being fused with the Spritely Sage Grail was like Yang Qi being fused with the Myriad Dragons Lair, and he took that to be a sign that she was trying to unify the destiny of the Spritefolk.

After all, every faction within the Spritefolk would offer yearly sacrifices to the Spritely Sage Grail. And it was certain that Sprite Susu possessing the grail meant that she was constantly improving her cultivation base.

Yang Qi was very curious to see what the situation was all about.

WHOOSH!

Eventually, he reached a delicately decorated bedchamber deep in the palace. There was no one present; apparently, Sprite Susu liked things quiet.

Eyes flashing, Yang Qi looked inside and saw a young woman dressed in violet garments. If it wasn’t Yang Susu, then who could it be?

Swish!

He entered, and was now standing behind the woman.

She could sense that someone had entered, as she said, “We’re not married yet, Dugu Yunkong. So why exactly are you sneaking around in my palace? This is against the rules, and if the leaders found out, you’ll be punished.”

“I'm not that piece of trash Dugu Yunkong. I trust you’ve been well since we last met, Aunt Susu. After we parted ways in the Demi-Immortal Institute, we never saw each other again. You disappeared like a wisp of smoke. Now here we are together in the god world. It's almost as if this was foreordained. As if nothing could have stopped this from happening.”

When the woman in violet heard his words, she spun around. Visibly trembling, she said, “Y-y-you... Yang Qi?! Am I dreaming or something?”

Yang Qi didn’t look at all like he had in the past, having experienced far too many transformations. But at this point, physical appearance wasn't very important. What mattered was the mind, spirit, soul, and substructure. Yang Susu looked very different physically. However, in terms of her life force, thoughts, and substructure, she was the same person.

He sighed. “That's right, Aunt Susu. It’s me. It’s a strange thing for us to be meeting here. I can calculate the workings of heaven and manipulate the cosmos. I can even create god kingdoms. But I couldn’t ever have calculated that we would meet like this.”

“Yang Qi... you....” She seemed to be so excited she was at a loss for words. Then she made as if to lean forward and hug him, only to suddenly hold back. “Yang Qi, this is a very dangerous place. How’d you get into the House of the Invincible with a cultivation base like that?”

Yang Susu had advanced her cultivation, so the first thing she thought about was the matter of safety. Consummate experts had to get rid of their normal emotions to be able to maintain a cool and collected demeanor.

“Don't worry. The cultivation base I'm revealing is fake. I'm actually on the very verge of stepping halfway into the Annulled level. Few people in the god world could be a threat to me.” He took a step forward and embraced her, allowing him to sense her aura and soul even more deeply.

She trembled as she hugged him back. “How did you get your cultivation base that high, Yang Qi? What's going on here?”

“It’s a long story, Aunt Susu. So, your psychic scale and godhood rating are beyond nine billion. It won't take much to reach ten billion, except it seems you're stuck in a bottleneck.” Looking more closely, Yang Qi saw that Yang Susu pulsed with destiny. Inside her was the Sage Grail, which continuously absorbed the destiny sacrificed by the Spritefolk. Although it was somewhat weak, it was still impressive.

However, she hadn’t yet fully fused with it. In other words, most of the destiny went to the Sage Grail, instead of Yang Susu.

‘The Spritely Sage Grail actually resembles a tree,’ he thought. Even more surprising, that tree had spritefruit on it. He remembered from his encounter years ago that the Spritefolk actually lived in enormous trees.

Waving his hand, he quickly created a replica of the Spritely Sage Grail, which he sent into Yang Susu. At the same time, he said, “I call upon the power of my name to appoint Yang Susu as the senior princess of the Sage Monarch Empire.”

RUMBLE!

He spoke with a golden mouth and jade words, instantly causing a stream of destiny to pierce into her. She trembled, and the Sage Grail inside of her merged with her life force and genes. In that moment, she became the Sage Grail, and the Sage Grail became her.

She was now the Holy Mother of all the Spritefolk.

At the same time, her psychic scale and godhood rating burst into the level of ten billion, making her like the God-Lords of old.

“I can’t believe you founded an empire like that, Yang Qi!”

“I recently took over the Myriad Dragons Lair and used it as the foundation of my empire. It’s not quite complete, though. When I heard the news about your wedding, I had to come here and help you take over as the leader of the Spritefolk. I want the Spritefolk as part of my Sage Monarch Empire. It’ll make me the fourth great dynasty here. Eventually, I’ll take over the other three and control the entire god world.”

“Amazing,” she said excitedly. “You're completely amazing. I can definitely help you, now that I've fused with the Sage Grail and achieved a breakthrough. However, there’s something else you need to help me with.”

“Is it Dugu Yunkong? All I have to do is subjugate him to take care of the situation. Unfortunately, his cultivation base is very impressive. And I don’t think I can overcome him while inside the House of the Invincible. It needs to happen outside.”

“There’s no rush. Now that I've achieved this breakthrough, I’ll have a much higher position among the Spritefolk. Yang Qi, what happened after we parted so long ago? I'm dying to hear.”

“Alright.” They sat down on the bed and started chatting, and it was the most natural conversation possible. He recounted everything about the Demi-Immortal Institute, killing the Crown Prince, unifying the Rich-Lush Continent, going to the Hanging Mountain, joining the Titan Emperor Collegium, ascending to the immortal worlds, reaching the Titan Emperor Heaven, the invasion of the future world, the formation of the Dao Defense League, the appearance of the Great Necropolis, his conquering of the impure lands, ascending to the god world, entering the House of God Ordainment, and all the other things that had led to the current point.

His story already sounded like the stuff of legend, and Yang Susu couldn't help but be excited and impressed.

He could have used divine will to simply impart the information to her, but talking seemed like a better choice. And it had been a long time since he’d just enjoyed a good conversation. It was a nice break from all of the conquering and killing he usually did. And it actually led to some further enlightenment regarding the Annulled level.

Their conversation lasted all day and then through the night.

When he finished, he said, “Now, Aunt Susu, I'm curious how you got to the god world.”

“It’s not that complicated. A powerful force pulled me up into the immortal worlds, and once I got there, I realized it was Proud Heaven. He wanted to use me to get at your God Legion Seal. However, in the process of trying to imprison me, he provoked a reaction from a sealing mark inside me. It caused a brilliant shaft of light to shoot down from the god world, grab me, and pull me up. Once I was here, I found myself inside the Spritely Sage Grail, which was where I continued my cultivation for a number of years. When I finally got out, I was among the Spritefolk, who named me a holy daughter with the divine right to accept the power of sacrifice.”

Although it was a fairly simple story, Yang Qi picked up on some important aspects.

“It seems you’re a fated individual among the Spritefolk, Aunt Susu. Unfortunately, while you have the divine authority of sacrifice, you don’t have official royal authority, so you haven’t been able to unify your people.”

Yang Susu was a princess and holy daughter. She had been given the ability to tap into the sacrifices of her people using the Sage Grail; however, what she had access to was minimal at best.

Chapter 1492: Divine Authority and Royal Authority

Throughout history, it was generally known that royal authority surpassed divine authority. The person who held royal authority handled practical matters, while in contrast, divine authority was related to faith. When a dynasty changed, people would have no choice but to alter their faith in order to stay alive.

The reason Yang Susu had been able to reach the level of the God-Lords so quickly wasn’t specifically because of the Spritely Sage Grail, but rather because she bore divine authority.

Because of her divine authority, she had destiny constantly flowing into her, that equivalent to that of a viceroy of tens of thousands of lands in the House of the Invincible.

That said, it wasn’t enough.

To achieve the goals she sought, she would need both divine and royal authority, combined and united.

Yang Susu understood this as well. She had learned a lot in her time in the god world. Although she had limitations in terms of her cultivation base, she had benefited a lot. And although she hadn’t experienced as many complicated situations as Yang Qi, she had been through many things.

“The Spritefolk are broken up into numerous interest groups,” she said. “Furthermore, there are multiple empires, not to mention the smaller kingdoms. Everyone fights for power and authority, and frankly, it would be impossible to subjugate them all. This arranged marriage between me and Dugu Yunkong is the work of several emperors, all of them old-timers who don’t want me to gather any more divine authority. You see, it's all a big plot. After the wedding, they’ll make up some excuse to strip me of the Sage Grail. It’s sort of like a royal seal, so whoever has it is considered the official ruler. Unfortunately, I don’t have the influence to oppose these old-timers. But I do have some loyal followers. For instance, most of the members of the army protecting me. Although, there are outside agents among them. For instance, the man you subjugated, Sprite Guyuan, is a mole placed in my army by the Gu Dynasty. It’s actually good that you subjugated him. It removes a big thorn in my side, a potentially deadly one.”

“I knew that bastard was no good. Otherwise, why would he be meeting with the priestesses of the Palace of Destiny? You’ve done well up to this point, Aunt Susu. I suggest that right now, you summon all of the peak Paramount Gods who work for you to a meeting. We’ll use the opportunity to find out who’s really loyal to you, and who’s an agent. If we don’t clean house a bit, it's going to lead to disaster later on.”

“But how exactly do we do it?” She knew that Yang Qi had a lot of experience in running national affairs. And although she had long since hoped to gain greater authority, she was simply too weak to pull it off. But with Yang Qi's support, she was like a tiger that had grown wings.

“Simple. Call the meeting, with the excuse of forming a palace guard. Then, announce that with the authority granted to you by the Sage Grail, you’re going to call on your divine authority to bring new glory to the Spritefolk. In other words, you’re going to found a new empire. Taking your palace guard with you, you’ll secretly leave the House of the Invincible and travel around to the numerous royal dynasties to recruit ambitious experts. When the time is right, use your divine authority to call a huge meeting of all the Spritefolk, where you’ll force all of the other emperors and old-timers to submit to your authority. With your divine authority, you should be able to get plenty of ambitious people to work for you, not to mention that I’ll be helping you. We’ll overwhelm your opposition with unstoppable momentum.”

“How many experts can you provide me to help?” she asked calmly. “I don’t have enough to pull this off. There are too many Spritefolk old-timers who can tap into the dao of heaven. And the Spritefolk empires opposing me are powerful. They have access to destiny that ordinary people could never even dream of.”

“Don’t worry about all that. When you tap into your divine authority, I’ll have all of the Dragonfolk old-timers with me to act as dharmic dragon guards. Since you’re now the senior princess of the Sage Monarch Empire, having them act as guards for you makes perfect sense.”

“Alright. I’ll call the meeting now.”

“Alright!”

Bells tolled as Yang Susu entered one of the main halls of the Cloud Palace, whereupon the troops rushed inside.

Yang Qi was actually surprised by what he saw. There were several thousand people, all of them peak Paramount Gods. It went to show how important Yang Susu’s wedding was to the Spritefolk. After all, a lot of the people present were obviously moles sent to make sure she didn’t try to escape the marriage.

However, this would just make it easier to handle them all at the same time.

As soon as everyone was inside, Yang Qi waved his hand and closed the door. Then, a huge greyspace sprang up, ensuring that whatever happened inside would remain secret. After all, they were still in the middle of the House of the Invincible, so if word spread, it could lead to disaster.

The assembled Spritefolk looked over at Yang Susu, and from the way their eyes flickered, some could obviously sense that something strange was going on. Finally, one of them stepped forward and said, “Exalted Princess, why exactly did you call this meeting? Is there some important matter to discuss?”

“Well, if it isn’t General Sprite Tushan from the Totem Empire.” Yang Susu smiled. “I called this meeting because I have an important announcement. The Spritely Sage Grail has suddenly become active, and issued an official decree regarding the fate of the Spritefolk.”

“What? The fate of the Spritefolk?”

“Can that even happen?”

“What the hell is going on?”

“Keep it down! The princess is going to explain the official decree. It’s completely inappropriate for you to be talking so loudly.”

Yang Susu’s announcement had already led to a big stir, and Yang Qi was already starting to identify who was loyal, and who were moles.

“Quiet, everyone!”

Whizz!

Yang Susu used a special voice technique to silence the hall. When that happened, two of the experts present who had been standing there with eyes closed the entire time, suddenly looked up.

“Princess, your psychic scale has reached ten billion!”

Those two, as well as the man Yang Susu had just addressed, all had psychic scales of ten billion. They were very important people among the Spritefolk, and were the commanding officers of the army that guarded Yang Susu.

All three were clad in bright red armor, with red cloaks and tall helms. They all held scepters in their hands, and were surrounded by thrumming energy fields.

Obviously, they were the ones who held primary authority over the task of watching over Yang Susu.

She had already told Yang Qi about them. Their names were Sprite Tushan, Sprite Zhangang, and Sprite Gufeng.

They were old-timers from powerful empires who, despite being at odds with each other, were united in their resolve to keep Yang Susu under control, and prevent her from expanding her influence and seizing royal authority.

Before, it had been an easy thing to control her, but now that she had a psychic scale of ten billion, it would be a lot harder.

They knew that she could control divine authority with the Spritely Sage Grail, which made her very dangerous.

“That's right. The Spritely Sage Grail gave me the power I needed to break through last night. It also gave me an order regarding how to lead the Spritefolk. It said that we should leave the Invincible Dynasty, lest we be destroyed in the future.”

Silence reigned. Hearts pounded, and quite a few people actually twitched because of the tension.

Everyone knew exactly what Sprite Susu meant. She was planning to break her promise of marriage and go out on her own. If news spread, it would cause a major commotion. The House of the Invincible, the House of the Chiliocosm, and the Central Dynasty would definitely be riled up into a huge stir.

RUMBLE!

Sprite Tushan stepped forward. Voice hard, he said, “Princess, I can respect you because of your title. But you don't have the right to go around randomly making official decrees. This wedding has already been set in stone by the real leaders among the Spritefolk. We and the Invincible Dynasty are going to merge to form a grand empire, and you have no choice but to go along with it. You're nothing by a figurehead, and have no royal authority. Understand? Don’t tell me you plan to break the law here today.”

“What gall!” Yang Susu barked. “You’ll follow all the rules and laws of the Spritefolk when you address me, Sprite Tushan. Have you no respect for the Sage Grail? You’re a disgrace to the totems of the Spritefolk. Maybe I should just have you burned at the stake!”

“I wouldn’t dare disrespect the Sage Grail,” Sprite Tushan replied. “I'm just asking you to not randomly announce official decrees. Perhaps you think that because you have a psychic scale of ten billion you can now interfere with royal authority. But that's not how things work. Let’s join forces to teach a little lesson to the princess, and make sure she stops this melodrama.”

“Alright!” Sprite Gufeng said. He and Spring Zhangang stepped forward as, behind them, their followers started shouting out to admonish the princess and call for her to be punished.

RUMBLE!

Even the Spritefolk who were loyal to Yang Susu were struck speechless by what was happening.

It went to show how lacking in influence and power Yang Susu really was. Without Yang Qi there to back her up, she would have had no choice but to go through with the wedding to Dugu Yunkong, after which she would be stripped of any power she did have.

Chapter 1493: Striking Back

“What, planning a rebellion?” Yang Susu didn’t have much power and authority among the Spritefolk, but now that Yang Qi was there, she wasn't afraid of anything. She chuckled coldly as an enormous vortex opened up behind her, and more than thirty figures appeared, all of them pulsing with immense power.

Twenty-eight of them were the top patriarchs of the Dragonfolk. The Second and Third Devil Generals were there, as was Yang Jian from the House of the Chiliocosm. These people all had psychic scales and godhood ratings of ten billion!

Yang Qi was also there, sitting upon an emperor’s dragon bed and being carried by a handful of the Dragonfolk patriarchs.

“Who’s causing a scene here?” the Third Devil General growled, her voice so cold and sinister that everyone was struck speechless. Of course, they could tell that she had a very profound cultivation base, and was obviously some sort of important old-timer.

“What? Paragon-King Sage Dragon?!” Sprite Tushan didn't recognize the Third Devil General, but he did recognize the white-robed Paragon-King Sage Dragon. “What are you doing here? What’s going on?”

Paragon-King Sage Dragon snorted coldly. “Sprite Tushan, you old bastard. Maybe Sprite Tuba deserves to consider himself my equal. But you? How dare you talk to me like that. Are you feeling suicidal? The exalted Yang Susu has been appointed the senior princess of our Sage Monarch Empire. And you just threatened her. Are you actually asking us Dragonfolk to kill you?”

“Senior princess? What are you talking about? What’s happening here?”

Everyone was shocked, and no one dared to take any action. These people were all top experts from the Spritefolk, and they were experienced and knowledgeable down to the last one. They could see that there were over thirty Dragonfolk old-timers here, and the aura they emanated was enough to chill anyone down to their souls. No one wanted to do the wrong thing and cause a fight to break out.

“Third Devil General, ma’am, can you please explain?” Paragon-King Sage Dragon said.

“Okay,” the Third Devil General said with a nod.

However, when Sprite Tushan heard the name, he blurted, “Third Devil General?! The patriarch of the devil-dragons that was sealed by the King of Godmammoths? That Third Devil General? That’s you? How did you get out? You're not dead? I thought your story was just a legend!”

“Ladies and gentlemen, allow me to explain,” the Third Devil General said loudly. “We were led here today by our boundless, paragonic, divine, and ultimate leader, His Majesty Yang Qi, who unified us into a magnificent and grand empire. All of the Dragonfolk patriarchs now work for him. As for your Princess Sprite Susu, she was His Majesty Yang Qi’s aunt when they were together in the impure lands. And now he’s appointed her as the senior princess of his Sage Monarch Empire. We’ve come here to purge any rebels from the senior princess’ forces, and the first part of that effort involves establishing the Knights of the God Shrine. You lot here are going to be the first group of knights. Understand? Any who dare to resist will be executed immediately. There is no second option.”

‘His Majesty the Emperor?’

Everyone looked over at Yang Qi sitting on the dragon bed, unmoving, but emanating an immense grandeur. And they couldn’t help but notice the pious expression on the faces of the Dragonfolk patriarchs who held the bed aloft.

‘Who is this person? The Third Devil General works for him?’

The Spritefolk were all wondering what exactly was going on, but none of them dared to do anything yet. In fact, none of them even spoke. They were aware that many Dragonfolk enjoyed consuming human flesh. In fact, there had been some occasions where dragons would devour entire kingdoms of humans.

It was a terrifying thing that was little different from the dao of devils.

The Dragonfolk had never been united, and had always fought amongst themselves. But apparently, some profoundly powerful person had finally brought them under control. And that was a terrifying and dangerous thing. Everyone had already reached the conclusion that a new dynasty had been formed.

When Sprite Tushan, Sprite Gufeng, and Sprite Zhangang realized what was happening, they were shocked. They knew that Sprite Susu had acquired a huge backer, someone so powerful that she could now call off the wedding with Dugu Yunkong. Furthermore, she was now strong enough that she could probably take control of all the Spritefolk.

And if they tried to fight back, they would be ripped to shreds.

Waving his finger, Yang Qi said, “You three, get on your knees and prepare to receive a baptism. The Spritefolk as as disunited as a dish of loose sand, and I’m going to fix that. I'm forming the fourth dynasty in the god world, and you Spritefolk are going to lead the organized religion of my empire.”

WHIZZZ!

Three beams of golden light shot out, becoming like enormous mammoths crushing down toward their heads.

“AAAAAIIIIIIIEEEE!” The three experts roared in defiance as they tried to fight back with various consummate abilities. One even tried to simply run away. But the three golden mammoths hit them, forcing them to their knees.

“Pitiful fools. Just accept my baptism.” Golden light flowed from Yang Qi, forcing the three experts to prostrate themselves so low they looked like frogs on the ground. They twitched as if with insanity, until a moment later, they calmed and climbed to their knees. “Milord, we’re here to follow any orders you have. We hereby pledge our lives to the senior princess, and will clear any obstacles presented to her divine authority.”

Turning to the other Spritefolk, they shouted, “The rest of you, get on your knees!”

The rest of the Spritefolk were embarrassed and completely at a loss. But they knew they couldn’t defy the three leaders of the army, therefore, they dropped wordlessly to their knees.

Yang Qi waved his hand, sending out golden light to subjugate all of them.

Yet again, he had won a victory without shedding any blood.

“Teleportation portal! Devour Heaven and Earth!”

RUMBLE!

Yang Qi inhaled deeply, and everyone present saw black as they were sucked inside. A moment later, they were in a minor god world in the Myriad Dragons Lair.

The Myriad Dragons Lair itself was slowly being converted into a minor god world, and was filled with lush mountains and rivers, numerous planes of existence, and thriving life force. Everyone present realized that this was the Sage Monarch Empire, a rising force that couldn’t be stopped.

“Susu,” Yang Qi said, “organize these Knights of the God Shrine however you see fit. Then pick some Dragonfolk experts to add to the ranks. Once you’re ready, go to the Spritefolk kingdoms and start gathering more experts to your side.”

“Okay.”

Meanwhile, the larger army remained outside of the Cloud Palace. Taking them along would have attracted the suspicions of the House of the Invincible, so he left them alone for now. With the Spritefolk on Yang Qi’s side, he definitely had a strong enough force to consider himself the fourth dynasty.

Their destiny was roughly on the same level as the Dragonfolk, and the new addition was so immense that it immediately benefited his cultivation base. What level would he reach? Fifty billion? A hundred billion? It was hard to say.

One thing was for certain, he was now in a position to produce clouds with one turn of the hand and rain with another in the god world. In other words, improving his cultivation level was as easy as drinking water.

The Knights of the God Shrine quickly increased their number tenfold. With the twenty-eight dragon patriarchs at their side, they formed ranks and left the Myriad Dragons Lair.

“Yang Qi, I'm going to head to Spritely God-Temple, which is where I connected with the Spritely Sage Grail. After I take control of the temple, I’ll make my announcement and summon all of the important people to a meeting.”

“Doing that will be beating the grass to startle the snake,” Yang Qi said. “Instead, do some selective targeting and subjugate some of the empires. Start with their leaders. Then have your meeting, and you’ll have momentum going into it. Doing it the other way will lead to fighting, which will harm the destiny. Even better, why don’t we split the responsibilities? You to go the Spritely God-Temple to make preparations, while I go and personally handle some of the emperors and other leaders.”

“Alright! Let's do it that way. You start with the Totem Empire, while I head to the temple and take control of all its aspects.”

Chapter 1494: Two Courses of Action

Yang Qi’s plan was to take two courses of action. He would use his incredible cultivation to strike with lightning speed and subjugate the leaders of some of the Spritefolk empires. At the same time, Yang Susu would take the newly established Knights of the God Shrine to take control of the temple she had mentioned. By the time she called her meeting, he would already have some of the empires under his complete control.

The Spritefolk were numerous, and had countless empires. In fact, they were larger than the Dragonfolk in terms of population. The only reason the Dragonfolk had such incredible destiny was that one dragon was worth ten thousand humans in that regard.

That was why conquering all of the Spritefolk nations wouldn’t be a simple task. Doing it with pure force would take a lot of time, which was why he wanted to take advantage of Yang Susu’s divine authority to get more people on their side more quickly.

The best way to conquer a people wasn’t to forcefully subjugate them, but rather getting them to willingly join up.

Yang Qi had no idea of the total population of the Spritefolk, but he did know that they were scattered throughout the god world. Subjugating them one by one was simply too unrealistic. But if he could establish a grand empire with divine authority, based on the faith power of the Spritely Sage Grail, they would flock to it.

Spritefolk were actually human, and they had a lot of potential. Their vast numbers ensured that they would be difficult to rule, but if he had the destiny of a few powerful empires to work with, it would make things a lot easier.

Right now, he had ten million sage monarch magistrates, which wouldn’t be enough. He wanted more. A hundred million. With that many, he could manage an organization as large as the House of the Invincible, at least with some effort. For things to be run absolutely smoothly, he would need three or four hundred million. And if he wanted the destiny to be absolutely pure and clear, it would require a billion.

The more sage monarch magistrates he had, the better.

“Look, Yang Qi. That’s the Spritely God-Temple. I’ll lead the knights there. Use the maps I gave you to travel around to the most powerful Spritefolk empires. I’ll take care of everything else.” Yang Susu spoke with the manner of a ruler. After coming to the god world, she had obviously experienced and done a lot.

Yang Qi looked over at the temple, and found that it was a complex of buildings filled with the enormous trees that were the trademark of the Spritefolk. And streams of Spritefolk headed into the temple, where they would offer sacrifices and worship.

It was a marvelous location. Every hundred years, countless Spritefolk would travel to it in a mass pilgrimage.

As luck would have it, this was just such a year.

“I know a lot of the secrets of the Spritefolk,” Yang Qi said. “So subjugating them won’t be very difficult. You do your work here at the temple and wait for my signal. When the time is right, unleash the power of the Spritely Sage Grail.”

The grail was so powerful that it didn’t matter where the Spritefolk trees were located in the god world, it could connect to them and urge the Spritefolk there to come to the temple.

There were even powerful experts who could use the power of the trees to teleport here. That was one reason why the Spritely Sage Grail was such a coveted item.

If it weren't for the fact that Yang Susu had a powerful cultivation base, other Spritefolk would surely have already taken it away from her. She was now a figurehead that most Spritefolk wouldn’t dare to disrespect. On the other hand, controlling her was controlling a symbol that would lead to immense power.

Whoosh. Whoosh. Whoosh.

Yang Susu and Yang Qi parted ways. As he flew off, he referenced the maps he had memorized and identified an expansive continent upon which had been built a sprawling empire.

Getting around the god world was easy for him. There were distances that ordinary Paramount Gods would take thousands of years to span via flight, but he could cross in the blink of an eye.

That was the result of his combination of a high cultivation base with the Myriad Worlds Greater Teleportation and Tribulation Wings.

As for his fighting prowess, he was already at the peak of what ancient God-Lords were capable of.

Of course, future breakthroughs would only get more and more difficult.

‘So, this is the Totem Empire? It has incredible destiny!’ He stopped just on the borders of the empire to examine it, and was thoroughly impressed by the destiny and net of law, which would repel anyone who tried to invade.

It was a huge empire that rose high into the sky and far under the ground. There were huge trees everywhere, atop which were built various palaces and temples.

The Spritefolk in general couldn’t ever stay far away from their spritetrees.

They were born under those trees, and their life force would be linked to it throughout their life. And the spritefruit that grew on the trees were holy fruits to them.

The height to which a spritetree grew was a reflection of how much power and influence its Spritefolk wielded.

Some of the trees were so enormous that they stretched millions upon millions of kilometers into the air. Some even reached deep out into the void. The sky of the god world was filled with chaotic vital energy and deadly killing energies, but the spritetrees had an innate power that could shield against such danger. In fact, the trees could absorb those chaotic energies and convert them into something beneficial to the cultivation bases of the Spritefolk who lived in the trees.

The trees were like naturally formed cities or even castles. It was actually rare for them to be gathered into an empire, as each tree was a world of its own.

However, they did exist, and when they were gathered into an empire, there would always be common people and high-level leaders. At first, Yang Qi just took some time to look around.

The destiny was incredibly strong, far denser than anything from the Dragonfolk kingdoms. Dragonfolk destiny was always chaotic and scattered, whereas this destiny burned like the sun.

It was definitely nothing to look down on.

After some basic calculations, Yang Qi came to the conclusion that the destiny of this empire was equivalent to three or four hundred million lands in the House of the Invincible.

It was little wonder the Invincible Dynasty was drooling over the prospect of getting the Spritefolk on their side. The boost in destiny would be immense. If a single empire had the equivalent destiny of three or four hundred million lands in the House of the Invincible, and they could get a few such empires, along with some other smaller nations, they could acquire billions, or even tens of billions of times as much destiny as before.

Not even Yang Qi could prevent himself from licking his lips in anticipation. Using his Lord's Eye, he examined the structure of the society here, and analyzed its destiny transformations. The Totem Empire was ruled by a single dynasty, and although the place was very orderly, there were obviously places where the destiny was weak and could be improved.

He could also see that it was connected to the destiny of the House of the Invincible. Obviously, this empire paid them fealty.

There were also many teleportation portals leading to the House of the Invincible, which were used to conduct business. And business was obviously booming.

If nothing else, the rare spritefruit were a source of immense profit. Spritefruit could be used to concoct medicinal pills, or as materials in equipment forging. Although the Spritefolk had rules regarding their holy fruit, the rules had changed in recent years, if for no other reason than survival.

After examining the destiny, Yang Qi could see why the old-timers here wanted to get rid of Yang Susu. It would mean they could benefit even more from the House of the Invincible. They were definitely very ambitious.

‘They just want to use Aunt Susu for their own benefit,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘I'm not going to forgive them for that. That said, this emperor's cultivation base is no weaker than that of Paragon-King Sage Dragon. And he’s hidden in the depths of his empire. It’s not going to be easy to subjugate him. I have to come up with a good plan.’

This mission was going to be a lot harder. For one thing, he had subjugated Paragon-King Sage Dragon in the Myriad Dragons Lair, where Yang Qi controlled the natural laws.

It would actually have been much more difficult outside of the lair.

A second reason this would be harder was that Yang Qi had crushed Paragon-King Sage Dragon’s kingdom, making him unable to tap into its destiny. Here in the Totem Empire, it was going to be different.

A person with numbers in the level of twenty billion, plus the power of an empire to back them, could brush off an attack from Yang Qi. He could theoretically destroy the empire, but he didn't want to take over a patch of scorched earth.

Chapter 1495: Proud Heaven?!?!

‘I need to identify where the destiny is converging,’ Yang Qi thought. After doing some searching, he found what he was looking for. It was an incomparably vast tree that was so high it was almost impossible to measure. And it was covered with immense buildings that pulsed with the energy of an emperor. This had to be the imperial palace.

There was one location in the middle of the palace where the vortexes of destiny were so strong, and the net of law so dense, that anyone who tried entering would be killed instantly.

Thankfully, Yang Qi had subjugated Sprite Tushan, thus acquiring some of the destiny of this place. With it, he could pass himself off as a Spritefolk general.

Thus disguised, he entered the empire without suffering any ill effects. An ordinary person who tried to do the same, even someone with a psychic scale of ten billion, would trigger invasion alarms and be inflicted with crushing pressure.

But not Yang Qi.

As he approached the imperial palace, he drew on the heavenly workings calculations systems that were built into his mind, using them to analyze the destiny and net of law. He assessed their profundities and weaknesses, and even tapped into the destiny a bit to strengthen himself.

The destiny here was no weaker than that in the Invincible Dynasty, but given Yang Qi’s cultivation base, it was an easy task for him to remain hidden.

Swish!

Soon, he was inside the palace without having been detected. And in his hand was a small replica of the Spritely Sage Grail.

That was his trump card.

After becoming familiar with Yang Susu’s grail, he had used the preheaven explosions in his growing minor god worlds to produce a copy. With it, he could exercise immense control over the Spritefolk. Without an asset like that, he would never have just strolled into this empire to try to subjugate the emperor.

Exercising utmost caution, he used the Life-Death Void-Destruction God-Lightning to head into the middle of the tree. There were countless soldiers on guard here, as well as numerous spell formations that actually surpassed anything he had seen among the Dragonfolk.

Dragons were incredibly strong on an individual level, but they weren’t good at building things. They weren’t particularly skilled at pill concocting or equipment forging either. So there was no need to mention spell formations.

Of course, after being conquered by Yang Qi, they tapped into their true potential and started turning into actual humans.

As they grew stronger, their destiny grew more impressive, and they slowly parted ways with their animalistic nature, heading more in the direction of civilization.

In some sense, Yang Qi hadn’t conquered the Dragonfolk, but saved them.

‘What a powerful energy,’ he thought as he blurred into motion, heading deeper into the palace. What he sensed up ahead was an energy so immense that it surpassed his own cultivation base significantly. It almost seemed like some sort of ancient beast was waiting for him.

This shocking level of power was nothing to look down upon.

He had been operating under the assumption that the strongest person in the Totem Empire was the emperor, whose cultivation base was similar to Paragon-King Sage Dragon, at twenty billion. But this energy he was sensing actually surpassed fifty billion. In fact, it seemed something more like eighty billion, or possibly a hundred billion.

How strong would a person like that be?

This was someone who could step halfway into the Annulled level, and as far as Yang Qi knew, the Spritefolk didn’t have any experts like that. If he faced someone like that, he would have no choice but to flee, and would definitely have to abandon any plans to subjugate the emperor.

Even if this person wasn’t half Annulled, but still had a psychic scale of a hundred billion, they would still be someone very difficult for Yang Qi to deal with.

‘Who is it? It’s definitely not one of the Spritefolk.’

Eventually, he reached an area where the emperor was meeting with a visitor. Yang Qi inserted himself into the flame of a lamp so that he could spy.

This person looked dangerous. He was tall and fit, and had a majestic aura that caused Yang Qi to shudder.

Behind him, ten universes rotated without cease.

It was the aura of the Ten Universes!

Proud Heaven!

Yang Qi couldn’t mistake him. It was Proud Heaven! From the impure lands to the Ancient Road to the Gods, all the way here to the god world, this man had always been his biggest enemy.

He looked physically different than before, taller, with different facial features. But in his substructure, he was the same. And the aura of his Ten Universes was very similar to Yang Qi’s Sage Monarch Grand Magic.

Proud Heaven was here, discussing some private matter with the emperor of the Totem Empire.

Yang Qi felt an impulse to just jump out and start fighting. However, he suppressed the urge. This wasn’t the time for that. He would have to wait until Proud Heaven left, then continue with his plan of subjugation.

“Exalted Proud Heaven, it’s a true honor to have you visit me in person like this.” The emperor was an old man clad in an imperial gown, who pulsed with the aura of an emperor. However, it was obvious that he couldn’t measure up to Proud Heaven.

“There’s a big matter to discuss, Emperor Sprite Totem. One of your Spritefolk is set to marry that brat from the House of the Invincible, Dugu Yunkong. I'm here to take charge of the matter. If you Spritefolk join up with the Invincible Dynasty, that leaves me out in the cold.” After hearing his voice, and the immense air of control it contained, Yang Qi was convinced that he was dealing with Proud Heaven.

Smiling obsequiously, Emperor Sprite Totem replied, “You’re mistaken. That princess is nothing but a figurehead. Exalted Proud Heaven, everyone knows the Central Dynasty is the one that truly has the mandate of heaven. Your destiny is righteous and pure, and surpasses even the ancient halls of heaven. If we were truly going to join a dynasty, it would be yours. What makes you think we’re really going to be loyal to the House of the Invincible?”

“Yes, I know that.” Proud Heaven smiled. “You’ve done well to stick to the plan. I'm just here to guide you a bit. I want your empire to become the strongest among all the Spritefolk. Unite your people, then sow chaos in the House of the Invincible. With you working on the inside, and the army of the Central Dynasty pressing in from the outside, we can finally bring the House of the Invincible crashing down!”

“Many thanks for your interest,” Emperor Sprite Totem said, sounding delighted.

“There’s another thing,” Proud Heaven continued, “something that must be kept a secret. When your princess marries Dugu Yunkong, it’s highly likely that someone named Yang Qi will show up. He’s my biggest enemy. He’s long since ascended here to the god world, but unfortunately, I have no way to locate him, as he’s a Fateless One. I absolutely must get my hands on him.”

“What? Fateless One? Isn’t Yang Voidprime from the Chiliocosm Dynasty a Fateless One? Are you saying there’s another one? All the old records say that there's only supposed to be one Fateless One at a time.”

“The details are too confidential to explain to you right now. Suffice it to say that Yang Voidprime and Yang Qi are connected. They're predestined to be enemies. Yang Voidprime is a genius with an incredibly powerful cultivation base. He’s also extremely ambitious. Sadly, it's foreordained that he’ll be killed. He’s no match for Yang Qi. You see, it's impossible to describe exactly how crafty and cunning Yang Qi is. In any case, he's connected to Sprite Susu, and that’s why I’m here to watch over things, ensuring that everything happens as it should. If I can make Yang Qi show his face, and simultaneously bring down the House of the Invincible, I’ll have killed two birds with one stone.”

“Oh exalted Proud Heaven,” Emperor Sprite Totem gushed, “I have nothing but the utmost admiration for you!”

“Enough with the bullcrap. Here, I brought some resources for your empire.” Proud Heaven produced a talisman filled with countless medicinal pills, ores, and other types of wealth. “This should push your empire to an even high level. Furthermore, here’s another talisman that contains a Heaven-Burying God Pill that I personally concocted, expending great effort to do so.”

The second talisman was roughly the size of a fist, and looked like some sort of ancient stone.

‘That’s the quintessence of the Great Necropolis!’ Yang Qi thought, having immediately sensed what he was looking at. He knew that if he could get that pill, his previous connection to the necropolis would ensure that he experienced a huge boost in cultivation base.

“Only consume this Heaven-Burying God Pill after you still your energy. And go slowly. With it, you can double your strength! Remember, don’t rush. It will take at least a thousand years for you to fully assimilate it. Very well, I’ll leave now, before anyone from the House of the Invincible senses my presence. I have important matters to attend to, so don’t attempt to contact me. In a hundred years, burn that talisman, and I’ll return to you.”

Chapter 1496: Thwarting the Plot

Yang Qi was finally getting a glimpse into Proud Heaven’s plot. He really was trying to lure Yang Qi out into the open, and had even roped this emperor into his plan. Sadly for Proud Heaven, Yang Qi had seen through his plan, and could plan countermeasures. Furthermore, even if nothing else came out of this trip, he had learned some of Proud Heaven’s secrets, as well as gotten information about his cultivation base.

His psychic scale was at the level of a hundred billion, and he was in the process of stepping into the half Annulled level.

Once he succeeded, he would be like the Demon Master, True Devil, King Immortal-Slayer, Wretch God, and Sovereign Lord. It would be very difficult to deal with him at that point, and he would definitely be in the position to kill Yang Qi.

There was no way Yang Qi was going to let him succeed.

Clearly, Proud Heaven had been researching the Great Necropolis and had learned something from it. He had also seemed anxious to leave, presumably to go back to the Great Necropolis and continue his work. Apparently, he needed a hundred years before he anticipated carrying out the next step of his plan.

That meant Yang Qi only had a hundred years to work with.

That was enough time to build up the fourth powerful organization in the god world. Once he did that, people would flock to his banner, and his destiny would surge, giving him a cultivation base that could counter Proud Heaven’s. Add in the resources he planned to take from the halls of heaven, and he might even be able to surpass Proud Heaven. If he could reach the half Annulled level, he would definitely kill Proud Heaven and dismantle the Central Dynasty.

Yang Qi remained in place quietly for a short time while Proud Heaven gave a few reminders to Emperor Sprite Totem, as well as some assorted daoist techniques. Then he left.

The emperor did as he had been told and didn’t immediately consume the pill. Instead, he drew on the surrounding destiny to make the net of law around him ten times stronger. Being inside of the area already, though, Yang Qi wasn’t affected.

After the area was secure in the bubble of destiny, Emperor Sprite Totem looked at the talisman with the Heaven-Burying God Pill, and smiled broadly. “You plan things out well, Proud Heaven. But do you really think I would follow your instructions with this pill? You want me to take the pill so you can control me. Sure, it will make me stronger. But as an old-timer who’s been around for hundreds of millions of years, do you really think I would let someone turn me into a zombie puppet like that? You just wait until I join forces with the Invincible Dynasty. As I grow my influence there, I’ll use it to get stronger. Then I’ll just wait for your two dynasties to clash. When both of you are injured and weakened, my time will have come! Hmph! The destiny of the Invincible Dynasty is the only way I’ll get a stronger cultivation base than you!”

As it turned out, Sprite Totem was no slouch. He was trying to play both sides against each other, while simultaneously benefiting from the resources of the House of the Invincible, and at the same time, getting benefits from Proud Heaven.

Inside, Yang Qi smiled coldly.

It was a given that Proud Heaven knew about this. When it came to plots and schemes there was nobody who could outdo Proud Heaven, except for Yang Qi.

As Yang Qi looked on, Sprite Totem wrapped the talismans with destiny, then waved his hand.

A spell formation suddenly took shape in front of him, in the middle of which was an altar that he placed the talismans onto. Immediately, a passageway opened up.

All of a sudden, the energy of the House of the Invincible rushed into the hall.

“Dugu Yunkong!” Sprite Totem said. “I've received some magical treasures from Proud Heaven. It's obviously a trap. I need some of the destiny from the House of the Invincible to make sure he's not using them to spy on me. Can you help?”

“You've planned things out well, haven’t you, Sprite Totem? Trying to play us against each other? What exactly are your intentions with the Invincible Dynasty?”

“We’re on the same side here, Dugu Yunkong. I know you’re fighting for control of the Invincible Dynasty. And I heard that you went into the Myriad Dragons Lair and fell victim to some powerful expert that stole things that belonged to you. How about this: I’ll give you half of everything I received to make up for your loss. I know you’re in a tough spot, so if I get on your good side now, it’ll benefit me greatly in the future!”

“Good idea, Sprite Totem. Except I don’t want anything that comes from Proud Heaven. He’s a vicious schemer, and whatever gifts he gives are definitely a trap. Fine. I’ll use the destiny of the House of the Invincible to cleanse it. After all, it’s not as though the destiny will benefit you directly.”

Bzzzzzzzz!

A stream of destiny flew out onto the altar, causing black smoke to rise up from the talismans, apparently from some sort of warding spell.

Moments later, the two talismans were clean.

“Now, Sprite Totem, you need to work on contacting more empires to discuss our plan of joining forces. Once I’ve fully recovered, I can marry Sprite Susu. And then we can speed up our plan.”

“Of course, of course.”

Sprite Totem closed the passageway, then threw his head back and laughed loudly. “Ah, Proud Heaven. I used the destiny of the House of the Invincible to cleanse the treasures you gave me. You're not strong enough to defy that level of power. Now I can use them safely.”

“You’re quite the opportunist, Sprite Totem,” someone said.

Of course, it was Yang Qi.

It was a case of the mantis stalking the cicada, unaware of the oriole behind it, and Yang Qi was the oriole. In the moment that the destiny from the House of the Invincible cleansed Proud Heaven’s gifts, he had sensed Proud Heaven’s aura flicker, then fade away. It made it clear that Proud Heaven was truly gone.

Clearly, he had more pressing matters, presumably his work on the Great Necropolis and King Immortal-Slayer. Besides, Proud Heaven was the type of person who would have backup plans for his backup plans. There was no way the destiny of the House of the Invincible had truly cleansed the Heaven-Burying God Pill of everything Proud Heaven had hidden in them.

“Who are you?” Sprite Totem blurted, and as he shot to his feet, he drew deeply on the destiny of his own empire. Not even Proud Heaven should have been able to get in without his sensing it, yet Yang Qi just strolled right in. It made the emperor wonder if he was actually a half Annulled expert.

But a half Annulled expert wouldn't need to come inside to cause harm. He could wave his arm from outside the empire and suck it up into his sleeve without any effort.

“I'm the person Proud Heaven just said to watch out for. The Fateless One.” He extended his hand to reveal his copy of the Sage Grail, which looked almost like a tree, its leaves growing with a green light that was the perfect bane of the vital energy in the surrounding empire.

“The Spritely Sage Grail!?” Sprite Totem said, confusion in his eyes.

“Yes, it is. Well, it's a copy. But it’s the perfect thing to keep the destiny of your empire under control. That’s why trying to fight me will be useless.”

“What are you doing here?” Sprite Totem said. He was a consummate expert and an experienced leader, so he was keeping his cool.

“Oh, nothing. You see, Sprite Susu and I have come to an agreement. She’s going to draw on her divine authority to summon all of the Spritefolk to her, give her their royal authority, and allow her to put together a truly grand empire. I'm the leader of the Sage Monarch Empire, and I've come here to recruit you to our side. You need to throw your support behind Sprite Susu. By the way, the person who hurt Dugu Yunkong in the Myriad Dragons Lair was me. I conquered the Dragonfolk, and am in the process of creating the fourth major power in the god world. So forget about your plan of trying to play both sides off each other. Join me. That's the only real choice you have.”

“You....” Sprite Totem’s heart was pounding as he realized he was facing a truly dangerous opponent. Anyone who could conquer the Dragonfolk and found a new kingdom, injuring Dugu Yunkong in the process, was obviously formidable. And it was true that news had spread recently of the Myriad Dragons Lair disappearing.

“What’s your decision?” Yang Qi sat down in the very chair Proud Heaven had been sitting in moments ago. “I'm patient, so I can wait for you to think things through. Look. I'm sitting in the same chair Proud Heaven was just sitting in. I know he has a good cultivation base, but mine is superior. So I’d suggest you refrain from offending me just as you refrained from offending him.”

“You’re Yang Qi.... You’re both ambitious and skilled to be trying to found a fourth empire. And you also conquered the Myriad Dragons Lair? Unfortunately, that's not going to be enough. Even if you get the Spritefolk on your side, it won’t be enough to deal with the other three dynasties. Don’t forget, they form a tripartite balance of power! If you form another dynasty, they’ll join forces to crush you.”

Obviously, he was trying to buy time.

“Don’t you know? With my techniques of administration, I can increase the destiny of an empire by tenfold. You think your destiny is impressive here? From what I can tell, it's actually far from pure. Sadly, there’s nothing you can do to improve it. But I can.” He reached out and took the Heaven-Burying God Pill, which looked like a fist-sized rock that pulsed with incredible power.

“You’re serious, aren’t you? In that case, I’ll join you. I’ll even announce it publicly!” As the words left his mouth, he bent back, then snapped forward toward Yang Qi in a burst of power.

Roar!

However, what met him was a huge primal-chaos elder-snake with gaping maw. Before he could react, he was swallowed up.

“King Heaven-Devourer!?”

Chapter 1497: The Lurking Oriole

Yang Qi had been waiting for Sprite Totem to launch an unexpected attack. The man was treacherous to the core, and was also the type who would bet everything on a desperate move. Sadly for him, he had fallen for Yang Qi’s ruse.

After having fully assimilated King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans, he had essentially turned into King Heaven-Devourer.

When he went all out, he was about a third as strong as King Heaven-Devourer himself, and when you added in the golden blood of the King of Godmammoths, he could reach even greater heights. And that wasn’t to mention that he had taken the actual head of King Heaven-Devourer. All of it made him like a snake guarding a tree stump, just waiting for rabbits to snatch up.

If he had taken the initiative to attack, his opponent would have fought back bitterly, and the shockwaves would have caused chaos and destruction that went outside of the borders of the kingdom they were in. But now, his opponent flew straight into King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans, and was devoured by Yang Qi.

Not pausing for a moment, Yang Qi unfurled his Tribulation Wings and flitted away.

Shortly thereafter, he was in the Myriad Dragons Lair.

SPLAT!

Opening his mouth wide, he spat out Sprite Totem. Before the man could even get his bearings, Yang Qi clamped his hand onto his head and unleashed the power of the God Legion Seal, wresting control of his thoughts and soul. It only took a moment to subjugate him, and then he dropped to his knees.

Swish!

Not bothering with long-winded explanations, Yang Qi then returned him to his palace, where he could control him from behind the throne like a marionette.

Sprite Totem immediately started summoning his top officials.

Yang Qi was so familiar with this process that his skill had reached the point of perfection. It was exactly how he had taken over the Myriad Dragons Lair.

Furthermore, Sprite Totem was an emperor who commanded immense respect and authority. His underlings were much easier to issue commands to, unlike the Dragonfolk, in which countless generals would always squabble endlessly.

Sprite Totem was the type of ruler who would punish insubordination with execution.

He summoned all of the senior officers from the armed forces, and before they knew what was happening, they found themselves sucked into a spell formation and sent to the Myriad Dragons Lair. The subjugation process went quickly, and they were back in little more than an hour.

After the military was under control, the members of the officialdom were summoned and subjugated. It was a snowball effect that ended only about six hours later, with tens of thousands of members of the leadership all subjugated. Before anyone knew what had occurred, there was a new leader.

The underlings were kept in the dark, including the ordinary soldiers in the army and the low-level administrators. None of them knew that a major transformation had occurred, and that their actual leader was now someone named Yang Qi.

Next, Yang Qi distributed the resources that Proud Heaven had given, including all sorts of medicinal pills, magical treasures, preheaven medicines, ores, and even godnotes. It was a collection that would definitely fuel immense growth in his empire.

Although all the top leaders were now puppets under Yang Qi’s control, their administrative capabilities had already increased by many times over. After all, leadership ability didn't really have anything to do with cultivation base.

The empire was experiencing a major revolution.

Normally speaking, there would be competing interest groups that took part in a revolution, making things very difficult. It generally wasn’t easy to just depose an emperor without throwing the entire empire into chaos. But Yang Qi had perfect control of the leadership, and was thus able to iron out all such problems.

The interest groups collapsed, and the power of the government increased. Even the common people could sense the dramatic transformations to the destiny that occurred in the following days. Corrupt officials were being removed, and the national storehouses were being tidied up, with resources being allocated to the proper places.

One of the worst things that could happen to an empire would be for its resources to be wasted, with riches molding away in storage instead of being used to groom talent.

Now, a storm was rocking the empire as Yang Qi ensured that all of the resources were brought and distributed perfectly.

It took almost no time at all for the entire empire to be thrumming with vitality.

Within a few short days, the destiny improved tenfold, and the net of law became vastly sturdier and more effective.

Revolution had swept the empire from top to bottom, and everything was different.

No one could top Yang Qi in terms of ability to run governments. After all, his ability came from the combined experiences of countless civilizations throughout history, including all of the innumerable revolutions that had occurred. Any government he ran would experience a massive boost in destiny.

Within a matter of days, the other major empires of the Spritefolk had taken notice of what was happening, and they were shocked.

Of course, they had no idea what had occurred. They just knew that in a matter of a few days, the Totem Empire had experienced a dramatic transformation. Most of them assumed that the Totem Empire had secretly acquired the support of one of the major sects.

And immediately, they all started considering ways to get a share of the action.

As it turned out, that was when Emperor Sprite Totem sent out invitations to the major empires of the Spritefolk, saying that he had benefited from a huge influx of resources, and that he wanted to discuss forming an alliance.

Without hesitation, the other emperors accepted the invitation. As soon as the meeting started, and before anyone could even give any suggestions about how to divvy up the destiny and resources, Yang Qi made his move.

He acted with incredible speed, so despite the fact that all of the emperors were experts with psychic scales of over ten billion, with immense destiny at their command, they were still virtually powerless.

In the blink of an eye, he subjugated five major Spritefolk emperors, who he then sent back to summon their subordinates to also be subjugated.

It was in this manner that, in roughly ten days, Yang Qi took over five empires, which he made sure were linked via teleportation portal, creating a unified alliance.

Including the Totem Empire, he now had six Spritefolk empires under his complete and utter control.

Of course, the destiny of those six empires was surging to higher heights than ever. No one outside of the empires knew what was happening. However, inside, all of the top officials and important people were working together according to Yang Qi’s instructions.

A month later, all the people in the six empires knew that an official announcement was coming. All of the Spritefolk were excited at the prospect of their people becoming the most powerful group in the god world.

On one particular day, Yang Qi watched as the destiny of the six empires converged, creating a pillar of energy that resembled an enormous tree. It was a level of destiny equivalent to roughly a third of that of his dragon kingdom. And these six Spritefolk empires were only a scratch on the surface of what the Spritefolk in general had to offer.

Yang Qi wasn’t even inclined to calculate the precise destiny valuation.

After the process was complete, he called a meeting in which he announced that all the major leaders of the six empires would be taking a trip.

During the month that had passed, Yang Susu had accomplished a lot, and had finished her preparations.

“People of the Spritefolk,” she announced, “we already have six major empires who have sworn loyalty to me and my Grand Sage Monarch Spritefolk Empire. I hereby invite all Spritefolk, regardless of where you are in the god world, to join us! In the future, our people will never be fractured again. We will be united, and follow the will of the Spritely Sage Grail to rise to prominence in the god world!”

Chapter 1498: Grand Sage Monarch Spritefolk Empire

The enormous Spritely God-Temple was filled with a sea of people.

They were the most important and influential Spritefolk, and they were gathered in the most important temple of their people. This was where the Spritely Sage Grail had originally been housed, and as such, it was a most holy of locations, that had existed since primeval times.

Countless Spritefolk in the god world would look in this direction and long to lay eyes on the Spritely Sage Grail, no matter how long and dangerous of a journey it involved. And most Spritefolk would do anything to defy death if they hadn’t yet made the pilgrimage.

The temple existed as an independent entity within the Spritefolk, and was almost like an empire of its own. However, there were only priests there, no commoners, and the sacrificial resources they gathered came from the numerous other empires that existed.

The handful of high-ranking priests wielded immense power and influence. Technically, Sprite Susu was supposed to be the leader of them all, but the truth was that originally, she only had the loyalty of a few of the priests.

However, with the help of the twenty-eight Dragonfolk experts, and her own command of the Sage Grail, she had brought the entire priesthood under her control. She now had complete control of the temple, and all of the divine authority that came with it.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi had subjugated six of the top empires, which meant she was now benefiting from royal authority as well.

It was already causing a sensation among the Spritefolk near and far.

The day had come in which Yang Susu was planning to officially combine the divine and royal authorities. Millions of high-ranking members of the six empires were present, and there were countless priests and priestesses praying. Meanwhile, Yang Susu sat on a throne, the Sage Grail floating above her head.

A tree grew from within the grail, spreading out to obscure heaven, and casting dazzling sagelight down onto the Spritefolk.

Flanking Yang Susu were the twenty-eight Dragonfolk patriarchs, who were imbuing her with additional power that allowed her to catalyze the Sage Grail to an even greater level. After all, the combined might of those twenty-eight Dragonfolk could be considered second only to Proud Heaven. Everyone present could sense the splendor and might of the grail.

Their eyes brimmed with tears of excitement as they looked at it and realized that the time had come for the Spritefolk to be rejuvenated.

In addition to members of the six major empires, there were representatives of countless other smaller empires as well. Seeing the trend of events, and knowing they couldn't do anything to change it, they had come to join. With the six major empires united, what could the smaller nations do?

Seeing that all the preparations had been made, Yang Susu rose to her feet and said, “I hereby declare the founding of the Grand Sage Monarch Spritefolk Empire!”

RUMBLE!

The millions of members of the six great empires all joined their voices together, announcing in a booming voice, “For the glory of the Spritefolk!”

Yang Qi immediately sensed a huge surge in destiny coming from all directions.

Although the initial destiny couldn’t compare to that of his Dragonfolk kingdom, as time went on, numerous smaller nations would flock to the new Spritefolk empire, and the destiny would continue to grow.

“Sage monarch magistrates!”

Ten million sage monarch magistrates flooded onto the scene, much to the shock of the leaders of the various smaller nations.

“These thrall troops have been provided by the Sage Grail!” Yang Susu announced. “With this army, no one can do anything to harm our empire. Starting today, these thralls will be the ones to accept the loyalty of any Spritefolk who wish to join us.”

Ten million sage monarch magistrates made for a virtually invincible force.

They had previously been tasked with bringing the dragon kingdom under control. That task had been completed, and the kingdom now existed in a state of peace and calm. For now, it could govern itself for a few hundred years without the intervention of the magistrates.

And the Spritefolk empire definitely needed their help now. Yang Qi also planned to bring Dragonfolk into the Spritefolk areas and take some of the Spritefolk into the Myriad Dragons Lair, slowly integrating the two peoples into an even larger empire.

Yang Qi’s destiny was increasing, and as it did, his psychic scale and godhood rating were climbing higher and higher. In fact, they were already at the level of thirty billion.

Cultivation base improvements were just that simple now. Now that he had his Sage Monarch Dragon Kingdom and Grand Sage Monarch Spritefolk Empire, he really was a truly important ruler.

Thanks to his cultivation base improvement, the sage monarch magistrates had added a million to their number. As soon as they began governing the Spritefolk, Yang Qi sensed the destiny stabilizing and increasing.

One day. Two days. Three days....

There was already an immense net of law formed by destiny, spreading out from the temple. And Yang Qi was already creating minor god worlds, causing explosions of preheaven treasures. Of course, the Spritefolk thought it was happening because of the Spritely Sage Grail.

Meanwhile, Spritefolk continued flowing into the empire, and all of them felt like they were wandering vagabonds who were finally returning home.

Destiny was building with every moment that passed.

Yang Qi nodded. His effort to create the fourth major power was finally starting to come to fruition. And it would soon be time to announce the foundation of the Sage Monarch Empire.

The news of the unification of the Spritefolk was still not very widespread, and many people who heard of it just assumed that it was a situation of chaos.

But then the Spritefolk armies and the Dragonfolk armies started combining, and under the direction of the sage monarch magistrates, they started marching out to conquer surrounding nations.

There were many races in the god world, such as the Mechfolk, Magefolk, Giantfolk, Seerfolk, and others. In the end, they were all humans. As for the Spritefolk, they were known for being proud conquerors, so it was little surprise that they would be doing this, especially considering they had the help of the Dragonfolk.

Yang Qi nodded in satisfaction.

His plan was working, and he was already so strong that none of the other three major powers would dare to act against him alone.

More sage monarch magistrates came to exist every day, and thus, his cultivation base constantly advanced. At the same time, he took efforts to excise all disloyal people.

A few dozen days passed, and the empire was more stable than ever.

At that point, Yang Qi slipped away alone, heading back to the House of the Invincible. He wasn’t afraid of anyone now, not even the nine patriarchs of the House of the Invincible. They couldn’t hurt him. His cultivation base was at the level of thirty billion, and he now had incredible destiny to draw on. Not even the nine patriarchs had access to anything close to what he had.

Based on his calculations, it would be somewhere between three and five years until his psychic scale and godhood rating would reach the level of fifty billion. Of course, he had no plan to simply stop at fifty billion. Right now, he wanted to see what was going to happen in the House of the Invincible. He wanted to subjugate more experts there, preferably including Dugu Yunkong. If he could get the House of the Invincible under control, then they wouldn’t be a threat to the Spritefolk. And then he could proceed with the next phase of his master plan. He wanted to enter the halls of heaven and take the resources there. If he could, his psychic scale and godhood rating would climb to a much more acceptable level, such as a hundred billion. At that point, he would be approaching the level of King Immortal-Slayer.

Besides, it was likely there was another piece of the Mahātmā Jade in the halls of heaven.

Upon arriving at the House of the Invincible, he immediately sensed that the atmosphere was different. Everyone seemed tense, as though war might break out at any moment. Obviously, they were bracing for conflict with the Spritefolk.

When news struck that Yang Susu had left the Cloud Palace and suddenly founded a Spritefolk Empire, everything had changed.

There was no way the House of the Invincible would simply let things proceed. No, they would dispatch an army to take care of the troublesome situation.

“Dugu Hong, take me to see Duke Nine Cauldrons!” Yang Qi ordered. Dugu Hong didn't hesitate to comply, and the two of them flew into the depths of the House of the Invincible.

He was currently in the middle of a very tense meeting that had already been underway for several days. Once Yang Qi announced himself, he was called inside.

Hurrying in, he saw that there were tens of thousands of top experts gathered for the meeting, all of them viceroys with ten or more lands. All of them were respectfully listening to the instructions being given by Duke Nine Cauldrons, and other top figures like him.

Obviously, those people were the ones who led the major interest groups in the sect.

Chapter 1499: A String of Subjugations

It was a rather small meeting, and there wasn’t even anyone present with a psychic scale of ten billion.

The tens of thousands of people present were all viceroys with ten lands or more, but to Yang Qi, they were like nothing. After all, in the Invincible Dynasty, viceroys numbered like the eternal sands.

“Ladies and gentlemen,” Duke Nine Cauldrons said loudly, “a major event is playing out. We leaders are currently considering how to wage war on the Spritefolk. All of you need to put pressure on the lands you control to produce as many resources as possible. Once the war starts, you’ll need to provide steady contributions. As you all know, our Invincible Dynasty is lax during times of peace, but when war comes, we strike like lightning and crush the enemy! We’re going to raze the Spritefolk Empire to the ground! Hmph! It’s unbelievable that their vile princess fled the agreed-upon marriage, insulting the dignity of the Invincible Dynasty. We simply won’t tolerate such behavior!”

Yang Qi didn’t say anything, but his gaze turned very sharp.

All of a sudden, a golden tempest sprang up, and everyone felt like they were suffocating down to their souls, or being devoured by a horde of godlings. Moments later, all of the viceroys were subjugated, as was Duke Nine Cauldrons. Everyone swayed dizzily as if drunk.

“You're all dismissed, immediately,” Yang Qi said via thought projection. In response, the viceroys all left in a daze.

Going forward, they would secretly prepare to gather all of their resources and defect to the Sage Monarch Empire at a moment’s notice.

The dukes were given similar orders, and they left.

Ever since Yang Qi took the Cruiser of Civilization as his own brain, it was possible for him to monitor the thoughts of the countless individuals he subjugated, without the risk of missing any important thoughts.

Soon, only Duke Nine Cauldrons was left behind.

Walking forward, Yang Qi coolly said, “Take me to see your direct superior. I want to snag all of the grand exarchs from the confucian faction. The true ruler of the House of the Invincible has a psychic scale of ten billion. You people are just the middle management.”

“You... I can’t believe you're behind all of this,” Duke Nine Cauldrons said bitterly. Of course, he had been subjugated, so he couldn’t do anything to fight back. “You founded the Spritefolk Empire and the Dragonfolk Empire?”

“That’s right, Duke Nine Cauldrons.” Having subjugated such a large group of people, Yang Qi could sense destiny from the House of the Invincible converging on him. Smiling, he continued, “I'm going to continue subjugating people just as I did here. I’ll even get to the higher echelons of leaders as well. Eventually, the House of the Invincible will be mine. I'm going to do something the likes of which has never been done in the god world before.”

Heart pounding, Duke Nine Cauldrons said, “I... I can’t commit a sin like this! I’ll be condemned by the Invincible Dynasty!”

“Hmph! Cut the crap!”

Duke Nine Cauldrons’ thoughts were under Yang Qi’s control, so he bowed at the waist, “Of course, Milord. I’ll take you to see my direct superior. I report to Dugu Ruxia, who has a psychic scale of fifteen billion. I understand your plan, Milord. You’ll subjugate everyone you can, then use them to learn the secrets of the top leaders.”

“Lead the way.” Yang Qi waved his hand dismissively, indicating that Duke Nine Cauldrons should lead the way.

Soon, they were in an area filled with towering bookshelves, which were packed with books and scrolls of all types. They contained all sorts of knowledge and profound information about the virtues taught by the confucians. Yang Qi didn’t need to read them; with a mere scan of thought, he could gain plenty of information from them.

They passed through several worlds of bookshelves, until they were in a place where the bookshelves stretched up into the clouds, and emanated an aura that seemed packed with destiny, and a sensation of strength that seemed impossible to conquer.

Yang Qi was shocked as he realized how powerful the confucian experts were. They sustained the righteous energy of heaven and earth, would defy threats and violence, espouse justice, die for a good cause, and sacrifice themselves for their principles.

However, this Dugu Ruxia only had a cultivation base of fifteen billion, while Yang Qi’s was over thirty billion, so crushing him would be simple. Furthermore, after subjugating so many people earlier, Yang Qi had a lot of the destiny of the House of the Invincible on him, giving him even greater influence over the net of law.

With the Spritefolk empire backing him, he no longer feared anything. If he encountered a difficult situation, he could just use the God Legion Seal to reach out to the halls of heaven. If he did that here, the House of the Invincible would face a major disaster.

Every time his cultivation base rose, more profundities of the God Legion Seal would be unlocked.

And he was convinced that if he fully drew on them, he could definitely scour the treasure troves in the halls of heaven.

“We're here,” Duke Nine Cauldrons said, stopping in front of a towering bookcase. “It is I, Duke Nine Cauldrons, here to request an audience with the exalted Dugu Ruxia. A subordinate viceroy of mine has brought information about the Spritefolk. I'm sure you’ll find the news shocking, so I brought him here to deliver the details in person.”

“Oh?” someone said in a surprised voice. A gravitational force sprang up and sucked them into the bookcase. Looking around, Yang Qi saw himself surrounded by book scrolls, and looking up, he saw a world of books. Some of those books pulsed with the aura of the Sovereign Lord, indicating that he had been the one to pen them.

Standing in the middle of it all was a confucian reading from a scroll of bamboo slips. As he looked up, a righteous, noble aura settled over Duke Nine Cauldrons and Yang Qi.

“This is the viceroy? Oh, you're the one with the good record of service that the Palace of Destiny is after. How exactly did you resist their advances?”

“It was really a fluke, oh exalted one. And it was also by chance that I learned that the Spritefolk are working with the Dragonfolk. They’ve created a massive empire, and the one pulling the strings from the shadows is Proud Heaven from the Central Dynasty.”

Dugu Ruxia turned and looked at Yang Qi with glittering eyes. “That's it? I knew all of that already, so why exactly did you come here? What’s going on here, Duke Nine Cauldrons? Did you really interrupt my important work for something so trivial?”

“I wouldn’t dare!” Duke Nine Cauldrons said, trembling like a cicada in winter.

“Tell me how you manage your lands so well. What's your secret? Why is the destiny so pure? Also, what type of thrall is it that you got from the Bastille of the One God? How come they’re so skilled at governing nations? We confucians specialize in such matters, and know full well how destiny can provide immense benefits to cultivation. Explain your secrets, and if I'm impressed, I’ll reward you greatly.”

“Yes sir!” Yang Qi said, bowing at the waist. “The truth is that they’re not thralls. They're actually ancient souls that I discovered in a magical treasure in the Bastille of the One God. I can show it to you, as long as you don't laugh at the simplicity of it all.”

With that, he pulled out a treasure that glowed with golden light.

“What? What kind of treasure is that?” Eyes glittering with more intensity, Dugu Ruxia said, “Hand it over!” As Yang Qi extended his hand, golden light suddenly shot out, piercing right toward his head.

He immediately realized what was happening. “How dare you plot against me!”

Roar!

Yang Qi opened his mouth, and instantly, the numerous minor worlds around him were sucked inside as he became an embodiment of King Heaven-Devourer.

However, Dugu Ruxia was more impressive than Yang Qi had anticipated, and he fought back so strongly it seemed like he might break free.

‘Incredible. It’s almost like being in the House of the Invincible really does make him invincible. Even cut off from the destiny, he's still fighting? Confucians really deal with destiny differently. Their whole life and cultivation is about the governing of nations. They're so strong!’ Thankfully, he had planned for a possibility like this.

“Many Heavens God Seal! Crushing Power!”

He exhaled, and a huge sealing mark appeared, like the jade seal of an emperor.

“Who exactly are you? That’s the Many Heavens God Seal!” Dugu Ruxia struggled, causing white steam to rise up from him.

But only a moment later, he was whisked into the Myriad Dragons Lair.

Chapter 1500: Secrets of the Confucians

Dugu Ruxia, a confucian expert, master of the ruling of nations, blessed with immense destiny, had been dragged into the Myriad Dragons Lair by Yang Qi.

As soon as he was out in the open, a tremor passed through him, and the golden light that had been binding him shattered. Unexpectedly, the God Legion Seal wasn't able to subjugate him. Yang Qi couldn’t help but admire the man’s noble and righteous soul.

His soul was so strong that it seemed impermeable, and held strong even against several of Yang Qi’s attempted incursions.

Yang Qi could kill him, but subjugating him was going to be much more difficult.

“This is the Myriad Dragons Lair?” Dugu Ruxia murmured, looking around. He didn’t seem fazed by the attack, and instead just smoothed out his clothing, then looked at Yang Qi and nodded as if in greeting.

“You’ve got some icy nerves there,” Yang Qi said. “Don’t you know that once you get pulled into the Myriad Dragons Lair, you can never escape?”

“Perhaps I'm going to die, but I won’t make it easy,” Dugu Ruxia replied. “I almost can’t believe you exist. You command the God Legion Seal, and you're already unleashing a reign of carnage. I guess another arrogant and conceited Sovereign Lord is on the rise.”

“Strong words. Don’t you see what I've already accomplished? Look, I'm not going to force you into anything. I know that you confucians don’t fear death. However, when it comes to the ruling of nations, can you really top me? You've seen how well I run my Dragonfolk kingdom, right? And you know what I accomplished with the Spritefolk. So what do you say?”

Yang Qi had shifted to more psychological tactics.

He knew that he could subjugate Dugu Ruxia if he wanted to, but it would take a very long time, probably months or years. And he didn’t have that kind of time.

Waving his hand, he summoned an image of the extremely orderly affairs of the Dragonfolk and Spritefolk.

When an empire grew big enough, it would eventually stop providing destiny, and would instead absorb it from below. The result was that the empire would eventually crumble. However, that wouldn’t happen with the Spritefolk or Dragonfolk.

Seeing it, Dugu Ruxia’s expression flickered. “That’s an unprecedented achievement in the ruling of nations. Incredible. Where did you get those thralls? Why are they so good at governing? They’re far better than ordinary government officials, and they don't require any destiny.”

“They're my sage monarch magistrates. Not only do they constantly replicate themselves, but they also have immense fighting prowess. And yes, they’re incredible at governing nations. I infused them with the success and failures of countless civilizations throughout history. They're even superior to the ancient angels, although they don’t match up in number. But they’ll continue growing. Look, see how I’ve turned the dragons into actual people? Not even you confucians can do anything like that. Before long, all of the devils in the god world will exist in a state of order. Can you imagine that?”

Dugu Ruxia’s eyes widened with shock. The power of the Myriad Dragons Lair was enough to shake the House of the Invincible, much less when it was combined with that of the Spritefolk. And the force was increasing on a daily basis.

The House of the Invincible would have to pay a heavy price to win a victory in open conflict. And it was entirely likely that they would suffer so much damage they would slip to the level of a second-tier sect, then be overtaken by the House of the Chiliocosm or the Central Dynasty.

“What do you think? I already have agents in the House of the Chiliocosm and the Central Dynasty, all of them ready to take action whenever I say. And I've already established a fourth major dynasty. Your Invincible Dynasty has a lot of resources, but you don't use them effectively. Why not let me run things? It won't be long before you completely surpass the other two dynasties.”

“I have to admit you’re right,” Dugu Ruxia replied. “Your way of ruling leads to a huge influx in destiny, and your sage monarch magistrate are simply terrifying. They're almost like machines. Unfortunately, the Invincible Dynasty is an independent entity, and you're an outsider. I know that you’re telling me all of this to shake my confidence. Unfortunately, it won’t work. I'm not shaken at all. You can kill me, but you’ll never subjugate me. We have an orthodoxy that outsiders can’t interfere with, and we confucians are tasked with maintaining its honor and dignity.”

“Don’t you believe in the old maxims? A just cause enjoys abundant support? The lands belong to the virtuous? Don’t tell me you think my actions aren't virtuous. I'm not going around killing anyone, and I’m skilled at governing. If I controlled the Invincible Dynasty, everyone would live in peace and prosperity. Furthermore, no outside force could ever invade successfully. Doesn’t that meet your standards?” Yang Qi was starting to get impatient.

“Not, it’s not enough,” Dugu Ruxia said. “You’re not from the orthodoxy. You’re an outsider.”

“I'm not from the orthodoxy?” Yang Qi pursed his lips and decided to deliver a bombshell. “Let me tell you the truth. There’s no one more orthodox than me in the entire House of the Invincible. My Master is the Invincible Dugu. In the impure lands, his divine will founded a group called the Invincible Society, and I was his eighteenth apprentice.”

“What did you just say?” Dugu Ruxia said, visibly stunned. “That's impossible. Our patriarch fell in primeval times and left behind nothing but a corpse, which is buried in the deepest crypts of the House of the Invincible. Although we long to resurrect him, everyone knows it will never happen.” All of a sudden he leveled an accusatory finger at Yang Qi. “How dare you try pulling a dirty trick like this!”

“Hmph! You think I'm trying to pull some trick?” Yang Qi quickly used his divine will to recreate an image of the Invincible Dugu from the impure lands. “Take a look for yourself.”

Dugu Ruxia shivered as the memory was transferred into his mind, and he was able to see the Invincible Dugu.

“That’s Patriarch Invincible! I've offered worship to his image, and it looks exactly like the face from your memories! Don’t tell me Patriarch Invincible might be able to live again! But where did his divine will projection go? Why did he take you as an apprentice? And what was he doing in the impure lands?

“Hmph! What makes you think you could understand all the complicated factors that play into it? Patriarch Invincible gathered a group of apprentices in the impure lands, and once he was done with his work there, he vanished. Presumably, he’s waiting for me to come rescue him. It touches on karmic relationships and the magical laws of fate. Surely you're aware of how such things work. In any case, do you really dare to defy the master plan of your own patriarch?”

“Never! I would never!” By this point, Dugu Ruxia was unable to keep his composure.

Yang Qi waved his hand, and a golden halo of light descended onto Dugu Ruxia, which entered his mind and subjugated him before he realized what was happening. He dropped to his knees.

“You... you subjugated me!” he said, his face a mask of despair.

“Yes, I did. And now you know that this is no trick. I really am the apprentice of Patriarch Invincible. He expended immense effort to send some divine will into the lower worlds to find me. And now I have to rescue him. As someone who is loyal to him, you should be doing everything possible to figure out a way to save him. And the truth is that while the House of the Invincible has incredible destiny, it’s not very pure. If I command this place, and use my sage monarch magistrate to govern it, the destiny will become incredibly pure, making it ten times as strong as before. And that’s how the patriarch can be resurrected. In some ways, you being subjugated by me will help you fulfill your obligations of duty.”

Although Yang Qi was being glib, he was also telling the truth. In his heart, Dugu Ruxia realized that.

“Alright, let’s go back. I had no idea subjugating a confucian with a psychic scale of ten billion would be so difficult. It took some work to find the weakness in your soul. It seems the techniques of righteousness that you confucians cultivate really bear more analysis.”

Yang Qi opened a rift, and they stepped back into Dugu Ruxia's study in the House of the Invincible. The destiny that belonged to Dugu Ruxia split off into Yang Qi, and he could immediately tell how superior it was to that of the viceroys. It was a matter of substructure, much the same way that mud could be compared to gold. Even a huge amount of mud could never be worth the same as even a little bit of gold.

“You really are an important person in the sect, aren’t you? I don’t think I’ll waste any more time subjugating more confucians. Who do you think I should target next?”

“The other two factions in the sect are the army and the Palace of Destiny. Of course, there’s also the emperor, and the imperial clan, of whom Dugu Yunkong is a member. They get a lot of destiny. However, tangling with them would be dangerous. I suggest you start with the army.”

“Good idea. I'm sure their leaders will have some good secrets to share with me. I’ll start with them.”

Chapter 1501: Heading to the Army

The army of the Invincible Dynasty had divisions devoted to warfare, martial law, training, assassination, and the like. The army was very influential, and when it came time for war, it would become even more powerful, and resources would be poured into it. It was hard to say how many threats to the Invincible Dynasty had been destroyed by the army throughout the years.

The confucians weren’t easy to subjugate, as they had special cultivation techniques and abilities, and were closely linked to the destiny of the nation. Yang Qi wasn’t inclined to waste time on them, thus he shifted his attention to the army.

The members of the army were top experts who specialized in fighting and war. They weren’t particularly adept at matters relating to the heart or destiny, therefore, they would be easier to deal with.

Once the leaders of the army were subjugated, Yang Qi would have truly inserted himself into the Invincible Dynasty like a parasite. He was like a tumor that was slowly leeching away at the dynasty’s force.

“That’s the army just ahead.” Yang Qi caught sight of an enormous military base that resembled the encampment of the Army of Radiance and Light in the Bastille of the One God. It thrummed with killing energy, and troops were pouring into it constantly through teleportation portals.

The destiny of the army was linked with the destiny of the nation, creating a power that could conquer every obstacle in its path.

‘The army has quite a formidable killing energy. Should I try subjugating it from the bottom up, or the top down?’ He had to make a decision whether to start with a peak Paramount God with a psychic scale of only one billion, or to aim higher, such as a marshal with a psychic scale of ten billion.

The weaker target would be easier to subjugate, the stronger one would obviously be harder.

Unfortunately, subjugating weaker individuals would clog up the bandwidth of the God Legion Seal, and make its functions less efficient. Even Yang Qi’s mind had limits, just like how photonic computers had limitations.

He had only recently subjugated the Spritefolk and the Dragonfolk, and monitoring all of the thoughts of the people involved was no simple task.

There seemed little point in wasting time on the underlings. He would aim for a peak Paramount God!

‘I’ll subjugate some of the army leaders, get more destiny, then start working on that Heaven-Burying God Pill with power from the halls of heaven. All I have to do is advance my cultivation base one more step, and Proud Heaven won’t pose a big threat.’

He was really looking forward to acquiring some of the quintessence of the Great Necropolis via that Heaven-Burying God Pill.

Proud Heaven had hoped to get Emperor Sprite Totem under his control. How could he ever have guessed that Yang Qi would beat him to it? And not only that, but Yang Qi would also use the power of the halls of heaven to unlock the trap of the god pill he had provided as a gift, then use it to learn more about the Great Necropolis.

Yang Qi knew he would eventually have a showdown with Proud Heaven, the result of which would determine who got the Great Necropolis.

Obviously, subjugating important people in the army was the best way to get more destiny. And the more destiny he had, the better. That would increase the number of his sage monarch magistrates, and enable him to control the thinking of his government officials even better.

With that, he blurred into motion as he entered the army and looked for the most impressive aura he could find. It didn't seem like it would be a difficult task. This was the location where all the marshals resided.

However, after searching through several parts of the base, he found that most of the army officers weren’t present. His first guess was that they were all in a meeting somewhere. Quickly drawing on his Life-Death Void-Destruction God-Lightning and the Myriad Worlds Greater Teleportation, he headed deeper into the base.

It was such a huge place that even a Paramount God who tried flying from one end to the other would need a long time. Thankfully, Yang Qi was far beyond the level of an ordinary Paramount God.

All of a sudden, he noticed a part of the camp that had been built out of a mountain chain. It looked almost like a temple of stone that had been built to resemble the word Invincible.

Within that temple were numerous auras that could only belong to elite experts. ‘Why are there so many top experts gathered here?’ he thought. ‘These are people with psychic scales of ten billion! The Dragonfolk only had twenty-eight of them. I knew the House of the Invincible surpassed the Dragonfolk, but the fact that they have thousands of these people is terrifying. There might even be tens of thousands of them! They’re almost as numerous as the God-Lords from the Sovereign Lord’s Age.’

Even a few hundred God-Lords with psychic scales of ten billion would be difficult for Yang Qi to defeat and subjugate. And there were definitely more than a few hundred people of that level here.

In other words, he might as well forget about trying to subjugate them, and instead consider how to not get killed by them.

What exactly were they meeting about?

Thankfully, the palace was lit with numerous burning lamps, so Yang Qi simply called on the power of the Everlit Godlamp to insert himself into one of them and spy on the proceedings.

As he examined the situation, he saw that there were several hundred marshals, all of them on the level of God-Lords with ratings of ten billion, dressed in the clothing of the House of the Invincible. Opposite them were seated numerous experts from the House of the Chiliocosm. Unexpectedly, this was a meeting between two opposing armed forces.

There were hundreds of God-Lord-level experts here!

Even the combined experts of the Spritefolk and Dragonfolk who were in that level couldn’t surpass that number. He had the twenty-eight Dragonfolk patriarchs, the Second and Third Devil Generals, Yang Jian, and himself. That was a total of thirty-two. Add in the roughly forty or so from the Spritefolk, and it didn’t even surpass eighty.

Present in this hall was a group that numbered nearly a thousand. The nine patriarchs of the House of the Invincible even had ratings that went past a hundred billion.

If all of them acted together, there was no way Yang Qi could be a match for them.

If the group that was gathered here today went onto the warpath, he would be in a very dangerous situation. He might have founded a fourth dynasty, but its destiny wasn’t stable, and if he faced an enemy like this, it would probably be destroyed.

That said, he was fairly confident they wouldn’t take any such action. The casualties for them would be too severe. After all, the Central Dynasty was eying both of them like a tiger eying its prey, and the last thing they wanted was to be gobbled up.

In short, Yang Qi wasn’t worried. He could buy time if he wanted to. And every day that passed meant he had more time to get stronger. After he was done with this reconnaissance mission, he needed to head to the halls of heaven as quickly as possible. If he could push his psychic scale to a hundred billion, he wouldn’t need to worry about any sort of attack or invasion.

Yang Qi remained unmoving within the lamp light in order to avoid attracting the notice of those present with ratings of fifty or sixty billion.

The person to break the silence was a marshal from the House of the Chiliocosm, an expert with a psychic scale of fifty billion. “Dugu Sheji, there’s no need to talk about a minor matter like the Spritefolk empire. We brought the army of the Chiliocosm Dynasty here to talk about important things such as the Central Dynasty. Proud Heaven is working hard to recruit as many allies as possible, and we need to figure out what to do about it. The Central Dynasty could deploy troops against us at any time, and we can’t just sit around waiting for it to happen.”

Yang Qi looked over and saw that the man was dressed in a red cloak that burned with intense flame. Reaching out to Yang Jian for information, he found that this was one of the top experts from the House of the Chiliocosm, and his name was Yang Primal-Chaos.

He was strong, but he wasn’t on the level of Yang Voidprime.

The person Yang Primal-Chaos was talking to was Dugu Sheji, an expert who had a psychic scale of sixty billion. He was actually a generalissimo who reported directly to the emperor. He was so powerful he didn't even care about the Palace of Destiny or the confucian faction.

If Yang Qi could subjugate him, he would have control of the entire army.

Unfortunately, even on the outside, Yang Qi would have had trouble doing that. The difference between ratings of thirty and sixty billion was just too immense. Even a fight with him would be difficult.

Maybe if he could lure him into the Myriad Dragons Lair, where he could use the power of the halls of heaven, and also have all of his expert subordinates attack in unison with spell formations, then he might stand a chance.

He had no choice but to squash thoughts of subjugating Dugu Sheji right now. However, if he could subjugate everyone else, then turn them on Dugu Sheji, he might succeed.

“We absolutely have to deal with the Spritefolk,” Dugu Sheji said. “I think this newly formed empire of theirs is Proud Heaven’s doing. If we don't get rid of them, what will happen with all the other races who have been thinking of joining us? Everything will descend into chaos.”

Chapter 1502: Over a Thousand Marshals

There were over a thousand marshals gathered here, all of them on the level of God-Lords. Their combined might was so incredible that if they attacked Yang Qi’s lands, nothing could stop them.

Of course, it seemed unlikely that they would truly act in unison.

Yang Qi had already made a decision: he absolutely had to subjugate the two top leaders, Yang Primal-Chaos and Dugu Sheji. They were the key to controlling both armies.

One had a psychic scale of more than fifty billion, and the other was at sixty billion. It was hard to say what the two of them could accomplish together. Sadly, the idea of subjugating them seemed completely insane right now.

There was simply no way that Yang Qi could pull it off.

“What? You're saying that everything happening with the Spritefolk is actually Proud Heaven’s doing? If that’s the case, then we can’t just attack them. What if people from the Central Dynasty are actually with the Spritefolk? If we go in and start a war, the ramifications will be hard to deal with.”

“No, we have a perfect excuse to attack them,” Dugu Sheji replied. “They backed out of an arranged marriage, which is a clear violation of the rules of the House of the Invincible. The Central Dynasty can’t send in troops considering we have a justification like that.

“Furthermore, the Spritefolk have openly declared themselves an empire. If Proud Heaven is behind that, it’s a clear case of subterfuge. Think about it. What happens if that Spritefolk Empire joins the Central Dynasty? Just what level of destiny will that form? Furthermore, it seems that someone has organized the Dragonfolk into some sort of empire. Dugu Yunkong suffered greatly in the Myriad Dragons Lair, and your own Yang Jian has gone missing. I’d say that’s more of Proud Heaven’s meddling.”

“You're right. Our Lord of the Chiliocosm said exactly the same thing. It’s definitely Proud Heaven. He’s the only one strong enough to do that. And he’s been to the impure lands, where he collected all sorts of magical treasures.

“The fact that he's doing all of this secretly means that he doesn’t want open conflict, but can we really afford to take action? There’s no way he doesn’t have countermeasures in place in case we do. Based on our latest information, the Dragonfolk and the Spritefolk are working together, which means they have an immense level of destiny, and are incredibly powerful. Our two dynasties could probably destroy them, but the casualties would be horrendous, and our vital energy would be seriously damaged. At that point, the Central Dynasty could gobble us up with no effort at all.”

“We need to plan things out very carefully,” Dugu Sheji said. “If we can’t afford to act openly, perhaps we should carry out a secret operation! For instance, we can kidnap Sprite Susu. She's the key to all of this. She’s their leader, and the holder of their divine authority. If we bring her back here and force her to go through with the marriage, we won’t need to attack with our armies!”

“That’s a pretty basic plan,” Yang Primal-Chaos said. “In fact, you could do it yourself. What do you need our help for? You’re really making a big fuss over a minor issue here.”

“No, if Proud Heaven is manipulating all of this from behind the scenes, and we send people in, he’ll just kill them. We need to pick one person to go in undercover and handle the mission.”

“Oh, that’s what you mean,” Yang Primal-Chaos said. “You want us to send in our Fateless One, Yang Voidprime.”

“Exactly. If a Fateless One does it, Proud Heaven won’t have any clue what's happening. Sprite Susu will be gone before he knows what’s happening. Besides, Yang Jian is an imperial prince, and considering he's being held captive by the Spritefolk, there’s no way you can just sit back and do nothing.”

“But how do we benefit from all this? If Yang Primal-Chaos brings Sprite Susu back here to marry Dugu Yunkong, you’ll have a formal alliance with the Spritefolk. And we’ll come out empty-handed.”

“It's simple. Our patriarchs have already agreed that if you send Yang Voidprime on the mission, we’ll pay you with a huge lot of Invincible Gold Pills. You’ll gain a lot of top-level experts with those pills. Remember, the formula for Invincible Gold Pills is top secret. Nobody but us knows how to make them. We’re making this offer in good faith, and we hope you’ll respond in kind.”

“Alright!” Yang Primal-Chaos said with a curt nod. “We agree. However, you have to provide some experts for backup. It’s entirely likely that Yang Primal-Chaos will end up fighting Proud Heaven. And if the God-Lords from the Spritefolk and Dragonfolk get involved, it’s going to be a tough situation.”

“That’s fine, we can do that. Based on our intelligence reports, the Dragonfolk have twenty-eight patriarchs, and the Spritefolk have over forty. Without sending out our entire army, that's going to be a difficult force to deal with. How about we provide seventy God-Lords, and you provide thirty? That’s a total of a hundred, and if they operate in formation, they should be able to give Yang Voidprime a window of opportunity.”

“That should work,” Yang Primal-Chaos said. “The only question is how many Invincible Gold Pills you’re offering.”

“If you provide thirty God-Lords, we’ll give you thirty pills.”

“Absolutely not. We’ll only accept a hundred at the very least.”

“A hundred?! That’s far too many. Even our imperial princes only have one or two each. You have no idea how incredibly expensive and difficult it is to concoct Invincible Gold Pills.”

“A hundred. Any less and the deals off. That's the price to get the help of Yang Voidprime.”

“The most we can offer is fifty.”

“Ninety!”

Yang Qi watched as they negotiated, eventually reaching an agreement for sixty Invincible Gold Pills. It really was a small fortune. After all, Invincible Gold Pills could unlock the potential of even a weakling, and push them all the way to a psychic scale of a billion.

He continued watching as they selected the group of a hundred experts to go on the mission.

The plan was for them to operate an ancient spell formation that had been originally used by the Sovereign Lord’s army. It was designed to deliver killing blows to the head using something called the Purification Thorn.

Once the hundred experts were selected, they set about training together in the use of the formation.

After pooling their life essence and vital energy, each expert transformed into a mote of light, which then swirled together to create a long, sharp thorn.

The thorn was both holy and sharp, and could obviously pierce through anything and everything. In fact, not even Yang Qi could evade it if it were to fly toward him.

It was, of course, the Purification Thorn, which had been used in the past to assassinate elite military experts. Because it wasn't something the King of Godmammoths had used, Yang Qi wasn’t able to use it.

In fact, to Yang Qi’s surprise, the thorn was so formidable that he could tell the net of law in his Spritefolk Empire couldn’t even block it.

He immediately started thinking of ways to deal with the Purification Thorn, and possibly even subjugate the hundred experts who were part of the mission. All of them had ratings of ten or twenty billion, which meant he could deal with them, if he planned well.

WHOOSH!

The experts continued training in the use of the formation, and simultaneously tried to lock down Sprite Susu’s current location.

A day passed, then a night.

Eventually, they finished their training, and clearly, they were all exhausted.

“Take some time to build your vital energy back up, everyone,” Dugu Sheji said. “This joint venture between the Chiliocosm Dynasty and the Invincible Dynasty is going to work perfectly. Now we just need to wait for news about Yang Voidprime.”

“Yes,” Yang Primal-Chaos said. “Go back and get some rest while we wait for Yang Voidprime. The current plan is to set off on the mission in ten days. There’s no way Sprite Susu and her Spritely Sage Grail can block our Purification Thorn.”

“That’s a given,” Dugu Sheji replied. “The Purification Thorn is simply too powerful. Of course, in ancient times, the God-Lords who used this formation were led by the Lord of the Sword Dao, and we're not quite on his level.”

“I heard that when the Lord of the Sword Dao used the Purification Thorn, he actually reached the half Annulled level. But moments later, he perished. I wonder if that story is true. In any case, it’s definitely the most powerful attack the God-Lords could use.” Yang Primal-Chaos sighed. “I wonder if his remains are still in the ancient halls of heaven. I guess it doesn’t matter. In all the hundreds of millions of years that’ve passed, no one’s ever been able to defy the glory of the Sovereign Lord and go into the halls of heaven to hunt for treasure.”

Chapter 1503: Purification Thorn

Yang Qi didn’t do anything other than observe the one hundred God-Lord-level experts training in the use of the Purification Thorn. It was obviously a huge drain on their animadestiny godpower, and they were going to need a full ten-day period to get back to full strength.

Yang Qi knew his opportunity had arrived.

He had ten days to subjugate all of those experts. Then he could use them to turn the Purification Thorn on Dugu Sheji and Yang Primal-Chaos, catching them unawares, then subjugate them too.

Everything was working out perfectly to his satisfaction.

The only hitch was Yang Voidprime, who was an expert on almost the same level as Proud Heaven. Dealing with him was going to be very difficult. That was why Yang Qi had to be absolutely prepared with all of the other subjugated experts before tangling with him.

“You’re all dismissed,” Dugu Sheji. “Our alliance is now formal. Although our Chiliocosm Dynasty and Invincible Dynasty are weaker, if we work together, not even the Central Dynasty would dare to tangle with us.”

With that, the meeting ended.

Yang Qi also slipped away and prepared to make his move against the hundred experts.

His first target was someone from the Invincible Dynasty who had a psychic scale of twenty billion, making his fighting prowess roughly equal to Paragon-King Sage Dragon. His name was Dugu Badao, and he pulsed with a divine blade aura that made him seem capable of destroying anything in his path.

Yang Qi followed him deep into the command center, where his quarters were located. Inside was an enormous lake of liquid jade.

Dugu Badao entered the lake and sank into its depths, allowing the liquid jade to wrap him up like an embryo.

‘Incredible,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘I’ve heard of this thing before. It’s a jadevoid pearlspring, which erupted from a preheaven spring of jade in the ancient preheaven primal-chaos. Only the most favored of the Sovereign Lord’s concubines were allowed to use them. But now the House of the Invincible has them. Anyone who practices cultivation in that spring will be able to concentrate destiny to lead to rapid cultivation progress.’ With that, he sent his thoughts piercing into the liquid jade.

Thanks to his command of so many streams of destiny in the House of the Invincible, no one could tell what he was doing. Soon, he was part of the liquid jade itself and was slowly surrounding Dugu Badao.

Having just worked so hard with the Purification Thorn, Dugu Badao was exhausted, and had only begun recovering.

“What? What’s happening?”

All of a sudden, Dugu Badao realized that something strange was happening around him, and just as he was preparing to shoot out of the jade, he realized he was stuck as surely as a fly in amber.

If he had attempted to escape earlier, he might have had a chance, but now it was too late.

Yang Qi had sent his thoughts to fill the jade spring, turning it into an incarnation of himself.

“Be subjugated, Dugu Badao,” he said. “I am the true Sovereign Lord, and you are my servant. For all eternity, you will follow my commands, and never defy me. Open your spirit and soul....” Without any hesitation, Yang Qi unleashed the Sovereign Lord’s Holy and Far-Reaching Consummate Omnicurse, sending it stabbing into Dugu Badao.

RUMBLE!

A shockwave passed through the lake as Dugu Badao’s mind went blank. A moment passed, then he dropped to his knees in front of Yang Qi. “Milord!”

The moment Yang Qi subjugated him, he felt a shift in destiny as he gained a greater foothold in the net of law.

Dugu Badao was a marshal in the armed forces, and commanded millions upon millions of troops. When he marched into battle, countless nations could be destroyed. He had access to even greater destiny than Dugu Ruxia, so with his additional destiny, Yang Qi was almost on the level of a member of the imperial house.

The shift in destiny wouldn’t be noticed by the net of law, because it involved a personal possession of Dugu Badao. The destiny generated by personal possessions could be freely used or distributed by whoever owned it.

Yang Qi smiled. Having subjugated Dugu Badao, it would be easier to subjugate the next target. It was a snowball effect.

WHOOSH!

After giving orders to Dugu Badao to simply continue his session of cultivation, Yang Qi headed to a different part of the encampment.

He had decided to focus on the experts from the Invincible Dynasty first, as each one would give him a boost in destiny, and also greater command of the net of law.

The next location was another spring of liquid jade, and the expert inside it was Dugu Shiwang, whose cultivation base was on the same level as Dugu Badao.

This subjugation went even more smoothly.

Within less than ten breaths of time, Yang Qi had him completely under control, and had gained access to even more destiny.

In Yang Qi’s view, the destiny from the House of the Invincible had taken a shape that resembled a crown, further cementing the fact that he was like a member of the imperial clan.

He now had so much destiny that, if he had to fight any of these marshals or generals, he wouldn’t even need to use his divine abilities to crush them. He could just use destiny.

Whooosh!

He visited one location after another in the military camp, targeting the marshals who were soaking in their springs of liquid jade. For all intents and purposes, those jade springs were like tombs now.

Over the course of the next hour, he subjugated about a dozen marshals.

RUMBLE!

Something like a vortex of power could be seen above Yang Qi as more and more destiny flowed toward him, and the shape of the crown became clearer.

For now, it was completely illusory, and no one knew anything about it. Only after he subjugated all of the top leaders, and took over the position of emperor, would he become a recognized ruler.

That said, his crown of destiny made him so powerful that not even the grand princes of the imperial house could surpass him. And once he subjugated all of the marshals, the House of the Invincible would become home ground for him.

‘Even with only a dozen marshals subjugated, I don’t have to fear the Purification Thorn anymore!’

Yang Qi was able to pick up speed now, and started subjugating the marshals even more quickly. Twenty. Thirty. Forty. Eventually, it reached the point where he didn’t need to do anything to subjugate them. He would just wave his finger and say a few words, then their destiny would shift to him.

Soon, he had subjugated all of the marshals from the House of the Invincible who were assigned to the Purification Thorn mission. And thanks to the surging destiny, his psychic scale and godhood rating had both improved. Before, he had been at the level of about thirty billion, but now he was closing in on forty billion.

It seemed his breakthrough to forty billion was just around the corner.

Next, he shifted targets to the marshals from the House of the Chiliocosm. It would be even easier to deal with them, now that he was like a shadowy version of the emperor of the House of the Chiliocosm.

One. Two....

Using the same methods, he eventually subjugated all of the marshals who were involved in the Purification Thorn mission. With the increased flow of destiny from both the House of the Chiliocosm and the House of the Invincible, he finally broke through to forty billion!

Chapter 1504: Shadow Emperor

Yang Qi had reached a psychic scale of forty billion, which was a feat that would cause anyone who learned of it to gasp in amazement. There were old-timers who had spent forty billion years working on their cultivation base without reaching that level.

Destiny was the foundation of everything. Not even tens of thousands of years of cultivation could compare to getting even the tiniest scrap of destiny.

It was similar to how, in the impure lands, an ordinary person might spend their entire life building up some wealth. But other people would take the imperial examinations, whereupon money would pour into their pockets without cease. In the end, there wasn’t any better way to get rich than becoming a government official.

Thanks to the immense destiny Yang Qi had access to, he was like a shadow emperor that existed behind the scenes.

It was the same for the Chiliocosm Dynasty.

After all, the marshals in the armed forces were all important people who had access to even more destiny than the important government ministers. In any government, military credit was worth more than anything else.

‘Now that I've reached a psychic scale of forty billion, I'm stronger than ever. The God Legion Seal works even more efficiently, and I can send even more resources from the halls of heaven into the Myriad Dragons Lair!’

Yang Qi was very excited.

The Myriad Dragons Lair was already a hundred times what it was before, and was well on its way to becoming a true minor god world.

With every new landmass that popped up there, Yang Qi gained more destiny. At the same time, the explosions led to more preheaven treasures and god medicines. And there were preheaven aboriginal humans who would appear in the new landmasses, which led to even more destiny.

As Yang Qi’s cultivation base improved, the God Legion Seal worked better, making the growth in the Myriad Dragons Lair increase. It was a virtuous cycle that led to constant improvements.

Of course, he still wasn’t content with how strong he was. Next up, he had two generalissimos to subjugate.

Yang Primal-Chaos had a psychic scale of more than fifty billion, while Dugu Sheji was at sixty billion. If he subjugated them, he would get an even greater influx of destiny, and would probably be able to break into the level of fifty billion himself. Perhaps even higher.

It was almost impossible to imagine what kind of destiny they had access to as top leaders of the armed forces.

Considering that they were the primary factors in the Purification Thorn, he absolutely had to subjugate them. Before, it would have been very difficult, but now that he had an additional hundred experts to back him, along with the Purification Thorn, it wasn't going to be a problem.

However, the most pressing matter at hand was figuring out a way to get them apart.

Time was of the essence, so he chose to focus first on Yang Primal-Chaos.

‘I have a few more days to work with. With all of these experts, and the resulting increase in destiny, I could probably subjugate that confucian expert.’ He was doing everything possible to further his master plan; therefore, he headed into the depths of the Invincible Dynasty like a ghost, planning on subjugating as many top experts as possible.

WHOOSH!

The next target was someone named Dugu Gaishi, who had a psychic scale of ten billion. He was the type of person whose destiny was so strong he could vanquish opponents who were stronger than him.

Sadly for him, there was nothing in this army that could stop Yang Qi.

Yang Qi slipped into where Dugu Gaishi was cultivating his energy arts and drawing on his destiny.

Yang Qi pounced, devouring him in a single move, like a snake swallowing an egg. Just like that, Dugu Gaishi was gone from the world.

A moment later, Yang Qi spat him back out.

Dugu Gaishi dropped to his knees immediately. “Milord.”

“Just stay here and keep working on your cultivation.” The combination of King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans with the God Legion Seal was extremely effective.

Without King Heaven-Devourer, the Sovereign Lord never would have been able to subjugate the legion of gods.

Neither Proud Heaven nor King Immortal-Slayer could have subjugated people in the House of the Invincible like this. The destiny would have revealed them, and they would have been attacked.

Transforming into an incorporeal snake, Yang Qi continued threading his way through the military encampment, arriving next at a marshal named Dugu Xin, who was in the middle of reading a book. In the blink of an eye, Yang Qi devoured him, then spat him back out.

Next came a marshal who unexpectedly wasn't surnamed Dugu. His name was Wang Xilai, and he was a faithful adherent of the House of the Invincible who had a long and successful military career. It was a bit strange, as most of the higher-level members of the House of the Invincible had imperial blood and were surnamed Dugu. Not many people without the surname Dugu would reach such a high level of influence, and it went to show how skilled he was.

Upon devouring him, Yang Qi found that he was actually hiding his true strength. He looked like he had a psychic scale of a bit over ten billion, but the truth was that he rated more than thirty billion! He had been keeping the truth hidden, in the hopes of revealing it in dramatic fashion at a critical moment.

Upon being devoured, he struggled mightily, unleashing a host of deadly techniques.

Sadly for him, Yang Qi’s cultivation base was simply too high. He just unleashed the Sovereign Lord’s Holy and Far-Reaching Consummate Omnicurse, and moments later the man was subjugated.

Again, Yang Qi received a significant benefit of destiny.

“Milord, I’d been concealing my strength for many years, all in the hopes of making a meteoric rise. But now I’ve been subjugated by you. I guess I'm just unlucky. I’d always hoped I would eventually become the ultimate leader of the House of the Invincible.”

“Don’t worry,” Yang Qi said. “Now that you're working for me, you’ll reach amazing heights.”

Over the course of the following days, he was like a specter that went about subjugating dozens of marshals. He even found spies from the Central Dynasty. One of them was Dugu Baihuo, who was actually operating under an assumed name. His real name was Proud Baihuo, and his destiny really came from the Central Dynasty. Furthermore, his psychic scale was actually forty billion, not the ten billion he displayed as a front.

There really were hidden dragons and crouching tigers everywhere. However, Yang Qi crushed them one after another, causing his destiny to constantly rise.

Nine days went by, and he had subjugated fully two hundred marshals!

Thirty were from the Chiliocosm Dynasty, and a hundred and seventy were from the Invincible Dynasty. As of now, the destiny they provided had pushed his psychic scale and godhood rating to the level of forty-five billion.

By now, he knew that the House of the Invincible’s army had a total of six hundred marshals, and he had subjugated a bit less than two hundred. It was about a third of the total number of marshals.

Unfortunately, he didn’t have any more time to work with, as Yang Primal-Chaos and Dugu Sheji had called another meeting. The hundred experts tasked with the mission all flew over to them.

“Yang Primal-Chaos, where exactly is Yang Voidprime?” Dugu Sheji said. “We’re supposed to go on the mission now.”

“Don’t worry about it. He's ready to take action, he's just hiding in the shadows, waiting for the right moment. He said for us to make the first move. The Central Dynasty and Proud Heaven have spies everywhere, and he doesn't want to alert them to his presence. As long as Proud Heaven isn’t willing to make an open move, he won’t do so either. So we need to use the Purification Thorn to attack the destiny of the Spritefolk kingdom before striking our blow at Sprite Susu.”

Chapter 1505: Making a Fool of Yourself in Trying to be Clever

‘So, my ruse was effective. Yang Voidprime is completely focused on Proud Heaven, which means I'm now free to act more openly here.’ Yang Qi knew he had struck it lucky.

Without Yang Voidprime to worry about, he could subjugate Yang Primal-Chaos and Dugu Sheji without having to worry about being careful.

They obviously had no idea that the hundred marshals they had personally trained were now working for Yang Qi.

“Alright, let's get going!”

The two experts led the marshals out of the House of the Invincible on their mission to strike at the heart of the Spritefolk.

They moved with incredible speed, such that they arrived at the Spritefolk Empire the next day. Normally speaking, it would take a Paramount God ten years to make that trip. But these people were all consummate experts that were like the God-Lords of old. From the void, they looked at the empire and the temple at its core, which was abuzz with activity.

“Incredible. All of you, look...” Dugu Sheji said. “How could the Spritefolk Empire have grown such incredible destiny? This is impossible. Completely and utterly impossible.”

Yang Primal-Chaos looked at the enormous temple that formed the core of the empire and saw spritetrees growing up everywhere, forming impenetrable defenses that allowed for the inhabitants to safely work on business, cultivation, and general growth.

Apparently, the Spritefolk weren’t as xenophobic as they used to be, as there were now other races of people living with them in harmony.

As a result, their destiny was stronger than ever.

Upon inspecting the destiny, the two generalissimos found that the Spritefolk had created a world of their own. It also pulsed with the aura of dragons, because they were now working together with the Myriad Dragons Lair. Furthermore, there were even Dragonfolk and Spritefolk getting married and having children, creating a new generation unlike anything that had ever come before.

The combination was one of pure harmony.

And the destiny created an exterior shell that was like impenetrable armor. Without it, how could this place really be considered a fourth dynasty?

The more Yang Primal-Chaos and Dugu Sheji studied the situation, the more unsightly their expressions grew. The destiny was completely shocking both in quantity and in quality.

“Incredible. Completely incredible. Who did this? It wasn’t Proud Heaven. He’s strong, but he doesn’t excel at the governing of nations. If he was, the Central Dynasty would already be completely dominant, and our dynasties wouldn’t be around anymore.”

“Don’t tell me that Sprite Susu actually did all of this,” Yang Primal-Chaos said. “If so, she’s far more incredible than we realized. If we could get her secrets of governing nations, then our two dynasties would get destiny that the Central Dynasty couldn’t possibly compare to. Did you notice that the destiny has actually increased even in just the time we spent talking? It’s like it's endless! Once the Dragonfolk and Spritefolk become fully integrated, it really will become a fourth dynasty.”

“It’s possible that could happen. This kind of destiny increase is simply terrifying. It’s a good thing we found out about this early on, otherwise, if too much time passed.... In any case, we simply can’t allow the Spritefolk to do this. Come on, let's determine where Sprite Susu is.”

“Okay, I’ll do the calculations. Thankfully, I have a geomantic compass that’s locked on to her. It's an ancient magical treasure that the Lord of Civilization used to model his heavenly workings calculation systems on.” He pulled out his geomantic compass and set to work.

Buzzz... Buzzz...

The compass flashed and pulsed as the workings of heaven stirred, and Yang Primal-Chaos poured power into it.

[Beep-beep-beep. Beep-beep-beep.]

The compass suddenly flashed brightly, indicating it had determined Sprite Susu’s position.

“Alright everyone,” Dugu Sheji said, “get in formation and launch the attack. Pierce through the destiny and drag Sprite Susu out!”

Swish!

The hundred marshals leaped into action, and their combined aura was so powerful that it was impossible to detect, almost as if it was in the Annulled level.

The incredibly sharp Purification Thorn formed, and it was so powerful that even Dugu Sheji was surprised by the sight of it.

“Attack!” he growled.

The Purification Thorn suddenly started moving toward the Spritefolk Empire, with Dugu Sheji following it with divine will.

But then, something very unexpected happened.

The thorn suddenly appeared right in front of Dugu Sheji, piercing through his defenses before he could react, and stabbing him directly in the forehead.

SNICK!

He suddenly went completely stiff as a primal-chaos elder-snake appeared, gobbling up him, and everything around him.

Yang Primal-Chaos had been focusing on his calculations, so he was also swallowed up.

Almost immediately, cracks spread out over the surface of the snake, as though it might explode. But then it vanished, having teleported into the Myriad Dragons Lair.

Once inside, the Dragonfolk patriarchs appeared, along with the Second and Third Devil Generals and the top Spritefolk experts.

This was exactly as Yang Qi had planned it.

The snake exploded, and Yang Primal-Chaos tumbled out, his psychic scale of fifty billion roaring with power. “Who the fuck are you! How dare you trifle with me!”

“Welcome to the Myriad Dragons Lair,” Yang Qi replied, having returned to his normal form. Dugu Sheji still had the Purification Thorn stabbed into his forehead, but he was glittering with a bright light that seemed to indicate he hadn’t been subjugated.

However, Yang Qi drew deeply on his destiny to crush the man with incredible pressure.

At the same time, the Dragonfolk and Spritefolk patriarchs, as well as the Second and Third Devil Generals, were in formation dealing with Yang Primal-Chaos.

“It's really true that each new generation will produce talented individuals,” the Second Devil General said. “You youngsters nowadays are always reaching new heights.” The Second Devil General used to be the top subordinate of the True Devil, but even at his prime, he couldn’t have matched up to Yang Primal-Chaos and Dugu Sheji.

Of course, that was because the True Devil had never founded an empire and harvested destiny.

In the ancient past, God-Lords with psychic scales of a hundred billion were very rare. Of course, back in those times, half Annulled experts had existed, whereas now they didn’t.

When comparing ancient times to modern, it was a fact that the average level of the top experts was higher.

As for what it all meant, not even Yang Qi was sure.

Regardless, he was now focused on subjugating Dugu Sheji.

Yang Qi drew deeply on the God Legion Seal, as well as the mighty destiny of the Dragonfolk and Spritefolk.

Yang Qi had a psychic scale of forty billion, while Dugu Sheji’s was at sixty billion. If it weren’t for the sneak attack with the Purification Thorn, Yang Qi never would have been able to fight him like this. And outside of his own lands, not even the Purification Thorn would have given him the upper hand.

“You chickens and dogs! I'm a generalissimo from the Chiliocosm Dynasty! You can’t fight me. Even if you had more people on your side, you’d still die!”

RUMBLE!

Yang Primal-Chaos unleashed an enormous attack that caused a huge hand to rumble out, violently shaking the nearby minor god worlds.

BAM!

The Second Devil General was too slow to defend himself, and was sent flying backward, nearly losing consciousness in the process. Climbing angrily to his feet, he said, “I'm the Second Devil General, subordinate of the True Devil. I'm the most powerful devil there is! How dare you insult me!”

“Second Devil General? Devil king in ancient times?” Yang Primal-Chaos looked surprised, but then he just laughed. “You old bastard. I can’t believe how weak you are. You have no idea what the times are like now. I’ll show you what true power is. You're about to be ended, understand?”

Chapter 1506: Bad Luck for the Leaders

Yang Primal-Chaos was a brutal and ruthless fighter.

He would never surrender, and he pulsed with a fiercely baleful energy. He controlled the army of the Chiliocosm Dynasty, and had countless years of experience. Not only that, his cultivation base was domineering to the extreme.

Not even the God-Lords of ancient times had been as strong as him.

When he swept his hand out, backed by his psychic scale of over fifty billion, numerous experts were sent flying.

Inhabitants of nearby minor god worlds were also injured by the shockwaves, and in fact, had they been on the outside, they would have been wiped out of existence.

“Come forth!” Yang Qi bellowed.

RUMBLE!

All of a sudden, a host of experts appeared out of nowhere, a full hundred of them, all of them experts from the Invincible Dynasty. They were the additional marshals Yang Qi had subjugated, and in this critical moment, they would prove to be the straw that broke the camel’s back.

Instantly, those hundred experts formed another version of the Purification Thorn, which then shot toward Yang Primal-Chaos.

“What’s going on here?” Yang Primal-Chaos blurted. “You people are from the Invincible Dynasty! Don’t tell me this has all been some sort of trap. Impossible! This is just going to lead to ruin for all of us! What’s happening, Dugu Sheji?”

Unfortunately, Dugu Sheji was also in a very tricky situation.

“Brother Primal-Chaos, we've been tricked. I don’t see how we can get out of this situation. Who is this person anyway?”

“Enough jibber-jabber,” Yang Qi growled impatiently. “Be subjugated!”

Despite how much effort he was putting forth, he still couldn't forcibly subjugate Dugu Sheji.

“Sage monarch magistrates!”

At this point, he finally drew on his sage monarch magistrates. He now had fifteen million of them, and they acted in perfect coordination with his will to launch attacks on Dugu Sheji.

Pop!

The dam finally burst, and Dugu Sheji collapsed. In the blink of an eye, a golden throne rose up in the God Legion Seal. This was the largest throne so far, even larger than those thrones in the seal from the ancient legion of gods.

That said, the Lord of the Sword Dao had a superior cultivation base. It was just that Yang Qi didn’t have his golden throne; after he had died long ago, his throne vanished. There were other almighty beings of the past who had used the release of death to escape the binds of the God Legion Seal, as well.

However, those were matters to worry about later. Now that Yang Qi had subjugated Dugu Sheji, he instantly experienced a deep transformation.

Dugu Sheji was a powerful generalissimo with a psychic scale of sixty billion, who commanded a huge force of troops. Even Dugu Yunkong had to support him, and if he refused, would have suffered greatly because of it. Obviously, his destiny was completely shocking.

Upon subjugating him, Yang Qi immediately felt as though the energy of war from the Invincible Dynasty was gathering within him.

“This is my opportunity. Dugu Sheji, crush Yang Primal-Chaos!”

With a roar, Dugu Sheji lunged forward and smashed his palm into Yang Primal-Chaos, sending him staggering backward. At the same time, Yang Qi’s other subordinates launched attacks, causing Yang Primal-Chaos to be overwhelmed with energy.

There were just too many people for him to deal with. Over two hundred experts had formed two Purification Thorns. Plus there was Dugu Sheji and all of Yang Qi’s other people, as well as the raw power of the Myriad Dragons Lair. Probably the only person who could avoid being crushed by such power was Proud Heaven himself.

There was no suspense as to how things would turn out.

Yang Primal-Chaos was vanquished, sucked into Yang Primal-Chaos, and subjugated. Instantly, even more immense destiny was flowing into Yang Qi.

Yang Qi threw his head back and howled as winds whipped around him.

Slam!

Power that had been locked inside of him was released. His life force flourished as his cultivation base rose to the level of fifty billion.

In just a few short hours, his cultivation base had risen by nearly ten billion. He had massive destiny flowing into him from the other two dynasties, and the God Legion Seal glittered with intense golden light. All of a sudden, that golden light shot into the Halls of Heaven, causing starlight to shine dazzlingly. Suddenly, one of the heavenly bodies exploded, and the pieces fell down into the Myriad Dragons Lair, causing explosions left and right.

Yang Qi wanted to take advantage of the moment to fully convert the Myriad Dragons Lair into a minor god world.

Given the previous level of his cultivation base, this effort would normally have taken a thousand years to come to fruition. But he was many times stronger than before. Plus, he had nearly three hundred God-Lords, as well as the leaders of two entire armies. With all of that power to catalyze the God Legion Seal, he was able to do, in a very short period, what would normally have taken a thousand years to do.

With the Myriad Dragons Lair as a minor god world, it would be far superior to the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, and would be something he could rely on to stay safe if the other three dynasties attacked him.

“Let the stars fall....” Rumbling sounds echoed out as more stars from the Halls of Heaven exploded and fell down.

The stars that filled the sky of the Halls of Heaven were actually heaven caliber godstones, which were comparable to perfect caliber godstones. In other words, they were so incredible that even one of them the size of a fingernail would be considered literally priceless.

As the stars continued to explode and fall into the Myriad Dragons Lair, primal-chaos paleo-energy erupted everywhere.

It was an incomparable act of creation.

Not even King Immortal-Slayer could have done something like this. Only Yang Qi was able to, thanks to the immense power of the Halls of Heaven, and the legacy he had inherited from the Sovereign Lord.

As millions of stars exploded and the lair transformed, Yang Qi led his experts in reciting an enchantment that caused numerous preheaven treasures to form.

The destiny of empires was being used to create a true minor god world, and that minor god world was improving the destiny of his empire.

As the process went on, the destiny of his combined empire grew to incredible levels.

As for his sage monarch magistrates, their numbers jumped to twenty million, then thirty million.

RUUUUUMBLE!

Yang Qi was benefiting immensely.

Eventually, a hundred thousand stars fell into the Myriad Dragons Lair, at which point the dragon energy was completely replaced by preheaven primal-chaos paleo-energy. And in that moment, a new god world was created. A minor god world.

It rotated slowly, a crystal ball hovering in the void, pulsing with immense power.

“Henceforth, it will be called the Everlasting Aegis.” Upon naming the minor god world, he sent his divine will into it, causing calm to fill it.

Then, the sage monarch magistrates set to work.

As they labored, the Everlasting Aegis became filled with the lands, life force, vital energy, and people of the two empires that formed the basis of it.

Yang Qi now had a safe place for his empire, a place that not even Proud Heaven could easily enter.

In the moment that the Everlasting Aegis was completed, Yang Qi’s cultivation base advanced again, and his psychic scale and godhood rating increased from fifty to fifty-five billion.

His next goal was going to be reaching sixty billion.

That said, even just fifty-five billion was still an incredibly domineering level. And with the power of his minor god world as well, he was no longer someone the other three dynasties could take lightly.

Chapter 1507: Everlasting Aegis

Yang Qi had finally fulfilled his long-held goal of completely converting the Myriad Dragons Lair into a minor god world. Then he had converted that minor god world into his Everlasting Aegis. It covered his empire and all the lands therein, and if danger arose, it could whisk them away, causing it all to disappear without a trace in front of any enemy.

It was essentially the same thing the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart could do.

Henceforth, his empire would be even more stable and safe.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi was constantly drawing on the grand destiny of the Chiliocosm Dynasty and the Invincible Dynasty for his own cultivation. His sage monarch magistrates continued constantly growing stronger, and given some time, they would be able to reproduce yet again.

“This is great,” Yang Susu said as she flew over, accompanied by Jadefall and Yang Qi’s other brethren.

“Yang Qi, you really do have what it takes to found the fourth great empire,” Jadefall said.

Yang Qi’s other friends and family started weighing in as well.

“Exactly. With Yang Primal-Chaos and Dugu Sheji as loyal servants, you’re now just as strong as the House of the Invincible and the Chiliocosm Dynasty. You might as well officially declare the founding of the fourth empire. Spread the word through the god world, and your destiny will become even more impressive.”

“Yeah. If we declare a fourth empire, people from throughout the god world will flock to us, and provide a huge increase in destiny. It’ll be completely different from lurking in the shadows.”

“But if we declare the founding of the fourth dynasty, won’t the other empires attack us? Then what do we do?”

Yang Qi waved his hand to interrupt the talk. “For now, we can’t make any announcements about a fourth empire. In a moment, I'll head into the depths of the Halls of Heaven to look for resources. Once all of you are on the level of the ancient God-Lords, we can make the announcement. As for Yang Primal-Chaos and Dugu Sheji, they need to return home for the time being.”

“Why?”

“They work for us now, and they make us vastly stronger. What happens if Proud Heaven or Yang Voidprime come to cause trouble? We won’t be able to stop them.”

“First of all, if we openly steal the subordinates of the Chiliocosm Dynasty and the Invincible Dynasty, they couldn't possibly stand the loss of face, and would definitely mount a full-scale attack. And that isn't something we could defend against. Second, if they publicly defect, then their superiors in their respective dynasties would definitely end up being sacked, and that would interfere with the destiny we have access to now. That’s why our current focus should be on stockpiling as many resources as possible.

“With the Everlasting Aegis completed, the current focus needs to be on taking advantage of all the preheaven treasures that were created. Use them to expand our own destiny and produce more sage monarch magistrates. Unite everything we've gained up to this point. Once I'm back from the Halls of Heaven, we can definitely tap into the true history and potential of the god world.”

“The Halls of Heaven are a very dangerous place,” Jadefall said. “Do you want to take the purrling along with you?”

“That won’t be necessary. The purrling is our most precious asset, and although the Everlasting Aegis is impressive, if a truly almighty entity came along, it might not be able to stand firm. Considering we openly exist in the god world, it's obvious we have to do business to stay afloat, and that means it’ll be impossible to prevent almighty beings from coming into our territory. The key is making sure they don’t harm our destiny. And if any of them turn hostile, we’ll have to rely on the help of the purrling. Proud Heaven and Yang Voidprime will find a big surprise waiting for them if they try anything funny. Although, I'm fairly certain Proud Heaven already knows about the purrling. For now, focus on expanding and subjugating as many people as possible to bolster our forces.”

“There are some races that have come here to join us,” Jadefall said. “Unfortunately, we suspect many of them of being spies, or at least, up to no good. How should we handle them?”

“Don’t worry about them. We now have more than thirty million sage monarch magistrates, and their combined power surpasses the God-Lords of old. Anyone who comes to cause mischief will be dealt with quickly. Furthermore, my travels in the Halls of Heaven will definitely result in major benefits. And as my life force improves, the sage monarch magistrates will grow in number. By the way, Jadefall, if you ever notice the sage monarch magistrates suddenly ceasing their reproduction, or if you see their aura unexpectedly decline, open a portal to me immediately, and send the purrling to help me.”

Yang Qi was planning for all possibilities.

“Alright...” his friends and family said, nodding in agreement. There were many tasks at hand. For one thing, although they were all peak Paramount Gods, that didn’t mean they had cultivation bases like the God-Lords of old. That would require more time spent in cultivation. After all, they weren’t Yang Qi, who could tap into the national destiny.

Yang Qi was the emperor of his empire, which meant that he was the only one who could improve his cultivation with its destiny. And of course, he was fully focused on using the destiny to make more sage monarch magistrates.

Whoosh. Whoosh...!

After giving some orders, his newly subjugated marshals returned to their respective dynasties. Although they hadn’t completed their mission, and would thus be punished, they were all important enough that such matters would quickly be smoothed over. Marshals were just too important, and were always being targeted for recruitment by the various interest groups. Now, Yang Qi had some very powerful agents in place in the other dynasties who could use their influence to start persuading powerful government officials to look kindly on the Sage Monarch Empire.

And of course, both Yang Primal-Chaos and Dugu Sheji were vitally important figures. Other than the top patriarchs of the two dynasties, nobody could do a thing to them. Obviously, they were going to be of immense help to Yang Qi, and he wasn’t going to reveal the fact that they were working for him.

Furthermore, with the two armies essentially under his control, it would be much easier to secure new resources, going forward.

Thus, the destiny only continued to improve.

With all his preparations made, Yang Qi headed to the spot in the Bastille of the One God that was directly beneath the Halls of Heaven, where the sky still glittered with a host of stars. Although he had destroyed several hundreds of thousands of them, it was still only a fraction of the total amount. As a result, dazzling starlight still bathed the area.

Normally speaking, even the most elite expert wouldn’t even consider approaching the Halls of Heaven, much less try exploring their depths.

But Yang Qi had the God Legion Seal, which he could use to suppress the tempests that surrounded it. And his Tribulation Wings were a continuation of the Angel Wings, which made it easy for him to flit back and forth between the passageways that separated reality from illusion. In other words, he could easily travel to places where ordinary experts just couldn't go.

Despite that, it still took him several hours of flying to reach the outskirts of the actual Halls of Heaven. It resembled an enormous ship, so big that nothing like it had ever existed.

Tapping into the God Legion Seal, he landed on the deck of the ship, and could instantly sense how different it was from anything else he had ever seen before. It appeared to be completely made of crystal, using some sort of unheard-of technique. And each step he took on its surface caused a sonorous thrum to echo out, like that of a saber or sword being unsheathed.

It was like each step caused a host of top experts to draw their weapons and prepare to attack.

Thankfully, he had the God Legion Seal, otherwise he would already be bleeding out of his eyes, ears, nose, and mouth.

‘What an incredible view!’

Looking down, he could see the Bastille of the One God in its entirety, as well as numerous other locations in the god world. It was like he was standing at the peak of the entire god world.

The reality was that the god world wasn’t a place where the higher you flew into the sky, the further you could see. It was entirely possible to fly higher and higher, only to end up in a lower position.

The god world was neither a planet nor a continent. It contained numerous universal structures and shapes, and didn’t have a true high point or center.

The truth was that Yang Qi’s position in the Halls of Heaven was like a convergence of numerous universal coordinates. And from there, he could see the Sage Monarch Empire, its destiny burning like a torch.

He could also see the Central Dynasty, whose destiny was like a pure white flame that had tendrils spread out through the entire god world, as if it was trying to completely envelop it.

Yang Qi could also see the Chiliocosm Dynasty and the Invincible Dynasty in their entirety.

The god world had numerous empires and races, such that even the most powerful old-timers had never been given a glimpse of what it truly looked like. Yang Qi felt like a frog that had been sitting in the well looking at the sky, only to suddenly fly up and look back down.

At that moment, he suddenly felt even more connected to the god world, and also sensed that he was brushing closer to the Annulled level.

Chapter 1508: The Highest Point of the God World

Yang Qi was currently standing at the highest point of the god world, and it had led him into a state of deep enlightenment. His mind pulsed and his thoughts stirred as his consciousness spread out over the god world at large. All of a sudden, he felt himself enter a state in which he understood deep matters regarding the existence and destruction of the god world.

From any location in the Halls of Heaven, it was possible to get a birds-eye view of the god world.

It was hard to say how the Sovereign Lord had controlled it all, or how he had searched through all of the infinite spatial nexuses of the universe to find this one specific location of immense ‘height’.

Perhaps a place like this hadn’t existed in the god world, and the Sovereign Lord had used his magnificent godpower to create one. Perhaps the Halls of Heaven actually didn’t even exist in the god world.

After all, it would be impossible to gaze upon the entire god world from within the god world.

You can’t know the true shape of the god world because of being in the god world itself.

Yang Qi knew that his cultivation base wasn’t high enough to perceive the entire god world while simultaneously being in it.

Even now, while he did have a bird’s-eye view, there were still many parts of the god world that were shrouded by primal-chaos. Outside of the god world, there was nothing but primal-chaos. Furthermore, the god world was constantly expanding. Eventually, when it filled the entire world of primal-chaos, the entire multiverse would explode, bringing about the ultimate doomsday. As for what would happen afterward, it was impossible to tell.

That would be a true tribulation.

And without reaching the Annulled level, no one could survive it, not even someone like the Sovereign Lord.

Yang Qi just stood there, soaking in the view of the god world and gaining unprecedented enlightenment. As he did, his psychic scale shot upward by billions and billions.

Six hours later, intense rumbling filled him as his psychic scale reached sixty billion. At the same time, the surging godpower of the Halls of Heaven flowed into him, pushing his monarch godhood to the same level.

He was now standing atop the buildings that made up the Halls of Heaven, which represented a power that no magical treasure could match up to. The Halls of Heaven just weren’t made from the same material as the god world.

It would be like the difference between someone absorbing the rays of the sun in the sky, and a person standing on the sun directly absorbing its power. The two couldn’t compare.

As the hours passed, Jadefall and the others in the Sage Monarch Empire could sense that something was happening. The sage monarch magistrates grew stronger, then started proliferating again. As they did, they threw back their heads and let loose howls that filled the entire empire.

They weren’t howls of fear, but of passion and struggle. And the cries caused the hearts of everyone that heard them to thump with anticipation. They all knew from the sound alone that their empire would continue to thrive, and would never decline.

“The sage monarch magistrates are proliferating again. And each one is already at the peak Paramount God level. Are they going to break through? Incredible! They all have teleportation portals linking them to the power of the Halls of Heaven.”

Jadefall, Yang Qi’s other brethren, the Dragonfolk patriarchs, the Second and Third Devil Generals, and everyone else in their group exchanged stunned glances.

They could only watch as the sage monarch magistrates grew stronger, slowly reaching the power level of nine hundred million. If they broke through, there would be no question that they were the most elite type of thrall in all heaven and earth. Although their numbers were particularly impressive, they only had a few million, but that still represented an immense level of power.

Thirty-five million.

Forty million.

Fifty million.

In the blink of an eye, the sage monarch magistrates had proliferated to the level of fifty million! Because of the rapid increase, everyone knew that Yang Qi had come across some sort of amazingly good fortune.

Of course, it hadn’t come from any magical treasure or treasure trove, but rather a deep and profound enlightenment.

That was the best type of cultivation, which, when coupled with destiny, was unmatchable. To reach the Annulled level, one had to break through the bounds of one’s own soul and spirit.

Aaaaoooooo!

Heaven and earth trembled violently.

Yang Qi’s cultivation and thinking had both reached perfect states. He had a psychic scale and godhood rating of sixty billion, which ensured that dramatic transformations were taking place within him. His black hair seemed to fuse with the void around him, and his feet connected firmly to the ground.

Soon, the fluctuations died down and the moment had passed.

Whoosh. Whoosh. Whoosh.

Again, Yang Qi stared down at the god world, as if committing everything he was seeing to memory, creating a map of the place that existed in his mind.

Despite being in the Halls of Heaven, he still couldn’t tell exactly how large the place was. It was like looking at an iceberg floating in the ocean; how could anyone tell what exactly lay beneath the surface?

But the tip of the iceberg that he could see was still more than enough to understand the circumstances of the god world much better than before.

One thing was certain: if one wanted to leave the god world, it would essentially be impossible, no matter which direction they chose to travel.

If he could leave the god world, he could search for the Ancient Road to the Gods and the vanished impure lands. And if he could do that, he would be able to collect all the friends and family he had left behind.

All such people would become key elites in his empire, which would make it even stronger. So he very much wanted to do that, and until it was accomplished, he couldn’t rest at ease. Unfortunately, to date, he still didn’t know how to get from the god world to the Ancient Road to the Gods and the impure lands.

After gazing at the full structure of the god world, he turned and headed deeper into the Halls of Heaven. They were huge, larger than any other unique area Yang Qi had visited. It made sense, considering the Halls of Heaven weren’t truly a part of the god world. However, he could also tell that they were smaller than the god world as a whole.

The Halls of Heaven had been created with immense effort by the Sovereign Lord after he had unified the god world. He had used incalculable amounts of resources, and numerous treasures taken out of the ancient primal-chaos, to build it.

The time had come to search for treasures. He was in another world of resplendent palaces and buildings, although he didn’t enter any of them. He restricted his search to places he could see without touching anything.

At one point, he caught sight of a group of pearls inlaid in the walls of a palace, which glowed with a soft, pure light that was devoid of even a speck of darkness and gloom. They were preheaven treasures, born out of big bang explosions in ancient primal-chaos, and they were known as nine-yangs ultraradiance pearls.

Their light could pierce through any haze, and they could be used to create the most powerful out-of-body incarnations, form second nascent divinities, and pierce through the defenses of any enemy.

Yang Qi chose not to take them. Although they were true treasures, they were an integral part of the Halls of Heaven, so taking them would damage the structure of the halls.

He wanted to find some treasure troves that contained stockpiles of treasures.

‘Where would the treasures be hidden here? Most importantly, I need to find another piece of the Mahātmā Jade. Once I get the piece from here, I should be just on the verge of completing my collection. It’s likely that the final piece is in the Central Dynasty with Proud Heaven or Proud Central.’

Yang Qi’s heart thumped a bit.

Closing his eyes, he focused on the energy of the jade, and in his mind, he could see the composite image, except that it was clearly missing two pieces. Furthermore, they were obviously the two most important pieces. With them, the jade would be complete, and he would have the legacy of the ancient True Devil, and could tap into the true power of the dao of devils.

Of course, getting that piece would also boost his psychic scale, most likely to the level of seventy billion.

At that point, getting the final piece would be a lot easier. He might even be able to reach out and summon it to him, regardless of how tightly its current owner had it locked down. But no matter how he did it, he needed to be very careful. Proud Heaven and Proud Central could very well be using it as bait to trap whoever was trying to collect them.

Yang Qi himself had used tactics such as that in the past, so he knew how effective they could be.

Even as he formed the image of the jade in his mind, it suddenly stirred, giving him a direction to travel in.

He nodded, and proceeded forward carefully, using the God Legion Seal to make sure he stayed as safe as possible.

Chapter 1509: Consummate Treasure Trove

The depths of the Halls of Heaven were filled with hidden spell formations. In fact, even the dust motes in the air had them. Someone who inhaled such a dust mote would be inhaling a deadly trap. Even an expert with a psychic scale of a hundred billion who did so would end up dead through and through.

If it weren’t for how deadly the Halls of Heaven were, it would have already been looted clean by experts from the three dynasties. There wasn’t anyone who didn’t drool over the idea of getting what the halls had to offer.

Sadly, from ancient times until now, any hero who got too close to them ended up dead. And those who didn’t die from the initial contact were cursed horribly, ending up with such bad luck that they would eventually die.

Not a single expert had ever entered this place.

Thankfully, Yang Qi had the God Legion Seal. That said, he still wouldn’t underestimate the place. He knew that there were spell formations everywhere, and that even inhaling a mote of dust could prove deadly.

About half of the deadly formations could simply be dismantled by the God Legion Seal. The other half required Yang Qi to use special means to avoid. As long as he did that, and didn’t touch anything, he wouldn’t have any trouble traveling about, as he had the blood of the King of Godmammoths.

But doing any sort of looting was going to be difficult.

He could sense that even the blades of grass had been put in place according to a special design. Everything conformed to the dao of heaven and earth, and the quintessence of the universe. Even the floor tiles seemed uncharacteristically rare and special.

Yang Qi wasn’t going to take any sort of action blithely, as he knew that disturbing the structure of the Halls of Heaven would provoke a deadly attack.

He could only go about his search slowly and carefully.

Thus, he followed the guidance of the Mahātmā Jade, flying along with immense caution.

As he proceeded along the roads in the Halls of Heaven, he passed pagodas, kiosks, palaces, wide avenues, enormous public squares, and every one was as beautiful as could be imagined.

He saw a flower garden filled with fresh blooming flowers, and he recognized many of them: flowers of illusion, flowers of karma, flowers of good and evil, flowers of time, flowers of the five phases, and others. All of them were vying with each other in terms of glamor and beauty, and some of them had even borne fruit.

Yang Qi could create things like these with primal-chaos explosions. And he didn't dare attempt to pick any of these flowers or fruits. Instead, he remained completely focused on finding the piece of the Mahātmā Jade.

After all, the jade wasn’t fundamentally part of the Halls of Heaven, so taking it wouldn’t provoke a reaction. Once he got the jade, and his psychic scale increased, the God Legion Seal would give him a deeper connection to and understanding of the Halls of Heaven, and then getting such treasures would be much easier.

He still hadn’t reached the ultimate limit of what the God Legion Seal had to offer.

The interior of the Halls of Heaven had countless pathways that twisted and turned. There were bridges that spanned streams, twisting corridors, and numerous sights to see. But he didn’t waste time on sightseeing.

Several hours later, he stepped out into a wide public square, covered with bronze floor tiles. And a bronze temple sat at the other end, pulsing with the energy of the Mahātmā Jade.

‘Hmm. This is a treasure storehouse alright. There are a lot of places like this throughout the Halls of Heaven. Too many to count. But why does this one seem to be in disrepair?’

The main gate was halfway collapsed, and it bore the aura of ancient devils, as well as the musty smell of age.

It seemed this was a place in the Halls of Heaven that had suffered an attack by the True Devil. Either that, or when the Mahātmā Jade exploded, one of the pieces landed here and caused the destruction.

Yang Qi immediately headed toward the entrance, which was mostly in ruins. However, his heart pounded as he knew that the Mahātmā Jade was here, and that he was about to get it.

He stepped inside, to find that it was pitch black. However, he could still see, and at the far end, embedded deeply in the wall, was a piece of jade that was the exact shape of one of the missing pieces in his collection.

“Excellent,” he murmured, his heart pounding in his chest. Once he got this piece, all he needed was the piece from the Central Dynasty.

That said, he wasn’t about to let his guard down now.

Walking further inside, he opened his Lord's Eye to scan the area for danger.

The vital energy here was in chaos, and was thoroughly intermingled with the aura of devils.

The place was completely empty, as though it had been wiped clean by a single destructive blast. Obviously, when the Mahātmā Jade had hit this place, the force released had destroyed the other magical treasures that existed there, transforming them into nothing but ash.

Approaching the bronze wall, he reached out toward the depression, whereupon the Mahātmā Jade started trembling. Then, cracking sounds rang out as sections of the wall crumbled and fell off.

Finally, the jade shot out into his hand.

‘Alright,’ he thought, although he kept his heart calm and at ease.

However, even as he prepared to assimilate the piece of the jade, he sensed something being him, a beam of sword light stabbing toward him with unexpected speed.

“That’s....”

There was no time to contemplate what dao of the sword this was, or where it came from. It wasn’t King Life-Killer’s sword, nor was it that of Star Swordlife.

King Life-Killer’s dao of the sword was about pure killing.

Star Swordlife’s dao of the sword was about pure life.

As for this dao of the sword, it was about the pure sword.

This was a true dao of the sword, something that could truly be called a sword technique. As it stabbed toward him, Yang Qi suddenly came to understand the true meaning of the dao of the sword. He finally understood its ultimate meaning.

Swords weren’t life. Nor were they destruction. Swords were swords. There was nothing really complicated about them. They were a weapon, and they were a concept.

“Dammit....” he murmured as the sword seemed ready to eradicate every aspect of his life force. All of a sudden, his eternally indestructible soul seemed like a mere candle flickering in the wind.

Of course, Yang Qi wasn’t an ordinary person. At this moment in which he faced sudden death, in which catastrophe loomed, the Mahātmā Jade suddenly vanished from his palm.

It became a stream of thought that shot into his mind, whereupon his entire person vanished, replaced by the fluctuations of kalpas and tribulations, completely lacking in fear.

“Your sword; my will,” a voice spoke.

Yang Qi's thoughts expelled the sword energy, and then his body formed again, and his psychic scale was climbing. He had devoured the Mahātmā Jade!

Creak. Crack....

His psychic scale instantly jumped from sixty billion to seventy billion! It was an increase of ten billion! And it had occurred as easily as if he had just taken a drink of water.

Looking off into the distance, Yang Qi murmured, “Lord of the Sword Dao. Who would’ve guessed that you’re not actually dead? You’re here in the Halls of Heaven. You have my admiration. That sword alone would have killed anyone other than me, even someone with a psychic scale of a hundred billion. Sadly for you, I was already fusing with the Mahātmā Jade. In order to destroy me, you would have had to destroy the jade. In other words, without destroying the jade, you can’t destroy me.”

“I’m truly shocked that the world has changed in this way in the past hundreds of millions of years....” As the voice drifted into the room, a tall, burly man walked in, holding a sword in his hand.

He looked like a lonely wanderer, the type that wouldn't have a home or friends to return to. It was as if he didn’t even belong in the world of ordinary men, nor in this universe. He was desolate, lonesome, and the type of nomad no one could ever understand. He didn't carry a vat of alcohol, as he didn’t rely on alcohol to dispel his melancholy. He only relied on his sword.

He almost didn’t look like the enigmatic master killer that the Sovereign Lord had employed, the famous Lord of the Sword Dao, top member of the God-Lords. He looked more like a down-and-out assassin from the impure lands.

However, within his eyes was a darkness like that of the resplendent chill of nightfall.

This was definitely the most powerful expert Yang Qi had ever encountered, someone whose experiences surpassed even that of Proud Heaven.

This was a true swordsman. Compared to him, Star Swordlife’s sword of life was like absolutely nothing.

Chapter 1510: Lord of the Sword Dao

In a completely unexpected turn of events, Yang Qi had been ambushed by the Lord of the Sword Dao in the middle of the Halls of Heaven. Thankfully, he had acquired another piece of the Mahātmā Jade, boosting his psyche and allowing him to think like the True Devil. Were it not for that, he likely would have been badly injured.

But things hadn’t turned out like that.

And while there was still one piece left in the Central Dynasty, he had certainly reached a minor level of completion in terms of his collection.

His psychic scale had reached the level of seventy billion, improving his control of the God Legion Seal to a point that not even the Lord of the Sword Dao, with his rating of a hundred billion, was anything for him to fear.

As long as he could get the final piece of jade, he was sure he could break through to the level of a hundred billion. When that happened, he would be in the half-Annulled level, making him like people such as King Immortal-Slayer, the Sovereign Lord, and the True Devil.

Looking every bit the lonely wanderer, the Lord of the Sword Dao said, “Who could ever have guessed that after all this time, someone else would show up in the Halls of Heaven? It’s been a long time since there’s been a visitor here.”

Yang Qi was stabilizing the power of the Mahātmā Jade and simultaneously absorbing the flowing power of the Halls of Heaven. Inside him, the trumpeting of the King of Godmammoths could be heard in his God Legion Paradise as a teleportation portal opened and allowed the destiny of the Sage Monarch Empire to pour into him.

With the fifty million sage monarch magistrates he had, his empire was strong and constantly expanding. It was now roughly half as big as either the Invincible Dynasty or the Chiliocosm Dynasty, although it was still in its initial stages of growth. In four or five years, it would reach the level of seventy to eighty percent. It was a speed the likes of which the god world had never seen before.

And that was with Yang Qi trying to keep a relatively low profile. If he pulled in the two marshals, Yang Primal-Chaos and Dugu Sheji, the destiny of his empire would be much different, and he would be in a position to contend with the other two dynasties much sooner.

In other words, with the destiny he could tap into, he had absolutely no need to fear the Lord of the Sword Dao.

Not daring to bandy words, Yang Qi directly asked, “Why did you ambush me, Lord of the Sword Dao? I'm just here to get some treasure.”

Sighing lonesomely, he replied, “You have the God Legion Seal, which means you can help me leave the Halls of Heaven. Because of the destruction wrought upon this hall by the Mahātmā Jade, I can stay here safely. But if I try traveling about outside of it, the innumerable spell formations of the Halls of Heaven will cause me endless trouble. It's better to just stay put. Isn’t the God Legion Seal reason enough for me to attack you?”

“It is,” Yang Qi said with a nod. “The God Legion Seal could cause rivers of blood to flow in the blink of an eye. To get it, fathers would slaughter sons, and even bring about an end to all human life. Unfortunately, Lord of the Sword Dao, you’re not strong enough to kill me.”

“You're right. I’m not. Unexpectedly, you’ve fused the God Legion Seal with the Mahātmā Jade. And you have the blood of the King of Godmammoths, monarch godhood, and an enormous empire to fill you with destiny. Meanwhile, I have nothing. No empire, no anything. I'm no match for you.”

Although the Lord of the Sword Dao seemed like a truly lonely wanderer, he had obviously seen through Yang Qi to his core, and understood everything about him.

Yet to Yang Qi’s surprise, he couldn’t read the Lord of the Sword Dao at all, which meant the man’s psychic scale was definitely at least at the level of a hundred billion. That was when the psychic scale converged on itself and pushed one into an entirely different state of existence.

That was why he had been able to attack Yang Qi so unexpectedly. Long story short, his psyche was immeasurably close to the Annulled level, which was a terrifying thought. However, Yang Qi had still been able to detect the attack at the last moment, which meant the Lord of the Sword Dao couldn’t kill him. Of course, neither could he kill the Lord of the Sword Dao.

“What exactly do you want?” Yang Qi said. “For me to take you out to the god world? How about you join me in looting some of the treasure troves here? You can be one of the cofounders of my empire. I’ll appoint you as a grand elder, and even give you a share of the destiny. And you won’t have to do a thing other than stand guard over the empire.”

Obviously, having an expert like this, who would provide an inherent boost in destiny, would make his empire even more stable. Not even the patriarchs of the House of the Invincible, Proud Heaven, Yang Voidprime, or Yang Chiliocosm would be able to cause problems for him then.

Right now, Yang Qi only had to fear people with psychic scales of a hundred billion or more. That meant people like Yang Chiliocosm, Yang Voidprime, and Proud Heaven. The Dugu Clan had their nine patriarchs, and although they all weren’t at the level of a hundred billion, there were two who had indeed reached that level. And the others weren’t far behind.

All of them were terrifying individuals and hardened killers who could inflict major destruction on Yang Qi’s empire if they so chose.

Yang Qi didn’t really have anyone who could counter forces such as that. Not even he himself counted in that regard. But if he could get the Lord of the Sword Dao on his side, it would change everything. The three other empires wouldn’t dare to attack him, and he could bide his time in peace, slowly emptying out the Halls of Heaven and building up a destiny superior to any of the other groups.

“No,” the Lord of the Sword Dao said. “You're trying to recruit me? It won’t happen. The God Legion Seal is the most horrifying thing in existence. In the past, the Sovereign Lord used it to control me. His thoughts governed my life or death, and he could even monitor my mind. It was a life worse than death. If I work with you, help you grow your empire with the riches of the Halls of Heaven, you’ll just become the next Sovereign Lord. Eventually, you’ll subjugate me with the God Legion Seal, and I’ll yet again be trapped.”

“I guarantee that I won’t do that,” Yang Qi said quickly.

“The only thing I trust is my own sword. I don’t trust the guarantees of anyone. If the Sovereign Lord were to be resurrected, and he made a promise to me, I’d spit on it. So what makes you think I’ll trust you?” The Lord of the Sword Dao was making it very plain that he wouldn’t work with Yang Qi.

Yang Qi could sense his resolve, and knew that people as strong as him didn't waste words. Besides, if he was the Lord of the Sword Dao, he would make the same decision. The God Legion Seal was just too dangerous. Working with Yang Qi would just be heading toward the path of subjugation.

But Yang Qi had to have him!

If he couldn't be convinced, he would have to be subjugated!

Time was of the essence, and his empire was on the line. There was definitely war on the horizon. When empires arose, it always happened along with blood and fire.

When people made cultivation progress, they had to pass through tribulations, and it was the same with empires. Other forces could attack an empire, but if the people held firm and fought back, their hearts would grow more resolute. They would have infinite faith in their country, and develop a sense of belonging. When that happened, the empire would become truly powerful.

The Chiliocosm Dynasty, Invincible Dynasty, and Central Dynasty had all experienced such things, which was why they were considered unparalleled under heaven. All of their people had a strong sense of belonging, which led to powerful destiny, and the willingness to sacrifice themselves for their country.

Yang Qi’s empire hadn’t yet reached that state, as it hadn’t had a chance to experience warfare. But war would come eventually. That was why Yang Qi had come to the Halls of Heaven, to ensure that he was as prepared as possible.

“I can see the killing intent in your eyes, young one,” the Lord of the Sword Dao said. “You’re extremely ambitious, aren’t you? You’re thinking of trying to subjugate me. Turn me into your servant. You just began building your empire, and need to temper it in the flames and blood of war. You need me to be able to stand at the true peak of the god world. I've seen far too many ambitious people like you. I guess that means I need to kill you. That's the only way to put an end to thoughts such as yours.”

Yang Qi smiled. “Even if I didn’t subjugate you, Lord of the Sword Dao, you wouldn’t just let me walk out of here. I'm your only way out of the Halls of Heaven. Am I right? You could say we're two peas in a pod. The main difference is that you were once subjugated by the God Legion Seal, yet your golden throne is nowhere to be found inside. How did you free yourself from it? Mind explaining?”

“It’s not just me. You’ll find that all of the ancient God-Lords died and were born again. That’s how we got free. That’s how we were able to appear once again as this new age dawns.” He looked down and tapped the blade of his sword. “Anyone who was once controlled by the God Legion Seal will hate you down to their bones. You’ll eventually face the wrath of the countless God-Lords. Well, you might. It depends on whether or not I cut you down right here and now!”

Chapter 1511: Bitter Fighting

The Lord of the Sword Dao wouldn’t just let Yang Qi go. The moment his sneak attack had failed, he realized that Yang Qi wasn't the type to be frightened easily. Furthermore, here in the Halls of Heaven, Yang Qi had the advantage. Worse, the Lord of the Sword Dao was limited to being able to act within this hall of bronze. He was stuck.

The vital energy in here was weaker than outside, and there were no spell formations to worry about.

“You want to fight me, Lord of the Sword Dao? And you say all the other God-Lords will do the same? Good. I want that. That way I can subjugate the lot of you, one after another. Remember, I've combined the God Legion Seal with the Mahātmā Jade, which means you can’t escape me.”

Yang Qi’s words were immeasurable domineering.

Even though the Lord of the Sword Dao was down on his luck right now, he was still as overbearing as ever. And his own unique style was what made his dao.

Yang Qi also had his own style. For one thing, he was the successor of the Sovereign Lord, and had his aura. But he was also different from the Sovereign Lord. The Sovereign Lord had sought to conquer everything in existence, while Yang Qi’s ultimate goal was actually to make life better for everyone.

That was the dao of the sage monarch.

The dao of sages was to make everything better, and the dao of monarchs was to conquer. Sage inside, monarch outside.

The Sovereign Lord had only followed the dao of monarchs. His way was to conquer, conquer some more, and then keep conquering.

Yang Qi had his sage monarch magistrates, who had changed what it meant to subjugate people. His empire was a wonderful place, a place of order that lacked any impurities, a place where everyone belonged.

The Lord of the Sword Dao had his dao, and Yang Qi had his as well. Right now, they were engaged in a clash of psyche and will, and although the Lord of the Sword Dao had been an outstanding figure among the God-Lords of old, that didn’t mean Yang Qi was afraid of him.

Any who tried to stop him, he would kill or subjugate.

No one could impede his godly might, not even the Lord of the Sword Dao.

“Make your move,” Yang Qi said with a beckoning gesture. “You attacked me from behind, which earned you the fate of becoming my servant. Nobody is going to come along and save you.” Yang Qi wasn’t interested in wasting words, and in fact, was curious to see what the Lord of the Sword Dao’s cultivation base was really like.

“No problem.”

SWISH!

The Lord of the Sword Dao immediately unleashed a succession of three sword moves, and if nothing else, they were devastatingly powerful. The first move caused an enormous gully to appear in Yang Qi’s mind, which filled with rippling sword energy, creating an Unbounded Sword River.

It was filled with countless swords of all shapes and sizes, and it sliced into his sea of consciousness with enigmatic power.

This was a sword that didn’t cause any outside fluctuations. It pierced right to the soul to destroy a person at their core.

It was a sword of the heart.

Belief existed in the heart, and one could use this sword to pierce that heart.

King Life-Killer had used a sword of killing, and Star Swordlife had used a sword of life. But the Lord of the Sword Dao used a sword of the heart, and could use it to pierce his enemy’s heart in the most flawless fashion.

Yang Qi responded in a flash, his body and soul transforming into concentric circles that fluctuated out at rapid speed. They were the fluctuations of kalpas and tribulations.

All of a sudden, the Unbounded Sword River collapsed into fragments.

“Four Directions!”

The Lord of the Sword Dao shifted tactics. His expression lonesome, he sent his sword speeding out in four directions, causing everything around them to collapse.

Winds sprang up from the four directions, and Yang Qi felt himself surrounded by sword light, crushing down on him as if to seal him. In fact, the fluctuations of tribulations and kalpas started to calm.

“Son of Heaven Defends the Nation’s Gate!”

Suddenly, he switched to a fist strike, punching out with the Nation-Fate Godfist. Use the dao of heaven to fight the dao of men, use the dao of men to crush the dao of heaven.

The more powerful the national destiny, the stronger the Nation-Fate Godfist, and right now, Yang Qi had access to incredible destiny. In fact, it was so strong that it shattered the surrounding sword light, turning it into nothing but ash.

Unexpectedly, the Lord of the Sword Dao took three steps backward. Despite having a psychic scale of a hundred billion, he had been shoved back by Yang Qi, or more specifically, by the power of his destiny.

Yang Qi had such powerful destiny that he could reduce most experts to dust. Meanwhile, the Lord of the Sword Dao didn’t have any destiny at all. He could only rely on his own personal strength, so how could he possibly fight against Yang Qi?

It had taken billions of years for the three dynasties to reach their current state, and Yang Qi was at almost half their level. Just what kind of destiny was that? And what exactly was it capable of? The Lord of the Sword Dao had a strong cultivation base, and walked his own orthodox dao. In order to reach the half Annulled level, he had to leave this place and found his own empire devoted to the dao of the sword. But would that happen?

“Sovereign and State Die Together!” Yang Qi said, unleashing another fist strike. Numerous projections sprang up, representing the people the emperor ruled over, as well as the ministers and nobility. As a result, it unleashed mountain-toppling, sea-draining force that few people could possibly counter.

Whack. Whack. Whack!

He unleashed a series of punches that smashed into the sword light, shoving the Lord of the Sword Dao relentlessly backward and quickly putting him on the defensive.

However, Yang Qi could see that, despite how he had seized the upper hand in the fight, the Lord of the Sword Dao wasn’t actually hurt. He was waiting for the right moment to turn the tables and deliver a killing blow. The man was clearly profound on many levels, and it seemed unlikely that Yang Qi could kill him.

Thankfully, Yang Qi had an unending supply of destiny to support him, so much that no one could possibly compare to him.

His empire was so powerful that no individual person could do anything to it.

“Blood Stains Spring and Autumn!”

Yang Qi’s moves were impossible for the Lord of the Sword Dao to avoid. He couldn’t flee, and they were forced to fight in very tight quarters.

Out in the open, the Lord of the Sword Dao would have had a lot of options, but here in the Halls of Heaven, Yang Qi had a clear advantage.

The time was right. The conditions were favorable. And Yang Qi had the upper hand.

“Now that you’ve seen me use my destiny, Lord of the Sword Dao, you can see how powerful my empire is. Furthermore, I have the advantage here in the Halls of Heaven. I can back out of the fight any time I want, and step out to where you can't strike at me. Remember, I've already assimilated that piece of the Mahātmā Jade. Maybe I can't win this fight, but I can't lose it either. Maybe you could fight me on the outside, and maybe even hurt my empire. But right here, you can't do anything. Do you really think you have what it takes to win?”

Yang Qi was trying to strike a blow to his confidence.

Unfortunately, it didn't work. The Lord of the Sword Dao simply dodged the attacks, moving as fluidly as water. He wasn’t the type of person who would get flustered in a fight, and would remain calm and cool no matter what.

“This fight is like nothing compared to what I’ve experienced in life. Remember, young friend, I've fought the Sovereign Lord and the King of Godmammoths. You weren’t even alive back then.” The Lord of the Sword Dao spoke as calmly as if they weren’t even fighting, but were instead having tea together. At the same time, he unleashed occasional jabs with his sword, probing Yang Qi’s weaknesses and forcing him to go on the defensive.

To Yang Qi, he seemed like a monster who couldn’t be harmed. It almost seemed pointless to fight him.

“Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth!”

In that moment, he chose to use his top technique, the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth. And he resorted directly to the Fist of the Halls of Heaven.

That move relied on the godly might of the Halls of Heaven, and right now, he was right in the middle of those halls! Immediately, the energy of the halls rushed toward him, and as it did, the damage done to his surroundings was repaired.

In a shocking twist, Yang Qi was using the Fist of the Halls of Heaven to actually repair this area, in order to completely trap the Lord of the Sword Dao.

The Halls of Heaven were like a desert to the Lord of the Sword Dao, whereas this hall of bronze was like an oasis. And the Lord of the Sword Dao was a fish in a pool of water in that oasis. But if Yang Qi removed the oasis, the Lord of the Sword Dao would be stuck in the middle of that desert with no other option than to simply die.

“Do you recognize this, Lord of the Sword Dao? It’s the Fist of the Halls of Heaven. I bet you never would have guessed that I could use this move.” Yang Qi was like a giant who could call on the might of the surrounding halls, causing it to whip about like storm winds.

CRASH!

The main entrance had previously been half-broken, but thanks to the influx of vital energy, it was rapidly forming anew.

“Fist of the Halls of Heaven?!” the Lord of the Sword Dao said, although there wasn’t a scrap of fear in his voice. Instead, he brandished his sword and said, “One Sword to Destroy Nations; A Million Royal Defenders; Slaughter Everything in Existence!”

RUMBLE!

A river of sword might swept forth as the fighting reached a fever pitch. The Lord of the Sword Dao was finally revealing what he was capable of.

If Yang Qi was a nation whose might couldn’t be challenged, then the Lord of the Sword Dao was a single swordsman who could kill a million troops, and single-handedly wreck a nation, up to its highest leaders.

BAM!

A massive explosion ripped through the area.

Yang Qi’s destiny shattered, and the repair to the surrounding bronze hall ceased. At the same time, a stream of sword energy suddenly surged as if to break out into the Halls of Heaven in general.

Chapter 1512: One Sword to Destroy a Nation

The Lord of the Sword Dao had finally gone all out. Every move from his daoist techniques was incomparably devastating. Each of his sword strikes could destroy a nation, and thus Yang Qi’s destiny was crushed. The sword energy then swept outward, moving beyond the boundaries of the building in the destruction it wrought.

The Lord of the Sword Dao had sword techniques that were formidable to the extreme. Sometimes he struck like lightning, other times his strikes were as exquisite as silk. Sometimes he was like a god from heaven descended into the mortal world, and other times his sword was like a tiger hiding in a mountain. Regardless, it could lock down and destroy just about anything.

The sword energy spread out, sealing everything it touched as if in ice, and simultaneously releasing fluctuations that could crush souls.

This was the sword of the heart.

As one sword technique after another was unleashed, Yang Qi found himself vanquished left and right. His destiny was shattered, and the Lord of the Sword Dao had him completely locked down. The man had created an enormous prison of sword energy that was slowly shrinking around Yang Qi to shred him apart.

RUMBLE!

The dao of heaven transformed, and the sword technique became nothing but destructive fluctuations that flowed like the tide, piercing into Yang Qi and causing him to tremble deep in his mind.

“You’re weak,” the Lord of the Sword Dao said. “You thought I’d be impressed by the Fist of the Halls of Heaven? Can that technique really crush me? I've been living here in the Halls of Heaven for tens of billions of years. Did you really think the halls would be able to do anything to me?” His voice boomed from within the sword light, which ate away at Yang Qi like a corrosive flood, piercing toward his soul.

All of a sudden, Yang Qi felt like a fish in a puddle.

‘This bastard is impressive. I have a psychic scale of seventy billion, plus the blessing of destiny. Yet he can still do this?’ Yang Qi actually felt fear in his heart because of the Lord of the Sword Dao’s fighting prowess, which was inconceivably formidable. In fact, Yang Qi felt like he was just on the verge of losing the fight.

Of course, he still had trump cards he hadn’t played.

Before he did, he wanted to see exactly how impressive the Lord of the Sword Dao was in terms of fighting prowess, and how strong his cultivation base really was. Furthermore, fighting an opponent of this caliber would provide priceless experience.

In fact, Yang Qi actually felt somewhat liberated. It had been a long time since he had engaged in a truly risky battle, and he needed this experience. The Lord of the Sword Dao would be a catalyst for him, providing crucial enlightenment regarding what half-Annulled experts were capable of.

“What, Lord of the Sword Dao, you think that just because you have some flashy moves, you can overcome me? True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body!The Hell-Crushing Godmammoth Crushes the Halls of Heaven. Yin Yang Convergence!” Yang Qi’s divine will unfurled, binding the sword energy as he himself transformed into pure jade. It was none other than the energy of the Mahātmā Jade!

At the same time, a projection of a mammoth emerged from the jade, seemingly capable of trampling the universe into nothing.

Immediately, the sword light gave way.

“The Wheel Comes Full Circle!” the Lord of the Sword Dao said, and the sword light bent into a circle that surrounded Yang Qi as surely as a python.

“Heaven-Devouring Will!” Yang Qi said. Opening his mouth, he unleashed the consummate techniques of King Heaven-Devourer, and started consuming the sword energy.

It happened so quickly that the Lord of the Sword Dao was very nearly devoured as well.

Whooosh!

However, he flitted away like a specter, using some sort of powerful teleportation technique similar to the Myriad Worlds Greater Teleportation. Although he’d managed to evade the devouring technique, he had also lost the initiative.

On the outside, he would have a one hundred percent chance of defeating Yang Qi. Not even Yang Qi’s destiny would have given him an edge.

But here, the Lord of the Sword Dao was severely restricted.

“Flood of Heart-Blood!”

Seeing how things were progressing, and how Yang Qi had pierced the bindings of his sword technique, he unleashed another move, one that resembled a beating heart. However, it wasn't made of flesh and blood, but rather swords!

This was the true heart of swords, the ruler of myriad other swords.

As the heart beat, it sent sword energy flowing out like a flood of blood.

Crack!

King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans crumbled, the primal-chaos elder-snake collapsed, and the mammoth shattered.

Crick. Crack. Snap....

The sword energy pierced into Yang Qi, and blood sprayed out everywhere.

The truth was that Yang Qi normally didn’t have blood to bleed. His blood had changed into life force quintessence, so if his godhood was damaged, the pure liquid of the God Legion Paradise would come out.

But this injury had been inflicted by the Flood of Heart-Blood, and it went to show how savage and merciless the Lord of the Sword Dao was.

“That injury is going to put you out of the fight. And now, we enter into an era in which the God Legion Seal belongs to me!” The lonely assassin swordsman that was the Lord of the Sword Dao strode forward and thrust his sword directly at Yang Qi’s throat.

That sword strike contained his pure quintessence. He knew that Yang Qi fundamentally couldn’t be killed, because his spirit had fused with the Mahātmā Jade, making him eternally indestructible and everlastingly deathless. However, he was confident that he could still reduce him to ashes, and possibly extract him from the Mahātmā Jade. Maybe he couldn’t destroy the jade, but he could destroy Yang Qi.

And he was taking advantage of Yang Qi’s injury to try pulling it off.

Unfortunately for him, an enigmatic smile suddenly appeared on Yang Qi’s face.

All of a sudden, he transformed into the Great Necropolis. The sword then stabbed into the Great Necropolis, which flew up and expanded to cover the entire bronze palace, trapping the Lord of the Sword Dao within.

“Is that...?” The Lord of the Sword Dao was finally visibly shaken.

The power of the Great Necropolis wasn't something that he could contend with.

“Heaven-Burying God Pill!”

All of a sudden, the Lord of the Sword Dao realized that his sword had stabbed into the Great Necropolis to pierce, not Yang Qi, but the Heaven-Burying God Pill!

That pill contained the quintessence of the Great Necropolis, and had been given to Emperor Sprite Totem by Proud Heaven as a trap. Sprite Totem thought that he had extruded any extraneous will from it, but he was wrong. Therefore, Yang Qi had never dared to use it. He had just kept it in reserve for later.

And now, he had found an opportunity to use it.

He had intentionally allowed himself to be wounded, then let the Lord of the Sword Dao stab him, all with the purpose of killing the nascent divinity that remained in the pill.

The Lord of the Sword Dao was the type of person who made every strike lethal. So when he stabbed the Heaven-Burying God Pill, it instantly cracked open, and a righteous, orthodox destiny spilled out of it.

It was the will of Proud Central of the Central Dynasty, the ultimate emperor, mysterious and enigmatic, who had lurked in the shadows during the Sovereign Lord’s Age, and had thus escaped destruction. Later, he had subjugated the Lord of Righteous Justice.

The will of Proud Central had been hiding in the Heaven-Burying God Pill, ready to pounce on whoever tried to assimilate it. Obviously, that was how Proud Heaven had hoped to control Sprite Totem.

Of course, Proud Heaven knew that Sprite Totem couldn’t actually assimilate the pill.

Furthermore, he knew that Yang Susu of the Spritefolk was deeply connected to Yang Qi, and that Yang Qi would eventually go looking for her. In other words, he had planned for the pill to ultimately fall into Yang Qi’s hands.

Never could Proud Heaven have imagined that Yang Qi would not only have uncovered his plot, but that he would also have refrained from assimilating the pill, ultimately using the Lord of the Sword Dao to purge it.

The mighty will of Proud Central was now receiving the full wrath of the sword light from the Lord of the Sword Dao.

In the blink of an eye, the fight turned into a life-or-death battle between the Lord of the Sword Dao and Proud Central. Proud Central's will spread out to fill all creation, wrapping up the sword light. At the same time, a mighty figure appeared and thrust his hand out to summon a river of stars that slashed the sword energy to bits.

He was trying to take control of the Lord of the Sword Dao!

“Proud Central!?”

There was no possible way the Lord of the Sword Dao could ever have guessed that Yang Qi would have a trump card like this to call on, and because of that, he just couldn’t react in time. But the will of Proud Central was obviously trying to devour him, and he couldn't just sit around and do nothing.

Therefore, he decided to go all out, and bet everything on a single sword move, backing it with all the power he could muster.

As the two mighty experts clashed, Yang Qi looked on coldly and focused on healing his injury.

At the same time, the quintessence of the Great Necropolis flowed into him from the Heaven-Burying God Pill, transforming the blood of the King of Godmammoths and turning it into the color of stone. After all, the blood of the Great Necropolis was the most powerful blood that existed in the god world.

All of a sudden, Yang Qi’s godpower started changing.

Chapter 1513: Top Skills

Yang Qi immediately benefited from assimilating the quintessence of the Great Necropolis. The necropolis could bury the legion of gods, and the god world as a whole. In fact, it could bury anything and everything. The truth was that the necropolis wasn’t made from stone, but rather the quintessence of ‘burying’. And theoretically speaking, it was actually stronger than the Mahātmā Jade.

In the hopes of pulling Yang Qi into a trap, Proud Heaven had actually refined the quintessence of the necropolis into the form of a medicinal pill.

But in the end, he had actually helped Yang Qi.

The quintessence of the necropolis was boosting Yang Qi’s psychic scale in a way that was similar to the Mahātmā Jade.

His psychic scale reached eighty billion, and kept climbing. At the same time, deep in his mind, his connection to the necropolis grew stronger, improving his ability to control it.

‘The Great Necropolis is currently in the Central Dynasty. I haven’t seen King Immortal-Slayer in quite a while, which means he must be struggling to maintain control. He’s powerful, but he's stuck in the necropolis, besieged by Proud Central and countless Paramount Gods. Not only that, but he also has to deal with the destiny of the Central Dynasty. For now, he’s not going anywhere. But now that I can tap into the essence of the Halls of Heaven to improve my destiny, I can start working on a plan to rescue him.’

Using the power provided by the Lord of the Sword Dao, he had taken the Heaven-Burying God Pill for himself, turning a trap set by Proud Central and Proud Heaven into a major windfall.

They had given their enemy a wife and lost soldiers to him as well.

As Yang Qi’s cultivation base rose, the Lord of the Sword Dao was clashing with Proud Central. As it turned out, the Lord of the Sword Dao was a bit stronger. Eventually, the projection of Proud Central shivered and started fading out of existence. As he did, his voice echoed out, “Incredible, Lord of the Sword Dao. You’re strong. But I won’t let you live in the end!”

BAM!

Unleashing one final blow, Proud Central sent the Lord of the Sword Dao flying backward into the bronze wall, his aura in chaos. His sword even fell out of his hand and clattered to the ground. Obviously, if they were on the outside, the Lord of the Sword Dao couldn’t actually match up to Proud Central.

Proud Central had been stronger than him even in the ancient era. After the Sovereign Lord perished, and Proud Central founded a dynasty, he got access to massive destiny, so he was even stronger than before. In fact, it was possible that Proud Central was already in the half-Annulled level.

However, at the moment, Proud Central was so focused on struggling with King Immortal-Slayer that he couldn't spare the effort or energy to try to take over the god world. If it weren’t for the current state of affairs, the Chiliocosm Dynasty and the Invincible Dynasty would likely be in great danger.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi shivered as he fully recovered from his injuries. Now that he was surrounded by the Great Necropolis, he was so powerful that nothing here could possibly harm him.

Smiling, he walked over to the Lord of the Sword Dao and said, “You thought you hurt me? Sorry, you were mistaken. It was a big trap, and you fell right into it. I used you to assimilate that pill, which contained the quintessence of the Great Necropolis. Now my psychic scale is at eighty billion. Plus, I can call on the Great Necropolis to defend myself any time I want. Your sword technique simply isn’t good enough to hurt me. What's your stance now, Lord of the Sword Dao?”

“So, it turns out you’re a real force of nature,” the Lord of the Sword Dao said, slowly rising to his feet. Although he didn’t appear to be wounded, Yang Qi knew that his clash with Proud Central’s will must have been very taxing.

Were it not for the Lord of the Sword Dao, he never would have been able to assimilate the Heaven-Burying God Pill. In the end, the Lord of the Sword Dao suffered the ill effects he would have suffered had he tried.

“You came out on top in every way imaginable,” the Lord of the Sword Dao said coldly. “You benefited from that pill, you hurt me, you hurt Proud Central, you boosted your cultivation base, and now your psychic scale and godhood rating are at eighty billion. On top of it all, you have the protection of the Great Necropolis. You’re right. I can’t hurt you. Despite all that, you still won’t be able to overcome me. So just leave.”

“Leave?” Yang Qi said. “Is that supposed to be a joke? You’re hurt, and I'm getting stronger by the moment. I've already surpassed you, and you think I'm just going to leave? No. Instead, I’ll kick you while you’re down.”

“You can’t subjugate me, young one. I advise you to just turn and walk away. The most important thing in the world is your own life, and it would be stupid to throw it away in the hopes of achieving a minor gain.”

“Minor gain? You count for much more than that. I know you have other tricks up your sleeve, Lord of the Sword Dao. I'm sure you could keep fighting me for quite some time. But do you think I'm out of tricks already? Thanks to your clash with Proud Central, I can rest assured he won't come for my empire anytime soon. So now I’ll show you what I’ve been holding in reserve this entire time. Exalted Purrling, please, come forth!”

Purr. Purr....

An immense aura suddenly weighed down on the area.

Yet again, the purrling had come to the Halls of Heaven, and it obviously existed on a higher level than the Lord of the Sword Dao. The purrling had the respect of even King Immortal-Slayer, the reason being that it was truly capable of half-Annulled levels of power.

The downside was that its main interests seemed to be sleeping. And it generally didn't like fighting. For the most part, it viewed the conflicts of the world as having nothing to do with it, and it would only take action when Jadefall requested it. Thankfully, Yang Qi didn’t ask too many favors of it.

The purrling was actually curious about Yang Qi. After all, the two of them would occasionally communicate directly, therefore, it was interested in what happened to him. So when Yang Qi asked the purrling to come to the Halls of Heaven and help him deal with the Lord of the Sword Dao, it did.

Yang Qi didn’t normally ask for help from the purrling. For one thing, the purrling wasn’t his. Furthermore, he had no idea what karmic ramifications there could be when asking for its help. Also, there was also the possibility that he would ask for help only to be refused.

He had never even considered trying to subjugate it.

Most likely, even if the Sovereign Lord were to be resurrected, not even he would be able to subjugate the purrling.

“Exalted Purrling, allow me to introduce you to the Lord of the Sword Dao,” Yang Qi said in the purrling’s language.

It looked at the Lord of the Sword Dao and made a few purring sounds, which meant, “This human is strong. But he hasn’t taken the final step. He still has fetters binding his heart, an obstacle he has yet to transcend. That said, if you subjugate him, he’ll be very useful.”

“Exalted Purrling,” Yang Qi replied, continuing to use the purrling's language, “would you like to say something to the human? I can translate.”

“Fine,” the purrling said. Then it made a few purring sounds to the Lord of the Sword Dao, which Yang Qi translated.

“You should just surrender, human. You haven’t taken the final step, and you can’t beat me in a fight. Not that I'm interested in fighting. I’m with Yang Qi here. He has a unique fate, and I suspect that he might be able to survive the destruction of the god world. I’ve seen some signs of the trajectory of his fate, and the fact that he’s combined the God Legion Seal, the Mahātmā Jade, and numerous other magical treasures just goes to show that he's very unique. I might even need his help to fully transcend my own fate, and become truly lifeless and destructionless.”

“Who are you?” the Lord of the Sword Dao said, his expression serious. “And why would you speak such words to me?”

Given the level of his cultivation base, he could see how strong the purrling was, and knew that it was at a level of strength that he couldn’t contend with. And that wasn’t to mention the fact that Yang Qi was also present. Worst of all, he was stuck in the middle of the Halls of Heaven with no way out, and for that matter, no idea which way to go even if he did have the chance to escape.

“A mighty being such as yourself should achieve breakthroughs on your own merit,” he continued. “You shouldn’t be getting help from others. If you try that method, you’ll never make progress. I was wrong. You don’t have a truly mighty heart.”

Yang Qi translated for the purrling.

“Foolish human! There’s nothing wrong with using tools and resources to forge the perfect soul and the perfect will. True strength comes from using anything and everything necessary. The difference between humans and animals is that humans can use tools. Refusing help in getting strong might seem like perseverance, but it's really a sickness. A disease. In fact, that's why you haven’t achieved your own breakthrough. You have a soul disease that you haven’t excised. A devil.”

Yang Qi felt deeply shaken as he translated the words. It made perfect sense to use the term soul disease. On the one hand, relying on others could lead to dependency-devils. But refusing outside help could also lead to the devil of a soul disease.

The key to it all was achieving the right balance. The golden ratio between making progress alone, and relying on help. One needed the strongest will and the strongest soul possible to reach the half-Annulled level.

The Lord of the Sword Dao shivered as though he had just come to understand something. All of a sudden, he bowed deeply to the purrling. “Oh mighty one, many thanks for your reminders. However, I'm still not going to surrender and be subjugated. So, please show me how strong you are.”

“Fine, human. Make your move. You're still not convinced, so you want to challenge me to a fight. Truth be told, I like your attitude. And because Yang Qi wants to subjugate you, I won’t kill you. Besides, I don't like killing people. It's a blasphemy against life force, and creates an aura I find very distasteful. I love life, not the endless, dead void of ancient primal-chaos. Only the modern world is interesting and colorful.”

Swish!

Even as the words left the purrling’s mouth, a sword closed in on it.

Chapter 1514: The Purrling Fights the Sword Lord

The Lord of the Sword Dao was fierce and valiant, and contrary to expectation, he actually attacked the purrling. The purrling could come and go as it saw fit in the Halls of Heaven, yet the Lord of the Sword Dao wasn’t afraid. He certainly lived up to his reputation of having thoroughly tempered himself by cultivating the sword of the heart. There was nothing that could possibly shake his sword heart.

He was the sword. The true and ultimate sword.

BAM!

And right now, he was like a steel needle piercing into polished glass.

The purrling was surrounded by a huge bubble, but the Lord of the Sword Dao sent his sword stabbing into that bubble. His sword rotated, moving millions upon trillions of times per second as it burrowed inside. Sadly, it was to no avail. The purrling’s bubble was something that not even he could pierce through.

Purr!

A bubble shot out and headed directly toward the Lord of the Sword Dao.

The Lord of the Sword Dao reacted with visible consternation. He knew that if that bubble wrapped around him, he wouldn’t be able to escape. There was no question: he was now in a very dangerous situation. Therefore, he swept his sword out in an arc, slashing into the bubble and causing it to burst.

‘So strong!’ Yang Qi thought. He couldn’t help but be impressed by how the Lord of the Sword Dao handled the situation. When it came to cultivation base, the dao of the sword, and fighting experience, there was no one who could match up to him.

At that point, the purrling flicked a claw, and the burst bubble suddenly expanded, turning into an enormous net that swept toward the Lord of the Sword Dao. It was the first time Yang Qi had ever seen the bubbles do anything different, and it went to show how amazing the Lord of the Sword Dao was.

Of course, Yang Qi had long since learned to imitate the purrling, and therefore, watching it fight was always very helpful. In fact, his psychic scale was becoming more perfect.

He even wondered if this trip into the Halls of Heaven would end with him reaching a psychic scale of a hundred billion, and becoming one of the most powerful beings in the god world.

It was currently at eighty billion, which was a far cry from a hundred. And further progress would only be more difficult. But considering the treasures and legacies that were available in the Halls of Heaven, it still seemed possible.

“One Sword to Crush Eight Distant Lands!”

The Lord of the Sword Dao slashed out with his sword, twisting elegantly as eight beams of sword light shot out and formed a mirror that blocked the purrling’s bubble net. Then, the Lord of the Sword Dao dashed out from the scope of the net, making it seem like nothing could possibly capture him.

According to Yang Qi’s estimation, he couldn’t even match such agility with his Tribulation Wings.

However, the purrling seemed to be taking everything in stride. Waving its claws again, it caused the bubble to stretch out until it looked like a sword, which then stabbed toward the Lord of the Sword Dao.

This was Yang Qi’s first time seeing the purrling use a sword technique. Nobody could match the Lord of the Sword Dao in terms of sword techniques, not even Yang Qi. Yet here the purrling was accomplishing that very task.

It used its bubble of energy to create a sword, which flew out with such elegance that it actually seemed to surpass what the Lord of the Sword Dao was capable of.

“Nice sword technique,” the Lord of the Sword Dao said, clearly shaken. “Oh mighty one, you actually have a true and real sword technique. However, I am the lord of all swords, and no one can compare to me. Not even you. I am the true master of all swords.”

Swissshhhhh!

The Lord of the Sword Dao unleashed a flurry of sword moves as he tried to regain the upper hand and crush the purrling’s sword.

Although the purrling’s sword was made of energy, it seemed likely that it was the number one sword in the god world, and the Lord of the Sword Dao wasn't going to take it lightly.

“Sword Shakes all Things!”

“Break the Sword in Nine Prefectures!”

“One Sword to Pierce Heaven!”

“Sword Destroys Mountains and Rivers!”

“Sword Energy Like a Rainbow!”

“Sky of Snow Engulfing Earth!”

“One Sword to Seek the Dao!”

“Cut and Sever Even the Future!”

“Fate of Heaven in My Hands!”

“Sword Like Fate and Destiny!”

The Lord of the Sword Dao was fighting with increased ferocity, and his each and every move was extremely deadly in nature. He unleashed move after move, none of which Yang Qi had ever seen before. Nor could he replicate them after having seen them. In the blink of an eye, the Lord of the Sword Dao revealed thousands of deadly sword moves, sending a river of destruction to smash into the purrling’s sword.

Unfortunately for him, the purrling's sword could never be destroyed, and it blocked all of the sword moves, crushing them out of existence.

Purr. Purr!

They had been exchanging sword blows for about four hours now, and finally, the purrling seemed to have had enough. It exhaled a stream of energy and simultaneously began growing larger, causing the Halls of Heaven to shake violently.

SNICK!

The sword of energy suddenly grew dramatically larger, then was thrust forth in a smacking attack.

The Lord of the Sword Dao couldn’t block it.

BAM!

His sword shattered, and he was smashed down so hard he was embedded into the ground. By now, he wasn't even in human form. Instead, he had turned into a sword.

This was the Lord of the Sword Dao’s original form. Similar to the Lord of Radiance and Light, he had been born of the big bang explosions of primal-chaos, where he started out as a sword. In fact, it was entirely likely that he was the very first sword that ever existed, and as a result, his technique was number one in all heaven.

Until he met the purrling. He simply couldn’t beat the purrling.

“Abandon the Sword and Demand Slaughter!The Sword Cannot be Destroyed!”

Having returned to his original form, the Lord of the Sword Dao wasn’t dead or unconscious. In contrast, he now seemed capable of moving ten times faster than he could before. And instead of attacking the purrling, he headed toward Yang Qi. He was attempting to snatch victory out of the jaws of defeat. He hadn’t lost yet, and considering he knew he couldn’t beat the purrling, he decided that he should shift his target to Yang Qi.

If he could cut down Yang Qi, maybe he could get the God Legion Seal, and experience a rapid advancement in cultivation. Then, he might have a chance of escaping from the purrling, and even looting the Halls of Heaven and becoming stronger than he had ever been.

In that case, he might even have a chance to become as strong as the purrling itself.

Although the purrling wasn't truly in the half-Annulled level, it was as strong as that level. As for what level it was really in, the Lord of the Sword Dao wasn’t sure.

“Solitary Sword Parasitization!”

Yang Qi was completely taken aback by the Lord of the Sword Dao attacking him. However, it was actually the perfect development.

Before, the Lord of the Sword Dao had been unleashing his most powerful attacks. But now he was fighting for his life, and that was a very different thing.

Now he was like a cornered animal.

Yang Qi could sense that if this attack hit him, then everything about him, including his treasures, destiny, techniques, vital energy, and psychic scale would all be taken by the Lord of the Sword Dao. It was a very profound sword technique designed to possess the target.

It was something that was designed for use in a worst-case scenario.

The Lord of the Sword Dao was putting everything on the line to deal with the greatest tribulation he had ever faced!

As for the purrling, it didn’t interfere. Apparently, it wanted to see if Yang Qi could deal with the situation. It was like a test, and if Yang Qi passed it, then it meant that he qualified to subjugate the Lord of the Sword Dao. If he couldn’t, he would die.

The purrling wasn’t Yang Qi’s guardian or nanny. It actually didn’t care if Yang Qi lived or died. That was one reason why Yang Qi didn't often ask for help from it.

The sword was moving with indescribable quickness, such that it seemed impossible to stop. In fact, Yang Qi knew that trying to block or dodge would be stupid. All of a sudden, a smile appeared on his face as he seemingly entered a lifeless and destructionless state.

The unblockable sword headed toward his throat, intent on taking his life. Defensive moves were pointless. The Lord of the Sword Dao was going all out.

However, in the moment that it seemed Yang Qi would be cut down, he suddenly vanished. More specifically, he disappeared into the Lord of the Sword Dao’s sword.

Unexpectedly, Yang Qi was simply going along with what was happening.

The Lord of the Sword Dao had resorted to a last-ditch move, and so had Yang Qi.

In the blink of an eye, their wills clashed.

Chapter 1515: Subjugating the Sword Lord

Yang Qi was in a life-or-death struggle that would be resolved in the blink of an eye.

His divine will was clashing directly with that of the Lord of the Sword Dao. It was a very dangerous risk. However, the Lord of the Sword Dao was both injured and flustered, while Yang Qi’s cultivation base had just improved. As far as he was concerned, this was an opportunity.

After all, even if the purrling had defeated and sealed the Lord of the Sword Dao, it would still have been difficult to subjugate him.

But the situation had changed.

If their souls clashed, and the Lord of the Sword Dao lost, it would be a truly ultimate defeat that he could never come back from. And Yang Qi could definitely enslave him.

The sword hovered in the middle of the bronze palace, twitching as it switched back and forth between glowing with the golden color of the blood of the King of Godmammoths, and the stone color of the Great Necropolis.

Yang Qi was going to succeed or die trying.

Everything would be determined by this one clash.

“Well played, boy,” the Lord of the Sword Dao said in a booming voice. “I never imagined that you’d turn out to be as vicious as me. But I suppose that’s to be expected from someone as ruthlessly ambitious as you. I underestimated you. That said, you think a bit too highly of yourself if you think you can single-handedly take on my will.”

“Cut the crap, Lord of the Sword Dao. We're going to compete with each other on the level of our souls. Show me what you've got! Halls of Heaven, give me your power!”

RUMBLE!

All of a sudden, the Halls of Heaven trembled as the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth called on numerous streams of energy, causing them to form an enormous spell formation.

As for the purrling, it was watching with keen interest.

Hooooooowlllll.

Power from the Halls of Heaven poured into the sword. Furious, the Lord of the Sword Dao shouted, “I can’t believe you’re drawing on the might of the Halls of Heaven! Are you crazy?! Not even the resurrected Sovereign Lord could subjugate me! You're going to die, and the God Legion Seal will be mine!”

“Is that so? The moment you unleashed your possession move on me, you fell for my trap. Maybe the resurrected Sovereign Lord couldn’t do anything to you. But what if the Sovereign Lord and the True Devil were both resurrected at the same time? True Devil Sovereign Lord! God and Devil Combined!”

Whizz!

In the depths of the Halls of Heaven, an enormous figure appeared, larger than any giant of the past, his face shining with radiance and light.

It was none other than the Sovereign Lord.

Then another figure appeared, one whose face was a mass of darkness and gloom. It was the True Devil.

Crack!

The two bodies merged, becoming a single figure with two faces that stepped into the sword. However, they were as opposed as fire and water, so they suddenly exploded.

The Lord of the Sword Dao let out an anguished shriek as he sustained an attack from the combined wills of the Sovereign Lord and the True Devil.

“I'm in charge here,” Yang Qi said. “This is my empire, my heaven and earth. This is my universe! You’ve lost, Lord of the Sword Dao. Now get out of here!”

WHOOSH!

Redirecting the force of the explosion, he sent the sword shooting out of the bronze palace.  It wasn’t a very impressive distance, but it immediately put the Lord of the Sword Dao into grave danger.

He was safe inside the bronze palace, but outside of it, he was subject to the full, explosive power of the Halls of Heaven. Given the level of his cultivation base, it should have been impossible to force him outside of that bronze building. But Yang Qi had played his cards perfectly.

RUMBLE!

As soon as the sword was out in the open, lightning massed and shot toward it! The Halls of Heaven were trying to eliminate the outside threat!

All this time, he had been hiding in the bronze palace, but now that he had been found out, he was viewed as a tumor that had to be removed.

The purrling looked on, nodding.

It knew that victory and defeat had been determined. It was only a matter of time now.

Screams echoed out from the sword that was the true form of the Lord of the Sword Dao as he fought to free himself from the power of the Halls of Heaven and get back to the bronze palace.

Sadly for him, that was no easy task. Under ordinary circumstances, he might have succeeded. But right now, Yang Qi was inside him, and he had to protect his soul. If he didn’t, Yang Qi would definitely possess or subjugate him.

“Lord of the Sword Dao, you’ve already fallen into the depths of frenzy. You've lost control of your heart and soul, and are heading toward inevitable destruction. Why don’t you just let me subjugate you?” As he spoke, Yang Qi continued exerting full pressure with the God Legion Seal and the Mahātmā Jade, until the Lord of the Sword Dao finally stopped trembling and simply remained in place, unmoving.

RUMBLE!

An enormous hand appeared, which was none other than the Hand of the One God. It grabbed the sword and assaulted it with immense, deadly pressure.

The Lord of the Sword Dao could sense that this was a power he couldn't fight, but he remained calm and collected. “Ah, tribulation. I am the Lord of the Sword Dao, who has experienced narrow escapes from death on numerous occasions. I was subjugated by the God Legion Seal, but escaped from it, and now it’s happening again. Is that just my fate? If so, damn my fate. I refuse to be subjugated! I'd rather die to have my freedom!”

“You won't find freedom in death!”

The Lord of the Sword Dao had reached the end of the line, and Yang Qi could tell that he was even willing to end the fight in mutual destruction. But sadly, not even that would work for him.

It was his last stand. Some people would expect a scene like this to end with Yang Qi freeing the Lord of the Sword Dao, who would then offer to willingly serve him out of gratitude.

Unfortunately, that wasn’t how this scene would play out.

At cultivation levels such as this, only fools and the weak would free an enemy and expect gratitude in return. At this level, everyone had their own dao, and the only way to pursue it was to crush the daos of others. In other words, freeing an enemy was essentially the same as declaring defeat.

Yang Qi wouldn’t do something so monumentally idiotic. Furthermore, there was no way the Lord of the Sword Dao would offer service to Yang Qi because of being freed.

The only path before him was one of darkness.

“Annul Death; Eternally Bury!” Yang Qi said, resorting to the tenth move from the Sage Monarch Grand Magic. Instantly, he became the Great Necropolis and rumbled down to bury the Lord of the Sword Dao.

Still unwilling to give in, the Lord of the Sword Dao started chanting, “In the grand heaven; verily, only exists the sword. The soul never concedes; verily, the spirit shall return. The heart is boundless; verily, what can it be?God and spirits; verily, return they home....

“You’re truly incredible, Yang Qi. I can’t believe you tricked me into this position, outwitting me at every turn. However, I still have one move left in my dao of the sword. You’ve never seen anything like this, nor has your all-powerful ally.” Voice turning cold, the Lord of the Sword Dao continued, “This final move is called Home. This place doesn't belong to either of us. It’s not your home, nor mine. Let’s go home.”

For his last move, the Lord of the Sword Dao was using something that could end the fight in mutual destruction. Even if it didn’t end up killing Yang Qi, he wanted to die. To him, that was like going home.

Once the move was unleashed, there would be no more sword energy. There would be no more ultimate martial path. There would only be the will to go home.

That lonesome wanderer finally wanted to return to his home.

It was his ultimate dao of the sword.

His ultimate move.

Home.

Yang Qi suddenly felt as though he wanted to join the Lord of the Sword Dao in returning to his home. It was an eternal rest. Death. The vanishing of the world. Nothing. Dust.

“Whose home? Where? Souls have no home. Heaven and earth are filled with homes. A steady heart is home.” Yang Qi’s soul slipped into a state almost like slumber, and it almost seemed like he was going to pass out. But then his eyes glittered. “I am your home....”

RUMBLE!

An explosion rippled through the sword, then vanished. All of a sudden, Yang Qi’s will seemed to slip into eternal slumber, making him feel like he had disappeared, and wasn’t aware of anything. Was he dead, or just unconscious? No one knew.

He had never suffered an attack such as this. The Lord of the Sword Dao had a truly powerful cultivation base.

Chapter 1516: Deadly Tribulation

Yang Qi was in a position of deadly tribulation.

For him to go up against the Lord of the Sword Dao seemed to be just asking for humiliation. Not even a psychic scale of eighty billion would give him that right. Yet, by grasping at a host of varying opportunities, he had succeeded.

Unfortunately, the Lord of the Sword Dao had one final move to use. Home. It was designed to take both fighters into that eternal home of nothing, and as a result, Yang Qi had lost consciousness.

He wasn't sure if he was dead or alive.

It was a terrifying sensation, and truth be told, he felt like he was in a nightmare that he was unable to wake up from, his soul sealed forever in a location of absolute nothingness.

The purrling wasn’t there. The Halls of Heaven weren’t there. Nothing was there. It was very strange. What had just happened?

He felt depression grip him as he realized that he didn’t even have a body. It was as if literally everything had gone away, leaving behind only his thoughts.

Where was he?

‘Don’t tell me I'm in a state of Nevasaññānāsaññāyatana.’ All of a sudden, a daoist scripture flickered into his mind.

The state of Nevasaññānāsaññāyatana was one of ultimate understanding, which involved making everything disappear, and leaving behind only thoughts. It was a state of true invincibility. Once a person entered that state, no attack would be useful against them. If the physical world didn’t exist for them, how could physical attacks do anything to them?

All of a sudden, joy surged within Yang Qi.

However, his joy quickly faded as he realized that he didn’t know how to return from this state. If he couldn't return, it made reality like little more than a dream. This wasn’t the half-Annulled level. After all, in that level, it was supposedly possible to freely enter and exit the state of Nevasaññānāsaññāyatana.

“Die!” Yang Qi drew on his mind and unleashed a powerful attack.

Unfortunately, nothing happened as a result. If thoughts were useless, and he existed in a world of only thoughts, then what could he do?

‘Impossible, there has to be a way out,’ he thought, calming himself. ‘Given the level of my cultivation base, there must be a way back to the real world. Why can’t I even sense the Mahātmā Jade and the God Legion Seal? Only my own personal thoughts remain? Not even the purrling can help me in this situation. However, I still have my mysterious connection to the Great Necropolis.’

Focusing his thoughts, he imagined the Great Necropolis, and how it had crashed down into the impure lands.

RUMBLE!

After an unknown period of time passed, Yang Qi spotted a pinprick of light. The light rushed toward him, accompanied by immense rumbling; then, with no warning at all, he popped back into the real world. There he was, a short distance from the bronze palace.

Looking down, he saw a sword in his hand, and it was marked by the God Legion Seal.

“Don’t tell me the Lord of the Sword Dao died.” Delighted, he flew over to the bronze palace, where he found the purrling waiting for him.

The purling nodded and purred. “Congratulations. You passed a deadly tribulation. You were in a very dangerous situation, but you managed to find your way back from death.”

“What? Wasn’t I just in the state of Nevasaññānāsaññāyatana?” Yang Qi said, looking surprised.

“Yes. And at the same time, no. You were on the edge of it. You’re like an expert who tried to break into the half-Annulled level, but was too weak to succeed. Your psychic scale isn't strong enough to break through. However, you're obviously incredibly lucky in that you didn’t die. Usually, people who try to break into the half-Annulled level, but fail, end up dead.” The purrling spat out a bubble that wrapped around the sword.

Slowly but surely, the sword took human form again.

It was the Lord of the Sword Dao.

BUZZ!

He opened his eyes, and they looked like ten thousand swords piercing the heart.

“I'm not dead? I didn’t go home?” he said, looking confused.

“Get on your knees and pay your respects, Lord of the Sword Dao!” Yang Qi roared.

CRACK!

The Lord of the Sword Dao felt immense pain in his head, and although he fought the urge, he dropped to his knees. “My respects, Milord”

A new golden throne had risen up in the God Legion Seal.

The Lord of the Sword Dao had escaped the fetters of the seal, only to fall right back into them.

“I just can’t escape the seal, can I,” he said bitterly. “Is this just my fate? I refuse to accept this. I refuse!”

Yang Qi felt powerful thought fluctuations bucking against him; monitoring the thoughts of the Lord of the Sword Dao was not easy! It was like trying to manage a hundred million Paramount Gods all at the same time.

However, considering the level of his cultivation base, and the fact that he had just survived a deadly tribulation, he was now more in a position to succeed than ever.

“You’re right, Lord of the Sword Dao. Your fate is to be bound to me. We're going to work together. If you refuse, or try to kill me, we’ll have to do things the hard way. However, while it’s true you’ll serve me forever, don’t think too much into it. In fact, I'm going to give you some of the power of the God Legion Seal. That way, the Halls of Heaven won’t attack you, and you can go take a look at the god world.”

“No! You won’t bind me! I'm the Lord of the Sword Dao! I broke free from the God Legion Seal before, and I’ll do it again. You’d best just kill me. I could snap at any time and destroy your empire!”

“Not likely. I'm going to keep a very close eye on you. I know everything you’re thinking, including your dao of the sword, and your battle experience. And I'm thoroughly familiar with your cultivation base as well. For now, you’ll become a sword again, and I’ll use your power to clear out the treasures of the Halls of Heaven. The first stop will be the pill repository. I want to see what kind of medicinal pills are there.”

He made a grasping gesture, and the Lord of the Sword Dao transformed back into a sword, which Yang Qi grabbed.

“Alright,” the purrling purred, “you got what you wanted. I'm leaving now. Remember, you owe me a favor.” With that, the purrling made as if to leave.

“Exalted Purrling, don’t you want some of the treasures from here?”

“Nope. I wouldn’t be interested even if the Sovereign Lord showed up. When you get to my level, treasures are like trash. Besides, the Halls of Heaven basically belong to you, so if I took treasures, I would just be prematurely calling it even with you, right?”

With that, the purrling vanished.

Yang Qi shook his head to clear it of extraneous thoughts. Now that he’d subjugated the Lord of the Sword Dao, he had learned a lot of secrets pertaining to the Halls of Heaven. For instance, the location of the pill repository.

Whooosh!

He shot off like a bullet into the twisting depths of the halls.

The pill repository contained pills that had been personally concocted by the Sovereign Lord. If Yang Qi could send them to his empire, his loyal people would get far stronger, which would lead to better destiny.

One of the fastest ways to improve destiny was to improve the cultivation bases of the people. And medicinal pills were a great way to do that.

RUMBLE!

Yang Qi sped through countless buildings, ignoring the auras of quite a few magical treasures. For now, he was focused on the pills. After all, the stronger he got, the easier it would be to control the Lord of the Sword Dao.

Wasting time on random treasures along the way would be pointless.

Swish!

He finally arrived at a huge building that was shaped like a medicinal pill. There, he swept out the sword that was the Lord of the Sword Dao, allowing him to take the brunt of the defensive measures.

The door opened, and he found himself looking at layer upon layer of yellow sand. It was like looking at a desert.

‘What’s this?’ he thought. There was something about the sand that seemed odd, so he opened his Lord's Eye, which was when he realized that the grains of sand were actually medicinal pills.

‘Are they Eternal-Sands Willpower Pills?’

He remembered reading about Eternal-Sands Willpower Pills in an ancient record book. Only the Sovereign Lord had ever been able to concoct them. They were used to boost psychic power, remold the nascent divinity, and unlock hidden strength. However, after concocting them, the Sovereign Lord had second thoughts, and because he feared other gods becoming too powerful, he only handed a few out.

Nowadays, the recipe for Eternal-Sands Willpower Pills was considered a thing of the past.

“These things are amazing. With all these pills, the psyches of my people will reach incredible heights. And I bet the destiny will improve by thirty percent without a hitch.” Even Yang Qi was surprised by how much he was benefiting from visiting the pill repository.

Chapter 1517: Taking the Pills

The huge collection of Eternal-Sands Willpower Pills that Yang Qi had found would provide a huge boost to his empire’s destiny. They looked almost like sand dunes spreading out in all directions.

It was Yang Qi’s first time coming across a true treasure trove in the Halls of Heaven.

RUMBLE!

Opening his mouth, he transformed into King Heaven-Devourer, and sucked in the collection of pills.

As soon as he devoured the pills, he activated his internal teleportation portal, and sent them into the waiting hands of Jadefall, Yang Susu, and his numerous other friends and family. The veritable mountain of medicinal pills descending from above caused a shocking aura to fill everything within the Everlasting Aegis.

“These pills are incredible!” Yang Susu said. “They were concocted by the Sovereign Lord. Let's hurry and distribute them!”

“Let me take a look,” the Shepherd said, striding forward and grabbing a handful of the sesame-seed-sized pills. He tossed them into his mouth, whereupon every pore on his body erupted with sizzling flames that engulfed the entire area.

At the same time, his life force substructure transformed dramatically, and his psychic scale increased by several hundred million.

“This pill is amazing! Just what you’d expect from something made by the Sovereign Lord. It’s far beyond anything the God-Lords could make. Brothers, come, take some and see for yourself! Our empire’s destiny is going to skyrocket!”

“Sage monarch magistrates!” Jadefall said in a loud voice, and whooshing voices could be heard as a few thousand magistrates flew over. “Take these pills and fit them into our current reward system. And use them as a signing bonus for any new experts we recruit. That should improve our recruitment numbers.”

“Yes ma'am,” the sage monarch magistrate thundered back, then they gathered up the sand-like pills.

These were pills from the Halls of Heaven, personally concocted by the Sovereign Lord. Not even the House of the Invincible could produce anything close to this level.

Under the direction of the sage monarch magistrates, the pills could be distributed without worrying about anyone pocketing some on the side for personal use. And they were the perfect tool for recruiting new experts, such as top leaders from the Spritefolk.

There were also people who were owed rewards, that received the pills, took them, and instantly experienced huge jumps in cultivation base.

Most importantly, the pills could be used by Quasi-Gods and Paramount Gods alike. A Quasi-God who took one would transform on the deepest level and become a full god. And a Paramount God who took even one pill would experience a boost in their psychic scale. That wasn’t to mention what taking multiple pills could do.

A few hours passed.

RUMBLE!

The destiny of the empire burned brighter than ever as numerous geniuses reached higher levels than before. The expression advancing by leaps and bounds couldn’t even come close to describe what was happening.

Hooooooowlllll.

Yang Qi looked on as the destiny caused the spherical greyspace that was the Everlasting Aegis to rapidly grow stronger and larger.

‘Incredible,’ he thought, feeling quite delighted. ‘It only took a few hours for the destiny to improve dramatically. Those pills really are amazing.’

By now, he had already cleared out all of the Eternal-Sands Willpower Pills.

That was when he realized there was another type of pill present. They were roughly the size of mung beans, and were stored in cauldrons, making them seem almost like grain. He had never seen pills stored in this way before.

He picked one of them up and found that it was an ancient pill known as the Jasper Yin-Yang Obstacle-Dissolving Pill, which could be used to directly improve the power of a nation or empire. It was very different from ordinary pills that were designed for a single expert to use.

Yang Qi was very pleased.

After all, he wasn’t interested in pills that would benefit his cultivation base, but rather pills that could improve the destiny of his empire. A boost in destiny would also benefit his brethren.

In terms of how to improve the destiny of a nation, it was rather simple. First, one could improve the quality of the citizens. Second, one could increase the number of citizens. Third, one could gather resources by conquering other nations.

As for the Jasper Yin-Yang Obstacle-Dissolving Pill, it could improve the people on a fundamental level, helping them survive their cultivation tribulations. Normally, tribulations were a very deadly thing, but this pill could change that.

Yang Qi inhaled deeply, absorbing all of the cauldrons and pills, and sending them into his internal teleportation portal.

Yet again, things inside the Everlasting Aegis began transforming at top speed.

Time passed, and his empire was developing at rapid speed. Normally speaking, growing that quickly would be flirting with danger, as it would be hard to provide the necessary resources. Ordinary empires would consume massive amounts of resources on a daily basis. And those resources didn’t come from nowhere. They had to be taken from the god world.

Without resources, people would starve, and in that case, destiny would decline, not increase.

However, Yang Qi didn’t need to worry about that. When he had succeeded in forming his minor god world, there had been a huge influx of preheaven treasures, enough that it would keep his empire running for hundreds of years. That wasn’t to mention the resources pouring in from the Halls of Heaven.

If an empire wanted to close its doors to the outside, it had to consider a few things: first, the godstones they could produce; second, the medicinal pills they could provide; third, the magical treasures in the empire; and fourth, the resources gained from military campaigns.

Yang Qi was fine on all of those fronts; furthermore, he could adjust how time flowed in his empire. A few days could be equivalent to a few dozen years. And in a few dozen years, it was definitely possible for his empire to grow to roughly the same level as the Invincible Dynasty.

Of course, that required a lot of godstones. But he had the Halls of Heaven, so he wasn't worried. No one else could possibly replicate what he was doing.

After clearing out the Jasper Yin-Yang Obstacle-Dissolving Pills, Yang Qi went looking for other pills. He found a large group of Dao-Enlightenment Gold Pills, which could provide deep enlightenment, then replenish the body afterward.

They were stored in bags, which made them resemble rice from the impure lands. And each bag contained tens of thousands of ‘grains’. Of course, even that much was like nothing compared to what was available in the Halls of Heaven as a whole.

As he explored the pill repository, he sent all sorts of pills back to his empire.

Meanwhile, powerful streams of destiny were flowing into him, and at the same time, his sage monarch magistrates continued proliferating.

By the time he cleared out all the pills, his sage monarch magistrates were a hundred million in number, and they were all on the verge of breakthroughs with their psychic scale. Once they succeeded, they would be peak Paramount Gods, and if Yang Qi fought with them, they could probably take down an opponent with a scale of a hundred billion. He was getting stronger and stronger.

Laughing heartily, Yang Qi said, “My empire's destiny is just getting stronger and stronger. What do you think, Lord of the Sword Dao?” The stronger Yang Qi grew, the less the Lord of the Sword Dao could struggle.

And the Sage Monarch Empire was getting more and more in the position to hold its own against the three other dynasties.

Chapter 1518: First Energy Primordial Chaos Pill

“It won’t work, Yang Qi! I already freed myself from the God Legion Seal once, and I’ll do it again. You’re not the Sovereign Lord, after all! I escaped from his God Legion Seal, do you really think I can’t deal with you?” The Lord of the Sword Dao was fully locked down, yet he refused to give in. He still believed he would find a way to make trouble, and eventually, kill Yang Qi.

Yang Qi snorted coldly. “You just refuse to give in, don’t you, Lord of the Sword Dao? Don’t forget that in this world, strength is what gets respect. I could just devour you and take your cultivation base. You’re only a sword, after all. Remember, I've devoured the Dragon Compendium, the Mahātmā Jade, King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans, the Everlit Godlamp, and all sorts of other preheaven treasures. You’re no different than them.”

Yang Qi knew that the Lord of the Sword Dao had made his mind up not to be a servant. Even if Yang Qi consigned him to the deepest depths of hell, the man would never give up on his quest to destroy the Halls of Heaven.

For now, the only thing he could do was get strong enough to assimilate him, thus reaching a psychic scale of a hundred billion.

That was the only way to deal with him. After all, this was no Second Devil General. The Lord of the Sword Dao had already escaped from the God Legion Seal once, so keeping him around like this was extremely dangerous.

Before long, Proud Central and the other dynasties would definitely come for Yang Qi and his empire.

Once that happened, the situation would turn extremely perilous, and there would be a lot of deadly fighting. If he got surrounded and besieged, it was possible that the Lord of the Sword Dao would use that chaos to try breaking free.

And if he succeeded, the first thing he would do was kill Yang Qi.

Obviously, he hated Yang Qi with a passion.

Assimilating him was really Yang Qi’s only option. Besides, if Yang Qi could reach a psychic scale of a hundred billion as a result, who could possibly challenge him?

Once his psychic scale reached that level, and his cultivation base followed, the God Legion Seal would be even stronger, and the vital energy of the Halls of Heaven would be easier to control.

Once he had access to all the resources of the Halls of Heaven, everything in existence would essentially be his for the taking. The god world would be his.

The more destiny he had access to, the less effective the Lord of the Sword Dao’s struggles would be. And while it was true he had escaped the God Legion Seal in the past, that was after the Sovereign Lord had died. While the Sovereign Lord was alive, he had been forced to be nothing but an obedient servant.

For now, Yang Qi was focused less on directly dealing with the Lord of the Sword Dao, and more on making sure his destiny was equal to that of the House of the Invincible. At that point, he would publicly declare the founding of the Sage Monarch Empire, the fourth empire alongside the Central, Invincible, and Chiliocosm Dynasties.

The news would spread rapidly, and his destiny would grow in kind. Eventually, he would reach the point of being able to thoroughly and completely assimilate the Lord of the Sword Dao. Until then, he would grow in secret. Thanks to the fact that he had agents in leadership positions in all three of the other dynasties, he had direct access to all of the latest news from all three places. That made it easy to make plans and arrangements.

As more medicinal pills flowed into his empire, it bubbled like boiling water, expanding rapidly. Of course, resources were being devoured like mad, but Yang Qi didn’t care. The Halls of Heaven weren’t running low yet.

“Grand-Clarity All-Soul Pill?”

“Double-Nines Paragonic Cauldron Pill?”

“Sun-Moon Radiance-Light Glitter-Sparkle Pill?”

“Primal-Chaos Hetero-Fruit Primordial-Vitality Pill?”

“First Energy Primordial Chaos Pill? I can’t believe this pill is here. And there are so many of them! Incredible. This thing is truly incredible! It’s specifically designed to bring empires to greater glory!” In the depths of the pill repository, he encountered an entire world filled with medicinal pills the size of longan fruits. They were pills that had long since been considered lost in the god world.

Anyone could make use of this pill. And while it wouldn’t increase psychic power or godhood rating, it had the ability to change one's substructure, making it possible to absorb an aspect of primal-chaos paleo-energy called primordial chaos first energy.

After consuming it, the people of an empire wouldn’t need ordinary resources to survive and flourish. The reason was that ordinary resources had their origin in primal-chaos paleo-energy. And normally speaking, only the power of the god world could be used to break down primal-chaos paleo-energy and turn it into precious materials, which could then be tapped into.

It was similar to how, in the impure lands, people had to eat food to survive. And food could only be grown from the dirt in the ground, with sunlight from above. But imagine what it would be like if the people of an empire could absorb energy directly from the sun, and could eat dirt for sustenance. Just how powerful would that empire become?

The Sovereign Lord had originally concocted the First Energy Primordial Chaos Pill in the hopes of improving the destiny of his own empire. But later, he realized that if his citizens didn’t need resources, they would prove difficult to govern. After all, if they could directly grow by taking primordial chaos first energy from the larger primal-chaos paleo-energy, and didn’t need resources from the empire, things would quickly get out of hand.

Of course, Yang Qi wasn't worried about such things. He could rely on his sage monarch magistrates to keep things running smoothly. He now had a hundred million of them, and their cultivation bases were growing constantly.

These pills would increase the empire’s destiny, and that would make the people more content. After all, even the common citizens knew that the level of resources in a nation was important. The more resources there were, the more content the people would be.

As this pill was distributed among the populace, the people in general would know that they didn’t need to worry about a lack of resources.

As word about this spread, the destiny would increase.

Yang Qi didn’t hesitate to collect the pills, then distribute them in concert with a specific reward system designed for their use.

The sound of horns and drums filled the worlds of Yang Qi’s massive empire. And in the middle of all those lands was a public square, in which the sage monarch magistrates had gathered.

“Hear ye, citizens of the Sage Monarch Empire,” their voices boomed in unison. “Our boundless leader, His Majesty Yang Qi, has acquired an ancient boon, the First Energy Primordial Chaos Pill. It ensures that you don’t need to use resources in your cultivation, but can instead tap directly into the primal-chaos paleo-energy. Observe the effectiveness of this pill.”

Up in the air, a sage monarch magistrate hovered next to a Mechfolk chief elder, the latter a Paramount God who had recently joined the empire and made significant contributions.

“For his contributions to the empire, this Mechfolk chief elder will be given a First Energy Primordial Chaos Pill. Please, consume the pill immediately.”

“Many thanks to the empire for this reward!”

The Mechfolk chief elder took the pill and popped it into his mouth.

RUMBLE!

All of a sudden, an enormous nascent divinity appeared behind him. It was a first energy primordial chaos nascent divinity, and it immediately began absorbing the primordial chaos energy, then turning it into precious materials such as godstones, medicines, and vital energy.

Everyone watching was stunned into envious silence.

The sage monarch magistrates then called an assembly to reward the most faithful and loyal people with First Energy Primordial Chaos Pills.

The same thing happened to everyone who could use them. What was even more amazing was that the resources produced by the resultant nascent divinity could actually be sold!

Anyone who took the pills turned into resource-making machines.

Not even the Cruiser of Civilization had been as effective at converting primal-chaos paleo-energy into medicinal pills. Now, Yang Qi realized that the Lord of Civilization must have devised his methods by imitating these very medicinal pills created by the Sovereign Lord.

However, the cruiser required large amounts of godstones to fuel the process.

But now, he didn’t need any outside help, only primal-chaos paleo-energy.

And there was an endless supply of that out in the void.

Chapter 1519: Fourth Empire

Yet again, Yang Qi’s empire’s destiny was burning like fire.

The leaders were the first to get the new medicinal pills, allowing them to generate their own resources.

The entire empire surged with excited activity as everyone thirsted to get their own First Energy Primordial Chaos Pill. As a result, the people worked even harder to perform services, resulting in an immediate ten percent increase in destiny.

Time sped by.

Destiny improved constantly, and the Everlasting Aegis expanded with even more rapidity. By now, the Everlasting Aegis was a treasure superior to even the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi was scouring the Halls of Heaven for more medicinal pills.

His empire had been growing for ten years.

Back when Yang Qi had first ascended to the god world, he hadn’t even been a Paramount God. But now, his empire was thriving so incredibly it was hard to say how many top experts it could produce. There were some god-spirits there, who, because of the superior nature of the empire they lived in, could reproduce at an incredible rate.

Furthermore, Yang Qi had subjugated large groups of Demonfolk, and had transformed them on a genetic level, turning them into true humans. And they had incredible reproductive capabilities. They could produce a hundred offspring at a time! In fact, the sage monarch magistrates started recruiting their nursemaids to join the learning institutes of the empire and train everyone else on how to raise children.

Eventually, Yang Qi cleared out the final First Energy Primordial Chaos Pill.

Yang Qi looked at his empire, and saw that the destiny was like a mighty pillar climbing into heaven, where it spread out into the void, sending out tendrils that could absorb everything it touched.

His destiny was now at about eighty to ninety percent that of the Invincible Dynasty!

In other words, he had nothing to fear if the Invincible Dynasty invaded. Of course, if all three of the other dynasties joined forces to attack him, he would be in extreme danger.

Having finished with the First Energy Primordial Chaos Pills, Yang Qi continued his exploration, gathering up medicinal pills of all sorts to send back to his empire. However, he now needed to reduce how much he was sending back. He had already reached the point where the pills couldn't be used fast enough, and had to go into storage.

And when stores built up unused, the destiny would grow more slowly.

For now, he stopped looking for pills designed to improve destiny, and instead focused on pills similar to the Invincible Gold Pill, which could be used to boost individual cultivation bases.

“Lord of the Sword Dao, what sort of pills can be used to achieve a cultivation base like you God-Lords of old?” Yang Qi asked.

“Quit dreaming,” he replied with a cold smile. “You think the Sovereign Lord could literally do anything? The God-Lords had psychic scales of at least ten billion, and were considered completely invincible. That requires personal enlightenment. Even with a blessing of destiny, you can’t just make a peak Paramount God into a God-Lord. It has to be done on one’s own merit.”

Yang Qi chuckled coldly. “You're wrong. God-Lords aren’t half-Annulled experts. With the right resources, any breakthrough is possible. All of my friends and family are peak Paramount Gods, and I want them to be God-Lords. And that’s going to take medicinal pills.”

“Regardless, I'm not going to help you,” the Lord of the Sword Dao snarled. “As long as you don’t kill me, Yang Qi, I'm going to get out of here eventually. And then I’ll kill you!”

“I know. You and I are as opposed as fire and water. If I were in your position, I’d have the same attitude. Don’t worry, I’ll kill you as soon as I can.”

When the Lord of the Sword Dao heard that, his heart went cold.

However, there was nothing he could do. King Immortal-Slayer and Proud Central were in a similar deadlock. If the latter couldn’t assimilate the former, the former would eventually escape and kill the latter. There was no way to resolve the situation.

It was survival of the fittest.

Yang Qi spent a lot of time searching for rare medicinal pills, but didn't send them to his empire. It was already saturated with pills, and it would be hundreds of years before they ran out.

For now, the destiny in his empire wasn’t going to suddenly surpass that of the House of the Invincible, because in terms of strength, he couldn’t outdo them.

Before that could happen, he needed to push his own psychic scale to the level of a hundred billion, and also make sure he had multiple God-Lord-level subordinates, people like Dugu Sheji and Yang Primal-Chaos. With fighting prowess like that, his forces would be unparalleled in all creation.

Leaving behind the lower-level medicinal pills, he raced on, knowing full well that time was of the essence. As his empire’s destiny rose, it was only a matter of time before the other three dynasties found out what was happening. And there was no way they would be happy with a fourth major power rising up to compete with them. Once they found out, it would mean war, so he needed to get as strong as possible before that happened.

After some searching, he suddenly detected the fluctuations of a powerful medicinal pill. It came from a wide-open square filled with a forest of stone pagodas. And atop each pagoda was a crystal box shaped like a coffin, filled with pills, all of which resembled śarīra left behind after some top expert experienced nirvanic extermination.

However, closer examination revealed that they didn’t have the aura of the buddhist schools, but instead, a radiance and light filled with a sensation of righteous justice.

As Yang Qi looked closer, he realized that they weren’t made of pure medicinal ingredients, but rather seemed like convergences of psychic scale and godhood rating, with destiny thrown in. And as it turned out, they were filled with the aura of the confucian schools.

Yang Qi couldn’t help but let out a laugh. “Do you know what pills these are, Lord of the Sword Dao? As it turns out, the legends are true. The Sovereign Lord slaughtered countless confucians in the ancient era. It was a bloodbath that later came to be called the Sovereign Lord’s Confucian Purge, and even the most elite experts lost their lives in it. I used to be skeptical about whether it really happened, but after seeing these medicinal pills, I understand the truth.”

The legend of the Sovereign Lord’s Confucian Purge stated that, as the confucian schools gained power, they began establishing empires throughout the god world. And because they excelled at governing nations, other empires would invite them to send advisors and counselors to help them. Even the Sovereign Lord had confucians as government officials.

But as time went on, they got stronger and stronger, eventually gaining such immense influence that they earned the right to disagree with the Sovereign Lord. It reached the point where they wanted the Sovereign Lord to be a figurehead ruler, while they took responsibility for governing the god world.

That was when conflict broke out.

In his fury, the Sovereign Lord slaughtered all of the confucians he could find.

The confucians fought back, but they couldn't counter the might of the Sovereign Lord. He wiped them out in bloody fashion, although a few survived. In the countless years that followed, they eventually came back, to the point where the three major dynasties in the modern god world all had confucians as government officials.

Based on what Yang Qi was seeing, the countless confucian experts that were slaughtered had been used by the Sovereign Lord as ingredients in medicinal pills.

The pills were called The Lord’s Wrath.

After concocting them, the Sovereign Lord didn’t give any to his subordinates, but rather kept them sealed here.

“I wonder how strong these pills are,” Yang Qi said, reaching out to open one of the crystal boxes.

Taking out a pill, he peeled it apart, until he could tap into the quintessence of the pill. Intense rumbling shook the area as confucian ideals, divine abilities, and other things poured into Yang Qi, causing his psychic scale and godhood rating to jump by several hundred million!

Although that wasn’t very much considering his overall level, it went to show how impressive the pills were.

Most people would get an increase of several billion if they took the pill.

“Incredible! With these pills, my friends and family will definitely experience huge boosts. Even if they can’t become God-Lords with psychic scales of ten billion, they’ll at least get up to the level of nine billion. They’ll be just on the verge of breakthroughs!”

Yang Qi couldn’t have been more delighted.

Chapter 1520: Sea of Faith

The medicinal pills known as The Lord’s Wrath had been created after the mass slaughter of confucians, using their quintessence as the main ingredient. After sampling just one of them, Yang Qi had experienced a big boost to his cultivation base.

He waved his hand, and a stream of sword energy flew out, slashing into the sealing marks protecting the various crystal boxes. Taking the medicinal pills, he sent them to his friends and family.

Unfortunately, the pills wouldn’t help his sage monarch magistrates, otherwise he would have had them achieve breakthroughs.

Their breakthroughs were dependent on his enlightenment. Without gaining new enlightenment, they couldn’t do anything, not even with medicinal pills.

It could be likened to ordinary government officials. It didn't matter how hard they worked, if they didn’t catch the attention of a superior, thus getting promotions, they might as well be considered trash. But once a superior took a liking to a lower-ranked official, that official would have a chance to gain immense power and authority.

It had basically nothing to do with hard work.

When the new pills arrived in the Everlasting Aegis, Jadefall and the others were very excited. Those who used them would achieve dramatic transformations, and the first to do that was Jadefall herself. Previously, she had been deeply connected to the purrling, and its cultivation base had a big influence on her.

Once she consumed The Lord’s Wrath, her psychic scale rose into the billions. Yet that wasn’t enough for her, so she consumed more. In fact, she took seven at once, causing thunderous rumbling to sound out as her psychic scale skyrocketed to the level of ten billion.

She had become a God-Lord, a level that most experts would dream about constantly.

Furthermore, she gained the frank and calm air of a confucian, bringing her even closer in alignment with the destiny of the empire.

Confucian ideals could greatly benefit any nation, and in fact, any top government would have to consider them. Of course, sage monarch magistrates were an exception. That said, the magistrates innately used confucian thinking in many ways.

Next came the Shepherd, Eldest Brother Mage Cloudwalker, Brahma, Yang Doom, Yang Proudworld, Yang Manifestation, Yang Memory, Yang Celestial, and all of Yang Qi’s other friends and family. Considering how superior the pills were to Invincible Gold Pills, if the other three dynasties saw what was happening in Yang Qi’s empire, they wouldn’t hesitate to launch a bloody war.

However, Yang Qi’s brethren didn’t need to treat them like incredibly precious items. After all, they had tens upon tens of thousands of them.

The confucian schools had been so incredibly powerful and influential that even the most remote corners of the impure lands had been touched by their influence. In fact, some people believed that confucian ideals were the true path that should be followed in the god world. For example, the rightful rulers in the Rich-Lush Continent had been the institutes, which were essentially confucian schools.

All it took was seven or eight of The Lord’s Wrath, and his brethren were bathed in golden light and white energy, and inundated with complex information.

RUMBLE!

Yang Doom broke through. He was a unique person, as he had once borne a third of the God Legion Seal, and had immense personal destiny. Now, his cultivation base was like that of the ancient God-Lords.

One by one, his other friends and family broke through to the level of ten billion.

When Yang Qi saw what was happening, he thought, ‘Incredible. I never would have guessed it would happen like this. I guess ascending from the impure lands and immortal worlds makes them very special indeed. I thought they would all get stuck at the level of nine billion, but instead, they’re breaking through all obstacles.”

Thus was the effectiveness of a type of medicinal pill based on the ancient confucians.

Next, Jadefall had other elites from the empire take the pills, hoping to create even more God-Lords.

Unfortunately, of the several dozen they picked, none of them could get past the level of nine billion. They weren’t Ascendants, so they couldn’t just break through.

All of a sudden, Yang Qi came to a realization. Ascendants didn't come from the god world, so they weren’t under the same pressure from the local natural laws. They had fewer obstacles, which was why they could achieve breakthroughs so easily.

All of a sudden, Yang Qi realized how valuable Ascendants were.

‘My brethren all succeeded because they’re Ascendants. Yes. I must figure out a way to get back to the impure lands and rescue all of my other friends and family members from there. They’re the greatest treasure conceivable. Without them, it won't matter if I completely clear out the Halls of Heaven. People. I need my people!”

Never before had Yang Qi been in such pressing need of top talent.

After distributing The Lord’s Wrath, Yang Qi decided to give up on searching for pills. Instead, he spent time looking for formations and magical treasures. Some, he could send to his people, while others were stashed away for later use. For instance, he found something called a Universe-Origin Many-Heavens Myriad-Manifestations Transformation-Destruction God-Sphere that seemed like it could be particularly useful in the right circumstances.

Eventually, he shifted his attention again, and began looking for the passageway to the impure lands.

He already knew that there was an entrance to the Ancient Road to the Gods somewhere around his current location. That was how the Great Necropolis had ended up in the impure lands. The Great Necropolis had been locked down by the Sovereign Lord, and had remained in the Halls of Heaven for billions of years before ultimately descending to the lower worlds.

‘That’s right. I bet if I could track down the aura of the Great Necropolis, it would lead me to the passageway. Once I find the passageway, I can figure out a way to bring all of my people up here. That's going to be the best way to strengthen my empire. People. Talented people. That’s what I need.’

As he began his search, he took on the form of the Great Necropolis, and began flying back and forth throughout the Halls of Heaven. It was similar to how he had searched for the Mahātmā Jade.

“You’re trying to find a way to the impure lands, aren't you, Yang Qi?” the Lord of the Sword Dao said. “That’s complete lunacy!”

“It's none of your concern,” Yang Qi replied coolly.

As he floated around like a specter, he happened across various magical treasures and weapons that he would take and send to his empire. Obviously, anything he found in the Halls of Heaven would be very impressive to anyone outside.

As his people improved their fighting prowess, his empire’s destiny would also improve, although in measures so small they weren’t even worthy of his notice. Eventually, when he reached the half-Annulled level, he would assimilate the halls as a whole, and add it to the Everlasting Aegis.

At a certain point, he suddenly detected a familiar aura, that of the Great Necropolis. Flying onward, he suddenly detected the sound of ocean waves.

‘An ocean?’

Up ahead, he saw an azure blue ocean, covered with waves, which were crashing against the cliffy shore. The sound, intermingled with cries like those of birds, sounded almost like prayers.

‘If this isn't an ocean, what is it?’ There actually weren’t any animals in the ocean, and the water wasn’t real water. Each drop was incomparably heavy. As it turned out, it was the faith of people!

Making a grasping gesture, he pulled a single drop of water into his hand, gazed into it, and saw countless people in the god world, including humans, demons, and even devils, all of them praying to the Sovereign Lord.

It was a water of faith.

This ocean had been formed by the faith power of countless individuals praying to the might of the Sovereign Lord.

Faith power and destiny were different. Faith power was purer and stronger, but it was tainted by the karma of the living beings that had offered it. In contrast, destiny didn’t have karma.

Destiny came from a mutual arrangement. When the ruler worked hard at his job, and the people prospered, then the destiny would grow. If the ruler was tyrannical, the people would suffer, as would the destiny.

It was a clear cycle.

But faith was different. Faith could be demanded even in concert with tyranny. It could also be forcibly taken. There was no cycle when it came to faith. The people of a country could rebel against their leader, but believers couldn't rebel against the god they put their faith in. The two were fundamentally different.

Chapter 1521: Passageway to the Impure Lands

The difference between faith and destiny could be summed up in this way: destiny was a business transaction, while faith was simple plundering.

Plundering brought profit much more simply and quickly than a business transaction, and it didn’t require capital. But it came with big risks and restrictions, primarily that of karma. And that twist was what had led many gods to their death. While it had initially been very popular, once the gods realized its side-effects, things had changed.

The ancient buddhist schools had been particularly skilled in the use of faith power, which was how they qualified to compete with the Sovereign Lord. But eventually, their faith power reached a zenith, then they collapsed, primarily because faith could only be taken, with no return. That, coupled with the karmic side-effects, made faith inferior to destiny in many ways.

In front of Yang Qi was an entire ocean of faith that the Sovereign Lord had collected.

Of course, the Sovereign Lord also knew of the brutal side-effects of faith, which was why he had collected and sealed it here, instead of using it.

This power was ancient and immense, considering it contained the faith of gods. And because of that, it was like a dangerous bomb that could rip anyone who unleashed it incorrectly to shreds.

Yang Qi could tell that if he absorbed this faith power, he would instantly jump to a psychic scale of a hundred billion. Unfortunately, the karma within it would ensure that, after he reached those heights, he would perish.

Nodding, Yang Qi thought, ‘Incredible. Simply incredible. I can’t believe the Sovereign Lord stored up this much unused faith power. I used to use faith power before, but once I got to the god world, I got rid of it to clear myself of any karma. Taking this faith power would definitely be suicide. However, this faith does seem to have transformed in some way.’

Studying it more closely, he saw that the faith power resembled dragons flying back and forth, and although they contained karma, that karma was slowly weakening. That was because the gods who had given their faith to the Sovereign Lord had all perished. Normally speaking, that meant their faith should have faded away, but for some unknown reason, the Sovereign Lord had ensured that it remained. And he had also done something to slowly weaken its karmic power.

If a few more tens of billions of years were to pass, the faith power might actually become completely free of any karma. Then it would be a real treasure that could lead someone to becoming like the Sovereign Lord himself.

But unfortunately, it couldn’t be used right now.

‘Is there something that can get rid of the karma in that faith sooner?’ He thought about it for a long time, but couldn't come up with any good ideas. As far as he knew, there hadn’t ever been anything that could negate karma effectively.

It would be like someone in the impure lands trying to come up with a way to commit robbery without breaking the law.

‘There must be something. But it’s probably a magical treasure that surpasses the god world. Only something that doesn't conform to the natural laws here could cleanse this faith power.’

After thinking about it for a bit longer, a flash of realization hit him. “The Great Necropolis. It’s got to be the Great Necropolis! It surpasses the god world, and wasn’t born out of ancient primal-chaos. No wonder I can sense the aura of the necropolis here. So that’s how it is! The Sovereign Lord stored this ocean of faith here and was using the Great Necropolis to cleanse it of karma. However, at some point, the necropolis ended up dropping down into the immortal worlds. But how?’

He continued along that line of thinking for some time.

‘I bet the passageway to the impure lands is somewhere in this ocean. I should be able to search the ocean as long as I don’t absorb any of the “water”.’

Exercising utmost caution, he summoned a bubble of energy from the Great Necropolis, surrounding himself before he jumped in.

The water of faith pressed down on the bubble, causing bubbling sounds to fill it. Ironically, it was Proud Central who had given Yang Qi the quintessence of the Great Necropolis, making him deeply linked to the necropolis wherever he went.

Over the course of the next several hours, he searched here and there within the ocean of faith. Eventually, he ran into an enormous cavern in its depths, which bore the shape of the necropolis. Peering inside he saw something like an ancient road.

Unfortunately, it was a dead end.

‘Damn.’ Of course, Yang Qi knew that the Ancient Road to the Gods had vanished. Back in the impure lands, it had ceased to exist in the Primeval Age and the Future Age. It only existed in the Immortal Dao Age. But now, it had apparently vanished from the Immortal Dao Age as well, which meant there was no longer any connection between the impure lands and the god world. Traveling back and forth was impossible.

‘I can’t accept this. Don’t tell me I’ll never reunite with my friends and family. Impossible. With all the divine abilities I have, can’t I recreate the Ancient Road to the Gods? Can’t I pierce through the natural laws of the god world?!’

“You’re thinking about remaking the Ancient Road to the Gods, aren’t you?” the Lord of the Sword Dao said with a cold laugh. “Very ambitious, Yang Qi. But it won’t work. Not even the Sovereign Lord himself would’ve dared to entertain such talk, yet you think you can do it?”

“If you keep jabbering, Lord of the Sword Dao, I’ll make you suffer worse than you can imagine! Maybe I’ll force you to absorb all of this faith. Turn you into a killing machine that I can turn on the other three dynasties. How about that?”

“Do you have a death wish, boy?!” the Lord of the Sword Dao shouted. However, a moment later, he chuckled. “Alright, bring it on. I’ll take that faith power. It will kill me in the end, but at least I’d be able to break free and slaughter you in the process. As long as I can kill you, I’ll die happily.”

“Well thought out,” Yang Qi replied as he flew out of the ocean of faith. He knew that his attempt to find the ancient road had failed.

That said, as long as travel back and forth with the god world was impossible, that meant his friends and family were safe. They were the ultimate rulers of the impure lands, and no one would be able to overthrow them. Since no one from the god world could travel down to cause problems, they were secure.

Once he pushed his cultivation to the point where he was stronger than the old Sovereign Lord, he would try remaking the connection.

He was confident he would succeed, as he was certain he would surpass the Sovereign Lord.

Since he couldn’t rely on his friends and family from the impure lands to boost his destiny, he now had no other choice than to continue searching the halls of heaven for more treasures. If everyone among his people had preheaven treasures, then his empire would obviously be much stronger.

As he searched, he found all sorts of treasure troves with amazing things inside of them, all of which he sent to his empire. However, he didn’t find anything useful for himself. For now, the only thing that would give him a major boost was the final piece of the Mahātmā Jade.

And that was in the Central Dynasty.

With it, he could definitely reach the level of a hundred billion, and possibly push past it.

For the moment, he was acting like a delivery service, tracking down amazing things from the halls of heaven and sending them to his people.

A month passed.

The Sage Monarch Empire was getting bigger and bigger, and his people were all armed to the teeth. Its destiny and net of law were so incredible that they seeped outside of the Everlasting Aegis.

The Everlasting Aegis was big, but it had its limitations, and soon, the empire itself was growing beyond its borders.

The destiny valuation had already reached the same as the Invincible Dynasty and the Chiliocosm Dynasty, but it was a far cry from the Central Dynasty. Regardless, he was definitely the fourth major power in the god world.

At a certain point, Yang Qi stopped his work.

The time had come to try something new.

WHOOSH!

He vanished from within the Halls of Heaven, and headed to the imperial palace in the Sage Monarch Empire. The imperial palace itself was like a minor god world, and in the middle was a yin-yang taiji symbol of immense profundity, where all of his people with psychic scales of ten billion were converging for a meeting.

He now had nearly a hundred such people, and if he added in the people from the House of the Chiliocosm and the House of the Invincible that he had subjugated, he would definitely be at a hundred.

It was time to do something that would shake heaven and earth.

He was going to make a public announcement regarding the founding of the Sage Monarch Empire, the fourth major dynasty. And that would involve sending formal declarations to the other three dynasties asking for a non-aggression pact.

“Isn’t it a bit too early for that?” Yang Susu asked. “Why don’t we secretly invade the House of the Invincible? Maybe subjugate some more of their leaders. Take over the Palace of Destiny and get the confucians working for us. Perhaps do the same to the House of the Chiliocosm.  Or maybe we could even target the Central Dynasty.”

“That’s right!” Jadefall said, sounding worried. “I feel like we need to spend some more time preparing. If we rush the announcement and things go bad, we can't go back and change it.”

“There’s no need for that,” Yang Qi said. “And subjugating more experts won’t do any good. If we tried, it would affect the destiny of the House of the Invincible, and their patriarchs would notice. Furthermore, subjugating too many people puts a strain on my mind. It's difficult enough just keeping the Lord of the Sword Dao under control. The time has come to make the announcement!”

Chapter 1522: A Massively Shocking Event

Yang Qi had made his final decision.

The time had come to tear away the veil and publicly announce something that would definitely send immense shockwaves through the god world. He had originally hoped to subjugate more people, and also get the Lord of the Sword Dao completely under control. But the truth was that the mere act of subjugating more important people would cause a public stir.

For the moment, he had to shelve that idea.

Once the announcement was made, and the shockwaves started spreading out, people would definitely be eager to join his empire. Destiny would surge, and he could use that momentum to fully subjugate the Lord of the Sword Dao. Even if he didn’t fully succeed, he could at least make sure the Lord of the Sword Dao was completely locked down. And then Yang Qi would take advantage of the chaos he had wrought to sneak into the distracted Central Dynasty and get the final piece of the Mahātmā Jade.

The Lord of the Sword Dao was so strong that even Proud Central would be leery of him.

Unfortunately, until he was fully subjugated, he would definitely cause trouble if he were to be released. However, once Yang Qi made his announcement and got enough destiny to crush him, the man would become like a clone whose sword energy could devastate countless enemies.

In the depths of the empire, a huge square had been constructed, where the sage monarch magistrates had led all of the leaders and officials, gathering them in ranks.

Yang Qi stood up front, clad in his voluminous God Legion Battle Robe. Of course, the robe was now different. Instead of coming fully from the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, it contained elements of the Mahātmā Jade and the True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body, making it far different from before.

When that garment stirred, the power of countless tribulations and kalpas surged within it. Obviously, any opponent of his would face the destruction of tribulations if they tried fighting him.

“People of the Sage Monarch Empire, today we tell the god world about our existence. Henceforth, we are the fourth great dynasty of the god world!” His words echoed out through space-time and filled the furthest corners of his empire, causing everything to tremble.

“As everyone knows,” he continued, “for many years, the three greatest powers have been the Central, Invincible, and Chiliocosm Dynasties. But now the Sage Monarch Empire has joined their ranks. Furthermore, we will demand that they acknowledge us as equals. If they refuse, we will convey our displeasure by means of the sword. Lord of the Sword Dao!”

“Here!” the Lord of the Sword Dao said, appearing beside Yang Qi. He was now little more than a puppet, although it still took Yang Qi a lot of effort to control him. As soon as he appeared, he waved his hand to produce an immense preheaven godsword, which he slashed out in front of him.

RUUUUUUUUMBLE!

Space-time collapsed and vital energy bled out as the sword light swirled out in all directions.

“I am the Lord of the Sword Dao, subordinate of the Sovereign Lord, the king of slaughter. And now, I'm the guardian of the Sage Monarch Empire. Whoever harms the interests of the empire will be cut down, be that enemy a person or a nation!”

The Lord of the Sword Dao had a fierce, violent aura that seemed to spill out without end. Although he was the guardian of the empire, he still wanted to be free. But that only made him more deadly and dangerous.

In fact, by using him as the guardian, the bounds of destiny were more tightly wrapped around him. After all, being part of the system made one more vulnerable to the control of the system, as well as a better killer!

As soon as the Lord of the Sword Dao appeared, the people of the empire erupted into cheers.

Destiny swelled, and to Yang Qi, it felt like a vat of oil. All it would take would be a spark, and that oil would erupt, and he would reach a higher level.

“We are mighty. We are mighty!” It was the sage monarch magistrates who began the cry, and before long, all of the people were shouting at the tops of their lungs.

They knew that they were witnessing the dawn of a new era. After the destruction of the Sovereign Lord, there had never been a new empire that had simply sprung into existence like this. And they knew that the blood and fire of war was on the horizon.

Of course, all of the young people in the empire, those who had been born in the last hundred years, were burning with passion.

Although only a month had passed on the outside, Yang Qi had allowed a hundred years to pass inside. And that meant that the young ones had been given time to grow up.

“Ladies and gentlemen, let’s prove that miracles are possible. We will spread the might and grandeur of the Sage Monarch Empire to the most distant corners of the god world!”

He went on with various formalities and ceremonies, then the event was over.

Then he allowed the destiny to surge out in all directions, drawing on all channels of news and information to spread the word to countless people.

Yang Qi had control of numerous channels of communication. For instance, he controlled many powerful members of the armed forces from the Invincible and Chiliocosm Dynasties, which meant getting information out posed no challenge to him.

The news was already shaking the god world.

It only took a month for the news to reach even the most remote areas. All organizations and all people heard about what was happening, even the demonlings, devillings, godlings, and the strange subterranean races.

Furthermore, the news indicated that this fourth dynasty espoused justice and impartiality. Because of that, many races who were oppressed by the other three dynasties, and struggling to survive as a result, made the decision to change.

Within a month, it was common knowledge that Emperor Yang Qi of the Sage Monarch Empire had many treasures from the Halls of Heaven, which meant his people would never lack for resources.

To most people in the god world, resources were the key to everything. A race of people needed to be wealthy to prosper, but unfortunately, any group that gathered wealth would eventually have it taken away by the three dynasties. How could any group possibly reach the point of being able to rival those three empires?

There were many peoples that the three dynasties had persecuted to the point where they hovered on the brink of extinction.

The truth was that the three dynasties didn’t prefer to slaughter other groups, but rather to control them and take their resources. Any group that didn’t have resources would be living on borrowed time.

Unfortunately, doing things that way led to inferior destiny, and would also foster resentment. Over the past billions of years of history, the three dynasties had learned that the hard way. When they conquered a people, there would be many deaths. As for the people who were captured and enslaved, they would hate the dynasty down to their bones. And later, when such a slave encountered good fortune and got strong, they would inevitably lead rebellions that would harm the dynasty.

Such things had happened too many times to count.

Not even the most powerful wielder of magic could prevent such things from happening.

However, they wouldn’t happen to Yang Qi.

It wasn’t that he could prevent the people of his empire from encountering good fortune. But his sage monarch magistrates would ensure that everything happened peacefully.

Ultimately, the three dynasties had ended their tactic of conquering other peoples with war, and seizing their resources. It led to less resentment and less chaos among the slaves.

But the enslaved people were still stuck, and could only watch as their numbers slowly shrank.

However, Yang Qi’s fourth dynasty abounded with resources, so all those struggling people longed to join him.

In the month it took for the news to spread like wildfire, numerous people flocked to his empire, causing the destiny to surge wildly. And it wasn’t just humans who wanted to join him. There were demons, devils, godlings, and even beings that existed only in spirit form.

Yang Qi didn’t discriminate against anyone.

There were limitations on other dynasties. The first related to resources, and the second related to governance. But neither applied to Yang Qi. He had immense resources, and the sage monarch magistrates to manage everything.

Furthermore, as his destiny increased, so did the sage monarch magistrates. Not too long ago, he had possessed a hundred million of them. But now he had a hundred and thirty million. Unfortunately, he still couldn’t get them all to the level of peak Paramount Gods. If he could, it would be vastly easier to manage his empire.

That breakthrough would be very difficult; essentially, he had to have the complete Mahātmā Jade before it could happen.

The Lord of the Sword Dao was now in a completely hopeless state. During the month that had passed, the increases Yang Qi had experienced had pushed his psychic scale to the level of ninety billion. The Lord of the Sword Dao couldn’t even utter anything disrespectful, only foster rebellious thoughts in his heart. However, such thoughts couldn’t last long before they were detected and he was wracked with pain. In the end, all he could do was put on a cheerful front and comply with any orders that were given to him.

Yang Qi had already begun the process of turning him into an out-of-body incarnation. The two of them would essentially fuse, then he could turn him into a weapon to use against the top experts of the other dynasties.

Yang Qi was causing a stir in the god world the likes of which hadn’t been seen in billions of years. A new age was beginning.

The time of the Sovereign Lord could be considered the primeval age.

The time of the three dynasties was like the middle ages.

But now that Yang Qi had founded his fourth empire, the future had come. A true future. And it was going to bring him incredible destiny.

Chapter 1523: Strong Reaction

It only took a month for news of the fourth empire to spread far and wide.

Of course, it only took three days for the members of the other three dynasties to become aware of the situation.

Immediately, numerous meetings were called.

After all, none of the leaders of the other three dynasties wanted a fourth power to contend with. It signified that there was going to be even more competition for the resources and destiny to be had in the god world. As a result, all three dynasties were thinking about ways to get rid of this interloper.

That said, none of them dared to take action blithely. The Lord of the Sword Dao had presided over the ceremony, which was a shocking matter that had astonished everyone who heard of the details.

No one dared to face the wrath of the Lord of the Sword Dao. Not even the leader of the House of the Chiliocosm would dare to face up against the energy of the Lord of the Sword Dao.

The Lord of the Sword Dao hadn’t been seen for billions of years, but it was a given that, now that he was back, his dao of the sword was as incisive as ever. That, coupled with the destiny of the Sage Monarch Empire, was enough to dominate everything around them. He would have been impressive enough on his own, but as the guardian of the empire, boosted by its destiny, he was even more formidable. In fact, the arrangement was a virtuous cycle that improved his cultivation base and made him virtually unstoppable.

That said, it also made his cultivation base dependent on Yang Qi, which gave Yang Qi even more control over him.

It had always been this way throughout history. An emperor gave his ministers power and control, but it could all be stripped away from them in an instant.

It was the same with the Lord of the Sword Dao. Everything about him was now bestowed by Yang Qi. The net of law created by destiny covered everything and was beyond compare.

**

For now, Yang Qi was simply waiting.

He knew that after the announcement was made, it would cause a commotion in the god world in ways that even he couldn’t even predict. People were streaming to join him, even experts from confucian and buddhist schools. Individuals similar to Patriarch Deva from tiny locations would come, seeking refuge within his borders, and hoping to get their hands on some resources.

Resources were all-important.

Intentionally or otherwise, news had spread about Yang Qi having access to treasure troves from the halls of heaven, which only made him more attractive to even more people.

Of course, it was little surprise that some of the newcomers were actually spies from the other dynasties.

Sadly for them, once they entered the Everlasting Aegis, the net of law would sense them. Then the sage monarch magistrates would make special arrangements for them, using those opportunities to brainwash them and turn them into double agents. In the end, the other three dynasties were harming their own interests with their spies.

Yang Qi spent a lot of effort adjusting the structure of his dynasty, ensuring that the destiny flowed in the most perfect way possible. As a result, he was starting to unlock the deepest secrets of karmic recompense.

Karmic recompense was the highest manifestation of a system of destiny.

And now, it was appearing in the world.

For example, if someone dared to violate the moral principles or general laws of the empire, for instance by committing murder, the empire's destiny could punish them instantly, reducing them to nothing but ash. It was only karmic recompense that could lead to long-term stability. And it was only because of karmic recompense that people wouldn’t dare to commit harmful acts.

In the end, destiny would seep into the hearts and minds of all the citizens, and ensure that they didn’t even consider doing anything to violate the law.

That was the ultimate goal.

The destiny of the empire could ordain gods and inflict karmic recompense, leading to peaceful thoughts in the minds of all. If the people of the empire never had harmful thoughts, it would lead to the empire being invincible in any battle they fought.

Of course, right now, Yang Qi’s destiny and karmic recompense hadn’t reached that level. But it was on the way.

That said, none of the other empires could even come close to doing such things. Their empires were huge, and their destiny was scattered and difficult to manage.

Yang Qi looked at the destiny of his empire; it was like a white pillar of jade, supporting the four corners of the universe. At this point, his empire was clearly equal to the Invincible and Chiliocosm Dynasties. He couldn't help but nod in satisfaction. His foundation was solid, and if some situation arose in which he was backed into a corner, he could always have Yang Primal-Chaos and Dugu Sheji come join him. That would not only strengthen him, but it would also weaken the other two dynasties. And his destiny would improve as a result.

For now, he would hold back, though. With those two in their positions in the armed forces of their respective dynasties, he had a great way to get new information.

Although the other three dynasties didn’t dare to make any open moves in the month that passed, countless meetings were held, and various plans were devised. Yang Qi got almost immediate reports on many of those secret meetings, although it was harder when it came to the Central Dynasty.

He had subjugated Proud Mindtravel, but unfortunately, the man wasn’t even a God-Lord, so the information he had access to was limited.

RUMBLE!

All of a sudden, Yang Qi realized a dramatic transformation was occurring to the flows of destiny, which seemed to indicate that the other three dynasties had joined forces. Although he had speculated that something like this would happen, it was still something of a shock.

Moments later, he received messages from both Yang Primal-Chaos and Dugu Sheji.

“Milord, Proud Central issued invitation cards to the top members of the other two dynasties, inviting them to the Central Dynasty for an assembly. It’s highly likely that the Sage Monarch Empire is going to be targeted by a new alliance!”

“Milord, you have to make preparations. I'll be attending the meeting in which the patriarchs make the final decision. I won’t be able to do anything to stop it from happening. Please, forgive me for that.”

“Don't worry. You’ve done nothing wrong. In fact, quite the opposite. That said, I think I'm finally going to make my move, and head into the Central Dynasty. You two just wait for me to arrive. This chaotic moment is the perfect time to sneak in there.”

How could Yang Qi not take advantage of this moment? There was no better opportunity to sneak into the Central Dynasty and look around for the Mahātmā Jade. If he could get that final piece, he could make his final major leap in power. And at that point, he wouldn’t need to be afraid of anyone.

His psychic scale was already at ninety billion, which meant he could hold his own against numerous top patriarchs. But unfortunately, he couldn’t come out on top of someone with a psychic scale of a hundred billion. Proud Central was just beyond him, and it was the same with the treacherous and deadly Proud Heaven.

With the three other dynasties on the move, the Sage Monarch Empire was in extreme danger, and could very easily be strangled out of existence. It was a moment to act with extreme caution.

Therefore, he simply had to get the final piece of the jade.

Of course, getting the jade didn’t mean that he would simply reach a psychic scale of a hundred billion, and that was all. For all he knew, completing the jade might push him to the level of hundreds of billions. Furthermore, the mutual opposition and attraction of the Mahātmā Jade and the God Legion Seal could lead to dramatic transformations that he had no clue about right now.

Another thing to consider was that, once he was strong enough, he would be able to take full control of the halls of heaven.

A whole chain reaction of results was going to occur.

It was entirely possible that he would step into the half-Annulled level, and become a mighty entity like King Immortal-Slayer or the Sovereign Lord.

It all rested on the final piece of the Mahātmā Jade. Without that piece of jade, any sense of security or accomplishment was a sham.

Yang Qi was also aware that the final piece of the jade contained profound secrets, and possibly traps. Getting it wasn’t going to be easy.

However, that didn’t make him any less certain that he had to get it. If anything, it only made him more certain.

RUMBLE!

All of a sudden, he blurred into motion, vanishing from sight.

Shortly thereafter, he was in the depths of the House of the Invincible. After all, he was still technically a viceroy there, and had subjugated quite a few of its people.

Slipping secretly into the armed forces, he found Dugu Sheji, upon whom he concealed himself in the form of a jade pendant.

Dugu Sheji then flew out to a location where numerous top experts were converging. All of them were elite members of the imperial house, or other old-timers. And they all had psychic scales of over thirty billion. There were about a hundred of them in total.

Whoosh.

Nine vortexes appeared overhead, and everyone dropped to their knees, joining voices to say, “Our respects, Patriarchs!”

Those nine vortexes contained the top figures of the House of the Invincible, the nine patriarchs who ran everything. No one even knew exactly where they normally stayed.

Yang Qi also spotted the emperor, whose psychic scale was at the level of eighty billion. Although he couldn’t measure up to Yang Qi himself, he was still very impressive.

Yang Qi nodded. ‘The collective leadership of the House of the Invincible is still a bit superior to my Sage Monarch Empire.’

Chapter 1524: Alliance of Three Dynasties

If the power of the House of the Invincible alone was enough to surpass the leaders of the Sage Monarch Empire, what would happen if all three dynasties joined forces?

Of course, the Sage Monarch Empire had an advantage in the united hearts of its people. There were no plots or infighting sullying its destiny. Nor were there political shenanigans, ensuring that the destiny burned hot and bright.

If there really was a clash between the two empires, the Invincible Dynasty would ultimately be routed. Destiny was the determining factor in everything, so in the case of a protracted war, the chaos and disunity there would lead to its downfall.

It was the opposite with the Sage Monarch Empire. Even if they were wiped out, the people would fight to the last man, completely determined to give their lives for their empire.

There were now more than a hundred million sage monarch magistrates, and they continued proliferating every day. With each new magistrate that appeared, their ability to govern the empire improved, and the citizens felt safer.

In most empires, a protracted war would lead to situations in which some of the people became resentful, and would surrender to the enemy if they had the chance. Not so with the Sage Monarch Empire.

Everyone had their place in the system, and all of them were rewarded with resources for their services. As such, everyone was content.

One factor had to do with the fact that the sage monarch magistrates weren’t human. They were thralls, almost like machines, and performed their duties with cold efficiency. And their mere nature meant that no one was jealous of them.

Furthermore, the sage monarch magistrates were completely righteous and just, and would never discriminate. They were impartial and incorruptible to the core. The end result was that they were respected and trusted. Even people who had once completely trusted in the confucians had to admit that the sage monarch magistrates were superior to even the confucian grandmasters.

That was why a conflict between the Invincible Dynasty and the Sage Monarch Empire would end in certain defeat for the former.

“Ladies and gentlemen, this is a matter of great importance both to our empire, and the god world as a whole,” one of the nine patriarchs said. “In short order, all of our top leaders will go to the Central Dynasty, where the three dynasties will discuss the matter. For the entire existence of the three dynasties, we’ve abided by a general non-aggression pact. Now, a fourth empire has arisen that presents a clear threat to all of us. Soon, we will decide exactly how to deal with the situation.”

There were several hundred members of the imperial house present. This group truly represented the top leaders of the dynasty. And it was only now that Yang Qi was getting a true sense of what the House of the Invincible was capable of. Sadly, almost all of Yang Qi’s psychic power was focused on keeping the Lord of the Sword Dao in check, otherwise he would have tried subjugating a few of these people.

A similar meeting was taking place in the House of the Chiliocosm, and after it was over, Yang Qi sensed Yang Chiliocosm and other top experts heading in the direction of the Central Dynasty.

Neither group was afraid. Given that they both had so many top experts present, there was no way the Central Dynasty would try anything tricky. In fact, most of the time, none of the dynasties would ever agree to let so many top experts inside their borders. That was one reason they knew the Central Dynasty’s invitation had been made in good faith.

It went to show how anxious the Central Dynasty was about the situation, and how much they wanted to destroy this newly-arisen fourth empire. No one knew exactly what the emperor of the Sage Monarch Empire was like. They knew little more than his name. However, the might of the Lord of the Sword Dao was something they all recognized.

Yang Qi remained hidden as the group flew along.

Several days later, the Central Dynasty appeared in front of them, like a mass of white energy, as pure as jade. A road appeared leading inside, standing in the middle of which was a mighty expert with flowing black hair and disdain in his eyes. Unexpectedly, it was Proud Heaven!

Proud Heaven himself was accepting the visitors!

He was the number two figure in the Central Dynasty, so it made sense for him to be the one to wait for the top figures of the other dynasties. Unfortunately, Yang Qi didn’t have much idea what was going on in the Central Dynasty, thanks to his agents there being of such low rank.

In fact, the true secrets of the dynasty were completely beyond his purview. And right now, he very much needed to know what was going on behind the scenes there.

“Patriarchs and royals of the Invincible Dynasty, I am Proud Heaven. I've been waiting here in great anticipation of your arrival. The patriarchs from the House of the Chiliocosm are already here. Please, allow me to escort you to the Central God-Palace, so we can begin our meeting.”

Proud Heaven spoke with great poise and dignity.

In response, the nine patriarchs from the House of the Invincible nodded respectfully. After all, they might consider Proud Heaven to be part of the younger generation, but his cultivation base was roughly on par with theirs. He had a psychic scale of over a hundred billion, so there was no way they would try to take advantage of their technical level of seniority.

With little fanfare, they indicated for Proud Heaven to lead the way.

Yang Qi remained hidden. Considering his cultivation base was at the level of ninety billion, he had no fear of being discovered by Proud Heaven. Only a half-Annulled expert would have any chance of doing that.

They walked down the path for some time before eventually reaching the Central God-Palace.

It was a hulking structure filled with countless seats for the guests. Interestingly, the seats were golden thrones that reminded Yang Qi of the thrones in the God Legion Seal. Apparently, the top experts of the Central Dynasty knew a bit about the God Legion Seal.

And it was no surprise that the experts from the Chiliocosm Dynasty and the Invincible Dynasty went a bit chill at the sight.

Even upon initial observation, Yang Qi could sense the tension between the three dynasties, and hoped that he could use that to sow discord, making it difficult for them to form an alliance. Every moment of time he bought now would make his empire that much stronger. In fact, if he could force the other dynasties to drag things out for a few months, he would probably be in the position to hold his own.

He spotted the Lord of the Chiliocosm, and could sense how profound his cultivation base was. It was definitely over a hundred billion. Unfortunately, being in the Central God-Palace, he couldn’t make a more accurate assessment without the risk of revealing himself. That said, he could tell that Yang Chiliocosm was stronger than the Lord of the Sword Dao. After all, he was fundamentally at the level of a God-Lord, but also had a dynasty that had been around for billions of years. For all Yang Qi knew, it might have been around for more than a hundred billion years, or even longer.

Yang Chiliocosm had a lot of people with him, but Yang Qi’s attention was immediately drawn to a burly young man who sat there with his eyes closed, not saying a word. To Yang Qi’s immense and utter shock, that young man looked exactly like he himself during his days in the impure lands!

He looked exactly like teenage Yang Qi from back in Yanhaven!

Of course, Yang Qi had changed a lot since his fateful clash with Yun Hailan. Yet here was a person who looked exactly like he had back in those days. It was really remarkable.

He immediately realized that this person had to be Yang Voidprime, the other Fateless One.

He was no less enigmatic than Proud Heaven, and there was no doubt that he was an enemy. In fact, as soon as Proud Heaven entered, he looked over and smiled faintly.

“Where’s Proud Central?” Yang Chiliocosm asked. “There’s no way you're going to preside over this meeting, is there?”

After all, Proud Central was the official leader of the Central Dynasty.

Proud Heaven smiled. “Lord of the Chiliocosm. Ladies and gentlemen. Patriarch Proud Central in the middle of dealing with an invincible monster. If this monster escaped, it would wreak destruction on the whole god world. Therefore, Proud Central must devote his full concentration to the matter. In the meantime, I have the power and authority to make any decisions here. So yes, I will be presiding over the meeting. Does anyone object? If anyone believes that I'm too weak to qualify, you’re welcome to submit a complaint.”

“It’s fine,” said one of the patriarchs from the House of the Invincible. “He can sit in for Proud Central. I, for one, believe you’re more than strong enough to preside, Proud Heaven. And you're more trustworthy than Proud Central anyway. So go ahead and tell us what’s on your mind.”

The Lord of the Chiliocosm had immediately bristled at Proud Heaven’s response, and had been thinking of making a sharp comeback. But when he heard the patriarch from the House of the Invincible, he suddenly came to a realization. “You’re the real emperor here in the Central Dynasty, aren’t you Proud Heaven? Proud Central works from behind the scenes, but you control the armed forces and all the government officials. Fine. You really are planning to preside over the meeting.”

It was obvious that the two leaders were trying to sow disharmony between Proud Heaven and Proud Central.

Proud Heaven’s eyes narrowed sharply. “I wouldn’t dare,” he said. “Patriarch Proud Central is the one who issues the orders around here. And I follow them. Please, don’t think too much of me. Now, let’s get down to business. What are we going to do about this fourth dynasty, the Sage Monarch Empire?”

Chapter 1525: Yang Voidprime

The quick responses provided by the patriarchs only served to convince Yang Qi that they were troublemakers who had all sorts of tricks up their sleeves.

Proud Heaven was also inwardly surprised.

These patriarchs were profound experts and expert schemers. That much was obvious, otherwise they wouldn't have accomplished what they had accomplished in life. Proud Heaven was wildly arrogant and immensely powerful, but not even he would dare to be anything but cautious and careful around people like this.

“Ladies and gentlemen, I’ll keep things simple,” Proud Heaven said. “This fourth dynasty, the Sage Monarch Empire, is expanding rapidly. We need to strike quickly before it siphons away too much of our destiny. If that happens, the consequences will be too horrible to contemplate. Dividing the dao of heaven in thirds is enough. If this fourth dynasty disturbs the balance we've created, we’ll undergo untold hardships. That’s why the patriarchs of the Central Dynasty have already agreed that we three dynasties should all send troops to crush them.”

“We completely agree,” said the Heaven-Extinguishing Dugu, a patriarch from the House of the Invincible. “However, the question is how exactly to do that. The Central Dynasty is the strongest of the three, so it seems to me that you should provide sixty percent of the forces, while we provide twenty percent each. And when we conquer the Sage Monarch Empire, we split any loot three ways.”

“I agree with that,” the Lord of the Chiliocosm said with a faint smile.

“That seems a bit excessive,” Proud Heaven replied. “We invited you here to discuss things honestly and fairly. The resources taken after conquering the Sage Monarch Empire should correspond to the troops provided. Don’t you agree?”

The one to respond was Yang Voidprime. “Brother Proud Heaven, how about you keep all of the resources, and just give us Yang Qi? He has the God Legion Seal, and how could that possibly be split three ways?”

RUMBLE!

A buzz arose amongst the gathered patriarchs.

“What? God Legion Seal? You’re saying the God Legion Seal has appeared?”

“What’s going on?”

“Don’t tell me that Emperor Yang Qi has somehow acquired the most powerful legacy there is, the Sovereign Lord’s God Legion Seal!”

“How could that even be possible? Isn't the God Legion Seal in the impure lands? Not only can we from the god world not go to the impure lands, but the Ancient Road to the Gods has also disappeared, which means Ascendants can’t come here.”

“Does he really have the God Legion Seal, Yang Voidprime? Are you sure your information is accurate?”

“If the God Legion Seal really has appeared, Yang Voidprime, then it's a major matter that affects the entire god world, and would bring countless invincible old-timers out of hiding. This is no joking matter. Forget the actual God Legion Seal. Even news about the God Legion Seal would cause a huge stir. Many God-Lords went to incredible lengths to avoid being trapped by the God Legion Seal. Some even killed themselves to be freed from it, and eventually, were born again.”

Yang Voidprime rose to his feet. “Brother Proud Heaven, there’s no reason for the two of us to keep any secrets. I'm not sure what power you used, but you somehow sent an expression of will into the impure lands to search for Yang Qi. But guess what? I did the same, using someone connected by destiny to the talismans of King Immortal-Slayer's legacy medallions. You clashed with Yang Qi several times, then eventually brought the Great Necropolis back here with King Immortal-Slayer imprisoned in it. That's what Proud Central is busy with, isn’t it? He's keeping King Immortal-Slayer under control. He wants to assimilate him to reach the half-Annulled level. I bet Proud Central is waiting until just the right moment to jump out and get control of the God Legion Seal. You might be able to hide the truth from the masses, but not from me. If you get the God Legion Seal, your Central Dynasty will be unstoppable. You’ll destroy our two dynasties, take the treasure troves of the Halls of Heaven, and accomplish your wildest ambitions.”

Dead silence followed his words.

The other figures from the Central Dynasty exchanged awkward glances as they realized there were plenty of secrets that even they were unaware of. As for the experts from the Chiliocosm and Invincible Dynasties, those with psychic scales over a hundred billion, their eyes glittered at the mention of the God Legion Seal.

“What are you talking about, Brother Yang Voidprime?” Proud Heaven said, looking at Yang Voidprime with shock in his eyes. “I really just don’t understand.”

Yang Voidprime threw his head back and laughed. “Brother Proud Heaven, surely you’ve noticed something strange about me. Don’t my features resemble someone you know? Aren’t I Yang Qi from the impure lands? Don’t I look exactly like him? You know full well that Yang Qi is a Fateless One, just like me. But according to all the old legends, there shouldn’t be two Fateless One in existence at the same time. Do you know what’s going on here?”

“You’re very informed, Brother. You know just about everything that happened in the impure lands. Presumably you have more to say?” Proud Heaven spread his hands. “Well? Go ahead. Tell us what’s going on here.”

“Simple. A stream of fateless energy came to be in the god world many years ago, something that surpassed fate itself. And the Sovereign Lord took notice. He knew that the birth of the fateless energy could bring down his rulership. Therefore, he used a most boundless divine ability to lock up that fateless energy, in the hopes that he could absorb it and grow stronger as a result. Perhaps it could’ve even helped him break through to the true Annulled level. After all, fateless energy is key to that breakthrough. Unfortunately, he couldn't assimilate it. So he sealed it with the strongest seal imaginable, then gave it to the High Priestess to watch over. You see, when it came to the Sovereign Lord’s subordinates, the King of Godmammoths was known for strength and power, but the best schemer of them all was the High Priestess.”

Everyone present was hanging on Yang Voidprime’s every word, as this was information most of them had never heard before.

“Sadly, the Sovereign Lord did everything wrong, and eventually the legion of gods turned on him. In the preparations for the final attack, the High Priestess unsealed the fateless energy and tried to assimilate it herself. She failed, fracturing the fateless energy in the process. One part of it was reincarnated as me, while the other part fell into the impure lands, where it disappeared. Obviously, that second bit of fateless energy became Yang Qi.”

Yang Qi couldn’t help but be shaken by what he was hearing. Was that really how he had come to be? Was he really an expression of fateless energy?

If so, was he really incomplete? Did he really have to devour this Yang Voidprime to become whole?

And wouldn’t that mean that Yang Voidprime wanted to devour him as well?

‘Is he connected to the High Priestess? No wonder! The High Priestess built the Nacrelight Sageland, and this guy went there and hooked up with one of their women, then built the Destined Marriage God Temple. Thankfully I subjugated the Nacrelight Sageland, otherwise I might have alerted him to my presence.’

Yang Qi had always been afraid of the High Priestess, as he knew that she was on roughly the same level as the King of Godmammoths. She wasn’t as strong as him, but her ability to manipulate the dao of heaven had been profound and enigmatic, and she obviously wasn't someone to be taken lightly.

Legend had it the High Priestess had long since perished, but now Yang Qi couldn’t help but suspect that perhaps she was similar to the Lord of the Sword Dao, and had actually gained some enlightenment of the boundless will of the dao of heaven, allowing her to remain alive.

“Is the High Priestess still alive?” Proud Heaven asked. Although he didn’t completely trust Yang Voidprime’s story, he was still shaken.

“That's right,” Yang Voidprime replied. “She is alive. However, she’s in a state of deep slumber, similar to that of the patriarch of the House of the Invincible, the Invincible Dugu.” Yang Voidprime glanced over at the patriarchs from the House of the Invincible, then continued, “Everyone has secrets. As for your Central Dynasty, you've been keeping secrets regarding the Great Necropolis, King Immortal-Slayer, and the Lord of Righteous Justice. As for the House of the Chiliocosm, our secret relates to the High Priestess. And the House of the Invincible has been keeping the Invincible Dugu a secret. But now everything is out in the open. So, Proud Heaven, don’t think you can take advantage of us. If you do, you’ll get just as badly hurt as us. And if you don’t believe me, maybe you’ll believe the High Priestess’s spokeswoman. Come out, Hailan.”

Suddenly, chiming laughter rang out, and a figure stepped out from behind Yang Voidprime, clad in a blue cloak. She pulsed with the energy of the High Priestess, as well as an air that implied she could manipulate the dao of heaven and summon all types of energy to her.

The High Priestess had been as famous as the King of Godmammoths, and there were old-timers present who had actually laid eyes on her. So they knew that this newcomer was definitely her spokeswoman. With that, the woman pulled her hood back and revealed her face.

Shock coursed through Yang Qi as he realized this woman looked exactly like someone whose face he would never forget. ‘It’s Yun Hailan!’

However, his shock soon turned to icy calm. After all, it made sense. If he really was an incarnation of a stream of fateless energy, it was a given that people would have been trying to keep an eye on him.

“I wonder if my mother was some almighty transmigrated person as well. Why don’t I sense her aura on Proud Heaven?” Yang Qi had another goal in coming to the Central Dynasty, and that was to search for clues regarding his mother, Greensura. So far, he hadn't come across any useful information. However, he was now certain that his mother wasn’t an ordinary person, any more than Yun Hailan had been ordinary.

Giving a little salute, the young woman said, “I am your humble servant Hailan, spokeswoman for the High Priestess. Well met, Master Proud Heaven.”

Yang Qi could see that this woman really did resemble Yun Hailan in every way, including her imperious disdain for others. She would do anything to anyone, as long as it resulted in her own profit. Chuckling coldly, he thought, ‘It seems Yang Voidprime and this woman are both using each other. However, their plots and schemes are only going to buy time for my Sage Monarch Empire to grow. Right now, the priority is to use this opportunity to get that piece of the Mahātmā Jade!’

Chapter 1526: Hailan

More and more experts were showing up.

The young woman named Hailan had a cultivation base of a hundred billion, but what was more terrifying was her backer. Yang Qi had absolutely no confidence in being able to fight her successfully.

The upside was that the three dynasties were still at each other’s throats, and definitely weren’t ready to work together.

Unfortunately, getting out of the Central God-Palace didn’t seem possible right now. The place was locked down tight, and if anyone discovered his presence, he would be dead without a doubt.

Thankfully, he had patience.

Furthermore, this might be a good opportunity. Proud Heaven was presiding over the meeting, and almost all of the top leaders were present. Although Proud Central wasn’t around, he would definitely be keeping an eye on what was happening, and that meant his attention would be somewhat diverted from King Immortal-Slayer and the Great Necropolis.

That might be just the chance that Yang Qi needed.

“You’ve done well to keep yourself well hidden, Miss Hailan, considering how powerful you are,” Proud Heaven said. His tone of voice was calm and measured, but his eyes glittered as though everything was going according to plan. “Might I ask how the High Priestess fares? Will we be seeing her out in the world again soon?”

“The High Priestess was seriously injured. But there are major changes coming to the god world, and she’ll recover soon enough. Don’t worry. She has everything under control, and is doing everything possible to restore the glory of years past.”

“That’s good to hear. I have to say, if it's true that the High Priestess isn’t dead, then wouldn’t it be safe to assume that the King of Godmammoths is alive as well? Perhaps we’ll be seeing him again soon, too.”

Hailan’s eyes flickered in response to his words.

Years ago, the High Priestess and the King of Godmammoths were the top subordinates of the Sovereign Lord. She had been his minister of culture, and he had been his minister of warfare. They hadn’t gotten along. In fact, they clashed frequently. And although the High Priestess had always been at a disadvantage, the Sovereign Lord had always supported her in his effort to maintain balance between them.

It was similar to how, in the impure lands, a prime minister would often be at odds with the generalissimo of the armed forces. Truth be told, the Sovereign Lord hadn’t wanted complete peace and harmony among his subordinates.

“We don’t need to discuss that right now, Brother Proud Heaven,” Yang Voidprime said. “Our top priority is discussing exactly how to deal with Yang Qi. How do we destroy his empire and take what's his? Remember, the God Legion Seal was broken into three parts, but he's obviously collected them all. Am I right?”

“That’s right,” Proud Heaven replied. “The God Legion Seal had been restored, and it won’t be broken into pieces again. Nothing in the world is strong enough to do that.”

“In that case, we have to decide who gets the God Legion Seal when this is all over.”

“Wrong, wrong, wrong,” Proud Heaven said with a chuckle. “First we need to figure out how to deal with Yang Qi. We don’t want to be like the fools who see a goose flying by and start talking about how to cook it, only to have it escape in the meantime.”

“Wrong, wrong, wrong,” Yang Voidprime said. “Yang Qi isn't a flying goose. He’s a duck in a cage. As long as the three of us work together, there’s nowhere in the god world he can go and stay alive. That’s why we need to talk about important matters first. Who gets what? If we aren’t on the same page, then how will we possibly deal with Yang Qi? Remember, he's cunning and skilled, and will definitely try to turn us against each other and benefit in the process.”

Proud Heaven knew that he couldn’t get everyone to work together if they wouldn’t profit in the process. In fact, they might even turn on him if he wasn’t careful. Gritting his teeth, he said, “How about this. Yang Qi is your doppelgänger, right? Another Fateless One. So it's simple. Your share is Yang Qi. With him, you’ll be able to complete your fateless energy, and likely reach the half-Annulled level. I get the God Legion Seal. And you experts from the House of the Invincible will take his empire and resources. How does that sound?”

One of the patriarchs from the Invincible Dynasty chuckled darkly. “That’s a great idea, Proud Heaven! We get his resources. The House of the Chiliocosm gets the fateless energy. And you get the God Legion Seal. Isn’t that a bit lopsided?” This patriarch was the Heaven-Sacrificing Dugu, and his cultivation base was roughly the same as Yang Qi’s, at ninety billion. “In terms of the House of the Chiliocosm, they actually don’t get much at all. Yang Voidprime is a Fateless One, so that fateless energy will be very beneficial to him. But what about everyone else? What about Yang Chiliocosm? Is he just supposed to step aside and let Yang Voidprime take over?

“And if the House of the Chiliocosm is getting a bad deal, then ours is even worse. What are we supposed to do with a bunch of people from another empire? If we try to take them into our dynasty, it’ll just lead to chaos.”

Proud Heaven laughed. “You’re thinking about it wrong. Everyone knows the Sage Monarch Empire runs smoothly because of the sage monarch magistrates. They run nations even more smoothly than the confucians. Whoever gets those magistrates is instantly going to get a huge improvement in destiny. In some ways, that’s far better than the God Legion Seal. Furthermore, it’s rumored that Yang Qi has already used the God Legion Seal to amass a huge stockpile of treasure, and you’ll get all that as well.”

“Incorrect again, Proud Heaven,” said the Heaven-Extinguishing Dugu. “If you take the God Legion Seal, the Halls of Heaven will automatically belong to you. How could any of what you’re promising us measure up to that?”

“Agreed,” said Yang Voidprime. “It’s not really appropriate. Although it's true that I want Yang Qi’s fateless energy, it won’t do any good for our dynasty as a whole. Therefore, I don’t really want Yang Qi. Furthermore, your proposal is a trap for the House of the Chiliocosm. We don’t know exactly how Yang Qi built an empire so quickly, but we do know that he’s used the God Legion Seal to control the minds of the Dragonfolk, the Spritefolk, and even the Lord of the Sword Dao. So if you get the God Legion Seal, then you’ll be the one who controls his empire. In the end, the House of the Chiliocosm would get nothing.”

“Nice try, Proud Heaven!” shouted someone from the Chiliocosm Dynasty. “You people from the Central Dynasty have no good faith whatsoever. In fact, what’s the point of even continuing this discussion? Why don’t you handle the Sage Monarch Empire yourself? In fact, maybe we should join them to deal with you!”

“Friends, friends, calm down,” Proud Heaven said placatingly. “It was just a suggestion, that’s all. If you have a better way to distribute everything, let’s hear it. How about the Invincible Dynasty gets the God Legion Seal. Would that make you happy?”

With those words, he kicked the ball into their court.

“We don’t want the God Legion Seal,” said the Heaven-Immolating Dugu. “It's too big of a bone to swallow. In fact, considering all the baggage that goes with it, I don’t think any of our dynasties should have it.”

“Then what do we do with it?” Proud Heaven asked. “Someone has to watch over it. After all, we can’t let it fall into the wrong hands.”

“It's simple,” Hailan said. “When we attack the Sage Monarch Empire, we create a prison and seal Yang Qi within. Leave the God Legion Seal in him while we slowly take over his empire. We split the sage monarch magistrates evenly, as well as everything else. Later, we’ll figure out a way to destroy the God Legion Seal. And if we can't, we just keep him sealed up forever.”

“Good idea.”

The nine patriarchs of the Dugu Clan were the Heaven-Extinguishing Dugu, Heaven-Defeating Dugu, Heaven-Eclipsing Dugu, Heaven-Immolating Dugu, Heaven-Propping Dugu, Heaven-Conquering Dugu, Heaven-Rending Dugu, Heaven-Sacrificing Dugu and the Heaven-Reaching Dugu. And all of them had suddenly come to the realization that the young woman Hailan was obviously a profound and wicked schemer.

Yang Qi was also shaken. He had been hoping that these people would disagree, but Hailan had managed to easily smooth things out.

He suddenly felt an impulse to kill her.

“It’s a good idea,” Proud Heaven said, nodding. “We work together to create a spell formation that, in a critical moment, we use to capture Yang Qi. We don’t give him any chance to escape. In fact, we can even force him to open up the Halls of Heaven to us. Now that we've resolved that issue, let’s discuss how we’ll deploy our people.”

“We attack with full force,” Hailan said. “Go at him with everything we have, and crush him. When you fight a rabbit, you still use the force of a lion. That’s the way to ensure victory. Don’t give him any chances. Ladies and gentlemen, don’t forget that Yang Qi is a clever troublemaker. If he finds out what we’re planning, he’ll disappear, and we’ll never find him. The god world is too big. And if he starts attacking us with guerilla tactics, what will we do? Or what if he hides in the Halls of Heaven?”

“Well said,” Proud Heaven said, a note of respect in his voice.

By this point, Yang Qi was convinced that this woman had the exact same personality as the Yun Hailan from the impure lands.

If the three dynasties came to an agreement right here and now, it would make things difficult.

Scrambling to come up with a plan, Yang Qi had Yang Primal-Chaos suddenly rise to his feet. “Proud Heaven, when you were in the impure lands, you got a piece of the God Legion Seal. If we capture Yang Primal-Chaos, what if you use your understanding of the seal to snatch it out from under our noses? Mind explaining?”

Chapter 1527: Sowing Chaos

Of course, Yang Primal-Chaos was under Yang Qi’s control, and was speaking at his behest.

In response to his words, faint changes of expression could be seen on the faces of many of the experts present. If Proud Heaven really did get the God Legion Seal, and could use it easily, it would be problematic at best.

“What do you have to say to that, Proud Heaven?” The people from the Dugu Clan weren’t giving Proud Heaven even an inch of wiggle room. The truth was that nobody really trusted him. In fact, nobody had ever trusted him, other than trusting that he would be deceitful and cunning.

Meanwhile, Hailan looked over at Yang Primal-Chaos with a piercing gaze, as though she suspected something strange was going on.

That gaze caused Yang Qi’s heart to turn cold. This ruthless Hailan was obviously trying to speed things up as much as possible, with the goal being to kill him. Furthermore, she was obviously working together with Yang Voidprime. And if she was the woman from the Nacrelight Sageland that Yang Voidprime had pursued, it meant there was definitely a grand conspiracy afoot.

Of course, even if she was suspicious of Yang Primal-Chaos, it wouldn't do her any good. And she couldn’t criticize what he had just said.

“It's true that I once had a piece of the God Legion Seal,” Proud Heaven said. He made an innocent-looking gesture by spreading his hands, then continued, “But Yang Qi stole it from me way back in the impure lands. And now he's combined all three pieces. Whatever I do remember of it won’t be of any help with the completed version. In any case, we’re going to be working together to create a spell formation to trap Yang Qi. It's not as if I can pull any tricks under those circumstances.”

“That is true,” Hailan said. “We’ll be working together to make the spell formation, so he won’t be able to do anything tricky to take advantage of us. None of us will.”

“Why are you defending Proud Heaven so much, Hailan?” Dugu Sheji said. “This is going to be a major undertaking, and if anything goes wrong, we two smaller dynasties could be wiped out. If Proud Heaven gets the God Legion Seal, he’ll definitely use it against us. We have to take precautions.”

Eyes flashing coldly, Hailan looked over at Dugu Sheji and said, “Who the hell are you? How dare you talk to me like that?”

“I'm a generalissimo from the House of the Invincible. Dugu Sheji. I honestly can't believe you would dare to insult me like that, floozy.” Dugu Sheji was sowing chaos by being intentionally provocative. And while Yang Qi was hiding on Dugu Sheji’s person, he wasn't worried about Hailan attacking. If she did, the patriarchs of the Invincible Dynasty would definitely intervene.

“What did you just call me? A floozy?! In all my years no one has ever dared to use that word on me. Alright. Considering you’ve used such language, you’re going to die. And nobody will be able to save you!”

WHOOSH!

All of a sudden, a scepter appeared in her hand, which she swept out in his direction.

Instantly, a glittering blue stream of light shot toward Dugu Sheji, moving with such incredible speed that no one could even track its movement.

“How impudent!” the Heaven-Reaching Dugu said, flicking his sleeve to send a stream of golden light out in front of Dugu Sheji, which took the shape of a bridge that blocked the attack from the scepter. When the two lights clashed, a lamenting clang echoed out.

“I said nobody can save him, Heaven-Reaching Dugu!” Hailan said icily. Then she flicked her finger, causing the scepter to rotate rapidly, boring into the bridge amidst a shower of sparks.

The Heaven-Reaching Dugu immediately staggered backward.

“Very presumptuous, girl,” the Heaven-Conquering Dugu said. He waved his finger, and a divine saber appeared, slashing down toward the scepter. When the two connected, a huge shock wave spread out through the Central God-Palace.

“Enough!” Proud Heaven growled. He swept his hand out, and all of the vital energy went still, separating the scepter and saber. After all, he was presiding over the meeting, and this was his territory.

Putting her scepter away, Hailan glared at Dugu Sheji and said, “There’s something very suspicious about you, boy. I'm working hard here to smooth out the situation between the three dynasties. But with a single word, you’ve caused all this trouble. Could it be that you’re a spy sent here by Yang Qi?!”

“Like hell I am,” Dugu Sheji shouted. “Everyone in the god world knows that Proud Heaven is treacherous and can't be trusted. You're the one who keeps pressuring us to form this alliance, no matter what anyone says. Didn’t Yang Voidprime say that Yang Qi is a duck in a cage, with nowhere to run to? We were still in the middle of discussing how to split the profits, but you’re rushing everyone to make the final decision. That’s what’s suspicious. Let me ask you this: what if we do capture him, but his subordinates, who are all under the control of the God Legion Seal, decide to fight to the death? Then what? Do you have some way to control Yang Qi’s thoughts? Also, how exactly are we supposed to split up the sage monarch magistrates? Even if Yang Qi is taken captive, as long as he still has the God Legion Seal, how do we control them? We need to talk all of these things over and make smart decisions. Only then can we take action.

“At least, that’s my opinion. Obviously the patriarchs here can make their own decisions. But I have years of experience at war, and I can tell you that the bigger the battle, the more you need to plan things out ahead of time. You need to consider all the possibilities, and come up with contingency plans for all of them. As the saying goes, thorough planning defeats cursory planning. If it were up to me, we would draw up a formal battle plan that everyone would swear oaths to follow. Anyone who deviates from the plan will suffer the full wrath of all the patriarchs. Patriarchs, please consider this option!”

Everything Dugu Sheji said seemed to make perfect sense. Important matters shouldn’t be rushed.

Even Yang Chiliocosm was nodding in agreement.

“We can’t make such an important decision so quickly,” said the Heaven-Extinguishing Dugu. “First let’s come to an agreement of how to split the profits, and sign a contract with all the details written out. We can even swear blood oaths. That will ensure that things are binding, and nobody can cause mischief. The only way this whole venture will succeed is if we’re all working together honestly. If we take the matter lightly, then trouble could result.”

Swearing oaths with words meant little.

But having an oath in writing, signed with blood, would ensure that natural laws were part of the matter. Someone who violated an oath like that would find their own blood reacting against them as a result.

“I suggest we also use destiny in the oath,” Yang Chiliocosm said. “That way, anyone who violates the agreement will weaken their dynasty’s destiny. This tripartite agreement is going to involve all of us using our destiny to full effect. We have to take this matter very seriously! It’s much more effective to spend a bit of time upfront than to tackle the matter as a disorganized mob.”

“Alright! The Invincible Dynasty is completely willing to use our dynasty’s destiny to swear an oath of alliance. After all, we have no intention of stabbing anyone in the back.” The nine patriarchs of the Dugu Clan had been worried all along that Proud Heaven would cause mischief, so they were more than willing to go along.

Swearing an oath with destiny would be very effective. Everyone knew that breaking such an oath would cause a decline in their dynasty, which could lead to their ultimate ruin.

That, coupled with the blood aspect of the oath, would ensure that it was stable and trustworthy.

Upon hearing all of this, Yang Qi chuckled inwardly. He had bought the time he needed. These were matters of national security, and the debate over them would definitely take a long time. And by the time they finally reached an agreement, it would be too late for them.

“If we sit around negotiating, Yang Qi is just going to get stronger,” Hailan said.

“So what if he does?” said one of the patriarchs from the Central Dynasty. How strong could he possibly get? Once our three dynasties have come to a formal agreement, and are truly united, we’ll be strong enough that we could overthrow the old Sovereign Lord if we wanted to, much less this puny Yang Qi. Our dynasties have been around for billions of years, whereas his just popped up. How could he possibly surpass us? Miss Hailan, you really seem to be anxious. Is it that you want to foment discord between us? Or could it be that you’re trying to lure us into Proud Heaven’s trap? Are you out to harm our two dynasties? Regardless, we’re willing to put an oath in writing. This matter is just too serious.”

Virtually all the other experts present were nodding their heads in agreement.

The God Legion Seal was at stake, so nobody wanted to be careless. Forming a temporary team and just leaping into the action wasn’t the right choice.

“Proud Central needs to sign the oath as well,” Yang Chiliocosm said.

“Of course,” Proud Heaven said, nodding. “Let’s iron out all the details, then we can write up the agreement and sign it.” With that, the true discussion began.

‘The perfect opportunity!’ Yang Qi thought as he listened to the buzz of conversation. Taking advantage of the moment Proud Heaven had unsealed the hall and made contact with Proud Central, Yang Qi turned into a blur and shot out of the meeting hall.

‘Now I can finally start looking for the Mahātmā Jade. Although, if it’s in Proud Central’s hands, that’s going to be a big problem. He might even be using it to deal with King Immortal-Slayer. Perhaps that could be an opportunity. If I can take advantage of the right moment, I might be able to free King Immortal-Slayer from the Great Necropolis.’

Now that he was outside of the hall, he cast his senses out to try to identify the location of the jade.

Soon, he had locked on to its aura. However, he didn’t blindly rush toward it. After some consideration, he decided to track down the Great Necropolis. Simultaneously, he started building an expression of energy that resembled that of Proud Central.

He had never even seen the man, so it wasn’t an easy task. However, Proud Central had made a fatal mistake in allowing Yang Qi to get the Heaven-Burying God Pill. His will had been inside that pill, and although it had been destroyed by the Lord of the Sword Dao, Yang Qi had taken advantage of that moment to absorb some of Proud Central’s aura.

Chapter 1528: Proud Central

The top experts of the three empires were all gathered in the Central God-Palace, wrangling over the details of the soon-to-be signed agreement between them. There was no way the discussion would be wrapped up in less than two weeks, which meant Yang Qi had plenty of time to work with.

Unfortunately, that wasn’t going to do much for the Sage Monarch Empire. As had just been said moments before, the three dynasties had been around for billions of years, so there was no way Yang Qi’s empire could easily surpass them in a short time. The Sage Monarch Empire had reached a limit in its destiny growth, and significant gains weren’t going to happen.

Yang Qi knew full well that the only way to improve his empire’s destiny was by means of personal action.

Once he broke through to the level of a hundred billion, he would be incomparably powerful. Furthermore, all hundred million of his sage monarch magistrates would rise to the level of peak Paramount Gods.

At that point, his destiny would finally surpass that of the other three empires. And all of that rested on him acquiring the final piece of the Mahātmā Jade.

Now, he had it in his sights, and knew that it would be his shortly.

RUMBLE!

Yang Qi was making his way through the Central Dynasty as smoothly as a fish through water. The net of law gave him a slight bit of resistance, ensuring that he needed to act with caution. Thankfully, by faking the aura of Proud Central, he was able to fool the net of law.

In the past, Proud Central was untouchable as long as he was in the Central Dynasty. But then he had created a fatal weakness for himself.

Yang Qi made all the preparations in Proud Mindtravel’s quarters, where he was completely safe and didn’t have to worry about any interlopers.

Pulling out Proud Central’s aura from his reserves, he expanded it until it was a sphere roughly the size of a human. Then he shrank it down until it took a form that resembled Proud Central. It was similar to what Yang Qi had done with the will projection from Eternal Millennium, so he was very familiar with the process.

‘This is really a virtuous cycle. Proud Central plotted against me, and it's helping me plot against him. The net of law won’t be able to do anything about me!’

After the husk was built, Yang Qi sent his own will inside, taking control of it. Now, he was like a second version of Proud Central.

‘Time to connect to the net of law and pull off a true hoax....’

Sending out his will, he touched the net of law, resulting in a white stream of light shooting into him. It was destiny, the purest and most intense form he had ever encountered.

As of this moment, he was Emperor Proud Central.

He actually had better control of the destiny of the Central Dynasty than Proud Heaven.

Proud Heaven was a crown prince, while Proud Central was an emperor. There was a fundamental difference between what they were capable of. The effectiveness of destiny wasn’t just about how much of it one could tap into, but rather the structure of control. An imperial prince would have a lot of power and influence, but there were still restricted areas that he couldn't enter. In contrast, nowhere was beyond the control of the emperor.

Although Proud Heaven could tap into the pure destiny, it wouldn’t be as pure as what Yang Qi could now tap into.

Only Proud Central could access the truly deep type of destiny of the dynasty.

In the countless civilizations that had existed throughout history, there had often been preposterous situations in which an emperor was so caught up in living a life of pleasure that he found a person to stand in as his double.

If that puppet emperor eventually managed to tap into the destiny of the empire, he could kill the true emperor and actually take over his position.

That was very similar to what Yang Qi was doing right now.

As soon as he was connected to the destiny, he could send his thoughts out through the net of law, filling the entire Central Dynasty. He could see everything, including the ministers, armies, secret reserves, and even some of Proud Heaven’s secrets.

The eyes of the emperor could see anything and everything in his empire. Nothing could hide from his gaze, not even Proud Heaven.

Upon connecting to the empire’s destiny, Yang Qi’s godpower and psychic scale skyrocketed. After reaching the level of ninety billion, further advancement had become very difficult. For instance, medicinal pills were essentially useless to him. But having made himself a fraudulent copy of Proud Central, things were different. Truth be told, this was an act that had occurred in the past, but only in lower-level civilizations, never in the god world.

Yang Qi was only pulling it off because, first, Proud Central was completely wrapped up in the effort with King Immortal-Slayer, and thus couldn’t afford to be distracted. And second, Proud Heaven was presiding over the meeting, and wasn’t taking time to check in on the empire’s destiny.

Who would ever think that someone would do what Yang Qi was doing? It was completely unheard of.

The process went on for a few hours, during which time Yang Qi’s psychic scale climbed from ninety billion to ninety-two billion. However, he knew this process wouldn’t get him all the way to a hundred billion. As long as the true Proud Central existed, that would never happen. As a fake version of Proud Central, he could only siphon away a bit of the destiny.

Right now, he was like a rat that had slipped into the storehouse and was helping itself to a bit of the fine oil inside.

After reaching the level of ninety-two billion, he couldn’t benefit himself any more. However, he could use some of the destiny to make a few more sage monarch magistrates. But unfortunately, the only way to get them from a hundred million to two hundred million was to improve himself.

Having done all that, his aura now resembled Proud Central’s so much that the empire was essentially his. He could have walked into the Central God-Palace and not even Proud Heaven would have realized that he was a fake. He could theoretically even use that as an opportunity to try to assassinate Proud Heaven. Unfortunately, he had no way to know if he would succeed in that, so there was no way he would try.

Right now, he needed to use his command of the aura and destiny to track down Proud Central.

Chuckling, he rose to his feet in the guise of Proud Central. ‘I know you have that piece of the Mahātmā Jade, Proud Central. Are you using it as bait for me? Even if you are, I’ll beat you at your own game. Let’s see who comes out on top. You’re standing out in the open, and I'm hidden in the shadows. Plus, I'm the incarnation of fateless energy! You have no way to calculate or divine any information about me. Once I take that piece of the Mahātmā Jade, I’ll kill Yang Voidprime and become whole. Then no one in the world will be a match for me.”

It didn't take long for him to use his connection to the destiny and net of law to lock on to the position of the Mahātmā Jade.

With that, he opened his Lord's Eye!

RUMBLE!

His psyche connected to the Halls of Heaven, allowing him to look down on the god world as a whole.

With that view, it wasn't possible for anything to be hidden from him.

There were some low-level civilizations that had technology that allowed them to create satellites that could even see ants in full detail. To Yang Qi, the Halls of Heaven were like a satellite. They let him see everything.

As he looked at the Central Dynasty, he saw many secrets; he also realized that the aura of the Mahātmā Jade could be sensed in multiple areas.

‘Hmph! Just as I thought. It’s a trap. If I head to any of those locations, I’ll stumble into a spell formation. Proud Central is just as cunning as you’d expect. Thankfully, I have other options at hand. Thanks to being connected to the destiny here, and having the Halls of Heaven, I can see many secrets.’

With that, he continued his inspection.

Before long, he saw a location deep in the Central Dynasty where the space-time created a complex labyrinth. And in its depths was a necropolis.

The Great Necropolis.

Chapter 1529: Looking Down from Above

Yang Qi was looking down on everything from above. And with his connection to the destiny and net of law of the Central Dynasty, no crafty plots or machinations would work against him.

Proud Central had laid some clever traps, which went to show that he had anticipated Yang Qi coming to the Central Dynasty. And he had intentionally used the aura of the Mahātmā Jade to try to lure him into a trap.

But how could he have ever anticipated what Yang Qi was actually capable of? In fact, his machinations had actually opened doors for Yang Qi.

At the moment, Yang Qi’s attention was focused on the Great Necropolis. It was hidden in the most secret location in the dynasty, still and unmoving. However, countless dhāraṇī incantations were flowing in bright white streams into it.

And they were coming from Proud Central.

He was tall and imposing, making him reminiscent of the Sovereign Lord. And the white streams of light that flowed around him were like dragons. His hand resembled the Hand of the One God as he stretched it out toward the Great Necropolis, fingers splayed.

Every breath he took caused the power of primal-chaos to flow, and big bang explosions to occur around him, causing preheaven treasures to appear.

‘He knows how to create big bang explosions with primal-chaos? Did he somehow come across a batch of First Energy Primordial Chaos Pills?’ Yang Qi was more than a little surprised. Furthermore, he could see that Proud Central’s cultivation was far, far above his own. It was past a hundred billion, and was more likely at around two or three hundred billion.

‘He’s so strong! I definitely can’t fight him. Something must have happened recently. He can't have always been this strong! If he’d been this strong in the past, the House of the Chiliocosm and the House of the Invincible would never have risen to power. I wonder if it's because he's absorbing the power of King Immortal-Slayer.’

There was obviously no time for delay.

Unfortunately, it seemed that the Mahātmā Jade was actually in the Great Necropolis.

Proud Central was trying to assimilate the Great Necropolis and King Immortal-Slayer, which meant it would be extremely difficult for Yang Qi to get inside safely. And if he did get inside, he would end up trapped like a turtle in a jar. Perhaps it was all a trap laid by Proud Central. Regardless, Yang Qi was prepared to break it.

“Yang Immortal-Slayer!” he said via thought projection.

Back in the Sage Monarch Empire, Yang Immortal-Slayer nodded, then looked around at Yang Qi’s brethren who waited around him. “Get ready to carry out the master plan. Sacrifice!”

In the blink of an eye, countless secret channels of communication were opened in the Sage Monarch Empire.

An enormous altar appeared, surrounded by throngs of experts, all of whom slashed their wrists, causing blood to splash forth onto the altar.

Unfurling an imperial decree, Yang Immortal-Slayer raised his voice and said, “The emperor has officially ordered that King Immortal-Slayer be named the imperial preceptor of the Sage Monarch Empire!”

Instantly, the destiny of the empire surged into motion, converging on the altar. As the destiny drained, Yang Immortal-Slayer threw the imperial edict toward the altar, where it burst into flames.

In the blink of an eye, the destiny of the entire empire was catalyzed.

Then, a shadowy figure appeared on the altar, which was none other than the mighty King Immortal-Slayer.

Suddenly, he lunged into action, piercing through the void into the Central Dynasty and the Great Necropolis.

RUMBLE!

Having benefited from the boost of the sacrifice, he suddenly had the power to fight back with unprecedented strength.

King Immortal-Slayer’s voice suddenly echoed from within the Great Necropolis. “And here I thought you were going to go back on your word, Yang Qi. I almost can’t believe you’ve gotten this strong! This is far more power than could come from sacrificing the puny Second Devil General!” He laughed heartily. “Alright, Proud Central. Even if I was nothing but the shadow of a ghost, I wouldn’t let scum like you profane my glory. Back when I fought the Sovereign Lord, you were a piece of trash who could do nothing but cower out in the primal-chaos. And you think you're going to assimilate me? The mere thought is criminal! Get ready to die!”

“Damn you!” Proud Central blurted in shock and surprise. However, when he realized what was happening, he shouted, “How dare you try to escape, King Immortal-Slayer! Who gave you this power? How did you get so much destiny? Is it the Sage Monarch Empire? Yes, it must be. Only the Sage Monarch Empire could provide you with this much destiny! You must’ve been made the imperial preceptor of the Sage Monarch Empire! But the three dynasties are preparing to attack the Sage Monarch Empire. And they're choosing to help you in such circumstances? Are they feeling suicidal or something?”

Being an imperial preceptor was no small thing. After all, such people could wield immense destiny. Generally, they had access to a fifth of the destiny of the entire empire they served.

The imperial preceptor, the crown prince, and the grand princes were all the foundation of an empire. That was why such titles couldn't be casually given out.

As for the destiny in the Sage Monarch Empire, it was so incredible that if someone from the impure lands gained access to it, the cultivation base improvement they would experience would be unimaginable.

Someone could go from the Energy Arts level through Lifeseizing, Legendary, Great Sage, Godmyth, the Deathless Heavenly Stairway, Grand Emperor... and go all the way to becoming a God-Lord.

There would be no bottlenecks, no tribulations. They would just immediately rise to an incredibly high level.

It was power. Pure, consummate power that could change fate itself. In the face of destiny, tribulations were nothing.

That was why, in many ancient civilizations, fox spirits would take the form of beautiful women to seduce emperors. It was the best way to bypass tribulations.

If the destiny of empires in the impure lands was so amazing, just what was the destiny of the Sage Monarch Empire like? Even the lowliest member of the Sage Monarch Empire had access to stronger destiny than anyone from the immortal dao civilization.

Thus, when King Immortal-Slayer became the imperial preceptor, he experienced a meteoric rise.

In primeval times, King Immortal-Slayer had never founded a dynasty of any sort. So although he was powerful, he and his seventy-one brethren were little more than an unruly mob. That was also why the Sovereign Lord had called them the Seventy-Two Bandits.

One reason they never founded an empire was that they had no one skilled in governing people, nor in the act of creation. They could only destroy. In that sense, they weren’t very different from devils.

As a result, destiny wasn’t important to them.

Therefore, upon being conferred such an important title, King Immortal-Slayer experienced an explosive change.

In the past, Yang Qi had said he would sacrifice the Second Devil General and give his blood to King Immortal-Slayer. However, he had never done so. King Immortal-Slayer assumed that Yang Qi had changed his mind, yet there was nothing he could do about it. And the pressure on him had grown so intense recently that he couldn’t even come out of the Great Necropolis in clone or projected form. Not even Yang Immortal-Slayer had been able to establish contact with him.

However, on this day, Yang Qi made good on his previous guarantee. And instead of giving him blood, he appointed him as the imperial preceptor. In fact, he was giving King Immortal-Slayer power that was a hundred times what the Second Devil General would have provided.

As King Immortal-Slayer erupted with power, Proud Central was forced to draw on ninety-nine percent of his total power, and focus all of his attention on maintaining control.

Yang Qi used that moment to transform into a stream of energy that shot into the Great Necropolis. He was taking advantage of the clash between King Immortal-Slayer and Proud Central to find the Mahātmā Jade.

“Be destroyed!” howled King Immortal-Slayer. “Let everything be destroyed. I’m going to crush the Great Necropolis and break free! Any who profane the mighty King Immortal-Slayer will perish!”

Proud Central’s eyes snapped open. “Lord of Righteous Justice! Get out here, slave! Help me draw upon the righteous power of heaven!”

WHIZZZ!

Beneath the Great Necropolis, something enormous emerged. It looked like a white mammoth, part human and part demon, yet neither. It was a level of strength roughly equal to Proud Central, yet it had no attack power. Instead, it pulsed with pure righteous energy.

In fact, it was the same type of righteous energy that flowed through heaven and earth.

It was none other than the Lord of Righteous Justice, who Proud Central controlled.

Proud Central sent power crushing onto King Immortal-Slayer, ensuring that the two of them were locked in a stalemate.

“Hmph! You think you can escape from me, King Immortal-Slayer? I've been working on this plan for billions of years. You think that was all in waste?”

‘Is that the Lord of Righteous Justice? A white mammoth?’ Yang Qi couldn’t help but wonder if it had some connection to the King of Godmammoths. Was the Lord of Righteous Justice the son of the King of Godmammoths? Yang Qi couldn’t sense such blood in him. All he could tell was that the Lord of Righteous Justice wasn’t adept at attacking.

Of course, he was primarily focused on the Mahātmā Jade right now.

He was already in the depths of the Great Necropolis, searching through the sprawling and complex immortal worlds there. The worlds had changed. They were now like embryonic minor god worlds. In the immortal worlds, the Great Necropolis ejected more immortal worlds. But in the god world, it had power that could do far more.

Yang Qi was visiting old haunts, and although things had changed, in many ways they were the same. Thankfully, it was similar enough that he could still make his way around, and that made it easy to follow the aura of the Mahātmā Jade.

Before long, he reached an enormous gate made of green stone, that glowed with soft light. There was a paper talisman pasted to the door that had a single character on it: devil.

This seemed to be the place where the Mahātmā Jade was sealed.

Chapter 1530: A Sudden Development

The Mahātmā Jade was right in front of Yang Qi, sealed by the character ‘devil’.

Within him, the existing pieces of the Mahātmā Jade trembled, and his mind pulsed as if it were boiling. The jade wanted to be complete. However, now wasn’t the time to act casually. He needed to find a safe place to study the talisman and the ‘devil’ character, which vibrated with the energy of all the sages and mahātmās of the horde of devils.

He was fairly certain it was another trap.

It was just his intuition, but he had a feeling that if he just combined the pieces of the jade, he would fall right into that trap. There was no way Proud Central hadn’t planned for this possibility, no matter how difficult it had been to provide aid to King Immortal-Slayer.

Therefore, he would wait until the fighting between King Immortal-Slayer and Proud Central heated up.

In the meantime, he tapped into the blood of the King of Godmammoths and studied the white mammoth that was the Lord of Righteous Justice. The fact that he bore the semblance of a white mammoth indicated that he must be connected to the King of Godmammoths somehow.

After some consideration, he forced out a drop of the King of Godmammoths’ blood, then surreptitiously sent it shooting out to enter the body of the Lord of Righteous Justice.

Whizz!

A small-scale explosion rippled out, and a cold smile appeared on Yang Qi’s face. ‘I knew it was a trap. Well, it's not going to be that easy to stop me. I think I’ll make a feint to the east and attack in the west. That’s how I’ll free the Lord of Righteous Justice.’

RUMBLE!

He sent out his will, piercing through all manners of sealing marks to reach into the will of the white mammoth.

He soon found himself in a pure white labyrinth that seemed to stretch on to infinity.

‘Incredible. This is the Lord of Righteous Justice’s sea of consciousness, and it's a complex maze. Any other person would likely get lost here. But with the calculations my mind can perform, I can pierce through the power of any labyrinth.’ And he began doing just that.

Before long, all the secrets of the labyrinth were laid bare to him.

Whoosh. Whoosh. Whoosh.

His mind shot through the maze, entering the depths of the sea of consciousness, until he found a white mammoth, tightly sealed up in a crystal ball. The mammoth was constantly attacking the ball, trying to free itself, yet failing every time.

“Lord of Righteous Justice?” Yang Qi said via will projection.

The white mammoth suddenly went still. “Who are you? You’re not Proud Central. How come the aura of your thoughts resembles the aura of my father?”

“Your father? Are you talking about the King of Godmammoths?”

“Yes, that's right. My father was the king of Godmammoths. Who are you? Don’t tell me you’re with Proud Central. Don’t even think of trying to run some scam on me. Proud Central did that years ago, but I learned my lesson. You’re not going to assimilate my soul. I won’t let it happen. Hmph.”

Yang Qi laughed. “I don’t give a crap about Proud Central. You think I’d work for him? I came here today to free King Immortal-Slayer, and since you’re trapped as well, I might as well help you, too.”

“You can’t free me,” the white mammoth said. “This sealing mark is too strong.”

“I can free you. Perhaps not at this moment. Right now, I want to give you a bit of energy to make you stronger. Then, with you distracting Proud Central, I’ll have an opportunity to take the final piece of the Mahātmā Jade that I need. Then I can free King Immortal-Slayer, and with the two of us working together, we can take Proud Central down.”

“Alright, fine. So what's your exact plan to help me?”

The white mammoth already seemed to be leaping with joy at the prospect of being freed.

“I’ll give you some of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth, which contains some of the dao of the annulled. With that boost of power, you should be able to make some headway against the sealing mark. And once you do, Proud Central will be dead!” With that, Yang Qi sent some of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth into the Lord of Righteous Justice, along with various understandings and enlightenment he had gained over the years.

Truth be told, the Lord of Righteous Justice had never cultivated the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth.

Whizz!

Never could Yang Qi have guessed that things would work out this way.

As soon as the Lord of Righteous Justice got the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth and started cultivating it, his tusks suddenly grew longer, and his body larger. Clearly, he had just gained incredible enlightenment.

Normally speaking, it wasn’t possible to cultivate the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth without the God Legion Seal. But since the Lord of Righteous Justice was directly related to the King of Godmammoths, it was possible.

Almost immediately, the Lord of Righteous Justice surged with psychic power, which slammed into the sealing barrier and caused it to tremble.

The Lord of Righteous Justice had been born in the early years of the god world, in the form of a white megamammoth. He represented the power of justice and order, which was why Proud Central had been able to use him to create the top empire in existence.

Neither the High Priestess in the Chiliocosm Dynasty nor the Invincible Dugu in the Invincible Dynasty had been able to compete.

The pure white power of justice and righteousness made the Central Dynasty’s destiny beyond compare. Proud Central almost immediately sensed the development. “What?! What’s going on? The Lord of Righteous Justice is slipping out of my control. Be crushed! Vast Expanse God-Fist!”

He clenched his hand into a fist and unleashed the power of the great vast expanse to crush the Lord of Righteous Justice.

‘Now’s my chance!’ Yang Qi thought. Proud Central couldn’t have been more distracted, so Yang Qi quickly reached out with his will. He was making his move on the final piece of the Mahātmā Jade.

Suddenly, laughter rang out from Proud Central. “So you're finally showing your face, Yang Qi! I'm not going to let you go free! Did you think that trying to distract me with King Immortal-Slayer and the Lord of Righteous Justice would really work? You're delusional!

“Central God-Fist!”

RUMBLE!

All of a sudden, a hand shot out from inside the ancient stone door, headed directly toward Yang Qi’s expression of divine will, and grabbed it. At the last moment, Yang Qi was incapable of laying hands on the Mahātmā Jade.

Then the door opened, and a version of Proud Central stepped out that looked exactly like the version on the outside. In fact, it was impossible to tell which of them was real.

With his hand still latched on to Yang Qi’s divine will, he summoned a huge cage that dropped down and trapped Yang Qi. Meanwhile, the talisman with the ‘devil’ character flew up into the air, where it transformed into a chunk of jade.

“You can’t escape, Yang Qi. I've captured you. Now I have half of the fateless energy and the God Legion Seal! Plus, you have the rest of the Mahātmā Jade. You’re a real treasure, you know. Getting you is going to make me so strong that not even the Sovereign Lord could be my enemy. The god world is going to be mine! The High Priestess. The Invincible Dugu. They're all going to die!” He laughed again. “What you saw outside is my exterior body. This is my true self! And now you’re trapped in my Central Prison. I spent blood, sweat, and tears to make it, and now I have a Fateless One as a prisoner inside. While they continue the negotiations, I'm going to use you to become a true Annulled expert! I’ll be completely invincible!”

“Is that so?” Yang Qi said. All of a sudden, his projection of will transformed into a black ball of lightning, pulsing with incredibly destructive power. “I knew all along that you’d have traps within traps, Proud Central. Sadly for you, you can’t out-scheme me. Your prison isn’t going to do a thing to me. You see, I have a treasure from the Halls of Heaven, made from the blood of the Sovereign Lord. It's called the Universe-Origin Many-Heavens Myriad-Manifestations Transformation-Destruction God-Sphere. It's the most destructive magical treasure in existence, and little did you know that I tricked you into thinking it was me. Now that sphere is in your little cage. Have fun with it!”

WHOOSH!

Suddenly, Yang Qi’s true form appeared. Reaching out, he grabbed the final piece of the Mahātmā Jade.

Chapter 1531: One Step Behind

As it turned out, Proud Central had always been one step behind Yang Qi.

During Yang Qi’s trip to the Halls of Heaven in which he collected numerous medicinal pills, he had picked up the Universe-Origin Many-Heavens Myriad-Manifestations Transformation-Destruction God-Sphere, which was a single-use item. However, it was incredibly mighty, and could be used to thoroughly confuse an enemy.

Thus, Yang Qi took advantage of it to win a sweeping victory.

He finally had the last piece of the Mahātmā Jade in his hands. As soon as he did, he unfurled his Tribulation Wings and shot up into the sky, where he disappeared.

Moments later, he was at the safest place he could be, high above the god world. He was in the Halls of Heaven, holding the Mahātmā Jade in front of him.

He knew it was an extremely dangerous time. He still had the High Priestess to worry about, although it was likely she hadn’t fully recovered yet. He still couldn’t directly fight Proud Central, and there was also the mysterious and ruthless Hailan in the picture. In addition to all of that, the King of Godmammoths wasn’t dead. It was as if all of the almighty beings from the past were finally starting to resurface.

It was even likely that there were also mysterious and powerful entities lurking in the primal-chaos outside the god world.

Although the god world was constantly expanding, it would eventually reach a point where it ran out of momentum. Then, the infinite universe would experience a final Big Bang and everything would be destroyed. And the only way to survive was to be Annulled.

That would be the final tribulation, and Yang Qi planned to be ready for it.

But right now, he needed to prepare for the combined assault of the three dynasties. Thankfully, he had the last piece of the Mahātmā Jade.

RUMBLE!

As he stood in the Halls of Heaven, he looked down to where the ball of lightning was exploding.

As it turned out, it was out in the world of primal-chaos. A mighty force ripped through space-time with the power to shred chiliocosms of worlds. Primal-chaos itself was wiped out of existence.

‘Impressive. Proud Central is really impressive. He reacted quickly enough, sending that prison out of the god world and into primal-chaos. At least I destroyed one of his top magical treasures. He obviously spent a lot of effort making that Central Prison of his. That was definitely a big blow to him.’

He chuckled. It wouldn’t be easy to take down Proud Central. Even if the Sovereign Lord were to be born again, he wouldn’t find the task easy.

Proud Central was incredibly strong. But more than that, he was full of craft and cunning. Furthermore, he had deep resources. If it weren’t for King Immortal-Slayer and the Lord of Righteous Justice causing complications, Yang Qi probably would have met his end.

Of course, after assimilating the final piece of the Mahātmā Jade, everything would be different. He crushed the piece of jade, causing streams of flickering luster that twisted and turned with the energy of mahātmās and sages to shoot out. It was like countless wise ones chanting sutras. The sutras weren’t from the dao of devils; rather, they were designed to bring order to the chaos that was the dao of devils.

Those sages and mahātmās sought to preserve devilishness, and use it to create order, which was a very difficult thing. Devilishness was inherently chaotic, while order was righteous. If a devil became orderly, it would be like someone from the dao of righteousness becoming evil.

It was an inherent contradiction that couldn't be rectified. But the sages and mahātmās from the dao of devils had sought to solve that problem. Unfortunately, they had never succeeded. However, all of the power and research that had gone into their efforts ended up in the Mahātmā Jade, and now Yang Qi had it.

As soon as the power of the jade was in the open, he drew on the power of the Halls of Heaven and unleashed the crushing pressure of the Hand of the One God.

When he grabbed the jade, a scream echoed out, filled with agony and fury. The screams created a massive explosion that rocked the area.

‘Hmph! So Proud Central had one final trap in play. He used the rancorous energy that had built up in his empire for the past several billion years to create a bomb. Then, he put it into the Mahātmā Jade so that whoever tried to assimilate it would be destroyed.’ Yang Qi laughed. ‘The rancorous energy is powerful, so much so that it would destroy even me if I tried assimilating it. Thankfully, I’m not so stupid as to fall into such a trap.’

A smile appeared on Yang Qi’s face.

Keeping a firm grip on the Mahātmā Jade with the Hand of the One God, he looked up at the stars and used their light to burn away the rancorous energy until it was no more.

He waved his hand and the Mahātmā Jade dropped into his palm, sparkling, translucent, and lacking in any impurities.

Then, he called on the pieces of the jade he already owned, and sent them out.

Click!

A tremor passed through the Halls of Heaven, and countless streams of vital energy thrummed as if they sensed something incredibly mighty coming into existence. It was very similar to what had occurred when the God Legion Seal became whole. Suddenly, a stream of greenish light shot out into the Halls of Heaven, piercing through everything and erupting into the primal-chaos beyond the god world.

As the green light pierced through the primal-chaos paleo-energy, it created world after world, all of them perfect.

“Be absorbed!”

Yang Qi changed into the form of King Heaven-Devourer, and as a primal-chaos elder-snake, he lunged at the completed jade and swallowed it up. Immediately, dramatic transformations occurred.

RUMBLE!

There was no tribulation. Instead, his psychic scale started climbing, bashing through the level of a hundred billion. And it kept going! A hundred and ten billion. A hundred and twenty. A hundred and thirty... a hundred and fifty... a hundred and ninety. Two hundred....

And it kept going!

Winds screamed in the depths of the Halls of Heaven, provoked by Yang Qi’s aura.

Yang Qi knew full well that this was a major accomplishment. He had prepared long and hard for this moment. Struggling his way from the impure lands to the god world, he had fought every step of the way. And now he had finally succeeded.

His psychic scale climbed and climbed, eventually coming to a stop at two hundred and ninety billion, just shy of three hundred billion!

That was what resulted from getting the final piece of the Mahātmā Jade.

Not even he could have imagined that the result would be like this. It would be like a beggar suddenly inheriting a fortune, and turning into a young master who could eat whatever he wanted, have any beautiful women he wanted, and never run out of money.

Moments before, he had been at ninety billion, and now he was at nearly three hundred billion. It was a shocking difference. The current version of himself could kill the old version with the mere snap of a finger.

The Mahātmā Jade was now complete, and it flickered with a light that seemed to contain intelligence, thoughtfulness, and data. As it connected to his soul, he suddenly sensed the might of the True Devil.

WHOOSH!

As Yang Qi’s strength erupted, the God Legion Seal reacted, becoming a golden stream of light that pierced into his sea of consciousness and connected with the Mahātmā Jade.

The God Legion Seal had been Yang Qi’s invincible magical treasure ever since he had started out in the impure lands.

He had slowly unlocked its various features and functions, and now that he had a psychic scale of nearly three hundred billion, it was going to make him more formidable than ever. As the God Legion Seal and the Mahātmā Jade fused, they produced memories and thoughts that then became part of Yang Qi, similar to the way that ideas in a book would become part of the reader after the act of reading.

Yang Qi settled down cross-legged and started working on his cultivation in the ordinary fashion. His energy spread out to fill the Halls of Heaven, and he became like the Sovereign Lord himself.

Inside, he was drawing on the power of King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans to devour more of the King of Godmammoths’ blood. Not even he was sure what his blood really was now.

As his thoughts expanded, he stepped past the Unbounded level.

At long last, he was grasping at the half-Annulled level!

Crack!

Deep in the Sage Monarch Empire, the sage monarch magistrates started transforming. They were like butterflies coming out of cocoons as their psychic scales reached the level of a billion. They were now peak Paramount Gods, which was their ultimate limit. Henceforth, they could get stronger, but they couldn’t step into the level of God-Lords.

That was an ironclad rule. They were thralls, and thralls couldn't be God-Lords.

However, they could continue proliferating. In the blink of an eye, their numbers reached two hundred million!

Chapter 1532: A Psychic Scale of Three Hundred Billion

The sage monarch magistrates were now peak Paramount Gods with psychic scales of one billion. Not only did they have more powerful cultivation bases now, but their skills in administration had also improved.

Even viceroys from the House of the Invincible were only late Paramount Gods.

As of this point, there was absolutely nothing causing problems for the management of the various lands and peoples in the Sage Monarch Empire. After all, there were two hundred million sage monarch magistrates! That was simply a huge number.

Even if the Sage Monarch Empire doubled in size, they could still manage it all. In other words, the empire could now expand and subjugate more of the surrounding nations and peoples.

It was now obvious to anyone paying attention that the emperor of this empire had risen to an unheard-of level. As for Yang Qi’s friends and family, they were all elated.

“Sorry, Lord of the Sword Dao, but you’re useless to me now. Be destroyed!”

RUMBLE!

A howl of anguish could be heard as the Lord of the Sword Dao was crushed. There wasn’t anything he could do to resist Yang Qi’s will. After all, he only had a psychic scale of a bit over a hundred billion.

Crumbling into a stream of light, he flowed into Yang Qi’s palm, where he took the shape of a sword.

Then, Yang Qi opened his mouth and devoured the sword, which became a part of him, causing his psychic scale to rise by a few billion. His psychic scale was now at over two hundred and ninety billion, while his godhood rating was still at ninety billion. Obviously, the latter needed to be increased.

As such, he turned into a primal-chaos elder-snake that shot up into the sky and started devouring the countless heavenly caliber godstones that were the stars there.

As he did, he grew larger and larger, until he had devoured over a hundred million stars. Even having taken that many, the sky was still a dazzling tableau of brilliance. That said, it was now possible to tell that there were fewer stars than before. Of course, that many godstones was something that the other three dynasties couldn’t even dream of.

After all, they used perfect caliber godstones, whereas these were heaven caliber.

Yang Qi threw his head back and laughed heartily. ‘This way, I should be able to get my godhood rating to equal my psychic scale. Ah, what a pity. My cultivation base still isn’t high enough. If I could fully step into the half-Annulled level, I could definitely devour the Halls of Heaven.’

As a primal-chaos elder-snake, he looked at the Halls of Heaven and thought about what it would be like to swallow them up. That had always been King Heaven-Devourer’s aspiration. Second to his desire to devour the Halls of Heaven had been his hope to consume the King of Godmammoths.

Yang Qi could sense that many eyes were fixed on the Halls of Heaven right now, and although they didn’t know what exactly was happening, they could tell that something momentous was going on.

Before long, his godhood rating reached the same level as his psychic scale. Now both were only about a hundred million away from reaching the level of three hundred billion.

Unfortunately, that bottleneck would be difficult to pass.

That said, he was definitely strong enough to dominate the top experts in existence in combat. Of course, it wouldn’t be simple to do that. Furthermore, now that Yang Qi had reached this level, he saw traces of the King of Godmammoths about, and was starting to think that the Sovereign Lord might not be dead after all.

He was now beginning to get very nervous.

‘I’ll just have to wait for the final battle,’ he thought. ‘The three dynasties are definitely going to besiege my Sage Monarch Empire, and I have to stop them. I have to force them to acknowledge my might. Once I'm the top power in the god world, I’ll finally be able to tell what’s really going on. People will stream to me, and stand by my side. It will prove that I am the orthodox dao.’

Yang Qi’s dao could only be corroborated by defeating the combined armies of the other three empires. That was what everything came down to.

‘This is working great. I’ve already reached a higher level. Excellent! Now that I have momentum, I need to rain fire and blood on my enemies, with my friends and family at my side! Let’s do it!’

As a primal-chaos elder-snake, he sped through the Halls of Heaven with his mouth open, devouring the countless magical treasures he found. Then he sent all of them to his empire, improving its fighting prowess.

The empire was expanding, and everyone within it knew. However, they also knew that it meant terrible times were ahead. As the magical treasures flowed in, they went to the most loyal of the top experts, all of whom immediately used them to boost their cultivation bases.

All of them went into sessions of cultivation and prayer.

Their prayers weren’t to a person, as Yang Qi didn’t need, nor want their faith. Their prayers went to the Sage Monarch Empire as a whole, as they asked for prosperity for the nation itself.

These were the preparations for war.

A night passed during which temples were erected in numerous lands within the empire. The sage monarch magistrates led the activities as all citizens worked hard to get as strong as possible.

All production work ceased, as the constant influx of magical treasures ensured that they had more resources than they could even use. Even in a hundred million years, it wouldn't be possible to produce what Yang Qi was sending from the Halls of Heaven.

‘Oh Sage Monarch Empire, I hereby pray for your prosperity. I pray that you, my empire, flourishes for all time, triumphant in every battle, victorious in every fight....’ Billions of experts were gathered, and they were all praying such things.

The destiny of the nation was converging, and the people were experiencing breakthrough after breakthrough.

Crack. Crunch.

The destiny was like the root system of a tree, spreading deep into the space below as the prayers transformed it. As it spread, numerous lands in the god world became part of the empire as it grew constantly.

The growth of the destiny represented the growth of the nation.

In fact, the destiny was so incredible that it would soon surpass the civilization of the gods.

In the civilization of the gods, destiny could be used to ordain people as gods. There was nothing in all of the universe of primal-chaos that had ever surpassed the civilization of gods. After all, nothing existed above them.

‘Incredible. The destiny is growing so rapidly!’ Yang Qi nodded in satisfaction as his armies were sent to occupy the new lands. Many places in the god world were occupied by Demonfolk, but as his destiny spread out, they were converted, and became members of the Sage Monarch Empire.

In the impure lands, people who had lived in a place for generations, then suddenly faced an incoming army who declared their homeland part of an empire, would have no choice but to accept the new rulership. This was momentum. And it was momentum that couldn’t be stopped.

Yang Qi flew into motion, heading down into his empire.

He had truly founded a new dynasty.

Thanks to the surging destiny, his friends and family were all becoming stronger, their psychic scales and godhood ratings climbing by hundreds and hundreds of millions.

Obviously, the members of the other three dynasties in the Central God-Palace noticed what was happening.

‘Just what exactly is going on? Why this sudden, dramatic change?’ Proud Heaven’s eyes widened as he saw the Sage Monarch Empire, burning like a bright torch as it expanded rapidly.

He could even hear the prayers of its countless citizens.

The Sage Monarch Empire’s destiny was expanding so rapidly that it quickly outpaced the Invincible Dynasty and the Chiliocosm Dynasty, and was soon equal to that of the Central Dynasty.

“What’s this?”

Many of the other experts present were shocked. “The Sage Monarch Empire’s dynasty is increasing so fast! This is terrifying. Horrifying! How is Yang Qi doing this?”

“There’s no time to lose, ladies and gentlemen! Yang Qi’s empire is expanding, and his people are preparing for war. His destiny is increasing, and if we just sit around here, we’ll end up dead. Sign the agreement! Join our destinies and marshal the troops!”

Chapter 1533: The War Begins

Never in anyone’s wildest dreams could they have imagined that the destiny of the Sage Monarch Empire would rise so rapidly. It seemed completely unimaginable to the extreme.

After Yang Qi’s major breakthrough and subsequent gains, he immediately ensured that everything in his empire improved. He also rebuilt the Everlasting Aegis until it became a treasure that vastly surpassed the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

Meanwhile, the people prepared for war, their blood boiling with battle spirit. Everyone could see that the momentum of the Sage Monarch Empire couldn't be stopped. And the confucian experts could tell that it was being ruled properly, ensuring that more people would flock to join it.

Atop a high mountain, an old man sat in front of a group of young people. Obviously, he was a confucian teacher, and they were his students.

Further down the mountain, a confucian college could be seen.

The old man’s cultivation base was mysterious and impossible to read. He was definitely a God-Lord, at the very least. As for his students, some were God-Lords, while others were simply peak Paramount Gods. These people weren’t quite on the level of the Dragonfolk or the Spritefolk, but they were still powerful.

As the old man sat there, he studied the destiny quietly.

Eventually, one of his students said, “Teacher, ever since the Sovereign Lord perished, heaven and earth transformed, and the god world was split in three. The Central, Chiliocosm, and Invincible Dynasties controlled everything. That itself was in accord with the dao of heaven, as we all know the saying a nation is like a tripod standing on three legs. With three major powers in play, they can keep each other under control. It’s a very stable structure. But now that this Sage Monarch Empire has come into play as a fourth empire, what will happen? Will everything fall apart?

“Throughout all the years, there have been many occasions in which people tried to challenge the might of the three major dynasties. But all such opposition was eventually crushed. For instance, the ancient buddhist schools tried to found a buddhist empire, but they were defeated. Presumably, they found some distant corner of the god world to hide in and lick their wounds. The Demonfolk had almighty experts who tried creating a demon empire. They were also smashed by the three dynasties. It seems like a foregone conclusion that the same will happen with the Sage Monarch Empire.”

“It’s all predestined,” said the teacher. “I’ve been studying the destiny of this Sage Monarch Empire, and it's like nothing I've ever seen before. The governing method of this empire surpasses the civilization of gods. It seems to me it’s a different type of civilization, something transcendent. Whether it will truly transcend the god civilization remains to be seen. That’s something easier said than done. That said, the Sage Monarch Empire is different from any other empire. Not even the buddhists could do something like this. After all, they excel at cultivation, not governance. And the demons and devils, they’re virtually the same thing. Creatures of chaos without order. Years ago, the Demon Master reached a very high level of cultivation, but he could never found a Demonfolk empire. They simply have no concept of order in their minds. It’s impossible to change the fundamental nature of an entire race. But look. The Sage Monarch Empire has turned the Dragonfolk into true humans, which is nothing short of amazing. A single dragon will provide vastly more destiny than numerous humans. That’s why human emperors are called True Dragon Sons of Heaven. Incredible. Simply incredible. I think this Yang Qi might have a way of governing that’s superior to even we confucians.”

The students then chimed in.

“Teacher, it looks like the other three dynasties are going to work together to fight the Sage Monarch Empire. Do you think this Yang Qi fellow can handle it? Do we just sit on the mountaintop and watch the tigers fight, then reap the spoils when they tire out? Or do we interfere?”

“I don’t think it would do to interfere. We’d only be asking for trouble.”

“We’d end up getting crushed. No, we stay out of it. After all: When you’re successful, you should focus on your own cultivation. When you're unsuccessful, you should work hard to benefit all people.”

“Can’t you see?” the teacher continued. “The god world is changing rapidly. If we don’t take advantage of this situation, it’s likely it will devolve into a world of terror. You have limited foresight, and can't see the bigger picture. We confucians should be the best at seeing through to the truth of matters.”

“What do we do, Teacher? Do we join the three dynasties to put down the Sage Monarch Empire?”

“Moron!” the teacher scolded. “This is a major change for the god world. Without the Sage Monarch Empire, things would continue with a tripartite balance of power. But if the Sage Monarch Empire wins, it will control all creation. It will unite the god world in the greatest revolution to ever occur. The future is going to change! We have to take advantage of this situation and become like an official who follows someone's rise from a lower rank to that of emperor. That’s the only way to see true destiny, and transcend the bounds of civilization.”

“What? Teacher, are you saying you prefer the Sage Monarch Empire?”

“That’s right. Look at its destiny. It’s amazing. It’s definitely not something that an ordinary person could pull off. I've already made my decision. Before the war starts, we’ll take all of our disciples to join the Sage Monarch Empire. First, we want to see how they govern their empire. And second, we want to be within their destiny when they transcend.”

“But... what if the Sage Monarch Empire loses? We’ll end up damned by myriad tribulations.”

“It’s a gamble. But everything in existence is really just a game. We’re betting on who has the sharpest eyes and the best plan. Furthermore, we know what sort of morality is espoused by the Central Dynasty, and their views on governance. Besides, among all the countless civilizations that have existed, there have been many occasions in which the side with fewer numbers came out on top of a war. The decision is made. Make the preparations. We're heading to the Sage Monarch Empire.”

“Yes sir!” the students said, and they rushed down to the college to make preparations.

It was a mass migration of the entire population of the college, not just a handful of people choosing to go.

As the massive confucian college made their decision, a group of God-Lord buddhas were meeting in a buddhist kingdom in the depths of space.

One of the buddhas said, “Buddha-Lord Pārisuddhi Outstanding Vaiḍūrya Saddharma Puṇḍarīka, what do you think of this war? Is this our chance to rise to prominence?” The buddha he was speaking to was exceedingly fat, but at the same time, looked extremely dignified. He also bore the air of a leader.

He was Buddha-Lord Pārisuddhi Outstanding Vaiḍūrya Saddharma Puṇḍarīka, and he was considered the hope for the future of the buddhist schools.

His psychic scale was at the level of a hundred billion, yet he didn’t dare to establish an empire. In ancient times, there had been experts stronger than him who had tried to do so, only to end up destroyed. The descendants of those former empires had long since scuttled in the shadows of the god world, not willing to show their faces.

But now it seemed there might be an opportunity to emerge from the shadows.

“This is our chance,” Buddha-Lord Pārisuddhi Outstanding Vaiḍūrya Saddharma Puṇḍarīka said. “Once war breaks out, all four of the dynasties are going to experience a decline in destiny, and terrible situations in their borders. Now is our opportunity to spread the creed of the Pure Land. We’ll take advantage of the situation to make sure everyone knows that giving us faith is the only true path. Furthermore, I suspect that the Sage Monarch Empire is going to be crushed. So we can take advantage of that moment to take their wealth. We must take action now. Begin our campaign of preaching. Any who refuse to be purified will be slaughtered. Send them to the True Void. The buddhist schools will rise to prominence! Now is the time for fury and vengeance, not mercy. Understand? We’re going to make our comeback, and wait until the four dynasties are weak, then crush them all! It couldn’t be more perfect! All creation will belong to us. The god world will no longer be called the god world. It will be the buddha world. And we’ll finally be able to transcend everything.”

“Yes sir!” The enormous buddhist school stirred into action.

It wasn’t just the buddhist schools. There were Demonfolk, Devilfolk, wretch-gods, and experts of all sorts who took action. Some marshalled their troops, others fled into hiding. All sorts of plans were hatched.

A storm was coming, and everyone had to decide what to do.

It was going to be true war, and no one knew how it would turn out. No one could make predictions with utter certainty.

Meanwhile, in the Central God-Palace....

“We can’t wait any longer! Sign the agreement! Now's the time to act, not delay! Sign it! Tell everyone in existence that we're going to war with the Sage Monarch Empire!”

Chapter 1534: It&#039;s Here

The Lord of the Chiliocosm, the nine patriarchs from the House of the Invincible, and all of the other top experts had originally anticipated negotiating matters for a matter of months. Maybe even a year. But now they saw that it wasn’t the time to bicker over trivialities.

Acting as quickly as possible, they signed the agreement.

All of the leaders and ministers then swore oaths.

It only took three days to handle all of the particulars. That alone went to show how anxious everyone was about the matter.

If Yang Qi had hidden the fact that he got the final piece of the Mahātmā Jade, and continued to operate in secret, they would have continued to argue and haggle. However, operating in secret wasn’t particularly effective.

So he chose war.

It was a foregone conclusion that it would happen eventually, so there was no need for delay.

RUMBLE!

Dramatic transformations were occurring everywhere, and the destiny of the god world was changing. Meanwhile, the citizens of the Invincible, Chiliocosm, and Central Dynasties all heard the news that they would be going to war with the Sage Monarch Empire.

In the shortest amount of time imaginable, the god world was set abuzz.

After all, it was an official announcement, not just scuttlebutt. The leaders of the three dynasties had sworn blood oaths and signed an agreement, outlining all of the details.

The very substructure of the god world was going to change.

“We three empires shall work together to conquer the Sage Monarch Empire. All members of the empire will be slaughtered, down to the chickens and dogs. Only those who surrender before the fighting begins will be spared. Those who refuse, and proceed to fight, will be killed, and will not be allowed to surrender.”

The declaration was chilling.

As word spread through the god world to all the innumerable planes of existence, the people who heard it shivered in fear.

The true intentions of the three dynasties had been made very clear.

Of course, considering all the channels of communication the Sage Monarch Empire had open, they got the news almost immediately. Yang Qi was making a similar announcement. “We’ll fight to the death. When the three dynasties come, we’ll wipe out their armies. The Sage Monarch Empire will unify the god world, becoming unparalleled under heaven and achieving a level of glory that only the Sovereign Lord has ever had.”

The people in the god world who heard his announcement couldn’t help but be impressed.

Not only was the Sage Monarch Empire going to fight back against the invasion, but they were also going to unify the god world and bring back the glory of the Sovereign Lord? It seemed crazy. What kind of statement was this? What kind of confidence backed it?

It was almost as if they weren’t worried at all about the other three dynasties.

Numerous factions and peoples were watching with keen interest. Of course, many people were moved. After all, Yang Qi was a Leading One, as were all of his sage monarch magistrates. Down to their genes, they were adept at leading people and convincing them with logical arguments.

As the god world buzzed with all the news, Yang Qi released another statement.

“I am Yang Qi, bearer of the God Legion Seal. The Halls of Heaven are mine, and the resources in the Sage Monarch Empire are from there. Those who join my Sage Monarch Empire and help crush the three other dynasties will receive treasures from the Sovereign Lord. Furthermore, those who join in crushing the other three empires can also join in looting their treasure storehouses!”

Immediately, a crazed frenzy broke out.

The God Legion Seal had once belonged to the Sovereign Lord, and whoever held it commanded the mandate of heaven!

Innumerable civilizations in the god world had information about the God Legion Seal, but most people thought it would never be seen. After all, it had fallen into the impure lands.

The shockwaves created by the announcement were unprecedented. Thankfully, Yang Qi wasn’t worried that he would be like an ordinary man who possessed great treasure and made himself a big target.

In the impure lands, a random farmer who found an emperor’s jade seal would be considered a criminal. But if a powerful noble acquired the same thing, he could take over the empire.

Numerous powerful entities knew that he had the God Legion Seal, yet none of them even dared to think of stealing it. After all, the three main dynasties had already set their eyes on the Sage Monarch Empire. Anyone who tried to singlehandedly take on forces like that would get killed, even if they had a psychic scale of a hundred billion.

No single person would dare to take on an empire.

It was similar to how the Central Dynasty had always been the only ones to print godnotes. Although many people were completely envious over the magical treasure they possessed to do that, no one had ever attempted to steal it. It was just too dangerous.

The Sage Monarch Empire’s dynasty was growing so rapidly that it finally outpaced that of the Central Dynasty.

In the Central God-Palace, Proud Heaven remained as cool as ever, as though he wasn’t under any pressure at all. Standing directly in front of him were Yang Voidprime and Hailan.

Although they weren’t consummate patriarchs, they were some of the most enigmatic people in the entire god world, and there was obviously more to them than met the eye. And now, they were all looking at each other with mysterious smiles on their faces.

“Proud Heaven, do you think we can win this war?” Hailan asked. “Even back in the impure lands, Yang Qi was clever and decisive. And virtually invincible. He’s worked hard to reach this point, found his empire and establish order, and even create a net of law. His tentacles are spreading out everywhere. Although our three dynasties combined are stronger than his, even ocean waves won’t crush a reef. Besides, he definitely has reserve powers he can call on.”

Proud Heaven looked back at her. “I’ve always wondered, Hailan. You had a divine will projection in the impure lands. Did you have some sort of relationship with Yang Qi there?”

“I only ever got scattered bits of information from my will projection, so not even I can be sure. However, I do know that, considering Yang Qi is an expression of fateless energy, he definitely caused strange things to happen. He’s different from you, Yang Voidprime, isn’t he?”

“It doesn’t matter who he is or what strange transformations he provoked. He’s worthless, and he's going to die, no matter what. I must get his fateless energy to become a complete Fateless One. He might seem strong now, but it’s a facade. Just wait until he’s past his zenith and on the decline, and he’ll die for sure.”

“Are you that confident you can kill him?” Proud Heaven asked with a smile. “The House of the Invincible and the House of the Chiliocosm have both left to prepare their troops. Once they’re ready, the Central Dynasty’s army will join them and go on the warpath. We’re going to destroy his empire, and there’s going to be a lot of bloodshed.”

“Yes, there will be blood,” Hailan said. “But remember, in addition to Yang Qi, we’ll also have to deal with the Lord of the Sword Dao, as well as his mob of followers. There’s also the Second and Third Devil Generals, the Dragonfolk, and the others like them. They’re trash who haven’t accomplished anything in the past hundreds of millions of years. But what I'm truly worried about is that there might be some powerful entity lurking out there, waiting to strike at the moment we attack. For instance, there’s the will of the King of Godmammoths. Furthermore, none of the seventy-two monarchs have shown up, either.”

“If one such person shows up, it won't be a problem,” Proud Heaven said. “And do you really think they’ll be teaming up to do anything? None of them understand the power of destiny, and none of them ever established empires, not even King Immortal-Slayer. They were famous, yes, but not worth worrying about now. With the destiny we command, even an enemy with a psychic scale of a hundred billion wouldn’t do anything other than die in front of us.”

RUMBLE!

All of a sudden, everything started trembling.

“What’s going on here?” The three experts looked around in shock.

“This is bad!” said an expert from the Central Dynasty. “Exalted Proud Heaven, it’s really bad! The armies of the Invincible Dynasty and the Chiliocosm Dynasty were just preparing to leave for the rendezvous point. However, even as they did, the two marshals, Yang Primal-Chaos and Dugu Sheji, suddenly turned and left. They rebelled! They went to the Sage Monarch Empire, where they were received with open arms. This is going to be a huge blow to our destiny!”

“What did you just say?” Proud Heaven blurted, his face turning ashen.

Chapter 1535: Striking Before the War Starts

The news was heaven-shakingly, earth-shatteringly shocking to Proud Heaven, Hailan, and Yang Voidprime.

Of course, it wasn’t the actual loss of strength that was bad, but rather what it represented.

The alliance of three dynasties was planning to attack the Sage Monarch Empire and wipe them out down to the chickens and dogs, carrying out a bloodbath that would leave the stench of death behind for years to come. They had already made the public announcement, and it was tied to their destiny. It couldn't be changed!

The Sage Monarch Empire wasn’t showing any sign of weakness or fear, either. They announced that they were going to crush the three dynasties and restore the glory of the Sovereign Lord. They were going to unite the god world!

The swords were drawn and the arrows were nocked. War could break out at any moment, and it would engulf the entire god world. It would be a war on the same level as the one fought in ancient times between the Sovereign Lord, King Immortal-Slayer, and the True Devil.

Of course, that war had been between individuals, whereas this one involved the destinies of massive empires.

The combined destinies of the three dynasties could even crush half-Annulled experts like King Immortal-Slayer. Although Proud Heaven’s cultivation base was beyond a hundred billion, compared to the destiny of an empire, it was weak nonetheless.

That was what happened when the power of the masses was tapped into.

Of course, it was the same with the Sage Monarch Empire.

Yang Qi’s psychic scale was at three hundred billion, but with the power of destiny backing him, he had nothing to fear, even from experts with a rating of six hundred billion.

Even the purrling was shocked.

“Why? Why is this happening!?” Proud Heaven shouted. “What did he do? They were two top generals! They surrendered, and took many of their officers with them. All God-Lords! This drop in destiny is going to have a huge effect on our reputation. Yet this happened right when we were about to march into battle with weapons drawn? What are all the countless people in the god world going to think of us now? Damn it all!”

“No one from the Central Dynasty turned traitor?” Hailan asked.

“There were,” the army officer said, “but none that were God-Lords. Certain viceroys left, and that's going to have a big negative influence. Almost half of the God-Lord officers from the armies of the Chiliocosm and Invincible dynasties had left! This came out of nowhere! What are we supposed to do? Exalted Proud Heaven, please, issue some orders!”

The army officers were trembling in their boots. None of them had ever seen Proud Heaven this furious.

“Well this is a splash of cold water,” Yang Voidprime said coldly. “We have to strike back immediately. Regardless of how much we were just hurt. It’s obviously going to be a big blow, and news is going to spread fast. Before, our alliance had the upper hand, and people were laughing at the Sage Monarch Empire and their talk of unification. But with this development, people are going to start changing their minds. Everyone wants to be an official who follows someone's rise from a lower rank to that of emperor. We have to strike fast and hard. I suggest that we leave the Chiliocosm and Invincible Dynasties behind. Muster the troops of the Central Dynasty and attack right now. Catch Yang Qi completely unprepared. If we do that, we might be able to regain the upper hand.”

Yang Voidprime was from the Chiliocosm Dynasty, and Yang Primal-Chaos had just betrayed him. But he didn’t seem particularly worried about that, which reinforced the amazing nature of Fateless Ones.

“Hmph. You think I'm just going to run out and fight Yang Qi?” Proud Heaven laughed. “Did you think that because of my little outburst a moment ago that I’d suddenly lost my wits? Don’t joke around. I'm not going to single-handedly win the war. Remember, the Central Dynasty didn’t turn traitor. And the losses suffered by you two dynasties have nothing to do with me. Right now, the other two dynasties need to get their broken armies back together and prepare to attack. We suffered a big blow, but we aren’t dead. And we still have the superior position.”

“Aren't you impressive,” Yang Voidprime said dryly, then shut his mouth.

“I knew all along that those two had been subjugated by Yang Qi,” Hailan said. “I was advocating for a blitzkrieg strategy, before Yang Qi built up any momentum. But then we got bogged down in negotiating for personal gain, giving him all the time he needed. The coming war is going to be even more challenging now.”

“Challenging?” Proud Heaven said. “All of the dynasties have trump cards to be played. And when they are, Yang Qi is going to be dead meat.”

“You think Yang Qi doesn’t have trump cards?” Hailan said. “You’d do best not to underestimate him.”

“It doesn’t matter. We have to make our move now. Crush him. Contact the other two emperors and tell them to mobilize their troops immediately. There’s no time to lose, and we can't afford any further delays. If we waste time, we're going to end up dead.”

They all sensed the impending danger.

The blow that had been struck just before fighting broke out really was severe. It turned the tables, causing all the citizens of the three dynasties to feel choked with fear.

Meanwhile, laughter echoed out as Yang Qi’s friends and family saw him welcoming Yang Primal-Chaos and Dugu Sheji, as well as numerous other God-Lord officers and viceroys, providing an instant increase to their military might. Throughout the empire, hearts swelled with pride as they reveled in what was a clear victory.

The war hadn’t even officially begun, and they were already winning.

What better way could there have been to boost morale?

The people had been feeling a lot of pressure regarding the impending fighting, and if it weren’t for the sage Monarch Empire leading everyone in prayer, there would have been plenty of deserters. But now, no one was afraid to fight.

The armies hadn’t even clashed yet, but the people of the empire knew that His Majesty Yang Qi’s declaration wasn’t just mere words. He really was planning to unify the god world.

If he defeated the other three dynasties, the Sage Monarch Empire really would be number one in the god world. Not even the Sovereign Lord could have done anything about it.

Of course, the way Yang Qi was welcoming them was a bit of a sham. But he still went through the motions of formally appointing them to be generalissimos of the Sage Monarch Empire.

It was a good way to show the rest of the world that he could be accepting of former enemies.

The ceremony was broadcast for everyone to see, and sent out to countless planes of existence.

Yang Qi’s cultivation base was many times that of the old Lord of Radiance and Light, so it was a simple thing for him to project images in that way.

Everyone who saw it reacted with shock.

“Incredible. Completely incredible. Yang Qi is nothing short of amazing!” That was what many of the buddha-lords were saying.

“Things are changing. If Emperor Yang Qi can do things like this, it’s obvious that heaven and earth are going to transform. The god world is changing. Is the civilization of the gods really going to reach a higher level?” The confucians were all abuzz, and many of them were flocking to join the Sage Monarch Empire.

Of course, during all this, Yang Qi’s destiny was increasing. At first, his empire had consisted mostly of Dragonfolk and Spritefolk. But now those groups only made up about a third of the population.

That alone showed how much the empire was growing.

If the other three dynasties didn’t do something quickly, he was just going to continue getting stronger. For all anyone knew, he might actually break past the half-Annulled level.

Despite everything he had been busy with, Yang Qi hadn't forgotten about the Nacrelight Sageland. Waving his hand, he pierced through space and time, pulling the Nacrelight Sageland toward him.

Instantly, he could sense the rage of the High Priestess. She was obviously slumbering in some aspect of space-time. But once she finished regenerating, she would wake up. The time had come to fight.

However, he wanted to ensure that the majority of people were still able to live in peace.

In fact, getting so many new God-Lords wasn’t as important as the prestige he had earned.

The god world was huge, and nobody even had any idea of how many God-Lords there were out there. He had won the first major victory in the conflict, and the hearts of many people. Because of that, more people were streaming toward him. Many, many more times than before.

There were even people in the three dynasties that were considering defecting. After all, the three dynasties didn’t have sage monarch magistrates to help calm the hearts of the people.

Chapter 1536: Army Pressure

The hearts of the people had been won by Yang Qi.

Before the war had even started, the Sage Monarch Empire made a deadly move. Under normal circumstances, it might not have been so dramatic. But for it to happen just as the two sides had swords drawn and arrows nocked and were about to fight to the death ensured that it was deadly to the extreme.

As a result, the Sage Monarch Empire’s destiny completely and utterly surpassed that of the Central Dynasty.

The pieces of Yang Qi’s plan were slowly clicking into place. He was truly full of craft and cunning. Even Proud Central, who had survived the Sovereign Lord’s schemes, had been played like a fiddle by Yang Qi.

Overnight, his destiny was growing like an inflating balloon. And of course, his borders were expanding. The Everlasting Aegis was growing as well, keeping everything inside completely safe.

None of the other three dynasties had nets of law as sturdy as this, nor anything like an aegis to protect them. They had spell formations, big ones too, but none that could cover an entire empire.

Treasures like the Myriad Dragons Lair and the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart were few and far between.

After all, the aegis grew stronger along with Yang Qi.

Creak. Crack!

As destiny flowed into Yang Qi, the sage monarch magistrates proliferated, their numbers climbing from two hundred million to two hundred ten, two hundred twenty.... As the destiny of the empire grew, so did they.

Most empires had problems with destiny, because as new people joined the empire, they came along with spies and profiteers, people who weren’t truly loyal.

But Yang Qi wasn’t worried about that.

Given the strength and numbers of his sage monarch magistrates, they could get rid of any such people. The people who joined the empire and became part of the system were sent through a system of education that involved training, cultivation, classes, propaganda and the like. Their spirits were cleansed, and they were taught how to pray to the empire.

Praying to an empire was different than praying to an individual, just as faith in an empire was different than faith in an individual.

Empires couldn't be infected by the karma of those who prayed to them. An empire was made up of all the living beings in it. In some ways, the people were the empire. From a certain point of view, when people prayed to the empire, they were praying to themselves.

Yang Qi was waiting for the big battle to begin.

He sat on his imperial throne, watching as his sage monarch magistrates handled everything and led the experts in prayer.

It was actually a very unique thing; among all the civilizations that had ever existed, only Yang Qi had ever thought to do it. Temples were erected for the people to pray, not to the emperor, but to the empire; thus, the people were praying to the people.

The empire was Yang Qi’s home. His property. And he would protect it with his life against any enemy. It took a lot of work to build an empire, and it was just as important as personal cultivation.

So he sat and watched from outside the circle of karma.

As he continued gazing out over his empire, he felt like a thought was growing within him, and suddenly remembered the ocean of faith back in the Halls of Heaven.

It had been huge, being composed of the faith given to the Sovereign Lord by the legion of gods. The Sovereign Lord hadn’t taken it into himself, but stored it as an enormous ocean.

All of a sudden, Yang Qi realized that it was a major weak spot for the Sovereign Lord.

The Sovereign Lord had been forcing people to worship himself! He had hoped that by putting it in the ocean, he would free himself from its downsides. But in the end, he was infected by karma, then killed.

‘Now I understand!’ Yang Qi thought. ‘Transcendence isn’t a purely personal matter. It's about leading the entire god civilization to transcend. The god civilization is the highest of civilizations. The lesser martial civilizations. The middle martial civilizations. The greater martial civilizations. The truth cultivation civilizations. The immortal dao civilization. And the god civilization. That’s it. There are no further types of civilization. But if someone could lead that most ultimate civilization into transcendence, then all people in it would succeed. That’s the grandest aspiration there could be. If all people open their hearts, and the god civilization transcends, reaching a higher level of civilization, that’s what it means to be Annulled....’

At that moment, Yang Qi realized what he needed to do.

He would remain free of karma. The karma belonged to the people, and they would have to deal with it. He would unify the god world, make it one enormous empire, and lead it into transcendence. Raise the legion of gods to a higher level.

Of course, he was a long way from even being able to talk about doing such a thing.

But now that he had achieved this enlightenment, he had a great dao to follow. His ideal. His ideal of transcendence. He would surpass the Sovereign Lord. His temples wouldn’t contain divine likenesses of himself, but would guide people to pray to the empire instead.

Having a goal was essential in making progress, otherwise one would wander aimlessly into ruin. And now he had a goal.

The Sovereign Lord had walked the wrong path. So had King Immortal-Slayer. But Yang Qi knew the correct way. He had a direction.

‘Now that I know all of this, does it mean I should absorb that ocean of faith? Or rather, absorb it into my empire? It's full of so much raw power that if an individual absorbed it, thereby accepting all the karma of the people who had offered the faith, then he would surely perish. But if a nation were to absorb it, for instance, into its net of law.... The karma of a people will be accepted by a people. It seems doable. Unfortunately, it obviously comes with the caveat that if the empire can't sustain the karma, it will perish.’

Yang Qi had his great dao. And considering the vast potential of that ocean of faith in the Halls of Heaven, he couldn’t help but start wondering about using it. And of course, there was also the broken Ancient Road to the Gods at the bottom of it.

Maybe if he drained the ocean of faith, he would be able to repair the Ancient Road to the Gods.

Of course, it was all just wishful thinking right now.

For now, he had to lead his army to crush the advance of the three dynasties. Once he defeated them, he would truly be invincible. Then he would have time to do more research, and likely take everything in the Halls of Heaven for himself.

RUMBLE!

Looking over, he saw something that looked like a black cloud that could blot out the sun rumbling in the direction of his empire.

The destiny of the three dynasties had reached the Everlasting Aegis, and was clashing with the destiny of his Sage Monarch Empire. When the two destinies clashed, massive shockwaves rolled out through the god world, destroying and creating entire continents.

The power being unleashed here went beyond anything the Sovereign Lord could have done.

“The war is starting,” Yang Qi said, rising to his feet. “Warriors of the empire. Citizens. Prepare for war. The Sage Monarch Empire will triumph in every battle. Soldiers. Magistrates. Get ready to fight!”

RUMBLE!

His people flew out, ready to fight for their empire.

Yang Qi led them, including all of his friends and family, backed by destiny. When they reached the Everlasting Aegis, they looked out into the big bang explosions that were occurring everywhere, and saw that the aegis was teetering.

Farther out were hordes of troops filling space like the eternal sands, who had come to destroy the Sage Monarch Empire.

Among them were Proud Heaven, the nine Dugu patriarchs, Yang Chiliocosm, Hailan, Yang Voidprime, and other experts. There were numerous individuals with psychic scales of a hundred billion, and they had come to fight.

Chapter 1537: War, the Empire is Everlasting

The war had started with a clash of destinies.

Destructive shockwaves rolled out in all directions, slamming into the Everlasting Aegis with such force that cracks started spreading out across its surface.

Such was the immense power of national destiny.

In facing the three dynasties, Yang Qi was up against a force that not even a psychic scale of three hundred billion could stand against. If he hadn’t created his Sage Monarch Empire, and grown its destiny to surpass that of the Central Dynasty, then he would never have been able to do this. He would have been crushed like a chicken or dog.

Of course, the combined destiny of the other three dynasties was more than even the Sage Monarch Empire could handle. Thankfully, every expert in the Sage Monarch Empire who was capable of fighting was ready to do battle.

The other three dynasties couldn’t bring every single member of their respective empires to battle. First of all, they needed a constant flow of resources, so they couldn’t take people away from production centers. If they did, it would lead to catastrophic disaster. Because of that, they only had about a third of their total populace in the army.

As the destinies clashed, everything trembled violently.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi was guiding some of the destiny to bolster the Everlasting Aegis.

As the battle between destinies played out, Yang Qi led his brethren, government officials, and sage monarch magistrates to form an immense spell formation behind the Everlasting Aegis.

The three opposing dynasties also had their people in formation, waiting in combat readiness. Neither side was willing to take action blithely. Without having a very well-thought-out strategy beforehand, doing so would lead to a major defeat.

“Pull back!” Proud Heaven shouted.

He could see that, because of the sage monarch magistrates and the Everlasting Aegis, the Sage Monarch Empire's destiny was flowing as strong as ever. Obviously, leading a direct charge would be suicidal. Even someone with a cultivation base ten times as strong as anyone present wouldn’t survive the raging destiny on display.

Furthermore, a dip in morale would cause the destiny to decline, then that side would be easily wiped out. And right now, the only people who seemed like they might suffer a loss in morale were the three dynasties. After all, they were only in a temporary alliance, and the hearts of their people weren’t united.

That was the first downside.

Second, they had just experienced the defection of some of their top army leaders, which had resulted in an immediate decline in destiny.

Third, they suffered from political instability. They didn’t have sage monarch magistrates to keep everything operating smoothly.

Because of all those things, their destiny was inferior to that of the Sage Monarch Empire.

Not even Proud Heaven could do anything about those three things, not even if his cultivation base had been on par with that of the Sovereign Lord. Political savvy was something that had nothing to do with cultivation. Controlling a nation, moving the hearts of the people, enticing them, stirring up their emotions, and using that all to improve destiny, was something that, if Yang Qi were considered second best, would have no one occupying the top spot.

That said, despite all their downsides, the alliance was still in the superior position. They had sheer numbers on their side.

But they still didn’t dare to try fighting their way past the Everlasting Aegis, especially not with Yang Qi waiting in formation. They had to just chip away slowly but surely.

War drums pounded, yet the two armies still hadn’t charged into battle. Yang Qi wouldn’t lead his people out of the Everlasting Aegis, and the three dynasties didn’t dare to attempt breaking inside.

It was a standoff.

The true battle was yet to begin.

If Yang Qi managed to survive, his reputation in the god world would soar.

If he couldn’t hold out, then he would die.

Raising his voice so that it echoed out across the battlefield, Yang Qi said, “I never would’ve guessed that I’d see you again under these circumstances. I'm actually thrilled! It's wonderful that you three dynasties have come to offer me your heads. Do you really think you can take down my Sage Monarch Empire?”

Proud Heaven, Yang Voidprime, and Hailan were all out there, and Yang Qi knew that he couldn’t afford to take them lightly. There was also Yang Chiliocosm and the nine Dugu patriarchs to worry about.

In the Sage Monarch Empire, only he had a psychic scale above a hundred billion, while the three dynasties had more than ten who had reached such heights. That said, Yang Qi was like one man guarding a mountain pass, preventing ten thousand men from breaking through.

He was actually a bit disappointed that they hadn’t just charged forth in a big attack. Then he could have had his sage monarch magistrates fire their Tribulation Monarch Cannons, and it would have devastated the enemy. And he could have followed up with an attack via destiny to wipe them out.

However, Proud Heaven and his compatriots were capable strategists, and knew that they needed to have a solid foundation before pressing the attack.

Right now, they were too orderly. If Yang Qi unleashed a bombardment with the Tribulation Monarch Cannons, they could use their formation to easily defend themselves.

Tribulation Monarch Cannons were terrifying weapons, but were useless against national destiny guided by formation.

For now, it was a battle of attrition.

In response to Yang Qi’s provocation, Proud Heaven threw his head back and laughed. “I never could’ve guessed that a piece of trash from the impure lands would reach this point. It's definitely unexpected. That said, your honor and glory have reached their zenith, and will soon crumble. Nothing in the god world can stand up to the alliance of our three dynasties. Our armies are going to crush you and turn the people of your empire into a river of blood.”

“Yang Primal-Chaos!” the Lord of the Chiliocosm shouted. “Get the hell out here!”

Yang Primal-Chaos had a psychic scale of more than fifty billion, which was obviously a major accomplishment that could come only with significant enlightenment. And the Lord of the Chiliocosm had put a lot of effort into grooming him. The fact that he had defected to Yang Qi, and right on the eve of battle at that, had caused the Lord of the Chiliocosm to nearly cough up a mouthful of blood. And it had only been with bloody countermeasures that he stopped more of his people from fleeing because of it.

Furthermore, even if they won this war, it was still highly possible that it would end with his empire being swallowed up by the Central Dynasty.

In fact, the Lord of the Chiliocosm wasn’t really sure of what steps he should be taking now.

That was how empires were. Sometimes, once they started going down a certain path, there was no way to go back.

But the Lord of the Chiliocosm had one big asset.

The High Priestess.

Laughing heartily, Yang Primal-Chaos rose to his feet and said, “Lord of the Chiliocosm, even if I hadn’t defected, you’d still be in a bad situation. Remember, your name is Yang Chiliocosm. And the leader of the Sage Monarch Empire is named Yang Qi. He’s the true leader of the Yang Clan, and you’re technically his subordinate. You should be hurrying over here to pay your respects.”

“Yeah, that’s right, Yang Chiliocosm. His Majesty Yang Qi is the ultimate leader of the Yang Clan, so you should be on your knees in front of him!”

“This is preposterous! Yang Chiliocosm doesn’t even acknowledge his own patriarch! That’s the worst kind of treason!”

“Get on your knees, Yang Chiliocosm. His Majesty Yang Qi is your patriarch! Besides, he also has the God Legion Seal. And since you were a government official in the service of the Sovereign Lord, it’s high treason for you to refuse to respect him.”

“Bahahahaha! Yang Chiliocosm? Lord of the Chiliocosm? More like Lord of the Clowns!”

Sneering laughter rang out from the officers of the Chiliocosm Dynasty who had defected to the Sage Monarch Empire. They were all God-Lords and important people, and right now, they were mocking their former emperor without the slightest scruple.

“Looking to die?!” the Lord of the Chiliocosm shouted angrily.

Many members of the Chiliocosm Dynasty were so angry they weren’t thinking clearly, and could hardly hold back from charging forth to slaughter Yang Qi and his empire, cleansing the humiliation that was being heaped on them.

“Shut your damn trap, Yang Qi!” Yang Voidprime growled. “If our two armies really clash, a lot of people are going to die horrible deaths. We don’t want to see that, do we? How about we do things differently? Our four empires can send out champions to fight each other. We’ll have nine matches, and whoever comes out on top will be the winner of the war. How about that?”

He was clearly trying to take advantage of the Sage Monarch Empire. After all, Yang Qi was really the only person strong enough to compete in that way. In the past, the Lord of the Sword Dao might have counted, but he had been devoured.

The Second and Third Devil Generals were getting stronger, and Yang Qi had helped them with treasure from the Halls of Heaven, as well as secrets from the Mahātmā Jade. But they still hadn’t passed the level of sixty billion. That meant that they weren’t even close to being on the level of Yang Voidprime, Proud Heaven, Hailan, the Lord of the Chiliocosm, and others like them.

Of course, there wasn’t even any need to mention Yang Qi’s other friends and family. Some had psychic scales of over ten billion. But at their current rate, they wouldn’t match up to the Lord of the Chiliocosm even if they worked hard at cultivation for hundreds of millions of years.

Chapter 1538: Fighting Before the Army

In the Halls of Heaven, there were medicinal pills that could raise people to the level of God-Lords. There were even preheaven nascent divinities that could be unlocked and used to force preheaven spirit bodies.

That said, the resources there couldn’t easily be used to reach levels beyond that of God-Lord. And going past thirty billion could only be achieved by years of hard work, as well as psychic baptisms that couldn’t be provided by medicinal pills or magical treasure.

The strongest of Yang Qi’s subordinates were Dugu Sheji and Yang Primal-Chaos. After them were his brethren from the impure lands, and some of the Dragonfolk experts.

Although they were all strong, and getting stronger, they simply weren’t in a position to fight on the battlefield.

However, a challenge had been issued.

They were obviously trying to embarrass Yang Qi, yet he didn’t care.

“Don’t tell me you’re too scared to accept the challenge, Yang Qi,” Yang Voidprime said. “If our armies clash, the casualties will be too immense. I heard that you don’t like to see your people die. If that’s true, the best thing would be to resolve our conflict before the armies assembled here.”

“Who said I was scared, Yang Voidprime?” Yang Qi said. “I'm the emperor of the Sage Monarch Empire, so I'm responsible for its fate. I'm its protector, and I'm standing right here. Anyone who wants to cause problems for my empire has to get past me, first. I heard that you’re formed from fateless energy, Yang Voidprime. So how about the two of us fight first? I'm curious to see what you're all about, and whether you qualify to fight me. Or is your challenge nothing more than attempted suicide?”

WHOOSH!

Yang Qi flew out and stood between the two armies.

The shockwaves caused by the clashing destinies were so intense that anyone weaker than a God-Lord would instantly be wiped out of existence.

Normally speaking, an emperor wouldn’t be the first one out onto the battlefield. But Yang Qi knew that if he wasn’t, his entire empire would collapse. None of his subordinates could serve as a champion. The best they could do was pray to the empire and provide destiny for him to fight with.

Taking his place up front, Yang Qi produced a long sword that seemed magical in nature, whose most casual movement caused everything around it to shake.

Many of the old-timers reacted with open shock. “Is that the Lord of the Sword Dao? He refined the Lord of the Sword Dao into a weapon?”

“That’s right,” Yang Qi said, “I refined the Lord of the Sword Dao into a weapon. So what do you fools count for in comparison? Considering all the noise you’re making, Yang Voidprime, why don’t you come fight me?” Yang Qi extended the sword and pointed it at him in a clear challenge.

“The Sage Monarch Empire really doesn’t have anyone worth mentioning in it.” Yang Voidprime wanted nothing more than to kill Yang Qi, but at the same time, he knew he couldn’t do it himself.

If he could have, there wouldn't have been a need for this war.

But Yang Qi had a psychic scale of three hundred billion, which was far beyond Yang Voidprime. Neither could Proud Heaven, the Lord of the Chiliocosm, or any of the other old-timers pull it off.

“Hailan,” Yang Voidprime said, giving her a look that indicated he wanted her to join him. However, not even the two of them working together would be strong enough. “He’s the only person in the Sage Monarch Empire who can really fight us. Considering we have so many experts on our side, we shouldn’t let them go to waste. Brother Proud Heaven, why don’t you join us? Let’s kill him and put an end to the Sage Monarch Empire.”

“Grand Generalissimo. Prime Minister. Imperial Preceptor. You three join us. I’ll probe him to find his weakness, and once I do, I’ll use the destiny to strike like lightning. Once we break open his defenses, we can send our forces in and wipe out his people. Lord of the Chiliocosm. Heaven-Defeating Dugu. You lead the army in when the time comes.”

The forces of the three dynasties were ready to spring into motion.

“Oh? Teaming up on me?” Yang Qi looked at the assembled forces and laughed. “I guess that means I really am the top figure in the god world. Ever since the Sovereign Lord and King Immortal-Slayer fell, there hasn't been someone who could get all of you to work together against.”

“Today is the showdown between our great nations. And even if we’re just killing a rabbit, we still need to use the force of a lion. Look, enough jabbering. We're not here to bully you, so go ahead and have some of your subordinates join you. This isn’t just going to be a contest of destiny. We have ten times as many top experts as you, but there’s still time to surrender. If you want to, just get on your knees.”

“We’ll see who gets on their knees,” Yang Qi said. “Alright, come at me, all of you. I'm curious to see who the strongest expert in the god world really is.”

He was currently completely confident, no matter how many enemies he faced. Furthermore, this action would instill faith in his followers. And he had to defend them. If they lost heart, his destiny would plummet and the results would be too horrible to contemplate.

Besides, he knew that his enemies were just trying to intimidate him. There were obviously higher-level experts who were just waiting to see how things would play out before stepping in for the final battle.

If his empire was destroyed, the god world would continue with a tripartite balance of power. But if he came out victorious, then Yang Qi would be the ultimate figure, and the High Priestess and the King of Godmammoths would never be resurrected.

“We’re going to kill you today, Yang Qi,” Yang Voidprime said as he and Hailan walked out. “And we're going to take over your empire and enslave your people.”

The grand generalissimo, prime minister, and imperial preceptor from the Central Dynasty joined them, as did Heaven-Reaching Dugu, Heaven-Immolating Dugu, and Heaven-Sacrificing Dugu.

In total, there were eight. All of them had psychic scales of a hundred billion or more. And Yang Voidprime and Hailan were above the level of the old Lord of the Sword Dao. As for the others, they were all elite experts who had managed to escape the wrath of the Sovereign Lord, and were apex entities in the god world.

They fanned out to face Yang Qi, with Hailan and Yang Voidprime taking the centermost positions.

“Void Slash!”

Yang Voidprime was the first to attack.

He was empty handed, yet as he lunged forward, he was like a sword, spear, saber, and whip, all combined.

Swish!

Yang Qi didn’t even bother looking up. He simply thrust his hand out, causing a surge of power as he unleashed the Fist of the Halls of Heaven.

BAM!

Yang Qi hardly moved, while Yang Voidprime was sent spinning backward like a bird being knocked out of the sky.

“You think you can fight me alone?” Yang Qi said. Taking advantage of the moment, he launched another attack at Yang Voidprime, trying to slash him apart and take his fateless power. With it, he knew he would have a very good chance of reaching the half-Annulled level.

However, Yang Voidprime proved to be quite impressive. Yang Qi hit him with immense power that should have been enough to destroy him, yet he managed to negate it.

Obviously, completely vanquishing him would be difficult. And that wasn't to mention that Yang Qi had to be careful about attacks from the other opponents, or that Proud Heaven had the ability to attack him with destiny.

“Die!” Hailan jumped forward with a whip that was some sort of preheaven magical treasure, bright blue and filled with streams of faith.

Yang Qi could faintly see that ancient figure who had officiated sacrifices for the Sovereign Lord.

She was the High Priestess, and when she took action, any opponent she faced would be damned by myriad tribulations.

Chapter 1539: Besieged

Hailan’s cultivation base was very mysterious. The whip in her hand seemed like a spirit snake, and at the same time was a convergence of faith so powerful that Yang Qi didn't dare allow it to hit him. If he got infected by that faith power, he would be able to extrude it, but it would put him in a bad position that Proud Heaven would surely take advantage of to launch a fatal blow.

And there were definitely other almighty entities who were waiting to step in, and would be more than happy to have a share in splitting up Yang Qi’s corpse.

Swish!

Yang Qi didn't hesitate to dodge to the side, then struck out with his sword. Of course, that sword contained the will, energy, light, and divinity of the Lord of the Sword Dao.

A sword nimbus flared to life, slashing right toward Hailan’s neck.

It was a strike with such speed and magnificence that it actually surpassed anything the Lord of the Sword Dao had been capable of.

Shocked, Hailan shrank down into a point of blue light that sped away in the opposite direction.

However, she was slow enough that he managed to slash off a strand of hair, which he reached out and grabbed, then scanned to assess her life force and substructure.

‘This woman is very strange,’ he thought, surprised. Within her genes, he found something like a spiraling river of stars, and other bizarre things unlike anything he had ever seen before. It was almost as if she were connected in communication to the dao of heaven.

The genes seemed similar to those of the King of Godmammoths. ‘Don’t tell me they’re the genes of the High Priestess!’

If they were, he knew he had to be particularly careful.

“Die!” Heaven-Reaching Dugu, Heaven-Immolating Dugu, and Heaven-Sacrificing Dugu combined their power and unleashed a strike from the Invincible God-Fist.

The Dugu Clan hated Yang Qi with a passion. After all, he had stolen roughly a third of their top experts when Generalissimo Dugu Sheji defected. And that had left the clan leaderless and badly weakened.

“Complete crap!” Yang Qi said, chopping his hand out to destroy the fist strike. Then he slashed out with his sword again, sending sword energy rumbling toward the three Dugu patriarchs, who were forced to leap away in terror.

“Central Tempest!”

The grand generalissimo, prime minister, and imperial preceptor from the Central Dynasty had also joined forces, sending godpower out that formed a spectacular tempest and slammed into the sword energy of the Unbounded Sword River.

RUMBLE!

The three experts staggered backward, while Yang Qi simply remained in place, unfazed.

“If this is all the eight of you can do, I'd say the time has come to wipe you out, one by one!” He spun into motion, first sending a fist toward Yang Voidprime that sent him flying. Then he slashed his sword at Hailan, removing another strand of hair. Another sword move devastated the three Dugu patriarchs, and caused blood to flow from the three leaders from the Central Dynasty.

It was with ease that he shoved all eight opponents into very bad positions.

“So incredible!”

Everyone in the Sage Monarch Empire watched with awe. Then, the sage monarch magistrates took advantage of the scene and began chanting, “Sage Monarch Empire, Triumphant in Every Battle! Victorious in Every Fight! Unifiers of the God World!”

As their voices joined together, their wild shouts caused the destiny of the empire to surge. As a result, the Everlasting Aegis slowly started expanding into something even more colossally large.

“This is bad!” Proud Heaven said. “He used only three moves to gain the upper hand against eight people, and that's got his side even more stirred up. If he defeats those eight, or kills one of them, it's going to cause a dangerous decline in destiny!”

Transformations to morale and destiny could have a major effect on a battle. It was the case in the impure lands, so it would obviously apply just as well in the god world, or even more so, considering how destiny functioned.

‘Impossible!’ Proud Heaven thought. ‘How could Yang Qi have gotten this strong? I had no idea the treasure troves in the Halls of Heaven were this incredible.’

“Surprised, Proud Heaven?” Yang Qi said. “You’re probably wondering how I got this strong. It's simple. I pulled a fast one on Proud Central. I got the last piece of the Mahātmā Jade, giving me the full, combined version. King Immortal-Slayer is going to break free soon, and the Lord of Righteous Justice is waking up. Once you lose your ability to negate the rancorous energy of your dynasty, you're finished!

“Of course, now would be the perfect time to seize control, Proud Heaven. Proud Central has no idea what’s going on, so if you just go back and attack him when he's not expecting it, you could devour him and get your cultivation base to the same level as mine. We don’t have any true grudge between the two of us. Why don’t we split the god world between us? If we join forces, we could take the Invincible Dynasty and the Chiliocosm Dynasty for our own. What do you say?”

His words caused anxiety to well up in the hearts of numerous individuals.

“Don’t try playing mind games on me, Yang Qi,” Proud Heaven said with a sinister chuckle. “Our three dynasties signed a formal agreement, bound with a blood oath. We have no choice but to work together. Besides, do you really think your jabbering would have any effect on me? Kill him! Then kill him again! Get out here, Star Swordlife!”

Whizz!

Dazzling light flashed in everyone’s eyes as a sword shot out from the depths of the Central Dynasty, accompanied by a surging energy of life force. This was the very same person from the impure lands who had invented a dao of the sword based on life force, then clashed with Yang Qi on numerous occasions. Star Swordlife!

After Proud Heaven took him to the god world, Yang Qi had never seen him again, or even sensed his energy. Therefore, it was something of a surprise to see him here.

His energy was different now. Apparently, he had acquired the legacy of some top expert, or perhaps found a source of immense life force in the god world. Even more interesting, his cultivation base and dao of the sword surpassed those of the old Lord of the Sword Dao. Furthermore, he had obviously gained far more enlightenment into the mysteries of life force.

With Star Swordlife added to the mix, there were now nine enemies facing Yang Qi.

“I can’t believe it's you, Star Swordlife,” Yang Qi said. “You just won’t go away, will you? I let you live, down in the impure lands, yet you dare to show your face here and now. Do you really think you can't die?”

“I don't kill people,” Star Swordlife replied. “And because of that, karma ensures that I can’t die. Haven’t you come to understand that yet, Yang Qi? Whether in the immortal worlds or the god world, it doesn’t matter how many times you try to kill me, you won’t succeed. Those who kill often end up getting killed. It’s an eternal truth. Because you're a killer, you have a killing will, and that ensures that eventually you’ll be killed. As for me, I don’t kill; therefore, I’ll exist for all eternity. If you don’t gain enlightenment on this, you’ll never transcend.”

Star Swordlife was the same old person spouting the same old words.

His facial features were the same, which went to indicate that he hadn’t changed in any way. Apparently, no one could change his mind about anything. However, Yang Qi didn’t care. And even if Star Swordlife were stronger than he was, he still couldn’t match up to Yang Qi.

Yang Qi had reached a point in which destiny mattered more than personal strength. And because of that, Star Swordlife was like little more than one of the crowd ganging up on him.

However, he was curious how Star Swordlife had grown so much stronger so quickly. It wasn’t Proud Heaven’s doing. And most likely, it wasn’t Proud Central’s doing, either. Had Star Swordlife come across some sort of good fortune?

“Look at my empire, Star Swordlife. And look at my destiny. This is the true dao of life. Rulership. You've walked down a wretched path and become a wretch-god. You don’t even know yourself anymore. My empire is upright and just, and you have nothing that can even compare to it. Even if you were stronger, as strong as the Sovereign Lord for instance, you would still perish. After grasping at the true dao, you went down the wretched path. How tragic. I guess I have no other choice than to bury you.”

He didn’t have to fear Star Swordlife any more than the commander of an army needed to fear a random bandit.

Looking very grim, Yang Voidprime said, “Impressive, Yang Qi. Very impressive. So it turns out you got the God Legion Seal and the Mahātmā Jade. You combined the legacies of the Sovereign Lord and the True Devil. That’s how you’ve reached this level. If we don't kill you, then you're going to turn into another Sovereign Lord. And we can't have that.”

Their earlier clash had confirmed to him that he wasn't strong enough to beat Yang Qi on his own.

“You have a lot of treasures, Yang Qi,” Hailan said. “Sadly, you don’t know how to keep a low profile. You established an empire that all heroes under heaven want. And the essence of the god world won’t let you succeed. You are a threat to the very nature of the god world!”

Chapter 1540: Holding the Line

“That's a load of garbage,” Yang Qi said to Hailan. “I'm not even half-Annulled yet. How could I be a threat to the essence of the god world?”

Yun Hailan from the impure lands had been a will projection of this woman. Of course, Yang Qi killed her after she had nearly damned him to myriad tribulations.

“You think you have to be half-Annulled to be a threat to the essence of the god world? The God Legion Seal and the Mahātmā Jade are destructive items that can build things more powerful than the god world can produce. Furthermore, the God Legion Seal can absorb the power of the god world and turn it into godnotes and godstones. If you don’t deserve to die for stealing from the god world, who does? But in the end, although the God Legion Seal and the Mahātmā Jade are impressive, the god world itself is what’s the most impressive. It continues expanding in the world of primal-chaos, and has long since become the most colossal thing in existence. It surpasses all magical treasures and all other entities. And your mere existence is a threat to it. You see, we've come here today backed by the might of the god world’s essence, with the purpose of destroying you. And you will die beyond the shadow of a doubt.”

A pleased smile could be seen on Hailan’s face, although to Yang Qi, it looked like the most disgusting thing imaginable.

“The essence of the god world....” Yang Qi knew that Hailan wasn’t just saying random things. It was entirely likely that some of her words were true. However, the essence of the god world couldn’t converge into a manifestation of power that would oppose Yang Qi. Instead, it would use other manifestations to oppose him.

For instance, whatever good fortune Star Swordlife had come across might be connected to the essence of the god world. The Sovereign Lord’s fall in years past was also likely due in part to some mysterious connection to the essence of the god world.

If the essence of the god world was actively opposing him, it could mean he was in real danger. That said, he wasn’t worried. He would kill anyone who dared to oppose him and stop him from transcending.

“Cut the crap,” he said. “You have nine on your side now, but you're still as weak as chickens and dogs. I'm going to bury all of you!”

Suddenly, the sword in his hand vanished.

Going forward, he wasn’t going to fight with sword techniques.

Although his sword technique was advanced, it wasn't his most impressive asset. His greatest weapons to use for attacking were the Sage Monarch Grand Magic and the Hand of the One God.

“Get ready, everyone,” Star Swordlife said. “You can’t afford to underestimate him. He’s like a convergence of baleful energy, and his Hand of the One God and Sage Monarch Grand Magic are terrifying. Back in the impure lands, I tried to handle him alone and failed. We have to work together. Destroy his energy. Of course, he won’t repent even if you kill him, so we have to capture and seal him.” Star Swordlife was still spouting the same words he had been since back in the impure lands.

“I won’t take pity on you this time, Yang Qi,” he continued. “I'm going to seal you in the depths of the essence of the god world for all eternity. Understand?” Under his direction, the other experts got into formation, causing them to look like nine shining stars.

A swirling vortex of power surged toward Yang Qi. All of his opponents were top experts, and they knew that without working together, they weren’t a match for him.

They had learned their lesson moments before, and were now working together in unison.

“Nine Combined as One!”

The formation they were in caused nine shadowy figures to appear, like snakes, dragons, whips, or bolts of electricity, all of them extremely deadly and powerful.

“Unmovable as a Mountain!”

Yang Qi stood strong, causing the explosive energy and sounds of megamammoths to erupt from him, allowing to stand as firm as a mountain. At the same time, primal-chaos paleo-energy surged around him.

He almost seemed like the King of Godmammoths, powering up to his peak.

“You nine are like nothing to me. Screw the hell off!” The primal-chaos paleo-energy surged out like meteors as big as mountains, creating a hand that could stir the god world itself, and cause the creation of countless civilizations.

It was a hand of creation, a hand of heaven on high.

And it was the hand that could manipulate the civilizations of people from behind the scenes.

RUMBLE!

A massive explosion occurred as Yang Qi's single hand slammed into the nine experts. Instantly, the nine shadowy figures exploded. Yet again, Yang Qi was one man guarding a mountain pass, preventing ten thousand men from breaking through.

SPLAT!

Heaven-Immolating Dugu coughed up a mouthful of blood, his face pale as he stared in shock at Yang Qi.

“Dao of Life!”

Star Swordlife thrust his sword out, causing sword light that pulsed with life force to enter Heaven-Immolating Dugu, healing his wounds and leaving him feeling invigorated.

“This kid seems like the incarnation of the life force of heaven and earth!” Heaven-Immolating Dugu said in shock.

Yang Qi had been just about to press the attack when he saw the turn of events.

Not even Yang Qi could penetrate the depths of the god world to reach its core, which contained its life force. That was what gave birth to the jungles, ores, and living beings that inhabited the god world. Later, the living beings eventually became the demonlings and humans that filled the lands.

Now Star Swordlife was using that life force, which made it seem likely that he was actually part of the life force of the god world. In other words, unless the god world died, he couldn’t be destroyed.

He could even restore lost life force to his comrades, bringing them back to life in any circumstance in which they weren’t completely destroyed.

The mighty power of resurrection was terrifying.

It was a blessing to his allies, but a nightmare for Yang Qi. Now, Yang Qi understood what Hailan had meant about the essence of the god world opposing him. Star Swordlife had been created by the life force of the god world itself; no wonder he could achieve such freakish progress.

“See, Yang Qi?” Hailan said. Although she had been shoved back by Yang Qi, she wasn’t hurt. “Star Swordlife is an incarnation of the life force of the god world. He can save any of us, even from death. So it doesn’t matter how you harm us, you won’t be able to kill us unless you destroy the entire god world. Now do you understand how horrifying an enemy you're facing?”

“Very bombastic!” Yang Qi said, taking a few measured steps forward. “Son of Heaven Subdues the Border Regions!”

It was with explosive force that he unleashed the Nation-Fate Godfist. He had long since extrapolated more moves than it contained, and it was incredibly mighty when backed with the destiny of the Sage Monarch Empire. In fact, it was even superior to the Hand of the One God.

After all, the Hand of the One God was the hand of the Creator, not anything human.

But the Nation-Fate Godfist was a manifestation of power.

Right now, Yang Qi wasn't interested in Hailan, the nine Dugu patriarchs, or the high officials from the Central Dynasty. In fact, he didn’t even care about Star Swordlife. Instead, he targeted Yang Voidprime.

“Watch out!” Star Swordlife shouted. “Everyone defend Yang Voidprime! He’s an expression of fateless energy. If Yang Qi kills him, he’ll take all of that energy and become unstoppable!”

“Since when did I become a person who needs to be saved?” Yang Voidprime said angrily. “Yang Qi! I'm not going to let you get away with this. You think I'm that useless? Just wait to see how strong I really am. Fateless Seal: Open!”

RUMBLE!

Yang Voidprime suddenly unsealed something inside of himself. It was like his sealing mark had been shackled with ancient chains, but now they were falling away.

Instantly, Yang Voidprime’s strength rose. His psychic scale climbed from the level of a hundred and thirty billion all the way to two hundred and fifty billion. The shockwaves from his powerup were causing the other experts to be violently pushed away from him.

Ding!

His fist met Yang Qi’s, and a vicious smile appeared on his face. “You forced me to undo my Fateless Seal, Yang Qi. And for that, you deserve to die ten thousand times over. I was going to eventually use that power to reach the half-Annulled level, and now you’ve forced me to waste it. Damn you!”

Chapter 1541: Fateless Seal

Yang Voidprime had been keeping some reserve power ready to go.

He had a Fateless Seal filled with power that he had originally intended for use reaching the half-Annulled level. But sadly for him, Yang Qi had forced his hand, and he had to undo the seal to even the odds. Obviously, his hatred for Yang Qi had reached an even higher level.

He was now going all out to strike a blow.

As of this moment, Star Swordlife had become secondary in importance.

Yang Voidprime was an incarnation of fateless energy, just like Yang Qi, and now he was the top figure among those who were ganging up. Even Hailan sensed that she should follow his lead.

Unexpectedly, she also seemed taken aback that Yang Voidprime had been keeping power sealed within himself.

“I’m going to kill you, Yang Qi, and take your fateless power!” Yang Voidprime shouted.

“I don’t think so,” Yang Qi replied. “You fell right into my trap.” The attack he had sent toward Yang Voidprime suddenly veered to the side and headed toward the three old-timers from the Central Dynasty, the grand generalissimo, prime minister, and imperial preceptor.

The imperial preceptor wore a daoist robe and pulsed with a sensation of yin and yang. The grand generalissimo wore a battle garment and held a dual-crescent-bladed halberd. As for the prime minister, he was a wise confucian who manipulated national destiny according to righteousness and orthodoxy.

However, they had just been blasted back by the power of Yang Voidprime’s powerup, and now they were subject to an attack from Yang Qi.

It was all part of his plan. His first move had been using the Nation-Fate Godfist on Yang Voidprime.

Yang Voidprime didn’t trust anyone, therefore, he was forced to draw on his secret weapon to make sure he came out alive. That was the second step.

Immediately, the alliance of nine enemies was thrown into chaos, which was when Yang Qi seized the moment. That was step three.

Not even Star Swordlife could do anything to react. Even he had been blasted aside, thanks to Yang Voidprime.

“Eternal Peace and Security for the Living! Nation-Fate Godfist!”

Yang Qi became like an ancient divine mountain rumbling toward the three leaders from the Central Dynasty, moving with unthinkable speed.

The move was called Eternal Peace and Security for the Living, and it was filled with an aura of security and peace. The three experts weren’t even able to think about how to fight back, as their minds were filled with peacefulness, a state in which all weapons were put into storage and no one wanted to do battle.

POP!

The grand generalissimo was hit first, and blood sprayed out of his mouth as he was flung backward, his energy draining rapidly.

Crack! Snap!

Then, Yang Qi sent a golden stream of light into his soul, which wrapped around him like golden chains.

“One Energy, Three Vitalities!” Yang Qi suddenly split into three parts, with the other two heading toward the imperial preceptor and the prime minister.

Within moments, all three had been defeated and sealed. He moved with such exquisite speed that no one could possibly have guessed what he was planning.

“Preheaven Mystery and Wonder; Devil-God Seal; Mahātmā Jade; Unspoiled Body; God Legion Seal; Drastic Subjugation!”

In the blink of an eye, the three experts were wrapped up like cocoons.

Crack. Crunch!

The imperial preceptor and the generalissimo were subjugated, but the prime minister was still fighting.

He was the only confucian in the group, and he possessed a staunch will that made him difficult to subjugate.

Yang Qi wasn’t worried. He unfurled his Tribulation Wings and unleashed a maelstrom of destiny onto the prime minister.

Cracking sounds could be heard as the prime minister was subjugated.

Three major figures from the Central Dynasty had been turned into government officials of the Sage Monarch Empire.

“Proud Nineheavens, grand generalissimo of the armed forces in the Central Dynasty, offers respects, Your Majesty!”

“Proud Ancestor, prime minister of the Central Dynasty, offers respects, Your Majesty!”

“Proud Cultidao, imperial preceptor of the Central Dynasty, offers respects, Your Majesty!”

Everyone stared with wide eyes as the three leaders took a knee and swore, “We hereby leave the Central Dynasty and join the Sage Monarch Empire to help unify the god world and conquer everything under heaven!”

RUMBLE!

The moment they swore their oaths, destiny shifted, and everyone in the Sage Monarch Empire cheered wildly.

Then, the destiny shot toward that of the alliance of three dynasties.

The people from the Central Dynasty couldn’t believe what they had just seen. Those three officials were extremely important, and most people in the dynasty would follow their orders to the death.

But now they were on their knees, a massive humiliation to their former dynasty.

Everyone knew that this would likely be the death knell for the Central Dynasty. After all, the grand generalissimo was the leader of all their armies, and was nearly as important as Proud Heaven.

The prime minister was the leader of all the confucians, in other words, all of the countless government officials.

The imperial preceptor was similarly important. He was similar to the leader of the destinors in the Invincible Dynasty.

The three of them were also important leaders in the alliance of three dynasties. But they had surrendered. It was obviously a major blow to the Central Dynasty.

Then, the three newly-defected experts raised their voices and said, “All disciples of the Central Dynasty will immediately join the Sage Monarch Empire. The Central Dynasty is ending. Henceforth, nothing can stand in the way of the Sage Monarch Empire. Its destiny will grow, and all living beings in it will transcend, forming a civilization that exists beyond the god world.”

All of the subordinates of the three experts were thrown into complete chaos. And it was going to be hard for the rest of the leaders to recover from this.

Proud Heaven had obviously suffered a big blow because of this, but he was an invincible expert. When he saw the damage being done to his destiny, he shouted, “Those three have been subjugated by the God Legion Seal. They're puppets. Don't believe anything they say! Remember how terrifying the God Legion Seal is. Anyone who falls under its control becomes like the walking dead, completely unable to have freedom of thought. Join forces and resist the urge to panic, otherwise you’ll be trapped by the God Legion Seal as well!”

His words managed to stabilize his destiny for the moment, but the damage had already been done.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi laughed heartily and said, “Many thanks, Yang Voidprime. Unsealing yourself was just the opportunity I needed to get three experts from the Central Dynasty on my side. Well, what do you think? Still interested in fighting me and my empire? Your dynasties are losing so much destiny you’ll never be able to stand against me.”

“Damn you!” Yang Voidprime howled. He wanted to charge forth and fight, but didn't dare. He knew that if he did, he would likely be trapped and killed.

“We have to kill him, Proud Heaven! Destroy his empire right now! With those three experts he captured, our destiny is dropping like a rock. If we don’t do something now to kill him and his experts, the Central Dynasty will fall completely. We can’t afford to delay! Attack now!”

“He's right. We can't wait!” The nine Dugu patriarchs all knew how grave the situation was.

And even though Yang Qi wasn’t going to bring his entire army onto the battlefield, retreat wasn't a viable option for the alliance of dynasties. They had suffered a grievous loss, and would definitely suffer from infighting. Yang Qi’s empire continued growing in strength, and everyone could see that it was gaining dominance in the god world.

If things kept going like this, the three dynasties would reach a point where they couldn't even fight back.

A very grim expression could be seen on Proud Heaven’s face. He knew that retreat wasn't a good option, which meant the only thing they could do was go all out. Morale was already horrible, so if they didn't win some sort of victory, they were done for.

It didn’t matter if they suddenly got an ally like the Sovereign Lord, there would be no coming back from this position.

If you ride a tiger, it's hard to get off. They were indeed trapped in an impossible situation.

Retreat, and they would end up dead.

Advance, and they would die even quicker.

Of course, it was still possible that they could somehow win, although the hope was faint. And it would probably result in something along the lines of eighty percent casualties, which would be hard to deal with. Afterward, the other groups like the Demonfolk or the buddhist schools would surely pounce on them.

“I know what you're thinking, Proud Heaven,” Hailan said. “That we’re trapped in an impossible situation. We have no options here. We have to break the cauldrons and sink the boats. Don’t even consider going back. I can reach out to the High Priestess and awaken her true body. I highly doubt that Yang Qi could deal with an attack from her.”

“What? Wake up the High Priestess?” Proud Heaven said. “If you can do that, we might actually have a chance here.”

Even as they were talking about this, the sound of shocking war bugles echoed out.

“What? The Sage Monarch Empire is advancing?!” Everyone was shocked as they saw troops pouring out from the depths of the Sage Monarch Empire.

Chapter 1542: Everything on the Line

“Kill ‘em all!”

“Attack! Attack!”

“Show them what we've got!”

Just when Proud Heaven and his compatriots were getting ready to make their final stand, the forces of the Sage Monarch Empire charged forth in a terrifying show of force. The sage monarch magistrates all erupted with the energy of the Eternal Heavenly Aria, which spread out to every last citizen of the empire. Halos sprang up on each of them, pushing them to the ultimate limits of their potential and making them ten times stronger than normal.

Of course, the Eternal Heavenly Aria could also cast halos of damnification. Unfortunately, they couldn’t pierce through the destiny to reach the enemies from the three dynasties, so the sage monarch magistrates didn’t bother with them.

If both types of halos had been usable at the same time, the three dynasties would have already been crushed.

Still, the pressure on the three dynasties was so great that many of their experts were shaking at the knees.

Many of their government officials had never participated in any sort of large-scale war. They normally lived like royalty, and at most, would discuss warfare as a matter of theory. Such people were pissing their pants in terror, having come to the realization that the Sage Monarch Empire was on the rise, and the billions of years of glory their own dynasties had experienced was coming to an end.

Once confidence was lost, it wasn’t an easy thing to gain back. Proud Heaven and his fellows were full of craft and cunning, and were all hoping to rely on crafty plots to come out on top. Meanwhile, Yang Qi’s upright and straightforward way of handling things gave him incredible momentum, making him nearly invincible.

Meanwhile, the Sage Monarch Empire’s Everlasting Aegis continued to expand threateningly.

The armies and the people relied on the aegis for safety, and the sage monarch magistrates were in charge of maintaining and expanding it. It was like a city wall made of iron, but at the same time, a living thing made of flesh and blood, with a will of its own. And right now, it was a stronghold too powerful for any enemy to breach.

The sage monarch magistrates shone like living lighthouses as they led the people forward. And as they advanced, they glowed brighter and brighter, which was a sign that they were readying their Tribulation Monarch Cannons to fire.

Of course, no outsider knew anything about that weapon. From the establishment of the empire until now, not a single Tribulation Monarch Cannon had been fired. But now, there were nearly three hundred million sage monarch magistrates, all ready to unleash a bombardment. It was a trump card Yang Qi had been keeping in his back pocket.

Proud Heaven hadn’t even formulated his plan of attack, only to find Yang Qi’s forces going on the offensive. They simply couldn’t allow the enemy to break through their front lines, so he shouted, “Fall back! FALL BACK!”

As soon as the command left his lips, the people from the three dynasties started backing up in panic. After all, they weren’t sure if Proud Heaven was planning to have them retreat from the battlefield, or simply back up and reform their lines.

“No, we can’t fall back!” Yang Voidprime shouted. “Stabilize the battle formations! Wait until you see the whites of their eyes! There’s no way they can get through our defenses. They're just trying to get us to panic. If we panic, we’ll be in big trouble. We have the advantage here. We haven’t suffered any real casualties, and those three traitors can’t do anything to our destiny.”

“You damn morons! When I said ‘fall back’ I meant to build up for a major counteroffensive. What the hell are you getting all anxious for!?” Proud Heaven was actually surprised by the chaos among the troops. Sadly for him, after the generalissimo, imperial preceptor and prime minister defected, it was harder to give commands to the armed forces. When the primary leaders of the army turned traitor, how could the masses be kept in line?

Some wanted to fall back, and some wanted to shore up their defenses. Nobody really knew what to do.

One of the worst things that could happen on the battlefield was for the army to devolve into chaos.

“Hold the line! Stay where you are!” The nine Dugu patriarchs, Yang Chiliocosm, and the other leaders could all sense the hearts of their people wavering.

This was the moment Yang Qi had been waiting for.

“Advance!”

BUZZ!

Roars of rage could be heard from the sage monarch magistrates as they unleashed an invincible white light that seemed to originate in hell and target the Halls of Heaven. The sun and moon declined, the lands split apart, space shattered, and tribulation descended.

The Tribulation Monarch Cannons had been unleashed.

Yang Qi had also been powering up his own Tribulation Monarch Cannon. It was his first time using it in a long time, and now he was unleashing it to rip a hole in the defense provided by the enemy’s destiny. With the enemy in chaos, and his own forces possessing incredible momentum, he was essentially unstoppable.

As the bright light shot forward, furious rumbling sounds could be heard, like millions upon millions of lightning bolts. And when it hit the defenses put up by the spell formations and destiny of the enemy, the layered defenses shattered.

Screams rang out as countless government officials were turned to ash by the white light, and numerous spell formations were completely destroyed.

Enemies who weren’t killed immediately started scrambling for safety. Even Proud Heaven, Yang Voidprime, and their compatriots scattered, showing not a scrap of interest in the other members of their respective dynasties.

RUMBLE!

The white light continued on relentlessly, wiping out numerous government officials, soldiers, and the like.

That said, although the white light was devastating the ranks of the three dynasties, it couldn’t pierce all the way to their base.

‘So strong!’ Yang Qi thought. When the assault of the Tribulation Monarch Cannons reached the primary spell formation of the alliance, it fought back relentlessly until the white light faded away.

That said, the cannon fire had thrown the enemy forces into complete and utter disarray.

“Warriors, the time has come to establish our might and glory!” Yang Qi said loudly. “After this battle, our empire will never be forgotten. We will shake the god world by wiping out these three dynasties. And your names will live forever! Epic sagas will be written about your actions, and they’ll be sung for all time!”

The true attack was now beginning. The Sage Monarch Empire was on the move en masse!

The cry of bugles and booms of war drums joined the rumble of spell formations being activated. The entire empire was like a massive weapon thrusting forward with deadly momentum.

“Fall back. FALL BACK! Retreat to the dynasty!” Proud Heaven could see that there was no way they would recover from this. Yang Qi’s empire had achieved a momentum that was essentially unstoppable.

No single person could do anything to shift the tide of battle, except perhaps a half-Annulled expert.

The only thing they could do now was pray to the essence of the god world in hopes that it could resist Yang Qi and his empire.

However, even Proud Heaven thought of prayer as ridiculous.

As Yang Qi and his armies charged forth, the sky suddenly split open, and an enormous monument appeared, crashing down to land right in front of them.

“Monument of Power....” a voice echoed.

It was inscribed with the epic sagas of millions upon millions of gods, and their warfare accomplishments. This obviously wasn't some sort of magical treasure, but rather, a mighty expression of the will and psyche of an almighty entity.

As soon as the monument landed, it was clear that it was blocking the path of the army.

“Hmm?” Yang Qi thought, looking over. The monument was almost like a wall right there in front of him, and he could sense that it had been sent from afar by some extremely powerful entity. Raising his voice, he said, “Warriors, not even the most almighty entity can block our path. We are invincible! If mountains are in our way, we’ll tear them down. If oceans block us, we’ll dry them up. People will tremble at our passing! ATTACK!”

Rumble. Rumble....

One attack after another was unleashed on the monument.

It was clearly sturdy, but under the assault of destiny, it started to crack, and after only a few dozen breaths of time passed, it exploded into countless fragments.

“The High Priestess is taking action!” Hailan shouted. “This is her most powerful god item, the Deathless Monument! The Sovereign Lord had her use the noble spirits of countless members of the legion of gods to create it, then used it to perform sacrifices day and night. This is going to buy us the time we need! Everybody, reform the battle lines!

“Her power won’t last for long under the assault of that destiny. However, now we can at least hold them off for a bit longer. And once they run out of steam, we can fight back! Hurry! Get in formation! Get ready to strike back the moment the Deathless Monument collapses.”

“Strike back! Strike back! All citizens of the three dynasties, get in formation. This is the chance we've been waiting for. The High Priestess has taken action. The Sage Monarch Empire is doomed to failure!”

Yang Chiliocosm, Proud Heaven, the nine Dugu patriarchs, and countless other top experts were all shouting similar things.

As a result, the scrambling forces of the three dynasties finally started regrouping. After all, the name of the High Priestess was profoundly moving.

When the Deathless Monument collapsed, Proud Heaven saw that while the forces of the Sage Monarch Empire were still rushing forward, they had lost the unstoppable momentum from before.

Waving his hand, he sent the alliance troops forward. At long last, the real fighting would begin.

And this time, everything was truly on the line.

If the Sage Monarch Empire could come through the fire and seize victory, it would rise to complete prominence. But if it failed, it would be defeated for all time.

Chapter 1543: Everything on the Line (2)

“Ah, what a real pity....” Yang Qi sighed.

He had built up immense momentum, throwing the three dynasties into chaos. In the process, he had gained three more experts with psychic scales of a hundred billion. And he had struck a major blow, blasting through the enemy’s front lines.

Unfortunately, the Deathless Monument had come and stopped him in his tracks.

It had taken the High Priestess to throw an obstacle in his empire's path. Although she hadn’t done anything to stop them for long, only a few dozen breaths of time, that gave the three dynasties enough breathing room to regroup.

After all, the High Priestess was as famous as the King of Godmammoths. Having her on the side of the three dynasties gave their people a big boost, right at the moment when they had been feeling completely shaken.

When the Deathless Monument shattered, the High Priestess’ voice could be heard ringing out.

“I am the High Priestess, officiator of sacrifices for the ancient  court of the Sovereign Lord. People of the three dynasties, there is no need for panic. I will awaken soon, and come to help you. Fight, warriors! This Sage Monarch Empire is a cancer on the god world, and must be excised. All of you must fight for the glory of the god world! Fight for heaven and earth. Your righteousness, your power, your glory, and your spirits will bolster you. Eradicate the Sage Monarch Empire. If you do, the essence of the god world will finally transcend. Fight, warriors! I, the High Priestess, will be here backing you. You won’t be alone. Your heroism will be forever inscribed on my monument for all generations to come. Even if you die, you will continue to exist forever....”

All of a sudden, the warriors of the three dynasties felt their blood boiling as they were convinced that they were fighting for the god world itself, ensuring that its essence was with them.

It was like electricity sparking through their hearts and souls.

After all, the High Priestess had officiated over countless sacrifices, and was beyond the compare of just about anything and everything. Her voice alone could catalyze the morale of her people. Of course, she didn’t actually dare to come as her true self, because if she did, Yang Qi would slaughter her.

Even if she were stronger than she was, the best she could do was provide moral support.

“Kill! Destroy the Sage Monarch Empire!”

Destiny surged as the warriors charged forward with slaughter on their minds.

BAM!

The soldiers of the three dynasties, backed by immense destiny, clashed with the Sage Monarch Empire, causing the god world to be truly shaken.

No military clash in history could compare to this.

The god world was physically shaking, and countless beings in all aspects of existence sensed impending doom and calamity. Innumerable almighty entities were looking on, knowing full well that their personal strength was like nothing compared to the forces clashing.

Whooooooosh!

The fighting was incredibly fierce.

Yang Qi watched as the Dragonfolk experts and Spritefolk formed immense formations. The sage monarch magistrates led countless top experts, many of whom were reduced to piles of ash or puddles of blood in the initial clash.

In the blink of an eye, he lost ten million sage monarch magistrates and a hundred billion citizens!

The casualties were staggering, but he didn't care. He was already prepared to lose his own life if necessary. His brethren were all at their peak fighting capacity, but they were by his side, waiting. As for the purrling, it was resting in Jadefall’s arms, sleeping quietly.

Even if the fighting got worse, Yang Qi knew the purrling wouldn’t take part. The karmic ramifications were simply too immense.

This battle would determine the future of the entire god world. The winner would decide the fate of countless people, and it didn't matter if the purrling were stronger than it was, it didn't want to be stained by that much karma.

Blood flowed and lives were lost. Vanished. Yang Qi even saw God-Lords from the Dragonfolk being slaughtered.

However, the three dynasties were suffering even greater casualties.

In fact, they were losing ten times as many people as the Sage Monarch Empire!

They had already lost more than ten God-Lords, who had been exterminated so thoroughly it was as if they hadn’t existed to begin with.

Over a trillion troops were wiped out of existence just like that, causing cries of anguish to reach all corners of the world.

A battle this intense had never been seen before.

Of course, even a trillion troops was like one hair on nine trillion oxen to the three dynasties. They were just too huge.

For instance, in the House of the Invincible, a single land would be populated by tens of trillions of people. So what did it matter to them if trillions died? Although it wasn't necessarily a good thing, it was hardly something to even blink at.

Even to the Sage Monarch Empire, a trillion wasn’t a huge number. That said, to lose ten million sage monarch magistrates was definitely noteworthy. The only consolation was that, among the forces of the three dynasties, numerous peak Paramount Gods with psychic scales in the billions had already died.

For most dynasties, God-Lords were the ultimate leaders, and losing even one would be a major disaster. And peak Paramount Gods with psychic scales in the billions were where God-Lords came from.

“Eternal Heavenly Aria!”

Yang Qi could sense immense karma brewing, but he didn't care. He had started this war, and it had reached a moment of life or death.

Opening his mouth, he sent halos of damnification out over the forces of the three dynasties. In terms of numbers, he simply couldn’t match up. The troops of the three dynasties outnumbered him by at least a hundred to one.

RUMBLE!

There was another major clash, and Yang Qi lost twenty thousand sage monarch magistrates and a trillion citizens. Several of his friends and family nearly coughed up blood at the sight. Thankfully, he had already bolstered their souls, otherwise they might have died.

The viciousness caused Yang Chiliocosm to cough up blood, and Proud Heaven to go pale in the face. Even Hailan seemed on the verge of collapse. Yang Voidprime had it better off than the others, and simply looked to be in pain. As for the nine Dugu patriarchs, one of them had died!

The one who died was Heaven-Rending Dugu, whose cultivation base was still a few billion short of the level of a hundred billion. During the massive clash of destiny, he got unlucky, and was transformed into ash.

“Fuck! We have to go all out! I've never led a battle this intense before!” Proud Heaven had lived for a long time, yet had never seen anything like this before. Even the fight between the Sovereign Lord and King Immortal-Slayer hadn’t been on this scale. After all, King Immortal-Slayer had never founded his own empire.

In this type of fighting, anyone could lose their life, be they leaders or commoners. Proud Heaven knew that included himself as well.

However, he couldn’t run. He had to stake everything on this battle.

“Die!”

Drawing on the destiny under his control, he sent countless government officials forth to attack, backing them with spell formations.

Another round of fierce fighting played out.

“Triumph in Every Battle! Triumph in Every Battle!” Yang Qi shouted, throwing caution to the wind as he catalyzed the battle spirit of his people, hoping to fuel as many enemy casualties as possible.

“Everlasting Aegis, Battlefield Advancement!”

The enormous Everlasting Aegis started moving forward, giving people a place to retreat to if necessary, and imbuing the battlefield with power.

No longer holding back any power, Yang Qi shouted, “You’re all going to die. And you’re no exception, Yang Voidprime! Let the Halls of Heaven Come!”

The clouds parted and the Halls of Heaven became visible overhead, causing endless power to pour into Yang Qi. At the same time, millions of mountains, seas, suns, moons, and worlds appeared behind him.

“Devour All Under Heaven!”

Among them was an enormous primal-chaos elder-snake, which sucked in countless enemy spell formations.

Then he waved his hand.

RUMBLE!

Space, fate, impermanence... countless such things shot toward Proud Heaven, Yang Voidprime, Hailan, Yang Chiliocosm, and the other leaders of the three dynasties.

Yang Voidprime was shocked. He had previously thought that he and Yang Qi were both putting everything on the line. But unexpectedly, he found that Yang Qi was now fighting everyone at the same time.

‘Just how strong is Yang Qi? He wasn't fighting with full force before? He’s only now showing his true, terrifying power? My god!’ Yang Voidprime felt completely helpless.

“Everyone join forces,” Proud Heaven said. “He’s staking everything on this one attack!” All of a sudden, he exhaled, and a piece of the Great Necropolis shot out, a stone cloud designed to protect Proud Heaven.

“All government officials, attack Yang Qi and kill him. Use the spell formations. Draw on destiny!” Yang Chiliocosm shouted.

Everything was going to come down to this one clash.

Chapter 1544: The Saddest of Dirges

“You scum! If I hadn’t shown my true strength, you wouldn’t know what it means to ‘be killed beyond the shadow of a doubt’!”

Yang Qi was finally showing what he was truly capable of as he resorted to the full fury of the Nation-Fate Godfist. And he mixed it in with the Hand of the One God, the Fist of the Halls of Heaven, and the Sage Monarch Grand Magic.

The Nation-Fate Godfist fit perfectly into the ten daos of the Sage Monarch Grand Magic, specifically the aspects of Emperor and Sovereign.

All of his opponents staggered backward.

Neither Yang Voidprime, Yang Chiliocosm, Proud Heaven, Hailan, nor the Dugu patriarchs were a match for him.

Yang Qi knew that his empire’s population was low compared to the others, and that he couldn’t sustain such heavy casualties. Furthermore, if it weren’t for the help from the High Priestess, the three dynasties’ forces would have already been vanquished.

But she had interfered, and it had led to a very unfavorable development for Yang Qi.

It was going to be a tough battle, and there was no room for playing games. Yang Qi needed to use his most deadly moves to take out some of the enemy’s leaders, such as Proud Heaven or Yang Chiliocosm. If he could do that, it would lead to a chain reaction that would greatly weaken the enemy forces. When an emperor fell in battle, his people would be leaderless, and they would eventually be defeated.

RUMBLE!

Proud Heaven, Yang Voidprime, Yang Chiliocosm, the Dugu patriarchs, and Hailan were now being forced to defend personally against Yang Qi, and were scrambling to stay alive. Luckily for them, they were backed by trillions upon trillions of troops in spell formations, which made their cultivation bases a hundred times more powerful than normal.

Proud Heaven had a tight grip on his dynasty’s destiny, and was unleashing power that even a half-Annulled expert would shy away from.

Continents were being wiped from existence, and subterranean worlds were being destroyed. The god world was shaking violently as its essence was damaged.

Countless almighty entities were trembling in fear, and even the most colossal sects were terrified.

Bam. Bam. Bam. Bam! Bam!!

Yang Qi was drawing deeply on the Nation-Fate Godfist, unleashing moves like Son of Heaven Subdues the Border Regions, Sovereign and State Die Together, Blood Stains Spring and Autumn, and Eternal Peace and Security for the Living.

His attacks contained such immense convergences of destiny that even if the Sovereign Lord had come, he would have been swept off his feet by it.

“Pray for the Blessing of Destiny!” Yang Qi howled as he led the fighting on the front lines, battering the armies of the three dynasties with incomparable might that surpassed that of the King of Godmammoths.

People were dying left and right in the most brutal fighting the god world had ever seen.

“I pray that my Sage Monarch Empire be in good health for all time....”

“I pray that my Sage Monarch Empire is triumphant in every battle....”

“I pray that my Sage Monarch Empire lasts forever....”

The sage monarch magistrates led their troops in prayer. Soon, everyone was risking life and limb to send their prayers to the empire, causing its destiny to surge.

Even the Second and Third Devil Generals were praying in all piety, ensuring that their fates were tied to that of the empire.

As a result, the fighting prowess and morale of the troops surged.

“Take these medicinal pills!” Yang Qi said, sending out a host of extremely precious pills from the Halls of Heaven, healing wounds and bringing his people back to full energy.

It was a big loss in terms of wealth, but what good would wealth do if he lost the battle? And if he won, he could always get more wealth. After all, at that point, the god world would be his.

Yang Qi was a burning sun in the middle of the battlefield, his attacks vaporizing countless enemy experts. Not even Proud Heaven and his compatriots could do anything to stop him.

SPLAT!

Yang Qi landed a major blow on Yang Voidprime, who coughed up a mouthful of blood. Behind him, a squad of thirty billion soldiers was turned into ash. Not that thirty billion was much. In this battle, numbers like hundred million, trillion, or even quadrillion could be considered trifling.

Truth be told, no one present really knew how many people they had within their various empires.

The war playing out today was going to significantly change the face of the god world. And if it went on for much longer, the god world might very well split in two.

“We can’t let this go on,” Hailan said. “Yang Qi is too strong. Even if he suffers major casualties, our casualties will surpass his.” She was spattered with blood, having killed too many people to count. However, she had also lost too many people to count, making her feel like singing the saddest of dirges.

“Die!” she howled, lashing her whip at a host of Dragonfolk experts from the Sage Monarch Empire. Her whip happened to find a crack in the protective destiny, and...

BAM!

A Dragonfolk expert was hit, and he screamed, his body twisting and distorting into death. Shockingly, it was one of the God-Lords from the Dragonfolk.

Of the original group of twenty-eight, eighteen had been killed, leaving only ten alive. The Spritefolk had also seen numerous God-Lords killed.

Of the God-Lords who had recently defected, sixty were dead! Yang Qi had suffered about thirty percent casualties so far. There were even close calls in which Yang Susu, Brahma, and the Second and Third Devil Generals had nearly died.

Luckily, the prime minister, imperial preceptor, and grand generalissimo had been there to save them. Roughly half of Yang Qi’s closest friends were dead. It was brutal, but none of them feared death.

“This is the grandest war that’s ever played out. Even if we all die, we can die proud!”

The Shepherd, Yang Proudworld, Yang Manifestation, Yang Memory, Sword Seventeen and many others like them were filled with zealous faith. Their cultivation bases had constantly improved, and they had gained enlightenment that most people would never experience in a lifetime.

And it was all thanks to Yang Qi.

“Come forth, power of the Halls of Heaven! Become one with me. I am the Halls of Heaven, and I shine down upon the entire god world!” Everyone watched as boundless radiance and light descended from above, as if God himself were on patrol.

“Be destroyed! Halls of Heaven! Become part of me!”

As Yang Qi’s voice echoed out, the Halls of Heaven surged with numerous streams of power that descended into him in an explosion of dazzling starlight. As they did, a destructive shockwave spread out all around him, killing countless enemies.

“Proud Heaven. Yang Voidprime. Your doomsday has arrived. Prepare to fight. Your foolish alliance is about to be ended. Your worlds. Your kingdoms. They will all be destroyed!” In order to seize victory, Yang Qi had assimilated all of the stars and treasures in the Halls of Heaven. Of course, he hadn’t taken the ocean of faith, as he didn't want to be infected by the karma of so many individuals.

“Oh great Sovereign Lord, you singlehandedly collected the faith of so many people, and it caused you to perish. But my empire, and my people, will benefit from that faith!”

RUMBLE!

The ocean of faith spasmed, then shot out from the Halls of Heaven and into the net of law and destiny that surrounded the Sage Monarch Empire.

The destiny and net of law moaned as the faith of the ancient legion of gods filled it. Any individual, even a half-Annulled expert, who tried to accept this faith would collapse. But the destiny of an empire was different.

Yang Qi was taking the faith of one group of living beings and giving it to another.

Crunch. Crack!

The destiny of the Sage Monarch Empire suddenly increased dramatically. At the same time, explosions occurred throughout the net of law as it both expanded and crystallized. In the blink of an eye, the destiny of the empire increased by tenfold! Meanwhile, individual members of the empire were growing stronger rapidly.

“Everyone, power up!” Yang Qi roared, his voice echoing like thunder. “I hereby ordain all citizens in the empire as nobility!”

The net of law descended, and every person it touched experienced a dramatic and rapid upgrade. Normally speaking, it would have been impossible. The Sage Monarch Empire just hadn’t had destiny to support that.

But with the ocean of faith from the Halls of Heaven, it was a different story. The Sage Monarch Empire was now mighty enough that it could ordain Quasi-Gods to the level of Paramount Gods. Of course, it couldn’t do it for everyone.

Even still, it was an unimaginable thing.

If the Central Dynasty had tried to do that, it would have collapsed immediately.

Nobody could have predicted that Yang Qi would do something this crazy. However, doing something crazy had been in his plans all along.

Chapter 1545: All Citizens Ordained

In the impure lands, a nation couldn’t simply say that all the citizens were nobility. It would quickly go bankrupt, then be destroyed.

In the civilization of gods, ordaining someone as nobility involved tapping into the quintessence and destiny of the nation. Although it would give an immediate boost in strength, the harm to the destiny would be irreversible.

Without taking the ocean of faith from the Halls of Heaven, Yang Qi could never have done this. His empire’s destiny would have collapsed, which would mean that the individual strength of his citizens didn’t matter.

However, with the ocean of faith, not only did his destiny and net of law not suffer any damage, they actually expanded.

Faith and destiny could both be considered types of wealth. But while individuals couldn’t really use faith, nations could. Yang Qi had long since gained enlightenment of this point. With that ocean of faith pouring into his net of law, it was as if he was receiving the destiny of the ancient legion of gods, plus that of the Sovereign Lord.

Because of that, when his people were ordained, they didn’t have to deal with tribulations, bottlenecks, or any of the negative aspects to growing stronger quickly. And the people could accept the karma of the original living beings who had created it. People as a whole could accept the faith of other peoples. As a result, individuals could benefit.

The strength of the people rose, not just by a single level, but by many. In many instances, Quasi-Gods rose through the ranks, becoming Lesser Gods, Common Gods, or Greater Gods. And there were many Greater Gods who became Paramount Gods.

There were even numerous individuals becoming peak Paramount Gods.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi’s closest friends and family experienced boosts in cultivation base, with some of them reaching psychic scales of fifty billion.

Yang Qi could well be said to be taking all the wealth of the ancient Sovereign Lord.

Unfortunately, the Sovereign Lord’s kingdom had never contained destiny, as he had been too focused on faith. Sadly for him, faith came from the people, and belonged to the people.

Yang Qi was like a bandit who plundered a huge treasure trove, then redistributed the loot to the common people. The illicitly taken treasure was thus given back to those who it had been taken from.

As a result, everyone benefited. Everyone was ordained.

Everyone transcended.

This was Yang Qi’s ultimate trump card. Without it, he would never have started a war with the three dynasties. Although he had impressive destiny, he just didn’t have the population to stand up to them. But with this major upgrade, he could definitely break through their front lines.

Destiny surged, and mountain-crushing, sea-shattering force swelled out in all directions, causing everyone to get stronger, and as a result, making the spell formations many times stronger. In some cases, a hundred times stronger.

“Warriors of the empire,” Yang Qi howled, “YOU are the mightiest of all. You can seize victory and destroy the three dynasties!”

In the fierce fighting leading up to this point, many people had died, and as a result, the empire’s destiny had waned. But now, not only had it recovered, but it had reached a much higher level than before.

RUMBLE!

Everyone in the empire was at their ultimate personal peak.

“This is bad. Retreat! Everybody retreat!”

Proud Heaven knew that they couldn’t stand up to this enemy. This final trump card had been too crushing to their morale. Yang Qi was like an unbeatable fiend-devil, a domineering figure backed by an empire nobody could stop.

Right now, the only option left was to run. Return home and hope to find some way to turn the situation around.

After all, the army Proud Heaven had brought wasn’t made up of all the members of the Central Dynasty. Seventy percent of the citizens had remained at home to defend it. And obviously, the Sage Monarch Empire couldn’t take on that many people.

They might have an advantage right now, but facing numbers like that, they would be crushed.

Unfortunately, a full-scale retreat wasn’t really possible right now.

“High Priestess, hurry up and help,” Proud Heaven shouted. “We need time to escape!”

The enormous monument once again descended from the sky to block Yang Qi, but this time, it collapsed in only a few breaths of time.

However, that was all the time the three dynasties needed to stabilize their situation.

“I, the High Priestess, will protect ye peoples who are fleeing to your homes!” All of a sudden, immense power flowed out and encompassed the forces of the three dynasties.

Whooosh!

At the same time, numerous copies of the Deathless Monument fell, blocking Yang Qi and his armies.

“My Deathless Monument won’t hold out against them for long,” the High Priestess continued. “Ladies and gentlemen from the three dynasties, why don’t you temporarily allow me to be your leader? Then, I can wield your destiny. What do you say?”

Yang Chiliocosm and the Dugu patriarchs all knew that if something didn’t immediately happen to change the situation, they were going to die.

“We name you our leader, High Priestess!”

As soon as they agreed to the suggestion, the destinies of their dynasties shifted, gathering on the High Priestess.

Waving her hands, she sent the various projections of the Deathless Monument rumbling toward Yang Qi and his army.

“Get into formation!” Yang Qi shouted, and countless formations appeared. Then, the Tribulation Monarch Cannons were unleashed, slamming into the monuments. At that point, he caught a glimpse of the High Priestess’ true form. She wore a long priestess’ robe. She had facial features that seemed to come from an older time, and her hair was bound up with a long hairpin. She also had a dot of red on her forehead, and it looked like blood. In fact, it emanated a sound like that of a flowing river of blood, which was either righteous or evil. It was hard to say.

Furthermore, she emanated the energy of a half-Annulled expert!

It was a terrifying thought.

However, Yang Qi wasn’t afraid. What did he have to fear from the half-Annulled level? Not even someone like that could halt the progress of his empire. His destiny was powerful enough to force even the High Priestess into retreat.

Glaring viciously at Yang Qi, the High Priestess said, “Warriors of the three dynasties, I, the High Priestess, am now your leader. Hear my commands. Retreat immediately, but maintain order. Your homelands are there behind you, filled with countless citizens who support you. They are what make us strong. We have to stop fighting now, lest we be routed. We’re thousands of times more numerous than the people of the Sage Monarch Empire, so as long as we remain united, they can't do anything to us!”

Her words calmed the hearts of the people, and numerous spell formations popped up as people began calmly retreating.

“Do we chase them, Yang Qi?” Yang Susu said.

“No. It won’t do any good. We won today, but we also sustained heavy losses. That said, we made a name for ourselves, and solidified our destiny. With the addition of faith to the net of law, we’ll be fine. However, we need to sort out the details of the newly appointed nobility, and get more people to join us, replenishing our ranks. Fall back, everyone. Return to the empire.”

It wasn’t a complete victory, by any stretch of the imagination. And now that the three dynasties were returning home, it would be difficult to strike at them. Worse, they had the High Priestess on their side, a half-Annulled expert that surpassed the level of anyone currently in the god world.

She was like the King of Godmammoths, so Yang Qi was certain that if he pressed the attack in full force, he would still lose. But he was already pleased with the results of this battle. At least he had forced the three dynasties into retreat, and established his name in the god world.

“Do you think the High Priestess will help them recover?” Jadefall asked. “Maybe even form a new dynasty? If they truly become united, it's going to be difficult to stand up to them, considering their population.”

If nothing else, the battle had shown that the Sage Monarch Empire’s true weakness was its low population. They just couldn’t sustain heavy losses.

“What a pity,” Jadefall replied. “If only we could open the Ancient Road to the Gods and call everyone up from the lower worlds. Then we would really have a population explosion. And with that many Ascendants on our side, things would be different. Sadly, the Ancient Road to the Gods isn’t accessible. And it's going to be hard to grow our population just from the denizens of the god world. After all, the three dynasties still have big reputations, and now they even have the High Priestess.”

“Don't worry about it. I'm going to gain enlightenment of the half-Annulled level soon. And I'm already strong enough that I might be able to rebuild the Ancient Road to the Gods. Maybe I won’t be able to do it permanently, but I should be able to open a way to the lower worlds for at least a few hours. That should be enough. If we can do that, I can use the divine abilities of King Heaven-Devourer to quickly bring up a huge group of people from the lower worlds. Our empire’s population would increase dramatically, and our destiny would rise. For now, everyone needs to focus on stabilizing your strength and getting the empire back in order. I'm going to go up to the Halls of Heaven to take control of the entire place. I’ll also send every last bit of that ocean of faith into our net of law.”

Chapter 1546: Both Sides Rest and Recuperate

Because of the meddling of the High Priestess, the battle had come to an end.

She was a half-Annulled expert, with an incredibly high psychic scale that was probably twice Yang Qi’s level or more. Of course, she couldn’t stand up to the Sage Monarch Empire as a whole. But she effectively organized the three dynasties’ retreat, giving them a chance to recover and make new plans.

Right now, the three dynasties had a lot of problems. For instance, their peoples weren’t united, which would make recovery difficult. However, given enough time, they would be back to full strength.

As for Yang Qi, he had a low population, but an incredible destiny. If he could deal with the population problem, he would reach even more unheard-of heights.

The three dynasties had the upper hand in numbers, while Yang Qi and the Sage Monarch Empire had the advantage in quality.

For now, the fighting was over. But it would only be temporary. There would be an even bigger battle to come, and the winner would take control of the god world and start the wheel of time turning in a way that couldn’t be stopped.

Yang Qi took his people back to the kingdom to rest and lick their wounds.

The empire had lost a fifth of its population in the fighting, with a heavy blow being struck to the Dragonfolk God-Lords. The Dragonfolk in general were now a small and pitifully weak force, and other people with God-Lords were in similarly bad condition. As for the sage monarch magistrates, there were only about a hundred million left.

How profoundly tragic!

Everyone in the empire wept at the knowledge that they had just been through an extremely brutal fight. However, the survivors had experienced the baptism of war, and would grow because of it. In the coming days, the empire would become stronger than ever.

Yang Qi knew that his people had experienced a major catastrophe. However, they had passed through the fire, just like a cultivator passing through tribulation. Now the empire needed to grow rapidly.

Once he finished pouring the ocean of faith into his net of law and destiny, his empire’s destiny would be vastly beyond that of the three dynasties.

That ocean of faith wasn't a normal resource, like magical treasures or medicinal pills. It was pure faith that could be converted into destiny.

Medicinal pills and the like could be stockpiled, but not turned into destiny. Thus, the ocean of faith was better than any sort of resource. And when he finished absorbing the entire thing, the sage monarch magistrates would once again begin proliferating.

There were just far too few of them now. After all, if he had had a few billion of them, the High Priestess would never have succeeded.

Yang Qi made some arrangements in his empire, assigning the surviving sage monarch magistrates to various tasks. He also had his friends and family help out. When everything was settled, he headed out to improve his cultivation base and repair the Ancient Road to the Gods.

WHOOSH!

A short moment passed, and he was in the Halls of Heaven.

He had gained a lot during the fighting. In fact, as long as he could get enough power and destiny, he knew that he could easily reach the half-Annulled level.

The High Priestess was mighty, but she was nothing more than a guard right now. She wouldn't dare to come pick a fight.

Yang Qi’s first destination was the ocean of faith, where he set up a huge teleportation portal to absorb the power and send it to the net of law in the Sage Monarch Empire.

Whizzz....

The net of law became even more crystalline as it expanded, causing the empire to slowly shift in the direction of another location that wasn’t in the god world. It was slowly developing into an even higher type of civilization.

The ‘water’ level in the ocean slowly started lowering, and in the Sage Monarch Empire, people’s positions as nobility stabilized as a result.

At the same time, the empire’s destiny grew, and slowly started transforming into something like a greyspace.

Destiny was invincible.

All citizens had been ordained as nobility, which had resulted in a huge drop in destiny. But now that was being made up for.

In fact, there was so much destiny now that, even if Yang Qi did the same thing again, it wouldn’t have any bad result. Once he opened the Ancient Road to the Gods, and saved all his people from below, he could ordain them as well. Then he would really be able to crush the alliance of the three dynasties.

With the ocean of faith handled, Yang Qi turned his attention to the Ancient Road to the Gods.

“God Legion Seal. Mahātmā Jade. Halls of Heaven. Passageway Creation. Ancient Road to the Gods, REFORM!”

BUZZ!

Almost instantly, hissing and popping sounds could be heard from the depths of the god world, like the sound of burning.

Yang Qi was melting the essence of the god world to rebuild the Ancient Road to the Gods. However, the process would take many hours.

A passageway began taking shape, like an enormous ancient road, right beneath the Halls of Heaven.

Yang Qi’s immensely powerful psyche, as well as his wildly strong destiny, was helping him accomplish the most shocking of deeds. Reestablishing the Ancient Road to the Gods was only the first step in his plan.

Meanwhile....

There was a very depressing atmosphere in the Central God-Temple.

The three dynasties had suffered a major defeat. They had failed to defeat the Sage Monarch Empire, and only escaped with their lives thanks to the High Priestess. Without that last-minute save, their armies would have been wiped out of existence. Then, mass desertions would have followed.

They had been routed, and the Sage Monarch Empire had established a reputation of might and glory that was unrivaled. After all, if the Sage Monarch Empire could vanquish their three dynasties, what existed in the god world that they couldn't destroy?

“We lost,” Proud Heaven said gravely. “Badly. Thoroughly. The prestige of the god world is at an all-time low. And there were plenty of old-timers out there, watching the whole thing. During this period of rest and recuperation, there’s no doubt that many empires, organizations, and individual old-timers will join Yang Qi. They’re going to get stronger and stronger, while we get weaker and weaker. We should be happy we haven’t had more people defecting. Do we just sit around and wait to die? Do any of you have any good ideas?”

“We have to bring more people into our alliance,” Hailan said. “Either that, or merge our three dynasties into a single empire. The Sage Monarch Empire doesn’t have anywhere close to our population. Maybe ten percent, at most. And they lost a lot of people. It’s not going to be easy to come back from that. Our downside is that we aren’t united. We lack a true leader. If our dynasties accept the leadership of the High Priestess, then given her cultivation base, we should be capable of great things.”

As Hailan spoke, everyone turned to the High Priestess.

She sat unmoving in the seat of honor, looking almost like a statue. It was almost as if she hadn’t heard Hailan mention her becoming the leader of a new empire.

However, her lack of response didn’t make anyone present feel any less repulsed by the idea.

Whether it was Yang Chiliocosm, Proud Heaven, or the Dugu patriarchs, they were all people who had been working for tens of billions of years to become top figures in the god world. They had all suffered big defeats. However, an emaciated camel is still bigger than a horse, and most of them would rather go back and work hard to rebuild their forces.

If they combined their dynasties, they would become like government officials, and the destiny they had once commanded would belong to someone else. How could any of them just accept an arrangement like that?

The High Priestess was simply the leader of their alliance, and although she could benefit from its destiny, she couldn't make major decisions. That had to be decided by the three dynasties together.

A league-lord and an emperor were two different things.

The Dugu patriarchs were all thinking roughly the same thing. ‘That Hailan is a real plague. Fuck. If the High Priestess had stepped in earlier, we wouldn’t be in this position. She only showed up when we were about to be destroyed!’

They were old-timers who excelled at intrigue, so how could they not realize what was going on?

The High Priestess had obviously planned this all along. She set things up so that she could steal the fruit of other people’s labor without spending any effort of her own. And if she ended up combining the three dynasties under her leadership, it would be a perfect outcome for her.

The old-timers knew that she could have struck at the Sage Monarch Empire at any time. If she did it when the three dynasties were at their peak, the Sage Monarch Empire would have been done for.

Instead, she waited until just the right moment, so that she could be a savior and seize some power in the process.

None of these old-timers wanted to give up everything they had worked so hard for over the years. Even Proud Heaven’s eyes glittered with hatred for Hailan.

There was no way he would let an emperor rise up and take control over him.

“The idea of combining our dynasties into an empire is no trivial matter,” Proud Heaven said. “We need to discuss this in detail. Right now, Yang Qi is strong, but not strong enough to invade our empires. He has to focus on defense, and that means we have the upper hand. As long as we can get our troops in order, we may yet be able to seize victory. What do you say, Lord of the Chiliocosm? Don’t you agree that our current alliance is enough? We don’t want to complicate things and cause further chaos.”

Chapter 1547: Internal Conflict

None of the dynasties that made up the alliance were interested in combining to form a larger empire. It would involve their emperors being demoted, and as mere government officials, their lives would be in the hands of another. No one would willingly debase themselves in such a way.

“Are you people really willing to just stand around and watch Yang Qi destroy you?” Hailan asked, looking around at everyone present. “It's not as though we’ve never encountered someone as strong as Yang Qi before. He's not in the half-Annulled level, but he's close. At the moment, only the High Priestess can keep him in check. The rest of us are useless in that regard. He's definitely gone to assimilate the Halls of Heaven, and if he succeeds, we're all dead. The only shot we have is if we work together. Unite the three dynasties and act as one. We don't have a second option.”

“You want us to take the result of billions of years of effort and just give it to someone else?” Heaven-Defeating Dugu asked. “You think you’re very clever, don’t you, Hailan? If we give all of our hard work to the High Priestess, and she becomes the empress, she’ll use the destiny to finally surpass the Sovereign Lord.”

“It’s the only option we have,” Hailan replied, her eyes glittering with killing intent. “If we remain divided, our fate will be horrific. The High Priestess is already in the half-Annulled level, the same as the old Sovereign Lord. She's the only one who can gain the support of the people, and then command the destiny.”

“Our current alliance is more than enough,” Yang Chiliocosm said. “The Chiliocosm Dynasty is an independent entity, but we support the High Priestess as our league-lord. That’s more than enough respect. If she wants to become an empress, forget it. In fact, don’t even bring it up again. The Chiliocosm Dynasty would rather be destroyed than let someone take advantage of our billions of years of effort.”

“I completely agree,” Proud Heaven said. “An alliance of three dynasties is more than sufficient. What we need to do now is analyze exactly what happened, and where we went wrong. We also need to train in formations. Going forward, there can be no bickering between our three dynasties. We’ll work together in good faith. Considering that, there’s no need for any sort of empire. We take things one step at a time, and make sure our alliance is unified. Considering our combined destiny and population, there’s no way Yang Qi can match up, not even if he makes some progress. In the end, population is the most important thing. When a dynasty lacks people, they can only develop so far. Destiny comes from the masses and is intrinsically connected to the living beings of a dynasty.”

“Alright,” the High Priestess said. “There’s no need to muddy the waters by talking about an empire, Hailan. Besides, I have no interest in being an empress. I just want to prevent Yang Qi from getting too powerful. If that happens, we’ll end up in the same mess we were in during the Sovereign Lord’s Age. We’d be enslaved by the God Legion Seal. I have no plans to interfere in the affairs of the emperors of the three dynasties. For now, we need to go our separate ways and make all the preparations necessary. Gather whatever resources are necessary, train the troops, prepare the formations. I won’t participate in such matters. As the league-lord, I’ll oversee things and make sure the people remain calm and orderly. Incidentally, in short order I plan to head out into the primal-chaos outside the god world and make contact with some old friends from years past, people who weren’t killed by the Sovereign Lord. Although I don’t have any plans to found an empire, I do intend to make this alliance even bigger and stronger than any of your empires could dream of.”

Quite a few people were astonished by her words.

“You’re nothing less than incredible, High Priestess,” Heaven-Defeating Dugu said. “We’ll head back to our dynasties to calm the hearts of the people and revitalize our destiny. Once all of us have taken care of our various responsibilities, we’ll meet back to plan the next step.”

“I’ll be taking my leave now,” Yang Chiliocosm said.

“And I’ll go talk things over with our emperor,” Proud Heaven said, leaving.

Before long, the only people left in the Central God-Temple were the High Priestess, Hailan, and Yang Voidprime.

Seeing that they were alone, Hailan said, “Master, these people don’t know what’s good for them! I can't believe they rejected the suggestion of unification. What do we do now? Why didn’t you just strike a few of them dead? For instance, that one Dugu patriarch, or Yang Chiliocosm. I can’t believe Proud Heaven will yield to force but not coercion.”

“Enough with the melodrama,” the High Priestess said. “It was worth a shot, but we can't force it. At least I'm the league-lord. If we push things too far, it could cause the alliance to fall apart. Remember, although I'm in the half-Annulled level, the emperors of the dynasties all have access to boundless destiny, which means that not even I can deal with them easily. That is the power that comes with being an emperor.”

“High Priestess,” Yang Voidprime said, “although this has nothing to do with me, I'm happy to support you. I’ll head back to my dynasty now. Remember, I have no desire for destiny. I just want that fateless energy from Yang Qi. I need it to become complete and transcend. I already have a cultivation base of two hundred and sixty billion, and no amount of destiny is going to help me get stronger easily. And that damned Yang Qi forced me to open my Fateless Seal, which means that reaching the half-Annulled level is going to be difficult.”

“Don’t worry,” the High Priestess said. “When I promise to do something, I do it. Your cultivation base is impressive, but insufficient. Go back and seize rulership from Yang Chiliocosm, then start advocating for the unification of the three dynasties.”

“No problem. Yang Chiliocosm isn’t a match for me at this point. However, it's going to take careful planning to seize full power of the Chiliocosm Dynasty.”

“Go,” she said, waving her hand dismissively. Yang Voidprime flew away, then the High Priestess vanished with Hailan in tow.

Outside in the primal-chaos beyond the god world, she raised her voice and said, “King of Godmammoths, you've been hiding for long enough. Show your face. That Yang Qi has become a threat to your existence. You should know that raising a tiger is inviting calamity, and if I were you, I’d avoid inviting the wolf into your house. Aren’t you recovered yet? I'm already back in business, what about you? If not, then maybe I’ll take your blood and send the rest of you to hell! I have some good destiny now as a league-lord. Maybe I'm not an empress, but I'm still strong enough to crush you.”

**

Meanwhile, in the depths of the Central Dynasty, in an odd fold of space-time, white energy pulsed everywhere, and Proud Heaven could sense the fluctuations of the Lord of Righteous Justice.

‘Yang Qi was right,’ he thought. ‘The Lord of Righteous Justice is fighting back, and that’s helping King Immortal-Slayer.’ Then he saw Proud Central, wreathed in flames, struggling mightily.

‘No wonder Proud Central didn’t update me on the situation. He didn't want me to know what a bad situation he’s in.’ All of a sudden, a wicked smile appeared on Proud Heaven’s face.

“My respects, Father!” he said, bowing. “Our Central Dynasty suffered a big loss. The alliance of three dynasties was completely defeated by Yang Qi. It was brutal, Father. Now the High Priestess has shown up, and she wants to combine the three dynasties into an empire. You have to take advantage of this crisis to assimilate the Great Necropolis and King Immortal-Slayer, then reach the Half-Annulled level. That’s the only way you can kill all of our enemies.”

“It’s you, Proud Heaven?” Proud Heaven said. “Get out of here! You don’t need to worry about my affairs. It doesn’t matter what happens out there, as long as you keep the situation under control.”

Proud Central didn’t seem to care at all about the latest turn of events, and in fact, didn't even seem surprised to hear what had played out.

“You already know about what happened, Father?” Much of this is your fault. You fell for Yang Qi’s trickery, and ended up giving him the final piece of the Mahātmā Jade. Now he's combined it with the God Legion Seal, and is immensely powerful. You really screwed up, Father. Ai.”

“Get the fuck out of here, Proud Heaven! What are you complaining about? I don’t need advice from you. Leave. Now!” Even as the words left Proud Central’s mouth, a huge ball of white lightning suddenly appeared and rumbled toward him like a gigantic mountain.

Proud Heaven chuckled. “Old codger. You've been pinned into a corner!”

CRACK!

Suddenly, Proud Heaven unsealed something inside himself. Unexpectedly, he was similar to Yang Voidprime in that he was hiding his full capabilities. However, unlike Yang Voidprime, he didn’t have fateless power within him, but rather the power of ten different universes.

Ten enormous universes appeared behind him, each of which was like an embryonic god world. In the blink of an eye, Proud Heaven reached a level of power vastly superior to Yang Voidprime.

Laughing heartily, he said, “I finally have the chance I've been seeking. Ten Universes!” Bursting with power, he shattered the white ball of lightning, then grinned viciously and said, “Proud Central, you scum. You piece of trash! I'm going to devour you right here and now. I’m going to digest every bit of you, and you're going to make me a true emperor! I’ll devour you, then King Immortal-Slayer, the Great Necropolis, the Lord of Righteous Justice, and finally, I’ll secretly strike the High Priestess as well. This is my ultimate power, the Ten Universes. Understand? Back during the original Big Bang in primal-chaos, there were ten unique universes that struggled for control. The god world was only one of those universes, but it devoured the other nine. However, I found them and turned them into magical treasures, which became my personal dao. With the Ten Universes, I have a consummate art equivalent to ten god worlds! In other words, it represents ten different ways the god world could’ve ended up. Now, Proud Central, prepare to die!”

Chapter 1548: Devouring Proud Central

“Proud Heaven, you vicious wolf! If I’d have realized you’d do this, I would’ve taken care of you a long time ago. You’re my son! I raised you! How could you possibly betray me like this? Are you even human?!” Previously, Proud Central hadn’t been scared at all of Proud Heaven. But seeing Proud Heaven reveal his Ten Universes made it clear that he had been hiding his true strength. And now... Proud Central was afraid.

“Maybe I’m your son, Proud Central, but that doesn’t matter. Do you think I don’t know the truth about your plans? You know the amazing potential I have, so you’ve been grooming me with the goal of eventually devouring me to improve your cultivation base. Thankfully, Yang Qi has given me the perfect opportunity to kill you.” He threw his head back and laughed loudly. “To be honest, I should thank Yang Qi. Without him, I never would’ve been a match for you. But now, the time has come for you to die!”

The ten universes behind Proud Heaven started rotating, making them look like enormous suns that cast out rippling strands of light, which shot toward Proud Central at top speed.

“Central Grand Tempest!” Proud Central shouted, unleashing the most powerful psychic tempest there was.

“Dark Universe!” Proud Heaven shot back, unleashing a pitch-black universe that instantly devoured the psychic tempest.

BAMMMM!

Proud Heaven viciously struck Proud Central, and without the slightest scruple, started absorbing his power. As for Proud Central, there was nothing he could do but watch as the energy of the Dark Universe infected him, turning him into a pitch-black mass covered with pinpoints of light that resembled stars.

“Proud Heaven, you animal!”

Although Proud Central fought back viciously, he was too distracted by King Immortal-Slayer and the Lord of Righteous Justice. And that wasn’t to mention how Yang Qi had used the Sovereign Lord’s lightning attack to wound him. Given all that, how could he possibly defend against this sudden ambush by Proud Heaven?

“You beast! I’ll make sure you die with me!”

He suddenly abandoned his work with the Great Necropolis and unleashed all the power he could muster.

“Die together? Nice idea. God World Essence!”

Proud Heaven smiled oddly as the essence of the god world sprang up beneath him, pouring into his Ten Universes, causing each and every one to swell dramatically. As a result, Proud Central’s stream of power was shattered, and Proud Heaven’s Ten Universes shot into him like a parasite.

Then, all ten of them began absorbing Proud Central’s power.

“What’s going on, Proud Heaven? You've been approved by the essence of the god world?” Proud Central suddenly felt as though fighting against Proud Heaven was the same as fighting against the entire god world, and it caused him to shiver with terror, fury, and helplessness.

“That’s right, Proud Central. I have the approval of the god world. Little do you know that, when I was in the impure lands, I met a girl named Greensura. Not only was she Yang Qi’s mother, which means she had fateless energy inside of her, but she was also closely connected to the essence of the god world. The essence of the god world knows that it couldn’t have any greater enemy than a Fateless One. After all, the god world will eventually devour all of the primal-chaos out there. And we’re nothing more than parasites living inside of it.

“However, Fateless Ones are different. And so is the Great Necropolis. I control Greensura, therefore I can connect with the essence of the god world. The god world has long since taken Greensura back, thus becoming an enormous, unified living thing. And it’s completely different from us. I'm helping the god world get rid of Yang Qi, so it's helping me. Of course, once I use its essence to devour you, I’ll move on to the Great Necropolis. After that, I’ll devour Yang Qi, and ultimately, the god world itself. The god world is going to be mine! I'm going to reach the Annulled level. Not the half-Annulled level. The full Annulled level!”

Even after hearing all of these secrets, Proud Central was powerless to do a thing. He was already being devoured, and all he could do was wail, “Raising a tiger is inviting calamity. Raising a tiger is inviting calamity.... You beast! I should never have taken care of you. Agghhhhhh!”

Moments later he was dead, completely absorbed by Proud Heaven’s Ten Universes. Considering Proud Heaven had the help of the essence of the god world, what could Proud Heaven have done to fight him?

Having assimilated Proud Central, Proud Heaven waved his hand, and it thrummed with power. As a result, the Great Necropolis suddenly went completely still. Then King Immortal-Slayer’s voice could be heard, “Well played, boy. Very ruthless of you. You even went so far as to devour your own father. Unfortunately for you, you still won’t be able to do anything to me.”

“You’re going to be the next to die, King Immortal-Slayer,” Proud Heaven said. “I'm going to turn the Great Necropolis into an out-of-body incarnation. An animadestiny magical treasure. Lord of Righteous Justice, you should stop struggling as well. I'm going to absorb you as well.”

RUMBLE!

Proud Heaven’s divine will shot into the white mammoth that was the Lord of Righteous Justice, provoking an agonized shriek.

Proud Heaven’s cultivation base skyrocketed, breaking into the half-Annulled level and bringing a cold smile to his face. “High Priestess, I bet you couldn’t have guessed in your wildest dreams that my plan would succeed. You want to be the empress of the three dynasties? I think you’ll serve better as food. Next, I'm going to go deal with Yang Voidprime. Not munching him down would be a big waste!”

Opening his mouth, he sucked the Great Necropolis inside of him and sent the Lord of Righteous Justice into his Ten Universes.

Then he turned and vanished.

**

Countless people in the three dynasties were on the move, forming alliances and making plans. Proud Heaven was no exception. Everyone wanted to take advantage of the chaos, or at the very least, take precautions to stay safe.

Meanwhile, the Sage Monarch Empire was expanding rapidly.

At the moment, a huge teleportation portal had been opened, and Yang Susu, Jadefall, Yang Doom, Yang Proudworld, and others of Yang Qi’s brethren were leading an army through it. On the other side was an immense golden buddhist kingdom.

It was what remained of the ancient buddhist kingdoms, and its leader was Buddha-Lord Pārisuddhi Outstanding Vaiḍūrya Saddharma Puṇḍarīka. When Yang Qi had been fighting the alliance of dynasties, he had been marshaling the various troops of the buddhist schools in the hopes of taking advantage of the situation.

However, the Sage Monarch Empire had come out on top, and now it was planning to bring the buddhist kingdom into the fold.

The buddhist kingdom was like a viper lurking in the shadows, waiting to strike. Obviously, they were a dangerous threat that needed to be handled.

Yang Susu, Jadefall, and many of the others had psychic scales of more than ninety billion. Because of the great ordainment that had occurred on the battlefield, everyone had reached psychic scales of fifty billion at a minimum. Then the ocean of faith was fully tapped into, causing even further breakthroughs.

Although the empire had lost a fifth of its population, its destiny was many times greater than before. That was why the High Priestess wouldn’t dare to attack, for fear of being slaughtered.

Also in the group heading to the buddhist kingdom were the grand generalissimo, imperial preceptor, and prime minister, whose psychic scales were all above a hundred and fifty billion.

The sage monarch magistrates had all recovered from their injuries, and were now proliferating like mad. In fact, they had already reached four hundred million, which was a hundred million more than when they had first gone into battle.

A hundred million sage monarch magistrates had come along on this expeditionary force, as well as other top experts.

“This is the Buddhist Empire,” Yang Susu said coldly. “You can see how rapidly it’s been growing. They’re obviously quite ambitious.”

“Not bad,” the prime minister said. “This place really does have high ambitions. They finally managed to unite most of the scattered buddhist schools. If we and the three dynasties had both been injured badly enough, they could have jumped in and taken advantage of the situation. They have some good destiny as well. That said, they’re not quite in the position to compare with our armies.”

It was only natural that the prime minister would look down on the buddhist schools, considering he was a confucian.

“We can still try peaceful measures before using force,” Jadefall said.

“Alright!” the Shepherd said with a smile. Raising his voice, he said, “Sage monarch magistrates, join your voices!”

RUMBLE!

The entire force of sage monarch magistrates spoke out in exactly the same tone and volume. “Buddha-Lord Pārisuddhi Outstanding Vaiḍūrya Saddharma Puṇḍarīka, and any other buddhas! Listen well. The Sage Monarch Empire has sent an army here to accept your surrender. We defeated the alliance of three dynasties, and we won’t approve of any other major powers. If you don’t surrender, we'll crush you into dust.”

Almost immediately, there was a huge commotion as numerous buddhas flew out in a panic.

As it turned out, there was no military response at all. The armies of the Buddhist Empire couldn’t compare at all to the forces of the Sage Monarch Empire. And they had no High Priestess to jump in and help them.

“Leaders of the Sage Monarch Empire, I am Buddha-Lord Pārisuddhi Outstanding Vaiḍūrya Saddharma Puṇḍarīka. Our buddhist schools are pure, and stand aloof from worldly affairs. We only want to focus on cultivation. Why would you attack us? Aren’t you people who emphasize morality? Don’t you espouse the saying sage inside, monarch outside? Why do you want to make us your enemy?”

All of a sudden, they caught sight of a golden buddha, floating up into the air.

However, what was telling was that he didn’t leave his buddhist land, and was obviously staying within the defenses of his destiny.

Chapter 1549: Conquering the Buddhist Empire

Buddha-Lord Pārisuddhi Outstanding Vaiḍūrya Saddharma Puṇḍarīka had appeared, surrounded by magnificent golden light and zen chanting. Buddhist dragons swirled around him, and the convergence of faith and destiny around him caused flowers to rain down constantly. He was surrounded by dazzling white light and made everyone want to look at him.

Sadly, to the people from the Sage Monarch Empire, he seemed as laughable as a child playing house.

They had all been born again through fire recently, reaching a level that made Buddha-Lord Pārisuddhi Outstanding Vaiḍūrya Saddharma Puṇḍarīka seem like little more than a toy.

“Buddha-Lord,” Yang Susu said, “we didn’t bring the armies of the Sage Monarch Empire here to listen to bullshit. So enough of your games. We want more experts to strengthen our empire, so don’t even think of trying to take advantage of us. Did you think we didn’t know how many Demonfolk, Devilfolk, and wretch-gods you’ve purified? That’s how you expanded your destiny and prestige. Sadly, the Sage Monarch Empire can't permit you to grow any further. So I'm going to count to three. If you haven’t surrendered by then, we’ll grind you into powder.”

“Oh Boundless Buddha. You people are really pushing things too far. Our buddhist kingdom is no threat to you. We've pledged our life to spiritual pursuits!”

“We’ve pledged to spiritual pursuits! We’ve pledged to spiritual pursuits! We’ve pledged to spiritual pursuits!”

“We’ve pledged to spiritual pursuits!”

Countless buddhist believers all started chanting, creating a thunderous roar.

Destiny surged, making it obvious they weren’t going to back down.

“Well, I guess we have no choice, then,” Jadefall said, shaking her head. “You people really are just too stubborn. I can't believe you’d profane the majesty of the Sage Monarch Empire this way. We defeated the three dynasties and shook the god world! Our armies defeat anyone they face. It seems we’re really going to have to wipe you out of existence. Prepare the Tribulation Monarch Cannons!”

BUZZ!

The sage monarch magistrates revealed their cannons, then massive waves of white light rumbled forth, slamming into the golden destiny of the Buddhist Empire and shattering their defenses.

Shouts of rage rose from the buddhist believers.

“Kill them!” Yang Susu said coldly, and the army flooded forth.

From high above, the Buddhist Empire looked like an enormous golden egg, while the army of the Sage Monarch Empire was like a long sword slashing toward it.

“You people are being intolerable bullies! Compassion cometh from Buddha, but we also know how to slaughter devils!” Expression twisting viciously, Buddha-Lord Pārisuddhi Outstanding Vaiḍūrya Saddharma Puṇḍarīka extended his arm and shouted, “Disciples, get into the Mandala Formation. Summon the aegis!”

As they got into various formations, flower petals appeared, forming together into the shape of an enormous lotus flower. Then, countless buddhas appeared on the flower, shining with golden light as they muttered enchantments that flowed forth to meet the incoming army.

“Flowers Bloom to Reveal Buddha; Buddha Chants Dhāraṇī Incantations!”

“What kind of crap is this supposed to be?” Expressions of disdain could be seen on the faces of Jadefall, Yang Susu, the Shepherd, and others. This was far less than they had dealt with when fighting the three dynasties.

“Sword of the Dao of Heaven; Exact Punishment!”

Whizz!

Backed by destiny, the army took the shape of a huge sword, which slashed into the dhāraṇī incantations, destroying them. Then, the sword changed into the shape of a boat that looked exactly like the Halls of Heaven.

It was yet another formation.

The Halls of Heaven could conquer every obstacle!

As the army slashed into the lotus flower, wreaking destruction along the way, countless buddhas were sucked into the boat and were taken captive.

“Hand of the One God!”

By using the formations, the soldiers in the boat were able to summon a huge hand that could grasp universes, much less this Buddhist Kingdom. Wherever the hand went, the buddhas became streams of golden light that were sucked inside and bound captive.

“Damn you!” Buddha-Lord Pārisuddhi Outstanding Vaiḍūrya Saddharma Puṇḍarīka shouted. “How could this be happening?! We can’t even stand up to a single charge? Is my Buddhist Empire that inferior to the Sage Monarch Empire? I refuse to believe it! The buddhist schools are foreordained to conquer the god world! Even the essence of the god world trusted in us!”

Sadly for him, he couldn't stop the Hand of the One God from grabbing him.

He struggled, but it was completely useless, and he immediately felt like everything around him was spinning dizzyingly. He had a psychic scale of a hundred billion, yet it didn’t do him any good. Not even the half-Annulled High Priestess had dared to risk tangling with the destiny of the Sage Monarch Empire. And now that the destiny had been bolstered by the Sovereign Lord’s ocean of faith, it was vastly beyond anything an ordinary empire could handle.

As of now, the three dynasties couldn’t do anything but hunker down and wait. They couldn’t attack, and the High Priestess couldn’t risk going out and being ambushed. If she got captured or killed, it would be a huge disaster.

Twenty hours later, the Buddhist Empire was completely conquered.

Buddha-Lord Pārisuddhi Outstanding Vaiḍūrya Saddharma Puṇḍarīka was tightly bound, his face a mass of despair. Even after being dragged before Yang Susu for an audience, he still couldn't believe what was happening. “Twenty hours? It only took twenty hours for my entire Buddhist Empire to be taken over? There wasn’t even a bloodsoaked last stand? Why? Is the Sage Monarch Empire really that strong? What happened to the High Priestess? She should’ve shown up to do something! I can’t believe you weren’t worried about her.”

As it turned out, he thought his empire was as safe and stable as Mount Tai. He had assumed that because the High Priestess and the three dynasties had clashed with Yang Qi and the Sage Monarch Empire, there would be time to develop while everyone licked their wounds.

But now this had happened.

“The High Priestess?” Jadefall said. “You think she’s omnipotent or something? Our Emperor Yang Qi controls the Halls of Heaven, from where he can look down on the whole god world. Even the almighty entities of ancient times are nothing compared to him. In fact, we can use the teleportation portals in the Halls of Heaven to go to any location in the god world! Not even the High Priestess can deal with the destiny of the Sage Monarch Empire. If she tried, she would only end up dead and buried.”

“I submit. I submit!” Buddha-Lord Pārisuddhi Outstanding Vaiḍūrya Saddharma Puṇḍarīka shrieked. He knew had no other choice than to accept his fate.

“Go. Take the buddhist captives back to the Sage Monarch Empire.” With the command given, the army took the captive buddhas and left. The Buddhist Kingdom had disappeared just like that. However, there were now new kingdoms popping up in the Sage Monarch Empire.

Everything had proceeded very smoothly.

The Sage Monarch Empire was now truly on the path of conquering the god world. They needed a bigger population, and they were going to take it by force. After all, they needed more destiny. With more destiny came more nobility.

In fact, the nobility represented the destiny, and no one could face the nobility of the Sage Monarch Empire without their hearts pounding. Even the top old-timers knew that this was probably the best time to join the Sage Monarch Empire.

In the past, they had been waiting to see how things played out with the three dynasties. But now it seemed obvious. They all wanted to be an official who follows someone's rise from a lower rank to that of an emperor, so they needed to act before it was too late.

Yang Qi’s friends and family were in the middle of discussing what to do now that the Buddhist Empire was taken care of when people came with a report.

“We have news! A large number of confucian colleges have come to join us. They are all groups that have lived in seclusion for many years. Now they're coming in waves. They have a population of roughly five quadrillion. Should we ordain them as nobility, or do something else?”

“Five quadrillion confucians?” Yang Susu said. “And they’re all powerful old-timers? I wonder how many God-Lords they have? You take care of the details. We’ll wait for His Majesty to return and make a decision. Tell them that he's in the Halls of Heaven, breaking through to the half-Annulled level. Once he succeeds, not even the Sovereign Lord would be a match for him. The nobility are like weapons, and we don’t have the right to make decisions in that regard. Besides, we can’t just appoint newcomers as nobility. They’ll understand. Just give them some gifts in the meantime.”

“Why don’t we go meet them personally,” Jadefall said. “You know, treat the virtuous men courteously and the scholars with respect. If we give them some gifts from the Halls of Heaven, it’ll earn their trust and loyalty.”

“That’s fine. But first we need to see how many God-Lords they have. How many are there?”

“They have a total of eight hundred, as well as three with psychic scales of a hundred billion.”

Chapter 1550: The Confucians Join

“What? Eight hundred God-Lords? That many?”

Yang Susu, Jadefall, and everyone else were shocked. The fact that the confucian colleges were this powerful was nothing less than terrifying. As it turned out, they really did believe the saying: When you’re unsuccessful, you should focus on your own cultivation. When you're successful, you should work hard to benefit all people.

Apparently, throughout the past hundred million years, there had been a lot of these people who had erred on the side of when you’re unsuccessful, you should focus on your own cultivation.

As for people with psychic scales of a hundred billion, they were the type who would provoke a double-take from anyone.

Jadefall and Yang Susu would have been happy with just a population increase of five quadrillion. Although some people might think that was a huge number, to the Sage Monarch Empire, it wasn’t.

Truth be told, it was normal to see a daily increase of five quadrillion.

In other words, it merely doubled the daily normal.

However, eight hundred God-Lords, including three with psychic scales of a hundred billion, were rare. That would be a big boost for the Sage Monarch Empire.

Before the war, the Sage Monarch Empire had boasted a large group of God-Lords. Unfortunately, more than half of them had been killed in the fighting, which was a brutal loss. Later, the ordainment of the nobility had resulted in a few people becoming God-Lords. But unfortunately, they still didn’t have anything close to their previous numbers.

Peak Paramount Gods with a psychic scale in the billions could be created easily. But God-Lords were another story. They generally required a lot of hard work, as well as significant destiny.

If they were really going to get eight hundred new God-Lords, it was going to be a significant change.

However, Jadefall and Yang Susu knew full well that plenty of old-timers were profound schemers. For all they knew, some or all of these people might be like the turtledove trying to occupy the magpie’s nest.

If a single God-Lord had shown up, or even ten, they would still have been suspicious, let alone eight hundred.

“Let’s go see what's going on.”

Everyone present rose to their feet.

“Exalted superiors, the people from the confucian colleges are waiting outside of the Everlasting Aegis. They set up camp there, and have already drawn up the formal papers of surrender. We invited them inside, but they refused. If you want to visit them, you’ll have to leave the Everlasting Aegis.”

“Oh,” Yang Susu said. “So it seems they're wary of us.”

She waved a finger, and a screen appeared, upon which was depicted the space outside the Sage Monarch Empire. There, a white aegis had been set up that resembled a college, and as it rotated, it pulsed with the righteousness of the confucians.

“It’s hard to believe that such an enormous and powerful force has come to surrender,” Yang Doom said. “This has got to be a trick.”

“There can never be too much deception in war,” the Shepherd said. “It’s to be expected. If they’ve come here to surrender, we can’t very well force them to stay away. After all, with a juicy morsel like this, how could we do anything other than swallow them whole? Besides, the buddhists we just crushed were about as fifth as powerful as the confucians. If we really do assimilate them, our foundation will become much stronger. I say, let’s devour them now and report the matter to Yang Qi later.”

“You go handle them,” a voice said. It was Yang Qi. “These are the confucian colleges that have been hiding out in primal-chaos. They were sent by the High Priestess to be spies, although not all of them intend to follow her instructions. Let them inside. It doesn’t matter how strong they are, they’ll submit to our destiny.”

From his vantage point in the Halls of Heaven, Yang Qi could see everything that was happening.

“Alright, let’s go out and meet them.”

The destiny of the empire stirred as the Everlasting Aegis appeared, and a road opened up, allowing them to walk outside.

The confucian college that had been set up wasn’t corporeal, but rather formed from a righteous and noble energy. And there were a host of people who were holding a meeting, all of whom were God-Lords.

Three had psychic scales of over a hundred billion, but actually, they seemed closer to two hundred billion, although they were trying to keep that secret. As for their appearances, one was an old man, one looked middle-aged, and the third looked young.

The old one looked like a saint, a person of virtue and prestige who understood everything in heaven and earth. The middle-aged man looked like someone used to wielding authority, and the young scholar seemed high-spirited and full of mettle.

They were the leaders of the confucian colleges.

Beneath them were eight hundred ordinary God-Lords, who pulsed with the righteous energy of the confucians.

Beyond them were the five quadrillion confucian students, who were busy reading books, reciting information, and the like. It was knowledge that could dispel the haze and propagate civilization and culture.

What was righteousness and justice?

It was the dissemination of civilization. It was making the world a better, more beautiful place. Everything other than that was wicked and heretical. Confucians were considered righteous and just because they spread knowledge and understanding.

It was the true dao of heaven.

After all, even heaven could be improved.

In the impure lands, landmasses would become planets only by virtue of the countless empires and the civilizations they represented.

Eventually, planets would become planetary systems in the same way.

Planetary systems would become immortal worlds, and those immortal worlds would grow to higher and higher quality.

Later, the highest-level immortal worlds would have a chance to break into the god world.

Now, the god world was preparing to break into another level of higher civilization. When heaven and earth went to a higher level, the impetus had to come from the living beings. And what was the foundation of forward progress among living beings? Civilization. Knowledge. Study. Wisdom.

For many years, the confucians had taken responsibility for the spread of knowledge; thus, they represented righteousness. They did everything in accord with the natural rules of heaven and earth.

That was what the confucians excelled at.

As Yang Qi looked down on them, he knew that the High Priestess had urged the leaders of the confucians to infiltrate his empire and spread their ideals. Their aim was to cause conflict with this sage monarch magistrates, hopefully sowing enough chaos that it would lead to a major collapse.

Sadly for them, that wasn’t going to happen.

Most empires collapsed because the scholar-officials ended up at odds with the emperor. And when the emperor wasn't strong enough to fight back, they would threaten him into relinquishing his power. Eventually, that would lead to the downfall of the empire.

“Chancellor Vicissitude, do you really think they’ll just let us join the Sage Monarch Empire?” a God-Lord asked. “Will they appoint us as nobility? Will they have us apply our confucian principles to the governing of the people?”

The old man to whom he spoke was one of the leaders of the confucians, and his name was Confucian Vicissitude.

His given name was a reference to the phrase vicissitudes of literature.

The middle-aged man was named Confucian Meaning, and the younger was Confucian Script.

“It's all part of our master plan,” Confucian Vicissitude said. “It won’t be possible to gain power immediately after joining the Sage Monarch Empire. Yang Qi is no fool. If he was, he wouldn’t have been able to establish such an amazing empire.”

“That’s true,” said Confucian Meaning. “I heard he uses some things called sage monarch magistrates to keep order and make sure everything is done fairly. It's not going to be easy to seize power. Most importantly, we don't know if we can do a better job of ruling.”

“The sage monarch magistrates run things too robotically,” said Confucian Script. “They lack human feelings. I'm curious to see exactly how they work. Regardless, assuming we’re accepted into the Sage Monarch Empire, they’ll definitely appoint us as nobility. Then we can start working our way into the various political circles, and slowly gather power. Before long, we’ll be on equal footing with the emperor. After all the years that have passed, there hasn't been a single empire worth infiltrating until now. None of them had good enough destiny. But now we have a good opportunity on our hands. As long as we run things well, and can tap into the destiny, we’ll eventually be able to take over.”

“That's how we confucians have always operated,” said one of the God-Lords. “But what about the alliance? They have a huge population, and it seems like a good opportunity to do something. The High Priestess wants to unify them into an empire. It should be easy to get the best government positions there. And taking control of a place like that would be a lot easier than the Sage Monarch Empire.”

“The three dynasties are declining on a daily basis,” Confucian Vicissitude said, “and their destiny is flawed. It's nowhere near that of the Sage Monarch Empire. Besides, the High Priestess is half-Annulled, and would probably try to use us as pawns.”

Chapter 1551: No Immediate Ordainment

“Furthermore,” Confucian Meaning said, “the Sage Monarch Empire currently has amazing destiny, and will likely end up ruling the god world. On the other hand, we have no way of knowing whether the three dynasties will combine into an empire.

“Besides, the High Priestess isn’t truly in control. Based on the information I got, her apprentice suggested combining the three dynasties, but was fiercely rejected. There are even some old-timers from the dynasties who want to have her killed. There’s simply no way that the High Priestess can control such a wide range of factors.”

The God-Lords present all quickly agreed. “Well, that’s a given. The empires that make up that alliance are all extremely famous, and they’ve been building their reputations for billions of years. How could they possibly give that up? And how could their emperors possibly agree to become government officials? The High Priestess wants to steal the fruit of other people’s labor. Meanwhile, neither the Invincible Dugu nor Proud Central have made a move yet.”

“She won’t succeed in her plan. However, she’s been recruiting old-timers from out in primal-chaos to join the alliance, all for the purpose of sowing chaos and gathering power. Sadly, the situation is hopeless, and her efforts aren’t going to do any good.”

“That’s right. If the High Priestess wants the destiny of the three dynasties, she’ll have to completely take them over by force. Unfortunately, that’s not a viable option. She’s skilled at demagoguery, but no good when it comes to ruling. Even if she did become the empress, there are too many interest groups at play. She can’t just kill everyone, nor can she completely replace the officialdom. And she doesn't have the God Legion Seal, so she can't control their thinking. She also doesn't have the sage monarch magistrates, who are cautious and conscientious in their governing. Whatever empire she formed would be as disunited as a dish of loose sand.”

All of the confucian God-Lords could see how difficult the matter of ruling was; not even the Sovereign Lord had been able to keep his empire united.

Good governments didn’t result from the application of raw power alone. Other assets were required, such as wisdom, technique, skill, and adaptability.

Truth be told, the confucians were shocked by Yang Qi’s governing techniques, not his strength. And it came down to how he could use the God Legion Seal to subjugate the top government officials, and control their thinking, then use his sage monarch magistrates to run everything smoothly.

The God Legion Seal and the sage monarch magistrates were his most deadly tools.

“The key to this will be negating the God Legion Seal and the sage monarch magistrates,” Confucian Vicissitude said. “That's how we’ll bring the Sage Monarch Empire under control. We’ve been watching things since ancient times, and we know that the God Legion Seal was the Sovereign Lord’s attempt to rule his empire and control the competing interest groups. But the Sovereign Lord had the wrong idea. He tried to focus all of the glory on himself, and as a result, he perished. Yang Qi used the God Legion Seal as the basis to create his sage monarch magistrates, but unlike the Sovereign Lord, he uses the faith of the people to bolster the people themselves. That way, they accept the karma, not him. A very smart move, and very impressive.”

“I wonder what rewards we’ll get for surrendering. Let’s not ask for positions as nobility or officials. But we definitely have to be allowed to open colleges and establish confucian ideals. Then, as we slowly gain more disciples, we can get more influence. Once people start having confidence in our confucian way of thinking, we can change their hearts and get rid of the sage monarch magistrates.”

“That's right. Changing the way of thinking of the masses is the key to transforming everything. The bureaucracy of the Sage Monarch Empire is too mechanical. In contrast, our way of thinking is people-oriented. We need to spread word that we care about people, and that they’re the foundation of everything. If we can convince everyone that the government officials should be human, then we confucians can take control easily.”

“But if we set up a bunch of schools and try to change the minds of the people, will Yang Qi interfere?”

“It’s possible. He's definitely very clever and ruthless. He might see through our plan.”

“It doesn’t matter. The sage monarch magistrates are lacking in human qualities, while we offer a more mainstream approach. Besides, when people lose their freedom and independence, how can the empire get stronger?”

“Let’s first get a feel for things, especially regarding the current leaders.”

Although the confucians present at the meeting had different ideas and goals, all of them wanted to get into the Sage Monarch Empire and establish colleges and schools there. They thought that if they could influence the thinking of the populace as a whole, they could overthrow the sage monarch magistrates and establish a confucian officialdom.

With an officialdom powerful enough, not even an emperor could deal with it.

Throughout history, there had been many civilizations in which the confucians grew so powerful the emperor couldn’t do anything about them. In fact, there were some situations in which the scholar-officials would make the decisions about which prince would end up inheriting the throne. In places like that, the scholar-officials ran everything, while the emperor was a figurehead who simply enjoyed a life of luxury in the palace.

In the end, they sometimes seized complete control and got rid of the emperor.

As the meeting was reaching an end, a voice rang into their ears. “Our dear confucian friends, we leaders of the Sage Monarch Empire would like to invite you to a chat.”

RUMBLE!

An enormous bridge had appeared outside, provoking expressions of praise from many of the students in the college. All of a sudden, everyone in the college felt immense pressure coming from outside, something strong enough to crush them all. They were five quadrillion strong, and the plan was for them to enter this new empire, become teachers, spread schools, and influence the masses.

But in the end, a population of five quadrillion just wasn’t very large.

“Come, let’s go offer formal greetings!”

The confucian God-Lords rushed out to see the leaders of the empire, who were of course Yang Susu, Jadefall, and the others. These leaders were backed by destiny so immense that the confucians would be damned by myriad tribulations if they opposed it.

The High Priestess didn’t dare to cross the Sage Monarch Empire, so how could a few quadrillion confucian scholars do so?

“You confucians have come to join the Sage Monarch Empire, correct?” Yang Susu said. “Impressed by our power, I suppose? Well, congratulations, you've made the right decision.”

She was obviously seizing control of the situation with her words.

“Ladies and gentlemen of the Sage Monarch Empire,” Confucian Vicissitude said, “it’s true that we’ve come here to surrender. However, we have some conditions. Surely you wish to treat the virtuous men courteously and the scholars with respect. Therefore, please allow us to—”

“There’s no need for that. Since you’ve come to surrender, of course we’ll treat the virtuous men courteously and the scholars with respect. You want to open colleges in our empire, correct? That's simple. We’ll support you, and even allow you to spread the ideals of confucian civilization. Hopefully, you can turn out plenty of talented people. Furthermore, we’re even willing to ordain you all as nobility, although that’ll have to wait until the emperor himself returns. He's the one that does such ordaining. However many of you there are, we’ll keep a record and reward you for it. His Majesty Yang Qi is currently in the Halls of Heaven, breaking through to the half-Annulled level. He should be back soon.”

“Men. Bring out the gifts we've prepared from the Sovereign Lord’s Halls of Heaven. There are plenty of items our confucian friends will love to have.”

Even as the words left her mouth, piles of ancient records and other things were brought forward as gifts.

“What? These are confucian records from the Halls of Heaven?” The confucians’ faces were fairly glowing with anticipation. They had never forgotten how the Sovereign Lord persecuted them long ago, and killed so many of them. Many of their top figures in the past had been just on the verge of reaching the half-Annulled level when the Sovereign Lord executed them. It had been nothing short of a disaster.

And of course, numerous ancient records had been lost in that time.

The confucians had long dreamed of somehow getting those records back. But now, the Sage Monarch Empire was giving them out as a gift. It seemed like a gift from heaven itself. All of a sudden, many of them felt gratitude for the empire welling up in their hearts.

“Praise heaven!” many of their God-Lords said, dropping to their knees, their eyes filling with tears.

Yang Susu and the others smiled as they saw that their plan was working. The confucians had planned to worm their way into the hearts of the people, but Yang Qi’s people were planning to do the same to them. And this was only the first step.

Once the confucians were part of the empire, the next parts of the plan would be accomplished easily.

Chapter 1552: Important Debates

How could Yang Qi not realize what the confucians were really up to? In order to create his government, he’d carefully studied innumerable civilizations that had existed throughout history. Considering how huge the god world was, and the countless nations that existed within it, it begged the question of exactly how many civilizations that included. And that was taking in billions upon billions of years of history.

Yang Qi had studied them all carefully.

Only then did he set his targets on the confucians.

They were the best at running governments, so much so that it was pointless to mention them in the same breath as devils or demons. The latter didn’t care about order at all. With them, the law of the jungle prevailed, and the weak were the prey of the strong. Chaos reigned. The daoists and buddhists were slightly better, but not much, and they were always plagued by corruption.

The confucians were the only ones who espoused knowledge, and constantly maintained the spark of civilization. However, no matter how well they ran things, they could never avoid the maxim that all things start to crumble after reaching the zenith.

Yang Qi’s sage monarch magistrates possessed the quintessence of the confucians, but at the same time, had removed any last bit of rubbish that their teachings contained. The infiltrating confucians had a simple plan: spread knowledge, then stir up public sentiment with falsehoods. Seize power, then usurp the Son of Heaven and turn him into nothing but a tool to be manipulated. Then they could seize the destiny of the nation and form a truly confucian empire.

That was how confucians had done things in all of the countless civilizations in which they existed. And the empires in which they operated were helpless to do anything about them.

Any truly mighty emperor who wanted to control his empire would have to call on the help of the confucians. And they would surreptitiously infiltrate every aspect of the government, until they controlled the emperor himself.

Even the Sovereign Lord had fallen victim to their scheme.

He had used numerous confucians in his government, and they had eventually tried to seize power. Sadly for them, he had, in his fury, executed almost all of them. Unfortunately, the removal of the confucians created a huge power vacuum, and in the end, the entire thing was destroyed.

It had really been a lose-lose situation.

The reason Yang Qi was allowing the confucians into his empire, and was even going so far as to encourage them to establish schools of learning, was that the more order they created, the more sage monarch magistrates he would get. In the end, he would force them to accept his rulership and do away with confucian thinking, or at least the negative aspects. For instance, there would be no cliques or interest groups, and there would be no sharing of imperial power.

He would let them spread knowledge as long as it benefited him, but he wouldn’t let them have any true influence.

When the confucians finally entered his empire, it was to their shock that they found things were very different than they had imagined. There were already countless schools of learning, in which instruction was given in reading, writing, language, daoist techniques, divine abilities, magical laws, machinery, culture, cultivation, godhood, and even business.

Even more astonishing to the confucians was that the students had the option to study whatever interested them.

They had originally envisioned marching into the empire, setting up schools, and getting masses of students to flock to them for learning. Then they could use those schools to propagate their philosophy and subtly promote their own way of doing things. However, contrary to expectation, there were already a host of schools in existence. And everyone in the empire had the option to attend classes.

When the confucians set up their schools, people would flock to them to learn divine abilities and magical techniques. But when they tried spreading their unique way of thinking, not a single student would attend their classes.

The reason was that Yang Qi’s way of thinking had long since permeated the land, and everyone was used to giving their faith to the empire. In fact, they didn’t even give faith to their emperor. In this empire, even the emperor was beholden to the law.

And of course, the sage monarch magistrates saw to it that everything ran according to the law.

Soon, the confucians and their existing students started protesting. They complained that the sage monarch magistrates didn’t run things properly, and were too strict, taking away the freedom of the people in the empire.

The leaders of the empire quickly sent this news to Yang Qi.

Of course, he had simply been waiting for this to happen, and had already prepared a response. Thus, it was announced that there would be debate competitions in every college in the empire! And the debates would be held between the sage monarch magistrates and the confucian disciples!

They would talk about politics, national identity, issues among the citizens, history, civilization, and a host of other topics. Everyone in the empire was invited to attend, and they were encouraged to listen to whoever made the most sense. It was a fair arrangement, and the confucian disciples had to admit that it made sense. If the empire had tried to suppress them, they would have incited further unrest, but instead, they were given a chance to speak their mind in the open, in front of the eyes of all.

Soon, the debates were underway everywhere.

Almost immediately, the confucians were flabbergasted by how ineffective their arguments were. There was no way that they could call themselves sages of any sort. As it turned out, even the average citizens in the empire were extremely knowledgeable, and would often ask questions that were so difficult the confucians found themselves tongue-tied and unable to respond.

When the sage monarch magistrates taught classes, they would encourage debate, regardless of the topic at hand. And they taught classes in a witty and interesting manner, constantly quoting the classics and teaching in a way that surpassed any of the confucians.

After all, the sage monarch magistrates were a collective that contained knowledge from innumerable civilizations. Their understanding of everything from mathematical calculations to daoist techniques actually surpassed that of the God-Lords.

Each sage monarch magistrate was like an embodiment of the heavenly workings calculations systems, and they could perform functions that would normally take hosts of photonic computers working together to do. The sage monarch magistrates were good at everything. For example, when common citizens had problems with their cultivation, or had personal disputes, they could always seek answers from the magistrates.

They weren’t just administrators, they were also all-knowing teachers. In fact, most people in the empire didn't view the sage monarch magistrate as government officials, but rather as tools, or expressions of the law.

The confucians’ entire plan had revolved around getting people to think of the sage monarch magistrates as cold-hearted, inhuman machines that weren’t fit to serve as officials. Simultaneously, they would set themselves up as all-knowing sages who were worthy of respect and even worship. By slowly changing the hearts of the people, they would then be able to seize power.

But now, they realized that wouldn’t be possible. In fact, the truth was that they couldn’t match up to many of the common citizens, let alone the sage monarch magistrates.

As the debate competitions continued, the confucians lost over and over again.

“Ai! Another confucian lost a debate. They're always struck speechless by the sage monarch magistrates.”

“Those confucians want to be teachers? They can’t even hold their own in a debate. They're completely useless. They probably ought to study history a bit more.”

“That’s right. It's really a pity. We haven’t even been alive that long, yet we've been taught so much by the sage monarch magistrates. We know of the downsides of all sorts of civilizations, and we've identified our own dao. We're actually superior to those pedantic confucians. And they want to be in charge of us?”

“What? The confucians want to be in charge? You've got to be kidding me!”

Such talk could even be heard among children in the empire who were only a few years old.

The Sage Monarch Empire hadn’t existed for long, but time passed differently in the Everlasting Aegis. There had already been several generations of children born.

“It would be better to have pigs in charge than them. Even we can beat them in a debate, and they want to run things? Yeah right. Our sage monarch magistrates are trillions of times superior to them. Ai. What a ridiculous situation.”

“Maybe if they put in a few more years of study, they might reach the same level as us ordinary citizens of the Sage Monarch Empire.”

The debates went so poorly for the confucians that many were coughing up blood in shock. Of course, the failure of the debates shook the foundations of many of the confucians.

With this one move, Yang Qi had broken their dao hearts.

A few months went by, and while the confucians continued teaching classes, they hadn’t made any progress in establishing a power base. In fact, most people just made fun of them for their lack of knowledge.

The sage monarch magistrates were like mountains that absolutely crushed the confidence of the confucians. Confucians didn’t fear military conflict, nor did they fear death.

Yet when it came to debate, they were flummoxed. And that went to show how deeply they were shaken internally. In fact, because of the debates, Yang Qi was actually learning more about the governing of nations.

Deep in his heart, radiance and light shone, and he felt as though he was just on the verge of grasping at the half-Annulled.

Chapter 1553: Convincing People with Virtue

“Absurd! Preposterous!”

Three months later, the leaders of the confucians, the eight hundred God-Lords, and the three top experts Confucian Vicissitude, Confucian Meaning, and Confucian Script, were holding a big meeting. All of them were flustered and exasperated as, in the months that had passed, none of them had recruited a single loyal disciple.

Their effort had resulted in a major defeat. Never could they have guessed that the civilization of the Sage Monarch Empire was so advanced. In fact, because of the debates that had been held, many confucian students had been influenced by the empire, and begun changing their ideals and way of thinking.

After all, everyone wanted to be a part of an advanced and progressive civilization. The civilization of Yang Qi’s empire surpassed anything the confucians could ever have brought to realization. As the students of confucianism learned this, they realized that they were pursuing an incorrect path, and that Yang Qi’s way was the right one.

“Who could have guessed that the people in the Sage Monarch Empire would be so stubborn?” Confucian Vicissitude said, sounding utterly discomfited. “Why? Every single one of us is an amazing confucian scholar, a great sage with vast experience in education. People will claw over each other tooth and nail to get us to teach them, but here they just laugh at us. It seems we’ve underestimated the capabilities of the sage monarch magistrates. They aren’t government officials, they're part of the natural laws of the dao of heaven. And they’re constantly transforming. We need to come up with a new plan. Changing the hearts of the people isn’t going to work.”

“But what do you suggest we do now?” Confucian Meaning said angrily. “In the debates over the past three months, we confucians have been completely trounced over and over again. We've become a complete laughingstock in this empire. Damnation! We should’ve realized that the debate proposition was a trap. I'm honestly shocked that we’ve lost so badly, even though we held back from using force!”

When confucians tried to take over a government, they always faced opposition, and the main way they overcame it was to hold public debates to sway the general public. Generally speaking, they could crush buddhists in debates.

But when debating the sage monarch magistrates, they were completely routed.

There had been some occasions in which the confucian students openly accused the sage monarch magistrates of being unfit to serve as government officials.

The magistrates didn't lose their temper, nor did they resort to force. They just discussed the matter publicly, even asking for suggestions from the confucians, which they would subsequently debunk.

The confucians were crushed completely.

Even Confucian Vicissitude and Confucian Meaning had been defeated in debate, causing a huge loss of face for the confucians in general. They were even thinking of leaving the Sage Monarch Empire.

However, they knew that if they defected, the empire would never forgive them, and they would likely be killed. And they had no doubt that Yang Qi was controlling all of this.

Yang Qi was just waiting for them to try to try to defect, whereupon he would punish them severely.

“Teachers, if things keep going on like this, we're going to be in extreme danger,” one of the confucian God-Lords said. “Our plan failed. There’s no way we’ll depose or recruit the sage monarch magistrates. In fact, it's going to be difficult to maintain the reputation of confucianism. Of the five quadrillion students we brought with us, one percent have already left confucianism. The sage monarch magistrates are experts at government, and in fact, they seem to understand more about culture and civilization than we do. They’re creating a new path that will be used to transcend everything, and reach the Annulled level. At this rate, it will only take four or five years for us to lose all of our students!”

“Come on, let’s get out of here!” another God-Lord said through gritted teeth. “There’s no benefit to us if we stay here. In fact, we're just giving more destiny to the empire. Let’s go to the alliance of three dynasties. We’ll have plenty of opportunities to take advantage of there. We can use the power of the High Priestess to quickly reach high levels of authority, which just isn’t going to be possible here in the Sage Monarch Empire. Nothing we’ve done in the past three months has helped, and we’ve lost every debate we participated in. This has been an unmitigated disaster.”

“Defect? You think Yang Qi doesn’t know we might try that?” Confucian Vicissitude sighed. “We completely failed. If you ride a tiger, it's hard to get off, and now we’re in the position where we can't go forward, and we can't go back. The only thing we can do now is hunker down and hope that we can slowly make some headway.”

“But if we do nothing, more and more of our people are going to become ordinary citizens of the empire. When we're the only ones left, then what?”

“Don’t worry,” Confucian Meaning said, a vicious smile on his face. “We’ll find a way to get a message to the High Priestess. A coordinated effort from inside and out will definitely result in the destruction of the Sage Monarch Empire.”

“Destroy the Sage Monarch Empire?” Confucian Script said. “I’m afraid that’s not going to happen. Furthermore, destroying it wouldn’t do any good. The High Priestess will treat us like cannon fodder. Besides, we know definitively that the sage monarch magistrates are superior to us in the ways of governing nations. Otherwise, how could we have lost every single debate over the last three months? The only explanation is that we really aren’t as knowledgeable as them. We have to change, that much is obvious. The only option is to acknowledge that we lost, then work on improving ourselves. Bring forth new ideas, and blaze new trails. When our confucian theories have been made more perfect, we can have a new round of debates.”

“Moron!” Confucian Vicissitude barked. “You’re not thinking straight, Script! We came to the Sage Monarch Empire to take control, not the other way around! Don’t tell me you’ve been deluded by the debates, too! If we really can’t take control, our only option is to make a surreptitious escape. We can’t stay here.”

“But how do we leave?” Confucian Script said coldly. “You yourself said we can move neither forward nor backward. And if we stay, we’ll eventually lose ourselves and be homogenized into the empire.”

“Simple,” Confucian Meaning said. “We coordinate both an internal and an external assault. On the one hand, we can pretend that we’ve decided to convert to the Sage Monarch Empire’s way of thinking. But in reality, we’ll secretly make contact with the High Priestess! The Sage Monarch Empire is going to belong to us confucians eventually. Nothing can change that inevitability. And if we can't persuade them with words, we’ll just conquer them.”

“Conquer them?” a voice said. “I thought you confucians were focused on loyalty. I thought you cared about peace and security the most. But here you are, planning a revolt. I gave you many chances. I gave you the debates. You had the chance to win out over the sage monarch magistrates. If you had, you could’ve earned a lot of power and authority. But instead, you’re forsaking your own path. What a pity. Thanks to losing those debates, even the common citizens think of you as trash. In your hearts, you know that we represent the advancement of civilization, yet you still want to defect? That’s simply unforgivable.”

A shadowy figure stepped out into the open, and it was Yang Qi!

“What?!”

The three confucian leaders shot to their feet in astonishment, and the eight hundred God-Lords instantly prepared to start fighting.

“What. Planning on attacking me?” Yang Qi glanced around at them. “This is my empire. Do you people really want to throw yourselves at me like an egg thrown at a boulder?”

He wasn’t afraid of them at all. This was his empire, and here, not even the High Priestess could attack him without getting killed. With destiny at his back and the dao of heaven on his side, he was impervious to attack.

Furthermore, thanks to his effort to repair the Ancient Road to the Gods, and because of what he had learned from the three months of debates, he was just on the verge of the half-Annulled level. At that point, he wouldn’t even need national destiny to defeat the confucians.

“Yang Qi!” Confucian Vicissitude said. He sounded nervous. He knew that even with numbers on their side, they wouldn’t be able to do anything to this opponent.

After all, if it was possible to kill Yang Qi like that, the High Priestess would have already made a move on him.

“What. You confucians really don’t understand proper etiquette? You're supposed to kneel in the presence of the emperor.”

RUMBLE!

As the words left his mouth, waves of vital energy crushed down, causing creaking sounds to echo out as the God-Lords were forced down.

“On your knees!”

Only the three leaders remained standing, although their joints creaked and their backs were bent as they struggled against the force.

“Still not going to kneel?” Yang Qi barked, whereupon destiny suddenly rushed in, and the three experts dropped to the floor.

“This is my empire, and not even the High Priestess, a half-Annulled expert, can defy the destiny here. You three confucians really hid your true motives well, but in the end, you can’t defy me. When you became citizens of the empire, you agreed to my rules. But here you are, holding a secret meeting in which you’re opposing the interests of the empire. How exactly should I react?

“I gave you the chance to prove yourselves through debate, but you lost. And now you’re talking about colluding with outsiders? You’ve violated the mortal integrity of confucianism! But don’t worry. I'm not going to kill you. However, I’m going to tell everyone in existence what you’ve done. All common citizens will see exactly what kind of people you are. And I'm sure you can imagine how they’ll want you punished.”

“No!” Confucian Meaning blurted. “If that happens, confucianism will become infamous for all time!”

Chapter 1554: Connecting the Ancient Road

The confucians often talked about mortal integrity. They claimed that they would rather die than lose it. Yet in response to losing in the debates, the confucian leaders were hatching a conspiracy, which couldn’t have been more of a humiliation of confucian ideals.

If word leaked of this, then the ordinary confucian students would feel ashamed to the core. After all, many such students had already been attracted by the sage monarch magistrates’ way of doing things, and enjoyed the general environment of the empire.

Their leaders were more than willing to engage in double-dealing and backstabbing to further their own interests, and would even go so far as to abandon the righteousness of confucianism. They were stern and awe-inspiring people who stood high above others, telling everyone what to do. If the truth was exposed, they would fall from grace so badly that they would never recover.

“What do you think? It’s not too late to devote yourself to my empire. I can give you official posts as teachers, as long as you wholeheartedly espouse my ways. I won’t make you nobility, but you’ll have a chance to rise up even further once war breaks out with the three dynasties. You know, I could’ve forcibly subjugated you, but frankly speaking, I wasn’t interested in using the God Legion Seal in that way. My empire is bringing the civilization of the god world to a higher level, and if you come along, you’ll benefit personally. Refuse to cooperate, and you won’t. People who live in an advanced civilization can’t accept reverting to barbarism, and that’s exactly what the people from the three dynasties are like.”

Some of the leaders immediately gave in.

“We’re willing to surrender!”

“We’ll serve you, especially if it means we can become nobility eventually.”

They understood the hidden meaning of Yang Qi’s words. They would be required to fight the three dynasties to earn merit and have their criminal record wiped clean. And if they performed well enough, they might be ordained as nobles.

At this point, the confucian experts were having a hard time refusing. They knew that they had lost in the debates, and as such, if they wanted to become true sages, leading the people of the empire in some sort of revolt wasn’t the right thing to do.

“That’s good,” Yang Qi said. “You can't afford to take this situation lightly. Granted, you were only discussing revolt, and never took any action, so I won’t enforce the death penalty. Instead, you’ll go to the mightiest of the temples in the dynasty, where you’ll pray to the empire for forgiveness. You’ll also pray for the empire itself, imploring its destiny to improve and for the empire to shine like a blazing sun. If you’re insincere, the destiny will be blackened, and everyone will see it clearly.” Raising his voice, he said, “Sage monarch magistrates!”

“Sir!” Swarms of magistrates converged on the college where the meeting had been taking place.

The confucian leaders were herded to an enormous temple where hosts of government officials and magistrates were in the process of offering prayers.

“Sage monarch magistrates,” Yang Qi said, “lead the confucian leaders in prayers for forgiveness. When their sincere prayers lead to improved destiny, they can leave, their crimes forgiven.”

It was a vicious move.

He was forcing them into this action, and if they didn’t pray sincerely, it would stain the destiny, and they would be wiped out by it.

Yang Qi wasn't worried that they might fight back. By forcing them to pray for forgiveness, he had completely shattered their faith. Normally speaking, confucians focused on righteousness and status, and would rather die than submit. But by his careful plan, he had destroyed their dao hearts and forced them to do exactly that.

Having accomplished this, Yang Qi headed back to the Halls of Heaven. Looking down, he could see the destiny of his empire climbing higher, which confirmed that the confucians had been subjugated. They had hoped to infiltrate his empire and take the destiny for their own. Instead, they ended up sincerely praying to the empire, and increasing its destiny.

The influx of leaders was going to be a boon for the empire. They needed human leaders in general, and what was more, Confucian Vicissitude, Confucian Meaning, and Confucian Script all had psychic scales of two hundred billion. With them praying to the empire, the place would be stronger than ever.

That wasn’t to mention the five quadrillion students they had brought with them. They were now inextricably linked to his empire, and would live or die with it. That was the attitude that all citizens had. Without the empire, they were nothing.

In this regard, they were the same as Yang Qi.

‘The destiny is going to expand even more now. The ocean of faith is almost completely integrated with my empire, so now, the destiny of the Sage Monarch Empire is vastly superior to the hodgepodge of the three dynasties. The only thing I lack now is population. I'm way behind in population!’

Although he had superior destiny, when it came to outright war, he would still be in a very dangerous situation. The three dynasties just had too many people. And if the High Priestess managed to truly unite them, by using confucians to help in governing, for example, then their destiny would rise to a level higher than that of the Sage Monarch Empire.

An alliance like theirs hadn’t even existed in the Sovereign Lord’s time.

Furthermore, Yang Qi could see powerful streams of energy entering the alliance from the primal-chaos on the outside. Obviously, the High Priestess had roused numerous top experts who would be more than happy to take advantage of the chaos in the alliance to benefit themselves.

Normally speaking, they wouldn’t do such a thing, for fear of being found out, captured, and ultimately enslaved.

‘What's this...?’ Yang Qi looked over at the Central Dynasty to find that King Immortal-Slayer’s aura had vanished, as had that of Proud Central. And the energy of the Lord of Righteous Justice was nowhere to be found.

King Immortal-Slayer had previously been connected to the destiny of the Sage Monarch Empire, as he had been ordained as the imperial preceptor. But now his aura was gone. Did that mean he was dead? Or had he been captured?

‘Don’t tell me Proud Heaven has made a move,’ Yang Qi thought. Looking closer, he realized that Proud Heaven’s aura was nowhere to be found either. Given his vantage point over the god world as a whole, that was very strange. He couldn't find the High Priestess either, but she was a Half-Annulled expert. Proud Heaven wasn’t. Yang Qi should have been able to see him as easily as Yang Voidprime.

But that simply wasn’t the case.

‘He must have killed his father. Don’t tell me my plan succeeded already. Perhaps they wounded each other. If it's the former, then the plan is progressing beyond what I’d intended. I wanted the two of them to injure each other. I hadn’t planned for Proud Heaven to devour Proud Central. This seems to indicate that Proud Heaven has some immensely powerful ally....’

Yang Qi performed some calculations, and came to the conclusion that the essence of the god world had to be helping Proud Heaven. It had helped him improve his Ten Universe by tenfold, which was how he had devoured Proud Central.

Yang Qi’s plan had worked, it was just that he hadn’t anticipated the essence of the god world supporting Proud Heaven.

In any case, nothing had really changed. He still needed to open the Ancient Road to the Gods and rescue all of his friends and family from the impure lands. With the right boost in population, his empire would reach the ultimate peak. And that was even more the case, considering his people would all be Ascendants. He had already adjusted the Everlasting Aegis to accommodate everyone from the lower worlds, and ensure that they became gods.

And those who couldn’t reach that level would still be Quasi-Gods, which would ensure that they could at least survive in the god world.

“Destiny Improvement. Ancient Road to the Gods. Juncture Creation!”

Drawing on his divine abilities, Yang Qi summoned a gold and jade bridge, drawing on the destiny of his empire to reach levels of power that surpassed that of the High Priestess.

Creak. Crack.

Beneath the Halls of Heaven, the essence of the god world retreated, and slowly but surely, the lower worlds came into view.

Yang Qi drew on another powerful divine ability, thrusting his palm out as he used the Hand of the One God to span space-time and create a new bridge.

He instantly felt the opposition of the essence of the god world.

‘Now I understand why the Ancient Road to the Gods disappeared. It was the only path from the lower worlds to the god world. The lower worlds have natural laws that are different from the god world, which is why Ascendants are so powerful. To the god world, such people are foreign parasites. The more Ascendants, the more parasites! And that's bad for the god world! The god world is essentially alive, and those people who are born in it are subject to its magical law. That's why they're easier to control. As the god world grows, it gains awareness. It's waking up. And it’s just doing whatever it can to reduce the number of parasites within it. Well, I'm going to reopen the Ancient Road to the Gods and bring all of my friends and family up here, along with all their people. It will violate the taboos of the god world, but that's what I have to do. Besides, the essence of the god world is already opposing me. I bet Proud Heaven gobbling up Proud Central was just the god world trying to cause trouble for me.’

Chapter 1555: Essence of the God World

Yang Qi couldn’t help but be a bit excited.

With the connection to the impure lands restored, he would finally be able to bring up his friends and family. The Sage Monarch Empire would have fresh blood, Ascendants who could flout the natural laws of the god world. They wouldn’t be like the ordinary inhabitants of the god world, who had trouble with every step of cultivation they took.

Yang Qi could use the destiny of his empire to help his Ascendant brethren rise to the level of God-Lords. However, he had other experts whose psychic scales were over nine billion, but couldn’t proceed any further. Yang Qi had a feeling that the natural laws of the god world were holding them back, making it difficult for them to achieve breakthroughs.

There wasn’t anything he could do about it. The essence of the god world just wouldn’t permit immensely powerful entities to rise up.

But if he could get a huge influx of Ascendants, boosting his population to greater heights, there was no question that he would have the most powerful empire, one capable of crushing the alliance of three dynasties.

Normally speaking, only a half-Annulled expert could reopen the Ancient Road to the Gods, which meant that Yang Qi shouldn’t have been able to. But as an emperor, he could use destiny to bolster himself. Furthermore, the Halls of Heaven could help him surpass the god world, and allow him to see its natural laws from a different vantage point.

“So, god world, you closed the Ancient Road to the Gods, hoping to prevent more Ascendants from showing up. Unfortunately, you're a world. The more Ascendants that come, the more new civilizations there will be. My empire will use your essence to give rise to a new civilization. In all of the many heavens that exist, the civilization of the gods is the most advanced. For now. I'm going to surpass it. And then you’ll also be able to ascend to a higher level. What do you think?”

Yang Qi was hoping that his words would stir the essence of the god world, and cause it to loosen some of its constraints.

Sadly, his efforts were futile.

The god world wouldn’t simply agree to loosen its bonds and reopen the Ancient Road to the Gods.

“Fine. Be opened!” Yang Qi wrenched his hands through the air, severing the essence of the god world in the area, and allowing the power of the Halls of Heaven to rush forth like a river.

Whoosh!

The essence of the god world began to converge, causing glittering light to form into what appeared to be a young woman with long hair, wearing an elegant and simple garment. Unexpectedly, this woman appeared to be Yang Qi’s mother, Greensura!

“Mother?” Yang Qi said, his gaze suddenly turning indescribably sharp. ‘No wonder I couldn't sense her aura in the Central Dynasty, or on Proud Heaven. Proud Heaven devoured Proud Central because the essence of the god world was causing trouble. It supports Proud Heaven, and has even taken my mother in an attempt to strike at me. Does it really think I'll fall for something like that? My empire, my civilization, is going to be something indescribably mighty. I'm going to transcend anything and everything. And that means I'm going to rescue my mother too. Even if she’s been completely wiped out of existence, I’ll bring her back. Once my cultivation base surpasses everything in the god world, all of its natural laws will be nothing but an illusion to me.’

Although this woman resembled his mother, she wasn’t the real Greensura. She was a product of the essence of the god world, sent to stop him from reopening the Ancient Road to the Gods. He had been marked by the essence, and it was using Proud Heaven in its attempt to kill him.

Of course, Proud Heaven was an extremely ambitious person. If he could use the essence of the god world to help him kill Yang Qi, then he would definitely turn on it. He would devour that essence, absorb the god world into his Universes, and then transcend.

“Heaven and Earth Unmatched; Sun and Moon Sink to Oblivion; Destruction of the Universe; Space and Time Collapse....” Yang Qi unhesitatingly launched a deadly attack on the essence of the god world.

In response, the god world had Greensura’s visage wave a hand, causing a shield of light to rise up and block the attack.

Yang Qi’s gaze grew sharper, causing sword light to converge, which then exploded into millions upon millions of streams of sword energy that slammed into the shield, peppering it with damage.

“Be destroyed!”

The combined image of a god and devil appeared behind Yang Qi, the fusion of the True Devil and the Sovereign Lord. The half-devil half-god thrust its hands out, creating a green claw that could obscure the sun and obfuscate the heavens. Devil energy surged toward the essence of the god world, as if to transform it into an endless hell of devils.

This was truly something from the True Devil.

The boundless True Devil had created as many hells as the eternal sands, and they existed outside of the god world. However, the horde of devils couldn’t actually come to the god world, as the Ancient Road to the Gods was defended by the Executors of the Ancient Road. The Executors would kill any demons or devils they saw on sight.

Years ago in hell, there had been entities similar to the gods who had risen up. Unfortunately for them, the countless wars that were waged in hell ensured that such entities faded away into nothing. It was only in the impure lands that such beings could lurk indefinitely. And if Yang Qi used the psychic quintessence of the Mahātmā Jade to bring the armies of hell into the god world, the horde of devils would throw everything into chaos.

The enormous devil claw was the ultimate attack of the True Devil. And given Yang Qi’s strength, it was entirely possible that it was on the same level as the True Devil’s. In fact, because it was fused with destiny, it was something the True Devil never could have done, even in his prime.

The devil claw surged toward the essence of the god world, but the greyspace the essence had erected blocked its path. However, Yang Qi then followed it up with the Hand of the One God. Both were hands that could cover all things in existence.

The dao of devils was one of destruction and carnage.

The dao of gods was one of conquering and order.

The True Devil’s claw was smashing at the shield created by the god world, thirsting to unleash hells and destroy everything. Meanwhile, the Sovereign Lord’s hand was out to conquer everything and turn it into a personal plaything.

Pop!

The essence of the god world was pierced through, and Yang Qi’s power reached the impure lands, causing the Ancient Road to the Gods to start forming anew. With his Lord’s Eye, he could now see the vast conglomeration of immortal worlds below.

Things looked different now. Thanks to the Great Necropolis continuously spewing out so many immortal worlds, the place was filled with numerous three thousandth ranked worlds.

The population was staggering.

Yang Qi could already sense his friends and family.

The people he had left were now boundless patriarchs, constantly working on their cultivation in the hopes of reaching the god world. Shockingly, they had set up a huge empire, and were gathering destiny in the hopes of breaking the barrier to the god world.

With the Ancient Road to the Gods gone, the only way for them to get stronger was to use destiny. And that was their only hope of reaching the god world. Sadly, their efforts were all in vain.

“Such a huge population,” Yang Qi breathed. The impure lands were packed. In the lowest of the planetary systems, people were constantly advancing their cultivation and rising to the immortal worlds. But unfortunately, no one could ever reach the god world.

If things kept going this way, the immortal worlds would eventually collapse. The resources here just weren’t sufficient to support such a huge population. Eventually, they would run out, and everything would implode.

Thankfully, the Great Necropolis had ejected countless high-level immortal worlds, ensuring that a long time would pass before things reached that state.

Unfortunately, the dao of immortals was definitely reaching the point of being overcrowded. Resources were starting to grow scarce, and even the three thousandth ranked worlds were too small.

Yang Qi’s friends and family occupied the best locations, and were domineering forces that no one could fight against. After all, he had given them all boosts of power from the God Legion Seal.

No individual from the dao of immortals could ever surpass them.

Nobody like Yang Qi could rise up again, and since the Ancient Road to the Gods had been cut off, there was no way for fresh blood to descend from the god world.

The immortal worlds were stagnant, and would eventually be overwhelmed with death. And that was what the essence of the god world wanted.

How could the god world ever have guessed that Yang Qi would advance so rapidly, or make an empire that he could use so effectively? He was already right on the verge of the half-Annulled level. With his destiny, and the combined power of the Sovereign Lord and the True Devil, he had broken free from the prison of the god world.

Yang Qi couldn’t go to the immortal worlds as his true self.

He was so powerful that if he went there, his mere presence would destroy everything and kill everyone.

Therefore, he very carefully sent down a sliver of will.

Whooooooosh!

A massive vortex sprang up, sucking in countless immortal worlds. At the same time, Yang Qi’s friends and family received a message from him.

Chapter 1556: Everyone Ascends

Yang Qi’s divine will permeated the immortal worlds, using King Heaven-Devourer’s talismans to suck up all of the countless individuals that lived there, and bring them to his God Legion Paradise. That would ensure that the people didn't suffer any adverse side effects from the magical laws of the god world.

After all, only mid Terrifying experts could actually get into the god world without dying instantly.

Yang Qi had experienced some difficulties when he’d first arrived, but his friends and family had his protection, and suffered no such consequences.

As they arrived in the God Legion Paradise, they shivered as they were instantly brought up to the mid Terrifying level. In fact, some of them immediately reached the Lesser God level.

With the destiny Yang Qi had at his command, he could take a puny Quasi-God and ordain them as a God-Lord. Considering that, making his friends and family Lesser Gods took almost no effort at all.

In fact, it would take minimal effort to ensure that hundreds of millions of people reached either the Quasi-God or Lesser God level.

Yang Qi took many people and made them citizens of his empire. All citizens would benefit from the destiny of the empire, and it would allow their cultivation bases to rise rapidly to, at a very minimum, the Lesser God level.

That was one of the benefits of fusing the Sovereign Lord’s ocean of faith with the destiny of his empire.

RUMBLE!

As Yang Qi pulled his friends and family from the impure lands into his God Legion Paradise, the Ancient Road to the Gods trembled as though it might collapse at any moment. Despite how strong Yang Qi was, he could only sustain this effort for a short while. In the end, he wasn’t actually a half-Annulled expert.

However, even in the short bit of time that had passed, he had already pulled a quintillion people up. That was no small number; it was already many times the existing population of the Sage Monarch Empire.

Most were either Quasi-Gods or Lesser Gods, although some were in the mid Terrifying level, which meant that even just surviving would be difficult for them at the moment.

After ensuring that they were all ready, Yang Qi sent them into the depths of the Sage Monarch Empire.

Within the Everlasting Aegis, they were met by the sage monarch magistrates and other representatives, then shown to where special lands had been prepared for their use.

Primal-chaos paleo-energy had been used to create endless resources that they could use for their cultivation.

“Friends from the immortal worlds,” a sage monarch magistrate said, “you’re now in the god world. Our great leader, His Majesty Yang Qi, the very same one who unified the immortal worlds, has established a grand empire, of which you are now a part. For now, you only need to focus on rest and recovery....” It made things easy that most of these people were already familiar with Yang Qi, or had even been close to him. As a result, it wasn’t hard for them to adjust to their new circumstances.

In fact, before long, the sage monarch magistrates were taking them to be integrated into the existing society of the Sage Monarch Empire.

They were welcomed with open arms. The people of the Sage Monarch Empire knew that Yang Qi had reopened the Ancient Road to the Gods and brought numerous Ascendants to bolster the population of the empire. And such a boost in population would only help the empire grow.

The empire’s destiny and resources had already been in a perfect state. But as the Ascendants arrived, they began to pray and work on their cultivation; therefore, what little destiny they drew on was immediately made up for, or even surpassed.

Ascendant were essentially living resources. After all, in the past, it had been common for the various nations in the god world to capture Ascendants and use them for the nations’ benefit.

RUMBLE!

A few hours later, the Ancient Road to the Gods closed. Yang Qi had moved virtually everyone from the lower worlds up to the god world, to the point where almost no one had been left behind. And now, he had an uncountable amount of Ascendants.

Of course, the massive influx of Ascendants meant that the resource stockpiles of the empire would start shrinking. However, there was still plenty to be taken from the Halls of Heaven. Besides, it wasn’t as if Lesser Gods would consume that many resources. A single Paramount God would use as many resources as a hundred billion Lesser Gods.

Of course, that meant that as the Ascendants’ cultivation bases rose, the resources would start disappearing more and more rapidly.

Thankfully, the destiny of Yang Qi’s empire ensured that the Everlasting Aegis was continuously expanding. And as it took in more primal-chaos paleo-energy, it could produce more resources.

As long as there was primal-chaos paleo-energy to absorb, there would never be a shortage of resources.

As such, the Ascendants weren’t worried about resources, and could instead focus on their cultivation, their prayers, and their social interactions.

A golden age of cultivation was flourishing in the Everlasting Aegis.

The Ascendants were as harmonious as an ant colony. They didn’t fight or cause any problems. After all, a Paramount God could wipe them all out in an instant. However, as they grew stronger and stronger, and received all sorts of training, they began rising through the levels.

One after another, they became Greater Gods, Consummate Gods, and Perfect Gods. Some even developed Unbounded will convergence.

‘The Ancient Road to the Gods collapsed in the end,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘But that doesn’t matter. What remains behind in the immortal worlds isn’t important to me. Without powerful cultivators down there, the people will probably have much better lives.’ Nodding in satisfaction, he sent an incarnation of will into the Everlasting Aegis to meet with his friends and family, and explain matters to them.

Interestingly, after the Ancient Road to the Gods disappeared, no traces of it remained behind. The Immortal Dao Age was now destined to be nothing but dead water. Perhaps the population would grow again, eventually spreading out to inhabit the countless immortal worlds that had been spat out by the Great Necropolis. But in the end, resources would dwindle, and that time period would become dead, a forgotten nothing in the river of history.

Yang Qi’s friends and family would have suffered that fate eventually. But thankfully, he had opened the way for them to come to the god world and be saved from that inevitable crisis.

Yang Qi immediately had his friends and family take leadership positions. A quintupling of population was incredible, and there just weren't enough sage monarch magistrates to handle everything.

Of course, there were other human government officials that had been trained to handle matters. It would be enough temporarily. Although the minor government officials couldn’t handle things as well as the sage monarch magistrates, at least it would prevent total chaos. And it would also allow destiny to grow.

Time had been adjusted in the Everlasting Aegis. For every two hours that passed in the god world, a year went by in the Sage Monarch Empire.

Every day in the god world was over ten years inside the Everlasting Aegis. After about twenty years passed in the empire, things had reached a stable state.

The Ascendants had been sent to various parts of the empire, and although they had reduced the resource stockpiles by half, they were growing stronger and stronger.

Chapter 1557: Faith of an Empire

The empire’s destiny had temporarily been reduced by a third, but now it was completely restored, and in fact, had doubled in total! Every moment that passed, the destiny of the empire grew; at this point, it was far beyond the level of the three dynasties. Furthermore, the population level wasn’t a problem anymore. Virtually overnight, it had been quintupled, which was a completely shocking development.

Now, the main task at hand was to rest and be rejuvenated. Once the Ascendants’ fighting prowess was at a peak level, the Sage Monarch Empire would finally be in a position to go on the warpath. Of course, that was a process that had to be taken slowly but surely.

Yang Qi returned the Everlasting Aegis to the normal flow of time, and a tremor passed through it. Then, the empire entered a state of complete calm and balance. The Everlasting Aegis continued to absorb primal-chaos paleo-energy and convert it into resources, making up for the dramatic loss of resources due to cultivation. As of now, the empire was in a golden age of both population and resources.

It actually wasn’t a good thing to have resources and wealth just lying around accumulating, but neither was it good to have a population that was too large for the resource pool at hand. That would lead to a drop in destiny.

Right now, there was neither a surplus of resources nor a deficit, which ensured that there was a positive destiny cycle. When the cultivation bases of the citizens improved, it added power to the empire. And as its power grew the empire could absorb primal-chaos paleo-energy more rapidly.

Yang Qi was very pleased, as all of this was his own creation. And as his empire expanded, he could sense his own cultivation base and psyche growing stronger. He truly felt like he had all of the Halls of Heaven under his control.

Right now, he wanted to take things easy and fully assimilate the Halls of Heaven. Once he did, it would be time to step into the half-Annulled level.

At that point, he would be in a position to kill Yang Voidprime. Unfortunately, Yang Voidprime was in the alliance, protected by the High Priestess. And even with his destiny, Yang Qi couldn’t take her on.

He absolutely had to be in the half-Annulled level first.

That was why assimilating the Halls of Heaven and making them part of the Everlasting Aegis was top on his list of things to do.

Only then would he truly be in a position to challenge the god world.

The Ascendants in his empire were growing stronger, not just because of their cultivation, but because of prayer. In fact, prayer had become a part of their daily routine. They had already come to find that, the more pious they were in their prayers to the empire, the more pure the empire’s destiny became. And that would help them advance their cultivation base more quickly.

That discovery led to them becoming even more faithful, and praying even more often.

In the impure lands, people would often give faith to a single person, who would then bless them as a result. It was similar here, except instead of a person, they were giving faith to an empire. Because an empire was a collection of its people, it broke the fetters that were normally put in place by karma.

That, in turn, avoided heart-devils and other impurities that normally came with cultivation.

Yang Qi had truly discovered the right path to follow.

Throughout history, there had been many empires that tried to do what he was doing, but hadn’t succeeded. That was because the government officials always tapped too deeply into the destiny of the empire. The prayers of the common people were essentially being commandeered by the leaders.

Because of that, the commoners would never pray in full piety.

But here, the sage monarch magistrates ensured that everything was fair and just, and that the laws applied to everyone. As a result, people could pray in full faith and piety.

Thus, a grand empire was born.

The empire changed dramatically on a daily basis, with new and amazing treasures popping up in all corners for people to find.

Yang Qi could sense the prayers becoming more pious, and the destiny of the empire rising as a result. He was the emperor, so he benefited most from the destiny. However, the specific ratio was fixed and couldn’t be changed. He couldn't draw too much on it, lest it harm the empire. He needed the empire strong so that the destiny would improve.

Only with a strong empire could he himself also grow stronger.

His boundless psyche had already permeated every corner of the Halls of Heaven, and it was now possible to see something like a gigantic primal-chaos elder-snake outside the halls, its mouth open wide to devour them the same way that a snake would devour a mammoth. Once the mammoth was inside that snake's belly, it would slowly be digested.

The Bastille of the One God was filled with endless treasures that were now flying up to aid in the process of assimilating the halls. At a certain point, the Bastille of the One God simply vanished. It didn’t exist anymore. In fact, once the Halls of Heaven were also assimilated by Yang Qi, there wouldn’t be any remaining trace of the Sovereign Lord.

That said, Yang Qi was still suspicious that the Sovereign Lord had really just vanished so simply. He must have left behind contingency plans. Perhaps he was hiding. Waiting for just the right opportunity. Perhaps he was still in slumber, or perhaps he had already been transmigrated, and was alive in the world. If he was alive, who was he?

There were too many variables for Yang Qi to make a determination. He just had to get stronger, strengthen his empire, and take over the god world. That said, Yang Qi still couldn't see exactly what the god world as a whole looked like; however, he could see that it contained a multiverse.

No matter what angle it was viewed from, one could only see the tip of the iceberg, not what lay beneath or within.

Yang Qi focused on his cultivation and assimilating the Halls of Heaven. Time passed.

**

“What’s going on?”

The alliance of three dynasties was in tumult. In the face of the expansion of Yang Qi’s empire, the three dynasties had thrown aside their previous differences, and were working together in full cooperation. Before, this could never have happened. But now they were truly becoming united, to the point where they were revealing to each other what resources they actually had.

Furthermore, their destinies were rising, although they were fused together.

Thanks to the way they were working together, everyone hoped that they would finally be able to deal with the Sage Monarch Empire. And they were finally starting to forget about their previous defeat.

The people from the three dynasties who manipulated the destiny had created a huge spell formation that constantly analyzed the destiny of the Sage Monarch Empire.

When they noticed Yang Qi’s empire suddenly lost a third of its destiny, they went wild with joy. Thinking that there was chaotic infighting in the Sage Monarch Empire, they started to hatch new plans.

But even as they did, the destiny suddenly recovered completely, then rose higher than before. In fact, every moment that passed, the destiny improved, to the point where it could reach out to the highest and lowest aspects of the god world. It seemed like it was reaching the point where it could take control of the god world, which left everyone in the alliance exchanging awkward glances.

Alarm claxons suddenly blared to life, filling the three dynasties, shaking the leaders to the core, and alerting both the High Priestess and the countless old-timers she had contacted to help her.

A huge meeting was being called.

There were many new faces in this meeting, all of them God-Lords, and all of them clustered around the High Priestess. Proud Heaven and the forces of the Central Dynasty were in another part, while Yang Chiliocosm and the Dugu patriarchs had their factions. Everyone had an impressive destiny, making it obvious that everyone had been working hard to get stronger.

The various empires had entered into periods of immense glory.

Previously, they had begun to atrophy, with the top leaders ignoring day-to-day affairs while they spent time in seclusion, meditating.

But now they had taken control of their organizations. For the moment, everything was in high gear.

Chapter 1558: Proud Heaven versus the High Priestess

Although the three dynasties had experienced an increase in destiny, it wasn’t anything close to matching the Sage Monarch Empire.

Because the Sage Monarch Empire now had destiny that surpassed the alliance, and thus was stronger, it meant that if the three dynasties initiated another attack, they definitely wouldn’t have the advantage like before.

After everyone was gathered, the High Priestess looked around with a pleased smile and said, “Ladies and gentlemen, as you can all see, the destiny of the Sage Monarch Empire is seething. It’s seeped throughout the multiverse of the god world, and although it hasn't become all-pervasive, if things go on like this, it’ll eventually swallow us all up. We simply can’t tolerate this.

“Our three dynasties have already established trade routes, secret cultivation exchanges, and other training programs. We’re no longer enemies of each other, and for now, you can all see that working together is the only way to succeed. Trying to keep the old dynasties going independently is only going to lead to death.”

“We already know that, High Priestess,” Yang Chiliocosm said, his eyes glittering. “What we don't know is how the Sage Monarch Empire is doing this. Did they acquire some new treasure? How have they improved so dramatically in such a short time? We really just don’t get it. You’re a half-Annulled expert, so you're privy to many more secrets than us. Can’t you explain a bit? If you know yourself and know your enemy, you’ll always be victorious.”

“It relates to an immense secret,” the High Priestess replied. “Although, I suppose it wouldn’t hurt to explain.” Although she spoke slowly, her tone was extremely grave, leading everyone to feel as though she was about to talk about something extremely dangerous. That was because the High Priestess was a master of manipulating hearts; in that regard she was vastly superior to even the Inspiring Ones.

As everyone listened with bated breath, she continued, “Yang Qi reopened the Ancient Road to the Gods, and brought almost everyone from the impure lands up to join his empire. Because of that, his population increased by four- or fivefold. Although that still doesn’t equal the population of our alliance, every person he added is an Ascendant. All of those new citizens are praying on a daily basis, growing the destiny of his empire. I'm sure all of you are fully aware of how impressive Ascendants are. With the resources they have in the Sage Monarch Empire, they’re definitely going to rapidly improve their cultivation. That’s why we need to consolidate all of our own resources and strike like lightning to destroy the Sage Monarch Empire. Otherwise, the Ascendants are just going to get stronger and stronger. And even if only a tiny fraction of them become God-Lords, it’s going to be a huge problem for us.”

“Does the Sage Monarch Empire really have enough resources to sustain so many Ascendants?” someone asked.

“We have that problem,” the High Priestess answered. “A huge population requires a huge amount of resources. But it’s not a problem for the Sage Monarch Empire. They’ve never lacked resources, only population. And with their population problem solved, we're facing a major crisis.”

As her voice grew louder and louder, she seemed like an immense mountain weighing down on everyone. “As all of you know, the main foundation of the Sage Monarch Empire is their Everlasting Aegis, which is a combination of the Myriad Dragons Lair and countless treasures from the Halls of Heaven. As it grows, it does the same thing the god world does: it takes primal-chaos paleo-energy and produces preheaven treasures with it. And those treasures can be used by the people of the empire to improve their cultivation. They have a perfect cycle. As long as they have the Everlasting Aegis, we’ll never be able to break their supply of resources. And they're only going to continue growing.

“Eventually, the Everlasting Aegis will be able to separate from the god world and go out on its own. It will be like another god world. As all of you know, the god world can take in the energies of primal chaos to expand and create resources. The Sage Monarch Empire is continually growing stronger, and Yang Qi is trying to fully assimilate the Halls of Heaven. If he succeeds, his cultivation base will definitely reach the half-Annulled level. Most people have a hard time with that breakthrough, but he won’t. Because he has his empire and that incredible destiny, it's only a matter of time before his cultivation base reaches the same level as the Sovereign Lord.”

“What's that supposed to mean? Is Yang Qi really invincible?”

Many people exchanged awkward glances of fear.

“If he does reach the half-Annulled level, then yes, he’ll be invincible,” the High Priestess replied. “And we’ll be his slaves. But right now, before he makes that breakthrough, and before his Ascendants reach their full potential, he's weak enough that we might stand a chance of taking him out.”

“Ladies and gentlemen,” Hailan said, “you can all see what's going on here. The three dynasties absolutely have to unite. We can’t delay any further. I know that all of you have your own interests and goals. You even have your own emperors, who normally wouldn't spare a thought about becoming government officials. However, even as government officials, they’ll still be incredibly important. And wouldn’t that be better than being enslaved or assimilated?”

In response, Yang Chiliocosm and the Dugu patriarchs maintained silence. In the end, none of them would ever agree to unite the three dynasties, resulting in them becoming government officials.

“I agree to unification,” Proud Heaven suddenly said.

Everyone looked over at him in shock. It seemed like a bolt out of the blue that he would endorse unifying the three dynasties. He was considered the ruler of the Central Dynasty, which meant that if there was a unification, he would suddenly rank even lower than Hailan. After all, the High Priestess would obviously be the empress of the new empire, and would give Hailan vast power and authority.

How could someone like Proud Heaven possibly accept humiliation like that?

A tremor seemed to pass through the High Priestess as she shifted her piercing gaze onto Proud Heaven. “You're really endorsing the unification, Proud Heaven?”

“Of course I am,” he replied, chuckling. “It’s a great idea. Why wouldn’t I endorse it? Truly uniting the three dynasties would result in destiny ten times the current amount. There’s no way the Sage Monarch Empire could match that. And with a ruler to manage things effectively, perhaps taking cues from Yang Qi, it’d be a surefire success.”

“What else are you not saying, Proud Heaven?” Hailan asked. “Just spit it out for us to hear. An honest man doesn’t prevaricate. The entire purpose of this meeting is to decide whether or not we truly unite.”

“Oh.” Proud Heaven looked deeply at Hailan, a profoundly merciless and treacherous smile on his face. “Well, it’s simple. First of all, uniting the three dynasties will be the best thing for everyone. Second, you need to select the right ruler. Someone who can rule our empire as well as Yang Qi can rule his. If we pick the wrong ruler, it's going to lead to disaster.”

“If the three dynasties unite, it's obvious who the leader will be,” Hailan said. She obviously realized where Proud Heaven was going with his line of reasoning, and she seemed to view it as a big joke. “The High Priestess will be the empress. Wait, did you think you were going to be in charge? If so, you’re dreaming. Whether in terms of position, might, or cultivation base, you can’t even compare to my Master, the High Priestess.”

She didn’t even attempt to be polite. Obviously, she felt that Proud Heaven was being completely unreasonable, and in fact, insulting to the High Priestess. In the past, the High Priestess would have struck dead anyone who acted like this.

“Do you want to be the emperor of the three united dynasties, Proud Heaven?” the High Priestess asked, obviously not wanting to beat around the bush. All of a sudden, everyone felt as if they were under immense pressure. The Dugu elders and Yang Chiliocosm didn’t say anything as they watched Proud Heaven and the High Priestess face off, the hostility ramping up and tensions mounting. Of course, they knew that if the two clashed and hurt each other, they might be able to benefit.

After all, while the High Priestess spoke in a very calm and even tone, everyone could sense that she was furious, and might strike at any moment.

Proud Heaven was obviously provoking her.

“That’s right, High Priestess. I want to be emperor.” Proud Heaven didn’t seem angry, and in fact, the same sinister smile was on his face as before.

“If you're the emperor, what am I? A government official. By what virtue or ability do you deserve the throne? Are you suddenly a half-Annulled expert now?”

“Do you want to see what cultivation level I’ve reached?” Proud Heaven asked. “You can test me, if you’d like. High Priestess, we have a common enemy here, and that's Yang Qi. So don’t be so hostile. You might be strong, but you have no ability to govern an empire. In contrast, I’ve put a lot of work into studying the subject. In that regard, I could beat you in any scenario.”

The High Priestess burst out laughing, as though she had just heard the funniest joke in the world. “You're really trying to vie for the throne with me, Proud Heaven? Since when did you become so gutsy?”

Proud Heaven rose to his feet. “If you want the throne, High Priestess, it's not going to be a walk in the park. You might be a half-Annulled expert, but I honestly don’t care about that. I want the three dynasties united under my rulership. And it seems to me the only way to make that happen is to fight. So I hereby challenge you, High Priestess! Since we have plenty of witnesses, let’s fight right here and now. I promise ahead of time not to use the destiny of the Central Dynasty. That way it’s a fair fight. If I win, then you’ll be the imperial preceptor, and can also be the High Priestess, with only one superior and many subordinates. If I lose, you can make whatever arrangements you want, and I’ll pass control of the Central Dynasty to you. What do you say?”

Chapter 1559: Rising to the Challenge

Proud Heaven was directly challenging the High Priestess. And even if she had been more furious that she was, she would have accepted it.

Obviously, it related to her prestige and personal interests. Everyone was watching with wide-eyed interest. If the High Priestess wanted the destiny, she would have to fight Proud Heaven and remove him as an obstacle.

That said, the High Priestess was shocked to see Proud Heaven facing her with such calm.

Normally speaking, even if Proud Heaven were stronger than everyone knew him to be, he still wouldn't be able to win in a fight against the High Priestess. The High Priestess was a half-Annulled expert, so without tapping into the destiny of the Central Dynasty, Proud Heaven was no match for her.

Yet Proud Heaven had specifically said that he wouldn’t use destiny in the fight.

The fact that he was still confident in winning indicated that he had something up his sleeve.

The High Priestess wasn’t the type to underestimate an enemy. She knew that Proud Heaven wasn’t a fool, and that he wouldn’t throw his life away. He obviously had a secret weapon, and a powerful one at that.

Unfortunately, she had absolutely no clue what it might be. While she was profoundly nervous, she couldn't let it show. Proud Heaven had challenged her, and if she wanted to be empress, there was no way she could shrink from tests like this.

Laughing heartily, she said, “The younger generation always finds ways to be impressive. Well done, Proud Heaven. Well done. It’s been years since anyone’s dared to challenge me. I’ve been invincible for numerous generations. In fact, ever since the Sovereign Lord died, I haven’t found a single person worthy to be my rival. However, you do know what's going to result from you challenging me, right Proud Heaven? Your death. By the way, what does Proud Central think of this? Why isn’t he here?”

“My father is in hiding while he crafts a powerful magical treasure. He gave me full authority, so for all intents and purposes, I'm the emperor of the Central Dynasty.” He smiled viciously. “The victor of this fight will win the empire, High Priestess. But who will it be? Are you really sure you can kill me?”

The High Priestess rose to her feet. “Does anyone have an objection?” she asked, looking around.

“None here,” said the Dugu patriarchs and Yang Chiliocosm. They knew that the matter had already slipped out of their control. How could any of them have predicted that Proud Heaven would make a move like this? Of course, they approved with all sincerity.

They would love for Proud Heaven and the High Priestess to both end up weak and injured.

Even Yang Voidprime, who had been a supporter of the High Priestess from the beginning, would rather sit on the mountaintop and watch the tigers fight, then reap the spoils when they tire out. As for Hailan, she had an odd expression on her face as she realized that she couldn’t do anything about the situation. Not even she had considered that Proud Heaven would do this.

She knew how terrifying her Master was, yet Proud Heaven had unexpectedly challenged her to battle. It was obvious that Proud Heaven had a trump card, and it made Hailan nervous about what it was.

“I agree completely,” said an old man sitting near the High Priestess. “I'm the Patriarch of the Universe, and I support the High Priestess’ bid to be empress. As such, I agree that she needs to accept the challenge.”

The old-timer’s psychic scale put him just on the verge of reaching the half-Annulled level. Obviously, his words carried great weight. And his sudden appearance and endorsement had plenty of people shivering in fright.

Years ago, when the Sovereign Lord unified the god world, there were certain old-timers who refused to accept his authority and went into hiding. They were all people who had come into existence before the god world, and were close to the half-Annulled level. Of course, that made them major threats to the Sovereign Lord.

Eventually, he had issued orders for them to be hunted down and killed. Although most of them were killed, a few had survived and remained hidden out in primal-chaos all this time.

Obviously, people the Sovereign Lord had failed to kill would be extremely formidable. And one of them was the Patriarch of the Universe.

The fact that the Patriarch of the Universe was here was terrifying to most of the people present. Although he wasn’t a half-Annulled expert, he had been working on his cultivation for billions of years, and as such was obviously strong enough to defeat half-Annulled experts.

“I also vote yes,” another expert said, rising to his feet. “I'm the King of Dark Mist, and I also agree that the fight should happen right here and now. The High Priestess was invincible even in ancient times, and no one present is a match for her. Anyone who defeats her will win our support in their bid for leadership.”

“The King of Dark Mist?” People began shouting in shock. He was yet another person that the Sovereign Lord had sentenced to death.

More such old-timers started speaking up, and they were joined by people who no one had ever heard of, but whose support the High Priestess had won.

Truth be told, there was no way to avoid fighting.

The High Priestess had to make a move, lest she lose all credibility.

“Set up the fighting arena!”

The countless experts present drew on the destinies of the three dynasties to create a huge fighting platform. It was so solid that not even a half-Annulled expert could easily damage its surface. And it was completely sealed off, so that no one could interfere in the fighting. It also cut Proud Heaven off from the destiny of the Central Dynasty.

Furthermore, a rule was instituted that whoever wanted to be considered the victor had to stay on the platform until there were no more challengers. That person would then be the emperor.

“Hmm?” Yang Qi had noticed that something was happening.

From his position with the boundless view of the multiverse of the god world, he sat there devouring the Halls of Heaven and furthering his cultivation. No one could possibly launch a sneak attack on him, as the destiny at his command was too majestic. In fact, it was so powerful that even the High Priestess would be smashed to bits if she challenged it.

Back during the war, she had used her Deathless Monument to stop Yang Qi’s army, but that wouldn’t be possible now that the Sage Monarch Empire had benefited from the Sovereign Lord’s ocean of faith. And that wasn’t to mention the addition of all the Ascendants. With all the recent gains, the sage monarch magistrates now numbered four hundred million, and they were still proliferating.

It seemed likely that, sooner or later, they would reach the level of a billion. And a billion sage monarch magistrates would definitely be an invincible force.

Despite that, Yang Qi remained fully on guard. Right now, the only possible threat to him would come from the three dynasties with their immense population. And if someone could actually unite them and focus their power, it would be possible to launch a deadly blow on him.

Other than them, Yang Qi didn’t have anything to fear, even if the King of Godmammoths or the Sovereign Lord himself returned.

Yang Qi watched as various old-timers secretly slipped into the three dynasties, causing their destiny to rise continuously. The main reason he didn't do anything to the dynasties now was that he was worried what would happen if their power was focused.

For now, he would rather wait until he reached the half-Annulled level.

Furthermore, his Ascendants were still weak, in the grand scheme of things, so if they got involved in a big fight, it would be a bloodbath.

He needed to give them time to get stronger. Meanwhile, his empire would also be growing stronger.

As he looked into the three dynasties, he eventually reached a place where his vision couldn’t penetrate. That was when he opened his Lord's Eye. Not even the destiny of the three dynasties could stop him from doing that.

He could now see that the destiny of the three kingdoms was chaotic, and as such, nowhere close to the level of the Everlasting Aegis.

‘Proud Heaven is going to fight the High Priestess.’ Yang Qi was tempted to try interfering, but in the end, he decided against it. If he were discovered, it could lead to disastrous consequences.

Plots and schemes wouldn't do any good right now. He needed to act openly, and for everyone to see. Once he crushed his opponents for good, the might of his empire would be established forever.

‘I'm curious to see how this fight plays out. Proud Heaven must be planning to use the essence of the god world. I wonder if he actually devoured the Great Necropolis and assimilated King Immortal-Slayer. I doubt it. If he killed and assimilated King Immortal-Slayer, he would already have reached the half-Annulled level.’

As he watched, he paid close attention to the fluctuations of the essence of the god world.

That essence was a terrifying thing, but it wasn’t capable of directly fighting people. It had to groom representatives to do that. And Yang Qi was hoping that Proud Heaven would reveal some of its secrets.

Chapter 1560: The Might of Proud Heaven

Proud Heaven stood atop the platform and watched the High Priestess float toward him. Her billowy garment seemed to connect to the void itself, and caused all heaven and earth to tremble around her as she moved.

Everyone could tell that the High Priestess was furious, and had sworn to herself that she was going to kill Proud Heaven on the spot.

For him to vie for the throne against her was disgraceful, even rebellious behavior. After all, she was a mighty figure who even people in the Sovereign Lord’s Age hadn’t dared to defy. Worst of all, Proud Heaven had been the one to bring the fight to her. In essence, he had to die. There was no room for mercy.

“You really want to kill me, don’t you High Priestess?” Proud Heaven said, standing there still and unmoving, but with a vicious grin on his face that made him seem like a tiger staring at a fat sheep. He seemed so ready to attack that looked as though he wasn’t feeling any pressure at all.

“That’s right, Proud Heaven. But it's not too late for you to concede the fight. I'm not sure what makes you think you can beat me, but you’re not a half-Annulled expert, nor do you have destiny to draw on. The only way this fight is going to end is with your death. However, if you get on your knees, kowtow, and hand over control of the Central Dynasty, I’ll spare your life. But if you obstinately persist in going about things the wrong way, it’ll be too late.”

“High Priestess, aren’t you aware that talking to me like that is going to piss off the essence of the god world?” Now that they were locked together in the fighting arena, Proud Heaven didn’t feel the need to hide anything. “Did you really think I’d throw myself into a fight I knew I couldn't win?”

“What did you just say?” the High Priestess blurted, her face falling. “Essence of the god world? What do you mean?”

“I'm the representative of the essence of the god world. Yang Qi has become a big threat to the god world, which I'm sure you understand in full measure. The god world needs primal-chaos paleo-energy to grow, and once it’s had its full, it will achieve a breakthrough. But then Yang Qi showed up and built his Everlasting Aegis. Now he's started taking primal-chaos paleo-energy, in direct competition with the god world. Not only that, he just acquired a host of Ascendants that the god world can’t sustain. The essence of the god world has no further patience, and has called on me to kill him! All it’ll take is a mere inhalation on my part, and I’ll become one with the god world.”

He threw his head back and laughed heartily as unsightly expressions appeared on the faces of everyone present.

The mere words ‘essence of the god world’ were enough to cause numerous top experts to be completely dumbfounded with terror. After all, many old-timers knew that the essence of the god world had once inflicted a serious injury on the Sovereign Lord.

“The essence of the god world?!” the High Priestess murmured, and her expression quickly returned to normal. “Now I understand. So that's why you felt you could challenge me. Sadly, you’ve made a big mistake. Maybe the essence of the god world supports you as its representative, but this fight is really going to come down to cultivation base. If I kill you, then I’ll be the representative. Strength is the only thing that matters, when it comes to helping the god world get rid of Yang Qi. Yang Qi has the God Legion Seal and the Mahātmā Jade, and he's combined them into one. He’s devouring the Halls of Heaven, and once he succeeds, he’ll be able to strike a deadly blow to the god world. And I'm the only one that can save the god world from him. You’ve grown a bit too cocky for your own good.”

RUMBLE!

Even as the words left the High Priestess’ mouth, Proud Heaven suddenly shivered, and the essence of the god world started rolling out from him with tremendous force.

Snorting coldly, Proud Heaven said, “Clever idea, High Priestess, Not bad. Not bad at all. You're trying to weaken the god world’s decision to bless me. Unfortunately for you, you won’t get the chance to pull that off. Prepare to face my consummate art: Ten Universes!”

RUMBLE!

Ten universes appeared behind Proud Heaven. In the past, they were dead and lifeless, but now that they were powered by the essence of the god world they had become ten powerful incarnations, each with different universal characteristics. And they all bore down on the High Priestess with crushing power.

“Ten Universes?”

The High Priestess flicked her sleeve. “Deathless Heaven Art!”

She thrust her hand out from the depths of her sleeve, sucking all the vital energy in the area into her palm and leaving behind a vacuum. As a result, the aura of the Ten Universes was locked in place.

“You have a powerful cultivation base, Proud Heaven, and those clones created by your Ten Universes are very impressive. They’re essentially ten versions of you. However, you still don't understand the vast difference between you and me. I'm half-Annulled! There’s no way you can fight someone like me.” Chuckling, she stepped forward, looking like a terrifying devil-god as she continued, “God Steps of Prayer!”

Swish!

It was like the prayers of countless individuals had been gathered by the High Priestess and turned into a massive attack, then launched right at Proud Heaven.

All of a sudden, the spectators saw a vision of the High Priestess leading the legion of gods in offering sacrifices and praying. And that sky-obfuscating, land-enshrouding power was something that no one could possibly defend against.

The speed, might, and grandeur of this attack were beyond description. And its power covered the entire battlefield, ensuring that Proud Heaven couldn’t possibly escape from it.

This attack by the High Priestess was clearly intended to kill Proud Heaven instantly.

In her fury, she was using attacks that drew on the prayer power of the ancient legion of gods, which was something she could have used to defy even the Sovereign Lord.

“Proud Heaven, this fist technique is something I prepared over billions of years to use against the Sovereign Lord, if I had to. It would kill the Sovereign Lord himself, if he were struck by it, so you’re definitely going to die.” It seemed like something that no one in existence could dodge or block.

“This isn’t going to go well,” Yang Qi said.

However, what he meant was that things weren’t going to go well for the High Priestess! It was obvious to him that Proud Heaven was using the High Priestess’ power as a half-Annulled expert to benefit himself.

“You have to hold on just a bit longer, King Immortal-Slayer,” Yang Qi murmured. After all, he couldn’t step in to help.

RUMBLE!

The High Priestess’ fist slammed into Proud Heaven’s chest, much to the shock of the onlookers. It seemed obvious that anyone who was struck by it would be completely wiped out of existence, yet it seemed to be doing nothing to Proud Heaven.

Then the Great Necropolis suddenly appeared behind Proud Heaven, and cracking sounds could be heard as the power of the attack hit it, piercing inside to strike King Immortal-Slayer.

A howl of rage rang out from King Immortal-Slayer.

“High Priestess, you moron! You're attacking me! Agggggh!” The destructive power of the attack engulfed King Immortal-Slayer, and the Great Necropolis started shrinking down. Proud Heaven’s will wrapped around it, and the aura of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart started seeping out.

Proud Heaven cackled madly as King Immortal-Slayer went silent, seemingly having disappeared. However, it was still possible to detect his vital energy on Proud Heaven.

Proud Heaven had assimilated him, thanks to the power of the High Priestess’ attack. And having been hit hard enough, King Immortal-Slayer’s defenses had all been worn down, to the point where Proud Heaven was able to assimilate his soul and use it to bolster himself.

“Half-Annulled! I finally assimilated King Immortal-Slayer. Wahahahahahaha!” The insufferably arrogant Proud Heaven was now bursting with power. At the same time, the essence of the god world became like hosts of dragons wrapping around him. The vital energy in the area shattered as he broke through his previous limitations. Then, his power fluctuations vanished. His godhood vanished. His body vanished. Everything about him was becoming annulled.

This was the half-Annulled level.

Proud Heaven’s plan had succeeded.

He had even used the last bit of power to devour the Lord of Righteous Justice.

Yang Qi exhaled slowly as he saw Proud Heaven reaching the half-Annulled level. He knew the truth: King Immortal-Slayer wasn’t dead. In the very last moment, he had entered an incomprehensible state of existence that not even Proud Heaven could be aware of. But Yang Qi was aware of it. King Immortal-Slayer wouldn’t be King Immortal-Slayer if he were that easy to slay.

Proud Heaven was now half-Annulled, but King Immortal-Slayer was hiding inside of him, waiting for the right moment to strike a mortal blow.

Because Yang Qi had ordained King Immortal-Slayer as his imperial preceptor, he was connected to the destiny of the Sage Monarch Empire. And because of that, Yang Qi was able to sense that he wasn't gone. He was in a state that surpassed even Nevasaññānāsaññāyatana, yet wasn’t the Annulled level.

Having reached the half-Annulled level, Proud Heaven stepped forward and grabbed the High Priestess’ fist.

“Many thanks to you, High Priestess. That blow of yours was just what I needed to deal with King Immortal-Slayer. I never would’ve reached the half-Annulled level without you. Now I can show you what I'm really capable of. I'm going to make sure you’re buried by the essence of the god world!”

Proud Heaven truly was pleased, as he really wouldn’t have succeeded without this moment playing out just as it had.

Now he was convinced that he could defeat the High Priestess and take control of the three dynasties. Soon, he would be the most domineering figure in the god world!

Chapter 1561: Half-Annulled

Proud Heaven had reached the half-Annulled level, which put him on equal footing with the High Priestess. It was now impossible for her to crush him simply because her cultivation base was superior. Furthermore, he could now wield immense power from the Great Necropolis. Because of that, he was completely fearless.

Everyone was so shocked they didn’t know how to react. That was especially true of Hailan. ‘What do I do? What do I do?! How could Proud Heaven have reached this level? If he’s in the half-Annulled level, it means the High Priestess won’t be able to deal with him. How could things have turned around like this?’

She knew full well that, given the gains Proud Heaven had made, the High Priestess didn’t have any hope of beating him in a fight.

“Ten Universes!” Once again, Proud Heaven’s ten universes appeared, except they were vastly different than they had been before, and created a swirling vortex that shot toward the High Priestess with deadly force.

“God Art of Prayer!”

The High Priestess still wasn’t a weakling, so she launched a fist strike that caused the images of countless noble spirits of antiquity to rush forth and meet the attack of the Ten Universes.

In the blink of an eye, a major fight had broken out.

The High Priestess fought with enigmatic speed and ruthless violence. Her attacks crushed Proud Heaven’s Ten Universes over and over again.

And Proud Heaven couldn't stop her special movement techniques, which allowed her to close in on him and unleash marvelous attacks.

“High Priestess, why don’t you take a look at what a real fist technique of the gods looks like?” Proud Heaven was clearly not at a disadvantage. He met the High Priestess blow for blow, causing heaven-rending, earth-crushing force to ripple out.

BAM!

The battlefield was battered and cracked, but the destiny from the three dynasties continued to pour in and bolster it, filling in the cracks and repairing it. This fight was on par with the fight that had played out long ago between King Immortal-Slayer and the True Devil.

The two danced nimbly back and forth as they fought, exchanging thousands upon thousands of blows. As for Proud Heaven, the longer he fought, the stronger he became. At a certain point, he thrust his hand out, causing a tombstone to appear that rumbled unstoppably toward the High Priestess.

“High Priestess, you use the Deathless Monument, which is filled with countless noble spirits. But I use the God Tombstone Palms, a consummate art from the Great Necropolis. Let’s see which will come out on top. The God Tombstone Palms, or the Deathless Monument.” Proud Heaven was using the God Tombstone Palms, which was something Yang Qi often did.

However, this version was vastly superior to anything that had ever been seen before, as they were corporeal. In fact, the mere sight of it caused Yang Qi to nod inwardly as he gained new insight into the secrets of the technique.

Because Proud Heaven was a half-Annulled expert now, he could command the powers of the Great Necropolis in a way nobody else had in the past.

Aaaaoooooo!

“Deathless Monument!” the High Priestess said, then she exhaled, causing countless monuments to spring up and meet the God Tombstone Palms. Instantly, the palms crumbled under the force of her attack.

“Your fist technique is amazing, Proud Heaven. Sadly, you reached the half-Annulled too late. You lack experience. Let me show you what a true half-Annulled master is capable of. Deathless Monument, Void Fusion!” The High Priestess suddenly vanished into thin air, along with her Deathless Monument.

Then, Proud Heaven was suddenly swept along as though by a riptide, causing him to tumble about letting out roars of rage. Apparently, he was being battered by invisible fluctuations of true energy.

The High Priestess had entered an annulled state, and was using it to launch attacks that Proud Heaven couldn’t see or even touch.

As Proud Heaven staggered, his Ten Universes collapsed. His God Tombstone Palms collapsed into rubble that swirled around him. Apparently, he just couldn't deal with this attack from the High Priestess.

Unseeable chains were wrapping around him as the High Priestess upped her efforts.

Proud Heaven was like a fly caught in a spiderweb, incapable of moving or escaping.

WHOOSH!

After this continued for a while, the High Priestess suddenly appeared again above him, where she thrust her hand out, causing a huge stone monument to drop toward him.

“Great Necropolis!” Proud Heaven shouted, and blood sprayed out of his eyes, ears, nose, and mouth as a projection of the necropolis appeared around him. The necropolis rumbled upward, smashing the descending monument, and causing blood to spray out of the mouth of the High Priestess.

Proud Heaven retracted the Great Necropolis into his body, his face ashen as he stood there unsteadily. Meanwhile, the High Priestess had staggered backward and was staring hard at Proud Heaven, but wasn’t attacking.

“Just what exactly is going on here?” That’s what everyone was thinking. “Are they both injured?”

Suddenly, the High Priestess threw her head back and laughed loudly. “Quite the young hero, aren’t you, Proud Heaven? Not bad. Not bad at all. I can see now how amazing you are, and how inferior I am. I relinquish leadership of the three dynasties to you. I’ll be the imperial preceptor, instead of the empress. What do you say? Let’s let bygones be bygones, and start working together. We can revisit the topic after crushing the Sage Monarch Empire, if necessary.”

The truth was that not even Proud Heaven was sure what was happening. However, after the color returned to his face, a strange smile appeared on his face and he casually said, “Thank you for yielding. You truly live up to your reputation as someone from the senior generation. And since you're so flexible, Senior, I can't possibly be impolite. You’ll be the imperial preceptor, that’s already a given.”

It was almost as if their last clash had involved them reaching an agreement.

The fight was over.

Before, they had faced each other with swords drawn and arrows nocked, each seemingly unwilling to let the other live. But now they were being courteous and respectful in a way that defied imagination. However, to many of the old-timers, it seemed as though both parties had been hurt, and knew they couldn’t fully defeat the other, and had thus reached a compromise.

‘The essence of the god world interfered with the High Priestess,’ Yang Qi thought. He had sensed a stir in the essence of the god world, and was certain that was what had happened.

Otherwise, the High Priestess never would have given up so easily. However, Proud Heaven also had to compromise. For instance, he was referring to the High Priestess as “senior”, and had given her a high position, that of imperial preceptor. That position came with power that was inferior to the emperor, but was still incredibly influential.

“The younger generation should have their chance, Proud Heaven,” the High Priestess said. “And since the essence of the god world wants it, I’ll defer to you. When the three dynasties are combined into one empire, it won’t just be you and I that have a say in how it works. The essence of the god world will be part of it. Presumably, the rest of you are fine with that?”

When the people present heard her words, they were shaken.

Contrary to expectation, she had brought the essence of the god world into the mix.

As of now, they realized that Proud Heaven and the High Priestess should actually have been evenly matched, but given that he had the support of the essence, she had backed down.

It was no blow to the High Priestess’ dignity.

“What do we do?”

With the High Priestess and Proud Heaven working in unison, it was obvious to Yang Chiliocosm and the Dugu patriarchs that the ball had begun rolling. If they all stood united against the High Priestess, they might have been able to stop the unification of the dynasties from happening. But now, that wouldn’t be possible.

That wasn't even to mention the fact that the essence of the god world had been thrown into the mix.

Crack!

The battle arena collapsed.

“Ladies and gentlemen,” Proud Heaven said, “the time has come to combine our three dynasties into one enormous empire. The new dynasty will have the support of the essence of the god world. We will eradicate the Sage Monarch Empire, after which we’ll receive immense blessings from the god world itself. What do you all think? I have the god world’s support to be emperor. The High Priestess is the imperial preceptor. The rest of you will be given important positions, and of course, the protection of the throne. What do you say?”

“This....” The Dugu elders knew they couldn't fight what was happening. “We agree! However, we don’t have the right to enter any sort of agreement. We're outranked by Patriarch Invincible, which means we need to supplicate his noble spirit to awaken and approve the decision.”

“The Invincible Dugu?” the High Priestess said, and her eyes flickered as she started forming plans. Then she nodded. “There isn’t a huge rush to combine the three dynasties, and we still need to have a separate meeting to discuss all the details. In ten days, we’ll meet in the Central God-Temple to discuss the particulars, hand out the titles, and do whatever else needs to be done.

“We need to appoint regent princes, grand princes, vice princes, grand ministers, generalissimos, and others.”

“That’ll be fine,” Proud Heaven said. “Ten days. That’s the time limit set by the essence of the god world. Everyone, make the necessary preparations!” From the wan expression on Proud Heaven’s face, it seemed he would actually need those ten days to recover.

Chapter 1562: Devouring the Halls of Heaven

It seemed the three dynasties really were being combined.

There was simply no one who could defy a coalition of Proud Heaven, the High Priestess, the essence of the god world, plus the old-timers like the Patriarch of the Universe, King of Dark Mist, and others who had been sentenced to death by the Sovereign Lord.

The High Priestess and Proud Heaven had allowed ten days for everyone to get ready. Of course, they needed that time to lick their wounds and recover. After all, everyone knew that long delays usually lead to trouble, and normally speaking, they would rather have taken care of things immediately.

RUMBLE!

The destiny of the Central Dynasty surged, causing white pillars of energy to shoot up like heaven-propping pillars. It actually looked similar to the Sage Monarch Empire. In fact, it was clear that the Central Dynasty was in a position to directly compete with the Sage Monarch Empire in terms of destiny.

That was what happened when their leader, Proud Heaven, reached the half-Annulled level and defeated the High Priestess in combat. The destiny was like a fire that had just had oil splashed onto it.

Any empire that acquired a half-Annulled expert would experience a major improvement. God-Lords would flock to a place like that, and no other force could possibly invade it successfully.

Not too long ago, the Central Dynasty had been in a very chaotic state, thanks to the defection of their grand generalissimo, prime minister, and imperial preceptor. But now things were very different.

The hearts of the people had been stabilized, all thanks to Proud Heaven’s transformation.

Half-Annulled experts were like powerful weapons that no empire would trifle with casually. They could protect their own empires, no matter how many experts an enemy had. In fact, a nation with one was as safe and secure as flowers in a mirror or the moon in the water.

A half-Annulled expert was the only thing that could provide a truly domineering foundation. And how could the destiny of such a place not be stable?

Furthermore, the fact that Proud Heaven had defeated the High Priestess was a huge boost in reputation, such that experts of the other two dynasties were even thinking of immediately going to join him. Virtually infinite glory was now converged on one person.

That would also have a huge effect on the destiny.

Yang Qi was watching as all this happened. That said, he wasn’t anxious about it. The truth was that everything was going exactly as he wanted it to. Once the three dynasties merged, the half-Annulled Proud Heaven wouldn’t hesitate at all to bring destruction to the Sage Monarch Empire.

After all, the Sage Monarch Empire didn’t have a half-Annulled expert.

The empire formed by the merger of three dynasties would be very attractive to the denizens of the god world, and would be very dangerous for the Sage Monarch Empire. In the end, Yang Qi wasn't going to allow the three dynasties to actually combine.

“Heaven and Earth in all their Brilliance; Growth of the Sun and Moon; Bewilder Ghosts and Gods; A Myriad of Spirits Die in War....” All of a sudden, Yang Qi was powering up to his highest level.

‘I have to stand strong against the High Priestess and Proud Heaven. If I want to avoid being killed, I have to finish devouring the Halls of Heaven. Only then can I brave what's to come. It's time to call on my most consummate technique!’

Even if he couldn’t fully assimilate the halls, as long as he could devour them, he would be able to stand up to attacks from a half-Annulled expert. At the moment, he wouldn’t be able to fight Proud Heaven or the High Priestess without using destiny.

And if they teamed up, he would be dead for sure.

Unfortunately, the Halls of Heaven were something that no one could possibly devour. Not even a half-Annulled expert. But Yang Qi had a plan, and he was very confident it would succeed.

His divine will had spread to all corners of the Halls of Heaven, and he could sense it clashing with the will of the Sovereign Lord.

He might be the bearer of the God Legion Seal, but the Sovereign Lord would even fight against himself if he tried to devour the Halls of Heaven. The halls were suspended above the god world, and were all that remained of the Sovereign Lord. Once they vanished, all of his glory would also vanish.

How could the will of the Sovereign Lord simply allow that to happen?

Yang Qi was going all out. However, his facial expression didn’t show it. Thrumming with a powerful will, he said, “King Heaven-Devourer, I know that your will still exists out in primal-chaos. The rest of your body is out there too. The time has come to fulfill your deepest desire: to devour the Halls of Heaven. But if you want to do it, you have to do it together with me. Become part of me, and you can accomplish your life’s dream!”

RUMBLE!

Yang Qi’s divine will and thoughts swept out of the god world and into primal-chaos, to a distant location where he had long since sensed a powerful entity lurking.

It was an enormous dragon, millions upon millions of kilometers in length. However, it had no head, and was completely skeletal. Even its bones were in tattered condition, having been battered by the primal-chaos paleo-energy that surrounded it. Obviously, it had long since been scraped clean of any flesh.

It was King Heaven-Devourer’s corpse.

Yang Qi had acquired the head, but not the body. But by using certain methods, he had tracked it down. Apparently, the rest of the corpse was naturally absorbing primal-chaos paleo-energy in the hopes of restoring itself. It was a given that a primal-chaos elder-snake would absorb primal-chaos paleo-energy.

However, it was all instinctual, and there was no way it would result in King Heaven-Devourer being resurrected.

When Yang Qi’s psyche reached the headless corpse, it unleashed a roar with its mighty will, instinctively fighting back. Mighty entities such as King Heaven-Devourer would never agree to be subjugated, even after they died.

King Heaven-Devourer devoured people, not the other way around.

Aaaaoooooo!

As Yang Qi met resistance, he repeated his offer. “King Heaven-Devourer, give your remains to me, and allow me to wield your power! Understand? I’ve accepted your legacy, and I'm about to devour the Halls of Heaven. Don’t you want to be a part of that? Come, join me! When I devour the Halls of Heaven, I’ll accomplish the final thing you never managed to accomplish!”

Roar!

The headless primal-chaos elder-snake corpse thrashed and howled, seemingly having been stirred into action by Yang Qi. Apparently, there was still deathless anger and resentment in it that Yang Qi had prodded, and they were focused on the Halls of Heaven. Although it took some time, King Heaven-Devourer finally agreed.

King Heaven-Devourer would pay any cost to see the Halls of Heaven devoured!

It didn't matter that he had perished, he still wanted to achieve his goal. The longing to devour the Halls of Heaven and the King Heaven-Devourer still burned within him.

The headless snake shivered, then shot through the world of primal-chaos toward Yang Qi.

Crick! Crack!

It surged into him, whereupon Yang Qi himself suddenly transformed into the image of King Heaven-Devourer.

Wham!

Opening his mouth, he drew on the God Legion Seal and the Mahātmā Jade to the ultimate limit, causing his divine will to fill the Halls of Heaven. Then, the halls began shrinking rapidly, as if Yang Qi were the Sovereign Lord himself. Soon, they had solidified into a starry sphere that he inserted into the God Legion Paradise.

The Halls of Heaven were a fantastic magical treasure, but now they were part of him, and he could draw upon them at any time. However, if he wanted them to truly become one with him, it would take a lot of time and effort.

That said, at least he was now in the position to hold his own against a half-Annulled expert, even without using destiny.

Next, he needed to work on the next phase of his plan.

And he only had ten days to do it.

At that point, the High Priestess and Proud Heaven would have recovered, and Yang Qi would be finished if he didn’t prepare. The Sage Monarch Empire couldn’t stand up against those two. Nor could his Ascendants couldn’t rise to incredible heights in such a short time.

Right now, he needed to buy some time.

Chapter 1563: Meeting Master

Yang Qi had finally fused with King Heaven-Devourer’s deathless will, thus accepting his full legacy. He had devoured the Halls of Heaven so thoroughly that it was as if they had never even existed.

The will of the Sovereign Lord had been devoured along with them.

Although Yang Qi hadn’t reached the half-Annulled level in the process, his battle prowess was now roughly equivalent to that level. He was now about three times as strong as he had been before.

When he devoured the Halls of Heaven, the destiny of his empire surged upward and the Everlasting Aegis expanded, allowing it to take in even more primal-chaos paleo-energy. New resources popped into being every day, and the defensive greyspace was sturdier than ever, glowing with countless motes of sagelight. Not even a God-Lord could break through the defenses, and any who tried would suffer a vicious counterattack from the Hand of the One God.

By this point, Yang Qi was the Everlasting Aegis, and the Everlasting Aegis was him.

Now that the Halls of Heaven were inside of him, Yang Qi was taking all of the medicinal pills, spell formations, magical treasures, and other resources stockpiled there.

For instance, there was a Thousand Year Dream formation, which was perfect for training purposes. Supposedly, when disciples entered that formation, they would enter a dream realm in which they faced endless battle. None of it was real, but the experience they gained as a result was immense.

In fact, within the dream of the formation, they could live entire lives and even be reincarnated to experience life again. It was a great way to boost the skills and abilities of disciples in a very short time. It was hard to comprehend how much wisdom someone could get by living numerous lifetimes.

They would eventually become like those old-timers who had been born again and practiced cultivation in ways that surpassed imagination.

As soon as Yang Qi took the Thousand Year Dream formation, he activated it and sent numerous Ascendants inside to work on enlightenment and breakthroughs.

As they succeeded, it caused the destiny of the empire to climb.

By now, it wasn’t even possible to use a destiny valuation to describe the Sage Monarch Empire.

The Ascendants soon became Lesser Gods, then Common Gods, Greater Gods, and Consummate Gods. In less than a day, Paramount Gods could be seen popping up like bamboo after a spring rain. The Everlasting Aegis was like fertile soil, and the Ascendants were like seeds that quickly grew into towering trees.

Friends and family of Yang Qi, such as Jadefall, Yang Doom, the Shepherd, Yang Memory, Yang Manifestation, Yang Proudworld, and even his father Yang Zhan, were all reaching psychic scales of over a hundred billion. And all of it was thanks to the energy of the Halls of Heaven being added to the Everlasting Aegis.

The entire world was reaching a higher level.

The Sage Monarch Empire had over a dozen people with psychic scales of a hundred billion, meaning that it now had incredible fighting prowess. It was almost impossible to compare it to the small and pitifully weak force it had been before.

The only thing they lacked now was a half-Annulled expert. Once Yang Qi reached that level, the empire's destiny would skyrocket.

Of course, the flourishing destiny of the empire caused Yang Qi’s cultivation base to rise as well, allowing him to further get the Halls of Heaven under control.

Once he fully assimilated them, and integrated the resulting liquid into his blood, his life force and genes would transform, and his Fist of the Halls of Heaven would become remarkably divine.

Almost no one would be able to sustain a blow from it. But unfortunately, he needed time to do that. At the moment, he didn't have any idea how to do it quickly.

Blurring into motion, he headed toward the House of the Invincible.

The Dugu patriarchs were opposed to being pulled into an empire, but they had little choice in the matter. There were only ten days to go. Yang Qi hoped to win them over and make the Invincible Dynasty part of the Sage Monarch Empire instead. For quite some time, he had been diametrically opposed to the Invincible Dynasty. However, at the same time, he was the apprentice of the Invincible Dugu, so he also needed to champion them.

He hoped that his visit to the House of the Invincible would result in him finding the Invincible Dugu’s true self. Perhaps he could awaken his Master, even just a little bit, in which case he could easily take over the place.

If he could bring the House of the Invincible into the Sage Monarch Empire, the resulting boost in destiny would push him far past the Central Dynasty or the Chiliocosm Dynasty. Then, not even the fact that Proud Heaven represented the essence of the god world would do him any good.

Yang Qi basically had two options at the moment. One was to kill Yang Voidprime, take his fateless energy, and use it to reach the half-Annulled level. Unfortunately, Yang Voidprime was with the High Priestess, which meant killing him would be almost impossible. Therefore, he was going with the second option and going to the House of the Invincible to search for his Master.

In the depths of the House of the Invincible, there was an enormous world in which the Dugu patriarchs and other high-ranking members of the clan were gathered around an immense corpse, fervently praying.

It was a giant clad in a long robe, and while he lay there still, he was clearly breathing. With every breath he took, primal-chaos paleo-energy rushed into his body, resulting in cracking and creaking sounds. And in the depths of his belly, it was possible to hear rumbling, as if of thunder.

This giant was none other than the Invincible Dugu.

Obviously, he wasn't dead, and was being supported by the faith of the House of the Invincible. He was one reason why, over the course of the past billions of years, no one had dared to openly attack the House of the Invincible.

Even the High Priestess was fearful of his corpse.

The patriarchs were all praying similarly. “Oh mighty Patriarch, the Dugu Clan and the Invincible Dynasty has reached a point of deadly crisis. We’ll soon be absorbed, devoured, by Proud Heaven of the Central Dynasty. He’s gained the support of the essence of the god world, and is being profoundly aggressive. The High Priestess also harbors evil intentions. Thus, oh mighty Patriarch, we implore your noble spirit to awaken!”

“Oh mighty Patriarch, in ten days, the House of the Invincible will face extinction. The Sage Monarch Empire threatens us from without, and Proud Heaven eyes us like a tiger eying its prey from within. Patriarch Invincible, you have to wake up to help us survive!”

“Patriarch! Hurry and awaken!”

“Patriarch, we are your offspring, and we implore you to step in and defend the fruits of our labor. We’re currently powerless to deal with the High Priestess and Proud Heaven. We need your protection.”

All of them were trembling in fear and anticipation. After all, the slumbering Invincible Dugu was their only hope.

Unfortunately, he just lay there sleeping, not moving a muscle.

Even as they begged and prayed, another voice rang out. “Greetings, Master. Your apprentice has come to kowtow in salute!”

Shocked, the patriarchs looked over to see a newcomer, who was none other than Yang Qi. Dropping to his knees in midair, he kowtowed to the corpse of the Invincible Dugu.

“Yang Qi...?”

The patriarchs, and other high-ranking members of the clan, shot to their feet in astonishment. Yang Qi’s fame and might were known in every corner of the god world, and it was said he was like the Sovereign Lord born again. Many people even suspected that he was actually a reincarnation of the Sovereign Lord. Although, others said that he was actually a Fateless One.

Regardless of what people thought he was, they knew he was an extremely domineering figure. Although he wasn’t technically a half-Annulled expert, he was strong enough that Proud Heaven and the High Priestess were working together to fight him. And his empire was the top empire in existence.

Compared to the Sage Monarch Empire, the Invincible Dynasty was as disunited as a dish of loose sand.

“How dare you come alone into this sacred area of the House of the Invincible?” Heaven-Defeating Dugu shouted. “Are you looking to die?” However, from the way his voice trembled, he seemed to be at a loss for words.

“Calm down,” Yang Qi said. “The Invincible Dugu is my Master. So why shouldn’t I come here? I want to offer formal greetings, and see if there’s a way to save him. Do you seriously want to stop me from doing that?”

“Don’t run your mouth like that, Yang Qi. Do you really think you can impress us by claiming that Patriarch Invincible is your Master?” Although Heaven-Reaching Dugu was confused about what to do, he knew he couldn’t attack. For one thing, he had to worry about what tricks Yang Qi might have up his sleeve. Also, Yang Qi was claiming that the Invincible Dugu was his Master.

Yang Qi laughed heartily. “You think I'm trying to impress you? I'm so powerful right now that not even the Sovereign Lord deserves to be my Master. You see, I knew the Invincible Dugu in the impure lands. That's where he became my Master. Do you really think I would make something like that up? You weaklings can't save him, and I'm definitely not going to allow Proud Heaven to assimilate him and turn him into an out-of-body incarnation.”

Chapter 1564: Rescuing Master

If Proud Heaven took over the Invincible Dynasty, the Invincible Dugu would fall into his vicious hands.

Perhaps in the beginning, he would have placated the Dugu Clan by claiming that he wouldn’t. But as his strength and influence grew, his true ferocity and ambition would have shown through.

The Invincible Dugu wasn’t actually dead, and his body contained immense power. He was also a half-Annulled expert, and that made him very valuable. It only made sense that Proud Heaven would drool over the prospect of acquiring him. Assimilating someone like that would ensure that Proud Heaven could deal with the High Priestess much more easily. And if he made it into an out-of-body incarnation, he would become completely invincible.

Obviously, there was no way Yang Qi could let any of that happen.

Looking around at the leaders of the Dugu Clan, Yang Qi said, “Proud Heaven is an immensely ambitious individual, and he doesn’t just want to unify the three dynasties. He wants to profane Master's corpse. I'm sure all of you realize that.”

“You’re completely exaggerating things, Yang Qi! Proud Heaven might have a lot of nerve, but he wouldn't dare desecrate our patriarch’s corpse. Don’t you think he’d be worried about us fighting back?”

All of a sudden, Dugu Yunkong let out a howl of rage. He had hoped to marry Yang Susu, but those plans had been foiled by Yang Qi, giving birth to an immense animosity. Although few people present had anything but hatred for Yang Qi, Dugu Yunkong hated him down to his very bones.

“You think Proud Heaven wouldn’t dare? He devoured his own father! So why wouldn’t he dare to do the same to Master? As for you, Dugu Yunkong, what trouble do you think you’re going to start here? Do you want to drag your Dugu Clan into the damnation of myriad tribulations?” Yang Qi’s gaze caused Dugu Yunkong to stagger backward, blood spraying out of his mouth.

Reaching out and steadying Dugu Yunkong, Heaven-Reaching Dugu said, “What? Proud Heaven devoured Proud Central? Yang Qi, this is Dugu Clan territory, so you’d better not act out of line. Do you have any proof that Proud Heaven actually devoured Proud Central?”

“Proof?” Yang Qi said with a cold chuckle. “What more proof do you need than what already exists? When Proud Heaven declared his intention to be the emperor of the combined three dynasties, Proud Central didn’t have a thing to say. Do you think he's a complete moron? No, Proud Central’s aura is no more. And how could that be, if he wasn’t devoured by Proud Heaven. Did he commit suicide?”

The Dugu patriarchs had already considered this possibility, but Yang Qi was the first to say it out loud. Proud Central had to be dead, and that meant Proud Heaven had devoured him. In turn, that also meant the Central Dynasty was thoroughly under Proud Heaven’s control. And when the three dynasties were combined, he would be the emperor.

“Why did you come here today, Yang Qi?” Heaven-Extinguishing Dugu asked. “To get us to join you? If that’s your plan, you’ve completely miscalculated. Our House of the Invincible is completely at odds with you and your deceitful behavior. We have no desire to join Proud Heaven, but we most certainly don’t want to be on your side. Nobody has any idea what you plan to do next. You used the God Legion Seal to subjugate Dugu Sheji, and plenty of other God-Lords. You also killed a lot of people in our army. If we joined you, we’d turn into cannon fodder. You think we don’t know that?”

“That’s right, Yang Qi!” Dugu Yunkong said. “No matter how bad you make Proud Heaven sound, you’re a thousand times worse. Maybe even ten thousand times worse! At least he wouldn’t use the God Legion Seal on us and turn us into the walking dead, with our thoughts under your control. And the High Priestess is around to keep him in check. After the three dynasties are united, as long as we work with the High Priestess, he won’t dare do anything to us. And we’ll get plenty of benefits. So why would we possibly want to join up with you? Come on, everyone. Don’t let this guy fool you. Draw on our destiny and crush him! And notify the High Priestess and Proud Heaven right away!”

The atmosphere was very tense.

Everyone wanted to crush Yang Qi, but none of them dared to make a move. They knew that if he unleashed his might, many of them would die. And obviously none of them were keen to end up dead.

“Your arguments do make sense,” Yang Qi said. “If you join Proud Heaven, you can work with the High Priestess against him. But if you join the Sage Monarch Empire, you’ll answer to me. However, I didn’t come here to get you to join me. In fact, I didn’t come here for you at all. I'm here as an apprentice, hoping to save his master. To bring him back to life.” He snorted coldly. “But since you brought up the subject, I’ll point out that you joining me won't exactly help me a lot. I don’t have a population problem anymore. Furthermore, I have a whole host of Ascendants that are part of my empire now. My Everlasting Aegis is constantly expanding, and using primal-chaos paleo-energy to create preheaven treasures. So wouldn’t you people just be a drain on my resources? Furthermore, I know how ambitious you are. You’d only cause problems for my empire’s destiny. It would probably be better just to let you be combined with the other dynasties, then sit and watch as you fight it out with Proud Heaven.”

Yang Qi’s grave and stern demeanor made everyone even more hesitant to do anything to him. At this point, many of the leaders of the Dugu Clan were starting to come around, and they were shocked.

“You really want to save our patriarch?”

“Don’t tell me that he can really be brought back to life.”

“Don’t be fooled!” Dugu Yunkong said loudly. “This guy is just like Proud Heaven. He just wants to turn our patriarch into an out-of-body incarnation. We can't let him do it!” Dugu Yunkong hated Yang Qi so much that he would stop at nothing to interfere with him.

“Hmph! Dugu Yunkong, you unfilial bastard!” Yang Qi swept his hand out, and the others present felt like they were in a dream as he simply grabbed Dugu Yunkong and hoisted him into the air by the neck like a duck.

“What do you think you’re doing, Yang Qi?” people shouted.

“Oh, nothing,” he replied. “I'm just showing you what I'm capable of. You see, you can’t fight me. That said, I'm not interested in hurting my Master’s progeny. So don’t force me to. I've already assimilated the Halls of Heaven.” His words caused the members of the Dugu Clan to shiver in terror, and none of them dared to take any action whatsoever. “I’ll make this simple. As I said, I'm not here for you. If I was, I would’ve just subjugated you immediately, then used you to strike a blow against Proud Heaven. Think about it. If I was really a threat to you, wouldn’t Patriarch Invincible have done something to interfere?”

They exchanged awkward glances as they considered the truth of his words. He was far stronger than the last time they had seen him in action, and if he really had assimilated the Halls of Heaven, they knew that he was definitely strong enough to fight half-Annulled experts, assuming he used destiny.

“Do you really want to help our patriarch, Yang Qi?” Heaven-Sacrificing Dugu asked. “If so, then give us a show of good faith by releasing Dugu Yunkong.”

“Of course, no problem!” Yang Qi said, tossing Dugu Yunkong to the ground as if he were an insect. “However, this unfilial bastard has to pay for his actions. He was actually opposing my effort to help my Master. I just used my Devil-God Seal on him. For the next twenty-four hours, he won’t be able to move, or even think.”

“I'm not interested in wasting words with you people. If you try to stop me from saving Master, you’ll have to take responsibility for your crimes. And when he wakes up, he’ll surely show you what true punishment is.” Yang Qi flicked his sleeve, and a stream of sagelight shot out and landed on the Invincible Dugu.

The Invincible Dugu was huge, as if his body contained numerous universes. With each exhalation, they would collapse, while each inhalation would cause them to swell.

Right now, Yang Qi was calling out to his thoughts, hoping to see how powerful he was.

“Nobody move,” Yang Qi said. “I'm sending sagelight into Master to assess his injuries, not hurt him.” Seeing the other members of the Dugu clan fidgeting anxiously, Heaven-Sacrificing Dugu said, “In years past, the Sovereign Lord used sagelight in that way to help certain God-Lords.”

They settled down and focused on watching Yang Qi work, hope starting to tug at their hearts.

Next, Yang Qi sent his divine will into the Invincible Dugu, where he sensed a boundless power pulsing, resisting him.

‘Master, in order to save you, I'm going to have to do something a bit blasphemous. I'm going to summon your will from the impure lands.” He threw his head back and howled, whereupon a tiny version of the Invincible Dugu appeared behind him, perfectly similar to how he had appeared in the impure lands. There, he had been the society chief of the Invincible Society, the very same one who had taught Yang Qi the Prodigious Proto-Epoch, Invincible War-Steppe.

Yang Qi hadn’t seen him since then.

He had hoped to find him in the immortal worlds, and even in his travels in the god world. Of course, Yang Qi knew that he was a pawn his Master had put in play as a desperate move. But Yang Qi didn’t mind. After reforming the image of his Master from the impure lands, Yang Qi sent him into the body of the gigantic Invincible Dugu.

As a result, the Invincible Dugu didn't instinctively resist, allowing Yang Qi to get a glimpse of the chaotic universes inside him.

It was as if there was a labyrinth of universes within him, all of them constantly changing in a very confusing way. Apparently, the Invincible Dugu had made his body similar to the god world itself, and his insides were as complex as the Halls of Heaven.

Yang Qi began searching for his sea of consciousness in the hopes of restoring his lost will.

Chapter 1565: Rescuing Master (2)

The Invincible Dugu’s body contained a host of universes, so many that they were something like a maze. However, that didn't stop Yang Qi from searching for his Master’s sea of consciousness in the hopes of identifying what his current condition was.

The body was secondary in importance. The most important aspect was the soul, which was in the sea of consciousness.

However, it was no easy task. It was like fishing a needle from the sea, considering how many universes there were within him.

The Invincible Dugu’s sea of consciousness wasn’t in his head. After all, the sea of consciousness wasn’t always located in the head. And sending one’s mind into the Invincible Dugu’s body was dangerous, as it could get lost in the universes and ultimately devoured. In some ways, the Invincible Dugu’s body was a treasure trove, but in other ways, it was a danger zone.

However, Yang Qi was willing to face the danger, if it meant saving his Master. True confidence stems from superb skill, plus he had the power of the Halls of Heaven to back him, and a psychic scale that was almost half-Annulled.

Whizz!

Eventually, Yang Qi located the central region of the numerous universes, where he found a huge world that was formed by a mountain of black rock. And at the bottom of the mountain was a gateway.

Rumbling sounds could be heard from inside the gateway, and it was covered with sealing talismans, all of them a mass of sprawling writing.

These ancient sealing marks couldn't be the work of human hands, and in fact, not even the Sovereign Lord could have done something like this. They were clearly the work of the essence of the god world.

‘The essence of the god world!’ Instantly, Yang Qi understood.

The Invincible Dugu definitely wasn’t dead. His mind had been sealed, not by some human enemy, but by the god world itself.

If Yang Qi had to speculate, his guess would be that, while the Invincible Dugu was working on his cultivation, he had clashed with the essence of the god world, perhaps in an attempt to devour it. And that was how he ended up like this.

The essence of the god world wasn't something that could easily be defeated.

At least not at the moment.

Even the Sovereign Lord had perished because of reasons pertaining to the god world.

‘So that’s how it is. Master’s will is sealed, thus his body is immobile. The only way to save him is to break open that seal. Then he’ll be restored, and will once again be a half-Annulled expert.’ Yang Qi studied the sealed gateway, but didn’t dare to do anything to it.

This was his Master’s sea of consciousness, and if he took action casually, he might damage the sea of consciousness and do nothing to the sealing marks.

Yang Qi could tell that if the sealing marks were suddenly broken, the essence of the god world would erupt with full power, and they would likely reduce the body to powder, simultaneously destroying the will inside.

For all intents and purposes, the Invincible Dugu was stuck.

WHOOSH!

Yang Qi extracted his psyche, his expression grave.

“Well?” asked Heaven-Extinguishing Dugu. “What's the situation with the patriarch?”

“I understand what happened,” Yang Qi said. “Master isn't dead. His will and soul have been sealed by the essence of the god world. Break the seals, and he’ll recover. Unfortunately, they can’t be easily broken. Use force, and the essence of the god world will erupt, completely destroying Master.”

“Then what can we do?”

“Is that really all there is to it?”

“Are you lying to us?”

The members of the Dugu Clan were elated to hear that the Invincible Dugu wasn’t dead, but they were obviously worried about the sealing mark. Although it confirmed that there was hope he could be resurrected, the fact that the essence of the god world was involved made the situation grave. And worse, the threat of Proud Heaven still loomed over them. Proud Heaven had the essence of the god world on his side, which meant the Invincible Dynasty was already a big target.

“I'm not lying,” Yang Qi said coolly. “And if you don’t believe me, take a look for yourself. I left a path open that you can follow to reach Master’s sea of consciousness.”

“We wouldn't dare profane the patriarch’s body in that way.”

Some of the experts of the House of the Invincible were shaking their heads, and many were openly suspicious.

“Yang Qi,” said Heaven-Sacrificing Dugu, “you’re telling us our patriarch has been sealed by the essence of the god world, and that if you break the seal, he’ll awaken. But how exactly are we supposed to do that?”

“I honestly can't believe that Master has progeny as useless as you people,” Yang Qi said. “If he hadn't been sealed by the essence of the god world, he probably would’ve committed suicide because of your stupidity. If I had an easy way to free him, I would’ve used it already. Look, there’s no time to lose. We need to take Master’s body into the Everlasting Aegis. I can use my empire's destiny to save him. That's the best bet.”

“Never!”

“Are you looking to die!?”

“So, Yang Qi, you finally show your true colors, you evil villain!”

“Bah! Yang Qi, you claim that Proud Heaven will turn our patriarch into an out-of-body incarnation, but it seems you want that even more than him. You’re not in the half-Annulled level yet, and that's why you want to assimilate him. Well, we’ll fight you to the death before we let that happen!”

The Dugu Clan experts weren’t going to agree to Yang Qi’s suggestion, and were cursing him for it. In fact, they even seemed like they might be getting ready to attack him.

“You might be Master’s descendants, but I have no room to show mercy. It’d probably be better to just slaughter all of you, saving me a bit of effort when it comes time to deal with the three dynasties.” Yang Qi’s killing intent was burning. He had never had any good impression of the Dugu Clan, to the point where he hadn’t even considered subjugating them.

Now, his mind had been made up.

Truth be told, Yang Qi had long since begun freeing people from the fetters of the God Legion Seal. Originally, he had subjugated many people. But after order was established and those people realized the point of his empire, becoming willing to fight for it as citizens, there wasn't any need for him to force their loyalty.

Oftentimes, empires were built on blood and carnage. However, after they were established, such things became unnecessary.

It was the natural evolution of things.

It was like how savages would devour raw meat at first. But after they discovered how to use fire, they would leave such things behind. Yang Qi’s empire was a place of order, where it wasn’t necessary to subjugate people. In fact, even people like the Central Dynasty’s old imperial preceptor, prime minister, and generalissimo of the armed forces had had their free will returned. Even people with psychic scales of three hundred billion had to admit that Yang Qi’s way of running things was superior, to the point where they would risk life and limb to defend it.

By now, the destiny of Yang Qi’s empire contained karmic recompense.

In other words, those who performed services for the empire would immediately get compensated with destiny. Government officials didn’t need to embezzle things to benefit, and as a result, the thinking of everyone in the empire had shifted, and they all wanted to serve the greater good.

What was good for the empire was good for everyone.

Bringing the people of the Dugu Clan into the Sage Monarch Empire would only lead to chaos, so Yang Qi was more inclined to either kill them or puppetize them, bringing an end to the House of the Invincible.

Yang Qi had long since considered doing this, and the only reason he’d been holding back was for the sake of the Invincible Dugu.

“Activate our destiny and crush Yang Qi!”

“Kill him! Considering we’re in the middle of the Invincible Dynasty, he can’t deal with us. Draw on all the power of destiny we can muster. Send word to Proud Heaven and the High Priestess. Two fists are no match for four hands, so he has no choice here but to die!”

“What? He wants to take the patriarch’s body away? That's treason! We’ll die fighting before we let that happen!”

All of the experts were shouting angrily, and the destiny of the dynasty was gathering.

The space around them was being locked down.

“What do you think you’re doing!?” All of a sudden, just when the fighting was about to break out, a thunderous voice erupted from within the Invincible Dugu, creating a resonance with the blood of the clan members, who were struck with the impulse to kowtow.

“The patriarch! That's the patriarch’s voice! He's alive!”

Heaven-Extinguishing Dugu, Heaven-Reaching Dugu, Heaven-Sacrificing Dugu, and all of the others present were very familiar with the voice, and they knew what it implied.

“Patriarch, hurry and crush Yang Qi!”

“He’s too big of a threat to the Invincible Dynasty. You have to kill him!”

“This guy is a freakish hellion!”

“Oh mighty Patriarch, now that you’re alive, please save our Invincible Dynasty. Awaken and defeat Proud Heaven and the High Priestess. Seize the throne!”

All of the Dugu Clan members were calling out similar things.

“Fools!” the Invincible Dugu shouted. “Yang Qi is my apprentice from the impure lands. I sent a stream of will out of the god world to summon him to rescue me. And now I'm appointing him as emperor of the Invincible Dynasty!”

Chapter 1566: You Be the Emperor

“Yang Qi.”

“Here, sir.”

“The divine will I sent to the impure lands has long since faded away, scattered by the essence of the god world. I'm speaking to you now through another sliver of will that I managed to squeeze through the sealing marks. But it won’t last for long. Yang Qi, the essence of the god world is incredibly powerful. It has imprisoned your mother, and is trying to assimilate her in its effort to become the mother of all things. If it succeeds, your mother will become the god world, and the god world will become your mother. However, she could also be destroyed in the process. Worst of all, you can’t do anything to save her right now. The most pressing matter at hand is to destroy Proud Heaven. Then you can unify all the people in the god world and lead the fight against its essence. In the end, devour it!”

Thanks to the Invincible Dugu’s booming voice, none of the members of the House of the Invincible could even move. All of them were completely shocked by what their Patriarch Invincible was saying to Yang Qi, and by their relationship.

“Therefore, Yang Qi, I want you to run the Invincible Dynasty as its emperor,” the Invincible Dugu continued. “You have to promise me that you’ll do as I ask. I'm at war with the essence of the god world. It views all powerful entities as threats, thus it’s the greatest enemy to us cultivators. The Sovereign Lord. The True Devil. They’re all gone because of the essence of the god world. Be wary of Proud Heaven. He isn’t an ordinary person. He has the Great Necropolis, and it doesn't originate with the god world. In fact, it’s the bane of the god world. The main reason the god world picked Proud Heaven to represent it is to control him, and eventually destroy the Great Necropolis. Of course, Proud Heaven wants to use the necropolis to recreate the essence of the god world in the way he wishes. Remember: destroy the Great Necropolis. Destroy the essence of the god world. Use your empire to transcend the civilization of the gods. Create a new civilization, a new age, a new world. You have to change everything! And remember... to save me, Yang Qi.”

Toward the end of his speech, the Invincible Dugu’s voice weakened until it eventually faded away.

Yang Qi nodded. “Don’t worry, Master. I’ll find a way to save you.”

Turning to the members of the Dugu Clan, he said, “Well, what do you think? You heard my Master’s words. He entrusted the Invincible Dynasty to me. What’s your stance?”

The leaders of the clan were absolutely flabbergasted.

As of now, they realized that everything Yang Qi had told them was true. The Invincible Dugu himself had confirmed it all, and had even said to make him emperor. In fact, they could do nothing but watch as the destiny formed something resembling a crown that settled onto his head. It was something that couldn’t be imitated or forged. It was formed from pure destiny.

The only way for that crown to have been created was if the Invincible Dugu really had decreed for Yang Qi to be the emperor.

After all, the Invincible Dynasty belonged to the Invincible Dugu, and his words were law there. The Dugu patriarchs couldn't do anything in opposition.

“What do we do?” they said amongst themselves as they exchanged awkward glances.

Generally speaking, they couldn’t go against the will of their Patriarch Invincible. However, none of them really wanted to go along with his instructions.

“Are you really thinking of going against Patriarch Invincible’s wishes?” Yang Qi said. “If you refuse to accept me as your emperor, so be it. The days of the Invincible Dynasty are over anyway, and it doesn’t really matter who the emperor is. My Sage Monarch Empire could crush this dynasty to powder in an instant. I'm going to take Master's body with me, all in accord with his wishes to save him. I won’t let him fall into the hands of Proud Heaven or the essence of the god world. If you try to stop me from helping Master, I’ll slaughter every last one of you, down to the chickens and dogs.”

Yang Qi’s words were spoken with a decisiveness that could sever nails and chop iron, and they left the Dugu Clan leaders shaken.

Using destiny to crush him wouldn't do any good, because he now controlled that destiny. Attacking him would be counterproductive. Furthermore, all of them were deeply afraid of the Invincible Dugu, and didn’t dare to defy him.

“Ah, whatever,” said one of the patriarchs. “If that's what the patriarch wants, we’ll acknowledge allegiance. I hereby swear an oath that I’ll go along with you, Yang Qi. However, you have to agree to use the Invincible Dynasty to save our patriarch.”

“The truth is that I have no desire to be your emperor,” Yang Qi said. “But I’ll respect Master’s wishes. Unfortunately, you have too much hidden misfortune in your empire for me to bring it into my Everlasting Aegis. The Everlasting Aegis is a place of perfect balance, and having you there would throw things into chaos. It’d take years to recover from that. Therefore, you won’t be part of the Sage Monarch Empire. Furthermore, any large-scale activity here would alert the Central Dynasty that something is going on.”

“So what do we do?”

The Dugu Clan had acknowledged Yang Qi as their emperor, and they had no choice but to bow their head to him, lest they openly acknowledge that they had no Dugu blood in them.

The matter had been settled, and as they thought about it, being in the Sage Monarch Empire actually wouldn’t be that bad, especially considering there were endless resources there.

Unfortunately, Yang Qi had nixed that idea.

He left them on their own, which was a really big blow. They had originally thought he was trying to take their empire, but in the end, he actually didn't care about them. It was far beyond anything they could have predicted.

“Master did entrust me with his empire,” Yang Qi said. “Therefore, I’ll send some sage monarch magistrates here to help you run things. It’ll be a major reform, considering your empire has become rotten to the core. Maybe after you’ve been cleansed, I’ll let you into the Sage Monarch Empire. In addition to that, I’ll send some resources to help. However, make sure that no one outside has any idea what’s happening. Keep your borders locked down during the next ten days.

When the High Priestess and Proud Heaven come out of seclusion, don't attend the meeting they call. Tell them the Invincible Dynasty doesn’t want anything to do with their shady dealings, and you’re withdrawing from the alliance. I'm curious to see what the High Priestess and Proud Heaven will do in response to that. If they attack you, the Sage Monarch Empire won't sit idly by. We’ll make sure they don’t hurt you.”

“I guess that’s all we can do,” the Dugu leaders said, nodding.

“Master, I have to go now. Come into my God Legion Paradise so that I can take you to the Everlasting Aegis....” Yang Qi opened the God Legion Paradise, which was more than large enough to contain the Invincible Dugu.

As soon as the God Legion Paradise was open, it was possible to see the Halls of Heaven inside it, pulsing with destructive power. Shocked, everyone backed up.

A teleportation portal appeared and Yang Qi stepped inside, using the destiny of the Invincible Dynasty to power it. Through it, the Everlasting Aegis could be seen.

Compared to the Invincible Dynasty, the Everlasting Aegis was like the Halls of Heaven.

RUMBLE!

Sage monarch magistrates poured out of the teleportation portal into the Invincible Dynasty, as well as some of Yang Qi’s brethren with psychic scales of a hundred billion.

By now, the Sage Monarch Empire had over twenty such individuals, God-Lords of immense power. In addition, there were Ascendants, Yang Qi’s fellow apprentices from the Invincible Society in the impure lands, and his old sword siblings.

They had all experienced the blessing of the Thousand Years Dream formation, as well as god pills from the Halls of Heaven. That was how they had become powerful so quickly.

Throughout history, only the Sage Monarch Empire had ever been able to do anything like this. Because of Proud Heaven’s recent gains, the Central Dynasty could rival the Sage Monarch Empire in terms of destiny. However, that had resulted from a sudden eruption that was already starting to die down.

Furthermore, the quality was different.

The destiny of the Sage Monarch Empire was like gold, while that of the Central Dynasty was like black iron.

“Now,” Yang Susu said, “close your borders and go into seclusion. Don't let anyone in or out.”

Yang Susu’s cultivation base was already superior to the Dugu patriarchs, and she was in command of the army.

In the past, the destiny of the Invincible Dynasty had been formidable, but now they had to follow Yang Qi’s orders. And by extension, they had to listen to Yang Susu.

She represented the crown.

In response to her orders, the Invincible Dynasty went on immediate lockdown.

Chapter 1567: Locking Down

There were only ten days left.

More realistically, there were only nine.

During that time, the Sage Monarch Empire had to make the Invincible Dynasty an impregnable fortress. Thus, the entire place was being locked down.

Countless troops were mobilized and sent to the border regions to defend them.

Entire cities were moved to create a line of defense. The end goal was to make sure the place was impossible to invade. The area covered by the Invincible Dynasty was just too immense.

As it stood, the place’s destiny was scattered and weak, which meant people with psychic scales anywhere from ten to a hundred billion could sneak inside unnoticed. And if they did, they could wreak immense destruction.

Thankfully, Yang Qi had all of the top experts of the Dugu Clan on the move, creating a stable base and borders. And part of that involved shrinking the area covered by the dynasty by about fifty percent.

Everyone was abuzz as the dynasty was locked down and the borders were thoroughly. inspected

By reducing the total area of the dynasty by fifty percent, it concentrated the destiny by five times. From afar, the destiny almost looked like a turtle shell covering all of the lands of the dynasty. Even experts with a psychic scale of a hundred billion would think twice before trying to sneak in now. Of course, it was nowhere near as impressive as the Sage Monarch Empire.

The Sage Monarch Empire and its Everlasting Aegis had destiny so intimidating that not even half-Annulled experts would try breaking into it.

Unfortunately, shrinking the Invincible Dynasty came with some downsides. The population was immense, and resources were insufficient. Thankfully, since the Everlasting Aegis was constantly producing masses of new resources, the deficits in the Invincible Dynasty could be made up for.

Of course, the sage monarch magistrates were taking the lead throughout the Invincible Dynasty, leading the people in prayer on a daily basis and helping set up spell formations.

Each spell formation would be powered by trillions of people, and were essentially independent aspects of space-time. Together, they made a greyspace that would help the Invincible Dynasty live up to its name.

Because the populace constantly had things to do, the dynasty was growing stronger and more consolidated.

Normally speaking, something like this never could have happened. First of all, the Invincible Dynasty was too big, and with the Dugu patriarchs in charge, it would have been impossible to galvanize the hearts of the people. Thankfully, Yang Qi had dispatched the top experts of his empire to work with the Dugu patriarchs, ensuring that everything operated smoothly.

Second, even if the Dugu patriarchs could have stirred the hearts of the people in this way, they simply couldn’t have handled the militarization aspects, especially when it came to the production requirements. Normally speaking, they would have run out of resources within days, and everything would have fallen apart. But now, the citizens were praying on a daily basis and creating spell formations, and they had the Sage Monarch Empire to keep them going.

Furthermore, as the new emperor of the Invincible Dynasty, Yang Qi could feed some of its destiny into the Everlasting Aegis, which would increase its production capacity.

This was only the beginning. Yang Qi planned to grow the Invincible Dynasty to roughly the same level as the Sage Monarch Empire before integrating the two. And he needed to cleanse the place as well. After all, he didn’t want to bring the impurities of the Invincible Dynasty into the Sage Monarch Empire.

Sadly, that couldn’t happen in ten days. It was a process that would likely take years.

It was a given that when the High Priestess and Proud Heaven emerged, they would launch an invasion of the Invincible Dynasty.

Yang Qi was ready. He wanted the people of the Invincible Dynasty to fight a bloody battle resulting in high casualties, in which the citizens risked life and limb. Then he would step in at the critical moment to tip the scale of battle. To temper the hearts of the people in war was the best way to build a strong empire.

The hearts of the people were ready. The dynasty was ready.

In the past, it was rigid and rotten, but now it had been born again, and its people burned with passion.

Of course, it also created a very precarious situation. If Yang Qi didn’t protect the Invincible Dynasty and keep it whole, it would devolve into destruction. However, he didn’t have any other options. This was the key to bringing about the destruction of the alliance.

In ten days, Proud Heaven would rise as the emperor of the ‘three dynasties’, with the High Priestess there to back him up, creating a force the likes of which had never existed before. Everyone in the god world knew that a unified empire was the most proper arrangement.

It seemed that the Sage Monarch Empire was in big trouble.

However, the unification of the three dynasties was nothing more than a mirage.

Whether the Invincible Dynasty remained whole as part of Yang Qi's empire, or was completely destroyed, there would only be two dynasties left to form Proud Heaven’s allied empire. At that point, the people of the god world would view Proud Heaven’s ‘empire’ as nothing more than a joke, and would flock to the Sage Monarch Empire.

During the ten days that passed, Yang Qi had his brethren taking care of the Invincible Dynasty, along with the sage monarch magistrates. Meanwhile, he focused on thinking of a way to rescue his Master, the Invincible Dugu.

If the Invincible Dugu hadn’t set things up in advance, and the triple alliance hadn’t been forced, he would likely have been in a very dangerous situation. Thankfully, he was living up to his reputation as an almighty entity from ancient times. It almost seemed like he had foreseen how everything would play out, and had set things up for Yang Qi’s advantage.

That said, Yang Qi was constantly on guard against the essence of the god world. The essence was far more worrisome to him than Proud Heaven. After all, it was trying to fuse with his own mother, and if it succeeded, it would be his mother. What would he do then? Kill his own mother? How could he possibly do that?

Unfortunately, he was powerless to do anything about that now, and could only hope to awaken the Invincible Dugu and ask him for advice.

Sending his divine will into the Invincible Dugu’s body again, he started working at excising the essence of the god world. The enormous gateway in his Master’s sea of consciousness was surrounded by all sorts of destructive energy, so he had to be very careful as he worked. It was like reeling silk from the cocoon.

Already, the Everlasting Aegis wasn't part of the god world; it was its own entity that could absorb primal-chaos paleo-energy and use it to create preheaven treasures.

In this regard, it was different from the god world. The god world took in primal-chaos paleo-energy to grow larger and stronger, whereas the Everlasting Aegis used it to create resources. For the Everlasting Aegis, growing stronger was a very different process. As it created resources for the people within it, they would pray to the empire, causing the empire to grow stronger and the aegis to expand.

The god world didn’t need the help of the people within it to grow. But the Everlasting Aegis had a more symbiotic relationship with its people.

Of course, Yang Qi was aware of this fundamental difference.

The dao of the god world was a lonesome one.

But Yang Qi’s dao involved working with the people to help them transcend. And that ensured that he would be completely at odds with the god world. As such, he would use his own dao to help the Invincible Dugu get rid of the sealing mark placed in him by the essence of the god world.

He could use sagelight to slowly get rid of it, the same way that drops of water could be used to eat through stone.

‘Oh, right. The bane of the god world is the Great Necropolis. I wonder if I should try using the Great Necropolis God Art.’

Exhaling, he used the final move from the Sage Monarch Grand Magic: Annul Death; Eternally Bury. Instantly, an image of the Great Necropolis appeared around the Invincible Dugu.

As soon as it appeared, the essence of the god world was sent into retreat.

‘It’s working!’ Yang Qi thought in delight. The sealing mark seemed to be calling out for more power, except it was in the Everlasting Aegis now. The Everlasting Aegis didn’t need the god world to exist, and as a result, the god world couldn’t get inside of it.

Whizz!

A sound like the buzzing of locusts could be heard as the sealing mark trembled, constantly spitting out spell formations to protect itself. It was almost like a saint writing calligraphy in the form of articles.

Countless magical symbols spread out, creating a marvelous defense.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi wielded the will of the Great Necropolis in his battle with it. As he did, the essence of the god world unleashed trillions of daoist techniques that surpassed the power of even the Sovereign Lord.

Chapter 1568: Ten Days Later

Thus, Yang Qi struggled with the essence of the god world, slowly wearing away at it in a process that was obviously going to take a long time. Ten days definitely wouldn’t be enough.

Not even his ability to alter the flow of time would do any good, because the essence of the god world was tied to the structure of the god world itself. He could speed up time dramatically for himself, but for the god world, time would continue at the same rate. There was nothing he could do other than slowly chip away.

He would have loved to be able to save the Invincible Dugu in that ten-day period. Then he would definitely be able to defeat Proud Heaven and his allies. And a half-Annulled expert would have done amazing things for his destiny.

On the upside, the destiny of his empire was more stable than ever. Everyone knew that he had subjugated the Invincible Dynasty, and they were helping to consolidate it and supply it with resources.

At the same time, the citizens of the empire were developing a sense of national identity.

They knew they represented a powerful empire. The citizens normally wore long, flowing robes that made them seem like sages. They were broad-minded and accepting, and didn't go around bullying people or acting jealous.

It was nothing short of miraculous.

If things went on like this, they would eventually become an empire that could defeat any opponent. Even if the Sovereign Lord, King Immortal-Slayer, the True Devil, Wretch-God Ultimate, and the Demon Master were all resurrected, they wouldn't be able to defeat such an empire.

Ten days passed in a flash.

Yang Qi inhaled as he retracted his will from the Invincible Dugu’s sea of consciousness. His ten-day battle with the essence of the god world had given him many new insights and understandings.

He could even use the God Legion Seal to directly draw on the essence of the god world to create heavenly caliber godstones.

He was like a flea living on the god world, able to suck its blood any time he wished. And if the god world tried to smack him, he would just jump away to safety. There was nothing the god world could do about it.

Normally speaking, the God Legion Seal could only create perfect caliber godstones. The fact that Yang Qi could make heavenly caliber godstones was a result of him being so infinitesimally close to the half-Annulled level. Sadly, he still wasn’t able to reach that level.

Yang Qi inhaled, and like a flea sucking blood, he tapped into the essence of the god world, causing his psyche to surge and his monarch godhood to swell.

Thanks to his close-quarters conflict with the essence of the god world, he knew a lot more about it now, and was able to use it to transform himself much more easily. In the blink of an eye, his psychic scale rose from six hundred billion to seven hundred billion.

In terms of psychic scale, he was now on the same level as the High Priestess.

Generally speaking, it was impossible to push one’s psychic scale and godhood rating past three hundred billion if they weren’t half-Annulled. But Yang Qi was different. In fact, he was the first person in all history to have done such a thing.

That was what resulted from devouring the Halls of Heaven.

Also, no one had ever combined the God Legion Seal with the Mahātmā Jade. That wasn’t to mention that Yang Qi had gained enlightenment of the Wretched Brain God Art, and set up an independent empire that was completely linked to its people. The natural laws of the god world had nothing to do with its inhabitants, which meant that if it broke through to a higher level, everyone who lived within it would die.

But the Everlasting Aegis was completely tied to its people.

As long as the Everlasting Aegis existed, its people would exist. And the people knew that the Everlasting Aegis was their heaven and earth, which would protect them. It was like the relationship between a fish and the water around it.

Yang Qi had already taken the first steps toward surpassing the god world. At the moment, it was in an early stage of development. And while a baby lion cub couldn't possibly defeat a full-grown male dog in battle, eventually, the lion would grow up, and then it would be completely superior.

That was why the essence of the god world had picked a representative to try to destroy Yang Qi.

‘Proud Heaven and the High Priestess should be coming out soon, right?’ Yang Qi thought, looking in the direction of the alliance’s headquarters. Sure enough, hosts of experts from the Central Dynasty and the Chiliocosm Dynasty were converging on the Central God-Temple.

Proud Heaven opened his eyes and exhaled slowly. Feeling more satisfied than ever, he smiled and said, “Doomsday is coming to you, Yang Qi. Starting today.”

“This is bad, Brother Proud Heaven!” someone said as a shadowy form flew into the Central God-Palace.

“Oh? What happened?” Proud Heaven looked over with cold eyes to see Yang Voidprime. He had long since considered devouring Yang Voidprime, but couldn't because he was under the protection of the High Priestess. However, after he became the official emperor, he would outrank Yang Voidprime, and could crush him at will.

“The people from the Dugu Clan have gone crazy! During the past ten days, they consolidated their destiny and locked down their dynasty. No one is allowed in or out. We sent some emissaries over to invite the Dugu patriarchs to the unification ceremony, but they said they’re backing out of the alliance, and won’t participate in the war with the Sage Monarch Empire!” Yang Voidprime could sense that Proud Heaven wanted to kill him. Even a simpleton could guess that Proud Heaven wanted the fateless energy for himself.

However, he wanted to kill Proud Heaven just as much, so he didn't care.

“What? This is preposterous! They backed out of the alliance? Are they feeling suicidal or something?” During the ten days that had passed, Proud Heaven had not only healed up, but had also interacted with the essence of the god world, improving his cultivation base and psyche.

This news had come as a complete and utter shock, and all of a sudden, Proud Heaven’s supreme confidence was shaken.

The ‘alliance of three dynasties’ now existed in name only.

“I knew this was going to happen,” Proud Heaven said, rising to his feet. “The Dugu Clan is unreliable, and simply won’t give up their autonomy. Sadly, events are already in motion, and unification is coming. If they wish to swim against the tide, we’ll make sure the tide drowns them. What did the High Priestess have to say about this?”

Of course, Proud Heaven knew that going to war with the Invincible Dynasty wasn’t something they could do lightly. And he didn’t want to be the one to lead the charge.

Swish!

The High Priestess arrived in the Central God-Palace, along with numerous other old-timers.

Swishing her sleeve, she said, “I'm aware of the situation, and have come to talk it over. I can’t believe the Dugu patriarchs had the gall to leave our alliance. It’s going to be a big blow to morale. Furthermore, we already sent out the announcements. We’re going to be a laughingstock, especially to the Demonfolk. And our prestige is going to drop a lot. We have to strike a blow immediately.”

“I agree,” Proud Heaven said with a vicious smile. “They really don’t know how to appreciate favors. What did they think, that if they went into hiding, we’d hesitate to shoot the rat for fear of breaking the vases? Let's strike quickly. Get our hands on the patriarchs, and enslave them and all their people. They were supposed to be given positions as grand princes in the new empire, but for their traitorous behavior, they’ll be punished according to the law. Furthermore, not giving them positions will save a lot of destiny.”

“True,” said Yang Voidprime. “That means this is actually good for us in some ways. Do we attack them right now?”

“No!” Proud Heaven replied. “At the moment, we’re as disunited as a dish of loose sand. And the Sage Monarch Empire will definitely try to take advantage of the situation. We need to combine the two dynasties so that we're as strong as possible. Set our foundation, and ordain all of the government officials. Once the new structure is in place, we’ll force the Dugu Clan to come and admit their crimes. Then we’ll wipe them out.”

“We agree,” Proud Heaven’s subordinates all said.

The High Priestess had originally been considering vying for power with Proud Heaven. But she could tell that if she did that, the resulting instability would give Yang Qi the perfect opportunity to strike at them.

“Fine,” she said. “Settle the foundation and ordain the ministers. After everything’s in order, we’ll attack the Dugu Clan and wipe them out of existence!”

Chapter 1569: Foundation

The preparations had all been made for Proud Heaven to ascend to the throne. Once the two dynasties were combined, and their destinies became one, they could crush the Dugu Clan and vanquish the Invincible Dynasty.

That said, Proud Heaven was still irritated.

He had set his mind on being the emperor of three combined dynasties, and the sudden loss of the Invincible Dynasty was a big blow to his majesty. Obviously, he needed to wipe them out of existence quickly to establish his power in the god world.

Right now, the Demonfolk occupied the majority spot in the population of the god world. Although in the past they had always existed in tribal structures, over the years, many Demonfolk empires had been founded. However, they were scattered and disunited, and most weren’t even as powerful as the old Deva Dynasty.

Every ancient forest or jungle in the god world had Demonfolk in it.

In fact, they made up about eighty percent of the population, while humans were only about ten percent, and other denizens made up the final ten percent. However, because of the lack of order among the Demonfolk, it was easy for humans to subjugate them. A single human empire could usually defeat hundreds or thousands of Demonfolk empires in battle.

Considering that this current conflict was between human empires, the Demonfolk were essentially sitting on the sidelines waiting to see how things would play out. It was the biggest conflict that had ever occurred in the god world, and of course, the sages and mahātmās of the Demonfolk were already hatching plans for how to take advantage of the situation.

It was the same with the Devilfolk in the god world.

Even the various races of godlings were around, waiting and watching.

Everyone wanted to see which human empire would prevail, then hopefully seize some advantage out of it.

Despite the fact that humans only made up ten percent of the population, they commanded ninety percent of the resources.

The Central, Invincible, and Chiliocosm Dynasties had been in power for billions of years, and during that time, the Demonfolk had waged war on them countless times in the hopes of seizing resources. The human empires didn’t want demons or devils in them. Because of their inherently chaotic nature, they would damage the destiny, and were a constant threat to the citizens.

Yang Qi was no exception. He had subjugated the Dragonfolk, and even brought certain Demonfolk into his empire. However, he had been forced to alter their life force and genes, turning them into humans.

Later, he had stopped accepting Demonfolk.

Transforming them into humans was just too big a drain on resources. In the end, he realized that transforming demons and devils as a whole just didn’t make sense. It was little wonder that humans had long emphasized the importance of ridding the world of devils and demons.

That said, the Sage Monarch Empire wasn’t completely opposed to them. Destructive demons and devils had to be exterminated, but those who could accept order would be accepted.

For now, the most powerful of the demons and devils were simply waiting to see how the conflict between the humans would play out, and how it would change the god world. And as soon as Proud Heaven took the throne, everything would begin in earnest.

Countless beams of prismatic light shot toward the Central God-Temple as old-timers headed there to watch the ceremony.

Yang Chiliocosm’s expression was unsightly, as though he also wanted to back out of the alliance, just like the Dugu Clan. Unfortunately, the die had already been cast, and he couldn’t afford to do anything dramatic. The High Priestess and Proud Heaven were both half-Annulled experts, and if he tried anything like that, they would definitely pounce and destroy him.

It would be better to accept a position as a government official and reap whatever benefits there were to be had.

That was better than being dead. And while Yang Chiliocosm longed to reach the half-Annulled himself, he knew that it wouldn’t happen anytime soon.

Numerous old-timers observed as Proud Heaven walked up to the throne. The first thing he would do was offer a sacrifice to the god world.

Burning sagefire erupted as he began the rite. “Oh great essence of the god world... I, your servant Proud Heaven, shall sit as emperor and excise the tumor that is the Sage Monarch Empire. I only hope that you will bless my efforts!”

RUMBLE!

Everyone could sense the god world trembling as numerous spatial rifts opened up, and vital energy swirled around and into Proud Heaven. Obviously, the god world was accepting him as its representative.

Any other person who claimed that position would be a heretic and a liar.

Everyone could sense the massive power of the essence of the god world. It was something that couldn't be faked. There were numerous old-timers here who were deeply familiar with that essence, and as such, they could all sense the terrifying power that was converging in Proud Heaven.

“Not even the Sovereign Lord provoked signs like this when he assumed power,” the Patriarch of the Universe said. “Is Proud Heaven the true Son of Heaven? Is he the real Lord of the god world? The essence of the god world accepts him, which gives him the legal right to rule. And the destiny of his empire will be linked with that essence!”

The High Priestess wasn’t very happy about what she was seeing, but she couldn’t do anything about it. If the essence of the god world was going to accept Proud Heaven, and not her, then her hands were tied. Having been a follower of the Sovereign Lord for so long, she knew how terrifying the essence of the god world could be. Even the Sovereign Lord had perished after plotting against it, so what exactly could she do?

The essence of the god world was providing signs and portents so that all living people, even in distant locations, knew that it had selected a representative.

This was the first time that the god world had actually had a legal and rightful ruler.

When the Sovereign Lord unified the god world, it wasn’t legitimate. He had taken over by force, and the essence of the god world had eventually seen to it that various powerful entities rose up to overthrow him.

But now, because Proud Heaven had the legal right to rule, many people were viewing him as someone that had surpassed the Sovereign Lord. He was now more untouchable than ever, and at the same time, the destiny of his empire was growing.

“Congratulations on taking the throne, Emperor!”

The old-timers could see how things were going, so they didn’t hesitate to act pragmatically. They began offering their congratulations, knowing that with Proud Heaven as the emperor, it would be a big benefit to become a government official in the Central Dynasty.

Eventually, Hailan, Yang Voidprime, Yang Chiliocosm, and even the High Priestess all offered their congratulations.

“I hereby ordain the High Priestess as the imperial preceptor!” Proud Heaven said as he began the various ordainments. In response, the destiny converged, growing even stronger.

“Let Yang Chiliocosm be ordained the premier and regent prince. Let Yang Voidprime be ordained as a grand prince. Let Hailan be ordained as a grand princess. Let the Patriarch of the Universe be ordained as a vice prince....” One by one, Proud Heaven made all the announcements according to the plans he had made. He also made various promotions among the existing leadership of the Central Dynasty, much to their delight.

“Make the official announcement. The Central Dynasty and the Chiliocosm Dynasty have now become one. And instead of taking either of the previous names, the new empire will be called the Deathless Heaven Empire! The ‘Heaven’ comes from my name Proud Heaven!” As Proud Heaven’s voice rumbled out like thunder, the influx of destiny caused his cultivation base to rise to a level no one could even assess, making him seem completely fused with the multiverse.

The Patriarch of the Universe and the other old-timers were all shocked.

“This reminds me of the time of the Sovereign Lord. The Sovereign Lord was the only one whose aura seemed like it wasn't part of the world, as though he was about to reach the Annulled. Until now.”

“You're exactly right. Proud Heaven’s cultivation base is now at the same level as the Sovereign Lord’s was. In fact, if the Sovereign Lord suddenly returned, it's hard to say who would come out on top in a fight.”

“From ancient times until now, there have been countless boundless experts. But the Sovereign Lord was number one among them all. And now Proud Heaven stands shoulder to shoulder with him. He’s definitely beyond the High Priestess now.”

The High Priestess felt grimmer than ever on the inside, but she knew she couldn’t defy Proud Heaven and the essence of the god world. That said, she still hoped that one day she would be able to kill him and take the approval of that essence by force.

Proud Heaven had established his foundation smoothly and with no problems.

The entire ceremony lasted seven days and seven nights.

Not even Yang Qi’s empire had legitimacy or legality, and was thus considered heretical by the god world. Only Proud Heaven’s empire was legitimate and orthodox.

After the destiny stabilized, Proud Heaven didn’t hesitate to issue his next order. “Let’s go. The time has come to bring destruction to the Dugu Clan and the Invincible Dynasty!”

Chapter 1570: Demonfolk Empire

Proud Heaven felt more grand and ambitious than ever, now that he had become a true emperor, with access to destiny that was only climbing higher and higher. He was itching to send troops to deal with the Dugu Clan and their Invincible Dynasty. He hoped that war would be the way to solidify his position and ensure that his own system was operating smoothly. He also wanted to dispel the influence of the High Priestess, who was now the imperial preceptor of the Deathless Heaven Dynasty. Unfortunately, not even the emperor could simply appoint or dismiss people at random. His position wasn't stable enough for that. However, after enough battles were fought, and the armed forces had become completely loyal to him, things would be easier to deal with.

When trusted aides performed services in war, it was possible to promote them and give them more power. At the same time, he could slowly distance himself from others, until eventually, his loyalists and bloodlines were in complete control.

Nepotism and favoritism generally weren’t good for an empire, but in this case, Proud Heaven was more concerned with centralizing power. He could always reform the system later, if it proved necessary.

Eventually, he would find a reason to demote the High Priestess, then arrest her and turn her into an out-of-body incarnation.

As Proud Heaven issued the commands to march on the Invincible Dynasty, people could sense a mysterious aspect of space-time off in the distance, where an immense destiny thrummed. In fact, it rose high into the sky with such power that it pierced the fetters of the universe and reached out into primal-chaos.

Meanwhile, an emissary had arrived, and was on his knees in the outer audience hall, asking for an audience with Proud Heaven.

A guard rushed in to inform Proud Heaven. “Your Majesty, the recently established Demonfolk Empire has sent emissaries here to offer congratulations to you humans on the founding of your empire.”

“What? Demonfolk Empire?”

This unexpected development had caught Proud Heaven completely unawares.

He never would have predicted that an empire of demons would suddenly pop up. At first, he assumed it was Yang Qi causing trouble. After all, humans always looked down on the chaotic demons, who lacked order and civilization. How could Demonfolk ever manage to establish an empire?

Even the Demon Master had been like a night queen flower that crumpled almost as soon as it bloomed, having never accomplished anything worthwhile.

But apparently, such an empire did exist, and it had sent emissaries in an obvious move to force the humans to recognize them. It was essentially a direct insult.

“I should’ve known,” Proud Heaven said, his jaw tightening. “No matter how many issues you take care of, there are always new ones that pop up. I knew the Demonfolk old-timers have been eying us like tigers eyeing prey, but now they’ve gone and started an empire. And they sent people to offer congratulations to us? Are they looking to die? Who is this emissary? Bring him in immediately!”

“Yes sir!” Several old-timers rushed out, grabbed the emissary, and dragged him in. Everyone was wondering why the Demonfolk were suddenly causing problems right now.

Logically speaking, even if some of the Demonfolk old-timers had founded some sort of empire, they should have waited to see whether the Deathless Heaven Dynasty or the Sage Monarch Empire came out on top before trying to make a move.

Doing it this way seemed like a major blunder.

However, the Demonfolk were often far more devious and cunning than humans. They could tap into the dao of heaven, and were profoundly ambitious and ruthless. It seemed unlikely that they would make such an obvious mistake.

Before long, the Demonfolk emissary had been brought in.

He looked like a young man, tall and well-built. However, he seemed like little more than a Paramount God with a psychic scale of a few billion. He wasn’t even a God-Lord. However, he glanced at the surrounding old-timers as if they were slaves, which obviously rubbed them the wrong way. In fact, some of them were inclined to just kill him on the spot.

However, when two empires made contact, it wasn't good to instantly kill the messenger. Besides, Proud Heaven wanted to see what kind of individual had been sent, and why this newly founded empire didn't seem frightened about being wiped out.

No matter how well the Demonfolk tried organizing themselves, they were still like animals, and couldn’t possibly foster any sort of destiny.

“You're the Demonfolk emissary?” Proud Heaven said coldly. “Who are these old-timer Demonfolk that sent you? Do they really not know the difference between life and death? Otherwise, why would they go and found an empire? Tell them to come in person and kowtow to me, in which case I might spare them the death penalty. Otherwise, I’ll send my army over there and wipe you all out.”

The young man threw his head back and roared with laughter. “You’re Proud Heaven? You killed Proud Central and devoured him, seizing control of the Central Dynasty. That's very unfilial behavior. Outright rebellion. And now you’re trying to take over the entire god world. Ridiculous. The reason we Demonfolk have founded an empire is that we're going to wipe out you humans and establish the greatest government in existence. We're going to ensure that Demonfolk rule everything. Proud Heaven, you and your supposed Deathless Heaven Dynasty will acknowledge allegiance to us. Kowtow and beg for forgiveness, and we might spare your lives. Otherwise, Doomsday is here for all humans!

“By the way, we also sent an emissary to Yang Qi from the Sage Monarch Empire. Once he surrenders to us, he’ll be our lackey, and will help us turn everyone in his empire into demons. And if you don’t give in to us, we’ll turn them on you and have them rip you to shreds!”

“Kill him!”

“These Demonfolk are repulsive!”

“They're nothing but wild animals. I can’t believe they're being so aggressive. I'd say the time has come for us to simply exterminate the Demonfolk.”

“Since when are the Demonfolk so interested in playing with fire? Have they gotten tired of living?”

The top experts of the Deathless Heaven Dynasty were fuming, and some of them had to hold back from immediately launching deadly attacks on the emissary.

However, Proud Heaven held out a restraining hand. Glaring at the young emissary, he said, “That’s big talk. But can you back it up? Given what you've said so far, child, it seems unlikely that you’ll leave this place alive. Unless you have something else to say...? I'm going to guess that you have an animadestiny soul lamp back home that you think will ensure your survival. But apparently you don’t know what the half-Annulled level is capable of. Not even your Demonfolk old-timers can protect you from that power. I can make sure that soul lamp gets exterminated as well.”

The young Demonfolk burst out laughing again. “The reason I came here today, Proud Heaven, is to tell you that your Deathless Heaven Dynasty isn’t as impressive as you think it is. We Demonfolk really have started working together, and we outnumber you humans in every way imaginable. The Sage Monarch Empire is going to be wiped out, and that leaves you two choices. First, you could start working for us. We’ll treat you like the dogs you are, but at least you won’t die. The second option is to be exterminated. The essence of the god world won't be able to protect you from us.”

“Die!” Proud Heaven sent out his divine will, creating a psychic tempest that dropped down right into the young Demonfolk.

Crunch.

He didn't even have time to scream before he was ripped to shreds. Simultaneously, Proud Heaven’s divine will traced his soul back to its origin to wipe it out as well.

There was no corner of the universe that could hide from Proud Heaven.

However, even as Proud Heaven’s divine will locked on to the distant part of the universe where the young demon’s energy was located, he suddenly found himself slamming into something that was at least as strong as himself!

Then, an immense and glorious power rushed forth to slam into him.

He staggered backward, his face a mask of shock.

“The Demon Master! The King of Godmammoths!”

There were two ancient expressions of will, both of them half-Annulled experts!

They were none other than the ultimate patriarch of all Demonfolk, the august Demon Master! The other was a font of boundless power who had crushed hells for countless years. The King of Godmammoths! In many ways, the King of Godmammoths was also considered to be Demonfolk.

Those two individuals had perished and disappeared into the sands of time, yet here they were, resurrected!

And now they were clashing with Proud Heaven.

Even if Proud Heaven were stronger than he was, he couldn't possibly fight these two beings. He would definitely meet defeat!

Face draining of blood, he suddenly began chanting, causing streams of magical symbols to flow out that belonged to the essence of the god world. Apparently, he was enacting some sort of enchantment.

“What?!”

The other members of his empire were shocked. As for the High Priestess, her face fell as she said, “What did you just say, Proud Heaven? The King of Godmammoths and the Demon Master!?”

“You heard me,” Proud Heaven said coldly, not pleased at all that she had directly addressed him by name. “Imperial Preceptor, given that our empire has already been founded, you should really remember to follow proper protocol and forms of address.”

Swish!

The High Priestess’ face turned ashen.

She knew full well that Proud Heaven was warning her. In fact, it was almost a reprimand. The High Priestess was so powerful that not even the Sovereign Lord had ever reprimanded her, yet Proud Heaven was doing that very thing. She was so angry she almost rebelled against him right then and there, but then she remembered the essence of the god world. Smiling coldly, she said, “You’re right, Your Majesty. We should all follow proper protocol and forms of address. Now that two mighty Demonfolk have suddenly appeared, what exactly are we going to do? Are we going through with the plan to attack the Dugu Clan?”

“No!” Proud Heaven said, glancing over at her. “This changes everything, and we can’t act rashly. For now, we need to focus on stabilizing the empire. Didn’t that psycho just say they’ve sent people to the Sage Monarch Empire as well? Let’s see what Yang Qi does. If Yang Qi fights them, maybe we’ll have the perfect opportunity on our hands. But if he doesn't, you’ll need to go talk to the King of Godmammoths. Perhaps he’ll join us in attacking the Sage Monarch Empire. I'm the rightful ruler, and I have the support of the essence of the god world. Even if the King of Godmammoths is stronger than he is, he's not going to defy the god world itself, is he?”

“Perhaps we should call a meeting to discuss the matter,” one of the old-timers said.

Chapter 1571: The King of Godmammoths and the Demon Master

The King of Godmammoths and the Demon Master had both made their debut. Unexpectedly, they had managed to unify the Demonfolk.

They had done it without anyone the wiser, similar to how Yang Qi had secretly spent years building the Sage Monarch Empire. Both empires had popped up like bamboo after a spring rain.

Creating a Demonfolk empire was no easy task, what with their enormous population. Even for two top experts, it would be difficult. Normally, it would involve tracking down all the great sages among the Demonfolk, then using them to instruct the masses in ways to become human and embrace order.

In the beginning, the Demon Master had done things that way.

He had taught the Demonfolk new ways, in an effort to reach the peak of existence. But in the end, he failed. Demonfolk were Demonfolk, and getting them to become orderly and abandon their brutal nature was impossible. The law of the jungle was built into their life force and genetic structure.

But the Demon Master was attempting a comeback. He had obviously thought the matter through, gaining new enlightenment of the Demonfolk, and somehow instilling order into their instincts. And the combination of the Demon Master and the King of Godmammoths was obviously an unstoppable force.

Now that the grand Demonfolk Empire had been set up, they wanted to use Proud Heaven to make a demonstration of military force. That way, the other human empires would know that the Demon Master and the King of Godmammoths were a serious force to contend with.

Obviously, they wanted to control heaven and earth, and in the process, take all power away from humans.

It was obvious that an age of transcendence had arrived.

**

Around the time Proud Heaven had been planning to invade the Invincible Dynasty, the Demonfolk emissary arrived at the Sage Monarch Empire.

Yang Qi had watched as Proud Heaven combined the Central and Chiliocosm Dynasties into the new Deathless Heaven Dynasty. Although the resulting destiny was amazing, it was still a hodgepodge. There was no true unity, and the only way Proud Heaven was able to keep control was because he had the backing of the essence of the god world.

Next, he waited for Proud Heaven to launch the invasion, whereupon Yang Qi would unleash all of his various preparations in all their destructive glory.

Yet things developed in a way that he could never have anticipated.

The Demonfolk Empire had suddenly risen up out of nowhere.

All of his previous plans were now useless. And of course, the situation was obviously not ideal. He had hoped to use the Invincible Dynasty to win a big victory in battle, and at the same time, ensure that its people experienced a rebirth through tribulation.

But now Proud Heaven was holding back, and the transformation via fire that the Invincible Dynasty was supposed to experience was obviously not going to happen. That was bad for Yang Qi.

Worse, there was now a third major power at play. Yet again, the god world had a tripartite balance of power, and there was nothing Yang Qi could do about it.

Hurrying into the throne room flanked by numerous experts, Yang Susu said, “Yang Qi, there’s an emissary from the Demonfolk here. Are you going to receive him? This is really an unexpected development. Proud Heaven isn’t attacking, and now this powerful group of Demonfolk has shown up. Normally speaking, you’d think that Proud Heaven would simply slaughter whatever Demonfolk caused problems for him. But he’s obviously afraid of them. Who exactly is behind all of this? Don’t tell me the Demon Master has been resurrected.”

“It absolutely is the Demon Master,” Yang Qi replied. “However, Proud Heaven is currently no weaker than the Sovereign Lord, so even if the Demon Master was resurrected, he could still defeat him. That means there’s another powerful Demonfolk expert involved.”

“But who, exactly?” many people asked.

“If my speculations are correct, it's the King of Godmammoths.” Yang Qi smiled faintly. “Things are really getting complicated here. For the first time, I haven’t been able to manipulate things to turn out as I want. Oh well. When soldiers come, send a general to stop them. When flood waters come, use earth to block them. I'm not too worried. Let’s see what this emissary is like.”

“Yes sir!”

“Bring in the emissary!”

Before long, a passageway opened up and the Demonfolk emissary entered. This emissary wasn’t the man that Proud Heaven had dealt with, but rather a young woman.

She wore palace attire, and looked very cold and arrogant. That said, she was so pretty that most men who looked at her would have trouble keeping their composure. She was the kind of beauty that could case nations to fall without exerting any effort at all. Her cultivation base was unreadable, but seemed close to the level of three hundred billion. She was a peak God-Lord, similar to Yang Qi before he had assimilated the Halls of Heaven.

She wasn't as aggressive as the young man who had dealt with Proud Heaven. Upon entering the meeting hall, she faced Yang Qi and offered a curtsy. “I am your humble servant Ruo Chen. Greetings, Young Sir Yang Qi. My father sent me here to negotiate with you. Might I ask if you’d like to start out the discussion in any particular way?”

“Ruo Chen. If my guess is correct,” Yang Qi said, “you’re the firstborn daughter of the Demon Master, who was sentenced to death by the Sovereign Lord years ago. The Demon Master’s original form was that of a preheaven spirit fox from primal-chaos. He was so clever that he rose above the masses, tapped into the dao of heaven, and became invincible even before the god world came to be. Somehow, he gained enlightenment of a way to bring order to the Demonfolk and wants to lead them to prominence again. Am I right?”

Ruo Chen smiled faintly. “You make me sound more impressive than I am, Young Sir. Although the Sovereign Lord did indeed sentence me to death, I was very low on the list. Truth be told, yes, the Demon Master is alive again, and he’s put the Demonfolk in order. And now he's turned his attention to the human empires. Although Proud Heaven has the support of the essence of the god world, my father believes him to be of the old guard, while you are of the new. He represents antiquity and decay, whereas you’re the true representative of humans in the god world.”

“Oh?” Yang Qi laughed. “Now the Demon Master is the one making me sound more impressive than I am. All I did was found my Sage Monarch Empire, and I'm not even as strong as the Deathless Heaven Dynasty. Furthermore, I'm not even in the half-Annulled level yet. For someone as powerful as the Demon Master to offer me praise is frankly overwhelming. Miss Ruo Chen, why not just directly tell me why you’ve come. There’s no need to beat around the bush.”

“My reasons are simple. We hope that the Sage Monarch Empire will join our Demonfolk Empire. My father will give you a high position as a government official. In fact, he’d like your help in governing the Demonfolk. What do you say? Given your skill and ability in that regard, you should be able to bring true order to the Demonfolk, which will be an achievement of boundless beneficence.” Ruo Chen’s clear, sparkling eyes seemed capable of piercing all the way to the soul, and entrancing any man upon whom they gazed.

However, Yang Qi was unmoved. “So that's how it is. Miss Ruo Chen, please head back and explain that even if the Demon Master himself had come, it would’ve been in vain. It doesn’t matter whether it’s the Demonfolk Empire or the Deathless Heaven Dynasty, any who oppose me will face me on the battlefield. I’ll even end up fighting the King of Godmammoths, eventually. My empire and my dao are both born of fire, war, and tribulation. You see, any dao that doesn’t come about that way isn't real. I'm sure the Demon Master will understand that. He founded the Demonfolk Empire to conform to his dao, and I'm the tribulation that he has to face. If I join him, it wouldn’t work out well for either of us. Ah, what a pity. Rivers of blood are going to flow when the Demonfolk Empire, Sage Monarch Empire, and Deathless Heaven Dynasty clash. Countless souls are going to end up in hell. It's foreordained, and can’t be changed.”

“It seems I won’t be able to persuade you to change your mind, Young Sir,” Ruo Chen said. She sighed. “The truth is that my father the Demon Master told me that I wouldn’t be able to change your mind. Now I know he was right. Consider this your notice. Over the course of the next year, the Demonfolk Empire will be launching successive attacks on the Sage Monarch Empire, Deathless Heaven Dynasty, Invincible Dynasty, and any other human empires that exist. The Demon Master and the King of Godmammoths have formally announced that the Demonfolk are to slaughter any humans they find. Eventually, humans won't exist at all.”

“I assumed that's what you were doing,” Yang Qi replied calmly. “We humans always talk about ridding the world of devils and demons, so it’s only natural that the demons and devils want to get rid of us. War between the races is inevitable. There’s no right or wrong in it. It's about survival. And in the end, it boils down to who is stronger. That said, although you Demonfolk have the advantage of numbers, and finally managed to found your empire, have you decided who is going to command the army? I ought to explain, Miss Ruo Chen, that I already control the Invincible Dynasty. If you're interested, you could invade them and test out your military.”

“Is that so?” Ruo Chen said, visibly taken aback. However, she quickly regained her composure. “Truth be told, I suspected something like this was going on. It seemed very premature for the Invincible Dynasty to suddenly withdraw from the triple alliance. That said, we Demonfolk get bored following all of your human drama. In any case, since you’re rejecting our offer, there’s nothing I can do. I just hope you don’t regret it when we come to destroy you and your brethren.”

“I hope that when the Demon Master and King of Godmammoths are ultimately destroyed, they don’t regret today’s events. Men, escort the emissary out.”

A passageway appeared, and she turned, vanishing without a trace.

“The Demonfolk obviously don’t care about us at all, Yang Qi,” Jadefall said. “Why not just take the girl captive and subjugate her? She's powerful, and could be a good tool at our disposal.”

“The subjugation powers of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth come from the God Legion Seal. And if the King of Godmammoths is working with the Demon Master, it obviously wouldn’t work. Besides, why would I want to subjugate someone as useless as that?”

Chapter 1572: Another Tripartite Balance of Power

Proud Heaven had risen to power, but his attack on the Invincible Dynasty had been thwarted by the rise of the Demonfolk Empire. The news spread like wildfire throughout the god world, and before long, everyone knew the current situation.

A tripartite balance of power had arisen again.

Before, that balance of power had been provided by the Invincible, Central, and Chiliocosm Dynasties. Yang Qi had then risen with deadly force, establishing the Sage Monarch Empire, vanquishing the triple alliance, and assimilating the Halls of Heaven.

But the Demon Master and the King of Godmammoths were back, having founded the Demonfolk Empire, which was filled with Demonfolk old-timers and demon-devil wretch-gods.

The Demon Master was the most honored teacher among the Demonfolk, while the King of Godmammoths had specialized in crushing the horde of devils in hell. It was a given that they would be able to keep the demons and devils in line to form their empire.

However, how would they fare in terms of management and governance?

Yang Qi and his experts could see that, deep in the multiverse of the god world, a greyspace had been erected with immense destiny. However, the destiny was hazy and scattered, which was very strange.

That said, within the haze, Yang Qi could see glimpses of golden light that reflected the newly established order.

“Lord's Eye!”

Adjusting his vision, he was able to see numerous golden giants wielding immense power, traveling within the greyspace to subjugate the wretch-devils.

‘What? Why do those thralls look so similar to my sage monarch magistrates?’

Apparently, the King of Godmammoths had succeeded after years of seeking enlightenment, and with the help of the Demon Master, had created something similar to Yang Qi’s sage monarch magistrates. In other words, they had expert government officials.

No wonder the hazy destiny was slowly taking an orderly shape and gradually becoming clearer.

Before, the Demonfolk Empire’s destiny had been like a lightning bolt in the clouds. But as time progressed, it was becoming more like human destiny.

‘Impressive,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘The Demon Master and the King of Godmammoths are nothing short of geniuses. It's not an easy thing to gain enlightenment of the sage monarch magistrates. That said, my version was made by the combination of the God Legion Seal, the Mahātmā Jade, the Cruiser of Civilization, and even bits of the Great Necropolis. There’s nothing in the god world that can compare to them. Furthermore, as the sage monarch magistrates work, they gain valuable experience. In fact, their debates with the confucians made them vastly more skilled and effective. My dao and my civilization are things the Demon Master and the King of Godmammoths can't possibly comprehend.”

Yang Qi shook his head.

“What are we going to do, Yang Qi?” Jadefall asked. “The balance of power in the god world has been disrupted again. And if the Demon Master and the King of Godmammoths bring their empire against us, how will we defend against Proud Heaven?”

“That’s right,” Yang Susu added. “What if they work together to try to destroy us?”

“Don’t worry about it. There’s no way Proud Heaven will work with them. If he did, his empire would be infected by demon energy. He leads an orthodox organization, so working with wretch-devils would cause too many problems. At most, he could cooperate with them in small matters. Besides, the fact that the Demonfolk Empire is being so aggressive is going to ensure that nobody does anything rash. And they know that if we were to assimilate Proud Heaven’s empire into our own, it would be very bad for them. That's why they made their move when they did. They wanted to do it before we started fighting Proud Heaven’s empire. Although we both would’ve suffered casualties, whichever one devoured the other would then have been completely capable of devastating the Demonfolk Empire.”

“Besides, this is actually going to create an opportunity for us.”

“What opportunity?” asked a few people present.

“To sow discord between the High Priestess and Proud Heaven. Think about it. Proud Heaven got the approval of the essence of the god world to become the emperor. But what about the High Priestess? She's not the type to willingly submit. She's definitely not happy, and it's only going to be a matter of time before she has to vent her fury. Now that her old partner the King of Godmammoths has shown up, she’ll definitely try getting him to join her in taking down Proud Heaven. She doesn't care at all who's human and who isn't. She’d be perfectly content to have the Demonfolk running the god world, as long as she benefits in the process. So let’s see how things go between the King of Godmammoths and the other two. For now, let’s lock everything down and just focus on getting stronger.”

“Lock down the empire?” Yang Susu said, visibly surprised. “You mean we’re really not going to rid the world of devils and demons?”

“The way to rid the world of devils and demons is to provoke the King of Godmammoths and the Demon Master. Right now, let’s keep growing stably. That’s the smartest move. Our Ascendants are getting stronger and stronger, and when the time is right, we’ll be able to unleash immense fighting prowess. I'd say we’ll be ready in only a few years. And I need to take this chance to step into the half-Annulled level. Once I do that, I can finally rescue my Master, the Invincible Dugu.”

The Sage Monarch Empire was the weakest of the three powers, particularly because they had no half-Annulled expert defending it. If it wasn’t for their spectacular destiny, they would already have been wiped out.

In other words, they absolutely had to get a half-Annulled expert as quickly as possible.

Everyone in the empire was heading in the direction of becoming a sage or mahātmā. But even sages and mahātmās had weaknesses.

“Yang Qi,” Sword Seventeen said, “we have to produce a half-Annulled expert. The Deathless Heaven Dynasty has Proud Heaven and the High Priestess. The Demonfolk Empire has the King of Godmammoths and the Demonfolk Empire. If you can become half-Annulled, and bring back our Master, the Invincible Dugu, we won’t have to be afraid of anyone.”

By now, Sword Seventeen had a psychic scale of a hundred billion. Although he didn’t have an official position in the Sage Monarch Empire, he did teach the dao of the sword in many of the colleges there. And he was very influential. As such, he had a lot of destiny.

Yang Qi had imparted to him the combined daos of the sword from the Lord of the Sword Dao, Star Swordlife, and King Life-Killer. Sword Seventeen had then used those to perfect his own dao of the sword, which was extremely formidable.

“Yang Qi,” Jadefall said, “there are old-timers popping up all over the place. Most of them have been in hiding since ancient times, and they’re obviously itching to get stronger. We have to make sure we're prepared.”

“This is good,” Yang Qi said with a cold smile. “As I suspected, there are quite a few half-Annulled experts from ancient times who never actually died. For all we know, the Sovereign Lord might be hiding out there somewhere, just waiting to jump out and try to possess me.” Although Yang Qi was smiling, everyone else felt their hair standing on end. However, as they considered it, it made sense. It wasn’t as if the Sovereign Lord was someone who could be easily killed.

“When do you think you’ll reach the half-Annulled level, Yang Qi?” asked one of his sword brothers from the impure lands.

Yang Qi had become sworn siblings with quite a few people on the Rich-Lush Continent, and they had stood with him against the Crown Prince. There was nothing that could possibly erase that friendship.

Few of those sworn siblings were very important in the Sage Monarch Empire. Despite that, Yang Qi had helped them all with their cultivation, not even sparing his own destiny to help them. He couldn’t give them an unfair share of destiny from the empire, so it had to be his own.

Not even the emperor could break the rules in Yang Qi’s empire. That was the only way to maintain true order.

“I think I'm going to seek some help from some of those old-timers,” Yang Qi said with a chuckle. “When it comes to half-Annulled experts, I know about the Sovereign Lord, King Heaven-Devourer, the True Devil, Wretch-God Ultimate, the Demon Master, the King Immortal-Slayer, and the High Priestess. King Immortal-Slayer has been devoured, although a bit of him remains behind that not even Proud Heaven knows about. The Sovereign Lord, the True Devil, and Wretch-God Ultimate haven’t shown their faces. Of those three, I need to track down at least one to devour and boost my cultivation base.”

“Which one are you going to target?” Jadefall asked. “Do you have any clues about where they are?”

“I do. I'm going to take advantage of this temporary lull to track down and devour... Wretch-God Ultimate! During my sessions of secluded cultivation, I’ve come to the conclusion that he’s resting in preparation to make a big move. But now that the empire is locked down, nobody will be coming in or out, so I'm free to make a move!”

With a whoosh, he vanished using the Myriad Worlds Greater Teleportation. A short while later, he was in the location where Wretch-God Ultimate had supposedly perished.

It was said that he had fallen in the vicinity of empires such as the Nacrelight Sageland, Eternal-Life God-Dynasty, League of Academies and League of the Devil-Dao. Of course, they weren’t really empires. They couldn't even compare to the Deva Dynasty, much less the Sage Monarch Empire. They were like specks of dust compared to planets.

Back then, they had been bustling places, but now they were empty and filled with devil energy. After all, he had taken all of their members into the Sage Monarch Empire, and the devils among them had been genetically modified to become sages.

This was also the location where Yang Qi had picked up Wretch-God Ultimate’s consummate ability, the Wretched Brain God Art.

Chapter 1573: The Fallen Wretch God

Yang Qi couldn’t help but sigh with emotion as he revisited old haunts.

Back when he first arrived in the god world after leaving the impure lands, his first stop had been the Lightningbolt Continent, although it was only a few months before he found himself in the House of God Ordainment. All of his old stomping grounds were in this general area. One by one, he had taken over the House of God Ordainment, the Eternal-Life God-Dynasty, and even the Deva Dynasty. He had journeyed to the Bastille of the One God, subjugated the Second Devil General, entered the Myriad Dragons Lair, and conquered the Dragonfolk.

This area was where he had spent the most time in the god world.

But now it was an abandoned wasteland.

Wretch-devils. Humans. Demonfolk. None of them were around anymore.

All that remained was devil energy, drifting about aimlessly.

Yang Qi had the feeling that the location where the Wretch God was said to have fallen actually contained numerous profound mysteries. No one had ever uncovered the truth of the matter, although the fact that the High Priestess had set up the Nacrelight Sageland in the vicinity was very telling.

Looking around quietly, Yang Qi thought, ‘So this is where the Wretch God supposedly perished. I'm curious to see what’s under the ground here. What profound mysteries are here to be found? Whatever is here remained hidden from both myself and the High Priestess. And that's something, considering my deep enlightenment of the dao of wretch-gods. After all, I transformed the Wretched Brain God Art, fusing it with the Cruiser of Civilization to make a new type of brain. Regardless, I'm going to keep digging until I unearth Wretch-God Ultimate, then assimilate him and use him to reach the half-Annulled level.’

In the depths of the lands around him, a black fluid flowed that resembled oil, but was in fact an energy of wretched evil.

It was like a subterranean ocean of darkness.

The lands of the god world were so thick they were impossible to see fully. After all, if one went digging in the multiverse of the god world, they would inevitably pop out into another universe.

WHOOSH!

Yang Qi pierced into the lands below, boring downward for hundreds of kilometers, surrounded by the oil-like wretch energy. It almost seemed like the blood of the Wretch God. And it was so deadly that it would be fatal even to people who cultivated the dao of devils.

Of course, Yang Qi wasn’t affected by it. He continued downward, piercing through multiple universes as he went. As he dug deeper, the wretch energy grew more intense. However, the energy around him simply faded away. He was now as powerful as any half-Annulled expert, and the fact that he had the Halls of Heaven inside him meant he could cleanse any type of wretched evil.

Soon, the surrounding wretch energy had been cleansed away, revealing an enormous bone. It was so large that it passed through multiple universes, and it was clearly in bad shape.

It was a finger bone.

And it was broken.

‘Is this one of the Wretch God’s fingers?’

Using the Hand of the One God, Yang Qi reached out to grab the enormous finger bone, and as soon as he did, black smoke roiled off of it.

The fluctuations were so powerful they could destroy entire universes.

Yang Qi snorted coldly. “Even if Wretch-God Ultimate were to be resurrected, he still couldn’t deal with me. And you think you're going to fight me? A measly finger bone?” He made a grasping gesture, and a projection of the Sovereign Lord appeared behind him, which caused the finger to shrink down to normal size, then plop onto Yang Qi's open palm.

There was no flesh on it whatsoever, however, it was possible to see what remained of the Wretch God’s genetic material inside.

Unfortunately, a finger wasn't really going to do Yang Qi any good. He needed the full corpse.

The Wretch God’s brain had contained countless psychic information and daoist techniques, all of them related to wretch energy. With Yang Qi’s skills and abilities, he could take all of that, convert it to something righteous and good, then use it to ascend to the half-Annulled level.

‘With the information in this finger, I should be able to track down the rest of the Wretch God much easier.’ After contemplating the finger, Yang Qi extracted the relevant genetic material, and instantly gained a better understanding of Wretch-God Ultimate’s techniques.

Slapping his hand down on the finger, he sent sagelight streaming around it as he began to assimilate it.

A moment later, he devoured the finger, then continued piercing through the multiverse. Even the most powerful and ancient entities would get lost in this maze, but Yang Qi wasn’t worried. Having devoured the finger, he could now sense Wretch-God Ultimate’s aura, and would be able to follow it to its source.

If could get the corpse, and completely master the Wretched Brain God Art, he could refine his own brain to the ultimate level. Not only would he be able to personally govern his empire better, but he might be able to push his sage monarch magistrates to the level of God-Lords.

Of course, it was only a possibility.

The sage monarch magistrates currently had psychic scales of several billion, and were peak Paramount Gods. For now, it seemed impossible for them to become God-Lords. After all, there were nearly a billion sage monarch magistrates by now.

It seemed hard to imagine what a billion God-Lords would be like. Just how much power would that represent? Even if he drained the destiny of the Sage Monarch Empire, and added in that of the Demonfolk Empire and the Deathless Heaven Empire, it still wouldn’t be enough.

Even if all the God-Lords who had ever existed in the god world were gathered together, they still wouldn’t number a billion.

In the Invincible Dynasty, there had only ever been about two thousand, with the Chiliocosm Dynasty having a similar number, and the Central Dynasty topping out at about three thousand.

Even combined, the three dynasties had never contained more than ten thousand God-Lords.

As for the Sage Monarch Empire, it currently had around two thousand, which meant that it couldn't even match up to the combined level of the three dynasties.

Given all the old-timers flocking to the Deathless Heaven Empire, they probably had a bit over ten thousand. And the number of random God-Lords hiding out in other parts of the god world probably didn’t exceed that by much. If Yang Qi were to guess, he wouldn’t pin the number of unaligned God-Lords as anything over four thousand.

In other words, if he turned his sage monarch magistrates into God-Lords, then nothing could stand in his path. The High Priestess, Proud Heaven, King of Godmammoths, Demon Master, and Sovereign Lord would all be easy to destroy. But for now, that wasn’t possible.

Even if he achieved the breakthrough he sought, and could perhaps turn some sage monarch magistrates into God-Lords, he wouldn’t have enough power to enable them all to reach that level of strength.

It would be like someone learning how to kill dragons, but living in a world with no dragons. What good would that do?

That said, Yang Qi had a master plan to deal with the essence of the god world, and the sage monarch magistrates played an important role.

In the end, he had to transform them and make them stronger.

Right now, the sage monarch magistrates improved by absorbing destiny, which wasn’t ideal. Yang Qi wanted them to be able to grow using primal-chaos paleo-energy, or even the essence of the god world. That was his plan. He wanted each and every sage monarch magistrate to become like the Everlasting Aegis.

If he could have a billion sage monarch magistrates who were able to absorb the essence of the god world, then he could easily get rid of the god world, and leave behind only the Everlasting Aegis.

At the same time, he would reach the half-Annulled level.

‘Proud Heaven. King of Godmammoths. High Priestess. Demon Master. You’re all underestimating me and my plans. I've long since reached a major understanding. The Sovereign Lord created the God Legion Seal to fight the essence of the god world. Once I get Wretch-God Ultimate’s complete corpse, I’ll become so powerful that I can make minor versions of the God Legion Seal to give to my sage monarch magistrates. Then they’ll be able to directly absorb the essence of the god world, and become God-Lords!’

This was Yang Qi’s plan. It was vicious, and it would enable him to strike a powerful blow against his enemies.

He would create multiple God Legion Seals. If the Sovereign Lord could make that seal, then so could Yang Qi.

It would be complicated. Trillions of times more complicated than what he had done with the Cruiser of Civilization. And it would require immense amounts of power. But the God Legion Seal was the key to sucking away the essence of the god world.

The advantage Yang Qi had over the Sovereign Lord is that he had much more destiny to work with, and he had also converted the Sovereign Lord's collection of faith into destiny.

‘Wretch-God Ultimate, I know that you intentionally left your remains here as a trap. But unfortunately for you, that works perfectly for my plan.’ Chuckling coldly in his heart, Yang Qi continued his search.

Chapter 1574: The Wretch God&#039;s Plot

Yang Qi had dug his way through multiple universes in the location where the Wretch God perished, and had already found a severed finger. However, he was convinced that the Wretch God wasn’t actually dead. He had already run into multiple beings from ancient times who had come back to life, so why would he expect anything less from the Wretch God?

In fact, he was convinced that the severed finger had been left there as bait.

However, Yang Qi loved to beat his enemies at their own game. He was going to capture Wretch-God Ultimate and put him to good use.

Most likely, the reason he hadn’t shown his face so far was that he hadn’t fully recovered, so he was still hiding in the depths of the multiverse. And that meant this was a perfect opportunity for Yang Qi.

Wretch-God Ultimate’s wretched brain was exactly what he needed to reach the half-Annulled level.

Aaaaoooooo!

Yang Qi had entered the depths of a pitch-black universe, where towering mountains were filled with dark energies. Countless wretch-god devils lived there, although they were all very low-level. Only a few here and there were Paramount Gods.

However, Yang Qi could see that in the depths of the mountains, there existed the bone of a dragon. It appeared to be a backbone, which was of course the most important part of the skeleton. And it was the backbone of the Wretch God.

Without hesitation, Yang Qi exhaled, sending out a stream of fire that shook the surrounding universes, incinerating the nearby wretch-devil Paramount Gods and destroying their kingdoms.

Soon, the wretch energy had been cleansed away, leaving only the backbone, which Yang Qi reached out and grabbed. Not hesitating at all, he sucked it into his body and assimilated it.

Immediately, his understanding of the Wretched Brain God Art grew more complete.

As the new information flowed through his mind, he waved his finger, causing a stream of golden light to appear, which started to assume the shape of an imp.

However, after a moment, the golden imp faded away.

Thanks to the influx of power from the Wretched Brain God Art, Yang Qi was on his way to creating his own version of the God Legion Seal. Not even the King of Godmammoths could have ever imagined doing something like that.

Whooooooosh!

As his thinking transformed, back in the Sage Monarch Empire, his sage monarch magistrates started changing. Specifically, it was their faces, which all resembled that of the old crown prince, Eternal Millennium. On their foreheads, a golden mark appeared briefly, then vanished.

Then, the light flashed again, revealing something that resembled the God Legion Seal, which subsequently vanished.

That said, even this small transformation caused the sage monarch magistrates to grow much stronger.

Jadefall and the others were laughing in delight. “The sage monarch magistrates are getting stronger! This is unimaginable! It seems Yang Qi must’ve made some impressive gains!”

“That's right,” the Second Devil General said. “The sage monarch magistrates’ psyches are different now. They’re revealing spectacular potential, and it looks like they can connect to primal-chaos paleo-energy. If they can absorb that energy, as well as the essence of the god world, they’ll be extremely impressive!”

By this point, Yang Qi had released the general from the control of the God Legion Seal.

Of course, the general’s inherent nature had changed dramatically, and he was now like a mahātmā. He cared about the empire and its people, and no longer had an air of violent brutality. He had changed completely.

In fact, it would make more sense to call him the Second Mahātmā.

It was the same with the Third Devil General.

Both of them had psychic scales bordering on a hundred billion, thanks to their devotion to the empire. Yet even they could only sigh in amazement at what was happening to the sage monarch magistrates.

They weren’t the only ones with psychic scales of about a hundred billion. Yang Susu, Jadefall, the Shepherd, Yang Doom, Yang Immortal-Slayer, and others of Yang Qi's brethren were included. So were Yang Primal-Chaos and Dugu Sheji.

They were the true inner circle of the Sage Monarch Empire.

Of course, they didn’t try to snatch the destiny of the empire. Instead, they served it, improving its destiny.

Normally speaking, the sage monarch magistrates used the destiny of the empire to proliferate. But right now, they were transforming into a state in which they didn’t need to do that anymore.

Their auras were linked to the Everlasting Aegis, and now their powers of absorption reflected that. In the briefest of moments, the Everlasting Aegis’ ability to absorb primal-chaos paleo-energy jumped by double.

“This is amazing! What an important transformation. The sage monarch magistrates’ cultivation bases are growing constantly. And the Everlasting Aegis can now make even more preheaven treasures. Now we can give even more resources to the Invincible Dynasty!”

RUMBLE!

The destiny of the empire surged, causing the Everlasting Aegis to rise upward. It almost seemed like it might leave the god world and float out into the primal-chaos beyond. Unfortunately, it still had its foundation rooted in the essence of the god world.

Meanwhile, the shrunken Invincible Dynasty was finally starting to expand again, while simultaneously keeping its borders secure. It had recovered, and was in a position to go on the offensive again.

Given some more time, its destiny would become pure enough that Yang Qi could prepare to combine it with the Sage Monarch Empire.

Having assimilated Wretch-God Ultimate’s spine, boosting his sage monarch magistrates, Yang Qi sensed his empire’s destiny rising. A smile appeared on his face as he continued his search deeper into the multiverse. Before long, he found more of the Wretch God’s skeleton, including an arm bone, thigh bone, and sternum.

He devoured all of them, furthering his understanding of the Wretched Brain God Art.

Eventually, he had found and consumed virtually all of the skeleton, with the exception of the skull.

Despite having searched through multiple universes, Yang Qi still hadn’t been able to locate it. He frowned. ‘Where exactly is it? Where is Wretch-God Ultimate hiding? Is this a game of hide-and-seek?’

He exhaled a stream of energy, and a shadowy projection of the Wretch God appeared behind him, except without a head. And it seemed to be chanting. “Head... my head... where is my head... bring my head to me... bring my head....”

The words echoed out, flowing through countless universes.

Yang Qi flexed his Tribulation Wings and sped through more of the multiverse as he carried out his search in a way that not even the High Priestess or Proud Heaven would have been able to do.

Eventually, he caught sight of a black vortex that seemed to be reacting to the chanted words.

‘This is where the Wretch God’s head is.’ Yang Qi stopped outside the vortex as he considered what to do. As he did, the projection of the Wretch God suddenly seemed to be grabbed by the power of the vortex, dragging Yang Qi along with it.

Booming laughter rang out as a mighty power erupted from the vortex. “After all these years, it finally worked! I finally caught someone. You collected my bones and came here, and now I'm going to end you! I’ll take your flesh and blood for my new body, and at long last, Wretch-God Ultimate will return to the world!”

“Oh really?” Yang Qi said, and suddenly he flared with burning sagelight.

The light illuminated the vortex, revealing a huge head in its depths, like a divine mountain rising up in the depths of the darkness. It was transparent, making it possible to see the brain inside, glittering with daoist techniques, information, and even the workings of heaven. As for the face, it was that of a beautiful man, except with an evil tinge to his expression, and eyes that could capture souls.

Wretch-God Ultimate was an extremely good-looking man, yet he was obviously full of evil. In fact, he seemed like the kind of person who would want to devour the brains of others.

It was Wretch-God Ultimate’s head! And his crafty plot had been revealed. However, Yang Qi had assumed this would happen, and was confident he would come out on top.

“Who are you?” the head said in response to the blinding light.

“You’re finally showing your face like all the other old-timers, Wretch-God Ultimate,” Yang Qi replied coolly. “You just can't bear the loneliness. Well, if you want to dominate the world, I can help.”

Chapter 1575: Making the God Legion Seal?

At long last, Yang Qi was in front of the Wretch God.

Wretch-God Ultimate. A half-Annulled expert.

In the past, Yang Qi would have had reason to fear him. But now, he wasn’t even the least bit nervous. After all, he was now fundamentally stronger than Wretch-God Ultimate, and if he tapped into destiny, could definitely crush him. And that wasn’t to mention that Yang Qi had the advantage of the Wretched Brain God Art.

And he wanted to take advantage of this opportunity to seal and assimilate him.

That said, he knew from the moment he saw the enormous head that he was going to end up fighting a big battle.

There would be no better moment. After all, Proud Heaven had just established his foundation and had all sorts of things on his plate. He had to manage the court, keep his top experts under control, and deal with the High Priestess, who was scheming to overthrow him. On top of that, he had the Demon Master and the King of Godmammoths breathing down his neck. There was no way he would have time to go searching for Wretch-God Ultimate.

“You haven’t fully recovered from your old injuries, Wretch-God Ultimate,” he said with a faint smile. “In other words, your cultivation base can’t compare to a true half-Annulled expert, yet you dare to rave in my presence. Seems to me you’re looking to die. To answer your question, you have no way of knowing who I am. But I'm sure you recognize this.” All of a sudden, the God Legion Seal appeared on his forehead.

“The God Legion Seal?” Wretch-God Ultimate blurted. “Are you the successor of the Sovereign Lord?!”

“No, I'm not,” Yang Qi replied coolly. “I'm a Fateless One, the remnant of some fateless energy that the Sovereign Lord trapped long ago. I’ve come here specifically for you. I’m going to assimilate you and reach the half-Annulled level.”

Wretch-God Ultimate was a terrifying entity that essentially couldn't be subjugated. If Yang Qi tried making him part of his empire, it would lead to devastation because of the dangerous wretch energy.

Yang Qi wasn't stupid enough to do that.

Wretch-God Ultimate had his own dao, and it couldn't be changed. In that regard, he was similar to Star Swordlife. Yang Qi had no intention of trying to change him. Instead, he would wipe him out of existence.

Wretch-God Ultimate laughed. “You're a Fateless One? And you think you’re going to assimilate me? Not even the Sovereign Lord could do that, what makes you think you can? Incidentally, the fact that you tracked down all of my bones in the multiverse just shows how greedy you are. Assimilating them has simply infected you with my wretch energy, which means I can control you now. Get on your knees!”

As soon as the command left his lips, creaking sounds echoed out from Yang Qi.

“Let Destiny Come! In the grand heaven, verily, the nation is eternal!”

Yang Qi could sense the bones of the Wretch God within him trying to wreak havoc. Obviously, this was what the Wretch God had planned and hoped for. But was Yang Qi really that stupid?

Destiny flowed into him, causing cracking sounds as the bones were first suppressed, then started crumbling. Meanwhile, the Wretch God’s head started trembling, as if with madness.

“What is this? How can you have such powerful destiny? Not even the Sovereign Lord was able to do anything like that.” Fear could be heard in the Wretch God’s voice as he realized the level of destiny he was dealing with.

“It’s simple,” Yang Qi replied. “The Sovereign Lord didn’t know how to govern a nation. The god world has been developing for billions of years now, and the dao of governance has surpassed anything from the time of the Sovereign Lord. Back then, he relied on faith. But destiny is different. My empire has already surpassed anything the Sovereign Lord was capable of. I'm not lying when I say that I can crush half-Annulled experts. If I couldn’t, I would’ve already been defeated by the High Priestess, the King of Godmammoths, and the Demon Master.”

“Y-y-you...” the Wretch God blubbered. “Have a death wish, brat?! Wretched Brain God Art!”

The head began vibrating with fluctuations that immediately caused a huge psychic tempest to form.

However, Yang Qi didn’t seem worried at all. He threw his hands out, and destiny flowed around him, creating a universe that locked down the entire area, and was filled with countless sealing marks.

Although it was only a bit of destiny, combined with Yang Qi’s strength, and the fact that Wretch-God Ultimate wasn’t fully recovered, it was extremely dangerous.

“Be sealed!” Yang Qi made a grasping gesture, and a primal-chaos elder-snake appeared and began devouring everything around it.

Wretch-God Ultimate was too stunned to react. Before he could even begin to formulate a response, he was devoured. Then, Yang Qi used the Myriad Worlds Greater Teleportation to send him to the Everlasting Aegis.

Inside the aegis, the primal-chaos elder-snake exploded, and Wretch-God Ultimate’s head appeared, instantly unleashing fluctuations that could destroy universes.

“This is your empire, boy? I'm going to destroy it! In my eyes, this empire isn't worth anything. Who would have thought that in this dying age, empires would become the orthodox way? In my time, we strove to develop power that could destroy all empires. If you stand in my way, it's foreordained that your empire will be destroyed!”

Of course, Yang Qi had a plan. First, he would bring the Wretch God into the Everlasting Aegis, then he would use a powerful formation to crush him.

“Be crushed!”

Yang Qi’s command of destiny was very different inside the Everlasting Aegis. In fact, it was ten times higher. Instantly, Wretch-God Ultimate’s head faced crushing pressure. Then Yang Qi shouted, “Sage monarch magistrates, use your Tribulation Monarch Cannons!”

Countless magistrates appeared, nearly a billion of them, and they immediately got into formation and aimed their Tribulation Monarch Cannons at Wretch-God Ultimate.

RUMBLE!

A massive blast caused the Everlasting Aegis to tremble as countless Tribulation Monarch Cannons shot Wretch-God Ultimate.

Yang Qi suddenly started growing larger, simultaneously extending his hand to reveal the Halls of Heaven. Then he struck Wretch-God Ultimate’s head, which began to crumble loudly.

“Your end is here, Wretch God. This is my home and my destiny. Even in your prime, you wouldn't be able to stand up to me here.”

Suddenly, the Wretch God head erupted with hairs, each of which looked like a snake, or possibly a hand. And they all shot toward Yang Qi.

“I never could have guessed that the first tribulation to block my path to freedom would be you, boy. Well, it’s only to be expected. I've experienced countless tribulations, and yours is trifling at best. I'm going to devour both you and your kingdom, then recover fully and dominate everything under heaven.” Each of the strands of hair was like a consummate expert that could bash apart destiny and shatter the greyspace of the Everlasting Aegis.

“Half-Annulled experts are strong. Sadly, you’re not at full strength. You’re like King Immortal-Slayer, stuck in the Great Necropolis. Except in this case, it’s the Everlasting Aegis.

“Be crushed!” Yang Qi exhaled, and countless streams of energy erupted out, which were none other than the preheaven essence of the god world. In his previous clashes with the essence, he had picked up on some of its techniques and powers!

It was like a river of daoist techniques slamming into Wretch God Ultimate’s hairs, causing them to ignite.

“Wretch God Destroys Worlds. Wretch God Ultimate's Obsidian Flame!”

Wretch God Ultimate’s head unleashed a torrent of black fire that rapidly ate up Yang Qi’s daoist techniques. If he hadn’t been in the Sage Monarch Empire and the Everlasting Aegis, it would have spelled complete destruction. Not even the Central Dynasty could have dealt with this.

This was a fire that could destroy planets, stars, god kingdoms, and universes.

Even a God-Lord with a psychic scale of a hundred billion who was hit by this black flame would be killed.

Chapter 1576: Mass-Producing God Legion Seals?

Even if Wretch God Ultimate were stronger than he was, now that he was inside the Everlasting Aegis, there was no escape for him. That said, as soon as he unleashed Wretch God Ultimate's Obsidian Flame, which pulsed with a seemingly all-destructive power. In fact, if it kept spreading, it would likely kill everyone it touched, like some sort of plague.

Not that Yang Qi would let that happen.

Yet again, King Heaven-Devourer’s form appeared behind him.

The enormous snake inhaled, and the countless streams of black fire entered its mouth. As of now, the snake was incredibly powerful. In fact, it was capable of unleashing about eighty percent of King Heaven-Devourer’s full might.

After the black flame entered the snake, it shrank down as it started assimilating it internally.

Yang Qi wasn’t spending a lot of time analyzing the situation. He thrust his hand out again, and a projection of the Great Necropolis appeared, which slammed down onto Wretch God Ultimate’s head. It was the Great Necropolis God Art!

As far as Yang Qi was concerned, it didn’t matter that Proud Heaven had unlocked so many of the secrets of the necropolis. Yang Qi's connection still hadn’t been severed. And for some mysterious, unknown reasons, King Immortal-Slayer had access to certain bits of knowledge that he’d hidden from Proud Heaven, making them impossible to discover. The Great Necropolis still had more mysteries to be revealed. Proud Heaven thought that because he could use the necropolis to deal with the High Priestess, he already understood everything about it. Sadly, he was completely wrong.

Yang Qi knew what the Great Necropolis was ultimately capable of. And his knowledge had only increased after Proud Heaven mistakenly came to believe that he had assimilated King Immortal-Slayer.

Because both Yang Qi and King Immortal-Slayer were deeply connected to the Great Necropolis, it was possible for Yang Qi to sense how King Immortal-Slayer had survived. There was no way King Immortal-Slayer was going to be assimilated by Proud Heaven that easily.

Yang Qi was using the final move from the Sage Monarch Grand Magic. Annul Death; Eternally Bury. He wasn't giving the Wretch God any chances to destroy his empire.

RUMBLE!

The Great Necropolis crushed down inexorably until the Wretch God was completely suppressed. Not even the incredibly powerful brainwaves he fought back with did any good.

“Prayers and Destiny of the Empire!” As soon as Yang Qi gave the command, the destiny of his empire flowed into the Great Necropolis, where it battered the Wretch God.

The Wretch God was finally starting to shrink back.

“I have undying immortality!” Wretch God Ultimate shrieked. “Nobody can defeat me! I'm going to destroy everything. Ultimate’s Dao of Gods; Melt Heaven and Earth into Wretchedness; Let the Wretch World Appear!”

RUMBLE!

The Wretch God’s head vanished, to be replaced by a wretched world that was rapidly expanding outward. Yang Qi had created the Everlasting Aegis, which was independent from the god world. And now the Wretch God wanted to do the same thing. He’d created his Wretch World long ago, but it had vanished, and now he was hoping to use a world to defeat a world, break free from the Great Necropolis, and make his escape.

The Wretch God was proving difficult to deal with.

But... he was dealing with Yang Qi! And Yang Qi wasn’t going to let him succeed in his plan. In response, Yang Qi vanished, to be replaced by an image of the Halls of Heaven, which shot into the Great Necropolis and slammed into the Wretch God’s world. The Wretch World then deflated like a popped balloon, provoking a shrill scream from the Wretch God. “You assimilated the Halls of Heaven!?”

“That's right, Wretch God Ultimate. Your fate is sealed. Give me your head, and open up your psyche to me. Be cleansed by the sagelight of the Halls of Heaven. Your destiny is going to push me to new heights.” With that, Yang Qi focused even more of his destiny on assaulting Wretch God Ultimate.

It became so forceful that Wretch-God Ultimate couldn’t even move.

“I might not have been a match for you in the past, Wretch God Ultimate. But with the power of my empire to back me, you won’t even be able to self-destruct. My empire is one of a kind, and everyone within it is a sage or mahātmā. You want to break down order, which makes you fundamentally incompatible with my empire. My empire’s destiny is the bane of your existence, and now, you will be assimilated!”

Streams of wretch energy and psychic fluctuations flowed into the Halls of Heaven, causing blackness to spread into the white.

Eventually, the ship-like form of the Halls of Heaven was half black and half white, almost like a taiji symbol.

The Wretch God's power was weakening, and he could only roar out a curse of defiance as he realized he wasn’t a match for Yang Qi. Not even his greatest art, Ultimate’s Curse, could do anything to Yang Qi’s soul.

Yang Qi was a Fateless One. Nothing could touch his fate, not even the Wretch God’s curse.

“Be crushed!” Yang Qi howled.

Wretch energy flowed like mad, causing the Halls of Heaven to turn even darker. Slowly but surely, the Wretch God’s skull was removed, revealing his brain, wriggling and twitching with a psyche and will that could destroy the heavens and extinguish the earth.

The Wretch God had started out in ancient primal-chaos as nothing but a brain. That brain had slowly absorbed endless amounts of preheaven wretch energy, ultimately transforming into the invincible entity he had become. Now Yang Qi was taking that wretch energy away, leaving behind only the original brain.

The time had come! Yang Qi transformed into a stream of sagelight that shot into the wretched brain and started chewing away at it. It was a battle of pure psyche and thinking.

As for the wretch energy that was flowing into the Halls of Heaven, bright sagelight erupted and started melting it away. Of course, it was Wretch God Ultimate’s incredibly powerful wretch energy, so it wasn’t a process that went quickly.

The Halls of Heaven erupted with countless shockwaves as radiance and light fought darkness and gloom, in a battle of righteousness versus evil.

Sadly for Wretch God Ultimate, he also had to contend with Yang Qi’s destiny.

This battle between the extremes was pushing the Halls of Heaven into a very unique state.

Yang Qi had been constantly working at assimilating the Halls of Heaven, and had been trying to find an opportunity to finish the job. Now, he was killing two birds with one stone by borrowing the power of Wretch God Ultimate’s energy to assault the halls and make them easier to assimilate.

All of a sudden, the Halls of Heaven became a complete mix of black and white. It was now a different type of magical treasure, and the Sovereign Lord’s aura was gone from the spell formations inside.

It now conformed perfectly to the destiny of Yang Qi’s empire.

“I finally assimilated the Halls of Heaven! It’s now my treasure. Many thanks to you, Wretch God Ultimate! Without you, it would’ve been impossible to remold the halls.

“Henceforth, the Halls of Heaven will be a never-setting sun above my empire!”

A tremor passed through Yang Qi as he sent the Halls of Heaven flying up into the greyspace that was the Everlasting Aegis.

It was now a sun, although it looked different from ordinary suns.

Half of it burned with radiance and light, while the other half radiated darkness and gloom. As it rotated, it would sometimes cast brilliant light onto the empire, and other times it would wreath the Everlasting Aegis in night.

Peace. Security. Rest. When night fell on the Sage Monarch Empire, people could sleep soundly. After all, this darkness didn’t contain any sort of evil, but was instead meant for recuperation and recovery.

In the past, the Everlasting Aegis had only contained radiance and light, without any darkness at all. Of course, its inhabitants were all gods, so they didn’t care.

But now that there was nighttime, they realized it was the perfect opportunity to rest at ease. During the night, the entire empire would become calm and quiet.

Strangely, during those periods of nighttime rest, the destiny of the empire didn't decrease. Quite the opposite. It increased, instead! That was one of the benefits of rest and recovery.

As the Halls of Heaven became part of the Everlasting Aegis, the empire suddenly grew, reaching an unimaginable state.

At this point, neither the High Priestess nor Proud Heaven could possibly invade in force.

The Sage Monarch Empire was now a true fortress that didn’t need to fear anything else in existence.

Yang Qi looked up at the sun that was the Halls of Heaven, and while it was black and white, it still bore the general shape of a ship, with two pointy ends. ‘The Halls of Heaven are now gone,’ he thought. ‘Looks somewhat like an eye. I think I’ll call it the Everlasting Eye. It can bring peace and rest to all of the gods, which is something the Halls of Heaven could never do.’

He was still fighting his battle with the Wretch God’s brain. However, now that his work with the Everlasting Eye was complete, his empire became even more pious, and as a result, his psyche and will started climbing again.

In that moment, he vanquished all of the Wretch God’s defenses.

“No! I can’t believe you used my wretched power to assimilate the Halls of Heaven! Damn you forever! You’ve profaned the glory of the Sovereign Lord! When the Sovereign Lord joins forces with me against you, you're dead! Not even your status as a Fateless One can protect you!” As Wretch God Ultimate was suppressed, Yang Qi’s power climbed, and his psychic scale and godhood rating rose.

Whack. Whack. Whack!

Suddenly his body exploded, as did his monarch godhood, becoming a tempest that swept through his empire, causing it to tremble. Lightning fell as countless living things rose up.

The detonation of his monarch godhood represented Nothing.

He had finally stepped into the half-Annulled level!

Chapter 1577: Becoming Half-Annulled

Yang Qi had taken advantage of the situation and blown through all lines of defense.

Wretch God Ultimate had collapsed, and Yang Qi devoured his brain, until at last he broke through, detonating his monarch godhood. The power released by the explosion of his godhood connected to the Everlasting Aegis, whereupon all people in the empire could sense the power of the breakthrough in their hearts.

Everywhere throughout the empire, eyes were brimming with tears of excitement.

They knew their emperor was now a half-Annulled expert, which meant they were no longer weak and defenseless. At long last, they were a truly grand and magnificent empire.

However, the fluctuations of the explosion didn’t reach beyond the borders of the Everlasting Aegis. No one outside had any idea what was happening inside. And that was a unique situation, as normally, the almighty beings would have sensed the ascension of a new half-Annulled expert, and would have come to investigate.

But Yang Qi didn’t want the news spreading.

Now that he was in the half-Annulled level, there was nothing Wretch God Ultimate could do to fight back.

As Yang Qi absorbed his brain, he reached a level fully a hundred times anything from before. His power, psyche, magic, and daoist techniques were all unleashed as if floodgates had been opened.

“Agggghhhhh!” Wretch God Ultimate screamed. “I'm not going to die! I'm going to enter a special state which will be a nightmare for you. I’ll haunt you forever until I manage to possess you. It’s impossible to truly get rid of half-Annulled experts. The only way to possibly do it is to break into the full Annulled level!”

Eventually, Wretch God Ultimate's voice faded away.

Yang Qi sank into silent contemplation, reining in his power. His body was hardly discernible, as though it had vanished. That was what happened in the half-Annulled level. The body didn't exist. Only the deathless and eternal psyche and will remained. Of course, immense power fluctuations resonated from the heart and mind, spanning the gap between that which was real and that which was illusory.

“God Legion Seal; Form!”

A new God Legion Seal appeared in his hand. Although it was small and dim, that was only because it was an embryonic form. At the same time, golden imps appeared in the foreheads of all the sage monarch magistrates. They were faint, and couldn’t compare to the true God Legion Seal, almost as if they were simple ink wash paintings depicting the real version. But they were there.

The magistrates were experiencing major changes in their form and structure.

Yang Qi’s abilities of extrapolation had increased many times over, and he was now able to see all the areas in which the sage monarch magistrates were deficient. Although the tiny God Legion Seals in their foreheads weren’t complete, nor as strong as even one ten-thousandth of the real version, they still made the magistrates vastly stronger. In terms of the fighting prowess, they would soon be close to the level of God-Lords.

Yang Qi rose to his feet, pleased that the magistrates had taken a big step toward becoming more powerful. Now that he was in the half-Annulled level, he could see everything more clearly and in more detail. His cultivation base was completely different from before, making new levels of enlightenment much easier to achieve. In fact, he was approaching the point of being both omniscient and omnipotent.

His psychic scale was nearing nine hundred billion, making him very close to reaching the level of a trillion.

He was already far higher in level than the High Priestess. It was something extremely rare. Now that he was in the half-Annulled level, it meant that he was superior to any other half-Annulled expert that had ever existed. Even the Sovereign Lord.

In terms of fighting prowess, he was without a doubt the number one figure in the god world. In fact, it might be impossible for the purrling to beat him at this point. At the same time, he now understood exactly what the purrling was.

“Purr. Purr....” The moment Yang Qi reached the half-Annulled level, the purrling spoke in its purring language, making it clear that it recognized Yang Qi as an invincible entity. Soon, Yang Qi would fight his true enemy, which was the essence of the god world.

All half-Annulled experts were threats to the essence of the god world, and it viewed every last one of them as enemies. Not even Proud Heaven was an exception.

‘The time has come to rescue Master,’ Yang Qi thought, turning and heading in the direction of the Invincible Dugu.

The Invincible Dugu’s physical body was now the size of a normal person, but when he breathed out, minor universes and planes of existence appeared, similar to how the Great Necropolis had ejected immortal worlds.

“Begone, essence of the god world!”

Yang Qi was in a completely different state now. His fingers spread wide as he sent boundless power into the Invincible Dugu, backing it with the full might of a half-Annulled expert.

Crack!

He forcefully grabbed the sealing marks inside his Master, and they subsequently twitched as if to flee. However, Yang Qi didn't let them, but instead slowly assimilated them into himself.

Then he waved his finger, sending another massive burst of power into the Invincible Dugu.

His Master’s will surged, and his voice echoed out from inside the gateway. “I'm finally back! My will was sealed by the essence of the god world for billions of years, but at long last, I can return!”

Everything trembled as the Invincible Dugu slowly opened his eyes, then, with seemingly immense effort, rose to his feet. For a moment, he surged with power, but he quickly pulled it back in. Looking at Yang Qi, he said, “Well done, Yang Qi. Very well done. All of my plans and preparations in the lower worlds have finally come to fruition. And it's all thanks to you. The sealing marks placed on me by the essence of the god world are gone, and I can finally return to full power.”

“I’m extremely grateful for the help you provided in the lower worlds, Master,” Yang Qi replied. “It's thanks to you that I’ve made so much progress. So it's only natural that I return the favor. Master, I don't think I need to go into a lot of detail about what we need to do next. Now that you’re awake, focus on getting back to your full strength. Our dynasty is the strongest in existence, so we have nothing to fear from the Demonfolk Empire or Proud Heaven. Sir, you need to go back to the Invincible Dynasty and take back control. Nobody will dare to oppose you. Once you have everything under control, we can combine our dynasties and I’ll ordain you as the imperial preceptor.”

“Exactly,” the Invincible Dugu said, then sighed. “You’re many times more skilled at running governments than me, so it makes more sense for you to get the Invincible Dynasty in order. I don’t want the destiny, either. I’ll make full use of my position as imperial preceptor to take more disciples and found the Invincible College. I’ll be a sage of the empire, with my primary responsibility being teaching. I will help all of the citizens to develop invincible faith and invincible fighting ability, whether they’re fighting heaven, earth, or man! They’ll be invincible in all!”

“That’ll work,” Yang Qi said with a nod. “Master, please accumulate some more disciples. You’ll be unsurpassed as a sage of the empire. And now, I’ll call all my fellow apprentices to offer you formal greetings.”

He issued a call, and Eldest Brother Mage Cloudwalker, Sword Seventeen, and all the other apprentices from the old Invincible Society came to offer greetings, eyes overflowing with tears.

“Master!”

The Invincible Dugu burst out laughing. “At long last, we’ve been reunited, and the Invincible Society will rise again. What reason do we have to shed tears? The circumstances now couldn't be better. Yang Qi started the ball rolling, and he’s already stronger than the Sovereign Lord ever was. Even if the Sovereign Lord somehow came back to life, he couldn’t possibly deal with Yang Qi. Our task at hand is to unify the god world by defeating all the other dynasties. There’s no time to relax. Come with me to further your cultivation. After all, brutal combat is on the way!”

With that, he began drawing on his immense experience to teach new techniques and skills to his apprentices.

Now that the Invincible Dugu was awake, Yang Qi’s empire had two half-Annulled experts. They were already stronger than the King of Godmammoths and Demon Master, and definitely beyond the level of Proud Heaven.

Unfortunately, Proud Heaven and the Deathless Heaven Dynasty had the support of the essence of the god world, which made things different. They couldn't be taken lightly, and Yang Qi knew that if he wasn’t careful, he could end up being wiped out.

For now, the best thing to do was wait and see how things played out in the Demonfolk Empire.

When the demons clashed with Proud Heaven, anything could happen. After all, the High Priestess was definitely going to cause trouble.

The return of the Invincible Dugu wasn’t announced publicly. However, the loyal citizens all knew that they now had two half-Annulled experts, and it made them more delighted and confident than ever.

Destiny bubbled in the depths of the empire, although no one on the outside had any idea.

Smiling, Yang Qi looked in the direction of the Deathless Heaven Dynasty, and saw that Proud Heaven had erected a powerful greyspace in the middle of his roiling destiny.

‘What!?” Yang Qi murmured, shooting to his feet. ‘That’s the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart!’

It was only natural that, upon devouring King Immortal-Slayer, Proud Heaven had gained control of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. And now he was combining it with his empire’s destiny to create something similar to Yang Qi’s Everlasting Aegis. If he succeeded, it would make it much more difficult for Yang Qi to invade.

Thankfully, the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart could never compare to the Everlasting Aegis, which now had the Halls of Heaven as an integral part of it.

Chapter 1578: Domination

Yang Qi was becoming truly invincible!

Now that he was in the half-Annulled level, everything had become clear to him. He knew how to deal with all of Proud Heaven’s machinations, and was pushing his own psychic scale toward the level of a trillion.

That made him far beyond even the Sovereign Lord.

With his power, he could definitely conquer everything that existed. For all intents and purposes, there was no one who could possibly match up to him.

‘Proud Heaven is integrating the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart into his empire’s destiny. It seems he's getting ready to fight a war of attrition. Or perhaps he’ll use it to strengthen his Ten Universes. I need to take a closer look at what's going on. If he succeeds, and his cultivation base reaches the ultimate level, it’ll be even easier for him to control the High Priestess. So what will she do about all this?’

Even as he contemplated these things, he could sense the aura of the High Priestess in the depths of the Deathless Heaven Empire.

She sat unmoving as she focused her attention on what was happening in the dynasty. Her expression was grim. Next to her was Hailan, who said, “Master, it seems Proud Heaven is trying to fuse the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart with the destiny of his empire. If he succeeds, he’ll be in even more control, and we’ll be in an even more passive position. But is there anything we can do to stop him, considering how much he’s shored up his defenses?” From the murderous expression in her eyes, it seemed she wanted to immediately attack Proud Heaven.

“The Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart was a powerful treasure belonging to King Immortal-Slayer. If Proud Heaven assimilates it, the dynasty will fall even more firmly under his control, and we’ll lose even more influence. Unfortunately, I don’t think there’s anything we can do other than watch how things play out.” Yang Voidprime seemed similarly worried. “It's too bad that swine Yang Qi forced me to use my Fate Seal. Otherwise, I might’ve been able to reach the half-Annulled level by now.”

“You’re still half of a Fateless One,” the High Priestess said. “Logically speaking, you should still have a chance to reach the half-Annulled level.” As she watched the empire’s destiny flow into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, her expression turned more and more furious. “This Proud Heaven is really pushing things too far. I'm not going to let him get away with this. Unfortunately, I'm not strong enough to deal with him alone. If we just had a third half-Annulled expert, we could take him on.”

“I'm the most likely to reach that level,” Yang Voidprime said. All of a sudden, he seemed to realize something, and laughed. “High Priestess, don’t tell me you want to help me break through? I don’t see how that’s possible. The only way for me to do it would be to devour Yang Qi and take the rest of the fateless power he has. If I became a full Fateless One, then I’d definitely be strong enough to take on Proud Heaven. But Yang Qi won’t be easy to kill. His empire has been transforming lately, and its destiny is constantly growing.”

“That’s true. Yang Qi’s empire keeps improving in destiny, although I'm not able to see inside to identify exactly what’s going on.”

To her, the Everlasting Aegis and the Sage Monarch Empire seemed like an enormous sphere of stone, hanging in the middle of primal-chaos, slowly rotating as it absorbed the surrounding energy. It was even drawing on the power of the god world.

“He’s very audacious to be feeding off the god world like that,” the High Priestess said angrily. “The essence of the god world is bound to be furious, and want him dead. But his empire’s defenses are so strong, and he's already independent from the god world. He has plenty of advantages over us. After all, we’re completely dependent on the god world for our resources. I wonder what level his cultivation base has reached. Logically speaking, he shouldn’t have much trouble reaching the half-Annulled level. Once he does, he should create a resonance with heaven and earth, allowing me to sense it. But so far, I haven’t sensed anything.”

“Master, forget about Yang Qi,” Hailan said through gritted teeth. “We won’t need to worry about him later, and when we do, it should be easy to either kill him or force him into flight. As they say, before defending against invaders, pacify the interior. I can sense that Proud Heaven is getting more influential, and more old-timers are siding with him. For example, the Patriarch of the Universe has already defected from us. We absolutely have to kill Proud Heaven as soon as possible. Why don’t we lend someone a knife and have them do our dirty work for us?”

“Oh? Who exactly do you mean?” the High Priestess said. “We can’t use Yang Qi as our ‘knife’. He’s too clever, and besides, his cultivation base is too weak. He's only strong when he taps into that destiny of his. I say that we use the King of Godmammoths and the Demon Master. Use them to crush Proud Heaven. Furthermore, the Dugu Clan and their Invincible Dynasty seems to have gained new momentum, and their energy is growing. I wonder if the Invincible Dugu has awakened. If so, the god world will be partitioned even further.”

“What? The Dugu Clan? The Invincible Dynasty?” The High Priestess cast her vision in the direction of the Invincible Dynasty, and found that it was as sealed as tightly as a turtle in a shell. No one came in or out, which meant there was no influx of resources. It was almost as if they had endless resources at their disposal.

“This is really strange,” Yang Voidprime said. “There’s no way a dynasty could have that many resources stockpiled. The Invincible Dynasty is entirely made up of humans, which means they’re definitely using up a lot of resources. And everyone knows that just sitting and eating, one can deplete even a mountain of wealth. They can’t be doing what Yang Qi’s Everlasting Aegis does, and constantly producing their own resources. Can they? And how is the destiny of their dynasty so strong? Everyone there seems peaceful and calm, as if they aren’t afraid of anything. It's what you might expect if they had a half-Annulled expert stationed there. Could it be that the Invincible Dugu really is awake now?”

Everyone else was similarly shocked.

“The Invincible Dugu has a mysterious and unfathomable cultivation base,” the High Priestess said, and she sounded worried. “Not even I'm confident that I could handle him. If he's awake, then everyone is going to be worried about him. However, based on what I can see, I don’t think he is. If he was, the Invincible Dynasty wouldn’t be hiding away like a turtle. As for their resources, it’s likely the Everlasting Aegis is helping them.

“What?” Yang Voidprime said in shock. “You're saying Yang Qi worked out a deal with the Invincible Dynasty? How is that even possible?”

“It's not impossible,” Hailan said coldly. “Yang Qi needs the help of the Invincible Dugu to keep his empire safe. And the Invincible Dugu needs Yang Qi for resources. It makes perfect sense for them to reach an agreement. Although, I wouldn't worry too much. They’re definitely going to end up plotting against each other, and it will end up weakening Yang Qi and his empire. Furthermore, if they were really working together sincerely, why wouldn’t they combine their empires? Why would they leave things as they are?”

Although Hailan’s analysis seemed to make sense, she was actually playing right into Yang Qi’s hands.

After all, the reason he hadn’t combined empires was because he didn’t want impure destiny staining his Everlasting Aegis. Of course, now that the Invincible Dugu was awake, it would be easy to fix that problem. But he still wanted to keep the smokescreen up.

If they combined empires and revealed that they had two half-Annulled experts, it was a given that Proud Heaven, the High Priestess, the King of Godmammoths, and the Demon Master would find out, and they would do everything possible to destroy them.

Maintaining a front of weakness wouldn’t ensure that people would ignore them, but would at least give more time to prepare. Only when the time was right would Yang Qi grow his empire.

Furthermore, he could make it seem to outsiders like his empire and the Invincible Dynasty were struggling for dominance.

So far, everything was going according to plan.

In the past, he had wanted news of his empire to spread, so that people would flock to join him. But now he had his Ascendants, who weren’t connected to the god world, and he had made himself independent from the god world. That meant the essence of the god world had less and less control over him.

“Alright, I'm going to go see the King of Godmammoths and the Demon Master!” the High Priestess said, rising to her feet.

“No, Master!” Hailan said. Then she smiled. “I suggest you and Yang Voidprime go together. Tell the King of Godmammoths and the Demon Master that you want to overthrow Proud Heaven. Kill him. But Yang Voidprime needs to step into the half-Annulled level first. You can’t do it yourself, but if they help you, it’ll definitely be possible.”

“Ah, yes. That sounds good.”

The High Priestess chuckled. “That said, Hailan, I also need to make all of this worthwhile for you.”

“Agreed,” Hailan said. “I’ll trust your judgment, Master.”

“Yang Voidprime, you come with me.”

WHOOSH!

The two of them vanished into thin air as they headed in the direction of the Demonfolk Empire.

‘You’re finally going to meet your end, Proud Heaven,’ Hailan thought, a vicious smile playing out on her face. However, a moment later, she ground her teeth. ‘Of course, I'm not going to let Yang Qi off the hook. Heh heh. Yang Voidprime, do you really think that my Master is so kind-hearted to just freely help you reach the half-Annulled level? Once you succeed, I’ll rip the husk of your body away and get your Fateless One status. I'm going to devour both you and Yang Qi!’

Chapter 1579: The Cool Eye of the Bystander

A crafty smile could be seen on Hailan’s face. Truth be told, it wasn’t out of good intentions that she convinced Yang Voidprime to go with the High Priestess to see the King of Godmammoths and the Demon Master. Yang Voidprime obviously didn’t have as good a relationship with the High Priestess as Hailan did. After all, Hailan was the High Priestess’ apprentice.

The High Priestess had arranged everything in advance, preparing this elaborate trap for Yang Voidprime, with the intention of giving his cultivation base to Hailan.

Hailan was a profound schemer, but her cultivation base was only at the level of around two hundred billion. And she deeply wanted to reach the half-Annulled level. Chuckling coldly, she prepared her cultivation base to start absorbing destiny from the empire around her.

However, that was when an immense wave of power washed over her, and she suddenly realized that Proud Heaven was standing in front of her.

“Oh, it’s you, Your Majesty,” she said, snapping out of her reverie. “Might I ask why you’ve graced me with your presence? What commands might you have for me?”

She was under no illusions that he had come for benevolent reasons.

The court had essentially split into two factions, with one loyal to Proud Heaven, and the other siding with the High Priestess. The friction between the two factions was growing increasingly intense, although the top leaders were still refraining from personally interfering.

Furthermore, Proud Heaven was supposed to be working hard on the empire’s aegis, and shouldn’t have had the time to come see her.

Hailan was completely on guard.

“Did the High Priestess and Yang Voidprime just leave for somewhere?” Proud Heaven asked. “Where did they go?”

“I'm not sure,” she replied. “Would you like to wait here until they get back, Your Majesty? You can ask them yourself.”

“Hailan,” Proud Heaven said casually, sitting down and fixing his eyes on her like a predator eyeing prey, “a lot of experts seem to be siding against me nowadays. I know you’re the High Priestess’ apprentice, but have you ever considered working with me instead? I'm going to take over the god world, eventually. Yang Qi isn’t even close to being a match for me.”

“I'm not sure what you mean, Your Majesty. I already am loyal to you. Everything I do is for the sake of the empire.” Hailan knew exactly what was going on. Now that the High Priestess was away, Proud Heaven was taking advantage of her absence and trying to recruit Hailan. But did he really think she would switch sides because of a simple invitation? He should at least offer some compelling arguments, or a reward of some sort.

“Your Majesty, we're always more than happy to offer advice to help you overcome any personal obstacles,” Hailan said, sticking to the prescribed formalities of the court. Obviously, she didn't want Proud Heaven uncovering any of her own weaknesses. “Remember, the empire doesn't belong to you alone, it belongs to the citizens. If the people find fault with you, it's our job to help you rectify the situation. And so, Your Majesty, I really hope that you can refrain from this talk about factions and sides. We're all working together for the same purpose. For the same heavenly empire.”

“Oh really,” Proud Heaven said with a smile. “This is a personal conversation between you and me, so you can drop the official jargon. I know you want to reach the half-Annulled level. After all, you're ambitious. Furthermore, you know a lot about Yang Qi, and I need help in that regard. So join me. If you do, I’ll make sure you reach the half-Annulled level.”

“Is that so?” Hailan said, her heart pounding. That said, she didn’t really trust Proud Heaven. “Your Majesty, if you could really help me improve my cultivation base, that would be wonderful. But I don’t think I deserve that. How could I possibly be so blessed? And why would you give me a reward like that?”

Lounging on the chair haughtily, Proud Heaven stared at Hailan with a piercing gaze as he said, “What do you think of the destiny in the empire, Hailan?”

“The destiny of the Deathless Heaven Empire is boundless and invincible, superior to any empire that existed from ancient times until now. Not even the Sovereign Lord’s court could compare. It’s the result of the hard work of all the loyal citizens of the empire.” She was intentionally refraining from giving credit to Proud Heaven, in the hopes of seeing how he would react. Normally speaking, she should be lavishing him with praise, considering he was the emperor.

Proud Heaven didn’t seem to get angry at all. In fact, he smiled. “The hard work of the citizens? I'd say that if people weren’t so interested in plotting and scheming, the destiny would be even better. Hailan, an honest person does not resort to insinuation. Where did the High Priestess and Yang Voidprime go? To visit the King of Godmammoths and the Demon Master, to ask for their help in overthrowing me? The High Priestess has never really liked me, has she?”

“Careful, Your Majesty,” Hailan said. “I really don’t know where the High Priestess and Yang Voidprime went. But they definitely aren’t doing anything to harm the interests of the empire. Of that I'm sure. Your Majesty, if you start recklessly hurling accusations at your officials, it’s definitely going to harm the destiny of the empire.”

Despite her words, Hailan was profoundly shocked. She had assumed that the High Priestess’ actions were top secret. After all, the High Priestess was a half-Annulled expert, which should have made it impossible for anyone to spy on her.

But apparently, Proud Heaven knew everything that was going on.

Proud Heaven laughed coldly. “Not shed a tear until seeing the coffin? It’s not as though you're up to any good, Hailan. You want to use Yang Voidprime to get to the half-Annulled level. By possessing him. Taking his quintessence-blood and vital energy. Unfortunately, your little plan isn’t going to work.”

“I don’t know what you're talking about,” Hailan said, so shocked that she forgot to address him as Your Majesty. That alone showed how discomfited she was.

“Yang Voidprime isn’t a complete fool,” Proud Heaven said. “Although you’ve been close with him up to this point, even giving him your body, he still doesn’t trust you. Of that, I can assure you. Furthermore, he’s hoping to devour you. By the way, you probably don’t know that when two people have fateless power, they’re fatally connected. If Yang Voidprime dies, his fateless power will immediately be transferred to Yang Qi. There’s nothing anyone can do to stop it. In the past, I was planning to kill Yang Voidprime, but later on, I realized the truth, which is why I’ve kept him alive. Otherwise, do you really think he would still be around?”

“Y-y-you,” Hailan stammered. “How did you find that out?”

“You forget that I'm now the representative of the essence of the god world. I know everything the god world knows. In other words, I'm far more informed than the Sovereign Lord ever was. And I'm privy to many matters. For instance, I've been keeping an eye on the High Priestess. You can’t keep secrets from me, Hailan. I know how ambitious you are, but did you really think that you're strong enough to dominate everyone else in the god world?” There was killing intent hidden in Proud Heavens words, and Hailan could sense it.

“If I join you, Proud Heaven, how exactly will you make sure I reach the half-Annulled level?” Hailan had made her decision. In the end, Proud Heaven was simply too terrifying.

Proud Heaven chuckled darkly. “Simple. You become my woman. I’ll appoint you as my empress, making you the mother of everything under heaven. You and I will have an equal share of the destiny of the empire, and we’ll jointly control everything in existence. As the representative of the High Priestess, you have command of an enormous faction that you can bring to our side. In the end, the High Priestess will be isolated and helpless.”

“Is that so?” Hailan said with a smile. Now she knew what Proud Heaven wanted, and what he wanted her to do. “But I'm already Yang Voidprime’s woman, and I have been since ancient times. If I become your empress, that’ll be a big stain on my reputation. And how will Yang Voidprime react? He’ll go crazy.”

“None of that matters. I'm the emperor. What does Yang Voidprime count for, compared to that? I’ll keep him in check, and make sure he knows what’ll happen if he acts up. Besides all I have to do is break his dao heart, and he’ll never be able to reach the coveted half-Annulled level.” Proud Heaven laughed darkly. “The matter is fairly simple. He’s working with the High Priestess against me, all for the purpose of breaking through to half-Annulled. And that was a big mistake.”

“I like the way you think, Proud Heaven,” Hailan said, flashing a dazzling smile. “You're right, I do have control of a major faction. The High Priestess wants the power of a clique, but doesn't want to deal with its day-to-day affairs. She wants to focus on cultivating and strategizing. So she’s long since handed control to me. There are a lot of officials in the government who are loyal to me specifically. If I become empress, we can unite the dynasty, and Yang Voidprime and the High Priestess won’t be able to do a thing about it. We can even get rid of them, eventually. However, there’s one issue. How do I know I can trust you?”

“What more can I do? As the empress, you’ll be mine, and you’ll have to be loyal to me. At the same time, I’ll have no reason to work against you. It’s a mutually beneficial arrangement.”

“Well said," Hailan said, nodding. “When will you make the announcement?”

“The sooner the better. In fact, how about immediately.” As he spoke, his eyes gleamed with a lascivious light. “After all, once you’re the empress, you’ll be mine, and you’ll have to do whatever I want you to.”

“What's that mean, Proud Heaven?” Hailan said. Proud Heaven’s lascivious look hadn’t gone unnoticed, and she suddenly had a very bad feeling. It seemed that Proud Heaven wanted to do something inappropriate right then and there.

“You're a half-Annulled expert, Proud Heaven. Can’t you wait just a bit longer? Look, I need to think about this. I never agreed to be your empress. And I currently have the rank of grand princess, so don’t even think of acting outside protocol.”

Snorting coldly, Proud Heaven rose to his feet. “Outside protocol? I'm in charge here, and I’ve been waiting long enough. What the emperor wants, he gets. I'm going to unite the entire god world, and all other empires and dynasties are just stepping stones for me. You’re with me now, Hailan, whether you like it or not. I'm curious to see if you have anything you think can be used to stop me.”

As the words left his mouth, he smiled cruelly and reached out to grab her clothing.

Chapter 1580: The Cool Eye of the Bystander (2)

“Stop right there, Proud Heaven!” Hailan said. Sadly, the High Priestess wasn’t here to step in and interfere. Proud Heaven had picked the perfect moment to violate her, and there was nothing she could do about it.

He was like a bear pouncing on a helpless rabbit, and in the blink of an eye, Hailan’s clothing was being ripped off.

Proud Heaven chuckled evilly as he prepared to satiate his primal desires, and simultaneously force Hailan to become loyal to him. In his belief, the best way to seize the loyalty of a woman was to control her body.

“You’re completely shameless, Proud Heaven!” Hailan shrieked.

But in the end, she had to give in....

**

‘What’s this?’ Yang Qi murmured. He had been studying the destiny of the Deathless Heaven Dynasty, and noticed that it suddenly started bubbling madly as it became more united than ever.

He frowned. ‘What just happened? The destiny of the Deathless Heaven Dynasty used to be split in two, thanks to Proud Heaven and the High Priestess opposing each other. So why is it united now?’

After examining the destiny more closely, he picked up on some clues.

‘The High Priestess’ faction was being run by that vicious schemer, Hailan. And the High Priestess just left to see the King of Godmammoths about overthrowing Proud Heaven. Hailan remained behind. Wait, does this mean Proud Heaven somehow subjugated her?’

As Yang Qi looked on with the cool eye of a bystander, he became convinced that that was what had just happened.

If Proud Heaven had subjugated her, the destiny could be united, and the High Priestess would be forced into a dead end. And it would even be possible for Proud Heaven to work out a deal with the King of Godmammoths.

Of course, Hailan was no simpleton. She had a wicked heart, so for all Yang Qi knew, she might have manipulated Proud Heaven for her own advantage, and was now waiting to take everything away from him.

In the impure lands, Yang Qi had dealt with Yun Hailan, who was a will projection of Hailan. Yun Hailan had been crafty and murderous, causing immense trouble for Yang Qi on numerous occasions. If anything, Hailan had to be even more treacherous and deadly than Yun Hailan. So if Proud Heaven was ‘subjugating’ Hailan, it seemed entirely likely that he was actually falling for her plot.

‘Well played. Very well played. Well, while you people are fighting amongst yourselves, I’ll have my sage monarch magistrates working on getting stronger and stronger. And my Ascendants will also be working on their cultivation. It won’t be long before we surpass the Deathless Heaven Dynasty, and I’ll be in a position to conquer everything.’

**

Laughing, Proud Heaven crawled off of Hailan and said, “Now you’re my woman. In short order, we’ll go through the ceremony to make you empress. Then, we’ll take stock of the situation in the empire and put all the resources in order.”

As Hailan put her clothes back on, her pupils glittered. “Once I'm the empress, can I use the destiny to step into the half-Annulled level?”

“There isn’t enough,” Proud Heaven replied. “I’ll use the essence of the god world, instead. Now get out of my way so I can make the announcement.”

Soon, word was spreading that the emperor had decided to take an empress.

Many eyes went wide.

Hailan was a major enemy of Proud Heaven’s faction, and was the representative of the High Priestess. And a lot of people knew that she was Yang Voidprime’s woman. But now she was with Proud Heaven? What was going on?

Many people realized that Proud Heaven was striking the High Priestess right in her weak spot. The High Priestess had given control of the faction to Hailan, and now Hailan had switched sides. That meant the High Priestess was now a general with no troops to command.

But why hadn’t the High Priestess done something to prevent this? Where exactly was she?

The announcement caused a huge stir as preparations were made for the wedding and coronation.

It only took a day for everyone to hear the news, and for an immense stage to be set up in the middle of the empire. There, Proud Heaven and Hailan appeared, wearing extravagant garments. With the essence of the god world there to bear witness, they were wed.

Everything trembled as numerous supernatural signs appeared, thanks to the essence of the god world. Streams of energy converged on Hailan, surrounding her with dazzling light that seemed befitting of an empress.

“Let the essence of the god world bear witness to the fact that I, Proud Heaven, and Hailan, are now a married couple. Let everyone know that Hailan is the empress, and that together, we rule all creation by means of the Deathless Heaven Dynasty.”

RUMBLE!

As the words left his mouth, a deathless energy settled onto Hailan, and her cultivation base rose. Dazzling light shone from her, making it seem like she might well rise all the way to the Annulled level.

However, in the end, she didn’t even reach the half-Annulled level. The power she received after becoming the empress left her just shy of that benchmark. That said, she could sense that she now had hope of making that final breakthrough. And her cultivation base was already three times as strong as it had been before.

In the past, it wouldn’t have mattered how she tried to further her cultivation, she would never have reached the half-Annulled level. But things were different now.

There was a huge difference between having no hope at all, and having immense hope.

Seeing Hailan’s psychic scale rise, Proud Heaven couldn’t help but smile. “Hailan, there’s only one thing you lack. One thing preventing you from reaching the half-Annulled level.”

“And what’s that?” Hailan asked, her eyes glittering coldly. The truth was that being violated by Proud Heaven hadn’t left her with any feelings at all. On the contrary, it was a humiliation that she would repay with thousands of times the fury she felt right now. She would make sure that Proud Heaven lived a life in which he longed to die! However, for the time being, she had to go along to get what she wanted.

“Simple. The High Priestess’ soul. If you get it, you’ll definitely reach the half-Annulled level. For now, the High Priestess has no idea that we're working together. But she’ll be back, sooner or later. Once she steps inside the borders of the empire, she’ll be living on borrowed time. The two of us need to work together to kill her, then you can devour her soul to break through. We're in a dangerous spot right now. If word spreads, and she finds out, it could ruin everything. So let’s strengthen the empire while we can. Call a meeting. Have all the old-timers you’re connected to come talk about joining me. The stronger the empire’s destiny gets, the mightier we’ll be. And the essence of the god world will support me more as well. As I fuse the destiny with the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, the essence of the god world will provide more and more resources. For some reason, the essence seems more and more determined to get rid of Yang Qi. Apparently, his Everlasting Aegis is a major threat to the god world.”

Hailan nodded. “It is. The god needs to absorb primal-chaos paleo-energy to expand. And the Everlasting Aegis does the same thing. They’re basically predators competing for the same prey. They’re obviously enemies. That said, if the god world can provide more resources for our empire, that's good news. We definitely need to kill the High Priestess as quickly as possible. If she forges an alliance with the King of Godmammoths and the Demon Master, it’ll make things difficult for us.”

“Don’t worry. They're all dead! The essence of the god world supports me, and when the moment comes, it’ll help me crush all my enemies.” Proud Heaven laughed. “Alright, let's begin.”

Streams of energy coursed through the dynasty with sky-obfuscating, land-enshrouding force. One by one, all of the various factions were coming under Proud Heaven’s control. Apparently, forcing Hailan onto his side had been a good move, and Proud Heaven was very pleased with how things were playing out.

**

‘So, he's starting,’ Yang Qi thought as he observed the changes to the destiny in Proud Heaven’s empire. ‘Now I just need to wait for Proud Heaven and the High Priestess to clash. There’s no way the High Priestess can come back from this. She's a general with no troops to command, and once the fighting breaks out, one of them will die for sure. If the High Priestess really doesn’t know what’s happened, then Proud Heaven will definitely come out on top. Meanwhile, I’ll be waiting to take advantage of this battle between a dragon and a tiger.’

Yang Qi could tell that Proud Heaven was getting rid of the factions in his empire just by observing. Yang Qi could also see the aegis forming there, and how it connected to the essence of the god world to create resources.

The Everlasting Aegis could produce resources, and now Proud Heaven was accomplishing the same thing. In fact, it could produce even more resources than the Everlasting Aegis.

The god world wanted to get rid of the parasite that was Yang Qi, thus it was giving immense power and help to Proud Heaven.

Yang Qi chuckled. “The essence of the god world is giving Proud Heaven a lot of help. Apparently, it doesn’t realize how much of an ungrateful and vicious person he is. When the time comes, he’s definitely going to use the Great Necropolis to devour the god world. Now to see how things work out with the High Priestess and the King of Godmammoths.”

Chapter 1581: Intense Infighting

Yang Qi was holding back to see how things played out, hoping to work things to his own advantage. He wasn’t announcing that he had reached the half-Annulled level, and wasn’t combining with the Invincible Dynasty. As a result, any outsider who looked his way would think he was a lot weaker than he actually was.

Because of that, the High Priestess and Proud Heaven felt free to struggle with each other without worrying that he might interfere.

If Yang Qi were to be perceived as being too powerful, Proud Heaven and the High Priestess would feel compelled to refrain from infighting. They would stick together and stand strong against him. But when external pressure was light, they wouldn’t hesitate to move against each other.

Yang Qi didn't want to put pressure on any of his enemies. He wanted them fighting amongst themselves while he remained locked up inside his own empire, slowly growing stronger. He wanted to become the top power in the entire god world, unbeknownst to everyone else.

Of course, part of it was also that he wasn’t quite confident that he was in a position to go on the offensive. So he couldn’t have been more pleased to see that the High Priestess and Proud Heaven were at each others’ throats.

‘If that slut Hailan has become Proud Heaven’s empress, then this is a perfect opportunity for me. I need to find a chance to capture and subjugate her. Then I can place her next to Proud Heaven as my pawn. Yes. The time has come to finally subjugate her.’

Yang Qi wouldn’t pull any punches in dealing with Hailan. And by now, his cultivation base had made him the number one expert in the entire god world.

The main thing he was worried about was multiple half-Annulled experts teaming up on him. And he knew that there were still old-timers out there hiding, just waiting to make a move. Of course, the two most powerful of all the old-timers had yet to show their faces: the Sovereign Lord and the True Devil.

They had to be out there somewhere, hiding in an unknown location and watching things develop in the god world, waiting to take advantage of the moment. If Yang Qi, the King of Godmammoths, Proud Heaven, the High Priestess, and the Demon Master got into some deadly fight, it was a given that those two would jump in at some point.

So for now, Yang Qi did nothing.

His main concern was the Sovereign Lord, who had previously been the top expert in the god world. Someone like him wouldn’t just die, and it was entirely likely that he had become stronger than he was in the past. Although Yang Qi wasn’t afraid of fighting him one-on-one, he was worried about what would happen if the Sovereign Lord ambushed him.

Yang Qi had been able to track Wretch God Ultimate’s aura, and ultimately devour him. But he couldn't find the Sovereign Lord’s aura anywhere in the Halls of Heaven, thus he couldn’t follow him. Unfortunately, neither could he use the Mahātmā Jade to find the True Devil. Both had cast aside all of their previous glory, entering a mysterious state that would make them very hard to defeat.

Thus, Yang Qi was waiting. He knew how to be patient, and how to wait until he had an advantage.

Next, he shifted his gaze to the distant Demonfolk Empire, whose energy was growing along with its population. If all of the Demonfolk in the god world were united, or even just a third of them, they would outnumber the humans by many times over.

The only reason they had never overwhelmed humanity was because they lacked the ability to act together. That was why an army of a billion humans could easily rout an army of a hundred billion Demonfolk. Another factor was that Demonfolk tended to have lower cultivation bases.

But things were changing. As the human empires struggled to maintain cohesion, the Demonfolk were rising, and madly inflicting vengeance on the smaller human groups.

Yang Qi couldn’t afford to pay attention to that now. The Invincible Dynasty would occasionally send people out to rid the world of devils and demons, bringing any humans they encountered back into their empire.

But that didn’t have anything to do with the Sage Monarch Empire.

For the time being, Yang Qi was just working on his cultivation and watching things play out in the god world.

**

“We’re here!” The High Priestess and Yang Voidprime had reached a location with endless forest-covered mountains. This was the Demonfolk Empire, and the demon energy was immense. Furthermore, order could be seen. Although it couldn’t match up to that of the humans, it made it obvious that half-Annulled experts were in charge.

“I can’t believe the Demonfolk Empire has destiny as amazing as this,” Yang Voidprime said. But then he shook his head. “Sadly, Demonfolk are Demonfolk, and they can’t change their genes and life force. They’re innately chaotic and evil. They might’ve managed to piece together this empire, but they’re going to end up tearing each other apart.”

In the impure lands, wolves were meant to eat sheep, and there was no way to change that, no matter how hard you tried. And despite the fact that this Demonfolk Empire had been created, there was no way that Demonfolk could actually exist in orderly fashion. Nor was there any way they could truly cooperate with non-Demonfolk.

Every empire had factions and infighting. The Demonfolk were no exception, and it was definitely going to lead to fierce competition.

At least human factions could reach balance and cooperate. With Demonfolk, that was just impossible. For example, the wolf demons couldn’t ever get along with the sheep demons. They had blood feuds going back generations, and such things couldn't be forgotten. In the end, this empire couldn’t be stable. Not even using force would really do any good.

The Demon Master had tried that in the past, and it had ultimately failed.

“You're right,” the High Priestess said. “The Demonfolk Empire won’t progress past this current level. Not even the most almighty entity can change the fundamental nature of the Demonfolk. The demons number as many as the eternal sands, and they simply have no mental concept of what national unity is. I don’t think the King of Godmammoths and the Demon Master intend for this to be a truly lasting empire. They probably want to use the Demonfolk to feed some sort of spell formation. How very vicious of them. A blood sacrifice to help the two of them to reach personal breakthroughs.”

“You’re wrong, High Priestess,” someone said in a sonorous voice.

The High Priestess backed up as a burly man appeared, clan in animal skins. He seemed like the personification of all the power and will in the world, and was clearly barbaric and violent. At the same time, he seemed strong enough to prop up the Halls of Heaven on his shoulders, and crush the horde of devils in hell.

Yang Voidprime also sensed that this person was as mighty as a mountain.

He was none other than the King of Godmammoths.

In terms of raw power, no one could match up to him. In ancient times, it was impossible to say how many devils in hell he had awed, and how many top experts had trembled at the thought of his name. Nor was it possible to determine exactly how many enemies he had slain.

Yang Voidprime backed up a few paces, trembling inwardly as he realized what sort of mighty being he was looking at. The King of Godmammoths was vastly superior to Proud Heaven in every way.

‘Incredible,’ he thought. ‘Just what I’d expect of the King of Godmammoths. No wonder he was considered the strongest expert in ancient times, someone who could crush the nine heavens and ten earths, a person who the legion of gods bent their heads to.’

“You’re right that Demonfolk are chaotic,” the King of Godmammoths said, “and will only think of personal interest instead of the good of the nation. But that doesn’t matter. We can change that. You see, the Demon Master gained enlightenment of a dao that can unite the countless demons, and even now, we're teaching our people about it. The disorder among us is being rooted out and we're gradually learning how to live harmoniously. Eventually, no other races will exist at all, other than demons. There will be no humans. No Spritefolk, Magefolk, or even ordinary mortals. No one will exist but us.” With that, he threw his head back and laughed uproariously. “Ah, it's been a long time, High Priestess. The years haven’t been kind, have they? Billions of years have passed, yet it doesn't seem like much time has gone by. We’ve finally reached the true golden age. I suppose we ought to sit and reminiscence a bit.”

“King of Godmammoths, the Sovereign Lord is dead,” the High Priestess said. Clearly, she wanted to get right to the point. “Now, people are fighting for supremacy of the god world. Unfortunately, that brat Proud Heaven has gained the support of the essence of the god world. He’s already too much for me to handle, and I’m sure you can envision what’s to come. In addition to the support of the god world, he has the Great Necropolis, and he devoured King Immortal-Slayer. He’s going to conquer the entire god world unless we join forces to crush him. Wipe him out of existence for all time.”

The High Priestess and the King of Godmammoths were very familiar with each other. Although they had fought each other in the past, the billions of years that had gone by had removed any animosity they felt for each other. Both of them cared for little else other than personal gain.

“You don’t need to explain,” the King of Godmammoths said with a smile. “I understand everything. You’ve been patient, High Priestess. I'm honestly surprised you waited so long to come see me. In any case, yes. Proud Heaven has to die. You don’t need to convince me.”

Chapter 1582: Breakthrough for Yang Voidprime

With a decisiveness that could sever nails and chop iron, the King of Godmammoths said, “Proud Heaven has to die.” And it caused wide smiles to appear on the face of Yang Voidprime and the High Priestess.

“Yes, the vile and repulsive Proud Heaven must die,” the High Priestess echoed.

“It doesn’t matter whether or not he’s vile and repulsive,” the King of Godmammoths said. “He has the Great Necropolis and the support of the essence of the god world. And that means he needs to be dead. The god world is our greatest enemy. It will continue to grow and grow until it reaches its limit. Eventually, it will explode, allowing primal-chaos paleo-energy to rush inside, destroying all living beings. We half-Annulled experts will be the first to go.

“Years ago, the Sovereign Lord perished because of the god world, and the other old-timers like us were hoodwinked. Tricked by the god world. But that’s not going to happen again. The downside is that, over the billions of years since then, the essence of the god world has grown stronger.”

“So what do we do?” the High Priestess asked. “And what do we do about the additional enemy, Yang Qi? He’s created a second version of the god world.”

“I'm aware of him. He’s half of a Fateless One, and he has the God Legion Seal. On his journey from the impure lands to here, he's always defied fate, and has been impossible to keep tabs on. He even assimilated the Halls of Heaven. However, he can be dealt with. Since you’ve brought the other half-Fateless One here, I can help turn him into a half-Annulled expert. And I can teach him an incredibly powerful energy art. Then, all he has to do is forcefully summon away the rest of the fateless energy from Yang Qi, and he can become whole. At that point, he’ll be a full Fateless One, and Yang Qi will be nothing but an ordinary person.”

“Summon it away?” Yang Voidprime said, visibly pleased.

Of course, he knew it would come at a very high price. The King of Godmammoths, the Demon Master, and the High Priestess weren’t going to make him a half-Annulled expert for free. And it begged the question of what they would want in return.

Chuckling, the High Priestess said, “You’re as frank and straightforward as ever, King of Godmammoths. And I agree. You expressed my views perfectly. Here I thought I was going to have to go into a big speech to explain things. Instead, you planned everything out and were just waiting for me to come along and agree.”

“Yes. So let's get going. There’s no need to waste any more time.” The King of Godmammoths made a grasping gesture, and before Yang Voidprime could do anything, he was grabbed and taken into the depths of the Demonfolk Empire. Yang Voidprime was strong, but compared to the King of Godmammoths, he was like nothing. Only now did he realize why the King of Godmammoths had been considered the most powerful person in ancient times. Not even the Sovereign Lord had been on par with him.

In the depths of the Demonfolk Empire, Yang Voidprime and the High Priestess were shocked to see countless golden giants leading the Demonfolk in prayer. The Demonfolk were changing as a result, gradually becoming less chaotic. They were literally turning into a new form of life.

“This...” the High Priestess said. “You're really transforming the Demonfolk on a fundamental level. This is going to be a monumental undertaking.”

“No, it’s going to be a snowball effect,” the King of Godmammoths said with a smile. “I have Yang Qi to thank for this. I'm just copying his sage monarch magistrates. They were all the inspiration I needed to gain the new enlightenment I needed to create my kings of order. They’re even better than the sage monarch magistrates. After all, Yang Qi is only able to use the dao of the Lord of Civilization.

“I know far more about ancient civilizations than Yang Qi could ever know. Furthermore, I'm a half-Annulled expert. So how could his creations possibly measure up to my kings of order? His version of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth is crap. I created that technique to begin with, and I didn’t need it to be linked to the God Legion Seal. So in the end, I'm not worried at all about Yang Qi. I just want him for his fateless energy.”

“You really live up to your reputation, King of Godmammoths.” The High Priestess sighed admiringly. “Impressive. Very, very impressive. You’ve obviously surpassed me, and I can do nothing about it but offer you praise.”

“There’s no need to be unduly humble, High Priestess,” someone said. All of a sudden, a middle-aged man appeared who had the bearing of a sage or mahātmā. In the darkness created by the Demonfolk, he was a mass of shining radiance and light, and seemed to radiate a sense of order. He was none other than the Demon Master.

“Demon Master!” the High Priestess exclaimed.

“It's been a long time, High Priestess,” he said. “Back when I opposed the Sovereign Lord, you and I fought a few times. But it's been years, so let’s let bygones be bygones. For all we know, the Sovereign Lord might not be dead, and could be waiting to make a comeback. And if he does, he’ll be the number one figure in the god world. Right now, our main enemies are Proud Heaven and Yang Qi. However, there are others to worry about, such as the True Devil and the Wretch God.”

“So what do we do now?” the High Priestess asked. “Seeing all you old friends again really fills me with hope. That Proud Heaven and his Deathless Heaven Empire has made me so angry I feel like coughing up blood.”

“Our next move is obvious,” the Demon Master said. “We help Yang Voidprime achieve his breakthrough. No one else has the potential he does, not even my own daughter Ruo Chen.”

“After Yang Voidprime achieves his breakthrough,” said the King of Godmammoths, “we can work with him to cast the summoning spell that’ll take Yang Qi’s fateless energy away from him. We’ll all have a share of the spoils, boosting our cultivation bases to the point where crushing Proud Heaven will be as easy as turning over a hand. Without his status as a Fateless One, Yang Qi will never reach the half-Annulled level. We can then simply enslave him and take over his empire, benefitting from its incredible destiny.”

“Exactly,” the Demon Master said. “The final task will be to crush the essence of the god world. At some point along the way, the Sovereign Lord and the True Devil will come out of hiding, and we can devour them. Once the god world is truly ours, our day of transcendence will be at hand.”

“In that case,” the High Priestess said, “we should begin immediately. How do you plan to improve his cultivation base?”

“Simple,” the King of Godmammoths said. “We have to fully unlock the potential of his fateless energy. You see, the reason the Sovereign Lord was so worried about fateless energy in the past is that it could have been used to surpass his level of power. High Priestess, you used to work with fateless energy in the past, so you’re familiar with it. In other words, there’s no need to pretend you don't know these things. Begin!”

“As perceptive as ever, King of Godmammoths. Fine, I’ll drop the act.” Chuckling, the High Priestess reached out and put her hand on Yang Voidprime’s head.

At almost exactly the same time, the Demon Master and the King of Godmammoths did the same.

Three top experts were all working to stimulate the fateless power within him.

It was definitely a possibility that this could provoke a breakthrough to the half-Annulled level. Normally speaking, it wouldn’t work; not even on someone like the Patriarch of the Universe, who had been a peak expert for billions of years. It would be like three powerful individuals throwing someone up into the air. No matter how hard they threw, that person would still fall back down to the ground. But if those same three people tossed a bird up into the air, then obviously the bird wouldn’t fall. Yang Voidprime was like the bird. He was half of a Fateless One, and had long since been in the position to break through. In fact, if Yang Qi hadn’t forced him to use his Fate Seal, he probably would have already.

Most people would have to follow the flow of the river of fate, but obviously, Fateless Ones could go against it.

RUMBLE!

As the three experts poured power into Yang Voidprime, he felt like he was going to explode. Immense power filled him, trembling with ferocity, similar to how a sea of oil would ignite if a meteor fell into it.

“I'm breaking through!” he cried as his body was shredded to pieces, and his godhood collapsed. As he became like the void, his psyche reached a higher level. It was as if he had already died, and his soul had moved on to the most incomparably true and real world there was. In the blink of an eye, his view of everything changed, and he felt like he had previously been a tiny frog looking at the sky from the bottom of a well. But now he had leaped out of that well, and was on a mountain, looking around at the wide world around him.

In the moment that he exploded, the High Priestess, King of Godmammoths, and Demon Master watched with delight. As they saw the connection between the fateless energy and the half-Annulled level, they themselves were cleansed by the energy.

“Incredible!” the King of Godmammoths said. “Although we can’t absorb the fateless energy directly, just being in its presence affects our fate, and makes us freer from the god world. And our cultivation bases are increasing! This is going to be a huge help in reaching the Annulled level. Not even the Sovereign Lord could match this.”

“Yes, this is amazing!” the Demon Master said, laughing. “It seems all of our enlightenment over the years isn’t going to go to waste.”

“I never imagined that fateless energy would be this profound!” the High Priestess said. “Proud Heaven, I'm definitely going to make you regret everything you've done!”

Chapter 1583: Yang Qi Makes a Move

The King of Godmammoths, Demon Master, and High Priestess were all benefiting from observing the profundities of fateless energy. Despite all the billions of years they had lived, none of them had ever been able to see anything like it, thus the enlightenment they gained was immense.

It took almost no time at all for Yang Voidprime to reach the half-Annulled level. Instantly, he felt like his will was so powerful he could rule over all of heaven and earth.

However, with the three experts glaring at him like tigers eyeing prey, he had to maintain a cool head.

Despite his breakthrough, he couldn’t possibly overcome those three. In fact, he couldn’t even take on one of them right now.

That said, he had still passed a major milestone, and couldn’t have been more pleased.

‘These three want to use me as a pawn. They helped me reach the half-Annulled level, but I shouldn't be thanking them. I’ll devour them sooner or later. Of course, I have to start with Yang Qi. Heh heh. Just wait until I summon that fateless energy away from him and become a true Fateless One. Then all three of you are dead! Completely and utterly finished!’

“You’ve succeeded,” said the King of Godmammoths. “You truly have a lot of potential as a Fateless One. Now we need to start the summoning. Let’s work together with Yang Voidprime to strip Yang Qi of his fateless power. Once we do so, we can force him to work for us. Then, once we’re at our peak, we’ll take on Proud Heaven and the essence of the god world.”

“Fateless Ones really do have a lot of potential,” the Demon Master said. “Anyone else that we poured power into like that would have died. But as a Fateless One, you used it to reach the half-Annulled level. Incredible.”

“Yes, let’s begin the summoning,” the High Priestess said.

“Alright! Activate the spell formation!” The King of Godmammoths knew they didn’t have any time to lose, so he waved his hand, causing an enormous spell formation to appear.

“Get into the middle of the formation, Yang Voidprime. Understand?” the Demon Master said. “We made that with blood, sweat, and tears, over the course of many years. It can summon anything in existence, and is your key to getting immense power.”

Yang Voidprime’s expression flickered. It seemed like an obvious trap; once he stepped into the formation, they would probably be able to kill him at any moment.

“What are you waiting for, Yang Voidprime?” the High Priestess growled, not even making a pretense of courtesy. “Get in the formation!”

“Hold on,” he said. “Is it dangerous? What if Yang Qi takes my fateless power?”

“That won’t happen,” the King of Godmammoths replied loudly. “You’re a half-Annulled expert now, and he isn’t. You’ll instantly crush him. And even if he has somehow broken through, he won’t be able to resist a summoning backed by the power of all three of us. He's going to die soon, so stop wasting time! If you don’t, I’ll just kill you. Don’t think that because you’re in the half-Annulled level now you can just ignore us.”

RUMBLE!

All of a sudden, a mammoth trunk appeared, which wrapped around the shocked Yang Voidprime and threw him into the formation.

He had only been in the half-Annulled level for moments, which meant the King of Godmammoths was vastly stronger than him.

Swish!

“He’s still struggling,” the High Priestess laughed. “But you're far superior, King of Godmammoths. Maybe we should just take control of him. Puppetize him. Then when we take Yang Qi’s fateless power, we can split it three ways.”

“Not a bad idea,” the Demon Master said with a smile. “There are no free gifts under heaven. This guy is destined to be our cash cow. If I were him, I would’ve already run as far away as possible to get stronger. Instead, he stuck around doing nothing, just giving us the chance to kill him.”

“Begin the summoning!” the King of Godmammoths said, waving his hand. Instantly, the spell formation stirred to life.

In the formation, pain wracked Yang Voidprime, who finally understood that none of this was being done to benefit him. He was just being used as bait. He might be a half-Annulled expert now, but the King of Godmammoths, Demon Master, and High Priestess had left their power in him after the breakthrough, allowing them to control him. If he weren’t in the formation, he might have been able to run away and hide somewhere, then slowly figure out a way to extrude their power. But now, he was trapped. He just couldn't compare to these three old-timers in terms of wisdom and cleverness.

He felt like he was being roasted alive by fire, or tormented in the deepest depths of hell. Of course, that was because of the King of Godmammoths, who specialized in matters relating to hell.

Yang Voidprime wasn’t even strong enough to deal with the King of Godmammoths alone, let alone him working with the Demon Master and the High Priestess.

“Fateless Summoning!”

The King of Godmammoths made a grasping gesture, and all heaven and earth seemed to shatter, causing brilliant light to shine about.

“Out-of-Body Incarnation: King of the Great Dao!” The King of Godmammoths was drawing on a consummate art to create an out-of-body incarnation. It was called King of the Great Dao, and it was so amazing that as soon as it appeared, the High Priestess’ face fell.

“Fear not, High Priestess,” the King of Godmammoths said. “We won’t treat you like this brat. You’re an old friend, whereas this kid wants to crap all over us. Obviously, we won’t go for that.

“As of this moment, I have a second identity: the King of the Great Dao. I learned this from the Sovereign Lord, a consummate art he cultivated with the intention of transcending the essence of the god world. Sadly, he fell before he succeeded. But I learned the essence of the technique, and now I'm going to use this fateless power to complete my King of the Great Dao. Then, the King of Godmammoths will vanish and be replaced by the King of the Great Dao. Among the three thousand great daos, and the great dao of the universe, I am king. The leader of all, the king of myriad ancient daos, the king of kings!”

“Incredible. Simply incredible!”

The appearance of the King of the Great Dao convinced the High Priestess that the King of Godmammoths was definitely far beyond her. He had truly stepped on the path to a great dao, placing him immeasurably close to the Annulled level.

“Brother, your cultivation base is far beyond mine. Going forward, I’ll follow you without question. I just hope you can help me get rid of that pesky Proud Heaven!”

“Not a problem at all. Begin!”

As the King of Godmammoths pushed the King of the Great Dao to the limits of power, tapping into the depths of the multiverse, Yang Voidprime was screaming in the middle of the formation. As he did, he began melting into a clump of vital energy that resembled primal-chaos. Then, the King of the Great Dao exercised control over the vital energy, causing it to swirl into the form of a single character: fate.

However, the “fate” character was incomplete. After all, the other half was with Yang Qi.

Of course, it was pure fateless energy.

Yang Voidprime howled in defiance, but fighting back didn’t do him any good. The “fate” character then erupted with a gravitational force that stabbed out into the void to look for its other half.

“Hmm?”

Yang Qi suddenly sensed the power within him stirring. Despite his connection to his empire and its destiny, in the blink of an eye, he felt like he was about to fly away, as if something was pulling at him.

There was no question that it would be very harmful.

‘Someone’s trying to summon the fateless power out from within me?’ A cold smile broke out on his face.

Ever since he had reached the half-Annulled level, he had been able to directly sense the fateless power within him. It was changing, becoming more closely fused with him, yet at the same time, he didn’t understand its profundities.

But now that the other half of the fateless power was reaching out to him, he had no choice but to act.

“Be crushed!” he said, drawing deeply on his will.

Chapter 1584: Yang Qi Makes a Move (2)

The power behind the summoning was immense, but Yang Qi’s cultivation base was in the half-Annulled level. And he was no ordinary half-Annulled expert, either. He had devoured the brain of the Wretch God, pushing his psychic scale very close to the level of a trillion. He was the top figure in the god world, such that not even the King of Godmammoths could deal with him.

He had gained enlightenment of the most profound mysteries, and was also blessed by the destiny of an empire. There was literally no one who could best him. With a mere thought, he stabilized himself and made it impossible for the fateless energy to be extracted from him.

Not only that, he tracked the summoning to its source.

His divination gave him a view of the spell formation in the depths of the Demonfolk Empire, with Yang Voidprime howling in the middle of it, completely at the mercy of the King of Godmammoths, Demon Master, and High Priestess.

Yang Qi instantly realized what was going on.

‘I can’t let them realize that I'm in the half-Annulled level.’ With another thought, he caused a shadowy duplicate of himself to step out. It was touched by the empire’s destiny, as well as the aura of a Fateless One. However, the projection was being held firmly in place by the destiny of the empire.

Yang Qi wouldn’t gain any benefit by allowing his opponents to know he was in the half-Annulled level. And the longer he held out before revealing it, the more destiny the Sage Monarch Empire would accumulate.

The King of Godmammoths, High Priestess, and Demon Master could sense what was happening.

“So, Yang Qi is fighting back,” said the High Priestess. “And it seems that he’s getting close to gaining enlightenment of the half-Annulled level. But he hasn’t succeeded yet. If he thinks he can rely on the destiny of his empire to keep him safe, he’s delusional. If he didn't have that destiny, he’d be dead already.”

“The Sage Monarch Empire is strong,” said the Demon Master. “Just about everyone is a sage or mahātmā. The citizens aren’t selfish, and they practice cultivation for the sake of their empire. The stronger the empire is, the stronger the people are. There’s a cycle of karma there. The empire is the source of faith, and those who show faith in the empire benefit greatly. This is definitely the most superior type of government there is. From ancient times until now in the god world, no one has ever done anything like this. Although the kings of order we created are just as good as his sage monarch magistrates, we Demonfolk are just too weak to perfectly compare to these humans. But given enough time, our Demonfolk is going to grow stronger and stronger.”

The King of Godmammoths chuckled coldly. “I refuse to believe that Yang Qi’s empire can surpass ours in strength. And if he thinks he can prevent us from taking his fateless energy, he’s crazy.”

The King of Godmammoths was drawing fully on the King of the Great Dao, causing Yang Voidprime’s pain to increase tenfold. He now existed in a hellish agony in which he wished he could simply die.

The King of Godmammoths had resided in hell for countless years, and knew all about pain. And his command of the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth was obviously superior to Yang Qi’s. Thus, it was easy for him to ensure that Yang Voidprime felt immeasurable pain.

“Relish the pain, Yang Voidprime! Lose yourself and your will. Become my puppet! There’s no reason to struggle.” The King of Godmammoths’ voice pounded at Yang Voidprime with terrifying viciousness.

Despite being a half-Annulled expert, Yang Voidprime was already on the verge of collapse.

But then, a stream of will surreptitiously entered him and began speaking into his sea of consciousness.

“Yang Voidprime, it's me, Yang Qi. I can see that you’re about to die. Do you have any last wishes?” Because they were both Fateless Ones, it was possible for Yang Qi to communicate with Yang Voidprime in a way that the King of Godmammoths, Demon Master, and High Priestess would never be able to detect.

“Yang Qi? You... you aren’t being affected by this at all?” To be contacted by Yang Qi was like a wakeup call to Yang Voidprime, and it caused his will to solidify. “You’re so vicious! Fine. I want you to kill the High Priestess, the King of Godmammoths, and the Demon Master! Although, you’re going to have trouble resisting their power.”

“You’re right, Yang Voidprime. It's not going to be easy. But I’m in a better position than you. I have the backing of the destiny of an empire. They won’t be able to deal with me. That said... you’re in a really tragic situation. The way things are going, you’re going to die, and there's nothing you can do about it.” Yang Qi sent some of his psychic power into Yang Voidprime to ease his pain a bit. “I can save you, Yang Voidprime. You're a half-Annulled expert, which means your cultivation base surpasses mine. But with the destiny backing me, I'm actually much stronger than you. So what do you think? Want my help?”

“Help me? How?”

“It’s simple. I’ll keep pouring power into you, using my powerful destiny to make sure the King of Godmammoths doesn’t have any idea what's happening. Then you use a self-destruction technique to blow yourself up. I’ll take the fateless energy and add it to myself, and while you’ll die there, I’ll resurrect you in my empire. What do you think?”

Yang Voidprime burst out laughing. “Nice plan, Yang Qi. You want me to kill myself to damage the spell formation so you can take my fateless power? You’ll become a true Fateless One, and I’ll be dead. What kind of fool do you take me for?”

“You’re thinking about it wrong, Yang Voidprime. I will resurrect you. Perhaps I'm not a half-Annulled expert, but I know many secrets of the half-Annulled level. A lot of experts from the ancient era died, but have been resurrected. All you have to do is give me your soul essence, and I can make a new body for you. You’ll be born again in my empire.”

“Are you serious about this?” Yang Voidprime said, starting to wonder if he should agree. For one thing, the King of Godmammoths was unleashing the most horrific pain on him, and even just the ability to stop that pain would probably be worth it for him.

“Yes, I'm serious,” Yang Qi said. “I want to help you. Think about it, Yang Voidprime. They’re using you to try to get at me. But I can free you. As a half-Annulled expert, you could be very useful to me in my empire. If we work together, we’ll be unstoppable. We're both Fateless Ones, so it only makes sense for us to join forces. By the way, I’ll tell you another secret: your girl Hailan shacked up with Proud Heaven. She's the empress of the Deathless Heaven Dynasty now. Did you know that? The moment you left, Proud Heaven turned you into a cuckold. It's all part of his plan to destroy the High Priestess and seize ultimate control. So even if you somehow got out of this situation and went back to the Deathless Heaven Dynasty, you'd still be dead.”

“What?!” Yang Voidprime exclaimed in shock. “How dare he! I refuse to believe this!”

“Fool. Just peer into my mind to see what’s happening back in the Deathless Heaven Dynasty! Psychic Link; Fateless Connection!”

All of a sudden, Yang Voidprime was given a view of the situation in the Deathless Heaven Dynasty. He saw Hailan as the empress, and could see Proud Heaven’s power and influence growing.

“Damnation! You animal, Proud Heaven! I won’t let you get away with this. I’ll kill you! I’ll slaughter you!” Yang Voidprime was so enraged he wanted to rip Proud Heaven to shreds right then and there.

“The only option for you is to work with me. So do the self-detonation. You’ll be reborn in my empire, exactly the same as before, except with a new body. And you’ll still be a half-Annulled expert. Together, we can be unparalleled under heaven!”

Deep in his heart, Yang Voidprime was thinking, ‘You’re going to copy my will and mind and put me into a new body. That just means you’ll have access to all my experiences getting to the half-Annulled level. You just want to use me to achieve another breakthrough.

‘Well, don’t blame me for taking advantage of this situation. I’ve gained a lot of enlightenment thanks to what the High Priestess and the others have done. And I already know a lot more about fateless power than you. When I self-detonate, my fateless power will enter you and become one. And in that moment, I’ll be able to possess your physical husk. Then I’ll wipe you out and become the only true Fateless One!”

Chapter 1585: Hoodwinking Yang Voidprime

Yang Qi knew full well that Yang Voidprime was a vicious schemer, and that as a half-Annulled expert, he would take the first opportunity to try to possess Yang Qi. Sadly, Yang Voidprime was the one being played. He had no idea that Yang Qi was already a half-Annulled expert, and was in fact the number one person in the god world.

Not even the King of Godmammoths knew how strong Yang Qi really was. After all, none of them could see inside the Everlasting Aegis to assess the Sage Monarch Empire.

Plus, Yang Qi was a Fateless One, which made it impossible to divine information about him. And the fact that he had completely locked down his empire ensured that no rumors could spread.

It would only be when Yang Voidprime actually tried to possess Yang Qi that he would realize how horribly wrong he’d been about everything, and that he had thrown himself from the tiger's den into the wolf pack’s lair.

In other words, he was being hoodwinked by Yang Qi.

The truth was that even if Yang Qi hadn’t suggested it, Yang Voidprime would have attempted a self-detonation. Unfortunately, the King of Godmammoths was using his terrifying King of the Great Dao to completely suppress Yang Voidprime, which meant he couldn’t self-detonate even if he wanted to.

Therefore, it would require Yang Qi’s help. Yang Qi planned to use their fateless power connection to slowly give energy to Yang Voidprime, until he had enough to break free from the restrictions and go through with the self-detonation.

The detonation of a half-Annulled expert would release the most destructive power imaginable into the surrounding heaven and earth.

“Be summoned!” the King of Godmammoths howled. “King of the Great Dao; Reverse Reincarnation; Shatter Heaven and Earth; Let Ghosts and Gods appear!”

Immense flows of energy shot out of the King of Godmammoths, who was using a deadly technique called Boundless Shattering.

Yang Qi instantly felt more power flowing away from him. And the fateless energy within him seemed like it might fly out, which would weaken him dramatically, maybe even removing him from the half-Annulled level.

“Do you really think it’ll be that easy?” he growled. Tapping into the destiny of his empire, he sent more streams of power into Yang Voidprime.

“Yang Voidprime, use the power I'm giving you to collect your memories and thoughts. Give them to me so that I can resurrect you in my empire!”

“Alright!” Yang Voidprime said. But in his heart, he was chuckling in sinister fashion. ‘You’re only a peak Paramount God, Yang Qi. A God-Lord. Even if your psychic scale was higher than it is, you couldn’t possibly understand the profundities of the half-Annulled level. You really think you can control me? I'm going to destroy you! I'm going to come out of nowhere to possess you, and there won’t be anything you can do to stop me!’

Thanks to the help from Yang Qi, he actually felt much better, and wasn’t really being harmed at all by the King of Godmammoths.

Furthermore, reserves of power were building up inside of him, although no observer could tell.

As he continued producing false screams of pain, he sent his thoughts and experiences to Yang Qi’s empire via psychic fluctuation. Eventually, he caught sight of the body that Yang Qi had prepared for him, which looked like an exact copy of his real body.

“So, you weren’t lying, Yang Qi!” Yang Voidprime said. “Siding with you was the right decision. We can wage war together, and I’ll draw fully on the power of the half-Annulled level to help you!”

Of course, inwardly, he was actually thinking, ‘You really don’t get how powerful the half-Annulled level is. You think that you can just create a clone and put my will into it? Unfortunately, without the fateless energy to go along with it, I won’t stay in the half-Annulled level. And there’s absolutely no way I’ll agree to that. Instead, I’ll use that clone to strike Yang Qi when he least expects it!’

Meanwhile, Yang Qi was also chuckling coldly. He had used a whole collection of preheaven treasures to make a new body for Yang Voidprime, who assumed that he didn’t understand the half-Annulled level. But the truth was that Yang Qi had prepared all of this in advance, and was in fact so powerful that, if he wanted to, he could actually damage the spell formation the King of Godmammoths was using.

But thanks to the Life-Death Void-Destruction God-Lightning, Yang Voidprime had no idea what was really going on, or that Yang Qi was already a half-Annulled expert.

Yang Qi twitched, creating a duplicate of himself.  He had no idea how long the process would take. Maybe months, maybe years. In any case, he had other things he needed to do in the meantime.

He left the clone in his place, with some fateless energy in it to keep the King of Godmammoths occupied. With the backing of his empire’s destiny, the Halls of Heaven, and the sage monarch magistrates, it would be able to hold out.

“Master!” he said, and the Invincible Dugu appeared.

“Can you watch over this clone of mine? I need to take a trip to the Deathless Heaven Dynasty to subjugate the empress there, Hailan. She wants to reach the half-Annulled level, but doesn't quite have what it takes. I'm going to take advantage of the situation to see if I can work out a deal with her.”

“No problem,” the Invincible Dugu said. He was now fully recovered, which placed him in a position of being no weaker than the King of Godmammoths. “I’ll take care of everything here for you.”

Yang Qi nodded. “You certainly live up to your reputation, Master. I definitely can’t measure up to you.”

“Don’t be so modest, Yang Qi,” the Invincible Dugu said, laughing. “I'd say that, even considering all of history as a whole, you’re the top figure to ever have existed in the god world. Not even the Sovereign Lord can measure up to you. Even back in the impure lands, I could tell there was something special about you, which is why I selected you to rescue me. Alright, be on your way. Subjugate that Hailan woman. She seems to be an expert in causing trouble. Besides, the essence of the god world seems to be nearing the point of succeeding in taking human form. Once that happens, it’ll crush anything and everything that gets in its way.”

“What? The essence of the god world can take human form?” Yang Qi frowned.

“That's right. And I can sense that it's about to succeed. The form it takes will be that of your mother. As I said before, the essence of the god world is your mother, and your mother is the essence of the god world. You’re going to be in a very difficult position soon. That’s why you need to take over the entire god world before it succeeds. Once you ensure that it has no formal representative, you can assimilate the god world. Take the Great Necropolis back from Proud Heaven, and use it to bury the god world!”

“Alright! I'm leaving.”

With that, he blurred into motion, leaving his empire.

Before long, he had pierced through multiple universes to reach the spot where the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart was fusing with the Deathless Heaven Dynasty.

Proud Heaven’s empire.

Looking at it all, Yang Qi smiled. ‘Ah, Proud Heaven. You’re very impressive. You’re actually fusing the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart with your empire’s destiny. Your cultivation base is rising, and now that you’re a half-Annulled expert, not even I could sneak into your empire under normal circumstances. Sadly, you devoured King Immortal-Slayer, who isn't actually dead. He just entered another state that you can’t detect. And King Immortal-Slayer also has some of my energy, which I can use to sneak into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart without you realizing it. That's what you get for devouring King Immortal-Slayer!”

King Immortal-Slayer was a profound schemer. It was no wonder that he had been ambitious enough to contend with the Sovereign Lord in ancient times. In fact, it was entirely likely that he had realized the best way to deal with Proud Heaven was to let himself be devoured by him.

Truth be told, it wasn’t that King Immortal-Slayer couldn’t deal with Proud Heaven. It was the essence of the god world that was truly troublesome to him. And in the moment before he ‘perished’, he set everything up so that Yang Qi could sneak into the Deathless Heaven Empire.

‘You underestimated King Immortal-Slayer, Proud Heaven,’ Yang Qi thought. ‘Of course, I did something similar with the Wretch God. The difference is that I didn’t underestimate the Wretch God.’

WHOOSH!

With that, he flew into the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

All of a sudden, a thought occurred to him. What if the Sovereign Lord had left a secret way to return to the Halls of Heaven? And what if the Sovereign Lord used that method to try getting into Yang Qi’s empire? Thankfully, he had already made preparations to ensure that no such attempt would succeed.

Chapter 1586: Viciously Crushing Hailan

King Immortal-Slayer had left a back door open, allowing Yang Qi to sneak right into the Deathless Heaven Empire without anyone being the wiser.

The truth was that if Proud Heaven hadn’t integrated the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart into his empire’s destiny, it would have been much more difficult for Yang Qi to sneak inside. His immense aura definitely would have provoked a reaction, one that Proud Heaven would almost certainly notice. But now, despite the fact that he had defenses that not even half-Annulled experts could easily bypass, he had created a huge weakness for himself that not even he was aware of.

After all, it had all been done by King Immortal-Slayer, who was even beyond the level of the King of Godmammoths. The King of Godmammoths had never been able to free himself from the fetters put in place by the Sovereign Lord, whereas King Immortal-Slayer had directly contended with him.

After sneaking inside, Yang Qi didn’t dare do anything other than observe the workings of the destiny around him.

The population of the empire was immense, and political affairs seemed to be in order. Of course, the reason for that wasn’t because Proud Heaven had suddenly become skilled in governing, but rather because he had dispersed all of the interest groups, which inherently made the empire stronger.

It also had to do with the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart.

There was more than one reason why Proud Heaven had integrated it into his destiny. The first was to provide stronger defenses, keeping out half-Annulled enemies and the destruction they could bring with them.

The second reason was to improve the political climate of the empire. Because the chart was his, he could control everything inside it by mere thought alone. In other words, having it integrated into his empire meant he would be able to constantly monitor everything. He would always be directly tied into the most fundamental circumstances of his empire.

If rancorous energy developed, he would know about, and able to deal with it.

For instance, if the government officials in some location used their power to tyrannize the people, the rancorous energy would come to Proud Heaven’s attention, and he could pacify that area.

This could be considered an effective way to run a nation.

In fact, in certain ancient civilizations, they had a name for this technique: the Son of Heaven’s Horoscopy.

With it, the Son of Heaven could stand in the imperial palace and gaze out over his lands, looking for any rancorous energy that resulted from deficient government officials.

However, there was a weakness with this type of government. It turned the emperor into an emergency response unit, going around putting out fires as they popped up. Yang Qi didn’t need to use such an inefficient system, as he had his sage monarch magistrates. Furthermore, all of his citizens were sages and mahātmās, which meant that his empire was completely unified. Because of that, rancorous energy could never even develop there.

From what he could see around him now, he knew that Proud Heaven’s empire would only flourish for a few tens of thousands of years. Eventually, Proud Heaven would tire of managing things so directly, and the empire would get so big that he wouldn’t be able to keep up even if he wanted to.

Yang Qi’s method was much better. He had created a virtuous cycle in which the larger his empire got, the more sage monarch magistrates he could create. The increases in destiny kept up with his governing ability.

As time went on, his empire would eventually surpass Proud Heaven’s Deathless Heaven Empire. Not even the essence of the god world could help Proud Heaven stop that.

Yang Qi could see the influence of the god world in the empire around him. It was producing all sorts of preheaven resources, which were being used to advance the interests of the empire.

It was obvious that after a few tens of thousands of years passed, Proud Heaven would bring the fight to Yang Qi. The situation was delicate now. If the balance was disturbed, it would definitely lead to full-scale war.

‘Where’s Hailan? She can’t be with Proud Heaven. Now that he got what he wants, he’s probably focusing on his own cultivation. And Hailan is going to be off somewhere causing trouble of her own.’ Yang Qi began prowling through the empire, observing his surroundings and assessing the energy.

Before long, he sensed two immense sources of energy. One was mighty, like a pillar that could prop up heaven and dominate everything in creation. The other was softer, but at the same time more sinister, the type that one would expect to belong to a second in command.

Obviously, the former was Proud Heaven, and the latter was Hailan.

Proud Heaven was in the depths of his empire, working on his cultivation in unison with the essence of the god world.

As for Hailan, she was also in cultivation, trying to get into the half-Annulled level.

‘Be revealed.’ Yang Qi’s will caused a shadowy projection to appear, depicting Hailan in her palace, a vicious expression on her face as she gathered energy to herself. As her will trembled, she murmured, “I'm going to make you pay, Proud Heaven!”

Yang Qi waved his hand, tapping into the imperceptible energy that King Immortal-Slayer had left behind, causing it to cover the palace and ensure that Proud Heaven’s will wouldn’t detect what was going on inside. He would simply assume that Hailan was working on her cultivation.

She took a deep breath, causing countless streams of energy to enter her, along with numerous preheaven medicinal ingredients.

Resources were the key to everything.

She wasn’t like Yang Voidprime, who had so many advantages. And if stepping into the half-Annulled level was such a simple task, wouldn’t the world be filled with half-Annulled experts? Even Yang Qi had only accomplished it by devouring the Wretch God.

‘Why?’ she thought. ‘Why am I unable to reach the half-Annulled level? I'm already the empress of the Deathless Heaven Empire, which is the top empire in existence. I can tap into destiny that no one else can. Shouldn’t that be enough to fuel a breakthrough? Don’t tell me I’ll have to take over as the ultimate leader of the Deathless Heaven Empire.’

No matter how Hailan shifted the flows of power within her, she couldn’t break through, and was starting to get angry. Her eyes glittered like those of a fox or wolf, making it seem like she was filled with sinister plots and killing intent.

‘Maybe I need to find some help in dealing with Proud Heaven.’

But where exactly would she get such help?

Her eyes flashed as she considered what vicious plans could be hatched.

‘Maybe if I devour Yang Qi, I could achieve the breakthrough.’

Even as Hailan was lost in thought, a voice suddenly rang out. “What atrocities are you considering committing, Hailan? You really want to take down Proud Heaven, don’t you?”

Shocked, she rose to her feet and looked around her meditation chamber, only to find it completely empty. No one was inside with her.

“Who’s there?” she hissed.

“Keep your voice down,” the voice said. “Otherwise you might attract attention. You want to deal with Proud Heaven, right? Then why not work with me?” All of a sudden, a shadowy figure appeared in front of her, which resolved into Yang Qi.

Hailan’s expression immediately turned extremely sharp. “So, it’s you, Yang Qi. How did you get in here? Proud Heaven connected his empire’s destiny with the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, yet you still managed to get inside. Not even half-Annulled experts should be able to do that.”

“Why don’t you take a guess how I got here?” Yang Qi said with a smile. “By the way, don’t get any ideas. I wouldn’t have come if I wasn’t certain you couldn't do anything to me. And if you try, you’ll lose your shot at dealing with Proud Heaven. Look, I just want to talk, that’s all.” From the glitter in her eyes, he could tell that she really wanted to lunge forward and devour him.

“I know what’s going on,” she said, a cold, calculating smile appearing on her face. “You got in because of the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, didn’t you? Proud Heaven devoured King Immortal-Slayer, but the latter isn’t actually gone. And you have a clone, Yang Immortal-Slayer, who’s actually the apprentice of King Immortal-Slayer. You were given something that lets you slip right past the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart. Am I right?”

“I'm very impressed,” Yang Qi said. And he really had to admire Hailan’s way of thinking. Of course, it only made him want to subjugate her even more, and turn her into a useful servant. “You live up to your reputation as a profound schemer. Back in the impure lands, your will projection caused me some serious grief, and your true self seems to be even more impressive. You hit the nail on the head. Well, since you know the truth, are you going to go report it to Proud Heaven?”

“That depends on you,” she said, her smile widening. “You’re Proud Heaven’s archenemy, Yang Qi. And now I'm his empress. You tell me. Should I help you?”

Yang Qi laughed. “Honest people do not resort to insinuation, Hailan. I came here to offer you help in dealing with Proud Heaven. You hate him down to your guts, and I feel the same. So why shouldn't we work together? By the way, I already told Yang Voidprime about how Proud Heaven humiliated you.”

“What? Yang Voidprime knows?” Hailan was clearly shocked, but she recovered her composure quickly. “I should turn that moron into a puppet. I can't believe he went with the High Priestess to go talk to the King of Godmammoths and the Demon Master. He’s like a lamb in the tiger’s den. How could things possibly turn out well for him?”

Hailan was making a lot of good guesses, but that didn’t mean she would ever guess Yang Qi was already in the half-Annulled level.

“You don’t seem surprised at all. I suppose you anticipated this.” Yang Qi waved his hand dismissively. “Let's get to the point here. Are we going to work together? I need an agent next to Proud Heaven, and if you agree to join me, I can help you reach the half-Annulled level.”

“What?!” Hailan couldn’t help but be moved. However, she chuckled coldly. “That sounds completely and utterly preposterous. You’re not even in the half-Annulled level, so how could you possibly help me break through? Have you gone insane? Or am I the crazy one for even taking you seriously?”

Chapter 1587: Viciously Crushing Hailan (2)

Yang Qi could sense that Hailan still wanted to do something to him. However, she didn’t touch the destiny of the empire to notify Proud Heaven of his presence.

Considering that she was the empress, she could do that very easily if she wanted to.

If Proud Heaven was alerted to his presence, he would need to flee immediately. And if Proud Heaven found out about the ‘back door’ in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, he would definitely do everything possible to close it up. In fact, he might even uncover the truth about King Immortal-Slayer. Because of that, Yang Qi had to be very careful in how he dealt with Hailan.

As such, he resorted to trickery.

“Well, Yang Qi? Did I get it all right?” Hailan chuckled coldly. “Don’t fool yourself. I know how wily and mischievous you are, and that you love fooling people. But you’re crazy if you think that’ll work on me.”

“I'm not fooling you. If I help you reach the half-Annulled level, then the two of us can accomplish a lot together. Yang Voidprime has already joined me. You see, he was tricked, and fell into a trap in which they tried to extract his fateless power. However, I helped him, so now he's on my side. If he dies, his fateless power will instantly be transferred to me, and I’ll become a true Fateless One.”

“Oh, so that’s your plan,” Hailan said, looking surprised. “Although, that doesn’t have anything to do with me.”

Yang Qi sighed. “How can you say that? Yang Voidprime is still your man. Are you really willing to just watch him die?”

“If he dies, he dies. So what? And Proud Heaven’s going to die as well.”

“You really don’t care if Yang Voidprime dies?” Yang Qi shook his head.

“What does his death have to do with me?” she replied. “I'm under Proud Heaven’s control right now. And you're trying to con me as well. You’ve talked a lot here, but you still haven’t explained how you're going to help me reach the half-Annulled level. And if it involves me somehow trying to get Yang Voidprime’s fateless energy for you, forget about it.”

“My plan has nothing to do with fateless energy. Besides, that fateless energy wouldn't do any good for you. No, my plan involves something else entirely. That said, it’ll take some work on your part as well.” Yang Qi waved his hand, and a golden stream of light emerged, taking the form of an imp, pulsing with a most terrifying aura. “What if I gave you this?”

“What’s that?” Hailan's eyes suddenly went wide. “That's the God Legion Seal. That's what fueled your growth, helping you rise from the impure lands to the immortal worlds, then from there to the god world. That’s how you founded your kingdom, and without it, you wouldn't be where you are right now. And you're just going to give it to me? You’re obviously trying to pull some kind of trick.”

“It’s not a trick. At least not completely. The Sovereign Lord left this thing behind, and I'm convinced that he’s still alive, out there hiding somewhere, watching the god world and waiting for the right moment to return. And because the God Legion Seal is his, he’ll definitely use it to track me down. Why do you think I've held back from reaching the half-Annulled level? Did you really think it's because I'm unable to? It's because I’ve forsaken the God Legion Seal. I don’t want it in me, because it’ll make it possible for the Sovereign Lord to possess me. However, I don’t mind giving it to you. You can assimilate it and push your cultivation base to the most boundless heights. What do you say? You can look at it if you want to.”

He tossed it toward her, and the golden imp became a streak of light that landed right on her palm.

Hailan drew on some of her daoist techniques, causing an immense wave of power to wash over the God Legion Seal.

“As the empress, I command the will of the empire to cleanse this thing!” Instantly, the destiny of the empire converged on the God Legion Seal, causing it to shine with dazzling light. Immediately, Hailan could sense the grandeur of the legion of gods, and the immense might of the Sovereign Lord.

A few hours passed, but nothing else happened.

Hailan hadn’t yet assimilated it. “Are you really giving me the God Legion Seal, Yang Qi? It’s not trapped or anything?”

“Like I said, the God Legion Seal is amazing, and it helped me a lot, but in the end, it still puts me in danger because of the Sovereign Lord. And it will be dangerous for you as well. If you assimilate it, you have a one hundred percent chance of reaching the half-Annulled level. However, later on down the line, the Sovereign Lord will come for you. So you have to be very careful. And now I’ll tell you something else: although Proud Heaven devoured King Immortal-Slayer, he didn’t get rid of him completely. And that was a big mistake. One day, when the essence of the god world isn’t there to watch over Proud Heaven, King Immortal-Slayer is going to make a comeback.”

Yang Qi was telling the truth. However, it was bait, or more precisely, a trap. Yang Qi had long since abandoned the God Legion Seal, choosing to become stronger on his own merits instead. And he was just waiting to see if Hailan would actually devour the seal.

“Based on all that, it seems you really are telling the truth,” she said.

“Given how intelligent you are, I don't think you’re the kind of person who would fall for tricks. What do you think? Take the poison, or not? It’s up to you. Either way, I don’t want it anymore. I don’t want the karma. You can give it to someone else, or even just throw it away. I don’t care. From now on, I don’t want to have anything to do with the Sovereign Lord.”

“Oh? Don’t worry, I won’t be giving this to anyone else.” She laughed. “I can accept karma like this, if that's what it takes to reach the half-Annulled level. If Proud Heaven can devour King Immortal-Slayer, then I can devour the Sovereign Lord, assuming he comes for me. By the way, what about the Halls of Heaven? Why not give them to me as well?”

“I already gave them to someone else,” Yang Qi replied coldly. Hailan was obviously fishing for information, but he wasn’t going to give it to her. “As for who it is, you’ll have to find out on your own.”

She chuckled coldly. “You think I don’t know who it is? It’s obviously the Invincible Dugu.”

“Good guess,” Yang Qi replied. “You’re right, I gave them to the Invincible Dugu. The Invincible Dynasty is now linked with my Sage Monarch Empire. I'm giving them the resources they need to solidify their empire and grow their destiny.”

“I guessed that some time ago,” she said with a sneer. “Seems to me you’re getting nervous. You can’t reach the half-Annulled level, so you’re working with the Invincible Dugu. Sadly, that’s asking a tiger for its skin. Maybe he was your Master in the impure lands, but personal relationships like that don’t matter when you reach our level. You’re plotting against him, aren’t you? To him, the Halls of Heaven are poison, and even though he knows it, he can't help himself. Well played, Yang Qi. You’re in such danger that you’re grasping at whatever straws lay about. You’re even going so far as to get rid of the Halls of Heaven and the God Legion Seal. What about the Mahātmā Jade? Are you getting rid of that as well? Are you really going to rely solely on yourself to achieve your breakthroughs?”

“I am. Once I free myself from everything else, I’ll be strong on my own merits. And that means you have a chance to take the God Legion Seal. Are you going to assimilate it or not?”

“I am. Unlike you, I don’t feel the need to give up on everything. And did you really think I'm scared of the Sovereign Lord? He’s half-Annulled, but not truly half-Annulled. And I have a chance to reach the true half-Annulled level.”

“And what about the two of us working together against Proud Heaven, with the God Legion Seal being my down payment.”

“Down payment? All you’re doing is giving me a catastrophe in the waiting. In any case, yes, I’ll work with you. But first, I need to be in the half-Annulled level. There’s no time to waste.”

“Alright, I’ll help you,” Yang Qi said.

“No thanks. I'm not going to fall for your tricks. I’ll assimilate the God Legion Seal on my own, without any ‘help’ from you. Watch.”

She waved her hand, and a stream of vital energy flew out. “Out-of-Body Incarnation: Soul of the Ancestor God!”

All of a sudden, a mighty figure appeared behind her, which reached out and grabbed the God Legion Seal, instantly causing it to melt.

“The legendary Soul of the Ancestor God?!” he said, shocked.

“That’s right. The Soul of the Ancestor God is the actual soul of the ancestor of all gods, which existed before the god world came to be. The ancestor of all gods isn’t a person, but rather a conglomeration of vital energy. Although it didn’t exist at the ultimate beginning, after encountering certain almighty entities, that vital energy turned into a god. And this is the Soul of the Ancestor God!” Hailan threw her head back and laughed. “I bet you never guessed this would happen, did you, Yang Qi?”

Chapter 1588: Viciously Crushing Hailan (3)

Hailan had revealed the Soul of the Ancestor God.

It wasn’t a person, but a conglomeration of preheaven vital energy that had been born out of primal-chaos big bang explosions before the existence of the god world. According to the stories, it was the foundation of the gods, and contained the ultimate expression of godliness.

The original ancient primal-chaos hadn’t contained any gods. However, the weak entities that had existed within it, upon making contact with the Soul of the Ancestor God, could instantly become gods.

However, after enough time went by, and a certain number of gods were created, the Soul of the Ancestor God disappeared. Who could have ever guessed that Hailan would track down what remained of it? It was something that could make the weakest of people into Lesser Gods.

That made it like the key to the civilization of the gods, and incredibly important on a symbolic level.

Furthermore, it could have a catalyzing effect on the God Legion Seal. The seal contained the combined wisdom of the legion of gods, placed there by the Sovereign Lord. It was the quintessence of the civilization of the gods.

And the Soul of the Ancestor God had allowed the legion of gods to come into existence. So if the God Legion Seal touched it, it would release such an incredible force that the God Legion Seal would become completely different from before.

“I bet you never dreamed this would happen,” Hailan sneered. “I've been plotting for a long time to get your God Legion Seal. In fact, I even sent that stream of will down into the impure lands to get it. Apparently, some trouble cropped up, as the will projection foolishly sided against you, and ended up getting killed. Well, she deserved it.”

“You... y-y-you...” Yang Qi stammered.

“I’ve been plotting all of this for a very long time. Of course, it all came down to the High Priestess recovering the Soul of the Ancestor God. It disappeared for a long time, and no one thought it would ever be found again. In fact, the Sovereign Lord actually created the God Legion Seal in the hopes of finding it. But sadly for him, it was the High Priestess who succeeded. And that's how she broke free from the bounds of the God Legion Seal. Now, I can use the Soul of the Ancestor God to push the God Legion Seal to a higher state than before, a state in which the Sovereign Lord won’t be able to find it. You see, that’s how I, Hailan, do things.

“There’s no way you could’ve known any of this, Yang Qi. Otherwise, you wouldn’t have just freely handed the God Legion Seal to me. Instead, you would’ve struck quickly to subjugate or assimilate me. Sadly for you, I'm not so easily fooled. Starting to regret your choices yet? You see, the Sovereign Lord isn’t going to do a thing to me. The High Priestess predicted a long time ago that you’d come for me, and she helped me set all of this up. Of course, not even the High Priestess could’ve guessed that, instead of having to track you down, you would walk right into my arms.”

“No!” Yang Qi said, staggering backward.

“Tremble in fear as I break through, Yang Qi!”

RUMBLE!

She exhaled a stream of energy that locked down the entire area. “You can’t run away now, Yang Qi. I bet you thought you were going to subjugate me here, but in the end, the reverse is happening. And now, I’ll use the Soul of the Ancestor God on the God Legion Seal!”

Even as the words left her mouth, she produced a talisman and shoved it onto the God Legion Seal.

However, when she did, something unimaginable happened. The God Legion Seal transformed into a magical symbol.

“W-what... what’s going on?” Hailan said, her eyes widening in shock as the magical symbol entered her body and sealed her. At the same time, the Soul of the Ancestor God popped out of her, completely unaffected.

“Did you really think I’d just give you the God Legion Seal, Hailan?” he said, shaking his head. “You made a huge mistake just now. You see, I'm still connected to the seal. In fact, it’s more appropriate to say that I am the God Legion Seal, and the God Legion Seal is me.”

“But what about the God Legion Seal you gave me?” she cried, struggling in vain to free herself. “It was real. I could tell! There’s no way it was a trick!”

“That was a duplicate I created. By the way, I'm already in the half-Annulled level.” All of a sudden, he revealed his half-Annulled energy. “I was playing you this entire time. You see, I’ve made many copies of the God Legion Seal, and given them out for my people to use. Although the copies aren’t even close to being as powerful as the original, they still provide immense benefits. And I just used one of them to seal you. I had to do it this way to make sure the process didn't alert Proud Heaven. After all, if you got the empire’s destiny involved, it would have alerted him. Now, prepare to be crushed.

“You started out with Yang Voidprime, and then became Proud Heaven’s. But in the end, you’re going to be mine. I guess it was just foreordained. Now, give me the Soul of the Ancestor God.”

“Stay away from me, Yang Qi! Stay away!”

To her terror, Hailan realized that she was the one who had been fooled.

She was actually dealing with a half-Annulled expert, someone vastly beyond her ability to handle. And he had complete control of the God Legion Seal. It was like a nightmare.

“Come! Soul of the Ancestor God!” Yang Qi made a grasping motion, and the Soul of the Ancestor God flew over into his hand.

“Be sealed!” He instantly sealed it and threw it into the God Legion Seal. He wasn't going to take the thing lightly, and would definitely study it later when he had the time.

As usual, he would make detailed plans before taking any action.

Upon seeing Yang Qi simply take the Soul of the Ancestor God, Hailan crumbled into despair. She had hoped that if he took it, he would try to assimilate it immediately, and some sort of dramatic things would occur, allowing her to escape. Sadly for her, Yang Qi wasn’t the type to give in to temptations like that.

“Don’t subjugate me, Yang Qi,” she said. “Don’t use the God Legion Seal on me! I don’t want to become like the walking dead. How about I become your woman instead? I’ll do anything you want me to, I swear!”  She forced a smile onto her face. “I know that you always regretted losing me in the impure lands. But now you can have me all for your own!”

Yang Qi burst out laughing. Looking at Hailan as if she were a complete moron, he said, “Have you for my own? You’re nothing but a pawn for me to use as I see fit. And you think I want you as ‘my woman’? Are you crazy?”

“What?! You don’t want me?” Hailan seemed stunned.

Scoffing, Yang Qi said, “Enough chit-chat. Get ready to be subjugated. Me using the God Legion Seal on you won’t turn you into the walking dead. But I will be able to monitor your thoughts.”

He reached out and clamped his fingers onto her head, then unleashed the power of the God Legion Seal into her.

Crick. Crack.

All of a sudden, Hailan’s power levels skyrocketed. But at the same time, her thinking came under Yang Qi’s control. After becoming a half-Annulled expert, his understanding of the God Legion Seal had reached even higher levels. As such, there was no way Hailan could do anything to resist him.

Dropping to her knees, she said, “I kowtow in salute, Milord.”

It wasn’t that she wanted to do that. Rather, her thoughts were telling her that she needed to. It nearly made her vomit blood. In her mind, she was telling herself that she wouldn’t let Yang Qi get away with this, but he instantly detected those thoughts and destroyed them.

“Alright, enough, Hailan. Stop cursing me in your heart. I'm going to find a way to help you reach the half-Annulled level. But let me tell you this: the process isn’t going to be easy. Maybe seeking enlightenment of the Soul of the Ancestor God will do the trick. Only time will tell. For now, you stay here as my agent. Be ready to follow any instruction I give regarding how to deal with Proud Heaven.”

WHOOSH!

With that, he turned and vanished, leaving her sitting there alone. ‘Why did this have to happen? How is Yang Qi so strong? I planned everything out perfectly. But I ended up seeming as foolish as a child. There’s no way Proud Heaven can match up to him. He's already a half-Annulled expert? Terrifying! No. I can’t give in. I refuse to accept this! I have to fight back!’

However, even as she howled in rage, Yang Qi’s voice echoed in her sea of consciousness. “Stop the temper tantrum, Hailan. I can hear it all. Your only chance to escape is to become a member of my empire. None of my people have their thoughts monitored anymore. So follow orders and you’ll be fine.”

Chapter 1589: Soul of the Ancestor God

‘Who could’ve guessed that I would benefit so wildly. Not only did I subjugate Hailan, but I also got the Soul of the Ancestor God. I knew there was more to her than met the eye, but surprisingly, she had an incredibly powerful item, something not even the Sovereign Lord ever got his hands on. With it, the God Legion Seal is really going to become something that can surpass the civilization of the gods.’

Yang Qi was back in his own empire, with Proud Heaven none the wiser.

Settling down cross-legged, Yang Qi drew on the destiny of his empire and locked it down completely. Up above, the black and white sun rotated, and while it had transformed from its original state, Yang Qi knew it could still function as a back door for the Sovereign Lord.

There were still some things about it that Yang Qi didn't understand, but that said, he wasn’t overly anxious about it.

Now that he had the Soul of the Ancestor God, he would be able to remove all traces of the Sovereign Lord from his empire. It was the key to opening the door that led to that profound civilization that surpassed that of the gods.

Yang Qi didn't immediately attempt to integrate the Soul of the Ancestor God into the God Legion Seal. Instead, he carefully extracted it, still sealed, and began carefully studying it. At a certain point, he fed a bit of energy into it, causing it to pulse. Inside, he could see the beginnings of a grand civilization.

He had never had the profundities of the gods laid out in front of him in this way. As he continued studying the soul, he saw the civilization of the gods developing in his mind’s eye.

History was playing out right in front of him. The elites of the past didn’t really have any idea how to advance their civilization, but the Soul of the Ancestor God had opened the doors for them.

Yang Qi felt like he was mentally floating along the river of history, which of course gave him a much more profound understanding of the God Legion Seal. And as the will of the legion of gods percolated in his mind, his thinking became more profound and clear, and he saw, not just the past paths with utmost clarity, but also the path going forward.

Because he had devoured Wretch God Ultimate, his own will had occasionally been influenced by the Wretch God. But now, he sloughed off any such fetters, reaching a new acme of enlightenment.

‘Now, I’ll draw on the Soul of the Ancestor God.’

Using the Wretched Brain God Art, he performed countless mental calculations, which he used to analyze all of the historical information from the Soul of the Ancestor God. At that point, he realized that the Soul of the Ancestor God really did have a soul in it.

Now, he was ready to integrate it into the God Legion Seal. As he did, he realized that he was creating the perfect trap for the Sovereign Lord. When the Sovereign Lord returned, and made his move on the God Legion Seal, he would meet a powerful backlash. It would be a perfect trump card for Yang Qi’s defense.

Furthermore, the Soul of the Ancestor God would have a profoundly positive effect on the God Legion Seal.

After all, simply trying to assimilate the Soul of the Ancestor God would be like killing the chicken to get the eggs.

Slam!

Something seemed to break inside the Soul of the Ancestor God, and Yang Qi saw a huge door opening. In its depths were various types of godly civilizations, creating a sea of information that washed through his psyche, causing enormous transformations.

He was experiencing a baptism in regard to the civilizations of the gods, as well as the dao of gods.

He suddenly understood everything about the legion of gods. Matters of civilization, will, transformation, cultivation base, worlds, nations. He knew about the quintessence of the god civilization, and he knew how to make something superior to it.

“There never really was a god civilization,” Yang Qi said coolly. “There was the Soul of the Ancestor God. It was what brought civilization. And previously, there was no way to surpass it. But I can.”

His psychic scale was continuing to grow, and was getting closer to reaching the level of a trillion.

Even in ancient times, no one had ever reached the level of a trillion, not even the Sovereign Lord.

As he gained further enlightenment of civilization, his sage monarch magistrates also transformed, with the God Legion Seal on their foreheads becoming more distinct. And they experienced inner changes, such as their hearts transforming into projections of jade.

That came from Yang Qi’s deeper and deeper enlightenment of the Mahātmā Jade, enabling him to create copies of it, just like he could with the God Legion Seal.

If people such as the King of Godmammoths could see him right now, they would only be able to use one word to describe him: freakish. Not only could he mass-produce God Legion Seals, but he could also do the same with the Mahātmā Jade.

As this process went on, Yang Qi’s empire grew stronger.

Crunch. Crack!

As he grew stronger, the Everlasting Aegis expanded, and was able to absorb primal-chaos paleo-energy more quickly and in greater quantity. And as that happened, Yang Qi could sense the essence of the god world trembling, as if in pain.

It was similar to how if a person had a tick sucking their blood, they might not feel it. But if that tick transformed into a vampire bat, they would definitely find it unbearable.

RUMBLE!

All of a sudden, a faint tremor passed through the god world, something that most ordinary people wouldn’t even feel. But Yang Qi knew that it meant the essence of the god world was reacting to the sudden growth of his empire.

The sage monarch magistrates were experts at their work and would quickly disseminate the new knowledge that Yang Qi had gained, giving it to the common people and fueling more growth.

Heaven and earth changed dramatically and constantly, and that meant the Sage Monarch Empire was constantly gaining new sages and mahātmās, whose thinking was profound and unparalleled under heaven.

‘Yang Voidprime, the time has come to bring you to me.’ A smile appeared on his face. ‘I’d originally hoped you’d end up blowing up. But I just made some significant progress, and I have no need to hide any longer. My empire is ready to bring about a new age.’

Yang Qi had been hiding in the shadows for too long.

Now that he had taken the Soul of the Ancestor God from Hailan, he had what he needed to take the next step. Although he wasn’t any stronger than before, he had the key to civilization, and deep enlightenment of the God Legion Seal. He was just on the verge of a psychic scale of a trillion, and could now mass-produce copies of the Mahātmā Jade.

Having been bolstered by the copies of the Mahātmā Jade and the God Legion Seal, his sage monarch magistrates were in an even better position to govern the empire and educate the masses. And that made his empire grow even stronger.

The time was ripe to crush all obstacles blocking his forward progress.

And the first step in it all was to summon Yang Voidprime.

Only by getting the other half of the fateless energy he needed could he get his sage monarch magistrates to the level of God-Lords.

“Come to me! King of Godmammoths, Demon Master, High Priestess, you people are useless to me. Weak trash that needs to be gotten rid of.”

Yang Qi rose to his feet and surged with fateless energy, then unleashed a fist strike.

Cracking sounds rang out as he pierced through the multiverse of the god world, sending an attack right into the middle of the Demonfolk Empire.

Chapter 1590: A New Age Begins!

Yang Qi’s fist strike revealed his domineering dao. It could shake the nine heavens and ten earths, rock the legion of gods, horde of devils, multitude of buddhas, host of immortals, and throngs of demons. It unleashed the power of a half-Annulled expert, which could span all nations, all barriers, and all types of power. Compared to it, the destiny of the Demonfolk Empire was pitiful at best.

It was none other than the Nation-Fate Godfist.

In the Sage Monarch Empire, the destiny ensured that everyone was a sage or mahātmā. Everyone was selfless and worked hard to further the interests of the empire, which in turn cared for them, protecting them and ensuring their prosperity.

Yang Qi’s fist strike contained that will, the will of sages and mahātmās, which gave it the power to pierce right to the altar he had been aiming for.

“What’s this?”

The King of Godmammoths was the first to open his eyes, and when he saw what was happening, he immediately reacted with his King of the Great Dao.

“Great Dao Reversal; King of Dao Kings; Invincible in Three Worlds; Existing for All Time!”

RUMBLE!

He met Yang Qi's fist with a fist of his own, one that was superior in the three realms, the ultimate type of power in the many heavens. It caused the entire Demonfolk Empire to tremble as he unleashed it.

However, when the fists collided, the King of Godmammoths was sent flying backward, completely incapable of matching up to Yang Qi’s strength.

Henceforth, he would never again be considered number one in the three realms, the ultimate representation of power and strength.

“Stop him!” he howled, hoping that the Demon Master and High Priestess would interfere.

The Demon Master’s eyes flashed with fury. He was also an apex entity from ancient times, and when he attacked, it was with both elegance and intensity.

“Demon Taiji!”

A taiji symbol appeared on his hand, but instead of being black and white, it was pure green, like ghostfire that could block any and all power.

The Demon Taiji was the great dao that the Demon Master had gained enlightenment of.

RUMBLE!

Yin and yang converged as the Demon Taiji absorbed demon energy from the area and used it to block the path of Yang Qi’s Nation-Fate God Fist. However, after blasting aside the King of Godmammoths, Yang Qi’s attack apparently hadn’t lost any momentum. It slammed into the Demon Taiji, which immediately crumbled.

Next, the High Priestess threw her arms out as if in sacrifice to the heaven on high. “God-Fist of Prayer!”

A huge fist appeared to block Yang Qi. However, having knocked the Demon Master out of the way, Yang Qi’s fist slammed right into the High Priestess.

Then, Yang Qi could be seen standing right there in front of Yang Voidprime, where he reached out and made a grasping gesture.

A myriad worlds shook violently, and countless people saw an enormous hand appear in the sky of the Demonfolk Empire. Instantly, the entire empire started crumbling, and its destiny fell apart. Even the surrounding god world was shaking.

Crack!

The King of Godmammoths, Demon Master, and High Priestess were completely helpless to do anything in the face of this enormous hand, other than back away in fear.

A vortex appeared, swirling out with such ferocity that anyone who saw it would think that doomsday had arrived as it sucked in everything around it.

Yang Voidprime was snatched up and whisked away to the Sage Monarch Empire.

Then everything grew calm and quiet. The Demonfolk that remained scattered, instantly returning to their previous chaotic state.

Everyone knew that Yang Qi was on the move. His empire had been locked down up to this point, and it was now obvious that he had simply been biding his time. And while many people had assumed he was hiding because he wasn’t in the half-Annulled level, as of this moment, they realized that he was obviously the top figure in the god world.

The King of Godmammoths, Demon Master, and High Priestess all working together hadn’t been able to stop him. Just how invincible was he, exactly? Not even the Sovereign Lord had been this terrifying.

Word spread like wildfire.

“Preposterous. Outrageous!”

When the King of Godmammoths, Demon Master, and High Priestess saw their empty altar, their faces burned with fury. They wanted to see Yang Qi dead right then and there, but they knew they didn’t have any way to make it happen.

As they looked over at the Sage Monarch Empire, they saw incomparable energy surging, and destiny that resembled dragons, plundering primal-chaos with abandon.

How could they possibly launch an attack against something like that? If they did, the backlash from its destiny alone would be far more than they could deal with.

“We have to attack the Sage Monarch Empire!” the King of Godmammoths shouted angrily.

However, the Demon Master reached out to block his path. “We can’t. Based on that brief clash with Yang Qi just now, I can tell that he's in the half-Annulled level. And he might have broken through a lot earlier than we realized.”

“So we just let him take Yang Voidprime? What if he combines the two halves of fateless energy? How will we survive?” the High Priestess exclaimed.

“We have no choice but to attack immediately,” the King of Godmammoths said impatiently. “If we wait any longer, it's going to be a waste of our resources. We can lead our army of Demonfolk there right now, and batter him with endless waves. He’ll be forced to pay a huge price to defend himself, and in the meantime, we can launch Operation Demon Destruction!”

“Operation Demon Destruction?” the Demon Master said, shivering. “You really want to go through with that? But what about Proud Heaven?”

Operation Demon Destruction was a deadly plan that, once initiated, left no other options, and could easily end in mutual destruction.

“If Yang Qi gets all of the fateless energy, and turns into a true, complete Fateless One, we won’t survive. We have to take action. We have to enact Operation Demon Destruction!”

“Look, something's happening!” the High Priestess cried.

They looked over and saw the void trembling violently, with clouds roiling everywhere, and streams of power ripping back and forth. The Invincible Dynasty was on the move! It rumbled in the direction of the Sage Monarch Empire, moving like the tide. Then the two combined!

At the same time, the voice of the Invincible Dugu echoed out to fill the multiverse.

“I, the Invincible Dugu, have awoken. The Invincible Dynasty is becoming part of the Sage Monarch Empire. Emperor Yang Qi is now our leader! We are one united empire!”

Countless old-timers were shocked to the core. Yang Qi had just put on a massive display of strength and power, then the Invincible Dugu announced that his dynasty was joining the Sage Monarch Empire. The result would be something of immeasurable power. Not even Proud Heaven, who had the support of the essence of the god world, could possibly be Yang Qi’s match.

Someone similar to the old Sovereign Lord had appeared, and all of creation was being shaken as a result.

As the Invincible Dynasty joined the Sage Monarch Empire, all of the previous seals were undone, allowing everyone to see its true destiny on display.

The Sage Monarch Empire was filled with sages and mahātmās, and those people provided the backbone of the empire with their thinking, discussions, wisdom, intelligence, and invincible, domineering nature.

The people were like the legion of gods that supported the Halls of Heaven and provided the power to crush the horde of devils in hell.

They were sages. They were monarchs.

And their spirit was different than that of the people of the god world.

The Ascendants in the empire were rising to the greatest heights, and Yang Qi was finally allowing the public to see the truth.

The essence of the god world wasn’t true and orthodox. Neither was the god world itself.

The Sage Monarch World was true and orthodox.

“My Sage Monarch World will replace the god world,” Yang Qi said in a loud voice that echoed everywhere. “My people rose from the impure lands to the immortal worlds, and from there, they ascended to the god world. In the future, people from the god world will rise to the sage monarch world. For countless years, people thought that the god world was the ultimate destination. They were wrong. The sage monarch world exists above it.”

This was Yang Qi’s great plan, and he was making it happen. He had already surpassed the Sovereign Lord. To rise from the half-Annulled to the full Annulled level, he had to surpass civilizations. He had to make a world that was greater than the civilization of the gods.

The Sage Monarch World was that world.

The King of Godmammoths, Demon Master, and High Priestess wanted to carry out Operation Demon Destruction to attack the Sage Monarch Empire. But now they realized it was pointless. Attacking the Sage Monarch Empire would be pure suicide.

Chapter 1591: Complete Fateless One

Yang Qi had taken the initiative, attacking the Demonfolk Empire and snatching up Yang Voidprime. Then he combined the Sage Monarch Empire with the Invincible Dynasty, thereby creating a new world populated entirely by sages and mahātmās. Not only that, the new world had two half-Annulled experts protecting it.

No one could possibly crush his empire now.

Now there was no need to keep the place sealed up and hidden from the eyes of the public. He had opened up, and all heaven and earth now trembled in the face of his empire.

His empire held a long sword in its hand, ready to slash apart the sky.

His empire wore iron boots, ready to trample all the lands.

His empire was a warship, ready to sail and conquer all the oceans.

Where Yang Qi’s empire existed, no one could block his path. It was his empire, a place devoted to the people, a place that surpassed the ordinary, a place in which the populace caused destiny to surge.

And what in existence could possibly stop his empire from continuing to grow?

Even the King of Godmammoths had to back down from his empire, and didn’t dare even think about trying to attack it. And if they tried getting inside to attack Yang Qi, they would die. It didn’t matter that they were considered invincible in the world.

Their billions of years of experience, and the power they had accumulated during that time, were now laughable.

Not even their Operation Demon Destruction would do any good at this point.

“How could this be happening? How could his empire have developed to this level?” The King of Godmammoths felt powerless and bereft of valor. He could easily face hordes of devils and the boundless armies of hell. But facing Yang Qi’s empire, he felt absolutely no confidence.

And he knew that he wasn’t a match for Yang Qi, either. If he fought him alone, he would be crushed. That wasn’t even to mention the empire that backed him.

He couldn't even have fought the Sovereign Lord’s empire, let alone this one.

“We have to mobilize the Demonfolk Empire!” the Demon Master shouted. “We can’t wait any longer. That brat is gaining momentum, and we can’t let it continue. If we don’t act, Yang Voidprime is going to die, and we won’t have any hope at all. The essence of the god world is furious, even more so than it ever was in the era of the Sovereign Lord. It’s definitely going to take action against him soon.”

“We have to summon the Demonfolk and get them moving. And what's going on with Proud Heaven’s empire? Is he going to do anything?” the High Priestess said.

Looking in the direction of Proud Heaven’s empire, her jaw dropped. “Dammit. DAMMIT! Proud Heaven you piece of shit! I can’t believe you're doing that!”

Only now did she realize what had played out in the Deathless Heaven Empire. She had no place there anymore, and couldn’t touch its destiny. Her palace there had been completely removed. The empire had been united, and was rapidly developing, without anything holding it back. And it was so strong it could kill her instantly.

“What happened, High Priestess?” the Demon Master asked.

“Proud Heaven took away all of my destiny,” she said through gritted teeth. “I'm all alone now. He even subjugated my apprentice. He’s founded a unified empire that we can’t resist. And the essence of the god world has provided him with endless resources. His resources even surpass the Sage Monarch Empire! He has the support of the entire god world. We're no match for him!”

The god world itself was still the ultimate entity.

It had been like that in the time of the Sovereign Lord as well, which was why he had never been able to truly defy it.

And although Yang Qi’s empire had transcended the god world, enabling him to head toward the Annulled level with all his people, it still couldn't directly fight the essence of the god world. And in terms of the resources it could create, it also couldn’t compete.

The god world was still constantly expanding, and because of that process, it was creating preheaven treasures nonstop.

In the past, the resources had been evenly distributed throughout the multiverse inside the god world. But now, all of the resources were going to Proud Heaven’s empire.

The god world was also producing preheaven souls to add to the Deathless Heaven Dynasty’s aegis, ensuring that it was a place of peace.

Fighting within empires generally had to do with lack of resources. But when resources were abundant, there wasn’t any need for competition.

Thus, Proud Heaven’s empire was peaceful and harmonious, and its destiny climbed constantly.

“We can still use the Demonfolk to carry out Operation Demon Destruction,” the King of Godmammoths said. “Without a secret weapon, they won’t dare move against us, lest we all end in mutual destruction. With Operation Demon Destruction, we can unleash the most destructive force in existence!”

“Fine. Let’s do it.”

The three half-Annulled experts drew on powerful divine abilities to draw the scattered Demonfolk back together.

Something similar was playing out in Proud Heaven’s empire. Obviously, the old-timers there were able to see the Sage Monarch Empire combining with the Invincible Dynasty.

“Call an assembly....”

“Call an assembly....”

Countless voices rang out, as if war were about to break out at any moment.

The leaders of the empire converged on the Central God-Palace. Proud Heaven was there, and his mysterious aura and surging destiny were such that no one even dared to look at him directly for fear of being burned out of existence.

His cultivation base was truly enigmatic and impossible to assess.

As the old-timers filed in, he looked over at his empress, Hailan.

Her cultivation base had advanced significantly, yet he wasn't worried, as he knew she couldn’t possibly reach the half-Annulled level.

“Your Majesty!” said the Patriarch of the Universe, dropping to his knees. “Yang Qi finally made a move. He's been hiding his true strength all along and is already in the half-Annulled level. Furthermore, the Invincible Dugu awakened and joined the Sage Monarch Empire, bringing his entire dynasty with him. Of course, we didn’t dare make any decisions about what to do. We need your input, Your Majesty!”

The Patriarch of the Universe was someone the Sovereign Lord had sentenced to death. In other words, the Sovereign Lord hadn’t actually been able to kill him. Yet here he was, kneeling in front of Proud Heaven. That just went to show that Proud Heaven had already surpassed the Sovereign Lord.

Of course, what the Patriarch of the Universe was really kneeling to wasn’t Proud Heaven, but rather the essence of the god world.

The reason he and all the others the Sovereign Lord had sentenced to death were able to flee with their lives was because the essence of the god world had supported them.

“I know about all of that. Yang Qi is the greatest enemy of the essence of the god world. And the god world will do something about it soon. For now, do everything necessary to resist him. In the meantime, I’ll bring the full glory of the essence of the god world with me to go visit the King of Godmammoths and the Demon Master. I’ll get them to join my empire, then together, we can go destroy Yang Qi. The god world has arranged all of this, and as its representative, I'm fully on board with everything.”

“That Yang Qi has to die,” Hailan said. “Unfortunately, when he attacked the King of Godmammoths, he kidnapped Yang Voidprime. If he combines the two halves of fateless energy, he's going to be difficult to deal with.”

“Don’t worry. The essence of the god world has planned for that outcome, and will give me extra power to deal with it. I'm literally invincible in the god world, no matter where I go.” Proud Heaven looked closely at Hailan in the hopes of getting a better idea of what she was thinking. “Hailan, you’ll be in charge of everything here while I go to see the King of Godmammoths. Got it?”

“I don’t think I can accept such a weighty responsibility,” she said.

“You’ll do fine. The officials of the empire are loyal to me. I represent the essence of the god world, which means no one in the god world will dare to attack me. Not even Yang Qi can do so. He's already being rejected by the god world itself, placing him under severe restrictions. I'm going to subjugate the King of Godmammoths and the Demon Master. And even that pesky High Priestess. Then I can deal with Yang Qi. The power of the Demonfolk will come in very handy.”

“In that case, I’ll await your triumphant return, Your Majesty.”

“Good,” Proud Heaven. Smiling viciously, he continued, “You’d better bear me a son soon, Hailan. I need an heir to inherit my rule after I transcend.” With that, he vanished without a trace.

Hailan could sense life force stirring within her, something that resembled Proud Heaven’s aura. It was the result of her humiliation by him, and there was nothing she could do about it. She was completely under Proud Heaven’s control.

She couldn't do anything to get rid of the child. However, that was when Yang Qi’s voice echoed in her sea of consciousness. “Proud Heaven left some life force quintessence in you. Once you give birth, he’ll kill you. But we can beat him at his own game. I can add some of my life force to you, which will cause that child to dramatically transform.”

“What's your plan?” she replied. “Proud Heaven is gone, so I'm in charge of the empire now. What do you want me to do?”

“There’s no plan for now. Proud Heaven’s empire is too stable to overthrow. And I haven’t yet reached my peak. Once I have, I can crush everything in my path.” Hailan suddenly sensed a life force enter her and head to her belly, where a wriggling lump of flesh and blood already existed. It was Proud Heaven’s child. However, it was now changing. Would it become Yang Qi’s child? Or would it become something else?

Chapter 1592: Complete Fateless One (2)

Yang Qi had inserted something into the life force seed Proud Heaven had placed in Hailan. As for what it would turn into, only time would tell. But it would definitely be a tool to use against Proud Heaven.

Although Proud Heaven was currently backed by the essence of the god world, there was far more to him than that. He had the Great Necropolis, which he could use at any time to combat the will of the god world. Perhaps he could even use it to devour the god world. Yang Qi was under no illusions. He knew how incredibly ambitious Proud Heaven was. He might as well have been a fiend-devil who would devour anyone he needed in order to accomplish his goals.

Working with him didn’t make any sense, as those who worked with him always ended up as corpses. And no one had ever been able to avoid being devoured by him.

Thus, Yang Qi was using Hailan as a pawn against him.

As far as Proud Heaven leaving her in charge of his empire was concerned, the truth was that she didn’t have any actual control. Any orders she issued had to be approved by Proud Heaven’s will, and if she opposed him, she would die.

The empire as a whole wouldn't follow her personal orders. She was essentially there as an administrator.

When Proud Heaven left to meet the King of Godmammoths and the others, Yang Qi smiled in the knowledge that the time had come to truly oppose Proud Heaven.

Yang Voidprime was captive in the middle of the Sage Monarch Empire, suspended in the air such that he resembled the character 大. Now that Yang Qi had combined with the Invincible Dynasty, the destiny at his command was immense. It didn't matter that Yang Voidprime was in the half-Annulled level now, he still couldn’t fight back.

“Is there anything you’d like to say, Yang Voidprime?” Yang Qi asked. “I bet you never thought you’d end up in such a tragic position. None of your plans worked. In the same moment you reached the half-Annulled level, you were trapped. And even as the two of us reached an agreement, you were plotting against me. But you had no idea how strong my energy arts were. I broke right into the Demonfolk Empire and grabbed you for myself.”

“You kept your true strength hidden well, Yang Qi. You really fooled me.” Yang Voidprime knew that it wouldn’t matter what he said now. As the saying went, the winner is deemed righteous, and the loser is always in the wrong. Right now, there was no way Yang Qi would free him.

“I didn’t fool you. You fooled yourself, thanks to your greed. You never even got to experience what it’s like to truly be a half-Annulled expert. Ai.” Yang Qi shook his head. “It’s really tragic. However, I need your fateless energy to become a full Fateless One.”

“Then let me go!” Yang Voidprime said, his face lighting up. “I’ll be loyal to you. Even if I lose my fateless energy, I’ll still be a powerful asset. Maybe I won’t be a half-Annulled expert anymore, but I can cultivate my way back to that level eventually. My wisdom and experience will come in very handy, and I’ll work for you faithfully.”

“Sorry, not interested,” Yang Qi said, waving his hand dismissively. There was no way he would believe anything Yang Voidprime said. Taking his fateless energy would reduce him to the level of a God-Lord, but his psychic scale would remain the same, roughly three hundred billion. And that would make him superior to all other God-Lords in existence.

In other words, both his physical body and the experiences in his mind were top notch.

In many ways, he was almost exactly the same as Yang Qi.

“Yang Immortal-Slayer,” Yang Qi said suddenly.

“Here,” Yang Immortal-Slayer replied, stepping out of nowhere. His psychic scale made him the strongest of the God-Lords, which made sense considering how many preheaven treasures, vital energies, and national destinies he had devoured over the years.

As soon as Yang Voidprime saw Yang Immortal-Slayer, he knew what was coming, and a mournful expression appeared on his face. “How sinister of you, Yang Qi! You’re going to take my fateless energy, and you’re going to have this Yang Immortal-Slayer take my physical body, to help him reach the half-Annulled level. Considering you and I are perfectly compatible, it’ll work without a hitch. How vicious! Why? Why did I have to end in such tragedy? No one has ever experienced misfortune of this level. I reached the half-Annulled level, the peak of the god world, only to end up like this. I was supposed to be the main character of this generation!”

“Stop whining, Yang Voidprime. You shook the god world for years, and enjoyed life to the fullest. It’s not so bad an end to die like this. Alright. It's time for you to meet your end.”

RUMBLE!

Yang Qi reached out and clamped his hand down on the top of Yang Voidprime’s head. Instantly, numerous streams of energy flowed from Yang Voidprime into Yang Qi, like a river of fate. Nothing changed within Yang Qi as it happened. His face was expressionless as he watched the innumerable people from a chiliocosm of worlds, their fates clear for him to see. He was like a bird gliding gently over the river of fate.

What is fate?

I am fate.

A Fateless One is fate.

Such were Yang Qi’s thoughts.

As the fateless energy suffused him, his status as a Fateless One grew whole. And as he was blessed, the Annulled level reached out, beckoning toward him. Never had he experienced anything like this, in which he had such deep enlightenment of the terror of fate, and the majesty of the Annulled level.

Only by being Annulled could one truly be free from the fetters of fate, and become invincible.

When the fateless energy left Yang Voidprime, he sagged limply as he fell to the God-Lord level. That said, he still pulsed with such immense power that he could easily kill the Patriarch of the Universe and the others that had been sentenced to death by the Sovereign Lord. In fact, ordinary half-Annulled experts might not even be able to take him on.

“You’re turn, Yang Immortal-Slayer. Use the dao of King Heaven-Devourer to devour him.” He waved his hand, causing invincible power to flow into Yang Immortal-Slayer.

Yang Qi’s cultivation was rising as he combined the fateless energies. Suddenly....

Crack!

His psychic scale broke through the gap to reach a trillion.

In all likelihood, he was now the strongest god to ever have existed throughout all of history. Not even the Sovereign Lord had reached this level. And just as how immortals changed fundamentally upon becoming gods, he was experiencing dramatic transformations.

Meanwhile, Yang Immortal-Slayer transformed into a primal-chaos elder-snake and lunged toward Yang Voidprime, who could do nothing but struggle in vain as he was devoured.

Flop!

Afterward, Yang Immortal-Slayer returned to human form, then threw his head back and howled, “Embrace Vitality to Unify; Complete and Utter Confinement; Sever the Four Gates; Seal the Six Senses!”

Yang Qi waved his hand, causing the God Legion Seal and the Mahātmā Jade to appear on his palm. Then, they flew out as two dazzling beams of light that shot into Yang Voidprime to help him fully assimilate Yang Voidprime.

“Blessing of Destiny!” Yang Qi said. “I hereby ordain Yang Immortal-Slayer as grand prince, and task him with protecting the empire!”

Slam!

A massive stream of destiny descended, coursing into Yang Immortal-Slayer, who again transformed as he thoroughly assimilated Yang Voidprime. Instantly, Yang Voidprime’s experiences, knowledge, and enlightenment became part of Yang Immortal-Slayer.

Normally speaking, a process like this would come with dangerous side-effects. But Yang Immortal-Slayer didn’t need to worry about that. He was a clone of Yang Qi, and both Yang Qi and Yang Voidprime were Fateless Ones. Their energies were similar, and for all intents and purposes, they were the same expression of vital energy.

“Time for a complete transformation with fateless power. As a Fateless One, I hereby summon the King of Fate!” Instantly, a figure appeared behind him, clad in white, surrounded by a swirling river of fate that could pierce through the universe.

This was his out-of-body incarnation.

The King of Godmammoths had the King of the Great Dao, but Yang Qi had the King of Fate. Within him swirled countless streams of fate, that of all living beings, which he controlled, making him invincible and ultimately powerful.

It was a second version of Yang Qi, or perhaps the ultimate version of him. After all, his godhood had vanished upon reaching the half-Annulled level.

“Time to step into the half-Annulled level, Yang Immortal-Slayer.” Yang Qi sent the King of Fate piercing into Yang Immortal-Slayer, who shot to his feet in response.

Chapter 1593: Increased Prestige

Yang Immortal-Slayer had finally reached the half-Annulled level.

By devouring Yang Voidprime, being blessed by the destiny of Yang Qi’s empire, receiving the aid of the combined might of the God Legion Seal and the Mahātmā Jade, and being given enlightenment of the King of Fate, he finally achieved the breakthrough.

Strange chanting filled the lands, and beautiful magical symbols swirled everywhere, filling the many heavens. In numerous locations in the god world, experts suddenly sensed the aura of someone becoming half-Annulled.

And it came from the Sage Monarch Empire.

Countless old-timers were shaken by this development. The Sage Monarch Empire was already considered invincible with two half-Annulled experts, namely Yang Qi and the Invincible Dugu. But now they had another?

Didn’t that mean they would be completely unbeatable?

And the influx of destiny caused by the breakthrough would make the hearts of the people even more stable.

Everyone in the Sage Monarch Empire could tell that they had three half-Annulled experts to protect them. They were definitely the top force within creation.

The Demonfolk Empire had two half-Annulled experts: the King of Godmammoths and the Demonfolk Empire. In the Deathless Heaven Dynasty, there was Proud Heaven and the High Priestess.

For a time, there had been a balance between the three major forces. But now Yang Qi had seized the upper hand, and as a result, more experts were experiencing breakthroughs, and his destiny was growing again.

News was spreading throughout the multiverse of the god world that the Sage Monarch World was a powerful organization, which caused many people to want to join them.

That said, the Sage Monarch World wasn’t recruiting. And even when it did recruit, they had a very tough application process. They only wanted truly elite experts.

The people of the Sage Monarch World were similar to those immortals from the immortal worlds who would only select the best of the best from the impure lands to become apprentices. The people of the Sage Monarch World had already developed a lofty attitude and believed themselves to be above the god world. It was only natural.

All of them wanted to fight to help the Sage Monarch World transcend.

It was similar to how, in the impure lands, planetary systems would want to become immortal worlds.

Thankfully, Yang Immortal-Slayer’s rise to the half-Annulled level had provided a big boost in destiny.

“Citizens of the empire,” Yang Qi said. “We finally have three half-Annulled experts. Next, we’ll all enter a huge session of cultivation. I want everyone to become as strong as possible. Before long, we’ll wage war on the god world, and conquer it!”

Everyone excitedly began their sessions of cultivation. All of them were very confident that their empire was the most unique to ever exist; it would definitely conquer all, and slaughter all fiend-devils.

As for Yang Qi, he focused his daoist techniques on searching for clues about the True Devil and the Sovereign Lord.

It was now very clear who the top powers in the god world were.

The half-Annulled experts were Yang Qi, the Invincible Dugu, Yang Immortal-Slayer, Proud Heaven, the High Priestess, the King of Godmammoths, and the Demon Master.

Seven people.

It would be difficult for anyone else to reach the half-Annulled level. Not even Yang Chiliocosm could do it by himself. Little did he know that Yang Qi had a plan to win him over to his own camp. His plans were unfolding one after another, and once he had fully realized all of them, the Deathless Heaven Dynasty would collapse.

And much of it came down to the back door that King Immortal-Slayer had left for him.

Even if the King of Godmammoths, High Priestess, Proud Heaven, and Demon Master joined forces, he would still be able to slip into the Deathless Heaven Dynasty. The only downside was that the essence of the god world was involved. Furthermore, the Sovereign Lord and the True Devil were still in hiding. That much he was sure of, considering their auras were still detectable.

They might jump out from the shadows at any moment to unleash a deadly blow.

For all he knew, they might even be hiding among his own citizens. Given how powerful they were, it was entirely possible they could hide from him. And it was compounded by the fact that his entire foundation was built on the God Legion Seal and the Mahātmā Jade.

Another downside to consider was that Yang Qi would have a disadvantage if he fought in open battle. The god world had already rejected his empire, and if his people tried to go about in it, they would be targeted and rejected. The god world wasn’t a good place for the Sage Monarch Empire to fight; the battlefield had to be in primal-chaos.

That was one reason why Yang Qi wanted to further his research of the God Legion Seal and the Mahātmā Jade, so that all citizens of his empire could have duplicates that would let them travel freely in the god world, if it became necessary.

His world continued expanding.

Countless old-timers in the god world would look up to it as if it were a moon at night or a sun during the day.

The night sky of the god world was completely dark, with no stars or moon. But now, Yang Qi’s empire was there, casting light down.

Of course, they could also sense how unstable the god world was, and it made them want to join Yang Qi.

The prestige of the Sage Monarch World only continued to grow.

**

By this time, Proud Heaven had reached the Demonfolk Empire.

Demonic winds screamed through the Demonfolk Empire as countless Demonfolk prayed. Of course, they had been forced to do so by the King of Godmammoths and the Demonfolk Empire. They weren’t praying to found an empire. Instead, the various demon tribes were praying as a curse. And as the curse power converged on an altar in the middle of the empire, it became something that even half-Annulled experts would find absolutely terrifying.

In Yang Qi’s empire, people prayed for destiny and glory.

But here in the Demonfolk Empire, they were creating a curse that would lead to fiery destruction.

In other words, the Demonfolk were all praying for the end of the world.

This was curse power, not destiny. And it was an aspect of Operation Demon Destruction. The baleful will would become a tool of attack designed to kill.

When Proud Heaven arrived and saw what was going on, his expression flickered.

However, he quickly raised his voice and said, “King of Godmammoths. Demon Master. High Priestess. I trust you’ve been well since we last met?”

“Proud Heaven! It's you!” The High Priestess rose to her feet with a furious smile as she prepared to directly attack Proud Heaven.

However, the King of Godmammoths waved his sleeve, blocking her way. “We’ve never met, boy. So what's that supposed to mean?”

“There’s no need to be so arrogant, King of Godmammoths,” Proud Heaven said with a smile. “That last part was meant for the High Priestess.” Turning to her, he continued, “High Priestess, you’re the imperial preceptor of the Deathless Heaven Dynasty. So why exactly are you siding with these people? Are you really interested in committing treason?”

“I'm going to kill you sooner or later, Proud Heaven!” the High Priestess said angrily. “So cut the crap. Are you just sitting around waiting for Yang Qi to crush you? I can’t believe you stole my apprentice and besmirched her honor. You bastard! You completely removed any trace of me from your empire. Did you really think I wouldn’t pay you back for that?”

“It's not as though you had good intentions, High Priestess. It just so happens that I came out on top instead of you. The winner is deemed righteous, and the loser is always in the wrong. I'm sure you’ve heard that saying before. I'm actually here to recruit the lot of you.”

“Recruit us?” the King of Godmammoths said, then laughed. “Do you know who you’re talking to, boy? You think you’re going to do that all alone? Who do you think you are, the Sovereign Lord?”

“It's actually not me who wants to recruit you,” Proud Heaven didn’t seem to have even noticed the King of Godmammoths’ sarcasm. “It's the essence of the god world that wants you. And that essence is so much more powerful than the Sovereign Lord that you can't even begin to imagine it.” Seeing the reaction to his words on the faces of the three experts seemed to please Proud Heaven even further. “You see, the essence of the god world is completely enraged because of Yang Qi and his Sage Monarch World. Anyone from there who comes to the god world will immediately be attacked. It’s only a matter of time until Yang Qi is crushed. It won’t be long before the essence of the god world can take human form, whereupon it’ll come to fight Yang Qi personally.”

“What?!” the King of Godmammoths said. “The essence of the god world is going to take human form and come here? That's impossible. The essence is so mighty that even thousands of years pass with the speed of a single thought for it. It simply can’t take human form.”

“I won’t go into the details,” Proud Heaven said. “I just hope that when the essence of the god world does, you’ll be standing by my side to fight Yang Qi. If you aren’t, then you’re going to have a hard time escaping with your lives. After all, that will indicate you're siding with the enemy, and need to be purged.”

Proud Heaven’s words pulsed with killing intent.

Chapter 1594: Essence in Human Form

Shocking news had just been revealed to the King of Godmammoths, Demon Master, and High Priestess. The essence of the god world was going to take human form. They weren’t even sure how to react.

The god world wasn't a person. It was more like an animal, except its true existence was something that people couldn’t truly comprehend. After all, it could take anywhere from hundreds to tens of thousands of years for it to form a single thought.

There was no way to change that.

The god world was so large it defied imagination. It was like a combination of innumerable half-Annulled experts.

Everything it did happened slowly. It wasn’t like ordinary gods, who could experience billions of thoughts in a single moment. That was why it had to operate through a representative.

Even that was only possible through great effort.

If the god world had been able to directly interfere with the Sovereign Lord, he would have died much earlier. Although the King of Godmammoths was said to be the strongest, that wasn’t taking into consideration the god world itself. The main difference was that the god world had never taken human form.

But if it did, that would change everything. If it could think that much faster, then no one could possibly be a match for it. Not even the combination of the King of Godmammoths, Demon Master, and High Priestess would be close. They would be killed in an instant.

It didn’t matter how impressive Yang Qi was. If the essence of the god world could take human shape, then he would be wiped away by its power like an egg encountering a rock.

“I don’t believe you, boy,” the Demon Master said. “The essence of the god world simply can’t take human form.”

“Believe me or not. Your choice. I've said what needs to be said. I just don’t want to see you die. You see, we're all like ants on a string right now. Forget about the god world taking human form. Even just Yang Qi is a big threat right now. Do you really think that you’re strong enough to deal with him alone? If so, you’re crazy. The only way we can handle him is if we work together. And if we don’t, we’ll just end up subjugated.”

“In other words, you want us to join you,” the Demon Master said. “Come on, we’re no fools. We know what you really want. You’re more ambitious than a wolf! In fact, why shouldn't we just go join Yang Qi?”

“It's true that it probably makes more sense for you to join Yang Qi than me,” Proud Heaven replied with a sinister smile. “Anyone can see that his empire is bringing about a new age. Although my empire is growing rapidly as well, there’s no way it could ever catch up to Yang Qi’s. However, if you side with Yang Qi, that means you’ll eventually face the essence of the god world. So you decide. You can already see the punishment the god world has meted out to the Sage Monarch Empire. They're clearly enemies. In fact, the god world directly told me this. War will break out soon, and there can't be a third major power. The god world won’t allow it. So let me summarize why I came here. First, to recruit you. Second, to warn you. Neither the essence of the god world nor Yang Qi will allow another major power to enter the picture. However, you have to wonder why Yang Qi hasn’t already come to take care of you. The reason is that he’s not worried about you. He’s trying to uncover clues leading to the Sovereign Lord and the True Devil. He wants to force them out and get rid of them so they won't cause unexpected problems later.”

“What?” the High Priestess said in astonishment. “The Sovereign Lord and the True Devil are still alive? Doesn’t the essence of the god world have some clue about where they are?”

“What's there to be surprised about?" the King of Godmammoths said. “We three survived the great tribulation. And those two were the top figures in the god world, far surpassing us. Yang Qi’s doing the right thing, tracking them down. After all, his success is built on the God Legion Seal and the Mahātmā Jade. Those two things contain the will of the Sovereign Lord and the True Devil, respectively. He has to find them and wipe them out, otherwise they could spring on him unexpectedly and try to possess him.”

After hearing the King of Godmammoths’ analysis, Proud Heaven laughed heartily. “You’re absolutely right, King of Godmammoths. So now do you understand? Think it through. If you join Yang Qi, you’ll enrage the essence of the god world even further. And you might even end up clashing with the Sovereign Lord and the True Devil. Surely you don’t want to fall into his hands again. You could try to form a third power, but that would result in you dying. In the end, your best bet is to join my dynasty, which is really run by the essence of the god world, not me.”

They understood their options.

Joining Yang Qi would be extremely risky. None of them could possibly deal with the essence of the god world, nor were they sure about the ramifications of the Sovereign Lord and the True Devil. Forming their own power structure seemed foolish. It seemed the third option was the best.

After a long moment of silence, the Demon Master said, “It seems siding with the essence of the god world is the best choice. But how exactly do we go about doing that? For example, I suggest I bring all of my Demonfolk with me. Otherwise, the power of your destiny will turn us into nothing but slaves.”

“Absolutely not,” Proud Heaven said. “This is a simple matter. The Demonfolk won't be allowed in, otherwise everything will descend into chaos. There are ten times as many Demonfolk in the god world as there are humans. My empire would collapse.”

Even the Demon Master had to admit that it was true that bringing so many Demonfolk into a human empire would lead to disaster.

“What if we just bring the Demonfolk God-Lords,” the King of Godmammoths said, “and you ordain us as nobility. What do you say? And of course, you have to promise not to harm us in any way.”

“That’ll work. All three of you will have the same rank. Agreed? Furthermore, I don’t have the right to execute you, nor randomly expel you. I can only deal with you as the essence of the god world wishes. Truth be told, this is all what the essence of the god world wants. For me to ordain you with titles will involve a big expenditure of destiny. In other words, it won’t do my empire much good. But the essence of the god world has convinced me to do it.”

“In that case, why don’t we discuss which God-Lords to bring? The total number will definitely be at least twice what you currently have. And we also need to come to an agreement about the titles of nobility.”

“What about the other Demonfolk?” the High Priestess said.

“Other Demonfolk?” the King of Godmammoths said mercilessly. “Hmph! We continue to force them to pray, building up the power of Operation Demon Destruction. That can be our trump card to use against Yang Qi.”

As long as he could transcend safely, he didn't care if all the other Demonfolk in the god world were wiped out.

“Agreed,” the High Priestess said. “With a deadly trump card like that, we won’t have to worry about unexpected opposition.”

Operation Demon Destruction was a destructive plan that involved having the Demonfolk constantly pray, building up immense curse power. It would twist the hearts of the Demonfolk who prayed, turning them into vengeful spirits that would be absorbed by the altar itself. When the power was unleashed, it would be enough to slaughter half-Annulled experts.

Proud Heaven didn’t dare to allow himself to be infected by that rancorous energy.

Of course, he knew that the “unexpected opposition” the High Priestess had mentioned referred to him.

That said, he had his own plans, and knew that if he said anything to oppose these three experts, they wouldn't join him.

‘These three have a very vicious plan in their Operation Demon Destruction. They plan to force all the Demonfolk to use a curse that turns them into rancorous spirits. When they unleash that power, it could damage the god world itself, let alone some empire. Of course, the price is the sacrifice of countless Demonfolk lives.’ Proud Heaven could see the process happening in the Demonfolk Empire even now.

The final weapon would be deadly. Proud Heaven wasn’t going to do anything about it now. First, he had to deal with Yang Qi, then the essence of the god world. After all, he had no sense of loyalty to the god world. He actually wanted to devour its essence.

“Of course you can go through with your Operation Demon Destruction,” he said. “I’ll even help you with it. Call your God-Lords into a meeting to explain what's happening, then carry on with your plan. The god world doesn’t want a bunch of Demonfolk in it anyway, so wiping them out will be good. And it will save a lot of resources.”

Thus, a master plan was hatched.

The King of Godmammoths and Proud Heaven sealed the deal, and countless Demonfolk God-Lords were summoned. Titles of nobility were handed out.

To Proud Heaven’s surprise, they didn’t even try to negotiate. Of course, the Demonfolk feared the essence of the god world, so there was no way they would make demands.

Several days passed before the process was complete.

Chapter 1595: Essence in Human Form (2)

Proud Heaven’s glib tongue had won over the King of Godmammoths, the Demon Master, and countless Demonfolk God-Lords. They would all join the Deathless Heaven Empire. And they signed a formal agreement allowing for all of them to share in the destiny.

Even Proud Heaven signed it, binding it with his own life force.

Next, Operation Demon Destruction was furthered. The Demonfolk God-Lords didn't care at all for their own kind. They treated them like livestock, and simply watched as their prayers ended with them being sacrificed.

Several months passed.

Thanks to the innumerable prayers being offered by the Demonfolk, a devil embryo now existed on the altar, and it was growing larger every day. It already pulsed with an energy that seemed to border on the half-Annulled level.

Eventually, it would become a rancorous spirit that would take the initiative to devour the Demonfolk around it, inflicting misery and suffering on them.

The Demonfolk in the god world were experiencing a tribulation like no other.

“Well, Operation Demon Destruction is roughly half accomplished,” said the King of Godmammoths. “The devil embryo has reached strength equivalent to the half-Annulled level, and can now feed itself. Let’s leave it to run amok in the god world, and head back to your empire to take our positions.” The King of Godmammoths couldn’t help but chuckle at the sight of the devil embryo.

He couldn't control it, nor could the Demon Master or the High Priestess. When the time came for Operation Demon Destruction to come to fruition, the devil-god would destroy the rest of the Demonfolk and become the most powerful entity imaginable.

“Alright, let’s go,” Proud Heaven said, casting a grim look at the devil embryo. He knew full well that the inhuman embryo could easily kill him, if he didn’t have the protection of the essence of the god world.

Right now, the King of Godmammoths and the others were afraid of the god world, not him. Otherwise, they would have done everything they could to kill him.

Once the devil embryo was complete, the King of Godmammoths wouldn’t have anything to fear from Proud Heaven’s empire. Of course, because of the agreement that had been signed, Proud Heaven couldn’t do anything against them. For now, they would go and take their official positions, then struggle for power using interest groups.

Of course, the King of Godmammoths and the Demon Master were already planning a way to overthrow Proud Heaven.

RUMBLE!

The Demonfolk God-Lords joined the four half-Annulled experts as they headed toward the Deathless Heaven Empire. Yang Qi saw all of this happening, and smiled. ‘Operation Demon Destruction? Ruthless. They're going to wipe out all the Demonfolk in the god world. The destructive power of that weapon is enough to wipe out any empire. That said, the King of Godmammoths is asking a tiger for its skin by joining Proud Heaven. The only question is how he’ll end up dying. It's a good thing I have my back door into his empire. I'm curious to see how things develop.’

Unfortunately, Yang Qi didn’t have time to waste on the King of Godmammoths and the others. He had been fully focused on trying to track down the True Devil and the Sovereign Lord over the past few months.

He was starting to wonder if they were really dead. That said, he was remaining on full alert, and wasn’t taking the situation lightly. He was still operating under the assumption that they were deep in hiding.

Over the course of the past months, his empire’s dynasty had grown, and he had built up more resources. A multiverse was forming in the depths of his empire, and each universe that made it up was complete with its own flow of time.

He was making his own natural laws.

Immense power was building up as he drew on primal-chaos paleo-energy.

Yang Immortal-Slayer becoming a half-Annulled expert had been extremely beneficial. He joined the Invincible Dugu in taking the lead in educating the experts of the empire in matters of their cultivation base. And as they led the people of the empire in prayer, they improved both individuals and the empire as a whole.

Jadefall and the others were constantly climbing in their cultivation, but unfortunately, none of them were able to reach the half-Annulled level.

That said, most of them had psychic scales between two and three hundred billion.

And all of them wore a combined version of the Mahātmā Jade and the God Legion Seal, created by Yang Qi after he became a full Fateless One. Although it was only about one percent as powerful as the original, that was still incredibly mighty.

By now, all of Yang Qi’s friends and family were on par with the Patriarch of the Universe and the others who had been sentenced to death by the Sovereign Lord. Unfortunately, further progress would be difficult.

Yang Qi knew that the bottleneck they faced didn’t have anything to do with him. Nothing he could do would help them reach the half-Annulled level.

Of course, there was another unique entity to consider, and that was the purrling.

It had been deeply asleep ever since Yang Qi reached the half-Annulled, and it wouldn’t wake up. It didn’t want to be affected by any karma, and Yang Qi was happy to go along with its wishes. He wasn't going to get any more help from it.

That said, he didn’t need help. He would face his enemies alone. No one could help him. He had to rely on himself, otherwise how could he possibly qualify to lead all living beings in transcendence?

Furthermore, he had enemies who operated in the open, and enemies in hiding. Those in the open were Proud Heaven and the essence of the god world. Those in hiding were the Sovereign Lord and the True Devil.

He had to be prepared to face both.

Thus, he was holding back his troops without moving.

When the King of Godmammoths, High Priestess, and Demon Master led the Demonfolk God-Lords into the Deathless Heaven Dynasty, everything trembled violently.

It was a result of the power of the Demonfolk.

At the moment, everyone was gathered in a public square to be officially ordained with titles.

Proud Heaven stood at the head of the crowd, but he hadn’t given out any of the ordainments yet.

At a certain point, the King of Godmammoths frowned and turned to the Demon Master and the High Priestess. “What exactly is Proud Heaven up to? Don’t tell me he's planning to back out of the agreement!”

The Demon Master chuckled coldly. “Even if he were ten times gutsier than he is, he wouldn’t back out. First of all, we have a signed contract connected to the destiny of his empire. Second, if we start fighting, it’d be devastating. Third, we could summon the devil soul from Operation Demon Destruction to absolutely destroy his empire.”

“Then what the hell is he up to?” the High Priestess asked.

“Let’s wait and see.”

Proud Heaven almost seemed to be in a trance, leading everyone present to have a very odd feeling about what was going on.

Hailan was there, but she wasn't speaking. She just stood there as if she knew exactly what Proud Heaven was planning.

All of a sudden, Proud Heaven opened his mouth.

However, what came out wasn’t a proclamation of ordainment. It was something else! “We offer respectful greetings, essence of the god world! Welcome to the Deathless Heaven Empire!”

RUMBLE!

RUUUUUUUUMBLE!

Mountain-crushing, sea-shattering force weighed down on the empire, causing all of the experts present to nearly pass out. Most of them dropped to the ground, where they remained in place unmoving. The King of Godmammoths and the others just barely managed to stay standing, and the God-Lords all dropped to all fours, making them look like frogs.

“What? Is this the essence of the god world?! It’s so strong!” The King of Godmammoths suddenly coughed up a mouthful of blood as the King of the Great Dao appeared behind him.

He wanted to fight back, but knew that he couldn’t. No half-Annulled could.

They were as helpless as children.

However, the pressure only lasted for a short while, whereupon everyone breathed sighs of relief. They could sense a mighty will converging before them, something that could dry up seas and crumble rocks, sink moons and bury stars, and crush the heavens and destroy all life.

It was a woman.

It seemed as though her each and every moment was filled with preheaven power, as if she controlled primal-chaos and could wield the boundless meridians and the great dao. She seemed like the incarnation of infinite glory, infinite order, infinite vital energy, infinite fate, and the infinite void.

She was the manifestation of the essence of the god world.

And she was the spitting image of Yang Qi’s mother, Greensura.

The essence of the god world had taken a shape. Normally speaking, the god world would take hundreds of years to form a thought, but now it could think like a normal person.

The essence of the god world was mightier than the Sovereign Lord, but because of the slowness of its thoughts, it was normally possible for the most elite experts to escape its wrath.

It was similar to how an elephant would have a great deal of trouble getting rid of a single ant.

But now that the god world had a human form, who could escape it? She looked over at the King of Godmammoths, the High Priestess, and the Demon Master.

They felt their hair standing on end as they realized they were absolutely powerless to stand up to this level of power, and that if they moved, they would likely be punished with death.

How very miserable.

All the schemes and plans these people had been considering were now completely pointless.

As it turned out, Proud Heaven hadn’t just been trying to intimidate them. He understood matters far more deeply than they did.

Chapter 1596: The Debut of Greensura

The essence of the god world had taken human form, and it looked exactly like Greensura. It might even be possible to say that it was Greensura, and Greensura was it.

The will of the god world had combined with Greensura in order to manifest itself.

Greensura was fundamentally an extraordinary individual. Considering she had given birth to Yang Qi, that much was obvious. However, the essence of the god world had changed her, otherwise she couldn’t have appeared in this fashion.

Which was more difficult: for an ant to turn into an elephant, or for an elephant to turn into an ant? Both would be extremely challenging.

“Hello, King of Godmammoths,” Greensura said. Her voice was clear and crisp, and everyone who heard it felt somehow comfortable and calm.

“Y-y-you... you,” the King of Godmammoths stammered, trembling physically. “You're the essence of the god world? How did you take this form?”

“I'm Greensura, Yang Qi’s mother. Yang Qi is a Fateless One, and considering I gave birth to him, what’s so surprising about this? King of Godmammoths, you worked with the Sovereign Lord in the past to try to siphon away my essence. But I killed the Sovereign Lord. Yet you’re still buzzing around causing trouble for me?”

“You...” the King of Godmammoths replied. “What are you planning to do?”

He obviously didn’t dare to take any action. He knew that if he did, he could end up dead in an instant.

“Join me to deal with Yang Qi,” Greensura said. “He might be my son, but he wants to transcend the god world, and I simply can't forgive crimes like that. And all I want to do is crush him down into his essence, that way the two of us can transcend together.”

“We intended all along to cooperate with you,” the High Priestess interjected quickly.

Greensura shook her head sadly. “You wanted to use your share of destiny to hatch all sorts of plots and schemes. Obviously, that won’t work. So I'm negating the clause about you being ordained as nobility. In fact, I'm cancelling the contract. You need to serve Proud Heaven unconditionally as slaves. After all, he’s my representative. Acknowledge allegiance to him, and you acknowledge allegiance to me. Understand? Now kowtow!”

“This...” Upon hearing that the contract was being canceled, a buzz rose up among the Demonfolk God-Lords. However, they didn't dare to do anything in defiance. And the destiny of the empire wasn’t affected at all.

After all, it wasn’t Proud Heaven who was rescinding the contract, it was Greensura, the essence of the god world. She was so powerful that there was no destiny backlash for doing things like that. In the god world, she was completely untouchable.

“What. Not willing to go along?” Greensura laughed. “In that case, I suppose I’ll have to purge you parasites. All you do is lurk on my body sucking my blood. Not exterminating you is just a waste of my resources!”

“No!” the High Priestess said, dropping to her knees. “Oh mighty essence of the god world, we're willing to acknowledge allegiance to you. We don't need any titles of nobility, or any share of the destiny. We’ll give destiny to the empire!”

The Demon Master also knew that the only option in dealing with this entity that dwarfed the Sovereign Lord... was to drop to his knees.

“What about you, King of Godmammoths?” Greensura said, looking at him.

The King of Godmammoths hesitated for a moment. However, he knew that a wise man knows when to back down when the odds are against him. Dropping to his knees, he said, “I acknowledge allegiance.”

“Good. You three, plus those Demonfolk God-Lords, will form the Sage-Extermination Battalion, an autonomous group that focuses on warfare. I’ll give you the resources you need, but keep in mind that you have no authority in the empire. You follow orders, and focus on cultivation, training, and war. Understand?”

With that, she severed their connection to the destiny of the empire. Going forward, they would be tools used to attack the enemy. And they obviously wouldn’t be able to act in their own interests.

Greensura did things efficiently, both bringing them into the empire and, at the same time, ensuring that they wouldn’t cause problems.

Normally speaking, the god world wouldn't have done something like this. But Greensura would. After all, she had commanded hosts of Demonfolk in the impure lands, back when she was the Holy Mother of the Hanging Mountain.

The combined version of her and the essence of the god world was now capable of countless plots and schemes.

“This...” the Demonfolk God-Lords murmured, exchanging awkward glances. However, they knew there was nothing they could do. They were now slaves, but at least they were in the Sage-Exterminating Battalion, which wasn't a bad thing, all things considered. The downside was that they were tools, little more than thralls that Greensura was obviously going to use to wage war on the Sage Monarch Empire.

When facing Proud Heaven, they could have fought back, or found ways to cut him down.

But they had no chance with Greensura.

Under Greensura’s command, all of the Demonfolk were brought into the empire, causing its destiny to surge wildly. With the host of God-Lords, plus three half-Annulled experts, as well as Greensura herself, it was impossible to say how high the destiny would go.

Yang Qi could do nothing but watch as the Deathless Heaven Empire’s destiny skyrocketed. In fact, the god world instantly expanded as streams of energy swept back and forth everywhere.

It wasn’t going to be possible to avoid war.

It was now obvious who the major forces in the god world were. The Demonfolk Empire was no more. The King of Godmammoths had control of the rancorous energy caused by the sacrifice of countless Demonfolk, and he was fully on the side of the Deathless Heaven Empire.

When the destiny of the Deathless Heaven Empire reached its absolute peak, filling every corner of the god world, when there were no other organizations at all, and when there were no other forces out in primal-chaos, that would be the time for the final battle.

That moment was rapidly approaching.

“There’s still time to work with,” Yang Qi murmured, sighing. Thanks to the back door in the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, he was aware of everything that had just occurred in the Deathless Heaven Empire.

He remembered everything about his mother, all of the details of her face, and everything else about her.

Sadly, this wasn’t his mother anymore. It was the essence of the god world, the mightiest entity there was, surpassing even the Sovereign Lord. It had absorbed his mother, and the only possible way to separate them was to seal the essence of the god world. That said, he was still convinced his mother was safe.

He would kill the essence of the god world, if he had to. There was nothing in the world he couldn't do, and he truly believed that he was the most powerful and competent god-spirit to exist in the many heavens.

All problems would have to be solved through the final battle.

All fates in the world led to war.

After the battle was fought, perhaps the god civilization would evolve into a new type of civilization. Or perhaps a new heaven and earth would be created, a new universe and a new age.

Proud Heaven’s empire was growing, and Yang Qi’s empire was also growing. Both were devouring primal-chaos paleo-energy to get stronger, and both were putting everything on the line.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi’s cultivation base was rising. With every breath he took, his aura got closer and closer to being Annulled.

Unfortunately, he still hadn’t located the Sovereign Lord and the True Devil, which made him very worried about where exactly they were.

If he didn’t find them, the essence of the god world probably would. Obviously, it knew exactly how dangerous and powerful they were.

All of Yang Qi's friends and family knew that war was coming; therefore, all of them focused heavily on their cultivation. There were no locations in the god world that hadn’t been explored. The ruins had all been dug up, and the most powerful objects had been added to the Everlasting Aegis.

The Everlasting Aegis produced brand new preheaven treasures constantly, and Yang Qi had even started working on the Minor Halls of Heaven.

As Yang Qi breathed, he absorbed the primal-chaos paleo-energy and used it to create all sorts of treasures. Then he took those treasures, compressed them, and used them to create ship-like structures that resembled the old Halls of Heaven, except smaller. At the moment, they only had about one percent of the level of power as the original.

He then inserted the small versions of the Halls of Heaven into his sage monarch magistrates, making them much stronger. He did the same with his friends and family, who would then be able to practice their cultivation much faster. Unfortunately, none of them were able to enter the half-Annulled level. That said, all of them were strong enough that they could at least hold their own against a single half-Annulled opponent.

His people were growing stronger and stronger. As for the Ascendants, they had already surpassed the Dragonfolk and the Spritefolk.

Although he couldn’t produce more half-Annulled experts, he had all sorts of God-Lords popping up everywhere. Their numbers reached a hundred thousand, then two hundred thousand. And when the men and women became couples, they produced offspring whose cultivation advanced rapidly.

Yang Qi observed for a while, then closed his eyes.

He knew that it wouldn't be long before it would either be the time of transcendence, or the time of destruction. Everything would explode, or everything would die. The god world included. In fact, so were the immortal worlds and the impure lands. Once Yang Qi went to war with the essence of the god world, nothing would be left behind.

The universe was about to enter the cycle of reincarnation.

Either that, or it would never again be reincarnated, nor would it produce new life. All eras would end, and eternal night would come about.

He breathed slowly, remaining still and quiet in thought.

Then he sent a stream of divine will down to surround the god world. He heard voices that sounded like those of mothers speaking to children, holding them in a warm embrace.

‘The essence of the god world is calling me.’

He opened his eyes, and they looked completely calm as he stepped out of the Sage Monarch Empire and into primal-chaos. It was a dangerous thing to do, as he was outside of the protection of his empire and its destiny. Therefore, he didn’t want to go too far.

That said, the only possible threat he could face was the essence of the god world.

Chapter 1597: A Discussion with ‘Mother&#039;

The essence of the god world had called out to Yang Qi.

Therefore, he stepped out of his empire into primal-chaos. Looking around, he could see the primal-chaos slowly shrinking, like a lake that was slowly evaporating in the hot sun and turning into a quagmire.

The world of primal-chaos was large, but with the god world and the Sage Monarch Empire constantly expanding, it was slowly getting smaller and smaller.

Two tigers cannot live on one mountain. One sea cannot contain two dragons.

Resources were limited.

One day, the resources would run out, and death would result.

From their perspective, both Yang Qi and the essence of the god world could see the changes occurring.

Clasping his hands behind his back, Yang Qi said, “Show yourself.”

A mighty will descended, taking human form a few dozen meters in front of him. It was Greensura.

Yang Qi’s mother.

Of course, Yang Qi knew that this terrifying entity wasn’t truly his mother. His real mother no longer existed, having been absorbed by the essence of the god world and turned into something different.

“I'm honestly surprised you left the safety of your empire to meet me, Yang Qi,” she said with a smile. “I didn’t think you’d take that risk.”

“Why wouldn’t I?” he said, his face completely expressionless. “Scum like the King of Godmammoths might be afraid of you, but I'm honestly not worried at all. Why exactly have you called for a meeting instead of just starting the final war?”

“Is that how you speak to your mother?” she said with a slight frown.

“You’re the essence of the god world, and we’re foreordained to fight each other. So stop wasting words. This is a war for existence. Look around. The world of primal-chaos paleo-energy is shrinking. In the end, only one person can have access to all the resources. If we could share them, we could both transcend.

“But that's not going to happen. So this is a war of resources, survival, and transcendence. Only with complete command of the resources can one of us transcend and reach the other shore of pāramitā. Anyone who tries to stop us will be eradicated. You know that as well as I do, so stop with the sentimental nonsense. I don’t want to hear anything about familial love, friendship, or romantic love.”

Yang Qi had perfectly described the determination that was involved in transcendence.

Everything was false. Only transcendence was true and real.

When it came to transcendence, things like emotions and love were nonsense. Infantile. Laughable.

Yang Qi wasn’t afraid of the essence of the god world. He knew the essence was incredibly mighty, and was the most powerful entity to have ever existed. But that didn’t change the fact that he was the top expert in the god world. So he wasn't going to allow himself to be pushed around.

Besides, even before he had absorbed the other half of the fateless energy, he was already strong enough to crush the King of Godmammoths, Demon Master, and High Priestess.

After absorbing the fateless energy, he had advanced by leaps and bounds, reaching an enigmatic state in which he could break through to the ultimate level at any moment.

Furthermore, his efforts to duplicate minor versions of the Halls of Heaven had pushed his cultivation base to a completely different level. He was now many times beyond the level of the old Sovereign Lord. Thus, he didn't fear the essence of the god world. At least, not as long as he was outside of the god world.

It would have the advantage there, on home ground. But out in primal-chaos, it couldn't simply kill him. This was neutral ground, where they were surrounded by nothing but endless primal-chaos paleo-energy.

This was the most powerful man in existence, and the most powerful woman.

Of course, the essence of the god world could have taken either male or female form.

“Well said,” Greensura said. “As a Fateless One, you’re just as stupendous as would be expected. You’re definitely my biggest enemy. That said, given your fateless origin, why exactly do you want to lead all living beings into transcendence? Don’t you realize that only a single individual can transcend?”

“You're wrong about that. The only way to transcend is along with all living beings. Without them, it's impossible. Death will result. The reason for that is that the living beings of the world are required to tap into its energy. Without the people, there wouldn't be any energy in the world to begin with. It’s a simple truth, don’t you agree?” Yang Qi waved his hand, causing a starry sky to appear in front of him. Within it was a planet orbiting a star, upon which humans came to be. Millions and millions of years passed, during which the humans eventually developed the ability to create power that surpassed that of their own planet. They eventually traveled to other planets. One day, their own planet was reaching the end of its life, and was about to sink into destruction. However, the humans were able to save it by infusing it with new life force.

“See? Things like this have happened in the impure lands many times over. Worlds exist only because of the living beings that occupy them. It’s a beautiful thing. With living beings, transcendence is possible.”

“You’re mistaken,” Greensura said. “Living beings are parasites that waste resources and power. The more people, the more waste. The only possible path is to kill them all and allow one individual to have access to all the resources. That’s the key to transcending. And the fact that you’re taking away the primal-chaos paleo-energy that I need... well, it's a big threat to me.”

“You can’t do anything to me,” Yang Qi said.

“Is that so? Well, the more primal-chaos paleo-energy I devour, the bigger I get. Once the primal-chaos paleo-energy is all gone, your world will be exposed, and I’ll devour it too.”

“We're both devouring the primal-chaos paleo-energy. And thanks to the people in my empire, my use of it is many times more efficient than yours. Even if I devoured dozens of times less primal-chaos paleo-energy, I’d still be more than a match for you in the final battle. You say living beings aren’t useful, yet you're using Proud Heaven and the others to make destiny, and to power your war machine. After all, devouring primal-chaos paleo-energy to create resources doesn’t instantly result in fighting prowess.”

Yang Qi had hit the nail on the head.

The essence of the god world could devour primal-chaos paleo-energy and create resources, but the resources required living beings to turn them into fighting prowess.

He had only been telling the truth. The people in his empire made his use of resources many times more efficient. He could use one-tenth the resources to create an equivalent amount of fighting prowess. In Proud Heaven’s empire, on the other hand, everyone operated with selfish motives, which meant that they required ten times as many resources as Yang Qi to produce the same result.

In other words, even before the primal-chaos paleo-energy was completely devoured, Yang Qi’s empire would definitely surpass the fighting prowess of the god world. The god world would be at a disadvantage, and he could crush it.

To Yang Qi, it was obvious why the essence of the god world had been so anxious to assume human form and meet him. Greensura knew that the end result of the current situation would be disadvantageous for it. Therefore, she wanted war sooner rather than later.

Beforehand, though, she wanted to see how strong Yang Qi really was.

In response to Yang Qi pointing out her weaknesses, Greensura smiled and prepared to hit back in kind. “You’re right that you can benefit a bit by ruling those bugs. But there’s something you've forgotten. In fact, there are two things that are going to stab you in the back. I doubt you know what I'm talking about.”

“The Sovereign Lord and the True Devil?” Yang Qi said.

“Oh, so you do know. Then why aren’t you out there looking for them? Those venomous bastards could jump out at any moment to overthrow your empire. But I have a way to find them, if you want it. But I have to warn you, they’re actually hiding in your empire. That’s the price you have to pay for using the God Legion Seal and the Mahātmā Jade.”

“I’ll find them on my own,” Yang Qi replied. “I wouldn't want to trouble you.”

“If only you’d join me, Yang Qi,” she said. “Bring your Sage Monarch Empire back into the god world. I'm your mother, after all. I don’t want to kill you.”

Yang Qi laughed. “If I came back into the god world, you’d devour me. You just told me you want to devour all other living things. That’s your plan, to consolidate power and transcend. As a Fateless One, you’d benefit a lot from assimilating me. Do you think I'm a child that I would believe your lies?”

She smiled. “No, Yang Qi. You’ve miscalculated. There’s something that I can’t devour, something that the both of us could use to transcend together.”

All of a sudden, everything clicked for Yang Qi, and his eyes blazed with incisive light. “The Great Necropolis?”

“Exactly. As the essence of the god world, there’s only one thing I fear, and it’s not you. It’s the Great Necropolis.” When she spoke the words, her eyes flickered with hatred. “I can devour all the resources there are, but not the Great Necropolis. Furthermore, it can stop me from transcending. It’s the only flaw that exists in my plan, the only thing that can ruin everything. But you have the power to assimilate it. So join me. I’ll give you the Great Necropolis. Then I can devour everyone else and transcend. What do you think? You use the Great Necropolis to transcend, I’ll use all the living beings in existence. It’s the perfect plan. All existence will belong to you and me. Mother and son.”

This was a true proposal, not a trick.

However, Yang Qi had a question. “I thought you had made your choice already in Proud Heaven.”

“Proud Heaven?” She laughed. “That rapacious wolf? I know full well that he's secretly planning to use the Great Necropolis against me. But how could childish plots like that slip past me? I’ll make it very simple: if you join me, we can kill Proud Heaven. He's nothing but a slave anyway.”

Chapter 1598: The Perfect Plan of Cooperation

Proud Heaven was a vicious wolf who would stop at nothing to get what he wanted.

Both Yang Qi and Greensura knew that.

In fact, if Greensura didn’t know, it would reveal her to be a massive idiot who didn’t deserve to have fused with the essence of the god world. Yet she was still willing to use Proud Heaven. He was the perfect genius to use against Yang Qi, and in fact, without him, the entire effort would have been impossible.

But if she could get Yang Qi to join her, she would kill Proud Heaven without hesitation. Then she could give the Great Necropolis to Yang Qi, while she devoured everything in the god world in preparation for transcendence.

After all, she needed someone to assimilate the Great Necropolis, otherwise she couldn’t transcend.

Although Proud Heaven had command of a portion of the necropolis, he couldn’t assimilate the entire thing. Only Yang Qi had that power.

If Yang Qi couldn't do it, no one could.

There was just one critical point that hadn’t been clarified. “So,” Yang Qi said, “you want to devour my empire, along with all my friends and family?”

“That’s right. You know as well as I that your empire is just too big. It has too much of a negative influence on my development. Because of it, I can't get all the resources I need. Your friends and family steal my resources. Furthermore, you have that purrling there with you. It's a unique entity that exists separate from all types of karma. I need to devour it as well. It's a tradeoff. You get the Great Necropolis, but I kill everyone. We’ll be the only two beings left. That's what it means to transcend. No third living being can be left alive.”

“In that case, I refuse,” Yang Qi said with a decisiveness that could sever nails and chop iron. “The only way to end this is with war.”

He wasn’t even sure if he could assimilate the Great Necropolis. But the more salient point was that abandoning his empire and his brethren to get it just wasn’t an option.

“Fine. Then I guess this discussion is over. It’s time to prepare for war.” Greensura had created the ‘perfect plan’ of cooperation.

But Yang Qi would never abandon his empire and its people. So the idea of cooperation popped like a bubble. War would be the outcome, and no one had any idea how it would all end.

However, one thing was certain: Yang Qi needed time to find the Sovereign Lord and the True Devil.

Sadly, there was no way the essence of the god world would readily give him that time.

Every moment that passed was bad for the essence of the god world. Although the god world could devour resources much more quickly than the Everlasting Aegis, those resources weren’t particularly effective in terms of fighting prowess. In other words, the potential of Proud Heaven’s empire was limited.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi’s empire had fighting prowess that was only continuing to rise.

Everyone there was a sage or mahātmā. Even the children were born that way. It led to a terrifying level of power.

“Well then, Yang Qi, our mother-son relationship ends here and now. Going forward, we have nothing to look forward to but war. I hope you’re ready to face my wrath.”

Yang Qi laughed. “I could’ve told you before that we weren’t mother and son. I'm going to kill you and bring my real mother back. Let the war begin. And by the way, yes, I'm ready.”

“Ai...” she sighed. “You're strong, but in the end, you’re going to be destroyed. You might be the most powerful expert to have ever existed, but you're still just human. I'm the ultimate entity to exist in all the many heavens and myriad worlds. I represent everything. The great dao. Fate. Power. Glory. Anything and everything. Everything and anything. It’s all encompassed in me. There’s no way you can win a war with me. Your empire and your people aren’t going to survive.”

“I guess we’ll see,” Yang Qi said.

RUMBLE!

Greensura vanished without a trace.

As soon as she returned, the god world changed. Yang Qi saw it suddenly brighten, and could sense an evil climate from within it. Apparently, the mass destruction of the living beings there had already begun.

The god world was an inherently vile existence. When Yang Qi had first arrived, it snowed for months. And it had experienced ice ages that lasted for thousands of years. Other times, summer would bake the lands as if with fire.

Now, its climate had become millions upon millions of times worse than before. The light that shone down on it could kill Paramount Gods, and destroy virtually any god kingdom that had been set up in its multiverse. Resources were no longer created anywhere in the god world, nor could safety be found anywhere. Except the Deathless Heaven Empire.

The essence of the god world was transforming its physical shape, ensuring that no living beings were there to take resources. Not even the most powerful old-timers could continue to exist.

A massive tempest raged through the universes of the god world, and no one could escape destruction.

It was a catastrophe the likes of which had never been seen. The radiation from it even seeped out into the world of primal-chaos, forcing the old-timers who remained hidden there to flee into the Deathless Heaven Empire, lest they die.

Greensura was preparing for the final attack.

Yang Qi could see mass destruction playing out in the god world. Humans. Demonfolk. Countless civilizations. They were all dying.

Back when he’d arrived in the god world, it had been a rich and marvelous place.

Small nations like the Lightningbolt Continent had numbered as many as the eternal sands, places where Lesser Gods were the patriarchs.

But places like that were of little note. Even back when the three-dynasty alliance had existed, Yang Qi hadn't been able to consider conquering them.

But now, all of that was going away. The climate itself was horrible enough to eradicate the common people. And there was nothing Yang Qi could do about it. There was no way for him to save those people or those civilizations.

The essence of the god world was destroying all civilizations.

In some ways, it was a natural thing. In the impure lands, planets would often experience catastrophes that wiped out all life on them. That was what happened when people got too comfortable, and disturbed the natural order of things.

What he could do was search through the primal-chaos paleo-energy to find any old-timers in hiding, to see if they would be willing to join him.

The battlefield needed to be prepared, cleaned such that a third force couldn’t arise to cause problems.

“Speed up operations!” Yang Qi ordered, and the Everlasting Aegis sped up, devouring primal-chaos paleo-energy at a greater rate than before. At the same time, he adjusted the flow of time.

For every day that passed in the god world, a thousand years passed in Yang Qi’s empire.

After all, at the current rate, the resources wouldn’t last for very long.

However, after some time he had to change the flow of time again.

Now, for every day that passed in the god world, ten would pass in his kingdom. Allowing a thousand years to pass would cause the population to grow far too rapidly.

In order to devour the resources that were required, Yang Qi transformed into a primal-chaos elder-snake. He was King Heaven-Devourer. Actually, he had already surpassed King Heaven-Devourer. He was more like a primal-chaos elder-dragon!

And it was with mad abandon that he devoured the primal-chaos paleo-energy.

In fact, he wasn’t thinking about anything else.

Thus, days passed. Eventually, after a certain amount of time had gone by, the primal-chaos paleo-energy shivered. It had grown visibly thin, and beyond it was nothing but a boundless void with absolutely nothing in it, and no end. It was a place of eternal silence and emptiness.

Yang Qi’s empire was now ten times larger than before, and it was so powerful it seemed completely and utterly capable of crushing the god world below it.

Meanwhile, everything was still and silent in the god world. Within its multiverse, no life existed. Everything was dark. The Demonfolk were no more.

There was only one location left worth noting, and that was the Deathless Heaven Empire.

“It's been three years already?”

During the years since his conversation with Greensura, they had both made plenty of preparations. However, despite the growth in Yang Qi’s empire, or the increase in God-Lords, he still hadn’t made any more half-Annulled experts. There were only three.

As for the Deathless Heaven Dynasty, they had Proud Heaven, the King of Godmammoths, the Demon Master, and the High Priestess. There was no fifth. Greensura didn't count, as she was of a much higher level.

The primal-chaos paleo-energy was very thin.

The countless old-timers who remained were shaken as they realized that the final war was about to begin, a war that would determine the fate of the many heavens and the myriad worlds.

In the Sage Monarch Empire, everyone was calm. They looked upon death as going home, and were ready to fight. In contrast, the people in the Deathless Heaven Empire still had plots and schemes of their own that they were hoping to carry out. That said, the leaders kept strict control over everyone.

The destinies of the two empires had reached the limit, and the clash between the two would shake all of the universes and worlds that existed.

As the two destinies probed each other, the multiverse of the Sage Monarch Empire trembled, and the same happened to the god world.

By now, the Sage Monarch Empire was roughly a third as large as the god world, which went to show how much Yang Qi had accomplished in growing it.

As for Yang Qi’s cultivation base, no one could assess it.

Chapter 1599: Let the War Begin!

The primal-chaos paleo-energy was finally thinning out. Generally speaking, it would be considered a bad thing, as it indicated that the many heavens and myriad worlds were going to run out of resources.

Furthermore, it meant that war was coming.

In the Deathless Heaven Empire, inside the Central God-Palace, Greensura sat on a high throne, with Proud Heaven on a smaller throne below her. Standing at an even lower level were the King of Godmammoths, High Priestess, and Demon Master. The other old-timers were all kneeling.

“Everyone, prepare for war,” Proud Heaven said.

The atmosphere was very tense, and no one dared to speak. When Proud Heaven made his announcement, everyone felt their hearts sink as they knew that the time had come to fight the Sage Monarch Empire.

Greensura didn't do any of the talking. She had Proud Heaven do it for her.

Proud Heaven’s aura seemed invincible. At the same time, he seemed to be vibrating constantly, sending out a rock-like energy that made him seem like some sort of ancient necropolis. His mere gaze was enough to freeze anyone in place and cause prickles of discomfort. By now, the King of Godmammoths knew without a doubt that he wasn’t a match for Proud Heaven. Not by a longshot.

During the past three years of rest, recovery, and preparations, Proud Heaven had grown stronger by several times over. Not even the Sovereign Lord could be a match for him now. As for his psychic scale, it had already blown past a trillion.

The King of Godmammoths and the Demon Master still controlled the power of Operation Demon Destruction, thus were backed by a dimension with a sealed devil soul in it, as well as immense curse power. They could unleash it at any time as the most powerful of weapons.

Greensura had helped complete Operation Demon Destruction, and was planning to use it against Yang Qi.

If Yang Qi’s empire were to be hit with a devastating blow like that, it would surely reveal its weaknesses and allow for even more fatal blows to be unleashed upon it.

No one really knew how much the Deathless Heaven Empire had grown during the past three years.

The King of Godmammoths wasn’t involved in the upper workings of the dynasty, but he knew that new experts had proliferated like bamboo after a spring rain. They had dozens of times as many God-Lords as before, perhaps even as many as a hundred times. The god world had never seen a level of force like this. Compared to the Deathless Heaven Empire, both the Sovereign Lord’s old dynasty and the Sage Monarch Empire were like children’s toys. After all, the Sovereign Lord had been fighting against the True Devil, Demon Master, King Immortal-Slayer, Wretch God, and others. But now, there were only two forces in existence: the Sage Monarch Empire and the Deathless Heaven Empire.

“Presumably, you’re mentally prepared,” Proud Heaven said, looking over the crowd. This fight is to determine the fate of everything, including the god world. The Sage Monarch Empire is a cancer that has to be eradicated completely. Don’t worry, we’re going to win. We have to win. We’re going to wipe out everyone from the Sage Monarch Empire, down to the chickens and dogs! It's also the time to enrich yourselves. If you see something you want, take it, whatever it is.”

Everyone present exchanged surreptitious glances as they wondered if Proud Heaven was telling the truth. Did the Deathless Heaven Empire really have a chance of winning?

“We're definitely going to win,” Hailan said. “His Majesty and I will personally lead the army, along with our aegis, out to meet Yang Qi. The entire god world will move to the location of the Sage Monarch Empire. And we will have the advantage!”

Even as the words left her mouth, the god world started trembling and everyone could sense that it was moving upward, slowly heading toward the Sage Monarch Empire.

Ever since the Sage Monarch Empire and the Everlasting Aegis had risen above the god world, everyone in the god world could look up and see it. And over the past three years, it had been obvious that it had been growing larger, until it seemed to cover almost everywhere in the god world.

It caused an immense weight to crush down on them. But now, as the god world rose up, they eventually reached the position of being on the same level as the Sage Monarch Empire.

As the destinies of the two empires clashed, the destructive force created an empty space between them, which would be the battlefield.

Each clash of destiny caused both empires to tremble, resulting in the destruction of innumerable heavens and worlds.

All of a sudden, Yang Qi sensed the passageway to the impure lands opening up from the force. As the shockwaves swept forth, everything in both the impure lands and the immortal world was destroyed. The Titan Emperor Heaven, the Rich-Lush Continent, the Quake-Dawn Continent, Yanhaven, the Demi-Immortal Institute.

Everything was now nothing but a distant memory.

It was a new beginning.

The past was being swept away by the wind, dispersed like clouds.

Yang Qi stood at the forefront of his brethren and people as the god world rose up before them. Everyone had placid expressions and faint smiles, making them look almost like sleeping children.

From the look of it, everyone knew that war was coming, and after that, transcendence.

“My people,” Yang Qi said, his voice echoing throughout the silence of his empire. “The time of transcendence has come. The final battle is here. No one will pose an obstacle for our will. If the dao of heaven blocks us, we will crush it. If fate tries to hold us back, we will destroy it. After this battle, we’ll enjoy eternal peace and tranquility. It will be a new age, the likes of which has never been seen before. It will surpass the civilization of the gods, and will form an epic saga that lasts for all time.”

In response, cheering rang out everywhere.

“Let the fight begin!” Yang Susu cried.

“Fight!” shouted Jadefall. All of Yang Qi’s other friends and family took up similar cries.

“To battle!” Yang Qi said.

RUMBLE....

His empire opened its doors and endless hordes of people flooded out, instantly getting into formations that could destroy anything in their path.

Heaven and earth vanished.

The universe became nothing.

It was like a dream.

This was truly mighty power.

Before the god world could stabilize its position, Yang Qi and the armies of the Sage Monarch Empire smashed into it.

Immeasurable force slammed into the greyspace of the god world.

The people of the Sage Monarch Empire were like floodwaters, singing divine songs as they bore the quintessence of their empire.

“The Eternal Living Beings; Pursuing Your Ideal; In the Depths of the Void; The Aeonic Empty Spirit.”

“The Free and Unfettered Spirit; When Tribulation Descends; Atop the Ruins, a Beautiful Flower Blooms!”

“The Mighty Will; Severing the Yoke of Thought; The Founding of Civilization; Creating the Age of an Epic Saga!”

“The Psyche of Predestination; Controlling the Fetters of Fate; By Means of the Deathless Charge, Freedom is Attained!”

“Heft Your Sword; Lift it High; the World, the Sky, the Earth, the Universe, the Legion of Gods... Nothing Can Block our Path!”

Countless songs and hymns were being sung by the citizens, arias regarding the destruction of heaven and earth, the end of the universe, the reincarnation of life, new epochs, and new starts.

This was Yang Qi’s empire. These were his people. These were his gods. This was his civilization. Nothing had been seen like these wills, these songs, this might, this grandeur. It could overwhelm everything, like a tempest sweeping over the battlefield. The greatest epic sagas of the past paled in comparison.

Yang Qi’s people were a true people.

And he was leading the charge.

BAM!

As they smashed into the greyspace of the god world, everything trembled. The multiverse of the god world cracked loudly, and began to crumble. The god world was the mightiest thing in the many heavens, but it was at a disadvantage. And it couldn’t stop the charge.

SPLAT!

All dimensions within the Deathless Heaven Empire received a staggering blow, and spell formations and god kingdoms collapsed left and right. People evaporated.

Countless citizens were turned to dust.

There were even old-timers in the court who coughed up blood, completely shocked that Yang Qi's initial blow would be this severe.

The chanting and singing echoed in their minds. Whether it was the Patriarch of the Universe, Yang Chiliocosm, or other old-timers, including the government officials, grand princes, monarch rulers, imperial dukes, marquises, and other leaders.

Their empire couldn’t even stand up to even a single blow from Yang Qi’s empire. They couldn’t fight a people like this. The destiny of the Sage Monarch Empire was simply overwhelming, making theirs seem like a joke.

The Sage Monarch Empire had a will that could topple mountains and drain seas, and its people were completely and utterly united.

This was a true empire.

The people of the Deathless Heaven Empire, even those like the King of Godmammoths, felt like an unruly mob in the face of this charge. They were like gangsters who lived by extorting the weak, only to face an unstoppable army of divine soldiers. The two simply couldn't compare.

Chapter 1600: The Grand Finale

The Grand Finale had arrived.

War had broken out between the god world and the Sage Monarch Empire, and there was no embellishment involved. There was no time wasted on empty speeches. Yang Qi led his citizens out, singing psalms and anthems, leading an attack that immediately unleashed devastation on the Deathless Heaven Empire.

Just that first blow served as a staunch warning.

Everyone in the Deathless Heaven Empire immediately realized that their disorganized forces were like nothing. Their empire was little more than a pack of disorderly hooligans.

Yang Qi’s Empire represented true sages, true destiny, and true transcendence. There was no denying it.

CRACK!

Destructive power flowed through the god world.

The greyspace of the Deathless Heaven Empire began crumbling, and sagelight pierced inside, transforming anyone it touched into ash.

Even Proud Heaven was deeply shaken.

As for Hailan, she coughed up a mouthful of blood.

Everyone who wasn't a half-Annulled expert felt doom and destruction about to overwhelm them.

“Damn you!” Proud Heaven growled, his face ashen. Then a mighty aura erupted from his forehead, spreading out to stabilize his empire. His aura was fused with the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart, which was supposed to provide an impenetrable defense. Sadly for him, it wasn’t doing anything right now.

The greyspace created by his aura and the Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart might as well have been made of paper.

Already, the second attack was incoming.

All of the leaders could see clearly that the Sage Monarch Empire was unleashing everything. And the next attack was going to be ten times stronger than the previous.

The singing rang in their ears, shaking them down to their souls. As for the sight that met their eyes, it was like a magnificent and majestic opera playing out right in front of them.

It was a power they couldn’t stand up to.

Unless something happened to change the flow of events, they were going to be destroyed by this attack. No one could stop it, not even the god world itself.

How could anyone have predicted that Yang Qi would grow this strong in only three years? How had the Sage Monarch Empire advanced to such a level?

The King of Godmammoths looked drained, and his eyes contained nothing but terror.

The High Priestess and Demon Master looked similarly grim and terrified. They realized now more than ever that they couldn't fight Yang Qi. The destruction he could wreak was millions upon millions of times their own level. It was something that vastly surpassed the half-Annulled level in every way.

There was only one tiny scrap of hope left.

Greensura.

She rose to her feet, and as she did, she grew to a size that made the god world itself look small. She was clearly the most powerful entity in existence! She waved her finger, ending with it pointing right at the flood of troops from the Sage Monarch Empire. She was unleashing her power to crush that river!

Yang Qi was at the forefront of the army, and when he saw Greensura move her arm, he knew what was coming.

“Go!”

All of a sudden, he grew incomparably large and mighty, such that he was on equal standing with the essence of the god world.

The essence of the Sage Monarch World was about to clash with the essence of the god world. He also waved his finger out, but without any flourish or fanfare. Instantly, a wave of brilliant light swept forth, like the light of eyes, swords, blades, and gods.

WHACK!

The two streams of power collided, and a massive shock wave rolled out, destroying countless things. Universes collapsed. Worlds, immortal worlds, the past, present, future, and everything else vanished. History, the myths of the gods, and time itself ceased to exist.

As the past, present, and future converged into a single eternal point, a new beginning of dazzling radiance emerged. The eternal had been converted into dust and smoke, and the deathless was changed into nothing

RUMBLE!

Yang Qi and Greensura were both shaken deeply.

They had both left their empires, and were in the middle of the world of primal-chaos, where they were unleashing their most deadly attacks. Meanwhile, the people of the two empires were fighting fiercely.

There was a lot of fighting to come.

“Operation Demon Destruction!”

The King of Godmammoths and the Demonfolk waved their arms, sending out the devil embryo! All of the Demonfolk in the god world had been converted by means of a curse into this devil embryo, which flew out toward the Sage Monarch Empire.

The devil embryo’s body was made of countless universes, and as it lunged toward the river of troops from the Sage Monarch Empire, it seemed to roil with black clouds and sinister winds, as well as the wailing of ghosts and weeping of gods.

“A mighty will, turned into a monster....”

The Invincible Dugu and Yang Immortal-Slayer charged forth, leading endless waves of sage monarch magistrates, all of them chanting curses.

SPLAT!

Every citizen of the empire exhaled, and countless versions of the Halls of Heaven shot out, then converged, creating a stream of distorted radiance and light that shot forth to meet the devil embryo.

The rancorous energy and curses that made up the devil embryo of Operation Demon Destruction suddenly turned, smiling viciously as it looked at the Deathless Heaven Empire.

Shockingly, the power of Operation Demon Destruction was being turned on them!

“Crap!” The King of Godmammoths, Demon Master, High Priestess, and countless Demon Master God-Lords went crazy with fear and started screaming, “Get out of the way! Run!”

They knew full well how terrifying Operation Demon Destruction was.

Its power was sufficient to destroy empires. It was their trump card, and the fact that it was turning on them caused their hearts to go cold. Chaos ensued, and the only person who maintained their calm was Proud Heaven.

His expression was cold as he reached out and made a grasping gesture. As he did, the Great Necropolis appeared and its power rumbled out to absorb the essence of the god world!

As a result, the god world immediately shrank down to ten percent of its previous size.

In contrast, the Great Necropolis grew to be thousands of times as big as the Halls of Heaven. It swept forth, covering the deathless devil embryo and the river of light created by the Halls of Heaven, after which a shriek rang out. Then the Great Necropolis shrank down and entered Proud Heaven’s body again.

Devil energy and sagelight seethed inside Proud Heaven, a result of him devouring both the devil embryo and the Halls of Heaven.

The combination of power caused his cultivation base to climb, and at the same time, let him clamp down on the vital energy of the Sage Monarch Empire.

“Well done. Very well done,” he said, and his voice was so loud that it overwhelmed the sound of the fighting between Greensura and Yang Qi. Of course, while it was his power, it was also the power of the Great Necropolis.

“I finally opened the doors of the Great Necropolis, allowing me to devour both Operation Demon Destruction and the Halls of Heaven created by the citizens of the Sage Monarch Empire. My power, my psyche, my cultivation base, and my Great Necropolis are all awakening.” Already, his power was surging to incredible levels. “Everyone in the Deathless Heaven Empire, listen to me. Do you know why no true Annulled expert has ever existed in this world? It’s because the resources of the god world aren’t enough to push anyone to that level. The most it can handle is half-Annulled. But I can go beyond that. I have a way to reach the true Annulled level. And it's all because of the Great Necropolis. The Great Necropolis is designed to bury, and being buried is being Annulled. My power is such that neither the essence of the god world nor Yang Qi can match me. I'm going to truly transcend, and all of you are going to die!”

RUMBLE!

Proud Heaven's cultivation base started rising rapidly. Then, his fist rocketed out in the direction of where Greensura was fighting Yang Qi.

Both Yang Qi and Greensura had been holding nothing back, and the fighting had already become difficult between the two of them.

But then Proud Heaven flew out, summoning the Great Necropolis to attack them. Both could sense the aura of death approaching.

But what kind of person was Yang Qi? He had defied the dao of heaven to become invincible, and had anticipated a moment like this would arrive. And he knew the time had come to use his trump card.

“Sage monarch magistrates: power up! Rise to the level of God-Lords. Take your power from primal-chaos, the god world, the universe, and from fate!”

Yang Qi threw his hands up, then dropped them down.

As his hands dropped, the sage monarch magistrates began changing. They threw their heads back and let loose long howls as their power and wills erupted. In the blink of an eye, all of the primal-chaos and essence of the god world was sucked into them. At the same time, inside of them, it was possible to see the Mahātmā Jade, God Legion Seal, and Halls of Heaven.

RUMBLE!

Countless explosions could be heard from within the god world as the sage monarch magistrates became vastly stronger.

Crack!

Each and every sage monarch magistrate became a God-Lord, one after another. And as they did, a chain reaction resulted, as their wills, spirits, and cultivation bases suddenly became void.

The sage monarch magistrates were all becoming God-Lords.

As a billion of them absorbed the primal-chaos, it became thinner and thinner around them. It was like a mist that was slowly fading away.

Meanwhile, Yang Qi’s power was growing. Clenching both hands into fists, he launched strikes at both Proud Heaven and Greensura. One of them slammed into the Great Necropolis and the other sent Greensura staggering backward.

At the same time, the King of Godmammoths and his comrades were engaged in fierce fighting with the Sage Monarch Empire, with people falling in death with every moment that passed.

Chapter 1601: It Ends

All of a sudden, Greensura said, “True Devil. Sovereign Lord. Why haven’t you come out yet?”

The god world was shrinking rapidly, and at the same time, crumbling everywhere. To the shock of all present, that world, which had remained unchanging for aeons, suddenly became the size of a pellet and shot into Greensura’s chest. As for the Deathless Heaven Empire, it was left hanging alone in the thin, fading primal-chaos.

People could hardly wrap their minds around what was happening.

Everyone could tell that an era of great destruction had arrived. The god world was gone, and that meant that the fates of all people had reached the end of the line.

The war was reaching its final blaze of glory.

As Greensura called out, energy fluctuations suddenly rolled out from the Sage Monarch Empire.

And they were coming from two specific members of Yang Qi’s brethren.

It was his sworn brother, Yang Doom! In the past, he had been called simply: Doom. He was the bearer of the God Legion Seal from the Primeval Age. The other was the Shepherd, the previous leader of the sages and mahātmās of hell.

All of a sudden, Yang Doom erupted with unbounded radiance and light! It was with the same ease as blowing some dust that he stepped into the half-Annulled level, then continued rising in power, his psychic scale reaching a trillion as he sucked in the destiny of the empire around him.

The Shepherd also rose to a higher level, quickly breaking past a psychic scale of a trillion.

Of course, Yang Doom wasn’t Yang Doom. He was actually the Sovereign Lord. And he was backed with a blazing sun of radiance and light, the power of which sought to destroy the Sage Monarch Empire.

As for the Shepherd, he wasn’t one of Yang Qi’s brethren, he was the True Devil. And he also wanted to destroy Yang Qi’s empire.

The dao of heaven was collapsing, and order was falling apart.

A storm of destruction was descending on the Sage Monarch Empire. Their psychic fluctuations alone were enough to slaughter everyone in the empire.

The Sovereign Lord. The True Devil. They had finally shown their faces.

As for the True Devil, he was backed by a blazing sun of pure darkness.

“I gave you everything, Yang Qi,” said the Sovereign Lord. “And now the time has come for you to pay me back!”

“I also gave you everything, Yang Qi,” said the True Devil. “You got my Mahātmā Jade, and now the time has come to pay me back!”

Dramatic things were happening in Yang Qi’s Sage Monarch Empire.

A destructive revolution was underway.

The empire’s destiny was crashing, and many of the citizens were transforming either into angels of radiance and light or devils of darkness and gloom.

The True Devil and the Sovereign Lord had chosen this moment for their comeback, and they were trying to seize all the resources they could.

Purr!

However, that was when the purrling opened its eyes and spat out a bubble. Before the two experts could react, they were trapped, and balance was restored. However, that seal would obviously not last for long.

In his mind, Yang Qi said, ‘God Legion Seal. Soul of the Ancestor God. Combine!’ This was his true trump card that he had planned to use against the Sovereign Lord and the True Devil. The Soul of the Ancestor God was vastly beyond the level of Operation Demon Destruction’s deathless devil embryo.

The God Legion Seal appeared on Yang Qi’s forehead, and as it combined with the Soul of the Ancestor God, everything was pushed back, both radiance and light, and darkness and gloom.

Then, everything combined!

The True Devil and the Sovereign Lord suddenly became ordinary citizens again.

Pop!

The True Devil and the Sovereign Lord were ejected, and everything went back to normal. A black and white shadow flew out of the Sage Monarch Empire.

Inside the empire, Yang Doom and the Shepherd had returned to their previous state. However, they remained in the half-Annulled level!

Yang Qi burst out laughing. “Sovereign Lord, True Devil, I knew that you were hiding in my empire. And I had a plan for how to deal with you all along. Now you’ve been expelled, and your little attempt did nothing but push two of my brethren into the half-Annulled level. Many thanks to you!”

Outside of the Sage Monarch Empire, the stream of black and white combined, then shot toward Proud Heaven.

Shockingly, they were going to attempt to possess him!

“Give your body to us, Proud Heaven! And give us the Great Necropolis! We are its true owners!” In the blink of an eye, the True Devil and the Sovereign Lord shot right toward Proud Heaven.

Proud Heaven shivered, then a cruel smile appeared on his face. “Hailan!”

In response to his words, she appeared behind him, and he stepped aside. Before the Sovereign Lord and True Devil knew what was happening, they were sucked into her belly, where an unborn child existed.

Moments later, the child appeared, radiating immense power that merged with the Great Necropolis, which hovered above its head.

Bloodcurdling screams rang out from the True Devil and the Sovereign Lord.

“What’s this? What’s going on? How could this be happening?”

“This is the result of all my hard work! The King of Annulled!” Proud Heaven suddenly erupted with psychic power as his plot against the True Devil and the Sovereign Lord was revealed. By means of the devil embryo and the Great Necropolis, he was taking the True Devil and Sovereign Lord to make himself stronger.

“King of the Great Dao? King of Fate? They're all false. Only my King of the Annulled is real! I am now the true Sovereign Lord of the god world!” Proud Heaven’s cultivation base was reaching the ultimate limit.

Taking advantage of the clash between Yang Qi and Greensura, he clenched his hand into a palm... and attacked Greensura!

Immense power rumbled toward her, causing her to look over her shoulder and shout, “Proud Heaven, you vicious wolf!”

“Am I vicious? I thought we were supposed to be working together. Well, I've assimilated the Sovereign Lord, the True Devil, and the Great Necropolis. I have more power than anyone’s ever experienced. You can’t fight me! I'm going to devour the god world. Which means I'm going to devour you! Then I'm going to kill Yang Qi. Everything will be mine!”

He viciously clenched his hand and a pellet was ripped out of Greensura, which was none other than the god world. Instantly, the Great Necropolis covered it.

“Die!” Yang Qi said, turning into a blur that shot toward Proud Heaven, who spun to face him. However, Yang Qi had already used his fateless power to grab Greensura.

In the blink of an eye, he had her in his hand.

By this point, Greensura wasn’t controlled by the essence of the god world. She was really his mother. Proud Heaven himself had extracted the god world pellet from her.

“Mother!” Yang Qi said, sending his will into her.

Blinking, she looked over at him, and it was clear she remembered everything that had played out. This was the real Greensura, and she was in the half-Annulled level. That said, her cultivation base was weak, far below the level of the High Priestess and the others. After all, she wasn’t the god world anymore.

“Go into my empire, mother. Lead the fight against the Deathless Heaven Empire. The fight between me and Proud Heaven has only just begun!” With that, he sent her down to his empire, where the fight with the Deathless Heaven Dynasty was still raging.

Of course, the Deathless Heaven Dynasty was crumbling, with the King of Godmammoths, High Priestess, Demon Master, and others having lost their morale. Some among their forces were already surrendering.

Sadly for them, Yang Qi was too strong, and the attacks of the Sage Monarch Empire were too devastating.

RUMBLE!

Furthermore, the Sage Monarch Empire now had five half-Annulled experts: Yang Immortal-Slayer, the Invincible Dugu, Yang Doom, the Shepherd, and Greensura. That wasn’t to mention the upgraded sage monarch magistrates. There just wasn’t anything the Deathless Heaven Empire could do to fight back.

It only took about an hour to wrap things up.

The King of Godmammoths, High Priestess, and Demon Master all surrendered. The Deathless Heaven Empire was no more.

As for Proud Heaven, he hovered far above, his power levels rising.

Having devoured the Sovereign Lord and the True Devil, as well as the essence of the god world, he was reaching an unheard-of level of power.

Because of that, he didn't even care that his empire had been destroyed.

“The fight is over for you, Yang Qi,” he said hoarsely. “Now that you’ve devoured my Deathless Heaven Empire, your destiny has reached an unprecedented level. Your empire is truly invincible.”

Hailan was standing next to him.

Suddenly, he smashed his palm into her, provoking a scream that echoed out for a moment as she faded away into nothing.

Expression hardly changing, Proud Heaven growled, “Useless woman. Now you’re dead forever. Now that you’ve given birth to the King of the Annulled, you serve no purpose.”

Yang Qi didn’t show much of a reaction either. “You've lost, Proud Heaven. Why not just kill yourself.”

“Kill myself?” Proud Heaven threw his head back and laughed. “Very funny, Yang Qi. That’s like a child claiming to be an emperor. You see, destiny doesn’t matter much in the face of the truly Annulled. If you don’t believe me, well... just wait a moment while I reach the true Annulled level. You're going to die, and your empire is going to die. This is the strongest you've ever been, but it’s not going to do you any good. I'm happy to cut you down when you’re at your peak. I look forward to the look of despair on your face. Then I’ll eliminate everyone else, until I'm the only person remaining.”

“Ai...” Yang Qi sighed. “You created your King of the Annulled. And your body is the Great Necropolis. But sadly for you, you missed something huge. You see, that King of the Annulled is mine. Didn’t you realize that? I placed my own life force quintessence inside Hailan.

“Look, I'm not going to lord it over you. You're simply no match for me. You can begin now, King Immortal-Slayer!”

“AGGGHHH!”

Proud Heaven’s head filled with intense pain as the image of King Immortal-Slayer appeared behind him.

“Come to me, King of the Annulled. I'm your father!” Yang Qi made a beckoning gesture, and the King of the Annulled flew over to him, the Great Necropolis in its hand.

“No!” Proud Heaven screamed. He knew that his cultivation base was strong enough that he could kill Yang Qi, but in the blink of an eye, everything had changed as Yang Qi seized control.

BAM!

Then Yang Qi walked forward and punched him in the face, sending him tumbling backward, another scream escaping his lips.

Yang Qi walked over and stamped down on his chest, causing him to squeal like a pig. Then he trampled him, kicking him in the face and chest over and over until they caved in, leaving him a bloody paste. He now existed in a universe of never-ending pain.

“Great Necropolis!” Yang Qi said, calling on the power of the King of the Annulled.

Instantly, Proud Heaven was trapped.

Yang Qi exhaled onto the necropolis, causing it to become his own, filling it with his psyche. Suddenly, he came to understand everything about the profundities of the necropolis, and all its transformations. That was when he realized that the Great Necropolis didn’t represent an end, but a beginning.

Proud Heaven struggled inside, wracked with pain and screaming in rage, but completely helpless.

“I refuse to accept this, Yang Qi!” Proud Heaven shouted. “I've never been stronger than this! But you beat me with no effort! No! I'm the apex entity of all existence! How could I be destroyed like this?!”

“I never considered you to be a match for me,” Yang Qi said. “I've been playing you this entire time.”

“No!” he screamed. “I'm going to destroy everything. Die! Die! All of you, just DIE!”

RUMBLE!

He self-detonated, drawing on the power of the god world to do so, hoping to destroy Yang Qi with himself.

However, Yang Qi simply used the Great Necropolis to suck up the force of the blast.

Then his voice rang out, “Proud Heaven, you sought to self-detonate using your power and that of the god world to open the final aspect of the Great Necropolis. But now you realize that I have no enemies left.”

Yet even as he spoke those words about not having any enemies left, a dazzling beam of sword energy appeared, heading right toward his forehead.

It was impossible to say where the sword light came from, and while it came when Yang Qi was at his strongest, in some ways, he was also at his weakest, as he had just assimilated the Great Necropolis and was using it to defend against the detonation of the god world. Without Yang Qi to contain the force of the explosion, everything would have been destroyed.

The sword light was attacking at just the right moment, hoping to seize victory right at the last. It was Star Swordlife, and a brutal smile could be seen on his face. Somehow, he had survived until the very end.

The truth was that not even he was sure how it happened.

Sadly for him, Yang Qi’s forehead transformed into a vortex that quickly devoured the sword energy. Then, he reached out and grabbed the shocked Star Swordlife. “How did you know, Yang Qi?”

“Because I'm omniscient. You’ve been pestering me ever since the immortal worlds. I knew all along that you wouldn’t just disappear.”  Yang Qi exhaled and burning fire wrapped around Star Swordlife, turning him into streams of life force that faded away in all directions.

At that point, Yang Qi floated down into his empire. There, the King of Godmammoths, Demon Master, and High Priestess all knelt to him.

“Is it all over, Yang Qi?” Greensura asked. She was flanked by Yang Zhan, Yang Susu, and all his other friends and family.

He exhaled, and King Immortal-Slayer flew out as well.

“It’s over, everyone,” he said, his voice both soft and resolute. “I have no enemies left. My empire is invincible, and we’ve created something one-of-a-kind: an ideal nation. There is no such thing as hell. The impure lands are no more. The immortal worlds are gone. The past doesn't exist, nor does the future.”

Everyone knew that they had just barely survived a major disaster, and it was a very unique feeling.

“Now, we transcend,” he said. “In this new world, I’ll bring back all the living beings that died. It will be a new place. Everyone, pray for me. Pray for yourselves. Pray for the empire. Pray for the void. Pray for fate....”

Everyone sat down cross-legged and began to pray.

Using the Great Necropolis, Yang Qi absorbed what remained of the primal-chaos paleo-energy. As he took it into himself, the world became deathly silent. There was no light, no time, no space, no primal-chaos, no living beings, no world.

Everything became nothing.

However, the Great Necropolis was fully open.

“Come, everyone. Come into the Great Necropolis.” As Yang Qi led his father and mother, and all of his brethren, into the necropolis, he said, “The Great Necropolis buries the world, but it still represents life. It's not an end, but a beginning!”

Everyone went inside, leaving not a single living thing in the outside world.

Then, boundless light erupted from the Great Necropolis, and cracking sounds rang out from Yang Qi. “Transcend!”

The Great Necropolis vanished, and everyone vanished with it. Yang Qi vanished. His empire, his glory, his ideals, his faith, his valor, they all vanished.

It was impossible to say where they went. It was almost as if they had never existed.

However, when the Great Necropolis vanished, a pure expression of vital energy suddenly rippled out into the void. Then a multitude of worlds came into being, filling space.

Life had appeared again.

Slowly but surely, the impure lands came to be again. Then immortal worlds came into existence. Even the god world came to be.

After untold billions of years passed, after untold generations, the legion of gods yet again came to exist. However, there was a legend among this new legion of gods that said that a higher form of civilization existed. And countless experts in the legion of gods wanted to go there. It was just how countless cultivators from the impure lands wanted to ascend to the immortal worlds.

It was an eternal legend. A door had been opened. No one knew what type of civilization existed above the god civilization.

But it was there.

As the years passed, myths and histories came and went.

But that legend remained in the hearts of people for all eternity.

The End

Table of Contents

Chapter 1: Befuddled by Love

Chapter 2: Profiting from a Disaster

Chapter 3: Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth

Chapter 4: Energy Eruption Level
Chapter 5: Yang Clan Forum
Chapter 6: Tit for Tat
Chapter 7: A Bolt from the Blue
Chapter 8: Displaying Prowess to the Full
Chapter 9: Shocking Everyone Present
Chapter 10: Duel in Three Months
Chapter 11: Invincible King's Fist
Chapter 12: Sixth Phase of Energy Arts
Chapter 13: Fist Versus Bell
Chapter 14: Daughter of the City Magistrate
Chapter 15: Detoxification
Chapter 16: Profoundly Shocking
Chapter 17: A Dream of a Thousand Years
Chapter 18: Blackcorpse Mountains
Chapter 19: Hunting Demonlings
Chapter 20: Battling a White Ape
Chapter 21: Seventh Phase Breakthrough
Chapter 22: A Goldmine
Chapter 23: Going Home
Chapter 24: Attending the Banquet
Chapter 25: Dealing with the Chen Clan
Chapter 26: Who Dares Block My Path?

Chapter 27: Hostility from the City Magistrate

Chapter 28: Open Clan Fighting
Chapter 29: Defeating the Chen Clan
Chapter 30: One Man Tries to Kill a Thousand
Chapter 31: Pillaging
Chapter 32: Spoils of War

Chapter 33: Disciples of the House of Spring and Autumn

Chapter 34: Four Seasons Swordplay
Chapter 35: Chiliocosm Mirror
Chapter 36: Ambush
Chapter 37: Fighting a Master of Energy
Chapter 38: Eighth Phase
Chapter 39: Killing a Master of Energy
Chapter 40: Preparing a Diversion
Chapter 41: Three Months Later
Chapter 42: The Clan's Autumn Hunt
Chapter 43: A Slap on the Face
Chapter 44: The Chief Elders, Astonished
Chapter 45: Vanquishing All Five
Chapter 46: I Make the Rules
Chapter 47: Uniting the Clan
Chapter 48: Aunt Susu
Chapter 49: Passing Energy to Father
Chapter 50: Yun Zhonglong
Chapter 51: Young Man in Blue
Chapter 52: Sea God Institute
Chapter 53: Heart of the Sea
Chapter 54: Entering the Institute
Chapter 55: Yun Hailan's Whereabouts
Chapter 56: Thumb-Ring of Holding
Chapter 57: Vampire Brigands
Chapter 58: Chu Tiange
Chapter 59: Another Encounter with Yun Hailan
Chapter 60: Paying Back Humiliation
Chapter 61: Master of Energy Level
Chapter 62: Secrets of the Hanging Mountain
Chapter 63: The Sage Monarch Society
Chapter 64: Dragonpearl
Chapter 65: The Ancient City of Kroran
Chapter 66: Red Fur
Chapter 67: The Brigands' Treasure Stores
Chapter 68: The Brigands' Treasure Stores (2)
Chapter 69: Battling a Lifeseizer
Chapter 70: The Power of Twenty Megamammoths
Chapter 71: Everyone Levels Up
Chapter 72: Returning to the Institute
Chapter 73: Outer Campus Students
Chapter 74: Giant Guards
Chapter 75: Aunt Susu
Chapter 76: Profound Energy Arts
Chapter 77: Medicinal Pill Explanation
Chapter 78: Sage Devil

Chapter 79: Breaking into the Lifeseizing Level

Chapter 80: Life Force Springwater
Chapter 81: Another Encounter with Chu Tiange
Chapter 82: An Enormous Tomb
Chapter 83: Thousand-Year-Old Corpse King
Chapter 84: Chu Tiange Appears Again
Chapter 85: Fierce Combat
Chapter 86: Killing Chu Tiange (1)
Chapter 87: Killing Chu Tiange (2)
Chapter 88: Aftermath
Chapter 89: Consuming a Demon Core
Chapter 90: Lifeseizing Level
Chapter 91: Devil-God Seal
Chapter 92: Academy of Sage Studies
Chapter 93: How Impudent!
Chapter 94: Ceremony
Chapter 95: Becoming an Elite Student
Chapter 96: Uniting Yanhaven
Chapter 97: Energy Formation Drill
Chapter 98: Summoned by an Energy Crane
Chapter 99: Sun Moon Institute
Chapter 100: Wrecking the Proposal
Chapter 101: Holy Daughter Manyflowers
Chapter 102: Minorcosm World
Chapter 103: Enemies Meet
Chapter 104: Patriarchs Wind and Cloud

Chapter 105: Ramifications of Accepting an Apprentice

Chapter 106: Secondary Lifeseizing
Chapter 107: Physical Transformation
Chapter 108: Preventative Measures
Chapter 109: Black Floodwyrm Grotto
Chapter 110: Encountering a Black Floodwyrm
Chapter 111: Exceptional Strike
Chapter 112: More Assassinations
Chapter 113: The Devils in Chaos
Chapter 114: Killing a Quinary Lifeseizer
Chapter 115: Another Brother

Chapter 116: A God from Heaven Descended into the Mortal World

Chapter 117: The Fury of Song Haishan
Chapter 118: Crush Him in Person
Chapter 119: As Useless as Chickens or Dogs
Chapter 120: Blood Tribute
Chapter 121: You Think I Won't?
Chapter 122: Going Home
Chapter 123: Yang Zhan, Lifeseizer
Chapter 124: Official Banquet
Chapter 125: Spring and Autumn; Shadowblight

Chapter 126: Entering the Blackcorpse Mountains

Chapter 127: Getting Stronger
Chapter 128: Devil-Ghost Spirit Body
Chapter 129: Devil Horde Defilement
Chapter 130: Quaternary Lifeseizing
Chapter 131: Heavencorpse Dimension
Chapter 132: Conclave Students
Chapter 133: Grand Thunderclap Swordplay
Chapter 134: Three Birds, One Spear...
Chapter 135: Ghost Emperor Yama
Chapter 136: The Imp Acts
Chapter 137: God Legion Seal

Chapter 138: Young Lord from the House of Spring and Autumn

Chapter 139: Converting Enemies to Friends
Chapter 140: All Men Are Brothers
Chapter 141: Jun Tianchou Requests Help
Chapter 142: Fiend-Devil Viscounts
Chapter 143: Doing It Alone
Chapter 144: Saving Everyone
Chapter 145: Fighting Devils
Chapter 146: Sworn Siblings from All Corners
Chapter 147: Sword Training
Chapter 148: Island of Unusual Fate
Chapter 149: Subduing the Divine Sword
Chapter 150: Ice-Soul God-Sword
Chapter 151: Shroud-Heaven Alliance
Chapter 152: Sword Dao from the Distant Past
Chapter 153: Capturing Frost-Drake
Chapter 154: Behind-the-Scenes Information
Chapter 155: Join Us
Chapter 156: Power Rising Everywhere
Chapter 157: Becoming a Legendary
Chapter 158: Seven Apertures Sprite Body
Chapter 159: Martial Arts Competition
Chapter 160: Seven Seas of Energy
Chapter 161: Treachery
Chapter 162: The Competition Begins
Chapter 163: Heroes Gather
Chapter 164: A Hot Knife Through Butter
Chapter 165: Revealing Ability
Chapter 166: You Can't Block One Sword Strike
Chapter 167: Finals
Chapter 168: Finals (2)
Chapter 169: Finals (3)
Chapter 170: First Place
Chapter 171: First Place (2)
Chapter 172: First Place (3)
Chapter 173: A Moment of Great Danger
Chapter 174: Supreme Honor and Righteousness

Chapter 175: Matchlessly Rude and Unreasonable

Chapter 176: Utter Chaos
Chapter 177: A Sudden Development
Chapter 178: The Chancellor
Chapter 179: Ancient Mine
Chapter 180: Turning in Merit Points
Chapter 181: Euphoria Godstone
Chapter 182: Devil Embryo
Chapter 183: Hell Portal
Chapter 184: Reaching the Peak
Chapter 185: Arriving at the Ancient Quarry
Chapter 186: Deadly Spell Formation
Chapter 187: Sura Devil-Eye
Chapter 188: Sealed Asura
Chapter 189: A Chat
Chapter 190: No Way

Chapter 191: The Nine Legendary Transformations

Chapter 192: Nonary Lifeseizing

Chapter 193: A Fierce Battle Between Two Heroes

Chapter 194: Massive Fight
Chapter 195: Spell Formation, Activated
Chapter 196: Taking the Pagoda
Chapter 197: The Crown Prince in Danger
Chapter 198: Seriously Hurt and Running
Chapter 199: Calling Out to Sworn Siblings

Chapter 200: Astonishing the Tabernacle of Flame

Chapter 201: Cultivating Together
Chapter 202: Five Years
Chapter 203: Gathered Under One Roof
Chapter 204: Physique of the Sovereign Lord
Chapter 205: Spirit Rain
Chapter 206: Six Months

Chapter 207: Repairing the Roof before the Storm

Chapter 208: The Myriad Consortium
Chapter 209: Buying Information
Chapter 210: Taking More Heads
Chapter 211: Wiping Out the Myriad Consortium
Chapter 212: Exterminating Them All

Chapter 213: The House of Shadowblight's Moving Island

Chapter 214: Holy Neophyte
Chapter 215: Stealing Spirit Stones
Chapter 216: Spirit Stones In Hand
Chapter 217: Tackling Legendary
Chapter 218: Mastering the Legendary
Chapter 219: Brazen Assassination
Chapter 220: Terrifying Attack
Chapter 221: You're Not Going Anywhere
Chapter 222: The Crown Prince's Whereabouts

Chapter 223: A Deal with the Shroud-Heaven Alliance

Chapter 224: Hua Tianxiong
Chapter 225: Old Man Superdestruction
Chapter 226: Demanding Spirit Stones
Chapter 227: Striking it Rich
Chapter 228: Five Phases Treasures
Chapter 229: Heaven-Demon Seed

Chapter 230: Deliberately Making Things Difficult

Chapter 231: You Qualify?
Chapter 232: None of You Qualify
Chapter 233: Strike First, Achieve Lethality
Chapter 234: Becoming a Holy Neophyte
Chapter 235: Killing Grand Elder Feat-Virtue
Chapter 236: Psychic Tempest
Chapter 237: Inter-Society Alliance
Chapter 238: Being Used Again
Chapter 239: Mission: Mend Heaven
Chapter 240: All-Encompassing Devil Energy
Chapter 241: Hell Monsoon
Chapter 242: Spirit-Soul Transformation
Chapter 243: Deadly Training
Chapter 244: Completing the Spore-Devil
Chapter 245: Completing the Spore-Devil (2)
Chapter 246: Selfless Philanthropist
Chapter 247: Trying to Steal a Chicken....
Chapter 248: Astral-Star Fiend-Devil

Chapter 249: Thirty Thousand Ancient Megamammoths

Chapter 250: Planar Pearl

Chapter 251: Breaking Through the Interceptors

Chapter 252: Left Behind by Sages
Chapter 253: Immense Fortune
Chapter 254: Hero
Chapter 255: Joy and Worry
Chapter 256: Discussing Important Business
Chapter 257: Western Continent
Chapter 258: Silvermoon
Chapter 259: Let the Slaughter Begin
Chapter 260: Crashing the Party
Chapter 261: Lady-Princess Silvermoon
Chapter 262: Taking the City
Chapter 263: Sagely-Grade Spirit Stone
Chapter 264: Filling Up with True Energy
Chapter 265: Nine Stars Pearl Necklace
Chapter 266: Incapable
Chapter 267: The Will of Great Sages
Chapter 268: Frenzied Flight
Chapter 269: Angel Wings Transformation
Chapter 270: Escaping Alive

Chapter 271: Drift with the Waves, Go with the Flow

Chapter 272: Quake-Dawn Continent

Chapter 273: Secrets of the Crown Prince

Chapter 274: Reaching the Third Transformation

Chapter 275: Experts Gather

Chapter 276: Breaking Open the Door

Chapter 277: Heaven-Dominating Golden Swordbreaker

Chapter 278: Battling a Half Sage
Chapter 279: Vanquishing a Half Sage
Chapter 280: Vermillion Dragon City
Chapter 281: Grand-Wilds Mansion
Chapter 282: Capturing an Asura
Chapter 283: Working with the Five Phases
Chapter 284: Deal
Chapter 285: Assessment
Chapter 286: Captain
Chapter 287: Wormhole
Chapter 288: Returning to Rich-Lush

Chapter 289: Giant Snake from the Hell of Nagas

Chapter 290: Another Encounter with the Ghost Emperor

Chapter 291: Donning the Tiger Skin
Chapter 292: Power of the Wilds God
Chapter 293: You Lose
Chapter 294: Flabbergasting News
Chapter 295: Difficult Questions

Chapter 296: That's All the Evidence You Have?

Chapter 297: Someone from the Quake-Dawn Cathedral

Chapter 298: Rage of the Ghost Emperor
Chapter 299: Negotiation
Chapter 300: Go Ahead and Fight
Chapter 301: One Hundred Days
Chapter 302: Restoring a Soul
Chapter 303: Supreme Devil Might
Chapter 304: Progress
Chapter 305: There's a Way
Chapter 306: Yore-Wilds' Heart
Chapter 307: Sage Monarch City
Chapter 308: Underneath the Continent
Chapter 309: The Depths of Primal-Chaos

Chapter 310: Black Golden Dragon-Smelting Cauldron

Chapter 311: Taking the Fragment
Chapter 312: Without a Hitch
Chapter 313: Yin-Yang
Chapter 314: Ballad of the Dao Testimonial
Chapter 315: The Return of Yun Hailan
Chapter 316: Dragon World Godpower
Chapter 317: Immortal Plane
Chapter 318: The Will of an Immortal
Chapter 319: Godly Might of the Paradise
Chapter 320: Sixth Legendary Transformation
Chapter 321: Prologue to the Final Battle
Chapter 322: The Crown Prince Returns
Chapter 323: Incredible Decisiveness
Chapter 324: Savage Compulsion
Chapter 325: The Slaughter Begins
Chapter 326: Yang Qi Kills a Great Sage
Chapter 327: Superlative Defense
Chapter 328: Total Annihilation
Chapter 329: Devouring Everything
Chapter 330: Ghost-God Transformation
Chapter 331: A Complete Rout
Chapter 332: The Chancellor to the Rescue
Chapter 333: The Chancellor's Turn
Chapter 334: The Crown Prince Killed
Chapter 335: The Dust Settles
Chapter 336: Uniting the Continent
Chapter 337: A Continent Becoming a Planet
Chapter 338: Assassination Attempt
Chapter 339: Looking For Trouble
Chapter 340: Secrets
Chapter 341: Immortal Grass
Chapter 342: Killing
Chapter 343: People from the Hanging Mountain
Chapter 344: A Decree from the Holy Mother
Chapter 345: Secrets
Chapter 346: Very Confusing
Chapter 347: Di Shidao
Chapter 348: A Debut
Chapter 349: Yan Wubing
Chapter 350: Plateau of the Leviathan
Chapter 351: Mammoth Force
Chapter 352: The Mammothfolk

Chapter 353: The State of Affairs in the Hanging Mountain

Chapter 354: The Competition
Chapter 355: The Holy Mother
Chapter 356: Trouble Brewing
Chapter 357: The Competition Begins
Chapter 358: Outstanding Heroes Gather
Chapter 359: Power Struggles
Chapter 360: Battle of Experts
Chapter 361: Hell Opens
Chapter 362: Hell of Mahanata
Chapter 363: Attacking Armies
Chapter 364: Shaking the Hanging Mountain
Chapter 365: Subterranean Ore
Chapter 366: Slaughtering Lionfolk
Chapter 367: Complete Extermination
Chapter 368: Warmonger Giant-Devils
Chapter 369: Fighting an Infernal
Chapter 370: Eternal Godwind
Chapter 371: Great Sage Level
Chapter 372: The Heroes Strike
Chapter 373: Ape Battle
Chapter 374: Powerless to Resist
Chapter 375: Nascent Divinity Ensconcement
Chapter 376: Mammoth Manyvoids' Debut
Chapter 377: Experts Go All Out
Chapter 378: Major Spectacle
Chapter 379: Complete Slaughter
Chapter 380: It Ends
Chapter 381: Devil Embryo
Chapter 382: Infernal Expert
Chapter 383: The Return
Chapter 384: Blessings
Chapter 385: Back to Rich-Lush
Chapter 386: The Terror of the Ghost Emperor
Chapter 387: Power Brewing
Chapter 388: The Holy Mother Emerges
Chapter 389: Bickering
Chapter 390: Titan Emperor Collegium
Chapter 391: The Arrival
Chapter 392: Sword Seventeen
Chapter 393: The Invincible Society
Chapter 394: A Bunch of Freaks
Chapter 395: Entrance Ceremony
Chapter 396: World of Mirages
Chapter 397: Golden Dragonscale Godskiff
Chapter 398: Magical Laws of Life and Death
Chapter 399: Number One
Chapter 400: Killing People Left and Right
Chapter 401: Strictly Organized Ranks
Chapter 402: Joining the Collegium
Chapter 403: Elder Siblings
Chapter 404: Treasure Hoard
Chapter 405: Myriad Worlds Monarch Chart
Chapter 406: Refining the Continent

Chapter 407: Major Success with the Immortal Child

Chapter 408: People from the Megaplexus Planetary System

Chapter 409: Northstar Fleet
Chapter 410: True Danger
Chapter 411: Slaughter
Chapter 412: Killing a Demi-Immortal
Chapter 413: The Might of the Holy Mother
Chapter 414: Invincible in Battle

Chapter 415: Tossing Corpses into the Crucible

Chapter 416: Three Prime Demi-Immortals
Chapter 417: Scheming (1)
Chapter 418: Scheming (2)
Chapter 419: Madness
Chapter 420: No One Survives
Chapter 421: Major Accomplishments
Chapter 422: Coiling Arc Planetary System
Chapter 423: Primeval Godworm
Chapter 424: Enemies
Chapter 425: Metadimensions
Chapter 426: Fellow Disciples
Chapter 427: Despicable
Chapter 428: It Appears
Chapter 429: Explosion
Chapter 430: Nexus
Chapter 431: Big Fight
Chapter 432: Outstanding Heroes
Chapter 433: Escape
Chapter 434: In the Chart
Chapter 435: Secrets
Chapter 436: World Junctions
Chapter 437: Various Factions
Chapter 438: Endless Treasure
Chapter 439: Imperial Snakecharm
Chapter 440: Grand Emperor Rich-Lush
Chapter 441: The Fisherman
Chapter 442: Getting the Talismans
Chapter 443: Seizing the Grand Emperor
Chapter 444: Godworm Nest
Chapter 445: Chaotic Fighting
Chapter 446: Demi-Immortal Breakthrough
Chapter 447: Chief of the Snakefolk
Chapter 448: Primeval God Skills
Chapter 449: Complete Success
Chapter 450: Legacy of King Immortal-Slayer

Chapter 451: Successor of King Immortal-Slayer

Chapter 452: Yellow-Garbed, Buzz Cut
Chapter 453: The Future
Chapter 454: A Good Person
Chapter 455: Devil Sauvastika Assembly
Chapter 456: A Deal
Chapter 457: Elysian Children
Chapter 458: Mahanata Greyspace
Chapter 459: Very, Very Hard
Chapter 460: Goals Met
Chapter 461: Rising Rapidly
Chapter 462: Planet Sage Monarch
Chapter 463: Three Periods Tribulation
Chapter 464: All the way to the Ninth

Chapter 465: Eight Hundred Forty Million Particles Awake

Chapter 466: Get Out Here!
Chapter 467: You Can All Just Die
Chapter 468: Weaklings
Chapter 469: Arrogant and Despotic
Chapter 470: World Splitting
Chapter 471: Demi-Immortal Tribulation
Chapter 472: Viciously Shaking the Collegium
Chapter 473: Cutting Down an Elder King
Chapter 474: Intrepid Slaughter
Chapter 475: Vice-Rectors
Chapter 476: Invincible
Chapter 477: Shocking Renown
Chapter 478: Immortal Army Battlefield
Chapter 479: Creating a Planetary System
Chapter 480: Tusita Heaven
Chapter 481: Secret Meeting
Chapter 482: Negotiation
Chapter 483: Duped
Chapter 484: The Beastmaster Society
Chapter 485: The Godrelic
Chapter 486: God Blood
Chapter 487: Liege Beast
Chapter 488: Incredible
Chapter 489: Transformations
Chapter 490: Endless Experts
Chapter 491: The True Battlefield
Chapter 492: Enemies Everywhere
Chapter 493: Overlords Fight
Chapter 494: More and More Emerge
Chapter 495: Different Daos
Chapter 496: Deadly Recklessness
Chapter 497: A Big Fight

Chapter 498: Crushing Weeds and Smashing Twigs

Chapter 499: Terrified
Chapter 500: The Supreme Rector's Plot
Chapter 501: Magnetic King Sarira
Chapter 502: Initiation Power
Chapter 503: One Massive Attack
Chapter 504: Dumbstruck
Chapter 505: Axes to Grind
Chapter 506: Kill You All
Chapter 507: Praying to the Heaven Above
Chapter 508: Birth Origin
Chapter 509: Fierce Breakthrough
Chapter 510: A Banished Immortal Arrives
Chapter 511: The Trap
Chapter 512: Devastating an Immortal
Chapter 513: Sage Monarch Collegium
Chapter 514: Complete Annihilation

Chapter 515: Big Matter for the Immortal World

Chapter 516: The Overall Structure
Chapter 517: Boundless Faith
Chapter 518: Taking an Energy Art
Chapter 519: He's Back!
Chapter 520: Into the Monarch Chart Again
Chapter 521: Siblings Reunite
Chapter 522: God Item
Chapter 523: Elder-Immortal
Chapter 524: Assimilation
Chapter 525: In This Together
Chapter 526: Passageway to the Immortal World

Chapter 527: Killing Fist of the Dao of Monarchs

Chapter 528: Plundering
Chapter 529: Heaven and Earth Furnace
Chapter 530: Father Appears
Chapter 531: Extreme Danger
Chapter 532: Irreconcilable
Chapter 533: Killing Chief Beastmaster
Chapter 534: Returning
Chapter 535: Godliness
Chapter 536: The Immortal World Invades
Chapter 537: Fierce Fighting
Chapter 538: Epic Battle
Chapter 539: Holding the Line
Chapter 540: Going All In
Chapter 541: A God Item Appears
Chapter 542: Reaching the Eighth Order
Chapter 543: The Immortal World Defeated
Chapter 544: Suing for Peace
Chapter 545: Negotiation
Chapter 546: The Very Strange Voice
Chapter 547: Misty Kingdom
Chapter 548: Mass Surrender
Chapter 549: Establishing a Network of Laws
Chapter 550: Cultivation
Chapter 551: Immortal Body
Chapter 552: Decade
Chapter 553: Arriving in the Immortal World
Chapter 554: Imperial Court
Chapter 555: Status
Chapter 556: Infiltration
Chapter 557: The Mechfolk
Chapter 558: Treasures Galore
Chapter 559: More Imperial Snakecharms
Chapter 560: Princess Jadefall
Chapter 561: Immense Energy
Chapter 562: The Obliterators
Chapter 563: The Endless Forest
Chapter 564: The Demon Altar
Chapter 565: An Incredible Opportunity
Chapter 566: Immense Gains
Chapter 567: Protomammoth Particles
Chapter 568: Back at the Base
Chapter 569: Dominating the General
Chapter 570: A Rise in the Ranks
Chapter 571: A Deeper Look at the Consortium
Chapter 572: Immortal Paragon
Chapter 573: The Fury of Night-Ksetra
Chapter 574: Major Success
Chapter 575: Proud Warpatience
Chapter 576: Two Armies Face Off
Chapter 577: Sixtieth Young Sir Proud
Chapter 578: Lost Civilization
Chapter 579: Immense Power
Chapter 580: Two Tigers Fight
Chapter 581: Reincarnated One
Chapter 582: Word Becomes Law
Chapter 583: Terrorized Masses
Chapter 584: Never-Dying Disappears

Chapter 585: A Frank Discussion with the Princess

Chapter 586: Titan
Chapter 587: Big Developments
Chapter 588: Hanging Heaven
Chapter 589: Fighting for the Asteroid
Chapter 590: Slaughtering the Enemy
Chapter 591: Absorbing Essence
Chapter 592: Besieged by Demons
Chapter 593: Megamammoth Immortal Ancestor
Chapter 594: Boundless Demolishing
Chapter 595: Dangerous Ambush
Chapter 596: Finally, Success
Chapter 597: Wrangling
Chapter 598: Stable Foundation
Chapter 599: Shopping Spree
Chapter 600: All the Enemies Meet
Chapter 601: Arresting Titan Duelbringer
Chapter 602: Blocking
Chapter 603: You're Digging Your Own Graves

Chapter 604: Shaking Court and Commoners Alike

Chapter 605: Glib Tongue
Chapter 606: The Power of a Reincarnated One
Chapter 607: Porcelain Godspore

Chapter 608: Emissaries from the Brahman Society

Chapter 609: Brought to Justice

Chapter 610: Threats

Chapter 611: Drawing the Snake out of its Hole

Chapter 612: Getting Them All in One Shot
Chapter 613: Slaughtering All Enemies
Chapter 614: Crushing the Buzz Cut Kid
Chapter 615: Secrets of a Future One
Chapter 616: Gone Forever

Chapter 617: The Mysteries of the Monarch Chart

Chapter 618: Seizing Power
Chapter 619: A Visit
Chapter 620: Subduing Six Worlds
Chapter 621: The Brahman Society
Chapter 622: Infiltration
Chapter 623: Five Phases Combination
Chapter 624: Children of Brahma
Chapter 625: Unique Constitution

Chapter 626: Business in the Scripture Pavilion

Chapter 627: Combining Eighty-One

Chapter 628: Blending into the Brahman Society

Chapter 629: Meeting of the Children of Brahma

Chapter 630: Heaps of Experts
Chapter 631: Mission
Chapter 632: True Energy Curse
Chapter 633: Regal Event Heaven
Chapter 634: Hell of Bleached Bones
Chapter 635: August Patriarch Fire Dragon
Chapter 636: Big Fight
Chapter 637: Immortal General
Chapter 638: Taking a Thousand Talismans

Chapter 639: Assimilating August Patriarch Fire Dragon

Chapter 640: Incomparable Sword Dao
Chapter 641: Castle Heaven-Devil
Chapter 642: Eruption of Magical Power
Chapter 643: The Full Eight Tribes Godfist
Chapter 644: King Life-Killer
Chapter 645: Tempered God
Chapter 646: Bloodsea Heaven-Devil
Chapter 647: Seven Holy Swords
Chapter 648: Jade-Colored Tomb
Chapter 649: Tempting
Chapter 650: Rewards Come Only With Risk
Chapter 651: An Incomparable Seal
Chapter 652: Sage Sword Heaven
Chapter 653: Tempered God Tribulation
Chapter 654: Eighteen Sword Sects
Chapter 655: God-Slashing Sword Sect
Chapter 656: Traceless Slasher
Chapter 657: Slashing One
Chapter 658: Taking On a Slashing One
Chapter 659: Inspiring One
Chapter 660: A Huge Secret
Chapter 661: A Conspiracy
Chapter 662: Exploitation
Chapter 663: Retreat
Chapter 664: Uniting an Immortal World

Chapter 665: Secrets of the Brahman Immortal World

Chapter 666: Passage to the Future
Chapter 667: Divine Likeness of Proud Heaven
Chapter 668: Boundless Rewards
Chapter 669: Slaughtering a Heaven Moving One
Chapter 670: Brahma Echo-Silk
Chapter 671: Meeting
Chapter 672: No Way Out
Chapter 673: Limited Time
Chapter 674: Contingency Plans
Chapter 675: Invincible God Might
Chapter 676: Great Fanfare
Chapter 677: Leading One

Chapter 678: Tusita Heaven, Immortal-Slaying Medallions

Chapter 679: Fortuned One
Chapter 680: Sudden and Unexpected Disaster
Chapter 681: Mechfolk Base
Chapter 682: Cruiser of Civilization
Chapter 683: Helping the Mechfolk
Chapter 684: Cannon of Civilization
Chapter 685: The Flatverse
Chapter 686: Ungrateful Curs
Chapter 687: Taking the Spacecraft
Chapter 688: Gaining at Others' Expense
Chapter 689: A Violent Tempest
Chapter 690: A Change in Plan
Chapter 691: Rapid Development
Chapter 692: Power Eruption
Chapter 693: Godly Might of the Brahman River

Chapter 694: Entering Glorious Treasure Heaven

Chapter 695: Brahma's Heart
Chapter 696: Out of Hand
Chapter 697: Taking God Crystals
Chapter 698: Dao Heart Formation
Chapter 699: Dao Defense League
Chapter 700: Infiltration
Chapter 701: Nine Yangs God Sect
Chapter 702: Girl in Green
Chapter 703: Counter Attack
Chapter 704: Morphblight
Chapter 705: God-Doctor
Chapter 706: Conflict
Chapter 707: A Big Stir
Chapter 708: The Fish Takes the Bait
Chapter 709: Aeonic God Psalter
Chapter 710: Turning the Tables
Chapter 711: Heaven Beyond Heaven
Chapter 712: Confusing the Enemy
Chapter 713: Hells like Eternal Sands
Chapter 714: Heading Toward the Godrelic
Chapter 715: Intense Self-Detonation
Chapter 716: A Successful Framing
Chapter 717: The Mysteries of ‘Beyond Heaven'
Chapter 718: Finally Profiting
Chapter 719: Chasing Young Master Leaf
Chapter 720: God Pill
Chapter 721: The Dragonfolk Arrive
Chapter 722: Dragon Everlasting
Chapter 723: Join Me
Chapter 724: God Dragon Tribe
Chapter 725: An Independent Sect
Chapter 726: A Huge Stir
Chapter 727: Flabbergasted
Chapter 728: The Boy, Promoter
Chapter 729: Helping Hundred-Gods
Chapter 730: Heaven Dancer
Chapter 731: Your Father Sent Me
Chapter 732: Special Ops Team
Chapter 733: General Samman
Chapter 734: A Grim Situation
Chapter 735: God Dao Seeds
Chapter 736: Live Forever God Tree
Chapter 737: Primal-Chaos Ruins
Chapter 738: Devouring Destiny
Chapter 739: True Godhood
Chapter 740: Devouring Without Stop
Chapter 741: Success at Last
Chapter 742: Many Heavens God Seal
Chapter 743: A Mass of Breakthroughs
Chapter 744: Getting Rid of Hidden Injuries
Chapter 745: The Old-Timers
Chapter 746: Sectlord Nine Yangs
Chapter 747: Terror
Chapter 748: Locked Up
Chapter 749: Becoming a Patriarch
Chapter 750: The Unfathomable Heart
Chapter 751: Fooling the Patriarchs
Chapter 752: Assimilating Dragon King
Chapter 753: Becoming a Godmyth

Chapter 754: The Patriarchs Acknowledge Allegiance

Chapter 755: Planting a Mole

Chapter 756: Stripping Young Master Leaf of Followers (1)

Chapter 757: Stripping Young Master Leaf of Followers (2)

Chapter 758: Stripping Young Master Leaf of Followers (3)

Chapter 759: Assassinating Sectlord Nine Yangs (1)

Chapter 760: Assassinating Sectlord Nine Yangs (2)

Chapter 761: Assassinating Sectlord Nine Yang (3)

Chapter 762: The Backer
Chapter 763: Join Me
Chapter 764: Just Too Stubborn
Chapter 765: Clone Transformations
Chapter 766: The Buddha Dragon Tribe
Chapter 767: The Remaining Talismans
Chapter 768: Passageway to the Past
Chapter 769: Plundering
Chapter 770: Samman Arrives
Chapter 771: The Will of Proud Heaven

Chapter 772: Same as the Strength of the Hell-Crushing Godmammoth

Chapter 773: Battle Between Two Gods
Chapter 774: Endless Killing Intent
Chapter 775: A Sudden Blow
Chapter 776: The Plan Works
Chapter 777: Big Success
Chapter 778: Emergency Meeting
Chapter 779: Ancient Experts
Chapter 780: Selecting the League-Lord
Chapter 781: Patriarchs Fight
Chapter 782: All Sorts of Divine Abilities
Chapter 783: Young Lord of the Dragonfolk

Chapter 784: Grand Emperor Ragefire Broilheaven

Chapter 785: League-Lord Inauguration

Chapter 786: Unrestrained Heaven

Chapter 787: Competition for Emissary of Radiance and Light

Chapter 788: Obstacles
Chapter 789: Convincing the Masses
Chapter 790: Organizing the Armed Forces
Chapter 791: Distributing Resources
Chapter 792: Seven Pieces of the God Psalter
Chapter 793: The Boss Behind the Scenes
Chapter 794: Sowing Seeds of Disaster
Chapter 795: The Army of Radiance and Light
Chapter 796: Supreme Position
Chapter 797: The Rage of the Grand Emperor
Chapter 798: More Map Pieces
Chapter 799: Young Master Leaf Goes All Out
Chapter 800: Unlocking the Temple
Chapter 801: Secrets of the God Psalter
Chapter 802: The Aeon Portal
Chapter 803: Seven Gods Combined
Chapter 804: The Final Talismans
Chapter 805: Rescue
Chapter 806: Meeting with Sectlord Nine Yangs
Chapter 807: Hooking the Fish
Chapter 808: Primeval Experts
Chapter 809: Vying Over the Engine
Chapter 810: Fleeing Again
Chapter 811: Meeting Suzerains of Hell
Chapter 812: Not Gonna Cooperate?
Chapter 813: Submission by Beatdown
Chapter 814: You Must Acknowledge Allegiance
Chapter 815: The Four Emperors Together
Chapter 816: Beast King Corpse
Chapter 817: A Cabal of Six
Chapter 818: Surging Destiny
Chapter 819: Demon League
Chapter 820: Campaign of Radiance and Light
Chapter 821: Flames of War Rage
Chapter 822: Defeating the Demonfolk
Chapter 823: A Major Invasion
Chapter 824: Seizing Power
Chapter 825: Show Yourself!

Chapter 826: The Dao of Heaven Fights Fiercely

Chapter 827: Mysteries of the Monarch Chart
Chapter 828: Subduing a Grand Emperor
Chapter 829: A Position of Power
Chapter 830: The Big Picture
Chapter 831: Demonfolk Experts
Chapter 832: Power Index
Chapter 833: Changes to the Ancient Road
Chapter 834: Something Comes (1)
Chapter 835: Something Comes (2)
Chapter 836: Something Comes (3)
Chapter 837: Something Comes (4)
Chapter 838: God Finger

Chapter 839: Energy Arts of the Seventy-Two Monarchs

Chapter 840: Three Worlds Together
Chapter 841: God Soul Godhood
Chapter 842: Power Assessment Systems
Chapter 843: Grand Emperor Godworm
Chapter 844: Vital Energy Crumbles
Chapter 845: People in the Necropolis

Chapter 846: Experts from the Ancient Road to the Gods

Chapter 847: Fire God Soul
Chapter 848: Secrets Upon Secrets
Chapter 849: Forces on the Ancient Road
Chapter 850: The Ancestral Wilds Basilica
Chapter 851: Location of Godhood
Chapter 852: A New Overall Structure

Chapter 853: The Legacy of God-Noble Goldensword

Chapter 854: Sword Duels
Chapter 855: Destabilizing Level
Chapter 856: Philosophy
Chapter 857: Collecting Them All
Chapter 858: Firmament-Blood Lightning-Origin
Chapter 859: Breakthrough of Will
Chapter 860: Transformations
Chapter 861: Joyflower Palace (1)
Chapter 862: Joyflower Palace (2)
Chapter 863: Coercion
Chapter 864: Countermeasures

Chapter 865: Getting the Tiger and the Wolf to Kill Each Other

Chapter 866: Concealing Malice
Chapter 867: Joining the Joyflower Palace
Chapter 868: Slaves
Chapter 869: Hunting for Treasure
Chapter 870: Eight Legacy Medallions
Chapter 871: Treasure Storehouse
Chapter 872: A Mouse in the Granary
Chapter 873: Unraveling the Warding Magic
Chapter 874: Secrets of the Storehouse
Chapter 875: Three-Headed God-Origin Grass
Chapter 876: A Billion Spell Formations
Chapter 877: God-King's Tear
Chapter 878: The Exquisite Desert
Chapter 879: Another Danger Zone
Chapter 880: A Mysterious Consort
Chapter 881: Putting More Pawns in Place
Chapter 882: The Cathedral is Found
Chapter 883: The Beautiful Zilin
Chapter 884: A Piece of Godhood
Chapter 885: Fighting Over the Altar
Chapter 886: Seizing the Moment

Chapter 887: Feinting to the East, Attacking from the West

Chapter 888: A Needle and Jade
Chapter 889: Godhood in Hand
Chapter 890: Taking God Formations
Chapter 891: The Empress Returns
Chapter 892: Summons from a Flower Goddess
Chapter 893: Sowing Dissension
Chapter 894: The Fury of the Flower Goddesses
Chapter 895: Butting Heads
Chapter 896: Split Second Decisions
Chapter 897: Toying With You
Chapter 898: Double-Dealing and Back-Stabbing
Chapter 899: Bestowing Magic
Chapter 900: Plotting Together
Chapter 901: Sectlord Cipher-Devil
Chapter 902: Sectlords
Chapter 903: Leaf Dao-Denier's Vicious Plan

Chapter 904: Secret-Ensconcing All-World Anything-Everything Fundamental-Law Magic

Chapter 905: Borrowed Power

Chapter 906: Heaven-God Hell-Exterminating Devil Embryo

Chapter 907: Cosmic Upheaval
Chapter 908: Cosmic Upheaval (2)
Chapter 909: Arrogance
Chapter 910: Hundredth Ranked Immortal World
Chapter 911: Joining Forces for a Big Fight
Chapter 912: Faceoff
Chapter 913: Profound Valor
Chapter 914: The Big Secret
Chapter 915: The Inheritors
Chapter 916: Profound Danger
Chapter 917: Assimilating Godhood
Chapter 918: Plotting Against the Empress
Chapter 919: Plotting Against the Empress (2)
Chapter 920: Plotting Against the Empress (3)
Chapter 921: Snitch
Chapter 922: Prelude to a Huge Battle
Chapter 923: Completely Horrifying
Chapter 924: Extracting Blood
Chapter 925: Godhood Stars
Chapter 926: Relying on Oneself
Chapter 927: Terrifying Will
Chapter 928: Another Seal
Chapter 929: People from the Primeval Age
Chapter 930: Profound House of Battle Energy

Chapter 931: Immortal House of Supreme Preeminence

Chapter 932: Complete Defeat

Chapter 933: Another Increase in Destiny

Chapter 934: Another Fight with Profound Valor

Chapter 935: A Successful Sneak Attack
Chapter 936: Another Inheritor
Chapter 937: Sword Dao of Life
Chapter 938: Killing. Saving.
Chapter 939: Thralls
Chapter 940: The Will of the Great Necropolis
Chapter 941: Another Glimpse of Godhood
Chapter 942: Superpower Sects
Chapter 943: Capturing Super-Experts
Chapter 944: The Cave Temple
Chapter 945: Seed of Truth
Chapter 946: Will Manifestation Heaven Sect
Chapter 947: Joining the Sect
Chapter 948: Joining the Sect (2)
Chapter 949: Joining the Sect (3)

Chapter 950: The Executors of the Ancient Road

Chapter 951: Memory Peak
Chapter 952: A Huge Collection of Godhood?
Chapter 953: Land of God Extermination
Chapter 954: Chief Disciples
Chapter 955: Round after Round of Fighting

Chapter 956: Round after Round of Fighting (2)

Chapter 957: Emperor Heart-Celestial
Chapter 958: Two Luminaries Clash
Chapter 959: Crossing the Blood River
Chapter 960: Blood-Colored Fog
Chapter 961: Exploring the Temple
Chapter 962: Fiend-Devil Assembly
Chapter 963: The Hell of Sages and Mahatmas
Chapter 964: The Sealing Mark Transforms

Chapter 965: True-Devil Unspoiled-by-Myriad-Kalpas-and-Tribulations Body

Chapter 966: A Tribulation per Character
Chapter 967: Working with the Seal
Chapter 968: Working with the Seal (2)
Chapter 969: Mutual Scheming
Chapter 970: Taking the Sheepskin Scroll
Chapter 971: Complete Victory
Chapter 972: Perfectly Matched
Chapter 973: One Word to Reach the Heart
Chapter 974: Enemies Approach
Chapter 975: Enemies Arrive

Chapter 976: Extremely Aggressive and Arrogant

Chapter 977: Junior Superintendent from the Ancient Road

Chapter 978: Savior of the Sect
Chapter 979: Savior of the Sect (2)
Chapter 980: Savior of the Sect (3)
Chapter 981: Savior of the Sect (4)

Chapter 982: Wretch God Ultimate's Obsidian Flame

Chapter 983: Defeating the Junior Superintendent

Chapter 984: Defeating the Junior Superintendent (2)

Chapter 985: A Shameless Ambush

Chapter 986: No Way Out

Chapter 987: The Depths of the Great Necropolis

Chapter 988: The Executors' Lair
Chapter 989: Trying Everything
Chapter 990: Trying Everything (2)
Chapter 991: Locked Up in Heaven Penitentiary
Chapter 992: Wretch God Apostle
Chapter 993: In the Prison
Chapter 994: Mahatma Jade

Chapter 995: A Dragon Trapped in a Shallow Pool of Water

Chapter 996: The Exalted Immortal-Slayer

Chapter 997: Plotting Against the Wretch God Apostle

Chapter 998: Plotting Against the Wretch God Apostle (2)

Chapter 999: The Immortal-Slaying Clone Reaches the Terrifying Level

Chapter 1000: Incredibly Domineering
Chapter 1001: Subduing the Wretch God Apostle
Chapter 1002: The Experts in the Prison
Chapter 1003: One Psychic Slave After Another
Chapter 1004: Treasure Storehouse
Chapter 1005: Super-Powered Thug
Chapter 1006: Junior Sectlord
Chapter 1007: Paying Respects
Chapter 1008: Destroying Joyflower Palace (1)
Chapter 1009: Destroying Joyflower Palace (2)

Chapter 1010: An Encounter with a Powerful Expert

Chapter 1011: Retaking the Dao Defense League
Chapter 1012: The Hell of Sages and Mahatmas
Chapter 1013: An Expert from a Buddhist Sect
Chapter 1014: Fiend-Devil Assembly
Chapter 1015: The Capital City
Chapter 1016: The Shepherd
Chapter 1017: Proud World
Chapter 1018: Jade Medallion
Chapter 1019: Buddha Goes to a Strange World
Chapter 1020: Receiving Blessings
Chapter 1021: Study and Research
Chapter 1022: Study and Research (2)
Chapter 1023: Study and Research (3)
Chapter 1024: Study and Research (4)
Chapter 1025: Assembly of Sects
Chapter 1026: Unconvinced
Chapter 1027: Shi Yuan
Chapter 1028: You Wouldn't Dare!
Chapter 1029: Too Much To Take In
Chapter 1030: A Profoundly Treacherous Woman

Chapter 1031: The Sovereign Lord's Holy and Far-Reaching Consummate Omnicurse

Chapter 1032: Eradicating an Inheritor
Chapter 1033: Superpower Assembly
Chapter 1034: Superpower Assembly (2)
Chapter 1035: The Amazing Purrling
Chapter 1036: Bubbles Unrivaled

Chapter 1037: An Invitation from the Junior Pontiff

Chapter 1038: Swords Drawn and Arrows Nocked
Chapter 1039: Calm and Unruffled
Chapter 1040: Shattering the Enemy Ranks
Chapter 1041: Bowling Over the Heroes
Chapter 1042: Bowling Over the Heroes (2)
Chapter 1043: Great Necropolis Savages
Chapter 1044: The Archmonk Appears Again
Chapter 1045: Luminaries Abound

Chapter 1046: Star Swordlife Makes Another Appearance

Chapter 1047: The Flower-Seizing Marauder
Chapter 1048: One Versus Two
Chapter 1049: Obsessed

Chapter 1050: Fighting the Flower-Seizing Marauder

Chapter 1051: Heating Alcohol
Chapter 1052: Heating Alcohol (2)
Chapter 1053: Heating Alcohol (3)
Chapter 1054: Deer Cauldron
Chapter 1055: An Uninvited Guest
Chapter 1056: The House of God Bastards
Chapter 1057: A Private Discussion
Chapter 1058: Help
Chapter 1059: Help (2)
Chapter 1060: Help (3)
Chapter 1061: Great Necropolis Bubble
Chapter 1062: It Actually Worked?
Chapter 1063: Mu Yexi
Chapter 1064: All Sorts of Preparations
Chapter 1065: Eighteen Godpower Seeds
Chapter 1066: Inescapable Bubbles
Chapter 1067: Plans and Plots
Chapter 1068: Grabbing from a Distance
Chapter 1069: Name Your Price
Chapter 1070: Dealing with the Seeds
Chapter 1071: The Terrifying Level
Chapter 1072: The Assembly Begins
Chapter 1073: Heroes Contend for Dominance

Chapter 1074: Heroes Contend for Dominance (2)

Chapter 1075: Heroes Contend for Dominance (3)

Chapter 1076: Heroes Converge
Chapter 1077: A Mysterious Expert
Chapter 1078: A Mysterious Expert (2)
Chapter 1079: The Mammoth King's God Whip
Chapter 1080: Bastard Seacliff Shows Up
Chapter 1081: Bashing Bastard Seacliff
Chapter 1082: Beaten to Death
Chapter 1083: Houselord God Bastard
Chapter 1084: Everything in Chaos
Chapter 1085: Receiving the Blessing
Chapter 1086: Redirection
Chapter 1087: One Stroke
Chapter 1088: I Run This Alliance

Chapter 1089: The Initial Structure of the Sect

Chapter 1090: Proud Heaven's Son

Chapter 1091: Join Forces to Kill Proud Heaven?

Chapter 1092: The Last of King Immortal-Slayer's Legacy Medallions

Chapter 1093: Other Magics
Chapter 1094: Making a Backward Thrust
Chapter 1095: Cleaning House

Chapter 1096: Begging for Mercy is also Useless

Chapter 1097: The Book of Genesis
Chapter 1098: Plundering the Storehouses
Chapter 1099: Plundering the Storehouses (2)
Chapter 1100: Plundering the Storehouses (3)

Chapter 1101: Heavenly Workings Calculations Systems

Chapter 1102: Immense Benefits
Chapter 1103: Dramatic Growth
Chapter 1104: Astonishment
Chapter 1105: Great Necropolis Essence
Chapter 1106: King of Assassins
Chapter 1107: The Ultimate Conspiracy
Chapter 1108: Proud Heaven is Finally Here
Chapter 1109: Coffins
Chapter 1110: Secrets
Chapter 1111: Illusion
Chapter 1112: Breaking Open a Coffin
Chapter 1113: Burial
Chapter 1114: The Coffin
Chapter 1115: Assimilating the Face
Chapter 1116: Mysterious Mask
Chapter 1117: Seeing Through
Chapter 1118: Three Combined
Chapter 1119: A Critical Juncture
Chapter 1120: Twisted Words and Forced Logic

Chapter 1121: Using Swords to Assimilate Treasures

Chapter 1122: Proud Heaven Arrives
Chapter 1123: Talking About Cooperation
Chapter 1124: Fighting Proud Heaven
Chapter 1125: Ten Universes
Chapter 1126: God Body
Chapter 1127: Life or Death Decision
Chapter 1128: Combination of Two Seals
Chapter 1129: Sage Monarch Grand Magic
Chapter 1130: A Mighty Will

Chapter 1131: Dramatic Upheavals in Heaven and Earth

Chapter 1132: Unifying the Dao of Immortals
Chapter 1133: Chasing Proud Heaven
Chapter 1134: The Third Seal
Chapter 1135: Nine Magisters, Dead
Chapter 1136: Ending One
Chapter 1137: Escape
Chapter 1138: Harmonious God Legion Seals
Chapter 1139: Destroying the Executors
Chapter 1140: Advancing to the God World
Chapter 1141: Leaving for the God World
Chapter 1142: Fighting for Survival
Chapter 1143: Fighting for Survival (2)
Chapter 1144: Night in the God World
Chapter 1145: Rain in the God World
Chapter 1146: Pirate Ship
Chapter 1147: Peak Terrifying Expert
Chapter 1148: Breakthrough
Chapter 1149: Godnotes
Chapter 1150: Young Woman from a Major Clan
Chapter 1151: Wang Clan
Chapter 1152: Godhood Rating
Chapter 1153: Godsieve Pills
Chapter 1154: Banquet
Chapter 1155: Proud Radiance
Chapter 1156: House of God Ordainment
Chapter 1157: Wretch-God Sneak Attack
Chapter 1158: Nighttime Attack
Chapter 1159: Wretch-God Believers

Chapter 1160: Experts from the Hell-Breaking Church

Chapter 1161: Altar Destruction

Chapter 1162: Blood Infant

Chapter 1163: A Chat with King Immortal-Slayer

Chapter 1164: Flying over the Ocean
Chapter 1165: Chaotic Weather
Chapter 1166: Bloodgore Trials
Chapter 1167: Forging Godnotes
Chapter 1168: Primeval Pavilion
Chapter 1169: Godsand

Chapter 1170: Ten Directions God Convergence Flags

Chapter 1171: Consummate God Tree
Chapter 1172: The Trial Begins
Chapter 1173: Brutal Fighting
Chapter 1174: All Kinds of Characters
Chapter 1175: Encountering an Expert

Chapter 1176: Not Even Godly Ascension will Help

Chapter 1177: Killing a God
Chapter 1178: Official Disciples
Chapter 1179: Mysterious Mine
Chapter 1180: Administration
Chapter 1181: Local Thugs
Chapter 1182: Purging the Degenerates
Chapter 1183: Seizing Control
Chapter 1184: Assimilating the Mahatma Jade
Chapter 1185: Secrets of the Mine
Chapter 1186: Secrets of the Mine (2)
Chapter 1187: Demonling Invasion
Chapter 1188: Demonling Invasion (2)
Chapter 1189: Demonling Invasion (3)
Chapter 1190: Elder Brother Yue
Chapter 1191: Demonlings
Chapter 1192: Demonlings (2)
Chapter 1193: Demon-Gods
Chapter 1194: Snake, Monkey
Chapter 1195: Envoys from the Sect (1)
Chapter 1196: Envoys from the Sect (2)
Chapter 1197: Envoys from the Sect (3)
Chapter 1198: Merit Points
Chapter 1199: Scripture Pavilion
Chapter 1200: Personal Records
Chapter 1201: Monarch Godhood
Chapter 1202: Still Alive
Chapter 1203: A Visit from the Demonfolk
Chapter 1204: Demon Master
Chapter 1205: Psychic Devil-Raising
Chapter 1206: Split Psyche
Chapter 1207: Defeating Oneself

Chapter 1208: Paramount Before Godly Ascension

Chapter 1209: Returning to the Sect
Chapter 1210: Returning to the Sect (2)
Chapter 1211: Taking a Mission
Chapter 1212: Junior Houselord
Chapter 1213: Ruins of the Pill-King God
Chapter 1214: Exploring the Ruins
Chapter 1215: Expert in a Medicinal Pill
Chapter 1216: Chaos-Cavern Grand-Magnate Pill

Chapter 1217: Extremely Shoddy Fighting Experience

Chapter 1218: Chaos-Forge God-Shrine
Chapter 1219: Scholar's Corpse
Chapter 1220: Squeezing
Chapter 1221: That Person's Plot
Chapter 1222: Reunion
Chapter 1223: The Dragon Society
Chapter 1224: Tit for Tat
Chapter 1225: A Big Con
Chapter 1226: One Step Away
Chapter 1227: Killing Intent
Chapter 1228: White-Haired Young Man
Chapter 1229: Eternal-Life God-Dynasty
Chapter 1230: Testing Each Other Out

Chapter 1231: What a Greater God is Capable of

Chapter 1232: Borrowing Nourishment
Chapter 1233: Monarch Godhood Breakthrough
Chapter 1234: A Monarch Appears
Chapter 1235: A New Beginning
Chapter 1236: Treasures Hidden in Pillars
Chapter 1237: King of Specters
Chapter 1238: Promotion to Elite
Chapter 1239: Jadefall Appears
Chapter 1240: An Equal to the Purrling?
Chapter 1241: Exalted Celestial Silver-Dagger
Chapter 1242: Consummate Toxic Devils

Chapter 1243: Taking the Law Enforcement Disciple Test

Chapter 1244: Easy
Chapter 1245: Another Crown Prince Society
Chapter 1246: Making Things Difficult
Chapter 1247: Harvesting Mission

Chapter 1248: The Fate of Crimson-Maiden Inferno

Chapter 1249: Mental Probing
Chapter 1250: Spritefruit
Chapter 1251: Subjugating Gods

Chapter 1252: Joining the Crown Prince Society

Chapter 1253: Scheming for the Jade

Chapter 1254: Flower of Time

Chapter 1255: Taking Control of the Playing Field

Chapter 1256: Patriarch from the Dao of Devils

Chapter 1257: Patriarch from the Dao of Devils (2)

Chapter 1258: Reincarnation God Item

Chapter 1259: One Crown Prince Versus the Other?

Chapter 1260: How Could This Be Happening?
Chapter 1261: Dragon Floret
Chapter 1262: Dragon Floret (2)

Chapter 1263: Unable to Withstand a Single Blow

Chapter 1264: A Higher State of Invincibility

Chapter 1265: A Higher State of Invincibility (2)

Chapter 1266: Secret Reserve Power
Chapter 1267: Striking Dragon Floret
Chapter 1268: Complete Devastation
Chapter 1269: Complete Devastation (2)
Chapter 1270: Shaking the Upper Echelons
Chapter 1271: Fallen

Chapter 1272: King Immortal-Slayer and the Purrling

Chapter 1273: King Immortal-Slayer and the Purrling (2)

Chapter 1274: A Paramount God Arrives
Chapter 1275: A Paramount God Arrives (2)
Chapter 1276: The Lord of the True Void
Chapter 1277: A Sinister Plan
Chapter 1278: Emissary from the God-Dynasty
Chapter 1279: God-King Ruthless
Chapter 1280: Nation-Fate God Pill
Chapter 1281: Successful Transformation
Chapter 1282: Who's the Pawn Now?
Chapter 1283: Heading into the Dynasty
Chapter 1284: Supreme Concubine
Chapter 1285: The Eunuch
Chapter 1286: Nie Yinyang
Chapter 1287: Taking the Jade
Chapter 1288: Taking the Jade (2)
Chapter 1289: Almost Unbounded

Chapter 1290: The House of God Ordainment's Treasure Storehouse

Chapter 1291: Buddhist, Daoist, Confucian. Three God Pills

Chapter 1292: Consummate Godhood
Chapter 1293: Irrefutable Evidence
Chapter 1294: Head Held High
Chapter 1295: Nacrelight Sageland
Chapter 1296: What Reward?
Chapter 1297: Stamens
Chapter 1298: Essence of Time
Chapter 1299: Land of the Fallen Wretch God
Chapter 1300: Wasteland Bazaar
Chapter 1301: Devils and Wretches
Chapter 1302: Fifteen Hegemons
Chapter 1303: Come At Me, All Of You!
Chapter 1304: Wretched Brain God Art
Chapter 1305: Foundation Complete
Chapter 1306: An Expert Shows Up
Chapter 1307: Confucian Scholar
Chapter 1308: Summer Vastcold
Chapter 1309: Limitless Wealth
Chapter 1310: Evading Notice
Chapter 1311: High Priestess
Chapter 1312: Complicated Circumstances
Chapter 1313: Destined Marriage God Temple
Chapter 1314: History
Chapter 1315: Master Plan
Chapter 1316: Everything Going Smoothly
Chapter 1317: Concocting the Pill
Chapter 1318: Concocting the Pill (2)
Chapter 1319: Surging Killing Intent
Chapter 1320: Stealing another Piece

Chapter 1321: Cruiser of Civilization, Completed

Chapter 1322: Cruiser of Civilization, Completed (2)

Chapter 1323: Seizing Victory Within Chaos
Chapter 1324: Unbounded Will
Chapter 1325: Ruthless Vengeance
Chapter 1326: Ruthless Vengeance (2)
Chapter 1327: Bleeding Them Dry
Chapter 1328: Planting Moles
Chapter 1329: Transforming Subordinates
Chapter 1330: Battle Armlets
Chapter 1331: Bringing an Army
Chapter 1332: Big Trial
Chapter 1333: Playing Games
Chapter 1334: Completely Arrogant
Chapter 1335: Reserve Power Activated
Chapter 1336: Taking the Commander's Tally

Chapter 1337: The Houselord Acknowledges Allegiance

Chapter 1338: The Crown Prince's True Self

Chapter 1339: The Crown Prince's True Self (2)

Chapter 1340: The Crown Prince's True Self (3)

Chapter 1341: Martial-God Soldier-Kings

Chapter 1342: Plotting against Eternal Millennium

Chapter 1343: Ocean Travel
Chapter 1344: Ocean Travel (2)
Chapter 1345: Deva Dynasty
Chapter 1346: A Big Haul
Chapter 1347: Full Probing
Chapter 1348: Profundities of the Baptism
Chapter 1349: Profundities of the Baptism (2)
Chapter 1350: Profundities of the Baptism (3)
Chapter 1351: Putting Things Aside Secretly
Chapter 1352: Purchasing the Mahatma Jade
Chapter 1353: Pursued by Paramount Gods
Chapter 1354: Pursued by Paramount Gods (2)
Chapter 1355: Five Unbounded Experts
Chapter 1356: Second Devil General
Chapter 1357: Inflicting Fear
Chapter 1358: Destiny like a Furnace
Chapter 1359: Attack from the Dao of Devils
Chapter 1360: Subjugating Them All
Chapter 1361: Princess Charming

Chapter 1362: Nine Dragons Court, Sumeru Temple

Chapter 1363: Bastille of the One God
Chapter 1364: Bastille of the One God (2)
Chapter 1365: Starting Operations
Chapter 1366: Sage Monarch Magistrates
Chapter 1367: Sage Monarch Magistrates (2)

Chapter 1368: The End of the Line for the Crown Prince

Chapter 1369: The End of the Line for the Crown Prince (2)

Chapter 1370: Tribulation Monarch Cannon
Chapter 1371: Tribulation Monarch Cannon (2)
Chapter 1372: A Month Delay

Chapter 1373: The Trump Cards of the Dragons and Buddhists

Chapter 1374: Spacetitans

Chapter 1375: More Than a Thousand Magistrates

Chapter 1376: Bathed in Sagelight
Chapter 1377: Incredible Upgrade
Chapter 1378: Three Experts

Chapter 1379: Feinting to the East and Attacking in the West

Chapter 1380: Crushing Down
Chapter 1381: They All Kneel
Chapter 1382: Major Success
Chapter 1383: Breakthroughs for the Brethren
Chapter 1384: A Plot to Seize the Throne
Chapter 1385: A Plot to Seize the Throne (2)
Chapter 1386: The Throne, Seized
Chapter 1387: Unification Begins
Chapter 1388: Very Dangerous People
Chapter 1389: Mid Paramount God Level
Chapter 1390: Army of Radiance and Light
Chapter 1391: Army of Radiance and Light (2)
Chapter 1392: Devil General of Antiquity
Chapter 1393: Unrivaled Devil Might
Chapter 1394: The Real Second Devil General
Chapter 1395: Unravel the Sealing Mark?
Chapter 1396: Giving a Devil a Ride
Chapter 1397: Giving a Devil a Ride (2)
Chapter 1398: Dugu Clan
Chapter 1399: Perfect Return
Chapter 1400: Perfect Return (2)
Chapter 1401: A Tough Nut to Crack

Chapter 1402: The Plan to Destroy the God World

Chapter 1403: Speeding up the Subjugation
Chapter 1404: Capturing Patriarch Deva
Chapter 1405: Capturing Patriarch Deva (2)
Chapter 1406: Dragon Lair
Chapter 1407: Dragonization
Chapter 1408: Buddha First-King
Chapter 1409: Dragonpearls
Chapter 1410: Seven Stances of Creation
Chapter 1411: Getting them Under Control
Chapter 1412: Shocking Self-Detonation
Chapter 1413: Extreme Climax of Danger
Chapter 1414: Yang Susu's Whereabouts
Chapter 1415: Mass Migration
Chapter 1416: The Dragonswarm Society Attacks
Chapter 1417: Rating of a Billion?
Chapter 1418: Bluffing
Chapter 1419: Archangels
Chapter 1420: Ancient Halls of Heaven
Chapter 1421: Major Counter Attack
Chapter 1422: Slaughtering Buddha Thunderjolt

Chapter 1423: Explosive Increase in Cultivation Base

Chapter 1424: Reaching an Agreement
Chapter 1425: Everyone Scheming
Chapter 1426: Breaking Free
Chapter 1427: A Temporary Alliance

Chapter 1428: Heading to the House of the Invincible

Chapter 1429: Heading to the House of the Invincible (2)

Chapter 1430: Net of Law
Chapter 1431: Infiltration
Chapter 1432: Seizing Destiny
Chapter 1433: Chief of Police
Chapter 1434: Viceroy of Ten Lands
Chapter 1435: Business Headquarters
Chapter 1436: Trapping Turtles in a Jar
Chapter 1437: Trapping Turtles in a Jar (2)
Chapter 1438: Peak Battle Prowess
Chapter 1439: The Blade Misses
Chapter 1440: Destiny Valuation
Chapter 1441: Karmic Retribution
Chapter 1442: Taking Office as a Viceroy
Chapter 1443: Shaking the Upper Echelons
Chapter 1444: Shaking the Upper Echelons (2)
Chapter 1445: Earning Favor
Chapter 1446: Earning Favor (2)
Chapter 1447: Dragon Compendium
Chapter 1448: Third Devil General
Chapter 1449: Hired Labor
Chapter 1450: Wanton Plundering
Chapter 1451: Massive Kingdom
Chapter 1452: Juicy Morsel
Chapter 1453: Gobbling a Juicy Morsel
Chapter 1454: Gobbling a Juicy Morsel (2)
Chapter 1455: No. No Destiny for You
Chapter 1456: Proud Mindtravel
Chapter 1457: Proud Heaven's Whereabouts
Chapter 1458: The Dao of Righteous Justice
Chapter 1459: Reaching the Peak
Chapter 1460: Sage Monarch Dragon Kingdom
Chapter 1461: Sudden Hostility

Chapter 1462: King of Godmammoths' Sealing Mark

Chapter 1463: Most Powerful Genes
Chapter 1464: Expert Interlopers
Chapter 1465: Dugu Yunkong
Chapter 1466: Clearing the Haze

Chapter 1467: The Head of King Heaven-Devourer

Chapter 1468: Entering the Belly of the Devourer

Chapter 1469: Secretly Carrying out the Plan
Chapter 1470: Yang Clan Devil General
Chapter 1471: Invincible Gold Pill
Chapter 1472: A Critical Moment
Chapter 1473: Numerous Benefits
Chapter 1474: Third Devil General
Chapter 1475: Intense Fighting
Chapter 1476: Taking Control of the Lair
Chapter 1477: Reconstructing the Dragon Lair

Chapter 1478: Reconstructing the Dragon Lair (2)

Chapter 1479: Internal Restructuring
Chapter 1480: Delegations Come
Chapter 1481: Twenty-Eight Potentates
Chapter 1482: Sinister Negotiations
Chapter 1483: Planned All Along
Chapter 1484: Who Won't Submit?!
Chapter 1485: No Other Choice
Chapter 1486: Rapid Development
Chapter 1487: Psychic Scale of Twenty Billion

Chapter 1488: Returning to the House of the Invincible

Chapter 1489: One of the Spritefolk
Chapter 1490: I'm the Successor
Chapter 1491: Finally Reuniting

Chapter 1492: Divine Authority and Royal Authority

Chapter 1493: Striking Back
Chapter 1494: Two Courses of Action
Chapter 1495: Proud Heaven?!?!
Chapter 1496: Thwarting the Plot
Chapter 1497: The Lurking Oriole

Chapter 1498: Grand Sage Monarch Spritefolk Empire

Chapter 1499: A String of Subjugations
Chapter 1500: Secrets of the Confucians
Chapter 1501: Heading to the Army
Chapter 1502: Over a Thousand Marshals
Chapter 1503: Purification Thorn
Chapter 1504: Shadow Emperor

Chapter 1505: Making a Fool of Yourself in Trying to be Clever

Chapter 1506: Bad Luck for the Leaders

Chapter 1507: Everlasting Aegis

Chapter 1508: The Highest Point of the God World

Chapter 1509: Consummate Treasure Trove
Chapter 1510: Lord of the Sword Dao
Chapter 1511: Bitter Fighting
Chapter 1512: One Sword to Destroy a Nation
Chapter 1513: Top Skills

Chapter 1514: The Purrling Fights the Sword Lord

Chapter 1515: Subjugating the Sword Lord
Chapter 1516: Deadly Tribulation
Chapter 1517: Taking the Pills

Chapter 1518: First Energy Primordial Chaos Pill

Chapter 1519: Fourth Empire
Chapter 1520: Sea of Faith
Chapter 1521: Passageway to the Impure Lands
Chapter 1522: A Massively Shocking Event
Chapter 1523: Strong Reaction
Chapter 1524: Alliance of Three Dynasties
Chapter 1525: Yang Voidprime
Chapter 1526: Hailan
Chapter 1527: Sowing Chaos
Chapter 1528: Proud Central
Chapter 1529: Looking Down from Above
Chapter 1530: A Sudden Development
Chapter 1531: One Step Behind

Chapter 1532: A Psychic Scale of Three Hundred Billion

Chapter 1533: The War Begins
Chapter 1534: It's Here
Chapter 1535: Striking Before the War Starts
Chapter 1536: Army Pressure
Chapter 1537: War, the Empire is Everlasting
Chapter 1538: Fighting Before the Army
Chapter 1539: Besieged
Chapter 1540: Holding the Line
Chapter 1541: Fateless Seal
Chapter 1542: Everything on the Line
Chapter 1543: Everything on the Line (2)
Chapter 1544: The Saddest of Dirges
Chapter 1545: All Citizens Ordained
Chapter 1546: Both Sides Rest and Recuperate
Chapter 1547: Internal Conflict
Chapter 1548: Devouring Proud Central
Chapter 1549: Conquering the Buddhist Empire
Chapter 1550: The Confucians Join
Chapter 1551: No Immediate Ordainment
Chapter 1552: Important Debates
Chapter 1553: Convincing People with Virtue
Chapter 1554: Connecting the Ancient Road
Chapter 1555: Essence of the God World
Chapter 1556: Everyone Ascends
Chapter 1557: Faith of an Empire

Chapter 1558: Proud Heaven versus the High Priestess

Chapter 1559: Rising to the Challenge
Chapter 1560: The Might of Proud Heaven
Chapter 1561: Half-Annulled
Chapter 1562: Devouring the Halls of Heaven
Chapter 1563: Meeting Master
Chapter 1564: Rescuing Master
Chapter 1565: Rescuing Master (2)
Chapter 1566: You Be the Emperor
Chapter 1567: Locking Down
Chapter 1568: Ten Days Later
Chapter 1569: Foundation
Chapter 1570: Demonfolk Empire

Chapter 1571: The King of Godmammoths and the Demon Master

Chapter 1572: Another Tripartite Balance of Power

Chapter 1573: The Fallen Wretch God
Chapter 1574: The Wretch God's Plot
Chapter 1575: Making the God Legion Seal?

Chapter 1576: Mass-Producing God Legion Seals?

Chapter 1577: Becoming Half-Annulled
Chapter 1578: Domination
Chapter 1579: The Cool Eye of the Bystander

Chapter 1580: The Cool Eye of the Bystander (2)

Chapter 1581: Intense Infighting
Chapter 1582: Breakthrough for Yang Voidprime
Chapter 1583: Yang Qi Makes a Move
Chapter 1584: Yang Qi Makes a Move (2)
Chapter 1585: Hoodwinking Yang Voidprime
Chapter 1586: Viciously Crushing Hailan
Chapter 1587: Viciously Crushing Hailan (2)
Chapter 1588: Viciously Crushing Hailan (3)
Chapter 1589: Soul of the Ancestor God
Chapter 1590: A New Age Begins!
Chapter 1591: Complete Fateless One
Chapter 1592: Complete Fateless One (2)
Chapter 1593: Increased Prestige
Chapter 1594: Essence in Human Form
Chapter 1595: Essence in Human Form (2)
Chapter 1596: The Debut of Greensura
Chapter 1597: A Discussion with ‘Mother'
Chapter 1598: The Perfect Plan of Cooperation
Chapter 1599: Let the War Begin!
Chapter 1600: The Grand Finale
Chapter 1601: It Ends